Disney now owns our childhood

Where were you on that fateful day, October 30, 2012?

You know the one I'm talking about. The day the earth moved, shifting on its axis, when millions of voices weren't silenced, but instead exploded onto Twitter to vent outrage or glee?

Yes, that was the day that news came out of Disney buying Lucasfilm (and all that it owns) for $4 billion.

Believe it or not, I was actually in an office meeting. I had a dead spot in the meeting while the others were looking at things that they needed to talk about and I fired up my phone and checked Twitter. I'm sure my eyes widened when I saw the first thing that popped up.

Twitter became a madhouse for the next two hours at least. The productivity of nerds (hey, that's a great name for a band!) all across the country probably plummeted toward zero at a lightning pace.

All for $4 billion.

Is this a good thing?

Opinions are divided on this. Many Star Wars fans have been disillusioned for years about how George Lucas has pretty much made the franchise unwatchable with the prequel trilogy. Jar-Jar Binks is almost a curse word in nerd circles.

On the other hand, while many around the Net were making jokes like this:

others seem to remember that Disney has actually done a pretty good job with other companies that they've purchased. The Marvel Comics movies have been very good since Disney bought the comic company.

Personally, I'm actually optimistic, though I realize they could ruin a good thing with Episode VII on its way in 2015. On the other hand, it was already ruined, so could it get any worse?

What hits me more is just how much of what I grew up with is now owned by Disney. I grew up reading Marvel Comics, and while I also read a lot of DC (owned by Warner Bros), Marvel was huge in my life. They are part of Mickey's empire.

ESPN (and ABC along with it)? That was my major sports network growing up.

Disney also owns the Muppet Studios, so the muppets are now part of the empire.

A major chunk of my childhood, all under one huge umbrella.

Still, it's not all bad. At least they haven't bought Hasbro.

Yet.

The Wonder of Nathan Fillion

Actors usually come in one of a couple different formats. Either they're true stars that shine off the screen no matter what they're in, where you go to see the movie or watch the TV show just because of them.

Then there are the types who successfully blend in to any script and story that they appear in. You may not be going to see the movie because of them, but you know that when you see them, they're going to give you an outstanding performance. They add to the wonder of a movie. Even if the movie or show is bad, you can at least say "this actor was good despite the material."

Then there are those who lie outside of those two boxes, or maybe they straddle both of them. They are a rare breed.

Nathan Fillion is one of these actors.

I first stumbled across Fillion in Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog where he played Neil Patrick Harris' nemesis, Captain Hammer. I thought he did fine, but didn't really think anything of it.

Fast forward to V-Con 36 in 2011, which had a large concentration of stuff on Joss Whedon and his many TV shows. I had been hearing so much good stuff about Firefly, but had never bothered to sit down and watch it until I was inundated with Whedon at the convention. The wife and I raced through all of the episodes of the series, and Fillion (who played Captain Mal Reynolds, the lead in the series) was simply outstanding. Yes, Whedon and the other writers gave him some great lines, but Fillion made that show.

I was sort of aware that Fillion was currently starring in a different television series, Castle, but it wasn't really on my radar. We started watching that, and the healthy respect for Fillion that Firefly gave me blossomed into full-blown "damn, this guy is awesome!" feelings.

For those who don't know, Fillion plays Richard Castle, a crime writer who is shadowing a New York detective for his new series of books based on a hot female detective. Detective Kate Beckett is his muse, and he also has the hots for her. Together, along with other cops in the precinct, they solve murders and Castle brings his unique writer's perspective to the solving of the crimes.

The writing is top notch, the cast is excellent, but Fillion is just awesome in the role. His interplay with Beckett (played by the also excellent Stana Katic) is wonderful. He brings a roguish charm to the role that just works brilliantly. I don't know if the series was created for him, but I can't see anybody else playing that role.



We've watched a few episodes of Season 5, but have decided not to watch anymore until we get caught up on the series. We're currently in Season 2, and loving it.

One of my favourite scenes:



Fillion is the ideal Hollywood icon as far as I'm concerned. Not only is he in an excellent series, not only is he brilliant in everything I've seen him in (even his recurring Buffy the Vampire Slayer role in the last season), but he seems to realize what he has. He doesn't let the success get to him.

He's a wonderful person to follow on Twitter because he doesn't get into the morass of politics. I can only remember a small handful of tweets that have had anything to do with politics. As Michael Jordan once supposedly said when refusing to endorse a Democratic candidate, "Republicans buy shoes too." Why alienate half of your fans?

Fillion doesn't do that. He's a fun follow on Twitter. He's an great actor in an outstanding show.

How can you go wrong with that?

Red Dawn - Update (North Koreans?)

Coming out on November 21 is the remake of the cult classic movie Red Dawn. I originally posted about this here around when it was first announced and when China was the villain (instead of the Soviet Union, as in the 1980s movie).

That was three years ago, and it's finally coming out.

But not without a big change. Rather ground-breaking, actually.

Yes, after Chinese outcry, they have changed the enemy from the Chinese to the North Koreans. I guess because we're not indebted to the North Koreans.

Instead, it just gets sillier.

Supposedly changing from Chinese to North Koreans just involved redoing/editing/deleting a couple of scenes and using digital technology to change the Chinese symbols to North Korean ones (you know, because all the peoople look alike and everything). Unless they digitally redressed everybody too, I'm assuming the uniforms weren't even accurate to begin with?

To me, this takes the remake from needless to stupid, with a pit stop at mystifying.

North Korea? Invading the US? It just boggles the mind.

Here's a little of the plot description from the Internet Movie Database:

"With the town completely overrun by the enemy, Matt and Jed watch helplessly as their father gives up his life to protect his family, allowing his sons to escape into the Cascade mountains. Determined to fight for their community and rescue what's left of their hometown, the brothers assemble a ragtag group of high school students and begin to fight back. Being a war hero, Jed is able to train this unlikely group of heroes the same way that he was trained. Soon they are transformed into sharp shooting, camouflaged, freedom fighters. Known as the "Wolverines" (after Matt's football team), the group soon becomes a national symbol for the resistance and the hope of Americans everywhere. What this enemy didn't realize is that what makes the U.S. great is not the size of its military, but rather the men and women who wear the uniform and the communities they come from."

The movie takes place in Spokane, Washington. I'm not sure exactly how mountainous the Michigan filming locations are, but whatever. I guess we'll see how they do it.

But come on. North Korea? Bringing the country to its knees, so that "with the fate of the country on the shoulders of these small town heroes, the Wolverines must summon the courage to overcome impossible odds and unity a town against the greatest threat this country ever faced."

The fate of the country?

Against North Korea?

There had better be a damned good explanation in the opening sequence explaining the backdrop of the movie for this to make *any* sense. They removed the Chinese because they didn't want to lose access to the Chinese box office, so I doubt they're going to have the Chinese secretly facilitating this whole thing.

The North Korean army is going to parachute in to Spokane (and I assume many other places). Seriously?

I just find the whole thing ridiculous. Especially because one of the main characters is a guy who's just back from Afghanistan, so it's obviously taking place in the extremely near future. At least in the video game Homefront, there was much more of a prelude to everything going to hell. The invasion actually took place in 2022 after North Korea managed to somehow unify with South Korea and yet be the dominant partner, wars broke out all over the world, and the US suffered a catastrophic economic collapse.

I still don't buy it, but it *could* be plausible. As a story idea, anyway.

It will be interesting to see what the pretext of the movie is. As it stands right now, it just seems really dumb.

For a hilarious look at this, check out the Guardian in the UK.

I love the "Take that, Unidentified Asians Who Are Probably North Koreans!"

So while all the pre-release stuff says they're North Korean, nothing actually in the film says that?

Now I'm really confused.

Movies - Dark Shadows and Avengers

Since this weekend is a long weekend up here in Canada (Victoria Day is today, for those of you who don't know), we decided to do a movie day yesterday. There are a bunch of movies we want to see this Summer, so why not get started!

Today's double-bill was Dark Shadows and The Avengers. We'd been wanting to see the latter since it came out but wanted to let the crowds die down a bit. Dark Shadows isn't doing very well, so who knows how long it will stay in the theater here? Avengers has been out for three weeks, so we figured it was a good time to go.

First, let me say that there are still lines for Avengers. Yes, even after three weeks! We got stuck in one, but thankfully we weren't in it for long before they let us in.

Meanwhile, I believe there were around 10-15 people at most in the 12:20 pm showing of Dark Shadows. That is not a good sign.

What did I think of the two movies? They were night and day, and not just in tone. Also in quality.

Dark Shadows was the first one we saw. The trailers made it look funny as hell, with a lot of "fish out of water" scenes of Johnny Depp playing the 200-year-old vampire Barnabas Collins unfamiliar with all of this newfangled 1972 technology. While those jokes are definitely in there, and director Tim Burton does play with the "out of time" aspect of Collins' re-awakening, the movie is much more than that. I felt that the trailers did the movie a disservice. Those fans of the original 1966 soap opera (or the great remake that was done in the early 90s with Ben Cross as Barnabas) know there's much more to the show than that. But if you're not familiar with it? There's a lot in there you wouldn't expect.

There are a great many funny scenes in the movie, but there are also just as many that miss the mark. The wife and I were the only ones in the theater that laughed uproariously at a keyboard music joke (what is with these people we were with?), but other scenes dragged on and weren't funny at all. Then, of course, there was the drastic changes in tone, sometimes within a scene. A scene will be played for laughs throughout most of it and then turn to horror right at the end. I understand that this is probably supposed to be a "dark" comedy, but this movie got a bit ridiculous on that score at times.

There are some great performances in the movie, but they are wasted in a film with barely any character development at all. Michelle Pfeiffer is criminally under-used as the matriarch of the current Collins clan. Helena Bonham Carter is the psychiatrist Dr. Julia Hoffman, a character who only seems to be in the movie because she was important in the series. In the movie, she does nothing and is a total waste of screen time (though Carter's performance certainly can't be faulted). Eva Green as the witch Angelique (the woman who loved Barnabas back in the 1760s and who cursed him to become a vampire) is extremely hot in her role, but over-acts it to an extreme.

There were bits I loved in the movie and parts that I hated, but overall I'd say it's worth seeing if you get a chance. Just don't pay full price, and if you can, wait for HBO or something.

As for Avengers, I have to say something right now.

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, that was the comic book nerdgasm that I had when the movie started. This movie is everything a Marvel superhero junkie could want in a movie with some of their favorite characters. These characters, Thor, Captain America, Nick Fury, Iron Man, Hulk, and many others, have all been introduced in various other Marvel hero movies, all culminating in this two and a half hour extravaganza that is beautiful from start to finish. There's everything a comic-book lover could want in there, but it's told so well that it's no surprise so many non-comics fans have also enjoyed the movie.

In fact, there's more character development in this action-fest than there is in the entirety of Dark Shadows. Robert Downey Jr. steals the show as Tony Stark/Iron Man, with constant quips and great dialogue that comes from a combination of screenwriter/director Joss Whedon's brilliance and Downey's excellent touch. Mark Ruffalo is a surprise as Bruce Banner/Hulk, in the sense that he didn't originate the role unlike the other characters in the movie. He brings a very nice, subtle touch to Banner, a man who has come to terms with his dark side and has figured out how to control it.

Needless to say, the special effects are amazing, but somebody like Whedon is not going to make a movie that's all about the FX. The Avengers cares just as much about character as action, and there are quite a few scenes between these disparate heroes who shouldn't get along, but are able to come together for a common cause.

I loved everything about this movie, with just a couple of minor quibbles that are contain a bit of spoilers so I won't go into them here.

All in all, it was a very good afternoon. Dark Shadows was enjoyable enough that I didn't regret going and Avengers more than made up for it anyway. That is a movie that we may very well see again, this time in 3-D. Or maybe not.

Can anybody tell me whether the 3-D is worth it in this one? I heard that they did it in post-production, which rarely turns out good, in my opinion.

Movie Review Misogyny

Being a gamer, I know that women who show themselves online, broadcasting the fact that they are female, can bring a lot of hate, or at least just lewd come-ons.

However, you would think movie reviewing would be safe from that.

You would be wrong, at least depending on what kind of movie the woman is reviewing.

I'm greatly looking forward to the new Avengers movie that's coming out next Friday. Everything I've seen of it points to it being a kick-ass movie with lots of action and it has Joss Whedon writing and directing, so the dialogue should be great too. Basically, it's a comic book fan's dream come true in movie form.

I do realize, however, that not everybody will share that opinion. Most critics who have already seen it, however, do share it. They give the movie very good reviews.

With one exception.

Reviewer Amy Nicholson gave the movie a mediocre review, 3-stars, with some complaints about it. They certainly could be valid, though I may not agree with them after I've seen the movie. I've never read any of her reviews before, so I don't know anything about her reviewing style or anything like that. There are definitely errors pointed out in the comments, such as calling the Nick Fury character "Nick Frost" (maybe she's a Simon Pegg movie fan? And apparently she's edited the review now to correct that mistake), so there may be a reason to avoid her reviews.

Why am I bringing this up?

Because she's getting slammed for it. And many of the slams are because she's a woman. (h/t: my good friend Engima667 on Twitter)

Some of the comments are pretty vile.

DVDA says:
"See internet, this is what happens when you give your PA the change to write reviews because it's cheaper than hiring a proper male writer."

3490314 says:
"She asked her boyfriend what score she should give. Just stick to rom-coms, bitch."

and the same person also says:
"Her boss/lover says it's better than having her make the coffee and answering phones and besides what else was she going to do with that creative writing degree daddy paid for?"

Movie2012 says:
"I know the first bad review was gonna come from a woman ....."

You get the idea.

Now many of the other comments talk about her reviews as a whole, or talk about her accuracy and proofreading. Maybe she does have the history that they claim that she has, regarding inconsistency in her reviews as an attempt to garner hits to the web site. All of that, if true, would be really bad. So I'm not defending her or her review.

What I am doing is calling out those who would go the whole sexism route. Why can't you just slam her for the quality of her reviews rather than making a comment about "getting coffee for the boss" or making cracks about her boyfriend telling her what to give the movie?

Women should be open to criticism for the job they are doing, just as men should. So why does gender have to be the issue?

I think some guys (despite what Melissa Silverstein says in her post, none of the obviously female commenters that I saw on there actually made any misogynistic statements) just have trouble dealing with any woman who dares set foot in the domain that they firmly feel should be a man's. That's why they get obnoxious and rude to female gamers, and that's why whenever a woman pisses them off in regards to a comic book movie, they get their backs up.

I only have this one example to go by. Amy says that this has happened to some of her other reviews, and to other reviewers as well, both men and women (though she says "...though men get more death threats while women get more poetry like, 'Whose $%#@ did you suck to get your job?'"

Is this really necessary, people?

C'mon, it's just a movie. Misogyny is ugly no matter what form it takes.

Movie Review - Rise of the Planet of the Apes

The original Conqeust of the Planet of the Apes is not my favourite of the original Ape movies, thus making it a prime candidate for a remake, this time being called Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Thankfully, the remake is everything the original wasn't, which includes "good." Yes, there were definitely problems with the movie, but overall, it was a very enjoyable experience.

Unless you're squeamish about animal testing, that is.

Will Rodman (Jamie Franco) has created a new drug that could cure Alzheimer's Disease, and of course it has to be tested on animals before it can proceed to human trials. In the chimps, it seems to have heightened the intelligence in at least one case, along with fighting the disease. The chimp, affectionately called Bright Eyes, goes berserk just as Rodman is presenting his findings to the board for more funding for human trials. Bright Eyes' son is found in her cage, and Rodman smuggles him out to take care of him, naming him Caesar. Caesar (played wonderfully by that motion capture genius, Andy Serkis) has even more intelligence than Bright Eyes did, and lives a happy life with Rodman until things go horribly wrong. Caesar will end up leading his fellow apes to safety, perhaps a precursor of an Ape society that will rise in the future?

(Thanks to Shopping Blog)

The humans in Rise of the Planet of the Apes are nothing to write home about. Other than Rodman, none of them are given any depth at all, playing more caricatures than anything else. Rodman's new girlfriend, Caroline (Freida Pinto), is totally wasted, doing nothing in the movie other than identifying a few primate traits so the audience would understand them later in the movie, as well as providing one scene of being Rodman's conscience. The head of the drug company where Rodman works, Steven Jacobs (David Oyelowo) is your stereotypical company head honcho who wants money more than anything else.

As an aside, do we really need to see yet another greedy drug company businessman in films? Talk about your stereotypes! At least Rise limits it to one man, rather than making the entire company that way, but it's still annoying.

Rodman is the only human character given any depth, and even he's semi-cliched. He's desperate to create the Alzheimer's cure because his father is suffering from it. Thus, the shortcuts that he takes are done for personal reasons, not those of greed. You can also tell that he cares about Caesar. Yet even Rodman only manages to barely reach a third dimension.

I have to especially call out the head of the Primate refuge and his son (Bryan Cox and Tom Felton), who are so stereotypically cruel and provocative that it was almost over the top. Felton's performance is the same, though Cox tones it down. However, the characters themselves are hopeless.

(Thanks to InEntertainment)

The good thing is that the apes save the day, which I guess might be the point. Serkis is simply amazing as Caesar, assuming that even the expressions on Caesar's face were taken from Serkis. You can almost tell what he is thinking at times. The other apes are also very well done. The CGI when they move doesn't quite cross into "Uncanny Valley" territory, but it is exceptional. The one major confrontation in the movie, on the Golden Gate Bridge (shown in all the trailers), is beautifully shot.

(Thanks to Twitch)

The story was interesting and definitely keeps your attention. The movie packs a lot into less than two hours, though that could be because the ending is so obviously a set-up for a sequel that it doesn't even really exist. The movie just ends. There isn't a cliffhanger or anything, but there also isn't really a resolution.

There are a few plot holes, though. Caroline dates Rodman for years, moving in with him at the very least (apparently), yet five or so years later, she still is shocked at Caesar's origin? You weren't curious for all those years? And if you did ask and he blatantly lied to you about it, that's a pretty big lie to forgive without saying much. This is a testament to how unimportant the human characters are in this movie.

Overall, I did greatly enjoy Rise of the Planet of the Apes. If your heart goes out to animals so much that you can't see any mistreatment of them whatsoever, then this movie is not for you. They have to set up why Caesar is outraged to begin with, so there are some bad scenes. Keep in mind, though, that I don't believe any real apes were used in the movie. If there were, certainly not in any of the violent scenes.

Grab your popcorn and get ready. This is a very good movie, and know that you'll be getting more of it in the next few years as well.

It's a win-win!

Captain America - Movie Review

Captain America is one of the oldest superheroes around, almost as old as Batman. He's long been a fighter for "truth, justice, and the American way" (though granted, that's Superman's byline, Cap has also fit that profile). I was really into comic books for a long time, and while admittedly he was never my favourite character, I've always had a certain respect for him.

(Thanks to Smurfin' the Web)

With Marvel Comics creating their own movie studio and making a series of superhero films that will culminate in next year's Avengers movie, you knew that Cap would be one of the mainstays of it. That would be Captain America: The First Avenger. The question was, would director Joe Johnston, following the typical Hollywood lead, water down Cap's patriotism to make him more a "man of the world" with deliberate moral ambiguity and a denial of who Cap really is? And even if he didn't, would the movie just suck?

Thankfully, I can say that the answer to both question is a resounding "no."

The movie mostly takes place in World War II, though there is a framing sequence in the modern day to explain why Cap can be in the Avengers despite being a 40s superhero. Scrawny lightweight Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) is trying desperately to enlist in the army to fight Nazis, but he's got a number of physical frailties that keep him out of it. He's determined to keep trying, though, and this comes to the attention of Dr. Abraham Erskine (Stanley Tucci), who is perfecting a serum to create the ultimate soldier. He chooses Rogers because he sees that he is a good man who wants to do the right thing, whatever it takes.

The serum enhances everything about Rogers, making him ripped like (ladies, fill in your perfect male specimen here), along with other physical and mental improvements. He starts out by out-racing a car, for example. Bureaucrats, being what they are, decide that the best use for somebody like this is to sell War Bonds! Steve reluctantly agrees, but he ends up taking the war to Hydra (the Nazi scientific division, headed up by Johann Schmidt (Hugo Weaving), who is an insane product of Erskine's serum) instead. Schmidt, also known as the Red Skull, wants to go beyond even what Hitler envisioned, and he's got the intelligence to do it.

(Thanks to Wolfman Cometh)

The movie is a lot of fun, though the pacing is really slow in the first 45 minutes or so. Once things get moving, though (pretty much after the USO tour), the movie really takes off and is at its comic book best. There are some great action scenes, if a little CGI heavy at times. The fight choreography is really good, both the hand-to-hand combat as well as the various attacks on Hydra bases.

(Ladies, don't say that I don't post anything for you)

The characters aren't anything to write home about, not being nearly as nuanced as they could be (heck, even Iron Man has a bit more of a dimension), but that's not really a problem in this flick. They are pretty much archetypes, and fairly good ones at that. It's fun to finally see a movie where there aren't any grey areas; there's simply right and wrong. Cap is excessively good, the Red Skull is a megalomaniac. What could be more stark?

I appreciate that, despite pre-publicity comments from Johnston and Evans that seem to contradict this, the Stars and Stripes are very prominent throughout this movie, and with no apologies. Rogers is a hero, an ordinary man who, while given heightened everything from the super serum, is just a man underneath. A man who wants to do what's right and fight evil wherever it is.

Red Skull: "What makes you so special?"
Cap: "Nothing. I'm just a kid from Brooklyn."

Yet the film isn't jingoistic at all. It lets its imagery do the talking.

(Thanks to OiMag)

I appreciated that.

I really enjoyed Captain America: The First Avenger. There are some great performances that really add to that enjoyment. Tommy Lee Jones steals almost every scene he's in as the head of the scientific branch of the army that's facing off against Hydra. He's got some great lines ("I asked for an army. All I got was you."). It's always fun seeing Stanley Tucci (though his German accent is simply dreadful) and Weaving chews the scenery with relish as the Skull. I kept waiting for him to call Cap "Mr. Anderson," but he didn't.

Hayley Atwell is gorgeous as Peggy Carter, British liaison with the army scientific group, but she also does a good acting job too. The character is written very nicely, as well.

(beautiful and awesome, all in one package!)

One final note of interest. When Steve Rogers is the scrawny mess at the beginning of the movie, Chris Evans' head is CGI'd onto a scrawny body. It works a lot better in motion than it does in still picture form.

(Thanks to Geek Girl on the Street)

I barely noticed it in the movie itself, but when you look at the picture, you can see how disproportionate the head is to the rest of the body. Thankfully, it didn't bother me like it did some other people.

Ultimately, while not a perfect movie by any means, Captain America is a fun popcorn movie that embodies a lot of what we love best in heroes, something that seems to be missing from a lot of other movie heroes nowadays. An essential goodness and a willingness to fight evil because it's the right thing to do.

To quote Dr. Erskine, when explaining his choice of Rogers as test subject:

"Why someone weak? Because a weak man knows the value of strength, the value of power..."

Also, don't forget to stay until the end of the credits! As with all the other Marvel movies, there's a post-credit sequence, though this time it's a full-blown trailer for the Avengers!

Hey! Where's the Ending???

Don't you hate it when you're reading a book, and it just suddenly stops? Does it make you want to throw the book against the wall?

No, I'm not talking about a badly written book with an ending that makes no sense.

I'm talking about a book where the ending is totally removed.

"Never happen!" you say?

Think again.

Catherine Hardwicke, of the Twilight movie franchise fame (at least the first one), has a new movie coming out. Called Red Riding Hood, it brings back the "latent sexuality" of the original fairy tale, a supernatural story (hopefully there will be no vampire fangs and much more skin pigment in this one) that re-tells the classic tale for a modern audience.

But according to Macleans magazine (this is the general "Newsmakers" page, with this particular story being headlined "No Fairy-Tale Ending Here"), the controversy is regarding the novelization of the movie, by Sarah Blakley-Cartwright.

You see, the book has no ending. At least not until the movie comes out.

In an effort to keep the ending of the movie secret, the book instead has an URL in the back of the book that will take you to a web site where you can find the ending.

Once the movie comes out.

Is this what the media world has come to, the conglomeration of various different types of media into one huge ball, dependent on each other?

Some authors have been very innovative with this type of thing. Jasper Fforde has a lot of web content that heightens the experience of his books, and his site is very much worth looking at.

News programs have interviews on the show, with the "complete" interview being hosted on the show's web site. You no longer get the full interview by watching the show. On the other hand, this gives them a chance to do a more in-depth interview. You can broadcast the best part on the show itself and then, if somebody wants to hear more, they can go to the web site.

But to have a book depend on a web site seems to be taking things a bit too far. You shouldn't have to go to a different form of media in order to follow a story.

This is ridiculous.

Besides, does the movie change the story that much? Do Hood and the wolf go on the road for an orgy of violence, like Mickey & Mallory?

Or something equally as stupid?

What do you think? Should media be mixed to this extent? Should a different form of media be required for the recipe to be successful?

Or should the combination of media just add a little spice to an already delicious concoction?

And does anybody really care about this movie anyway?

Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader

I was a big fan of both Narnia movies, so it was only natural that I was really looking forward to seeing The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Since I haven't done anything even remotely constructive all week, I decided today I would go ahead and see it.

I'm very glad I did.

I haven't read the books, written by C.S. Lewis, since I was a kid. In fact, I don't believe I ever read all of them. I may have to rectify that one of these days, inspired by the movies.

Anyway, the movie stars Georgie Henley and Skandar Keynes as Lucy and Edmund Pevensie, the only two Pevensie children who are still able to go to the fabled kingdom of Narnia (their older brother and sister, Peter and Susan, have "outgrown" it). The older children have gone to the United States during World War II, but Edmund and Lucy are stuck with their aunt and uncle, and their annoying little cousin Eustace (Will Poulter). In fact, he's making their life almost a living hell. They still have fond memories of Narnia, though, and soon circumstances draw them (along with their cousin) into that magical world again. This time on an ocean adventure with Prince Caspian (Ben Barnes), the man they installed on the Narnian thrown in the previous movie.

Along the way, they'll suffer through temptation, and learn a lot about themselves in the process.

The Narnia books have a very moral bent, with a lot of Christian symbolism in them, and the movies have pretty much retained most of that. Aslan, the Lion (voiced by Liam Neeson), is obviously a Christ figure, and it's even more blatant in Dawn Treader than it was in previous movies. The trials that the children go through teach them a lot about themselves, their morality, and the proper way to live their lives. In fact, Aslan pretty much flat out tells Lucy that he's Jesus in the "real" world.

Yet that really shouldn't be an issue, even for those atheists among us. It doesn't matter what the moral code is; the fact that the movie *has* a moral code is good enough. You can ignore the Christian imagery and just take the morality story for what it is. If you don't *want* any morality story whatsoever, then you may find yourself feeling a bit oppressed.

That being said, the movie is also a hell of an adventure movie too, and you can enjoy it on that front. A huge sea serpent, dragon, funny creatures that try to impress, a talking mouse swordsman, this movie has it all. The special effects are very good, and the movie's just a lot of fun. Yes, the acting is a bit wooden, but it's not too bad. It carries the story along, and that's good enough.

I do have to say that the 3D is largely unnecessary for this movie. Yes, it does bring the world to life a little bit more (especially when Lucy is in the invisible house to find the spell that will make it visible again), but I would have preferred it 2-D and $3 cheaper. That being said, it certainly doesn't hurt the movie at all. It doesn't try to draw attention to itself with any visual tricks, which is greatly appreciated.

Those of you who were concerned about all of the violence in Prince Caspian can rest assured: while there is action and some sword-fighting in this movie, this is a straight-out adventure that any kid would love if he/she likes to imagine themselves in the middle of the story. There's no blood, though there are a few scary moments. Nothing that couldn't be found in Dr. Who if it had a movie-level budget, though. And Dr. Who is definitely family viewing.

All in all, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is another excellent entry in the Narnia movie series. And it may even provoke me into reading the books.

When was the last time you could say that about a movie?

(Cue people telling me about a movie they saw just last week).

Thank You, Leslie Nielsen

As most of you already know, actor Leslie Nielsen died yesterday at the age of 84. I honestly didn't even know that he'd been ill, but I don't really keep up with a lot of the celebrity gossip, and Nielsen wasn't usually found in those pages anyway.

This news saddened me, because I grew up on Leslie Nielsen's comic misadventures. I knew he had been a serious actor before that, but I had never seen him in any of those roles. I still haven't seen Forbidden Planet, something I should do soon.



To me, Nielsen was always the king of deadpan humour, the man who played everything straight even as we were all laughing in the aisles.

Airplane came out in 1980, when I was 10 years old. I don't think I saw it until it was on HBO, but even so it was only a couple of years after that, I believe. It was my first exposure to Nielsen, and surely this movie is the one that cemented his reputation for the type of character that he played throughout the rest of his career.

(Yes, I am leaving out the joke that *everybody's* quoting today, just because I don't want to be one of the crowd).

In addition to Airplane (he wisely declined to be in Airplane 2, though even that movie had its moments), Nielsen is best known as Police Detective Frank Drebin in the short-lived (and much-loved, from us fans) TV show "Police Squad" and the subsequent Naked Gun movies. As Drebin, he moved from complete deadpan to clueless bumbling that still had us laughing.

Drebin: "Well, when I see five weirdos, dressed in togas, stabbing a man in the middle of the park in full view of a hundred people, I shoot the bastards, that's *my* policy!"

Mayor: "That was a Shakespeare-In-The-Park production of 'Julius Caesar,' you moron! You killed five actors! Good ones!"

He would continue to play the same type of character for the most part, in films like Repossessed, the Scary Movie franchise, Spy Hard, Dracula: Dead & Loving It, and many more.

Most of these didn't do very well, or did but he wasn't prominent in them. I think he will forever be known as either Drebin or "that doctor from Airplane."

And really, is that a bad legacy? I don't think so.

He provided so many of us with so much laughter. I hope he realized that throughout his last years, that no matter which crappy movies he might make, he will always be remembered fondly.

Here's his introduction to the Cincinnati Bengals' return to Monday Night Football after a very long absence:



And there's also this classic one from "Police Squad," which I honestly didn't even remember but now find supremely hilarious.



Finally, I just discovered this on Youtube, and it's more classic Nielsen character cluelessness.



Many people today will be memorializing Nielsen. He led a long and varied life, even flying with the Royal Canadian Air Force in World War II before entering acting.

And I know this memorial may be lost in all of those.

But I don't care. Nielsen was one of the greats. He will be greatly missed, and I get the feeling that there will be a number of Airplane and Naked Gun movie marathons coming up in the very near future.

Thank you for the decades of laughter, Mr. Nielsen.

You will live forever in some of our hearts.

Netflix comes to Canada!

Yes, I know this announcement is a few days old, but I've been immersing myself in it so that I can comment on it, rather than just announcing it.

As of Wednesday, Netflix is now available in Canada, but only for streaming video. They will not be offering the "mailing you DVDs that you have to mail back" option up here. And really, with the way streaming video works nowadays, how many people will really mind that?

For $7.99/month (a dollar cheaper than in the US, and even cheaper still considering the Canadian dollar still isn't quite up to par with the US dollar), you have unlimited streaming access to the entire Netflix library on your PC, iPhone/iPad, PS3, Wii and eventually Xbox 360 (I'm assuming that will be after the Fall Xbox Live Dashboard update, but that's just a guess), as well as wireless-capable televisions.

Even better is that you get a free month to try out the service to see if it's something that you're interested in. I'm not sure if that's an introductory offer because of the Canadian launch, or if it will always be that way (Zip.ca has an introductory offer as well, so it may very well be permanent), but if you're Canadian and you just *might* be interested, now is the time to try it out. That offer may not last.

We signed up Wednesday night, even though we generally don't watch that many movies or TV shows, just to see what it offered and whether we would be interested in it. So far, so good.

I've watched a couple of episodes from Season 1 of the BBC Robin Hood series, as well as started In the Name of the King: a Dungeon Siege Tale. Yes, I said "started," as I haven't been able to finish it yet. (And it's a *really* bad movie, but kinda/sorta in an enjoyable way)

But that's the cool thing about streaming. If you go back to a movie or show that you started watching, it will allow you to resume where you left off. You don't have to try and remember where you were at.

I realize this is probably old-hat to all of you American Netflix users, but it's very cool that they finally made it up here. Will this threaten Zip, the Canadian Netflix equivalent, that started doing the "by mail" DVD distribution method up here after Netflix pioneered it? Zip has supposedly announced they'll be offering streaming service soon as well. Zip's current price of $10.95/month for 1 DVD out at a time (higher cost for more DVDs) will have to change to compete with Netflix once Zip goes online.

It will be interesting to see.

Of course, the Canadian Netflix launch didn't go off without some hitches.

It closed down part of John St. in downtown Toronto and attracted a crowd to the launch event, but neglected to say that many of those in the crowd were actors paid to be there.

An information sheet handed out to the paid extras said: “Extras are to look really excited, particularly if asked by media to do any interviews about the prospect of Netflix in Canada.”

After word of the ruse spread on Twitter, Netflix apologized and said the extras should not have been talking to reporters.

A spokesman for Netflix said the handout for extras was required to obtain a film permit for the launch. The instruction sheet referred to Wednesday’s event as a “corporate documentary.”

“I was unaware that script was handed out to extras and that was not supposed to happen,” said Steve Swasey, vice president of corporate communications for Netflix. “Some people got carried away and it’s embarrassing to Netflix.”

Another thing to be cautious of. Many Canadian ISPs have download limits, which will incur charges if you exceed them (we pay for having a greatly increased download allowance for Shaw). You should definitely watch out for that.

"Hastings said a good ballpark figure is one hour of video equals 1 gigabyte."

Judging by our use of it so far, I have a feeling we will remain Netflix customers, though only time will tell.

I'm just glad that we Canadians have options now.

Kick-Ass: Movie Review

Monday nights are good movie nights, because the crowds are rarely large for even the most successful films. Last Monday, we took advantage of that to go see Kick-Ass, the new movie from director Matthew Vaughn (Stardust, Layer Cake). It's based on the comic book of the same name, and it's a really great movie.

Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson) is a high school student who's the typical nerd: likes comic books, hangs out with a couple of similar friends, girls pretty much ignore him and he gets bullied by the tougher guys at school too. (Hey, without the bullying part, that's basically me in high school, and he's got my name, too!) Dave suddenly starts wondering why nobody's ever tried to become a superhero before, and he decides to do it himself. He buys a green wetsuit and mask and calls himself "Kick-Ass."

He becomes a sensation, but is soon made to look completely ordinary when Big Daddy (Nicholas Cage) and Hit Girl (Chloe Moretz) show up to defend him from getting his ass kicked. Unfortunately, Kick-Ass has stumbled into the middle of a war between these two vigilantes and a mob kingpin named Frank D'Amico (Mark Strong). Does he have what it takes to be a true hero?

Sadly, there wasn't enough Big Daddy and Hit Girl in the movie, as they steal the show every time they come on screen. Moretz is an 11-year-old actress, and the character she plays is a foul-mouthed dynamo of violence and acrobatics. Taught well by her father to deal death and take revenge on their enemies, she hasn't had any real childhood to speak of. This is the relationship that was worth examining, and it sometimes gets lost in the high school antics of Dave and his compatriots. It's never totally off the radar screen, though.

There has been some controversy about Hit Girl's extreme violence and vulgarity, but I think that says something about the characters upbringing. As for corrupting the actress herself, I love her take on the whole thing in Macleans magazine:

"It's a role—it's not meant to be taken as real life. I was raised to think cursing makes you look unintelligent. As Chloë, I can honestly say I've never uttered a syllable of a curse word, not even behind closed doors."

I love the quirkiness behind Kick-Ass, with good little asides about the comics genre ("With no power comes no responsibility...though that's not true"). It's a funny movie with some great dialogue, but there's also a wonderful comment on society behind the whole thing too, and it hits both sides. On one side, you have Big Daddy and Hit Girl, extremely violent (the blood flows liberally when they're around). Some might say they are psychopaths who exemplify the "law and order" types taken to the extreme.

On the other hand, they also represent a statement that true evil does exist in the world, and that it must be fought without any hand-wringing or trying to understand it. They just must be dealt with.  While Kick-Ass feels the same, it's obvious that idealism alone won't work, without a little muscle and willingness to get dirty behind it.

Personally, I think both sides are valid.

How does it work as a movie, though? I think it works wonderfully, though again Cage and Moretz steal the movie. Katie (Lyndsy Fonseca), the girl Dave has the hots for, is totally undeveloped and her change in attitude really doesn't have the greatest foundation. The same goes for the other high school characters. While they're funny, they just don't seem three-dimensional. They're even less than sidekicks sometimes.

Frank D'Amico is fairly one-dimensional too, though Strong does play him very well, giving him much more depth than the script does.  He gets to snarl a lot, which Strong is definitely good at.  I feel bad for him, though, as the shooting of the confrontation between D'Amico and Hit Girl had to have been hard.  How do you fight an 11-year-old girl?  Kudos to both actors as well as the rest of the behind the scenes crew for making that fight look *very* realistic.

All that being said about the characters, the movie is just fun to watch, and you might take away something as well.  Kick-Ass himself is the perfect foil for the other two heroes, as he is the crusader who wants nothing more than to stand up for the little guy and against the bullies of the world.  The script is funny, there are a few in-jokes that are hilarious if you catch them, and the rest of the dialogue is top-notch as well.

It is very violent and there is a lot of bad language (not just from Hit Girl), so be warned.  It's rated R for a reason.  But if you are old enough, or if you think your teenager can handle it, it's a great movie to see.