Monthly Archives: December 2016

Movie Review: Rogue One; A Star Wars Story (spoiler free)

Sunday morning my sweetie-wife and I caught an early morning showing of the latest Star Wars film and the first movie that focuses on characters not established in the main storyline or connected to those iconic people. In their bid to print endless reams of money, Disney is expanding the franchise and that is a risk.

The first of the ‘anthology’ stories is directly tied to the event for the first Star Wars which premiered nearly 40 years ago. In the opening credit crawl we were told that the Rebels striking from their hidden base have revolted against the Galactic Empire and in the battle stole the plans for the Empire’s new weapon, The Death Star. Rogue One is that story.

This is a movie that leans much heavier on the words ‘war’ than on the word ‘star’ from their sub-title. This is a grittier, darker, and more cynical view of the rebel’s revolt against the Empire. The good guys are not quite so good and their actions not always so justifiable. It does not drop down into a cynical level of ‘they are all the same’ so it is still a story with heroes and villains, but the heroes have sharper edges and are not engaged in a long form reenactment of Campbell’s mythic story telling courses. There is a hero character that when they are introduced their ruthlessness is sa cold as to make Han Solo’s original introduction very tame.

So, does this darker tone work?

Yes. This is an enjoyable and in many ways a more adult approach to the Star Wars franchise. The courses aren’t so clear and the costs of victory are much higher than in the simple fantasy fair of the first trilogy. Character death here is not checking off a box about having the mentor depart the story. Overall I enjoyed the film and the experience.

There are flaws in the film. I do not think it joins seamlessly with the very first film, but given the monstrosity that Lucas called continuity in the prequels this is a tiny quibble. A more serious flaw is the CGI human characters. There are two human characters represented by fully CGI effects and the uncanny valley prevented both from working for me. I was utterly aware that they were visual effects and not actors inhabiting the same space as their co-actors. It was a bold attempt but one that failed.

In the end this film is worth seeing and seeing in a good cinema.

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Themed Review: Doctor X

Okay, I want to get this out there straight away, I do not think that this movie belongs on this listing. Oh lots of people think that it’s part of the secret theme but I disagree. However in the spirit of inclusiveness I will write a few brief words about this oddball movie.

Doctor X is a pre-code thriller/horror/sf/comedy movie and it works about as well as a mash up of such disparate genres can be expected to function. It star Lionel Atwell, who also appears in one of my favorite of the classic Universal Frankenstein film, Son of Frankenstein. It also stars Fay Wray of King Kong fame. This is a film that deals with murder, prostitution, and even cannibalism. Since it was made before rigid enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code it is more daring than many classic films but is rather tame by modern conventions.

The monster important take away from this film is that a not point in it does the titular Doctor X create a person or any sort of creature. He does create synthetic flesh with which he creates artificial limbs and masks, but not living, independent beings.

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Themed Review: It Came From Outer Space

1953’s It Came From Outer Space could have been a very low brow affair. Alien invasion stories in the paranoid 1950s were often thinly disguised expressions of the cold war and reaction to the recent World War. However Universal contacted celebrated author Ray Bradbury to help them make this SF film and with his touches and concepts the story became something richer and something more personal.

Directed in 3D by jack Arnold who also helmed The Creature From the Black Lagoon for Universal, It Came From Outer Space is a story of first contact, the gross prejudices humans carry around with them and the hope that we can become something better than ourselves.

I have the good fortune to see this movie for the first time on the big screen. back in the 1980’s the Ken Theater was a revival house, playing a different double feature every night with occasional film festivals. One weekend evening I rode the bus out to the theater and watched this movie and Creature From The Black lagoon, both projected in 3-D. That was a treat. The 3-D effect worked flawlessly, Arnold shows real restraint in its application with very little of the ‘it’s coming right at me!’ shots, and both films had strong script performed by competent actors.

I recently got a copy on DVD. Not on the big screen, not in 3-D, but still a fine film and look forward to sharing it with people who have not seen it before.

 

 

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Themed Review: King Kong

I really enjoy King Kong. How much do I enjoy the classic 1933 movie? I have driven from San Diego to Los Angeles, a little over two hours each way, in order to watch the movie on the big big screen. (It was the Egyptian Theater, an old movie palace with a balcony. The film played beautifully there.)

Of course I have seen the 70’s remake, but that is a poor poor imitation of the exciting original. Also I have watched King Kong vs Godzilla and King Kong Lives! The often

forgotten sequel to the 70’s remake. This century saw another remake, this time from Kiwi director Peter Jackson. I own that version on blu-ray, a reasonable $7 purchase. Jackson’s King Kong is a decent 3 ½ hour movie with a really good 2 hour movie hiding inside it. It is overly indulgent, needs a serious edit, and is flawed in its approach to one of the original’s more likeable character, Carl Denham, but it still far exceeds the quality of the 70’s vision. (Which has an additional element of pain on rewatching due to the prominent placement and use of NYC’s World Trade Center.)
No in spite of all remakes and different takes inspired by the original movie in my opinion nothing matches the 1933 film for tone, excitement, and over all fun.

The story is straightforward and simply. An expedition to a distant island discovers dinosaurs and a giant ape. They bring the ape back as an exhibit, it escapes in New York City and after a brief rampage it is killed.
The thing that is missed in all the remakes is that there are no truly bad people in the story. No one is a villain. This film is almost free of cynicism, reveling in the thrill of exploration and adventure over making some statement about humanity. In that pure adventure
it reveals elements of humanity in a much cleared way than a dozen cynical ‘message movies.’

The 70’s remakes falls prey to the darkness of its decade, unable to resist to impulse to portray some classes of people as evil and others as good. Jackson’s vision is less political but equally cynical.

It will be interesting when next year we get Kong: Skull Island and find out how much adventure there is compared to how much cynicism

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Themed Review: The Invisible Man

Wells published his novel in 1897 and the concept has fascinated us ever since. It has been adapted both directly and in concept several times, most notably in 1933 by director James Whale with Claude Rains voicing the titular part. (That itself is amusing. We mostly know Rains for his elegant style and distinguished voice, but his accent was an act. In home life he spoke with a cockney accent so thick people often failed to understand him.)

Most people know the plot. A scientist invents a serum that makes himself invisible, however the serum has an adverse event that also make the user insane. Power and paranoia drive the protagonist to his doom.

This however is a distortion of Wells’ original vision. The scientist, Griffin, is brilliant and does create the invisibility concoction, however he is, before the experiment, already vain, and amoral. Invisibility releases him from the consequences of his actions and frees the monster that always dwelt within him. Wells is making a damning statement on human nature with his story, one that most filmmakers omit just as they omit the sacrilegious subtext to The Island of Doctor Moreau.

Surprisingly in the horrid movie Hollow Man, a blatant adaptation of the story, the scientist is presented as an amoral man and so the theme of the movie is much closer to Well’s vision than the classic film. However Hollow Man is such a wretched movie that I could not recommend it at all.

 

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Themed Review: Flash Gordon

The trouble with a review of Flash Gordon is which one do you examine? There is the original comic strip, created to rival the very successful Buck Rogers, perhaps the radio serials, or do you look at the film serial from the 1940 where the hero appears ‘silver underwear’ but also established many of the tropes that live on to this day? Of course staying with the cinema there was the campy 1980 film, a guilty pleasure for many people. Television has also gotten in on the act, there were repurposed serials, animated shows, and even a recent attempt at a dramatic live action program. I think looking at the wealth of material I will focus on the one best known to me; the feature film from 1980.

It surprises some people that I truly like this movie. Mostly my tastes in SF movies runs to the serious and films that don’t even try to hadwave their scientific discretions rarely work for this author, but Flash Gordon with its tongue in cheek campiness strikes just the right tone.

The entire concept, a sportsman from Earth (the original was a polo player by the 80’s be had become a football player and if made today perhaps he’d be into basketball) is the saviour of an entire people because he can teach them teamwork and fairplay, is fairly silly. Dictators are tougher to topple than that, but if you take that premise and run with it in a bright colorful and campy manner then it can work. There are several truly good actors in the cast and one that towers over the rest, Max Von Sydow. That man can take any line and make you believe the truth behind it. I own the blu-ray and I tell you half the reason I re-watch the movie is because of Max.

This is not deep and meaningful cinema, but it is fun and it knows when to wink at the audience.

For me, in a film of this nature, that is enough

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First in a Series of Themed Reviews: The Day The Earth Stood Still

I am starting a new series of classic film reviews. There is a pattern to which films are reviewed and their order, but I am not going to reveal that pattern until someone outs it.

The Day The Earth Stood Still is one of my favorite SF films. Directed by the incomparable Robert Wise it is the story of alien Klaatu, his very tall robot Gort, and the mysterious message he brings for the entire world. Of course upon arrival Klaatu is shot by the army, though giving credit where credit is due, they didn’t come out blazing and it was more a product of poor training than murderous intent.

Soon Klaatu takes to his heels, gives the army the slip, and investigates humanity directly.

In the end he presents his message, and this is a message movie thought it is a good one because you can enjoy the film without having accept it’s soapbox.

One of the interesting behind the scenes stories i have heard about this production is that Spencer Tracy got his hands on the script and lobbied very hard to be cast as Klaatu. Robert Wise hated the idea, feeling that the part needed to be played by an actor that the American public was unfamiliar with and he ended up casting Michael Rennie a tall English actor with a regal manner. Wise made the right call. These days it is hard to envision anyone else in that part.

The recent remake was, in my opinion, crap. Substituting an environmental message for an nuclear war one simply failed on multiple levels.

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Research Can be Surprising

One of the ways to avoid doing the actual work of writing it is do research. Of course your story needs research but it is also an easy out, after all there is always another article to read, another book to check out, another paper to scan. I am no more immune to this than any other writer.

For y next SF military novel I am doing research into PTSD. The question I have is if the bio-chemical and neurotransmitter links of PTSD can be undone and restored by physical treatment what does that do to issues such as survivor’s guilt?

While doing the research I followed some breadcrumbs down a rabbit hole of information and ended up reading about children and PTSD. Not at all germane to my novel as none of the characters are children and certainly not the character for whom I needed these answers, but the research turned surprising in a personal matter.

My father died when I was ten years old and it was quite a blow emotionally. Reading the symptoms and expressions of PTSD in children I was struck just how much of it lined up with my memories if myself during the years following his passing.

Now this was the early 70’s, hardly a time when people would have considered such a diagnosis for a boy, but the tremors of familiarity resonate strongly for me. Today, there are now symptoms of expressions and I am quite satisfied with life.

Writing can be a profession that transforms the writer and not just their readers. I have already had an adjustment t some political thought as a results of fiction heads I have crawled into for their POV and now I have a new take on my own childhood.

 

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A Day Off

Lately I have been working 50-54 hours weeks at my day job as the Medicare application flood in during the Annual Enrollment Period. This week my body informed me that it no longer approved of the extra money I was making and allowed the Psoriatic Arthritis to flare up.

Now, this is not disabling and many people, some close friends, suffer far worse health issues, but the outbreaks, the joint pain, and the lack of sleep do take their toll. This was a result of physical stress and in order to de-stress I took today off.

Surprisingly I slept for 9 hours, which means I really and truly needed it. I operate, happily, on 6 1/2 hours each night and even n the weekends rarely go beyond 7.

This morning has been a lazy morning of burritos, British WWII documentaries, and thinking about my current SF short story.

It had been stuck for an ending but now I have it. I knew the story, and that pointed to the character change, what I did not have was the plot that got me there. Now I think I have that plot. When I awoke this morning I even was struck by an experiment style to pull off the ending. It’s wacky and may not work but I will attempt it. You should write outside your comfort zone.

 

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Fasten You Safety Belts

So here is another political – sorry I gotta say a couple words about the recent kerfuffle concerning Trump, Taiwan, and The People’s Republic Of China.

Trump accepted a congratulatory telephone call from the recently elected pro-independence president of Taiwan Tsai Ign-wen. This is provoking a diplomatic mess with the PRC. China considers Taiwan a wayward and disobedient province, Taiwan considers themselves the Real China and the communist government on the mainland as illegal and illegitimate. The official US position since 1979 has been to publicly agree with the PRC, give Taiwan the diplomatic cold shoulder, but simultaneously provided the island with arms and an implicit assurance that we are really their allies and will come to their aid if they need it. Everyone involved knew about the fictions and how everyone really felt. When he accepted that phone call Trump upset more than 30 years of diplomatic deals.

Two narratives have emerged ‘explaining’ the incident and both are quite troubling.

Explanation 1 is fairly straight forward; the Taiwanese president called Trump, trump accepted out of ignorance, and now we have a potential crisis. This is troubling because it has the subtext that Trump is too ignorant to be aware that as Presidents your words really matter and as his ego will not allow him to refuse any form of congratulations he accepted the call. It also implies that if you accept that President Tsai Ing-wen is not as foolish as Trump, then she used his ignorance to further her own political goals. It is not good that other world leaders may already be considering how to play our president for the fool that he is.

Explanation 2 is a bit more Machiavellian. The Washington Post is reporting that elements within Trump’s team that are pro-Taiwan and hardliners against the PRC have been working for sometime to make that particular phone call happen, but that this was not something Trump was aware of and in fact that they played him for their own ends. This has the subtext that the people in Trump’s administration will be plotting and playing the President for their own ends. That implies not only chaos but political war within the administration of the United States and president too ignorant to be aware of the war and its ramifications.

Of course these two scenarios are not mutually exclusive and both may be true to various extents. Narrative 1, narrative 2, or both, it doesn’t matter, it all portends badly for the United States, her people, her economy, and the world for the next four years.

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