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Apr. 1 (Tu): The Video View: April 1, 2008 April 1, 2008 (Tuesday):
The Video View: April 1, 2008 (No Foolin')
Sorry for the late, short post today. I'm pressed for time...
It's a slim week for movies on DVD. The big release is Alvin and the Chipmunks, which was a surprise hit when it reached theaters last year. By mixing the nostalgia factor with its inherent family friendliness, this film was able to overcome its narrative shortcomings and lure in huge groups of film goers, reinforcing the importance of G and soft PG rated films to the industry. Alvin is being released both in standard DVD format and Blu-Ray. Its shelf counterpart this week is Sweeney Todd, Tim Burton's bloody barber movie, which attracted fans of the stage show and not many others. There's a two-disc special edition and a one-disc movie-only version, but nothing in high definition. Three noteworthy Blu-Ray catalog titles are being released: Unbreakable, Hidalgo, and Coyote Ugly. There's also the direct-to-DVD Cutting Edge 3, which shamelessly panders to the surprisingly large fan base of the original Cutting Edge by using the title. None of the actors from the original make an appearance, although the storyline is pretty much a retelling. The only tenuous plot link to The Cutting Edge is that the coach of the skaters in film #3 is the daughter of the skaters from film #1. She was also the main character in film #2. Got it? I can't recommend this film to anyone, not even Cutting Edge die-hards. (Confession: I have seen the original more than a half-dozen times and am sorry to say I forced myself to watch this so-called sequel. It can't appear on my Bottom 10 list because it wasn't released into theaters.)
Lots of TV-related stuff this week. Two old Doctor Who stories, "The Time Warrior" (featuring the Third Doctor, Jon Pertwee) and "Timelash" (with the Sixth Doctor, Colin Baker), make their DVD debuts. Joining them are Murder She Wrote Season 8 (scary to realize the series lasted so long), Law & Order: Special Victims Unit Season 6, Martin Season 4, That '70s Show Season 8, Becker Season 1, and John from Cincinnati Season 1. Also, for those of you who love old-time television and dream of the days when everything was in black-and-white, there's the long-awaited Father Knows Best. Yes, Father Knows Best has beaten Steve Austin to North American DVD.
There is one box set worth singling out: the Bette Davis Collection #3. It includes six Davis titles: The Old Maid, All This, and Heaven Too, The Great Lie, In This Our Life, Watch on the Rhine, and Deception. At a discounted price of $45, that works out to $7.50 per movie - just about the same price one would pay for a single admission ticket to a new movie. Not bad, which is more than can be said about this week's overall roster of home video titles.
My Life as a Geek (Part Five)
And so we come to the end of "My Life as a Geek"... (Figuratively speaking, that is.)
Actually, most of the autobiographical details have already been filled in. Now it's time for a broader discussion about nerds and geeks in general and how Hollywood perceives them. This is where I get a little more serious because, as a group, we have not been well treated.
Few would argue with the statement that geeks are treated better today than they have been in the past. There's a reason for this: computers. For as long as there have been computers, there have been geeks. ENIAC was invented by geeks. The early home P.C. market was aimed squarely at geeks. High school computer classes were attended by geeks. I've had a computer of sorts since I was about 15 years old. I started with a TI-99 4/A and eventually graduated to an XT clone and so forth. I learned most of the important languages of the time: Basic, Fortran, Pascal, Assembly, etc. (Somehow I missed Cobol.) Back in those days, computers were for geeks. Why would anyone else have interest?
Today, of course, that has all changed. Now, everyone uses computers and they have infiltrated all areas of daily life. The P.C. is no longer just a nice little toy in the corner. Geeks remain closely wedded to computers. They control the industry and that gives them a lot of power. Bill Gates (love him or hate him) is a geek. He's also one of the most influential men in the world. So it makes sense to be nice to the geeks. Imagine what a conglomeration of pissed-off nerds could do if they put their minds to it. Most geeks aren't malicious by nature. In fact, most of them are timid. But society has decided that it's a good idea to "play nice." So the label of "geek" has transformed from a term of derision to a mere classification. There's no more stigma attached to it than there is to "jock" or "stoner."
In general, Hollywood has not treated geeks with warmth or respect over the years. People suppose that since I'm a self-professed geek, my favorite movie must be about geeks or at least "geek-friendly." I was recently asked in a public forum if I could quote a few lines from my favorite movie. They were aware of my geek credentials and were therefore expecting something along the lines of "May the Force be with you" or "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few... or the one." What they got was: "I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country... We're not holding anything. Let the Hun do that. We are advancing constantly and we're not interested in holding onto anything except the enemy. We're going to hold onto him by the nose and we're going to kick him in the ass. We're going to kick the hell out of him all the time and we're going to go through him like crap through a goose!"
The typical movie geek is a blind stereotype with no room for variability. The geek is typically intended to get laughs, not to be a well-rounded individual. Revenge of the Nerds is among the worst offenders when it comes to pigeonholing and denigration. The geeks populating this film are outright caricatures with all of their social inadequacies accentuated for supposed "comic" effect. (If you get the idea I don't like the movie, you are correct.) We end up rooting not so much for them as against the assorted bullies and jerks they come up against. It's productions like this that give nerds a bad name. Sadly, many movies featuring nerds/geeks aren't much kinder. Hollywood likes to view the nerd as an offbeat pet whose antics can be used to generate a few cheap laughs.
Another area where the movies invariably get things wrong is in presenting geek romance. Generally speaking, in real life, like attracts like. Or, to put it another way, geek boys are attracted to geek girls. There's a reason for that: relationships involve more than sex and a geek couple will have common interests and plenty of things to talk about outside of the bedroom. That's not to say that geeks aren't attracted to cheerleaders and jock girls but the attraction is typically fleeting. The average geek might be interested in seeing the busty blond he passes on campus naked but it's unlikely he would be interested in dating her. It may sound like a cliché but there is a strong intellectual element to a geek relationship. Hollywood discounts this and figures that all geeks yearn for cheerleaders. This makes the average movie geek seem rather pathetic. And it really doesn't matter who the geek eventually ends up with - the fact that he's pursuing the gorgeous blond is what's embarrassing. (So writes the geek who spent half his college years in a relationship with a busty blond. Oh well.)
Fortunately, there are geek movies that get it right, or right enough to be worth mentioning. To keep this column to a reasonable length, I'm going to limit my list to four titles, all of which I can unreservedly recommend. None are "classics" in the traditional sense of the word but all treat the geek as more than a comic foil. An attempt is made in each case to make the character a real person rather than just another "movie nerd." Feel free to add to them as you see fit. There are others out there.
In fourth place is Amy Heckerling's Loser, which puts Jason Biggs in the title role. Admittedly, the "loser" aspect of the character is overplayed in the early going but the film gets two important things right: the nerd is allowed to change and develop in a credible way and the object of his affection a reasonable choice. Mena Suvari's Dora is cute but not drop-dead gorgeous. She's exactly the kind of girl a geek guy might fall for. The plausibility of their relationship and the likeability of Biggs' character makes this a solid choice for a geek date movie.
In third place is last year's Oscar nominated Juno. Face it - Juno is a geek. Part of the reason why this may not be obvious is because she's not a cartoon movie geek. She's smart, articulate, and isn't costumed to look like the drabbest girl in school. Granted, the average geek girl doesn't get pregnant in high school, but there wouldn't be much of a movie if that didn't happen. And, as with Loser, the boyfriend/girlfriend relationship is credible. Juno doesn't pine over some unattainable hunk; she wants the dweeb she's with.
In the runner-up position, Amy Heckerling has her second entry on the list (saying something about her insight into geekdom). This time, she's partnered with Cameron Crowe. Fast Times at Ridgemont High provides multiple crisscrossing storylines, one of which features the longing of geek Mark Ratner for the seemingly demure Stacy Hamilton. (Emphasis on the word seemingly.) Jennifer Jason Leigh's good looks are toned down enough to make this couple believable, and Stacy is portrayed as the kind of girl someone like Mark could fall for in high school. The movie treats both of these characters with sympathy and allows them to find a little happiness together – at least as much happiness as can be obtained in high school.
Finally, my pick for the best motion picture depiction of a geek goes to Lucas. (What, you thought it was going to be Napoleon Dynamite?) Before the drugs and the "two Coreys" phase of his existence, Corey Haim showed some talent by playing that rarest of rarities: a geek who never strays into the realm of stereotypes. Lucas is a real person from the moment we meet him. The girl he is pursuing has ensnared him by doing something simple: being nice to him. He's not interested in her because she's pretty (which she is), but because she's kind. It's the size of her heart, not her breasts, that matters to him. In the end, he is paired with geek girl Winona Ryder, which helps to salve the wound of a broken heart. Another nice touch - the film's jock (played by Charlie Sheen) is not an anti-geek jock. I have to admit that when I was in high school and college, I didn't have a lot of interaction with jocks, but the few I knew were nice guys and didn't hold my nerdiness against me.
So there you have it... a rambling five-part discourse on all things geeky. I'll admit it was self-indulgent but hopefully it didn't put too many readers to sleep or turn them off to ReelThoughts altogether. I can't promise that I'm completely done with the subject, but it's time to move on to other things.
Theatrical Releases: April 4, 2008
It's like a broken record, and one that has been broken since the end of January: another weekend, another lackluster crop of movies. Interest in multiplex fare is at a low ebb. I drove past a theater at 7:45 pm this evening - prime movie-going time - and the parking lot was half-empty. The traffic logs of my website, which are highly sensitive to the anticipation of new releases, have been in a slow decline for weeks now. It's a clear sign that, while people haven't stopped going to the movies, they're not pumped about what's out there. And I can't blame them. I saw eight movies this week and none of them had me weeping for joy that I'm a film critic. (One of them almost had me weeping for other reasons.) Few things make me happier than for movie-goers to be enthusiastic about what they're seeing. In all the years that I have been doing this, I can't recall as long a period of dead time as this. My guess is we'll see some recovery in two weeks with the release of Forgetting Sarah Marshall, but the lethargy will persist to one degree or another until the big May movies start arriving. And one has to wonder what the summer will look like if they disappoint.
One of the higher profile movies opening this week that I'm not reviewing is Shine the Light. Yes, it's Martin Scorsese, but it's also a concert film. Over the years, I have reviewed two or three concert films but I made a decision a few years ago not to stop reviewing them. The reason: they're all about the music, and I'm not a music critic. In fact, I'm one of the least musically-oriented people you're likely to meet. For me, music is a distraction and/or something to add background color. If I attend one concert every other year, it's a lot. In the car, I'd rather listen to talk radio. Having said that, the equation for Shine the Light is pretty simple. If you enjoy the Rolling Stones, you'll like the movie. This is one film where it really is just a matter of thumbs up/thumbs down. The finer points of movie-making don't make a whole lot of difference.
Whichever film wins the box office competition this week, it's not going to be with healthy numbers. My guess is that Leatherheads will prevail as this week's Box Office Champion, but I could be wrong (as I was last week). It's not a slam-dunk. George Clooney isn't popular with the teenage male crowd, but there's a legitimate question about whether they'll be seeing anything this weekend. Nim's Island will draw from the family film audience (and its strongest appeal will be to the under-10 female crowd), but it's an "unknown" so it won't have the pull of Horton Hears a Who!. The Ruins is a horror movie, but it's got two things going against it as far as the 12-16 year old age group is concerned: it's (thankfully) rated R and it has not been aggressively marketed. (It does, however, have good online word-of-mouth. And it is the first movie not screened for critics that I have ever given three stars to.) Leatherheads, it should be noted, is also my Pick of the Week. It's not a great movie, but I enjoyed it more than anything else I saw that's opening this weekend.
I reviewed a couple of limited releases this week. They're already playing in some markets and will open in others soon. The first, Chaos Theory is a waste of time. It's poorly written, badly directed, and miscast. It's one of those movies where I left the theater irritated. The other limited release film, Under the Same Moon, is in Spanish but it's getting some play in multiplexes. (For example, it's opening locally at an AMC 24-plex.) To me, this is an indication that the Latino population of the United States is reaching a point where it's no longer "death" to show a Spanish-language subtitled movie in a mainstream theater. If this was in French or Chinese, it would still be stuck in art houses only. It's an emotionally affecting story but its pro-illegal immigrant political shadings will make it highly unpopular in some quarters. While I don't necessarily share the politics of the filmmakers, I will argue that it works on a personal, human level even if its global view is one-sided.
So that's where we are this week. Does anything above sound all that exciting? Are those the kinds of titles that will get people out of their living rooms and into multiplex lobbies? Probably not. Looks like a good weekend to clean up the yard and fertilize the lawn. Most of these movies will look just as good when they arrive on video in a few months.
How Bad Is It?
A slump seems to be a poor way to define the free-fall situation in which the movie industry finds itself. Hollywood has only itself to blame. When the multiplex output consists of one lame film after another, what could the expectations be? This isn't even about quality; it's about energy. No one is excited about movies now because there's nothing out there to be excited about. The industry is banking on the big May releases like Iron Man and Indiana Jones 4 to re-invigorate the box office, and no doubt they will. But a nagging concern remains: when audiences have become accustomed to not going to the movies on a regular basis, how many simply won't come back, even for a big event? For a movie that grosses $300 million, a loss of as little as 10% of the audience represents $30 million. That's a staggering number. It's impossible at this point to measure the long-term damage that three months of lifeless movies have produced, but it wouldn't surprise me if some of the summer's big guns don't live up to expectations.
But where are we now, and how bad is it? It's ironic that I should be asking that question. In late January, the box office was doing so well that pundits were predicting a record-setting year. They may have been right, but not in ways that will make anyone who cares about Hollywood's output happy. Gloom and doom are the watchwords. I don't delight in them. I wish things would turn around. It hurts me financially when the landscape is this bleak. But I don't believe in hiding my head in the sand. Box office receipts are down. DVD sales are stagnant. A summer SAG strike looms. And the economy is in recession. This is not a happy recipe.
This past weekend's tally represented a 28% decline over the same weekend last year. Assuming roughly a $100 million box office, that means about $30 million less this year. Extrapolate that over a month, and it's the budget of one summer blockbuster. This is the seventh week in eight in which the 2008 box office has shown a double-digit percentage decline over the 2007 box office. Why the difference? 2007 stuck all the lifeless bombs in January and February, then started ramping up with 300 in early March. By this time last year, people were bubbling with anticipation. Quality-wise, the movies may not have been better, but they had juice. This year, aside from the mid-January hyped release of Cloverfield, there has been nothing. And there continues to be nothing. Something is needed to prime the pump. By the time that happens, let's hope the well hasn't run dry.
My website traffic statistics are a good barometer of the general level of movie interest exhibited by those surfing the net, and the story it tells is no different from the one related by the box office cash registers. My average daily traffic during "normal" periods of activity is about 17,000 visitors per day (more on Fridays and Saturdays, less on Tuesdays and Wednesdays). My baseline number, which represents the traffic I get from regular readers who visit frequently regardless of what's playing or not playing, is about 10,000 per day. Here are some numbers to ponder...
Average daily number of visitors in January: 18,200
The highest daily traffic of the year occurred on January 18 (the day Cloverfield opened): 32,200 visitors. The lowest occurred last Wednesday: 10,600 visitors - right around the baseline. The average Friday "spike" typically hits around 20,000 visitors (unless there's a big release, then it goes much higher). What about last Friday? 13,800 visitors. In other words, not many people cared enough to seek out ratings or reviews. It's not just ReelViews. Webmasters of other movie-related sites have reported similar patterns.
Some readers may believe I gain some perverse delight in this situation but, considering that I'm losing hundreds of dollars each week as a result, I can assure everyone that's not the case. (The equation is simple: more traffic equates to more ad clicks and more ad clicks equates to more dollars. There's no way I can make up the lost money of 50,000 fewer visitors per week.) I want people to be excited about movies, and not just for financial reasons. It's a lot more fun being a critic when people are talking about movies rather than shrugging their shoulders.
Is there hope before Iron Man? Perhaps. On April 18, Forgetting Sarah Marshall opens and that's the kind of movie that can kick-start things a little. It won't be a monster hit, but it should play well enough with the college crowd to generate some buzz. The week after, the Harold and Kumar sequel arrives. Then it's May and (hopefully), the skies will brighten. But will they brighten sufficiently to make everyone forget about the woes of February, March, and April, or will storm clouds linger on the horizon? Only time will tell.
The Video View: April 8, 2008
The hit-and-miss nature of high definition releases is maddening. The latest film to fall into the "where's the high-def?" category is There Will Be Blood. Coupled with Lust, Caution, this makes two egregious omissions in the past few months. It doesn't take much investigation to determine the underlying cause. Blood is distributed by Paramount Vantage and Lust by (Universal) Focus. Paramount and Universal were, of course, the final two HD-DVD holdouts. However, while Lust came out before the format war was over, the same cannot be said of Blood. Paramount's inability to get this title out day-and-date with its standard DVD counterpart will cost them sales. The more I study business practices in Hollywood, the more astounded I am by how dumb the studios appear to be. I used to believe that greed was the engine that drove Hollywood. Lately, however, I have come to realize that it's a combination of arrogance and willful blindness. Exhibit A: the high-def format war. Exhibit B: an inability to develop an intelligent response to piracy (more in an upcoming column). Exhibit C: the WGA and possible SAG strikes. How much money has been left on the table due to stubbornness?
Two movies are getting Blu-Ray and standard DVD releases this week: the faux Loch Ness Monster yarn, The Water Horse, and Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story. Titles coming out only in the standard DVD format are the aforementioned There Will Be Blood (although there are two versions: a movie-only edition and a two-disc special edition), Reservation Road, P2, the eco-doc The 11th Hour, and the Robert Redford Iraq War dud, Lions for Lambs. Blu-Ray catalog titles include The Adventures of Baron Munchausen and The Sixth Day. A remake of Day of the Dead is also arriving. It claims not to be direct-to-DVD, but I'm unaware of it having played in any theaters.
Jane Austen lovers can get their fill of the new TV version of Sense and Sensibility (recently shown in the United States on Masterpiece Theater), which is available as a standard and collector's edition DVD. The Cosby Show offers a double dip: both Seasons 7 and 8 are coming out. Other TV shows taking a bow this week: Grandma and Grandpa's favorite, Matlock Season 1, Hell's Kitchen Season 1, and the British The Last Detective Season 4. Pickings are indeed becoming slim when combing the Network TV archive vault.
There are two box sets of note this week. The first is a nine-movie collection called Classic Musicals from the Dream Factory - Volume 3. It contains: Hit the Deck, Deep in My Heart, Kismit, Nancy Goes to Rio, Two Weeks with Love, Broadway Melody of 1938, Broadway Melody of 1938, Born to Dance, and Lady Be Good. The other set is The Bette Davis Centenary Celebration Collection, which features five of Davis' best-known features (all of which are being re-released separately as well): All About Eve, Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte, The Virgin Queen, Phone Call from a Stranger, and The Nanny. At about $52 ($5.77 per movie), Classical Musicals is the better buy but, if you're looking for higher-profile titles, The Bette Davis Collection is reasonably priced at $37 ($7.40 per movie).
My Voice from the Past
I frequently write things that have nothing do with movies, although most of them go unpublished because of my fundamental laziness when it comes to taking all the tedious steps necessary to get them from a semi-final state to where they're in a publisher's hands. Editing, re-writing, query letters, rejection notices... who needs that, especially in an era where the web has made it easier to get things into the public eye without going through the process? (Note: having had two books published, I can speak with some authority on what a pain in the ass it is.) The three "Price" novels I have written are available on this site, but fantasy is not to the taste of many readers of my reviews or this column. So what about other stuff?
Earlier this year, I indicated that my penchant for reviewing started when I embarked upon a project in 1991 of providing a write-up for every episode of the original Star Trek TV series. There are two problems with making these available for on-line consumption and ridicule (something more than a few e-mailers have requested): the only copies I have are hard copies, so the effort (even using a scanner and OCR software) is not insignificant, and some of them are embarrassing for me to read after all these years. Another request I have received is for non-fantasy prose, and that's easier to provide. Written about 15 years ago, this is an autobiographical short story about my first meeting with the woman who would become my college girlfriend. Those who read the "My Life as a Geek" series will recognize her impact on my movie-going habits. It's short (about 1400 words) and self-indulgent but hopefully some of you will find it interesting.
I lived in a three-bedroom quad - that's four people to three rooms: two singles and one double. I was unlucky enough to be stuck with a roommate, and Rich was not the most considerate of people to live with. Most of the time he was okay on Mondays and Tuesdays, but later in the week he had an annoying tendency to come in around two in the morning, usually not on tiptoes. Once, he stumbled and collapsed into my closet, tearing the doors off their hinges. The next morning, he was his usual expressive self, observing his handiwork and saying, "Wow."
By December 22, however, Rich was already gone for the holidays, so I had the room to myself. Another of my suite-mates, Alan, was also gone, but Scott was still here. In fact, I doubt Scott had a home to go to. He lived a bohemian life and if he had any family, he never mentioned them. I'd constructed this image of him as an eccentric, independently-wealthy English major. After all, to afford the university's tuition and lodging fees, he had to have some money.
Scott was my antithesis. I was an engineer; he was an English major. I had no girlfriends; he had at least a dozen. I was quiet and sedate; he was larger-than-life. I didn't drink; he consumed alcohol like water. Despite our differences, or perhaps because of them, we got along pretty well. We'd spend some nights talking until the wee hours, Scott taking drags on a joint while I sat across the room from him near an open window.
It didn't surprise me that Scott had discovered a party and it was apparent from the noise level on the floor that this soiree was two doors down the hall in Tina and Lisa's room. If I was going to get any sleep tonight, it was going to require ear plugs. Even then, the vibration might be enough to keep me awake. That, and wondering whether I had answered question five on the final correctly.
At seven-fifteen, I was curled up on my bed, with the heater cranked up to seventy-six, turning the pages of David Eddings' "Magician's Castle." My mood didn't warrant anything more substantive. I didn't bother to turn on a radio; the noise from the party would have drowned out anything I tried to listen to. Reading wasn't a problem, though. I'd long since mastered the tactic of tuning out distractions.
"Yo, James," said Scott, cutting into my concentration as he stuck his head through the open doorway to my room. "Come with me to the party."
"No thanks," I told Scott. "I've got plans." It wasn't a lie. I fully expected to get eight or nine chapters read before turning out the lights.
"Bullshit," said Scott. "Get up. You're coming with me even if I have to drag you by your hair."
I knew Scott well enough to realize he was probably serious. Over the past couple of weeks, he'd gotten it into his head that his mission during the final days of the semester would be to expand my cultural horizons. To that end, he had introduced me to three of his girlfriends, tried to get me to accompany him to a bar, and nearly succeeded in forcing a shot-glass of whiskey down my throat. According to him, I was hopeless. He was probably right.
So I got up, reluctantly put the book down, and threw on a sweater.
The noise was a lot louder in the hall and almost deafening once Scott had opened the door to Tina and Lisa's small three-room suite. The pungent aroma of sweat, booze, and grass wafted into the hall, accompanied by the blare of the Rolling Stones and the shouting of at least fifteen people, all trying to be heard over the din. I resisted the urge to plug my ears as Scott and I slipped inside.
Boy, was this place crowded. The living room, which was probably twelve feet by twelve feet, was wall-to-wall people. The same was true for the double bedroom. Even the bathroom appeared to be filled. My best guess put the total number of people present at close to thirty. I wondered how many fire laws were being broken.
Scott disappeared into the press around me, presumably looking for something to drink. It's amazing how hard it can be to locate someone in such a small space. I considered leaving immediately now that my escort had abandoned me, but trying to make it to the door would have been like swimming upstream. The prevalent current of bodies was going deeper into the suite, pulling me along with it.
I felt someone grab my arm and turned to see Lisa, one of the two girls who lived here. She was a short, petite brunette with ample cleavage that the gaping neckline of her oversized sweatshirt wasn't doing anything to hide. Her hair, normally worn loose, was pulled back into a simple, utilitarian ponytail. She flashed me a slightly drunk smile and shouted in my ear that it was a surprise to see me. My response was a rather unenthusiastic nod.
Whatever song had been playing came to an end and there was a momentary lessening of noise. Into this breach, Lisa said, "Look, there's someone here I want you to meet. She's staying with us for a few days to, like, get to know the university. She's transferring from UCLA."
Taking me by the hand, Lisa forced her way through a knot of people over to a girl who was lounging up against a half-open window. It was twenty-five degrees outside, but the frigid breeze was welcome in the heat of the room.
"Tracie, this is James. James, Tracie," said Lisa, perfunctorily introducing us before melting out of sight. The music started up again: Steve Winwood's "Take It as It Comes."
Tracie was about two inches shorter than I was with curly fair hair that hung to her shoulders and bright blue eyes. Her skin had the healthy color of someone who'd spent a lot of time out in the sun, the typical Southern California look. She was wearing a tight-fitting black tee-shirt and a skirt that ended well above her knees. It was pretty clear she kept herself in excellent physical condition and wasn't shy about showing it off.
"Hi," she mouthed, the noise level again having risen to where conversation was impossible.
Tracie moved away from the window and, beckoning for me to join her, started to gyrate to the music. It wasn't actually dancing - there wasn't really enough room for dancing - but she was undoubtedly letting the pounding rhythm of the song carry her along. Hips swayed and arms moved, alternately lifted above her head then sliding down the side of her body. Hair whipped from left to right, frequently obscuring at least part of her features.
I could feel a flush of heat and, despite the frigid blast of air from behind me, a trickle of sweat made its way between my shoulder blades and down my back. Tracie took my hand and pulled me more toward the center of the room where the crush of bodies was nearly unbearable.
When the music ended, we broke apart, she to get something to drink and me to make my way to the exit. I pushed and shoved until I got outside, where I heaved a sigh of relief. I went back to my room where I took a quick shower, then collapsed on the bed. I didn't try to do any reading. Instead, I lay there in the dark listening to the sounds from down the hall: music, shouting, and laughter. I didn't get a wink of sleep all night.
Theatrical Releases: April 11, 2008
The end of the drought is nearing: Al Pacino, a Judd Apatow-produced comedy, and a teaming of Jet Li and Jackie Chan. But that's next weekend. What about today? Sadly, more of the same. A lot of movies that few people care about and even fewer will see.
The two biggest titles of the weekend endeavor to take us back to the '80s in spirit if not in fact. Prom Night is not, as it has been mistakenly identified in numerous places, a remake of the 1980 movie of the same name. In fact, it has nothing to do with that one. The producers must have been aware of the connection, so why create the confusion? Maybe they were hoping it would sucker a few more souls into theaters. Prom Night, while not a remake of an '80s movie, is still a throwback. Recall the mid-'80s, when the slasher genre was gasping its last breaths and some horrifically bad movies were rising from the ashes. That's the kind of film Prom Night is, with the added twist that it's rated PG-13. That's like a porn movie without the sex scenes. Nevertheless, most analysts expect this to be the Box Office Champion, and I'll go along with them. If you don't remember how bad slasher films can get, Prom Night provides an excellent opportunity to jump-start the memory.
Street Kings is a throwback as well - to the tough, gritty cop movies that flooded theaters during the '80s. It was the era of Dirty Harry (who was still around) meeting Miami Vice. Some of them, especially at the beginning, were good. Most, however, were routine and the more of them that were produced, the more clichéd they became. Street Kings seems a little out-of-place in 2008 but would have found a familiar niche 20 years ago. It's not a bad movie until the end, when it implodes in a few minutes of spectacular stupidity. I'd love to know if the last scene was tacked-on after the fact, because it feels that way. I can't really recommend the movie, but it's not a total disaster. And, while Hugh Laurie isn't officially playing Dr. House, he might as well be.
Smart People and The Visitor share a thematic kinship. They're both about bored, disgruntled college professors who find something to re-invigorate their lives. Of the two, The Visitor is smarter and more interesting. Smart People features Ellen Page in a supporting role, but she doesn't have a lot to do. The Visitor has a slightly stronger "feel good" vibe, although there is a pro-illegal alien message contained within that some will find disturbing. (This becomes the second movie in as many weeks to underline this theme - see last week's Under the Same Moon.) I'm recommending The Visitor, but not with boundless enthusiasm. I'm not recommending Smart People - it's too formulaic to be worth the price of admission.
So, with all these misses, is there something to see? Yes, if it has opened near you. This week's Pick of the Week is the inspirational documentary Young @ Heart, which follows the exploits of 24 oldsters who form a chorus that sings pop, rock, punk, and blues. No Sinatra for these Senior Citizens. Young @ Heart isn't the Next Great Documentary, but it's a pleasant 100 minutes and it's hard to imagine anyone not liking it. The term "crowd pleaser" applies. And if it's not opening at a theater near you, this may be another weekend for yard work and DVDs.
Upgrade Update
Originally, I had hoped the site redesign, which I have unoriginally dubbed "ReelViews 2.0," would be ready by May 1, but I underestimated the amount of time necessary to add reviews to the newly created database (the underlying foundation of the redesign). As a result, the changeover will be a month later than originally planned, but June 1 is an achievable target. So, what will be available when you log in on that Sunday morning and what will be still to come?
First of all, no content will be lost even though only 20% of the reviews will be in the database at that time. There will be a link to the current "Archives" page that will serve as a gateway to the existing site. All of the unconverted reviews will be accessible that way until they have been ported. However, after May 31, no updates will be done to the old site and some of the "front" pages (the main movies and ReelThoughts pages) will be replaced by their new counterparts.
As of June 1, all reviews written in 2007 and 2008 will have been converted to the new format. In addition, approximately 400-500 older reviews will have also be in the database. Many of these are among the most frequently accessed titles. There will be no broken links. All reviews linked in the new format will also be re-formatted. After June 1, older reviews will continue to be ported over at the rate of about 50 per week, so it won't be until sometime in 2009 when the entire ReelViews content will be available via the database.
ReelThoughts will undergo a similar transformation. At the outset, only the most recent few months of older posts (probably all those from 2008) will be available. Older posts will gradually be added. At the very end, I'll probably convert the old "Commentaries" into ReelThoughts posts so they aren't lost altogether. (I had initially planned to purge the Commentaries due to low traffic but was convinced by readers of the value of keeping them around.) The format for ReelThoughts will change so that scrolling isn't necessary to locate older entries. When I first set up ReelThoughts, too little thought went into formatting. That will change.
The "static" search pages will be gone. Access to the archives will be available via a text search box that will appear on every page and an advanced search page that will provide a number of options. On June 1, it should be possible to search by title, by director, by cast member, by "star rating", and by year of release. Annual Top 10 lists and my Top 100 will also be accessible via this page, although possibly not at start-up. My fantasy novels will also still be available. In fact, I don't foresee any significant content being lost. If it's there today, it will be there in the future.
The overall goals for the redesign remain the same: to give the site a cleaner, less cluttered look and to bring it up to date with the latest web standards. A lot of this is behind-the-scenes work, but it will make a difference in how the site works and will open the possibility of interaction if I ever decide to introduce a forums section. (Something that's under consideration for a future enhancement but which will NOT be available at start-up.) Also, there are known issues with Apple's Safari browser that should be fixed as a result of the upgrade.
Finally, a "programming" note... From now until May 31, I will be reducing the number of ReelThoughts posts to three per week to allow more time for database conversion. The plan is for ReelThoughts entries on Monday (random topics), Tuesday (DVD and Blu-Ray updates and discussion), and Friday (new theatrical openings). ReelThoughts will return to four posts per week in early June. Also, for April, May, and June, there will only be one planned new review of an older movie per month. (April: The Maltese Falcon, May: The Sure Thing, June: Back to the Future). New reviews of older movies will return to a bi-weekly schedule beginning in July, then go weekly once the database conversion is complete.
The Video View: April 15, 2008
It's David Lean week at the video store. Three of his films: Lawrence of Arabia, The Bridge on the River Kwai, and A Passage to India are being re-released as two-disc Collector's Editions. This is fine - classics like this deserve to be re-packaged and resubmitted to the public once in a while - but there's something strange going on here. A Passage to India is also being released in Blu-Ray format. This isn't surprising. However, the same cannot be said of either Lawrence or Bridge. Admittedly, we have been promised a high-def version of Lawrence for a while, but nothing has officially been announced. Wouldn't it have made sense to hold off releasing the Collector's Editions of Lean's two best-known movies until their Blu-Ray counterparts are available? And it's not as if the defunct format war could have impacted these releases. Sony owns all three titles so there's never been a question about whether or not they were going to come out in Blu-Ray. At any rate, for now at least, we only get one of these three titles in the new format, and that one is easily the least requested.
Moving on to movies that have nothing to do with David Lean, the big hitter this week is Juno, which is arriving in three versions: a one-disc standard DVD, a two-disc standard Special Edition, and a Blu Ray version. Juno's home video release now closes the book on the 2008 Oscar nominees - they're all available for DVD viewing. Three of the five nominees are also out in Blu Ray. High-def versions of Atonement and There Will Be Blood have yet to be announced. Two other titles this week are getting the joint standard/Blu-Ray treatment: Before the Devil Knows You're Dead and Alien vs. Predator: Requiem, which is being released "unrated." I can't say whether the "unrated" designation means more gore and violence, although that's probably a good bet. I'm not going to subject myself to another viewing of the movie just to make that determination, however. Once is enough in this lifetime.
Uwe Boll's latest masterpiece, In the Name of the King, arrives in a standard version only. Ditto for the much better Lars and the Real Girl, about the love affair between a man and a sex toy. In an odd bit of synergy, the cheesy '80s movie Mannequin is also being released. It would make an interesting double feature with Lars. A couple of Schwarzenegger catalog titles are getting the Blu-Ray treatment this week: Commando and Predator. We're still waiting for the good Schwarzenegger movies - primarily those done with James Cameron (although Conan the Barbarian would also be welcome).
TV releases on DVD this week are almost an afterthought. In keeping with their recent release schedule, Masterpiece Theater continues to have a fast turnaround time. They aired a new version of A Room with a View on April 20 and it's out on DVD two days later. Fans of Melrose Place can exult that Season 4 is now available. And "Volume 3" of American Dad hits shelves. I'm not sure whether the "Volume 3" signifies "Season 3" or just a third collection of random episodes.
Theatrical Releases: April 18, 2008
This is an odd time for theatrical releases. It's the first weekend in a while when a few mid-budget films are opening that are capable of generating some interest. It's also a weekend when studios are taking the trash out, getting things nice and tidy for the influx of big summer movies. That season is only two weeks off, and it can't come soon enough. Even if the films aren't any good, at least people will be talking about and caring about movies - two qualities that haven't been in abundance since January.
Many pundits have opined that the weekend's biggest grossing entry will be The Forbidden Kingdom. I can understand their reasoning. It's an action film. It has family appeal. And it features the first professional exchange between legendary martial arts masters Jackie Chan and Jet Li. The experts believe the film will earn between $18M and $20M. This doesn't seem unreasonable. What is giving me pause, however, is Forgetting Sarah Marshall. The experts are pegging this in the $15M to $18M range, and I think that's low. As a comparison, however, consider The 40-Year-Old Virgin ($21M opening weekend), Knocked Up ($31M opening weekend), and Superbad ($33M opening weekend). These are three recent offerings from Team Apatow, the group behind Forgetting Sarah Marshall. The closest analog might be Knocked Up, another Spring raunchy romantic comedy. It seems reasonable to me that Forgetting Sarah Marshall should be able to come close to Knocked Up's financial total, unless the argument is that college students will be too busy studying for finals to see a movie. At any rate, I'm going to peg Forgetting Sarah Marshall as my Box Office Champion for this week. It also gets the citation for my Pick of the Week. It's the funniest comedy to come along in quite some time, and is significantly better than any of its competitors this week (although it must be stated that it earns its R rating).
Now we come to the movies that the studios are tossing into the marketplace, hoping something will stick. The first is The Life Before Her Eyes, which would be a tough sell no matter when it came out. The film is thoughtful and provocative, but movies about school shootings and survivor guilt aren't popular. It's unclear whether this was timed to come out close to the first anniversary of the Virginia Tech shootings or whether Magnolia was oblivious to the connection. It's worth seeing but the limited release may make it difficult to locate.
88 Minutes is raising an interesting question in some critical circles: Could this be Al Pacino's worst movie? It's probably not his worst performance, but there's more to the film than Pacino's acting, and none of it is good. The writing is embarrassing, the direction is poor, and the other actors were probably just in the movie so they could share some screen time with a legend. Pacino has done enough great work in his career that he deserves a pass, but the worrisome thing about 88 Minutes is that it was made by the same director (Jon Avnet) who is behind the much-anticipated Pacino/De Niro team-up, Righteous Kill.
Three other movies are opening in a limited number of theaters. The first two were not screened for critics; the third was. The first is a B-grade thriller called Pathology that features a bunch of second-tier actors, including Milo Ventimiglia and Alyssa Milano. Then there's Ben Stein's Expelled, a so-called "documentary" about the persecution of scientists who back the idea of "Intelligent Design." I haven't seen the movie, but several of those interviewed in it have indicated they were "ambushed." They were told that the movie was going to be called Crossroads and that it was intended to be about the intersection of faith and science. The interviews are also said to have been selectively edited. Hey, if Michael Moore can do this sort of thing for the Left, why not Ben Stein for the Right? By all accounts, Expelled is very Moore-esque, albeit taking a position that Moore would never adopt.
Speaking of documentaries, Morgan Spurlock, the guy who ate fast food for 30 days, is back. This time, he's looking for Osama: Where in the World is Osama bin Laden? The movie isn't as interesting or instructive as Supersize Me, although Spurlock's wit is in evidence. Unfortunately, most of the observations and conclusions made by the film are rather obvious. Granted, one doesn't expect a lot of depth from Spurlock - he's not that kind of filmmaker - but a little more substance would have been welcome.
The Death of the Print Critic
The rumors of this death, sadly, have not been exaggerated...
I can remember as a child seeing my father sitting at the kitchen table in the morning, drinking a cup of coffee and reading the newspaper. I have similar memories of my grandfather when I would stay with my grandparents for a week during the summer, except that he would sit in an easy chair after breakfast and go through the entirety of Ihe New York Times. Most children today won't have recollections like that. Newspapers are slowly, inexorably becoming obsolete. They are already artifacts, struggling to stay afloat by providing on-line versions. Circulation is dropping. As older readers die off, they are not being replaced by younger ones. A generation or two from now, it's hard to imagine the newspaper as being anything more than a curiosity.
I am occasionally asked why I haven't pursued employment as a newspaper or magazine critic. There are two reasons for this. The first is that I like the freedom afforded by not having an editor to answer to. I have written for print publications on occasion and find the restrictions stifling. A feature I wrote for The Chicago Sun-Times was sliced and diced for space reasons (and because I had some nice things to say about the late Gene Siskel, who had been employed by the rival Chicago Tribune). A review I wrote of Blade for Playboy ran afoul of the magazine's desire to put the movie in the best possible light. It goes to show that you should understand exactly what you're being asked to write before writing it. I got paid by Playboy but the review never saw the light of day, except on this website where the magazine graciously allowed me to post it (See here). They had wanted a "puff piece" to go alongside their 20 Questions with Wesley Snipes, and the review was deemed to be "too negative." Sorry about that.
The second and more cogent reason for not pursuing a position in the more "respected" field of print journalism is that there aren't any to be had. With newspaper circulation down, belt-tightening is taking place, and some of the first casualties are film critics. Those that retire are not being replaced. Others are being unceremoniously dumped. The average age of the print film critic must be in the range of 50-60 years old. There are young film critics, but they're mostly working in "new media." For many newspapers, an in-house film critic is an unaffordable luxury. So they resort to syndicated reviews or assign a general entertainment reporter to cover movies.
Film criticism has undergone a major shift in the last 20 years, due in no small part to the emergence of the Internet. Reviews are now designed more for popular consumption than for cineastes. I'm not going to pass judgment on whether this is good or bad; it simply is. The majority of movie-goers would prefer to read 500-700 words about a movie than a lengthy, detailed essay that's four or five times that length. They want to know if they might like the movie and a little of what it's about, not a comprehensive discourse on its cinematic virtues. The marketplace dictates the writing. Those who gripe about this change are the same individuals who complain how great things were "in the good old days." Film critics must adopt an "adapt or die" attitude. It's journalistic Dawinism. Survival of the fittest. Those who don't change to fit the new culture will perish. It is perhaps regrettable, but that's life. Fairness never comes into it.
Movies are making more money than ever before, but those who see them are increasingly cinematically illiterate. For the critic who seeks to teach and enlighten, there is a place to do it: The Internet. Not a magazine or a newspaper. On-line, you can write whatever you want: old school, in-depth criticism or less detailed, consumer-oriented reviews. Newspapers don't have a choice in the matter. They must cater to the "unwashed masses." In an era of blurbs and sound bytes, five columns cannot be devoted to the analysis of an art film, no matter how worthy it may be of such analysis.
When I first started writing reviews, there was no such thing as an "Internet critic." I can recall trying to explain "who I wrote for" to the studios when applying for accreditation. I was one of the first Internet critics to receive that benison, but it took five years of phone calls and letters (this was before e-mail was a widely accepted means of communication) and, in the end, I'm not sure the studios still understood what I did. (In the end, print-outs of 1000 reviews convinced them I wasn't some fly-by-night individual just trying to see free movies.) I was also one of the first critics accredited at the Toronto International Film Festival - and that probably wouldn't have happened if Roger Ebert hadn't gone to bat for me in 1997. Back then, "prestige" came from writing for a newspaper or magazine. Writing for an on-line site wasn't only new, it was regarded with skepticism and, in some cases, contempt. Ever had someone look down their nose at you? I got that a lot in the mid- and late-'90s.
Times have changed. Ten years later, on-line critics have made inroads into defining themselves as legitimate journalists. Print criticism has lost its sheen. It's not quite a dinosaur yet, but the extinction event is growing ever closer. It's no longer an embarrassment to admit to being an "Internet critic." People don't silently react with the mental comment: "Oh, so you're not good enough to write for a newspaper." I recognized long ago that aspiring to be a print critic was a dead-end goal. 20 years from now, being an Internet critic may be old fashioned but, for now, it's where there's vitality and variety to be found. Criticism has never been more lively than it is today, provided you know where to look. And that place is not in print.
Video Views: April 22, 2008
Since the death of HD-DVD and the end of the format war, there has been an upswing in Blu-Ray revenue, which is a good thing for Hollywood. High def DVD sales are still dwarfed by those of their standard DVD cousin but it's at least a positive sign in an arena that hasn't had many of those. The real test will come in the fourth quarter when Blu-Ray makes its first unopposed pitch in the high definition DVD market. Meanwhile, retailers are opening more space for Blu-Ray discs and a few libraries are now making them available for borrowing. (I was recently asked to provide a comment for a newspaper article about my local county library, which will be the first in the area to offer Blu-Ray titles.) In tight economic times, libraries are a great choice for obtaining Blu-Ray discs since they will allow anyone with a PS3 game system to sample high definition movies without spending anything.
This week's new releases are slim on the high-def side. Only two of the major new features - One Missed Call and The Orphanage - are coming out in both standard and Blu-Ray packages. The other major movie titles are from Universal and Paramount and, while both have abandoned HD-DVD, neither has come up to speed on Blu-Ray. To Universal's credit, they have announced a slate of Blu-Ray titles but Paramount remains mum (still licking their wounds, one assumes). Universal's title is Charlie Wilson's War, a film that many mistakenly believed was about Iraq. It's not – it's about Cold War Afghanistan. It's funny and incisive and worth the price of a rental. Then there's Cloverfield, which may prove to be less nausea-inducing in a home environment. Three smaller movies - The Savages, Starting out in the Evening, and Romulus, My Father - are also arriving in standard DVD only. All are worth seeing, with Romulus being the weakest of the three titles.
It's another lifeless week for TV on DVD, but a lot of that has to do with the time of year. TV on DVD has two peak seasons (late summer and before Christmas), and we're in neither of them. This week, all that's out there are the second season box set of Friday Night Lights, the release of the just-on-Masterpiece Theater version of My Boy Jack (featuring Kim Cattrall and Daniel Radcliffe, both of whom keep their clothes on), and season four of Laverne and Shirley.
Four older titles are being released by Universal under the banner of "Universal Classic Cinema," but they are not available as a boxed set. They are: Midnight, The Major and the Minor, Easy Living, and She Done Him Wrong. None are exceptionally popular or well-known and their reasonably low prices indicate that. As far as box sets are concerned, there are three, each of which caters to a different audience. Criterion's Eclipse series is releasing three silent films by Ozu: 1931's Tokyo Chorus, 1932's I Was Born But..., and 1933's Passing Fancy. At $34 (discounted), the set is pricy, but it provides an interesting time capsule. These three films are among a very limited number of pre-World War II Japanese movies available and they provide a different view of life than those produced after Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Those who like sweet trifles may be amused by Shirley Temple: America's Sweetheart Collection #6, which contains 1936's Stowaway, 1937's Wee Willie Winkie, and 1940's Young People. All three titles are also available individually but, at $23, the set is the bargain. I have never cared much for Ms. Temple, so I'll pass. The third box set is a repackaging of four early-1970s Pete Walker gore-fests called British Horror Quadruple Feature. It includes Frightmare, House of Whipcord, The Flesh & Blood Show, and Die Screaming Marianne. In the early '70s, these were controversial movies, but not so in today's environment. The set can be gotten for $20, which isn't bad considering that's the usual price of a single new movie. Whether this is a bargain depends on how much you like the genre.
Theatrical Releases: April 25, 2008
Consider this the proverbial calm before the storm. Choices are mediocre this week. Next week is, of course, Iron Man, and fans are already gearing up for it (and, in at least one case, lining up for it). The interesting thing about next week is that, even if Iron Man makes $100 million, there will still be a major deficit versus last year, when Spider-Man 3 came in at $150 million. This is a problem that Hollywood will face all summer. For the most part, the 2008 blockbuster roster doesn't measure up to the 2007 one, at least in terms of excitement and anticipation.
This week offers an assortment of movies that studios wanted to get into the marketplace before the big guns start firing. None of these will have much of shelf life and, except for a tiny French thriller, none of are especially good. The worst of the bunch is Helen Hunt's directorial debut, Then She Found Me, which is a painful mix of bad sit-com humor and bad soap opera melodrama, all wrapped into a tiny package with Hunt and Bette Midler doing battle to see who can be more off-putting to an audience. Simply awful. Deal isn't much better. This is about as predictable as gambling movies can get. And you know you're in trouble when it's 2008 and your biggest star is Burt Reynolds.
Deception wasn't generally screened for critics, although I know a few who saw it (and regretted having wasted their time). This is the movie where Ewan McGregor claimed he was worn out because of all the sex scenes. That makes the movie, a moronic thriller with a predictably flat plot, sound a lot more steamy and salacious than it is. If it wasn't for last week's 88 Minutes, this movie would get the year's "worst movie with a good cast" award. If you're looking for real thrills, try Claude Lalouche's Roman de Gare, a delightful French import that gets my Pick of the Week citation. The problem is, as often seems to be the case with the movies I champion, that it's hardly playing anywhere. File this one away as a recommendation for when it actually opens in a theater near you or for when it comes out on DVD. It's worth seeing.
The two biggest commercial performers will be Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay and Baby Mama. Neither is going to generate much heat at the box office. The H&K movie will draw from a small-but-loyal crowd of adherents. The SNL movie will pull in viewers from a more general crowd. However, based on its performance at the advance screening I saw (where 50% of the seats were empty - a rarity), people aren't excited about this movie. Neither film is great or terrible. In terms of which one will do better, I'll pick Baby Mama as the Box Office Champion, but it could well go to Harold and Kumar if a few more people see it than expected. I haven't been predicting accurately in recent weeks, but that's what happens when movies are in general not drawing crowds. I guarantee I'll get next week's right. You can bet the mortgage on it.
So, for those of us that like the buzz of crowded multiplexes and people who seem interested and excited in what they're seeing, the time is only a week away. This week is a mere placeholder.
Iron Mania
I am willing to give Paramount's publicity and marketing department a huge share of the credit for transforming Iron Man into a must-see event. Though Tony Stark's legion of devoted fans may howl at this pronouncement, in the pantheon of comic book superheroes, Iron Man is merely a Demi-God. Everyone knows Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, the X-Men, the Hulk, and the Fantastic Four. They're part of the fabric of pop culture. Iron Man, however, is known primarily to those who follow (or have followed) his adventures. Back in the days when I used to collect comic books, Iron Man was roughly on par with Daredevil and Thor - titles that generated solid sales numbers, but couldn't touch the volume of the "big books." Yet Paramount has managed to position Iron Man as 2008's second Big Event. (The first Big Event, Cloverfield, was also a Paramount property. They also have the fifth Big Event, which opens on Memorial Day weekend.)
Making Iron Man into an event movie in May 2008 might have been easier than Paramount suspected due to the weakness of the spring box office. It has been 3 1/2 months since any movie (big or small) has been able to excite movie-goers. The largest and most slavishly catered-to target demographic for the studios - males age 14 through 30 - haven't had much to see or cheer about in February, March, or April. Iron Man is a hand-engraved, welcome-back card to them. From the beginning, Paramount decided to position this film as a summer tent-pole rather than an early year "throw out" like Daredevil. It's doubtful that its box office take will come close to last year's first-weekend of $151 million for Spider-Man 3, but half that will be considered successful and it's hard to imagine a scenario in which there will be no Iron Man 2 in two or three years.
Let me pause for a moment to provide a clarification/definition. When I refer to a "comic book based superhero," I'm thinking of a character who had his start in comic books before shifting to the big screen. James Bond and Indiana Jones may be "superheroes" in the broadest sense of the term, but they are not "comic book based superheroes." Also, a movie like The Incredibles doesn't count because, although it's rooted in the culture of comic book superheroes, no book preceded the movie.
Comic book based superhero movies are nothing new. Even the big-budget, effects-driven blockbusters can date as far back as 1978 and the release of Richard Donner's Superman. Until this decade, however, they have represented sparse ingredients occasionally stirred into the Hollywood cauldron. Through the '80s and '90s, a Superman or Batman would pop up every few years, and occasionally there would be something offbeat (like 1997's Spawn or 1998's Blade). In fact, while Marvel Comics could claim some limited success on television (with Saturday morning cartoons and the Bill Bixby/Lou Ferrigno The Incredible Hulk), they had done little before 2000 with the exception of the previously mentioned Blade and an ill-fated Roger Corman 1994 version of The Fantastic Four that never saw the light of day.
2000 can be considered the year that everything changed for big-screen comic book superheroes. That was the when Marvel upped the ante in a big way with the release of The X-Men. It was the only comic book superhero movie of the year, but its unexpected success (exceeding studio estimates by 50%) resulted in numerous superhero movies stuck in development hell getting fast-tracked. This ramp-up would be seen beginning in 2002, with two comic book superhero releases (Spider-Man, Blade II). 2003 and 2004 both brought four titles (five in 2004 if you want to count Catwoman, which I do not), with three to follow in 2005, two in 2006, and three last year. This year, there are five expected, with four (Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Batman: The Dark Knight, Hellboy 2) opening during the summer and one in December (The Punisher 2).
Comic book superhero movies are no longer a niche market. They are a major revenue engine. There is some concern in the industry about too many superheroes causing overexposure but that hasn't caused the pipeline to dry up, although D.C. is having difficulties with two of its highest profile properties. There are a lot of questions about when/if the next Superman movie will go into production and the on-again/off-again Justice League project may never get off the ground. Marvel isn't slowing down, though. Its goal seems to be to give every superhero in the Marvel universe his/her own motion picture.
New superheroes like Iron Man are necessary because some of the venerable ones are getting long in the tooth. Spider-Man is a case study of what can happen to a superhero franchise after only a few chapters. The third film was of considerably lower quality than its predecessors, even though the same creative team was in place. While the box-office bonanza of Spider-Man 3 guarantees film #4, there are a lot of questions. Will Sam Raimi come back? Will major re-casts be necessary? How to make the next adventure fresh and not a re-tread? X-Men is also in limbo, with the current plan not to continue the series but to branch out and present a stand-alone Wolverine film. And recall that the '70s/'80s Superman and the '80s/'90s Batman both went bust after the third sequel.
As I write this, I haven't yet seen Iron Man (the local screening is tomorrow night), but the "word on the street" is that the film is smartly written and Robert Downey Jr. brings qualities to this superhero movie that are unusual for the genre. That's a good thing because few tales are more boring than generic superhero origin stories. One thing I appreciated about Ang Lee's much-reviled Hulk is that it dared to be different. I felt similarly about Superman Returns, which was more of a tortured love story than a superhero movie. Big fight scenes without deeply personal stakes in superhero movies are overrated. Will Iron Man fans be happy with what they see Thursday night? Time will tell, but there will certainly be a lot of them in theaters this weekend giving Marvel's would-be next franchise a dynamic send-off.
The Video View: April 29, 2008
The biggest two movies new to DVD this week are available in both standard and Blu-Ray formats. The third film, despite getting its share of accolades, is only arriving as a standard DVD. This would appear to be the shape of things to come, at least for the foreseeable future. It is increasingly likely that there will never be a complete transition to high definition DVDs, no matter how deeply the penetration goes. The current view is that, since Blu-Ray is backward compatible, the two formats can not only peacefully co-exist but can complement each other. As a result, we should limit our expectations regarding which older/niche/smaller titles will make their way to Blu-Ray. Even as high-def becomes more prevalent, a lot of "little" films are still going to be targeted for DVD-only.
The two dual-format releases for this week are the romantic comedy 27 Dresses, which joins an ever-growing group of movies available for home viewing about three months after debuting in theaters, and The Golden Compass, which has taken a more leisurely 4 1/2 months. The movie only available on standard DVD is The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. As with most foreign-language films, the concept of a "release window" has little meaning here since the movie was kicking around the film festival circuits for many months before receiving a "general" North American theatrical release. There have been occasions when foreign films have come out on DVD one or two weeks after completing their limited art house runs.
Turning to television, the most controversial release of the week is Volume 3 of The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones. Instead of releasing the TV series as it aired, Lucasfilm re-cut the episodes into 22 "chapters" that eliminated the wrap-around narration by Old Indy. This approach has annoyed fans and, to add insult to injury, the boxed sets are expensive. Volume 3 features the final seven chapters (fourteen TV episodes) and 31 companion documentaries. The list price is a steep $130, although the set can be found discounted for about half that. Still, at a time when the trend is for cheaper DVD presentations of TV shows, this gouging is decidedly un-fan-friendly. It's not going to help George Lucas' reputation among the conflicted legions who love his work but despise his business practices. It's strange to think how much reverence has turned to bitterness in the span of less than one decade.
In other television news, there's The Waltons Season 7, Cheers Season 9, Beverly Hills 90210 Season 4, and Seasons 1, 2, and 3 of I Spy. Amazon.com is also doing some heavily discounted bundling of TV sets already out there. These kinds of buys are tough to pass up if you like the shows and don't already own them. They include: Lost Season 1-3, Scrubs Seasons 1-6, Grey's Anatomy Seasons 1-3, and Desperate Housewives Seasons 1-3. Sales like this are good ways to clear out back inventory since buying trends show that more than 90% of season box sets are purchased during their first month on store shelves.
Next week, Hollywood's attention will shift from video store shelves to multiplexes as the summer blockbuster season gets under way. This is reflected by the anemic list of titles arriving on DVD. Of course, the box office weakness from January through April will be reflected in the home video market from May through July.
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