My birthday, Aug. 26, falls on a Friday this year. A Friday birthday means your big day coincides with new movies being released. A Friday birthday in August usually means the movies being released are bad ones.

August is the dumping-ground month. It’s when they toss out movies that are too dumb to be autumn, Oscar-bait releases, and not entertaining enough to be summer blockbusters (else they’d have released them earlier in the summer).

Some recent August releases include “Coyote Ugly,” “Hollow Man,” “Original Sin,” “Rush Hour 2,” “Captain Corelli’s Mandolin,” “Bubble Boy,” “Ghosts of Mars,” “Summer Catch,” “The Master of Disguise,” “Serving Sara,” “FearDotCom,” “Gigli,” “Uptown Girls,” “My Boss’s Daughter,” “Exorcist: The Beginning,” “Without a Paddle,” “Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid,” and “Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2.” (The last three all came out the same DAY in August, last year. Yeesh.)

There are exceptions, of course. “Bring It On,” “Space Cowboys,” “The Others,” “Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back,” “Signs” and “Freaky Friday” were all August releases in the past few years.

Anyway, back to my point, Aug. 26. This year my birthday movies are:

“The Cave,” in which people go into a very deep cave and are killed by monsters/aliens/something. The quintessential late-August crapfest, by the looks of it.

“The Brothers Grimm,” Terry Gilliam’s latest fairy tale, about two con artists who protect villages from magical creatures that don’t exist — and then are called upon to save the day when some REAL monsters appear. Could go either way; the fact that its release date was pushed back from last fall makes me nervous.

“Undiscovered,” about a group of young performers trying to make it big in L.A. Yawn.

Curious, I looked to see what films were released on my birthday in 1994, which is the last time it fell on a Friday. They include:

“It’s Pat.” Yes, the movie about Pat from “Saturday Night Live.” Surely among the worst movies of the 1990s.

“Natural Born Killers.” Oliver Stone’s controversial anti-violence (or perhaps pro-violence), anti-media (or perhaps pro-media) screed. You love it or you hate it, but it’s at least worth talking about.

“Police Academy: Mission to Moscow.” May heaven help us all.

“Wagons East.” John Candy’s last film. Universally loathed.

Here’s hoping my birthday movies this year are better than the last ones.

Regarding my review of “Hustle & Flow” — one of only a few mildly negative reviews it has gotten — I received this e-mail from a fellow identifying himself as “Michael”:

I read your review on Hustle and Flow. It is obvious you have no idea what you are talking about. Hustle and Flow and 8 Mile have nothing whatsoever in common. Just because both have Hip Hop music, you are quick to compare the two movie. You need to watch the movie again and take it for what its worth. Question, “Why do (white people) love to lump things together, you always have to catergorize? [Sorta like lumping all white people together by saying they tend to categorize things?] The movie is about someone who went down the wrong path in life, then realize they had other ambitions and strive to turn their life around. Its not rocket science.

Peace…….

I replied to Michael to tell him that “someone who went down the wrong path in life, then realize they had other ambitions and strive to turn their life around” is what “8 Mile” was about, too, thus proving my point. When he replied this time, his e-mail said his name was Yusef Shaheed. Here’s what he said:

No! In 8 mile “Rabbit” (Eminem) had a “square” job. After the battle at the end of the movie he went back to work. [Whereas in "Hustle & Flow," the protagonist continues onward with his career in rap, though he still misses being a pimp.]

Whatever. Anyway, next I got an e-mail from someone whose name line read “Your ignorant” (my ignorant what?), at e-mail address “don’t_worry_about_it@yourmom.com” — anonymous and un-reply-able, in other words, like all the best editorials. The subject line: “Nieve.” The text, which contains a vulgar but hilarious expression, is as follows:

Your current movie review on the new flick “Hustle and Flow” begins with you stating: “Hustle & Flow” is a movie about rap music, which means, perforce, that it is also about guns and sex.” Well Eric, obviously you don’t understand s*** about rapping, which is part of the Hip Hop culture. [Wha?! Rapping is part of the hip hop culture?!] For those of you ignorant dumba**es(yourself) who don’t understand much about hip hop or “rap”, [you know, "rap," as the kids call it] just keep to listening to your Simon & Garfunkel CD’s back in your suburban home. You must be thinking, “if your so hip hoppish then how do you know about Simon & Garfunkel?” It’s because you blow dogs for quarters. Find a new profession you ugly a** Jerry Seinfeld lookin muthaf***a. Bye

I was, in fact, wondering how someone so hip hoppish knew about Simon & Garfunkel. Turns out it’s because I do lewd things to dogs in exchange for 25-cent pieces. Who knew? (Where would a dog even get a quarter? And is that really what he would spend it on? I’m just sayin’.)

Eric D. Snider is coming to a county fair near you!*

*Assuming you are near Weber, Sevier or Washington counties in Utah.

Eric is taking his little piano comedy show on the road this summer, performing at three fairs in Utah in August! That’s right, in the same venues as giant hogs and sweaty square dancers, Eric will be singin’ his songs and playin’ his piano! More excited, he could not be.

Here’s the schedule:

Thursday, Aug. 11, 2:45 p.m.: Weber County Fair (Ogden).

Friday, Aug. 12, 6:30 p.m.: Sevier County Fair (Richfield).

Saturday, Aug. 13, 2 p.m.: Washington County Fair (St. George).

In all cases, there is no extra charge for the show once you’ve got admission to the fair. The Weber County Fair has free admission, and I can’t imagine either of the others charges very much, if anything. (Washington County’s Web site doesn’t say, and Sevier County doesn’t have a Web site.) So if you find yourself near Ogden, Richfield or St. George in mid-August, come on by!

Note that in St. George, I will be performing immediately after a man who does yo-yo tricks, so you might want to get there early.

Here is something you probably did not know about me. About twice a month, I get an e-mail from someone wanting the e-mail address of a famous person. Now, nowhere on my Web site does it suggest that I am Directory Assistance for celebrities. My only connection to celebrities is that I review the movies they appear in. This process does not grant me any special access to them; they are not actually THERE when I watch the movies, you see. It’s just photographs being projected on a screen.

Yet still I get these e-mails. Here is the most recent one. It said, in its entirety:

can i have rabes email address

I replied thus:

I don’t know who “rabe” is, and I don’t know why you think I would have his/her e-mail address. Did I mention “rabe” in a movie review? Because all that means is that I saw a movie that had “rabe” in it, and then wrote a review of that movie. That is the extent of my involvement with “rabe”: seeing him or her in a movie, same as you.

I received this reply:

im sorry but i didnt meen rabe.i ment raven symone.do you know who she is?she is a disney channel star.well i hope you give it to me.

I was nonplussed. Had I not just stated that, regardless of who “rabe” was, I would not know how to reach him or her? Did this person think I would say, “Oh, RAVEN! You said ‘rabe,’ and I had no idea who that was. But Raven, of course I’ve got HER e-mail address! Let me get that for you….”?

I think what must happen is, these people Google the celebrity’s name and my site is among the hundreds that pops up, because I have mentioned that person in a movie review. Then the fan comes to my site, sees the “e-mail” link, and e-mails me to ask for information, without even bothering to read what I’ve said about the celebrity in question. Surely if they read the review, they would understand that it’s just a movie review and not an interview with the star. Does Roger Ebert get e-mails like this? Actually, he probably does, because he actually does publish celebrity interviews sometimes and probably actually does have some contact info for them. But why would anyone who actually READ what I wrote think that I would have any connection to anyone?

Anyway, for future reference, here are the famous people that I DO have personal contact information for:

- Dr. Demento
- Richard Dutcher, director of “God’s Army” and “Brigham City”
- Will Swenson, star of “Singles Ward” and other LDS comedies
- Orson Scott Card
- My mom, who was once in extra in something
- Myself, author of many famous movie reviews

And also for future reference, no I will not give you the contact information for any of those people.

The other day I got an e-mail from a reader named “Robyn” who took issue with my review of the Hilary Duff trainwreck “Raise Your Voice.” She writes:

I read one of the reviews that you made on the Hilary Duff movie Raise Your Voice. [Evidently I wrote several "Raise Your Voice" reviews, and Robyn read one of them.] Im not a big fan of Hilary Duff and I was not expecting much from this movie till I saw the previews. I think you were absolutley wrong. This was a great movie that I enjoyed because it was dealing with music and what real people go through, like losing a loved one. I play the violin and piano, so I was especially happy to see music to be a huge part of the movie. I believe that everyone has their right to their own opinion, but next time try not to be so harsh, [because you really only have the right your own opinion if it's nice] because your opinons don’t agree with everybody, [hence the definition of "opinion"] especially me and Im not going to be expecting any good reviews from you anymore, so Im not going to even bother reading them.
ballet/rocknrollchick

Within 10 minutes, Robyn had broken her own pledge, read more of my reviews, and sent me another e-mail:

I wanted to know why you always diss all the movies that you see even if their really good. Harry Potter movies kick a** and I think that you are way out of line on how you write reviews, but Im not just talking about you. All movie reviewers suck, they are such critizers {whatever}. [Hence the definition of "critic."] I have no idea why people even join your stupid Snide Remarks s***. I really don’t blame you for writting about Tom Crise, though, the guy has gone bloody mental, but please refrain from making rude remarks about future hp films.
Ballet/Rocknrollchick

I don’t even know where to begin dismantling the logic of that e-mail, especially considering my reviews of the three Harry Potter films were fairly positive, and altogether rapturous on the third one. It’s obvious Robyn is a teenage girl, and ripping apart a teenage girl’s logical flaws is too easy to be any fun. So I didn’t respond to her. Her e-mail address is harrypotter1fan@sbcglobal.net, though; now it’s on record in case I change my mind.

Then I had this succinct e-mail from someone named Mitch (deeppurple1971@comcast.net), who disagreed with my F grade for the original “Friday the 13th.” He says:

friday the 13th ***1/2 you are trash suckhole

Suckhole?! I don’t even know what that means! But it’s a great epithet. I plan to use it now in my daily life.

This guy, I did respond to. I said:

“Wow. Your e-mail address leads me to believe you were born in 1971, which makes you 34 this year. And a 34-year-old man is writing a movie critic to call him a ’suckhole’ because he disagreed with him about a movie? WOW. That’s all I can say…. wow.”

He did not reply.

Number of films in which a man gets his hand nailed to a piece of wood so far in 2005: 2 (”The Devil’s Rejects” and “The Island”)

Number of films in which a man gets his hand nailed to a piece of wood in all of 2004: 1 (”Passion of the Christ”)

Drop whatever you’re doing, hurry to your nearest book emporium, and buy “A Portrait of Yo Mama As a Young Man” by Andrew Barlow and Kent Roberts. One author contributes humor pieces to The New Yorker; the other writes for The Onion. Both are younger than I am, which makes me extraordinarily angry.

But anyway, this book is hysterically funny, one of the funniest, silliest, most random books I have ever read. It is a 188-page treatise on yo mama and all the things wrong with her.

There are many pages of “yo mama” jokes, but not the sort you hear on the playground. These are non-sequiturs, random insults that are only mildly insulting, or that barely make sense. I quote a few examples:

“Yo mama’s so lupine, she chases rabbits.”

“Yo mama was the subject of the TV movie ‘Fat Insane Whore.’”

“When people look at yo mama’s wedding photos, they remark that she looks ‘haggard.’”

“Yo mama is a poor man’s Roy Orbison.”

“Yo mama spent most of July 1988 in a labyrinth.”

“Yo mama’s so Abraham Lincoln, when someone comes up behind her and shoots her in the head, they say ‘Sic semper tyrannis’ afterwards.”

The book also includes yo mama’s resume (honors and awards include: “Won daughter in pie-eating contest, 1983; Perfect Attendance Award, Northern Arizona Nazis; ‘Caller 105,’ WSMX Hits 105.3 FM, Providence”), some e-mails yo mama wrote you while you were in college, a list of terms yo mama has Googled (”strictly-for-fashion wheelchair,” “how do i get there,” “boxes boxes boxes,” “best way to kick dogs,” “kevin costner + abdominal + november + corn on the cob + my kids + wisconsin newspaper”), and much, much more.

It’s absurdist, ridiculous stuff, and man, does it ever make me laugh. Laugh till I weep. Find it, flip through it, see if it makes you laugh, too. If it doesn’t, we can still be friends, but we cannot get married.

(By the way: If you want to buy the book from Amazon, please use the link above, as I get a tiny referral fee that way. And then perhaps I will reconsider the marriage thing.)