Racing Stripes

Day 364 - 12/30/09 - Movie #364

BEFORE: Just two more movies until the end of Year One. Much progress has been made, but I still have miles to go before I sleep (usually in the middle of a bad film...) For now, it's back-to-back zebra films.

THE PLOT: An abandoned zebra grows up believing he is a racehorse, and, with the help of his barnyard friends and a teenage girl, sets out to achieve his dream of racing with thoroughbreds.

AFTER: Someday, this movie will be seen as important for starring Hayden Panettiere in-between her role on "Ally McBeal" and her role in "Heroes". Just as Elizabeth Taylor had "National Velvet", Hayden's got "Racing Stripes". If she goes on to bigger roles, this film could come back to haunt her...

This is an animated film cross-breeded with a sport film, it's only missing the cliche where an official holds a giant rule book and announces that, by gum, there's no rule that says a zebra CAN'T run in a horse race. Umm, yes there is, it's up there in rule 1 which defines the term "horse race". (funny, you never see lawyers involved in these disputes, which would slow the whole film down...)

Yes, Stripes is a zebra, a fact which the film chooses to remind us of about 50,000 times, as it's the main topic of every conversation between any two characters, or even just his internal monologue...just in case you forgot, or your eyes stop functioning halfway through the film. And we all know it's not the breed of animal, or the size of his legs, or the physical impossibility of beating a thoroughbred in a race - it's all about "heart", isn't it. Funny how the main character's opponent never has any "heart", right? I mean, that would make things difficult, if the other fella wanted to win just as much...

There are nods here to "Field of Dreams" - father builds a racetrack in a cornfield, despite working very hard plowing said field earlier in the film - and "Karate Kid" - training montage of doing manual labor as unlikely preparation for sporting event. Heck, throw in "Rocky IV" and any other sports film you care to name.

And I know it's a film for kids, but there's just too much comic relief - too much time devoted to a couple of rapping/singing flies (David Spade and Steve Harvey) and all the fecal jokes that come with them, and a pelican named Goose (Joe "Joey Pants" Pantoliano) whose main role is to dive-bomb people with his guano... A high ratio of comic relief suggests an attempt to distract from the main storyline.

Also starring Bruce Greenwood (JFK from "13 Days"), Wendie Malick, and character actor M. Emmet Walsh in live-action form, and the voices of Frankie Muniz (Stripes), Dustin Hoffman (as a horse), Whoopi Goldberg (goat), Jeff Foxworthy (rooster), Snoop Dogg (dog, ha-ha), Mandy Moore (horse), Michael Clarke Duncan (Clydesdale horse), and Fred Dalton Thompson (horse). All were pretty easy for me to identify, except Moore and Thompson - I admit I had to fast-forward to the end credits to identify him, it was really bugging me.

And my only personal connection to tonight's film was that Michael Rosenbaum (Lex Luthor from "Smallville") had a few lines as a horse named Ruffshod. I spoke with Michael briefly at the premiere of "Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith", as we were standing at the popcorn counter together. Not a great story, but I do enjoy speaking to celebs, even when they're incognito.

RATING: 4 out of 10 riding crops

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa

Day 363 - 12/29/09 - Movie #363

BEFORE: Perhaps it wasn't the best plan to watch those long WWII movies during the busy Christmas season, because now that I have some extra time, I'm watching these shorter animated features. Oh, well, I'm going to finish the year on track, and that's all that matters in the end.

THE PLOT: New York Zoo animals Alex the Lion, Marty the Zebra, Melman the Giraffe and Gloria the Hippo, still stranded on Madagascar, start to leave the island - but they land in the wilderness of Africa, where Alex meets the rest of his family.

AFTER: Jeez, has it already been 11 months since I watched "Madagascar"? In some ways, the year has flown by, but in other ways it's also felt very long indeed.

The first movie saw these four zoo animals making their way to the title island, and in the sequel they try to return to New York, but only make it as far as mainland Africa. Wouldn't you know, they crash-land right near the wildlife preserve where Alex (Ben Stiller) was born - hey, it's not like Africa is a giant continent or anything... They meet his father, Zuba (Bernie Mac), and his mom, Mom (Sherri Shepherd) and also his father's rival, Makunga (Alec Baldwin). I wish I knew enough about "The Lion King" to spot any parody references. (yeah, I know, it's on the list...)

The other zoo animals encounter difficulties fitting in as well - Marty the zebra (Chris Rock) finds out what it's like to be part of a herd for the first time, Melman the giraffe (David Schwimmer) becomes a sort of witch doctor to the other giraffes, and Gloria the hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith) explores the perils of dating a chubby chaser.

The other popular characters are back from the first film also, like the lemur king (Sacha Baron Cohen) and the penguins (who also have a spin-off TV show) but it seems like they're just given odd jobs to keep them busy while the main characters have their personal encounters, and also solve the mystery of the disappearing water hole. I will say that the plot is very tight - all of the major actions have repercussions which become important later, and everything that comes around goes around.

I don't know if they're planning another sequel or not (in addition to the Christmas special that aired earlier this month) but the plot's wide open for it. The jury's still out on whether zoos are "good" or "bad", according to this franchise, or whether animals should be left alone on the African plains. Both environments seem to have their pros and cons - basic needs are attended to in the zoo, plus the animals are stars there - but out in the wild, they're with their own kind and seem to "fit in" in a more social way. Instead of tackling these issues, this film would rather show a long slugfest between a Yiddish grandma on safari and a lion - not really sure what the take-away message is there...

But thank God these animated movies finally stopped listing "Production Babies" in the credits. No one at home cares that someone managed to work on an animated film AND reproduce at the same time...anyway, those kids are probably neglected since Daddy (or Mommy) spends so much time crunching pixels at the Disney or Dreamworks cartoon factory. If that seems mean-spirited, let me point out that I spent 3 years at film school and 5 years in the music-video trenches before I got my name in the credits of an animated feature, and all those kids do is get born - it's just not fair.

Also starring the voices of Andy Richter, Cedric the Entertainer, Harland Williams, and Fergie and Will.I.Am from the Black Eyed Peas. And one of the penguins is voiced by Chris Miller, director of "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs", who also used to be an intern at one of my jobs. So that's tonight's personal connection...(the animation community is like that, everyone seems to know everyone else)

RATING: 6 out of 10 parachutes

Kung Fu Panda

Day 362 - 12/28/09 - Movie #362

BEFORE: My personal connection to this film is that Ethan Reiff, one of its writers, used to live right above me in a condo in Park Slope, Brooklyn, before he moved out to L.A. - so I knew about this film years before it was released. Ethan also co-wrote the movies "Tales From the Crypt: Demon Knight" and "Bulletproof Monk", and the TV series "Brimstone" - so tonight he gets a shout-out from me.

THE PLOT: Po the Panda finds himself chosen as the Dragon Warrior despite the fact that he is obese and a complete novice at martial arts.

AFTER: Yay, Ethan! This was a really good one. Lots of action, and the voices were really well cast, especially Jack Black as Po the Panda. Dustin Hoffman was also great as Master Shifu, and so was Ian MacShane as Tai Lung, the snow leopard. Holy cats, that was Angelina Jolie as the Tigress, and Lucy Liu as the Viper? I recognized Seth Rogen (again?) as the Mantis and David Cross as the Crane, but didn't recognize Jackie Chan rounding out the Furious Five as the Monkey.

What I liked about this film was that it at first seemed very unlikely for a panda to learn martial arts, in fact it seemed like he was picked to be the Dragon Warrior at random, and a poor random choice at that. But then once his teacher found the proper way to motivate him (using food as a reward) he not only trained hard, he found a way to put his size and his innate panda skills to work for him. He retained his "panda-ness", and didn't have to conform the same rigid training method the other animals did.

And that's important, since the members of the Five all had different fighting skills - one wouldn't expect a monkey to fight like a tiger, or a snake to fight like a bird. And just because no one had ever seen "panda-style" kung fu before shouldn't mean that it is without merit or its proper place in the dojo.

If I had any complaint, it might be that the kung fu action was a little TOO slick, and overly complicated. Some fight sequences were so quick, it was sometimes hard to tell exactly what was going on. I guess when you're dealing with CGI warriors, you can literally make them do anything, without worrying about wires being seen, or actors getting hurt, or the laws of physics. The only limits on the fighting sequences were the imaginations of the animators, so why not go all out? I just would have preferred that they keep one foot (just one...) in the realm of reality so I could follow along.

So there's a great message (you know, for the kids) about following your dreams and having self-confidence, and succeeding in your own individual way, and the message doesn't get too preachy. I had an experience of my own today while giving a friend a tour of the animation studio where I work - and he was a little envious of my job, which is something I should think about when the daily grind gets me down. I've had some great opportunities, and I've taken advantage of them in my own way, and I should remember how lucky I've been, since there are other people who haven't had the same opportunities.

But still, what was the deal with the panda having a duck for a father? Obviously he's adopted, but the film never addressed this point. Will we be seeing Po's mysterious father in the sequel? The IMDB's synopsis for the sequel (due in 2011) says that Po will "discover the secrets of his mysterious origins". OK, we're cool...

RATING: 8 out of 10 dumplings

Horton Hears a Who!

Day 361 - 12/27/09 - Movie #361

BEFORE: Back in NYC, the holiday is over and so are my holiday movies - but I'll watch back-to-back Dr. Seuss (and Jim Carrey) movies, and end the year with a chain of animated films.

THE PLOT: Horton the Elephant struggles to protect a microscopic community from his neighbors who refuse to believe it exists.

AFTER: It's a little tough to get a handle on this one, since I remember it as a kids' story that took about 10 minutes to read (perfect for small kids and their short attention spans) so just like with the "Grinch" movie, it takes some doing to bump it up to a 90-minute film.

What starts as a somewhat silly film about a huge elephant and a tiny life-filled speck can also be seen as a commentary on the nature of the universe - hey, maybe we're all just floating on a speck, or maybe our earth is just an electron in a giant solar-system sized atom, which is a tiny piece on the toenail of some giant creature...wow, man, I'll have another hit of whatever Dr. Seuss was smoking...

But then there's sort of a commentary on religion, as the Mayor (voiced by Steve Carell), the only Who in Whoville that can hear Horton (Jim Carrey), has to get the rest of his community to believe in the giant elephant in the sky, even though they can't see or hear him. And if they do, then their world will be saved, but if not, then it's certain doom. You can draw your own parallels to Judeo-Christianity, or Islam, Scientology or whatever. And religion is a bit of an all-or-nothing proposition for me - if some part of it is bogus, then it's all bogus. Christmas is a fun time for me to engage in religious discussions with my parents - can you guess which side I'm on?

What makes God any more or less real than a giant invisible elephant, or Santa Claus, or a flying spaghetti monster? But I digress...

I suppose you could draw an analogy to science as well, since at one point people weren't aware of tiny things like germs or bacteria - and when some scientists figured it out, they had to convince people that maybe washing hands, sterilizing scalpels and wearing surgical masks were good ideas.

The point is, Horton believes in the Whos, and the Whos believe in him - but Horton's obsession with tiny, invisible lifeforms angers Ms. Kangaroo (Carol Burnett) who sends Vlad the Vulture (Will Arnett) to destroy this clover supposedly containing tiny lifeforms that she can't see or hear.

I would like to believe that there is something bigger (or smaller) than humanity in the universe - that somewhere, someone is in some kind of control (the "Daddy's driving" theory of religion) but I'm certainly not arrogant enough to say that I've got it all figured out, one way or the other. Why can't part of my belief system be in a higher power that I don't think I'm designed to understand? My god is funny like that - he doesn't want me to think I've got all figured out.

But I do admire a movie that raises a few questions...

Also starring the voices of Seth Rogen, Amy Poehler, Jonah Hill, Jaime Pressley, Charles Osgood, and Niecy Nash.

RATING: 7 out of 10 leaf-bugs

How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Day 360 - 12/26/09 - Movie 360

BEFORE: Another silly holiday movie that I don't want to carry into the New Year... Of course, I'm already familiar with the old animated TV special, which contains some of my favorite TV trivia. The original Grinch special was narrated by Boris Karloff (most famous for playing the Frankenstein Monster and appearing in other horror films) and the famous song "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" was sung by Thurl Ravenscroft, who also provided the voice for Tony the Tiger in all those old Kellogg's Frosted Flakes ads...

THE PLOT: The Grinch is a nasty creature who hates Christmas, and plots to steal it away from the citizens of Whoville.

AFTER: There's something that makes this version interesting, and it's not just Jim Carrey's mugging as the Grinch. In the old TV special, Whoville is portrayed as something of a perfect society, with perfect little Whos celebrating Christmas in a perfect little fashion. The live-action film takes a bit of a risk by showing that Whoville is overly commercialized and materialistic, plus not all of the Whos are perfect. There's a competition for who has the best Christmas light display, and the contestants undercut each other, and are jealous of each other's success -plus the mayor fixes the competition because he's got a crush on Martha Whovier (I suppose calling her Jackie Whovier would have been a little too on-the-nose?)

So the Whos seem to have lost the true meaning of Christmas, and the Grinch hates Christmas because of the way he was treated during Christmastime when he lived in Whoville - yes, the Grinch now has more of a back-story, probably because the filmmakers had almost two hours to fill, and had to stretch out a 5-minute children's book and a 30-minute TV special into the space provided.

Fortunately, a little girl named Cindy Lou questions the mores of society (atta girl!) and nominates the Grinch as the Whoville "Cheermaster", pointing out an obscure rule that says that the Cheermaster should be the person who needs Christmas spirit the most. This seems like a nod to "The Hunchback of Notre Dame", in which Quasimodo is nominated as the King of Fools, and the one person who lives outside of society is temporarily made part of it. And at first it seems to work, with the Grinch participating in holiday sack-races, egg-nog drinking contests, and so on.

However, the Mayor proposes to the Grinch's old love interest in the middle of the ceremonies, and that sets the Grinch off. All the progress is undone, and he's back to his old ways. This sub-plot leads back into the familiar scenario where the Grinch steals all the presents, decorations and holiday food, leaving the town bereft of Christmas cheer.

Or so it seems - when the Whos celebrate anyway, both the Grinch and the townspeople are reminded that true celebration and spirit comes from within, and that the outward trappings of the holiday are just window-dressing (so why is it such a big deal when he returns them?)

From my perspective, we didn't have the time this year to put up a decorated tree at my parent's house, and (much to the chagrin of my aunt) the holiday dinner wasn't perfect. But so what? Maybe you didn't get everything on your Christmas list, or were bombarded with holiday music, or your holiday wasn't everything you hoped it would be. If you spent some time with family and friends, I say you're ahead of the game.

Also starring Jeffrey Tambor, Christine Baranski, Bill Irwin, Molly Shannon, and Clint Howard. Personally, I thought the best actor in the whole film was the dog.

RATING: 5 out of 10 cans of hash

The Polar Express

Day 359 - 12/25/09 - Movie #359

BEFORE: Merry Christmas to all! We hit two family celebrations today - my mother's family (formal, full turkey dinner), followed by my father's family (more casual, cold cut sandwiches) - then back to my parents' house for dessert and coffee, and now a late movie. I never got around to watching this Christmas film before, but I really should have...

THE PLOT: On Christmas Eve, a doubting boy boards a magical train that's headed to the North Pole.

AFTER: From a technical standpoint, simply amazing. I work in the animation industry, and I can't even imagine the computing firepower that it took to make this film. I know that motion-capture is something of a short-cut, but even so, this probably took YEARS to develop, animate and process.

The one thing I remember people in the animation community talking about was the "dead-eye" effect, caused by these blank stares that the CGI human characters seem to have, which some people also interpreted as a lack of soul. I think this effect could have been lessened a great deal just by making the characters blink a little more often.

And while I'm dazzled by the technical wizardry of it all, I'm left wondering if it was a little TOO dazzling - there were at least three sequences in the film based on a "roller-coaster"-like series of up-and-down train tracks, or slides in Santa's workshop. But, I guess if you're going to create a whiz-bang trip to and through the North Pole, you might as well go all out.

The film plays off the average's child's attempt to reconcile the story of Santa Claus and his method of delivering presents all around the world at midnight on Christmas Eve with an awareness of geography and basic physics, which suggests that Santa Claus cannot possibly live in the North Pole, and travel at faster-than-light speeds in a flying sleigh. The unnamed central boy character has begun to doubt the existence of Santa, and that's when he is visited by the Polar Express, and offered a ride to the North Pole to see for himself what takes place there.

Magic is a wonderful concept for children, and a handy one for screenwriters as well. All issues of unlikeliness, impossibilies and continuity mistakes are negated - "How does the train stay on the tracks at such a high speed?" "How do the tracks travel over an icy lake?" "How can kids spend hours on a magic train, and then return home 5 minutes after they left?" Because it's a MAGIC train, that's how... After watching this movie, kids won't be asking how a fat Santa comes down a skinny chimney, because it won't seem so outlandish by comparison.

Starring Tom Hanks, Tom Hanks, and oh yeah, Tom Hanks. He plays at least 6 different roles in the film, some of which facially resemble him and sound like him. Similar tech is used in the version of "A Christmas Carol" that was released this year, with Jim Carrey playing most of the characters. But the few characters here that are NOT played by Tom Hanks are acted or voiced by Peter Scolari (Hanks' ex-co-star from "Bosom Buddies"), Michael Jeter and the prolific nerdy character actor Eddie Deezen.

And now I know where this Josh Groban Christmas song "Believe" originated. It's really caught on in the last 2 years on those Lite radio stations that switch over to Christmas music in December.

It's very entertaining, and certainly a thrill-ride. But another gripe is the overly-fantastical nature of it all, and in attempting to explain the existence of Santa Claus, the story seems to raise many more questions than it answers. But again, Magic of Christmas and all that....this is the time of year where NORAD pretends to track Santa's sleigh, and the local weathermen and TV bimbos play along. So we grant an exemption on reality for one day - for the KIDS, man...

RATING: 7 out of 10 gift tags

Jingle All the Way

Day 358 - 12/24/09 - Movie #358

BEFORE: It's early morning on Christmas Eve, and there's time for one more movie, before I pack for Massachusetts - we're driving up for Christmas at my parents' house. (Got to remember to pack a few DVDs...) I left this film out of my Schwarzenegger chain earlier this year, with tonight in mind, apparently.

THE PLOT: A harried father decides to dream the impossible dream, to get that year's hot toy for his son just before Christmas Day.

AFTER: Well, the whole movie takes place on Christmas Eve, so what could be more appropriate? I'm not expecting a great storyline, this is another one of those films that I don't want to carry over into the next calendar year, so I'm anxious to clear it off my list...

This movie shows just how far a parent is willing to sink to get his son the unobtainable toy - here it's an action figure named Turboman, but it could just as easily be a Cabbage Patch Kid, or a Tickle-Me-Elmo, or...geez, what is this year's hot toy? It's some kind of robot hamster, right? Boy, I'm out of touch. With a 1 year-old niece and nephew, I have to start thinking about this sort of thing.

Anyway, Arnold Schwarzenegger plays Howard Langston, a furniture dealer who doesn't spend much time with his son, but he's willing to lie, cheat, steal, and trample toy-store employees to get a Turboman figure - since he apparently doesn't possess the necessary skill to read his son a story, or toss a baseball back and forth. Really, when the kid says "I want this toy," what he means is, "I want YOU to get this for me," which is just an extension of "Love me, daddy." So under all the craziness and the silly stunts, there is something of a message, but the father just doesn't pick up on it.

Like "Christmas Vacation", the movie relies mostly on slapstick - Arnold punching out a reindeer should have been a career low. And like last night's film, it features a number of SNL veterans, like Phil Hartman, Jim Belushi, and (future SNL star) Chris Parnell. Also, like last night's film, I've met one of the stars in person - Jake Lloyd, who autographed an 8x10 photo of himself as Anakin Skywalker in "Star Wars: Episode I", which is hanging in my basement collection (70 Star Wars autographs and counting...)

Also starring Sinbad (as another father looking for the same toy) and Rita Wilson, with cameos from Robert Conrad, Martin Mull, Harvey Korman, Phil Morris (Jackie Childs from "Seinfeld") and Curtis "Booger" Armstrong. And was that wrestler "Big Show" as the giant Santa? Why, yes it was - very few people could tower over Schwarzenegger...

RATING: 5 out of 10 traffic tickets (Bad acting makes it a 4, but I'm adding one for having a mostly positive message - spend time with your kids, not money on toys)

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation

Day 357 - 12/23/09 - Movie #357

BEFORE: See, I told you we'd get there...Chevy Chase was my link to Christmas movies. Very appropriate since I just finished wrapping gifts last night, and my own vacation/time off starts this afternoon. (I love it when a plan comes together...)

THE PLOT: The Griswold family's plans for a big family Christmas predictably turn into a big disaster.

AFTER: Ah, slapstick! Last resort of desperate comedians everywhere. The lowest rung on the comedy ladder - which Clark Griswold is always either falling off of, or getting smacked in the face with... Plus there are Christmas trees that catch on fire, cats getting electrocuted, exploding sewers, dry holiday turkey, and a large number of breaking windows.

Then we have the many, many, continuity mistakes listed on the IMDB. Such as - how come one electocuted cat trips the house's circuit breaker, but the 25,000 Christmas lights on the roof doesn't? Or how come the grandparents arrive at the house in the week before Christmas, and watch the Macy's parade on TV, which takes place on Thanksgiving?

But you know what, I'm in a holiday mood, and this is the season of giving...I'm going to go easy on this one because they broke the "road trip" stereotypes of the other "Vacation" movies. I'm even going to ignore the fact that the Griswold kids get randomly older and younger in each film - Rusty was clearly a teen in the first film, seemed about 24 or 25 in "European Vacation", and in this one he's back to being a kid...

While I'm reminiscing about people I've met, I did have the pleasure of meeting Beverly D'Angelo a few years ago, she came in to a sound studio and recorded a voice for a character in one of my boss's animated features. She told some great stories... For that matter, I also sort-of met Johnny Galecki (Rusty) at a party at the Sundance Festival a year or two later...

Lots of great acting talent wasted here, though - Galecki and Juliette Lewis aren't given much to do as the Grisworld children, with appearances by E.G. Marshall, Diane Ladd, Doris Roberts and John Randolph as Clark and Ellen's parents, plus William Hickey, Mae Questel (her last movie role...), Brian Doyle-Murray, Sam McMurray, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus (getting attacked by a squirrel AND a dog in a slapstick two-fer...). Plus, what's a "Vacation" film without Randy Quaid? (I guess that would be "European Vacation"...)

Written and produced by John Hughes (aww...)

RATING: 5 out of 10 extension cords

Deal of the Century

Day 356 - 12/22/09 - Movie #356

BEFORE: Another Chevy Chase comedy, which will lead me into Christmas movies tomorrow... Most of the cable channels have given up on running new movies, at least until January 1, so this week is a great chance for me to lower the number of movies on my list and make some progress - oh, yeah, and celebrate Christmas and stuff.

THE PLOT: Arms dealers vie to sell the most expensive and highest tech weapons to a South American dictator.

AFTER: Wow, this one's even more outdated than "Spies Like Us". The U.S. selling arms to South America is just so 80's, man...

Chevy Chase plays Eddie Muntz, an arms dealer who doesn't seem to have any conscience at all - but depends on his partner, Ray, (Gregory Hines), who wants to get out of the arms business and become a preacher of some kind. Muntz meets Harold DeVoto (Wallace Shawn), another arms dealer who's trying to sell the Peacekeeper drone planes, and when this guy kills himself, Muntz takes over to try and make the sale (because that's how these things work, apparently...) with the help of DeVoto's widow (Sigourney Weaver).

I guess this was supposed to be a satire of the weapons industry, and the U.S. military-industrial complex, but it doesn't really go far enough. Yeah, so the dictators are corrupt, and the arms dealers are unscrupulous, and the military unloads its inferior technology to other countries - so freakin' what?

The funniest part in the whole film is watching Gregory Hines lose his cool after a traffic accident with another man who won't let it go - when the other man starts trashing Hines' car, he pulls out a flamethrower from the trunk and torches the other car...

But other than that, there's not much to discuss. The film hasn't really aged well, and Chase is essentially playing the same smug character he played in "Caddyshack", only less effectively.

RATING: 3 out of 10 bazookas

Spies Like Us

Day 355 - 12/21/09 - Movie #355

BEFORE: Speaking of soundtracks, one of the only things I know about this film is that Paul McCartney wrote an original song for it, if memory serves. It may seem weird to waste one of the last few movie slots of the year on a silly 80's spy comedy - but I'm going to re-organize and re-prioritize my list in January, assuming I continue the project, so it's just as well that I get this film off the list now.

THE PLOT: Two bumbling government employees think they are U.S. spies, only to discover that they are actually decoys for Nuclear War.

AFTER: I had the opportunity to meet the great John Landis, this film's director, at the San Diego Comic-Con this past July. He was extremely cool, and just as happy to meet my boss as we all were to meet him. Oddly enough, this film has cameos from two other living legends who I've met - stop-motion animator Ray Harryhausen and Monty Python alum Terry Gilliam...

I just wish the movie delivered on other fronts - yes, it's a variation on the old "Road to" buddy films of the silver screen (Bob Hope also makes a cameo here) - but Hope and Crosby never made "Road to Pakistan"...Anyway, it's like someone just forgot to make this comedy, you know, funny.

Dan Aykroyd and Chevy Chase play two wanna-be spies who are also total screw-ups - well, OK, Emmett Fitz-Hume (Chase) is the incompetent screw-up and Austin Millbarge (Aykroyd) is more of a bookworm nerd. But the point is, they're expendable, and they're sent to Pakistan and then the U.S.S.R. as decoys, so the real spies can get their mission done. The mission specs are on a need-to-know basis, and these guys don't even need to know. They just need to be visible, and incompetent.

The mission is apparently to set off a Soviet missile, so the U.S. can test their "Star Wars" missile defense systems, which are designed to shoot down the nuke. But since our heroes don't know this - they think the world's about to end, so they naturally all decide to get in one last roll in the hay, with Donna Dixon (who was and still is married to Aykroyd) and a cute Soviet (Vanessa Angel)

Also starring Bruce Davison and Frank Oz, with cameos by Sam Raimi, Joel Coen (co-director of "Burn After Reading"), and B.B. King.

RATING: 5 out of 10 launch codes

Pineapple Express

Day 354 - 12/20/09 - Movie #354

BEFORE: Similar to last night's movie, about regular people who get caught up in a mess of espionage (I think) - and James Franco was hosting SNL last night in an act of synchronicity (for me).

THE PLOT: A stoner and his dealer are forced to go on the run from the police after the pothead witnesses a cop commit a murder.

AFTER: OK, I was wrong. This has nothing to do with spies, I don't know what I was thinking...this is just about a couple of stoners who get caught up in a drug war.

It's one notch above "Harold & Kumar", I'll give it that, but in the end that's not saying much. I guess I don't find the antics of stoned people to be good enough fodder for a movie plot. I just kept cringing as these two morons kept getting into deeper and deeper trouble.

Seth Rogen plays Dale, a process server who accidentally watches a drug kingpin (Gary Cole) and a cop (Rosie Perez) waste a member of a rival cartel, and he gets traced (through a particular strain of weed) back to his drug dealer, Saul (James Franco). So they both have to go on the run - but since they're constantly stoned, they're always either panicking, acting irresponsibly, or smoking more weed to calm down.

They hook up with Saul's connection, Red (Danny McBride) and they're chased by two hitmen (Kevin Corrigan and Craig Robinson) but there's no plan, at least not a good one, for getting out of trouble, so the situation just keeps getting worse and worse. It's hard for me to find a point, or a message, or a reason for this all to be happening...

Cameos by Ed Begley, Jr., Nora Dunn, Joe LoTruglio (from "Reno 911" and "The State") and SNL's Bill Hader.

The story is really a "5" but I'm adding 1 point for the soundtrack - starting with "Electric Avenue", one of the best songs of the 80's (or any decade), and ending with an original song by Huey Lewis over the end credits. (whatever happened to Huey Lewis & the News, anyway?)

RATING: 6 out of 10 dimebags

Burn After Reading

Day 353 - 12/19/09 - Movie #353

BEFORE: Another one I've been looking forward to watching, being a big fan of other Coen Brothers movies like "Raising Arizona" and "Fargo".

THE PLOT: A disk containing the memoirs of a CIA agent ends up in the hands of two unscrupulous gym employees who attempt to sell it.

AFTER: I don't know, this is a tough one for me to judge, for some reason. It's definitely got echoes of those other Coen Bros. movies - with a small crime that spirals out of control, like ripples in a pond. Here there are a lot of minor sins, like marital infidelities, that seem to cause the maximum amount of confusion - everyone's cheating on everyone else at the same time.

John Malkovich is the standout as Osbourne Cox, the CIA agent who's got a crumbling marriage and a drinking problem - some of the best scenes are just Malkovich surprised by the idiocy of the other characters. It's no small feat that Malkovich can check his bank balance on the phone, and do it in a dramatic fashion. The mark of a true professional - drama is where you find it, kids.

Tilda Swinton plays his wife, who's thinking of divorcing him, so she makes a copy of their financial records, and the disk accidentally contains a draft of her husband's memoirs - when the disk gets lost, it's found by some gym employees, Linda and Chad. Linda (Frances McDormand) is an insecure serial internet-dater who wants to get money for some plastic surgery procedures, and Chad (Brad Pitt) is a muscle-headed gym trainer who sees spy conspiracies everywhere. The two set off on a course of blackmail and international espionage, but of course they're horrible at it, and things spiral out of control since they're no match for Malkovich (who is?)

Everyone in this wacky movie is connected - the agent's wife is sleeping with treasury agent Harry Pfarrer (George Clooney) who's also married, and uses internet dating sites, where he hooks up with Linda. And Richard Jenkins plays the gym manager, who worships Linda from afar, but is below her notice. Lots of coincidences abound, mistaken identities and wacky mishaps, so somehow the movie seems to be about everything and nothing at the same time.

There are lots of mysterious limos trailing everyone around, and a lot of times the movie seems to be shot from a distance, like from the point of view of a detective or an intelligence agent. And I was bothered by the fact that a lot of the action happens off-screen, as a pair of CIA men (David Rasche and J.K. Simmons) try to piece the whole mess together.

It's an entertaining-enough farce, which for me only edged into brilliance when Malkovich lost his cool...

RATING: 6 out of 10 lime wedges

Get Smart

Day 352 - 12/18/09 - Movie #352

BEFORE: Unlike last night, this is a movie that I've been looking forward to - because I was a fan of the 1960's TV show (OK, the syndicated repeats...) and I think Steve Carell is usually pretty funny.

THE PLOT: Maxwell Smart, Agent 86 for CONTROL, battles the forces of KAOS with the more-competent Agent 99 at his side.

AFTER: Clever move, making Maxwell Smart an intelligence analyst who becomes a rookie agent - not only does it reboot the franchise and show us his origin, it strikes the right note between him being well-trained, and a total screw-up. We want him to succeed, but we also want him to be funny - too far in one direction, and you've got James Bond, and too far in the other direction, he's Frank Drebbin from "Naked Gun". So here he's got lots of intelligence (the spy kind) but no real experience out in the field.

He's teamed with Agent 99 (Anne Hathaway) and they flirt cute as they crash a Russian arms dealer's party. Adam Arkin plays his boss, "Chief", and he also strikes a good balance between supportive and stuffy. By contrast, Terence Stamp takes over the role of Siegfried from Bernie Kopell (who also has a cameo) but Stamp doesn't really bring much to the table - not as much as Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson does as Agent 23.

Another WWE wrestler, The Great Khali, plays a villain here - also cameos by Bill Murray, Kevin Nealon, Larry Miller, Masi Oka from "Heroes", David Koechner, James Caan and also Ken Davitian, that guy who played Borat's friend. Also Patrick Warburton appears at the end as Hymie the robot, which suggests that a sequel is in the works - right, Hollywood? RIGHT?

RATING: 7 out of 10 laser beams

The Avengers

Day 351 - 12/17/09 - Movie #351

BEFORE: My movie year is winding down - it's 1 week until Christmas, and 2 weeks until New Year's Eve. Now that my heavy war films are over, I'm going to concentrate on comedic spy films, holiday films, and animated animals - so, really, I'm coasting to the end. All I have to do is wrap gifts and stay on track with the numbers. I'm not expecting much from this film, other than to serve as a link to other films coming up - I suppose this week's theme is "Spy movies based on 1960's TV shows".

THE PLOT: Two British agents (John Steed and Emma Peel) team up to stop Sir August De Wynter from destroying the world with a weather changing machine.

AFTER: There actually was some potential here - Uma Thurman, some tight catsuits and thigh-high boots, and lots of double-entendres about "undercover work" and "debriefings"...
Huh? Oh, the plot? (There's a plot?) Silly me, I got a bit sidetracked there. It's something to do with Sean Connery trying to control the weather...I think. It's all very stiff-upper-lip with a lot of silliness, and it's hard to tell whether Steed and Peel are flirting, or just being proper and a bit naughty at the same time.

Did I mention that Uma Thurman wears skin-tight leather suits? Wait, there are TWO Uma Thurmans, one good and one bad? Someone's been tapping into my brain's fantasies again to generate movie plots. But then there's the organization of villains, which requires its members to dress like giant Day-Glo Beanie Baby bears - you know, I don't even want to know why.

There's a nice shout-out to M.C. Escher, with a constantly descending staircase. (For you kids out there, M.C. Escher was a Dutch surrealist artist, not a rapper...) But I can't really find anything else redeeming about this film, except for the aforementioned Ms. Thurman. Talk about carrying a movie...

RATING: 3 out of 10 teacups

Mission: Impossible III

Day 350 - 12/16/09 - Movie #350

BEFORE: According to the DVD case, reviewer Jeffrey Lyons said this movie was "The best Mission: Impossible yet!" However, based on the first two films in the franchise, that doesn't seem so hard to accomplish.

THE PLOT: Ethan Hunt comes face to face with a dangerous and sadistic arms dealer while trying to keep his identity secret in order to protect his girlfriend.

AFTER: Looks like Jeffrey Lyons got it right - that was the best of the three films, partially because it was the most "realistic" while still maintaining the spirit of the first two. For example, they only pulled the latex mask "false face" trick once (OK, twice...) instead of the 4 or 5 times it was overused in the previous movie.

A lot of acting heft was added with the casting of Philip Seymour Hoffman as the film's villain - he worked much better in an action film than I would have expected. Hunt's botched capture of arms dealer Owen Davian (Hoffman) puts Hunt's fiancee (Michelle Monaghan) at risk - so the last part of the film is devoted to her kidnap and rescue. Plus there may be another mole high up in the IMF organization - damn, how does this keep happening?

Also starring Ving Rhames (again), Jonathan Rhys Myers, Billy Crudup, Laurence Fishburne, Keri Russell, and that Simon Pegg guy (who was so great in "Star Trek" and "Hot Fuzz") Some of the castings make more sense when you realize the film was directed by J.J. Abrams, who directed "Alias", "Felicity" (with Keri Russell) and the new "Star Trek" (with Simon Pegg).

For the most part, this is a back-to-basics spy film, with more emphasis on gunplay and wire stunts over fantasy tech devices (though there are a few) - but I've got to take a point off for not including the famous "this tape will self-destruct in 5 seconds" bit...I've also got a problem with any movie (or comic book, for that matter) that takes a scene from the end of the movie and plays it at the beginning, to show us the most exciting bit that's coming up later in the film. What it suggests to me is that the writer or director doesn't have much confidence in the opening scenes of his film, or can't come up with a good way to start the story. The problem is, we the audience then spend the whole movie knowing where things are going - to be fair though, in this case, there is a twist once we reach that point...

RATING: 6 out of 10 satellites

Mission: Impossible II

Day 349 - 12/15/09 - Movie #349

BEFORE: Despite last night's "Movie: Unwatchable", I'm willing to give the franchise a second chance.

THE PLOT: A secret agent is sent to Sydney, to find and destroy a genetically modified disease called "Chimera".

AFTER: This movie makes the mistake of opening with images of Tom Cruise rock-climbing, with no visible support ropes. To someone like me who's afraid of heights, nothing that comes after this could possibly be as nerve-wracking or thrill-inducing.

But most movies seem to function better with actual plots, so this time it's a super-flu virus (how timely, just 9 years before Swine Flu) called only by a code name. Ethan Hunt has to find out what it is, where it is, and how to stop it. To do this, he has to recruit a rogue ex-agent's ex-girlfriend to work on his team, joining Luther (Ving Rhames, carrying over from the last film) and...um, Australian guy. But Hunt makes the mistake of falling for the girl while recruiting her, so watching her seduce her ex is his own personal torture.

My main problem with this film is the overuse of latex masks and synthetic voice-changers as these sort of ultra-perfect disguises, which means that though you see Ethan Hunt/Tom Cruise on screen, it might actually be another character in disguise, or when you see another character, it might be Ethan Hunt... Of course, the disguise tech in the real world is nowhere near as good - so there are 4 or 5 of these "AHA!" moments when someone pulls off their fake face to reveal their identity, and it rings about as true as a lame episode of "Scooby-Doo". (Oh, look, it wasn't Bigfoot at all! It was just old man Jenkins!)

And once again, the climactic stunts (this time on motorcycles) are just way too far-fetched to be remotely believable. But at least the tech got a little better, with GPS locators and digital cameras...

Also starring Thandie Newton, Brendan Gleeson, Dougray Scott, Richard Roxburgh (who played Dracula in "Van Helsing") and William Mapother - who just happens to be the cousin of Tom Cruise (born Thomas Mapother). William has been on "Lost" and in the film "In the Bedroom", but he started out as Clint Howard to Tom's Ron, taking bit parts in many of his movies ("Born on the Fourth of July", "Magnolia", "Vanilla Sky", "Minority Report", etc.)

RATING: 5 out of 10 betting slips

Mission: Impossible

Day 348 - 12/14/09 - Movie #348

BEFORE: Well, it only took me 13 years to get around to this one - and as a bonus, back-to-back Jon Voight appearances!

THE PLOT: An American agent, under false suspicion of disloyalty, must discover and expose the real spy without the help of his organization.

AFTER: Jon Voight plays Jim Phelps, who was the lead agent on the TV show of the same name, formerly played by Peter Graves in those classic opening scenes where the tape would self-destruct. Without giving too much of this movie's plot away, it's carefully crafted to replace Phelps with his protege, Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) and to let everyone know that this isn't your father's spy story. The old TV show would famously feature a revolving-door cast of agents, that most often included a disguise expert (Martin Landau), a tech guy (Greg Morris), a muscle-man (Peter Lupus) and, um... the "woman" (Barbara Bain).

This movie starts out with a very similar group of agents - and the initial mission is to recover a stolen list of U.S. spies working in Europe and their code names. But it turns out the mission is a dodge, designed to root out a mole in the IMF, and the list was never in danger. Since Ethan Hunt survives the mission, he is thought to be the mole.

But here's where the movie lost me - to prove his innocence, Hunt assembles a new team of former agents to break into CIA headquarters and steal the REAL list - which he had falsely been accused of trying to steal. Huh? Wouldn't that make him guilty of doing the EXACT same thing that he knows he is innocent of? Doesn't that, in essence, make him the mole that he's accused of being? Isn't it, like, illegal to break into the CIA and steal something, even if you've got good intentions for using that thing?

You probably know the famous iconic scene with Cruise suspended from wires, trying to get the disc from the computer room - but the context around it, the reason for him being there, makes exactly zero sense. So I have to call "Shenanigans" on the movie after this point, especially the extremely improbably stunts and explosions in the climactic scenes, involving a high-speed train and a helio-copter.

You can tell the movie was made in 1996, because Hunt uses Usenet to contact the buyer who's interested in the list. USENET? Yeah, I just knew all those alt.sex rec.forums were fronts for terrorist groups and arms dealers...but was there really ever a user group devoted to the Bible's Book of Job? And not just one, but several, since Hunt spends all night sending random e-mails to the moderators of different Bible groups. Right... Apparently it was really tough to be an international man of mystery before they invented the World Wide Web.

Furthermore, if Hunt had no intention of letting the arms dealer transmit the coded list - why not just give up a disk with a bunch of random, real-looking names on it? Why risk everything by giving them a copy of the real, actual list and putting American spies' lives on the line? This is like the Valerie Plame scandal, only 100 times worse!

Supporting work by Emmanuelle Beart, Ving Rhames, Jean Reno, Kristin Scott Thomas, and Vanessa Redgrave. But why was Emilio Estevez, who played the tech expert in the film's first mission, completely left out of the credits?

RATING: 4 out of 10 floppy disks

Enemy of the State

Day 347 - 12/13/09 - Movie #347

BEFORE: Alex, I'll take spy movies for $400...

THE PLOT: A lawyer becomes a target by a corrupt politician and his NSA goons when he accidentally receives key evidence to a serious politically motivated crime.

AFTER: Will Smith plays Robert Dean, a well-intentioned lawyer whose friend accidentally records the murder of a U.S. senator by shady government forces, led by a guy named Reynolds (Jon Voight). Dean's friend (Jason Lee) slips him the disk while being pursued by government agents, and then he himself becomes a target of NSA surveillance, framed for adultery, shot at, and pretty much put through the wringer until he surrenders the evidence. He hooks up with "Brill", (Gene Hackman), who's an ex-NSA man himself, and together they try to clear his name and monkey with the government agents.

What's most amazing is the fact that this movie was made before 9/11, before the Patriot Act, and before President Cheney was even in office - so it's pretty uncanny to see that someone predicted government wiretapping, phone surveillance, and all the trampling of the little guy's rights that came along with it...

There's a lot of cool technology in play, like satellites and hidden cameras, and cel phone recording, and I wish I could say that it all adds up to a coherent whole, but I'm just not sure that it does. Similarly, there are a lot of cool actors who play bit parts in the NSA unit, like Jake Busey, Seth Green, Jack Black, Barry Pepper, Jamie Kennedy and Ian Hart - and I think that if they had cut down on the number of actors, maybe combined a few roles to make one "tech expert", this might have worked better. Does it really take TWO cool slacker guys to tell us what the satellite camera can see, each time it gets used?

I've got a few other nits to pick, too. There are 100 senators, so if the surveillance bill isn't likely to pass, does that mean that killing ONE senator is going to make a difference? What are you going to do, keep killing senators until you get 51 of them to will support your bill? And then there's the climax of the film, where Dean decides that it's a good idea to put the NSA men who want to kill him in the same room with the mob bigwig who wants to kill him, and just sort of hope that a wacky misunderstanding between them will save his behind... And what was your back-up plan if that didn't work?

Also with cameos from Jason Robards, Gabriel Byrne, Tom Sizemore, James LeGros, Dan Butler and Philip Baker Hall. That's a lot of talent wasted in tiny roles for one film...

RATING: 5 out of 10 smoke detectors

Traitor

Day 346 - 12/12/09 - Movie 346

BEFORE: Let's stick with the theme of international intrigue...

THE PLOT: When straight arrow FBI agent Roy Clayton heads up the investigation into a dangerous international conspiracy, all clues seem to lead back to former U.S. Special Operations officer, Samir Horn.

AFTER: Don Cheadle plays Samir Horn, who's a former U.S. citizen working for Arab terrorists (or is he?) in planning bomb attacks on U.S. embassies, and then a large-scale operation in the U.S. He's being pursued by FBI agents (Guy Pearce and Neal McDonough) and seems to also have contact with a CIA agent (Jeff Daniels). So who is he really working for, and what is his ultimate goal?

Since the whole movie hinges on this fact, I won't be divulging it here. But this was an OK, just-twisty-enough thriller, with an interesting take on the nature of terrorism, and the lengths that some people will go to in order to carry it out, and to try to stop it.

However, it encountered some of the same problems as "Munich" - without giving anything away, I'll just state my opinion that if you're one of the "good guys" conducting an operation, and you're wondering if the operation has gone too far, there's a simple test. When one innocent bystander dies, that's a sign to pull the plug. If you don't, then there is no difference between you and the actual terrorists...

RATING: 5 out of 10 suspicious briefcases

Munich

Day 345 - 12/11/09 - Movie #345

BEFORE: That's it for WWII films, but as long as I'm in Europe, I'll watch this film about the killing of athletes at the 1972 Olympics, and the aftermath - and I'm sort of bookmarking the week with Spielberg films...

THE PLOT: Based on the true story of the Black September aftermath, about the five men chosen to eliminate the ones responsible for that fateful day.

AFTER: I don't know, I wasn't really feeling this one. I don't know if I've become desensitized to war and violence, or I'm burned out on movies, or if my mind is just pre-occupied with my lack of progress on buying Christmas presents.

To believe in this film, I think you first need to believe that two wrongs make a right, and I'm just not sure that I do. Yes, it was terrible that Arab terrorists killed Jewish athletes at the Munich Olympics. It was a horrible, terrible, dreadful act. But I'm not convinced that the proper response is for the Israeli government to hire a squad of hitmen to track down the perpetrators and the planners of the attack, and gun them down or blow them up.

How do you condemn one act, but condone the other? At some point, shouldn't the members of the hit squad realize that they have become EXACTLY the type of people that they are trying to destroy? Maybe when innocent people start getting caught in the crossfire?

At one point, the members of the Israeli hit squad are holed up in a safehouse, and another team of professionals shows up, accidentally booked into the same safehouse - so after the Israeli squad pretends to be a German squad, they decide to share the safehouse for the night. The leader of the Israeli squad (Eric Bana) has a political discussion with the leader of the Arabic squad - and of course they disagree. But HOW do you proceed with killing people after you've shared space and had ideological debates?

Then again, I suppose we've all had roommates at one time or another who we would be happy to assassinate...

It was interesting to see a pre-James Bond Daniel Craig as a member of the squad, and it was interesting to see the role of the clean-up man, the man who swings by after each assassination and makes sure there are no stray cartridges or other evidence. Makes sense, as the gunmen are probably too frantic to think clearly at that point.

But other than that, I didn't find much here that I could really agree with.

RATING: 4 out of 10 detonators

Everything Is Illuminated

Day 344 - 12/10/09 - Movie #344

BEFORE: Three weeks left in the year, and I should be on the interwebs, ordering Christmas gifts - but instead I'm wrapping up my World War II themed movies with this one. We move from Poland to the Ukraine, where a man is searching for information about his late grandfather.

THE PLOT: A young Jewish American man endeavors to find the woman who saved his grandfather during World War II in a Ukrainian village, that was ultimately razed by the Nazis, with the help of a local who speaks broken English.

AFTER: Once in a while, not often, I come across a movie that really surprises me, that exceeds my expectations, like "Darjeeling Limited". This is another great example of a little uncut gem of a movie, one that I might never have watched - if not for my list.

It's funny that I was writing about my grandfather last night, because this film is all about grandfathers, and our connections (or lack thereof) to them. The title refers to how "everything is illuminated" by the past, by our experiences and the stories of our parents and grandparents. How many people can't name the town(s) where their grandparents were born? How many people have lost that connection, part of their history, because of war, or time, or lack of interest?

This is based on a novel by Jonathan Safran Foer, and adapted and directed by the actor Liev Schreiber, who did a helluva job. Elijah Wood plays a young writer (also named Jonathan Safran Foer) who has an odd habit of collecting things in small Ziploc bags, and hanging them on a wall next to portraits of family members. Being a collector of sorts myself, I can get behind this guy... But after the death of his grandmother, he realizes that there's a big gap in his collection, relating to the story of his grandfather, Safran, and how he escaped the persecution of Jews in World War II.

So he hires a travel guide to take him to the location of his grandfather's village in the Ukraine - but gets stuck with the guide's teenage son and elderly father driving him around, looking for a village that no one seems to remember. The young guide, Alex, is a tall, lanky wigger who likes wearing chains and dressing like an American rapper - like Vanilla Ice, talking like Borat. And the grandfather is a cantankerous sort who claims to be blind (he isn't) and has a "seeing-eye bitch" dog named Sammy Davis Jr., Jr. who is "mentally deranged".

Jonathan is seen as a very unusual person - not just because of his huge Coke-bottle glasses, but also his lost puppy-dog demeanor, his vegetarianism, and his odd habit of saving things in little baggies. I sort of went through this myself, when I went to Germany on a high-school exchange trip. I looked up some of my grandmother's relatives, and sat in a cafe and spoke with them for a few hours. When my great-aunt learned that I couldn't swim, this baffled her - she was threatening to buy me a swimsuit and throw me into the Rhine river so I'd learn to swim...

What starts out as a lost-cause road trip turns into a journey of self-discovery for all three men. Saying what they find along the way, and how it affects them, would give away the plot - but they all manage to connect with their heritage in very profound ways. I get the feeling that if I were to watch the film again, I'd notice all kinds of symbolism that I didn't see before - like the grandfather's "blindness" meaning that he is blind to his own cultural heritage, and that's just one example...

It's also a "fish-out-of-water" story that highlights the cultural differences between Old World Europe and today's America. But as Jonathan and Alex spend time together, naturally their similarities are highlighted and their differences are minimized. When Jonathan returns to the U.S., he sees people in the airport who look EXACTLY like some of the people he met in the Ukraine. This is no "Wizard of Oz" hey-I-guess-it-was-all-a-dream moment, it's more of a symbolic realization that people are basically the same wherever you go - as well as a sign that his journey to Europe has caused him to look at the world in a different way.

Yes, it's the places that we go, and the people that we meet along the way, that help us define our story. But we should never forget that it's the stories of our parents and grandparents that determined where our own stories started.

RATING: 8 out of 10 packs of Marlboro cigarettes (very premium!)

To Be or Not To Be (1942)

Day 343 - 12/9/09 - Movie #343

BEFORE: I've seen the remake by Mel Brooks - damn, that would have been a great way to follow "1941" since both films starred Tim Matheson. But this is the original 1942 version starring Jack Benny, Carole Lombard, and Robert Stack (AHA! There's my connection, since Stack was also in "1941")

THE PLOT: During the Nazi occupation of Poland, an acting troupe becomes embroiled in a Polish soldier's efforts to track down a German spy.

AFTER: Once again, I've made the mistake (?) of watching a remade film before the original - what can I say, I'm a product of my times...for me, the definitive version of "King Kong" will always be the one with Jeff Bridges, Jessica Lange and Charles Grodin, where Kong climbs the World Trade Center instead of the Empire State Building.

Jack Benny is more subdued than Mel Brooks, though he has great reaction takes - he's like a fine-point pen to Brook's giant paint roller. The plot is essentially the same, and the funny lines are the same ("So they call me Concentration Camp Ehrhardt, eh?") but in the original film, the acting couple's names are Josef and Maria Tura, and one of the actors in their troupe is named Bronski. In the remake, Mel Brooks changed the couple's names to Frederick and Anna Bronski - realizing, of course, that Bronski is a much funnier name...

Plus there's Prof. Siletsky, Lt. Sobinksy and so on - it's like that bit in "Miracle at Morgan's Creek" where the girl can only remember that the soldier's name was "Ratzky-Watkzy". Comedy lesson for the day - words with "K" sounds in them are funny, kids.

I'm amazed that they got away with making fun of Nazis the way they did in this film - this was 2 decades before "The Producers", even. The Germans are portrayed here as a bunch of bumbling, easily fooled yes-men. Why, because that's funny too - but this was made in 1942, right in the middle of the war - so does it count as comedy, or propaganda?

And that's THREE films this week set in Poland at the start of WWII - for those of you scoring at home...which reminds me that I did dedicate this year's efforts to my grandfather, who was of Polish descent (but his parents left long before WWII).

RATING: 4 out of 10 parachutes

1941

DAY 342 - 12/8/09 - Movie #342

BEFORE: And this comedy, which is set in the days just AFTER Pearl Harbor. Makes sense, right? I do have my fun...

THE PLOT: Hysterical Californians prepare for a Japanese invasion in the days after Pearl Harbor.

AFTER: By all rights, this movie should have worked, should have been hilarious. You take a comic situation, like college, or a sports team, or in this case the confusion and panic in the early days of WWII - cast a bunch of great comic actors like John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, John Candy and so on, plus some stuck-up straight men like Robert Stack and Christopher Lee to play generals, throw in the nostalgia of swing bands and dance contests, and let the fun begin. Hey, it worked for "Animal House" and "Stripes", right?

The problem here is that the whole film devolves into slapstick, which ends up being one of the lowest forms of entertainment. Tanks run over cars, dance-hall riots spill into the street, gas stations blow up - and there's very little rhyme or reason to it all. And someone forgot to make it funny.

Tim Matheson and Nancy Allen have a bit where they're trying to join the mile-high club in a borrowed plane, and John Belushi's crazy pilot, Capt. Wild Bill Kelso, mistakes them for a Japanese fighter. And he tries to shoot them down, over a crowded city full of people. Again, where's the funny part? And why can't anybody do anything without screaming?

This movie got bad critical reviews when it was first released, then got a little more respect over time - but I think maybe the first reactions were right.

Also featuring Ned Beatty, Treat Williams, Warren Oates (Sgt. Hulka from "Stripes"), Joe Flaherty, Wendie Jo Sperber, Lionel Stander (Max from "Hart to Hart") and Eddie Deezen (best known as the nerdy guy in "Wargames" and many other 80's movies...).

RATING: 2 out of 10 torpedoes

From Here to Eternity

Day 341 - 12/7/09 - Movie #341

BEFORE: See, there IS a method to my madness. Today is Pearl Harbor Day (a day which will live in infamy...) and I've already seen the movie "Pearl Harbor" - so I'll watch this classic film, set in Hawaii in the months leading up to the 1941 attack. One of the premium movie channels is running this film today also - so I guess great minds think alike.

THE PLOT: In 1941 Hawaii, a private is cruelly punished for not boxing on his unit's team, while his captain's wife and second in command are falling in love.

AFTER: See, now Pearl Harbor makes sense - the company captain was so busy putting his boxing team together, that nobody was watching out for those Japanese planes...

All I really knew about this film was that Frank Sinatra won a Best Supporting Oscar for it, and of course that infamous beach scene with Burt Lancaster and Deborah Karr kissing in the surf. But now I have a context around those two things...

Montgomery Clift stars as Private Prewitt, who's been transferred to a new base since they're in need of a middleweight boxer - but he refuses to fight since injuring an opponent months ago. So the officers set out to make his life miserable with extra drills and duties until he agrees to box. Meanwhile, Sgt. Warden (Burt Lancaster) begins an affair with the company commander's wife, leading to that famous beach scene. And Pvt. Maggio (Sinatra) has some barroom altercations with the sergeant who runs the stockade - gee, I hope that doesn't come back to haunt him later on...

It's funny to see the double-standard in the 1940's - a military man having an affair is acceptable, but if his wife has the affair - it's a scandal. It's also funny how unimportant everything else is once those planes come over the horizon.

There's a moment in the film where Burt Lancaster is on a phone call, and leans against the wall, which contains a large calendar showing the date December 6, 1941. This is the equivalent of showing a desperate person racing for an ocean liner - and pulling back to reveal that the ship is the Titanic...

Another moment that struck me was when a munitions officer wouldn't dispense any ammunition without a signed order from the company commander - even though Japanese planes were strafing the base. This is a great metaphor for the film's blanket question - what makes a good soldier? Is it blind obedience to regulations and one's superiors, or could there be a better way to measure it?

Co-starring Ernest Borgnine (a real Navy vet, and I don't mean "McHale's Navy"), a young(ish) Jack Warden, and Claude Akins.

RATING: 6 out of 10 Hawaiian shirts

The Pianist

Day 340 - 12/6/09 - Movie #340

BEFORE: Last night's movie, as I mentioned, was over 3 hours long. Yes, it's an important story, but how about a little editing? You know, tighten it up...but I guess that's what my weekends are for. Tonight's film is a slightly more reasonable 2 1/2 hours.

THE PLOT: A Polish Jewish musician struggles to survive the destruction of the Warsaw ghetto of World War II.

AFTER: I admit I had this movie pegged wrong, I thought it was a concentration camp movie - but it's about Wladyslaw Spizlman (Adrien Brody) doing everything possible to AVOID being sent to a camp, after his entire family is sent to one.

There are a lot of similarities to last night's film, with Jews being first confined to a Polish ghetto, then shipped off as the Nazis build labor camps. But this is a tale of one man's survival, first in the ghetto, and then living in secret in various abandoned apartments around Warsaw. He becomes something of an eyewitness to history, watching from his window as the city is bombed, set afire, and eventually taken by the Russian army.

Various members of the resistance set him up in apartments, where he is locked in for weeks at a time, and unable to leave to get food or medical help. Irony comes when he learns that one of his safehouses has a piano, but he is told that he must not play it, for fear of being discovered.

REAL irony comes when you realize this film was directed by Roman Polanski, currently living under house arrest in Switzerland...

Another very powerful movie, one that I thinked worked better than "Schindler's List", because it found a way to narrow the focus down to one man's struggle to survive, from which we can extrapolate. The character's hunger, isolation and desperation really come across.

RATING: 8 out of 10 sacks of potatoes

Schindler's List

Day 339 - 12/5/09 - Movie #339

BEFORE: Let's take a minute to talk about lists - right now my life revolves around them, between a Christmas card list, gift list, and the list of over 400 movies that dominates my late nights. I'm also trying to catch up on the first season of "My Name Is Earl", since I didn't start watching that show until late in Season 1. I want to give a shout-out to this great sitcom that was cancelled last season (prematurely, if you ask me...). If you've never seen it, Jason Lee plays Earl Hickey, who learns about the concept of karma after winning the lottery, then getting hit by a car and losing his ticket. He makes a list of all the bad things he's done to people over the years, then sets out to find them and make amends as a way of improving his life. It was a madcap, often juvenile sitcom set in a town of rednecks somewhere in Middle America, but every episode had a life lesson that made me smile, as Earl (and his brother Randy and ex-wife Joy) learned that doing good deeds would bring good things his way. It's in syndication now, so check your DVRs and catch it if you can. Now, on with the countdown.

THE PLOT: Oskar Schindler uses Jews to start a factory in Poland during the war. He witnesses the horrors endured by the Jews, and starts to save them.

AFTER: Unquestionably a powerful film, and until now perhaps the most egregious omission on the list of films I'd seen. I've got no quips or jokes tonight - I'm inclined to just assign a rating and move on...

But thinking about the concept of karma, and how it applies here... Oskar Schindler was a German businessman who started a factory, and initially he was interested in the Jews from the Krakow ghetto as a source of cheap labor. His initial efforts to save Jews were done as a way of protecting his business, but the movie suggests that over time his motivation changed to a purely humanitarian one.

Well, he did make a fortune, but between the bribes to German officials, administrative costs, wining and dining his mistresses, and (one assumes) all that list-making, he was out of money by the time the war ended. But then, not all fortunes are measured in money.

Despite saving 1,100 lives from the concentration camps, Schindler was distraught that he didn't do enough. Yet the numbers quoted at the end of the film tell the tale - at the date of the film's release, there were about 4,000 Jews living in Poland, while those rescued by Schindler and their descendants numbered over 6,000.

If I have any complaints, they revolve around the length of the film, which clocks in at about 3 hours and 15 minutes. A large number of German atrocities are depicted, and instead of focusing on one man or a small group, the movie seems to want to tell the tales of thousands, which would be overly ambitious regardless of the subject matter. I have no doubt that the holocaust was a terrible, terrible time, and I'm left wondering at what point its depiction becomes overkill.

Starring Liam Neeson, Ben Kingsley, Ralph Fiennes and a cast of thousands...

RATING: 7 out of 10 bottles of cognac

To Have and Have Not

Day 338 - 12/4/09 - Movie #338

BEFORE: It's December, and you'd think I'd be watching holiday movies or light comedy films - but instead I'm wrapping up my political films and starting a chain of films about World War II. Then I'll move on to films about spies and secret agents. Would you believe me if I said that I've got a way to (eventually) connect to some Christmas films? Just trust me, I'll get there...

Tonight I move from Cuba to Martinique, and from 1962 to 1940 for this Bogart/Bacall WWII film.

THE PLOT: Harry Morgan and his alcoholic sidekick, Eddie, are based on the island of Martinique and crew a boat available for hire. However, since the second world war is happening around them business is not what it could be.

AFTER: My dislike for Humphrey Bore-gart continues. Though he does manage to smile a few times in this film, and the romantic tension between him and Bacall is icy-hot, I still don't understand how a man with so little emotional expression became regarded as a fine actor.

Walter Brennan, most famous for playing old, drunk cowboys, goes outside his comfort zone in this film and plays an old, drunk sailor. Bit of a stretch. Lauren Bacall (last seen by me in "My Fellow Americans"), much like Bogart, maintains one facial expression for the entire film - but at least it's a smoldering one. She sings a couple numbers with the Hoagy Carmichael Band (nice get for a little Caribbean club!) and her voice seems to come from another dimension - it's beyond sultry and smoky, there's just something odd about it. Those of us who watch American Idol regularly would call it "affected", at best. She sort of reminds me of Kathleen Turner - it's a rare woman who can sing in the baritone range...

The similarities to "Casablanca" are quite noticeable - a nightclub during WWII, a smokin' dame, and Dan Seymour, playing sort of a combination of Sydney Greenstreet and Claude Rains's characters from that other Bogart film...

This film is probably most famous for Bacall's "You know how to whistle, don't you?" line - which was probably scandalous at the time. But I never really understood it. Without getting vulgar, what's so sexy about saying "You just put your lips together...and blow"? I mean, yeah, it's got the words "lips" and "blow" in it...heh heh...but on a practical level, it just doesn't make sense. These days, we hear things ten times more suggestive on sit-coms. Bacall's line is just begging to be followed by a "That's what SHE said!"

The film ends rather abruptly - we see Capt. Morgan (Bogart) aid the French resistance by picking up a couple of passengers, but there's a larger mission to rescue someone from Devil's Island, and that we never get to see. What happened, did the camera run out of film or something? Or did the studio run out of money? Actually the film doesn't really end, it just sort of...stops. "To have not" a plot resolution, I guess...

RATING: 4 out of 10 searchlights

Thirteen Days

Day 337 - 12/3/09 - Movie #337

BEFORE: From Nixon we move to JFK, and from Watergate to the Cuban Missile Crisis, another historical event that I feel I don't know very much about.

THE PLOT: The film is set during the two-week Cuban missile crisis in October of 1962, and it centers on how President John F. Kennedy, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, and others handled the explosive situation.

AFTER: Hmm, a peacable president who inherited a situation with a small radical country, and who has to figure out how to deal with hidden weapons of mass destruction. I bring this up for no particular reason, or connection to this week's speech by President Obama...

By all accounts, this is a tense, gripping thriller about a tense, gripping international incident. You see, this was my problem with "All the President's Men" - the pacing. You can make a film about a 2-week period in U.S. History, and it doesn't have to FEEL like it's 2 weeks long. It's called editing, guys, look into it.

Actually, there are some neat little editing tricks used in this film - like Kevin Costner closing a door in an empty Oval Office, and when he turns around, he's in a room full of people as the President is giving his address. Or a subtle use of black and white footage transitioning to color, to give us a feel of a newsreel turning into real events.

But let's tawk for a second about Boston accents. President Kennedy (Bruce Greenwood) has a real subtle one here, which makes sense for a man raised in upper-class Boston and on Cape Cahd, who might have needed to get rid of his accent while running for national office. And Robert Kennedy (Steven Culp) has one that's more pronounced, but Kevin Costner as Kennedy aide Kenny O'Donnell? Unless he was TRYING to speak like a poor kid from Southie with a speech impediment, he really overshot the mahk. My point is, if the accent is so noticeable that it overshadows every line, you may want to dial it back. Just a bit. His character was from Worcester, MA (pronounced "Wusster", not "War-chester") and they don't have so much of a Bah-stin speak out there in central Mass.

A lot of great character actors turned up in the cabinet meetings - like Dylan Baker as Defense Sec. Robert Macnamara, Michael Fairman as U.N. ambassador Adlai Stevenson, Len Cariou as Dean Acheson, Elya Baskin (last seen in "Air Force One") as a Russian ambassador, even Jack McGee as Chicago's Mayor Richard Daley. I watched the last hour of the film on my computer, and I just kept a browser open to the IMDB and had a good time looking up all the actors. Hey, that FBI agent looked familiar - yep, Tom Everett was in both "My Fellow Americans" and "Air Force One" earlier this week...though I may never see him in another film. And that pilot looks a lot like the guy who used to be on "Whose Line Is It Anyway" - yep, that was Charles "Chip" Esten, all right...Oh, I do have my fun.

RATING: 7 out of 10 satellite photos (it probably should be an 8, but I'm deducting for Costner's uber-accent getting in the way)