Willing Sacrifices (Bloodtide, 1982)

Set on a small greek island, a young man, Neil, and his new wife Sherry have arrived looking for his missing sister Madeline. He discovers she is staying with some nuns restoring art and hanging with a gruff treasure hunter named Freye.

The Island locals are secretive and not very friendly. As the film goes on, we discover that there is a dark secret… the locals still sacrifice virgins to a creature that lives under the island. Freye has disturbed the creature from a long slumber. Madeline’s art restoration reveals ancient art of the creature, and the discovery of coins seems to infect the locals with a madness reaching even the children. Meanwhile the visitors are all becoming obsessed with their own goals.

For some reason I always thought this was a killer crocodile film. But while it is a creature feature, it is more of a monster flick. You never see much of the monster, even in the few reveal shots. Otherwise you usually see everything from the monster’s perspective. Thankfully, this actually benefits the movie as you get some absolutely beautiful underwater scenes. This movie makes great visual use of it’s environment.

While a slow moving film, I found myself drawn into the mystery and the characters. Bloodtide has a couple moments that left me scratching my head (a passionate lover’s kiss between brother and sister for example). But really, I enjoyed the film a lot of a visual level and seeing James Earl Jones in a not Darth Vader role was fun.

Bloodtide is a film that got relegated to the bargain DVD bin for years, which is a shame as I found it rather interesting and engaging.

October 31, 2020 0

Vulgar Display of Power Pt 2 (the Exorcist II: The Heretic, 1977)

Looking at the basics? The Exorcist II seems like it could be a winner. Returning cast members, an established director and dependable new cast members…

And yet?

Father Lamont is in Rio. He is struggling with his faith, and attempts to exorcise a demon from a young woman, but he fails and she kills herself. When he returns to the United States, the Diocese assigns him to investigate the death of Father Merrin four years prior.

This brings him into contact with Regan, now eighteen and having pushed the horrors of the first film from her mind. She is working with the psychiatrist Dr. Tuskin who believes she can help Regan recover those lost memories.

The investigation takes Lamont deeper and deeper into a rabbit hole leading to one of Father Merrin’s early exorcisms. And then things go crazy. Giant Locusts, exploding houses, duplicate Regans…and the end result is a crazy mess.

This film is just so bizarre and it’s attempts to build off the first film miss a distinct aspect. Sincerity.

Here, we see Lamont is a man struggling with his faith. And that is something that horror really can explore well. The first film does that. In part, it features Karras and his doubts, but how they are played out against Merrin’s confidence. The Exorcist II tries to recapture the spiritual horror of the first film, but instead ends up seeming like a hilarious joke.

October 12, 2018 0

Nothing But Star Wars Episode Six (Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, 1983)

It took three agonizing years for the audience to get the answers to our questions. Excitement built with the initial announcement of Revenge of the Jedi. A bold and powerful title, it had fans eager. Before long, the title shifted to Return of the Jedi. Lucas noted that the Jedi do not deal in revenge.

And this seems a fair assessment for what little we really knew about the Jedi at this point. It did not matter though. Return was a good enough title and certainly not something to dampen the fan excitement.

And so, here we go…as with the previous installments, we are going to spoil the heck out of this one.

Picking up some time after Empire (weeks? Months? It is not entirely clear) we are introduced to Darth Vader arriving at a…half built Death Star. Did not work the first time, but the Empire does not give up so easily.

Meanwhile, C-3PO and R2-D2 arrive at Jabba’s palace. 3PO notes a sense of dread as he points out that Lando never returned from his visit. Upon gaining their audience with the immense slug-like creature, R2 plays a message which understandably freaks 3PO out, as Luke bargains for Han Solo and offers the droids as good will gifts. Jabba laughs this off, keeps the droids and starts up a party, complete with singers and a dancer. Half way through, he pulls the dancer towards him aggressively, as soon as she is close, he drops her down a pit. We don’t see what is down there, but it sounds pretty terrible.

3PO is now his translator, and that is good, because a bounty hunter shows up to claim a bounty on Chewbacca. After a tense negotiation, the party goes on and Chewie is led away. We discover later the Bounty Hunter is Leia in disguise. She frees Han from the Carbonite only for them to get caught. Han is jailed away, while Leia suffers a creepier situation…

Leia gets to be the sex object for a good chunk of the film. While the films had not shied away from the notion that Leia is beautiful, this feels…a bit creepier. The film implies some unsavory things for a film largely seen as a kids film. Granted, when I was eleven, all of it went over my head. But still…anyways, Luke shows up and Jabba instantly tosses him into his death basement. There, look has to outwit the Rancor, a large creature with a big appetite. I suddenly find myself wondering just where Jabba got this thing. Is it native to Tatooine? Is it something Jabba imported? Like an exotic pet? Are there laws against importing Rancors? Anyways, Luke kills it, angering Jabba, who decides to have Luke, Han and Chewbacca tossed into the Sarlaac Pit, where they will be digested for thousands of years.

No worries though, Luke has a plan. R2 has his lightsaber and shoots it to Luke from his barge. It turns out Lando is posing as a guard and Leia finally gets in on the action again and chokes Jabba with her chains. This sequence has one of the original trilogy’s most infuriating moments for many fans. Remember this guy?

He is the bounty hunter who caught Han Solo because Darth Vader gave him Han encased in Carbonite. And yet, somehow? The guy has a reputation as an intergalactic badass. Boba Fett does nothing on film to warrant this, but his rather embarrassing death (Han Solo accidentally sets off Fett’s jet pack, shooting him into the side of the barge and then on down the Sarlaac’s gullet.

This so bothered some people that in the comics being published at the time (by Marvel) had an issue that brought him back. After laying waste to Jabba’s thugs, the heroes head off.

Luke Makes a stop on Dagobah where he finds Yoda near death. Yoda confirms that Vader is indeed his father. After Yoda passes away, Obi Wan’s ghost visits.

Old Ben explains that really, when he said that Darth Vader killed Luke’s father, it was true…in a way. It all depends on how you look at it. Of course, a person being corrupted is not actually the same thing as another person killing them. And frankly, this should have been a hint for us all that maybe the Jedi were a bit ridiculous. In Empire, there was a reference made to their being another in an exchange between Ben and Yoda as look sped off for Bespin. This becomes clarified to explain that Luke had a Twin sister, who he realizes is Leia.

Luke shows up at the rebel fleet just in time to join Han and Leia as they lead a team to take down the shield protecting the new Death Star that is powered on the forest moon of Endor. Lando will lead the fleet in the assault on the Death Star itself, taking the Falcon with Han’s blessing…and a promise to not get a scratch on the ol’ ship.

On Endor, the rebels get help from the natives, little teddy bear creatures called Ewoks. They help Leia and Han make an assault on the base powering the shield. Luke has gone to meet Darth Vader and is brought before the Emperor. The hope of the Emperor is to win Luke over to the Dark Side. He taunts Luke repeatedly trying to drive Luke into trying to kill him in anger.

Luke and the rebels are shocked to discover that the Death Star is fully operational, and Luke gives into his anger. Vader protects the Emperor and they two duel. After near defeat, the rebels on Endor take out the shield and Lando’s forces are able to set off the chain reaction necessary to destroy the Death Star.

Before it reaches critical mass, Luke has almost defeated Vader, only to find himself halted seeing Vader’s mechanical hand, and looking to his own mechanical hand.

“MARTHA!”

Just kidding. This is actually a good call back moment. Luke sees that he is in some ways now like his father, and is shaken back to reality. He tosses aside his lightsaber. The Emperor uses his force lightning to kill Luke…as he is dying, Luke calls out to his father…And Vader picks up the Emperor and throws him down a shaft.

With his dying breathes, he asks Luke to remove that dark visage and allow him to look upon Luke with his own eyes. He asks Luke to let Leia know that Luke was right…that there had been some good in him after all.

On the moon of Endor there is celebration with a song containing the lyric Yub Yub. Luke stands with his friends and then looks off and sees Anakin, Ben and Yoda smiling at him and the credits roll!

Jedi has always taken a lot of crap for the Ewoks. It turns out they were originally supposed to be Wookies, but Lucas felt that Chewbacca had established that they were to technically minded. This does not make sense. Chewbacca merely proves Wookies are adaptable and intelligent. But while the Ewoks are a bit to cutesy at times, their inspirations are kind of interesting. Lucas had a fascination with how effective the Viet Cong was, in spite of their technological inferiority. They knew their land and turned it into their strategy.

Return of the Jedi really cemented the myth that Lucas had this all planned out. That he had this big screen play that he chopped into three parts. And it only got bigger from there. Supposedly, this was actually a nine part series. But by the early 90’s Star Wars was mainly kept alive through the expanded universe of comics and novels. Every now and then there would be a story about Lucas and his massive epic…but it seemed pretty clear that we were never going to see more movies.

This allowed people to ignore those little leaks where people would point out that when they started filming Empire nobody knew Vader would be Luke’s father. Or that while the line about “there is another” did indeed refer to a sister for Luke, it was not Leia…they had no idea who or where the sister was.

Harrison Ford did return for Jedi, but he really felt that Han Solo should have died. I kind of agree. It would have been a tough pill to swallow, but it would have hit home that they were at war. Not everyone gets that happy ending. But the film really does act like the story is over. The Rebels win, Vader is redeemed and Jabba is a grease spot on the desert floor.

There have been rumblings of late from folks who feel the later films present the Jedi in a disparaging light, but I disagree. This was always there. We just wanted to ignore it for the legend. Ben Kenobi deceives Luke throughout the series. He does not want Luke to redeem Vader, he hides the information thinking it will be easier for Luke to kill Vader. Empire and Jedi both call Ben’s wisdom into question, heavily.

With the impending prequel films, the Special Edition of Return of the Jedi was, again, largely cosmetic in it’s changes. Some were more extreme than others. For example, the Sarlaac Pit was not just a pit with tentacles. Now it had an extendable beak or mouth or something. But the largest change was in two sequences. One was Jabba’s palace. The musical number that proceeds the death of a slave girl was a pretty small affair. Now there is a space rock number with dancers and a really articulate digital band. The song is…well, not really terrible, but certainly not going to find it in many folks digital playlists.

And then there is the final scene. Instead of just showing us the celebration with the ewoks, we see various planets celebrating the end of the Empire. And this:

This was before Attack of the Clones had cast it’s grown up Anakin. By the time the movies were released on blu-ray, we got this revision:

Anakin sure is looking creepy there. This change creates un-necessary questions. Why are Ben and Yoda Old? Why is Anakin looking younger? I suppose the argument is based on the idea that this was the last time from before he turned to the Dark Side…but that is kind of a silly and arbitrary choice.

So, of the original trilogy, this is the weakest entry, but it still is a lot of fun. It has plenty of humor and excitement and really is an enjoyable watch.

December 21, 2017 0

Nothing But Star Wars Episode Five (Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, 1980)

Star Wars became a world wide phenomenon. This meant that Lucas would get to build on his adventure. Already there were comics from Marvel, novels inspired by the first film and toys galore. How could they deny giving the audience more?!

And so, Lucas set forth to continue the story of intrepid rebels trying to take down the galactic Empire. This time he stepped back a bit from both writing and directing. Lawrence Kasdan stepped in as screen writer and Irvin Kershner as director.

Spoiling the Heck out of the Star Wars movies continues here!

Picking up anywhere from a few months to maybe even a year or two after a New hope, Empire opens on a secret Rebel base on an icy planet called Hoth. Han is trying to get out back on the run from Jabba the Hutt, feeling it is no longer safe for him. Han and Leia argue over his leaving, Han believing it is because Leia having feelings about him, Leia apparently feeling he is an asset against the Empire.

Luke has had a vision of Ben Kenobi which advises him to go to a planet called Dagobah and find a Jedi Master named Yoda. When the Empire finds the hidden base they attack. After getting the rebel fleet on it’s way, Han, Leia, Chewie, and C-3PO find themselves on the run in the Millenium Falcon. Luke and R2-D2 go off to find Yoda.

Dagobah turns out to be a swamp planet with no technology. Yoda himself seems to be a confused little kook at first, but really is a character meant to challenge Luke’s pre-conceived notions of what a Jedi Warrior is.

Darth Vader is on the hunt for Luke Skywalker. The motives for this are not entirely clearly during the film. We learn that Vader is, in fact, the right hand man of the Emperor.

The Emperor sanctions the search for Luke, for he sees the potential of a great new ally for the Empire. To this end, Vader has gone as far as hiring bounty hunters. I confess, one bounty hunter stood out to me above all the rest…

No, not him…

Yeah…Bossk. But he did not become the legend that was Boba Fett. Which is garbage.

Meanwhile, Han and Leia try hiding out with an old friend and associate of Han’s named Lando Calrissian. Lando is a reformed scoundrel turned legit businessman, running the sky based Bespin. But Lando, trying to protect his city cuts a deal with Darth Vader.

Vader torments Han and Leia enough to cause a disturbance within the force powerful enough to nudge Luke a few solar systems away (I am guessing, the fact is, the relationship of various planets to each other is never really clear in the world of Star Wars). Luke immediately seeks to rush off to help his friends, but Yoda and the Ghost of Obi Wan implore him to stay and focus on his training.

Vader has Han Solo frozen in Carbonite as a test to see if it will work for his plans to capture Luke. As Lando starts to realize he is going to see Vader continue to change the rules, he helps Leia and Chewbacca escape. Luke and R2-D2 arrive in Bespin, quickly becoming separated as Luke enters a confrontation with Vader.

Leia, Lando, Chewbacca, C-3PO and R2 fail to save Han, with Boba Fett managing to leave with the frozen body. They make their way to the Falcon instead. Luke and Vader’s confrontation ends with Luke losing his hand and lightsaber, and nearly his sanity. In one of the most earth shattering moments of all cinema, Darth Vader reveals that Kenobi lied. Vader did not kill Luke’s father…he was Luke’s father. Luke cannot accept this and appears to leap to his death. He manages to catch some outcropping below the city and reaches out through the force, connecting to Leia. She has Lando turn the Falcon around until they can rescue Luke.

Empire felt like a bit of a revelation for a franchise films. It was not merely a retread of the the first film. It felt like a natural extension. Han and Leia’s relationship grows from a complicated adversarial friendship to a romantic one. Luke learns that the dark side is not merely an external force. And the film ends on that heavy note of Luke discovering that Vader may be his father and Han has gone missing. The Carbonite subplot with Han was actually something of a safety move. It was uncertain if Harrison Ford would be willing to return for the third film, so it was a way to write Han Solo out if necessary.

Yoda, a small green puppet with big ears came to amazing life, voiced by Frank Oz, who (as well as going on to be a noted director) was part of Henson’s Muppet troop and the voice of Miss Piggy. Yoda was small, but as noted earlier, was meant to teach Luke very important lessons about his expectations. He describes Yoda (not realizing he is talking to Yoda) as a great warrior. Yoda just laughs and declares that “Wars do not make one great!” Luke Struggles with the force, moving small rocks and the like. Yoda can move Luke’s X-Wing without breaking a sweat. Luke finds himself unable to deny his worry about his friends. He is easily given to fear.

And again, that reveal. For the next three years, we argued about whether it was true. I mean, surely, Darth Vader was a liar, right? There is no way this could be true!

For the special edition of Empire Strikes Back, the work was largely cosmetic. And for the most part, I approve. There were some dialog changed (there is a redundant scene of Darth Vader telling his people to ready his ship so he can return to his star destroyer). I really liked the changes like blending the snow speeders into the picture better. One of the issues when they made the film was compositing the speeder on a white background. The lines around the ship were glaring. So they faded the images just enough…which resulted in the ability to see through the snow speeders. This was fixed for the special edition.

The city of Bespin was now full of windows allowing sweeping cloud fill skylines. And they expanded some of the stuff with the Wampa snow creature, allowing us to see more of the creature. But there was not anything I would call a “new scene” in the sense of that the Jabba scene was. But there was one change that made some folks genuinely mad.

The original film features a hologram of the Emperor that is distinctly different from the version we see now. This is because the actor playing the Emperor in Empire is Marjorie Eaton. The voice provided was Clive Revell. In Return of the Jedi, they cast Ian McDiarmid as the Emperor. And so, for the special edition they more closely approximated the look of the Emperor for the hologram with McDiarmid.

The Empire Strikes Back is the high mark of the Star Wars franchise. It is powerful, without losing the sense of fun and grandeur of the first film.

December 20, 2017 0

Nothing But Star Wars: Episode Four (Star Wars: A New Hope, 1977)

In the 70’s a young filmmaker convince a movie company called 20th Century Fox to let him make a film by pretty much forgoing massive creative fees and keeping the licensing, which he turned into a massive empire. George Lucas had an idea for an epic space film. Now, if you follow the “Official Story”, Lucas had a bible he stuck to. He Cut the original film into parts and made the first part into Star Wars.

The truth is a bit murkier. It is certainly plausible he had a larger epic ready…but it is pretty obvious that the story was evolving as he went along. But I am getting way ahead of myself. Originally just released as Star Wars, the film was later retitled as episode 4 and “A New Hope”.

Nothing But Spoilers ensue!

The film opened with the now iconic screen crawl telling us of the war between the cruel empire and scrappy rebellion. We quickly are introduced to the villain Darth Vader. Dressed in black with ominous breathing apparatus, Darth Vader intimidates the crap out of people with his super deep voice.

A young woman sends two droids on a mission, which leads them to a nearby desert planet. There, the droids (named C-3PO and R2-D2) end up in the ownership of Lars Owen. R2-D2 is a spunky little droid who is actually trying to find a mysterious individual. This man is Obi Wan Kenobi, or as Luke Skywalker knows him, “Old Ben”. Skywalker is Owen Lar’s nephew. He is not content with being a farmer, he wants to join the rebellion.

Ben reveals he is a member of the order of Jedi. Knights who defended the galaxy against darkness and protected the weak. They get help from hotshot smuggler Han Solo and his partner Chewbacca (a large alien covered in hair, looks kind of like a bi-pedal dog). They save the Princess (well, sort of, as she ends up taking over the rescue) and the rebels lead an assault on the ultimate weapon…a planet killing space station called the Death Star.

And if that sounds like the most awesome thing in the world, five year me can assure that it most definitely was! But seriously, I saw A New Hope at five years old and it made a powerful impact on me. Both in general of a love for movies and as a specific thing, Star Wars. I wanted Star Wars clothes, I wanted the toys and Lucas got my parent’s hard earned cash.

But what did I love so much?

Was it how hard core science drove the images on the screen? Well, um, no. The films are not seeking to be scientifically accurate. The smaller spaceships fly like they are in World War 2 dog fights, there is sound in space and so on. Star Wars wants to draw you in and does so with exciting visuals and sounds.

And the Star Wars films began a revolution in visual effects. He used the existing technology and worked with upstart creatives to make the technology that did not exist yet. And while today computers and CGI rule the day, the practical model work of Star Wars holds up in the present.

The characters drive this film. Luke Skywalker is one of those characters who works effectively as the audience proxy. He is young and stuck in a life that is less than the one he desires. He wants to break free. He is also a bit whiny, but in a way that is probably more relatable than we want to admit.

Princess Leia is an inversion of the damsel in distress. At first, it seems she is the woman who must be saved. But when Luke and Han Solo arrive, they muck up her rescue, requiring her to help get them out. Leia is brash and tough, and a really great character.

Ben Kenobi is the wise old knight. He tells us tales of the Jedi as the most noble policemen in the galaxy before they were decimated by the evil Darth Vader. Vader killed Luke’s father, who was Kenobi’s friend.

And this first film establishes Vader as a cruel master of the Force, though working in the service of Gran Moff Tarkin. He is not really a sidekick, in spite of a comment from Princess Leia, the film clearly implies Tarkin and Vader have discussions about how to proceed with their policies.

The interesting choice Lucas makes though, is to frame the story not through Luke’s eyes. Rather he does so through the two droids. R2-D2 and C-3PO are thrown into the center of the war which, well, C-3PO is woefully not qualified for. 3PO is a fussy butler, a protocol droid. He basically is a translator, his hands cannot even effectively hold weapons. His companion, on the other hand, is a tough little fighter. R2-D2 is an astro droid, essentially he is a co-pilot for smaller space ships and also maintenance for larger ships. R2 speaks exclusively in beeps and squawks. The film only gives us any kind of hint as to what he is saying through other characters. Apparently, it is a commonly understood language, and everyone knows what R2 is saying, and so their responses are able to give the viewer context.

Meanwhile, there is Han Solo and Chewbacca. Han is the adventurer Luke wants to believe he can be, but disappoints Luke because he is a craven mercenary. Technically, he and Chewie are smugglers for the underworld of the Star Wars universe. And Han has a price on his head, which may have made him an easier sell for Luke and Ben’s needs. Chewbacca is, like R2, a character who has no english dialog. He howls and growls. In this case, not everyone apparently speaks wookie, but Han clearly does and gives us insights into Chewie’s comments. Between this, body language and the various inflections of Chewie’s growls, Chewie can be funny and sympathetic. In one scene, Han warns C-3PO against letting R2-D2 beat Chewbacca in a game. 3PO notes that nobody worries about upsetting droids. Han notes Wookies are noted for…less than sportsmanlike responses to losing. Chewie leans back and puts his hands proudly behind his head which really sells the joke in the scene.

One of the defining moments for Han is when he is confronted by a bounty hunter named Greedo. Greedo tries to extort Han, but Han uses this to slowly get his gun, allowing him to fire on Greedo before Greedo can pull the trigger. When we reach the end of the film, Han has gone from focusing only on his own survival to taking a risk for Luke and a cause bigger than himself or money. Sort of.

The thing to remember with Star Wars is that it has been an ongoing adventure in revisionism. Lucas initially made subtle changes to the film. Calling it Episode 4, naming it a New Hope. But with the announcement of a planned new trilogy, Lucas saw another opportunity. He would use modern technology to beef up his original trilogy of films. He had his teams clean up effects, enlarge the impact of other effects and expand the scope of the films.

Some of this involved making Mos Eisely look bigger and more populated. Making some of the stiff creatures look more lively. making sure wheels were not visible beneath Luke’s landspeeder (kind of a hovering dune buggy) and so on. But Lucas also added scenes that had long been thought lost to time.

For instance, Han has a run in with Jabba the Hutt. The sequence was filmed with a human actor and they intended to super-impose a stop motion creature over the actor. But they could never make it work. So, by the time they reached Jedi, they got to totally come up with Jabba completely from scratch. But now the technology made it possible to go back and re-examine the scene. And so they got to work on creating a digital Jabba. The results were…well…

Mixed. It does not look awful, but it sure looks dated. And the scene is solely interesting as an artifact of history. As a story scene it adds nothing to the tale. And not knowing who Jabba was or what he looks like built up his threat across three films, and here, it kind of makes him seem…gentle.

Most of the additional stuff in the Special Editions does not bother me. I am totally fine with seeing effects cleaned up. But there is one intensely controversial change. Even people who have not seen any Star Wars films are probably aware of the “Han Shot First” movement. In the remastered and expanded edition, Greedo gets a shot off before Han shoots him. This of course, makes Han appear less cold blooded. Sure, you could argue self defense before, but it definitely made Han seem like a sketchier dude, and increasing the power of his arc in the original.

This is certainly not enough to kill my love for the original film. The good of Star Wars far outweighs the bad here. The story is exciting, the characters engaging and the film has a killer musical score. I feel like I should have mentioned that sooner. John Williams defined movie music for much of the seventies, eighties, and nineties. And Star Wars was the Cornerstone of that.

The Star Wars story kicked off with a bang and still fills me with the same joy I felt as a kid watching it in 1977.

December 19, 2017 0

Roid Rage Part 1 (Conan the Barbarian, 1982)

Conan the Barbarian has conquered a lot of mediums. Books, comic books, television…but I think it is hardly an exaggeration to say that the Arnold Schwarzeneggar films heavily defined the public’s perception of the character.

As a young boy, Conan’s family is slaughtered by a snake cult led by Darth Vader’s voice. Thulsa Doom lets his men sell young Conan into slavery. Conan grows up to be super strong, going from slave to popular pit fighter. This affords him rewards. Eventually, he is free and goes to find Doom. He makes friends with the mystic Wizard and the beautiful warrior Valeria.

Conan’s world is full of magicians and demons. Thulsa can transform himself into a snake and commands his people to perform human sacrifices. There is not a lot of depth to this character, and really, the story does not call for it.

Robert E. Howard’s Conan was on the high end of the “noble savage” trope. This film aims more for the brute force savage. Granted, they try and make sure he has a sense of goodness. In one early scene, he is offered a nearly slave girl. His first action is to give her a blanket to cover herself.

This Conan is a man of few words. Even in the opening scenes with his parents, there is no real dialog. This may have been a bit of necessity, as Schwarzeneggar was very fresh to acting.

Conan the Barbarian is one of the better barbarian films of the early eighties and remains pretty entertaining.

December 5, 2017 0

In Search of White People (Allen Quartermain and the Lost City of Gold, 1986)

Pretty sure this sequel was greenlit before the previous film hit theaters, hoping to have a franchise. For Chamberlain and Stone, this was the end of the road.

Everything that plagues King Solomon’s Mines? Is still here. There are no improvements. Poor effects, awkward performances… the sexism, Jesse still does not really do a thing other than getting in trouble and get saved by Quartermain.

For racism, the natives do not fare any better this time around. They are either primitives or mysterious primitives.Their search is for the titular Lost City of Gold…a city of myth inhabited by white Africans. The white people they find are (of course) not primitive. Oh, and they are ruled by Elvira, Mistress of the Dark.

This sequel is no improvement over the first film. Granted, it is not really any worse. Just equally terrible.

September 29, 2017 0

Force Adjacent (Rogue One, 2016)

Taking it’s plot from about two sentences of Star Wars: A New Hopes Opening Scrawl, this Star Wars Story focuses on the Rebels who got the Death Star plans carried by R2-D2. Focusing on Jyn Erso, daughter of a brilliant engineer, Rogue One follows her forced recruitment by the Rebel Alliance in an attempt to get the information. Along with her father, Erso has another connection the Alliance wants to take advantage of. After escaping the clutches of the Empire, Jyn was raised for a time by Saw Gerrera. The Alliance parted ways with him over his extremism, but feel they now need his help.

What follows is an exciting espionage and war film, different from what we have seen in the past…and yet familiar. While there are brief glimpses of some recognizable faces, our central cast is pretty much new. The film is a bit darker than other entries, showing a side of the Rebel Alliance not often addressed. Some have expressed problems with this. While I had not given much thought to some of the darker implications of the alliance, I cannot say this take is unreasonable. The idea that people are sometimes doing things they struggle to justify as being in the greater good makes absolute sense. Certainly, it may seem out of place if you are used to thinking of the Alliance as morally pure.

Jyn is an interesting character who despises the Empire for a pretty simple and personal reason. They took her dad and killed her mom. She seems to have soured on the rebellion though (feeling betrayed by Saw) and given way to cynicism. Meanwhile, Cassian Andor is a dedicated Rebel spy who plays out his role without question. At least until he is given a side mission that makes him question his moral compass.

A real standout character is the reprogrammed Imperial Droid K2-S0. He is mouthy, sarcastic and also the brawn. Whereas C-3PO up-tightly delivers in depth information about the odds, K2 casually tosses out comments along the lines of “The odds are bad” and just leaving it at that. Then there is the blind monk Chirrut Îmwe. He fights like a Jedi Master, but is not a Jedi. He also fights with a staff, rather than a lightsaber. His sighted companion Baze prefers blaster rifles and does not buy into the Force at all.

The film does suffer a bit from the problem of many prequels. The obsessive desire with filling in every blank results in a way that it can start to interfere the film it is “setting up”. This leads to the film dying to pull right up to the beginning of a New Hope.

Admittedly, it feels a little odd having no potential Jedi (Chirrut does not use force moves beyond a certain Daredevil styled super hearing) or lightsaber duels. The Force is spoken of, but not really seen in action beyond Darth Vader.

In the end, however, the film more than overcomes these things. It is exciting and fun, while having an edge more in the vein of Empire. I found Rogue One immensely satisfying.

December 21, 2016 0