V V V W V V V V V 'V q ME 7W -lw M- AV -m- -1 4B - The Michigan Daily - Weekeid Majamine - Thursday, April 4, 2002 JAPIYA BURNS - THEFFTH DEGREE YOUR SUMMER HOT LIST WHAT TO WATCH, RENT AND LISTEN TO The Michigan Daily - Weekend MagaZinl E3 ELITE ENTERTAINMENT EXPOSITI r LUKE SMITH -- LESS THAN ZERO WHAT ABOUT YOUR 'FRIENDS?' DRAFTING THE ULTIMATE SIT-COM When I was in eighth grade, longing for the endless stretch of summer ahead, my school implemented a summer reading list. My care-free sun- drenched days of beaches, biking and comic-book reading were marred by the over-hanging threat of reading three books like an anvil over my head. Everything became less enjoyable. Of course, part of the problem was that most of us were too young to understand the subtleties of Scarlet Letter, or too old to really care about the Yearling. The other part of the problem was just that we all had to scramble-for the Cliff's Notes the week before classes start- ed, or hope that our beloved dead- deer movie would show again on TNT. Luckily college loads enough books on you during the semester that they don't expect you to read much over the break. You're free to pursue your E! Internship; your travels in Europe; return to the fam- ily life, harboring secret hopes of meeting Steve Kemetco; pleasures in Amsterdam; and not having to do your own laundry for a few months. But here's some suggested pieces of entertainment nonetheless, whatev- er you may be doing this summer. No family pet gets killed in any of them, and there's very little perse- cuted adultery in these films, books, and websites I've grown to love. Clip this article and put a check next to it as you complete the assignment! Everything Bond. If you've just joined the series, go back and watch the best of the Bonds - Sean Connery, save the world with real style and cruel, irresistible good looks. And before the next movie comes along, catch the Gamecube game or pick up one of the many soundtrack compilations with theme songs from everyone from Shirley Bassey to Wings. Sure, Bond's a little misogynistic, but he's bad-ass, and he's got Judi Dench on his side. Attack of the French Films. Perhaps after watching Amelie your appetite for French films has been whet? Or perhaps after Amelie you think all French films are sicken- ingly cute and don't want to see another one again? Either way, here are some movies for the believer and non-believer alike. The Vanishing is one of the scariest movies you will ever see. There is also a small plot point about a gold- I en egg that I haven't figured out, but you won't need to get it either. Belle du Jour is a hilarious look at an unsatisfied housewife with a gorgeous street criminal to boot. La Lectrice, available on VHS, shows the literary value of cinema, quot- ing everything from poetry to Marx in the heroine's readings, while still scandalizing with school-boy seduction, prostitution and adul- tery. A good enough reason not to throw out your VCR just yet. Spit On Your Grave. Forget Moulin Rouge. Sure, the singing, dancing, and visuals are a spectacu- lar spectacular, but strip it all away and the plot is paper thin, a gen- dered role-reversal of Titanic. Poor idealist falls in love with unattain- able beauty, short-lived affair, for- ever-cherished romance emotional- ly-heightened by killing off a hero- ine. Why not enjoy something a lit- tle more trashy, a lot less glossy,. and one in which the abused female gets some comeuppance? Spit On Your Grave is for you! A Bust mag- azine recommendation, it follows the exploits of a woman, who, after being raped, finds her four assailants and kills them one by one. Not exactly Take Back the Night, but a challenging, perhaps inadvertently feminist film nonetheless. Bollywood. You need this. It might not be a first date activity, but you need to rent some of these movies from India, make or order in some spicy chicken curry dish and make a night of it. ® Kylie Minogue's Fever. This album was made for you. Kylie shows that Britney has nothing on pop, giving you a soundtrack to work out to, blare at home and dance to at the clubs. You will love her, so just get over that elite-music critic part of yourself and buy it. N RuPaul.com. There are a few problems with most personal web- sites. Even with the advent of Jour- nal-design aides like blogger, there's still a certain element of people just throwing up pictures of their kittens or disguising personal ads as meaningful content. And when people actually have some- thing interesting to say, they usual- ly don't. Leave it to RuPaul to be the one to have the balls to tell everything like it is. Her weblog details her life amid normal people as well as the famous. Honest and funny, her latest entries find her visiting a party filled with porn stars, meeting Bon Jovi and recom- mending recent favorite movies. Other things to enjoy this sum- mer: grass underneath bare feet, mangoes and vanilla ice cream, naked-eye astronomy, shell-collect- ing and getting the smell of camp- fire on your clothes. - Japiya Burns can be reached at japiyab@umich.edu. Now that's what I call villainy. BILLBOARD* ITO P 10 1. Now 9, Various Artists - Upside-down crosses, flies, pigs- in-the-window, THIS IS A SIGN! 2. The Best of Both Worlds, R. Kelly and Jay-Z -- If you substitute best with worst and "of Both Worlds" with "Idea of all Time." 3. O Brother, Where Art Thou? Soundtrack, Various Artists - Constant sorrow that Now 9 is in over a million homes. 4. World Outside My Window, Glenn Lewis - Who is this person, and why are we supposed to care? 5. Far Side of the World, Jimmy Buffett- OK, know who this guy is, still don't know why caring is pertinent. 6. Drive, Alan Jackson - Embarassing. 7. Hybrid Theory, Linkin Park - Stop. 8. Under Rug Swept, Alanis Morissette - Death to all of the reviewers that gave into the urge to be punny. We're better than that. 9. Word of Mouf, Ludacris - Ludacris like a fox. Yeah, that's right, bitch. 10. M!ssundaztood, Pink- Oh, this is urine personified. IOWs age so fast don't they? The characters on NBC's will be a metaphor, but only the smart people will pickupon mega-hit "Friends" are perfect exnples. They have all it. My blonde woman would pick up on it.Nathan will have a Gotten old and tiresomne.Who really cares who knocked beard, as all hippies and/or com munsts have beards. My show up Rachel, or who she's 'really'-in love with - shes still bed- will be the only show with a hippie/communist. It will be mag- ding Brad. nificent.We will appeal to all demographics. Fortunately for you, the verydayTVwatc her and There will be an African-French woman. Yes, African. "Friends"-a-hoic, NBC hasrecognized this problem. Some Fre.ch,. She'd be a love interest for Darrell, not because sheis time after NBC President Jeff Zucker finished my last noel, black, but because she speaks with a French accent. In addi- one of his personalassistants called me on the phone. They .ion to liking blondes, Darrell cannot resist a French accent. wanted me to draft some character sketches for a'new show I will have'a slow-witted white guy. He's a poet.His verse with the pilot airingin the fall. Theprice was right, and I oblig. is so dense, it is so rich, it is so, so awful. But women will fall ed - Courteously, of course. before him, falling on their knees begging for his affection. NBC wanted something "ip,"."fresh" a. most important. But there is a twist, because my show needs one. My slw-.wit- ty, something culturally relevant I, a man of extreme cultural ted white guy, Jeremiah is homosexual. And only the viewer relevance, was not concerned with their request..knows it. It can be the viewers hitle secret, so that they can "It must appeal to all the demographics, Luke;" they said. laugh at the other characters lack of knowledgeabout I shrugged and said,Tll do what Icai" Jeremiah's secret. They will find out because Jeremiah's char Then they offered more money. acter will have soliloquies; In his soliloquies, he will always l started writing. pine about Mariah Carey and her failing wardrobe. It must be pre-packaged, over-simplified crap; that is the.That will be the giveaway. Mariah Carey. only way this would work. I'm so perfect for the job that my Jemiah's roommate Gordon is a man's man. He watches toes tingle football,.is Jewish and has loads of promiscuous sex. He is First, I'd reed all the major ramson theshow;inorder for Jewish for no. ..erreason, than need a Jewish character.- the show to have the mass-market appeal that NBC so desper- The unnamed blonde.girl will live in an apartment with a ately seeks I'd need racial diversity. Otherwise the WB or BET brunette and the Afro-French woman. The brunette is a devout would blow my show out of the vter on Thursday nights. Christian named Sadie and clings to the conservative white- Darrell will be my black man. He'll have light brown skin, picket fence of politics. Obviously, she will be the love inter- so the white-flk watching the show in Arkansas won't be est of Jeremiah. It will behilarious. completely turned-off by his character. Darrell is funny. Gordon willinfinitely pursue Sadie (ala Screech and Lisa). Extremely funny. Funt in the way where you aren't sure if She will quote scripture from the New Testament to keep you are laughing at him, or with him. He needs to be '"het- Gordon at bay. The whole time she will love his mystique. It to" - but in a way that bubbles 'camnp. ie's hard. but with a will be a nationwide obsession, i the vein of "who-killed soft spt for blonde women. Laura Palmer'?" It will be fantastical. My blonde woman will be ironic. Irony isn't dead yet, The show will define boundares; it will break walls; it will despite Seinfeld's long-since syndicated status. She will be rule ratings. Advertisers will pay tons of money for a 30 sec- beautiful and smart, she will say smart things - the most and spot. It will be bigger than the Super Bowl, "Suriver" insightful the world has ever heard. She will be Winston and "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire ?" lIwill be a millionaire Churchill with long legs and fake boobs. She will be beyond because of my wonderful show. brilliant, she will be so intelligent that f will have to write all My black man, my slow-witted Mariah Carey lover, my of her lines for her personally, because to come from anyone wonderfully un-ironic blonde, mly excellent Afro-French else would be insincere. Yes, I must write all of her lines per- woman, my hippie-commie, my devout Christian brunette and sonally She will draw many, many male viewers.. . her Jewish male suitor - they will capture the heart of She is not ironic. I changed my mind. Billions. Yes, billions. It must be translated. Nathan is my ne.hippie communist. Communists are an My show will be perfect. underrepresented minority on television right now, and Nathan It will be horrible. will work perfectly in the mix. He will live in a flat above a It will have Mark-Paul Gosselar. coffee shop down the street from the apartment complex It will suck to no end. where everyone else lives. His separation from everyone else- Luke Smith can he reached at lukems~aumich.ed. i I ILARG EST SELECTION ., I . ....... .................... .... ............ WHAT'S NEWS IN ENTERTAINMENT c2!tn V BEATTY BACKS OUT OF "KILL BILL" - Warren Beatty has with- drawn from Quentin Tarantino's upcoming film, and his role will be played by David Carradine of "Kung Fu." Tarantino has previously had to stop production of the film because of Uma Thurman's pregnancy. Zap2it.com reports that with this new cast change, the beginning of prodution has beeh pushed to this summer. LOU PEARLMAN CLEARED OF CHILD LABOR ACCUSATIONS - The mastermind who is responsible for The Backstreet Boys and *NSync has been cleared of charges that he broke Florida child labor laws. The Florida Deprtment of Labor said that there is no evidence that Pearlman and his company, Trans Continental Entertainment, violated any labor laws. The investigation started when the mother of a member of Take 5,one of his less successful groups, complained that Pearlman was keep- ing the kids past 11:30, among other violations. FREDDY KRUEGER VS. JASON CROSSOVER APPROVED - After years of speculation and rumors, Bob Shaye, Chairman of New Line Cinema, has greenlit a movie that deals with the worlds of "Nightmare on Elm Street" and "Friday the 13th." Shaye com- mented, "The basic idea is how does Freddy come back after his banish- ment and how does he use Jason and eventually have to vanquish him, and then how do the children of Elm Street have to get rid of everybody?" SAM RAIMI SIGNED ON FOR SPIDERMAN II - Sam Raimi, who directed the upcoming "Spiderman," has agreed to to a sequel, and he has also expressed interest in doing an extremely low budget "Evil Dead 4" with -Bruce Campbell also has a part in "Spiderman" and will have one in Courtesy of New Line Cinema the sequel. THE O.J. ALL STAR OF THE WEEK MARILYN MANSON The dapper singer/songwriter, nee the decidedly un-frightening Brian Warner, has been ghoulishly sued in civil court for the wrongful death of Jennifer Syme. Syme's mother claims her daughter died after getting high from some eeire cocaine supplied at a party thrown by Warner, and crashing her car the next morning. Between this and the whole sexual assault thing, it hasn't been Brian's month.