Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Manliest Movie Moment #2

Just finished watching "Dog Day Afternoon" with Al Pachino. As usual, he gives a stellar performance that sells the movie more than anything else. Why isn't he doin' more stuff these days? I've NEVER seen him in a bad role. Sure, he's been in a few so-so movies, but Pachino himself always excells. Also, I found in this movie at least that he REALLY bears a striking resemblance to the young Dustin Hoffman. He and him should have played brothers at some point. Dustin could have been the nice one, Al the one who would friggin' rip your head off.

However, the BEST part of "Dog Day Afternoon" is that it contains what I consider the second manliest movie moment onscreen. The first, as I already established in my first blog entry (I believe) was when Viggo Mortensen shook hands with Harrison Ford in "Witness." The second, contained here, is when Al Pachino manages to get all his hostages into a limo-van to go to the airport. An FBI agent drives the car, and winds up sitting next to Al. And who PLAYS this FBI agent??? LANCE HENRIKSEN!!!! YES!!!! The synthetic human Lance Henriksen who gets stabbed through the chest by the Alien Queen in "ALIENS"!!!!! How awesome is that??? Lance and Al together in the front seats of a limo-van!!!!

So yeah...that's it.

Monday, July 17, 2006

Da Bearz!

Just finished watching "Grizzly Man." A VERY haunting, sad, and scary film that deals with my favorite issue (of course) of mankind's interactions with nature. One of the most entertaining parts of the movie is Werner Herzog's narration, although at times I felt he pressed his own judgements on the viewer more than he should have instead of letting us draw our own conclusions. At one point when Treadwell (the guy who got killed) points out how harmonious nature is, Herzog's narration states something along the lines of "All I see here is the indifference of nature." I would be inclined to side somewhere in the middle of these two views, but Herzog doesn't give us a chance to decide what we think--he just tells us HIS opinion and disrupts our chain of thought. This happens on multiple occasions later in the doc too. Still, Herzog's German (I think) accent is always fun to listen to: "For thirteen yearz, he would liv with da bearz!"

Another bone of contention (so to speak) with the film that has raised my morbid curiousity is the fact that Treadwill and his girlfriend's death by one of the bears is actually recorded on audiotape. We get plenty of nightmare-inducing descriptions of what the tape sounds like, and Herzog is even shown listening to the tape himself. However Herzog tells the woman who owns the tape "never to listen to it" and "to burn it." I WANT TO HEAR THE FUCKING TAPE!!! The movie doesn't feel complete without it. I don't CARE if I can't sleep for nights afterwards! I want to know Treadwill's story, and in what way is Herzog more privledged than I to hear it?

However, despite these things that irk me, what haunted me most was the fact that I could sympathize with Treadwill so much. To be sure, he was fairly loopy, and anyone who decides to hang out with GRIZZLY BEARS of all creatures is asking for trouble. However, much of this loopiness could be attributed to Treadwill's past involving drugs. And granted, if ANYONE hangs out in the wilderness alone for an extended period of time, it is easy to start to go a little "nuts" in the view of "civilized" people. Trust me. I've never done drugs, but I know that chances are I would seem a little strange too if I spent entire summers with no human contact. And there IS much that Treadwill says that makes sense to me. Granted his politics are off, and something has clearly addled his brains somewhere along the line, but his heart is in nature nonetheless, and I certainly could sympathize with his lone wanderings, musing, and connectings with the natural world.

Also, the fact that Treadwill did go out there for THIRTEEN YEARS with those bears and be OK for that amount of time really does prove these creatures aren't monsters. Granted, it is a REALLY bad idea to hang out with grizzlies, but they aren't the sort of animals that are going to attack you at first sight (only chupacabras do that). It appears Treadwill only finally got munched because the bear in question was old, starving, and desperate. It was trying to survive just as all of us are.

Maybe I AM just an environmental whacko, but hell, if I could choose to get eaten by a T. Rex, I would. And Treadwill says that getting killed by a bear is the way he wants to go. So there's something hauntingly poetic about his horrific death.

Oh yeah...Anthony...you're KIDDING about HP right? If not, I AM SO FREAKING SORRY!!!

Sunday, July 16, 2006

Not Much

Not much to say right now, but other than that I'm missing people. A lot. Also saw "Friday Night Lights." One of the best sports movies that's out there...highly recommended.

And I apologize for ruining the "Pirates" surprise to a few people. APPARENTLY some people don't know when they ought to get their asses out there and see a movie! This is like people complaining about Snape killing Dumbledore! OF COURSE you're going to get a surprise like this ruined for you if you don't get to it yourself quick enough!

Oh...I didn't ruin the HP surprise for anyone now, did I?