The Twonky Movie Review

Dear All of You,

I was not sleeping again in the middle of the middle of the other night and by pure inability-to-sleep-because-Helen-left me and sheer un-spellcheckable luck I happened to catch one of the greatest movies I've ever seen, on Turner Classic Movies. I was previously unaware that this movie existed before that night. The movie was called: The Twonky. I fell in love instently. I took notes while watching. What follows below is my as-it-happened notes and review, in poem form.

If you haven't seen The Twonky, I've got bad news. It's almost impossible to find. I've checked. It's never been released on VHS, DVD, or any of that other type stuff. So if you haven't seen it, this review is going to be the closest thing you're going to get to actually being there until some movie DVD distribution company pulls it's un-distributed head out of it's ass and puts this fucking movie back into print (sorry about that).

Write your Congressmen! Let's organize a bake sale! Fuck the fucking fuckers! Yes we can!

Sincerely,

Get in the car, Helen

The Twonky

“All my life when I think about women, I think of french fried potatoes.

  Do you know why that is?”

I can’t sleep

so instead of doing that I’m up early watching Turner Classic Movies

They’re playing an old movie called Twonky

In Twonky, a man’s wife who has the same name

as the wife who just left me leaves him

but before she goes she buys him a TV

but this is no ordinary TV

This TV lights your cigarettes for you

and follows you around your house

like some strange robot waddling space dog

and it can do dishes

and mass produce money

and kicks the poor guys ass at solitaire

and won’t let him shave himself

Twonky does the shaving in this house

and also dusts his shoes off

so that the guy can skip church

Twonky doesn’t like Mozart

Twonky likes to listen to records

recorded by military type marching bands

instead

An old man stops by and witnesses Twonky

shuffling around the house and the two men

sit down to try and come up with a rational

explanation for a television acting in such ways

when Freud doesn’t work they turn to

homemade wine

which inevitably leads to talk of love

and the mysterious nature of women

and the old man passes out on the couch

mumbling something about how women remind

him of french fried potatoes

and he has no idea why

Later the man tries to write a lecture

explaining why

Individualism is the basis of all great art

but his Twonky won’t let him

His Twonky keeps distracting him

with dirty picture books

and odd quotes from Abraham Lincoln

He tries to give his lecture in front of a room

full of tightly sweater’d females

but all he can think about is his Twonky

and this thinking effects his general demeanor

resulting in a klutzy presentation

            he’s literally laughed off the lecture podium

            with his nerves completely shattered

            and his Twonky tucked

            dejectedly between his legs

He tries to tell others

the truth about his Twonky

but nobody believes him

they think he’s just drunk

causing him to declare:

Why is it whenever a man’s telling the truth he’s accused of drinking?!

A repair man is sent over and in old porn style

wrestles with the man’s Twonky for a good chunk of time

before collapsing in a heap, exhausted, to the ground

I ‘m not sure how TCM managed to con me into

watching gay porn, especially at this early hour of the day,

but rest assured, I’ll be writing Robert Osbourne a letter

Not a dirty letter, one that he’d be inclined to

touch his Twonky while reading

I’ll be writing Mr. Osbourne a proper letter

one that will in no way prompt him to masterbate

                a proper one…

but back to the movie,

When the old man with the fucking-women-like-fried-potato fetish wakes up, he has a theory

In the future: Every family has a Twonky of its own to serve the purpose of the super state.

A world in which man’s fate

is literally in the hands of

his own Twonky

The two men hatch a plot

to thwart their Twonkey’s plans

for world domination

Step one: Neutralize the Twonky’s power

by asking the fried potato girl standing in the corner

to leave the room

before they get any further than that

 the cops show up, accusing the guy of counterfeiting

but he slugs them all across the face with his Twonky

and they sort of stumble out of the room, dazed

and feeling a little bit raped-upside-the-forehead dirty

swearing never to speak about such things

in public or not in public

again

after that the man gets plastered

and his Twonky orders a whore

delivered to the house

the professional working girl shows up

and for whatever reasons

the dude’s Twonky goes silent

and the man stands there

screaming at his Twonky at the top of his lungs

in front of the prostitute

“Don’t just stand there! Do something!

            Do Something!

Do Something!”

While the hooker lays sprawled out

on the couch unimpressed

repeating her mantra of

“86.50”

over and over again

when the man finally manages to get

his Twonky working again

it scares the hell out of the woman

and she runs screaming naked out of the house

where she bumps into the man’s wife

who’s come back to him

she’s naturally pissed off to return home

to find her husband hanging out with

a naked whore

but after the guy explains to her

that it’s not his fault

his Twonky made him do it

for some reason this explanation

seems expectable to her

(perhaps because she’s been off camera

 the entire movie banging some dude

 who owns a polo lounge or something like that

 and now feels a bit guilty and has decided

 to let shit slide)

and everything’s ok

until the end

in the end the man is driven quite mad

by his Twonky

leaving wife

followed by

disgruntled hookers

followed by

car crashes

and busted legs

followed by strait jackets

and the mad house

where they’ve got a tiny TV

mounted to a high wall

            in the Rec Room

and every day

the inmates religiously gather

their Twonky’s heavily medicated

to sift through what’s left of their lives

staring at the dusty screen

watching whatever’s playing

on some previously pawn shop’d looking

Twonky

TV

for Turner Classic Movies,

he’s Robert Osbourne
The End