The Films of Judy Greer, Part Three: Desperate But Not Serious (1999)

This was an odd movie, though not completely sucky. It seemed to be clinging to that pin-up retro vibe that Swingers had capitalized on, but only in Paget Brewster's character, and to an annoying degree.

This film is about two young ladies, Frances (Brewster) and Lili (Christine "Ben Stiller's Wife" Taylor), who are out for the night in Los Angeles, trying to hit a few parties before they meet up with Jonathan (John "I'm at home on a farm" Corbett). Jonathan lives in some foreign country, Lili lives in San Francisco, but they're both in LA for the weekend. They spent a day together at some point in the recent past, and want to hook back up to see if they're made for each other or some bullshit.

Frances is a stumbling drunk, a sycophantic bore, and an amalgamation of every LA struggling-actor stereotype you can think of. She would have made for a solid bit part in the flick, but following her through the entire film is exhausting. Lili is a bit more grown-up, and plays the voice of reason. So, they hit some parties, and of course, Lili loses the directions to the spot where she's supposed to meet Jonathan. Things get wacky from there, with a bunch of cameos and sub-plots that aren't worth explaining.

However, there are a few things worth noting:

Max Perlich is in this film, which once again proves my theory.

Henry Rollins plays a thick-necked bartender, which is both funny (he's always funny) and depressing (his film choices are spotty).

Putting Claudia Schiffer on the cover of this DVD makes no sense, considering she's hardly in the film, and the parts she does in the movie cannot technically be considered "acting."

Jay Johnston shows up towards the end of the flick, playing "Mustachioed Cop," which is basically the exact same character he plays on The Sarah Silverman Show. Crazy, I know.

Brian Posehn and Patton Oswalt play a couple of nerds arguing about the sexual orientation of Star Wars characters. What a stretch!

It is very odd watching a film like this now, because it seems the whole thing could have been sorted out with a cell phone call. So then I thought, well, maybe it wasn't typical for folks to have cell phones back then. Then I remembered it was Los Angeles. Then Lili whipped out her cell phone to make a call. Then I got confused.

Anyway.

Judy Greer plays Molly, the personal assistant of an asshole who is throwing one of the parties they go to. She's only in a few scenes, but she's bitchy, mouthy, and quite convincing. So, there you go.

Oh, and Joey Lawrence is in this movie, as a pot-smoking DeadHead former child star. It's an all-star cast.

Sean Penn is a Stooge.

Apparently he's signed on to play Larry to Benicio Del Toro's Moe and Jim Carrey's Curly.

Nyuk?

Aw, Jeez.

You got the stink lines and everything.

Winter Dodgeball - Week Six: Maybe We Should Get A Coach...

Because one of the other teams had one on Monday night. Seriously. He stood on the sidelines with them and argued with the ref. At our dodgeball game. More about that in a bit.

It was the last night of the regular season, and we had our work cut out for us. Not only were we playing against a team we had yet to play, but our second match was against a team that we beat (barely) in the first week, and they're of the "not stoked when they lose" variety. So, we knew it was time to put our game faces on and really get wingin'.

Our first match went really well. The team we were playing against were really nice, and though we won fairly easily, it seemed that everyone had a good time. This, my friends, is the way it should be. I guess it helps when the game's not super close, but this can be such a fun game when everyone isn't taking it too seriously. A lot of teams seem really determined to beat us. I don't know if that's because we've been in first place for part of the season, or if they hate us.

When it came to our second match, I ended up feeling like it was a combination of both. They're a competitive bunch, and by that I mean overly aggressive and awkwardly mouthy. To top it off, they house a few members who are all-around spazzes. I don't mind a few errant throws (we've all thrown some too high), but when you're consistently doing it, it might be time to sit out a season or two until you can get your shit together. Or at least don't complain when you drill a guy with glasses in the face and then you're declared (by the stoned ref) "out." Ugh.

The match was frantic, with their 400lb coach yelling at us, yelling at the ref, and probably consumed by thoughts of post-game pie. By the time the final game came and we were tied at three apiece, I almost wanted them to win. One of the cro magnon men on their team seemed both gooned on the juice and on the verge of tears. If this was that big of a deal to them, they could have it. And have it they did, in a very close last game. In my first conscious move of unsportsmanlike conduct, I did not high-five their coach when he lined up for the perfunctory "good game" hand-slapping. He whiffed and then tried to pat me on the back but I slipped away. That'll learn him!

Standings are here, and by god, we finished in first place. Given our odd "draw" from the second week, we should probably be tied for first, but hey, first is first, even if we tied. Looking at the schedule, I'm realizing we don't play next week, so it looks like playoffs will be delayed till the 30th. I'm hoping we can break our streak of sub-par performances in the postseason.

And avoid any more yelling.

Bonus pic: (Thanks Erin!)

Lousy Smarch Weather.

Winter Dodgeball - Week Five: It's Lonely At The Top.

Complete with a majorly blurry photo of Leah appearing to give the old school Eff You to somebody. Clearly I'm running out of pictures.

It's not that I feel like our season started off shaky. In fact, the second match we played on the first day of league play was one of the best ones we've had. But Week Two was a bit frustrating, and I think we all felt a little annoyed/discouraged after that night. So, like I said, it's not like we played poorly in the first two weeks. But in the past three weeks, we've played really well. Yeah, we lost one last week, but we simply got outplayed. It wasn't like some of our losses in the past few seasons, ones that we knew were going to bug us all the way home. It could have gone either way, and it didn't go ours. It happens. Or at least that's how I feel about it.

This week, we continued in our recent (and highly successful) trend of pulling together as a team, and it seemed we could do no wrong. (I should also mention that as much as we have gelled as a unit, there have been some outstanding last-man-on-the-court performances of late, and those people have exemplified true grit in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds.) We took our first match by a fair margin, coming out on the better end of the 6-2 score. I was sweating pretty hard by the end of that one, which should be shocking to absolutely no one at this point.

It's been hard to determine if we play better when we're fresh (not tired, but also not really warmed up) or one game in (plenty warm, but possibly overtired). In our second match, we were playing the team we were tied with for first place going into the week, and who had not yet played that night. We knew what we were up against, and if we were tired from the first match, we didn't seem it. The final score ended up 5-3 in our favor, but it didn't seem that close. Maybe we were ahead the whole time? I don't quite remember the specifics. Either way, they were a really good team, and much like we were outplayed last week, we were the ones doing the outplaying this week.

I ain't even gonna front, y'all: it made for a sweet victory. So, if you check the standings here, you'll see that we are alone in that coveted top spot. But, there's still another week left, and none of it really means jack, because it's all-or-nothing in the playoffs. We're re-playing the team that we had such a good game with in the first week for our last game, and it promises to be a vengeance-filled rematch.

We'll give 'em a good run.

The Films of Judy Greer, Part Two: Kissing A Fool (1998)

I remember when this came out, and my only thought was, "what the fuck is Jason Lee doing?" This was his first non-Kevin Smith leading role, and I wasn't ready to see him be a rom-com wuss. So, I never saw it. It's been staring me in the face in video stores and on basic cable for years, but I never gave in. Until now.

And it ended up not being terrible. Part of this is due to the fact that I don't seem to loathe David Schwimmer as much as the rest of the world (do people hate him, or do they hate Ross?), and he plays a sweet bro in this flick, which is a believable turn for him. Lee isn't given much to work with, but he's funny without even trying (or at least he was in the 90's), so he makes his boring character a little more interesting.

Bonnie Hunt plays some rich lady/the narrator-of-sorts, given the unenviable task of sitting at a table and relating the story to a couple of numbskulls. How she knows every little detail is a little confusing, but hey, it was the crazy 90's, anything was possible!

Judy Greer plays Andrea, the main chick's little sister (cousin?), and I think she's supposed to be in high school, or maybe just out of high school. Anyway, she's rebellious, and she's only in a few scenes, mostly for the comic relief resulting from her sassy attitude. Either way it was a big step up from Stricken, and her star is clearly rising!

Though I fear it may have sank a bit after the next film she appeared in... The Netflix envelope is on top of my DVD/VCR, and though I can't even remember what the movie is called, I am ready.

Winter Dodgeball - Week Four: Split Decision.

The undefeated streak (which wasn't legit anyway) has ended. Eh, it wasn't really our style, anyway.

The only reason it was semi-frustrating was that we played incredibly in our first match, and then found it hard to carry that momentum into the second one. We gave it a good go, but we were tired. We could blame it on some people getting hit and not going out (there was definitely some of that), but we would have lost anyway. And I don't mind losing, but it's slightly irksome to lose to spazzes who can't keep their throws below top-of-the-imaginary-stovepipe-hat level. Such flailing.

So yes, we won our first match, which was a tough one, and then lost by a few games in our second one. But, we got a lot of games in, and everybody got to play quite a bit. I was in need of a good mop-up by the end of it all, and that's always a good sign.

Standings will be here, when they post them. I'm curious to see if we held onto that top spot...