In case you weren’t aware, the Cannes International Film Festival is well under way, with only four days remaining for Tara Reid and her leather wallet to convince people she can memorize a few lines and not blink while she says them. Hell, Rihanna can memorize 68 of them, so why not Tara? But until then the big buzz is surrounding Natalie Portman’s newest project, Jane Got a Gun.

Yep, it’s a Western with a “clever” title, so naturally it’s causing a massive bidding war. I just hope this poorly-titled film doesn’t have a great plot that will be bogged down by people making Aerosmith jokes for the rest of eternity.

Jane Got a Gun centers on a woman whose outlaw husband returns home riddled with bullet wounds and barely alive. When her husband’s gang eventually tracks him down to finish the job, she is forced to reach out to an ex-lover and ask if he will help defend her farm. (Via the Hollywood Reporter)

Damn, that sounds intense. I mean, what did her husband do? What did he put Jane through? Ugh, I can’t even do it.

Anyway, to make up for it, I think what this film really needs is a huge, epic shootout at Jane’s home, as she’s pinned down by two dozen gunmen. Because then, there’s only one way she could survive…

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Did you remember that Jennifer Aniston was in Leprechaun? That Jake Gyllenhaal played Billy Crystal’s son in City Slickers? Of course you don’t, you’re not IMDB! (you’re NOT IMDB… are you?). Luckily this supercut is here to take you on an interesting and informative trip down memory lane, where future stars starred in films you don’t remember, where you can see Natalie Portman giving herself a breast exam in “Developing,” a 1994 short film about breast cancer. Just don’t wank to it, she was 13. I mean, I’d hate to see what would happen if PERVERTS got a hold of this footage. This is why I try to offer free breast exams to all the 13-year-olds in my neighborhood. So they never have to appear in films like this. I worry about them, and they know there’s nothing but love in these hands.

[pleated-jeans]

I originally wrote this review in January of 2010 after seeing Hesher (directed by Spencer Susser, co-written by Susser and David Michod of the equally kickass Animal Kingdom) at Sundance.  Since then, it’s gotten a new cut, and opens today in these cities*.  I saw the new cut of the film a few weeks ago, and though I couldn’t isolate what exactly was different, I can tell you that I liked it even more, or at least, felt that much more justified in loving it the first time around.  It’s essentially the story of a family who experience a loss and start to lose themselves, wondering if life has no meaning.  Then a mysterious character named Hesher comes along and basically says, “F*CK IT, MAYBE LIFE HAS NO MEANING!” and lights everything on fire.  Seriously, Joseph Gordon-Levitt is so righteous in this movie, you guys.  One of the things I love about Hesher is that it’s finally an indie movie that isn’t so f*cking mannered. You see Paul Giamatti in a movie like Win-Win, and it’s a pretty well-made film, but everything about it is just so… expected.  You know it’s going to warm a smug film critic just like one of his conservative sweaters.  It’s exactly the kind of film you expect to see at Sundance, and has all the heart, middle-class ennui, and character drama that middle-aged progressives demand in a film they discuss over Chardonnay.  It’s not bad, it’s just godd*mn boring.  Hesher is a gleefully nihilistic cinematic middle finger that has Joseph Gordon-Levitt talking about old ladies “getting strangled with their dirty panties” and specifying between “dick f*cking” and “finger f*cking.”  It’s abrasive, it’s not nice, and your parents will probably hate it.  Just like heavy metal.  That’s part of why it feels so good.

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Joseph Gordon-Levitt is a White-Snake Chorus

You know that one White Snake song, where it starts off kind of slow, and there’s all these gay synthesizers, and some guy’s singing about being “a heart in need of rescue?”  And the first time you heard it, you were just about to turn it off, but then all of a sudden, this thumpin’ chorus fades in and you just wanna jump up on the bar and start singin’ — HERE I GO AGAIN ON MY OOOOOWWWN — and you kick an old lady’s drink into her lap, and you’re still shouting, and the veins in your neck are all poppin’ out — GOIN’ DOWN THE ONLY ROOOOAAAD I’VE EVER KNOOOOOOWWWN — and it’s rocking you so hard, you pull your pants down and start waving your wiener around like a helicopter — LIKE A DRIFTER I WAS BOORN, TO WALK ALLOOOOOOWWWOOONE — but then the chorus ends, and it’s back to the gay synthesizers again?  But it’s almost like the gay synthesizer parts don’t even matter, because in the back of your mind you know that awesome chorus is coming up again any second now, so while the gay synthesizers play, you’re just waiting to get naked and light the bar on fire?  And it’s almost unfair to criticize the gay synthesizer parts, because without them the chorus wouldn’t make you want to run up to the overpass and flash your tits at oncoming traffic nearly as much, and the anticipation is half the fun?  Yeah.  So Hesher.  It’s, uh… it’s kind of like that.

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I saw Hesher last year at Sundance, and while it had some stock-indie-movie elements I didn’t love, the good parts still kicked enough ass that I named it to my top 10 of 2010.  Since then, it got a new cut (which hopefully made it even better) and played SXSW.  A few months ago, a trailer hit the web, but it wasn’t very good and had a nut shot in it, and director Spencer Susser said it was an unauthorized version and urged people not to watch it.  Today brings us a new, Susser-approved trailer, cut by Susser himself.  And yeah, remove your metal fingers from your butt because this one’s a lot more awesome.

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Natalie Portman’s father, Avner Hershlag, a Long Island fertility specialist, self-published his first novel, Misconception, a self-dubbed “reproductive thriller”, last year.  According the the New York Observer, it’s “a tale of cloning experiments gone bad and the compromised embryos of a U.S. first lady,” and is currently generating interest from major publishing houses.  Hey, who wants to bet the first lady in question is a fictionalized Sarah Palin?  Old Jews never shut up about Palin.  Eh, at least he’s not commenting on all your pictures on Facebook.  Anyway, the fine folks at NYMag dug up an excerpt, and there’s a penis-measuring scene in the first paragraph, so it’s got that going for it.

This time I won’t let the doctor pull down my underwear. No way will this man feel my balls again and measure my penis with a yardstick. I hate him. I hate the clinic.
For six months, Mom’s been dragging me every week to this nightmare of a place, to see the awful doctor. The freezing stethoscope and his cold hands give me the creeps. Why would the bastard think his white coat gives him the right to embarrass me in front of the nurse, telling her with his smart-ass attitude to look at my private parts, pulling my elastic without permission?

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