About

 

Hay! Hay! Everybuddy!

The Film Yahoo welcomes the matrix of “bad boys” and “bad girls”—who indulge (thru a smudged lens) in the not-so-guilty (but oh so ghastly) pleasure known as “the movies.”

In West Pullman on Chicago’s South Side, a fire hydrant marks the spot — where The Film Yahoo’s Mom first collared him at an “R” rated film. For that undue respect, he served time as a Teamster /gas jockey at his Dad’s armed-robbed , high-octane pumps next to The Pit – a hot rod, drive-by; not a White Castle.

Once paroled from Marist C.H.S., he high-tailed-it off to WIU – where he barfed up clean air, and lapped down the murky waters of the Lamoine – while nailing a master’s degree in painting the town red/read.

Whilst grifting the glint of Shakespearean blood feuds, he found rebel camaraderie among friends –within the vampires’ deep-woods of Vishnu Springs, then the werewolves’ tall-corn of Goodhope.

A tour of duty in Hollywood be-knighted him a “word-warrior.” He fox-holed at CBS’ TV City, then the Warner Bros.’ lot — going Special Forces with screenplays and indie films – in “The Heart of Screenland.”

Then the Worst Recession since the Great Depression pirated the Wall Street contraband — that had greased his 17 wheeler. He had “nowhere else to go” but back to his own New Salem – on that fantasy island called Forgottonia – where he prayed his “Honest- Abe” handle, “Fish,” had long been deep-sixed.

For since his college daze, he’d long been hooked deep-throat — by a cavalier “shining” on a ride to the Lake. The sky’d parted; the sun’d shown;  he’d found his promised land – as time… ground to… a halt   – while riding shotgun in a cherry red Impala, and passing by a blood red home …with …a …foreboding … driveway.

Now he lives there with his son, angling for life’s revolver to spin “wheel of fortune” again …with hard cold cash.  He has four acres (no mule), but his affable neighbors do have a back-hoe. And while not as alluring as the ”hoes” along the Sunset Strip, that back-hoe manfully plows a monkey-go-round — for horses “of a different color.”

His co-combatants in L.A. (among the siren-psalmed “Bird Streets”) had had Lamborghinis and Benzes and  Ferraris, “oh my.” But the ”tweeters” of his new hood don’t choke- down smog, and the steeds next door don’t tailgate his Benz– like the star-crossed, cocaine-injected rides of The Hills often nudged.

Last autumn, our homesteader –after a homeboy’s head-butt — stumbled into movie reviews — for the local rag-sheet. Now he hunts down story arcs — within Hollywood’s legendary labyrinth — like an eagle-eyed Mark Twain, for Hannibal and the Mississippi are but a bright star’s …meteor skip …away.  

Flashing his press pass “whenever” for oh-so-dicey pop corn, our columnist had now come full circle – as he exploited skills he’d muscled-up as a writer, network executive and creative producer.

To spin the bottle “nevermore” (one snowy, blackbird haunted night), he unearthed his dog -eared copy of Jonathan Swift’s “Gulliver’s Travels” – where the word “yahoo” had not been immaculately conceived.

Now, “Sweet Jesus!” “Gulliver’s” upcoming Christmas reboot by Jack Black seemed like a crisscross across the Milky Way! Or was our columnist just galaxy-eyed due to mad dog, Bud, the King of Beers?

Gulliver, our homesteader reread as he flexed his six-pack, had a sarcastic bite like him, a nervous tick of hooking up in bandit hideaways like him, and had been dumped by pirates where nags ruled as well.

Now pipe dreaming that Swift had coined the word “yahoo” for him all along, he re-birthered himself “The Film Yahoo,” marching-on with a fresh gloss of whitewash  into a portal called the “here and now.”

While he’s long known that every film’s not everybuddy’s particular strange brew, he now offers up his mischievous but corny, and oddly soulful, but heartfelt “take” – on whatever’s stalking the multiplex.

He knows it’s un-cool “to care,” but, what-the-hell, even yahoos deserve up-time …to poop down a scruple or two.   

And now that this free market website’s up, he’ll paw into advance screenings, so he can disseminate on opening day — like the big dawgs. And with tireless clawing, he’ll unearth a movie’s bone-headed triumphs – because he made the damn things himself, and knows no one sets out to make a bad film.

As well as his current review and a weekend round up, archived reviews are offered here to nurture your “bow-wow” — for messages near hydrants “more nutritious than dirt.”

Just be forewarned to “movie up” – The Film Yahoo will sniff out reasons that dare you to see a movie.

They’re more fully blooded than dreams, or the truth — while fulfilling every yahoo’s patrimony: “time off for bandit behavior.”

Now, come on: the projector’s ”sweet-toothed- spin” on our “universal Irish wake” waits …for no one.

“There is nothing to fear but fear itself!” Lincoln dead-panned. Or, was that FDR, or maybe even Steven Spielberg — who held that gun to our head?

Hay! Hay! Everybuddy!

thefilmyahoo.com

“For those who know how to read, and still love to watch!”

Virtually all these reviews were originally published in “The McDonough County Voice.”

The Film Yahoo always gives credit where credit is due. Thanks to Bruce Newman for the still photographs, Bruce and Stephanie Newman for being the best production assistants on West Adams Road, and Michael Thompson for capturing on film the true essence of The Film Yahoo’s quirky obsession with the greatest art form ever invented. And Sue Scott as well — for this website and for knowing that artists don’t make programmers.