1. Lesbian home sex pictures
2. orchiectomy
3. castrato
4. reform school babes
5. Xena nude
6. Asian virgin porn girls
7. Che Guevara-closeted homosexual
8. Fat woman on high heels
9. Mickey Rourke fingernails
10. girl naked boy sex
11. sex in the farmer
12. Pierre Garcon French ass name
13. mother fucking her daughter

   “A person is smart… people are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals.”

                                         -Agent K. (Tommy Lee Jones) in Men in Black (1997)

Ask most people today what they think of mob rule and they will speak of Transylvanians with torches storming Castle Frankenstein, angry Springfieldians amassing to harm Homer Simpson, Black Sabbath lyrics from the early R.J. Dio era or how much they loved The Sopranos.

What they will fail to mention are the dangers of ochlocracy or “mob think”. It can breed fear, malice, hatred, mistrust, greed, bigotry, and terror.

Much like a Tea Party Rally.

One must be vigilant (see “irony”) against such bandwagoning and conformity in order to prevent injustice from occurring.

This is the timeless warning of 1943’s The Ox-Bow Incident, a morality play masked in chaps and spurs that was Hollywood’s first anti-western and a catalyst in the way many filmmakers would deal with the genre in the future.

Ox-Bow spawned the 1950’s collaborations of Anthony Mann and Jimmy Stewart; dark, brooding oaters like Winchester ’73, Bend of the River, The Naked Spur, The Far Country and The Man From Laramie. This led to the revisionist westerns of the ‘60s; Sergio Leone’s Spaghetti Westerns, Monte Hellman’s Ride in the Whirlwind (1965) and The Shooting (1967), Marlon Brando’s One-Eyed Jacks (1961) and Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch in 1969.

The 1970’s blurred the “black hat/white hat” western morality into a further shade of grey with Arthur Penn’s Little Big Man (1970) and Missouri Breaks (1976), Robert Altman’s McCabe and Mrs. Miller (1971), Peckinpah again with Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid (1973), and Clint Eastwood’s The Outlaw Josey Wales in 1976.

If Unforgiven, Dances with Wolves and Dead Man are children of this movement, Ox-Bow is their grand pappy. 

Daryl F. Zanuck did not want to make the film. The horrors of World War II were heightening and the Fox Studio Head was reluctant to back a film with no significant heroism and a lynching at the heart of its story. On the home front, Japanese-Americans were being held in internment camps on the west coast. There were race riots in the major cities of the north. In the south, the hangings of African-Americans were all too commonplace, and had been since the end of The Civil War.

Director William Wellman’s argument was that Ox-Bow was an engaging, ever-relevant story of mass hysteria and mob mentality, much like what the United States was struggling against with the fascism of Germany, Italy, and Japan. He also owned the rights to Walter V. T. Clark’s source novel and was eager to get it made.

Zanuck agreed to back it on two conditions. The budget was to be miniscule and Wellman would have to direct two pictures of Zanuck’s choosing without question. Wellman agreed. Zanuck was ultimately correct on the venture. The movie performed poorly at the box office despite being well received by critics. It was only through later screenings on television that the film gained a larger audience and earned its status as a classic of the genre.

Zanuck was never averse to “message” pictures, he just liked the dollar a little more. As one of the few goys among the Hollywood moguls, he was remarkably forthright in his desire to condemn anti-Semitism and racism. Zanuck himself got the House of Rothschild (1934), Gentlemen’s Agreement (1947) and Pinky (1949) made during a time when most other studio heads (particularly L.B. Mayer) were either hiding their Jewish roots or wrapping themselves in the American flag and a manufactured air of wholesomeness.

All of the studios touted these prestige and/or “message” pictures and were proud of them all, despite poor box office performance, but it was Zanuck and his love of controversy who realized, “People will accept enlightenment if it is skillfully served to them. They will not go to the theater for enlightenment alone.”

It was with a paltry budget, a big name star in Henry Fonda, and a disturbing new vision of subverting a beloved genre that “Wild Bill” Wellman set out to make the first “anti-western”.

It is Nevada in 1885, and cowboys Gil and Art (Henry Fonda and Harry Morgan-M*A*S*H*’s Colonel Potter) are returning from the range. They ride into a town “deader than a Piute’s grave,” and head for the saloon. After a few whiskeys and a curiously good-natured fistfight (a cowpoke insinuated Gil and Art might be cattle thieves), a man storms into the bar and announces that a local rancher has been shot dead and his cattle rustled.

The rancher was a friend of the cowpoke Farnley (Marc Lawrence) and, after his humiliation by Gil, he’s pumped up for vengeance. He gathers some like-minded vigilantes from the town (they are all quickly whipped into a hanging frenzy) and forms a lawless, makeshift posse. Gil and another man go speak to the town Judge (Matt Briggs) and ask him to quell the fervor of the hanging party until the Sheriff (Willard Robertson) arrives back in town. The acting Deputy (Dick Rich) is notoriously sadistic and sets out to lend legitimacy to the mob. The wheels of injustice are in motion and reason is given a deaf ear.

“The law is slow and careless”, says Farnley, “We’re here to speed it up.”

Despite a call for calm and patience from the Judge and shopkeeper Davies (Harry Davenport), the posse gains new members; Major Tetley (Frank Conroy), a local big wig who dons his former Confederate army uniform and Ma Grier (Jane Darwell), a tough talking cowgal with a thirst for blood. All of them are poisoned by personal shortcomings and insecurities, fueling their vendetta against an unknown enemy.

They ride out into the night and stumble upon three sleeping cowboys, Martin (Dana Andrews), Martinez (Anthony Quinn) and Harvey (Francis Ford- brother to Director John). Their guns are taken and they are questioned. It is obvious to any rational person that they are innocent, yet small bits of circumstantial evidence begin to arise. Martin had purchased cattle from the dead rancher, but has no bill of sale. The rancher’s gun is found in Martinez’ possession and, out of coercion and panic, the senile old Harvey erroneously confesses that Martinez killed the rancher. This is all the mob needs for a conviction. A last ditch effort is made to vote on postponing the hanging until the sheriff can be found, but only seven men (out of about 20) call for it. 

The condemned are allowed to write a letter and eat some food. Major Tetley has wrangled control over the proceedings and by morning, thinking the Sheriff might be arriving soon, he rashly decides to begin the executions.

The three men are strung up, hung, and then shot.

The mob rides back toward town and runs into the Sheriff, approaching from the dead rancher’s place. They learn the rancher has survived his bullet wound and the guilty party is now in custody.

A discernible pall hangs over the lynchers as they slink back to the saloon.

Once there, Gil pulls out the letter Martin wrote to his wife and reads it aloud. It is a devastating accusation from the grave, appealing to conscience, justice, and forgiveness. Gil and Art walk out to their horses. Art asks him where he’s going.

“He said he wanted his wife to get this letter, didn’t he”, Gil replies harshly, “Said there was nobody to look after the kids, didn’t he?”

The two men saddle up and ride out of town.

This film is as strong of an indictment toward mob mentality, gang ethics and vigilantism as it is a heartbreaker. It acts as an affront to the cavalier way that former (and future) western “heroes” dispense justice. Its star, Henry Fonda, despite top billing, receives little or no more screen time than most of the other players. His character is ineffectual, ignoble, and shows only mild reluctance toward the will of the mob, until it is too late. His sidekick Art is even worse. All the characters suffer from misjudgment. The Major wrongly sees his son’s humanism as feminine and weak. Ma Grier sacrifices her better judgment in order to prove she’s as tough as any man around. The Deputy is a bully and is driven by the want of power and respect. Farnley is mistrustful of everyone and even the Judge cringes and fusses when he actually has to do his job. Only the town preacher (Leigh Whipper) and the shopkeeper maintain a voice of reason throughout.   

The scant budget and obvious soundstage sets (there are only a few brief outdoor location sequences) add to the film’s creepy sense of claustrophobia and doom. Orson Welles would later use interior western sets at the Republic Studios to equal effect in his 1948 version of Macbeth. With the majority of the scenes taking place at night, Cinematographer Arthur C. Miller (three-time Oscar winner) utilized shadow and minimal lighting to give menace and psychological darkness to the characters and surroundings. It is the first western to use this type of expressionism.

It’s like a John Ford nightmare, where Maureen O’Hara is raped and killed by Apaches and John Wayne is too cowardly to do anything about it… powerful, strange, unique.         

The Ox-Bow Incident is a small, internal picture. Unlike most westerns that use the vast spaces and vistas of the terrain to give their stories an epic, heroic feel, Ox-Bow is contained and introspective. It represents the place where Americans' desires to expand their society overshot their ability to keep it civilized. The danger, it warns, may not be from an unseen enemy lurking just past the hills or beyond the mesas but, rather, inside the hearts and minds of us all.

Come bury your arrow in my quiver, stout Friar. I am not afraid.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Whilst in bloody battle with the dragon beast of Angthor, Larry Blankenship and his brother Stu could not, for the life of them, remember whether they had turned off their rock tumbling machine in their apartment in their parent's basement.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oooh. Menacing. Uh, I'm pretty fucking sure I could wipe the Coliseum with this guy's ass.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Good luck with that, Pablo. More power to you. I'm just impressed they found a guy without man boobs to pose for the photo.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Plumber's assistant Steve Tablon was a huge hit at the fair in the garb of the fiercely popular, world-reknown, comic book superhero "The Phantom".

"Look Midge, he even has the collector pistols for further authenticity."

It is in our nature as political animals to want to attribute human traits to nations, a way to symbolically capture the spirit of their peoples and help us define the character of something too large and messy for neat categorization.

The United States is, of course, the drunk, horny frat boy of the globe. Selfish and belligerent, but really starting to feel the hangover from his excesses.

The Chinese? The patient, abused servant, with a recently deceased master, who now holds the keys to the manor.

And Mother Russia - the ugly, battered old matriarch, ravaged from years of abuse and neglect, simply wanting to be left alone to die peacefully in the corner of her dilapidated mansion.

In cinematic terms, America is Daniel Plainview from the final scene of There Will Be Blood.

China is Charlie from Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory.

And Russia; the beaten, impoverished whore from Lilya 4-ever.

So, when we are introduced to our desperate, bruised, fleeing protagonist in the opening frames of Lilya 4-ever it is to a cacophonic wall of growling, German industrial metal from Rammstein. As we cut to the first scene of exposition, to an unbearably drab and ugly landscape of Eastern European tenement/apartment buildings, a subtitle pops up revealing, "somewhere that once was the Soviet Union".

Not exactly a fairy tale setting. As a matter of fact, it is Estonia.

And you just know that none of this is going to turn out well.

And right you are because Lilya 4-ever, Swedish filmmaker Lukas Moodysson’s third feature (he is the heir apparent to the Bergman throne), is more of a sadistic dare than it is a movie. Lilya’s character arc begins at a nadir and subsequently falls off the chart of despair.

She is a sixteen-year-old spirited youth whose interests primarily entail hanging out with her friend, bumming smokes, huffing the occasional tube of glue, drinking vodka, mouthing off to her elders, underachieving at school and dreaming of a way out of her numbingly boring, grotty, slate-skied Estonian existence.

Her mother has taken a lover who promises to bring them to the States. Problem is, the mother has no real intention of including her daughter (Oksana Akinshina) in the move. In what can only be described as a need for better Estonian child welfare policy, she is left to fend for herself when mother and lover book for the U.S.A.

Her aunt usurps the family apartment (it’s a cozy one by former Soviet standards) and banishes the girl to a filthy rat hole of a room where an elderly tenant has just died. He lovingly left a stool in the toilet for her as well. She is cold, hungry, parentless and destitute. Then, in true Russian fashion, things take a turn for the worse.

At times like these I am always reminded of a line from Schindler’s List. One of the Jewish women steps off the inhuman cattle car to Auschwitz and naively utters something like, “Well, at least the worst is over. What else can they possibly do to us?”

Ah, Europe. Ah, joy!

Lilya is, of course, channeled in the direction of prostitution in order to feed herself. It’s quite repulsive to her (we see the sex from her angle with the panting, grunting faces of lecherous men poised above her) but she seems proud to finally have money to buy junk food, cigarettes and even a basketball for a twelve-year-old boy from the neighborhood who has befriended her and become a bit of a younger brother. This is the closest the film ever gets to tender emotion.

She struggles along, pulling tricks out of the local disco, when a young man catches her eye. He seems nice, takes her on some dates and doesn’t demand sex from her. As their relationship grows he reveals he works in Sweden and would love for Lilya to accompany him there. He can even find legitimate work for her. He snags her a passport (with another person’s identity on it - uh oh) and buys her a plane ticket. He tells her he has some business to take care of and will meet her there in a few days. Uh oh again. But no worries, his boss will pick her up at the airport. Run, you stupid little girl, run!!!!

Lilya’s naiveté, her youthful optimism, infatuation and willingness to escape the hell of Estonia lead her into the hands of monsters.

A typical fate for many impoverished females from the former Soviet Union on the international sex trade.    

Moodysson’s film never dips into warnings or social commentary however. It is simply a small character study of shattered hope and dashed dreams.

It is never particularly disturbing like Funny Games or the more emotionally abstract moments of a Cronenberg or Lynch film, just relentlessly brutal and exhaustingly pessimistic. There are few surprises. You know from the outset that Lilya is doomed (hence, the ironic title) yet this human car wreck of a character demands attention. You will be driven to turn it off again and again. You will curse Moodysson for the near sadistic way he compels you to watch despite your good nature and your desire for justice and closure. But, it will stay with you for days, even weeks.

It is not so much a film, but a task.

I have not seen Moodysson’s two previous efforts, Fucking Amál and Together. Both critically acclaimed films that deal with, shall we say, lighter, more ebullient and satirical topics.

So, if they are as warm and life-affirming as Lilya is bleak and oppressive, they must be made of gumdrops, moonbeams and unicorns. 

I put them on my Netflix queue immediately. I need to wash the grim off of me.

 

Sword, dagger, goblet, KY Jelly, ball gag and masculinity not included. Safe word is "Regret".

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thrifty, smart and stylish. This cap also doubles as a handy bonnet for barn raisings during the "Amish Days Transgender Festival" in mid-October.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pleased customer "Golthan the Barely Remarkable" offers his testimonial - "Not only do these flowing robes mask your farts from the comely wenches at the fair but they are roomy enough to allow you to really dance to The Spirit of Radio and China Grove at the festival after-party."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"So help me God if I end up having to fuck that fat Nottingham dork again after the Mayfair Dance I'm getting back my Betty Page lunchbox and going Goth again."

 

 

"I am so plowing Maid Marian's field after the Mayfair Dance tonight. That chick is totally into me. She used to be a Goth you know."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Look Rolf, I'm as secure in my masculinity as the next guy, but are you sure the nude, oiled arm wrestling isn't leaning a bit toward the... I don't know... insouciant?

I'm an admirer of Terry Gilliam.

But he’s a difficult bloke to love.

His production troubles (Lost in La Mancha) and budget headaches (Brazil, Adventures of Baron Munchausen) are legendary. Inexplicable illnesses, deaths, weather, project overlaps and cost issues have shut down more of his productions than those of Orson Welles’ due to hedonism and ego. So biblical have been the Job-like sufferings of Gilliam in his art that it's the closest I’ve ever come to believing in a wrathful God. The vengeful havoc that He hath wrought on this poor filmmaker is inexplicably cruel. If there is a deity, he's a mean bastard and he really has distaste for Terry Gilliam’s work.

Probably for that Life of Brian thing.

Yahweh is not known for his sense of satire or parody.

But Gilliam is a glutton for punishment.

He comes off the relative success of The Fisher King and 12 Monkeys (and to a lesser extent, cult status with Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas) and makes something as horrific and indefinable as Tideland. He gets a shot at mainstream convention and gives us The Brothers Grimm - a silly, watered down version of his visual flair and surreal storytelling to appease an audience that was never there in the first place.

This is the director who made Brazil, one of the greatest movies of the past 25 years, and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, an underseen and underappreciated visual feast of fable that should hold a place between Willie Wonka and The Wizard of Oz as one of the those rare, timeless gems that adults and children can both enjoy.

And let's never forget the man was the sole American member of a little British comedy troupe where his animation seamed together the brilliant lunacy of something called Monty Python's Flying Circus.

Pretty good credentials for a guy viewed as the biggest financial black hole of the cinema since Michael Cimino.

So, with another break and another few backers who have decided to roll the dice against a stacked house and a surefire, crippling economic failure, he gets a shot at redemption.

And he titles this comeback… the project which will set his career right again... wait for it…

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.

He likely could not have alienated more of the casual movie going audience had he called in a bomb threat to the theaters and violently wielded a large shillelagh at the ticket booths.

There has never been a want for very bad titular ideas in the history of film. They are too countless to list here. But what we can offer is a short slate of fatally long-winded titles that guaranteed box office failure. No matter how nuanced, how against the grain, how subversive, how clever the rubric - wordiness equates to commercial failure in Hollywood.

And I'm pretty sure Gilliam knows this. Sometimes he's his own worst enemy.

Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium

Those Daring Young Men and Their Jaunty Jalopies

The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds

Quackser Fortune Has a Cousin in the Bronx

Can Hieronymous Merkin Ever Forget Mercy Humppe and Find True Happiness?

The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick

The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!

Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?

Etc.

As you can see, we're not exactly looking at Jaws, Titanic or Avatar type opening weekends here. Which is not to argue that a film's box-office potential is any measure of its quality. Far from it.

What it is to say is - at least give the thing a fighting chance out of the gate before you bury it in obscurity or ignominy with a garbled mouthful of a title.

It's like when I try to recommend The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada. I get to the "of" part, mumble some Spanglish and end up saying, "Fuck it, it's the border movie with Tommy Lee and January Jones".

And I took three years of Spanish in high school.  

Life is hard on the little things. Give them names that don't cause people to become confused or recoil in disgust.

Which brings us to The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassas.

It's sort of an amalgam of all the strengths and weaknesses of Gilliam's previous work. Dazzling, cool-as-hell visuals mixed with a clusterfuck of thematic ideas and plagued by some uncontrollable, behind-the-scenes tragedy. In this case, the untimely demise of Heath Ledger.

And just a few words about that. Heath Ledger was a gifted actor who seemed well on his way to a career of interesting role choices and unusual performances. But let's nip all this unwarranted idol worship in the proverbial bud. The guy was not James Dean for chrissakes. And I don't recall Monty Clift being in anything near as childish as Lords of Dogtown, A Knight's Tale or 10 Things I Hate About You. Let's put Ledger's death right around the tragic equivalent of River Phoenix's and move on from there.

This reminds me of the Kurt Cobain/John Lennon comparisons. Grow up and get a fucking grip.

But we were dissecting The Imaginarium weren't we?

Briefly, it is a story of a traveling sideshow of actors led by the mysterious Dr. Parnassus ( a memorable Christopher Plummer). We discover the old Doctor is a bit of a gambling man and has bet consistently throughout the ages (he was granted eternal life for the hand of his daughter when she turns sixteen) with none other than Mr. Nick (Tom Waits), Old Scratch himself. Parnassus' struggle against the devil and his own ethical shortcomings is about all the thematic consistency you can bleed out of Gilliam's mess. As simple as man's desire for endless life and a shot at redemption. The rest of the film is a collection of half-baked ideas and questions of morality, purpose and love that are never fully explained and go primarily unanswered. There are just too many dead-ends and emotional cul-de-sacs to the film. Gilliam seems to be saying something about gambling, atonement, good vs. evil, the fear of one's own desires and the struggle of pure artists in a rigged commercial game but it all gets lost in the meandering storyline. It could be the first film diagnosed with ADHD. 

As with all Gilliam's work, the visuals are magnificent to behold. The set designs are jaw dropping. The Victorian-age thespian wagon the troupe travels in both blends and contrasts with the facades of modern day London. The concept of the imaginarium itself (a mirror one walks through to realize hopes, dreams, fear or desire) is well done, just never fleshed out. The film has Tom Waits in it, which anoints it with a sense of cool regardless of the outcome. And, of course, there are midgets.

What ruins the film is ironically what ended up saving it after Ledger's death. Gilliam was talked into finishing it, after some salvaging re-writes, with Johnny Depp, Colin Farrell and Jude Law stepping in to play Ledger's role during the unfilmed imiginarium sequences.

The result is this forced hodgepodge of a movie. A Frankensteinian patchwork that never finds its bearings because it never really knew in which direction it wanted to go.

The Terry Gilliam fund for wayward artists starts anew.

Your donation would be greatly appreciated.