Escape From Hell

Ask 411 Movies for 08.01.11: Mr. Popper's Penguin-Free Column!

Ask 411 Movies for 08.01.11: Mr. Popper’s Penguin-Free Column!
Posted by Leonard Hayhurst  on 08.01.2011

When did Eddie Murphy stop doing stand-up? When did Jim Carrey lose his edge? Did Mark Wahlberg use a prosthetic in Boogie Nights ? Did Chloe Sevigny perform oral sex on Vincent Gallo on film? All this and more covered this week in Ask 411 Movies!

The A-Team was a great blend of action and absurdity that perfectly appealed to children of the eighties. One of the most absurd installments was when the gang joined forces with rock star Boy George and his band Culture Club. "Cowboy George" from season four sees Face thinking he made a windfall by booking country singer Cowboy George in a country and western saloon, but he actually gets Boy George and Culture Club. Hannibal impersonates Cowboy George and the show goes fine. However, the owner of the saloon is conspiring with bank robbers to nab the payroll of a nearby oil field. I can't help but of think of Eddie Murphy.He broke out big after SNL with 48 Hr's, Trading Places, & Beverly Hills Cop. But for the most part his early movie work remains his best stuff. All he seems to do nowadays is safe and crappy family films. Sure, the remakes of Dr. Dolittle and The Nutty Professor were alright. But outside of his great work on Dreamgirls (For which I still think Norbit cost him an Oscar win)he hasn't been the cool and edgy Eddie Murphy since back in the mid 80's. Any thoughts? And any others that could be included in that same folder? A: As Nick mentioned in the comments, Brendan Fraser said he wants to do movies his children can see. Since 2002 when his first kid was born, he's mostly done family oriented pictures. Since 2002 he has done The Air I Breathe, The Last Time, Journey to the End of Night and Crash all rated R. However, his most high profile films since then have been The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, Journey to the Center of the Earth, Inkheart and Furry Vengeance . Jim Carrey has also become more family friendly over the years, but his only daughter was born in 1987. Oddly, he broke his engagement with actress Renee Zellweger in 2000 when his first real big family movie, How the Grinch Stole Christmas was in theaters. They started dating while making Me, Myself & Irene , released the same year, which might be Carrey's last real gross out, edgy type comedy. Cuba Gooding Jr. has three children.

Quick thoughts on Escape From Hell | Robert Mitchell Evans

. Jerry Pournelle maintains a blog — he hates that words but that is what the world calls such things — and so as a frequent reader I have a taste for what the author thinks versus what his characters are saying. (Larry Niven does not maintain such on line presence and so his thoughts are more mysterious.)

This book in many ways feels like the authors having fun putting their political rivals in Hell and torturing them. There is a decided lack of conservative figures in hell, while prominent liberal such as President Lyndon Johnson, are named and figure as characters. Now I am not insisting that author must maintain an quota system for such works, that’s silly, but the complete absence of namable conservatives betrays the heavy bias and that undercuts any arguments and persuasive  powers the text might have.

This major flaw made the book far less enjoyable than the original, even with that novel’s flaws. (Such as maintaining homosexuality as a sin, something that was seriously modified by the sequel. Apparently hell is subject to retconning

Interesting shocker from the Bible, related to homosexuality – did you know there is no mention in the Bible AT ALL about homosexual acts between women? Does this imply that if you are a homosexual woman, God is okay with it? Also, did you know that the only specific “homosexual” act prohibited in the Bible is sodomy – and that it doesn’t really specify the sex of the receiving partner?

One might ask, “Why is this?” However, to me the answer is clear and parallel to the dietary rules of the time of the Bible – the concept of clean and unclean food which really had more to do with food safety than with superiority of inferiority of he animals in question. Having said that, repeatedly practicing sodomy can, and usually does damage the body of the receiving party. Could the real issue be one of not harming others? Thought about in this light, does it not seem likely that any prohibition of homosexual act in the Bible might be related to physical harm instead of an issue with whom one loves?