Lovely & Amazing (2001) is the second feature film from director/writer Nicole Holofcener, and there is no doubt that she knows how to make movies. It is essentially a slice of life story depicting the insecurities that all women have and usually don't show. The story centers around a mother, Catherine Keener, her two grown daughters, Brenda Blethyn and Emily Mortimer, and an adopted black girl, Raven Goodwin. Mom is having liposuction to finally lose her gut, Blethyn is a wannabe artist in a loveless marriage with a husband who is a stereo salesman, and cheats on her with her best friend. She is angry, and demonstrates her anger against anyone who crosses her path. Mortimer is an aspiring actress who is deeply insecure about her appearance. and young Goodwin is a real butterball, whose biological mother was a crackhead, and who really wants to be white.

Keener's surgery has complications, Blethyn takes a job in a one hour photo store, and ends up screwing her High School aged boss, and Mortimer chases off her boyfriend with her insecurities, and beds the star of a series she was not cast for after a decent audition. After the sex, which we don't see, she asks him to give her an honest appraisal of her body. This, of course, is a much more serious version of the question all men dread hearing from their wife, "Do I look fat to you?" She poses stark naked for him while he gives an honest appraisal. Indeed, I got a few laughs from this film, seeing these women effortlessly place men in uncomfortable positions that I have been in myself. For the most part, the film was not really interesting for me, and I couldn't relate to these women and their problems.

It was no surprise to me that women at IMDB rate this 8.1, with a 9.0 from girls 18 and under, while men say 7.1, with 6.7 from men aged 30 to 44. In other words, it is a chick flick, but is well made enough that it still caries an overall 7.3. Mrs. Tuna liked it, saying that you get to see a side of women, accurately portrayed, that they usually hide. Ebert adored it, awarding a perfect 4 stars. It wasn't clear to me from his review why he awarded it his highest rating, to her than the fact that he liked the honest portrayal of flawed women who were out there trying. Berardinelli says 3 stars, praising the character development from the roles carefully crafted by Holofcener. Rotten Tomatoes has it at 84%, with 89% from top critics. Although I ultimately didn't really enjoy the film, it is basically an estrogen centric character driven comedy/drama, yet has high scores from demographics that would generally not enjoy this sort of film, so the proper score is probably B-.

Happy thanksgiving to those that celebrate it.

Here's the last movie clip from Femme Fatale.

• Romijn (strip scene). Again, this is in .divx format, DIVX 5.02 codec. The sound is stripped out to allow a nice big picture at a reasonable bandwidth (this is a very long scene - about 12 meg). If you're lost, just download their latest player and codec at www.divx.com (they are bundled together), and you'll be in like Flynn, whatever that means. I tried again to call Flynn and ask him what that meant, but he was still out. He's never in.

Unfaithful is Adrian Lyne's film about a woman who is, well, unfaithful. I guess that's how they thought of the title. I wrote about a zillion words about it on the info page, but the main point is this: Diane Lane nudity.

• thumbnails
• Diane Lane (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)

OTHER CRAP:

• More Page 3 hopefuls
• The world is back to normal. For a brief, shining moment, the critics were in love with Adam Sandler. Then they remembered - hey, he's Adam Sandler, fer chrissakes. (Link goes to RT's summary of the reviews of the soon-to-be immortal cinema classic, Adam Sandler's 8 Crazy Nights, a Hanukkah holiday film). The Orlando Sentinel said - "Sets animation back 30 years, musicals back 40 years and Judaism back at least 50."
• preview of The Two Towers
•  It takes a thief ... President Bush appoints the head of his 9-11 investigation squad - raising from the dead the famed socialite, bon vivant, and war criminal, Hammerin' Hank Kissinger. I have to admit, it's a smart move by Bush. You see, the purpose of the investigation is "to help the administration learn the tactics and motives of the enemy". Who understands better than Kissinger why anyone would make an aerial attack on non-combatant civilians in a country which is not at war? Hell, he probably won't even have to investigate anything but his own diaries. Years ago, management made the same move at 7-Eleven when we wanted to devise a c-store robbery program - we hired a famous multiple-store robber to tell us how the the crooks think.
• Mike Tyson says "I'm tired of being stupid". Hey, Mike, smart is overrated. Ask Kissinger.
• the latest e-bay scam: buy a ten dollar bill - current bid $11.50. Or, if you prefer, they can just charge your credit card a buck and a half and send you nothing.

Hey, Scoop:

Got a question for any other readers out there.  Jill Hennessey (sp) just had a movie come out that according to the reviewer is rated R for extreme sexuality.  Any hope that she's the reason for that comment?  Has anyone seen this movie?

Mr Skin had this to say:

"There is no nudity in this, but Law and Order/Crossing Jordan babe Jill Hennessy is seen in her bra and panties sitting on a bed about to have sex with a contractor who has come to her house for a job. Rosario Dawson has a fun scene where she takes her clothes off for Steve Buscemi, who is sketching her, but we see nothing because the camera pans away. "

Shameless Propaganda, part 3:

Who is Pat Reeder?

Pat Reeder is a guy whose name is not familiar to you, but who affects your life every day. He's the guy who inspects your t-shirts. You know "Inspected by #16"? Well, Pat is inspector 16. He's also the guy who checks to make sure you haven't removed those mattress tags.

OK, I'm just kidding to see if you were paying attention.

He's actually the guy who writes the jokes that your DJ tells every morning during your drive to work.  He's also the guy who writes those Comedy Wire things that you see on the bottom of this page from time to time. If you wonder why your DJ and the Fun House tell the same jokes, Pat's the reason. At the moment, Pat has a new book out called "Nine Hallmarks of Highly Incompetent Losers."  It's a "reverse self-help" book that helps the reader attain success by avoiding nine stupid mistakes made by failures and idiots.  He illustrates his points with over 200 hilarious-but-true stories from his syndicated radio service, "The Comedy Wire."

If you like weird news and dumb criminal stories, or if you've ever been forced to suffer through a boring business/self-help book like "Who Moved My Cheese?", you'll love "Nine Hallmarks of Highly Incompetent Losers."  It earned four stars from Wireless Flash News, and will be in bookstores nationwide next spring, but you can get the jump on the rest of America and get it now through Pat's website.  Cheaper than Amazon and every copy is personally autographed! 

Click here (http://www.comedy-wire.com/bookorderpage.html) for a book excerpt, Real Audio updates on "Losers In The News," samples of the Comedy Wire and more. 

FREEBIE ALERT!  Be the first Funhouse denizen to order a copy via credit card and win a free year's subscription to the Fun House. That's a whole year of access, completely free. If you pay $39.95 per month, that's worth more than $450! Plus the damned book costs less than thirteen bucks to begin with, including an autograph! Just mention on the order form that you saw it in Uncle Scoopy's Funhouse. (If you're not a member now, and are reading this on the free version, you'll have to prove that you're 18, or the second guy will get the prize.) This Sunday, Pat will let me know who got in first, and we'll announce the winners in next Monday or Tuesday's edition, depending on how long it takes to verify that the winner is old enough.

And remember, I receive no cash for sending you there.

Although, in the interest of truth in advertising, I do appreciate the fact that I can now go to 7-Eleven in my new Lear Jet.

Chapter Three:  Don't Sweat The Details

By now, you have been spooked into developing a plan and keeping your eye on the goal.  But never fear, you can still attain a coveted spot in the Loser Hall of Fame.  It's easy.  Just make the most popular mistake of all: "Don't sweat the details"...

*   At age 18, former child actor Brad Renfro, who starred in John Grisham's "The Client," was arrested in Florida on grand theft charges.
Police said he and an accomplice tried to steal a 45-foot yacht but overlooked the tiny detail of untying it from the dock first.  It was yanked back, causing major stern damage and proving that Renfro was a young man in desperate need of a stern lecture.  The cops said Renfro kept demanding, "Don't you know who I am?"  Of course, they did: he was famous for playing a kid who really needed a lawyer.

*   A 25-year-old man in Romania was released from prison after a four-year term and wanted to celebrate with a marathon sex session.  He had heard that petroleum jelly was good for sex but didn't know how to use it.  Rather than asking someone, he simply injected his penis with six syringes full of petroleum jelly.  It swelled in size, all right, but then he collapsed in pain and was hospitalized.  The fact that he had no idea how to use a sexual lubricant should tell you just how rough Romanian prisons are...
 

Here are the latest movie reviews available at scoopy.com.

• The yellow asterisks indicate that I wrote the review, and am deluded into thinking it includes humor.
• If there is a white asterisk, it means that there isn't any significant humor, but I inexplicably determined there might be something else of interest.
• A blue asterisk indicates the review is written by Tuna (or Lawdog or Junior or C2000 or Realist or ICMS or Mick Locke, or somebody else besides me)
• If there is no asterisk, I wrote it, but am too ashamed to admit it.

Okay, so I've been holding out on you guys. For the past couple of months I have capped a bunch of movies with Hefmates in them but I've sent in only some of the collages or...the horror...none at all. The result is this, a present from me to the fellow readers of the Funhouse, a flood of Hefmates. Thirty-seven of em, to be exact. All of these collages are brand spanking new. Even if they are caps from movies and Hefmates I've sent in already, the collages cover scenes previously unseen by human eyes... other than my own, I guess. And Junior's. And now yours.

This is a mixture of VHS and DVD caps.

Part 1 today, with more to come...

• August 1986 Hefmate, Ava Fabian, topless in VHS caps from "Ski School" (1990). (1, 2, 3)

• September 1983 Hefmate Barbara Edwards in some kick-ass Tuna-captured DVD frames from "Malibu Express".

  Topless in the shower in collages 1-4. You just have to take a look at #4, because in it are frames from when she stares right at the camera. Can see the wheels turning in her head: oh yeah, this isn't one of those lame Hefmate videos we're shooting. Must look away.

  Great open blouse in #5.

  Topless in bikini (collages 5-11) while POURING COFFEE. Didn't I tell you? Huh? You see a topless babe pouring coffee and, friend, you are watching an Andy Sidaris movie.

  The real winner is collage 12. Outtakes of the shower scene. Kim MacArthur topless and Barbara, full-frontal. Jackpot! (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)

• December 1992 Hefmate Barbara Moore in DVD caps of "Wild Malibu Weekend" (1994). Lots of exposure from lots of babes, all of whom you will see in the next couple of weeks. But Barbara didn't get the message the day they planned and wrote this movie. She hides the goodies and lets them out very briefly (about five frames worth of hooters, and just barely exposed). So I grabbed what I could and here it is. (1, 2)

• April 2000 Hefmate, Brande Roderick, in two movies. First up are VHS caps from Stripper Wives (1998). Got this from Blockbuster because I couldn't find a DVD anywhere and couldn't find another copy of the videotape anywhere else. Some, or even a great deal of the nekkidness might have been missing. Still you see Brande's el primo bum in a lap dance while she's wearing a thong and a bra. Man, if there is a version of this with her nekkid I just gotta find it. She shows off her then-natural and then-wonderful boobs in #'s 5 and 6. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

• The next batch of April 2000 Hefmate, Brande Roderick. These 'caps are from a DVD called "Life of a Gigolo" (1999). Again, the wonderful natural ones are really well shown off in the first nine collages, with some grabbing and kissing to boot. Number 7 is a side view of a full-frontal, if that makes any sense; number 9 shows off her bum and the last is a greatly lightened view of Brande's muff. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)

• September 1993 Hefmate, Carrie Wescott, in "Garage Girls" (1999). Robo-hooters throughout, bum in 2 and 3 and a vague look at the bush in 7 & 8. My favorites by far are the 6th collage and the last one. Everything just clicked with those. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)

• Sept 1971 Hefmate Crystal Smith in "Hotdog the Movie" (1984). Crystal improved greatly in the 13 years between the Hefmag and the movies. Went from a cutie to a hottie in a triple-B performance. (1, 2, 3)

• Feb 1973 Hefmate Cyndi Wood in DVD caps from "Apocalypse Now, Redux". Boobs only in a scene that has been capped before, but I didn't think you'd mind seeing it again. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

• April 1987 Hefmate, Eloise Broady, in a single collage of toplessness from "Dangerous Love" (1988). Eloise was a real looker who didn't mind taking off her clothes in front of a camera (she was a frickin Hefmate, for heaven' sake) but this set of VHS caps is the only cinema exposure of her. Que lastima.

• January 1989 Hefmate Fawna MacLaren in VHS caps from "Lady in Waiting" (1994). Collages 1-3 show hooters from Fawna in a three-some (the other woman is former Pet Sandra Taylor); the fourth shows hooters in anothe scene. (1, 2, 3, 4)

• December 1987 Hefmate, India Allen, in "Almost Hollywood" (1994). She produced this movie and starred as herself, and did a topless scene, which didn't turn out too bad, as far as VHS things go. (1, 2, 3, 4)

She's a bit out of the picture for the moment, but next week Winona Ryder should know what her sentence will be. You know how many people were joking that she should star in a women-in-prison flick. Well, did I find the right WIP flick for her! Your Honor, if you're reading this then, nudge, nudge, wink, wink...

I am talking about "Caged Women", also known as "Caged - Le Prede Umane" and "QHS" (French DVD title), from 1992. I really can't recall having seen one WIP film in which the lead actress and various other women are practically stark naked from beginning to ending. That lead actress is Pilar Orive, now Oribe, a former Miss Spanish Basque Country, who played in a couple of softcore films in which she really showed everything. She was then engaged and is since 1995 married to Paolo Salvatore, apparently a famous Chilean singer. I always thought Flemish songs had the most silly texts in the world, but this song by her hubby beats them all (read it here in Spanish www.midicorreo.com/letras/mc0181.txt ). Did he write this while watching one of his wife's movie's? Yep, she's married, you can clearly see her ring in pictures 4 and 10 and it's not on one of her fingers. I don't know if there are any Chilean Fun House readers but if there are they'll be happy to see these pictures, I assume. In an interview with a Chilean newspaper she said that these films were really hard to do for her, but you never get that impression while watching the film, so she must have been a great actress :-)

The film itself deals with a young American girl, played by Pilar, who arrives by boat in a small jungle town by the sea in South America. She checks in into the local hotel and starts undressing. She puts on a sexy dress, goes down to the bar and has a local macho hitting on her. He doesn't take no for an answer so one of the patrons, an American, comes to the rescue. She rewards him afterwards in her hotel room in the appropriate way for a damsel having been in distress. The next morning when she wakes up the macho guy and a few other men come bursting into her room. He turns out to be a local narcotics cop and he's really pissed off by the humiliation he suffered in the bar. He plants some dope in her suitcase, arrests her and takes her to a prison for women. Among the other women she meets there is yet another American. The jungle sure seems crowded with Americans in this flick. Then we have all the typical ingredients for a WIP film, like girls having their clothes ripped off, being hosed down, forced prostitution and so on. You can see it all in my pictures. Finally there's the "girl hunt" that goes terribly wrong for the hunters.

What makes this film different from other WIP flicks you might ask? Well, first of all the film doesn't take itself so serious like others. Not that it is a comedy, but let me illustrate it with a few examples. When Pilar and her American friend finish making love he says he would like them to stay together, but she answers that she has to leave this town the next morning because otherwise she has the feeling that she might get involved in things that might put her life in danger! In the prison where the girls are forced into prostitution, Pilar kicks her "client" in the nuts. The mean guy asks and gets a refund because these women don't want him. Because Pilar and her American prison mate are rebellious, they're put in a cage in the burning sun on the roof of the prison. They counter dehydration by licking off each other's sweat! I never saw that one before. Furthermore we hear our heroin say that you wouldn't think this is still possible in this day and age. At one point she is even invoking that her human rights are being violated. As if that will help. We even have a happy ending thanks to the American good guy who from early on in the film never stopped looking for her and the girls certainly don't seem scarred for life.

All this mockery makes it much easier to watch this film since you are constantly reminded that this is not reality and that you are just seeing what you in fact just wanted to see: naked girls in awkward situations without everything being too serious. From this POV and thanks to the cohesive storyline it is certainly the best WIP flick I have ever seen and thus I rate it at C+. The IMDb has it at 4.2 now, last week it was still on 6.1, both scores with only 19 votes! How is this possible? Are these the guys who organised the Florida 2000 election?

Nudity report: Pilar Orive is stark naked or very skimpily clad throughout most of the film, Isabel Libossart (not Lissobart like in the IMDb) also shows all three B's and more, Elena Wiedermann as the lesbian warden goes full frontall, and lots of unknown women ranging from stark naked to superskimpy clothing.

There are several versions of this film around: Amazon has a 90 minutes NTSC VHS tape at $ 89.95, there is a hard to find Japanese region 2 NTSC DVD at 81 minutes long and all frontal nudity blurred out, and a British 65 minutes (!) PAL DVD region 2 version with pratically all the goodies censored. The British version is really just a tad more than a pipe without the stem and the head missing as well (even a scene at the beginning in which both Americans are making love doggy style is edited out). The version all these images come from is a French region 2 DVD in PAL and 90 minutes long. Unfortunately there is no English language version on this disk. It is titled QHS (Quartier Haute Sécurté) and shouldn't be watched by children under 12 according to what's written on the DVD case. Some politicians and philosophers in France would cry outrage if they knew this.

• Isabel Libossart Thumbnails
• Isabel Libossart Thumbnails
• Isabel Libossart Thumbnails
• Isabel Libossart Thumbnails

• Isabel Libossart, all 3 B's and some lesbo lickin' (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31)

  
  

• Pilar Orive Thumbnails
• Pilar Orive Thumbnails
• Pilar Orive Thumbnails
• Pilar Orive Thumbnails
• Pilar Orive Thumbnails
• Pilar Orive Thumbnails
• Pilar Orive Thumbnails

• Pilar Orive, all 3 B's (including several close-ups), sex scenes, lesbo lickin' and even a little bondage action. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61)

  
  

• Elena Wiedermann Thumbnails

• Elena Wiedermann, breasts, bondage, and full frontal nudity. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)

  
  

• Unknown Thumbnails
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• Unknowns (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67)

Covering a bit of old news....As far as Death Wish II is concerned, the Brazilian DVD has finaIly arrived and I can confirm that it is indeed the uncut version of this flick. I'll probably do some caps of it next week or so.

Today we look at Angie Everhart in "Another 9 1/2 Weeks". No nudity, but she still looks very sexy wearing in these lingerie scenes.

• Angie Everhart (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

Then we move on to a real Turkey of a movie (pun intended) "Last Stand", which at least shows us Kate Rodger giving us a little boob exposure. In the last 2 caps she becomes my "Babe in Bondage" for the day, sadly fully clothed.

Happy Thanksgiving to all.

• Kate Rodger (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

Kate Vernon topless and even showing some rare bush in "Bloodknot" (1995) (not to be confused with the much tamer tv movie of the same name and also starring Kate). Kate is the real-life daughter of John "Dean Wormer" Vernon so you're all on double-secret probation for seeing her naked.

• Kate Vernon

• Soap actress Penelope Gioris also topless in Bloodknot.

"Trailer Park Boys" (2001) is a Canadian mockumentary tv series with plenty of trailer trash chicks.

• Lucy Decoutere: braless pokies but very small breasts.
• Sarah Dunsworth: slight pokies with Lucy but has much larger breasts.

Next up...Nancy Osborne topless in "Hometown USA" (1979). She's one sexy six-foot tall amazon woman.

• Nancy Osborne

"Grievous Bodily Harm" (1988) is an aussie crime-mystery about a teacher obsessed with a kinky sex video of his missing wife (soap actress Joy Bell) having a threesome with his best friend and his wife (Caz Lederman).

• Caz Lederman: topless but hands covering breasts
• Joy Bell: topless but images in movie are from video monitor so quality is poor.

South Africa's Michelle Bestbier in two movies....

• First up, Michelle Bestbier skinnydipping in "Prey for the Hunter" (1993) but only showing bare back.

• Michelle Bestbier also has a topless under-the-sheets love scene in "To the Death" (1993) but breasts hidden by arms and shadows.

ARNOLD ADMITS TO LYING AND POT USE
Puffing Weed - A digitally-restored print of the 1977 documentary "Pumping Iron" is being released, and it could cause problems for Arnold Schwarzenegger's political ambitions. In it, the young Arnold is shown smoking pot and telling a story about his life that was later shown to be untrue. Arnold told the A.P. that bodybuilders made outrageous claims to promote the sport, and he admitted, "I did smoke a joint, and I did inhale." But he said it was in the '70s, and "I have never touched it since."