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In the Spotlight
Most Famous PG Underwear Scenes in Cinema
by Jaden
A few of my writer contemporaries wrote posts recently that related their website’s topic to underwear. I couldn’t resist but to join in the fun.
Here is my countdown of the most famous *PG-esque sexless underwear scenes of the last four decades.
Lost in Translation (2003)
Never have granny-panties looked so good as on Scarlett Johansson in the opening scene of Lost in Translation, written and directed by Sofia Coppola.
The scene is written like this:
INT. CHARLOTTE’S ROOM - NIGHT
The back of a GIRL in pink underwear, she leans at a big window, looking out over Tokyo.
CUT TO:
Melodramatic music swells over the Girl’s butt in pink sheer
underwear as she lies on the bed.
TITLE CARDS OVER IMAGE.
Sixteen Candles (1984)
Written and directed by John Hughes, Molly Ringwald plays a teen girl named Samantha who gives her panties to the high school geek in exchange for information about the boy she likes, Jake.
Played by Anthony Michael Hall, Farmer Ted the geek tells Jake about Samantha, “I mean, not many girls in contemporary American society today would give their underwear to help a geek like me.”
Like Lost in Translation, these are not the sexiest panties, but the scenes written around these underwear are priceless!
Samantha’s best friend tells her, “Last night at the dance, my little brother paid a buck to see your underwear.” Samantha screams.
Risky Business (1983)
By far one of the most famous non-sexual underwear scenes is Tom Cruise dancing in his tighty-whities, singing to Bob Seger’s “Old Time Rock ‘n Roll,” just after his parents leave him alone in the house.
Written and directed by Paul Brickman, I think this scene is so famous because it is something to which we can all relate. It is that embarrassing performance that most of us would never do in front of anyone else. It is that private moment alone in your underwear using some inanimate object as a microphone as you sing at the top of your lungs to your phantom audience. Come on, you know you have done it. Tom Cruise goes over the top in this scene, it was sort of the precursor to Oprah’s couch, and we love him dearly for it.
Alien (1979)
Writers Dan O’Bannon and Ronald Shusett didn’t specifically write in the script what Ripley was or was not wearing, but director Ridley Scott made a fine choice dressing tough and sexy actress Sigourney Weaver in white cottons. Again, as with the other three movies, these are not the sexiest underwear and the scene has nothing to do with sex, but the way the underwear are worn and the way the scene is shot, makes for a lasting impression.
What is your favorite PG-esque underwear scene in cinema?
You may see Melissa’s brilliant panty twist on writing at Writing Forward in her article called Briefs are Not Just Underwear. Melissa was inspired by Brett Legree from 6 Weeks who wrote about why blogging for profit is like collecting underpants.
*PG-esque: Some of these movies are R-rated, but none of these underwear scenes are sexual.
Spank David Lynch, That Naughty Boy
by Jaden
On my site, I focus on teaching people the basic rules of screenwriting for Hollywood so that people have a chance to make a sale.
In my heart is another thing: creative freedom.
David Lynch is one of my top five favorite filmmakers and by far the most unruly of the bunch. Who else breaks all the rules of screenwriting better than David Lynch? Due to his screenwriting delinquency, Lynch does not have pop appeal. Most people I know (outside of Hollywood), walk out of his movies saying, “I didn’t get it.”
Despite confusing the average Joe, Lynch has a large dedicated following, oodles of respect, and some of the coolest weirdest films ever made: Blue Velvet, Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive, Twin Peaks, Crumb, and Wild at Heart.
I praise Lynch’s selection of unique actors and lifelong commitment to them: Dennis Hopper, Laura Dern, Isabella Rossellini, Kyle Maclachlan, and others.
Not too long ago, Lynch launched a bizarre website with odd things for sale like coffee (yum), coffee cups, ringtones, posters, and a few films.
One special item for sale on David Lynch’s site is the DVD “I Don’t Know Jack,” which is a documentary about Jack Nance the actor in Eraserhead, The Elephant Man, Twin Peaks, Lost Highway, Blue Velvet, and Wild at Heart,
who died from a head injury shortly after a brawl at Winchell’s donut shop.
Also, you will find on his site, the David Lynch Foundation that teaches transcendental meditation to troubled youth.
Poke around on the David Lynch site, see what you find.
Script Buzz: The Mask of Manolo by Alveraz Ricardez
by Jaden
My website and services are geared to help people make a screenplay sale in Hollywood, a Hollywood that I would like to see change.
Part of my personal life mission is to elevate people and stories that have something positive to add to the world.
With so much negativity, selfishness, violence, xenophobia, ignorance and emptiness to combat, every bit of clever positive brilliance needs all the momentum and support it can get.
We have to entertain to educate. Film is a powerful tool that can be used for good or evil. There have been stories throughout time that have moved people and changed the world forever, some making the world worse, some making it better.
As writers, we can’t all write those special stories, but we can at least try.
Alveraz Ricardez submitted 
a script to me this week called The Mask of Manolo. Knowing nothing about him, I expected the usual fledgling screenwriter with little to say and much to learn.
What I received with The Mask of Manolo was a wonderful script based on 500 years of literature, intermixed with pop culture, and psychological issues that span all humanity. All of this was presented in a rapid-fire entertaining story full of quick-witted dialog, introspective poetry, colorful relatable characters, vivid imagery, and a wacky adventure. By the title, you can guess that this adventure story has a Spanish flavor as it travels through Mexico and the south-western United States.
Alveraz’s love of literature and understanding of people is evident from his script. He also clearly understands that to reach the public, you must entertain.
For confidentiality, I can’t tell you any details about the story, but I truly hope he makes a sale with this script and that it gets made into a movie quickly because I am desperate for my friends and family to see it!
Crying by page one, laughing by page two, The Mask of Manolo is an emotional roller coaster that can help people to better understand themselves and others. Artistic and poetic, it also has potential for mass appeal. It is campy, silly, and fun, while also being profound with intellectual merit.
The best part about this script for whoever the lucky producers shall be, is that it is relatively cheap to make with potential to make a lot of money. This is a winning combo that any studio would love to have.
Wishing Alveraz Ricardez the best of luck. This is a movie I want to see!
You may learn more about Alveraz Ricardez at his kicking website:
“Zampano Films delivers lasting independent cinema. We strive to transcend the standard, indifferent movie experience and bring you independent film that is not only entertaining but innovative and engaging.”
For serious inquiries only, if you want to throw buckets of money at Alveraz Ricardez (like he deserves), you may contact him directly at:
a l v e r a z 1 (at) y a h o o . c o m
Chapter 27 Murders John Lennon Again
by Jaden
The internal life of a famous murderer is an interesting high concept screenplay that is usually an easy sell, 
but for some reason, Chapter 27 is not appealing to the critics. The reviewing public (possibly Internet users born after 1980 who do not comprehend the importance of John Lennon or for what he stood) seem to like the film.
Why kill? Why kill a peace preaching person who is adored by the world over? It is the burning question we all want to know and why we would go to see a movie like this. Does this movie answer that question? A little bit.
There are many conspiracy theories and endless explanations for John Lennon’s death. He was one of the strongest voices for peace of all time who was globally in conflict with politicians and religious leaders. Many see Lennon’s death as the end of a major movement towards peace.
Chapter 27 is about Mark David Chapman who went to New York, stalked, and killed John Lennon of The Beatles. This story takes the angle that Chapman’s mentality floated somewhere between mental illness and religious zealousness.
Not mentioned in Chapter 27 is why would a Christian hate the peace-loving Beatle?
On March 4, 1966, Lennon said to the London Evening Standard, “Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I do not know what will go first, rock ‘n’ roll or Christianity. We’re more popular than Jesus now. Jesus was all right, but his disciples were thick and ordinary.”
Did the young 25-year old religiously-turmoiled killer Mark David Chapman know about this statement in 1980? I don’t think Chapman was even a Christian yet when Lennon made that comment.
Chapman was obsessed with J.D. Salinger’s outstanding book Catcher in the Rye wherein the narrator goes on about how “phony” everyone is. According to Chapter 27, Chapman decided that Lennon was a wealthy phony and should therefore be killed.
Relating the ever-inspiring Catcher in the Rye to this sicko is not something I enjoy having in my brain file. According to Leto, for rights reason, they were unable to use much of what was written in the screenplay that tied the murderer’s actions and thoughts to the Salinger novel. Thank heavens for that! I’m already traumatized.
Whereas I thought the title Chapter 27 was a reference to law and murder, researching the matter, I discovered otherwise. Catcher in the Rye has 26 chapters, so supposedly Chapman was writing the 27th chapter with John Lennon’s death. Also, John Lennon is said to have been into numerology and multiples of 9. Lennon and his son were born on the 9th and he wrote a few songs with the number 9 in the titles. His first home address was 9 Newcastle Road. Lennon was murdered in the evening of December 8th in New York on what would be the 9th in his English homeland. (27 is 3 times 9, in case you didn’t do the math on that one.)
Author Robert Rosen wrote a book called Nowhere Man: The Final Days of John Lennon that elaborates on the numerology. Rosen states that the movie’s title “comes from the section of the book called The Coda, which includes Chapter 27. The producers claim to have based their story on the Chapman bio Let Me Take You Down, by Jack Jones. The problem with the Jones book, however, is that it doesn’t explain how 27 numerologically connects Chapman and Lennon. As has been reported in Mojo magazine (and various other publications), only Nowhere Man fully explains what Chapter 27 means.” The Coda section, Rosen explains,”is based on original research, including interviews with people who’d interacted with Chapman outside the Dakota. I also attended Chapman’s court hearings, but I did not interview him.”
Before Chapter 27 was made, a British version of the film called The Killing of John Lennon came out by writer/director Andrew Piddington, based on official court transcripts, journals, depositions, and interviews with Chapman himself. On a small budget, Piddington’s film faired a little better with the critics than Chapter 27, but it was still met with mixed reviews. Piddington welcomed the “controversy, adverse criticism, and scorn.”
Watching these kinds of movies about real killers makes me a bit uneasy because I don’t want to be part of the machine that glorifies and encourages freaks. Oh yay, you shot someone, wow, you are really f’n special. Way to make a name for yourself.
Here’s the clincher that really chaps my hide. Not only does this murderer of one of the greatest most beautiful musicians of all time get to live, but Chapman is also currently eligible for parole! Ain’t that a kicker? And who has been paying for this guy to live in prison for the last 28 years? Us! The American taxpayers. Chapman probably costs us about $4,000 a month; more than we spend on ourselves! I don’t get it.
With so many important issues to discuss, the hour long interview I attended with Jared Leto (where I was clearly not the one asking questions) only focused on the actor’s weight gain for the movie.
In two months, Leto gained 67 pounds for the role and required a wheelchair because he was so out of sorts and had troubles walking. To gain the weight, he said he stuffed his face with fast food constantly. On the Internet are reports that he drank pints of melted chocolate ice cream and olive oil — aack!
How exactly he lost that 67 pounds, Jared never really answered. Was it cocaine? Anorexia? Bulimia? Carrot juice? What? All that his interviewers and presenters kept saying was that he was “sick.” My friend said that there is probably some secret Hollywood drug diet that they don’t want leaked to the press. I don’t know, but actors sure do turn it around quickly. Jared joked: Like a pregnant woman, the bulk of the weight came off quickly, it was those last few pounds I couldn’t get rid of.
Jared said that no one forced him to gain the weight, that he chose to do it himself and that it really helped him to get into the psyche of his character. The weight altered his gait, his voice, and his emotions. At the end of the work day, there was no going home and taking off the uniform.
By the time I saw him, Jared was as skinny as a rail again. How he lost the weight — who knows?!
Jared Leto and Lindsay Lohan give quality believable performances that truly merit recognition.
Writer/director J.P. Schaefer’s screenplay Chapter 27 is not faulty, it is just not great. It plainly walks us through three days of a mildly disturbed person’s life.
I could not find out much information on Schaefer, but Leto said he was 20 years old when he wrote and directed the script. Schaefer looks much older in pictures, but if he is or was young, then he did a pretty good job with Chapter 27, all things considered.
The fact that writer/director Schaefer was not even born yet when John Lennon died could explain his irreverence to the human being who is now a mythical legend.
To be fair, I don’t have a negative review of Chapter 27. If it was not John Lennon about whom we are speaking, if it was not someone who gave his life to worthy causes and who charmed the world with his gift of music, if Chapter 27 was just another stalker movie, I would tell you that it is a fine movie.
The problems I have with Chapter 27 are 1) who we are talking about here, John Lennon, is far too important to be a nonentity in this film, and 2) there are far more interesting and in-depth ways to tell this story.
As a film unrelated to the truth or a real person, it is a satisfactory movie. Though it would not get as much press, I would have enjoyed this film far more as fiction with a man who stalks and kills an undisclosed celebrity. The way this story is told, and because we don’t see or learn anything about John Lennon, it could have been anyone. In this case, it would have been to the filmmakers’ advantage to make it fiction.
Writing this review makes me feel sad and empty because I want to give credit to the filmmakers and actors for their valiant efforts, but something feels wrong about it; there is a lack of respect. The film and its entities come across as purely financially driven and naïve.
Someone as special as John Lennon warrants a better explanation for his untimely death than what Chapter 27 bestows upon him.
A distant dead star, John Lennon’s brilliant light continues to shine, and no little energy-sucking black hole is going to snuff it.
photo credit: Atari, Gracinha & Marco
In Bruges: The Sleeping Beauty of 2008
by Jaden
For the past two months, every time I look at the list of movies, I cannot find a single film worth my $10. This weekend, I was visiting a friend in a small town. “We could go to the movies, but I don’t think anything good is playing,” I said. “Read me the list of what’s playing here.”
He read the list to which I answered, “No. No. No. No. Wait, stop; read that one, I haven’t heard of that one.”
The movie was “In Bruges.” He read, “Two hitmen in Belgium–”
“Say no more!” I said. Those few words alone were more interesting than any synopsis I have heard in a long while. (My readers’ pitches on my Sunday Picture Posts are far more interesting than any of the other movies playing.)
All the Oscar hopefuls release their films in December in an effort to be fresh in viewers minds for the Academy Awards. It is impossible to see all the good movies within the one month period of December. I end up missing several exceptional movies and cannot cast my vote fairly when the time comes. This frustrates me every year. In an ideal world, I would like to see one great movie per week. The movies released January through October are generally disappointing.
With renewed hope of seeing a good film, off we went to see In Bruges, knowing only that it was about some assassins in a foreign country. I like to see movies knowing as little as possible to get the full effect of surprise.
Like a heavy European locomotive, In Bruges starts off slowly; un-American with a patient screenwriting formula, it picks up speed and suspense with each scene, until it reaches an exciting multi-climatic ending.
The cast is enjoyable, each bringing his or her own personality to well-written diverse characters. Giving a sensitive performance, Brendan Gleeson stars as the lead assassin. Colin Farrell plays a hitman new to the business. Ralph Fiennes plays the scary top assassin. Clémence Poésy plays the sexy adorable fun love interest. Jordan Prentice, who looks like a short Matt Damon, plays the dwarf and star of the film within the film.
Written and directed by witty Martin McDonagh, In Bruges is the sleeping beauty of 2008. It is a film about which I have heard little and yet have enjoyed the most as we round the bend of the first quarter of 2008.
London-raised Irish writer/director Martin McDonagh won an Oscar (among several other awards) for his film short Six Shooter in 2004. He has no other publicly attributed film credits, though he has received many awards for his theatrical play writing. To me, this signals the start of an amazing film career for Martin — a punk rock fan (yay!) — and I look forward to his future cinematic works.
For people like me who can’t tolerate the usual meaningless gibberish that is unloaded on today’s audiences, In Bruges is a delightful break from the norm of Hollywood’s insulting drivel. Elements in this story are art, culture, travel, filmmaking, history, religion, morals, prejudice, relationships, assassins, family, and midgets — I mean, dwarves.
One of the many themes McDonagh interweaves into his story is the famous 500-year old painting by Dutch artist Hieronymus Bosch: The Garden of Earthly Delights. Mounted in the Museo Del Prado in Madrid, Spain, I have been blessed to see this magnificent oil on wood triptych painting. Based on bible stories, it depicts the Garden of Eden, Earth, and Hell on Earth. Imagery that still influences artists today, The Garden of Earthly Delights is nothing like the art of its contemporaries from the 1500s. McDonagh dreamily brings Bosch’s astounding work to life while tying it into his story seamlessly.
If you are the typical American trying to keep your brain cells operating at an absolute minimum, In Bruges might not be the film for you; but for those who choose to brave the contemplative first half, you will be rewarded by a violent action-filled second half.
In Bruges is intellectual and entertains; it is a strange breed and therefore ranks high on my respect-o-meter.
Martin McDonagh, I promise not to forget In Bruges come voting season 2009! Thank you Focus Features, Blueprint Pictures, Film Four, and Scion Films for the early release and spicing up this drab film quarter of 2008; wish others had your courage!
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