Sunday, 1-7-7b
Ehh. It was alright. No, one notch below alright. Not crap but not approaching good either. I heard the director wouldn't do the movie unless he was allowed to use the original music. It's a good thing because that was the best part of the film, the score.
The story is:
Superman has returned after a five year absence. It's never addressed in the film but for some reason everyone looks ten years younger rather than five years older. He's been off-world investigating the possible discovery of Krypton. No luck, it's not there.
Lois has moved on and married and had a child. At this point, the opening credits are barely off the screen and Teresa says, "That's Superman's baby". I've never seen her get one so quickly and never before I did. She's getting better at this. Lois is bitter and angry at Superman for leaving her and has even won a Pulitzer for an article entitled, "Fuck Superman!" Ok, maybe not. "Why the World Doesn't Need Superman." I think my version of the title is why I never won a Pulitzer...
Lex Luthor has managed to manipulate a wealthy and influential widow and has been released from prison and 'inherited' her fortune. Lex returns to the Fortress of Solitude and learns more about the crystals from Superman's home world. Apparently, when mixed with water, they generate an intense EMP and grow to enormous size. A miniscule chip knocked out power to everything for hundreds of miles and grew to the size of a house. Lex decides to grow a new island just off the east coast that will eventually destroy North America and give him a new nation to control.
Superman catches on to Luthor's plan. Somehow Lois is now held hostage. I say somehow because I just don't understand how it happened. I mean, she was soooo careful. She goes to investigate the epicenter of the EMP. First, she stops to pick up her son from school. Then she wanders deep inside a huge uber-yacht with her kid. By the time she realizes this was a mistake only a moron in a bad movie would make, it's too late. She's the moron in the movie and is now Lex Luthor's hostage. Superman goes to foil the plot and discovers that the new crystal island also has Kryptonite in it so he's powerless. The kid saves his mommy by exerting superhuman strength. (Actually he launched a grand piano at the bad guy) And Lois's new husband saves Superman.
I'm not much of a Superman movie fan so I have some missing information that I need to look up. We'll stick to the movies, not the comics since this is a question from the newest movie. In the Christopher Reeves movie universe, does Lois know Clark is Superman? I remember in one of the movies she is pretty sure he is but he gets her to doubt it after almost going over Niagara Falls. Also, did she sleep with Clark or did she sleep with Superman? If she doesn't know they are one and the same, and she slept with Clark, she knows now.
Was the new cast up to snuff? Well, could anyone follow in those red booties? Christopher Reeves was already an iconic Superman. After he became crippled, he was a huge public figure and only recently died so whoever played Superman would be held to Reeves' shadow. I don't really care either way, I thought everyone sucked. There was almost no depth to any of the characters. Lois and her husband were almost like they were minor characters even though they played heavily in the plot. Clark/Superman was lame. His Clark wasn't nerdy enough, his Superman wasn't super enough. The only highlight was Jimmy Olsen. He was barely in the movie but when he was he acted like... well he acted like Jimmy Olsen. As much as I love Kevin Spacey, his Lex Luthor wasn't right either. Maybe it was good, but it was forgettable. Spacey is great at what he does but he really doesn't do "Lex Luthor". The best they could do to show Luthor's quirky insanity was to show that he had a pool table on his yacht. That's funny as hell, but it's not acting, that's props. The plot was the borrowed "real estate" creation line and every time he referenced the new island I kept wanting to hear it called "Otisburg".
It was alright. I am glad I saw it but I'm also glad I didn't waste any real time on it. We watched it on a lazy Sunday that we ended up just sitting and watching a bunch of movies together. I had worked mega hours last week and ended up working Thursday/Friday with no sleep. Friday night I was up all night and got up (semi) early on Saturday to Melbourne and home. So Sunday I was exhausted and couldn't bring myself to get anything productive done. If I was feeling up to getting anything else done around the house, I would have been pissed that I wasted my time watching this luke-warm interpretation of Superman.
Sunday, 1-7-7a
Teresa surprised me with this one. She saw a trailer for a network TV version of it and decided she wanted to see it so she got on line and put it on the top of the Netflix queue. She never does that, she always tells me to do it. AND she picked an action flick and not a chick flick. I had seen bits and parts of the movie but I never actually sat through the whole thing. I don't put movies I've already seen up here on the page. If I did you guys would be reading about "Full Metal Jacket" and "Goodfellas" about once a week... Anyway, after watching the whole movie, I guess I actually only saw a few minutes of it, maybe only the trailers.
I don't remember why I never saw this one. Maybe because it was supposed to be a big blockbuster hit and all but I never saw it. US and Russian forces capture a dangerous rogue General and put him in prison. A crew of Russian loyalists are really upset about it so they kill a TV crew and using their credentials, gain access to Air Force One. With the help of a Secret Service Agent-gone-bad, they take the plane. The Presidential escape pod is jettisoned but the President stayed hidden on board AF1. Washington is working on negotiations with the hijackers to release the captured General and the President is trying every way possible to take back the plane or get it on the ground.
As a side note; I always thought it was a little unnerving when we are coming in for a landing and the captain/stewardess says, "We'll be on the ground in five minutes." Why not, "We'll be landing in five minutes"? If we run out of fuel or crash or roll over on the tarmac, we'll still be ON THE GROUND.
Ok, back to the movie... Eventually, after a lot of action and dramatics, the President is captured. The bad guy is pointing a gun at his wife and daughter forcing him to make the call to release the General. He does and after a few minutes, he manages to escape and kill the bad guy. He runs back upstairs and calls in to cancel the General's release. The day is saved! Until... the rogue nation sends up fighter planes and AF1 is damaged in the fight. The plane is deemed "un-landable" and everyone on board is doomed. They come up with a way to get everyone off the plane by installing a tether between another transport plane and AF1, sliding everyone across on harnesses. There is a final show down with the bad Secret Service agent and the President is finally reeled in as AF1 hits the water with the bad guy still on board.
The special effects of the plane hitting the water were interesting. I wonder what I would have thought of them when the movie came out and they were cutting edge. They weren't bad so much as they were old. They serve as a great timestamp on movie effects showing, "That's the best we could do back in 1997"
I thought the scene where he caves in to the demands because of his family was wrong. As a father, I can sympathize how difficult it must have been to see a gun to his wife's head with his daughter six inches away knowing she's next. But as President, he can't make those decisions based on emotion. This is why the First Family has Secret Service agents assigned to them, we know they are targets and we know they can be used as pawns to blackmail the President. He has to rise above it, just like he did when they executed the other two or three people to draw him out. He didn't give in because he knew they were dead anyway, the only way out was to not give in. But now that it's his family he caves in? He can't. Would I? Not in that situation I wouldn't. Sitting there watching it with Teresa we talked about what we would do and we both came up with the same answer; there's nothing you CAN do. You have no choice in that situation and you can't give in. Even if they kill us all.
I thought of a great way out of the situation but I don't know if it would work. What if he made the call, had Washington on the line of course, and just before he made the command, quit? Relinquish all duties of the Presidency, giving command over to the Vice President. Or maybe he wouldn't have to quit, just identify himself as under duress and incapacitated. Either way, he has no power, no authority to get the General released. Holding him or his family hostage gets them nothing. Ok, so it's technically a way out but it would probably get you killed.
Harrison Ford as the President is almost believable until he smiles. No politician has a smile like that. It was Indiana Jones as President. Not because he couldn't act the part, in fact I thought he played it well in his "Jack Ryan" style. The problem is in my own head. Every time he flashed that smart-assed smile I just expected him to pull out a bullwhip or something. Snakes, why did it have to be snakes? See, maybe I have something here..."Indiana Jones" on "Air Force One" turns out to be "Snakes on a Plane"? Ok, No.
Gary Oldman is one of my favorites. I liked him in a lot of movies and I like the way he plays a lot of different characters so believably. That being said, I didn't like him in this one. Maybe it was the 'over the top' Russian accent, maybe it was his explosive temper that was always too short-lived or maybe it was that I saw this movie 9 years too late and the idea of a Russian bad-guy wanting to reunite Mother Russia is just not believable any more. I don't know but either way, Oldman's baddie was a weak link.
I thought it was a decent movie. It gave me goose bumps at the action scenes and brought a tear to my eye when they were going to kill his daughter. I thought it may have run on a little too long, too many twists and turns with one crisis after another but I'd probably bitch that it was too simple if it didn't. Not bad, I liked it but I'll never own it on DVD.
A Christmas Carol (Patrick Stewart)
Friday, 12-22-6
Every Christmas eve, I used to listen to Patrick Stewart's one man show audio tape of A Christmas Carol. I didn't even know he had a movie version of it. Teresa was excited that she had seen something I hadn't.
It was a very nice rendition of the classic. Nothing new, nothing terribly different. They showed Jacob Marley's funeral, most versions skip that part (don't they?)
I liked the ghost of Christmas Present. It would have been perfect had he been played by Brian Blessed. The ghost of Christmas Future was a little too overdone and Christmas Past was almost frail looking. Stewart may be an excellent actor but I kept expecting him to yell, "Get off my bridge!" He'll be Captain Picard forever, and that just goes to show what a nerd I am.
Friday, 12-22-6
Another of the recent "holiday stinkers" and this one wasn't too bad either.
Tim Allen and Jamie Lee Curtis are hitting the mid-life crisis when their daughter goes to Peru for one year, just before Christmas. They decide to completely do away with Christmas and take a luxury cruise instead. Everyone freaks out because they are normally really big on Christmas. They cancelled the big party they host every year, they won't put up lights, they won't put Frosty the snowman up on the roof (everyone in the neighborhood has one) they don't buy the annual tree from the Boy Scouts and they won't exchange gifts at work, stuff like that. After taking a lot of flack for all of this, daughter calls from the airport, "Surprise! I'm coming home for Christmas. We'll be there at 8pm tonight." They have less than 8 hours to create Christmas. With the help of the neighborhood 'boss' (Dan Aykroyd) they just barely pull it off. Tim is upset because he still wants to go on the cruise. Then in the obligatory "realization of the spirit of Christmas moment" he gives the cruise to his cranky neighbor and his wife who is dying of cancer. The weird guy at the party, who seems to know everyone but no one knows who he is, turns out to be Santa Claus.
No real surprises here. Other than Jamie Lee Curtis is looking old but still showcases a great rack. Yeah, that's about all I ever think of... It was a cute movie. It never got too sweet where it was unwatchable. While never really reaching the heights of greatness, I think it pulled off as good as it could have with this plot line. Not too bad for all the negative critiques I heard about this one.
ThThursday, 12-21-6
We got on a kick recently of watching the Christmas movies. All the old Rankin/Bass animations, the "Grinch", "Charlie Brown"... I can't get Teresa to watch "Christmas Vacation" so I watched it on my own. Funny, she loves "Scrooged" with Bill Murray but hates "Christmas Vacation" with Chevy Chase.
We decided to order a bunch of the newer Christmas movies through Netflix. The ones that people said were pretty crappy but we haven't seen them yet so, order it, watch it, send it back and we'll see some new holiday movies, even if they suck.
Ben Affleck has had a few bad years. Hasn't come up with a GOOD movie in a while. "Surviving Christmas" was listed as one of his bad ones. I thought it was alright.
A guy doesn't observe Christmas because he doesn't see the point. When he schedules a vacation to Fiji over Christmas, his girlfriend breaks up with him. He suddenly feels the need to be SOMEWHERE for Christmas. Everyone is already busy with family. He talks to a therapist who tells him to return to a childhood Christmas memory and release his issues. A new family has moved into his childhood home and he pays them to be his family so he can reenact a childhood Christmas. Complications arise and the girlfriend comes to meet his "family". Mom and Dad are splitting up. His "sister" shows up unannounced. Grandpa is black. In the end, everything works out... of course.
I thought Affleck did a decent job. James Gandolfini was good too. The movie was predictable but aren't they all? I don't see why everyone bagged this movie. It wasn't half bad.
Sunday, 12-17-6
Fred brought this one over. He's gun-shy about watching movies with me because I'm an asshole. Years ago, he loved "The Crow" and couldn't wait to get me to watch it. I MST3K'd it the whole time, tearing it apart, ruining it for him. To this day, Crowing a movie is an actual term between us. So, understandably, he's always unsure how I'll react to a movie. I try not to be such a dick anymore but hey, it's in my nature...
I really liked this one though. It didn't stop me from making my comments, but they were short and funny. The recurring comment from me was, "I fucking hate this guy. He found a way to get paid to go around the world, hang out with rock legends and heroes, and I didn't think of it first!!!" The premise was simple. The film maker was a metal fan, went to college for Anthropology, and decided to study the subculture of metal. The difference between this movie and most other documentaries is that this guy really seemed to do his homework. He showed the roots and showcased a few of the earlier bands that rarely get credit for their contribution to the music scene. Everyone credits Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin and so does this guy but he also talks about the Mississippi delta blues and bands like Blue Cheer and MC5. Of course there was talk about the classical music influence, the blues scale and how playing in diminished 5th was called the devil's note. While all of that may be true, I tend to shy away from calling on classical music as a defense for the music I like. It seems too much like grasping at straws, putting on heirs. Using the perceived prestige of classical music to polish a turd. I'd rather make no excuses, no apologies for the music. I love it. If you don't, then more power to you, go listen to "the Best of Sting".
OK, back to the movie. He went through a lot of the metal genres. He couldn't hit them all because it seems there's a genre for every band. Metal is factionalized even amongst ourselves. But he got the big ones and for the most part, Fred and I agreed with his list. There were 2 or 3 that we would have listed differently but hey, we're only experts in our own minds. I may not be the world's leading expert in metal but even I knew "Cradle of Filth" didn't belong in the "Norwegian Black Metal" list. They're from freaking England!!! I listen to a lot of NBM music and I love it. Unfortunately, the Norwegian Black Metal scene is famous (infamous) for a bunch of church burnings. The movie focused on this. Some of these bands are taking credit for them, publicly encouraging them and in some cases are going to jail proudly for them. First off, burning down a church is crap. I don't care how much you disagree with another person's point of view; you don't burn down their temples. BUT, these fucking morons are burning down 1200 year old buildings! Not only are they works of art, not only are they national treasures but they are the very buildings that they say they want to build in place of these Christian churches! These are old pagan staves! The Christians simply moved into the buildings after Olaf II embraced the new religion in exchange for free trade with mainland Europe! These dickheads are screaming about returning to the old ways and are burning down the very churches in which their ancestors worshiped the old gods!
OK, ok, ok, enough of the history lesson, back to the movie. Sorry about that, can you tell I am passionate about this and I obviously have lots more to say on it? So, the best part of the movie was the extended interview on the bonus DVD with Lemmy. If you don't know who Lemmy is, it's hard to explain him. He's the singer for Motorhead. Old and ugly as sin, known for his drinking binges and cockney accent, as well as these huge moles on his cheek. Sounds like he gargles with gravel, wears sunglasses and keeps the microphone above him so he sings straight up into the air. In one movie, a guy is quizzing another guy to see if he's really a metal fan or just a 'poser". He asks, "Who would win in a fight, Lemmy or God?" Of course the guy says, "Lemmy" and the other guy says, "Trick question asshole, Lemmy IS God!" This pretty much sums up Lemmy. He freely speaks his mind during interviews and this time, he hit me in the balls twice.
The fist time requires a bit of a set up. Fred and I have had a long-standing disagreement on Motorhead. I'm a fan, he's not. In the list of "Who is metal, who is not", Fred calls Motorhead Rock, I call them Metal. This has been a long running argument. All throughout this movie, they keep running back and forth between interviews with everyone and they keep showing Lemmy. They showcase a lot of Motorhead's music. I tell Fred, "You know, for a band that isn't metal, they sure do use them a lot in a movie called, METAL!!!! One day, you will admit you are wrong, you will bow before Lemmy, you will call them metal!" Not two minutes later, they show clips about where the name "Heavy Metal" came from and the application to each band when it was new. Lemmy said, "Well, I never really considered us metal, I just call it all rock and roll." Fred just looked over at me and smiled. Fucker!
The next time Lemmy stuck the pin in me was when he was asked about commercial success and the branding of sell-out bands (although they never mentioned Metallica by name). He said something like, "Well that's why were here, to get our music out. We don't do this to die poverty-stricken and unheard of. What these fans are really upset about is not the fact that these bands made good money, it's that these bands are not your little baby anymore. It used to be your little secret, just you and five of your friends, now everyone gets to hear these bands and you feel like you lost something." Fuck you Lemmy for being right... I am guilty as hell about that. Some bands I just can't listen to anymore once certain people start digging on them. Like with newer rock, once Zephyr and Becca start liking them, I'm done with them. I've got to stop that shit. But it only happens with marginal bands. I mean, I don't care who likes Slayer, I'm a fan till death. But crap like Lacuna Coil and Evanescence, I used to like them, but I can do without them if it means I can crowbar myself away from the larger group of losers in their fan-base.
OK, I keep going off on tangents, time to wrap this up. Metal: A Headbanger's Journey. It was great. I loved it but it's not for everybody. If you're not a fan of metal or at least a musicologist, you probably won't like or even understand this movie. If you are a rabid fan, you still might not like how he doesn't just gloss over the rougher spots of the scene and how he delved into and exposed the darker aspects that give us all a bad name. If you like to explore the good as well as the bad, while still glorifying the scene, this is a great film. If nothing else, it will be the catalyst that finally gets me off my ass and across the ocean. After seeing the Wacken OA festival in the movie, I am starting to make plans to go to Germany in the next three years. Fred thinks I'm joking but I'm not. In two or three years, we ought to be able to rat-hole away enough money to make it to WOA by 2008 or 2009. No wives, no girlfriends, no BS, just the music. I've always wanted to see Germany, why not see a bunch of bad-assed bands while I'm there...
An Evening With Kevin Smith Part 2
Saturday, 12-16-6
Simple equation, did you like part 1? If so, you'll like part 2 and for the very same reason. Kevin Smith is very funny to his group, his generation. I thought it was a little ridiculous to put out a part 2 to a DVD that really was just a collection of comments in the first place. Both of these fuckers are 2-disk sets. 3.5 hours (each!) of him standing there literally answering questions from college audiences. He stands up on stage, a student asks him a question and he answers it, most often running on for ten or even twenty minutes telling a story that has almost nothing to do with the question. Very funny to me and apparently to a lot of other people too. Thankfully, this was filmed a few years back, before he started filming the abomination that is Clerks 2. According to him, his original idea (at the time) was for Clerks 2 to be an animated movie and straight to DVD release. I could have gotten into that. The Clerks cartoon didn't go over well so he knew his limitations. Who the fuck talked him into going live-action and wide release with this crap?
So, if you like Kevin Smith's movies, if you like the idea of a lazy slacker standing on stage and basically goofing off, then you'll like it. If you don't like hearing the ramblings of a fat, lazy, slacker, why the hell are you reading this? I'm nothing but a low-rent Kevin Smith knock-off.
Sunday, 12-10-6
Adam Sandler. Hit or miss. I loved Happy Gilmore and The Wedding Singer. I liked Billy Madison. Little Nicky was alright and Big Daddy was pretty crappy. Spanglish and 50 First Dates were just fucking horrible. I got Click because it looked like it had potential. A guy is chasing success, he keeps putting off family and life in general until his inevitable promotion and then he'll have time. He meets Christopher Walken (always cool) and he gives him a universal remote that controls life. Mutes annoying people, fast forwards through traffic jams and arguments with the wife, pauses and slow-mo's for boob shots and stuff like that. Like any amazing power, it is also a curse. It starts to recognize patterns and runs life on auto-pilot, automatically fast forwarding over EVERY argument with his wife, skipping EVERY sickness he has. Soon, life is over and he missed all the good stuff.
Pretty standard fare. No surprises here, it's the usual "be careful what you wish for" story. I liked it the first time I saw it, back when they called it "It's a Wonderful Life". Kate Beckinsale is hot. No gratuitous nudity but that's actually a good thing, there was no real reason for it. Christopher Walken is cool. A little goofy, but always cool. Now we get to Adam Sandler. Not the greatest performance, but not the worst. He plays the serious part pretty well. Nowhere as bad as "Spanglish" but not bad. He's funny as a comedic actor, he's not so great as a serious actor. "The Longest Yard" is about the most serious as I ever want to see him.
Click is rated above Big Daddy but below Billy Madison. About even with Little Nicky. Maybe a little higher above Nicky because it was a clean family movie, Nah, Rodney Dangerfield playing with the tits on Kevin Nealon's head, now that was cool...
Monday, 12-4-6
What is all the hype about this movie? I thought it sucked. And it had NOTHING to do with the sexual orientation of the characters. The movie itself was crap! I forced myself to sit through it because I wanted to see why everyone was making a big deal about it. It's been in my Netflix queue for a while but I just haven't ordered it yet. Now I can remove it and hopefully never see this thing again.
Here's the basic idea: Two young cowboys (Jack and Ennis) are hired to herd sheep. Out in the wilderness, they bang one out. Eventually, they come to terms with their situation and continue their relationship for twenty years (film time). Living their "normal" lives, they occasionally return to the same mountain to be with each other. Jack wants to give up his straight life and live together, Ennis refuses out of fear and uncertainty. Both men have dismal marriages and their returns to the mountain are fewer over time. Jack is frustrated that Ennis won't live with him even after his divorce. When Jack dies, Ennis learns too late that he should not have fought so hard against what he really wanted and that he really loved Jack.
I may have missed a minor point or two because I kept switching back over to the History Channel. They had a history of "The Black Plague" on and the movie was just so hard to sit through. I doubt I missed much.
Anything I did miss I'm sure I picked up in the oh-so "subtle" subtext of the movie. Two gay men, one is named "Ennis" and it's pronounced "Anus" throughout the whole movie. The other gay man has the stereotypical Village People gay-cop mustache. And was that an earring in his ear? A supposedly "straight" roughneck cowboy in the early 1960's wearing an earring? That's as far as the director and writer got for subtext though. The rest looked like it was made up as they went along. Camera angels? "Why bother, have the actors look down at the ground the whole time and we'll just film the tops of their hats. No, it won't interfere with their dialogue, they speak in mumbles the entire film. Isn't it great!?!" Of course they had to write some kind of screenplay to get the studio to produce the movie. They took the hook-lines and made sure those were spoken clearly. Nothing seemed as out of place as the two guys muttering and mumbling in coyboyese, drawling each and every word so badly that even the words you could hear were hard to understand and then, clear as day and annunciated in perfect Kings English, "I wish I knew how to quit you" and then back to muttering and drawl. It was like a bad exercise in some far-far-off-broadway acting class. The story takes place over twenty years. We are supposed to see them age from 19 to 39 years old but by the end of the movie, it just looks like two boys dressing up in their daddy's clothes. It was really cheesy.
After I sat through it all, I thought it was a bad movie but it was not without at least one or two good points. One good thing I'd take from this movie is the actor's willingness to play "very" gay roles. While I'm not a fan of either of them, they had to know how big this thing was going to be, they knew from day one that they'd be forever known as the "gay cowboys". The overall acting sucked but the passion these two showed in their intimate scenes together was pretty convincing. Maybe that was the whole problem to begin with. They focused so much on the "gay" scenes, they forgot to rehearse the entire remainder of the movie!
The only other thing I liked in the movie was the main thrust of the plot. Like any good tale, it has a central moral: Even if you find your life-mate, if they aren't willing to commit to you, you need to move on before you waste your entire life waiting on someone that just isn't going to happen. I liked that. Very practical. Gay or straight, finding love is nice but you're not going to get far banging your head against a wall and you're foolish to stick around.
So, I thought it sucked, but not for all the reasons everyone wants you to love/hate this movie. I just thought it was poorly done. The story is a basic chick-flick but the twist was to make it "taboo" with not only two men, but to make both men cowboys; iconic macho stereotypes. Could have done the same thing using 1950's 'greaser' gang members. You want this movie done right? Don't use the pretty-boy teen actors like they did. Don't go the overly flamboyant gay actor route either, you loose your punch. Get Samuel L. Jackson and Johnny Depp in these roles. I'll bet you get a better movie. I'll guarantee you get better dialogue!
SuSunday, 11-19-6
The theme song came up on my iPod and I started to think about how Becca has no idea who Superman is. So, when it came in, I told her a bit about it and she said she wanted to see it.
We sat down and put it in and 20 minutes later, she was in her bedroom again reading a book. I noticed when it came in from NetFlix that it was the director's cut. I didn't know how much additional footage there would be. There were a lot of scenes I didn't remember but it could just be my bad memory. Anyway, either the beginning had tons of additional footage or I just didn't remember how boring the start of this movie is.
First off, the opening music and credits are over five minutes long! Then we go into the Krypton scenes where everything is way too bright and it's obvious that Marlon Brando is reading his lines from queue cards. Kal-El is sent off into space and it seems like we travel the 30 year journey with him because it goes on forever. Becca looked up and asked, "Do I have to watch the rest of this?" Poor girl, I have all these great movies that I remember and want to share with her and I haven't hit a good one yet. TRON, Watership Down and now Superman, soon she won't trust me anymore.
I watched the rest of the movie alone because Teresa agreed with Becca. The movie held up over time. Superman is a pretty dated idea, very "tights and a cape" era. I thought it was a great scene in the first "X-Men" when they get into the black leather gear and they make reference to the original yellow spandex... I haven't seen the new one (Superman Returns) yet but I imagine Superman wouldn't be Superman without the stupid tights and cape and a big red "S" on his chest. The flaws are the strengths.
Like I said earlier, I don't know what was added or what was forgotten but when he runs alongside the train I don't remember the little girl that sees him being addressed as "Lois Lane". That very well may be my forgetfulness but one scene I'll bet was added footage was seconds later as he jumps across, in front of the train, the words "Smallville High" are visible on his backpack. I'm betting that was added in after the TV show made it big.
When I saw this the first time around might have been the point when I started rooting for the bad guys in movies. Gene Hackman as Lex Luthor was cool. Ned Beatty was very good as the supporting "Otis". Superman was good and honest but Hackman's Luthor was bumbling and loveable. I'm ordering Superman2 just to see Luthor and General Zod. I don't really care if Superman even makes it to the screen. I promise I won't make Becca watch it. I don't know if my movie recommendations hold any weight with her any more.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
FrFriday, 11-17-6
I had seen most of this one a long time ago. I remember liking it and trying to find it and it was impossible to find. They've just released it on NetFlix and now I got to see it again. Very cool stuff.
Some basics. In Shakespeare's play 'Hamlet', Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are the two men dispatched by the king to come cheer Hamlet up. When the king sees that Hamlet is a threat, he tells R&G to escort Hamlet to England and then to kill him once they arrive. Hamlet uncovers the plot against him and kills his would-be killers.
Other than that, they are very minor characters. This movie is the story of Hamlet as told through these men's eyes. The idea of telling an epic tale through lowly characters is simple enough, it's been done before. But to RE-tell an already famous story through existing minor characters... I like the idea. I like it, but that's not why this is a cool movie.
They did a decent job in the retelling of Hamlet, especially since we only see the parts that R&G see, but the real work in this one was the dialog. The banter between Tim Roth and Gary Oldman made me want to be an actor. Richard Dreyfus also makes a great appearance. Imagine a goofy yet cerebral Monty Python version of Hamlet that has nothing to do with Hamlet... The two of them bumbling around (accidentally discovering the laws of physics) trying to discover who they are and why they're here. Discussions about existentialism, death, the laws of probability and their place in the universe. It's absolutely hilarious. One of the few movies that actually had me laughing out loud. Oldman's delivery and Roth's deadpan are so great that even when I knew what was coming, it still cracked me up. The second half of the movie seemed to drag a bit but still, one of the best comedies I've seen in a long time.
Last Updated: 06/20/07 06:31 p