BARBIE (2023)

"You guys ever think about dying?"

Things seem to be pretty chill in Barbieland. If you are one of the more popular Barbies. Our hero, "Stereotypical Barbie" (Margot Robbie), is quite popular and every day is a happy-go-lucky series of events like playing volleyball at the beach, having a dance party in front of her dream home and a slumber party with a dozen of her closest girlfriends. She also might even spend a few seconds away from her important daily activities to acknowledge that her boyfriend "Beach Ken" (Ryan Gosling) is alive. All of that eternal bliss comes crashing down one evening when Barbie starts to have thoughts about death. Sweet lovely death.

BARBIE is a fantastic movie. I’ve seen it many times and every time I smile non-stop at Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling’s performances. Which, strangely enough, outside of the visual look of the film and cinematography are the only good things about BARBIE. It’s weird to be such a fan of the film and dislike nearly the entire cast, nearly all of the songs and the script, but it is what it is and I just accept it. Ryan Gosling’s facial expressions alone are worth watching the film.

I have a ton of thoughts about BARBIE, but honestly I’m way, way, way too depressed to be able to assemble them into any kind of readable order. I’ll probably update this review later on. For now though, if you have a soul, then just check it out. It’s super cute, full of thoughts about death and funny as fuck. Just like me.

And speaking of Dexter season 4, I would have much rather seen FBI Special Agent Frank Lundy marry Debra Morgan and they get a spin-off show where they’re a wife and husband serial killer hunter team. That would have been doe, I mean, dope. P.S. I have all the genitals.

DRIVE (2011)

This movie was too cool for me. I always try, when sitting down to watch a movie, to know as little as possible about the movie.  I like going in completely blank.  In this case, I did pretty good.  I only knew: the title, the DVD cover and that there was a million copies on the shelf at the video store which lead me to believe it was a popular film. I didn't even read the description on the back of the DVD case. So...based on the cover and the title, I figured the film was about a guy who liked to drive and since he was holding a bloody hammer I figured either somebody really pissed him off or maybe he was dressed up as ol' boi from OLDBOY for Halloween.

The movie starts out okay enough with a rather subdued car chase scene and I use the term "car chase" very loosely because it would barely even rate a 1-star rating on GTA. After that, we're more formally introduced to the character of Driver and there's not a lot going on there. In the daytime he's a part-time mechanic/stunt car driver and at night he's a getaway driver for the highest bidder. Sounds exciting, but it's not, because throughout all of this, Driver just calmly chews on a toothpick and stares into space like he might not be getting enough oxygen to his brain (or it could be that he never sleeps). Driver comes across kinda like a heavily medicated Forrest Gump. He has the personality of an ice cube and I guess that might be the point: maybe his robotic performance is some kind of complex social commentary by the filmmakers about desensitized, emotionally unavailable males in contemporary society or something like that. I don't know and I don't give a fuck. I'm a simple-minded man (aka idiot) and in my movies called DRIVE about getaway drivers holding bloody hammers I want to see cars wrecking! A lot.

Anyway, as Fate would have it (and Fate is really stretching it here) Driver's neighbor just happens to be in debt deeply to the same mafia gangster guy that Driver's business partner is in cahoots with. Small world huh? Anyway, Driver doesn't know this when he agrees to help his neighbor rob a pawn shop. Almost instantly the deal goes south and Driver ends up in a very bad situation.

The story is older than dirt, but oh well, it's nothing that a lot of character development, violence and jaw-droppingly awesome car chases can't fix. Too bad then there's a total of 7 minutes of car chases in this entire movie...and that's including the opening scene! The other 93 minutes are spent slowly telling a story that a better filmmaker could have told in 40 minutes and then beefed up with jaw-droppingly awesome car chases.

Bottom line: DRIVE is too in-your-face stylized for me, there's too many song moments that come off like music videos, numerous plot holes, the action (what little there is) is underwhelming, the story is ancient and filled with unsympathetic characters, the pace is torture and worst of all the Driver character is a bore. Not a bad movie, just one that I don't get. But don't take my word for it, check it out for yourself. As for me I'll be in my room watching THE ROAD WARRIOR. Maybe I'll re-visit DRIVE in a few decades when I'm wiser.

Wow. Computer generated blood. Awesome.