Got
a few more movies that I want to mention but not devote entire posts
to.
I
had this one in my Netflix queue forever and just got around to
watching it a week or so ago. It’s definitely a comedy and a spoof
of James Bond/spy movies, but much different from the Austin
Powers
series – which I still like, by the way.
Before
you go in you should know that the whole movie is in French with
subtitles, but it really adds to the humor. The main character is
Hubert
Bonisseur de La Bath
and he thinks he is as cool as Sean Connery as James Bond. He starts
the movie with zero awareness of what an absolute fucking toolbox he
is. All of the tropes of 60’s-era James Bond are present, right
down to the style of cinematography. This is truly a masterful spoof
and Jean Dujardin is amazing. He is very much his own character, but
there are times when you could swear you were looking at Sean Connery
on the screen – little moments where the parody almost becomes
homage.
The
sexy female spy he teams up with – Dolores Koulechov – is played
by Louise Monot and she is gorgeous. You really just can’t take
your eyes off of her when she’s onscreen and she’s very good in
her role besides that. Ms. Monot hasn’t really been in anything
else that I’m aware of and that surprises me.
There
are some other great supporting characters – an American spy that
is a hilarious stereotype, Nazi bad guys, and (main guy)’s boss.
But probably the highlight of the movie for me as far as neat little
surprises was the presence of two luchadors-for-hire working for the
bad guys. It was awesome.
I
highly recommend you watch this movie as soon as you can. It’s a
whole lot of fun; just be ready for some subtitles.
The
Thing (2011)
When
I first heard that they were making a prequel to one of the greatest
horror movies of all time I was actually excited. It seemed perfectly
acceptable to me that somebody wanted to tell the story of the
Norwegian research station from the beginning of John Carpenter’s
movie. As long as they kept the technology, music, and clothes in the
right decade it could be really cool. I was not considering CGI when
I thought about this. Why would anybody use CGI when so much was
accomplished with practical effects in the original?
The
casting seemed solid; there were no indications of a lack of quality
when you saw names like Adewale
Akinnuoye-Agbaje and
Mary Elizabeth Winstead.
But
the movie totally sucked donkey balls. Rather than give us a new
perspective on the alien or try and tell a different sort of story
this movie rehashed almost exactly the same sort of events as the
Carpenter movie, only with incredibly shitty CGI.
The
practical effects looked great. A few of the plot points were
actually pretty cool, like the alien just bursting out of the block
of ice while Akinnuoye-Agbaje’s
character was in the room. And I did enjoy the post-credits sequence
that led directly to the opening scene of the original. The actors
were all very good. I feel like they deserved a better movie.
So
to sum up – blech. Skip this piece of crap. Watch Carpenter’s
instead. This one is an utter waste of time.
Harry
Brown
Michael
Caine plays a former Royal Marine who has retired and moved to some
British urban environment. His wife is in the hospital and failing
and his best friend is going a little nuts because of the
proliferation of young shitbags in the area. Things get really bad
and Caine’s character decides he’s going to have to Take Care of
Business.
Harry
Brown
is sort of a classier, more artful, and very British version of Death
Wish.
I don’t want to give any more away than what I’ve said – just
watch this one when you can.
Prometheus
I
really wanted to talk about this movie after I saw it. This did not
translate into wanting to write a review, as it turned out. Here’s
how far I got into that before I decided it just wasn’t something
that was working as a one-sided conversation for me:
“Obviously
there are going to be some spoilers in this. I’m not even entirely
sure how much of a review this is going to be because I really want
to discuss the movie more than I want to just talk at you about it.
Prometheus
made me think and that’s one of the best things I could say about a
movie. It has stayed with me for days after and caused me to seek out
people who have seen it so that I can exchange ideas about it. In
this way it was extremely successful. I enjoy plenty of movies, but
very few make me actually use my brain.
Before
I get into any of the aspects of the plot I want to be sure and
mention the music. From the very beginning of Prometheus
I was struck by how elegant and engaging the score was. That’s kind
of all I have to say about it, but the music truly was fantastic.
There was no industrial “CHOOM”-ing, no choral stuff (which is
fine in some cases but distracting in others), and no guitar riffing.
It was perfect for the movie.
Okay,
so the movie opened with a (seemingly) male humanoid standing near a
waterfall. No explanation of who he was or where he might be. He
opens up a container, drinks from it, almost instantly develops a
black discoloration that disintegrates his body, plunges into the
water, and dissolves. Then the word “Prometheus” appears in a
fashion that should be very familiar to any fans of the Alien
franchise.
That’s
it. No dialogue, no explanation of what the heck is going on. Just
that sequence and the beautiful music accompanying it.
The
next scene is identified as happening in Scotland. We are introduced
to our protagonist, Dr. Elizabeth Shaw (played by Noomi Rapace).
Those of you who are fans of Doctor
Who
might recognize that name. It belonged to one of Doctor Three’s
companions. I can’t help but assume this was an intentional nod.
There are no coincidences in science fiction.
Dr.
Shaw and her boyfriend are examining cave paintings that depict giant
beings pointing towards round objects in the sky - a very specific
constellation. This is very exciting for them because they have found
similar – extremely similar – cave paintings from different
civilizations across the world. Their interpretation of the images in
the paintings is that the giant beings are telling them to come
visit.
Naturally
the Weyland Corporation (not yet Weyland-Yutani) sponsors the trip
which, as you might imagine, does not go as planned.
One
of the central themes of Prometheus
is faith. Dr. Shaw has faith that the way she has interpreted things
is correct. Over the course of the movie her faith is tested. The
outcome of the narrative is largely up to the audience, many of whom
I do not feel came to the same conclusions that I did.
The
ship that carries Dr. Shaw and her team to their destination is named
Prometheus.
The ship’s crew consists of Dr. Shaw and her boyfriend (who is a
scientist of some sort and very much a douchebag), captain Idris
Elba, Weyland representative Charlize Theron, and some biologists and
geologists and random science folk. Not a salvage crew, but not
Colonial Marines, either.
Also
on the ship is David. David is played by Michael Fassbender, who does
a tremendous impersonation of a creepy android. The living crew of
the Prometheus
are in suspended animation for a little over two years during their
trip to the specified constellation. During this time David is riding
a bike, playing basketball, watching Lawrence
of Arabia,
dyeing his hair to look like the aforementioned Lawrence, and
watching everybody’s dreams. WATCHING EVERYBODY’S DREAMS. This is
just as creepy as you are thinking it is. The sequence of David’s
shenanigans starts with him viewing Dr. Shaw’s dreams of her
childhood with her father – played by Nite Owl – who was
apparently a missionary of some sort. In the dream, she is watching
tribes people from some squalid little third-world country on Earth
bury one of their own. Young Ms. Shaw asks her father what’s up
with their crazy primitive ways and he says they don’t believe the
same things about the afterlife that we do. When she wants to know
how he knows what’s right he says you gotta have faith.
(video
here)
After
that David withdraws from his heinous invasion of privacy and runs
all over the ship like Billy from The
Family Circus.
Then an alarm sounds and we get an absolutely awesome sequence of
Charlize Theron doing push-ups while wearing gauze undergarments. I
heard somewhere that this scene was also shot with Theron nude and
I’d like to file a complaint about it being re-shot.
Anyway,
the alarm signified the ship’s arrival. Everybody wakes up and we
get a segment of hologram Mr. Weyland (played by Guy Pearce under
makeup that didn’t even look as good as what the guys on Jackass
use) explaining why everybody is there and who’s in charge. He then
introduces Dr. Shaw and her boyfriend and the pair explain about the
cave paintings. Also, there is an Irish geologist who is obnoxious.
You just know he’s going to die badly.”
I
honestly didn’t feel like being all clever with this one like I
normally am for my reviews and I didn’t feel like doing a recap,
either. I just wanted to talk about it.
Prometheus
is a stunning, thought-provoking, and massively flawed movie. This
does not mean it isn’t worthwhile. As a matter of fact it is the
one movie I have seen this year that I would consider a must-see and
also the one I am most excited about watching again. It’s weird and
beautiful. If you get too caught up in all the illogical stuff you’re
not going to enjoy it, but if you can get past the massive number of
things that just do not make sense then I think you’ll get a kick
out of it.
Here
are a couple of other posts that either do a better job of discussing
it than I do or just give you a bit more information:
I
guess it comes down to the many different ways Prometheus
looks at faith. The thing you have to remember when looking at the
movie and all of the information it throws at you – not to mention
the HUGE lack of information – is that everything we know about the
Engineers is told to us by humans who might not know what the fuck
they’re talking about. It’s all theory. If you as an audience
member choose to have faith in the scientists and what they believe
that’s up to you.
Another
interesting plot point is how the scientists take the existence of
the Engineers as proof that God does not exist. Obviously this is
silly. Without even getting into the dispute over whether or not
there is a God, the Engineers and their DNA only prove that there is
another species with DNA very similar to ours. It doesn’t even
prove that the Engineers made us. Again, this is all speculation from
the humans in the movie.
I’ll
definitely buy this one when it does come out on Blu Ray.
Speaking
of Blu Ray, Prometheus
prompted me to finally sit down and go through the immense number of
special features on the Aliens
collection I bought recently. I’ve seen the deleted scenes on most
of them before, but I have apparently never listened to the
commentaries. They’re fantastic and it is fascinating to hear
Ridley Scott discuss the earliest plans for Prometheus
with Sigourney Weaver on the Alien
commentary. Also, I enjoyed Alien:
Resurrection
a lot more than I thought I would. It’s still very odd and
different from the rest of the series, but it’s very entertaining
in its own right.
-Phantom
I enjoyed Prometheus quite a bit. I have read other reviews and people who have just ripped the thing to shreds, but really a lot of the stuff they complained about did not particularly bother me.
ReplyDeleteThe best thing to come out of Prometheus is it got me more interested in the Alien movies in general, so I bought that Anthology Blu Ray set. They're awesome. I still found Alien 3 pretty depressing (I had not seen it since it originally came out in theaters), and it was the first time I ever saw Resurrection. Sure it's not a great film, but I found it very entertaining.
I still can't wait to see Prometheus again. I might even make a second trip to the theater.
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