The Screengrab : pretty in pink

Revenge of the Nerds - The 10 Sexiest Guy Geeks In Cinema (Part One)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 20:00:00 GMT

Last week, Screengrab celebrated the 10 Sexiest Girl Geeks in Cinema...and now, in tribute to the return of that dreamy Professor Henry Jones, Jr. (in the hotly anticipated Kingdom of the Crystal Skull), we present our equal opportunity list of ten hot nerdy guys.

As with the previous list, most of these so-called nerds, geeks, dorks and maxi-zoom dweebies are played by actors who, in real life, are pretty easy on the eyes. But their characters, at least, are misfits and loners, undervalued diamonds in the rough just waiting to be discovered by some lucky, sharp-eyed lady (or gentleman).

Why lucky? Because as Robert Carradine’s Louis Skolnick says in Revenge of the Nerds (and as we at The Screengrab know oh so well), “Jocks only think about sports, nerds only think about sex.”

10. William Hurt as Professor Eddie Jessup in Altered States

Back in the 1980s, William Hurt was the poster child for brainy-sexy-cool, thanks to his breakthrough role in Ken Russell’s nerd-tastic acid trip Altered States. Hurt stars as Professor Eddie Jessup, a Harvard scientist who is so totally obsessed with his research into universal consciousness that he’d rather “experiment” on himself than have sex with his hot primatologist wife...and what’s geekier than that?

9. Alan Tudyk as Wash in Serenity

Not being a lady or a gay gentleman, I was a little unsure of the actual “hotness” of some of the geeks on this list, and when I ran my original #9 (Jeff Goldblum as doomed scientist Seth Brundle in The Fly) by my wife, she shrugged, “Yeah...uh...I guess.” And while no less an authority than Geena Davis apparently found Brundlefly plenty damn sexy, I nevertheless decided instead to dedicate this space to the late, lamented pilot of the good ship Serenity, who my friend Julia informs me is quite the nerd hottie. Sweet, technology-obsessed and a little bit dorky, poor Wash is gone but evidently not forgotten.

8. Cary Grant as David Huxley in Bringing Up Baby

In last week’s girl geek list, I noted that Scarlett Johansson playing a geek in Ghost World was about as believable as Denise Richards playing a nuclear physicist, and I freely admit it seems hypocritical to list this uber-suave icon of urbane manliness in a top ten list of cinematic nerds...yet Grant’s stuffy paleontologist is the ancestor to any number of sweetly sexy absent-minded professor characters too obsessed with their studies to recognize their biological needs or the effect of their powerful chemistry on the world around them. Speaking of which...

7. Ryan O’Neal as Dr. Howard Bannister in What’s Up Doc?

I deferred again to my wife here in the #7 spot after she violently rejected my original pick: Jon Cryer as Phil “Duckie” Dale in Pretty in Pink, about whom I said: “Sure, Molly Ringwald’s Andie Walsh ultimately chose Andrew McCarthy’s limp noodle preppie, but in the same way all my guy geek friends preferred the pre-makeover Allison in The Breakfast Club, just about every alterna-girl I know would have picked Jon Cryer’s sometimes annoying but always stylish and devoted Duckie in a heartbeat.” To which my wife, an alterna-girl in her own right, shot back, “No. He’s not a hot nerd. He’s just a dork.” So, instead, I’ve substituted Ryan O’Neal’s befuddled, wife-approved musicologist as my #7 pick, in part to beef up the 1970s content of this list, and in part because any character who spends the majority of his time obsessed with igneous rock formations yet still manages to attract offbeat beauties like Madeline Kahn’s Eunice Burns and 1970s-sex-kitten-era-Barbara Streisand’s Judy Maxwell is clearly a nerd to be reckoned with.

6. Wes Bentley as Ricky Fitts in American Beauty (by Paul Clark)

When we first came up with the idea for this list, we went back and forth about the idea of including Ricky Fitts. Sure, he's an outcast at school, but does that make him a true geek? Ricky certainly doesn’t fit the mold on the surface -- no horn-rims, not especially studious, and so on. But, to quote American Beauty's tagline, "look closer." With his ever-present camera and intense gaze, he has the bearing of someone who's spent his life on the outside looking in, the way all geeks feel during their high-school years. Listen to his famous monologue about the plastic bag -- there's an analytical mind at work here that distinguishes him from his more socially-adept, less self-aware peers. Being a loner has given him plenty of time to step back from life and think about the world around him in a way most people his age don't have time for. It's also given him a serene acceptance of his life that proves irresistible to his troubled next-door neighbor Angela (Thora Birch). When she's not sneaking him up to her bedroom to have sex, he's everything a good boyfriend should be -- sensitive, empathetic, a good listener, the whole shebang. So Ricky doesn't look the part, but so what? In many ways, he's the real deal in a way those Urkel wannabes aren't, and a kind of ideal for young women who find themselves frustrated with the limited possibilities of dating popular jocks. -- Paul Clark

Click here for part 2.

Geek Love: The Ten Sexiest Nerds in Cinema, Gen-XX Edition (Part Deux)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 20:30:00 GMT

5. MARY STUART MASTERSON AS DANNI IN HEAVEN HELP US AND WATTS IN SOME KIND OF WONDERFUL

Danni in the 1960s-era Catholic school comedy Heaven Help Us would surely have been too cool for me in the real world, but the tomboy drummer Watts was a perfect fantasy: the groovy gal pal who’s been secretly pining for you all along -- then, when you finally catch wise, she’s dressed in a sleek, Goth-y chauffeur’s uniform. Tellingly, in John Hughes’ gender-flipped version of the same story (Pretty In Pink), Jon Cryer’s groovy guy pal, Duckie secretly pines for Molly Ringwald’s Andie, but then has to just suck it while she runs off with...yes, another popular hunk.

4. MICHELLE MEYRINK AS JORDAN COCHRAN IN REAL GENIUS

I wouldn’t have been smart enough for Jordan Cochran’s motor-mouthed, socially awkward “Pacific Tech” brainiac, but it was nice to know cute girls could be hyper, too!

3. THORA BIRCH AS JANE BURNHAM IN AMERICAN BEAUTY AND ENID IN GHOST WORLD

I’d evolved from a hopelessly geeky adolescent to a somewhat less geeky adult by the time Thora Birch became the definitive fin de siècle geek girl, but her sultry slow-burn cynicism (and surprisingly huge breasts) put the “It” in her misfits. (Scarlett Johnasson in Ghost World, meanwhile, is one of the hottest screen characters of all time, but ScarJo as a nerdy misfit is about as believable as Denise Richards as a nuclear physicist.)

2. CARRIE FISHER AS PRINCESS LEIA IN RETURN OF THE JEDI

The iconic, the unforgettable, the indisputable chain mail bikini. Even my gay nerd friends wanted a piece o’ that.

1. ALYSON HANNIGAN AS MICHELLE FLAHERTY IN AMERICAN PIE

A goofy, accessible, redhead nymphomaniac played by the actress who played the lesbian witch (and the evil vampire lesbian witch) on Buffy the Vampire Slayer? My friends, we have a winner.

And now that we've got you all lathered up in a hot geek frenzy, we'd love to know the nerds that steam up YOUR Coke-bottle glasses...and stay tuned for next week's list of Top Ten Brainy BOYS!

Click here for Part 1!

Vanishing Act: John Hughes

Scott Von Doviak — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 19:00:00 GMT

You learn some funny things when researching a column dedicated to filmmakers who have mysteriously vacated the multiplex. As surprised as I was last week to find out that Michael Cimino was originally slated to direct Footloose, I am doubly stunned this week to discover that there are no less than five Beethoven movies. I’m not talking about the deaf composer idolized by Alex in A Clockwork Orange; I’m talking about the freakin’ St. Bernard of that name. And do you know what that fifth Beethoven movie is titled? That’s right, it’s Beethoven’s 5th! And why am I telling you this?

It’s because the first Beethoven movie was co-written by John Hughes, under the nom de garbage Edmond Dantès. Dantès, you may recall, was the Count of Monte Cristo, but it’s also the name Hughes has used on several occasions to disguise his involvement in films such as Maid in Manhattan. Looking over his body of work, you have to wonder if he wishes he’d started using the name earlier.

Hughes had a pretty good thing going for a while there, as almost anyone who was a teenager in the 1980s will tell you. Together, Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, Weird Science, Pretty in Pink and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off pretty much comprise the definitive portrait of teen angst in the Reagan era. But after a brief foray into the grown-up realm with She’s Having a Baby, Hughes regressed like Charlie in Flowers for Algernon, churning out increasingly lame kiddie fare, from the Home Alone series to Curly Sue to (shudder) Baby’s Day Out. At some point, perhaps he realized his name was becoming shorthand for “prolific purveyor of puerile pap,” and made an abrupt course correction. Now he’s almost reclusive enough to consider changing his name to Howard.

The most recent project Hughes graced with his own name was the barely-released Reach the Rock, an uncharacteristically downbeat small-town dramedy he scripted in 1998. Around that time he gave one of last known interviews, conducted by High Hat co-founder and Screengrab confidant William Ham. In it, he does sound like a man who’s ready for an extended sabbatical. “The only sequels I was involved in were under duress,” he says. “I didn't even know about Vegas Vacation until I read about it in the trades!... I tried to talk them out of doing Ferris Bueller as a series…That's why I've stayed in Chicago, 'cause I never quite fit into L.A. It's easier to maintain a degree of innocence here, you're not playing the herd so much.”

It’s a little hard to buy the notion of John Hughes as anti-Hollywood renegade, especially since his alter ego Edmond Dantès is back at work. Did you catch the Drillbit Taylor trailer earlier today on the Screengrab? Well, Dantès is credited with the story on this latest export from the Judd Apatow conglomerate. Indeed, the increasingly overexposed and overextended Apatow could do worse that to regard his latest collaborator as a cautionary tale…before he ends up making his own Curly Sue.

The Devil Wears Izod: The Ten Greatest Preppy Villains

sometripe — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 20:00:00 GMT

There's something about pleated khakis and navy-blue blazers that gives us chills. Clearly we're not alone — the preppy villain has been a staple of Hollywood's light fare for decades. You can spot him (and it is always a "him" — girls like the Heathers were the same genus, different species) by his ascot and asymetrically parted hair, or perhaps the pink Lacoste sweater tied loosely across his shoulders. Sometimes he wears only tennis shorts, a polo shirt and a sneer. He had a big hand in popularizing feathered hair — that's how evil he is. The preppy villain hit his stride during the Reagan years (60% of our featured preppy villains are of the '80s), but he still pops up now and again, a magnet for our disgust so there's nothing left but love for the little guy.

10. Vice-Principal Gills, Summer School (1987)

Gills (Robin Thomas) plays a leisure-suit-wearing high-school VP who assigns his gym instructor, Mr. Shoop (Mark Harmon), to teach a remedial summer English course so he can spend the warmer months wooing the history teacher (Kirstie Alley). He serenades her with vintage convertibles and well-prepared picnics that include expensive fromage. Being the villain, he also tries to sabotage Shoop's class by loudly pointing out their inadequacies. Evil-prep quirks include dropping fancy French phrases like "joie de vivre" and expressing exaggerated horror at a clip of Texas Chainsaw Massacre before running from the room. — Liz Nadybal

9. Mick, Teen Wolf (1985)

Somehow, Scott Howard was only briefly fazed by the whole being-part-wolf thing. Yet Mick, his arch-nemesis and star of the rival high school's basketball team, threw his life into complete disarray. Mick could usually be found coordinating his denim-on-denim ensembles and inappropriately groping his girlfriend. When he wasn't playing point guard for the Dragons, he enjoyed creating clever quips about Scott, like "Hope your acting's better than your hook shot, kid." — LN

8. Zachary "Sack" Lodge, Wedding Crashers (2005)

Sure, Bradley Cooper's portrayal of Rachel McAdams' fiancé is over-the-top. But what do you expect from a plot in which McAdams' mother makes Owen Wilson feel her up and her sister jacks off Vince Vaughn under the dining room table? This is not a subtle movie, nor is Sack a subtle villain. He's designed to be the character you automatically hate, in direct contrast to Owen Wilson's laid-back butterscotch stallion and Vince Vaughn's affable teddy bear. He hunts quail with a vengeance, kisses senator ass, takes a game of touch football to death-match levels and wears the perfect rugby-shirt-and-Abercrombie ensemble for each occasion. His shining moment takes place at McAdam's sister's wedding to Vaughn, where the Sack tells Christopher Walken he "don't know shit" and orders McAdams to "get your fucking ass on that altar right now." We all cheer when Vaughn knocks him out. Nobody can disrespect Walken. — Nicole Ankowski

7. Patrick Bateman, American Psycho (2000)

I'd always imagined Christian Bale smelled of high-end grooming products like Kiehl's Rare-Earth Cleansing Masque, a preppie of the truly classy sort. Then I saw American Psycho, a Bret Easton Ellis adaptation in which Bale plays a slick Wall Street financier with a penchant for after-hours rape and torture, and Kiehl's suddenly seemed a bit twee. Still, Bateman has a Newport summer home, a prep-school diploma and a collection of Hugo Boss three-pieces we'd like to get our hands on. If he didn't insist on disemboweling people, we'd be in love. — Steph Auteri

6. Stan Gable, Revenge of the Nerds (1984)

Bright red short-shorts and feathered hair — we could never quite reverse that image of Ted McGinley, even after several years of his role as the girlish Mr. Marcy D'Arcy on Married...With Children. Nor the image of him tossing freshmen out their dorm windows after his frat house burns down, participating in a tricycle race, or pulling a jockstrap over the head of an Asian student while yelling, "Do you know karate?" Subtle! — Will Doig

5. Rand McPherson, PCU (1994)

Before he became the grizzled Dennis Finch on Just Shoot Me, David Spade played a pitch-perfect prep-frat leader, Rand McPherson, attending the counter-culturally diverse Port Chester University. Lackey to the university president, the sniveling Finch leads a group of Republican minions in a quest to rid the campus of binge-drinking, loud music and all things un-Izod. Obviously, he gets it in the end, locked into a room by Jeremy Piven with a stereo playing "Afternoon Delight" on repeat, though just locked in a room with Jeremy Piven might have been a more effective coup de grace. — SA

4. The tennis players, Trading Places (1983)
Philadelphia in 1983 was a septic system of crime and filth, so Louis Winthorpe III and his snotty friends played tennis at an upscale private club. Winthorpe's friends were the kind of old-money preps that almost don't exist anymore. They spoke with Katharine Hepburn accents and serenaded their female hangers-on with their Ivy League alma-mater song. They owned the kind of white tennis shorts that are now selling on eBay for triple digits. And they really didn't like prostitutes (Jamie Lee Curtis) or poor black people (Eddie Murphy). When Winthorpe loses his money, they drop him faster than you can say forty-love. By the time the second half of the film rolls around they've basically disappeared, but you have to assume they got cleaned out in that frozen concentrated orange juice debacle. — WD

3. Hardy Jenns, Some Kind of Wonderful (1987)

With his popped collar and visible-from-space chin dimple, Hardy (Craig Sheffer) was quintessential '80s prep: rich, philandering, ready to embark on a college career of date rape and a professional career of white-collar embezzlement. "He's a total buck," as one character describes him, and even at twelve, I didn't understand that. Writer/director John Hughes does have a tendency toward broad stripes, and he painted Hardy with an industrial-size rollerbrush. "You walk out on me, where you gonna go?" he snarls at his beautiful girlfriend, played by Lea Thompson. Into the arms of true love, of course. Enjoy your status car and your receding hairline, buck. — Sarah Hepola

2. Johnny Lawrence, The Karate Kid (1984)

I still can't watch that Halloween party scene, when Ralph Macchio is running for the chicken-wire fence in his crazy shower costume and the skeleton thugs pull him down and kick the stuffing out of him. Johnny Lawrence isn't even a preppy villain in the fun way. I knew too many of him in high school to be amused. In fact, nine-tenths of the pleasure of watching The Karate Kid is simply seeing Lawrence get that screaming-bird kick to the face. They should put that on a loop and play it repeatedly for unpopular high-school kids with low self-esteem. — WD

1. Steff, Pretty in Pink (1986)

James Spader's Steff was the ultimate preppy villain during a time when wearing silk dressing gowns at keggers was cool. He spends the entire movie trying to bed Molly Ringwald's friend Andie while keeping his best friend, pretty-wuss-boy Blane (Andrew McCarthy), from getting into her pants. Despite being fabulously dressed in pastels and shoulder pads, he imbues his character with enough quiet slime that you can understand why Molly recoils every time she sees him. Spader so inhabited the bad boy with the pretty face that it launched his career, and you can still see some Steff in most of his roles today. — NA