Jeremy Scott – Homeschool Mom Movie Mavin – Type "AUDIO" into the search box for AUDIO version. And remember…EDUCATION DOESN'T HAVE TO ALWAYS COME FROM A BOOK

KUDOS TO CINEMASINS FOR BREAKING THE FOURTH WALL TO SAVE LIVES

Jeremy Scott, the primary narrator at CinemaSins about whom I have written in another post created the persona of someone who enjoys finding every possible trivia sin and piccadillo in every movie he reviews. The videos are primarily for fun, occasionally somewhat bawdy, often profane, frequently very funny, but the result is always insightful. He spends 15 or so minutes showing video clips which point out clichés, newspaper text which has nothing to do with the headlines being used for exposition, wildly incorrect timers, continuity goofs, historical anachronisms, just plain bad acting or terrible CGI, and his two FAVORITE sins – too many opening credit logos and narration which substitutes for plot. And he rarely condemns politely, which is part of his humor schtick. This is a site for older mature teens and up, certainly. But his commentary, while biting, is usually both quite accurate and mostly played for laughs

However, during his “Everything Wrong With A Star is Born” send up video, after he does his usual nit picky comic but precise routine, he calls out the movie’s plot for its attempts to paint the lead male character’s suicide “…as almost chivalrous, and I’m just never getting on board with that.”

Well, Jeremy, neither am I. And good for you. As I pointed out in my post: “A Star is Born: Masterful Variation on an Inherently Dissonant Theme” I make a similar argument against lionizing this behavior.

Jeremy THEN does something that in the hundreds of his videos he has never done before, he breaks the “Fourth Wall” – that barrier between the audience and himself which maintains the suspension of disbelief. Jeremy Scott posts a great big notice for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline and their phone number.

This was an admirable and bold move in a culture of death which has even rationalized the wholesale savage slaughter of unborn infants. He has opened himself up to criticism but it will certainly not come from me.

Thank you Jeremy.

Your instincts are good and this is one of the many things on the list of what I would call Everything Right with CinemaSins.

CINEMASINS – CRITIQUING THE CRITIQUERS

SHORT TAKE:

CinemaSins (sic) are short Youtube-available videos detailing humorous and accurate analyses of cinematic flaws in post-theater run movies, (on DVD or streaming). Armed with scathing, pointed audio critique while showing movie clips, nothing, from the worse cinematic flops to the most beloved and respected classics, is safe from their sarcastic, persnickety and hilarious exams.

WHO SHOULD WATCH:

I can only recommend these shorts for adults because of Jeremy's penchant for language and frequent frat house humor delivered with wit dry enough for James Bond's martini. But for mature people they are both attentively eye-opening and acerbically funny.

AND IF YOU LIKE THESE REVIEWS PLEASE SUBSCRIBE! THEN YOU'LL GET EVERY NEW REVIEW SENT STRAIGHT TO YOUR E-MAIL!!

GO TO THE BOTTOM OF THE LEFT HAND SIDE AND TYPE YOUR E-MAIL IN – IT (SHOULD BE) THAT EASY. ANY PROBLEMS PLEASE SEND ME A COMMENT AND I'LL DO MY BEST TO RESOLVE YOUR ISSUE.

LONG TAKE:

We homeschooled six kids from kindergarten through high school. The last one born is 10 years younger than the oldest. So between the children, their friends and a constant stream of pets, when I say we were outnumbered ….. I MEAN it!! We tried to keep a household with a well-defined set of reasonable rules. One of those rules was that, when you BROKE a rule, if you could make Mom laugh, you would get in less trouble.

This applies, I think, to my favorite fellow reviewer, Jeremy Scott of CinemaSins. He and his buddy Chris Atkinson have a six year library of movie reviews, starting with a castigation of The Amazing Spidermanthen branching out to music videos. Jeremy narrates against a background of film clips demonstrating his complaints, accompanied by a "ding" counter which tallies the sins. The short videos are free and available on the CinemaSins Youtube channel, and to date number 590, with at least one new one added per week.

The video reviews run anywhere from two to 30 minutes long, but are for adults only, spiced as they are with liberal amounts of raunchy off-color jokes and profanity. Normally, I strongly disapprove of content with unnecessary swearing and CERTAINLY do not approve of the innuendo filled throw away lines referencing strip club dances and personal body parts. HOWEVER, I must admit to a soft spot for Jeremy's patter, nonetheless, because, not only is he unerring in his observations but he is very very funny.

And I feel like I owe Jeremy a shout out. My one-way association with this glib contemporary pundit has been useful and educational to me personally. When writing stage plays or film scripts now, I have taken to wondering what would Jeremy say if this were ever produced. He has made me very aware of what he rightly and regularly identifies as "sins" and I genuinely think this has made me a better writer (or at least a less egregious one).

WhiIe, as I mentioned, he also "sins" music videos, my preference is for his movie reviews, so I will confine myself to them. They are, more often than not, extremely well researched, and detailed down to the obscure and arcane.

Though they mostly do kids movies, slasher films and almost every sci-fi, no movie is off limits. They also do classics, musicals, and serious films, even occasionally going where any other critic would fear to tread.I admire his chutzpah.

But by Jeremy's own admission it is all a front, a character he plays. He says he imagines a grouchy curmudgeon who just likes to sit and pick at movies. But in reality he LOVES movies and it is all intended for good natured laughs. To prove this they have even "sinned" themselves.

Be aware, fellow cinephiles, that Jeremy – or his caricature curmudgeon – is predisposed against mushiness. So anything smacking of long talky heart-on-your-sleeve moments will get a "sin" ding as Jeremy announces: "Skip!"

While anything from a continuity goof (such as a stain appearing and disappearing on a shirt in the same scene) to an inaccurate date reference to a historic event can attract the ire of his sin counter, he has certain pet peeves.

The predictable penaltied piccadillos include: narration, long and multitudinous production credit logos at the beginning of movies, cinematic cliches, unexplained character inconsistencies, andarticles in expositional newspapers that cheat using text that has nothing to do with the headlines.

Jeremy uses a number of short hand references for other oft recurring offenses, and each occasion will acquire at least one "sin":

"Gone to the Prometheus School of running away from things" – means running in a straight line away from something, from which you could easily evade by swerving right or left.

Shooting like a stormtrooper – meaning they couldn't hit the broad side of a barn even if they were leaning against one.

Eating an apple is interpreted as an attempt by the director to identify the masticator as an "a**hole," explained in a tweet that this connection seemed natural to them because of Adam and Eve.

Belabored and unnecessary location captions printed on shots that already have a wealth of identifying visual imagery.

Scenes where characters emerge from falls, beatings, and explosions without major injury, also known as "He survived that," sins.

And AH – the Pronoun Game – where someone gratuitously substitutes a pronoun (he, she, it, they) for a common name (daughter, chair, sun room) or a proper name (Fred, Statue of Liberty, Mississippi River), as a clumsy set up for a "surprise" or misunderstanding or jump scare or comic confusion.

He HAS been known to DEDUCT sins as well, such as at the end of Monsters, Inc. when sins are removed for the scene when Sully visits Boo and she says "kitty". As he puts it, he's "not made of stone". But those reductions are few and far between.

I do not always agree with him. For example I thought he missed the entire point of The Greatest Showman, focusing on Barnum's personal flaws and not accounting for the historical context. And Jeremy complained at length about Mama Mia, the MUSICAL having too much music. But this could just be part of his character's "curmudgeonliness". As a friend of mine and I have discovered during the span of a dozen years' worth of emails, when communicating exclusively by computer, it can be very hard to distinguish between sarcasm and misunderstanding .

Either way, I completely respect the CinemaSins adherence to an established set of criteria, despite the fact it is often punctuated with the occasional angry profanity and the high school level sexual joke inuendo.

Jeremy's attention to detail is occasionally astonishing. He will go to the trouble of pausing, enlarging and reading the entire newspaper which only flashes in front of an audience for a few seconds, in order to determine if the content is consistent with the advertised headline. He will measure the length of screen time that actually elapses during a countdown or someone holding their breath to determine if the announced period of time is accurate.

His breadth of knowledge of film is impressive, with references dating back to at least as far back as Donald O'Connor.

All this work has paid off handsomely as CinemaSins enjoys quite a bit of success. As of January 11, 2018, according to Wikipedia.org the CinemaSins channel has 7.4 MILLION subscribers and has had 2.1 BILLION hits. Jeremy and his co-conspirator, Chris, admitted, during an interview, to having tried a number of YouTube channel gimmicks before hitting upon this one six years ago. The interview took place about 4 years ago, just as CinemaSins was finding its legs and audience. The interviewer asked them if they were making any money at it. Jeremy's response was to smile like a Cheshire Cat and say that he and his friend had quit their other jobs and now did this full-time.

Jeremy was also asked if he ever ran into any push back from the filmmakers of the movies or challenges on copyright infringement issues. Jeremy said that, on the contrary, he often received favorable responses from the filmmakers who agreed with him, admitting to flaws in their films which occurred from lack of time, budget, access to talent or simply an oversight on their part. Once again, laughter being quite an effective panacea, in this case for the pain of the critique.

My favorite reviews are of movies I either personally loved, like The Hobbit, or hated, like Assassin's Creed, either exposing hitherto unnoticed flaws or reinforcing my own opinion. But all of the videos are quick, witty, and perceptive.

But as brilliant as Jeremy is, there are few places I can recommend him because of the language and "close to the knuckle" jokes he makes. I have oft noted I believe use of profanity stems from a lack of creativity. CinemaSins is entertaining, cleverly written, astute and intelligently droll DESPITE those flaws. (Maybe I should do a "ding" count for him for every unnecessary obscenity he uses.)

So to paraphrase Joe Harper in A Midwinter's Tale who gently chided a fellow gifted but insecure actor for leaning a might too heavily on his drinking: Don't cuss Jeremy…you don't need it.

Interstellar – Too Much Empty Space and Not Just Between Planets

Interstellar is an interesting movie. Faint praise, perhaps, but it had so many ups and downs that reviewing it I feel like Tevya in Fiddler on the Roof – on the one hand —, but on the other hand —, but then on the other hand —. To start with the basics, the acting is – if not stellar (sorry, couldn’t resist) then excellent.

Matthew McConaughey (a name along with Rhys Ifans I can never get right off the top of my head) plays Cooper, a once pilot now farmer on an ecologically dying planet Earth.

Now – you see here, right at the start I have an issue with this. They never explain WHY Earth is supposedly dying. Plus the fact that, contrary to the goof balls in the Flat Earth Global Warming cult, there’s not a blessed thing we could do to destroy Earth permanently even if we all tried — real — hard. I wish we COULD influence the meteorological balance that much because had we that much power we could stop the many MANY hurricanes I have lived through.

ANYway – taking a deep breath and accepting the dumb premise (which my brother always calls a McGuffin – the “thing” that propels the story but which isn’t in and of itself necessarily very important and could be substituted for something else – as here it could have been diseased humans, alien invasion or a zombie apocalypse and the story COULD have played out about the same) I note the acting is quite good — and even distracts you from the ridiculous McGuffin.

Anne Hathaway, whose acting skill rocketed in my esteem exponentially having been blown away by her Fantine in Les Mis, plays Amelia, lady astronaut and daughter of one Professor Brand, played by Michael Caine (whose presence would have made this movie palatable even WERE the McGuffin about a zombie apocalypse). Brand thinks there is a way to save Earth BUT, given the time it will take and the risks of failure involved and what is at stake (the future of all humanity and its culture, blah, blah) he sends Amelia, Cooper, some fertilized eggs, the summation of culture of Earth and a variety of red shirts (Star Trek fans will know what I mean) TO INFINITY AND BEYO—- oh wait wrong movie.

OK now I have to stop being so snarky.

If you access Everything Wrong with Interstellar on Youtube you will get a hilarious verbal map of plot holes large enough to fly the Starship Enterprise through – but you will ALSO get some scientific points on gravity and its effects which Interstellar got RIGHT. Now – be advised Jeremy Scott has a habit of using very salty adjectives. Many are pointlessly asterisked and bleeped out – pointless because it is quite obvious what that word is supposed to be. And frankly I wish he would use more family friendly and creative alternatives (there is a book available of Shakespearean insults, for example AND the movies dating back before the 60’s usually managed quite well without MOST of what we hear now as expletives) because it is this one unfortunate attribute that prevents me from recommending these Youtube videos more often.

For Everything Wrong with Interstellar Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson does a guest spot-co-host for this Youtube video and points out what they DID do correctly. Which brings me to the positives. The visuals are absolutely stunning. They feature both a frozen planet and a planet “near” a black hole and what those worlds might be like. Both planets are shown as shocking and terrifying and gorgeous all at once. (Great places to visit maybe but ——-) There are also some visuals concerning a fifth dimension which is dumb in concept, completely and illogically paradoxical and really cool looking all at the same time.

As for the language in Interstellar itself there is one use of each of the two worst of the profanities and a very small sprinkling of the lesser offenders. For more detail check out Screen-it on Interstellar. (You have to be a member to access all the info but it is definitely worth the $7.95/month OR $47/year. There are dozens of times a year I am quite happy to have had the subscription – they give good reviews and almost agonizing detail on everything from “jump scene” content to scary music, profanity and issues to discuss after.) No sex, but some very disturbing family issues appropriate enough to an end-of-world cataclysm movie. So who you think appropriate for this movie should be considered carefully.

BUT ———

I have seen the world and it is hollow (apologies to Star Trek for this rough paraphrase*):

While the science is fun, the visuals outstanding, the acting quite good and the overall idea of the story make it quite entertaining, I have one really big problem with the movie. In all the catastrophe going on, no one seeks any comfort in religion. This is both religiously biased and extremely unlikely. Personally I’d be heading for the nearest priest, but even for the agnostics and atheists – well, as my Dad used to say, there are NO atheists in fox holes and the whole world in this movie is IN one big fox hole. And while it is reasonable to believe that there could be some hold outs, I would say that inasmuch as the vast majority of the Earth’s population believes in a Supreme Being, that there would be SOME theological expressions. But – nope – their god is science. If you have enough of it we can: save the world, or at least save humanity, or seed the cosmos with our genes or—- whatever. That as long as our fertilized eggs are still around with a copy of the Mona Lisa then all’s right with the — Universe.

This made an otherwise, at least INTERESTING movie, to me feel quite hollow and empty as —- as —- as well, what is in Interstellar space.

And HEY – I think I wrote this one without a single important spoiler!!

I was referencing the title of the eighth episode of the third season of the original series: “For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky” —–OK, OK, it seemed like a close paraphrase to me at the time!!!