The following may contain *****SPOILERS***** for the following films: Doomsday, Into The Wild, Southland Tales
One of the oddest feelings in the life of a moviegoer is when you know a movie is awful, but you can’t help but love it anyway. This is what the term “guilty pleasure” refers to. However, I am a member of the camp that loathes that term; our motto is “IF YOU LIKE IT, LIKE IT, NO GUILT REQUIRED.” Please believe me when I say I love a lot of awful movies. Movies that even I will admit are just downright muck (still don’t feel guilty.) I like watching Bad Boys, Armageddon, and Troll 2, but there is no way in hell I’m going to say they’re “good.” However, I am one of those outcasts who also loves unjustly excommunicated films that no one ever gave a chance. I will not only defend the likes of Last Action Hero, but will go on the offensive and actually prove its merit as a genius satire of the 80s/90s action movie scene. Once again, no guilt consumes me at all. If anything, I take pride in defending such movies. This brings me to a few words on Doomsday.
It’s a bad movie. It moves at a silly-fast pace, the narrative is stuck together with watery chewing gum, and God only knows who the intended audience is supposed to be. The plot, as if it needed to be explained, revolves around a virus breaking out in Scotland which is sealed off from the rest of the planet. Years later, the government sends in a female version of Snake Plissken to find the cure for the virus, which she only has 48 hours to do until her team is left for dead. It’s a bad movie. Yet, I liked it. Though, my positive feelings toward the flick are not that of a normal nature. Doomsday is kind of writer/director Neil Marshall’s John Carpenter/George Miller fan film that just so happens to have made it into theaters. I don’t even know if I am comfortable calling it a homage or a satire, I much prefer the term “fan film” for this movie. The reason being that while watching it I felt the whole time like Marshall was just saying “hey, I worship Escape from NY and The Road Warrior! check out my version, dude!!!”
The similarities are so thick between Doomsday and those two films that honestly I don’t know why he did not just title it Mad Maxine Plissken Escapes from Glasgow. Our main heroine, Eden, starts out the movie with an eye patch for fuck’s sake, dressed nigh identical, to Kurt Russell’s Plissken. The villain, Sol, was an exact representation of the younger version of Vernon Wells’s character from The Road Warrior. There was even a character named “Carpenter.” Like I said above, who in the hell is the audience for this thing? I couldn’t imagine anyone that didn’t grow up on a firm diet of John Carpenter or George Miller’s MAX trilogy seeing this and not just passing it off as garbage. Hence, it’s completely a fan film, from the Escape from NY title font, to its awesome Carpenter-style-synth music, right down to the blatantly similar Mad Max car chase scene. It is simply like one hardcore 80’s sci-fi/horror action geek ejaculating all over the screen. A screen probably being viewed by people too young to recognize the warm globs of classic films oozing southbound.
Luckily for me, I, much like Neil Marshall, worship Mr. Carpenter and grew up on a solid diet of The Road Warrior. Thus, I just answered my own question. I am the audience. The problem with that being that fellow lovers of these old films could react in two ways: either like me, or in complete rage over someone ripping off material from older, better, classics. My mind never instantly jumped to the words “rip-off” and the only explanation is Neil Marshall’s track record. His werewolf movie Dog Soldiers is solid as hell, and The Descent was one of the coolest horror flicks I had seen in the past decade. Perhaps my love of his résumé gave me the positive spin I needed going into Doomsday, because without that I might have thought it was just hackneyed slop. Another theory that was boiling in my brain is that he was trying to do a Tarantino and take all the best parts of old films he loves and make a Frankenstein creation out of them and his own oeuvre. In this case, just change Quentin’s love of 70’s kung fu/exploitation schlock to Neil Marshall’s love of 80’s sci-fi/horror. Though, perhaps due to way too much direct homage and frenzied cliché camera work, he never quite makes Doomsday the Kill Bill triumph that I (and probably he) wish it was. As a fan film, it’s fucking genius. As a film, it’s just lukewarm poop. I am going to give Marshall the benefit of the doubt and say that he is fully aware of the film he has made and it’s place in the pantheon of homage, satires, and spoofs…also acknowledging that the classics he has intentionally aped from are much better then anything he could have ever hoped to accomplish with Doomsday. Viva La John Carpenter.
Into The Wild
It warms and chills my heart knowing this film is based on a true story. A masterful work, directed by Spiccoli himself, about a young student named Chris McCandless, who abandons all his money, family, and possessions so he can live in the wilderness. Some people would say it’s a journey to find himself, however I say it’s a journey to save himself from the lies he sees around him. Emile Hirsch does an amazing job here, playing Chris as a kid too smart for those in his life, but aware enough to know he hasn’t got it all figured out. Hence why he leaves the life that his parents, materialistic social nightmares caught in a loveless marriage, are trying to guide him toward. He packs up, gives all his money to charity and just disappears.
They make good note of the fact that he is on the rather intelligent side. He has the opportunity to succeed in the academic and business world, yet is obviously disgusted, or possibly more confused, by the shallow nature of it all. This is obvious from the get-go when he is almost insulted that his parents offer to buy him a new car so he doesn’t have to drive around in his old piece of junk. He reacts with outrage toward them for even suggesting it, not because he is spoiled, but because he sees no need to fix what isn’t broken, nor does he understand his parent’s, or society’s, obsession with aesthetics. He goes on a journey to the wilderness, heading for Alaska, meeting folk along the way, but ultimately on a one-way ticket to be alone with nothing but trees and sky to keep him company. He ends up shacking up in an abandon bus in the middle of nowhere, only to die alone from starvation.
Depressing? Yes. However, he learns the two truths about life. One, Society is nothing more then an illusion that dampens the mind and kills the soul. Two, sadly that (society) is the greatest resource for the one thing all of us need the most…other people. It’s a very long movie, very quiet, yet beautifully directed. Nothing is overly stylistic. Hell, even the simplistic title font (Arial?) is in keeping with McCandless’s entire lifestyle. I can honestly say that no movie in such a long time, perhaps with the exception of the ending of Clerks 2, has spoke to me on such a direct, agreeable level. This is a film for any one that is frustrated with those around them that don’t seem to get the fact that this is all just a big chunk of fabrications and falsities. It’s for people that look at a building and see a bunch of walls stuck together with nails, or a car as just a structured pile of metal, glass and rubber. It’s a film for anyone that questions from a young age if gold, diamonds, or money are actually worth something or is it just because we humans have place value on them. I realize that might be a little out there, but if you watch the movie you should get the gist of what I’m blabbering about. For a similar foray into the same type of material, try the Albert Brooks’ classic Lost In America, which is based on Easy Rider. It’s easier on length, it’s a comedy, and the ending isn’t as heart wrenching. Sean Penn has done a masterful job here. It succeeds as a film, a message, and most of all, a beautiful tribute to an interesting, clear-minded man.
Southland Tales
Wikipedia defines “glory hole” as
A glory hole (also spelled gloryhole and glory-hole) is a hole in a wall, or other partition, often between public lavoratory stalls or video booths for men to engage in sexual activity
A former co-worker once described to me why he loved David Lynch movies. I guess he felt as though he had to defend liking movies that made almost no sense to the common person. He said “Bob, if I walk into a public bathroom and see a glory hole, then proceed to stick my penis in the glory hole, then just wait and exist in that moment of wonderment where I either could get my dick sucked or get castrated…that is what it feels like to watch a Lynch film.” Odd as that statement may seem, I totally got what he was saying, and subsequently enjoyed Mulholland Dr. all the more because of it. I honestly love movies that are a labyrinth of storytelling, even when they go nowhere. I dug Richard Kelly’s Donnie Darko for that very reason. I guess what I’m saying is I love glory hole films. A lot of people don’t, which is understandable, but there’s some pleasure in being able to pen in your own meaning behind a movie. If you can go back and think of what it meant, it kind of makes you feel smarter then you know you are, or you’ve figured something out that no one else has. These movies have their audience, and their merit. Often, in the case of Lynch or Cronenberg, they are beautifully shot, edited, and if anything, encompass the total and complete vision of their masters. No studio heads trudging around stomping on all the wonderful weird that they loathe oh so much.
Writer/director Richard Kelly’s Southland Tales is most certainly a glory hole. The problem is that it’s so small that anyone who isn’t a newborn can’t use it. The narrative is such a destructive mess that I can barely even give you a synopsis of what happens. It’s about the end of the world, Buffy being a porn star, and two Stiflers being separated souls that come together as one and float an ice cream truck that belonged to Connor Macleod of the Clan Macleod. Oh yeah, and The Rock is in it and he does some vague stuff, and his hands shake a lot, and…yeah. It’s a complete mess. It has an amazingly diverse cast, comprised of comedic faces from the B-list of the past 20 years. You even get to see a dead serious, blonde, homicidal Jon Lovitz ask Cheri Oteri if she wants to fuck. Was it supposed to be funny? I wasn’t laughing. All I was doing was standing next to the bathroom stall repeatedly banging my tiny dick against the miniscule glory hole trying to figure out what the hell Kelly was thinking. The movie fails for me in that I have no interest in sitting through it again, I don’t feel the “want” to figure out what it all means, and I really don’t want to talk about it after this sentence.
Real quick, my top 5 extreme sport’s movies:
5. RAD (1986) – Such beautiful schlock. If BMX gets you hot, this movie is the center of the sun!
4. Side Out (1990) – I realize that there could be a strong debate on whether or not volley ball is an “extreme sport.” Either way, this movie SERVES up the action. What? You think of a better pun.
3. Thrashin’ (1986) – Planet Terror and No Country for Old Men have now made this Josh Brolin classic all the more relevant and fun to watch. Not until 300 did this showcasing of male abdominal muscles get surpassed in the confused homosexuality department. It’s so worth a watch if only for the music and the painfully extended skateboarding scenes that were obviously used as time filler.
2. Airborne (1993) – I legitimately love this movie. It introduced me to Seth Green and Jack Black. The end rollerblading race down the “devil’s backbone” is probably one of the greatest rollerblading achievements in film ever, and the greatest triumph in Elektra director Rob Bowman’s career! Yeah, I guess that really isn’t saying much.
1. Gleaming the Cube (1989) – The greatest skateboarding movie ever made. See Christian Slater ollie over an entire highway on his skateboard. See Tony Hawk drive a pizza truck. Seriously, this movie holds up after time. Great plot, great acting, and some serious 80’s spice really make it work. Also should be a contender for most befuddling tagline in film history: “All he cared about was Gleaming the Cube…until the night they killed his brother.”
That’s all for Column 3, thanks for reading and let me know of any great “extreme sports” movies that you would put on your list.
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March 26th, 2008 at 2:05 pm
Bob, I am shocked you left out Solarbabies. It is probably the best movie about a team of orphaned children the play roller hockey. Did I mention that this all occurs in the future when there is fascist goverment controlling the world’s dwindling water supply. Then all is saved when a young deaf boy finds a glowing orb named bodhi, that allows him to hear again then he loses it, then rescues it, and the glowing orb then sets the world’s water supply free for all. Not to mention that the Solarbabies, the futuristic roller hockey underdogs, beat the odds on favorite the Scorpions. And character names like Metron, rabbit, tug, darstar, greentree, terminack and Grock! How can this not be a fav!
It has Jason Patric, and Jami Gertz. It’s Money!
Keep up the posts, i’ll keep reading.
Chuck
March 26th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
While I agree it’s a good choice for the list, unfortunatley I’ve only ever seen the trailer for Solarbabies. However, with your reccomendation I might have to change that.
thanks Chuck.