repost from Josephdickerson.com...

I have a love/hate relationship with Star Wars. I am a fan, though the humanism of Star Trek will always make me prefer that series. Star Wars is all peaks and valleys to me - the first two films being the peak, and most of the recent output being a (very deep) valley.

Well, you see some of the negative reaction to these deep valleys in the following trailer, for the documentary The People Vs. George Lucas:



If you go to sites highlighting this trailer, like deadlinehollywooddaily.com, you see a lot of very strong opinions expressed about Lucas, and this documentary. OK, here's some more of mine:

Lucas settled. He took the easy money. He could have done the "art films" he claimed repeatedly that he wanted to do, and he didn't. He went to make the prequels and the cartoons and even more toys and THAT is why many many people are frustrated with him.

He stopped trying.

You see some of that frustration in the trailer, people who LOVE his work and hope that we will see the potential he showed in THX-1138, in Graffitti, in Star Wars... once again realized.

Hasn't happened. And I think it never will.

Did Lucas impact Hollywood, and create a lot of opportunities for a whole lot of people? You bet. I don't think that is the point of this documentary. Whether this documentary is professionally done or not, this effort is a reflection of a shared opinion: Lucas let us down. And we're frustrated with that - and with him.

Being the father of three and the holder of a fifty-hour work week (NOT counting household chores) I tend to be late to the game when it comes to movies, especially when the holidays roll around. Now that Chstmas/New Years is past I have had a “buffer zone” (between work and family obligations) that gave me the chance to catch up on the latest James Bond film and a movie that has been bandied about in many Oscar conversations. Bond comes first…

Quantum of Solace is, well… a mess. Not a HUGE mess, mind you, just one of those messes that tends to linger in your bedroom, in front of the dresser… big enough to notice, just not one that you get offended at and have to clean up RIGHT NOW. It just kind of meanders about, as sub-par messes tend to do.

It has its moments (mainly, the first twenty minutes) and it has its charms (Daniel Craig, mostly) but it just kind of lies there. The movie is WAY too short in some respects - I still don’t know what the bad guys were after, besides keeping water away from poor people (a plot that is, well, comic-booky). The characters were underdeveloped and flat, another victim of the short running time methinks. I’m glad I just rewatched the last Bond Casino Royale a month ago… otherwise I would have been clueless, because this Bond starts five minutes after that one ended (and yet some characters have had some notable time pass/events occur since that film ended - lazy writing?).

In the end, it fails to do what even average Bond films do at times: excite me. Meh. Well, better luck next time.

Now The Wrestler, on the other hand: WOW. To say that Mickey Rourke gave the best performance I saw this year is an understatement (sorry, Heath). The last time I watched an actor so completely in character, and so raw and real and true, was when Brando played Don Corleone in The Godfather. It’s THAT GOOD a performance, and I feel pretty confident my hyperbole is in check here.

The script has some weak and contrived moments (I can see the ending coming a MILE away), and the other performances are inconsistent (Tomei is good, the actor playing the title character’s daughter, not so much), but putting that aside, this is a fantastic character study and one of the best of 2008. It’s my new favorite Darren Arronovski film.

What should I believe?

It’s an odd question, but it’s one we have all had at one point or another. We may have not even expressed this question consciously - we may have absorbed what other people told us, and adapted their belief system, making it our own. We get it from our parents, our friends, or... Some of us... well...

Some of us get a large part of what we believe in - what is right, wrong, or neither - we get it from a piece of entertainment. An album. A movie. A TV show.

Obviously, this is not the way most people do it, and sometimes it can be a VERY BAD THING (see: Charles Manson) - but nature abhors a vacuum. The need is there, to have SOMETHING to believe in.

I believed in Patrick McGoohan.

Not as a person, really - I believed more in what he messaged to me and many many others through his performance in and writing of the classic TV show The Prisoner.

That the rights of the individual to BE an individual is the most important right any of us have.
That knowledge, without context and wisdom, is useless trivia.
That we are not numbers.
That we are beholden to no one save ourselves.
That our life is our own, to do with as we see fit.
That the government, the mob, cults of any kind - they are NOT on your side.
That we make our own prisons.
That you can’t escape yourself.
And so on.

I would have loved to have been near McGoohan in 1968 and saw his reaction to how the finale of the Prisoner was received by the public - when they expected some type of James Bond Villain reveal as to who #1 was. The leader of the Village, the warden, the Big Bad.

In the end... it was #6 himself, behind the mask... The monkey mask of “I”...

The viewers were outraged. The press wrote scathing critiques.

He probably laughed his head off.

Patrick McGoohan died today at the age of 80 after a prolonged illness. I am incredibly remorseful, as I never had the chance to thank him for his work. And he did much much more than The Prisoner (I loved his appearances in Columbo, his work in a little-known movie called The Hard Way, and his Academy Award-nominated role as Longshanks in Braveheart). But The Prisoner is the work that impacted me, that had a huge role in making me who I am today... and one of the reasons my first born son has the middle name of Patrick.

Rest in peace, sir. And thanks.

One of the things that I've been thinking about over the past few weeks is continuity. Now, to some people, the term "continuity" means consistency on a TV show or movie from scene to scene (someone on the set makes sure that the actor's hairstyle does not change from scene to scene and that props set on a table don't mysteriously "move" in between cuts). That's not what I'm talking about.

What I mean is the continuity of character and story inside a TV series. In the 1950s there was very little of this, even in hour-long dramas (with some exceptions - The Fugitive famously had the ongoing story thread of the one-armed man, which was resolved in the series' final episode). In the sixties some continuity began to occur more often, with recurring villians (Wild Wild West, Batman, Star Trek, Doctor Who) and references to earlier episodes in later ones (again, Doctor Who, The Prisoner, Thunderbirds). Note that british television was an early pioneer of continuing story arcs and continuity.

The real continuity as we know it today was on TV in the 50s and 60s, was on daytime television. Soap Operas such as Guiding Light and Edge of Night told continuing stories, and character arcs ended while others began.

Then the era of the mini-series: the 1970s became the "novel for television" decade, starting with Roots and continuing with Rich Man Poor Man, Holocaust, Winds of War and many many others. These allowed the creators of television productions to tell complete stories with a limited number of "episodes" and to may in television this was a very appealing prospect (far better than having to create stories in the context of "everything's the same/works out/fine" at the end of every episode). A lot of the writers on mini-series ended up in hour long dramas and so...

Following quick on the mini-series was the prime time soap opera, taking the same approach at story telling that daytime TV had used for decades. You know the shows: Dallas, Knots Landing, Dynasty, Falcon Crest. Continuity was all-important and, like day-time soaps, viewers had to tune in every week to keep up with the story. It has continued to this day, with dramas (Lost, ER, Battlestar Galactica, etc.) and comedies alike (The Office, My Name is Earl, Arrested Development, etc.) having ongoing stories steeped in a self-created continuum.

And that's when I think the problems started, for both viewers and TV creators.

First, the positives that continuity brings to TV:

• Stories are not limited to an hour, and can last anywhere from two episodes to an entire season.


• Viewers HAVE to keep watching (to keep up - networks LOVE that)


• Characters can leave and return, and writers can explain advances in their character through exposition (it happens "off camera) and allow for


• New characters and arcs can be created and introduced at any time.


• An entire series can be "planned out" by the producers, much like the better soap opera writers have done.


• It allows for the creation of a rich "universe" that can be used as a springboard for new ideas and arcs.

Now, the negatives (some directly related to the above):







A final thought: One of my favorite shows of all time (often referenced on this blog) is The Odd Couple, and it had a huge number of continuity problems/contradictions (here is an article that lists most of them). It was also pretty damn funny, and consistently so. In interviews, when producer Garry Marshall has been asked why there were four different episodes showing how Felix and Oscar met (for example). Marshall has shaken his head. His reply?

"It's just a TV SHOW! All we were trying to do is tell a good story and make people laugh!"

I daresay if more shows spent more time telling good stories and less on trying to "map out arcs" we'd have better television.

…I’m tired and I want to go to bed. I had a little drink about an hour ago and it’s gone right to my head…"

I had a… well, it was a very challenging day at work today. And so I needed some reassurance and comfort when I got home. I needed… comfort food.

Only my comfort food is not, well, actual food. It’s movies.

Tonight, it was Jaws.

Setup the video projector, put the disc in, and forgot all my troubles.

Have I mentioned that I consider Jaws a near-perfect movie before? If not, then I have been remiss in my blogging duties.

Jaws is nearly perfect. More than Gone with the Wind, more than Casablanca, and more than Citizen Kane. And I love ALL those films.

Why is Jaws special to me, more than the above? Because I have read about the making of many many films and the making of Jaws was far far worse than the other "disastrous" shoots I have read of. Worse than any Herzog shoot. Worse than shooting Apocalypse Now.

It was brutal. It almost made Spielberg hang up his directing cap, when he had barely begun.

If you doubt me, just read up on the making of the film. Heck, a whole documentary has been made highlighting the turmoil of the filming (and the films impact).

So, besides being a fantastic movie to begin with, it is, to me, inspirational. Because, if Steven can get through all he had to push/force himself through to make Jaws, then any of the daily frustrations I have, well.. they pale in comparison.

I am not tying to shoot a major motion picture at sea, with three different boats and a mechanical shark to coordinate, for example.

I am also not fighting for my life against a great white shark - that, too, is something to be thankful for.

Quick addendum - tonight was the first time I was able to watch the movie with my 10-year old son, Hunter, and I took great pleasure in seeing it through his eyes. He enjoyed it, and "jumped" at the proper moments.

It holds up.

I have no doubt it will ALWAYS hold up as a great film, for generations still to come.

Thanks again, Steve, for pushing past the obstacles and making it work. It encourages me, even with obstacles and barriers unplanned for, to keep going.

In the end, it’s worth it. Even if the results are not shown to an audience of millions.

Haven’t done this in a while, so let’s have a go shall we?

Man, it is really hard to believe it’s been almost 14 years since this, the first film to feature the Next Generation crew, was released. Lot’s happened since then, both in the world and in my own personal life. When this came out, I was in the middle of courting my soon-to-be wife, and the idea that she would be a stay-at-home mom with three sons to take care of wasn’t even a vague notion in my head/

Technology has advanced quite a bit as well. I remember being impressed by the wall-sized view screen on the 1701-D bridge, and would have killed for a similar setup. After all this time, how did I revisit this film? On my wall-sized (projected) screen, which cost less than some Star Trek collectibles I have seen for sale on ebay.

And all that 24th Century tech gear they used? Heck, my iphone looks cooler than any tricorder from the show (though nothing beats the classic style of the original series’ props).

So, 14 years later, how did the movie stand up? Not very well, I’m afraid. Course, I did not like it that much when it was initially released, either…

The film marks the meeting of the original captain of the Enterprise James T. Kirk with the next generation’s Jean-Luc Picard. This was a BIG DEAL for Trek fans, and there was a lot of anticipation for the film. How would the meet? What would they do? What epic struggle would they have to join forces to defeat?

They finally meet, dramatically… actually, no they didn’t. They debated each other about obligations and duty as one of them fixed breakfast.

Sigh.



How’d they get to that point (and how did WE get to that point as an audience)? The plot is a contrivance, really, to create an adversary to defeat and get the two captains (Kirk and Picard) together. The bad guy, played by Malcolm McDowell, is a one-note character though McDowell does a great job with what he is given (he, Shatner and Stewart are all good here, and the acting is one of the few highlights). The effects are solid, the supporting cast all have great moments, but…

It just doesn’t work. The quest of the bad guy (to get back to The Nexus, where "death has no teeth") involves collapsing stars and killing millions of people and, well… the stakes just seem artificial. The way the crew stumbles into the bad guy’s plot is just… well, they stumble into it. Whoopi Goldberg’s powers are, like in other episodes of TNG, mainly the alien power of exposition, allowing Picard to get the information he needs to advance the plot forward. None of it is organic, it’s all forced.

The nice thing about rewatching it was I was able to watch it twice – once with my oldest son (who thought it was ’OK’) and once with the Ron Moore and Bannon Braga audio commentary track on. Braga and Moore wrote some of the best episodes of TNG and Moore is a fantastically talented writer (see the new Battelstar Galactica) and so their comments are particularly enlightening.

They don’t like it either.

Well, let me clarify that: they don’t out and out say "man, we screwed up" but they say enough things to make you realize that, if this was not a commentary track for a DVD, they would probably be a lot more critical and forthcoming about their opinions (though they do admit that the final two-hour episode of TNG was better and THAT should have been the movie). Moore, especially, appears to have a lot of regret about how it turned out. He’s not the only one.

A couple of final thoughts: They had to reshoot the ending which, like the final version of the movie (SPOILER ALERT) had Captain Kirk die. Watching the original ending, I shudder to think of how that would have been received (it may have killed Trek at the cinema much sooner than Nemesis finally did). It was pretty bad, and the final ending was better by comparison but…

I’m not one to say "Captain Kirk should not have died" or "how dare they kill Kirk!" but I will say that the whole narrative structure failed the audience and reduced the meaning of Kirk’s death to a footnote. Allow me to explain this opinion. Basically, whenever anyone sees a film, reads a novel or watches a TV show a natural suspension of disbelief occurs, and how far the audience will "go along" with the writer or director depends on how "grounded" the story is by the rest of the work.

Ian Fleming wrote some CRAZY stuff in his James Bond novels, but he "grounded" the story elements with so much real world detail that the reader got past any doubt and got swept up in the story. Richard Donner and Mario Puzo’s Superman: the Movie has at it’s heart a near-ludicrous premise (most super-hero stories do) but they do a very smart thing: they make the world Superman lives in as real as they can and the authenticity of his surroundings helps the audience believe what they are seeing. I could list other examples but let’s return to Generations…

Two-thirds the way through the movie, Picard enters the Nexus (where Kirk has been since the first part of the picture), where everything is a fantasy and NOTHING IS REAL. See what I’m getting at? To viewers, who have bought into the story by that point, you have now reset their expectations and shown them a completely "real-looking" environment that does not really EXIST. Then you take them out of the "fake world" and put them back in the "real world" and… you’ve lost them. Now, it’s just a movie, there is no emotional investment, and they have no "skin" in the game.

The Matrix had a similar problem with their narrative, but they fixed it by making the audience care about the characters and curious about the "secret" of the Matrix and THEN it was revealed, the twist being that the "real world" they had come to believe was NOT real. That worked (at least for the first film). This… didn’t.

Kirk died, and it FELT like it did not matter (even though in the story he saved millions of lives). And that is hard to accept as a classic Trek fan.

So, all in all, was I glad I revisited Generations? Yes, because it is still not a "bad" movie in the context of something that MST3K would make fun of… but I doubt it’s a DVD I’ll revisit anytime soon.

Maybe in another 14 years.

Up until two days ago, I was coveting the AppleTV, especially after the new upgrade and features they recently added, but thrift and frugality has prevented that particular splurge… again, up until two days ago.

Well, I bit the bullet, I got one, and I’m impressed. A couple of quick thoughts…

I am not a big TV watcher, spending most of my time in front of either my work or my home computer. Like many others I have started to watch a lot of video content in that context (mostly at home). Up till recently I watched mostly podcasts, but now, with all the big four TV networks offering streaming video (I caught up with almost a full season of Lost watching ABC’s streaming HD feed), I am watching shows on my computer I already have on my DVR while I work. I’m not too lazy to get up and walk the fifteen feet to my media room, it’s just much more convenient and efficient.

So, what does this have to do with AppleTv? Well, everything.

Apple is still trying to leverage what I think is a dead content model, by selling episodes of TV shows for $2 and rentals for $4. When you have better quality video streaming for free (ad supported, of course) with ubiquitous access (any computer with sufficient processing power and a high-speed connection will do), with Netflix offering numerous pricing and rental models to support differing viewing habits, and with cable and satellite providers undercutting each other by giving away free DVRs and receivers, why spend $230 for the privilege of paying to watch TV or movies?

Now, don’t get me wrong, I LOVE my AppleTv, even though the UI is somewhat counter-intuitive (I may post on that later). But I think the real value of the unit to me and a lot of others is the ability to stream content from my computer. I marvel at how good video looks from DVDs I have ripped to my Mac hard drive (for archival purpose, of course). The video quality of most youtube videos I’m watching on the AppleTV is also quite surprising, with several looking better than some of my DirecTV channels.

BUT I think AppleTV is a solution looking for a problem, and the solution primarily involves exploiting impulse buyers to boost Apple’s bottom line (and yes, having that easy-to-use "Rent" button is very tempting, and that movie will get here a lot faster than Netflix).

What can Apple do to make this a must-have device? What they have avoided for years… a monthly all-you-can watch rental service as part of .mac. I’d pay $20-30 for such a service… and if they could get enough content as part of the package, I might even cancel my Netlix account.

From March 19th: Arthur C. Clarke, the great SF author, died today at the age of 90. Actually, since his home in Sri Lanka is a day ahead, he passed away - appropriately enough - tomorrow.

Clarke’s short fiction was one of the many things I aggressively sought out when I was in my early teens, and being the geek I am I also was a huge fan of his collaboration with Stanley Kubrick 2001: A Space Odyssey. Huge fan of his novels as well, most notably Childhood’s End. To state the obvious point, he was a fantastic writer whose work brimmed with great ideas (even his "lesser" work had flashes of fantastic imagination).

I had the privilege to speak to him once, VERY briefly. I was volunteering and running a lot of the A/V stuff at Dragon Con one year, in the early 90s, and the convention was able to get a satellite feed from Sri Lanka to have Clarke speak. The audio was not coming through and I had to test the mike here in Atlanta.

"Hello, Mr. Clarke," I said, with the thought OMGIMTALKINGTOTHEGUYHOWROTE2001!!! screaming in my brain.

"Can you hear me?"

Smiling, he looked up. Through the video feed it looked like he was looking at me (which, of course he couldn’t; the video was one-way).

"Yes, we can hear you. Hello there!"

"H…Hi."

I could have said a million things, like how much I loved his work, how much I appreciated the ideas he always brought to his stories, about how much I admired his dedication to the science field, how I thought he was as brilliant as they come… But, as these things always seem to happen, the moment was lost. I handed the mike to the MC and walked off stage….

Well, I couldn’t say it then so I’ll write it now. Thank you, Arthur C. Clarke. Thanks for making the impossible seem possible, for opening the mind of many many readers around the world - myself, of course, included.

Thanks you so much.

Like I have stated before, we are losing some of the greats, people. If you can, reach out to the people you admire for what they have done, because pretty soon they won’t be here any more.

Copied with extreme prejudice from josephdickerson.com:

They didn't f' it up. Thank god.

That's the initial, gut reaction I had to it, after I saw an advance screening of The Transformers movie last week. I was relived because, before I saw the film, I thought the odds were stacked against my childhood friends the Autobots. You had Michael Bay behind the camera directing, who has been very hit-and-miss for me (I actually liked Armageddon, and The Rock for what they were - big, dumb entertaining movies; don't get me started talking about Pearl Harbor, however…) You had Paramount paying the bills, and they have had a long streak of really bad, almost unwatchable adaptations over the past few years (Tomb Raider, Sum of All Fears, etc.).

So, I was excited but also filled with trepidation before the film started rolling.

I can gladly report that not only did they not screw the pooch, but they made a genuinely great, entertaining movie.

Yes, it's a great movie. And it's Michael Bay. Wow, is that the four horsemen I hear galloping in the distance?

I won't go into the plot much - it's wafer-thin, and that's perfectly fine (after the convoluted Pirates sequels, a straight through-line is refreshing). There's an object to be retrieved, a frozen Decepticon to be revived, and a lot of urban renewal to be done - the REALLY HARD way.

As in, giant monster robots fighting each other. Beautifully.

Which was what I paid to see. Unlike some of the Type-A fanboys who are totally hardcore, I have some perspective. The Transformers ain't Shakespeare. They are robots in disguise. They're toys. I just wanted to see them made real. And boy, did I ever.

The special effect in this movie are as good as I've seen in a while, and the CGI are absolutely seamless with the practical on-set explosions (safe for one scene near the end of the film, where the elements just don't look like they were fully actualized). The attention to detail is amazing, and I can only imagine how many computing cycles went into rendering the transformations from vehicle-mode (to map every embedded component of a car and then lock it to where they are when they become a robot - the mind reels). The weight, the real-world physics applied to the Transformers - they have presence and heft on screen. They look real, and not like a special effect - the ultimate compliment I can give the FX crew.

I was, in British slang, gob-stopped.

I can only compare my experience watching Transformers with two other movies I have seen - the first was Jurassic Park, where my jaw dropped the floor constantly throughout that first showing. The second was Independence Day, where I was swept up in the b-movie plot completely and cheered - repeatedly. Yes, in hindsight both movies have deep problems (especially ID4) but those initial viewings were magic.

That's how I felt when I watched Transformers - and when Peter Cullen, reprising his role as Optimus Prime, the Allfather from the original G1 cartoon and animated film, said the famous line from the 1986 movie (which I won't spoil) I was 8 years old again, only this time I didn't have to imagine the robots were real - they were, as real as anything else on screen.

And they were kicking all sorts of ass.

I posted a quick comment on the Transformers message board giving my initial impression and reassurance (lots of nervous hard-core fanboys lurking about) and one othe aforementioned Type-A fans posted a response. He wrote that Bay made a movie for people who "didn't like Transformers, and the film didn't respect the mythology, etc." and I got the sense his religious dogma would prevent him from enjoying it. So I replied:

Even the mythology has been inconsistent over the years. This is not G1 or Beast Wars or Armada or RiD. It is ANOTHER, bigger, different take on the basic story and characters, with hints of many different iterations. If you want to be dogmatic that is your choice. Paramount and Hasbro are in the business of making money by providing entertainment and I was entertained. Very much so.

I hope he sees it and likes it, because I'm utterly convinced we will never see a better adaptation of this property on screen, ever. It just works.

I'd add one more thing - this movie has made Transformers cool again. Really cool. Paramount has a license to print money with this one.

And they deserve every penny.

Just got home from a sneak peak (yes, I got to see it five days early - insert Nelson's HA HA here) of The Transformers. I'll have more to write later but here's a quick, flash response:

It's the most awesome piece of awesomeness, ever. And if this movie cost half as much to make as Spider-man 3 and Pirates of The Caribbean did, then the respective producers of those movies need to do an internal investigation as to where the money went.

Paramount is gonna make a mint.