Equinox of Insanity

Long story short, Great White Snark’s reaction to Cloverfield differs vastly from mine, and I’d like to talk about that.

First let me make note of the two points he raises that I completely agree with: 1) the shaky-cam is awful and 2) the film doesn’t do enough of what it does really well.

I think as a storytelling device the use of shaky-cam was brilliant, as it not only adds to the drama of the story by making the action more hectic, but it’s inability to clearly see the action around us is used well in the film. You want to see more of what’s going on, but you can’t, and it adds to the suspense. The fact that you only see the monster when director Matt Reeves wants you to see it is done perfectly, and I appreciate the genius of it. But, seriously, the thing was a pain in the ass. The Snarktastic One mentioned that he had to look away from the screen a couple of times and, yeah, I had to do the same thing to, you know, not puke all over the place. Granted, it didn’t help that I had 1 glass of beer before and 64 fucking ouces of Coke and half a pound of popcorn during the flick. Seriously, that was not cool.

When Great White Snark says the film doesn’t do enough of what it does well he points specifically to the military-on-monster action scenes. Honestly, I could watch an entire movie of that, and walking out of the theater my first questions to Zach were all about the military stuff (because, obviously, an IT specialist in the Navy is sure to know how the army would react to a giant fucking monster tearing up New York City). During the movie it did cross my mind how awesome the military stuff was, and how I really, really wanted to see more of it (though not in the usual lame-ass cut to General in the bunker, cut to pilot flying F22, cut to slow-mo of child looking up at F22 with an American flag in her hand Michael Bay/Roland Emmerich sort of way).

I’d go one step farther than that, though, and say that I don’t think there was enough human suffering and mass hysteria in the film, which they also did very well. By focusing on a small group of people the film ignore the millions of other people who are probably freaking the shit out, or worse. The bits it does show were some of the more interesting parts of the film.

Where I disagree with Great White Snark is in the realization of the characters and their relationships, which is clearly where I think the main difference in our responses to the film come from. He writes:

The movie is thick with style and interesting visuals, but comes up short on substance like character development. I cared not one iota whether the characters lived or died.

I remember having a conversation with a friend about The Fountain and how I friggin’ totally loved the movie while she totally hated it, and basically it came down to the simple fact that I believed the love between the characters was real and she didn’t.

I think it’s the same thing with Cloverfield. I believed that the relationships between the main characters were real. I think you kind of have to do so to enjoy Cloverfield, because that’s really what this movie is about. I think if you’re going to grab some chicken wings and some beer and start talking about this movie that you’re going be talking about it in the context of our own relationships with each other, as brought out by the film.

Now, if you don’t believe the relationships between the characters are real, then, yeah, I think it’s fair to say the movie is annoying. Cloverfield is a movie about people, not the monster.

And you know — as I’ve come to respect in my old yet handsome age — believing in the relationships between characters, or even in the characters themselves, is totally a subjective thing. I remarked to Jackie a while back that I didn’t really like Thank You For Smoking because I could never actually believe that what’s-his-face was really that slick. That’s really not something you can argue about. You buy the characterizations or you don’t. You like characters or you don’t like Cloverfield.

So, in conclusion, I won’t be punching Great White Snark in the nuts for not liking Cloverfield, and that is a courtesy that I will extend to all the peoples of the world. I would still recommend seeing the flick, but I totally get it if you didn’t like it. It’s not like disliking Se7en, which is a completely inexcusable and unforgivable personal opinion to form. In that case, your balls beware!

1. Elektra

I hated the movie Daredevil, have never read a single comic book with the character of Elektra in it, and never watched the show “Alias” or been a fan of any kind of Jennifer Garner’s.

This is by all reasonable definitions a terrible movie. Jennifer Garner isn’t nearly as hot as she needs to be to pull off this role, there’s a pre-teen girl in the movie that is oppressively annoying, Shang Tsung from the Mortal Kombat movie and General Zod show up for no reason, there’s a razor thin plot that makes absolutely no sense in the absence of a monumental backstory that they never bother to share with us, and the fight scenes are poorly directed with far too many quick indecipherable cuts. This film doesn’t have a single redeeming quality.

Yet, I can’t not watch this film. If it shows up on FX — which happens at least fifteen times a day — I stop and watch it, and then when there’s a commercial I switch away (because I hate commercials¹) and then after thirty to sixty seconds I switch back to and continue watching this horrible, horrible movie. It’s a sickness.

2. Legally Blonde

I’m neither a gay man nor a teenaged girl, so there’s no reason I should watch, let alone enoy, let alone friggin’ love, this movie. But I do. It’s one of those movies that I can watch over and over again and find equally delightful each time. It’s like eating gumdrops. I know they’re bad for me, but they’re so tasty. Like little candy boobs.

But seriously, I’m not gay.

3. Van Helsing

This is the less reputable of the leather-clad Kate Beckinsale vampire-vs-werewolf B-list action movies (the Underworld films being the other ones). She’s hot in the film, of course, but that doesn’t compensate for how painfully bad the movie is. The story is infantile, at best, and it’s directed by Stephen Sommers who directed the terrible Mummy movies. Yeah, those movies with Encino Man² in them. And let’s be clear, in comparison to this film The Mummy Returns is a directorial masterpiece.

The hero of the film, Van Helsing, is so dim-witted that I wonder if he might actually be handicapped³, and the villain, Dracula, is the most uncool vampire ever to appear in film⁴. It also features the lamest Frankenstein’s monster I’ve ever seen, and I have seen the movie Monster Squad. A monster movie with asshat monsters is totally worthless.

But like all the films on this list, I really enjoy watching this movie. I guess that the lameness of the villains is offset by the lameness of the heroes, and the effect kinda counter acts each other, which is weird because I always just assumed lameness was additive. My brain just shuts off and I’m mesmerized by the flickering lights. Also, Kate Beckinsale is still pretty friggin’ hot.

4. Jason X

I know the difference between a good movie and a bad movie. Jason X, the tenth film in the Friday the 13th series, is a bad movie. It’s set in the distant future, in space, and Jason gets turned into a cyborg. You’d think a cross between Friday the 13th and Robocop (in space) would be totally freakin’ awesome, but it’s not. It’s actually terrible. Like combining mashed potatoes and sex. In space.

Now, you might wonder where Jason X falls into the pantheon of Friday the 13th films. Well, it’s better than Friday the 13th Part VIII in which Jason goes to New York⁵, but definitely not as good as Friday the 13th Part VII in which Jason fought a chick with telekinetic abilities⁶

What separates Jason X from all the other Friday the 13th films — you know, aside from being set in space and shit — is that it is unapologetically and deliberately campy. I’m pretty sure the film makers set out to make the stupidest horror movie they could, and yeah, they were totally successful. It’s way postmodern. I think.

Anyway, I’m a sucker for sucky cyborg slasher horror films set in space.

5. War, Cradle 2 the Grave, The One, and every other crappy Jet Li movie

Jet Li fucking sucks. I’m sorry, but that’s all there is to say about that. He just does. My Chinese college buddies may keep jizzing there pants over him, but let’s cut the crap — he’s no Jackie Chan. Turns out, he’s not even a Jason Statham. He keeps making these idiotic movie where he walks around and doesn’t speak English properly. I mean, what the hell! Buy some of those damn Rosetta Stone language teaching things for Christ’s sake.

So why the hell do I keep watching these movies? I don’t know. I fucking watched Cradle 2 the Grave. It stars DMX. D-friggin’-MX. And so help me I would watch it again. Without beer. I would watch the hell out of that movie. And then I’d watch Hero. Have you seen Hero? I don’t want to spoil it, but you see the same Asian asshole die four times. In different colors. Do the colors mean something? I asked Asian people and they didn’t even know. I hate that movie, but I keep watching it. Each time the guy dies I think, “Why, God, why? Why am I not watching Marked for Death instead?” Steven Seagal is the balls!

I need help. Also, more money. That’s a tangential point, however. Mostly I need to stop watching these terrible, terrible movies.

1. Except for those awesome Burger King commercials with The King being hella creepy and giving people delicious sandwiches.↩
2. I remember seeing this movie in the theater and loving every minute of it. Clearly, as a child I was a moron.↩
3. He’s also a rip off of D, from the anime-tastic Vampire Hunter D↩
4. For reference sake, the coolest vampire in a movie ever has to be George Hamilton in Love at First Bite.↩
5. I maintain that the greatest movie ever would be a combination of Friday the 13th Part VIII and Muppets Take Manhattan — Jason vs the Muppets: Battle For Manhattan.↩
6. This is the Friday the 13th that features the infamous “teens making out in sleeping bag getting smashed against a tree” kill.↩

Ten minutes ago I had zero interest in seeing the film The Kingdom. Now, after watching the 4 minute opening credits twice, I can’t not see it. It covers the history of the U.S. involvement in Saudi Arabia in a gorgeous, though disturbing, way.

Screenshots don’t do it justice. Just watch the video.

Found due to the most excellent website of writer John August.

From RottenTomatoes.com:

“Written as well as directed by Hyung-rae Shim, which apparently means Uwe Boll in Korean, [it's] so campily awful that it’s Mystery Science Theater-ready.” – Frank Swietek, ONE GUY’S OPINION

In case you’ve forgotten who Uwe Boll is, he’s the brilliant filmmaker that made the spectacularly awesome movie Alone in the Dark.

“This one’s for connoisseurs of the “totally preposterous crap” school of fantasy cinema.You know who you are: You have all the Warlock sequels on Laserdisc, the complete Leprechaun series on DVD, and go see Uwe Boll movies on opening weekend” – Luke Y. Thompson, L.A. WEEKLY

FYI, best movie ever: Leprechaun 5: In the Hood.¹

“America does just fine making cringingly terrible special-effect extravaganzas, so back off, South Korea!” – Brian Orndorf, EFILMCRITIC.COM

OK, South Korea, we get the terrible special-effect-laden crap, you get StarCraft. Ummm… wait a minute, can we talk this over a bit?

[Updated with another awesome quote]

“First, the plot holes. When I say that the plot has gaping holes, I mean the holes are big enough to accommodate a fleet of tractor trailers dragging a school of blue whales.” – Great White Snark, GreatWhiteSnark.com

OMFG, it’s like one part Eragon, and one part Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. ² Sounds like the balls, yo!

Conclusions

I can’t wait to see this movie!!!

1. Thanks, Gary.↩
2. Yes, the whales are different, but still.↩