Girl on Films

What up?

Something's happenin' here.

What it is?

Ain't exactly clear.

posted by imp @ 1:57 PM 0 comments

Shows You Should Watch This Season On No Authority But My Own Superior Taste

Gilmore Girls on The WB(starts tonight)
Veronica Mars on UPN(begins Sept. 28, has moved from Tuesday to Wednesday)
Arrested Development on FOX (begins Sept. 19, moved from Sunday to Monday)
Smallville on The WB (though not always possessed of great dialogue or even acting for lead Tom Welling, Michael Rosenbaum as Lex and my hopes for James Marsters in the role of this season's villian, Brainiac, make it worth tuning in.)

posted by imp @ 10:38 AM 1 comments

Save the Date

Pulpy, poppy and near-perfect: Veronica Mars starts its new season on Sept. 21.

posted by imp @ 1:36 PM 0 comments

Girlz on Film readers, I'd like you to cute-meet...

Billy Mernit, an excellent teacher of screenwriting and particularly romantic comedy writing, now has a blog, Living the Romantic Comedy. Think all the good ideas have been taken? That's probably because Billy has already had them.

posted by imp @ 1:05 PM 1 comments

Remake!

That applies not only to the box office, but to this site. Look forward to greater frequency and actual useful (and useless, I can't reinvent the wheel here) stuff at this spot....

posted by imp @ 8:12 PM 0 comments

I pledge allegiance to the polar opposite of that crap show, '7th Heaven'....

You know something's wrong with the brains of the average American when a show like "Seventh Heaven," in which the writers seem to dumb down plots from old After-School Specials and then Christian-ize them in a covert manner, can survive into its 10th season (is it 10 years now that this show's been plaguing the airwaves?) but a show like "Arrested Development" can't even be certain of its fate for the entirety of its second season. (Yes, this marvelous second season was cut from 22 episodes to 18, supposedly to "help" the show, though whether it will meet its end this year is as-yet unknown.)

But, cleverly enough, the show is asking viewers to sign a "loyalty oath" (a nice little slam of the Bush-Cheney stump speech procedures and policies manual). If you've seen "Arrested Development" and realize its genius -- even if you've watched the show only a few times this year and often have no idea what's going on -- sign up to preserve the program for its third season. It is comedy you have to work for -- in more ways than one -- but it's well worth the effort.

posted by imp @ 8:40 AM 0 comments

When I grow up, I don't wanna be a doctor, I just want to play one on TV

Um, I'm wondering about my pension plan? 

Jane Espenson, a writer for three of my favorite television series of all time ("Buffy the Vampire Slayer," "Gilmore Girls" and "Firefly") muses in the LA Times on whether or not a female television character's career choice (or in Buffy's case, fate) can lead to more workplace equality in the real world (As an aside here, let me note that the double use of the word 'soul' in the headline is an error on the part of LATimes.com. To LATimes.com's Human Resources Department -- CALL ME.):

Then there's Buffy, the teenage "vampire slayer." A woman warrior, she refused to answer to her profession's stuffy, male-dominated Counsel of Watchers. She had the power, she reasoned, and that gave her the authority to decide how to use it. She didn't figure it out overnight or without a struggle, but after seven TV years, she had learned how to make it in the graveyard.

Espenson says that more important than the career you choose for a character is the content of that character's, erm, character. (Would you believe me if I said I didn't feel like searching for a thesaurus right now? Yeah, you would.) But she still hopefully concludes that -- by endowing characters with a hearty dose of humanity, coupled with a passion for what they do, whether housewifing or vamp-slaying -- maybe television can inspire the littlest women.

Buffy was at her best when she made decisions using both her girliest qualities and her supernatural abilities. Lorelai Gilmore, the mom of "Gilmore Girls," loves to buy shoes but only those made for walking -- with authority and decency as she runs her own inn and refuses to sell out to corporate types.

Now, using Espenson's piece as a segue (a not-very-subtle segue in which I refrain from using the word segue), I'll say I'm indubitably (told ya I wouldn't bust out the thesaurus, choosing instead to use words preferred by turn-of-the-century detectives) pleased with the choice of Buffy creator Joss Whedon to pen and direct the film adaptation of "Wonder Woman." In all his projects, Whedon endows the female of the species with vivid personalities and realistic faults and flaws. People talked about how much "Sex and the City" represented women as they really are, but I always felt that -- supernatural powers aside -- "Buffy" did a far better job. How Whedon puts Wonder Woman's Lasso of Truth to work promises to be far more entertaining than any number of SATC's Manolo musings...

posted by imp @ 10:03 PM 1 comments