Tagged: Movies
Who Loves His Daughter More? Arnold vs. Liam, A Joint Review of Maggie and Taken
“Good will overcome. Trust in that.”
Lord Locksley is right yet again.
I hated Liam Neeson’s blockbuster Taken. Hated it. I hated it despite finding myself in a pool of people who loved it, people who adored it, people who worshiped it. It came out while I was still serving and both the men and women serving beside me couldn’t get enough of it. They also couldn’t keep their enthusiasm to themselves. A happy soul would volunteer they watched it on a long flight, and at least one listener would perk up with, “You saw Taken? What’d you think of it? Awesome, right? I loved it.”
I instinctively hated Taken because it is too easy. Is there any thing Neeson can’t do? No. He’s the most highly skilled and trained operative the world has ever seen. And he’s a dad. Then his virgin daughter gets kidnapped. Yes, I said virgin. His daughter is a virgin, and the whole movie rests on this one simple fact. Like a Fifty Shades of Grey for men, Taken is nothing more than fantasy of the basest kind. What wouldn’t a father with Neeson’s skills do to get his virgin daughter back? American macho men itch for a predicament like this, for a hero to cheer on, for a scenario that they can dream about happening to them. Wouldn’t it be nice if perfect, beautiful, innocent girls were being harmed? Then we could go torture and kill some people without losing sleep at night. Give me a break. Don’t believe my little theory? Ask yourself if you would’ve enjoyed the movie if the daughter had a reputation of being sexually active? Ask yourself how you would’ve felt if when given the horse for her birthday, the daughter had responded, “Aww, you shouldn’t have. I appreciate the effort, but I wanted something ‘hung like a horse’, not an actual horse.”
Yeah, yeah. I get it. I’m alone in my criticism. What else is new? I’m alone, but never without hope. For a long time I’ve waited for someone–anyone–to tell a good father-daughter story. You can imagine my excitement when, yesterday, I stumbled upon Arnold’s newest flick Maggie.
The premise? Zombies. The location? Rural Kansas. The conflict? Arnold’s late teenage daughter is infected with the dealio that turns people into zombies. But Arnold promised her mom, before she died (the mom, not the daughter) that he’d keep her (the daughter) safe.
That’s a remarkable story. The kiddo is going to become a flesh-eating zombie, and you have to kill it or it will kill you. What do you do? What will audiences cheer for? Who wins? Is it believable?
In this simple story, Arnold, the man who single-handedly inspired me and countless millions of others to exercise, essentially standing chest kicks Liam and his Taken nonsense 300-style into the pit. In effect, Arnold says, “You think traipsing around the globe killing people over your virgin daughter is love? Ha. You don’t know what love is, buddy.”
Kansans know what love is though. And I’d like to take a moment to personally thank Arnold for demonstrating this. “Thank you.”
Even before Maggie, Man of Steel did Kansans right with an amazing, old t-shirted (seriously, how do they make a t-shirt look so perfectly old?) Kevin Costner and his confident-yet-never-certain wisdom that goes against seemingly common sense which molded Clark into, well, Superman. Yahoo for Kansas.
You know that I grew up in Kansas. Kansas, which is beside Missouri–the Show Me state–must be the place then where I picked up my anti-authority, anti-utilitarianism attitude. The same attitude that Arnold and the other Kansans have in Maggie. The attitude that says, “So what if the government has mandated that infected folks have to be quarantined until they’re killed, so what if I might not be able to do what needs to be done before it’s too late and consequently the larger group is put at even more risk. So what? Who are you to tell me what to do? I only have one daughter, and I made a promise to her dead mother. There is more going on here than you and your rules.”
In the end, of course, Arnold kicks Liam’s ass. The movie is fantastic. There is actually another father-daughter sub-plot that takes the cake, but you have to see it to believe it. No spoilers here. If you secretly or overtly laughed at Taken, watch Maggie.
Review of Maid In Manhattan, Err, Jupiter Ascending by The Wachowskis
“What are you trying to tell me? That I can dodge bullets?”
“No, Neo. I’m trying to tell you that when you’re ready, you won’t have to.”
Seemingly new, fresh, sleek, palatable, and a ton of fun, The Matrix might be the second most pivotal movie in my movie-watching career. (Easy, TC, I said second most.) Two and Three aren’t bad either if you can get over yourself. It’s difficult to comprehend that the same two minds that created that trilogy unleashed Jupiter Ascending on us.
So groundbreaking were those three films that it’s troublesome to attempt to recall what popular opinion held regarding Keanu Reeves before Neo. He was laughable in an unforgettable kind of way in Bill and Ted’s. Eighteen movies later takes us to The Devil’s Advocate, (his last role before Neo) which is very watchable. I guess where I’m going is I heard once that Forrest Gump was cast as the lead astronaut in Apollo 13 precisely because the team behind that film knew that they needed an actor whom, once stranded in space, moviegoers would unanimously desire to bring back to Earth.
My question to the Wachowskis is, “What the heck?” Channing Tatum? Is there any moviegoer who wants to credit a victory on any level, much less the cosmic level, to Magic Mike?
I matter. Think of me. I, just for myself, purchased at least eight theater tickets for the Matrix films. I owned the VHS of the first one and then still went ahead and later bought the collector’s edition DVDs of the entire trilogy in the neat holographic packaging. I have also raved about V for Vendetta countless times. Are you telling me that you think I ever want to see Channing Tatum in a movie? Let some lesser filmmakers get him to blossom. You two are too good to be guessing.
Lastly, I feel like I was lied to. And that makes me sad. We all know that movie trailers are supposed to entice us to see a movie by telling us a compelling story that isn’t what the actual movie is really about. But nowhere, NOWHERE, in the trailers did your team indicate that Mila Kunis’ character was an immigrant housemaid before she got caught up in the whole “your majesty” bit. What are we doing here? Teaching impoverished little girls that aren’t in the theater with me to never stop dreaming? The reason I feel lied to is that you spent all that effort on the film and yet left the one reason no adult man would pay to see the movie out of the preview. Tisk Tisk.
Neo, awesome. Trinity, even awesomer. V and Evie, amazing. Jupiter? Trust is broken. But don’t worry. I’m easy. You can make it up to me next time. Just please, make it up to me.
Review of Good Kill, directed by Andrew Niccol
You know that a movie is no good when it’s available for free in high definition on the internet one month before it is in theaters. I actually have a theory about these things. You can’t tell me that all the big movies, like Furious 7, have some special agreement within their production team to not leak a copy early to the internet and that the lesser movies aren’t able to form this sort of solidarity. So my theory is that certain movies, even ones with A-list-ers, are purposefully leaked so the studio or powers that be can get a feel, or more properly, brace themselves for the box office flop that they already fear they’ve produced. Niccol’s flick Good Kill starring Ethan Hawke is just such a movie.
If you haven’t heard of the film that isn’t due in theaters until May 15th, it’s essentially American Sniper, except that it’s about an USAF drone pilot instead of a Navy SEAL sniper. But all the familiar themes are there–estranged wife, alcohol abuse, PTSD, questioning the war, suspected adultery on all sides.
Naturally, I watched the film because it’s about something very close to home. When I worked shifts in the operations center overseas, I watched “predator-vision,” as they called it, and saw little black missiles zip from the top left of the screen onto the astonishingly unsuspecting bad guy. I heard knuckleheads cheer in a way that made me uncomfortable, though I was never certain which of us was expressing the proper sentiment after witnessing such things.
I’ll tell you what my favorite part of the movie was, the movie that no one should watch (it really is terrible and boring and filled with an agenda that is not hidden anywhere close to well enough to be powerful), my favorite part of the movie were the scenes where the camera lingered–perhaps unintentionally–on shots of the six or seven trailers that were essentially the cockpits of the unmanned aircraft. There was just something about the idea that in the middle of the desert in an unknown location, Air Force personnel are sitting inside tan double-wides and sniping terrorists seven thousand miles away. It’s difficult to articulate my feelings about it, but especially if the director lingered on purpose, I think those scenes are the “a picture’s worth a thousand words” that define the issue (or whatever we’re calling it.)
In the end, I don’t know why I watch these movies and I’m probably going to call it quits soon. Hollywood’s proven they can get insider information and make a realistic movie, but Good Kill is just another example that despite this access they have nothing valuable to say on the matter.
Vin Diesel Recants Oscar Prediction For Furious 7 After Viewing TC’s Newest Trailer
In case you missed it, last week action film superstar Vin Diesel claimed that his new movie Furious 7 (in theaters this Friday) will win a few academy awards. That was before he saw the trailer to Mission Impossible Rogue Nation, which is Tom “TC-to-me” Cruise’s newest entry in his own unexpectedly lengthy action franchise.
And so yesterday, in a bizarre turn of events, Diesel formally and sheepishly recanted his odd prediction, saying,
“I wanted to be excited. I really thought Furious 7 pushed the envelope and had the perfect mix of everything that makes for a killer flick and a critically acclaimed feature film.”
He then coolly stroked his chin while his eyes looked beyond the horizon, adding,
“And in another Oscar year, maybe it would have won.”
Returning to the moment, he excitedly asked,
“I mean, have you guys see Tom Cruise’s newest trailer? I can’t compete with that. No one can. Much respect.”
Never one to deflect praise, Cruise’s reaction to reporter’s barrage of questions regarding this incident was to simply smile his million dollar smile and say,
“What can I say? Vin knows movies.”
Would Freud Have Laughed? An Apology
I have to think he would have at least smirked. But from what I remember being taught about him, he was a very serious, very serious man. So no. Even jokes that I am only able to attempt after his research and ideas have had a century to take root in western society wouldn’t have caused him to laugh.
I love blogging. I love it because it forces interesting questions, questions like this one about Freud, into my head. You see, life is so very easy for a smart, not to mention good-looking, eligible man like me that I need some way to make it challenging. So I write. I try to see if I can make a total stranger laugh in the same way that I can make someone laugh that I’m talking to in person. And here’s the real challenge. I try to see if I can make them laugh for the same reason.
By the way. Please send me a check for, I don’t know, $300, each month from now on to support my quest. Make it payable to Pete Deakon and mail it to PO Box 3392, Parker, CO 80134. Thank you.
A man like me doesn’t just appear. It takes a very special woman years and years, like 18, to mold a boy-child into a man like me. This woman wouldn’t have been afraid to punctuate the training with a wooden spoon if necessary.
One more thing. This woman, the mother of a man like me, a man who shed the constraining shackles of fear long ago, a man who publicly bears his soul in ways that make her shake her head in disappointment, this woman has no problem walking out of a movie. Not that she’d even let herself be taken to a movie of Fifty Shades‘ caliber. Even by her son.
I’m sorry folks. I want this blog to be a place you can come for truth and laughs. I failed yesterday. The opening of yesterday’s post, the truth I sought to share, was it is really funny to think of an adult man and his mom watching Fifty Shades together. I didn’t take her. She hasn’t seen the movie. We don’t live in the same town. The parenthetical apology was an “I’m sorry for picking on you again, mom.” Not that I’ll ever stop.
But picking on her doesn’t mean I don’t love her. I do. She’s my mom. I just am compelled to avenge myself every once in a while.
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By the way, she finally added to yesterday’s discussion. And on a separate note, Glenn’s review of my new book is up. Buried Within – Isn’t As Gay As I hoped
Review of Fifty Shades of Grey, by Sam Taylor-Johnson (Based on the Book)
Did you know this movie was going to have sex scenes? I had no idea. Neither did my mom. I’ll leave the awkwardness of our watching it together to your imagination. (Sorry, Ma. I had to.)
What pisses me off about this movie and book is that they leave me speechless. I thought I knew.
I thought I knew. Really, if you think you know the story based on overhearing things, you don’t. And you don’t want to know the story. It’s past ridiculous. Beyond ridiculous. It’s stupendous in its ridiculousness. A friend loves the books. And she’s cool, so I can’t go the one further step that I want to and say people who enjoyed the book are ridiculous too. To each his own. But I can safely say that she’s in the same category as Chris Rock’s women who listen to degrading rap and say, “He ain’t talkin’ ’bout me.”
I had to watch the movie because it’s based on a book that sold 100 million copies. I was a fool. At least I didn’t pay for it.
Did anyone else laugh uncontrollably when Christian tells Anastasia, “If you were mine, you wouldn’t be able to sit for a week”? My laughter wasn’t at the movie, but at me. At first I thought that he meant she wouldn’t be able to sit because he had spanked her so hard with some “playroom” device. Then I realized, nope, he meant…
Have I ever mentioned I’m an Eagle Scout?
Does anyone else find it funny that a female author’s written-for-women fantasy involves a man making sex so good that the woman needs a week to recover? I’ve always thought the goal was making sex so good that the woman wouldn’t want to stop for a week. Lesson learned I guess.
The trouble with this whole Fifty Shades phenomenon is that we let it frame the discussion. It seems to force the questions, “Is BDSM really a secret fantasy for all these women?” and if so “Why is it a fantasy?” moreover “Is it right or wrong?” And also, “Do women want to change men?” and “Why do women want to change men?”
The truth, in and of itself always sobering, is we don’t have to allow E.L. James to frame the discussion. She is not a dominant. We are not submissives.
I wanted to watch this movie because I thought it would give me some pointers about what book buying audiences want to read, as my books aren’t selling. What I really learned is that I will never be able to read audience’s minds. My next book (after the illustrated children’s book that is coming soon) will be more of an escape than my first two. It will have more violence and the violence will be more graphic. It will have more sex and the sex will be more graphic. It’ll be that way because I can see now that people like to read that and it will be fun to write it. But it will be my kind of violence and my kind of sex. Not yours.
Oh. Back to the review. Don’t watch the movie. Or do. Whatever.
What The Bleep Is The Secret?
One person presents/reads/speaks uninterrupted for up to twenty minutes on any topic of their choosing. Up to thirteen other people listen while they eat dinner. (We do spaghetti). Then those thirteen folks (even the women) each take a turn at responding–also uninterrupted–for up to ten minutes. Then we break for dessert. Then the speaker gets a ten minute follow-up window, after which the others get their own up-to-five minute responses. That’s the Mark Twain Listening Club.
With the enthusiasm of some friends, I began the Mark Twain Listening Club (MTLC) over two years ago. We meet twice a month (give or take) and while talking for twenty minutes or ten minutes seems daunting, it does not take much thought to realize that it isn’t about talking, but listening. You share for up to ten minutes and listen for one hundred thirty. Now, what, I wonder, do you suppose happens when people listen to each other? I’ll tell you. Empathy. Understanding. Fun. Friendship. And witty witticism’s.
Last dinner a friend wanted to talk about manifesting reality. She had recently watched What The Bleep Do We Know? She loved the ideas presented within that film but was a bit nervous that she would be ostracized for misunderstanding them or oversimplifying them. But when one of her conclusions or take-aways or bottoms lines was “Consequently, if I’m manifesting my reality, and for example trying to make a new friend, then I don’t have to focus on their negative qualities. Instead, I can choose to direct my attention towards the positive qualities,” you can’t help but want to be closer to someone with such heart. Even her husband, the scientist, couldn’t find fault with the argument.
Naturally, the phenomenon known as The Secret, not to mention a certain more ancient book, was introduced during the pursuant discussion. While it is impossible to recreate the power of the moment, when one friend had his turn and asked, “What the bleep is the secret?”, I couldn’t help but think that there is no social setting that fosters such simple creativity than table dinners of this nature.
You know what the neatest thing about the Mark Twain Listening Club dinners is? I chose the goofy name to pay tribute to Mark Twain because I got the idea from his autobiography (and women attendees weren’t allowed to speak in his day). But about a year into it, someone pointed out the acronym could also be “More Tender Loving Care.”
Nice.
Part 5/5 – Review of American Sniper by Clint Eastwood
I am a very fortunate man–more than fortunate. Though I can’t assess that it is random luck. I attempt to live honestly and not just honestly, but nobly. And the historical record proves that that behavior tends to be noticed and supported. I wouldn’t change anything about how I live. Until today.
I’d like to point out that I think I told at least one reader that I didn’t want to watch this movie. I mean, I wanted to, but I didn’t. I didn’t want to watch it because I didn’t like how I felt after watching The Hurt Locker. I didn’t want to watch it because I knew he was going to open the door to the adjoining hotel room in Flight. I didn’t want to watch it because I have known for a long time that like Eastwood’s portrayal of Chris Kyle while he talks to his wife on the phone from the bar in America rather than in person upon arrival back in the US because he “needed a minute”, that like Kyle, when I got back I needed a minute. Unlike Kyle, I have never admitted it. Well, today I’m admitting it. I needed a minute. More than a minute, I needed a week it seems, and honestly, I guess I needed nearly eight years.
I don’t know if I experienced enough trauma to conclude that I have PTSD. And frankly, I don’t see how applying the word disorder to myself could be viewed as anything other than immature white whine. Also, I’m not sure what practical steps follow such an admission. But that’s just me.
I do know that I drink too much. I also know that “too much” sounds less harsh than to say I have a problem with alcohol, so let me try again. I have a problem with alcohol. I know because of how I defend my drinking habit if it’s called into question. I know because any story/movie that remotely comes close to pointing out how alcohol destroys some people makes me think I should probably cut back. I know because I feel like a liar that is about to get caught. I feel like this for too much of too many days as I press on in my new life and start to meet both ugly and beautiful smiling people that I do want to spend time with.
I know because when I saw Eastwood’s lazy film American Sniper I knew exactly how I would have made it better and in doing so made it speak to me. And if I know how to make a movie about coming-to-Jesus moments speak to me more clearly, it’s because I know I needed to be spoken to.
So I’m done drinking. And as I am forging ahead in my new life as a writer, it seemed appropriate to announce my decision via the blog. More because of the cold H- transferred to me than anything else, I haven’t had a drink since the uninspiring visit to the empty dance floor two weeks ago, and so I’m calling that the day I stopped. I’m not exactly sure what I’m going to do about this practically, but I am pretty sure the first step in problem solving is to recognize the problem. Done. I guess that leads me to a second mention of step two for the week: gather the data. Sounds fun.
In the end, I guess I need to thank Mr. Eastwood’s lazy-good-for-nothing-too-old-and-too-tired-to-make-a-good-movie guiding hand for pushing me to my breaking point. He’s just the best, no?
This isn’t going to be talked about much on here after today, but I mention it here because at the end of the day, the inescapable truth is a blog is for its writer, just like this commitment is for me.
Have a great weekend.
Part 4/5 – Review of American Sniper by Clint Eastwood
But, then, what do I know? I don’t have PTSD.
I don’t think I have PTSD. I just don’t. I didn’t see any crazy shit. I didn’t really hear any crazy shit. I just woke up, briefed, flew, debriefed, and went back to sleep. Honestly, that was it. Don’t ever go thinking you’re reading the words of a man who was in the mix. I’m not saying that there wasn’t any threat of danger, but no, I didn’t do or see anything that qualifies as traumatic.
But say after learning the ins-and-outs of what I did in Iraq you’ve convinced me otherwise. Say you brought in some nerdy looking dude with pleated khaki’s and unbreakable eye-contact. Say he pointed out that my life has kinda turned into a wreck since deploying. Say he pointed out that since leaving the military three years ago I have had and quit five jobs (I have a hard time dealing with what I perceive as disrespect), got divorced (totally unrelated to anything), am currently unemployed (though wrote and self-published a book and am half-way through my third and am not in debt, mom) and probably drink more than I should or, hell, just more than I ever did before deploying (but have only ever really regretted one decision I made while drinking). Say that he’s broken me down and we’re getting misty-eyed together. I’ll tell you what will dry my eyes real quick. Putting beautiful smiling people at the end of the tunnel. If all he can tell me is that by the time I find myself outside of the tunnel, by the time I have removed my hand from between the bright light and my now-adjusted eyes, if all he can tell me is that all along it was beautiful smiling people that make up the light, then I’ll open the door and kindly show him the way out. If there are any people who I’m confident do not have a clue about happiness, it’s beautiful smiling people.
You know what I want at the end of the tunnel? I want people to stop believing that anything on a screen–whether a laptop, a phone, a tablet, a movie screen, or the goddamn television set–has any value whatsoever in aiding veterans with PTSD. Want to know what does have value? Humans. Those real, fleshy people who have all the opportunity in the world to make every other decision than offer their help. Men like Diarmuid, Robert, and Ron. Real people who took real chances on a veteran, a veteran who doesn’t have PTSD.
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Tomorrow – Or do I?
Part 3/5 – Review of American Sniper by Clint Eastwood
The movie ends with what appears to be the real footage of Chris Kyle’s funeral procession. Hundreds, if not thousands of well-wishers lined the highways. American flags almost outnumbered people, and a few cranes were even used to hang an enormous flag high against the skyline. I’d be lying if I said I cried because honestly, while I remember crying during the movie, I can’t remember if I cried at that specific moment. What I do know is that I was very, very sad–no different from you I’d guess.
But now it’s Wednesday and the immediate effects have worn off. So how do I feel about that funeral procession now, today? A little anecdote is necessary to explain it.
Judging by the fact that the show was cancelled after a single season, I’m pretty sure no one will remember an HBO show called John From Cincinnati. It came out after Deadwood ended and it had the same writer. Well I thought the show was just fantastic. One thing I learned from it was how to feel about the familiar, black POW/MIA flag. Up until that tv series I never wanted to look at the flag or think about it or even acknowledge its existence. I had no context for it. For whatever reason, I felt that I should be sad when I thought on it and its meaning, but I honestly didn’t feel sad or really anything when I saw it. And that embarrassed me. But then in that goofy little show there was a character who was a Vietnam veteran who showed me the way. The dude was pissed. Anger was his idea of the proper emotion to associate with the POW/MIA flag. The gist of his sentiment and why he proudly sported the flag was, “Our motherfucking government took these boys outta their home and lost them. That’s not right and needs to be fixed.”
With that in mind, how do I feel now about the procession, now after the emotions that the film stirred have calmed? I feel like only I understand what all those well-wishers wanted to communicate that day. I feel like no one else gets it. I feel like everyone who has seen Sniper and loves it, all they saw was some level of patriotism and/or patriotic support. But I know the truth. The truth that I know is that all those people who took time out of their day to line the highways did so because they wanted to communicate a solidarity that it wasn’t right for the government to put a man through what Kyle went through. Why would his leadership do that to him? Did they think it was fun? Did they like that their ‘boy’ was racking up their numbers? Did they want to be able to have a bullet on their performance report that said “rubbed shoulders with most lethal sniper in US military history?” Why would they keep sending him in? If there is one fact that I am certain of, and that I would like to believe people who are leaders are certain of, it’s that motivated individuals will drive themselves into the ground if left to their own devices. I learned this about myself through the most embarrassing experience of my life. Only a handful of people even know this prior to now. Want to know how lost I became as my wife and I sat alone in our town home for nearly three weeks after my first deployment, me being either drunk or hungover for the duration? I arrived at a place where I heard a nice sounding legal assistant on the other end of a phone hurriedly whisper, “You can’t ask that. You can’t ask what the punishment will be for going AWOL if you haven’t left.” A lifetime of leadership and decision making training was being put to use to gather all the data (step 2) so I could make an informed decision that going to prison would be better than going back.
I ramble a bit here to illustrate that while I was sad as I watched that scene of the movie Saturday night, today when I think about that scene I am angry.
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Thursday – But, then, what do I know? I don’t have PTSD.
Friday – Or do I?
Captain’s Log 