There’s nothing quite like finishing work early. It gives me the opportunity to spend a large portion of my day doing things I love—like watching the cinematic event known as Stick It in Hi-Def. Oh, those witty one-liners and puns! Is there a more pun-derful writer in the modern teen comedy genre than…(Wikipedia is still loading)…Jessica Bendinger? I don’t think so! Bendinger? More like Funbringer!
Speaking of movies…Jack, Ken and I were invited to see a cast-and-crew-only premiere of The Flying Scissors on Monday evening, because Ken is credited with being one of the two “visual effects” persons who worked on the film. It’s a mockumentary in the vein of Best In Show or Spinal Tap that follows a fictitious professional Rock, Paper, Scissors league.
The showing was held at the Anthology Film Archives, in a large room with maybe a dozen rows of seats. The writers and directors thanked everyone for coming and for their dedicated work, and then the lights dimmed. No opening title sequence, it just went right into the first scene. The majority of the movie is a series of confessional-style interview shots. Hilarious writing and great acting, but the it really dominates to the point where there are almost no scenes with action involved. In other films (granted, they have higher budgets) the interviews are broken-up with performance clips, or the cameras follow characters through their everyday routines. In Flying Scissors the characters spend the bulk of the film seated and talking directly at the camera.
Nevertheless, for a first film it is great. The writers take a topic that could easily get too silly, and craft a concise feature that exposes the demented personalities of competitive individuals. There is no shortage of material to work with, and the six or seven featured personalities each have their own unique, weird habits. Sometimes it borders on cliche (most noticeably with the math-loving Asian “athlete” who depends on the statistical tendencies of his opponents), but the characters are well-developed, and the viewer has a chance to spend equal time with each, silently changing his-or-her favorite as more biographical information is revealed.
There was one glaring problem I saw with the film, and that was it only devoted five minutes to the climactic league championships. In Best In Show, the actual dog show is treated with the same detail as the rest of the film, and it’s shown fairly in-depth, even though the majority of the film is devoted to the build-up. In Flying Scissors, “the big game” passes in a flash, with no attention given to gameday rituals or down-time between matches, both of which could be rife with humor. This might be nitpicking, as it could be attributed to strict filming schedules or minuscule budget.
Also, watching a movie with cast and crew opens one up to the inevitable guy-sitting-behind-you-who-won’t-shut-up scenario. Someone behind me kept saying retarded shit like, “Oh, that’s Cynthia’s necklace she’s wearing in this scene,” or “That’s not actually White Plains, it’s…” or “I was actually on set when they filmed this scene, it was so funny.” It can be a trifle bit distracting.
Finally, I should note that Ken and I kept scanning the crowd for Sarah Wheeler, the girl who plays…well, I guess the best character description would be “the stupid slut,” because she’s smoking hot. Sadly, we couldn’t locate her. If she happens to be reading this, I’d just like to say, “Hey…what’s up?”
On a scale of 52 to 84 yellow balloon animals, I give Flying Scissors a 75.
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