Day 136 - 5/16/09 - Movie #135
BEFORE: Another star-studded space travel film - this one with Clint Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, Donald Sutherland, James Cromwell, and James Garner. I did take a break midway through this film - I watched the set-up, then we took a drive up to the Empire Casino in Yonkers, ate at the buffet and spent some time at the slots - but it didn't affect my enjoyment of this film. Let's hear it for the "pause" feature on the DVD player...
THE PLOT: When a retired engineer is called upon to rescue a failing satellite, he insists that his equally old teammates accompany him into space.
AFTER: Grizzled veteran with a grudge and something to prove? Check. A ragtag bunch of misfits that have to put aside their differences and work together? Check. A longshot plan to fix a satellite that's so damn crazy that it just...might...work? Check. Sure, they're cliches, but this film was still darn entertaining. I suppose this was made with the boomer generation in mind - to prove that the over-65 set is a viable part of the workforce, and a profitable movie-going demographic. But the film still made space travel exciting again, in a very back-to-basics way.
I particularly enjoyed the opening scenes, with younger actors playing the younger versions of Eastwood, Jones, and Sutherland's characters. This was very well-cast, and the stars' voices were dubbed in perfectly - I couldn't spot any sync problems, anyway - and I thought it really helped to show their backstory as test pilots. It was also good to see Courtney Vance in a supporting role, playing with the big dogs. NOT good to see Marcia Gay Harden's unfortunate hairstyle.
RATING: 8 out of 10 booster rockets.
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Friday, May 15, 2009
Meteor
Day 135 - 5/15/09 - Movie #134
BEFORE: The 1970's were a different time - today, if a giant asteroid were found to be hurtling toward the earth at destructive speed, we'd probably send up a rocket, along with a ragtag group of renegade astronauts, with a plan to blow it up that's so crazy, it just might work. The proper procedure back then, however, was to throw as much acting talent at it as possible - will the combined forces of Sean Connery, Natalie Wood, Martin Landau, and Henry Fonda as the President be enough to divert the meteor?
THE PLOT: After a collision with a comet, a nearly 8km wide piece of the asteroid "Orpheus" is heading towards Earth...
AFTER: This movie is a strange pre-cursor to future space/disaster films - it's got the tidal waves and impending destruction of New York seen in "Day After Tomorrow", the team-up of the U.S. and Soviet space program, as seen in "2010", and it's got NASA turning to a veteran action-movie star for help, as in "Armageddon". (which reminds me, I should add "Armageddon" to my want list...)
The technology seen in the underground control center looks ridiculously outdated. One monitor in particular, the one that shows the trajectory of the asteroid, isn't a CRT at all - it's a hard screen of plastic with lettering on it, and red lights representing how close the asteroid will be on each day - it looks like one of those old electric football games from the 1950's! (Plus, how did some technician know what trajectory the meteor would take when he designed it?)
A "splinter" piece of the meteor strikes New York, and instead of complicated special FX, the filmmakers chose to run every piece of stock footage you've ever seen of buildings being destroyed or imploded. Why not run the Hindenburg explosion while you're at it? Guess they blew the effects budget on all that big-name talent...
Aiming nuclear missiles at a meteor to destroy it should have been exciting - but standing around in a control room, watching the action on TV monitors? Not so much.
RATING: 3 out of 10 ICBMs.
BEFORE: The 1970's were a different time - today, if a giant asteroid were found to be hurtling toward the earth at destructive speed, we'd probably send up a rocket, along with a ragtag group of renegade astronauts, with a plan to blow it up that's so crazy, it just might work. The proper procedure back then, however, was to throw as much acting talent at it as possible - will the combined forces of Sean Connery, Natalie Wood, Martin Landau, and Henry Fonda as the President be enough to divert the meteor?
THE PLOT: After a collision with a comet, a nearly 8km wide piece of the asteroid "Orpheus" is heading towards Earth...
AFTER: This movie is a strange pre-cursor to future space/disaster films - it's got the tidal waves and impending destruction of New York seen in "Day After Tomorrow", the team-up of the U.S. and Soviet space program, as seen in "2010", and it's got NASA turning to a veteran action-movie star for help, as in "Armageddon". (which reminds me, I should add "Armageddon" to my want list...)
The technology seen in the underground control center looks ridiculously outdated. One monitor in particular, the one that shows the trajectory of the asteroid, isn't a CRT at all - it's a hard screen of plastic with lettering on it, and red lights representing how close the asteroid will be on each day - it looks like one of those old electric football games from the 1950's! (Plus, how did some technician know what trajectory the meteor would take when he designed it?)
A "splinter" piece of the meteor strikes New York, and instead of complicated special FX, the filmmakers chose to run every piece of stock footage you've ever seen of buildings being destroyed or imploded. Why not run the Hindenburg explosion while you're at it? Guess they blew the effects budget on all that big-name talent...
Aiming nuclear missiles at a meteor to destroy it should have been exciting - but standing around in a control room, watching the action on TV monitors? Not so much.
RATING: 3 out of 10 ICBMs.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Outland
Day 134 - 5/14/09 - Movie #133
BEFORE: Enough animation for a while - this Sean Connery film fits with my theme, because I've heard it described as "High Noon" in space (which reminds me to add "High Noon" to my want list...) Connery plays the new sheriff in a mining town - but the town is on Io, a moon of Jupiter.
THE PLOT: In the distant future, a police marshal stationed at a remote mining colony uncovers a drug-smuggling conspiracy, and gets no help from the populace when he later finds himself marked for murder.
AFTER: It's more like a mystery as Connery tries to figure out who's smuggling contraband onto the space station. The other crime taking place is that Frances Sternhagen nearly steals the movie, playing a world-weary but sassy doctor/coroner...
Since this movie was made in 1981, the vision of the future is a little off - apparently in the future everyone will be using Commodore 64 computers again. Plus, it seems like they can put a man on the moon (of Jupiter) but they can't seem to improve weapons technology beyond the basic shotgun. What, no lasers?
In the 2nd part of the film, I can really see the references to "High Noon" - when the gang of thugs is arriving on the next space shuttle (train) and a big digital readout shows the time until their arrival (standing in for the big clock tower in a Western town).
Bonus for "Cheers" fans - in addition to Frances Sternhagen, who played Cliff Clavin's mother, John Ratzenberger himself has a small role. Bonus for "Star Wars" fans - in addition to Ratzenberger, who had a small role in "The Empire Strikes Back", there's also an appearance by Angus MacInnes, who played Gold Leader in the Death Star battle in "A New Hope".
RATING: 6 out of 10 space-suits
BEFORE: Enough animation for a while - this Sean Connery film fits with my theme, because I've heard it described as "High Noon" in space (which reminds me to add "High Noon" to my want list...) Connery plays the new sheriff in a mining town - but the town is on Io, a moon of Jupiter.
THE PLOT: In the distant future, a police marshal stationed at a remote mining colony uncovers a drug-smuggling conspiracy, and gets no help from the populace when he later finds himself marked for murder.
AFTER: It's more like a mystery as Connery tries to figure out who's smuggling contraband onto the space station. The other crime taking place is that Frances Sternhagen nearly steals the movie, playing a world-weary but sassy doctor/coroner...
Since this movie was made in 1981, the vision of the future is a little off - apparently in the future everyone will be using Commodore 64 computers again. Plus, it seems like they can put a man on the moon (of Jupiter) but they can't seem to improve weapons technology beyond the basic shotgun. What, no lasers?
In the 2nd part of the film, I can really see the references to "High Noon" - when the gang of thugs is arriving on the next space shuttle (train) and a big digital readout shows the time until their arrival (standing in for the big clock tower in a Western town).
Bonus for "Cheers" fans - in addition to Frances Sternhagen, who played Cliff Clavin's mother, John Ratzenberger himself has a small role. Bonus for "Star Wars" fans - in addition to Ratzenberger, who had a small role in "The Empire Strikes Back", there's also an appearance by Angus MacInnes, who played Gold Leader in the Death Star battle in "A New Hope".
RATING: 6 out of 10 space-suits
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Heavy Metal 2000
Day 133 - 5/13/09 - Movie #132
BEFORE: It took me a few decades to get around to watching the first "Heavy Metal" film, but only 9 years to watch its sequel - so that's progress, right? This is the third animated film I'm watching in a row with an interstellar quest for a mysterious planet, this one supposedly holds the secret of immortality...
THE PLOT: A miner becomes possessed by an insatiable hunger for power and a thirst for immortality. On his way to the planet of youth, he wipes out most of a space colony and kidnaps a sexy woman. His big mistake is that he doesn't kill the woman's sister, Julie, who then sets out on a mission of rescue and revenge.
AFTER: The first "Heavy Metal" film was a collection of linked short stories, but this one is just one longer story - it's more coherent, but also less random fun. It takes place in a future with spaceships, but where people also still fight with swords and battle-axes. The villain, Tyler, has a Wolverine-like healing ability, and is being directed by an alien key (which according to the IMDB could be a piece of the Loc-Nar from the first film) towards... OK, honestly the back-story here is quite ridiculous, it just seems to exist as an excuse to show a lot of killings and topless space-chicks. Which pretty much describes the old Heavy Metal magazine too.
Cotton candy tastes great, but it's not very nutritious. Same with eye-candy.
RATING: 2 out of 10 beheadings
BEFORE: It took me a few decades to get around to watching the first "Heavy Metal" film, but only 9 years to watch its sequel - so that's progress, right? This is the third animated film I'm watching in a row with an interstellar quest for a mysterious planet, this one supposedly holds the secret of immortality...
THE PLOT: A miner becomes possessed by an insatiable hunger for power and a thirst for immortality. On his way to the planet of youth, he wipes out most of a space colony and kidnaps a sexy woman. His big mistake is that he doesn't kill the woman's sister, Julie, who then sets out on a mission of rescue and revenge.
AFTER: The first "Heavy Metal" film was a collection of linked short stories, but this one is just one longer story - it's more coherent, but also less random fun. It takes place in a future with spaceships, but where people also still fight with swords and battle-axes. The villain, Tyler, has a Wolverine-like healing ability, and is being directed by an alien key (which according to the IMDB could be a piece of the Loc-Nar from the first film) towards... OK, honestly the back-story here is quite ridiculous, it just seems to exist as an excuse to show a lot of killings and topless space-chicks. Which pretty much describes the old Heavy Metal magazine too.
Cotton candy tastes great, but it's not very nutritious. Same with eye-candy.
RATING: 2 out of 10 beheadings
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Titan A.E.
Day 131 + 132 - 5/11 + 5/12/09 - Movie #131
BEFORE: Well, I managed to watch the finale of "The Amazing Race" before I saw the winning team announced in the media - I had to stay out of on-line TV forums and avoid newspapers for a day, but it was worth it. The finale is always emotional, provided I don't know the results in advance. Right now my two favorite words are "season finale" - with the exception of "TAR" and "Heroes", I'm still watching TV from late February. So here comes my chance to catch up - 2 hour-long shows each night (plus a movie), and I'll be current in about 2 months. After "American Idol" and "Survivor" end, I think I'll just have "Rescue Me" to watch this summer, plus the odd episode of "Mythbusters" and "Dirty Jobs", if they're new. The only thing that could slow me down would be if "Top Chef" comes up with some sort of fill-in show for the summer...
Once I catch up on TV, I'll have time for some longer movies, instead of these shorter animated ones.
THE PLOT: A young man learns that he has to find a hidden Earth ship before an enemy alien species does in order to secure the survival of humanity.
AFTER: I thought this would have something to do with a "Titanic"-like storyline, so I was way off. Just like "Treasure Planet", this is about a quest across the galaxy to find a treasure, only the treasure is not gold, it's a lost ship. Don Bluth co-directed this, so again there's a lot of people getting separated from each other, and calling out each other's names incessantly. You may recall the video-game "Space Ace" (with cut scenes also directed by Bluth), which featured a stereotypically buff hero (Ace) who would get zapped by a ray that turned him into a whiny, geeky teen, so that he would chase after the kidnapped, stereotypically buxom heroine, nasally screaming, "I'll save you, Kimm-EEEEEE!"
This sort of thing gets toned down in this film, but it's still there. The movie also suffers from "Silly Alien Sidekick Syndrome", much like "Treasure Planet" did. The action is exciting enough, but I saw the resolution coming a light-year away.
The voice-work is done by Matt Damon (playing, well, a spacefaring Matt Damon...), Drew Barrymore, and Bill Pullman as the humans, and Nathan Lane, Janeane Garofalo and John Leguizamo as the goony aliens. I think I pegged them all except for Leguizamo.
RATING: 4 out of 10 enemy spacecraft.
BEFORE: Well, I managed to watch the finale of "The Amazing Race" before I saw the winning team announced in the media - I had to stay out of on-line TV forums and avoid newspapers for a day, but it was worth it. The finale is always emotional, provided I don't know the results in advance. Right now my two favorite words are "season finale" - with the exception of "TAR" and "Heroes", I'm still watching TV from late February. So here comes my chance to catch up - 2 hour-long shows each night (plus a movie), and I'll be current in about 2 months. After "American Idol" and "Survivor" end, I think I'll just have "Rescue Me" to watch this summer, plus the odd episode of "Mythbusters" and "Dirty Jobs", if they're new. The only thing that could slow me down would be if "Top Chef" comes up with some sort of fill-in show for the summer...
Once I catch up on TV, I'll have time for some longer movies, instead of these shorter animated ones.
THE PLOT: A young man learns that he has to find a hidden Earth ship before an enemy alien species does in order to secure the survival of humanity.
AFTER: I thought this would have something to do with a "Titanic"-like storyline, so I was way off. Just like "Treasure Planet", this is about a quest across the galaxy to find a treasure, only the treasure is not gold, it's a lost ship. Don Bluth co-directed this, so again there's a lot of people getting separated from each other, and calling out each other's names incessantly. You may recall the video-game "Space Ace" (with cut scenes also directed by Bluth), which featured a stereotypically buff hero (Ace) who would get zapped by a ray that turned him into a whiny, geeky teen, so that he would chase after the kidnapped, stereotypically buxom heroine, nasally screaming, "I'll save you, Kimm-EEEEEE!"
This sort of thing gets toned down in this film, but it's still there. The movie also suffers from "Silly Alien Sidekick Syndrome", much like "Treasure Planet" did. The action is exciting enough, but I saw the resolution coming a light-year away.
The voice-work is done by Matt Damon (playing, well, a spacefaring Matt Damon...), Drew Barrymore, and Bill Pullman as the humans, and Nathan Lane, Janeane Garofalo and John Leguizamo as the goony aliens. I think I pegged them all except for Leguizamo.
RATING: 4 out of 10 enemy spacecraft.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Treasure Planet
Day 130 - 5/10/09 - Movie #130
BEFORE: I was hoping to get 2 movies in today, but after sleeping late, picking up Merlin from the vet, and squeezing in 2 episodes of "The Amazing Race", there just wasn't time. And tomorrow after trivia, I want to watch those final 2 episodes of TAR, so it looks like I'm going to fall behind again...
My current theme is classic literature updated into modern animation - this is an animated version of "Treasure Island", but moved into futuristic outer-space. Let's see how well it adapts...
THE PLOT: Treasure Planet follows restless teen Jim Hawkins on a fantastic journey across the universe as cabin boy aboard a majestic space galleon.
AFTER: The story seemed to translate well, from a sea-pirate tale to a space-pirate tale, with a few minor glitches. Am I supposed to believe that a galleon-shaped technological spaceship that can sail between worlds is still kept clean with a mop and a bucket? Shouldn't there be a Roomba or some other robot to swab the deck?
Long John Silver now has cyborg parts instead of a peg-leg, which is kind of cool - but in general it's a little sad that some studio executive probably thought that an old-school pirate story wouldn't appeal to kids in a post-Star Wars world. And they had to dress it up with so many silly-looking, flatulent alien characters - an effete doctor, a broken robot, and a tiny morphing alien (what, no cybernetic parrot on Long John Silver's shoulder?). I remember "Treasure Island" being a very exciting book to read as is - if they had just waited a couple of years, "Pirates of the Caribbean" would have come along and made pirate movies cool again, and they could have played it straight.
As for the voices, I knew that Joseph Gordon-Levitt (from "3rd Rock from the Sun") voiced Jim Hawkins, and there was no mistaking David Hyde-Pierce as Dr. Doppler, but I failed to recognize Emma Thompson as the ship's captain, or Martin Short as the robot B.E.N. (I thought that was David Cross...) And hey, it's Roscoe Lee Browne again!
RATING: 7 out of 10 supernovas (would have been an 8, but I'm docking 1 for having one too many silly sidekick characters)
BEFORE: I was hoping to get 2 movies in today, but after sleeping late, picking up Merlin from the vet, and squeezing in 2 episodes of "The Amazing Race", there just wasn't time. And tomorrow after trivia, I want to watch those final 2 episodes of TAR, so it looks like I'm going to fall behind again...
My current theme is classic literature updated into modern animation - this is an animated version of "Treasure Island", but moved into futuristic outer-space. Let's see how well it adapts...
THE PLOT: Treasure Planet follows restless teen Jim Hawkins on a fantastic journey across the universe as cabin boy aboard a majestic space galleon.
AFTER: The story seemed to translate well, from a sea-pirate tale to a space-pirate tale, with a few minor glitches. Am I supposed to believe that a galleon-shaped technological spaceship that can sail between worlds is still kept clean with a mop and a bucket? Shouldn't there be a Roomba or some other robot to swab the deck?
Long John Silver now has cyborg parts instead of a peg-leg, which is kind of cool - but in general it's a little sad that some studio executive probably thought that an old-school pirate story wouldn't appeal to kids in a post-Star Wars world. And they had to dress it up with so many silly-looking, flatulent alien characters - an effete doctor, a broken robot, and a tiny morphing alien (what, no cybernetic parrot on Long John Silver's shoulder?). I remember "Treasure Island" being a very exciting book to read as is - if they had just waited a couple of years, "Pirates of the Caribbean" would have come along and made pirate movies cool again, and they could have played it straight.
As for the voices, I knew that Joseph Gordon-Levitt (from "3rd Rock from the Sun") voiced Jim Hawkins, and there was no mistaking David Hyde-Pierce as Dr. Doppler, but I failed to recognize Emma Thompson as the ship's captain, or Martin Short as the robot B.E.N. (I thought that was David Cross...) And hey, it's Roscoe Lee Browne again!
RATING: 7 out of 10 supernovas (would have been an 8, but I'm docking 1 for having one too many silly sidekick characters)
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