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Movies, Uncategorized

29 Movie Headscratchers Solved…

Love this list, which appears on Time magazine’s website:

http://entertainment.time.com/2012/08/13/hollywood-mystery-solved-29-movie-head-scratchers-explained/#opener

There are an awful lot (29!) of films mentioned, and some of the “headscratchers” may be more a function of lapses in logic with the screenplay.

For example, there is no way to understand or explain why the alien invaders from the movie Signs decided to target our planet when it has the one item (water) that can effectively destroy them.  The sad thing is that, for the most part, I enjoyed the film, but that lapse in writing logic really sunk the movie.

The movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, presented an ending that was also very ambiguous, at least in parts.  As the article states, one realizes that there is story structure clearly evident before and after protagonist Dave Bowman’s “psychedelic” trip.  The monoliths that take the Earth explorers out to Jupiter, and subsequently had Bowman enter a monolith floating out there and transform into a “cosmic” star child, indicated this was the next step in evolution.  The scene also neatly replicated the first part of the movie, where we witnessed the evolution of apes to humans via touching the monolith and gaining an understanding of using tools.  The question, of course, is then: What about the elegant room Bowman was in?  His aging?  His meal?  Dropping the glass of wine?  If you look closely at the scenes, Bowman is aging.  He appears first as the astronaut he is in his full spacesuit.  He subsequently (I believe, anyway), is allowed to live out what is left of his life in comfortable surroundings.  Perhaps it is a gift of the alien race.  Once he ages to the point of death, it is then that he is reborn as the star child.

At least that’s the way I saw it!

If you make it far enough into the list, at 29 they mention another headscratcher that, like the Signs example, I feel is a major writing flaw.  The movie is the 2009 reboot of Star Trek and the issue cited is the convenient way the young Kirk meets the old (now alternate reality) Spock on Delta Vega following the destruction of Vulcan.  When that scene played out in the theater I was watching it, I couldn’t believe it and for the reasons cited in the article.  Far fectched doesn’t begin to do justice to the astronomical coincidence involved in Kirk and the elder Spock meeting in that barren planet.  Yet the scene plays out straightforwardly and no one in the film questions Kirk’s incredible luck.

Anyway, the list is there for you to read, should you be interested.

Movies, Uncategorized

Green Lantern (2011) a (mildly) belated review

I’ve mentioned before my love for what is arguably the first -and equally arguably the best– “modern” superhero film, 1978’s Superman.  This is a film that offered viewers an incredible array of material.  You had drama, you had tragedy.  You also had slapstick, romance, and (of course) high adventure.  Heck, there was even a quasi-musical/dance number thrown in, to boot!

What is most amazing is that with all those different elements, tones, and styles, the movie worked.  Through clever writing, directing, acting, and editing, all that stuff came together into a wonderful whole and the film never felt excessive or overwhelming (In the theatrical print…I’m not quite as enamored of the “extended” cut released to DVD).

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of the 2011 film Green Lantern.  As I finally watched the film a couple of days ago, I couldn’t help but feel that the people behind the cameras were hoping to match Superman‘s mojo.  They offered a big story that featured a big cast and took you to quite literally the ends of the universe.  The movie also features a hero that would prove his worth before an awesome foe, all while re-connecting with the love of his life.

Unfortunately, all those ideas are thrown at the viewers without the skill of a Superman.  Instead of a fascinating whole, the film works only in spurts and seems content to throw out comic books characters after characters and hope that that alone makes the film interesting.

It doesn’t.

Now, I’m a fan of Green Lantern, particularly the silver age iteration as illustrated by the incomparable Gil Kane and, just a little later, Neal Adams.  I think the character’s back story and supporting cast are interesting and naturals for film.  However, did the film really need to have Dr. Amanda Waller in it?  Worse, given all the things thrown out (including Waller’s character herself!), did we also need to spend precious screen time showing her “origin”?  And while the character Tomas Kalmaku, unlike Dr. Waller, was a big part of the early Green Lantern comic books stories, he was mostly irrelevant in the film and did nothing more than take up screen time that could have gone to Blake Lively’s Carol Ferris.

The movie offers us two big villains, but given what ultimately happens with Hector Hammond, the Earth-bound villain, I can’t help but wondering if it might have been better not to have Hammond appear at all and instead focus the main conflict entirely on Parallax.

Or, even better yet, why present Green Lantern arch villain Sinestro in his “pre-evil” form at all?  He would have made a far better villain instead of being shown as a noble member of the Green Lantern Corps that (inexplicably) succumbs to evil after the credits roll.  That’s like giving us a new Batman film with the Joker featured prominently within it as a good guy and then teasing us only at the very end that he’ll be the bad guy next time around.

Sometimes, the next time doesn’t come around.

As for the acting, the two leads, Ryan Reynolds as Hal Jordan/Green Lantern and Blake Lively as Carol Ferris, are…ok.  While they didn’t display the charisma Christopher Reeves and Margot Kidder had in Superman, I thought a better, clearer, and more focused story might have helped show them off much better.

In sum, count me among those that cannot recommend this film.

Movies, Uncategorized

Tony Scott, RIP

There have been quite a few nice tributes written for the late director Tony Scott, who committed suicide last week and was recently laid to rest.

His career was varied and productive, not unlike his (perhaps) better known brother Ridley Scott.  Unlike his brother, however, Tony Scott’s films never quite achieved the higher critical reaction that his brother Ridley received for at least two of his films, Alien and Blade Runner.

Nonetheless, Tony Scott was behind the director’s chair for such commercial -if not always critical- hits like Top Gun, Beverly Hills Cop II, Crimson Tide, Enemy of the State, Man on Fire, Spy Game, and, most recently, the remake of The Taking of Pelham 1, 2, 3 and Unstoppable.  The films mentioned above were all, in my opinion, reasonably popular entertainment, but I suspect there are few who would all or even most “classics” that will stand the test of time.

Of these, the two that I find the most intriguing are Enemy of the State and Spy Game.  These two films, along with the Michael Bay directed The Rock, formed a trilogy of “pseudo” sequels to very famous films.  As a great bonus they also featured the same actors playing very similar roles to their more famous original films.  In the case of The Rock, for example, it was clear Sean Connery was playing an older James Bond.  In the film he was described as a top British spy who had run afoul of -and was betrayed by- the people he worked for.  A relic of the Cold War.  Enemy of the State featured Gene Hackman reprising his role from the Francis Ford Coppola classic The Conversation, while Spy Game featured Robert Redford reprising his character from Three Days of the Condor.  While none of these pseudo sequels rose to the level of the originals, I felt it was an intriguing idea and made for some entertaining, if not quite classic, films.

Of the films Tony Scott directed, I personally consider The Hunger and True Romance his two “best” films.  When originally released, The Hunger was way ahead of its time, a romantic/erotic vampire story that was much more influential on what followed than it was successful upon its release.  True Romance, which featured a screenplay by Quentin Tarantino, proved an entertaining and very wild ride, with a large cast of actors doing some great work.

While I don’t consider myself a huge fan of Tony Scott’s overall body of work, there is no denying that for the past several decades his presence has most certainly been felt.  His death comes as a shock and one can’t help but wonder what might have come next.

The other day I picked up a bargain BluRay disc featuring two Bruce WIllis films, Last Man Standing and the Tony Scott directed The Last Boy Scout.  The one and only time I saw The Last Boy Scout was when it was originally released back in 1991.  Back then I didn’t think all that much of it but nonetheless recalled one bit of dialogue between Bruce WIllis’ character and a police detective/ex-friend.  If memory serves (and it certainly might not!) Willis’ character’s wife left him for that now ex-friend and the meeting was salty, painful, yet surprisingly down to earth.

Perhaps I’ll revisit it when I get a chance.

Rest in Peace, Mr. Scott.  While not all your films were my cup of tea, considering all the works you were involved in, you nonetheless provided me with hours of entertainment.

In the end, what more could anyone ask?

General, Music, Uncategorized

David Bowie again…

The Olympics ended yesterday with a very, very big show that lovingly displayed the things that make Britain Britain.  There were fashion models, theater, and psychedelic floats.  There was much music, even a performance of “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life” by Eric Idle.  This song, which appeared at the very end of The Life of Brian, my favorite Monty Python film, was aired complete, though the single profanity uttered in the song was heavily (and loudly) bleeped for American viewing.

Given all the Britannia on display, I was curious if David Bowie might make an appearance at the event.  After all, his song “Heroes” was played in a very prominent spot at the very beginning of the Olympics while the British athletes made their very first appearance/entrance into the stadium.

While the closing ceremonies were going on, and the show focused on the British fashion industry, they of course played Mr. Bowie’s song “Fashion” and, I suspect, that might well be where the show’s makers might well have loved to have him appear and sing…

But he didn’t.

Mr. Bowie wasn’t the only musician whose songs were played during the Olympics and didn’t show.  Pink Floyd’s “Wish You Were Here,” for example, was sung live, but neither Roger Waters or David Gilmour showed up to perform the song.  I believe Nick Mason, the band’s drummer, was the only Pink Floyd member present.

Yet Mr. Bowie’s absence felt to me like something more.  There have been articles written here and there hinting if not outright saying that Mr. Bowie has effectively, though quietly, retired, and not seeing him at the Olympics seemed to further that notion.  After all, this is a man who tended to release a new album almost every year and was constantly touring or making appearances in movies or TV shows.  His last album, 2003’s Reality, is rapidly approaching a decade since release.  While he toured in support of the album, he was diagnosed with an acute arterial blockage and had emergency angioplasty in 2004.  From that point on, his appearances have been sparse.  His last stage appearance was in 2006, his last recorded song was a collaboration with Scarlett Johansson in 2008.

So when his songs were presented in such prominent places during the opening and closing of the Olympics, I couldn’t help but think the event organizers were hoping to lure him out to do a live performance.  And given how long it had been since he did such a thing, one might have thought that Mr. Bowie would enjoy the opportunity to do just that.

The fact that he didn’t, as I said before, suggests to me that perhaps the whispers were right.  No, I’m not privy to Mr. Bowie’s personal life.  For all I know, he might be furiously working on a new album or acting in some film or doing something that deprives him of the time to head over to the Olympics and perform.

On the other hand, and given the fact that we’ve seen so little of Mr. Bowie since 2008, I can’t help but wonder if, indeed, those whispers of his retirement are indeed accurate.

If they are, I take that news as bittersweet.  After several decades of hard work, the release of many classic albums, and what must have been a very frightening health emergency, it would not surprise me if Mr. Bowie has decided he’s done enough.  I will continue to hope for new songs/albums from Mr. Bowie, but if Reality represents his last major work, I will cherish it along with his other albums, which never seem to grow old.

General, Uncategorized

So I went to a 7-Eleven yesterday…

…and as I walk to the counter and get in line behind the person the cashier is currently attended to, he asks for and receives two packs of Camel cigarettes.  As the attendant rings him up, she notices a can of cold beer on the counter beside him and asks if that’s his as well.

The man grips his two packs of cigarettes, shakes his head, and replies in one of those how-could-you-possibly-think tone of voices: “No, dear, I don’t drink.”

Reminded me of that scene in Airplane! where one of the passengers takes a swig of liquor while an old lady sitting next to him watches.  He realizes she’s staring at him and offers her a drink.  The old woman appears horrified by the man’s attempt at politeness and frostily replies “Certainly not!”.

She then proceeds to put a straw in her nose and snort a couple of lines of what looks an awfully lot like cocaine…

General, Uncategorized

Fan of sports?

Then you’re probably not a fan of these, the teams with the 50 worst seasons in Sports history:

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1170925-the-50-worst-seasons-in-sports-history

Many of them are familiar to me, but there were some very amusing ones I wasn’t familiar with.

Particularly amusing were some of the baseball teams of old mentioned, like the 1935 Boston Braves, who went on to a pathetic 38-115 record.  This team featured a nearly retired Babe Ruth.  Or the 1899 (yes, that 1899) Cleveland Spiders who managed a pathetic 20-134 record and 101 road loses (something that will never be equaled with today’s schedule).

Interesting, and at times hilarious, stuff.

Movies, Uncategorized

White Lightning (1973) a (very) belated review

Back in the 1970’s Burt Reynolds was easily one of the biggest movie stars in Hollywood.  Quite an accomplishment considering some of his rivals included such heavy weights as Clint Eastwood, Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Dustin Hoffman, etc. etc.

Today, he is probably best known for two movies/roles:  The wannabe outdoorsman Lewis in the 1972 adaptation of James Dickey’s novel Deliverance and the 1977 action/comedy Smokey and the Bandit.  But his success in the movies, of course, wasn’t limited to just those two roles.

Perhaps falling a hair under those two films (at least in terms of recognizability) are his “Gator” films, 1973’s White Lightning and its 1976 sequel Gator.  A recent episode of Archer (catch it if you can, it is quite hilarious, an animated spy version of Reno 911) had Burt Reynolds as a “guest”, and one of the more amusing comments by the show’s dazed protagonist was his pitch to Burt Reynolds to make a sequel to Gator, and Burt noting that the movie was a sequel.

Which brings us back to White Lightning.  Watching the film recently was an interesting experience.  The passage of time may have dulled some of the movie’s more exciting set pieces (mostly involving car chases), but the Burt Reynolds charisma shines very bright in this film.  The plot is simple enough:  Gator McKlusky (Reynolds) is “good ol’ Southern boy”, a bootlegger currently in jail serving a small sentence.  He’s due out in a year or two, but when word comes that his younger brother was found dead, he is filled with righteous fury.  And when the rumor comes that his death was the result of the action of Sheriff J. C. Connors (Ned Beatty), he agrees to go undercover with the Feds to take the man down.

What follows is Gator’s attempts to infiltrate the moonshining organization in Connors’ town.  But when Connors gets wind he has a Fed infiltrator in his territory, things go from bad to worse.

I have to admit, while I enjoyed White Lightning, I found Gator an overall better film, if only because the villain in the later film, played by Jerry Reed (who would join up with Burt Reynolds once again in Smokey and the Bandit in a very, very different role!), was soooo much more detestable than Ned Beatty’s Sheriff Connors.

Still, one has to admit that watching White Lightning you see the very beginning of things that were to come.  Turn the movie’s plot a little this way -and into comedy with even more car mayhem- and you have Smokey and the Bandit.  Turn the film a little that way -and make it more of a drama- and you have Justified.

So, if you’re interested in movie history and would like to see something that may well have influenced works that even today entertain us, you could do a lot worse than check out White Lightning.

Movies, Uncategorized

Edge of Darkness (2010) a (mildly) belated review

Way back in the mid-1980’s and while looking through a newspaper I found a very positive review for Edge of Darkness, a mini-series that was scheduled to air on PBS.  The premise was intriguing:  A British police officer’s daughter is murdered and, in his subsequent investigation of the matter, discovers a toxic cesspool of government corruption linked to nuclear research.  I watched the series when it aired back then and though my memories of it are vague after the passage of time, I distinctly recall liking it quite a bit.  I also really, really liked Joe Don Baker’s performance within the series as Darius Jedburgh, a shady CIA operative/fixer who, over the course of the series, became a delightfully unpredictable wild-card.

Years passed and, in 2010, I heard that the mini-series’ original director, Martin Campbell, was working on a movie remake of the mini-series with Mel Gibson in the title role.  I was intrigued.  I’ve been a fan of Mr. Gibson’s work since first seeing him in the incredible Mad Max 2 aka The Road Warrior when it first hit theaters way back in 1981.  Of late, I’ve been equally shocked by some of the lurid details regarding his personal life.  Still, I was interested in seeing the film but, of course, didn’t find the time to do so when it was initially released to theaters.  Yesterday, I finally had a chance to see it and did just that.

The 2010 film version of Edge of Darkness retains the same general plot involving police officer Thomas Craven’s (Mel Gibson) search for his daughter’s murderers and the way it eventually ties in to a shady nuclear research facility and equally shady politicians.  The movie’s setting has been changed, transplanting the story for no discernible reason from England to Boston.

While watching the film’s first half, I thought things were unfolding quite well.  The central mystery was set up and Mr. Gibson does well providing a Boston accent and acting both filled with equal parts grief and rage as he investigates his daughter’s murder.  Unfortunately, in the film’s second half the story suffers from compressing too much material to fit the parameters of a theatrical release.  The original Edge of Darkness mini-series had the luxury of five and a half hours to tell its story.  The movie, which clocks in at just under two hours, simply doesn’t have enough time to flesh out characters and situations and provide a good wrap up in that short a period of time.

The character who suffers the greatest from this compressed storytelling is, unfortunately, the character that to me was the most intriguing in the mini-series: Darius Jedburgh.  In the movie, the role is played with considerable menace by Ray Winstone.  Unfortunately in the movie he isn’t given anywhere near enough time to develop.  In the mini-series, Craven and Jedburgh meet many times and become something of an odd-couple while pursuing the mystery of Craven’s daughter’s death.  In the movie, they meet up a total of two times.  There is more story presented with Jedburgh, but it involves his own reactions to his “bosses” and isn’t nearly as compelling as it could have been.  Anyone who hasn’t seen the original mini-series and therefore isn’t aware of how important the character of Jedburgh was in it can be forgiven for wondering just why he was present in this film at all.  He simply isn’t as necessary to this version of the story and, sadly, could well have been cut out entirely in favor of more time with Mel Gibson’s Craven.

In conclusion, what you have with the 2010 version of Edge of Darkness is a movie that starts well but simply can’t present as much plot as the original mini-series, devolving into a rather standard “good guy takes on the bad guys” story before reaching its admittedly very emotional conclusion.  Two stars out of four.

And here’s Jedburgh and Craven’s first meeting from the original mini-series:

Movies, Uncategorized

The Dead (2010) a (mildly) belated review

The ingredients that make a successful film versus an unsuccessful film are diverse.  The most successful films, in my opinion, grab you from the very beginning, building from scene to scene and delivering a dynamic and unforgettable conclusion.

Unsuccessful films, too, are composed of varied ingredients…often resulting in something less than memorable.  An unsuccessful film, for example, can have good acting voided by a weak script, or a good script hurt by bad acting.  The direction could be pedestrian…the effects unimpressive or, worse, laughable.  Then there are those films that are firmly average.  They may be good enough to entertain you while you’re watching them, but the moment they’re done, so too is your interest in them.

Then there are those in between films.  Movies that are “near misses”, containing so very many great features yet…yet don’t quite successfully cross the finish line.

The Dead (2010), as it turns out, is to me a pretty good example of just such a near miss.  A very near miss.

The Dead is, yes, another exercise in the seemingly endless zombie genre (they’re everywhere, from TV to movies to apps to video games).  The most unique element of this particular movie, however, is the setting: Africa.

In brief:  The last flight of white foreigners leaving Africa after the zombie plague began crash lands.  One of the very few survivors of the flight, Lt. Murphy (Rob Freeman), a mechanic/mercenary, tries to reach civilization alone.  He eventually runs across another survivor, Sgt. Dembele (Prince David Oseia), an African military officer who abandoned his post and is searching for his son.  Together, the two try to find some hope in this hopeless new world.

Again, there is plenty to like here, even if the plot is far from earth-shatteringly original.  The zombie plague is presented in a harrowing way…the dead are quite literally everywhere, and one must not only fight them, but also the harsh African elements if there is any hope to survive.  The cinematography and setting is at times breathtaking.  This is territory we’ve rarely seen in film.  Further, the effects and acting are also quite good.  For those into gory effects, there’s plenty of it to see here, along with some great scares.

However, despite all the good, to me the film simply runs out of gas as it nears its end.  I don’t want to give away any too many details, but in general I’ve found that zombie plague stories tend to end in one of two ways:  1) depressingly, as demonstrated in the original zombie plague film, Night of the Living Dead, wherein the entire cast is wiped out and we’re left with the feeling that civilization is very much doomed or 2) depressingly but with at least one ray of hope, as presented in the sequel to that film and perhaps greatest zombie plague film of them all, the original Dawn of the Dead.  In that movie’s case, while most of the cast does wind up dead, the movie concludes with a feeling that the very few that have survived can and will fight on.

The Dead follows this formula.  However, in this instance it felt like the ending was too “artsy” and symbolic.  It was, unfortunately, my impression that the filmmakers, talented though they were, had a great idea for a story and had all these intriguing sequences they wanted to put into it, but were simply unclear on how they would wrap it all up.  So they went for the formula ending but in this case, it just didn’t work.

However, having said all that, if you’re a fan of the zombie plague genre and are looking to kill a few hours watching just that, you’d do a lot worse than give The Dead a try.  For all others, you may be better off going to the original two George A. Romero directed classics.