Not Another Teen Movie (2001)

dir. Joel Gallen
Viewed on 2007-04-09
Rating: 3

Arrgh! Stupid f***** Blogger!

I had a post for this movie almost completely written several days ago, when some piece of crap, Java-spewing, Flash-"enabled," or whatever-the-hell-plugin-enhanced site I had open in another window (to research some point I was going to make) crashed my computer. (I think it was the homepage of one R. Ebert, that computer-crashing bastard!) Despite the crash being so bad that I had to restart the computer manually, I thought at least my post would be safe because Blogger has an "auto-save" feature. Turns out it is shite; auto-save "auto-lost" everything. If there is one thing I truly, truly hate it's having to (attempt to) retype something from memory, especially if wasn't my fault that the original was lost.

So, there will not be the usual movie write-up because... screw Blogger, that's why! From now on I'm going to type posts somewhere else and only paste and do final edits in Blogger.

Okay, I have to say something about the movie. It sucked.

That's it.

But the point of my lost post, after an introductory section contemplating what possessed me to add the movie to my Netflix queue in the first place, was going to be that the movie was at least useful in reminding me of an idea I've had for several years: Someone should make a movie composed entirely of cliches, but done in a complete deadpan way--because farces (like Not Another Teen Movie, Scary Movie, Airplane, Naked Gun, etc.) are basically cliche-fests done in an overt, slapstick way, and are totally obvious as to what they're about. NATM in fact expressly calls attention to the cliches it mocks, like the "token black guy" who introduces himself as such. Just for the hell of it, though, I'd like to see someone intentionally make a movie full of cliches but not call any attention to them whatsoever. That includes the acting: no over-acting-to-emphasize-the-silliness allowed. No winks to the camera. The film has to be completely unselfconscious, apart from the filmmakers' conscious attempt to be utterly clicheed, that is.

But nooo! Blogger deprived me of the opportunity to make that point. And trust me, my friends, it was going to be insightful.