Art La Flamme

In case you had not heard, I’m on the road today, headed north to Deal’s Gap. Tomorrow, I’ll be driving the Dragon with a bunch of other Minis. Should be good.

So, to honor that glorious event, I decided it was high time to went back and watched The Italian Job again. Yes, the original one.

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How bad can a movie be, if the most redeeming thing it has is a hot leather jumpsuit worn by the heroine?

Bad.

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Oh, how cool would it be to be a Death Dealer? Well, how cool would it be to be able to call yourself a Death Dealer? It’s make for some sweet business cards, I would think, or an eye-catcher on your r?sum?.

Oh, I see that after you worked at Poppa John’s, you were a….. Death Dealer? And what did that involve?

Mainly I collected intelligence on werewolves — we call them Lycan — and when I had a solid target set, I would hunt them down and kill them. It was a general rule of thumb to try and avoid killing humans like yourself, but, well, sometimes… That didn’t always happen.

That’d be a pretty decent way to gloss over the fact that you are, indeed, a vampire yourself.

Anyway, Death Dealers and the Lycan and all that are at the core of Underworld, a 2003 almost-straight-to-DVD movie about Selene, an ?ber-hot vampire and Death Dealer, who’s caught up in the final preparations for a big vampire festival that will, oh, coincidentally coincide with a big push back by the often-hunted, often-killed werewolves.

Selene. Mmmm. Vampire eye candy. Kate Beckinsale — I can forgive her for being in Pearl Harbor, because she was in Underworld and she was in Van Helsing, another vampire / vampire hunter movie. Shoot, it could be a whole week of her and vampires.

Dark, brooding, with black hair that covers her eyes often. And a propensity to wear leather. All leather. Mmmm, and that British or almost British accent. And the guns, and the fighting. Yaba daba doo.

So, as the movie opens, the vampires rule the shadow world. Long ago — six centuries ago — the vampires killed off the last great werewolf leader (Lucian), and they’ve spent the intervening years hunting the werewolves to near extinction.

But now we learn that something is a foot. New werewolves — strong ones — have emerged, and they don’t need the moon to change, and can in fact change at will. And they come out all the time.

Selene figured out that they are stalking a human, so she intervenes and steals him away. She doesn’t know why the werewolves are after him, but their interest in the human is enough to get her attention.

The human, Michael Corvin, is not just any human. Utlimately, he proves to be a descendant of Alexander Corvinus, who fathered the twins who created the vampires line and the werewolf line. Michael possesses the rare genetic make up for immortality that Alexander Corvinus has, which would make his a great ally for either the vampires or the werewolves.

The werewolves manage to score the first bite, but Selene strikes back later and bites him, too. And with good timing — there’s a long running conspiracy between Kraven (head vampire) and Lucian (head werewolf, thought to be dead), to conceal Lucian’s death. In killing Lucian, Kraven had gained enormously within the vampire community, rising to power with proof that he had killed Lucian all this years ago, and Lucian has been able to go underground and regroup / rebuild the werewolves.

The movie ends, well, setting up a sequel. Which there is. Which I’ll probably watch tomorrow night.

This is a perfect DVD rental. Who doesn’t love vampires and werewolves, especially when they’re civilized and produce their own synthetic blood to survive on?

And who doesn’t love ladies in black leather?

The story is pretty good. It’s original, and well told, and captivating. And dark, and rainy, and full of gadgets and neat toys and stuff. It’s no Driving Miss Daisy, it’s no Fried Green Tomatoes, and it’s not a date movie. It’s an OK movie to see with your spouse, I think.

How sad is my life?

I can watch a decent vampire movie and think only how it compares to US Army doctrine for fighting an insurgency.

30 Days of Night came out last year, and came out on DVD this year. It’s yet another movie based on yet another graphic novel, like Wanted, like 300, like everything else.

Barrow, Alaska is our most northern city, and in this fictional account of life in this small town, the 500 people there mostly leave for the 30 days a year when it’s all but dark all the time.

On that last day, as most are trying to get onto that list flight out of town, a strange arrives by boat. And starts to cause problems. Kills the dogs, sabotages the phone network, and just poses a general menace.

And right after that, the vampires arrive. And they are a mean bunch.

Now, I don’t know how much you know about vampires, but, well, they vary a bunch. One main tenant of being a vampire seems to be that if you’re a vampire, you drink the blood of your victims to survive. The blood is their food, and given their hyper metabolism, I’ve always guessed that they need a bunch of it.

But in this movie — wow, they’re not in it for the nutritional value. For all the killing they’re doing, on what is a finite number of people in this sleepy down, you’d think they’d put heroic effort into getting all the blood they can from each victim. Eventually, it turns into siege warfare.

I could tell you more, but really, it’s a vampire movie. And really, it’s an insurgency. No one fights clean, and everyone is fighting to win. There are no masses of soldiers in formation, standing off on each side of an open field ready to fight, out of the way of the civilians and in some sort of noble manner.

No, none of that. Just lots of blood spilled, spilled on the white, white snow.

As vampire movies go, this one is OK. Middle of the road. On a scale of 1 to 10, it’s a 6. But it’s new, and it’s pretty well made. I guess I’d rather watch a decent new vampire movie than a better old one.

If you need to see a vampire movie, sure, see this one. But if you don’t need a vampire movie, well, skip it.

Though the little girl vampire is a nice change.

Unicorns. Bigfoot. A keg. A teen-age girl living next door who likes to sunbath topless.

And Death Race 2000 on VHS.

These are the mythical creatures from when I entered my teenage years. I had about as much of a chance of finding any of the first four, as I had of finding a copy of Death Race. There was no Amazon, no Blockbuster, no torrents, no Napster. Movies on video tape where prohibitively expensive, and just blank videotapes themselves cost an arm and a leg.

But when I was about 14, I found out that a friend of a friend had a copy. He’d taped it from cable television!

So, about ten years after it first played in the theaters, I got to see it. On, like, a Saturday afternoon or something. I’d gone to my friends house, and we’d gone to his friend’s house, and we got to watch it there.

There’s a certain lore that goes with the original movie. Specifically, it’s where our culture gets the notion of hitting and killing pedestrians, and getting points based on their age and gender and density (1 or a whole group). The premise was that America had collapsed, and this transcontinental race was symbolic of both the new America and the fascist stare that existed. It was a mix of violence and satire.

And it was nothing like anything I had ever seen. Seeing it that day was indeed like seeing a teen-age girl living next door who likes to sunbath topless.

So, you’ll understand why I’ve been waiting to see her again.

And I have to say, I was not disappointed. She’s still as beautiful as ever.

Now, I should add just a couple of more nuggets about the differences between the old film and this new one. The old one two interesting stars — David Carradine as Frankenstein, and Sylvester Stallone as Machine Gun Joe. Yep. Mr. Kung Fu himself, and Rambo (pre-Rocky), both in this classic B film. Can it get any better?

This one is a bit higher quality film, if it can be called even that. Jason Statham plays Frankenstein this time, with Tyrese playing a now-gay Machine Gun Joe (which really didn’t do anything for the plot). Our main hero ends up being Joan Allen, who runs the prison — yes, Joan Allen from the Bourne movies.

It’s still set in a collapsed and failed America, but in 2012 it is one wherein large corporations have stepped in to provide the capabilities previously filled by the US Government. One thing they have done is taken over the operation of the prisons.

Is that important? Well, not really. It just sets the stage for why they’re racing around a fortified island, and why their fates are tied to the outcome of the race, why the warden has domination of them, etc. Blah, blah, blah.

But it should be at least interesting. How’s America’s economy these days? How’s the dollar? In the older Death Race film, the US economy had crashed and with that, the US had ended. In this one, the economy has crashed but the US limps on, only through the fascist changes to society and the increased role of private business in the operation of the nation.

But with that has also come one other interesting thing — the security state that America is today, becomes even more severe. Security is still the growth industry that it is today. Really, things only get worse. It makes me wonder some what really would happen if our economy were to tank — what would it take to break our country?

And what would that do to Survivor and all of the other reality TV shows? You’d end up with this, I suspect.

Anyway, enough of all that. This movie is built around four things: Ames trying to get revenge for the death of his wife / being framed; the race itself; his relationship with his navigator; and his relationship with Machine Gun Joe (and no, they are not gay lovers).

The revenge storyline works itself out pretty well. He finds out who is behind it, and is able to exact revenge. He seems OK with it, and the revenge killing itself fits well into the rest of the movie. It actually supports the progress of the race fairly well.

It might seem outside the scope of the possible, that a prison warden could send an assassination crew out to frame a race car driver for murder, to get the driver into their prison in time for a race. OK, it does sound a little far fetched. But in a police state, especially in a post-collapse America favoring businesses, the killing could probably happen. Maybe not as they show it here, but really, when there are other entities besides the government that have extra-judicial powers, well, abuse happens. I don’t care if it’s Haliburton or military death squads, it can happen.

The race itself is pretty good. I was worried that the race would be the main effort of this film, a movie to showcase all of the different cars and drivers and guns and explosions and crashed and deaths. But it’s just a part of it, and there’s a fine balance to it. It’ll make a fine video game here in a couple of months, I am sure.

What I don’t like is the apparent parity in the racing capabilities of the many cars. The hooped up Mustang, with massive horsepower and nitrous, runs as fast as a big-ass pick up truck loaded to bear with ammo and armor. I just don’t see the parity there.

And as the laps pass, and the ammo is expended and the brass ejected, and even as the heavy armor drops or is dropped from the car, the performance of the cars (maybe not the truck) should only increase. Lose the weight, and those differences in horsepower should shine through, like night and day. Lose the weight, and yo should be off like a rocket.

After that, though, there are just two other minor themes to the movie: Ames / Frankenstein and his driver, and Frankenstein / Machine Gun Joe. Both of which support the plot well enough, and both of which help to carry along the film.

So, yeah. It’s worth the $7 I paid to see it. Probably not worth owning on DVD, unless, of course, it comes packaged with the original movie and it’s a gift from the teenage girl next door.

My friend’s dad use to say that government employees would rise to the level of their proficiency, and then get promoted one more time, right smack into incompetence.

The same can be said for this movie series.

Gone too far. Pushed their luck. Cashed in. Jumped the shark.

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Oh, yuck.

From the very get go, this movie has a yuckie factor that will have you pulling your chairs up onto your seats.

Ripley is back. Bishop is back. And the alien is back.

Did I say that Aliens are just like Alien, only different?

Shoot, I said that too soon. Alien? is just like Aliens, only different. Here’s now.

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If Alien scared the snot out of you, well, Aliens will… well, it probably won’t.

Aliens. A sequel. And in so many ways, it’s not.

Alien was science fiction. Well, a combination of science fiction and horror. And when it was released, it not only scared the snot out of bajillions of people like me, it also created or at least helped create a whole new flavor of movie. There hadn’t been anything like it, but there’s been plenty like Alien since then.

Same for Aliens, only it ushered in significant changes to American perception of action films and science fiction, and created the fusion of the two. Rambo in space, when that happens, will be a direct descendant of this (and will likely be horrible, too).

This movie is as awesome as the first, and it s as different as can be. There really are only three things in common between these two movies: Ripley, the moon, and the species of Alien. But that’s OK — the story and the directing make up for that.

James Cameron, coming fresh from his success with Terminator, directed this. Ripley, our intrepid hero, survived. She was unfortunately, adrift in space for 57 years. When reunited with civilization, everything she knew from before has come and gone — to include her daughter, who died of old age.

And about her daughter. I’m watching the “special edition” of the movie, and it has extra scenes that are “must see,” I think. It’s how we come to understand that everything from Ripley’s world is gone, and we better understand why she thinks she has nothing to lose be going back to the planet. It’s also where we see Newt and her family, and their discovery of the alien ship, her father getting face sucked (I think that’s the technical term, and we understand how this whole mess gets started — again.

The planet, LV-426, has seen been colonized by terra-formers, folks who have gone there to establish an atmosphere and to make the planet livable to humans. All of this is being done by Weyland-Yutani Corporation, a private firms that has its hands in just about everything and a private firms that, we’ll see, is not above putting business interests before the interests of others.

But as I mentioned, all does not go well. The company loses contact with the folks on the planet, and with Marines in hand, they come calling for Ripley. Will she go back, with the Marines and the company, to see what’s going on? At first, she’s opposed to the idea. But eventually she realizes that she needs to go. She has to go. She needs to know that the one creature from before, the one she blew out of the hatch, was indeed just the one.

Which seems fair, if you ask me. Face her demon, and feel better about it afterward.

She does, though, insist on one thing from Burke, her company contact (played by Paul Reiser, later to be made famous on TV in Mad About You). The one thing? They’re going out there to kill it if they find it, not to bring it back like Ash wanted to do in the first movie.

The band of Marines are a hoot. The represent the whole gamut of military types, from the entirely inexperienced, to the goofballs (Bill Paxton nails the performance), to the gung-ho killers. Oh, to another android, this time played by a new, more advanced model, Lance Henriksen.

Of them all, though, without a doubt my favorite in Gunnery Sergeant Apone, played by Al Matthews. As the senior NCO, he’s the mother hen that looks after everyone, and he’s the guy who looks to make sure that the mission will succeed, especially in light of their weak leadership. Al Matthews, a decorated Marine who served in Vietnam, carries the role very well, and has some awesome lines that, if I had to bet, would improvised.

One of the awesome things about this film is all of their gear. Their weapons are functional — and I don’t mean their use in the story, I mean they really fire blanks. And their vehicle? Awesome. Just awesome. The drop ship is an excellent interpretation of a combat helicopter, and isn’t anything beyond what you might actually expect to run into in combat in our semi-near future. Watching them drop out of orbit looks as exciting as jumping out of an airplane.

But once they get there, well, it all goes to hell in a hand basket. In Alien, there was one alien and its fight was with a shuttle crew. In this movie, there are gobs and gobs or aliens — gobs! — and the fight is with a squad of Marines. In the first movie, there were maybe a half dozen or so humans that could die, and one alien. Much bigger potential body count in this movie.

And much bigger actual body account in this movie.

I guess I should say something about Newt. She’s a kid, she’s pretty well traumatized, and she’s pretty much going to have issues for the rest of her life. She’s survived by adapting to the world around her, a world that she has from one dominated by humans to one dominated by the aliens. She lives in secret and on her own, and she’s hesitant to interact with another group of humans (the Marines) who arrive, because she’s pretty sure they’re going to be killed, too.

The movie has all of the level of suspense that the first movie had, with an awesome addition of the action from the Marines / aliens fight. One of my favorite scenes is when the Marines realize that they aren’t thinking in 3D, that there’s battlespace above and below them that they, Newt, and the aliens can all use.

The other thing I love is the relationship Ripley builds with Newt. Newt trusts no one, and does not want to connect with any of them because she knows they’re all going to be dead. But for Ripley, it’s a chance for her to get over the loss of her daughter. This really only comes out if you see the special edition of the film, because a lot of that got cut for the theatrical version. Watching them lets us see Ripley’s struggle with her own motherhood, and her own loss of her daughter. She might have lost her own daughter, but she’s not going to lose Newt.

Oh, and I love the visuals. In settling into the place, the aliens went to town redecorating, Giger style. This movie has the same visual styling as the first one, it just doesn’t play as much of a role. It’s so much prettier, the sterile nuclear plant, after the aliens have had a chance to pretty things up some.

There’s one more thing worth mentioning. In this movie, we get to see mother. and we are introduced to what becomes one of the main themes for the other movies — for love of mother. When that first burst of flames is fired, down below the cooling tanks, the aliens come out of the woodwork and go on the offensive. They’re doing what they have to, to protect Momma. She’s their queen bee. Tie that in with Ripley and Newt, and it’s the start of the Mother, Mother, Mother theme.

I can watch this movie every six months or so. When I’m feeling all Army and stuff, I can watch it a lot more often. When you next watch Alien, make time to watch this one soon afterward.

(PS — it’s also two and a half hours long. So, prepare yourself.)

Back when I was starting my “Summer of a Hundred Movies” project, I watched Alien vs. Predator and Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem.

No, I was not smoking a lot of dope back then. I was watching some of those movies I’d just not watch at home with the wife or kids. And really, that list of “Movies I’d Never Watch In the Presence of Another Human Being” has Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem at #6 (Howard the Duck is #1, and Xanadu is #2, if you’re really curious).

As i was making my way through the Star Wars series, I was toying with what to watch next. Some action flicks, like Transformers, the Transporter films, or Jet Li? Or old Samuri flicks, on which some of the characters from Star Wars are based (like C3PO and R2D2)?

What I decided on is the Alien box set. I bought it a few years ago, have seen Alien and Aliens a couple of times since then, and only once did I watch them all – 1 to 4 — back to back.

If my views of Star Wars could change so much seeing it now, would Aliens be any different?

I suspect the answer will be yes. So, here we go: Alien.

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After watching all of the other movies over this past week, Return of the Jedi is such a disappointment.

Easily, of the six movies, this is the lamest. And it’s lame for so many reasons.

1. The Ewoks. Seriously, who wants teddy bears with lips? Not me. The only thing of any value that came out of the whole Ewok thing was the brief scene with Luke and Leia talking, and realizing that they are indeed siblings.

2. A second Death Star? What’s that going to cost? No wonder the Emperor has no interest in resolving the dispute over the trade route taxes — he obviously needs the extra taxes to pay for all these damn Death Stars. And they build the Death Star while in orbit around a planet — you’d figure that the planet would be a giant steel factory. Or is the Death Star made from wood harvested from the Ewok forest?

3. How long does it take to build a new Death Star? Why is their no scaffolding? If there are unions involved, well, I’m sure it’ll take billions of years to finish and the mob is involved.

But really, the big kickers are this:

The Emperor and Darth Vader both want to turn Luke to “the Dark Side.” And we’re suppose to assume that this means that he’d become a Sith. But wait — there can only be two Sith at any given time. Does the Emperor plan to replace Darth Vader with his son, or does Vader plan to kill off the Emperor? Or are they both so stupid that they don’t think the other one remembers the whole “Rule of 2″ regarding the Sith?

The Rebels, after all these years, have figured out that the Emperor is the Center of Gravity for the Empire – kill him / take him out of the power, and they can finally affect change within the Galaxy. To which I can pretty much only say, “No shit, Sherlock.”

If there is any redeeming value to this film, it’s Leia and her bikini of yumminess. Watching her in that outfit, choking the snot out of Jabba the Hut, was better that watching “professional” women’s wrestling.

I’m glad I had a chance to rewatch these. After all these years, and all this time in the military, I see them in a whole new light. What was good, isn’t, and what was bad, well, is just less bad.

Best: Darth Vader / Anakin Skywalker, and then Padm? Amidala.

Worst: Jar Jar Binks, and then the Ewoks.

What I learned: The Jedi Knights are either just plain dangerous, or living in a world of denial. Oh, and that The Force is a bunch of poppycock.

What I already knew: It’s really not much of a rebellion.

Favorite pet peeve: R2D2 is the common thread throughout this entire series, yet he recognizes no one.

I don’t know why anyone else would undertake watching all six of these in order, like I just did. I hope these notes, and the ideas I presented in them, make it a different experience. I doubt we’ll get a series like this any time soon.

When this movie came out, it was dogged. The critics went to town on it, really beating it up. Why? Lots of reasons.

* It suffers the same fate as that other great cinematic achievement, Back to the Future II, in that it’s a bridging film. It has no real beginning, and no real end. it just is.

* The storyline is a lot more complicated and advanced that Star Wars IV, with deep emotional and intellectual issues. It’s no Western, that’s for sure.

I’ll admit — when this movie came out, I was underwhelmed, if you can be that as a pre-teen. Really, I liked the fighting on Hoth, which was totally cool, but the rest of it — all of the grown up crap — just had me wanting the next movie to be released so we could get back to the adventure stories. (and — my God! — those were a long three years waiting for the next movie!)

But now that all of the movies are out, and we all have the chance to watch the story unfold from the beginning, I think I’m not alone in saying that this may well be the best of the six. It’s only real competition is from III — that whole “turning to the dark side” / Anakin choosing to side with the Chancellor and the Republic when the Jedi Knights try to stage a coup d’?tat. While III has the more complex internal struggle issues of Anakin, this is a complex study of interpersonal relationships.

Also, watching the movie changes so much now that 1-3 are out. Vader is his father? No surprise there, though it was a HUGE deal back in 1980. Vader is actually human? Well, duh — we saw him suit up in his rig in Star Wars III. Luke and Leia are twins brother / sister? Uh huh, yeah, we know.

Of these, though, the biggest change in perception is with the whole Vader / Luke dynamic, and what this does to the movie. In 1980, it was the mega shocker of the year, a plot twist that put The Crying Game to shame. Now that we’re past all of that, the revelation really ties into a key element of the film, and helps to define the road ahead for both Vader and Skywalker.

And while this movie also makes great advances in the character development of the 4-6 folks — Luke, Leia, Han, etc — it’s also, as I see it, the turning point for the Empire. Sure, the Death Star was blown up — big deal. They obviously got over that. But by the time we get to this movie, the Emperor has done nothing to resolve the issues that caused the conflict in the first place. All those issues remain unresolved. The Empire is no better than the Republic.

And yes, I realize that I probably sound like a broken record, spouting off Army doctrine, and “counterinsurgency” this and “counterinsurgency” that. But hey — that stuff is important today, and both understanding it and applying it are important things. So, bear with me — it’s important.

But for all of the fun and games of watching the Emperor struggle with leadership and civic duty, with war and peace and conflict and unruly systems, it’s a lot more fun to watch Han and Leia in this movie. Yeah, yeah, yeah — I’m a big softy, and I get a kick out of their back and forth banter. They are, at times — a lot of times — worst than high schoolers. And it doesn’t hurt that Leia is pretty damn cute in this film (and so is R2D2). It’s a good chuckle seeing Leia kiss Luke, to spite Han — back in 1980, we didn’t know they were twins. Now, though, it’s either comical or, well, creepy.

I wish we got more of Leia’s story. From the looks of it, she’s got some of the same issues her mother has.

It’s an honest film, not trying to be a marketing tool first and a movie second. There’s no Jar Jar in here, no Ewoks. And frankly, that’s refreshing. Before 1-3 came out, I shunned this movie; now I look forward to seeing it.

(and when they run into Yoda, shouldn’t R2D2 recognize him?

A couple of observations, and then a couple of more serious topics.

Really early on, one of the storm troopers says to set their gun things to “stun” and then he blasts Leia. So, if “stun” is an option, why isn’t that used more often? Stun some rebels, take them to the cell and waterboard them later, right? Stun would be awesome.

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[UPDATE: Michelle re-posted her review of STIII -- it's worth a read, here.]

In case you have not noticed, I am much more of a concept guy than I am a fact guy. I am most comfortable arguing about ideas and big, broad concepts that I am about specific facts, mainly because I have no mental capacity to remember exact facts.

Which should explain why there are two additional things from Phantom Menace that I need to add. Both came to me as I was trying to go to sleep this morning. And by “this morning” I mean, yes, this morning, as watching that movie and birthing that giant blogstrocity last night went well past midnight.

1. Padm? Amidala is a dirty old man. A cradle robber. “Born in a mountain village on Naboo 46 years before the events of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope” (here) which means that she was, well, 14 when Phantom Menace takes places (and when Anakin Skywalker is found, freed, and, oh, yeah, nice years old). I have problems with this — she’s the elected queen of the planet at age 14? Fine – I’ll assume that the nerds of the Galaxy are right about that. Still, though — the Queen and later as the Senator / Ex-Queen, she’s getting all hot and heavy in secret with a guy 5 years younger than her. Whooooo, scandal! OK, not really — It’s ten years later, when she’s supposedly 24 and he’s 19, that they get busy and make babies. I just find it hard to believe that she’s suppose to be 14 during Phantom Menace.

You know, maybe part of her attraction to little Anakin later is that she just hasn’t had time to be herself, and he’s the first guy around her that pursues her. Before this, she did her long stint as the Queen, and was more or less untouchable and outside the societal norms. And even later, as she emerges as a Senator, little has changed for her. Too smart, too powerful, too perfect. My dad, when I was heading off to college, told me to ask out the incredible women around campus. The insanely popular ones. The amazingly beautiful ones. He had learned in college (he claimed) that they didn’t go out much, because everyone held that view and because of that, few asked them out. While my dad could have been totally off his rocker, his observation at least appears to have some bearing on Queen Hottie and her reaction to young Anakin as a suitor.

But as the movie rolls on, I wonder more and more how or why they would be together. Granted, I do not claim to understand the affairs of the heart — my master’s degree is in applied violence, not the touchy-feely stuff. But still — she’s about democracy, he’s about totalitarianism. She’s for the people, he’s for relying on the best to look after the rest. She’s about talking, he’s about “aggressive negotiations” and “negotiations with a light saber”. She’s mature and logical and responsible, and he blames everyone else for everything.

2. What’s up with this Trade Franchise thing? Late in the movie, when the war seems to be won by the locals, that Queen Amidala tells the Viceroy that he will likely loose his Trade Franchise. That really was bugging me last night — what the hell is that? So, I sank some time over lunch today to try and figure it out. I’m still nt sure, but I think I found a decent explanation here.

Although a corporation cannot have a senator in real life, suppose corporations could purchase cities or states? If Microsoft somehow made a deal with the American federal government to have local control of Washington State without seceding, would it not merit senate representation? Similarly, the Trade Federation must have acquired some territories above and beyond its originating homeworld, to warrant representation as a distinct body in the Senate as opposed to being a mere special interest indirectly represented by the Neimoidian senator. This would explain the “trade franchise”. It is highly unlikely that a species or planetary government would require a license to conduct trade- that sort of thing is generally considered a sovereign right. California does not need a license to trade with Nevada. However, it is likely that corporations would need licenses- in fact, real life corporations need various types of licenses to do business. We can therefore confidently conclude that the Trade Federation must be a corporation, but one which is so large that it completely controls enough territory to be regarded as a separate entity, worthy of direct representation in the Galactic Senate.

I can live with that description.

Anyway, on to the Attack of the Clones.

And if you suffered through my long piece last night about Stars Wars 1: The Phantom Menace, here, have a cookie. It goes perfectly with the end of the movie, when the clone Army is formed up before the Supreme Chancellor, and is heading out into space. Fleet week, indeed.

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I haven’t even made it through the opening scrolling text things, and already I have the movie paused. Something just isn’t right.

A long time ago, in a galaxy far away….

Turmoil has engulfed the Galactic Republic. The taxation of trade routes to outlying star systems is in dispute.

Hoping to resolve the matter with a blockage of deadly battleships, the greedy Trade Federation has stopped all shipping to the small planet of Naboo.

While the Congress of the Republic endlessly debates this alarming chain of events, the Supreme Chancellor has secretly dispatched two Jedi Knights, the guardians of peace and justice in the galaxy, to settle the conflict.

Whoa, whoa, WHOA. Are you freakin’ kidding me? If I have to keep pausing this thing in order to write loooog things, it’s going to take all weekend to watch this movie.

OK, let’s start with the easy ones.

1. “The taxation of trade routes to outlying star systems is in dispute.” Hmm. Where have we heard that one? That happens all the time in the US — people don’t like the taxes, or how they are implemented, or their rate of taxation, or whatever. Sometimes, the people get all crazy from the heat and do things like throw tea in the harbor, when they don’t like the taxation and what it brings them in the form of representative government. Opinions on taxation are a lot like asshole — everyone’s got one, and generally speaking, you should keep your to yourself, but if yours is giving you angst or discomfort, you probably need to go see someone about it — a doctor, a congressman, even the Supreme Chancellor.

Do you need to go get a beer or something? Use the bathroom? Because, as Theron says in 300, “This will not be over quickly.”

(more…)

Don’t mock me.

This movie is like mashed potatoes for me. It’s total comfort food. See if you can follow along:

It’s got John Landis directing. Same guy who directed Blues Brothers. Ditto for Animal House. The list keeps on going from there. The script for this is great, and Landis does a great job bringing it to life.

It’s got Dan Aykroyd and Chevy Chase working as a team. And Spies Like Us was made back in ’85, back when they were at the height of their game. They are top performers in this. It’s not laugh-so-hard-you-can’t-breath kind of funny; it’s on par with Stripes.

Add to that the timeframe for this film, and you’ve got magic. It’s classic 80′s cold war, Reagan war mongering. It’s chock full of Soviet fears, Star Wars, and intelligence blunders.

Oh, and Donna Dixon. Hubba, Hubba.

The gist of this story is that the US military / secret cabal has a new space-based laser weapon system that they want to actually test. The plan is to insert two teams — one real, one decoys — into the Soviet Union to grab hold of and launch a nuclear missile at America. The American secret squirrel guys can then test their new toy, save the day, and validate their new toy.

Aykroyd and Chase get sent to Intelligence Operative Training, which is like Satan’s Basic Training program. They get subjected to the worst things the military would ever do to someone — like dragging them behind a boat, radical vertical impact simulation, and putting them in sire resistant suits and hitting them with flamethrowers. Watch this.

The whole thing is filled with one-liners and awesome quotes that, twenty plus years later, still show up in my vernacular. Boys, it’s be a shame to have to kill you now.

There’s a ton of military humor in this that cracks me up, but it’s the intelligence / espionage humor that gets me every time. The humor ranges from the bungling spy jokes, to jokes just about the intelligence profession on the whole. All of that comes out as Aykroyd and Chase make their way through training, on into Pakistan, and across the border into the Soviet Union. I love the collect phone call from Pakistan. Watch this — it’s a classic.

Along the way, they learn the truth — they’re the decoys. They run into the other team – the one with Donna Dixon on it. In coming to terms with their being the decoys, and in seeing Dixon’s partner killed, they realize that they must see the mission through, even if no one expects them to be able to succeed.

The long and the short of it is that they make it into the Soviet Union, they take control of the launcher, and they launch the missile. They realize the seriousness of what they have done, and they jury-rig a way to recall the missile and abort its flight. The secret cabal and American military nuts are exposed, they save the day, and they get the girls.

I saw this in the theater, and I have bought it on DVD a few times – it makes for a great gift. I watch this movie at least once a year, and I use some of these quotes — “Doctor. Doctor. Doctor!” — waaaaaay too often. I love looking for the cameo performances — Frank Oz, BB King, and the like.

And I love Donna Dixon. Hubba hubba.

If the studios released movies onto DVD or Blu-ray at the same time that they came out in the theaters, I’d be telling some of you to just go out and buy this. Tropic Thunder had me on the verge of peeing in my pants. It’s not for everyone, but for the right folks, it kicks ass.

(more…)

My wife will kill me for saying this: It’s 8pm, and I’m almost ready for bed.

The movers arrived today, and are doing day 2 of unloading the stuff into the new house. She’s in it up to her eyeballs, and here I am in Georgia (the state, not the country), sipping a Diet Coke and watching a nude Angelina Jolie do her thing on the small screen.

Can I get a Hooah?

Yeah, I didn’t think so.

Beowulf. Weird movie, weird / classic story. The story is old, the author is unknown. In a nutshell, our hero — that would be Beowulf — kills a monster (Grendel), claims he has killed the monster’s bad-ass momma (that would be the nekkid Angelina, pre-birth of the Brangelina twins), and in the end, one pretty bad-ass dragon. Oh, and along the way he became the king. And, apparently, impotent.

Because, you know, seeing Angelina Jolie naked will apparently do that to you. Little known fact, that one.

And speaking of sterile, it’s true — I have not read the story. Not sure how that happened, either. It just slipped through the cracks. No one ever made me do it at school, and I sure as hell never read it “for fun.” Before tonight, I wouldn’t have been able to tell you squat about the story.

But now…. Well, now I can tell you all kinds of things.

Like how it’s a pretty classic tale. King #1 (played by Anthony Hopkins — who kicks ass) is king because years ago he slayed a dragon. The dragon was also probably his son by Angelina, but hey, that’s a whole separate issue and something probably better left to Freud. He slayed the dragon, was made king, and did a decent job serving as king. Until this Grendel chap showed up. Until Grendel pretty much handed him his ass after having kicked it.

Enter Beowulf. Enter the man of tall tales. Enter the guy who who busts off Grendel’s arm in a nude-o-rama death cage match in the beer hall. Yeah, uh Freud? You wanna weigh in on that one, please?

King Anthony Hopkins dies, leaves it all to this new Beowulf guy. Who chases down the wounded Grendel, to make sure he’s dead. And ends up boinking (technical term) Angelina, Grendel’s mom. So what does he do afterwards? Well, he doesn’t run around telling everyone that he boinked her — he claims instead that he killed her.

Not that he has any actual evidence that he killed her, mind you. He just has a good story. A good story that’s probably best re-told by midget actors. Because really, every good story is best re-told by midget actors.

In the end, that comes back to bite him in the ass. That little roll in the hay produced something — an offspring that, oh yeah, turns out to be a dragon that attacks. He kills it, and loses his own life along the way. Sucks to be him.

And since he, too, has been rendered sterile after boinking Angelina, what does he do? Names his buddy to take the crown after him.

And what does his buddy do? Damn skippy, he wanders out into the water and boinks Angelina.

That Angelina — she’s a classy lady alright.

At first, the quasi-animated format of this movie was kind of freakin’ me out. They filmed the actors, and then fed that film into the old Hal 9000, which then generated computer images of the acting. Weird stuff.

But as the movie carried on, I realized that it was really necessary. There was no other way to really integrate the fantastic portions of the story, to really bring alive the myth. In the end, it works pretty well. Just be ready for it when you watch it — and watch it you should.

Also, some of the performances are fantastic. And no, I am not talking about Nakedgelina Jolie, though she does fine in this. It is awesome to see Robin Wright Penn back on the screen — Buttercup, from The Princess Bride — and she totally overshadows Alison Lohman. John Malkovich and Anthony Hopkins are also great in this, but I think the lead should have been Sean Bean.

It is worth seeing. Not worth buying, but worth seeing. And I would bet — worth reading. May have to look for the text online — it can’t be copyrighted, not if it dates to between the 8th and 10th centuries.

I may be in a rut. There’s this pattern emerging — a see a good movie, and then I see a bad movie.

This is a bad movie.

I did not think it was possible to find a bad Jack Black movie, but I have. Nacho Libre just isn’t a good movie, as much as I want it to be. Never has been, never will be.

OK, Shallow Hal was pretty bad. But it was really bad.

Black plays Ignacio, a monk who loves wrestling and really doesn’t like being a monk. He wants to be a luchador — a great wrestling performer. After a turn of events, he teams up with Steve, aka The Skeleton, to become Nacho, a masked wrestler. As a team, they are horrible, but they do make money just for participating.

And with the money, Ignacio can buy fresh food for his day job as the cook at the orphanage at the monastery. it’s better than nothing, but it’s still not what Ignacio wants out of life. He wants more. He wants to be a famous wrestler and, well, he also wants the nun that has started to teach at the orphanage. He’s in loooooooove.

With time, he wrestles more, they wrestle more, and they fare better.

It’s not all horrible. The midgets are funny. The crazy love life of The Skeleton is pretty funny. And the movie is rich in the culture of Mexico’s wrestling, which is pretty awesome.

But really, you can skip this. If you’re a hard core Jack Black fan, OK, see it. But everyone else — skip it.

I left the room twice today, and the building just once. This school, it’s a pretty monastic life for me.

Well, not that monastic. I have a TV that I don’t watch. I have cable channels that are there, but other than seeing that the Discovery Channel was in fact celebrating Shark Week a while ago (and then not watching any of it), I’ve ignored them.

I do have net access, and I do read it a lot online. I have a massive stack of books — two boxes, each bigger than those in which copier paper is moved around in. I have my laptop, with music and podcasts that I really don’t listen to all that much. And I have the Cylon with me — a whole bunch of movies and TV shows. And, as you know, I am watching one a day (sometimes two, if I know that I need to get ahead in the numbers — ssssssssh, it’s our little secret).

I have heat. And AC. And a bed. And two pillows. And an electric fan. And even a fridge with a freezer. Running water, a sink, a toilet and a bath/shower round out my luxuries.

I sleep, I eat. I read stuff, I write some. Sometimes it’s news, sometimes it’s fiction. Sometimes it’s homework, sometimes it’s crap comments on Twitter. I try to share one meal at day with others from my class, and on a super duper day I will do that twice. But this is really a chance for me to recharge my alone batteries — a nicety, given that I tend to wander a hair over the line into introverted land.

But, that’s just the distance of a hair. I need to be alone to fully recharge, but that’s a “some time” unit of measure, not an “all the time” kind of thing.

Into the Wild is a good movie. Not a great movie. Not a run out and rent it right now kind of movie. Somebody who reads this is going to decide later that it is a movie worth owning and seeing again from time to time. It’s a “move to the front of the Netflix queue” kind of movie. And here’s why.

1. If you are 51% or more of an introvert (hello, MBTI!), I think you’ll dig this movie. Our hero, Alex, decide that, post-college, he needs to be alone. He destroys his ID and credit cards and the like, and gives away or gets rid of his money. And he takes off West. His adventures are awesome, his journey truly neat. For some reason he has Alaska as his goal, to live alone in the wilderness there, and this is what he works for and achieves during the course of the movie. I kept saying, “Oh wow” about every 12 minutes.

2. The imagery is awesome. I know, I know — this always gets my attention. But it’s great in here. There’s a simple scene, early on, about his family. And the imagery used is their eyes. The same message, the same scene, could have been told so many different ways. But the visuals in this movie was wonderful.

3. There is no happy ending. There will be no sequel.

4. It’s long. It’s a good two and a half hours long. No, it’s not some artsy fartsy flick, it’s just that that is how long it takes to tell this tale. Telling a good story really does seem to be more important here than anything else.

5. There’s a great supporting crew. Yes, Emile Hirsch is awesome as Alex Supertramp (I love that name), but it’s folks like Marcia Gay Harden and Catherine Keener. Shoot, even the girl from Denmark had some real talent.

6. Rise (that’s an iTunes link) is a pretty good song. It’s nice to see what it was intended for, because all I’ve had it associated with is that damn cancer commercial they show before movies.

What didn’t I like? He actually reads all the books I think I’m suppose to read. And he seems to understand them. They’re just props for me.