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Forever Vanilla

2024-03-03T01:20:43Z

For a sheltered young woman, meeting a handsome, supernatural boy can be the beginning of a passionate adventure, lasting beyond a lifetime. For others, like the heroine of 2002's Tuck Everlasting, such an encounter may be a chaste and pleasant diversion for a few weeks, or even months, but, well, there's never any reason to become too terribly excited. This anemic fantasy romance will make you feel that it's not worth pondering whether your most fantastic wishes may come true.

In the early 1900s, a pretty young woman named Winnie (Alexis Bledel) chafes somewhat against the strict outline her parents have imposed on her future. One day, she escapes into the forest where she means a nice, clean family who became immortal after drinking from a magic spring.

She strikes up a friendship with the good-looking Jesse Tuck (Jonathan Jackson). The two find each other very pleasant and even dance and swim together. Finally, one day the Tuck patriarch (William Hurt) explains that immortality can be a curse. This sets up a conflict between her desire to share a life with Jesse and her preference to avoid becoming an eternal being cut off from human society in some vague, abstract, intellectual way. Whatever her decision, this movie is always ready to gently remind you that nothing is worth getting excited about.

As Roger Ebert aptly put it, "The movie is too impressed with its own solemn insights to work up much entertainment value," it's a movie burdened with "feather-brained sentimentality." Oh, Roger Ebert, I miss you. I know you'd know how to use eternal life. Indeed, he said so; "I know what I'd do: Spend 10 years apiece in the world's most interesting places." Think of all the things you could learn, all the skills, all the experiences you could have. It hardly seems to require that much imagination, which makes it all the more incredible all of the characters in this movie are completely lacking it.

Tuck Everlasting is available on Disney+.

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The Princess We Need

2021-04-05T10:05:52Z

It still amazes me how great 1997's Princess Mononoke (もののけ姫) is. Especially watching it after not having watched a Hayao Miyazaki movie in a few years. Like most of this films, it's so densely packed with fascinating visual ideas it seems almost superhuman. And then you have the great characters and story on top of that. But it came to mind because I watched Pocahontas and I recalled again how Miyazaki's movie succeeded so strongly where Disney's failed.

The hero, Ashitaka (Yoji Matsuda) rides a red elk, said by another character to be distinctive of the Emishi people. The Emishi were a real tribe in Japan that disappeared hundreds of years before the events of the film. The film makes no argument for the racial or cultural superiority of the Emishi, it's just interesting that he has this background, and it enables him to see the film's conflict with the clarity of an outsider. Ashitaka is such a solid hero he would have been boring in most films. In the context of the psychologically nuanced environment Miyazaki establishes, Ashitaka comes off as truly remarkable for the extent of his patience and keen instincts.

It's easy to say "life is complicated" but it's quite another thing to see it. The number of fascinating visual ideas in the film--the elk, the creepy/cute little forest children, the monk with the giant geta shoes, the inexhaustibly inventive animation of human and animal movement--is a visual complexity that complements the complexity of character. Many people have commented on the lack of "evil" characters. There is no Ratcliffe or other two dimensional maniac--which is not to say maniacs and tyrants don't exist but in order to have a serious discussion about the relationship between humanity and nature you can't define humanity merely by its abnormal extremes. Most destructive policies have reasons behind them and hindsight is by no means always 20/20, if it's honest.

There are analysts who have bent over backward to ascribe evil to Lady Eboshi (Yuko Tanaka). But she has clear motives and the welfare of her community at heart. Ultimately, the film is less a story about the environment than it is a story about territoriality. Eboshi leads a community of lepers and prostitutes, San (Yuriko Ishida) is part of a community of forest gods. One could argue both groups would traditionally get the short end of the stick. The forest gods are of less and less use to a technologically advancing culture, lepers would be the definition of the sick members to be culled from a herd. And prostitution isn't an occupation associated with a long and healthy life. So both sides are compelled to fight extra hard for survival. But of course, their situation reveals not their peculiar natures in this regard but their essentially universal natures. What human or animal wouldn't naturally fight to survive if circumstances required it?

Above all, the movie isn't focused on preaching, it's focused on telling a good story. And I really admire its construction--how Miyazaki so quickly and thoroughly establishes Ashitaka's people with an action sequence. He establishes it so well that it's an emotional punch when Ashitaka's forced to leave it minutes into the film. And already we're invested in this protagonist enough that new pieces of information he discovers are more interesting to us because of how critically they may affect him.

The consistency with which Ashitaka never takes a side in the conflict while behaving as a friend to both sides is lovely. The strength of character it takes for him to hold his course while San is cursing at him or the innocent people are hurt and confused by his unclear loyalties is beautiful because it always comes with a clear compassion for everyone.

Princess Mononoke has been very influential but mostly for its visuals. James Cameron did acknowledge the film's influence on Avatar and of course Dave Filoni has shamelessly pilfered from it for his Star Wars projects. It's a shame both men couldn't emulate Miyazaki's writing.

Twitter Sonnet #1439

A hungry creature fights a feeding wight.
The gentle pool concealed a panicked fish.
The vibrant grass concealed the bugs from sight.
The ruddy claw revealed the tasty dish.
A sound dispersed the vision right and left.
The blades were grass disturbed beneath the foot.
The living shadow things were quick and deft.
The April air dissolves with rain and soot.
Descending grains reveal the phantom field.
The smokey house collapsed beyond the fence.
An iron ear discerned the wooden yield.
A crowd of trees regained a forest sense.
A verdant math produced a strange advance.
A word for rain implied a liquid dance.

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The Clone Echo

2020-02-29T17:51:49Z

The second episode of the new Clone Wars season aired last night and was a puzzlingly severe drop in quality. "Distant Echo" feels unfinished, featuring a suspiciously similar opening shot to the previous episode and weakly choreographed action scenes. The subtextual conflict, though, between independent thought and mindless following remains interesting.

Poor Anakin (Matt Lanter) never learned how to spot early pregnancy.

A clandestine transmission between Anakin and Padme (Catherine Taber) gives the episode a strong feeling of connexion to Revenge of the Sith, something that has generally not been present in previous seasons. It makes sense given how much closer the show is drawing to the final prequel film. The very brief dialogue between Obi-Wan (James Arnold Taylor) is amusing as it suggests again how well aware Obi-Wan is of Anakin's secret romance.

My favourite scene in the episode, though, was the argument on a hilltop between the Bad Batch (Dee Bradley Baker) and Rex (Dee Bradley Baker). There was no clear good or bad side in the argument even though Rex's anger is overplayed to make him seem like he's making a mistake. The Bad Batch clearly look down on the "regs", the regular troopers, an interesting turn after how much the clone stories on the show have emphasised the value of teamwork. We know just how right the Bad Batch will prove to be in the events of Revenge of the Sith, something I suppose they won't live to see.

The attack on the droid base was so badly directed it was confusing. One scene had Anakin standing in a thin corridor while two droids gently took turns firing at him from each side. The episode's credited director is Steward Lee but Dave Filoni is supervising director. I'm wondering if the sloppiness of this episode is the first real sign of George Lucas' absence as executive producer.

The episode's conclusion, when Rex finds the mangled Echo with his mind being plundered by machines, was pretty effective, though. The always slightly offputting effect of clones interacting is always even better when a healthy one is talking to a sick or dying one. These guys must think about death a lot.

Rex thought he'd left Echo behind to die, it turns out Echo's fate was even worse than death.

Clone Wars is available on Disney+.

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The Tight Gears in a Distant Part of the Galaxy

2019-11-15T22:15:27Z

The "wormhole aliens" or "Ancients" on Farscape finally get wind of how Crichton's wormhole knowledge is being used and they're none too happy about it. In the form of Crichton's father once again, the representative of the strange aliens tracks down the Crichton aboard Talyn in the first part of an incredible two-parter.

Season Three, Episode Fourteen: Infinite Possibilities, Part I: Daedalus Demands

Another memorable season one character reappears in this episode, too--Furlow (Magda Szubanski), the mechanic from "'Til the Blood Runs Clear" to whom Crichton (Ben Browder) was obliged to sell his observations of a wormhole. This was an episode from before a "Human Reaction" so it's a little strange that Jack (Kent McCord) thinks Crichton used the Ancients' subconsciously implanted knowledge to help Furlow's unscrupulous new henchmen, Charrids, to craft wormhole technology. But, to be fair, all Jack knew was that a perfect copy of Crichton's module was making wormholes for the use of notorious psychopaths.

Rygel (Jonathan Hardy) remembers the Charrids well--they massacred Hynerians and devoured Hynerian children. So Rygel dishes out some of the same medicine he administered to Durka when Crichton and Aeryn (Claudia Black) manage to take a prisoner. Somehow the combination of Rygel's tiny stature and vindictive sadism never gets old.

Mainly this episode functions as a fantastic piece of action and suspense storytelling, courtesy of how comfortable the cast and crew have clearly become at this point. Against the backdrop of the desert world established in the season one episode, the crew of Talyn are forced to use special masks to stave off the blinding effects of local solar flares as they strategise on the go. It's a lovely, tightly woven ballet of solid characters and plotting as Crichton, Aeryn, and Crais (Lani Tupu) find themselves suddenly under siege by the Charrids. The rapport between Crichton and Aeryn in these scenes is bittersweet given what happens in the following episode but it's also the same tone that characterises many of the best episodes to come.

It's episodes like this where you can distinctly see the influence the series had on James Gunn when he made Guardians of the Galaxy. But he couldn't replicate the dynamic of people who'd spent years working together on one story, as good as the Guardians of the Galaxy movies are. Every moment works--Aeryn giving Rygel instructions on operating a gun turret, Stark (Paul Goddard) acting like Aeryn's fanboy suddenly after the events of "Meltdown" (to Rygel, "She likes me more than you!"), the romantic moments between Aeryn and John which aren't really threatened by Furlow's broad flirting with him. The roller coaster sequences in Crichton's head when he talks to Harvey (Wayne Pygram) are appropriate for this episode--it's a great ride.

. . .

Farscape is available now on Amazon Prime.

This entry is part of a series I'm writing on

Farscape for the show's 20th anniversary. My previous reviews can be found here (episodes are in the order intended by the show's creators rather than the broadcast order):

Season One:

Episode 1: Pilot

Episode 2: I, E.T.

Episode 3: Exodus from Genesis

Episode 4: Throne for a Loss

Episode 5: Back and Back and Back to the Future

Episode 6: Thank God It's Friday Again

Episode 7: PK Tech Girl

Episode 8: That Old Black Magic

Episode 9: DNA Mad Scientist

Episode 10: They've Got a Secret

Episode 11: Till the Blood Runs Clear

Episode 12: Rhapsody in Blue

Episode 13: The Flax

Episode 14: Jeremiah Crichton

Episode 15: Durka Returns

Episode 16: A Human Reaction

Episode 17: Through the Looking Glass

Episode 18: A Bug's Life

Episode 19: Nerve

Episode 20: The Hidden Memory

Episode 21: Bone to be Wild

Episode 22: Family Ties

Season Two:

Episode 1: Mind the Baby

Episode 2: Vitas Mortis

Episode 3: Taking the Stone

Episode 4: Crackers Don't Matter

Episode 5: Picture If You Will

Episode 6: The Way We Weren't

Episode 7: Home on the Remains

Episode 8: Dream a Little Dream

Episode 9: Out of Their Minds

Episode 10: My Three Crichtons

Episode 11: Look at the Princess, Part I: A Kiss is But a Kiss

Episode 12: Look at the Princess, Part II: I Do, I Think

Episode 13: Look at the Princess, Part III: The Maltese Crichton

Episode 14: Beware of Dog

Episode 15: Won't Get Fooled Again

Episode 16: The Locket

Episode 17: The Ugly Truth

Episode 18: A Clockwork Nebari

Episode 19: Liars, Guns, and Money, Part I: A Not So Simple Plan

Episode 20: Liars, Guns, and Money, Part II: With Friends Like These . . .

Episode 21: Liars, Guns, and Money, Part III: Plan B

Episode 22: Die Me, Dichotomy

Season Three:

Episode 1: Season of Death

Episode 2: Suns and Lovers

Episode 3: Self-Inflicted Wounds, Part I: Would'a, Could'a, Should'a

Episode 4: Self-Inflicted Wounds, Part II: Wait for the Wheel

Episode 5: . . . Different Destinations

Episode 6: Eat Me

Episode 7: Thanks for Sharing

Episode 8: Green Eyed Monster

Episode 9: Losing Time

Episode 10: Relativity

Episode 11: Incubator

Episode 12: Meltdown

Episode 13: Scratch 'n Sniff

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Interminable Progress of the Doctor

2019-11-03T15:29:21Z

Whenever you're slogging through some seemingly hopeless, endless task, just remember the time on Doctor Who when the Doctor was stuck in a castle for billions of years. I found myself in the mood for the Twelfth Doctor episode "Heaven Sent" last night, an episode with an impressive, almost entirely solo performance from Peter Capaldi as he tries to work out the nature of his strange, shifting castle prison.

Following the death of Clara in the previous episode, the Doctor finds himself forced to deal with that loss while also dealing with his strange, solitary predicament. It's an appropriate story for grief with the two-fold sense of isolation in the absence of a loved one and the absence of anyone who can truly appreciate the depth of feeling in the loss.

Much of the performance, of course, is monologue, though in some of it the Doctor pretends to be talking to Clara in his mind. He remarks on how no-one remembers their birth or their death, a comment, like many other comments he makes throughout the episode, that will take on another significance when the mystery of the place is revealed.

A story about living with grief becomes a story about living with living as the Doctor discovers just how difficult his task is. The fact that it doesn't drive him mad is surely a testament to his fortitude. He claims at the end of the episode to remember all the time he spent in the prison in spite of a key point in the plot being that he constantly has to perform the same investigation over and over, make the same confessions over and over, because he doesn't remember. I wonder if the memories all came back in an instant at the end, which must have been like a cannonball to the head, or if he just discovered a part of his brain where they'd been accumulating.

I like the idea of the Doctor having to expend the energy of a past self to create a new self who is very like the old self, and I like that undergoing this process seems to cause a subtle, accumulating strain. In the modern conversation about the past needing to die to make room for a future, it's nice to see a story that shows, whether that's really necessary or not, the exchange is painful and comes with profound, incalculable loss. At one point the Doctor wonders why he can't just rest, just lose this once. I can hardly blame him for feeling that way which makes his success all the more admirable.

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So Long to the Throne

2019-05-20T12:52:12Z

Well, that's it, no more Gamey Thrones, at least not on television anyway. It was a pleasant series finale, filled with fond farewells. Considering my least favourite character in the series ended up in charge of the Seven Kingdoms, it was pretty painless.

Spoilers after the screenshot

Do you suppose the image of that fateful bell that at last unmasked Danaerys' (Emilia Clarke) hypocrisy was meant to evoke the Liberty Bell? Considering the show once got in trouble for putting an image of George W. Bush's head on a pike, it wouldn't be the first time they made a reference to U.S. politics. If that's so, arguably Danaerys has become a metaphor for Trump, ironic considering how often people invoked her as an emblem of Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential campaign. But the most ironic thing of all may have been the fact that the finale, with its hints at the beginnings of social reforms and Samwell's (John Bradley) awkward remarks, praised democracy while a petition to have the whole season rewritten has gained more than a million signatures.

Considering most of those signators would prefer a season where Danaerys was portrayed in a positive light as a conquering queen, or as one who inexplicably endorsed a republic, this is a good example of why art should not be a democracy. Though, to be fair, the show hasn't been as well written since it strayed from the source material. There are, as people have complained, too many shortcuts. Bran (Isaac Hempstead Wright) becoming king being a last example, as he went suddenly from being a character with no longer any apparent desire to assert himself in worldly affairs to becoming the king of the world. There's mention, indeed, of how he had no desire for the throne yet he said himself that he came "all this way" for this sole purpose.

Thinking back on "The Bells", though, it has occurred to me that Danaerys' infamous "heel turn" may have needed to not make sense. If she had done the more logical thing and gone straight for the Red Keep and Cersei (Lena Headey) then people would probably not have been horrified by her actions, even if collateral damage had included dead children. The glory of finally killing the hated Cersei and claiming ultimate power would have pleased people too much for them to worry over trifling details. That's always been a problem with democracy--tyrants tend to be popular. I'm reminded of John Milton's 1660 pamphlet, "The Ready and Easy Way to Establish a Free Commonwealth". As the hope for an English Republic fell apart because the people of England seemed to prefer the return of a monarch, Milton in exasperation speculates that perhaps sometimes the people must be forced to make the right decision.

Maybe the best historical comparison for Danaerys would after all be Oliver Cromwell, a leader who rode a wave of popularity for an ideal as a liberator and advocate for republic who then led an infamously horrific conquest of Ireland. Benioff and Weiss might have learned a lesson from that as Cromwell's motives were fundamentally tied to religion which, like Anakin in Revenge of the Sith, helps explain his seemingly incongruous actions.

It would have been nice to dwell more on Queen Danaerys and her introspection. I also would've preferred it if Drogon had killed Jon (Kit Harrington) instead of the Iron Throne, a symbolic act I should hope we're not meant to think the dragon himself understood, otherwise we'd rightly wonder why he happily obeyed Danaerys' command to slaughter children. But this was meant to be a victory lap to revel in as the show returned characters to some of their most memorable positions--Jon at the Wall, Arya (Maisie Williams) heading off for unknown adventure at sea as she did at the end of season four. Oddly, the impression I was left with was a perhaps unintentional admission by Benioff and Weiss that the show had never really progressed beyond those points. They did the best job, really, that could be expected from average television writers but there's no way anyone could match work George R.R. Martin crafted over periods of years. I guess we'll all have to learn to read again.

Twitter Sonnet #1237

With fragile words to highest seats they're led.
As em'rald hills appeared behind a mist.
And further off, a wall forestalls the dead.
The headsman's heavy sword but rarely missed.
Discussion shades the easy road and hard.
Collected thoughts ennoble wolf and cat.
Collected eggs bequeath a hopeful card.
To Queens and knaves at large who gamely chat.
When armies tread across a winter's pond.
A broken hand may yet deserve a watch.
Succeeding reigns of children stretch beyond.
A broken wheel may yet turn round a notch.
As fire melts the metal bells are toast.
A fond adieu returns the crew to ghost.

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Kicked Out to Paradise

2019-05-18T15:14:36Z

Crichton storms off of Moya in an extraordinarily infantile mood on Farscape only to witness the big ship take off without him. But that's just the beginning of his troubles.

Season 1, Episode 14: Jeremiah Crichton

Natalie Mendoza, future star of Neil Marshall's excellent The Descent, guest stars as a potential love interest for Crichton (Ben Browder). Crichton is beefy and handsome and he's inflamed the jealousy of another beautiful man with sculpted muscles, Rokan (Kevin Copeland), who belongs to the same tribe as Mendoza's character.

We find months have passed after the cold open and during the show's theme song and Crichton seems to have been living in paradise. He has beachfront property in a beautiful wilderness and his few neighbours are attractive and friendly. You can almost understand when he's kind of rude to D'Argo (Anthony Simcoe) when the Luxan and Rygel (Jonathan Hardy) finally show up to rescue him. Still, I think Crichton's pretty childish. We see that, surprisingly, it's D'Argo who'd been Crichton's advocate back on Moya and had insisted they continue searching for him.

Zhaan (Virginia Hey) is for abandoning the search and there's discussion about her abandoning the practices and codes of behaviour of a priest. Now freed from what she, at this point, apparently regards as phoney benevolence, she seems to be testing the waters of unabashed selfishness. Even Aeryn (Claudia Black) is more outwardly interested in seeking Crichton.

A lot of synopses spoil the surprise ending of this episode so I may as well talk about it--though, if you haven't watched this one yet, consider yourself warned now.

I guess if you live long enough in a Sci-Fi/Fantasy universe you're going to inspire an entire religion, which is what it turns out Rygel has done for the people of Crichton's paradise planet. Though it was actually Rygel X--our Rygel apparently being the sixteenth of that name--who sent out colonies with hidden devices that disabled their technology to keep them on their designated worlds--the same device which is now preventing Crichton's escape. This concept of a protagonist accidentally inspiring a belief system for generations does turn up in Science Fiction now and then, my favourite example being the Doctor Who serial called The Face of Evil. Mainly what I appreciated in "Jeremiah Crichton" was seeing actual evidence of Rygel's empire, something you'd think we'd see more of, though with the show's thematic focus on people forced to contend with life away from any cultural support for their self-perceptions, it makes sense that we wouldn't see any Hynerians or Hynerian subjects.

. . .

This entry is part of a series I'm writing on Farscape for the show's 20th anniversary. My previous reviews can be found here (episodes are in the order intended by the show's creators rather than the broadcast order):

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The Old Fashioned Dragon

2019-05-13T12:40:58Z

Well, I hope we all learned a valuable lesson from last night's Game of Thrones, the penultimate episode of the series. I do appreciate audacity though it's nice when it makes sense. But there were some really impressive visuals that came along with the show finally putting some focus on the common people of King's Landing.

Spoilers after the screenshot

Last night was so close to brilliant. If it were just a little different, I'd have been willing to take back every bad thing I said about Benioff and Weiss. If you look back over the series, the signs that Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) might not be the most stable leader are plentiful. Her crucifying all the people in Meereen, her preference for letting her dragons roam around poaching livestock until they inevitably killed some people. And then there's the fact that, despite all Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) says about how Cersei (Lena Headey) having public policies that abuse the people, we never actually see any of it.

The worst thing we actually saw Cersei do was blow up the temple that was full of her enemies, the people who forced her to march naked through the streets while people threw garbage at her. Cersei, who's also been forced to watch all her children die. And yet, after last night's episode, one of the main complaints I saw on Twitter was that Cersei didn't suffer enough. Why did people root for Daenerys and hate Cersei? This is why last night's episode was almost brilliant, because it was the culmination of a hypothetical exercise in propaganda, on just how easily people are convinced to place their loyalty in one faction over an other. Daenerys was younger, prettier, and the point of view was with her in her sufferings.

But it doesn't really make sense that she'd rampage throughout King's Landing after everyone had surrendered. Even if she snapped and let her rage take over, it seems obvious the first thing she'd do was fly straight for the Red Keep and go for Cersei. Just like last week's episode, part of the explanation would seem to be that Benioff and Weiss just don't know how to write dragons. Now Daenerys flies over and above the ballistae, easily burning all the weapons that suddenly weren't as capable of as rapid a fire rate. Why didn't she do that last week?

And this is why internal logic is so important to the story. Ideally, to-day people should be having conversations about how populations can be misled and manipulated, but you can't make a point about how human nature works by just randomly making things up.

Anyway, it was nice seeing all the ground level stuff, Arya (Maisie Williams) running around, suddenly not seeming as godlike. The relentlessly desperate situation was well conveyed by director Miguel Sapochnik; it was like a cross between Skyrim and Children of Men.

I didn't quite buy that Arya would give up her quest for vengeance so easily but it was still a sweet moment between her and the Hound (Rory McCann).

And I was really sad to see Cersei die, but there was a powerful bittersweetness in her final embrace with Jaime (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau). I suppose it was the best ending for her I could've expected. And she certainly won the moral victory, if nothing else.

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First in Tyranny

2019-05-06T12:51:31Z

After the moral clarity of a battle with the Night King, Game of Thrones delivered a more dramatically fraught episode last night, "The Last of the Starks", the best episode of the season so far and my favourite since season six.

Spoilers after the screenshot

First of all, what a great party (complete with coffee, as sharp eyed viewers observed). It was fun seeing everyone drinking and relaxing, particularly the Lannister brothers and Brienne (Gwendoline Christie). Inebriation finally brings out some of Tyrion's (Peter Dinklage) old cruelty and he loudly informs everyone that Brienne is a virgin, not an observation requiring the keenest of insights. Jaime (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), fortunately, is more of a gentleman and assists his former captor in changing this lamentable state of affairs.

This ends up being a set-up for Jaime's departure for King's Landing. There are evidentially some viewers who believe he's going off to join up with Cersei (Lena Headey) again, despite that prophecy still hanging over Cersei's head about being strangled by her brother. Though that might be difficult for Jaime to accomplish with one hand. Anyway, poor Brienne.

Before he leaves, though, we get the amusing confrontation between the Lannister brothers and Bronn (Jerome Flynn) who basically uses his order to kill the two fellows as an opportunity to demand more money. I do hope we haven't seen the last of him.

It looks like this was likely the final episode for Sam (John Bradley), Gilly (Hannah Murray), and Tormund (Kristofer Hivju), who all make their farewells, which makes sense--none of them really have any stake in Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) taking the throne. Less explicable is the departure of Ghost, the dire wolf.

He's aptly named. Watching the rarely glimpsed significant plot element from season one, he's like the ghost of the Game of Thrones we'd have had under George R. R. Martin's unfettered stewardship. Seeing the beast go for no apparent reason seemed symbolic of the show bidding farewell to its book origins finally and totally. The characters say something about Ghost having no place in the south but that doesn't explain why he can't stay at Winterfell.

At the heart of last night's episode, though, was Daenerys (in another terrific outfit), who I really started to feel for. Seeing her watch Jon (Kit Harington) being Mister Popularity at the party following her foray into cleverness by making Gendry (Joe Dempsie) a lord and then Tyrion and Varys (Conleth Hill) having a sober (despite Tyrion's vigorous attempts to drink it down) debate about her viability as a ruler all contributed to a dark cloud over her future. It made the usual paradoxes of her character a bit poignantly sad--you could sense everyone's chagrin when she demanded she could use the might of her dragons to force herself as sole reigning Queen onto the kingdom as part of a project to "end tyranny", an evident and all too common contradiction Varys points out to Tyrion as gently as possible. Everyone is finally, belatedly wondering what makes Daenerys such a good bet anyway, and even if Jorah (Iain Glen) were still alive, the writers had long since lost the will or ability to use him as her cheerleader.

And then Daenerys loses one of her dragons in another stupid surprise attack from Urine--I mean, Euron (Pilou Asbaek). A fleet of ships on a beautiful day like that ought to be visible on the horizon, long before they could get into firing range. Lookouts at Dragonstone should've been able to spot them in ample time, particularly in broad daylight, to say nothing of Daenerys' own ships or the birds eye view offered by dragons. And once Euron is in range, what exactly stops Daenerys from attacking them from behind or above? Plot armour, I guess.

I don't necessarily need a plot to make sense but in a case like this it's crucial. The reason something like the Red Wedding works and something like this doesn't is that the Red Wedding made sense. We knew everyone's motives, we knew how the Starks misread the situation, we knew how it could happen logistically. All of these questions need to be answered because it's painful for people to see their favourite characters get killed. If they get killed for no reason, it's like a cheap prank pulled by the writers. If you show reasons, then it might still be painful but the viewer is forced to recognise how it reflects the way things work in reality, which ultimately makes it a cathartic experience. This is why the best part of last night's episode was the troubling questions surrounding Daenerys' fitness to rule and Jon's complete inability to keep his heritage secret.

He is such a dope. That's part of what makes him likeable, but do people really want a dope on the throne? It might be nice for a change, I suppose. But no-one really comes off as very clever on the show anymore, I think because Benioff and Weiss simply aren't very clever. Which doesn't necessarily make them bad writers, but I wonder if they were themselves aware that Tyrion was basically responsible for Missandei's (Nathalie Emmanuel) death.

Tyrion walks up to the gates alone, Cersei wants to execute him the spot but she can't bring herself to do it. She really does love her family or, more likely, she doesn't want to be seen publicly doing something so cheap and cruel. Which is exactly why Tyrion shouldn't have publicly declared that the people hate Cersei and Cersei hates the people. After that, any concession Cersei made to Tyrion would be as much as to say, "Yeah, you're right, I do hate the people." Tyrion is talking like someone so blinded by the ideology of his chosen side he longer has any ability to negotiate. This would be more interesting if Tyrion had made one useful contribution in the past three seasons, but at this point he's another character whose capabilities we're supposed to take on faith who continually fails to demonstrate them. Tyrion forced Cersei to choose between executing Missandei and losing public support then and there.

I guess it was sad to see Missandei go. Her and Grey Worm (Jacob Anderson) are both really cute though not the most exciting of characters.

Anyway, it was nice to see an episode that was predominately about thoughtful debate and negotiating emotional stakes. I'm looking forward to seeing where it goes next week.

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Too Many Kings

2019-04-22T12:56:43Z

In "A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms", last night's new Game of Thrones, it seemed like knights and kings were all over the place. Just one place--the whole episode took place in Winterfell as characters from most of the series' disparate subplots reconnected and addressed issues before the final showdown next week. It was a nice episode and any judgement of it must be tempered by a realisation of just how much material Bryan Cogman had to untangle and put into a coherent whole.

Spoilers after the screenshot

Jorah (Iain Glen) finally has a moment with that annoying little Lyanna (Bella Ramsey) that supports the fact that they're both from family Mormont. It feels more like a bit of trivia than an emotionally meaningful moment but I don't exactly expect anything emotionally meaningful from a silly character like Lyanna. Poor Jorah still feels short changed, though. Despite having a scene where he consults with Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) and mentioning that he was heartbroken about being passed over for the Hand of the Queen role, it still feels like the romantic tension that had been built up between the two in the first four seasons has just been jettisoned. It's a shame, I think Daenerys and Jorah would have much better chemistry than Daenerys and Jon (Kit Harrington).

It was kind of funny last week seeing people criticise Jon and Dany's chemistry. I kept thinking, "People are just now noticing?" Judging from the conversation between Sansa (Sophie Turner) and Daenerys, the Khaleesi still misses the man she was forced to marry who raped her on their wedding day. It's weird how no-one remembers Drogo that way, especially in this age of outrage. It goes to show how subjective all this really is.

I couldn't help thinking how nearly everything Sansa and Daenerys said to each other was, at best, not strictly accurate, particularly the part where Daenerys observed that the two of them have both done really good jobs as rulers so far. If you can call running to Littlefinger for help before betraying him and the chaotic mess that is Meereen examples of good rulership, okay. But I guess they are two politicians now.

Jon's revelation of his heritage didn't seem to sit well with Daenerys, how inconvenient he delivered it just as the Night King was spotted approaching. That's two inconvenient kings. Meanwhile, Gendry (Joe Dempsie) got a much better reaction from Arya (Maisie Williams) when he revealed he was also a secret heir to the throne. It was nice seeing those two get together.

But the most emotionally satisfying scene was probably the one that gave the episode its title; the informal fireside meeting where Jaime (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) confers a knighthood on Brienne (Gwendoline Christie). That was sweet and the same scene also had Tormund's (Kristofer Hivju) tall tale about how he got the name "Giantsbane" and ended with Podrick's (Daniel Portman) debut of a new Florence and the Machine song. Kind of an odd song for a kid like him to be singing and not one to exactly raise anyone's spirits but still a very nice moment reminiscent of Pippin singing to King Denethor in Return of the King. Which reminded me of reading an interview with Benioff and Weiss where one or the other said that the upcoming Battle of Winterfell was meant to outdo the Battle of Helm's Deep from The Two Towers. I guess we'll see next week.

This seems like a good time for me to make predictions. Just don't blame me if you lose money. Next week I think Cersei's army will show up and save everyone. I think Brienne might get killed. I suspect the climax of the season will have it looking like Cersei's definitely going to be sitting on the Iron Throne until Jon sacrifices his life which somehow will lead to Daenerys taking the throne. And Daenerys will then either end up with Jorah or Tyrion (Peter Dinklage). Probably Tyrion. I'd like either one, though I sure feel bad for Jorah. I bet Iain Glen's happy he negotiated for the "With Iain Glen" in the opening credits way back when this looked like just another HBO series.

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Everyone's Going to the Fantasy North

2019-04-15T12:44:13Z

Happy Birthday to my fellow Aries, Maisie Williams, and congratulations on having been in a pretty decent premiere to Game of Thrones, season eight last night. That's the most expensive show on television, aren't you lucky? But despite the show still moving generally away from the character drama it used to be to become more of a blockbuster spectacle, "Winterfell", the premiere, written by Dave Hill and directed by David Nutter, had several nice moments where the characters felt more like themselves than they did for the entirety of last season. And there was a nicely eerie climax.

Spoilers after the screenshot

I've come to accept my isolation in wanting Cersei (Lena Headey) to come out on top at the end of the series. Even Lena Headey has called her evil in an interview. I still think she's gotten a bad rap. It was particularly disappointing seeing her sleep with that Ramsey wannabe, Urine Greyjoy (Pilou Asbaek). Sorry, yes, I mean Euron. I promise I don't laugh every time someone says his name. Just most of the time.

I suppose I shouldn't judge Cersei too harshly. Despite working hard all her life to protect her family, all of them have either died or betrayed her, with her brother/lover Jaime (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) being in the last nail in the coffin. Though he was pretty annoying all last season and there was the time he raped her over the corpse of their son (but it wasn't supposed to be rape, according to the writers and director, it just looked that way to everyone watching). So she's bound to not be making the best choices in her current emotional state, and Urine, I mean Euron, certainly seems like that sort of bad choice.

Headey's real life ex, Jerome Flynn, appeared in the episode as the loveable cutthroat Bronn, though not in a scene with her, of course, due to the ongoing real life drama between the two. Qyburn (Anton Lesser) acts as proxy, delivering to him a crossbow so he can assassinate Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) and Jaime. Why she would entrust this job to the guy who serves her only because he was loyal to Jaime, who served him mainly because he was loyal to Tyrion, I really don't know. It's not hard to guess how that's going to end up. Maybe she deliberately chose a bad assassin because on some level she doesn't want Tyrion or Jaime dead.

Tyrion continues to be relegated to the role of chorus, basically doing little more than recapping or commenting on events in this episode, but he does have a brief reunion with his sort-of wife, Sansa (Sophie Turner). Like most of the many reunions in this episode, it only has time to touch on a few points but it was nice seeing them being polite to each other.

I really liked Arya (Maisie Williams) reuniting with Jon (Kit Harrington); it was a moment where you could see she was still the girl she used to be, she still loves poor Jon. Poor Jon, whose general job on the series remains to know nothing. She looks on him a little pityingly because he doesn't know she has superpowers yet. He's dumbfounded when the northern clans don't understand why he gave up his crown. He doesn't know how to ride a dragon, giving Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) plenty of opportunities to smirk at him in a pretty cool dragon riding sequence. And, finally, he doesn't know he's king of the whole damn world.

One day, Jon's going to get the drop on someone else. He's so overdue for it.

Arya's reunion with the Hound (Rory McCann) wasn't quite as satisfying but it would have felt kind of wrong if it were. It's been so long since I saw her with Gendry (Joe Dempsie) I don't remember much about their relationship. But she gave him my favourite line of the episode, "You don't know any other rich girls." It made up a little bit for her calling Sansa the smartest woman she knows. Did Sansa ever do anything clever? Maybe I would need to hate Littlefinger in order to see it.

I loved the moment with the kid pinned to the wall near the end, just when I was thinking, "Damn, not another fucking kid lord." I'm not sure why the White Walkers would bother sending a message, though.

Altogether, a nice enough premiere.

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The Mind's Common Black Magic

2019-04-10T18:17:53Z

Farscape contemplates acts of vengeance and violence when a sadistic wizard brings Crais and Crichton together. Zhaan struggles with her own repressed sadism which she finds she must tap into in order help Crichton as well as save the population of an entire planet.

Season 1, Episode 8: The Old Black Magic

Once again, Rygel (Jonathan Hardy) sets things in motion with his bodily fluids, though he has a much smaller part in this episode. He's sick and the rest of the crew have entered the marketplace of a nearby planet, looking for a cure. It's notable how much effort everyone puts into helping one member of the crew, which continues when the focus shifts to helping Crichton (Ben Browder) escape from the clutches of Maldis (Chris Haywood). They're already turning into a sort of family.

To psychically feed off his pain and eventually his death, Maldis traps Crichton in an illusory realm, eventually bringing in Crais (Lani Tupu) as well, snatching him from his Peacekeeper Command Carrier aboard which he's searching for Crichton. The confrontation pleases Maldis and it also gives Crichton an opportunity to try to reason with Crais.

We'd already seen in the first episode how Crais had discounted the clear evidence of his eyes and has chosen to believe Crichton is the deliberate murderer of his brother instead of the innocent cause of a terrible accident. Somehow, between periods of all out fighting, Crichton manages to spell things out even more clearly for Crais who finally seems to digest something like the reality--only to tell Crichton, "It makes no difference." His brother is dead, someone else has to die in retribution.

Maldis shows Crichton and Crais a vision from Crais' childhood, where Crais' stern father solemnly commands him to watch out for his little brother. Crais' brother's death is too significant an event, too traumatic, to have been the result of dumb luck. The Sebacean brain, like the human brain, requires more meaning than reality can supply.

I also like the subplot involving Zhaan (Virginia Hey), whose past as an anarchist we learn a little more about. A local apothecary, which whom Zhaan shares some tentative romantic chemistry before things go to hell, joins her in mustering the psychic energy to fight Maldis. He explains how she must return to a place mentally where she enjoys inflicting pain or there's no chance. I thought this was a pretty astute concept--in order to do anything well, you have to love it in some way. It makes for potent internal conflict for Zhaan.

. . .

This entry is part of a series I'm writing on Farscape for the show's 20th anniversary. My previous reviews can be found here (episodes are in the order intended by the show's creators rather than the broadcast order):

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As the Turnip Turns

2019-04-03T21:37:29Z

Keep the working class sedated and maybe they won't figure out the giant turnips they've been pulling out of the ground are being used for nefarious purposes. It's a simple socio-economic allegory but this episode of Farscape works primarily because of character interactions and, as usual, the visuals.

Season 1, Episode 6: Thank God It's Friday Again

Once again, the show returns to the subject of identity, too. Events kick off when D'Argo (Anthony Simcoe), lost in a Luxan "hyper-rage" that makes him want to kill any potential male rival in the vicinity, leaves for a nearby planet. The rest of Moya's crew track him down and find him surprisingly sedate, surrounded by a dozen or so equally sedate red skinned humanoids with white eyes.

Is that any way for a warrior to act? D'Argo explains to Aeryn (Claudia Black) and Crichton (Ben Browder), "I've been a prisoner and a fugitive longer now than I was ever a warrior. Don't you think it was time I stopped lying to myself about who I really am?" The hard truth, that the life of a prisoner has robbed him of the normal Luxan life experience that would have reinforced his identity as a warrior, is easier to face now that drugs have made life look so rosy.

Before long, Zhaan (Virginia Hey) wants in on this simple, down to Earth identity too. But maybe it's not so new as it at first seems--D'Argo tells Zhaan about how when he was a child he had two, seemingly contradictory dreams; to be a warrior, and to have a simple, quiet life. The idea of not having to fight to prove who or what you are, to live entirely by tangible, physical measures like a subsistence farmer, has an obvious appeal.

Meanwhile, Aeryn has to figure out how to cure Rygel (Jonathan Hardy) of his suddenly explosive bodily fluids, a condition certainly liable to give a fellow a new perspective on himself. Although this subplot does feature more humiliation for Rygel, it's mainly about how Aeryn finally does start to become "more" than a soldier, like Crichton promised she could be in the pilot episode. Black is good showing Aeryn's cautious pride as she figures out she can muster the intellect and discipline to solve Rygel's medical issue. In the process, Pilot (Lani Tupu) divulges to her that he's not so good at science as everyone might expect, something he only admits to her because he instinctively feels he can trust her. That's a nice bit of set up to make a future episode more painful.

The workers' overseer, Volmae (Angie Milliken), despite apparently belonging to the same species as the workers has different pigmentation--almost directly opposite with white skin and red eyes instead of red skin and white eyes. She has a great outfit, her top looking a bit similar to the vest that would later become Aeryn's regular top.

. . .

This entry is part of a series I'm writing on Farscape for the show's 20th anniversary. My previous reviews can be found here (episodes are in the order intended by the show's creators rather than the broadcast order):

Episode 1: Pilot

Episode 2: I, E.T.

Episode 3: Exodus from Genesis

Episode 4: Throne for a Loss

Episode 5: Back and Back and Back to the Future

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All You Need is the Ground Edge of the Time Loop Day

2019-03-29T17:33:10Z

Farscape indulges in a Groundhog Day style time loop plot which may remind viewers of Edge of To-morrow/All You Need is Kill in that it involves the protagonist repeatedly glimpsing his own demise (the episode predates the Japanese novel but came six years after the Harold Ramis movie). An episode with a few plot points that feel only halfway thought through, it's still pretty good.

Season 1, Episode 5: Back and Back and Back to the Future

The danger of attempting to conform to a specific cultural identity again manifests as D'Argo (Anthony Simcoe) abruptly switches from wanting to ignore the survivors of an exploding spacecraft to wanting to help them entirely because the survivors belong to a species traditionally allied with the Luxans, D'Argo's species. D'Argo, whose crime we learn in this episode was even more shameful than the killing of a superior officer, jumps at the opportunity to prove he's a good and true Luxan through and through. It's motive enough to make him ignore every piece of evidence that the survivors might be dangerous.

An older man named Verell (John Clayton) and young woman named Matala (Lisa Hensley) are the only survivors. In inspecting the vessel, Crichton (Ben Browder) is hit by a strange green energy discharge and afterwards finds himself randomly, temporarily transported to moments in the near future. At first, several of these involve Matala, whose overtly seductive manner comes off a bit like Rue McClanahan, sexually assaulting Crichton. The episode's explanation for these scenes is a little vague though not as inexplicable as a bit of information D'Argo imparts in Crichton's absence that Crichton nonetheless seems aware of when trying to convince D'Argo of his time jumping. But maybe the pleasure viewers and writer Babs Greyhosky took in Crichton's ravishment made up for any inconsistencies.

For those attracted to women who are looking for some fan service, Aeryn (Claudia Black) has a temporarily bare midriff in this episode thanks to a kind of unflattering crop top that doesn't last very long. But she also has my favourite line in the episode--in a meeting between her, Zhaan (Virginia Hey), and Crichton, Crichton, beset by another future assault vision from Matala, is compelled to leave the room, muttering, "I'm just gonna get some air." Aeryn, indignant and confused, says, "We have air in here! What is the matter with him?"

. . .

This entry is part of a series I'm writing on Farscape for the show's 20th anniversary. My previous reviews can be found here:

Episode 1: Pilot

Episode 2: I, E.T.

Episode 3: Exodus from Genesis

Episode 4: Throne for a Loss

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Of Kings and Chemicals

2019-03-25T12:41:48Z

Being a Dominar isn't all it's cracked up to be and two very different prison experiences are contrasted in the fourth episode of Farscape. It's a thoughtful, exciting episode with mud, chemical addiction, incidental spooning, and more mud.

Season 1, Episode 4: Throne for a Loss

Again, the original broadcast order is different from the proper episode order. If you're watching on Amazon Prime, which has the episodes in broadcast order, you can find the proper order on Wikipedia here. "Throne for a Loss" makes more sense as a follow-up to "Exodus from Genesis" because this way we see Rygel (Jonathan Hardy) go from a victory and personal assertion of his identity as a ruler to being captured and held for ransom because of that identity.

Thinking they're meeting some traders, the crew of Moya are instead met with an attack by the Tavlecs, a group of pirates who specialise in kidnapping intergalactic royalty. Rygel finds himself buried up to his armpits in mud in a cell next to another ruler, someone who looks a bit like Cthulhu.

Meanwhile, one of the Tavlecs is held prisoner aboard Moya where Zhaan (Virginia Hey) takes charge of him and shows him a very different experience. This is where we get to see Zhaan as a priest and we get to see how her maturity distinguishes her from the other characters. While Crichton (Ben Browder), Aeryn (Claudia Black), and D'Argo (Anthony Simcoe) spend the episode bickering about how to save Rygel--or whether they should even bother--Zhaan conducts a carefully coordinated rehabilitation of the Tavlec boy who's chemically addicted to a device mounted on the forearm which functions as gun, shield, and stimulant.

The boy writes her off as "soft and weak" to which she somewhat amusingly replies that she is soft but by no means weak--in fact, she displays greater than average physical strength, something that allows her to take control of the situation at any moment.This strength allows her to pick and choose when to administer her soft side. When he tries to shock her by showing his naked body, she replies by showing him hers, divesting the situation of the tension of repressed sexuality and also bringing another dimension to the show's blurred boundaries between psychological and biological.

Zhaan also uses moments of calculated trust, allowing the prisoner moments of freedom, to provide an environment that might allow a personality free from chemical addiction to emerge. Her methods have mixed results but this thread in the plot keeps you with her perspective and I find myself invested in her success or failure.

In the more action oriented parts of the episode, chemistry between Crichton and Aeryn is starting to become more obvious. I was amused to see how many times the two hide from gun shots in ways that just happen to look like cuddling.

. . .

This entry is part of a series I'm writing on Farscape for the show's 20th anniversary. My previous reviews can be found here:

Episode 1: Pilot

Episode 2: I, E.T.

Episode 3: Exodus from Genesis

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Pearls Too Rare for Circulation

2018-03-26T20:36:29Z

1962's Amphibian Man (Человек-амфибия) is the story of tragic love between an intensely pretty fish man and an intensely pretty human girl. This Soviet fantasy film pushes Communism a little bit but it thankfully never gets in the way of this really sweet, beautiful story.

Set in Argentina but filmed in Azerbaijan, the story begins with a girl named Guttiere (Anastasiya Vertinskaya) being menaced by sharks while swimming near her father's pearling craft. Fortunately she's rescued by a mysterious silvery being called the Sea Devil. Later, after the two meet again on land, she knows him by his own really cool name, Ichthyander (Vladimir Korenev), though she doesn't learn for some time he was the one who saved her from the sea floor.

She faces another shark in her personal life, the wealthy Pedro Zurita (Mikhail Kozakov), who is basically buying Guttiere as a wife through the debts her father (Anatoli Smiranin) owes him. Obviously there's a dig at Capitalism here, especially since Ichthyander's father, Professor Salvator (Nikolay Simonov), dreams of creating an underwater Republic where everyone is equal. He considers Ichthyander the first citizen--the boy had bad lungs when he was born so Salvator replaced them with shark gills, enabling him to breathe underwater. When Salvator's friend, a reporter named Olsen (Vladien Davydov), complimented his skill in surgery I thought it was quite an understatement.

But Ichthyander isn't interested in any high minded governing philosophies. He's young and in love--he escapes from his father's compound and wanders the streets for the first time, drawn by the siren call of jazz and folk music.

Everyone seems to be singing about calling men back from the sea, too. It's a nice effect. He braves the city traffic and angry street vendors to find love.

I love how the colour in old Soviet fantasy films looks like birthday cake. I also miss the days when filmmakers, whatever their nationality, tried to think of creative ways to show a character transitioning into a dream sequence or memory. There's a really lovely bit where Ichthyander's musing face dissolves into stars as he fantasises about swimming with Guttiere.

One could even find a faint critique of the Soviet Union in the film's presentation of the impossibility of a patently unreal Communist ideal ultimately unable to connect with the real world. There's an elegiac quality to the film's preoccupation with a nice but impossible dream.

Twitter Sonnet #1097

A whale of tea reports a heavy drop.
A starry band contains the second lake.
Around the bend the beaches must be cropped.
Like points of wings the ripples brightly bake.
A tilted lamp acknowledged torchless swords.
Impatience stops a piled dust to light.
As countless feet were walking to the boards.
The silhouette returned to set it right.
In dreams of weirder pipes the trees were free.
A lasting gum completes the trailer set.
Completed ants obliged a subbing bee.
A silver suit emerged a trifle wet.
The mem'ry grew in dreamy velvet stars.
The ocean floor would glow for distant Mars.

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The Uncommon Dream and the Less Common Dreamer

2018-03-15T01:19:19Z

Here's a deceptively simple and incredibly beautiful film, Alexandr Ptushko's 1961 romantic fantasy, Scarlet Sails (Алые паруса). It says something about the interpretive skills of Soviet authorities that something so frivolous as fantasy films were allowed to flourish under their noses, and Scarlet Sails is a startlingly subversive example. But the film's story of two people who fall in love through a shared passion for stories and dreams has greater and lovelier resonance than simply subversion.

In the early 19th century a man named Longren (Ivan Pereverzev) returns from sea to find his wife has died and his infant daughter is being cared for by a neighbour. Forced to stay at home to care for the girl, he uses his knowledge of sailing vessels to make toy ships he sells in town. But he has a hard time finding anyone who will place much value in such things as children's toys, as much as his daughter loves them. So he has a hard time making ends meet.

Meanwhile, the son of a wealthy count continually disappoints his stern father. The boy continually dodges his governess to waste time pretending to be a sea captain with a servant in the attic. A parallel is already drawn between the boy and girl as people who value fantasy over pragmatism.

In one moment with a particularly striking anti-Communist subtext, the girl is sleeping in her father's lap when a homeless man approaches and asks Longren for some tobacco. Longren says his tobacco is in his other vest and doesn't want to wake his daughter to fetch it--significantly, he won't interrupt her dream for the needs of the common man. Considering the symbolism of the common people in Soviet Propaganda films like Eisenstein's it's hard to see how this scene wasn't considered outright dangerous.

Playing with a little red sail boat in a creek one day, the girl runs across a mysterious man (Nikolay Volkov) who, charmed by her, decides to give her a prophecy--one sunny day she will marry a prince who will come for her in a ship with red sails. Years later, the now teenage girl (Anastasiya Vertinskaya) still contentedly believes she will see red sails one day, despite having to endure mockery from all the common people of the town.

The boy (Vasily Lanovoy) has grown up too and decides to leave his father's expensive home to live the life at sea he always dreamed of. You don't need to be Nostradamus to guess the trajectory of the plot from here but the crucial thing is how the characters make decisions in an effort to reach the happy ending. Both characters, particularly the boy, need extraordinary sensitivity, imagination, and restraint--and the ability to ignore the mockery of the common townspeople in order to utilise these qualities.

As always, Ptushko crafts a visually stunning film with wonderful sets lit in a powerful chiaroscuro. Longren's face at the beginning of the film when he realises his wife is dead is so quiet and stunningly effective. The whole film is available on YouTube with English subtitles here.

Twitter Sonnet #1093
for Stephen Hawking

Confirming numbers launched a blurry shot.
Arriving lifts the sails from off the mast.
A world developed from a glowing dot.
The lunar porcupines assembled fast.
Attempts to find the disk refract the line.
A useless trail of dust concludes the flight.
Within the picture depths restructured time.
A skillet claimed a rapid eggy right.
Designing grids have dipped in distant black.
Behind a fan the hands of clocks increased.
The motion carried took the minutes back.
A fractured cup returns in single piece.
A paper folded fields a larger plane.
The oceans wait in stars like drops of rain.

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Don't Cheat the Water Tsar

2018-03-13T23:29:01Z

Look carefully--even though all these doves have her face only one of them is the real Barbara the Fair with the Silken Hair (Варвара-краса, длинная коса). Alexander Rowe's 1969 film is among the many wonderful Soviet films that present the viewer with such delightfully unrestrained fantasy, relentlessly providing one bizarre image or idea after another as though they were the most natural things in the world. Barbara the Fair with the Silken Hair is a particularly manic and faintly sadistic example but this makes it seem even more like something that sprang directly from the 18th century.

Based on a fairy tale by Vasily Zhukovsky, the story concerns a hairy red-headed Tsar named Yeremei (Mikhail Pugovkin) who tries to weasel out of accidentally promising his firstborn son to Chudo-Yudo (Georgy Millyar), an underwater Tsar who almost strangles the land Tsar to death.

Like a good Enlightenment thinker, Yeremei has decided to organise and categorise everything in his kingdom so when Chudo-Yudo asks for everything in the kingdom Yeremei doesn't know about he figures he's got the upper hand on the water monster. Unfortunately, life doesn't comply with Yeremei's carefully compiled lists and, unbeknownst to him, his wife has given birth to a son, Andrey (Sergei Nikolaev). So Yeremei switches the infant with a fisherman's son, conveniently also named Andrey (Aleksei Katyshev), another subtle dig at categorisation. But maybe he wouldn't have done this if he'd known Chudo-Yudo would want the prince as husband for his daughter, the beautiful Barbara (Tatiana Klyueva).

Everyone seems to be a sorcerer underwater, except for a gang of French pirates (credited as "Most real pirates") that serve Chudo-Yudo. But Barbara dreams of living among humans and begs her nanny (Varvara Popova) to teach her to knit even though Barbara can instantly weave an elaborate tapestry with her telekinetic powers. These are usually accompanied by a groovy snap zoom to her lovely eyes flashing red and blue.

In addition to a dove, she can also turn into a mouse and a squirrel--she uses the latter form to scope out the fisherman's son when it looks like he might be a suitor. There's a lot of stuff with real animals in this film that I hope didn't involve traumatising them too much but I can't help finding really charming. Somehow in the underwater kingdom there are two bear cubs working as ferrymen who demand honey for payment; the fisherman's son has a whole bucketful but slurps it all up himself right in front them.

Barbara has several suitors who disappoint her. I really love how everyone can't seem to understand why she's not turned on by the guy whose belly is a bowl of fish.

This movie really never lets up on the weird. It's great. The whole thing's on YouTube with English subtitles here:

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Invocations of Rule 42

2018-03-12T21:41:43Z

It's hard to believe Disney's 1951 version of Alice in Wonderland is only an hour and fifteen minutes long. Not merely because it had more songs written for it than any other Disney film to date--over thirty songs!--but because it doesn't feel like a single film but like a series of short films. This is part of what's generally considered its greatest flaw, by its critics and by Walt Disney himself, that there were too many cooks in the kitchen so the film lacks a cohesive narrative. Yet it remains perhaps the most influential adaptation of Alice in Wonderland ever made and easily overshadows Tim Burton's big budget adaptation from a few years ago (and its swiftly forgotten sequel). Both Burton's and the 1951 version miss crucial aspects of Lewis Carroll's books but Burton's film goes a step further to carry a message of empowerment in direct opposition to the attitude of the original work. Frequently considered a parody of Oxford scholars and faculty of his time, Carroll's Alice books lampoon the self-seriousness and absurdity of the adult world while Burton's film ends with Alice taking a place of prominence firmly within that world. The 1951 film, for presenting a series of effective shorts, falls closer to Carroll's work by default except in scenes where an attempt is made to force some kind of arc on Alice. The "Very Good Advice" sequence, with a song that expands on a line from the book, is very good and sweet in isolation, but in the context of the film as a whole comes off as somewhat bizarre. Nothing in the Dee and Dum sequence or the Made Tea Party sequence had led us to believe that Alice was on the kind of devastating track of tragic hubris that would seem to justify a bitterly self-reflective song like that.

Alice growing in the Queen's court later on seems to have been changed in the 1951 film for a similar purpose. She eats the mushroom to grow large in an effort to escape her absurd persecutors but once she finds herself in a position of dominance she can't help but heap petty insults on the Queen: "And as for you, 'Your Majesty'--Your Majesty indeed! Why, you're not a Queen! You're just a fat, pompous, bad tempered old tyrant!" With each invective, Alice shrinks until she finishes up smaller than everyone else in the court. It's an amusing moment that clearly says something about the importance of remaining gracious when one is in a position of power but the book's version of the scene comes from a more effective idea.

Just at this moment Alice felt a very curious sensation, which puzzled her a good deal until she made out what it was: she was beginning to grow larger again, and she thought at first she would get up and leave the court; but on second thoughts she decided to remain where she was as long as there was room for her.

‘I wish you wouldn’t squeeze so.’ said the Dormouse, who was sitting next to her. ‘I can hardly breathe.’

‘I can’t help it,’ said Alice very meekly: ‘I’m growing.’

‘You’ve no right to grow here,’ said the Dormouse.

‘Don’t talk nonsense,’ said Alice more boldly: ‘you know you’re growing too.’

‘Yes, but I grow at a reasonable pace,’ said the Dormouse: ‘not in that ridiculous fashion.’ And he got up very sulkily and crossed over to the other side of the court.

Alice becomes more confident in how she speaks to the court but she remains essentially polite. The transition is more subtle and the effect resolves into Alice finding herself at her natural size in relation to a pack of cards at the moment she wakes up, the impression being similar to the nonsense of a dream slowly resolving itself into reality. At the same time, though, the idea that Alice can't help but naturally be larger than a court contrived of abstract rules and senseless rhetorical manoeuvres has a very effective subtext. It's not that Alice is trying to make herself bigger, she simply can't help it--and, of course, the idea that a young girl might be more reasonable than a card Queen obsessed with who stole the tarts directly in front of her seems inevitable.

I've written about the Alice books a lot in my blog over the years and I've sought as many film adaptations as I could. None of them really get it totally right--my favourites are the Jonathan Miller version and the Jan Svankmajer version, the former because of how much dialogue it directly imports from the books to be delivered by great actors, and the latter because of how Svankmajor digests the themes of the books to create something very much his own. But I'll always love the 1951 Disney version, mainly as an example of what a great animation studio Disney used to be. It's a kind of 2D animated storytelling you don't see anymore and watching it makes Disney's recent Forces of Destiny shorts even more depressing.

This is all kind of on my mind to-day because of the Wrinkle in Time movie which I don't plan on seeing. The trailers look like Skittles commercials and many of the reviews remind me of exactly the problem I had with Burton's Alice in Wonderland--a lot of people are saying the film has almost the opposite message to the books. I read the Wrinkle in Time books when I was a kid, but not since then, so I only dimly remember them. What I mainly remember is that, compared to other books I read at the time, they had a remarkably cold quality, and I remember a lot of impressions of the lead character alone in some kind of dark and hostile realm. Nothing like the unremarkable candy riot trailers I've seen.

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Baby's First Star Wars?

2018-03-06T23:14:59Z

Another chapter of the Star Wars saga drew to a close last night with the series finale of Star Wars Rebels. Coming from much of the same creative team, notably showrunner Dave Filoni, as the beloved Clone Wars, Rebels had its good points but suffered from greater restrictions with regards to depictions of violence due to Disney's apparent desire to market this show to kids too young for the kinds of dismemberment and killing seen in A New Hope. I'm guessing two to three year-olds? Maybe that's also why the writers were comfortable leaving so many plot holes in last night's movie length finale--consisting of two episodes, one a half hour, one over forty minutes. But many of the people who claim The Last Jedi makes no sense or is badly written also happen to be strong advocates of Rebels, a fact perhaps related to the series' much more male-centric stories. The finale certainly doubled down on that premise presenting a world where female characters are motivated by their devotion to boys who would be obnoxious or unremarkable in real life and male characters who are also driven by their devotion to other male characters. And at the centre of everyone's universe is a charmless boy named Ezra Bridger.

Spoilers after the screenshot

Being so used to Clone Wars, which achieved appeal for all ages by drawing inspiration from old adventure movies and serials, it hadn't occurred to me until recently to try to see Rebels from the perspective of what must be its only intended audience: very, very young children. In this context, Taylor Gray's performance as the character's voice actor, which I always found so gratingly whiny, might have been sympathetic to those whose primary means of communicating with other people had been crying for most or all of their short lives. Ezra's expressions of emotional and physical needs are met selflessly and tirelessly by maternal female characters, Hera (Vanessa Marshall) and Sabine (Tiya Sircar).

There'd been a couple episodes, notably in season two, that had focused on Hera, her backstory, and her motivation, written by the series' only female writer, Nicole Duboc. This stood in contrast to the multiple female writers employed on Clone Wars, none of whom were among the several carried over for Rebels. I'm not one of those people who thinks men can't write women and vice versa--I think Rey is a good character, after all. But maybe if there'd been some more gender diversity in the Rebels writing staff it would've helped the show achieve the wider perspective portrayed on Clone Wars. On the other hand, maybe a narrower perspective was precisely the point on Rebels. With Disney going all in on female protagonists in the feature films, maybe Rebels was intended to make sure they also captured the audience uncomfortable with that. There was an attempt made in season three to foreground Sabine a bit more by giving her a sword and involving her people, the Mandelorians, but she never connected the way Ahsoka did on Clone Wars. Partly this is due to Rebels' generally inconsistent character development for nearly all characters, male or female. Ezra, who began season four providing comic relief with broad Jar Jar-ish slapstick, was abruptly arced into being a canny strategist in the finale.

Here a shot, cribbing from the popular Darth Vader action sequence from the end of Rogue One, displays Ezra's deliberate theatricality to inspire terror in stormtroopers who attack the Rebel base on Lothal, Ezra's homeworld. Not that any Imperial need worry; much like the cartoon tiger on Walking Dead, these wolves can distinguish friend from foe and can take prisoners.

Some stormtroopers tossed off-screen presumably died but not so explicitly that young children will get any idea there's anything ugly about killing. The finale does feature a sequence where, Ezra's brilliant plan apparently not accounting for the possibility of Thrawn (Lars Mikkelsen) using the firepower of his Star Destroyers, many civilians are probably killed by turbolaster fire, though no deaths are shown. The only character who definitely dies is one of the aged clone troopers (Dee Bradley Baker).

These characters, who were the titular clones of Clone Wars, are brought in to help the Rebels in their attack on Lothal's Imperial base along with another carry over from the old series, the pirate Hondo (Jim Cummings), who now expresses a zealous devotion to Ezra. Why this shady character, who seems a prototype for Benicio del Toro's character in Last Jedi, has suddenly found himself so committed to the Rebel cause isn't explained. Maybe it's something Disney has left open for tie-in media. Many of the plot holes in last night's episodes made me wonder if the company has taken a page from EA, the video game company who has gained notoriety lately by generating profits in Star Wars video games via charging for extensive downloadable content. Any plot hole or unexplained element could be a canon book or comic Disney can sell.

A good candidate for such tie in media would be the bounty hunter Ketsu Onyo, Sabine's former partner introduced in season one. Voiced by Gine Torres, she's a very welcome boost to the show's otherwise mostly lacklustre acting talent. She's brought in for the finale with even less explanation than Hondo, her conflicted feelings about the cause Sabine had subscribed to apparently having been tidily resolved at some point.

The finale also brought back Mart Mattin (Zachary Gordon). A character introduced in a second season episode with peculiar emphasis, intended to be a charming rogue type, he was then oddly shunted to a non-speaking background part for season four until the last episode when he's sent off to enlist the aid of the giant space squids Ezra had befriended in season two.

How Mart is able to lure the beasts to Lothal without Ezra's Force ability to communicate with the animals is left unexplained.

Ezra, meanwhile, has delivered himself to Thrawn in exchange for Thrawn holding fire on the civilian population. Ezra derides Thrawn for stealing art he didn't "earn", an ironic statement coming from Ezra who started the series as a street thief and who is currently in league with the pirate Hondo. Thrawn then takes Ezra to the hold of the Star Destroyer where there's stashed a fragment of the Jedi Temple which in a previous episode had allowed Ezra to reach back in time to save Ahsoka Tano. Here Emperor Palaptine appears via hologram, voiced by Ian McDiarmid himself, who's so good you almost don't notice what he's doing doesn't make any sense. It seems similar to Palpatine's tempting of Anakin to go to the Dark Side by promising the power to save Padme from death but no connexion to the Dark Side is made when the Emperor shows Ezra a portal through which his dead parents can be brought back to life. What exactly was the plan? "Phase 1: Get Ezra on the ship. Phase 2: Show him how he can resurrect his parents. Phase 3: Something something Dark Side." In any case, Ezra refuses to save them because "letting go" is more important than saving their lives. I'm not sure how the two to three year-old target audience would take that.

In the end, the show moves forward in time to after Return of the Jedi when we see Hera has given birth to a child she'd conceived with Kanan. Apparently she and Kanan had had sex before she told Kanan she loved him. Was Disney promoting the idea of a kinky, purely physical relationship between Kanan and Hera? Well, given the target audience I suppose it's more likely we're to assume a Loth Stork delivered the baby.

Ahsoka shows up with no explanation as to what she'd been up to during the original trilogy (something else for potential tie-in media) and she and Sabine, who finally has a decent haircut, rush off to find Ezra, wherever he is, now that the war is over, fervently clinging to the belief that he's survived somehow. It's too bad Lorca didn't have friends like that on Star Trek: Discovery. Personally I hope they only find that Thrawn is still alive.

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A Rebel's Journey Through Time

2018-02-28T00:59:25Z

One thing was made clear by last night's two new Star Wars Rebels episodes--the show is a lot better looking than it was in season 1. It looks about as good now as Clone Wars looked in its last couple seasons so I guess Dave Filoni finally convinced Disney it was worth spending money on a show like this. If only Rebels had the same calibre of creative talent when it came to writing.

Spoilers after the screenshot

I watched the "Rebels Recon" followup interview package that went with these two new episodes. Dave Filoni, showrunner on Rebels and nominally on Clone Wars, wrote and co-directed last night's two episodes and in the interview segment he talks about how the "Mortis Gods" featured in the episodes were created by George Lucas for a story arc on Clone Wars. Not my favourite arc from Clone Wars as it happens. They look pretty cool and I like design of the mural but I don't really like the vaguely Catholic Holy Trinity aspect of the Mortis Gods. It is, however, another example of the show leaning on teases of things Lucas came with to try to string us along with Ezra's (Taylor Gray) story. An even better example is when Ezra enters the cave, hears a bunch of soundclips from all over Star Wars history, and then saves Ahsoka Tano (Ashley Eckstein) from her duel with Vader via a time portal on what looks like a great Mario Kart map.

So they actually came up with an explanation for that lame jump in time at the climax of season 2. I only wish Ezra had reached further back to when Ahsoka had her original face. I'm glad she's alive, hopefully in her next incarnation she'll look like herself. There was a little while where Rosario Dawson was rumoured to be up for a life action Ahsoka, something I whole-heartedly endorse. There is a real physical resemblance and Dawson is one of the most under-appreciated actors of the past thirty years.

Anyway, of course Ahsoka being there is all about Ezra and her teaching him how to let go of Kanan. I guess if Ezra's voice didn't annoy me so much, and I wasn't so bitter about how Ahsoka's been relegated to an advisor role on this series, I could've found the moment poignant. Ezra's one of two elements that Filoni seems to consider a point of deep personal expression, the other being those Loth Wolves.

If only they didn't look exactly like the wolves from Princess Mononoke, something I'm far from alone in noticing. It invites a really unflattering comparison for Rebels. So far they've been transport and quest givers on Rebels, nothing like the truly fascinating dramatic conflict from the Miyazaki film about the need for humanity to exploit nature for survival. But last night's episodes of Rebels did introduce an interesting Imperial character voiced by Malcolm McDowell.

Until he inexplicably had a stormtrooper knock Sabine (Tiya Sircar) in the head I liked how he was actually trying to win her over instead of immediately going for the slobbering Nazi interrogator thing. Though here, as I have since the beginning of the series, I found Sabine's attitude about art insulting. In season one we were supposed to take her Sixth Doctor colour palette as a sign that she was just so creative and rebellious, and now she says that everything about art has meaning, like it's a secret code only artists can read. I did like how the score seemed almost to be quoting Raiders of the Lost Ark when she and Ezra were looking at the mural, though.

Ian McDiarmid returned as Palpatine, the Emperor, last night, which was great, though his moments felt a little deflated. Being absent for the whole series, and absent in Rogue One, has lent him some mystique that felt kind of squandered by him showing up to have a chat with McDowell's character. And the idea of him caring so much about Ezra seemed ridiculous.

This moment at the end with Ezra and Hera (Vanessa Marshall) was nice, though. Really pretty. I hope Ezra dies early on next week so I can enjoy these visuals without him around. I hope his eyebrows fall off when dies, like that guy from FLCL.

Twitter Sonnet #1088

A quarter candle's lit for later ghosts.
The fire shades support a nymph and swain.
Into the ceiling reach the leafy hosts.
A deep above, a pitch as blood contained.
A string denotes the brow against the paint.
A struggling wind revived the ancient drapes.
Recumbent wrists in darkened heat were faint.
The silhouettes in plaster burned their shapes.
The blurring branches blend behind a tree.
Tornadoes smaller than the dream approach.
The second leaf in ev'ry bush can see.
A watchful ceiling cloud amassed reproach.
A shadow's budget broke the paper dogs.
A velvet fire's stitched to velvet logs.

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To Wakanda, a Dream Country

2018-02-18T20:51:51Z

I didn't honestly think I was going to like 2018's Black Panther. The trailers didn't look good, filled with lousy cgi, and I thought Chadwick Boseman's portrayal of Black Panther was the dullest part of Captain America: Civil War. But the film I saw on Friday was pretty enjoyable, largely due to an excellent supporting cast, particularly Lupita Nyong'o, Danai Gurira, and Letitia Wright. The story's central political conflict, though it owes a lot to the first Thor movie, was also engaging and provided an interesting commentary on contemporary American politics.

This is the shot I especially hated in the trailer. It's so clear every grouping of people on all the little outcrops aren't really there. The movie's shots of Wakanda, the fabulous secret high tech city, generally made me long for the gritty realism of Coruscant in the Star Wars prequels. The film would've benefited a lot from some actual African shooting locations.

I really don't understand why this film was shot entirely in Atlanta and South Korea. It wasn't long ago that Mad Max: Fury Road, a film shot largely in Namibia, was a smash success. My guess is Disney's insurance wouldn't cover African locations. The 1950s and 60s were filled with Hollywood films with real African locations, from 1950's amazing King Solomon's Mines to John Huston's classic The African Queen starring Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn. Ironically, the period so associated with soundstage exteriors has a more authentic location feel than this 2018 film.

But Black Panther is really a fantasy about the United States. Michael B. Jordan is another excellent member of the supporting cast, playing the villain Killmonger. His rise in the Wakandan government, overthrowing the anointed ruler T'Challa (Chadwick Boseman), will remind more than a few people of Donald Trump for Killmonger's ruthlessness and for the way the mechanisms of government and tradition compels people to automatically follow him. In fact, Boseman himself has pointed out similarities to Trump's election. To be fair, though, Killmonger seems like he's more capable of empathy than Trump. I suppose it's a bad sign when a guy named "Killmonger" comes off as more sensitive and altruistic than the U.S. president.

But the resemblance adds an interesting dimension to a plot otherwise strongly reminiscent of Kenneth Branagh's Thor. Arguably, both films are drawing on the Edgar/Edmund subplot from King Lear. One could very naturally give Edmund's "Why bastard?" speech to Killmonger, who is made T'Challa's illegitimate brother for the film:

Thou, Nature, art my goddess; to thy law
My services are bound. Wherefore should I
Stand in the plague of custom, and permit
The curiosity of nations to deprive me?
For that I am some twelve or fourteen moonshines
Lag of a brother? Why bastard? Wherefore base?
When my dimensions are as well compact,
My mind as generous, and my shape as true
As honest madam’s issue? Why brand they us
With base? With baseness? bastardy? Base, base?
Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take
More composition and fierce quality
Than doth within a dull stale tired bed
Go to the creating a whole tribe of fops
Got ’tween asleep and wake?

Oddly, Boseman's uninteresting performance actually makes him seem a bit more like royalty. Listening to his flat line deliveries reminded me of listening to Prince Harry and thinking, "This guy's supposed to be important?" It's also not unlike how Thor was meant to be sort of a good natured but simple minded fellow in the first movie before filmmakers decided to emphasise Chris Hemsworth's comedic talents. When the much better trained and charismatic Killmonger challenges T'Challa, a lot of the tension comes from how difficult it is to see why T'Challa deserves to be king instead of Killmonger. I would have really liked if the film included montages contrasting the upbringing of Killmonger and T'Challa, showing how Jordan struggled on the streets of Oakland before beginning the hard military training that led to him becoming a Navy Seal while T'Challa was doing . . . whatever a Wakandan prince is brought up doing. One suspects it's nowhere near as rough.

Since Wakanda doesn't exist, its isolationism and hoarding of its superior technology and resources as a country that was never colonised makes it more reminiscent of the United States than any African country and Killmonger's plight, coming from an impoverished lower class, gives his conflict with the Wakandan elite a resonance more like the poor working class who voted for Trump as, Michael Moore observed, a "fuck you" gesture to the paralysed Washington political machine.

The first part of Black Panther is a bit tedious, though, concentrating on ceremony and airless banter, like that moment in the trailer where T'Challa insists he doesn't "freeze". This stuff is finally replaced by a fun film when Letitia Wright is introduced as Shuri, T'Challa's sister, a tech genius who provides her brother with gadgets in a role very much like Q in the James Bond films.

Her teasing him drew the first genuine laughter from me. This is followed by the other highlight when Okoye (Danai Gurira), head of Wakanda's female militia, and Nakia (Lupita Nyong'o), a spy for Wakanda and T'Challa's love interest, join the Black Panther for his mission to South Korea, their personalities easily eclipsing his. I would so love to see a buddy cop movie starring Gurira and Nyong'o. Throughout the rest of the film, any time none of these three women are onscreen, I found myself impatiently waiting for their return. More than anything else, they're the ones that truly make this movie work.

Twitter Sonnet #1085

A line in straw presents the only shield.
The sensors broke upon beholding stars.
The rabbits green dispersed in barley field.
The wind contorts the wheat to drying cars.
A waiting ghost returns the mind to dawn.
A sprinkling starred the darkened forest edge.
Collected hues combine chromatic brawn.
The boulder 'neath the house is called a ledge.
A massive cursor moves the mouse anew.
In shapely time the pear's too like a watch.
Ordained for fast repast the snows accrue.
A dip between the wire hills was notched.
A paper rights itself on inky tracks.
The shelling front prepares for turtle backs.

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The Greatest Worlds

2018-01-24T22:40:13Z

It's been over ten years since I last read a book by Ursula LeGuin, who passed away two days ago. So I can certainly say her works linger in my mind long after reading them, certainly more than many other authors I read over a decade ago. I first read her over twenty years ago, though, in high school when I encountered Wizard of Earthsea which compelled me to seek out Left Hand of Darkness, then The Dispossessed, a few other novels in her Hainish Cycle, and then The Lathe of Heaven as well. Looking over excerpts and summaries to-day I would credit LeGuin with teaching me at a young age the value of understanding other perspectives, of appreciating the complex factors that form a human personality. Whether in her works of fantasy or her works of science fiction, a consistent virtue in her work is the fascinating exploration of people and how and why they think as they do.

Looking over several quotes from her at Wikiquote, I see many keen and insightful statements, some of them almost reminding me of Oscar Wilde.

As a fiction writer, I don't speak message. I speak story. Sure, my story means something, but if you want to know what it means, you have to ask the question in terms appropriate to storytelling. Terms such as message are appropriate to expository writing, didactic writing, and sermons—different languages from fiction.
The notion that a story has a message assumes that it can be reduced to a few abstract words, neatly summarized in a school or college examination paper or a brisk critical review.

And this is absolutely true. What I learned about the value of understanding other perspectives didn't come from LeGuin saying to me, "You need to understand other perspectives!" but by taking the time to invite me into another time and place and showing me how they work. The fact that the books are deeply enjoyable is related to this.

There's something frantic and inherently fearful when people cling to messages over a portrait of experience. As LeGuin also said, "The artist deals in what cannot be said in words. The artist whose medium is fiction does this in words." It reminds me of Oscar Wilde again, saying that art is "the perfect use of an imperfect medium." It's precisely in the lack of precision, the dovetailing of impressions of visceral experience and human relationships, that we get to something that truly speaks to human nature. Partly it's simply the virtue of "showing not telling," partly it's that people naturally respond better to the companionable tone of storytelling over the rebuking and restrictive tone of the prescriptive lecture or sermon. When Ged goes on his journey in The Wizard of Earthsea, it's not a story about how we should be more like Ged but simply about who Ged is and what we do with that is entirely up to us.

The world seems especially in need of more voices like LeGuin's and I'm very sorry to see her go.

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The Lacked Knight

2018-01-02T17:34:23Z

If you're looking for a film that embodies many of the negative preconceptions people might have about old movies, 1954's The Black Knight fits the bill in a lot of ways. A big Hollywood star who couldn't be bothered to do much work; a screenplay lacking any sense of research, heavily reliant on well-worn formula; a pro-Christian bias that seems there more by default than any deeply held feeling. The Black Knight does have some beautiful location footage and a great supporting cast that includes Peter Cushing, Patrick Troughton, and Andre Morell but in too many ways it feels like it has less than half of what it needs to be a real movie.

Alan Ladd stars as John, castle smith to the Earl of Yeonil (Harry Andrews) in Arthurian England. John decides to become a knight on the recommendation of his friend, Sir Ontzlake (Morell), after the Earl banishes John when the smith's love for his daughter, Linet (Patricia Medina), comes to light.

This movie is not an example of Alan Ladd at his best. I guessed that he must not have been present for any of the location shots--every scene set in the woods has his character wearing a face concealing helmet with an occasionally very obviously process shot close-up of Ladd thrown in.

Then I read on the Wikipedia entry this quote from Donald Sinden who had a dressing room near Ladd's during the film's production: "(Ladd) brought in his entourage a double-cum-stunt man who bore an uncanny resemblance to him. The double did all the long shots, most of the medium shots and even appeared in two-shots when the hero had his back to the camera. The 'star' only did eleven days work in the entire film." And as for the few times you do see Ladd, I couldn't agree more with a critic quoted on Wikipedia as saying Ladd played the part "like a tired American businessman prevailed upon to take the lead in a revival of Merrie England." The movie clearly aims to be in the Errol Flynn or Tyrone Power mould of exhilarating swashbuckler but Ladd doesn't muster an ounce of the requisite pluck.

Adopting the persona of the Black Knight for reasons not entirely clear while searching for proof that Sir Palamides (Cushing) conducted a raid on Yeonil's castle disguised as a Viking, John seems to be aping Zorro a little bit. Palamides is a Saracen, a real character from Arthurian legend, though even Thomas Malory doesn't portray the Arabian knight as such a two dimensional villain. But he's still one of the film's high points for Cushing's quietly intense, fiery performance. His dialogues with the film's other villain, King Mark (Troughton), are great fun to watch.

Another character actually from Arthurian legend, the film takes a lot more liberties with King Mark, rendering him a crypto-Pagan complete with a secret headquarters for human sacrifice at Stonehenge. This leads up to a big set piece where the need for a "flaxen haired" sacrifice bizarrely calls for Medina to wear a blonde wig, presumably meant to be a scalp.

The cheesy Stonehenge set is okay but it pales in comparison to several shots of real castles in Wales and Spain used for the film.

Though the movie has no idea how things worked in mediaeval castles--Palamides storms the Earl's castle in the beginning without any resistance due to a total, inexplicable lack of guards.

The movie has a lot of great location shots, including a really cool joust between Ontzlake and John in a wood with little ground foliage.

And Andre Morell, the weirdo, actually showed up for work at the location shots. He looks and acts every inch the romantic mediaeval knight. How nice it would've been if he were the lead.

Twitter Sonnet #1070

In placid jello faces light emerged.
Unshaking mass engulfed the glassy ice.
In time the many feet in lines converge.
The splitting sand collects the movers twice.
Behind a pallid flame the floor descends.
A novel sun awakes in vanished eyes.
Through hers on tape a biker's ghost suspends.
The mountain grants the mice a thousand tries.
Eleven days a double knight assayed.
A speeding station filled electric clouds.
No faster thing than static posts invade.
About the dust there grew the dizzy crowds.
Eleven lads escort the active noon.
Surprising breakfasts greet them on the moon.

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The Amphibious and Amorphous

2018-01-01T02:53:54Z

Reinterpreting classic monster stories as sympathetic portrayals of misfits is nothing new but Guillermo del Toro reaches new heights with 2017's The Shape of Water. An unabashed ode to Creature from the Black Lagoon and, to a lesser extent, King Kong, The Shape of Water teases out the hints of erotic and romantic subtext in those films into a lovely, full blown fantasy romance film.

Arguably Del Toro's most political film, even more than The Devil's Backbone or Pan's Labyrinth, the action is set in 1962, rather than Black Lagoon's 1954. The civil rights movement, the Red Scare, and the Cold War are all integral aspects of the film's backdrop and occasionally its plot. The film's two central protagonists are a mute--but not deaf--woman named Elisa (Sally Hawkins) and a gay man named Giles (Richard Jenkins). Their thematic connexion to the "Amphibian Man" (Doug Jones), trapped in a lab by the white, Christian, heterosexual men of the U.S. government is not ambiguous. Giles agrees to help Elisa rescue the creature after he's cruelly rejected, in an effectively brutal scene, by a man in a cafe. He understands then why Elisa might feel some camaraderie with the beast.

Thankfully, the movie doesn't simply render the monster a thoroughly safe and passive version of the Gill Man from Creature of the Black Lagoon. One scene that will be especially unpleasant to cat lovers shows the Amphibian Man is, like the Gill Man, a wild animal capable of killing with little discrimination. I also liked that Giles was surprisingly understanding about it. Jenkins is very good in the film as the often put upon and mildly exasperated voice of reason.

Creature from the Black Lagoon is already a film that puts much more blame on human arrogance than on any ideas the monster might have. The true villain of the 1954 film is arguably the one scientist who wants to kill or capture the creature for his own glory. The other humans are pretty vocal about not wanting to kill it and wanting to allow it to remain in its natural habitat. I watched Creature from the Black Lagoon again last night and I was surprised how many little things Del Toro references in Shape of Water. Even the odd idea that study of the Gill Man can somehow be utilised for space travel. Like the male protagonist of Black Lagoon, a Russian spy working under the name of Hoffstetler (Michael Stuhlbarg) in Shape of Water voices the assertion that it would be more valuable to study the creature alive than dead. His adversary is Colonel Strickland played by Stuhlbarg's Boardwalk Empire co-star Michael Shannon.

Shannon's great talent for playing violent men is further emphasised by two severed figures that were reattached early in the film. They become more and more discoloured over the course of the film and work nicely both to add to tension and to add the sense that the colonel himself is becoming monstrous.

Doug Jones is fantastic as usual as the Amphibian Man and his make-up and costume pay homage to the great Gill Man costume with the addition of more expressive eyes. But it's Sally Hawkins as Elisa at the heart of the film.

Quite fearless in scenes depicting her masturbating in the bath, Hawkins helps the film express fully the erotic undertones of Black Lagoon by providing more intimacy with the female protagonist's internal motives and needs. Her vulnerability and determination in her identification with the monster are also beautifully expressed resulting in a surprising, and surprisingly effective, musical number.

Octavia Spencer plays a kind of a stock character as Elisa's friend and coworker. Spencer's comedic timing is nice enough but Colonel Stickland's casual racism talking to her doesn't quite make up for her unimaginative character. Her and Elisa being the cleaning women adds kind of a nice remark on classism, though.

It almost goes without saying, but really, it's worth repeating--the film is visually stunning.

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