Every Monday morning, InsidePulse Movies Czar Scott “Kubryk” Sawitz brings an irreverent and oftentimes hilarious look at pop culture, politics, sports and whatever else comes to mind. And sometimes he writes about movies.
For as much grief as he’s given because he is the head of the UFC, there’s always been one thing I admired about Dana White that no one ever really gives him credit for: every show feels like a big show, no matter who is on the card. It’s in how they present it that keeps me paying to see every card; everyone is noticeably and truly excited about the card while it’s happening. But the thing that always has intrigued is one man: Bruce Buffer.
The younger brother of the immortal Michael Buffer, Bruce Buffer does one thing better than any other MMA announcer: he gets everyone excited for nearly every fight in that moment before the action begins. It’s kind of crazy about how excited he gets and how it kind of leaks out into the audience. We care because he does, which is why I don’t think any other MMA organization can get it right until they get someone who can get that jacked up to announce the fights. But it always leaves me stumped as to how Buffer keeps up that level of energy. And I’ve come up with a theory that I partially formulated during UFC 121.
Listen to me now and believe me later.
While the normal presumption would be that he’s genuinely excited and loves his job, and I tend to think that it’s the right presumption, but it’s just not amusing enough. No one can love their job that much, right? I get stumped as to how he can maintain that level of energy through all the undercard fights and scream so loudly and energetically when the main event rolls around without needing something to boost him up. Which is why I’ve come up a theory as to how the younger Buffer maintains that level of energy; Michael only does a certain amount of fights on boxing cards so he has time to rest and recoup, but Bruce is amplified and has every fight on the card. It also explains where he goes in between fights, too, which they never show (but I presume is at or really near ringside so he can be by the action at all times). And it comes down to one posit:
Bruce Buffer is the manliest man who has ever lived, ever.
I think he goes underneath the cage, where he has the ultimate in portable man caves assembled. Think like the Bat Cave, only cooler. Since they never show the crew assembling, or disassembling, the cage you could speculate that the cage itself is really just the top covering of the Portable Buffer Lair of Awesome. After every introduction he goes underneath to sustain his energy because no human being can keep that level of energy up without some sort of artificial enhancement. What does he have underneath that would fire him up? A couple things, really:
1. A huge goblet of Cocaine – One imagines that needing to sustain that much energy can drive a man to use illegal drugs, especially one like Cocaine that artificially elevates everything. And he is a Buffer, after all, and thus he just can’t have a baggie of illegal drugs with a mirror and a dollar bill. That’s not the Buffer way; these guys are dressed in high priced tuxedos and suits everywhere they go. I’ve never seen either in just like a sport coat and slacks, or a t-shirt and jeans. They’re always dressed to the nines and thus even a drug-addled member of the Buffer clan doesn’t skimp on his drug habit. I imagine he’s got a goblet, like one that ancient Kings and Emperors used to drink wine out of, alongside a snorting tube device made out of BigFoot’s thigh that he uses in between fights to maintain that energy.
2. Four massive plasma televisions showing Fight Club, The Expendables, 300 and Gladiator – Those films get any red-blooded American male ready to start a fight with someone. In concert with a coked up Bruce Buffer, the energy level inside him alone would be able to fire up a large group of African “freedom fighters” to commit genocide.
3. A terrorist that Buffer happens to be interrogating – Wouldn’t it make a great cover for a water-boarding? Who’d believe that Bruce Buffer was really our secret weapon in the WAR ON TERROR? Like Buffer is so jacked up that the military gives him a terrorist a month to break that they can’t. I can imagine they’d give him a lot of leeway, too, so he gets to punch them in the face with boxing gloves for fun. They’d have to have to have bow-ties on them, so that they match his tux of course, but I can imagine that he gets all worked up trying to stop a nuke from going off in a civilized part of the world. Like 24 based Jack Bauer on one of the stores of Buffer’s interrogations, right down to the “WHO DO YOU WORK FOR?” bit. But they had to tone done his wardrobe so that it wouldn’t be completely obvious. And after screaming at some dude, of course he’d be worked up into making the fight announcement.
4. A fully operational slaughterhouse and BBQ grill – “Buffer’s Basted Barbeque” is only a couple years away, I can imagine, because there’s nothing more awesome than grilling meat. I can imagine that in between fights he gets the Anton Chigurh gun from No Country for Old Men and puts down cows that he later turns into hamburgers for the Buffer clan. He would also have to have a massive BBQ underneath so he could eat what he kills like old time hunters used to. Right now he’s just trying it out to see if he can make it work so that way he can bring “You Get to Kill It and Then Grill It” style motif to perfection. Nothing gives you more energy than freshly grilled meat.
5. A Firing Range with his trusty auto shotgun “Charlene” – Anyone who saw The Expendables remembers one thing more vividly than anything else in that supremely awesome movie: Terry Crews and his AA-12 combat shotgun. And I’d imagine being the announcer of the UFC probably gets him more than enough money to be able to buy and supply that weapon. I bet Buffer has a firing range underneath the cage where he just shoots random objects with that shotgun for fun. I was amped up watching Crews fire that shotgun; can you imagine how awesome it must be to shoot one of those things?
6. A full recreation of the original “Breakthrough & Conquer” game from the first run of American Gladiators – You know why they didn’t bring this game back for the revival of American Gladiators? Because only Bruce Buffer is bad ass to be on the other side of some pipsqueak trying to win money in a game show, that’s why. Since he can’t show his dominance on that show, he built one underneath and the UFC sends in the undercard losers to see if they can survive one round with Buffer. If they do, they can stick around for another fight. If not, they go home with a paycheck and the knowledge that Bruce Buffer is the baddest mofo alive.
Then again, thoughts like these are reasons 1 to 6 why I didn’t get into the good colleges.
Random Thoughts of the Week
One of the more interesting stories of the past week that apparently is winding down is that of Mel Gibson’s involvement in The Hangover 2. Originally slated for a cameo role as a tattoo artist in the same way Mike Tyson played himself in the original, Gibson was eventually replaced in this capacity by Liam Neeson after an uproar from the cast (most notably Zach Galifianakis). While it does allow for half of the A-Team remake cast to share the screen again, in what will be the closest we’ll get to a sequel to that film, it’s interesting to see all the storylines from this play out.
Obviously there’s the fact that Mel Gibson is persona non grata in Hollywood despite not being convicted of or charged with any crime stemming from the audio tapes his ex girlfriend released of him being a general ass-hat. Jodie Foster’s film The Beaver, which he’s reported to have an insanely brilliant performance in, has been shelved indefinitely because of his personal problems. He does have the DUI, and the anti-Semitic commentary he made during it, but despite being a first rate ass monkey Gibson isn’t a convicted rapist. Tyson is. Roman Polanski, too, and he sodomized a child after slipping her drugs. What are odd are the career parallels both have followed.
Tyson had a brief moment of brilliance before pissing it all way and somehow is still a figure that people focus on and talk about, despite being retired for some time from boxing. Polanski still has people falling over themselves to star in his crappy movies despite making bad films that don’t draw at the box office consistently for several decades. He’s like a less rapey Michael Bay, except without the box office drawing power.
It’s rather odd that both men were at their peak several decades ago and now are just coasting; Tyson was a world champion in the 1980s and Roman Polanski made two good movies before the bicentennial (and then has been coasting since). Gibson has at least done something of note in this century, independently financing and directing two films that were massive worldwide hits. But then again it’s old hat to talk about the blatant hypocrisy of why people are lining up to work with a convicted rapist (and pedophile) and yet shun Gibson. There’s nothing really to say about that, and one can speculate on why various members of the second Hangover would object to Gibson’s presence, but the one thing people are missing is that Mel would immediately overshadow everything about the film for one reason:
He’s a Movie Star and no one else in that film is. Not by a long shot.
Galifianakis has every right to not want to work with Gibson for any reason, especially considering it’s a cameo role and not critical to the film itself, but the one thing on one is saying is that no matter what role Mel Gibson would’ve had in that film it immediately overshadows every member of that cast. Justin Bartha and Ed Helms are talented character actors, Bradley Cooper has a presence and Galifianakis is a funny guy but at this moment the man who brought Martin Riggs to four Lethal Weapon films is still Mel F’n Gibson and a bigger star than the bearded sidekick from Bored to Death. That’s not a knock on him, as he very well could become a massive star in the near future, but right here right now he’s a guy that you don’ go “Oh wow, he’s in a movie? I want to see it.”
By being in that film Mad Max immediately becomes the biggest thing in it for that very reason; it’d be the equivalent if Robert De Niro, Will Smith, Al Pacino, Denzel Washington or any number of actual movie stars were to show up for the part. It immediately becomes much more about them because no one in the film currently matches that wattage they bring to the table (and probably never will). Hollywood might never work with him again, and most of America might not like him much more, but there is a power to his name that only time can take away. Eventually he’ll be forgiven and people will remember the great movies, not the enormously flawed man. For better or worse Gibson is an icon of cinema that can’t just be erased overnight. And that’s why The Hangover 2 would be a bad move for everyone else.
For all the talk of how people were a bit nonplussed with Mel Gibson being on set, which is understandable, having Liam Neeson in that role also makes everyone in that cast still seem like they’re all stars and the badass Neeson is just having some fun between indies. Neeson’s a name actor but it’s not as if he’ll overshadow anyone with a brief cameo that’s probably going to be wild in nature. It won’t be the first thing that people talk about when they see the film, which is exactly what having Gibson in the film does to it. It’s similar to Schwarzenegger and Willis in The Expendables; the hype for their roles was disproportional to the amount of time they actually were in the film. But you can’t throw Arnold and Willis into that film without it being leaked, ala Tom Cruise in Tropic Thunder, and a huge chunk of Hangover 2 marketing would have crazy tattooing Mel Gibson in it.
Mike Tyson’s cameo was funny and unexpected, of course, but it was also appropriate because he’s kind of a joke to begin with. It’s harmless because he’s long since been relevant to the landscape of Americana. He’s a faded American icon trying for some redemption. Gibson, on the other hand, may be far removed from his peak as an actor but is still a movie star. It is like getting a college degree; no matter how removed you are, you never lose it.
A Movie A Week – The Challenge
This Week’s DVD – Leaves of Grass
This is a film that I’ve been hearing about since it first hit the festival circuit but never the theatrical one; it could never find a big distributor for a wide release. Like many greatly hyped indie flicks, Leaves of Grass was quietly dumped into a handful of theatres to avoid the DTV stigma for a short time and then shunted onto DVD rather quickly. It’s just another version of DTV without actually being DTV; you get the “prestige” of playing in theatres but not the cost of more than a handful of prints and a modest P&A budget. With enough buzz on the festival circuit, DVD becomes an almost ideal place for this kind of film because it has enough stars to make it a blind buy for many people. I bought it blind, I admit, but with the hype surrounding it the purchase price ($14) wasn’t enough to throw me off. Considering I just paid $10.50 to see Hereafter it’s not much of a leap to pay $15 (with tax) and own a copy. They wonder why tickets for movies are continually moving down and yet in the last 18 months I’ve gone from paying closer to 9$ than to the 11$ for a regular ticket; when a ticket to see a film in the theatre is nearly as much as a brand new DVD something’s wrong.
Grass is a tale of two brothers. Billy (Ed Norton) is a Professor of Philosophy and a rising talent in the academic circuit. His identical twin brother Brady (also Ed Norton) is a small time pot dealer in rural Oklahoma. When Billy is lured down to his hometown in a trick by his brother, thinking he had been murdered with a crossbow, he has to come back and see the place and the people that made him leave in the first place. What follows is a bit of a comedy thriller as Brady’s motives aren’t as altruistic as he makes them out to be to his twin, needing his presence to pull off some evil things that only a pair of twins can.
I blind bought this mainly on its reputation from a lot of people with opinions upon whom I trust. Like every movie I went in hoping it would be perfectly acceptable entertainment; anything more I’m a happy guy, anything less and I’m not so much. It did have a first rate cast, a writer / director behind a number of films I’ve enjoyed and it has Ed Norton in dual roles. Last time that happened in a film was Adaptation and I really enjoyed that film. And it has everything it ought to be a great little indie film but I just wasn’t feeling it.
It just felt like it was trying too hard to be quirky, etc, as opposed to letting it flow naturally. It’s a good film, definitely watchable, but I didn’t think it was an especially brilliant one.
Mildly recommended.
What Looks Good This Weekend, and I Don’t Mean the $2 Pints of Bass Ale and community college co-eds with low standards at the Alumni Club
Due Date – Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Galifinakis on a road trip.
See It – Two of Hollywood’s hottest actors currently working get to do a “road to” film. Downey has been on such a hot streak that this just oozes insanely funny.
For Colored Girls – Tyler Perry brings the play “For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf” to the big screen with nearly every notable black actress.
Skip It – Tyler Perry hasn’t made a good film in a while and this won’t break that streak.
Megamind – Apparently Brad Pitt voices a Superman knockoff that takes on a blue-skinned wannabe Bond villain with Will Ferrell’s voice.
See It – I’m not really sure if this actually has a plot, but it has first rate voice casting and Dreamworks is looking for this to replace Shrek.
127 Hours – James Franco goes hiking and finds his hand caught underneath a boulder, in limited release.
See It – It’s gotten Oscar buzz and seems a lock for Best Actor and Best Picture nominations.
Fair Game –The scandal surrounding Valerie Plame (Naomi Watts), a super spy on par with James Bond but with a nicer butt, having her cover as a CIA Operative blown. In limited release.
Skip It – How much you want to bet that the film spend two hours not actually mentioning Richard Armitage? For those who haven’t done the research, he’s the guy who actually blew Plame’s cover to Bob Woodward. My guess is that this will be another left-wing screed about the Iraq War that’s god-awful but gets insanely good reviews for its politics.
Do you have questions about movies, life, love, or Branigan’s Law? Shoot me an e-mail at Kubryk@Insidepulse.com and you could be featured in the next “Monday Morning Critic.” Include your name and hometown to improve your odds.
Scott “Kubryk” Sawitz brings his trademarked irreverence and offensive hilarity to Twitter in 140 characters or less. Follow him @MMCritic_Kubryk.
