TRON: Legacy

Evan and I went to see TRON: Legacy last night with some friends. The experience started out with some good and some bad. First, the good. The theatre itself was amazing. The seats were fake-leather (instead of the usual felt cushions. No more static worries). The rows had more legroom, which also meant getting past people was easier (no more of this “sorry, excuse me, sorry, excuse me” nonsense). The seats reclined, although you had to be tall enough to make that work the best. I was only able to get about half the angle possible, so shorter people may have a small problem. Or need to bring a phone book. Lastly, we didn’t need to worry about getting there early to grab seats, because I could choose them AHEAD OF TIME! What great planning by the movie people. It may only be possible at that theatre (3D, AVX, lots of initials for it), but still. Awesome! We may never go anywhere again.

The bad: there was a family in front of us that included two six to ten year old boys, and a baby. Seriously. Could not have been older than two years. I would question the parenting skills, but it’s a touchy subject with most people. Secondly, there was a group of girls behind us who commented on everything. I didn’t mind too much because I could tune them out (and the movie was loud enough to drown out a lot), and also because I agreed with them half the time. Still, it wasn’t audience participation night. Shut up!

Trailers started off well. No ads or anything, just dimmed lights and future movies. Evan got Mars Needs Moms (I think). I got The Green Hornet again (Evan usually owns me on that one, but it was a different trailer) as well as On Stranger Tides and Thor. The latter three are going on our movie list to see next year, which is shaping up quite nicely.

The movie itself opened with a flashback to 1987, where a digitally de-aged Jeff Bridges left his son to go to work and never came home. The only nitpick I could find with this is that the news called him a video game icon. Video games didn’t become popular until the Famicon System (You’ll know it as the NES, or Nintendo) about a year later. Previous to that, video games had been limited to the Arcades and to Atari, and played mostly by geeks.

Anyhow, in the present day his son has his own adventures, breaking into the company he technically owns, but the board of directors controls. A bit later, he gets sucked into the computer world from the previous movie. And the movie suddenly takes a turn for the awesome.

The real world had been shot in 2D, and the computer world in 3D. So suddenly, the world jumps out at you. Plus, the sound is a theatre-shaking bass. So the first moments in the computer are EPIC! Good choices by the director.

After a brief interlude, the action starts. The arena games of TRON are featured (Disc and Lightcycles battles), with much better fight choreography these days than the last go around. And then there’s a really long break in the action while the plot unspools and Sam (Flynn’s son) has many things explained to him. Then there’s a club with a fight, and another (shorter) break, and the climax.

My secret fear is that despite the hype and trailers, and awesome fight scenes, this isn’t an actual action movie. And that would totally kill my review if it weren’t for a few things. Like I said, the choreography has comes miles since 1982, so the fighting is way cool. Secondly, this movie is amazing to look at. Possibly the best 3D I’ve ever seen (Avatar can suck it). The only bad thing to look at was the villains second-in-command. His facemask was silly. Everyone else had motorcycle helmets, or at least headgear that could come out of Mass Effect, but his facemask was a pretty stupid plastic thingy.

And then there’s the soundtrack. I’ve known for a while that Daft Punk was doing the soundtrack, so I had it on my list of things to pay attention to. A few weeks before the movie came out, they released a music video for Derezzed, and it was suitably Daft Punk-ish that I thought it likely I would get the album, expecting more techno. And Daft Punk knows its techno. I was totally blown away that they also knew their orchestral music. I was sitting there thinking “This soundtrack is pretty good. I should really get it.” And then they had a scene with Fall, and it was more “I must acquire this soundtrack as soon as humanly possible.” It takes place in an elevator with no brakes, so if you can get past the sound of it plummeting to its doom, you can appreciate the gravity of the song.

There are of course some minuses to this movie. The breaks in action are annoying. There are some clunky lines, particularly at the end, when the heroes fall victim to one-liner-syndrome. It’s where they’re forced by the writers to say one-liners right before or after they dispatch each of their enemies. Hey writers, not everyone is Schwarzenegger or Willis. You can have capable actors emoting without speaking. And lastly, try to avoid seeing this movie with people who must comment to the entire movie about obvious things. Most of the time it was alright, but right at the end they made a comment so dumb we made fun of them for the entire walk to the car and most of the drive home.

Most of the time these would detract significantly from the movie. But this time, the movie is just too awesome. The soundtrack, action, and visuals of the movie are too good not to see it anywhere but in the biggest, loudest theatre you can. Twice.

Spies vs Military

I recently found out that a lot of my knowledge about certain subjects is filtered through various media. For instance, at a Christmas party last night, there were a few people talking about the medical profession (two were going through medical school, one was in their residency). I could follow along with their discussion mainly because I watch way too much Scrubs. It’s how I know that internship is one year, followed by two years of residency (for internal medicine) or a four years (for surgery). When they were talking about specialties, I knew what they were talking about because I had seen the effects on TV and in movies. Pathology? CSI. Proctology? Lots of humour (“Let’s check you for cancer!” *snaps rubber glove*).

Over the past couple of years, I’ve gotten a lot of media about spies. It probably started with Chuck (which is a lot less realistic than real life), and continued with Tom Clancy’s books. He apparently got permission to interview people at the CIA about how things work, so these books would be the most realistic if I knew how the CIA actually worked. And most recently, I have begun watching Burn Notice. It’s about an ex-spy who’s trying to get back into the business. Also, he’s the Best Spy Evar! So that’s cool. The writing staff has an actual retired CIA agent on hand to tap for information about homemade devices, although they change small details so the audience doesn’t learn how to make homemade bombs or hack Bluetooth with a Pringles tube and a wire hanger. It does seem to emphasize the importance of cell phones (they’re great at remote anything. Setting off explosives or disabling cars. Whatever).

This summer, part of our mindless movie line-up was The A-Team, in which the villain was (*SPOILER ALERT*) a member of the CIA. The protagonists were all from the military (Army rangers or special forces, I can’t remember which. All I know is they had a tattoo) and guess which side won? The military, of course. In fact, until recently, the CIA had been the villain in a lot of media. Possibly justified after the Pay of Pigs fiasco, but the CIA are no more or less evil than any other group that works for the government (with the possible exception of lobbyists. They are evil incarnate).

Of course, in Chuck or Burn Notice, the heroes are spies and sometimes the villains are from the military. So the spies win. To be fair, Burn notice also has an ex-navy SEAL (played by Bruce Campbell. AWESOME!) and an ex-IRA bomber (played by Gabrielle Anwar. HOT!) so it’s not all spy vs military. But it does raise the question of who would win between the top spy and the top military person (Army ranger, Navy SEAL, Marine … you know what? Marines are all badass. But I’m sure even they have a section for people who are a little too badass).

In media, it certainly depends on who the protagonist is. Because who wants to see the heroes lose? Well, critics do, but I’ve had enough of them. In real life, I think the military would be tougher and able to withstand more punishment, but the spy would be able to think laterally and more innovatively. So it would be a toss up that I’d pay money to see, if they didn’t keep showing better versions of it on TV.

And you know what? I almost forgot about a third party until I saw a Promo for Human Target on TV. It centers on an ex-assassin (how come there are so many shows about awesome people that quit or get fired from their day-jobs?) who now saves people from being assassinated. And anybody he comes up against (CIA, Military, Private military contractor) gets beaten. Hard. He is pure awesome. Like a cross between John McClane, MacGyver and Jet Li.

So I think I’ve covered most of the important sides. Military, Spy, Assassin. Whoever wins depends on who’s the hero, and who’s the villain. Really, the only losers are the FBI.

Faster - Benjy's Take

So, Evan posted his review before mine, plus his team made our fantasy football playoffs and mine didn’t, even though we had identical records. Suffice it to say, Evan has been schooling me lately. But he’s also doing a PhD, so I’m going to cut him some slack. Because if you do great things, you can be a great jerk. On with the show …

Faster started in our consciousnesses as a poster on the wall of the movie theatre during the summer. It was a simple poster, depicting a car, in front of which was a man standing mostly out of frame. The only thing in the frame was his left arm, tattooed up, and holding a gun. “Ah” I said to myself, “I shall put that movie on my radar.”

Later, we learned the Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson would be that armed man, and we saw trailers, and I said to Evan “Our continued survival depends heavily upon seeing this movie.” So when we had the chance, we saw it.

The movie started off well. Driver (Johnson’s character) was released from prison. There wasn’t much dialogue except for a warden who droned on a bit, but the movie cleverly used the audio to show Driver was tuning him out. From there, he was let out of the main gate, where he turned and ran down the road to a junkyard. He pulled back the cover of a car, got in, and found a name and a gun. Drove to the address that came with the name and pulled up across the street. Walked across the road while traffic slammed on their brakes, strode into the office, and stormed into the cubicle farm on the back, found the guy he was looking for, and shot him in the head. And I said to myself “What a wonderful life.” No, wait - I said to myself “This movie is AWESOME!”

Then he met up with some people to get a list of names. And the movie went downhill. You see, it tried to tell a story. It had a cop (named Cop) who was two weeks from retirement on the case. I guess calling him Cliché would've been too on the nose. It introduced a hitman who underwent a lot of character development. Which was a mistake. Halfway through, it wedged in a message about forgiveness instead of revenge. Which was a mistake. Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s a tremendous message to spread … in real life. In movies, give me action and gunplay anytime. And this movie failed.

There were maybe three shootouts, each of which lasted under a minute. There was hand to hand fight, which even in slow-motion lasted less than 30 seconds. There were a couple car chases, which were good, but short. The climax ended in three bullets, without any action at all.

The movie was going for plot, dialogue, and character development. It was desperately trying to be a Critic’s movie, instead of an action movie. I wouldn’t have minded, except I wanted to see an action movie. That’s what I go to movies to see, especially when they star The Rock. I do not go to see stories that happen to have guns in them. Maybe I should have clued in when the assassin (named Killer) packed for his mission by taking his pistol, but leaving his assault rifle behind. At least his girlfriend-then-wife can look after them. Yes, he got married. Yes, he promised to stop killing people. Yes, he got character development. Yes, I was disappointed.

As the movie progressed with less and less action, I progressively downgraded the movie. It finally ended before I got to “Avoid at all costs” and instead landed on “Watch it on TV if it’s on, but only if you’re bored.” Why? It’s got good music (by Clint Mansell, composer of one of the greatest songs ever) and it has some camera shots that I’ve seen rarely, if ever. A shot from behind the speedometer? Neat. Also, one of a corridor at an incredibly disconcerting angle. And of course, you should watch it if you curious about what happens when they suck all the action out of an action movie. Just don’t spend money on it. Like the studio that made it.

Faster

"Faster" has got to be the slowest movie I have seen in a long time.

Ok...I know I haven't been very good with my blogging updates. I finally got enough of my thesis written that I felt I had some time to go and check out a movie. So Benjy and I picked the most mindless movie out right now...and any movie with Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson should be the most mindless thing available.

As it turns out...The Hollywood hype machine got to me. Check out the movie poster:

IMDB Page

It features a completely roided out Rock, holding a handgun and just looking plain BADASS! The word "FASTER" has a bullet flying through it for crying out loud!

Things actually start out pretty awesome. The Rock is being let out of jail...he is huge! (Seriously...how many steroids did he take to get that big?) Anyways...As he is getting out of jail we see that all the inmates hate him, the guards are afraid of him and the warden apparently feels sorry for him. He then walks out the front door, is in the middle of the desert and then proceeds to RUN all the way home...for serious...he just runs into the middle of the desert! You can't help but think he is a badass.

So he goes and picks up his sweet muscle car, drives to some office call center, goes inside without saying anything to anyone, walks up to some nerd's cubicle and proceeds to shoot him right between the eyes!!! I think to myself "This is going to be fun!"

We then cut to Billy-Bob Thornton who is some sad crack head only to discover that he is actually a cop who has been assigned the case of the nerd with the bullet between the eyes...I think to myself "Awesome...interesting twist."

Then we cut to some crazy cool house and some guy doing weird yoga stuff...Proceed to find out that he sold some computer company and got insanely rich that way. Then it is revealed that he is an assassin! I think to myself "To what places of awesomeness are you taking me movie!?!?!"

And then the wheels fell off.

This movie morphed into some strange story of revenge and redemption with each new "action" scene becoming less awesome and more "blah" intermingled with odd artsy fade outs and stupid character development. Billy Bob Thornton turns out to be a cop 10 days from retirement with drug issues. The assassin...we find out that he only charges $1 for his services because he does it as a hobby. Apparently he really IS a computer geek...which is probably why he never kills The Rock by the end of the movie.

As for the The Rock...he is on a war path for the first ten minutes. Then somebody decided that he should act for the rest of the the movie. As he continues his revenge spree, his gun hand begins to shake more and more as he becomes increasingly conflicted. Ohhhhh...a shaking hand...give him an academy award! I finally lost it when they have a close up of his face with a tear rolling down his cheek. Are you kidding me??? The Rock doesn't cry! He kicks asses! This was what frustrated me the most...the movie poster led me to believe that I was going to get an awesome, high paced, action packed thrill ride...what I actually got was a movie that started fast and then fizzled out slowly with predictable "twists" along the way. If you can't figure out that Billy Bob is the real bad guy after about 30 minutes then you probably fell asleep.

Oh whoops...SPOILER ALERT...ahhh...whatever...you wont watch this movie anyways.

I give this movie 2 tricycles out of 10 muscle cars (Tricycles are slow...muscle cars are fast...nobody???...I guess Benjy isn't the only one who needs to work on analogies)

Christmas Movies

Well, it’s December, so I thought I'd write about Christmas movies. Not a whole lot about Christmas movies, because I haven’t seen that many. And of the ones I’ve seen, I don’t remember them. Everyone else calls them classics. Me, not so much.

It may just be I don’t place an emphasis on Christmas like so many other people do. Theologically, Christmas is far less important than Easter. To make a baseball analogy, Christmas is like stepping into the batter’s box. Easter is hitting a Grand Slam. Technically, the grand slam can’t happen without Jesus first stepping into the batter’s box, but no one’s excited about the batter’s box – just the grand slam. The only reason people cheer when players step into the box is because of the potential for a grand slam. And if you don’t get that, maybe I just need to work on analogies.

Anyway, if you haven’t seen many Christmas movies (like me), you can tune into almost any channel on TV. By the time the 25^th rolls around, some of them will be playing on a continuous loop.

First, there are the animated movies from the sixties. Rudolph, The Grinch (which had a nice live-action version in 2000), and so on, that parents grew up on, and seem to think their kids will love. We grew up on Transformers and Ninja Turtles. Do you really think we’ll love Dr. Suess? The books? Yes. The adaptions? Not so much.

Then the live action ones from all over. Miracle on 34^th st, which has Santa Claus in it (I think). I saw ads all the time for it 15 years ago on CBC, and made a point to do something else. It’s a Wonderful Life, about a suicidal man who learns life would be better if he lived. A Christmas Story, involving a BB gun and eye injuries, but doesn’t look that interesting despite those elements (my friends all rave about it). Any one of the adaptations of A Christmas Carol, where Scrooge learns to be generous. Good for him. Never mind that they’re all incredibly cheap for stations to air, which is the only reason they’re on.

For my money, there are only two Christmas movie really worth watching - Die Hard, and Die Hard 2: Die Harder. They’ve got love (John and Holly get together in each movie), redemption (Al overcoming his fear of guns in the first), and terrorists. They’re perfect for Christmas. Snow, carols, and blowing the snot out of whatever bad guy has taken over whichever building. Plus, they have a smarmy guy getting his comeuppance. And it’s the same guy. Twice!

And of course, if it weren't for Die Hard, we wouldn't have this great song (NSFW: Language).