Newspaper Page Text
wrapping
hotcakesdesign
WSpedaU
581 S. Harris Street * (706) 548-7803
1985 Barnett Shoals Rd/- (706) 208-0911
$4.50 PITCHERS
Bud, Bud Light G Coors Light
$6.00 PITCHERS
Yuengling
$230 Well Drinks
I $2.00 Well Shots
$1.0012 OZ. DOMESTIC BOTTLES
(Sun. - Thurs. Only) i
Bud, Bud Light, Coors Light, Miller
Lite, Miller High Life, Natural Light, j
Yuengling, PBR
$1.2516 OZ. $1.75 22 OZ.
DRAFT SPECIAL DRAFT SPECIAL I
l Coors Light G Killian's I
Wednesday Night • October 7,2008 at 5:30 p.m. • Westside Locos
CRAZY GOOD MUSIC
John Keane & Nathan Sheppard Opening Art: Kay Tinsley
$2.25 Yuengling pints I $3 22 oz. Yuengling drafts
^ WESTSIDE ♦ 202D Timothy Rd.»(706) 549-7700
AAA
Airport Express, Inc.
800.354.7874 • 404.767.2000
Call for reservations
www.aaaairportexpress.com
Athens/UGA Schedule
12 Round Trips Daily
$45/Person, One Way '
Children Under 10 Ride Free PER Paying Adult
TMWPOUTJM
I4£ i (IflVIOII (TACIT • DOWHTOWH JH4IEHS • 70C-CU-077J
Come enjoy our rooftop patio at our
Oglethorpe Avenue location! | N
LYING IS GOOD
THE INVENTION OF LYING (PG-13) An adult
fable, The Invention of Lying, the new film
from British "Office" creator and star Ricky
Gervais, posits a world in which everyone tells
the truth. Not only is everybody honest to a
fault, nobody keeps any secrets. If you think
it, you say it. Don't like your date because
he's short, fat, poor, and has a snub nose?
Tell him. That's what
beautiful, shallow Anna
McDoogles (Jennifer
Garner) does while
dining with said fat,
snub-nosed date Mark
Bellison (Gervais).
But soon Mark makes
a discovery. You do not
always have to tell the
truth. His friend, Frank
(Louis C.K.), doesn't
quite understand what
Mark is doing. Mark's
boss, Anthony (Jeffrey
Tambor, "Arrested
Development"), has no
clue when the recently fired Mark turns in an
absurd new screenplay he discovered while
wandering in the desert. Suddenly, he has
money, power, and everything else he needs to
win Anna, except for the non-fat, non-snub-
nosed genes of his major rival screenwriter,
Brad Kessler (Rob Lowe).
Lying is a hilarious film, powered by
Gervais' awkwardly likable onscreen persona.
Mark is also the film's deepest character.
Apparently, lies give us depth; the truth makes
us shallow. It does not hurt that Gervais must
have called in every marker he has accumu
lated over the past few years. The film practi
cally rains cameos.
Still, Lying may wind up the most boringly
shot film of the year, and the high key light
ing is sitcom abys
mal. Gervais and his
co-director, Matthew
Robinson, show no
particular behind-the-
camera talent. But
Lying is not about cam
era angles, movements
or lighting: the comedy
is about ideas.
When man learns
how to create fiction,
man creates religion.
To comfort his dying
mother, Mark tells a
tiny lie about what
happens after we die.
Soon he is weaving an entire mythology about
a man in the sky. He even writes down a set
of rules on tablet-like pizza boxes. The film
never descends into an atheist screed, but it
does confront the concept of religion and its
creation, especially regarding mankind's need
to create a creator.
Drew Wheeler
Ricky Gervais
SK8R GRRL POWER
WHIP IT (PG-13) Whip It, the grrl-powered
directorial debut of Drew Barrymore, personi
fies the sunny star. Uncomplicated, funny,
cute and ultimately nonthreatening, this is
the most fun I've had at a movie since last
fall's Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist.
Bodeen, TX native Bliss Cavendar js the
sort of independent-minded teenage girl in
which star Ellen Page specializes. She's the
kind of girl who proudly wears her mom's
old Stryper tee. Bliss's
ideas are too big for her
small town. Her mail
carrier mother, Brooke
(Academy Award win
ner Marcia Gay Harden),
wants Bliss to make
her mark on the world
through beauty pag
eants. Her dad, Earl
(Daniel Stern), wishes
she played football.
Bliss knows there is
more to life than Bodeen and the Oink Joint,
proud servers of the Squealer.
But Bliss has other ideas after sneaking to
the big city of Austin to watch a roller derby
match. Soon, she's hauling her Barbie skates
out of the attic toy box and trying out for the
winless Hurl Scouts. Led by exasperated, jorts-
clad coach Razor (the third Wilson brother,
Andrew, who directed The Wendell Baker
Story) and fen favorites Smashley Simpson
(Barrymore) and Maggie Mayhem (Kristen
Wiig), the Hurl Scouts need some new blood
if they are ever going to overtake the unde
feated Holy Rollers, captained by league pinup
Iron Maven (Juliette Lewis). Bliss' O-positivity
is just the type needed to power the Hurl
Scouts to victory after victory.
Barrymore and screenwriter Shauna Cross,
who also wrote the novel upon which Whip
It is based, fly around this exhilarating rink,
thanks to their fleetly terrific cast. Page could
not be Page-ier. She
is the real deal, an
amazingly gifted young
actress who deserves
every bit of the acco
lades she receives.
Page may be the
foundational cake, but
everyone else—and I
do mean everyone—is
the sweet sweet icing.
Always funny and rarely
serious, the wistful,
ironic, and sweet Whip It might be too light
and fluffy for some moviegoers. Every dilemma
works out a little too easily, but sometimes a
lack of complications is nice. Every movie does
not need to be an agonizingly tragic explica
tion of the human condition. Sometimes,
roller-skating girls in fishnets pounding on
one another is enough. You can't fault the
soundtrack, either.
Drew Wheeler
14 FLAGPOLE.COM • OCTOBER 7, 2009