Buena Park

There reached a point when I was living in Chicago when everyday became pretty much exactly the same as the one before. I was unemployed at the time, and it wasn’t one of those I’m-really-excitied-and-optimistic-about-the-prospect-of-finding-a-new-job kinds of unemployment. It was more like an I-can’t-believe-I-couldn’t-get-a-job-working-the-front-counter-at-a-fucking-cleaners kind of unemployment. If you’ve never been there, I’ll try to illuminate the situation. You reach the point where you get beaten down so much that you basically give up and you start to revel in the unemployed lifestyle. Sure, you’re totally broke and a little bit suicidal, but you know that regardless of what happens during the day, you don’t have to do a damn thing, and that’s comforting. Anyway, my days during this period (and this was a very long period) began at around 4:00 or 5:00 in the afternoon. I had started going to bed at 9:00 AM, so things got turned around pretty quickly. I would start the day by looking through the “help wanted” sections of the papers and circling jobs that I had absolutely no intention of following up on. Then my mom would call, and I’d tell her I had some good prospects. Then, if it wasn’t too late I’d try to catch the last couple of innings of the Cubs day game. A couple days of the week, my friends would stop by to make sure I hadn’t gone completely insane, but you know they had to work and be a part of humanity and stuff, so there were many nights I didn’t see anyone. I’d head out on my nightly quest for pizza (sweet Bojonno’s) and porn. Yep, ‘cause no matter how broke you are, you can always dig up money for a slice and some porn. Well, one of these nights as I walked home with pizza in my hand and adult entertainment shamefully hidden in my backpack, I was stopped when I got to my street. One look at the guy’s neck and his white polo-style shirt told me he was a security guard. At first, I thought they had outlawed porn and they’d finally caught up with me. Pissed that I would be going to jail and that I would never know how the intriguing “H.R. Muff n’ Stuff” series would turn out, I thought about making a run for it. Then, I pulled myself together and remembered that security guards can’t arrest you for porn. Except perhaps in Arkansas. God, I hate that state.

“Where you goin’?” The security guard asked.
“Home,” I said.
“Where’s that?”

I pointed to my sweet pad down the street, and he nodded as if to give me permission to continue walking. He then proceeded to follow me to the door of my apartment building. As I walked, I noticed trucks filled with lights, dudes running chords everywhere, and a crafts service station. Then I remembered, they were filming Dragonfly on my block and sweet Kevy Costner was only a few doors away.

Dragonfly
Dragonfly starts out with a heavy Mothman feel. Costner’s pregnant wife dies while trying to bring some much needed doctorin’ to the needy and the indigenous tribes of somewhere in South America, and her body is never found. Costner, a doctor too, starts receiving messages from beyond via his wife’s former-children-cancer-patients-who-have-had-near-death- experiences. These spunky dying little ones, it seems, cross over on a regular basis, and when they return from the Other Side to their beds in a made up Chicago hospital they start drawing strange pictures (sadly not of a mothman) and telling Costner that his wife needs to speak to him. Meanwhile, Costner starts losing his mind back in my old neighborhood. Kathy Bates (go SMU Mustangs!) tries to help him with her wisdom and bizarre haircut, but nothing seems to work. Not even the parrot he lives with can help him out. Some creepy stuff kind of happens, but it’s never really creepy enough. Eventually, Costner meets up with a nun who knows what’s what. The nun is played by the incomparable Linda Hunt, whom you may remember as Ilsa Grunt in a picture I like to call If Looks Could Kill starring Richard effing Grieco. Anyway, eventually with the help of the nun and some of his rafting buddies, Costner tracks down the place where his wife died, and a spirit-vision he has as he’s drowning leads him to the the village of an ancient tribe where he finds….wait for it…his daughter. Yep, the tribe saved the unborn baby from its mother’s womb and raised it until her dead spirit could lead Costner back to it. Just take a second for that to sink in. OK. Got it? You know, I should’ve seen it coming, but I told by myself no way are they going to trot the freaking baby out. Maybe his wife’s body, or some dragonfly bullshit, because his wife had a dragonfly-shaped birthmark don't you know, but the baby? Please. I can’t even---goddamnit how does this crap get made?!

Sorry. While Dragonfly does have the gaping plot holes of The Mothman Prophecies, it lacks Indrid Cold, and without Indrid what’s the point? Oh, and it’s not scary at all, unless you’re kind of freaked out by parrots, which I kind of am because, you know, they can talk. Anyway, I’m giving it 2-Griecos (see ratings). The ending is so ridiculous it almost makes the movie worth watching, but unfortunately Costner’s not as bas as he usually is (of course he’s not good either), so it’s kind of disappointing. Ultimately, I'm giving the movie an extra 1/2-Grieco because it made me miss Chicago’s Buena Park neighborhood, and I didn’t think anything could ever do that. Go Cubs, and give my love to the lady who smells of piss and wears black lipstick all over her face.