Category: Cinema

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An Interesting Dissertation

An interesting dissertation on how to best represent DUNE's Baron Harkonnen on screen in our post-modern society without resorting to the tropes for evil used in the 1960s when the novel was written…

And the comments that follow the article are for the most part—refreshingly—thoughtful. I could not help but draw parallels between the Baron's character and another sociopathic, malignant narcissist we're all having to deal with in there here and now.

Definitely worth a read if you're a fan of DUNE.

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It Looks Like It's Happening

There have been rumors of a rebooted/reimaged Dune movie in the works for years now. But it looks like it's finally happening.

As I may have written before, when the original Dune came out in 1984 I was ecstatic. The Dune series remain my favorite books of all time, and while it was a difficult, convoluted story, I knew the first time I read it that it was deserving of a proper screen adaptation.

That being said, when I saw David Lynch's version, I walked away sorely disappointed. Visually stunning, what I saw on screen matched almost exactly what I had visualized while reading the novel. But halfway through the story had been changed to such a degree that it was almost unrecognizable. And Paul making it rain at the end? Water is poison to the sandworms, so he would've effectively destroyed all spice production then and there.

I had my hopes dashed once again with the Dune and Children of Dune miniseries that appeared on the SyFy Channel in the early 2000s. This time the story matched the books almost perfectly, but the visuals were off. They looked cheap and I not-so-affectionately refer to the production as "Planet of the Hats." Still, it was better than nothing, and better than Lynch because at least it followed the original storyline.

That's why when I heard that Dennis Villeneuve (most recently known for Blade Runner 2049) would be taking the helm this time around, I had my hopes rekindled that we'd finally see a Dune worthy of its beloved status.

This production will star Timothee Chalamet (Call Me By Your Name) as Paul Atreides. The cast will also include Rebecca Ferguson (Mission Impossible) as Lady Jessica, Dave Bautista (Guardians of the Galaxy) as Beast Rabban, Charlotte Rampling (Broadchurch) as The Reverend Mother Helen Mohiam (perfect!), and Stellan Skarsgård (Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again) as Baron Harkonnen. The other major roles have yet to be cast, but I'm optimistic because of who has already signed on.

The film is expected to begin filming in Budapest and Jordan this spring.

Precious few details have leaked out, but today I found these enigmatic photos on a Dune fan taken in Jordan that were simply labeled, "Arrakis, Jordan. Wadi Rum. Our New Home of Dune."




Squee!

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Unnecessary

One of the movies we didn't get a chance to see when it came out last summer because of financial constraints was Solo: A Star Wars Story.

Based on the reviews I'd read, I took the fact that I missed seeing it when it was in the theaters as a blessing in disguise. When it appeared on BlueRay a few weeks ago I briefly considered purchasing a copy, but again lack of funds prevented me from doing so.

It appeared on Netflix a few nights ago.

I was not impressed. In my opinion it wasn't so much a bad movie as simply an unnecessary one in the Star Wars pantheon. Yeah it provided backstory of how Han and Chewbacca met, how he won the Millennium Falcon from Lando Calrissian, and provided the expected stunning special effects and action sequences, but I came away thinking, "They went to a hell of a lot of trouble  making this film simply to explain away a stupid technical error—Han's bragging that he "made the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs" (a parsec being a unit of distance, not time) in the original Star Wars film.

Maybe it's just the curmudgeon in me, but I'm starting to believe there can actually be too much Star Wars; that the magic is being diluted.

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Trump Supporters

IMHO, this movie (Bird Box if you haven't heard of it) deserves every merciless, hateful meme it's generating. A cheap ripoff of the general idea of A Quiet Place (which I thought was excellent, by the way), it's obvious Sandra Bullock's bank account was getting more than jus a little lean when she agreed to participate in this travesty. If it was playing in a theater I would've demanded my money back. It's that bad.

 

 

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(Very) Late to the Party

Even though the film came out sixteen years ago, I'd never seen The Hours in full until today. I ran across the soundtrack sometime during 2005 while browsing at the public library and it became my go-to writing music for quite a while, without ever really knowing the story behind it. (I love all things Philip Glass so that point was moot.)

Several months ago I noticed it playing on IFC one day while channel surfing, but it was nearly over so I set the DVR to record the next showing. I attempted to watch thereafter but I fell asleep halfway through. (It wasn't the movie's fault; I was exhausted.)

Today I started it over and watched the whole thing. All I can say is "Wow."

I'll leave it to a review I found online that mirrors my own feelings about the film:

"…it is impossible to fault at any level: Acting, dialogue, costumes, locations, soundtrack, scenery, settings or storyline.

"Films like this don't come along too often–beautifully made in an almost understated way, it relates to no major event or cataclysm, it chronicles no turning-point in history and it poses no worrying conundrum for the future. It is simply a quietly-told story that will criss-cross between various points in time and take you deep into the characters' emotions and portray the effect that they have on their lives. When you have seen and come to understand the events that take place, by the time it concludes it will leave you feeling refreshed and perhaps a little better in touch with the emotions in your own life–just like good films should, but sadly, so rarely do…

Easily 9 out of 10–If you watch this one, you will not regret the time spent."

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Released 22 Years Ago Today

The Addams Family (1991)

Another one of those films (along with its sequel) that when it appears on cable I drop everything I'm doing to watch. Raúl Juliá's death in 1994 was an absolute tragedy. The Addams Family films had the potential for becoming such a wonderful series. Watching Pugsley and Wednesday grow up would've been delightful…

It turns out that the film had a very tortured birth and that there actually was a third film with a totally different cast, director, and production company that went direct to video and crashed horribly—as it should have. You don't mess with classics.

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Name Three Movies

Name three movies that no matter how often they show up on cable, you'll stop to watch.

For us, they're:

● The Fifth Element
● Pitch Black
● Resident Evil

What are yours?

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Wow!

We finally got out to the movies yesterday and saw A Quiet Place.

All I can say is, "Wow! What a great movie!" and I'm so glad we got to see it in the theater instead of waiting for Netflix. This is one film what needs to be experienced in a dark theater without any sort of outside distractions.

While the general structure of the film echoes many a sci-fi trope (The Waveries by Fredric Brown immediately comes to mind), A Quiet Place ramps up the fear factor to 11 and immediately turns it into a good old-fashioned monster movie. No explanation is given as to how the creatures came to be, where they came from, or what their ultimate goal was—other than to ravenously eat any living thing that makes a noise.

The sense of claustrophobia in this movie telling the story of a seemingly isolated family in the aftermath of a global apocalypse is compounded by a skillful use of absolute silence punctuated by the movie score.

And without giving anything away, the ending is one of the best I've seen in years. It's been a while since I was in a theater that spontaneously erupted in applause when the credits started to roll.

If you're a fan of the genre—or only want to spend some quality time with a very hunky bearded John Krasinski, set two hours aside and go see it. You won't be disappointed.

(I just read there is already a sequel in the works. If they must do this, I seriously hope it isn't a sequel, but rather a prequel. Considering this film starts on "Day 89," I want to see what happened Day 0-88.)

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50 Years Ago

50 years ago today, Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey had its galactic premiere at the Uptown Theater in Washington, D.C. on April 2, 1968, forever changing my young—and ultimately providing wholly unrealistic—expectations of the future

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Did They Even Read The Book?

After a delay of over a year from its original scheduled release, the third and final installment of the Maze Runner trilogy finally hit the theaters last week. I saw it today and all I can say is…well…that was $7.50 and a little more than two hours of my life I'll never get back.

Okay, I will admit it's been a few years since I read the book, and I'm a little hazy on the small details. But c'mon. This was one of those films "based on" a book that the script writer obviously never actually read; the "based on" part being the title of the book, a few of the characters, and precious little else. I suppose I should have expected it; the previous film was just as off-script as this one,

It's kind of sad because the first film was faithful to the source material and it was a genuinely interesting story. I guess subsequent marketing surveys convinced the filmmakers that there just wasn't enough blowing shit up in the two subsequent books to attract their desired demographic. and changes needed to be made.

And oh…was there ever a lot of blowing shit up in this last film.

As I read in a review,"By the time the villainous scientist played by Aidan Gillen sighs in the middle of a fight scene, 'Okay, that's enough,' you'll have long since come to share his weariness."

That about sums it up.

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I Just Can't Any More…

I am not generally one to cast aspersions on a fellow blogger (there are so few of us left after all), but I just can't any more.

There is one blogger who I've been following for quite some time. He's  gay, well-read, and at times a hilariously funny and spot-on reviewer of film and television. But lately, every other post has been about Call Me By Your Name. It's like he orgasms at the mere mention of it. He's admitted to thirteen screenings (and counting), and every newly discovered muscle twitch or sideways glance in a screening immediately generates a blog post.

Don't get me wrong: I'd been eagerly looking forward to seeing this film based on his recommendations for months. I saw the film (which I might not have heard of at all had I not been following him) in December. I liked it. I'd like to see it again. (Ben was not as impressed.) I bought the soundtrack on limited-edition numbered blue vinyl for chrissake! God knows I have impure thoughts about Armie Hammer. But enough is enough, dude.

I understand it's his blog and he's free to write whatever the fuck he wants, just as I am. And furthermore I understand from his writings on the subject that this obsession stems in part from his own coming out story; like the young character in the film, this blogger's first male-on-male sexual experience was with an older man while he was still in his teens, so I get how it reaches deep down inside him and tugs at his heart-strings. And if it takes him to his happy place, fine. But dude—please stop shoving this movie in our face on a daily basis! You're starting to turn me off to it completely and I can't be the only one who's feeling that way. Or, better yet—as I suggested to him in a comment I left on the site which seems to have immediately been deleted—create a new blog that is nothing but Call Me By Your Name.

I like reading his other reviews, but frankly I'm at the point where I'm simply about to drop him from my feed for six months to see any sort of balance returns.

Oh scratch that…six months will be about the same time the BluRay of the film comes out. Let's call it a year.

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Musing Luke Skywalker and The Last Jedi

I know I've written nary a word about The Last Jedi, which is kind of odd considering the inveterate Star Wars fan that I am and my philosophical connections with the films, but it's not laziness; I'm simply still processing the film after all these many weeks and have been rather tongue tied on the subject. But the other day I ran across the following and found it absolutely amazing and too good not to pass on:

(Warning, spoilers)

Rewatch The Empire Strikes Back and I think it's apparent that there was no other choice for Luke Skywalker in The Last Jedi, given the events of The Force Awakens. The entire premise of The Empire Strikes Back is that Luke Skywalker can sense Han and Leia in danger before it happens across the galaxy and drops everything to save them.

Which makes the biggest question in The Force Awakens, to me, "Why didn't Luke save Han?" Not Snoke, not Rey's parents, nothing. Why did Luke Skywalker let Han Solo die?

Luke is the central mystery of The Force Awakens. The opening sentence of the crawl is "Luke Skywalker has vanished." The closing shot is Rey having found him. The film is begging us to ask these questions about Luke. Why are we getting sidetracked by Snoke and Rey's parents?

Because of Empire and The Force Awakens, I don't think Rian Johnson COULD have done anything else with Luke Skywalker and have it make sense. There were slight variations that could have been made, sure, but the broad strokes of what Johnson gave us are pretty much inevitable. I expected Luke to toss the saber the first time I saw the film. That's his thing. I've been on the "Luke is turning to non-violence" bandwagon for a while. But I was furious the first time I heard him say, "Where's Han?" BUT! I realized there had to be a reason for it… My patience paid off in what I find one of the most heartfelt and stunning moments in the film: when Rey realizes that Luke has cut himself off from the Force.

Here we have the single most powerful Force user in the galaxy forced to cut himself off of every instinct he has for fear he'll do the galaxy more harm than good. From Luke's perspective, this abstinence of the Force is heroic. Another Jedi purge becomes impossible. The perspective of the audience hasn't been as sympathetic. But this is also one of the central themes of The Last Jedi: that we can all perceive the exact same thing in a different way.

I'm not just talking about the Rashomon sequence (which I thought was brilliant filmmaking), but the vision Rey and Kylo shared and discussed on the elevator. They saw the same thing and came to different conclusions about what that outcome would be.

"Always in motion is the future," Master Yoda would say.

But let's talk about the Rashomon sequence. Because, to me, this is what made Luke the LEAST Luke and the MOST Luke and the more I watch it, the more heartbreaking it is to me in the best ways. In case anyone is unfamiliar, Rashomon is a groundbreaking 1950 samurai film by Akira Kurosawa, who has always been an intense influence on Star Wars. It tells the tale of a murder in a meadow from three different perspectives. The film never offers us an objective truth on what happened, merely lets the narrators be as reliable or unreliable as our point of view allows.

Our first glimpse of the "Rashomon" triptych in The Last Jedi comes when Luke explains that he'd sensed the Dark Side in Ben. He went to confront him about it and it didn't go well. No sabers were in play. This is how Luke WISHES it would have gone, if at all. The second version is from Ben's perspective. Naturally, he's the hero of this version. Luke practically has Sith eyes and his green lightsaber is almost a sickly yellow. From Ben's POV, Luke arrives to murder him absolutely. There is no question in his mind. And then, the third time, we're given Luke's version. A blend of the two with plenty of shades of gray. And, for my money, the version of the story I believe. And it's the one I think truest to Luke's character, too.

Luke goes to check on Ben and the darkness growing inside him. This wellness check is already filled with self-doubt. Luke, like every creative or heroic person I've ever known, suffers from impostor syndrome. Just like Obi-Wan's.

And here he sees a darkness greater than anything he could have ever imagined. And a future where all of his loved ones are killed and the Jedi order he cared about burned to the ground. What happened the last time he was confronted with an image of this? The last time this happened, he was in the Death Star Throne Room and Vader taunted him with this vision of the future and he lost control. He ignited his saber out of instinct and fought. With rage and anger. But he pulled himself back from doing the thing he swore he wouldn't do: kill his own father. Then he tosses his lightsaber and says, essentially, "kill me if you have to, but I'll die like a Jedi."

Now, he goes to Ben's hut and sees that future all over again. And, as before, his saber ignites. And this is startling to him. He's instantly ashamed of himself and must deal with the consequence of that split-second consideration. We know he'd NEVER kill his nephew. Ben doesn't. Some have said that Luke wouldn't consider this again, but facing the Dark side of yourself isn't a "one time and it's over thing." It's a constant. We learn and we grow and we constantly have to reevaluate that.

And here's where Luke decided it was ultimately the right thing for the Galaxy to end the Jedi and quit the Force. Because these cycles of violence will happen between good and evil jockeying for power. And the constant in Luke's view was the Jedi.

Their failure. Hypocrisy. Hubris. If they were off the playing field, there would be no Vader. Or Kylo Ren. So instead of doubling down and training NEW Jedi to take down his nephew, he simply ends the cycle. VIolence begets violence and Luke would no longer participate.

And that's why I love the end of the movie. Luke finally learned from his mistakes. He could stick to his non-violence, but still set an example that would ignite the galaxy. Which is why his saber never touches Ben's during the fight. It's 100% evasion. He had lost the understanding of the value of the Legend of Luke Skywalker, but Rey helped him find it again. And he could once again believe in himself. And the Jedi.

From my perspective, given Luke's inaction in The Force Awakens, this is the ONLY thing that could have been done with him. And why I've embraced the arc so much. I love it. You don't have to like it, but this is the Luke I saw up there. And when he has his heroic moment on Crait and binary sunset… It's a perfect capstone to his character, given the turn the universe and canon took.

This is perfection. Luke has been my favorite character since he first saw him gaze into that double sunset in the summer of 1977, and I love how his arc has played out. I understand some will never like it, but I'm really happy that Luke became a more complex character who still makes mistakes and isn't an unrealistic cinnamon roll 24/7. This guy is absolutely correct; the internal struggle is never a one-and-done thing and I love that it harkens back to Return of the Jedi and Luke's dark moments, but also his choices. His scenes in the end of The Last Jedi are so moving because of his choices and doing the right thing in the end for both Ben and the galaxy.
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Movie Review

I stumbled across this film via Spewing Truth in The Face of Lies, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It's what I affectionately refer to as "hard" sci-fi, in the vein of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Interstellar, and Moon. No space battles, no laser swordfights, no retina-searing special effects.

The only thing about the story I find a little off is I find it very hard to believe NASA would send a single astronaut on a mission of this import and duration. Other than that, the acting, sets, and storyline were well worth the running time. A few reviews berated the ending; the movie failed to explain exactly what the message was that the spheres were sending us, but at the same time the ending left things open for a sequel—something that after seeing this film I would wholeheartedly welcome.

Lastly, I don't know if it was the escapism or simply being allowed to step away from the shit show that is our current existence or something more, but it actually gave me hope for our future as a species.

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Call Me By Your Name

One of the films I most wanted to see this year (besides a couple of little sci-fi romps) was the independent film Call Me By Your Name. That was based solely on the orgasmic reviews of a certain blogger who had screened it multiple times when it first appeared on the festival circuit (and the fact that Armie Hammer—for whom I have very impure thoughts—was starring). Being in such limited distribution however, I really had very little hope that it would ever make it to the cinematic backwoods of Phoenix.

Well, it did arrive. Not in the first wave of releases or even the second, but nonetheless it did, and we got a chance to see it yesterday.

I liked it. Not on the same level that said blogger did, but enough that I might want to see it again on the big screen and definitely add it to my collection when it comes out on disc. I thought the first half of the film was plodding, and agreed with Ben that they seemed to go into way too much character development that did nothing to move the story forward. But the second half definitely took off and engaged me. Armie's character comes off as more than a bit of an asshole—but it came from a place of uncertainty. Both Oliver (Hammer) and Elio (Timothée Chalamet) are unsure of the intents and affection of the other, so they do a push me-pull you love-hate dance for the vast majority of the film until they finally realize the feelings each of them have for the other are mutual. It's a situation we've all been in at one point or another, but it seemed to me the film spent way too much time building up that tension.

There has been some blowback regarding the relative ages of the two main characters. Elio is 17; Oliver is 26. It should be noted that the age of consent in Italy is 14. So calm down folks. Even though it may not sit with Puritanical America's ideals (except of course, if it was a girl), Elio's more than legal at 17 and Oliver is not a kiddie diddler.

Ironically that age difference is mirrored in the actors' real lives. Chalamet is 23 and Hammer is 32.





Some random thoughts:

  • I know exactly what it feels like to have a love like that.
  • The stillness of the film was refreshing from the usual blow-everything-up fare  at full volume of other modern cinema.
  • I love how they alternated between English, Italian, and French.
  • The wardrobe brought back many warm memories of the era. Especially the short shorts.
  • Setting the story in the early 1980s was genius. They didn't have to worry about AIDS or social media or posting selfies to Instagram and then feeling bad because everyone else's life was better than theirs.
  • The languid pace of life expressed in the film and the sense of isolation from the rest of the world was wonderful, although it took some time to get back into that mindset and away from our current frenetic "always on" culture.
  • Their goodbye at the train station and the subsequent followup six months later was heartbreaking, although the discussion Elio's father had with his son after Oliver's departure is one that I wish every father could have with their gay sons or daughters.


There is already talk of a sequel.

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Building the Death Star

(Maximize in a dark room for full effect.)

Ben and I saw the new film last weekend. I really enjoyed it, although I didn't get the usual adrenaline rush when the first notes of the theme rang out and the screen crawl started. By the time the end credits rolled, I wanted to see it all again. Ben was not impressed.

As has been written elsewhere, Episode VIII is definitely not your father's Star Wars. Sacred cows are slaughtered. And as the movie itself drives home, it's time to let go of the past and move on. I approve of this.

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Blast From The Past

Summer 1977: "Star Wars" summer. Seemed like everyone and their brother was attempting to cash in on the phenomenon that was Star Wars, including Burger King.

I bought this set of four posters as they came available at the fast food chain, hoping to one day get them framed. I'd completely forgotten about them until I ran across these images online. As it turns out, forty years later they're still not framed, languishing in a cardboard shipping tube in the bedroom closet—along with probably a dozen other posters I'd hoped to get framed "someday."

Considering it costs upward of a hundred dollars to get a simple black frame and mount for art of this size (with a 40% discount coupon!) at Michaels these days, it's still not going to happen any time soon.

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What Might Have Been

From ArsTechnica:

While most Star Wars pieces you'll see this week are focused on the soon-to-be-revealed adventures of Finn, Rey, Poe, and BB-8, today we've got a blast from the past to share with you—sort of. As any self-respecting nerd will tell you, the whole look-and-feel of the Star Wars universe owes a lot to Ralph McQuarrie. In 1975, George Lucas hired the conceptual artist to create the characters and worlds that then only existed on the pages of his scripts. So McQuarrie's paintbrush created the first images of C-3PO, R2-D2, Darth Vader, stormtroopers, and others, not to mention all those TIE fighters, X-Wings, and Y-Wings.

His paintings and concept art heavily informed Lucas' filmmaking, and the director reproduced many of McQuarrie's pieces in Star Wars. But quite a lot changed between the earlier scripts McQuarrie was working from and the film that audiences saw in 1977. Stormtroopers used lightsabers. Luke Skywalker was a girl. And the Millennium Falcon looked very, very different. Now, thanks to the 2017 graduating classes of the DAVE School, we have an idea of what a 1975-era movie—The Star Wars—would have looked like:

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A Masterpiece

When I first heard a Blade Runner sequel was in the works, my initial thought was, "For the love of all that is holy, WHY?!" Blade Runner stands as a cinematic masterpiece that needs no followup story, no re-imaging, no retelling.

And yet, after seeing Blade Runner 2049 yesterday, I take it all back. Admittedly I softened my stance somewhat by seeing the various trailers that came out over the past year and the reviews of the advanced screenings. But nothing prepared me for the tour de force that greeted me yesterday.

Every frame is an absolute feast for the eyes. If Roger Deakins does not walk away with an Oscar for cinematography, there is no justice in the world. The story answers many of the questions posed by the initial film and raises enough new ones to occupy your thoughts for quite some time. Twenty four hours later 2049 is still swimming in my consciousness as probably one of the greatest sci-fi films I've seen since the original Blade Runner in 1982.

The score—written by Hans Zimmer and Benjamin Wallfisch and not by Vangelis—retains enough of his influence that you'd think was the composer.

IMHO, definitely worth the price of a full admission and having to put up with the today's increasingly unpleasant movie-going experience in order to appreciate it fully.