E.R. Torre's Blog, page 20
June 7, 2021
Did not see that coming…
Over on jezebel.com, Shannon Melero offers this intriguing article…
The “Texas Bee Lady”, Erika Thompson, has posted several videos showing her saving bees from various places and somehow -who knows exactly how, its probably in the analytics of the various internet search engines- I’ve become aware of them and seen them.
For example…
Seems like a nice thing, no?
I mean, she’s trying to save bee colonies, moving them from places where they may be in danger and putting them somewhere where they will thrive, right?
However…
Frankly, I was surprised at first to hear that someone would criticize these vidoes…
…but…
I have to give it to the above bee keeper. She points out and gives very specific reasons for why the “Texas Bee Lady” is a “fake”.
And, frankly, I find her reasoning pretty solid.
Look, I’m very much concerned with the environment. I read with great alarm how insect and animal populations are rapidly declining and I hope we sober up and realize we have to work with the environment around us rather than destroy it.
And, watching some of the Texas Bee Lady’s videos I felt like it was nice to see someone devoted to helping this important insect by relocating their hives.
But when you’re right you’re right.
Bees, as much as I want them to survive and thrive, can be aggressive creatures. They can and will sting you. I knew an odd kid way, waaaaaay back in my childhood who got a kick out of provoking bee and hornet hives and then getting himself stung.
I distinctly recall one day he showed up to school with a face so puffed up it looked like something from a cartoon. I really, really hope he got some help regarding this weird masochistic tendency.
Regardless, seeing the Texas Bee Lady without any protection and, as noted by the critic above, with her long hair flowing as it is, is an invitation to disaster. I agree with the critic: What we see is one thing but what we don’t see is quite another.
What does her husband do before they record her moving the bees and their hive? These hives can’t always be as mellow as she makes them out to be, can they?
My guess is no.
As much as I may like the Texas Bee Lady’s videos, I’m inclined to believe the critic. The videos are cute. The videos are encouraging to anyone who wants to preserve the environment and especially the bee population.
But these videos are also clearly modified to the point of fakery.
And that’s a shame.
It reminds me, frankly, of all those lovely HGTV programs out there where people are flipping properties. They make the whole process of buying a home, gutting it, then renovating it look like such a breeze and the end result always looks so good… not to mention we usually end with the kicker of how much this newly renovated property will get sold for and the profits to be made in doing this.
It’s a lovely thought and I’m certain a large reason real estate properties are going through the roof nowadays is because of people feeling like they can do this flipping thing and make themselves money.
But I’ve had personal experience in renovations. Not to the extreme degree of gutting an entire home at one time, but over the course of my life I’ve been involved in enough renovations, including full roofs redone to renovating a kitchen, bathrooms, A/C units, tiles, etc. etc. that I know the nature of that business.
To begin, on the HGTV shows they usually lowball the hell out of the estimates for remodeling something. One time on one show I saw they had to redo the roof and the estimate given was $10,000. I was shocked because at least around where I live, a similar roof being redone would cost at least double that and likely more. And we weren’t talking about a tile roof or anything ornate like that!
If one is skeptical of that price, one has to be skeptical of all the other estimates.
Worse, these shows make it look like a home can be redone without much time or efforts with that jackpot profitable sale at the end of the proverbial rainbow.
The reality is that it takes months, sometimes years to get something like this done. In the neighborhood I live, there is one house that I swear has been worked on for nearly three years now. It looks close to being done, but it still isn’t finished, and it was a flip job: It was purchased, gutted, then they worked on the inside and outside and it took sooooo long!
You also deal with contractors who can be less than helpful. I don’t want to tar all contractors with a single brush, but at least in my experience a job that sometimes starts out great can rapidly devolve into disappointment and plenty of angry phone calls to try to get the contractors to properly finish up the job they were hired to do.
Alas, contractors often take up multiple jobs and if you’re not on top of them, they can put your job on the backburner.
Finally, there’s the inspections, permits, and codes you have to deal with. If you’ve ever experienced these lovely things, you know just what a pain in the ass they can be.
So, yeah, I totally understand the Texas Bee Lady critic.
Sometimes what’s presented is, to say the least, manipulated for effect.
June 3, 2021
Too Much Free Time…?
In this year of COVID its been interesting to see the various ways people have tried to make money.
I’ve watched as certain stocks have risen, sometimes to seemingly ridiculous highs, and then there’s Cryptocurrency, which I still don’t understand…
One of the weirder things to rise is the NFT, or Non-Fungible Tokens market.
This one I really didn’t understand, though for a while there it seemed to be something plenty of companies were talking about.
If I understand this correctly (and please forgive me if I’m horribly off!), NFTs were a way for people to “buy” and therefore “own” a digital image or video.
The first time I heard about NFTs to any great degree it involved one time Wonder Woman artist Jose Delbo who made himself quite a mint on selling his images.
Here’s an interesting article about this particular artist and his sales. It was originally posted on kryptobia.com…
Who can sell a Wonder Woman NFT? The artist or DC Comics?
The upshot is that publisher DC Comics, who owns the character of Wonder Woman, grew concerned over Mr. Delbo’s NFT success -he reportedly earned something like 2 million dollars selling his Wonder Woman images!- and essentially brought the hammer down and forbid artists from selling their images via NFTs.
However, that was then and this is now.
According to the below article by Luke Plunkett and presented on kotaku.com, it would appear…
The NFT market has collapsed, Oh No
I can’t say I’m terribly surprised.
The fact of the matter is -and again, I may be totally misunderstanding NFTs- it seems to me NFTs were a hopeless cause.
I mean, buying a digital image may make you its “owner”, but what’s to stop these images or movies from appearing online anyway?
I mean, even if you own it, what does it matter? Can you profit off of it? I suppose you could if you found someone else who wanted to buy it, but that seemed like a limited thing.
Perhaps others are beginning to realize this as well and maybe that’s why the NFT market seems to be collapsing, at least according to the article above.
It’s a curse of the internet, truly. So much digital content is so readily available and one wonders how this will shake out in the future, whether with NFTs or not.
As it stands, we already have musical artists who have trouble getting money for their new music, especially given how easy it is to pirate individual songs via MP3s.
Its even easier to post full comic books online and, even though I’m far from the most well known author out there, I nonetheless have found my books available in questionable websites for “free” download.
Its infuriating, certainly.
The world keeps changing, I suppose and I hope that in the future there does appear some way for artists -including me- can keep their projects theirs.
June 2, 2021
Coronavirus Diaries 37
It seems we’re getting closer than ever to an end of the pandemic.
Monday New York City reported no Coronavirus deaths and across the country, cases and deaths are plunging.
Memorial Day just passed and, ’round these parts, the vacationing crowds were pretty thick. I’m hoping the infection rates don’t show a big increase come two weeks from now, but if things keep going as well as they have been, we might be in for a very pleasant surprise.
Fingers crossed!
If things work out well, I wonder if it has anything to do with the vaccinations?
I write this sarcastically.
Why? Because as I’ve noted before I’m incredibly frustrated with people who are “anti-vaccers” or who deny the seriousness of the pandemic.
Come on, people, the evidence is right before your eyes: While the pandemic isn’t gone -and let’s hope there never appears a variant of the COVID-19 virus that is resistant to the vaccines- it has been beaten down considerably in the months since vaccines were so prominent.
There is no other way to look at this. There is no other way to account for the changes.
We’ve had a tremendous number of people vaccinated and, thus, we have a concurrent drop in infections, hospitalization, and -yes- deaths.
It’s as easy as that.
Get vaccinated.
Please!
The Purchase of MGM
Amazon.com has acquired MGM which means they have purchased the back catalogue of films which means (redux) that they now own the James Bond films.
Screenwriter John Logan, who worked on both Skyfall and the (IMHO) abysmal Spectre, had some thoughts about that and wrote an opinion piece lamenting/worrying about what that might mean to the long running franchise.
Over at deadline.com, Tom Grater writes about Mr. Logan’s thoughts:
In essence Mr. Logan’s fealty is with the Broccolis, who have controlled the James Bond franchise since its inception, and worries that if some corporate overlord worms their way into decisions regarding the franchise -versus continued control by the Broccolis- the brand may be diluted.
His worry isn’t far off. We’ve seen what’s happened -some good, some pretty bad- following George Lucas selling his ownership of the Star Wars franchise to Disney.
Certainly one thing that does seem to happen with these well known franchises that are acquired by studios is that there is an effort to maximize releases of new material and, hopefully, then make the brand even more profitable.
Mr. Logan likely worries that there might be a Miss Moneypenny TV show/movie down the road or perhaps something with Q or M. Given the way Disney is now releasing movies based on villains of their popular movies (Cruella being the latest release), might there not be the possibility of a Goldfinger (the villain) movie? Or perhaps something with Blofeld?
I can see Mr. Logan’s worry…
…but…
The fact of the matter is that the James Bond movie franchise has existed since the very early 1960’s. There have been great James Bond films. There have been mediocre James Bond films. And, yes, there have been pretty abysmal James Bond films (looking at you, Spectre).
There was a time when the James Bond films were the state-of-the-art action/adventure films but that, it seems, hasn’t been the case for quite some time.
The wonder surrounding the franchise -which for many years was the only movie franchise out there- IMHO has lost that luster.
James Bond films were essentially lost in the wilderness following Pierce Brosnan’s run. If it wasn’t for the success of the Matt Damon Bourne movies and the franchise using them as a template, perhaps the James Bond franchise might have faded away anyway.
Much as I love Casino Royale, the first and best of the Daniel Craig Bonds, it was clearly a film that benefitted tremendously from using elements found in the Bourne films.
What followed, sadly, has proven disappointing to me. Quantum of Solace was a slick looking film with some good action sequences but a story which was murky… and that’s being kind. Granted, the movie was a victim of a writer’s strike, but still. Skyfall, as I’ve noted before, I absolutely loved when I saw it in theaters upon its initial release. However, the moment the film was over and I thought about what I just saw, I realized that movie’s plot was complete nonsense as well and my opinion of the film has subsequently dropped.
And Spectre, as I’ve mentioned twice before above, I felt was absolutely abysmal, easily IMHO the worst Bond film ever made.
Would more Bondian works dilute the franchise?
I suppose its possible but I wonder if it matters at this point. The James Bond franchise seems to move in waves, sometimes good sometimes forgettable/bad.
Could more James Bond make the franchise better or worse?
Either is possible, certainly, but given the very long history to date, I wonder if audiences will be as preoccupied about that as Mr. Logan is.
May 28, 2021
The New Novel Update #4
I’m posting this today because it occurs to me I should present this at this time.
I’m going to be vague about certain things, but bear with me. Eventually, perhaps several months down the road, it will make sense.
I began my new novel, according to my notes, on 9/30/2020.
By 5/12/21 I had the first draft finished and began the second.
These dates are important, at least for me, to remember.
Why?
Well… I can’t go into it because doing so would spoil the novel and essentially make it pointless to continue working on it.
As much as I’m enjoying writing this novel, there are forces outside my control which have made me for the very first time I can remember consider giving up on a work after spending so much time (some eight months!!) devoted to it.
However, after giving it a lot of thought this past week, I’ve decided to go ahead and finish it up. I’m roughly 2/3rds or so into the second draft and feel the book is worth continuing despite these reservations.
I’ll explain it all in the book itself, I promise, and I’m sorry for being so vague.
If nothing else, its important for me to set this marker down on this particular date.
Again, my apologies for being so vague!
New Ancient Greek Dictionary…
…not for the meek!
Over on theguardian.com Alison Flood offers the following fascinating article about a new Ancient Greek language translation, which this time does away with many of the Victorian niceties.
Yup, this time we get to read what the Ancient Greeks actually wrote without the veil of polite then modern Victorian society’s attempt to sanitize it. Read on…!
English Dictionary of Ancient Greek “Spare No Blushes” With Fresh Look At Crudity
Perhaps the key paragraph from the article is this one (pardon the language!):
The new dictionary’s editors “spare no blushes”, (Professor James) Diggle said, when it comes to the words that “brought a blush to Victorian cheeks”. The verb χέζω (chezo), translated by Liddell and Scott as “ease oneself, do one’s need”, is defined in the new dictionary as “to defecate” and translated as “to shit”; βινέω (bineo) is no longer “inire, coire, of illicit intercourse”, but “fuck”; λαικάζω (laikazo), in the 19th-century dictionary translated as “to wench”, is now defined as “perform fellatio” and translated as “suck cocks”.
It’s fascinating to look at these ancient cultures and realize much of what we seen nowadays has indeed been sanitized. Views of sex in ancient times would appear to have been far more open/tolerant than what the Victorians -who did this earlier translation of the Greek language- were willing to accept and present to the public at large.
Even today there are examples -plentiful!- of art that is highly erotic which has been either held back or not presented to the public at large because of concerns regarding the subject matter.
Just doing a rudimentary Google search and putting in the line “Ancient Greek (or if you’re curious, Roman or Indian or Chinese or Japanese or Mayan, etc.) sex art” will certainly open your eyes when you look at images of artwork and statues depicting various sexual practices, some very much frowned upon today. Among the examples you may find are depictions or orgies, pedophilia, bestiality, homosexuality, and, of course, the more “vanilla” -yet sexually charged!- depictions of sex between a man and a woman.
Again, in these cases it was a very different time and some of these presented sexual practices, rightfully frowned upon today -especially when it comes to pedophilia and bestiality- weren’t viewed, one guesses, quite that way back then.
Regardless, it’s all there and at least to me its fascinating to look upon these ancient cultures as they actually were, in all their gleaming glory and, yes, extremely dark decadence, versus filtered through the veil of our more polite society.
May 27, 2021
Coronavirus Diaries 36
With Memorial Day just about upon us, it’s been announced that 50% of U.S. adults have now gotten the full vaccine for COVID-19. Further to that, vaccines are being now administered to children.
Then there’s this great news, from abcnews.go.com and written by Dr. Deepak Ramanathan:
COVID-19 infections are exceedingly rare after full vaccination: CDC
The upshot of the article is that studies have found that if you are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, the odds of you catching the virus is exceedingly rare. From the article:
The new CDC report shows that such breakthrough infections may occur in just 0.01% of all fully vaccinated people.
Not only are the odds very rare for catching COVID-19, those who do get it are likely to get far less scary symptoms.
The news is terrific and, as I’ve written many times ’round here: Go get vaccinated!
Yesterday I was talking with a few people I knew. One of them just got their second Pfizer shot and I noted that in a matter of two weeks he may not have to wear the mask as much as he has and that we can finally talk to each other without masks.
He stated that even with the full efficacy of the vaccine, he was still going to take things easy and wasn’t quite ready to give up the mask, even after two weeks.
I agreed with him.
Hell, I’ve had both vaccines for a while now and I continue to go to stores or any areas where there are larger groups of people with a mask on.
Another person we were talking to told me he has a Doctor who told him they were leery of the vaccine and, frankly, that set me off.
I. Just. Don’t. Get. It.
I can understand people who aren’t “professionals” in the medical field getting influenced by the bullshit you find the internet and/or questionable talk shows/”news” programs.
But to be a medical doctor and actually seeing clients -real flesh and blood human beings!- and professing skepticism about vaccines and the ways to keep one safe…
Just wow.
I noted a few days back that I had a similar experience, talking to someone in the medical field who also stated something similar and refused to vaccinate.
With stories like the above, I can’t help but shake my head.
Almost everyone has relied on medications at some point in their life. Whether it be to help with a cold or anti-biotics to deal with an infection, most of us don’t question their need in certain situations.
Reports like the one above show us the real world results of vaccination and, frankly, they’re incredibly encouraging. They point us directly toward the path to the end of this pandemic and yet…
…and yet there are still people out there who either refuse to vaccinate or seem to discount the seriousness of the virus.
Hopefully, news like this will start to turn minds.
If nothing else, its becoming crystal clear that with the rise of the vaccines we’ve seen a definite drop in COVID cases.
What more does one need to know?
May 26, 2021
The New 2021 Novel Update #3
Don’t have a ton to update at this moment yet, nonetheless, enough to warrant this post.
Basically I’m still at the novel’s first act, rewriting/revising the material as I’m going along.
What is very fascinating about going over something you’ve written already is that you start adding stuff to it and, often, it proves to be exactly what’s needed and probably should have been there to begin with.
I can’t get into details as that would be SPOILERY and, also, we’re so early into the writing of this book that even if I did state what I’ve come up with, its possible things might change in the later parts of the book and/or in a future draft.
Having said that, I’m very pleased with what I’m doing here.
I just hope I can get it done well before the end of the year and release it!
I’m genuinely excited about what its about and feel it works wonderfully with these bizarre times.
I’ll say no more!
May 22, 2021
Army of the Dead (2021) a (Right On Time!) Review… Now With Bonus Comments!
Have to say… I was looking forward to seeing this film.
While I’m one of those nut-cases that defended -and continue to defend- Zack Snyder’s Batman v Superman despite so many hate-hate-hating the film, I kinda loved it, especially in its Extended/Director’s Cut (truly, that version made the theatrical cut unnecessary).
Having said that, I’m not a Zack Snyder uber-fan. In total and before seeing the above film, I’ve seen a grand total of two of his films start to end: Dawn of the Dead and Batman v Superman. I’m well aware of his other films, including Man of Steel, the film that led to BvS, as well as the very recently released Zack Snyder’s Justice League, his version of the infamous film which has received quite good reviews. I intend to see that later film as soon as possible.
Regardless, I was a little more curious to see Army of the Dead and, voila!, that’s what I’ve done.
Army of the Dead, a Netflix exclusive film, was released yesterday and I wound up seeing it in two sittings. It is a long film and, frankly, with one hour of it left yesterday, my poor (increasingly) old body wasn’t up to catching the full thing as night was closing in and I was very tired.
Lest you think otherwise, though, I would have sat through the whole thing if I had the energy.
It was quite good!
Here’s the movie’s trailer:
Army of the Dead brings director Zack Snyder back to the “zombie” genre he had so much success with in his first feature film, the remake of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead.
I recall when word came out that he was remaking it people thought it sacrilege: How could anyone dare to remake what is probably the all time best zombie film ever made? (I know, I know… there are those who think Night of the Living Dead, George Romero’s first zombie film, is his best… I think it, along with Day of the Dead, are both incredibly good, but Dawn IMHO is his very best)
Incredibly, Zack Snyder and screenwriter James Gunn (yes, the very same James Gunn that would go on to make Guardians of the Galaxy and the upcoming Suicide Squad film) did the near impossible: Create a film that touches upon George Romero’s classic -at least with regard to the movie’s setting- yet goes down its own fascinating path.
And that opening sequence…!
Fast forward to yesterday and, as I said, Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead is released and once again we’re back to those darn zombies.
First though: Army of the Dead (let’s call it AotD from now on, ok?) is not a direct sequel to Snyder’s Dawn of the Dead.
While it does feature zombies, the cause of their appearance and the setting is vastly different from the end of the world scenario presented in Dawn of the Dead.
AotD’s plot goes like this: Las Vegas gets a zombie infection, is closed off (a la Escape From New York) and, maybe a few years later (or a little less), a very rich Japanese businessman approaches Scott Ward (, quite good) one of the “heroes” of the Las Vegas evacuation who helped save many others, including a VIP right as it was closing off, to “break into” Las Vegas (again, a la Escape From New York) to get to a vault in one of the city’s buildings and steal back some 200 million dollars in it. He stands to claim $50 million of it and split it however he wants with his crew.
Tempting though the offer is, Ward, who turns out to be suffering PTSD from the events of the evacuation of Las Vegas and has nightmares and visions, including the death of his wife, of that time, isn’t willing to say yes right away. Though he’s working in a greasy hamburger joint and is estranged from his daughter and could use the money, it takes him a full day to agree to the job and gets his old crew together for it.
But Ward is no amateur: He knows there’s more here than meets the eye and doesn’t trust his employer at all.
Among the old group he gets together are Maria Cruz (), Vanderhoe (), safecracker Dieter (), and helicopter pilot Marianne Peters (). But as the group is about to leave, they’re thrown a curve: the billionaire who hired them insists one of his security men, Martin (), accompany them.
Further complicating things a little later on is that Ward needs his estranged daughter, Kate’s () help to get them into Las Vegas because she’s a volunteer at a shelter just outside the city and that, in turns, leads them to Lilly the Coyote () who knows just how to do this but may not have the group’s best intentions in mind.
Each and every one of the actors are damn good in their respective roles and a further note should be made regarding the ingenuity of Zack Snyder with regard to Tig Notaro’s role.
For those unaware, the film was completely shot with comedian Chris D’Elia in the helicopter pilot role. However, after the filming was complete serious sexual misconduct accusations were leveled against Mr. D’Elia and Zack Snyder chose to scrub the comedian from the film. He was digitally replaced, in post production, with Tig Notaro (you can read more about that here).
While the end product isn’t completely seamless, it is damn close and Notaro’s interactions with the cast -which she never had!- work an incredible 99% of the time. In fact, there was only one occasion where I felt it was obvious she and the others weren’t acting against each other and that was the very first scene where Ward and Maria Cruz meet and recruit Notaro’s Marianne Peters. That was the one, and only scene, where it felt obvious their performances were pierced together.
Incredible end result, truly!
So the various characters eventually make their moves and more intrigue forces compromises -I won’t spoil everything!- to their group. Once they do make their entry into Las Vegas, the zombie plague they expected to find isn’t quite what many thought it would be and the zombies may not be completely brainless murderers after all.
AotD, to its great credit, doesn’t fully take itself seriously. There’s plenty of tongue in cheek elements and humorous interplay along with the serious -and at times gory- elements. The last hour/climax of the film, in particular, left me pretty breathless but that worked so well because the buildup made me care for what happened to the various characters in the end.
Still, there were little things here and there that annoyed me, particularly Mr. Snyder’s use of out of focus frames here and there. I know he gets a lot of grief for using too much slow motion -he really didn’t do so here- but this time around he seemed enamored with doing these hazy out of focus shots and, at times, they were perhaps a little too much.
The film is also quite long, clocking in at 2 and a half hours and maybe some might consider that a little too much. There’s a CODA as well that, for me, maybe was better left either on the cutting room floor or after the credits rather than in the film proper.
But that’s just me!
Regardless, if you’re in the mood for some good action/suspense and aren’t too burned out with the zombie genre, AotD is a perfect time killer.
Recommended.
POSTSCRIPT:
I’ve been intrigued to see the various comments from people regarding this film, mostly very negative.
Over on rottentomatoes.com, Army of the Dead is currently earning a very good 70% positive among critics and a 76% positive among audiences.
And yet… I see plenty of online posts in the various blogs and places I visit with people quite literally wondering why anyone would like the film.
One of the bigger criticisms I see involves the character of Martin who joins the team at the last minute and works for the billionaire who hired them originally. To everyone -including the members of the team- he clearly has an agenda of his own, and later in the film we find out that the money the billionaire claims to want to recover is not as important as getting the head/blood of one of the uber-zombies.
Later in the film he, along with the “Coyote”, capture the female uber-zombie and he decapitates her, taking her head with him at that point.
However, these people point out, early in the film they first encounter the female zombie and her companion, and he could have captured her then and taken off, leaving the others to get the money on their own.
I suppose… but…
This was early in the film and Martin had yet to have any interaction with the Coyote character and, like everyone else, wasn’t as sure of the so-called “lay of the land” within Las Vegas. Because of that, attacking her at that point might have resulted in a really big attack on them.
So, yes, I can see why he didn’t act at that point and it wasn’t such a huge plot hole to me as some feel it is.
Regardless, there are those who feel the film was terrible even without this particular issue. They feel the film was either too slow or too long. Both criticisms, IMHO, are certainly valid to these individuals. The film is 2 and 1/2 hours long and I can certainly see people becoming anxious for it to move along. For me, this too wasn’t such a big bother.
Another criticism is that the movie’s ending is too much of a downer, that (SPOILERS!!!!!) all these characters die out so quickly at the very end.
This I kinda don’t understand.
Zombie films, especially those by George Romero, tend to end on a very downbeat nature and with most of the main cast annihilated. Thus, people we’ve come to like generally tend to not make it to the end. Further, this is also a heist film, and if you’ve seen many of them, they don’t always follow the lighthearted pattern of an Ocean’s 11 (the original or remake). In fact, more often than not these films are about not only the heist, but the disintegration of the team after said heist. Often, characters are double crossed or captured and/or killed before they can spend their ill-gotten gains.
I’m talking about films like The Anderson Tapes or The Killing or The Brinks Job.
So, again, not much of an issue for me.
Elsewhere, I found it interesting when I interacted with someone over on i09.com and s/he noted that perhaps because we are dealing with a Zack Snyder film, there is a certain amount of baggage inherent in people’s reaction to it, not unlike they have a certain reaction to the works of J. J. Abrams or Michael Bay.
It seems to me this may be a valid issue, at least with some people’s reactions out there, but I doubt it has to do with the vast majority of the negative reviews I spotted.
Understand: To me, people’s opinions are just that. What may work for me may not for you and vice versa and therefore I take people’s criticisms at face value and try not to look beyond it at possible agendas that may -or may not!- be there.
Still, its intriguing how many people had a very negative reaction to what I thought was a decent action/suspense film!
Army of the Dead (2021) a (Right On Time!) Review
Have to say… I was looking forward to seeing this film.
While I’m one of those nut-cases that defended -and continue to defend- Zack Snyder’s Batman v Superman despite so many hate-hate-hating the film, I kinda loved it, especially in its Extended/Director’s Cut (truly, that version made the theatrical cut unnecessary).
Having said that, I’m not a Zack Snyder uber-fan. In total and before seeing the above film, I’ve seen a grand total of two of his films start to end: Dawn of the Dead and Batman v Superman. I’m well aware of his other films, including Man of Steel, the film that led to BvS, as well as the very recently released Zack Snyder’s Justice League, his version of the infamous film which has received quite good reviews. I intend to see that later film as soon as possible.
Regardless, I was a little more curious to see Army of the Dead and, voila!, that’s what I’ve done.
Army of the Dead, a Netflix exclusive film, was released yesterday and I wound up seeing it in two sittings. It is a long film and, frankly, with one hour of it left yesterday, my poor (increasingly) old body wasn’t up to catching the full thing as night was closing in and I was very tired.
Lest you think otherwise, though, I would have sat through the whole thing if I had the energy.
It was quite good!
Here’s the movie’s trailer:
Army of the Dead brings director Zack Snyder back to the “zombie” genre he had so much success with in his first feature film, the remake of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead.
I recall when word came out that he was remaking it people thought it sacrilege: How could anyone dare to remake what is probably the all time best zombie film ever made? (I know, I know… there are those who think Night of the Living Dead, George Romero’s first zombie film, is his best… I think it, along with Day of the Dead, are both incredibly good, but Dawn IMHO is his very best)
Incredibly, Zack Snyder and screenwriter James Gunn (yes, the very same James Gunn that would go on to make Guardians of the Galaxy and the upcoming Suicide Squad film) did the near impossible: Create a film that touches upon George Romero’s classic -at least with regard to the movie’s setting- yet goes down its own fascinating path.
And that opening sequence…!
Fast forward to yesterday and, as I said, Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead is released and once again we’re back to those darn zombies.
First though: Army of the Dead (let’s call it AotD from now on, ok?) is not a direct sequel to Snyder’s Dawn of the Dead.
While it does feature zombies, the cause of their appearance and the setting is vastly different from the end of the world scenario presented in Dawn of the Dead.
AotD’s plot goes like this: Las Vegas gets a zombie infection, is closed off (a la Escape From New York) and, maybe a few years later (or a little less), a very rich Japanese businessman approaches Scott Ward (, quite good) one of the “heroes” of the Las Vegas evacuation who helped save many others, including a VIP right as it was closing off, to “break into” Las Vegas (again, a la Escape From New York) to get to a vault in one of the city’s buildings and steal back some 200 million dollars in it. He stands to claim $50 million of it and split it however he wants with his crew.
Tempting though the offer is, Ward, who turns out to be suffering PTSD from the events of the evacuation of Las Vegas and has nightmares and visions, including the death of his wife, of that time, isn’t willing to say yes right away. Though he’s working in a greasy hamburger joint and is estranged from his daughter and could use the money, it takes him a full day to agree to the job and gets his old crew together for it.
But Ward is no amateur: He knows there’s more here than meets the eye and doesn’t trust his employer at all.
Among the old group he gets together are Maria Cruz (), Vanderhoe (), safecracker Dieter (), and helicopter pilot Marianne Peters (). But as the group is about to leave, they’re thrown a curve: the billionaire who hired them insists one of his security men, Martin (), accompany them.
Further complicating things a little later on is that Ward needs his estranged daughter, Kate’s () help to get them into Las Vegas because she’s a volunteer at a shelter just outside the city and that, in turns, leads them to Lilly the Coyote () who knows just how to do this but may not have the group’s best intentions in mind.
Each and every one of the actors are damn good in their respective roles and a further note should be made regarding the ingenuity of Zack Snyder with regard to Tig Notaro’s role.
For those unaware, the film was completely shot with comedian Chris D’Elia in the helicopter pilot role. However, after the filming was complete serious sexual misconduct accusations were leveled against Mr. D’Elia and Zack Snyder chose to scrub the comedian from the film. He was digitally replaced, in post production, with Tig Notaro (you can read more about that here).
While the end product isn’t completely seamless, it is damn close and Notaro’s interactions with the cast -which she never had!- work an incredible 99% of the time. In fact, there was only one occasion where I felt it was obvious she and the others weren’t acting against each other and that was the very first scene where Ward and Maria Cruz meet and recruit Notaro’s Marianne Peters. That was the one, and only scene, where it felt obvious their performances were pierced together.
Incredible end result, truly!
So the various characters eventually make their moves and more intrigue forces compromises -I won’t spoil everything!- to their group. Once they do make their entry into Las Vegas, the zombie plague they expected to find isn’t quite what many thought it would be and the zombies may not be completely brainless murderers after all.
AotD, to its great credit, doesn’t fully take itself seriously. There’s plenty of tongue in cheek elements and humorous interplay along with the serious -and at times gory- elements. The last hour/climax of the film, in particular, left me pretty breathless but that worked so well because the buildup made me care for what happened to the various characters in the end.
Still, there were little things here and there that annoyed me, particularly Mr. Snyder’s use of out of focus frames here and there. I know he gets a lot of grief for using too much slow motion -he really didn’t do so here- but this time around he seemed enamored with doing these hazy out of focus shots and, at times, they were perhaps a little too much.
The film is also quite long, clocking in at 2 and a half hours and maybe some might consider that a little too much. There’s a CODA as well that, for me, maybe was better left either on the cutting room floor or after the credits rather than in the film proper.
But that’s just me!
Regardless, if you’re in the mood for some good action/suspense and aren’t too burned out with the zombie genre, AotD is a perfect time killer.
Recommended.
