Double Feature

One more digression before I share with you the grand finale of my road trip, my day at Cedar Point... this being a much shorter trip to the local movie theater. I caught two movies on Saturday, The Skeleton Key and The Aristocrats.

I saw The Skeleton Key because I have a taste for thiller/horror/suspense movies. While I lived in Virginia, I used to see them all with my roommate. Now, my group of college friends go. We'll see them all, no matter how bad they look, because fans of this genre know that finding a good thriller is like panning for gold. You have to stand there in the freezing rapids forever dumping out silt until you find one nugget of gold.

Well, The Skeleton Key wasn't gold, exactly, but it was much better than I was expecting. The pleasant surprise came in that the overall tone of most of the movie had little to do with the supernatural. From the trailers and commercials, you'd expect wall-to-wall voodoo. And yes, that's in there in spades at certain moments. But the majority of the movie is fairly grounded-in-reality "creepy mystery," and actually plays very well on that level. The acting is good. The writing is great -- the story is woven pretty well, and the dialogue spoken by the characters is very authentic Southern patter. And the people I saw it with -- we thought the ending rocked. Actually, the movie has been growing on me since I walked out of the theater, and I'd have to say I'd give it a B. Of course, this genre of movie is the sort of thing you were probably going to see or avoid already without any sort of recommendation from me.

After that movie, it was a quick drive over to the local "indie" theater to catch The Aristocrats. I've discussed the premise behind this film before. And since then, the film has received a lot more attention, including a full article in Entertainment Weekly. I had let the hype get to me a bit, I think, and my expectations were pretty high. Too high, really.

Now don't get me wrong. The movie had several big laughs. And it was a deeper documentary that simply one version of the joke after another; it actually delved a little into the origins of the joke, "why" this joke, and so forth. But I think I'd prepped myself for constant, mygodicantbreathe laughter, like the kind I had the first time I ever watched Eddie Izzard's Dress to Kill. And with that unrealistic yard stick, it came up short. Certain versions of the jokes in the movie were absolutely hysterical, and worth going to see it for. Personally, I liked George Carlin, Billy the Mime, the card trick magician, and Sarah Silverman. But there's also quite a lot of time where you just don't laugh much. (And not for being offended -- not in my own case, anyway.) I give it a B-. But here again, this is a movie you already knew you either wanted to see or avoid, regardless of my recommendation.

If you've seen either of the movies in my weekend double feature, I'd love to open up the floor for discussion. What did you think?