Woot

I turn 30 today. I am still stuck in a dead end retail job. My life is definitely still not where I want it to be. I have worked to try to change that but I haven’t had much luck. Well, at least I still have this blog, right? Well, yes and no. You see, I am usually so mentally drained at the end of my work shift every day that I can’t summon enough energy to think, let alone make a coherent blog post. I’m not going to bitch about my life for the rest of this blog post however, I’m gonna talk about movies. ‘Cause that’s what this blog was set up for.

So what am I gonna do for my birthday blog post? Well, at first I thought I might review a movie that came out the same day that I did – April 30th, 1982 (my birthday was on a Friday). But the only film I could find was a crappy comedy movie starring John Hurt called Partners. However, not only is this movie considered an execrable piece of garbage (not even in the good MST3K kind of way) by most who have viewed it, it’s not available on DVD and is really hard to find even on VHS. So I nixed that idea.

 Then I thought I could do a movie comparison between two cop movies that I saw for the first time recently – Dirty Harry (1971) and Beverly Hills Cop (1984). You, know, compare/contrast, analysis, talk about which one I liked better (Dirty Harry)… the usual. But you know what? I realized something while watching both. On the surface, Dirty Harry is a more realistic gritty thriller while Beverly Hills Cop is a less realistic comedy/action movie.

Although I do see how it may be difficult to see a difference.

But at their core, these two movies are the same – they are both fantasy films. Fantasy films do not have to involve magic or the supernatural or even anything recognizably “fantastic.” They are exactly what their title suggests – a fantasy being played out on the screen for the benefit of the audience. James Bond movies are fantasy movies because the males in the audience get to watch their fantasies being reenacted – fast cars, scantily clad babes with ridiculous names, fighting sharks, or what have you (personally, I have always had this weird desire to fight a huge Asian man with a killer steel-rimmed hat). Romantic Comedies are almost tailor-made for the female audience members. And Harry and BHC are also fantasy movies – they are Cop Fantasy Movies.


Dirty Harry may seem more “gritty” and “realistic” on the surface, what with all of the brutal violence and a sadistic serial killer and whatnought, but there are still shootouts! And Harry gets to jump onto a bus from a bridge! And give snappy one-liners!

"Freeze or I'll shoot you!  No... not cool enough.  Okay, how about...."

You see, if they made a movie about what it’s really like to track down a serial killer, it would probably be too boring for a general audience – it would probably resemble a "Frontline" documentary. Too much investigative work, too much questioning followed by a brief shootout and apprehension. So this Clint Eastwood movie is really a (mostly right-wing) fantasy for all of the male audience members who want to gun down psychopathic killers and play cowboy cop. Now that’s not to say that I didn’t enjoy the film (I did) or that there is some real drama (the whole fair process/criminal’s rights thing that could have been expanded on). It’s just at the end of the day I have to call a spade and spade and recognize this movie for what it is.

Which is a charming movie about a  heartwarming school field trip.

Beverly Hills Cop is much more blatant. In American cinema by 1984 all of the relative subtlety and nuance of the seventies had been replaced with over-the-top and completely nonrealistic antics. Look, I know that BHC is supposed to be comedy, but that doesn’t mean that it has to be a cartoon. The police chief YELLS at Axel (yelling in cop movies always makes it more DRAMATIC!)! Axel is THROWN through a window!

Thown through modern Plexiglass... that's a good trick!

Axel SMASHES UP a rich-person buffet! And gets away with it! It’s all very cartoony and very unrealistic. Any police officer acting like Eddie Murphy does in this movie would be an ex-police officer after about 3 seconds. Being a comedy is no excuse… there are police comedies that are funny while having their characters not be completely and unrealistically “maverick” – the Rowan Atkinson TV show “The Thin Blue Line” comes to mind.

And you know what else I realized? Almost ALL movies are fantasy films of some sort. Very few are focused on real drama. I figure it this way – if you are watching a movie and are attaining some form of wish fulfillment then what you are watching is a fantasy. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I don’t think that every film needs to be a heavy drama, or a straight-up comedy. It’s just that I think people need to be more honest and accurate with their labels. For example, I am probably going to see The Avengers when it comes out, and I have no illusions about what it is. It is a fantasy film.

Oh, and the verdict on Dirty Harry and Beverly Hills Cop? I liked Dirty Harry although I thought it could have used some more ideological balance. It does pose some interesting questions about law enforcement and civil rights although (like I said) the emphasis is more on Harry’s attempts to catch the obviously EEEEVIL Scorpio. Beverly Hills Cop is two shades shy of a cartoon (like most Hollywood movies of the Eighties)

I.e., any movie where it's this obvious who the villain is.

but it’s not even that good, or even that funny. If you want a funny Eddie Murphy movie get Trading Places or Coming to America, or even Shrek.




P.S. I see that Google has "updated" Blogger - I guess now I really *do* have to post more....