Category Archives: Film

John Wick

The Equalizer

I know I saw The Equalizer before Myschievia, because I saw it the same day I bought my new canvas tent, which while not as waterproof as advertised, is far more waterproof than I have ever had a tent be in the past. Which is to say, more than a month ago.

I’m kind of sad that this has to be one of the shoddy movie reviews I had mentioned earlier (in point of fact, I may have seen it before I finished reading the Stormlight book, they were within 24 hours of each other, but who can remember?), because I had some thoughts about race and remakes while watching it that I no longer feel comfortable delving into, with the material no longer fresh in my mind. Something about the lack of black action heroes (well, since the ’70s anyway) and incorporating a comedy routine I heard sometime in that same time period but no longer remember the author of that discussed black remakes of what had been white movies, and the cultural shifts that occur and how this movie doesn’t really have that, but it’s all too vague and muddled in my head to feel particularly comfortable making a go at it.

Still and all, if you were wondering whether an action/mystery series from the mid ’80s with a British protagonist needed a modern-updated prequel starring Denzel Washington, with Hit Girl as an Eastern European prostitute who is his initiating client, the answer is: yeah, I’d keep watching that series. (In fact, there’s a sequel in development, but man, just like Star Trek: The Reboot Picture, this would be far better served by a TV season than a movie every two or three years.)

Guardians of the Galaxy

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The crazy thing about how far behind my reviews have fallen isn’t that the backlog is huge, but that it’s so very, very small. There’s the movie I saw before this, which I have finally accepted won’t be served by a useless review and which will therefore have to wait until dollar theaters pick it up so I can ~~purge~~ expiate my sins, there’s this one, and there’s one book I finished almost at the same time. Nothing else.

I haven’t exactly been avoiding the theater? I have most definitely been avoiding books though. Which is to say, boy howdy have I read a ton of comics over the past month. None of that has anything to do with anything, except oh wait, it totally does, since I just remembered that the movie I am reviewing is Guardians of the Galaxy. If you were to guess I had seen that comic in the mid ’70s, the answer would be, sort of? I did, but just the premiere issue so far, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with the characters that populate this movie. I did read a handful of issues of Adam Warlock which introduce Gamora, making her, so far as I can tell, the oldest of these characters in Marveldom. This is not only pretty cool, but it definitely puts a pleasantly ironic spin on a situation I read about a few weeks ago where someone was selling kidshirts of the characters and left her off because she wouldn’t appeal to boys enough. That’s already dumb on the face of it, obviously, but man oh man is it five times as dumb with the added knowledge about their collective history in comics.

None of which has anything to do with how good the movie is, I know, but… it’s been out more than a month. I kind of missed the boat on that one already, y’know? But let’s pretend I haven’t, and someone who can see this hasn’t actually seen the movie yet. It’s like this. A misfit kid with the soundtrack of the ’70s and ’80s as his sole possession in life winds up in space because that’s how comics work sometimes, only now he’s a cool thief[1]. Then he gets caught up in a galactic civil war[2] between the Kree and some other people who are not the Skrulls and who I would probably know more about if I had read comics from the ’80s, meets up with the daughter of the baddest dude in the galaxy[3], not to mention a psychotic raccoon, his pet tree who has a lot to say but only the raccoon can translate, and an angry tattooed giant out for revenge because the second baddest dude in the galaxy killed his entire family one time.[4] Then, they… well, the point is, literally any damn thing could happen, and if you aren’t desperate to know what, we are entirely different people, you and I.

[1] Not the Danny Ocean kind of thief, the Indiana Jones kind, if Indy had ever acknowledged that he’s totally a thief but for museums, which by the way is 100% what he is. I mean, it’s not his fault, it is colonialism’s fault, but think about it.
[2] It’s more complicated than that, but at some point I’m just writing a spoiler-filled summary of the movie instead of a review; plus also, if I break it down, the movie sounds less like Star Wars.
[3] Who we last saw financing the destruction of the earth for unknown reasons.
[4] “For you, the day Bison graced your village with his presence was the single most important moment of your life. For me, it was a Tuesday.” Oh Raul Julia, we miss you still.

Prometheus

Then I got to pick up a movie that I’ve long regretted missing out on, by virtue of it apparently being a recommended reference piece for the latest in quality surround sound.[1] I would never have been so obsessed with seeing Prometheus if I had not known about its connection into the Alien mythos, a series with which I am quite obsessed indeed. I find it ironic, therefore, that the huge failing of the movie is that Ridley Scott thought he could make a science fiction movie by drawing so strongly on the same elements that made Alien one of the best horror movies of all time.

See, there are these archaeologists, and they have found evidence in the records of a dozen ancient cultures that aliens were once among us. Better yet, they found a map. Off they go (courtesy of the Weyland Corporation, its Yutani partnership still in the murky future) to meet said aliens and see what can be learned from them or their remains. (After all, it’s been a while since anyone has heard from them.) And then… well, the problem I have here is that the only thing that compelled me to eschew my usual lack of non-theatrical reviews is how much I want to talk about What Went Wrong. And though I don’t plan to lay out the plot detail by detail, the broad strokes of conflict necessary to explain myself are major spoilers for the last third of the movie. Probably nobody is worried about being spoiled for a generally panned film that is also two years old? But just in case, you have been warned.

So, after various trials and tribulations that there’s no need to detail, half of the main characters are standing face to face with one of their Progenitors. They have woken him from presumed millennia of cryogenic slumber, they have a robot with enough linguistic knowledge and recent research to speak with him. This is a high level “Are you There, God? It’s Me, Margaret” moment in progress here. And then…

Let me come at it from another direction. Science fiction, at its core, is about the betterment of humanity. Depending upon the flavor, it may not always be successful, but we are always striving, seeking answers, reaching beyond ourselves in some way, whether technologically, physically, philosophically, morally, or some combination. And you cannot get more science fictional, I would posit, than going into deep space to learn the fundamental answers of our own genesis.

Horror, at its core, is about the inexplicable. Sometimes we try to impose a cause where no cause exists[2]. Sometimes we just shy away in existential or literal terror at the knowledge that there is no reason to be had. Ridley Scott’s Alien was exactly that movie. Some miners on their way home stumble across an old space beacon, accidentally wake up an egg filled with death, and the lone survivor walks away with no answers at all, just bloody destruction.

As you can see, these two genres are fundamentally at odds with each other, in their purest forms. The reason Prometheus is a failure, then, is because Scott pulled a bait-and-switch. Two-thirds of the way through a science fiction movie, the audience is suddenly faced with inexplicable horror and an ending that promises only the lack of answers, even as the film’s heroine launches into the uncertain future to continue her off-screen search for them.

Which forces me to wonder if the sequel (2016, IMDB says) will retroactively redeem some portion of this movie?

[1] I suspect this is entirely due to the waterfall scene the flick opens with.
[2] Pamela Voorhees launched a decade of schlock by pretending her murder spree was about teenage drug use and premarital sex instead of blind, flailing denial of her own senseless loss.

The Purge

The number of things I have to review since this time on Thursday of last week is frankly astonishing. First up, The Purge, which I was reminded of when advertisements for the first of what I presume will be half a dozen sequels starting airing on, I don’t know, the radio? Somewhere, anyway. Then, for a wonder, the first movie of whatever series you happen to be thinking of[1] was actually available for free on my Roku search during the timeframe in which its sequel was dominating the media. Thanks, HBOGo!

Anyway, it’s the near future. Like, ten years from now. And the “new founding fathers” have instituted an annual 12 hour purge, in which all crime, up to murder[2], is legal, with the exceptions that you cannot use “class 4 and above weaponry” and that there are some small number of government officials who are immune. Of course, the hammer falls hardest on those without the monetary wherewithal to hide themselves behind gates and walls, but this is all good because between the shrinking indigent population and the annual catharsis, crime is way down and people feel safe all the rest of the year. Pretty much everyone digs it! Except for people who have been negatively affected, of course, and they hardly count.

Into this morality play is dropped Ethan Hawke, his inexplicably raven-tressed Lannister wife, his needlessly over-sexualized schoolgirl daughter[3], and his moral son, who drops the lot of them in a kettle of boiling fish, or some such metaphor, when he lets a nameless, terrified, and conspicuously black young man into the house after hearing the latter pleading for someone, anyone, to help him. The stage set, about 15 simultaneous games of cat-and-mouse begin. Can the injured young man be trusted? Is it suspicious that the schoolgirl’s boyfriend has picked tonight of all nights to have a man-to-man discussion with Ethan Hawke about his relationship with Hawke’s daughter? What about the people who injured that other guy in the first place? How far will Hawke go to defend his family? Will it be too far? Will it be far enough? Isn’t Lena Headey usually tougher than this? Will the neighbors band together against the external threat? If so, which one(s)? Pretty much the whole movie is Choose Your Own Adventure: Bloody Morality with Racist Overtones edition.

It seems heavy-handed on paper, but I honestly thought it was pretty effective. 1) Because like it or not, there’s no way to tell what anyone’s motives truly are, especially on a night when there are no legal consequences. 2) Because, even if you do want to take a moral stand, or at least a stand geared toward trust rather than betrayal, there’s no guarantee that circumstances will allow you that luxury. Nobody should be put in the position of valuing one life over another, but “should” is also a luxury that we aren’t always allowed.

[1] In this case, it should probably be The Purge, though.
[2] Except rape, right? Right? RIGHT? Because what possible good would that serve, even if you can come to a truce in your mind that the rest of the plan has some kind of upside? The movie did not really address this question at all, which was probably better news for my peace of mind than if it had.
[3] If she had not stayed in the schoolgirl uniform the whole movie, it would not have been even a third as blatant, I don’t think.

Edge of Tomorrow

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Man. I am so slow at watching / reading / playing anything at all, this year. So slow. It’s driving me a little bit crazy, although I have read really a lot of comics from the overly dense mid 1970s. I’m looking rather forward to a lot of titles starting to collapse by 1977 or so. However, this is not about that.

This is about Edge of Tomorrow, in which Tom Cruise plays the main character in a video game, stuck on an endless escort mission to get Emily Blunt (who used to be the main character in the previous video game to which this is the sequel) into close proximity with the boss fight, so that she can save humanity. Despite what a misery that would be as a player or to live through, it actually works pretty well on the big screen. Which you presumably knew it would, since you already know what an excellent movie Groundhog Day is.

If it feels like, between my thumbnail sketch and my acknowledgement of the very clear forebear, I’ve given away too much? Well, a) I like to think there’s enough depth in the movie (character studies, sfnal exploration of the possibilities, new and improved explosions, etc.) that it’s not actually as simplistic as that thumbnail, but then also b) it’s still a summer action movie. So maybe it is that simple, and all you’re going for are the broad sketches and explosions. If that’s the case, I offer up as my defense that I gave you one half of a detail beyond what the previews did. Either way: it’s more good than bad, as most Tom Cruise sci-fi vehicles are. So that’s cool.

X-Men: Days of Future Past

The Amazing Spider-Man 2

Can I just say I’m really happy that Spider-Man got rebooted? I would not have predicted feeling that way, but after two movies into the current franchise, it is become more and more clear to me that Tobey Maguire’s take just didn’t really cut it. It’s true, Peter Parker has a really hard life; but he’s not a sad, mopey person, and that’s what we got out of the previous trilogy. (Yes, the second movie starring Doctor Octopus was still incredibly done every step of the way, and my realizations do not take away from that in the tiniest regard.)

There are plenty of things that work better about this new series. I’ve already mentioned how the seeds of sequels are planted here and there and all over the place, just as though it’s a living, breathing world in which all relevant information doesn’t happen in the same segment but instead gets spread out over time. Comics weren’t episodic in the 1960s at the latest, TV has stopped being episodic as of the 1990s, and if serial movies can make the transition? All the better for me! (And, I would argue, the viewing public in general, but nothing pleases everybody, regardless of how much it ought to do.)

As for the movie in question? Clearly, I am still okay with the basic structure and with the way the characters are being acted. Gwen Stacy is a strong, modern woman who actively contributes and makes her own damn choices[1], Spider-Man runs at a quip a minute, Oscorp is a creepy company that has its tendrils into everything, etc., ad nauseum, this is Spider-Man done right nearly as much as Marvel is doing its own properties right in the expanded Avengers franchise; my only complaint, if any, is that they aren’t all in the same world, as God and Stan Lee intended. And the story is pretty good too! Nearly everyone is paying for the sins of the past, sins none of the players actually committed. It’s not a new plot, but it’s one you can’t really go wrong with. Plus, usually that plot doesn’t star Jamie Foxx as a being of pure electrical energy with an inferiority complex. It’s cool, you can’t go wrong with that plot element either.

[1] Which, okay, Mary Jane was doing by the 1960s also, and I guess you can see yet another reason why I’ve always been enamored of these comics.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier

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Argh, this movie. Here’s the problem, in a nutshell. I saw it in a double feature with the first one, as a premiere event before opening day. And I had no idea how to review it, because literally anything I could say that delves into character motivations or why some characters work and others do not, and how…. anything at all would be a massive spoiler. So instead I’ve sat here for days, letting the review get stale, still just as stuck with nothing to say. It’s hateful is what it is.

Instead, I will talk about the event. Even though it’s probably all stuff I’ve said before. See, I’ve certainly discussed how much I love the Alamo Drafthouse out of Austin, and I know I’ve talked about my excitement that it finally came to Dallas. What I only believe I’ve said (but have no proof, short of 12 seconds’ worth of research that clearly isn’t going to happen) is how thrilled I am by the Dallas location’s management. These guys are as genuinely excited about their movie events as the original management in Austin, and not to leave out that they’re as excited as yours truly. It’s not the single most comfortable theater experience I’ve had, and it’s nowhere near the most high-tech or immersive. But I can always be certain of the quality of the audience, and I can always be certain of the quality of the staff, and I can always be certain of the quality of the event. More to the point, I can always be certain that every film I see there will be worthy of being called an event.

I’m pretty passionate about this chain, is what I guess I’m saying. And yes, the new Captain America movie was no exception. Where else do you get to watch animated Baron Zemo from the ’60s dancing around in glee after being reminded that maybe Paste Pot Pete can help him get the mask off his face from where it’s been glued for twenty years, during the half hour pre-show entertainment?

Okay, that plus the cut I’m about to put in here should be plenty enough spoiler space. Screw it, everything hereafter is for people who saw the movie or else want to be sad.

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Shards of Delirium

Fragments of Delight