Another fascinating article, this on on Time magazine’s website, by Brad Tuttle concerning the declining rate of bank robberies around the country:
http://business.time.com/2013/02/06/bank-robbers-going-the-way-of-blacksmiths/
I tend to agree with the article: Bank robbery is too high risk/low reward. Interestingly, ATM machines are hit and electronic types of theft continue, but it appears actual, physical bank robberies are on the decline.
Fascinating article by Lee Spiegel for HuffingtonPost.com concerning members of the World Economic Forum (yes, the World Economic Forum) at Davos wondering what the social implications might be if evidence of Extra-Terrestrial is realized within the next decade:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/01/alien-life-discovery-implications_n_2568280.html
Given the advances we’re in discovering what lies in other solar systems, it appears logical that eventually we will find a solar system, and subsequent planet within that solar system, that is near identical -or close enough- to conditions on Earth to wonder if there is life on said planet.
As with the previous decade in terms of scientific advances, I look forward to see what happens next.
From CNN, Postal Service to end Saturday mail delivery:
http://money.cnn.com/2013/02/06/news/economy/postal-service-cuts/index.html
They will, it should be noted, continue their package delivery on Saturday. Package delivery, in this modern computer (Amazon) world, remains a vital way of getting products to people and therefore has a definite future.
Mail, on the other hand, is becoming less and less important as a way of communicating between people and/or paying bills.
It’s fascinating to see how much of an impact computers have had on the general economy.
Record/Music stores? Pretty much a thing of the past thanks to MP3s.
Bookstores? Rapidly going the same way thanks to Kindle, Nook, and tablets in general.
Someone much smarter than me (sorry, don’t recall who exactly who) noted in a business column that the future of certain retail stores may be small kiosks. You go into them, look at the latest models of, say, computers/tablets, then go to the counter and pay for your order. Your purchased order is sent to your home by the same or next day (package delivery becoming more and more important).
If this is true, the U.S. Post Office -and indeed all package delivery specializing companies- should focus on improving their package delivery. Regardless of whether the kiosk idea comes true, it seems logical that the business of package delivery will continue to be lucrative in this day and age.
…From Slate.com, a very amusing video of Jeremy Clarkson’s P45, the world’s smallest car:
The full article can be read here:
But the video is the thing. Loved how well the “car” manages bumpy roads.
Fascinating article by the always readable Andrew O’Hehir for Salon.com regarding the possibility that Football, the King of Sports in the U.S.A. today, may be in trouble:
http://www.salon.com/2013/02/03/footballs_death_spiral/
I’m a big fan of the sport of Football but I totally agree with Mr. O’Hehir’s article. In fact, I’ve even written about this before (you can read about it here).
The fact is that as the sport of Football has became more “professional” over time and athletes had the time and means to build their bodies to their absolute best, the subsequent hits between players became harder and harder. And while their bodies may be at their peaks, there is simply no way to build one’s head and brain so that it too can take all those jarring hits.
The other scandals Mr. O’Hehir notes are worth mentioning as well, but I think Football’s eventual downfall will come because of the continuing revelations of just how much brain damage the players who participate in the game receive.
As I said before, I happen to love the sport. But one has to be truly blind and uncaring about others to defend a sport which slowly kills a person’s mental -and physical- abilities.
When I was young, I was hyper-critical about movies. There were precious few I felt were “perfect”, and even some of the better ones had flaws that just had to be pointed out…by me…to anyone willing to listen.
As I grew older, I adopted a far more mellow attitude. I became more forgiving and, instead of starting to watch a film with a razor-sharp critical eye, I sat back and let the film envelop me as best as it could and tried to put my mind in neutral throughout the entire viewing experience. After all movies, like all forms of entertainment, are made by people and nothing in this world is perfect. Further, what may be brilliant to you could be terrible to someone else and vice versa. Live and let live, enjoy what you can. Don’t take these things so seriously.
Which brings me to the Jason Statham film Blitz.
What a terrible film.
Sorry but even my more mellow/forgiving attitude has its limit and Blitz crossed it. I suspect going into making this movie the producers/writers/director had in mind the idea to re-make (in a way) Dirty Harry only set it in England and add more (uninteresting) characters to the mix.
The villain of the piece certainly operates on the same level of the Scorpio killer from Dirty Harry. He is clearly a maniac, one who kills cops in this story (instead of anyone he feels like in Dirty Harry). He calls a reporter to brag about what he’s doing/about to do (much like the Scorpio Killer left behind notes about who his next target would be), and even wants to be known by a nickname, Blitz (natch). As the film marches on, he is eventually captured but because he’s oh so clever in how he does his crimes, he is eventually freed and comes back after our protagonist (something very similar happened in Dirty Harry as well, though the killer ultimately was released not because of his cleverness but because of Harry’s inappropriate actions).
Perhaps sensing they needed to do more than just emulate coughripoffcough Dirty Harry, the makers of this film added a homosexual new department head our protagonist works with (there is much homophobic-but-really-said-in-good-fun interaction between the two) as well as a female police officer who once worked undercover as a drug addict but fears she is really a drug addict working as a police officer now. That side-plot never really goes anywhere, except that she almost falls victim to our villain.
I could go on and point out the fact that the film meanders when it should be tightly focused and that Jason Statham, an actor who I feel often is better than some of the lesser movies he’s sometimes starred in appears to be phoning his role in this time and that the villain, once he is captured by the police, should have stayed in prison (did no one in the police station notice the huge wad of cash he was carrying when captured, cash that a reporter gave to an informant who was subsequently -immediately!- killed, should have been enough to connect our killer to at least that particular killing?)…
What is perhaps most frustrating about the whole thing is that the film is certainly put together fairly well. The cinematography and direction are generally pretty good and the actors appear competent. But that story…I simply can’t figure out what anyone saw in this to make it worth their while.
Needless to say, I recommend anyone interested pass on Blitz.
A couple of weeks ago the two hour finale of the J. J. Abrams produced TV series Fringe aired. It has taken a little while for me to get to it, but I finally had some free time to give the show’s conclusion a whirl.
Going into the show’s concluding two hours, my expectations were modest. This season of Fringe, already reduced to a mere 13 episodes and touted before it aired as the final one, offered the hope of a good wrap up. However, the final season’s overarching story line hadn’t grabbed me as much as I hoped.
But allow me to backtrack just a little. I’ve enjoyed the series through most of its five year run, even though there were things about it that bothered me. Fringe’s first season, for example, made note that the Fringe division’s overall focus was on checking up on and stopping instances of high tech “terrorism”. Yet the show quickly became a thin variation (those less charitable might call it a rip-off) of The X-Files.
By the start of the second season, the show morphed. Future seasons presented more than a little comic book influenced story lines, including alternate universes and strange Observers, as well as added mythology around Peter and Walter Bishop and the later’s relationship with/to Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv), the show’s protagonist. As entertaining as it often was, it quickly dawned on me that the writers had no real overall plan for this show and the shifts in themes and tone suggested very strongly they were making things up as they went along. How else to explain our protagonist Olivia Dunham having a sister with a daughter and a dangerous/abusive ex-husband…a plot point that was dropped on us as something we would see more of and then promptly forgotten and never mentioned again after a while? If memory serves, we never saw the dangerous ex-husband and I believe there might have been some dialogue at one point saying she and her daughter had moved away and that was that.
And what about Nina Sharp’s (Blair Brown) robotic arm, something also presented early on in the series and then, essentially, not dealt with again? When this revelation was first made, I wondered if the show’s writers would ultimately reveal that the character was ALL robot, some kind of strange experiment Walter might (or might not) have been privy to. Alas, it amounted to nothing.
Still, despite all this, I hung around and watched. Why? Because the show’s five main characters, Olivia Dunham, Peter and Walter Bishop (Joshua Jackson and John Noble), Astrid (Jasika Nicole) and Agent Broyles (Lance Reddick) formed a fascinating dynamic. They were compelling characters that smoothed over whatever doubts I had about the stories and their inconsistencies.
Besides, can you really complain about a show that features, perhaps, the last acting work of Leonard Nimoy (following his work on the show, he stated he was retiring from acting)?
Unfortunately, when the fifth and final season arrived and the episodes began airing, the show had once again shifted into a new, more radical direction. We were in a near future Earth where the Observers were in control and humanity was being subjugated. The Fringe division was history and our heroes (now down to essentially Olivia, Peter and Walter Bishop, and Astrid) embarked on a search for mysterious items that would end the Observer’s reign.
While there was certainly potential in this, I found the season surprisingly lifeless. Early on we’re introduced to a young adult Henrietta Bishop (Georgina Haig), the daughter of Olivia Dunham and Peter Bishop, but her character is dispatched so quickly that I had no chance to form any sort of relationship with her as a viewer and therefore felt no terrible sadness when she was gone.
Even worse, the character of Olivia Dunham, THE main character of the show, was presented throughout the season in a surprisingly muted way. For the most part she seemed to be on the (ahem) fringes of the main stories, often contributing very little in terms of dialogue and action, following the crowd but never really leading them.
But…would all those sins be wiped away with the show’s two hour finale? Would we get a good resolution?
Unfortunately, to me it was a little more of the same.
Yes, Olivia Dunham did get to do more this time around. However, the story as presented didn’t really get my blood pumping. As I suspected months ago, the show would ultimately “reset” time in some way and render everything we’ve witnessed in this season moot. Don’t believe me? This is what I wrote back in October 31st, 2012 after the fourth episode of the season aired, the one featuring Henrietta Bishop’s death (you can read the full post here):
Worse, I suspect her (Henrietta Bishop’s) death will only be temporary and lead to the show’s ultimate conclusion/happy ending: Somehow, Walter Bishop will undo the damage wrought by the Observers and “reset” time. Thus, that day in the park that Peter, Olivia, and the infant Henrietta will play out once again in the closing minutes of the show’s final episode, only without the Observers’ invasion.
And we’ll see Henrietta grown once again, thinking back to that childhood, perhaps along with the older Peter and Olivia as they bury Walter and think back to the beautiful life they had together.
Pretty prescient, eh? Well, other than that little bit at the very end about seeing the grown Henrietta again. Naturally, I prefer my prediction to what actually aired, ie the picture of the orchid.
I guess if anything my observation/guesswork revealed that the show’s eventual conclusion had become something obvious to me and, therefore, I was just waiting for everything to wrap up. Thirteen episodes, thus, were perhaps seven to nine too many.
Looking back, perhaps Fringe’s final season should have been a mini-series consisting of four or five hours worth of material. Instead of an adult Henrietta, we could have witnessed the death of the young Henrietta in the park, and the subsequent reactions of the protagonists to this tragic loss and their determination to defeat the Observers. A streamlined plot and a sharper story might have made for a better conclusion, especially with those closing scenes as presented.
Ah well, despite its flaws, there was fun to be had along the way. While I’m bothered by its flaws, I don’t regret the time spent following Fringe from start to end. It may not have been my favorite sci-fi show, but it was far, far from the worse.
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Operatives within a top secret government agency are suddenly being killed off. The heads of the secret government agency, it turns out, are destroying all evidence (human included) of the existence of said operation. But one (or more) of the agents in that secret agency survive the initial massacre and take on their bosses, all the while watching out for more assassins coming after them…
Despite much to recommend the movie and partly because of the above, The Bourne Legacy falls short of what one hoped it would achieve. The original Bourne movie legacy featured Matt Damon as Jason Bourne, an (initially) amnesiac agent who has to figure out his role in a cloudy government conspiracy. The films were high energy and featured intriguing twists and turns and, while Matt Damon himself noted (If memory serves!) after the third movie that each film was essentially remaking the first film again and again, these films nonetheless delivered.
When I first heard of The Bourne Legacy, I wasn’t put off by the fact that Matt Damon wasn’t returning to the franchise. I like Jeremy Renner and Rachel Weisz, the protagonists of this film and hoped for the best. I did my best to stay away from all spoilers and, over the weekend, finally had a chance to catch the film on DVD.
As mentioned before, there is much to recommend the film. For the most part it is entertaining enough to keep you going and never does get dull. The action sequences were clearly designed to emulate those found in the previous Bourne films and, for the most part, delivered.
…but…
As I mentioned in the opening paragraph, this film sure had a very familiar plot. Even worse, despite a long run time (the movie clocks in at two hours and fifteen minutes in length!), we finish off roughly where we started, with no serious closure and, most astonishingly of all, without the hero and villain ever having confronted each other.
To put things bluntly: By the film’s conclusion The Bourne Legacy didn’t so much feel like a complete piece of entertainment so much as the opening chapter of a new series. We’re left with so much unresolved that you can’t help but wonder what the point of this exercise was.
Look, I know that if successful, films inevitably get sequels, and the entire Bourne film series has been nothing if not successful. However, even if you’re already thinking about a new franchise with a new star (or, perhaps, a future Bourne film featuring both Mr. Renner and Mr. Damon), the least you can do with the product in hand is deliver something that stands on its own. In the case of The Bourne Legacy, once the film was over you realized that despite all the gobblygook concerning enhanced abilities via meds and shady government departments, it was all window dressing meant to kill time before getting to the next action sequence. And by the time all that was over, we still have the villains in place and the hero on the run. Pretty much the way the film started.
Despite this, I was entertained enough with The Bourne Legacy to give it a mild recommendation. If you can shift your brain to neutral and ignore the lazy plot/story, you’ll have a decent enough time. Otherwise, beware.
Another fascinating article, this one from Huffington Post and written by Treye Green, focusing on one of the more intriguing things about well-known films: Actors who were almost given a very famous role that went to someone else:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/24/actors-recast-in-movies_n_2543452.html
One of the more famous ones mentioned in this article is Tom Selleck for the role of Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark. According to the article, George Lucas wanted Selleck and Steven Spielberg wanted Harrison Ford. I’ve heard that there was a little more involved than just that. At the time, Tom Selleck was under contract for his hit TV series Magnum P.I. and the show’s schedule and his inability to take time off from filming it was ultimately the reason Mr. Selleck couldn’t do Raiders. I suspect the only thing that remains of Mr. Selleck’s involvement in the role is this screen test for the role along with Sean Young in the Marion role:
My all time favorite “could have been” (and which was not listed in this article) has to be the role of Dirty Harry. Originally, the role was intended to be for Frank Sinatra but he apparently turned it down because, among other things, an old hand injury made it difficult for him to wield the large handgun the character used. The role then was offered to, among others, John Wayne, Robert Mitchum, and Burt Lancaster before settling on Clint Eastwood.
The rest, as they say, is history. Ah, but what might have been!
A couple of fascinating articles I ran across, one from Slate.com (not to be confused with Salon.com) and the other from Salon.com (not to be confused with Slate.com).
The first article is by Andrew Leonard and can be found on Salon.com. It concerns the new 3D printing technology and the fact that it might render any gun control legislation moot:
http://www.salon.com/2013/01/25/will_computers_kill_gun_control/
Absolutely loved the article and, moving past the implications of 3D printing regarding gun control, one begins to wonder about what other things the future of 3D printing might impact as well. Will there come a time, for example, when 3D printing technology will become so advanced (ie able to make items made of metal) that one might be able, for example, to create a new sink for one’s house? A hose? A TV set? If all we need are the raw materials and a program/schematic to print what we want, what effect will this have on industry? Like MP3s, will there be websites containing downloadable schematics for just about everything we need? And, returning to the weapon debate, will we be able to “make” our own rocket launcher?
Or perhaps there will come a time when there will be 3D printer “stores” with really big 3D printers within and one could show up with a schematic for your favorite car and, within the day, they might be able to “print” you all the parts to assemble the car on your own at home.
Again, where does this technology leave industry? And employment?
The second article can be found on Slate.com and is by Mark O’Connell. It concerns the writing of one Amanda McKittrick Ros, whom many peers (and, apparently, modern readers as well) consider one of the worst writers ever. A very amusing article:
Reading about Ms. Ros made me think of what is possibly her counterpart in the movie business, the notorious Ed Wood. I loved this line by Mr. O’Connell which describes the level of “badness” of Ms. Ros’ work:
Ros’ writing is not just bad, in other words; its badness is so potent that it seems to undermine the very idea of literature, to expose the whole endeavor of making art out of language as essentially and irredeemably fraudulent—and, even worse, silly.
Oh my…