The Oscars, Tron and let’s flagellate expired equines(Season of the Witch)

Well, the Oscars are coming on tonight. Mr. Franco and Ms. Hathaway are busy raising Oscars up and down, wondering if they could slip one into their hip pocket. I wonder how many times they’ve contemplated the idea of opening the envelope and saying “And the Oscar goes to …. me!” Boy, talk about never workin’ in this town again.

Well, according to the entertainment certain national papers I perused the contest has come down to The King’s Speech and Social Network. Which means I don’t care. Not that I cared anyway. In case you haven’t figured it out by now, I won’t be watching the Oscars. Instead I’m grabbing a big bowl of popcorn and watching a documentary on sewage processing. (Heh, heh, heh) Not really, but it would be funny. Actually I’ll be attending the Morts. This is a local event where my neighbor Mort hands out small figurines of himself to friends whose home videos he likes the most. (His wife does ceramics for a hobby.)

Yes, that is a joke.

All joking aside, I want to restate my opinion the Oscars are a night where Hollywood dresses up, drinks up, parties up and pats itself on the back, handing out little statues to actors and directors who towed the party line. There. I said it. (And there go my chances of winning an Oscar. Awww, shoot.)

On a happier note, I watched Tron Legacy this week. Wow, this is one good movie. The special effects and score are incredible. The film is not bad itself. And its really decent— nobody takes their clothes off and the language is passable. (Yes, I know some of you are getting tired of this.) I really enjoyed it, took lots of notes and am pleased at the movies Hollywood is rolling out.

And, not to beat a dead horse(flagellate expired equines, get it? Ah, never mind.) , Season of the Witch is on the second run circuit. I actually plan to go see it a second time. At least that’s the plan. As I have already said this film is an incredible educational experience. (Hey you, yeah you! Stop rolling your eyes and mouthing that last sentence sarcastically. Yeah, I see you.)

On a related note Sean Bean is starring in Black Death, coming out in May. I’ve seen the trailer. It will be an interesting contrast to Season. I don’t plan to watch it either on the big or small screen but I will be watching to see how it handles the material covered by Season.

On several unrelated notes I discovered Sean Bean has a fear of flying. Evidently during the filming of LOTR he took a ski lift to a filming location and walked the last few miles in full armor with sword and shield. I momentarily got he and Russel Crowe mixed up (Sorry, guys, no insult intended) and discovered that Russel Crowe’s parents were movie set caterers. Hmmm. That’s interesting.

And as a addition to my post about British shows ported to America, it turns out there is a Law and Order: UK which did follow the American version. Just thought you’d like to know.

Have a great week and don’t watch the Oscars.  🙂

District 9

Well, I watched District 9.  I didn’t like it. Please read on and find out why I didn’t like it.

I fast forwarded through a lot of the film. First, large parts of the movie were just dialogue. Second, there was too much foul language in the film. Perhaps I am in the minority, but I find this language offensive and unnecessary. Especially in the quantities and varieties that were in District 9.

So, on to the reasons I think its a badly written movie .

First, I don’t like bait and switch. The whole reason I watched District 9 was the flying saucer on the cover and the extraterrestrials in the ad. The flying saucer serves as pure backdrop only. The movie is not science fiction.(I’ll explain this later.)  Its some sort of political statement with a sci-fi veneer.

Second, the movie is mostly a political statement. I don’t mind movies having political agendas, but this whole movie was a political statement. At first I thought it was had a political agenda about apartheid. I was okay with that. Day After Tomorrow had a political agenda about global warming. But it still had the elements for a good movie. Which it was.

I now believe District 9’s political statement was about the Iraq War. The vehicles, the military contractors, the emphasis on the search for weapons, the tactics of the Nigerians and the “ghetto” look of the alien area remind me of certain actions in Iraq. Political statements are okay, but bait and switch is not.

Third, the movie unimaginatively broke all modern sci-fi rules. The aliens are act like humans. Come on. I mean, we stopped having aliens act like this fifty years ago. Inter-species prostitution? Remember the lobster space aliens that were always going after the blond females in the 1950 B movies? Come on, can’t these writers come up with something better? This is only the most blatant example. There are many others.

Fourth, is it supposed to be a documentary?  One moment you have camera footage, then interview footage, the next we’re seeing action that couldn’t be recorded by cameras in the film. Maybe this was supposed to be some noveau art style. That’s the only explanation(or excuse). This definitely had the feel of an art house film masquerading as a sci-fi feature film.

Fifth, it was too slow. There was too much dialogue. The writers told too much and showed too little. They turn the eviction process into a giant exposition. There are high school students who can write better. They should have folded the exposition into the action.

Sixth, the movie insulted science fiction fans by relying on CGI aliens to make it “sci-fi.”  In fact, there’s a good chance they used one actor to portray all the aliens. The only real sci-fi comes in near the end as the saucer lights up. If you replaced the aliens with poor humans and took out the space ship you could have the very same movie.

Seventh, the protagonist was portrayed as a weak, indecisive, unimaginative, foolish idiot. The first thing he does when he escapes is use a cell-phone. Oh come on! Everybody knows those things are traceable.  How big an idiot are we supposed to think he is.

This guy knows the system. He knows what his pursuers will do. But does he use any of this knowledge? Nooo. My only explanation is that the writers want to depict him as a bumbling idiot. They want us to think of him as an incompetent political appointee. I also watched Salt. Evelyn Salt is in the same situation. Everything has been taken, she is a stranger not belonging to either world. What does she do? She makes a plan and follows it. She triumphs. Oh, and she doesn’t use her cell-phone when she’s on the run.

I don’t know much about these writers. But I’m going to assume they are competent individuals who know their craft. Therefore I’m going to assume they are making a political statement, since to assume they set out to write science fiction would be an insult to them. This leads to the question who are they meaning to insult? Who is the protagonist supposed to be? Who is MNU? The Special Features clearly state it is not a commentary on apartheid. They purport it to be intended as pure sci-fi. Hmmm. I certainly hope not.

This brings up another issue. According to Wikipedia all the critics loved District 9. One even called a lone dissenter a “troll.” What kind of movies do these people like to watch? This movie drug along with no action, an incompetent protagonist who we don’t like and aliens who are painted with disgusting human traits. This movie actually won four Academy Awards and Star Wars won none. How is that even possible?!?!? Evidently these critics want science fiction to service some agenda and let the story fall by the way.

Well, this ran too long. But there is one thing I did like. The fluid that splashes the protagonist evidently has enough recombinant alien DNA to start his transformation. This makes sense. Since their weapons are biometrically controlled, the ignition capsule would contain very active DNA. Sighhhh. If only this logic had pervaded more of the film. It could have been much, much better.

Let me know what you think. Everybody seems to love this film(Except Nigerians). Whether you agree or disagree, let me know.

Despicable Me, the Oscars, which movies to watch and my idea for a movie

Well, the other week I watched Despicable Me. It was an incredible movie that everyone should watch. I think I’m actually going to buy this one. There are several interesting things I noticed about the film. For the sake of time the only one I’ll mention is that Russian Army intelligence is named the GRU. In Russian its an acronym for Main Intelligence Directorate

Also my friend Mr. C saw True Grit and can’t stop talking about it. He says its wonderful, great and really good. (Not necessarily in that order.) He is a fan of the Cohen Brothers so he has a far better opinion of their work. According to him the language is clean and the music is mostly Gospel instrumentals. I may or may not check it out in theaters, but I’ll definitely watch it on DVD.

This last week I rewatched Iron Man 2. Boy, that is a good movie. I’ve seen some criticism of the writers that they throw in too many other superheroes. Well, that’s the comic books for you. These characters  are interwoven, even if they’re not part of the Avengers. To me this is the most amazing thing about comics, how the stories are so deep.  For example, ultimately Pepper Potts falls for Happy Hogan and she will eventually get a suit of her own. (Sorry about the spoiler, but its all on the ‘Net if you want to read it. And of course, they could always write it differently.)

Well, I won’t be watching the Oscars but the nominations are out and I’m pleased to see Inception is in the running. I hope it will pick up several awards.  It is simply the greatest movie ever made.

The King’s Speech and Social Network are too drama for me. (No aliens or explosions.) Also I think The King’s Speech is too, well, Hollywood for my taste. I mean, this is the man who assumed the throne went his brother abdicated, led Britain through World War II and died of lung cancer. I’m not trying to be insensitive but this seems  to be like, well, a bit on the drama side of things. Of course, I hear the Queen likes it and since I’m not British I won’t lay into it too hard. If they like it then I can definitely live with it.

And while I’m a bit disillusioned with Miss Hathaway you should try and catch the ads ABC is running of her and Mr. Franco “preparing” for the Oscars. Whoever came up with these is a genius.

If you live in Asheville check out the Asheville Pizza and Brewing Company up on Merrimon. They are playing Silence of the Lambs and The Princess Bride this week. While I don’t plan to see either I feel this is a great opportunity. These are films some of us might have only seen on television. If you really like these the chance to see them on the big screen should not be missed. I keep hoping they’ll show some of my favorites.(Ummm, okay, so I drew a blank, but there are some. I hear the mothership in Independence Day was amazing.)

The Next Three Days (Russel Crowe and Liam Neeson) is off our local second run circuit but a friend of mine saw it on the second run circuit and said it was really good. Watch for it on DVD.