The Kids In The Hall: Brain Candy
Saturday, 2-3-7
The Kids In the Hall were always funny. Unlike Saturday Night Live, they knew when to call it quits and when things went dry, they pulled up the carpet and shut it down. SNL just rotates in new players, even if they aren't funny.
Brain Candy was a pretty funny movie. It wasn't set up like a two hour skit, it had a running plot and though they threw in a few recurring "show characters", they worked in supporting the movie.
A crew of scientists are working on a pill that cures depression. They get encouraging results and now they need to begin long term testing. The CEO begins emptying the place out and calls each crew up for review. When asked if his cure was ready, the scientist says no. When he is told the project will be shut down he changes his mind and says the pill IS ready. The pill goes on the market and becomes an instant success. The lead scientist becomes a celebrity and lets it go to his head. Enter test subject #1; Mrs. Herdecure. (Every time they say her name, all I can think of is Steve Martin as Dr. Harrfurrhur.) She has fallen into a catatonic state, locked in to her favorite memory forever. Scientist realizes what he has done and he goes against the CEO to make things right.
Ok, so it's not an exceptionally deep movie. You won't need a translator or anything but it was still funny. The whole reason I got it on Netflix was so I could put it on the computer and sample one line from it. In the big board meeting the CEO comes up with a new idea and then turns to one of his lackeys and asks, "How are we coming on that project?" "You mean the project you just mentioned to me just now?" "Yes" "Oh we're on top of it!" I always thought that was funny. That and the way the CEO says, "Riiight". Unfortunately, I watched the movie and put it back in the mail without thinking and didn't realize I forgot to sample the lines until the next day. Oh well.
It was a good movie, it's one I'll buy eventually. Of course, I already like the show so maybe that's influencing why I like the movie.
Friday, 2-2-7
I thought this one sounded great. How could it not be? "March of the Penguins" done with voice-over work by great comedians and narrated by Samuel L. Jackson!?! How is this not going to be great? Jackson alone could make this worth it!
It wasn't. In fact, it sucked so bad that I suffered through to the end like it was the original. I watched the whole thing even though I'd rather be doing ANYthing else. It really was a great idea. I still say it could have worked. They just needed a better writer. Bob Saget is not funny. Never was. I saw "The Aristocrats" and saw him trying to be vulgar and it came across as just that. He was trying too hard. It was the white-bread yuppie kid trying to impress the street hoods. "Hey my homies, what be going down, you all?" He should stick to family comedy; I hear he does that rather well.
The same plot applies as for the original. The life of the Emperor Penguin. The males walk, they eat, they walk, they mate, they sit on the egg while the females walk and eat and then walk and return to the hatched egg. The male then walks and the cycle repeats. Only this time, they use really poorly edited stock footage of penguins and we hear the thoughts of the penguins and all the hilarious scenarios that could ensue from their complex life of walking, eating, walking mating, walking eating, walking, returning. Fart jokes. That's it. That's the sum total of Bob's humor bankroll. Fart jokes, poop jokes, "my nuts are freezing" jokes and the penguin voiced by the black actor, he's rather well endowed... Nothing original, nothing funny. It was like sitting through an Antarctic version of the Howard Stern show.
There were funny lines. Few and far between but there was the occasional zinger. One of the lead voices was Lewis Black and I think he's funny as hell, except in this movie. As funny as he is, he couldn't save this shitty movie. Most of the voice-overs were actors and comedians speaking one line. That's it.
If scatological humor is your thing then go right ahead, go out and treat yourself to this stinker of a film. Otherwise if you are twelve years or older, I'd suggest passing on this one. It was one long morning radio skit.
Friday, 2-2-7
This one scared me shitless. It was like watching a horror movie, but it is for real. It was shot documentary-style about Evangelical Christians in Missouri. Specifically, Evangelical Christian children. It started out about their home life, the churches and centered on the annual Bible Camp they run in South Dakota at a place called Devil's Lake. Couldn't they have picked a different place rather than Devil's lake? They followed a bunch of people but the main focus was on the same three or four families.
Now, you know I am skeptical of everything and that I also have a good time arguing against the concept of most organized religions, Christianity being a favorite target of mine due to its continual re-emergence in my life. Well in the name of fairness, I watched this movie as skeptical as ever, watching for any slant against the Christian groups. And there was bias against, or at least what I saw as bias. The dramatic music (very reminiscent of the "Jaws" theme or the "Psycho" shower music) crescendoing up as the church started really getting into their praising. The unflattering camera angels and bad lighting of the pastor. I was well aware of how I was being manipulated and I dismissed it, watching these people and letting their words speak for themselves. And it was still horrifying!
While debating a guy on a call-in radio show Pastor Becky says they make no apologies for their actions, they KNOW they are brainwashing their children but as long as they are doing it for Christ, it is a good thing. They prefer the term "Indoctrinating". It's those damned Muslims that brainwash their children at an early age that are the evil ones. When the guy points out that all they are doing is making little suicide bombers for the Republican Party, the lady goes nuts. Not about the turning kids into warriors comment, she repeatedly insists they have no affiliation with any political party. Yeah, no shit. They'd lose their tax-exempt status and have to pay their admission price for all that church land and that nice lakeside retreat in South Dakota.
There were several points in the movie that I had to hit pause and go walk around for a few minutes. It was a truly a creepy film.
The movie talks about fantasy being evil. The kids actually cheer when the pastor says that Harry Potter is an evil warlock and should be burned alive at the stake. This was shortly after she prayed over the computers and the PowerPoint presentation to keep Satan away from these electrical systems. They showed her working on the presentation and she had "The punishment for sin is death" on the screen. She says, "Hold on, I have a font that is dripping blood in here somewhere". She changes it and now we have Sin and Death in red bloody letters. Oh yeah, she also had a guy whipping these kids into a frenzy about abortion and then passing out tiny plastic fetuses to everyone. Cute. Something nice for all the little kiddies to play with...
The home schooling scene was bad. The blurb on the screen says that 75% of home schooling is done by Evangelical Christian families. They show a mom teaching her kid about global warming and how it has become a political issue. The kid immediately throws it aside and asks if evolution is a political issue. I guess he noticed the camera following him around and wanted to be a star? The mom says, "No, not really". What rock has she been living under!?!? Ever heard of the Scopes trial? 1925 too far back for you? What about the Kansas school system and "Intelligent Design"? She then tells her kid, "What if you went to a public school where they told you creation was stupid and you were stupid for believing in it?" The kid says he wouldn't like it, then mom says, "And what if you went to a public school that told you evolution was stupid and you were stupid for believing in it?" STOP: I was happy for this split second. I thought mom might have a level head on her shoulders and was presenting the whole argument to her kid. Nope. Roll film: the kid says he'd love that and the mom, sadly, agrees with him. For what it's worth, on the table was a copy of "Lord of the Rings". Were they reading this 'fantasy' novel or using it as a display of evil? The last line in the segment was the kid saying, "I think it's a great thing that Galileo gave up science for grace."
It's the kids in these churches are the ones to be scared of. They are afraid of nothing and starved for attention, they are dying to impress the Christian adults in their lives by trying to save everyone they come across. This one little girl cold-evangelized six different people in the movie, once in a bowling alley. When the movie started the bowling alley scene, they showed the outside of the bowling alley and its proximity to an "Adult Supercenter". I don't know what that was supposed to signify, the fact that the evil world is all around them I guess? She prayed over her ball, commanding it in the name of Jesus to roll straight. After the inevitable gutterball, she picked up her "Jack Chick" tract (Don't get me started on that fucking nutcase!) and went over to a lady three lanes over. She told the lady that Jesus had been telling her to come and let her know that God wants to love on her. She gave the lady the tract and went back to bowl her second ball. She got seven of the ten. She told her chaperone that she felt guilty for not going over when Jesus first told her to go.
Another little girl said that she loves to dance. Although she is scared to dance now because sometimes she dances just for the fun of it and not to glorify God. I think this was the same little girl that was asked how she liked camp and she said it felt great to be in the presence of God. She explained that God doesn't exist in dead churches. She goes on to explain that in these "Dead" churches, they sing a few songs, pray and listen to a sermon. God doesn't live there. He only comes to churches where people are jumping up and down praising Him whenever the spirit hits them. You've got to jump and shout hallelujah to get God into your church. All those people that just worship Him without making a scene, they're not talking to God, and He's not talking to them either. Nice to know I guess.
One little boy said he got saved at five years old because he wanted more out of life. He was bored without Jesus. Five years old, bored and wanted more out of life. Right. But this kid was intriguing. He was the preacher boy. 10 or 11 years old he was already preaching sermons and doing a great job of it I thought. He visited Colorado Springs, apparently a Christian Mecca (pardon the pun) for its Evangelical "Superchurches". He met the main pastor there and got to talk with him. The blurb on the screen gave this guy's name and said that this guy talks with President Bush and his advisors every Monday. This preacher asked the kid if people listened to his preaching because he was a cute little kid or because he had good content. The kid paused and said, "I don't know". That was the most intelligent thing I saw the entire movie. That kid is pretty sharp from everything I saw.
The most disturbing scene I saw was the big sermon where the pastor was guilting the fuck out of these little kids. She is going on and on about "I feel that there are a lot of kids here today that are one type of person in church and a different type around their friends. Maybe they talk like their friends; maybe they don't have the will of Jesus in their every action. If you are one of those hypocrites, one of those sinners, come forward and wash your sins away with the water of God's word". When the kids clamored forward, she dumped bottled water on their hands. It was still in the bottle, you could read what brand it was. Am I filled with the Holy Spirit now because I just drank the same bottled water? She kept badgering them until these kids were in tears. I don't mean a trickle; these poor angels were red-faced and sobbing. Wailing for forgiveness. The dramatic background music started again, this time it sounded a whole lot like chanting, and I immediately separated it from what was going on until I saw that it was someone beside the pulpit with a microphone. She was encouraging the spooky feeling of this scene. It was part of Pastor Becky's plan to scare the hell out of these kids! Fucking crazy bitch! You can get kids to believe anything. You can get them to cry over anything. You can manipulate their fragile, growing minds and mold them for your own agenda. That was the whole premise behind the Hitler Youth. Get them young while you can make them believe, even under threat of death, in your cause. There's a special place in Hell for people like Pastor Becky.
Whatever happened to letting these kids be kids? Train them up in the way you want them to go and all that, but why can't these kids dance? Why can't they bowl without commanding the ball in the name of Jesus? Why can't they tell ghost stories? That's right. A room full of boys, at camp, complete with wildly arcing flashlights and one of them starts to tell a spooky story. Not a gross bloody stump type of thing, this kid starts out with there was a dark, dark house with a dark, dark hall and at the end of the dark, dark hall is a dark, dark room... and before he gets too far, one of the fathers busts in and says that he "doesn't approve of ghost stories because they don't honor God. Lights out, go to bed." Buzz kill mother fucker. If I were at that camp he'd be knocked out, blindfolded and waking up chained inside a canoe in the middle of the lake. And if he did it again, he'd wake up at the BOTTOM of the lake!
I'll have to quote someone else on this one, "I could never believe their God is the same as my God. I always believed God was like Hugh Beaumont. When you fucked up he hugged you and said, "Come here you, why'd you fuck up? Ahh, I love you kid' and then send you on your way, lessoned learned. Another issue I have always wondered about and this film awoke; why is it that these Christians believe that God is all-powerful and has a plan for EVERY thing but then they pray for changes to that plan? I actually heard this line in the film, "...just pray that God's perfect will, will be done." Do you have to pray if it's already His will and that He can do anything? I don't get it.
So I came away from this movie with a refreshed outlook toward Christians. I always knew it was never ALL the Christians that are fucking nuts, just the Fundamentalists and Southern Baptists. Now I know that not only are the Evangelicals crazies, they are proud of that fact.
Wednesday, 1-31-7
Another of the movies that I hear a lot about but have never seen. Well, now I have and I thought it was good. Although they had a lot of star power to help in that too. I wonder how well it would have been received if the starring roles were a bunch of slobs instead of Spencer Tracy, Burt Lancaster, Montgomery Clift, Dietrich and Garland... However, every time they showed Werner Klemperer all I saw was Col. Klink from "Hogan's Heroes"
The premise is simple. Long after the original trials of the big names and big-time German leaders, the US tries the German judges that knowingly condemned or sentenced innocent men. They plead that they were following orders, that they were doing it for the love of their country or that they didn't know how bad it was.
The prosecutor and the judge are getting pressure from the Army to lighten up and give soft sentences because they need to look out for public opinion. The Berlin blockade had just begun and it was not a good time to be unpopular with the people. After showing the human side of the crimes and arguing his point and fighting with the other judges, each of the men are found guilty.
This came out four years after "12 Angry Men" and to me it had the same feel. One man holding out for the truth no matter what pressure he is feeling, he will rule on what is right, not what is popular. I liked it.
Friday, 1-26-7
Everyone lists this as one of the greatest filmmaking achievements of all time. I've never seen it before and with my knowledge quest of "you gotta show me before I believe it" I had to see it. I've heard it was considered great but very controversial because of its portrayal of the races. Even Netflix tried to warn me of its racial content. Whatever, I just wanted to see this "epic" so I could judge for myself.
It is a silent film made in 1915, just 50 years after the close of the civil war. The musical score was a bunch of marches and operas. They played 'Dixie" when showing the Southern scenes, 'Hail to the Chief' when showing Lincoln, 'Ride of the Valkryies' when the cavalry comes to the rescue and stuff like that. The old film was kind of cool to watch because every once in a while, through all the grit and grain, you'd see a full fingerprint. I paused the movie and wondered f it was possible to run the print and see if it was from the original film era or from the transfer to DVD. Just curious.
We open with two 'fictional' families. The Pennsylvania boys (The Stonemans) travel to South Carolina to visit their old boarding school friends (The Camerons). One of the northern boys falls in love with the sister of the southern boys; one of the southern boys is enamored with a portrait of the northern boy's sister. The visit is interrupted by news of a possible coming war between north and south. All of the boys return home and soon after, go off to war. The war is shown to be gruesome and painful. Some of the boys meet up on the battlefield, dying next to each other. The surviving sons return home to their families to resume life. The northern family leader (Stoneman) is telling Lincoln that we must step in and punish the south as if they were conquered territory. In my favorite line Lincoln says, "I shall deal with them as if then never left". (Ok, it was a silent movie but the card said the lines so... it counts as a spoken line... I think) Lincoln is assassinated, closing out to a fade.
So, I was thinking, "What racial overtones?" I thought they did a great job of portraying the Civil War. I even liked that they emphasize the fact that the Civil War was not fought over slavery but over individual state sovereignty. It was obvious that DW Griffith's family was southern from the spin he put on the characters. I went and looked that up after the movie and low and behold, his father was a colonel in the confederate army! Oh well, it wasn't too bad and besides, it had to be over soon. Little did I know the movie went on for another hour and a half! This thing is over three freaking hours long!
Curtain up on the second half. Lincoln's assassination frees up Stoneman to establish his agenda. He is a reconstructionist that ensures the blacks that he is going to make the "white south" pay for it's crimes against this nation by smashing it under the heel of the "black south". He travels to South Carolina to ensure they suffer the most. I'm assuming because they were the first to succeed from the union? Riots are commonplace, whites are kept from voting, white homes are ransacked by black militia, all under the design of Stoneman. The youngest Cameron daughter is forced to decide between jumping to her death or be raped by a crazed black man. She chooses death. Who can stop the madness? Who can restore order? Why, the Ku Klux Klan can, that's who. Stoneman's black protégé (Lynch) is back in Washington, power drunk and forcing Stoneman's daughter into marriage against her will. Two white spies see this and run off to get reinforcements. The southern Cameron family is being chased by another black militia. They find refuge in a hut occupied by two Union soldiers. They immediately find common ground and all differences are forgotten in the name of defending their "Aryan birthright". With their ammunition running low, the men are poised to kill their women to keep them from being raped by the black invaders. Just in the nick of time, and to the tune of "Ride of the Valkryies", here comes the Klan. Riding in full force they save the day. They liberate the hut rescuing the Yankee soldiers as well as the Cameron family. They ride into town and save Stoneman and his daughter from Lynch and his men. They even find time to kill Gus, the man who was after the youngest Cameron daughter, forcing her to jump to her death. They stand by for the next vote, this time it is thee black man who is kept from voting. They march out as victorious heroes and we fade to a double honeymoon as the Cameron brother marries the Stoneman daughter and the Stoneman brother marries the Cameron daughter. The film ends with a mob being run by a figure on a horse with a whip, fading into a peaceful scene with Christ standing in the middle of the people. The title card reads something like, "Can we hope for a day when war is no more and we all take after Jesus?" or something like that.
Three hours long. In a day and age where films were most often single reels, this one was twelve reels. I feel like it could have been broken into two separate "six reel" movies. The first half could have kept the "Birth of a Nation" title, the second half could have been called, "Gee, ain't the KKK Swell". Christ, it was nothing more than a Klan recruitment movie. The way it was presented, I began thinking that if ANY of this were true, there must have been two versions of the Klan. One forming after the Civil War, riding around defending white interests in the face of reconstruction and the other is what we know it as today; a group of rednecks sitting around hating "niggers and jews", but not really having any real reason. So off to the great Internet I go and I found out that not only was I right, but this movie was a key factor in the revival of the KKK.
I thought it was a very long movie. Very real in its portrayal of war. They all say that it was groundbreaking in its use of camera angles and shots but to be honest, I don't know much about movies before 1915 so I wouldn't know any different. On that, I'll take their word on it. The portrayal of the Klan? I don't know. I wasn't filled with my usual hatred of these modern redneck low-rent hate-mongers. I saw the early Klan as white southerner's response to undue punishment. Am I a sympathizer? No. Hell no! But I see some of the historical significance now that I have looked it up on line and read a lot more on them.
One of my favorite parts of the film was when Lynch tells Stoneman that he wants to marry a white woman. You can clearly see Stoneman say the words, "Well good for you!" as he claps him firmly on the shoulder. That is of course, until he learns that the white woman in question is his daughter. Oh sure, being an abolitionist looks great on paper but what happens when it comes into your living room? All I could hear was Eddie Murphy saying, "Give a nigger a rope, he wants to be a cowboy." Stoneman was an idealist but a hypocrite. The black man was equal, as long as 'they' didn't sully his family.
People often ask me what I would do if Becca brought home a black man. I answer them honestly. I have personal beliefs that I have formulated through the years on my own. They are in constant flux and I will never force them onto my child. If Becca is truly happy and this person will treat her with honor and respect, I don't care if she brings home a black man or a green woman, as long as she's happy. Thank the gods we've evolved a little bit in the last hundred years or so huh?
Tuesday, 1-23-7
Teresa groaned when she saw this one come in. She can't stand this movie. She refused to believe that I wanted to watch this one again. I haven't seen it since '92? Bobcat Goldthwait has always been one of my favorites. He hasn't done much in the way of movies. I don't know if he's even capable if living beyond his image as "That screaming guy from the Police Academy movies" but I'd like to see him try. He's funny when he's being himself. His stand up routines are set up with him doing the screaming and giving face to the image for about ten minutes, the other 50 minutes is really funny shit. I wish he'd do more movies but, most people consider "Shakes" to be the death knell for his career. So be it, I'll take what I can get from him.
Plot: Drunk guy is approaching hitting bottom. He is screwing up at work. His nemesis gets the promotion he wanted. His boss fires him because he screwed up at work again. Recently promoted nemesis is caught in a compromising position, kills the boss and frames the drunk guy. Drunk guy and his friends prove who really did the crime. Drunk guy decides to clean up his life. The movie ends with him going to AA and then getting the promotion.
Now that's not such a bad movie is it? We've all seen it a thousand times right? Then why was it given such bad press? All the actors are in full clown makeup. Shakes and his friends are party clowns. I don't have the typical "fear" of clowns (no thanks to "Poltergeist") but I never trust a guy that won't let me see his face and plays with children.
I thought the movie was great. I wouldn't go so far to say, as one person put it, "The 'Citizen Kane' of alcoholic clown movies" but there's just something so funny in seeing Bobcat in smeared makeup waking up after a rough and drunken one-night-stand with Florence Henderson. The "Citizen Kane" comment was meant to be funny but has actually drawn fire from some people saying, "How can you compare 'Citizen Kane' to such a crappy movie like 'Shakes'!?" Folks, it's like me saying "Becca is my least favorite daughter." She's my ONLY daughter and therefore by default, my most favorite as well as my least favorite. Name another alcoholic clown movie... Anyway, this movie got a lot of bad press but "Bad Santa" didn't take heat like "Shakes" did. It's basically the same outline of taking a "beloved" icon and showing the seedier side of them. Well it was for me anyway.
Adam Sandler and Robin Williams are in the movie. Both of them are hard to miss, but Tom Kenny is also in the movie, he plays the nemesis "Binky". You know Tom Kenny better as the voice of "SpongeBob SquarePants".
I liked it. I'm thinking it might be one I'll have to buy. It's one of those "cult favorites" everyone is talking about. I definitely wouldn't recommend this to the mainstream but I thought it was funny.
Sunday, 1-21-7
What was this? Was it good, was it bad, was it deep, was it a bedtime story, was it an exercise in writing? I think it was all of these at once. It was interesting and sometimes, being interesting is all it takes.
I watched this one waiting to see the hook. Every time I see a damn M. Night Shamalangadingdong (or whatever the fuck his name is) movie the plot is paper thin and easy to spot. I sat there the whole time trying to figure out what the plot twist was going to be and the more the clock hands moved toward the end of the movie, the more frustrated I became that I hadn't figured it out yet. Then, the movie ended, and there was NO plot twist. Isn't that what he's known for? Why was I trying to decipher this simple, simple film?
Think fairytale: An ancient race of uberintelligent water people advised humans for centuries until humans stopped listening and moved inland and created war. The water people occasionally visit and inspire humans that have potential to change human history for the better. Once inspired, they can return home if they can evade the evil chameleon-wolves with the help of some unwitting humans with unknown powers.
The tale unfolds around an apartment complex with strange people living there. The superintendent slips and hits his head (Is the whole thing a dream? No.) and finds the lady in the water. He hears a little of her story and introduces her to the man she is supposed to inspire. He is sufficiently inspired. Trying to return home, she is attacked by the wolf. Superintendent guy stumbles across the full meaning of the fairytale from an ancient Chinese story from one of the tenants. After hearing about the humans that are supposed to help, he consults a film critic that has just moved in. He lays out the basic premise that all movies follow and the choices for who is supposed to have what power seem obvious. After another failed attempt to return, it is discovered that the critic was wrong and another crew of helpers was assigned and this time, it works and the lady in the water returns home.
That's it. No twist. No unexpected turns. Just a nice bedtime story for his daughters. So in that respect, it was a cute fantasy movie. A little flat and two dimensional but all of M. Night's movies turn out like that. He has good ideas about lighting and camera angle but all of his characters are boring and strained.
Some people try to tell you that if you don't get the deeper meaning in movies, then you're too stupid and should go home and watch "Earnest Goes to Camp" or something. I don't think there was anything too deep in this one. Other than the fact that I was actively watching for a non-existent twist, I enjoyed the fantasy tale.
I thought it was a little self indulgent the way he used it to call attention to his persecution complex. If you make a shitty film, people will call you on it. If you make "apparently" simple films, people will heckle you on it. M. Night is not above this, he makes good movies but they are movies that some peole like to tear apart. In retaliation, he was not subtle at all in this movie to portray himself (I mean actually CAST himself and acted the part) as the writer that will change the world while the critic that calls him predictable and boring is torn apart by a wolf. The main character (the Lady in the Water) was named STORY for fuck's sake! How blatant can you get!? Everyone came together to heal her and to get the writer's muse to live. Then he sets himself up as a martyr by saying that this writer's book will be so unsettling to some that he will be assassinated because of it. He accepts his fate and moves forward with it because his work is so important, it will inspire future leaders and change the world. Ok, so I called it a little self-indulgent. It is, but I'm not going to fault him for it, I think it's great. If I had that level of media exposure, I'd set myself up as savior of the world too. Why not?
Saturday, 1-20-7
After the original "Superman" fiasco and the really crappy "Superman Returns", I decided to watch this one myself. Once again, I just couldn't maintain focus. I fell asleep several times. It just seems that these movies are drawn out way too long. Not that I'm one of the mindless masses that needs constant action/explosions to keep me entertained, but sometimes there is way too much exposition. There's no movement, no development. The Superman movies seem to be extremely guilty of this.
The version I watched was the "Donner Cut". Much was said about how this was supposed to be the true vision of Superman, but the changes I saw were minor. Of course it has been years since I saw the original version so I may not be remembering enough of the details to make an educated critique, but when have I ever claimed to make educated statements? My rants and raves are purely emotional.
The three bad guys from Krypton who were banished to the 'Phantom Zone' from the first movie are accidentally released and they come to Earth to rule. Each of them has the same powers of Superman. Just before they come to Earth, Lois figures out Clark Kent's secret and Superman takes her to his Fortress of Solitude to show her the whole story. While there, he renounces his birthright and he steps into a special chamber where all of his powers are stripped from him in the name of becoming 'human' so that he is free to live a normal life with Lois. Upon his return (don't ask me how the hell they got out of there without the ability to fly) Clark gets the shit beat out of him at a diner. After his ass-kicking, they turn on the TV and learn about General Zod taking over the Earth. Superman goes back to the Fortress to beg for his powers to be returned so he can save mankind. It works. He returns to Metropolis and has a grand scale battle with the three Kryptriplets. After seeing that he can not beat them and that the battle is only killing innocent people, Superman flees to the Fortress and the Kryptriplets follow, carrying Lois and Lex Luthor along with them. Now that his usefulness is exhausted, Zod says he will kill Luthor. Luthor goes to Superman for help, Superman tells him to try to get the three baddies to step into the power-stripping chamber. Immediately, Lex double-crosses Superman and tells Zod it's a trap. They force Superman into the chamber and activate the machine.
This, for some unknown reason, has generated my NEW favorite phrase from this movie, "Lex Luthor, ruler of Australia, activate the machine". It's just funny, that's all. It's got to be better than my old favorite, "Come, son of Jor-El, kneel before Zod! Snootchie bootchies!"
So, Zod commands Superman to kneel and when he does, he wrecks Zod who now has no powers. The machine was reversed. Anyone outside of the machine lost their powers, Superman, inside was shielded and safe. The three baddies are defeated and Superman saves the day.
The movie dragged in a lot of places. I was glad that they removed a lot of the cheesy lines. I remember the original being a little too over the top about comic relief. There was still plenty of cheese to go around in this one but it was thinned out nicely. The only possible drawback to that is that a lot of the assigned "religion overtones" rang out a lot cleaner. Superman no longer talks to his mother about Lois, he talks to his father again. In the speech you can't help but hear all of the "I have sent them my only son to save the Earth" and "You are the light of the world" etc. Jor-El cast out the devils from the Krypton utopia (Heaven) and then sent his only son to earth in a star, to parents who did not conceive him, Kal-El and Jor-El both use the Hebrew "El" meaning God. Some people really go out of their way to see these traits and I never gave them much thought but after watching this version with the additional footage, it came to my mind while watching.
I was also happy to see a lot of the stranger scenes disappeared too. The Mount Rushmore re-imaging was thankfully missing. Instead they just topple the Washington Monument. They never right the Tower of Pisa. The thin/filmy "S" that he tears off of his chest and throws as a weapon was also recognized as "fucking stupid" and removed. Paris is also left out so the Eiffel Tower bomb that originally shattered the Phantom Zone is missing. The ICBM Superman diverted from the first movie is now what breaks and releases the phantom zone. The dorky bad guy isn't so dorky in this one either. That makes better sense, Jor-El wouldn't banish a retarded criminal to the Phantom Zone.
All of these changes are for the better but there was one change I didn't care for. At the end, to make Lois forget his secret identity, instead of kissing her with the special, "forget all this shit, baby" kiss, Superman simply spins the Earth backward in time, again. Somehow I have to believe that they wouldn't have used the same ending twice if they didn't have to. There has to be a reason why they did this. It's absolutely stupid. Another thing I didn't like was that there was less Lex Luthor than I remember. For plot purposes, they probably used him just right but he's a major draw character and I would like to have seen a lot more of him. Why not!? I mean, some movies take completely inane characters that have ten seconds of plot use and carry them through entire films. Jar-Jar Binks must die!!!
No more Superman movies for me. I've seen all I want to see. I don't need to see an idiot-savant Richard Pryor or a nuclear Superboy. Superman 2 was better off living in my head. Now that I've seen the "Donner Cut" I have to conclude that the Superman movies were good but they taste better with a little memory dust on them.
Sunday, 1-14-7
Heffner told me about "The Vader Sessions" a while back and now it has become part of our everyday quoting. Some guy took some "Star Wars" scenes and dubbed in James Earl Jones' voice from other movies he was in. It's pretty funny. A lot of the lines were from "The Great White Hope" but I hadn't seen it in years. So, with all the quoting, I decided to see it again. I've been playing with doing the same type of thing with other stuff but I can't seem to edit video very well.
A black heavyweight fighter is at the top of his game and no one can beat him. Set in the early 1900's, the trouble comes because he is living his life his way and not too concerned with playing by society's rules. He plays the "part" of the ignorant black man to the camera and reporters but he also refuses to become a hero to the black community saying, "I ain't fighting for no race, I ain't trying to redeem nobody". He is a man ahead of his time seeing himself not as black or white but as a man. His biggest trouble is that he has a white girlfriend. The promoters are trying to find a white boxer that can take the title back from Jefferson. When that fails, they have him arrested for crossing state lines with his white girlfriend. He flees the country but is unable to find a country that will let him fight. Jefferson and his girlfriend travel the world hand to mouth trying to make a living. He hears that there is an offer on the table that will allow them to return home if he throws the fight to the latest white boxer. He refuses to give up his title by throwing the fight. He wants a fair fight. Win or lose he wants it kept honorable. When the girlfriend pleads with him to take the deal, he tells her to go. She ends up killing herself. In remorse or in futility, he takes the fight but refuses to take the dive. He fights with everything he's got but age and life on the run has caught up with him and he loses the fight.
I thought it was a great movie. Obviously, there were the depictions of blatant racism and bigotry. The hypocrisy of how the black man could be good enough to be our sports hero but not good enough to date out white women. It was a great movie for all of that but I loved it for Jefferson's refusal to give up his honor. The whole movie the main character kept talking about how it's not about race for him. The whole movie he just boxed the best he could. When he had the opportunity to save his ass by compromising his honor, he refused. The whole world knew that he HAD to give in to this. But he didn't. That tenacity, he held his honor sacred to the very end. In every review I've seen on this movie, everyone focuses in on the race aspect, I only saw a man of honor that refused to bend.
Sunday, 1-7-7c
Another surprise for me. I got this one basically for Becca. I had heard it was a good movie but I didn't expect to like it. It just didn't look like it would appeal to me. I got it for Becca but she's the only one who didn't watch it. By the time we started to watch this one, we weren't alone anymore so we lost some of the cozyness of spending time together. I was alright with that because I figured I'd watch about ten minutes of the movie, dislike it and get up to work on my computer.
After ten minutes, I was on schedule; the movie sucked and I was going to go in the other room. I don't know why I sat there (I was exhausted maybe?) but I'm glad I did. It turned out to be a good movie. It was an old movie but it was good. There again, depending on who you read or how detailed you want to get, there are only 105, 32 or 7 basic plot lines...
First off, cars are alive, cars are people. No humanoid figures in this one, the cars themselves are the people of the world. Famous rookie race car is cockey and hard to work with but is enjoying success. He is traveling to California for the final race of the season to settle a three-way tie between himself, the just-as-cocky veteran and the humble "King". I don't know ANYTHING about racing but a baby blue Roadrunner with an extended spoiler is Richard Petty. I don't know who the other cars were representing but even I knew who that was. On the way, he is separated from his transporter. Trying to find him, he ends up more and more lost. He ends up tearing up a road in a tiny little 'ghost' town off of the old Route 66. They sentence him to five days of fixing the road. He resists but eventually gives in and accepts his sentence. During his time there, he gets to know all of the town's inhabitants. He falls in love and he learns that the judge was an old racer himself. The judge tries to give the rookie some advice but Mr. Know-it-all won't listen. Just about the time he starts to learn his lesson and starts to care about everyone, the media finds him and they whisk him away to California. During the race he hears the judge's voice over his radio. They all came to the race to be his pit-crew (he kept firing his old crews). He runs into trouble and uses what the judge tried to teach him to straighten out. He wins the race and returns to the little town to live, putting it back on the map and enticing people off of the highways and back onto Route 66, bringing all of the little old towns back to life.
Cute story. I was beginning to think it was a lot like "Days of Thunder" with Tom Cruise but as the movie went on it was almost a line-by-line version of "Doc Hollywood" with Michael J. Fox. Upwardly mobile kid, trapped in an old town against his will, falls in love with the city-smart girl, comes to love the people in the town, returns to the city to find that he would rather be back in the little town. How many plotlines are out there? Enough that they could have disguised this one a little better.
We had a lot of fun trying to identify the voice talent. The judge was Paul Newman but we weren't totally sure until we saw it on the end credits. Cheech Marin and George Carlin was easy enough but I can't believe I pulled Katherine Helmond out of the blue. It was just some non-descript old lady voice but then there was one line she said and her face jumped into my head. Of course, the big draw (and probably the reason I was dreading this movie) was Larry the Cable Guy as the busted and rusted tow truck. I do not like this guy. Oh I'm sure he's a nice guy and all. I'd be nice to him if I ever had to meet him. When I say I don't like him, I mean I don't like his act. I never found the redneck-loser look/sound to be funny. Every time I hear someone say "Get Her Done" I just want to smack them with a fucking 2x4 full of rusted nails while gouging out their eyeballs with a broken beer bottle! Where was I? Oh yeah, Larry the Cable Guy. I was expecting him to dominate the movie and be the reason I hated it. He didn't and I don't. There was lots of him in the movie and he did his redneck bit (does he do anything else?) but it was alright. His character was just an animated version of his stage persona but it wasn't too much. They portioned him out just right I guess.
There were a lot of little references that I thought was cool. Being a designing animator for Disney/Pixar must be about one of the coolest things ever. All those little details you get to put into a film that most people will barely notice, freaking cool. Like the rubber chunk debris on the racetrack, every time they showed it I was fascinated that they bothered to put it in there (although just about the time I said it out loud there were a whole bunch of shots of the track and maybe there were a few too many shots of the debris...) The shape of the mountains behind the town had to be a representation of those Cadillacs sticking nose down out along Route 66. One of the license plates read A113. That's the animation classroom at Cal-Arts. They've snuck that one in a whole bunch of movies. It's like George Luca$ putting 1138 in a scene where ever he can or Kevin Smith putting in a 37. There were a lot of ones I saw and I'm sure a whole bunch I missed. I probably missed more than I usually due just because it was a racing movie. I'm sure NASCAR fans caught a lot more than I did.
There were a lot of people that assumed that the main character, Lightning McQueen, was named for Steve McQueen but he was actually named for a Pixar animator who died recently. One of the funny stories I read about names was the old VW bus. The name was Fillmore but they wanted to name it Waldmire after another animator. The guy refused because he was a vegan and didn't want his name on anything that would end up in a McDonald's Happy Meal. Funny stuff, those silly vegans. VW Buses made of meat? Still, you've got to admire his convictions...
The movie had a slow start. If you can get past the first ten minutes, you'll probably like it. If you're a race fan you'll probably love it. I thought it was alright. Another one that I'm glad I saw but probably won't own although I'm more inclined to buy this one than some of the others I've said that about. If you bought "Toy Story" or "Monsters Inc." you'll probably buy this one too.
Last Updated: 06/20/07 06:32 p