The American Astronaut-The Old West Meets C.S Lewis's Space Trilogy Through The Eyes of Johnny Rotten

Imagine a diesel-punk era where pioneers, brigands, pirates and other roughneck sort ply the planets in the solar system seeking their fortunes.  Everything seems dirty and tired and technology looks like it can be repaired and jury-rigged using no more than Tim Allen's tool belt.  One such ship is piloted by Samuel Curtis (Cory McAbee, who directed and wrote this film as well as provided the music through his band, the Billy Nayer Show. Did I mention this thing was also a musical)?   Curtis ends up taking a commission from an acquaintance, the Blueberry Pirate, to find a new King for the women of Venus, who need a replacement king to propagate their race. Also, he runs afoul of an old foe, Professor Hess, and does other typical space adventure things, like participate in a dance competition.

Yep, this one is a strange one, filmed in black and white and using an approach that accentuates it's feel by a combo of world weary matter-of-factness to all the odd things in the setting, yet all clearly having fun at the absurdity of the situation. 

Don't try to "logic" this one out, a scientifically and technologically consistent universe isn't the point here.  It is all about mood, feel, strangeness and kind of a flip of the bird to more "self important" space operas, though these guys are clearly fans of the genre. 

If you dig science fiction comedy like Red Dwarf and Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, The Stainless Steel Rat or Bill The Galactic Hero, this one should do ya fine.

Much Ado About Nothing-Or, Like The Avengers, Only Everyone Talks Like Thor...

I'm not going to pretend I'm a Shakespeare expert.  I most certainly am not.  I guess you could call me a 'spear late bloomer.  I do know enough about The Bard to know he is referred to as The Bard, and that my favorite play is MacBeth, and that to declare Romeo and Juliet his worst play is not an unreasonable position to take on his body of work.  I've so much work ahead of me and I suppose my ultimate test would be to be cast in a stage production.  Like some people desire to train to run marathons, this would be my marathon, I suppose.

I don't expect to ever be fortunate enough to participate in a Shakespeare production helmed by Joss Whedon.  I'll be blessed beyond expectation to be someday involved in one of his productions in any capacity.  But, in the meantime, being a fan of all things Whedon, it is my joy to take in his take on the work of The Bard.

Joss recognizes his audience is a smart, literate one, but not necessarily as grounded in da 'speare as he is.  So opening with a mostly silent scene with Alexis Denisof (Benedic) and AmyAcker (Beatrice), it hauntingly hearkens back to their chemistry as Wesley Windham-Price and Winnifred Burkel, and then opens up on a kitchen scene with rapid fire Elizabethan dialogue, but it is over relatively simple matters and allows you some time to get acclimated to it, kind of like slow rising after a deep dive to allow any linguistic gases that may cause pain in the vascular system to disappate safely and allow you to get in this tale.

Oh so many Whedon players are in here.  It is almost easier to point out the cast members who haven't worked with Joss before.  But Clark Gregg is in there playing Leonato, governor of Messina.  Nathan Fillion, who is an ass, is a modern cop version of Chief Constable Dogberry.  Fran Kranz plays a scheming Claudio.  Sean Maher is in there, Tom Lenk is in there, and more.

The black and white noir feel in the modern day, though the characters staying the same is an interesting touch.  It is Shakespear.  It is not for everyone.  But if you can develop a taste for it, you will find this take tasty indeed.

The Aviator-Money Buys You A Whole Lotta Eccentric

Howard Hughes.  An enigmatic figure in American history, innovation and entrepreneurship if there ever was one.  If he wanted to, he could have made a living as a modest tycoon making industrial parts in Texas and that would be that.  But the man had a vision and was propelled on by forces he could not resist.  Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio captured this high velocity personality in the film The Aviator.

After getting a glimpse of him as a child and the psychological seed planted by his mother that would grow into a crippling mental monstrosity in his adulthood, we see him in California at the age of 22, combining his interests in cinema and aviation to make the film Hell's Angels.  You see his drive and his willingness to put resources at work to achieve his vision.  The film is a hit and he later goes onto make other films, including  exercising his engineering skills in support and display of a woman's frontal assets, shown at it's puchritudinal peaks upon the prow of one Ms. Jane Russel in The Outlaw.   He also pursues his interest in aviation, designing cutting edge aircraft, and in the process, founding Hughes Aircaft to pursue these designs. 

Being a reckless, maverick personality who marched to his own beat and his commercial interests bumping up against other powerful interests, naturally, they take aim at him, questioning his design work under the accusation of being a war profiteer and also of being a deviant (his showcasing of boobs in some of his films).  But none of this was enough to bring him down.  His own inner demons would be that which laid him low.

This was an amazing film and touches on so many of what makes America great and at the same time an extremely contradictory culture.  We celebrate entrepreneurs and those that take risks.  But those that deviate too far from the approved cultural paths, we then want to take down.  We celebrate the capitalist, but capitalists themselves often play alpha wolf games with each other which aren't good for their businesses or for the culture at large.

And, we are uncomfortable when people in plain public view flout convention, even though we deify individualism.

Howard Hughes was in many ways the inspiration of Tony Stark, Iron Man of Marvel Comics.  He is an American figure worth visiting again and again, whose legacy goes far beyond this film.  But...this film is a great primer to start, for those who want to learn more.

I Know What I Saw-And Remember, Watch The Skies, Everywhere...

Many people think of the UFO phenomenon as a recent thing, but truthfully, humans have been seeing strange things in the sky since we've been looking up.  Long before Kenneth Arnold saw his flying saucers, people have been recording strange aerial phenomena.  Most of it is explainable.  But...there is always a percentage of these objects which defy explanation.  Now, the skeptic might be inclined to brush it off, but modern skepticism seems to have become less about facts and more about idealogy and defense of a world view.  That is the point of this documentary, one of several produced by filmmaker James Fox. 

Not so much about the skeptical position on this subject, though it is mentioned.  The point is the sheer level of sane, sober professional types, especially those who know about things in the sky, have intimate knowledge about what flies as far as human knowledge goes and have a good idea what is outside those boundaries.  Others, like police officers and the like, are trained at observation and accurately recalling what they have seen.

James Fox has a series of documentaries out about this, along these lines.  This one especially notes a case dealing with a formation of lights belonging to a wedge shaped object soaring above the cityscape of Phoenix, Arizona.  I remember this case being reported on CNN.

This is some amazing stuff.  If you buy into the phenomenon or are at least open to some amazing stories, this is worth your time.

Blue Steel-Packing Heat in a Man's World

Blue Steel is a 1990 star vehicle directed by Kathryn Bigelow and starring the lovely Jamie Lee Curtis as rookie NYPD police officer Megan Turner.  You see her at her Academy graduation ceremony and later, interactions with family and men, and all seem a bit disconcerted about the idea of a pretty young woman being an armed, trained police officer.  Now, I remember police shows and films from the 70s and 80s and it seemed like America was still getting used to the idea of female police officers, that the idea was still a novelty and the culture was still adjusting.  Part of me is thinking that this film, directed by a woman who portrays strong, competent, heroic women in her works, is kind of the tail end of this cultural adjustment.  Her family is concerned about her choice of careers.  Men flirting with her then blanch and bail when they find out she's a gun toting warrior babe.  Now, me, I find such sexy, and I think I always have, once I figured out what "sexy" meant.

Anyway, Officer Turner happens on a robbery happening at a convenience store.  The robber (Tom Sizemore) turns his gun on Megan and she has to shoot him.  One store patron, a broker played by Ron Silver, nicks the robbers dropped gun.  The missing pistol causes Turner problems, and those problems are compounded when the broker begins shooting people in the street.  NYPD internal affairs begins investigating Turner, represented by Detective Nick Mann (Clancy Brown).  And though she goes through many trials, the truth does begin to emerge. 

This is a gritty police drama and has less stylish flourish in both it's shooting style as well as language than we are used to getting from Ms. Bigelow.  It is as if she played this one purposely low key as to emphasize both it's street feel and a more "true to life" vibe.  Turner, though being a trained cop, is just a normal woman doing a job and trying to live her life and doing her best with some crazy, crazy circumstances.

It is all low key, until the firefight at the end, then that's when it all hits the fan.

Good flick.

Voices of a Distant Star-Can Love Cross Light Years?

Imagine enlisting into a future military fighting a war against an offworld threat.  You are a warrior in a space going fleet.  You plunge into the inky black depths of space and to the surface of alien worlds in ships and mecha fighting suits to meet the enemy on it's grounds and defeat it.  You started out with fear and uncertainty.  But your training carried you through your first encounters and experience along with fortitude carries you on.  The thing that matters to you the most, though, is a voice that is increasingly heard from less and less as the light years stretch out between you and the home you left.  Though it takes years, though, the one you love, though it now takes years to hear from him...he continues to assure you he remains.  His love remains.  He is concerned later that you will arrive back home still relatively young and he may be an old man.  But...still, he waits.  His voice still reassures you from a home that is distant in space and memory.

Japanese anime is full of clichés. But every now and then, you get a new creation in the medium that plays with ideas you have not seen done much in it, or most other mediums.  This little gem is an example, playing with Einsteinian time dialation with the age old dilemma of a soldier going to war, yet leaving a special loved one behind.  Will they stay true to you?  Will you survive to return to them?  Will there still be anything to return to, or will time and experience wear away what you once had?  The uncertainties of war are tough enough.  But for those in love, that love is indeed a double edged sword.  If that love stays strong, your fighting spirit is indomitable.  But should it falter...it becomes a blade through the heart, reaching inside you in a way the enemy never could.

Is it worth it?  I'm still wagering most warriors would say yes.

Upstream Color-Right On That Line Between Profound and Opaque

In 2004, a small indie film director named Shane Carruth brought to the world a science fiction film called Primer.  This time travel tale took a very different approach to the subject and thought the concepts it was dealing with were easy for any science fiction fan to understand, the narrative was quite convoluted.  This was intentional for the feel the writer was going for, with it's tale of a twisted timestream.

Upstream Color is his sophomore effort.  Released in 2013, this science fiction story is even more convoluted.  Not from the sheer number of variables in play, like Primer, but due to both the alien-ness of the concepts at play and his intentionally vague approach to spreading out the narrative.  From the excellent music, to the minimalist script to the non-linear narration, this tale of people caught up in what appears to be the life cycle of a strange life form and dealing with the side and after effects of the same is very, very difficult to follow.

Kris is a graphics designer who works hard and is seemingly in control.  Due to inadvertent exposure to one stage of the life form, she finds herself susceptible to suggestion and ends up getting financially ruined.  A mysterious scientist/pig farmer "cures" her of the contagion, but her life has been irrevocably altered. Drifting about, she meets Jeff, another who has been exposed to this life form.  The two of them come together and slowly find love as they seek to put their lives back together and find themselves still caught up in the mysterious life cycle of the organism, in ways no one understands.

Many have speculated that Carruth seeks to be obscure on purpose, that he disdains the idea of mass acceptance of his work, that he is making science fiction purely for the art set.  I'm not sure if that is actually true.  To me, it seems he just belongs in the same subset of abstract idea driven films like Richard Kelly, Richard Linklater and David Lynch.  He has a particular style, he is about ideas, but more to the point, he is about symbols, spirit and mood.

He is not for everyone, certainly not the masses, who like plots simple and delivered with 'splosions.  But even though this film is more difficult than Primer (I almost gave it a bad review until I had more time to think about it), for this this film is for, this film will be for them.