screen |skr_n| |skrin| |skri_n| noun • a blank, typically white or silver surface on which a photographic image is projected : the world's largest movie screen • movies or television; the motion-picture industry : she's a star of the stage as well as the screen. verb [ trans. ] • protect (someone) from something dangerous or unpleasant • evaluate or analyze (something) for its suitability for a particular purpose or application


Saturday, July 12, 2008

The Love Guru

First, let me explain why I saw this. The plan was to see Journey to the Center of the Earth. But when we got to our seats (reserved seating) there were two old ladies sitting there. We told the ushers we didn’t mind sitting in the old lady’s seats, we just needed their ticket stubs. They don’t have them. So when we go sit in their seats, people show up to tell us we’re in the wrong seats. Cut to: 10 minutes later, the ushers running around trying to find us tickets and finally we say, “Fuck it.” We get our money back and Arclight gives us a free movie for our trouble. The only thing starting soon that we hadn’t seen was The Love Guru. So…

I don’t know what to say. It was terrible. But on the positive side, it did help remind me how important the ol’ Joseph Campbell, hero’s journey archetypes are. Basic storytelling: Create a hero, upset their ordinary world, and make them want something. If Mike Meyers and company had followed some of the simplest rules of storytelling, instead of making the Love Guru an unsympathetic, unfunny, narcissistic prick, than they might not have perpetrated the catastrophe they managed to.

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