The other day, my husband and I caught a trailer for The Expendables, which is the cinematic result of a mad scientist’s attempt to mix the mitochondrial DNA of every American action star from the 1980’s into a sweaty, tattooed, bulging-veined chimera. We first saw this trailer during Kick-Ass, and my comment at the time (aside from my ceaseless laughter, which I think unnerved a few of my fellow theatre-goers) was: “Wow! It’s like the ’80’s mated!” As usual, my husband had a more measured reaction: “No action movie can claim to be complete unless it has Sygourney Weaver.”
Which got me wondering: if someone made a movie like The Expendables with a cast of female action stars, what would it look like? Read the rest of this entry »
Note: My husband typed this during his usual comics-consumption time. If it was important enough to interrupt that, you should definitely read it.
This is Not a Digital Revolution
or
You Won’t Believe What Watching The Runaways Taught Me About the Fight Over Manga and DRM
In my last year of high school, I wrote an essay that used the French Revolution as a model to describe the fall of communism in the U.S.S.R. as a revolution. The realisation that all revolutions follow such a similar, and relatively simple basic pattern was one of those mind-opening moments that has stuck with me ever since. What does this have to do with anything? Maybe nothing, but I’m going somewhere with this, so stick with me for a few pages and see what happens.
I saw Splice last night, and I’m glad I did. It’s not as shattering as District 9 (last summer’s surprise SF hit), but it is genuinely horrific without being visually explicit. It makes a lot of reference to the Frankenstein story, but it’s actually positioned somewhere on the Ira Levin/David Cronenberg side of the horror continuum. The most terrifying things happen offscreen, and but the violence you do see is both quick and intimate, and the creature effects are juicy. Despite some glossed-over science, it’s still a lot smarter than most of the dreck that bobs up in theatres and, as Peter remarked when we left the show, “At least it portrayed scientists as capable of meaningful relationships.”
The trailer would have you believe that Splice is a straight-up monster movie, an updated Universal feature from the days of Karloff and Chaney. It’s not. It’s one of those rare movies that centres on an intelligent but deeply troubled woman, and the consequences her obsession and lack of moral compass. We see stories like this all the time involving men, so it’s nice to see this one told about a woman. Women form the core of the story; in a reversal of traditional horror film conventions, the men are just there to get fucked and splattered when the plot calls for it. That doesn’t mean that the women do everything right all the time and the men don’t (far from it), but truly multi-dimensional characters have flaws and make mistakes. Main characters don’t have to be heroes. They just have to hold your attention.
In short, go see it, even if you’ve been waffling. You’ll be pleasantly surprised. I was.
I watch a lot of tutorials online. I find they really calm me down before I try to sleep. I had a feeling that this one would be an instant favourite the moment it appeared in the related content navbar, but wow. David Lynch teaching me how to cook? I’m so there.
This is only the first part of the tutorial. The second part is here. Apparently, Lynch released them as part of a promotional campaign for Inland Empire. What I really enjoy about the twenty-minute tutorial in total is that it not only teaches you how to make quinoa, but Lynch tells a story while he’s waiting for it to plump up. He tells it just like you imagine he would, only better, and the whole scene reminds me a little bit of David Carradine preparing a sandwich at the end of Kill Bill, only real and therefore scarier.
Also, I find it completely adorable that Lynch compensates for his cigarette smoking with whole foods. Whatever he’s doing, it works — he’s probably around 63 in this clip, but you’d never know.
It didn’t give me the rush of pure awesome that Kick-Ass did, but it fell prey to exactly none of the problems I once imagined it would. Charlie Jane Anders is correct when she says that the greatest villain of the story is Tony Stark himself, but while for her this was a betrayal of the first film’s promise to Tony’s growth as a character, I found it a further development of that character. At an early point in the film, Tony refers to the suit as a “prosthetic,” and what rapidly becomes clear is that he is using it as such in his relationships. This movie is about the consequences of that behaviour.
There was a huge amount to accomplish in this glimpse of the Marvel cinema-verse, and Justin Theroux ticks off every box. The pacing suffers a little as a result, and it can be easy to lose track of what the stakes are, but if you keep in mind that it’s all about Tony, you’ll do fine. While the former film was about the redemption of Stark Industries and the possible future of the military-industrial complex, this one reminds us that changing one’s company does not equate changing oneself. Prosthetics only get us so far.
But you see, those people are wrong. Charlie Jane Anders brings up the important point that superhero films create a context for acceptable violence, but I think her argument, that this narrative frame is similar to the frame surrounding consensual harm in BDSM, needs refining and clarification. Moreover, the Silver Ager bemoaning of a seeming lack of moral centre in this film and other self-aware superhero films is, well, a whole lot of moaning and groaning and little else. Kick-Ass is almost painfully self-aware, yes. But it’s not morally bankrupt. The story makes a compelling statement about cowardice and fantasy, and the danger of both. And that statement is that fantasy can occasionally help us overcome cowardice, but that past a certain point it only serves to enable it. The film is full of cowards: not just the bystanders who see crimes unfolding and do nothing to stop them, but the men who send their children to fight their battles for them. And down to the last man, they all suffer for that act. It’s a neat, tidy statement to make in the context of two continuing wars. It just happens to come in the form of a really fun, bloody film.
Rebecca isn’t Hitchcock’s best film. Not by a long shot. But everything that made him a good director is visible here: the way he frames each shot, his fascination with the transformation of a girl into a woman, his willingness to trust in the strength of the original source material. (I only wish he could have hooked up with Bernard Herrmann before 1955, because a Herrmann score for Manderley would have been both lovely and appropriately eerie. The real score is flowery and over-wrought. Oh, well. ふくすいぼんにかえらず.) He also made several good decisions on the picture: he didn’t cast Vivien Leigh in the role of the unnamed narrator (though oddly enough I always imagine her, when I imagine Rebecca’s character), and he waited until his producer Selznick was away to get the subtler, creepier ending that he really wanted.
The thing that struck me watching the film this time was Joan Fontaine’s nervy, twitchy lead performance. She does all the heavy lifting, which is saying something when her co-star was Olivier. Even Judith Anderson can’t really touch her, except for during a few quiet moments when she’s actually allowed to speak and not simply loom over the set. (That looming is still quite powerful in its silence; I think it informed some of the animation of Cinderella’s stepmother Lady Tremaine, ten years later.) duMaurier’s novel was met with indifference by critics, but Fontaine’s performance really pulls out the discomfort the narrator feels in her new position, and makes the viewer feel it, too. She’s almost grating in the first quarter, which makes the fourth that much more rewarding. Part of it is Hitchcock’s ability to pluck out all the relevant tensions and flay them open: after a discussion about the narrator’s father, Olivier’s deWinter instructs the narrator to eat her lunch “like a good girl.” There are similar moments throughout, but that one tells you everything you need to know. Even before we meet Mrs. Danvers, there’s something intrinsically horrifying about the situation. Then it all unravels, gorgeously, into a story about the vicious competition that can exist between women, and the danger of comparing oneself to an ultimately hollow ideal.
Bitch, please. This movie is like that hot cheerleader you always wanted to date: very pretty, very cheerful, very sincere, but not exactly marriage material. You’d hook your bio-USB up to it once, maybe twice, maybe when you’re feeling lonely or bored. But that’s it.
Because while there is something poetic about using new technology to tell an old story, I don’t think excellence in technical innovation is a pass for lacklustre narrative. There are stretches of Cameron’s film where the story is just plain boring. You don’t notice it right away, because there are a lot of colours and depth and semi-nude blue people and Sygourney Weaver doing her best Susan Calvin impression, but at the end you’re left wondering why the story’s inherent tensions weren’t exploited for their best possible effect. Spoilers below. Read the rest of this entry »
Thanksgiving, as I was exhorted late last night, was October 12th. It was, according to some, the only Thanksgiving that should count. However those of us with two countries to our names sometimes get double holidays. (Japan, it should be known, has the best assortment of holidays: Christmas is for lovers, New Year’s is for family, Valentine’s Day is for men, White Day is for women, Golden Week is a whole week long, and there’s Obon and Halloween. But I digress.) This means getting two Thanksgivings.
In other words, I’m boarding a plane later today for Los Angeles. There was a frantic pawing through my bureau this evening (yesterday evening, technically) for my bathing suit (I found it!) and I’ve charged up my mobile and borrowed an EEE. I’m going to see my mother’s family and my former roommate. This will be my husband’s first opportunity to meet some of them. (I considered making flashcards.) Since family is the theme of the weekend, I thought I’d share these trailers.
I’ll try watching this one tomorrow, if my last-minute shopping doesn’t get in the way. To me it’s the perfect family film.
I’ve also included this trailer, because it’s far more informative than the one floating around on television. That one just spits out the names Roald Dahl, Wes Anderson, George Clooney and Meryl Streep at you, without any context. This one actually gets at plot. And showcases Bill Murray as a badger with a thing for explosives. Which is a real winner, as far as I’m concerned.
In other good news, related pieces of which I shall divulge later on, Shine: An Anthology of Optimistic SF*, edited by Jetse de Vries, is available for pre-order. I wrote a story especially intended for it, and I was lucky enough to see it accepted. I’ll probably do some talking about it to the family members I don’t see very often, if they ask what I’m up to lately. Then we’ll just segue into killer robots, and all will be well.
*Yes, I know about the typo. The fine people at Solaris are on it.
Yes, now you too can watch poorly-dubbed Italian classics like Playgirls and the Vampire, for free, on AMC. This is the perfect way to celebrate Halloween, unless you a) live near abandoned barns you can explore or b) have a goodly amount of small-batch bourbon and a toolbox of Hammer films at the ready. (Parties are also good.)
Also good is the fact that AMC is streaming episodes of the original Prisoner series, to tie-in with their upcoming adaptation starring Ian McKellen as the sinister No. 2 and Jim “I played Jesus” Caveziel as the prisoner, No. 6. As much as I love Ian McKellen, I maintain the opinion I held this summer: No. 2 should always be played by a new actor in each episode, to heighten No. 6’s uncertainty and set his usual “three steps forward, two steps back” pace. Ian McKellen will probably make an excellent No. 2, but so would Ricky Gervais. Go back and watch the original episodes, and you’ll know what I mean. To my mind there was no need to Galactica-fy The Prisoner by adding gritty realism; even during its most zany moments the series was emphatically bleak and nihilistic, with little potential for hope in either the system or the humans living in it. It didn’t matter that the Village’s prisoners wore primary colours and got hot cocoa each night before bed — they were watched as they slept, drugged by their caretakers, and betrayed by the people they trusted most on a regular basis.
If you want to see a real response to The Prisoner, go watch Dollhouse.
...is a science fiction writer, grad student, おたく, and immigrant. She has lived on the outskirts of Los Angeles, Seattle, and Toronto, where she is now a member of the Cecil Street Irregulars and a contributor to both Tor.com and WorldChanging Canada. Her fiction has been published in Tesseracts, FLURB, and Nature.
