That Vanity Fair article got me thinking about boy bands, though, and about how I never thought anybody in any of them was hot, not even a little, not even Justin Timberlake (although, really, that hair.) Actually Justin Timberlake didn’t really do much for me even after he cut his hair, until I saw the Steven Klein photos a few years ago. Not the bloody ones, although I really like those too, but, um, these ones where he was hanging out in like a ski lodge somewhere and eating cereal and stuff.* And I was all like “Awww, pretty man, I could totally eat you up! Also, the last *Nsync album is actually pretty good, especially that song about how shorty had you up against the wall.”

Of course, as much as I like Justin Timberlake and applaud his decision to release a new single off the album every four days for the last year, I still don’t want to sleep with him. Not even in fantasy-everybody’s-a-big-homo world. He’s just not my type.

But who is my type? Well, even when I was in high school and everybody in *Nsync and the Backstreet Boys was basically my age, my locker was filled with pictures of Alec Empire and Jarvis Cocker and Damon Albarn and Trent Reznor in that one video where I thought he was the hottest thing alive.

The only boy band member that got me even a little excited was Brian Littrell, and only because he looked a little bit like like a slightly cleaner Mark Wahlberg. Who knew that he’d grow up to be all pudgy and born-again?

So anyway. That’s my story. Boy bands aren’t hot. Even when I was gay and sixteen I didn’t think boy bands were hot. Maybe if I were a creepy 300-pound blimp impresario I’d want to jump on them wearing only a towel, but as things stand right now I say no, no, no. They’re just too…. clean. And ridiculous. And the music is always so terrible. Like, if I were straight I’d probably totally want all of Girls Aloud because their songs are actually awesome (for the most part.) But manufactured boy music always blows. I don’t know why, exactly, but it does. And, if there’s one thing I’ve tried to make clear with this blog, bad music is just terrible for the libido.

(*And oh my God is it hard to find specific pictures of Justin Timberlake. I just spent like 20 minutes on it and couldn’t come up with any….)

I thought about JP this week because, when trying to have wildly hot celebrity sex with my hand, he’s often the first person I think of. He’s scruffy, he’s hairy (well, before the chest-waxing started), and he seems like he’s probably kind of a skeezebucket in real life. In other words I want him. Bad. But more pressingly, this insanely long and ultimately kinda dull video just popped up on YouTube yeterday. Don’t you just want to squeeze his cute little drunken cheeks and then give him a rimjob for two hours while telling him what an awesome drummer he is?

One confession, though. I’ve never seen a single episode of Entourage. I mean, I always put it down to the fact that I don’t have cable, but there are several seasons of it out on DVD, so basically I’m just lying to myself. I also never saw him way back when he was on The Larry Sanders Show. Although, you know, Garry Shandling obviously isn’t for everybody. And by everybody I mean me. I also don’t think I saw a single episode of Cupid, which was back when I actually watched sitcoms.

No, my only TV encounters with Mr P were when he played Spence, the cousin that moved in with Ellen right about when Arye Gross left the show. (Back in 1993, when I was all of 12, I had a thing for Arye Gross too, but that’s around the same time that I also wanted David Letterman, Michael Stipe, the son on Grace Under Fire, and Jerry Desiderato, the soccer hero at my junior high (also, speaking of him, check out this completely unremarkable video). But Arye Gross was in Hexed, which was a dirty dirty movie (or seemed like it when I was twelve) and so it was easier to imagine him doing dirty things to me. But then he totally dropped off my radar once hunky Jeremy Piven came on the show and then spent an entire episode shirtless in Ellen’s bathtub. Mee-yow!! It even gave me a boner for other hairy-chested balding actors, like the evil Stanley Tucci in the sorta underrated A Life Less Ordinary. (It didn’t, however, extend as far as getting me horny about Gene Siskel. Although I did try a couple of times.)

I also haven’t seen (or wanted to see) many movies he was in. Like Smokin’ Aces. Or Old School. Or Larger Than Life, the movie with Bill Murray and an elephant that I always get confused with Operation Dumbo Drop, a different elephant-themed film of the same era. Or Singles. Which is ironic, because the first time I probably ever saw Jeremy Piven he was all shirtless and dancing in a Paul Westerberg video. Jeremy bared his hunky, hairy chest to the world in what is basically a really stupid video for a really stupid song that just happens to have a catchy na-na chorus part. I think he might be playing his character from Singles but I don’t know for sure. Anyway, skip ahead to about 1:24 for seven seconds of a sexy sexy man with a terrible hairdo doing a really dumb dance. And be amazed by the first appearance of several hallmarks of Jeremy’s career: namely, chest hair, a balding forehead, and assy behavior around celebrities in bars.

At the time, he was already making a name for himself (or at least appearing) in a bunch of John Cusack movies, like One Crazy Summer, Say Anything, and The Grifters. I’ve seen all of these movies several times and don’t actually remember him being in any of them. But I’m sure it was hot!

The one Cusack vehicle I actually remember him in is Grosse Pointe Blank, a comedy about high school reunions with an 80’s soundtrack that came out about the same time as a similar, though much less dark, reunion movie with an 80’s soundtrack. It’s a really underrated movie and I highly recommend it. In fact, a car salesman once showed me part of it in an effort to get in my pants, and Reader, I tell you it worked! Plus Jeremy Piven is smokin’ and I totally want him to fuck the hell out of me. Like, totally.

Other movies he was in, none of which I have seen, include Black Hawk Down, Rush Hour 2, and Very Bad Things, where he plays the guy that’s there when the hooker dies. I had no desire to see the movie even when it was new (because, it being 1998 and all, that fucking Vegas-y indie movie swing revival thing was already getting on my damn nerves.) But, you know, apparently I missed seeing his dreamy ass.

Now that he’s on Entourage he’s big into waxing his chest, I guess, which is pretty unfortunate. But, you know, maybe it’s just for the character. Regardless, he still has the cute cheeks, the stubble, and the generally dickheaded behavior. Plus he allegedly had a thing for Lindsay Lohan for like half an evening (an evening which gossip websites were full of pictures of, but which have ALL BEEN TAKEN DOWN so now we can’t watch him shirtlessly blowing out the candles on his birthday cake.) But yeah, Lindsay Lohan. That’s kinda hot to think about.

Now, I don’t pretend to think he’s actually a whiz in bed. In fact I imagine he’s usually overly wasted by the time he gets to the bed, and probably just wants one to blow him. And while I’m sure he likes to plow the occasional starlet, I bet it’s not totally overwhelming to be involved in if you’re the starlet. But the thing is, I don’t care. I also don’t care that some former child actress says he has a small wang. I don’t care that he yells at people in restaurants. I don’t even care that he was in the Car 54 Where Are You movie. I don’t care that Kelly Ripa can do more push-ups than him. I care that he shaves his chest, but not so much that it turns me off. All I know is that he’s the hottest thing since, like, jalapenos dipped in jabanero sauce and then put in the microwave. In the summer. (ie hot in every way!)

Just days before heading out to Vegas for my first-ever AVN show (oh
boy!), I decided to throw this trashy-looking doozy into my DVD player
to see what might be in store for me.

And, oddly, the movie’s sort of accurate. The pace is slow and the
frills are almost non-existent; the sound quality is terrible and the
whole thing is really just an excuse to watch a bunch of drunk people
run around at a big party. Which, it turns out, is pretty much what a
real weekend in Vegas for AVN is like (I even rode in a big and long
limo myself, which is such an absurd experience that I highly
recommend it to anyone who’s in a group of over ten and driving less
than two miles.) Who knew?
Vivid Vegas Party starts off slowly the night of the AVN Awards show,
with a lot of standing around and talking. Afterwards, we follow Jon
and his entourage back to the hotel, where Cherokee (the spirit guide
from Camp Cuddly Pines) does a split and then makes out with someone
named Mercedez.

Anyway, even though I like Cherokee (kind of a lot, actually), the
scene’s not very exciting. I think part of the problem is the music.
Lil’ Jon produced it himself, but it’s Dullsville. I mean, I complain
about how boring hip-hop is a lot, but this is the guy who made Get
Low, for Christ’s sake! The man who does nothing but get people to
yell words like “Shake it like a salt shaker!” and “Yayuh!” over pervy
beats. But does that happen in this scene? No, no it doesn’t. Instead
we get any old porn music. It’s like he totally thought the thing he
does best didn’t matter. Way to blow it, little man.

Also, it’s over half an hour before we see anybody’s uglies get
bumped. Which is a really long buildup, if you ask me. And it’s also
kind of annoying because the sex scenes are actually pretty good.
There’s only three of them, mind you, and they’re each about five
minutes too long, but the cast is cute and they know what they’re
doing. It’s just too bad the scenes are drawn out to the point that
soon the margins of my notes said things like “People’s Choice
Awards–Army Archerd still alive? How old?” and “Sicilian girls like
to fuck and fuck and fuck.” (I’m assuming that second one actually had
some relevance to the movie, but for some reason I can’t remember what
that might relate to…)

In the last scene, which takes place in a shower, the music’s gotten
noticeably better, but there appear to be some distracting drainage
issues with the shower. Overall, the performers are attractive but the
sex is a little too vanilla and nobody seems that into it. Also, and I
probably only noticed because the movie was in the interracial section
of the video store, there’s no interracial sex. There’s three guys and
six ladies in the movie. The limo driver, for some reason played by
Tommy Gunn, is the only white guy in the bunch, and he screws Lexie
Marie, the only white girl in the movie. Not that I’m offended or
anything–I just think it’s interesting.

Of course Jon’s not in any of the sex scenes at all, although he does
make a brief appearance during a limo scene to check in on the action.
I wonder when the day’s going to come when one of these rappers
actually performs in their porn production…

What could there possibly be to not like about a movie called Toss My Salad 7?

A lot, it turns out.

I imagine that the movie came out thanks to its star Rod Fontana, who
gets his salad tossed in half of the scenes in the film. I bet he
called up his friends Rick Masters and Dwayne Cummins and Steven
French.

“Hey guys,” he probably said over the phone. “So I had this idea. I
want to get rimjobs from a bunch of hot chicks, but since I’m mad ugly
and my penis is of an unimpressive size, I think I’m going to film the
whole thing! That way, in addition to seeing my big ol’ guy and lil’
ol’ weenie, the girls will think they’re going to be PORN stars! Then
they’ll have to toss my salad! And yours, too, if you come over
today!”

“And hey,” he would have added to one of them. “Why don’t you bring
your wife over? It doesn’t matter if she’s twenty years older than the
other hot smokin’ babes, I’d really like to see her toss my salad!”

And he probably would have said “toss my salad,” too, because he’s
like that. Even though that expression makes no sense. I mean, really.
I’ve tossed salads and I’ve eaten asses and there is no relation
whatsoever, physically or even metaphorically, between the two. If
anyone, anyone at all, can explain this to me, please do. I really
want to know. Seriously.

But anyway, after he got off the phone, it turned out that he and his
friends couldn’t actually “score” any “hot” “smokin’” “babes”
(although that one guy’s wife was happy to come along) so they had to
go to the nearest corner and find whatever junkies happened to be
passing by.

Seriously, the girls in this movie do not look healthy. Especially the
one named Kandi, who a) keeps looking at the camera as though she
can’t believe she’s really giving a rimjob to the nasty guy down the
street, and b) has matching piercings on both of her…. face-sides. I
was watching this with my roommate and we really couldn’t figure out
what the hell was going on with her piercings. They were on possibly
the only part of the face we couldn’t name. Like, start at your
earlobes and come forward a couple of inches. Then move up until
you’re not on the cheekbone anymore. So it’s down from the temple a
little, but higher than the cheek. Kind of in the general eye area.
Honestly, out of all her 2000 parts, why would this crazy loon want to
get THAT one pierced? On both sides? Jesus.

Anyway, the movie’s 99 percent abysmal. Every scene takes place in the
same room by the same ugly brown couch. At one point Rod Fontana
actually uses the phrase “ass juice,” at which point the girl he’s
with (Krysta Lynn Lovely) takes ona decidedly suicidal appearance.

The only bright spot, which is the hottest thing ever in comparison
with the rest of the movie, is the scene with Gen Padova and Steven
French. Unlike the other guys, French isn’t horrifying to behold and
Padova looks more like a homely-but-kinky lady and not the village
crackwhore. This scene has a lot of spit in it, which is nice, and
while he has a tendency of squeezing her Semitic nose for no reason
and she makes a ton of unnecessary noises, well, it’s downright hot
compared to the rest of the movie.

And I won’t even get into the fact that this movie is subtitled
Citizens On Patrol. Referencing one of the Police Academy movies for
NO DISCERNABLE FUCKING REASON is too stupid to even approach.

(Okay, oddly I just did some research on Rod Fontana, and he’s in the
AVN Hall of Fame. I mean, WTF?!?! Can somebody explain that one to
me?)

La Veuve (The Widow) was recommended to me by Brandy, the
exceptionally helpful manager at the video store I’ve been going to .
She remembered me saying that I liked my movies a little less
mainstream, and said this would be a good one.

I’ll talk about the movie in a minute, but first I thought I’d mention
the really crazy thing about the DVD, which is the totally fucking
insane condom PSAs that were appended to it. In one, a woman is
handcuffed to a bed in a remote cabin in the snowy woods when her
lover, on top of her, suddenly has a heart attack. In the other one, a
film crew is making a porn scene with this couple in a hot tub when
one of the camera guys accidentally drops a big light into the tub and
electrocutes them. The message is that you can never be 100 percent
safe while having sex, but that you can stop the spread of AIDS by
using condoms. I’m not sure, but I think the French message in the
original is translated totally differently into English. I should also
note that in the ad they said (in French) AIDS, when the last time I
took a French class (which was, you know, a long time ago) they were
calling it SIDA over there. The other is that safe sex in French is
apparently called un rapport protégé, which for some reason I think is
insanely funny.

Anyway. La Veuve. It’s the dramatically told story about a mob wife
(Oksana) who needs money after her husband is suddenly offed. She goes
to the Don (Mr. Corleone–get it?!) to ask for a loan, after we get a
flashback of her and her (wicked hot) husband fucking. After a few
minutes of sex Mr Corleone (Horst Baron) walks in and pulls his dick
out. He owns them both, and he can do whatever he wants. Blah blah
blah, evil laughter blah. His penis is unattractive.

So this is who the widow goes to for money later. He tries to whore
her out and she doesn’t want to. The women who surround him and his
goons exchange catty glances and then have really attractive but not
particularly exciting sex. One of the girls wears really long gloves
and it’s kind of the best part of the movie.

About halfway through the movie, Oksana gets a phone call from an
anonymous woman saying that the mob boss killed her husband. The
widow, who is apparently an idiot, is shocked.

The movie goes on with its attractive cast and unattractive sex, which
culminates in an orgy scene where a lot of girls with masks on make
unattractive faces and someone who looks a lot like Katie Holmes with
big hair wanders around and looks bored.

Overall, nothing about La Veuve particularly impressed me, although
the cast was for the most part really good-looking (exceptions being
Mr Corleone and Omar Galanti, the goober from the Rocco Siffredi
movies.) The girls, including Tera Bond, Monica Sweetheart, and
Claudia Rossi, are all kinda gorgeous. (Although, in that typical porn
way, I can’t actually match the actresses to who they played. And the
internet doesn’t help, annoyingly….) But the plot wasn’t very
well-constructed and the editing was a little clunky, despite the fact
that the movie obviously cost a shitload of money to produce.

Also, the film seemed like it was made the Italian way, where
everybody was speaking a different language. Some people spoke clear
English, some spoke heavily accented English, and Oksana was clearly
dubbed. It seemed like the movie was filmed entirely in several
languages, though, because when I first started the movie it was in
French with Romanian subtitles. Weird.