Imagine opening a video on YouTube and discovering someone who looked and sounded exactly like you. That’s what happened to Anais Bordier, a Korean-born French student attending school in the UK. The YouTube video she saw featured another Korean woman, American actress Samantha Futerman. After connecting through Facebook, the two girls learned that not only had they both been adopted, but shared the same birth date as well. Ultimately, a DNA test confirmed what everyone who had met the girls in person already knew: Anais and Samantha are identical twins.

Unfortunately, the concept of Twinsters is more interesting than the documentary itself. First, Samantha and members of her family fly to the UK to meet Anais and her family. Later the reverse happens, with Anais and members of her family visiting Samantha’s family in California. In a wacky Disney film this would lead to zany “fish out of water” antics, but in reality both Anais and Samantha are intelligent, well-spoken women who have no trouble navigating London or Venice Beach. Later, the two travel to Korea together to visit each of their original foster moms before attending a conference for adopted Koreans.

Few questions are presented throughout the film, and even fewer are answered. Other than the obvious stuff (“we both have the same fingernails!”) the film doesn’t get much into the nature vs. nurture questions we have about identical twins separated at birth. The twins wonder why they were separated and why their birth mother refuses to see them and denies she gave birth to twins, but all of these questions and more are met with merely a shrug. Instead, Anais and Samantha giggle a lot, hang on each other, and take selfies. By the end of the film, each of the girls are back home in their respective countries and we have no hint as to what their future relationship will be.

Great documentaries not only document an event, but present a narrative as well. Twinsters is primarily video footage of an extremely odd event that happened to two people. It fails to ask, or answer, any real questions. Perhaps fittingly, most of the film feels like a really well-shot YouTube video that simply sits back and says “Well, that happened.” While two separated twins discovering one-another through social media is an interesting occurrence, it is not enough to carry a 90 minute film. A more seasoned director could have done much more with the material.

An old man from Salt Lake City. A teenage girl in Missouri. A homeless drifter in Germany. A Connecticut handyman who immigrated from Ecuador. These four people couldn’t be more different, and yet they all share something in common that has changed their lives.

They all share the name “Hitler.”

At first, it seems almost comical. Sixteen-year-old Emily Hittler shows off signs in her room her friends made that say, “Go Hittler!” Gene Hitler, an 89-year-old man, had four daughters and joked with them about their husbands taking their last names. One of Gene’s daughters shows the swastikas students drew in her high school yearbook. Gene Hitler grew up in a small town. He lived on Hitler Road, next to the Hitler Cemetery. It’s tough not to snicker.

Unfortunately, every single person featured in the film has had hardships solely because of the name they share with one of the most infamous human beings ever to have lived. Hitler Gutierrez, the handyman from Ecuador, shares how he has lost contracting jobs because of his name, and is frequently asked for two (and sometimes three) forms of identification to verify his name. One of Gene’s daughters shares a memory of being booed off the stage at school by hecklers who accused her of killing Jews.

The subjects featured in Meet the Hitlers fall into one of three categories. First are the people like Gene Hitler, Emily Hittler, and Hitler Gutierrez — people with no connection to Adolf Hitler in any way, but have had their lives affected by sharing Adolf’s last name.

Then you have Romano Hitler, a 62-year-old adopted man who claims to be the nephew of Adolph Hitler, and the four anonymous sons of William Patrick Stuart-Houston (ne’ Hitler) who was Adolf Hitler’s nephew. It is obvious that both the brothers (who are spoken about, but not involved directly with the film) and Romano feel deeply guilty by association. Although none of them have done anything wrong, they have fought hard to disassociate themselves from their family’s history.

The last man to be featured in the film is Isadore Heath Campbell, a white supremacist who made national headlines in 2008 by trying to force ShopRite to make a birthday cake for his son, whom he had named Adolf Hitler. The incident brought attention to Campbell’s family, and resulted in the state taking possession of all of their children. Campbell appears in the film sporting a traditional “Hitler” mustache, a Nazi uniform, and a large swastika tattooed on his neck.

The documentary makes the case that a name (literally, six letters) can change a person’s life, whether it’s people who through no fault of their name inherited the name, or, as in the case of Campbell, glom onto it for the notoriety and attention it brings. Throughout the film, each subject is eventually asked why they never changed their name. Answers vary, but each one is insightful.

Meet the Hitlers leads an interesting discussion on what’s in a name, and how our names are tied to our identities.

I’m going to say this up front — The Banana Splits Movie is not terrible. To be more specific, it’s no more terrible than any of the hundreds of other straight-to-video/SyFy-distributed horror films I’ve watched. It’s only problem — and it turns out, a big one — is that it’s a terrible “Banana Splits” movie.

“The Banana Splits Adventure Hour” was an hour-long Hanna-Barbera television show that aired in the late 60s and early 70s. It was a kid-friendly variety show (think “Laugh-In”) starring four animals — Fleegle (the beagle), Bingo (the ape), Drooper (the lion), and Snorky (the elephant) — played on-screen by adults in mascot-like costumes. The show consisted of live action skits along with animated cartoons, musical performances by the Splits, and other nonsense. The takeaway here is that the Banana Splits were revered by a generation of children who grew up watching them.

In real life the Banana Splits went off the air in the early 70s, but in the alternate universe in which The Banana Splits Movie takes place, the Splits were (and are) a real-life television show that allows kids and their parents to attend live tapings. In this same universe, the anthropomorphic Banana Splits are, underneath their fun costumes, robots. It boggles the mind why millions upon millions of dollars worth of advanced robotics would be used when paying human beings minimum wage to perform in funny suits would suffice, but no one in the film seems to question it, so neither should viewers.

The movie opens on Harley’s eighth birthday, and although a big deal is made of the fact that he is “too old” to still enjoy the Banana Splits, his parents gift him five tickets to a live taping of the show. Another big deal is made of the fact that Harley’s friend Duncan is sick and can’t come along, and so his mother has made arrangements for another friend (Zoe) to attend the taping with Harley’s family. By the way, there’s no payoff for any of these little details. We never meet Duncan, the fact that Zoe came instead of Duncan doesn’t change anything, and the two eight-year-olds (despite being “too old” for the show) are literally the two youngest people in the audience. These are all red flags that you should probably check your brain at the door before continuing.

From the onset it’s obvious not all is well with the Splits. When one of them receives a corrupted code update (the code literally changes from green to red on screen), whatever bug has been introduced is serious enough to turn this gentle robotic performer into a violent animatronic killer. And when his robotic cohorts learn (along with the staff) that the show has been cancelled, they too turn homicidal. Not all the animatronics receive the corrupted code, but they all seem on board with hacking up staff members and children, and that’s what’s important.

After the taping ends, a handful of (un)lucky groups are invited to an after-show meet and greet. Along with Harley and his family, the other invitees include a father desperate to get his daughter into showbiz, and a social media-obsessed couple. This, along with the show’s staff, gives the now homicidal Banana Splits more than enough victims to work with. Anyone who’s seen more than three horror movies will have no problem figuring out which members of the cast will last long enough to see the closing credits.

If murderous animatronic animals roaming around in the dark sounds familiar, you may have heard of Five Nights at Freddy’s, a popular video game franchise. According to the IMDB trivia section, The Banana Splits Movie script was originally pitched as a Five Nights at Freddy’s film; when licensing fell through, the script was recycled, Freddy was out, and the Splits were in.

The Banana Splits Movie isn’t a mystery and wasn’t particular scary. Instead, the entire pitch seemed to be, “wouldn’t it be funny to watch adult-sized animals killing people,” and at least on that level, the film delivers. Someone gets cut in half. Someone gets decapitated. At least two of the kills are on par with the Saw franchise. If you have been patiently waiting for a film in which a giant beagle burns a man’s face off using a cigar and an aerosol can, boy did you hit the jackpot.

For the average horror fan, The Banana Splits Movie is a fun romp. The push back will not come from horror fans, but fans of the original Banana Splits. Take any beloved franchise from your childhood and imagine that character doing the absolute worst thing possible. Few people want to see a movie in which Mr. Rogers becomes a serial killer, or the denizens of Sesame Street become kidnappers. The film gains little (other than shock value) from attaching itself to the Banana Splits franchise, and instead has to potential to distance viewers because of it.

In 1984’s Revenge of the Nerds, the members of Lambda Lambda Lambda were forced to stand up for themselves after being repeatedly attacked by the jocks from Alpha Beta, led by Stan Gable and his ogreish sidekick, Ogre. The Tri-Lambs, guided by mega-nerds Lewis Skolnick and Gilbert Lowe, bested the Alpha Betas in a series of head-to-head challenges which ultimately led to Gilbert becoming the new Council president. The conflict followed the two fraternities to a national convention in the 1987 sequel, Revenge of the Nerds II: Nerds in Paradise. There, in Florida, the nerds again prevailed, and the Alpha Beta’s chapter was permanently disbanded.

Or so you thought.

Revenge of the Nerds III: The Next Generation is such a bizarre and inconsistent film that it may take place in a different universe from the first two films. The story begins with Harold and Ira (the titular “next generation of nerds”) headed off to Adams College. There, they discover the Tri-Lambs now rule the university. Nerds are “cool,” while the Alpha Betas (“permanently revoked” doesn’t mean what I thought it means) are now looked down upon. Shortly after arriving, Harold visits his Uncle Lewis and Aunt Betty for dinner, but learns that Lewis is no longer the nerd he once was. Lewis has grown a ponytail, ditched his pocket protector, denounced his formerly nerdy ways, hides his iconic laugh, and now insists on being called “Lew.” It’s a change in character that completely contradicts the theme of the first two movies, which was “it’s okay to be yourself.” Not only has Lew forgotten where he came from; he also forgets “when” he came from, when he tells his nephew he’s Adams class of ’80. (In the first movie, he was a freshman in 1984.)

Conflict arrives in the form of university president Orrin Price (Morton Downey, Jr.) and his son, Adam. Orrin thinks the Tri-Lambs being treated as human beings is a crime, and devises a scheme to return the Alpha Betas to power. To set his plan in motion, Orrin hires Stan Gable (Ted McGinley), former charter president of the Alpha Betas, as the college’s new dean. Stan has zero experience in being a dean, but accepts the role so he can exact revenge against the Tri-Lambs (none of whom have any idea who he is) and potentially win back Betty (his girlfriend from ten years ago) from Lewis.

Er, “Lew”.

The biggest problem with the Next Generation of nerds is that the next generation of nerds are bland and forgettable. Along with the completely interchangeable Harold and Ira, other Tri-Lambs include an Elvis impersonator from South Korea named Steve Toyota and an overweight kilt-wearing Englishman named Trevor (played by the late John Pinette), whose only real jokes are their accents. The rest of the Tri-Lambs fade into the background as quickly as they appear, and none of them have any skills or personality quirks that add value to the plot or make them memorable in any way.

It’s not until the Tri-Lambs require legal council that they contact local attorney and former Tri-Lamb Dudley “Booger” Dawson and breathe some life into this snooze-fest. Played again by Curtis Armstrong, Booger is the only character that seems to remember anything from the previous two films. He still picks his nose, loves to party with the ladies from Omega Mu, and is genuinely confused by the next generation of Tri-Lambs. “You don’t eat meat, you don’t do drugs… what’s wrong with kids today?” he opines.

And that, of course, is the core of the issue. To say the first two films in the franchise aged poorly is putting it mildly. In the first film, the Tri-Lambs set up security cameras in a neighboring dorm to spy on (and take pictures of) nude girls. Later in the film, Lewis has sex with Betty while pretending to be her boyfriend Stan (see Rape by Deception. In the second film, the Tri-Lambs attract a large crowd to their rally by changing the sign outside their hotel to read “hot oral sex.” The question is, how do you gracefully steer a franchise away from the raunchy, sophomoric 80s humor that originally made it popular, and the answer is, you can’t.

Parading some of the original nerds at the 11th hour is too little, too late to save this tragedy. Mr. Skolnick, U.N. Jefferson, Lamar, Takashi, Wormser and Gilbert (the latter two having been recast) arrive in the closing minutes of a court session to lend support to their friends (and the movie). Their arrival does nothing but scream “we’re could only afford these people for a single day” on this made-for-television film’s $2 million budget.

In the closing scene, Alpha Beta / alpha male Stan Gable admits that he too is a nerd, claiming that he only played sports as a kid because his parents made him. Before all the mean, violent, and downright cruel things the Alpha Betas had done to the Tri-Lambs over the past three films had time to flash before my eyes, Stan had already been forgiven, and made an honorary Tri-Lamb. Forgiving the guy that helped set you up on felony charges and let you rot in jail doesn’t make them nerds. It makes them, like the rest of this movie, dumb.

In the opening of Tattoos & Tequila, Vince Neil claims his dream job would be renting jet skis to tourists on a private beach. Sadly for him, Neil drew a short straw and somehow ended up as the lead singer for Motley Crue (one of the most popular and successful rock bands of all time) instead.

Tattoos & Tequila was the last memoir to be published by a member of Motley Crue. First was The Dirt, the ultimate sleazy tell-all book which was published in 2001 and has since been turned into a Netflix original film. Following that book, drummer Tommy Lee published his own book, Tommyland, in 2005; that was followed by bassist Nikki Sixx’s The Heroin Diaries in 2007. One might assume there’s not much blood left to squeeze from these four turnips, and for the most part you would be right — 2010’s Tattoos & Tequila adds little to the band’s overall lexicon. Instead, Neil mostly uses his platform to brag about his sexual conquests while making sure readers know just how much he hates the fellow members of Motley Crue.

Neil wastes no time in separating himself from his band mates. In the very first chapter, he clarifies that he’s no longer a member of Motley Crue. “These days I’m basically like a free agent,” he says. “I have a separate deal. I got out because I just didn’t want to deal with their bullshit anymore.” For decades, the Crue’s public image has been one of four inseparable members (Nikki Sixx often referred to the band publicly as a “gang”). If Neil is to be believed, much of that, especially over the past thirty years, has been little more than an act.

Still in the first chapter, Neil makes sure readers know that the guys in Motley Crue “are not my friends. And they haven’t been for a long time.” This theme continues throughout the book. “I just don’t trust Nikki,” he says later. “I don’t trust him. I don’t trust any of the guys in the band. Because they’re not trustworthy.” And later, in case you didn’t catch it — “We don’t really like each other anymore, maybe, but we’ve stayed together for the benefit of the kids.” Throughout the lows of Neil’s life — the DUI that killed his friend Razzle and injured two others, the death of his daughter, his multiple failed marriages — Neil is quick to remind readers that his three band mates never once called to console him. Particularly, the lack of emotional support he received from his band after the death of his daughter Skyler (who passed away at the age of four from cancer) still bothers him. “I know that feeds into my whole resentment of the band as well.”

Technically, Tattoos & Tequila was not written by Neil; it was orally dictated to author Mike Sager, who appears to have simply transcribed Neil’s words. Most of the book reads exactly how one might imagine Neil (a self-described “surfer dude”) actually speaks. Lots of sentences end with “you know?” or “whatever, dude.” The first few chapters are difficult to follow as Neil leaps wildly between topics, jumping back and forth between decades. It’s not until later when the chronological story line begins that things become easier to follow — and even then, many of Neil’s stories lead nowhere, trailing off with “I don’t really remember…”

Once the book begins to resemble a narrative, Neil spends 3/4 of it weaving through tales of sex, drugs, sex, concerts, sex, booze, sex, cars, and more sex. The notches in Neil’s bedpost number somewhere in the hundreds (or possibly thousands), and Neil repeatedly reminds readers of his type (“girls with a smokin’ bod and a nice rack”). There are more than a few humble brags (“Sorry I’m late, but I had to swap out my Ferrari for my Lambo”) and some not so humble (“I’ve always been stronger and in better shape than Nikki”). Most of the sexual encounters Neil mentions happened while he was married, which is why in different sections of the book we get to hear from his first, second, third, and fourth wives. Each time Neil cheats on one of his wives, he offers excuses like, “well, a girl came over and took her clothes off, what was I supposed to do?”

There’s an old saying about how money can’t buy happiness. No matter how much money the guy makes or how many exotic sports cars he buys, every couple of chapters another one of his wives is leaving him. In one chapter, Neil talks about how he’s the most popular guy in LA, throwing parties that last for weeks. A few pages later, he can’t get a single person to pick him up after he is released from jail. And if money can’t buy happiness, based on this book, it surely can’t buy class. Throughout the book, multiple people from Neil’s life including family members, ex-wives, and ex-band mates contribute to the narrative. Few of them have great things to say about the man. The last two interviews are with two of Neil’s grown children, both of whom say they largely communicate with their dad through text messages.

The beginning and ending of the book aren’t tales of old, but stories from the then 48-year-old (now 58-year-old) Vince Neil. It is there that he discusses his latest business ventures. Some of them, like Vince Neil Aviation and Feelgood’s Rock Bar and Grill, didn’t last the test of time, while others, like Neil’s own line of vodka and his tattoo shop located on the Vegas strip, are still around. In addition to his side ventures, Neil expresses a hope that someday his solo band will be as big as Motley Crue is. “I want to get to that next level,” he says in the final chapter. “I want to get to the Ozzy level. I want to headline arenas with my own band.”

At the time this book was published, Neil did not know how his own story would end. Despite his publicly stated disdain for his fellow band members, Neil continued touring with Motley Crue. In 2014, the band announced their Final Tour, signing an official “cessation of touring” agreement to take place by the end of 2015. Fortunately, I was able to attend the show in Oklahoma City.

The end of Motley Crue has allowed Vince Neil to pursue his dream of touring as a solo artist, where he mostly performing Motley Crue hits with a light sprinkling of his own solo songs throughout his sets. According to Vince Neil’s Facebook page, his next appearance will be at the 2019 Hair in the Fair festival, taking place at the Welland state fair in Ontario, Canada.

A long time ago back in the 1980s, a weird kid with a bowl haircut used his family’s video camera to create and record his own videos. Sometimes his friends and family made appearances in his videos, and other times he was the only performer. Some of the videos were skits, while others were simply of him dancing around, lip-syncing to his favorite songs and pretending to play the guitar. When he got a little older, he actually learned how to play the guitar and began writing and recording his own silly songs.

I am, of course, talking about myself.

But I am also talking about “Weird” Paul Petroskey, subject of the 2019 documentary Will Work for Views: The Low-Fi Life of Weird Paul.

In the 1980s, both Paul and I (two kids who lived a thousand miles apart and have never met one another) were both busy recording videos and writing songs. I eventually grew out of creating funny songs and videos, and that’s where my path diverged from Paul’s. Weird Paul continues to write songs and create videos to this day. He has released more than 700 songs, dozens of albums, uploaded almost a thousand videos to YouTube… and unfortunately, has very little to show for it.

Will Work for Views peels the curtain away from “Weird Paul” and gives viewers a view into the daily life of Paul Petroskey. The documentary focuses less on Paul’s creative output and more on the daily struggles he goes through to create it. Because the money Paul makes from his songs and videos doesn’t pay the bills, his primary source of income is a part-time job at Spencer’s Gifts, where he folds t-shirts, works the register, and spends his daily breaks coming up with new song and video ideas. Time spent working at Spencer’s (or on home maintenance) is time spent away from his true passion.

Paul is less obsessed than most musicians about pesky things like sound quality, and uses whatever resources he has on hand to create his art. His vast catalog of old songs were recorded on regular cassette tapes, while his videos have been digitized from decades-old VHS tapes. To this day, Weird Paul films his monthly YouTube videos using a vintage VHS camcorder, laboriously transferring each clip to his computer by way of a VCR while doing things like laying on his back when narrating certain scenes to maintain consistent audio quality.

In his YouTube videos, Weird Paul comes off as positive, happy, and childlike. Whether he’s singing about a pot of macaroni, a guy with a bone disease, or simply talking about his latest thrift store finds, he always has a twinkle in his eye. But when he steps away from his happy place, reality quickly creeps in. Paul admits he’s getting older and increasingly tired, and wonders when his big break will come. In a particularly revealing scene, Paul’s live-in girlfriend (artist Niffer Desmond) interrupts a scene to point out that the couple’s home is quite literally falling apart, with pieces of plaster falling from the ceiling, broken plumbing, and a basement full of mold.

There are hints that Weird Paul’s window to success is closing, with talks of limited income, limited time, limited resources, and even limited amounts of energy. If money were no object, I have no doubt Weird Paul would be uploading new content on a daily basis. Everything he does outside of that is simply a means to an end.

In separate moments during the documentary, both Paul and Niffer state that the mark of a successful artist is the ability to make a living from his or her art. They’re wrong. The mark of a successful artist is the ability to spark emotion in others through the art they create, and by that definition, Weird Paul is most certainly a success. His music is not for everyone; then again, whose is? Weird Paul is as honest and genuine as he is weird. Regardless of whether or not viewers think Paul will ever find the widespread success and validation he so desperately seeks, it’s impossible to walk away from this film not rooting for the guy.

Will Work for Views: The Low-Fi Life of Weird Paul is available through Amazon, YouTube Red, and other streaming services.

NOTE: Weird Paul does not make any money from sales or views of this documentary. Instead, I recommend checking out Weird Paul’s YouTube Channel, Patreon Page, Bandcamp Page, and Weird Paul’s website where he sells physical copies of his albums and other merchandise.

Multiple times in The Princess Diarist, Carrie Fisher writes that more than anything, she wanted — no, needed — to be loved. As the daughter of Debbie Reynolds, Fisher was thrust into the public eye before she could walk or talk. As a young teen, she dropped out of high school to perform in her mother’s traveling cabaret act. When she enrolled in acting school, it was only because as a high school dropout, she didn’t know what else she could become. What she became, of course, was Princess Leia.

The relationship between an aging Fisher and the beautiful and bold interstellar princess she portrayed is just one of the contradictions examined in Fisher’s last work. Weeks before arriving on the set of Star Wars, a 5’6″, 110-pound Fisher was sent to “fat camp” to lose ten pounds before filming was scheduled to begin. Later in the book, Fisher discusses her life as a “celebrity lap dancer,” her term for a person who signs autographs for money. She writes at length about overzealous fans, all of whom confess Princess Leia was their first crush.

The middle (and largest) section of the book is dedicated to Fisher’s long-rumored affair with Harrison Ford, fifteen years her senior at the time. He had a wife and two kids back at home; she was nineteen, and had only previously dated one boy. If you’re looking for sordid details, you won’t find them in this book. Fisher comes clean about the logistical arrangements, but the details have (perhaps conveniently) been forgotten.

After referencing the diaries she kept during this three month period, she shares them, and this is what lost me. Half of this book consists of journal entries and poetry written by a then nineteen-year-old Fisher, as she falls in love with her co-star and, over time, realizes that the relationship is, at best, one of convenience. The entries are like reading moody and vague Facebook entries from a young girl trying to appear more worldly and wise than she was.

Post-diary entries, Fisher returns to reflecting on her life as an adult — on signing 8x10s for money and whatever else it takes to keep up her shopping habits (or, in other times, keep the lights on). In one particularly heartbreaking story, Fisher recalls a young child who, having just met Fisher at a convention, broke into tears and begged to see “the other, younger Princess Leia.” Considering that this (and each of Fisher’s memoirs) have included pictures of herself from 1977 on the front cover, it’s safe to say Fisher wouldn’t have minded seeing that other princess, too.

Fans of Star Wars will be disappointed in the lack of information related to the film here. (Other than a bit about her interview process and a day with her hairdresser, she writes almost nothing about the trilogy.) Most of the good stories were shared in Fisher’s two previous memoirs, Wishful Drinking and Shockaholic (not to mention the almost-autobiographical Postcards from the Edge.) With little else left to share it seems Fisher dug out the one remaining story she had been keeping to herself (her affair with Ford), and even that isn’t particularly detailed. In a book that details how she came to cope with “selling herself out,” it’s hard not to see this book as an extension of that.

Sadly, Carrie Fisher passed away five weeks after the publication of The Princess Diarist. With nothing left to share, maybe there was simply nothing left. Rest in peace, Princess Leia and Carrie Fisher.

On July 15, 1974, Florida news reporter Christine Chubbuck committed suicide live on the air during a morning broadcast. Christine, released in 2016, is based on the final months of Chubbuck’s life.

It is unfortunate that the signs of depression are not always obvious to outsiders. To her friends and coworkers, Christine Chubbuck (Rebecca Hall) was a respected but introverted news reporter. Her focus in human interest stories were at odds with the times, as grittier, more sensational news stories began to pull in higher ratings. Even when Chubbuck tries to adapt and reports on a local house fire, she spends the entire time interviewing one of the victims and chooses not to capture footage of the actual fire, further infuriating her short-tempered and frustrated boss.

Few of Chubbuck’s coworkers were aware of the young reporter’s struggles outside of work. The discovery of a mass on one of Chubbuck’s ovaries reduced her odds of having children. Having recently relocated from Boston, Chubbuck lives with her mother, who has begun seeing someone. The closest Chubbuck gets to a relationship in the film is when a coworker takes her to dinner, followed by a group therapy session. Things come to a head when Chubbuck realizes she has been passed over for a promotion to a larger station. When Chubbuck confides to her therapy partner all she wants in life is to get married, have children, and do work she enjoys, her partner suggests she should lower her expectations.

To viewers, Chubbuck’s hurdles seem depressing, bot not worth taking her life over. Again, that’s the problem with depression and mental health; what to others may seem like major or even minor setbacks can seem like insurmountable obstacles to others.

The final moments of Chubbuck’s life are shocking and heart-breaking as she announces to her broadcast audience what is about to happen. One of her final acts was to leave behind notes for the next broadcaster to read, describing herself in third person as being rushed to a local hospital in critical condition.

During the film’s closing credits I found it impossible not to think about those I’ve known who ended their own lives prematurely. We can never truly know the extent to which others are suffering, but we can be kind, and we make ourselves available. We can do it for them. We can do it for Christine Chubbuck.

In the first line of NOFX’s memoir, Fat Mike (the band’s bass player and vocalist) talks about the first time he drank his girlfriend’s urine. By the end of the second paragraph she has also tasted his, and by the end of the third, he has sampled his own. By the end of this paragraph, you should be able to tell whether or not The Hepatitis Bathtub and Other Stories is for you.

The California-based punk band NOFX was formed in 1983 by vocalist/bassist Fat Mike and guitarist Eric Melvin, and were quickly joined by Erik “Smelly” Sandin on drums. Eventually, after a series of other guitarists, Aaron “El Hefe” Abeyta joined the band on lead guitar in 1991. For NOFX, punk is more than a style of music; it is their ethos. The band proudly boasts they have never signed to a major label, leaving the quartet to march to the drum of their own vices.

And let’s be absolutely clear — there are a lot of vices.

Throughout the book’s 350+ pages, the four members of NOFX (Mike, Melvin, Smelly, and El Hefe) along with a couple of former members (Dave and Steve) take turns sharing stories that most normal people would prefer to take with them to their grave. A third of the way into the book, you’ll wish the worst thing you had learned was that Fat Mike likes to drink pee. Most of the guys were alcoholics or using drugs before they were old enough to drive. The surprise isn’t that several of the guys went on to develop full-blown drug addictions; it’s that any (much less all) of them lived to see the age of 30.

Story by story, the guys take turns piecing together the history of NOFX in mostly chronological order. If ever a book was able to share the details of sex, drugs and rock and roll without making it look glamorous, this is the one. In the early days, NOFX consisted of four out-of-control kids (fueled by alcohol and drugs) who played backyard shows to tens of people earning tens of dollars. A decade later, the still out-of-control quartet was now playing shows to hundreds of people for (maybe) hundreds of dollars. There was a time in my life when riding in a van for weeks on end while surviving on beer and one meal a day might have sounded like an exciting challenge, but those days have long passed. And never has having someone poop in my shower or urinate in my utensil drawer sounded like fun.

You probably wouldn’t have wanted to have been a NOFX fan in the early 80s, as according to the band’s memories at least one person the band knew got beat up, stabbed, or shot at every show. Those were the shows that didn’t end in a riot. Some rock stars brag about the number of cars or gold records they own; Fat Mike boasts that he “still has his own teeth,” which in this scene is an accomplishment. Most of the band’s stories about their close friends end with “and then he died” or “and then he went to prison.”

A lot of the band’s abhorrent and destructive behavior would be tolerable (or at least easier to ignore) if it were limited to people within their own circle, but they achieve an even higher level of unlikable when take advantage of their own fans’ hospitality. Shortly after recording their first demo, the band drove eight hours east to perform a show in Reno, Nevada. After the show, the guys crashed at a guy’s house whose only rule was “don’t bring any girls back here.” They brought girls back there. Years later while on tour, they crashed at a random girl’s house who said they could help themselves to anything in her house except her senior project which was inside her refrigerator, and she needed to graduate from college the following day. They destroyed it. Everyone who was generous enough to let the band crash at their house ended up with crabs on their toilet, spray paint on their walls, or (as the book’s title references) a bathtub full of hepatitis.

Unlike similar tell-all books by Motley Crue and the Beastie Boys, at no point do the members of NOFX ever apologize for their past sins. In those (and most) memoirs, the storyteller’s voice and viewpoint is one of an older and wiser individual, able to look back on past sins through additional life experiences. The Hepatitis Bathtub and Other Stories adds no such wisdom while reminiscing; it’s mostly just a collection of stories about people getting stabbed, arrested, screwed, beaten, drunk, and stoned, with little if any repentance. Other than the time Smelly spent in rehab for heroin, the closest any of the guys come to growing up is when Fat Mike cut down his pre-show ritual of “20 milligrams of Vicodin, four or five martinis, and snorting lines of coke during the show” to “just 10 milligrams of Vicodin” (plus the martinis). This compromise took place around his 40th birthday.

Toward the end of the book, the guys talk about their business ventures outside the band. El Hefe opened his own club, and seemed genuinely dumbfounded when all his “friends” stole from him. Melvin opened a coffee shop, admitted he didn’t know anything about owning or running a coffee shop, and lost a couple hundred thousand dollars in the process. Stinky formed a motocross team and had a lot of fun for fifteen years and didn’t make a dime. Only Fat Mike, who founded the record label the band is on, seems to have made any money doing anything other than getting wasted and playing three chords over and over.

Like a lot of people, I discovered the music of NOFX in the mid-90s when other punk bands like Green Day, Rancid, and Bad Religion broke through to the mainstream. And while I enjoyed (and continue to enjoy) the music of NOFX, I wouldn’t let anybody in (or associated with) that band within 1,000 yards of anybody I loved or anything I owned. Maybe 2,000 yards. The antics of NOFX are as entertaining to read as they are appalling, but it’ll be tough to listen to the band’s music without thinking of heroin withdrawals, violence, and butt plugs.

Dozens and dozens of Christmas movies are released every year. Occasionally one of them, like 2003’s Elf, breaks through the pack and becomes a part of our holiday traditions, working its way into regular seasonal rotation alongside other classics such as A Christmas Story, Miracle on 34th Street, and It’s a Wonderful Life, among others.

But in 2003, the same year Elf was released, we also saw Blizzard (directed by LeVar Burton and featuring voices by Whoopi Goldberg), Stealing Christmas (a TV movie starring Tony Danza), and National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation 2: Cousin Eddie’s Island Adventure, a movie I once almost got into a fist fight over whether or not it even existed. The point is, of all the holiday films that get released each year, only a few go on to become perennial favorites. The rest end up out in the dumpster, along with shreds of wrapping paper and candy cane wrappers.

The first act of the 2018 Netflix exclusive The Christmas Chronicles feels more like a Hallmark Christmas movie than a big budget film. After a series of home movie clips in which we run through several of the the Pierce family’s previous Christmases, viewers are dropped into 2018 only to learn that Doug (the family patriarch) has passed away, taking much of the family’s Christmas spirit with him. Left behind are Claire, the mom who works extra shifts at the hospital to make ends meet; Teddy, the fifteen-year-old who, with little parental supervision, has started running with the wrong crowd; and Kate, the eleven-year-old daughter who picks up the slack by doing the dishes, taking out the trash, and preparing dinners. Despite everyone’s (or at least Claire and Kate’s) efforts, the Pierce family is unraveling.

The plot begins to roll when Claire is called into work on Christmas Eve, leaving Teddy and Kate home by themselves. Kate, using video she recorded of her brother stealing a car as leverage, convinces Teddy into staying up late to attempt to capture video of Santa delivering toys. Ensuring they’ll capture footage of the jolly one and inspired by Kevin McCallister, the kids set up a series of traps guaranteed to trip up Santa. Somehow all of this works, and before long not only have the siblings caught footage of Santa (which turned out to be remarkably easy), but hidden themselves in the back of his sleigh. When St. Nick discovers the stowaways mid-flight, things go terribly wrong. The sleigh crashes to earth, causing a series of incidents that must be corrected in order to save Christmas: Santa’s reindeer must be recaptured, his bag of toys must be located, and, perhaps most importantly of all, Santa’s magic hat which was lost in the crash must be found. Santa’s hat, we learn, is the sole source of all his magic.

If the first act of the film is Home Alone the remainder is Adventures in Babysitting, with a dash of A Christmas Carol. Santa, Teddy, and Kate — stranded in Chicago and without the use of Santa’s magic — must find Santa’s missing reindeer, toys, and hat with enough time left to still deliver toys to every good boy and girl around the globe. Desperate times call for desperate measures, and before the sun comes up the trio has stolen a car, called upon elves for help, and performed a musical number in quite possibly the cleanest jail in Chicago.

Despite several timely references — namedropping Uber, Amber Alerts, a new Dodge Charger, and even “fake news” for example — The Christmas Chronicles feels like it takes place a decade or two ago. In one particularly dated plot point, Kate carries a Sony camcorder with her throughout the film, which she uses to capture the evenings events. Not only is the camcorder jarringly dated (my youngest asked what it was), but it’s a constant reminder that Kate and Teddy, ages eleven and fifteen, are the last two kids on earth without cellphones.

Along the way, Teddy and Kate learn the reason for the season, but it’s a little disappointing to see Santa’s elves getting so much screen time. A cross between Gnomes and Minions, Santa’s CGI helpers tinker their way into every crisis, saving the day time and time again. Both Santa and the kids are lucky he brought the elves along — without them, his sleigh would have remained busted, Santa would have spent (at least) the night in jail, millions of children would have woken up to empty stockings Christmas morning, and Kate and Teddy would most likely be dead.

The Christmas Chronicles is fun to watch, despite the fact that most of the actors seem like they’re in the middle of a TV movie. The one exception is Kurt Russell, who brings a sack full of his personal charm to the role of Santa. (How tough it must be for St. Nick to live in a world where, despite knowing every single person’s name, every gift they’ve ever asked for, every detail of their modern life, and being able to pull any gift at all at any time out of his red coat, people still don’t believe he’s the real deal!). Many of the character choices throughout the film are questionable, and by the time Santa’s playing piano in jail cell with Steven Van Zandt’s band and a group of prostitutes on backup vocals, you start to wonder how exactly we got here. There are lots of questions about where Santa’s magic begins and ends and how things work on Christmas Eve, but this is a Christmas movie, and the time to check your logic was before starting the film, not during. For what it’s worth, there’s a payoff at the end worth sticking around for.

Will be people watching The Christmas Chronicles five or ten years from now during the holiday season? I doubt it. It’s a bit formulaic with few surprises along the way to earn a spot in regular rotation. That being said, there are worse ways to spend an evening than sitting down in front of the fireplace with a glass of eggnog and watching Kurt Russell do his thing. Ho, ho, ho!