Defend the Indefensible: "Reality Bites"

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His interviews are great fun, when he tries to put distance between himself and every other young actor. He makes some comment about Ben Affleck and money roles every time - even in the last Biskind book.

― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 02:57 (twenty years ago) link

We've made a hundred posts without discussing Ash Wednesday

― Sym (shmuel), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 03:09 (twenty years ago) link

With good reason.

― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 03:09 (twenty years ago) link

From what I've heard, his first novel was even worse.

― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 03:09 (twenty years ago) link

You know, Hollywood actors get a lot of shit, but most of them are good at what they do. Ethan Hawke is one of the few that actually can't act.

― Sym (shmuel), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 03:10 (twenty years ago) link

You mean you didn't buy him as a tuff LA cop wanting to work the drug squad? (Hawke's PCP scenes were great.)

― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 03:12 (twenty years ago) link

Haha no i didn't

― Sym (shmuel), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 03:20 (twenty years ago) link

But I don't even buy him when he's playing himself

― Sym (shmuel), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 03:20 (twenty years ago) link

Like, even when he's playing annoying artsy goatee dude Troy Dyer, I think "here's an annoying artsy goateed actor playing an artsy goateed dude"

― Sym (shmuel), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 03:22 (twenty years ago) link

OK, I haven't seen this but I caught about 30 minutes on TV. I didn't stay because I really had to go work on my thesis but it seemed like totally classic Couplandesque 90s pretension with a solid pathetic-guy unrequited love thing being set up. I liked all the hip pomo TV stuff and the way that Winona Ryder and Ben Stiller got busy to Peter Frampton. I wanted to rent it sometime to see the whole thing. Actually I'd probably just watch anything with Winona Ryder. Do they ever blast REM in the movie? I hope so.

I enjoyed Love and a 45 at the time too.

― sundar subramanian (sundar), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 04:13 (twenty years ago) link

Tape is up there with Before Sunrise, actually. I love that stagey three-people-trapped-in-a-room conceit.

But Slacker, Dazed and Confused, and Waking Life are all overrated. School of Rock was fun, I guess, but not especially remarkable.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 04:29 (twenty years ago) link

Slacker was my favourite movie evah back then.

― sundar subramanian (sundar), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 04:32 (twenty years ago) link

My impression of Ethan Hawke's acting is a kind of amazement that he can make the face he always seems to with no drool escaping his mouth. How does he do that?

― jazz odysseus, Tuesday, 6 April 2004 04:49 (twenty years ago) link

I'll give you Waking Life - the animation isn't quite as cool after the first go-round.

But there's no way Dazed & Confused is overrated - most people just write it off as a stoner movie.

― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 05:02 (twenty years ago) link

Reality Bites is an underrated piece of 90s filmmaking majesty and I'll box anyone who says otherwise.

― Catty (Catty), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 14:18 (twenty years ago) link

I've never seen it but it does have Ethan Hawke in it, a man whose acting talent seems to be to stand there thinking that he's smouldering when in fact it looks as if he's trying to squeeze out a big poo. Therefore it's dud.

― chris (chris), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 14:20 (twenty years ago) link

Yeah, but Janeane Garafolo in a seminal role. Way better than The Truth About Cats and Dogs.

― Catty (Catty), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 14:25 (twenty years ago) link

There are some really funny as fuck scenes in both SFW and Reality Bites.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 14:25 (twenty years ago) link

nickalish nooooooooo
seriously, the movie was like the visual equivalent of Jeff Gomez' Our Noise, just pander pander pander right from start to finish. eeeyuck.

― sean via cell, Tuesday, 6 April 2004 14:32 (twenty years ago) link

Ethan Hawke is the fucking Antichrist. The bookstore I worked at in his heyday was drowning in copies of his allegedly ghostwritten novel "The Hottest State" from the minute it came out; we sold one. Maybe. Also, that movie made me hate Ben Stiller for a long time, and I don't think my husband has ever really forgiven me for the time we went to see it IN THE THEATER. Those were hard times. Thanks for nothing, Hawke. PS "Before Sunrise" sucked ass

― Donna Brown (Donna Brown), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 14:33 (twenty years ago) link

am i the only one who just noticed what sean did there?

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 14:34 (twenty years ago) link

ILX ON THE ROAD NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 14:34 (twenty years ago) link

opening for the Mountain Goats

― Donna Brown (Donna Brown), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 16:30 (twenty years ago) link

http://cache.gettyimages.com/comp/3102796.jpg?x=x&dasite=MS_GINS&ef=2&ev=1&dareq=E2399169AC85D6DE47D554B31AC9B1E183EB543DEA732705

― El Diablo Robotico (Nicole), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 16:32 (twenty years ago) link

He's posted that way before, as when Toronto went down in the power outage. However, now he has no excuse.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 16:33 (twenty years ago) link

But the world must be warned!

― El Diablo Robotico (Nicole), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 16:34 (twenty years ago) link

Ethan Hawke isn't the only person in SFW.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 16:55 (twenty years ago) link

Cyanide isn't the only ingredient in that rat poison.

― El Diablo Robotico (Nicole), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 16:59 (twenty years ago) link

Okay then. I'll take my "defending the indefensible" elsewhere then.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:01 (twenty years ago) link

Uday wasn't the only Hussein

― Gear! (Gear!), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:02 (twenty years ago) link

I've gone too far.

― Gear! (Gear!), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:03 (twenty years ago) link

I mean, seriously, you guys do understand the "defend" part of "defend the indefensible", right?

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:04 (twenty years ago) link

i thought SFW was alright. but i don't remember ethan hawke being in it at all! dorff and witherspoon, possibly.

i have nothing +ve to say about Reality Bites

― zebedee (zebedee), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:08 (twenty years ago) link

ha ha DORFF duh ha ha DOH!

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:09 (twenty years ago) link

I can never tell Stephen Dorff from Ethan Hawke from that one other goateed dude.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:09 (twenty years ago) link

SKEET ULRICH>

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:10 (twenty years ago) link

If Ethan Hawke ever plays a vampire, I will totally punch him.

― Tep (ktepi), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:13 (twenty years ago) link

(or 'jizz' ulrich as we must now apparently call him)

(xpost)

― zebedee (zebedee), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:14 (twenty years ago) link

I was trying to think about which actor was >>>> than the others and my head just exploded. destroy them all!

― Gear! (Gear!), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:17 (twenty years ago) link

I crack up. The fury!

'Alright fine, you wanna be in a band, fine. Go ahead. Play every night. Play three times a night! Don't just dick around the same coffee house for five years. Don't dick around with her or with me. I mean try at something for once in your life, do something about it. But you know what? You better do it now and you better do it fast because the world doesn't owe you any favors.'

― luna (luna.c), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:26 (twenty years ago) link

"What's your glitch?"

o wot a square, he said 'glitch'!

― Gear! (Gear!), Tuesday, 6 April 2004 17:34 (twenty years ago) link

two months pass...

OK, I just watched the entire movie (on the 10th anniversary DVD no less!).
While it is watchable from start to finish and does contain memorable (!= good) lines, there really is something ultimately horrible about it, mostly for the reasons Gear! gives. Ben Stiller's Michael is the only remotely likeable (and not by that much) character. The romance between Laleina and Troy makes no sense (for the reasons Gear! gives) - or maybe it does but not in a good way. Troy's supposed to be brilliant but gives no demonstration of it at all. And, yeah, all the voice-of-generation junk, from the valedictory speech to all the so-cute ironic pop culture references, is so pandering.

― sundar subramanian (sundar), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 23:34 (nineteen years ago) link

hey we get a new EHAAMAWAG movie soon too, what with Before Sunset coming out soon.

― Gear! (Gear!), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 23:38 (nineteen years ago) link

EHAAWAWAG

― miloauckerman (miloauckerman), Wednesday, 9 June 2004 23:57 (nineteen years ago) link

http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/6327/reality.html

― EHAAWAWAG, Thursday, 10 June 2004 00:29 (nineteen years ago) link

Noone has mentioned the name of Ethan Hawke's shitty band yet? For shame, ILX!

― Sym (shmuel), Thursday, 10 June 2004 00:39 (nineteen years ago) link

Hahaha this is fantastic: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110950/board/nest/6622538

― Andrew (enneff), Thursday, 10 June 2004 00:51 (nineteen years ago) link

You also invalidated yourself by being overly dramatic -- the character of Troy worse than Hitler? Hitler was responsible for the mass murder of twelve million people. The character of Troy was responsible for some dialogue that you found to be overwrought and cliched, and for being a part of a movie that you found to be a waste of ninety minutes. Now, I understand that you weren't serious (you couldn't have been) but next time, you should be a little bit more reasonable in your comparisons.

― Sym (shmuel), Thursday, 10 June 2004 01:07 (nineteen years ago) link

The worst thing is that they so desperately try to portray Troy as somebody uber-cool. Which he is, hahaha, not.

― Pingu, Thursday, 10 June 2004 05:17 (nineteen years ago) link

I bought a copy of SFW last night for AUD$3 at a local video store. I'm looking forward to watching it soon :)

― Andrew (enneff), Friday, 18 June 2004 03:39 (nineteen years ago) link

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