Filed under The Big Picture …

Apr 29 2012
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Analyze This, Culture & Media, Rerun, The Big Picture

Analyze This: Underworld as Miscegenation Allegory

A few nights ago The Boy and I were bored and wanting to watch something stupid in bed that it would be okay if we fell asleep during. So, we pulled out our copy of Underworld, the Crow/Matrix-copying vampire versus werewolf flick that is much more badass that Bella mooning over Edward. I mean, not that it’s a good movie. Kate Beckinsale looks hot and badass in that suit that prolly gave her a yeast infection for a year and it has Michael Sheen in it! Plus, Bill Nighy? Always a win. Sure Ben from Felicity is cast as doctor (once again) and I’m like, dude can barely speak full sentences, no way he’d do well in a medical school interview, but overall, nice cast.

Anyhow, the quality (of lack therefore of) is not the point of this at all. It’s that when watching it, it occurred to me that it’s an allegory for miscesgentation, particularly that between a lording class (Vampires or, say Southern plantation owners) and enslaved peoples (Werewolves or, you know, enslaved African-Americans). The war that continues to wreak havoc between the two immortal species, who share a common evolutionary ancestor, is because a werewolf loved and mated with a vampire. The vampire’s father thinks this is an abomination, a dirtying of their bloodline, a threat to their very species, so he kills his daughter. Obviously her lover is angered and rises up against his servitude and then shit hits the fan. Next thing you know, you have lots of leather capes and people with guns and their best “stern serious face” and slow-motion fighting scenes. What a world, what a world!!!!!

The film comes firmly down on the “race-mixing is okay!” and “but what about love?” side of things. I mean, there’s not only a new Vampire/Werewolf love, but a mixed baby of sorts. WHO HAPPENS TO BE BETTER AND STRONGER AND AWESOMER THAN THE TWO SPECIES!! Could this movie be anymore clear? I mean, yeah, it probably could since it’s kinda confusing and not that well written… I’m not sure whether the writers of this series intended to make this kinda of “we should all get along”/”world peace” statement via Vampires and Lycans, but there ya go.

Intentional or not, it’s better than me realizing the film is on the side of justifying genocide and master races… Cause then I would be forced to know that Michael Sheen was in a movie that was uncool and I’d have to stop crushing on him. Oh, wait…

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Apr 29 2012
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Reviews, The Big Picture, The Oscars

The Big Picture: Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

❆ ❆ ❆ 3 Mittens ❆ ❆ ❆

(Spoilers!)

Last night, The Boy and I finally got around to watching David Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I had waited to see it because I kept wanting to read the book. I have this thing about reading books before seeing movie adaptations… However, I’ve tried three times to get through Stieg Larsson’s runaway hit and I just can’t. I don’t know if it’s the translation making some of the phrasing a bit odd for me or the fact that Mikael just isn’t that interesting a character and he’s in the first part of the book.

After seeing the movie, I definitely think the latter is true. If it weren’t for the natural charisma of Daniel Craig, I would really give a flying fuck about Mikael and his journalistic issues. There’s a reason that Lisbeth Salander is the titular girl with the dragon tattoo. She is an amazing character, played brilliantly by the Oscar-nominated newcomer Rooney Mara. Lisbeth has had a hard life, filled with violence and mental illness and, some have argued, autism. She has been touted as a feminist hero, though that can also be argued, especially since she takes revenge upon her rapist by raping him. I have to say, those scenes were really hard to watch. Raping your rapist makes you a rapist. That’s not okay, in any moral world. It just keeps the rape happening. Though, the outward marking of him as a perpetrator of violence against women was an interesting revenge fantasy played out, since so many rapists walk free and you can’t tell by “looking” at someone. Also, the massive amount of violence against women, detailed and shown in photographs and flashbacks, seemed to want to be a part of some anti-misogynist statement, yet is very much based on a misogynist form of storytelling.
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Apr 21 2012
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Now Playing, Reviews, The Big Picture

Now Playing: Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

❆ ❆ 2 1/2 Mittens ❆ ❆

Spoilers!!!

Like The Hunter, Salmon Fishing in the Yemen is a film based on a novel that seems to have lost something in translation. I desperately wanted to love this film, as I’m a big fan of both Emily Blunt and Ewan MacGregor. Add in some angsty self-discovery and some making-cute and you’ve basically won me over. Except, there was so little make-cute! Sure there was the initial comedic tension of opposites attract, but there’s no big kiss, no overwhelming romantic swooning! The only sex scenes aren’t even between the main characters and Ewan MacGregor’s is the opposite of sexy. I guess not everything we see him in can be Young Adam hotness, but still.

Overall it was a sweet film and I enjoyed the fishing part of it more than I thought I would. Plus, the political machinery of Kristin Scott Thomas is brilliantly wrong. But…I just didn’t get the satisfaction I was hoping for after two hours of hoping for a happy ending. It was like getting a banana split for desert and only eating the banana part.
I want my emotional whip cream and cherry, y’all!
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Apr 21 2012
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Now Playing, The Big Picture

Now Playing: Cabin in the Woods

❆ ❆ ❆ 3 1/2 Mittens ❆ ❆ ❆

 

So, I saw Cabin in the Woods almost a week ago and have been reading tons and tons of stuff on the web about it and talking to other friends that have seen it, but I haven’t been able to write a review. I think that’s because if I really talk about what I thought, I will spoil the film. Yes, I know I do that sometimes, but so much of the awesome of this movie relies on it being unspoiled. It’s clear it’s about sacrifice from the opening credits (and trailer) and that it’s not just a simple “big bad” horror film. There are people running the show and weird electric boundaries and elevators and… well, I can’t tell you and what else without giving too much away.

I will say that if you like Joss Whedon’s self-aware style of genre-tv and film, you will love this. It’s so much more an exploration of tropes (both horror and myth and religious) than a “scary movie.” In fact, I didn’t find it very frightening, beyond the concepts behind the titular cabin in the woods and the weekend that spells doom for the young, beautiful archetypes who stay there. In some ways, Cabin in the Woods feels like an extended Buffy episode, but without the character development that many episodes give you. It also felt like a conversation about films more than an actual film. Like, I really enjoyed the conversation the film was having and that it sparked amongst viewers, but I’m not sure I can say that it’s a good movie.

Still, I highly recommend going and seeing it. It’s definitely a fun time at the movies. And an even funner time for Whedonites like myself and others who like to geek out over tropes and archetypes and other annoying film study words like that.

PS If you want a film that is both a satire of genre films and a great movie, watch Shaun of the Dead. It is spot-on all around.

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Apr 21 2012
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Now Playing, Reviews, The Big Picture

Now Playing: American Reunion

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American Pie came out the year I graduated high school, 1999. It was the beginning of modern film’s r-rated comedy boon that eventually led us to The Hangover and I remember feeling very uncomfortable by the film when watching it… My parents were pretty strict about censoring inappropriate content so it took a few years for me to be unashamed watching things like Jason Segel and his penis getting dumped in Forgetting Sarah Marshall.

American Reunion, unlike its predecessor, is not the beginning of a new era. Rather, it is clearly the end. Stale jokes based on objectifying women, masturbating, and parents having sex lives distract from the only part of the film with any resonance, what has happened to these characters as they grew up. You know, like how we grew up and became adults. It’s mildly touching as a “going back to who we were” film, but fails as a contemporary comedy. The plot is too focused on Jim and the kid he used to babysit and on Stifler being a jerk who just wants to be loved. Yes, those are the two most charismatic actors in the film, but it undermines what made American Pie so sweet at its core: the friendships of these young men.

Overall, it’s definitely a rental if you are curious and nostalgic about the Class of 1999. If you want a good time, I recommend passing as I honestly don’t think I chuckled out loud once.

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