Hiking Pine Mountain

At the top of Pine Mountain. Photo by me, September 2015.

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t was the first week of September 2015 and it was still hot and humid as it tends to be in the south that time of year when a friend, their dog and I decided to tackle Pine Mountain. Now this isn't to be confused with the other Pine Mountain down in central Georgia where President F.D.R. had his Little White House, no this is Pine Mountain in Bartow County northwest of Atlanta. You've probably been right by it plenty of times and never knew it heading north on interstate 75 from Atlanta to Chattanooga.

Downtown Cartersville is sneaking into the right side of the photo and power plant Bowen beyond that. Photo by me, September 2015.

Photo by me, September 2015.

 Pine Mountain is a minor mountain in terms of elevation at only 1,562 feet above sea level but it stands out nicely compared to the surrounding landscape of rolling hills and Lake Allatoona. It is also taller than its nearby cousin, Red Top Mountain. Once you arrive at the summit you do get nice views to the south, east and west from a large rock outcrop. You won't be fully escaping civilization because you will see the alteration of the landscape by human hands but this isn't like Kennesaw Mountain where it is surrounded by choking sprawl. Other than some people and their dogs that you might encounter this is a quiet trail so you can still enjoy nature without the sounds of traffic and you might encounter see a snake like we did.
 

We parked on the western side of the mountain at the trailhead located there but you can also approach the summit from a trailhead on the eastern side too, just be mindful of bikers on the eastern trail on certain days. This mountain which you can see from the interstate is immediately off it and once you exit and drive maybe one minute down the road there's the trailhead, so it's a convenient place to go for a hike.

The trail as it winds it up the western slope. Photo by me, September 2015.

Large rocks overhangs and outcrops on the trails. Photo by me, September 2015.

 The western trail isn't steep or difficult except in a couple places otherwise it is a gradual climb with switchbacks. If you need a breather there are plenty of rocks or downed trees to take a break on. There is one creek crossing using a foot bridge at the very beginning but other the trail is dry. About midway as the trail climbs the terrain becomes more rocky and there are a few rocks jutting out on the trail so be aware of trip hazards. In total (up and down) we might have done two miles of hiking that day, which isn't much and I would have preferred to have done more but hiking with a small dog limited our mileage that day.

Above the tree line clearing yellow weeds bloom in late summer. I believe these are goldenrod. Photo by my September 2015.

Lake Allatoona as seen from the top. Photo by me, September 2015.

 

Photo by me, September 2015.

Mount Oglethorpe

Photo by me, October 2015.

The day before Halloween, the fall weather was splendidly perfect. It was 2015, the sky was the deepest blue and the leaves were drenched in the electric peak fall color. That was the day I made my way out to and up Mount Oglethorpe.

Rising 3,288 feet above sea level Mount Oglethorpe is a historic place. The Appalachian Trail began  or ended atop the mountain depending on which way you hiked from 1937 to 1958. In 1958 it was robbed of that title and the trail began/terminated at Springer Mountain, Georgia henceforth. Prior to 1930 the mountain was known as Grassy Knob but it received the honor of being renamed after James Oglethorpe who was the founder of the British colony of Georgia in 1733.

Photo by me, October 2015.

Photo by me, October 2015.

With the name change and the loss of the Appalachian Trail the mountain had just become a pretty part of the mountainous landscape and transmission towers and wildlife were the only things taking in the view from the summit. Then in the spring of 2014 the mountain was reopened to the public as Eagle's Rest Park which covers 107 acres. Dedicated volunteers cleared areas, built viewing platforms and established a hiking trail network. Human life had returned to an important mountain in North Georgia.

The Atlanta skyline is just visible to the naked eye 50 miles to the south. Photo by me October 2015.

Incredible fall color that day. Photo by me, October 2015.

Mount Oglethorpe is situated in a unique location as the last significant peak in the Appalachian Mountain chain and where North Georgia becomes a wave of rolling hills to the south with only a few minor peaks. That location has the advantage of offering outstanding views in most every direction. It is one of the better summit views in the North Georgia mountains and one of the most accessible since you can drive to the top.

Photo by me, October 2015.

Looking down at Lake Petit on the left and Sconti Lake in Big Canoe. Photo by me, October 2015.

Driving out there is just as interesting as being there. Turning off Highway 136 a few miles east of Talking Rock you start on a narrow ridge at around 3,000 feet in elevation. The road becomes more narrow and twisty as you drive further and further out the ridge and over Sassafras Mountain to Oglethorpe. It's a slow drive with a few houses along the road clinging to the side of the ridge. There are points where the road opens up to inspiring views and then you reach Eagle's Rest Park. At the entrance you climb straight up the mountain road to the summit of Mount Oglethorpe. It is a fun drive and nothing something I would want to do in snow or ice.

An old stone building that sits at the top. Photo by me, October 2015.

Photo by me, October 2015.

Photo by me, October 2015.

Mount Oglethorpe is 76 miles by car due north of downtown Atlanta or 50 miles as the crow flies from the center of the city. It is well worth the drive to go see a view that not many people have seen in recent times. In addition to the hiking trails at the summit there are also other trails that cross the mountain and lead to other areas.

Renaissance Of The City Update

Renaissance Of The City, May 1965. Video capture.

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n November 2013  I wrote about a sculpture by Robert Helsmoortel called Renaissance Of The City that once was located on Peachtree Street in downtown. At some point the sculpture was removed and I haven't been able to locate it and wondered if it had been destroyed, sold or was sitting in a private collection or a city warehouse. I still haven't had any luck in locating the sculpture though I am still trying however, I have found out more on the history of it.

I have been able to locate a video of television news footage located in the University of Georgia archives that was taken the day of the installation on the street. The film is black and white 16mm and was shot on May 18th, 1965. Even though I may not know when and where the sculpture disappeared I have established the date of installation.

Here is the model they had on site that day for the installation.

 Robert Helsmoortel was on site the day of the installation. That is him standing there supervising the work, taking photos and wearing the black tie and coveralls.

 

Now for a sense of scale as to how large this sculpture was it was transported on the back of a flat bed tractor trailer truck.

It took a large crane to lift the pieces of the sculpture into place.

Then workers put the final touches on securing it into place in front of Peachtree Center.

How long it stayed there and what happened to the sculpture remains a mystery.

Flux Night 2015: Dream Is A Disaster

Where's the art? Photo by me, November 2015.

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few years ago I fell in love with Flux Night. Here is my warning that what I have to say of what has become of Flux Night is critical and not pleasant; even what we love must sometimes be critiqued.

There is no nice way to say it, but Flux Night 2015 was a disaster. Some will blame the weather and that it was pushed back a week and then on the rescheduled night it had rained earlier in the day, but that is an excuse. Even had the weather been absolutely perfect this event was a failure. There was so little to see, there was so little to do and trying to find any of the limited art was like trying to solve a riddle that could not be solved. 

Remember that Wendy's commercial from the 1980s that asked, "where's the beef?" That was Flux Night 2015.

 

I arrived with with an umbrella in case and was prepared to suffer through the rain if it returned since I loved Flux Night that much. The event was off from the beginning as Flux Night was a Castleberry Hill event that was meant to be in that neighborhood and not the Old Fourth Ward. Sure, flux means change, but not all changes are equal.

 

I found a volunteer, pretty easy to do in the sparse crowd, and was handed a guide to the night. She hit me up for a donation in a rather rude way and I said, "I'll be back by, let me see some art first."

People standing around with nothing to see. Photo by me, November 2015.

The organization behind Flux Night took a year off in 2014 to regroup and to focus on building a better Flux Night and then produced the worst Flux Night ever. There is an old saying that you 'don't fix what isn't broken' and that is exactly what happened here. Yes, events can evolve and grow, but you do not lose the key vision of what made an event special. Flux Night was a night of the arts on the streets of Atlanta. It was a night to celebrate our thriving artistic scene. What we saw in 2015 was a mess that was haphazard, ill-conceived and dull.

 

A curator was brought in from New York that had no connection and I mean none to the city of Atlanta or its history and culture and you got this lame event. One of the city's most historic neighborhoods is chosen to host and this was produced? This? Really? It was awful and insulting how far Flux Night had fallen. 

 

It was as if an outsider said this is what Atlanta is like; a tourist who comes and spends a day downtown and pretends to understand the place like a local. Atlanta does not need people from other places for validation or to tell us how it should be done. There is plenty of homegrown talent here. I am all for bringing in artists from outside the city, but to hand over the reigns and have someone with no connection to Atlanta be the curator is to betray the event and those that love it.

Cool inflatable something bro! Photo by me, November 2015.

Where was the art? I walked up and down Edgewood and Auburn Avenues and even with a map I kept asking that question. There was a little something here and a little something there, but mostly it was bored people wandering around wondering why they had come and what the hell happened to Flux Night. You had all this space on the street so why weren't you using it? Hardly any of the street was activated by art installations or performers. Food trucks are nice for a bite to eat or grab a beer, but they aren't art and I don't come to Flux to see food trucks. I come to Flux to see A-R-T.

Part of what made Flux Night great was the character of Castleberry Hill. Not to take away from the Old Fourth Ward/Edgewood, which I enjoy and it is the trendy neighborhood du jour, but Flux Night was best suited for Castleberry Hill surrounded by the old warehouses turned lofts. Moving Flux Night was akin to taking a rose and transplanting it into the arctic tundra.

 

Another aspect that made Flux Night special was that it was a nighttime event. Other than nightlife or sports, most city events are daytime ones. It was great to see people out wandering the streets taking in the arts under the night sky. It reminded me of an Atlanta event that I remember from New Year's Eve 1996 that was set in Midtown. It was called First Night. It was not necessarily about the arts, but it was a cultural alternative to fireworks and partying at night and on the streets of the city. It brought out people into what would have been otherwise dead streets.

I don't think they were on the schedule but decided to do a street performance and busk for money. They were more entertaining than a dead street. Photo by me, November 2015.

Another aspect of what made Flux Night special was that it was an overwhelming and exciting experience. You could turn a corner and be wowed by the next installation or performance or the humanity. It was about the unexpected. There was always so much to see, to do, to admire to be inspired by. There was a feeling of the unexpected and sometimes you had to stand there awhile and think about what you were seeing. Nothing from 2015 had that.

To repair Flux Night it needs to be local again, involve local artists, thinkers and performers and embrace what makes Atlanta unique. People that understand this city need to be running Flux Night and they need to bring life back into it and put it back in Castleberry Hill. Make it overwhelming again, make it exciting and unexpected again, but never ever do what was done in 2015.

Photo by me, November 2015.

This was the Yoko Ono installation. It was at least interactive and went along with the notion of world peace that she and John are known for however it was nothing more than a world map that you could stamp. Photo by me, November 2015.

A larger view of the Yoko Ono installation. Photo by me, November 2015.

Photo by me, November 2015.

This is where we went down into a mud hole on a vacant lot for something that was doing nothing until much later in the night.

Photo by me, November 2015.

Photo by me, November 2015.

Sparse crowds with nothing to do related to the event. 

 

Photo by me, November 2015.

The most interesting things I saw all night were the things that already make the Old Fourth Ward interesting, the old Fire Station number six and the King Center.

Photo by me, November 2015.

Photo by me, November 2015.

My face summed up how disappointing the night was from beginning to end.

Noccalula Falls

Noccalula Falls with a rainbow in its spray. Photo by me, March 2011.

Noccalula Falls is located in a park in the city of Gadsden, Alabama. It is said to be named after a Native American Indian princess but there is no historical evidence for such a person. It is a stunning waterfall to behold as the water plunges 90 feet over the rock edge. If you go at the right time you might capture a rainbow in the water spray at the base.

Photo by me, March 2011.

Black Creek is the source of the water for Noccalula Falls. As with any waterfall rainfall is going to be the determining factor as to how dramatic the water flow is going to be. I find that in the south the best times to go are in the winter and early spring when rainfall is more abundant.

Photo by me, March 2011.

This park is nicely done with a bridge over Black Creek right at the edge of the waterfall so you get a nice view and feel the intensity of the water rushing underneath you.

Photo by me, March 2011.

This is looking right over the precipice of the falls. There are massive boulders below and quite of bit of spray as Black Creek continues on through the hills of northeast Alabama.

In addition to the waterfall this park offers camping, hiking trails and a fort. Parking is free.

Little River Falls

Little River Falls. Photo by me, November 2007.

This is the prettiest waterfall in Alabama in my mind and it is easily accessible too. Little River Falls is located in the northeastern part of the state in the Little River Canyon National Preserve on Highway 35 between Gaylesville and Fort Payne. Out of the many natural wonders in the northern part of the state this is one I place at the top of the list.

Grace's High Falls

Grace's High Falls, Alabama. Photo by me, February 2008.

Fortunately for me when I visited in the dead of winter it had been a very wet start to the year. If it hadn't been so wet then I might not have seen this waterfall as it only flows over the cliff into Little River Canyon during times when there has been recent and steady rainfall.

Bucksnort To Enigma

If you grew up in North Georgia in the 1980s and watched any local news then you knew Leroy Powell. He was the only reporter on channel 5 or any station for that matter in Atlanta that had an authentic southern accent. His beat was that of a humorist and to produce human interest stories that reflected what we might not have realized then was the vanishing south. He had weekly segments and the occasional special that shared the common theme of life and the peculiarities associated with living in the south.

The towns in this video still have the same names from Arab to Tallapoosa but the people have changed in the past thirty years. Leroy mentions people in the south being gracious and it struck me how that's gone now. The Greatest Generation was a living embodiment of that graciousness be they black or white it was a natural disposition like a hereditary trait. The Boomers still carried some of this graciousness but it was a weakened characteristic, by the time Generation X came there were only scant traces and now Millennials would have to ask Siri what graciousness meant.

Today some people want to claim that the southern heritage is that ratty old Confederate flag but our heritage is in our grits our red eye gravy, RC Cola, the Claxton Fruitcake, our way of speaking, the stories we share like my grandfather that ran moonshine, the rotting home places that dot the back roads, the sap in the pine trees and in Georgia that iron-rich red dirt.

The evolution of our regional identity is now viewed through the frames of politics, the names on our subdivisions and served to us at Cracker Barrel on plates from Thailand. If you are lucky you might still have a living grandparent that can cook genuine southern food. The southern identity has become as faded as a washed out Drink Coca Cola mural on a falling down gas station at the crossroads in towns like Bucksnort and Enigma (yeah, I've been both places).   

I won't pretend that the story of the south is all sweet tea, barbecue, and see Rock City signs along the roadways. Our story includes the Trail of Tears, the slave markets in Charleston, the blood soaked soil of Chickamauga, the Edmund Pettus Bridge, civil rights workers murdered in Mississippi, Lester Maddox's axe handle, the nail bombs of Eric Rudolph and numerous other tragedies. We can't forget the terrible parts of the past but I do miss the graciousness that sewed the south together like that quilt that had been passed down from generation to generation.

Leroy died in 1999 at the age of 55 from cancer. In the modern landscape of local television news Leroy wouldn't have a career and that's a shame. There is not a news department budget in this city for this type of work and there's not an audience with the interest or attention span either. Leroy's work in the present is like that quaint old Zebco 33 reel hanging in the boathouse.  

The Movies Of 2015

It’s the Oscars tonight and here’s what I loved and hated on screen in 2015.

 

I don’t watch television but I do watch a lot of movies. I consider myself a film snob and some might think that’s elitist sounding, however it’s not intended that way. It just means I didn’t waste my time watching Star Wars Episode 5,631 because I was too interested in trying to watch every movie made by John Cassavetes - seriously go watch Love Streams and tell me it isn’t simultaneously the oddest and greatest film.

2015 wasn’t the greatest year for movies. There were only a few that were memorable and great and the rest were just good enough or awful. So 2015 was the year of ‘just good enough’ in regard to my favorites list. As far as the worst movies list of the year, well I enjoyed writing about them more than I did watching those movies .

 

If you like movies maybe you will see one listed here that you didn’t know about.

 

 

My 16 Favorite Movies of 2015

1. Carol - Even in a year when there weren’t many great movies if you were to take Carol and put it in a year with better competition it might still be the best movie that year as it was in 2015. The women (Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara & Sarah Paulson) in this cast had the best roles and performances of the year. Like The Danish Girl this film was beautifully shot from costumes to locations. That wasn’t 1950s New York you were seeing it was the architecturally underrated Cincinnati where it was filmed. This was easily the best movie of 2015.
2. 45 Years - This movie hurts you and that’s a great thing. 
3. Clouds of Sils Maria - Juliette Binoche can be in any film and I would watch it because she is that great of an actor. Her role is so rich in this movie and her performance is like peeling the layers of an onion only to discover it keeps going. Who knew Kristen Stewart could act? I certainly didn’t think she could until her role as Binoche’s assistant. Aside from a couple of odd and minor editing sequences that were sloppy, this movie is outstanding. Like a good movie should do, not every plot point is spelled out and you have to interpret a few things on your own and come to your own understanding of what happened. 
4. The Danish Girl - If awards were given for prettiest movie this would be the winner. It’s beautifully shot in a technical sense, the locations are stunning and the costumes are exquisite. The story has a few weak points but Eddie Redmayne is too good in his role just like Patrick Swayze was too good in To Wong Fu. Redmayne should win the Oscar but he probably won’t. 
5. The Lobster -This had to have been the most original concept for a movie I had seen in some time. I expected to hate it but I loved every second. The director of this movie, Yorgos Lanthimos, is the same director that brought you Dogtooth in 2009. Dogtooth was waaaaay out there but The Lobster is much more accessible. 
6. Hateful 8 - You either get Quentin Tarantino or you don’t. This movie was the funniest thing I saw in 2015. This movie isn’t politically correct and in the context of the film it is done to make a statement on stupidity and isn’t for comedic effect. There’s probably a large segment of the population that unfortunately laughed for the wrong reasons though. 
7. The Big Short - Brad Pitt in a smaller role actually makes him better. The idea behind this movie is take a complicated topic relating to finance and turn it into a comedy, of sorts. This movie is the American Hustle of 2015 which strangely enough stars Christian Bale too. It’s not great but it’s good enough in 2015 and then it will be largely forgotten by everyone. 
8. The Revenant - Shot only using natural light, now think about that for a second. It’s an epic journey in film making but a little weak in plot. After watching it you feel like you went on a journey. The landscape is a greater character than Leo Dicaprio and deserves an award more than he does. Grunting for an entire film reminds me that he hasn’t played a good role since he was a teenager. Sure, he’s a blockbuster name but he’s a modern cardboard cutout actor that directors paint their palette on and he brings nothing to his roles from within. It’s a big, grand experience of a movie and despite the flaws it has I enjoyed it. 
9. Boulevard - This is the last movie of Robin Williams. Oh, it’s a depressing film. It was overlooked by everyone. 
10. Spotlight - It has the quality of a made for tv movie, but hey there’s the talented Mark Ruffalo and the suddenly resurrected Michael Keaton.
11. Nasty Baby - A movie with a unique name and a dramatic and dark plot twist. 
12. Goodnight Mommy - A German film that was the talk of indie and foreign film circles last fall and deservedly so. If you pay attention closely you will figure it out. 
13. Ex Machina - Artificial intelligence movies are becoming a trend again but this one is good enough. Under The Skin was a darker, more subversive AI movie that came out in 2014 and I liked it better. Still, 2015 was a poor year for movies so Ex Machina makes the cut this year. 
14. Brooklyn Bizarre - A very indie film set in the hipster Bushwick neighborhood of Brooklyn. It’s a low-budget production but the acting and character’s arcs pull it off. 
15. Mistress America - I’m a sucker for Noah Baumbach movies and yes, this was basically a sequel in disguise for the dearly loved Frances Ha - it just wasn’t quite as good and was in color. The movie is funny, not as lighthearted as it appears and does kind of go raging over a cliff once it leaves Manhattan for Connecticut but that appears to be on purpose. Baumbach reminds me of Woody Allen in a good way.
16. Life - This movie made no year-end lists for 2015 but it should have. The life of James Dean has been explored over and over but this movie focuses on the true story of a photographer trying to do a photo spread with Dean for Life Magazine. The movie is largely set in New York and Indiana (thankfully very little of Hollywood) and portrays Dean in a way you might not expect just before his fatal car crash. 

Honorable Mentions: Truth, Tangerine, What Happened Miss Simone, Amy, The Wolfpack

The Worst Movies of 2015

These movies are insults to movies and the audiences that watch them.

Crimson Peak - I was more disappointed in this movie than any movie of the year. I had such high expectations going into it and then within the first few minutes I knew exactly where it was going and it wasn’t going to end well. This movie was The Babadook of 2015 (but worse) in how you wanted to love it but you just couldn’t lie to yourself like that. I figured out the plot in the first ten minutes so that removed any mystery for me and then I kept hoping it would give me some sense of horror or suspense or even creepiness but it couldn’t even manage those things either. This was so bad compared to director Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth which he wrote and directed in 2006. Pan’s Labyrinth doesn’t even seem like it was by the same person because it was so good compared to Crimson Peak, it had everything that Crimson Peak was missing.

Bridge Of Spies - It’s a Spielberg movie so that automatically qualifies it for this list. Spielberg never leaves anything to the imagination of the audience. He feels like you are too dumb to think for yourself so he directs in a heavy-handed, patronizing, manipulative way where he must spell everything out for you in big bold letters. Where the touch of a feather would be better for making a point he always reaches for the hammer to smash it into your head. Spielberg has never possessed any subtlety. Director Terry Gilliam says it best about how stupid Spielberg movies are. Bridge of Spies stars Tom Hanks and there isn’t a more safe and banal actor in the world than Tom Hanks (see everything he’s ever acted in except maybe Philadelphia) so he is perfect casting for this movie. It was nice however to see Alan Alda get a role in a movie.

Irrational Man - Woody Allen hasn’t made a good film in a very, very, very long long time. Match Point in 2005 was his last decent movie and Midnight In Paris was a complete waste. His last movie that was very good was Manhattan Murder Mystery in 1993. Before he gets too old to make movies I keep hoping he will make something worthy of his best work like Manhattan, Annie Hall, Interiors, Husbands and Wives, or Hannah and Her Sisters. New York used to be a central character in his movies and without the city he just makes average films that are lacking. Irrational Man could have been a good movie but it was shallow and once again featured an older man becoming inappropriately involved with a much younger female; a theme that has become all too common in Woody Allen movies and given his own personal life this seems creepy. The male lead is played by Joaquin Phoenix who displays the only two methods he has in his acting repertoire: being asleep or being crazy (see the strange The Master or the bad Her ). The only highlight in this movie was Parker Posey who’s character and her acting make this movie worth watching, sadly her character isn’t developed enough. Posey deserves to be in more movies and she does have more films in production including another Allen movie in 2016. Finally some of the dialogue was as poorly written as a 1980s after school special, I was cringing at the scene in the diner.

Concussion - While this was an important film for its subject matter it couldn’t seem to simply stay focused on that. It instead went meandering off on a love story and couldn’t decide what it wanted to be. It was a mess of a script with science, football, love and real life footage of games tossed into a blender. Yet, none of those topics were presented well enough in this film to make it interesting.

The Intern - Robert De Niro was once a fine actor that chose roles wisely. Now he is a man that thinks comedic roles are his forte and he’s wrong about that. These are roles that even Tony Danza would turn down if he could. He’s become stuck in a rut of playing in movies that have cheesy, brain-dead scripts and are as fluffy as cotton candy. This was the most condescending movie of 2015. It was so trite, cliche and had such stereotypical characters I felt insulted by it.

A Walk In The Woods - This movie was mostly filmed in Atlanta and North Georgia. It was nice seeing Burkharts and The Colonnade make cameos but this movie was complete dreck. The casting was terrible as Robert Redford and Nick Nolte were way too senior to play these roles based on the book. Casting these two changed what the plot was about and the jokes centering around these two being too old to hike the Appalachian Trail were so cornball it was ridiculous. Nick Nolte is in such bad health that you thought he was going to die on screen and you need subtitles to understand a word he says. The greatest laugh I had was when they were supposed to be trapped on a ledge at the old quarry in NW Atlanta and the set was so fake and poorly done it looked like a high school play production. This movie didn’t even try to be mediocre.

The Walk - Let’s take a fascinating true story, hire a decent leading actor, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and make a huge joke of a movie. From the opening scene of Gordon-Levitt standing atop a cartoonish Statue of Liberty, director Robert Zemeckis decides that he isn’t going to take this subject seriously and wants to throw every cent of his special-effects budget at this. Having a different director with a different vision would have made this into an okay movie and Gordon-Levitt tries his best to save it but he can’t overcome all the bad directing decisions. The movie is based on Philippe Petit, a French tight rope walker that dreams to walk a high wire spanning the two original World Trade Center towers just before they are opened to the public in 1974. The movie begins with the preparations and planning in Paris and follows it through to the execution of that plan. It could have been an exciting drama as the material was there but Zemeckis ruined it.

Knight Of Cups - Even Cate Blanchett in her prime couldn’t save this existential, self-indulgent movie about a man in a mid-life crisis. I’m a fan of long and sweeping camera shots but not constantly for two hours. What the plot consists of is Christian Bale either having sex or jumping into a body of water (pools and the ocean) repeatedly with a comatose stare on his face. Maybe that stare was his reaction to agreeing to be in this movie. Knight Of Cups directed and written by Terrence Malick is what you get when Hollywood tries to do a film that wants to edgy and arty. I am assuming people must have owed Malick favors as to the only reason they would be in this as the amount of irrelevant cameos is amazing - even Fabio is seen walking around in the background of one scene... Fabio. The humor in this movie would be in how much the studio lost in making it. Sometimes really awful movies will years later become cult favorites, well this is so bad it won’t even achieve that.

Love - Well this French movie was controversial I can say it had that going for it. The controversy was that all of the sex in the movie was real and not simulated and that’s true. This movie was all about sex from beginning to end with the three main characters and the plot was a thin wrapper of a contraceptive that mainly served as a device to film as many sex scenes as you could into a two hour and fifteen minute movie. That much real sex or even simulated sex gets boring quickly if there’s no story. The trailer makes the movie seem more interesting than it really is.

Stonewall - This is the absolute worst movie in many, many, many, many years. One of the first lines spoken in this movie is, “I got you all figured out.” Yep, that says all you need to know about this All-American blonde haired cliche. How someone could take the historic Stonewall Riot and reduce it to this pep rally is unforgivable. I hope everyone involved in this tragedy of epic failure never makes another movie.