My Year Of Nerdery Catch-Up

This year, as readers (anyone? anyone there??) will know, I started playing Dungeons & Dragons with LDB,BL co-creater Chris Santee, who serves as my esteemed Dungeon Master. If memory serves me right, we started around January or February which makes it almost a year. But just because it has been a year, doesn't mean I am remotely close to being a Dungeon Master myself. I still never remember which die to roll for damage most of the time or which abilities my character has. Not for lack of interest, it's just simply a lot of stats and figures to remember and I am terrible at math. And memory. And props to DM Sitmo because those books are dense, there's no way I would ever be able to break all that stuff down and wrangle it into a cohesive game that 5 or 6 people can play at the same time. I of course started as a human ranger named Leoendrithas Droverson, an archer raised by elves. This was a whole new world for me, elves and dwarves and XP and hit dice...it was all foreign. Frankly, I wasn't nerdy enough to understand it at first. I mean, I've seen Lord Of The Rings once but I am no means a fantasy genre enthusiast and have never played table games beyond Monopoly and Candy Land. I've never played Skyrim or seen Game Of Thrones. That became evident when we tried to play a Star Wars role playing game, for which I had to be schooled in the basics of the Star Wars world, which drew the ire and laughs of my fellow gamers. Truth be told, I feel like a complete outsider in the D&D group but that's okay. The more the game goes on, the more I am immersed in the fantasy genre world, the more I learn the lingo and character archetypes, the more enjoyable it becomes.

Of course, the aforementioned Star Wars debacle continues to haunt me and I made an effort earlier this year to right that oversight. And I tried, I really tried. This summer, I made the effort, I had all three of the original trilogy in my possession but I just didn't make it. I'm sure it's a fine world that Lucas has created, I'm just not that interested in it. As I've said before, I think I needed to see it about 15 years ago, when it was the height of technological and special effects achievement, not to mention, the height of cool. Now, it just looks hokey, the world not sufficiently interesting enough for me. By now, there's too much in the canon for me to bother catching up with. When people catch wind of me not seeing Star Wars, they give me the same response as when they find out I don't drink. "WHAAAATT!!! I want to be there when you watch it for the first time." I of course don't want to watch it, just like I don't want to go out and get drunk, but it doesn't stop people from expressing the interest in wanting me to do so. As noted in previous posts here, my interests lie elsewhere but this year and from here on out, I hope to expand my nerdy oeuvre. My collection of comics is growing, I'm going to see The Hobbit: The Desolation Of Smaug, and I've tried to limit the amount that I talk about football and Jason Statham among people whose eyes will glaze over when I do so. Gotta know your audience.

Every time a comic book movie comes out, I go to my friends to get the background on what I missed out on in decades of comics and movies. I'm slowly catching up, but every time a new character pops up in a Marvel film, I always require a primer to get the basics. I'm excited in theory about these four new series that Netflix and Marvel are collaborating on but I know absolutely nothing about any of those characters. I think Ben Affleck was Daredevil once upon a time but that's as much as I could tell you. After watching the new Thor film, I needed Chris to tell me what the deal was with The Collector and how he fits into the universe. And watching Marvel's Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. has opened a whole new round of questions about what it is they do and how they fit in. And apparently the new Superman film will be Batman versus Superman, which is a mystery to me because I thought Batman and Superman were allies. But again, I enjoy delving more into these worlds because I feel like I'm catching up on what I missed out on as a child, when I was doing who knows what instead. I just need time to catch up because right now I'm pretty busy with the NFL and NBA seasons.

Lee Loves Action Movies

Everyone who knows me knows I love two things: 1) Lists and 2) Action Movies. Thus, I will create a list right here of my favorite action films of the last 10 years. Action films are usually the butt of the joke because most people just have a vision of a shitty car chase and a bad one-liner uttered by a washed up old actor. People see Bruce Willis now in 2013 and see a sarcastic, bloated, uninterested old man doing paycheck cameo roles in movies like GI Joe: Retaliation while forgetting that for the past 25 years, he has been one of the biggest actors in the world and played arguably the most beloved action film character of all time, John McClane in the Die Hard movies. Just because A Good Day To Die Hard (which I really enjoyed) was clearly a case of Well, Why The Hell Not Make Another One, We Don't Have Anything Better To Do, it doesn't take away the fact that those first three movies are all-time greats. There are always a slew of bad action movies in theaters and on video store shelves (oh, wait...) but there are also a whole slew of god-awful dramas and comedies and every other genre. Action films just have a stigma that they will never be able to get past. There will never be a best action film category at the Academy Awards* and as much as films like Gladiator, The Hurt Locker, and Braveheart are considered action films, I want to see a movie like 13 Assassins win an Academy Award so that they have to show a 15 second clip where dozens of people are being decapitated and lying in a pile of bodies and blood. I am a complete homer for the aforementioned one-liners and car chases, it's something I loved as a kid, then became too cool for when I was a teenager and then became enamored with again as I got older. The most recent example was Lockout, which I just watched a few weeks ago, with Guy Pearce sneering & snarking his way through a space prison to rescue the president's daughter from the world's most dangerous criminals, which is pretty much the most awesome plot for a movie in recent memory. With all that said, let the list commence (in no particular order):

KILL BILL VOL. 1 - Almost all of my favorite directors are the ones who love movies and love making movies that harken back to their favorites. I can't think of anything better than getting paid millions of dollars to make a movie with your childhood idols that you wrote and directed about whatever genre you're obsessed with at the moment. Quentin Tarantino is such a director. He created a world with these movies where he could incorporate all of his favorite things about the genre and make something completely original while being an homage to its predecessors. The final battle between Beatrix Kiddo and the Crazy 88 in the House Of Blue Leaves is operatic. I think when QT jerks off, he closes his eyes and thinks about the 5,6,7,8's and finishes when Lucy Liu gets scalped.

FAST 5/FAST 6 - While the future of the franchise is in question with the death of Paul Walker, it's hard to not see the last two films as two of the best of the series, if not two of the best action films in recent memory. They did something smart with this series; they moved beyond them being "car movies" and just turned them into solid, if absolutely insane and ridiculous action movies. A "family" of rich, globe-trotting criminals chasing bad guys in airplanes and tanks and trains and, of course, cars turned out to be a pretty great conceit. This franchise, even with the loss of Walker, could conceivably go on forever and if so, count on me being there opening day for Fast 12 in about ten years.

BELLFLOWER - This is a great movie that is not necessarily an action film, but it has action film DNA running through its blood. The first half is almost a romantic drama about two buddies who love their apocalypse-prepped Frankenstein monster of a car, Medusa, and the various weapons they've built to prepare themselves for a Mad Max-like apocalypse. A girl gets involved and the second half turns into a nightmare of violence, blood and sex that is admittedly pretty haunting.

SHOOTER - Bob Lee Swagger is one of my favorite literary characters and is played here by Mark Wahlberg who is much younger than the character in the book. He's an Army sniper on the wrong end of a conspiracy and left for dead in the Middle East but returns to live in solitude in the mountains with his dog but is summoned to hypothetically surmise how the vice president might be assassinated only to be set up for the crime and forced to go on the run. The sniper is always an interesting character, akin to the samurai or the lone gunman of a thousand spaghetti westerns. A fantastic long distance shootout atop a mountain is the crowning achievement of this movie. There's nothing better than a wronged man shooting his way out, doing what he was trained to do and having it come back on those very people who turned their back on him. I think I'm getting a boner.

13 ASSASSINS - This is a movie that people who I have never heard express interest in action movies say they loved. God knows I love it when someone puts together a team and a hell of a team get assembled here, in order to fight back against an evil relative of the current Shogun. They convert a small town into a warzone by using elaborate traps and setups designed to help them fight the expected 70 soldiers traveling with the evil lord but are beset upon by over 200 armed soldiers. The entire second half of the film is the ensuing battle, where just about all of the 213+ participants end up in piles of blood, mud, limbs and bodies. This is the dirty, gritty, more brutal younger brother of the House Of Blue Leaves fight from Kill Bill. This movie is amazing.

PACIFIC RIM - I think I loved this movie more than most people. There are giant robots fighting giant sea monsters who sprout wings and fly into space and then fall back to earth. That's amazing. Watching Charlie Hunnam and the girl from The Brothers Bloom pilot a giant American robot that can pick up a battleship and swing it at something is pretty fantastic to watch. I heard people's complaints and nitpicks about the film but then I listened to Guillermo Del Toro explain how every single thing in the film has a purpose and has roots in something he wanted to honor and discounted all the complaints wholesale. They don't matter. Why worry about petty little things and little plot holes when you are rooting for humanity to destroy a race of aliens living in another dimension inside the earth who are sending monsters to destroy all of humanity? My favorite scene is when the Australians are about to be killed by a Kaiju when, who's that behind it, backlit & inert and hanging from some helicopters, it's Gipsy Danger motherfucker, about to kick some ass. This one is pure spectacle, people. Just sit back and enjoy it.

OLDBOY - I haven't seen the Spike Lee remake yet but I intend to. However, I doubt it will surpass the pure, visceral, nightmare of a film that Park Chan Wook made. It really is a nightmare, being imprisoned for 15 years and then set loose on a desperate wild goose chase for answers full of dead bodies, incest, and live squids being eaten. Korea does this kind of extremely violent revenge fantasy very well, and this is the middle film of Wook's Revenge Trilogy along with Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance and Lady Vengeance. The single shot action sequence in the hallway with a hammer is still one of the best sequences I have ever seen.

THE RAID: REDEMPTION - I don't need to say much about this one, everyone worth their salt has seen it and loved it. Gareth Evans made a masterpiece of family loyalties and pure carnage. When all the bullets run out, it turns to some of the most brutal hand-to-hand combat I've seen until there are piles of bodies lining the hallways of a slumlords high-rise. The second one looks like it's going to be even more crazy.

IP MAN - Donnie Yen plays the titular Ip Man, who is touted as teaching his signature style of martial arts, Wing Chun, to the likes of Bruce Lee. In this movie, he is a wealthy martial arts teacher beloved by his community in China until the Japanese invade and turn his people into slaves and force them to fight to prove their superiority to the Chinese. Humble, yet superior, Ip Man refuses to fight at first but soon is compelled to fight and inspires and carries his people on his back and beats the shit out of a whole bunch of Japanese guys. I don't like martial arts movies as much as some others but this one is great and Donnie Yen is a pure star.

BAD BOYS II - This is the granddaddy of ridiculous, over the top, one-liner spouting buddy cop action movies. At one point, there is a car chase where they drive a hummer down a mountain taking out hundreds of shanty homes. There is a car chase on a freeway in Miami that would've snarled traffic for weeks were it real life. If you sit back and suspend your knowledge of reality, you can enjoy this because it is insane and wonderful. Buddy cop movies are great, and Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are two of the all-timers when it comes to sarcastic banter in the middle of carnage. I hate Michael Bay but this is his masterpiece and the man knows how to make an amazing looking movie. Car chases and shootouts in Miami were made to be filmed by Bay. And remember, "We ride together. We die together. Bad boys for life."

Honorable Mentions - The last 3 Bond movies, the 4 Bourne movies, the last 2 Mission: Impossible movies, Hot Fuzz, The Dark Knight, Crank, The Transporter, Sunshine, Lockout, Dredd, Death Race, Drive, Smokin' Aces, Taken.

*Part of the reason for thinking about action films right now is the fact that theaters for the next few months will be flooded with marquee Academy Award contending films and I will be needing to balance my film diet with some action and excitement, not just watch droll, depressing, "important," Oscar bait.

Underwhelmed & Not All That Worried About It

"Underwhelmed" is the word I used to describe how I felt about the Robert Redford, 2014 Academy Award Nominated* film All Is Lost. It concerned one of our most beloved actors, one of the icons of the medium, surely one of the faces on the Mount Rushmore of American actors* whose face is the only one that appears in the film, a face that carried with it the entirety of the struggle of life and death and the toll it takes on a man. Robert Redford is a titan in the world of cinema, everything he touches turns to gold, for the most part, and will certainly add to his legacy with this film and his performance in it. However, the first word that came to mind once the credits roll, once that hand plunges into the ocean to grab him, was "Finally." It wasn't the worst way to spend two hours, I've seen worse films, hell, I probably saw worse films that week, but my enjoyment did not live up to the hype and I was glad to be getting on with my day. There was something about a rich, old, white man that looks like the Sundance Kid enjoying his retirement on a boat that cost more than my parents house that just didn't resonate with me. A craggy, all-American man facing certain death and looking mortality in the eye and persevering and rising above the odds and all the other things a man can do and must do in a movie like this didn't equate to greatness for me. That being said, it was a perfectly fine movie. I admire its originality and its different focus but I feel that having a movie with no dialog and only one actor in the entire thing was a gamble. However, it looks like the gamble paid off for Redford, the director JC Chandor, and the studio because I'm positive that it will win numerous awards in the next few months.

What I'm saying is, for a film that will be a certain Oscar lock, as well as a crowd favorite was underwhelming, in my opinion. I've seen many more less memorable movies before and since but this one stuck with me. I've thought about it and tried to like it more than I initially did but I didn't budge. In the long run, who gives a shit if I liked this movie or not? The answer is, nobody. Including me. However, I enjoy this time of year because a lot of quality films are released in an attempt to qualify for Academy Awards and I will see or at least try to see most of them. I like being able to talk knowledgeably about all these films when the time comes around to talk about the Oscars but this years slate has been unimpressive so far. I usually hate those people that say the movies are shitty every year** and I'm pretty sure this year will redeem itself for me, but so far, the contenders aren't living up to their potential. Gravity was excellent, however, it's grandeur and attention to detail will be lost if I ever try to watch it again on a television. This was yet another case of a film with not much plot and not much dialog relying on the performance of one of the most beloved actors of our time talking to herself and cursing and doing a lot of face acting. A lot of floating around in both films. I had no interest in seeing The Butler. Blue Jasmine was pretty good, although not as funny, not as interesting, not as good as other recent Woody Allen films. Today I watched Dallas Buyers Club which featured an emaciated, gaunt, pale and scabby Matthew McConaughey in yet another Academy Award nominated* performance for Best Actor. In this case, I am underwhelmed for a different reason. DBC is the true story of someone facing certain death and looking mortality in the eye and persevering and rising above the odds...sound familiar? As with the handful of other films that have garnered early awards recognition, Fruitvale Station, The Butler, Rush, Captain Phillips, 12 Years A Slave, Lone Survivor to name a few, it is recognized that if you make a somber, important movie about a somber, important event and dramatize it to it's full Oscar potential, you're good. Unfortunately, Matthew McConaughey's best film this year was Mud which will probably get overlooked because it's a smaller film, a smaller story and more noticeably a fictional story. This falls in line with the other movies I was more excited about this year so far and to come, Her, American Hustle, and Nebraska to name a few.

But in the end, it doesn't matter. I love movies and even if there were 100 absolutely awful movies released this year, I will just come back next year to see what else is out there. I'm not all that worried about not liking what I'm supposed to like and appreciate because of its importance. For some reason, I have never been too fond of biographies, documentaries and films "based on a true story." I like fiction because you can come in as a fan completely unbiased, completely free of that anchor that "films based on a true story" always carry with them because naturally someone will have heard the "real story" on NPR or read an article about it online somewhere and go "Psshh, well you know, that's not what really happened" or the opposite, and watch Tom Hanks be heroic when in real life, his crew is suing him for ignoring orders and putting them in danger with the threat of pirates looming for them in the open seas. I have always enjoyed fiction more, possibly because my life is unexciting and I enjoy diving into a completely new, original world as opposed to being beat on the head and reminded of how horrible some event in history was and made to watch a two and a half hour dramatization of it. With Mud, which will probably end up being in my top ten of the year, I got a movie about friendship, hero worship, love and adventure all wrapped up in an awesome small genre film without being burdened about its real-world implications. No doubt, Ron Woodruff is a real life hero, his struggle inspired and helped a lot of people, but reading the story, you can't help but think how perfect it would be as a movie. Hopefully the engravers of the Oscar statues know how to spell "McConaughey".

*Projected (Stay tuned for the LDB,BL Oscar Predictions post, coming soon, I'm sure.)
**Last year, while watching the Oscars telecast, some guy sitting next to me at my friends house, right when Argo won for Best Picture, said, "That's so fucking stupid, that's the one that won?" I asked what he thought should've won and he said, "Well...I didn't see any of the other ones but they look better than Argo." I asked, "Did you see Argo?" He, of course, said "No." So that's why I rarely trust anybody's opinion on movies.

A Quick Appreciation Of Hal Hartley

There's a scene in Hal Hartley's 2006 film Fay Grim where Parker Posey is asked "Fay? Are you okay?" This is a question that can be asked in almost every one of Hartley's films. His movies are populated with people who are always in the midst of a crisis. He makes movies about men who are too smart, too complicated, too big for the world around them. They always seem to be waiting for the rest of the world to catch up to them. They're too intelligent by far, attractive, handy, self-reliant, dangerous, deadpan humorous and always preoccupied with the inner workings of things, always waxing philosophically about life, the universe and everything else. The men in his films always encounter strong, complex women who are a match for their curious, awkward, stilted attempts at figuring out life. The romance is always a little strange, quirky before the word meant what it does now, and doomed. As with most auteurs, one assumes that his characters are slightly removed versions of their creator, and not surprisingly, Hartley married an actress he worked with in his 1995 film Flirt.

Hartley's brilliance as a filmmaker lies in his writing. Since his first film in 1988, The Unbelievable Truth, his signature style has been evident, and still continues with his latest, 2012's Meanwhile. His characters speak in a poetic, sometimes jarring start-stop rhythm as if they're performing live for an audience. They speak fast, always bouncing back and forth off each other, theatrically enunciating and gesturing, almost as if allowing for a laugh track to come in or a live adjustment to be made. Talking is what most of Hartley's characters do best. In 1998's The Book Of Life, Jesus (Martin Donovan) and Mary Magdalen (PJ Harvey) ponder humanity and whether or not to trigger the apocalypse at the millenium and argue with Satan (Thomas Jay Ryan) about opening a program on an Apple laptop computer that will do so. In Flirt, 3 separate characters live their romantic lives in 3 different cities using the same dialogue. People seem to rarely be standing still in Hartley's movies, as if stopping would be akin to drowning. In fact, most of his characters are either running to or from something. A running theme in Hartley's work seems to be men who are perceived as dangerous always trying to escape or talk their way out of trouble. In the film No Such Thing, Sarah Polley is sent to Iceland to find a monster who killed her fiance. The monster, played by Robert John Burke, a frequent Hartley collaborator, is a sensitive, lonely, misunderstood creature who is at odds with the world because of his appearance and struggles to connect with Polley's character who tries to get him to come back to New York with her. In Simple Men, two brothers, played by Burke and Bill Sage, set off to find their fugitive father, a formerly famous mad genius. They argue, talk, philosophize, contemplate and argue some more. Continuing the theme of fugitive geniuses, 1997's Henry Fool, which is still considered Hartley's masterwork, concerns a mysterious stranger who arrives in the lives of the Grim family. Henry is a loud, garish, blustery writer who claims to have written the great novel of his time. He wreaks havoc on the Grim family, both inspiring and incriminating Simon, a bland garbageman who crafts a poem under the influence of Henry that makes him an instant star in the literary world, something that Fool could never achieve. Henry makes claims of having the secrets of the universe if people would just listen to him, for his genius and his bravado are always questioned. He eventually seduces and impregnates Simon's sister Fay, played by a fantastic Parker Posey, who would get her own story in 2006's Fay Grim but not before sleeping with their unstable mother in full view of Fay. In Fay Grim, it's many years later and Fay is being hounded by numerous state, federal and international agencies who want her help finding Henry's notebooks, which they believe hold state secrets. We learn more about the absent Henry, who since the end of Fool is on the run with the help of Simon, who is now in prison. Hartley writes fast and furious, his characters almost tripping over themselves in conversation, and Posey puts in the best performance of her career and that of anyone in Hartley's films in Fay Grim. She embodies everything that's great about Hartley and will soon be back to complete the family trilogy.

While the first focused on Henry and the second told Fay's story, the upcoming third film will feature the now 18 year old Ned, the son of Henry and Fay. It was just announced that Hartley is turning to Kickstarter, which he was able to successfully finance Meanwhile through to make Ned Rifle. Ned Rifle will tell the story of young Ned setting out on a journey to find his father and kill him for the trouble he has brought to the Grim family. It pretty much marks off everything on the Hal Hartley checklist and I for one can't wait. All the principles are on board and hopefully Hartley can find the amount he needs to get this going. The world created in these two films so far is fantastically woven, full of the extraordinarily mundane right next to the just plain extraordinary. Fay Grim is shot almost completely in what I learned is called Dutch angles, with the vast majority of the films scenes tilted precariously, so every shot looks as if it's on the verge of sliding away into something else if the characters don't finish their scenes quickly enough. It's sneakily tense and straddles the line between drama and tragicomedy. Henry Fool, made in the heyday of American indie film, looks slightly more aged but lacks none of the signature wit and storytelling that makes Hartley so brilliant. He birthed a world in Fool that will be continued in Ned Rifle and I can hardly wait. If you aren't familiar, I highly suggest delving into the world of Hartley. A double feature of Henry Fool and Fay Grim is as good a place to start as any.

Movie Review: Escape From Tomorrow

  

The easiest way to describe Escape From Tomorrow would be: David Lynch does Disney World. There is all manner of evil and debauchery here behind the curtains at the happiest place on earth, problems that manifest as visions (or are they?) as well as physical ailments on one man having a very bad day in his already shitty life. He is married to a woman ("She's pretty in an Emily Dickinson sort of way") who barely tolerates him and his beer belly & Hawaiian shirts. He's the kind of guy who gets bullied by his kids. He's on vacation with his family in Florida when he gets a call from someone telling him he has been fired from his job doing who knows what. He leaves that information for a later time, wanting to let his kids enjoy one last day of vacation before they head back to who knows where. His wife nags and cuckolds him, not even giving up a kiss while enjoying a leisurely ride through the world of Winnie The Pooh. On the monorail into the park, the first hint of lechery seeps out of Jim (Roy Abramsohn), whose face devolves into a slimy grin when he sees two young, flirty Parisian teenage girls who giggle and flirt their way into the debauched mind of the bored, middle-aged, horny Jim, whose wife and kids are sitting right next to him. The strange journey that he goes on while not-too-stealthily following the two girls around the park ("Daddy, why are we following those two girls?") only begins on that monorail and doesn't end until Jim really sees what goes into making the happiest place on earth and what happens when you don't heed the warnings and blindly try to enjoy yourself.

Did I mention that this is for all intents and purposes a comedy? Writer/director Randy Moore gets plenty of shots of all the things that you see in a place like Disney World (Disney is only uttered one time in the film and it gets bleeped out); sneezing, coughing, hacking old men, obese Southerners in scooters eating chicken, lots of vomiting, lines that go for hours only to finally arrive at the cars and have the ride shut down. However, in this context, they're humorous, and watching our Jim try to navigate the sea of people and fake happiness lets us enjoy it instead of be victim to it. Moore and a small crew shot the film over a series of trips to Disney World and Disneyland and shooting among the crowds with no interruption from cast members. Abramsohn, on a recent episode of Doug Loves Movies, noted that that method was possible because the grounds are so hectic and there are already so many people with cameras that one or two cameras filming a family didn't raise any eyebrows. He noted that while Disney never gave permission to shoot there, they are aware of the film and are not going to plan any kind of interference upon its release. If they were remotely concerned about Escape From Tomorrow, the film would have never seen the light of day.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of Tomorrow is the fun it has at the expense of Disney and its properties. Animatronic figures and beloved characters devolve into demonic creatures that start to unravel Jim's already fragile state of mind. A sultry woman sharing a bench in a playplace with Jim tells him over an oversized Emu drumstick as their kids play with each other that all the princesses are in fact high priced call girls and that Asian businessmen pay handsomely for private time with them. Jim witnesses this first hand and what starts out as a fun photo op for he and his son turns into a vulgar display that Jim can't believe what his eyes are seeing is actually happening. Another scene has fun showing us what really goes on inside that big Epcot globe ("It looks like a big testicle"). However, the more bizarre stuff is what really makes it interesting. A nurse clinging to the edge of her own fragile state of being, Jim's lust for the Parisians (as well as the effect they have on his young son) and their overt sexuality and infatuation with various phallic objects around the park, the threat of Cat Flu and a sinister plot involving naked women and the Siemens Corporation provide plenty to enjoy and ponder. The entire film is in black & white and it creates an eerie mood and even makes Disney janitors seem menacing. Having all the color and cheer taken out of the park makes it easier to see the weird and the creepy that is lurking in the shadows. At least for Jim. Everyone else seemed to be having a good time, and why wouldn't they, who doesn't love Disney World? Seeing Disney push a man to the brink of sanity is worth the price of admission alone. If David Lynch or David Cronenberg did tackle a project like this, it would be better and would bring the weirdness and quality to the next level but for now, we can enjoy this unique film and be glad that Disney is letting us.

The Great Un-Watched Movies Of My Life

Much to the chagrin of friends & family, there are a whole host of classic films I have never seen one minute of. Actually, that may not be true. Some of these movies loom so large in the collective consciousness that I know more about them than films I love that I have seen multiple times. The reasons for my not having seen some of these are varied. My dad loved movies and I can recall watching a ton of cool movies as a child but they don't seem to be any of the same movies that EVERYBODY my age saw when they were younger. I didn't develop a taste for movies and a desire to seek them out until, at the very least, 12th grade. I remember telling a girl I was seeing Senior year asking me what my favorite movie was and I said School Of Rock, simply because it was the last movie I had seen and show me a 17 year old boy who doesn't love Jack Black and hard rock and I'll show you a liar. She said Fight Club, which I hadn't seen but HAD heard of. Of course, I now love the films of David Fincher and I really wish I had a more quality answer to that question at the time (even though I don't have an answer still to this very day) because movies are so important to me now and I would have benefited from a better knowledge of cinema at an earlier age. The movies I loved as a young man were movies where the hero shot a lot of people and said cool one-liners. My tastes haven't evolved much since then but I still apparently missed out on some of the standard-bearers of the medium that even people who have bad taste in movies have seen and loved (My roommate was watching a Sarah Jessica Parker movie yesterday ["No, it really is good!"] so I have no qualms about calling people out on their bad taste). In my defense, I have seen a million fantastic movies that I will defend to the ends of the earth but usually don't have to because nobody I know has seen them. And it's not like I'm watching Tyler Perry's Madea movies all day, I know quality movies, I just have different tastes. Please share any thoughts, comments, concerns, etc. below and tell me how you can't believe that I haven't seen your favorite movie.

THE PRINCESS BRIDE
This one just seems annoying. I know what it's about, I know how charming everyone thinks it is but I have actively decided to not watch it and my life is perfectly fine.

INDIANA JONES (all of them)
My reasons for never having seen this are not so clear, as I recall the VHS tapes of at least one of these films somewhere in my house as a child, so I'll blame my parents for not popping this in at some point. Now, it just looks corny. A guy in khaki running around some caves chasing after Nazis, is that the gist of it? Maybe when I have kids.

STAR WARS (all of them)
Continuing with the corny Harrison Ford movies of yore, Star Wars was a favorite in the Einboden household, my brother was and still is a huge fan and continues to chide me for not having seen it. So big brother, why didn't you sit me down at the age of 12 and show me them? As some of you may know, I recently legitimately tried to watch them, I had all three of the originals lined up next to the tv but I didn't even make it off of Tatooine before I turned it off and switched to ESPN. Like I said, seeing them at the age of 27 for the first time is not the best way to see them. In all honesty, the first Star Wars film I will see will be Episode VII in Summer of 2015. Because of how much I love JJ Abrams. Are you mad yet?

JOHN HUGHES MOVIES (all of them)
High school was bad enough, and these movies do not seem charming or fun. When I was in detention with the likes of the jock, the cool kid, the nerd, the whoever else, it didn't turn out well. We didn't become friends or unite against the principal or whatever happens. There's just something about The Breakfast Club and Sixteen Candles and movies about high school in the eighties that don't click for me.

JAWS
I want to see this but I have a pretty large fear of being in a boat on a body of water, not to mention giant sharks. My question is, why didn't people just stay on land? Ironically, I have seen Sharknado.

HALLOWEEN
I have seen the Rob Zombie version so I'm pretty much good, right?

ROCKY
Not sure why I haven't seen Rocky, I'm sure it's full of boxing excitement and triumphant step-running but I'd rather watch Sylvester Stallone shoot people than punch them.

E.T. THE EXTRA TERRESTRIAL
No thanks.

PIXAR FILMS (all of them)
I saw Brave recently for some reason, and by all accounts Up is a great film, regardless of animation or not, but there is a certain Pixar formula that doesn't appeal to me. It's all glossy, heartstring-tugging cuteness propaganda (eh, just go with it) that has a reputation that permeates everything they make. Again, maybe when I have kids.

TITANIC
This is the classic never having seen it, but have basically seen all of it. There's an old lady, the boat sinks, "I'm the king of the world!", a boatload (no pun intended. Actually, yes, pun intended) of money. I don't need to see this, and I certainly wasn't rushing out to see the re-release in 3D recently.

Different groups of people will of course have different criteria for what is considered great or must-see. These films listed above are mostly pop culture icons from eras before mine. I was talking with a friend who noted that he has seen all the old pop-culturally significant movies and shows but struggles to name contemporary well known actors, movies and shows. It's all subjective, it's all relative to our specific upbringing, tastes, interests, etc. etc. I was perusing AFI's Ten Top Ten lists and I have seen almost all of the Western, Mystery, Gangster and Sci-Fi films but almost none of the Epic, Fantasy or Romantic Comedies and that pretty much sums up my interests.

In Response to the Fall Movie Preview

First things first, the teaser I saw of Ender's Game looks incredible and was all the more intriguing because I had just read the book. Thankfully I am an adult and can separate my love of the literary version from the film version of a story. Just kidding, that's not a thing! Still though, it's gonna have spaceships and Orson Scott Card's story is marvelous and should be a fitting allegory against interventionism. Looking at you America.

As far as films go I can get behind some Indie movies and maybe a blockbuster or two every once in a while. I'm not the die hard Sci-Fi fan I am being made out to be.* For example, PACIFIC RIM sucked. I am disappointed that such a creative mind as Guillermo Del Toro made a movie about giant robots versus extra-dimensional monsters and had both look so boring. Why didn't the robots fly? Why do the monsters from another plane of existence or far away planet or whatever look so much like Westernized** monsters?

That being said Iron Man 3 was awesome because I love buddy cop movies and I give props to a big budget hero movie for going in that direction. Despite the obvious KISS KISS BANG BANG narrative device. Ben Kingsley's Mandarin was entertaining and Guy Pearce is a personal favorite of mine (I recommend THE PROPOSITION. MEMENTO is alright, but gimmicky.) Was Pearce supposed to be Fin Fang Foom? Anyone else with me on that one? He did breathe fire and had a dragon tattoo on his back.

My favorite movies of the summer were THE WAY, WAY BACK(Jim Rash and Nat Faxon wrote this, see below) and THE SPECTACULAR NOW. This is because I love the coming of age tale, and these two pulled off that common trope in a  unique and fully entertaining way. Shailene Woodley was great of course, as she was in THE DESCENDANTS(Alexander Payne, Jim Rash and Nat Faxon also wrote this) and is in the now-filming THE FAULT IN OUR STARS. TFIOS is about kids with cancer who hate being treated special because they have cancer and then go to great lengths to take advantage of the situation through cancer perks. It has a great cast so maybe they'll carry that story a little bit.

To conclude here's a list of movies that will be boring***, but make a ton of money. Coming soon to a theater near you:

THOR: EVEN THORIER

THE HUNGER GAMES: WE KNOW IT SHOULD JUST BE ONE MOVIE BUT WE LOVE MONEY

OLD MAN AND THE SEA starring Robert Redford

THE BLOND DIES IN THE END

THE HOBBIT: DEUS EX BARDICA

Okay I'm done.

*This is a lie.
**Oh yeah, a capital "W." I went there.
***"Boring" here is used in the Millenial sense where it means "Maybe it's good, but I'm not interested at this moment and thus my opinion on it is extremely negative."

The Like Dark Brown, But Lighter Fall Movie Preview

The summer movie season is finally coming to a close and naturally, the only people who care are the people who call it the "Summer Movie Season" and people who work at movie theaters. The audiences are different, the movies are different, the quality is different and the overall feel of Hollywood starts to evolve. The summer was chock full of tentpoles wrapped in movie stars and money but lacking in quality but the fall usually brings the focus back to quality and the film festival favorites start to gain some attention. The best big-budget films of the summer, or at least my favorites, IRON MAN 3 and PACIFIC RIM among others, were epic in scope and budget but retained their auteur sensibilities. Indie movies in the summer usually tend to get lost in the shuffle but there were a few choice titles, THE KINGS OF SUMMER, MUD, and THE WAY, WAY BACK to name a couple. But the sweater weather months are ripe with good movies just waiting to be plucked so without further ado, the Like Dark Brown, But Lighter Fall Movie Preview.

(NOTE: The views expressed herein do not necessarily represent the feelings of everyone associated with LDB,BL. There is only like one sci-fi movie and only one mentioned with a dragon in it.)

THE AWARDS CONTENDERS

Even though the time frame for potentially Oscar nominated films is the whole year, most of the films that eventually win are released in the fall and winter. I guess the Academy has a short memory. Some early, early contenders were released this summer, including Cate Blanchet in BLUE JASMINE, Brie Larson in SHORT TERM 12, Forest Whitaker in THE BUTLER and Michael B. Jordan in FRUITVALE STATION. The next few months will see a probable contender in 12 YEARS A SLAVE, the Steve McQueen (Shame, Hunger) film with Chiwetel Ejiofor about a free black man who is kidnapped and sold into slavery before the Civil War. Another likely nomination will come for Matthew McConaughey in DALLAS BUYERS CLUB about a man's struggle with the law and the pharmaceutical companies after he is diagnosed with HIV. And this has Jared Leto as a a fellow HIV positive patient/prostitute for all those people who have been waiting for him to make a comeback. Anyone? Nobody? Okay. Tom Hanks stars in CAPTAIN PHILIPS as the captain of a Maersk shipping boat that is overtaken by Somali pirates. If this doesn't scream Oscar contention, I don't know what will. ENOUGH SAID is the James Gandolfini/Julia Louis-Dreyfus film from Nicole Holofcener (Please Give, Friends With Money) which will play the dead actor card and get lots of goodwill. Harsh but probably true, nobody ever says anything bad about somebody who dies. But Holofcener makes good movies about real people, simple as that and this should be good. NEBRASKA is about an aging drunk on a road trip to collect prize money with Bruce Dern and directed by Alexander Payne (Sideways, Election). Looks great, and it's in black & white. Always a plus. The other ubiquitous old white guy Oscar contender is the Robert Redford in a boat movie ALL IS LOST which will give old people boners for weeks at the LC5. I hear Sandra Bullock is great in GRAVITY, the Alfonso Cuaron (Y Tu Mama Tambien, Children Of Men) film about two astronauts adrift after an accident. Ridley Scott's new film is THE COUNSELOR, written by the reclusive author Cormac McCarthy (!) about a lawyer who gets in over his head with drug dealers. All star cast, great writer, usually always good director, should be pretty great. The Ron Howard film RUSH stars Chris Hemsworth (!) as a sexy Indy Car driver in a fierce rivalry with another driver. It also stars Olivia Wilde, so yeah, I'll be there. Most of the heavy favorites come out later in the year so there will obviously be more to contend with later on.

THE POPCORN MOVIES

You always have to wonder why big budget franchise movies released in the fall weren't released in the summer. One figures that with less competition in the fall, there will be a better box office but when a movie like THOR: THE DARK WORLD is released in November instead of June, for some reason it automatically seems inferior. That could be flawed logic but I can't help but believe that T:TDW will not be great. Probably the biggest release of anything since the summer will be THE HUNGER GAMES: CATCHING FIRE which sees our hero Katniss Everdeen again returning to the titular games as punishment from the evil President Snow and dealing with the unwanted (or are they?) advances from her best friend and her games partner. This movie will basically be a license to print money for the studio. THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG will be another three hours of people looking for a dragon. You're already either in or out on that one. For those of us who have a secret fetish of seeing cute girls covered in blood (this is one of those views from the disclaimer above that is the sole opinion of the author and nobody else), we have the CARRIE remake with Chloe Grace Moretz. The star-studded adaptation of ENDERS GAME looks glossy and confusing and has the kid from Hugo as a gifted child going to alien war school. I think my colleague is psyched for that one. Leonardo DiCaprio looks like he is actually having fun in THE WOLF OF WALL STREET, his umpteenth collaboration with Martin Scorsese (you've heard of him) and continues the amazing comeback of McConaughey, who has had a fantastic couple of years. ALL THE BOYS LOVE MANDY LANE is not only my favorite movie title of the year, but it stars Mrs. Johnny Depp herself, Amber Heard and was directed (way back in 2007) by Jonathan Levine (The Wackness, 50/50). The specifics aren't important (virginal high school girl is terrorized by somebody) but could be worth seeing. The too long absent Scarlett Johansson stars with Joseph Gordon-Levitt in DON JON about a couple of guidos deciding if they should fall in love with a real person or keep watching their porn and rom-coms. Johansson will also be in HER, the new Spike Jonze movie, about a man (Joaquin Phoenix) who falls in love with his robotic futuristic operating system, and it with him, as well as UNDER THE SKIN later in the year. The most fun film of the season will probably be MACHETE KILLS in which we find out that "Machete don't tweet" and that women really like Machete, both things we kind of already knew. The other badass of the season award contenders are Jason Statham in HOMEFRONT (written by Sylvester Stallone) about a guy who kicks all the asses of all the people who are messing with him and his daughter in a small town. It kinda reminds me of Straw Dogs but kinda not. Most importantly, James Franco is the villain, a meth dealer named Gator. Wait, why isn't this up there in the Oscar contenders section? And Josh Brolin stars in the reluctantly anticipated OLDBOY from Spike Lee which hopefully employs some of the brutality and strangeness of the Korean original. Lets just hope he eats a live squid to show his commitment to the role. 

ODDS AND ENDS

There is a movie that was all the hubbub at Cannes called BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR, a 3 hour, NC-17 rated French film about a teenage girl who begins a very intense and relationship with Lea Seydoux. The hubbub comes from the supposed full length, incredibly graphic lesbian sex scenes throughout the film along with stories about how the director was basically a slave driver, asking for more than 100 takes sometimes. For the first time in a long while, a new Coen brothers film is on its way and I'm not excited for it. INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS, about a young singer-songwriter stars the couple who were Ryan Gosling's neighbors in Drive but just hasn't got me excited like their films usually do. In the ridiculous action film category we have ESCAPE PLAN with Arnold and Stallone as two prisoners who have to break out of the most secure prison on Earth. Spoiler Alert: Stallone built it! A very intriguing adaptation of ROMEO & JULIET from Julian Fellowes stars Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit, Ender's Game) and will not use Shakespeare's traditional dialogue. Traditionalists are already in a tizzy, I'm sure. A film called C.O.G. based on a David Sedaris story follows a cocky young man who travels to Oregon to work on a farm and experiences a completely different kind of life. Naomi Watts, fresh off the scandalous ADORE stars as the late Princess Diana in, wait for it, DIANA. I hear this is terrible, an abomination actually, but who knows. The complete opposite of an abomination is anything Idris Elba is in and the biopic about Nelson Mandela MANDELA: LONG WALK TO FREEDOM is sure to be lauded. Another Jack Kerouac story, this one being much lower profile than On The Road will be out soon, BIG SUR, starring a guy I've never heard of as Jack Duluoz. On a related note, KILL YOUR DARLINGS features Daniel Radcliffe among others as the various beat characters we have come to know. It has an excellent cast, just like On The Road did but these stories about the Beat Generation never seem to translate well to the big screen. There are a ton of good movies to look forward to in the coming months and they will only get better as awards season creeps ever closer. Lets cross our fingers for a bunch of good movies not mentioned above that will sneak up and pleasantly surprise us. Of course, I have not seen any of the films mentioned above and only recommend or take note of them based on trailers and reviews from people who actually get paid and are good at writing about movies.