A-to-tha-Zizzle: E

What a week.  I have FOUR exams this week and a map quiz (harder than you think it is), and I'm psyched because I have one more next Wednesday, then NO MORE EXAMS UNTIL FINALS! Woop woop!  I'm so happy about that.  I can't even express it adequately. 

Anyhoo, onward with April's A-to-tha-Zizzle challenge.  Today's letter:  E.  Here we go...

Empire Records

Angsty kids spend a day working at a music store while dealing with their various personal issues, some of which are seriously deep for teenagers.  Lucas (Rory Cochrane - my fave) has lost the money from the previous day's sales, and manager Joe is trying to figure out how to handle it without sending Lucas to jail.   Corey has ivy league aspirations, but relies on speed to keep up with her straining workload.  Oh yeah, she plans to lose her virginity to pop star Rex Manning, who is visiting the record store that day.  Gina is the slut, and is honest - sometimes too honest.  A.J. is an artist who is desperately in love with Corey, and gives himself a deadline to tell her how he feels, but he keeps changing it.  There's also Debra, the suicidal angry girl, Mark the pothead/wannabe heavy metal star, and Berko, Debra's boyfriend.  Whew. 

Anyhoo, the owner of the record store tells Joe he's going to sell it to a generic music store chain.  Joe and the kids decide to do whatever it takes to save the Empire.    GREAT soundtrack.

Damn the man, save the empire!

Edward Scissorhands

Tim Burton's excellent tale about the poor boy with no hands, so his adoptive inventor guy makes him hands out of scissors.  Riiiiight. 

I can totally look past the plot on this because it's JOHNNY DEPP. 

So a lady is selling beauty products one day and finds Edward.  She takes pity on him and brings him home to live with her family.  She has a teenage daughter (a blonde Winona Ryder) who Edward falls in love with, but he's terribly shy.  The neighbors soon learn Edward has a knack for haircutting, so he begins a haircutting/pet grooming/landscaping job that takes the neighborhood by storm. 

Pretty ridiculous story, but hey, it's Burton and Depp. 

Ever After

LOVE LOVE LOVE this film.  A modern-day adaptation of Cinderella starring Drew Barrymore, Angelica Houston and Dougray Scott.  Barrymore is delightful as the mistreated Danielle, stepdaughter of the materialistic, rude and pompous Rodmilla.  While pretending to be wealthy to keep her friend from being shipped to the Americas, Danielle has a chance meeting with Prince Henry and completely infatuates him.  She uses her mother's name and title, and has to keep up the charade as Henry pursues her.  It becomes more difficult to lie to Henry as Danielle starts to fall for him, but events keep preventing her from telling him the truth. 

I love that only one of the stepsisters is evil (Megan Dodds plays awful Marguerite excellently - you just HATE her).  Melanie Lynskey portrays sweet stepsister Jacqueline, and you find yourself cheering for her as well.  Houston plays big bad stepmomma like nobody's business.  She's a great villain, which just makes it that much more fun when she finally gets her due. 

Easy A

Although a fairly new addition to my list of favorites, I just have to say Emma Stone is awesome, and I am one of her biggest fans.  She rocks my socks off.

Smart, respectful student Olive wants to shut up her best friend, so she lies and says that over the weekend she lost her virginity to a college guy.  Unfortunately the school's holy rolling Marianne overhears the conversation, and by the end of the day the whole school knows about Olive's sex life.  Later in class a discussion about the novel The Scarlett Letter gets aggressive when one of Marianne's friends refers to Olive's losing her virginity.  Olive reacts and ends up with detention.  While in detention she tells a gay friend that she made the story up, and he then asks her to pretend to have sex with him so people will leave him alone.  She agrees and they fake having sex at a party.  Suddenly Olive is the school slut, and boys are paying her to say she had sex with them.  As Olive's bad reputation grows, Olive starts to realize she doesn't like the stigma that goes along with it. 

I don't want to say anymore about it since it's sorta new and I don't want to spoil it. 

I love the supporting cast in this film, with Amanda Bynes, Penn Badgley, Thomas Haden Church, Dan Byrd, Patricia Clarkson,  Stanley Tucci and Lisa Kudrow filling the time with excellent dialogue.  Olive's parents (Clarkson and Tucci) are hilarious. 

Encino Man

It's not on my top ten list, but I have to include it because I failed to in my Brendan Fraser post the other day, and because I love Pauly Shore.  I kind of feel obligated. 

Stoney and Dave (Shore and Sean Astin) are digging a pool when they discover a frozen caveman (in California....I know).  They thaw him out, clean him up and adopt him as their new pet/friend Link (Fraser).  The new Link is instantly popular at school, which in turn gives the guys a rise in status. 

Trying to modernize a caveman, though, is no easy feat....especially for Pauly Shore. 

It's a fun stupid movie, sort of like Bio-Dome (now THAT is one of my favorites!).

Enchanted

This is a fun family movie.  Amy Adams is adorable as the ditsy cartoon-turned-real-life-woman Giselle and Patrick Dempsey is YUMMY (as usual) as Robert, lawyer and father of the cutest kid ever.  Susan Sarandon plays the evil Queen Narissa, stepmother of Prince Edward (James Marsden).

Cartoon Prince Edward saves cartoon Giselle and they decide to get married, but Narissa doesn't want to give up her throne, so she pushes Giselle into a well that sends Giselle to New York City as a real life woman.  Robert and his daughter give her a place to stay, and Giselle begins to show Robert the beauty and fun in life, while Robert shows Giselle what life is really like. 

Prince Edward follows Giselle down the well, and is followed by Narissa's henchman Nathaniel, who is ordered to poison Giselle before Edward can find her. 

Enchanted is sweet, and makes you remember being younger and watching Disney princesses fall in love with their princes, living happily ever after.  I love it. 



Today's episode has been brought to you by the letter E.