Comedian Ari Shaffir

This review is going to be particularly difficult for me for two reasons. First of all, I’ve never written a movie review before. As with any new endeavor, there is a learning period one has to withstand in order to properly understand the techniques to use and the format to which to adhere. The first jokes and bits I wrote for the stage were underdeveloped. The first script I ever wrote was horribly unfunny and without form. And this movie review probably won’t seem like too well written. Second of all, the movie I’ve chosen to review, District 9, will be particularly challenging for me to critique since I haven’t seen it. Not only that, I haven’t seen a preview for it during other movies. I haven’t even seen a commercial for it on TV, mostly because I torrent everything and watch it on the computer with no commercial interruptions. It’s a much quicker way to watch television but it proves a liability when you’re trying to write about a film you haven’t seen. In any case, those are my caveats. You are not going to see anything in the way of reliable spoilers. Reliable, because I’m probably going to include some spoilers but they’ll be based off my knowledge of the movie gleaned entirely from billboards and bus stop signs. If any what I write actually spoils any parts of the movie for you, I think I should get some sort of award for being so randomly rad at guessing.

Peter Jackson’s 8th film is by far his grandest vision of the future. (I also am not going to do any research on anything, so I’m probably wrong about all the stats I include, too. For instance, I doubt very much that this is Peter Jackson’s 8th film. I know about the 3 Lord of the Rings, and King Kong (which su-u-ucked) but that’s all of what I’m aware. I get the sense that he’s done other stuff, though, right? I mean they’re not going to let him direct The Lord of the Rings if he hadn’t done some other stuff first.) It’s quite easy to see why the haute of our society have given him the mantle of “The next Gene Roddenberry.” Jackson amazes us with an ephemeral glimpse at a world most noticeably driven by the production of goods. Though the aliens are the tool by which he builds his vehicle, it is the predictions of a globalized economy that has Mr. Jackson so noticeably worried about the coming decades.

As the film opens, we see little or no conflict between the intelligent species on Earth. For their parts, the aliens seem little more than metaphors for Asians of pre-American involvement in World War II. And though everything seemed fine and dandy for a few years, like they were finally being accepted as equals, we all know what’s about to happen. Distrust, greed, and fear drive a wedge in between the alien leadership and the Earth government. The Earth President, as played wonderfully by Phillip Seymour Hoffman (Not only do I not know if he’s in the movie, I don’t even know if that’s how you spell his name.) decieves the aliens, also colorfully referred to as “Bindles,” into gathering together under the guise of an Earth parade. Little do they know, they’re actually being brought together so they can be rounded up and placed into a high tech internment camp known as “District 9.” To this point, the acting was wonderful with the only weak spot being Peter Jackson’s incessant need to cast his wife in every film he touches. I’m sorry if this sounds harsh, but she can’t act, and physically, she’s no longer believable as a high school cheerleader/debate team chairperson. In everyone else, however, Jackson has instilled a sense of awe mixed with a casual complacence that I haven’t seen in a film since Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece, “2001, or 2010 or whatever.”

The only problem with District 9 is that the Earth government didn’t round up all the Bindles. There were pockets of people who were either too sick or too cool to go to the Earth parade. The too sick were quickly rounded up and slaughtered so they can be turned into food. This food will be fed to the prisoners of District 9 in order to demoralize them with the news that they cannibalized the infirmed of their people. The too cool were, however, were too cool to be captured by Earth police (that’s what they call police when there’s just one country of Earth even though we don’t call them American police now) so they go into hiding in the only place the Earth police can’t find them: Broad daylight!

Fuck yeah! The plot thickens and shit. Here’s what had happened. The cooler Bindles have been trying to score sweet hot Earth sluts for years now, and a few have recently developed a technology which covers their Bindle looks and allows them to blend in with native earthlings at clubs and discotheques across the globe. The cool Bindles form a resistance movement led by the coolest of the cool aliens, Faheem (played by gorgeous young newcomer Antonio Acevedes). Faheem blends in perfectly with the Earthlings. He wears black pants and a black shirt with the first 3 buttons undone to display his chest hair and a gold necklace. He drives around in a Silver Mercedes convertible that his father bought for him through his hard work. The older generation of Bindles actually had a great work ethic and strong family values. But they’ve spoiled the children and now the younger generation acts horribly, going to clubs every night, wearing Drakkar-Noir to excess, keeping Ed Hardy in business walking around with a sense of entitlement, and just generally acting like fucking Persians.

Faheem hatches a plan to turn District 9 into an actual working space station, fully equipped with proton torpedoes. That was the one weakness that the floating internment camp had, that it could too easily be turned into a battleship. But in his hubris and haste the Earth president overlooked that risk and rushed into this plan. The movie moves on, with some very interesting shots that have become staples of a Peter Jackson project. He enjoys shooting large landscapes and continues to show a fascination with the environment around us. I wish more directors would take time to smell the roses, as it were. (No idea what that meant)

I don’t want to spoil anything for the readers, but I will say that there is one amazingly shot sequence in which Faheem, now completely in charge of a working space battle station, is firing proton torpedoes at every major city on the planet, forcing the Earth people to go into slavery for their bindle masters. And from that point, until 10 minutes later as Phillip Seymour Hoffman is trying to still maintain his composure as he signs his people’s freedom away in a peace treaty, we can see the brilliance of Peter Jackson as he directs Faheem to reveal a slight smile right before he stabs the Earth President and announces to the world that the treaty is denied, but they will live in peace as brothers.

Overall, I’d give this movie 4 out of 5 stars. The story is good, but the special effects were riveting. If you don’t like SFX because you’re a mindless hipster or a stupid fucking bitch, I’d suggest checking out Julia and Julia this weekend. It’s got wonderful pacing and an understated charm. If that last sentence sickened you, then you’re a normal person who isn’t too douchey to appreciate flashing lights and sweet God damn explosions. If so, I would definitely give District 9 a chance. And make sure to stay to the end of the credits. They play the new Ace of Base music video. The video sets up the sequel, letting you know that the Earth President survived the knife attack and goes underground on a Rambo style killing spree that’s the bloodiest sequence I’ve ever seen in cinema and quite frankly made me question my ability to feel love. Also, they have bloopers.

I just finished taking what could possibly have been the longest running dump I’ve ever conceived possible and it made me consider the interesting things in my life. I think almost everyone takes for granted where they are in relation to where they thought they once might have found themselves. Sometimes it’s interesting to step out of your body for a moment and think about your life from the perspective of your younger self of 10 or 20 years ago. And by the way, when I say “longest running dump” I’m referring to the amount of time that doodie was coming out. It lasted 40 minutes from first kerplunk to final splash. It wasn’t the biggest mass I’ve ever had but it wasn’t too far off.

I took this dump in a hotel room in Philadelphia, where I was in between doing stand up comedy for two sold out shows at Helium Comedy Club with Joe Rogan and watching the UFC live at the Wachovia Center the following evening. I had just smoked some of the Banini joint that I smuggled across the country. I think it’s a cross between Banana Kush and something else that ends in “ini” like Martini OG or some crazy shit like that. I don’t know why they don’t just give each weed a numerical assignation. That would be easier to remember. “I like pot flavors 3, 217, 136, and 44. Actually, that would be significantly more difficult to remember. Let’s stick with the name system we’ve already got.

Anyway, this joint and one just like him were given to me at a marijuana dispensary in Studio City, California. It’s right over the hill on Laurel Canyon just before you get to Moorpark on the right side of the street. I just did some research. It’s called Secret Garden Cannameds. And what they did for me (because it was my first time there) was they offered me for free one free small pipe of my choice (valued (by me guessing) at 10 dollars), 10 screens to fit in that pipe (valued at 1 dollar), a lighter (valued at 50 cents), and 2 joints of a hybrid marijuana that they’ve renamed “Banini” (valued at 15 dollars). That’s a total prize package worth over 26 dollars. And all because I bought a Reefers Peanut Butter Cup, and a Tokreo Cookie for 10 each and two lollipops for 7 each or two for 10. I can’t vouch for the edibles because I gave them all away. The first two to my friend Pete who was having an emotional mushroom induced life crisis and the two lollipops to my friend Steve who has a kid. Pete said they were wonderful, Steve never said anything, and I can vouch for the Banini myself. I think it’s an indica, or a hybrid but that’s just a guess. What’s not a guess is that it’s A to the Wesome.

On Thursday I woke up in Los Angeles, California in an apartment on the Sunset Strip. I live in a nice builiding in an awesome location in a pigsty of an apartment. Since the girl moved out, I’ve cleaned exactly zero times. I’ve been relatively careful not to leave foodstuffs around so as not to attract bugs, rodents, and (later) taloned birds. The mess is just a clutter but its a horrible clutter. I sleep on approximately 1/3 of my bed because the other 2/3 are covered in clean laundry that I haven’t folded in maybe 3 months. If you’re doing the math, that means you think I haven’t washed my sheets and blanket in 3 months. Wrong. It’s probably been closer to a year. My couch is full of clean laundry. There’s a blanket on the floor that is also full of clean laundry. One area not full of clean laundry: My closets. There is an area where the kitchen table would go if I had one that is filled with plastic grocery bags. It looks like that giant garbage barge the size of Texas that’s off the western coast of the United States. Attached to the barge is the yard sale area. That’s where I keep a selection of toolless power cords and out of date connectors, worn out golf bag with no clubs, printers, and books. All of which I would sell at a yard sale for 50 cents each or less. That region borders Box Town, where I keep my cardboard boxes open that I may fill with pieces of balled up paper, empty Jujyfruit containers, self loathing, unemployment check pay stubs, empty ibuprofen containers, and smaller, less adaptable boxes. That area butts right up against the La-Z-Boy recliner that my brother in law gave me if I was willing to pick it up from The Price is Right stuido warehouse. It’s a wonderfully plush maroon recliner from Living In Comfort (pictured here and valued at 549 dollars).

Features include massage and built in refrigerator. And it’s sitting, unplugged, in the very spot 36 inches inside the door my friend Shawn and I set it down when he helped me move it in. There’s an area outside the clean laundry on the blanket on the floor area path (I have paths set up so I can get around) where I just have empty and half empty suitcases piled up. My kitchen is disgusting. And my bathroom is beginning to smell like a gas station restroom. Plus the fridge is making a strange noise like the motor is about to fail and the shower drain has been stopped up for 5 months so I have to wade in an ankle deep bath 3 minutes into any shower I take. And I can’t call the maintenance guy to come fix those things because I’m too embarrassed for anyone to see how I live including the Mexican fix it guy who sometimes sleeps drunk in the bed of his pickup truck outside our building as he sings himself to sleep.

On Friday I woke up across the country in a hotel room in Manhattan. At 7 am I walked from there to the Sirius XM studios to be a guest on the Opie and Anthony show. It’s my favorite radio to do and it’s my favorite program to listen to. I’ve had some of the best, most memorable times of my life on that show. Do a google search on “The Baby Bird on O&A” and you’ll see my favorite. Hopefully you can find the video. It involves an eggnog drinking contest and a lot of radness. On Friday we all sniffed the dried up and fermented spooge puddle that Jim Norton found in his belly button. It made Jim Jefferies barf. I uploaded a video of it here:

Later on Marion Barry, the former two separate time mayor of Washington D.C. came in to talk. Well, he didn’t actually come in for that reason. He was there to do an interview for the black station, but Norton asked him if he’d like to come in there and the former mayor/crackhead accepted the offer. He did a 2 minute interview about his new HBO documentary and about overcoming adversity and about how he didn’t really smoke crack because the cops were setting him up so it wasn’t crack in that pipe. When asked by Rogan what he thought he was smoking, the man cooly replied, “I never smoked it. I just took a drag.” Then he realized that he was standing next to a trashcan full of vomit and he left the room shortly thereafter.

We drove from there to Philadelphia where we went straight backstage to the weigh-ins for UFC 101. I like being backstage for those things because it’s my only real chance to say hi to all the fighters and trainers that I’ve become friends with. Most of them sit in super VIP areas during the fights and unless I run into them in the morning in the hotel lobby, there’s never any time to catch up. You can’t do it at one of the retarded after parties because I can’t talk over the Pussycat Dolls on full blast. It’s demeaning to me that professional sluts are turned up so we can hear what they’re saying. Plus, my ears mumble as bad as my mouth, so communicating at clubs is an impossibility for me. So at the weigh-ins I got to talk to Greg Jackson for a while and he introduced me to Renzo Gracie. I also got into a nice theoretical discussion about breakups with one of the behind the scenes guys whose name I won’t mention until he’s no longer hurting. Kendall Grove came over and said hi. He and BJ Penn saw me in Columbus and they’ve both been cool ever since. The weigh-ins themselves were uneventful. Ed Sinister was talking about Anderson Silva’s stare down, but I didn’t know there was any real beef between he and Forrest Griffin, so I don’t think I noticed that it was too harsh. Then I said hi to Dana White and we we went back to our hotel to get ready for the Helium shows.

The crowds in Philadelphia have always been great. They’re a bunch of rowdy filthpigs who like their beer. You definitely get a higher percentage of add douchetards who enjoy yelling out tag lines to every single one of your jokes and set ups. Every time I’ve been to Helium it’s always been just one or two people, which you can deal with. When 5 different people or more across different parts of the room start yelling shit out, that gets a little crazy and it’s hard to deal with. But these shows had nobody bad in the first show and just one idiot in the second, and he wasn’t even that bad. Plus there were two fun black people sitting next to him, so I could play around with them and not worry about seeming too racist. It’s amazing to me that sometimes I’ll make a racist joke and if the 3 black people in the room get upset, the whole room gets weirded out. But if the same 3 black people laugh at the same racist joke (because it’s just a fucking joke and that’s what non-retarded humans are supposed to do), the whole room relaxes and gets into it. It’s almost like everybody looks at those 3 as representatives of the black race and they let them decide what is or is not the racial line in the sand. These black guys were cool, so that transferred to everyone else. Joe Lauzon and Chris Palmquist came to the first show. Our friend/gorilla, Mr. John Rallo, came out to the 2nd show. Rallo is a white, so please don’t think that was a racist joke. Matt Serra, Opie, Cole Miller and his father were also at the 2nd show. It’s strange that there could be a room of 260 people who have never heard any of my bits before, but I can’t stop thinking about the 6 people who might’ve already heard what I’ve said. I was talking to Greg Jackson and Joe Lauzon about it. Joe is a comedy fan, so he understands and appreciates the different subtleties in seeing a joke done two separate times. Greg agreed with me. That still bothers the shit out of me for some reason. So I end up having to try to think when the last time these people saw me was, and then try to figure out all the new material that I started doing after that show. Matt Serra hadn’t seen me for 8 months, so that wasn’t a problem, but Lauzon saw me 4 months ago in Montreal, so I had to scramble a little. I ran out of new material at 22 minutes and had to repeat a jiu-jitsu joke to close it out.

On Saturday I woke up in a hotel room in Philadelphia. I slept nearly a full 8 hours and I probably would have slept longer if not for nearly pissing the bed at noon. I was having one of those dreams about wading through a river and I was too tired to realize the difference between peeing in my dream and peeing in my underwear. I think I probably let 20 or 30 drops worth out before I woke up and pinched it. By then I was up, so I got high and started writing this blog until Eddie Bravo called me to go with him to Modell’s to get a knee sleeve for his student, George Sotiropoulos. We took a cab out to the boonies. I couldn’t tell the difference between the regular people and the hookers. Actually, I think they were all regular people, but I’m still shell shocked from that back alley to Club Soda in Montreal and these people were pretty worn down. The best part of this little adventure is that we told the Muslim cab driver to wait for us for 5 minutes and we’d be right back out. He said he’d wait. Then Eddie gave him a 20 dollar deposit to make sure he’d stay. Of course he wasn’t there when we came back out 2 and a half minutes later. I was just about the forgive Muslims for 9/11 because of how cool this guy was being. Now I have to hate them more than ever. Way to ruin it for everyone, dickwad.

The fights were kind of shitty. There was a lot of hugging and holding and not too much action. At one point during the Aaron Riley/Shane Nelson fight there was a fight in the stands and everybody in attendance was more interested in that than what was going on inside the octagon. I was, too. This dude in the stands connected on a straight right that came from one row up and just leveled this other dude. He had gravity on his side and the shot was brutal. That or the Anderson Silva knockout was probably punch of the night.

On Sunday I went back to the chaos of my apartment. The plan is for me to move my bed into the living room and turn my bedroom into a studio for writing and editing. It will require A LOT of cleaning up and rearranging that I’ll probably never get to but that’s the plan anyway.

So in three days, I got to do a bunch of stuff that I normally would take for granted. I got to wake up on the Sunset Strip in Hollywood, California. I got to be a guest on my favorite radio show ever in New York City. I got to hang out backstage at the UFC weigh-ins. I got to perform for two awesome sold out crowds in Philadelphia. I got to watch perhaps the greatest MMA fighter of all time defend his reputation against a marquee name in a higher weight class. And I got to go back to LA to perform at a club that was once home to almost every legendary standup comedian in history, the Comedy Store. That’s kind of a cool three days. I think it’s not a bad idea to take stock every once in a while to get yourself feeling happy about yourself. 10 years ago, I wouldn’t have thought any of those things were possible for me. Now, it’s almost a typical weekend. Even if I fail as a standup, I’ve still gotten to live a pretty fun life for a decent percentage of my life. When I’m putting the gun in my mouth because I can’t take one more day as a mattress salesman in Maryland, I’ll hopefully look back on a weekend like this and smile a little before I blow my brains out.