TV And Films

The shows and movies I like (or don’t).

Good Action is Geography

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Vanity Fair has a huge article looking at the new Indiana Jones movie, and midway through, there are some quotes from Spielberg that sent two thoughts running through my brain. The first was that what he was saying was making me more excited about this latest sequel than I already was. The second was how desperately I wished more directors would think like Spielberg does here (don’t worry, there aren’t any movie spoilers):

Rather than update the franchise to match current styles, Lucas and Spielberg decided to stay true to the prior films’ look, tone, and pace. During pre-production, Spielberg watched the first three Indiana Jones movies at an Amblin screening room with Janusz Kaminski, who has shot the director’s last 10 films. He replaces Douglas Slocombe, who shot the first three Indy movies (and is now retired at age 94), as the man mainly responsible for the film’s look. “I needed to show them to Janusz,” Spielberg says, “because I didn’t want Janusz to modernize and bring us into the 21st century. I still wanted the film to have a lighting style not dissimilar to the work Doug Slocombe had achieved, which meant that both Janusz and I had to swallow our pride. Janusz had to approximate another cinematographer’s look, and I had to approximate this younger director’s look that I thought I had moved away from after almost two decades.”

That much already had me nodding and thinking good things, and then he went on….

Spielberg promises no tricky editing for the new one, saying, “I go for geography. I want the audience to know not only which side the good guy’s on and the bad guy’s on, but which side of the screen they’re in, and I want the audience to be able to edit as quickly as they want in a shot that I am loath to cut away from. And that’s been my style with all four of these Indiana Jones pictures. Quick-cutting is very effective in some movies, like the Bourne pictures, but you sacrifice geography when you go for quick-cutting. Which is fine, because audiences get a huge adrenaline rush from a cut every second and a half on The Bourne Ultimatum, and there’s just enough geography for the audience never to be lost, especially in the last Bourne film, which I thought was the best of the three. But, by the same token, Indy is a little more old-fashioned than the modern-day action adventure.”

The script, Spielberg says, can provide the blockbuster pace. “Part of the speed is the story,” he says. “If you build a fast engine, you don’t need fast cutting, because the story’s being told fluidly, and the pages are just turning very quickly. You first of all need a script that’s written in the express lane, and if it’s not, there’s nothing you can do in the editing room to make it move faster. You need room for character, you need room for relationships, for personal conflict, you need room for comedy, but that all has to happen on a moving sidewalk.”

Not just yes, but hell yes.

I was skeptical when I first started hearing about Indy 4, but the more little bits leak out (though I am endeavoring to stay spoiler free), the more I’m looking forward to seeing this one.

Condescended

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I’m hoping that now that we’re just about a year away from the transition to all-digital TV broadcasting and the government’s TV Converter Program is up and running, we’ll finally start to get some information and reviews on the various TV converter boxes that are (or will be) available.

I just applied for my two coupons towards the boxes, and then started searching on some of the listed eligible converter boxes to see what they’re like. Unfortunately, much of what I found was brief little snippets from über-geek and audiophile sites with comments like this…

…one of the “digital switchover” converter boxes your stubborn granny can buy early next year with her $40 coupon from the government, in lieu of getting a new goddamn TV.

Okay, sure, that’s from Gizmodo. Still — not every geek out there works for Microsoft and has a gazillion expendable dollars…or sees the need to toss out a perfectly good (and, actually, very nice) TV set that works fine, aside from not having the ATSC tuner.

The Ratings Game #2

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Given that I don’t have enough of a regular readership to really make this a game, and that I don’t want to have to constrain myself to any sort of real schedule, I’m going to change the way I’m doing this ratings game thing. Seeing as how the point is really just about the silliness of the MPAA’s ratings rationales, I’ll just toss one up whenever I feel like it. I won’t immediately give away which movie the rating comes from, but you can click through the rating to figure it out. It’s all just for fun, after all!

Ratings Game 0002

The Ratings Game #1

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Some time within the past couple years, it seems to have become standard (whether voluntarily or by decree, I don’t know) for all new DVDs to flash the MPAA rating on screen for a few moments just before the movie begins. Additionally, for the past few years the MPAA has been including a brief description underneath the rating of why the movie in question has received its particular rating.

I’m constantly amused by these little blurbs and their attempt to rationalize, in fifteen words or less, what prompted the MPAA to assign the rating it did to each movie. So, I thought we could try a little game: every so often (whenever I get around to it, hopefully no less than once a week), I’ll post the MPAA rating and rationalization. Your goal is to try to guess the film, based solely on the MPAA’s rating and their description of its faults. I’ll post the answer either after someone guesses it correctly, or later on if it has remained a mystery.

Number one, then…any guesses?

Ratings Game 0001

Kynt and Vyxsin

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A Q-and-A from the Gothic Charm School (sort of a Goth Miss Manners):

The other thing that was recently brought to the Lady of the Manners’ attention is the fact that there’s apparently a gothy couple on The Amazing Race. (The Lady of the Manners had to have The Amazing Race explained to her. The Lady of the Manners watches TV by viewing complete seasons of shows on DVD, and so is somewhat behind on current pop culture and reality shows.) One reader (who asked not to be named) queried:

I don’t know if you watch reality television, but I have some questions about the self-styled “Gothic” team Kynt and Vyxsin from The Amazing Race. I get that they wear weird makeup and fishnet T-shirts, but they seem to be way too happy (not to mention wearing way too much pink) to really be Goths. Surely no self-respecting Goth would be this interested about running around in the scorching heat in Africa, grinning from ear-to-ear with hot pink hair! Can you settle once and for all on whether these two are the biggest posers since Gumby, or is hot pink as Goth as Hot Topic?

Oh dear oh dear. People aren’t really still clinging to the false notions that Goths can never be cheerful, or never wear pink? Good heavens, the Lady of the Manners thought those cliches were put to rest ages ago! Yes, Goths can, and frequently are, very happy and cheerful. Goth is about appreciating the off-kilter, the darkly humorous, the (as the sainted Lydia from Beetlejuice said) “strange and unusual”. Goth is not about maintaining a seamless facade of woe and gloom, and never has been. Goth is more about embracing a dark and decadent aesthetic while simultaneously being able to laugh at oneself for sitting around wearing black velvet and reading Dracula by candlelight.

As to the “wearing way too much pink” comment: hot pink has been a wonderful accent color for black Gothwear since the early days of Deathrock and Batcave. (The Lady of the Manners personally prefers cupcake pink, but to each their own.) Goth fashion, while predominately black-hued, frequently dabbles in other colors. The Lady of the Manners thinks that the hot pink and black color scheme that Kynt and Vyxsin have adopted is striking, and also makes them slightly more approachable than an all-black wardrobe would. Which is a very clever move on their part, since they will need every advantage they can get to go forth and win this race thing.

Prairie got me hooked on The Amazing Race last year, and we’ve been having a lot of fun watching this season. The season started with a lot of teams that we liked, and while we’ve been a bit frustrated that we’ve lost some good teams while others that we’d like to see go keep hanging on, we’re thrilled that ‘the hippies‘ and ‘the goths’ are still part, and we’re really rooting for one of those two teams to win.

One of the things we’ve really noticed about both TK and Rachel and Kynt and Vyxsin is how markedly more mature their relationships are — with both teams, even when they’re behind, stuck somewhere, risking losing their spot, tired, hungry, or frustrated, they rarely if ever take it out on each other. They’ll express their frustration and anger, sure, but they don’t turn on each other and attack the other player. Even Kynt and Vyxsin’s ‘meltdown’ on last Sunday’s episode was worlds away from the regular abuse that Nate and Jennifer heap on each other in their good moments.

While sure, I’ll admit that part of the ‘drama’ of reality programming is the relationships (good and bad, but often bad) between the contestants, it’s been nice to see that at least two of the final five teams in this race actually treat each other like people should be treated — and it’s more than a little thrilling that it’s the two ‘counter-culture’ teams that have the best relationships.

Go weirdoes! ;)

Best Xmas Commercials (So Far)

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It’s only a top two, rather than a top ten or top three or any such thing (mostly because it’s so rare that commercials are actually fun that it’d be nearly impossible to get a list longer than two). However, here for your amusement are the top two commercials of this Christmas season, as chosen by Prairie and me.

In second place: the Staples Easy Button.

And…(the envelope, please)…in first place…(riiiiip): Verizon’s Pony!

Prairie can’t even think about the pony commercial without giggling, let alone watch it.

Zoom

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  1. 1957: Cosmic View: The Universe in 40 Jumps, by Kees Boeke.

  2. 1968: Cosmic Zoom, a Canadian animated short film inspired by Boeke’s book.

  3. 1977: Powers of Ten, a short film by Charles and Ray Eames, inspired by the prior two pieces. This is the most commonly known version of this presentation.

  4. 2004: The Simpsons parody version (10.3 Mb .mov file), as the couch gag for The Ziff Who Came to Dinner

All links via Kottke.

Meme: The ’80’s Movie Scientist Test

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Your Score: Jordan Cochran

140 Heart, 138 Genius, 157 Cool, 144 Excitability

Jordan Cochran — (Michelle Meyrink)
Real Genius (1985)

You’re Jordan Cochran, the adorable fast-talking GIRL scientist of all things. While she may not be up there with the other super-geniuses of the ’80s, her awesome mechanical aptitude and geek-girl cuteness have made her the sweetheart of nerds for over 20 years.

“I never sleep, I don’t know why. I had a roommate and I drove her nuts, I mean really nuts, they had to take her away in an ambulance and everything. But she’s okay now, but she had to transfer to an easier school, but I don’t know if that had anything to do with being my fault. But listen, if you ever need to talk or you need help studying just let me know, ’cause I’m just a couple doors down from you guys and I never sleep, okay?”

Other scientific possibilities: Gary Wallace, Wyatt Donnelly, Peter Venkman, Jordan Cochran, Egon Spengler, Doc Brown, Newton Crosby, Paul Stephens, Ben Crandall, Wayne Szalinkski, Winston Zeddemore, Ben Jabituya, Lazlo Hollyfeld, Ray Stantz, Buckaroo Banzai, Chris Knight

Link: The Which 80s Movie Scientist Test

Amusing side note: Jordan is one of the first movie character crushes I ever had when I was growing up. :)

Historical side note: Jordan was based on a real Caltech student:

And, yes, Jordan of Real Genius was based, at least in part, on me. My class’s president and social organizers decided to ask me in on an interview being done by the movies producers and so there I was in one of the fanciest restaurants in Pasadena wrapped in a slightly oversized sweater that I’d knit myself one night when I was cold, talking blithly about life at Caltech without, from what folks say, a single breath. One of the most amusing things in my life was, fifteen years later, seeing that movie with a roomful of my friends from Temple Square and, the minute Jordan introduces herself in a long string of breathless sidetrains having the entire room turn to just look at me afterwards. That was most amusing. As Cera says, she has my voice.

I’ve learned about commas since. Also about breathing. And, finally, yes, I’ve also learned to finally sleep once in a while, though that took staying up 72 hours for a project while I was doing my MSEE at the University of Washington and having my body literally fall asleep on me before it shut down completely to really bring that lesson home.

Hm. I should put in here, also, that I’m the only Caltech woman that I knew was actually interviewed for source material; but I tried for a whole perspective about the female experience at the school. Not just me. It was an ME friend of mine that did the scuba gear testing in the pool, and while all the physically possible things that Jordan did were done by some Caltech woman, it wasn’t necessarily me. I’m also very sure that Dave Marvit and the other Caltech consultants for the movie all contributed some of what they knew about the females of the school to Jordan’s character as well. So I’m pretty sure she’s a composit of the others who were there at that time. Personally, I was just glad that they got her right.

Oscar the Adults-Only Grouch

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The original Sesame Street episodes are being released to DVD (Vol. 1, Vol. 2)…just don’t show ’em to your kids.

According to an earnest warning on Volumes 1 and 2, “Sesame Street: Old School” is adults-only: “These early ‘Sesame Street’ episodes are intended for grown-ups, and may not suit the needs of today’s preschool child.”

What?

I asked Carol-Lynn Parente, the executive producer of “Sesame Street,” how exactly the first episodes were unsuitable for toddlers in 2007. She told me about Alistair Cookie and the parody “Monsterpiece Theater.” Alistair Cookie, played by Cookie Monster, used to appear with a pipe, which he later gobbled. According to Parente, “That modeled the wrong behavior” — smoking, eating pipes — “so we reshot those scenes without the pipe, and then we dropped the parody altogether.”

Which brought Parente to a feature of “Sesame Street” that had not been reconstructed: the chronically mood-disordered Oscar the Grouch. On the first episode, Oscar seems irredeemably miserable — hypersensitive, sarcastic, misanthropic. (Bert, too, is described as grouchy; none of the characters, in fact, is especially sunshiney except maybe Ernie, who also seems slow.) “We might not be able to create a character like Oscar now,” she said.

I’ll freely admit to leaning to the left politically and socially, but this level of über-sensitive, overwrought ‘Political Correctness’ is absolutely ridiculous.

Were I ever to have kids (or spend some time babysitting any nieces or nephews — consider yourselves warned, Kev and Emily, Noah’s in trouble with me!), I’d be more than happy to give ’em a full dose of Sesame Street and the Muppets both (that is, during one of the few times we plopped ’em down in front of the TV instead of with a book or a game or outside play or other such things).

This world just gets weirder and weirder some days.

(via /.)