Speaking of International Banking Conspiracies…

Tom Tykwer has been so assuredly devious in his direction, across the five very distinct films I’ve seen, that you almost want to do a spit-take when his name comes up at film’s end, as credits roll. Whaaaa? This plodding porridge of overheated performances, long (long, long, long) expository conversations, and hamfisted visual echoes of Pakula and Hitchcock was directed by the playful pomo trickster of Lola Rennt, the oblique moral visionary of Heaven, the perverse aesthete of the less-effective but ambitious Perfume? Even a fairly fun sequence shooting the shit out of the Guggenheim doesn’t really make the film worth renting. Bleccch.

Musings on Movies

The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai. Someone give me an objective view. I remember loving it in grad school, but I just tried to watch it with the kids, and they were distinctly unimpressed (“Daddy, Daddy, let’s go see Night at the Museum 2 instead; We hear Reynolds loved it”). In fact, they became quite abusive. Was it that bad? Why did I enjoy seeing Jeff Goldblum in chaps? Why did the lines “don’t be mean” and “no matter where you go, there you are” seem profound to me? Was it the drugs? Or is this a lost masterpiece?

“Always do the right thing.” “That’s It?” “That’s It.” “I got it. I’m gone.”

20 years on… So many great lines in this thing. A movie I loved then, and appreciate more and more as time goes on.

And how’s this for an image? Though like great lines, this one has ’em to spare.

dotherightthing.jpg
Continue reading “Always do the right thing.” “That’s It?” “That’s It.” “I got it. I’m gone.”

Night at the Museum 2

I saw this movie.

Night at the Museum 2 made me want to punish all the children in the theater. To sneak up behind each, and as they expressed some moment of pleasurable engagement with the film, just to scream “What the fuck is wrong with you!” into their ears so that they jumped, or cried, and forever after hated Ben Stiller. Or, rather, to punish all children, to stand outside of every theater in the country, and as children came out, to box each upon the ears. A hard box–a Dickens box, not one of those wussy tv ear-pats but a good Mr.-Gower-making-the-ears-bleed kind of smack. Or, if they looked particularly satisfied, to punch them. The happier they look, the bigger the smile, the more painful the body part targeted. Fuck you, children, for making this movie possible. And fuck you, parents, for actualizing this movie. There’s a reason children don’t have disposable income–they’d waste it on shit like this. So shame on you. You all get kicked hard, in soft tissue. Or maybe I just take one kid hostage, one poor hummel-eyed waif, and I set up a website, and I vow to make that kid watch Takashi Miike with me until gangs of children hunt down Shawn Levy, blood-crazed with fear for my webcammed hostage to rip Levy into unrecognizable bits that’ll never work with Steve Martin or any funny people ever again.

I’d punish myself but sitting through it was penance enough. Ah, shit, I probably deserve more.

Terminator Salvation

Set in 2018, the machines have taken over and they do battle with a fully-formed resistance that has access to submarines, aircraft and secret bases. Skynet is far less omnipotent in this iteration, largely restricted to particular zones, and its assorted machines surprisingly easy to kill. John Connor (Christian Bale) is a local commander at this point, about whom there are vague rumors among the populace that he is the prophet who will save them. He spends his time obsessively listening to old tapes left him by his mother, hoping to hear clues that will help beat Skynet, and inspiring the scattered resistance in scratchy radio broadcasts. Connor’s specific goal is to locate and protect Kyle Reese, now a teenager, but the man who was/will be his father, sent back in time to protect Sarah Connor in the first Terminator. The time paradox implications of him doing so, or failing to do so, are never made clear. Continue reading Terminator Salvation