Fahrenheit 2012?
Going Rate: Worth matinee price
Starring: Dinesh D'Souza
Rated: PG (but could pass for G)
Red Flags: Nothing beyond what you see on TV news, so the PG rating is a mystery
I don't have an equal-time policy for movie reviews. Still, since I reviewed Fahrenheit 911 in 2004, I figured I at least owed it to myself to take on an election-year documentary with a conservative perspective.
First, let me put some transparency on the table. I consider myself an independent, mainly because I dislike both the Republican and Democratic parties. To be sure, I'm not a fan of political parties in general. As I have said before, George Washington didn't like them, didn't think they were good for America. We should've listened to him. If you had to peg me politically, I would call myself a moderate, nearly dead center, but leaning conservative. That's where PoliticalCompass.org puts me.
Despite the title, most of conservative writer Dinesh D'Souza's doc devotes itself to an examination of President Obama's beliefs and what formed them. Less than 10 percent of the film is devoted to predictions. D'Souza narrates the movie not as a raving partisan or GOP mouthpiece but as somebody who wants to understand how Barack Obama thinks. His thesis: Obama's ideology comes from his dislike of colonialism, having grown up in Kenya, which threw off British rule, and Hawaii, where some still resent annexation by the United States.
D'Souza journeys -- literally -- through Obama's upbringing and family, traveling around the world to talk to people who knew him, even borrowing the president's own voice from the audiobook version of Dreams From My Father. It's methodical and heartfelt as D'Souza explores the foundations of the president's leanings. D'Souza doesn't stage Michael Moore-style joke sequences. If anything, the doc plays like a political travelogue, where you're walking with D'Souza as he pursues his gnawing curiosities as a conservative intellectual.
Smartly, it doesn't bite on hot-button issues we've heard too much about. The picture quietly dismisses questions about Obama's birth country. It mentions mentors Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright, but comes at them from a different perspective. And D'Souza steers clear of divisive ideological foghorns, choosing to interview comparatively quiet conservative intellectuals.
Making a movie like this is challenging from a illustrative perspective. When not taking us to lands far and away, one can only license or borrow so much news footage, show so many shots of Washington, and splice in so many soundbites. D'Souza and co-director John Sullivan make the interesting choice to stage or re-create a few visuals. That's not something we're allowed to do in the news business, but it's not off-limits in documentaries, and the way it's done is mostly tame.
2016 may change a few minds at the ballot box. It may also change a few minds about conservatives in general. As I write this, the picture is doing much better than expected at the box office for a documentary, especially one with no star power behind it. Perhaps it's because it doesn't preach or pound the table. Given the waves of negative ads we're seeing in this presidential campaign, that's refreshing for a lot of people.
Saturday, August 25, 2012
Saturday, August 11, 2012
Reel To Reel: The Bourne Legacy
Somebody get this man a compounding pharmacy!
Going Rate: Worth matinee price
Starring: Jeremy Renner, Rachel Weisz, Edward Norton, Stacy Keach
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Action violence, language
Universal Pictures thinks there's enough in the tank for a fourth Bourne picture, with or without Matt Damon. It's certainly doable, given the infrastructure created by Robert Ludlum's books. But a Bourne movie without Bourne like a James Bond film without James Bond, or George Lazemby as 007, and we saw how that turned out.
No matter. It turns out the super-secret assassin operation known as Treadstone has churned out several dark operatives, including Aaron Cross (Renner). When we meet him, he's in survival training and on some sort of meds -- this combination of green and blue pills he calls "chems," which do something to enhance his skills. We're never sure what. He's no Jason Bourne, but he's getting there. What he does to a wolf will remind you of what it's like to give a dog heartworm medication.
Halfway around the world, the spook bosses are nervous and cloistered in dimly-lit rooms because they're losing institutional control. People on the outside are talking -- and they can read it in their wiretaps -- about Bourne and Treadstone and all these things that probably aren't legal, much less Constitutional. They decide to shut things down, which in super-spook parlance means killing a lot of people, including Cross.
Out in the snowy abyss, Cross is running low on pills-- excuse me, chems. It turns out they come from this government pharmacological enterprise where one scientist doesn't know what the other is doing. Every so often, Dr. Marta Shearing (Weisz) draws blood work on spooks, presumably to examine the effects of said chems. She's unaware of how deep she's in the swamp until an outburst of violence at the lab ultimately leads Cross her way. His bosses are running him down, and he's still looking for pills.
All through the film, we see ghosts of Bourne. He's mentioned here, he's there, they're talking about him on MSNBC. It's almost as if the film wished it had Matt Damon again.
The Bourne Legacy left me scratching my head at how a group of intelligence chiefs could have so much information and yet be so clueless. I kept wondering when somebody in the room full of monitors, computers and phones would speak up and say, "Hey, shouldn't we maybe just lay off this guy for awhile and catch him off guard?" But movie spooks don't think that way. Neither do action movies.
Going Rate: Worth matinee price
Starring: Jeremy Renner, Rachel Weisz, Edward Norton, Stacy Keach
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Action violence, language
Universal Pictures thinks there's enough in the tank for a fourth Bourne picture, with or without Matt Damon. It's certainly doable, given the infrastructure created by Robert Ludlum's books. But a Bourne movie without Bourne like a James Bond film without James Bond, or George Lazemby as 007, and we saw how that turned out.
No matter. It turns out the super-secret assassin operation known as Treadstone has churned out several dark operatives, including Aaron Cross (Renner). When we meet him, he's in survival training and on some sort of meds -- this combination of green and blue pills he calls "chems," which do something to enhance his skills. We're never sure what. He's no Jason Bourne, but he's getting there. What he does to a wolf will remind you of what it's like to give a dog heartworm medication.
Halfway around the world, the spook bosses are nervous and cloistered in dimly-lit rooms because they're losing institutional control. People on the outside are talking -- and they can read it in their wiretaps -- about Bourne and Treadstone and all these things that probably aren't legal, much less Constitutional. They decide to shut things down, which in super-spook parlance means killing a lot of people, including Cross.
Out in the snowy abyss, Cross is running low on pills-- excuse me, chems. It turns out they come from this government pharmacological enterprise where one scientist doesn't know what the other is doing. Every so often, Dr. Marta Shearing (Weisz) draws blood work on spooks, presumably to examine the effects of said chems. She's unaware of how deep she's in the swamp until an outburst of violence at the lab ultimately leads Cross her way. His bosses are running him down, and he's still looking for pills.
All through the film, we see ghosts of Bourne. He's mentioned here, he's there, they're talking about him on MSNBC. It's almost as if the film wished it had Matt Damon again.
The Bourne Legacy left me scratching my head at how a group of intelligence chiefs could have so much information and yet be so clueless. I kept wondering when somebody in the room full of monitors, computers and phones would speak up and say, "Hey, shouldn't we maybe just lay off this guy for awhile and catch him off guard?" But movie spooks don't think that way. Neither do action movies.
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Reel To Reel: The Dark Knight Rises
If this is the 99 percent, I'd rather be in the minority.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission
Starring: Christian Bale, Gary Oldman, Tom Hardy, Anne Hathaway, Marion Cotillard, Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Matthew Modine
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Action violence
I wonder what would happen if the French Revolution broke out in 2012 New York City, perhaps if Occupy Wall Street acquired some super-criminal who trapped the cops and built a nuke and threw everybody in Manhattan making above five figures into the street. I think it would look at lot like The Dark Knight Rises, the satisfying end to Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy. If not for the opening-night massacre in Colorado, we'd be talking about how this film is anti-Occupy and right-wing friendly. That's even despite the best efforts of a certain radio talk show host to draw a connection between the arch-villain and one of Mitt Romney's old jobs, somehow inferring the left will use it to their advantage. Enough, already.
Batman is in bat-retirement as the threequel opens, blamed for the death of beloved DA Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight. Bruce Wayne (Bale) is living more like Howard Hughes. He's secluded in his stately manor outside Gotham, which still looks a lot like Chicago. Dent's legacy is anti-racketeering laws which have cleaned up the city and left the police, I presume, with little more to do than chase the routine thugs, murderers and thieves. They don't need a superhero anymore, especially not "The Batman."
However, nobody's been checking the sewers, where a criminal mastermind named Bane (Hardy) is building an army out of various low-paid cretins, who may or may not be construction workers. Bane is what you get when you cross Darth Vader with Hannibal Lecter: a highly-educated, highly-sophisticated maniac with a voice that should be advertising Bose speaker systems. He's got a scientist in his pocket and a plan to use Gotham as a lab for a class war that really is a war. He's also got a girl: Selina (Hathaway), aka Catwoman, who's making a living robbing the rich like Wayne and forgiving herself under the guise, "A girl's gotta eat."
Wayne catches Selina stealing his mother's necklace, but he sees it's a ruse for something much bigger. So does Commissioner Gordon, hospitalized by an injury in the line of duty, who's carrying the weight of the truth about what happened between Batman and Dent but afraid to tell because bigger things are at stake. He knows he needs Batman, but can Gotham's Finest handle the truth? As Wayne mulls whether to put the dark suit back on, he's prodded this way and that by his two stalwarts: genius inventor Lucius Fox (Freeman) and faithful servant Alfred (Caine, in an emotional performance). We also see a prototypical Good Cop, Foley (Modine), someone who isn't afraid of a guy in a bat-suit.
It turns out Batman and Bane are cut from the same cloth as superheroes go. What's fascinating is that they lack any super-powers. Bane needs a mask to breathe. Wayne can barely stand without a cane. Much of the movie involves his physical rehabilitation after Bane leaves him to suffer in a middle eastern prison.
And oh man, what toys they have. The Bat-cycle returns along with an aerial assault vehicle that makes Blue Thunder look like Those Daring Young Men In Their Flying Machines. Bane's got a fusion nuclear device and a whole lot of explosives which allow him to blow up the stock market, put Gotham under siege during a football game, and unleash his version of the 99 percent to wreak havoc upon the upper class. Who needs a guillotine when you can force those unrepentant filthy rich to go walk across thin ice and watch them fall in? They've probably heard that old Mel Brooks joke, "Comedy is when you walk into an open sewer and die!"
Most of the action in The Dark Knight Rises is cerebral, playing upon nuances and hints to let our brains fill in details while the film charges ahead. But director Christopher Nolan goes all-in for the finish, building mass heroism on top of nightmarish terrorism. My takeaway from this film, however, is a warning about populist movements and class struggles, and how they can be used by corrupt forces looking to amass power. I don't think Occupy Wall Street would line up behind Bane, but sometimes, I'm not so sure.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission
Starring: Christian Bale, Gary Oldman, Tom Hardy, Anne Hathaway, Marion Cotillard, Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Matthew Modine
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Action violence
I wonder what would happen if the French Revolution broke out in 2012 New York City, perhaps if Occupy Wall Street acquired some super-criminal who trapped the cops and built a nuke and threw everybody in Manhattan making above five figures into the street. I think it would look at lot like The Dark Knight Rises, the satisfying end to Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy. If not for the opening-night massacre in Colorado, we'd be talking about how this film is anti-Occupy and right-wing friendly. That's even despite the best efforts of a certain radio talk show host to draw a connection between the arch-villain and one of Mitt Romney's old jobs, somehow inferring the left will use it to their advantage. Enough, already.
Batman is in bat-retirement as the threequel opens, blamed for the death of beloved DA Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight. Bruce Wayne (Bale) is living more like Howard Hughes. He's secluded in his stately manor outside Gotham, which still looks a lot like Chicago. Dent's legacy is anti-racketeering laws which have cleaned up the city and left the police, I presume, with little more to do than chase the routine thugs, murderers and thieves. They don't need a superhero anymore, especially not "The Batman."
However, nobody's been checking the sewers, where a criminal mastermind named Bane (Hardy) is building an army out of various low-paid cretins, who may or may not be construction workers. Bane is what you get when you cross Darth Vader with Hannibal Lecter: a highly-educated, highly-sophisticated maniac with a voice that should be advertising Bose speaker systems. He's got a scientist in his pocket and a plan to use Gotham as a lab for a class war that really is a war. He's also got a girl: Selina (Hathaway), aka Catwoman, who's making a living robbing the rich like Wayne and forgiving herself under the guise, "A girl's gotta eat."
Wayne catches Selina stealing his mother's necklace, but he sees it's a ruse for something much bigger. So does Commissioner Gordon, hospitalized by an injury in the line of duty, who's carrying the weight of the truth about what happened between Batman and Dent but afraid to tell because bigger things are at stake. He knows he needs Batman, but can Gotham's Finest handle the truth? As Wayne mulls whether to put the dark suit back on, he's prodded this way and that by his two stalwarts: genius inventor Lucius Fox (Freeman) and faithful servant Alfred (Caine, in an emotional performance). We also see a prototypical Good Cop, Foley (Modine), someone who isn't afraid of a guy in a bat-suit.
It turns out Batman and Bane are cut from the same cloth as superheroes go. What's fascinating is that they lack any super-powers. Bane needs a mask to breathe. Wayne can barely stand without a cane. Much of the movie involves his physical rehabilitation after Bane leaves him to suffer in a middle eastern prison.
And oh man, what toys they have. The Bat-cycle returns along with an aerial assault vehicle that makes Blue Thunder look like Those Daring Young Men In Their Flying Machines. Bane's got a fusion nuclear device and a whole lot of explosives which allow him to blow up the stock market, put Gotham under siege during a football game, and unleash his version of the 99 percent to wreak havoc upon the upper class. Who needs a guillotine when you can force those unrepentant filthy rich to go walk across thin ice and watch them fall in? They've probably heard that old Mel Brooks joke, "Comedy is when you walk into an open sewer and die!"
Most of the action in The Dark Knight Rises is cerebral, playing upon nuances and hints to let our brains fill in details while the film charges ahead. But director Christopher Nolan goes all-in for the finish, building mass heroism on top of nightmarish terrorism. My takeaway from this film, however, is a warning about populist movements and class struggles, and how they can be used by corrupt forces looking to amass power. I don't think Occupy Wall Street would line up behind Bane, but sometimes, I'm not so sure.
Monday, July 9, 2012
Reel To Reel: The Amazing Spider Man
Caught in a web of growing up.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission
Starring: Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Rhys Ifans, Denis Leary, Martin Sheen, Sally Field
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Action violence
Einstein said insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. He wasn't talking about Hollywood reboots, but I figured it odd when Columbia Pictures opted to restart the Spider-Man franchise when plans for Spider-Man 4 fell through. Only this time, instead of a straight comic-book actioner, we get a superhero coming-of-age film that seems to borrow from the Twilight and Harry Potter flicks.
The new Spider-Man is rebellious and conflicted, but it's also focused. It reworks or abandons key parts of the story we already know. Peter Parker/Spidey (Garfield) still takes pictures, but he's not gigging for the "Daily Bugle." Mary Jane is out of the picture, replaced with Gwen Stacy (Stone). The Green Goblin has been rejiggered into another green baddie. Fortunately, it leaves one ingredient alone: Parker's status as a nerd shutterbug who can't get a girl.
We get to see more of what happened before Parker became the webbed one. The film starts with a desperate hand-off of the young boy to his Aunt May (Field) and Uncle Ben (Sheen). Fast forward to Parker's teenage years, where he's bullied for standing up to the school bully Flash (Chris Zylka) and mentored by his uncle. The opening 15 minutes reminded me a lot of the original Superman, when a teenage Clark Kent was struggling with an identity crisis and a family he didn't really know.
Parker learns his father was involved in some kind of cross-species genetic testing, which prods him to sneak into Dad's old laboratory. It's located inside Oscorp, a multinational behemoth that makes, well, a lot of stuff and has a really cool building to show for it in Manhattan. While poking around inside Oscorp, Parker gets a little too close to some genetically-diddled spiders, and you probably know the rest.
We see several great sequences of Parker learning to cope with his Spidey superpowers, although he is not pushed towards the red spandex look we're familiar with until his beloved Uncle Ben falls victim to a punk armed robber. At the same time, he's trying to help finish the work his father began, befriending Dad's old lab partner, Dr. Curt Connors (Ifans), who is about to embark on a disastrous experiment. And yes, he's going after Gwen in an awkward way.
If Tobey Maguire was a vulnerable, innocent Peter Parker, Garfield is more James Dean than Peter Parker. At times, The Amazing Spider-Man seems like it belongs on the CW's primetime schedule than on the big screen. It's heavy on teen love, angst and romance, so much so that it rushes other plot points, notably Parker's life-changing encounter with the spider. A final showdown contains a plot device that looks like it got there because the writers -- including Spider-Man veteran Alvin Sargent and Harry Potter scribe Steve Kloves -- couldn't think up anything better.
When Warner Bros. rebooted the Batman series, it took on new maturity and depth. The new Spider-Man doesn't rise to that level, but it's at least willing to try to evolve beyond a run-of-the-mill comic-book movie.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission
Starring: Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Rhys Ifans, Denis Leary, Martin Sheen, Sally Field
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Action violence
Einstein said insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. He wasn't talking about Hollywood reboots, but I figured it odd when Columbia Pictures opted to restart the Spider-Man franchise when plans for Spider-Man 4 fell through. Only this time, instead of a straight comic-book actioner, we get a superhero coming-of-age film that seems to borrow from the Twilight and Harry Potter flicks.
The new Spider-Man is rebellious and conflicted, but it's also focused. It reworks or abandons key parts of the story we already know. Peter Parker/Spidey (Garfield) still takes pictures, but he's not gigging for the "Daily Bugle." Mary Jane is out of the picture, replaced with Gwen Stacy (Stone). The Green Goblin has been rejiggered into another green baddie. Fortunately, it leaves one ingredient alone: Parker's status as a nerd shutterbug who can't get a girl.
We get to see more of what happened before Parker became the webbed one. The film starts with a desperate hand-off of the young boy to his Aunt May (Field) and Uncle Ben (Sheen). Fast forward to Parker's teenage years, where he's bullied for standing up to the school bully Flash (Chris Zylka) and mentored by his uncle. The opening 15 minutes reminded me a lot of the original Superman, when a teenage Clark Kent was struggling with an identity crisis and a family he didn't really know.
Parker learns his father was involved in some kind of cross-species genetic testing, which prods him to sneak into Dad's old laboratory. It's located inside Oscorp, a multinational behemoth that makes, well, a lot of stuff and has a really cool building to show for it in Manhattan. While poking around inside Oscorp, Parker gets a little too close to some genetically-diddled spiders, and you probably know the rest.
We see several great sequences of Parker learning to cope with his Spidey superpowers, although he is not pushed towards the red spandex look we're familiar with until his beloved Uncle Ben falls victim to a punk armed robber. At the same time, he's trying to help finish the work his father began, befriending Dad's old lab partner, Dr. Curt Connors (Ifans), who is about to embark on a disastrous experiment. And yes, he's going after Gwen in an awkward way.
If Tobey Maguire was a vulnerable, innocent Peter Parker, Garfield is more James Dean than Peter Parker. At times, The Amazing Spider-Man seems like it belongs on the CW's primetime schedule than on the big screen. It's heavy on teen love, angst and romance, so much so that it rushes other plot points, notably Parker's life-changing encounter with the spider. A final showdown contains a plot device that looks like it got there because the writers -- including Spider-Man veteran Alvin Sargent and Harry Potter scribe Steve Kloves -- couldn't think up anything better.
When Warner Bros. rebooted the Batman series, it took on new maturity and depth. The new Spider-Man doesn't rise to that level, but it's at least willing to try to evolve beyond a run-of-the-mill comic-book movie.
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Reel To Reel: Brave
A brave heart demands freedom!
Going Rate: Worth full price admission
Starring: Voices of Kelly Macdonald, Emma Thompson, Billy Connolly, Kevin McKidd, Robbie Coltrane
Rated: PG (too intense for the wee ones)
Red Flags: A few brief bare unkilted bums, some scary scenes
Some full disclosure: I love wearing kilts. I love Scottish culture, primarily the dancing. So now you know that I am going into Brave with warm predispositions. But lose the plaids and the Highland airs, and Brave is fairy tale mashed up with a teen angst flick. It works because it's colorful and heartfelt, not because it breaks any new ground. Some people demand Pixar be smarter than competing CGI animation studios; I'm not one of them.
Princess Merida (Macdonald) would rather be a tomboy in flaming red locks than a heir to the throne. While her mother Queen Elinor (Thompson) hectors and natters her on how a proper princess should behave, she longs to dart out into the glens and bullseye targets with her bow and arrow. Her father Fergus (Connolly) is an oaf who rests on the laurels of his showdown with the bear that took part of his leg. Even though he gave Merida her first bow, he's not much of a presence in her life. Her three kid brothers are too busy stealing desserts.
Queen Elinor is micromanaging her daughter's betrothal, as is tradition, to the first-born from one of three bickering clans, led by Lord MacGuffin (McKidd), Lord Dingwall (Coltrane), and Lord Macintosh (Ferguson). I'll wager you that last clan was named in honor of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, who bought Pixar from founder George Lucas and receives a dedication at the end. None of the three suitors is particularly dashing, but you know kids these days.
Merida, realizing she is also first-born of her clan, decides to upend everything by becoming one of the competitors in an archery competition for her hand. She's a great shot but a lousy diplomat. Queen Mum is incensed, and Merida wants to just get away from it all. Escaping into the woods once more, she comes across a witch (Walters) who offers her a spell to change Mum's disposition, but it comes with a huge side effect.
Brave is that kind of movie that mothers and young daughters will want to watch together. Most families don't do arranged marriages anymore, but you can substitute any number of issues that drive a wedge between mother and child: driving, dating, make-up, clothes, boyfriends, money. Then there's that familiar refrain: "Mom, you never listen to me!" I'm sure a few families will find some uncomfortable moments watching art imitate family life, but as I have seen with Fireproof and Courageous, a great movie will spur us to examine our lives outside the theater.
Another advisory for parents: the PG rating is no joke. Pixar pushes some lines with animated brief bare bottoms, but it also contains some scary scenes involving bears which are definitely not for young children. The maturity level of your kids will vary, so I am not going to give a guideline age.
Pixar overhauled its animation system for Brave, and you see it in the beauty of the Scottish Highlands. It is lovingly faithful to its Celtic roots, including many jigs and reels in the soundtrack. I am hoping Brave reignites interest in all things Scottish just as Braveheart did many years ago. All right, I'll admit it: anything that gets more men wearing kilts can't be all bad.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission
Starring: Voices of Kelly Macdonald, Emma Thompson, Billy Connolly, Kevin McKidd, Robbie Coltrane
Rated: PG (too intense for the wee ones)
Red Flags: A few brief bare unkilted bums, some scary scenes
Some full disclosure: I love wearing kilts. I love Scottish culture, primarily the dancing. So now you know that I am going into Brave with warm predispositions. But lose the plaids and the Highland airs, and Brave is fairy tale mashed up with a teen angst flick. It works because it's colorful and heartfelt, not because it breaks any new ground. Some people demand Pixar be smarter than competing CGI animation studios; I'm not one of them.
Princess Merida (Macdonald) would rather be a tomboy in flaming red locks than a heir to the throne. While her mother Queen Elinor (Thompson) hectors and natters her on how a proper princess should behave, she longs to dart out into the glens and bullseye targets with her bow and arrow. Her father Fergus (Connolly) is an oaf who rests on the laurels of his showdown with the bear that took part of his leg. Even though he gave Merida her first bow, he's not much of a presence in her life. Her three kid brothers are too busy stealing desserts.
Queen Elinor is micromanaging her daughter's betrothal, as is tradition, to the first-born from one of three bickering clans, led by Lord MacGuffin (McKidd), Lord Dingwall (Coltrane), and Lord Macintosh (Ferguson). I'll wager you that last clan was named in honor of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, who bought Pixar from founder George Lucas and receives a dedication at the end. None of the three suitors is particularly dashing, but you know kids these days.
Merida, realizing she is also first-born of her clan, decides to upend everything by becoming one of the competitors in an archery competition for her hand. She's a great shot but a lousy diplomat. Queen Mum is incensed, and Merida wants to just get away from it all. Escaping into the woods once more, she comes across a witch (Walters) who offers her a spell to change Mum's disposition, but it comes with a huge side effect.
Brave is that kind of movie that mothers and young daughters will want to watch together. Most families don't do arranged marriages anymore, but you can substitute any number of issues that drive a wedge between mother and child: driving, dating, make-up, clothes, boyfriends, money. Then there's that familiar refrain: "Mom, you never listen to me!" I'm sure a few families will find some uncomfortable moments watching art imitate family life, but as I have seen with Fireproof and Courageous, a great movie will spur us to examine our lives outside the theater.
Another advisory for parents: the PG rating is no joke. Pixar pushes some lines with animated brief bare bottoms, but it also contains some scary scenes involving bears which are definitely not for young children. The maturity level of your kids will vary, so I am not going to give a guideline age.
Pixar overhauled its animation system for Brave, and you see it in the beauty of the Scottish Highlands. It is lovingly faithful to its Celtic roots, including many jigs and reels in the soundtrack. I am hoping Brave reignites interest in all things Scottish just as Braveheart did many years ago. All right, I'll admit it: anything that gets more men wearing kilts can't be all bad.
Monday, June 11, 2012
Reel To Reel: Prometheus
In space, nobody can hear you say, "Don't go there!"
Going Rate: Worth matinee price admission in 3D
Starring: Noomi Rapace, Michael Fassbender, Charlize Theron, Idris Elba, Guy Pearce, Logan Marshall-Green
Rated: R
Red Flags: Gross aliens, gross alien violence, mild language
Prometheus is a prequel to Alien, the 1979 sci-fi classic that effectively blended horror and science fiction. But as my Queen Mother points out, knowing it's a prequel dilutes its effectiveness. Indeed, Prometheus feels like an Alien remake at times. Both films even come from the same director, Ridley Scott. So why see this movie? It's nice to see the same director remixing his own material.
The film follows a team of explorers led by Elizabeth Shaw (Rapace) and Peter Weyland (Pearce) on a journey to a distant planet to find a lifeform supposedly connected to early civilizations on Earth. There goes that theory of evolution. They wake up from a long hibernation and get down to the grunt work of exploring a desolate rock with an unbreathable atmosphere. Their commanders, more or less, are starchy corporate liason Meredith (Theron) and a souless android David (Fassbender). The Royal Father noted David reminded him of HAL 9000 in 2001: A Space Odyssey. I kept expecting David to unplug somebody's sleep chamber.
Now on a wasteland of a planet, you can expect whatever these explorers find to be up to no good. This alien race has somehow created its own sustainable atmosphere, but it has run into something that has also killed it off. None of this seems to matter much to Shaw, who's consumed with answering that basic question: "Where did we come from?" She wears a cross around her next, so I gather she knows part of the answer. But she wants to know more.
The team she leads runs into trouble as they walk deeper into an underground shaft. The alien race they find has left them warnings and clues, but are they hostile or friendly? I dunno, what do you think?
Prometheus wants to be broader than just another sci-fi action horror film where aliens eat people. Yes, they do that here. I can also tell you we see an alien come out from somebody's stomach, but at least the way it's handled here is a bit more creative. The film makes a stab at questions of faith and creation, but it doesn't spend much time on them. It also doesn't spend much time on charazterization, either, beyond Shaw, Weyland, and their two supervisors. We know Shaw's faith and tenatiousness drive her forward. Still, when ghouly aliens are killing your crew off, shouldn't your overriding desire be getting the heck off the planet?
The movie is scary and gross in the places I expected it to be, although I still had a few seat-jumping moments. "Definitely not for children," as my Queen Mother observed. It works well in 3D, with copious holographic computer display images. It would work even better if the film seemed fresher, but stale it's not.
Going Rate: Worth matinee price admission in 3D
Starring: Noomi Rapace, Michael Fassbender, Charlize Theron, Idris Elba, Guy Pearce, Logan Marshall-Green
Rated: R
Red Flags: Gross aliens, gross alien violence, mild language
Prometheus is a prequel to Alien, the 1979 sci-fi classic that effectively blended horror and science fiction. But as my Queen Mother points out, knowing it's a prequel dilutes its effectiveness. Indeed, Prometheus feels like an Alien remake at times. Both films even come from the same director, Ridley Scott. So why see this movie? It's nice to see the same director remixing his own material.
The film follows a team of explorers led by Elizabeth Shaw (Rapace) and Peter Weyland (Pearce) on a journey to a distant planet to find a lifeform supposedly connected to early civilizations on Earth. There goes that theory of evolution. They wake up from a long hibernation and get down to the grunt work of exploring a desolate rock with an unbreathable atmosphere. Their commanders, more or less, are starchy corporate liason Meredith (Theron) and a souless android David (Fassbender). The Royal Father noted David reminded him of HAL 9000 in 2001: A Space Odyssey. I kept expecting David to unplug somebody's sleep chamber.
Now on a wasteland of a planet, you can expect whatever these explorers find to be up to no good. This alien race has somehow created its own sustainable atmosphere, but it has run into something that has also killed it off. None of this seems to matter much to Shaw, who's consumed with answering that basic question: "Where did we come from?" She wears a cross around her next, so I gather she knows part of the answer. But she wants to know more.
The team she leads runs into trouble as they walk deeper into an underground shaft. The alien race they find has left them warnings and clues, but are they hostile or friendly? I dunno, what do you think?
Prometheus wants to be broader than just another sci-fi action horror film where aliens eat people. Yes, they do that here. I can also tell you we see an alien come out from somebody's stomach, but at least the way it's handled here is a bit more creative. The film makes a stab at questions of faith and creation, but it doesn't spend much time on them. It also doesn't spend much time on charazterization, either, beyond Shaw, Weyland, and their two supervisors. We know Shaw's faith and tenatiousness drive her forward. Still, when ghouly aliens are killing your crew off, shouldn't your overriding desire be getting the heck off the planet?
The movie is scary and gross in the places I expected it to be, although I still had a few seat-jumping moments. "Definitely not for children," as my Queen Mother observed. It works well in 3D, with copious holographic computer display images. It would work even better if the film seemed fresher, but stale it's not.
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Reel To Reel: For Greater Glory
Praise the LORD and pass the ammo.
Going Rate: Worth matinee price.
Starring: Andy Garcia, Eva Longoria, Peter O'Toole
Rated: R
Red Flags: Intense war violence, including multiple hangings and atrocities against children
I wonder what a director like Quentin Tarantino or Robert Rodriguez would have done with this story of Mexico's Cristero War, an uprising against institutionalized Catholic persecution that claimed more than 90,000 lives and led to a wave of immigration into the U.S. back when nobody was talking about border fences. The conflict has the elements of a neo-Spaghetti Western: bloody violence and ambiguous morality. This production, which was largely funded by the Knights of Columbus, is more of a tribute film to the Cristeros which pulls emotional strings without giving us enough emotional base.
The movie picks up the story in 1926, when Mexican president and atheist Plutarco Elías Calles (Rubén Blades) institutes several laws to curb the Catholic Church's power. The "Calles Laws," as they're called, forbid priests from wearing religious garments in public, expel foreign clergy, and close Catholic schools. We get no background on why Mexico is taking this drastic step. We're barely told of the anti-Church sentiment stemming from the 1910 Mexican Revolution. The film omits a critical point for understanding it: Church-backed counterrevolutionary Victoriano Huerta overthrew and executed President Francisco Madero after the revolution. As I have told people in my re-enacting pursuits, history is complicated.
While we're trying to figure out why Mexico's government is acting like a secular Taliban, it starts laying emotional pipe. We meet José (Mauricio Kuri), a rascally boy pushed into serving Father Christopher (O'Toole) after playing a practical joke on him. The lovable old padre thinks Joselito will make a good altar boy, if the Federales don't shut his church down and kill him first -- which they do. Non-violent resistance against the Calles Laws fails, and another revolution erupts as Catholics are drawn to war in the face of seeing clergy and parishioners harassed and killed.
Shift to Enrique Gorostieta (Garcia), a secular retired general now running a soap factory. The Cristero forces need his expertise for organization and tactics. Going back to war -- especially for the Catholic cause -- doesn't particularly interest him, but a good paycheck helps. The new jefe insists on fighting with honor. Try selling that one to bands of guerrilla banditos who don't need no stinkin' badges.
The film nearly forgets about José until it needs more dramatic pull. He runs off to join the rebels and ends up under the general's wing. This is when the film starts finding some velocity. Gorostieta gets a few victories and wins respect from a reluctant bandito leader. And somehow, he starts drawing closer to GOD. Behind the scenes, U.S.-Mexican relations get a discussion over breakfast and adult beverages as American ambassador Dwight Morrow (Bruce Greenwood) is more interested in protecting U.S. oil interests than ending a conflict he's clueless about.
For Greater Glory's problem is that it displays too many tendencies of a propaganda film: distilling the conflict down into a straight morality play. The film does devote one brief scene to a Cristero atrocity of burning innocent civilians on a train, but it also leaves out the assassination of Mexican President-elect Álvaro Obregón by a Catholic radical, who was set to become President Calles successor.
The film works when it sticks to the innocence of José and the religious epiphany of Gorostieta. It really works when its characters try to understand where GOD is in any of this. My favorite sequence shows a rebel leader -- who is also a priest -- explaining to the general why bad things happen to good people. Hollywood doesn't do well in explaining that. But this film wasn't made in Hollywood; hecho en Mexico.
Going Rate: Worth matinee price.
Starring: Andy Garcia, Eva Longoria, Peter O'Toole
Rated: R
Red Flags: Intense war violence, including multiple hangings and atrocities against children
I wonder what a director like Quentin Tarantino or Robert Rodriguez would have done with this story of Mexico's Cristero War, an uprising against institutionalized Catholic persecution that claimed more than 90,000 lives and led to a wave of immigration into the U.S. back when nobody was talking about border fences. The conflict has the elements of a neo-Spaghetti Western: bloody violence and ambiguous morality. This production, which was largely funded by the Knights of Columbus, is more of a tribute film to the Cristeros which pulls emotional strings without giving us enough emotional base.
The movie picks up the story in 1926, when Mexican president and atheist Plutarco Elías Calles (Rubén Blades) institutes several laws to curb the Catholic Church's power. The "Calles Laws," as they're called, forbid priests from wearing religious garments in public, expel foreign clergy, and close Catholic schools. We get no background on why Mexico is taking this drastic step. We're barely told of the anti-Church sentiment stemming from the 1910 Mexican Revolution. The film omits a critical point for understanding it: Church-backed counterrevolutionary Victoriano Huerta overthrew and executed President Francisco Madero after the revolution. As I have told people in my re-enacting pursuits, history is complicated.
While we're trying to figure out why Mexico's government is acting like a secular Taliban, it starts laying emotional pipe. We meet José (Mauricio Kuri), a rascally boy pushed into serving Father Christopher (O'Toole) after playing a practical joke on him. The lovable old padre thinks Joselito will make a good altar boy, if the Federales don't shut his church down and kill him first -- which they do. Non-violent resistance against the Calles Laws fails, and another revolution erupts as Catholics are drawn to war in the face of seeing clergy and parishioners harassed and killed.
Shift to Enrique Gorostieta (Garcia), a secular retired general now running a soap factory. The Cristero forces need his expertise for organization and tactics. Going back to war -- especially for the Catholic cause -- doesn't particularly interest him, but a good paycheck helps. The new jefe insists on fighting with honor. Try selling that one to bands of guerrilla banditos who don't need no stinkin' badges.
The film nearly forgets about José until it needs more dramatic pull. He runs off to join the rebels and ends up under the general's wing. This is when the film starts finding some velocity. Gorostieta gets a few victories and wins respect from a reluctant bandito leader. And somehow, he starts drawing closer to GOD. Behind the scenes, U.S.-Mexican relations get a discussion over breakfast and adult beverages as American ambassador Dwight Morrow (Bruce Greenwood) is more interested in protecting U.S. oil interests than ending a conflict he's clueless about.
For Greater Glory's problem is that it displays too many tendencies of a propaganda film: distilling the conflict down into a straight morality play. The film does devote one brief scene to a Cristero atrocity of burning innocent civilians on a train, but it also leaves out the assassination of Mexican President-elect Álvaro Obregón by a Catholic radical, who was set to become President Calles successor.
The film works when it sticks to the innocence of José and the religious epiphany of Gorostieta. It really works when its characters try to understand where GOD is in any of this. My favorite sequence shows a rebel leader -- who is also a priest -- explaining to the general why bad things happen to good people. Hollywood doesn't do well in explaining that. But this film wasn't made in Hollywood; hecho en Mexico.
Sunday, May 27, 2012
Reel To Reel: Men In Black 3
Still hunting the original illegal aliens.
Going Rate: Worth matinee price.
Starring: Will Smith, Tommy Lee Jones, Josh Brolin, Jemaine Clement, Emma Thompson
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Creepy alien violence, mild language, one gross make-out scene
Men In Black debuted in 1997, made a forgettable sequel in 2002, and now comes back with another go in 2012. Columbia Pictures and Amblin Entertainment (Steven Spielberg is executive producer) still see life in a stale franchise. Perhaps it's time to throw the reins to a new generation of space cops.
MIB3 does that, sorta, by prequeling while sequeling. Agents K (Jones) and J (Smith) are still chasing extraterrestrial baddies and erasing memories, but now J is having to do that in two different centuries. It turns out an alien super criminal, Boris "The Animal" (Clement), has just busted out of the supermax lockup on the moon. You could call him the original Spider-Man because he releases these insect-like creatures from the palm of his hand. I'd tell you more if it didn't make me nauseous.
Boris wants to kill K, who not only locked him up but also shot off one of his arms. Worse, Boris wants to do it retroactively -- time-traveling back to 1969, when they first tangled, but offing K before the agent can cuff him. The killer finds a way to do it, and suddenly J finds his partner is reduced to a memorial bust. Worse, the "ArcNet," an Earth-protecting shield, is gone. That was also K's idea.
So now J must get back to 1960's, save his partner, and save Earth from invasion. Remember that the next time you complain about your job. After going way back, he runs into a younger version of his partner, played perfectly by Josh Brolin. I wondered whether CGI, makeup effects, or dubbing enhanced Brolin's younger K. Nope, it's just good old-fashioned casting and performance. He mimics Jones to the letter.
I like how MIB3 moves along before it has a chance to get boring, although Smith's character wore me a bit thin at times. The film also throws another genuinely interesting creature at us, Griffin (Michael Stuhlbarg), the lone survivor of an alien race who can see multiple future events at the same time. I'm not sure if he's somebody you'd want with you at the Vegas sports books.
MIB3 is better than it could've been, but it still seems dated, like a classic rock group getting back together for a reunion gig. I hear production on Ghostbusters 3 is moving forward with or without Bill Murray. If can be interesting as the Men In Black, it may have a chance.
Going Rate: Worth matinee price.
Starring: Will Smith, Tommy Lee Jones, Josh Brolin, Jemaine Clement, Emma Thompson
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Creepy alien violence, mild language, one gross make-out scene
Men In Black debuted in 1997, made a forgettable sequel in 2002, and now comes back with another go in 2012. Columbia Pictures and Amblin Entertainment (Steven Spielberg is executive producer) still see life in a stale franchise. Perhaps it's time to throw the reins to a new generation of space cops.
MIB3 does that, sorta, by prequeling while sequeling. Agents K (Jones) and J (Smith) are still chasing extraterrestrial baddies and erasing memories, but now J is having to do that in two different centuries. It turns out an alien super criminal, Boris "The Animal" (Clement), has just busted out of the supermax lockup on the moon. You could call him the original Spider-Man because he releases these insect-like creatures from the palm of his hand. I'd tell you more if it didn't make me nauseous.
Boris wants to kill K, who not only locked him up but also shot off one of his arms. Worse, Boris wants to do it retroactively -- time-traveling back to 1969, when they first tangled, but offing K before the agent can cuff him. The killer finds a way to do it, and suddenly J finds his partner is reduced to a memorial bust. Worse, the "ArcNet," an Earth-protecting shield, is gone. That was also K's idea.
So now J must get back to 1960's, save his partner, and save Earth from invasion. Remember that the next time you complain about your job. After going way back, he runs into a younger version of his partner, played perfectly by Josh Brolin. I wondered whether CGI, makeup effects, or dubbing enhanced Brolin's younger K. Nope, it's just good old-fashioned casting and performance. He mimics Jones to the letter.
I like how MIB3 moves along before it has a chance to get boring, although Smith's character wore me a bit thin at times. The film also throws another genuinely interesting creature at us, Griffin (Michael Stuhlbarg), the lone survivor of an alien race who can see multiple future events at the same time. I'm not sure if he's somebody you'd want with you at the Vegas sports books.
MIB3 is better than it could've been, but it still seems dated, like a classic rock group getting back together for a reunion gig. I hear production on Ghostbusters 3 is moving forward with or without Bill Murray. If can be interesting as the Men In Black, it may have a chance.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
The Official Patriot
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| At left, Chapter President James Williamson pins the SAR rosette on your humble servant under the admiration of SAR officer Al Niemeyer. |
HUZZAH! Two years with the Sons of The American Revolution as a prospective member, participating with the color guard, and I'm finally in after getting my act together on the research part. It took at least two false starts. I thought I would be able to do it on my own, but I found it's handy to have an experienced genealogist who knows what to do, where to get the documents, how to get the documents, and how to lay everything out so that the application gets through.
Your humble servant's patriot ancestor is Robert Foresman, Sr., who fought in the Pennsylvania Militia during the Revolutionary War, traced back through my father's bloodline. I am also trying to "prove out" another patriot in the family, this one a member of the Continental Army. Research has also found a redcoat who surrendered to General Washington at Yorktown... but, psst, we don't discuss him a lot.
Saturday, May 12, 2012
Reel To Reel: The Avengers
The gang's all here!
Going Rate: Worth full price admission.
Starring:Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Samuel L. Jackson
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Comic book action violence, mild language
I'll let you in on a little secret: Iron Man steals The Avengers. With that in mind, this all-star comic-book superhero movie is a highly enjoyable ride that takes itself only moderately seriously, and most of that is due to Iron Man (Downey), whose motor-mouth wisecracks put a reality check on an over-the-top fantasy.
A superhero film filled with superheroes requires the evilest threat a screenwriter can think up. This time, it's the Tesseract, a self-generating energy source so powerful it can punch a hole into the universe and bring forth a whole host of ugly superbaddies. Only in movies does such technology always suck from the bottom of the barrel. What if it brought in a race twenty times smarter than us? Would we resist sharing our turf with a superior intellect or defend our dumbness to the death? I dunno.
This energy source, held by a super-dark security group called S.H.I.E.L.D., brings out Loki, a sinister authoritarian bad guy with a scepter that flips people's allegiances. Imagine what it would do to Rush Limbaugh. Loki inverts a scientist and ace archer Hawkeye (Renner) and takes off with the Tesseract. Not good.
S.H.I.E.L.D.'s topper, Nick Fury (Jackson), realizes this problem will require him to do more than stand around and be cool with one eye, so he starts putting together a team: Captain America as Steve Rogers (Evans), Natasha Romanoff as Black Widow (Johansson), Thor as his Shakespearean hammer-throwing self (Hemsworth), Hulk hiding inside Bruce Banner (Ruffalo), and the aforementioned Iron Man doing business as Tony Stark. Put this many egos in a room, and you're bound to have trouble, especially if you get Dr. Banner angry -- something he doesn't want to do anymore, thus leaving doubts about his viability as a team player. Captain is the born leader, even if he's a little too flashy-looking. Widow really doesn't have any superpowers beyond bringing a lot of creative hurt to people. We're really not sure whose side Thor is on, given Loki is a relative. And Stark? Let's just get this done and go eat Chinese.
The film delivers everything expected of a summer blockbuster in its genre: lots of CGI, lots of explosions, lots of impossible stunts. What saves it from being a forgettable thrill-ride is Joss Whedon's touch. He made the film for fanboys without making it a fanboy movie, avoiding the mistake that doomed Watchmen. Seeing Captain America and Thor is not a prerequisite. Prepare to be more than a bit surprised. And stay through the end of the credits. I didn't, but a friend tells me it's worth it.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission.
Starring:Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Samuel L. Jackson
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Comic book action violence, mild language
I'll let you in on a little secret: Iron Man steals The Avengers. With that in mind, this all-star comic-book superhero movie is a highly enjoyable ride that takes itself only moderately seriously, and most of that is due to Iron Man (Downey), whose motor-mouth wisecracks put a reality check on an over-the-top fantasy.
A superhero film filled with superheroes requires the evilest threat a screenwriter can think up. This time, it's the Tesseract, a self-generating energy source so powerful it can punch a hole into the universe and bring forth a whole host of ugly superbaddies. Only in movies does such technology always suck from the bottom of the barrel. What if it brought in a race twenty times smarter than us? Would we resist sharing our turf with a superior intellect or defend our dumbness to the death? I dunno.
This energy source, held by a super-dark security group called S.H.I.E.L.D., brings out Loki, a sinister authoritarian bad guy with a scepter that flips people's allegiances. Imagine what it would do to Rush Limbaugh. Loki inverts a scientist and ace archer Hawkeye (Renner) and takes off with the Tesseract. Not good.
S.H.I.E.L.D.'s topper, Nick Fury (Jackson), realizes this problem will require him to do more than stand around and be cool with one eye, so he starts putting together a team: Captain America as Steve Rogers (Evans), Natasha Romanoff as Black Widow (Johansson), Thor as his Shakespearean hammer-throwing self (Hemsworth), Hulk hiding inside Bruce Banner (Ruffalo), and the aforementioned Iron Man doing business as Tony Stark. Put this many egos in a room, and you're bound to have trouble, especially if you get Dr. Banner angry -- something he doesn't want to do anymore, thus leaving doubts about his viability as a team player. Captain is the born leader, even if he's a little too flashy-looking. Widow really doesn't have any superpowers beyond bringing a lot of creative hurt to people. We're really not sure whose side Thor is on, given Loki is a relative. And Stark? Let's just get this done and go eat Chinese.
The film delivers everything expected of a summer blockbuster in its genre: lots of CGI, lots of explosions, lots of impossible stunts. What saves it from being a forgettable thrill-ride is Joss Whedon's touch. He made the film for fanboys without making it a fanboy movie, avoiding the mistake that doomed Watchmen. Seeing Captain America and Thor is not a prerequisite. Prepare to be more than a bit surprised. And stay through the end of the credits. I didn't, but a friend tells me it's worth it.
Monday, April 9, 2012
An Open Letter To George Zimmerman
Mr. Zimmerman, I have only one thing to tell you.You're guilty. Start making peace with that.
It doesn't matter whether you're charged or not, or whether you'll be convicted or acquitted. People have already made up their minds. You can't appeal that sentence.
I want you to get familiar with another person: Casey Anthony. You two need to start comparing notes, because you'll have to rely on each other's advice if the justice system eventually decides in your favor.
But like I said, that doesn't matter. You have no way to win. If the special prosecutor declines to press charges, people grumble about you beating the rap in the white man's justice system. If you go on trial and a jury acquits you, it's still beating the rap. If the facts show you gunned Treyvon Martin down in prejudicial cold blood, if a jury convicts you and sends you away, then that's that. You did it. Go away.
Or is it, really? The stench of a tainted verdict is still out there because people will gather the jurors had their personal nightmares of Sanford, Florida morphing into post-Rodney-King Los Angeles. With so many people calling for you to be locked up, can anybody seriously believe they're willing to accept a verdict of "Not Guilty?"
Here's the irony of all this: the hue and cry for your arrest is done in the name of justice. But the justice system only works to the degree with which we believe in it. The outcomes which don't match our personal beliefs -- regardless of what the facts tell us -- reinforce our notions that the system is broken. Protesters say prejudice led to the shooting that started all of this. Now prejudice is going to envelop the rest of it.
It's so inconvenient for us, this justice system that is supposed to keep our society somewhat civilized. It's too slow, too laborious, too detail-oriented, and dadgumit, doesn't make the right decisions all the time. Conviction by assumption is much easier, much more streamlined. No, I'm not going to blame the media. That's a cop-out. Despite what some people tell you, reporters don't tell us how to think. We make that choice. Show me where the First Amendment deprived us of free will.
You've already had your trial. You've already been convicted. Personally, I don't know whether you're guilty or innocent. I haven't even gotten to the likely possibility of a wrongful death lawsuit. I can't do anything for you now but tell you to pray and pray for you myself. GOD promises HE will deliver justice in the end. For now, you're stuck with the rest of us.
Friday, March 23, 2012
Reel To Reel: The Hunger Games
An appetite for blood.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission for deep thinkers and fans of the book
Starring: Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Lenny Kravitz, Stanley Tucci, Donald Sutherland
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Graphic violence involving teenagers
A co-worker describes The Hunger Games as "Survivor to the death." Actually, this first in what will likely be a series of movie adaptations from the Suzanne Collins trilogy plays more like a hybrid of Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, Survivor, 1984 and The Truman Show.
It also reminds me of a conversation I had with a young lady at work who was fixated on an episode of The Bachelor. A spurned suitor wept in the back of a limousine for all of televisionland to see. While she and other ladies grinned and gawked, I felt repulsed.
"How can you watch this show?" I asked. "You wouldn't want to be on that show, would you?"
"No," the lady co-worker replied with an oh-come-on air.
"You wouldn't want any of your friends to be on that show, would you?"
"No."
Still, they watch. We watch. So the setting of The Hunger Games does not require much personal suspension of disbelief. It's a nation whose 12 "districts" each give up two of their young for a yearly televised fight to the death.
The land of Panem is North America in a post-war morass. We aren't told in the film what started this war, what it was about, or who we should've been rooting for, leaving us to conclude it was won by a technologically-savvy faction who have really crummy taste in make-up and fashion. This ruling class chirpily anticipates each year's fight to the finish -- "Happy Hunger Games!" -- with twisted totalitarian logic. What once started as penance has become for them a unifying tradition, something to bring the nation together as a common people. Yeah, I think Hitler's final solution was supposed to do that, too.
As you might expect, the inhabitants of the Capitol don't have to give up their young, but you can see the dread on the faces as teenage boys and girls are summoned for a lottery -- called "the Reaping" -- in the industrial area of District 12 to determine which boy and girl will be drafted as gladiators-- er, "tributes." I get the feeling they're too weary to rebel any more at this game forced upon them.
Katniss Everdeen (Lawrence) bravely volunteers to take the place of her drafted kid sister. But pity Peeta Mellark (Hutcherson). He's a baker, not a fighter, and no warrior types will step up. I can hear Meryl Streep in the remake of The Manchurian Candidate: "Where are all the men anymore?"
The two are whisked off to The Capitol for a bit of training and a bit of mentoring from a soused former champ, Haymitch Abernathy (Harrelson). Largely, it's all showbiz. The competitors go through a parade and celebrity interviews like they're competing for Miss America. The citizens of the Capitol watch it all and place bets like it's March Madness. The other districts of Panem can just watch and hope their sons or their daughters make it out as the last one standing. Maybe they pray. I don't know. GOD is not a part of this land. Judges 17:6 comes to mind: "In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes."
The games take place in a giant forest battle dome where every action is televised live, and every element -- including the weather, sunlight, and the presence of wild animals -- is manipulated by a team who points, click and drag on holographic workstations like they're building the next version of "Age of Empires." Katniss becomes an early favorite in the competition largely because of her thinly-veiled moxy. She's not good at building alliances, but she can shoot a deadly arrow or two. Peeta is the opposite, more friend than fighter. Going into the death match, they have a storyline: the public sees them as "star-crossed lovers." That wasn't Kat's idea, but it makes it easier to get "sponsors," people behind the scenes who pay to send medicine and aid to the competitors. They soon find out that winning will take each other, whether they're lovers, friends, or neither.
Having not read the source material, I can't tell you whether The Hunger Games stays true to its novelization, although having the author as one of the screenwriters is a huge sign. I will tell you it stays true to a nightmare we have about our governments: that they will eventually grow to enslave and hate us, setting apart a privileged class who enjoy the liberty and prosperity we once enjoyed. That's not supposed to happen in America, is it? You're going to hear a lot of people trying to convince you otherwise as the election season revs up. And separating truth from fiction and heartfelt concerns from a sheer lust for power is no game.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission for deep thinkers and fans of the book
Starring: Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Lenny Kravitz, Stanley Tucci, Donald Sutherland
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: Graphic violence involving teenagers
A co-worker describes The Hunger Games as "Survivor to the death." Actually, this first in what will likely be a series of movie adaptations from the Suzanne Collins trilogy plays more like a hybrid of Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, Survivor, 1984 and The Truman Show.
It also reminds me of a conversation I had with a young lady at work who was fixated on an episode of The Bachelor. A spurned suitor wept in the back of a limousine for all of televisionland to see. While she and other ladies grinned and gawked, I felt repulsed.
"How can you watch this show?" I asked. "You wouldn't want to be on that show, would you?"
"No," the lady co-worker replied with an oh-come-on air.
"You wouldn't want any of your friends to be on that show, would you?"
"No."
Still, they watch. We watch. So the setting of The Hunger Games does not require much personal suspension of disbelief. It's a nation whose 12 "districts" each give up two of their young for a yearly televised fight to the death.
The land of Panem is North America in a post-war morass. We aren't told in the film what started this war, what it was about, or who we should've been rooting for, leaving us to conclude it was won by a technologically-savvy faction who have really crummy taste in make-up and fashion. This ruling class chirpily anticipates each year's fight to the finish -- "Happy Hunger Games!" -- with twisted totalitarian logic. What once started as penance has become for them a unifying tradition, something to bring the nation together as a common people. Yeah, I think Hitler's final solution was supposed to do that, too.
As you might expect, the inhabitants of the Capitol don't have to give up their young, but you can see the dread on the faces as teenage boys and girls are summoned for a lottery -- called "the Reaping" -- in the industrial area of District 12 to determine which boy and girl will be drafted as gladiators-- er, "tributes." I get the feeling they're too weary to rebel any more at this game forced upon them.
Katniss Everdeen (Lawrence) bravely volunteers to take the place of her drafted kid sister. But pity Peeta Mellark (Hutcherson). He's a baker, not a fighter, and no warrior types will step up. I can hear Meryl Streep in the remake of The Manchurian Candidate: "Where are all the men anymore?"
The two are whisked off to The Capitol for a bit of training and a bit of mentoring from a soused former champ, Haymitch Abernathy (Harrelson). Largely, it's all showbiz. The competitors go through a parade and celebrity interviews like they're competing for Miss America. The citizens of the Capitol watch it all and place bets like it's March Madness. The other districts of Panem can just watch and hope their sons or their daughters make it out as the last one standing. Maybe they pray. I don't know. GOD is not a part of this land. Judges 17:6 comes to mind: "In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes."
The games take place in a giant forest battle dome where every action is televised live, and every element -- including the weather, sunlight, and the presence of wild animals -- is manipulated by a team who points, click and drag on holographic workstations like they're building the next version of "Age of Empires." Katniss becomes an early favorite in the competition largely because of her thinly-veiled moxy. She's not good at building alliances, but she can shoot a deadly arrow or two. Peeta is the opposite, more friend than fighter. Going into the death match, they have a storyline: the public sees them as "star-crossed lovers." That wasn't Kat's idea, but it makes it easier to get "sponsors," people behind the scenes who pay to send medicine and aid to the competitors. They soon find out that winning will take each other, whether they're lovers, friends, or neither.
Having not read the source material, I can't tell you whether The Hunger Games stays true to its novelization, although having the author as one of the screenwriters is a huge sign. I will tell you it stays true to a nightmare we have about our governments: that they will eventually grow to enslave and hate us, setting apart a privileged class who enjoy the liberty and prosperity we once enjoyed. That's not supposed to happen in America, is it? You're going to hear a lot of people trying to convince you otherwise as the election season revs up. And separating truth from fiction and heartfelt concerns from a sheer lust for power is no game.
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Sunday, March 4, 2012
The Earl In Williamsburg
WHATEVER SHALL I WEAR?
A fancy 18th Century Ball in a historic setting requires no less than my finest attire: my gold 1750's regalia, manifested in gold brocaded breeches, a gold weskit, and a gold skirted jacket, adorned with a red baldric and a lace jabot. For eye candy, I'm adding an emerald brooch. And of course, I have to wear my gold-trimmed tricorn, the one inspired by Lord Cornwallis' topper in The Patriot. Not only does the outfit befit mannered English royalty, the skirted coat make me appear fashionably portly.
Underneath, I've added a few hidden touches. I'm wearing a new ruffled shirt with ruffled cuffs I saw this morning at a store in Willamsburg. I am also wearing two layers of white stockings, necessary because the new white stockings I have just purchased are a little sheener than I desire. I want my calves to be snow white when I bow to the ladies of Williamsburg, not white tinged with pink.
The neck ruffles in my shirt are tucked into my weskit, away from view. They don't play nicely with my weskit, so I tuck them in and tie on the jabot, attaching it to my baldric with a safety pin to keep it from flying about as I prance the night away. I also pin my baldric to my shoulder with the brooch. This is when the shirt's true value emerges: I accidentally prick my finger and deposit blood spatters on one of my cuffs. Fortunately, the shirt's synthetic weave makes it a snap to remove the offending spots with tap water. My purist friends might frown on anything less than period-correct materials, but I will politely disagree.
PUNCTUALITY IS PROPER
I have only a short walk down the halls of my inn to the grand ballroom, so I shan't be needing the carriage. But timing is a question. The announced start time is 7:00, but I am not certain if that's the time of the first dance or the time the reception begins. I split the difference and arrive at 6:30.
Our Colonial dancing hosts are still arranging the entry table and placing the modern-day nametags which we will all use to identify each other. I'm happy not to have to remember names, which I struggle with. Remembering the dances will challenge my memory quite adequately.
The tag reads "Christopher Francis," to my delight. "You fit all 11 letters of my first name on!" I marvel to the hosts.
"We're proud of that," one of them smiles.
As the guests arrive, the color and fancy flourish I am hoping for materializes before me. Ladies are not shy about wearing their wide 18th Century polonaise ball gowns with the farthingdales and corsets. But most of them are skipping the highly-powdered, highly-elevated wigs. Several ladies are fast-forwarding to the late 18th Century, preferring the Regency pillar dress of the Pride & Prejudice era. One lady walks in wearing a hat with a large plume atop her fancy wig. My Lady, how shall she be able to dance in that?
The gentlemen are sporting a few powdered wigs here and there. They run the gamut of the breeches-and-buttons theme: a few townspeople, a few fancy aristocrats, a Continental Navy officer or two. Many are wearing tricorns. And they will keep them on, just like your humble servant as he eagerly awaits the first dance.
APPREHENSION
The journey to this moment has taken three months of preparation, and many months more of researching and dreaming, along with a electronic correspondence to the hosts...
My Most Honourable Ball Host or Hostess,
Greetings from Tucson!
I am registered for the upcoming George Washington Ball, and I had a couple of curiosities.
First, I notice no mention of a caller. I completely understand this is in the spirit of the time and true to the authenticity of the dance, but I do hope others will be forgiving of my missteps. I have indeed received the instructions, and I plan to attend the "refresher" session on the day of the ball, but many of these dances are new to me.
I have been dancing English Country Dances for about 5 years with a couple of groups here in Arizona, and although I do not consider myself a beginner, I do not consider myself advanced, either. What advice would you give to a newcomer to this ball who will be journeying quite a distance for an immersive Colonial experience? How best can I enjoy the evening without being a burden to more experienced dancers?
I have wanted for some time to dance at a grand Colonial ball, in my finest period attire -- a rare experience indeed, one that is even rarer in Arizona. This is a "bucket list" item for me, and I want to make sure I do things in a manner pleasing to all.
Thank you so much for this opportunity. I pledge I will not be unworthy of it.
Your Humble Servant And Friend In The Dance,
Christopher Francis
Tucson, Arizona
A few days later, I had my reply from Lou, Dancing Master Emeritus, who said he was "delighted" that I would be coming so far. "We pride ourselves at being a very welcoming an accommodating group of dancers," he wrote. He also assured me there would be callers and opportunities to practice the tougher dances.
In closing, he wrote: "In an interesting aside, a dancing master in Colonial Virginia was named Francis Christian, a striking similarity to your name."
Francis Christian. My mouth drops open. The past has caught up again with me once more.
FAKE IT TILL YOU MAKE IT
The first dance of the evening is not a grand march, like I am used to, but a minuet, of which I have no practical experience. This is the only dance of the evening we have not rehearsed at a practice session earlier in the day.
"Can I fake one?" I asked one of the instructor/callers.
"You can try, if you know what you're doing."
Which I don't, at least not exactly. The minuet refers to any number of dances, and there is no clue as to which one our hosts intend. But like dancing at a fancy ball, I have also dreamed of dancing a minuet at a fancy ball, and so I intend to do my best.
I bow to a young Regency lady, asking for a dance.
"Do you know the minuet?" she asks. "I don't."
"Well, I don't either," I reply. "But if you follow my lead, we shall both be fine."
Couples are lining up in two columns, facing our trio of musicians: Japanese keyboard, violin and English flute. My dancing partner and I take a position near the rear of a long row. If both of us blow it, it will look fairly inconspicuous.
The secret to my scheme lies in situational awareness. We will need to follow the lead of the couple in front of us, and in front of that couple. Everybody will be doing the same dance the same way. Just what way is about to be revealed.
It starts easily enough, with a courtly bow and a curtsy to the players and to each other. Then the gentleman and lady take hands and begin moving daintily about each other. It's ballet before people knew what ballet was. I'm watching the footwork and the movement of the gentleman in front of me as I try to synchronize my movements. I'm about a second behind as I tread lightly around the lady with a fancy flourish of my hands or my tricorn. It's a beatiful dance, even though I have only a faint idea of what I'm doing.
Five minutes after this charade begins, it is all over with another courtly bow to my partner, who seems pleased and satisfied. The ultimate irony: if she was true to her Regency persona reflected in her dress, she probably wouldn't have danced the minuet in the first place.
MANY ARE CALLED, BUT FEW ARE KNOWN
The first country dance of the evening is about to begin. Now the real test of my abilities begins. I have rehearsed this dance earlier, but now I will have to do it with little or no help from a caller.
From my experience and travels, a caller is the guiding light in historical English dance. That person is there to help you enjoy the evening by not forcing you to know hundreds of dances, as those Colonial Virginians did. Yet we are not among novices. So the procedure will be this: the caller will briefly walk us through one iteration of the dance, since the steps all repeat in a loop. The music will begin, and the dance will be called during the opening iteration, and then the caller will drop out, leaving us to our own skill... or lack of it. This is where the reassurances of the Dancing Master Emeritus shall be put to the test.
I bow to my new partner and get to it.
If I err, I err slightly. Others are far from flawless. We help each other in the lines, softly prompting each other or pointing where to go. I imagine those Colonial Virginian dancers did the same to guide and correct each other, not in anger but in love.
The first dances fly by, and my apprehensions about the material dissolves. Now I can focus on my other responsibilities... like honouring the ladies.
SHE'S THE ONE
Many attending have come as couples, but in the courteous tradition of historic dance, the guests are encouraged to dance with as many different partners as possible -- especially the gentlemen.
Some call that a requirement. I call it a blessing. The mathematics of historic dance always seems to favour the honourable; more ladies than gents always attend such functions. In every dance, several ladies end up dancing with each other because there either not enough gentlemen or not enough gentlemen willing to dance.
Not me. I know what to look for. The ladies who are desirous of a dance are nearly always standing on the edge of the floor, looking a bit forlorn or lost, scanning the crowds with their eyes to see if a gent might be walking their way...
"My lady, do you have a partner for this next dance?" I ask in my aristocratic British accent as I bow to a lady, a question I shall repeat as the night progresses. When she says no, true to my suspicions, I add the predicate: "May I have the honour of this dance."
"Honour." Always "honour." Never the vernacular shorthand. Everything is done in honour to the ladies. Every step shows them honour. The mannered Colonial gent shall look his partner in the eye in the spirit of Christian love. When I bow to them, I shall bow low and with great reverence, as if each one of them were The Queen.
"My Lady," I say upon rising. "I thank you for such a wonderful dance. And I thank you for your patience and tolerance of my faults."
I have been told such overly courtly manners are more than what is required. The ladies, however, merely smile and enjoy it, returning the thank-yous with another curtsy and maybe a blush.
LEAD ME ON
One of the many callers of the evening assures us we can master the steps of the last dance before the break for refreshments.
"They look much harder than they actually are," he says after he's walked us through it once.
In his mind, he's right. But for us novices, we need more help with its looping figures which take us inside and outside our little groups of four along the line. At least in my line, several of us are more than a bit confused.
But when the dance begins, his calling dissolves. We are on our own, lost in time and space beyond the first few figures. A few others are getting through, but the dance's rapid pace does not allow them the opportunity to prompt us with a quiet word or gesture.
My partner and I along with the couple next to us do the only thing we can. Stand. Stand and look admirably to each other. Try to keep the dance's progression going as neatly as we can without disrupting the other couples. But like bubbles in a torrid sea, we can't escape our fate as we rise to the top.
Fortunately, our caller has gotten the hint. "All right, let's halt," he says, seeing the need to walk us through it again.
"He needs to call it," I observe to my partner. "Sometimes you just have to call it. This isn't like in Colonial Virginia. We don't do this for a living!"
My partner smiles and curtsies to me again, "Thank you, my kind sir!"
We walk through it again. We amble through it once more as the music resumes. And somehow, we learn it. Our caller is right in the end, but if only the journey was less agonizing.
THE INNER CIRCLE
Circle mixers are my delight, for they allow me to dance with as many ladies as possible -- all in one dance. For the sole one of the night, our leaders choose "Indian Princess," a variant of the dance "Indian Queen," which was originally developed with Pocahontas in mind.
The steps are easy and lively: setting to your partner, passing them by and turning another lady next to you, then returning to your partner, setting to them again, passing them again to the other lady on the other side and turning them. Then you turn your partner a couple of times before progressing three places down to meet a new partner, where everything begins again.
Nobody needs to call this dance, at least not for long. Everyone picks it up right away, in two large circles as we skip around one another and allow our joy to pour out of us.
It is my tradition to raise my free hand whenever I am turning a lady -- an affectation many of my dancing friends at home warmly embrace. Abroad, it is harder to convince others to let their light shine through. It is true for this group... until I spot a gentleman next to me raising his free hand high in exhaultation.
"They're doing it," I laugh to my partner. "They're doing it! HUZZAH!"
I shout more huzzahs when the dance ends over joyous applause.
LET THE LADY LEAD
I am only planning to sit out two dances this evening. One of them is "Prince William," a dance that threw my friend Madame and I into a near fit of frustration at a Scottish ball in Tucson. It is a beautiful dance, but it is also filled with complicated figures and turns and the dreaded "crossover hey." For a pro it's no sweat. For a novice, it's too much all at once.
But as I am walking away from the floor, a lady turns the tables on me.
"Did you want to dance this one?"
"My Lady, as much as I would like to, I didn't do it very well at the rehearsal this afternoon. But I can do it if you lead me strongly."
She agrees she can, and we line up in a three-couple set. A saving grace of the dance is that if a few dancers mess up, the effects can't ripple through the entire ballroom like in longways dances. We could mess up as much as we wanted in our little group of six and the dance police wouldn't pull us over.
So we start the dance, which should look something like this, as demonstrated by another group:
Now imagine that same dance with one lady pointing at several of us to single when to move and who to turn. She did not have to make an exasperating amount of gestures, to our relief. And eventually, we all learn the dance, including that crossover hey, more or less.
"There's a bulge in it," another lady had explained to me at the earlier rehearsal. And by golly, that cleared things up for your humble servant.
LONG AGO AND FAR AWAY
The other dance I intended to sit out, "The Punch Bowl," came with fair warning not to attempt to learn on the floor. So I sit it out -- for real this time, with no lady jumping in to rescue and prompt me at the last moment. That's when I encounter a lady in garb at least one century earlier than most of the room.
"I see you have embraced the Renaissance," I complimented.
"Yes! This is from the De Medici era of Italy," she explained, describing her green dress adorned with hundreds of hand-stitched beads. She talks about her life as a Renaissance re-enactor in Crownsville, Maryland. She had shifted timelines from later eras. But she was still fond of historic dance of the Colonial era, even though she was choosing to sit out the second half of the program. Her body would only allow her so much.
A tinge of sadness flashes through me. I know there might well come a time when my "dancing days are done," as George Washington once lamented as he turned down an invitation to join an assembly late in his life. For the life of me, though, I shall fight that day until I breathe my last. You can bury me on the dance floor.
THE LAST MINUET
The second half of the ball flies by as quickly as the first. By 11pm, it is time to call the festivies to a close. After a final French contredanse, our orchestra indulges a common wish for a final waltz with the ladies and gentlemen who came together.
Some may waltz. Others will minuet, and that other would be me, as I saunter amongst the couples, holding my hands gracefully in three-quarter time in a solo, improvised caper, but I don't want it to end like this.
I quickly locate another of those ladies standing on the side of the ballroom floor, scanning the crowds, and ask for a waltz.
So we start to waltz. But I have a last request.
"My lady, I often dance an improvised minuet with my partners back home. If you are willing to learn, I can lead you through it. Would you like to try? It's like a country dance we make up as we go along."
She agrees with a smiling nod, and I begin the number, starting by turning her by right and left hands, and then backing away, coming forward, and then turning single before siding to each other. The secret is in the hand signals. I call the next step just before it's done, and the lady follows my lead. It's not in perfect synchronization, but it looks beautiful as the Earl of Suffolk in his gold attire steps stately around a lady of the Colonies in her green and pink floral dress, rosy cheeks highlighting her smiling face. She is a quick learner.
"Thank you for indulging me," I say after a low and final bow.
A FRIEND IN HISTORY
All during the evening, a Colonial lad thought he spotted a familiar face. After most of the others had left, we met up as I was talking to another.
"Your face is familiar," he said to me, "But I can't place it."
I looked at his nametag. I instantly recognized it.
"I know you!" I explained. "You were at Manassas! You're the guy who saved me from heat exhaustion!"
Now the light was on. In my change from Civil War to Colonial attire, John couldn't place me. But now he remembers, and he's happy to see me both well and not in need of another ice cube pressed up against a major artery.
I know he loves to dance. John had mentioned an opportunity at Manassas last summer, and I knew I wouldn't be able to take him up on it in the short timeframe I had for the trip. "Oh, just break my heart!" I had said.
But now, here we are, neither expecting the other. History repeats. I indulge him to take a few pictures of your humble servant before the time comes to say good night.
AND IN THE MORNING...
The afterglow is with me through the night and into the morning as I walk in Colonial Williamsburg. The ball is like a dream now, something I cannot believe happened, and yet it did. Wistfulness and sadness tinges within me. At times my life is measured as time between fancy balls.
I don't know if I will ever see most of my new dancing companions ever again. Expense and real life will only allow me so many of these ball adventures.
Yet as I walk down Duke Of Gloucester Street, I spot a group of familiar young ladies, who instantly spot your humble servant. I'm not wearing any historic attire anymore -- just shorts, tennis shoes, and a red jacket... but topped with a tricorn hat.
They greet me again, smiling, their ball gowns exchanged for sweaters and skirts.
I remove my tricorn and bow.
Friday, March 2, 2012
The Ladies Shall Enter Through The Private Entrance -- All Gentlemen Shall Wait Outside In Traffic
It's not an adventure to Virginia without some adventure in getting there. The first two legs play out flawlessly. The planes are on time. The crews for the planes are on time. The pilot on the Tucson-to-Chicago leg pushes tin and gets us into Midway 15 minutes ahead of schedule, even as he dodges storm clouds. Even the rental car surprises me: Budget puts me into a Chevy Impala, as opposed to the Toyota Yaris I've gotten in two past ventures, both of which illuminated the "Check Engine" light just as I was returning them.At 4:20pm EST, I fully expect to be in Williamsburg by 5pm, with perhaps time to change into my period attire for a candlelight concert at the Raleigh Tavern. Then I start up Interstate 64. The warning from the electronic sign minces no words: "I-64 BACKED UP 8 MILES."
In an instant, Norfolk becomes Los Angeles. Cars slow to a crawl. Virginia State Police patrol the diamond lanes, flashing their blue lights and perhaps busting a few motorists who decide to violate the HOV rules or drive on the shoulder.
The radio traffic reporter is incredulous: "There's a mondo backup on the Westbound 64 from about the tunnel on." Already I'm coming in contact with history; it's the first time I can recall a traffic jockey using the word "mondo."
Cars creep forward. 4:30 turns to 5:00 and then 5:30, and I still haven't hit the BB&T. At this rate I'll be lucky to make into Williamsburg by 8pm. By 6:00, I'm finally through the tunnel, out of the backup, without seeing any trace of the traffic anomaly that started the whole thing.
"It's a really bad Friday out there! I-64 still backed up from the tunnel. For some reason it has just never recovered from the earlier situation," the traffic lady updates.
Now I will have to push tin, within reason. I once got a ticket on Highway 93 outside Las Vegas for doing 104 miles per hour after neglecting the speedometer on a lonely stretch of desert highway. Now in Hampton Roads, I don't have an opportunity to repeat the deed as the line of traffic mysteriously slows again, this time outside of Yorktown, and again, for no obvious reason. I can only surmise the combination of rush-hour traffic and Friday getaways is coming together to my disadvantage.
By 6:30, I roll into Williamsburg. After getting thrown off course in my journey towards the historic area, I duck into a garage and beat a charge towards the Raleigh Tavern. Colonial Williamsburg gives off a beautiful tranquility at night. Modern lighting, what little there is, sparsely illuminates the streets. Not only am I seeing the past, I'm seeing reminders of my past visits, the sights and the atmosphere that has me wondering what in tarnation I'm doing in Arizona.
I slip into the Tavern and hope the ticket-taker in period attire will have mercy on a soul who has just traveled 2,000 some miles by plane, 40 more miles per car, and is wearing shorts in March, as per Tucson tradition.
"The ticket office was closed," I explain to him as he shines a non-period LED flashlight on my voucher, which would've been exchanged for a proper admission slip had the proper office been properly open instead of shutting down 15 minutes before closing time.
"Well, I've got a list here," he says, pulling out a piece of paper, scanning it for my name. I'm not on it. But he is kind and hospitable -- as so many people in Virginia are -- and my paperwork proof is enough to gain your humble servant passage.
I soon forget about the Interstate quagmire as candles -- real ones, not electric -- illuminate the small side room. In October 1771, a concert featuring a radical new instrument, the pianoforte (which means "soft-loud" in Italian) took place here. And this is what we are about to see as our players enter the room.
"I must apologize to the ladies," our pianoforte player notes playfully, "for I have offended you in a way you weren't even aware of. We made you enter through the front door, which means you had to pass by the bar. In the 18th Century, you never would have brought a lady around that way. There are two other private entrances here for you."
The trio consists of pianoforte, viola da gamba -- essentially a six-string bass violin that's tuned like a lute -- and a German flute. They are with the "Governor's Musick," one of Colonial Williamsburg's top interpretive groups. So when they begin to play, the clock instantly winds back 200 years with the opening strains of John Ranish's Sonota opus 2, Number 7, Adiago and Allegro. Pieces by Theodore Smith and Francisco Guerini follow. It's like a lullaby in the night, a reminder of what I came here for, what I would love to do if I wasn't so rooted in Arizona.
"We're so spoiled here in the 21st Century," the keyboardist notes midway through the concert. "Music is just a mouse click away." He tells us how his instrument was high tech for its time, primarily because of its touch response -- a lighter keystroke produces a softer sound. The pianoforte was to the harpsicord what Moog or ARP would later be to the piano.
Somehow I'm able to resist the temptation to dance. It's probably becauase I'm not in my breeches and tricorn. But when the trio plays a closing minuet, I can close my eyes and see myself bowing to Madame Noire before I move gracefully around her.
"I had this dream where we were doing this beautiful dance from the Renaissance," she once told me. I know she would love to be by my side right now, soaking up all the Colonial atmosphere.
We'll have that dance, My Lady. Our day will come.
Saturday, February 18, 2012
In The Middle
I am a moderate, and I am not ashamed of it.
I draw that conclusion after having taken my political temperature at politicalcompass.org, which offers this handy-dandy X-Y diagram of one’s leanings, provided you are willing and honest enough to answer a set of pointed ideological questions. The test placed your humble servant nearly dead-center, between conservative and liberal, between authoritarian and libertarian — or as one might describe it, right in the crosshairs for somebody to run right over me.
I believe extremism in any form, left or right, harms this nation, and I am not ashamed to admit it. I believe partisan politics is becoming a false religion, but the die-hard partisans refuse to admit it. Think I’m kidding? Have you seen the “Conservative Bible Project?”
We are now in an age not of truth, but of conservative truth or liberal truth, where the truth is not based on facts or provability but whether it fits the desired ideological narrative.
The number of independents in Arizona is growing, and that’s no accident. You can argue that it’s rebellion against “the establishment,” but I tend to believe it’s because people are tired of seeing deviation from strict conservative or liberal principles equated with religious heresy.
I wear a tricorn hat. Remember when that hat was a symbol of our heritage — something unquestionably beautiful, inclusive and inspiring? Before members of a certain political movement appropriated it for their own means? Just so we won’t forget who the “Real Americans” are… like themselves?
I draw that conclusion after having taken my political temperature at politicalcompass.org, which offers this handy-dandy X-Y diagram of one’s leanings, provided you are willing and honest enough to answer a set of pointed ideological questions. The test placed your humble servant nearly dead-center, between conservative and liberal, between authoritarian and libertarian — or as one might describe it, right in the crosshairs for somebody to run right over me.
I believe extremism in any form, left or right, harms this nation, and I am not ashamed to admit it. I believe partisan politics is becoming a false religion, but the die-hard partisans refuse to admit it. Think I’m kidding? Have you seen the “Conservative Bible Project?”
We are now in an age not of truth, but of conservative truth or liberal truth, where the truth is not based on facts or provability but whether it fits the desired ideological narrative.
The number of independents in Arizona is growing, and that’s no accident. You can argue that it’s rebellion against “the establishment,” but I tend to believe it’s because people are tired of seeing deviation from strict conservative or liberal principles equated with religious heresy.
I wear a tricorn hat. Remember when that hat was a symbol of our heritage — something unquestionably beautiful, inclusive and inspiring? Before members of a certain political movement appropriated it for their own means? Just so we won’t forget who the “Real Americans” are… like themselves?
Sunday, January 29, 2012
Reel To Reel: Red Tails
These colors don't run, but they do fly.
Going Rate: Worth matinee price
Starring: Cuba Gooding, Jr., Terrence Howard, Nate Parker
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: World War II aerial combat injuries, mild language
George Lucas modeled the space battle sequences in Star Wars after World War II aerial dogfight footage, so a film paying tribute to the Tuskegee Airmen -- the Army's elite black flying squadron -- seems like a good fit for his production banner. But that's before I realized the film felt like an extended Star Wars fighter sequence that just so happened to include a plot, characters and a few compulsory clichéd scenes exploring the racial realities of the WWII military.
The Airmen racked up one of the most impressive records of the war, but as we meet them they are relegated to garbage-collector duty, shooting easy targets with patched-up used aircraft. A military report finds them nearly unfit for duty. We can see they are being set up for failure. It's a scenario the Axis would love to brag about through Hitler's propaganda machine.
Major Emanuelle Stance (Gooding, Jr.) is the pipe-smoking leader of what the Army considers an experiment -- a black fighting force that exists solely to placate somebody's call for racial equality in the military. But Bullard is not one to dwell on racial politics. He sees his fighters as recipients of great privilege in getting to fight and possibly to die for their country. As for his scrappy pilots, they are looking for real action beyond blowing up munitions trains. They have a strong ally in Col. A.J. Bullard (Howard), their Pentagon representative who knows how to tread through the combat zone of racial politics in an nearly all-white military.
The Army is dealing with a big problem in the air: bombers aren't getting through to their targets as German squadrons lure cocky pilots into dogfights when they should be sticking beside the heavies. Major Stance offers a deal: get us new planes and a real mission and "we'll light up the board." The Army delivers shiny, brand-new fighters which the squadron adorns with red tails, "to make them stand out."
We spend plenty of time with the Airmen on the ground, enough to make the film a black Top Gun: "Easy," the ace pilot, "Junior," the aspiring ace, along with "Lightning," "Joker," and "Smokey." They live for the fight and the wisecrack, and we see plenty of them. They have their issues, true, and their beef with Uncle Sam and The Man, but all that's secondary to the mission. This and the battle sequences are where Red Tails flies, but at times it sputters with ditzy pedestrian dialogue -- "I hope those Red Tails are with us next time!" The racism in this movie is soft-pedaled, save for a token barfight between one of the Airmen and a white bigot which is discussed in the next scene and then tossed away like a live grenade.
About those air battles: they are nothing short of thrilling, even though most of the action is CGI-based. I read George Lucas went back to studying WWII footage to prepare for this film, and it shows. Lucas also stepped up to fund the movie and its marketing when Hollywood studios shied away. Early box office reports hint he may barely break even, but it's not like he's hurting for cash.
Red Tails is a labor of love and heroism, and it does justice to its subject matter. But it doesn't into the category of epic war film, as much as some of us would desire. If this film has any stereotypes, they're not based on race but on Hollywood laziness and the lack of a good script doctor.
Going Rate: Worth matinee price
Starring: Cuba Gooding, Jr., Terrence Howard, Nate Parker
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: World War II aerial combat injuries, mild language
George Lucas modeled the space battle sequences in Star Wars after World War II aerial dogfight footage, so a film paying tribute to the Tuskegee Airmen -- the Army's elite black flying squadron -- seems like a good fit for his production banner. But that's before I realized the film felt like an extended Star Wars fighter sequence that just so happened to include a plot, characters and a few compulsory clichéd scenes exploring the racial realities of the WWII military.
The Airmen racked up one of the most impressive records of the war, but as we meet them they are relegated to garbage-collector duty, shooting easy targets with patched-up used aircraft. A military report finds them nearly unfit for duty. We can see they are being set up for failure. It's a scenario the Axis would love to brag about through Hitler's propaganda machine.
Major Emanuelle Stance (Gooding, Jr.) is the pipe-smoking leader of what the Army considers an experiment -- a black fighting force that exists solely to placate somebody's call for racial equality in the military. But Bullard is not one to dwell on racial politics. He sees his fighters as recipients of great privilege in getting to fight and possibly to die for their country. As for his scrappy pilots, they are looking for real action beyond blowing up munitions trains. They have a strong ally in Col. A.J. Bullard (Howard), their Pentagon representative who knows how to tread through the combat zone of racial politics in an nearly all-white military.
The Army is dealing with a big problem in the air: bombers aren't getting through to their targets as German squadrons lure cocky pilots into dogfights when they should be sticking beside the heavies. Major Stance offers a deal: get us new planes and a real mission and "we'll light up the board." The Army delivers shiny, brand-new fighters which the squadron adorns with red tails, "to make them stand out."
We spend plenty of time with the Airmen on the ground, enough to make the film a black Top Gun: "Easy," the ace pilot, "Junior," the aspiring ace, along with "Lightning," "Joker," and "Smokey." They live for the fight and the wisecrack, and we see plenty of them. They have their issues, true, and their beef with Uncle Sam and The Man, but all that's secondary to the mission. This and the battle sequences are where Red Tails flies, but at times it sputters with ditzy pedestrian dialogue -- "I hope those Red Tails are with us next time!" The racism in this movie is soft-pedaled, save for a token barfight between one of the Airmen and a white bigot which is discussed in the next scene and then tossed away like a live grenade.
About those air battles: they are nothing short of thrilling, even though most of the action is CGI-based. I read George Lucas went back to studying WWII footage to prepare for this film, and it shows. Lucas also stepped up to fund the movie and its marketing when Hollywood studios shied away. Early box office reports hint he may barely break even, but it's not like he's hurting for cash.
Red Tails is a labor of love and heroism, and it does justice to its subject matter. But it doesn't into the category of epic war film, as much as some of us would desire. If this film has any stereotypes, they're not based on race but on Hollywood laziness and the lack of a good script doctor.
Monday, January 23, 2012
Reel To Reel: War Horse
Riding off to war.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission
Starring: Jeremy Irvine, Emily Watson
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: World War I violence
Do horses know how to act? Do they even know they're in a movie? I'm not sure, but the equine stars of War Horse certainly know how to tug at our emotions, just as in Black Beauty and The Black Stallion. Yet director Steven Spielberg clearly wants to add to his roster of epic war pictures, which includes Empire Of The Sun, Shindler's List, Saving Private Ryan, and unfortunately, 1941. So we get a picture that's never completely about either war or a horse but a mixed mash-up of both, incorporating several side stories into the main narrative.
The film parachutes us into Ireland just before World War I, green and beautiful. An alcoholic Irish farmer, Ted Naracott (Peter Mullan), pays out the nose for a thoroughbred horse instead of a work animal. His wife Rose (Watson) despairs, knowing the old fool is putting the family farm on the line. Both Ted and his son Albert (Irvine) sense some sort of greatness in the animal that will be their deliverance. Albert is a natural-born horse whisperer. He knows exactly what to say to his new equine friend Joey (more than a dozen horses played the role), and he's not above putting a collar around his neck to show Joey how it's done. The two of them share a deep resolve and strength. A sequence where Albert and Joey must plow a rocky field to save the farm has a sports-film quality to it, two underdogs banding together to achieve the impossible.
All of Joey's and Albert's work are not enough to keep Ted's finances above water, so the reluctant father sells the horse to the British army as troops march out of town for the Great War. Albert longs to go with Joey, but his age keeps him from enlisting, so an officer pledges Joey will receive great care until horse and rider can be together again. So begins a picaresque journey that takes us from Ireland to France and through the trench-warfare, horror and disillusionment of WWI with a horse who just happens to be along for the ride -- or two horses, actually. Joey finds a companion after shipping off for the front, and the two of them bond like war buddies.
A couple of other war movies entered my mind as this film unspooled. An early battle scene reminded me of the climatic assault in Gods And Generals, and a sequence where soldiers on opposite sides must work together to rescue Joey recalls Joyeux Noel. I'm sure many of you will also make comparisons to National Velvet.
I liked War Horse, but I felt the film needed focus. A recent opinion column in the Los Angeles Times theorized the dearth of WWI movies is due to the war's moral ambiguity, its lack of clearly defined good and bad guys which doesn't make good commercial cinema. Spielberg tries introducing some of that into War Horse, particularly in a subplot involving two German deserters. This is where it detours from Joey's perspective to try to include some larger truths of WWI, and that's where it falters. Black Beauty took us through a journey of several owners, but at least the title character narrated his own story. War Horse is also adapted from a novel and a stage play, but I'm not familiar with the source material to tell you whether the flaws originated there. What isn't flawed is Spielberg's touch for creating emotional bonds and characters we care about, and that ultimately redeems the movie.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission
Starring: Jeremy Irvine, Emily Watson
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: World War I violence
Do horses know how to act? Do they even know they're in a movie? I'm not sure, but the equine stars of War Horse certainly know how to tug at our emotions, just as in Black Beauty and The Black Stallion. Yet director Steven Spielberg clearly wants to add to his roster of epic war pictures, which includes Empire Of The Sun, Shindler's List, Saving Private Ryan, and unfortunately, 1941. So we get a picture that's never completely about either war or a horse but a mixed mash-up of both, incorporating several side stories into the main narrative.
The film parachutes us into Ireland just before World War I, green and beautiful. An alcoholic Irish farmer, Ted Naracott (Peter Mullan), pays out the nose for a thoroughbred horse instead of a work animal. His wife Rose (Watson) despairs, knowing the old fool is putting the family farm on the line. Both Ted and his son Albert (Irvine) sense some sort of greatness in the animal that will be their deliverance. Albert is a natural-born horse whisperer. He knows exactly what to say to his new equine friend Joey (more than a dozen horses played the role), and he's not above putting a collar around his neck to show Joey how it's done. The two of them share a deep resolve and strength. A sequence where Albert and Joey must plow a rocky field to save the farm has a sports-film quality to it, two underdogs banding together to achieve the impossible.
All of Joey's and Albert's work are not enough to keep Ted's finances above water, so the reluctant father sells the horse to the British army as troops march out of town for the Great War. Albert longs to go with Joey, but his age keeps him from enlisting, so an officer pledges Joey will receive great care until horse and rider can be together again. So begins a picaresque journey that takes us from Ireland to France and through the trench-warfare, horror and disillusionment of WWI with a horse who just happens to be along for the ride -- or two horses, actually. Joey finds a companion after shipping off for the front, and the two of them bond like war buddies.
A couple of other war movies entered my mind as this film unspooled. An early battle scene reminded me of the climatic assault in Gods And Generals, and a sequence where soldiers on opposite sides must work together to rescue Joey recalls Joyeux Noel. I'm sure many of you will also make comparisons to National Velvet.
I liked War Horse, but I felt the film needed focus. A recent opinion column in the Los Angeles Times theorized the dearth of WWI movies is due to the war's moral ambiguity, its lack of clearly defined good and bad guys which doesn't make good commercial cinema. Spielberg tries introducing some of that into War Horse, particularly in a subplot involving two German deserters. This is where it detours from Joey's perspective to try to include some larger truths of WWI, and that's where it falters. Black Beauty took us through a journey of several owners, but at least the title character narrated his own story. War Horse is also adapted from a novel and a stage play, but I'm not familiar with the source material to tell you whether the flaws originated there. What isn't flawed is Spielberg's touch for creating emotional bonds and characters we care about, and that ultimately redeems the movie.
Sunday, January 15, 2012
Reel To Reel: The Artist
Silence is golden.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission
Starring: Jean Dujardin, Bérénice Bejo, John Goodman, James Cromwell
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: One very brief crude gesture and some potentially disturbing images
It's hard to believe people in the film industry considered "talkies" a passing fad when they arrived in the late 1920's. Motion pictures were works of art, and like their still counterparts, why would anybody on earth want to hear them speak? Oh, but they did. The Artist is a loving and painful tribute to that turning point in movie history where art gave way to innovation and demand.
George Valentin (Dujardin) -- named so we will conjure up the memory of Rudolph Valentino -- is the king of the silent movie swashbucklers in 1927. With the help of his little dog Uggie, he's invincible on the screen and adored off of it, but his home life is suffering. His wife is unhappy with her walk-on role in the marriage, especially when she sees George on the front page of Variety getting a kiss from a mystery girl.
That girl, Peppy Miller (Bejo), idolizes Valentin to the point of sneaking into his dressing room while playing an extra. She shares a dance with him in a wordless sequence of scenes that depicts their blossoming relationship more economically than a Hallmark greeting card. George gives her a valuable piece of advice along with a beauty mark to her face. Miller shoots up the credit list, from extra to star. Is it that fake mole, or is it something else, like hearing her presumably golden voice?
Valentin's career heads in the opposite direction. His studio scraps silent films at the behest of a cigar-smoking topper (Goodman) who can see the future and it talks. George, one of those people who consider silent film an art, sets out to save his career and his own beloved medium while Peppy looks to save George from ruin.
The Artist is faithful to silent films in so many ways, leading off with title and cast cards in addition to the obligatory dialogue cards. It has so much love for its inspiration, we don't need much convincing to see why Valentin considers a talking film noise pollution. A key scene turns the most mundane of sounds into obnoxious intrusions, interrupting a symphony of music and lighted images.
Silent films forced filmmakers to pay more attention to nuance and gestures, and director Michel Hazanavicius doesn't miss a beat. Neither does Ludovic Bource, who composed the film's soundtrack with all the intensity and emotional pull of original silent films, which were designed to play with your emotions.
I enjoyed the world of The Artist. So many films talk so much and say so little. Here's a film that talks little and speaks volumes.
Going Rate: Worth full price admission
Starring: Jean Dujardin, Bérénice Bejo, John Goodman, James Cromwell
Rated: PG-13
Red Flags: One very brief crude gesture and some potentially disturbing images
It's hard to believe people in the film industry considered "talkies" a passing fad when they arrived in the late 1920's. Motion pictures were works of art, and like their still counterparts, why would anybody on earth want to hear them speak? Oh, but they did. The Artist is a loving and painful tribute to that turning point in movie history where art gave way to innovation and demand.
George Valentin (Dujardin) -- named so we will conjure up the memory of Rudolph Valentino -- is the king of the silent movie swashbucklers in 1927. With the help of his little dog Uggie, he's invincible on the screen and adored off of it, but his home life is suffering. His wife is unhappy with her walk-on role in the marriage, especially when she sees George on the front page of Variety getting a kiss from a mystery girl.
That girl, Peppy Miller (Bejo), idolizes Valentin to the point of sneaking into his dressing room while playing an extra. She shares a dance with him in a wordless sequence of scenes that depicts their blossoming relationship more economically than a Hallmark greeting card. George gives her a valuable piece of advice along with a beauty mark to her face. Miller shoots up the credit list, from extra to star. Is it that fake mole, or is it something else, like hearing her presumably golden voice?
Valentin's career heads in the opposite direction. His studio scraps silent films at the behest of a cigar-smoking topper (Goodman) who can see the future and it talks. George, one of those people who consider silent film an art, sets out to save his career and his own beloved medium while Peppy looks to save George from ruin.
The Artist is faithful to silent films in so many ways, leading off with title and cast cards in addition to the obligatory dialogue cards. It has so much love for its inspiration, we don't need much convincing to see why Valentin considers a talking film noise pollution. A key scene turns the most mundane of sounds into obnoxious intrusions, interrupting a symphony of music and lighted images.
Silent films forced filmmakers to pay more attention to nuance and gestures, and director Michel Hazanavicius doesn't miss a beat. Neither does Ludovic Bource, who composed the film's soundtrack with all the intensity and emotional pull of original silent films, which were designed to play with your emotions.
I enjoyed the world of The Artist. So many films talk so much and say so little. Here's a film that talks little and speaks volumes.
Sunday, January 8, 2012
Reel To Reel: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
It's all in your head.
Going Rate: Worth matinee price
Starring: Gary Oldman, Colin Firth
Rated: R
Red Flags: Some brief language, two violent scenes, and one graphic sex scene shown from a distance
"Watching this movie was like watching paint dry," observed my Queen Mother as we walked out of the theater. But my Royal Father liked it. Your humble servant had mixed feelings. This a movie that deserves a split rating, like grading a figure skating performance: one rating for technical merit, another for artistic impression. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is a superbly made movie about its subject matter. But as such, it's disappointing to audiences fed four decades of James Bond. As a cloak and dagger thriller, it's more cloak than dagger.
The film takes place in 1973, in a slightly warmer Cold War, and British Intelligence is trying to find a Soviet mole high in "the Circus," as spooks call it. An operation to learn the double agent's identity ends bloodily in Budapest, and when that happens, a head has to roll at the top. Mr. Smiley (Oldman) is forced out of the Circus, consigned to a life of mediocre post-spy existance. But the mole is still there.
Smiley's former superiors ask him to conduct an under-the-wire investigation to root out the mole. This is the point where a conventional spy movie would be submersing us in danger and beautiful women at exotic locations. Instead, it takes on more of the feel of a detective novel. We see many shots of Smiley walking and carrying a satchel, walking some more, walking again, and asking a few choice questions of a few spook sources.
We learn this mole may or may not have something to do with a top-secret information clearinghouse designed to milk a particular Soviet source who's thought to be providing a gusher of valuable intelligence -- or is it just well-phrased garbage?
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy ia a psychological thriller in the purest sense of the word, where the action takes place in your brain as you process its endless stream of information and clues trying to figure out what's going on. And yet this film still feels bloated, like something could still be trimmed. No doubt that's due to the involvement of John Le Carre, who serves one of the producers on this adaptation of his novel. You will also hear a lot of praise for Oldman's performance, but it's hard for me to award a laurel to a performance which has only one mode.
I really enjoyed this film's treatment of the 1970's world of intelligence gathering, where people still hacked away at Olympia typewriters and teletypes and used land-line dial phones. Intelligence workers will tell you their jobs are mostly analytical and not exciting. In real life, yes, but most moviegoers will expect something more.
Going Rate: Worth matinee price
Starring: Gary Oldman, Colin Firth
Rated: R
Red Flags: Some brief language, two violent scenes, and one graphic sex scene shown from a distance
"Watching this movie was like watching paint dry," observed my Queen Mother as we walked out of the theater. But my Royal Father liked it. Your humble servant had mixed feelings. This a movie that deserves a split rating, like grading a figure skating performance: one rating for technical merit, another for artistic impression. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is a superbly made movie about its subject matter. But as such, it's disappointing to audiences fed four decades of James Bond. As a cloak and dagger thriller, it's more cloak than dagger.
The film takes place in 1973, in a slightly warmer Cold War, and British Intelligence is trying to find a Soviet mole high in "the Circus," as spooks call it. An operation to learn the double agent's identity ends bloodily in Budapest, and when that happens, a head has to roll at the top. Mr. Smiley (Oldman) is forced out of the Circus, consigned to a life of mediocre post-spy existance. But the mole is still there.
Smiley's former superiors ask him to conduct an under-the-wire investigation to root out the mole. This is the point where a conventional spy movie would be submersing us in danger and beautiful women at exotic locations. Instead, it takes on more of the feel of a detective novel. We see many shots of Smiley walking and carrying a satchel, walking some more, walking again, and asking a few choice questions of a few spook sources.
We learn this mole may or may not have something to do with a top-secret information clearinghouse designed to milk a particular Soviet source who's thought to be providing a gusher of valuable intelligence -- or is it just well-phrased garbage?
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy ia a psychological thriller in the purest sense of the word, where the action takes place in your brain as you process its endless stream of information and clues trying to figure out what's going on. And yet this film still feels bloated, like something could still be trimmed. No doubt that's due to the involvement of John Le Carre, who serves one of the producers on this adaptation of his novel. You will also hear a lot of praise for Oldman's performance, but it's hard for me to award a laurel to a performance which has only one mode.
I really enjoyed this film's treatment of the 1970's world of intelligence gathering, where people still hacked away at Olympia typewriters and teletypes and used land-line dial phones. Intelligence workers will tell you their jobs are mostly analytical and not exciting. In real life, yes, but most moviegoers will expect something more.
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