p e n g u i n d e v i l

Another of the old favorites of mine, from that great genre of political sci-fi classics. Fahrenheit 451 (from a great book by Ray Bradbury) is the story of Montag, a fireman. But in this place, where all houses are fireproof, a fireman’s job is starting fires. Fires of books specifically. Books are illegal here (In fact, writing seems quite rare and even the opening credits are all spoken, with no writing to be seen) and as one might expect the land is filled with malcontents who have concealed stashes of them in their homes. The fireman’s job is to find these books and burn them.

In this land, which comes across as being not so much in the future as in an alternate present, books are pursued with the determination of chasing commies during the cold war (or maybe more like Nazis’ weeding out subversive matter, even Mein Kampf has an appearence). The film, which I am always surprised to see is by Truffaut, is pretty blunt in its message and it can come across as a bit too obvious in its critical eye towards television, society and, of course, book censorship.





Our hero is one of the driest characters that you are bound to ever see in a movie. Montag is a man of few words or emotions. He comes across as thoughtlessly content as he goes to work everyday and then he comes home to a wife who seems to be immersed a strange land of television. Though he does seem to enjoy his successful career raiding peoples homes and burning their books… That is, until one day when he is approached by a neighbor on his way home. A young lady may have an ulterior movie to talking to him, something more than being neighborly. In fact, she might be one of those that thinks that books maybe aren’t such a bad idea afterall. As she befriends him and talks to him more and more, he begins to become curious about the dangerous land of books. A dangerous territory for one in his position.





As happens with things like this, this new influence threatens everything that he has. Even his boss at the station, when he begins to suspect the direction that Montag is heading, tries to save him rather than see him fall! I also did find it interesting to notice the books that we seen being burnt: Genet, Proust, Lolita, too many old Penguin paperbacks… (more about the books here).





All in all, even though it is slow and very dry, I always find this movie to be engrossing and completely watchable. The ending is also a bit hokey, but it gets its point across.

Of course, weeks ago we finished the Lord of the Rings trilogy by watching The Two Towers and The Return of the King. About these, I don’t feel the need to go into much depth. Though the first movie feels more complete, more movie-like, than the two following it, I rather prefer the later ones as they have a more epic scope and are more orientated towards battle… Something that I tend to prefer with Fantasy-type material. Also, of course, it is somewhat due to less of a focus on the hobbity trail to the mountain. Which is a good thing in more way than just one, as Frodo gets more and more irritating as the story progresses. Aside from that though… The Two Towers is pretty entertaining. Though it lacks the three things that make the first movie bearable (the shire, Moria and the first scenes of the Nazgûl) I found the Ents to be workably sympathetic and most especially I do like the Rowan story-line. In fact, I like the Rowan folks in general and, though moving into Helm’s Deep seemed to be a questionable maneuver, the Battle of Helm’s Deep is certainly about the high-light of the entire series.

And finally, The Return of the King. Well, this featured more kings than just one. Not only is it the story of the sappy ol’ King of Gondor, who has nothing going for him aside for the amazing fortress of Minas Tirith, this also features one of Sauron’s great commanders, the baddest Nazgûl of them all, the Witch King! I have always been fond of the Witch King as he was the topic of one of my favorite rpg modules from the days of yore: Angmar, Land of the Witch King (from I.C.E… Easily the best rpg’s ever made).





While the stuff surrounding the Witch King in this movie isn’t that inspiring, the man himself is pretty neat and one of the high-lights of the series. I could have used more of him than just what we get to see in the battle at Minas Tirith. Though that is a good battle otherwise, maybe not as good as the battle at Helm’s Deep, but fun nonetheless. In terms of the other storyline, though we do have to put up with more sappiness and whimperings courtesy of Frodo and Samwise (how Samwise puts up with that schmuck, I do not understand), our obnoxious traveling hobbity’s do get to have some dirty fun with a big spider, some orcs and visit Cirith Ungol (not the band). Of course, like the crew of the Enterprise, they persevere against great odds to prevail. One thing that re-watching these has done is make me feel inclined towards the books again. And regardless of what flaws I find in the movies, I have no issues with those glorious old books… I still recall the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings books to be quite good, though I haven’t made a complete reading of them in probably 20 years. This week I picked up a copy of The Silmarillion, so we’ll see how that goes.

We also watched Star Trek: The Voyage Home. One of my favorites in the old days and, though it seems a bit much corny now, I still have fond feelings for it, especially as it is filled with many of my favorite quotes: “No, I’m from Iowa. I only work in outer space”, “Hello computer” and “Rich beyond the dreams of avarice”. This silly sci-fi comedy was directed by Leonard Nimoy and is the is the story of our crew taking their Klingon Bird of Prey on a time-travel adventure to 1980’s San Francisco in pursuit of some Humpbacked whales. See, on their way home after the end of The Search For Spock, when they get Earth-side they realize that some huge object is causing great trauma to the Earth while sending it strange signals. Of course, the signals are the songs of Humpbacked whales and when they realize this they (rather easily) devise a method of traveling back in time to before the whales died off (cue many environmental themes here…) to bring some home so that they could talk to the object and save the Earth. Fhew! So we are greeted with many humorous moments as these fancy future spacemen attempt to find their way around San Francisco. It’s all in good fun though, and filled with lot’s of silly commentary on 1980’s society and the way that the environment is treated.

Ah yes, The Player. One of those brilliant classics from Tim Robbin’s golden years of the early 90’s (the others being, of course, Jacob’s Ladder, Bob Roberts and The Hudsucker Proxy) that I really can’t tire of watching. And also one of the the best movies to watch about movies. Tim Robbins is Griffin Mill, the titular Player… An arrogant Hollywood producer who is completely wound up in his power and ego, and holds great pride in that. But once he starts receiving anonymous death threats (in the mail, via fax…) from someone who claims to be a spurned writer, we start to see just how short his hold on both his power and ego really are. The persistence and mystery behind these messages starts chipping away at his unshakable and shark like image, at the worst time for him as there is a newcomer on the studio scene who he fears is threatening to take his career. As he starts trying to discover who is threatening his life, he is falling apart mired in nerves and fear which only get worse once the police (in the form of Whoopi Goldberg and Lyle Lovett, both of whom are pretty great here) begin investigating him for a rather serious crime… As he fears for his life, sanity and career, the studio (as well portrayed by Fred Ward and Brion James) begins to fear for its reputation. Mill has little capacity for having so little control and he starts to make a lot of bad decisions, including falling for someone who is a very awkward someone to fall for…

The movie is good all around: A great cast, a great script and an entertaining an engaging story on its own. But all of this is really just a coating under which to make a scathing satire on the ludicrous state of the American movie industry. The film executives are portrayed as either shallow morons who can only understand films in terms comparing them to films that they’ve already seen:

It’s like The Gods Must Be Crazy except the coke bottle is an actress.

Right. It’s Out of Africa meets Pretty Woman.

or

So it’s a psychic, political, thriller comedy with a heart.

With a heart, not unlike Ghost meets Manchurian Candidate.

Or else as just plain greedy and irresponsible…

The story has lots of twists and few “good guys” (except for Mill’s girlfriend… A very decent character who gets the crappy end of all the sticks), but it is all brought together in a warped version of the “Hollywood ending”. A great movie to pair with Robbin’s following picture, Bob Roberts, for a clever and fun night of social satire.



It’s not like I don’t already have enough DVD’s of Stephen King related movies (currently about 12, I believe), but now I’ve added one that I hadn’t heard of (I hadn’t even heard of the story), Riding the Bullet. Of course King movies tend to be a mixed bag, and this was no exception. Feeling at times like a good indie film, and at other times like a corny TV movie, it as actually more entertaining than most of them. This was the first film that I’ve seen by Mick Garris, which scared me a little as his career seems to be all about B-movie/TV horror, and it maybe exceeded my expectations of him a little.

The story of a college student who, after a failed lovelorn suicide attempt, sets off on a 100-mile hitchhiking trip to visit his mother who has suffered a stroke (Barbara Hershey, who looks more like she is suffering from failed attempts to not look 60 years old). Of course, in this day and age, hitchhiking is an awkward proposition but even more so in King’s world. Encountering dark rural roads, hostile rural folk, creepy old men who talk too much, himself (as his conscience) and too many, too odd encounters with a tough in an old muscle car (David Arquette). Throughout this journey, he spends a lot of time reliving his past (especially moments with his mother) and having strange visions that lead one to think that maybe things are not as they seem. Well, maybe not as you are supposed to think that they seem. The movie is pretty predictable and the twist doesn’t come as much of a surprise. But it is certainly watchable enough… Just don’t take the blurbs on the case too seriously: “Scary, Haunting and Surprisingly Emotional” (Tobe Hooper?).

Whether it more deserves to be one of the great: comedies of all time, music films of all time or documentaries of all time… I don’t know, but it is certainly one of the great films of all time. Yes, This Is Spinal Tap and the world is a better place for it. Rob Reiner, in his first feature film directorial role (and the first of six great films in a row from his hands), delivered us a genuine classic. For anyone out there who may not know, this mockumentary of a rock band on tour is a brilliant combination of all of the above. A great (and somewhat realistic?) tour diary of a band who seem to be a spoof on any hard rock or prog band who toured during the 1970’s; from Hawkwind to Led Zeppelin. They’ve got the band manager, attitude, presence and egos that helped to define the great era of big rock. Oh, and they’ve also got the spandex, the volume and the armadillos…





In short, Nigel Tufnel (Christopher Guest of The Princess Bride and of his own series of mockumentaries), David St. Hubbins (Michael McKean of Clue and Laverne and Shirley) and Derek Smalls (Harry Shearer of The Simpsons: Mr Burns, Smithers, Flanders and many more!) are the core of Spinal Tap, a British hard rock band in the second decade of their career. For the release of their newest album, Smell the Glove, the band proceeds to the US for its first North American tour in years. Sadly, this is the tour in which they come face to face with how “selective” their popularity has become. Starting out with a respectable itinerary of arena shows across the country, as the tour proceeds those shows start getting canceled, the album’s release is continually delayed, their bookings become much more unusual and the tension between the two lead members starts causing strife. This situation is not improved by the mid-tour addition of David’s pushy “yoko” girlfriend and her groovy attempts to improve the band. The footage of the tour in progress is interspersed with videos of past incarnations of the band, interviews of the band members discussing their musical history and the unusual deaths of their past drummers.





If you haven’t seen it in a while, remember that This Is Spinal Tap includes all of those (now iconic) scenes: Stonehenge, “11”, the Air Force Base, “Puppet Show and Spinal Tap”, Graceland… Everything about this movie is fun and with the director and the cast writing the movie and most of it being somewhat ad libbed, it comes across as feeling very genuine. The movie is really a wonderful ensemble piece, with the film’s director playing the documentary director and the actors writing and playing the music in the film it really brings the production and the performance together. There are also many fun and short cameos. And, of course, the musical numbers are wonderfully great!

Tap in to witness all of your favorite tunes: Hell Hole, Big Bottoms, Sex Farm Woman, Stonehenge, Tonight I’m Gonna Rock You and more!





I have the old Criterion Edition, which I wouldn’t recommend as its image quality isn’t very good (though I haven’t seen any of the newer editions to compare it with)… though it does have over an hour of cut scenes.

I did it. I went out and saw the new Star Trek. As an avowed fan of the original series (and quite disinterested in all of the other series), this is the first of the films that I’ve seen since either The Undiscovered Country or The Final Frontier.

Regardless, after all of those years and the disdain I’ve felt for the non-original Star Trek, I wasn’t too skeptical coming into this. Though I hadn’t heard much about it and I wasn’t thinking much about it, I did have it in my mind that it might be worth checking out. Of course, the fact that it is a prequel to the original series and would feature the classic characters, did make me wonder how much they would work to tie it in to the existing history. Only after the movie did I realize that it had been directed by J J Abrams (of Lost), otherwise I might have been prepared for some the alternate reality involved. First off, the whole premise. It is, yes, the story of the young (original) crew of the Enterprise and their (and the Enterprise’s) first mission. But instead of just doing a straight up prequel to the original series, he has thrown in some time-chucking to make it both a prequel and also an alternate history.

An evil Romulan, Captain Nero, has come back in time to wreak some vengeance on the Federation and the Enterprise crew must once again (though for the first time) go up against unbeatable odds to defeat a seemingly undefeatable enemy who will otherwise destroy the Federation. In the midst of this, we have to see the characters and relationships that we know so well begin to develop… Starting out with an exciting sci-fi battle and then moving to Kirk’s youth (and an unexpected Beastie Boys song… it certainly does have its cheesy moments) and the formation of our core folks. There is lots of action and space battling, the special effects are nicely done… This I especially appreciated because of lot of the stuff didn’t look too far removed from now. Wandering through the Enterprise it looks like you could have been just wandering through the aircraft carrier, rather than the spacecraft. There were some other good ships and some fun science stuff… Though I hate those silly “black hole/worm hole” theories, I did enjoy the Red Matter.

I thought that it was an interesting way of being able to use the same characters but yet also be able to do whatever you want with the story (and I believe, move us into a whole new series of movies using the classic characters). Of course, as with the second chunk of Star Wars movies and anything prequelesque, it feels a bit too self referential (even going so far as to give us the Kobayashi Maru incident and also an unusual and surprising take on a rather infamous romantic angle from the show)… But I find it easy to forgive such things in this case. Though I wonder how most of the movie will be perceived by people who are not thoroughly familiar with the classic star trek series.

The casting is pretty good, but most outstanding is the choice of Karl Urban (previously seen as Eomer, the great warrior of Rowan in the Lord of the Rings movies) as McCoy. Though his attempts to pull of McCoy’s mannerisms may at time seen a bit overdone, he actually makes it come across pretty well. But then, with the original series, being overdone is part of the package. And though it has a few corny and light-hearted moments that don’t really interest me, some of the other “funny” stuff I didn’t mind. Especially surprising was seeing Simon Pegg as Montgomery Scott… And when the credits rolled I realized that I had unfortunately and completely missed that Spock’s mother was played by Winona Ryder!

So with my little brother-in-law staying over we let him pick out a movie to rent and he picked one that I’d never heard of and that didn’t seem particularly exciting. But we watched it anyway and after seeing it, I am somewhat surprised that I hadn’t heard of it and assumed that is was just another old time cheapo Kung Fu flick. But no, the movie was Forbidden Kingdom and it seems to be a fairly recent addition to the flying through the air kung fu extravaganza genre. Though I haven’t seen many of these, after having Sleeping Dragon Flopping Lizard leave a dull taste in my mouth, I thought that this one was actually pretty good. Starting of with the photogenic scene of a martial arts battle across a bunch of little mountain tops poking out of the clouds…





We wake to a young American fellow who has seemingly been dreaming it… The plight of those who watch too many Kung Fu movies, I suppose. Anyway, to make things more interesting, he comes across a staff in a junk store… A staff that featured prominently in his dream… And we’re off!

Forbidden Kingdom is the story of Chinese immortals with an issue. See, the Monkey King is rather obnoxious (and quite undefeatable with his magic staff)





and many years ago, he ticked off the Jade Warlord by crashing a party and the Jade Warlord managed to trick him and get the upper hand. Of course, prophecy says that one day a stranger will come and return the staff to the Monkey King and he will be able to defeat the evil warlord.





One guess who this prophesied stranger is… Our guy meets up with Jackie Chan (as the drunken immortal) and Jet Li (a monk on a mission) and a woman with vengeance on her mind and they set out through lush landscape, dramatic scenery and much much Kung Fu fighting to get to the palace of the warlord.





In addition to all the nice looking scenes, they encounter some interesting landscape, a witch with some tricks up her sleeve and the movie is pretty entertaining with not too much of the sappy stuff, not too much of the dumb slapstick but tons and tons of action. All sorts of fight scenes, all sorts of martial arts techniques… Just people flying and fighting all over the place.

Feeling the urge upon us for some quality historical fiction to get involved in, we picked up something called Cranford. A BBC Masterpiece Theater production. Though I have finally gained an appreciation for the old, old classics, I still shudder when I see the words “masterpiece theater” as I so loathed the show back when I was in short pants. But we watched it anyway. And I must say, After completing 291 minutes of it, we want more! So we will be netflixing the others productions that are trailered on this disc.

Cranford is the story of an old fashioned British town, even old fashioned for the 1840’s (when it takes place). Cranford seems to be primary a town for (and dominated by) widowed or single older women and their work to keep things proper… Which leads to gossip and judgment and people trying to do the right thing… But of course, inappropriate things do happen! The story focuses primarily on two much respected sisters (one of whom is Dame Judi Dench) who are considered to be somewhat the model of behavior and opinion in the town and also on the events that occur when a charming and young new doctor moves to town and gains an attraction to the vicar’s daughter…





Though he is maybe not as careful around the others ladies of the town as he should be… The cast is a wonderful collection of British actors (including Mr Everywhere, Michael Gambon), but I most particularly liked Philip Glenister as Mr. Carter, the estate manager of the wealthy and sad Lady Ludlow. A great character of pride, logic and compassion.





It is based upon three novels by Elizabeth Gaskell, and while that doesn’t mean anything to me, it was surely a different kind of beast than the historical fictions I’ve seen from the hands of Dickens and Austin. Cranford is funny and light-hearted, but quite dramatic, and while certainly a downer at times, as there is love and death, crime and scandal, wealthy and poverty, and the eternal conflict between the old ways and the new ways… There is a charming silver lining in those old British clouds.

The final episode though, has too, too much drama! I was hiding my eyes and hanging on to the edge of the seat… Cranford is a great series that I would have liked to have not seen, just so I could see it anew again!

I stumbled on this silly little webapp, NetFlix History Analyzer. Here you can enter in your NetFlix rental history to see, for example, how much you have spent/saved by using NetFlix. I wasn’t particularity interested in that, but as I can’t avoid any pointless statistic that are sent my way, I did like this part:

Here’s some more about your renting habits…

* You kept each rental for around 12 days on average.
* The longest you kept a single DVD was 117 days.
* You rented about 5 DVDs each month.
* You’re not taking full advantage of your current plan. You could be renting 13 DVDs each month.

Sure, as we barely get one a week, keep them for nearly two weeks on average and kept one for 4 months, maybe we aren’t getting the most from this… But I like the convenience and gimmickry of NetFlix, so even though we could certainly go out and rent a dvd every week without it, we aren’t going to get rid of it… I’m just saying…

Speaking of things I’m just saying, As I haven’t been able to get around to catching up with my backlog I will just jot down some movies from the last few months…

1) We watched a CIA movie, The Good Shepard. Though it had a cast I could do normally without (um… Matt Damon, Angelina Jolie, Alec Baldwin? Ekk!) they actually did fine jobs, which, coupled with the good cast members (De Niro, Michael Gambon, William Hurt, among others) made it a respectable and involving movie. The (truish?) story of the CIA told via a young fellow who gets involved with the Company when it is formed. It is an engaging and serious film and Damon plays a serious workaholic spy officer who puts his family and everything else on the backburner as he seems to be involved in every major event of the CIA for decades. I liked its quiet pace and the only problem that I had (as I barely recognized Jolie) is that it made me think of Breach, which I liked better (but probably just because of Chris Cooper).

2) Primary Colors. I always find this to be an entertaining film. It is basically the story of Bill Clinton’s first presidential campaign. Well, not really the story of the campaign so much as the story of the personality of Bill Clinton at the time of the campaign… And the story of his handlers trying to keep the scandals under wraps, or at least in check. Told through the vehicle of an idealistic fellow (Adrian Lester) who joins the campaign only to find out that there isn’t much room for idealism. John Travolta does a good (though generally comes across as corny) portrayal of Clinton, as Emma Thompson (as Hilary) and Kathy Bates are both good, but the highlights are Larry Hagman and Billy Bob Thornton… Though Billy Bob does get carried away at times, they are the most compelling characters of story.

3) The Darjeeling Limited. I wasn’t sure what to expect from this. As I’ve said before, each of Wes Anderson’s film has been better than the previous one so I was curious to see what he would follow up The Life Aquatic with, as it is one of my favorite movies of recent times. The Darjeeling Limited is certainly cute and clever and witty and all of that. It also feels very Wes Anderson, but it feel like Wes Anderson not trying too hard and it didn’t really move me. The story of three brothers traveling across India to visit their mother, at heart it felt more like a first movie, only coated with much more money and the clever design and cinematography of Anderson’s films. The characters didn’t interest me, the story didn’t particularly interest me, the soundtrack wasn’t as good as I might have expected and it wasn’t too interesting. But it does have its visual merits, and a couple of genuinely funny and/or touching scenes, but not something I’d probably watch more than once.

4) We also watched Control. A biopic of Ian Curtis from Joy Division, based heavily on his wife’s memoir. It was pretty good, but we watched it right about when we watched Joy Division, which made for an interesting pair. The documentary is certainly better, but after watching it and hearing many aspects of Ian’s life referenced, it did add some depth to follow it up with this movie as it thoroughly cover his depression, his epilepsy, his personal troubles between his ladies, the specifics of which weren’t really covered in Joy Division. And though I don’t know how similar this was to Deborah Curtis’ book, if it was at all then she must have been quite fair minded about it, as the relationship between her and Ian seems quite honest and believable.

Honestly, I wouldn’t have upgraded to the new WordPress if I knew how much it was not made for a little screen. On this thing that text box is about 6 inches across, making me feel all claustrophobic…

Aside from that, last week I watched Wall Street. Believe it or not, I’d never seen this one before. Though it is one of those bad people behaving badly while dressed in bad fashions, it otherwise good (and I shouldn’t really dismiss it for the fashions, as it is 22 years old).

Charlie Sheen is Bud Fox, a young fellow working the trenches of Wall Street (meaning calling people on the phone trying to get them to bite on his stock tips) who is impatient to become a mover and shaker and decides that the best way to do it is to jump in with the big man about town, Gordon “Greed is Good!” Gekko (with Michael Douglas in an Oscar winning performance that made Gekko into such a figure that some people (myself included) thought that he was a real person). Of course, Gekko is a ruthless bastard but he decides to give the young feller a chance to be as much of a ruthless bastard as he is.

Looking for angles to impress his new “mentor”, Bud gets torn between himself and loyalty to his father (Martin Sheen, oddly enough) on one side and loyalty to achieving his dreams and Gordon on the other… It’s all about insider trading, betrayal, what people will do for money and what a punk Gorden Gekko is.

Also featuring Daryl Hannah, James Karen and Hal Holbrook.

Well, well, well.. Many, many years ago I read The Keep (by F. Paul Wilson) and I liked it quite a bit. Ever since then I’ve wanted to see the movie and today, I finally got my hands on a copy. Now I won’t have to want to see it anymore. While the story and the movie had some potential, in the hands of Michael Mann (yes, he who would go on to bring us Miami Vice) in the director’s chair and behind the screenplay, and under the shadow of early 1980’s special effects… It just doesn’t live up to much of anything.

The Keep is the story of a group of German soldiers who are assigned to a keep in Romania to watch over a pass through the Carpathians. Even with Jürgen Prochnow in command, the villagers are none to pleased to see these fellows roll into town. Even less pleased are the family of hereditary keep keepers who strongly suggest that the soldiers not spend the night in the keep, saying the people who have tried are driven from the place by dreams. Just to make matters worse, the walls of the keep have 108 large crosses embedded in them that the soldiers think are silver and want to pry off of the walls, even after the keep keeper strongly advises against doing so.





Of course, the first night some soldiers who are convinced that the crosses are a sign of treasure hidden somewhere in the keep, under the cover of Tangerine Dream, try prying a cross off the wall. This leads them to the discovery that there is something hidden in the keep, but it certainly isn’t anything I would call treasure. As things start to get fatally bad for the soldiers, Prochnow tries to get the unit reassigned.

Instead of that happening, things get worse. A unit of the S.S. are sent to take over. They are harsh and mean and led by Gabriel Byrne and so the movie still seems like it might turn out alright. Then Byrne ends up bringing in a surprisingly lame and melodramatic performance by Ian McKellen, the terrible effects start and everything settles down to a dry and forgettable film.





It is hard to believe that with Nazi’s, ancient evil, and a Romanian village that this bad is how it would turn out, but it does. And then from there, a sudden, corny and anti-climactic ending wraps it up. The end.



We also watched The Descent again. As this is its 4th appearance in these pages, there isn’t really much to say about it. Admittedly the thrills and chills lose their thrilly chilliness after so many times through, but it is still a great and tense horror film. One that still cannot quash my interest in the idea of spelunking. But enough about me… The women still go down into the big dark cavern. They still encounter things that they wouldn’t want to encounter, their personal relationships still start to fray and it is still very, very dark down there. Oh yeah, and there is still madness on the bloom. In summation: it is one of the best horror movies in many, many years. But be sure to see it with the full British ending instead of the lame hacked-off American one.