Sleepless in Midland

Loved the meat pies, Mrs. Lovett

Maybe it's an acquired taste.  Or maybe it's the simple appreciation of a well told story of pain, abuse of power, revenge and ultimate justice.  Also there's that touch of cannibalism.  It's the movie version of Sweeney Todd.  Here's the official site (all Flash).

It's the story of the London barber who was shanghaied and banished by a corrupt judge who lusted after the barber's wife.  And the story begins as the tortured barber returns and reunites with his razors to settle the score.

The Stephen Sondheim music and lyrics are mesmerizing and sung admirably by Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter.  Even the quintessential villain Alan Rickman gets to belt out a tune.

Maybe fans of the stage version are tempted to turn up their noses at the movie version, but not I.  On stage what the audience saw is what the actors gave on that particular night.  But in a movie the viewers get to see the best of several takes of both acting and singing.  No late entrances.  No forgotten lines.  No missed notes.  Add a computer generated old London, and the result is a visual and auditory feast.

The squeamish might do well to remind themselves that movie makers can create an amazingly realistic look.  But the wounds are illusions, the blood is fake.  And remember, modern day barbers don't use straight razors.

Two thumbs way up, but count your fingers on the way out to assure yourself that it's only a movie.

Attention old movie fans

Gary Ott has a great old movie quiz at his MR-T column.

"Death at a Funeral," the movie

If you haven't experienced a parent's funeral, you will.  And for me, my parents' funerals were times to let go and experience an emotional release followed by an unexpected serenity.  Or maybe a little guilt.

Leave it to the Brits to come up with a movie that will make you laugh at a funeral.  It's Death at a Funeral, and it's hilarious.  And it's great fun to laugh at a situation you've experienced with an entirely different emotion.

Death of a Funeral looks like it could have been a stage play, and the action takes place mostly at a  beautiful British country estate.  It's a family of means, and one might expect the solemn affair a funeral was intended to be.  But it's a family with quirks.  The deceased dad had a secret, and the siblings experience all the conflicts that siblings everywhere experience.  Throw in an amateur, unlicensed, pharmacist who mixes drugs for recreational use.  Add an accidental ingestion by an unsuspecting future in-law.  Pitch in a stranger with a photo album the family might want to buy and bury, and there's a funeral story worth telling.

It's now showing at the Bijou at the Crossroads in San Antonio, where movie goers can order and consume food and adult beverages right there while watching the movie.  (Take smallish bites to avoid spit-takes.)

"The Brave One" - the movie

Jodie Foster seems to like the action hero role, and what star wouldn't if she can do it convincingly?  It's the old James Stewart "everyman" who gets sucked into a extraordinary situation, and in this movie Jodie plays the victim of a brutal crime who takes matters into her own hands.  If you are inclined to see the movie you'll probably see it regardless of what I say, but here's the spoiler alert for those who haven't seen it yet:  Spoiler alert!

I seldom see first run movies, but I was in another city, and a relative and I saw two movies in one afternoon, one of which was The Brave One.  And it was a pretty good movie.  There were a few movie cliches, and the basic theme had been done a few decades ago by Charles Bronson, but it held its own.

So Jodie and her fiance go for a walk.  The fiance is presented to us as such a likable guy that anyone who has seen the commercials knows that his role is to be the homicide victim.  They stumble into a circumstance in which three thugs attack them, beat them, kill the fiance, and video tape the whole ugly scene.

And Jodie buys a gun.

A gun is probably seen by the Hollywood set as a device that transforms psychology, a device which can change an ordinary, decent citizen into a person who in the blink of an eye can become a mad murderer.  And in the hands of a crime victim, like the one Jodie plays in the movie, a gun must turn her into a killing machine, a vigilante bent on cleansing the earth of scum, one or two thugs at at time.  Doing what the cops can't.

But a satisfying movie needs the good guys prevailing over the bad guys with little or no consequences.   And this was a satisfying movie.  To someone who doesn't regularly see movies in theaters, it was interesting to hear audience members react to certain scenes.  The movie makers created some frightening scenarios, and the audience can feel the terror that subway riders might feel when a couple of menacing creeps start harassing passengers.  But we're comforted, because we know Jodie is packing a piece in her purse.  And the audience applauds the screen as the tables are turned, and a bad boy buys a ticket to eternity.

Okay, a minor quibble.  The investigators say they found 9mm casing where she's done her thing, but Jodie's gun looked exactly like a .45 caliber Sig Sauer P220 ST.  And her reconciliation with the lawman was a bit contrived, but hey, it's only a movie.

All in all, it was very entertaining.  And it will be interesting to see how well it scores in the competition for ticket dollars.  There's action, there's excitement, there's revenge, there's good conquering evil.  But  Death Wishes 1thru 5 came out when the NY crime rate was much higher -- didn't Rudy Giuliani clean all that up?  Anyway, we'll see how audiences take to it.

"Hairspray," the original

There's a movie about to hit the big screen that's a remake of a play that was a remake of a movie.  It's "Hairspray."

The original movie was indeed an original.  Made in 1988 by the incomparable John Waters, it starred Divine, Mink Stole, Ricky Lake, Sonny Bono and others.  IMDB.

Anyone who wishes to see the original "Hairspray" will have that opportunity tomorrow as TBS is scheduled to show it on Friday, 7/20/07, at 9:00 am Central.

John Waters made some very controversial movies back then, although "Hairspray" was rather tame compared with some of the others.  Nonetheless, it's worth a look if you haven't seen it, and it probably won't ruin your appetite.

Early prediction:  John Travalta is no Devine.

Peter Weller, the way we were

Was watching a tape of the last season of  24 and who shows up?  None other than Peter Weller as a major villain.

We weren't friends, but we were both students at NTSU years ago. I caught him stealing some roses from the yard of the house where I was renting a room, but he said the owner had given him permission.  An unlikely story as the owner lived a few blocks away, but I couldn't prove it.

He was a handsome drama student, popular with the ladies.  His acting ability helped him in that regard, too, no doubt.

Anyway, my girl friend at that time was friends with him, and I was a tiny bit jealous.  So I resorted to the old tried and true weapon of ridicule.  I said to her, “Peter Weller, what's that?  Some sort of venereal disease?”

Ha ha, good  joke, right?  Well, I was the only one laughing.  I've repeated the story a couple of times over the years and got the same blank stare my girl friend gave me.  I thought it was a clever play on words, but I guess it's one of those jokes only the teller can enjoy.  Or to their credit, maybe they simply weren't familiar enough with vulgar slang.

But who knew he would grow up to be Robocop?  Not to mention Buckaroo Banzai, gasp!

So there he was as arch villain Christopher Henderson on “24.”  Well, Mr. Peter Weller, best of luck to you, but here's hoping Jack Bauer kicks your character's rear.

United 93

That movie, United 93, is opening this weekend and is all over the news.  The people on that United flight 93 were real heroes, and they deserve every bit of the attention they get for many reasons, not least of which is the lesson they gave us on how to reason, organize and respond in the face of terrorism.

But this entry isn't about the movie itself, it's about all the attention it's getting.

The cable channel A&E showed a made for tv movie about the same incident a few months ago.  It was a great movie, an emotional tv event.  The Flight 93 surviving family members who were interviewed gave it a thumbs up.  But, apparently, very few of people actually watched it.  (I did, by the way.)

So along comes this new theatrical release titled "United 93."  And in a stroke of marketing genius, commercials for it were shown in theaters in NYC to unsuspecting audiences.

"Too soon!"  "Too soon!"  We all heard the reports.  But it seems that the movie producers had to spend very little money on advertising, because the news folks gave them as much exposure as any movie producer could ever hope for.

Poor A&E.  Been there, done that, they are probably saying.  But their thunder got stolen by a shrewd marketer.  It's as if they were airline passengers watching helplessly as their plane got hijacked.

Instant update!  The A&E show Flight 93 is scheduled for airing again on April 29 and 30.  Great timing, A&E!

Desert Reel Film Festival 2006.

Mark your calendars.  The Desert Reel Film Festival has been scheduled for November 2, 3 and 4, 2006.   And they are currently soliciting entries.

Last year they showed some very unique films, some of which were made by our own home grown film makers.  And this year should be no different.

There are a surprising number of talented writers, actors and film makers around here.  In the past, the cost of making a movie was prohibitive.  But since the use of digital media became so prevalent, the cost has dropped significantly .  And some of last years Desert Reel features were made on a shoe string. 

So all of you talented people out there get cracking.  Why don't I do it?  Got no talent.

Dennis Weaver, star of "Duel," dead at 81

Dennis Weaver, remembered as "Chester" by people over a certain age, passed away last weekend.

I remember him as the hapless driver in the Steven Spielberg movie Duel, a truly terrifying movie.  He plays Mr. Mann, an everyman driving on a lonely highway, who by some relatively innocuous act manages to annoy a truck driver.

They get into a very scary game of highway cat and mouse with Mr. Mann being the mouse in his puny little rented car.  It was a case of road rage before the phrase "road rage" was invented.

If you ever drive on two lane highways, don't see that movie!

Netfix. Maybe, maybe not a good deal

I've been tempted by the advertising to try a subscription to Netflix, but I was holding back to wait for a time when I knew I could watch a lot of movies so that I could get my money's worth.  Now it looks like that strategy has a downside.  See Frequent Netflix renters sent to back of the line:

Netflix typically sends about 13 movies per month to Villanueva's home in Warren, Mich. — down from the 18 to 22 DVDs he once received before the company's automated system identified him as a heavy renter and began delaying his shipments to protect its profits.

The same Netflix formula also shoves Villanueva to the back of the line for the most-wanted DVDs, so the service can send those popular flicks to new subscribers and infrequent renters.

The little-known practice, called "throttling" by critics, means Netflix customers who pay the same price for the same service are often treated differently, depending on their rental patterns.

But, while Netflix might not be as good a deal as it sounds, it still might be a place of last resort to get access to those movies that aren't available at the local video rental shops.

Preview of coming attractions:  A courtroom drama featuring Netflix and the same class action lawyers who sued Blockbuster.

(Story link via James D. Hudnal.)

Going to see.... That movie!

Okay, I say to myself.  Keep you head low.  Don't make eye contact with anyone.

"One, please."

"Which movie?"

"(mumble mumble)"

"Huh?"

"(mumble mumble)."

"Brokeback Mountain?"

"Uh, okay.  Might as well see that one."

So I walk into the theater, the lights were off and the previews were rolling.   I couldn't see a thing, so I just stood there until my eyes adjusted.  I didn't want to run the risk of accidentally sitting on someone's lap.  Not at that movie!

But, I needn't have worried as there were fewer than a half dozen seats filled -- it's not going to be a huge grosser out here.  Or uh, let me rephrase.  It's not going to make a huge sum of money out here.

Director Ang Lee has made a movie that broke down barriers:  It brought gay jokes back out of the closet.  Comics everywhere are now free to make jokes about the gay cowboys of "Brokeback Mountain."  David Letterman and the late nighters along with radio personalities Don Imus and Craig Anderson have been set free of the politically correctness that shackled them for so long.  Heck, even I gave it a try at A Real Man's Guide to Brokeback Mountain.

For those who won't be able to see the movie, it's about two guys who take jobs herding sheep in Wyoming during the summer of 1963.  And one cold, drunken night their lust for each other took over the movie.

When the job ends they both move on their own separate ways, each getting married (to women) and fathering kids.  But over the course of a 20 year span they continue to meet up for fishing, hunting and gay sex, although viewers are spared from having to get too intimate with them in that department.

It was basically a gender bender, buddy film, chick flick, scenery rich, relationship western about an independent guy and a clingy co-dependent.

All in all, the movie was okay, but not great.  It certainly wasn't good enough to have earned all of the hoopla.  The movie has gotten a bunch of awards and will probably get more on Oscar night, not because it's good enough, but because the more-tolerant-than-thou Hollywood crowd loves throwing things in the faces of those who they perceive as intolerant.  Yet by doing that they are demonstrating the same intolerance they purport to abhor.  That spectrum is actually a circle where the extremes are indistinguishable.

So with that in mind, I would like to present to those award givers as well as to those who admonish us to avoid the movie, the "Two Door" award.  The winner gets to stand between two closed doors.  And what that award represents is that the winner doesn't know whether he's coming or going.

A Real Man's Guide to "Brokeback Mountain"

The two most important things that those of us who are "real men" most do is this: (1) make sure everyone knows that you are not gay, and (2) make sure everyone knows that you are not homophobic either, in that order.

It's okay to have gay friends so long as the two of you are never alone together, and never, ever in a hot tub!  And by all means, don't carry a man purse!  Uh, not that there's anything wrong with that.

So if you go to see "Brokeback Mountain" make sure there's a woman sitting beside you.  Better yet, one on each side.

I understand that the two guys who play the gay cowboys are closet heterosexuals.  Well, okay.  But, you just know that most young leading men types really love the adulation they get from their female fans.  That has to be one of the lures of stardom.  What hetero guy wouldn't relish the thought of scores of beautiful gals swooning over them?

So I have to wonder how those two actors will feel when it develops that their biggest fan base consists of gay men.  Oh well, just stay out of the hot tubs.

This movie will eventually appear on tv, Bravo channel is a good bet.  So, fellow real men, if you see the movie then there has to be something you can say you liked about it or else you might appear homophobic.  So here it is: "The scenery is spectacular!"  (Or so I've heard.)