HUMOR: This Season's Summer Blockbuster (long)

[Bettyc <Bettyc@flyinggoat.com>]

Since we've been discussing the next JP, I thought many of you would
find this funny
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>> The really big picture
>> Billion dollar summer pic to buoy
>> sinking studios

>> BY RANDOLPH HEARD

>> Hollywood studios have been
>> extremely nervous about the
>> overabundance of pricey blockbuster
>> films being released this summer.
>> According to the Wall Street Journal,
>> this summer's 12 biggest movies
>> together cost more than $1 billion to
>> produce. Inevitably, only a few of
>> these films will emerge as hits. The rest will flop, taking with
>> them the heads of various studio executives.

>> But there is a simple solution. The major studios should have
>> pooled their $100 million budgets, their A-list stars and their
>> high-concept story lines into a single, fail-safe BILLION
>> DOLLAR MOVIE -- and then divvied up the resulting
>> megaprofits. What family in America could resist going to see a
>> film featuring dinosaurs, aliens, multiple love stories, Peter
>> Fonda as a stoic Florida beekeeper, Batman and Robin, and a
>> feisty Sandra Bullock striving to save the Titanic from an
>> iceberg?

>> Here are a few of the most memorable scenes from what could
>> have been "The Really Big Picture."

>> The Boarding Sequence

>> "The Really Big Picture" opens with a bang -- the longest
>> one-take tracking shot in film history. We can only marvel as
>> Kate Winslet, Leonardo DiCaprio, Bill Paxton, Billy Zane,
>> Sandra Bullock, Jason Patric, Willem Dafoe, Tommy Lee
>> Jones, Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, Julianne Moore, Jodie
>> Foster, Matthew McConaughey, Julia Roberts, Cameron Diaz,
>> Harrison Ford, Glenn Close, Gary Oldman, John Cusak,
>> George Clooney, Chris O'Donnell, Alicia Silverstone, Arnold
>> Schwarzenegger, Uma Thurman, John Travolta, Peter Fonda,
>> Patrick Stewart and Mel Gibson take what feels like an
>> interminably long time to board the Titanic. They're all as
>> happy as clams because they don't know that they're going to
>> be ripped apart by velociraptors, bludgeoned on the head by
>> escaped convicts, abducted and experimented on by aliens and
>> drowned pathetically in the icy waters of the Atlantic.

>> On the other side of the Titanic, we see a group of convicts in
>> high-security cages -- Nicolas Cage, John Malkovich, Ving
>> Rhames and Steve Buscemi -- being secretly loaded onto the
>> ship. A jittery Buscemi hears a deep rumbling that sounds
>> peculiarly like a T-Rex trapped in some heavily reinforced hold
>> far below. No one else believes him. We know that they are
>> very, very wrong.

>> Best Poolside Scene

>> As in any Hollywood blockbuster, there are a few moments of
>> light-hearted fun before the hard-core action really kicks in.
>> After the midnight buffet, Uma Thurman, Alicia Silverstone,
>> Sandra Bullock, Kate Winslet, Cameron Diaz and Patrick
>> Stewart all get drunk out of their minds and impulsively go
>> skinny-dipping in the pool. What they don't realize is that Mel
>> Gibson, George Clooney, Bill Paxton, Gary Oldman and
>> Leonardo DiCaprio have decided to pull a prank on them by
>> stealing their discarded clothes and throwing them over the side
>> of the Titanic. Fortunately -- in a brilliant comedic moment --
>> Jodie Foster, Julia Roberts and an alien shaped like a T-Bone
>> steak are standing on a lower deck and manage to catch most
>> of the clothing before it hits the icy water.

>> Most Impressive Special Effects

>> In a big picture like this, it's hard to pick and choose what
>> wows the audience most. Is it when Will Smith and Tommy
>> Lee Jones -- the Men in Black -- pry open John Travolta's face
>> and discover that they were wrong in thinking there was a tiny
>> alien inside? Perhaps the most impressive and elaborately
>> choreographed sequence occurs when the velociraptors invade
>> the ship's storeroom. In an incredible display of the film's
>> devotion to historical detail, they greedily consume the 75,000
>> pounds of fresh meat, 35,000 fresh eggs, 40 tons of potatoes,
>> 1,000 bottles of wine and 15,000 bottles of ale and stout the
>> Titanic took with her on her maiden voyage. Batman and Robin
>> and Glenn Close's subsequent battle with a flock of drunken,
>> vomitacious velociraptors pales in comparison.

>> The Big Climax

>> Of course, all hell breaks loose at the end. Sandra Bullock is
>> bravely manning the helm, attempting to steer the vessel away
>> from an oncoming iceberg that Arnold Schwarzenegger, aka
>> Mr. Freeze, has vowed will destroy Nicolas Cage, who for
>> some reason he hates. The T-Rex is busily chomping on
>> computer-generated crowds of screaming passengers up by the
>> stern funnel.

>> The convicts, led by John Malkovich, have broken loose of
>> their holding cell and are in the luxurious ballroom battling
>> Harrison Ford, who plays the American president, and Jeff
>> Goldblum, who feels he should be doing something about the
>> T-Rex. Meanwhile, the aliens, tipped off by a psychic warning
>> from their mothership, are shoving past crowds of women and
>> children and leaping into the lifeboats. Despite the best efforts
>> of a couple dozen or so of our heroes, there is nothing that can
>> be done to save the Titanic from its doom.

>> The ship, along with a surprised-looking T-Rex, a live orchestra
>> and some of the most famous faces in Hollywood, disappears
>> into the icy, black waters. George Clooney is the last to go
>> when the Bat-dinghy springs a leak. The only survivor is Peter
>> Fonda, in an Oscar-worthy performance as a stoic Florida
>> beekeeper. The spitting image of his father as he impassively
>> watches the entire cast of "Con Air" get shredded by the
>> propellers, Peter realizes that his interest in bees is symbolic of
>> something and that he really should reconcile with his children.
>> A single tear trickles down his face. As the 45-minute-long
>> credit sequence starts to roll, we get a sinking feeling that the
>> dinosaurs, the aliens and the A-list stars will all be back -- in
>> next summer's trillion-dollar sequel.
>> June 18, 1997
-- 
           Betty Cunningham  
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