the "real" ignorant hit of the summer

Miss Talya Cooper has advanced the position that the two upcoming football movies "Gridiron Gang" and "Invicible" (starring The Rock and Marky Mark, né Walhberg, respectively) are actually the movies people should be sending phone-exhortations to, and internetting about, instead of "Snakes on a Plane."

Let's look at the last unbelievably-good summer movie, the first "Pirates of the Caribbean," by all accounts should have been a disaster, as its sequel indeed was, but was totally awesome because no one knew that Johnny Depp was going to steal every scene. But it isn't as though director Gore Verbinski had a handle on the genius of that film, because not only did he water it down with an extra half-hour of Orlando Bloom time, but then showed no understanding of its charm in making the sequel.

Most of the time, when you know you have something good on your hands, you ruin it, usually by overdoing it. This is the case with nearly every minor Simpsons character, most of whom were loveable as occasional one-liners, but nearly all of whom have been milked for entire plot-lines they were incapable of supporting. Which is to say, what is charming is often so only in moderation, and it is no logical jump to say that "Snakes on a Plane" will not be about moderation.

In short, if there is only one thing going for a work, and it is good every time it comes on, you want to keep the audience expectant. Like Grant Hart songs on Husker Du records. Like Tom Sawyer in Huckleberry Finn*. Like Randy Rhodes' solos on Ozzy Osbourne albums. and so forth. actually, I would love to make a longer list about things like this. But for now, let us just say that there is NO FUCKING WAY that "Snakes on a Plane" will keep itself in check, and you can bet your life that it will try to be "extreme" all the time, something that is nearly impossible to do and remain interesting (cf: death metal, Ezra Pound).

"Gridiron Gang" will not be as good as it should be, because it is a highly sincere movie whose star is bascially a con man (which is like being an actor, but not quite the same thing): The Rock. There was a great interview I read, where the interviewer admitted being impressed by the Rock's candour, intelligence, suavity, etc.... and then read a different interview the same month where he had given almost the exact same answers. I would almost prefer to rent "Walking Tall," because that movie was not attempting to disguise that it was a piece of violent trash. "Gridiron Gang" will run into a weird problem about 65 minutes in, when for a split second, you will enter a kind of moral worm-hole in which all you want to happen in the movie is for the Rock to pull some Scorpion King-style shit and rip someone in half, before you snap back into the Bruckheimer lull and realize that you aren't "supposed" to want that. Then, 15 minutes later, the movie will ASK overtly for you to want the Rock to tear some dipshit in half, and then when he does or doesn't, you will be satisfied/disappointed no matter what.

"Invincible" will be awesome. I bet there is a really trashy bar-maid he gets with, and hopefully something to do with the Mob/Vegas/corruption in football.

(* I like other things about Huckleberry Finn, too, but obviously Twain was concerned that people wanted more of Tom Sawyer, and when I read the book when I was 10, I felt that way, too.)