CV Rick's Reviews

A Good Guy Movie for Macho Men

The Boondock Saints is rich with symbolism and pop culture disdain, while making a statement that things have gotten out of control with a film that got out of control. The irony is steep, intention and not, throughout the film and the backstory.

Up front and center, I liked the movie. It ranks with the better films in a genre that arguably owes homage to Reservoir Dogs. The Tarantino elements are rich and clear, but not ripped off - a clear distinction for me. Duffy created a wild picture full of violence, but where he parted ways with Tarantino was in the significance of life in South Boston. These people are victimized by crime and shoddy policemanship and every day is an exercise in futility. Duffy brings to the screen the drama that answers the question, "what would you do about it?"

The brothers, two tough Irish kids have enough when assaulted and nearly killed by pissed off Russians. Something snaps inside them, something religious and right, something straight out of the worst war of heaven. They take this religion and make it a religion of violence, exacting revenge against the mob for injustices done to every Irish mother and daughter, son and father, throughout blue-collar Boston. It's not realistic, but it's realism, the dream that tough kids wanting to make a difference share throughout our violent society.

Where Duffy really makes his mark, however, is in the freedom of artistic excess he portrays. The FBI agent is gay and crossdresses. The funny man hates his mob bosses and tells particularly unfunny jokes. The cops are clowns, but not intentionally, it's just a system they don't think they can make a difference in. The gags aren't funny so much as ironic, like the brothers falling through a ceiling into a mob meeting, hanging upside down accidentally tangled in ropes, yet still succeed in their mission. Mission Impossible meets Hannah Barbara with an R-rating and blood splatter.

Irish Catholicism seeps through the pours of these brothers and this film, centering on cathedrals and confessionals, and a prayer that guides their murderous ways.

And shepherds we shall be
For Thee, my Lord, for Thee
Power hath descended forth from Thy hand
That our feet may swiftly carry out Thy command
So we shall flow a river forth to Thee
And teeming with souls shall it ever be
In nomine Patri, et Filii, et Spiriti Sancti

I only regret that Duffy destroyed the chances for this film to be legendary by biting the hand that feeds, so as to speak. He could've had it all, and it could've been to our benefit.

C'est La Vie.

- CV Rick

A Caricature of Bravery

 

Frank Miller's graphic novel come to life on the big screen doesn't live up to the promise of Sin City.

The art direction is phenomenal and the Spartans, led by King Leonidas (Gerard Butler), are imposing physical specimens of perfection - ripped abs, blazing scars, and piercing eyes. The scenes where the Spartans line up like models at a fitness photo shoot are imposing. The scenes of brilliantly choreographed combat are equally memorable, filling the screen with beautiful brutality, and images of desperate courage. It looked like the living comic book of a heroic tale when viewed without the story and when viewed in absence of the on-screen caricatures of the Persian Army.

That's where the problems begin. Reality, in this case, is more amazing than fiction. The movie pitted depravity against character by making modern moral judgments apply to ancient times. It presupposes that homosexuality and gender confusion is such a feared 'condition' that the audience will side with the Spartans who are free of its taint. When truth be told, the Spartans engaged in the deplorable acts of incest and pedophilia to an extent at least as great and perhaps greater than the Persians and that sexual identity wasn't part of the issues of battle during that time. Frank Miller rewrote history to make a modern-day bigoted comment in a completely inappropriate manner.

Why wouldn't the truth stand as banner to the bravery of the 300 of Thermopylae? The truth that the Persians as invaders needed to be stopped and the Hot Gate, a small pass from the beach into Sparta was the best defensible position is dramatic enough. There is no doubt that King Leonidas undertook one of the most inspired, brilliant, and courageous last stands in the history of warfare. There is no doubt that the Spartans were the most well-trained soldiers of the time.

Knowing these truths there was no perceivable reason, other than propaganda, to politicize the war so much. The council wasn't against Leonidas, the army hadn't stood down, the citizenry hadn't given up hope. He delayed the bulk of Xerxes forces long enough for the rest of the army to assemble, get into position and fight against the invaders. He stood his men in front of the juggernaut and laid down his and their lives for his people and his lands. He led by example and died with honor, not backstabbed by councilmen with agendas filling some imaginary role substitution Miller created to make an anti-peace statement deriding our own present-day Congress. The Persians were human and they didn't force any more slaves into their war than the Greeks conscripted on their own side. The Persians weren't transgendered freaks and demons. Dehumanization of one's enemy is a propagandist's trick, not used by great chroniclers of which Miller is not.

The individual historical inaccuracies are many - too many for this short review. The propaganda is thick and sickening, a movie made as a modern-day recruiting film, not a work of art or a worthy historical lesson, even dramatized as it could've been.

The Art Director should be given royalties, but the director and writer ought to be fired.

- CV Rick

The Speech that Changed America

Set amidst the backdrop of the Lincoln Memorial, Martin Luther King Jr. gave the speech that changed the social dynamic of America.  I Have A Dream, he repeated between refrains of equality and social justice.  From that speech erupted a movement – his dream become their dream and now it's our dream and closer to reality than ever before.

I've heard the speech before, and I've read the speech, but seeing it in its setting was a challenge to our basic institutions.  It was a challenge to Lincoln himself.  A challenge in oration, a challenge in tone, and a challenge to change America more

Peter Jennings narrates the dvd and it incorporates raw footage from marches and protests and concludes with a tribute to the man, murdered for his beliefs.  Three hundred thousand people stood before Dr. King that Summer day in 1963 but that's only a fraction of a fraction of those who have been touched by his powerful cadence.  It's both poetry and sermon.  I'm better for having watched it.

- CV Rick, February 2008

Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace - Well Named

I feel remiss that I didn't read this book when it came out six years ago, but I'm glad I finally read it. Mr. Vidal brings some emotional life into what is normally a lifeless policy-wonk issue and I can't stress how important it is to absorb his message – that we've completely given ourselves to a foreign dictated by military industrial interests.  He emphasizes that our dealings around the world and at home are with people, and dehumanizing them serves no one's interests. 

In a particularly long study, the author introduces us to Timothy McVeigh the Oklahoma Murrah Building bomber.  I was in downtown Oklahoma that day and lost people to that tragedy, so it was hard for me to understand that Vidal wasn't condoning his actions or justifying them, but instead showing the reader that McVeigh had human motivations to do that horrible thing. Understanding, on their own terms, if you will.  It shows that we can sit down and learn from people when it comes down to a one on one because humans can relate at some level with every other human. Randy Weaver, David Koresh, and even Osama bin Laden have motivations that can be understood and when those motivations are understood, it's possible to reach those people before it escalates into violence, murder, or tragedy. 

Vidal takes us back to 1947 when Dean Acheson advocated scaring the hell out of the American people in order to justify a wartime military budget and in turn pumps corporate money from those interests into the political system, essentially buying elections.  He tells the story of a foreign policy out of control and nonsensical where money trumps humanity every time.  He tells the story of an empire driven by it's privatized industrial military without controlling it.

What is America “doing” in the name of its citizens, under the cover of democracy?  Vidal publishes pages of aggressive military intervention around the globe and posits the question – have we made things better, or worse?

Finally what Vidal does is ring a clarion call to Americans to stand up and ask questions – hard, probing questions.  Don't let the media run interference and don't let accountability be shirked.  It used to be our government and it's time to take it back.

- CV Rick, February 2008

Best Courtroom Sequence in Fiction

An attorney friend of mine recommended this book as the most accurate portrayal of courtroom drama and true legal arguments in fiction. For him most other trial fiction (Grisham, in particular) is staged b.s. So, I picked this book up to give it a go and I wasn't disappointed.

The plot summary can be found anywhere (or in the movie), so I'm just going to dive into what really worked for me. It was the untrustworthy narrator. I felt disconcerted throughout the book because I couldn't tell whether the narrator, the protagonist Rusty Sabich, was an advocate for the reader by telling the truth, or whether he was carefully constructing his own version of the events in an elaborate lie that would only unravel near the end. It's a technique reminiscent of Philip K Dick's masterful narrative manipulations in science fiction, but this is the best use of that technique I can remember reading in modern mainstream literature.

The courtroom arguments were also compelling. Turow's knowledge of the law as a former U.S. Prosecutor comes through brilliantly in both those courtroom sequences and in the political intrigue always flowing behind the scenes, causing tension and making everyone's life a permanent roller coaster ride of insecurity.

This book hooked me like the movie never could.  I recommend it highly.

- CV Rick

Cyberpunk is Still Fresh

William Gibson burst onto the scene with slick writing and a dismal view of the future. His protagonists were all flawed and the endings resulted in bittersweet Pyrrhic victories - a world were pain begets pain. Mostly set in the criminal underground or the criminal corporate world at war, he explored the darkness in his future worldview and the darkness within each of us.

What I liked best about this collection is what I like best about all of Gibson's work, the fluid prose. Like liquid poetry injected directly into the consciousness it raises your pulse and quickens the anticipation. He's brilliant at creating a mood, a true master.

The highlight of this anthology was the title story, Burning Chrome. To describe it with words like octane and infused would be to weaken its impact, a pure rush of language that conveys the story of desire: wealth, sex, life. There may be no better story in the genre than Burning Chrome.

Of the other stories, Johnny Mnemonic and Hinterlands stood out as exciting rides of fictional craziness. Hinterlands was half-horror, half cyber, and full out corporate espionage. Johnny Mnemonic foreshadowed Neuromancer with the introduction of Molly and the ill-fated Johnny run cross of the true corporate power in Gibson's stories, the Yakuza.

The rest of the collection is a fine sampling of Gibson's writing.  Some better than others.

The following is the contents:

"Johnny Mnemonic"
"The Gernsback Continuum"
"Fragments of a Hologram Rose"
"The Belonging Kind"
"Hinterlands"
"Red Star, Winter Orbit"
"New Rose Hotel"
"The Winter Market"
"Dogfight"
"Burning Chrome"

- CV Rick

A Good Series Opener

It's quite an ordeal for me to begin a seven-book series with so much on my reading list.  But I'd heard so many good things about this series so I picked up Hidden Empire and it with much promise that I'll return to the series for the second volume. 

Kevin J Anderson sets up a universe with a lot of good ideas.  The coolest of these ideas is the Theron green priests of Theroc, an order of futuristic druids who can communicate telepathically through the worldtrees – instantaneous across space.  The largest of these ideas are the hydrogues, a race of advanced beings who live inside of gas giant planets.  And the common, human ideas, like the rivalry between the oppressive government – The Terran Hanseatic League – and the rogue gypsy Roamers who have a near monopoly on the fuel for starships. 

In Anderson's universe the humans look to the alien Ildirans as their trading partners and technological superiors, until an idea to turn gas giants into stars awakens the hydrogues to their presence. Then both the Ildirans and the humans are in danger.  It seems to be a one-sided war and everyone's at risk. 

It's a decent start, but so complex that this first book felt a lot like a long set-up and less like a cool, good hook.  I'll read the second one, and I'll expect it to be a well-told story, more gripping than the first.

- CV Rick, February 2008

 

Beautiful Gears, but Cogs in the Works

The hand-drawn artwork combined with CGI is simply stunning in this movie, it's a treat to the eyes.

The setting is 1800's England, in an alternative Steampunk past where machinery powered by steam has advanced civilization to a new age of reason - the promise of steam that if it would've maintained dominance in lieu of combustion, would've reinforced England's dominance. That's what steampunk is all about, after all, the investment that England made in infrastructure built for steam locked them into a future path that turned out to be weak and ill conceived in hindsight. It's a wonderful fantasy and when done well, it can be a rich alternate history. Tim Powers and Bruce Sterling create interesting Steampunk tales, and I can imagine if they'd written a story for Katsuhiro Otomo to direct, the combination would be magnificent. That said, the story just didn't work for me.

At first it was predictable, like stock parts off the fiction workshop shelf. A boy gets a powerful item of technology and has to fight his own father for the rights to assert his own will, his own ingenuity, and strike out on his own. There isn't enough background to allow the viewer to believe that this boy has the skills necessary to pull off his part in this story. There also isn't enough plot to sustain the believability of the entire story.

Bad guys are comical and wooden, good guys are stereotyped and predictable. If the movie hadn't been so pretty, I'd have given it a lower rating. Fortunately, with the volume off, it's a beautiful show.

- CV Rick

Golden Age Commentary

Van Vogt writes about a refugee people who escaped from Earth's clutches thousands of generations ago and mixed, Dellians with non-Dellians. The result of this union is a race of Mixed Men who are telepathic supermen. These people are hiding within the countless stars of the Greater Magellanic Cloud and call themselves Fifty Suns. Into this cloud comes an Earth warship, more powerful than the combined resources and power of the entire Dellianic race. It's the Captain of the Star Cluster, Lady Gloria Laurr, who is determined to subjugate these wayward humans back under Earth's control.

The leader of the Mixed Men fights back, falls in love, and then becomes distrusted by his own men. It's a grand drama and one of the earliest space operas I've read. I loved the writing for its simplicity, straight-forward and nothing wasted in advancing the plot. The dialogue is a bit stilted . . . okay, it's a lot stilted . . . but it fits in with the era in which van Vogt wrote the novel. All the characters except Maltby, the leader of the Mixed Men, and Laurr are carboard throwaway characters, reminding me of the legion of red-shirts used up in the many seasons of Star Trek series.

It's a fun read, especially if you don't think about it too much.

- CV Rick

The Best Reading, Period.

I love anthologies for a couple of reasons: the stories or articles are easily read in a short sitting and no matter how it was edited I usually find a couple of pieces I like.  Today I'm writing about one that sets a whole new standard. The Best American Nonrequired Reading of 2007, edited by Dave Eggers produced not just a couple of passable stories, but an entire volume of the most thought-provoking powerful writing I've ever encountered.

The premise is simple – San Francisco high school students scour through literary magazines, independent publications, and on-line journals for articles, stories, vignettes, and memoirs that they consider the best.  They share their findings with each other and with their editor, Dave Eggers, until they've parsed it down to a few pieces to publish in this NonRequired Reading volume. 

Who would've thought that high schools students would have the ability to spot stories to move me emotionally.  Me, a jaded forty-one year old man who heaps cynicism on top of his morning cereal the way some spoon out blueberries, or sugar.  But they did.  Story after article after first-hand account all pulled emotions from me and sat stewing in my mind for days afterward.  There wasn't a bad one in the bunch.

The first section is assorted lists and memes, which I consider filler.  It was fun I suppose, but the heart of the book lies in Section Two. 

The best of it all was from my all-time favorite essayist, Scott Carrier.  He weaves an account of his time in Burma before the crackdown.  When reading it I was struck by the obvious – how could we have been surprised?

After that brilliance the next story that caused me to ponder for days after reading was by Lee Klein. He put our entire society into perspective with the most amazing sports essay I can remember reading since Joyce Carol Oates wrote about Mike Tyson.  His All Aboard the Bloated Boat: Arguments in Favor of Barry Bonds is required reading for anyone complaining about unfair competition in sports.

Another favorite was by Stephen Elliott who knows what it's like to be a thirteen year old boy, homeless, sleeping wherever misfortune allows, and by reading Where I Slept, I feel as if I have some understanding as well.

Others that stand out:  Joshua Clark brings the reader into New Orleans first hand for the disaster.  It's terrifying and mesmerizing simultaneously.   James Ames, a reporter from Spin penned a piece about being out of place at GothicFest 2005. In it he comes to an understanding of a new culture and appreciates it for what it is, not for how it's similar to what he knows.  Alison Bechdel's graphic comic tragedy is one of the finest pieces of writing I've seen in comic book form.  Well-known writer, Jennifer Egan was included with a piece of short fiction, Selling the General, that satirizes our P.R. obsession and makes me want to pick up one of her books. Also, Miranda July weaves a story as well-crafted and surprising as any I've read this year in How to Tell Stories to Children.  Finally Conan O'Brien's commencement speech to Stuyvesant High School is the best of its kind I ever heard.

Here is the table of contents from the Book's Second Section.

Jonathan Ames. Middle-American Gothic
Alison Bechdel. A Happy Death
D. Winston Brown. Ghost Children
Scott Carrier. Rock the Junta
Joshua Clark. American
Edge Foundation. What Is Your Dangerous Idea?
Jennifer Egan. Selling the General
Stephen Elliott. Where I Slept
Kevin A. González. Lotería
Miranda July. How to Tell Stories to Children
Matthew Klam. Adina, Astrid, Chipewee, Jasmine
Lee Klein. All Aboard the Bloated Boat: Arguments in Favor of Barry Bonds
Nam Le. Love and Honor and Pity and Pride and Compassion and Sacrifice
Jen Marlowe, Aisha Bain, and Adam Shapiro. Darfur Diaries
David J. Morris. The Big Suck: Notes from the Jarhead Underground
Conan O'Brien. Stuyvesant High School Commencement Speech
Mattox Roesch. Humpies
Patrick Somerville. So Long, Anyway
Joy Williams. Literature Unnatured