Palin and McCain: The negotiations start.
Aug
31
Back in 1978 I saw the original Dawn of the Dead. At the time it was considered the epitome of horror and a great social satire. (Flash Fact: It was also unrated, but here in AZ. they ran commercials for it in prime time kiddie afternoon viewing. We were bound and determined to spawn a generation of horror & SF freaks.)
The next night I saw Apocalypse Now at the Cine Capri. (Our largest screen at the time.) I thought I had been misled, for this was surely the real face of horror. Social satire aside, you could totally divorce yourself from the over the top gory antics of Dawn of the Dead. Apocalypse Now had it’s share of outlandishness as well, but you were drawn in with the basis that the war was real. Man vs. man over some ideology was something you couldn’t escape, while zombies were…well, a metaphor at best.
Skip to the present. I saw The Final Destination 3D the other day. While it was OK matinee fare for a horror fan and 3D junkie, it wasn’t likely to scar my psyche. (On the other hand I saw a UK PSA on the dangers of texting while driving that just about had me in tears because an infant and toddler were involved in the carnage. Parenting changes you.)
I followed that today with The Hurt Locker. (Yeah, I know. I’m late to the show with this.) But again, I’m torn by what is categorized as horror and what really struck me as such. The Final Destination makes light of turning the everyday world into a death trap for its characters. Meanwhile, the world of Hurt Locker really is a death trap and the protagonists walk into its jaws to diffuse it for their fellows.
Horror seems to have become a rather toothless Grand Guignol. A more mature rollercoaster ride. (For increasingly younger ages with the films skirting PG-13 as much as possible.) There is no staying power. Ten minutes after the film the best you can conjure from it is an entertaining Rube Goldberg mechanism wired to terminate a character. Horror catches a lot of crap still, but beyond torture porn, it’s just cotton candy for the Hot Topic crowd. (Some more lame vampire shit? Sure, here you go.)
The Hurt Locker scares and gives you a lot to think about. More politically aware people have been dealing with the abstacts for some time, but this puts a face to things. That’s what real horror does. Consequently, it’s what real war does as well, so don’t confuse this with the good-time-snappy-dialogue of Inglorious Basterds. There’s no cartoon Nazis here.
It’s all the more interesting to see how the director’s are viewed here. Kathryn Bigelow has steeped herself in men-centric genres the majority of her career. She has an alternate take on action, male interaction and film dynamics. Tarantino, by turn, is more akin to a rap artist that samples frequently, throws in some of his own lyrics overtop and call it original. (Is that good or bad? Depends on your viewpoint. I’ve seen examples of both in rap and QT.) I guess Bigelow suffers because she doesn’t have a motormouth or feels she has to be her own hyperbolic PR agent. What’s readily apparent is that she has a very workman-like approach to projects that bring to mind other under-appreciated directors of yore like Don Siegel. It’s also interesting in that while Tarantino not-so-subtly proclaims Basterds as his masterpiece that title really should go to Bigelow and Hurt Locker.
Aug
26
Quentin Tarantino just had a good weekend (for him anyway) at the boxoffice with his new film Inglorious Basterds. I don’t know that it’s going to do enough business in the long run to help out his longtime co-distributor The Weinstein Company, but that’s another story.
I found the film entertaining but not the ‘masterpiece’ that some critics were going on about. (Those that reviwed it positively as it were.) That would be because Tarantino would just not shut up about how great this was going to be for years and years. Admittedly, you have to have a big ego to be a director or any type of successful creative person, but temper things. Tarantino originally was throwing around action star names like Stallone and Schwartzenegger with a well rounded list of B-Stars for support. Even back then this was hooey. He just doesn’t have to clout to pull off a picture with that kind of budget. (On the other hand, look at Stallone doing exactly that right now with his forthcoming film The Expendables.) As the years went on you would have thought he would have lowered expectations some, but I imagine he thought his approach to the WWII experience was going to carry things. (Along with, what?, two weeks of Brad Pitt and his buddy Eli Roth hamming it up.)
It is with this in mind that I take a look at another filmic wunderkind, James Cameron. Film Geeks have been hearing about Avatar for far too long now. Supposedly we had to wait to technology to catch up to Cameron’s vision. (3D at that.) So when the trailer finally hits it’s half live action and half…video game??? Not what we expected from the self proclaimed savior of film. Oh, yeah, there’s kind of a story there too. It’s been described as Dances With Wolves for SF. (Shudder!!!) So, again. Dial down the hype. (Except in his case he can’t. There’s waaaaay too much money riding on this. He’s got to deliver, so the hype is in overdrive.)
I think we’re better served with, say, a Soderberg, who has is fingers in many different projects and stays constantly busy than these overly gestated projects that fall under their own weight.
Aug
26
At The Rock
Watercolor and PrismaColor pencil on bristol board. I should do more of this. It’s my take on a technique Bob Peak would do to much success. (Only he used a watercolor board and brought pastel to bear on the painting instead.) It’s difficult to know where to stop with the details and not over render, thereby letting the looseness escape.
Aug
14
Work Sketch A
Sketch done at work while waiting for a meeting to commence. Mechanical pencil on notebook paper. A tad Gil Kane-ish I think. (If you don’t know who Gil Kane is, then I don’t know why you’re reading anything here. My references for all popular media will extend beyond Star Wars, which seems to be the point where most modern fanboys think everything started.)
Impressive usage of the <tits> tag.Jun
03
One of the breakout series of the just finished television season is Castle. One of the breakout series of the last few seasons of television is Burn Notice. What’s the difference between the two?
Castle is the story of a celebrity mystery writer that tags along on real police cases under the guise of doing research for a series of books. It has some fine character work and relies on some black humor and a Moonlighting-like romantic chemestry between the leads. What it doesn’t have is smart plots or mysteries that stump the audience. (Even for a moment.) The smartest guy in the room really doesn’t appear to earn that title.
Burn Notice features an ex-covert-op stuck in Miami for reasons unknown, kinda like The Prisoner. While he tries to unravel the increasingly intricate story behind his situation he helps people in trouble, kinda like The Equalizer. His narration dispenses knowledge of how to do covert-ops type stuff with readily available materials. Kinda like updated versions of The Poor Man’s James Bond or The Anarchist’s Cookbook. These asides make him definitely feel like the man for any particular job.
While Burn Notice is not the pinnacle of smart writing, it’s at least a consistent example of how not to let your characters become embarassed. For whatever reason, TV characters that should know better, don’t.
This is disheartening in that television is the last bastion for most clever writers. Here they are the movers and shakers and constantly rise to positions such as show runner. (Just the opposite of how they’re treated in film.) Apparently forever gone are the days when you could watch a battle of intellects on something like Columbo. (Hell, at this point I’d settle for any Mystery Movie characters, even McCloud.)
So really, if you’re not prepared to do the research of at least Burn Notice level, then don’t make your characters some kind of borderline geniuses. (And stop casting people we’ve seen in countless shows in some bit part and expect us to be surprised when the reveal is that they’re the baddie.) It’s just depressing to figure things out by the first or second commercial break.
May
04
So, usually Film Critics will have something about how Film reflects our times. So let’s see: We have a new President. He was apparently elected by popular vote despite being Black because he wasn’t an idiot. (Yeah, I know. Don’t tell me that race as an issue is dead just because of this. I wish it was, but no.) He inherited an assload of problems with the tops being a colapsing economy and a fucked up war. Oh, and the Republicans have their tit in a wringer over anything he does even though the majority of this crap was brought on by them.
How does Hollywood react to this? (Especially given that the job situation for many Americans is not rosy, so who is spending money at the movies?) A lot of summer blockbusters are in to metal. Wolverine has his skeleton laced with it. Splendiferous money shots of the Enterprise and other space vessels occupy a lot of Star Trek. The Transformers are back blowing the shit out of everything. Terminators are freakin’ everywhere after the big one. (Those two make Metal actual story elements.)
Is the hidden message that we need to get off our butts and manufacture stuff? Americans need to take control of production again and quit outsourceing things. (Even if those things turn around and want to kill us later?) I’m not sure. Steven Colbert probably knows but isn’t telling. (Yet)
But, there’s a definite theme running through a lot this summer and it can’t be coincidence. (Then again, Hollywood is not exactly known for independent creativity. Especially when scripts get around whether they’re spec or not.)
May
04
Each year we see it. Television shows fighting to stay on the major channels. Usually these are smart shows with devoted followings, but to the majors the squarely fall within niche programming.
Would Chuck be stuggling if it were on SyFy? (And let’s face it, the production values are lock step with their programming. An episode of BSG looks like the entire action & effects budget of Chuck.) How about Reaper? (Ditto on the production values.) Would The Unit be sweating it if it was on FX, Spike or USA?
No, and that’s the point. The audience is fragmented beyond recapturing. Cable offers more directed programming and the Internet is quickly becoming the to go place to catch your favorite shows without changing channels and with a minimum of interuptions. Numbers are down for the majors and they’re looking for ways to to reconfigure the ROI to reflect that and still look good. (Hence 5-night a week Jay Leno at 9/10pm.)
The majors always build up ones hopes by greenlighting niche programs. They want that bunch of desertees to come back. But their profit margins are too high for these kind of shows. So, they usually die too soon and take our hopes of good television with them.
That’s why the majors should just give up this kind of programming and leave it to the Cable channels where the numbers are more attainable for that kind of fare. So load up on ‘reality’ TV, more Law & Order (Unless the Belz & Ice-T get their own show. Then I’m there.) and by all means load up on Leno. The rest of us will be watching elsewhere.
Mar
24
One can’t help but be intrigued by Marvel’s efforts at global domination. While their comic sales have more or less plateaued, they’ve used their brand recognition to branch off into animation and film. While their animation efforts are somewhat hit-or-miss, they had some success with film. Well, mostly X-Men.
After reviewing what was working, Marvel made an unprecedented move by setting up their own studio. By calling the shots they were now reclaiming their brand. This is what they know and they didn’t want to leave it to various studio politics as to what their characters filmic fates were. Offhand, based on Iron Man and the strategy they’ve presented to start other tentpoles and then merge them into an Avengers film, I’d say they were on the right track. They are playing to their core audience, but making the appeal wide enough to eliminate barriers of entry from the general public.
Now they are trying to globalize their characters appeal. (Global box office is important.) This also impacts global amusement park potential. (Yeah, I miss the days when you could go to Universal Studios and eat at the Marvel Cafe, see their characters and buy merchandise.)
So, where is DC in all of this? Well, you’d think that they would be all over this, what with being owned by Time/Warner. However, that’s the problem. They are right in the middle of, not only studio politics, but corporate politics. They can’t watch out for their properties the way Marvel can now. Sure, they’ve had successes, mostly where Marvel has stumbled, in animation, but The Dark Knight showed that the characters were real cash cows.
But it seems that they lucked out with that. Superman Returns didn’t set the world on fire and there’s constant talk of a reboot. DC/Warners also can’t get it together to even bring Wonder Woman to the screen, let alone the countless second bananas in their universe. There’s no unifying strategy, just a bunch of isolated projects. The right hand doesn’t know what the left is doing.
More importantly, in the wake of Watchmen; is there really support for this kind of a business plan? Here’s a project fans have been clamoring for over a 20 year period, yet there was no pleasing anyone. (It was too faithful, it wasn’t faithful enough.) Given the pressures of bringing a big budget ‘R’ rated adaptation to the screen, it did as much as possible to get things right. Yet the box office might hit the break even point after international grosses and DVD sales are brought in. Where’s that Dark Knight support? Was it a one time fluke? Can’t you use Superheroes the way you can other fringe genres as a metaphor to address larger issues/current topics? Was it really the marketing campaign that did all of the work? Do you have to kill a star for that kind of dough? (Well, no, The Crow did very well, but not those kind of numbers.)
I’m afraid comic-oriented movies will end up in the ghetto that their published cousins have made for themselves. With luck, Marvel might smartly produce some non-Superhero properties and end up a mini-major like Lionsgate. Global domination will have to wait.
