Monster In Your Veins

Soundtrack to my Halloween (finale): "Around the World" by Daft Punk

2010-10-31T15:00:00.000-04:00

From one of my all-time, top 10 favorite albums, 1997's Homework.

Happy Halloween and have a good time out there!

Daft Punk - Around the World from you_want_elvis on Vimeo.

Soundtrack to my Halloween: "The Man Comes Around" by Johnny Cash

2010-10-30T15:00:00.000-04:00

Pretty dire. A true American icon (warts and all).

You know, I refuse to watch Walk the Line or for that matter any music biopic from this point forward? Just tired of that narrative trajectory.

Soundtrack to my Halloween: "Speed of Blood" by Gallhammer

2010-10-29T15:00:00.000-04:00

From their album, The Dawn of Gallhammer, and also polished and and reproduced on their follow-up, Ill Innocence.

Soundtrack to my Halloween: "Scared Away" by Ugress

2010-10-28T15:00:00.000-04:00

From the Norwegian composer/DJ. How could I NOT like a piece of music taking its cue from Evil Dead (1980)?

Oh, and this is an awful, awful video.

Soundtrack to Halloween: "Voci dal Nulla I" by Fabio Frizzi

2010-10-27T15:00:00.001-04:00

From Lucio Fulci's The Beyond (1980). Another impossible-to-find soundtrack.

Soundtrack to my Halloween: "Dig Up Her Bones" by The Misfits

2010-10-26T15:00:00.000-04:00

From their American Psycho album. Always thought this song was oddly... melodic?

Soundtrack to my Halloween: "Burn the Flames" by Roky Erickson

2010-10-26T00:13:00.000-04:00

From the most-excellent, and out-of-print/hard-to-find Return of the Living Dead (1985) soundtrack.

Music I Can't Live Without: Squarepusher's Hard Normal Daddy (1997)

2010-10-21T20:03:00.001-04:00

A little personal history here: Hard Normal Daddy (1997) is the second album I bought by the multi-talented Tom Jenkinson a.k.a. Squarepusher, after being introduced to/hooked by his work via Ken Ishii's X-mix: Fast Forward and Rewind (1998). In particular, it was "Squarepusher's Theme" (which is actually on the Feed Me Weird Things album.*

Anyway, I was actually a little put out when I bought this disc way back when--there was a gulf between the high energy jazz acrobatics of "Squarepusher's Theme" and the more laid-back vibe on display here. But laid-back isn't code for lazy: the album is incredibly sophisticated, with Jenkinson employing a variety of instrumental arrangements to realize his eclectic, acid-jazz-meets-drum-and-bass vision.

The album didn't have me truly in its grasp until the second track, "Beep Street," an arrangement of digital and analog arrangements that feels like Jenkinson's output in miniature: lively instrumental arrangements based on heavily-layered compositions, relying on a variety of instrumentation (and not just a drum track and a sick sample).

If you're familiar with their output it should come as no surprise that I got into Squarepusher around the same time as I started digging into Aphex Twin (Richard D. James). I always imagined that the latter was something of a lunatic prankster, laying down sick soundscapes and occasionally wicked moods with the occasional concession to typical forms of coherence.* Squarepusher, meanwhile, always felt like a genius in his lab, trying to rebuild beats using superscience. He might have a playful streak, but he's dead serious about it.

Hard Normal Daddy is one of those albums one can revisit every couple of years just to hear how the music changes the more sophisticated one becomes as a music listener. I envy a person who discovers it for the first time with an open mind.

*The hell? This album is out of print? I still have the original CD at home. The lack of a digital release is troubling as well.

**His most accessible works, "Come to Daddy" and "Windowlicker" are off-putting in their own ways, subverting and twisting industrial and hip hop sounds respectively.

Ugly Blu Mess

2010-09-15T22:46:00.000-04:00

No, not the films--some are actually quite brilliant. I'm talking about the hideous covers chosen for the Blu Ray releases.

I'm often curious about the instinct or inclination that goes into making these choices. Is it as simple as the original art being unavailable for some reason? Are they hoping to differentiate it from the packaging from older formats? Maybe they're trying to capitalize on some trend or other (Twilight-fever seems to have inspired the Near Dark cover).

Besides being ugly, many of these covers often offer something the movie frankly isn't selling. They promise something either cheap, silly, or compromised. They say, "hey, this movie's not so great but it's cheap--give it a try!"

Compare it to the original art used for either the DVD release or the theatrical posters and you'll find some prime art going unused.

Look at that Return of the Living Dead (1985) poster - say what you will but it's a distinctive image. Not like the slime green mess used for the Blu Ray (which is actually a pretty stacked, excellent disc, by the way). Looking at my copy of the disc I wish Fox had shipped the movie with a reversible cover.

Ditto, the Night of the Creeps poster, which I think was the art used for the video advertisements for the movie back in the day.

Finally, I find the Near Dark image to be the worst offender, pandering as it does to the Twilight audience. Not necessarily because I have anything against the franchise, but because it's pushing a soft, feminine vibe that's really only a small part of the movie. It's actually a pretty gory outlaw vampire movie. I'd have to imagine the audience that picks it up based on the art would feel like a bait and switch had been pulled on them.

"Resident Evil: Afterlife"

2010-09-11T22:04:00.000-04:00

Catch it before it wanders off the front page, my review of Resident Evil: Afterlife is live over at Twitch. It's about what you would expect given the limited narrative aspirations of the series, as Glenn Kenny so astutely observes, they're "the most subtext-free of any zombie movies."

It's perhaps this that keeps me coming back to the first and third movies: they're uniquely a collection of moments, sometimes interlinked, other times not, that feel like a free-flow blast of whiz-pow scenes that verge of being describes as non sequiturs. More than anything else I feel attracted to the empty calories the one might be into Mallomars or White Castle burgers. In moderation, it's not too bad for you and for a moment they provide a respite from complexity. Resident Evil as a film franchise isn't over-burdened by any particularly weighty thoughts, save to maintain fidelity to the long-running game series and present a few over-the-top action set pieces that, for my tastes, peaked at the laser grid in the first entry.

The third film in the series, Extinction admirably recreates this sequence as one of a series of traps for one of the infinite Alices revealed at during the opening of that film. It's a shame Afterlife does away with this plot point early on in its running time (the Resident Evil films: where the important plot bits bookend the actual meat and potatoes of the movie).

I just made the connection that this being the 4th movie in the franchise it's directly cribbing from the 4th movie in the game series (at least 4th chronologically with regards to the canon), which also took a wild left turn away from the conventions of the previous entries in the franchise. The games scaled back their reliance on the Umbrella Corporation as the prime villains, changed the setting, the flow of the action, and even did away with zombies as the primary enemies (the Ganados of 4 and 5 are mind-controlled humans).

Ruining Sex With Bad Biology (2008)

2010-09-06T17:38:00.000-04:00

Despite his relatively brief filmography, writer/director/editor Frank Henenlotter has been at this a while. This being the writing, directing, and editing of a certain type of horror film that lives and dies on sexual panic. Sex is terrifying and messy, potential partners are just as likely to kill as love you, and the body will crave what it craves (damn the consequences). Think Cronenberg's body horror without the art, or in simpler terms the Debbie Harry/James Woods sex scene in Videodrome over and over and over again. And the Debbie Harry role is filled by a stripper.

Case in point, 2008's Bad Biology. It a bad movie but "bad" in the way in which Henenlotter excels. Starring newcomers Charlee Danielson and Anthony Sneed, BB is mostly about a woman's search for the perfect man, where the definition of "perfect" involves satisfying her mutant, hyper-orgasmic reproductive system, which, by the way, can also fully produce a deformed baby within two hours of coitus. Jennifer (Danielson) is a photographer and self-professed nymphomaniac who beds and occasionally murders her partners during the act of sex, snapping shots of her victims for her private portfolio. I hope you like the sound of her voice, because Danielson provides running narration throughout the film, her delivery reminiscent of some of the most awkward spoken word poetry of the mid-90's, all swagger and emotional content that has a tendency to grate.

Anthony Sneed's Glenn Beck (really), aka Batz is the x factor Danielson is unaware she's always been seeking. Cursed with a pulsing, sentient, 4-foot-long penis, Batz spends his solitary life satisfying the drug addictions of his demanding member and constructing devices to give it release, all while holed up in his house that he optimistically hopes to turn into a club. Most of the movie's brisk 85 minute running time involves the two characters slowly entering one another's orbit until the climax sees he and she (him, "little him," and her) crash into one another in the final minutes.

There's a lot of sex and skin on display in the movie, but none of it is particularly titillating (at least for this viewer). Danielson, who comes to the role from a career of adoring photo shoots with rappers like 50 Cent and athletes in publications like Vibe isn't afraid to show a LOT of skin in the many simulated sex scenes. I kept thinking of Julianne Moore's Amber Waves, and how she described preparing for the role by imagining herself as an actress not in command of or in touch with her body. Awkward is maybe the kindest word for Danielson's performance with "disconnected" being the most apt. For a character obsessed with having sex, her Jennifer doesn't seem to know how to behave or move during the actual act. There is a LOT of flailing in this movie.

But bad acting is par for the course with Henenlotter movies, and the earnestness of the performances - well, they don't make up for the quality but they at least dull the blow. More uneven are some of the film's prosthetic/creature effects which aren't on-par with the wonderfully gross creations of Basket Case but again, their gags are emphatic.

The production is billed as the director's comeback feature - there's a 14-year gap between this and his last production - an almost Malick-like period in the wilderness. Weirdly, in spite of being unable to enjoy this movie I'd like for him to get behind the camera again to give us another whacked-out vision.

The Losers, Cop Out, and the Value of Good B-Movie

2010-09-01T11:45:00.000-04:00

...that's not to say either of these deservedly unsuccessful recent Warner releases fit in that category so close to my heart: the "good B-movie." With the release of Machete this week and the continued success of The Expendables, it felt like as good a time as any to think about what makes a good B-movie and what makes something like The Losers or Cop Out happen to the viewer. The failure of the latter examples stems from, I'm afraid a lack of commitment somewhere down the line to being a B-movie.

In the case of the Losers, it seemed that at some point up the pipe someone decided that a story about a bunch of hardened soldiers out for revenge against the conspirators that ruined their lives needed to be a PG-13 affair. Not so much. If anything, The Losers could have stood to have been a bit more ruthless, pulpy, and downright nasty. Instead, what came to the screen felt scrubbed and sanitized. Not to get too far into comparing source material and adaptation but it felt like all the juice (for lack of a better term) had been drained in the translation. Gone was the nervy paranoia of the Vertigo series by Andy Diggle and Jock as well as the harder edge of the characters. Gone was the nearly silent femme fatale Aisha, only to be replaced by the chatty film counterpart.

I have no objection to talk - it's why I thought I'd give the pretty-much hated Cop Out a chance. I hoped that Smith, who gives good talk in his movies, would deliver the goods in a buddy cop comedy that was a nice homage to the Lethal Weapons of yesteryear. Smith, and really everyone involved, feels under committed here. There's not a single laugh to be had and the action is - well, it'd be kind to call it lackluster. It all seems to be built on familiarity and perhaps the assumption that seeing Bruce Willis and Tracy Morgan interacting will be enough to generate comedy cold. Or something, I don't really know what anyone was thinking with this mess. It's pretty terrible and on second thought I'm not sure what I was thinking checking this one out. Maybe it was the choice of a KRS-One cut for the trailer.

Respect to KRS-One.

With that in mind I thought I'd share some virtues I'd love B-movies to adhere to:

Don't be ashamed of being shameless. Big emotions, lots of violence, and sex should be judiciously applied, where appropriate. And if aren't ashamed of being shameless...

When looking at some of Cronenberg's early work, or Cameron's*, or even all the way back to Val Lewton, you'll find that none of them were afraid to go big with the elements of their stories.

Make sure all that emotion, sex, and violence counts.

The best second-tier entertainments are always about the payoff. Cronenberg, Cameron, and Lewton's movies typically have a hell of a payoff.

Don't be afraid to screw around with your genre.

I LOVE twists and turns in genre flicks and outright mashups precisely because they bring something unexpected to the table.

Actually know your genre. REALLY know it.

It's something I'm trying to do with my own writing: increase the breadth and depth of my film knowledge so that when I have something to say about genre it's coming from an informed place.

*I'd argue that Cameron remains a b-movie director who just happens to excel getting the budgets for his visions. For all the pomp and seriousness of films like Avatar and Titanic they still feel like

Playing on Repeat: Major Lazer & La Roux, Lazerproof

2010-08-20T15:00:00.000-04:00

I've really been digging this Major Lazer mixtape over the last month or so, only getting a real chance to dig into it over the last couple of weeks. It took me a minute to place the above track - or at least the unmixed version - as the song accompanying the TV marketing of Bayonetta, a game which I'm quite taken with if you didn't know.

For comparison:

Anyway, Major Lazer's album can be downloaded at this link for free if you're interested in checking it out this weekend. Me, I have Blu Ray copies of The Good, the Bad, the Weird, and In the Realm of the Senses to occupy my free time when I'm not getting some writing done.

Scott Pilgrim vs. Me

2010-08-17T10:39:00.001-04:00

For your pleasure, I've articulated my thoughts about Edgar Wright's latest over on my Shot for Shot column at Comics Bulletin.By the way, I actually had the chance to interview the comic series writer, Bryan Lee O'Malley a little while back and he had some interesting things to say about the books.

As such things tend to go, it's not my final word on the subject. I took in a second showing on Sunday just to give the movie another shake, and maybe let the richness of the experience take over. Unfortunately, I think I came away with more problems than pluses the second time around:

The problem of "compression" I noted in the review feels even more present the second time. In a lot of ways it feels like a hurried race to the finish: get as many plot points and fan service from the books in before the final scene.
Brie Larson's Envy Adams just doesn't do it for me. While I think the film is populated with good to excellent performances (Kieran Culkin being the top of the heap) Larson's vamping is cranked up to an unbearable "11." When she reads her lines into the phone in her first scene I was cringing, I couldn't take it.
Am I the only one to notice that ex #4, Roxy Richter never gets named in the film? Or did I miss it at some point?
Speaking of, Mae Whitman has a lot of fun with the Roxy role but at some point it seems like someone told her to drop or scale back the Southern accent for her fight scene.
Occasionally (just once in a while, mind you) I was bugged by some of the incidental game-related sound effects that were unattached to any kind of visual cue. That is to say, occasionally there'd be a brief 8-bit beep or chirp accompanying something like walking or whatever and it caused me to look around for the jerk in the audience with the cell phone.
I would very much like to buy the soundtrack and score, but both are only available (in MP3 form, I mean) via iTunes are exorbitant rates (something like $16 a pop).
Back to Larson, her performance notwithstanding, her stage presence during the Clash at Demonhead concert scene is pretty great, and it helps that she's accompanied by the strongest track in the movie.

Backlash, Thy Name is M. Night Shyamalan

2010-08-15T12:11:00.000-04:00

...Or at least, that's my impression after observing the audience reactions to the trailer for Devil, the new M. Night Shyamalan-produced thriller directed by [REC] re-makers John Erick Dowdle and Drew Dowdle. The trailer played before both Inception and Scott Pilgrim and in both cases audiences were kind of rolling with it until Night’s name popped up on the screen and that’s when the laughter started. From there, audience members in one screening started shouting out potential twists for the movie or generally tuning out and chatting with their friends.

Now, both audiences were college-age crowds in a college town. Still, this is kind of a big deal for the master filmmaker’s cachet at this point and if this isn’t the actual death knell for his reputation it’s at least on life support. And it’s unfortunate, because Devil doesn’t look half-bad in a kind of Red Eye/Joy Ride sort of way. It feels like one of those lean little thrillers that has a couple of good surprises you’ll talk about with your friends after the fact that should be a solid, medium-tier performer when it drops in September.

But with Shyamalan’s name attached that doesn’t appear to be in the cards anymore. His reputation has become toxic, and the idea of sitting through one of his films has (for me at least) little to no appeal. I just don’t want to deal with his formulaic upending of formula, if you know what I mean. The prospect of yet another self-serious movie where the plot is stifled out of the characters like some kind of horror-movie version of Crash makes me want to run screaming out of the theater.

And again, this is kind of a crap reaction to have to the movie since for all intents and purposes Shyamalan is simply the producer on the damned thing. Hopefully for the brothers Dowdle, the trailer will be recut before the movie’s release (and in advance of any television spots) to minimize or maybe even omit the Shyamalan connection.

My Thoughts on Inception and Level Design is on Conducive Chronicle

2010-08-10T10:30:00.000-04:00

Wherein I talk a bit about a little movie you may have heard of and how a certain multibillion dollar industry still doesn't get no respect. You know what to do if you want to read it.

Besides being fairly happy with this piece I'm also reminded that I need to check out Inception once more before the local theater takes it off of the prime screens. Say what you will, the movie demands scrutiny. As a critic and a fan of whirling things I think I owe it another chance to get its hooks into me.

There's a piece on criticism coming out of all of this - I just can't quite articulate it yet to my satisfaction. It'll come to me, I'm sure.

On Girls Playing With Fire and Frank Castle

2010-08-08T17:46:00.001-04:00

Over at Twitch, I've got a review up of the plot-heavy and character-light The Girl Who Played With Fire, the second in Stieg Larsson's Milennium series of films. Go over there and read that, if you'd please.

I wanted to harp on one point that I brought up in my review that's stuck with me since seeing the movie recently and that's the mostly useless, practically forgotten outrage found in the film, specifically with regard to sexual violence committed against women. It's one thing the be a show like Law and Order: SVU whose whole point is shock-outrage-drama, but it's another entirely to be about a bunch of social activists with left-leaning politics whose whole thing should be, you know, fighting the system and representing the poor, abused, and underrepresented.

Instead, it takes the wrathful violence tact via Noomi Rapace's Lisbeth Salandar, the script contriving to get abusers in her hands for the purposes of righteous vengeance, which, if anything, makes her Frank Castle in Garth Ennis's brilliant Slavers arc, but stripped bare of the latter's outsize, mad dimensions. That is to say, he's a monster - one with a need to inflict punishment based on trauma, stripped of his emotions due to a lonely, nomadic existence. The difference between Lisbeth and Frank is that Lisbeth is just getting started while Castle has been at it for decades and the paint's starting to peel.

The Slavers pits Frank against a gang of Eastern European sex traffickers whose simple, direct, and particularly ruthless brand of sex slavery have created something like a factory system for breaking and controlling girls. Likewise, The Girl Who Played With Fire has Lisbeth tangentially dealing with those involved in sex trafficking (from the demand side) but here's the difference: Ennis's Punisher arc deals with a monster in the world of men while Lisbeth exists largely in a vacuum. Like Castle, she's largely a monster, a would-be torturer and killer, but it almost seems like the story doesn't care.

Perhaps in the books there's some kind of profound realization that this girl is fucked up - more than just her day-to-day fucked up - but I wouldn't know having not read them. On the screen though it feels like cheap, right-wing thanatos at odds with the left-wing rabble rousing within which the story seems to be set. Lisbeth's acts against her tormentors and the tormentors of others would maybe carry a bit more heft and not have the stink of cheap catharsis if the world she occupied wasn't so broadly written, with a nearly endless parade of male sexual victimizers, womanizers, and assholes. Ennis, by contrast, places his character in more or less the "real" world: we see a social worker who's horrified by Frank's methods even if the results save lives, and a couple of cops trying to play things at the middle, at least one trying to get something out of his involvement with a serial killer of criminals. Ennis uses a finer brush and as a result the picture has more detail. Sure the people Frank kills aren't worth living, but what Frank does to them is typically horrific.

I never get that with Lisbeth - it's all cool surfaces and tough schtick and it gets really boring really fast.

Tucker Stone does a brilliant breakdown of the most powerful and oft-repeated moment from that arc, and I'm not sure I could do it equal justice.

Devil In the White City and Why I Haven't Reviewed Inception

2010-08-05T16:03:00.002-04:00

So one of my all-time favorite novels, Devil In the White City, is available via Google Books. For those of you who haven't read it, I'd encourage you to do so.

Larson's brilliantly-crafted historical novel about the Chicago's World Fair and its unfortunate coincidence with the murders of serial killer/con man H.H. Holmes uses the conceit that nearly every word of dialog in the book is known to have been spoken by the historical figures to which they were attributed via correspondence and interviews. It's such a clean and clear way of maintaining verisimilitude, and it was surely and exhausting process for the writer, who is of course no stranger to historical fiction with his Isaac's Storm and Thunderstruck dealing with life and other calamities for different sets of real-life figures of the 20th century. Actually, thinking about his depictions of real-life architects Daniel Burnham and Fredrick Law Olmstead has generated another piece - this one about game design with regards to Christopher Nolan's Inception - it should be live presently on Conducive Chronicle.

This sideways approach to the film instead of an actual review has a great deal to do with my lingering uncertainty about it - I just haven't decided if I like the damned thing or not and it bears revisiting sometime in the near future. I had a similar reaction last year to Inglourious Basterds which was finally resolved through a second viewing - like Roger Ebert I couldn't decide if I was seeing one of the best movies of 2009 or one of the worst (I ended up wholeheartedly in the latter camp, all things said and done). At the same time, my feelings about Inception are complicated somewhat not only by the admittedly dense experience of seeing the film but because I've read so much about the damned thing in the weeks preceding and following its release.

In fact, it's caused me to revisit how I'll be dealing with coverage of movies which I'm anticipating in the future, specifically with regard to reviews and even more pointedly when I plan to write one of my own. While it can be argued that the rich discussions of film before and after their release generate more interesting conversations and appreciation of movies, it also has the unfortunate consequence of coloring the experience beforehand. How much less would I have appreciated Inception if I had not read positive reviews from Devin Farci and Roger Ebert or alternatively, how resistant would I have been to it if I'd read David Edelstein or A.O. Scott's skeptical take-downs? All I can say is those reviews, read (foolishly) prior to seeing the film have had the side effect of making it difficult for me to process the movie critically and independently.

So There's a Thor: The Video Game Trailer

2010-07-28T11:35:00.001-04:00

It's no surprise that Marvel wants to get a game out to coincide with the release of next year's Kenneth Branagh-directed Thor movie. What is surprising is that the comics publisher opted to go back to Sega for this one given the less-than-stellar critical response to the Iron Man tie-ins. Unless there was just a high level of faith in the developer to get their act together, I have to imagine that there was some kind of deal inked to produce games tying into all of the Avenger titles for the next few years.

Spoilers: this teaser trailer has no gameplay footage. But unless they've got some masterwork up their sleeves I foresee a God of War-style hack and slash, probably with some upgrade mechanics tying in and around the main plot of the movie. Maybe a prequel or something using villains from the comics.

Hope to See You At SDCC This Week

2010-07-20T16:00:00.000-04:00

The tickets are printed and the bags are (soon to be) packed. I will be attending this year's Nerd Prom on behalf of both Comics Bulletin and Twitch, as well as pitching a couple of projects to any editors I can pin down for a second.

If you happen to see me roaming the show floor, please feel free to say hello. Or maybe you want to talk about collaborating on a game or comic project? Maybe you want to just buy me a drink?

In any event, that's me up there and I'll be there in all of my comics and film press glory.

The Prognosticators, or How I Wish I Coul Give Up The News

2010-07-16T20:44:00.000-04:00

So it only took me 23 years, but I finally saw James L. Brooks' romantic comedy/satire/frightening gaze into the tea leaves, Broadcast News (1987). Having seen this masterful, nearly perfect movie, the only real fault I can find within its 133 minute running time is that it wasn't pessimistic enough about the future of news broadcasting.

I feel woefully undereducated in Brooks' filmography, having only seen As Good as it Gets (which had to grow on me) and Spanglish (which I have a bit of sympathy for, even as I can't quite bring myself to like the damn movie).

I'm not interested in reviewing the movie here - it's developed a well-earned reputation on its own, thank you very much. there's just a cool bit of parity here given that I just interviewed a young documentary filmmaker as part of the New York Asian Film Festival. During my conversation with Tetsuaki Matsue, he talked a bit about objectivity/subjectivity and reporting - the idea that with both documentaries and the news one can't escape from creating a story.

What I got to thinking about after seeing Broadcast News and reflecting on this interview is that with documentaries, one can be forgiven for entertaining a little, playing to the crowd as you try to lay down some kind of position piece or narrative with actors, stakes, and consequences. Where it get downright diabolical is with news reporting (this is all Media Studies, 101, forgive me, but I'm just riffing on my recent experience) where the need to create a narrative has intruded on the so-called objective attempt to present the facts.

Events now become binary, with opposing forces and equal weight given to each side of the conversation, which is kind of a false premise when sometimes the other side is actually just full of it. Worse, reporting has become the "fake tears" scene from Brooks' script writ large: news personalities have so thoroughly injected themselves into the narrative, we're now asked to care about how they feel about the news (and to in turn interpret current events through that prism).

It was just something that sort of bummed me out after watching the movie - seeing how far we've moved into what was just 25 years ago satire.

Terribly Happy (2008)

2010-07-14T10:52:00.000-04:00

This Dutch crime-thriller ultimately had to be put to the "localization test" after my viewing of the just-released R1 DVD. That test involves looking at a foreign-language film and evaluating if the cache of the production and the quality of the film come from the film itself or if the "foreign-ness" of the thing is really what's being sold. Simply put: if Terribly Happy were in English, would it be any good?

Well, it's not any good in Dutch, which makes the overwhelmingly positive critical response to it so confounding to me. I'm typically resistant to allowing the opinions sway my own when it comes to assessing a film, but its many fans and defenders are part of why I sought this movie out. And after an hour of - well, not suffering, but working my way through this film, I admit to a certain level of exasperation with anyone who's seen this and thought it rose anywhere above mediocrity.

The problems started for me from the beginning when I couldn't help shaking the feeling that I was watching a foreign-language riff on Hot Fuzz with a muted color palette. Indeed, Terribly Happy's Robert is transplanted from Copenhagen to a small, marshland town after some kind of nervous crisis puts him on the outs with his superiors back in the big city. The mud and dirt-covered hamlet is in need of a new marshal - not because they want anyone actually dispensing law and order, but it's just their way. Robert comes to find that the people of the town have a lot of ways: ways of hanging their clothes, ways of dealing with shoplifting children, ways of getting rid of unwanted bodies.

In this, the script by director Henrik Ruben Genz and Dunja Gry Jensen along with the stellar cinematography by Jorgen Johanssen are actually most successful, establishing a grim, slightly paranoid tone that would have better served a more well-developed conflict than the one provided here. That conflict is between Robert and local bully, Jorgen. Jorgen is broad, squat, and calmly mean, and may or may not be beating his disturbed wife, Ingelise. While this premise is fraught with tension I had trouble actually buying into it because of several irrational or plainly stupid actions on Robert's part. I have to confess to looking at the time remaining and checking out a little bit in the second half after the second or third boneheaded decision by the lead that just dug him deeper and deeper into the hole in which he found himself. I have patience for this kind of character when it's clear that there's an element of thrill-seeking as with Jeffrey from Blue Velvet or part of a slow-burn madness as with Next Door's (Naboer, 2005) John, but the script doesn't really earn Robert's behavior or develop it in any convincing way.

There was another issue that undermined the whole thing and that was the sexual tension between Robert and Ingelise - or lack thereof. The actress Lene Maria Christensen throws herself into the role and crashes around in it with abandon. While her dedication to the performance is admirable, it also made me think that, as Robert, I would definitely try to keep my distance from this lunatic woman and her obvious mental problems. After a bit it became clear his character had nothing in the way of survival instincts and as a viewer I didn't want to be around him and his ridiculously self-destructive behavior.

Again, I have to wonder if the goodwill directed at the film was in part a result of it being a well-shot foreign film. I don't think other writers were bamboozled or anything like that, but I suspect that throwing an accent on the events of the film may have made it somewhat more appealing.

Pagina Perdida?

2010-07-10T10:21:00.000-04:00

I'm not really sure what to make of this trailer for Pagina Perdida which found itself in my inbox this morning. Here's the copy from production company Sanglat Films:

Surrounded by an intriguing scenario and inhabited by strange characters, "Lost Page” ("Página Perdida") is an abstract film, the result of a powerfull visual dimension created by Lucas Moreira added to the experimental electro-acoustic music of Marcelo Armani.

Produced by Sanglant Films and Department of Culture of São Leopoldo.

New York Asian Film Fest Roudup

2010-07-09T01:00:00.001-04:00

This year I had the privilege of reviewing a few titles for the New York Asian Film Festival for Twitch, where I'm a regular contributor.

Below you can find links to my coverage of the fest:

Review: Castaway On the Moon

Review: Gallants

Review: Little Big Soldier

Review: Boys on the Run

Review: Bodyguards and Assassins

Review: Power Kids (aka Force of Five)

Interview: Adult Film and Action Actress Asami

Go Over to MangaLife If You Want a Free DVD...

2010-07-06T13:13:00.000-04:00

... if you live in the UK, that is.

We're running a contest in conjunction with distributor 4Digital Media to give away a free copy of Kaji: The Ultimate Gambler right here. So what are you waiting for? Get over there and win it !

Sniff 'N' The Tears - "Driver's Seat" (1978)

2010-07-01T08:05:00.000-04:00

A little road music as I head to NYC for the New York Asian Film Festival.

I Completely Forgot That John C. Reilly Was in Gangs of New York

2010-06-30T14:59:00.000-04:00

That's his "Happy" Jack Mulraney next to Liam Neeson's Priest Vallon in Martin Scorsese's 2002 film. It's no wonder that I'd forgotten he was in the movie given that Gangs wasn't on my "must revist" list since I first saw it 8 years ago. So I'm at a loss to explain why I plopped down $10 or so to see the movie again on Blu Ray.

But I'm kind of glad that I did.

It's still by no stretch my favorite Scorsese film - it remains to my mind a series of moments instead of a solid picture. The way the first 20-30 minutes or so of the movie scream music video/collection of cool images (it looks cool but I didn't feel anything for it during this chunk of time) and the feeling is reinforced anytime the camera lingers on drummers, dancers and singers frequently and conspicuously.

I'm sure part of my initial rejection of Gangs was the casting of DiCaprio opposite Cameron Diaz. I thought my problem with the pairing was him but rewatching it last night I realized that it was actually her. Some of it comes down to her Jenny feeling underwritten and kind of just there to react to the real drama between Leo's Amsterdam and Daniel Day Lewis' Bill The Butcher. Wedged in between these two dynamic forces, Jenny feels positively vacant. It doesn't help that at no point do I buy Amsterdam and Jenny's chemistry - while he spends most of the movie looking like a boy she looks like a full-grown woman and it always feels "off" when they're together.

The other (and most important) thing that bugged me about the movie it its treatment of New York as a subject. The script and direction can't stop reminding us that this is a movie about the birth of modern New York, don't you see?! I still cringe when Leo introduces himself as Amsterdam to Bill who responds with, "And I'm New York." It put me in the mind of the Hughes Brothers' not-as-bad-as-they-say-but-still-not-great From Hell, which cribbed elements of London's growing pains upon entering the 20th century, but in such as way as to just become all text instead of subtext. I'm sorry, but by the time it reached the closing sequence with the U2's "Hands That Built America" I was done with the movie before it was done with me.

Bodyguards, Assassins, Boys on the Run, Live Nude Girls, and Michael Jackson

2010-06-28T17:13:00.000-04:00

Over at Twitch, I review a couple of films currently screening at the New York Asian Film Festival (you're going, right?). First up is the historical martial arts epic, Bodyguards and Assassins, director Teddy Chen's attempt to add and action-packed chapter to the life of Chinese revolutionary leader Dr. Sun Yat Sen. Next up is the romantic comedy (?) Boys on the Run, which makes a great case for more genre fluidity and ambiguity in relationship movies. Finally, I had a chance to see director Tetsuaki Matsui's documentary about the late Japanese porn starlet Yumika Hayashi, Annyong Yumika, which attempts to make sense of the enigmatic actress' life after the discovery "lost" Korean-Japanese co-produced adult film.

Despite being wildly different, both Bodyguards and Yumika are unexpectedly linked by ideas about public figures and their approachability. Bodyguards approaches this at a right angle with the mostly implied presence of Dr. Sen in a film ostensibly about his struggle for Chinese liberty. But each character in his ideological camp "speaks" for the good doctor and attempts to create a picture of the venerated, but ultimately unknowable figure. Chen's film shies away from showing Sen's face (although there is a key scene with his mother which I suppose acts as an emotional stand-in) but ultimately it's admiration at a remove.

Then there's Yumika where the very public, very popular porn star nonetheless leaves an absence where her life should be. Underneath the analysis of a fairly silly, kind of horrible "discovered" porno is the sense that no one really knew this woman and Matsui spends 2 hours trying to capture some essence of her onscreen through the recollection of her lovers and colleagues.

Yumika was a performer and her career and persona were ultimately forms of performance and to a certain extent so was the persona of Dr. Sen, who has over time become an idea of a person. I wonder how many years before the same effect overcomes Michael Jackson, who was actually a living ghost for about 15 years as he retreated from public view. After his death, after the late-night jokes, after the contentious struggle for his kids what will remain is the idea of the performer which has almost overnight shed the taint of more than a decade of decline and scandal. We don't know about him than we did before but our impression of him has shored itself up into something concrete, something definite that we identify as performer, or Performer.

Anyway, check out the reviews and think a little about celebrity and illumination.

Goodbye, Dodo

2010-06-25T15:20:00.000-04:00

That would be the outgoing Xbox 360 HD DVD player. I'll cop to it, I made the wrong choice in the format wars a couple of years back, but c'est la vie. While it made a fine upconverting DVD player, it kind of pained me to look at the box and know that no new discs were being made. Now, my 20gb PS3 is the primary player. Yes, I've fallen for the sucker bet of converting some of my DVD collection to Blu (needless to say some of my HD discs have gotten turned around to Blu).

In the end, it was "so long, farewell" to the player and about 20-odd discs.

Sneaker Pimps - Loretta Young Silks

2010-06-24T18:39:00.000-04:00

Check This Out (If You're Going to Comic-Con 2010)

2010-06-23T19:13:00.001-04:00

Planning on attending SDCC? A good friend at THQ pointed me in the direction of a presentation the company will be doing at the Con talking about the expansion of the Red Faction franchise into another sequel as well as a production on the ScyFy Network.

Red Faction Armageddon: How to Build a Transmedia Universe
Saturday, July 24th
Room: 9
3:30–4:30 pm

Q&A with creator Danny Bilson (EVP Core Games, THQ), Lenny Brown (Director IP Development, THQ), Hollywood’s leading Transmedia Producer, Jeff Gomez (Avatar, Transformers, Tron Legacy, Men In Black 3D), Alan Seiffert (SVP Syfy Ventures) and Erika Kennair (Director, Development, Syfy).

For the record, here's the trailer to Red Faction: Armageddon:

Crystal Castles - Celestica

2010-06-23T09:42:00.000-04:00

Monster In Your Veins says "Good Morning."

About a Day Into Blur (360)

2010-06-22T12:56:00.000-04:00

So, I've spent the last day or so of my free time digging into Bizarre Creations' newest racer, Blur. Right now, this weapons-based racer seems to be in a tie with Split/Second for "experimental racing games no one is buying." Which is a shame since Blur has a lot to recommend it in spite of the developer's off-putting PR campaign to convince us that it's a grown-up kart racer. It's not a lie to say that's it's Mario Kart with licensed vehicles, but such dry, merely descriptive pushes obscure what a weird experience it is.

It's interesting to look at Blur alongside the Project Gotham series, tracing that genealogy and seeing how traits have been shed and acquired in the hopes of surviving the marketplace. The trick and stunt-based Kudos system has evolved into the somewhat more esoteric Fans persistent points meter. Like that other Activision offering, it's all about the process of tracking player experience and doling out points for the basic experience of playing the game - but unlike other titles it maintains two separate persistent experience systems for both the single player campaign and online multiplayer mode which perhaps speaks to the different competencies of meat and bone drivers versus AI gremlins.

I can attest to the "stickiness" of what's on display here. The campaign mode's triangle of demands (placing in races, gaining fans, hitting "Fan Run" special race lines) invite, nay coax the player into revisiting race challenges to max out the number of "lights." The multi-function weapons ensure that the flow of races will be elaborately chaotic dances of destruction whose manifest pleasures are only mitigated by the nagging sense that the AI is racing only against you and not against the other AI competitors. Not to whine but that feels a little unfair. As a gamer, I'm going to choose to ignore the attempts to propagate the game from within the game via Facebook and Twitter integration - linking the same to one's gamer score feels like the most odious, mercenary type of move that creates a cracks of doubt in otherwise sound products.

By necessity, Bizarre has had to distance their latest offering from the storied Microsoft exclusive given their publisher Activision's platform agnosticism and as a result, you don't see "From the makers of Project Gotham" in the marketing materials. But you know where this baby comes from.

The big crisis I see for the game is the small pool of players in the multiplayer mode. Presumably, sales have not been as robust as hoped, prompting the concerned parties to offer $20 off of the game, which has the net effect of getting you a copy for around $2 0 or maybe less at some retailers. Right now, the online lobbies aren't quite barren but triple digit numbers of users online at any given time tell me that it's not really being embraced.

Blog Refresh

2010-06-20T19:56:00.000-04:00

Welcome new and old readers to the blog. Ideally, if you're reading this you'll be coming here from one of the several outlets where I write.

This will act as a clearing house of random reviews, analysis, comments, and concerns that might otherwise not fit with the other site to which I contribute. I'll also be linking to my current articles and columns and providing details on any upcoming projects I'm working on.

If you have review material for me (films, books, games) you can contact me at cwebb39(at)gmail.com. Please, no attachments, as they'll just get deleted unread.

For the record, you can find my writing at @:

Comics Bulettin: Shot for Shot

Conducive Chronicle

MangaLife

TwitchFilm

Two From Denmark: Fighter and Princess

2009-10-15T13:44:00.009-04:00

Two movies I've been anticipating for a while are Anders Morgenthaler's animated revenge thriller Princess (2006) and Natasha Arthy's Bend it Like Beckham for the kung fu set, Fighter (2007).

Princess is an odd package on paper: August (Thure Lindhardt) is a priest whose porn star sister has recently and left her damage but smart 5-year-old Mia (Mira Hilli Moller Hallund) to care for. Shocked by the emotional harm done to his young niece, August embarks on a mission to erase any vestige of his late sister's porn career while working his way towards her lover/boss, Charlie.

Using traditional animation, CG, live action inserts, and grainy camcorder video the story follows August on his quest in the present while giving viewers hints about how the rift formed between the formerly close brother and sister. The camcorder views in particular (always from August's perspective) show his compulsion to document his sister, no matter how sketchy the situation.

August is a bit off - he hates pornography (with good reason, in this case) but he also seems deeply, profoundly broken in his own way, even before his sister's exploitation. In flashbacks - which are sometimes accompanied by a distracting CG trip through August's synapses - he's always the observer and never the actor. Morgenthaler and co-writer Mette Heeno's script has a tendency to keep August's camera rolling when it should not be (particularly in the tense, confrontational second scene with the landlord).

The present-day sequences show August attempting to connect with Mia, even trying to gain a measure of catharsis for her by allowing her to participate in the revenge against her exploiters and abusers. The script is a little unclear on how many people mishandled this unfortunate child - I think it was just one character, but August seems to believe Charlie was involved as well.

The movie's position, I think, is that Christina and Mia's exploiters should be destroyed absolutely and completely. The two that we see, Preben (Tommy Kenter) and Sonny (Soren Lenander) are essentially vile gangsters. Charlie remains elusive but we understand from the shrine he has built for Christina in the local cemetery that he's a grotesque.

The viewer gets a Death Wish vibe from the whole thing, with the very capable August taking down these unsympathetic scumbags, working his way up the food chain. Even the cops are somewhat on August's side, opining that Preben and Sonny are lucky they're getting any help at all. August's attacks against the pornographers (and later their gun-toting henchmen) are fairly stylized, with the camera following the trajectory of bullets and crowbars as they hit their mark.

The film ultimately becomes exploitation cinema, all things considered, with its blood red-tinted focus on the violence and the almost playful nature of August's vengeful outing. Consider the scene in the warehouse early in the film where he has Mia pouring the gasoline while her stuffed animal prances in the background (a common conceit is that Mia thinks her stuffed bunny, Multe, is alive).

Why was animation chosen as the primary method to tell this story? According to IMDB it's about 20% live action and 80% animation - that sounds about right. Obviously, there's the appeal of splitting the past from present via format but what did it serve making the present animated? I suppose as a practical consideration, animating the film allowed the filmmakers to execute some of their more visceral set-pieces (how else could they afford to show the destruction of a city block of porn shops?). Still, there's a sense of the fantastic to the events given the slightly stylized nature of the characters and Mia's inner world being manifest through the ever-present Multe that creates distance instead of drawing you in. The split between the "real" (August in the past) and just plain moviemaking distracts more than it attracts if that makes any sense.

What do we make of the character's fate at the end of the movie? Or the friendly porn starlet who aids Mia in the mansion? The very final scene would hint that August's quest was just and redemptive while the acts themselves and their physical repercussions would tend to read as an outsized reaction on his part. I think in crafting such a strange brew of film styles and focusing on the delivery method of the content, the creative team perhaps got a little muddled in the actual, you know, content of the content. Ultimately Princess comes off as a revenge pic of the sex and murder genre - think 1979's Hardcore with George C. Scott or the original Get Carter. Unfortunately it puts up so many layers between its lead and its message that the movie is difficult to get behind.

Fighter similarly has a problem with a somewhat inscrutable lead. A coming-of-age Kung Fu film should be an easy sell to me but the script and performances never really generate any sort of relatable or believable tension. Instead, we get a retread of of numerous teen girl empowerment films which aims for grit but hits melancholy.

It's about Aicha (Semra Turan) a high school student cool to her strict Muslim parents' aspirations for her to become a doctor. The tomboyish lead would rather be practicing martial arts and watching grainy interviews with the late great Bruce Lee, though. The tension is obvious well-worn - traditional immigrant culture (her family is Turkish) vs. modern opportunities for a girl in the west. Writer/director Natasha Arthy and co-writer Nicolaj Arcel's script just dresses it in martial arts drag.

I've mentioned before that Aicha is inscrutable: some of that is from a script that's vague on exactly what her character wants but the other part is Turan's performance which is incredibly internal. Aicha spends a lot of her time literally running between locations and keeping her eyes down and mouth shut when she gets there. Of course she opens up a bit when she joins a Kung Fu club run by the Hong Kong mainstay Xian Gao (Crouching Tiger, Fong Sai Yuk a.k.a. The Legend) but that liveliness is more the result of well-choreographed if choppily-edited fight scenes.

The movie only seems alive during the wire work-heavy action scenes (which culminate in a tournament that's more Fight Club than The Karate Kid) but for the remainder of its running time the story is on autopilot. The story can barely muster any surprises or variation on the type of film, instead coasting on the formula. If you guessed her father was an ogre, her mother was knowing and disappointed, and that she had an older sibling who was the family's pride and joy then you were right on all counts. Is there a Danish boy outside of her traditional community who has her eye? You bet, but in this case it's the slightly slimy Emil (Cyron Bjorn Melville) whose character is never really given anything beyond an overtly sexual interest in Aicha.

I can't fault the look of the film, however. The grime and grit of the lower class Denmark estates are convincingly visualized through lots of handheld camera work and a high level of grain in the image.

The trailer for Princess:

Fighter's trailer:

Two (NOT) to Watch: Deadgirl and Grace

2009-10-08T15:21:00.006-04:00

I recently checked out these two much talked about horror features on DVD and found both to be sorely lacking.

Deadgirl (2008) (not to be confused with 2006's excellent The Dead Girl) is about two high school outcasts and the dead girl they find in the basement of an abandoned asylum. The catch: she's not quite dead and can't quite die.

The two friends, Rickie and JT (played by Shiloh Fernandez and Noah Segan), are a pretty miserable pair from the beginning but the plot attempts to drum up sympathy by giving the former a pretty crush for him to gaze at longingly for much of the running time, even as things start to get pretty messy down in the basement. The plot attempts to wring extra tension from JT's rather abrupt descent into depravity and Rickie's inability (or unwillingness) to pull his best friend back from the brink.

On paper there's a lot of interesting things to explore in terms of slippery slope morality, the power dynamics between friends, and the use of sex as a form of power. In particular, the relationship between JT and Rickie should be an electric current running throughout the entire film. Unfortunately, the piece devolves into the realm of "gore-sploitation" so quickly (look, everyone - guys having sex with a gnarly corpse) that any emotional shock is quickly undercut by the juvenile attempts to gross viewers out.

The production values are strong and the gore effects are actually quite decent but the casting is horrible with one of the oldest looking crowds of 17-year-olds in recent film memory and overwrought, very broad performances by the entire cast. The only member of the cast who really acquits themselves is Jenny Spain in the thankless role of the Deadgirl. The only one not playing to some warped high school cliche template she goes full bore with an uncomfortable mix of sexuality and primal ferocity.

Next up is Grace (2009), a film with a bit of a built-in rep thanks to some walkouts and vomiting during its time on the film festival circuit.

This natal horror film deals with Madeline (Jordan Ladd, sleeping through the role) whose husband and unborn child are killed in a car accident. Determined to carry the child to term she(and everyone else) is shocked to learn that the child (named Grace, natch) isn't as dead as they all believed.

Being a horror movie, this can't go well.

Vegan Madeline quickly learns that her little girl isn't interested in milk and has to get a regular supply of the red stuff in increasingly gruesome ways. Meanwhile, her isolation and increasingly erratic behavior starts a power struggle with her unhinged, control freak mother-in-law, Vivian (Gabrielle Rose, willing to bare her teeth and everything else in this role).

The concept here is much thinner as the story travels the familiar horror path where stories like Pet Sematary have long since and much more interestingly tread. Perhaps if the lead weren't sleepwalking through the role the film might have made more of an impression.

As it stands, the film is a dull-eyed mess that kind of happens and then ends.

Both films have especially nice posters, though.

Deadgirl Trailer

Grace Trailer

See Cronenberg's delightfully weird The Brood (1979) instead:

Or Cemetery Man for another take on the girl who just won't die:

Heading Back Into "The Mist"

2009-09-24T10:50:00.010-04:00

I saw Frank Darabont's adaptation of Stephen King's "The Mist" back in its summer release back in '07 and kind of hated it. It was that rapid-build kind of hate as well where you like it marginally in the theater and by the time you hit the exit you're convinced you've somehow been... I don't know, swindled?

The film was is a "hell is other people" piece about a small New England town and the thick mist that covers it after a mysterious storm. The townies and some vacationers end up holing up in a supermarket when they learn that the mist is inhabited by all manner of vicious creatures from somewhere else. Of course as a microcosm of American values and types (the elitist lawyer, the noble artist, the barking mad evangelist) it's only a matter of time before conflict breaks out between the natives.

The ideological gulf is between Tom Jane's pragmatic artist character and Marcia Gay Harden's bible-thumping Miss Carmody. Harden's character spins the events in apocalyptic-mystic terms, equating the monsters with divine retribution due to the litany of complaints one gets with any zealots: people are having the "wrong" kind of sex, abortion is murder, cats are sleeping with dogs, etc.

Carmody was painted in such broad strokes that it took me out of the movie when some of the townspeople started coming around to her side of things by the midway point. Harden gives a foaming at the mouth, foul, bitter performance (note, I'm not qualifying it as "good" per se) and it felt like a cheat on the part of the story to generate artificial tension. By the end of the film some of her followers are calling for human sacrifice in their panicked need to assuage a conception of God closer to King's "Children of the Corn."

So why did I rewatch it recently? I can't really answer that in any satisfying way. I was compelled to take it in again, though. Two years out the acting is still rough (Tom Jane's last scene unintentionally gets a laugh), the CGI is still dodgy, and Mrs. Carmody is a broad as ever but somehow it kind of works now in a way that it didn't back in '07.

I'd say part of it - if I'm being honest, most of it - has to do with the seismic emotional shift the country has gone through post '08 election or at least the cable news version of the national attitude anyway. We seem more balkanized than before and some on the right appear just plain mean. In particular, the religious right has been co-opted by some of the most vitriolic voices in the Pat Robertson mold. Some of the most nasty thoughts have been given voice recently by religious leaders (which happens with any real cultural sea change) but what's most appalling is that there are too many nodding their heads in agreement or at least not calling bullshit.

There's a real feeling of blood in the water right now with the people who've been sharpening their knives for years waiting for some kind of ultimate confrontation between the people and the state, black against whites, or Christians vs. everyone else enjoying the increasingly hyperbolic and hostile mood out there.

The emotional violence of yesterday is becoming the actual violence of today. Just a couple of weeks ago it was a Baptist minister praying for the death of the President and today it's the discovery of the body of a Census Bureau employee hanged in a cemetery with the word "Fed" written on his corpse.

It remains to be seen how much of it is the cable news cycle giving voices and legitimacy to fringe elements but there's an element out there, increasingly vocal, that mimic the sentiments of the Mrs. Carmodys of the world. That is, they're the folks that believe that "something's not right" with the country, and wouldn't mind a little bit of bloodletting to get America back to the "good old days" (i.e. cultural hegemony, minorities "in their place," and a simpler black and white moral spectrum).

Also, as overwrought as the ending to the movie is, there's some subtle, maybe even accidental comment there about how leaving the crazies to it and bugging out will get you nowhere. Those final apocalyptic moments get kind of silly with Tom Jane's extended "noooooooooooo," and I can't dispute that at all. At the same time, it's kind of poignant - the sense that the loudest, craziest voices have won out and forced the voices of reason to beat a hasty, bloody retreat.

Again, "The Mist" hasn't suddenly become transformative art but it has become very much of the moment.

Please note the images I selected from the recent Teabagger rallies were selected with a Google search for the words "teabagger + racist." These are intentionally slanted images but it was alarmingly easy to find them to justify my point.

Apropos of Nothing Really... Some Songs I Can't Live Without

2009-09-18T16:04:00.004-04:00

I began thinking about songs - particularly the ones that play over and over in my head and the ones that I can't bear to be without on a CD or on my iPod. Here are a few, in no particularly order:

"Marked" - Bad Religion

This was actually one of the first CDs I had to have and it was all thanks to another song entirely,"20th Century Boy." But this song just got me and gets to me still with its insistent final verse and the relentless speed of the whole thing. It was like a message delivered on the run and if you didn't get it, so what?

I've listened to other albums by Bad Religion since - my estimation of the band has diminished over time. Part of that is because I saw over time how simplistic (in the pejorative instead of "simple" as an observation)their music was and is. Of course part of it is growing a little older and not being able to maintain that level of intensity that you have when you're 13 or 14, but there it is.

"Beep Street" - Squarepusher

I actually discovered Squarepusher thanks to an Ken Ishii mix CD via the track "Squarepusher's Theme." I was completely enamored with the song - the way it didn't sound like the usual fiddling with knobs that I was used to in electronic music. I could hear real instrumentation in there even through Ishii's blending the track so that it could work as part of the overall playlist.

Being in South Florida at the time before the advent of internet music sales, it took a little while before I got hold of Feed Me Weird Things, the album where the track actually appears. So I "settled" for Hard Normal Daddy which in and of itself was a revelation.

I mentioned the instrumentation in "Squarepusher's Theme" but I learned that the musician was actually a virtuoso in multiple musical forms. At the time I had trouble characterizing what I was hearing. It sounded like drum and bass, but at fewer bpm's - gentler without any sort of affectation. It wasn't music you danced to but it was music that you heard. The tracks on Hard Normal Daddy demanded my attention because of the many layers of sound, with the variable rhythms and pacing making each track stand out.

I loved "Squarepusher's Theme" when I first heard it but i fell in love with "Beep Street" the first time I heard it.

"It's In Our Hands" - Bjork

More recent than the other entries and maybe more fitting with my temperament at this age. If you'd asked a few years ago I would have chosen her "Hyperballad" given the rawness of that track, the emotions laid bare. "Hyperballad" is actually still my favorite song by Bjork and one that I could never bring myself to ignore if it were playing. But "It's In Our Hands" is the one that I can't live without right now.

It's the imploring and jarringly sensual nature of this track that appeals to me. It feels like seduction out of desperation, this song without the track itself ever feeling desperate or like shallow vamping on the part of the artist.

I've always felt that she had one of the most beautiful voices in the world and this song reinforces that. It's like a well-honed tool, her voice, bouncing between wavering, almost youthful imprecation, and bedroom cooing between verses.

"La Cerca" - Sparta

It occurs to me that in spite of enjoying their music for years as At the Drive-in and when the band members broke apart to become Sparta and The Mars Volta, I know almost nothing about the roster in either groups.

For instance, I didn't know Sparta vocalist Jim Ward's name even after all these years of enjoying the texture of his voice. It's a voice that works perfectly with the material, which bounces from pop profundity to lyrical absurdity.

I don't have any deep reason or emotional connection to this song - I just like it quite a bit and feel like something's wrong if I don't have immediate access to it.

"Seed Of Memory" - Terry Reid

What the hell, right? Anyone who knows me knows I have a strong aversion to the hippy drippy sentiment of the late 60's and early 70's. I can't connect to any of it, only really vibing to southern rock and the more aggressive precursors to hard rock.

Well, maybe how I came to the track is part of why I enjoy it - via Rob Zombie's The Devil's Rejectsof all things. Say what you will about Zombie as a filmmaker but the man knows how to put together a soundtrack.

In this case, the song actually plays during the end credits after the antiheroes of the piece have been peppered with bullets by the Texas State Police. The song was actually a great comedown to the often garish violence of the previous 2 hours and Zombie was right to use it for the credits which kept the image up high - an eagle's eye view of the world below, divorced from all the terrible things that had happened before.

I appreciate the song now on its own now because of how rich and textured the track is. Its melancholy melody can alternately soothe or subdue me depending on my mood and I come back to it frequently when I need it.

"Joga (Remix)" - Bjork remixed by Alec Empire

I mentioned before the quality of Bjork's voice. Here, noise and hardcore artist Alec Empire wields it like a weapon - sending a blast of her vocals in between assaultive bass attacks. It's actually really unexpected and was such a departure from what I was used to in her work. I think the only other analogue I'd heard up to that point was "Army of Me" but there was such a gap between that track and this one that history had a way of getting lost in between.

What I'm saying is, I love it precisely because it's NOT a song by my favorite artist or at least it's a dramatic reinvention that actually makes me appreciate her talent all the more for its malleability.

On top of that, I first heard this song around the time that I was really into the Atari Teenage Riot. At this age I may not get as much out of their music, but Alec Empire's solo work has continued to endure because it's usually so raw and powered at times by its digressions and divergences.

"I assume you know who we are."

2009-09-02T15:45:00.013-04:00

Last weekend I checked out both Inglourious Basterds and The Baader-Meinhof Complex. Both are stylistically two fairly different movies. But without the intent of denigrating or elevating either one I must say that on a certain level the two films are incredibly similar thematically.

On the surface they seem wildly different - QT doing his movie-movie thing about World War II and the power of big "c" Cinema. Some quibbles notwithstanding I'm beginning to feel like it was one of my favorite movies of the year as a cumulative effort (but more on that in another post). As for BMK, it a rousing action film wearing the skin of a counterculture 60's action film about the extreme leftist sentiments sparked by Western intervention in Vietnam, the perceived police state mentality of the German government, etc.

But look deeper and it's evident that both are movies about appearances and rep. In a 9.1.09 posting titled "Real of fictitious, it doesn't matter..." Jim Emerson makes a very thorough dissection of IG and the role of reputation and appearance throughout the film. Emerson postulates (and I agree with his analysis) that Tarantino crafts characters whose reputations precede them, noted by nicknames ("Aldo the Apache," "the Jew Hunter," "The Bear Jew") and even self conscious asides by the movie itself (notably Stiglitz's introductory vignette).

This common thread is shared by BMK which follows the Red Army Faction (RAF) terrorist/revolutionary group in its heyday in the late 60's and early 70's. Part of their mandate - one shared by the Basterds - is to strike fear into the German power structure, creating tension and demoralization of what they perceive as immoral and even inhuman oppressors. Point of fact, part of the RAF propaganda explicitly described the police as pigs and effectively declaring open season on the men in uniform while at the same time dissuading attacks on "the workers" (i.e. civilians).

While the RAF leadership doesn't have evocative nicknames like the Basterds, their identities are known and they have very public faces. In fact, one of the most effective tools in ultimately rounding up the RAF leadership was a sort of "catch 'em all"-style wanted poster with images of the known members of the outfit displayed with x's marking the ones that had been captured of killed by the authorities. Pay attention to the trailer as well - as much as it comes through there in the actual film there's a very pervasive rock star/outlaw swagger to the early exploits of the RAF. It's a handy bit of synchronicity that the fashions of the group members echos some of the styles seen today (skinny jeans, form-fitting clothes with a retro vibe) that's at odds with the proletarian aims of the group.

Indeed, for all its talk of anarchic abolition of controlling capitalist systems, the RAF was incredibly well-marketed in its day, with frequent distribution of flyers bearing the group's logo. Compare and contrast this to the Basterds' unique form of propagating their fear message which involves marking German survivors with swastikas on their foreheads. This act serves the double purpose of forever unmasking the Nazi soldier while also acting as the guerillas' calling card to the German people.

There's also the question of authenticity - it comes up a couple of times in Basterds as subtext (maintaining a pretense of authenticity to survive) and is part of why the characters/historical figures of BMK struggle. Shoshanna Dreyfuss a.k.a. Emmanuelle Mimiuex must maintain the mask of the Gentile to avoid extermination while Andres Baader strains in every scene to prove how dedicated he is to the proletarian struggle, often exploding at his compatriots for what he perceives as their lack of authenticity. In the middle of the film, there's even a moment where the BMK leadership doubts the authenticity of a group member and defames the person in order to have them liquidated.

The point of similarity between the two films simultaneously creates a contrasting effect as Taratino gives us these larger-than-life figures whereas by the end of BMK the characters have been reduced to an extent after making themselves mythic. One of the last lines in the latter film has the speaker telling the assembled group that their heroes weren't victims or victimized - that they weren't martyrs but instead subjects of their own choices. In this manner, we the audience and the assembled group listening to the aforementioned speaker learn that the BMK leadership was neither a cause to follow nor objects to be edified.

I Want My Copy of "Arkham Asylum"*

2009-09-02T14:49:00.004-04:00

Apropos of nothing but in the year that the U.S.A. get its first black President and Iran takes a stab at revolution that the most amazing thing to me recently is the fact that a licensed video game - featuring a comic character no less - is receiving almost universally positive reviews from the gaming press.

My priorities can at times be somewhat off-kilter.

*It'll be great to have my own copy of the game so I can talk about it with some level of authority.

Not a Review: F.E.A.R. 2

2009-08-24T13:40:00.007-04:00

I finally got around to playing through the second in what is presumably one of many chapters of the F.E.A.R. franchise.* Overall, I thought it was a series of interesting moments instead of a cohesive game. Below are some other thoughts about the game and where it succeeded and possibly failed.

Spoilers may follow.

Jump scares actually work

There are lots of "monster closet"-style encounters in the game with specters and beasts of all stripes appearing while you're exploring the blasted city in the game. Most effective, I think, were the sections in the abandoned elementary school. The eerie calm and quiet of an only recently abandoned school was well used by the level designers in heightening the in-game tension.

While the actual construction of many of the levels left a bit to be desired, the tone was just right in many places making this player feel like he was actually in a horror scenario.

I hated The Man Without a Face

The game was such a wildly extreme version of the faceless protagonist - your character has neither an identity nor a voice. It was my hope that somehow this would play into the story which deals with mass-market replica soldiers and the anonymity of for-profit combat but by the end of the game it felt as though the developers couldn't be bothered.

The issue is obviated by the large-ish cast of characters barking story content at you throughout. Why are they talking while you (potentially) have a mouth yet can not scream? Strangely, the developers have opted to make their player character a set of hands with some guns and it really makes the whole experience feel disconnected.

Consider as a counterpoint the faceless protagonist of Bioshock - what was really special there was how thematically your having no face or identity made sense. For all intents and purposes, your character Jack had no identity prior to entering Rapture.

Rubble rubble (I'm sick of all this)

The game just before and then immediately after the nuclear explosion which occurs at the conclusion of the first F.E.A.R.. As a result, much of the city and outlying areas have been decimated by the blast with toppled vehicles, blasted ash remains, and still-burning fires littering the landscape. In some cases this presents for interesting level design, with teetering buses perched precariously over your head and upended buildings for you to navigate.

Still, more often that I'd like to have seen obstacles in the environment tended to come in two flavors: rubble textures and slightly un-jump-able railings and platforms. It really shook the sense of being a nimble commando part of an elite team of badasses. More troubling still is how the game lends itself to exploration but contradictorily has these weird artificial barriers slowing your progress.**

It sure is quiet in here...

Feeding the sense of isolation in the game, F.E.A.R. 2 almost immediately separates you from your team and has you rolling solo for most of the game. While it feels a little sloppy in terms of the story (you're part of an elite team of commandos that tends to split up at the first opportunity) it's highly effective in making you feel the loneliness of the entire scenario.

This is aided by the use of sound in the game with the judicious application of silence where necessary (or the occasional howling of the wind). Sometimes, small touches are enough to enhance the overall mood of a thing, and here's a place where the developers at Monolith scored a point.

The accidental rape story

This is possibly a place where the content of the narrative may have gotten beyond the creators, so please bear with me.

There's a certain strain of body control in the narrative with the victim becoming the victimizer (at least in Alma's case). There are a couple of layers of the strong gaining physical agency of those who aren't as strong. Your character is warned repeatedly that Alma wants to "absorb" you as she has done to others in the past. You're forcibly thrown into fugue-like states thanks to Alma, drawn/guided to the next point in the story.

Then there's the elementary school where we learn that many children were being groomed like Alma to be telepathic soldiers. The way it unfolds during the course of the stories is as a series of abuses perpetrated in secret without the consent of either the children or their parents. The Armacham doctors exert their control over the children, altering their very makeup in spite of the known debilitating repercussions.

The whole story boils down to you trying to protect your body from Alma who ultimately succeeds in gaining control of you long enough to impregnate herself in the game's closing moments. She's the game's ultimate victim and controller. From beyond the grave she's seeking vengeance for her years of forced imprisonment by her own father. She was impregnated multiple times to gain manageable progeny who could be mined for their abilities.

We're told late in the story that she wanted children of her own - while it's handled awkwardly and the final scene is at odds with all the threats of her absorbing your character - the final moments are effective and put new light on the multiple encounters earlier in the game where Alma attacks - no, assaults you, grappling you, trying to pin you down.

It's heady stuff and I wonder if the creators indeed this as a layer of text in the game.

*Henceforth to be known as The Deadly Adventures of Sexy Super Ghost Alma.

** Fallout 3 was another culprit with this kind of design - but it was less egregious there since there was so much more open space to explore compared to the spare corridors, warehouses, and hallways of F.E.A.R. 2.

Packing in Arizona

2009-08-18T15:54:00.004-04:00

These CNN images of an automatic rifle-toting health care protester caused me no small amount of heartbreak this morning when I first saw them. You can read the original story here.

It wasn't because this was a citizen carrying a presumably loaded weapon to a site of public discourse. It wasn't that he equated debate with violence. It wasn't (just) the cool dispassion with which he responded to the reporter and the cold inexorable logic which seemed to have brought him to this set of actions.

It wasn't even that he was a fellow black man who felt he would have to defend himself from his black Commander in Chief... that this protester felt he needed to make a preemptive show of defense.

When asked why he brought the gun, the man - who refused to identify himself - replied, "Because I can do it." Later he said, "In Arizona, I still have some freedoms."

I was nearly heartbroken this morning because in a relatively short period of time - say a month - the national discourse has broken down to such a degree that some segments of the population feel we're on the verge of armed revolution. Rule of law and civility are nothing next to personal politics and emotion. The cynic in me would say, "What's new" but the other part of me, the maybe less reptilian part that generally has hope for people tells the cynic to shut the hell up.

Maybe there is a gap between the way we're expected to behave and the way we actually act. It is for all intents and purposes a hostile act to bring a gun to a health care debate and yet media outlets have reported multiple instances. And instead of outrage we barely respond. We've become so insistent on protecting our liberties that we ignore the fact that we actually have fundamental responsibilities as citizens and hell, as human beings.

Yes, a person can carry a firearm openly in the state of Arizona, but it's our responsibility to tell a person who brings a gun to a debate that they're escalating tensions, endangering others, and generally being a nuisance for its own sake.

Yes, a person can have a strong opinion on the overhaul of the health care system but it's their responsibility to do so in a way that's honest and doesn't involve shouting down the other side like wild-eyed mobs. This goes for both sides.

Yes, a person can editorialize on your national platform about your views about the government and how they're managing the country but it's your responsibility to make sure that there is a clear break between editorial content and the news. This means the relentless grinning, smirking, microsecond text polls, and controlled messages need to be identified as what they are - coded and colored presentations of opinion overlaid with the barest skeletons of facts.

Yes, a person can believe in creationism as the process of development of life on earth but they are not free to ignore the extensive scientific evidence or otherwise prevent others from learning essential scientific truths.

Yes, a person can - and should - work hard and earn money and be a success, but it's their responsibility to do so in a manner that doesn't harm the person next to them.

We're not a nation of lone citizens here - we're a collection of communities and shared interests. Why don't we start acting like it.

This Land is Our Land (Get Outta Here Aliens!)

2009-08-17T10:28:00.002-04:00

Having just seen District 9 this weekend I have to come down on the side of critical consensus and say that I found it to be an exhilarating experience that was very much of the moment. "Of the moment" means that the plot doesn't hold up to greater scrutiny after the fact, with some story elements remaining poorly-explained or outright ignored (particularly with regard to the central issue of the use, value, and application of the Prawn technology).

Still, the exuberance of the thing - the energy of the action, the humor invested in the many situations protagonist Wikus Van de Merwe stumbles or is thrown into - makes it work in a way that the recent Star Trek reboot worked.

One thing that has left me a little irked since the movie bowed was the insistence (critically, at least) that the movie is a parable for Apartheid when it instead feels reflective of the recent immigration crisis experienced in South Africa. For a time there reports would pop up on CNN about attacks by SA locals on immigrants from Zimbabwe and other displaced persons and it was actually pretty hairy. According to this NY Times piece from 2007 something like 3900 illegal immigrants we being deported weekly. They were viewed by locals and preexisting immigrants as a challenge to low-wage jobs and homes in informal settlements. It was all about hustling to get a place on the totem pole even if it's at the bottom.

If I recall correctly the violence reached a fevered pitch sometime in the middle of 2008 with immigrants being burned out of their homes or even killed but in the time since nothing about the issue has really popped up on my radar.

Obviously, I get that Apartheid is the more recognizable cultural issue* from the area that still has resonance to this day but it doesn't really jibe with the issues presented in the film. Plus, I kind of feel like this "good immigrant/bad immigrant" story is thematically richer today across all borders. Not just in the U.S. but in any country where the poor feel they have to duke it out with the recent arrivals - the fear that the "unwashed masses" will somehow wash over everything that has been built before by the "good" immigrants (i.e. the ones that were there first).

It puts me in the mind of Miriam Colon character from Sayles' Lone Star - a successful Latina businesswoman and Mexican immigrant who had pretty much convinced herself she was born on this side of the border and had no compunction talking trash about anyone else trying to cross the border. The script painted her as a fairly nasty character made so by an initially hardscrabble life after the death of her husband.

I'm curious as to how much co-screenwriter Neill Terri Tatchell Blomkamp were conscious of the immolation of Zimbabwean immigrants and the violence and all that when they were putting the script together. Blomkamp's Alive in Joburg short was shot/released in 2005, around the time that the massive wave of Zimbabwean immigrants were crossing the border into South Africa. I suspect it had to have at least been somewhere in his mind during the making of both the short and the current feature.

*It should be noted that directed Neill Blomkamp has gone on record as saying that he's not trying to make an "issue" and that his District 9 is more of a big action film with some sociopolitical undertones kind of informing some of the narrative.

In Honor of My First Vertigo Spotlight Column Posting on Comics Bulletin

2009-08-15T10:47:00.003-04:00

... Here's a little DJ Shadow for your pleasure (and mine).

And hey, here's a bit more:

Oh, and if you'd like to see that new column it's right about... here.

The Generation and Culture Gap (Increasingly a Divide)

2009-08-12T17:07:00.008-04:00

[ETA: Mr. Kenny has pointed out via his own blog that I misspelled his name. My apologies. However, this isn't actually about you per se but instead about this generational hostility that seems to be on the rise in the critical community.]

The [film critic] blogosphere has recently been up in a tizzy about the perceived dwindling of the collective intellect. The failure of movies like "The Hurt Locker" to gain major financial traction while "Transformers 2" makes more money than God have led some critics and writers to blog extensively about the dumbing down of film audience.

A.O. Scott launches the opening salvo over at the NY Times.

Roger Ebert becomes exasperated, calling it a Gathering Dark Age.

Jeff Wells gets all Wells on our asses and calls the current generation Eloi here.

And of course, it becomes point-counterpoint with Drew McWeeny formerly of Aint It Cool News weighing in and later, Glenn Kenny in a response devoid of the name-calling and cutesy inserts of incendiary film shots.

Past the name-calling and the "cute" use of counterpoint images (Wells in particular is fond of his Morlocks and Eloi) is a relevant and tricky question: as a society (and I'm talking about the U.S. only) are we coming apart at the seams, getting slow and dumber as some critics insist?

Bill Maher recently ran down a list of the educational failings of the U.S. - how the man on the street (according to recent survey data) is unable to provide the name of his Senator, the purpose and text of the Bill of Rights, or even about the history of their own country. This is a pet topic for Maher, who insists that we've long been in a swift slide into mediocrity or downright stupidity. Maher's complaints join the resurgence of the unfortunate "culture wars" which seem to crop up during times of crisis.

The connective thread between this and the movies is the idea that subjective increasingly trumps the objective. Facts don't matter - feelings do. "I know what I know, facts be damned."Debate becomes a matter of who shouts loudest longest. Because "G.I. Joe" makes money hand over fist, that doesn't make it an objectively better film - just one that makes a lot of money. At the same time, it doesn't objectively mean audiences are dumber - it means that visually and tonally it touched on something audiences were seeking.

This whole discourse isn't an and/or prospect of one either being slow or in the know - it's a more nuanced thing that many in this argument (both about film and in the broader cultural space) tend to neglect.

Among Maher's statistics it would have been useful to post a comparison showing whether the number of Americans knowledgeable about the facts and functions has increased or decreased as opposed to say, 1960. Instead, he wrings his hands and shakes his head at the failure of the country making the facile point that being intellectually incurious is, you know, dumb.

Maybe there's a segment of the population that refuses to learn, know, or grow beyond its limitations. Maybe there also a segment that has been left behind by an inadequate educational system. Maybe people see summer tentpoles because it's part of the shared annual cultural experience from May to August. Maybe the most ignorant of us are the most visible thanks to endless re-airings of their shouting matches and shenanigans.

All I'm saying is, I don't know if it's as bad as many are trying to make things out to be. I think there is a gulf that separates generations and we all reach a point where we look at those younger than us and wonder, "why?" It's nothing new, it happens as one generation ages and the other comes of age. Populist tastes will make money hand over fist but it won't kill independent voices and work.

I don't know.

I distrust the insistence among the deeply religious that evolution never happened or among some of our citizens that our President is both a non-citizen and a Muslim with a Socialist agenda for our nation (apparently with reparations being the motivation for his actions and policy). But that's not really the generational divide so much as an artificial cultural gap widened through repetition.

"They hate you and think you're ignorant!" "They're smug, Socialist scum!"

There's little to no modulation in opinion. It's binary. It's them or us. Sometimes there are wrongheaded notions about actual facts but the answer isn't approaching the other side with either condescension or insults. You don't convince the young that there's interesting, non-mainstream cinema out there for them by insulting them. Furthermore, you don't get the guy who's convinced that our President isn't from here to change his mind by rolling your eyes and walking away.

I guess this whole thing is an exhaustion with smug. I want to be smarter. I want people to be smarter, but I also want us talking to one another instead of pretending that the so-called other side/age group/whatever doesn't mean anything.

Anyway, comment, think on it, ignore.

Better still, start coming up with solutions instead of talking about how much better things were way back when or elsewhere. We're in the now, so goddamn figure out how to make it work.

Holy Crap!

2009-08-11T16:09:00.007-04:00

I haven't updated this space since the end of May. In that time:

- I've been to England

- Started a new job

- Seen the economic apocalypse become slightly less apocalyptic

- Swore off CNN and all cable news for the foreseeable future

- Watched a lot of cable news

- Seen the beginnings of a revolution in Iran

- Seen the suppression of discourse here in the U.S. through the "shout-it-down" model of protest

- Had a wonderful buttercream cake from Just a Taste

- Reviewed the comic we never thought would arrive

- Spent a little time at the NY Asian Film Festival and even got to interview a high-profile Korean actress

- Wrote a few reviews here and there (and there too)

- Interviewed Mr. Christos Gage about crime and a bit of the old Ultraviolence

- ... and even took the time to see Mr. Brendon Small rock out here in NY along with the School of Rock kids.

...So yeah, a bit has happened in the time since I saw Drag Me to Hell. I'll try not to be so neglectful in the future, little blog.

-CW, out.

(Not a) Film Review: Drag Me To Hell

2009-05-30T13:35:00.007-04:00

T.G.F.B. Edition!*

Star Alison Lohman was a very game participant through all of the trauma director Sam Raimi put her through.

It should be noted that most if not all of the violence directed towards the heroine is entirely non-sexual. It's not punitive violence for a character expressing her sexuality or having a good time. She does something wrong and she spends the next 90 minutes paying for it.

This is key, because it takes the movie from making the viewer an accomplice through titillation to allowing the viewer to relax and enjoy the events on display.

Having said that, the script spends a LOT of time shoving things in its lead actress's mouth or otherwise covering her in fluids.

It's an incredibly loud movie with Raimi cranking things up to somewhere around 11 (15 during the "dinner party" scene). Most times it seems to work, although it can be a little exhausting for the audience.

Nominee for most menacing handkerchief of all time.

It was weird watching a Sam Raimi film without the on-screen participation of either Ted Raimi or Bruce Campbell. (This is excluding the dramas Raimi has worked on in the past)**

Wow, this was a hard PG-13.

This might be setting back U.S.-Gypsy relations by a few years.

Small thing but I really loved the text used for the opening and closing title.

It's been noted elsewhere but I'd like to chime in in favor of the use of practical effects. There are a couple of CG moments (but not excessive). I miss the good old days of practical makeup, gags, and gooey effects.

This touched off a note of nostalgia and sent me back to watch my copy of Army of Darkness. Yeah, I still love it.

I need for Amy Adams, Isla Fischer, and Alison Lohman to never star in a movie together. For some reason I confuse them all visually in what I like to call the "Tom Jane/Aaron Eckhart Effect."

I didn't really have much use for Justin Long until the closing moments of the film. He essentially embodied "boring boyfriend" for most of the movie.

*Thank God For Bulletpoints
** According to the fine people at the IMDB Ted Raimi was in the movie in a "blink and you'll miss him" moment.

Film Review: Terminator Salvation

2009-05-20T11:11:00.001-04:00

The full review is up on the Comics Bulletin site. With that, I've done more thinking about a "Terminator" movie than I have since 1991.

Silver Soapbox: Why I Hate the Hood

2009-05-20T00:03:00.002-04:00

Head on over to Comics Bulletin where Dave Wallace and I look over the oft-used Marvel character the Hood and dissect exactly why he sucks so much.

Check out "Why I Hate the Hood."

(Not a) Film Review: Terminator: Salvation

2009-05-19T10:39:00.011-04:00

A full review will be appearing tomorrow on the Comics Bulletin. It was decidedly Not Good but here are a few thoughts about what I saw (in no particular order):

***Mildly, slightly, kind of spoilerish points if you haven't seen any of the trailers. I mean, like if you haven't paid ANY attention to the promotion of this film.***

The movie was a weird battle of the accents with Australian-born Sam Worthington and British-born Bale attempting to mask theirs in a sort of gruff approximation of middle America. (It was bothersome enough to remind me of the Family Guy bit about Liam Neeson attempting to bury his own magnificent accent anytime he plays an American).

Moon Bloodgood threatens to be this generations Tia Carerre: attractive and exotic enough to jazz up your movie but not terribly interesting otherwise.

(Pictured: Bloodgood in Terminator: Salvation)

(Pictured: Tia Carerre - Celebrity Mudfighter)

Can we do away with the shorthand of action characters becoming sympathetic by looking into the dewey eyes of a mute moppet?

I would love an artbook filled with the mechanical design from the film. It seemed to be where a lot of the passion for this project went (or at least where it was most productively focused).

Do the events of this film and John Connor's reactions to the new breed of Terminators mean T2 never happened? I worry this is the kind of thing that will keep me awake at night.

(Have we lost this rad little bastard to continuity?)*

It seems really easy to traverse war-torn California in 2018. Characters seem to be able to just hop their way to their destinations without much trouble, zipping from L.A. to San Francisco as the plot requires.

Between this and Reign of Fire I regret to say that it's in the latter that Christian Bale makes the most interesting post apocalyptic leader in charge of a rag tag group of survivors against an implacable, deadly force.

Helena Bonham Carter wasn't a name that floated to the surface too often in the prerelease discussion of the movie. It was a surprise seeing her name in the opening credits and odder still to see how she was used in the movie. Her appearance was... distracting.

I'm trying to recall the last time I enjoyed a film score by Danny Elfman. It sucks when you're the guy complaining about the band's new sound because you miss the old sound, but seriously, I miss Danny Elfman's old sound. He seems misplaced in recent films.

I hope I'm not projecting, but the audience seemed deflated at the end of the movie. Usually at the end of a big film like this there's a burst of applause (one of my pet peeves, but still). Here, everyone rushed out the second the credits started. The call outs to the previous movies and jokes didn't elicit very many responses either.

Seriously, there are like 6 references to the previous film. Only a few really work, whereas the others kind of happen - used only to remind us that they "get" that these movies occurred in the same universe.

It's such a relentlessly joyless movie. Compare it to the other three (yes, even Rise of the Machines) each of which was energetic, in parts humorous, and generally about living people trying to overcome the odds. Here it's this sort of dour humanity dedicated to survival in the abstract as a way of defeating the machines. I think maybe this is my biggest gripe with the film all things considered because it robs the movie of any essential life and makes the entire experience a grim, gritty, slog.

* It's disheartening Googling photos of celebrities who aren't working as much anymore. 9 times out of 10 the internet just wants to remind you of how much weight they've put on or how bad their hair is now.

Comic Reviews: Mad Comic Party!

2009-05-15T09:32:00.002-04:00

Sweet Christmas, I've bee writing a lot of reviews lately. Here are some of them for you to enjoy (or not).

Umbrella Academy: Dallas #6

We Kill Monsters #1

X-Factor #43

Superman: World of New Krypton #3

Iron West

New Mutants #1

War of Kings #3

Warning - Low Content Mode!

2009-05-15T09:28:00.003-04:00

Apologies for the infrequent updates, but sometimes life gets in the way of blogging. Expect regular updates soon.

Comic Reviews: Miscellany

2009-05-03T16:19:00.002-04:00

For this week's Sunday Slugfest, I review Final Crisis: Legion of Three Worlds #4.

My review of the first issue of Atomic Robo Volume 3 elicits some negative responses from the creator.

I take a look at the second volume of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

I complain a bit about Greg Land's art in my review of Uncanny X-men #509.

And finally, I don't hate the penultimate issue of Ultimate Wolverine vs. Hulk.

Comics Reviews: An Embarrassment of Riches

2009-04-26T17:58:00.003-04:00

Here are some recent comic reviews I've done for the Comics Bulletin.

First up, I tear into Detective Comics #853 in this week's Sunday Slugfest.

Then, I gush a little embarrassingly about Paul Pope in my Heavy Liquid review.

I show a little love for the return of the Skrull Kill Krew.

Finally, I gripe (virtually) at Greg Rucka in my Action Comics #876 review.

Silver Soapbox: Special

2009-04-26T17:55:00.002-04:00

Head over to the Comics Bulletin site where I use a lot of big words in talking about the movie "Special."

Comic Review: Wonder Woman - the Hiketeia OGN

2009-04-15T14:48:00.003-04:00

Wonder Woman gets her sacred duty on in this Greg Rucka-penned OGN. Find the review here on the Comics Bulletin.

DVD Review: Special (2006)

2009-04-14T17:33:00.002-04:00

Director: Hal Haberman & Jeremy Passmore
Writer: Hal Haberman & Jeremy Passmore
Starring: Michael Rappaport (Les), Josh Peck (Joey), Robert Baker (Everett), Jack Kehler (Dr. Dobson), Paul Blackthorne (Jonas Exiler), Ian Bohen (Ted Exiler)

Synopsis: The subject of a depression drug trial becomes convinced that the experimental medication has imbued him with super powers. Violent attempts to clean up the streets ensue.

***Spoiler-y Review follows***

The first thing Les (Michael Rappaport) asks when he receives the bottle of an experimental depression drug is if he can take it now. Anxious, smiling nervously, he asks the stern Dr. Dobson (Kehler) how long before he begins to feel the effects. In voice over he tells us that he wasn't even feeling particularly depressed before entering the drug trial.

Everything points to Les being a man who needs a change in his life: from the hunched way that he sits on his couch, eating his meager microwaved dinner, long limbs bunched up in front of him; to the way his boss admonishes him to repeat the mantra of the meter maid - "I'm important to the city... I matter." Les is the superhero fantasy in genesis: he's a normal, undistinguished man waiting for some catalyst to shake him loose and unleash his potential.

Before you can say "bitten by a radioactive spider," Les begins levitating in his living room and hearing the thoughts of the incredulous Dr. Dobson. With great power comes great responsibility and after sucessfully disarming a would-be thief, Les throws together a costume and hits the streets of his unnamed city to fight crime.

But the writing/directing team of Haberman and Passmore don't keep things simple. Les is convinced os his new abilities but from the subjective view of his doctor and friends, Les is delusional, visiting a good deal of physical damage upon himself in spite of his protestations that Les get help.

Then there are the Exiler brothers - investors in the experimental drug that give Les his powers/delusions. The last thing they want is some lunatic wearing their corporate logo running around claiming to have powers with their pills in his system. After a time, Les will find that he has archnemises to go along with his mania.

What's interesting is that the script doesn't let the miracle pills make Les anything more than he already is: he's a man who wants to do good and be valuable so he goes out and does some good measured with a certain dubious amount of value. He doesn't become smarter or more charming. He's still unable to connect with the pretty girl at the local convenience store. Even in his delusion he's only able to execute practical feats that combined common sense, observation, and willingness to punish one's body would allow.

If anything, Special is the anti-superhero movie somewhat in the way that Mark Millar's Kick-Ass (and its forthcoming film) is an anti-superhero comic in that both regard the desire to put on a costume and circumvent the law to fight crime as inherently selfish acts borne of varying degrees of delusion. Where they diverge (besides the subjective merits of the two works) is in how they treat their leads. Dave of Kick-Ass is an unlikeable, self-serving teen hoping to use a career as a superhero as a means to gain fame and noteriety (even if the goal is somewhat muddied by his identity being hidden behind a mask). Meanwhile, Les is a genuine guy - I've said before that he wants to do good and to that end he's trying.

Millar appears to be more cynical about human motivation: everyone wants their 15 minutes to somehow illuminate their angry, frustrated existences. At their core everyone is deeply flawed and set up to ultimately fail. Special posits a case where a man can be flawed (Les is lonely and perhaps a bit juvenile) but essentially good. When the chips are down, when Les realizes that he's a victim of psychosis, he does the right thing and attempts to shut himself away from anyone that he could potentially harm, taking an "antidote" that will supposedly remove the drugs from his system. Les would choose to sacrifice emotionally-fulfilling delusion in order to do the objectively right thing.

I have a great deal of affection for this movie. It's low-budget and the production values are spare, but it - like Les - have objective value. A premise that could have rested easily on quirk and the circumstances of its lead becomes something more compelling as a result of making hard choices and putting its hero through the ringer.

Special Features: There are some trailers for other Magnet releases as well as some deleted scenes.

Comic Review: The Punisher #4

2009-04-14T10:50:00.003-04:00

Because I live in the internet, here's my review of Punisher #4 for the Comics Bulletin.

DVD Review: Maiko Haaaan!!!

2009-04-13T15:10:00.004-04:00

Director: Nobuo Mizuta
Writer:Kankuro Kudo
Starring: Sadao Abe (as Kimihiko Onizuka), Shin'ichi Tsutsumi (as Kiichiro Naito), Kou Shibisaki (as Fujiko Osawa), and Saori Koide (as Komako)

Synopsis: An office worker for a noodle company has one great obsession in life: the Geishas of Kyoto. And he'll do anything to get a round of strip baseball with one of these painted beauties.

Maiko Haaaan!!! will be a like-it-or-hate-it prospect for most viewers with its broad comedy and decidedly unlikeable protagonist. The story follows its bowl-cut sporting lead Onizuka (Abe) as he gives up his life in bustling Tokyo for the sedate Kyoto, home to many a Geisha. Onizuka has spent the last decade obsessing over geishas since his first encounter with them as a frantic, lost schoolboy and now he seeks any means possible to spend his nights in their company.

To this end, Maiko Haaaan!!! follows a man able to do just about anything to reach his ambition and defeat his rival in the night-lit world of Kyoto after dark - the cocky pro baseball player Kiichiro Naito (Tsutsumi).

What follows is a primer in geisha etiquette, many a brightly-lit tableu, a couple of peppy musical numbers, and lots of mugging for the camera for just about everyone involved. The late-game addition of some melodrama to the proceedings softens the edges of some of the leads and gives the final narrative a little more shape than it started with, but the overall tone is that is garish, cartoonish abandon.

Again, it's not a movie for everyone - but in the final analysis I enjoyed what it had to offer with a weird, unlikeable, and utterly fun lead.

DVD Extras: Outside of some unsubtitled trailers for the film and a brief making of doc, not much.

Movie Review: Observe and Report

2009-04-09T09:56:00.003-04:00

Full disclosure: I've spent the last few months anticipating this movie. I've laughed at the red-band trailer that popped up online not too far back and not exactly grown bored with the oft-aired ads for the film on TV. I've eagerly absorbed interviews with writer/director Jody Hill touting the film as a spiritual successor to "Taxi Driver" in its dark misanthropy. I've even followed the trajectory of the "Seth Rogen: Fat No More" with interest because of this movie.

So now it's here and there's no way that expectation could meet experience, right? Well, yes and no. See, while on the final balance I enjoyed "Observe and Report," it wasn't the movie I went in hoping for, and more problematic still, it wasn't sure what movie it wanted to be.

The story is that of Ronnie Barhardt (Rogen), head of mall security at an unnamed Southern California mall. Ronnie has established a something of a fiefdom there, aided and abetted by his lieutenant, the sycophantic Dennis (Michael Pena) and the weapons-obsessed Yuen twins (John and Matt Yuan). He's even browbeaten an employee at the local seafood restaurant (Jesse Plemons) into following the path of the mall security guard, which for Ronnie's purposes entails a campaign of harrassment and decidedly unmeasured responses to vandalism and cars parked in loading zones.

Ronnie's control of his environment is shattered when a flasher begins harrassing female patrons, most notably Ronnie's crush, the vapid, drunken Brandi (Anna Faris). The flasher brinsg the police (in the form of Ray Liotta's Detective Harrison) and the presence of the police creates a loss of control in Ronnie's environment. He attempts to seize the reins of the situation by using the threat of the return of the "pervert" to harrass Brandi into going out with him and to ultimately get himself onto the police force.

Some of you may know be able to guess the trajectory from here: how there's another, gentler blonde competing for Ronnie's affections one free cup of coffee in the food court at a time; how Detective Harrison and the world in general show Ronnie what a joke his ambitions truly are; the bloddy -

Well, wait a minute. Now what I've described above has the marks of the typical "clueless hero" arc where our protagonist is redeemed in the end by an act of competence. And "Observe and Report" is, in fact, that. But there is a streak of meanness to it - of misanthropy that makes it more a spiritual successor to "Bad Santa" than to Taxi driver. This is not a strike against the movie since I think "Bad Santa" is one of the truly great dark comedies.

Ronnie is an appropriately foul-mouthed, violent, xenophobic, and petty hero convinced of his own invincibility within the confines of the mall, and those moments where the character's ambition is allowed to outsize the moment are great (specifically any scenes between Rogen and Liotta). Where the movie falters is in how true Ronnie's belief in his own invincibility is. For all of his faults as a person, Jody Hill has allowed Barnhadt to be a force fo nature in a fight and in command of his troops (with one exception I won't spoil here).

There's violence in the film (generally Ronnie is the one who causes it) but it becomes cartoonish after a point in how capable Ronnie is. The tone seems off and you're thrown into the middle of an action movie where your character-based comedy was supposed to be. Additionally, where there's supposed to be heart, there's a layer of broad schmaltz that can be disorienting. When Ronnie fails, it's funny - often very funny - but in the aftermath Hill lingers over his interactions with his drunken mother (Celia Weston) whose heart-to-hears have the setup and delivery of something out of a sitcom.

I brought up "Bad Santa" earlier. That film worked because it was so relentlessly committed to the darkness of its characters of the pessimissm of its world. Even its "happy" ending was nothing more than its lead character's cynical manipulation of his ultimate circumstances. "Observe and Report" lacks that commitment. When it should play the moment straight it plays it wacky and too often it goes for the pratfall when it doesn't have to. Nonetheless, this doesn't make the movie "not good" it just makes the movie "not excellent"(keep in mind, my expectations were calibrated for some kind of superlative experience). The real credit to the movie is that despite its shortcomings, I'd love to revisit Ronnie's world again to see where he is in a few years.

Comic Reviews: Captain America 70th Anniversary #1 and Werewolf By Night #4

2009-03-31T13:06:00.004-04:00

Two new reviews up on the Comics Bulletin site. First is the Captain America 70th Anniversary #1.

After that, there's my review of Dead of Night: Werewolf By Night #4.

Comic Review: Caped #1

2009-03-30T08:08:00.001-04:00

My review of Caped #1 is up at the Comics Bulletin.

Mr. Big Time

2009-03-29T12:00:00.003-04:00

My good friend Jarreau (AKA Reau) had the opportunity to paint the recent Rob Liefeld cover for the recent X-Force/Cable: Messiah War Prologue.

Big congratulations to him for the good work ushering in one the year's big X-events.

Comic Review: Hero Squared - Love and Death #2

2009-03-26T00:58:00.002-04:00

Here's my latest review for the Comics Bulletin. You know the drill.

Interview: Artist Rafa Sandoval

2009-03-25T10:27:00.003-04:00

Up and coming artist Rafa Sandoval was gracious enough to answer a few questions for me and the Comics Bulletin.

You can find the interview here.

You can find some of Sandoval's art here on his page.

Comic Review: The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Vol. 1

2009-03-25T09:15:00.003-04:00

You like comics, right? You like the read reviews of comics, right? Well, here's one for Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill's first volume of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

Comic Review: Nova #23

2009-03-24T17:21:00.002-04:00

Crazy super hero action! Analysis! My review of Nova #23 is up on Comics Bulletin!

Comic Review: X-Infernus #4

2009-03-24T10:11:00.003-04:00

Marvel plays musical chairs with the X-men franchise and I review it for the Comics Bulletin.

Comic Review: American Terror Vol. 2

2009-03-22T11:56:00.002-04:00

There's a slugfest review of American Terror Vol. 2 up on the Comics Bulletin.

Check it. Check check it.

What's Going On Here?

2009-03-20T17:58:00.004-04:00

"A good mystery flick (or more precisely a good what-the-fuck-is-going-on? movie) is supposed to work on a dog-race principle. The audience is the dog pack and the stuff you're trying to figure out is the artificial rabbit. The rabbit is always supposed to be just ahead of the dogs, but never so far ahead so that they lose hope and start to give up."

From Jeff Wells via Hollywood Elsewhere. (He's talking about Tony Gilroy's Duplicity which I'd like to get out there and see sometime in the near future)

I echoed a similar sentiment in my review of Potter's Field.

What are some other mysteries out there that followed this principle?

North by Northwest pretty much plays by the rules before laying everything out for the viewer.

Chinatown cheats too much to qualify but is still an excellent based on performances and veracity.

Memento is all about the trick and the trap -- the mechanics of the thing and intentionally keeping all the details from the viewer.

Red Dragon wasn't a particularly good movie but it made the viewers in the back row feel smart and with the current so on that level it worked.

How about some others?

Comic Reviews: Remnant #3 and Potter's Field: Stone Cold

2009-03-20T13:11:00.005-04:00

Two more reviews up on Comics Bulletin. First up is Remnant #3.

Then I talk a bit about the Potter's Field one-shot, "Stone Cold."

Comics Pitch: Image Universe

2009-03-20T09:55:00.012-04:00

[Edit - the review is up and you can find it here.]

Over at Comics Bulletin I'll soon be doing a proper review of Invincible #60 (you can find a preview here), Robert Kirkman's latest entry in his long-running series.

The issue is for the most part and all-out brawl between evil doppelgangers of the title character and the entire Image Comics Universe. While reading Kirkman's story and seeing a bunch of characters that I haven't seen on a page in years* illustrated so ably by Ryan Ottley, I wondered why this didn't happen more often.

Why hasn't Image done more crossover work in recent years? I imagine some of it could be logistical issues of having all of those creator-owned characters in one title perhaps stepping on the toes of ongoing narratives. Also, it's been years since Image really dealt with any kind of shared universe. Some characters might cross over from time to time, but for the most part the Image creators seemed to keep to their own little corners, tapping out their own self-contained narratives.

Could it also have to do with the fact that the brand identity of some of these characters are kind of hard to pin down? Who knows what Spawn or Youngblood are about anymore? Does seeing the Savage Dragon wailing on some villains alongside Shadowhawk elicit any sort of response from anyone save the most nostalgic fan still clinging to a connection with these properties?**

Kirkman is wise to keep his "Invincible War" to one issue for narrative purposes but it's interesting to think about Image exploiting the shared universe of these characters more frequently.

*Seriously, Pitt?! Did that book even reach a conclusion?
** I was totally happy to see Savage Dragon wailing on robots drawn by Ryan Ottley, so I might be the target audience for this sort of thing.

Comic Review: Sexy Voice and Robo

2009-03-19T09:22:00.003-04:00

I kick it a little differently this time with a manga review on Comics Bulletin. Read all about Sexy Voice and Robo today!

Comic Review: The Punisher #3

2009-03-17T13:28:00.003-04:00

Hop on over to the Comics Bulletin where I bust out some knowledge about Rick Remender's Punisher #3.

Word.

Ten To Play: Exploitation Games

2009-03-16T15:40:00.010-04:00

After getting some time in with Resident Evil 5, I'm glad to say that the game isn't racist*. Instead, it's actually an exploitation game as Stephen Totilo notes on his MTV blog, it trades in cliche.

Here are some other titles that are excellent examples of the exploitation genre - each an excellent game that traffics (well) in sex and violence but not at the expense of the overall game experience.

1. Manhunt (PS2/Xbox) Rockstar Games

The first outing the series captured the Running Man feel expertly with a gritty, grimy world out of a John Carpenter film. The player was implicated in the violence by placing an emphasis on "stylish" kills in order to improve the in-game ranking. The experience is heightened with the terrible-wonderful voice of Brian Cox cooing in your ear the entire time, goading you to "do it... do it..."

The game was of course considered a murder simulator by various pundits and talking heads. The outcry got worse with the (far inferior) sequel which bowed on the Wii and PS2.

2. Twisted Metal:Black (PS2) Sony

This game was like Death Race 2000 without pedestrians (with pedestrians it would be Carmageddon). One gets the sense that this game is what fans of the Insane Clown Posse** see when they close their beady little eyes at night.

The storied franchise started back on the PS1 and has had several enjoyable entries based on the simple premise of "guns on cars." It works and I wonder when we'll get a sequel for the current gen Playstation console.

3. Scarface: The World Is Yours (PS2/Xbox/Wii) Vivendi Universal

It's essentially the adaptation/sequel to an exploitation film. Girls, guns, and blow are all on the screen and in your hands as you take on the role of Tony Montana post end-of-the-move shootout.

Of course, the game is a GTA-clone, a franchise which gets much of its inspiration from the film.

4. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (PS2/Xbox) Rockstar Games

Which brings us to the proof that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Taking cues from Scarface (the film), Miami Vice, and using the voice of Henry Hill himself, the game is an exploitation blockbuster.

As Tommy Vercetti, players don't just wade in the seamy underwold of Vice City, they crawl, swim, and thrive in it. Before the series took a turn for the serious with part IV, this entry would typify the grindhouse experience in games, particularly within the crime genre. The game was just as often taking shots at the milieu as it was exploiting and exploring the tropes of crime fiction.

5. House of the Dead: Overkill (Wii) Sega of America

The game's trailer is a knowing nod to the recent box office failure Grindhouse and the game itself takes shots at the franchise known for its less than stellar production values.

6. Loaded (PS1) Interplay

Another Running Man/Smash TVs-style game, this was one of the more enjoyable games from the halcyon days of the PS1. Instead of style, the game emphasized racking up a hefty kill count. It was followed by a sequel, Reloaded that was actually superior.

Where's our next-gen Re-Reloaded?

7. Mortal Kombat: Deception (PS2/Xbox) Midway

Death match tournaments are a staple of the exploitation genre (see Enter the Dragon or Battle Royale). The Mortal Kombat series has tapped into this for years. Add in a dash of faux-Orientalism, some t&a, and toss in a helping of monstrous bosses and you have a grindhouse hit.

A part of me feels that a filmmaker with the right chops could make this into quite the R-rated (note, I didn't say "mature") movie.

8. Dead Rising (Xbox 360) Capcom

This game is an outright homage to Dawn of the Dead (not to contradict the carefully-worded warning at the beginning of the game). However, alongside the social commentary of the beloved zombie film is a healthy helping of gore and sex which are actually integral to the gameplay.

Making their protagonist a photographer opened up some well-executed gameplay possibilities for the developers. Players were often tasked with taking the most gory, dramatic, or sexually (read those involving panites and lady parts) photos possible in the middle of the zombie outbreak.

9. Dead or Alive 5 (Xbox 360) Tecmo

Boobs and figting.

'Nuff said.

10. Resident Evil 5 (PS3/Xbox 360) Capcom

Totilo shares his views on it far more articularly than I will here. But essentially, it's you and your hottie sidekick mowing down North African zombies as the white man at the top (captial M on "Man" there) unleashes a deadly virus.

It's the stuff of which Sci Fi Channel original movies are made.

* That is to say, I don't think the game has some deliberate racial agenda with bad black vs. good whites. I do think there are some naive and perhaps ill-advised visuals (the grass-skirted tribesmen spring to mind) but it was not the cringe inducing "brave white man saves the coloreds" of Ed Zwick movies.

**I will NOT use the word "Juggalo" in the main body of my work. It's retarded.

Comic Review: Action Comics #875

2009-03-12T14:27:00.003-04:00

My large and in charge review of Action Comics #875 is up on the Comics Bulletin site.

Accessory Review: Mad Catz Street Fighter Fight Pad

2009-03-10T22:39:00.004-04:00

Short review:

It's not just the controller. Apparently I'm just not good at the game.

Medium-ish review:

- The diagonal motions are still a little hard to transition into from one of the directions.

- The D-pad is a little slick instead of rubbery. I would have preferred it if Mad Catz had chosen rubberized texture for better grip.

- It sucks that the 360 version isn't wireless like its PS3 counterpart.

- It also lacks the heft of other controllers which can be kind of off-putting (likely because of the lack of rumble support).

- The "Turbo," "Back," and "Xbox" buttons are also much too small - I think Mad Catz was so worried about sacrificing real estate on the face of the controller that they erred too far on the side of caution.

- The size of the controller is just right and it fits even my girlish hands.

- It doesn't feel cheap or like it's going to crumble in my hands like many other accessories (some even from Mad Catz).

- The paint job is very decent (I opted for the Chun Li given the lack of Blanka or Akuma). I'm wondering how it'll fare in a few months' time after constant use.

Comic Review: Astonishing Tales #2 and The Spaghetti Strand Murder

2009-03-10T07:39:00.002-04:00

My review of the second issue of Astonishing Tales #2 is up at Comics Bulletin. The books very "Woverine-y."

Next up is my review of The Spaghetti Strand Murder, which is in fact, not very Wolverine-y.

Some Thoughts About the New "Star Trek" Trailer From Someone Who's Only Marginally a Trek Fan*

2009-03-06T11:01:00.005-05:00

1. Space... full of debris.

2. Several months and multiple trailers in and I'm still not feeling Chris Pine as Kirk. It's not like the role requires gravitas or anything - just someone whose features and name I could remember ten minutes later.

3. I'm really digging the oversaturated white of the set. It's a really cool aesthetic but I'm curious as to how it will contrast will all of the other "space grit" we see in the trailer.

4. Eric Bana: he feels much too good for the material here. From the looks of things he's going to be a tatted-up Khan.

5. Seriously... Eric Bana. The man was awesome in Chopper.

6. The trailer seems to be going for a character (lots of V.O. about Kirk living up to his dad's rep)** and action-based (lots of ships zooming in, out, and around debris) thing without bothering to touch on the story. Having watched it, I have no idea what the movie will be about.

7. The lack of Simon Pegg is disappointing. For real, I'd watch a Simon Pegg-as-Scotty space comedy over this.

8. You know what this reminds me of? Starship Troopers without the irony.

* Okay, I've seen all of the movies and watched the shows. But it's not like I know any of the episode titles... and I could only stick with Enterprise for like, ten minutes.

**Seriously, this is the characterization they're going for? Trite daddy issues to sell it to the under-15 set?

Comic Review: The Goon #32 & City of Dust #5

2009-03-06T09:28:00.005-05:00

Another review over at the Comic Bulletin for The Goon #32. Spoiler Alert: I LOVED this one.

Then, I review City of Dust #5, which was kind of "eh" but not bad.

Comic Review: Angel: After the Fall #18

2009-03-05T08:29:00.002-05:00

My online ubiquity continues.

Comic Review: Hollow-Eyed Mary

2009-03-04T23:31:00.001-05:00

I weigh in on Hollow-Eyed Mary on the Comics Bulletin site.

Comic Review: Agents of Atlas #2

2009-03-03T10:43:00.003-05:00

My review for Agents of Atlas #2 can be found at the Comics Bulletin.

Comic Review: Shrapnel #3

2009-03-02T17:48:00.004-05:00

You can find my latest comic review here at Comics Bulletin for Shrapnel #3.

I'm Not Having Fun Anymore: Difficulty and Accessibility in Modern Games

2009-02-25T20:53:00.005-05:00

I Kind of Sort of Hate This Game That I Like...

I complained recently about my difficulty playing SF4 - the control issues and the learning curve caused me to perhaps whine like a little girl with a skinned knee. I've put in a few more hours with the game and finally beaten it once (with Ken, on Very Easy, thanks for asking).

The arduous process of climbing the ladder and beating Seth brought me back to the hateful experience of being so incredibly bad at a game that you don't want to play it any longer.

The Sirlin article I linked to yesterday has opened up conversations about difficulty in the game and how accessible it is to the casual player. I'm by no means a casual player, but I'm also not one of the core Street Fighter devotees. Was this game made for me? More importantly, how can game developers ensure that their game is accessible for a wide audience while still delivering the values of a hardcore experience?

Throwing the Controller

Sometimes a game is tough due to the complexity and sometimes a game is just broken. I think SF4 falls into the former category: it requires some history with both the genre and this particular franchise to make any headway. There's a great observation in the GiantBomb review about the lack of a comprehensive training mode that teaches newcomers how to play the game beyond simply teaching the moves.

As Stephen Totilo noted, there's something approximating a training mode, buried in the Challenges which teaches the players the rudiments of each character's moves. What it doesn't teach is practical strategy - the theory of playing the game. When should I block? At what point in the Shoryuken can I snatch Ken out of his move and execute a throw or an EX move? What's an EX move?

Going into the game and learning these things has been an uphill process, even on the simplest modes of the game.

Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance from a couple of years ago had a more compelling and functional training mode that had many of the practical features I'm talking about here. Each tier of the practice mode would challenge the player to match not only commands but learn blocking skills and transitions between the different forms.

Apples and Oranges and Grenades

The modern shooter seems to have gotten this, with hit titles like Gears 2 and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare including tutorial segments that are at once cohesive with the overall game experience. Both are unabashedly games for the core - the former being a shooter requiring strategic movement around the battlefield and the latter having a more frantic combat environment.

The tutorials of each game reflect this. COD4's training mode even has a speed run mode, emphasizing the main feature of the game - navigating the battlefield swiftly and eyeing target placement. Gears has a more laid-back attitude with fewer targets and an emphasis on using the environment to engage the enemy.

Fallout 3 has one of the more interesting and compelling tutorials of recent memory, couching the core mechanics in the player character's growth from infancy to young adulthood. Beyond the narrative tie-in, the game also carves out moments to highlight the given mechanic that the player needs to learn for the overall game.

However, these games are broader experiences, lacking the minute details of a fighter like SF4. There are literally thousands of variables in any given SF match - the characters being used, the Super and Revenge bars, range and hit detection. How can anyone coming into this franchise fresh come to grips with the mechanics of the game?

The Arcade mode could potentially fill this need but the difficulty curve is very steep with characters laying the smack down on even the lowest levels. Learning your character's move priority becomes a frustrating, hateful chore, making the gamer (at least this one) wonder if the game is even worth learning.

This Game Hates You

SF4 puts me in the mind of Ninja Gaiden 2, a game which combined bruising difficulty with little to no tutorial.

The hack and slashfest is geared towards the core and actually revels in this (check the Achievements of the game - they all speak to the alpha players in the audience). The punishing difficulty of the game and the twitch experience it presents are for a certain segment of the audience who seeks out a level of frustration in their gameplay.

This is very present in SF4 - there's actually a "tax" (as described by Sirlin) to open up all of the characters in the game. Only by overcoming some ridiculous in-game hurdles can players open up the full gameplay experience. Locking characters behind such prohibitive barriers is not conducive to accessibility - it's telling the audience that the game, in actuality, is for the core.

The Last Thing I'll Say About SF4 for A While

I'm going to stick with the game - as I've said before there are things I do like about it. But I don't think I'll ever really gain any sort of profiency with it as I have some of the other titles mentioned above.

Which is a shame, because I really had high hopes for causing some trouble online.

Jesus Hates Zombies on Comics Bulletin

2009-02-25T20:51:00.003-05:00

My latest review is up on Comics Bulletin for Jesus Hates Zombies, Lincoln Hates Werewolves (Vol. 2).

In the Meantime...

2009-02-24T10:24:00.004-05:00

I'll be discussing training, tutorials, and the accessibility of games like Street Fighter 4 a little later this afternoon. Until then, chew on this highly technical article from Sirlin.net about balance, difficulty, and control issues in SF4.

Not A Game Review - Street Fighter 4 (Xbox 360)

2009-02-23T18:32:00.006-05:00

What's the deal?

The latest entry in the long-running Street Fighter series is great, except for the part about being able to play it out of the box.

What are you bitching about now?

If you're familiar with fighting games, you'll know that a certain level of precision is needed to execute moves - at times in split-second increments. These moves require semi-precise manipulation of an analog joystick or standard D-pad.

Using this...

... means precision ain't happening. So this means I have to buy a special edition controller to play the game.

Ah, you bitch and you bitch. Buy the new controller already!

Well, I would, but unfortunately it appears to be out of stock just about everywhere right now or going for prison rape painful prices on eBay.

Well how is the game, at least?

I honestly don't feel comfortable giving an assessment of the game at this point - not without being able to play it the way it was meant to be played. A part of me (the consumer with no money) feels that the game should have been designed with the limitations of the existing hardware in mind.

Alternately, I feel that would have done a disservice to the existing market for the game - people who've been playing Street Fighter in some form or other for the last 20 years.

Further hampering an honest assessment of the game is the fact that I, more of a Tekken man, am kind of crap at the Street Fighter games. I'm suffering from the anxiety Stephen Totilo at the MTV Multiplayer blog discussed recently prior to the release of the game. That is to say - how can you judge a game which, all things being equal you would not be good at anyway?

Fighting games are kind of a closed system.

Yeah.

On Gamasutra, Nayan Ramachandran makes some excellent, but brief observations about the accessibility of a game like SF4 for the new player. He even expresses concern that it might be considered too accessible by the hardcore.

I'm not sure it is - I think playing this game (crappy controller notwithstanding) requires a certain rewiring, especially if someone (like your esteemed writer) has trained the old thumbs and neurotransmitters for 3-D fighters over the last decade and a half. The loss of the Z axis in gameplay feels weird... wrong somehow.

And yet here I am trolling the internet for a $40 controller to use with the $60 game I just bought. This means that (barring some kind of cognitive dissonance I'm willfully ignoring) I must like some aspect of the game.

It IS a gorgeous game, and when by chance I'm able to execute one of the many complex moves there's great positive feedback both visual and mechanical.

Still... I wish I'd waited until I could buy the controller.

Tomorrow, I'll talk a little more about the training mode (or lack thereof) and the steep difficulty curve in this game.

She's Got Jokes (And Other Things Online)

2009-02-20T09:55:00.004-05:00

Go Read Some Funny Stuff

Check out my friend Dani's Tumbleblog, the Monologamist. She makes good comedy and is a freelance joke writer for SNL.

New Trailer For the Incredibly Racist (And Sexy) RE:5

Resident Evil 'New World' trailer HD

1. I mean, I guess. If I want to be really sensitive about it at this time of morning. Wesker kind of looks like a Nazi, I suppose.

2. Something seems kind of, I guess, flat about the music in the trailer. It has that generic action movie sound which doesn't really fit with the series.

3. Note the scaled-back amount of zombie content in lieu of showing some of the story (as it were).

4. FYI, I bet it's Jill Valentine under the sheet at the end.

This Is The Most I've Ever Read About Sabrina the Teenage Witch

At his Super Blog, Chris Sims writes a LOT about the end of the magafied Sabrina the Teenage Witch.

Monster in Your Comics Bulletin

2009-02-20T09:22:00.002-05:00

My review of the Umbrella Academy: Dallas #3 is up on the Comics Bulletin page.

For Further Consideration...

2009-02-18T16:50:00.002-05:00

Tycho at Penny Arcade has weighed in with his first thoughts on RE:5. Again, I'd like to play the game myself and don't see myself getting riled up as I would given say, discussing the work of Ed Zwick.

Still, it's food for thought.

The Pedantic Gamer

2009-02-17T08:26:00.004-05:00

The Ostrich

I came across this badly-written and reactionary article this morning from a gamer concerned about "Paranoia Over Racism and Sexism in Video Games." The article points out recent, well, Paranoia Over Racism and Sexism in Video Games referencing potential tempests in teapots that are Resident Evil 5, X-blades, Gears of War, and Duke Nukem.

Author "daimyo" attempts to contextualize the content of the games, trotting out the oft-used argument that a white dude blasting black zombies in Africa is just as appropriate as another white dude shooting Caucasian zombies in Eastern Europe*. Similarly, he argues that recasting musclebound, cigar chomping Duke Nukem or the members of Delta Squad would be unrealistic and that these characters are themselves, in fact, a form of stereotyping ignored by the mass media (the tough-talking alpha male).

In wrapping up his (her?) article the author rejects the spectre of government censorship of politically incorrect imagery and it's at this point that I call complete and total bullshit on this guy (or girl) and anyone else out there who continues their "leave our precious games alone" stance.

Save Our Games From the Prejudiced Media! (S.O.G.F.P.M.!)

The "is it racist or not" argument about Resident Evil 5 has been the most incendiary rallying call for gamers in recent months, replacing Roger Ebert vs. Games as Art which threatened to consume the Internet for much of 2007. Both dust ups were actually interrelated, in that each question the legitimacy of video games and their place alongside other respectable media.

Gamers, developers, bloggers, and critics are quick to step into the fray with opinions, advice, and insults in defense of or against the industry as a whole. In general, however, it becomes a circling the wagons mentality as we lifelong fans, we hobbyist feel caught in the cross hairs of outside media forces looking for a quick, slanted story.

There's the sense in some quarters that most external criticism of the gaming industry lacks context or is itself the product of some reactionary thinker looking to censor free thought - an army of mini-Jack Thompsons out there looking to dim the green lights on our consoles. And in some cases, my fellow gamers, game critics, writers, and bloggers are right - the "gaming panic" that has sort of peaked and ebbed throughout the major news outlets since the release of the first Mortal Kombat pervades to this day.

We want games to be taken seriously, to be respected and lauded and even have their own big, stupid ratings-deprived Oscars for our favorite games.

But when it comes to real cultural critiques of the work some folks get kind of squeamish.

Seriously, "Sexbox?"

If an artist uses an image of a crucifix immersed in his own urine, he's courting controversy and challenging preconceptions about the sacred nature of icons. If a filmmaker depicts the acrimony of black and white relations in the South during the 60's he's aiming for cultural reflection. So what does it mean when the Cole Train does a braggadocio-loaded shuck and jive for the Locusts in "Gears 2?"** What does that reflect about the game, about the character, and about us as consumers of the work?

Full disclosure: the single player campaign was one of the more enjoyable gaming experiences for me from the last year, and I'll be writing about it at length at a future date. But I also hold it on the same level as I would The Rock (loved it) or Katy Perry's I Kissed a Girl (if I could punch a song in its face...) - each is a lowest common denominator cultural artifact that reflect our desire for that which is harder, better, faster, and sexier (apologies to Daft Punk). They also reflect only the surface of what each medium is able to accomplish.

Never Do a Google Image Search of "Mass Effect + Sex"

It's understandable then when major news outlets seize on the player's ability to get a little hot girl on girl action in Mass Effect or when they try to pin a heinous crime on a drunken teen having recently played a 15-year-old game. "Where is the merit, the art, in hard-talking space marines shooting alien species number 5? Why are they selling a sex simulating space opera to kids?! Think of the children!"

Well to the last question, they - Bioware - weren't selling anything of the sort and it was a non-issue created in the middle of a slow news cycle by a cynical outlet. And it was cool to see people who write about games bringing a news outlet to task for not taking a deeper critical assessment of a game.

But when do we look inward? How often do we look at the games that dominate the charts or are considered high art and ask what they say about us as gamers or broader still, as members of society?

What does it mean when your white hero totes around a gun blasting away savage Africans with his "acceptably black," British-accented sidekick? Can we extrapolate anything about ourselves from the twitchy anxiety of Raz of Psychonauts (misunderstood, put-upon, daddy issues, physcially unassuming and not so great around girls)? What does it mean when a game like Little Big Planet gives players tools for user generated content andthe first thing we do is create Super Mario Brothers 1-1?

Why are we so willing to laud how games assess the external but unwilling to confront how the game may reflect something negative about ourselves as gamers?

Is RE:5 racist? I don't know. I haven't played anything beyond the demo. I'm black and I wasn't particularly offended by the imagery in the couple of minutes of gameplay I experienced.

And I call bullshit on anyone on either side of the aisle who says it is or isn't without having played the whole thing. But the question is fair to ask given the materials Capcom has put out there - it's fair to ask and to keep asking and we should be debating this (constructively) when the game is released.

Because I believe games are an art form, I believe they are legitimate, and I believe that we have an affect on and are affected by them.

*Wasn't Re:4 set in Spain, or at least a fairly rustic stand-in?

It Only Took a Month...

2008-12-05T16:44:00.006-05:00

... But I'm back. And hitched!

Regular (or semi-regular) posting should resume this month. In spite of the holidays. Until then, enjoy these little nuggets of info:

I'm Sorry Mr. Lethem, But I Don't Much Care For Your Work:

After being duly impressed by Jonathan Lethem's take on Omega the Unknown, I thought I'd give his prose a try. Couldn't really get into it.

Fortress of Solitude had an interesting start about life in Brooklyn in the 70's and 80's, despite being a little worn out by hard-luck obsessive nerds thanks to The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. But then the second half of the novel kicked in. The lead character became more unlikeable alongside prose that spelled out what he was feeling and to some extent how we should feel about him.

In my infinite wisdom, I thought I'd give him another shot - perhaps his book Girl In Landscape, described on the back cover as a surreal sci fi Western. Imagine the flaws noted above imposed upon a teenage girl's journey of self-discovery.

Moving on.

How Can We Miss You Batman, If You Never Go Away?

Last week DC dropped issue Batman#681, the final chapter of Grant Morrison's "Batman R.I.P." storyline. Newsarama, CBR, and other sites have reported that all of the Bat-family of titles will be axed in the coming months, presumably to be relaunched with shiny new number 1's.

What's bothering me is the oddity of releasing another Morrison-penned issue of Batman featuring Batman immediately after said character's presumed death a week before. It's not that I expect Batman to stay dead or anything - I'd just like to get to the epilogue (which #682 doesn't really feel like, so much as another interesting story that should have occurred in the middle of Morrison's run).

Still thought the issue was pretty neat, though, with all of the alternate takes on Batman had something else come through the window that fateful night besides a lost and confused bat.

I'd like to do a post sometime about Morrison and his fascination with branding, legacy, and the pervasiveness of pop.

Spoil Your Awful Third Act On the Cover, Why Don't You?

All things considered, I did want to give this movie a chance. But man, what a dumb twist that undid a pretty compelling and effective beginning.

Also, Will Smith should play more bastards.

Thoughts on a Couple of Things

2008-10-30T09:14:00.006-04:00

Seeing as Halloween is coming up this week, I wanted to post my thoughts on Let the Right One In. I want to share in the enthusiasm everyone else seems to have for the movie, and I think I might on second viewing. The leads were incredibly compelling, the film was impeccably shot, and it had a vein of pitch-black humor to it that I loved. Here's the problem: I saw it at NY's Two Boots Pioneer Theater during a free screening. Free screenings are themselves fraught with the myriad perils of urban life - odd crowds that are a mix of the young, the film savvy, and the mentally ill; raucaous noise makers who act like they've never been anywhere before; and that unique combination of crampedness while still feeling like you can't see the screen. But these don't harm the viewing of a film too much - no, what hurts the experience is seeing a highly-anticipated movie with the reels arranged out of order. So yeah, I MIGHT really, really like the movie, but I don't feel comfortable jumping on the "masterpiece" bandwagon until I see it from end to end.

Is anyone besides me kind of bummed at the lack of decent horror releases for this Halloween? The Saw movies? Not my thing. Sorry. Won't even link to them, don't begrudge anyone who likes them. Let the Right One In is a subtitled limited release, and even the list of new stuff on DVD is 2 year-old J- and K-horror films or some boring gore and no guts domestic releases. Fears of the Dark had me pretty excited but I'm going to miss it this weekend with all of my running around, PLUS it's not something the majority of the country will get a chance to see. We need a horror renaissance, people.

I've been wading through the Howard the Duck Omnibus and the more I read the 1000 page brick, the closer I get to psyching myself up to write my exhaustive piece about famous ducks. Yeah, that's right, I have a famous ducks article in me. Wanna make something of it? (Seriously, I need to finish the couple of pieces about John Carpenter) So yeah, expect a bunch of stuff about anthropomorphic ducks in the near future.

You know WHY it's taking so long to finish anything? Because between getting married in 4 days and changing up my position at Longtail, something awesome comes out every week. Seriously, it's an embarrassment of riches out there.

My friend Jarreau deserves props for being one week away from a full year of Wolverine Wednesdays. Head on over to his site and check out 51 flavors of Logan.

Short review of W: Josh Brolin and Jeffrey Wright carry what is for the most part a tonally inconsistent film. It wasn't exactly bad, but perhaps the rush to evaluate an unfinished presidency hurt the film since the story is essentially not over.*

Vote. Seriously, don't assume Obama's going to win just because he's got the hype machine behind him. Elections still get stolen, the law still gets used to disenfranchise the poor and minorites.

* But I'm willing to let Fincher's Zodiac slide on the same point because it seemed to paint a clearer portrait of an era and was about the obsession and the questions if not necessarily finding the answers that all of his characters were looking for.

Triumph of the Meme

2008-10-25T18:39:00.003-04:00

Found via Hollywood-Elsewhere.

Fragment - Backtrail II

2008-10-02T20:13:00.001-04:00

Course, Captain Grant wasn’t scared of no man or mutie. But he says to me once, Tomas, I like the gentle things and I prefer them in their places of order. Mine is a dominion of stillness.

Always made an impression on me, him sayin’ that when he did – right after he shot Black Paul through the eye all them years back.

Tomas, the Captain says to me now. I want you and him – he was thumbin’ at Ruiz at the time – to go to the muties and hire out two of their best trackers. Betray no hint of what happened to the other two or the purpose to which the new ones will be tasked.

Fragment - Backtrail

2008-09-29T11:50:00.004-04:00

Me and Dodge was the ones that found Collier by the fence like he was. Could tell from the brokeneck buzzards that Collier tried to stay alive. I don’t know what to make of it – her leavin’ him alive, gut shot like she did.

Dodge was sayin’ he knew Collie from way back. Two of ‘em used to ride with the Captain and the little woman out East in the old cities, keepin’ peace in a couple of black and red carros they got from God-knows-where.

Dodge said him and the woman was close on account of bein’ alike: didn’t wanna talk much, both just lookin’ out West like they missed it.

Maybe she was doin’ him a kindness, given Collie half a chance to make it ‘til we come back. Dodge said more’n likely she knew bein’ gut shot was the worst way to go, and for a big sumbitch like Collie it’d be the longest road.

Captain Grant didn’t have nothin’ to say on this. He didn’t have nothin’ much to say ‘bout any of it when we come up the road to see the farm mostly burned up. He didn’t even pull out his rifle then, likely figurin’ that she’d have been long gone.

I seen a picture of her once and she looked just like the girl. Miranda.

Ruiz found the mutie tied up in the barn, some of her hair burned off, half babblin’ in Spanish makin’ little noises like a dog. Captain Grant didn’t say nothin’ when Ruiz said he was gonna leave the mutie tied up.

Captain Grant didn’t say much of nothin’ for a spell. Just dug the toe of his boot in the ash here and there like he was lookin’ for salvage. Ruiz kept runnin’ his mouth, like he was tryin’ to fill up the silence with somethin’. We all felt before we even saw the Captain break Ruiz’s nose. Like as not because to shut Ruiz up as to just have somethin’ to do with his hands.

Captain led a row of trucks to Jude’s place. Later, I asked Dodge how the Captain would know she’d gone through Jude, but the wiseass sumbitch just said simpatico and left it at that.

Jude was worse off than Collie if that’s possible. He was wearin’ the butcher’s apron he put on when he was sewin’ us up and that’s how we recognized it was him. Otherwise, he ain’t had no head to know him by. That young boy call himself Pierce was the one found the bloody bandages in the back part burned. At this, the Captain got more philosophical, and so his mood got blacker.

We all of us kept quiet when we found the savages Jude and the Captain paid to keep watch on the border. Two savages and only one spear left between ‘em. It could be war with the jefe what hired these boys out to Jude on account of getting’ ‘em back without one of them holy spears. More likely as not, there’d be some real oro changing hands to make this right.

On John Carpenter (Part the First)

2008-09-24T13:34:00.004-04:00

Recently, I sat down to watch Neill Marshall's Doomsday, a clear homage to John Carpenter's Escape From New York. It's all there: a steely, black-clad, one-eyed protagonist traversing into a hostile, isolated area hoping to stave off Armageddon while fending with an authority figure who's kind of a prick.

While I've been enamored of Marshall's Dog Soldiers and The Descent, I think he was wrong for this material. His strengths lie in subtly communicating character and interpersonal within the context of genre films.* In attempting to ape Carpenter, Mr. Marshall may have missed the point: Carpenter rarely has a use for fleshed-out characters and instead tends to rely on broad archetypes to keep the story moving.

Carpenter and Character

Snake Plissken. Man of few words and not a whole lot of backstory. Dude even has a tattoo of a Snake on his belly (which came first - the name or the tattoo?). Most importantly, at least for Carpenter's purposes - he comes through the story pretty much unchanged. The same with Jack Burton, or Rowdy Roddy Piper in They Live, or any member of the weird gynarchy in Ghosts of Mars.** Not a single one of them changes or evovles through the course of the story - they're all rocks flung through the variety of circumstances that Carpenter has constructed.

What Carpenter was able to do in many of those cases - in defiance of most of the rules of narrative - is make this work for his stories. Jack Burton is cool and interesting and we want to see him succeed because he's pretty glib in the face of danger. Snake just doesn't give a damn and wants to get the job done despite all the complications and conflicting loyalties. And you know what Rowdy's here to do after all the bubblegum runs out.

Carpenter's strength is taking uncomplicated, tough characters and throwing them into outsized situations. Snake just wants to go free, Jack just wants to get his truck back, and Rowdy wants a job. I would argue that as soon as Carpenter started complicating his characters with backstory and motivations it began to hurt his work (James Woods' woman-hatin'-vampire-killin'-Vatican-raised the lead in Vampires being the most egregious example).

I feel like Carpenter has been able to get a bit closer to his roots with his fairly recent stint on Masters of Horror: Cigarette Burns.*** The story was direct and the hero did have an element of back story with a dead girlfriend, but really the story was about a fairly weaselly, resourceful guy trying to find a rare film print in spite of psychotic collectors and creepy German cineastes.

(Yeah. I came down on the side of Norm Reedus - Scud from Blade II. I'm as surprised as anyone else)

Climbing back to the original idea and away from the realm of pay cable, I lay part of the effectiveness of using simple archetypes in Carpenter's casting: Kurt Russell, Rowdy Roddy Piper, David Keith... Kurt Russell some more. Carpenter has cast based on the ability for a lead to alternately look like they don't give a damn but could totally, seriously mess you up if given half a reason.

In the next installment, I'd like to explore Carpenter's use and subversion of genre - particularly with regards to Big Trouble in Little China.

*See the underlying tension between Juno and Sarah - Marshall expertly sets up the tension between these two characters at the start of the movie and lets inform Sarah's choice about Juno's fate at the end of the film.

** Laurie Strode of Halloween, Sam Neill's character from In the Mouth of Madness and the Jeff Bridges as the titular Starman are all exceptions to the rule which I hope to discuss later. But Michael Meyers is totally an archetype.

*** I still haven't checked out his other entry from the series, Pro-life, so my premise could be faulty.

Considered, Not Spoken in Anger...

2008-09-23T13:56:00.000-04:00

Me: "Counting Crows is the type of band that, if heard on my car stereo, would cause me to pull over, get out of my car, and wait for the song to end - because I can't be near any radio that's playing that shit."

This Ain't No Fight to the Hurt...

2008-09-22T21:29:00.006-04:00

UPDATE: So, several friends have told me that the change from color to b&w was primarily a ratings consideration. This is based on their purchase and viewing of the R2 version of the film which has the entire sequence in glorious color.

So yet again import DVDs have proven my nemeses.

Well played, R2 DVDs.... Well played.

Thinking I'm well-versed in film, many callbacks from Kill Bill that nonetheless passed me right on by was the transition from full color to monochrome in the House of Blue Leaves sequence.

I recall it being reported at the time that the shift was done in to tone down the violence for the censors. More likely, this "concession" was actually a reference* to Men of the Monastery (Shao Lin Zi Di -- 1974), which also makes the shift from full color to monochrome when shit got real.

Most striking to me is how the filmmakers switch from black and white or sepia to red for the particularly gory moments involving the heroes. If anything, they underline the most wrenching moments. The transition also heightens the level of tension in the scene, making what was before a series of brawls, now something serious where any and everyone can get seriously messed up.**

What I respect about Tarantino's handling of the device is that he changed the tension from dramatic to comedic, using the the sequence to spotlight some of the more over-the-top violence between the two films. The violence here doesn't actually get real until it gets real, returning to the normal palette, with the Bride's victims laid out before her with limbs severed or gushing.

*I'm pretty certain this reference has been cited elsewhere by those with a more scholarly bent, but having not read their works, it's refreshing to me to meet these antecedents to work I admire on my own.

**For real, the guy at the end with the kick and the sword, and how it all goes wrong... yikes.