Adventures in Babysitting is the greatest movie of all time

Adventures in Babysitting. I've got the babysitting blues. Love this film that I was shocked to learn was not a John Hughes movie. Was indeed the first movie directed by Chris Columbus (who previously wrote Gremlins, The Goonies, and Young Sherlock Holmes all movies I love) who would go on to direct Home Alone which was written by Hughes. I mean, it is the light 1980s babysitting movie about high school kids in the suburbs of Chicago not directed or written by John Hughes. It is all very confusing. But a great movie that I remember fondly. Columbus, by the way, would go on to direct the first two Harry Potter films. Pretty safe to say he wins the movie as this flick really propels his career though after winning an infamous Golden Raspberry Award (a parody award) for Worst Picture for 2015's Pixels, everything has since sort of come to screeching halt. But that is none of our concern here.

Rotten Tomatoes Consensus: Sweet and spry, Adventures in Babysitting gets by on its amiable tone.

Gist of the movie is that senior in high school babysitter, played by Elizabeth Shue who is so pretty, has to pick up her friend Brenda, played by Penelope Ann Miller, who ran away from home, in downtown Chicago which is apparently the most dangerous place on earth. She has to take the kids along with her. Shit goes down.

Playing the kids are Keith Coogan who has the worst haircut of anyone I've ever seen and in the ninth grade is embarrassingly too old for a babysitter, little sister Maia Brewton, and Coogan's buddy played by Anthony Rapp. Shue's boyfriend is played by one Bradley Whitford whom you might remember from Billy Madison and The Cabin in the Woods. He is a fucking prick and an idiot. Other notable actors include a young Brett Kavenaugh who plays the dude Shue wants to get with at the University of Chicago (not really) and a young Vincent D'Onofrio plays Dawson, the garage/tow company owner who looks supposedly like Thor.

Some bullet points include the children witnessing five or six major crimes and nearly getting murdered. You see, Chicago in this universe is an all out hellscape. Much of the plot centers on the most popular Playboy of all-time and features a chick that looks a lot like Shue but is indeed not actually Shue. There is a scene where Shue and company go to an all-black blues club where everyone, including them, are forced to sing the blues before leaving. It is pretty racist. And a couple of rape jokes get thrown around which are always hilarious and appropriate for a children's movie. Like when Shue's character tells Rapp's character if he gives her any grief that she swears to god she will kill him. "Dead, murdered, stabbed," she says. "Raped?" Rapp's character says.

Speaking of Rapp and rape, you may recall an interview he did with BuzzFeed where he said not long before this movie came out, when he was 14, that a 26 year old Kevin Spacey of American Beauty and The Usual Suspects fame got drunk and tried to have sex with the child. Spacey tried to deflect by coming out of the closet (and, you know, implying a connection between being gay and sexually assaulting a minor) and making a bullshit apology but then 15 other people came forward accusing Spacey of similar fucked up shit. Because they really want your blood to boil, after a groping charge against Spacey was dropped last week after the accuser invoked the Fifth, I saw the disgusting headline "Comeback Kid! Kevin Spacey Ready For Return After Sex Assault Charges Dropped" on a fucking amoral clickbate website that you can Google if you really give a shit.

Piranha 3D is the greatest movie of all time

Piranha 3D. Trash. But fun AF. My female companion was pretty sure we'd watched this but no. That was either the original 1978 Joe Dante Piranha movie, which I loved as a child, or 1979's Killer Fish which was part of MST3K "The Return" on Netflix last year. Try to keep up. But I'll definitely watch this movie again.

Rotten Tomato Consensus: Playing exactly to expectations for a movie about killer fish run amok, Piranha 3-D dishes out gore, guffaws and gratuitous nudity with equal glee.

Lots to like here. Ridiculously over-the-top. Shitty CGI that they roll with. Solid B-list cast. Gore. Gratuitous nudity, the best kind. This movie does indeed have it all. Sort of weird watch all the shots that were done for 3D in standard 2D but other than that, I can't complain as the movie is what I've known it would be since it came out back in the day. Didn't see it in the theater which is surprising.

Most of the kills are meh because the CGI looks so bad. Lot of faces and eyes getting eaten off. There is a chick parasailing on the back of a boat with her giant breasts out. Thought she was going to pop up with piranhas hanging off her nips but the movie isn't that silly though one of the "Wild Wild Girls" does get eaten and her implants float up to the surface. One of the victims that popped out was a redhead that gets pulled under on her inner tube. I recognized this chick as a contortionist I follow on Instagram, one Bendy Bonnie, aka Bonnie Morgan. I've long been fascinated by stretchy people, probably because I'm so not even though I work on it every day (yoga every fucking day and I can't just reach down and touch my toes [though I can after a minute or two]). First on my radar from this show I fucking loved that got cancelled called Hap and Leonard. She was a bendy former lover. In this movie she bends herself in half. She is pretty and seems cool and it was weird seeing a minor celebrity you follow online just pop up in a movie like this.

Moving on. Basically the same setup as The Meg. There is a cavern under the body of water where another body of water lies, one filled with prehistoric creatures that have a taste for humans, apparently. First casualty is Richard Dreyfuss who is supposed to be his character in Jaws, Matt Hooper. Self-referential and what not. Also get some meta commentary from Jerry O'Connell who plays Derrick who is the man behind the camera of a Girls Gone Wild type of thing. The real guy that the character is based on, one Joe Francis, great guy I'm sure, was hella pissed as O'Connell was super upfront about basing the character on this douchebag. In his official statement after Francis threatened to get lawyers and shit involved, O'Connell said "I get to play Joe Francis! Oh, wait. For legal reasons I'm supposed to say, 'I play someone loosely based on Joe Francis.'" For this alone he pretty much wins the movie. Obviously have little respect for this guy as they portray him as being fucking terrible and his character gets it rough with the piranhas biting his dick off and his last words being "wet t-shirt contest."

Have one of my all time beauties here in Elizabeth Shue, still looking fine. Have a bunch of naked ladies but they all look meh compared to Shue though she seems to sort of phone it in. Adventures in Babysitting Shue this is not. But the movie is extremely entertaining and a fun watch. Also get some cameos from Christopher Lloyd and Eli Roth who were each on set for probably 15-20 minutes. Ving Rhames, Paul Scheer from like every podcast I listen to who was just in Hell Baby, and Adam Scott from Parks and Rec and Party Down are in the movie as well and are all serviceable. Again, a really fun ride for what it is.