Movie Review: Interstellar

Let's get the bad news out of the way for those of you who don't have the patience to read an entire review: I really wanted to like Interstellar, but it just didn't move, entrance, or excite me like I thought it would. I give it three stars. Those of you with short attention spans may now move along to other parts of the internet. If you'd like to know why I gave the film this rating, feel free to keep reading.

Obviously I wanted to like Interstellar because I'm a space geek and because it's been quite a while since I saw an upbeat vision of space exploration depicted on film. And let me be fair here: that is what Interstellar provides. And the stakes are high: astronauts heading off to the far reaches of space--via a black hole, no less--to save the Earth. So you've got the broad tapestry we expect from space operas, as depicted by SF Grand Master Brian Aldiss:

Ideally, the Earth must be in peril, there must be a quest and a man to match the mighty hour. That man must confront aliens and exotic creatures. Space must flow past the ports like wine from a pitcher. Blood must run down the palace steps, and Ships launch out into the louring dark. There must be a woman fairer than the skies and a villain darker than the Black Hole. And all must come right in the end.

Without giving too much away, I would say, again, that Interstellar includes most of these ingredients. Plus, as an extra bonus, the director got scientific input from an actual astrophysicist. Also on the positive side, the visuals of entering the black hole are amazing and worth seeing on the big screen. The space hardware, too, is believable. In fact, the spacecraft look very much like NASA hardware (which, in fact, they're depicted to be). Though truth be told, my favorite bits of screen eye candy are the closeups of the planet Saturn. And on the human interest side of things, we have people who are stock characters to serious SF fans: we have our plucky astronauts doing what they can for their own disparate reasons--the hot pilot (Matthew McConnaughey) flying off to live his dream and save his family; the scientist's daughter, out for reasons of her own and following in her father's footsteps; the robot with a sense of humor; and a range of characters who are either worth knowing or easily disposable.

So why does this film disappoint?

Let's start with the exposition--the "world building," as SF writers call it. We've got a future Earth that is dying from some sort of blight that is killing crops, eroding the oxygen in the atmosphere, and shrinking the world's population. The most obvious signs of this negative future are massive dust storms, which call to mind the nuclear winter parts of The Day After. In fact, a few aspects of Interstellar reminded me of The Day After, including the corn-country setting, the blowing dust, the air of despair, and the presence of John Lithgow, who in this film portrays a crusty grandfather instead of the scientific genius (that role is played by Michael Caine, who does much less crying in this film than the last Christopher Nolan Batman film). But the last thing that reminded me of that "epic" made-for-TV movie was the bad acting. Honestly, I can't recall the last movie I saw where I felt the actors just phoned it in, but this film had an abundance of it, including bad acting by a couple of famous actors whom I figured would know better. The best explanation I have for this bad acting is an unfamiliarity with science fiction and its unavoidable technobabble.

Next thing? The buildup. Interstellar suffers from pacing problems and is therefore too long, by about 40 minutes. There would be no shame in curtailing the exposition to get McConnaughey's pilot into space, but Christopher Nolan felt otherwise.

I was going to say nice things about the soundtrack, which has touches of classical Earth themes that will definitely remind audiences of 2001: A Space Odyssey. That is good and bad. 2001 definitely has grandeur, and the Interstellar soundtrack manages to evoke that grandeur in some cases. However, there are a couple places in the film where the soundtrack overwhelms the actors' voices. At the time, I was frustrated because I couldn't understand what the actors were saying. Only later, like this morning, did I realize that the sound problems had been on purpose, which somehow made it worse. A little reminder to Hollywood directors: don't make your game-playing so obvious. As with good written material, you don't want to disrupt the audience's willing suspension of disbelief. If the reader or movie-going audience is made aware of the artifice of what's going on, they are no longer paying attention to the story but are instead paying attention to the storytelling.

Lastly, there is the plot, which is convoluted in places, messy in others, and in some places outright unbelievable. It takes too many steps to get from Earth to the heart of the plot (the "MacGuffin," which was also the name of the bar where I bought a bourbon before entering the theater). And when I got to the MacGuffin, I found that...well, I just didn't buy it. It was like a "high concept" for a science fiction film written by someone who doesn't read a lot of SF but thinks, "Hey, if we do this, it'll be really cool and deep," but it's not.

Which brings me back to my original three-star rating. I applaud Christopher Nolan for making a space opera with a positive view of science, technology, and the human future. And he delivers that...BUT: I didn't care about the characters. The story is too long. The central "high concepts" that resolve the plot make no sense or are muddled. So Interstellar gets three stars from me. Your mileage could vary.

Movie Review: Ender's Game

Note: This is strictly a review of the movie. If you're interested in comments about any controversy surrounding the movie, you'll have to read elsewhere. 

So fans of the book Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card have been waiting for a movie version of the book to come out for years. Even the author has been impatient. The last time this discussion was in play, they were considering Jake Lloyd (the little bowl-cut runt who played ten-year-old Anakin Skywalker in Star Wars Episode I). I for one think this current iteration was worth the wait. This is an amazing science fiction film. Heck, it's just an amazing movie!


General concept: It's the future, 50 years after Earth was attacked by a race of insect-like creatures from another star system. The aliens--Formics--were beaten by the actions of one leader, Mazer Rackham. Since that time, Earth has been preparing to fight back against the Formics and has, if you can swallow the premise, been training an army of children ages 10 to 16 to lead the charge. At the center of this process is a series of simulated laser battles in a zero-gravity arena in orbit above Earth. The people in charge of this army, such as the character Graff (played pitch-perfectly by Harrison Ford), go to great lengths to observe special children whom they believe can beat the other kids in the arena. A lot of this involves subjecting the would-be "leaders" to some of the worst bullying possible.

Into this world is born Andrew Wiggin, nicknamed "Ender," who is born as an unprecedented "third" child because his other two siblings were so brilliant. The reason for needing permission for the third child are now lost to me because it's been over 20 years since I read the Nebula- and Hugo Award-winning book. As the "game" gets tougher and tougher, so too do the stakes for Ender, especially as the kids move further into space. I won't go any further into the plot for fear of giving away spoilers.

What impressed me most about this film is how well it captured the story, spirit, and essence of a well-written book. The primary elements are there, from Ender's sadistic brother Peter and empathetic sister Valentine to the manipulative Graff to Ender's group of peers, who are alternately hostile or respectful, depending on what they learn from him. The special effects are top-notch, as one would expect for a SF film made today. The acting is not too overdone--the stoic and harsh Ford is, much to my surprise, the biggest scenery chewer in the cast, though Ben Kingsley as a Maori runs a close second. The kid they got to play Ender, Asa Butterfield, gets Ender right as well, at so far as I remember him: simultaneously sensitive and dangerous when pushed to the edge. The action moves along a bit too quickly in places, but it doesn't sacrifice story cohesion. In fact, given that the film clocks in at a brisk 114 minutes, they probably could have taken a few extra minutes here and there to better cement some of the characters and their relationships.

There are a few sequels to Ender's Game, and the movie does leave a bit of an opening for any of those sequels to happen. I enjoyed Speaker for the Dead as well as the third book, Xenocide. Card has also written two or three other "Ender" books, which I believe are near-term sequels set in the same universe and concern other characters from the novels. Those didn't attract my attention quite as much, but Speaker won also won the Hugo and Nebula Awards and so is worth remaking.

Ender's Game gives me hope that Hollywood can stop making dreadful derivative science fiction flops and will start mining the tremendous riches of the best the genre has to offer. The techniques of filmmaking have at last caught up with some of these classics, it only remains for good directors to hire good actors and designers to render them faithfully on the screen. Ender's Game has received that treatment. Let's hope others will follow.

Movie Review: Star Trek: Into Darkness

No promises on whether I'll share "spoilers" or not. The risk is up to you.

Short version: Yes, the new Star Trek is as fun and action-packed as the first JJ Abrams movie. No, I'm not embracing the movie fully because it lacks the maturity of the TV series and other films.

If you want more of my "insights," read on.

Some audiences crave "origin stories," such as the beginnings of Batman, Superman, or Robin Hood. I suppose we all like to know where heroes truly come from and what makes them who they are. Great. In my mind, that was the purpose of the first JJ Abrams outing, when he rebooted the series and (reverse spoiler here) created a timeline that completely annihilated all of the Star Trek stories seen to date except the Enterprise series.

But it's been a few years now. James T. Kirk, Mr. Spock, and the rest of the crew have had some time to grow into their roles on the flagship of the United Federation of Planets. Certainly that is enough time for Kirk to settle down a bit and--jeez, there's no other way to say this--grow up. Chris Pine is about the same age William Shatner was when he first assumed the role of Starfleet's most action-craving, hormonal starship captain. Yet he looks and acts about ten years younger. He's got all the subtlety of a phaser blast to the head ("Helloooo, ladies!"). I had a discussion with my employer about this--he taking the position that Kirk would have acted exactly this way early in his career, before he learned a little more and smoothed out some of the rough edges. I would simply say that Shatner's Kirk had a certain restraint and charm about him that Pine's Kirk lacks.

Okay, fine. But two films are enough to get the point across that before Kirk became the eminent, stolid galaxy-saver that he was in the series and the movies, he was a walking Axe commercial, punching every guy and making love to every green woman to cross his path. Eventually he grew up, mellowed out, got smarter. I think it's about time Mr. Abrams take Chris Pine's Kirk to that level. Even Spock (as portrayed by Zachary Quinto) has some unvarnished emotional outpourings that are not in keeping with the stoic we came to know through most of the Star Trek canon. Karl Urban's Dr. McCoy is all gruff and grouchiness without the gentleness of the "old country doctor" we've known. Scotty is a sarcastic smartass rather than the bookish, geeky character created by James Doohan. The characters Uhura, Sulu, and Chekov are perhaps truest to the characters created by Nichelle Nichols, George Takei, and Walter Koenig, but they all look too young to be where they are. I loved my friend Dea's comment after seeing the film: "They gave these yahoos a starship?"

Yes, I realize the characters are supposed to be younger. Yes, I realize that actors are entitled to some interpretation in their work. The problem is, we've had 40 years of the same actors portraying these characters. We have a pretty good idea of how they operate, think, and act. And yes, some of us like them that way. It's been a pleasure watching the actors (and their writers) mature and build upon the work they did for a short-lived TV series years ago. I for one am used to the older--here's that word again--more mature portrayals of the Star Trek crew. Yes, I can enjoy a few chuckles as I watch the start of Spock and McCoy's feuds or Scotty yelling that he's "givin' her all she's got," but eventually I want to see them experience new, mind-expanding adventures.

And thus I arrive, belatedly, at the plot of Star Trek: Into Darkness, which is simultaneously exciting and a narrative mess. To JJ Abrams' credit, a lot of the predicaments the Enterprise crew face are the result of the immaturity of their adrenaline junkie commanding officer, and that adrenaline-seeking captain keeps the action moving, albeit in strange directions. So what are we facing here? Random terrorism, secret plots within the Federation, journeys to distant planets, angry admirals, sexy admiral's daughters, and crashing starships. I'm not giving away much here--that's most of what's in the trailers. However, much like James Cameron's films, if you spend too much time logically analyzing the plot here, you will find yourself exclaiming, "What?!?? Did they really just do that?"

The biggest gripe I have with Into Darkness, aside from the relentless, nearly mindless brashness of Kirk, is the amount of dialogue and storytelling they lifted wholesale from previous movies or episodes. If you're going to reboot a beloved series, the idea should be to take it in new directions, not rehash old material with additional stunts or effects. We've now had one film that set the new stage and one film that rehashed old material. It's time to take this younger version of the familiar crew on a new adventure that grows the characters and the series. Throw in a social message, an intellectual puzzle, a story with emotional resonance, a mind-blowing science fictional concept, or all of the above. Kirk was not just an action hero, and Star Trek was not just an action-adventure series. It's time that we saw that.

Movie Review: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Just got home from watching the first part of The Hobbit, the "prequel" J.R.R. Tolkien story of the epic Lord of the Rings (LOTR) directed by Peter Jackson during the past decade. It's always a challenge writing a review for this page because I'm never certain of the interest or knowledge of the audience. For grins, I'll assume that you know the events of LOTR to some extent and go from there.

As the "prequel" description implies, The Hobbit occurs some 60 years before the events of The Fellowship of the Ring and concern the adventures of Frodo Baggins' uncle, Bilbo, who found the One Ring that created such a fuss in those other stories. "And what is a Hobbit?" asked Tolkien in one of the opening lines of his charming 1937 book. Imagine a human being about 3-4 feet tall but perfect proportional. In this world of Middle Earth, they're called "halflings," when they're seen at all. In our world, you can picture the Hobbits of the Shire as miniature Englishmen, rather content to stay home, plant gardens, have supper, drink their ale, and smoke a pipe. This perception was changed quite a bit by the adventures of Frodo and his three friends, but I digress.

In this earlier time before Frodo and friends got into trouble, Bilbo was a happily settled bachelor, enjoying the quiet life of the Shire in his turf-covered hobbit "hole." Then he got a knock at the door by Gandalf the Grey, a wizard among men, who invited him into an adventure to help a group of Dwarves regain control of their home, the Lonely Mountain, from a ferocious dragon. Bilbo is not the adventuring type, and initially refuses, but eventually finds himself drawn into the quest and, as my buddy Widge likes to say, "hijinks ensue." I will do my best not to issue any "spoilers" in this review, but these things happen.

An aside on Widge, if I may (and I may, it's my blog): given his background as a literature, comic book, and science fiction geek, he has a perspective on movies that is similar to mine. This is why it's sometimes bad for me to watch one of his Wayhomer reviews of a film I plan to see, as his perspective can distract me from whatever ideas I have before I see it. Be that as it may, I have provided a link to his review of The Hobbit, refer to it on occasion, and then see what else I can add from the literature/comic/SF perspective.

Visual World Building
First, it is always a pleasure to "revisit" Tolkien's Middle Earth. Peter Jackson's team did a remarkable job conjuring up (so to speak) that world out of New Zealand's spectacular landscapes. In addition to Hobbits, there are Men (humans), Elves, and Dwarves as contentious but good creatures of the realm and Orcs, Goblins, Giants, and other nasty beasts on the side of evil. Men in Jackson's Middle Earth resemble Vikings, more or less; the Elves are ethereal, nature-loving creatures comprising two major families: a blond-haired strain concentrated in the forests and a darker-haired family that dwells primarily in a mountain retreat called variously Imladris or Rivendell; while Dwarves are more or less the same height as Hobbits but sturdier, rowdier, and more warlike. In addition to their characters, Jackson put a lot of work into the art design and costuming to create a visual "grammar" that helps the viewer easily recognize who is whom. That design work, so meticulously crafted for the LOTR, is repeated here, with more attention given to the Dwarves since this is primarily their tale.

And so we come back to two components of the Hobbit film experience: the story itself and the visual experience the audience sees on the screen. This is where I must refer the reader to Widge's excellent and nearly comprehensive video review of the visuals. His perspective on the film was almost distracting to my movie experience. He did not like his experience--he rated the film 1.5 out of 5 "cups" (his website is NeedCoffee.com)--and we both saw the 3D version with the "high frame rate." Widge understands the technology better than I do. For the non-cinematic viewer, the best way I can describe the visuals of The Hobbit is that it seems to bounce back and forth between a "film" look and a "video" look. It's like the film shifts between indoors and outdoors, and it's more than a little distracting if you're looking for it. Personally, I like the "outdoor" aesthetics of film because I can watch "indoor" visuals on TV.

If you're not interested in the visual quality of what's on the screen, great. I'll try to talk about characters and acting from here on.

Storytelling in Middle Earth
The Hobbit brings back the spectacular Ian McKellen as Gandalf the Grey, Andy Serkis as the voice and motion-capture actor for Gollum, and Hugo Weaving as Elrond. Other characters from the LOTR movies (or the book The Hobbit) appear in cameo roles, but I won't spoil whom. Suffice to say, it was nice to see them and to see Peter Jackson taking his Tolkien mythology seriously.

Other casting choices pleased me, including Martin Freeman as Bilbo. I'd last seen Freeman in the movie version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, though I needed IMDb.com to remind me of that. Freeman's character in that film--as an Englishman in out of his depth among strange and alien things--made him a natural for Bilbo. Another excellent casting choice was Richard Armitage as Thorin Oakenshield, the leader of the Dwarves. Even though they never identified him in the trailers, his intense look and aura of command made his role obvious to anyone familiar with the book. He played a bad guy in the Captain America movie, and before that seems to have done a lot of British TV work, but his face was unknown to me. No matter: he's a better embodiment of the character than whatever image I had in my head when I read the book 30 years ago.

As for the film overall, it's difficult for me to evaluate the film for a few reasons:

• The story isn't over yet. For reasons that elude me they're turning one book into a trilogy, where for LOTR they made three books into three films. In my mind, you could squeeze Hobbit into two films with some judicious editing. But I'm not Peter Jackson. Still, Mr. Jackson's editing is getting a little sloppy. As with big-name authors in today's publishing world, big-name, big-money directors seem to get a free hand when it comes to editing. This is how you get 900-page works by Tom Clancy or Stephen King or 600-page books by lesser-known authors when 200 to 400 pages would do. (Note to the viewer: make all necessary stops before watching this film. There's rarely a good time for a bathroom break, especially if you're unfamiliar with the story.)
• I know how the book ends. As with LOTR or any book-made-movie, I'm watching to see how the director executes the author's material. (An aside: I'm probably a heretic for saying this, but Peter Jackson's movies were more entertaining than Tolkien's novels, and the visual element is a primary aspect of that.)
• I will concur with Widge that the visual experience is a bit frustrating for the viewer, bouncing as it does between a "film" look and a "TV" look. I wouldn't go so far as to say it damaged my perception of the film, it was just one of many factors affecting my viewing experience.
• I am enough of a fan of the books that I will watch the other two. But I don't like having my patience tried. My inner editor could've cut 30 minutes from this film, easily, and lost none of the narrative thread. The Onion did a spoof on the nature of Jackson's editing by making up a story that he was going to include a 53-minute scene about Bilbo deciding what to pack for his journey. Well, there's nothing that blatant here, but the film does drag on longer than it needs to, and I'll be less inclined to buy the "director's extended version" when the DVD comes out in a year or two. 

I know I've griped a bit here, but this movie deserves to be seen. It's really taken this long for movie-making technology to do justice to great fantasy epics like Tolkien's. My sister asked me a question I couldn't answer: Why didn't Jackson make this film first? Thinking about it now, I suppose it was because he could convince a movie studio that he could compress three books into three movies more easily than he could convince them to fund a three-film version of one book. But yet one must consider: if Peter Jackson could convert three books into three movies, why didn't he try to shrink this book down to one--or at most, two? Never mind, I don't have the answer to that, any more than I can explain Star Wars Episodes I-III.
 
Happy Hobbiting!

Movie Review: Yesterday Was a Lie

This is a review of the DVD. Much of the following material was first written at OmegaCon, a one-time event I attended in Birmingham, AL.

And so, having promised myself (and the lady herself) that I would do so, I headed for the screening of Yesterday Was a Lie, starring Chase Masterson. One of the reasons I gave this movie a shot, aside from its concept (altered states of reality, SF-film noir) was that James Kerwin, the writer/director, was an astronomy minor, and so knew what he was talking about, at least in theory. Brother, did he ever!

This was a seriously amazing movie. Way too smart for Hollywood, which is probably why it's had a hard time getting into some film festivals. Try this for a multi-layered movie: you've got a black-and-white film noir with dark, brooding cinematography to match the quality of anything made "back in the day." You've got a troubled, hard-bitten, hard-drinking female detective who's having seriously bad cases of deja vu or disjointed experiences that come out of nowhere. You've got a mysterious man who appears to hold the secrets to all of this. You've got Peter Mayhew as an equally mysterious, dangerous figure. Somewhere in the mix, you've got a love story. And yes, you've got Chase Masterson starring as a lounge singer with many other roles to either help explain things or make them muddier, depending on how you interpret the dialogue.

I should stress that this story is set in the present day, but it still has a lot of '40s technological artifacts, like analog telephones, old cars, and snap-brim hats. However, items like computers bring us back to the present. Thus it is what it is: a purposeful homage to film-noir set in the present day. The tone and style might evoke Raymond Chandler or The Third Man, but the story structure is more like something by Alfred Bester. As a piece of science fiction filmmaking, Yesterday Was a Lie is superb.

However, being a relentless critic, there are a couple of things that I didn't like, but they are minor, and one of them eventually corrected themselves. It took awhile to warm up to the lead character actress, Kipleigh Brown, who plays the grumpy, and at times frumpy detective, Hoyle. The '40s fedora and baggy suits don't (shall we say) suit her, but that costume isn't seen after the early part of the film. The whiskey-drinking, cigarette-smoking tough-gal act struck me as a tad ridiculous, but this, too, seems to be shed as the story develops. I asked the director afterward which scenes were shot first, because it seemed as if Brown gradually became more comfortable with the role.

The other challenge of the film is that it is, as I told the director, simply too smart for Hollywood. As a science fiction fan and occasional fan of old movies, I got it. Hell, I loved the concept! However, I might be a very niche audience. You have to be comfortable with nonlinear SF stories. And the concept is very high, the sort of thing that SF fans read SF for: to expand our minds and horizons. As such, it is entertainment of a specific type for a very specific audience. You either dig it or you don't. (I recall Ms. Masterson saying, "I love you guys!" as the audience debriefed afterward and was getting the whole concept. Apparently a few people had told her or the director, "I don't get it.")

I was pleased that the film made it to DVD production, if not general theatrical release. The director is smart and clearly has a passion for stylistics. Kipleigh Brown got more interesting in the role as the film went on and is every bit as sexy as the luminous (yeah, I said luminous--watch the film) Ms. Masterson, who is mostly known to science fiction fans for the character Leeta in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine  as well as others. I hope all of the people involved in this project get to work on equally meaty films in the future. It'd do Hollywood and its audiences a lot of good.

Follow-up, 9/2/12
I posted this article via my Twitter feed and copied James Kerwin and Chase Masterson in the process. Mr. Kerwin was quick to respond (the magic of the internet!), thanking me for my comments and letting me know that Yesterday Was A Lie actually did enjoy limited release in theaters. I stand corrected. He also suggested I watch the movie with the audio commentary, which I will plan to do this weekend. The discussions during OmegaCon were quite illuminating. Anyhow, just thought I'd share.

Movie Review: The Dark Knight Rises

I'll talk about the horrific events surrounding the movie's premiere another time. I need a little time to process that first. Right now, since I just saw the film, I'll take it on as a work of cinema first.

What does one say about Christopher Nolan's third Batman film? Well, it lives up to the tone of the other movies in the series: it's violent, it's loud, it's dark, it's brooding, it's the whole Batman schtick as writ for the 21st century.

Okay, so what's the story? Well, we start with a James Bond type of opening and a new bad guy getting loose--Bane. And who's that? Well, Rush Limbaugh's claims to the contrary, he was not an invention to connect the "bad guy" with Mitt Romney--"Bain Capital," get it?--Bane (as in the bane of your existence) was created and named in the early '90s. Read enough comic books, as I do, and you learn a few things. Anyhow, Bane the bad guy is bald, muscular, and wears a Darth Vader-type breathing mask that gives him a voice that is utterly incoherent about 50 percent of the time. Drove me crazy. Bane and his thugs start letting loose on a Gotham City that had been relatively pacified and Batman-free for eight years. Batman has been missing since the death of Harvey Dent and the anti-crime act that bears Dent's name--the events of The Dark Knight. Bruce Wayne is a recluse and the people and organization around him are falling into disarray. All it takes, of course, is for a serious bad guy or two to appear and Wayne decides to resume his role as the Caped Crusader. And then, as my pal Widge would say, hijinks ensue.

This movie is a graphic novel writ large, as are the other two Nolan Batman stories. By the way, if you're not a comic book fan and are wondering what the heck a "graphic novel" is, it's a high-prestige comic book, often using familiar characters, better artistic quality, and better binding. Graphic novels, as opposed to the average comics you can find on the magazine rack, are complete stories and are meant to provide Deep Insight or to deal with Serious Issues in a literary field that usually focuses on super-villains with crazy plans for screwing up the world. The Dark Knight Rises addresses serious issues while telling a Batman story: about contributing to a civil society, about trust, about alternative energy, about vicious populism against "the 1%," and yes, it's about heroes and our need for them.

Along the way, this movie features some really good characters, some familiar, some new. Familiar ones would include Christian Bale as Bruce Wayne/Batman; Michael Caine as Bruce Wayne's faithful guardian and butler Alfred; Morgan Freeman as Lucius Fox, CEO of Wayne's corporation; and Gary Oldman as Police Commissioner Gordon. New secondary characters include Joseph Gordon-Levitt (who, a friend reminded me, starred in Nolan's Inception) as a "hothead" policeman named Blake and Anne Hathaway as Selina Kyle, a.k.a., Catwoman.

Oh my, yes: Anne Hathaway.

This is the first time Ms. Hathaway has appeared in a movie I wanted to see, and she's just darling. Kyle/Catwoman has always been an ambivalent character in the Batman universe because she was a love interest for Batman but also a clever, witty, violent, acrobatic, and notorious kleptomaniac. Hathaway nails the character and provides a light touch this very dark film needs. Okay, and she looks great and moves gracefully in a black catsuit.

Dark Knight Rises is certainly a long movie for the genre (make all necessary stops before entering the theater because it's easy to get lost). A scrupulous editor could probably have slashed 20 minutes from the story, but then I thought the same thing about The Dark Knight. If you don't like violent, loud, complicated movies with costumed heroes and villains, this film isn't for you. If you have a problem with Michael Caine crying a lot (and yeah, one spoiler: he does), this might bother you.

All that said, for me this was mostly a fun film, and it ends well. What more do you want from a superhero movie?

[Oh yeah, speaking of which: the trailer for the reboot of Superman, Man of Steel, was shown prior to this movie. Looking forward to that!]

Movie Review: Atlas Shrugged, Part I



There are two things that must be contended with when writing about Atlas Shrugged the movie: the writer’s relationship to the source material and the movie itself. I will cover the movie on its own merits first, difficult as that is.


The 2011 movie of Atlas Shrugged can best be understood as a comic book or—as the better ones out there are called—a graphic novel. The filmmaking style is almost impressionistic, giving the audience only quick bits and pieces like George Lucas might. The quick cuts and story pacing make handy work of condensing 300 pages of Ayn Rand’s 1957 polemical novel into a tidy 1 hour 42 minutes. In addition to the rapid cuts between scenes, a lot of background material is revealed in short news snippets akin to The Dark Knight Returns or Watchmen. I was pleased with the visual design of the film, as much or most of what I saw on the screen is as I imagined it to be when I read the book 15-odd years ago. That's either fortunate circumstance or a testament to Rand's literary ability to conjure up scenes in the reader's mind. The screenwriters also were clever in bringing the story up to the near future and in creating a world in which railroads are again dominant.


As far as the acting goes, as expected the most vivid characters are Rand’s leading protagonists: the railroad magnate Dagny Taggart and the steel manufacturer Hank Rearden. The actress portraying Dagny manages to display emotion at the precise moments she’s supposed to: when she’s worshipping people or moments of achievement. The actor playing Rearden is similarly dead-on in his portrayal, as Rearden is admirable on his terms—doing impressive work with a new metal—but completely off-putting within his social circle because all that motivates him is his work and the money he gains from it.


I’ve read critics complaining about the acting of the other parts, though I liked character actor Graham Beckel’s turn as Ellis Wyatt and Edi Gathegi’s work as Eddie Willers. The critics ignore the fact that Rand’s characterizations of her villains was purposely bland. Individuals not standing up for Rand’s Capitalistic Man of the Future are non-entities in the movie, as they are in the book. In Rand’s world, you’re either with her and a colorful hero, or you’re against her, and you’re a nobody. When you’re given that sort of source material, it’s not like you can chew up a lot of scenery with it. If the critics don’t like it, Rand might have said, too bad. She was not exactly what we’d call inclusive or politically correct.


It is Rand’s cold-blooded, larger-than-life characters that make Atlas Shrugged most like a comic book. Instead of wearing capes and wielding super powers, Rand’s heroes wear suits and wield money and ideas. They whirl about in a world of elegant homes, sleek offices, hard-driven work sites, and fashionable parties. Call it wish fulfillment for the hard-working or the striving. And, as with comic books in real life, they make a poor basis for a life philosophy or worldview. However, that doesn’t stop people from reading comic books, does it? The costumed heroes of DC or Marvel stand for certain things: persistence or humor or grace under pressure, a willingness to fight for what’s good and right, or resourcefulness in the face of evil. No one would question these traits as admirable or worth pursuing, but not at all costs, and certainly not to the point of donning some Spandex longjohns and hitting the mean streets looking to fight criminals. The point of heroes, going back to Odysseus, isn’t to be those people, but be like them.


And I suppose here is where, as an “angry young man” (my friend Anthony’s words), that I most agreed with Rand: I was a bit of a slacker in my 20s, but I found Rand’s paean to achievement something I could respect and believe in. I wasn’t doing much with myself or my talents in my mid-twenties and I was struggling against the demands of my job in the service industry. It would take a certain space conference a few years after reading Atlas Shrugged to channel my desire to make a difference and do something worthwhile with my life. For that, I owe some of my current success to Rand.


Taggart, Rearden, and the other heroes of the movie stand for achievement and acquisition of personal wealth for its own sake. They want a world in which they are left alone to build new materials, better machines, or bigger business empires. In Rand’s philosophical theory of Objectivism, the whole of humanity benefits from this sort of egoism, as they allow large numbers of people to have more efficient machines, better standards of living, and opportunities to be productive through jobs. However, that is merely a side-effect, in Rand's view: the pursuit of selfish goals is what leads to success, not the pursuit of others' happiness.


Rand’s heroes can be contrasted with the obstacles put in their path: confiscatory tax policies, “anti-dog-eat-dog” laws, and arm-twisting unions. There can be but one purpose to all of these obstacles in Rand’s world: theft from the achievers to satisfy the wants or needs of the jealous and less gifted. And here, for me, is where Rand’s philosophy always falls apart. She opened my eyes to a crucial fact about human existence: all men are not created equal--not everyone can be Dagny Taggart or Hank Rearden. Given that, what’s to be done with or for individuals not as gifted as the inventors or tycoons of the world? In Rand’s mind, little to nothing. If you have a sense of compassion, in Rand’s world, it’s acceptable to act upon that feeling, as long as you’re only doing so because it benefits you. Otherwise, to hell with those lesser mortals…and that’s something I cannot accept.


Objectivism is a philosophy of humorless justification for those who achieve but don’t have any great desire to share the fruits of their labor with others. You can live that way, mind you, but you won’t have a lot of friends or a particularly happy old age or afterlife, in my opinion. As I’ve moved along in life, I’ve donated more of my time and money to worthwhile causes because I’ve felt a sense of voluntary obligation. One would like to think that our society would inculcate such virtues as a matter of course without requiring government mandates that breed resentment, but apparently that’s not going to happen.


Will they make Parts II and III of Atlas Shrugged? I actually hope so. There were moments in the film that made me want to applaud. Rand deserves a full, honest hearing. But her philosophy also needs to be put in context and contrasted with other ways of living (perhaps we’re due for a remake of Lost Horizon?). Rand's comic-book world does an excellent job of setting up and knocking down straw men and extreme cases, but her depiction of the dark sides of government action or altruism cannot be ignored, either...nor can the real-world examples of greed run amok in our world today. So go see the movie. Reading the book first will give you have a better idea of what you’re seeing. Ignore the critics, and make up your own mind.

Movie Review: Inception

It's been awhile since I went to the movies, but the raves I heard about this film from a couple of fellow science fiction geeks seemed to make this film a must-see. I'm glad I listened. Inception is an inspired movie.

The trick with reviewing or recommending a seriously gimmicky SF movie is knowing how much you can or have to explain without blowing the whole thing. I'll make this simple: if you're not a fan of science fiction or movies with multiple timelines going on, you might want to pass. Imagine, if you will, technology (mysterious portable boxes and "compounds") that enable specially trained individuals to enter other people's dreams and then steal secrets out of their minds. That's the MacGuffin for this film. The visual effects involved in entering people's dreams are likewise mind-bending and worth seeing on the big screen.

But what makes this movie inspired is what writer-director Christopher Nolan does with it. He manages to incorporate dreams within dreams (and then some!). He plays with memories, with long-lost emotions, with the psychology and implications of manipulating others' minds. I was hooked.

The acting in this film, too, deserves special notice. Leonardo di Caprio, never a favorite of mine, has finally starred in a film that a) I wanted to see, but more importantly b) one in which he didn't just act like a Good Looking Movie Star. He manages to convey some serious acting chops as he deals with his rather shady line of business and complicated emotions related to his wife. His sidekicks are an interesting bunch of polished rogues who manage to come across as wholly developed personalities. Convincing acting matters in a complicated plot like this.

Another thing I enjoyed about Inception is the overall pace and tone of the story. The technologies (MacGuffin) are taken as givens in this "world." Aside from throwing in exposition to help the uninitiated get their bearings, the characters take the machinery for granted and focus more on doing their jobs. This is what some of the best SF does. Inception had the feel of a thriller/adventure written by Robert A. Heinlein, Theodore Sturgeon, or Alfred Bester. It's set in our own world and time, more or less, but they're able to do these crazy things with dreams, and the audience is taken along for the ride to see what happens.

I envy Christopher Nolan's talent. That he's a year younger than me chafes only a wee bit. :-) My buddy Doc informs me that Nolan wrote this script as well as the scripts to both of his Batman films and Memento, which I have not seen but also dealt with a lot of scene/time-shifting. Nolan's two Batman movies are like Inception in that they concentrate on characters in extraordinary circumstances rather than on the machinery or externals that make the circumstances unusual (dream invasion, costumed superheroes). In this way he is able to tell better and more subtle stories than, say, James Cameron's heavy-handed Avatar, which is akin to a technophilic "message movie," which can get tiresome.

I look forward to seeing whatever Nolan comes up with next. He has made me a dedicated fan.

Wayhomer Reviews

Howdy, folks!

If you find yourself holed up at home on a long weekend, have geek-minded sensibilities, and also happen to be a fan of big, dumb action movies, you might give NeedCoffee.com's "Wayhomer" movie reviews a try. The concept here being, Widgett (Widge) Walls, a blogger for Need Coffee, holds forth on whatever movie he's just seen, doing so on a camera in his car on his way home from the theater.

I know of Widge through my buddy Doc at work. I've never actually met him, but Doc describes him as "an extroverted Doc," and I'd say that's about right. Like Doc, Widge has a nearly encyclopedic knowledge of movie genres, tropes, styles, and conventions, not to mention comic books and sci-fi. Both Widge and Doc favor black jeans and black t-shirts with some strange imagery on them, and they both have the ability to spout off rapid-fire snarky remarks from the top of their minds, much as I do. Doc has more of an English major-geek bent to his "geek-fu," Widge has a beard. That seems to be it as far as differences go. I guess the fact that I consider all this cool goes a long way toward explaining my friendships.

Anyhow, I was curious about Widge's thoughts on The Last Airbender, the latest M. Night Shyamalan fantasy, as the film looked interesting to me. This was the first review of Widge's I'd watched in the Wayhomer format--I'd read quite a few on Need Coffee--and I was hooked. In 10 minutes, 41 seconds, Widge delivers one of the most hilarious verbal demolitions of a film I have watched since Siskel and Ebert took on Smokey and the Bandit 2. So after this review, I decided to watch all 24 (now 25 at this writing) of Widge's Wayhomer reviews for sheer amusement's sake. On the whole, I was not disappointed. My second-favorite review is Widge's take on Sex and the City 2, because he watched it on a dare by his readers and apparently hated it so badly that he became disoriented walking back to the car.

So what makes the Wayhomers so much more entertaining than, say, Leonard Maltin or Gene Siskel (minus Roger Ebert)? Well, Widge talks like a lot of my friends, which is to say, a comic/action/sci-fi movie geek. He knows the genres, knows what works and what doesn't, and is able to identify when films do well at what they're supposed to do. He isn't as animated when going outside those genres (Sex and the City aside) because that isn't his element. However, put him onto something like Avatar or The A Team, and he can give you a convincing explanation for why you should or should not see the movie, and under what conditions (pay for the 3D big screen vs. rent it via Netflix). In short, Widge is an excellent critic because he can tell you why something sucks (or doesn't) without spoiling the plot for his audience.

There are a couple of conventions in Widge's Wayhomers that have also become standards of their own, so much so that you can't help catching them once you've seen them a couple times (or, in my case, a couple dozen times). He seems to have had his format in mind from the beginning, and has stuck to it religiously since then. Every entry begins with Widge coming to the car, leaning his head over the top of the door, and saying, "Howdy, folks." You expect to see Widge in black jeans and a black t-shirt (and sunglasses if it's sunny). You expect him to gripe about the weather in Atlanta, regardless of what it is. You expect him to get an actor's name wrong at some point. If he's on the expressway, he'll just vaguely wave before saying "'Bye." He will often rate the film based on "cups" (of coffee) vs. stars, in honor of the Need Coffee web site. Just before the end, you see who the "camera wrangler" is for the episode. And yes, in less than 11 minutes, you can expect Widge to provide a decent, entertaining and shoot-from-the-hip lecture on why you should or should not see a particular movie. You don't have to watch them all at once like I did, but the Wayhomers are still worth watching. However, you might not appreciate Widge's approach if, perchance, you like movies like Sex and the City 2. Just sayin'. 'Bye!

Movie Review: G. I. Joe

There was a time when I was a connoisseur of big, dumb action films. I saw pretty much every Stallone, Willis, or Schwarzenegger film during the 1990s. Then--I don't know. My tastes changed. Ahhhnuhld became The Governator. Stallone retired. Bruce Willis started getting fewer gigs. The Batman movies turned silly and homoerotic. And I just couldn't gin up much enthusiasm for the latter-day James Bond franchise. So aside from a couple Star Trek films or the newest Batman movies, I don't get out to the big, dumb action films as much as I used to. I needn't have fretted. G.I. Joe is just as big and dumb as the movies I watched in the '90s, with the added benefit of being based on a childhood cartoon I watched, as well as being incoherent, visually stunning, and super-fast, as only late '00 CGI movies can be.

That is not to say the movie is utterly without merit--though I will mention some additional demerits in a few sentences. Two of the big MacGuffins in this movie are nanotechnology and "accelerator suits," both of which are in development.

In this film, nanotech does a couple of different things, such as dissolving/consuming anything in sight, reconstructing faces/bodies, and changing body chemistry (up to and including suppressing "ethics"). I'm not a huge fan of nanotech, but even I knew some of the things the filmmakers had the stuff doing were a bit of a stretch.

The accelerator suits are armored and armed exoskeletons that allow soldiers to move faster, carry more equipment, and remain protected from a wide variety of threats. The movie shows a couple of soldiers tearing up cars, buildings, and streets in Paris with these getups, and the sequences are impressive. And what bears thinking about is that the Department of Defense is developing this equipment today.

On the other hand there are several physics- and technology-defying moments that even an English major had to chuckle at (random thoughts during the movie: "I didn't know ice could sink" "How do you weaponize a warhead?"). It can overload someone's common-sense filter, even if you have the sense to turn it off before you walk into the theater--which is a good idea, by the way.

The problem, of course, is that these technologies are being showcased in what amounts to a live-action updating of a comic book...and a gruesome updating, in some case. One of the laughable things about the cartoon I watched was that, Mirable Dieu, every time a tank or airplane was blown up, the crew always managed to bail out and not get killed. A cartoon about G.I.s without blood. Which was probably just as well for a kid's show. The point was to get you or your parents to buy the toys and play soldier, not freak you out. This movie can freak you out a bit, if you're under 13 or so. Lots of cussin', lots of explosions, some quick shots of bodies being maimed, shot, or burned. In all, some creepy stuff.

But this is a kid's movie, in nearly every sense of the word--or an adolescent's, to be closer to the point. The dialogue and characterization are laughable. The attempts at flashback or "back story" are not nearly as deft as the recent Batman movies. There's some hint at sexuality, but it's subsumed in quick montages or clumsy repartee. I guess I really didn't have high hopes for this film, but some of these efforts are better than others. Great effects do not overcome serious gaps in logic, and there are gaps a-plenty in G. I. Joe. Like you expected something better from a big, dumb action movie?

Additional Thoughts

I gave a glowing review to the Batman movies in the last couple years, so I had to ask myself why I was so hard on G. I. Joe, which is hardly more realistic. Part of it was that I didn't have quite the attachment to that old cartoon series that I did to Batman. Batman is one of the more known commodities in the comic world and has had some better stories told in his world. It's one brooding, smart, tough guy against the underworld. It's as illogical as a gang of super-competent soldiers fighting armies of bad guys, and yet Batman ends up in a better movie. Perhaps it's just because the Bruce Wayne/Batman character is much better developed, however fantastically.

No, I'm not giving up on comic book heroes or big, dumb action movies. I'm just getting more selective about the kinds of stories that are getting told. It is possible to tell a not-dumb story or have a not-dumb message, even in the big, dumb action movie genre. Batman has them, G. I. Joe does not--that's about as simple as I can make it.

Potpourri LXXXIX

Mixed bag this evening, so let's just reach into the inbox and see what colored marbles I dig out.

From the Down Under Defense Expert (DUDE):

• Global warming is amok! Weather is out of control! Uh...unless you're a tornado hunter.


• Um...or a hurricane tracker. Remember when Al Gore, the Smartest Man With a PowerPoint, predicted that all of our weather was going to get worse every year?
• Remember the moral outrage over the Big Three automakers' CEOs taking corporate jets to Washington for their powwow with the president? Well, apparently, it's still okay for members of Congress to use private jets. I'm shocked, shocked...

Rod Coppinger at Flightglobal takes a few shots at the orbital fuel depot idea.

Responses to Darlene the Science Cheerleader have not been particularly polite or pleasant in the land of academia. I find a lot of the comments akin to something you'd read in high school: "brains" getting snippy because "a cheerleader is trying to do what we're supposed to do." These critics have little sense of humor or appreciation for what Dar is trying to do. The fact that she's a Republican probably just makes things worse, at least in the academics' eyes. Too bad. Dar has an audience, and probably a larger one than many of the folks currently sniping at her. It's not just a matter of cute. Positive attitude matters, too, and Dar has it in spades.

From Doc, a cool site on ways to get involved with the space biz.

One sign that I'm a Gen Xer is that I got cubicle toys for my birthday (I am currently 39.99999). Dr. OZMG sent me a sensitivity consultant from The Cubes. The awesomeness is so great it hurts.

After I finish with Europe, my next big vacation might be New Zealand, partially because I can hang out with the DUDE and Mrs. DUDE, partially because that's where they filmed Lord of the Rings, and partially because it's just a beautiful country.

Some idjit who didn't do well with women went nuts and killed three people and then himself in Pittsburgh. Dude, what the heck were you thinking? What were you doing/saying with these women that caused them to reject you? Could it have been that "tense, creepy, might-go-off-and-shoot-people" vibe you were giving off? Losers of the world, get thyselves to church!

The U.S. Navy's Littoral Combat Ship is ready to deploy.

New from Hu: Someone has taken the time to unleash a critical preemptive strike on G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra before it comes out. Why waste the energy? It'll be on DVD within three months anyway.

The Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) detected free oxygen in the Earth's atmosphere, indicating signs of life. Might've made a more intriguing story if it hadn't found life...or intelligent life, anyway.

Lego is cosponsoring a Lunar X Prize contest. Cool!

Oh yeah, and rather than take the word of the media, talk radio, or the blogosphere, check out this link and read for yourself the current healthcare bill before Congress...all 1,000+ pages of it. I read the Clinton healthcare plan, so I guess I'll subject myself to this one as well. Expect a very long blog entry, come the day...

And on that note, I guess I'll sign off. Tomorrow I'll be 40. How the heck did that happen? Never mind...

Movie Review: Star Trek

I could have also subtitled this

The Franchise Reloaded

or

Portrait of a Starship Captain as a Young Man

or simply

Wow!

The new Star Trek is a really great movie. If you like action-adventure science fiction movies with a touch of humor and maybe a little romance thrown in, you can safely like this film without ever having been a "Trekker" or "Trekkie." This movie will make Star Trek fandom socially acceptable.

I am, unsurprisingly, a full-blown Trekker--not someone so far gone as to wear Vulcan ears to the premiere, but someone who has watched enough of the series to catch three "continuity" errors in the very first trailer--that is, technical details that didn't match the official Star Trek history (or, as some might call it, the catechism). There are all sorts of things for the nitpicking fan to go after, if they so chose. The starship Enterprise is both more and less "modern" than the 1960s TV show ship. The characters, costumes, and situations both are and are not of Gene Roddenberry's "world." And yes, there are some serious time-travel issues here that will drive purists nuts.

None of it bothered me. I just loved this movie.

Here's why I liked it, as a fan and a writer: I finally understood the character of James T. Kirk, the take-charge, womanizing, @$$-whupping ball of testosterone who commanded his crew of well-mannered, multicultural misfits. It took a good actor to bring it all together for me, the new-to-me actor Chris Pine. What Pine does is make you understand how Kirk became the "living legend." He's brash, he's fearless, he's not above taking a cheap shot at some guy or making a pass at some girl. He goes after what he wants, and you believe him.

Don't misunderstand me, I've enjoyed William Shatner's Kirk, but the mensch never quite seemed real to me because Shatner tried to do it all at once--the tough guy stuff I've already mentioned--but also be the officer and gentleman with a hint of easy charm about him. Pine isn't like that. He's brash top to bottom, with the uniform barely containing the wild spirit that drives him to be a leader of men. He reminds me of some of my military buddies. They're all kind of wild, and the service never quite tamed them. And what makes Pine's Jim Kirk so cool is that you can almost understand why he got to be captain: it's got to be hell to be the smartest, toughest, most impressive guy in the room, and know it. It's that undeniable sense of confident ego that makes you see what propels him. The little continuity changes they make to Kirk's "official history" bothered me not at all.

Next we might turn to Zachary Quinto, a near dead-ringer for the young Leonard Nimoy, in face and stance, if not voice. Quinto has a bit of edge to him as well. The human half of this Vulcan-human hybrid is not nearly so well contained as it was in the old show. But, again, I believed him. As with Kirk's reimagined past, the movie gives a brief glimpse into Spock's childhood and youth, and how he turned his back on logic and the Vulcan way to become a Starfleet officer. Winona Ryder takes a turn as a middle-aged Amanda Grayson and is somehow prettier than she's been in some of her more glamorous, youthful roles.

And lastly I'll touch on Karl Urban as Leonard "Bones" McCoy," who doesn't get nearly enough screen time, in my humble estimation. DeForest Kelley, the charming, middle-aged country doctor, had moments of irascibility, but that couldn't quite cover the obvious decency beneath. The curmudgeonly comments seemed more like a pose. Urban's McCoy is more of a pessimist. He's got Kelley's soft drawl nailed, and throws in a little extra helping of complaining snarkiness to animate his McCoy in a way Kelley never did. You can feel the edge and the hurt in the man's voice, and you can understand what drives him.

Perhaps it's that edge again, which the old series often lacked. Roddenberry was trying to show humanity as better in the future, more capable, and still likeable and believable. It's a restrained, rather square kind of believable, though, which can prevent some viewers from understanding why these otherwise mild-mannered people would dare go out into space with each other. Urban's McCoy, along with the reimagined Kirk, Spock, Uhura, Chekov, Sulu, Scotty, and even Captain Christopher Pike, all have a certain restlessness about them, a little impatience and desire for action that makes you believe that they're adventurers. As Kirk said in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, "Galloping around the cosmos is a game for the young, Doctor." This is an awful lot of character analysis for a two-hour-plus film, but the acting really got to me, probably because I was ready to accept a re-interpreted Star Trek. These are not stiff-upper-lip, officers-and-gentlemen sorts of characters, but more like (original) Star Wars heroes: balls and bravado, high-energy players.

What about the story? Well, it's actually pretty standard Star Trek fare: a little time travel, a villain hell-bent on destruction, a lot of danger, and more than a few nods to previous incarnations of the series. The movie does a lot, including give most of the major characters their own small moments to shine, and still manages to tell a science fiction story with a minimum of "technobabble," a recurring sin of the later Star Trek franchises. The point of this review isn't to slice and dice the story, though it moves forward well enough, making sure not to leave too many unsolved mysteries or dangling plotlines. Given my commentary to this point, it should be no great surprise that I highly recommend this movie. There are many reasons to like it, even--no, especially--if you're a fan of the original series.

Movie Review: An American Carol

There's been maybe one person who managed to make propaganda funny, and that was Walt Disney, in Der Fuehrer's Face.

After that, face it: propaganda is what it is: it's a humorless rant for your side against the other side. Alas, for every nearly humorless conservative propaganda piece there are about ten liberal ones. Regardless, An American Carol is more pedantic than funny. The big studios could have let it flop on its own merits (or lack thereof). Instead, they made the mistake of refusing to market the film, thereby giving the conservative base a chance to push the film via underground marketing.

But I digress. What is this film about? Imagine that a Michael Moore-type Hollywood director experiences a series of Christmas Carol visits from patriotic spirits who try to show him the error of his ways as he tries to ban Independence Day. Now here's the problem I had with the film: I really like David Zucker's films. Airplane II is one of my favorite bits, and I usually laugh my way through most of the movie.

Such is not the case here. Where one might persuade with humor, Zucker becomes pedantic. The funny bits in the movie tend to NOT be political, but Zucker's usual slapstick or wordplay. The concerns of the film and the characterizations/impersonations will not age well because they are very much a product of their time. In fact, they're already past their time: this film would've had more of an impact about 5 years ago, when the Iraq War was hot and heavy.

Be that as it may, I suppose the conservatives deserve a B for effort. This one film stands up in the face of Fahrenheit 9/11, Rendition, Syriana, Sicko, Munich, Redacted, The Road to Guantanamo, and other anti-war films and says, "To heck with it, we're gonna laugh at YOU!" Again, the problem I have is that it's not as funny as it could have been. For instance, there was one bit that was taken out of the final cut of the film where a bunch of police officers is stopped at airport security while a group of bomb-carrying terrorists is allowed to just pass by. Now to me that's funny because it's aggravating and has a grain of truth. Alas, the scene didn't make the final cut. But then, let's be serious for a moment: it's very difficult to make the war on terrorism funny, period.

And then there's this: any piece of propaganda runs the risk of becoming forced, desperate, creepy, or contrived. Consider, for instance, the faux grandeur of "Tomorrow Belongs to Me" in Cabaret.

Or one might consider the attempt to create "great leader" songs for children of Obama voters.

So anyway, An American Carol is every bit the piece of red meat for conservatives to devour as Fahrenheit 9/11 is for liberals. If you go in knowing that, you may devour it (or not) as you see fit. Personally, I like my red meat served with a little better seasoning and taste, to extend the metaphor.

Of course, just for fun, I'd advise my conservative friends to go see the movie once or twice, just to jack up the sales and annoy some liberal entertainment reporters for a week. But after the first week, buy a ticket, then go sneak into Appaloosa instead because Viggo Mortensen can do no wrong, and he even manages to be funny occasionally.

Movie Review: The Clone Wars

Reviewer's notice: There are some minor spoilers in this review if you've not seen the new film; some major spoilers if you've never seen a Star Wars film in your life.

I went into this movie with pretty low expectations, mostly because I really despise Episodes I through III of George Lucas' Star Wars epic. I'll try to minimize my discussions of the six-movie cycle so I can focus on this particular film, but something must be said about how The Clone Wars fits into the big picture. Episodes IV-VI, the first Star Wars films made, cover the story of the redemption of a villain, Anakin Skywalker (a.k.a. Darth Vader). Episodes I-III, made ~20 years later, depict the making of Skywalker into a villain, with Episode I depicting him as an innocent, Episode II showing him conflicted, and Episode III showing his final fall into evil. The Clone Wars takes place between Episodes II and III.

I'll explain a couple of things up front: First, The Clone Wars is a cartoon, of the Japanese animé variety, which features fantastic environments, characters with over-large eyes, and extended, near-rubbery limbs. Second, as far as I can tell, none of the voices of the original actors were used. This is probably a blessing. Hayden Christensen and Natalie Portman are bad enough actors in person. I don't need to hear them act badly, though the kid standing in for Christensen comes close. Next, this movie is not directly related to the cartoon series that appeared on Cartoon Network a few years ago. It Is, however, a big-screen attempt to debut yet another cartoon series covering Anakin Skywalker's and Obi-wan Kenobi's adventures during the Clone Wars.

Here's the good news: this film is not nearly as bad as the episodes that surround it in the "live-action" movies. By minimizing dialogue, maximizing battles, and not using George Lucas as writer or director, the director of The Clone Wars managed to put together a decent adventure story. They even manage to introduce a new character--a padawan (trainee) for Anakin to train--that, had she existed in the series, might have offered some hope of humanizing Hayden Christensen. There are some other cute bits. For instance, instead of the usual screen-crawl story opener, the director jumped right into the middle of the action, showing battles going on as a breathless narrator, sounding like he just left a Flash Gordon or Captain Proton episode, gives a quick explanation of what's going on. Also, the story introduces some more of Jabba the Hutt's relatives, including his son and Uncle Zero (a priceless reincarnation of--no kidding--Truman Capote). So if you'd like to watch a movie with plenty of spacecraft, laser battles, explosions, and lightsaber duels, this is the movie for you. The violence, while slightly cartoony, is probably safe for kids 10+.

But. But but but but but!!!

There are so many little issues that bug me about this film that I simply cannot restrain myself.

Let's consider the Clone Army, introduced in Episode II. In Episode II the Clones, the original templates for the Stormtroopers, are revealed to all be derived from a single man, Jango Fett, father of Boba Fett, a bounty hunter who captured Han Solo in Episode V. They all look alike, as clones should, and are uniformly obedient soldiers.

We were led to believe, at the end of Episode II, that the advent of these white-helmeted troops was troubling and foretold evil, in the form of increasing government power and centralization. After all, these are the predecessors of the Imperial Stormtroopers that would be such a menace in Episodes IV-VI. In those films, the Stormtroopers are faceless, marching in lockstep, wearing masks that have frowns embedded into them. They are the friggin' bad guys, and there's little love lost between audience and villain when said villains are lasered or exploded en masse. The Clone Wars gives us a different picture. Now, the soldiers making up this cloned army have striven to become individuals. Helmets off, they wear different names, hairstyles, and hair colors to give themselves some sense of identity. This makes sense, if you think about it. Wouldn't YOU want to be seen as unique, if you were surrounded by a million buddies who all looked and sounded just like you? But here's the point that bugs me: we aren't supposed to like or care about these troops as individuals. Remember that part again about how they would eventually turn evil and become the Stormtroopers of lore?

Next, we have Anakin's new padawan, a somewhat reckless pre-teen girl named Asoka. As I said before, she could have humanized Anakin Skywalker, and she does in this film. But we don't want Anakin humanized. He's on the verge of becoming Darth Vader! In the midst of his fall toward destruction, why are we treated to this warmer, heroic Anakin Skywalker? Could it be that Lucas really likes anti-heroes like Anakin and just couldn't bear to have people think of him as a villain?

Well, jeez. Darth Vader was and is one of the greatest screen villains ever created. His redemption at the end of Episode VI is a surprise and cinematic triumph. The series could've ended with Return of the Jedi. We could've gone to our graves speculating about what happened in Episodes I-III, and been perfectly happy with that. But no: Lucas felt the need to show us the innocent child who didn't talk like a child, the whining, creepy, out-of-control youth, and the truly over-the-edge young adult that led to the guy wearing the big black helmet, cape, and scuba gear. Asoka is a narrative anomaly; one can only presume that she will meet her demise sometime between this movie and Episode III.

Next, we have Jabba the Hutt's little offspring and over-the-top uncle. They're interesting. They're cute. They give Jabba heart and depth. We don't want him to have either. He's a frickin' BAD GUY! One of the reasons Star Wars was so popular when it came out--and it's a reason Lucas seems to have forgotten--is that it was a simple morality tale of good versus evil. And the point of good was to destroy evil. Not sympathize with it. Not "understand" it. Blow it up. Fire lasers at it. Blow up its spaceships. Shoot its troops. Evil was not to be surrendered to except as a tactical maneuver/temporary retreat, and we weren't supposed to feel bad when its practitioners died. We were supposed to cheer! Star Wars was the great war story of its time, at a time when more movies were morally ambiguous, nihilistic, or actively evil. Star Wars uplifted, as it showed the triumph of good, friendship, freedom, and all the other things good is supposed to stand for.

Consider the following blurbs from the opening crawls of Episode IV (the original Star Wars) and Episode III (Revenge of the Sith, made last):

It is a period of civil war. Rebel spacecraft, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire.

War! The Republic is crumbling under attacks by the ruthless Sith Lord, Count Dooku. There are heroes on both sides. Evil is everywhere.

We can argue the literary value of the prose at some other point. Right now I'd like to ask: what are impressionable young kids supposed to make of "There are heroes on both sides"? I was 8 when Star Wars came out. I got the first message. Would I have understood the notion of both sides being good? Would I have had a clue about adult and murky concepts like moral equivalence? Would I have wanted to? You go to an adventure movie hoping to root for one side or the other because you expect one side, preferably the bad guys, to be defeated.

The Clone Wars is especially problematic, then, because we find ourselves rooting for the restoration of Jabba's family (the kidnapping of his son is what sets the action into motion). We find ourselves feeling sympathy for the Clones as they fall in battle and cry "Medic!" as their comrades fall in battle. We find ourselves liking Anakin Skywalker, who is one movie away from going completely off his nut and becoming Darth Vader. We find ourselves getting attached to a new character who is improving a character we know to be dangerously flawed; we can guess that she probably gets offed some way between now and Episode III. In short, we're rooting for the wrong people for the wrong reasons. You've got to jump through some real emotional hoops to appreciate this movie on its own merits, especially if you care about and understand the histories of these characters.

Okay, I get a little pedantic about these things, partially because I do care about good and evil, and partially because I really liked Episodes IV-VI, which is why I was so disappointed by the prequels. The Clone Wars is a product of the prequels and Lucas' now-ambiguous moral universe, and so cannot be taken out of context. If it were the only movie of its kind, it would probably win awards all over the place for its technical virtuosity, interesting characters, and dazzling space-opera environments. However, this is a Star Wars movie, and that means it must enjoy and suffer the inevitable comparisons to the other films in the series. It carries baggage from the other films, and that baggage does not match.

We also have the plot. Again, it's pretty much a standard space opera adventure. However, like Episodes II and III, it involves unnecessarily complicated plans and counter-plans employed by the Jedi, Count Dooku, and Chancellor Palpatine, the man who would soon become Emperor. Some characters drop in from nowhere and are not explained. We are given no clue that Palpatine is anything other than a benevolent Chancellor.

Perhaps it's just as well that I've run out of things to say. It's too aggravating to delve into deeper. The force is no longer with Lucas. I hope someone eventually has the sense to stop him from further muddying and milking this franchise.

Movie Review: The Dark Knight

I've been a fan of Batman since I was probably 6 or 7. Bruce Wayne didn't interest me, nor his sidekick Alfred, nor his loyal friend Commissioner Gordon. I can't even say I was particularly impressed by his villains. For me, the shows, comic books, and movies were always about Batman and his never-ending quest to fight evil. The Dark Knight is quite possibly the best Batman movie ever. Heck, it might be the best Batman story ever. Why? Let this Bat-fan count the ways.

The nice part of this second film with Christian Bale wearing the cowl is that it's past all the "origin" stuff--how Bruce Wayne became the Batman, how he got his cape, toys, Batmobile, etc.--and just focuses on the hero in action. And the action and villains here are brooding, diabolical, and morally reprehensible. There are moments when Bruce Wayne/Batman starts to step over the line when it comes to monitoring the citizens of Gotham City too closely, but the movie drops that line of inquiry almost as quickly as it starts it. The Joker, after all, is almost a force of nature unto himself, unable to be coped with by normal means. The late Heath Ledger, whom everyone desired to see if only for his last performance, managed to capture this role perfectly. Instead of some overly jovial dandy, like Cesar Romero, or some damaged, wisecracking hood like Jack Nicholson, Ledger's Joker is a mentally and physically damaged psychopath: the kind that probably got started cutting up little animals in his neighborhood. We might all pause happily and reflect that the Joker is, in fact, only a fictional character; because if he were real, we would NEED a Batman to stop him, and then some.

There are things one may quibble about with this movie. It's too long by about 30-45 minutes, though the two and a half hours flew by for me by the rocket pacing of the action; Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne takes a back seat to the Joker, and his sidekicks have very little screen time compared to the first movie. But they're not the focus of the movie. And despite all the raves about Ledger, the movie is not about the Joker. It is about Batman. People are giving Christian Bale too little credit in this film because I think he nails the Dark Knight perfectly as well. Bruce Wayne is a brooding, airheaded fop, like Don de la Vega in Zorro. His true face comes out when he puts on his mask, and when Bruce Wayne has the mask on in this film, he is single-mindedly, righteously angry and committed to stopping the Joker. That's what makes him a hero. That's why we watch him. He is not an idealized hero like Superman, but a mortal man, albeit one with superior facilities and resources. Like the Devil in Paradise Lost, the Joker might get the better lines than the good guys, but that doesn't mean he's better. He is the one who must be defeated, and Batman's righteous rage at the Joker as his violent actions escalate merely push him harder.

And we mustn't forget the edgy District Attorney Harvey Dent who (minor spoiler here, only if you're not a regular reader of the comic books) eventually becomes a "two-faced" character in his own right. He too is played with by the Joker, and he too reacts aggressively to stop the menace while facing his own horrors. The Joker is not skimping when it comes to inflicting damage on the good guys, regardless of their level of goodness.

There are some non-action moments, some hints of romance and some occasional moments of dry wit; but again that's not why one reads or watches a Batman story. His relentless pursuit of the Joker, even as things get worse and worse, provides some tense moments, great escapes, and surprising personal twists for Bruce Wayne and "Bat-fans," and all of those things together combine to make this my favorite Batman movie, period.

Movie Review: Gotham Knight

As I noted in an earlier posting, my purchase of Gotham Knight was delayed because Barnes & Noble had sold out of it. However, when I returned today, the movie was back in stock. Shazaam! Whups, wrong hero. Anyway, as might be guessed, Gotham Knight is a Batman tale. More to the point, this direct-to-DVD animated movie is a series of six Batman tales, all loosely connected by characters, if not theme or style.

I must confess to being a Bat-fan from way back, probably back when the old Adam West TV show was in its first or second syndication run. Bats was cool and more easily understandable because he was human (unlike, say, Superman). He has to rely on his brains, toys, and merely human abilities to help him win the day. I thoroughly enjoyed the Tim Burton Batman movie made in 1989, as well as The Dark Knight Returns, the Frank Miller graphic novel that brought a new maturity--and violence--to the Batman. I was somewhat less thrilled with the later Burton films, which were uneven. The film with Val Kilmer was almost decent, though the movies had started heading into homoerotic even then (nipples on the Bat armor, f'r gosh sakes?!?).

The Christian Bale incarnation of Batman was again a refreshing turn in the franchise. Bruce Wayne, the millionaire playboy with serious anger issues, comes across as slightly unhinged and very dangerous. His supporting cast, bolstered by big-name actors like Gary Oldman, Michael Caine, and Morgan Freeman, showed that Hollywood was willing to treat the live-action versions of these comic-book movies seriously.

And along the way, Warner Brothers was releasing a rather stylized animated series of Batman, as well as Superman, Justice League, and other DC Comics properties. I've watched the TV series on occasion, and it's been pretty good, though more in line with the spirit of the old '60s ethos of a "clean" Batman, simple moral fables, and no killing. So what happens when the edgier Batman depicted in Batman Begins meets the Warner Bros. animated series? What you get is a set of seriously violent cartoons. Gotham Knight is not for kids. It is for people 13 and up who are a little more used to the blood-and-guts of the graphic novel world.

For the uninitiated, a "graphic novel" is a comic book that attempts to deal with more adult themes, serious crimes, serious violence, and yes, death. It is, in short, a kids' genre attempting to go legit, and it generally succeeds. The recent spate of super-hero movies is the most elaborate extreme of the graphic novel ethos: they are an attempt to treat these costumed heroes on their own terms, as if they were people, not glossy images on the cover of a comic book.

This is interesting, as the voice actors used in Gotham Knight, according to my comics-geek buddy, are the same ones used in the tamer cartoon series. While I haven't heard of Kevin Conroy, who apparently did the Batman voice for most of the animated series, Gary Dourdan, who voices one of Gotham City's detectives, is known to me as one of the impressive actors making up the original CSI. It's as if the comic book TV show has similarly reached for adulthood. Again, this is not quite for kids. We've got violence, shootings, blood, etc. I might have to re-watch it; I don't recall a lot of "language" in the stories, but the graphic nature of the stories made up for the lack of profanity.

So, what about the story? In truth, this is a series of vaguely related vignettes--days-in-the-life of Gotham City's winged vigilante--in the days after Batman Begins. I can't say for certain that there is any resolution to any of the individual episodes, or the story arc in general. But then the comic books are much like that now, too: Gothic soap operas for geeks. Much like the Animatrix cartoon, which provided some narrative side notes to The Matrix movie series, Gotham Knight seems to be more about setting up the transition between Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, coming out next week, than telling a complete story. One villain is bagged, others are let go, and one is left to wonder how much of this will play out in the new movie.

The visual experience of the six stories is something else again. The six vignettes vary greatly in animation style. The first episode looks like something out of Miyazaki's Spirited Away. Others look like the animated series. Another looks like something out of Legends of the Dark Knight. Another looks like it was all or nearly all CGI-based. The consistent voices of the voice actors give the audience cues on who is who, given the widely varying appearances of some of the characters. This DVD is interesting, if only to show the many different ways the guy in the big black bat suit can be portrayed graphically. In one, he's anything from a slithering shape-shifter to a man-sized bat; in another, he looks like an animé pretty-boy; in another, he's a lantern-jawed adult. My guess is that there are as many conceptions of Batman as there are artists willing to draw him.

Can I recommend this DVD? To Bat-fans, sure. And to people who are likely to see the new movie. Otherwise, if you're not a comic-book reader now, you might be put off by this series of episodes, especially if your primary exposure to Batman was Adam West or even Michael Keaton. The Dark Knight has finally become the character he always was: mysterious, dark, and slightly off the wall. Enjoy, but don't bring the kids.