Tag: Hollywood

enema at the gates (and why I go to bat for Dances With Wolves)

Most nights I can’t sleep. Most nights I can’t sleep because I can’t stop thinking about a film. Usually, it’s not a great film that’s keeping me up. It’s a film that could have been great, but everyone fucked up.

One such movie is Enemy at the Gates (2001).

It’s a shame. This movie could have been dope. So what happened?

Now forgive me, it’s been a few weeks since I’ve watched it so I won’t go into plot details. But the screenwriters shouldn’t have committed to telling a love story AND a game of cat and mouse.

Individually these stories could have been interesting on their own. The Battle of Stalingrad was such a test of the human spirit that it provides an interesting backdrop to any story.

But Enemy at the Gates falls victim to a very serious problem…a problem that plagued so, so many movies of the era: it tries to have it both ways. It wants to be a gritty war film AND appeal to 90s sentimentality.

“But it’s based on a real historical account,” you might say.

And lo and behold, this is largely true. Of course, it takes a few creative liberties. I doubt Joseph Fiennes’ character was real. Same with Ron Perlman’s…a character that I hated so much because it seems to have been included for expositional purposes only. Because the film takes such liberties…it is a movie after all, and not a documentary…then pick a lane.

If I were making this movie, I would have focused exclusively on the chase between Ed Harris and Jude Law. But there’s no sense in crying over spilled milk.

Enemy at the Gates appears to have been one of the last of the so-called “90s, mediocre, sentimental historical dramas.” I don’t hate all of these movies. In fact, I go to bat for perhaps the greatest example of this genre: Dances With Wolves.

“Can you believe that Kevin Costner beat Martin Scorsese at the Oscars?” everyone says to me.

No. That’s not surprising at all. Have you seen the movie? I will pound the table every chance I get: Kevin Costner DESERVED his Oscar.

Quote me on that.

Honestly, as much as it pains me to say this, if there’s a flaw with the movie, it’s the screenplay. That’s a big one. This might not have been obvious to audiences then, but it’s clear 32 years later. BUT, it appears to me that Costner was involved in the project from the moment of its inception, so the script was suited to his strengths.

Could anyone else have made Dances With Wolves?

No.

And here’s where Costner excels: every character…EVERY last character…has their moment, however brief, to shine. When Stone Calf is killed, you feel it. Even when LT. Elgin is killed, one of the “villains”, there’s a shred of sympathy for him. This helps you become immersed in this lovely, bloody world.

Costner approaches the subject matter, much like his character, in a child-like, gentle manner. Not a detail is missed. It felt genuine, and not at all like it was trying “to have it both ways”.

It worked. It worked so well that nobody was able to emulate that style. They tried. But where every mediocre 90s historical drama failed, only Kevin Costner succeeded.

(Yes, I’m including Braveheart)

(Not sure about Saving Private Ryan)

legit ?

You know how there were a bunch of mediocre period films from the 80s and 90s?

You know, like Gandhi, Out of Africa, Titanic, Rob Roy, The Ghost and the Darkness, The Man in the Iron Mask, The 13th Warrior, Enemy at the Gates? Etc etc…

Has there ever been a movie that started off vanilla and then did a complete 180?

Like I have an idea of a period piece, during the Napoleonic Wars or Mongol Invasions or some shit, where the typical tropes are established: a virtuous hero, a mustache-twirling villain, a love interest, and a community standing up to the forces of evil, etc. The film will open with some boring quote on the nature of war: “In war, there are no heroes”, or whatever. Even the leading man will be the safest, whitest, most bland actor you can think of…one of the “Chris’s” probably (Chris Pratt, Chris Evans, Chris Pine). The entire first half will be nothing but tropes and cliches…even the cinematography and music are flat and unoriginal, to the point where the audience will stop paying attention…as our hero prepares his community for battle against some dumb villain.

Then the second half opens and all fucking hell breaks loose: the “hero” and his army, as one thing leads to another, just commits straight-up genocide in the most offensive and disgusting way possible. And the worst part: the “hero” doesn’t reflect on his dishonorable victory. To him, it’s all glory. The film is told from his perspective as he slaughters men, women, children, and takes slaves for good measure…all told through the lens of bland 90s filmmaking.

Then the lame quote from the beginning… “In war, there are no heroes” …reappears at the end, just so you can show the audience that you tried to warn them. And that’s the moral of the film: everyone is capable of evil so pay attention, we’re all blinded by ideology, blah blah blah

Is anyone else seeing what I’m seeing here?

Sure there are films that deliberately fuck with the audience, but is there one out there that fucks with the audience based on expectation (like making the audience believe they’re watching standard Hollywood fare, but reveal that they’re actually watching torture porn)?

never, never, never say never again

Have I already written about Never Say Never Again?

Fuck it, I’ll do it again.

Never Say Never Again is the best “James Bond” film of the 80s

I will die on that hill.

I love that cold open: 007 choking out some dude to the tune of a cheesy love song. Classic. 

Also, there are some killer lines:

Bond: “Free radicals, sir?”

M: “Yes, they’re toxins that destroy the body and brain, caused by eating too much red meat and white bread. Too many dry martinis.”

Bond: “Then I shall cut out the white bread sir.”

OR

Moneypenny: “Have you got an assignment James?”

Bond: “Yes Moneypenny. I’m to eliminate all free radicals.”

Moneypenny: “Do be careful!”

Plus, who doesn’t love watching a 53 year old, toupee’d Sean Connery get ogled by a sea of 20 year old women?

And Barbara Carerra Fatima Blush? 

You could say that she’s an “attractive woman” and made me “sexually aroused”. But I’ve never had an erection before.

You have. But that’s because you’re fucked up.

star trek v: the final assault

This was the first Star Trek movie I saw, so maybe I have a soft spot for it.

For the record, I don’t think Bill Shatner is the problem here. I’ll defend that man till death. The problem with this film is the poor special effects (mixed in with what I presume to be budgetary constraints) and some of the strange science that flies in the face of the grounded science of Star Trek.

I don’t think the script is the problem either. Sure there were some strange decisions. The romance between Scotty and Uhura was odd, especially since it was never hinted before (or after). Trek fans hate the idea of Sybok, Spock’s half-brother…which was also never mentioned before in Trek canon… but Sybok is actually an interesting character. However, the heart of Star Trek, particularly with the original cast, was the trifecta of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, and this film contains some of the best scenes of them together.

The “antagonist”, the aforementioned Sybok, was originally intended to be played by Sean Connery. If that had managed to work out, I’m sure this film would be looked at more favorably. That being said, Laurence Luckinbill does a stellar job making this religious charlatan both sympathetic and charismatic, enough for you to believe that he could rip apart the friendship between the trifecta. I’d say he’s the second best villain in Trek film (behind, of course, Ricardo Montalban’s Khan).

But I applaud Shatner’s ambition here. Harve Bennet, then the head of Star Trek films, hated the idea of “the Enterprise searching for God, but finds the devil instead,” which may be a controversial concept within Star Trek, but it is an interesting idea in-itself.

Did it work?

Not entirely.

Could it have worked?

Yes. Which is why it’s a shame that Shatner never got a chance to do a proper Director’s Cut, especially given advancements in CGI technology.

They gave Robert Wise that opportunity with Star Trek: The Motion Picture, and its reputation has greatly improved.

But there is an interesting fan theory floating around the internet: the main plot of the film is Kirk’s dream while camping with Spock and McCoy in Yosemite. You watch the movie, and you can definitely draw that conclusion.

That’s how I watch it. And it becomes the greatest Star Trek movie ever made.

Maybe the internet isn’t such a bad place after all.

facebook (update)

(Update: I’m 119 years old and I don’t understand technology. It doesn’t help that I lost the use of my left side brain at the Battle of Verdun. So forget all of this. It never happened. But I’m leaving this up because some of it is funny. I dunno. Then again I’ve been off my anticonvulsant meds the last few days)

So I was watching The Beastmaster when the Tanya Roberts bathing scene came on. I was about to “master” another “beast” if you know what I mean 😉😉😉 (Rip Torn gets me hot), but then I thought “I should create a Facebook page for my website!”

First, I tried setting up a business page, but Facebook forbids that with WordPress sites or some crap (or I have to buy some add-on, but I ain’t paying for that shit) so I set up a group page instead.

Here’s the link:

(not available)

“Why Facebook?” a question you’re probably not asking.

Because it’s the only social media site that doesn’t make me want to hire a hit man to set me on fire.

So come join! If you don’t then you probably have a tiny penis anyway. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I’m just saying that you’re less of a man if you don’t join my group.

So if you want to regain your self-respect, you better join the Internet Ruined Everything group and meet other weirdos just like YOU.

the cold civil war

The above interview is probably one of the the better, honest discussions I’ve seen in awhile regarding the nature of current politics.

It echoes my “everything is ideology” ranting, but Jonathon Gottschall takes it a step further: our ideology-making at the macro/political level amounts to nothing more than immersive storytelling.

Ideology, even ideological storytelling, can sometimes unite societies, but persistent vilification of fellow citizens will ultimately tear it down. With the internet, the “gatekeepers” of knowledge are gone, so it’s up to us to be skeptical…and humble…about the narratives we tell ourselves.

That’s really the only option we have.

So now comes the hard part of apologizing to those we vilified, and then the even harder part of forgiving those that vilified us.

I recommend watching the entire interview. If you have a right-wing or conservative perspective, you might think they’re dunking on you at the beginning, but they eventually turn that skepticism on their conversation and themselves.

penisball

So I was tossing and turning over night, agonizing over a specific question: is pop culture dead?

Of course, “pop culture” can never really “die” so long as there’s entertainment, fashion, etc. But has it fundamentally shifted in a way that requires new methods of critique?

Guys like Theodore Adorno were critiquing “pop culture” way back in the 1940s, claiming things like movies, music, etc. were massed produced commodities and were therefore not genuine (or whatever). But maybe the pandemic and the prolific use of the internet has changed the game.

Obviously these things have changed the way we interact with pop culture, but the question I’m concerned with is: “has the pandemic, and specifically the internet, changed the very nature of pop culture itself.”

(This is all from my dementia-driven perspective, btw)

Anyways, what made me agonize over this question is that everything feels a little passé. When people talk about reading tweets, I’m thinking “you’re still using Twitter?”. Even at 106 years old, I feel like I’m more “in the know” than most 20 year olds. It’s not because I’m “cooler” than them, it’s because they don’t give a shit. So how can “pop culture” be pop culture if it’s not popular?

Please help me. I haven’t slept in 27 days.