When we queued up Treasure of Monte Cristo/Roaring City/Sky Liner (1949/1951/1949), I didn’t realize that we were getting a short seminar on director William Berke. It turns out he was one of those B movie masters who just cranked them out. According to Wikipedia, he once got a big budget and relaxed shooting schedule, and still turned the picture around in 12 days. He also seemed to go for real fun rousing adventure movies.
Treasure of Monte Cristo is a great example. It starts with a little narration about the Edmund Dante’s treasure, now lost. Then we meet Dante’s modern day descendant, Glenn Langan (The Amazing Colossal Man), a sailor on shore leave in San Francisco. He hears a woman in trouble and goes to her rescue. When he drives off her attackers, she (Adele Jergens) tells her story: She is an heiress, but her people control the money until she is 25 or married - but if she dies, they get it. She finally begs Langan to marry her, in name only, so she can get control. When he marries her, she disappears, leaving a note letting him know where she is being held. When he gets there (climbing the building into an upstairs window, a man is murdered, and he is left to take the rap. Crooked lawyer Steve Brodie defends him, but actually throws the case, leaving him on Death Row.
I’m sure you can see where this is going - he was framed so that she, his widow, can get the treasure he didn’t know he had. There are intrigues, courtroom scenes, fist and gun fights, prison escapes, and everything you could want from a B movie adventure.
Roaring City also set in San Francisco. Hugh Beaumont has a place on the docks where he rents boats and does favors. A man comes in and asks him to place a large bet on a has-been boxer, so that word won’t get around that the fight is fixed. But the boxer drops dead, the young defender is found murdered, the bet was placed in the name of... Actually, I couldn’t follow this one. But it was full of exciting stuff. Also, it seems to be based on the old Jack Webb radio shows “Pat Novak for Hire”/“Johnny Madeiro”. There’s even the old drunk professor that does some legwork. There isn’t a lot of Webb’s poetic hardboiled dialog, but there’s enough.
In Sky Liner, FBI agent Richard Travis must retrieve stolen top secret papers from an airplane going from Washington DC to the west coast, aided by stewardess Pamela Blake. The movie isn’t set 100% on the plane, but a good amount is. Of course, since it is the 40s, they land several times, and also, there’s a lot of room to wander around. This may not have been the best of the batch, or maybe it’s just that we were getting Berke fatigue. Still a fun B if you like that kind of thing.
And that concludes by movie blogging for 2018. I’ll try to do a wrap up - after resisting for years, I now embrace the year-end post. See you in the new year.
Saturday, December 29, 2018
Thursday, December 27, 2018
Cossacks Carrying Horses Around the House
We watched Taras Bulba (1962) for pretty much 2 reasons:
It starts with a battle - Poles vs. Turks, and the Turks are winning. Then the Cossacks come sweeping in and save the day. The Poles offer to allow the Cossacks to become subjects to the Polish crown. When they refuse, the Poles turn on them, and take the steppe for their own. Cossacks, in disgrace, cut off their topknots. Cossack officer Taras Bulba (Brynner) retreats to the mountains to live quietly.
Years later, the Poles allow the Cossacks some freedom, even to wear the topknot. Brynner tells his sons, Tony Curtis and Perry Lopez, to go to school in Kiev, to learn the ways of the enemy. They are not treated well there, and get into amusing scrapes. Also, Curtis falls in love with a Polish princess, Christine Kaufman. Finally, they are forced to flee for home.
There, they find that the tribes are gathering. There is drinking and merriment, and a beautiful white horse is presented (inside the house) to Brynner. That’s where one Cossack shows off by lifting the horse off the ground. Ms. Spenser was very disappointed: one horse, not horses, lifted, not actually carried around. Oh well.
The gathering is to decide whether to help the Poles with another fight. Some are ready to go - a fight is a fight, after all. But Brynner wants to attack the Poles when they are pre-occupied. So they go off and route the Poles, driving them into a walled city. The Cossacks set up a siege.
Curtis finds out that his princess is in the city and suffering under the siege conditions. He sneaks in and finally agrees to break the siege for the Poles. So we have a father/son fight, leading to Curtis being killed. The Cossacks prevail, and Curtis is buried there, now on Cossack soil.
Frankly, this is not a great movie. Brynner is amazing, with his bare chest and topknot. But there isn’t enough of him. I don’t know why they keep casting Curtis in these roles (“Yonda lies da castle of my faddah”) - maybe his “dark good looks” used to be considered “exotic”. There are a few stirring battles, slightly marred by obvious dummy men and horses falling off cliffs. Also, the anti-Semitic angle (Pole = Jew) has been erased, but the smell remains.
Still, we do have a Cossacks lifting a horse.
- Yul Brynner
- To hear the immortal line: “Some day Cossacks will have better things to do than carry horses around the house!”
It starts with a battle - Poles vs. Turks, and the Turks are winning. Then the Cossacks come sweeping in and save the day. The Poles offer to allow the Cossacks to become subjects to the Polish crown. When they refuse, the Poles turn on them, and take the steppe for their own. Cossacks, in disgrace, cut off their topknots. Cossack officer Taras Bulba (Brynner) retreats to the mountains to live quietly.
Years later, the Poles allow the Cossacks some freedom, even to wear the topknot. Brynner tells his sons, Tony Curtis and Perry Lopez, to go to school in Kiev, to learn the ways of the enemy. They are not treated well there, and get into amusing scrapes. Also, Curtis falls in love with a Polish princess, Christine Kaufman. Finally, they are forced to flee for home.
There, they find that the tribes are gathering. There is drinking and merriment, and a beautiful white horse is presented (inside the house) to Brynner. That’s where one Cossack shows off by lifting the horse off the ground. Ms. Spenser was very disappointed: one horse, not horses, lifted, not actually carried around. Oh well.
The gathering is to decide whether to help the Poles with another fight. Some are ready to go - a fight is a fight, after all. But Brynner wants to attack the Poles when they are pre-occupied. So they go off and route the Poles, driving them into a walled city. The Cossacks set up a siege.
Curtis finds out that his princess is in the city and suffering under the siege conditions. He sneaks in and finally agrees to break the siege for the Poles. So we have a father/son fight, leading to Curtis being killed. The Cossacks prevail, and Curtis is buried there, now on Cossack soil.
Frankly, this is not a great movie. Brynner is amazing, with his bare chest and topknot. But there isn’t enough of him. I don’t know why they keep casting Curtis in these roles (“Yonda lies da castle of my faddah”) - maybe his “dark good looks” used to be considered “exotic”. There are a few stirring battles, slightly marred by obvious dummy men and horses falling off cliffs. Also, the anti-Semitic angle (Pole = Jew) has been erased, but the smell remains.
Still, we do have a Cossacks lifting a horse.
Wednesday, December 26, 2018
Wasp (Not Wasp)
Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018) is a nice follow up to the original. The first was bright and fun and uncomplicated. This one is a bit busier, but still fun.
It starts with Ant-Man, Paul Rudd exploring a microscopic world with his daughter, Abby Ryder Fortson - except it turns out to be an elaborate cardboard fort. Rudd is under house arrest, and having trouble keeping his little girl entertained. When he sticks one foot outside the fence, the Feds, led by Randall Park, come down on him. They are sure that he is a super-criminal, because of the events at the airport in that Avengers movie.
Meanwhile, Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) is searching for his wife, Janet van Dyne, the original Wasp, who has been lost in the Quantum Realm. He had given up rescuing her, but since Rudd came back, he is encouraged. While he is trying to open a portal, Rudd has a dream about van Dyne in the realm, and wakes up when Douglas calls him. He is clearly quantum entangled with her.
Pym’s daughter Evangeline Lilly goes to the black market to get some special parts, and sleazy dealer Walton Goggins tries to take the money and not deliver. This leads to a nice fight, but new character enter: a white costumed woman (Hannah John-Kamen) who phases in and out of existence. And she gets away with the goods, a full physics lab shrunk to the size of a suitcase.
So Douglas recruits Rudd, leaving a human-sized ant with the ankle monitor, to provide the proper day-to-day activity. Rudd just wants to serve out his sentence (he has two weeks left, I think), but gets whisked away and stuffed into a glitchy experimental suit. This makes for some fun fights, where Rudd can’t exactly control his size.
The fights are in general, a lot of fun. Our size-shifters shrink to avoid blows and grow to giant size to return them, beautifully choreographed. Add in a character who can phase in and out of existence, and you’ve got a movie.
Michael Pena is back as Rudd’s reformed criminal friend. He has a few good scenes, but not quite as many as the last time. He gets dosed with a mix of drugs that make you talkative and suggestible, but, the bad guys insist, is not a truth serum. So of course, he just starts free associating. Rudd has a similar scene, where his phone keeps ringing during a tense interrogation (by Laurence Fishburne) and he insists on taking it, because it’s his daughter, who lost her soccer shoes.
I’ll skip spoilers, but we do eventually get Jan van Dyne back, and she turns out to be played by Michelle Pfeiffer. She is iconic, of course, but had a kind of bad-ass Earth Mother style. My Janet van Dyne is a fashion-obsessed madcap heiress, which doesn’t really fit. Well, she said she changed a lot during her time in the realm.
And it all ends happily - until we get to the tie-in with the rest of the Marvel-verse. But that’s a story for another time.
It starts with Ant-Man, Paul Rudd exploring a microscopic world with his daughter, Abby Ryder Fortson - except it turns out to be an elaborate cardboard fort. Rudd is under house arrest, and having trouble keeping his little girl entertained. When he sticks one foot outside the fence, the Feds, led by Randall Park, come down on him. They are sure that he is a super-criminal, because of the events at the airport in that Avengers movie.
Meanwhile, Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) is searching for his wife, Janet van Dyne, the original Wasp, who has been lost in the Quantum Realm. He had given up rescuing her, but since Rudd came back, he is encouraged. While he is trying to open a portal, Rudd has a dream about van Dyne in the realm, and wakes up when Douglas calls him. He is clearly quantum entangled with her.
Pym’s daughter Evangeline Lilly goes to the black market to get some special parts, and sleazy dealer Walton Goggins tries to take the money and not deliver. This leads to a nice fight, but new character enter: a white costumed woman (Hannah John-Kamen) who phases in and out of existence. And she gets away with the goods, a full physics lab shrunk to the size of a suitcase.
So Douglas recruits Rudd, leaving a human-sized ant with the ankle monitor, to provide the proper day-to-day activity. Rudd just wants to serve out his sentence (he has two weeks left, I think), but gets whisked away and stuffed into a glitchy experimental suit. This makes for some fun fights, where Rudd can’t exactly control his size.
The fights are in general, a lot of fun. Our size-shifters shrink to avoid blows and grow to giant size to return them, beautifully choreographed. Add in a character who can phase in and out of existence, and you’ve got a movie.
Michael Pena is back as Rudd’s reformed criminal friend. He has a few good scenes, but not quite as many as the last time. He gets dosed with a mix of drugs that make you talkative and suggestible, but, the bad guys insist, is not a truth serum. So of course, he just starts free associating. Rudd has a similar scene, where his phone keeps ringing during a tense interrogation (by Laurence Fishburne) and he insists on taking it, because it’s his daughter, who lost her soccer shoes.
I’ll skip spoilers, but we do eventually get Jan van Dyne back, and she turns out to be played by Michelle Pfeiffer. She is iconic, of course, but had a kind of bad-ass Earth Mother style. My Janet van Dyne is a fashion-obsessed madcap heiress, which doesn’t really fit. Well, she said she changed a lot during her time in the realm.
And it all ends happily - until we get to the tie-in with the rest of the Marvel-verse. But that’s a story for another time.
Tuesday, December 25, 2018
It’s a Wonderful Movie
I'll Be Seeing You (1944) is a lovely Christmas movie that I discovered by accident. It also has an interesting link to the last two movies we’ve seen.
We meet Ginger Rogers in prison. The warden lets her know that she can be furloughed for the Christmas holidays because she has been a model prisoner. She gets on a train to her aunt and uncle’s place in the country (Texas?). The train is a rowdy affair with a bunch of soldiers goofing around. But she winds up sitting across from Joseph Cotten, a quiet, reserved serviceman (although he does try to chat her up a bit). She doesn’t want him to know she’s a prisoner, so she tells him she’s a traveling sales lady. He says he’s going to the same town as her to see his sister.
Rogers reception from aunt Spring Byington and Uncle Tom Tully is warm, but niece Shirley Temple (in her teen years) is superficially friendly but doesn’t want her using the same soap as everyone else. When Cotten calls, Rogers invites him to dinner. There he confesses that he doesn’t know anyone in town, he just got off the train to spend some time with her. He doesn’t want to talk about his war experiences. We know that he has been hospitalized for battle fatigue.
Later, on a date at the ice cream parlor, they meet soda jerk Chill Wills, who has a facial tick, due to shell shock in WWI. Cotten can’t stand the thought of being permanently disfigured and runs out. He finally tells Rogers that since his experience, his “timing is shot”. He tells her a little about his experience, and feels better. But then he tries to shy a stone at a lamppost and misses, but Rogers hits it. He rudely rushes off.
This is pretty much how things go. Cotten has to work through his PTSD, and Rogers wants to tell the truth about her incarceration, but she’s becoming afraid of losing him. They have a Christmas with her family, go to a dance, and so on. For instance, there’s a sweet scene in a dress shop where Rogers and Byington vie to secretly pay for Rogers’ dress. I won’t spoil the end for you, but maybe that doesn’t matter. The important things are the joys of family, small town life, and budding love overcoming all. It also features the song, “I’ll be Seeing You (in All the Old Familiar Places)”.
It’s funny, because I thought this was another woman in prison goes to small town on Christmas movie, Remember the Night, with Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray. That one isn’t available through Netflix. Maybe next year.
Merry Christmas, all.
We meet Ginger Rogers in prison. The warden lets her know that she can be furloughed for the Christmas holidays because she has been a model prisoner. She gets on a train to her aunt and uncle’s place in the country (Texas?). The train is a rowdy affair with a bunch of soldiers goofing around. But she winds up sitting across from Joseph Cotten, a quiet, reserved serviceman (although he does try to chat her up a bit). She doesn’t want him to know she’s a prisoner, so she tells him she’s a traveling sales lady. He says he’s going to the same town as her to see his sister.
Rogers reception from aunt Spring Byington and Uncle Tom Tully is warm, but niece Shirley Temple (in her teen years) is superficially friendly but doesn’t want her using the same soap as everyone else. When Cotten calls, Rogers invites him to dinner. There he confesses that he doesn’t know anyone in town, he just got off the train to spend some time with her. He doesn’t want to talk about his war experiences. We know that he has been hospitalized for battle fatigue.
Later, on a date at the ice cream parlor, they meet soda jerk Chill Wills, who has a facial tick, due to shell shock in WWI. Cotten can’t stand the thought of being permanently disfigured and runs out. He finally tells Rogers that since his experience, his “timing is shot”. He tells her a little about his experience, and feels better. But then he tries to shy a stone at a lamppost and misses, but Rogers hits it. He rudely rushes off.
This is pretty much how things go. Cotten has to work through his PTSD, and Rogers wants to tell the truth about her incarceration, but she’s becoming afraid of losing him. They have a Christmas with her family, go to a dance, and so on. For instance, there’s a sweet scene in a dress shop where Rogers and Byington vie to secretly pay for Rogers’ dress. I won’t spoil the end for you, but maybe that doesn’t matter. The important things are the joys of family, small town life, and budding love overcoming all. It also features the song, “I’ll be Seeing You (in All the Old Familiar Places)”.
It’s funny, because I thought this was another woman in prison goes to small town on Christmas movie, Remember the Night, with Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray. That one isn’t available through Netflix. Maybe next year.
Merry Christmas, all.
Monday, December 24, 2018
20th Century Schizoid Men
Just by coincidence, last weekend we managed to program three movies about men suffering from symptoms of PTSD. Let me tell you about two from the end of the last century - I’ll save the one from mid-century for separate post.
Gun Shy (2000) stars Liam Neeson. We meet him in an airport restroom, having a freak out. He’s trying to get out of undercover job - he was rumbled during the last meeting, stripped naked and laid on a bed of watermelon with a gun to his head. A DEA team got him out, and killed everyone who could talk, but he isn’t ready to go back into the lion’s den. He has disasterous psychosomatic digestion problems and just wants to retire. But his boss talks him into getting on the plane.
There he meets a psychiatrist, who convinces him to seek help, so he starts going to group therapy. He also goes to a doctor for his stomach and meets Sandra Bullock, who gives him an enema and tries to get him to try alternative therapy.
Meanwhile, he is in the middle of a deal between the Colombians and the Mafia (Oliver Platt). These guys are serious, but the money man, Andrew Lauer, keeps trying to ply them with women and champagne. But maybe they are trying to cut out the booze, and they actually respect women. And the Colombians don’t want to seem like stereotypes.
There’s a lot of fun, sharp writing in this - it has a Shane Black feel. The writer, Eric Blakeney, who also directs, seems to have mainly done TV. He did a lot of Moonlighting, which kind of makes sense.
Sadly, Bullock is very under used - she is barely a Manic Pixie Dream Girl. But she does give Neeson the confidence he needs to get back in the game.
Tom Hanks in Joe Versus the Volcano (1990) doesn’t have an exciting job like Neeson. He works in a disgusting anal probe factory. He has a depressing office, a horrible boss (Dan Hedaya), and a vague set of psychosomatic ailments. He goes to the company doctor and discovers the horrible truth: his symptoms are psychosomatic, probably due to his previous high-stress firefighting job. But he actually has a symptomless brain disease which will kill him in weeks. So he quits his job, invites the secretary to dinner, and gets ready to die.
His new devil-may-care attitude fascinates the secretary (Meg Ryan), but when she finds out what’s up, she can’t take it, and dumps him. Then a mysterious millionaire (Lloyd Bridges) shows up: His company needs a mineral only found on an isolated Pacific Island. The natives, descendants of an ancient Roman expedition and their Jewish and Celtic passengers, need to sacrifice someone to the volcano. Hanks is going to die anyway, so Bridges offers him a large sum of money to take the leap.
So Hanks goes on a shopping spree, buying everything he can think of, and four waterproof steamer trunks to put it in. He meets with Bridges daughter, the kinky, freaky Meg Ryan again. She is also intrigued by Hanks until she finds out he has a fatal illness and splits, delivering him to her half sister, Meg Ryan again, who will be sailing Hanks to the island in the family yacht.
The yacht is struck by lightning and sinks, but Hanks and Ryan survive - the steamer trunks float and serve as a raft. Hanks gives the unconscious Ryan sips of Pelligrino from the bar in the trunk, until he succombs to the sun and thirst. When he wakes up, Ryan has revived and is touched by his sacrifice. And together they watch the moon rise over the wide Pacific.
They get to the island and meet chief Abe Vigoda and his right-hand man Nathan Lane. Now he must make the ultimate sacrifice, although he may have met the love of his life. The ending is unbelievable and fantastic, in the literal sense. But a lot of fun.
I thought it interesting that men’s emotional pain was such a big seller at this time, but the next post will show that it isn’t particular to the end of the century.
Gun Shy (2000) stars Liam Neeson. We meet him in an airport restroom, having a freak out. He’s trying to get out of undercover job - he was rumbled during the last meeting, stripped naked and laid on a bed of watermelon with a gun to his head. A DEA team got him out, and killed everyone who could talk, but he isn’t ready to go back into the lion’s den. He has disasterous psychosomatic digestion problems and just wants to retire. But his boss talks him into getting on the plane.
There he meets a psychiatrist, who convinces him to seek help, so he starts going to group therapy. He also goes to a doctor for his stomach and meets Sandra Bullock, who gives him an enema and tries to get him to try alternative therapy.
Meanwhile, he is in the middle of a deal between the Colombians and the Mafia (Oliver Platt). These guys are serious, but the money man, Andrew Lauer, keeps trying to ply them with women and champagne. But maybe they are trying to cut out the booze, and they actually respect women. And the Colombians don’t want to seem like stereotypes.
There’s a lot of fun, sharp writing in this - it has a Shane Black feel. The writer, Eric Blakeney, who also directs, seems to have mainly done TV. He did a lot of Moonlighting, which kind of makes sense.
Sadly, Bullock is very under used - she is barely a Manic Pixie Dream Girl. But she does give Neeson the confidence he needs to get back in the game.
Tom Hanks in Joe Versus the Volcano (1990) doesn’t have an exciting job like Neeson. He works in a disgusting anal probe factory. He has a depressing office, a horrible boss (Dan Hedaya), and a vague set of psychosomatic ailments. He goes to the company doctor and discovers the horrible truth: his symptoms are psychosomatic, probably due to his previous high-stress firefighting job. But he actually has a symptomless brain disease which will kill him in weeks. So he quits his job, invites the secretary to dinner, and gets ready to die.
His new devil-may-care attitude fascinates the secretary (Meg Ryan), but when she finds out what’s up, she can’t take it, and dumps him. Then a mysterious millionaire (Lloyd Bridges) shows up: His company needs a mineral only found on an isolated Pacific Island. The natives, descendants of an ancient Roman expedition and their Jewish and Celtic passengers, need to sacrifice someone to the volcano. Hanks is going to die anyway, so Bridges offers him a large sum of money to take the leap.
So Hanks goes on a shopping spree, buying everything he can think of, and four waterproof steamer trunks to put it in. He meets with Bridges daughter, the kinky, freaky Meg Ryan again. She is also intrigued by Hanks until she finds out he has a fatal illness and splits, delivering him to her half sister, Meg Ryan again, who will be sailing Hanks to the island in the family yacht.
The yacht is struck by lightning and sinks, but Hanks and Ryan survive - the steamer trunks float and serve as a raft. Hanks gives the unconscious Ryan sips of Pelligrino from the bar in the trunk, until he succombs to the sun and thirst. When he wakes up, Ryan has revived and is touched by his sacrifice. And together they watch the moon rise over the wide Pacific.
They get to the island and meet chief Abe Vigoda and his right-hand man Nathan Lane. Now he must make the ultimate sacrifice, although he may have met the love of his life. The ending is unbelievable and fantastic, in the literal sense. But a lot of fun.
I thought it interesting that men’s emotional pain was such a big seller at this time, but the next post will show that it isn’t particular to the end of the century.
Sunday, December 23, 2018
It Conquered the Invasion of the Puppet Masters
I’m not sure I should admit it, but I’m a big fan of science-fiction author Robert Heinlein. Although he was a bit of a kook and politically questionable, I’ve read and enjoyed pretty much everything he wrote. So I’ve been eagerly awaiting a chance to see The Puppet Masters (1994), based on his 1951 novel. In fact, I was surprised that this was made in 1994 - I feel like I’ve been waiting since the 70s.
Donald Sutherland plays “The Old Man”, leader of a secret US intelligence operation. He calls on Eric Thal, his best agent and son, and exobiologist Julie Warner to investigate a flying saucer that supposedly landed in Iowa. When they get there, they find a crude mockup, built as a tourist trap. They almost go in, but Warner has a bad feeling and they skip it. Good thing too, because they soon find that there was a real flying saucer, and the aliens are stingray/slugs, who attach themselves to your spinal chord and take over your mind.
These aliens are pretty fun, although they do kind of call to mind the flying bat-rays of It Conquered the World. Come to think of it, so does the plot.
Of course, each of the main characters gets taken over by the slugs, as they are called. When Warner is taken, Thal goes into occupied territory to get her back. The infection spreads outside of Iowa, leading to paranoia - anyone could be infected. Of course, if you get them to take of their shirts and turn around... It’s funny that enforced social toplessness was acceptable in a 50s novel, but beyond the pale in the 90s. I guess it would have been a little uncomfortable for the only woman in the cast, though.
Also, it’s funny that the original novel has more character development than the modern movie, since early sci-fi was famous for strong plots and wooden characters. In the original, there was a real sense of dread and paranoia, and the horror and unclean feeling of being mind-raped by ther slugs. That’s present in the movie, but far in the background. In exchange, you get some pretty fair action, car chases and helicopter fights.
Donald Sutherland was probably the best thing in the movie, but even there, he might remind you of his role in Body Snatchers. I’m afraid I’m going to have to mark this as “for Heinlein completists only”.
Donald Sutherland plays “The Old Man”, leader of a secret US intelligence operation. He calls on Eric Thal, his best agent and son, and exobiologist Julie Warner to investigate a flying saucer that supposedly landed in Iowa. When they get there, they find a crude mockup, built as a tourist trap. They almost go in, but Warner has a bad feeling and they skip it. Good thing too, because they soon find that there was a real flying saucer, and the aliens are stingray/slugs, who attach themselves to your spinal chord and take over your mind.
These aliens are pretty fun, although they do kind of call to mind the flying bat-rays of It Conquered the World. Come to think of it, so does the plot.
Of course, each of the main characters gets taken over by the slugs, as they are called. When Warner is taken, Thal goes into occupied territory to get her back. The infection spreads outside of Iowa, leading to paranoia - anyone could be infected. Of course, if you get them to take of their shirts and turn around... It’s funny that enforced social toplessness was acceptable in a 50s novel, but beyond the pale in the 90s. I guess it would have been a little uncomfortable for the only woman in the cast, though.
Also, it’s funny that the original novel has more character development than the modern movie, since early sci-fi was famous for strong plots and wooden characters. In the original, there was a real sense of dread and paranoia, and the horror and unclean feeling of being mind-raped by ther slugs. That’s present in the movie, but far in the background. In exchange, you get some pretty fair action, car chases and helicopter fights.
Donald Sutherland was probably the best thing in the movie, but even there, he might remind you of his role in Body Snatchers. I’m afraid I’m going to have to mark this as “for Heinlein completists only”.
Monday, December 17, 2018
Ready or Not
Before we watched Ready Player One (2018), I had listened to several podcasts about it, including the Mike Nelson/Conor Lastowka “372 Pages We’ll Never Get Back” podcast about the book. Now I haven’t read the book, nor do I intend to. But I was perfectly ready to hate the movie. Actually, it wasn’t that bad - I’ve enjoyed worse.
It is set in the Future - 2045, when everything has gone to pieces and people all live inside virtual reality, called OASIS. OASIS was invented by Mark Rylance, an uber-geek who has recently died. As his will, he set up a massive puzzle game in OASIS, with three Easter eggs. The person who solves the puzzles and finds the eggs will inherit control of the OASIS and a bazillion dollars.
Teen Tye Sheridan is Parzival, an egg hunter, or “gunter”. This neologism seems to annoy most people more than anything else about this story. He has a friend who he’s never met in person, Aetch. They are typical teens, doing typical teen things in virtual reality. Sheridan meets up with Art3mis, a cute and somewhat famous gunter, and they bond. Together they solve the first puzzle, a racing game. Then they visit the Archives, where a robot curator shows them everything known about Rylance. This lets them solve the second puzzle, set in The Shining’s Overlook Hotel.
This gives director Steven Spielberg a chance to do an extended riff on Stanley Kubrick, which is rather sweet.
Meanwhile, the evil IOI corporation headed by Ben Mendelssohn is trying to solve the puzzles too, by throwing armies of gunters at it. When they see Sheridan getting close, they try to buy him off, then threaten him, bombing the stack of trailers where he lives in real life - so big body count here. He survives, but Art3mis is captured and forced into virtual servitude. With the help of a pair of virtual ninjas, they break her out, and go on to win the game (oh, SPOILER).
When Sheridan meets Aetch in real life, it turns out that “he” is a large black woman, Lena Waithe, which is cool. But what if Art3mis isn’t hot in real life? As it turns out, she has a birthmark over her right eye, but is otherwise totally hot. Again, cool.
The hook to the book is that the puzzles are all based on Rylance’s obsession with the 1980s. So Sheridan drives a Delorean, flies the Millenium Falcon, and Aetch builds an Iron Giant, which, wait a minute, wasn’t really 80s at all. But there really wasn’t a lot of this. I figured Spielberg would stuff his frames to bursting with references. But it was all very restrained.
In fact, we enjoyed this quite a lot. There were some plot deficiencies, but nothing that took me out of it. It was fun, exciting, well made. I don’t think I’ll watch it again, but it’s not as bad as it sounds. Like Wagner.
It is set in the Future - 2045, when everything has gone to pieces and people all live inside virtual reality, called OASIS. OASIS was invented by Mark Rylance, an uber-geek who has recently died. As his will, he set up a massive puzzle game in OASIS, with three Easter eggs. The person who solves the puzzles and finds the eggs will inherit control of the OASIS and a bazillion dollars.
Teen Tye Sheridan is Parzival, an egg hunter, or “gunter”. This neologism seems to annoy most people more than anything else about this story. He has a friend who he’s never met in person, Aetch. They are typical teens, doing typical teen things in virtual reality. Sheridan meets up with Art3mis, a cute and somewhat famous gunter, and they bond. Together they solve the first puzzle, a racing game. Then they visit the Archives, where a robot curator shows them everything known about Rylance. This lets them solve the second puzzle, set in The Shining’s Overlook Hotel.
This gives director Steven Spielberg a chance to do an extended riff on Stanley Kubrick, which is rather sweet.
Meanwhile, the evil IOI corporation headed by Ben Mendelssohn is trying to solve the puzzles too, by throwing armies of gunters at it. When they see Sheridan getting close, they try to buy him off, then threaten him, bombing the stack of trailers where he lives in real life - so big body count here. He survives, but Art3mis is captured and forced into virtual servitude. With the help of a pair of virtual ninjas, they break her out, and go on to win the game (oh, SPOILER).
When Sheridan meets Aetch in real life, it turns out that “he” is a large black woman, Lena Waithe, which is cool. But what if Art3mis isn’t hot in real life? As it turns out, she has a birthmark over her right eye, but is otherwise totally hot. Again, cool.
The hook to the book is that the puzzles are all based on Rylance’s obsession with the 1980s. So Sheridan drives a Delorean, flies the Millenium Falcon, and Aetch builds an Iron Giant, which, wait a minute, wasn’t really 80s at all. But there really wasn’t a lot of this. I figured Spielberg would stuff his frames to bursting with references. But it was all very restrained.
In fact, we enjoyed this quite a lot. There were some plot deficiencies, but nothing that took me out of it. It was fun, exciting, well made. I don’t think I’ll watch it again, but it’s not as bad as it sounds. Like Wagner.
Wednesday, December 12, 2018
Vanishing Innocence
The Vanishing (1988) was Ms. Spenser’s idea: I figured it would be too scary. I was right. I had also made a point of not learning too much about this movie, so I was a little surprised out it worked out.
A Dutch couple, Gene Bervoets and Johanna ter Steege, are on vacation in France. They tease and bicker, and they run out of gas in a dark tunnel in the mountains. Bervoets starts walking back to the last gas stop, but ter Steege is frightened and begs him to stay. When he gets back, she is gone - but when he drives out of the tunnel, he finds her waiting in the sunlight.
They stop at a crowded gas station and rest stop. It’s full of other vacationers, mostly following the Tour de France. Ter Steege goes to get sodas and when she is out of sight for a second, she vanishes. Bervoets searches for her, more and more desperately, but she is nowhere to be found.
Meanwhile, we get to meet Bernard-Pierre Bonnadieu, an ordinary man who seems to be practicing to abduct a woman. We noticed him at the gas station, but now we see him testing ether on himself, trying to get women into his car, and so forth. His wife wants to know what all of his traveling is about, but he claims he is working on an old farmhouse. He seems almost comical, getting shunned as creepy by most women, or getting noticed by his daughter’s gym teacher.
Three years go by. Bervoets has a new girlfriend, but he hasn’t given up searching for ter Steege. He even says he probably would have broken up with her, but has to know what happened. He has been getting notes from someone who might have been the perpetrator, asking for meetings but never showing up. Finally, Bonnadieu meets him, and shows him what happened. SPOILER - it is very bad.
I had assumed that this was one of those existential movies, where you never find out what happened. Oh, if only.
A Dutch couple, Gene Bervoets and Johanna ter Steege, are on vacation in France. They tease and bicker, and they run out of gas in a dark tunnel in the mountains. Bervoets starts walking back to the last gas stop, but ter Steege is frightened and begs him to stay. When he gets back, she is gone - but when he drives out of the tunnel, he finds her waiting in the sunlight.
They stop at a crowded gas station and rest stop. It’s full of other vacationers, mostly following the Tour de France. Ter Steege goes to get sodas and when she is out of sight for a second, she vanishes. Bervoets searches for her, more and more desperately, but she is nowhere to be found.
Meanwhile, we get to meet Bernard-Pierre Bonnadieu, an ordinary man who seems to be practicing to abduct a woman. We noticed him at the gas station, but now we see him testing ether on himself, trying to get women into his car, and so forth. His wife wants to know what all of his traveling is about, but he claims he is working on an old farmhouse. He seems almost comical, getting shunned as creepy by most women, or getting noticed by his daughter’s gym teacher.
Three years go by. Bervoets has a new girlfriend, but he hasn’t given up searching for ter Steege. He even says he probably would have broken up with her, but has to know what happened. He has been getting notes from someone who might have been the perpetrator, asking for meetings but never showing up. Finally, Bonnadieu meets him, and shows him what happened. SPOILER - it is very bad.
I had assumed that this was one of those existential movies, where you never find out what happened. Oh, if only.
Tuesday, December 11, 2018
Last of the Independants
Charley Varrick (1973) is another movie I’m just getting around to seeing. Directed by Don Siegel, and starring Walter Matthau, it’s about the cutest heist movie you’ve ever seen. It starts with Jacqueline Scott and Matthau in a car outside a small town New Mexico bank, where Matthau, in old-age makeup, is going in to cash a check. Two more men in masks jump up and the robbery gets going. But some cops make the Scott’s getaway car as stolen, she starts shooting, they shoot back, the guard shoots one of the robbers in the bank, and Charley and the remaining robber, Andy Robinson, pile in and they take off.
They get away clean, to a van stashed in the hills, but Scott has been wounded and dies. Matthau tells the story of their lives together: He was a stunt pilot and she was a wing walker. When that work dried up, they went into crop dusting. That didn’t pay, so they augmented their incomes with some bank robbery. She was one hell of a getaway driver. They put leave her body in the car and blow it up. This is a beautiful way to show Varrick’s tenderness and love for his wife, and his ruthlessness.
When he and Robinson get back to their trailer, they discover that their haul is much bigger than they expected - so big it must have been a mafia bank they knocked over. That’s bad news, because the police will stop looking some day, but the mafia won’t rest until they are dead. And indeed, we discover that the mob has assigned Joe Don Baker as “Molly” to find and kill the robbers.
Baker, who we know mainly from the MST3K movie Mitchell, gets to be pretty chilling in this. He suspects an inside job, because otherwise how did the robbers know about the money? He doesn’t take coincidence into account.
Meanwhile, Charley is making plans to get away, including going to the dentist to get his wife’s records (so her body can’t be identified). He pulls a little shuffle on some other records as well. He unsubtly digs up someone who can make phony passports, and I’m going “Charley, no!” But he has a plan.
It turns out to be pretty clever at that. In some ways, it’s the best part - we all love it when a plan comes together. In others, it’s too bad because we don’t see so much of his state of mind, just his cleverness. He is established as an old-timer - his crop dusting motto is “Last of the Independants”, and that’s Don Siegel’s motto too.
They get away clean, to a van stashed in the hills, but Scott has been wounded and dies. Matthau tells the story of their lives together: He was a stunt pilot and she was a wing walker. When that work dried up, they went into crop dusting. That didn’t pay, so they augmented their incomes with some bank robbery. She was one hell of a getaway driver. They put leave her body in the car and blow it up. This is a beautiful way to show Varrick’s tenderness and love for his wife, and his ruthlessness.
When he and Robinson get back to their trailer, they discover that their haul is much bigger than they expected - so big it must have been a mafia bank they knocked over. That’s bad news, because the police will stop looking some day, but the mafia won’t rest until they are dead. And indeed, we discover that the mob has assigned Joe Don Baker as “Molly” to find and kill the robbers.
Baker, who we know mainly from the MST3K movie Mitchell, gets to be pretty chilling in this. He suspects an inside job, because otherwise how did the robbers know about the money? He doesn’t take coincidence into account.
Meanwhile, Charley is making plans to get away, including going to the dentist to get his wife’s records (so her body can’t be identified). He pulls a little shuffle on some other records as well. He unsubtly digs up someone who can make phony passports, and I’m going “Charley, no!” But he has a plan.
It turns out to be pretty clever at that. In some ways, it’s the best part - we all love it when a plan comes together. In others, it’s too bad because we don’t see so much of his state of mind, just his cleverness. He is established as an old-timer - his crop dusting motto is “Last of the Independants”, and that’s Don Siegel’s motto too.
Thursday, December 6, 2018
Blind Justice
Girl in the News/Tread Softly Stranger (1940/1958) is a nice double bill of English noir or noir adjacent movies, both worth your time (if you like that kind of thing).
Tread Softly Stranger features Diana Dors, a platinum bombshell called the British Marilynn Monroe, although probably closer to Jayne Mansfield. It starts with gambler George Baker leaving London to escape his bookie, for his hometown of Rawborough, a bleak industrial wasterland. His brother, Terence Morgan, has been diligently working away as an account at the steel mill. He has also been carrying on with Dors, a cabaret hostess who goes by the name Calico. It turns out Morgan has been skimming from the company to buy Calico jewelry, and now the audit is coming. He wants to rob the company to cover up the embezzlement, but Baker thinks he can win the money at the track. As you might guess, it all goes horribly wrong.
This movie isn’t really much of a noir - it’s more of a “kitchen sink” crime drama, depicting the sad and sordid life of the British lower classes in the 50s. But it does have Dors as a toothsome femme fatale, and a decent crime plot.
Girl in the News is an early Carol Reed film, and a bit more classically British. Margaret Lockwood is nurse to an invalid woman who is very depressed and has trouble sleeping. When Lockwood is out, the old woman manages to get out of bed and gulps a handful of sleeping pills, killing herself. Of course, Lockwood is blamed, especially when it comes out that she has been added to the will.
She is defended at trial by Barry K. Barnes, a bit of a Leslie Howard type. He gets her acquitted mainly on the grounds that “look at that face. Is that the face of a murderer?” But even though Barnes and Lockwood become friendly, she can tell he isn’t quite sure.
Although she is acquitted, she can’t get any nursing work because of suspicion (and she won’t touch the bequest). So she changes her name and gets a job nursing a sweet old man. However, his wife and butler recognize her and plot to kill the old man and frame her for it. So it’s back to court. This time, lawyer Barnes is going to need more than her pretty face to get her off.
SPOILER - it’s funny that the climax of both these films hinge on the same plot device. In both, there is a surprise witness who panics the perpetrators into confessing. But in both cases, it’s a bluff - the witness is blind.
Tread Softly Stranger features Diana Dors, a platinum bombshell called the British Marilynn Monroe, although probably closer to Jayne Mansfield. It starts with gambler George Baker leaving London to escape his bookie, for his hometown of Rawborough, a bleak industrial wasterland. His brother, Terence Morgan, has been diligently working away as an account at the steel mill. He has also been carrying on with Dors, a cabaret hostess who goes by the name Calico. It turns out Morgan has been skimming from the company to buy Calico jewelry, and now the audit is coming. He wants to rob the company to cover up the embezzlement, but Baker thinks he can win the money at the track. As you might guess, it all goes horribly wrong.
This movie isn’t really much of a noir - it’s more of a “kitchen sink” crime drama, depicting the sad and sordid life of the British lower classes in the 50s. But it does have Dors as a toothsome femme fatale, and a decent crime plot.
Girl in the News is an early Carol Reed film, and a bit more classically British. Margaret Lockwood is nurse to an invalid woman who is very depressed and has trouble sleeping. When Lockwood is out, the old woman manages to get out of bed and gulps a handful of sleeping pills, killing herself. Of course, Lockwood is blamed, especially when it comes out that she has been added to the will.
She is defended at trial by Barry K. Barnes, a bit of a Leslie Howard type. He gets her acquitted mainly on the grounds that “look at that face. Is that the face of a murderer?” But even though Barnes and Lockwood become friendly, she can tell he isn’t quite sure.
Although she is acquitted, she can’t get any nursing work because of suspicion (and she won’t touch the bequest). So she changes her name and gets a job nursing a sweet old man. However, his wife and butler recognize her and plot to kill the old man and frame her for it. So it’s back to court. This time, lawyer Barnes is going to need more than her pretty face to get her off.
SPOILER - it’s funny that the climax of both these films hinge on the same plot device. In both, there is a surprise witness who panics the perpetrators into confessing. But in both cases, it’s a bluff - the witness is blind.
Wednesday, December 5, 2018
Big Fat Crazy Asian Wedding
When I queued up Crazy Rich Asians (2018), Ms. Spenser thought it wasn’t like the usual fare I go for (whatever that is). But I actually love a well-done rom-com - much more than she does. She prefers horror movies, car movies and action movies where well-built guys take their shirts off. Well, who doesn’t? But, genre aside, a great movie is a great movie.
It starts with economics professor Constance Wu teaching her class how to bluff at poker, as part of a lecture on game theory (which isn’t what game theory is, at least when I learned it). Her boyfriend, Henry Golding, invites her to go to Singapore with him for his best friend’s wedding. She agrees, and plans to see her old school friend Awkwafina. Someone in the coffee shop overhears this, and starts texting the gossip around. It seems that Golding is Somebody. When they get on the plane and are given a first class sleeping cabin, Wu starts to get the idea that maybe he’s richer than she thinks.
In Singapore, they head straight for a hawker center (Singapore local color), where she meets his friend Chris Pang, and his bride-to-be, Sonoya Mizuno. Then Wu goes off to meet Awkwafina, who lives in a mansion based on Versailles, with her goofy father Ken Jeong and mother and stalkers brother. She’s a funky punk with a blonde bob wig (“Asian Ellen”) who is very impressed that Wu is dating Golding - she lives in a mansion, but is trailer trash next to his family.
Wu meets Golding’s mom later on, and it’s Michelle Yeoh. She’s formidable and polite, but clearly won’t warm to Wu, who isn’t Chinese-Chinese. Later, Wu meets Grandma, who is much warmer, but ultimately forbids Golding from seeing her. So the question is: Can two crazy kids make it together in the world of Singaporean Chinese wealth?
OK, of course, they will. But the fun is in getting there. There are some great scenes (especially involving Michelle Yeoh). There’s a scene where the whole clan gathers to make dumplings by hand, to remind them of the hard work that’s the basis of their fortune. I especially liked this because I just made potstickers from scratch for the first time.
The scenes with Awkwafina and Jeong are good old zany fun. Gemma Chan plays Golding’s cousin, beautiful, poised and, as Golding says, she has heart. And she does. Nico Santos plays gay cousin Oliver, the “rainbow sheep of the family.” And dozens more characters.
It climaxes with a mahjong game between Wu and Yeoh, bringing it back to game theory.
Two final things I enjoyed about the movie. One is that I’ve been to Singapore two or three times, and even stayed at the Carlton Hotel, where several scenes were filmed. So that was fun for me. And finally, Michelle Yeoh is amazing in this and everything.
Some people love the fact that so many Asians are cast in this mainstream movie. Some people don’t care for the ostentatious wealth on display. Some have trouble with the erasure of the non-Chinese in Singapore. Look, it’s just a movie, and a very well made and fun one.
It starts with economics professor Constance Wu teaching her class how to bluff at poker, as part of a lecture on game theory (which isn’t what game theory is, at least when I learned it). Her boyfriend, Henry Golding, invites her to go to Singapore with him for his best friend’s wedding. She agrees, and plans to see her old school friend Awkwafina. Someone in the coffee shop overhears this, and starts texting the gossip around. It seems that Golding is Somebody. When they get on the plane and are given a first class sleeping cabin, Wu starts to get the idea that maybe he’s richer than she thinks.
In Singapore, they head straight for a hawker center (Singapore local color), where she meets his friend Chris Pang, and his bride-to-be, Sonoya Mizuno. Then Wu goes off to meet Awkwafina, who lives in a mansion based on Versailles, with her goofy father Ken Jeong and mother and stalkers brother. She’s a funky punk with a blonde bob wig (“Asian Ellen”) who is very impressed that Wu is dating Golding - she lives in a mansion, but is trailer trash next to his family.
Wu meets Golding’s mom later on, and it’s Michelle Yeoh. She’s formidable and polite, but clearly won’t warm to Wu, who isn’t Chinese-Chinese. Later, Wu meets Grandma, who is much warmer, but ultimately forbids Golding from seeing her. So the question is: Can two crazy kids make it together in the world of Singaporean Chinese wealth?
OK, of course, they will. But the fun is in getting there. There are some great scenes (especially involving Michelle Yeoh). There’s a scene where the whole clan gathers to make dumplings by hand, to remind them of the hard work that’s the basis of their fortune. I especially liked this because I just made potstickers from scratch for the first time.
The scenes with Awkwafina and Jeong are good old zany fun. Gemma Chan plays Golding’s cousin, beautiful, poised and, as Golding says, she has heart. And she does. Nico Santos plays gay cousin Oliver, the “rainbow sheep of the family.” And dozens more characters.
It climaxes with a mahjong game between Wu and Yeoh, bringing it back to game theory.
Two final things I enjoyed about the movie. One is that I’ve been to Singapore two or three times, and even stayed at the Carlton Hotel, where several scenes were filmed. So that was fun for me. And finally, Michelle Yeoh is amazing in this and everything.
Some people love the fact that so many Asians are cast in this mainstream movie. Some people don’t care for the ostentatious wealth on display. Some have trouble with the erasure of the non-Chinese in Singapore. Look, it’s just a movie, and a very well made and fun one.
Monday, December 3, 2018
We’re Going to Need a Better Movie
The way I heard it, Jason Statham swore he’d never work on a film against CGI monsters. Then came The Meg (2018).
It starts with Statham trying to rescue a bunch of sailors from a crippled sub. When he sees a mysterious creature crushing it, he leaves before everyone gets out. He is ousted from the Navy Rescue Squad (or whatever) in disgrace.
Some years later, Elon-Musk-like tycoon Rainn Wilson is showing off his underwater research lab to Winston Chao, his daughter Li Bingbing and her little girl. When the girl is alone looking out through the transparent walls, a giant shark attacks and nearly smashes through.
Meanwhile, Li is leading a project to send Statham’s ex-wife Ruby Rose, Masi Oka and Olafur Darri Olafsson take a sub to the bottom of the ocean, which has been obscured by a thermocline of hydrogen sulfide (I don’t need to explain these terms, do I?). And of course, they get struck by a mysterious creature and get stuck. Li heads down to save them, but a giant squid attacks - and gets chewed up by a giant shark. It’s time to call in the cavalry: Jason Statham, who has been drinking in Thailand since his last disgrace.
He rescues most of them, but Masi Oka stays behind, sacrificing himself for the rest can get away. This seems to be a pattern for Statham’s rescues - he can’t seem to get to 100%.
Anyway, we eventually get to the Jaws tribute, when the Meg (the big shark is a prehistoric megalodon) shows up at a crowded Chinese beach resort. This is mostly played for laughs, with a silly little dog swimming around being menaced, etc. In the end, Statham swims over and stabs it to death. The end. Or is it?
There’s a lot to like about this movie: Wilson’s dopey billionaire, Statham’s swimming, special effects, humor... But it doesn’t really add up to much. It was probably put together by a committee, and one that had its eye on the global market - it’s a Chinese production with an international cast and an American director, Jon Turteltaub (National Treasure).
Maybe it would have been better with the Rock.
It starts with Statham trying to rescue a bunch of sailors from a crippled sub. When he sees a mysterious creature crushing it, he leaves before everyone gets out. He is ousted from the Navy Rescue Squad (or whatever) in disgrace.
Some years later, Elon-Musk-like tycoon Rainn Wilson is showing off his underwater research lab to Winston Chao, his daughter Li Bingbing and her little girl. When the girl is alone looking out through the transparent walls, a giant shark attacks and nearly smashes through.
Meanwhile, Li is leading a project to send Statham’s ex-wife Ruby Rose, Masi Oka and Olafur Darri Olafsson take a sub to the bottom of the ocean, which has been obscured by a thermocline of hydrogen sulfide (I don’t need to explain these terms, do I?). And of course, they get struck by a mysterious creature and get stuck. Li heads down to save them, but a giant squid attacks - and gets chewed up by a giant shark. It’s time to call in the cavalry: Jason Statham, who has been drinking in Thailand since his last disgrace.
He rescues most of them, but Masi Oka stays behind, sacrificing himself for the rest can get away. This seems to be a pattern for Statham’s rescues - he can’t seem to get to 100%.
Anyway, we eventually get to the Jaws tribute, when the Meg (the big shark is a prehistoric megalodon) shows up at a crowded Chinese beach resort. This is mostly played for laughs, with a silly little dog swimming around being menaced, etc. In the end, Statham swims over and stabs it to death. The end. Or is it?
There’s a lot to like about this movie: Wilson’s dopey billionaire, Statham’s swimming, special effects, humor... But it doesn’t really add up to much. It was probably put together by a committee, and one that had its eye on the global market - it’s a Chinese production with an international cast and an American director, Jon Turteltaub (National Treasure).
Maybe it would have been better with the Rock.
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