Good Night, Sweet Grieco

The Dark Times come fast, my friends. One day you're a telephone psychic and on top of the world, the next day your wife leaves you, she gets shot, you lose your job, and your cat dies. You find yourself living in a cold, bitter wasteland, sleeping on the floor of a furnitureless apartment with nothing but porn, pizza, and the occasional boneless wing to get you through.

Things reach rock bottom for you one early morning at around 4:00 AM. You're walking down the street to the gas station for a pack of smokes and a can of Power Horse when a man easily twice your size grabs you. He says something like, “Give me six fucking dollars.” You know you only have a $20 in your wallet, and that's like a week's worth of food, and there's no way he's getting it. He grabs you again as you try to walk on, and he keeps yelling about six fucking dollars. This time, he doesn't let go of you. There's no way you're giving him the $20, though, so you start talking to him. Soon, you talk him out of mugging you by convincing him that you are as miserable as he is, you hate this place as much as he does, and your woman walked out just like his did. You make him laugh, talk about how things are better in the South, and tell him to come with you to the store. Once you get change from the smokes and the Power Horse, you'll give him the $6.00 he needs. He walks with you, you give him some cash, he says “God Bless You,” and wishes you better days ahead. You do the same, and then walk home. As you crack open your Power Horse, recline on your blanket-bed, and start talking to your one remaining cat, a part of your ceiling collapses. The City, like the house in The Amityville Horror, is telling you to get out.

Eventually, you make it to warmer climes, and the Dark Times slowly give way to the Gray Times. There's less porn, but the pizza isn't nearly as good and you still can't really find a job. You work in a call center, grade standardized tests, and then decide to sell Kias for a living. The man who interviewed you told you he drops more at the titty bar on a Friday night than you make in a month, so you figure it's gotta be great. I mean, you always wanted to sell fucking Kias, didn't you? Of course, you bail before your first day, and commit to another stint of unemployment. But then, you discover that some people will pay you to write from home, which is perfect, because you like to write and you hate wearing pants that aren't flannel.

You meet a lovely girl and the Gray Times start to pass, and you find yourself working from home and watching a lot of bad movies. One day, you decide you'll write about these bad movies, so the People (or your six friends) will also know about them. After some time, you send some of the stuff you've written about these bad movies to a guy, and he says he is willing to pay you decent money to write blogs for a living. You still get to work from home, so you still get to watch many, many bad movies.

After some more time, a company reads some of your stuff and convinces you to move back to your hometown and settle in for a job that will require you to wear real pants as well as write, edit, and manage some blogs. You do it, leaving the bad movies behind. You bitch about it a lot, but you know deep down it's the coolest job you've ever had, and there are moments when you catch yourself with your feet up on your desk, staring out the window of your office at the Dallas skyline, and you think, “In some fucked up way, if it weren't for Grieco, I would never have gotten to where I am right now.”

Thank you all. I couldn't have done it without you. Goodbye.

--#5

A Collection of Griecos

Over the last year while I was totally dropping the GIK ball, I would catch pieces of movies, read descriptions on the Guide, and see previews that made me think of Grieco and how I needed to get back to it. Of course, I failed. However, before Grieco and I ride off into the sunset, I want you to know about some of these pictures, so that you may see them and tell others of their Glory.

Voyage of the Unicorn
Beau Bridges stumbles around looking utterly bewildered in this mind-blowing made-for-TV LOTR-Potter-Land of the Lost attempt. Even the simplest line is spoken with pure wonderment, like when Beau and family gaze upon a plastic bluish rock and say, “amaaaazing.” Oh, and it’s four hours long. (3 ½-Griecos)

Left Behind 3: World at War
I’m guessing it’s the greatest installment of the greatest GIK series of all time. Lou Gossit, Jr. joins the cast as the President of the United States, Kirk Cameron is still rocking it as GNN correspondent Buck Williams, and the world is totally at war with the Antichrist, Nickolai Carpathia. I will miss you most of all Left Behind movies. (4-Griecos)

Atomic Twister
Amazing title. Mark-Paul Gosselaar as Deputy Jake Hannah. A must-see. (3 ½-Griecos)

All Things Sci-Fi
Don’t think for a second that the Sci-Fi Channel has stopped turning out gems just because GIK stopped covering them. I caught a preview for Ogre the other night while I was watching a bold modern-day Pterodactyl piece. Preview and movie both awesome. (3 ½-Griecos all around.)

I am Legend
OK, this film goes way beyond Grieco, but I have to talk about it. BTS was fired up about it over Christmas, and he told me I had to see it. I wasn’t sold on the idea, but the lovely Sherpa and I finally got around to checking it out at the dollar-movie last week. BTS was totally right. I loved it. Bold as shit. Had dreams about it for three straight nights.

The pictures are out there, people. Keep the dream alive!

Oh Grieeeeco…I’m dy---ing.

Have We Met Before, Monsieur?

So, this it. We're down to our final three posts. Let's not dwell on the past or focus on the sadness of it all. Instead, let's act as though we are young attractive characters in a movie who have just found out that they will die in three months, so they choose to embrace all the Joy in the world and live each day to its fullest, helping those around them to do the same in the process. Like Campbell Scott in Dying Young, Ali MacGraw in that horrible Love Story, Winona Ryder in Richard Gere is Way too Fucking Old to be My Love Interest, or that guy in that other thing.

On that note, here we go...

Deja Vu
A few weeks ago, I had to go to LA for work (yep, I used to work at home in my pajamas and now I have to fly places for the job. It's fucked up and sad.). On my flight back to Dallas, I cracked open my trusty portable DVD player and put in a movie my mom gave me for Christmas. It was Deja Vu, starring Denzel, the Jewish kid from Dazed and Confused, a hot chick, and a doughy Val Kilmer. It honestly took me a second to realize the man in the over-sized suit was, in fact, Kilmer, but once he brought out the acting chops I was sure.

Deja Vu involves a steamboat explosion, some cops, and the most tenuous time-travel plot/device (not plot device, mind you) you have ever seen. Seriously, I know how whenever you start thinking about a time-travel movie the physics of it all kind of breaks down, but at least the good ones adhere to some set of rules they've established. Other than Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, which is awesome and totally breaks it's own rules for all the right reasons (remember “Remember a trashcan,” anyone?). Anyway, Deja Vu is all over the place time-travel wise. It involves some FBI geniuses and a wormhole and a helmet with a camera mounted on it. For real, there is a helmet-cam that gives you a window into the past.

So, Denzel gets mixed up with Kilmer's rag-tag group of time-traveling agent/scientists and tries to save a dead girl that his time traveling may or may not have caused to die. There are some bold multi-time car chases and some sexy shower scenes, and a lot of Denzel doing his laughing and acting earnest at the same time thing. You know, where he has a toothpick in his mouth, but he's still kind of serious.

Alright, so Denzel has just broken through to the past for real, and he's tracking a killer/bomber and trying to save the dead/live girl, and-- “return your tray tables to their bla bla bla fuck you if you're watching Deja Vu, you're not going to get to finish it...”

The shit landed. I was actually mad about it. This movie was the perfect plane ride picture. Sure, it made no sense and Kilmer seemed bored at best (hopped up at worst), but it was still kind of awesome. I was way into it. Not into it enough to have actually finished it over the past three weeks, but still way into it. I give it 3-Griecos. Could have gone 3 ½, but even Timeline made more sense scientifically speaking.

Alas, poor Grieco! I knew him Horatio: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy