A Weird Thought.

Bryan Ferry as James Bond.

Not now of course.  But in the '70s or early '80s.  Ferry looks a bit like George Lazenby, and certainly could have pulled off the sauve spy bit that became a standard part of the Bond mythos in the movies.  Ferry doesn't seem to have had much interest in acting, other than appearing as himself in a 1980 French TV mini-series, and as Mr. Silky String in Neil Jordan's 2005 film Breakfast on Pluto.  How he might have dealt with the action parts of the role is an obvious question, but Roger Moore was looking pretty tired and unconvincing by the time A View to a Kill was filmed.

I Predict Flop.

I've never had much luck with predictions.  But here's another one.  This morning I read that the first trailer for a big screen Baywatch movie is out.  Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson will be starring in the David Hasselhoff role.

I have a hard time imagining there's a huge market waiting for a big screen Baywatch film.  Although the show ran for years it was utterly disposable fluff with the depth of a puddle in a parking lot.   The original fandom has moved on.  The younger viewers who you want to get into the seats probably have never watched the series.  Of course you could have said the same thing for 21 Jump Street, a series that ran for a much shorter period, and is primarily remembered now for helping make Johnny Depp a star.  Yet its big screen adaptation did well enough to spawn a sequel.  As always it's a crapshoot where tens of millions of dollars are spent in the hopes this one is the one that's the next blockbuster. 

Mister Versatile.

Last night I watched a mid '70s Italian crime film  on YouTube, A Special Cop in Action, or to use its original Italian title, Italia a mano armata.  It was the final film of a trilogy about Italian police commissioner Betti, played by the late Maurizio Merli.  His main opponent in the film is gangster Alberteli, played by American actor John Saxon.  Watching the film got me thinking that there probably isn't a genre, other than porn, that Saxon hasn't done. Crime, westerns, martial arts(Enter the Dragon, supporting Bruce Lee),  horror, science fiction, prime time soaps, and more.  All in a career that began in the mid '50s, and which continues to today.

You can watch A Special Cop in Action below.  Be warned that besides the general violence you'll find in a crime film there's a sexual assault scene, so some viewers may want avoid this one.

Mr. Holmes.

I watched it tonight, and I'd recommend it if you're looking for a break from typical loud Hollywood action-adventure or comedy.  It was nice to see Hiroyuki Sanada, even if his presence was fairly brief.  And someone should teach Milo Parker how to do a northern British accent, because in 10 years or so he'll be perfect for playing a young Mark E. Smith if someone wants to do a Smith/The Fall biopic.

I wonder what Arthur Conan Doyle would think of there being multiple versions of his creation extant in the 21st Century.  He often thought of the character as a burden, even trying to kill him off, but I suspect part of him would find the continued fondness for the character quite flattering.

Will I Or Won't I.

You can't avoid the Star Wars:  The Force Awakens hype right now.  But I have no idea whether I'll actually see it in a theatre or not.  I can't remember the last film I saw in one.  It's just not something I do these days.  I occasionally think I should go see a cheap movie a month but it hasn't happened yet.  I certainly won't be in line for the first showing in Saskatoon.

"Flop Has A Name."

That apparently should have been on the posters for Johnny Depp's latest film, Mortdecai, instead of the actual slogan of "Sophistication Has A Name."  The film has been out less than a month, and it's already in the cheap theatres in Saskatoon.   The film had a reported 60 million dollar budget, but it has apparently made just over a third of that worldwide.  Of late Depp seems to be able to make nothing but flops, often as a result of bad choices in roles, the most obvious being as Tonto in The Lone Ranger.

Years ago I watched an interview with Michael Caine, and the interviewer asked him about some of the poorer movies he'd been in.  Caine commented that he generally didn't turn down roles because he figured they might stop calling if he did.  One would think Depp wouldn't be worried about that given how much money he's made.  So it seems more likely Depp just has bad taste, although Caine also commented that you can't tell whether a movie will be good just by the script.  Perhaps Depp needs to reconsider taking roles that rely on him doing gimmick characters.

What's next for Depp?  Apparently a Kevin Smith film called Yoga Hosers.  Depp will also be appearing in Black Mass this fall, a film about Irish-American mobster Whitey Bulger, which strikes me as the kind of film Depp should be doing. 

The Interview...

...is now playing at the Rainbow Cinemas in the Centre Mall.  Does that mean I should stay away from the mall for a while, in case North Korean commandos decide to attack?

Bits And Pieces.

So, if you read the post before this you might be wondering what film I rented.  It was The Wolverine.  So here's a few random thoughts about it.  Spoilery I suppose, but I'm guessing most visitors have already seen it.

I was a fan of the X Men comics and spinoffs in the late '70s and early '80s but this is the first of the movies I've watched.  I've only seen tiny bits and pieces of the first, and maybe the second.  I just sort of decided to avoid them, because any superhero film won't fit the version in your memories.  So I came to this one fresh.

Jackman made an respectable Wolverine.  Yeah, he's too tall, but he was probably cheaper than the shorter, better known actors when the franchise started.  Seriously, do you want to see Tom Cruise as Wolverine?  And of course no "general purpose" actor is going to have a physique like the one Wolverine has in the comics.  A pro wrestler might, but Jackman is a better actor than most of them would be.

It's always interesting to see what is taken from the original material and what is altered.  For example the bit with the bear in the opening sequence comes partially from Chris Claremont and Frank Miller's original Wolverine miniseries from 1982, as do other bits in the movie.(Ah, Frank Miller, before we all knew he was nuts.)  On the other hand we get alterations like Yukio with long red dyed hair, versus the short undyed 'do of the original, and a blonde Viper.  Seriously, a blonde Viper?  And giving them both powers is a bit annoying, although Yukio's precognition might just as well not have been in the story given how little actual impact it had.  Meanwhile Viper's powers seem suspiciously like they were in part lifted from another Marvel character, Typhoid Mary.

Some changes are more understandable, and may actual help the movie.  For example movie Wolverine apparently knows little or no Japanese, while comics Wolverine is fluent.  So we don't end up being subjected to Jackman speaking in Japanese with a bad accent.  Although even that wouldn't have been as annoying as films where supposedly Japanese characters do so.

On the other hand Will Yun Lee sounded convincing to me speaking Japanese.  In a better world Lee and someone like Mark Dacascos would be starring in a buddy cop picture as a couple of Asian American cops, instead of doing his usual competent job in secondary roles.  And of course his character here, Harada, has a major difference from the original, specifically a certain suit of armour.

Nice to see Hiroyuki Sanada in this, although he probably should have had more screen time.  As I watched the sequence where Shingen battles Yukio I wondered if Sonny Chiba has seen the film, and what he might think of it and his former protégé's part.

Famke Jansen gets a rather thankless cameo here.  She lies around in a nightgown, torments Wolverine in his dreams, sounds kind of whiny at the end, and that's about it.  Kind of a waste for what I suspect might be her last shot at the character.

I think the climax of the film ended up being kind of a mess.  It certainly could have done with a bit more plot exposition, as what Viper and Yashida actually planned was kind of confusing.  There seems to be a bit of a "We don't need to explain things clearly because it looks cool!" vibe going on here.

Well, now it's off to the Redbox machine.  This was my first use of one, and since I used their "TRYME" promo code this one is apparently free.  Not that a buck fifty a day rental fee will break the bank.

In The Original Japanese.

Japanese actor Shin'ichi "Sonny" Chiba has had a career lasting more than 50 years.  But he is best known in the West, besides his appearance in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill Volume 1, for his role in the movie Gekitotsu! Satsujin Ken, released in North America as The Street Fighter.  Last night while looking at various things on YouTube I can across something I was hoping to find at some point, The Street Fighter with its original Japanese language track intact, and with English subtitles. 



I have no idea how truly accurate the English subtitles are in this version, but they definitely improve on the old US dub.  Certain things make a bit more sense than the mangled results in some places in the dub, like Tsurugi's motivations and exactly who the Hong Kong gang are.  It's also interesting to see some plot elements found in the English version, such as Tsurugi's mother being Chinese, may not be part of the original Japanese script.  Other bits are pretty much identical.  Of course it's still a '70s martial arts B movie, so don't expect this to suddenly be elevated to the lofty heights of Akira Kurosawa.

It's a common belief that North American moviegoers don't like subtitles.  I have no idea how correct that is, but I'm one person they don't bug.  I prefer to hear the actors as they originally sounded.  You also get a chance to pick up certain cultural things that a dub might ignore, such as the use of honourifics in Japanese. 

I'm Surprised It Didn't Happen.

Tonight I was watching Charlton Heston in the 1971 sci fi piece The Omega Man.  A few minutes into the film the thought came to mind that Clint Eastwood could have played the lead in that movie.  And that got me thinking that it's surprising Heston and Eastwood never did a film together.  Given the kind of films both men did, especially westerns, and the tough guy characters they generally played, it's odd no one cooked up a project involving the two of them.  Eastwood and Heston were friends, and reportedly talked about remaking Sam Peckinpah's Ride the High Country in the late '80s. 

One genre that the two didn't share was science fiction.  Other than a bit part early in his career Eastwood had no involvement in the genre.  The closest he got after becoming famous was 2000's Space Cowboys.  Compare this with Heston, who in the course of 5 years appeared in the first two Planet of the Apes movies, The Omega Man, and Soylent Green.  It would be interesting to know if Eastwood was offered sci fi movies, but rejected them, or if he just wasn't considered for such films.  The latter seems rather unlikely.

Not My Choice.

It's been announced that Ben Affleck will play Batman in the upcoming sequel to the recent Superman film.  I don't know who I'd get to play Batman, but Affleck wouldn't be my choice.  He just doesn't strike me as the right guy to play Bruce Wayne.

Apparently the folks behind the franchise aren't superstitious.  After all Affleck played Daredevil in the 2003 big screen film, which failed to spawn an ongoing franchise.  I suppose some might argue that was just as much the fault of the failure of Jennifer Gardner's solo outing as Elektra.  And in this case neither Affleck, nor Batman, will be carrying the film alone.  But he'll still have to deal with Christian Bale's brooding portrayal of the Dark Knight in the successful trilogy.

Perhaps Too Late.

July 3 will see the release of the latest big screen version of The Lone Ranger.  The relatively unknown Armie Hammer(who is the great-grandson of 20th Century American industrialist Armand Hammer) is in the title role, with the real star power coming from Johnny Depp as Tonto.  The latter casting has generated a lot of controversy, with many looking askance at a white actor playing a Native American.  Depp has claimed he has Native American ancestors, but the fact Depp isn't quite sure what tribe they actually were a part of hasn't helped dissuade the criticism. 

As a result some folks are hoping the film will flop.  I think there is in fact a chance the film won't make money, but not because of the Depp controversy.  A lot of people won't know about it before seeing the film, and many who do won't care.

Rather, I question the viability of the Lone Ranger character in the 21st Century.  A large percentage of the current film going public aren't familiar with the character.  The last attempt at reviving the franchise, a 2003 made for TV movie intended as a pilot for a TV series, failed.  I don't have the impression there's much of a Lone Ranger fandom around, and I question whether the character has much of a following outside North America..  So I wouldn't be surprised if the film does poorly.  And with a purported 250 million dollar budget a lot of bums are going to need to be in a lot of seats to break even.

Neck And Neck.

I have no interest in seeing it, but I've been curious about what the reaction to the just released dystopian thriller The Purge would be.  Given what many people think is a less than believable premise, that a future US dictatorship would allow one night a year where any crime is permissible, I expected the critical reaction would be poor.  Instead it's turned out to be considerably better than I expected.  It's currently rated at 40 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, based on the reviews of pro movie critics..  No, not good, but far from the depths some films have reached.  40 percent means 4 out of 10 reviewers liked the film.  I expected the positives to be much lower.  Even more interesting has been the response of  the general public, as recorded at Rotten Tomatoes.  Only 43 percent of visitors to the site gave The Purge a positive rating.  I expected it to be higher.  Interesting to see how close the public and pro reaction is.

Apparently a sequel to The Purge is already in the works, buoyed along by an opening take of 37.5 million bucks worldwide, versus a reported budget of only 3 million bucks.  I'm a bit skeptical of that budget figure.  I would have thought Ethan Hawke would still be enough of a name to make that kind of salary by himself.  Whatever the case it's all but certain The Purge 2 will be in a theatre near you within the next couple of years.   The obvious question though is how many of those who disliked the original will see the sequel, and what effect their word of mouth might have on audiences for it.

Just Imagine.

I was just looking at someone's favourites over on Deviantart.  One of them was some fanart of Starfire and Wonder Girl from the Teen Titans.  The artist drew what I thought was a rather African-American looking Starfire, and the thought came to mind of Beyoncé playing her in a movie.  And with that thought came the thought of the howls of indignation that would probably result in the dumber and, to be blunt, more racist section of comic book fandom.   They would ignore the fact that Starfire, being an alien, doesn't fit into human concepts of race, and decide that the character is white.  All one has to do is look at the idiot comments that came from some Hunger Games fans when one of the characters  was portrayed by an African-American actress in the movie adaptation.  Apparently the fact the character was described as having dark brown skin in the novel somehow eluded their grasp, and they thought she was a cute little white girl.

(Beyoncé would obviously be the wrong choice to play Starfire in a Teen Titans movie, being too old, but would be a good choice if the character was portrayed in a context where she was older.)

Surprisingly Fresh.

After much delay the remake of the 1984 Commie invasion flick Red Dawn finally hit the theatres this week. Seeing a review in the paper this morning I decided to check the Rotten Tomatoes page for the film.  It currently has a rating of 11 percent.  Sure, the film is a failure with the critics, but it's quite a way above the "Watch this film and you might die, it's that horrible!" level of something like Ballistic:  Ecks vs. Severe. It actually has several positive reviews, although even those are of the "damning with faint praise" genre.  Still, positive reviews are positive reviews.

No doubt some US right wing commentators will claim the bad reviews are because US movie reviewers are all a bunch of leftist traitors.  But the reality is that the concept of the film is ridiculous.  It's even more ridiculous given the decision to change the villains in the film to the North Koreans from the Chinese after the bulk of filming was done, delaying the release of the film.  The change came because the studio was afraid the film might not get played in the increasingly lucrative Chinese market with the Chinese as villains.  But it's a decision that may have hurt the film.  Viewers might have a slightly easier time suspending their disbelief with Chinese baddies, but the North Koreans?  Even with the help of the macguffin used in the film they'd have trouble invading a Sandals resort, let alone the United States.

Thinking about the 1984 original I realised this morning I remember nothing of its debut, or the critical reaction at the time.  I remember other Cold War oriented pieces of the era, like The Day After and the later "Soviets conquer the US!" miniseries Amerika, but not the original Red Dawn.  I wonder what distracted my attention.

It will be interesting to see how much money the film makes.  Will the nostalgia some people have for the original fill theatre seats?  Will the premise draw in younger viewers?   The initial box office results will probably tell the tale.

They Persist.

Some movies have a long production cycle, but this one seems a bit ridiculous.  Warner Brothers has indicated their continued interest in a The Man From U.N.C.L.E. film, despite director Stephen Sondheim jumping ship last week.  The article claims that Warners has been interested in a movie based on the '60s spy series for tweny years.  You have to wonder why.  Even the studio supposedly realises there lkely isn't a  large and devoted fanbase for the series, yet they've been trying for two decades to get the film off the ground.

For younger visitors not familiar with it The Man From U.N.C.L.E was a product of the early '60s spy boom that resulted from the success of James Bond.  It starred Robert Vaughan as Napoleon Solo and David McCallum as Ilya Kuryakin, agents for the fictional United Network Command for Law and Enforcement.  Together they fought against the schemes of THRUSH, an organisation bent on world conquest.  It was noteable that U.N.C.L.E. was an international organisation, and that the threat from THRUSH so great that an American agent could be successfully partnered with a Soviet agent, years before the real world detente period.

And it's the unfamiliarity of younger viewers with the series that strikes me as the problem.  It's these folks that fill the movie theatres for big budget action-adventure movies, not the people most likely to have actual nostalgia for the series.  Even more recent properties that have been turned into feature films, like The A Team, haven't been huge hits, and one assumes they have a larger fan base to draw on.  And given that much of the premise of the series is tied to the era it was made in it's not hard to suspect that a version set in the modern era will be little more than an original concept with a few signifiers tacked on to connect it with the original.  Doing it as a period piece?  Not likely, as that might not appeal to the young crowd you need to make it a hit.

That'll Leave A Stain.

It's that time of year again, awards nomination season.  Along with the "we really wanna win one" awards such as the Oscars we also have the Razzies, which honour the worst in film over the last year.  Not surprisingly the latest episode in the Twilight series, Eclipse received multiple nominations, including worst picture.  But that's like shooting fish in a barrel with a grenade launcher given that the original source material revolves around an ineffectual doormat of a heroine and her vampire stalker, presented as a romance, instead of creepy as it should be.  Leader of the pack this year is The Last Airbender, M. Night  Shyamalan's big screen adaptation of Nickelodeon's popular Avatar: The Last Airbender cartoon series.  The 9 nominations include worst picture and worst director, which Shyamalan especially deserves in the eyes of many for his whitewashing of the multicultural characters of the original and the unfortunate implications of the non-white casting that was used.  It's also up for the new category of worst eye-gouging misuse of 3D, which may not be a long lived category if the current fad for 3D fades out. 

A lot of the nominations will come as no surprise to filmgoers in general and those who have paid attention to the Razzies in the past.  You can find the complete list here.

Not Long Enough.

If you're a fan of the series 24 you may be seeing a big screen version next year.  Or not.  Kiefer Sutherland says that shooting on the film may begin in December of this year or January of next.  Fox on the other hand say he's jumping the gun.  In any case one problem with the film is obvious.  It won't be long enough.  After all the premise of the series was that each season covered the events of a single day, with each episode covering roughly one hour.  So shouldn't a 24 movie be 24 hours long?  If Jack Bauer can survive those 24 hours surely the audience can too.

A Bit Retro Perhaps.

Tonight YTV is playing Spice World, the 1997 movie made at the height of the Spice Girls' career.  Much of YTV's target audience wasn't even born when this film was made.  It's as much a "historical piece" to them as a Beatles film would be, so it's kind of an odd choice.  It's also another example of how time flies for us geezerly types ie those of us who were adults during Spice Mania.

"My name ish Butler, Gerard Butler."

Tuning around the dial tonight I stumbled across The 300.  Watching about five minutes of it I couldn't help but think it of it as a comedy given how cheesy the whole thing seems.  Specifically you had Gerard Butler's character confronting the Persian King Xerxes, and it seemed like something from a bad comedy sketch, this feeling being strengthened for me by Butler sounding like he was trying to do a Sean Connery imitation.  I suspect this is another film that will not age well.