Last week was a bad week. Promoters invite me to stuff all the time, and I go with fingers crossed that I can say something nice about them. That massive silence? I went to a party for Camarena Tequila and a screening of Beginners, a new film starring Ewan Macgregor and Christopher Plummer.

I'll yank this band-aid off fast. One of the workers at the Camarena party said he used to drink Patron, but gave it up in favor or Camarena. After downing two shots and a couple sips of four different cocktails, I can say with confidence I wouldn't switch to Camarena if my regular agave consumption came from sucking the outsides of cactus.

As for Beginners, well, its charms are largely dependent on the Jack Russell terrier star. The human characters aim for their share of quirky-cute, but when two separate people do the finger-pistol thing, I want Jason Statham to appear and real-pistol whip them both.

Director Mike Mills told the screening audience that he made the movie extra-cute to universalize the message. What message? I wondered. Apparently it's either "Sometimes you just want to shake the stupid out of some people" or "Dying really sucks."