10 Things I Learned From Watching Little House On The Prairie

Damn you, Hallmark channel!

1. Kidnapping Is Not Illegal: If you kidnap a child in Walnut Grove, you are in luck. As long as you are super sorry and learn a larger lesson in life you are forgiven (and never seen again).

For example in My Ellen, a young girl named Ellen Taylor drowns while swimming with Laura and Mary. The grief-stricken Mrs. Taylor eventually kidnaps Laura and keeps her in the cellar. Laura is rescued and Mrs. Taylor accepts her daughter's death. Nothing happens to Mrs. Taylor nor is the kidnapping incident ever mentioned.

In Bless All The Dear Children, Laura's baby is kidnapped by a woman who desperately wants a baby. Of course, they get her back. The kidnapper not only gets off scott free but receives a conciliatory orphan. Speaking of orphans......

2. He Followed Me Home Can I Keep Him: Why bother kidnapping kids when orphans are easier to get than a carnival goldfish? Pa meets Albert, a little street urchin and promptly takes him home. No signing papers or anything official.

In the two-parter Remember Me, Charles has to find homes for the orphaned Sanderson children. Grace Snider wants to adopt them but she is unmarried. As the prospective parents come for the children, Mr. Edwards swoops in with a proposal. Nobody gets mad at Mr. Edwards for bogarting the orphans.

3. Pa Ingalls Fails As A Fighter: We all remember Charles Ingalls as a man quick to throw a punch defending his family. But how many fights do you remember him winning? For example Bully Boys and As Long As We're Together, he gets the crap kicked out of him and his friends have to finish the job.
In Child Of Pain and Town Party/Country Party, Charles meddles in some guy's life and a fight ensues. However mid-fight the guy realizes that Charles was right to interfere and apologizes.

4. Spare The Rod And Tell Her She's Pretty: How do you deal with a bitch like Nellie? That curly haired tornado of spoiled evilness destroying everything in her path. Beatings don't work, neither does punishment or humiliation. How do you tame the beast? Just tell her that she's pretty.
In He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not, Nellie meets Percival who's supposed to teach her to cook. Fed up with her diva ways, he tells her off then tells her she's pretty. Instant bitch removal ensues and Nellie never shows signs of her old behavior.

5. The Original Full House: Half of Little House's episodes deal with the Ingalls encountering some financial issue. The farm is always thisclose to failing. Pa is continually doing as many odd jobs as possible to keep the family afloat.
What do you do when you live in a one room shack with three children and barely enough money to feed them? Adopt two more. In The Lost Ones, Charles adopts the recently orphaned James and Cassandra and welcome them to his happy poverty stricken little home.

6. Little Town In The Bermuda Triangle: Walnut Grove is supposedly a small town where everybody knows everyone. Yet dozens upon dozens of characters are suddenly introduced only to vanish, never to be heard from again.

Where are the townspeople going? Indians? Eaten by wolves? Has Mrs. Oleson gone into the meat pie business? Inquiring minds want to know.

7. The Ingalls Played Favorites: In I'll Ride The Wind, Charles has no problem allowing a 13 year old Mary to get engaged to John Edwards. But when a 15 year old Laura wants to marry Almanzo, Charles flips out fighting the couple every inch of the way. He even insists that she wait until she turns 18.

Also in Sweet Sixteen, Charles begins to accept Almanzo and Laura as a couple. Caroline says that she is "dying to call him Grandpa." So we're just gonna pretend that Mary didn't have a son who died in a fire. Pretty insensitive.

8. Pa Fails As A Farmer: This guy could barely keep a houseplant alive, let alone maintain a farm. His crops have been destroyed by heavy rain, hail, and even a tornado. And when did he have the time to do all that farming when he is doing odd jobs in order to feed his family.

9. Did They Have To Blow Up The Whole Town?: In The Last Farewell, evil landowners claim the town of Walnut Grove. Deciding that they can take the town but not their homes and businesses, the town blows everything up. Other towns vow to take the same action if the landowners try to take their towns. The landowners back down and the town of Walnut Grove walks off into the sunset.

Happy ending? An entire town is now homeless, jobless, and likely to never see one another again. What a way to end the series.

10. Family Friendly Programming: Let's see dead babies, kidnappings, blizzards, fires, people constantly dying and mime rapists. Little House On The Prairie makes an average Lifetime stalker movie look like The Bernstein Bears.

And I wasn't joking about the rapist mime.

The Runaways

I admit I was a little leery about watching this. I am a huge Joan Jett fan and was afraid this movie would be an exploitative hack job.

The film's trailer would have you believe that it's nothing but sex and scantily clad women with a little rock thrown in. The film however is very sensitive to it's subjects and avoids being just another rags to riches story.


I had concerns about the casting of Kristen Stewart, Dakota Fanning, and Scout Taylor Thompson. I had yet to see a movie with Kristen and Scout that I actually liked and I am still trying to accept Dakota Fanning as a grown-up. But after seeing this I have to say I am seeing all three actresses in a new light.

Kristen was especially impressive, in looks, mannerisms, and voice, she embodied Joan Jett. Scout made a great Lita Ford, but due to Lita's refusal to participate, she is barely seen. Dakota as wild child Cherie Currie steals the film. If she can avoid the pratfalls of other teen stars there's no telling how amazing an actress she can become.

Other actors in the film are Riley Keough, Tatum O'Neal, and Michael Shannon. Michael plays the girls manager, Kim Fowley. He is hysterical and almost every line he utters is comic gold.

Another impressive point was their handling of the much touted lesbian scene between Joan and Cherie. Instead of being some Skinemax wanna-be, it was an honest tender seen with the smutty parts happening off screen.

As for anachronisms I'm afraid there quite a few of them. But I understand that some things had to be altered for the sake of the story. The movie has a great soundtrack and awesome musical performances. The actors actually sing and play their own instruments which gives the film a better sense of realism.

This is a film I would definitely recommend to Joan Jett fans and music lovers. Don't let the trailer or cast scare you away, this film is worth the rental.

The Face On The Milk Carton

I've been searching for this film for years. Lifetime failed me, ditto Amazon and Netflix. I begin to wonder if I would ever be able see the movie version of one of my favorite books. Be careful what you wish for. There's a very good reason this film still languishes in the VHS hell in our modern age of DVD.

Let's start with the movie's length. The producers of the film inexplicably crammed both Face On The Milk Carton and Whatever Happened To Janie into a two hour format. Not even two hours, it originally aired on national television, so a half hour consisted of commercials.

Can a film be too rushed and overly drawn out at once? This film can. Barely a minute after the film starts Janie finds her picture on the milk carton. In less than half an hour, Janie learns about Hannah and the cult and then the film grinds to a halt. Reading about Janie agonizing over whether to contact the people looking for her is better than having to watch it.

The second part where she returns to her family is considerably better. Richard Masur plays her biological father. I have an unexplainable crush on him dating back to My Girl in '91. I'll watch anything with him in it. The movie has some awesome casting including Sharon Lawrence and Richard Herrman.

You probably noticed that I did not include Kellie Martin who plays Janie. The reason: As good as an actress she is, she just isn't who I pictured as Janie. Janie struck me a normal, average girl next door type. Kellie unfortunately brings to Janie the same nervous, precocious, energy she brings to all her roles. If Juno had been released ten years earlier, she would have been a shoo-in for the role. But Juno is no Janie.

Also, Janie looks nothing like her siblings. A big deal in both the book and movie is how she looks so much like her other siblings.

This is not how I pictured Janie when I read the book.

Awesome casting, the actors actually look like brother and sister. But Janie looks nothing like them no matter what the film wants you to believe. She doesn't even have the same shade of red as her mother and siblings do.

The story would have been better off as a four hour miniseries. It would've given the film more time for plot and character development, both missing from the movie version. I am both glad to have finally seen the film but disappointed in how it was handled.

Jessica Simpson: Blond and Ridiculous

The sad thing is that Jessica Simpson can act, she has a great sense of comedic timing. Given a strong supporting role and a decent cast, she could be wonderful. But these endless stream of ditz out-of-water films have got to stop.

Jessica Simpson plays Megan Valentine. An actress and singer with a string of bad films on her resume (Sound familiar). Of course, when her fairy tale life comes crashing down she hightails it to the army.

This film is strictly movie by numbers. She's the worst soldier ever. She gets her groove back and impresses everyone. Learns a larger lesson in life. Gets a hunky love interest. Need I say more? Even Simpson seems to have checked out during the film, she seems to be phoning it in waiting for the check to clear.

I was briefly in Air Force boot camp. I cannot speak for the Army Boot Camp but I assume the rules and regulations are the same. Privates do not get warm pep talks and pats on the head from their Drill Sergeants. Privates do not give attitude to Drill Sergeants and First Sergeants and have nothing happen to them. I understand that it's a fantasy movie but try a little harder for realism.

Simpson is not the only one suffering through this film. Cheri Oteri, Steve Guttenberg, and Vivica A. Fox also appear in the movie. Congratulations, Steve Miner, you've finally directed a movie worse than Friday The 13th Part 3. Bravo!

Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy

If you are a Nightmare On Elm Street fan, you simply must watch this documentary. Narrated by Heather Langenkemp this film explored the legacy of the Elm Street series and it's impact in horror cinema.
Something rare happened when I watched this, I simply watched it. Usually I am too restless to simply sit in front of a movie. I may work out, I may thumb through a magazine, or putter around the house cleaning. Not with this, I sat on the couch pleased as punch for four hours.
Yes, the film is four hours long but worth it. It covers every film from Nightmare 1 to the much lamented Freddy VS Jason. You learn everything, from the film inception, special effects, earlier script drafts, the casting of the actors, everything you wanted to know about Freddy but were afraid to ask.

Former actors return to share their memories of their times on the film. It seems everyone, cast and crew turn out to celebrate the series. Conspicuously absent however are some of the bigger name actors that starred in the series. Johnny Depp, Patricia Arquette, Jason Ritter, Breckin Myer, and Kelly Rowland make no appearance. I hope that time constraints kept them away, it would be a shame to see them dissing the franchise that started their career.

Since Nightmare On Elm Street 4 was my personal favorite, I looked forward to that installment. It was wonderful see my favorite film delved into with such detail. Seeing the actors 20 years later was fun as well.

I always considered Lisa Wilcox to be a beauty, she still is. 1988
Now


But, what the hell happened to Tuesday Knight?

Circa '80s



Now

Attention Hollywood actresses: Growing old is not the end of the world. We all age. Don't ruin a beautiful face just to appear sexy. Wrinkles are attractive, plastic is not.

Okay, rant over. Like I said, all Nightmare fans must check this out. It's a real cinematic treat.

Deception by Leigh Nichols

This awesome books came to me via giveaway hosted by the The Unprofessional Critic. If you haven't checked out the blog, it's awesome. And it was also the first giveaway that I actually won.

The book is Deception by Lee Nichols. It centers around a teen named Emma whose parents disappear. She is whisked off to another school by a family friend and starts to see dead people. She learns that she is a ghost keeper and finds herself being menaced by a evil force.

I liked the book. It's fun, mostly fast paced, and not too predictable. There are too many books that I end up figuring out the ending long before getting there. I have learned to appreciate books that I can't figure out.

I especially liked Emma's relationship with some of the ghosts. Usually ghosts are portrayed as menacing or saints that can do no wrong. These ghosts are given a more human perspective. Having Emma develop a familial bond with the house ghosts was sweet.

I wasn't too thrilled with the romantic subplot. I understand that it's a young adult novel and romance is required. However, a lot of the scenes were unnecessary and slowed the plot down some.

Still, all in all, great book. I actually look forward to reading the rest of the series in the near future.

Werewolves, Werepanthers, and Werefoxes, Oh My!

Club Dead is the third installment to the Southern Vampire Mysteries and by far my favorite. It's a wonderful blend of action, romance, and comedy.

Club Dead introduces a new supernatural element to the series, the Weres. Weres are not limited to wolves but also include tigers, panthers, and foxes (oh my.) I find the idea of a Were Fox to be the most adorable thing ever.

The book follows telepathic barmaid Sookie Stackhouse and her search of her missing boyfriend that leads her to Mississippi. She is accompanied by her bodyguard, Alcide, a werewolf forced to protect her by Eric. Some sparks fly between the two.

For the first part of the book I liked Alcide but the character is quickly revealed to be weak and indecisive. The love/hate relationship among him and his Were girlfriend, Debbie, slows the book down some. I did adore the snarky dialogue between Debbie and Sookie, though.

Eric and Sookie are sizzling in the novel and I am glad to see the connection among her and Bill fade some. Bill is unlikable in this book and shows signs of weakness as well.

Watching the current season of True Blood will be interesting. I watched the first two seasons with no knowledge of the books. If anything, reading the books have enhanced my love of the television series. Both Alcide and Debbie have been cast in Season 3 and I cannot wait to see them show up.

Bring on the cat fighting (pardon the pun.)