America's Next Top Model Series Seven #10

Pass the tissues, senorita. I'm muy emotional.
It might be jet-lag, the pressures of the competition, or a side-effect of being almost see-through, but whatever it is, this week's episode had more sobbing and snot than a Sandra Bullock movie. With my last vestige of theatrical fortitude, I bring you the "Drama Drama Drama Chameleon" episode of America's Next Top Module.
I'm exhausted. I need some prune juice.

· Jaeda is missing her boyfriend, and writes "I heart you" on a piece of paper, commenting to camera that she's "sick of living with all these chicks". Yeah. Chicks suck. Scratch your scrotum and crush a beer can on your forehead, sweets. You'll feel better.

· CariDee and twins Michelle and Amanda sit in the spa and talk about their varying levels of ambition. CariDee wants to win real bad, one of the twins is passionate about modelling, and the other one doesn't really give a skinny damn. Now, I know which one's CariDee, because she's wearing a bright yellow head-kerchief and looking like she wants to be my new best friend, but I can't for the life of me tell those twins apart. One's gay, the other isn't. One's good at modelling, the other isn't. Considering there's only enough meat and personality on and in them to make one person, I'm gonna treat them as such. They will now be called Mimanda, and I will only be buying them one Christmas present this year.

· Stock footage of the Module Mobile going from left to right brings us to the LA Repertory Theatre, where our modules are met by Tasha Smith, an actress, acting teacher, and friend of Tyra. Tasha says "You know how crazy Tyra is? This is where Tyra got her crazy from", gesturing towards herself. She's like the Cash N' Carry of Crazy, and Tyra has a corporate card and a jumbo trolley. Tasha outlines the first acting exercise of the day, called the "Silly Dilly" exercise, in which the girls are to let loose on stage without being afraid to be ugly or silly. I'm calling it the "Bitchy Twitchy" exercise, as every module called up to the stage proceeds to flop around wildly, having their own special brand of seizure. No wonder the casting couch technique is so popular. This acting shit is hard.

· The next exercise is called "Dump" (ironic, considering the faecal qualities of the last exercise), in which our girls are to 'dump' everything they're feeling, and completely let go. Eugena the Boring cries about something. Mimanda gets pissed off that people don't "get" them. Melrose, handing the stage over to the Postal Worker Within, puts the "mental" into "sentimental", and the "nuts" into "Wow. She's like, nuts". She screeches like a rake across a blackboard, tears spraying from her eyes and mouth rectangular with grief, randomly wailing "How DARE anyone tell me your picture is better than mine!". When the rant is over, tumbleweeds and crickets feature strongly, as the observing modules look on silently with raised eyebrows and fingers poised ready to dial the White Coat Hotline. Jaeda, in a surprise comparable to finding two ends on a piece of string, gets cranky about her hair, looking like an angry Henry Rollins in the process (is that a tautology?). Caridee, however, gives everyone an emotional Brazilian as she opens up tearfully about considering suicide at times in her life, and knowing what it feels like to want to die. Everyone gets extremely upset and tearful, faces are buried in hands, and hugs are exchanged. How am I supposed to say anything funny about that? Damn you, CariDee, you perfect, multi-faceted, emotionally complex thing, you. You're totally coming to my next dinner party.

· When everyone has recovered from Emota-Palooza, Tasha announces that each module will now be shooting a silent film as this week's challenge. A stage set from a bad high-school play is utilised, and each girl listens to Tasha's barked directions and tries to act accordingly whilst being filmed. It starts benignly with "Look sad!", "Cry on the telephone!", and "Answer the door!", and then becomes indescribably brilliant with "Drink the prune juice!" and "Eat the lemon!". Indescribably brilliant then becomes jaw-dropping disturbo-matic moment of the week as Mimanda's stomach rejects the arrival of actual nutrients and she barfs the prune juice back into the cup she drank it from. I guess she's just improvising – Tasha's trying to direct Gone With The Wind, and Mimanda's doing scenes from The Exorcist. Look for her soon in the feature film Dude, Where's My Ipecac? Tasha tells the modules that they'll find out who the challenge winner is "soon".

· Caridee cries again, this time on the 'phone to her boyfriend, who sounds sympathetic and gorgeous. I bet he's hot. Those two could double-date with me and Spunky Nigel. We could all go for breakfast.

· A Tyra-Mail arrives containing a DVD of the challenge-winner's silent movie, and the winner is Caridee! I love it when it's not Melrose. The mildly amusing scratchy black-and-white film, which contains thinly-disguised references to horse-buggery, has been edited with titles to resemble an authentic silent movie. It's also been edited to include scenes starring Tyra, loath as she is to point the spotlight towards herself, her bingo-wings and her three kilos of eye make-up. She over-acts abysmally in a Spanish-style outfit until the words "Pack your bags…." flash up on the screen, and the "real" Tyra rushes into the Module Mansion hollering "You're going to Spaaaaiiiiinnnn!!" Appropriate jumping and screaming ensues, and a guy who seems to be dressed as Dracula swooshes into the room to dance the flamenco with Tyra, such is the zany, nutty nature of this loopy show. At this point my housemate, Al, said "How come guys don't suddenly appear in our house and dance the flamenco?", and I struggled to find an answer. It's really the way the world should be.

· Caridee's prize for winning this week's challenge is a cameo appearance on One Tree Hill, in which she seems to be playing Paris Hilton's dumber paedophilic doppelganger. Good thing Jaeda didn't win – they would've had to re-write the script to include an upset gay weight-lifter.

· A quick animated plane-trip later, and the modules are in Barcelona (or Barfelona, if you're Mimanda). The girls are loaded onto a bus, which, to their pant-wetting delight, keeps stopping to pick up Spanish male models by the side of the road. At this point my housemate, Al, said "How come we don't have a bus that picks up Spanish male models by the side of the road?". I was stumped again. It's really the way the world should be. The he-modules could hardly speak a word of English, which always, for some inexplicable reason, makes a man hotter. The girls ogle and primp, and Caridee is pleased to have some male company, as she claims "I'm mentally like a man". I know a Jaeda joke belongs here, but I'm spent, I tell you.

· The Spunky Spaniards take the modules to a tapas place, and the waiter brings both food and scripts for this week's shoot – a commercial for deodorant, which the girls have to shoot tomorrow in Catalan, the regional language. The girls can hardly speak English. They also have to pash their male counter-parts, a task which makes Mimanda nervous due to their lack of boy-squelching experience. Jaeda takes umbrage with her hombre, believing him to have told her in broken English that he doesn't like black girls. For one, she's not really all that black, and by the same token, she's not really all that girl. I also don't think that's what the poor guy meant to say. Catalan for "you have the biceps of a toro" sounds a lot like "I don't like black girls" in English. It was nothing more than a simple international incident. Jaeda pouts and says "I have to make out with a jerk". At this point my housemate, Al, said "How come we don't get to kiss Spanish guys?". Maybe because we're at home with our feet on the couch, watching ANTM. It's really the way the world should be.

· After a night of script-panic, Tyra meets the girls in a park in a revolting pink frock, and brings on Mr Jay and the director of the commercial, Denis, who both let the girls know what will be required of them. Walking. Talking. Pashing. All in Spanish. Mimanda aren't bad, although their tonsil-tasting inexperience shows when they both kiss their victims like they're trying to pick up a rice noodle from a slippery plate. Kissing skills: zero points. Catalan-speaking skills: one point. Recommend learning to use mouths for something other than yakking up prune juice. Eugena develops some kind of Ghetto-Catalan hybrid, but otherwise does pretty well, looking for the first time like she has a joy for life, instead of just a concealed Uzi. Jaeda falls to pieces, cries, panics, and bombs. A pity – she looks more like a girl in this shoot than I've ever seen her before. When she kisses the male model, it only looks marginally Brokeback-esque. Melrose, aside from giggling like a psychotic murderess with no neck bones, does bloody brilliantly, because she knows it annoys me. Caridee is woeful. She may be a perfect example of a human being, but this is fifteen different types of shit. Catalan language skills: rubbish. Walking skills: atrocious. Ability to pull together after a mistake: non-existent. Kissing skills: give that poor man his face back. It's like she wants to eat his ears from the inside of his head.

· The inevitable Elimination Tyra-Mail arrives, and the girls traipse into the Spanish Elimination Villa to learn their fate. Tyra is somehow breathing, despite being strapped painfully and frighteningly into a leather, satin and tulle corset-dress from which her tortured mammaries are trying to escape. She's trying to evoke Catwoman, but coming up short with Slutty Gimp In Doris Day Movie. Tyra's hair is less scary than usual, supplemented effectively by Miss Jay's cockatoo-esque locks. Spunky Nigel, who can taste my paella anytime, is there, and commercial director Denis is guest judge. Twiggy is there, although I still haven't figured out why.

· The ads are shown, and the judges hate all of them except Melrose's. Nigel (Hi, Nigel!) says that Caridee looked drunk and crazy, and makes her cry. I'm a bit cross at him for that. He needs spanking. Twiggy calls Jaeda's effort a 'car crash', and she cries, too, tears dripping delicately over her Adam's apple. All the judges laugh at Mimanda's kissing attempts, and Tyra imitates their awkward mastication by demonstrating on Nigel. Hands off, chicken-fat.

· Elimination time, and the safe modules are summoned one by one until only Jaeda and (gasp!) Caridee remain. They hold hands nervously, and it looks like a Love Is… cartoon, only grown-up and frightening. Caridee is told she's full of life and amazing pictures, but not today. Jaeda is told she has nine lives, and her passion is doubted. Eventually, after giving me a scare, Jaeda is dumped like a sack of angular, blokey potatoes. She's philosophical about it, and only mentions her haircut five or six times. Bye, Jaeda. Mind your penis on the way out.

Next week, Caridee is rude to Nigel, the modules trip off on go-sees and there's a photo-shoot with bulls and matadors. Spite. Sight. Bullfight.