CINEMASCOPE HOROSCOPES

By: Gopi Mishra

As familiar with box-office charts as he is with star charts, Gopi Mishra, our resident astral traveler, psychic and cabalist gives you the monthly skinny on your life as pre-determined by heavenly bodies in the sky and on the screen.

ARIES: Saturn is cracking the whip again, not that you mind, you saucy little trollop, but it really is time for you to get back to work and stop daydreaming about those ten days in Jamaica when you hooked up with a chubby, balding nudist at Hedonism II. Not exactly Taye Diggs in How Stella Got Her Groove Back, but then again you’re not exactly Angela Basset, either.

TAURUS: A Full Moon in Taurus arouses your passion for living, but on or around the 17th , your passions take a turn for the naughty and you become a rabid, libidinous were-creature like Warren Beatty in Shampoo. On the 23rd, Mercury, that crafty swing-footed evil genius, commands respect from your boss, but not based on your exemplary work performance or your interoffice multi-player Quake rankings, but rather, on the fact that the man is bound-and-gagged in your trunk.

GEMINI: You schizoid freak, you have more faces than Eve this month, your Sybil-ant multiple personality disorders are in hyperdrive as hot-blooded Mars gets all hornified while bipolar Mercury kills any chances of a hook-up by raising your hackles. In the meantime, lovely Venus plans a little romantic rendezvous with someone from your sordid past on the 17th…if that old stick-in-the-mud Saturn doesn’t convince you to focus your energies on the non-essentials like paying your bills or personal hygiene.

CANCER: Uranus is in full view on the 13th, challenging you to tempt fate and throw caution to the wind in matters of the heart and the wallet. This either means you should loan cash to your shiftless partner in a relationship doomed for failure or that you should marry for money. Frankly, I’d marry for money. Because as unhappy as the folks in a Merchant/Ivory production can be, they are still rich.

LEO: Jupiter is in the driver’s seat this month, but that’s a good thing since God is his co-pilot. On the 20th, that fishy Neptune sinks your nuclear-powered submarine on The Poseidon Adventure of love when a quirky stranger comes into your life. Let’s just hope it isn’t Shelley Winters. Pluto encourages you to stand out in the workplace on the 4th, while Goofy can’t be a dog since he’s bipedal and talks.

VIRGO: In the middle of the month, Mercury goes retrograde. Although astrologers actually have no idea what the hell that means, it sounds official and important. In your case, however, you should be more concerned with Saturn stressing you out over finances, especially in the last few days of the month when a Quarter Moon causes you to become more absent-minded than the professor. But like Flubber, you’ll bounce back.

LIBRA: Venus -- and I don’t know about you, but, apologies to Botticelli, I always picture Uma Thurman rising from the clam shell in Baron Munchausen when I think of Venus -- is all about the long term plans for love. Any deviation from the plotted course will make the impatient green planet goddess extremely pissy.

SCORPIO: Old Fish Face has skewered you with his trident of lust this month, Venus is helping him out by providing the impetus for you to explore a brand new side of yourself with a whole new look. Not quite an American Beauty transformation, your change will nonetheless be drastic and you should brace yourself for an intervention by friends, family members and a neighbor who just came by for the finger sandwiches.

SAGITTARIUS: Things get freaky later this month when your Mars ruler encourages all kinds of outlandish, negligent and potentially dangerous activities from playing Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice with your best friends to river-rafting in the Ozarks. Mid-month, motor-mouth Mercury suggests a telephonic tete-a-tete with the opposite sex, but before you turn Girl 6 on us, consider a better long-distance calling plan.

CAPRICORN: On the 29th, Pluto urges you to keep procrastinating at your job and Neptune doesn’t help by focusing all month on frivolity. In the words of The Shining’s Jack Torrance, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” Of course, Jack was a possessed, axe-wielding homicidal maniac who also said, “Darling! Light of my life! I'm not gonna hurt you. You didn't let me finish my sentence. I said, I'm not gonna hurt ya. I'm just gonna bash your brains in. I'm gonna bash 'em right the f*ck in!” So, I would ignore Pluto and Neptune this month.

AQUARIUS: First, stop singing that damnable song from Hair. Thank you. Jupiter is pushing you into a major project this month, but if “The Manhattan” and/or “The Blair Witch” are codenames for this project, I’d opt out. If you’re a chimpanzee, stay away from “Project X” and Matthew Broderick, in general. Avoid “Project Grizzly” unless you have a flexible titanium suit of armor …that actually works. “My Science Project” is okay, but I prefer Real Genius. If you’re offered the “Untitled Woody Allen Fall Project 2000,” I’d take it.

PISCES: Mars Needs Women and apparently a lot of them this month as the fiery Red Planet incites fiery red passions all month long. Oceans 11! The Ruler of the High Seas gets into the action on the 11th, washing your unusual kinks ashore like so much flotsam. But make sure the object of your affections isn’t a co-worker because on the 12th, fickle Venus is likely to turn your interoffice fling into a full Disclosure.