In praise of ridiculous movies...

I generally tend to want to watch well-crafted, beautiful movies, with rich plots and convincing acting. I like to get sucked in, and I truly feel satisfied by a film when it both makes me cry and makes me think.

Then, there's the other sort of movie I like: the ridiculous movie. 

Last night, I was fully entertained by the silly 2022 movie, The Lost City, which starred Sandra Bullock, Channing Tatum, Daniel Radcliffe, and had a great cameo with Brad Pitt. The premise is pure bubblegum: a romance novelist is dissatisfied with the way her life has gone and she walks out of the venue where her book tour is launching. She is kidnapped by an amoral rich dude who believes her most recent book demonstrates that she has a unique skill set to help him find a long-long treasure in a remote island. Her cover model then tries to rescue her, aided in part by a former military special-ops guy-turned-meditation-guru. 

They find the "treasure," the bad guy gets punished, and they find love...

Yeah. I am not ashamed at all. It was great fun. The movie is self-aware; it is a parody of romance novels, but not to degrade them. Instead, at one point, the cover model, Alan, makes a small speech about not taking away what brings people happiness in their lives, especially if there's no harm in it. 

As the movie unfolds, we see that the novelist is actually a grieving widow, one who was working on her doctoral dissertation years before, but found that it was not going to pay the bills. So she ended up helping her husband, an archaeologist, and writing what she considered "schlock" because it made money. The cover model only went into modeling because he grew up poor, and modeling would allow him to travel to places he could only dream of otherwise. And the bad guy was obsessed with getting one over on his "brown-nosing younger brother" who had achieved both parental approval and real-world success. 

The stock characters gained a little depth, and the film worked its temporary magic. It's been a stressful week (oral surgery, snow storms, etc.), so this little cotton-candy respite was really welcome. The film even got me thinking about how we tend to judge other people's joy. If it's not harming anyone else or the planet, let it go, right? If people want to collect accordions, let 'em. If people love to sing opera in the park, go for it. Whatever the relief of choice is-- it's okay. The world is fraught enough, and even Shakespeare greatly disliked the severity of Puritans. Who could blame him? A life without a little fluff is pretty damned austere.

And this film? Sandra Bullock has to wear a shocking fuchsia sequined jumpsuit. And Channing Tatum's leach-covered bare buttocks are on display briefly. Total bubblegum.

Take good care, 

C