Circle of Trust

Meet the Parents

Director: Jay Roach

Cast: Ben Stiller, Robert De Niro, Teri Polo, Blythe Danner, Owen Wilson

Released: October 6, 2000

Viewed in theaters: October 7, 2000

Oscar nominations:

Best Song - "A Fool in Love" by Randy Newman (lost to "Things Have Changed" by Bob Dylan from Wonder Boys)

Meet the Fockers

Director: Jay Roach

Cast: Ben Stiller, Robert De Niro, Teri Polo, Blythe Danner, Dustin Hoffman, Barbra Streisand 

Released: December 22, 2004

Picture it: Kansas City, Missouri, 2000. My mom and I are in KC for a weekend, just for funsies. We shop, we eat, we go to movies both nights we're there. On Friday night we see Remember the Titans and on Saturday night we see Meet the Parents. Okay, that's the extent of my story! 

Yes, I'm missing the third movie in this trilogy, Little Fockers, but it wasn't available on Netflix like the other two are and I heard it's pretty terrible, so I don't feel like I'm missing anything! 

The first movie begins in Chicago where Greg Focker (Ben Stiller (oh, and we will get to how horrendous that name is later on!)) is getting ready to propose to his girlfriend, Pam (Teri Polo). She's a kindergarten teacher and he has this whole thing planned out where he has her students arranged by the window holding up letters that read, "Will You Marry Me?" and he will surprise her by turning her around so she'll see the message. It's all very cute. Just as he's getting ready to pop the question, her phone rings and it's her younger sister, Debbie, telling her SHE'S gotten engaged. What are the odds of that? When Greg hears that her sister's fiance, Bob, asked permission from her father because he appreciates things like that, he decides to nix the proposal. Although, does it seem a little weird that he was planning to propose to his girlfriend without ever meeting her parents? I know her parents live in New York, but you would think they've been dating long enough that their paths would have crossed at least once. Lucky for him, Debbie and Bob are getting married in two weeks (seriously, WTF? They JUST got engaged and they're getting married in TWO WEEKS?) so he will be able to meet Pam's parents and ask her father for permission to marry her

Greg's trip to Oyster Bay (yes, I checked, and yes, it is a real place -it's on Long Island) doesn't start out so well when the airline loses his luggage which had a two-carat diamond engagement ring inside of it. Was he seriously planning on asking Pam to marry him the same weekend as her sister's wedding? Ehhh....not a good idea. Why is he trying to take away attention from the sister who's getting married? But man, I would be so pissed if they lost my luggage with a diamond ring in it! And the next three days for him are only going to get worse.

Greg meets Pam's parents, Jack and Dina Byrnes (Robert De Niro and Blythe Danner) and right away Jack gets in two jabs at Greg. This will be a running theme throughout the movie (and the next one!). He comments about their rental car and tells him, "Interesting color, you pick it?" (It's green.) Greg tells him the guy at the counter was the one who picked it out and Jack tells him, "They say geniuses pick green...but you didn't pick it!" Ouch. Also, I call BS on that. When Pam tells her parents that Greg lost his luggage, Jack asks if she got her luggage and she tells him she took a carry-on to which he replies, "That's my girl!"

This is the point of the movie where the viewing audience learns what Greg's last name is. Dina asks him how it's pronounced and he tells her just how it's spelled, F-O-C-K-E-R. You know they were hoping that wasn't the case! I have to admit, I laughed at all the Focker jokes. Because I'm 12. There's a few in this movie, but they're more prevalent in the second movie when we meet Father Focker and Mother Focker (hehehe). Speaking of Meet the Fockers, I was surprised they got away with calling it that! Little Fockers sounds even worse...try saying that three times fast and you're saying something completely different! While doing research for this movie (which is reading the trivia page on IMDb), I read that the MPAA would not allow them to use that name (it is a PG-13 rated movie, after all) unless they found someone who had that last name. Evidently they did. Just imagine, there are some poor schmucks out there with this horrible last name. And these movies probably didn't help them! By the way, if I were Pam, I would NOT change my name! (Spoiler alert: they get married!)

We're introduced to the Byrnes' cat, Mr. Jinx (who usually goes by Jinx or Jinxy). Now, I don't remember my reaction to first seeing Jinx, but I'm sure it was one of the following:
-I probably clapped.
-I probably "ahhhhh"-ed.
-I probably squealed in delight.
-I probably did all the above.
Why? Well, because Mr. Jinx was played by a Himalayan and I don't know if you remember (and you probably don't), but when I reviewed Homeward Bound, which also features a Himalayan cat, I mentioned I had a Himalayan cat. His name was Mac and he has since passed on, but he was alive when I saw Meet the Parents, so of course I was more then delighted to see a Himalayan cat being represented in the film industry, haha. Jinx belongs to Pam and she left him with her parents when she moved to Chicago, but they should have just made him her parents' pet. It didn't make any sense why she never told her boyfriend about her cat...you think that would come up on one of their first couple of dates; everyone loves talking about their pets! Also, Jack is ENAMORED with this cat, another reason they should have just made it his own. While I remembered the whole teaching Jinx to use the toilet trick, I had totally forgotten about his smaller, but still equally impressive tricks. When Jack calls Jinx ("Come here, baby! Come to Daddy!"), the cat jumps onto a chair, then into his arms. Super impressive. Also, when Jack tells him to say "hi" to Greg, the cat waves his paw. It's so cute! In another scene, Jack will feed him bacon from his mouth (that's not really a trick though, anyone can do that!). Jack tells Greg that he taught Jinx to use the toilet and when Greg makes a joke about having another guy around to leave the toilet seat up, the three human Byrnes just stare at him and Jack tells him, "He can't lift the seat, Greg. He lacks the strength and opposable thumbs." Pam drops the bomb that Greg hates cat and Jack just gives him this look which quickly tells Greg that if he wasn't already on Jack's bad side before, he certainly is now! And maybe that's the reason Pam never told Greg about her cat. I still think they should have just made Jinx her parents' cat. I did laugh when Greg tells the Byrnes he's more of a dog person and Dina, who is standing behind Jack, mouths, "So am I." How much do you want to bet he would divorce her in a second he had seen her?

Later, Greg will accompany Jack to the store when Pam suggests they go together so he can pick up some toiletries in case his suitcase doesn't arrive. It's the first time they're alone together and it's super awkward with small talk and just when Greg is about to have a serious conversation about his feeling for Pam, Jack asks him, "Greg, how come you don't like cats?" Greg tries to do damage control and tells him that he does like cats, but just prefers dogs over them. Jack calls them "an emotionally shallow animal" and that "cats make you work for your affection; they don't sell out like dogs do." Trust me, that logic doesn't work for my cat. If you give him food and pats and belly rubs, he is all purrs and cuddles.

Greg gets caught in a little white lie where he tells Jack that he grew up on a farm and pumped milk. At dinner that night, Jack asks him about it and Pam tells him that Greg is from Detroit. It cracked me up when Dina asks him, "Do they have many farms in Detroit?" I have never been to Detroit, but I imagine the answer is no! Greg has to clarify that he grew up in a farm-style house with lots of pets and he tells this crazy story about how he milked a mother cat (who apparently had a litter of 30 cats!) so he could feed a little runt that wasn't able to get any milk. He tells them that you can milk anything with nipples and this is when we get the most quoted De Niro line since he uttered "You talkin' to me?" in Taxi Driver (I'm joking, but I'm not), which, of course, is, "I have nipples, Greg. Could you milk me?"

This is also the scene where Greg accidentally knocks over the urn with Jack's mother's ashes and Jinx uses it as a litter box. Greg will do a lot of dumb things over the next two days, but this one is probably the worst. Jack surprisingly forgives him (well, sort of!) pretty fast. Greg tells him that he feels horrible about what happened and Jack replies, "Well, it was a horrible thing, but let's just put it behind us and enjoy the weekend."

Jack has a little chat with Greg right before they're all getting ready to go to bed and I'm sure if Pam knew about this, she would be mortified. He tells him, "I'm a realist, I understand it's the 21st century and you've probably had premarital relationships with my daughter." I love that Greg just stares at him, not giving any indication that he has or hasn't. You know if he says yes, then Jack will get mad. And if he says no, Jack will call him a liar and get mad. So it's a lose-lose situation for him. Jack tells him he will be sleeping in the den and he doesn't want any funny business because "under my roof it's my way or the Long Island Express Way." Now, even though he says it's the 21st century, it was actually still the 20th century as the 21st century didn't start until 2001.

There are a lot of jokes about Greg being a nurse and his legal name (Gaylord) and I feel like they wouldn't fly today, because, really, is it that big of a deal for a guy to be a nurse? I don't think it is. But I guess since it was still the 20th century, those jokes were still okay to make.

Greg was under the impression that Jack was a horticulturist, but finds out he was actually in the CIA for 34 years and Pam never told him because it was "strictly on a need-to-know basis." He was a psychological profiler and was used to interrogate suspected double agents. This is the scene where he sets up a lie detector test for poor Greg. He tells Pam that he asked him if they were living together, something Pam made clear that she did not want Greg to tell her father, but he was saved when Dina interrupted them and was able to get out of the room. Pam tells Greg that her father is a human lie detector. Now, if she knew this about her own father, why is she making Greg lie about this if she knows her dad will probably be able to suss it out anyway? Jack tells Greg that he is now in the "Byrne family Circle of Trust" which is a running gag that goes into the next movie.

We find out Pam has a younger brother, Denny, the next morning when she's about to get Greg more clothes to borrow from her dad and he tells her he feels weird wearing her dad's clothes and underwear. Pam tells him to borrow some from her brother, who's still sleeping. It appears that Denny still lives at home and he's either in high school or college, but it's just so weird that we've already spent an entire day with the Byrnes and weren't introduced to him or Pam didn't say something about him. I think this might be some kind of joke that he's invisible because there will be a scene later on when Jack is looking for him and he yells his name a couple of times and his son is literally in the same room, sitting on the couch. ("I'm right here, Dad!") Anyway, Pam really annoyed me in this scene because she tells Greg to go wake up her brother, who he has never met, mind you, and ask to borrow his clothes, which includes underwear. That's a bit of a forward thing, don't you think, PAM? Why don't you ask your brother if he can lend clothes to your boyfriend, PAM?

Besides meeting Denny, Greg also meet's Pam's sister, Debbie and her fiance, Bob and his parents. (His dad is played by the late character actor James Rebhorn. Even if you don't recognize the name, you would definitely recognize him as he's been in a ton of things). They are all going to have a pre-wedding lunch at the Best Man's house. Okay, let's see if I can get this straight: the Best Man, Kevin (Owen Wilson) is also Pam's ex-fiance and he and Bob went to lacrosse camp together. Greg is very intimidated by Kevin because not only does he get along great with Jack, but he lives in this massive house with an indoor pool where they play volleyball. Greg, Jack, Denny, and Bob's dad are on one team and Pam, Debbie, Kevin, and Bob are on the other team with the two moms watching. Poor Greg isn't doing too well so when his team has a huddle, Jack gets another jab into him and tells him, "Greg, nobody's expecting much out of you, so if I set you up with the ball, do you think you could spike it." So mean, but so funny. Greg gets a little too aggressive and he ends up smashing the ball into Debbie's face. It looked like she broke her nose because a lot of blood comes gushing out, but she's screaming, "My eye! My eye!" and in the next scene her eye is swollen shut. I love that Dina starts freaking out and jumps into the pool with all her clothes on. Let's review here: Debbie's fiance is in the pool. Her father is in the pool. Her sister is in the pool. Her brother is in the pool. There are plenty of people to come to her aid, and of course they all do.

Greg's day will only get worse when he accidentally sets the ornate altar that Kevin carved for Debbie and Bob's wedding on fire and when he loses Jinx by letting him outside when he's not supposed to. Naturally, this upsets Jack greatly, especially since they can't do the dress rehearsal without Jinx because he's the ring bearer! Debbie say, "We can't cancel the rehearsal because of some stupid cat." Outraged, Jack replies, "Stupid cat? How can you say that? That cat's been like a brother to you." I love he says that with Debbie's actual brother right there in the same room. Jack voices his concern for Jinx: "We're supposed to let him wander the streets without food, water, or toilet?" Pam volunteers Greg to look for Jinx. He goes to an animal shelter and sees a Himalayan that he's sure is Jinx but the guy points out in the photo that Greg brought with him that Jinx has an all black tail and this cat has a white tip on the tail. Greg spray paints the cat's tail and passes him off as Jinx. Surprisingly, it works and he's hailed as a hero. I really thought Jack was going to see right through him and know that cat wasn't his, but he gets a message from his neighbor that night telling him that they have Jinx at their house.

They all come home from a rehearsal dinner that night to find that the impostor cat has gotten into all the wedding things, including the wedding dress. Jack accuses Greg of getting a Himalayan and passing it off as Jinx. In return, Greg accuses Jack of being back in the CIA business because he saw him have a meeting with some guy at the drug store who gave him some passports and overheard him talking in Thai on the phone. (I seriously would not know what Thai even sounds like!) Jack says that he was planning a surprise honeymoon for the newlyweds to Thailand and is angry at Greg for ruining the surprise. Things are just spiraling out of control and even Pam thinks Greg should leave, so he heads to the airport with his bag which he has just gotten.

I was under the impression that Jack wanted his daughter to marry Kevin because they were buddies and he was really successful and he had respect for him and that's why he was such a jerk to Greg, but we learn from Dina that he didn't warm up to Kevin until after they broke up, which is a bit weird that her dad is buddy-buddy with her ex, but whatever. Dina tells him, "Nobody is good enough for your Pam" and he realizes this is true and heads to the airport to make things right with Greg. I'm glad they didn't have both parents be crazy and at least there's a reasonable parent, or I would have really felt bad for Greg! They wait to make both parents crazy in the second movie!

Meanwhile, at the airport, Greg has been kicked off the plane when he got into a fight with the flight attendant about his bag not fitting in the overhead compartment. He tells her, "It's not like I have a bomb in here! It's not like I want to blow up the plane!" This, of course, gets him kicked off the plane. Even in a pre-9/11 world, you could NOT say the word "bomb" on a plane! (The same actress will return as the flight attendant in the second movie for a brief moment and if I hadn't watched these movies back to back, I would have never even noticed that!) Jack is able to talk to him and asks him if he wants to marry Pam and Greg tells him, "I did until I met you" which is really sad that he would not want to marry the love of his life because he's terrified of his girlfriend's father. Jack feels bad about this and says, "If I lighten up, would you consider marrying my daughter?" (Spoiler alert: he does NOT lighten up!) Greg agrees to this after standing up to Jack and asking him not to interfere with their lives so much and to stop making fun of him for being a nurse. They go back to the house, where, of course, he proposes to Pam (and uses Mr. Jinx to carry the ring on a little pillow...how adorable!).

Now it's time to meet the Fockers! Greg and Pam aren't married yet, but they're having their wedding in the near future. In the meantime, they're planning a trip to Florida with Mr. and Mrs. Byrnes so the two sets of parents can meet before the wedding. Nothing can absolutely go wrong with this plan! It has already been established that Pam has met the Fockers several times. It makes me wonder how that went. If Greg was worried about meeting HER parents, I bet he was much more concerned about his girlfriend meeting his parents! But nobody really cares about Pam meeting her future in-laws for the first time and the funnier story is the uptight and conservative Jack meeting the kooky and hippie-dippy Fockers for the first time.

They're all driving to Florida from New York in a huge RV with a cat (Mr. Jinx is back!) and Jack and Dina's one-year-old grandson they call "LJ" for Little Jack. He is Debbie and Bob's son and they are watching him while his parents are in Thailand (you remember, where they went for their honeymoon) opening a clinic. Wait, what clinic? It really makes no sense for this tot to be in the movie. He is only used as a plot device for a couple humorous scenes. If this were real life and grandparents were watching their grandson, they would NOT go on a trip across the country to visit their daughter's fiance's parents. No, they would reschedule when they weren't watching a one-year-old. Also, taking Mr. Jinx sounds like a really bad idea too. I would be worried that every time the RV stopped for a pit stop and the doors opened, the cat would get out and run away.

Father and Mother Focker

When they get to Florida and meet Bernie and Roz Focker (Dustin Hoffman and Barbra Streisand), Dina at least has the decency to be polite, but you can sense the irritation coming from Jack. I can't say I really blame him. Bernie is one of those touchy-feely people who hugs people and plants raspberries on their necks. Look, a hug is fine, but don't kiss me, especially if we're meeting for the first time. Roz is a sex therapist for older couples and Greg wants her to keep that under wraps until they've gotten to know the Byrnes a bit better. He has to hide all these embarrassing statues and paintings of naked people in the den where Jack and Dina will be staying. His parents are very open about their sex life and this leads to a lot of embarrassing moments for poor Greg.

Bernie shows the Byrnes the "Wall of Gaylord" where they have displayed all of Greg's "accomplishments". Jack sees a medal ribbon and says, "I didn't know they made 9th place ribbons and Bernie tells him, "They got them all the way up to 10th place." (Really? I thought they only went up to 3rd place.) Jack is not impressed.

There is a good call back to the first movie when Bernie toasts Pam and tells her if he had a daughter, he'd want her to be just like Pam. Jack questions Greg about him telling him he had a sister and had milked her cat. Greg does not respond at all, just ignores him.

Pam tells Greg that she's pregnant and they decide to move the wedding up to June instead of October.They also agree not to tell anyone about the pregnancy until after the wedding, but Roz finds out and she tells Bernie and Pam ends up telling her mother, so Jack is the only one who doesn't know.

Even though I still maintain the baby had no reason being in this movie, there is a funny use of him in a scene where everyone is having dinner and the Focker's voluptuous Puerto Rican housekeeper, Isabel, who Greg had a crush on when he was a teenager, says hello to everyone and sees LJ. She automatically assumes he's Greg's and Pam's and says, "Ooh, he's a handsome little Focker" which elicited a giggle from me. Jack is quick to tell her that he's Pam's nephew and "he has no connection to Greg whatsoever." Even though they've made progress since the first movie, Jack is still not too keen on Greg and meeting his parents probably doesn't help matters. Greg is mortified when his parents reveal to the Brynes' that Greg lost his virginity to Isabel when he was 19. Jack does some investigating with this information and finds out that Isabel has a 15-year-old son, Jorge, who suspiciously looks a lot like Greg, who, coincidentally, was 19 fifteen years ago. The teenager has never met his dad and doesn't know who he is. He is sure that Greg knows about this and has been keeping it a secret from Pam and plans to out him by giving him truth serum at an engagement party Greg's parents are throwing for them. Fifty Fockers are expected to attend. "Fifty Fockers. What could be better?"

Jack invites Jorge to the party and introduces him to Greg, telling him that he's 15 and has never met his dad and plants doubt in Greg's mind that this could be his son. When he gives a speech, Greg reveals he may have a son he never knew about and that Pam is pregnant. It turns out Jorge is not Greg's son (maybe Isabel has a certain type) and everyone is angry at Jack when it is revealed he gave truth serum to Greg. Jack also finds out that everyone knew about the pregnancy and is hurt by this. He leaves, but Greg and his dad go to find him, yada, yada, yada, everyone is happy again and Greg and Pam get married.

It's the End of the World As We Know It

Armageddon

Director: Michael Bay

Cast: Bruce Willis, Ben Affleck, Liv Tyler, Billy Bob Thornton, Steve Buscemi, Jason Isaacs, Michael Clarke Duncan, Owen Wilson

Released: July 1, 1998

Oscar nominations:

Best Sound (lost to Saving Private Ryan)

Best Sound Effects Editing (lost to Saving Private Ryan)

Best Visual Effects (lost to What Dreams May Come)

Best Song - Dianne Warren for "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing" (lost to Stephen Schwartz for "When You Believe" from The Prince of Egypt)

Deep Impact

Director: Mimi Leder

Cast: Tea Leoni, Morgan Freeman, Robert Duvall, Elijah Wood, Leelee Sobieski, Vanessa Redgrave, James Cromwell, Maximilian Schell

Released: May 8, 1998

Spoilers, obviously!

Remember in 1998 when two movies about asteroids hurtling towards Earth to destroy all mankind were released within months of each other? Those movies were Armageddon and Deep Impact and I'm going to review them both because it just makes sense to do them at the same time! I'm not going to make you wait with bated breath and I'll just come out and say it now: I don't really care for either one. If I had to recommend one, I'd probably say Deep Impact, but ONLY because it's half an hour shorter (but still long....Armageddon is TWO AND A HALF HOURS LONG (but yet feels longer!)) and at least I didn't get sick watching Deep Impact as the cuts in Armageddon only last about a second. In fact, I read the IMDb trivia for that movie and they said the average cut lasted about 1.5 seconds! It was like, Cut to Bruce Willis! Now to Ben Affleck! Now to Liv Tyler! Now back to Willis! Oh, we need to see Tyler again! Oh, wait, don't forget Affleck! This was pretty much the entire movie (with the other actors throw in, too of course). I felt like this movie was made by someone with ADD! However, I would recommend this one over Deep Impact if someone was looking for something to watch with friends and just get drunk and made fun of something because this movie is absolutely ridiculous (another piece of trivia I learned via IMDb is that (and I hope this is true!) NASA shows this movie as part of their management training program and asks new managers to spot as many mistakes as they can and the most number spotted has been 168!) and has more funnier moments than Deep Impact (mostly unintentionally!), which is the more serious film. While I immensely disliked Armageddon, I don't think it's Michael Bay's worst movie, which is saying something! That's when you know I really hate other movies of his! 

The premise of Armageddon is that an asteroid, the size of Texas, is hurtling towards Earth and there is only eighteen days to stop it. (There's even an ominous countdown clock!) If it hits, all life on Earth, as we know it, will be wiped out. There's only one man for the job and his name is Harry Stamper (Bruce Willis). Is Harry the best NASA has ever seen? No, because his field of expertise isn't even in astronomy. He's an oil driller. Yep. You heard me. But he's just not any oil driller, he's the BEST deep-sea oil driller in the world! Six billion people on the planet and he was the one they called. NASA scientist Dan Truman (Billy Bob Thornton) wants to split the asteroid in two (so then we'll have two asteroids the size of Colorado?) and divert them away from Earth.

"Mr. Wizard". Heh!

Truman introduces Stamper to his team of eight astronauts who have been learning to drill for the past eight months in preparation for the mission. Stamper is not impressed with them or the "piss poor" production of his rig they put together. Jason Isaacs plays another NASA scientist who helped put the rig together and Stamper calls him "Mr. Wizard". Um, hello! He is a wizard! He's purebred wizard, Lucius Malfoy! That made me LOL when he said that. Stamper claims he's the best driller in the world (just because you say it over and over doesn't mean it's true!) because he WORKS with the best and he wants his own men up there with him. Haha, I read on the IMDb trivia that Ben Affleck told Michael Bay, "Wouldn't it be easier for NASA to train astronauts to drill rather than training drillers to be astronauts?" and Bay told him to shut up. But he's right! It makes so much more sense that way! If this is true (and I'm sure it is), I bet Bay put in that line where Stamper asks Truman, "All they gotta do is drill? No spacewalking? No crazy astronaut stuff?" after he had that conversation with Affleck just so the audience wouldn't be thinking the same thing he did cuz he knew they would!

So Stamper rounds up his rag tag team of oil drillers. Even though they're the best team of oil drillers a man could have, they're all pretty much a bunch of imbeciles and dopes. I honestly don't remember any of the characters' name and even when I looked them up online, they still didn't register with me, so I'll just call them by their actors' names. Steve Buscemi plays a horny guy; Michael Clark Duncan's character is a big, burly guy who looks intimidating, but deep down, he's really sensitive and just a big teddy bear; Owen Wilson plays a dim-witted rancher who's also a geologist. Will Patton plays a gambler who lost his wife (or girlfriend?) because of that and never got to have a relationship with his son. (Spoiler alert: he will at the end of the movie). And there's other characters played by not as famous people.

Also on Harry's team is AJ (Ben Affleck) who happens to be dating Harry's daughter, Grace (Liv Tyler) and this does not please Harry. Harry raised his daughter her whole life and she grew up on the oil rig with him and the other men that work for him. She calls her father by his first name and it's so blatant how they shove it down your throat because, literally, in every line Grace speaks to her father, she ends it with his name. Such as, "I've been seeing AJ for five months, HARRY." Or "What about having a life, HARRY." Or "Who is the hypocrite here, HARRY?" Or "You listen to me, HARRY!" It's like, we get it, Michael Bay, she doesn't call her father "Dad" and they don't have a close relationship. Her mother left when she was really young and she was raised by a bunch of "roughnecks". A couple of the guys even tell Harry, THEIR BOSS, about what a "hottie" and a "babe" Grace has grown into. Really, what kind of moron would you have to be to speak that way about your boss's daughter? So stupid. And what makes it even grosser is that the comment is made that they all helped raise her, so they're all, in a way, father figures to Grace. So, eww. (To be fair, it was only Buscemi, Wilson, and the fat guy commenting on how hot she is, but still...)

This movie has probably what is the worst scene ever in the history of cinema. It is so bad and cringe- worthy. If you've seen this movie, you know what I'm talking about, don't you. I just have two words for you: Animal. Crackers. OMG, that scene is SOOOOOOOO bad! SO, SO, SO BAD! As if that scene isn't bad enough, Grace then asks AJ, "Do you think it's possible somebody else is doing the same exact thing somewhere else right now?" No, Liv Tyler, I really doubt nobody else is playing with animal crackers on their significant other's body right now! Aurgh, that scene is so stupid!!

The men agree to destroy the asteroid because they can't say no to their boss who tells them they can't refuse the U.S. Government in asking for their help to save the planet. There is an amusing scene where Stamper reads a list of requests from his employees to Truman about what they want if they complete and accomplish their mission. This includes having speeding tickets wiped from their record, being able to stay at the White House, and never having to paying taxes again. I mean, who can blame them? If you were tasked with having to save the world, you would want something out of it too! I would certainly be expected to be owed big time!

They have about fifteen days to train to go into space. William Fichtner plays one of the people who is in charge of training them and when we get a shot of the crew walking in slow motion, he exclaims, "Talk about the wrong stuff!" which made me groan. This includes getting physical exams, getting psych evaluations, flying in fighter jets to get used to traveling at fast speeds, training to know what it's like to be in space. They keep the fact that a huge asteroid is about to strike Earth a secret because they don't want mass hysteria and panic to ensue, which I understand. But about six days before the mission, a chunk of the asteroid hits East Asia and kills 50,000 people in Shanghai with a huge tidal wave. Then Paris gets hits soon after and now the entire world knows what's going on and about the mission. There is an unsettling scene at the beginning of the movie when New York is hit and you see one of the World Trade Center buildings with a gaping hole through it...a little too real to life.

The men go up in space and there's lots of action and quick jump cuts. A few of them die. But then we get to the point where one of them has to sacrifice themselves and AJ draws the short end of the stick for that (literally). However, Harry tricks him and takes his place, telling him to take care of his daughter. By this time he has approved of Grace and AJ being together. This makes AJ upset. I can understand he doesn't want Harry sacrificing his life because he is his fiancee's father (oh, did I mention AJ asked Grace to marry him and she said yes?), but did he really want to sacrifice his own life when he had a fiancee waiting for him? Dumbass. And let's be honest, Grace would much rather have him come back than her father. Okay, maybe that's a little cold-hearted to say. There was a scene that got me a little teary-eyed when Harry is saying goodbye to his daughter who can see and talk to him via a screen at NASA headquarters.

Harry sacrifices himself to save humanity, so he really should have a planet named after him. In fact, they should have just renamed Earth "Stamper". I mean, the dude scarified himself to save not only the entire human race, but the entire ecosystem on earth. If anyone should not have to pay taxes for the rest of their lives, it's Grace...and AJ since he is getting married to her. The movie ends with their wedding. Cue the Aerosmith song...you know the one!

Armageddon was the bigger success at the box office between the two movies which isn't a surprise because it did have the bigger stars and had more of a budget so it was more glossier. The first hour of Deep Impact is really boring, but the second hour gets more interesting with its premise, although I don't think they executed it as well as they could have. I think Deep Impact would have been better as a mini series than a two hour movie. With this movie, you're getting four different perspectives from four different characters. The character we get the most focus on is an MSNBC journalist Jenny Lerner (Tea Leoni - yes, I know there's an accent over the "e" and her name is "Tay-a" and not "tea", but I don't know how to add on the accent!) This is a woman in her mid-30s who is acting like a petulant child because her parents (Vanessa Redgrave and Maximilian Schell) are divorced. To make matters worse, her father is getting married to a woman only two years older than Jenny herself. Jenny is investigating what she thinks is an affair the Secretary of Treasury (James Cromwell) is having with a woman when he suddenly resigns. But after doing some research, she realizes she mistook what she heard as a woman's name, "Ellie" for "E.L.E." which stands for "Extinction Level Event." Morgan Freeman plays the President and he is way more presidential than the President in Armageddon. After Jenny finds out there's an asteroid (and this one is only the size of NYC, so it has nothing on the Armageddon asteroid! Cuz Bay does it bigger and better!), the President tells the American public that it is projected to hit the earth within a year and that he has assembled a team of astronauts (this time the are fully prepared astronauts and not just oil drillers!) to stop the comet. Even though it is significantly smaller than the asteroid in Armageddon, it is still big enough to cause extinction. For the past eight months, the United States and Russia have been building the largest spaceship ever constructed. It's called the Messiah and is being built in orbit around the Earth. Robert Duvall plays the veteran astronaut in charge of the crew, Captain Tanner. His crew also includes Jon Favreau and Blair Underwood. This movie has a lot of "Hey, it's that guy!" moments. (Or, "Hey, it's that woman!") Other people of note in this movie are Kurtwood Smith (the dad from That '70s Show), Laura Innes (Dr. Weaver from ER), Dougray Scott, Mike O'Malley (Kurt's dad from Glee), and Richard Schiff (Toby Ziegler from The West Wing).

Also in this movie are Elijah Wood and Leelee Sobieski who play a high school couple named Leo and Sarah. Their story never links with any of the other characters in this movie which is really weird because you would think all the stories would link together. I know Jenny and the President meet and Captain Tanner and the President meet, but I can't remember if Jenny and Tanner are ever in a scene together. But the high schoolers and their families are never in any scenes with the other main characters of the movie. So their role is that they discovered the asteroid. This happens two years before it actually hits. They're with their astronomy professor and he is looking up something on his computer and discovers the asteroid, but as he's going to tell someone, he gets hit by a truck and his car explodes in a fiery ball. We then get text on the screen that reads "One year later".  I guess even though he died, the U.S. government knew about it since they were already preparing for the mission to divert the comet. Since Leo and his teacher discovered it, they name the asteroid after them. Like would you really want a killing machine named after you? While watching this, I couldn't help noticing that Elijah Wood will play the exact same character again later in the same year in The Faculty. He discovers the asteroid (well, with help) in this movie and he's the one to discover the aliens in that movie and both are from outer space and he gets on the cover of a news magazine in both films. The only difference is he's the main character in that movie and he's more ancillary in this.

Okay, let's get to the part when it starts to get interesting. The first hour is just setting everything up and meeting the characters, and, like I said, it's boring. But I started to pay more attention again when President Morgan Freeman came on TV and announced that while they were able to detonate the asteroid with the Messiah, it did not succeed in destroying it and instead it has broken into two pieces: one is six miles wide, and the other about a mile and both are still heading towards Earth. He tells the American audience that while they've been "hoping and working for the best", they've also been "preparing for the worst." Working with the Russians, they have another plan to divert the two large comets away from Earth. However, their plan can only happen when they are only hours from striking the planet. But in case that fails too and the asteroids do hit, he tells his audience that they have been preparing in case they need to repopulate the Earth again and that an underground bunker has been being built in the limestone caves of Missouri. There is a network of caves that will allow one million people to live there for two years (the time it will take for the sky to clear of dust). Not only will there be people, but also seeds, plants and animals, "enough to start over". A computer will randomly select 800,000 Americans to join the 200,000 scientists, doctors, engineers, teachers, soldiers, artists that have already been selected. (I guess they already had their ow lottery - but, wait! What if you were a doctor and weren't one of the 200,000 selected, but would you be able to go if you were one of the 800,000 "normal" people selected? Do the non-selected scientists, doctors, engineers, teachers, soldiers, and artists get a second chance when they draw for the general public or was that their only chance? I'm so confused!) Basically what President Morgan Freeman is telling the American audience is, "Get busy livin', or get busy dyin'!" I guess if you were getting this bad news delivered to you, you'd want it to be from the soothing voice of Morgan Freeman.

Jenny delivers the details of the lottery on the news. The biggest kicker is that nobody over the age of 50 will be selected (the exception being if they are one of the 200,000 pre-selected who have knowledge in a certain field). While she says this, they show her mother watching the news and I felt so bad for her. (She later kills herself, good job stupid lottery people who make these stupid rules). I can understand if they wouldn't allow anyone over 80, even over 70, but I still feel like people in their 50s and 60s are not THAT old. And if there's going to be an age limit, why stop at 50? You only have 800,000 spots for the entire country which was what back in '98? 250 million people? Why have anyone over the age of 30? Why don't they just have the age range be 12-30? That way you don't have to worry about baby-sitting annoying little kids and people are still young enough they can repopulate the world. Seriously, if they're not going to let people over 50, they might as well do it that way! Maybe I'm over thinking this way too much. I think this whole concept is a great social experiment, but they don't really delve into it that much. Like I said, this movie would have been better served as a mini series.

A few special snowflakes have been pre-selected. This includes Jenny because she's an MSNBC reporter? And Leo and his family because he discovered the comet that's going to kill everyone. Sarah's family, however, is not selected (awkward!) So even though they're only 17, Leo decides he's going to marry her and basically green card her so she can get in the shelter. (They missed a golden opportunity not casting a Hispanic actress!) Sarah agrees to do it if it also means her parents and baby brother get space in the caves too. They seem to get the ok, however on the day when they are picked up by the military who is driving them to the caves, Sarah's parents and brother are denied access and she refuses to leave them, which I don't blame her. They're from Richmond, Virginia, and when Leo and his family get to the bunker caves in Missouri, Leo decides he needs to go all the way back to Richmond to get Sarah. Virginia and Missouri are not that close! Why didn't he think of this sooner? His parents (his dad is played by Schiff) are reluctant about him going back, for, like, half a second, then they're like, "Yeah, you better go and get her."

Oh, yeah, they're also letting two of each animal into the bunkers ala Noah's Ark and we see people with their young children who didn't get in, protesting. I love animals, but it is ridiculous they're giving up space that could have been used to save PEOPLE'S LIVES for baby elephants and giraffes (no matter how cute they are).

So the asteroid is getting closer and closer. Jenny gives her spot of safety up to Dr. Weaver and her young daughter. She goes to make amends with her father because they had a huge fight and they embrace as a huge tidal wave comes for them. The crew on the space shuttle sacrifice themselves to destroy the other comet. Leo gets Sarah and her parents tell her to go with him and take the baby.  I don't understand how all these people outran a tsunami...., but they just climb up a mountain and they're fine.

President Morgan Freeman is also alive and tells everyone that pretty much the entire U.S. from the East Coast to Ohio and Tennessee has been wiped out, but that they will prevail as a nation. I remember watching this movie when it first came out and thinking, "Oh, good I would have survived because that terrifying 1,000 foot wave wouldn't have reached me!"

Okay, that's it for now. I'm a gettin' the hell outta here!  

Nights at the Museums

Night at the Museum
Director: Shawn Levy
Cast: Ben Stiller, Robin Williams, Owen Wilson, Steve Coogan, Carla Gugino, Ricky Gervais, Dick Van Dyke, Mickey Rooney, Bill Cobbs, Kim Raver, Paul Rudd
Released: December 22, 2006
Viewed in theaters: December 23, 2006

Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian
Director: Shawn Levy
Cast: Ben Stiller, Amy Adams, Owen Wilson, Steve Coogan, Hank Azaria, Robin Williams, Christopher Guest, Ricky Gervais, Bill Hader
Released: May 22, 2009
Viewed in theaters: June 1, 2009

Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb
Director: Shawn Levy
Cast: Ben Stiller, Robin Williams, Owen Wilson, Steve Coogan, Ben Kingsley, Ricky Gervais, Rebel Wilson
Released: December 19, 2014

Two years before the first movie being released, I had been to New York City with my mom where we had visited the American Museum of Natural History which had quickly shot to #1 as my favorite museum of all time ever. (What was #1 prior to that? To be honest, I had never given it any thought.) So when I heard about this movie where all the exhibits come to life at night, I thought it sounded like a cool concept and was curious to see it. While I enjoyed it, I was a bit nit-picky. Obviously, if you have been to the AMNH, then you know it was not filmed there! (Which I get.) But they could at least tried to make it as similar to the real one! True, it's been awhile since I've been there, but I do remember that the dinosaur on display in the main lobby was not a T-rex like it was in the movie, but in fact two dinosaurs: a mother barosaurus and her baby. I suppose a T-rex is more frightening and exciting for a movie audience, but there were more dinosaur bones upstairs that they never had come to life! Although I don't think the AMNH has a T-rex because if they did, it probably would be featured in the lobby as the first thing you see! I kept waiting for the movie to show this HUGE grizzly bear that I remember seeing in the North America section (you know, the same section where you would find Lewis and Clark with Sacagawea!). I would be way more scared of that than the three lions that are in the movie....but there was no bears, grizzly or otherwise. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Larry Daley (Ben Stiller), a divorced father of a son, gets a job as a night guard at the museum when times are rough for him and he just needs anything that will give him a paycheck. He replaces three nigh guards who are retiring (played by Dick Van Dyke, Bill Cobbs, and Mickey Rooney). They give Larry a list of instructions which he will soon find out will come in handy. Even though this movie is called NIGHT at the Museum, there are actually three nights that are shown. The other two movies only have one night.

The first night, naturally, is the introduction of the characters who come to life. A bored Larry ends up falling asleep at the front desk (sidenote: how come they only have one night guard now when they used to have three? Maybe they are trying to cut costs?) and when he wakes up he is baffled to see that the bones of the T-rex are gone and thinks Cecil (Dick Van Dyke) and the others have played a trick on him and that they have made the dinosaur bones vanish in a David Copperfield type illusion. But no, the skeletal dinosaur has come to life and starts chasing Larry who hides under his desk and grabs the instruction and reads them for the first time. The first one tells him to "throw the bone", which he does and the T-rex hurries after it like a dog, wagging its bony tail. While I definitely would be freaked out if dinosaur fossils came to life, I really wouldn't be worried about the dinosaur eating me as there is no digestive tract!

Larry soon realizes that everything in the museum has come to life. There's Attila the Hun; the aforementioned Sacagawea; cavemen; an Easter Island Moai; a large menagerie which probably has the most iconic character, Dexter the capuchin monkey, is part of. Dexter torments Larry by stealing his keys, peeing on him, biting his nose, slapping him, and he will continue to be a pain in Larry's ass for the next two movies. Teddy Roosevelt (played by Robin Williams) acts as Larry's guide and offers to help him the first night. He is a wax statue on a horse in the lobby. He brings up something later in the movie that I had been wondering: these are not the actual people that are being shown at the museum. As Teddy tells Larry, he is not the real Roosevelt, but a wax figure made in a factory somewhere. However, he acts like a leader and emulates many of the traits the real Roosevelt had as so many of the other figures with their real life counterparts. (That would be a little creepy if the museum had the corpse of Teddy Roosevelt on display!)

Two other characters who will prominently be featured in the next two movies are a miniature version of a cowboy named Jedediah (played by Owen Wilson) and his rival in the display next to him, a Roman general named Octavius (played by Steve Coogan). In all three movies there will be a running gag where the two of

them will be in some sort of dire situation and the camera will pull back to show a very calm scene. It's funny at first, but the camera pans back too many time that it stops being funny. In the first movie, they are getting blasted by air from a tire, but when the camera pulls pack we just see a car sitting there.

After the first night, Larry wants to quit and tells the curator (played by Ricky Gervais) he won't be coming back. But after seeing how proud his son is of him, he decides to stick with it. This time he goes in more prepared, or thinks he is anyway. He has read some history books so he knows a few things that might help him with dealing with the live exhibits. He has secured his keys to his belt and fakes Dexter our with a pair of plastic keys. He gives a lighter to the cavemen so they will stop bugging him and they are amazed by how easy it is to start a fire. However, one of them gets out of the building to start a fire in the trash and ends up turning to dust when the sun comes up. Is the caveman also a vampire? No, that is what happens to the exhibits if they are not in the building back in their poses when the sun comes up.

The third (and most adventurous night as he will soon find out), Larry brings Nicky so he can see the displays come to life. Nothing happens and I thought that they were purposely not coming to life because they only let the night guards see them, but it is soon discovered they are not able to come to life because Cecil has the tablet. Oh, I forgot to mention the reason why everything in the museum comes to life: so there's this Ancient Egyptian tablet and it brings everything to life. Yeah. I don't get it either. That's got to be worth a lot of money! I had totally forgotten this storyline where Cecil and the other two guards were the bad guys and wanted the tablet because apparently besides giving life to wax figures, it helps old men have more energy (there's a really bad joke I could insert here, but I won't go there) and they want it so they can stay healthy and spry. At one point Cecil does a backflip. It's just totally random and out of left field. Everything comes to life when Larry gets the tablet back and the exhibits help Larry and Nicky stop the three old men. It gets quite ridiculous because at one point Nicky is riding the T-rex through Central Park.

The only way to stop them is to awake the mummy (I think he was a real mummy and not a prop one because in the third movie we will find out he is an actual person who was awaken from the dead? I think?) It's an amusing scene because Larry and his son are really scared and when he unwraps the bandages you think it's going to be some deformed corpse, but it turns out to be a good-looking young guy, an Egyptian prince named Akhmenrah.

I thought there was going to be a romantic sub-plot between Larry and Rebecca (Carla Gugino) who works at the museum and is writing a dissertation on Sacagawea, but they just have one "coffee date" when she offers to tell him some information on the Native American when he asks her. There is a romance between Teddy and Sacagawea, but it mostly consists of gazing into eyes and hand holding. Rounding out the cast is Paul Rudd who plays Larry's ex-wife's new smarmy boyfriend.

Larry has an idea for bringing the museum to "life" at night (which everyone thinks are either actors portraying the notable figures or, in the case of the animals and dinosaur, animatronics) because in a weird plot point, the museum had been having low attendance which made me LOL, because, please....I really doubt the freaking best museum in the world ever has that problem! When I was there, you had to wait in a long line to pay for your ticket (totally worth it, though). Wait...this might have been in the second movie where this happens....shoot, I don't remember!

Before leaving this movie and the American Natural History Museum (because even though there are thousand of exhibits you could base on several movies, the other two movies take place at different museums), I had to share a cute story from when I visited that museum. While my mom was waiting in line, buying the tickets, I was sitting on this circular bench and there were people all around me (I'm telling you: there is no problem with low attendance!) and I overhear a conversation between a mother and her son, probably no older than six. She tells him he has the choice of either visiting the new frog exhibit or going to Central Park. The kid was quiet for awhile, pondering this decision and finally declared he wanted to see the frogs. I silently praised his choice. After all, the frogs were only temporary.

Battle of the Smithsonian is my favorite in the trilogy and that is mostly thanks to Amy Adams who is the MVP of these movies (even though she is only in the second movie). As you can tell from its title, it takes place at the Smithsonian in Washington D.C., another museum to which I have been. This time, Larry has only been working at the museum part-time because he has another job selling something he invented...I can't even remember what it was. He was an inventor in the first movie too and had invented the Snapper where you snap to turn off lights, but since the Clapper was already a thing (and way easier to clap than snap!), the Snapper did not sell. His new invention is a big hit and he has become successful. He finds out the museum is being renovated and they are shipping several of the artifacts to the Smithsonian. This pretty much includes every character from the first movie except for Teddy Roosevelt (Robin Williams is only in the beginning and end and has a small scene in the middle), the T-rex bones, all the lions, and the Egyptian prince who comes with the tablet, except that Dexter has stolen the tablet to bring it with them. So you guessed it....everything at the Smithsonian will be coming to life!

Because there are so many new characters, a lot of the exhibits from the first movie take a back seat. The only ones who have a pivotal role are Jedediah and Octavius, our mini friends. We have the antagonist, a corrupted pharaoh named Kahmunrah played by Hank Azaria (also the older brother of Akhmenrah who he is obviously jealous of). He wants the tablet because it will open a portal that will help him take over the world. Or something like that. He enlists the help of three bad guys from history: Ivan the Terrible (played by Christopher Guest) who insists his real name is Ivan the Awesome; Napoleon Bonaparte (played by Alain Chabat) who is very sensitive and snippy whenever someone mentions his height; and Al Capone (played by Jon Bernthal) who is only shown in black and white which I thought was a cool touch. In a funny scene where he's trying to recruit even more famous baddies, we see him talking to characters off screen saying how much an honor it is to meet them and the camera pans to reveal Darth Vader and Oscar the Grouch.  Kahmunrah has kidnapped Jededian and put him in a sand timer and tells Larry if he doesn't deliver him the code to open the portal in that alloted time, then his "little friend will die."

Helping Larry along the way is Amelia Earhart. (Not the real Amelia, of course, but a wax figure). This is where Amy Adams comes in and she is so delightful in this. She has a very 1940s, rat-a-tat-tat way of speaking and does it very effortlessly and I know that cannot be easy! She rattles out such lines as "You haven't been able to take your cheaters off my chassies since we met!" and "I think we've been jimmy-jacked!"

Instead of just famous figures made of wax and animals coming to life, this movie takes a new twist on things. Paintings come to life, sculptures come to life, the statue of Abraham Lincoln in the Lincoln memorial comes to life, the bobble-headed Albert Einstein toys come to life. (I feel like there are no rules to this magical tablet...pretty much any inanimate object can come to life!) Since there are so many new characters to meet, it's no wonder many of the ones from the first movie are all but cameos. There is a bust of Teddy Roosevelt that Larry and Amelia get advice from. He is, of course, voiced by Robin Williams and when he learns that there is a full-bodied Teddy Roosevelt at the Natural History Museum he gets very jealous.

My favorite scene is when they go the the Air and Space Museum and Amelia is just enthralled. We did see Larry walking through here before the sun set and they didn't do the best job of setting this scene up. While we see all the historic aircrafts, we didn't see any of the famous aviators that are now being shown. Unless they were like Amelia and woke up in the storage basement and then came to the Air and Space Museum? But don't you have to be a certain distance from the tablet to do that? See, these rules of the tablet are so sketchy. I guess it really doesn't matter. They're about to do a launch and Larry has to abort all of them. Yeah....that would be bad news!

In the end he and his friends defeat the evil pharaoh and he brings everyone back to New York with the help of Amelia and her small plane (which managed to fit everyone in there...it reminded me of a clown car when they all just come tumbling out one after the other). She flies back to the Smithsonian...hopefully she made it back before she turned to wax so she wouldn't crash the plane!

Okay, remember how I couldn't remember if Larry had the idea to bring the museum to life after hours in the first or second movie? It was this one. I remember now because he notices a woman there who looks like Amelia Earhart (played by Amy Adams without wearing the wig or aviation outfit) and he asks her if she's related to her. For a second I thought it was Amelia Earhart and she had disguised herself but that was so far-fetched...even for this movie!

The third movie takes place at the British Museum in London. Larry has to travel there with Akhmenrah (the Egyptian prince if you recall) and his tablet because something is happening to the tablet where it is starting not to work anymore so Larry has to go see Akhmenrah's parents (the father is played by Ben Kinglsey) who are exhibits at the British Museum. It's kind of sad that Akhmenrah was separated from his parents. So the only actual "real" people in this movie, in terms of exhibits, are the mummies. Everyone else is just made of wax. There's a whole back story at the beginning of the movie that explains the tablet and how it was found when a very young Cecil (you remember him...he was played by Dick Van Dyke from the first movie) was in Egypt with his archeologist father and they unearthed a tomb that held the tablet.

This movie does not really bring anything new in terms of things we hadn't seen from the first two movies. Obviously, since it is set in an entirely different museum we do see new characters and exhibits come to life, most notable Sir Lancelot who is trying to find Guinevere. There is a silly scene where he runs up on stage in the middle of a stage production of "Camelot" and pulls his sword on Hugh Jackman. Um....okay, if that happened in real life, security would be on that guy's ass in five seconds. But he and Jackman just start arguing over who Lancelot is.

Ben Stiller also plays a caveman whose main goal is to annoy Larry. He was created for the museum in honor of Larry and his features were used so the caveman looks exactly like him and so he thinks Larry is his dad and follows him around all the time.

There's a scene where Larry is having a heart-to-heart with Dexter (the capuchin monkey) after Dexter almost died when it looked like the tablet was doomed, but Larry managed to fix it in the nick of time. I thought Dexter was going to slap Larry or bite him on the nose, but he kisses him on the lips which was really cute.

Anyway, I enjoyed these movies. They're just mindless fun. I kind of get a Jumanji vibe from them.