Let’s Play Cowboys and… Aliens?

What happened to Hollywood?

More specifically, what has happened to Steven Spielberg?

In 1975, one of the most famous book covers of all time, became one of the most famous movie posters of all time too. Simple, but effective. Talk about special effects!

When I was fourteen-years-old I was shocked right out of my seat by a character in a feature film. Millions of frightened movie goers were left clinging to twinkle lights high above cushy tilt-back reclining chairs that were bolted to the theater floor, folks hanging by a suspenseful thread, all because of a mechanical movie creation named Bruce. Of course, Bruce was the great white shark that scared audiences half to death all over the world in the film Jaws way back in 1975.

Can you imagine being afraid of a hunk of plastic as big as a car – named Bruce?

I can.

Robert Shaw as Captain Quint, Roy Scheider as Chief Brody, and Richard Dreyfuss as Matt Hooper (L to R) in Jaws. They don

Jaws is one of my all time favorite films. Considering I spent about three weeks every summer when I was a kid, doing whatever it is kids do while on vacation with their parents, on Miami Beach, I clearly remember how that particular monster of the imaginary deep created a real stir on beaches everywhere. Folks were going bonkers over a movie shark. It was a dose of simulated reality cleverly blended with one director’s ability to scare the pants off most folks.

Martha’s Vineyard had nothing on Florida beaches after Jaws hit the big screen. One bright and sunny day I recall hundreds of people fleeing the water in a panic (like a scene out of the movie), and still hundreds more rushing the beach to see what the commotion was all about, when a big ol’ sea manatee harmlessly made its way past our hotel about fifty yards out to sea. A manatee – probably the sea’s most docile creature – freaked everybody out.

That was the magic of a “scary movie” back in the days when movies could actually scare you. Nowadays the effects used in 1975 would be considered old-fashioned, but effects cannot replace good direction and good acting. Special effects lose their effect by the time you get home. The art of the scare is in the hands of the director. My favorite scene from Jaws is a great example of that:

“Brody! Get on the chum line!” Bellowed Quint.

“Let Hooper take a turn.” Brody said.

Roy Scheider as Chief Brody getting into position to deliver some bad news to great white shark Bruce. Don

“Hooper drives the boat, Chief.” Insisted Quint in a deliberate voice.

Brody says with a smirk, “Let him come down here and chum some of this shit…”

At the very moment we see Bruce for the first time, jaws gaping open, as he narrowly misses gobbling-up Brody spooning chum at the transom.

Brody backs into the cabin with a look of pure terror on his face and says to Quint with a shaky voice, “We’re gonna need a bigger boat.”

Classic! A Spielberg masterpiece and by today’s standards probably a very inexpensive film to make.

I saw a trailer this week for a new film coming out this summer along the same lines as Jaws. In fact, in places, it looks unmistakably like the original. Probably one of Hollywood’s “updated” versions? Probably a bomb. It looks like a video game. In spite of the obviously ripped-off scenes from the old, how much you want to bet the “new and improved” won’t be anywhere near as scary.

In the 1980’s Indiana Jones was all the rage. Indy’s search for the Lost Ark mesmerized audiences through three outstanding plots with amazing action sequences and dazzling special effects. Again, these may not live up to today’s computer generated standards, but the computer age that has made special effects better-and-better, so too has made film scripts unbearably worse.

Good stories with heroes like Indiana Jones seem to have evaporated into thin air. Acting legends just got old, or passed-away. We’ve been left with lots of computer generated explosions, caused by ugly and inhuman computer generated creatures.

Even the “creatures” are different. They don’t seem to have characteristics that we can relate to any more. They’re just “things” that must be killed in order for the “star” to proceed to the next movie. That’s kind of how video games work, isn’t it?

Can you remember a movie about one particular alien that was cute and entertaining? Remember ET: the Extra Terrestrial?

The film ET may have been Steven Spielberg’s finest hour. In my opinion, one of his best. The story was amazing. Another classic! The world was in love with ET and his legend still remains one of the greatest films of all time.

What about the “scary” movie?

Poltergeist may have been the scariest movie of all. It certainly struck fear into audiences everywhere and it was a thrill a minute sending many a popcorn bucket flying through the air with suspense. I almost got beat up for that.

Yuk! Not exactly a warm bath with wine and rose pedals, is it?

The scene of JoBeth Williams in the slop with a skeleton still sends chills up and down my spine. It was yet another cheap thrill that worked very well.

Heather Michele O

Looks like oatmeal to me! What do you think? Maybe the same stuff they used to simulate quick sand in those old movies when the stars got lost in the jungle.

How much could it have cost the studio to make this scene in Poltergeist anyway? A tub full of tepid water and a thousand pounds of Quaker Oats. But it worked. It was incredible and very scary.

Where have all the writers gone?

I cannot exactly say when movies turned into spectacles with zero plot. For me, it’s just as well I cannot pin-down a precise moment in time. All I know is that one day I was being entertained and the next I was wondering where it all went wrong. How can they do this to us? It’s brutal, unbearable at times.

Now there have certainly been some notable exceptions to my “When Good Directors Go Bad” theory. A talent like Steven Spielberg, for example, just doesn’t run out of ideas over night. Does he?

Could the entire swamp that is Hollywood have dried-up?

Tom Hanks, Matt Damon, and Edward Burns (L to R) hold the line in Saving Private Ryan.

No! Of course not. In the 1990’s through the early part of this Century Spielberg made some classic films: the Jurassic Park trilogy are among my favorites. Then there were seriously cool dramatic efforts like Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan.

The opening three-minute sequence of Saving Private Ryan is arguably the most intense war footage ever created. I watched a documentary about the making of SPR – they ran real WWII Omaha Beach footage next to Spielberg’s created film and it looked exactly the same. Of course, the quality was much better in the Hollywood version, but identical nonetheless. The painstaking attention to detail was true art.

But art became farther and fewer in between. Actors became celebrities instead. Writers were suddenly afraid to test the water of new ideas. Film making turned into a contest to see who could create the biggest spectacle, with the “hottest” celebrity name, to put as many butts as possible into the theater seats.

It had come full circle. They were trying to force you into the very seat they used to try to scare you out of. Sad!

Thank God for Harry Potter. That’s all I’ve got to say.

Fast forward to 2011. Steven Spielberg is still at it, but what is it?

As dumb as it sounds.

I have to admit, I’m not impressed by Hollywood’s efforts the last fifteen years or so, but today I went to go see Spielberg’s latest and greatest, Cowboys and Aliens. Greatest? I don’t think so! Maybe “greatest” isn’t the best choice of words. Actually, I think Steven may be losing his touch?

Olivia Wilde (I told you so!)

First let me say for the record that the only good thing about this film is Olivia Wilde. I’m not gonna say why I think this way, but I’m sure you can figure it out on your own. Let me just say that she is very easy on the eyes. (She’s a decent actress too, by the way.)

That being said, this film was a real turkey. And I’m not kidding either. It was a huge, ten-winged, alien turkey.

Why is Steven Spielberg suddenly obsessed with aliens?

Not just any old alien will do either. It seems he’s got an unnatural fear of aliens who come to Earth and bury themselves in the ground – until the moment of attack – to emerge from their burrow in massive vessels that, if you ask me, look a lot like great big beer kegs. I will accept giant coffee cans as an answer, as well.

In his film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Spielberg’s “kingdom” was a beer keg. Now he’s gone and done it again in Cowboys and Aliens.

What the...?

Cowboys and Aliens? What the…?

Did you ever have one of those moments when you knew you spotted a dumb idea the moment you saw it?

Yeah! Me too.

Daniel Craig is arguably the worst actor since Sylvester Stalone, but the ladies think he looks great with his shirt off. Apparently six-pack abs are an acceptable substitute for talent? Craig has little of it that I can see (with a single blank expression to punctuate the drab) and he fits perfectly into a long line of very successful leading men who cannot act worth a lick: Sly, Arnold Schwartzeneger, Steven Segal, Keanu Reeves, and the list goes on and on and on forever.

Is it me, or do they look too clean to be cowboys?

Sometimes surrounding a lousy actor with a good supporting cast helps, but not in the case of Cowboys and Aliens, however. There was a fair lineup behind Craig that’s for sure. It included the likes of Harrison Ford, Olivia Wilde, and Keith Carradine, but the two-time 007 doesn’t live-up to all the hype. He’s got one speed – dull – and he navigates the entire film with it.

Harrison Ford wasn’t a bore in Cowboys and Aliens. He was downright pitiful. His character is a weenie who spends two hours proving anyone questioning Ford’s acting abilities after having aged a bit, right on the money.

The film sets us up with huge expectations of Ford’s dramatic entrance. This guy is gonna be a bad dude, I kept thinking, as Ford’s on-screen son kept warning the town of his immanent arrival. But when he does arrive – WEENIE!!!

I’m a HUGE fan of Harrison Ford’s; wish he would have passed on this film. I wish I had passed on it too!

You’re probably thinking right now that I don’t like westerns, horror films, or sci-fi? Not true! In fact, they are my top three genres – in that order. Two of my favorite actors – Clint Eastwood and Vincent Price – should prove the point. Nobody will ever do a cowboy right ever again after Eastwood’s cold, ruthless eyes burned holes in the big screen. Clint’s character, the no-name cowboy that originated in the best western ever, The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, won’t ever be matched. Perfection!

I like westerns. I just don’t like this western. (Or was it sci-fi… horror? Oh, I don’t know?)

One thing’s for sure, I won’t be going back in a week to see Cowboys and Aliens again, like I did Harry Potter 7.2. I probably won’t see it another seventy-five times once it hits TV and DVD format either, as I have done with most of Eastwood’s films. Just a hunch.

Bela Lugosi

I love a good western. I said good, didn’t I? High Noon, True Grit (the John Wayne version), My Darlin’ Clementine, The Spaghetti Westerns (with Clint), Unforgiven – my wild west sensibilities stretch a few generations of film, as does my love for horror flicks and science fiction: Dracula, Frankenstein, Murders in the Rue Morgue, House of Wax, Independence Day, Men in Black, Ghostbusters, Star Wars, Star Trek, and the list goes on and on and on.

It’s cliché and I’ll probably be accused of being old after I say it, but I’m gonna say it anyway: they don’t make ’em like that any more!

Okay! Once in a while they do. (See my post on Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows II)

One thing is certain, after the new shark attack film is out in theaters next month and folks have a chance to take it all in, don’t expect any panic at the beaches. My guess is that the new Jaws won’t have people swarming theaters, or fleeing beaches, like the old Jaws did. No matter how good the special effects are, they won’t “sell the sizzle” as it were, like Robert Shaw did so long ago, with the simple act of raking his nails across a chalk board.

I still cringe when I watch that scene, but in a good way. Cowboys and Aliens makes me cringe too! But only because I had to spend six bucks to get into the theater.

My advice: wait until it hits HBO!

As for Steven Spielberg, I always have high hopes. I saw a trailer for The War Horse – due out this Christmas. Looks like he may reclaim his throne after all. At least he will try.

Life After “Deathly Hollows”

I just returned home from the movie theater. Got to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows with some of my church family. I certainly have nothing but good things to say about the film and highly recommend it for everyone. If you are looking for a great movie, this is it. But buy your tickets in advance – theaters are packed.

Hollywood has produced some real crap over the years – never so much crap as in the last 10-15 years, or so. But Harry is the one bright spot behind which all the freaks, dorks, dweebs, and bozos in tinsel town can hide their shame.

You’d think they would learn a lesson? I mean, most films these days are box office flops by the time you take into consideration how much money they spend on production and salaries. And the pain of it is that all they seem to produce are re-makes of old movies, or worse, old TV shows. Hollywood really hasn’t had many fresh ideas in a very long time. And the multiple part serial torture they put movie goers through is the worst.

Then along comes Harry Potter. Harry has grossed 6.4 billion dollars at the box office to date and that number was released two days before this latest installment’s opening weekend. Duh! What other evidence is there that folks are looking for good entertainment, fresh ideas, solid writing, and something more than lots of special effects and macho “heroes” spewing the F-bomb every other script line?

What makes this film series so different from the rest of the garbage cinema we normally get, other than the fact that there is no gratuitous sex, violence, or profanity, is that the whole Harry Potter sensation stands tall on its artistic prowess. Good art is hard to find nowadays, especially at the movie theater. Not in this case, however.

Twilight is on Harry’s heels to capture lightning in a bottle one more time, but I have serious doubts about pulp fiction having any lasting impact like Rowlings’ work. Rowlings penned a good story – the rest took care of itself. The copy cats are nothing but cookie-cutter impostors coming to cash in.

J. K. Rowlings, otherwise known as the 6-billion-dollar woman, proves she is worth every penny that she has earned by penning the book series that turned two generations of strict non-readers (my middle schoolers would rather wrestle a hungry alligator than a novel and most of their parents are the same way) into rabid – I mean rabid – readers. She really deserves credit for doing what I thought could not be done.

This series is on par with many great works of fiction too. Rowlings’ Harry Potter books have been compared to the likes of C. S. Lewis, which makes her in pretty good literary company.

On the film and merchandising front, Ms Rowlings gets 10% of the gross. And that’ll add up to more money than… well, when I think of anyone to compare her to, I’ll get back to you.

Harry Potter was a superb book series and a rare work of genius as far as Hollywierd is concerned. They’ll never do it again – unless Rowlings writes more books.

Here’s a pretty good review of the last Harry Potter – Deathly Hollows – which opens in theaters this weekend.

Go see it!!! You won’t be disappointed.

Memento Harry 
Lessons from the final Potter film.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This review contains spoilers.

There has never been anything quite like J. K Rowling’s Harry Potter, the hero of a hugely popular series of seven books followed by a successful set of eight movies. The decision to split the last book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, into two films turns out to have been a wise one. While part one, which ended abruptly after covering two-thirds of the material from the book, was somewhat anticlimactic, part two is a lean and dramatically satisfying finale. Director David Yates, who has been at the helm for the last three books in the series, and screenwriter Steve Kloves, who has penned all but one of the film scripts, move effortlessly between the large and the small, between grand battle scenes and moments of intimate, human interaction. The special effects are dazzling and the human drama gripping. The film also strikes a nice balance between the serious and the humorous, between tragedy and comedy.

In an age of increasingly decentralized media, in which sub-cultures of interest in TV shows, films, and music abound, Harry Potter is the common, unifying cultural marker for individuals between the ages of ten and 30, and perhaps well beyond that age. If the fictional characters and story-lines are woven into popular culture, the actors are equally well known, particularly those who play the three main characters: Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe), Hermione Granger (Emma Watson), and Ron Weasley (Rupert Grint). All three give fine performances in the last film, as do Ralph Fiennes as Lord Voldemort, Gary Oldman as Sirius Black, and Matthew Lewis as Neville Longbottom. The battle for, and at, Hogwarts, whose culmination is the ultimate faceoff between Harry and his nemesis, Voldemort, allows for the return of a host of well-known characters, all of whom are aware of what is at stake.

Given the malevolence of Voldemort, the books become darker as the story progresses. Particularly in Deathly Hallows and its immediate predecessor, Half-Blood Prince, deaths of major characters occur. Beyond her creation of memorable characters and plots, Rowling has crafted a mythical universe where remembering and preparing for death are central virtues. She revives the medieval theme of memento mori, the virtuous cultivation of the memory of death, as a counter to modernity’s vacillation between unhealthy obsession with and tragic forgetfulness of death.

This theme is powerfully coupled with repeated illustrations of (a) the unnaturalness of the project of overcoming death and (b) the way the practice of evil, murderous arts destroys the practitioner. In Half-Blood Prince, Dumbledore informs Harry that Voldemort’s pursuit of immortality has “mutilated” his “soul beyond the realm of what we might call usual evil.”

The contrast between Harry and Voldemort’s approach to death is palpable. The opening of Yates’s Deathly Hallows Part Two finds Harry and Voldemort occupied in two quite different activities. Harry, refusing to use magic, is physically digging the grave of his friend Dobby, the loyal house-elf who gave his life defending Harry.

Meanwhile, in an act of desecration of the dead, Voldemort is stealing the Elder Wand from the grave of Albus Dumbledore. At various points in the story, the Elder Wand is cited as one of three components (along with the Cloak of Invisibility and the Resurrection Stone) of the Deathly Hallows, the possession of which is believed to make one a “master of death” — the object of Voldemort’s quest.

At the center of Voldemort’s search is his performance of the darkest of dark arts: the creation of horcruxes, which preserve splintered pieces of his immortal soul, and which can only be created by committing murder. As Harry and his pals seek to discover and destroy the horcruxes, the only way that Voldemort himself will die, Voldemort pursues invulnerability and permanent rule over the world of wizards. The scenes featuring the destruction of horcruxes are among the most spectacular in the entire series of films, even as they heighten the dramatic tension and the sense of inevitable, final confrontation.

With threats imminent, there is no longer room for self-pity or teen angst — elements that were tiresomely common in the middle, overly long books in the series. Friendships deepen and in some cases blossom into love; the film contains two brief (and very nicely scripted) moments of passion, one between Ron and Hermione and another between Harry and Ginny. But this film is about what the books and previous films have always been essentially about: the practice of the virtues of friendship, loyalty, courage, and leadership.

In the midst of battle, there are revelations, small and large. We learn about the courage of Mrs. Weasley and Neville Longbottom, though Yates prunes important elements from Rowling’s version of their stories. Matthew Lewis is just right as Longbottom, capturing Harry’s rather plain and self-effacing classmate, who in the final film best combines valor and wit.

But the big revelations involve Snape and Dumbledore. The greatest reversal in the estimation of a major character in the entire series concerns Snape, who has throughout appeared to be Harry’s enemy and the Dark Lord’s servant. Realizing that Snape is of more use to him dead than alive, Voldemort bluntly informs him that his services are no longer needed, stuns him with his wand, and sets his snake, Nagini, to feed on him. Harry, Hermione, and Ron arrive just as this brutal murder begins. With Voldemort and Nagani departed, Harry finds Snape within seconds of his death. A tear falls from Snape’s eye, and he tells Harry to store the tear and take it to the Pensieve, a device for uncovering memories. As Harry captures the tear, Snape’s last words are, “You have your mother’s eyes.” Using the Pensieve, Harry learns the truth about Snape’s deception, not of him or Dumbledore, but of Voldemort. Snape had in fact vowed to protect Harry, out of his love for Harry’s mother, Lily, even as he elicited from Dumbledore the promise “never to reveal the best” of Snape to Harry. The revelation enables viewers to re-think the entire arc of the epic series, to see the plot from Snape’s vantage point.

A further revelation concerns the afterlife. Injured by Voldemort, Harry has a vision of Dumbledore, who reappears in his proper role — a teacher of the young. Harry and his deceased mentor are at King’s Cross, which looks like a cathedral bathed in light. Dumbledore instructs Harry on life and death. The fundamental lesson concerns the true way to conquer death: Do not cling to life but be willing to offer one’s life for the sake of others. This theme in Harry Potter calls to mind C. S. Lewis’s notion in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe of the deeper magic, a magic unknown to those who pursue vengeance and immortality by their own powers. As Wardrobe’s Aslan explains after he returns from the dead, “When a willing victim who had committed no treachery is killed . . .  the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backward.”

Throughout the series, Rowling has stressed the way in which evil, instead of freeing, enslaves; instead of increasing, diminishes. Indeed, after his first attempt to kill Harry, Voldemort becomes a disembodied shell, kept alive only by his horcruxes, a parasite feeding off the blood of innocent unicorns, seeking a body in which to lodge his wandering spirit. In the end, the very devices he chooses to gain absolute control turn against him, in an illustration of another classical teaching, namely, that vice is its own punishment — that it harms and ultimately defeats the perpetrator.

In the course of their final duel, Harry manages to extract the Elder Wand from Voldemort’s clutches. With that, Voldemort is defeated. Harry’s final decision, to destroy the Elder Wand, reiterates a theme that goes back to the first book and the philosopher’s stone, which promises limitless life and wealth. Some of the things men desire most are precisely the things most likely to destroy them. Here Rowling calls to mind, not so much Lewis as Tolkien and the ring of power, whose destruction, rather than use, is the only sure means of fending off evil.

In her description of Harry’s retrieval of the Elder Wand, Rowling writes that he caught the wand “with the unerring skill of a Seeker.” Of course, Seeker is the position Harry plays on Gryffindor’s Quidditch squad. But Harry’s character is also that of the classic seeker, an individual on a quest with personal and social significance, a quest to defend the innocent and fend off evil, a quest for self-knowledge rooted in a profound awareness of mortality. Hooked by the plot of the first book, readers were likely unaware that such a quest could be anything other than morbid. In Rowling’s hands, coming to terms with death is not tragic; instead, it is a comic affirmation of life over death, love over hate, and community over isolation. It is a mark of the success of Yates’s film version that it will lead viewers to feel and affirm the final words of Rowling’s sprawling series: “All was well.”

— Thomas S. Hibbs, an NRO contributor, is the author of Shows about Nothing.

Happy 4th of July and SEMPER FIDELIS

(Original post July 3rd, 2011)

The 4th of July is truly an All American holiday. It’s all about lounging around the backyard with family and friends. It’s all about hot dogs and hamburgers. It’s all about watching the kids play with sparklers. It’s all about fireworks, apple pie, baseball, and ice-cold watermelon.

Summertime fun… That’s what it’s all about! Have it. Make it. Breathe it into your soul. Enjoy life on this 4th of July and make the most out of your time with your fellow Americans.

There’s one thing I want to ask you to do this week before the 4th of July, 2012. But first, I want to remind everyone that Wednesday is actually called Independence Day. Why is this so important? Let me tell you…

It is my belief that everyone living in this country, a free United States of America, owes a HUGE debt. I’m not talkin’ about the national debt. I’m not talkin’ about the debt we owe because of DC bureaucrats. That’s all argument for another day.

I am talkin’ bout the debt we owe the American Soldier.

I’ve lived fifty-two years. In that time I have come to the conclusion that not a single one of our precious rights as Americans – call them freedoms – has come to us by the actions of a peace activist. Not one!

All of the rights we share, without exception, were given to us by the heroism of the American Soldier. Heroism! True heroism.

I’m not a “war monger” by any stretch, but some would surely accuse me of that. I am a “reality monger” who likes to remind folks that while “peace bro” is a sweet yet vague popular sentiment, our peace here at home is solely due to the grit of those who have sacrificed in war. Like it, or not, this is reality. And no amount of tie-dye peace sign t-shirts will ever deny that fact.

So, on this holiday, July 4th, 2012, I want all of you to take a moment to reflect upon those who have paid the price and those who continue to sacrifice in far away lands, for your freedom to relax and have fun. Make it about them this year.

(Here’s the part where I ask you to do something.)

To help you reflect, I am posting a link to a speech transcript that tells a story of true heroism. And if you are like me, you understand the word “hero” today means nothing more than celebrity in our shallow modern media culture – celebrity that rarely lives up to the status of hero and so often disappoints us with human dysfunction and failure in the end.

I aim to change that.

Heroes abound. But you won’t find any of them in the NBA, living in Hollywood, at the Grammy’s, on the golf course, on TV, in a newsroom, surfing the net, at the app store, with your smart phone, sitting in a fast food joint, or on your morning jog.

You will find heroes on the battle fields around the world, still doing the job you don’t have to do, so you can live free – like you often expect to do.

I’ve sent this speech out before, but believe it’s worthy of a re-visit once in a while – like on the 4th of July. General John Kelly, USMC, tells us of the bravery of two American Marines he recommended for the Navy Cross (posthumous). The Last Six Seconds is a story that will forever go down in history as a true act of heroism:

http://bobzilla.tv/supportourtroops/thelastsixseconds.html

 
Don’t take freedom for granted. As Ronald Reagan so correctly put it, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from being lost forever.”

Are we getting close to that point yet?

 

Happy 4th of July and SEMPER FIDELIS