FYI- Prometheus

I shan't be reviewing Prometheus until I've seen it a second time and done more mulling. Hopefully I'll have a great deal to say on it...

The Things That Went...I Can't Do This Anymore...Presenting the TWO (Count 'Em Two) AVP Movies and All Their Awfulness...This Is Gonna Be Real Short

So I'm not going to be the first person to say that Paul WS Anderson is a pretty shit director. He's sort of the poor man's Michael Bay. Except he's not poor. He's frequently given a legit budget for some random reason. I guess his movies make enough money to justify him getting opportunities to make a shit-load of sequels and whatever moronic projects he wants to (The Three Musketeers! With steam-punk airships! And martial arts! And explosions! Yeah!). I guess the very faint praise I can offer in favor of him is his vague sense of style. He can direct an action scene...competently. He make his sets and actors look of relative interest. And that's about it. I mean, do we really need FIVE Resident Evil movies? Does anyone actually know or care at this point what happens in them story-wise? One can watch and be distracted by any of his movies to the lowest level of consumerist enjoyment in terms of slightly entertaining Hollywood action flicks. There are things that happen on screen in his movies that I see occurring. I don't feel anything about those images. There aren't any emotions. But they exist in an inoffensive, overly simplistic manner. Is he really a director I can say I hate? No. He hasn't done enough as an artist to justify me giving any kind of significant opinion or analysis regarding his films other than merely recognizing that he makes movies.

I'll confess then that there aspects of his films that are fun. In a very very stupid kind of way. The image might look cool. The story might be blandly unoriginal and basic instead of sophisticated or overly complicated. The actors usually range from bad to...there. Saying lines. Not emoting. Mortal Kombat, Event Horizon, Death Race, and even elements of the Resident Evil films entertain. And I'd be lying if I said the first time I saw Alien vs. Predator I didn't enjoy myself. I did. Genuinely. Admittedly I was around 12 or 13 at the time, so I found a great many things entertaining. I had yet to develop any sense of intelligence-based criticism or analysis, so anything that held my attention for more than five seconds I referred to as "cool" and "fun." In retrospect the film is monstrously stupid. And it remains so. But mostly in a Freddy vs. Jason or Charlie's Angels kind of way. The directors and writers are clearly having fun doing what they do best, which is mostly injecting an already idiotic story with as much cheese and oddly well-produced scenes of destruction and humor and action. AVP does have good CGI. It distracts your attention for about 90 minutes with some neat explosions. It doesn't make much sense. It has a human...I can't believe I'm writing this...buddy up with a Predator. And they kill the Alien Queen by pushing her off a cliff. Enough said about that movie.

AVP: R as it is called in shorthand has none of what made AVP so good. That's saying A LOT. It's such a strangely confused and confusing movie. So darkly lit and incompetently directed as to make virtually every scene of action or violence incomprehensible and the only bits that are watchable end up being the incredibly dull "dramatic" parts that are supposed to "develop" the characters. Everyone working on the movie clearly said- "Characters? In an Alien movie? No way. We want awkward CGI and bunch of overly shadowed scenes of evisceration and a plot that makes no sense." Even though when you read the summary it sort of does make sense, which basically means the directors fucked up the simplest of Hollywood plots. Two kinds of bumbling alien monsters crash in a conveniently deserted town and have at it. Some stupid teens get involved. They sort of save the day, only to fuck things up further. The military comes in and drops a nuke. BOOM. The end. Um, wasn't that whole story framework dropped back in the 60's? The Alien movies do not equal The Blob or Tarantula. You know it's bad when the plot of AVP sounds more plausible and interesting than your sequel.

I really don't think it's necessary to say much more beyond what I have here. It's a sufficient enough analysis of two movies that really really don't deserve any kind of reviews, let alone an attempt at legit critical attention. They tanked for a reason. And Fox said, "Let's toss about some prequel ideas for a few years and chat with Ridley Scott. Maybe he's got a hankering for reigniting interest in this already incredibly tired film series..."

PS- Isn't it a tad funny to think that the Alien movies got bad after only one sequel? 

The Things That Went Bump In the Night...Again

I don't think there's much I can say in favor of this movie. I'm fairly certain none of it works. The story is...bad. The direction is...worse. The writing is kind of...awful. Even the always reliable Weaver turns in a surprisingly over-the-top performance and puts the other actors to shame in a cheesy "why aren't you having as much fun as me?" kind of way. Winona Ryder is miscast. Ron Perlman and Brad Dourif ham it up like it's nobody's business and pretty much everyone else in the cast is utterly forgettable. There are no significantly interesting characters on screen aside from Ripley, and even she is re-written into some vaguely sinister, lesbian antihero with nothing to do but spout lines for the trailers. This was the destiny of the Alien movies for a time- goofy stories with moronic, underwritten characters and hideously poor uses of the title creatures. 

Jean-Pierre Jeunet seems a rather odd choice of director in retrospect. Certainly his eye for interesting physical details of settings and use of unique special effects were a plus, but this was before he directed Amelie and A Very Long Engagement. At the very least it could be said that David Fincher showed significant talent with his music videos and he has the excuse of being the last in a long line of various other directors put through the proverbial ringer by producers unsure of what they were seeking. Alien: Resurrection script-wise desires to emulate the action components of Aliens as well as amp up the gore factor in as violent a way as possible which would theoretically be fine. Instead of going the more melodramatic route Alien 3 went with its story, the fourth film wants to head into familiar territory. Why then pick a French director with a guaranteed lack of American awareness? At the very least a known director could have provided a significant box office draw. Sadly Jeunet doesn't use his later favorite cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel who could've added a much needed attractive physical sensibility to the look of the film rather than the unjustifiably ugly and uncomfortable camerawork.

The same thing goes for the incredibly dull settings of the film. Large, empty hangar bays and large, empty ships all have a been there done that feel to them. Nothing is new. Whereas before with the other Alien films there were significant looks and feels to each of them to help them expand the world of the stories, this time- nothing is familiar or new in the worst of ways. An opportunity is lost.

Joss Whedon has disowned the film and rightly so as he has said that the producers and director reworked the majority of it to their advantage and dismissed a great many of his original ideas. None of the dialogue has his usual style. None of his usual themes are explored. An Alien movie with the touch of Joss could've added a great deal and made up for the supreme silliness of a tired story.

The creatures' effects have improved mildly in terms of their CGI work when compared to Alien 3, but again the majority of the aliens themselves are put to ineffectual use in terms of the story. They exist as villainous monsters to be defeated incredibly easily by the average humans and their convenient array of various weapons. They're not interesting to watch and they're not imposing or frightening in any way anymore because of how they are used in the plot of the film.

I don't remember a single note of music.

And really I don't remember a single shot or scene or moment of the film in any significant way.

To quote Roger Ebert, as I am bound to do, "There is not a single shot in the movie to fill one with wonder."

The Third Thing That Went Bump In the Night

David Fincher's first film proved his worth to the world as a director. If only the writers and producers had known what to do with the footage they were given. 

Alien 3 is filled with some extraordinary imagery and creates yet another intriguing and different setting in the already enormous world of the Alien movies. There are some fascinating ideas that the script and the characters attempt to explore in as much as they can given the limitations of the idiot plot they're involved in. It's sort of like intelligent and and interesting people were placed in a situation that they should be able to get out of but don't because the puppet-master pulling their strings is a moron and got scared by a silly CGI effect instead of an actual creature.

Once more the Alien movies feature an impressive cast of actors who, at times, almost appear to be winking at the camera saying, "we know how bad this film is going to be, but we're gonna give it all we can anyway." Charles S. Dutton, Charles Dance, Brian Glover, Paul McGann, and Pete Postlethwaite are all featured in varying capacities and all deliver the goods as we can expect of them. Then the script orders their characters to die in those obnoxiously sudden and lamely depressing ways at the most convenient of moments and almost all for no discernible reason aside from what could be called a temporary lapse in sanity and/or logic and/or humanity. This is especially true of Dutton's character, who, up until his death, is probably one of the most interesting creations of the film and the lead proponent of one of the movie's primary focuses and themes- religion. Though admittedly, in retrospect, the manner in which faith is discussed and presented in Alien 3 pales in comparison to how it is handled in Prometheus, at least on a consistently thematic level. Charles Dance also gives a good performance and his character is built up into what surely promises to be a worthy cohort of Ripley's damaged persona. Then he's killed. Really for no good reason other than the movie hadn't featured many deaths yet and the writers/producers felt it was high time to get to the slaughtering and bloodshed.

Alien 3 is notorious for its constant script problems and rewrites and random director choices. The producers were never satisfied and had no idea at the outset of what they wanted to accomplish with the film. This, to a degree, makes sense, as Alien and Aliens had completely different styles and tones yet were both equally smashing successes at the box office the producers felt it necessary to somehow combine elements from both movies to make the third a mesh. This was the result. And in every aspect other than the technical components the film is clearly wanting. The Assembly Cut available on DVD is marginally better and has some slight improvements upon the Theatrical Cut but ultimately the film is simply a mess of half-baked ideas.

A new form of the xenomorph is shown in Alien 3. Concept work for it looked fine, I'm sure. But a mixture of shoddily done CGI work and awkward mixing of puppets and stunts makes the creature in the film seem like several dozen different ones. The look is never consistent and never convincing.

Elliot Goldenthal's score is naturally something of a work of an eccentric genius as always. The mixture of a faint heavenly choir with a clanging metallic orchestra offset the tone of the film in an interesting way that complements virtually every scene in a surprisingly consistent manner given the disjointed nature of the movie's story and tones.

Newt and Hicks die at the beginning right before Ripley's shuttle crashes into the prison planet. Okay. Weaver as always grieves the way she should. And there are brief scenes of her and Clemens examining Newt's body at Ripley's insistence because she believes an Alien could have survived. There are rumors of graphic footage of Newt's autopsy that Fincher wanted to include but were deemed way too intense for the average audience member. I'm not sure what it would've added. But being the creep I am I'd like to see it. Back to my main point though- plot development wise I guess it makes sense to kill Hicks and Newt. But there's something so strangely off-putting and not-believable about their incredibly sudden and convenient deaths. I mean thus far in terms of the movies themselves Scott and Cameron attempted to keep more or less a sense of solid realism in regards to story and tone. All of a sudden two pretty well established main players in the last film are just kind of gone and not really referred to ever again by anyone. Just doesn't ring true.

Also question- how in the hell did Ripley get pregnant? How in the hell did an Alien find its way aboard the ship? It just kind of happens. And Ripley just kind of goes with it for a while, has some angst-talk with Dutton about it, and decides to off herself in the end. Okay. But why? Not why does she kill herself, but why is this necessary to...anything in the whole Alien series? To Ripley? This is sort of the central problem with Alien 3. And why Prometheus makes more sense as a separated story from the rest of the Alien films. Alien and Aliens, as I said before, are essentially based in a more or less realistic world. Alien is a slasher film in space with Ripley becoming the Last Girl who must defend herself against the xenomorph and survive his attacks. Fine. Aliens is an action movie with Ripley as the hero this time. And Alien 3...? I don't know what her point is. She just kind of does stuff and it usually involves the alien. Big whoop. She's a protagonist and the writers and director fill the world and the story around her with plenty of symbols and ideas but none of them are consistent or actually meaningful. Yes Ripley reacts to the bad things that happen to her, but in this film there's no context being provided. At least in Aliens it made a sort of sense that she'd be concerned about the people on LV-246 and that she'd be able to provide information about the Aliens. And more so there's the revelation of her kid issues, having lost a daughter, she finds a kindred child in Newt and becomes clearly protective over her. Alien 3 has Ripley becoming surprisingly helpless at times, no thanks to the again oh so convenient lack of weapons on the prison planet. And then Ripley sacrifices herself. It's probably the best thing about the film. Mainly because of the performance by Weaver again, but also the direction, and the music. It feels like at long last something significant has happened. What it means I'm at a loss for. There are emotions in the ending. They're there. Somewhere.

The look of the prison planet is fantastic. Bully for David Fincher. But again. What else is there of interest in this particular setting? The characters are...sinister. The place itself is...sinister. Everything's very sinister. But so what? Example again- the Nostromo is populated with regular working class people the average audience can relate to. The terraforming station on LV-246 set up in Aliens is populated with families and kids- people the audience can sympathize with. Fury 161? A bunch of really really unpleasant prisoners who have raped and killed and pillaged and all that. And again the oh so convenient "they hate women now because they tempt them" angle via the religion stuff? Isn't that a bit all ass-backwards and vaguely sexist for an Alien movie?

The religion aspect too is picked up and dropped at the movie's convenience. Dutton gets all fire and brimstone for a while. Ripley is vaguely disparaging and then they're sort of friends. Then they spew some random religious stuff again and then it's dropped right before Dutton goes down with the alien. It doesn't go anywhere or add anything. Except for ominous trailer sound bites.

And then, naturally, there's an endless, endless chase scene. It's dizzying. Not fun. Not scary. Just kind of existing. A bunch of people die because Dutton gives a speech. Ripley comes up with her usual brilliant plant. But really its rather silly compared to say Alien or Aliens. They trap it behind some heavy doors and walls. They cut it off. Then they pour some hot liquid stuff on it a lot. It dies. Um, what were we so scared of? How did these creatures defeat us twice before? And therein lies the ultimate fate of the remaining Alien movies from here on out. The creatures become just kind of menacing monsters who jump out a lot and kill a bunch of people and are easily defeated by run of the mill human beings with nothing special about them. Why is that interesting? Why is that original? Why am I still watching?

The Thing(S) That Went Bump In the Night

It's not the same as Alien. And that's a good thing. It's an action movie instead. A long, arduous, tough-ass adventure film. It's draining. Physically. Emotionally. And yet that's what's so endearing about it. I'm fairly certain the entire film rests on the success of Weaver's performance which is kind of what keeps the entire thing going throughout. Naturally dumb choices are made by dumb people. It's that kind of movie. But Ripley's motivation drives the story and those around her and us. If we can follow her through hell and back and then again a couple more times, then we can survive anything.

And I'm dead serious when I say Sigourney should've won Best Actress.

Yes there are some silly moments. Bill Paxton is...well...Bill Paxton. There are probably a couple of explosions too many. And Newt is rather grating after a while, though being a Kid In An Action Movie she could be a great deal worse. 

But..."Get away from her you bitch!" makes up for all of that. And then some. 

Being a James Cameron film naturally the look and design is flawless and distinctly different enough from Ridley's palette that we can call it relatively original. In fact the themes and ideas and styles are sufficiently different from the first Alien that we feel as though the whole thing were its own entity. Which is good. We want a sequel that is different. Not the same.

Everything goes up a notch this time around in terms of effects. There are, naturally, a lot more creatures. And a behemoth Queen that terrified me in my youth. The technology used is obviously much more militaristic and heavy

James Horner's score is trademark James Horner. Vaguely aggressive themes to match the action on screen and not much else. He had time limitations and it shows. He steals from his own marching Klingon styles and repeats several times. 

And the cast is quite decent. Very decent in some quarters. Paul Reiser is good at sniveling. Lance Henriksen brings that Ian Holm menacing quality initially, but he turns much more kind and focused by the end, making him easily one of the most intriguingly sympathetic of the androids in the series. Jennette Goldstein is definitely one of the most badass female army types in any movie of this ilk. And Michael Biehn is surprisingly sensitive and sweet and oh so sexy as Hicks. Sigh...

I'm back. So yeah. Aliens. It's just a good ol' fashioned time at the movies. A popcorn flick, if you will. Well made. Exciting. Exhausting. And nicely involving.

BUT. It does lack pretty much anything of genuine thematic substance. BUT. It doesn't endeavor to be more than anything other than what it is. This comes from a time when James Cameron knew his place as a solid action director and not much else. Before he got visions of sinking ships and tall blue Native American cats...

Aliens is good. Are good? Whatever. Just go watch and enjoy. For this film that's enough.

The Thing That Went Bump In the Night

In discussing older films it becomes much more difficult to identify what one's personal feelings are regarding the merit or potentially the negative components of a given movie, this is primarily because of the sheer volume of all ready available reviews and information and texts and essays on the subject matter of, in this case, Alien and its several sequels and now semi-prequel, and as such it becomes evident there are a wide ranging opinions already regarding these films specifically. What can I say that hasn't already been said? At what point am I beginning to rehash ideas and thoughts about movies in general that have been stated by others who are ultimately more educated but also paid to do such professional critical writing?

I won't be prefacing every single film review and discussion I do on this blog with a blurb such as this, primarily because such an act would be just plain repetitive and meaningless. I am simply posing the notion to anyone who cares to read these posts that I am by no means an authority on the ideas I expound and either praise or criticize. My intention is to merely tell others why I enjoy or dislike the movies that I've seen and to explain perhaps some of the more complicated aspects and symbols and ideas that good films have that are often unseen or misunderstood or so subtly integrated into a film that it's difficult to recognize by the layman.

Alien was not critically adored when first released. Most professional film people dismissed it as a well-made, high budget slasher film in space. They are quite right about it being overly simplistic, and I'll get to that later. The film made a great deal of money at the box office and is now considered one of the forerunners along with Star Wars and Jaws of the summer blockbuster, a concept, at the time, that had yet to be plundered. Nowadays such plundering is often taken to the extreme and the modern blockbuster is more often than not again technically well-made and featuring culturally popular ideas and trends instead of those subtly included notions and metaphors of more complex themes that I mentioned earlier. This is a nice way of saying blockbusters have been dumbed down to their bare essentials- a large budget, an attractive cast, a simplistic story (almost always a rehash of the first film the franchise because the majority of modern blockbusters are mere continuations of an already established film world), a skilled yet misguided director (Michael Bay, who shall be discussed in future posts), and the illusion of meaningful substance (by which I mean the bait for intelligent audience members- for science fiction films this usually involves a "high" concept idea that hasn't been employed by this particular series yet). Alien is now considered to be a critical darling by film professionals and the answer as to why is simple enough- it lies along with John Carpenter's Halloween as the "first of many" and most critics agree that by virtue of being something that is still consistently imitated Ridley Scott must have initially some kind of unseen gold that appealed to audiences and in retrospect that proverbial gold is obvious.

Alien is a very very very simple film. I will not bore you with the details of the story because they're practically known by all. Instead I will discuss why such a simple story works as well as it does for this film specifically.

For me one of the most notable aspects of Alien is the cast. Namely the fact that they're adults. And they're very good actors in very mediocre roles. None of the characters are that sophisticated on an emotional or psychological level, this isn't to say they're stupid, they're simply working people who don't need to do a lot of hard thinking. And that IS the emotional appeal to the audience. Instead of creating incredibly sexy and absurdly young kids piloting a heavy piece of ship-ware like the Nostromo, we get adults who look and act their duties. Ash is something of an exception character-wise because of what's revealed about later in the film.

Ridley Scott is consistently praised for being a master of creating original and unique worlds. And I mean worlds. We don't just see a couple of neat looking sets that are vaguely futuristic. Instead there is the planet LV-426 with its terrifyingly creepy and (forgive the pun) alien setting. There are the unexplained parts of LV-426 like the Space Jockey, in a lesser film the director wouldn't have included something that is inconsequential to the plot, but Scott knows its add to the mystery of the whole thing. Who or what are the aliens? Where did they come from? The ambiguity just inherently feels menacing throughout. And that mystery lingers after the film is over and in a similar way to Michael Myers in Halloween, one gets the idea that because so much is essentially unexplained about motives and story then there's that horrifying feeling of that creature could be right behind me. The world is insidious. As are the innards of the ship itself with its clutter and grime and hundreds of shadows and dripping chains. And more so than scary is the realism of the Nostromo with its dirt and lack of hygiene and toggles and buttons and old-fashioned computers. There's something eerily off about old computers that still give me the willies.

The egg. The face-hugger. The chest-burster. The xenomorph. The words evoke images. The images evoke the monsters as we see them in the film. And the monsters themselves are real. That's what's so scary to me. They're not computer-generated fakes. They're not animated cheese. And though they're mostly puppets and stunts- they simply don't feel that way by nature of their design. Alien has been described by Dan O'Bannon its writer as being a film in which he attacks the audience sexually. Story-wise that much is clear with the egg and the birth and all that jazz. But physically too the creatures are perverse in their form, clearly inspired by our own anatomies and appendages. We see incredibly strong elements of ourselves and our most primal actions in the very look of that which attacks us.

Again not much is sophisticated about the storyline of Alien. And the movie balances itself out with most of the rest of its technical qualities. And as I said before the basic personalities of the characters are enough that by simply having them talk about their daily activities the audience connects emotionally. There aren't a lot of big speeches and grandstanding about heavy ideas. There are simply these people being who they are. Again the exception in terms of dialogue is Ash with his overly formal choice of words and almost endless techno-babble, a clear case of foreshadowing for his later reveal as the cruel and focused android he is.

Jerry Goldsmith with his sparse and moody tones and minimal orchestra and choir of shifting whines and voices seem to fill the incredible void that is naturally at the core of Alien and completely enveloping the ship. It gets under your skin from the first few notes as the credits begin and unsettles you in the most uncomfortable of ways simply because you don't know why you feel so prickly and sweaty all of a sudden.

Finally the pacing. The film itself is almost obscenely slow at the start with its developing characters just milling about the ship and exploring the planet. Then it builds in brief moments of tension as Kane is attacked and tended to medically by Ash. There are a couple of jumps. Then calm for a time as he recovers with his mates at dinner. Then it all shifts. Scenes are more swift. Shots are more brief. Lights flash ominously in the many shadows of the ship. Dallas goes into the vents of the Nostromo and we witness an absolutely terrifying scene of suspense. The dot moves on the screen ever closer to him. But we can't see anything. It's too dark and cramped and the surroundings are moving by so quickly as Dallas tries to crawl his way out. The strobe lights go off against the glistening black skin of the creature. The briefest of shots of his snarling face and teeth. His massive outline. And then nothing. He is rarely seen full on on screen. The deaths are implied and vague for everyone. And then Ripley runs. And runs. Steam pours forth from everywhere. Lights continue to flash endlessly. An annoyingly calm computer's voice reads a countdown. It all just won't stop. And I'm gripping onto my seat with the tightest of clenched fists. And then calm again. Ripley's on the shuttle. She's fine. She's got her cat. She's going to sleep now. She sings. She moves her hand. The wall shifts slightly. It's aboard. And I can barely breathe.

A Man Alone...Or Is He?...And That's About It

Okay, so it's well made and features another one of those intense and intensely wacky Sam Rockwell performances, but so what? I didn't hate it, but ultimately haven't we seen this type of film before? The guy alone who gets well...lonely...and maybe starts to see things and go crazy? Except in this one, he's not crazy, he just starts out lonely and then gets plopped into this whole mean business made clones scheme. And by the end he stays lonely and dies, but he exposes the evil plan! Isn't that enough? He's the good guy! It all just feels rather overly simplistic. There's not really much, if any, moral or ethical discussions about cloning in general, Sam just kind of goes with it and is like- okay, fine, clones, yeah, moving on to the next plot development...

All the emotional stuff too- he's got a daughter and wife and is crazy lonely (have I mentioned he's lonely enough?) and the piano music is sad and mournful- it's all supposed to make us sympathetic, but, and this is especially in regards to the kid and the wife, we never see them aside from some oh so overdone video feed footage and that's just not enough for me. Same thing goes for the supposed bad guys who are never featured on screen. 

I'm kind of dulled by the lack of genuine villains in movies in general. It's just as true in Battleship or or Battle: Los Angeles or Signs or War of the Worlds or Day the Earth Stood Still (remake)- bunch of ugly aggressive aliens come with a vaguely defined plot to kill us for no discernibly justified reason other than we exist. They talk in some clicking, slobbering, non-subtitled language that is ultimately unnecessary because they're moronic actions speak for themselves and they try to kill us with their ridiculously powerful and awesome-looking technology and then we defeat them via the aid of a ragtag group of survivors who determine the ONE, incredibly convenient weakness of the bad guys and slaughter them all. The end. There's no notion of maybe the aliens could be characters. Who speak. With us. In English. Maybe they have a real reason to want to kill us. And we talk about it with them. Maybe those peace talks do eventually break down and we resort to regretful violence and it becomes emotionally hard for us to go to lengthy war with them because those peace talks took a couple of years of communication and we've sense made some friends with the aliens. That way there are feelings on both sides. And stakes- "I don't wanna kill this new pal I made, we're buddies." Maybe there continues to be heavy tolls on both sides in this lengthy war and actual peace has to be made after too many have died and then the aliens fly off saying, "sorry this whole thing was a mistake, we should never have come, you humans are far too primitive for us to want to deal with you right now, we'll talk after you've evolved." That's what I want. Not Moon. Not- we're the invisible and implied bad guys of the story by proxy of doing a couple of things that technically DO yield the salvation of the planet's population and fuel even though those things are actually morally questionable actions that could be discussed by the protagonist of this story but ultimately never are in any significant way. Needs of the many, people.

I'm not gonna mention all of the 2001: A Space Odyssey references and homages and obvious steals- GERTY is the most obnoxiously weak ripoff of HAL in a long time and he feels more so like a theft of a classic character because he really doesn't do much aside from emoticon and act detached in that vaguely creepy Kevin Spacey kind of way, I mean HAL adds the whole technology angle to 2001 and explores the whole evolution of machines thing which connects back to the primary theme of evolution in general and questions of the limits and/or lack of limits of technology for humanity- whereas GERTY is just kinda sinister and then just kind of nice and then just plain old overly informative of everything that's going on. He doesn't go anywhere.

I am reminded of Andrei Tarkovsky's brilliant Solaris, arguably one of the best science fiction films ever made and still rarely seen. Not only is it about a man alone in a unique setting, he's also alone in an emotionally consistent way, there are scenes of him on Earth which explore his character much more deeply and establish a sympathy with him for the audience that not only makes us care about him but also preps the majority of the psychological and potentially religious and most definitely other-worldly themes and ideas and events of the story. Moon spends no time on Earth. Sam is just in space, on the moon, and there are some references to his life back on Earth, but not much else. 

Finally more than all of that stuff combined is the fact that Moon sets up like a bazillion potential avenues of thematic and emotional material and doesn't go anywhere with it. Like I said no moral issues are taken with the cloning. There are ultimately no psychological questions asked about possibly all of this stuff taking place in Sam's head. There's an established bad guy that Sam just feels obligated to defeat in whichever way he can, despite there being no genuine discussion of their motives. Naturally, the big bad business types are evil by nature of their actions taken against Sam. We don't consider even the possibility that Sam could just say- yeah, maybe this is for the best, the Earth needs this fucking energy and the real Sam on Earth is a real human being, he deserves his life, my sacrifice is necessary. Or maybe- fuck the real Sam, I count just as much, I deserve life! Whatever perspective Moon wants to take is fine, there's just no real exploration of that perspective in the film as it stands.

Okay, this is supposed to be me not hating on a film, I did like it, I just wish it had done more or endeavored to have done more. Say what you will about the supposed flaws of Prometheus, at least it attempts to ask large questions given the large nature of its circumstances. Imagine if that film had simply featured David the android as an android and that was it. Nothing else said about him. No desires on his part to be more than the sum of his parts. No father issues. No need to also ask questions of the Engineer. No peering into people's dreams. Just him being creepy with his blond hair and Lawrence of Arabia obsession and him doing his job with the language stuff. Or imagine Shaw without her fucking cross and belief in and ultimate issues with God. 

Pros- Really well made. It's pretty. Technically fantastic. It looked and sounded like he was on the moon. It was, as near as I can tell, scientifically accurate. It was paced well, the editing was calm yet swift when it needed to be in the more tense moments. I like the ambition of doing a science fiction film in the current era of Transformers and big loud endless explosions and action that doesn't have any of that. That's fine. The acting is very good.

But ultimately the movie becomes something of a plodding affair of one thing that happens and then another thing that happens. It has a story. It tells it's story. The end. There are no grand attempts to leave things open-ended or interpretive. It believes by virtue of not being a Transformers type film it will be inherently loved by those seeking a quieter supposedly more introspective science fiction movie. 

Simply because you endeavor to make a film that is the opposite of all that is hated in Hollywood right now doesn't really give you a free pass to the auteur level. There still needs to be something more than just a story that features vaguely interesting events. Simply because you prove you can direct a film in a competent manner that isn't a blockbuster, doesn't make me feel as though you're a genius filmmaker. 

Duncan Jones is, I'm sure, a very good director. I have yet to see Source Code. Moon tells me he is promising, but hasn't proved he's brilliant. 

Inspirations

In no particular order...

George Carlin (The funniest man who ever was.)

Gene Roddenberry (He had one of the most inspiring dreams of the future.)

Joss Whedon (Everything's been said about him. A god.)

Carl Sagan (He made science...well...fun.)

Richard Dawkins (He'll tear those silly notions of religion down, and make you rebuild with rational thinking instead of blinded emotion and fear.)

Louis Malle (The radical gentleman.)

Margaret Cho (The funniest woman ever.)

Stanley Kubrick (He made cinema into an art. Literally.)

Stephen Fry (Witty. Insanely intelligent. A madman with words.)

Roger Ebert (The man who made me love film.)

Rob Zombie (Just watch one interview with him. The most brutally honest person I've ever seen, but in the best of ways. Also his music and movies kick ass, in the best of ways.)

How To Write About Your Entire Life In Just One Post...Namely...Don't

So really, how important is my biography at this point in time? Yes, things have happened in my life, but do they honestly necessitate me describing every last event in excruciating detail? I don't think so. So I won't. I will be succinct to the best of my ability. I will also not get too painfully personal and embarrass every single person I know family and friend alike. 

I was born in Virginia. I made a couple of okay friends. Then around age nine or ten (I don't remember which) the family decided it'd be best if we all moved to Illinois. No biggie. Not really. Left my chums behind and didn't look back like any rational nine-ten-year-old kid would.

Where I Was...

Where I Went...

I have two older brothers and a mom and a dad. Obviously. I shan't describe much more than that for fear of getting sued or beaten up or slaughtered viciously for even mentioning them.

Once in Illinois, adjusted to a new school, made some more friends up through eighth grade. Still in contact with most of the major ones. After eighth grade moved to a neighboring town and went to a completely different high school. Made a metric shit ton more friends. Most definitely still in contact with the important ones.

Went through several lame and silly phases of being goth and/or punk and/or any other absurdly amusing getup youngsters adorn themselves in for the sake of getting attention. (Admittedly I still do this to some degree even today, but usually in my own brand of...odd combinations of clothing and accoutrements- hair dye, different colored shoelaces, and a constantly worn hooded jacket). 

Around eighth/ninth grade figured out I was gay. No biggie. Tried to make into a huge deal ALL through high school. Didn't go down all that much. Most people in 90% liberal Evanston don't give a shit. Never had a dramatic coming out story. Never had a coming out story period. Wore my gayness on my sleeve. People asked. I answered. End of story.

You Decide...The Gayest Thing Ever? (Or At the Very Least The Awesomest)

Midway through high school fell head over heels in love with movies. All movies. Well most movies. There are always exceptions. No one loves everything. I certainly don't. Decided I wanted to make a career out of it. 

After viewing the entirety of Battlestar Galactica (the re-imagined series) I determined I was a deist for whatever reason. Perhaps I'm more somewhere between a deist and a secular humanist. But in any case religion sometimes has some slight relevance in my life and in my analyses. What bearing this will have on my posts I don't know. I'm just putting it out there as a weak attempt of igniting interest in whoever reads this junk.

Speaking of god (always with a lower case g)...

School was okay. No big deal. I enjoyed it. I made friends. I had some neat classes. I forgot most everything I learned. I didn't do prom. It wasn't THE time of my life but it wasn't horrible. I always wonder what would've happened to me if I had been out sexuality-wise at a school other than where I was. What if I had been in some rural podunk town in the middle of Nowhere, America w/ one friend? Would I have done everything the same? Would I have been as flamingly queer as I am nowadays? Not that I'm THAT flaming. I'm moderately hot. A solid simmer I'd say. Would I have been lukewarm? Or freezing cold? I don't know. Would it have been like those adorable coming of age and coming out novels written for young adults that I still lamely read to this day for fun? Those books where everything's against the main guy, until he meets that one awesome dude? And they sort of fall for each other, but the other dude won't come out? And then the main guy falls for his best friend who was there the entire time only the main guy didn't realize the obvious? And it all ends happily-ish? That's not real life. Which is okay sometimes. Sometimes those teens need hope combined with realism instead of constant pessimism. I like that. Most of the time. If it's done right. And it's almost always not done right at all. Anyway. School. It happened. Whatever. Shrugs shoulder.

One of My Favorite Books (Just To Read and Not Take THAT Seriously)

PS- It's a coming out/coming of age novel, surprise surprise

Politics are kind of a thing for me. I'm usually either liberal or on the fence. Again, is that kind of thing going to figure into these posts? I don't know. Maybe. We'll see. I know at the very least I loathe people who are 100% in one corner or the other and argue endlessly about every issue and get on their soap-boxes instead of LISTENING. Debates and discussions require calm. Not shouting. 

When Will People Listen?

I have a small group of friends. I tend to be rather anti-social. I don't hate people, I'm just extraordinarily shy. In many many ways this is to my advantage. I'm very observant. I watch people. In a non-creepy stalker kind of way. In a "I like to study human nature" kind of way. Next time you're on the train just watch and take note of those around you. What strikes you about them? What do you think they're thinking, where are they going, what do they want out of life? What little gestures do they make that might have some significance in regards to who they are? It's fun. And NOT CREEPY. In any way. In many many ways I also wish I were a social butterfly. But then again it must get exhausting having hundreds of so-called "friends" on Facebook. Are they really friends anyway? What meaning or bearing do hundreds of people have on your life? Or are they just random individuals you met one time and were vaguely interested in for about five seconds? Is that a friend? It has also been said that screenwriters (me) tend to be very introverted and hate talking with people (or at all). That's why the supreme irony is that it's required of us to pitch films to agents and producers. The world hates us/me.

Now I'm in college. Taking courses in screenwriting. I'm terrified of movie technology. I fear that camera may explode if I pick it up. I laugh when someone asks me if I know how to edit. My desires lie elsewhere. I like to imagine. And create. And pick the nits out of every fucking thing. I only JUST finished my first feature script. And it still needs revisions. As all art does. It's hard work. But oh so worth it. The best days ever are when people in your classes read the lines you've written and don't struggle with lame cliched dialogue but instead have fun with what you simply KNOW will go down in movie history as the next big THING. But it's not all fun and games and endless praise. Somewhere down the line someone inevitably challenges you or says it's shit. And it's tough. But that's why you fix it. And that's really why I'm doing this.

I don't wanna talk about my scripts or my story ideas, though I might mention them every so often. I want to do this blog to discuss the movies I've seen. The films I've enjoyed as mindless pop cultural entertainment. The cinema I've watched being created on the big screen for the first time. And the train-wreck travesties I've witnessed and shuddered at when they're referred to as "motion pictures" by the unenlightened and idiotic mass consumers sitting next to me in the theaters. 

There will be the odd identification and discussion of my favorite TV shows and music and books. There will be diatribes on new films I've just watched and rants about the movies I saw years ago and labeled a "Favorite" or a "Great."And there will naturally be the complaints and rambles and bitches and moans about the stuff that's popular that I hate for whatever reason or the stuff that's loved by everyone that I simply loathe with every fiber of my being.

Why? Because I Obsess...

So obviously I changed the background. The 2001 image just wasn't working for me.

The Next Spielberg...I Think Not...And Seriously He Was Once Called That

So has anyone noticed beyond The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, M. Night Shyamalan really hasn't made ANY good films? Not even to the remotest degree? It's kind of sad and kind of funny.

The Source of That All Too Serious Title Up There

"There are few things as fetching as a bruised ego on a beautiful angel."
- Stuntman Mike in Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof

ps- that background image is the stargate sequence from 2001: A Space Odyssey, arguably not only Kubrick's best film, but also one of the best movies ever made. period. so there.

pps- I'll inevitably be discussing both of these flicks at some point in the future. because that's what I'm here for...