Movies Archives - Page 21 of 34 - ForgottenStars.net

January 5, 2011October 3, 2021

“I’ve never really had a taste for this kind of thing, but I must admit I’m deeply enjoying the suit!”

Iron Man was never my favorite superhero in the Marvel Universe. Nothing against him per se, really; I suspect that this is likely due to the fact that the Iron Man comic wasn’t terribly compelling during the years I was an active reader of Marvel comics. I didn’t have all the money in the world, so I had to at least be somewhat selective with respect to the comics I was purchasing on a monthly basis, and when I occasionally tried an issue of Iron Man, I wasn’t terribly excited by it.

So that’s one reason I’m not terribly familiar with the whole backstory behind Iron Man – I know about as little about Tony Stark as one can know. In fact, when I was reading comics, Tony Stark wasn’t even Iron Man! For some reason, Stark had given up the suit, and another guy was wearing it. I don’t recall any of the background behind that. So I came into seeing Iron Man pretty much blind. All I knew, really, was that the movie is generally very highly regarded in the superhero genre.

I can certainly see why.

Iron Man is – wonder of wonders! — a superhero movie that is actually fun to watch. It employs a story that is as old as the hills, being a “Self-absorbed jerk learns a better way to live” narrative as Tony Stark realizes that maybe he can’t live with being the world’s greatest weapons manufacturer and that he has greatly misused his enormous intellectual gifts. What’s nice is that the film doesn’t dwell on Stark’s character growth; it’s there, but it doesn’t bog down the entire movie as these kinds of superhero lessons often do.

The film opens with Stark touring in Afghanistan with a company of US soldiers, but he is taken prisoner in a vicious attack and forced to build a weapon for the Afghan Taliban soldiers. (At least, I assume they’re Taliban. I’m not sure the film was entirely clear on this point.) The leader tells him, in Arabic, “Build the weapon and then I will set you free.” Another captive, who serves as translator, relates this to Stark, who mutters, “No, he won’t.” So Stark takes the raw materials he’s been given by the Afghans and builds his means of escape: an armored suit of metal that has rocket thrusters and a whole lot of flamethrowers. In other words, Stark builds his Iron Man prototype.

It’s when he returns to the US that Stark discovers that his company is not aligned with the side of the angels, and he begins work on his new, improved Iron Man suit. Thus begins some high adventure as Tony Stark realizes too late just whom he is up against.

As noted above, I give Iron Man high marks for not following along in the Dark Knightization of its superhero story; this is at its heart a light, fun adventure movie to which one can happily apply an adjective like rollicking. I have nothing against dark, grim stories that plumb the depths of human cynicism; but I do like the occasional story where a guy is a hero at least partly because he has fun being a hero.

Acting-wise, the film is top-notch; Robert Downey Jr. captures perfectly the inherent arrogance and brilliance of Tony Stark. Jeff Bridges chews lots of scenery as only he can. I always like to see Gwyneth Paltrow in stuff, flakey as she seems to be in real life. I wasn’t as totally thrilled with the Nick Fury cameo in the end credits, because as much as I loved the Marvel Universe when I was a kid reading comics, I’m not sure I’m enthusiastic about “Marvel Universalizing” the various movies they have coming out over the next few years. But that’s just me.

I’m told that Iron Man 2 is not as good as the first, but I’ll find that out for myself at some point.

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December 28, 2010October 3, 2021

Boom de ya da!

Yeah…I’m trippin’ on the classic Discovery Channel commercial again. This time I’m discovering cool parodies!

The original, for reminder’s sake:

But I didn’t know that the Discovery Channel did a newer version:

And a few take-offs….

I could listen to that friggin’ song all night. Boom de yada!

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December 15, 2010October 3, 2021

If this were a dream, there’d be rum.

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides now has an official trailer!

This excites the ever-bloomin’ crap out of me. I love, love, love the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, even the two sequels to the original, which aside from a couple of flaws I always found extremely fun and engaging (and not that hard to follow, either). I am highly excited about a fourth film of the adventures of Jack Sparrow — sorry, Captain Jack Sparrow — and I think they’re taking the right tack here, moving into a new adventure or set of adventures, now that the original story, the Will-and-Elizabeth tale, is over.

Bring me that horizon!

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December 13, 2010October 3, 2021

Every animated movie, ever. Or something like that.

I found this at Roger’s blog, and you’d better believe I’m doing it!

The Rules:

– X what you saw
– O what you haven’t finished/seen or saw sizable portions
– Bold what you loved
– Italicize what you disliked/hated
– Leave unchanged if neutral

CLASSIC DISNEY
——————————-
[X] 101 Dalmatians (1961)
[X] Alice in Wonderland (1951)
[X] Bambi (1942)
[X] Cinderella (1950)
[X] Dumbo (1941)
[X] Fantasia (1940)
[X] Lady and the Tramp (1955)
[X] Mary Poppins (1964)
[X] Peter Pan (1953)
[X] Pinocchio (1940)
[X] Sleeping Beauty (1959)
[X] Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
[X] Song of the South (1946) (Not a movie in this bunch that I don’t love, except the first two, which are OK. Even Song of the South, although when I saw it I was nine and was blissfully unaware of the racial tones. I want to see it again and find out how it holds up…but Disney refuses to release the film in the US. Peter Pan is my favorite classic Disney film, by the way.)

DISNEY’S DARK AGE
——————————-
[X] The Aristocats (1970) (It’s an OK flick, but you want to talk about some ethnic stereotyping, check out the Siamese cat. I mean…check out what happens at the 2:50 mark of this song from the movie. Whoa.)
[o] The Black Cauldron (1985)
[X] The Fox and the Hound (1981)
[X] The Great Mouse Detective (1986) (Not a bad movie. A fun adventure.)
[X] The Jungle Book (1967) (I have never liked this movie. Mainly because I can’t stand Mowgli and end up rooting for Shere Khan.)
[X] The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (1977)
[ ] Oliver and Company (1986)
[ ] Pete’s Dragon (1977)
[X] The Rescuers (1977) (I love this one, even with its 1970s era static-background, lazy animation.)
[X] Robin Hood (1973)
[ ] The Sword In The Stone (1963): Uh…Walt was still around for this one…

There’s some good stuff in here. And some not-so-good stuff.

THE DISNEY RENAISSANCE
——————————-
[X] Aladdin (1992)
[X] Beauty and the Beast (1991) (I adore both of these films. The Girlfriend (now The Wife) and I saw them in first release. We saw Aladdin five times.)
[ ] A Goofy Movie (1995)
[X] Hercules (1997)
[X] The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996) (Both of these seem terribly underrated to me.)
[X] The Lion King (1994)
[X] The Little Mermaid (1989) (And both of these seem terribly overrated to me.)
[X] Mulan (1998)
[X] Pocahontas (1995) (Both of these are just kind of “meh”. Mulan tends to be prized by film music fans because it has a score by Jerry Goldsmith. Not that good of a Goldsmith score, but there are people for whom Goldsmith can do no wrong at all.)
[X] The Rescuers Down Under (1990) (Not a bad adventure flick.)
[X] Tarzan (1999) (Love this.)

DISNEY’S MODERN AGE
——————————-
[X] Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001) (I love this one! It’s such a fun adventure story.)
[ ] Bolt (2008)
[X] Brother Bear (2003) (This could have been so much better.)
[ ] Chicken Little (2005)
[O] Dinosaur (2000) (A stunning opening sequence, followed by ninety minutes of “meh”.)
[X] The Emperor’s New Groove (2000) (Absolutely great. The Disney people were channeling the spirit of Chuck Jones on this movie.)
[X] Fantasia 2000 (2000)
[X] Home on the Range (2004)
[X] Lilo & Stitch (2002): Watched this the other day for about the fourth time, and it still holds up for me. (All fine films. Even Home on the Range, which was goofy fun.)
[ ] Meet the Robinsons (2007)
[X] Treasure Planet (2002): There’s some nifty stuff here, but the idea doesn’t work as well as it could have. Author Philip Reaves did much the same kind of thing in a series of “Victorian space operas” a few years later.)

PIXAR
——————————-
[X] A Bug’s Life (1998) Not a huge fan of this.
[X] Cars (2006) Well…I like a lot of the individual stuff in this movie, even if there’s something subtly creepy and unbelievable about the world the movie creates.
[X] Finding Nemo (2003) My favorite Pixar film.
[X] The Incredibles (2004)
[X] Monsters Inc. (2001)
[X] Ratatouille (2007)
[X] Toy Story (1995)
[X] Toy Story 2 (1999)
[ ] Toy Story 3 (2010)
[X] Wall-E (2008)
[X] Up (2009) Both of these suffered the same fault: “First-halfitis”. Wonderful first halves that were followed by conventional, dull second halves.

DON BLUTH
——————————-
[ ] All Dogs Go to Heaven (1989)
[ ] An American Tail (1986)
[ ] An American Tail: Fieval Goes West (1991)
[ ] Anastasia (1997) (Always wanted to see this one.)
[ ] The Land Before Time (1988)
[ ] The Pebble and the Penguin (1995)
[ ] Rock-a-Doodle (1991)
[X] The Secret of NIMH (1982) I love this one!
[ ] Thumbelina (1994)
[X] Titan AE (2000) This movie sure disappeared into a black hole, didn’t it? But I liked it.
[ ] A Troll in Central Park (1994)

CLAYMATION AND STOP-MOTION
——————————-
[ ] The Adventures of Mark Twain (1986)
[X] Chicken Run (2000) Just great!
[X] Corpse Bride (2005)
[X] James and the Giant Peach (1996)
[O] The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)
[ ] Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005) I desperately need to see this.
[ ] Coraline (2009) This too.

(I changed the category header here; it was just “claymation”, and that’s not true of each of these films.)

CGI GLUT
——————————-
[X] Antz (1998) I loved this, considerably more than A Bug’s Life, which came out roughly the same time.
[ ] Bee Movie (2007)
[X] Happy Feet (2006) This movie makes me want to club baby seals. I HATE it.
[X] Ice Age (2002)
[X] Ice Age: The Meltdown (2006) Love the first; the second is “meh”.
[ ] Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (2009) I’ve heard good things about this one….
[O] Kung Fu Panda (2008) I should watch the whole thing; I was kind of amused by the parts I saw.
[ ] Madagascar (2005)
[ ] Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa (2008)
[X] Monster House (2006) Fun flick.
[ ] Over the Hedge (2006)
[X] The Polar Express (2004) I love this movie…even the supposedly “dead eyes” of the characters don’t bother me. We watch this every year.
[O] Robots (2005): I liked this one more than I probably should have.
[ ] A Shark’s Tale (2004)
[X] Shrek (2001)
[X] Shrek 2 (2004)
[X] Shrek The Third (2007) Love the first, love the second even more, kinda liked the third.
[ ] Shrek Forever After (2010)
[X] Monsters vs. Aliens (2009) I liked this one more than I thought I would.

IMPORTS
——————————-
[ ] Arabian Knight (aka The Thief and the Cobbler) (1995)
[X] The Last Unicorn (1982) Love it!
[ ] Light Years (1988)
[ ] The Triplets of Belleville (2003)
[ ] Persepolis (2007) But I read the brilliant, brilliant comic.
[ ] Waltz With Bashir (2008)
[ ] Watership Down (1978)
[ ] When the Wind Blows (1988)
[ ] Wonderful Days (2003)
[ ] Yellow Submarine (1968)

Heavens, I need to see some of these!

STUDIO GHIBLI/MIYAZAKI
——————————-
[X] The Cat Returns (2002)
[ ] Grave of the Fireflies (1988) I’ve had this on DVD for six years or so and still haven’t watched it. Don’t know what I’m waiting for.
[X] Howl’s Moving Castle (2004) When I finally saw this, I couldn’t figure out why it was so roundly disliked by other Miyazaki fans.
[X] Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989)
[X] Laputa: Castle in the Sky (1986) Both fantastic films.
[ ] Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro (1979)
[ ] My Neighbors The Yamadas (1999)
[X] My Neighbor Totoro (1993) SO good!
[X] Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984): I watched this a couple of years ago, and I’ll be damned if I remember anything about it.
[ ] Only Yesterday (1991)
[ ] Pom Poko (Tanuki War) (1994)
[X] Porco Rosso (1992)
[X] Princess Mononoke (1999)
[X] Spirited Away (2002) Three amazing films…and none has anything in common with the other. Miyazaki’s diversity of storytelling is amazing to behold.
[ ] Whisper of the Heart (1995)
[X] Ponyo (2009) Wonderful.

Most of these feature wonderful music by Joe Hisaishi.

SATOSHI KON
——————————-
[X] Millennium Actress (2001)
[ ] Paprika (2006): Visually lovely, but I found it hard to follow.
[ ] Perfect Blue (1999)
[ ] Tokyo Godfathers (2003)

SHINKAI MAKOTO
——————————-
[ ] She and Her Cat (1999)
[X] Voices of a Distant Star (2001) Deeply haunting film…and it’s only 25 minutes long.
[ ] The Place Promised in Our Early Days (2004)
[ ] 5 Centimeters per Second (2007)

OTHER ANIME FILMS
——————————-
[ ] Akira (1989)
[ ] Angel’s Egg (1985)
[ ] Appleseed (2004)
[ ] Appleseed: Ex Machina (2007)
[ ] Arcadia of My Youth (U.S. Title – Vengeance of the Space Pirate) (1982)
[ ] Cowboy Bebop: The Movie (2003)
[ ] The Dagger of Kamui (U.S. Title – Revenge of the Ninja Warrior) (1985)
[ ] Dirty Pair: Project Eden (1987)
[ ] End of Evangelion (1997)
[ ] Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone (2007)
[ ] Evangelion 2.0: You Can (Not) Advance (2009)
[ ] Fist of the North Star (1986)
[ ] Galaxy Express 999 (1979)
[ ] Ghost in the Shell (1996)
[ ] Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence (2004)
[ ] The Girl Who Lept Through Time (2006)
[ ] Lensman (1984)
[ ] Macross: Do You Remember Love (U.S. Title – Clash of the Bionoids) (1984)
[ ] Memories (1995)
[ ] Metropolis (2001)
[ ] Neo-Tokyo (1986)
[ ] Night on the Galactic Railroad (1985)
[ ] Ninja Scroll (1993)
[ ] Patlabor the Movie (1989)
[ ] The Professional: Golgo 13 (1983)
[ ] Project A-ko (1986)
[ ] Robot Carnival (1987)
[ ] Robotech: The Shadow Chronicle (2006)
[ ] Silent Möbius (1991)
[ ] The Sky Crawlers (2008)
[ ] Space Adventure Cobra (1982)
[ ] Steamboy (2004)
[ ] Sword of the Stranger (2007)
[ ] Unico and the Island of Magic (1983)
[ ] Urotsukidoji: The Movie (1987)
[ ] Urusei Yatsura: Beautiful Dreamer (1984)
[ ] Urusei Yatsura: Only You (1982)
[ ] Vampire Hunter D (1985)
[ ] Vampire Hunter D Bloodlust (2000)
[ ] Wings of Honneamise: Royal Space Force (1987)

Wow. I need to see some of these. A lot of these.

CARTOONS FOR GROWN-UPS
——————————-
[ ] American Pop (1981)
[ ] The Animatrix (2003)
[X] Beavis & Butthead Do America (1996) Yeah, we went to see this. And we liked it. So there!
[ ] Cool World (1992)
[ ] Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2001)
[ ] Final Fantasy: Advent Children (2005)
[ ] Fire & Ice (1983)
[ ] Fritz the Cat (1972)
[ ] Halo Legends (2009)
[X] Heavy Metal (1981) So cheesy! It still appeals to my inner 15-year-old kid. And a great score by Elmer Bernstein.
[ ] Heavy Metal 2000 (2000)
[ ] Hey Good Lookin’ (1982)
[ ] Lady Death (2004)
[ ] A Scanner Darkly (2006)
[ ] Sita Sings the Blues (2008)
[ ] South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999) I want to see this.
[ ] Street Fight (Coonskin) (1975)
[ ] Waking Life (2001)

OTHER ANIMATED MOVIES
——————————-
[ ] The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926)
[ ] Animal Farm (1954)
[ ] Animalympics (1980)
[ ] Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon The Movie (2007): I watched about half of this; what is hilarious for 15 minutes proved to be tiresome for almost an hour and a half.
[ ] Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker (2000)
[ ] Batman: Gotham Knight (2008)
[ ] Batman: Under the Red Hood (2010)
[ ] The Brave Little Toaster (1988)
[ ] Bravestarr: The Movie (1988)
[ ] Cats Don’t Dance (1997)
[X] Care Bears: The Movie (1985) Ahhh, The Daughter’s Care-Bear phase! To be honest, I never even found the Care Bears all that annoying. No idea why.
[X] Charlotte’s Web (1973)
[ ] Fern Gully (1992)
[ ] G.I. Joe: The Movie (1987)
[ ] Gobots: Battle of the Rock Lords (1986)
[ ] Green Lantern: First Flight (2009)
[ ] He-Man & She-Ra: The Secret of the Sword (1985)
[X] The Hobbit (1977) It really isn’t bad. Here’s an old post about it.
[X] The Iron Giant (1999) Every bit as great as its reputation. It’s the Shawshank Redemption of animated movies.
[ ] Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths (2010)
[ ] Justice League: The New Frontier (2008)
[X] Lord of the Rings (1978) (Ugh….)
[ ] Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland (1992)
[ ] My Little Pony: The Movie (1986)
[X] Pink Floyd’s The Wall (1982) (At least, I think I liked it. I saw it five times, and was sober for none of them.)
[X] The Prince of Egypt (1998) Very well done, even if the opening musical number (“Deliver Us”) is so good that it overshadows all of the ones that follow.
[ ] Powerpuff Girls: The Movie (2002)
[ ] Quest For Camelot (1999)
[ ] Ringing Bell (1978)
[X] The Road to El Dorado (2000)
[ ] Shinbone Alley (1971)
[ ] Space Jam (1996)
[ ] Starchaser: The Legend of Orin (1985)
[ ] Superman/Batman: Public Enemies (2009)
[ ] Superman/Batman: Apocalypse (2010)
[ ] Superman: Doomsday (2007)
[ ] The Swan Princess (1994)
[ ] Transformers: The Movie (1986)
[ ] Wizards (1977)
[X] Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) One of the best films of the 80s.
[ ] Wonder Woman (2009) Don’t ask me why I haven’t seen this.
[ ] Balto (1995)
[X] Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron (2002) Watched it with the Kid. It was just kind of there.

Wow, that was pretty exhaustive. And yet even so, there are omissions, such as last year’s The Book of Kells. Animation marches on!

On an editorial note, I encountered someone on Facebook the other day who literally dislikes all animation. She claimed that none of it was “her cup of tea”, and that she’d rather watch real actors emoting than drawings of people emoting. I found that attitude utterly mystifying. I don’t watch movies for actors; I watch movies for story. If you can tell a wonderful story with a drawing or with an actor, well…who cares about the “how”?

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November 30, 2010October 3, 2021

Runnin’ off the Rails

Our Thanksgiving modus operandi around here, in recent years, has been to meet my parents at a local restaurant for dinner, after which they spirit away The Daughter for a couple of days of quality time while The Wife and I enjoy some quality time as well. Usually, then, after T-giving dinner, The Wife and I go to a movie. After seeing Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, and The Men Who Stare At Goats on previous Thanksgivings past, we’ve decided that our post-enormous dinner movie is better an action film of some sort. (Well, OK, calling Goats an action movie is a bit of a stretch. But as much as we enjoy a good romantic comedy, we don’t do rom-coms on T-giving.)

So this year’s movie was Unstoppable.

And seriously – that movie is a friggin’ blast.

It’s about as slick an entertainment as you’ll ever see. There’s really nothing that happens in it that is a surprise in any way, and in fact, you can almost feel the cliche’s falling into place, one by one by one. Unstoppable falls into the action movie subcategory of “Race against time toward an unavoidable disaster”. There’s a big long freight train in rural Pennsylvania that (a) is pulling a whole bunch of cars filled with stuff that will either explode hugely or poison half the state, and (b) has managed to get away from the freight yard workers. Oh, and it’s not just gently rolling away, either: it’s under full throttle, with no one at the controls.

Enter, at the other end of the line, another freight train. This one is driven by two guys: the grizzled old veteran of the rails whose career’s end is being forced upon him (Denzel Washington), and the young railroader who is smart and well-trained but who has only been on the job a few months and has the misfortune of being related to someone higher up the coporate food chain (Chris Pine). They’re just kind of ambling out onto their day, taking a train from point A to point B, when they learn that there’s this much bigger train that’s out of control and it’s heading right for them.

So, already we have the old vet who knows everything because he’s incredibly experienced, clashing with the young buck who doesn’t want to feel stupid. We have the lady running the freight yard who proposes an obvious solution (derail the train in farm country), but she’s overruled by the corporate bigwigs who are trying to manage the crisis from a conference room in a skyscraper in Pittsburgh. “Do you know how much money we’ll lose if we derail that train!” comes the typical reply from the guy in the nice suit. And of course, option after option fails until the train is, predictably, nearing a big city that can’t evacuate in time because it’s too big and where the tracks make a kind of curve that no train whipping along at 70 mph could possibly negotiate. Oh, and that particular curve in the tracks is surrounded on all sides by enormous tanks of fuel and such. See what I mean? Every cliché in the book – and I haven’t even mentioned the train full of kids on a school trip.

What I liked most about the movie was the way it got the ball rolling very early on. There is almost no tedious set-up here; less than ten minutes in, the train is out of control and certain disaster is about to strike. What little bits of backstory and character history we get throughout the movie come in little bits, here and there; no long speeches. Unstoppable keeps its eye on the prize, and delivers. It’s a terrifically fun flick. See it!

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November 29, 2010October 3, 2021

The Moonraker? Really?

Here’s something cool: a list of the 100 best movie spaceships. I was especially gratified to see that they don’t allow the fact that a lot of those movies are, well, total crap to color their estimation of the ships themselves.

Of course, I do have a quibble or two. Like, the Moonraker. Sorry, but it’s just a space shuttle, and I know, we got a lot of stuff done with the shuttle over the last thirty years, but face it — the shuttle was the Honda Accord of spaceships. Nobody’s excited by one. Frankly, that goes for the shuttles in Armageddon, too.

:: I don’t even remember the ship from Starman, and the photo doesn’t do it any favors.

:: I was also less than impressed with the Narada from Star Trek 2009 — it just seemed like something invented to look threatening on the screen, and there’s nothing from the movie to indicate that it was made with Borg technology or whatever. I suppose this is from the comic book that came out before the movie, but that’s weak tea, as far as I’m concerned. Plus, I didn’t like the way the Narada‘s weaponry was either powerful enough to swat around entire fleets like flies, or wimpy enough to fail to take out individual ships, based on whatever the needs of the plot happened to be at that moment.

:: Space Cowboy’s ship from Battle Beyond the Stars? Among those geeks who have seen that movie, who remembers for a second what Space Cowboy’s ship looked like? If you’ve seen it, you know what ship you remember from that movie. Damn right: Nell, the boobs-in-space spaceship!

:: I always liked the Klingon Bird of Prey from Star Treks III through VI. (I think they might have used it in Generations too, come to that.) Thinking back on Trek, there were a lot of ship designs that I really didn’t like, though — particularly ones from the TNG era, whose Enterprise always looked oddly distended in the saucer section. The Big E on that show looked great from certain angles, and utterly awful from others. And I was never able to figure out which end was up on the TNG-era Romulan Bird of Prey.

:: OK, I know this is geeky fan-stuff, but there are a few Imperial shuttles in use in Return of the Jedi. Only one of them is the Tyderium; that’s the one the Rebels use to penetrate the Death Star shield and land on Endor. The one that Vader uses in the first scene? Not the Tyderium. The one the Emperor lands on the Death Star? Not the Tyderium. The one that Vader uses to bring Luke back from Endor to the Death Star? Not the Tyderium. The one that Luke uses to escape the exploding Death Star at movie’s end (which is what’s pictured in the article)? Not the Tyderium.

:: I’m glad that a little love is given to one of the ship from the Star Wars prequels, which were chock full of fantastic spaceship design. Lots of fans complain that there’s not one single ship in the Prequel Trilogy to root for the whole way through, like the Millennium Falcon. Those fans are dummies.

(OK, maybe “dummies” is too strong a word. We’ll go with “oddly misinformed”.)

Still, a cool article with some surprising entries that I was glad to see on there. Check it out!

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November 23, 2010October 3, 2021

Lumos

So, I took The Daughter to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows the other day. We loved the movie, just loved it; but then, we’ve loved the entire series to this point — even the occasionally sickeningly-sweet first two, directed by Chris Columbus — and this is the one where it all comes together. Some of this will involve spoilers, so my thoughts are below the fold.

What I liked most about Deathly Hallows was that it didn’t make the mistake lots of movies make these days: it didn’t confuse “dark” with “relentlessly grim”. The film is dark, make no mistake about it. The way JK Rowling wrote the story, this is the one where Harry and friends basically get their arses kicked around for just about all of the story before finally figuring out how to turn the tide. Prices are paid — heavy, sad prices. Hermione must bid farewell to her family, magically erasing their memories of her so as to protect them; Harry has to watch the Dursleys, who never liked him much at all, give up their home so as to protect them. More and more unhappy events are piled on, along the way, and the film ends with the saddest loss of all.

But for all that, there is quite a lot of humor in the film: some genuinely funny stuff, and some stuff that is the humor that comes of people who are in the midst of grief but who find themselves laughing because they must. Deathly Hallows piles on, but it doesn’t do so relentlessly, which is a very welcome development. That’s what I liked most about the film.

Random observations:

:: There isn’t a single weak link in the entire cast. Not one. I love how perfectly the three leads — Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson — have been together long enough now that they can play off each other almost effortlessly. Their friendship is real, and it shows onscreen.

:: Some critics have noted dismay at the perfunctory nature with which Mad Eye Moody’s death was handled, but it felt real to me, in a way. Not everyone dies in a heroic final act, filmed in slow motion, with everyone else watching him go. Sometimes you have no idea until someone just bluntly tells you: “Mad Eye is dead.” The moment lingered, just enough, and then it was on to the next thing, because sometimes in war you don’t even have time to grieve.

:: I also think that by handling Moody’s death in this way, it made Dobby’s death at the end that much more emotional. There have been deaths along the way, and losses, and constant fear of losses — before we finally get one that hits home in all the usual cinematic ways. I found Dobby’s passing to be the best ending point for half the story; it leaves Harry at his lowest point. How can he keep going now? It’s been so hard just to find one Horcrux and destroy it. There are three more out there, and Voldemort has just found the Elder Wand. What a witheringly bad place to be, heading into the story’s climax.

:: The film didn’t really solve the structural problem JK Rowling created with the “camping all over England until they happen upon relevant information” nature of the central part of the story, but the film did take advantage of that opportunity to highlight some fine character moments, including the wonderful scene where Harry and Hermione dance to some rock tune.

:: In the book, Neville Longbottom doesn’t show up until the end; but here, we get one quick glimpse of him, standing up to Death Eaters who are searching the Hogwarts Express. The overall arc of Neville’s life, from loserish nerd to Kicker of Magical Arse, is one of the most satisfying things about the books, and I look forward to seeing Neville’s huge moment at the end of Part II.

:: There’s a “jump out of your seat” moment in the film that doesn’t conceal itself at all. You know it’s coming. You even know when it’s coming. And you still jump. That is effective filmmaking, folks.

:: The animation that accompanies Hermione’s telling of the story of the Deathly Hallows is absolutely brilliant. It’s one of the finest moments in a fine film.

:: Bring on Part II! (July? WTF, Warner’s?!)

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November 20, 2010October 3, 2021

I probably hate this, so let me tell you what I think of it!

Here’s the kind of review of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows that’s driving me crazy. I’ve seen a bunch of these over the last few days, all striking the same kind of tone, but this one takes the cake. Why oh why oh why should I take even remotely seriously the opinion of a person who leads off thusly:

Fans know the tales better than I; I stopped reading the books after the third entry, and have only enjoyed the movies intermittently. The first two, directed by Chris Columbus, were too faithful to their source material to have much life or personality. The next couple had moments of macabre delight in part because they strayed from their predecessors’ literalness but also felt curiously static; formula crushed the energy from them to the point that I skipped the fifth altogether. I did see the sixth, but cannot remember a single frame.

I’m not saying you have to be a fan to review the film, but it’s the final chapter of a larger tale. If you’re going to grapple with it, then you really should have some working knowledge of what has gone before. This kind of thing is like reviewing, oh, A Tale of Two Cities and saying, “Well, I didn’t really like the first ten chapters, skipped a bunch of the next ones, but here’s my take on the book’s last six chapters anyway.”

Ultimately this goes back to my deep, deep aversion to the whole notion of “objectivity” where Art is concerned. I remember arguments I’d have on rec.music.movies, for instance, where someone would say, “Well, the score to [Movie Title Here] is nice, but when you listen to it objectively, you realize it’s not that good.” I’d respond with the obvious point that no, you’re not being “objective”, you’re just being negative but trying to give yourself an air of authority by claiming “objectivity”.

I submit that if someone says “I really don’t know anything about Harry Potter”, then their opinion on the new movie is next to useless. And that goes for everyone, including Roger Ebert. If someone who loves Harry Potter doesn’t like the film, that’s interesting to me. Otherwise, it’s just people who don’t like spinach offering reviews of a cookbook of spinach recipes.

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November 9, 2010October 3, 2021

“These deadly rays will be YOUR death!”

A while back I posted about an old SF B-movie I saw when I was a kid, Battle Beyond the Stars. I saw Battle in this old, somewhat beat-up theater in Hillsboro, OR that often showed double features – which I remember my parents sending me off to with their blessing, only now realizing that it was probably a great way to get an annoying kid out of the house for a few hours. Battle was the main feature that day; the lead-in was another SF flick called Starcrash. Yup, I saw Starcrash in its theatrical run.

If you’re a fan of SF movies, you’ve probably heard of Starcrash — and not in a particularly good way, either. It’s one of the legendarily bad movies of SF history, made on a shoestring budget to capitalize on the SF craze initiated by Star Wars in 1977. I remember kind of digging the movie, when I was 8 years old, but I never saw it again…until a month or so ago. I tracked the film down, wondering just how bad it really was. Is it really one of the worst movies in SF history? Or is it a bit better than I remember?

Well, it’s bad. Really bad. Its badness exists on some kind of epic level. Starcrash is almost a primal force of nature in its badness. Seriously, this is a bad bad BAD movie. But it does have that nice virtue of being bad on a level that’s entertaining in a “watch it just to laugh at it” kind of way.

The main characters is a female star pilot and criminal named Stella Star, who is gamely played by Caroline Munro, a buxom, gorgeous woman whose best-known role was a femme fatale who tries to kill James Bond in The Spy Who Loved Me, but upon whom Bond turns the tables and kills instead. (Interesting Bond trivia: Munro’s Spy Who Loved Me character, Naomi, is the first woman directly killed by James Bond in the movie series. Sure, he’s responsible for a lot of women dying, but she’s the first we ever see expire by his hand.) Stella is flying around with a curly-headed guy named Akton, when they incur the wrath of a couple of space cops, one of whom is a robot named Elle. They are basically blackmailed into searching for a lost ship that carried on it the son of the Emperor of space, or something like that. This is important because there are bad guys about, led by an evil Count, planning the conquering of the Empire. Or something like that.

Starcrash is one of those movies where when you try to summarize it, you find yourself saying vague things and using the phrase “or something like that” a lot.

Much of the middle section of the film settles into routine: Stella and friends go to a planet, find the Prince isn’t there, evade some dangers, and go to the next planet. Eventually there is betrayal, a bunch of mystical stuff involving Akton that makes no sense at all, the Prince turns up (played by David Hasselhoff!), we meet the Emperor (played with benevolent and soporific droning by Christopher Plummer), and we finally find out what the title “Starcrash” means. It involves crashing. Among the stars.

Below the fold are some screencaps of the glory that is Starcrash.

This is what space looks like. Kinda trippy – lots of stars of different colors.

Stella Star, on the right, and her trusty sidekick Akton. Ships in this movie are boxy and square on the outside, and filled with circles and ovals on the insides. Weird.

Stella’s line here – believe it or not – is “First you gotta catch me, you dirty cop!” Note the goofy smile on Akton’s face. That’s his main facial expression.