until they bring back the alien probe to meet Kirk, Spock and McCoy, keep up the great work! 🙂

Aging Voyagers set to burst solar-system bubble

So had an opportunity to crank through many more movies in the past few weeks, given two flights to Europe and an overnight stay in the Roma airport on the way home.

First up, was the recent Muppets movie. Having been a huge fan of the original 70s show, and the first original movie (none of the rest, however), I was looking forward to this. And despite negative nellyism from some of the original Hensonites, i thought it was pretty good, one of the highlights being the ‘muppet or a man’ song from FOTC’s Bret McKenzie, love that song!

Next up: Haywire, starring Gina Carano, a Muy Thai-trained kickboxer and not a traditional actor. Basically a spy thriller with multiple twists, and she’s essentially a female Jason Bourne – and it totally works. Great support roles from Michael Fassbender, Antonio Banderas, Michael Douglas (when was the last time I saw him in a movie?), Bill Paxton and Ewan McGregor. This movie kicks a** – literally. Watched it a second time on the way home! The IMDB rating is way off, this is more like a 7.5 or 8, definitely.

Next up: Rumble in the Bronx. This is one of the movies that made Jackie Chan big in the states, and as usual with his later movies, it’s a mix of crazy action, martial arts, crazy stunts and silliness at times. One of the ongoing gags is that the movie is set in ‘the Bronx’ yet was filmed in Vancouver, BC – so there are mountain ranges(?) in the backdrop at infrequent intervals, which of course makes no sense, and near the ending ‘hovercraft chase’ they simply leave them in there for about the last half hour. Oh well. As per usual, Jackie plays a sometimes-clumsy badass who protects those who need it and tries to right wrongs along the way. He’s not a cop in this one, which is good, but goes for broke in more than one action sequence, which is why we love him.  What’s also a bit funny is the overuse of old 80s and even 70s cars (one of the cop surveillance vehicles is a classic 70s VW Bus – go figure – I’m sure it helped the budget aspect.

Next up, Beat Takeshi’s  The Blind Swordsman: Zatoichi.  This is a modern interpretation of a long, long running Japanese samurai series, done by one of Japan’s most famous actors (Takeshi Kitano).  It tells the story of a blind masseur who journeys from town to town earning his meager living, but reveals himself to be a brilliant sword-fighting avenger when rival gangs take over the town and exploit/extort the townspeople.  So I saw this movie several years ago and wanted to rewatch it, to compare to all the recent martial arts/etc. movies I’ve been watching lately.  Have to say – still excellent, very well made and not afraid to insert some laughs along the way (not unlike that of Stephen Chow‘s Kung Fu Hustle, which came out the next year in 2004) with great fight scenes but just beautiful filmmaking generally.

Finally, since I didn’t finish watching Bill Maher‘s Religulous yet – I’ll finish with the light sci-fi flick Time After Time, where H.G. Wells (Malcolm McDowell) travels into the future (1979 San Francisco) to stop Jack the Ripper (the always dastardly David Warner).  I never saw this movie back when it came out, although I always meant to.  While it is a fairly predictable ‘fish out of water’ story as to Wells – David Warner’s Jack the Ripper is likely just as menacing as a real one would be, save that he’s dressed in 70’s leisure suits, which definitely makes his daytime appearance less intimidating 30+ years later, to say the least.  Still, there are some twists and turns to the plot, and it’s nice to see Malcolm McDowell be the nice guy for once (he’s usually the bastard villain like Warner).  Certainly far better than say, The Black Hole of the same era….!

Once I had watched all these, it was nearly time to board the plane and head back to Seattle…..a rivederci, Roma airport…..

candybowl

A very interesting look at the music industry and artist success/failure in decades past vs. now. Here’s the article that spawned this graphic, and the article on BoingBoing where I saw this debate in the first place….

candybowl

Well, another great year of the NW Pinball and Arcade Show this past weekend. You can see a walk-through and some other videos on YT below. Hope to see you next year!

candybowl

So to me, Prometheus was another of my highly-anticipated movies this summer.  It has seemingly everything going for it – Ridley Scott as director/creative genius; solid cast (Noomi Rapace, Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce, Idris Elba); plot concepts originally from the ‘Alien‘ movies (well the first two – good, not the later two – lame – nor the even lamer Alien vs. Predator series);  some interesting pre-movie hype (see previous post on Guy Pearce’ fake TED speech); – but the result ended up a bit mixed for me.  SPOILERS BELOW!!!!

First, the good stuff: 

The movie LOOKS AMAZING.  While I’m sure they reaped the rewards of capitalizing on some of Avatar‘s special effects innovations – I personally think this movie simply blows Avatar out of the water visually – despite having a much ‘grayer’ visual look and an obviously much darker theme.  Scott has taken the earlier ‘Alien’ SFX, including the H.R. Giger artwork, and gone to a whole new level.  The ships, action sequences on the planet, the set(s) used for the ship interiors – all of it is just amazing and very realistic-looking.  Another major influence on the visuals has to be Chris Foss – their ship looks like it flew right out of one of CF’s paintings, and the overall effect of ‘tiny man, huge alien spacecraft/planet bases’ is a regular Foss artistic theme.

I also liked the cast.  I think the actors chosen were well-suited and believeable in their roles, despite in many cases not having enough to do or say (see below).  Noomi Rapace looks like a ‘tough Audrey Tatou‘ to me, and Charlize Theron seemed like she was shaping up to be the ‘Ripley character’ – she has nearly the same voice and bad-ass-type bearing as Sigourney Weaver in the first two Alien movies – but her role ends up pretty different than Ripley.  Michael Fassbender is the humanoid robot, kind of a ‘twisted Commander Data’ if you will – because it’s completely obvious from the first scene he’s up to something, and Fassbender has given him a strong dose of soft-spoken malevolence to boot (HAL 9000, anyone?).

The not-so-good:

The Plot – while not near as thin as say, TRON:Legacy was – there are some gaping plot holes here that just don’t make sense or seem inexplicable given the considerable talent and effort that went into this movie.

Example one – what IS Charlize Theron’s real role here – is it as enabler, spoiler or indifferent observer of Guy Pearce’s (Weyland Corp.) dream to discover these aliens?  Is she only in it for a paycheck?  She seems at first to be the person who’s going to end up running the show but that doesn’t happen, and despite several scenes where she’s obviously ‘in charge’ – there are many other critical scenes where she’s nowhere to be found, nor in charge?

Example two – where was the rest of the crew – especially David, who put it in her, when Noomi Rapace is busy using the med-unit to forcibly remove the alien implanted in her body?  Was everyone else taking a nap, or?

Example three – when the ship’s xenobiologist reaches out to actually TOUCH the cobra-like alien swimming around in puddles in the ancient alien ship on the planet – it attacks him.  What did he THINK was going to happen?  This was simply ridiculous to me – of COURSE it was going to attack him and even if it didn’t, no biologist EVER does something SO STUPID without adequate preparations and care?  Especially not one on ANOTHER PLANET.

Example four – I find it hard to believe generally that a private corporation would be the ONLY entity making such an obviously momentous and historic journey to potentially discover Man’s possible ancestors?  No govt’ involvement at all?  This is where movies like Contact and 2001/2010 have simply done a better job on this point, I think.  It seems almost impossible for such discoveries to remain secret if under control by one govt., let alone a private corporation?  Heck, there were actual Marines on the second Alien ship – but here?  Hmmm……not even private mercenaries?

Example five – Guy Pearce’ sudden appearance ON THE SHIP in the latter 3rd of the movie – hel-lo?  And all those ‘extra crew’ that seemingly appeared out of nowhere with him?  Come ON, guys – did everyone cryo-sleep in a secret footlocker for the first half of the movie?

Another aspect was simply ‘not enough explanation’ – the whole opening sequence is a complete mystery without a bit more info?  There was some interesting speculation in the IMDB faq on the movie, but it’s unconfirmed.  Maybe on the DVD later this year….

I guess in summary, not unlike TRON:Legacy of a couple years ago, this movie fulfills in many ways, but in some key ways, is simply flawed, given its implied mission as a ‘big thoughts’ kind of movie – If I compare it to say, The Avengers – I have to say that in some ways, The Avengers is more entertaining, but it’s also a silly superhero movie, so you don’t take it seriously in the first place.  It is probably harder to reach for bigger meaning in a movie – but when you do, you have to deliver, or it’s going to be more obvious you haven’t.

candybowl

One of the great ones has passed on.  Hopefully a stack of right-wing literature (maybe even with the authors) can be burned at 451 degrees in his honor……:)

R.I.P.

Seattle Times

GeekWire

BoingBoing

– candybowl

At least a year or more ago, I read Ira Levin’s The Boys from Brazil.  This is an interesting thriller with a somewhat ridiculous plot – Joseph Mengele and other escaped Nazis living in South America carry out a sinister experiment to clone a bunch of ‘baby Hitlers’ based on saved cells he had obtained from Hitler during the war.  Then when old enough, the babies are farmed out to foster parents in the USA and Europe with similar background demographics to that of Hitler’s original parents, and monitored to attempt to duplicate AH’s upbringing as much as possible to bring about the desired result (Hitler rises again to power and brings back Nazi control, of the world this time around).

A movie was made of this book in 1978, starring Gregory Peck, Lawrence Olivier and James Mason.  While naturally the movie cuts some of the details a bit short, it’s an entertaining view.  Other actors include a VERY young Steve Gutenberg as a cub reporter monitoring the Nazis in Paraguay; the familiar Walter Gotell (played the Russian spy boss in several Roger Moore James Bond films); Denholm Elliott (may remember him as Dan Ackyroyd’s butler in Trading Places, among his many other films, including at least a couple of the Indiana Jones movies).

IMHO Gregory Peck is the main reason to watch this movie.  Not only is he playing against type (here he’s the E-VIL arch villain, normally he’s the good guy everyone roots for) he goes for broke in playing the character, probably not unlike the real Mengele (who apparently was still alive in South America when this movie premiered in the theaters).  There are a number of scenes where he all but loses it (or DOES lose it) and goes apes*** – great fun and way over the top.

I thought Laurence Olivier was good too, but while he’s the good guy nazi-hunter, his character is a bit whiny and somewhat annoying – maybe that’s the way the real Simon Wiesenthal was?  Not sure.

It was also fairly surreal to see Bruno Ganz in this movie as a minor character in this movie – given that much more recently he played Hitler himself in Downfall, and of course starred in all those ridiculous ‘Hitler meme’ videos on YouTube as a result.

It’s always interesting to watch ‘alternative history’ movies generally (unless they really suck acting-wise or just present way too lame a plot premise) – this one doesn’t disappoint.

Other views:

Rotten Tomatoes

FeoAmante

candybowl

So now with YouTube, we usually have the ability to watch (even more) TV than we otherwise would, because all those crazy people out there with too much time on their hands spend uncounted hours uploading classic (and lame, to be sure) TV shows up there.  I’d sure hate to see YT’s power bill to keep all that crap online 24-7.

Anyway, for whatever reason I was thinking about The Six Million Dollar Man a few days ago and did some searches, specifically for an episode where he meets Bigfoot.  Bigfoot turns out to be a sentry for space aliens who live in a cave in the California mountains and study the human race from this hidden vantage point.  Naturally they want to examine Steve Austin – so Bigfoot (and some weird spinning tunnel) captures him for their nefarious needs.

Who is The Six Million Dollar Man, you say?  Well, he’s Steve Austin, an astronaut who crashed very badly in the California (Nevada?) desert during a test flight and had to be ‘rebuilt’ as a cyborg (new eye, arm and legs) to survive – this is all explained in the show opening sequence.  Naturally Steve then becomes a government agent for an elusive agency (OSI) and has weekly adventures on TV as a result.  Kind of like an early 70s Knight Rider without the computerized Trans Am, KITT, and without the mulletized Hasselhoff in a leather jacket (this being the early 70s, Steve was more a leisure suit kinda guy).

So back to Bigfoot.  The nice thing about YouTube (and DVDs for that matter) is that it lets you zip past boring plot points and/or stupid stuff.  Since T.S.M.D.M. were hour-long shows, and this was a two-parter, it meant not having to watch two whole hours of it – meaning not having to watch Steve Austin’s lame battle against Bigfoot (Bigfoot was played by Andre the Giant – cool!) and, all the footage of SA running around the woods in slow motion (a regular staple of this series to give the impression of great speed) and using his other bionic abilities (eyesight, powerful arm) to the requisite repeated sound effects for each – if you’ve ever watched this show, you know what i’m talking about.

This show was out in the early ’70s, so the special effects are ok, but obviously way dated given their age.  Lee Majors was the breakout star here (he had been in some TV before but this was a major role and god knows they marketed the HELL out of it then – you could buy nearly any action figure, toy, lunchbox, you name it).  What’s also weird is that given the time period – the hairdos and clothing makes everyone look so much older, even given that Lee Majors was only early 30s at best?  Kind of like the original Captain Kirk looking a lot older than his recent movie replacement did?  Or that i’m now older than both so I don’t know what the (blank) I’m talking about? 🙂

Anyway, it was weird watching that show again, probably first time i’ve seen any of the episodes *since* the early 70s, as unlike say, Star Trek – I don’t remember that show really going into syndication?  There were weird miscues in the sound effects – Steve Austin throws a large tree branch at Bigfoot during one of their ‘melee’ scenes – and it makes a sound like an incoming air missile?  Huh?

Also, part of the plot involved some missing scientists who Bigfoot/the aliens ultimately kidnapped – those scientists were researching a big earthquake fault line, which in part two they set off a NUKE to keep it from causing an even bigger natural quake that would have killed thousands along the California coast otherwise.  Really, a nuke?  Funny how everyone is only a mile or two away (likely less) according to the plot, and they show no mushroom cloud, the nukes are only buried a few feet deep?  Come on, people – even a 10 year old knows what a nuclear explosion looks like (and that you have to be a bit farther away from it)?

Finally, there’s a token phone call scene with The Bionic Woman (Jamie Sommers, played by Lindsay Wagner) where she wants to come help find Steve Austin (cooling his bionic butt in the aliens’ cave at the time with Stefanie Powers, who plays one of the aliens) but their boss tells her to just stay at home (like a good bionic girl – it’s not stated but that’s sure what he was telling her).  So the US Govt. spends all this money to build TWO bionic people and then tells one to stay at home and mind her knitting?  Really?  I guess the episode budget was already too high (given Andre the Giant, aliens and ‘special’ effects) to afford more than one scene from Lindsay Wagner – why even bother?

Apparently there is a second two-part Bigfoot episode from the next season also on YT – don’t hold your breath for me to watch it, though.  Eventually i’ll watch the better one from The Bionic Woman where she battles a HAL-like killer computer; or when she takes on the ‘fem-bots’ made by some mad scientist (arguably the second coming of Westworld).  Far more interesting.

Ah, tv……

candybowl

Where a horde of space aliens, steel balls, and sometimes unshowered nerds descend upon the Seattle Center for gaming craziness….woo hoo!

The 2012 Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show

candybowl

yeah – get your a** on those Underoo’s! 🙂

candybowl