I had a mental note to watch the movie Bait. I didn't remember when I made it or why: I just knew I had a mental note. So when I signed up with a streaming service and saw it available, I jumped at the chance to watch it.

From the first shot in the first minute I knew I was in trouble. Usually I love experimental movies, but sometimes it seems like they're purposely annoying. It's the same reason I have trouble with concerts: while I'm a big fan of art, I also believe you should give people what they want. Musicians have gold records for a reason, so when we pay hundreds of dollars to see them live I don't think the first words out of their mouths should be, "I'm really bored with singing my hits, so tonight I'll stick to songs by Blink-182."

In the case of Bait, I'm pretty sure the director didn't hear a ton of cinéastes demanding, "Just once in a film, I'd like some close-up, black-and-white shots of sedated lobsters."

I also like atmosphere, but at some point I like a story. Dialog. Characters. An hour into Bait, I'd heard three lines of dialog and saw eight hundred gruff sailors in rain slickers tie something with rope. I guess it was atmosphere. And I guess real art is supposed to leave you with questions. I'm not sure, though, that question should be, Why the fuck do sailors have so many different knots?

I mean, either knots work or they don't. They stay tied or they come loose. They've not like spray paint or glue, where one type works on metal, one on paper, and one on cement. Can't they make one master knot that'll work with everything? Because if we can put a goddamned man on the moon, we sure as fuck shouldn't have sailors in rain slickers looking at a thick rope and a wooden pier and saying, "I believe this calls for a double-sheep-shank twisting French Handstand."

With minimal dialog and hundreds of gruff sailors, it was just too hard to follow Bait's flimsy plot. I'm not particularly stupid, but if every movie followed the rules of Gilligan's Island, the world would be a far better place.

First, there's the character introduction. The singer declares, "There's Gilligan...", while they show Gilligan on the screen. Sure, showing a lobster tying a knot would be artier, but these guys really want you to be able to follow along. "The skipper too. The millionaire and his wife. The movie star. The professor and Mary Ann." And you know what? Years ago, instead of that last line, the song used to end with, "And the rest." Why did they change it?

BECAUSE THEY WANTED TO MAKE SURE YOU KNEW WHICH ONE WAS THE PROFESSOR AND WHICH ONE WAS MARY ANN.

I mean, one's in button-down shirts and the other has pigtails, a blouse tied above her waist, and Daisy Duke shorts on. But somewhere in Hollywood some brave executive said, "You know what? I still think it could go either way." Isn't that thoughtful? I mean, it's not a mistake that I would make, but there are adults who wear backward baseball caps.

Second, Gilligan's Island had a diverse assortment of characters, even though they were all white. (The Harlem Globetrotters showed up at some point, so I'm thinking they got all their People of Color points in one episode.) The producers and writers used different archetypes for each character. It's like Laurel & Hardy: you're never going to get confused and whisper to a friend, "Wait, which one is Stupid again?"

There's a blonde and a brunette. There's a fat guy and an idiot, a smart guy and a millionaire. Is there a problem telling them apart? Not a chance! Who's the millionaire? Oh, I don't know: maybe the dude in the BERET? Who's the Professor? Maybe the MONOCLE will give you a clue. Who's the glamorous actress? Gosh, I'm thinking maybe it's ... the BLONDE?

In a perfect world, every character would wear a name tag. I don't know about you, but if there are three middle-aged blondes in a film and they aren't introduced Gilligan's Island style, I'm going to assume there's just one lady going through some crazy shit.

Aside from confusing me, I don't understand how it happens. The director casts two young white women for his film. He gets the whole crew together, looks them over, and gets a pensive look on his face. "Wait," he barks. "I think we need another young white woman." In fact, my definition of hell is a movie where every character is young and white, and the dialog is just two lines, repeated: "Hey, I just got a haircut! What do you think?" and "Look, I bought a new outfit! Is it cool or what?"

It's why I can't watch Friends: just when you're up to here with young white people, another one walks in. At some point it goes beyond annoying and makes the viewer wonder if there's a hidden agenda. It's like when you're watching a Woody Allen movie and the gorgeous teen runs into the crotchety old man. I don't know about you, but I scream, "OH NO! NOT ON MY TV!" while literally pounding my fist on the remote control in hopes some button will make it go away.

So, I developed a system for everything I watch. Whenever a new character shows up, I give them a nickname so I can remember who's who. It usually works fine, as long as nobody changes clothes or gets their hair cut. In Bait this worked for roughly eight seconds, when Gruff Old White Guy With a Beard Who Wears a Rain Slicker All Day II showed up.

All of a sudden it hit me. This must be that arthouse film where Robert Pattinson and some grizzled old dude live in a lighthouse and act like five-year-olds play Very Dangerous Games. I've never actually seen a Robert Pattinson film, though, so I try to figure out which one he is in hopes it'll make further identification easier. The problem is, I don't know what he looks like. I spend the next few minutes trying to decide if he's GOWGWBWWRSAD I or GOWGWBWWRSAD II. Nothing happens in the movie so it's not like it's a horrible mistake to suddenly take up a hobby. After another fifteen minutes, though, I decide his transformation from hot young vampire to either GOWGWBWWRSAD I or GOWGWBWWRSAD II is absolutely astonishing, so I pause the movie and turn to Google for help.

He's neither of them. Google says that movie is The Lighthouse. This is Bait. Apparently there's a whole genre of Gruff Old White Guys With Beards Who Wear Rain Slickers All Day. It's not that crowded in the Non-Heterosexual Cowboys genre.

So, GOWGWBWWRSAD I catches fish. He sells some to the local restaurant, but he also puts some in bags and ties them to peoples' doorknobs. This is the problem with Movies Too Artsy To Have Voiceovers: I assumed he hated everybody and showed his disdain with the old dead-fish-on-a-doorknob prank. Online reviews later informed me that this actually meant he was a nice guy, because this is England's version of Hello Fresh.

GOWGWBWWRSAD II, his brother, has sold out the family business. Instead of catching fish, now he takes tourists on harbor cruises. Apparently in England this is like Jackson Pollock guest starring on Mama's Family.

"Tourists destroying age-old ways" seems to be the movie's theme. Next we see the ancestral family home that GOWGWBWWRSAD I was forced to sell. Director Mark Jenkin pulls no punches in showing us what horrific city slickers the new owners are. They actually redecorated the seaside cottage to look like -- shudder! -- a seaside cottage.

Yeah. That's what I thought too. Over the fireplace they've installed a fishing net, a couple buoys, and a porthole. GOWGWBWWRSAD I sees this and nearly loses his mackerel, but I look at it and think, "Couldn't they find any little plastic dolphins?"

As the second piece of evidence that Tourism Is Bad, there's a shot of a bachelor party boarding GOWGWBWWRSAD II's boat. One man is wearing a full-length penis costume, and my mind is off again.

It's full-length, from head-covering hood to shoe-skimming shaft. It's ridiculously unsafe. I don't know about you, but GOWGWBWWRSADs yell at me if I get on a boat and I'm not wearing an inflatable vest and don't have a whistle in my mouth.

I ask myself if this costume actually exists or if it was made by the filmmakers to bolster their argument. I've never seen anybody wearing one, and I've been to Prague. I can't imagine a logical buying process. I mean, I'm assuming the purchaser is heterosexual, since no gay man would wear such a thing. But how do you put it on and ask your friends how it looks? Any reply at all, from "It's too short" to "It's too thin” to "It's too veiny, and it has a weird bend toward the root" will make everyone involved look gay. Therefore, no such thing can exist.

GOWGWBWWRSAD I finally snaps. He breaks into the ancestral cottage and in a fit of inexpensive fury he breaks the glass in the porthole. "They pulled down mother's pantry!" he wails defeatedly.

Or maybe, "They pulled down mother's palm tree." I neglected to mention I think all the actors are faking Maine accents even though they're in England.

The two brothers then get on a boat and sail off. The film freezes on a closeup of GOWGWBWWRSAD I looking gruff. Since it's his only facial expression, it could mean he's thinking about the devastating effects of new money on ancient culture or he's picturing Vanna White naked. Then the credits roll and I realize I've missed the point of the movie by missing the very last line.

I narrow down the possibilities:

1. The newcomers pulled down mother's pantry. Maybe it was a building that meant a lot to mom. Or maybe there was a restaurant called Mother's Pantry and the cheddar biscuits were really good.

2. The newcomers pulled down mother's palm tree. Maybe she planted a coconut when the brothers were young and they watched it grow over the years and now it's gone.

I decide it doesn't matter.

But what about the boat? Did that mean anything? It looked like GOWGWBWWRSAD II's tourist boat, but with the signs removed -- which is the nautical equivalent of a haircut and costume change. Does it mean he's given up tourists and returned to the old way of life?

I decide to give nicknames to boats whenever they show up in movies. And if anybody asks me how their penis costume looks, I'll give them the Usual Gay Critique:

"If I can see your shoes, it isn't long enough."