I had fun at John Carter

I had so much fun at this movie! My sister and I went to see it yesterday afternoon. It reminded me of a hybrid Indiana Jones/ Star Wars experience - thrilling, funny, lots of fighting, sand and dust.  It's not as good as the best of either series, nor is it as bad as the worst of either series. I found it to be solidly entertaining.  Should the other two movies of this proposed franchise be made, I will go see them. Yes, it was silly in parts, but it's Adventure Movie silly, which is the nature of the beast. If you can't wrap your suspension of disbelief around a a civil war veteran traveling to Mars via a magic widget, you probably weren't much tempted by this story in the first place.  Besides, there's something almost cozy about an other-planet adventure that happens in our own solar system.

The cast is great - I especially enjoyed Bryan Cranston in his small part as Powell; Dominic West was delightfully weaselly as the baddie prince of Zodanga (ZODANGA!); Mark Strong was evil and bald in the way he has perfected; I was happy (as always) to see James Purefoy. As the titular John Carter, Taylor Kitsch was broody and believable - I thought he pulled off both the fish out of water comedy and man out of time pathos of his role, all while performing nonstop action, mostly naked. Not everyone can do that!  Lynn Collins was tough, beautiful and smart as my new favorite character Dejah Thoris,  princess of Helium. She's an orange badass scientist princess -  how many of those do you meet in a year?  Having never read the book (although I've just downloaded the free ebook), I didn't realize how much Star Wars borrowed from this story. Princess Dejah is the obvious ass-kicking loyal-to-her-people predecessor of Princess Leia.

 I laughed, the guys behind me laughed and at the end they both said it was better than they thought it would be. The showing I went to - middle of a Saturday afternoon, 2-D -  was a little over half full, and appeared to be a mix age and gender-wise. (although overall there were probably more dudes than ladies.)

The reviews for John Carter have been mixed but much of the discussion has been less about the story on screen and more about domestic gross and how expensive it was to make.  These reviews almost uniformly have a very discouraging title, but some eventually come through and say "if you like this sort of thing (you know who you are) you will probably have a good time at this movie." I do, and I did!

Now I will cherry pick quotes that reflect my views:

A word on costuming and awfully wonderfulness, from the Salon Review titled "Will John Carter Rank Among the All-Time Bombs" (a review that seems mainly concerned with the perceived universal badness of movies about Mars):

Playing the ruler of Helium and father of Dejah Thoris, Irish actor Ciarán Hinds gets to wear the most awesome military uniform I’ve ever seen, which appears to have been jointly designed by Julius Caesar, George Washington, Idi Amin and Karl Lagerfeld. (Sacha Baron Cohen’s fictional Arab dictator can eat his heart out.) At its best, “John Carter” is a mightily impressive spectacle, cleanly photographed in dusty reds and brilliant blues by Daniel Mindel, which dares to straddle that elusive boundary between awfulness and wonderfulness. It’s awfully wonderful, or wonderfully awful.

The NYT review has a more neutral title -  'John Carter' with Taylor Kitsch and Lynn Collins:

Messy and chaotic, in other words, but also colorful and kind of fun. The movie begins in an atmosphere of Victorian spookiness: an old manse with dark paneling, a sealed tomb out back and many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore piled up in the study. In the blink of an eye we’re in Arizona Territory just after the Civil War, which is to say classic western territory, with monumental rock formations, beleaguered cavalrymen, bellicose Apaches and a dark saloon into which a taciturn stranger comes a-moseying.
...
Carter, stripped of his shirt and endowed with extraordinary leaping ability (something to do with gravity), befriends some noble Tharks (voiced by Willem Dafoe and Samantha Morton), acquires a loyal Martian “monster dog” and falls in love with a Heliumese (Heliumian?) princess named Dejah Thoris (Lynn Collins), who is both a fierce sword fighter and a big shot at the Helium Academy of Science. 

There is more. There is nothing but more: a huge cast, soaring digital architecture, creatures both adorable and fearsome, lines of dialogue (“Thurns are a myth!”) made even more ridiculous by being uttered in earnest. The silliness — much of which is clearly intentional — is blended with some genuine grandeur.

I had fun. Normally, it would be enough for me to just tell my friends in person if I thought they might enjoy this movie - but since John Carter is getting piled on from every direction, I wanted to say that I liked it publicly. 

movie movie movie the word has lost all meaning

My Oscar Summary:

Billy Crystal - terrible in ways I would not have predicted.
Angelina's leg -  I think she was goofing on everyone and I kind of love her for it. LEG OUT
Bret Mackenzie - BRET! That he won for work with Muppets makes it even better.
Emma Stone's  dress - she loved it so much that I LOVE IT TOO. 95% of all other gowns looked like Barbie Prom, why not have a little fun with a beautiful color and a giant neck bow?
The Rest: I was crocheting, but I did love Captain Von Trapp winning his award with his dashing mustache and generous thanks. I'm also curious what they bleeped out of Christian Bale's speech.

IN SHORT: Hugh Jackman, please come back! (it won't embed, which makes me sad.) Notice that by the end of his performance that the audience loves him - he's really bringing it and they respond with surprise and delight -  not the grim gutting it out of 2012's audience. Oh, Hugh. (siiiigh.)

These two videos below made me laugh - first the star-studded trailer for Movie: The Movie, put together by Jimmy Kimmell and some people willing to be very silly.  Gary Oldman should be in everything. After that, Making the Movie: The Making of Movie: The Movie. ha ha ha!

hey hey in the hayloft

Today I watched Sullivan's Travels again and it was delightful as always. I forget how funny these screwball era movies are if I haven't seen one in a while. Sullivan's Travels was on my mind because I pressed it on a co-worker who hadn't seen it in years  -  she took it on holiday for thanksgiving and her whole family loved it. It's not a classic just because it was funny back in 1942, but because it's TIMELESS.

 One of my favorite bits from early in the movie is director Sullivan - known for his light comedies - trying to convince two studio bosses to let him make O Brother Where Art Thou, his movie vision that's "a true canvas of the suffering of humanity." I love the bosses trying to bargain for "a little sex in it" and I really love the titles of his early films: Hey Hey in the Hayloft; So long, Sarong; Ants in Your Plants of 1939. (ANTS IN YOUR PLANTS OF 1939!!!!) Ha ha ha! These titles are perfect parodies of a certain kind of movie (Gold Diggers of 1933/1935/1937, anyone?) but I would happily watch any one of them if they really existed.

But my luck is even better, because I have the rest of the Preston Sturges box set waiting by the television.  (I think maybe Palm Beach Story next - that one has Joel McCrae and Claudette Colbert and, of course,  hilarious misunderstandings.)

Or maybe I should watch this one again and follow it up with the Coen brothers O Brother Where Art Thou...

how go your plans?

Today was funny.  I was at work minding my business when a person who is not my direct boss but in a position of authority was taking her leave from a meeting. I know her, but not really well. She was chatting with people as she left, and stopped by my workstation to ask "how go your plans for world domination?" My first thought was WHAT?? my second thought was how did you know? What I said aloud was non-commital but generally positive. (the gist: I have no idea what you're talking about, but if I did, I would say Very Well.) (this was an exaggeration, but I've found - thank you Ghostbusters - that if someone asks about your plans for world domination, it's good to at least pretend to be prepared.)  The best thing about her question is that I spent the rest of the day feeling like a benign Doctor Evil with plans to make One Meeellion Dollars and maybe get some fricking laser beams on some fricking sharks. Time well spent!

*****

Below is the official trailer for the Jane Eyre movie coming out in the spring. It seems like they've got a lot of appropriate gothic spooky atmosphere, but as always Mr. Rochester is too handsome  and Jane too pretty. But they're making an effort to be more homely, I can tell! It's Hollywood Homely, bless their hearts. But anyway - I'm excited to see it! It's got Judi Dench (love her!) as Mrs. Fairfax and I believe Sally Hawkins (love her too!) as the evil Mrs. Reed... Excellent. They spared no expense on the fog machine, which is as it should be.

I am ALMOST done with the book. I'm going to quit the internet right now and go read some more - but before I go, I ask you: How go YOUR plans for world domination?

three things about monday

1. I ate a miniature cupcake in honor of Beverly Cleary's 94th birthday. The library I worked at is in Ramona Quimby's neighborhood, so naturally there was a party. There were mini cupcakes, stickers, many rounds of Happy Birthday, and some sugared up but smiling parents and children.

2. April is national poetry month - I signed up to get a poem a day for the month and today's was lovely: a dream language adventure that spans continents and seasons in one short prose poem. Read it here: Postcard to I. Kaminsky from a Dream at the Edge of the Sea by Cecilia Woloch. "My own bags were full of salt, which made them shifty, hard to lift."

3. I want to see this Edwardian lady adventurer movie right now - she definitely looks capable of thwapping someone (be they man, mummy, or flying dinosaur) with a parasol. After I watched this trailer the first time I thought "hey! this reminds me of The Professor's Daughter," but then saw that Adèle Blanc-Sec has her own comics of extraordinary adventures. Wikipedia describes her as "A cynical heroine, she is initially a novelist of popular fiction, who turns to investigative journalism as her research and subsequent adventures reveal further details of the mystical world of crime." Subsequent adventures! Mystical world of crime! Must learn more. (do you think they'll reissue because of the movie?) This looks to fill an Indiana Jones shaped hole in summer movie viewing.

so much it hurts

I know this is last week's news, but I'm so excited for the Scott Pilgrim movie - I wasn't sure about it until I saw the trailer (below):


...and now I can't wait! I guess the good thing is it gives me time to reread all the books. You should check them out if this clip looks at all funny/awesome/both to you - the tone is very similar. Go here or here (or both if your clicky finger is itchy) to find out more about the series. Go here to see who's in the movie. (Anna Kendrick as Stacy Pilgrim seems perfect, if the 2 seconds she's in the trailer are any indication.) All that, plus Beck wrote the songs for Sex Bob-Omb. (!!)

movie list

Here are some movies I’ve seen recently. Well, some of them are recent, some of them are from when I decided to start keeping a list a couple of months ago. My plan is to clear out the backlog (this post and maybe another) and then just sort of keep up to date in a weekly-ish fashion. WHO KNOWS! I don’t exactly have the best plan to action record these days. These are just little descriptions - I may come back to some of them for longer, later.

Ball of Fire: 1941, Howard Hawks (library) (written by Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder) I love Barbara Stanwyck. LOVE HER. You know what else I love? I love Barbara Stanwyck playing a slang-slinging burlesque-singing dame named Sugarpuss O’Shea, a woman with a gangster boyfriend problem, which leads to a hot nerd problem. Gary Cooper is handsome but hopelessly square Bertram Potts (good old Pottsie), a linguist trying to compile an encyclopedia entry on slang. He lives in a house with 7 other eccentric encyclopedia authors who each live up to different egghead stereotypes with great enthusiasm. Potts is convinced he must conduct interviews with Ms.O’Shea (and others) in order to fix his entry and save the encyclopedia. Complications, as you might imagine, ensue. Cops, the Conga, stockings, spangles, a grouchy housekeeper, cheesy wise-guy lingo, smooching, a car chase, self-taught pugilism and much, much more. Dana Andrews is gangster-boyfriend Joe Lilac. JOE LILAC!

Twilight: 2008, Catherine Hardwicke (netflix) - they filmed a lot of this in Oregon, and some of it in Portland (I drove by some of the high school stuff on the way to work one time) - so I love seeing the misty grey thickness of the rainforest represented so faithfully. I learned previously unknown to me things, like that when vampires sparkle in the sunlight (!!), they also make a noise not unlike a flourescent lightbulb. This movie was overcooked in a lot of ways (why not make up a new monster if you want to have a vegetarian vampire who can go out in the sun???), but I also know that I would have been desperately, irrationally in love with this whole franchise between the ages of 12 -14. (including a dramatic “you just don’t understand” door slamming fight about it with my dad, who was a big Dracula fan.) fun fact/ annoying weather pedantry: If the Cullens really lived in Forks, Washington they’d never get to play baseball (!) because while it does rain a lot, thunder and lightning are rare.

The Hangover: 2009, Todd Phillips (netflix) isn’t this just a raunchy version of Dude, Where’s My Car? (which itself is a goofy version of Memento?) Is that too reductive? I know there are only so many ways to tell a story, but I kept thinking “DUDE” while I was watching The Hangover. That said, I laughed a lot. Ed Helms and Zach Galifianakis are very funny. Bradley Cooper is funny too, and maybe he has the harder job since he always plays such an asshole.

Where the Wild Things Are: 2009, Spike Jonze (movies) I enjoyed this! The first bit (before Max runs off) is crooked and ragged and vital and the kingdom of the Wild Things is primal forest/beach strange, but also natural and beautiful. I thought most of the dialogue was too therapy-speak, but the visuals were magical and spoke to the 8 year old wild-jen within. (be warned: she is queen of the alligators.) Max Records has a very expressive face and I love the Karen O/Carter Burwell score.

Julie & Julia: 2009, Nora Ephron (netflix) I wanted to love the Julie parts of this story too, if only so I could be the one person on the planet who didn’t say “I wish it was Julia & More Julia.” But I didn’t so I can’t! I will say that I do normally really like Amy Adams. (did you know she was in an episode of Buffy? She was!)

The Wizard of Oz: 1939, Victor Fleming (library)The new digital technicolor restoration is AMAZING! I watched the old DVD version last year and the restored 70th anniversary edition this year - the difference is astounding. I thought the old one looked pretty good, but the new one is incredible.


The Harvey Girls: 1946, George Sidney (library) Judy Garland is a sassy mail-order bride/ railroad singing waitress in a wild west town. The guy with a lot of teeth and shiny black hair who runs the town is at war with her… or is he?! Will they resolve their differences? Will Judy sing songs by Harry Warren and Johnny Mercer? Also starring Ray Bolger (“Scarecrow, I’ll miss you most of all”) , Cyd Charisse, and let’s not forget Angela Landsbury in sequins and feathers, hiding her pining heart of gold if you know what I mean and I think that you do.

Fantastic Mr. Fox: 2009, Wes Anderson (movies) FANTASTIC! I loved this. Review from the 6 year old sitting behind us: Booo-ring. (of course that tiny critic thought the tooth fairy movie with The Rock looked good, so I’m not looking for any movie advice from him.) I loved every little individually placed piece of animal fur and cuss graffiti in this movie. It was a good year for stop-motion animation! It’s funny how these kind of raggedy puppets dressed in human style clothes get to the essential parts of their wild animal nature in ways that the big monsters of WtWTA never quite do.

how many nickels?

Easy Living is a 1937 film written by Preston Sturges, directed by Mitchell Leisen, starring Jean Arthur and billed as 'high society slapstick.' I liked it quite a bit but did not love it, although I would certainly recommend it if you like Preston Sturges or Jean Arthur or high society slapstick. The story begins with working girl Mary Smith riding to work on top of a double decker bus, only to have her view obscured by the very expensive fur coat that falls on her out of nowhere. (Nowhere turns out to be the window of a penthouse apartment, but she doesn't know that yet.) She puts it on, and suddenly everyone assumes she's a rich man's mistress. (She does try to find the rightful owner.)

On the coat throwing end of things, there's a husband in hot water; misunderstandings abound! Husband in Hot Water and Angry Wife have an Accused of Fecklessness (but handsome and intrepid) Son who stomps out of the penthouse to make it on his own (I'll show you!), while Mary Smith tries to figure out what the hell is going on and why everyone thinks she's sleeping with the rich old guy who let her keep the coat and bought her an expensive hat. (I like the way this was handled, surprisingly -- she's a nice girl, but not without a practical and sweetly mercenary streak. Rent is due and she lost her job because of all this and if he wants to buy her something, she'll let him.) Meanwhile, there's a cute boy working at the automat. You can probably guess what happens, but a surprise ending is not the pleasure in a film like this. There's a lot of barbed humor at the expense of Wall Street and bankers (everything old is new again!), but to counter that more cerebral fast talking there's a lot of double taking and slapstick falling down. I like it both ways in screwball comedies and this doesn't disappoint.

But let's talk about the automat! There is a fantastic automat scene in this movie -- Mary is all kitted out in her fancy coat and hat, but she's starving. Despite being installed in the Hotel Louis (by proprietor Louis Louis who thinks she's the old guy's mistress and is hoping to curry favor), despite her fetching hat, she is HONGRY and has very little money -- only the change in her pocket -- so she goes to the automat, which conveniently is open late and takes change.

I'm in love with the idea of the old fashioned automat; all that marble and frill for what's essentially a cross between a cafeteria and a vending machine. My first encounter with an automat was, no joking, in a Trixie Belden girl detective novel: the Mystery of the Blinking Eye. (Trixie and Honey stay at the Wheeler's fancy apartment and solve a NYC crime, I think something to do with smugglers and they end up getting chased through the U.N. --ANYWAY, the important part is they eat at an automat.)

I couldn't find any movie stills featuring the automat, so I had to make my own.


Mary's supervisor, about to rat her out to the boss for having a fancy coat. (this has nothing to do with automats, but I love the "you tramp" expression on her face, and of course the large Mr. Higginbottom on the door.)



This gives a general sense of the layout of the room -- lots of marble, lots of tiny little doors with categorized food behind. Some tables for sitting down, some tables for standing up. It looks like basic condiments are on every table. (salt/pepper, sugar, etc.)


hungry, but stylish.


dig the checkerboard floor and attractive waitstaff!


he recommends the pot pie, but Mary doesn't have enough nickels. (at this point, he thinks he knows her from some fancy society event. She thinks he's either crazy or just plain mean.)


but he persists and suggests that he'll open up the doors from the back, and pay the automat after he gets paid. (nothing can go wrong with this plan!) She's cracking wise because that's how you do in this kind of movie. Note the girl in the booth behind them: Wikipedia tells me that she's there to give change.


you sure this is okay?


uh oh. There has been some unauthorized/accidental lever-pulling in the back. (and a pretty great cafeteria-style kitchen fight!)


word gets out that the food is free. (I love the revolving door and the turkey leg in his hand.)


chaos, hot dishes, fruit salad, cake everywhere. This is very early in the food fight. (chaos is slippery.)


The drink station -- you can barely see it, but there are slots for nickels just to the right of every spigot.


I don't think this is the usual employee exit.


Time to go! (poor Mary, she barely got to eat anything.)


The aftermath. She's still hungry, but I don't think I'm spoiling anything if I tell you it works out okay in the end.