All posts by ERTorre

E. R. Torre is a writer/artist whose first major work, the mystery graphic novel The Dark Fringe, was optioned for motion picture production by Platinum Studios (Men In Black, Cowboys vs. Aliens). At DC Comics, his work appeared in role-playing game books and the 9-11 Tribute book. This later piece was eventually displayed, along with others from the 9-11 tribute books, at The Library of Congress. More recently he released Shadows at Dawn (a collection of short stories), Haze (a murder mystery novel with supernatural elements), and Cold Hemispheres (a mystery novel set in the world of The Dark Fringe). He is currently hard at work on his latest science fiction/suspense series, Corrosive Knights, which features the novels Mechanic, The Last Flight of the Argus, and Chameleon.
Movies

Terminator: Dark Fate (2019) a (almost right on time!) Review

I’ve spent the last few posts talking about Terminator: Dark Fate (let’s refer to it as TDF from here on out) and now, having seen the film, offer my opinion on it.

To begin: I very much recall going to the theater way, waaaaaaaay back in 1984 to see The Terminator. While viewers who watch the film today may not realize it because of the inevitable passage of time and cribbing of ideas, seeing the original film when it was originally released was a ferocious experience. It was, to my mind, the first time the action and horror genres were merged.

Once the film got going, it felt absolutely relentless, and despite what we now see as an obvious low budget and dodgy effects (again, this is the product of the passage of time), The Terminator essentially made director/writer James Cameron’s career. He would go on from this film to make the equally tense action/horror Aliens and from there Terminator 2 (which many, but not me, consider the very best Terminator film) before eventually becoming a box-office champion with Titanic and Avatar.

The Terminator franchise left James Cameron’s hands following T2, and he had no part in either Terminator 3, Terminator: Salvation, or Terminator: Genysis. Neither did he have a part in Terminator: The Sarah Connors Chronicles TV show, which I found quite good.

Unfortunately, the Terminator films that followed T2 were not that good, IMHO. Almost all of them had good elements, but the overall works simply didn’t carry each film into “great” movie territory.

Recently, the Terminator property reverted to James Cameron and with Terminator: Dark Fate, he’s “back”, though this time with the story and production credits while Tim Miller (Deadpool) directs.

If you’ve read my previous postings, it is worth noting that in making TDF, it was decided to create a story that actively ignores all the Terminator works that came post-T2. So going into the film, audiences should try to wipe their minds clean of all those works and stick with the first two.

The movie begins with a rather shocking development that reminded me in many ways of the opening of Aliens 3. I don’t want to give too much away here (I will talk about it toward the end, so BEWARE SPOILERS!) but if you’ve read online anything about the film, chances are you already know what happens at the very beginning of the film…

We then move to Mexico and, specifically, car factory worker Dani Ramos (Natalie Reyes, quite good), and the arrival -natch- of two visitors from the future, Grace (Mackenzie Davis, quite spectacular as an “augmented” human) and the evil Gabriel, aka REV-9 (Gabriel Luna, quite good), the robot sent to the future to take out Dani.

The story thus far isn’t all that different from all the other Terminators that came before: You have your “ordinary” person being alternately hunted and protected by two people who have come from the future. The early action set pieces are quite spectacular and Gabriel’s evil robot, while essentially still incredibly similar to Robert Patricks’ T-1000 from T2, has the added trick of being able to split into two Terminators at one time.

The opening action sequence terminates (ouch) with the arrival of Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton, looking as grizzly as can be but dangerous and smart assed to boot). The three form an uneasy alliance which eventually takes them to you-know-who (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and together the four of them form an even more uneasy alliance in trying to take on and destroy Gabriel.

Watching TDF, I realized how much better the film was compared to those that followed T2. Again, I don’t feel all those films are horrible, but clearly the people behind the making of TDF spent the extra capital in developing the relationships between the characters so that when we got to the ending, it was something of an emotional gut punch, at least to me.

TDF still falls a little below T2 (my second favorite Terminator film behind the original) yet rises IMHO far above the others and, for someone who was there when the first came out, felt it was almost a love letter to the fans of the series, even if it didn’t necessarily move out of the general Terminator comfort zone, story-wise.

Still, I liked it quite a bit and would easily recommend it to anyone interested. If you worry that these old-folks simply can’t do it in an intense action film, let me say they handle themselves quite well. I fear, however, that people are not giving this film a chance (it has been noted it underperformed despite generally good critical and audience reactions) because of the run of so-so Terminator films, including the not so-very-old Terminator: Genysis.

And that’s really too bad. If I could go back in time, maybe I’d convince the makers of those sequels to lay off and, by the time TDF shows up, people might be more willing/eager to give it a shot.

TDF is an easy recommendation for me. A film that, while not necessarily reinventing the Terminator-wheel, nonetheless respects the original two films and provides us with some genuinely good thrills and action set pieces, along with a story that is also quite good (if familiar) and some very welcome humor.

Go see it with an open mind… or at least without thinking about the last three Terminator films that followed T2.

Now then…

SPOILERS!!!!!

BEWARE!!!!

Still here?

Ok, you’ve been warned.

TDF opens with a post-T2 Sarah Connors and a young John Connor (both actors were digitally de-aged) resting from the end of T2.

Then, the T-800 (a de-aged Arnold) appears and kills John Connor.

It’s a rough scene, especially given we had a full film in T2 whose whole reason for being was to keep John Connor alive. However, in the course of that film, the future was changed and Skynet was destroyed.

What TDF does, somewhat cleverly but still kinda/sorta grimly, is show us that John Connor’s death no longer matters. That the T-800 that kills him turns out to have completed its programmed mission for a future that no longer was going to come into being.

Thus, the T-800 we see later in the film is that same robot, only he spent the next 20 plus years adapting to humanity and realizing what he did was terrible.

It’s an interesting notion and one that I felt made the relationship between Sarah and he that much more intriguing but… man, what a bummer of a concept! As I said, it was not unlike Alien 3, which opened with the deaths of two very likeable characters who survived the massacre of Aliens.

Still, for me not something that ruined the film.

Your mileage, as they say, may vary!

Movies

Terminator: Dark Fate Box Office…

It’s the Monday after the release of Terminator: Dark Fate (let’s refer to it as TDF from here on, OK?), and it would appear the film underperformed and might even be, as Jason Guerrasio writes in businessinsider.com, an outright bust…

Terminator: Dark Fate is a bust at the box-office, taking in only $29 million

I’m still curious to see the film but it is something of a surprise -or maybe not?- the film underperformed. Note that the original estimates were that TDF would rake in either in the high $30 to low $40 million for the weekend. The $29 million it managed is actually quite close to the opening take Terminator: Genysis did in 2015 when it scored $27 million.

Which kinda/sorta indicates that this seems to be roughly where current audience interest lies with regard to Terminator films.

It’s a sad fact of life that time marches on and while when I was young the original Terminator and Terminator 2 did incredible business and were very much in the public eye, the years have passed and (sadly) Arnold Schwarzenneger and Linda Hamilton are much older now, which may be a great negative to the younger audiences out there.

An admission: When I first saw the trailers for TDF, my first reaction -and I’m more than willing to accept this is a sign of my own shallowness- was surprise at Linda Hamilton’s aging.

I fully accept the fact that it makes me sound shallow (like I’m somehow immune to the passage of time!), but the reality is that film has a way of “freezing” people in time if they leave the public eye.

Arnold Schwarzenneger has aged too, obviously, but he’s been in the public spotlight with other films and, in my mind, I know what he looks like these days. Linda Hamilton, on the other hand, has kept a relatively low profile since Terminator 2. Looking over her IMdb listing, while she’s continued to work over the years, her “biggest” appearances post T2 were in the TV show Chuck (which I never watched) and a turn soon after the release of T2 in the film Dante’s Peak. Otherwise she’s appeared in relatively smaller works and often as a voice actor in animated features.

Which means that seeing her in the trailers for TDF was the first time since the 1990’s I’ve had a look at her.

So we have two older actors in what is, sadly as well, a “young person’s” genre: The action film. And, further to that, a film in a franchise which, let’s face it, has now reached its sixth theatrical film (and we’re not even counting Terminator: The Sarah Connors Chronicles TV show).

Given that Terminator: Genysis just came out a few years back and only did so-so business, it might in retrospect be that people are a little tired of the whole Terminator franchise and what you can make on these films is roughly in/around that amount.

Having said all that, I remain interested in seeing TDF and plan to do so soon, perhaps as early as tomorrow.

Linda Hamilton may no longer be the striking, young kick-ass warrior we saw so memorably in T2, but I’m intrigued with the notion of seeing her play an older, hopefully wiser warrior, whose scars -internal and external- give her that additional edge.

In reading the reviews of the film, it seems that while a slight majority of critics and audiences reacted favorably to the film, there nonetheless are many who feel TDF is a miss. That despite the return of Linda Hamilton, the film is yet another lackluster Terminator sequel.

Potential audiences out there are wiser to critical views of films and these negative reactions may have swayed many to not bother showing up.

Regardless, I will see the film.

Let’s see how I feel about it…

Movies

Terminator: Dark Fate and Continuity…

Over at io9.com, Germain Lussier interviewed Arnold Schwarzenegger regarding his just released film Terminator: Dark Fate.

Terminator: Dark Fate, Interview with Arnold Schwarzenegger

Terminator: Dark Fate is the sixth film in the Terminator franchise. It follows the original Terminator, Terminator 2, Terminator 3, Terminator: Salvation, and Terminator: Genysis.

What’s interesting about this film is that it effectively obliterates the “continuity” established in all Terminator films following the second. In other words, the story presented here ignores -and effectively contradicts/negates- all the stories presented in the other Terminator films that followed T2. In this case, it means even Terminator 3 and Terminator: Genysis, which featured Arnold Schwarzenegger himself, are no longer considered part of the Terminator story line present in Dark Fate.

And Arnold Schwarzenegger doesn’t care that this film ignores those others.

I find that attitude… refreshing.

Even though he was involved in the films and was effectively their star, he’s not so attached to those previous movies to feel that they should somehow be considered cannon. He’s more than willing to work in this latest film without feeling like he should be defending the others.

I suppose it isn’t a terribly big leap to make. Mr. Schwarzenegger is no doubt making a great salary and working on something he likes. He seems long past caring about all these details and more focused on the here and now compared to the past.

But for those who do like the Terminator films which came post T2, I don’t see much of a problem there either. If you like those films, guess what? They’re still there. They haven’t been burned up or erased from your digital libraries (provided you have them there). They can still be enjoyed, should you want to enjoy them.

And with a franchise that involves time travel and alternate realities, what better series than the Terminator to so easily put those films into these alternate realities?

General

So hard to talk about anything…

…other than politics nowadays. And I’m so loathe to do so on a consistent basis. I have my beliefs just as others have theirs and we may agree about a great many things and disagree about a great many others but that doesn’t make us mortal enemies.

Well, it shouldn’t. At least not here in the U.S. of A.

Yet it feels like its devolving into just that. You’re on your side and I’m on mine and you can go insane watching/listening/reading about whatever happened today.

Yesterday, of course, and on Halloween itself, a resolution was passed by the House of Representatives concerning Impeaching President Donald Trump.

Nancy Pelosi, the leader of the House, has been very cautious in her movement toward impeachment, taking things step by (sometimes painfully drawn out) step but it would seem we’re on the verge of getting televised hearings with witnesses detailing, finally to the public, the inappropriate actions taken by Trump which merit his Impeachment.

Those who don’t know, the House of Representatives can Impeach the President but it then has to go to the Senate, which has a very slim Republican majority, to actually -and formally – throw him out of office. As of this date, it appears doubtful the necessary 2/3rd majority is there to formally Impeach the President but we’ve got a long way to go yet and, unlike the House of Representatives, there are several Republican Senators -perhaps even a majority- who likely would vote for Impeachment if their vote were taken in secret.

Right of the bat, one thinks: Is this therefore necessary? With elections coming next year, do we really need to go through all this?

I say: Absolutely.

Trump is, in my eyes anyway, a deeply flawed human being who very purposely flaunts the laws for personal gain. For him, that’s what it is all about: Personal gain. I suspect he could care less about anyone other than himself. I suspect he could care less about the institutions which have guided the country all these years. He could care less about his supporters, who I also suspect he views as suckers and/or idiots… but useful ones at that.

As we near the end of the year, I have to admit I’m tired of hearing about all this. I’m tired of the way this man and his particular brand of insanity seems to take up all the oxygen of all news all the time.

I fervently look forward to the day we no longer have to hear/read about any particularly egregious act or lie or just plain stupidity he was involved in.

But that’s just me.

Movies

Zombieland: Double Tap (2019) an (almost right on time!) review

It’s taken a few days for me to get to writing this and, if you’ve read the post I wrote just before this one, you already know why.

One Sunday night my wife, youngest daughter, and I went to the theater to catch Zombieland: Double Tap, the sequel to (natch) 2009’s Zombieland, a film that delightfully skewered plenty of Zombie-movie convention.

Zombieland: Double Tap (let’s refer to it as Z2 from here on out, OK?) comes ten years from the release of the original and we quickly find out what’s going on with our four protagonists of the post-Zombie apocalypse: Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), Wichita (Emma Stone), and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin).

And the answer is: Not a whole lot.

They haven’t grown much since we last saw them, though they do seem to have a little more of a family thing going on and they have relocated to the White House. Problem is that familiarity, as the cliche goes, is breeding contempt, and Little Rock, the youngest of the four, in particular is developing a strong itch to spread her wings and go out -and away- from this group.

Meanwhile Columbus and Wichita, who are together, are also having issues. Wichita seems to still like Columbus but she too feels trapped with him and the routine they’ve developed. Which makes it most unfortunate that at that point Columbus decides to propose marriage…

Wichita and Little Rock fly the coop, leaving behind the two male leads, and Columbus in particular doesn’t know how to react to this. Soon, they find another survivor and things get a little more complicated, especially when Wichita returns and states that her young sister has abandoned her as well for a (*gasp*) hippy they found along the way.

Look, anyone coming in to Z2 expecting profound/deep plot lines and/or high art should have their head examined.

Z2 is a cute, at times quite funny journey through this particular Zombie apocalypse that features some interesting cameos (but none quite as good as the one presented in the first film, even though he makes his return in this one) and adventure.

None of it is taken terribly seriously and that, unfortunately, is the movie’s main problem and one I also found with the recently released Hobbs and Shaw.

To wit: How can you make a film that is (I’m assuming here) supposed to have its moments of suspense/thrills when it is clear from the get go that the filmmakers are taking none of this very seriously?

The fact is that Z2 does build to what should be an exciting, even suspenseful ending but the filmmakers never once give us a sense of any sort of seriousness/danger, at times winking at the camera and offering jokes that are clearly breaking the proverbial fourth wall.

So we’re left with a film that is for the most part quite amusing but never really moving to that higher gear to deliver some genuine thrills.

However, unlike Hobbs and Shaw Z2 is intended to be a comedy and therefore it doesn’t bother quite as much that the thrills are missing as they were in H&S.

Still while I recommend Z2, I have to also be honest and say: “I really wish there was more to it than what we got.”

Just because you want to make a smart ass comedy (nothing wrong with that!) doesn’t mean you can’t also deliver some suspense, amiright?!

General

To better days…

It’s a heartbreaking decision, one that everyone who has a pet faces at some point: The pet’s mortality.

Over my life, I’ve had many pets. Two in particular lasted a very long time. The first, we had to put down after some 12 years of life because his heart was simply giving out on him.

The other, we had for 15 and a half years and yesterday evening, we had to put him to sleep.

Oreo was given to us back then as a five or so month old ball of energy. He was named by my eldest daughter, who, along with my other daughter, loved him to pieces.

When we first got him, he would take me out on walks -he was the one guiding me– that took us around several blocks in the neighborhood. He was always a few steps ahead, darting this way and that and chasing after any stray lizard that had the gall to walk in front of him. He never caught them, but sure loved the chase.

As the years passed, he had certain health issues. His teeth were always crooked and weak. He would get most of them removed over time. When the teeth on the left side of his mouth were mostly gone, he began hanging his tongue off that side of his mouth… as you see in the above photograph.

The walks grew shorter. I distinctly recall the day we set out to do our regular multi-block walk but when we reached the edge of the first block, he slowed and stopped, looked up at me, and turned around to return home. That would be the last time we did one of our usual long walks.

Over the next few years, he slowed down even more, as any dog who reaches a very old age does. The now one-block walks became walks back and forth down our street. We no longer could use a neck collar as he pinched a nerve one day thanks to their use.

His favorite perch, which you see in the photograph above, used to be one he could jump from the floor to the couch to. No longer. We had to get him a small footstair to climb up to the couch and then up to the pillow.

Two weeks ago he had a strange episode which I thought was a muscle cramp. He stretched, then didn’t seem to stop stretching. His head turned back, and he howled in pain and dropped to the ground.

He seemed ok afterwards, but the fact was that this was the first sign of the bad things to come. Over the next few days, he had a couple more episodes like this, which I realized were seizures. Some were so strong he would lose control of his bowls.

His strength rapidly diminished. He could only walk a very short distance before being exhausted and run the risk of having another seizure. We took him to the vet and gave him medication for the pain, but in the last four days in particular it was clear he was on a rapid downward glide.

Yesterday, we left for a movie and when we returned home, he was on his feet, walking to us wagging his tail, but we realized he had just emerged from another terrible seizure and had laid -for who knows how long- in his own urine and defecation.

It was clear to us, even as it ripped our hearts, that he wouldn’t last much longer. By this point, he could barely walk and we feared leaving him alone for any length of time. His breathing was ragged, his strength almost non-existent. He was in bed most of the day and night, and we feared for him whenever he was up and walking, however short the distance.

We made the most difficult decision we could and took him in last night for his final ride.

In the end, Oreo lasted longer than most dogs of his breed. 15 and a half years is a very long time to live for any dog, and I know the joy he gave us -and I hope the joy we gave him- made up for his last few very rough days.

Here’s to you, Oreo.

You’ve earned your rest and you will be missed.

Music

Classic rock…

…ranked?

Over at deadspin.com Lauren Theisen has provided a list. A list of Classic Rock, ranked. A list that is likely to inflame passion. Anger…

What do you think?

Classic Rock, Ranked

All right, I’m going to spoil the whole damn thing and give you their entire list in the order they rank each musician/band…

1. David Bowie
2. Fleetwood Mac
3. The Beatles
4. Steely Dan
5. Jimi Hendrix
6. Black Sabbath
7. Heart
8. The Beach Boys
9. Elton John
10. The Rolling Stones
11. Bruce Springsteen
12. Tom Petty
13. Queen
14. Simon & Garfunkel
15. Led Zeppelin
16. The Cars
17. Neil Young
18. Pink Floyd
19. King Crimson
20. Creedence Clearwater Revival
21. The Police
22. The Band
23. The Allman Brothers Band
24. The Who
25. Lynyrd Skynyrd
26. Billy Joel
27. Yes
28. Van Halen
29. Cheap Trick
30. Wings
31. AC/DC
32. Rush
33. Electric Light Orchestra
34. Steve Miller Band
35. The Doors
36. Cream
37. Kiss
38. ZZ Top
39. Journey
40. Styx
41. Eagles
42. Kansas
43. Bad Company
44. Foreigner
45. Aerosmith
46. Boston
47. Getting hit by REO Speedwagon
48. Jethro Tull

Those on the floor, pick yourselves up, its over, man.

My feelings?

Well, its a list and any list consists of people’s opinions so yadda yadda yadda everyone’s entitled to their opinions yadda yadda.

As those who frequent these parts know, I consider David Bowie one of my all time favorite musicians. Even so, if I were making this list, I’d still put The Beatles at #1.

The fact of the matter is that without The Beatles and without their revolutionary sounds, there would likely be no modern rock music. And this is without noting that almost their entire catalogue of music rocks.

Fleetwood Mac #2?

Eh…

Look, I love Nicks/Buckingham Fleetwood Mac. I love Rumours. I love Tusk. I think the songs Stevie Nicks created during her initial years there are absolute, stone cold classics… not that the others, including Buckingham and Christine McVie were anything to sneeze at, either!

But… #2? Ahead of The Beatles, who this list puts at #3? Nah.

So if for me The Beatles are #1, who would I put at #2? Probably… Led Zeppelin. They are listed at #15, behind Heart at #7 which is really strange. Heart was heavily inspired by Led Zeppelin and some have even derisively stated the band is like a Led Zeppelin tribute act!

So for me, The Beatles #1, Led Zeppelin #2, then, probably, The Rolling Stones (on the above list, #10).

Then I’d probably put David Bowie at #4, even if I personally find his music better than some of the acts I’ve put above him.

We are talking about Classic Rock, Ranked, and if I think back to classic rock radio, these are the acts I tend to hear over and over and over again on that format.

But I’m sure others will disagree.

It’s the nature of the beast!

Movies

Terminator: Dark Fate (2019)… any good?

Incredibly, there are suddenly a handful of films I’m genuinely curious to see in theaters. Will I get a chance to? Well, that’s a whole other story.

Still, I’m reading reviews of some of those films that are either released or set to be released and, over at rottentomatoes.com, one of the films I’m curious about, Terminator: Dark Fate, now has 35 -count ’em 35– professional critics’ reviews. Check it out here (the count will surely go up, so if you’re reading this in the future, don’t be surprised to find a higher number of critical and, eventually, audience reactions):

Rottentomatoes.com: Terminator: Dark Fate (2019)

So, as of this moment, the 35 critics offer an average rating of 60% positive for the film.

Not superb, but not too bad.

The most worrying reviews note the film seems to be almost a remake of Terminator 2, which I have to admit makes me very nervous. I thought the original Terminator was a superb film and rightly put director James Cameron and actor Arnold Schwarzenneger on the map. However, I felt the film, which many people absolutely love, was ultimately a very sleek piece of work but not, again IMHO, as good as the original Terminator. In fact, I consider the original Terminator one of the very best horror/action hybrid films ever made.

Still, Terminator 2 wasn’t a bad film and I was hoping we’d get some decent/good Terminators afterwards. I thought Terminator 3 was a decent enough film but ultimately couldn’t quite match up with the previous two. Terminator: Salvation likewise I thought was only OK and, when all was said and done, wasn’t much more than a mild and forgettable time-killer. I thought the Terminator: The Sarah Connors Chronicles, the TV show based on the movies and starring a pre-Game of Thrones Lena Headey was far better than it had any right to be and its season 2 cliffhanger was incredible… alas, the show was cancelled and the cliffhanger’s resolution would never be dealt with. Terminator: Genysis, the most recent Terminator film, started promisingly IMHO but its last act was a mess.

In sum, there’s some good (T1 and T2, Sarah Connors Chronicles), and a lot of not so very good when it comes to the Terminator franchise.

Still, I have a fondness for the concept and in looking over the reviews so far posted, the general consensus among the various critics who do like the film is that it is far better than the many theatrical sequels to the Terminator films post Terminator 2.

So, yeah, I’ll certainly curious to see it, given the fact that James Cameron is once again -for the first time since Terminator 2!- back on board as producer and one of the writers.

I’ll catch it.

If I can!

Movies

Opinions are like…

….well… you know.

The older I get, the more I realize there is a very golden truth in that saying. What to you is solid gold might be, to me, nothing more than a smelly turd.

And vice-versa.

Having said that, I love reading opinion “lists”. In this case, and appearing on fashionbeans, Tom Fordy offers the following…

James Bond Films Ranked Worst to Best

Given the preamble I offered at the start of this blog, I think you can see what’s coming: There are points where I strongly disagree with Mr. Fordy’s list.

But first an admission: It’s been years since I’ve seen many of the Bond films in their entirety. It’s a fact of life: I have only so much free time and if I want to be fair to the films, I probably should revisit them before offering my opinions about which are “best” and which are “worst”.

Having said that, Mr. Fordy offers these films as the “bottom 10”, ranked from worst to best of the worst:

Die Another Day, Diamonds Are Forever, Tomorrow Never Dies, Thunderball, Octopussy, Quantum of Solace, A View to a Kill, The World is Not Enough, Moonraker, and You Only Live Twice.

Die Another Day, the last of the Pierce Brosnan Bond films, does get a lot of grief for going waaaaay overboard on many of its elements, including an invisible car. The CGI for the film was also quite crude, though that is more of a function of the fact that the film is by now rather old and those effects are simply a sign of that time.

Having said all that, the worst of the Bond films?!

For me, the very worst Bond film is easily the last one released, Spectre. Mr. Fordy feels good enough about that film to not even place it on the bottom 10 and ultimately ranks that film #14, which makes it his opinion #11from the bottom in the rankings. The fact of the matter is that I hate Spectre so much that I haven’t even bothered to buy a digital copy of it, even though I have all the other Bond films in my collection. And I’m a completist! It irks me to have so many films and not “complete the collection” but I hate that film so much I won’t spend another dime on it.

But as I said above, opinions are like… well.

My second least favorite Bond film is probably Moonraker, which Mr. Fordy puts at #16 on his list (or, to put it another way, 9th from the bottom). For many, many years I felt Moonraker was the absolute worst of the Bond films, supplanted only recently by Spectre. My opinion, however, has mellowed. In part it was because I so hated the Craig film that I realized my hatred of Moonraker might be exaggerated… after all, of the Moore Bond films, isn’t A View to a Kill even worse?

I have to admit, today my opinion would go that way.

Similarly, Diamonds Are Forever is listed by Mr. Fordy as the second worst Bond film ever made. I disagree. I happen to like the film and enjoy its pleasantly tongue in cheek attitude. In fact, of the Connery Bond films I would put You Only Live Twice as his worst, though I would agree that Thunderball was the first Bond film to start showing the formula could go bad. Still, I generally liked the film even if it was bloated.

Moving to Roger Moore, as I stated I very much disliked A View To A Kill. I also felt The Man With The Golden Gun (#12 on this list) was awful as well. My favorite Moore Bonds are Live and Let Die (#8 on the list) The Spy Who Loved Me (#11), and For Your Eyes Only (#13). I also like Octopussy (#20, or 5th from the very bottom). So right there you have strong differences in opinion. Further, to me For Your Eyes Only is Moore’s best Bond. I would then put The Spy Who Loved Me, Live and Let Die, and Octopussy in descending order from best to lesser -but still good- stuff.

Intriguingly, my biggest disagreement with Mr. Fordy may be his ranking of the two Timothy Dalton Bonds. I thought The Living Daylights (#9) was a damn good Bond film but his follow up and last Bond feature, License To Kill (#3…!!!!!) was a terrible Bond film and deserved to be on the bottom 10 rather than so high up. History would seem to bear me out as Mr. Dalton left the franchise at that point and the film didn’t do all that well at the box office.

Moving to the Pierce Brosnan Bonds, I have to say… they blur into each other for me. I thought the very first one, Goldeneye (#10) was probably the best of the lot, but it had its problems IMHO and should have been a lot better than it was, given that Brosnan was great in the role and the cast was quite strong. The Brosnan era was, IMHO, a great missed opportunity. You had a strong actor in the lead role but the films were mostly, again IMHO, tepid.

Moving to Daniel Craig, we again have IMHO a major missed opportunity. Mr. Craig started incredibly strong with Casino Royale (#5) but each subsequent film has been worse and worse. Quantum of Solace (#19, or 6th from the bottom) was slick but nonsensical. Skyfall (#7) I loved while watching it the first time… but then I thought about the story and realized it made not a lick of sense at all. My opinion of the film has subsequently gone down very steeply. And Spectre, well, I’ve already given my opinion of that film.

To Mr. Fordy, the best Bond film ever made and coming in at #1 is… On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, the sole outing of George Lazenby as Bond.

Again, I don’t agree.

While I think OHMSS is a pretty good Bond film, it isn’t anywhere near my favorite. I thought Lazenby didn’t work well as Bond, even if the film they built around him wasn’t bad at all.

Which is my all time favorite Bond film? That’s a really hard one to say. I love the first three Connery Bonds, Dr. No, From Russia With Love, and Goldfinger. Having said that, the films are showing their age with regard to Bond’s sexism. Especially the later two films, which show Bond engaging in what can only be described as rape.

Heady, heady stuff, yet perhaps of its time.

I also love the Moore Bonds I mentioned, even if Live and Let Die is another film that shows some questionable societal ideation, in this case transplanting the “yellow peril” of the 1930’s to African American culture.

Again, we’re talking opinions here and no one is right and no one is wrong.

Well, except when you’re trying to tell me Spectre is a good movie.

That I cannot agree with! 😉

General, Movies, TV

Odd news…

For those who are roughly my age, you may know actor Ron Ely. Though his heyday was a little before my time, I caught his work here and there and enjoyed it.

He Is perhaps best known for playing Tarzan in a TV series of the same name which aired from 1966-68…

A little later, in 1975, he would play famous Pulp hero Doc Savage in the film of the same name…

In truth, while those two features are what Ron Ely is best known for he acted in many other movies and TV shows from 1958 to 2014.

Now 81 years old, this bit of news appeared on CNN and its a wild story…

Police fatally shot a homicide suspect at “Tarzan” actor Ron Ely’s home in California

The basic story is this (and pardon me for giving the information away): Someone stabbed an elderly woman to death at Ron Ely’s home. The woman’s husband, who has a speech impediment due to a medical condition, nonetheless was able to indicate the killer was a family member. The indicated family member was subsequently found on the property, confronted, and posed enough of a threat to the police that they took him down.

Yes, the alleged killer him/herself was killed.

That’s the extent of the report to this point and anything else is speculation…

Having said that, I can’t help but wonder if the woman’s husband may well be Mr. Ely (who is, obviously by this point, elderly himself). The speech impediment due to a medical condition, sadly, makes me wonder if the person suffered a stroke.

Was the killer the son/daughter of the elderly woman?

Again, its all speculation at this point yet a very sad set of circumstances, regardless of whether they more directly involved Mr. Ely or not.

UPDATE:

Well, it now seems that the situation was as I speculated above. Ron Ely’s wife Valerie was stabbed to death by the couple’s son Cameron Ely. The police arrived on the scene and killed Cameron Ely.

This is all according to TMZ and the article can be found here.

A very, very sad set of circumstances.

Obviously I have no knowledge of the Ely family situation and clearly things went way overboard here for the son to murder his mother.

The weird thing is that apparently Cameron was the one that originally called the police and, again according to the TMZ article above, said it was his father -Ron Ely- that tried to attack his mother. Was Cameron trying to pin the blame of his mother’s murder on Ron Ely?

Regardless, the police arrived and somehow figured out Cameron was the one that killed his mother and then they killed him.

Wow. And damn.

Some days you just can’t believe the news you read.