Caws Radio

Cameron Diaz is Stupid

Today I actually have something to write about. I don�t have it all organized and I will probably just end up ranting, but I feel like this has to be said.

I know this can only be my opinion, but I am presenting it here as fact: Charlie�s Angels 2 sucks. It really sucks. I have not seen it, nor do I plan on seeing it, and if you have seen the previews or know anything about it I shouldn�t have to tell you why. Just the fact that it IS sucks. I know that a whole mess of movies come out every year just like this; big budget, juvenile �fun� movies that are formulaically produced in Hollywood without a brain cell of creativity or respect for the viewer, and usually I don�t mind. I don�t see them, and I don�t have to think about them. But something about Charlie�s Angels 2 just gets to me, personally, as if Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore and Lucy Liu have stolen my bike or kicked my cat in the face. I think the reason I am so offended is that it is a sequel. The first CA was bad enough; I made it out of that campaign having only viewed the last half-hour of it, and that was all I needed to see. My roommate Kenta was watching it one night when I returned to the dorm room. His words stand out in my memory like a critic�s quote:

me: What�s this?
Kenta: Charlie�s Angels. Have you seen it?
me: No.
Kenta: It�s not good.

Take a look at the title of this post. It may seem childish or ignorant, but I�m just being blunt in presenting my opinion. I don�t have to sugarcoat it because it�s her own fault that I hate her. In all the roles I have seen her in, not one of them has appealed to me as a likable character, not even when she played the idiot in Being John Malkovich or the other idiot in There�s Something About Mary. I think she�s stupid because of the movies she continues to star in and the characters she continues to play. Movies like Charlie�s Angels, Charlie�s Angels 2, and the brain-dissolving, please-kick-me-in-the-head-with-an-iron-boot The Sweetest Thing.

Getting back to Charlie�s Angels 2, I am offended because it is a sequel, as if the first one was such a goddamn masterpiece that we wanted more. When I am caught off guard by one of the overly obnoxious previews for the crap (I will not call it a film), I can almost hear director McG�s voice in my head shouting �You wanted more Angels, and here they come! In your face! G-dogg, bitch nigga! Whut??� (By the way, I think it no coincidence that this McG guy is also responsible for the Fox series Fastlane, which is quite possibly the dumbest show I have ever seen. What does McG mean? I have no idea, but it might have something to do with him looking like this.)

The other night I watched the movie Punch Drunk Love which is now on video and DVD. This is one of the best films I have seen in the past couple years, for a simple reason: it�s creative. This movie can be admired for a number of things, but what I took away from it more than anything is the idea that movies don�t have to be cliched, they don�t have to follow formulas, and they just plain don�t have to be anything. Punch Drunk Love is exciting to watch because it strays from all convention, placing you in a space beyond the average movie world. It is a world that seems strangely real in its surrealism, unbound by the traditional structures of what a movie should be and how characters should behave. It seems like the kind of film that someone like, say, McG wouldn�t be able to sit through because it would show him just how pointless and repetitive his work is. I believe Paul Thomas Anderson is on to something, picking away at a genre that exists somewhere between realism, French new wave, and hallucinogenic idealism.

If McG and Paul Thomas Anderson got in a fight, McG would probably win. ...I really don�t know how to follow that up. But know this: some movies stimulate brain cells, and some movies kill them.