Review – The Thing (2011)

When I first read that Universal was planning to revive The Thing, naturally my first thought was that they’d make another craptacular mess out of one of the best horror movies ever made. Fortunately, the folks hired to do the job were clearly sensitive to the attachment fans have to the source material. This prequel – which tells the tale of events in the Norwegian camp prior to the start of the original – is almost too respectful. I saw this one in the company of two other people who enjoyed the first one as much as I did, and we all loved the devotion to detail that creates new chills while sticking closely to the pre-established canon. However, those without such regard for the whole Thing thing may not get as much out of the experience. Though I’m giving it a three-star rating, I admit I plan to add it to my disc collection as soon as it comes out. Worth seeing

Review – The Next Three Days

Once again Paul Haggis makes a thriller as expensive as it is ludicrous (though I’m guessing this one won’t be the multi-Oscar triumph that Crash was). A community college professor (Russell Crowe) reaches the end of his rope trying to get his wrongfully-accused wife (Elizabeth Banks) out of jail legally, so he concocts an elaborate plot (is there any other kind?) to help her escape. The story dances through a relentless parade of ridiculous twists, starting with the notion that it’s cheaper to restart your life in another country than it is to mount a successful legal defense or buy a political pardon. The cast does what it can with the script, but with writing this terrible they don’t have much to work with. See if desperate

Review – Pay It Forward

I don’t know what pained me more, sitting through such a brazen attempt to manipulate my emotions or watching it fail so miserably at even this simple task. The idea of selflessly doing good things for other people could use a good pop culture promotion, which is why it’s such a terrible shame that this production skews good impulses into a dumb scheme by a middle school kid (Hayley Joel Osment) to match his alcoholic mom (Helen Hunt) up with his civics teacher (Kevin Spacey). Wish I'd skipped it

AGF #2

Anytime a character in a horror movie goes into a medicine chest for anything, we know it’s a cheap excuse to close the chest and suddenly reveal in the mirror that the ghost/killer/whatever is standing right behind her.

But of course when she turns around there’s nothing there.

In fact, maybe mirrors in horror movies in general should be absolutely goddamn forbidden.

Review – The Ward

I was actually looking forward to seeing a new movie from John Carpenter (though after Ghosts of Mars I can’t say exactly why I was eager for another round with him). Though he can still pull off a booga-booga here and there, that doesn’t make up for the lack of script. Anytime a movie begins with the main character admitted to a psychiatric hospital, the stage is set for a fair amount of rug-yanking before the end credits roll. And in that regard this picture doesn’t disappoint. At least it had enough of a budget to produce decent image quality. The guy-with-a-camcorder productions that currently dominate the market were beginning to wear me down. Mildly amusing

The Duck Slayer

I’m doing some research for an upcoming Veterans Day list of celebrities who have surprising backgrounds as war heroes. During my digging, I ran across this interesting tidbit: when Tom Savini was serving in Vietnam, he got spooked while on guard duty by something in the underbrush triggering a warning flare. Contrary to orders, he began firing blindly into the bush, only to have a duck waddle out. Apparently the incident earned him the less-than-heroic nickname “Duck Slayer.”

And on only tangentially related lines, George Romero was inspired to make horror movies at least in part by an early experience shooting a segment for Mr. Rogers Neighborhood about the host getting a tonsillectomy.

How my attention span works

I’m beginning to get the impression that “popular science” is an oxymoron. Case in point: How the Universe Works, a series from the Discovery Channel about, well, the obvious.

To be sure, there’s some hard science here. And pretty pictures. Lots and lots of pretty pictures. So many, in fact, that they start to get in the way of any genuine understanding of the topic at hand. Stars blow up. Planets collide with one another. The universe looks like a big Jerry Bruckheimer blockbuster.

Some of the graphics are unrealistic, either showing events at a greatly accelerated pace (with no note to that effect) or showing impossible scenes that look good but bear no direct connection to physical reality. And of course in true high-band cable style, they use the same animated sequences over and over again.

More troubling are the attempts by narrator Mike Rowe and many of the scientists interviewed for the series to sensationalize the science involved. For example, antiprotons are called the “arch enemies” of protons, two antagonists squaring off like gunfighters in some dirt-paved cowtown main street. Cataclysmic doom scenarios abound, as do science nerds’ stereotypically lame attempts at humor.

Sensationalism is one thing, but some of the statements play a bit too fast and loose with actual physics. The discussion of the Big Bang was particularly bewildering. Several of the scientists made statements akin to “One millionth millionth of a second after the Big Bang, the universe was the size of a baseball.” Such claims ignore the proven physical fact that neither time nor space is a constant. Particularly under extreme conditions such as those present just after the universe blinked into existence, things like “seconds” and “baseballs” wouldn’t have had any meaning that would correspond to our current understanding.

This slipshod attempt to simplify science for public consumption left me wondering if any of these folks had any idea what they were talking about. Though I appreciate the effort to explain things in terms that can be easily understood by the average Discovery Channel audience member, there’s still such a thing as dumbing things down until they aren’t true anymore.

Review – Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning

A lot of the user reviews on Netflix complained that Ginger (Katherine Isabelle) and Brigitte (Emily Perkins) have somehow been relocated from the suburbs of the first couple of movies in the series to the 19th century wilderness. Yeah, that’s a twist more worthy of fan fiction than serious filmmaking. On the other hand, it’s a werewolf movie. To be honest, I thought the historical setting worked much better than the contemporary setting. The girls are stranded in a fort under siege by lycanthropes, a situation that doesn’t spawn as many interesting plot twists as one might expect. Mildly amusing

Ken Burns’s Civil War: Giving credit where it isn’t due

After all these years, I assumed my immunity would still be good. How many episodes of Car Talk and Prairie Home Companion have I been exposed to? How many pledge drive marathons of the Three Tenors and Peter, Paul and Mary have I deftly avoided? I know I’ve given up on NPR in the car and I don’t get PBS directly anymore either. But from time to time I’ve watched Nova and Frontline on Netflix as booster shots if nothing else.

Still, nothing prepared me for a virulent case of the Ken Burns series on The Civil War. This was PBS history at its PBSest, taking a difficult and painful subject and making it far worse than it had to be. If Burns was a pediatrician, he would hit you with a mess of shots and then give you a plate of liver and lima beans to cheer you up.

After sitting through his treatments of baseball and World War Two, I had a pretty good idea of what to expect aesthetically: slide after slide drifting in and out like a middle school teacher-has-a-headache lesson with the projector not planted firmly on its prop books. Celebrities reading documents from the period. And of course minor key renditions of every folksy song from the era, which must have taxed East Coast harmonicas and dobros to their considerable limits.

All of that was well within the scope of my inoculations. I was even prepared for a certain amount of gloss. Many historians tend to regard Abolitionist Abe as the Real Lincoln, so little detours such as his support for an amendment that would have made slavery a permanent part of the Constitution tend to end up omitted.

What I wasn’t ready for was the inexcusable “even-handedness” of the production. The first few episodes were bound to be painful, as they covered Southern victories early in the war. But that was supposed to be the dramatic build-up, the part of the kung fu movie when the bad guys beat up the hero, burn down his house, assault his girlfriend and kick his dog. “The good part’s coming,” I kept telling myself. “Sherman’s gonna show up any minute now, and then all will be right with the world.”

Oh but no. Sure, the Union eventually wins the war (unlike Civil War reenactments, which often seem to be won by the Confederates whether or not that’s the way the actual battle ended). But the victory isn’t Bruce Lee stomping the bad guys’ guts out for killing his sister. The last two or three installments turn all goddamn weepy, wallowing in a ridiculous mess of “gallant enemy dignified even in defeat.” Episode Eight actually gave me the impression that the North was somehow apologizing for beating the South’s racist, traitor asses.

Particularly galling was the extended homage to Nathan Bedford Forrest. Yes, the man was a talented military commander. But after the war he founded the Ku Klux Klan, strongly suggesting that his involvement in the conflict wasn’t merely a matter of misplaced patriotism. Thank heaven Burns didn’t build this sort of “balance” into his series on the Second World War. Five minutes of loving tribute to Adolph Eichmann’s organizational talent with train schedules would have been more than anyone would have tolerated.

Which raises an obvious question: why treat the largest act of treason in American history as if it had been a noble cause worth dying or killing for? Maybe Burns knows his audience well enough to know that a more honest telling of the tale would have angered a lot of people in the former traitor states.

Ah, but that in turn raises another question: who gives a crap? If Southern “outlaws” still cling to the ersatz glory of the Confederacy, shouldn’t we stand ready to rub their noses in their inglorious defeat?

Perhaps not. Nearly a century and a half after Appomattox, maybe we should all forgive and forget. Time heals all wounds, does it not?

Not if the wound is still fresh. How many blocks do you have to drive from your house before you encounter the Traitor Battle Flag flying high in someone’s yard? Do the images of traitors still mar the face of Stone Mountain, Georgia? Did ESPN just fire Hank Williams Jr. for comparing the President to Hitler?

And the bastard actually had the temerity to whine that his right to free speech had been violated. No, Bocephus. Getting fired by your boss because you’re a racist turd doesn’t transgress upon the First Amendment. If you want to know what it feels like to have your rights violated, there are plenty of countries in the world that would execute you for publicly insulting the chief executive.

Oh, and a quick aside to ESPN: if you didn’t know the ugly truth about the guy, you’ve never been to the Missouri State Fair and seen his picture proudly emblazoned on banners proclaiming that “If the South would have won we’d have it made.” Pull your head out of the sand once in awhile.

Therein lies the problem with letting Shelby Foote influence how the South is handled in a documentary. Nobility in defeat is acceptable only if the enemy is actually defeated. As an ethical and practical matter, you can’t offer a hand up to a vanquished foe if he’s going to try to stab you again the moment he regains his feet.

So let’s stick Ken Burns’ The Civil War in a vault somewhere and let it sit awhile. Put a sticker on it for the benefit of future generations that reads: “Open only when the last vestiges of slavery have been not only marginalized but completely eradicated like Smallpox.” Maybe then the message of this production will be appropriate.

But until then, no.

Review – Ironclad

Wow, did they spend a lot on this movie. The sets must have cost a ton, and on top of that they hired quite a cast (Brian Cox, Derek Jacobi and Paul Giamatti). Sadly, they squandered all that cash on a picture with a script bad enough to be a SyFy production. The result teaches a lesson or two about Medieval siege warfare but wastes the rest of the time on some nonsense about Templars helping rebels hold out against King John’s decision to rescind the Magna Carta. See if desperate

Absolutely goddamn forbidden

Sequences in horror movies in which something scary (and non-undo-able) happens to a character, but then she wakes up and oh, it was only a nightmare.

Weak.

Review – Haunting at the Beacon

Definite E for effort. The producers spent enough to put a comfortable amount of distance between this picture and guy-with-a-camcorder productions. And though it indulges heavily in ghost story clichés, it manages a fun thrill or two as well. The biggest problem with this story of grieving parents moving into a haunted hotel is that it’s ever so apparent where it’s going before it even gets underway. Mildly amusing

Our first YouTube video

Yeah, it doesn’t particularly amount to much, just 15 seconds or so of an LED circuit I built out of Elector magazine (and modified a bit). The trick here is that I shot it with my phone, uploaded it to YouTube and added it to this blog entry just to see if I could do it.

And lo and behold, I can. Fun stuff.

Review – Tron: Legacy

I’m not at all sure that the original Tron needed a sequel for any reason, but if it did then this is what it had coming. Looks like they mixed a little extra Matrix into it. And of course the effects are greatly improved, which is a good thing because they’re the obvious star of the show. Overall this is a bright, noisy movie, which I expect will make it sufficient for its intended audience. Mildly amusing

Review – Buck

I haven’t seen The Horse Whisperer, so I don’t know what the fictionalized version of Buck Brannaman’s story is like. But the real guy is unusually interesting. Coming from a childhood of abuse, he developed the notion of treating horses with kindness and respect rather than “breaking” them with indifferent cruelty. The non-intrusive documentary style of this picture does a great job of telling his touching story. Worth seeing

Review – Contagion

On the surface this is a perfectly acceptable picture – at least until the plot twists take a turn for the ridiculous – about a killer plague temporarily devastating the human race. However, the problem with making a production about paranoia is that it tends to make your viewers paranoid. The more the movie encouraged me to fret about how many times a day I touch my face, the more keenly I noticed the bizarre politics of the drama. The pro-homeopathy, anti-establishment blogger is a creep and a profiteer. But then then the medical establishment gets tarred for taking too long to approve drugs, concerning itself with profits over people, and helping itself before aiding anyone else. Thus I struggled to figure out what lesson I was supposed to learn, other than “Gwyneth Paltrow makes a disturbing corpse” and “Matt Damon coveys emotion by repeating himself.” Mildly amusing

Ah, that’s more like it

For the last couple of entries I’ve been picking on our good friends at Chasing Fireflies for offering boys’ Halloween costumes that would most likely get your son’s ass beat by a bully. In the spirit of holiday cheer, objective fairness to the retailer and parents’ need for good advice as well as bad, here are some selections from the catalog that should safeguard your kid’s ass from potential beating.

Now this is a lot more like it. Scary costume = true spirit of the holiday. Plus if your son’s class is going to do a Halloween parade at a local rest home, there’s nothing the residents like better than the Grim Specter of Death (even a miniature version). 

Anything with a gun is a fairly safe bet.

“Astronaut” is a good blend of science nerd and macho man. Plus unlike Soldier, Cop or Cowboy, Astronaut has no Village People connection (not, mind you, that most 12-year-old bullies are likely to have heard of the Village People).

If your kid insists on going as a clown, this is a more ass-beating-safe option than more traditional Bozo suits. Here we have a solid blend of “whimsical” and “Juggalo.”

They also have Ace Frehley and Peter Criss, but Gene Simmons is your best bulwark against ass beating. No Paul Stanley, so if he’s your favorite member of KISS … well that’s just sad.

 

I’d maybe leave off the Super Mario moustache, but the rest of this should work. If nothing else, a bully might not want to risk a self-defense briefcase to the jaw.

Like astronauts, most superheroes are a nice blend of nerdy and tough. This Iron Man comes with extra weaponage, making it an excellent option.

I have no idea what this even is, but it looks badass.

“Robot” doesn’t automatically say “don’t beat my ass.” But this one looks enough like metal that a bully might fear bruising his knuckles. Plus those crab claws portend danger (though good luck to your kid trying to trick or treat with them).

Bully’s thought process: “Wow, that kid’s parents dressed him as a Speed Bump. They must hate him even more than my parents hate me. Maybe I’ll cut him some slack.”

Quiz answers - Bad Halloween costumes

Yeah, so it was a bit of a trick quiz. The short answer is “all of them.” The specifics:

The snake head is an excellent start, but problems crop up below the waistline. Despite evolving public opinion about sexual orientation, at this point it’s still a bad idea to send your son out in a dress.

 I am Poseidon, Lord of the Sea, King of Getting My Ass Beat

The ghost thing is a step in the right direction, but this execution isn’t exactly a ticket out of ass-beating land.

Even Hollywood has figured out that you pretty much have to dress Robin Hood in jeans and a T-shirt in order to keep him from looking like the Sheriff of Nottingham is going to beat his ass. If you want to do the outlaw thing, try “biker” rather than this.

“Behold, I am the Thief of Ass Beat!” Seriously, that sword isn’t fooling anyone.

Harry Potter and the Painful Ass Beating

 

Octopi rock. But this one’s just a little too glittery, and for those of us who remember the 70s it’s also too Sigmund and the Sea Monsters. Plus I think we already had the dress conversation.

Bully: “Quit molesting yourself! Quit molesting yourself!”

Traditional vampire = goth outsider = ass beating. However, if you have to do the vampire thing, this one is way better than …

This one actually has matching costumes for sister, Mom and Dad. So your entire family can experience the joy of getting your asses beat by a 12-year-old.

Review – Exorcismus

So is the title Latin for “exorcism,” or is this one of those cases where a word in another language sounds like something in English but actually turns out to mean something completely different, such as “stupid” or “boring”? It’s more than apparent early on that this is yet another indie exorcism movie (and why are indie producers so attracted to exorcisms all of a sudden?), but I watched it anyway because Doug “Pinhead from Hellraiser” Bradley was on the cast list. Turns out he’s in it only briefly, and the rest of it is a moody teenager who gets more and more grimy as a demon latches onto her and her Catholic priest uncle tries to drive it out. See if desperate

Quiz Time! Bad Halloween costumes

The first week of October means that the holiday season is once again upon us. And that means parents are searching for answers to the first of a long string of holiday-related questions: what are the kids going to dress as for Halloween?

Not being a parent myself (unless you count a couple of cats who would kill me if I tried to stuff them into costumes), I’m generally not much help with such issues. However, earlier this year the good folks at Chasing Fireflies were kind enough to send me an unsolicited costume catalog. And after going through it, I’ve actually come up with some input parents may find helpful.

First let me say that this company is staffed by nice people and offers a wide selection of Halloween-related merchandise that actually doesn’t suck. What concerns me, though, is the array of costumes for boys. Many of them are perfectly acceptable. But a handful … well, see if you can spot the problem.

Which of the following costumes are likely to buy your 10-year-old son an ass beating from a 12-year-old whose idea of a Halloween costume is a Knicks jersey?

Review – Highly Dangerous

A lot of espionage potboilers from the 1950s are hard to tell apart, but this one has a unique element: bugs. Oh, and a female protagonist. She’s an entomologist sent to an unspecified Iron Curtain country to spy on a secret lab for breeding dangerous insects. The story wavers between Third Man thrilling and Danny Kaye silly (especially after a brutal torture session leaves the good doctor convinced that she’s a secret agent from her nephew’s favorite radio serial). Still, it’s enough of a departure from the usual to keep it interesting most of the way through. Mildly amusing

Review – Moneyball

Every once in awhile I like a movie so much that I have trouble coming up with exactly what to say about it. But I’ve stared at the blank space for this review long enough, so let me at least give it a try. It’s entirely possible that if you don’t care for baseball that you won’t care for this movie, either. On the other hand, there’s something transcendent about the tale of Oakland A’s GM Billy Beane’s efforts to turn an underfunded team into a championship contender. Brad Pitt overplays his role in a spot or two (and he’s begun to resemble Benicio Del Toro when shot from the wrong angle), but that’s a small price to pay for such a well-scripted, well-shot and generally delightful experience. Buy the disc