A Riley's Rendezvous with KSIBTU

Happy weekend everyone! I said I was going to tell my Riley's tale, so I will. What I will not be doing is reviewing the movie (in detail)/discussing the plot because that is entirely unfair/rude, considering majority of you haven't seen it yet. In addition to that, we'd have nothing to discuss so that would just be boring. Oct/Nov? We will totes be gushing over plots.  Let's start from the beginning of the Riley's rendezvous.

... it's weird knowing what part of the movie this is from

I went to see this movie with my usual Cali suspects: Kim, Jess and Iris. We arrived at Regal and waited for a bit before being brought into the theater. Most of the middle was blocked off for press/important people (can you believe I wasn't included in that!? I'll pretend that was their bad). The stage was set up with empty chairs so we decided to sit about three rows back from the front. The theater started filling up real fast, but I was focused on watching twitter to see what the outside world knew before those of us in the theater did.

Someone spoke about her dress and then Sam Bradley.

"They say Sam Bradley is here." I said to Iris with a very 'yeah-right' look. She shrugged in response.

Then, after about 30 minutes, the side door opened. There was a white hallway… and then we saw her:

RUTH!

Bahah, seriously, though. Also, hot bodyguard was there in, get this, a three piece suit! Black jacket, vest, and shirt, and a silver-ish tie. Then Kristen walked in on her Blackberry, and said something like "I'm here" and then put it away. People were awe struck (me) and we just sat silently. Some people started taking pictures of her, and she walked about 4 rows behind us and walked into her reserved area and started hugging various people. Scout was with her and she looked slammin. She has super nice hair! 

prettttyyyy

Anyhow, I turn around and face forward and tweet a couple of things.

"Look at her!" Iris said.

"I can't." I said sitting forward, "It's too good."

Listen, this had to be so uncomfortable for Kristen. She's just trying to talk to some people and 300 people are taking pictures of her. It reminded me of a zoo. Now, I'm not saying it was WRONG because omg I couldn't stop looking at the pretty--I'm just saying that has to be so weird for her! 

Then Iris turns to me and says, "That's Sam."

"Who?" I asked.

"Sam Bradley. Standing between Kristen and [I forget who]."

...I googled Sam Bradley and this showed up. ROB AND KRISTEN

RUIN EVERYTHINGGGG!! ... u guys remember this night? WELL DUH.

Hate me if you want, but I wouldn't be able to pick Sam out of a line up. TomStu? Yes. Marcus? Yes. Sam? Apparently not. And he had snacks. Huge ass bucket of popcorn, a big ass drink--it was just too funny.

He went in the row behind her and they both sat down disappearing into the seats. A lady who works for LAFF came up and introduced the movie and then the stars. Melissa went up and said hey and offered it to Kristen, but Kristen legit ran away behind James. It was so cute. 

Brilliant.

I was on cloud 9 with James. I love James Gandolfini. I've said this before, and I'll say it again: I love Sopranos. That was a holy grail, sacred Sunday thing in my family. I miss it so much. I miss him so much.

Anyhow, then the movie started and was over two hours later. 

HOLY SHIT. 

This is Kristen's best role so far. Some people kept asking me if it was better than The Runaways, and my answer is yes. See, Kristen is always playing other people--Bella Swan from Stephanie Meyer's head, and Joan Jett--who is a real rockin' chick. But Mallory is whoever Kristen made her out to be, and I feel as if Kristen brought herself to this role more than any of the others. It was beautiful, seriously.

It was riddled with profanities and initially partial nudity. But here's the thing: this movie will break your heart constantly. I almost feel bad to say like 'OH I SAW KRISTEN'S ASS AND IT WAS FIIIIINE!' because the movie is so not trite and I feel as if I would be cheapening it. There are emotions here that will strike you so deep down inside that you don't know what to do. You feel nearly as helpless as every character who is suffering in their own ways. 

That being said… I saw Kristen's ass, and it really WAS fine!

This role is something you've never seen her play. She has open wounds, pimples, a filthy mouth, and it's raunchy at parts.

This picture?

That's her on her knees trying to give James' character a blowjay. 

James Gandolfini was amazing. The emotion he possessed (all of them truly) in this movie was just unreal. I was a bit concerned initially, having been such a diehard Sopranos viewer, but the mob was the last thing in my mind. I never thought I would watch him cry and want to cry myself. This movie achieved that. The surprise for me was Melissa. I did not know Melissa Leo before WTTR. After watching it I could NOT stop saying "Melissa Leo was unbelievable," and it's so true. She did the most phenomenal job guys, I cannot emphasize it enough.

But Kristen? OMG Kristen. There was no lip biting, hair playing, blinking--nothing that most people pick on. There was a raw character who really didn't respect herself and thought she didn't deserve anything. She thought she was as worthless as the body she consistently whored out to anyone who would give her a dollar. I suppose that's why I loved this movie--because although I've never been a stripper/prostitute, I've hated myself before… haven't we all?

YESSSSS

When the movie ended, a Q&A ensued. The script writer spoke and one of the producers, but no one really had any questions to ask. Perhaps it was because we were still in awe, or perhaps no one had the right questions to ask, but eventually Kristen was asked a few. Iris took a video of the panel so I transcribed the questions for you because some of the questions are missing from all of those youtube videos. This isn't WORD FOR WORD because it was so hard to hear the video very clearly. (thank you Iris) 

Q: Kristen you couldn't be much further away from Bella, has that been a conscious thing when you look for parts? In between the Twilight movies, have you been looking for characters that give you the opportunity to stretch in a very different way and remove yourself from that character? 

K: No it's never been… I've never been… it's a strange word to say "choose"… but I've never chosen and I've never chosen anything or been able to play something that I wasn't so moved by, and it's like something… I think it's a similar feeling, such an undeniable emotion or whatever… and you feel like you want to live and learn from that. But, um, I had that with this, and it doesn't matter what the budget of the movie is. I had that with Twilight… yeah so there you go. 

Q: What do you think happens to your characters after the final scene?

K: WHAT DO YOU THINK HAPPENED? *laughing and gesturing*

Q: What did you do to prepare for getting into the character of Mallory?

K: Um I didn't have a whole lot of time, and I was really terrified 'cause it's written really well and um I learned how to dance a bit, which you don't really see in the movie. Except, I have to say… the silhouette in that first shot? THANKS A LOT! [Note: they made her just a black silhouette and cut out her dancing] *raises hands* But it was good for me to know that you get bruises all over your body… it's… you get… you know… it's really tiring, it hurts. And I talked to a lot of girls who worked at this place called Dixie Divas where we shot, and a couple of the girls were so obviously, like, where Mallory goes before she meets Doug and that was good for me to see cause a lot of people are actually like dead in their eyes and you just can't… it was hard for me in the beginning to understand what could push you to go… to lose that. She basically walks around with open wounds, physically, literally, all the time, all day. I did all that and talked to this guy *motions to James* and Jake (the director) who is like… I would jump off a bridge for him, he directed the movie, and yeah!

Q: You have a lot of funny lines in the movie, was there any lines that was awkward to say.

K: She did the funniest thing [Melissa] when we were *laugh*, when we were doing the urinary tract infection scene. She was like, we were doing like close up, and off camera she was just more so, I mean some actors do this for you so that you can get more into it or whatever, sometimes things that don't necessarily go into the movie make no sense but they make sense to you. She gave me that to make it like UGH GET AWAY FROM ME! I felt really weird saying pussy to her. She made me feel really, really, really weird, and I have to ask you if this was awkward for you, if it was weird for you when you asked me if I could make "pee-pee"?

*everyone is laughing*

M: I'm somebody's mother Kristen, it's not funny to ask you to make pee-pee. That's what you do! *laughs*

Q: This is more of a comment for Kristen. I just want to say that I saw Speak a while ago and I went through a similar situation, and I just want to commend you and say thank you for roles like this and especially at such a young age that, you know, when hopeless situations happen, that it doesn't make that woman. It doesn't make that girl. And even though there's been Twilight, you still to continue to go back and show really strong women roles… I want to say thank you because there are people out there who really have problems with that situation. It's nice to know that there's somebody out there who is saying it's not okay and it's not alright.

*** This brave girl did the entire audience in. During this entire comment, Kristen was taken back. She was listening so intensely. It was so powerful because this girl has just told her that she lived through Speak. Kristen was fidgeting and she didn't really know what to do… because put yourself in her situation. After going through that whole rape comment recently, this was perfection. An actual survivor THANKING Kristen for her work towards awareness. Kristen was so moved folks, like she was on the verge of tears. She was so gracious and thankful for the comment. We were all on the verge of tears with her, so Kristen simply responded with a thumbs up as the audience applauded her.****

Q: I've heard that this is the character that you connected with the most.

K: Maybe it just affected me the most. It's hard to say what character I've connected with. Probably for very similar reasons *points to girl who just spoke about rape*, the two things that I've done that have been really…. sometimes you can leave shit at work, and sometimes you can't. This is sort of, like, undeniably in you or you're just going to ruin it. So that's what I meant. 

When it was over, Kristen got to take pics with like two fans before she was whisked away. I was so pissed. Why? BECAUSE I WANTED A PICTURE WITH RUTH. All I wanted to do was be friends with Ruth because… well… Dean and I are friends! (Note: I understand that Ruth is not Kristen's bodyguard, but I don't want to be friends with Nick. EVER.) How is that fair to Kristen? 

So we all were walking out on a Riley's High when Scout was walking back into the theater. 

"Hey Scout!" Iris says.

"Oh hey, what's up?!" Scout answers.

I stopped dead in my tracks. Fuckin' Iris is now friends with Scout! That shit's awesome. Allow me to fill you in on something I'm envious of: Iris has a copy of The Runaways already because she's hooked up. She's a b-word for already owning it. I tried to kill her and take it, but I wasn't successful. Anyhow, she had the copy in her purse that she wanted Kristen to sign, but Kristen was whisked away. As soon as Scout passed, Iris remembered and chased after Scout, but Scout was already brought back into the hallway where Kristen was. OH WELL, THAT'S WHAT YOU GET FOR HAVING THE DVD EARLY!! (no... I'm not bitter at all.)

the raw emotion, serio guys.

Overall, this experience was incredible. For a movie that consistently broke your heart, there were many times where you laughed, and that was good because it was heavy. It's impossible to not think that every single actor was the idea of perfection. The chemistry that each of them had with one another was undeniable and made the performances that much better. You will be touched, without a doubt.

The movie ends in a very open way and someone asked the screen writer about that. His answer was that he wanted the movie to end with "hope". 

I sincerely hope you all have the opportunity to see this movie because it is Kristen's finest performance, in my opinion, and it is indicative that she has so much left to give to her art of acting.

Prepare to be blown away.

I love this picture.

[A/N: Sorry if I didn't answer your tweets, but my timeline was a clusterfuck as I tweeted from the place. If you had a question I didn't answer, feel free to ask now! Eclipse. Midnight. Tuesday. OMG. I'm not sure what to do about it yet because most of the world won't get to see it because… they don't celebrate the 4th of July! Perhaps we will ignore Eclipse on Wednesday and talk EW? Or do i just do a post that says: IF YOU'VE SEEN ECLIPSE LEAVE A COMMENT? I'm uncertain. if you have ideas, let me know. I love you guys, lots <3]