The Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable
This is the repository for the Roundtable's previous reviews.
A weekly review of books, movies and TV that really stink!
For links to our previous reviews, visit us at The Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable.
As a drive-in mutant who doesn’t drive, a lot of bad movies are my fault. I’ve asked a cousin to see Hostel with me, and she spent thirty minutes behind the palms of her hands; told a friend that we “have to” rent (a heavily edited) Last House on the Left, because my dad made me promise never to see it. I’ve even begged my mother—my own mother!—to drive clear across town to the ultra-expensive multiplex for Cabin Fever. But when it comes to the worst mainstream movie we’ve seen all year, I can’t take all the blame.
“Tera!” my mom said in the car one day. “Donald Sutherland’s in a new scary movie!”
And I said, “Nunh-unh!”
“Really. It’s called An American Haunting. And it looks really good.”
Donald Sutherland in a new scary movie. After chasing down little girls in red coats and solving The Rosary Murders—not to mention fathering the creepiest guy in Hollywood—the senior Sutherland could surely scare the crap out of me again. Especially with Sissy Spacek involved. (Remember when she went on that killing spree with Martin Sheen in Badlands? And anyone who tells you that Carrie isn’t scary is a fool).
On opening weekend, I inform Mom that there’s a 1:30 show, and that we’ll be there. I pay six dollars. And two hours later, I am extremely pissed off.
An American Haunting, as its trailer tells us, is based on “the only recorded case in history where a spirit caused the death of a human being.” It’s also not very scary, but compensates by being incredibly loud.
In the 1800s, landowner John Bell and his wife—Sutherland and Spacek, respectively— have a beautiful daughter named Betsy. The Bells live out in the wilderness, so there are lots of wolves (ROAAR!!!!) and John shoots them (BANG!! BANG!!), But he still has time to cheat the neighborhood witch out of a ton of money, and the church, which he’s helped build, decides in his favor.
The witch is not pleased.
Soon, weird things start happening to John and Betsy. He gets sicker and sicker; she gets pulled upstairs by her hair (THUMP!! THUMP!! THUMP!!), thrown into walls (THWACK!! THWACK!!), and dragged around her room until she scratches up the wooden floor with her fingernails (SCREE!! SCREE!!). By the time she starts flopping on her bed and the doctor thinks she’s having seizures, I have to wonder: Why have we remade The Exorcist twice in the past nine months?
But fifth-generation plot points aren’t enough to make a movie bad. An American Haunting is mostly what Bart and Lisa Simpson would call “meh”—it treads water for 90 minutes, doing nothing well but avoiding Trumpet-worthy awfulness.
And then it ends.
The end of An American Haunting is impossible to spoil, because it has nothing to do with the movie. The filmmakers didn’t even shoot it; they just splashed some words on the screen and expected us to read them. Apparently, Betsy created the ghost herself to protect herself from her father. Why on earth would Betsy need, even subconsciously, to be protected from this guy? I have no idea, but here’s my completely evidenceless theory: He was molesting her. Obviously, an upstanding citizen—who works for the church! double points!—sexually assaults children.
So, what’s your theory? Why would a 10-to-12-year-old girl hate her dad enough to create a psychic disturbance? Don’t worry if you haven’t seen the movie: you know just as much about John Bell’s dark side as the rest of us. Go wild. (Bonus points for involving the Terminator). Fly, my beauties! Fly!
For links to our previous reviews, visit us at The Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable.
*Thanks, Pooper!
Our friend Miss Keeks scoffs at simpering and tears apart City of Light, a historical novel set in her hometown, by Lauren Belfer.
Grover Cleveland a rapist? How could he find his feet, much less his, well you know...
Wait a minute. I got him mixed up with the president in the bathtub.
Never mind.
Anyhoo, run over and give Keeks a shout!
Be A Gasbag!
If you're interested in joining our Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable review team, you can find the rules and sign up here!
For links to our previous reviews, visit us at The Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable.
I'd rather eat paint.
Janet and CharlotteBe A Gasbag!
If you're interested in joining our Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable review team, you can find the rules and sign up here!
For links to our previous reviews, visit us at The Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable.
Our friend Nightmare made it through a viewing of the chick-flick Uptown Girls with his eyeballs still intact. I think it turned his brain though--because he has a few ideas on how to improve the movie.
I, on the other hand, think the only thing that could improve it is a can of gasoline and fistful of matches.
Starring Brittany Murphy (don't get the casting there!) and Dakota Fanning (so annoying I was hoping the aliens would hurry up and eat her just to shut her up in War of the Worlds!), you can read Nightmare's man-friendly review here on his blog.
Be A Gasbag!
If you're interested in joining our Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable review team, you can find the rules and sign up here!
Here are links to our previous Gasbag Reviews:
Admiral Pooper's review of The MacGregor Brides
Rhonda's review of Artificial Intelligence
One Ear's review of What To Expect When You're Expecting
St. Jude's review of Tall Poppies
Miss Meg's review of The Truth About Diamonds
Sven's review of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
This week, our friend Sven not only kills a sacred cow, but he serves it up spitted, roasted and covered in BBQ sauce!
Come over here and read his hilariously incisive review of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, by J.K. Rowling.
Be A Gasbag!
If you're interested in joining our Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable review team, you can find the rules and sign up here!This week, our lovely Meg, The Compulsive Liar, gives us a review of the crapfest also known as The Truth About Diamonds, by the spectacularly untalented Nicole Richie.
Be A Gasbag!
If you're interested in joining our Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable review team, you can find the rules and sign up here!
Grab a bottle of bean-o and pull up a keyboard, it’s time for the first installment of . . .
It's time for the Sunday Trumpet!
The ever-fabulous Rhonda stepped up to the plate and agreed to write our very first Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable review!
If ever there was an expensive, high-tech, and craptastic waste of three hours, I think we could definitely put Artificial Intelligence in the top 10.
You can catch Rhonda's review on her blog: Rhonda's Ruminations .
If you're interested in joining our Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable review team, you can find the rules and sign up here!
Anyone can join, as long as they follow the rules (or else it would be anarchy, I tell you! Anarchy!)
The Rules:
1. Sign up in the comments section on this entry.
2. Everyone who signs up will be given a date (a Sunday) to supply a review. First come first served.
3. It has to be a review of a movie, a book or a television show you hated.
4. It has to be popular media---nothing really obscure, preferably within the last 5 years, exceptional exceptions accepted. ;-)
5. On Sundays, when the new review comes out, everyone on the list MUST write an entry on their own blogs with the logo (you can copy it from here) and a link to the reviewer's blog. You can write comments about what you thought of it, etc, on your entry if you choose.
Don't be shy! We'd love to have you join us!
So without further delay, I introduce our first official Sporadic Gasbag Roundtable review, courtesy of Mr. Charlie "I'm-not-too-macho-to-read-romance-novels" Callahan.
Roll Me Over, Royce, In My Rolls Royce, review of The MacGregor Brides by Nora Roberts.
As you all know by now, I approach every subject I write about with objectivity, integrity, and a sense of fair play—three characteristics that are, er, characteristic of me. Characteristically, then, and with no thought aforethought of being judgmental, I dove open-mindedly yesterday into the pages of Nora Roberts’ The MacGregor Brides.