Adam Sandler. Who'd a thunk?

If they start saying this is one of those things where we have to go back and watch The Wedding Singer and notice the emergence of his artistry, I'm outa here.

9:54:29 PM    sro home /

Years ago in NYC, I was sitting in the Personal Shopper's office at Barney's New York waiting for some help. The room was small and cramped with boxes and clothes hanging everywhere. The Shoppers were busy and I was asked to sit and wait and they'd soon help me. After a minute, there was a knock on the door and since everyone was running around, I got up and answered. It was Madonna.

"Well," she said, "you're a Big Boy."

"And you," I replied," are a Little Girl."

She is, well, compared to me. She was immediately whisked off to shop and I was left with my Madonna Moment.

Now her new movie's come out. It's been pretty much trashed by critics and fortunately it's neither a sci-fi movie nor animated so I'm free of any urge to actually see it in a theater.

I bet her husband hates her now. Here he's had all this cinematic Acclaim, touted as the Next Big Thing in Brit Flicks, and he marries this woman who, with probably little effect on her own career, flushes all his Cred down the toilet. Or loo or whereever it ends up.

It's become painful to try and watch her be a Movie Star, like watching Steven Hawkins at a track meet. You know the guy's a genius and could outthink any of the runners in a heartbeat but just leave the running to people who can do it.

Where are the queers who are her so-called "friends"? Where's her brother? Isn't there someone, anyone, who can give her some good advice in this area? Maybe Sally Struthers could step in, looking all big and sad at the camera, "Help this woman become a movie star. All it takes is thirty cents a day...".

Madonna's genius lies in staying one step ahead of the Next Big Thing, a social roadmap pointing to impending fads and ideas which will overwhelm us down the road. She's successfully changed her "image" and her music so that, when the rest of us catch up, there she is ready and waiting. Like running into an old friend abroad and suddenly feeling connected to the place because you recognize a face.

It's been great fun and why she doesn't try and do the same with movies is a mystery. From the trailers I've seen of Swept Away, shes all bejeweled and coifed like some Park Avenue roadkill and the wardrobe alone must be the GNP of several small countries. Some of the shots of her don't look so flattering. It's the first time I've seen her and thought she looked like Anne Bancroft. Depriving her of Screen Idol Glamour is Our Clue this is a "serious" movie and she's "acting".

If she insists on putting herself in that arena, she should do what she's done in her music. Look into the Next Big Thing in films, look to movies that push the edge and expand the bounderies of what movies can do. In her last concert, she showed a bit of animé on the big screen during a costume change. Where did that idea go?

Now I know, animé is not new to some of us but it's creeping up on the rest of America. Metropolis is one of the best, lushest, coolest movies I've ever seen and any animated film that scores a huge destruction scene to Ray Charles rocks. Where's Madonna?

When Lina Wertmuller made Swept Away the first time, it was a movie about class and sexual struggle between men and women. The new movie just sounds like it argues women need slapping around and since it's her husband directing, could be seen as a not-so-subtle hint. It just smells counter to all the ideas Madonna has cleverly espoused - women being strong, self-supporting and more than able to take on the world.

I want to see the "fuck you" Madonna. I want to see the Madonna that rolled around on stage in a Wedding Dress. I want to see Truth or Dare in animé, the song "Material Girl" playing as big-eyed cartoon pixies blow up Barney's. I want to see my Little Girl alive again. Please, can you help?

1:33:07 PM    sro home /