An Odd Movie Weekend

So after catching only one movie in theaters in the past few months (The Departed), I made a concerted effort to get out this weekend and actually see some stuff.

I wound up seeing two movies that are about as different as can be.

Saturday's movie was Jackass 2, aka the-latest-sign-that-our-civilization-is-going-into-the-toilet. The refined part of me was appalled that the unrefined part of me throughly enjoyed it. The unrefined part of me then knocked down the refined part and took a dump on his face.

Jackass 2 is pretty easy to review. If you liked the first one, if you liked the series, you'll probably like the second. I doubt I've ever laughed more while watching a movie, but your results may vary.

The weird thing about Jackass is that it has a huge heterosexual male audience despite the fact that it is really rather gay (not that there is anything wrong with that). There is copious nudity in the movie, all of it male, while I don't think there's a woman under 50 in the entire film.

The odd thing is that, despite all of the horrible, disturbing things in the movie (including a leech attaching itself to an eyeball, something even I couldn't watch), the only thing that they had to censor to get the R rating was a shot of someone drinking some horse sperm.

Apparently all the testicle shots were somehow less objectionable.

Sunday's movie was The Queen, which manages to pull an involving drama out of what initially seems like impossible subject matter, in the reaction of the Queen of England to the death of Princess Diana. I can't even imagine how you'd sell that project in a room.

It took me a little while to get into it, but by the end I was wrapped up in the tale, and it's worth seeing.

I can almost guarantee that I may have been the only person seeing both of those movies on consecutive days, though. Not a lot of audience overlap there.