Olympics 2012 Diary: Excitement

I love the Olympics.  It is hands down my favorite sporting event - even more than the Super Bowl that I have lovingly blathered on about before on this blog.  Look! I even debuted a new identifier disc to reflect my Olympic spirit!  I'm not some naive doofus that buys into all of that Olympic purity and honor and integrity garbage.  I know that this is big business and that athletes will do anything they can to get ahead.  I would not be surprised to find that even some of my very favorite athletes may have so many drugs in their system they could be considered a pharmacy.  Plus the belief that the Olympics somehow bring peace to this world is a joke.  That has been shown time and again at the Games.  People are still people, countries are still countries.  No torch is going to change that.

Yet, even in my cynical approach to sports, I still have a soft spot for the Olympics.  I believe some of that was forged in my childhood, when we all sat down together and watched the Olympics non-stop.  My parents loved them too - even my mother, who usually was as ambivalent to sports as a person could get.  (Except John Elway.  For some reason, which I never understood, she loved John Elway.)  Anything that caused that to happen in our house was going to get my stamp of approval.  I'm sure it didn't hurt that my first major Olympic memory was the 1984 Los Angeles games when we won everything due to the Communist boycott.

You know how you may have a restaurant you really like, but you only get to go once a year or maybe every other year?  Maybe its a place you go on vacation, so it is REALLY special?  It could be that if you were able to go to that restaurant all the time, it wouldn't be that special anymore.  I think that also has something to do with my draw to the Olympics.  The sports that make up the Olympic roster are ones that I really enjoy AND don't get to see that often.  You aren't saturated with the non-stop presence of them, unlike football or baseball.  So they remain special.  I love watching swimming, diving, gymnastics, track and field, volleyball, and rowing.  I don't know if I would watch those sports if they were on all the time, but I like watching them every four years.  The same goes for the winter games.  Bobsledding, skiing, figure skating, speed skating.  Those are fun things to enjoy, partly because they are rare.  Even the more accessible sports - tennis, soccer, basketball - find a new meaning in the Olympics.  I barely watched any basketball this past season - NBA or NCAA.  But I will watch Olympic basketball.

One final reason I have loved the Summer Olympics is that they usually fall during the summer.  (That may seem obvious, but we have also had games that ran during September, which is just stupid.)  As a student, that timing is perfect.  You are off from school, usually having trouble filling the time.  Out of nowhere, BAM, non-stop Olympics.  It is awesome.  Just about any time of day, you can find some kind of Olympics on tv.  Now, with all the iPhone apps and web coverage, a person could watch coverage all day.  [NOTE: Some of this coverage is boxing.  I hate boxing.  I used to watch it as a kid.  That was before two things happened.  First, the USA started to suck at boxing.  That makes it less fun to watch.  Second, I realized that boxing is a disgusting sport.  So CNBC is basically a useless station.]

As you can see, I love the Olympics.  Here are the ten things I am most excited to see during this Olympics.  (Spoiler alert - not all of them have to do with sports.)

1. Opening Ceremony - I know this happened last night.  All day, I was excited for it to start.  I actually was counting down the hours.  Personally, I loved the London opening.  I heard a lot of people say it wasn't as good as Beijing.  For some reason, I don't remember much about theirs.  But I thought London did a GREAT job.  Maybe I just appreciated the story-telling.   It was brilliant how they transformed the stadium like they did.  The rising smokestacks were very cool. And the forging elements, complete with the map of London on the floor of the stadium, were just incredible.  Their tributes to literature and music were fun - even though their exclusion of Coldplay, Adele, and U2 (YES I KNOW THEY AREN'T PART OF THE UK!!! But they are on the same islands, for pete's sake) was annoying.  I thought the parade of nations was great.  It was much faster than usual and the background music (which did include Adele and U2, but not Coldplay or Mumford and Sons) was super.  My favorite was the lighting of the torch.  I thought the incorporation of every country in the creation of the giant torch was brilliant - and it mimicked the storyline of building and forging.  I loved it.  Well worth the wait.
2. Oscar Pistorius Running - For those of you who don't know who that is, he is a sprinter from South Africa.  I've actually been following his story since the beginning.  The dude is fast - one of the fastest sprinters in South Africa.  But he has been refused inclusion for two straight Olympics.  Actually, he has competed . . . in the Paralympics.  He had both of his legs partially amputated as a child.  So he runs with these bladed appendages.  There has been a big fight over if he can compete because his artificial legs gave him an advantage.  US legend Michael Johnson even went on record saying he thought Pistorius shouldn't be allowed.  My thought is HE HAS NO LEGS!!!! What kind of advantage can POSSIBLY make up for having NO LEGS?!?!  He isn't going to win.  But I want to see him finally run in the Olympics.  What an amazing story.
3. Men's 100 Meter Finals - Talk about running!  This is stacking up to be the most incredible 100 meters race I can remember.  You have Usain Bolt, who has looked like he is running on fast forward for years.  But he has lost to his own countryman several times this year, including the qualifiers.  Plus, there is the gaggle of US sprinters and several others.  Just how fast can a man run?  I remember when Ben Johnson ran the 9.78 100 meter with the steroid needle hanging out of his butt.  I thought that we probably had hit the point where it was impossible to run any faster.  Bolt ran a 9.58 in Beijing.  What will happen in a field THIS competitive?  Will they run so fast they break out of their Matrix slumber?  (That was for the three of you who saw that short story on Animatrix.)
4. London - One of the alternating best and most annoying things about NBC's coverage of the Olympics is the human interest stories.  Sure, we hardly ever get to see these sports, so let's cut away to see Mary Carillo talking to some Ethiopian athlete's third grade teacher.  But I do love the insight into the host country.  Combine that with the fact that London is my ultimate dream vacation spot.  I love London - like an illogical love of London.  I've never been there.  But I would rather visit there than New York City, Hawaii, the Caribbean.  I've been to Washington DC, Los Angeles, Montreal, Sydney, Philadelphia, and Dallas.  But none of them were as high on my list as London.  I love history, I love Shakespeare, I love several UK bands (I KNOW U2 ISN'T FROM THE UK!!!), I love Harry Potter, I love Sherlock Holmes.  There is so much from London that I love.  At one point, Heather and I had discussed going to London for these Olympics - before Med School made that impossible.  I think I would have exploded.
5. Women's Gymnastics - I have always loved gymnastics.  They are fun to watch.  The fact that my wife is a major gymnastics fan, which she passed on to our daughter only serves to intensify my love for the sport.  If you don't believe that we are that attached to this sport, think of this.  We went to the Women's Gymnastics Olympic Trials in 2000 on our honeymoon.  That's important.  
6. Michael Phelps - I like Phelps.  I know he can be arrogant and make bad decisions.  But he is an awesome swimmer.  I want to see him become the most decorated Olympian of all time.  Plus, the drama from swimming is unmatchable.  I still can't believe Phelps won that one match in Beijing.  You know the one I'm talking about.  (That's another great thing about the Olympics.)
7. Ryan Seacrest - One thing I noticed last night is that his hair looks like he has completely replicated Bruno Mars' pompadour.  At what point does this guy have to clone himself to do all of his jobs?  I'm excited for that.  Cloning yourself never ends well in movies.  What kind of evil could multiple Ryan Seacrests propagate?  I'm on board to find out.
8. Basketball  - I have generally abandoned the NBA.  But even I have to admit that it is stinking cool to see our all-star team playing together like you do in the Olympics.  I also get a kick out of seeing NBA players playing for other countries - like the Gasol brothers in Spain and Ronnie Turiaf for France.  It will be fun to watch.
9. NBC Olympics LIVE - With each Olympics, NBC learns a little better how to handle the new technology.  I remember the 2000 Sydney Olympics, when Heather and I would get online to find all the gymnastics scores twelve hours before they were broadcast.  NBC has been under fire for years about delaying sports until prime time.  BUT, this year you can watch just about everything live.  They have a website and an iPhone/iPad app where you can watch any sport as they are happening.  Plus, they have sports running all day on NBC, CNBC, MSNBC, Bravo, and three different NBC Sports channels.  It is almost overwhelming.  Do I want to watch cycling, fencing, tennis, soccer, handball, boxing (not boxing), or beach volleyball?  Or do I go online and watch something I've never seen before?  
10. Tennis - The tennis matches are at Wimbledon.  Do you realize how cool that is?!?  Wimbledon only happens once a year and is just incredible to watch.  I have always loved Wimbledon.  It is another one of those special events, made more special by their limited access.  BUT, for one time only, we get to see it TWICE in a year.  Awesome.  Plus, all of the big name tennis stars are playing - but for their own country and not just themselves.  That is one thing I do like with the professionals being involved.  These stars make tens of millions of dollars a year.  But there still is something special enough involved in playing for their country that they will give up their offseason to play.  Roger Federer, Rafa Nadal, Maria Sharapova, Serena Williams, the basketball men and women.  It is cool to see them so invested in something like a gold medal that brings no financial gain.  

I hope to be writing a few of these articles as the Olympics go on.  So just look for the fancy new Olympics identifier disc at the top.  

Farewell Dear Friend

This morning I lost one of my oldest and closest friends.  We met in junior high, but like many friendships, it didn't fully grow until years later.  It really solidified in high school.  I remember strolling the halls together at Forest Hill High School.  We thought we were so cool - both just wisps of what we would later become.  We didn't care how goofy we looked - we felt more mature just being together.  As I got older, we grew more attached.  In college, things really firmed up.  And we've been together ever since.  Sure, there were times when my friend disappeared.  Sometimes it was my fault; sometimes it was his.  And sometimes something else would come between us - sever the ties.  But that never lasted.  I felt better with him than without him.  And he knew he couldn't exist without me.  I don't think we have gone more than thirty days in the last twenty years without seeing each other.

But today, tragedy struck.  It had been building for some time.  I had some concerns that he was covering things up.  I couldn't see the situation clearly as long as he was blocking my view by hanging around.  I tried to trim back his presence, but I still was having problems identifying the true story.  Heather and I talked about it a couple of days ago.  She urged me to give it time and see if things cleared up.  But they didn't.  Finally this morning, I knew what I had to do.  I had to make a clear cut of the situation.  I feel weird.  But it was a necessity.

I shaved my moustache off.

It is strange.  Like most guys, I have experimented with different facial hair combinations.  I've had a full-on James Harden hostage beard.  I've gone with no beard and just the little moustache.  I've had long 90210 sideburns.  I have even on a couple of (misguided) occasions gone clean shaven.  But for most of my adult life, I've opted for the moustache and goatee.  I don't like my face without facial hair.  My giant balloon head has so much real estate without something to break it up.  My dad always had a beard or goatee - except for a couple of weeks when I was in high school.  And I have always had one.

I noticed something the other day under my moustache.  Some kind of blemish.  At first I thought it was just a pimple.  (Sorry for the graphic description)  But then I realized that it looked like several pimples. And a big red patch.  Weird.  I trimmed the stache with my normal #2 guard.  I still couldn't figure it out, so I dropped down to the dreaded #1 guard.  Using a #1 guard on facial hair is a risky move.  It basically transforms whatever hair pattern you have.  There is a fine line between "unshaven" and "has facial hair."  A #1 guard is that line.  For some guys, it looks awesome.  For other guys, it makes them look slobby.  (Take a wild guess which group I am in.)  I got a clearer view of the spot and showed it to my almost doctor wife.  "I would have someone look at that."

Friends, let me tell you something, since I know most of you are not married to doctors.  I always thought that having a doctor for a spouse would be incredible.  FREE MEDICAL CARE!!!  Now, my wife has firmly informed me she is NOT my primary care doctor.  I still have plans to never see a primary care doctor again as soon as she can write prescriptions.  There is a great comfort in taking one of the kids to her and having her check them out or asking her about something.  One of my favorite questions (and her least favorite) is, "Hey, can you look at something?"  So, this all is a great benefit.  BUT...  When your doctor spouse looks at something and immediately says, "I would have someone look at that," that is NOT cool.  That is terrifying.  Of course, it is well documented that I am a massive panicker when it comes to medical issues.

Anyways, the spot never cleared up so I shaved off the moustache to get a better look at things.  The white points were not pimples.  They were some kind of dead skin patches.  Once the shower and shave were done, I was left with a neat pink patch about the size of a dime on my face right under my nose.  Doctor Heather looked at it again.  This time she told me to put some Neosporin on it for a couple of days.  And then have it looked at.  AAAAAAAaaaaaaaahhhhh!  What is it?  Leprosy?  Cancer?  Excema?  An alien infestation?  Only time will tell, I suppose.  (It probably is nothing.  Like I said, I like to panic.)  Whatever it is, I already am angry at it.  It cost me my friend.

Alien vs Alien

My wife is out of town for the week. So that means that I'm bored. Instead of watching the shows stacking up on my DVR (all of which my wife wants to see), I am hitting up the Red Box and catching up on some movies that I have not been able to see yet. To make this even more fun, I will be blogging my reviews and thoughts about the films. Today's Final Installment: Super 8.

What is wrong with aliens today?  This is something that I noticed in some recent movies that has started to bother me.  When I was growing up, we had some really iconic aliens.  Think back.  There was the plethora of cool extraterrestrials in Star Wars and Star Trek.  You had THE alien in Alien and Aliens.  Then there was the predator in Predator.  I would even include E.T. as one of these guys.  They were recognizable and memorable.  If they were scary, they inspired fear.  But they also were just plain cool.  I remember when I saw Alien.  That thing was terrifying.  It looked horrible.  And it was a complete nightmare.  It had armored skin, even side of it was lethal, and it even had acidic blood - so if you did shoot it, it could kill you with its wound!  That is just vicious.  BUT, the alien was so ... stinking ... cool.  I felt the same way about the predator.  They were terrifying with their hunting helmets on.  And when they took them off, man, even worse.

I don't know filmmakers that came after those epic monsters were worried that they couldn't live up to the standard of awesomeness.  Maybe they were afraid that people accuse them of just making a cheap knock off.  Or it could be that they needed to follow the current mindset of "bigger, gaudier, blockbustier" when it came to their creations.  Whatever the reason, aliens in movies are just not doing it for me.

I noticed the trend back in Independence Day, actually.  I remember that they never showed the aliens in the previews.  My friends and I intentionally didn't read anything or watch anything that might show the invaders - just so they would be ready to be stunned at the big revealing scene.  Then they showed the things.  Whaaaa?  What the heck is that?  Their ships were cool, their attacks were awesome.  They were just stupid.  I mean, look at that thing.  As memorable as the movie is (and trust me, it has a huge following), the alien in it is just about the least memorable thing.  You don't see people with little figurines of that or hear anyone clamoring for more of the shovel headed freak.

This has continued with other movies.  I really have rarely been that impressed with the aliens.  It seems the reliance has been on their technology or their ships instead.  Many times we never even see the alien.  There is a menacing craft doing unspeakable damage.  But the thing piloting is is irrelevant.  Think about The Avengers this summer.  Now, I loved the movie.  Absolutely loved it.  But was anyone talking about the aliens in it?  Nope.  They were just cannon fodder.  They had nothing unique or awesome about them.  They actually were one of the weakest elements of the whole movie.

I watched Cowboys and Aliens the other day.  This is a movie that is based on the terror of these invaders.  Again, they never showed the aliens in the previews - just their ships flashing around and the mayhem they cause.  I was looking forward to see what they aliens looked like in their big reveal.  Again, I have kindly included a shot of these things.  What in the heck is that supposed to be?  Is that a fish?  A rock man?  They were ridiculous.  Their chest would also open up and these weird hands would come out.  It actually made no biological sense at all.  Was there a symbiotic relationship?  Were there two creatures inhabiting the same body?  What was the purpose of the second internal hands?  And do they have internal organs?  Plus there was no consistency in how to dispatch the aliens.  They seemed like they could take arrow or bullet hits, but if you hit their head (which seemed extra reinforced) they could die.  The whole thing was very bizarre.  I'm sure it didn't help the movie that the aliens - part of the title of the movie - were lame.

This all brings me to Super 8.  On the whole, this was a very good movie.  I loved it.  Well, I loved the first three-quarters of it.  Then it seemed to derail.  (Hmmmm.  Kind of sounds like another JJ Abrams project involving suspense and thrills.  cough LOST cough cough)  I thought the opening minute of the movie demonstrated Abrams' absolute brilliance at story telling.  The opening scene has the haunting score, penned by the always incredible Michael Giacchino.  There is a factory with a sign showing how many hundreds of days it has had without an accident.  A worker climbs a ladder and starts taking the numbers down, replacing them with just a 1.  Then it cuts to a boy sitting on a swing in the snow.  In just a moment, we already know this boy lost his parent.  Brilliant.  I loved it.

Abrams has a knack for opening a story - it is one of his hallmarks.  Consider the opening scene of Star Trek.  It was absolute mayhem.  And it was incredible.  I remember watching it with my friend, Greg, and he leaned over to me when the scene ended and the title screen came up.  "JJ Abrams is a freaking genius."  I agreed.  The pilot of Lost was as good as any television episode ever.  The same could be say about the pilot of Heroes, the pilot of Alcatraz, the opening of Mission Impossible III.  Abrams grabs your attention on a consistent basis.  The challenge is carrying that all the way through.

Super 8 started off great.  I was very interested in the story.  It was a great tale.  The train wreck that really catapulted the movie was intense and incredible.  I really liked the kids that were the center of the movie.  It was a very good movie and it was very enjoyable.  But...

Throughout the film, there is this monster hiding.  It escaped from the train and it now lurking in the city.  We see glimpses of things happening.  The monster is obviously formidable.  It can crush a car.  Somehow it affects the electricity in its area.  People scream a lot when it shows up.  It is supposedly terrifying.  They are building to the moment when we finally see it.  I am actually excited and nervous to see the thing.  I'm sure that Abrams and executive producer Steven Spielberg will come up with something worthy of the hype.

Ummmmm.  What exactly is that?  It has six legs, I think.  The first time we saw it on the kids' video it looked like a spider.  I thought maybe it was a giant spider.  A giant spider is what they are going with?  After Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, we are supposed to be freaked out by a giant spider?!?  Then I realized it wasn't a spider. It had that weird face too.  What is that?  It looks like a dozen other creatures we have seen.  Actually, his face reminds me of Megatron from Transformers.

There are tweaks and such, but I wasn't that impressed.  It was ugly.  And then we are supposed to actually have some sympathy for it.  It just wants to go home!  Of course, it has killed dozens of people already and caused tons of damage.  One character has already said that it has no remorse or pity for anything.  And we are supposed to be like, "Poor spider looking transformer thing.  It misses its home."  Sorry.  Not working for me.

The other problem is that the scenes where we actually see the alien up close are so dark that I could barely make out details.  There is no big scene where the thing emerges so we can see it in its full glory.  It is always in shadows or silhouettes.  That's really annoying.  So we either have to deal with scenes too dark to actually be scared of the non-spider or we have to deal with Abrams love affair with lens flares.  [Side Note - there is an entire online community devoted to ripping Abrams for his love of lens flare effects.  For those of you who don't know, lens flares are this trick where light hits the camera just right and you get a little starburst of light in a scene.  Awww.  However, they also can be added through any video or picture editing software.  I know how to do them in Photoshop.  They are actually one of the first "tricks" people learn.  Star Trek was infested with them.  Light bounced off all the chrome everywhere and there were flares galore.  I actually laughed at one scene in Super 8.  It was a gas station at night (of course).  I counted six lens flares in one shot.  In a gas station.  At night.  But I quibble.]

I know that this whole alien thing may seem like a small thing to focus on in a rather enjoyable movie - especially for a guy who gave Cowboys and Aliens a VERY generous evaluation.  But, I think it should be an understandable rule in Hollywood.  If you are going to make a movie or show that focuses on the presence of a terrifying alien, then the alien needs to live up to the hype.  If not, then the movie kind of crumbles.  I mean, that is the crux of the conflict, right?  Was the alien in Super 8 scary?  Well, sure, if I was a kid standing there in a cave and that sucker came up to me, I would soil myself.  Heck, if I was the sheriff and that thing came jumping out of the dark at me, I would soil myself.  But I'm not. I'm a grizzled moviegoer who is used to aliens from decades of invasion movies.  I need to see something memorable.   I don't even know what I was hoping for.  I just know that wasn't it, especially with the big names that were associated with the film.

In addition, to have the movie end the way it did just seemed weird.  It almost felt like I had wrongly identified the main story arc.  The whole time we are sitting there worried about how to defeat this alien.  At the same time, we are supposed to be suspicious of the military guys, knowing they are up to no good.  The alien is actually going out of its way to hunt people.  He isn't just offing the clowns who cross his path.  He is out and causing trouble.  He takes out sympathetic characters, too.  So there is no reason to feel bad for this guy.  I am wondering the whole time how the kids and their parents are going  to fight off the military AND defeat the spider thing.  Then we get a twist that this guy just wants to go home.  And then he goes home.  Aaaaaand scene.  What?  That doesn't make any sense.  Everyone just stares up as his cobbled together ship takes off.  Now, mind you, only a couple people know that he just wants to go home.  But what's left of the town is just going to stare up approvingly at the killer leaving, as their buildings are burning all around them.  Nonsense.

In short, the movie was three-quarters very good and one-quarter confusing as heck.  The alien was disappointing on many levels.  And the ending was bizarre.  But there were some very cool elements and moments.  Which brings me to the end of my week of movie reviews.  I hope all two of you enjoyed it.  Actually, it is funny to see friends of mine out of nowhere putting status updates like "I finally am watching Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy" or "Let's see if Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol is any good."  I would like to think I made a difference.  Whether or not that difference was worth making is a different story.

Cowboys vs Aliens

My wife is out of town for the week. So that means that I'm bored. Instead of watching the shows stacking up on my DVR (all of which my wife wants to see), I am hitting up the Red Box and catching up on some movies that I have not been able to see yet. To make this even more fun, I will be blogging my reviews and thoughts about the films. Today's Installment: Cowboys and Aliens.


There is an especially funny episode of Friends where Rachel decides to make a traditional English trifle.  Her cookbook somehow gets some pages stuck together and she ends up combining the recipes for trifle (custard, lady fingers, and jam) and shepherd's pie (ground beef sauteed with peas and onions).  The resultant dish is reviled by all, with Ross going so far as to say, "It tastes like feet."  However, Joey eats not only his plate, but all the other hidden plates.  When someone asks him if he likes it, he says, "What's not to like?  Custard? Good. Meat? Good. Jam? GOOO-ooood!"

That exchange immediately popped into my head when I was thinking about Cowboys and Aliens.  On the surface, the individual elements of the movie look and sound great.  Jon Favreau, who brought us the incredible action movies Iron Man and Iron Man 2 and the class Christmas comedy Elf, was directing.  Steven Spielberg was producing.  As far as the cast goes, you have both James Bond (Daniel Craig) and Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) in roles that seemed created just for them.  The supporting cast was even stellar: Clancy Brown (Highlander, Shawshank Redemption), Keith Carradine (Deadwood), Olivia Wilde (Tron: Legacy, House), Paul Dano (There Will Be Blood), Sam Rockwell (Iron Man 2, Galaxy Quest), Walter Goggins (The Shield, Justified).  You get the point on the cast - a good strong cast.  It's a Western, which has a strong following.  It's a sci-fi, which has a stronger following.  Then you have a unique concept when so many people complain about too many reboots and sequels.

So, naturally, with all those great sounding ingredients, the movie bombed.  No, it wasn't a John Carter or Battleship level bomb.  But it was hardly the raging success everyone hoped for when it was made.  It took in $100 million in the USA and another $75 million overseas.  That doesn't sound bad, except it cost about $170 million to make, not counting the massive promotion costs.  So it didn't make blockbuster money.  Not only that, but its reviews were far from stellar.  If you go on Rotten Tomatoes - the online review site - the movie has a 44 percent fresh rating.  That means just 44 percent of people who reviewed it gave it a positive rating.  Among professional critics (translation: Morons that can't relate to the average moviegoer), it had a 50 percent fresh rating.  With the general audience, it had a 45 percent positive rating.  So, across the board, the movie just seemed to be not well liked.

When you actually read the reviews, few of them are actually viciously negative, though.  For some films, you will find hateful and scathing reviews.  I didn't see many like that at all.  Instead, most of them echoed along these sentiments.  "The movie wasn't as good as it should have been" or "It wasn't as fun as I thought it would be."  It seems like most people who went in thought they were going to get a fun, madcap, action film.  They were disappointed that the movie didn't deliver on it.

All of this puzzle me.  I remember reading about the movie from its original casting announcements.  I saw the previews, saw the marketing.  I don't really remember the movie ever being pitched as some kind of summer fun ride.  It wasn't supposed to be The Avengers or Fast Furiou6: More Fasterer and Furiouser.  So I'm not sure where people developed this perception.  After seeing the movie, I can say that the movie was a Western.  It had the pacing of a Western and the feel of one.  Thinking back on the Westerns I have seen, I don't remember to many of them having a frantic pace.  There aren't planes or guys in metal suits to race around.  There aren't race tracks and sports cars zipping back and forth.  People ride horses or walk.  It is dusty.  Fun time is sitting in a saloon and drinking, playing cards, and listening to music.  That's your average Western.

I know that the commercials highlighted the exciting moments of the film - Daniel Craig jumping off a cliff onto a spacecraft, Daniel Craig blowing up a ship with his bracelet weapon.  But it also showed a lot of Harrison Ford growling and Daniel Craig scowling and Olivia Wilde staring.  So, was Cowboys and Aliens mismarketed?  It is entirely possible that is the answer.  I know that even up to the release, friends of mine were not sure if the movie was supposed to be funny or not.  "Is it a spoof or something?"  [Answer: No.  It is not funny.  Very few laughs.]  When I would try to explain it to them, they would look at me and usually say, "That sounds dumb."  Now, these are the same people that have already pre-ordered tickets to Dark Knight Rises and can give you a fifteen minute dissertation on the symbolism in the Batman films.  They aren't movie noobs that don't get to a theater often.  But they still didn't catch the Cowboys and Aliens fever.

I remember in the past that there have been a handful of movies that were horribly mismarketed.  The strange thing is that I generally like those films because I judge them based on what they actually are.  But most moviegoers go in with a perception and are disappointed when the movie doesn't match that.  Here are a couple of examples.

• Hudson Hawk - This movie was supposed to be a typical Bruce Willis film.  Lots of action, some humor and sarcasm tossed in.  It was marketed as a caper film.  Bruce Willis was the best burglar in the world going after his biggest prize.  I can understand why someone would be upset when it turned out to be an action comedy about a duo of burglars who sang songs during their thefts instead of wearing watches.  It was zany and bizarre.  There were subplots about Da Vinci, the Vatican, mercenaries named after candy bars, and alchemy.  I loved it.  But it was NOT Die Hard 3: Rob Hard.
• The Cable Guy - Jim Carrey was a superstar.  Everything he touched up to this point was pure gold.  He was in the middle of a run that most stars would kill for.  Ace Ventura ($72mil), The Mask ($120mil), Dumb and Dumber ($127mil), Batman Forever ($184mil), Ace Ventura 2 ($104mil) led up to this movie.  The next two after it were Liar Liar ($181mil) and Truman Show ($125mil).  The Cable Guy thudded in at $60 million after costing $47 million to make.  It had Matthew Broderick, Ben Stiller (who directed it), Owen Wilson, Jack Black, and a very hot Jim Carrey.  People HATED it.  Why?  Well, simply enough, they were expecting a Jim Carrey movie.  They wanted to see him acting all crazy and speaking out of his rear end.  They thought he would twists his mouth sideways and cackle.  Instead, they got a VERY dark comedy and commentary on the unhealthy infatuation with entertainment, especially the voyeuristic appeal of criminal trials and the like.  It was should be paired up with Truman Show instead of Ace Ventura. Horrible marketing.
• Last Action Hero - Arnold Schwarzenegger at the peak of his drawing power.  He had just put out the monster hit Terminator 2 and was about to release True Lies.  This movie raked in a pathetic $50 million on a $85 million budget.  How did it fail so badly?  Again, it was marketed as a big Ah-nold blockbuster.  And it was NOT!!!  It was a BRILLIANT satire on the action picture genre that was about to collapse on itself.  Seriously, go back and watch it again.  I remember seeing it in the theater and being disappointed that it wasn't typical Arnold.  I watched it again a couple years later at home and loved it.  It was hilarious.  
• Shawshank Redemption - It wasn't marketed at all.  Or it was promoted as "from the mind of Stephen King."  Yes, he wrote the story it was based on.  But it was NOT a Stephen King film.  I remember seeing it in theaters and saying, "What in the world is THAT?"  I had no clue until the Oscar nominations came out that it was even a good movie.  Then I saw it.  WORST. MARKETING. EVER!  Seriously, this is one of the top 100 movies ever?  And it doesn't even get promoted.  Dumb.

So, did Cowboys and Aliens get tripped up by its own packaging?  I don't think it was as horribly mismarketed as those other films.  It wasn't presented as a comedy and then turned out to be a drama or anything.  But I do think it was communicated poorly.  People thought it was either a spoof, a rolling action flick, or a sci-fi film.  Each of those comes with a pretty standard set of preconceptions.  And those are all a pretty far cry from a Western.  Imagine if someone went into it thinking it was like Will Smith's Wild Wild West and realized it was closer to Unforgiven.  That would throw you for a loop.  

Judging the film for what it is, I actually liked Cowboys and Aliens.  I read one review that said Favreau couldn't control the erratic shifts in tone and mood.  Well, you're in a Western.  There's a guy who is wanted for all kind of crimes wandering through town.  People are coming after him, slowly, on horses.  One of them is a corrupt and cruel cattle baron.  They are threatening to hang him or ship him off to the marshalls.  Then three alien spaceships comes screaming down the middle of the street, blowing up stuff and snatching people.  That would be a erratic shift in tone and mood.  That is what made the movie so interesting to me.  How exactly would a Western gold rush city handle an invasion of massively technologically advanced alien spacecraft?  They don't have a clue.  They have six shooters and rifles and sticks of dynamite.  Think of the panic that ensued in films like Independence Day or V.  Those people at least had the benefit of having science fiction movies predicting alien invasions.  The Wild West didn't have that.  So it was a shock.

I also saw one reviewer mock the fact that the characters were able to overcome their differences to defeat a common foe.  Well, duh.  They had to.  Isn't that a common theme in movies from the very beginning?  And books?  And all literature?  Sometimes it takes a common enemy to help people learn that their differences are not really that important.  It puts things in perspective.  Why in the world someone would have a problem with that is beyond me.  That is the message at the heart of The Avengers.

I did enjoy the movie.  It wasn't my favorite movie of all time, or even my favorite Western.  (That still goes to Tombstone.)  I think that Jon Favreau has done better work.  Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig were both good in their roles.  And the aliens were actually very creepy and somewhat original.  There were some surprises that caught me off guard.  But I can understand the overall opinion that it didn't blow me away.  If I had spent the money to go to the movie in the theater, I would have been a little disappointed.  When I used to go to the movies all the time, this one would have fallen into the "good, not great, mostly forgettable, a little disappointing" category.  Now, I would have been more let down, since I don't go as often.  I wouldn't buy it, but I'm glad I saw it.  

Tonight I finalize my week of catching up with another film that I never got around to seeing.  Like last night's film, it has a lot of good credentials.  But this one lived up to the hype according to most people who saw it.  It is a good conclusion to the week - it has aliens,  secret agents, JJ Abrams, Steven Spielberg.  Basically it has a little bit of everything from the whole week.  Super 8.  Now the review won't probably be up until Saturday, though.  I'll be driving to Tampa on Friday.  Sorry to make you wait.  

Cruise vs Cruise

My wife is out of town for the week. So that means that I'm bored. Instead of watching the shows stacking up on my DVR (all of which my wife wants to see), I am hitting up the Red Box and catching up on some movies that I have not been able to see yet. To make this even more fun, I will be blogging my reviews and thoughts about the films. Today's Installment: Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol.


Last night I bypassed the Red Box and grabbed a BluRay that had been sitting on the shelf since I got it for my birthday - Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, aka Mission: Impossible 4.  I have, for the most part, enjoyed the Mission: Impossible series.  It is kind of a hard series to adequately assess.  When Tom Cruise decided to adapt the series, he for some reason came up with a plan to have a different director in charge of each series.  Usually in a franchise there is some kind of continuity - at least that is the goal.  You want to keep the same director, producer, screenwriter, and stars, if at all possible.  Otherwise you have a very uneven series.

I know that Batman is pretty high in the public awareness right now.  Part of the problem with the original series from the 90s was that there was so much changeover.  You had the Burton/Keaton movies, which were very good.  Then you had the Schumaker/Kilmer/Clooney films, which were disasters.  One very large reason that the current trilogy has been so good is that there has been very little change in leadership, acting, or anything.  (Well, except for switching Katie Holmes for Maggie Gyllenhaal, which really didn't matter at all.) You can also see this in the Star Trek movies.  They were extremely uneven, largely due to the fact that each movie had its own director with his own vision.  Harry Potter had several directors, but there was a common screenwriter, common producer, and the stabilizing influence of JK Rowling.  Plus they had the same director for the last four movies.

Tom Cruise actually wanted the change of vision.  The first movie, which was amazing, was directed by Brian DePalma and was more full of intrigue and mystery.  It was an older spy flick, where the main character had to unravel the story right along with the audience.  There still were some great action sequences (especially on the high speed train).  But the movie itself centered on solving the puzzle.  The second movie was helmed by John Woo.  As is his style, the movie was like a Hong Kong action movie.  There was a lot of stylized action and slow motion sequences.  It also served as a celebration of all things Tom Cruise.  The camera lovingly portrayed him as a model who could do anything.  I didn't care for the movie very much.  One of the best things about it was that it was filmed in Australia and I had just gotten back from there.  It was fun to see the various places I had been.  But I also annoyed my wife by pointing out where they had messed up the geography of the area.  [The funniest one to me was where Cruise and the bad guy battle at one place and then had a massive motorcycle race to another location for a second fight.  The two battle places were actually about a half mile away from each other and the road they raced on was what you take from Sydney to get to the beach.]  The third movie was directed by JJ Abrams.  It was typical Abrams with great action scenes, lots of character development, and brainy elements galore.  It was a bit of a mix of the first two films.


The style and pacing of each movie were completely different.  But there still were some common elements in all of the movies.  There are always surprises.  One way is in having characters pretend to be other people with hi-tech masks.  How many times in the four films has that technique been used - often to a shocking end (especially in MI3).  Another shocker is when there is a big time actor cast and then killed off early on in their appearance.  I still remember the absolute shock in the first M:I when Emilio Estevez got offed.  I don't think anyone suffered this fate in the second one.  But it happened in the third and TWICE in the fourth.  I like movies and shows that aren't afraid to kill off apparently major characters because it amplifies the stakes.  There is also always a lot of technology on display, fast cars, great action scenes.  And we almost always see Tom Cruise doing some kind of insane stunt that proves he is still a stud.  The first movie had the drop from the ceiling and the train chase.  The second movie had the free climbing scene at the outset.  The third movie had the bridge explosion.  And the fourth movie had the free climb up the tallest building in the world.

As far as Ghost Protocol itself goes, it was a very good action film.  I would say it was the second best film of the series.  Brad Bird, director of The Incredibles, took over this film - with Cruise and Abrams serving as Producers.  Simon Pegg returned from MI3, but the rest of the team was completely new.  We didn't even have Ving Rhames playing a major role as Luther for the first time in the series.  The team was completely isolated.  Somehow they still were able to get all kind of neat toys to use, anyway.  The other big change was the introduction of Jeremy Renner as another big time character.  (You can tell that his inclusion was intentional as a way to either spin-off or hand over the series at some point.)

For the most part, the movie took place overseas: Moscow, India, Dubai.  Even though it was set in exotic locales, it seemed like a tighter film.  A lot of the action took place in just a few places within those foreign cities.  They didn't roam all over Dubai - mostly they stayed in the hotel with just a few excursions elsewhere.  This actually helped the movie by allowed to build tension without being too frantic.  I thought this encouraged more character growth.  It also highlighted the isolation of the team - they had to make do with what they had and with each other.  The plot seemed far-fetched and familiar - someone wants a nuke, but for very different reasons than in many movies.  It wasn't the standard Arab terrorists either.  Personally, it was a nice touch for me to see the movie address some of the developing economies worldwide.  So many times when we see India or Arab countries portrayed, we see the dust and the poverty and the overcrowding.  This time, though, we saw that there are some very wealthy people in those countries.  The movie had elements in the slums and markets, but most of it stayed in the other areas.  That brought a unique feel to the movie.

The movie also did a great job with the character of Agent Carter, played by Paula Patton.  So many times in these movies women will only be included as victims or love interests.  Even Mission: Impossible has fallen into this trap.  The woman on the team is competent to a point.  The main character invariable falls for whatever woman lasts into the last half hour.  This time, though, she was a strong and competent agent throughout.  She had a history that motivated her and depth to her character.  She used her looks to accomplish tasks, but was not defined solely by them.  And there was no romantic connection with Tom Cruise - and not because she was a lesbian, which is one of the other cop-outs for action movies in their portrayal of women.

Tom Cruise himself is such a polarizing figure.  I am thoroughly convinced that in real life he is as wackadoo as they come.  Just by analyzing how he is marketed and portrayed, he is probably narcissistic.  His behavior dealing with Scientology and his marriages is beyond bizarre.  But, on screen he is still very popular - one of the last examples of an old-school movie star.  The Mission: Impossible movies have always been a great franchise for Cruise.  It reminds everyone of his drawing power and keeps him looking young and spry.  As long as it doesn't become a movie version of Glamour Shots, like MI2, the series is one of Cruise's strongest resources.  I have always liked Cruise on screen.  Personally, I think people are too harsh on him.  Most of the time, when he ventures outside of his typical wheelhouse of characters - the fast talking, smiling, likable, heroic characters - he gets slaughtered by fans.  I have never been bothered by those roles, though.  I thought he was pretty good in Interview with the Vampire and Valkyrie.  Actually, I was more ticked off by his going to the well too many times in movies like Knight and Day and Last Samurai.

Cruise's portrayal of Ethan Hunt has grown over the years.  In the first movie, he was the younger agent taking over the reins from the older generation.  In the second, he was the superstar.  (Unfortunately he was more like the whiny, self-obsessed Dwight Howard/LeBron James superstar.)  In the third movie he was getting older and realizing that there was more to life than just fighting and risking his life.  He wanted to settle down but was afraid of the risks involved.  In the fourth movie, he became the elder statesman.  He had a world weariness in his eyes that had come from too many losses, too many fights, too many double crosses.  He still is dedicated to his craft and understands its importance.  He has reached a place of expertise, where he knows what to do after so many years - no matter the situation.  However, you can still see that he is tiring of the battle.

I think this series still has legs.  They apparently have announced a fifth movie already, which I'm sure I will see.  If Cruise tires of the role, or if he just becomes too old to keep doing the field work, he could turn over the team to someone like Renner.  Or, if they want to continue to be daring by mixing things up, they could hand the reins to Patton and have a female lead the way. Based on precedent, there probably will be a new director for the fifth installment.  I would love to see Brad Bird get another shot since he did such a great job.  If not, I hope they find a good alternative that can add something and usher Ethan Hunt into the next stage of his career.

I hope you're enjoying these posts.  They have been fun for me and have given me something to do.  Tonight's feature will be something that I haven't looked at yet in this series - a bomb.  Not a real bomb.  Every movie I've watched had bombs in them.  But a movie bomb.  I'm going to be watching Cowboys and Aliens - something I really wanted to see, but didn't want to waste the money on.  Thank you, Red Box.