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igenlodeRewatching "Back to the Future III", which is much more impressive than any second sequel can be expected to be. I could only vaguely remember the events of the first two films (Marty messes up his parents' teenage relationship by time-travelling back to the Fifties, then discovers he has messed up his own future), but all you really need is the magic figure of 88 miles per hour in the time-travelling DeLorean... which, famously is the major issue in this film, as Marty has gone back to an era before petrol and the car won't start without fuel. Hence the iconic image of the car being pushed along by the fastest thing available in 1885 -- a railway engine, which might just theoretically be able to break the vital speed limit.
Setting the story in the very earliest days of the town allows the film to tap into a whole new set of imagery and poke fun at a fresh set of stereotypes (and gives Marty a fresh nom de plume to play with; instead of being named after the label on his pants, he ends up as 'Clint Eastwood'). It reuses familar tropes (the photograph that edits itself as they meddle with the timestream, a run-in with the Tannen family, landmarks whose names are affected by Marty's actions, Marty unable to resist accusations of cowardice), but takes the risk of having bug-eyed Doc Brown fall in love as its major plot strand, while playing the affair almost entirely straight rather than treating it for laughs. It shouldn't work, but it does.
The film manages to be genuinely funny, genuinely nail-biting and genuinely touching, all while satirizing the Wild West genre and ringing variations on a familiar theme. As a sequel to a sequel you'd expect it to be running out of steam, but it comes up with a successful new twist while neatly tying off the series. I'd forgotten how good this was.
I also saw the new "Downton Abbey" film, which I thought worked pretty well (apparently a sequel to this is now in the offing).
The story comes across as a bit compressed, since character developments that would normally be held in suspension over the course of several episodes all have to be wrapped up by the end credits, and there are moments where the dialogue over-eggs the pudding by making a subtle, in-period reference (e.g. Anna reminding Lady Mary that more local families than just the Crawleys are dependent on the big house as the centre of their existence, or Thomas remarking bitterly on the lack of foreseeable acceptance for sexual deviation) and then proceeding to hammer the point home in a unsubtle fashion with additional lines obviously aimed at a modern audience. Using a royal visit as the main plot trigger works well in providing the requisite stresses both upstairs and downstairs, with an additional complication in the shape of the Dowager's feud with one of the Queen's ladies in waiting. I suspected the secret involved at a fairly early stage, and was gratified to be proved right.
The film handles its vast cast and massive accumulation of backstory gracefully -- I certainly wouldn't have remembered who had married whom in the course of the last couple of series without helpful prompts, and it managed to introduce everybody in a way that jogged my memory without in any fashion seeming contrived; I was impressed. The producers clearly did a wonderful job in rounding up the old cast for a big-screen performance -- I'd rather concluded that Mary's new husband, who is said to be absent at a big car race in America, had failed to sign up to appear, but even he eventually turns up in person for the final reel ;-)
It's not an unmissable contribution to the Downton story (and as the Guardian review points out, it's a watered-down version of something that was becoming increasingly watered-down in its TV incarnation), but it's an enjoyable revisiting of old haunts.
And I finally caught up with "Rogue One" in the new Star Wars series, though I have yet to see "The Last Jedi". I was put off watching "Rogue One" for a long time by someone casually remarking 'they all die in the end' (just as I never did watch "The Sixth Sense" after someone divulged the central twist in my hearing a year or two after the film had come out, on the assumption that it was scarcely news to anyone at that point...) However, I was eventually stirred into action by spotting a copy of the DVD shortly after having to research what an unknown Star Wars toy robot was worth on eBay. It turned out to be a "K-2SO", and worth about eight pounds sterling... it's amazingly difficult to name a given robot when all you know is that it is probably something or other to do with "Star Wars", and can only look for Star Wars merchandising pictures in the hopes of at least narrowing down which film it appears in!
It's a better film than "The Force Awakens", as I think reviewers remarked at the time -- basically because it's not simply a retread of the elements of the original "Star Wars" film. My hopes were raised at an early stage when a lot of the characters were morally dubious: the rebel groups are splintering and resorting to desperate tactics to survive, like brain-draining would-be defectors for information at the cost of their sanity, or shooting reluctant allies in the back when they become a liability. (Though I think in context the reassurance which preceded that act was intended as a mercy rather than as a cruel deception...)
In the event, the moral ambiguities are rather played down in favour of an all-action finale; the rebels' understandable decision that Jyn's father cannot be pulled out alive is soft-pedalled by circumstances, and their use of her in order to get into Sol de Grisolles' hideout (sorry, it's hard to associate the crippled rebel leader with anything other than the historical Chouan of similar name and fame!) is a betrayal that likewise never has a chance to have any consequences. But it's very effective to give us that glimpse of Captain Cassian's operating methods in advance, to keep us in doubt as to just how much Jyn can safely trust him, and to give depth to his declaration of support on the grounds that he won't be able to live with his own past if it turns out to have been all for nothing.
(I admit to spending a large portion of the film in wondering subconsciously who had decided to cast Oliver Reed as Cassian; the resemblance is disconcerting, and in consequence it's hard not to see the character as an embittered Athos.)
I wasn't impressed by the computer-generated Peter Cushing -- the result didn't look natural to me, and it seemed completely unnecessary. They didn't have to insert the character (the Empire has more than enough scheming top brass), and if they really felt it essential to have the direct link back to events concerning the Death Star in the original film, they could simply have recast the part. (Like the Tyrannosaurus in "Jurassic Park", he mainly appears in poor visibility conditions anyhow, presumably for the same SFX reasons.)
Ironically I remember thinking that fortunately recasting Darth Vader hadn't posed any problem due to his full-face mask; in fact it turns out that they apparently did get the original voice actor to reprise his role, but it didn't sound like it!
The scene where Darth Vader single-handedly defeats an entire corridor of enemies using his Jedi powers against all the high-tech armament they can throw at him is very impressive, and restores the horror to the character who had been defanged by Lucas's later efforts. He just keeps coming, and nothing can touch him even though he is massively outnumbered.
As it turns out, it isn't so much a case of 'they all die at the end' as of 'the characters fall by the wayside one by one', which I suppose isn't quite in the spirit of miraculous escapes and derring-do featuring in the original film according to pulp tradition, but feels like appropriate heroics in the context of this one. And given that the original "Star Wars" does start off with Leia imploring Obi-Wan Kenobi as her only hope for the Alliance, and that the whole of "Rogue One" is basically dedicated to explaining the existence of the 'stolen plans' that are the McGuffin for that film, it makes sense in retrospect that things have to end up with the rebels in flight after a Pyrrhic victory. I did wonder just how fast a wounded Jyn and Cassian were able to run in order to outdistance what was basically a nuclear explosion -- it seemed as if they should have still been up that tower ;-p
Overall I thought it worked well. Where "The Force Awakens" carried an aura of 'fan-fiction', this one had a certain air of 'authorised tie-in novel' about it in its general competence, its meticulous tie back into canon events, and its care to dispose of all the new characters developed for the purposes of that particular episode, in order to explain why we don't hear about them subsequently at a point where they retrospectively didn't exist ;-p
Setting the story in the very earliest days of the town allows the film to tap into a whole new set of imagery and poke fun at a fresh set of stereotypes (and gives Marty a fresh nom de plume to play with; instead of being named after the label on his pants, he ends up as 'Clint Eastwood'). It reuses familar tropes (the photograph that edits itself as they meddle with the timestream, a run-in with the Tannen family, landmarks whose names are affected by Marty's actions, Marty unable to resist accusations of cowardice), but takes the risk of having bug-eyed Doc Brown fall in love as its major plot strand, while playing the affair almost entirely straight rather than treating it for laughs. It shouldn't work, but it does.
The film manages to be genuinely funny, genuinely nail-biting and genuinely touching, all while satirizing the Wild West genre and ringing variations on a familiar theme. As a sequel to a sequel you'd expect it to be running out of steam, but it comes up with a successful new twist while neatly tying off the series. I'd forgotten how good this was.
I also saw the new "Downton Abbey" film, which I thought worked pretty well (apparently a sequel to this is now in the offing).
The story comes across as a bit compressed, since character developments that would normally be held in suspension over the course of several episodes all have to be wrapped up by the end credits, and there are moments where the dialogue over-eggs the pudding by making a subtle, in-period reference (e.g. Anna reminding Lady Mary that more local families than just the Crawleys are dependent on the big house as the centre of their existence, or Thomas remarking bitterly on the lack of foreseeable acceptance for sexual deviation) and then proceeding to hammer the point home in a unsubtle fashion with additional lines obviously aimed at a modern audience. Using a royal visit as the main plot trigger works well in providing the requisite stresses both upstairs and downstairs, with an additional complication in the shape of the Dowager's feud with one of the Queen's ladies in waiting. I suspected the secret involved at a fairly early stage, and was gratified to be proved right.
The film handles its vast cast and massive accumulation of backstory gracefully -- I certainly wouldn't have remembered who had married whom in the course of the last couple of series without helpful prompts, and it managed to introduce everybody in a way that jogged my memory without in any fashion seeming contrived; I was impressed. The producers clearly did a wonderful job in rounding up the old cast for a big-screen performance -- I'd rather concluded that Mary's new husband, who is said to be absent at a big car race in America, had failed to sign up to appear, but even he eventually turns up in person for the final reel ;-)
It's not an unmissable contribution to the Downton story (and as the Guardian review points out, it's a watered-down version of something that was becoming increasingly watered-down in its TV incarnation), but it's an enjoyable revisiting of old haunts.
And I finally caught up with "Rogue One" in the new Star Wars series, though I have yet to see "The Last Jedi". I was put off watching "Rogue One" for a long time by someone casually remarking 'they all die in the end' (just as I never did watch "The Sixth Sense" after someone divulged the central twist in my hearing a year or two after the film had come out, on the assumption that it was scarcely news to anyone at that point...) However, I was eventually stirred into action by spotting a copy of the DVD shortly after having to research what an unknown Star Wars toy robot was worth on eBay. It turned out to be a "K-2SO", and worth about eight pounds sterling... it's amazingly difficult to name a given robot when all you know is that it is probably something or other to do with "Star Wars", and can only look for Star Wars merchandising pictures in the hopes of at least narrowing down which film it appears in!
It's a better film than "The Force Awakens", as I think reviewers remarked at the time -- basically because it's not simply a retread of the elements of the original "Star Wars" film. My hopes were raised at an early stage when a lot of the characters were morally dubious: the rebel groups are splintering and resorting to desperate tactics to survive, like brain-draining would-be defectors for information at the cost of their sanity, or shooting reluctant allies in the back when they become a liability. (Though I think in context the reassurance which preceded that act was intended as a mercy rather than as a cruel deception...)
In the event, the moral ambiguities are rather played down in favour of an all-action finale; the rebels' understandable decision that Jyn's father cannot be pulled out alive is soft-pedalled by circumstances, and their use of her in order to get into Sol de Grisolles' hideout (sorry, it's hard to associate the crippled rebel leader with anything other than the historical Chouan of similar name and fame!) is a betrayal that likewise never has a chance to have any consequences. But it's very effective to give us that glimpse of Captain Cassian's operating methods in advance, to keep us in doubt as to just how much Jyn can safely trust him, and to give depth to his declaration of support on the grounds that he won't be able to live with his own past if it turns out to have been all for nothing.
(I admit to spending a large portion of the film in wondering subconsciously who had decided to cast Oliver Reed as Cassian; the resemblance is disconcerting, and in consequence it's hard not to see the character as an embittered Athos.)
I wasn't impressed by the computer-generated Peter Cushing -- the result didn't look natural to me, and it seemed completely unnecessary. They didn't have to insert the character (the Empire has more than enough scheming top brass), and if they really felt it essential to have the direct link back to events concerning the Death Star in the original film, they could simply have recast the part. (Like the Tyrannosaurus in "Jurassic Park", he mainly appears in poor visibility conditions anyhow, presumably for the same SFX reasons.)
Ironically I remember thinking that fortunately recasting Darth Vader hadn't posed any problem due to his full-face mask; in fact it turns out that they apparently did get the original voice actor to reprise his role, but it didn't sound like it!
The scene where Darth Vader single-handedly defeats an entire corridor of enemies using his Jedi powers against all the high-tech armament they can throw at him is very impressive, and restores the horror to the character who had been defanged by Lucas's later efforts. He just keeps coming, and nothing can touch him even though he is massively outnumbered.
As it turns out, it isn't so much a case of 'they all die at the end' as of 'the characters fall by the wayside one by one', which I suppose isn't quite in the spirit of miraculous escapes and derring-do featuring in the original film according to pulp tradition, but feels like appropriate heroics in the context of this one. And given that the original "Star Wars" does start off with Leia imploring Obi-Wan Kenobi as her only hope for the Alliance, and that the whole of "Rogue One" is basically dedicated to explaining the existence of the 'stolen plans' that are the McGuffin for that film, it makes sense in retrospect that things have to end up with the rebels in flight after a Pyrrhic victory. I did wonder just how fast a wounded Jyn and Cassian were able to run in order to outdistance what was basically a nuclear explosion -- it seemed as if they should have still been up that tower ;-p
Overall I thought it worked well. Where "The Force Awakens" carried an aura of 'fan-fiction', this one had a certain air of 'authorised tie-in novel' about it in its general competence, its meticulous tie back into canon events, and its care to dispose of all the new characters developed for the purposes of that particular episode, in order to explain why we don't hear about them subsequently at a point where they retrospectively didn't exist ;-p
no subject
Date: 2019-10-16 08:19 am (UTC)Even that droopy eye is there. https://www.denofgeek.com/us/games/star-wars/281600/star-wars-jedi-fallen-order-saw-gerrera
no subject
Date: 2019-10-19 11:32 pm (UTC)(Sol de Grisolles, whose "health and vigour were gone, his eyesight almost ruined, and [was] an old man at fifty-four" as a result of his rebel activities: DK Broster.)
In my excuse, I've avoided the final season of "Blake's 7" since I first saw it, and hence beaten-up Blake isn't my immediate visual reference point!
But oddly enough I'd actually intended to write that the depiction of 'morally dubious' and splintering rebel groups was much closer to B7 continuity than to the original "Star Wars"/"Star Trek" axis. It just got left out in the process of composition.
no subject
Date: 2019-10-16 12:25 pm (UTC)I'm not excited for The Rise of Skywalker. I couldn't care less about any of these characters and I suspect it will suffer from the same terrible writing as The Last Jedi and Solo. I think I'm just done with Star Wars in general.
no subject
Date: 2019-10-19 11:17 pm (UTC)I did see "Solo" and thought it was pretty successful (any romantic interest as for a pre-series Han Solo has got to end badly one way or another, and I didn't see that way coming). The relationship with his 'mentor' is well set-up, and interesting in that it's an oldfashioned question of trust and loyalties without any element of sexual tension introduced as fanservice... though I'm sure there is slashfic out there for this movie :-(
The beginning was a bit confusing and the love affair wasn't all that engaging, but it got better as it went on (mainly once Chewbacca turned up). Of course, it *is* very much an 'origins story' like the one they did for Wolverine, which means it tries to make throwaway references from the original source material that are basically background colouring into major story pillars. (Han Solo mentions "the Kessel Run"? Then instead of having it as a mere speed boast, like the competition between the tea clippers to make a faster passage to London, we'll turn it into a unique act of heroism!!)
What I meant by an air of 'fanfiction' in "The Force Awakens" was the way that it replicates major parts of the original "Star Wars" in the way that an endless succession of POTO retellings feel obliged to provide a version of all the landmark events of canon: the kidnapping, the unmasking, the masquerade, the rooftop kiss, the torture chamber, the choice. (And yes, I've done two of those myself: Blue Remembered Hills and If I Were Vicomte :-p)
But I can't imagine who thought they could get away with a blatant rerun of the iconic Death Star trench attack...
I was never a great "Star Wars" fan in the first place, so I don't have too many elevated expectations to lose ;-) Just mildly curious about a cultural phenomenon, that's all. I did enjoy the first film when I rewatched it about fifteen years after it first came out, having seen a lot more swashbucklers in the interim; I didn't like it much when I saw it back in the Eighties.