Flashback to last week, with twelve performances, the judges' gushings, and their votes on which of the bottom two (Stereo Hogzz or InTENsity) they were going to send home. The editing makes it look like both Stereo Hogzz and InTENsity were literally rocked by the votes, but it was InTENsity that was eliminated from the competition. Don't worry, I'm sure they'll totally stay together. It's "Movie Night" now, but I'm going to skip past the previews that hint at what that means and skip right to what we all came here for. Which was...what, again?
Auditorium, audience, Steve, more reminders that it's Movie Night, etc. Steve explains that means all of tonight's songs are from "iconic movie soundtracks." We'll be the judge of that. He introduces the judges as "four superheroes-slash-villains," and then L.A., Nicole, Paula and Simon come out onstage to the strains of the Star Wars Main Title theme, I guess because the old opera cue was just too bombastic. Steve tells us once again that the winner gets a five million dollar recording contract, so as a taste of what kind of life that could bring, this week they got to attend the red-carpet premier of...Jack and Jill. So fabulously rich celebrities don't get to pick their own movies, then? They all interview about the dazzling experience, and getting to spot the likes of Katie Holmes, Neil Diamond, Jane Seymour and Al Pacino. Not to mention lead actor Adam Sandler, who hobnobs with all of them in between clips of the movie that don't make me want to see it any more than I already didn't.
Coming back, Steve sings out, "Glamorous!" and gives the floor to Nicole to introduce the first of the Over 30s, Stacy Francis, who will be singing a selection from The Bodyguard. In her intro reel, Stacy says she's never been this happy, although she misses being with her kids (I'm inferring the "although"). Nicole interviews that Stacy's song tonight is out of her comfort zone. L.A. thinks it's a bad song choice, even though he co-wrote it, but here she is, singing "Queen of the Night." She's in a rejected Wonder Woman costume redesigns made of rad naugahyde, with her hair done up so she's all forehead. And there are dancers swinging around on monkey bars and...I'm sorry, she just sounds like ass. This is not her kind of song. Back to your comfort zone, Stacy, stat. When she's done, L.A. tells her he didn't like the song much, but she did better than he expected. He's still wondering why she didn't do "I Will Always Love You," and instead of saying that would be capitally obvious, she says she wanted to "step it up and dance." L.A. would rather let her off the hook than watch her waggle her hair around any more. Paula says she never liked the song (with its co-writer sitting right there), but Stacy "delivered." Simon says she looks cute, "but I would have you wearing that somewhere else." Like the set of Battlestar Galactica for instance? The audience and Paula try to shout down Simon (with Stacy's encouragement), and Nicole goes full Paula about Stacy being a queen from within. L.A. throws in, "I like you better when you cry." Since when? Steve makes with the voting instructions and goes to the break.
Oh, an ad for Jack and Jill. What a coincidence.
, L.A. uses every hand gesture he knows while introducing Marcus Canty. We learn that Marcus's mom has been flying in from Baltimore every week, so no wonder she wants him to get a job. Marcus and the judges promise that he'll only be singing tonight -- no dancing. He appears on stage in a column of yellow smoke, wearing a mirrored tuxedo jacket and singing "I'm Going Down" from Car Wash. And as we see, with Marcus, there's a difference between no choreography and no dancing, and he's going with the former, if you know what I mean. And if you don't, it means lots of gyrating randomly and getting tangled in his jacket when he tries to take it off. Afterward, Nicole has two words for him: "Ma-gic." I have one for Nicole: shut up. She gets kind of inappropriately flirty with him as she goes on and on about how awesome he is. Paula also has a whole long speech, and Simon says Marcus was a thousand percent better when freed of L.A.'s songs and especially freed of that cabaret-singer jacket halfway through. L.A. tells Marcus he has a crystal ball with a picture of Marcus in it. Which isn't creepy at all.
After Steve does the voting instructions, it's Simon's turn to introduce one of the girls. He almost keeps a straight face as he says the song is from one of his favorite movies, You, Me and Dupree. In the intro reel, we see Drew hugging Adam Sandler on the red carpet, as well as some of the ways her hometown of Chino Valley has become Drewville. Simon promises this will show a new side of Drew. Oh, and she's really breaking out of her mold here, doing a slow, creepy, minor-key version of Coldplay's "Fix You." That is a departure; normally she does that with peppy songs, not with songs that start out that way. Also, she kind of looks like she was just in a cage match with a flock of peacocks. She kicks it up a little for the bridge, but I think she only cranks it up to about seven, which at least are four notches higher than she normally goes. L.A. tells her she's always really good, but is ready to see her do something different. I'm with L.A. And to Simon, he says he never even heard of You, Me and Dupree. He and Simon bicker about it, while Simon pretends that an obscure Owen Wilson flop wasn't just an excuse to have Drew sing some Coldplay. Nicole calls her "brilliant beyond your years" and "unlike your mentor...a little slice of heaven." Paula likes the song and the performance, but not the outfit, so she tells Drew she shouldn't let Simon give her fashion advice. Simon calmly informs everyone, "Drew designed that dress." Oops. Well, now Paula and I feel bad. Simon likes how Drew takes risks (I would like that too, if it happened), compares her fashion sense to that of Lady Gaga (as if), and accuses L.A. of trying to get into Drew's head. Or, you know L.A. might have a perfectly valid point. Steve cuts off what could be an interesting debate by reciting the voting instructions, which are not interesting.
Back from the break, Steve's up in the balcony to give his spiel reminding us about the importance of voting, and then it's time for the LeRoy Bell intro reel. He marvels over being on the red carpet at 60 (where Adam Sandler tells him he looks very young -- Id' say younger than Adam Sandler, even). Nicole says his song is from The Runaway Bride, by his favorite band. And it's "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" by U2. Really? Runaway Bride? I know it's going to be a stretch to call some of these songs "movie songs," per se, but wasn't this song in another movie called Rattle and Hum? This sounds like that version anyway, with gospel backup singers and a key change even thrown in for good measure while he sings in front of lights that look like a red version of the Matrix. L.A. says he was starting to get bored with LeRoy, but this was great. Paula says America has found what it's looking for in LeRoy. Simon adds that this was LeRoy's best performance by a mile, of course remembering to mention LeRoy's age (which is still 60, in case you needed an update). Nicole says LeRoy brought them all to a concert and to church, and back comes Steve with the talky-talky.
Tweet count: 3.8 million. I want to know how they're separating our version from the UK version. Paula finally gets to introduce one of her two remaining groups. Lakoda Rayne is singing a song from How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. But first, their intro reel reveals their amazement at getting to be back on the stage for another week, even after they had to perform last week looking like game pieces from the board game "Sorry." Cari from the group talks about her support back in Wall Township, NJ. I guess the other three are on their own. Paula, would you believe it, picked a "country-pop song" for them this week, apparently just to make L.A. crazy. They are indeed coming off like they're trying to be the Dixie Chicks with an extra blonde. I don't know the song they're singing, but they sound a lot better on the solos than in their harmonies during the chorus. I guess L.A. takes it as a country song, and tells them they're his favorite girl group in the competition. High praise indeed, given they're the last one. Nicole says she'd be awfully popular if she took them home with her to Kentucky. Well, every little bit helps. Simon says that after last week's "horror show," "you are the group I always hoped and prayed you'd become." Based on the title of the movie their song came from, he makes a lame joke about how fast Paula can lose a guy, which she turns around on him by pointing out how long she's been trying to lose Simon. Advantage: Abdul. Paula gives the girls a standing ovation, tells her she's proud of them, and sees them all over Pepsi ads in the future. Sure, if someone pastes photos of them up on the preexisting billboards.
Back to the balcony with Steve after the ads, and he throws it down to L.A., who introduces Astro with a song from, surprise, 8 Mile. He banters with Adam Sandler on the red carpet, wearing his big, puffy headphones he always has with him, and talks about always writing back home in Brooklyn. He appears onstage, shrouded in a cap, hoodie, and shadows as he kicks into his own version of Eminem's "Lose Yourself." As the song progresses, it looks like at least one of the backup singers is taking that advice to heart. L.A. reinvents the phrase "active listening" as Astro proves his words are so new there's a reference to Joe Frazier (and although he didn't quite have time to get a Heavy D rhyme in there, he throws one in at the end). That was actually really great, and I don't even get rap. Nicole and Paula blather about how awesome he is, and Simon prefaces his comments with, "this is so irritating." Simon compliments Astro's work ethic and tells him he has the X factor. L.A. is proud of Astro's audacity at rewriting Eminem's lyrics. "Well, that went rather well," Steve says when he joins Astro onstage. Astro gives a shout-out to his "Astro-nauts," and Steve sends us to break.
After the ads, there's a projection on the stage of tweets broken down by judge, with L.A. the most popular of the four. "Can someone get a Band-Aid for Simon's ego?" Steve cracks. After pushing the Twitter thing a bit, Steve adds, "Here's the third-most popular judge, Simon Cowell." Simon jokes about wanting a recount, and says Melanie will be singing a song from This Is It. So pretty much any Michael Jackson song, then? In rehearsal (I love how the default setting on the projector screens is a white grid pattern, like the show takes place on the Enterprise's holodeck), Melanie says that she's having throat issues. Well, that sucks. She's singing "Man in the Mirror," with a veritable Pandora's box of words flashing on the screen behind her. But then the words and the song get happy at the same time. As for her voice, she doesn't sound sick at all, even throwing in a nice big (but not overblown) finish at the end. L.A. tells Melanie she's a great singer, but dings Simon on it not being very inventive, arguing that Melanie always does the same kind of song. Nicole waits for the boos to die down before saying she loves the song. Paula says Melanie can sing the phone book if she wants. Well, her voice probably isn't up for that kind of endurance this week, so probably not. Simon Britishes that she was "bloody fantastic." He tells L.A. it was a tribute, and tells Melanie it was her best performance yet, showing all the range she needed to with the big note at the end. "You happy?" Steve asks her before rattling off the voting instructions. She claims to be, apparently saving her voice.
Stereo Hogzz are , singing something from Get Smart. Paula says she was shocked to see them in the bottom two last week. The members themselves are also a little nervous. "At any moment, we could go home." Well, probably just the one moment of any given week. The sing they're singing is "Ain't No Other Man" by Christina Aguilera, complete with a retro art-deco look, and Paula is not taking any chances with America not connecting with a group; while they sing, she's got close-up glamour-shots of them projected on the upstage Jumbotron to their names. They sound good, but for a singing and dancing group, it seems like a little overkill to have them up there with a squad of pantsless dancers and a half-dozen backup singers. L.A. doesn't wait for the applause to subside before saying it was their "recovery week," but he didn't know the song. Which isn't exactly their fault. I don't know all the songs either but I don't blame the contestants. Nicole says it's her favorite performance of theirs yet. One of the Hogzz hijacks the mic for some shout-outs (apparently they're microphone Hogzz as well), and then Simon takes a dig at Nicole's shallow criticism, and tells the Hogzz they're "not performing the record you would make," whatever that means. He calls it a cabaret performance, so I think they're getting dinged by both male judges for doing a deliberately retro song. The Hogzz take the criticism well, but Paula disagrees and makes lead singer Trace step forward and take a bow, which isn't embarrassing for him at all. Fortunately Steve comes out to give the voting instructions before she can do that to all the rest of them too.
One last Over 30 to go. Nicole misses her cue, then flusteredly says Josh Kracjik will be singing a song from Across the Universe, which narrows it down to pretty much any Beatles song. We learn in the intro reel that Josh's mom is probably enjoying this even more than he is, and the burrito place back home is even selling a Kracjik burrito. Which I assume is like a regular burrito but with more grease. He's singing the Joe Cocker version of "With a Little Help from My Friends." The backup singers drag him down a bit, but he rocks out with his Cocker out, crazy-eyes and all. L.A. tells him well done, and Paula tells him his voice is chicken soup for the soul. Not a burrito? Simon liked the song, but tells him, as criticism against Josh's mentor's idea of staging "You were like Dracula and the brides up there." Nicole responds, "Don't hate, just congratulate." She adds, "Steven, don't you talk," and tells Josh he's ready for a five-million-dollar recording contract. With that, Steve steps in with the voting instructions.
I don't know why Steve keeps getting evicted to the balcony during every commercial break, but there he is again as he reminds us to vote and calls down to L.A. to introduce the one Boy left to perform tonight: Chris Rene, with a song from Dangerous Minds. His mom is proud of his sobriety and his music, and L.A. interviews that he thinks they nailed it this week. Chris sings "Gangster's Paradise," and I guess he figures if rewriting a rap song works for Astro, why shouldn't it work for him? Well, for one thing, the army of dancers in white zoot suits kind of dents Chris's street cred. Nicole lets him repeat some of his lyrics back; Paula calls him honest, truthful and amazing; and Simon says, "Welcome back Chris Rene." He gives him props for doing what they all agreed on (meaning, I guess, staying off the drugs), and compliments L.A. on doing a good job with all his acts tonight. All L.A. says is that "it's been a long way home, but we're there now." Chris manages to tone down the mugging compared to last week, while Steve gives the voting instructions, which is only good news.
After the ads, Steve says the voting lines will open shortly, but there's one more girl left to sing. Simon has a song from Cadillac Records for Rachel, promising a big shock. In her intro-reel, Rachel reveals that she was adopted at six months of age. She does stand out a bit. Simon admits that he hasn't done a good job with her so far, but after listening to her, he thinks he's come up with a "game-changer." And indeed, he's got her singing "I'd Rather Go Blind," which serves her a lot better than the Mousketeer crap he's been pushing on her this whole time. L.A. says she's come out as a contender with this one, and adds that it's his favorite yet. Nicole takes credit for Simon listening to her on the song choice, but Rachel interrupts and says she's the one who picked it this week. Simon nods proudly. "And that would explain it," Nicole says, complimenting Rachel on her level of soul. Paula adds that she's glad Rachel's teaching Simon humility. Simon claims that he's willing to admit when he's wrong, especially when working with an artist he trusts, like Rachel. He compares her to a "mini-Beyonce" and tells her she's back in the game. Steve comes out and chats with her a bit before giggling, "I want to eat her up!" before going into the voting instructions and throwing it to a montage of tonight's top-eleven performances. After that, all of the finalists are out onstage with Steve as he opens the voting lines. It's a lot less crowded up there sans InTENsity, one can't help noticing. Simon shamelessly milks votes by saying his mom's not feeling well, Steve lets Paula babble for a second before urging everyone to vote, because someone will be going home tomorrow night. Can it be Simon?
M. Giant is a Minneapolis-based writer with a wife, a son, and a number of cats that seems to have settled at around two. Learn waaaay too much about him at Velcrometer, follow him on Twitter, or just e-mail him at m.giant[at]gmail.com.