Wow, I Am Actually Reviewing A New(ish) Movie

Today I watched Christopher Nolan's Interstellar for the first time: I saw the trailer last year and said "meh." It didn't look all that interesting and I figured it wasn't worth seeing in the theaters so I didn't, even after all the hype and rave reviews.  Well, my mom lent me the DVD and said, "you should see this" so I did and said...

..."meh."  Actually it was more "blah."  I didn't like it.  I didn't hate it either, I didn't have the same visceral reaction that I had to some of my most loathed movies like Armageddon, Die Another Day, Tommy or Gone With The Wind.  Just "blah." And maybe that's worse, because at least those turd burgers DID elicit a strong reaction to me, even if not a positive one.  Mostly I was just disappointed with Interstellar, even after I rejected all of the hype and didn't go in expecting the best thing ever.  I was at least expecting to be somewhat entertained or intellectually stimulated and the movie failed on both accounts.

I'm not going to take much time writing about this movie as it really doesn't deserve that much space. Matthew McConaughey annoyed me.  The rest of the actors disappointed me - even Michael Caine seemed to be phoning it in.  There are way to many Hollywood Theatrics for a supposedly hard sci-fi movie.  The abysmal score by Hans Zimmer is too loud and refuses to shut up.  The film is somehow overly pretentious and cutesy - one of the characters is even named "Murphy" after Murphy's Law (really).  Characters do things irrationally and out of the blue not to illustrate human fallibility or be realistic but to provide cheap Hollywood "Drama".  With all of the shouting and tears and glurgy music you can tell that this movie is trying to manipulate you emotionally, it's not subtle like, say, Conan The Barbarian (yeah, I just went there).

I do not have a degree in science but even I could smell BS on some of the "science" in this film - I doubt that entry into a black hole would result in what happens in this movie.  Even without the scientific factor, there are just way too many plot holes and stupid moments and stupid things that bring up way too many questions... why is a man who last piloted a plane 10 years ago *perfect* to fly a new spacecraft into another galaxy?  Why did the aliens (or whoever) who supposedly want to help humanity put a wormhole out by Saturn when it would have been waaaaaaay more helpful and expedient to put it closer to Earth - say, closer to Mars or the Moon?  For that matter what's up with the propulsion technology of the future?  They use a three-stage rocket to launch the spaceship from Earth and it takes this craft 2 years to reach said wormhole at Saturn (which is about how long it would take using today's technology) but their landers have Star Trek shuttlecraft anti-grav and propulsion technology and can land *and* take off on their own.  If they have sufficient AI to make sentient, wisecracking robots, why couldn't they just send advanced robot explorers out to this other galaxy instead of people who are fated to die (they try and explain away this one but it's bullshit)?  For that matter if the Earth is dying why don't the humans just immigrate to orbiting space colonies (oppa) Gundam-style?  You don't strictly need a planet to live, and they even show an O'Neill type cylinder at the end! Arrrrrgh!

Alright, as usual I spent way to much time ranting about this.  This is a movie I never want to see again.  I'm only providing one screenshot for this.  I had to watch another sci-fi movie, any other SF movie, to get the bad taste of this out of my brain.  I ended up watching Planet of the Vampires, which is actually a much better movie than Interstellar - and this is a 60s film that has Italian space zombies in leather gimp suits.  Hey, there's an idea - why don't I review Planet of the Vampires?

Next Time: Planet of the Vampires

Unmutual!

I couldn't stay away, but I won't be here long.  Too much personal stuff in my life, my slipping emotional sanity and the mind-numbing quest for an actual life mean that not only have I not written for this blog in a long time but that I won't be writing for it again ever come the near future; I am near done and we are approaching the end of line.  I truly mean it this time.  Cross my heart.

I didn't start up this blog again for the death of Leonard Nimoy, I didn't do it to commemorate Christopher Lee.  No, I am doing it today because today is American Patriotastic As Fuck Day, and as a Patriotastic American I feel like saying on this day celebrating the birth of "The Greatest Nation In The World":  It's a Sham.  Freedom is a myth.  You see, I have finished re-watching what is probably the Greatest Television Show Ever Made, and I had to come onto the internet, on this day, after a prolonged silence, to talk about it.  And it's British.  Ha.

1967-1968

Director: Basically Patrick McGoohan

This is a classic show.  If you haven't seen it, go watch it now.  Don't expect me to do a review in the classical sense and use it to decide whether you want to watch it, I'll just tell you right now.  Watch it now.  Now.

Now.

(17 hours later)

Okay, back?  Good.  Awesome, wasn't it?  And really fucking confusing too, I'll bet.  There's a lot of stuff in this show that makes you think, and makes you think about stuff that's not that pleasant.  Individuality vs the Community is only one facet.  I believe the overall conflict of the show is Freedom vs Control, or alternatively, Order vs Chaos... which ties into the Individual vs Society.  Of course Society stands for Order and Control... without control there would be no order, there would be chaos... and human beings cannot stand pure anarchy.  This is all Sociology 101, but the way The Prisoner star and creative force Patrick McGoohan handles it all is brilliant and nuanced.  From the tone and plot of the show you would expect The Prisoner (I refuse to refer to him as Number 6, after all HE IS NOT A NUMBER) to be the unabashed hero and the controllers of The Village to be absolute, unadulterated evil, but this is not always the case.  The Prisoner can sometimes be just as rigid and uncompromising in the name of the individual as the Village can be in enforcing Control -only near the end of the show does he stop flailing about in self-righteous rage and start to beat the Villagers at their own game. And while the antagonists do some pretty evil stuff in the course of the show it is made plain on a number of occasions that many of them are just as much prisoners as the main character.  You can actually sympathize with some of the Numbers Two (most notably Leo McKern's).

And in the end of course (literally) The Prisoner shows that you will never be free; if society is not trying to control and limit you then you yourself are.  The struggle is never over; we are doomed to conflict with ourselves and each other until the end of time... .. wait a minute, is this show British or German?

And that's why I say what McGoohan once said: freedom, or at least absolute freedom as imagined by most Americans, is a myth.  It has to be.  Or society would just fall apart.  In America you are only as free as you can afford to be.  Or as free as the powers-that-be will let you be.  Or as free as your family, friends, neighborhood or community lets you be.  The United States is no different.  Oh, don't get me wrong, I love living in the US.  As a (barely) middle-class American I enjoy a roof over my head and food whenever I need it (good, affordable medical care on the other hand....).  I am "free" to express my opinions about my government and not be jailed in a gulag somewhere but make no mistake... true political dissenters and undesirables are monitored covertly and often, and those deemed dangerous to the state (whether they are dangerous or not) are dealt with.  Scratch the surface of America's "free" exterior actually, and you'll find a surveillance and enforcement system that resembles a certain Village control room....

The United States (and other western countries) have done some very nefarious things to protect the community and its "freedom", many of them done during the decade The Prisoner was originally made.  Things that were just as nefarious as the "evil" Communist Soviet Union or third world brutal dictatorships (some of which we helped set up and/or maintain).  The East and West were not that different during the Cold War (something the show touches on).

So given the show's message and the state of the world it's all pretty depressing, right?  There is no hope.  Well, no.  The trick, and this is the beauty of McGoohan's message, is to despite all this never let them make you think of yourself as a number (which is difficult today, isn't it, with your Social Security Number, Driver's Licence Number, etc.).  Also, you have to *fight* for the rights you most want and cherish.  Don't let them take everything.  You should learn to compromise, but never just roll over and play dead.

All this coming from a Brit, no less.  Wait, actually, Patrick McGoohan was born and died in... America.


Go America!  Woo!

Happy Fourth.

Goodbye 2014

This year was a crappy year for me personally but it was a great year to go to the movie theatre.  The new Godzilla movie was great, Guardians Of The Galaxy was good, and a few others were fine too (but not Into The Woods as I mentioned a couple of posts ago).  People who believe that films today are all garbage compared to "the old days" need to get their heads reexamined.  Mindless drivel has existed since the birth of film.  The only really awful part of movie-going today is all the ads.

Well, here's to a happy new year... happy as it can be anyway.

Woot.

Ch Ch Ch Ch Ch Changes?

I got a Blu-Ray player for Christmas a few days ago.  I had wanted one for a while but couldn't justify the expenditure.  Well, now that I have one I guess I can pick up some Blu-Rays, if the price is right.  To be honest though I haven't had much time to watch many movies, imaginary reader.  I am currently trying (once again) to get out of my shitastic retail job, so there's not much time to be reviewing movies and stuff.  Besides, I'm less satisfied with simply offering my opinions on other people's stuff, especially when they aren't even intelligent opinions.  Maybe I'll wind down this blog like I've thought of doing before.

Or maybe I'll just put it on hold for a while.

Or maybe I'll just keep banging out mediocre shit endlessly until the sun explodes.

Who knows?

Musical Mediocrity

A friend of mine wanted to see Into The Woods, so I went and saw it with them today.  It was weird - the story and characters weren't bad but overall the whole thing was... mediocre, uninspired.  It was about an hour too long.  And being a musical, the music sucked... not in a horrible, painful sense but in a "This is boring and I can't remember a single song walking out of the theatre" sense.  Musical theatre has its roots in opera, especially German singspiel opera which has spoken words coupled with arias as opposed to the normal recitative/aria format.  Into The Woods was like watching spoken word combined with recitative with no arias.  What made this baffling was that it was written by Stephen Sondheim, who also did what is possibly my favorite musical of all time, A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum.  I guess he lost any talent for melody between the two.  Look, I don't need hooks and melodies to enjoy music, or even musical theatre.  Tristan und Isolde has almost no catchy tunes and its over three hours long but the difference is that Richard Wagner was a musical genius and the music in Tristan is on a whole different level - yes, there are no hummable melodies, but the chords and harmonies are brilliant and the whole... tone of the opera is so emotionally resonant that you are affected inside and you remember *that* after the thing has ended and you look forward to the day when it can do it to you again.

I know I normally don't do reviews on this blog for movies that are currently in theatres (I should, I guess... but I suppose I don't because it's expensive to go to the movies... or maybe it's because I can't add any pretty pictures).  I just wanted to express my disappointment in this movie and in the state of music in film in general (I know I did a while ago with my film score post) and musicals in particular.  The same friend and I saw Frozen last year and that was mediocre too, with only one memorable song (and we all know what it is....).  It makes me wonder what the point of making these things musicals is when the music is so uninspired and unmemorable... why not have it be a straight up play or movie?

I don't go to live shows so I don't know what the absolute latest things playing are (I'm only so interested in musicals, they aren't my favorites) but if Into The Woods is any indication (and checking online I see that it originally played in 1987) I don't really have much hope.  I guess I should be somewhat hopeful... another one of my favorites, Little Shop Of Horrors debuted at about the time (1982) so maybe one day I'll give another musical a chance.

Ooh, that got me thinking... maybe I should go re-watch Little Shop Of Horrors.

Still Better Than 99% Of All Christmas Movies

Hey, I know what you want for Christmas!  A really short picture review of a weird-ass modern Hungarian psycho-opera!  YEAH!

1981

Director: Miklós Szinetár

"Some drapes here, a table there...."

Pfft.  My torture chamber looks waaaay cooler than that.

What gets me are the flamethrowers on the wall.
I want.

So... Blubeard has his own  tacky disco?

The plants appreciate it, Judith.

Blubeard Presents

"Okay, now you're not even trying."

Wait, maybe this was really directed by Terry Gilliam....

...

Well, I hope you enjoyed my attempt to illustrate the awesomeness of a musical genre of film using only pictures.

Merry Christmas!

Three Days Of Ritual Retail Orgy Gives Me The Right To Rant

Well, retailers opened on Thanksgiving again this year.  Hell, the retailer I (still) work for decided to open two hours earlier than last year.  The trend is set.  Nothing is sacred to Americans anymore.  Is Christmas itself next?  You've spent weeks buying shit for this day, now go out and spend MORE on this day!  Spend more.  And more.  And more.  Spend money on useless shit that you will never, ever need.  Spend money on ephemeral, cheaply manufactured junk that will bring relief and shallow fulfillment to your miserable little life for just a few more seconds.  Spend until you can't shit another cent out of your wallet.  Spend more and more of your hard earned cash until every billionaire in this country can afford to buy his cocaine-addled blonde bimbo of a mistress her own island... or two.  Spend.  Spend.  Spend.