I remember watching Rally 'Round the Flag, Boys! (1958) on tv when I was a kid, at home sick. So I queued it up.
It stars Paul Newman as harried Connecticut suburbanite who can’t get a drink on the club car on the way home. Then his wife, Joanne Woodward, is too busy to pick him up at the station, so his predatory neighbor, Joan Collins, gives him a ride. He gets home and wants a little romance with Woodward, but between the kids and her committee work, she doesn't have any time for him. Just when he has gotten her to agree to take a little time, she gets roped into a new cause - the Army is building a Top Secret installation in their town. So she volunteers to lead the opposition to the installation, and volunteers him to go to Washington to fight the Army.
That's the setup. Busybody housewives on social improvement committees, sexpot neighbors, and the peacetime army. The Army is represented by General Gale Gordon and the captain in charge of the top secret project, Jack Carson (who I always get mixed up with Jack Haley) - two very funny character actors. Directed by classic screwball director Leo McCarey, it should be funny - and there are some great scenes. Newman and Collins having a little get-together that ends with him literally swinging from the chandelier, for instance. Who knew Joan Collins was so good at physical comedy?
But Paul Newman really isn't, at least as far as I can tell. Or maybe it's the mismatch of screwball, 60s sex comedy and comedy of suburban manners that makes it less than completely satisfying.
However, on a personal note, Ms. Spenser (Dr. Spenser, in fact) is a part-time college lecturer, and of course winds up working on it more than full time, to the point where she rarely gets to knock off early on a weekend even. So I got to rib her a lot about her being too busy for romance. But I did not joke about finding my own Joan Collins.
In conclusion, it turns out the movie that I saw on tv when I was a kid was Follow Me, Boys, a Fred MacMurray Disney film, which is more kid appropriate.
Saturday, September 30, 2017
Tuesday, September 26, 2017
Kiss Snatcher
Here's a hardboiled double bill for you: Kiss Me Deadly (1955) and Picture Snatcher (1933).
This was Ms. Beveridge's first look at Kiss. It stars Ralph Meeker, and directed with noir panache by Robert Aldrich. The opening is a real grabber - a bare-foot woman wearing a trenchcoat and probably nothing else (Cloris Leachman) is running down a road at night, trying to flag down cars. She jumps out in front of Mike Hammer's (Meeker) Jaguar, nearly causing a crash. He picks her up, but isn't happy about it. They quarrel, and he drops her off at the bus station. Of course, she turns up dead.
Then everyone else turns up, looking for something she had - Mike's secretary Velda (Maxine Cooper) calls it the Great Whatsit. He searches for it mainly by bumbling around and sometimes beating people up. At some point I was convinced that the whole mystery thing thing didn’t make any sense, but that might just be me. Maybe I was just to busy wallowing in the great LA scenery - especially the scenes set in Bunker Hill, including Angel’s Flight. But the greatest shot in the movie is Meeker in his apartment, next to his modernistic wall-mounted reel-to-reel answering machine, looking out the window at the cars on the freeway. Really says it all.
Then it becomes a sci-fi horror flick, and you know the rest. Wild movie, Aldrich’s best.
As a palate cleanser, let’s go back to the days of the Depression for a James Cagney film, Picture Snatcher (pronounced pitcher-snatcher). Will it be a musical, a comedy, a gangster film? The jaunty music over the credits hints at the first two, but it lies. Cagney is a gangster who wants to go straight when he gets out of jail. He wants to be a reporter, working for Ralph Bellamy, the drunk city editor of a trashy tabloid. Since he has no scruples, he does pretty well. He gets into and out of scrapes with girls, the law, and the managing editor. He is the only reporter to get a picture of a woman getting the electric chair - while the other observers are throwing up, he’s snapping a picture with a camera on his shoe. (This part was based on a true ripped-from-the-headlines story.)
Both movies feature charming, utterly amoral, and self-centered men. It only comes out well in Picture Snatcher. I guess it might have been a comedy after all.
This was Ms. Beveridge's first look at Kiss. It stars Ralph Meeker, and directed with noir panache by Robert Aldrich. The opening is a real grabber - a bare-foot woman wearing a trenchcoat and probably nothing else (Cloris Leachman) is running down a road at night, trying to flag down cars. She jumps out in front of Mike Hammer's (Meeker) Jaguar, nearly causing a crash. He picks her up, but isn't happy about it. They quarrel, and he drops her off at the bus station. Of course, she turns up dead.
Then everyone else turns up, looking for something she had - Mike's secretary Velda (Maxine Cooper) calls it the Great Whatsit. He searches for it mainly by bumbling around and sometimes beating people up. At some point I was convinced that the whole mystery thing thing didn’t make any sense, but that might just be me. Maybe I was just to busy wallowing in the great LA scenery - especially the scenes set in Bunker Hill, including Angel’s Flight. But the greatest shot in the movie is Meeker in his apartment, next to his modernistic wall-mounted reel-to-reel answering machine, looking out the window at the cars on the freeway. Really says it all.
Then it becomes a sci-fi horror flick, and you know the rest. Wild movie, Aldrich’s best.
As a palate cleanser, let’s go back to the days of the Depression for a James Cagney film, Picture Snatcher (pronounced pitcher-snatcher). Will it be a musical, a comedy, a gangster film? The jaunty music over the credits hints at the first two, but it lies. Cagney is a gangster who wants to go straight when he gets out of jail. He wants to be a reporter, working for Ralph Bellamy, the drunk city editor of a trashy tabloid. Since he has no scruples, he does pretty well. He gets into and out of scrapes with girls, the law, and the managing editor. He is the only reporter to get a picture of a woman getting the electric chair - while the other observers are throwing up, he’s snapping a picture with a camera on his shoe. (This part was based on a true ripped-from-the-headlines story.)
Both movies feature charming, utterly amoral, and self-centered men. It only comes out well in Picture Snatcher. I guess it might have been a comedy after all.
Thursday, September 21, 2017
Two Blades
Got an Asian martial arts double-bill for you. First up: Dragon Blade (2015), an East-meets-West drama, with John Cusack as West and Jackie Chan as East. Chan plays a protector of the peace on the Silk Road. He is first seen breaking up a fight between Huns (?) and Indians (?) - which involves him fighting an angry Hun woman, and accidentally grabbing her tits and ripping off her veil. That means they are married - Oh, Jackie!
But his squad is framed for corruption, and they are exiled as slave labor to repair the walls of a city. One day, a Roman legion lead by John Cusack shows up, exhausted, with a blond, blind boy-prince. So Jackie Chan goes out to fight - or to not fight, since he's a peacemaker. After some desultory fighting, Jackie convinces Cusack to drop his sword and they enter the city.
This has to remind you of The Great Wall. It has a number of similar scenes - the sword dropping surrender, the "dance-offs" where each group does a little display of their martial skills. My guess is that this is just China wanting to make international hits, and this is their formula.
Anyway, this gets pretty dark, especially when we're talking about Adrian Brody, who blinded the boy to secure his claim to the Imperial throne. But do you really get from Rome to the kingdom of the Parthians through China?
Once again, this isn't really a great film (too serious?), but I did love the Buddhist message of peace, hope, and friendship.
The Sword Identity (2011) is a different, odder beast. It is about a Chinese coastal city that had a problem with Japanese pirates a generation ago. Things have quieted down now, and the leading five martial arts schools have gotten sloppy and complacent. The town's guards have to use papier-mache armor, because metal is for the Imperial Army. A stranger (Song Yang) comes to town with a new fighting style, a new weapon. By tradition, he has to fight his way past all four schools so that he can set up his own school. But it isn't that simple.
His weapon is kind of cool - a samurai sword about 8-feet long, but - here's the kicker - it only has an edge on the last 2-3 feet, so you can hold it by the middle of the blade and work it like a quarterstaff. Yang's mentor intuited that the samurai technique was based on polework, and set out to combat it.
Once our hero gets chased off by the schools, he hides out with a Romany (Indian?) dancing girl on a houseboat in the canal. He decides to teach her to fight, so he gives her his sword sheath, sits her by the curtained door with the end sticking out and tells her to swing up when she hears someone approach. Then he sneaks out the back. For most of the rest of the movie she demolishes every challenger - and everyone thins it's Yang. They've started calling him the Japanese Pirate, because of his sword.
So, in some senses this is a serious martial arts film. The director, Xiu Haofeng, is a serious martial artist, who was reportedly trying to make his fights more realistic. It is also a "art house" movie, where the camera may drift from the fight to the dead lotus leaves in the canal, and only show you a few of the feet. But it is also very silly - our Japanese Pirate (who is neither) next captures the whole town guard and makes them wade through the canals all night, basically just to tire them out. But he also attacks them with his "Japanese" sword to see if their old tactic of close shield and spear work can defend against the Japanese (if they ever show up). He is happy to find that it is successful, even when used by idiots.
So. there's a little something here for everyone - some realistic (not too flashy) fights, some comedy, some romance.
But his squad is framed for corruption, and they are exiled as slave labor to repair the walls of a city. One day, a Roman legion lead by John Cusack shows up, exhausted, with a blond, blind boy-prince. So Jackie Chan goes out to fight - or to not fight, since he's a peacemaker. After some desultory fighting, Jackie convinces Cusack to drop his sword and they enter the city.
This has to remind you of The Great Wall. It has a number of similar scenes - the sword dropping surrender, the "dance-offs" where each group does a little display of their martial skills. My guess is that this is just China wanting to make international hits, and this is their formula.
Anyway, this gets pretty dark, especially when we're talking about Adrian Brody, who blinded the boy to secure his claim to the Imperial throne. But do you really get from Rome to the kingdom of the Parthians through China?
Once again, this isn't really a great film (too serious?), but I did love the Buddhist message of peace, hope, and friendship.
The Sword Identity (2011) is a different, odder beast. It is about a Chinese coastal city that had a problem with Japanese pirates a generation ago. Things have quieted down now, and the leading five martial arts schools have gotten sloppy and complacent. The town's guards have to use papier-mache armor, because metal is for the Imperial Army. A stranger (Song Yang) comes to town with a new fighting style, a new weapon. By tradition, he has to fight his way past all four schools so that he can set up his own school. But it isn't that simple.
His weapon is kind of cool - a samurai sword about 8-feet long, but - here's the kicker - it only has an edge on the last 2-3 feet, so you can hold it by the middle of the blade and work it like a quarterstaff. Yang's mentor intuited that the samurai technique was based on polework, and set out to combat it.
Once our hero gets chased off by the schools, he hides out with a Romany (Indian?) dancing girl on a houseboat in the canal. He decides to teach her to fight, so he gives her his sword sheath, sits her by the curtained door with the end sticking out and tells her to swing up when she hears someone approach. Then he sneaks out the back. For most of the rest of the movie she demolishes every challenger - and everyone thins it's Yang. They've started calling him the Japanese Pirate, because of his sword.
So, in some senses this is a serious martial arts film. The director, Xiu Haofeng, is a serious martial artist, who was reportedly trying to make his fights more realistic. It is also a "art house" movie, where the camera may drift from the fight to the dead lotus leaves in the canal, and only show you a few of the feet. But it is also very silly - our Japanese Pirate (who is neither) next captures the whole town guard and makes them wade through the canals all night, basically just to tire them out. But he also attacks them with his "Japanese" sword to see if their old tactic of close shield and spear work can defend against the Japanese (if they ever show up). He is happy to find that it is successful, even when used by idiots.
So. there's a little something here for everyone - some realistic (not too flashy) fights, some comedy, some romance.
Monday, September 18, 2017
Station to Station
We have been watching The Middleman (2008) when we have an open space in our queue. It's a short-lived sitcom about an ordinary (but cute) artist who takes a temp job that turns out to be sidekick to secret agent superhero - the Middleman. It's funny and stupid and the characters are kind of sweet and lovable. The Middleman himself (Matt Keesler) is a straight-shooter who drinks nothing stronger than milk and loves Budd Boetticher films.
Which is funny, because we had Comanche Station (1960) all queued up. Directed by Boetticher, this entry has Randolph Scott travelling into Comanche territory to redeem a white woman they are holding hostage. Now this setup is fraught with unspoken psychological depth (see The Searchers). We imagine the woman suffering the Fate Worse than Death at the hands of savages, and wonder if she can live in society after being defiled. Scott mounts the woman, Nancy Gates, on a mule when they ride away - the sterile beast of burden traditionally ridden by celibate priests. But I noticed that she was riding astride, not side-saddle, so maybe I'm making this symbology up. Yeah, probably overthinking.
So they get to Comanche Station to wait for the coach to send Gates home to her husband, when three men come thundering in, pursued by Comanches. With Scott, they run the Comanches off, but Scott recognizes the leader, Claude Akins - he kicked him out of the army for involvement with an Indian massacre. But they are stuck together. Akins has heard of Gates, and knows there is a large reward to bring her home - in fact, he tells Gates that Scott is just after the reward (and impugns the manhood of her husband). But he doesn't tell anyone but his henchmen that the husband will pay for her dead as well as alive, and that will make things easier all around.
The henchmen, by the way, are the fun part of this grim drama. Richard Rust is older and half-wiser. Skip Homeier is the kid who kind of wonders if maybe they are the bad guys.
This was the last of the seven Boetticher/Scott westerns. We still haven't seen a few, including Ride Lonesome, the movie the Middleman wanted to see. But we will.
Which is funny, because we had Comanche Station (1960) all queued up. Directed by Boetticher, this entry has Randolph Scott travelling into Comanche territory to redeem a white woman they are holding hostage. Now this setup is fraught with unspoken psychological depth (see The Searchers). We imagine the woman suffering the Fate Worse than Death at the hands of savages, and wonder if she can live in society after being defiled. Scott mounts the woman, Nancy Gates, on a mule when they ride away - the sterile beast of burden traditionally ridden by celibate priests. But I noticed that she was riding astride, not side-saddle, so maybe I'm making this symbology up. Yeah, probably overthinking.
So they get to Comanche Station to wait for the coach to send Gates home to her husband, when three men come thundering in, pursued by Comanches. With Scott, they run the Comanches off, but Scott recognizes the leader, Claude Akins - he kicked him out of the army for involvement with an Indian massacre. But they are stuck together. Akins has heard of Gates, and knows there is a large reward to bring her home - in fact, he tells Gates that Scott is just after the reward (and impugns the manhood of her husband). But he doesn't tell anyone but his henchmen that the husband will pay for her dead as well as alive, and that will make things easier all around.
The henchmen, by the way, are the fun part of this grim drama. Richard Rust is older and half-wiser. Skip Homeier is the kid who kind of wonders if maybe they are the bad guys.
This was the last of the seven Boetticher/Scott westerns. We still haven't seen a few, including Ride Lonesome, the movie the Middleman wanted to see. But we will.
Saturday, September 16, 2017
Detroit Muscle
I remember going to see Doctor Detroit (1983) at a bar or maybe Chinese restaurant in some small NH/VT city after a long hike, or maybe just because chances for entertainment were few and this bar or restaurant showed movies! But I don't think the timeline works, because our days of hanging out in the Great North Woods were pretty much over by 1983. So where did I see it?
No matter. When the Projection Booth podcast did their take on it, I was intrigued enough to go back to it. Would we get the good or sucky Dan Akroyd?
Akroyd plays Cliff Skridlow, a nerdy Chicago professor. We meet him out for a power walk - a limo full of escorts and their pimp gives him a hard time in passing. The pimp, Smooth Walker (Howard Hesseman) turns out to be in trouble with Mom (Kate Murtagh), the town's crime boss. He comes up with a scheme to blame it all on this uber-tough guy, Dr. Detroit. When he runs into Akroyd again in an Indian restaurant, he has his scapegoat.
The plan is to befriend Akroyd, ply him with booze, women, pot, women, cash, women, then turn the girls over to him and get out of Dodge. And this Hesseman proceeds to do. This is my favorite part - the corruption of the innocent. Like the bar scene in Mad Wednesday, when Harold Lloyd takes his first drink and comes out of his cocoon. He is a nerd, and he stays a nerd even when plied with booze and marijuana, but he gets very goofy and lets his romantic side show. He is, after all, a professor of heroic literature.
Plus, there's the girls:
When Hesseman takes off for Pago Pago, leaving Akroyd to look after the girls, he steps up to the plate. A quick trip to the theater dept costume room, and he is Doctor Detroit, complete with fright wig and metal hand. And we're off to the races.
The last act has Akroyd attending two parties at once: a gala being held by his father, George Furth, the president of Akroyd's college, and the Players Ball, where the Doctor is being made Pimp of the Year. Of course, this situation is a farce classic, and it's played very well.
I had remembered this as second-class Akroyd, and I still feel that way. But after this watch, I'd put it at the top of the second class. It's not often sidesplittingly funny, but it holds together. In some ways, it's like an old Danny Kaye comedy, updated, if that's your thing.
No matter. When the Projection Booth podcast did their take on it, I was intrigued enough to go back to it. Would we get the good or sucky Dan Akroyd?
Akroyd plays Cliff Skridlow, a nerdy Chicago professor. We meet him out for a power walk - a limo full of escorts and their pimp gives him a hard time in passing. The pimp, Smooth Walker (Howard Hesseman) turns out to be in trouble with Mom (Kate Murtagh), the town's crime boss. He comes up with a scheme to blame it all on this uber-tough guy, Dr. Detroit. When he runs into Akroyd again in an Indian restaurant, he has his scapegoat.
The plan is to befriend Akroyd, ply him with booze, women, pot, women, cash, women, then turn the girls over to him and get out of Dodge. And this Hesseman proceeds to do. This is my favorite part - the corruption of the innocent. Like the bar scene in Mad Wednesday, when Harold Lloyd takes his first drink and comes out of his cocoon. He is a nerd, and he stays a nerd even when plied with booze and marijuana, but he gets very goofy and lets his romantic side show. He is, after all, a professor of heroic literature.
Plus, there's the girls:
- Blonde Donna Dixon
- Asian Lydia Lee
- Black Lynn Litfield
- Jewish Fran Drescher
When Hesseman takes off for Pago Pago, leaving Akroyd to look after the girls, he steps up to the plate. A quick trip to the theater dept costume room, and he is Doctor Detroit, complete with fright wig and metal hand. And we're off to the races.
The last act has Akroyd attending two parties at once: a gala being held by his father, George Furth, the president of Akroyd's college, and the Players Ball, where the Doctor is being made Pimp of the Year. Of course, this situation is a farce classic, and it's played very well.
I had remembered this as second-class Akroyd, and I still feel that way. But after this watch, I'd put it at the top of the second class. It's not often sidesplittingly funny, but it holds together. In some ways, it's like an old Danny Kaye comedy, updated, if that's your thing.
Friday, September 8, 2017
Kaneda! Tetsuo!
I was inspired to watch Akira (1988) by the Projection Booth podcast. Their thesis was, basically, the Japanese had too much money in the 80s, so they made this ridiculously expensive and well-crafted anime. Because there was no way to make their money back in Japan, they sold it internationally. People were blown away by the quality, and that started the international anime craze.
Also, we felt bad about watching live-action Ghost in the Shell without much anime background.
It is set in Neo-Tokyo, some years after something blow a huge crater in the center of town, igniting world war. Then, it's 17 years later and we are hanging out with a teen motorcycle gang - in particular, Kaneda, a leader-type with a very futuristic bike and his kid brother, Tetsuo. You will remember these names, because they get shouted about 1,000 times in the movie.
In the middle of their highway rumble with the clown gang, a gnomish child shows up, pursued by the government. The movie is pretty stingy with the info, but the kid is one of a small group of high-powered espers, being held in government custody because one of them, Akira, caused that explosion at the start of the movie. And it turns out that Tetsuo is one of them.
Kaneda meets a cute girl who is part of the anti-government resistance, and joins up with their cause. Meanwhile, Tetsuo is getting mad, and when he gets mad, rocks start to fall upward, buildings come apart, etc.
This was a great looking anime, although not so different from other, cheaper productions. Sure, there weren't as zoom shots on a static picture with speed lines, but there might have been some. The story was pretty intense, and surprisingly few (if any) likable characters.
In conclusion, we aren't really sold on anime in general (still have our faves, of course). But we will watch the Ghost in the Shell anime.
Also, we felt bad about watching live-action Ghost in the Shell without much anime background.
It is set in Neo-Tokyo, some years after something blow a huge crater in the center of town, igniting world war. Then, it's 17 years later and we are hanging out with a teen motorcycle gang - in particular, Kaneda, a leader-type with a very futuristic bike and his kid brother, Tetsuo. You will remember these names, because they get shouted about 1,000 times in the movie.
In the middle of their highway rumble with the clown gang, a gnomish child shows up, pursued by the government. The movie is pretty stingy with the info, but the kid is one of a small group of high-powered espers, being held in government custody because one of them, Akira, caused that explosion at the start of the movie. And it turns out that Tetsuo is one of them.
Kaneda meets a cute girl who is part of the anti-government resistance, and joins up with their cause. Meanwhile, Tetsuo is getting mad, and when he gets mad, rocks start to fall upward, buildings come apart, etc.
This was a great looking anime, although not so different from other, cheaper productions. Sure, there weren't as zoom shots on a static picture with speed lines, but there might have been some. The story was pretty intense, and surprisingly few (if any) likable characters.
In conclusion, we aren't really sold on anime in general (still have our faves, of course). But we will watch the Ghost in the Shell anime.
Tuesday, September 5, 2017
Fool Me Once
King Arthur: Excalibur Rising (2017) is not the new Guy Ritchie King Arthur movie. It's a stupid copy, with a title designed to trick you. Well it tricked me. And since the Ritchie movie (KA: Legend of the Sword) is supposed to be bad, I didn't notice the deception until it was over.
There isn't even any King Arthur in this movie! They call him Arth-Yr, and he gets killed right off. The rest of the movie is about his bastard son (Adam Byard) who didn't know who his father was - and I don't think we find out who his mother was. But when some watery tart starts distributing cutlery, you know who gets picked.
His opponents are Mordred and Morgana (Nicola Stuart-Hill), who have some sort of virgin sacrifice running gag. Just to be fair, I kind of liked Stuart-Hill's look as the witch - a no-makeup Goth look, very plain and sort of practical-scary.
So, crappy movie, and not in fun way. Now I don't even want to see the Guy Ritchie.
There isn't even any King Arthur in this movie! They call him Arth-Yr, and he gets killed right off. The rest of the movie is about his bastard son (Adam Byard) who didn't know who his father was - and I don't think we find out who his mother was. But when some watery tart starts distributing cutlery, you know who gets picked.
His opponents are Mordred and Morgana (Nicola Stuart-Hill), who have some sort of virgin sacrifice running gag. Just to be fair, I kind of liked Stuart-Hill's look as the witch - a no-makeup Goth look, very plain and sort of practical-scary.
So, crappy movie, and not in fun way. Now I don't even want to see the Guy Ritchie.
Monday, September 4, 2017
Shell Game
Even though we lived in Japan for 2-3 years, I'll admit we aren't as up on manga/anime as some. So, we wound up watching the live Ghost in the Shell (2017) without having read the manga, seen the anime or even the TV show. So, sue us.
It famously stars Scarlett Johansson as Major, a cyborg with no memory of her life before she had her body replaced by mechanics. She lives in a futuristic city of skyscrapers and giant holographic billboards (often huge grandmother types, giving the city a homey feel). She works in a militarized police unit under Beat Takeshi (Zatoichi, Johnny Mnemonic). Her fighting style is to strip to her shell (no skin, she's a cyborg) and leap off the nearest tall building. She lands fully camouflaged and firing.
In the first fight, she is up against robot geishas who have had their minds taken over by hackers - cyberterrorists. This will be the major conflict in the story, but it's really about Major's past. Who was she before her body, and even her brain, were rebuilt?
Of course, there was a bit of a scandal (kerfuffle, really) about casting Johansson in an Asian role. Now, since all SF movies are required to star Scarlett Johansson, this is just silly. Besides, we always felt that manga character designs tend to look vaguely Euro, and Johansson seems to pull off a very anime style of movement, somehow. Besides, she is a complete rebuild. Who knows what she looked like before she got her shell.
When the movie reveals that, it does it with a good deal more sensitivity then we expected. The whole cyborg-human identity crisis story line is done well - it doesn't hit you over the head, but isn't obscure or hard to follow. But that's not the best part.
The best part is visual. This is pure eye candy. It pays homage to Bladerunner, or at least shares influences. Very cyberpunk, very lovely.
It famously stars Scarlett Johansson as Major, a cyborg with no memory of her life before she had her body replaced by mechanics. She lives in a futuristic city of skyscrapers and giant holographic billboards (often huge grandmother types, giving the city a homey feel). She works in a militarized police unit under Beat Takeshi (Zatoichi, Johnny Mnemonic). Her fighting style is to strip to her shell (no skin, she's a cyborg) and leap off the nearest tall building. She lands fully camouflaged and firing.
In the first fight, she is up against robot geishas who have had their minds taken over by hackers - cyberterrorists. This will be the major conflict in the story, but it's really about Major's past. Who was she before her body, and even her brain, were rebuilt?
Of course, there was a bit of a scandal (kerfuffle, really) about casting Johansson in an Asian role. Now, since all SF movies are required to star Scarlett Johansson, this is just silly. Besides, we always felt that manga character designs tend to look vaguely Euro, and Johansson seems to pull off a very anime style of movement, somehow. Besides, she is a complete rebuild. Who knows what she looked like before she got her shell.
When the movie reveals that, it does it with a good deal more sensitivity then we expected. The whole cyborg-human identity crisis story line is done well - it doesn't hit you over the head, but isn't obscure or hard to follow. But that's not the best part.
The best part is visual. This is pure eye candy. It pays homage to Bladerunner, or at least shares influences. Very cyberpunk, very lovely.
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