It’s October in the Metrodome, and the Homer Hankies are back in full force. What a sight!

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IT’S ALL IN THE DETAILS, part two.

(A sporadic series of appreciations or deprecations of those little details in movies that either enhance the story or evict the viewer from it. Read Part One.)

GOOD: In the Line Of Fire. This underrated thriller stars Clint Eastwood as an aging Secret Service agent who becomes personally involved when a brilliant assassin announces his intention to kill the President of the United States. He has a love interest in another Secret Service agent played by Rene Russo. In one scene where they seduce each other, the camera tracks the movement of their feet across the hotel room carpet as they undress each other — but as they move, one by one all of those gadgets Secret Service agents carry thud to the floor. Handcuffs, their guns, their holsters, their radios, those little ear-buds that come up the back of the neck, all of it. That’s a good touch in itself, but it actually is the set-up for a joke. Eastwood and Russo have barely begun when the phone rings. It’s their boss, of course, telling them that there’s been a change in plans and they’re to report immediately. Russo jumps up and starts getting dressed, leaving Eastwood alone in bed for a second, at which point he groans, “Now I gotta put all that shit back on.”

GOOD: Die Hard. This film is actually full of good details, but two favorites of mine occur during the scene where the police are about to attempt to raid the Nakatomi Building, ignoring the protests of John McClane (Bruce Willis). As the policemen make their way through the building’s surrounding landscaping, one of them catches his hand on a bush’s thorns, and yelps, “Ouch!” Meanwhile, the bad guys prepare to receive the cops in the building’s lobby, with one of them taking his position behind a candy counter. As this guy waits for the shooting to start, he reaches into the counter and swipes a candy bar.

BAD: Die Hard 2. I love all of the Die Hard movies, but Die Hard 2 has its share of goof-ups and errors. Two of them are most notable. Early in the film, Detective McClane is in Dulles International Airport, which is in Washington, DC. He uses a payphone to call his wife on her plane (she is flying in, and he is there to pick her up). The problem with the scene is that the payphone he uses is clearly marked, “Pacific Bell”. The other bad detail in the film comes when the terrorists intentionally cause the crash of a jetliner. This is a very horrific scene, complete with a shot of the passenger cabin before the crash just so we know that this is a fully-loaded jet whose passengers are all going to die. When the plane crashes, it goes up in an immense fireball. The problem with this is that we’ve already been told that this particular plane has almost no fuel left. It simply would not make that big of an explosion upon crashing.

BAD: Air Force One. Speaking of airplanes, there’s this film which may be the most disappointing film I have ever seen, when I compare my expectations based on a description of the plot versus the finished product. Harrison Ford plays the President of the United States who must fight armed terrorists when they hijack Air Force One — how could a movie with that story go wrong? Well, I won’t list the ways in which it goes wrong here, except to note one glaring detail. Air Force One contains the single worst visual effect I have ever seen in a big-budget Hollywood movie: the final crash of Air Force One into the ocean. This effect looks every bit like the lousy piece of computer animation that it is. I am astounded that the filmmakers looked at this effect and said, “Yep, that’s good enough”.

GOOD: Pinnocchio. You have to admire a Disney film with as cheerful a dark side as this one has. The scene where the pool-shooting ruffian Lampwick metamorphosizes into a donkey is a perfect bit of horrific film-making.

BAD: The X-Files. Just how did Mulder and Scully manage to get back from the South Pole, anyway?

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Perhaps it’s a result of conditioning by reading Tolkien at an early age, but it bugs me when I encounter an imaginary-world epic fantasy with no map of its world. Such was the case with Sean Russell’s The One Kingdom, a book which I set aside the other day after it failed to really grab my attention after 90 pages or so. I’ll try it again another time; I’ve had the experience many times of bouncing off a novel only to return to it some time later — years later, even — and come to love it immensely. But the lack of a map seriously rankles, especially in a book where geographical features play an apparently important role (in this case, a river).

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For vintage fountain pen collectors, one of the most popular items is a Parker 51. These pens are noted for not just for their apparently excellent construction (I don’t own one yet myself, but I have never heard a negative comment about them) but also for their non-traditional look, in which the nib is mostly concealed under a hood. Parker 51’s are fairly easy to find, as vintage pens go, and thus they tend to be reasonably priced (again, as vintage pens go). Nevertheless, Parker 51s are once again in production. They are available at Levenger. I know that vintage 51’s can be found that are cheaper than the new model, but it’s still neat to see the return of a classic.

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Weird post-moving observation: when watching weather reports on the TV news, I still catch myself looking on the weather map to see what’s happening in Buffalo — despite the fact that I now live 130 miles east of Buffalo, which is far enough that a frontal system moving through there takes at least another two to three hours to get here. I still have to recalibrate my geographical sense of place.

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Guilty Pleasures.

From time to time it’s fun to list one’s guilty pleasures. These are things that we like, even though we know that we shouldn’t; things that we indulge in from time to time, knowing that other people will look on with dropped jaws and say, “Why on Earth are you doing that?” Here are a few of mine.

(A quick note: By my definition of “guilty pleasure”, I do not include The Phantom Menace. That’s because a guilty pleasure is something we like even though we know it’s bad. That doesn’t apply here: despite the fact that most of the world considers Phantom to be a bad movie, I do not. I don’t like it in spite of knowing that it’s bad; I like it because I genuinely believe it’s good.)

:: Ramen noodles. I’ve almost been out of college for ten years, so why am I still eating these? Not out of any sense of thrift (although you can’t beat eight-for-a-buck). No, I actually like them. It’s probably one of those food-as-memory things, because I was actually eating Ramen noodles way back when I was a kid. My father liked to eat them with a piece of rye-crisp on which he’d spread a bit of butter; you dip the buttered rye-crisp into the broth before eating. Great stuff, that. I don’t eat Ramen noodles very often — their sodium content is staggering — but I always keep a few packages around. (And there are some nifty flavors now, like “Chicken Picante”. No, it doesn’t taste particularly like chicken, but at least it’s something other than beef, pork or Oriental.)

:: Clint Eastwood’s “Philo Beddoe” movies, Every Which Way But Loose and Any Which Way You Can. How in the world did anyone conceive of these two movies? A truck-driver who is also a bare-knuckle boxer; his two best friends, one of whom is an orangutan; a beautiful country-western singer who is on the run from her abusive husband; Ruth Gordon as the foul-mouthed mother; an incompetent motorcycle gang; many a bar-room brawl; bittersweet love affairs; loads of country music. There is really no way to describe these movies in such a way that they don’t sound absurd. But damn, they’re fun.

:: Independence Day. I’ve never in my life seen a film with more plot-holes and implausibilities than this (well, except Armageddon). And yet, the thing has such a sense of goofy fun that I still have a good time every time I watch it.

:: Buffalo-style chicken wings. ‘Nuff said, I think. I doubt there’s a single food that is less healthy than these…or more perfect.

More another time….

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For me, the sweetest part of the baseball playoffs is the annual demise of the Atlanta Braves. (Except in 1995, when no one bothered to beat them.) The pleasure this year is so much the better, as their demise comes at the hands of Barry Bonds, a man whose number has been in Atlanta’s lockbox for ten years until now. I remember Bonds’s disastrous performance in the 1991 NLCS, when as a Pittsburgh Pirate he fell into such a slump that Atlanta pitchers in that series would actually walk Bobby Bonilla intentionally just to pitch to Bonds, who would then play his part by popping up to short. Then there is the pain of the 1992 NLCS, when Bonds awoke from his slump with a home run in Game Six, only to have Sid Bream — the slowest player in MLB history — beat his throw to the plate in the bottom of the ninth in Game Seven, scoring the winning run. I remember Bonds’s amazing 1993 season, when he led his new team — the Giants — to 103 regular season victories, only to see the Braves notch 104 wins and take the NL West (the two teams were division rivals at the time).

Last night, Bonds scored two runs, which was all the Giants would need (although they later added a third) to defeat the Braves in Game Five of the divisional series, thus sending the Tomahawk-chopping Atlanta fans back home to watch the Falcons and the Hawks.

So, now that the matchups in both LCS’s are set, I can actually say that it won’t bother me at all if any of the remaining teams win it all. I’m personally rooting for the Giants (and I will be forced to do so even if they play the Twins in the World Series, which will annoy a certain Minnesota sports-crazed fan I know). But it’s great to see all these underdogs stepping up to stake their claim for October glory.

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I’ve removed the permalink to Arts and Letters Daily, because that fine site has closed down due to some legal stuff apparently involving bankruptcy with the site’s owners. A&LD‘s demise is a shame. I had only recently discovered it, and now it’s gone. Ah well….

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Football, baseball, and the Meaning of Life….

:: In the voice of Paul Reiser: “That’s what I’m saying!” The Buffalo Bills’ combination of awesome offense and lousy defense finally added up to something other than overtime; instead, the Bills kept it close until the fourth quarter, when the Raiders finally blew them out. I’ve been pointing out the fact that the Bills’ defensive deficiencies are going to cost them this season, and it’s certainly coming to pass. Next offseason, the defensive side of the ball must be the first priority. There is talent on the young secondary, but like all young secondaries they really need for there to be an effective pass-rush, because these guys simply can’t play man-to-man all day and not get burned. The Bills’ pass-rush, though, is nearly nonexistent. They had one sack yesterday, and the combination of no pass-rush plus a young secondary means that the Bills are the only team in the NFL without an interception so far this year. So, they don’t make turnovers, and they don’t stop opponents….ouch. Drew Bledsoe tried to accept the blame for the defeat after the game, talking about his three interceptions, but as Butch told Sundance: “It’s the fall that’s gonna kill you!” (Still, it’s nice to see the Bills’ offensive line starting to come together. Despite giving up five sacks, Bledsoe generally had more time to make his passes — until that fourth quarter, when the entire game ended up on his shoulders.)

:: The Steelers are 1-3. And the Steelers are my pick for AFC Champion. I’m not giving them up, yet. In the “Tortured rationale as opposed to acceptance of error” department, I shall now argue that the Steelers are actually more likely to get to the Super Bowl having started 1-3, because now they are virtually guaranteed to not have home-field-advantage in the playoffs. Insane, you think? Consider, though, that in the last ten NFL seasons, the AFC team with home-field-advantage has failed to advance to the Super Bowl eight times. Home-field is the kiss of AFC playoff death, and since the Steelers won’t have it….they’re going to the Super Bowl!!

:: In the NFC, I’m still sticking with the Eagles, even though they lost a close one to Jacksonville. I’m a bit worried, though, whenever a team’s leading rusher is its quarterback — but at least McNabb had 100 yards.

:: How on earth can the Rams be this bad?! There is an expansion team that has a better record than the Rams. Amazing.

:: All through the Buffalo-Oakland game, TV commentator Randy Cross kept insisting that the Raiders are the best team in the league right now. Maybe their offense is that good, but their defense looks a bit suspect to me. It’ll be interesting to see what happens when they encounter the Chiefs’ Priest Holmes and the power-game that the Chargers are running.

:: So, in baseball, we’re down to the Twins and Angels. I’m pulling for the Twins — a certain person I know will likely kill me if I don’t — but I won’t be upset if the Angels win it, either. As for the National League, well….Lord, I hope the Giants can win. (But shouldn’t Barry Bonds have a good postseason just once in his career? Amazing….)

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Oh, wow….look at the ratings that Spirited Away is receiving over on Rotten Tomatoes. Will this movie play in Syracuse? Oh, pleasepleasepleaseplease….

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