After several months of hemming and hawing, I've finally bitten the bullet and decided to engage in that most narcissistic of all modern pursuits, the weblog. My goal for this little page is to avoid the "woe-is-me" navel-gazing that plagues a great deal of first-person Internet writing, and instead offer what will surely be critical, whiny comments on topics that interest me -- check out the links on the left side of the screen to get a taste of what you're in for. Bitter missives about sports, movies, television, music, books, politics, and whatever else strikes my fancy will hopefully follow, and I'll also try to point you in the direction of interesting and entertaining happenings across the Web. I'm also a relentlessly nerdy list-maker, so a few Top and Bottom 10 lists in the aforementioned categories may be forthcoming.
To kick off the complaining, I offer the following piece of advice to Hollywood writers and producers everywhere:
Enough with the creepy kids.
Undoubtedly you've been subjected to umpteen commercials for Robert De Niro's latest attempt at flushing his cinematic legacy down the toilet, Hide and Seek. The ads feature formerly precocious child actress Dakota Fanning, decked out in requisite jet-black hair and milk-white makeup, intoning lines like "Come out, come out, wherever you are," while De Niro runs around looking freaked out and ruthlessly gobbling scenery. Apparently this is supposed to frighten and enrapture me to the point that I'll shell out $10 to spend two hours watching it in a darkened theater.
Sorry, Hollywood, but I've had it with the creepy kids. Ever since M. Hack Shyamalan rocketed Haley Joel Osment from obscurity to fame (luckily puberty has plunged him back to obscurity) in The Sixth Sense, it seems as if every writer seeking to imbue his film with spookiness and fright throws a creepy kid character into his script. The casting director hires the skinniest, most awkward-looking child actor he can find (one of the younger models from the Culkin Robot Factory is preferable), the makeup artist cakes as much pale makeup on the kid as possible, and the director has him or her stand motionless, widen their eyes, and say things like "She's in a dark place now."
That line comes from the creepy kid in The Ring, played by David Dorfman (who I'm utterly convinced escaped from the Culkin Robot Factory at a young age), who is extremely not scary and nearly unintentionally hilarious as he embodies all of the traits I just listed. Judging from the television previews, you'll see similar kids in the aforementioned De Niro crapfest, along with The Grudge, Godsend (double points for also starring De Niro!), not to mention Shyamalan's own Signs, which also holds the distinction of being one of the three worst movies I've ever paid money to see. The fact that the commercials for Boogeyman feature the sound of a kid singing a nursery school rhyme while actors run around looking freaked out and ruthlessly gobbling scenery doesn't bode well.
So please, for the love of all that is scary, find a new crutch, Hollywood. Creepy kids were freaky in The Shining, they were freaky in The Omen, but they haven't been freaky for a long freaking time.
