 Mike Nelson's Movie Megacheese (2000) In this book, Mike Nelson of "Mystery Science Theatre 3000" fame takes on
Hollywood! Reviews on the front and back cover tout the contents as "Funny," "Film savvy," and "Very, very funny."
While I must agree that there were select points during my reading when I
laughed out loud and thought to myself "Very, very funny!" (and/or "Film savvy!"), these moments maybe comprised three complete sentences in a book of 288 pages. That's not very, very funny at all. That's a painful waste of time.
Speaking of pain, it pains me to write this review, it really does, for I was a big fan of
"MST3K" in my formative years. Considering the quality of that program, its sharp and frenetic wit, and the delicious
obscurity of its bad movie selections, I expected this collection of essays to be
enlightening and intelligently written, perhaps to even educate me on some
unusual,
maybe even good films. O woe, but it did not. It was repetitive, random, and
confusing, to the extent that you could read the pages in ANY order with an equal level of
cohesiveness.
Mike's writing style is accessible and quickly digested; I was able to devour all 288 pages
in one evening-long sitting broken up only by two fornications. But upon reading the last page I felt about the same as when I consumed two entire boxes of Zebra Cakes in roughly as many hours: nauseated, and confused as to why I did it.
The author's use of the word "œuvre" to describe an actor's
body of work was mildly, mildly funny the first two or three times. After that, its overuse
began to make me feel like hunting him down and killing him with a hardbound Thesaurus. I could almost see him crouched over
the
keyboard, cackling to himself everytime he typed the word, much like 6-year
old
boys who have discovered the joy of farting on each other and won't stop
until you scream that you will PULL THE CAR OVER.
But with Movie Megacheese, the car never does pull over, it just tools along fueled by Mike's self-satisfied flatulence and aimless sarcasm. Repeated blatant attacks on pot smoking, which insinuate that this
activity is to blame for the decrepit state of American cinema, aren't at all funny, and furhermore only give the distinct impression that Nelson's family-man responsibilities have all but
destroyed his own freewheeling, pot smoking days of yore, and he is secretly
(or not
so secretly) bitter about it. In any event, pot doesn't
make bad
movies. Bad minds make bad movies. And bad books.
More disappointing was the random selection of movies reviewed, which aren't, for the most part, all that cheesy, much less mega-cheesy. There's no defined aesthetic, just a whole lot of lame reaction to mostly forgettable films that were popular a few years ago. (Hasn't The Loud Bassoon killed that approach for everyone yet?) The whole thing smacked of a guy whose semi-fame as a TV witmeister has allowed him to make bank on some truly lazy writing. I actually did AGREE with many of his analyses of
individual actors ( such as Keanu Reeves, Meg Ryan, Julia Roberts, and Val
Kilmer), although his assertation that Brad Pitt is a non-acting side of
beef
smacked of jealousy and pettiness. Proof that Brad Pitt can act: he convinced America, if only for a brief moment, that Geena Davis was gorgeous. Even general agreement with his
assertations couldn't force me to like this book. Its complete and total randomness
gave me the impression Mike was hunkered down in the garage while his wife was putting the kids to bed, knocking out a few words at a time, but really just getting totally blazed instead of "working on that book"
like
he told her.
Review by Miranda |