SOLE SURVIVOR

1. Hanna Montana The Movie/Disney Wknd/$ 34.0 Total/$ 34.0
2. Fast and Furious/Universal Wknd/$ 28.8 Total/$ 118.0
3. Monsters Vs. Aliens/DreamW Wknd/$ 22.6 Total/$ 141.0
4. Observe and Report/Warner Wknd/$ 11.1 Total/$ 11.1
5. Knowing/Summit Wknd/$ 6.7 Total/$ 68.0
6. I Love You, Man/Paramount Wknd/$ 6.4 Total/$ 59.0
7. Haunting in Connecticut/LGF Wknd/$ 5.7 Total/$ 46.3
8. Dragonball Evolution/Fox Wknd/$ 4.7 Total/$ 4.7
9. Adventureland/Miramax Wknd/$ 3.4 Total/$ 11.5
10.Duplicity/Universal Wknd/$ 3.0 Total/$ 36.8

I PREFER MARY BETH OREGON ON NICKELODEON
Hannah Montana opens at number one and since I don’t have kids and don’t babysit that often she’s mystery to me. Something about a teenager who is a pop superstar under another name like she’s a superhero or something…? Meh, who cares? On the other hand because I do pay attention to media gossip, I do know she’s played by Miley Ray Cyrus and she’s now worth a billion dollars in revenue to Disney and they’re already grooming a replacement for her since she’s growing up and dipping her toe in the pool of a wild teen youth by dating at 21-year-old underwear model. I have to give it up to her for that. I mean, if found out my 16-year-old daughter was dating a 21-year-old, I’d be super pissed and after his head. But if it was a 21-year-old model, I might just let it slide. Sorry, but I respect the hell out of that. She’s not playing, “Oh, I want someone who makes me laugh and has a nice personality.” No, she’s straight up, “I want someone even prettier than me.” Which, honestly isn’t that hard to do. Oh, shut up. You know I’m right. She’s cute like any kid, but pretty? Unless she were Miley Cyrus, she’d always be playing the sidekick. And let’s not kid ourselves by pretending this isn’t part of her success. Like Amanda Bynes and Hilary Duff before her, she wasn’t born with unattainable beauty. Her fans love that she looks more like them than a model. It’s also probably why her “older man” is only 21 and not 31 or 41, because if you’re going to be a dirty old man, it’s gonna be for someone so gorgeous that other men not arrest you for it (which happens every day and you know it). Let me put it this way: the pretty girl in the Harry Potter movies is dating a 27-year old. But I’ve seen Miley in interviews and she’s so typically teen I have to give up to Billy Ray and his wife that her only questionable choice is an older pretty boy. I mean, she’s not Lindsay Lohan or Drew Barrymore…or me. If I were rich, famous and 16, I’d emancipate myself from my parents then launch on a worldwide tour of utter debauchery to the point where they’d refer to certain criminal acts committed while nude and drunk an “angrygeek.” “So I heard over in the 24th precinct they caught a guy ‘angrygeeking’ that sick fuck.”

2 POINTY, 2 BREAKY?
Fast and Furious is down to number two and I can see from other reviews that I’m not the only person who noticed the softer jawlines on the leading men. While the women are more attractive now than they were eight years ago. And do you think somewhere Keanu Reeves is pissed as this was just a landlocked version of Point Break? I mean in this chapter Paul “Pretty Boy” Walker actually joins the FBI, like Special Agent Johnny Utah. Man did that movie ever suck. But where could the sequels go for Point Break? Could Keanu Reeves travel the world as a crime-busting surfer? And what kind of horrible sequel names would there be? Point Break: The Big Kahuna? Point Break: Gee These Waves Are Cold And Small On The East Coast? Everyone drives, everywhere, so there’s always street racing, but not everyone surfs. He’d be severely limited. Also, they’d have to find some way for Patrick Swayze to have survived Australia. But you know, it’s movies so he washes up onshore in Thailand, coincidentally when Keanu is there trying to bust a sex-slave ring which has for some reason kidnapped Lori Petty. They’d be more likely to kidnap pretty, pretty Keanu before her. Oh, shut up. You know I’m right. It would have to be Lori Petty’s younger, hotter sister, played by Megan Fox.

IGNORE AND INSULT
Monsters vs. Aliens is down to number three, followed by Observe and Report opening at number four, giving you a double dose of Seth Rogen. Now, I hate to admit that Seth Rogen was the best part of Monsters vs. Aliens, which had the upside of not having to look at him. Not so much in Observe and Report which is supposedly inspired not a little bit by Taxi Driver. You couldn’t make a movie less appealing to me without adding Jonah Hill as his sidekick and promising nude scenes of both. And Anna Faris gets points for willing to go out all the way she does in comedies, but that’s still not enough to make me see this.

AND I’D GIVE NICHOLAS HAMMOND WORK TOO
Knowing is down to number five, followed by I Love You Man at number six and also in this is Lou Ferrigno (Paul Rudd is a real estate agent trying to sell Ferrigno’s house) and you can tell how many geeks are working in Hollywood by how many times comic book stars like Lou Ferrigno get paid to show up to play themselves. Before this he was a semi-regular on King of Queens. Also on that show playing himself was Adam West, who recently turned up on 30 Rock playing himself. I won’t lie. I’d be doing it too if I could. But where’s the love for Burt Ward? Holy Overlooking!

GOLDEN YEARS FA-FA-FA-FA-FA
The Haunting in Connecticut is down to number seven, followed by Dragonball Evolution at number eight and I’ve been watching geeks seethe over this for the past year because this was obviously a trainwreck in the making, much in the same way I watched them pitch a fit over Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li. It’s fun watching rather than living it. I know nothing of Dragonball, not to mention Dragonball Z and could really care less, but I’d be pissed too if some ugly white dude was playing the lead of my Asian character, while his love interest (of course) remained Asian, played no less by the annoying girl who always looks on the verge of tears. She was also the lead in the Samurai Girl mini-series (again where the Asian guy was made White because you can’t have an Asian girl kissing on one of her own). But what’s really sad is that Chow Yun Fat is in this! Let me show you how horrible this is. Imagine if George Clooney had been in that Street Fighter movie. That’s how degrading this is. Hollywood has treated the man horribly and just when you think it can’t get any worse (second banana to Mark Walberg in The Corruptor, and to Sean William Scott in Bulletproof Monk) along comes something like this. And also here making a car payment is James Marsters, aka, Spike from Buffy, but you knew when that show was over so was he, but for the love of geeks. I call it the “Roddy McDowell Career Path” where you’ll never be in anything A-list again, but you’ll always work in science fiction, fantasy or horror and where you’ll probably be the best thing in it. And maybe one day you’ll get the Vincent Price or Christopher Lee effect where a geek will grow into an A-list movie talent and put you in his films and take care of you in your golden years.

THAT SHINY THING THAT YOU KEEP MISSING? THE BRASS RING.
Adventureland is down to number nine and Ryan Reynolds is the “older man” in this film to the two young leads which should be a wake-up moment for him in his career as he’s always played the young guy and usually the young wiseass. Time is ticking and he’s not getting any younger. In fact, the role he’s playing is someone aging in one place planning on being a success while the world is moving on around him. Actually, if you include the film Waiting, where he was the older guy next to Justin “I’m A Mac” Long, this is the second time he’s kinda done this, so now the writing’s clearly on the wall. For young characters, you’re an old man. Get it together now or you’re going to be back on TV. Look at your wife, Scarlett Johansson. She’s what A-list success in your 20’s genuinely would have looked like. Coincidentally they’re both going to be in upcoming Marvel Comics films. He’s Deadpool in the new Wolverine film and she’s been horribly miscast as The Black Widow in Iron Man 2. Deadpool is a very popular minor character in comics and Reynolds is openly hoping for a spin-off. Yeah, talk to Michelle Pfeiffer about her Catwoman spin-off film that was made 15 years later with Halle Berry. Or talk to Halle Berry about her Jinx spin-off film from James Bond that was never made at all. This is just more reason for him to regret not playing Wally West in the planned Flash film from Batman and Blade writer, David Goyer. Now he would have been perfect for that!

I LOVE MYSELF FOR HATING YOU
Finally Duplicity closes out the top ten and for a second I totally forgot what this movie was about and who starred in it and I’m supposed to know these things. That’s a bad sign, but clearly explains its failure. All I do is hate and if I can’t care enough to hate you…

SOLE MAN
So I’ve once again been obsessed with shoes. As a friend of mine put it, “I love that your Facebook status messages are gayer than mind.” Needless to say he’s gay. But I question his gayness as he can’t help me shop for shoes. It doesn’t help that my shoe-shopping buddy, The Libertine, now resides elsewhere. She left me for love. Bitch. It was totally an accident as I was doing the semi-annual replacement of black t-shirts. People outside New York won’t know this, but New Yorkers know there comes at time when the black you own is no longer quite so black and that simply will not do. You have to replace it. So I was in Daffy’s getting a 3-pack of black Calvin Klein t-shirts cheap when I saw they were selling a bunch of casual sneakers and amongst the Keds and PK Flyers was the most amazing thing I’d ever seen: the Calvin Klein Tarik. It’s like a Chuck Taylor only better. First of all, every fucking hipster asshole isn’t going to be wearing it. Secondly, the reason I don’t wear the Chuckie-T’s currently in my closet is the notoriously thin rubber sole. If I wanted to be that close to the ground I’d just go barefoot. I need support and this CK sneaker had it, complete with a rounded rubber heel. Oh, and it was a $90 sneaker going for $23.99. Of course they didn’t have my size. So I went to another Daffy’s. Nope. Then another. Nope. I went to every single one in NYC to no avail. DSW, nothing. I looked online. Nothing. eBay has a baby blue version but that’s just not going to fly. I called up the Calvin Klein store on Madison Avenue and was told that was Calvin Klein “white” and that the store was Calvin Klein “black” which is another way of saying “You’re a poor person looking for something from our poor person line and I know this because if you were a rich person, you would already know this and I’d probably already know your name as a regular customer, like the Van der Woodsens who were just here. Now go look for it at Macy’s, you plebian bastard, whilst I wash both the phone and my ears from having your poor person voice stain them.” I’m no fan of Macy’s either, but subjected myself to it to come up empty. And before you ask, “Why not just check the Calvin Klein site?” I did. And it’s there for $78. Now, I know it makes no sense given that’s cheaper than my Kenneth Cole sneakers, but I can only pay $78 for them if I know the original price was $160. Knowing I could have had them for $24 makes this purchase (sober) impossible. So the next step was to exploit my friends and head out to a CK outlet store in New Jersey and look there (somewhere the guy from the Calvin Klein store cackles gleefully at my poor person behavior). Salvation came from the Japanese. More specifically, the Muji store on 40th Street in the New York Times building. I was actually looking at a beautiful light blue linen shirt I saw in the window (which could be the gayest Facebook update ever if I bought it) when I notice a variation of the shoe I was looking for…for $20. I’m wearing them right now. But I admit, it’s like getting Megan Fox when you wanted Angelina Jolie.

OF CUPCAKES AND THINGS
So, I’m still on my strawberry milkshake kick, but cupcakes have reappeared in my life. After dinner with My MacGoddess---the friend I’ve known for 25 years who gave me my first mac (that’s right, bitch, we’re old)---where we discussed in detail our mutual anal ailments (she had what I had only they fucked it up the first time and she had to go into the hospital to have it done right) and general body deterioration, we got a cupcake from Crumbs Bakery on University and praise be to them. They make giant, weird cupcakes designed to kill you. Cookie dough cupcakes, Oreo cupcakes, Devil Dog, Reese’s Peanut Butter, Fudge, Boston Cream, etc. But the one I got was Apple Caramel and My MacGoddess put it best when she said, “This is so sweet it hurts my teeth.” I had to wait until I got home to finish it, it was so overwhelming. It was so good brought one for Dorito Cheeseburger Woman when I saw her the following night. It’s not unusual for me to go without seeing her for six months, but this time there was a legitimate reason beyond my own self-involvement: she’d been literally unable to walk. She went home for Christmas and was felled by a spinal problem that left her essentially paralyzed from the waist down. In a funny sad way, that this was my second dinner with someone where we discussed how fate decided to smite us down with a horrific condition out of the blue. Like my brain bleed, her ailment came out of nowhere and pretty much healed itself. She was seriously fortunate as she walked again just two hours before what was scheduled to be her first spinal surgery. Needless to say, if you wanted the easiest mugging ever, we were your targets. Neither of us can run nor risk too much movement right now. Take my money, just please don’t aggravate my ass. In her quest to regain her strength without impact on her spine she’s now swimming every day, reminding me of how much I miss it. And if you told me ten years ago I’d be someone who missed working out, I’d have thrown one of my cheese-covered nachos at you---then picked it up off the floor and ate it. Shut up. You’d have done it too. But I’m glad there are no Crumbs Bakeries near me. What the hell do you mean there’s one at 42nd and 6th!?!

SUPER SAVINGS
I’m not going to talk about how a conversation online led to me buying the first four seasons of Smallville on DVD off eBay (they kill Jonathan Kent in the fifth season which was a horrible mistake). I’m just not. I won’t even mention how I got a partial refund because one came in lousy condition, resulting in it costing me total about $30, as opposed to the best possible retail price of $120.

ROCK LIKE ABS OF LOVE
So Rock of Love 3 is over and I hope this is the last because while it’s fun still, it’s not as much fun and the women do seem to get a bit sadder each time. I’m pretty sure 50% of the first season weren’t single moms like this season and honestly, they seemed more emotionally stable. I can’t laugh too much at someone’s crazy, trailer park single mom. So I’m kinda glad Mindy lost because I don’t see Taya taking it well, being a crazy single mom. But I respect Brett for sleeping with Mindy not once, but twice because her body was ridiculous. Real breasts and a stomach you could wash laundry on. But she was too young, whereas Taya is clearly lying about her age and is at least within a decade of his. But did we really think the Penthouse Pet wasn’t going to get the rock star? Come on. Now on to The Cougar and in two weeks DAISY OF LOVE!

BRILLIANT BUT DISTURBING
The Burger King ad with Sir Mix-A-Lot and Spongebob Squarepants. It’s disturbing, creepy, funny…and maybe the most amazing commercial ever made. But do you think Gatorade told Tiger Woods the animated version of him would be quite so…black? Afro-Asian he is not. Then there’s the clearly “black voice” of the bear and the heavy R&B soundtrack? Someone is screaming at his lawyers and agents right now.