Dispatches from the Flying M

The Dark Knight

For most of my life, movies based on comic books have failed to live up to my hopes and wishes for them.  Although there have been good moments (and my love for the Adam West Batman movie of the 60s remains unabashed despite everything I'll say here) the problem as I saw it was that filmmakers refused to take superheroes seriously.  In comics themselves, superheroes could take themselves seriously, but when it came to film the filmmakers always had to insert a wink and a smile, as if to say, "Hey, we know guys can't really fly and do all this stuff, we're just having fun with it."

The Spider-Man franchise began to turn that around, but didn't do the job entirely.  This summer, though, we've finally reached the point where a superhero movie can be played as absolutely straight as any other action movie.  I didn't see the Hulk movie, because the texture of the CGI Hulk bugged me too much, but with Iron Man and now The Dark Knight, we've had two powerful films populated by real actors playing real people, films with gripping suspense and brilliant action sequences.  Heath Ledger's Joker looked a little lifeless to me in the early trailers I saw, but after watching the film last night, I take it all back.  It was an incredible performance, bringing Joker to a far different kind of life of grotesque sadness than Cesar Romero or Jack Nicholson ever did.  Watching it was bittersweet, of course, because we know Ledger will never reprise that role or any other, but as an actor it's an amazing legacy to leave behind.  The other roles were well cast, too (best stunt casting choice--the actor who played Batmanuel in TV's live action The Tick as Gotham's mayor).

Oddly enough, now that filmmakers are playing superheroes straight, they're setting box office records.  Does that mean the audience for these movies has matured at just this moment?  Or does it mean that I was right all along, and it just took Hollywood decades to catch up to what I wanted all along?  Not for me to say...

My one complaint with the film (besides sound mixing that was terrible, but which I blame on the theater, not Warner Bros.) was the Batman voice, as opposed to Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne voice.  It's way overdone and over the top, kind of a Clint Eastwood with laryngitis effect.  When an audience member cracks up every time the Dark Knight speaks, that's a problem.  Next time, guys, tone it down!

During the movie it started to rain, and apparently came down in buckets.  To get home, we had to drive through faster, deeper water than we have ever had to before--the kind of water that passenger cars can't navigate, and that remind us why, despite the price of gas, we continue to drive high-clearance 4WD vehicles.  Our dogs were outside, and we had just gone to town for a movie (under relatively clear skies, when we left home), not an overnight stay.  Had the water  been much deeper or faster, or had we not been able to gauge about how deep it was based on our knowledge of the road (the only road option) between town and home, we might have had to turn around. But we didn't, even though it meant sometimes driving blindly, water from under us splashing over the windshield so we couldn't see a thing.  It was a pretty hairy experience getting back, but the dogs were glad we did.  This morning our rain gauge showed that we got an inch and a quarter here last night, in just a few hours, and probably more closer to town.

Get Smart

The original Get Smart took the James Bond-initiated spy craze to its most absurd lengths, and from 1965 to 1970 the Mel Brook/Buck Henry creation was one of the funniest shows on TV, with a terrific cast headed, of course, by Don Adams and the beautiful Barbara Feldon.

We caught an afternoon showing of the new Get Smart movie yesterday, and loved it.  The usual problem with movies made from old TV shows is that the people making those movies try to "update" them for modern audiences by adding "irony"--and as a result, instead of capturing the essence that made the original show popular, they make a mess that mocks the original property instead of paying tribute to it.  I'm thinking here of movies like The Avengers, The Wild Wild West, I Spy, etc.  Anyone would be far better off just watching DVDs of the original TV series instead of trying to sit through those execrable film versions.

But Get Smart gets it.  Brooks and Henry are credited as "consultants," which is probably a good sign, because as two of the funniest writers ever to work on TV or film, they know how to move from one medium to the other.  Steve Carrell is almost as good as Don Adams at some things, better than Adams at others.  Anne Hathaway is brilliant, and if she's not quite as gorgeous as Barbara Feldon, she's close, especially when she wears a Feldon wig and a form-fitting metallic dress.  About 15 seconds after she came on the screen, I had a crush on her, and it only got worse through the rest of the movie.

The action is good, with stunts and effects work on a par with any other contemporary action flick.  The suspense is not quite nail-biting, but it works.  And most of the comedy is laugh-out-loud funny, which is really the point.  One doesn't have to be a fan of the original series to enjoy the movie, but if you are, rest assured that there's a shoe phone, a cone of silence, some "Would you believe" and "Missed it by that much" and "The old XXX trick" gags.

The first season of the original series will be out on DVD August 5.  That one will be a keeper.  But for once, modern moviemaking has done an excellent job of bringing a classic TV show to new life on the big screen.

Iron Man

Last night I saw Iron Man, in a packed theater in Sierra Vista (where, take that, city dwellers--tickets are still $6.50!).  I'm not certain yet, but I think it might have been the best superhero movie I've ever seen (not my favorite, which will always be the Adam West Batman movie, but the best).  Downey is definitely the best actor I've seen in a superhero role--he made Tony Stark his own, kept the character interesting and entertaining, and remained true to the Tony from the comics. The action sequences were good--a little jump-cutty, as they almost always are these days, but not so much that you couldn't usually tell what was happening.  The flight sequences were terrific, and convincing.  There was plenty of set-up  for a sequel but it felt natural, not forced, and the movie was good enough that a sequel would be welcome, for a change.

One of the coolest things about it is that Marvel seems to be creating a unified theory of Marvel movies--tying the movies together into a cohesive universe, much as they've done in the comics, instead of letting each movie universe exist independently of the others.  Some, of course, they can leave in the box, as far as I'm concerned--Ghost Rider, anyone?  Daredevil?  But if they keep making them this well, and create a filmic continuity, that'll be a real accomplishment, and we'll be able to celebrate Marvel's decision to launch its own film wing instead of relying on outside studios.

Oh--and if you go, don't leave before the credits are completely finished, because you'll kick yourself if you do and then find out what you missed.

Horton

One of the first books I ever owned was Dr. Seuss's Happy Birthday to You!  And one of my most prized possessions now is a thank you note he sent me when I was a bookstore manager in La Jolla, where he lived (and where his wife Audrey could often be seen around town, driving the Cadillac with the "Grinch" license plate).  I only met him once, at an ABA convention far from our mutual hometown, but I've read most of his books (some of them many, many times) and consider him one of the all-time greats.

Here's the note--the Cat is printed on the paper but the word balloon is in his own hand, as is the Ted Geisel signature. It hangs on my office wall, just to the right of my desk.

So it was with great interest that I went to see Horton Hears a Who last night. Suffered through it, actually, not because the movie was bad but because the theater was so cold that I literally wore my gloves through the entire movie.

The movie itself was mostly entertaining. Horton is voiced by Jim Carrey, doing a bit that once was the exclusive province of Robin Williams--if there wasn't a lot of improvisation in it, it was cleverly scripted to sound like it.  There were voices and shticks galore, even at one point a Henry Kissinger gag that would no doubt fly over the heads of most of the intended audience.  Steve Carrell, Will Arnett and Carol Burnett also did terrific voice work.

I like CGI animation most when there are no people involved--they still can't get people quite right, and it calls attention to the process, rather than inviting me into the world.  There was a trailer for the upcoming Disney/Pixar Wall*e, for instance, which looked great as long as it was focused on robots, and then artificial when people showed up.

For Dr. Seuss, CGI works beautifully (and there were some bits of 2-D animation worked in, in pure Seussian style, as well as a hilarious anime sequence).  I don't think I've ever seen the world of Dr. Seuss presented as purely as it was here, realistic in its depiction of such an imaginatively unrealistic world.  But there were no details that I could see that were left out--no bits of the real world working there way into the Seuss world.

So if you're a Seuss fan or you have a kid or can borrow one, go see it.  But depending on where you see it, you might want to wear thermal underwear...

Side note--we saw yet another Iron Man trailer.  Obviously it's not a call that can be made without seeing the movie itself, but visually, and from what little can be seen in the trailers, it looks like Iron Man will be a serious contender for the best superhero movie ever made (with the exception, of course, of the 1960s Adam West Batman).  We saw some of the armor in person at Comic-Con last summer, and it looked great, and on screen it all looks just amazing.

The Writers' Strike is (almost) Over

The WGA has essentially agreed to a compromise with the AMPTP.  There'll be a final ratifying vote on Monday, but it appears likely to be in favor of the compromise, and work will begin just in time to prevent that big 1 Biggest Loser Vs. 100 American Gladiators crossover.  It looks like the writers will be back to work on Wednesday, with some bad blood between them and the producers, but hopefully nothing that will interfere with progress on American films and TV shows.

For an insider's perspective, check out my friend Joe Harris's blog.

Paul Newman

When I think about the greatness of America, I think about people who take their early blessings and use them in some transcendent way to excel and ultimately to improve the lives of others.  That has been the American ideal pretty much from the beginning, and it's still a powerful force today, as exemplified by the billions of dollars Bill and Melinda Gates and Warren Buffett are using in the service of those less fortunate.

Paul Newman is another perfect example of this.  He was blessed with that facial structure and those incredible blue eyes.  He came from a comfortable background, went to college, served in the Navy, and used his looks and his talent to find work in the theatre, and then movies.  He could easily have made a fine living as a matinee idol, but that wasn't the kind of acting he wanted to do. 

Now it's hard to look at his career and choose just a few high points, a handful of excellent performances, because there have been so many. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.  The Long, Hot Summer.  Exodus.  The Hustler.  Hud.  Torn Curtain.   Harper.  Hombre.  Cool Hand  Luke.  Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.  Sometimes a Great Notion.   The Sting.  Absence of Malice.  The Verdict.   The Color of Money.   The Hudsucker Proxy.  Nobody's Fool.  Road to Perdition.  Empire Falls.  He was even good in Cars.

He never played it safe, never took the easy road.

Throughout that amazing career, he was married to Joanne Woodward--an accomplishment in itself, in divorce-happy show biz--and drove race cars professionally, and started the Hole in the Wall Camps for seriously ill children (13,000 of them a year, around the world) and the PEN/Newman's Own First Amendment Award to recognize those who protect the First Amendment, as it applies to the written word (its list of recipients includes a bookseller and librarians), and was 19th on Richard Nixon's enemies list for supporting Gene McCarthy in 1968.  Yesterday it was announced that he's donating $10 million to Kenyon College, his alma mater, for a scholarship fund.

As if that weren't enough, he started Newman's Own. Salad dressing, pasta sauce, popcorn, lemonade, etc., all of it well made, all of it dedicated to raising money for good causes.  More than $220 million so far.

At 82, he wants to retire from acting.  There aren't many actors who have racked up his record of brilliant performances, and if he feels like he's given it his best, that's fine with me.  I'll miss seeing new Paul Newman roles, but he has done plenty for American film.

More than that, he turned his success into an ongoing business that helps improve people's lives.   He's given  more than enough.  I think we should all raise whichever Newman's Own product we like most and extend a cheerful toast in his direction, and a hearty thank you for all he's done.

Al and Marty

So Al Gore didn't really win an Oscar last night, because Davis Guggenheim directed An Inconvenient Truth.  But the film was Gore.  He was onscreen, or his voice was heard, virtually every minute of the film.  It was based on his slide show.  And they--slide show and film--are brilliant ways of making the important point.  We are headed into a global crisis, but we can still turn it around if we act soon.

And Al was on stage more than just about anyone but Ellen Degeneres.  When he wasn't, as when Melissa Etheridge accepted her Oscar for best song, he was still seen in reaction shots.

Nice to see the elected president getting some attention.

And finally, Martin Scorcese, one of the best working film directors for the last 30-some years, picked up his statue. It's about damn time. 

Congratulations to Al and Marty, and of course everyone else who was recognized, nominated, and awarded.  Especially Ennio Morricone.  Again, about damn time.

Happy Feet, Unhappy Cons

I haven't seen Happy Feet yet, although being a long-time fan of penguins, I hope to sometime this month.  Now I'm even more anxious to see it, because the extreme right wingers--their favored policies having proven morally bankrupt, their grand experiment with promoting democracy by killing people having failed--have now taken to attacking it with a fervor previously reserved for targets like Al Gore and Bill Clinton.

Michael Medved, for instance, rants about it at length, saying: "This may be the darkest, most disturbing feature length animated film ever offered by a major studio. At least 80% of the film’s running time shows its penguin characters in pain or danger. Scenes of terrifying leopard seals and killer whales trying to devour the protagonist and his friends are so intense as to guarantee nightmares; the PG rating is a joke since the film is wildly inappropriate for young viewers under seven (and their parents)."

I guess he's never seen Snow White, for instance.  Or Lady and the Tramp.  Or virtually any other movie, animated or otherwise, except maybe for select Strawberry Shortcake films.  Stories are about conflict, Michael.

He goes on:  "The propagandistic theme suggests that the biggest menace for the lovable penguins is the human race --- stealing the fish on which the birds depend, or ruining planet earth through pollution and global warming."

Well... maybe it does.  Is it wrong?  Later in that paragraph he loses track of grammar and punctuation altogether, suggesting that he's so incensed by this film that he can't even think straight.  Or maybe he's just a bad writer.

The only argument I have to copy here in its entirety is his fourth one, which is just... well, you'll see:  "As in so many other recent films, there’s a subtext that appears to plead for endorsement of gay identity. Mumbles (the voice of Elijah Wood) displeases his parents and the leaders of his community because he’s born different, and makes an impassioned plea that he can’t possibly change – and they should accept him as he is."

Oh no!  Not a movie that suggests we should accept those who are different from us!  Didn't we have enough of that in To Kill a Mockingbird and Charly and Radio and probably 60-70% of all movies ever made?  The story of the outsider trying to fit in while remaining true to him or herself is one of the oldest stories there is.  Suddenly every movie that promotes tolerance is really pushing the dreaded "gay agenda?"  And how does it damage Michael Medved even if it is?

Medved's not alone in his scorn, of course.  The conservative punditry is nothing if not rigorously faithful to their talking points.  CNN's Glenn Beck called the movie an ""animated version of An Inconvenient Truth."

On the same day, Fox's Neil Cavuto referred to Happy Feet, creatively enough, as an "animated An Inconvenient Truth."

MediaMatters.org has both transcripts here.

As long as we're on talking points, the long-awaited Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group is due to be made public tomorrow, offering some suggestions on how to cope with the disaster Bush & Co. have made in Iraq (which conservative talking points are now blaming on the American public's impatience with the effort and not the administration's incompetence and dishonesty).

Bush keeps saying that he won't change his mind, that an exit is not the goal and that a stable Iraq is the only goal that matters.  TV talking heads keep reminding us that a few days before Donald Rumsfeld's resignation was announced, Bush claimed that Rummy would serve as SecDef until the end of the Bush administration.  In plain English, what they're reminding us of is that Bush is a liar who will say whatever is expedient at any given time.  With the exception of Keith Olbermann, though, TV newspeople aren't willing to come right out and say that.

So I will.  It's a point we would all do well not to forget.  You can't take Bush's word for anything.

And he probably hates penguins.

Voodoo Moon

When you blog about horror a lot, it attracts the attention of those who promote and distribute horror movies.  Three or four times a year, I am asked if I would be interested in viewing a horror DVD, in the hopes that I'll like it enough to blog about it.  Usually I decline the offer, because I have too much stuff to watch as it is and if I was interested in the movie I would probably already have taken steps to get my hands on it.  Besides, most of them sound terrible.

Not long ago, I got another such request.  This one was about a movie called Voodoo Moon, written, produced, directed and edited by Kevin VanHook, and starring Eric Mabius and Charisma Carpenter.

Full disclosure: I know someone who is friends with Kevin VanHook.  And Charisma Carpenter is an alum of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, so I've written about her many times, in the nonfiction books BtVS: The Watcher's Guide, Vol. 2, and The Angel Casefiles, Vol. 1, as well as having written many novels featuring her character, Cordelia Chase (like the Cordelia-centric haunted house novel Angel: Haunted).  So even though I didn't get to be on set the day Nancy and Maryelizabeth interviewed Charisma while she was wearing her metal bikini (from the Pylea episodes of Angel--and if they think I've forgiven and moved on, they're wrong), she's someone I've spent a lot of time with in a slightly removed sense.  Besides, she's a San Diego girl made good.

Given those things, I agreed to take a look.  And since we can talk about horror movies as well as books here in October Country, here's what I thought.

First, I was very pleased to find that the movie isn't a modern low-budget horror movie--in the sense that many modern low-budget horror movies are full of driving hard rock music and loud metallic sounds and quick cuts and dark shots, so that it's often hard to know just what is supposed to be going on.  Maybe that's the point--there really isn't much going on, so if that can be disguised with weird black and white shots and smash cuts and loud music, the viewer will still be scared (although, quite possibly, scared of the movie, not by the movie).

In this instance, though, VanHook is trying to make an old-fashioned horror movie, by which I gather he means one that makes a certain amount of narrative sense, well-lit and photographed.  He pulls that off here.  The movie is gorgeous, especially by low budget standards.  Shots are well thought out, well planned, well executed.  The lighting is clear and moody, stylish and frequently artistic.

And some of the special effects shots are outstanding.  In one, Daniel, the piece's villain (played by Rik Young} leaps from a tree branch and, halfway to the ground, transforms into multiple crows, who all fly away.  It's a clever bit and it really works thanks to some good CGI and green screen by Chadd B. Cole and his team.

Another favorite was when a truck goes off the road and into a lake, and then down, down, toward the small town that was drowned by the lake, years before.  Moments like these make one hope that next time out, VanHook will have a bigger budget to play with.  He obviously has a great visual imagination and a willingness to try new things.

The cast is, for the most part, pretty good.  A standout is John Amos, a veteran actor who plays an outlaw biker ally of Cole (Eric Mabius).  Charisma doesn't get to do as much as we know she can--she's not bad, just under-used.  Mabius and Rik Young are fine as the foes--Young (as Daniel), a kind of devil who has been tormenting Cole for years, during which time Cole has been learning all he can about faith and the occult, in order to finally defeat Daniel.  Now the final confrontation is upon us, and Cole has been trying to gather his allies--except Daniel, knowing it's coming, has been taking them out one by one.  The survivors meet up at a B&B owned by Dee Wallace (Cujo)--that credit being especially appropriate given that VanHook is going for a very Stephen King vibe here, particularly influenced by The Stand.  The weaker cast members tend to speak very slowly, making scenes drag on longer than they should and stalling the pace of the film.  VanHook should have been kicking them in the pants or making them watch some Gilmore Girls episodes, to pick things up.

Purely by coincidence, I happened to watch this on Friday night--the night of this year's Harvest Moon.  It's a coincidence because the final confrontation between Cole and Daniel takes place beneath the Harvest Moon.  Maybe if that had been the name of the movie, I wouldn't have been taken by surprise, but since it's called Voodoo Moon (a meaningless phrase that doesn't enter into the story at all--bad title) I got a little frisson when Cole revealed that Daniel, for ritualistic purposes, was holding off until the Harvest Moon.

Some of the supernatural bits, like that throwaway reference, are well done.  Cole doesn't just use Christianity against Daniel--he combines bits and pieces from different faiths and traditions.  Every religion has some things that work, he figures, so if you take those things and put them together with those from other traditions you can end up with a very potent weapon against evil.  There's also a great bit with Jeffrey Combs (Re-Animator) going up against a different incarnation of Daniel, who can empty the bullets from a revolver, levitate them, and fire them by flicking them with his fingers.

Although there are many suspenseful moments and an intriguing overall situation, the film's greatest flaw, ultimately, is that it doesn't succeed in being truly scary.  Given the supernatural aspects, it could have left a lingering sense of terror.  It didn't, which is unfortunate.  But it demonstrates the potential in VanHook, and with any luck we'll see more and scarier horror films from him in the years to come. 

The DVD, which went on sale Oct. 3, includes a making-of documentary, a special effects documentary, deleted scenes, a photo gallery, and on DVD-ROM, the screenplay.  It's a nice package and one horror fans will be pleased to own--especially if VanHook lives up to his potential down the road.

Adventures Into Digital Comics

A film with which I had a very peripheral involvement--basically, I was interviewed (not on camera) as background for it--will premiere next month at the Icon Film Festival in Tel Aviv.  Adventures Into Digital Comics has been nominated for a Best Documentary award at the festival, and the producer, Robert Nichols, will attend the festival (as will Neil Gaiman, who will do a press conference about it with Nichols).  The film screens Oct. 9th and Oct. 13th at the festival.

To me, comics are a sensory experience that have almost as much to do with holding them in my hands (or in the case of newspaper comics, spreading them out in front of me) as with the content.  I almost never look at comics on-screen, and don't foresee that changing any time soon.  Which is what I told the interviewer.  Probably not the kind of answer they were looking for, but they've been very gracious anyway, keeping me informed throughout production and feeling like a part of the process all the way.

It'll go on to other festivals, and be available on DVD as well.  If you're interested in comics, I hope you'll check it out.  The film's website also collects all the interviews of people who may not wind up in the final cut, a huge variety of comics professionals, and you should definitely have a look at those as well.

This film, by the way, is responsible for my virtually information-less page on IMDB.  Since I didn't get screen credits on the WildC.A.T.s animated series or the Gen13 animated feature (which was never released domestically), both of which I was more involved in that AIDC, they don't get mentioned on IMDB.