E.R. Torre's Blog, page 129

Comic Con trailers…

This past weekend and at San Diego’s huge Comic Con, fans of the fantastic were treated to an incredibly large variety of trailers and clips from some very hotly anticipated movies.  DC comics, IMHO, had the best showing and, ironically enough, possibly the worst as well (I’ll get into the one sour note in the next posting.  Why spoil the good?).

Here we have the beautiful trailer to the upcoming Wonder Woman film…

And here’s an intriguing first look at the Justice League film…

Here we have another intriguing trailer, this one to Kong: Skull Island, which looks like it takes equally from the King Kong features as well as, of all things, Apocalypse Now!

Lest you think Marvel Studios had nothing to offer, here’s the first, in my opinion, intriguing Doctor Strange trailer.  As much of a fan of Benedict Cumberpatch as I am, until this trailer, I wasn’t all that impressed by what I saw.  Now I am…

Looks like there’s some really interesting stuff coming your way very soon!

Apropos of Nothing, part deux…

Very weird story found here:

Meet Graham: The Only Person To Survive On Our Roads

From the story, by Rae Johnston at Gizmodo Australia:

…the Transport Accident Commission has collaborated with a leading trauma surgeon, a crash investigation expert and a world-renowned Melbourne artist to produce ‘Graham’, an interactive lifelike model demonstrating human vulnerability.

Graham is a representation of what a human body geared toward surviving car accidents would look like.  As noted in the article, our bodies, through years of evolution, can survive hitting a wall, for example, while running at it but vehicular accidents are (obviously) beyond the range of what our bodies can handle without any kind of safety harness/features.

Therefore, the design of Graham is a suggestion of what our bodies might look like if they could withstand harsher/faster impacts.

So, what would people “designed” to survive car crashes (and Donald Trump rallies) look like?

Glad you asked:

There are more photos available at the above link above, if you’re curious.

A very weird concept and topic yet one that nonetheless proved intriguing to me.

Apropos of nothing in particular…

In these days it seems many studios rely on popular young adult novels (like Harry Potter and Twilight) to create movie franchises.

But just because you have a successful book franchise it doesn’t mean your path to movie success is a given…

The Last “Divergent” Movie Did So Badly That The Finale Will Be Made For TV

I haven’t seen any of the Divergent films nor have an interest in doing so.  Having said that, there is absolutely no joy/gloating at the (mis)fortunes of these films/filmmakers and the various people who worked on these films.

I feel it is nice the producers of these films, despite the disappointment of the last film, will present a conclusion to this series for the many (though not enough) fans out there.

If nothing else, its an interesting new wrinkle in the way films can be made and series can be concluded.

Zoolander 2 (2016) a (mildly) belated review

Released mere weeks in 2001 after the tragedy of 9/11, the original Zoolander was a film that came to theaters and disappeared quickly.  The country, needless to say, didn’t appear to be in the mood for something light and funny at that time.

As this things are wont to do, time somewhat healed the pain of 9/11 and over the subsequent years people caught this film when it appeared on cable and regular TV…and they liked it.  Though even today I don’t think people consider the original Zoolander a comic “masterpiece”, they do acknowledge it is a pleasant, entertaining goof that featured some wild cameos (David Duchovny and David Bowie in particular come to mind) and an almost surreal alternative world plot: What if male fashion models –idiot male fashion models- were the most important people in the world?

Again, while the film may not be a stone cold classic, it had its charm and as a time killer, you could do far worse.

I wish the same could be said of the movie’s very belated sequel, 2016’s Zoolander 2.

While amping up (ridiculously, it must be said) the number of star cameos, this movie also tries to meld James Bondian and DaVinci Code-type plots.  There are laughs to be found, for certain, and some are (IMHO) quite hilarious, but when the film reached its climax I turned to my wife and daughter who sat through this with me and said:

This has to be the stupidest film ever made.

The statement was not intended as a complement.

As I said before, there were moments I found myself laughing and sometimes the laughter was quite loud.  For the most part, and unfortunately, this happened toward the film’s end, when our “heroes” the lame-brained Derek Zoolander (, who also directed) and his equally stupid partner/friend Hansel () confront Jacobim Mugatu () who, as he did in the first film, is apoplectic at the stupidity of everyone around him.

Good as that joke is, it was done better in the Pink Panther films via Chief Inspector Dreyfus (a hilarious ) and his having to deal with the inept Inspector Clouseau (an equally hilarious ).

The worst problem Zoolander 2 has is that it appeared the story totally got away from Mr. Stiller.  There were moments I couldn’t understand what the heck was happening and the gag cameos, while at times interesting, ultimately felt like they became the movie’s sole reason for being.

For example, as famous as Katy Perry is, her cameo was completely pointless and, even more importantly, not at all funny.  Had Mr. Stiller exerted more self-control over his product, he should have decided that despite her popularity and (I’m certain) the hoops he had to go through to get her into his film, the movie might have worked a little better without that unfunny scene.  Or, barring that, create a funnier scene!!!

The movie also inexplicably hired the usually hilarious  but chose to hide her behind so much makeup that you can’t tell who she was and, further, she like so many others had precious few humorous things to add to the proceedings.  Later in the film, when the makeup was removed (SPOILERS, I suppose), instead of revealing Ms. Wiig under the makeup we have another actor appear, this time one of the stars of the original Zoolander, as the person hiding behind that disguise.  This actress’ appearance, like many of the cameos within the movie, felt like it was done before a green screen in no more than an hour of time and stitched into the film proper long afterwards.

As for jokes that completely flopped, no bigger example of that was the extended joke involving Hansel’s Harem, which has, among others, in it.  They kept returning to this joke and it…Just.  Didn’t.  Work.

I could go on and on (why, Sting, why!?!) but suffice to say this film isn’t recommended.  For those out there who so gleefully slagged Ghostbusters, I dare you to compare these two films and not say that Ghostbusters, even with its faults, isn’t a far better product.

Not to pile on…

When I woke up this morning and heard Melania Trump had plagiarized portions of a Michelle Obama speech in hers last night, I figured it would be a line or two.

I was wrong.

Truly, I’m almost at a loss for words.

While I’m absolutely terrified of the idea that Donald Trump is this close to being a possible President of the United States, I have no opinions, good or bad, regarding his family and wife.

It seems pretty obvious that whoever helped Melania write this portion of her speech (assuming it wasn’t Melania herself, as she has stated she wrote most of the speech on her own), deserves to be fired.

I mean, if you tried to screw her over, and by extension Donald Trump, you couldn’t have picked a better, bigger venue than this speech.

The Trump people today claim she didn’t plagiarize the speech but come on.  You can ignore reality only so much.

Oh well.  On to day two of the convention!

A little more on Ghostbusters, and specifically Leslie Jones

Yesterday I reviewed the new Ghostbusters film and found it a solid, enjoyable comedy that did not, in my opinion, reflect the extreme negative comments people made on the internet regarding it.

Today, I find this article on CNN.com, written by Sandra Gonzalez:

Leslie Jones busts Twitter haters, gets love in return

All I have to say about this is the people who are going out of their way to insult Ms. Jones are nothing more than cowards and bullies.

I suspect the people insulting her are among those who claim Ms. Jones’ portrayal in the Ghostbusters movie was nothing but a “loud, annoying, street-smart stereotype”, as I mentioned yesterday.

First, those who have seen the film should know her character is not presented this way.  Secondly, her character proves very useful because her “street-smarts” involve knowledge of New York’s HISTORY.  She is the one who knows what happened in certain parts of the city, knowledge that eventually helps the others understand what is going on.

I will repeat what I wrote yesterday regarding those slamming Ghostbusters from way before its release: If you don’t like something, why focus so much on it?

Couldn’t you spend that energy doing something more productive?

Ghostbusters (2016) a (for the most part) right on time review

With the Ghostbusters remake, one need look no farther than Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice to see another example of a movie being completely taken in by pure, unadulterated craziness.

Look, I completely get it: We’re human, aren’t we?  We’re just as capable of loving one thing and hating another.  God knows, I was never a fan of Star Wars and to this day cannot understand why people love it so much.

However, I don’t go out of my way to point fingers and yell from the rafters as to why Star Wars is crap.  Frankly, I’m happy people found something they like and enjoy the hell out of it.  Especially those people my age who experienced it first, in 1977, as a child.

When BvS was first announced, there seemed to almost immediately appear a group absolutely convinced the movie would be terrible…even when it was a year or more away from release.  Some of their opinions I can’t debate: If you have experienced all of the Zach Snyder directed films and found they weren’t your cup of tea, it was logical to assume you would probably not be pleased you with his latest film.

Having seen only one Zach Snyder directed film in its entirety before BvS (for the record, it was Dawn of the Dead), I came into that film a near “virgin” with regard to the works of Mr. Snyder.  I also tried, despite the very negative critical reactions, to see it with as neutral a mindset as I could.

I liked the film.  I really liked the film.

And I now hate it because the Ultimate Cut of the film is so much better than the theatrical cut!

Similar negative vibes moved to the Ghostbusters remake.  People primed themselves to hate it many months before the film was released and, surprise surprise, many of the things they were so-damn-certain they would hate they wound up finding -and hating- in the film.

A self-fulfilling prophecy if there ever was one.

Over at the IMDB listing for the movie you have a featured 1 star review wherein the author, Girlycard, goes over everything s/he felt was wrong with the film.

Here’s the first of their complaints: This movie was stolen. Everything in this movie was stolen from the first two. All they did was literally take the first movie, and remove the action parts and the horror parts.

I don’t get it.  The movie is a remake.  If you hear they’re remaking Ghostbusters and the movie comes out and turns out to be a romantic film set in the 1800’s British highlands involving the upper and lower casts, wouldn’t people have been scratching their heads and wondering what the hell did this have to do with the original Ghostbuster films?

Then there’s this: The sexism. This movie is probably the most sexist movie since Doomsday Machine. They replaced the entire main cast with only women to appeal to the radical Feminists. When your ideology discriminates against who you can cast in a role, that is called Fascism, and it’s not a good thing.

Hoo boy.

I just didn’t see it.  If anything, the film slyly inverts some standard movie sexism jokes.  In the Mel Brooks comedy The Producers, you have a sexy (female, natch) secretary who does is a complete bimbo and does absolutely nothing but get oogled over by the men.

In Ghostbusters, you have  play Kevin, the male iteration of this stereotypical female role.  He’s quite literally this very same “dumb blonde” secretary who the female staff (actually, mostly  Erin Gilbert) oogles over and makes an ass out of herself doing so.

So, in The Producers using the dumb blonde female secretary is ok but if we invert this trope in Ghostbusters we’re being…sexist?!

Worse, fascist?!?!?

Pure hyperbole.

Also, the male characters in this films are not all portrayed as idiots.  Apart from Kevin, they seem reasonably “normal” for a slapstick comedy.  It’s like focusing on  Louis Tully playing a nerdy/horny fool in the original Ghostbusters and thinking that’s anti-male sexism.

Allow me one more thing pointed out by Girlycard: The racism. The only black character was turned into a loud, annoying, street-smart stereotype.

In this case, I have to admit when I saw the first trailers for the film, I feared this might indeed be the case.  However, I was delighted to find Patty Tolan far from just “loud” and “annoying”.  She was presented as “street smart”, but this was done in a truly positive way.  She knew specific historical aspects regarding New York the others did not and proved herself to be very much a helpful character in their mission.  And she does this while not yelling!  Imagine that!

Not to get too far afield, but if you compare her character with that of  in the original film, she comes out better.  Note that Mr. Hudson himself stated in interviews he views his participation in the original Ghostbusters with great ambivalence.  He was brought into the film thinking he would have a meatier role but once the cameras started rolling his character’s participation was trimmed to almost nothing but the token “African-American” guy by the end.

My point here is this: I can totally understand people really, really loving the original Ghostbusters and not stomaching a remake that does not involve Dan Ackroyd, Bill Murray, et al.

I get it.

But you know what?  You can do as I do with films I don’t care all that much about:  You can simply ignore them.  Why expend so much energy hating something?  Seriously, you don’t have to do it.

The Ghostbusters remake, for those willing to give it a shot, is a funny, engaging film that, while far from perfect, promises a good time…if you can overlook some of the movie’s faults.  At times there is a certain choppiness to the story and there was at least one major plot element that was clearly cut from the theatrical version…though perhaps it was just as well.  Finally, not all the jokes land, but that’s not unusual for a comedy.  As long as you do laugh several times during the film’s run, it’s done its job.

The movie, like the original Ghostbusters, concerns a group of people (yes, women are people, too) who are drawn together because mysterious things are a’happenin’ in New York.  As already mentioned, Kristen Wiig plays Erin Gilbert, nerdy scientist who is desperately seeking tenure at a prestigious university.   is Abby Yates, her childhood friend who, along with Erin, were once a duo determined to prove ghosts exist.  Erin left that behind but is drawn back and meets up with Abby at her university.  There, Erin meets Abby’s right hand woman, the bizarre Jillian Holtzmann (a very funny turn by ) and they go investigate a potential spiritual apparition.

This investigation winds up squelching any chance for Erin to get her tenure so the trio decides to form their own “ghost hunting” business.  Soon, they are hired by the not-always-yelling Patty Tolan () while also hiring the absolutely clueless Kevin (Chris Hemsworth) as their secretary.

As it turns out, there is a menace brewing which may lead to an apocalypse.  The Ghostbusters not only fight this menace but, in an amusing turn, they also have to deal with the Mayor of New York who…ah, I won’t give it away.  It’s a funny twist on the “typical” higher-up reaction to something fantastic.

Getting back to something I noted a little before: The one major plot element which seems to have been trimmed from the film involves Erin leaving the Ghostbusters.  This sequence is never shown and when Erin does get back to the group Abby happily states “You’re back!” yet we never saw her leave in the first place.  Again, nothing terribly big but it does point out the film had sequences which were eventually discarded (they also got rid of the very funny joke about the selfie picture in the heavy metal concert.  I thought its presentation in the trailer was funnier than the truncated version in the film proper).

As for the cameo appearances by the original cast…I hate to say it but they were largely not all that great.  There are those who stated Bill Murray’s cameo was the best but, frankly, I thought it was only ok.  It was, however, the longest of the cameos and involved two sequences.  My favorite was probably Sigorney Weaver’s but even that one could have been funnier, IMHO.

Anyway, I’ve rambled on enough.  If you can put aside your emotions and nostalgic fondness regarding the original Ghostbusters and give this new version a shot, you’re in for some fun.  This film may not be the best comedy evah, but it will have you laugh plenty of times.

Recommended.

Corrosive Knights: A 7/16/16 (and about damn time) update

This is a photograph of my desk, taken just moments ago:

What you see on the photo’s left side is my printer printing out the completed 9th draft of my latest Corrosive Knights novel, which will have this cover (the title will be kept secret just a little longer):

…and which I offered the following promotion for:

I began this latest draft of the book just a little over two months ago, on 5/12/16 and it really hurts to see it took me this long to get through this draft, especially since it took me about a month to do draft #8.

Why the considerably longer time?

Two factors:  First, because of this particular time of the year, ie summer, I’ve been traveling about.  Sadly, my travels do not involve any actual vacationing.  Instead, I’ve been helping my youngest daughter as she’s started up college and had to move in for her summer courses (it was recommended all freshmen take at least one summer course so they can acclimate themselves to this new setting).  Shortly, I’ll be moving her out as well as helping my other daughter move to her new apartment (thank goodness it is in the same building) and she starts her new year in college.

Maybe we’ll get some actual, honest to goodness vacation time.

We’ll see.

The second reason it took so long to do this draft is that while the first half of the book was pretty much good to go and required little more than grammatical/spelling corrections, the second half of the book required much more.

I was forced to get down and dirty and sift through almost every single damn line to get that second half of the book “right”.  On the plus side, the end result should make this second half of the book almost print ready.  It has to, given all the work involved!

But there’s little need to bore you with this, the bottom line is that I’m that much closer to being….DONE!!!!  FINISHED!!!!

Hurrah!!!

But before getting too excited, I’ll finish printing out this completed draft and, yes, once again revise it.  At that point I’ll have an even better idea of how far off we are from publishing this thing.

Regardless, we’re closer to the end.  We should be there quicker than you think.

Bitch n’ moan…

For the past however-many months, there were two movies on many people’s radar as being all but guaranteed “horrible.”

The first, which I’ve gone into ad-nauseum, is Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.  You name it, people had problems with it.  Among the many sins the film was guilty of in the eyes of many (pre-release) the biggest was that Zach Snyder was the movie’s director and, in the eyes of many, he had already revealed himself via previous films as a “talentless hack”.

When the movie came out, two camps were quickly formed: Those that loathed the film (it met every one of their darkest predictions) and those who saw it and…liked it.

This was not a small group.

While the film would go on to make a ton of money, the detractors found cause for snipping in that as well.  “Had the film been good, its $872 million plus take would have been a billion!” they said, ignoring the fact that the film’s take makes it one of the five most successful films released this year.

And when the “Ultimate Cut” of the film was released digitally and people like me got to see it, it proved both that the theatrical cut of the film was -let’s put it kindly- haphazard at best and further proved that Mr. Snyder had delivered a much more coherent story (even I, as a fan of the film. would admit the theatrical cut is, in light of the Ultimate Cut, something to be ignored completely), it still didn’t matter.

The hatred was already baked in and nothing could change opinions.

Fine.

The other film to receive fan scorn near the Batman v Superman levels has to be the Paul Fieg directed, Melissa McCarthy/Kristen Wiig/Kate McKinnon/Leslie Jones Ghostbusters.

The scorn heaped upon the film following its admittedly not-great first trailer was something to behold.  It turned into something of a runaway train and the trailer received the highest negatives ratings of ANY video on YouTube to that moment, quite the feat for something that was at worst, IMHO, “only” an OK trailer.

As the film was nearing release, those who were determined to hate the product were already posting comments along the lines of “how bad will the critics hate it?” to “those critics who like it are clearly in Sony’s pocket”.

And when the critics were finally allowed to post their reviews, something most curiously happened:  Most of them…liked the film.

Currently, Ghostbusters stands at a high 74% positive among critics but among audiences has a far worse 44% approval, almost the direct opposite reaction critics/audiences had to Batman v Superman, which was loathed by critics yet found a much higher positive rating among your average movie-goers.  I suspect it was the positive reaction by audiences which allowed Batman v Superman to make the box office it did.  I further suspect if the audience ratings remain as they are for Ghostbusters, this movie may do only mediocre box office before leaving theaters.

I point all this only because it intrigues me and shows the power of the internet and group thinking within it.

This won’t be the first (two) times internet pre-reactions to upcoming movies sows the seeds of love…or hate…with a particular work.

Cast A Deadly Spell (1991) a (very) belated review

Had this one on my list of films to catch whenever I could, thinking I hadn’t seen it but realizing, as the film reached its final act, that I’d seen at least that part of it.  Check that: Either I saw the film’s closing act or the movie’s resolution was so predictable it just seemed like I had seen it before.

While it may sound like a big knock against the film, trust me when I say I don’t intend it to be as this film entertained me through to that (at least to me) predictable ending.

Cast A Deadly Spell biggest draw is in the fact that it presents a Raymond Chandler-esq “noir” L.A. of 1948 merged with the dark magics of H. P. Lovecraft’s literature.

The story features a very game and engaging  who plays private detective Harry Phillip Lovecraft (yes, H. P. Lovecraft).  He lives in this “noir” L.A. and shuns any form of magic…even though it is a commonality in this world.  You see, everyone has some kind of relationship with the dark arts.  In this world, bloody rain can fall one overcast day and police stations bring in vampire and werewolf suspects for questioning.

In the film’s opening minutes Lovecraft finishes a case.  This serves to establish both his character -he’s very much a noble knight in the Phillip Marlowe tradition- and the peculiar world he lives in.  Following the opening, viewers are side-routed to some goings on involving a book and the shadowy people trying to get their hands on it.  It is during this sequence we see  in one of her earlier large roles.  Her character, Connie Stone, will play a role in the story to follow.

It is also during this interlude that one of the film’s “surprises” is presented, a character who doesn’t seem to be who they are, but viewers should detect a particular blonde’s secret right away.  At the risk of again sounding very down on the film, this was one of those plot twists that if you didn’t pick up on it right away, you truly need to get your eyes checked.

Afterwards we return to Lovecraft.  He’s directed to the Amos Hackshaw () estate and, while driving in, sees a unicorn and a woman on horseback and carrying a bow and arrow hunting the creature.  The woman will turn out to be Olivia Hackshaw (), Amos’ 16 year old “innocent” daughter.

Amos, it turns out, lost his copy of the (in) famous Necronomicon (the book we saw in the interlude presented beforehand) and he needs to get it back in two days for, he states, a conference he needs to attend.  Amos tells Lovecraft he suspects his recently fired chauffeur, a man who he says had his eyes on the youthful Olivia, stole the book when he was sent away.

I won’t get into too many more details beyond what I’ve laid out above but, apart from the ending you see coming and the non-surprise regarding one of the characters, Cast A Deadly Spell is an entertaining film that pleasantly mixes the noir and dark magic genres in an effective way.  While the mystery at its heart may not be quite as clever as those found in the best works of Raymond Chandler and the horror elements may not be quite as horrifying as those found in the best works of H. P. Lovecraft, the film nonetheless hits its marks and entertains which is, after all, what any good film should do.

So, while the film may feature a couple of “surprises” that aren’t all that surprising, Cast A Deadly Spell is a pleasant, entertaining feature that presents a unique melding of genres, a pleasant cast, and an engaging story.

Recommended.

Here’s the movie’s trailer.  Sorry for the poor quality…

A Random Thought: Hollywood really loves remaking films they shouldn’t yet here’s a case of a good film that might make a really great remake.  Should be considered!