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May 4th, 2008
11:34 am
Sorry about the lack of postage lately. I have to really be in the mood to throw thoughts down, and I haven't been in that mood as of late. Been running myself ragged at my new job, while getting FAR less pay than I was before. My financial situation is pretty dire, but at least I have a roof over my head for the moment. As long as I can continue to pay my rent, I'm cool, I think.
To top it all off, my father had another stroke this past week. Went up to Washington Hospital Center to see him the other day; he's doing a lot better (they're keeping him for a bit, to keep an eye on him). Apparently, for 72hours after a stroke, there's a good chance another stroke will hit. It doesn't help that my dad's heart is weird; one half pumps faster than the other half, and his blood is as thick as pudding and clots easily. He's had two strokes in the last ten years, plus about ten transient ischemic attacks (TIA's), or 'mini-strokes').
Oh... and of course, I saw the Iron Man movie. Will post my thoughts on that a little later, but for now, in the immortal words of Will Smith:
Oh, HELL yes!
Current Location: Home
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/charitycam/goth_boy/tired.gif) drained
Current Music: Watching Christopher Titus: Norman Rockwell Is Bleeding
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January 29th, 2008
07:57 pm - Well, THIS Certainly Sucks!
Well, it had to happen sometime.
Friendly Cab, the St. Mary's County place where I've worked as a driver and dispatcher for the last 13 and a half years, is shutting its doors within two weeks. Business has been horrible for the last two years, and has only been getting worse and worse. We've all been sensing it, but I was just informed today that our last 'official' day of business will be Friday. I'm staying on for another week to do some accounting work, but after that, I don't know.
Anyone know of any decent job opportunities in the Maryland/DC/Virginia area for a 34-year old ex-cab dispatcher? Just curious...
Current Location: Home
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/charitycam/goth_boy/gloomy.gif) pessimistic
Current Music: "ROAR! (Cloverfield Overture)", Michael Giacchino
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November 28th, 2007
07:29 pm - I Pity The Fool!
Ganked from
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) aynne_witch
Current Location: Home
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/charitycam/goth_boy/happy.gif) amused
Current Music: Watching "Shattered Glass" on DVD
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November 27th, 2007
07:36 pm - Movie Review: The Mist (2007); (3 1/2 out of 4 stars), rated R.
The Mist (aka Stephen King's The Mist) (2007), rated R. *** 1/2 out of ****. Directed by Frank Darabont. Written by Darabont, based on the novella by Stephen King. Starring Thomas Jane, Marcia Gay Harden, Toby Jones, Frances Sternhagen, Laurie Holden, Andre Braugher, William Sadler, Jeffrey DeMunn, Alexa Davalos, Nathan Gamble, Chris Owen, Sam Witwer.
"Fear changes everything."
David Drayton (Jane) is a successful illustrator of movie posters. He's working on a poster for an upcoming film (one that should be amusingly familiar to Stephen King fans, what with the duster-bedecked gunslinger drawing his pistols) as a massive, unexplained storm, terrifying in its fury, rolls into his small town. The next morning, massive damage is revealed, and Drayton and his son head into town, along with their litigious neighbor Norton (the ever-reliable Braugher, who, to me, will always be the fiery Detective Pembleton from the late, lamented NBC series Homicide). At the local supermarket, they run into several other of the town's denizens, all wanting to get their groceries and supplies as well. Feisty old Mrs. Reppler (Sternhagen), new schoolteacher Amanda Dumfries (Holden), meek, unassuming assistant store manager Ollie (Jones), bagboy Norm (Owen), cashier Sally (Davalos), and town religious nut Mrs. Carmody (Harden) all make small talk of one type or another as they wait to be cashed out, the store's registers out along with the power.
Soon, though, a bloodstained Dan Miller (DeMunn) comes racing into the parking lot, screaming about things in the mist, just as the eponymous stuff rolls in like the wrath of God himself. It soon becomes clear to most of the survivors that Dan is not crazy; he speaks the truth, and nervousness and fear begin to grow amongst the trapped townspeople, with Mrs. Carmody providing a constant stream of apocalyptic verbiage that does nothing but make everyone more and more scared. Without even realizing it, people start to take sides: those that KNOW that things slither in the mist, a group that thinks it's all a delusion, and Mrs. Carmody's initially small flock of true believers who seem to think that blood sacrifices are in order to appease a capricious and anngry God...
A little background here. Stephen King was one of the many writers who got me through high school. His style was so naturalistic to me, so laid back, that it seemed like he was telling the story just to me. I devoured as many of his books as I could, starting with the first one I read, It. It wasn't until about a year after I read It that I discovered King's short story collections. Night Shift was the first, and I had a grand old time perusing its pages until my aunt bought me a copy of his next collection, Skeleton Crew. The first story in that big-ass book was a frightening novella, one that shaped my reading for years, called "The Mist". It took me all of three hours to tear through that story at a white-knuckle pace, hands trembling, and when it was over, I put the book down for three days, a giddy grin on my face the whole time. It was as if I had been sucker-punched. It led me to other writers, including the great H.P. Lovecraft, but the power of that story always stuck with me. It was that good, and even at the time, I thought it would have made a wonderful movie. King's amply descriptive writing set the stage for me, and I could see the movie in my head as I read it.
Now, more than twenty years later, King aficionado Frank Darabont (who also scripted and directed King adaptations The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile) has given us the movie version of The Mist, and it's killer. Like his earlier adaptations, for the most part, Darabont stays true to the source material. He seems to 'get' King, in a way that few other directors (even people like Stanley Kubrick) possibly could, and in that faithfulness, he delivers an amazing movie. Some of the scenes played out exactly as I imagined them, all those years ago when I first read it. It's a strange experience, to be watching a movie and to realize that your own imaginary version of events is playing up there onscreen! For instance, the trip to the pharmacy, a key scene in the novella, is perfectly realized here. The whole time, I knew what was going to happen (thanks to my knowledge of the story), but even when the inevitable occurred, I jumped. The lack of 'scare' or 'boo' music helped that immensely, as you couldn't tell quite when you were supposed to be scared. The shocks were far more effective that way.
In any case, it works, and a big part of that is due to the stellar cast Darabont has assembled. From tough-guy Jane (The Punisher and the unfortunately horrible adaptation of King's Dreamcatcher), who plays the frustrations and fears of an average guy well, to the shrill, obsessed, and yet eerily vulnerable and human performance by Harden (Pollock, Mystic River) as the power-hungry hellfire and brimstone-quoting Mrs. Carmody, everyone in the movie is humanized and given ample opportunity to flesh out their characters. A personal favorite is Toby Jones' quiet performance as the outwardly geeky, but self-effacingly noble and heroic Ollie, who provides many of the movie's best moments, while King veterans Sternhagen (Misery), DeMunn (The Green Mile) and Sadler (The Shawshank Redemption) all do well with their necessarily limited roles. The creature design, as well, is amazing, thanks to the talented Bernie Wrightson. The creatures are horrific and induce much crawling of skin, and I would advise potential viewers with arachnophobia to consider themselves duly forewarned. My only problem is that some of the CGI isn't quite up to snuff, but just seeing the creatures in all their glory is enough to bring a smile to my face. I think I detected a little touch of that old Outer Limits episode "The Zanti Misfits" in some of the creature design, an element that adds even more chills.
Darabont has made a few changes from the source material. Some scenes are tightened up, others are allowed room to breathe. New characters are created, some for the better, some for the worse, but everything works in a story way. One thing that impressed me in the original story was that there was never any definitive explanation for the horrors in the mist. There was lip servide paid to the Arrowhead Project, a 'secret Amry experiment' in the mountains around town, but it was thankfully never fully explored. King even mentions in his notes on the story that the lack of an explanation makes things even more disturbing, and I agree. The movie is SLIGHTLY more definitive on this point, but even those little bits of information are gleaned from unreliable sources, and from unreliable extrapolation by panicked people. It was, I think, a good way of providing a possible reason for the mist, while avoiding the problem of over-explanation. The biggest thing that fans will likely debate, however, is Darabont's new ending. The story had what King called a 'Twilight Zone' ending, where there was no real resolution. Darabont has fixed that, providing a chilling, disturbing, shocking, yet ultimately logical ending, one that had me sitting in my seat, feeling drained, long after the credits began to roll. King himself has praised the ending, claiming that if he had thought of it, he would have used it (and there are hints to it, in the story itself), even going so far as to say that anyone who revealed the events of the final ten minutes should be hanged. In any case, as the movie ended, some people, I could tell, were disgusted or distressed. No matter to me; the ending worked, and it elevated The Mist from a badass apocalyptic tale with stunning monsters to a disturbing and relentlessly bleak masterpiece.
In closing, there may be monsters outside, the story tells us, but the worst monsters are within. The creatures in the mist are exactly that: creatures. They're not evil, or demented, or insane. They're animals. Big, scary, freakish animals, but animals nonetheless. We're supposed to be better than that, but The Mist shows that we're closer to the edge of insanity and dementia than we can comfortably admit.
Current Location: Home
Current Mood: drained
Current Music: "Sweet Home Alabama", Lynyrd Skynyrd
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November 5th, 2007
06:45 pm - The Chrisman Returneth!
Yeah, it's been awhile again.
Not as long as some of my hiatuses (hiatii?), but still not good. Been dealing with serious problems at work (mainly monetarily; that's what happens when your boss discovers that she's bipolar, while she's going through menopause, depression, an economic recession, and other personal problems). I've been dreading life in general for about the last two months or so, especially, but things SEEM to be on an upturn at the moment.
To Kory, Allison, Aynne, and the rest of the MSD crew... gropings and salivations once more! I have once again returned to the font of the living, and as long as I can keep things from spiralling into utter crap, I'll be posting semi-regularly again.
Current Location: Home
Current Mood: mellow
Current Music: Watching "Return of the Jedi"
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September 18th, 2007
10:07 pm - Why, Marvel? Why? And why, Joe? (Warning: long-winded Comic Geekery ahead)
Current Location: Home
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/charitycam/goth_boy/angry.gif) cranky
Current Music: Watching "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia"
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September 10th, 2007
04:00 pm - Official Iron Man movie trailer
Holy crap!
Can't wait can't wait can't WAIT!
http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/ironman/
In the immortal words of Sluggy Freelance, "Is it not nifty?"
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: ecstatic
Current Music: Black Sabbath, "Iron Man" (duh!)
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July 13th, 2007
10:36 am - Movie Review: Transformers (2007), 3 1/2 out of 4 stars, rated PG-13.
Transformers (2007). Rated PG-13. *** 1/2 out of ****. Directed by Michael Bay. Written by Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman. Starring Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Jon Voight, Josh Duhamel, Tyrese Gibson, Rachael Taylor, Anthony Anderson, John Turturro.
Holy. Fucking. SHIT.
Like many children of the 1980s, I was a HUGE fan of the Transformers. I can still remember my first two, bought for Christmas by my grandparents. They took me to the Zayre's department store on Marlboro Pike, just off the Beltway, and allowed me to pick out what I wanted. I looked, and the first two that caught my eye were a gun and an ambulance, aka Megatron and Ratchet. Ratchet, to me, seemed like a pussy, so I didn't play with him much, but Megatron was completely and utterly badass. That damned cannon he carried on his arm, formed from the scope attached to the pistol, lent him an air of menace, of sheer power that was barely contained. Over the next few years, I collected more and more of them, breaking several with my energetic style of play. There was Soundwave, loyal servant of Megatron. Jazz, the stylish, cool warrior. Sunstreaker, vain and borderline psychopathic. Ironhide, tough and dependable, and of course, the baddest, most honorable of them all: Optimus Prime. My good friend jemstone has told me, more than once, how Optimus was a guiding force in his life, how the Autobot leader's unwavering moral compass and quiet badassitude were benchmarks to live by. It was always kind of a mystery to me, how a character so uncompromisingly GOOD and moral could be so heartily embraced by so many people. A lot of my friends tended to like more ambiguous characters, but Optimus was always a favorite, even to them. A big part of it was the 1986 animated movie, which had the iconic sequence of Prime, outnumbered, charging into the mass of Decepticons and decimating them before falling in single combat with Megatron (Megatron, of course, went down as well). All to the power-chords of Stan Bush's "The Touch", a song denigrated over a decade later by Mark Wahlberg in Boogie Nights.
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: content
Current Music: "The Touch", Stan Bush
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July 7th, 2007
09:17 pm - Movie Review: Live Free or Die Hard (3 out of 4 stars), rated PG-13
Live Free or Die Hard (2007), rated PG-13. Directed by Len Wiseman. Written by Mark Bomback. Starring Bruce Willis, Justin Long, Timothy Olyphant, Maggie Q, Cliff Curtis, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Kevin Smith.
"Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker!"
What a way to breathe new life into an old franchise! Twelve years after the infinitely excellent third outing (Die Hard with a Vengeance) of beleaguered New York City detective John McClane (Willis), director Len Wiseman (Underworld and Underworld: Evolution) has brought McClane back, front and center, doing what he does best. What does he do best? Kill terrorists, of course! Ever since 1987's modern classic Die Hard reinvented the action genre, a host of imitators and pretenders to the throne have popped up. Die Hard's innovations, necessary for its story, included a limited area (in its case, a 40-story office building), spectacular action setpieces (McClane's fight with Karl, or the sight of him leaping off the top of the building with nothing but a firehose tied around his waist), brutal humor and sense of fun (favorite line ever, after watching an FBI helicopter blow up, the Deputy Chief of Police says, in a perfect deadpan, "We're gonna need some more FBI guys, I guess"), and unusual, exciting villains (who can forget Alan Rickman as the suave, urbane, witty, stylishly-dressed sociopathic thug/thief, Hans Gruber, or Jeremy Irons as his equally urbane and witty brother Simon in Die Hard with a Vengeance?) Its imitators usually aped the limited location, parodied as the infamous "Die Hard in a __________" plot. We've had Die Hard on buses (the excellent Speed), on planes (the disappointingly unoriginal Die Hard 2, Passenger 57, Turbulence), on aircraft carriers (Under Siege), trains (Under Siege 2: Dark Territory), and even back to office buildings (the surreal, unintentionally comedic Anna Nicole Smith 'film', Skyscraper).
Now, the daddy of all those bastard children is back, and in fine form. McClane is back at his old job, but things have changed. He and his wife Holly (played to perfection in the first two by Bonnie Bedelia, and relegated to an unseen phone voice in Vengeance) are now divorced, while his daughter Lucy (Winstead) is a college student, angry with her father, and aping her mother by using the mother's maiden name Gennaro instead of McClane. McClane is called up by the FBI to bring in hacker Matt Farrell (Long), who has been unknowingly assisting super-hacker Thomas Gabriel (Deadwood's Olyphant) in an attack on the United States computer system on the Fourth of July weekend. In the first spectacular action sequence, McClane has to rescue Farrell from his own apartment as it's besieged by Gabriel's mercenaries. Part of the charm of the Die Hard films is how McClane outwits his enemies, often resorting to crude, low-tech methods to get the job done. This sequence does that in spades, as McClane uses a fire extinguisher, his car, a dumpster, and a chain-link fence to take on the mercs in entertainingly over-the-top fashion. In later sequences, he uses vehicles as melee weapons multiple times. I was reminded of one of my dispatchers, Murphy, who memorably told a driver who found himself in a dangerous situation, in his cab, surrounded by hostiles, "Punch the pedal to the floor! Run 'em over! Remember, you're driving a 4,000 pound boxing glove!"
Things escalate from there, as McClane has to outwit Gabriel, his slinky femme fatale (Maggie Q), and Gabriel's team of mercs and hackers. His daughter gets drawn into things as well, while McClane tries to keep FBI cyber-crime head Bowman (Curtis) apprised of the situation. It's all great fun, especially watching McClane's continued survival and promises to kick Gabriel's scrawny ass take their emotional toll on the formerly icy criminal. Olyphant is an excellent actor (he's great as the straight-arrow sheriff Bullock on the unfortunately cancelled Deadwood), and his fear shows through, even as he's smugly certain, time and time again, that McClane is dead. His motives for villainy are interesting, although somewhat transparent. Long is quirky and funny without being too annoying, and the stupidity of the FBI (waved in the audience's face in the first film) has been replaced with a kind of informed helplessness. Bowman is pretty on the level, and the role of government scumbag department has been switched to the NSA. Curtis, a talented New Zealand actor who has the chameleonlike ability to change personalities, nationalities, and identities seemingly with ease, plays Bowman with a sort of tired, angry dignity. Winstead definitely plays Lucy as her father's daughter, whether standing up to her father in the early scenes, or laying a right cross on a villain's jaw, she doesn't fall into the standard damsel in distress mode. She echoes her mother in the original, who memorably and calmly responded to Gruber's "What idiot put you in charge?" with "You did. The moment you murdered my boss."
Some complaints about the movie. The hacking sequences, while standard for Hollywood, do seem a little too 'magical'. It's as if anyone with a computer in this world has mystical skills that allows him or her to take over the world, if they see fit. Also, a late-movie duel between McClane and an F-22 veers dangerously into "too far over the top" territory, as does a sequence in a city highway tunnel. Times and places seem to be compressed, as much of the action takes place in Washington, DC, and Baltimore, although the entire East Coast seems to be traversed with minimal time and difficulty. Also, the villain's main henchmen seem to be indestructible, although that is also a Die Hard staple (Karl in the original, or Targo in Vengeance). Still, those are minor gripes in an otherwise thoroughly entertaining film. I had thought that this might be McClane's last hurrah, but after this film, I think I'd like to see more of the grizzled, veteran badass at his finest.
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/charitycam/goth_boy/thoughtful.gif) contemplative
Current Music: "Comfortably Numb", Pink Floyd with Van Morrison, The Departed soundtrack
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June 22nd, 2007
02:07 pm - World War Hulk and Iron Man (minor spoilers, plus humor)
Well, with the arrival of World War Hulk, I decided to take a look around to see how badly my favorite golden-armored Avenger, Iron Man, is doing. For those who haven't been keeping track, in the Marvel Universe, Tony Stark is currently the head of SHIELD. He's also the head of the proi-registration movement, representing those heroes who have legally registered with the Super Hero Registration Act. He's imprisoned those who have resisted registration, including former friends, and has used villains as his henchmen (especially Norman Osborn). He triggered a fake assassination attempt on an Atlantean delegation by Osborn, helped to create a clone of Thor, convinced Spider-Man to publicly unmask on national TV, and apparently kicks dogs for fun.
Oh, yeah... he and the rest of the group known as the Illuminati (Stark, Black Bolt, Namor, Reed Richards, Professor X, and Dr. Strange) tricked the Hulk, got him in a rocket, and shot him into space. They had intended to end his rampages on Earth by sending him to a peaceful world, with no native sentient inhabitants, where he could supposedly live out his life in peace. As things go, it didn't end up that way. Hulk's ship ended up on the planet Sakaar, with a weakened Hulk captured and forced to become a gladiator. Much like the movie Gladiator, he worked himself up and up the line, eventually triggering a rebellion and toppling the emperor, only to take his place. He also gathered friends around him, even got married.
Unfortunately, somehow, the ship he came on detonated, killing a million people, including the Hulk's pregnant wife. Hulk knew who had sent him to Sakaar, and he vowed revenge on all of them. He gathered his surviving friends, got a ship, and headed to Earth to get his retribution...
Now, that's a pretty good setup for a storyline. Fortunately, unlike in Civil War, so far Marvel's been kind to my buddy Stark. My biggest criticism of Civil War was the ham-handed way they painted the pro-reg people as fascists, especially Tony Stark and Reed Richards. In the main book, it wasn't so much a concern; Stark was shown as a man who was troubled by what he felt was necessary for peace, but was strong-willed enough to do it. In the tie-in books, though, he was portrayed as a greedy, soulless, fascistic opportunist who only needed to twirl his mustache to make himself into a full-fledged villain. Even now, the Marvel webboards are full of "I hope Tony Stark dies" and "Stark needs his ass kicked" threads.
Now, to World War Hulk #1.
Heh. I found this comic on the Occasional Superheroine blog. Check out her blog for yourself after reading the little mini-comic; it sums up my feelings about Iron Man pretty well. Enjoy.
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: amused
Current Music: "War Pigs", Black Sabbath
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02:06 pm - Movie Review: 28 Weeks Later... (3 1/2 out of 4 stars)
28 Weeks Later...(2007). *** 1/2 out of ****. Starring Robert Carlyle, Rose Byrne, Jeremy Renner, Harold Perrineau, Idris Elba, Imogen Poots, Mackintosh Muggleton, Catherine McCormack. Written by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, Enrique Lopez-Lavigne, Jesus Olmo, and Rowan Joffe. Directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo.
Wow.
I saw 2002's 28 Days Later... with a friend, and was blown away by it. The documentary style, the in-your-face editing, the perfomances, the gore, the claustrophobic nature of it all. It was overwhelming, and it helped in the zombie movie revolution that's come along since. The rabidly insane Infected were terrifying enemies, unable to be reasoned with or driven off once they were infected. They were relentless in their pursuit, even to the points of their own deaths, and mindless to anything but the need to kill.
Now comes the sequel, 28 Weeks Later... As the title implies, it's been several months since the last film, and the Rage infection that decimated England seems to be under control. The U.S. military has moved into London, quarantining a huge section of town, which they've christened the Green Zone (nope, move along, no allegories here!) Headed by General Stone (Elba), they've cleared out and cleaned up several apartment buildings and shopping areas for the people to inhabit. They start moving the uninfected population back into this zone, with guilt-wracked survivor Don (Carlyle) being reunited with his children, Tammy (Poots) and Andy (Muggleton) in the Green Zone after the 'death' of his wife Alice (McCormack) at the hands of the Infected.
I won't spoil anything, but as you can probably surmise, the Rage virus hasn't died out. In fact, it's rather clever the way it's reintroduced, while American military doctor Scarlett Ross (Byrne) tries to figure out a cure or vaccine and sniper Doyle (Renner) starts to have doubts about his orders.
The whole movie seems of a piece with the first one, and apart from a rather stupid yet spectacularly gory action sequence seemingly stolen from the 'Planet Terror' sequence of Grindhouse, it's maddeningly down to earth. Because we've seen the effects of Rage, both in the first film and in this one, the quiet sequences have their own terrible suspense as we wait for the inevitable arrival of the Infected, a sense of dread hangs over the whole movie, a dread that's more than fulfilled as not all of the main characters make it to the end credits. The political allegories are there, but with a few exceptions, they're not ham-handed. And, for once, the Americans are shown as human, not as invicible good guys nor as inhuman monsters. Doyle, especially, is put into a terrible Scylla and Charybdis situation about halfway through the movie, a situation that forces him to examine his conscience and decide exactly what he wants to do. That's the horror, there, in a nutshell: when faced with horrifying situations, how badly do you fight to keep your humanity?
All in all, a fascinating film in its own right, and an excellent follow-up to a modern classic.
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: content
Current Music: "East Hastings", Godspeed You! Black Emperor
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12:53 pm - Movie Review: Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (3 out of 4 stars)
Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007). *** out of ****. Starring Ioan Gruffudd, Jessica Alba, Michael Chiklis, Chris Evans, Julian McMahon, Andre Braugher, Laurence Fishburne. Written by Don Payne. Directed by Tim Story.
Wow. What a difference a few years makes.
The first Fantastic Four was agreeable enough. It was rushed, a little too short, nearly plotless, and still incredibly enjoyable. Maybe Dr. Doom wasn't menacing enough, Reed Richards was too passive, and Jessica Alba was the worst-cast actress as a scientist since Denise Richards in The World Is Not Enough, but who cares? It was fun. They REALLY captured the rivalry between Thing (Chiklis) and the Human Torch (Evans), playing it out beautifully. They feuded like brothers. Brothers with superpowers, but brothers nonetheless. There was a certain lightness, a breeziness to the movie that made it pleasant and diverting, unlike most of the superhero movies out, which tried for a more epic, 'heavy' feel.
The sequel, the aptly named Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer corrects most of the mistakes of the first one while retaining the lightness of tone of the first one. As the title implies, the intergalactic hero Silver Surfer makes his appearance in this one, and as any comic fanboy knows, when you have the Surfer, you have the cosmic planet eater, the Destroyer of Worlds himself, Galactus.
Worldwide, weather systems are changing. Massive holes are appearing in the earth's crust, while a mysterious energy surge heralds these upheavals. The Four, though, are busy... preparing for the wedding of Mr. Fantastic (Gruffud), and the Invisible Woman (Alba). The arrival of the Surfer disrupts their plans, though, and inadvertently brings the thought-dead Dr. Doom (McMahon) back into the fold. As the Four bicker and argue over various issues (Johnny's childishness, Reed and Sue's impending nuptials, and Ben's still-strong sense of being an outsider), they also have to deal with the seemingly omnipotent Surfer and hs message of doom and gloom for humanity.
First up, the bad. I won't spoil it, but the nature of Galactus in the movie, while expected, left me a little... underwhelmed. I will say that there are flashes, little hints of the comic Galactus, and I'll cling to those like a drowning sailor to a piece of driftwood. Also, Doom seems a little... restrained, for Doom. There are few grand soliloquies, and none of the famous third-person "You dare to stand against Doom?!?" declarations. Still, these are minor complaints, and bear little on the final film.
As for the rest, it's as if they took the criticisms of the first film and worked to address them in this film. Everyone does their job with gusto, especially the Four themselves and Laurence Fishburne as the voice of the enigmatic Surfer. The effects are good-to-great, the plot simple enough to be easily understood but complex enough to satisfy, with plenty of geeky fanboy moments for readers of the comics. There are little Easter eggs everywhere. My favorite had to be the name of the female military attache that Johnny gets worked up over, a definite nod in the direction that they wish to go in future installments of the franchise. The characters are all sharply defined, with Reed's charming naivete countered with an inspiring, geek-empowering speech he gives to an old military nemesis (Braugher) about halfway through the film a highlight. Johnny's childishness, Sue's sheer level of power (accurately reflected; she's long been the most powerful member of the team), Reed's geekiness, Ben's good-natured humor, Doom's megalomania, and Surfer's essential nobility are all well-displayed here.
All in all, a damn good time at the movies. It won't win any Oscars, but who cares? It's fun; enjoy!
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: content
Current Music: "East Hastings", Godspeed You! Black Emperor
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10:05 am - Movie Reviews: Pirates of the Caribbean 3 (2 1/2 out of 4 stars)
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (2007). ** 1/2 out of ****. Starring Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Keira Knightley, Geoffrey Rush, Chow Yun-Fat, Bill Nighy, Jonathan Pryce. Written by Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio. Directed by Gore Verbinski.
Okay, I have to say, I LOVED the original Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl. Like many people, Johnny Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow made the movie for me. Without him, it would have been a good movie, but with him, it was a GREAT movie. His personality, his mannerisms, and especially his formidable sense of strategy and planning endeared the character to me, much more so than the bland Will Turner (Bloom) or Elizabeth Swann (Knightley). As the action played out, you could practically see the wheels turning in Captain Jack's mind as he tried to maneuver situations to his best advantage. He had a great nemesis in the wily Barbossa (Rush), playing each and every scene to the hilt along with Sparrow. It was all great fun.
The sequel, last year's POTC: Dead Man's Chest, was fun, but it seemed a little overpacked, as if the writers decided to throw in as much as they could. Unfortunately, without Barbossa this time around, it wasn't nearly as amusing as the first one. And the reversal of Captain Jack, from a great pirate pretending to be an idiot into an idiot pretending to be a great pirate, seemed a little forced. Still, some fascinating plot elements surfaced in that one, including the demonic Davy Jones (Nighy), the sorceress Tia Dalma (Naomie Harris), and the change in fortunes of the former Admiral Norrington (Jack Davenport).
Now, with the release of the final part of the trilogy, POTC: At World's End, things are... pretty much the same.
Don't get me wrong. The plot is thrilling, full of quite pirate-y backstabbings by everyone involved. It seems as if each character tries to come out on top, to the detriment of everyone else, at least once in the story. Elizabeth and Will are more fully developed characters, Barbossa returns triumphantly, as does Captain Jack (swallowed by the Kraken at the end of Dead Man's Chest). The problem is, it all feels like it's being stuffed in to pad the movie, much as the island of cannibals felt shoehorned into Dead Man's Chest. The rescue of Captain Jack from the hellish confines of Davy Jones' locker, while impressive (and, thanks to a scene where we see the full depths of Jack's madness, funny), still feels like padding, as does the opening meeting of our surviving heroes with Chinese pirate Sao Feng (Chow Yun-Fat, whose role in this movie is curiously touted in all the advertising, yet adds up to little more than a glorified cameo).
The problem is that too much is going on. It jumps all over the place, and by the time the fantastic final hour rolls around (complete with a guns-blazing ship battle around a swirling whirlpool), chances are, you'll feel exhausted. I honestly liked the movie, and I applaud the decision to end things on a bittersweet note, but it still seems as if it's both rushed and overstuffed. It's like eating a fantastic dinner that's three courses too long, while having only twenty minutes to eat it. It's also quite over-the-top, with several scenes that seem lifted from a Monty Python movie.
On the good side, some of the setups encountered in Dead Man's Chest have fantastic payoffs in this film, so all is not wasted. All in all, it's worth the price of a matinee showing, at least. And seeing Barbossa and Captain Jack having to work together, while still butting heads, is absolutely hilarious.
At the very least, it's a hell of a lot better than Spider-Man 3, so it's worth seeing.
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: content
Current Music: "Deception", The Cruxshadows
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May 10th, 2007
08:22 am - More on Spidey 3
Okay... after reading this article, it all starts to make sense. All the bitching I (and others, like jemstone) have done about the crowded feeling of Spidey 3 leads up to this. It's common knowledge that Raimi didn't want to include Venom, but was 'coerced' into doing so by Avi Arad. Raimi's original story likely would have worked much better on film; ironically, in trying to please all of the fans, he ended up alienating at least some of them.
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May 9th, 2007
10:14 am - Movie Review: Spider-Man 3 (Spoilers) (** out of ****/ 1/2 star out of ****)
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/charitycam/goth_boy/sad.gif) disappointed
Current Music: "Modern Day Cowboy", Tesla
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April 12th, 2007
12:26 pm - "I...AM...IRON...MAN!"
Cue Black Sabbath up! The Iron Man movie is go, and from this pic of Tony Stark's first armor (cobbled together from salvaged components while he's in captivity), it looks like this movie is gonna kick much ass!
The giddy Shellhead fan in me anticipates much joy.
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/charitycam/goth_boy/silly.gif) giddy
Current Music: "Iron Man", Black Sabbath
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March 29th, 2007
12:51 pm - The Movie List Meme
(ganked from tth)
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/charitycam/goth_boy/nerdy.gif) geeky
Current Music: Watching "Cold Case Files" on A&E
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09:58 am - "My God, it's full of stars!"
Wow.
That's all I have to say. Wow. Every time I think nature has shown us enough, something like this comes along. It's a massive storm on Saturn, four times as large as the earth. Notice the shape of the storm? It's a fucking HEXAGON! Plain as day, right there... how weird is that? Apparently, in an attempt to explain this bizarre occurrence, some scientists took buckets of water and spun them fast, so that the water clung to the sides of the buckets by centrifugal force, and the air pocket in the middle formed geometric shapes as the bucket spun. Triangle, square, pentagon, and finally hexagon... creepy, neh?
And listen to it, too! This is actually a clip of radio signals from Saturn. Sounds like something out of a horror movie! My apologies if you've seen or heard these before, but they were just too damned cool to not publicize!
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: giddy
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February 1st, 2007
08:57 am - "Bow your heads and pretend to be serious." + Movie Review: Pan's Labyrinth
This is rumor control; here are the facts!
After a seriously stressful work day yesterday, imagine my surprise when I turn on the news to discover what, at first, seemed to be a bomb scare in Boston. When I saw the 'bombs' that the police were carefully defusing, a smile crept onto my face. The face of evil (or at least rampant mischief) itself, the idiotic Ignignokt, the leader of the Mooninites from the Adult Swim show Aqua Teen Hunger Force, beckoned to me in Lite-Brite form, his middle finger outstretched. I could almost hear his mocking, imperious tone as he flipped the bird: "I'm doing it as hard as I can".
The very thought of a major city being nearly shut down by a cartoon character, especially one whose express desire is to make humans bow down before his 'superior intellect', made me giggle, a little. I can easily understand how something like this could be blown out of proportion, especially in a post-9/11 world, but the response just seems to me as just a little bit of overreaction, especially after the nature of the 'devices' was made perfectly clear. Trying to prosecute the company that produces the cartoon seems, to me, an attempt to wipe a little egg off of the Boston PD's face, especially after the revelation that the devices had been up for almost two weeks, with many other devices in 9 other citites across the country, all designed to promote both the TV show and the upcoming movie, Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film For Theaters. At any rate, the story itself amused me, which definitely went a long way towards bringing my spirits up after a shitty workday yesterday.
Current Location: Work
Current Mood: amused
Current Music: "Fett's Vette", mc chris
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