The Day After Tomorrow

Personally I thought this movie was very well done, despite the fact that it was ludicrous in hypothesizing that what will probably take a millenia to pass could happen in the space of a week. In fact, one of my buddies who workds for a disaster recovery corporation told me that all the techies were given the day off and told to go see the movie . . . since it IS in their particular pervue, you realize. He tells me that he was in the theatre with about 75 guys from India all yelling, "Dat is Boo-sheet!! Dat is such boo-sheet!!" for two and a half hours straight.

Other than that technical comment I figure that for your standard Man vs. Nature movie this one was very well done. You have your characters fighting the elements; you have your people who want to hold tight vs. your people who want to try to walk out of the danger. You've got your hero who crosses six states covered in a solid sheet of ice to find out if his son is alive or not. You've got your magnificent views of incredible damage.

Also, you that the humour element: That of tens of thousands of US citizens flooding south across the Rio Grande, until Mexico closes the borders! (Everyone should get a kick out of that!)

Basically, the writing of the movie is fairly well-done for the genre: it focuses on the humanity and having to face sudden hardships, however it takes care not to point out the complete weaknesses of the slovenly character of your average US citizen - I personally think that not all of them would be so heroic. In addition, the writing does slightly over-emphasize the stance of the current (and former) US administrations who are willfully destroying the environment without the slightest care of the future ramifications. In that aspect, it's a little overdone: I cringed with the VP openly apologized tearfully on what was left of television.

Other than that, it was a fairly entertaining movie, and not at all an afternoon wasted.


VG

Wild Things 2

Leila Arcieri

Rather tame, really - not what you'd expect - glittery sensual crime drama. Rather disappointing with a tepid and shallow plot.

Oh well. Live and learn.

VG

X-2

One of the few movies I watch again and again

Best scene is inside the house when Wolverine takes out the military "cannon fodder"

I like the way it both stands alone and is a continuation of the impending Mutant vs. Human war that's brewing. These movies actually follow, in a general way, the storyline of the X-Men comics of the 80's, the Claremont/Byrne classic. Makes me wonder if some of my signed copies are still worth anything?

Anyway - great characters, great action, good story - little uneven, but the dialogue is heroic without ever becoming truly "over the top" (although at times it runs the risk) - but the acting I have to admit is good enough to keep the excesses in check. These characters are beleivable, not campy - and it would be easy to become campy.

This one is defintely one for the collection. Makes me want to watch the first one again. And wait, salivating, for the third.

Out next month!

VG

VG

King Arthur

It's very hard to do anything with the Arthurian epic that hasn't really been done before, because these legends have been done over and over completely and again, with varying degrees of believability and storytelling, but I liked this "version"

Actually I shouldn't say "version" - because I am coming more and more to believe that movies are not so much their own genre of art form, but rather an extension of the larger tradition of storytelling.

Follow me for a moment: all the epics (Arthur, the Aenied/Odyssey, Arabian Nights, Gilgamesh, and indeed ALL mythological tales from every race that ever walked the earth) were all oral stories handed down from generation to generation, with each storyteller embellishing a little upon the story, making it their own, changing it as times changed.

Storytelling became a little more static once writing was invented - it was able to capture the culmination of millenia of storytelling. Even then, the larger tradition did not stop - what future storytellers (i.e. "writers") had then were specific texts to refer to, and stray from, depending on their audience and the point they wanted to make.

Now, in our "visual" audience, when we are moving almost completely to the visual art of storytelling (instead of the more cerebral art of reading!) we now have the images to tell these stories . . . it's an extension of the art form, for better or worse


How does that apply to this movie? Well, I'll tell you . . .

We've all grown up with the Arthurian tales, which were primarily from a French Knight who was rotting away in prison because he was a murderer and a theif, and he wrote down a load of stories that he had head (and read!) as a kid and those wound up giving us the Arthur that we know today: chivalric, magical, honest, brave true: with his Round Table and Lancelot and Holy Grail, etc.

Then, archaeological evidence helped to uncover other truths, such as the basis of King Arthur was really probably some minor celtic overlord who tried (unsuccessfully) to fight against the Saxon hordes that came rampaging and pillaging across Cornwall.

However, ALL these tales have one thing in common: Arthur, of whatever race/origin/or deeds, was born on the island of Great Britain.

THIS movie's slant is entirely different: Arthur and his knights of the Round Table were actually born on someplace near the Russian Steppes and were drafted into service of the Roman Empire because of pacts made with their fathers. They were sent to Britain to serve out their 25 years to the Roman Empire on this desolate island, and toward the end of their servitude (when this movie begins) what's left of these guys (about 5 or 6 from an original 20 or so) are all just waiting to go home. In fact, one of the startling images in the movie IS the round table, when they all take their places, and when they mention that the table used to be filled with men, and now it's just sparsely populated, the audience gets a very good example of how many of their friends have died on this (what is to them, a) godforsaken island.

Then, they have a standard plot device: their boss sends them on one last suicide mission - been done before, but not in Roman Britain, to my knowledge. They've got to go deep into "crazy hillbilly" territory, i.e. Scotland.

Kiera Knightly, as one of the Scots, by the way, is one of the best action heroines ever, hands down! (I thought she was cool in Pirates of the Carribean, but in this movie she's even cooler than Arthur or Lancelot)

Some of the rest of the story is standard fare: Arthur goes "native" and turns on the Romans in order to liberate the Celts, and the rest of his troops (what's left of 'em) finally rally around him, more out of personal loyalty rather than belief in the cause. In this aspect the film is a lot like some other "apocalypse now"-style films that we've grown up with.

Other than that - it's got some great action scenes (the frozen lake being my personal favourite) and a lot of blood flying everywhere - swordplay, arrows falling like rain, etc.

All in all, not the most original story, but then, it's not supposed to be: this is folklore of today - taking a story that we all know, that is completely part of our communal culture, and putting an interesting little spin on some of the details in order to keep our attention. This is a folk story, and fairly well told.

And in my mind, that's all any art needs to be: well-told.


VG

The Adventures of Shark Boy and Lava Girl

Robert Rodriguez

These days, you know what you're going to get from a RR movie: cool action scenes, not a whole heckuva lot of plot, but just a very good time. The man simply makes movies fun. This one, no exception, except that it has a little bit more plot than his other films. (I think that has to do with the fact that he didn't write the screenplay)

I won't receite the plot, however, because this story is more important in the lessons that it teaches, basically BE YOURSELF and DON'T BE AFRAID TO DREAM.

Yup, this movie is for all of us geeks who scribbled pictures of our own made-up superheroes on our notebooks in school (and yeah! I'm talking grade through high, buddies!) . . . especially if we got crap for it, too.

Anyway, it's about the boy being thrown into the world of his own creation, and now he has to save it, because there's a dark force threatening to destroy it. Which is, of course, the bully who stole the kid's dream journal and has begun to put his own dreams into the picture. In this way, the movie of course becomes allegorical. At first, I was under the impression that the "darkness" eating away at his dreamworld was simply the age at which we start to mature, to become more adult than child. But then, that must be because of my literary upbringing, because that plot's been done. This one was slightly more interesting in the fact that the darkness was simply just from the bully (and BOY do you wanna give THAT little brat the smackdown!)

As you might expect, we eventually arrive (after much cool action fight scenes) at the fact that the bully is simply lonely and misunderstood (ah! would that they were ALL like that! and would that they could ALL be 'turned to good' after we simply extend the hand of compassion!). Once the bully is on our side, we then have to save the 'real' world from destruction.

Hint! At this point, George Lopez gives perhaps the best line of the movie. "You made me the bad guy?! I'm a big fat round bad guy!" (Not so hot on the page, but he delivers it well, and you really have to see it in context.)

Oh yeah, we also, throughout the adventure, find out the true meaning of the existence of Shark Boy and Lava Girl, and yes, there are lessons here about true friendship.

This is definitely a great movie . . . one of RR's best (although El Mariachi will always be his numero uno, IMHO), but I would venture to say that you should at least see this movie, if not take the one step further and make it part of your video collection.

VG

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe

This was a beautifully-made movie, and it is one that should be seen in theatres, because of the panoramic fight scenes.

It followed the book fairly well, and in fact I thought it enhanced the book better, especially since the first ten minutes actually was only the two beginning sentences of the book: that of London and the air raids. Cinemagraphically, this was also well done in that it helped to illustrate a little more of the individual personalities of the characters, (esp. Edmund) and laid the ground for what was to come, that of his betrayal of the siblings to the White Witch. Whereas in the book his betrayal was due to some enchanted Turkish Delight, and thus he was operating under a spell, the movie appears to present us with a character who bears more of the responsibility - that of his headstrong personality and his hunger for greater things. I like this aspect over the book in that it makes his familial reparations that much more "intense," if you will.

Other than that, and certain other little plot tweaks, the movie closely followed the book, which I had actually thought would be boring for the children, for I've never found CS Lewis to be the absolute greatest writer of plots - most of his stories tend to gloss over details or rush the action, or worse, occasionally draw out one scene over half the book. But instead, the movie was very entertaining, visually stimulating, very heroic.

And, of course, it will draw some comparisons to Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings, because it follows so closely on its heels, and all I can say about any comparisons is that it has all of the heoric glamour byt not of the same "ponderousness" - again, a direct result of the differences between the books from which they were drawn.

Overall - watch it. And don't read any reviews, because they'll just colour your thinking and prevent you from fully enjoying the story, which is well-told in this particular medium.

And when I say don't read reviews, I, of course, include my own!

VG