Iron Man 2: And now for something similar...

So we just saw Iron Man 2, and I have to say it was fairly entertaining.

The movie makers had the sense to tell Samuel L Jackson, "You're like an FBI guy, sort of, but otherwise, please just play badass motherf***** Sameul L Jackson." This is a big improvement over George Lucas casting him as a boring monk for three terrible movies.

Anyway, Robert Downey Jr does a good job as expected. The movie benefits from the Avengers ramp-up and you do get the sense that this is a small story couched in a larger one.

Here's my beef: The ending is pretty weak. You've watched trailers of Iron Man and War Machine fighting the robot drones for months now. You see racks of hibernating drones for an hour. We all know what's coming. And at the end, the good guys predictably just shoot a bunch of drones with lasers. Meh.

But they KNEW this wouldn't be interesting enough, so... they quickly encased another bad guy in (shocker) a bigger more evil Iron Man suit. I can't remember where I saw this before... oh, yeah, Iron Man 1.

This does not bode well for Iron Man's future. Here's what I mean:

Tony Stark/Iron Man is not the first movie hero to get bogged down in an endless swamp of fighting a "bigger badder mirror of himself" in the end of each movie. It also happened to Superman... and look where it got him:

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Superman 1: Superman mostly matches WITS with regular human Lex Luthor.

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Superman 2: Superman fights 2 evil Supermen and 1 evil Superwoman. It begins.

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Superman 3: Superman fights Evil Superman in a computer (with Richard Pryor?!)

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Superman 4: Superman fights... an Evil Teutonic Superman

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Superman Returns: The largest/least successful superhero movie in recent history.

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Superman was a great movie, and part 2 was great too, but it took a steep dive from then on. Not a good trend... Now...

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Iron Man 1: Fights evil business partner in a big silver evil Iron suit.

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Iron Man 2: Fights evil business enemy in a big silver evil Iron suit.

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What makes it even weirder is that given a year of development time, the bad guy (Vanko) opted to pass on armor and just built weapons. Why, in his rushed attack at the end, is he in a form-fitting clean Iron suit that looks as perfectly modeled and planned as genius Stark's most current model suit?

Oh well. Like I said, I liked the movie, but the end felt like a missed opportunity.

An Epic Post for an Epic Fail

I couldn't help myself; I knew it was wrong but I had to go there.

My plan was to take three rowdy friends to 2012 and heckle the movie to pieces (as the movie shattered the earth to pieces). My reality was three sleepy friends unconscious throughout most of the nearly 3-hour schlockfest.

Where do I begin with a movie like this? If you stick with me through this longer than average post you will save 2 horus and 38 minutes of your life.

SELECTIVE INTEREST:
In this movie, something like ninety-five percent of humanity dies. Ninety-five percent of people. That's the biggest tragedy in a movie, ever--unless you count the 100% destruction of Princess Leia's homeworld in Star Wars. (And who knows how few or many people lived on her planet anyway? It looked mostly blue from where I was standing.)

Amidst the worst carnage in any movie, ever, this movie wants you to chuckle at cheesy summer-blockbuster jokes and cheer when the cute dog lives. The surviving fraction of humanity gives up a monstrous 'hooray' when John Cusack--who plays a failed author, of even less consequence than the real John Cusack--survives. Sheesh.

I mean, what do you say when Southern California falls into the sea (Lex Luthor's real estate plan, finally come to fruition?) and the President (still badass Danny Glover) dies from being hit in the face with an aircraft carrier riding tsunami ... and then no fewer than four main characters get visibly upset because a nameless Chinese national laborer's leg is bleeding from a machine accident? Seriously?!

I looked to my compatriots to ask them, "Almost everyone died in the last hour... who gives a rip about this guy's scrapes?" The answer was unanimous and swift: "zzzzzzzzzzzzz."

Don't worry, the dog is okay

A NEW KIND OF HERO:
The main protagonist in this movie is basically a global-warming scientist. Right. The only interesting scientist-protagonists onscreen are ones who squeeze more power out of the warp drive or blast Alien Queens out of airlocks. This one has the unfortunate habit of making Obama-light speeches throughout the movie, and it just doesn't work.

Especially when he basically quotes Christian Bale's speech from the most recent Terminator, about how "if we are willing to sacrifice any human lives in our struggle, we've already forsaken our humanity." It wasn't a great speech the first time. It should have been better the second time, especially since the actor is at home in disasters (2006's Tsunami: The Aftermath).

DESCENT TO DOOM:
Roland Emmerich's last few movies have followed the same arc as Stephen Sommers' entries (snap!): After starting with some fun popcorn-fare (Independence Day/The Mummy) he tried something similar but different (Godzilla/Van Helsing) that came up high on the FX budget and low on satisfaction. Finally he returned and supernaturally drained the joy from a genre that's hard to screw up too badly (2012/GI Joe). I hear that both directors are working on comedies about dead babies now.

MAIN EVENT: CRACKS VERSUS POPES
This movie is so ridiculous that the first hour consists entirely of people running from "cracks" splitting the earth. They run from a crack, drive just a few feet ahead of an assailing crack (that one of the characters observes in Puck-like fashion seems to be "following" them around), and take off from three separate runways that are "cracking" just behind their planes. They also escape the largest volcano eruption ever by driving two inches ahead of the shockwave in Woody Harrelson's RV.

That's why it rings so poorly when the movie takes a thirty-minute time-out in the middle to mercilessly mock all of the world's faiths. You just can't do that in a movie this crappy. You didn't see Bill Pullman in Independence Day cracking wise about how Moses never saw this one coming.

Yet 2012 has the President ominously cut off just as he tries to comfort the nation reminding them of Psalm 23 (The Lord is my shepherd...). It has the Pope and all the praying masses of the Vatican steamrolled like Wile E. Coyote by tumbling buildings. It has another one of those ironically self-aware cracks shoot between God's finger and Adam's in the Sistine Chapel. It has the Chist the Redeemer skydiving off a mountain in Rio de Janeiro. The entire disaster becomes a Darwinian mechanism for wiping out every world faith in 90 minutes (check your scorecard--only atheists survive despite a large collection of religious characters).

This too much in too cheesy a movie. Emmerich doesn't have the skill (and with his shoddy track record, dare I say the right?) to attempt to make statements like this onscreen. It's hard to explain the way this comes across in such poor taste... It reminds me of how I'd feel if a character started spouting abortion-commentary in Pirates of the Caribbean Part 5. Wrong movie, dude.

EVER HEAR THE ONE ABOUT THE POLISH SUBMARINE...
...with the screen door? This movie trumps that. The earth's brightest scientists build gigantic survival ships ("Arks"--see, we want to market to Nihilists, Jews, Christians, and ...people in comas with ten bucks?). The Arks have a few flaws. Namely: A huge draw-bridge style door on the back of the boat. This door goes from the top deck down to the lowest part of the hull. Unsurprisingly the door jams and hundreds of thousands of people almost die because, um... There is a door the size of a city block on the side of the boat that is open. This door is the size of an aircraft carrier but it james when a power cord falls into the gears.

It seems that shipwrights since the Stone Age have grasped the "no doors underwater" concept in boat-design, but for some reason we decided to go experimenting in this, our darkest hour. Second: When a leak is detected, the ship automatically seals individual compartments with airtight doors to prevent the leak from spreading. This would have been a great idea, except the compartments sealed with airtight doors have ceilings of open grating, so everyone sealed in a protective compartment turns out to be sealed in a... well, 'automatic watery grave.'

Third: The engines can't run when the door is slightly ajar. Why? I don't know. This 'technical difficulty' was left unexplained because (let's be honest) everyone knew it was just another reason to remain in "suspense." It was pretty cool though... I'm working with GM to get my car to shut down any time I roll the windows down. I told them I want this for "suspense" reasons.

10+1 Reasons to Love 'True Lies'

• It is the best Arnold movie behind Terminator (1 & 2) and Predator. He is funny, self-aware, and still built like a mountain.
  
• Its humor made me laugh the first time I saw it (and still does).
  
• TOM ARNOLD: In the best role that I've seen him in, as a chubby sarcastic secret agent. Bill Paxton comes in second place as a comic relief co-star.
  
• Some just plain cool action scenes, including: The coolest scene in any movie featuring a Harrier VTOL fighter jet....

• ... A chase involving a horse and a motorcycle...
  
• ...A great brawl/shootout in public restroom, and...
  
• ...A great infiltration (and escape from) a snowy chateau.
  
• Did you know it was Eliza Dushku's breakout?
  
• The bad guy (pre-9/11) is a carbon copy of Osama bin Laden. Good thing this was made when it was, because it would have been trickier in a post-9/11 world to make a movie with a US Govennor beating the hell out of Osama bin Laden (and yes, eventully thwarting a terrorist plan involving a nuke and exploding pseudo-Osama into a billion tiny pieces of flesh).
  
• I like Brad Feidel (Terminator)'s soundtrack. You might not remember it, but it was exciting and fitting.
  
• Speaking of, this movie was a re-teaming of Arnold, Feidel, Bill Paxton and James Cameron from Termintor. How many bad movies has James Cameron made? I can't think of any (though I don't watch Titanic too often, personally).

What's not to like about this movie? What can I say, it makes me laugh each time see it, and the action is the perfectly balance between semi-realism and Hollywood ridiculousness. Casablanca, it ain't, but sue me.... I love this movie.

Worth Seeing: District 9 / PS: NO, Joe!

District 9 is produced by Peter Jackson and directed by Neill Blomkamp. It's a movie about an alien (the extraterrestrial kind) refugee camp in Johannesburg, South Africa. District 9 if the kind of movie that's more fun the less you know about it.


So I'll just say this: I think it's worth seeing. It won't spoil anything to tell you that the production design and effects are great, and that this movie can be enjoyed on any level from shallow (explosions!) to deep (Apartheid metaphor, barely veiled).


If you are simply in too much of a hurry to see the movie (or you hate aliens, or Peter Jackson, or ... um, Africa?), you can ruin it by watching the short movie that this big movie is based on: Alive in Joburg.


In other news, it seems that against everyone's wishes and plain common sense, GI Joe 2 is already in the works. While contemplating this tragedy, I figured out another reason I hated that movie: The fights remind me of Star Wars Episode I's battles (snap!!). A lot. Check it out:


The ninja's (analogous to Jedi) are really cool, and they flip around and sword fight like crazy. But you just don't care about these strutting personality-vaccuums, so when they're not fighting (90% of their screen time) you're bored with them.


Everyone who's NOT a ninja is fighting a big, cheesy CG battle that just feels... without consequence. When the Joes were battling, I think for a second I imagined Gungans (lots of Jar-Jar's) fighting battle droids, and it just made me want to... to... to pay my bills, or wash my wife's car, or watch SportsCenter, or balance my checkbook or something. The whole thing JUST DOESN'T MATTER.


I will leave you with this riddle: Which is less important, the subjugation of Jar-Jar's people, or the survival of a big CG Eiffel tower?


Just in case you were worried, even the little CG people visibly evacuated the tower first. There is nothing to worry about. Or care about. Or be excited about. Or prevent you from yawning.




Okay, I can't help it--I have to answer my own riddle. They are both infinitely unimportant. This is not a good thing to be thinking when you just paid $9 to be entertained.

Yo Joe!

I had to see it because I grew up in the 80's--so back off, okay?!

Here are the things you need to know about GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra.

It's cardinal sin (here's looking at you, Star Wars prequels) is that it just plain isn't fun. There was no point during this movie when the characters, the action, or anything else made me happy. It was just a chore, through and through. In a day and age when you can find eight billion fun or funny things on Youtube within seconds, a movie can't afford to be funless from start to final frame.

The actors are wooden. Channing Tatum seems born to play high school football players--there just isn't a lot going on in this guy's noggin. He falls blandly in a dull netherworld between the original Rocky (who you pity because he's dumb as a brick) and some sort of trendy 'Fast 'n' Furious' type rogue (the kind of character that is lost on me). But I liked what one reviewer said about Dennis Quaid's 'General Hawk': He barks out orders "like your drunken uncle at Thanksgiving dinner."

America is mostly safe. The Joes operate out of Egypt (maybe because real estate is cheaper there?). We spend most of the movie watching French Moroccan and British 'Joes' rescuing Paris and Moscow. Maybe it's the poor direction and pace of the movie, or maybe it's our current geopolitical state, but I looked around the theater during the "save the Eiffel tower" scene and nobody seemed all that concerned.

WOULDA COULDA: I would have set this movie in another timeframe. Maybe during, or just post-WWII, or maybe the Sixties (interesting setting for a patriotic fighting force) or even the Eighties. And we should have had older heroes. How could Channing Tatum have earned the 3,437 tour of duty ribbons he's wearing when he looks like he's 23 years old?

Bring on Michael Biehn! Protagonist of Terminator, and supercool military squad leader in Aliens, The Rock, Navy SEALS (movie: bad; Biehn: good) and The Abyss. Come to think of it, how was Biehn NOT in a movie about a supercool American military team? If there is one guy who can walk around with a gun in a movie that springs from 1980's nostalgia and make it work instantly (with the exception of maybe der Gubernator), it's Michael Biehn.

DEATH BLOW: I'm not trying to be mean when I say this--really. But you know your military movie is bad when the audience is wishing it was more like a Michael Bay movie. I was missing the guns (with bullets, not lasers) and standoffs between Michael Biehn and Ed Harris I remember from The 90's blue-camo-cheesy Rock.

Seriously, Stephen Sommers? You forced me write that you something to learn from Michael Bay? Yowtch.

HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL: The movie ends with all villains surviving and vowing to get revenge in GI Joe 2: An Insult to Your Brain. This goes to show the one character attribute these filmmakers possess that I sorely lack: Unabashed, I-don't-care-what-people-or-numbers-say, hopeful-to-the-point-of-idiocy optimism.

Name that movie!

Tell me if you can identify this fantasy story (some of you know where this is headed already...):

Our tale begins a quaint village of little people (I mean, like, 'midgets'). They are enjoying food, drink, and the simple life... that is, until something very important comes into the possession of one such little person.

This item is of little significance on the surface, but a wizard identifies it as (foreboding drums...) the one key to toppling the Dark Lord who is coldly intent on ruling all free people. Let's call this item "The One Little Key to Intensely Evil Nature" (TOLKIEN, for short).

The little guy takes his closest companions and TOLKIEN on a quest far from his simple home. His plan is the get TOLKIEN out of his hands as soon as possible, because he's pretty sure he is not the guy destined to end evil.

On the way, one other little person's phileo (brotherly love) leads him to bind himself to the main heroic little person when other companions fall away for various reasons.

Also on the way, the little guys encounter a mysterious swordsman. Befriending this dangerous but skilled stranger may just plop TOLKIEN into evil's lap... or perhaps this rogue is more trustworthy than he seems at first glance.

As their company slowly deteriorates, they stumble into the woods and are befriended and encouraged by ancient, almost magical beings there.

From there, the remaining party members find themselves stalwartly defending a ancient white-walled good-guy fortress against an impossible onslaught of black-clad, inhuman, evil attackers. Things are looking pretty grim for our heroes, until...

... Norse-looking, red/blond-haired cavalry reinforcements ride in at the darkest hour to save our desperate heroes!

But it's not over yet. The rogue-swordsman-with-the-heart-of-gold has defended the good guys' castle, but now the little ones have an appointment at the Dark Lord's doorstep with TOLKIEN. While the swordsman leads a distraction-battle outside Evil's gate, the heroic little one enters the scary HQ of evil and puts TOLKIEN permanently out of the Dark Lord's reach.

Hooray!

The swordsman takes his place as king of the white castle (not the burger place) and the little hero returns home... having seen and done more than his entire village had in their collective experience, he's now the town hero.

You guessed it, the epic cinematic experience I'm referring to is...
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WILLOW!

Kind of makes you wonder how many original thoughts are actually floating around in George Lucas' noggin, doesn't it? See this link for someone another agreeing perspective.

This reaffirms my belief that George is not a 'visionary storyteller'... he is a mechanical recycler of old, great stories... and sometimes, he just gets lucky (or gets good help!) and his remanufactured pieces are better than the sum of their parts.

Contrary to what Obi-Wan Kenobi thinks however... there IS such thing as luck. That much is evidenced by the heartless, unoriginal, downright boring Indy #4 and Star Wars Prequels--which pale in the light of the old Star Wars movies and earlier Indiana Jones movies. Willow is a bit more lively than IJ4 and SW1-3, but as we see here, it's anything but original.

Ah, Sweet Incongruity

I was flipping through channels when I saw that Spike was airing the original Star Wars trilogy in HD. I stopped to watch a few minutes and noticed some things about 'old' (1970's, baby!) Obi-Wan Kenobi versus 'new' (prequel) Obi-Wan Kenobi. Let's check them out in a brief study in contrast.

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I recieved the Best Actor Oscar when you were 13, George Lucas... do not anger me.

New Kenobi (henceforth 'NK'): Try not to think about girls, the Council doesn’t like that. And whatever you do, don't make a rash decision!
Old Kenobi ('OK'): Leave your family--and planet--to attack the Death Star. Just you and me. We don't even have a ride there yet, but it will work out. Trust me.

NK: At six years old, you're too world-weary and corrupted to train as a Jedi. We only accept gelatinous, undeveloped brain-wash candidates.
OK: Nice to meet you. I recognize that as a backwater farmer, you are probably lacking the Sci-Fi equivalent of a GED but... you know what would look nice with that dusty tunic? A lightsaber--here you go!

NK: I hang out at Starbucks with the Evil Emperor every week, but he seems alright to me. I don't suspect him of anything worse than shoddy tax legislation.
OK: My sensitivity to evil is so well-attuned that I can sense fear in people I hardly know, and perceive the death of people light years from my location.

NK: I am so stupid I think that Stormtroopers are my friends.
OK: Stormtroopers are so stupid I can fold their feeble minds into taco-shell-shapes by waving my fingers.

NK: I sport various types of mullets and pony tails.
OK: I kill people who do that.

NK: I drink alone; the fate of all middle-aged single British librarians.
OK: I drink (and smoke) with the Most Interesting Man Alive from Dos Equis commercials. And Gandalf.

You can scramble the letters of my name to spell "Genuine Class." Bam!

Isn't the difference obvious? This comforts me, because it reminds me that these trilogies can't possibly coexist. Even the same characters are... different characters as far as these movies are concerned, which makes it that much easier for me to excise the new ones from my personal Star Wars canon.

See "Comment" link below to barrage me with nerd-related insults... but at least you hopefully agree that the 1970's version made for better cinema.

Michael Bay: If it exists, it can explode.

Transformers 2 is the 'big movie' these days, so I thought it was high time to give a shout out to the man, the myth, the Bay. You've seen his movies, but you can't remember a single character from any of them.

But who can forget the time he sent astronauts to drill a hole in a doomday asteroid to sink an A-bomb into it and save mankind? I remember it, and I wish I didn't. Here's looking at you, Michael Bay.

• Your movies average 26 explosions per hour--almost one every two minutes.
• Your movies always talk about and hint at sex, but stop short enough to maintain your PG-13 rating, so that you can convince half of America to see every reel you crank out.
• Your movies always try to tug at my heart strings, but are a mile from succeeding (see the tragic 'romances' in Armageddon, Pearl Harbor, and Bad Boys 2).
• Your movies are too, too long. Bad Boys 2 needed about 3 fewer climactic actions scenes, I fell asleep during the 'climax' of Transformers, and I am passing on Transformers 2... which weighs in at TWO AND HALF HOURS.

Based on a 22-minute cartoon and you need 150 minutes to get your point across? Remember, Mike, brevity is the soul of wit.


But then, maybe I am misunderstanding your intentions. I perceive that 'wit' may be your third or fourth objective, behind "filming explosions exploding and hot chicks."

Alas, poor Yorick... I knew him, until Will Smith shot him 16 times whilst jumping through the air, only for Yorick to flail bloodied onto a nearby landmine and explode (twice!!) while Shia LeBeouf French kisses Megan Fox in the background, and two F/A-18's streak overhead. Poor, poor Yorick...

Here is the real dagger: The original Transformers movie (the cartoon one, from the eighties) killed off the hero in the first 8 minutes (THAT'S how you push a story forward), starred Orson Welles (true!) and still managed to wrap itself up in about an hour. People in their thirties are still traumatized by Optimus Prime's death in the cartoon, while Bay's forgettable Transformers movies leave us--er, 'briefly sleepy yet irritated.'

Do you hear me, Bay? While your movies feature giant war-machines from a technoligically-advanced planet punching(?!) the crap out of each other as the finale, the cartoon version had Orson Welles as a freaking planet that eats other planets. That's bigger than anything you've ever done, and the story was more economical to boot. Also jumping onboard this banner project were Eric Idle, Leonard Nimoy, Robert Stack, Clive Revill (the original Emperor in Star Wars) and Casey Kasem. Booyah!



You are doing something right when Orson wants in on your cartoon.

Wikipedia says that Welles' Unicron is "neither Autobot nor Decepticon, [...] a prodigiously large robot whose scale reaches planetary proportions, and he is also able to transform into a mechanical planet. He travels the galaxy, seeking worlds to consume for nourishment."

He is big enough to EAT the combined pain-soaked mess of all 10 hours of your Bad Boys and Transformers franchises. Come, O Unicron... and consume Michael Bay.

Check out this video from Robot Chicken to see what Bay is all about.

Star Trek Wars

So, last week I saw Star Trek. I'll briefly preface this post by saying that I grew up a hardcore Star Wars fan, and that Star Trek fans were my school-yard enemies (Yes, even nerds have gangs).

The Star Wars franchise has aged (from about 1983 to present) about as well as an open bowl of chili sitting on a kitchen counter over a holiday weekend. Star Trek had some rough spots too, and its past couple of movies performed badly in theaters.

However, as the third major 'reboot' in the past few years, I highly enjoyed the last Trek movie. Sure, the science wasn't perfect (here's looking at you, Squid) but at least I had something I haven't had watching anything George Lucas has made in a generation: Fun!

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If I want bad computer animation to bore me to tears, I can manage that fine without paying nine bucks--here's looking at you now, Monster Quest!

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Here's my brief shopping list of things ST had, but by contrast Star Wars has lacked in the past couple decades:

More please...



• A prominent smart alec. Space opera, almost by definition, needs someone who doesn't take himself too seriously. Kirk did this. A bunch of stiff Jedi makes for a long movie... and an exponentially longer trilogy.

• Things exploding in space! How is it that my series has "WARS" in the title, but was seemingly bereft of the entertaining WWII space dogfights that made it big in the first place? ST delivered on this, even though they cruise around in a big science vessel. You're telling me that doctors and engineers and linguists get into better scrapes than ancient warrior fraternities?! Go figure.

• Space academy cadets ordering beer. While ST has moved from nerd-scape to mainstream, SW has moved from appealing to grown-up nerds and kids... to appealing to only tiny tykes. Today it is okay for a 'cool' adult to tell his friends that he (or she!) is going to see Star Trek. BUT... If you're going to a Star Wars movie in this millenium, you would be better off lying and telling your friends you're catching a matinee Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties.**

• Blue-screen, red blood! Despite requisite sci-fi blue-screen work, Trek has a bunch of people geting the hell beat out of them--and a good guy even gets tortured! Dull Lucas had his stable of actors interacting with absent costars and fake swords. Three long painful movies couldn't even cough up one good bar fight?! Plus, bonus points for Kirk losing most (all?) of his fights. Awesome!

Even Kirk's friends put the beat-down on him

I can't go on, because if I get started on how much I hate the Prequels, I'll get banned for posting a Gilgamesh-like 'epic' instead of a brief 'blog post.' Live long... and give me a little bit of fun for my nine bucks, okay?

**Bonus knowledge: Garfield: ATOTK fared terribly despite being based on not one, but TWO Dickensian masterworks. When a movie with a lot of CG aimed at kids does this badly, you have to wonder... was GL the clandestine hand behind the making of yet another insult to society?

Who's watching the Watchmen?

Millions of fans? Check.
Diehard following? Check.
Years of anticipation? Check.
"Hot" director? Check.
Monstrous ad campaign? Check.

Sounded like The Watchmen was set to be the next Dark Knight. But there was one more thing on their packing list:

Plummet to little or no profit after opening weekend? CHECK.

I have graphed below the millions made versus weeks after release (Week 1 was the opening, and so on).
The above graphic may remind you of the flight pattern of a duck that has suddenly been shot... eleven times.

Conan: First Impressions

So this weekend I saw Conan: The Barbarian for the first time ever (sue me) start to finish.

Impressions:

1. The Governator captures the physique, innuendo, and intellect of a barbarian with ease (snap!)

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"Dah first big snake looks like thees..."

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2. James Earl Jones is creepy as hell as Thulsa Doom. That dead stare, those weird lines, the awkward straight hair with tiny bangs...

Darth Vader had long hair under the helmet!?

3. Less is more: For a movie with a voiceover narration, Conan TB is remarkably low on exposition. Maybe it was Thulsa Doom's hypnotic gaze, but I have to admit--I did not know what in Crom's name was going on most of the time.

James Earl Jones turns into a snake while watching an orgy, but then he just leaves. Conan never fights Snake Jones?! Well, I guess he already killed one huge snake. When people decide to become Doom's followers, they become a herd of suicidal lemmings. I know life in Cimmeria (or Atlantis, or wherever they are at that point--the movie does not offer a lot of geographical help) sucks, but could you really market a huge cult by offering all your followers death as their signing bonus? Dialogue also comes at a premium: Each main character has about a dozen lines, it seems. That's okay though; it reminded me of my favorite Spaghetti Westerns in this way... long silences and wide landscapes.

4. Black Sun cult: This was genius--The cult Conan is trying to find is known for an emblem depicting two snakes facing each other. This is plausible cause for Arnold to roam the land, throwing up a monstrous double-front-bicep pose and asking, "Have you seen dare bannah, weet two big snakes--like theez?!?"

"Both of the big snakes togethah look like theez..."

5. Sequel: Arnold apparently takes on Wilt Chamberlain and Andre the Giant. This reminds me a LOT of Rocky III (Rocky vs Hulk Hogan vs Mister T).

"The snakes were about thees tall..."

Most Underrated Movie: The Shadow

Why this movie didn't make a bigger splash is beyond me.

For the uninitiated, The Shadow is the dark mysterious hero of 1930's radio serials, subsequently followed by every other sort of media including this movie in the 90's. The Shadow is the inspiration behind Batman, and probably every other popular hero that isn't a boyscout like Superman.

Here's the point I want to make about this movie: All of the individual parts work, and the whole thing works together as well. I can't figure why it wasn't better received, except guesses relating to shoddy marketing and PG-13 approach (it's decidedly more fun old-Star Wars than gritty-1989-Batman).

So let's start with the pieces:

My favorite thing about this movie is the soundtrack. Jerry Goldsmith's score is the perfect blend of haunting and exciting. I listen to it in my car... it's both memorable and enjoyable, and fits the film. Good luck finding it on iTunes though... you're going to have a find a used CD on eBay or Amazon like I did. (PS: Likewise the movie is relegated to an extremely-crappy 1:33-1 aspect ratio single disc DVD option--shenanigans)

The Force! This movie hits all the best good and evil, anger versus self-control themes that The Force did in the good old Star Wars movies (before the cheesy midichlorian-science era... shudder). This was just the right take on the Shadow's supernatural ability to "cloud mens' minds."

Alec Baldwin is tough, suave, and funny as the Shadow. Everyone's excited about him these days, but a lot of the same humor you see on 30 Rock is glimpsed in the Shadow. I am given to quoting his conversations with Margot and Shiwan Khan.

• Tim Curry plays a good slimeball


• John Lone does a great job as a modern day Mongol warlord


• Penelope Ann Miller is a solid 1940's dame


• Ian McKellen (Gandalf) plays a scatterbrained scientist


• The Shadow's Alfred-the-Butler is Moe, a helpful cab driver played by Peter Boyle (Everybody Loves Raymond's dad)


• Jonathan Winters is both the Shadow's dad and the NYPD Chief

This is a Black Hawk Down approach to casting. There are one or two truly big names there, and then almost a dozen other likable B-Listers in there.

The production on this film is solid, with a few great set pieces, sensible CG usage, a nice overall retro feel (late 30's, I think). The dialogue always makes me smile and everything else (story, pacing, etc.) is good.

This isn't an Oscar movie (except for maybe the soundtrack? Lion King won that year)... But it's a dang good movie! Worth watching if you haven't seen it.

Liam Neeson: Born to lose

Born to lose, I've lived my life in vain

Every dream has only brought me pain

All my life, I've always been so blue

Born to lose, and now I'm losing you

--Johnny Cash

Taken reminded me that it's time to post about Hollywood's greatest... um, "die-er," Liam Neeson.

Neeson has made a career out of dying on screen; more specifically, he seems to own the niche for mentor-like characters who die. Let's see.

Gangs of New York - "We need someone to play DiCaprio's virtuous priestly dad. This guy is on screen for 90 seconds before Daniel Day-Lewis whacks him. Neeson, anyone?"

Star Wars I - "We need a Jedi mentor for the young Darth Vader. Let's shoot his death scene first, so that when he realizes how terrible this movie is, he'll stick around anyway ...since he knows the pain is only temporarily."

Kingdom of Heaven - When I didn't see Neeson in the commercial for this movie, but he showed up as hero-in-the-making Balian's dad early on, I knew there was only one possible outcome: Neeson must die.

Batman Begins - His mentor-character only gets knocked out, but the evil character he actually IS gets killed and then returns as Neeson--who also dies! That doesn't make sense. See this movie.

Lincoln (due out in 2011) - Who should play a tall guy who dies? NEESON! The producers quickly signed Neeson to star. Even though he's a big Irish guy, his grip on the dying-mentor role is so firm that he even owns American presidential roles.

Love Actually - His movie wife dies just before the movie starts. The Grim Reaper clearly missed his target. Neeson is still mentor to a young romantic.

"Let's see... I'm the bigger star, but I'm not in the trailer... Quick, I bequeath my beard and cloak to Jim Caviezel!"

The Mission - Fielding, a priest and role-model to the masses, is killed in the conclusion.

Darkman - Neeson does one of those "horrifically scarred, life destroyed, I consider myself 'dead' but live as a phantasm haunting the enemies of the life I once lived" things.


When Irish Eyes are Crying - Neeson plays an IRA terrorist in the opening episode of Miami Vice Season 3. I have not seen this. BUT: When someone's in only one episode and they play a 'terrorist,' the odds are good that they die. Based on the patterns we see, it is probable that Neeson mentors another young terrorist before dying, too.

Neeson narrowly dodges becoming the first guest star to die on Sesame Street, after mentoring happy-go-lucky puppets.

Last but not least...

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe - Brian Cox (original Hannibal Lecter, badass villain of X-Men 2) was originally cast as Aslan. When he bowed out due to scheduling problems, producers were faced with a decision: Who should play Aslan, the Christ-figure who guides the movie's young heroes before dying sacrificially for Edmund?

Fortunately, they didn't have to think long before someone said, "Hey, why didn't we get Neeson in the first place?" But Neeson has the last laugh here: Ah ha! As a Christ-figure, Aslan returns from the grave after only a brief stay, and is death-proof from here on out! Neeson's agent finally found the ultimate sacrificially-dying-good-guy-who-comes-back role... the only question is, how did Neeson not get cast in The Passion?

Just saw "Taken"...

... and it wasn't half bad!


On the downside, it was pretty formulaic. If you saw the trailer, nothing will surprise you. Also, a sub-plot involving a Beyonce/Christina Aguilera knock-off... seriously? Finally, former Bond-girl Famke settles in as Liam Neeson's ex- in a role termed "thankless" by no fewer than 4 reviews I've read. That's what she gets for atomizing her boyfriend and turning evil mutant!



On the upside, Liam Neeson makes the movie respectable. He does a good job portraying a spy-slash-angry-daddy, and is old enough to explain his treasure trove of spy know-how. (Did you ever wonder how Jason Bourne spoke 10 languages, was trained in 5 martial arts, and knew every back-allley in Paris by the time he was twenty-three? Me too.) When he runs into evil Albanians in Paris, Neeson has to pick up a store-bought Albanian dictionary to figure out what's going on. Loved it!

This is not an A movie, but it's decent fun, and wins three bonus awards:

The ECONOMY award: Tons of commercials these days start off something like, "In these tough times, you need a hamburger that will ... " Taken is economic. Why does a B-movie have to be two and a half hours long? Answer: It shouldn't! Taken has a basic plot, but it respects the viewer by finishing the basic plot in a reasonable 90 minutes. Thank God I didn't see Watchmen, I'd have been there half my day off.

The INSPIRATION award: My friend Blake and I left the theater determined to learn Neeson's one-hit carotid-chop ninja technique. Good times.

The SURPISE ENDING award: What? Liam Neeson didn't die? Liam Neeson dies in most of his movies! Not this one. This isn't shot or delivered in a surprising way, I just expect him to die when I get to the theater.

Things to Come:

I am building momentum for someday years from now when I will post a Gilgamesh-like-epic-572-part series on how much I hate the Star Wars "prequels" and how they killed my childhood.

In the meantime, here is something nobody should, buy, but someone out there is buying anyway. Got $140 to spare, with an itch to have a dastardly fictional French archaeologist eyeing you from your bookshelf, anyone??

Over/Under #1

In these occasional features I will briefly assess two movies: One underrated, one overrated.

OVER: Batman Forever

Most folks liked Tim Burton's 1989 Batman, and about half of those folks liked his follow-up, Batman Returns. However, I can't get my mind around how anyone stuck around for the third installment, Joel Shumacher's regretable Batman Forever.

Supposedly a lot of film was left on the cutting room floor, which is why the audience gets a severely underdeveloped "Batman Forever" theme: Batman reconciling that he can be both Bruce Wayne AND Batman 'forever,' as he makes peace with his memories. You have to look pretty hard to find this in the movie though, so the 'Forever' mostly feels like fair warning that you'll feel like you're engaged in Chinese water-torture while you watch.

Val Kilmer was downright wooden as Batman, Nicole Kidman was a brainless hormonal bimbo as a "Doctor," and worst of all, the villains were truly wasted. Tommy Lee Jones could've provided a compelling Two-Face, but instead he plays a nutcase with a handgun, some hired goons, and bad fashion sense. Jim Carrey was near the height of his popularity at this time, but turns in only a slightly effeminate pink-haired Riddler--whose riddles all link together to reveal his alter-ego's true name, which never matters anyway.

Top it all off with whipped cream (fluffy dialogue, oddly fantastic and un-violent action, and an obsession with bright colors) and a cherry on top (Chris O'Donnell as a thirty-year-old Robin with nipples on his costume), and you have a poop-sundae.

Somehow this movie made a lot of money, and was decently-reviewed at the time. Since then, numerous fan reviews have pulled the Critic's Score on Rotten Tomatoes down from an extremely generous score of near 70%. It is now holding steady a more-fitting (though still generous, IMHO!) 44%. There is hope for our planet after all, it seems, but that doesn't mean this movie isn't overrated.

UNDER:

Rocky Balboa! Rocky got 10 Oscar nods and came home with 3 golden statues, including Best Picture. Its popularity then spawned 4 sequels of questionable merit, and the series traded its roots to spiral into full-blown Cold War hysterics as Rocky ended communism. My wife and ESPN's Bill Simmons insist that Rocky V is so bad that it does not exist.

Rocky Balboa (a.k.a. Rocky 6) brings Stallone back to the slums of Philly, and back to being a complete human character instead of just a fighting dynamo. The best part of this movie is that it makes you love Rocky Balboa again. He's a selfless dummy with an enormous heart who never quits trying to help his neighbors. He's the Italian Samaritan! It was a good decision to let Adrian go (she'd become a broken record of discouragement long ago), and Milo Ventimiglia turned in a strong effort as Rocky's semi-estranged son.

Overall, it provided satisfying closure to a movie series that has spanned the better part of most of our lives. That deserves kudos, as does the movie's necessary self-awareness due to its outlandish premise.

True, it is currently garnering a 76% approval rating on RT, but that's not praise enough for the second-best in a 6-movie series that made over $1 billion dollars and collected 11 Oscar nods (by my count). Plus, this movie gets the coveted "REDEMPTION BONUS:" Rocky V was so bad that Stallone himself said he would give it a "zero out of ten," but he was able to turn it around and make one of the few good sequels out there.

An Actor's Actor: Eli Wallach

Talk about a guy who could disappear into a role, and you have to talk about Eli Wallach. Look at this guy's resume (it's as long as both your arms) and there's a good chance you'll recognize less than 10% of what's on it. But somewhere along the line, someone in Hollywood (er, "Italy?") got the idea to go look for Mexican banditos on Broadway.

That's how (in my understanding) Eli Wallach ended up as the heart of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. A far cry from pigeon-holed Western-genre actors, Wallach would breeze through a genre and define it, then move on to something completely different.

One thing that Wallach does well is allow you to stomach a third, long movie starring Clint Eastwood as "The Man with No Name... who Speaks Twice Per Hour." Eastwood is great in his own right at this character, and was one of the most significant bad-good-guys. But this much of him is like ... like ... Hmm. It's too much. The only analogies coming to me right now have to do with alcohol and pancakes, so we'll leave that thought for the time being.

Did you see Eastwood and Van Cleef playing off each other in For a Few Dollars More? That was rough. They're so alike it was like watching two Chewbacca's with no Han Solo's.

Let's not forget: We're not talking about the Governator playing a ripped barbarian or a robot here. We're talking about a guy creating a character far from his own place and time, making it instantly believable.

Wallach is the heart of G,B&U because he plays the parts of villain, jester, victim, and hero. Lee Van Cleef ('the Bad') observed that Wallach's Tuco is the only character the audience really gets to know in the whole movie: 'The Good' and 'The Bad' are such 'iconic' representations that they're almost statues in some ways. Wallach navigates this 3-hour monster with amazing ease, and he makes it bearable for the audience to play along. He does more a lot more positive things than make the movie livable, but I don't want to bury you in a play-by-play of the film.

Here's to Eli Wallach: Who played the only character in 8 hours of Leone that I was able to sympathize with, hate, and laugh at... and an actor with so much range, he defined a role and then vanished into a hundred (or three hundred) other roles.

An Actor's Actor! And a guy I would definitely drive or fly a long way to sit down with over a pint.

Close, but I'll keep the cigar...

Who is... Mandy Patinkin? Sorry, but good guess. By the numbers:

1. Alive today-Very!
2. A retired WWII veteran-Ooh, this was the killer. Not unless he was sent back by Skynet: Patinkin was born in 1952.
3. A Jewish-Italian-American-I can't find anything indicating Italianicity.
4. A Tony Award winner-Yes!
5. A Broadway star-Yes!
6. My favorite on-screen Mexican bandit of all time-This is the closest I could find: Patinkin co-starred in The Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland as Huxley: the evil man who tries to steal Elmo's blanket.
7. Also referred to by Liam Neeson as "the great elder statesman of acting"-Nope. Without further ado, the actor I AM referring to is...

Sneak Peek Trivia

Points if you can identify the first actor to be highlighted on this blog without abusing Wikipedia. He is:

1. Alive today
2. A retired WWII veteran
3. A Jewish-Italian-American
4. A Tony Award winner
5. A Broadway star, and
6. My favorite on-screen Mexican bandit of all time
7. Also referred to by Liam Neeson as "the great elder statesman of acting"

Points are extremely valuable but I have not yet determined how so. No Google-ing! If you don't know and must research, go to your local library while you still have one. Unless you live in my town. Then there are reasons to stay away from the library. No further comment.

Day One

I have long considered hosting a "blog," and today is the day that it begins. The content of my blog: Amateur movie reviews.

Why? Because I love film... and I hate it. Though I love a good read, and visit art museums with my wife, celluloid is the medium that seems to bring forth the hottest hatred and happiest thoughtful smiles from me.

You will soon enjoy (?) my ranting on the myriad of reasons that certain movies leave me feeling let down (or downright angry) and doubtless think, "What is this guy's problem? He needs to find a new hobby." Well... maybe you're right. Go take your right-ness to some other blog, then! Ha!

You might also find yourself asking, "Why does this guy draw such transcendent delectation from low-budget spaghetti westerns?" I'll try to explain.

Maybe you will at least appreciate the fact that I'm joining you in evaluating and reflecting on an art form, instead of subjecting you to droning documentation of my daily life. Still, I reserve the right to wander off track and post on other topics as well. Farewell for now!