Following the storm around Roman Polanski's arrest and pending extradition from Switzerland, Mike and I decided it was time to watch two of his films that were on our fill-in-the-canon list. (Canon may be too strong here but they are oft-referenced films by academics and other reviewers that we hadn't seen.) Both films were available at our local library so I placed holds on both titles and the stars aligned to make them both available last night.
Rosemary's Baby does have some creepy moments but overall it is a ridiculous film. The most unsettling scenes are in the first act where a young couple moves into an odd apartment building and soon meets the Castavets, possibly the world's most invasive elderly couple. From the time that Rosemary (Mia Farrow) and her husband first dine with the Castavets, the film takes a turn from creepy to off-balanced and from there it rockets to just plain silly. The biggest problem comes from the connection that the screenplay (and Levin's book before that) makes between witchcraft and satanism. This not only dates the film (more so than the Vidal Sassoon haircut and 60s wardrobe) but makes it almost unwatchable for anyone who is familiar with wiccans and modern witchcraft. That aside, Polanski does manage to make the film tense right up to the last scene (which let me down), if you believe that the protagonist was unable to put two and two together until someone sent her a book filled with underlined passages. Her fogginess is due in part to being perpetually drugged by the Castavets and her complicit husband. His cooperation was one of many plot points that was poorly supported. It's clear that Rosemary's Baby is a horror film -- most of the truly frightening events are left to the imagination of the viewer -- but it is a weak representation of the genre.
Chinatown, on the other hand, is a much more watchable movie. Set in 1930s Los Angeles, the film centres on Jake Gittes (Jack Nicholson), a private eye who deals in relationship issues but .ends up getting drawn into a much bigger case. Chinatown is considered a "neo-noir" -- it bears all the marks of a Film Noir but was made 25 years after the golden age for that genre. Throughout, it reminded me of L.A. Confidential (if you have seen one, you'll likely enjoy the other). Nicholson is at his best here, playing a detective with a conscience -- he just wants to get to the bottom of it all. Faye Dunaway plays the femme fatale and she does it well; it's hard to tell just which side she's on until the end. I was not expecting the political intrigue or the other drama that unfolds; there's a lot to tell in Chinatown and it is all worth watching. The movie has aged well, perhaps due to being set in the past and, despite its age, still manages to be shocking.
** Rosemary's Baby
**** Chinatown
03 October 2009
07 June 2009
Hard Candy (2005)
What happens when the predator becomes the prey? In Hard Candy, we watch a 30-something photographer, Jeff lure Hayley, a precocious honor-roll 14 year old from an internet chat room to a meeting at a local coffee shop and then to his home. Unfortunately for Jeff, Hayley already knows what she's getting into.
Everything about the production -- from the direction to the sound editing -- is well executed but the performances from the two leads, each intensely emotional and raw, are the cornerstone.
Watching Hard Candy is an intellectual tennis match as the audience is torn between rooting for the creepy pedophile and the violent teen. Is it exploitation? That's hard to say although the suggestion algorithms on some movie sites put it in the same category as Saw and other "torture porn" horror films. Personally, I would put it in the same category as some of David Mamet's and Neil LaBute's work such as Oleanna and In the Company of Men. Like those films, Hard Candy humanizes people who are normally shown as one-dimensional villains and also forces the audience to consider the repercussions of vigilante actions.
****
Everything about the production -- from the direction to the sound editing -- is well executed but the performances from the two leads, each intensely emotional and raw, are the cornerstone.
Watching Hard Candy is an intellectual tennis match as the audience is torn between rooting for the creepy pedophile and the violent teen. Is it exploitation? That's hard to say although the suggestion algorithms on some movie sites put it in the same category as Saw and other "torture porn" horror films. Personally, I would put it in the same category as some of David Mamet's and Neil LaBute's work such as Oleanna and In the Company of Men. Like those films, Hard Candy humanizes people who are normally shown as one-dimensional villains and also forces the audience to consider the repercussions of vigilante actions.
****
26 May 2009
Underworld: Rise of the Lycans
The ancient feud between Werewolves (aka Lycans) and Vampires had a beginning. The first two Underworld movies were set in modern day as Vampires and Lycans blasted away at each other with machine guns and high-tech toys. In the modern day, Viktor (Bill Nighy) meets his end, there comes a hybrid of the Lycans and Vampires. Centuries earlier, Viktor was a king-- he held sway over lesser Vampires as well as the lords of the nearby human lands. He and his undead held court. Humans accept Viktor's reign in exchange for his promise of relief from the onslaught of Werewolves. Past their supernatural origins, Werewolves were polar opposite of Vampires: feral, cursed, once men but doomed to live our their lives as vicious predators in animal form. Viktor found a Werewolf that gave birth to a human-appearing child. He killed the Werewolf, but took her baby, named it Lucian, and raised him in his castle. When Werewolves bite humans, they transfer the curse to their victims. Lucian was different: he could transform into Lycan form and back into human form. As a Lycan, his bite would infect victims with his variation of lycanthropy-- they could go to and from human form. The Vampires ruled the night but could not survive the day-- they needed the Lycans as servants and daytime protectors-- slaves. As we all know, slaves rebel. Viktor's daughter, Sonja, eventually joins the Vampire ranks after spending her childhood growing up sharing the castle with Lucian as he too grew up. Sonja is in love with Lucian. When Viktor discovers their secret love and the unborn Vampire/Lycan baby she bears, he puts her to death. Open revolts breaks out between the Lycans and the Vampires. In this medieval battle, the stage is set for the latter events of the first two movies.
The first two movies were written and directed by Len Wiseman. This time, Patrick Tatopolous directs the movie. Most of his movie credits involve technical world as a creature designer or costumer. Being a designer doesn't preclude someone from being good as a director (eg. Len Wiseman's art production background as well as Guillermo del Toro's origins), but Tatopolous may be stronger in the workshop than behind the camera. Tatopolous is stuck on one palette in this movie: blue. Dark, light, dull blue. Blue! The piercing blue eyes of Bill Nighy was very impressive; but there is a scene where Werewolves are lying await in the night in some foilage and there is almost no way to tell what is what. It was like an extra layer of macrovision copy protection at points, where you have guess with dark blue is connected to someone with a sword or a set of fangs.
This movie has a couple unenviable stumbling blocks. Preclude can be claustrophobic-- you know characters who appear in earliers movies will make it out alive of the latter prequel. This movie definitely goes down that road. Also, it feels like there is some franchise fatigue. The first two movies has Scott Speedman and Kate Beckinsale in front of the camera; with Len Wiseman behind the lens and scripting. The signifigant players (Bill Nighy, Michael Sheen with Kevin Grevioux) do return to color in the start of this feud. Beckinsale's role of Selena is replaced by lookalike Rhona Mitra playing Sonja-- this was set-up in the first movie and paid off here. Danny McBride (stuntman and contributor to all three movies) and Dirk Blackman (who's credits are this movie and the Viking-Alien epic, Outlander) penned this movie in Wiseman's place.
This movie is just what the title implies: it's the origin story of the Lycans and much of the movie centers around those creatures and characters. You don't see the Vampires in all their glory (almost done of the "Dracula" bag of tricks come into play-- no turning into bats, rats or wolves, nada). Nor is there the angry villager bent. Humans are backdrop: they express displeasure with Viktor like they were townspeople lipping off to the city comptroller. There is some much great potential from this concept and much of it boils down to cool sword battles, some great CGI of Werewolves and Lycans laying seige to a castle; and some naked side-hip action from Mitra and Sheen. As way to close off the franchise, this movie does accomplish that, but it falls well short of surprising you or giving you something new.
DVD Extras: The special featurettes talk about the production of the movie and the inner workings of the feud between Lycans and their former masters. There is a filmmakers's commentary where he details the production from his perspective.
***
The first two movies were written and directed by Len Wiseman. This time, Patrick Tatopolous directs the movie. Most of his movie credits involve technical world as a creature designer or costumer. Being a designer doesn't preclude someone from being good as a director (eg. Len Wiseman's art production background as well as Guillermo del Toro's origins), but Tatopolous may be stronger in the workshop than behind the camera. Tatopolous is stuck on one palette in this movie: blue. Dark, light, dull blue. Blue! The piercing blue eyes of Bill Nighy was very impressive; but there is a scene where Werewolves are lying await in the night in some foilage and there is almost no way to tell what is what. It was like an extra layer of macrovision copy protection at points, where you have guess with dark blue is connected to someone with a sword or a set of fangs.
This movie has a couple unenviable stumbling blocks. Preclude can be claustrophobic-- you know characters who appear in earliers movies will make it out alive of the latter prequel. This movie definitely goes down that road. Also, it feels like there is some franchise fatigue. The first two movies has Scott Speedman and Kate Beckinsale in front of the camera; with Len Wiseman behind the lens and scripting. The signifigant players (Bill Nighy, Michael Sheen with Kevin Grevioux) do return to color in the start of this feud. Beckinsale's role of Selena is replaced by lookalike Rhona Mitra playing Sonja-- this was set-up in the first movie and paid off here. Danny McBride (stuntman and contributor to all three movies) and Dirk Blackman (who's credits are this movie and the Viking-Alien epic, Outlander) penned this movie in Wiseman's place.
This movie is just what the title implies: it's the origin story of the Lycans and much of the movie centers around those creatures and characters. You don't see the Vampires in all their glory (almost done of the "Dracula" bag of tricks come into play-- no turning into bats, rats or wolves, nada). Nor is there the angry villager bent. Humans are backdrop: they express displeasure with Viktor like they were townspeople lipping off to the city comptroller. There is some much great potential from this concept and much of it boils down to cool sword battles, some great CGI of Werewolves and Lycans laying seige to a castle; and some naked side-hip action from Mitra and Sheen. As way to close off the franchise, this movie does accomplish that, but it falls well short of surprising you or giving you something new.
DVD Extras: The special featurettes talk about the production of the movie and the inner workings of the feud between Lycans and their former masters. There is a filmmakers's commentary where he details the production from his perspective.
***
Terminator: Salvation
The film opens on death row. A condemned prisoner, Martin Wright (Sam Worthington) is giving a chance to donate his body to science. The scientist is from Cyberdyne Systems. In Terminator 3, John Connor is locked away safely when Skynet launches Judgment Day to emerge as the salvation of mankind-- pre-armed with the foreknowledge of how to fight the machines. Tune in 15 years later: Christian Bale plays John Connor-- the rebel leader / soldier. Humans are well organized against the robots: jets, subs and armed troops. They seem much better equipped than the ragtag fighters seen in the first movie. Michael Ironside commands the resistance from a secret location along with what looks to be remnants of an international force of senior officers. They have developed a way to shut off the machines and John Connor demands to test their new weapon. It also turns out that Skynet publishes a hit list of human targets: John Connor is #2 of the list; Kyle Reese is #1. Kyle Reese as Termintor followers will know is destined to be John Connor's father. Right now he's an anonymous resistance fighter and half of the force fighting in Los Angeles. After the raid on a research lab by Connor and the resistance, Martin Wright comes back from the dead. Confused, he stumbles through the wasteland (think of a super-duper version of the Fallout 3 environment). The wanders into LA defended by Reese and a plucky mute girl-- two people are left in Los Angeles. Outside of town Reese, Wright and the girl find an abandonned 7-11 teaming with survivors: easily 10 times the population of post-nuclear LA. The machines attack in some great action sequences-- scenes coupled with deep audio that rumbles like no home theatre could ever accomplish: it'll really bubble your soda. Reese is targetted for termination, but is taken captive. Wright does not get captured, but instead gets rescued by the sexy fighter pilot, Blair Williams (Moon Bloodgood). After the obligatory fighting-off-the-rapists scene, the two bond. She takes them back to the secret base when Connor is located. Then the big shocker-- the dead guy bought by Cyberdyne at the start of the movie who is impervious to harm and hunger, is.. a robot! Eventually he escapes and goes back to Skynet headquarters to find Reese. Connor follows to bust Reese and other captives out of Skynet headquarters. The big action unfolds and in a poorly guarded secret, Arnie makes a comback. What is majorly cool: it's an all digital Arnie. If your harken back to Mummy II and the sadly plastic Rock, then progress through the technical leaps you get to this movie. He looks freakish like the same Schwarzenegger that busted up a police station in the early 1980s. If this is the face of cinema, I think we'll get to see an all-digital Humphrey Bogart / Harrison Ford movie in five years. It's really impressive. By the wrap-up, the loose ends are tied and up the door is open for many sequences with young Kyle Reese and his son, John Connor fighting the machines.
The action is impressive. There is some terrific tension built into the scenes. McG has a stupid name but a real talent for putting together great action sequences. Christan Bale and the rest of the cast are good in their respective roles. If park your brain at the door, you're in for a great ride. If you think you sink in this movie. The plot holes abound. Connor keeps jumping up and down the Resistance org chart: one minute he's a soldier taking orders; next minute, he just short of being in charge of the whole movement. The robots control this massive sum of technology, but they can't zero in on the pirate broadcast from Connor yet they can tune in on the command headquarters. The robots wanted Reese and Connor dead-- but when given the chance they resort to stupid Bond-villian style exploits including revealing their plans to the only hero who can make a difference. Maybe someone jammed a Roger Moore Bond DVD into Skynet before it went online. Connor is obsessed with saving his eventual father because if he doesn't he won't be born. When WHEN WHEN will Hollywood figure out how time travels works? If someone changes "a" past it doesn't change all pasts-- it just changes the relative past. Besides that-- the crux of the Terminator franchise is that people travel through time to change the past. The resistance has a super weapon that will simple shut off the machines-- when they have the chance to deploy, they do not. Why? Likely because of Terminator Salvation II. Worst of all-- when they find Wright and discover that he's all fleshy on the outside and geary on the inside, Connor goes back to his mother's tapes. He was was never prepared for this. WTF? Didn't Connor hitch a ride with Arnie in Terminator II and III ? How could he not know that Terminator impersonate people? At the end of the movie, there is a stupid plot point introduced and then resolved. It's all sentimental and ridiculous. Go for the thrills, the explosions and super cool robots-- but put your brain in offline mode before seeing Terminator: Salvation.
**
The action is impressive. There is some terrific tension built into the scenes. McG has a stupid name but a real talent for putting together great action sequences. Christan Bale and the rest of the cast are good in their respective roles. If park your brain at the door, you're in for a great ride. If you think you sink in this movie. The plot holes abound. Connor keeps jumping up and down the Resistance org chart: one minute he's a soldier taking orders; next minute, he just short of being in charge of the whole movement. The robots control this massive sum of technology, but they can't zero in on the pirate broadcast from Connor yet they can tune in on the command headquarters. The robots wanted Reese and Connor dead-- but when given the chance they resort to stupid Bond-villian style exploits including revealing their plans to the only hero who can make a difference. Maybe someone jammed a Roger Moore Bond DVD into Skynet before it went online. Connor is obsessed with saving his eventual father because if he doesn't he won't be born. When WHEN WHEN will Hollywood figure out how time travels works? If someone changes "a" past it doesn't change all pasts-- it just changes the relative past. Besides that-- the crux of the Terminator franchise is that people travel through time to change the past. The resistance has a super weapon that will simple shut off the machines-- when they have the chance to deploy, they do not. Why? Likely because of Terminator Salvation II. Worst of all-- when they find Wright and discover that he's all fleshy on the outside and geary on the inside, Connor goes back to his mother's tapes. He was was never prepared for this. WTF? Didn't Connor hitch a ride with Arnie in Terminator II and III ? How could he not know that Terminator impersonate people? At the end of the movie, there is a stupid plot point introduced and then resolved. It's all sentimental and ridiculous. Go for the thrills, the explosions and super cool robots-- but put your brain in offline mode before seeing Terminator: Salvation.
**
Anacondas 4: Trail of Blood
This movie picks up from the events of Anacondas III. A scientist has perfected a hybrid of a Black Orchid that is capable of delivering total regeneration. Unfortunately, his anaconda test subject gains the ability to regenerate and grow to massive size. Three groups land in the same locale in the Carpathian Mountains of Eastern Europe: Amanda, a botanist (Crystal Allen) returns to happen upon a student walking in the woods; an archaeology team digging into the mountains; and mercenaries, dispatched by a dying billionaire, Murdoch, played by John Rhys-Davies (oh, Gimli... you'll do anything for money). No one is here for the snakes, but that's what they get-- plenty of poorly animated sequences with the giant Anaconda-- it's so bad it's cartoonish. The behavior of the snake is amusing-- it knows not to kill people except when killing them creates the best ironic justice. Don't even ask how a cold-blooded killing machine can thrive in the chilly mountains of Eastern Europe; or how the snake keeps popping back from total destruction like a video game character.
This movie was made back-to-back with Anacondas III, but it lacks the star power of David Hasselhoff. This movie saw its first life on the Sci-Fi Channel like its last installment. The franchise started in the late in the 1990s with some heavy star power and has sunk to this point. Basically, the movie amounts to lots of running around, some gun play, one or two clever moments, shots of bad CGI snakes and some shots set in snako-vision. By having three groups with competing agendas and throwing some guns into the mix, there is some manufactured drama and action. Shot in daylight with telegraphed moves its direction saps almost all of the suspense out of this topic. It doesn't need to be this mediocre, but it is. The best way to survive this movie is at 1.5 times speed. It then takes on a comical, Keystone Coppers / Benny Hill quality that makes it much more enjoyable. (Recommended audio track: Yakety Sax.).
When you're reaching for Anacondas 4 on the DVD shelf, veer left and grab the much better first in the series from 1997.
*
This movie was made back-to-back with Anacondas III, but it lacks the star power of David Hasselhoff. This movie saw its first life on the Sci-Fi Channel like its last installment. The franchise started in the late in the 1990s with some heavy star power and has sunk to this point. Basically, the movie amounts to lots of running around, some gun play, one or two clever moments, shots of bad CGI snakes and some shots set in snako-vision. By having three groups with competing agendas and throwing some guns into the mix, there is some manufactured drama and action. Shot in daylight with telegraphed moves its direction saps almost all of the suspense out of this topic. It doesn't need to be this mediocre, but it is. The best way to survive this movie is at 1.5 times speed. It then takes on a comical, Keystone Coppers / Benny Hill quality that makes it much more enjoyable. (Recommended audio track: Yakety Sax.).
When you're reaching for Anacondas 4 on the DVD shelf, veer left and grab the much better first in the series from 1997.
*
Star Trek (2009)
Prequels are so hot-- that 15 minutes at the start of the first Lord of the Rings movie where the armies of Orcs battled Elves and Men could have last for an hour and nobody would have cared. Star Trek began even before the career of its iconic leader, Capt. James T. Kirk, but you missed those first meetings: Kirk meeting Spock, McCoy and the others. Now you can see the genesis of Kirk from his birth through to his ascent to the Captain's chair. This is a story of the Romulan, Nero (Eric Bana), out for vengeance vs. Federation. But Kirk's nemesis is actually Spock. Spock is a sticklier for order and logic-- Kirk is a bad boy and rebel. Can the two bond? They're the ultimate odd couple.
In the original series, Kirk is a super student, "a pile of books with legs" who rises quickly through the ranks with Kirk-like style. JJ's Kirk is a lucky-- falling ass backwards into the First Officer job on Enterprise after being smuggled aboard. Just in time for the climax of the movie, Kirk is maneuvered into the Captain's seat. Along the way, Kirk hits on Uhura, meets the helmsman and navigator, Chekov and Sulu, and finds Scotty languishing on remote Delta Vega. Delta Vega-- an icy planet in the interstellar hinterland but close to the hot arid Vulcan. There is no big secret to the big surprise element: Leonard Nimoy reprises his role as Spock. Future Spock comes back into the past in a key plot device that also allows the book of Star Trek to be rewritten from the start without getting lots of fan's underroos in a knot. The cast ranges from modest to strong: Captain Pike was in command of the ship in the original pilot. He is brought back as the captain of this Enterprise and is well played by Bruce Greenwood. Karl Urban is eerie as Doctor McCoy played by the late DeForrest Kelly. Yelchin delivers as good a performance as he can manage though weighed down with most of the bad lines in the movie. Cho does his own incarnation of Sulu-- different from his predecessor but still maintaining that spark. The two big roles: Zachary Quinto as Spock delivers a good performance but it's not the same. Chris Pine as Kirk really doesn't do it for me. Shatner has this careful talent for being an a-hole. He showed it off in his portrayal of Kirk. It carries a tenacity and daring that makes you root for his character. Chris Pine doesn't have it. Can he develop it? I don't know.
Plot holes, incongruities and bad science abound-- just like regular Trek. The look of JJ's Trek is good but where before everything looked sterile and cardboard, this Trek has a smooth ethereal bridge but the engineering section looks like a pipe factory and showroom. That mix of messy and smooth keeps taking you in and out of the esthetics of the future. Star Trek is low Q but high thrills. If you can surive the lapses and nitpicking elements, the story is captivating-- a roller coaster ride that almost makes you get up at the end and say, "Again! Again!"
****
In the original series, Kirk is a super student, "a pile of books with legs" who rises quickly through the ranks with Kirk-like style. JJ's Kirk is a lucky-- falling ass backwards into the First Officer job on Enterprise after being smuggled aboard. Just in time for the climax of the movie, Kirk is maneuvered into the Captain's seat. Along the way, Kirk hits on Uhura, meets the helmsman and navigator, Chekov and Sulu, and finds Scotty languishing on remote Delta Vega. Delta Vega-- an icy planet in the interstellar hinterland but close to the hot arid Vulcan. There is no big secret to the big surprise element: Leonard Nimoy reprises his role as Spock. Future Spock comes back into the past in a key plot device that also allows the book of Star Trek to be rewritten from the start without getting lots of fan's underroos in a knot. The cast ranges from modest to strong: Captain Pike was in command of the ship in the original pilot. He is brought back as the captain of this Enterprise and is well played by Bruce Greenwood. Karl Urban is eerie as Doctor McCoy played by the late DeForrest Kelly. Yelchin delivers as good a performance as he can manage though weighed down with most of the bad lines in the movie. Cho does his own incarnation of Sulu-- different from his predecessor but still maintaining that spark. The two big roles: Zachary Quinto as Spock delivers a good performance but it's not the same. Chris Pine as Kirk really doesn't do it for me. Shatner has this careful talent for being an a-hole. He showed it off in his portrayal of Kirk. It carries a tenacity and daring that makes you root for his character. Chris Pine doesn't have it. Can he develop it? I don't know.
Plot holes, incongruities and bad science abound-- just like regular Trek. The look of JJ's Trek is good but where before everything looked sterile and cardboard, this Trek has a smooth ethereal bridge but the engineering section looks like a pipe factory and showroom. That mix of messy and smooth keeps taking you in and out of the esthetics of the future. Star Trek is low Q but high thrills. If you can surive the lapses and nitpicking elements, the story is captivating-- a roller coaster ride that almost makes you get up at the end and say, "Again! Again!"
****
09 May 2009
X-Men Origins : Wolverine
You can't know about how terrible Wolverine is without getting the spoilers.
Wolverine is mediocre from an action movie perspective. From a comic fan perspective it's a nightmare. From a storytelling perspective, this is the worst movie I've seen in a long time. There are plot holes you could fit the Blackbird through. Some "highlights": Wolverine was born in the Northwest Territories in the 1830s. We see him in a large home from the era-- after he kills his father with his bone claws, he escapes into the nearby forest (Forests in the tundra? Really?). From there, James Logan and his brother, Sabretooth fight in every war-- every American war: the Civil War, World War I, WWII, Vietnam. At one point his brother goes nuts in a Vietnamese village, Logan defends him and the two end up in front of the firing squad. After that, Col. William Stryker give them the chance to serve their country. So is Stryker Canadian and Canada is fighting in Vietnam? Or did two bloodthirsty mutants get their green cards? They join an elite force that goes on their first mission to Nigeria (a sprawling Lagos that looks more like LA) in search of a mystery metal from an meteorite-- an ore that contributes to adamantium. They find some of the metal, then go to a small village and demand more of the meteorite. The villagers refuse, the strike force starts to kill them and Logan refuses to take part. He walks out on them and heads into the jungle. Six years later, Logan has a good woman and a job as a lumberjack (very Canadian), living in the Rockies. Stryker finds him and tell him that his brother has gone crazy, killing members of their elite force. Eventually Sabretooth gets to Logan's woman and apparently kills her. Logan goes crazy, they duke it out, Sabretooth buries Logan under a bunch of logs and leaves him for dead. Logan is brought in for medical treatment and Stryker's offers Logan "more pain than he'll ever endure" and he will become indestructible. Logan agrees. They sink him in a tank of water, then they inject a dozen hypodermic things into Logan. They pump adamantium into him in what is obviously a liquid metal state (ouch! hot!) and plumes of smoke and steam rise from the tank. So, the human body has over 200 bones. This liquid metal is pumped in and it automatically finds all of the little bones (except the teeth). It also bonds to the Logan's claws. In their bony state they look like sharp finger bones-- these adamantium claws come out looking like sharpened knives which is a good thing since adamantium is indestructible and cannot be sharpened. That's one of those great comic book moments where reality doesn't enter into the equation. Within moments, Wolverine escapes and runs naked to a nearby farm. The elderly couple (I think they may be the Kents) befriend the naked superhero-- wait, it's that another movie? Wolverine picks up his signature jacket, some clothes and a sweet motorcycle. No sooner than does he pick this up, then one of his former team mates, Agent Zero, blows apart the farmstead, with Wolverines bursting from the fireball on his new hog. He leads the helicopter on a chase in some of these ridiculous situations: the helicopter gives the sharpshooter a literal birds-eye view of Wolverine and still he can't mow him down. Wolverine tricks a hummer into crashing and taking out the helicopter. It's nice to know that there were hummers in the late 1970s/early 1980s. The chopper is a flaming twisted wreck but Wolverine can still deliver some choice words to his would-be assassin before it's all over. The very next scene, Stryker opens up a box with a special pistol and eight adamantium bullets-- the only thing that can penetrate Wolverine's new metallic skull. Do you think he could have handed over that box to the sharpshooter, Agent Zero? Does Stryker think he can kill Wolverine? No-- his plan is to shoot Wolverine in the head and give him amnesia. That's actually his plan.
Wolverine teams up with Wraith (Will I Am) and they go to New Orleans to find the only man who ever escaped Stryker's clutches: a super lucky superhero, Gambit (Taylor Kitsch). In the meantime, Sabretooth has tracked down Scott Summers (Cyclops) and he is taken into custody. Then Sabretooth gets to New Orleans just in time to kill of Wraith leaving his loner brother, Wolverine to go to "The Island" with the help of Gambit. The Island is Three Mile Island. I thought, "Sweet! Tie the meltdown into the events of the movie." Nope.Stryker is holding a bevvy of mutants in storage and in cells. He's also holding Wolverine's woman who faked her death to trick Wolverine into doing his life changing procedure. He is doing experiments to create a super mutant by fueling Ryan Reynolds' character with all of the best superheroes (why not just find Sylar?). The end result is Deadpool. Wolverine mounts a breakout of the mutants-- luckily Cyclops' eyes are still covered so he never breaks the continuity. When the escapees get to the surfaceProfessor X is standing there with a helicopter ready to scoop up the mutants. Back to Wolverine, he's planning on blowing up the facility, so he gets to the top of one of the cooling towers.Sabretooth comes after him. When he's done beating Sabretooth, Deadpool teleports in (he had that power in his bag of tricks). Sabretooth decides that blood is thicker than water and teams up with Wolverine to try to beat Deadpool. They eventually win by cutting his head off. In a visually stunning but stupid moment, decapitated Deadpool falls into the cooling tower his eyes beaming out Cyclops' optic blasts from his eyes cutting the tower apart and raining down destruction.Stryker has a showdown with Wolverine, shoots him with in the head and has the desired amnesia effect (swell how that works). Wolverine emerges from this with two holes in his otherwiseimpenetrable skull and a couple bullets rattling around in there. He doesn't know who he is. Wolverine has to walk the Earth in search of his carefully excised memories.
At points this movie is exciting. Any two minute period of this movie is awesome. Put a couple of those segments together and a pattern emerges: this is a bad movie with great visuals. Almost everyone iscompetent in their roles: good acting, great production values and decent direction. The problem is the script: it's peppered with logic holes, bad decisions and dialogue too lousy to put into a comic book. Writers David Benioff and Skip Woods who wrote such contenders as Hitman, Troy and similar are key to the action packed train wreck of X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
**
Wolverine is mediocre from an action movie perspective. From a comic fan perspective it's a nightmare. From a storytelling perspective, this is the worst movie I've seen in a long time. There are plot holes you could fit the Blackbird through. Some "highlights": Wolverine was born in the Northwest Territories in the 1830s. We see him in a large home from the era-- after he kills his father with his bone claws, he escapes into the nearby forest (Forests in the tundra? Really?). From there, James Logan and his brother, Sabretooth fight in every war-- every American war: the Civil War, World War I, WWII, Vietnam. At one point his brother goes nuts in a Vietnamese village, Logan defends him and the two end up in front of the firing squad. After that, Col. William Stryker give them the chance to serve their country. So is Stryker Canadian and Canada is fighting in Vietnam? Or did two bloodthirsty mutants get their green cards? They join an elite force that goes on their first mission to Nigeria (a sprawling Lagos that looks more like LA) in search of a mystery metal from an meteorite-- an ore that contributes to adamantium. They find some of the metal, then go to a small village and demand more of the meteorite. The villagers refuse, the strike force starts to kill them and Logan refuses to take part. He walks out on them and heads into the jungle. Six years later, Logan has a good woman and a job as a lumberjack (very Canadian), living in the Rockies. Stryker finds him and tell him that his brother has gone crazy, killing members of their elite force. Eventually Sabretooth gets to Logan's woman and apparently kills her. Logan goes crazy, they duke it out, Sabretooth buries Logan under a bunch of logs and leaves him for dead. Logan is brought in for medical treatment and Stryker's offers Logan "more pain than he'll ever endure" and he will become indestructible. Logan agrees. They sink him in a tank of water, then they inject a dozen hypodermic things into Logan. They pump adamantium into him in what is obviously a liquid metal state (ouch! hot!) and plumes of smoke and steam rise from the tank. So, the human body has over 200 bones. This liquid metal is pumped in and it automatically finds all of the little bones (except the teeth). It also bonds to the Logan's claws. In their bony state they look like sharp finger bones-- these adamantium claws come out looking like sharpened knives which is a good thing since adamantium is indestructible and cannot be sharpened. That's one of those great comic book moments where reality doesn't enter into the equation. Within moments, Wolverine escapes and runs naked to a nearby farm. The elderly couple (I think they may be the Kents) befriend the naked superhero-- wait, it's that another movie? Wolverine picks up his signature jacket, some clothes and a sweet motorcycle. No sooner than does he pick this up, then one of his former team mates, Agent Zero, blows apart the farmstead, with Wolverines bursting from the fireball on his new hog. He leads the helicopter on a chase in some of these ridiculous situations: the helicopter gives the sharpshooter a literal birds-eye view of Wolverine and still he can't mow him down. Wolverine tricks a hummer into crashing and taking out the helicopter. It's nice to know that there were hummers in the late 1970s/early 1980s. The chopper is a flaming twisted wreck but Wolverine can still deliver some choice words to his would-be assassin before it's all over. The very next scene, Stryker opens up a box with a special pistol and eight adamantium bullets-- the only thing that can penetrate Wolverine's new metallic skull. Do you think he could have handed over that box to the sharpshooter, Agent Zero? Does Stryker think he can kill Wolverine? No-- his plan is to shoot Wolverine in the head and give him amnesia. That's actually his plan.
Wolverine teams up with Wraith (Will I Am) and they go to New Orleans to find the only man who ever escaped Stryker's clutches: a super lucky superhero, Gambit (Taylor Kitsch). In the meantime, Sabretooth has tracked down Scott Summers (Cyclops) and he is taken into custody. Then Sabretooth gets to New Orleans just in time to kill of Wraith leaving his loner brother, Wolverine to go to "The Island" with the help of Gambit. The Island is Three Mile Island. I thought, "Sweet! Tie the meltdown into the events of the movie." Nope.Stryker is holding a bevvy of mutants in storage and in cells. He's also holding Wolverine's woman who faked her death to trick Wolverine into doing his life changing procedure. He is doing experiments to create a super mutant by fueling Ryan Reynolds' character with all of the best superheroes (why not just find Sylar?). The end result is Deadpool. Wolverine mounts a breakout of the mutants-- luckily Cyclops' eyes are still covered so he never breaks the continuity. When the escapees get to the surfaceProfessor X is standing there with a helicopter ready to scoop up the mutants. Back to Wolverine, he's planning on blowing up the facility, so he gets to the top of one of the cooling towers.Sabretooth comes after him. When he's done beating Sabretooth, Deadpool teleports in (he had that power in his bag of tricks). Sabretooth decides that blood is thicker than water and teams up with Wolverine to try to beat Deadpool. They eventually win by cutting his head off. In a visually stunning but stupid moment, decapitated Deadpool falls into the cooling tower his eyes beaming out Cyclops' optic blasts from his eyes cutting the tower apart and raining down destruction.Stryker has a showdown with Wolverine, shoots him with in the head and has the desired amnesia effect (swell how that works). Wolverine emerges from this with two holes in his otherwiseimpenetrable skull and a couple bullets rattling around in there. He doesn't know who he is. Wolverine has to walk the Earth in search of his carefully excised memories.
At points this movie is exciting. Any two minute period of this movie is awesome. Put a couple of those segments together and a pattern emerges: this is a bad movie with great visuals. Almost everyone iscompetent in their roles: good acting, great production values and decent direction. The problem is the script: it's peppered with logic holes, bad decisions and dialogue too lousy to put into a comic book. Writers David Benioff and Skip Woods who wrote such contenders as Hitman, Troy and similar are key to the action packed train wreck of X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
**
16 March 2009
Watchmen (2009 - Warner Brothers)
In this alternate version of our history, masked heroes have fought for justice since the 1940s. By the 1980s, masked vigilantes have been outlawed and the world is teetering on the brink of nuclear war. The superhero Dr. Manhattan emerged in 1959 with the ability to control time, space and matter. As America's champion, Dr. Manhattan has triggered an arms race vs. the Soviets. They are trying to stockpile enough weapons to counter an omnipotent superman. When one of the few sanctioned heroes, the Comedian, is killed, an outlaw hero, Rorschach, investigates. He feels that something bigger is happening: he thinks someone is hunting for masked heroes. His former comrades have retired and moved on. Rorschach tries to warn the Watchmen and probe for answers. Billionaire and former hero, AdrianVeidt , is targeted by a gunman. Dr. Manhattan is linked to several cases of cancer among his colleagues and flees the Earth in a fit of upset. Rorschach himself is set-up, arrested and put into a prison full of former enemies with scores to settle. The stage is set for Armageddon and only the Watchmen can save the world.I was awestruck by Watchmen in 1989. Alan Moore put the superhero genre on its head with such fantastic works as Miracleman and Swamp Thing. The superhero team-up was a staple of comics: Legion of Superheroes, The Avengers, The X-Men, not to mention the painfulSuperfriends . Alan Moore took these people apart, looked at what made them tick and put them back together as dysfunctional as they were heroic. It gave these characters a realism missing from most of the other comics on the shelves. I immediately thought that this would be a fantastic, butunfilmable movie-- 300+ pages of comic books could not be condensed into a single movie. I was not alone in that opinion. Hollywood played hot potato with the Watchmen project for years. Eventually it landed in the lap of Zack Snyder. Snyder was the director of 300: the graphic novel by Frank Miller. Snider made it into loud, violent, dreamlike cut-sequence of a movie; but it worked. 300 was largely shot against green screens. That helped make the dreamlike feel of 300 and it was a concern that Snyder would use the same tool set and make Watchmen closer to Sin City than Dark Knight. Thankfully, that is not the case: the movie is wonderfully gritty and dark in its tone, but vivid and alive like a four-color comic. The movie lends heavily from the comic book scenes like the panels from the comics could be onion skinned over the footage. Set in the mid-1980s, Watchmen is seeped in the culture of the day: the look, the fashions, the technology and the music. Apart from Snider's panache and the modern day aesthetic in the superhero costumes, you'd swear this movie was made in the 1985.
The Batman role of a psychopath with gadgets and a hunger for justice is split out into two key characters. Night Owl gets the cape, the gadgets and a cool cave. His character, played by Patrick Wilson, more-or-less takes up the role of the central protagonist in what is otherwise an ensemble piece. Rorschach has the tortured childhood, the Machiavellian mindset and the gravelly voice of a man who needs to be taken seriously. Jackie Earle Haley is awesome in his role. Matthew Goode plays Adrian Veidt, the billionaire wunderkind and perfect figure of humanity. The Comedian (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) populates flashbacks as a young and vicious crime-fighter; then later as a bloodthirsty dark hero on the CIA payroll; and finally as an old but powerful man. Morgan makes the character coherent-- still evil, but a little close to being understandable. The most complex and otherworldly character is Dr. Manhattan, voiced by Billy Crudup, who also was the figure for the motion capture. It's a significant disconnect that a likable everyman is the basis for glowing blue naked transcendental being. A little part of me kept thinking that Dr. Manhattan was about to say, "Cost of watch repair: $10. Intrinsic field sub-tractor: $2 billion dollars. Being able to reassemble yourself from subatomic particles: priceless." Silk Spectre I is played by Carla Gugino, who plays the mother of Silk Spectre II, played by Malin Akerman. One criticism of the original story and this adaptation is that the women fill weak roles as largely sexual objects or literal targets. Akerman's character does get to exhibit more range and more pivotal role. I don't know if this anti-feminist element could have been repaired and still keep some of the key plot points intact. In one incarnation of Watchmen, the role of Dr. Manhattan was going to be by Schwartzeneggar. Star power would have wrecked this movie. Instead they casted the players who best fit the characters from the comic as part of a chorus. In some cases, the similarity of the actors to their comic book counterparts is uncanny.
There was no way to jam every last detail from the comic into movie. The two mediums are different and nobody would want a 4 hr. version of the movie that included all of the minutiae. The ending from the comic book has been eclipsed by 20 years of stories that lended from the idea. Kept as is, it would have looked hokey. This alternative ending isn't perfect, but it's a good compromise to keep the same gist of the story resolution. I had serious doubts that this movie could have been pulled off. I was happily surprised in this film making triumph.
****
01 March 2009
Newspapers, Pennies, Cardboard & Eggs by Roger Yepsen ( Rodale, 2007)
For something that is supposed to be relaxing, gardening can be a frustrating hobby. Happily, this engaging book is full of both new and time-tested tips and advice for every gardener -- whether you are planting a few vegetables in containers or landscaping a large yard. It's just as useful to seasoned gardeners as to those just getting started.
Tips range from above-ground potato growing to deer-proofing your garden to building a rock retaining wall. All of them are written in a casual manner and most fit on a single page making it an easy book to pick up and put down or just browse through.
****
Tips range from above-ground potato growing to deer-proofing your garden to building a rock retaining wall. All of them are written in a casual manner and most fit on a single page making it an easy book to pick up and put down or just browse through.
****
27 February 2009
My personal taste in music.
We don't often post music reviews here but if you are interested in seeing the kind of music I listen to, I've posted a list of 25 albums that influenced me on my personal blog, Flotsam & Jetsam.
The list includes these albums:
The list includes these albums:
07 February 2009
Coraline in 3D (Focus/Laika/Alliance 2009)
Coraline is a young girl whose parents always seem to be too busy for her. To make matters worse, she is stuck living in an old house with strange neighbours in the adjoined suites. Having just moved in, her mother suggests that she passes the time unpacking; her father absently suggests that she explore the new house, counting all the windows and doors. She decides to do the latter which leads to the discovery of a strange, locked door in the front room. When she unlocks it, she finds only a brick wall on the other side.
Later, however, the door opens to quite a different place, a place that is familiar and yet, better. Her "other" parents dote on her and make sure she is always happy. She is confused but happy and has no idea at first how much is really at risk.
Coraline is based on the best-selling book by Neil Gaiman. While the plot stays fairly true to the original text, additional characters have been added to explain things which, in the book, were left to the reader to figure out. Happily, though, the movie is just as tense and scary as the book -- scary enough that many reviewers are suggesting it is not suitable for young children. Our not-quite-8 year-old accompanied us, however, and loved it but we also took her to see Tim Burton's Corpse Bride in the theatre at age 5.
Technically, Coraline is a wonder to watch. Filmed in stop-motion animation on sets filled with hand-crafted wonders, there is far too much in each scene to take in during a single viewing. Coraline is also being released in 3D format (which we saw) which can be a bit disorienting but is a good fit for this movie. I will admit that I am not a huge fan of 3D as a rule but it is used well here, giving dimension to her world rather than making the audience jump.
Often, animated films depend on good vocal performances and the actors here did a fine job. Terri Hatcher was ideally cast as the mother/other mother and what the other mother turns into and Spink and Forcible were played perfectly by Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders.
Overall, this film is well-worth seeing on the big screen. It may scare small children but most will be fine and a few may even want to read the book which I highly recommend.
****
Later, however, the door opens to quite a different place, a place that is familiar and yet, better. Her "other" parents dote on her and make sure she is always happy. She is confused but happy and has no idea at first how much is really at risk.
Coraline is based on the best-selling book by Neil Gaiman. While the plot stays fairly true to the original text, additional characters have been added to explain things which, in the book, were left to the reader to figure out. Happily, though, the movie is just as tense and scary as the book -- scary enough that many reviewers are suggesting it is not suitable for young children. Our not-quite-8 year-old accompanied us, however, and loved it but we also took her to see Tim Burton's Corpse Bride in the theatre at age 5.
Technically, Coraline is a wonder to watch. Filmed in stop-motion animation on sets filled with hand-crafted wonders, there is far too much in each scene to take in during a single viewing. Coraline is also being released in 3D format (which we saw) which can be a bit disorienting but is a good fit for this movie. I will admit that I am not a huge fan of 3D as a rule but it is used well here, giving dimension to her world rather than making the audience jump.
Often, animated films depend on good vocal performances and the actors here did a fine job. Terri Hatcher was ideally cast as the mother/other mother and what the other mother turns into and Spink and Forcible were played perfectly by Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders.
Overall, this film is well-worth seeing on the big screen. It may scare small children but most will be fine and a few may even want to read the book which I highly recommend.
****
14 November 2008
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time begins with a murder but not the usual kind; the victim is a dog. Christopher, who lives across the street, decides he wants to find out who killed the dog but Christopher is not your average fifteen year old either. He is unable to read people's emotions, is easily overwhelmed by sensations and information, and does not like brown or yellow foods. He goes to a special school, too, where his instructor encourages him to write a book about his search for the person who killed the dog.
I tried to describe this book to someone who had never heard of it and the closest comparison I could make was that it read like one of those small British character-driven films. It doesn't necessarily go anywhere, it just puts the reader into the protagonist's shoes for a while.
Readers who are bored by math and physics may want to steer clear of this one as Christopher uses math to clear his head and as a result several chapters outline some famous and not-so-famous math problems. There is also some very strong language used in the book, so parents who worry about that may not want to offer this one to younger teens.
Cautions aside, Curious is a challenging, touching, and ultimately sweet book that is suitable not just for teens and young adults but also for grownups.
****
I tried to describe this book to someone who had never heard of it and the closest comparison I could make was that it read like one of those small British character-driven films. It doesn't necessarily go anywhere, it just puts the reader into the protagonist's shoes for a while.
Readers who are bored by math and physics may want to steer clear of this one as Christopher uses math to clear his head and as a result several chapters outline some famous and not-so-famous math problems. There is also some very strong language used in the book, so parents who worry about that may not want to offer this one to younger teens.
Cautions aside, Curious is a challenging, touching, and ultimately sweet book that is suitable not just for teens and young adults but also for grownups.
****
12 October 2008
TV worth watching again and again
Some television shows are worth watching more than once and some can be enjoyed many viewings later. Comedies tend to hold up best -- from classics like I Love Lucy to more recent hits like Seinfeld to British imports like Fawlty Towers -- but sci-fi shows have a place in many collections, too.
Here's five shows no collection should be without and a couple of personal faves thrown into the mix:
1. Firefly. Cancelled before it's time, this sci-fi/space western works on many levels -- it has action, drama, mystery, a little romance and lots of comedy. Buy the complete series on DVD; if you like it, you'll also want to get Serenity, the feature film released after the show's cancellation.
2. Fawlty Towers. Join Basil Fawlty (John Cleese) as he tries to run a hotel in Torquay. There's only a dozen episodes but each one is laugh-out-loud funny. Buy the complete series on DVD; if you like it, you may also want to get A Fish Called Wanda which has nothing to do with Fawlty Towers except that it features one of Cleese's finest comedic turns.
3. Arrested Development. Possibly the most dysfunctional family ever brought to the screen, the Bluths lack ethics, business sense, common sense, and common decency, but they do stick together. Buy Season 1, Season 2 and Season 3 on DVD.
4. The Office. As funny as the British original was, the American remake starring Steve Carrell is even funnier. If you've ever had to do time in a white collar ghetto, this show will make you cringe with some of the close-to-home moments and laugh at the over-the-top antics. Get started with Seasons 1-4 collected on DVD.
5. How I Met Your Mother. If you laughed with Friends in the 90s, you owe it to yourself to check out the most recent group of twenty-something New Yorkers to yuk-it-up on the small screen. While the whole cast is solid, Neil Patrick Harris regularly steals the scene as the womanizing Barney. Season 4 just started in fall 2008 but you can get up to speed with Season 1, Season 2 and Season 3 on DVD.
6. Blackadder. Everyone I know who likes this Britcom has a favourite season; the same cast surround a character named Edmund Blackadder (Rowan Atkinson) during the Middle Ages, the Elizabethan Era, Regency England and the First World War. Buy the complete series on DVD.
7. Battlestar Galactica. It amazes me that the seed of a bad seventies space opera could be reimagined into one of the grittiest most politically charged dramas in recent years. Miles away from the original, if you've steered clear of this for it's name association, forget all that and go buy the series: Season One, Seasons 2.0 and 2.5, Season Three and while you're at it, you may want to add Razor, the 2-hour movie/episode that tells the tale of the Pegasus.
8. Doctor Who. Another reborn sci-fi series, the most recent incarnation of this classic features better effects and a great cast with plenty of creepy aliens, robots and time-travel quandries. My only hesitation in recommending this great series its cost -- usually over $100 per season. Buy the Complete First and Second Series, Third Series, and Fourth Series on DVD.
Here's five shows no collection should be without and a couple of personal faves thrown into the mix:
1. Firefly. Cancelled before it's time, this sci-fi/space western works on many levels -- it has action, drama, mystery, a little romance and lots of comedy. Buy the complete series on DVD; if you like it, you'll also want to get Serenity, the feature film released after the show's cancellation.
2. Fawlty Towers. Join Basil Fawlty (John Cleese) as he tries to run a hotel in Torquay. There's only a dozen episodes but each one is laugh-out-loud funny. Buy the complete series on DVD; if you like it, you may also want to get A Fish Called Wanda which has nothing to do with Fawlty Towers except that it features one of Cleese's finest comedic turns.
3. Arrested Development. Possibly the most dysfunctional family ever brought to the screen, the Bluths lack ethics, business sense, common sense, and common decency, but they do stick together. Buy Season 1, Season 2 and Season 3 on DVD.
4. The Office. As funny as the British original was, the American remake starring Steve Carrell is even funnier. If you've ever had to do time in a white collar ghetto, this show will make you cringe with some of the close-to-home moments and laugh at the over-the-top antics. Get started with Seasons 1-4 collected on DVD.
5. How I Met Your Mother. If you laughed with Friends in the 90s, you owe it to yourself to check out the most recent group of twenty-something New Yorkers to yuk-it-up on the small screen. While the whole cast is solid, Neil Patrick Harris regularly steals the scene as the womanizing Barney. Season 4 just started in fall 2008 but you can get up to speed with Season 1, Season 2 and Season 3 on DVD.
6. Blackadder. Everyone I know who likes this Britcom has a favourite season; the same cast surround a character named Edmund Blackadder (Rowan Atkinson) during the Middle Ages, the Elizabethan Era, Regency England and the First World War. Buy the complete series on DVD.
7. Battlestar Galactica. It amazes me that the seed of a bad seventies space opera could be reimagined into one of the grittiest most politically charged dramas in recent years. Miles away from the original, if you've steered clear of this for it's name association, forget all that and go buy the series: Season One, Seasons 2.0 and 2.5, Season Three and while you're at it, you may want to add Razor, the 2-hour movie/episode that tells the tale of the Pegasus.
8. Doctor Who. Another reborn sci-fi series, the most recent incarnation of this classic features better effects and a great cast with plenty of creepy aliens, robots and time-travel quandries. My only hesitation in recommending this great series its cost -- usually over $100 per season. Buy the Complete First and Second Series, Third Series, and Fourth Series on DVD.
27 September 2008
Ten Favourite Movies made Before I was Born
You'll notice some "great" movies missing from this list -- such as Citizen Kane -- and while there are many older movies I appreciate, I can't watch them over and over like the ten here. These are movies I have seen multiple times and that I still love to watch; I've numbered them, but they are not necessarily in order:
1. The Wizard of Oz (1939). Yes, it's cheezy and melodramatic and kitchy, but I still watch it at least once a year. A few years ago, I saw it at Cinecenta -- the first time I had watched it in a darkened theatre on a full-size screen and the tornado sequence was so much more frightening! If you've never seen it on the big screen, I highly recommend tracking it down at a repertoire theatre.
2. The Apartment (1960). This film was full of surprises for me and, while it is very dated now, it's somehow still relevant. I think this was the first Billy Wilder film I saw and certainly the first time I had seen Fred MacMurray in a darker role (I was used to seeing him on My Three Sons and in Disney films). I also finally understood why Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine were stars.
3. The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951). Sure, Gort looks pretty non-threatening to today's viewers, but the brilliance in this film is the script. It's solid sci-fi and serves as a great overview of Cold War paranoia.
4. The Italian Job (1969). OK, so this was technically released the year I was born, but I'm confident that it was made before I was born and there's no way I would have seen it in the theatre. There is so much brilliance in this film -- Michael Caine is in fine form, the sequence with the Minis was brilliantly coordinated, and the ending? That's just movie gold. The "remake" from 2003 is a pathetic shadow of this movie and should be avoided at all costs.
5. The Odd Couple (1968). I never watched the TV show so I only begrudgingly bothered to watch this film the first time around. Turns out, it's hilarious and I frequently quote the characters. Full credit has to be given to Neil Simon's screenplay at the core of this film but also to the great performances by the lead and supporting cast.
6. Pillow Talk (1959). Possibly the finest example of a screwball romantic comedy with Rock Hudson and Doris Day giving some of their best performances. If you liked Down With Love, this movie is required viewing -- several scenes are almost shot-for-shot in homage; the reverse is also true!
7. The Desk Set (1957) Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn spar when a computer is introduced into the fact-checking department at a newspaper. Librarians are still facing off against Google and this movie still makes me giggle for that reason.
8. Mr. Blandings Builds his Dream House (1948). Every time we consider building a house, this movie runs through my head. Cary Grant has an intense job with an ad agency and an apartment full of women so they decide to buy a house in the country. Turns out the house is falling down so they decide to build-to-suit. Despite the laughably low prices for real estate and construction and the rather offensive caricature that is Gussie, the family housekeeper, this movie is very watchable and very funny.
9. Singing in the Rain (1952). I don't consider myself a fan of musicals, but this is the second one on my list. Debbie Reynolds sparkles and Donald O'Connor cracks me up every time plus it contains some of the most recognizable Hollywood musical songs.
10. Rope (1948). Really tough call between this one and Rear Window (1954); both feature James Stewart in strong Hitchcock films but Rope is just that much darker and that much more masterful. Actually, they make a good double feature if you can handle the tension!
1. The Wizard of Oz (1939). Yes, it's cheezy and melodramatic and kitchy, but I still watch it at least once a year. A few years ago, I saw it at Cinecenta -- the first time I had watched it in a darkened theatre on a full-size screen and the tornado sequence was so much more frightening! If you've never seen it on the big screen, I highly recommend tracking it down at a repertoire theatre.
2. The Apartment (1960). This film was full of surprises for me and, while it is very dated now, it's somehow still relevant. I think this was the first Billy Wilder film I saw and certainly the first time I had seen Fred MacMurray in a darker role (I was used to seeing him on My Three Sons and in Disney films). I also finally understood why Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine were stars.
3. The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951). Sure, Gort looks pretty non-threatening to today's viewers, but the brilliance in this film is the script. It's solid sci-fi and serves as a great overview of Cold War paranoia.
4. The Italian Job (1969). OK, so this was technically released the year I was born, but I'm confident that it was made before I was born and there's no way I would have seen it in the theatre. There is so much brilliance in this film -- Michael Caine is in fine form, the sequence with the Minis was brilliantly coordinated, and the ending? That's just movie gold. The "remake" from 2003 is a pathetic shadow of this movie and should be avoided at all costs.
5. The Odd Couple (1968). I never watched the TV show so I only begrudgingly bothered to watch this film the first time around. Turns out, it's hilarious and I frequently quote the characters. Full credit has to be given to Neil Simon's screenplay at the core of this film but also to the great performances by the lead and supporting cast.
6. Pillow Talk (1959). Possibly the finest example of a screwball romantic comedy with Rock Hudson and Doris Day giving some of their best performances. If you liked Down With Love, this movie is required viewing -- several scenes are almost shot-for-shot in homage; the reverse is also true!
7. The Desk Set (1957) Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn spar when a computer is introduced into the fact-checking department at a newspaper. Librarians are still facing off against Google and this movie still makes me giggle for that reason.
8. Mr. Blandings Builds his Dream House (1948). Every time we consider building a house, this movie runs through my head. Cary Grant has an intense job with an ad agency and an apartment full of women so they decide to buy a house in the country. Turns out the house is falling down so they decide to build-to-suit. Despite the laughably low prices for real estate and construction and the rather offensive caricature that is Gussie, the family housekeeper, this movie is very watchable and very funny.
9. Singing in the Rain (1952). I don't consider myself a fan of musicals, but this is the second one on my list. Debbie Reynolds sparkles and Donald O'Connor cracks me up every time plus it contains some of the most recognizable Hollywood musical songs.
10. Rope (1948). Really tough call between this one and Rear Window (1954); both feature James Stewart in strong Hitchcock films but Rope is just that much darker and that much more masterful. Actually, they make a good double feature if you can handle the tension!
17 August 2008
X Saves the World by Jeff Gordinier (Viking Press 2008)
Jeff Gordinier is unflinching in X Saves the World: How Generation X Got the Shaft but Can Skill Keep Everything from Sucking. The book is as much a call to action for Generation X as it is a rant about the generations between which it is sandwiched -- the ubiquitous Boomers and the up-and-coming Millennials (aka Generation Y).
Gordinier echoes demographers' arguments about the parameters of Generation X while adding another level by suggesting, via Douglas Coupland, that Generation X is as much a mindset as a birthdate. He is also careful to admit that he is making broad generalizations throughout the book and that being born during a given year does not automatically make one fall into step with everyone else born that year.
That said, no matter how you slice the Gen X pie, I fall squarely into the demographic both by birth and by attitude. I'm not sure how non-Xers would react to this book; likely call us all whiners and write it off as more gloom but the crazy thing is, there's a lot of hope in this book. It feels a lot like the end of V for Vendetta; I won't spoil the ending but I left the theatre feeling an overwhelming sense that change -- real change -- was achievable.
There were sections I skimmed -- personally, I could care less about Nirvana but Gordinier hangs an awful lot of his book on the impact of both "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and also on Kurt Cobain's suicide. I also skimmed Gordinier's take on the Poetry Bus -- something I had never heard of prior to this book and will not bother to research further.
On the other hand, I reveled in his descriptions of the internet boom and bust, about the movies and the directors who speak for and to our generation, and about Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart who brought Generation X's brand of subversive humour to the main stage.
Throughout X Saves the World, I found myself laughing ("By 1999 a fecal tide of suckitude, suckness, and suckronicity was upon us..."1), nodding (oh, yeah, I have definitely encountered the "grey ceiling"), and making note of suggested ways I could help keep my world from sucking.
****
------------
1 Introduction, p. xxiv
Gordinier echoes demographers' arguments about the parameters of Generation X while adding another level by suggesting, via Douglas Coupland, that Generation X is as much a mindset as a birthdate. He is also careful to admit that he is making broad generalizations throughout the book and that being born during a given year does not automatically make one fall into step with everyone else born that year.
That said, no matter how you slice the Gen X pie, I fall squarely into the demographic both by birth and by attitude. I'm not sure how non-Xers would react to this book; likely call us all whiners and write it off as more gloom but the crazy thing is, there's a lot of hope in this book. It feels a lot like the end of V for Vendetta; I won't spoil the ending but I left the theatre feeling an overwhelming sense that change -- real change -- was achievable.
There were sections I skimmed -- personally, I could care less about Nirvana but Gordinier hangs an awful lot of his book on the impact of both "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and also on Kurt Cobain's suicide. I also skimmed Gordinier's take on the Poetry Bus -- something I had never heard of prior to this book and will not bother to research further.
On the other hand, I reveled in his descriptions of the internet boom and bust, about the movies and the directors who speak for and to our generation, and about Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart who brought Generation X's brand of subversive humour to the main stage.
Throughout X Saves the World, I found myself laughing ("By 1999 a fecal tide of suckitude, suckness, and suckronicity was upon us..."1), nodding (oh, yeah, I have definitely encountered the "grey ceiling"), and making note of suggested ways I could help keep my world from sucking.
****
------------
1 Introduction, p. xxiv
09 August 2008
Clone Wars: My take on the latest from a Galaxy Far Far Away
I thought I could super-spoiler the Clone Wars movie or I could do a review. I did both.
Clone Wars is aimed at the Kiddie Set. Instead of the scroll that we've seen at least six times before (several video games in the license have used this too), we get a cheezy news reel narration. Instead of subtitling Jabba, people react and his protocol droid occasionally steps in. Rather than aim for the kid-lit crowd, Clone Wars aims for pre-lit crowd. While all of theSepartist gizmos (robots, vehicles, weapons) are on parade; the Republic side is sparse: Clone Troopers, Navy, a few Jedi and Padme for good measure. A nice small cast that even a six-year old could remember (that's handy for when they go intoToys'R'Us the next day). There is a real video game feel to this movie. It feels like you have a bunch of challenges to overcome: some fighting based, some logic based. If a video game isn't imminent, it could be knocked off in a weekend by pulling CGI models, clips for cut sequences and a couple of light saber shaped health meters. At times, I think I saw my score climbing as I watched the film.
The fight scenes are amazing-- on par with any of the movies. The movie is high on action, low on plodding political intrigue. The movie feels like the 2-D TV series of shorts, popped into the third dimension-- almost like thatSimpsons Halloween episode where Homer gets pulled into the third dimension. In an interesting budget-saving device: holograms are used very frequently. I have to think that is for economy: why render a character in all of their shades, when you can just draw them in shades of blue. While the foreground characters have that animation detail doled on them, background characters look like they're just being dragged across the background by some intern who thinks his days at Skywalker Ranch are numbered.
The soundtrack of Star Wars is memorable. My daughter hums the Imperial March. The symphonic feel of the music is gone. Tiny snippets of John Williams-esque music can be heard. In its place, the drum, string, flute melodies that are close to the incidental music from the Battlestar Galactica TV series. As this is not a Fox joint, but a Warner Brothers release: I have to wonder what was tied up in legal tangles and could not be moved out from the clenches of Rupert Murdoch.
Almost the whole voice cast are animation people or up-and-coming actors. Samuel L. Jackson and Christopher Lee voice Mace Windu and Dooku respectively (keep getting thosepaycheques, boys). Ahsoka Tano is voiced by Ashley Eckstein who fits the voice to the role. She has that aggravating quality that kids will find endearing. What is "fun" (I cannot believe I am about to write this): the troopers are extra New Zealand-y. BecauseJango Fett was originally voiced by Temuera Morrison, Clone Troopers have that accent-- I was expecting them to say, "Load up the Lorry, we're off to the beach, mates!" It worked. You can tell that the Troopers get bored on those trips through hyperspace; and they're tired of saying "No, I'm Trooper-3263827-- you're thinking of Trooper-03003817659." They're all sporting different haircuts (colors and styles)-- again a nice touch-- as a clone with 10,000,000 copies of me wandering around I would like likely try to make myself look a little unique.
All-in-all: this movie is for the pre-teen set, die-hard super obsessed fans and people who like decent animation. Please park yourstormtrooper outfit at the door-- you won't be able to sit down and you'll delay the start of the movie, you geek.
Clone Wars is aimed at the Kiddie Set. Instead of the scroll that we've seen at least six times before (several video games in the license have used this too), we get a cheezy news reel narration. Instead of subtitling Jabba, people react and his protocol droid occasionally steps in. Rather than aim for the kid-lit crowd, Clone Wars aims for pre-lit crowd. While all of theSepartist gizmos (robots, vehicles, weapons) are on parade; the Republic side is sparse: Clone Troopers, Navy, a few Jedi and Padme for good measure. A nice small cast that even a six-year old could remember (that's handy for when they go intoToys'R'Us the next day). There is a real video game feel to this movie. It feels like you have a bunch of challenges to overcome: some fighting based, some logic based. If a video game isn't imminent, it could be knocked off in a weekend by pulling CGI models, clips for cut sequences and a couple of light saber shaped health meters. At times, I think I saw my score climbing as I watched the film.
The fight scenes are amazing-- on par with any of the movies. The movie is high on action, low on plodding political intrigue. The movie feels like the 2-D TV series of shorts, popped into the third dimension-- almost like thatSimpsons Halloween episode where Homer gets pulled into the third dimension. In an interesting budget-saving device: holograms are used very frequently. I have to think that is for economy: why render a character in all of their shades, when you can just draw them in shades of blue. While the foreground characters have that animation detail doled on them, background characters look like they're just being dragged across the background by some intern who thinks his days at Skywalker Ranch are numbered.
The soundtrack of Star Wars is memorable. My daughter hums the Imperial March. The symphonic feel of the music is gone. Tiny snippets of John Williams-esque music can be heard. In its place, the drum, string, flute melodies that are close to the incidental music from the Battlestar Galactica TV series. As this is not a Fox joint, but a Warner Brothers release: I have to wonder what was tied up in legal tangles and could not be moved out from the clenches of Rupert Murdoch.
Almost the whole voice cast are animation people or up-and-coming actors. Samuel L. Jackson and Christopher Lee voice Mace Windu and Dooku respectively (keep getting thosepaycheques, boys). Ahsoka Tano is voiced by Ashley Eckstein who fits the voice to the role. She has that aggravating quality that kids will find endearing. What is "fun" (I cannot believe I am about to write this): the troopers are extra New Zealand-y. BecauseJango Fett was originally voiced by Temuera Morrison, Clone Troopers have that accent-- I was expecting them to say, "Load up the Lorry, we're off to the beach, mates!" It worked. You can tell that the Troopers get bored on those trips through hyperspace; and they're tired of saying "No, I'm Trooper-3263827-- you're thinking of Trooper-03003817659." They're all sporting different haircuts (colors and styles)-- again a nice touch-- as a clone with 10,000,000 copies of me wandering around I would like likely try to make myself look a little unique.
All-in-all: this movie is for the pre-teen set, die-hard super obsessed fans and people who like decent animation. Please park yourstormtrooper outfit at the door-- you won't be able to sit down and you'll delay the start of the movie, you geek.
Clone Wars : The Plot in all its Spoiler Glory
Highlight to read: almost all of this post is a spoiler:The film opens with the familiar "Long Time Ago... In a Galaxy Far Far Away..." and then jumps into the action: a montage of the Clone Troopers battling the Separatists. It turns out that the Outer Rim territories where the Kamino cloning facilities where is cut off from the Republic, so there is a shortage of Troopers. TheHutt clan (led by Jabba the Hutt) controls the shipping in the Outer Rim. Someone has kidnapped the Hutt's son. Jabba The Hutt makes a plea to Chancellor Palpatine for aid-- somehow a giant slug at the rim of the galaxy has the leader of a trillion people on speed-dial. Palpatine ask Mace Windu and Yoda for help. As luck would have it, they have two Jedi available: Obi-wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker. They are on the planet "Christophsis" having won out against the robot armies-- but communications have been broken. They relay a message to a Republic fleet at a staging area. In a geek-treat moment, we get to see Republic Navy officers-- somewhere on the evolutionary path towards the Imperial Navy. It turns out that Christophsis has not been secured. Anakin and Obi-wan need to lead their diminishing number of troopers vs. the robots. The droids are led by Whorm Loathsom, who looks the love child of Watto and a tusked-boar. A great battle ensues with heavy casualties on both sides. The robots fall back in time for a Republic transport to land and deposit a special messenger, a young Torgruta girl, Asoka Tano. It turns out she is an apprentice-- a padawan-- for Anakin Skywalker. The Jedi council decided that the irreverent Asoka is a match for the irreverent Skywalker. The robot army has fallen back to deploy a massive shield-- an expanding hemisphere that keeps the droids safe at they advance. Skywalker hatches a genius plan.
He and Asoka hide under a box in the path of the force field. When the army and field overtake then, they are safely behind enemy lines. While on her first day on the job, she and Skywalker sneak to the shield generator. They plant explosives. They trigger a number of barrel like droids that battle the two Jedi. In a page from Buster Keaton, Asoka uses the force to bring down a wall on the droids surrounding Anakin, leaving him safe in the hole in the wall. Meanwhile, back at the battle, the troopers have been picked off. Kenobi is surrounded and surrenders. He tricks Whorm Loathsom into negotiating the terms of the Republic surrender. This a ploy to kill time so that Anakin and Asoka can bring down the shield and luckily so that Yoda and re-enforcements can arrive. Almost instantly, they start using nicknames for one another: "Snips" and "Skyguy" (guess which is which).Yoda instructs Anakin and Asoka to find and rescue the Huttling. Kenobi goes to bargain with Jabba the Hutt. Rotta the Hutt is held by Asajj Ventress, pupil of Dooku. Whoever designed Ventress for this film came off of an Angelina Jolie binge (bee-sting lips, sultry voice).
I was expecting Ventress to admit that this wasn't a kidnapping, but a botched adoption, then try to adopt Asoka. She is holed-up on PlanetTeff in a Bohmarr Monastery (man, I bet those walking hookas are regretting never getting door-lock or firearm technology perfected-- it seems like everyone loves to take them over and move in). Helping her is an assortment of droids and a weaselly droid, 4A-7. The Republic forces go to Teff. The monastery is high on a butte; so the Jedi and troopers have to mount a vertical assault-- it makes for a great visual. The droids-- largely B1 droids-- are defaulting the monastery courtyard. They are amazingly stupid-- almost Jar-Jar stupid. At the top, Anakin mows down most of the remaining droids and leaves the troopers to mop up. 4A-7 comes out and feigns gratitude for the rescue. Anakin and Asoka go into the monastery to the detention level [a) Why does a monastery have a detention level? Do people pepper their quiet contemplation with assault and battery? b) I want a detention level!]; they know it's a trap. They dispatch some very dumb B1 droids and make it to the cell where Hutt's baby boy, Rotta. I was thinking this would be a douche-bag heir apparent of Jabba. Instead, it's an infant: a bowling ball with arms, a tail and a maw. Rotta is sick, adding to the urgency of getting him back to his parents-- of course I say "parents" but in sci-fi tradition, there is no sign of Momma the Hutt-- underlining that popular premise that females are there to be dying mothers, spunky hard-to-get-girlfriends or marketing ploys. For Ventress and Dooku, this is all part of the trap. They want to frame the Jedi for the death of Rotta. The droid army springs out of hiding (how is it that the security staff on my way in to see this movie could scan me for the presence of a camera; but the Republic forces cannot scan a planet for robots?) and attack the Clone Troopers. Anakin, R2 and Asoka find a way down to a secret launch pad. Once down there, Ventress pounces on them and the droids attack. They need to escape, but they don't have a ride. Beneath the landing pad is a nest of giant 10 meter long dragon-fly-type insects. Asoka spies a ship on a nearby landing pad on another butte. Senator Amidala comes into the Chancellor's office to discover that Anakin will be doomed if the Hutts think the Jedi betrayed them. She asks to plead with Jabba directly and Palpatine is against the idea. She suggests that she talks to Ziro TheHutt who live in Coruscant (in the "Old Town" sector-- on a city that covers a whole planet, what is that? Is Old Town the size of Europe?). She goes down to this place that looks like a speakeasy-- with a Thith band doing Swing music. Ziro: he's sort of a cross between Jabba theHutt and Truman Capote, with body tattoos compliments of Prince. Amidala pleads her case and Ziro promises to take it to Jabba. Before she leaves, she spots that one of Ziro's droids is armed with a B1 issue blaster. She dashes back to Ziro's room to overhear theHutt and Dooku (who is popping in via hologram) scheme to kill Jabba the Hutt , kill Amidala and let Ziro take over control of the Hutts (--Fab-Ulous!--). She is taken prisoner. B1 droids (aka the "Jar-Jar-Droid" line) trigger here hologram and up pops C-3PO. She calls for his help. Later, near the climax of the story, C-3PO and a squad of Clone Troopers rescue Amidala and capture Ziro.
Anakin and company get their Spice freighter jalopy on course for Tatooine (two questions here: Do people ship anything but Spice? How can Tatooine be a backwater but show up in six out of seven movies?). On Tattooine, Anakinet cetera are attacked by Dooku's droids. They make a crash landing and trek across the Dune Sea to Jabba's Palace. In the meantime, Dooku has whitewashed the Jedi involvement, convincing theHutt that the Jedi have already killed his son.
They formulate a cunning plan: Anakin with a Huttling sized backpack treks into the snare of Count Dooku. They get into a heated battle (if you've seen Revenge of the Sith, you know how this battle has to end). It turns out that the Jedi pulled a fast one. Asoka actually has the Huttling. She encounters three of Dooku's bodyguard droids and fights them. Somehow the plucky apprentice wins versus them. Anakin makes it to Jabba theHutt . He falls into the trap that Dooku has set up. A moment later, Asoka and the Huttling show up. The Hutts a re reunited. Jabba still wants to kill the Jedi (good idea-- Anakin's daughter will eventually do him in). Intervention by Amidala and a confessional Ziro (Fab-Ulous!) changes his viewpoint and he both sets the Jedi free and agrees to allow Republic access through his shipping lanes in the Outer Rim.All ends well and I'm sure there are more adventures to come (wink wink).
20 April 2008
Sublime Stitching and Subversive Seamster
Crafting and DIY culture is all the rage these days and there are plenty of books to support emerging and weathered crafters; this is a review of two of those books.
First up is Sublime Stitching: Hundreds of Hip Embroidery Patterns and How-To by Jenny Hart (Chronicle Books, 2006). Embroidery is the craft-of-the-moment and every indie crafter worth her salt has been jumping on that bandwagon. I learned basic embroidery way back in eighth grade and have been improving on my skills ever since. I picked up Sublime Stitching thinking it might help me bring my skills up to date since the book I usually reference was written in 1956. Alas, that old book is infinitely more useful than Sublime Stitching which is primarily a book of patterns rather than a reference -- there are only 48 pages of text (including the index and photos) and the remaining leaves are patterns.
I can't even admit to being very inspired by Jenny Hart's designs, but I suppose for someone who can't draw, they would be useful as guides. Personally, I am happy that I took this book out of the library rather than purchase it but only because my skill level seems to exceed that of Sublime Stitching's intended audience.
Next up is Subversive Seamster: Transform thrift store threads into street couture by Melissa Alvarado, Hope Meng and Melissa Rannels (Taunton Press, 2007) which is on the other end of the inspirational scale. With increasing media emphasis on going green Subversive Seamster's message of repurposing thrift store clothing merges the green and DIY/craft movements.
While there are some projects I would never attempt (there is no way at my age that I would wear a skirt made from a football jersey), others (like the bottle wrap made from a sweater sleeve) are no-brainers. The real message of Subversive Seamster however, is that with a little planning, you can make wearable clothing and useful accessories out of even the ghastliest of thrift-store cast-offs; the authors really empower the reader to think outside the seams and get creative.
If you are a needlecrafter, I heartily recommend Subversive Seamster, but only beginners should pick up Sublime Stitching.
Sublime Stitching : **
Subversive Seamster: ****
First up is Sublime Stitching: Hundreds of Hip Embroidery Patterns and How-To by Jenny Hart (Chronicle Books, 2006). Embroidery is the craft-of-the-moment and every indie crafter worth her salt has been jumping on that bandwagon. I learned basic embroidery way back in eighth grade and have been improving on my skills ever since. I picked up Sublime Stitching thinking it might help me bring my skills up to date since the book I usually reference was written in 1956. Alas, that old book is infinitely more useful than Sublime Stitching which is primarily a book of patterns rather than a reference -- there are only 48 pages of text (including the index and photos) and the remaining leaves are patterns.
I can't even admit to being very inspired by Jenny Hart's designs, but I suppose for someone who can't draw, they would be useful as guides. Personally, I am happy that I took this book out of the library rather than purchase it but only because my skill level seems to exceed that of Sublime Stitching's intended audience.
Next up is Subversive Seamster: Transform thrift store threads into street couture by Melissa Alvarado, Hope Meng and Melissa Rannels (Taunton Press, 2007) which is on the other end of the inspirational scale. With increasing media emphasis on going green Subversive Seamster's message of repurposing thrift store clothing merges the green and DIY/craft movements.
While there are some projects I would never attempt (there is no way at my age that I would wear a skirt made from a football jersey), others (like the bottle wrap made from a sweater sleeve) are no-brainers. The real message of Subversive Seamster however, is that with a little planning, you can make wearable clothing and useful accessories out of even the ghastliest of thrift-store cast-offs; the authors really empower the reader to think outside the seams and get creative.
If you are a needlecrafter, I heartily recommend Subversive Seamster, but only beginners should pick up Sublime Stitching.
Sublime Stitching : **
Subversive Seamster: ****
We're Back!
First, an apology to our readers for the very long break. We didn't forget you... we've just been busy. Hopefully in the next few weeks we can catch up on some of the many books, games, movies, and other media we've consumed since last fall.
Thanks for standing by.
Thanks for standing by.
07 November 2007
Dead in the Water (NFB/CBC 2006)
The question that director Neil Docherty asks on behalf of some of the poorest people around the world is "How can companies buy, sell and trade water, our most basic need?" Dead in the Water boils the answer down to greed, bullying, and a lot of smoke and mirrors.
I'll start by saying that I watched this during a week-long union education school, but it also aired as part of the CBC documentary series The Fifth Estate. Dead in the Water traces much of the global water trouble back to the privatization of public utilities spearheaded by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Regan in the 1980s. In most cases, water supply and sanitation are tied together in privatization deals but since sanitation provides little or no profit, it is often of little concern to private companies.
Dead in the Water asks a lot of questions and while it does provide a lot of numbers, they don't always answer the questions. On the other hand, the numbers are hard to ignore: 25 per cent of the world's population don't have access to fresh water and every 8 seconds, a child dies from a water-borne illness.
At the end of the film, it's pretty clear that the fight for public water is not over and it's not going to be easy for either side.
****
Buy Dead in the Water through the NFB (National Film Board)
I'll start by saying that I watched this during a week-long union education school, but it also aired as part of the CBC documentary series The Fifth Estate. Dead in the Water traces much of the global water trouble back to the privatization of public utilities spearheaded by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Regan in the 1980s. In most cases, water supply and sanitation are tied together in privatization deals but since sanitation provides little or no profit, it is often of little concern to private companies.
Dead in the Water asks a lot of questions and while it does provide a lot of numbers, they don't always answer the questions. On the other hand, the numbers are hard to ignore: 25 per cent of the world's population don't have access to fresh water and every 8 seconds, a child dies from a water-borne illness.
At the end of the film, it's pretty clear that the fight for public water is not over and it's not going to be easy for either side.
****
Buy Dead in the Water through the NFB (National Film Board)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
