Another long moviewatch post, this time mainly because I was very chatty about the movies when I made my notes.

Ella Enchanted,  2004.  I saw Anne Hathaway. I clicked “play”. Simple as.  Then I heard Eric Idle offering narration and I was hooked. AH plays a woman who is given the ‘gift’ of obedience; no matter what she’s told, she has to comply.  This becomes a problem when she receives two step-sisters (glory, are they ever good news?) who quickly realize they can exploit it. Ella’s inability to not obey orders can apparently override the laws of physics, as she stops mid-jump if told to freeze.   This is a playful mix of pseudo-medieval fantasy and pop culture storytelling, very much like A Knight’s Tale.  A favorite of mine, Cary Elwes, appears as the Evil Uncle.  He has a talking snake for a mentor and black hair, so he’s obviously a rotter. (He..also orders AH to do the hokey-pokey and turn herself around.)    A silly, but fun movie.    Given the amount of serious drama I ingested in May, an hour and a half of Anne Hathaway smiling and helicopter-kicking baddies was in order.  Also, it ends with AH and whoever her male lead was singing “Don’t Go Breakin’ my Heart”.  It sounds weird, though, like some kind of early auto-tune.

Saving Private Ryan, 1998. My third or fourth re-watch of this visceral WW2 movie.  This time I was occasionally distracted by Cinephile Brain. “Wait, is that Bryan Cranston? HO!!! That’s Paul Giamatti! Wait – CAPTAIN MAL?   I’m joking, but this is….an intense movie.  The first 20+ minutes depict the D-Day landings and it is as real and bloody and somber as you can imagine. The movie – if you’re living under a rock or something – is about a squad of men who are assigned to find and evacuate a Private James Ryan of the 101st Airborne: his three brothers were killed and the Army wants him out for the sake of his parents. This was not my first World War 2 movie – I’m pretty sure that was Battle of Britain – but it made the war real in a way that’s never been surpassed. I remember watching this for the first time and being slightly agonized by the squad not being able to help a poor French family, but now I could more fully identify with Captain Miller and the thought of losing his poor boys for a potential fool’s errand. It gave the “Earn this” line a lot more meaning.

“Every man I kill…..the farther away from home I feel.”

“Tell her..when you found me, I was with the only brothers I have left. I’ll never desert them. There’s no way I’m leavin’ this bridge.”

Star Trek: Generations, 1994.   My review doesn’t arrive until Tuesday. 

…okay, kidding. This is the Star Trek to The Next Generation transition movie. It opens with Kirk evidently dying in an attempt to save the Enterprise-B during her maiden voyage,  but we soon learn that he was sucked into a mysterious phenomenon called The Nexus.   A mad scientist starts blowing up planets in TNG’s time  so he can get sucked back into The Nexus. The plot is a bit out there, but there’s a lot to like about the movie: the TOS dialogue, the old Wooden Ships and Iron Men scene, Data experimenting with his emotion chip, etc. The latter allows Brent Spiner to  show off more of his range and personality. The worst part of the movie is crashing the Enterprise-D, who we get to see in this one movie before they destroy her to make room for the Enterprise-E.   I’ve grown rather fond of the Sovereign-class Big E, but  seeing the D’s saucer plow into the planet always hurts. (I have no attachment to the ships of the Kelvin-verse. There’s no….personality to them. They’re basically flying apple stores.) Watching this with some years under my belt,  there were production aspects I noticed with new eyes – like how the lighting in Picard’s office simulates late dusk, appropriate for a man contemplating the death of his family line.  Picard’s sorrow hits a lot harder in middle age than at 20, I can tell you.   I don’t know if I appreciated – as a kid – the fact that Picard spends his entire movie trying to be The Captain while dealing with his brother and nephew’s violent death AND while trying to counsel Data who is also dealing with emotions. As a kid – and by which I mean a twenty year old – that’s incidental. As a 40 year old, it’s an existential crisis.  How does Picard pull down his tunic and captain?    Also, I’m tickled by Picard’s Christmas fantasy that is as Victorian as you can get without a coal scoop.

Me, watching a champagne bottle fly through space to hit the Enterprise-B:   I question the space-physics of this shot.

Chekov, looking at Demora Sulu: I was never that young.
Kirk, amused: No….you were younger.

Kirk: Scotty, keep things together until I get back.
Scotty: I always do. 

Time is gaining on you. 

Data, singing:   “Life-forms….you tiny little life-forms….you precious little life-forms, where are you?”
Riker:

Star Trek: First Contact, 1996.   The Borg are back, and you’re gonna be in trou-ble! Hey la, hey la, the Borg are back.   And this time, they have….time travel.  When a Borg assault on Earth is thwarted by a Starfleet that has been seasoned by the Dominion War,  the Borg launch a sphere that can go back in time: their mission quickly proves to be stopping First Contact.  This event, one of the Federation’s greatest holidays, marks when Zefram Cochrane made Earth’s pioneering warp voyage,  caught the attention of the Vulcans, and inaugurated Star Trek’s future of peace, love, and replicators.   While Picard & co are able to stop the assault,  the Borg beam drones into the E itself and start slowly taking it over. The crew of the Big E and the officers on Earth are soon out of contact with one another.  The only reason that is is not easily Star Trek’s best action movie is that it has to compete with Wrath of KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!  The movies obviously mark a change in Picard’s character: now he goes sallying forth to the planet without a peep from Riker, and  he gets to lead the counterstrike against the Borg while wearing his Cool Combat  Vest. Also, continuing props to whomever – and I hope it was Sirtis herself –  chose to continue with Marina Sirtis’ natural hair rather than those awful wigs she sported in TNG.  Similarly, I’m glad to see LeVar Burton not having to wear that VISOR. I thought that thing was ridiculous when I was seven years old watching ST and ST TNG for the first time during a month-long hospital stay and I still do. 

One of the under-rated aspects of this movie is the use of Jerry Goldsmith’s Klingon theme every time Worf appears.

Picard: I’m about to commit a direct violation of our orders. Any of you who object should do so now; it will be noted in my log.
Data: Captain, I believe I speak for everyone here when I say…to hell with our orders. 

Troi:  If you’re looking for my professional opinion, as ship’s counselor, he’s nuts.
Riker: …I’ll be sure to note that in my log.

Pressure, 2026.  Brendan Frasier plays Dwight Eisenhower, planning D-Day, and Ike needs a verdict: go or no go on D-Day on June 5?  Andrew Scott plays Group Captain James Stagg, who – going on raw data, not historic precedents – has to present, and defend, a forecast that June 5 is a poxy day for weather. Pretty good character drama, but despite the trailer this is not a Brendan Frasier-dominated movie. He plays more of a 40/60 role against Andrew Scott’s Group Captain Stagg, who is tasked with the unenviable duty of delivering a weather forecast for D-Day, planned for Monday June 5.  It is not a forecast Ike, or anyone, wants to hear.  Does Frasier do Ike well?  As much as I like him, I never “lost” him in the role the way I did Bryan Cranston in “ALL THE WAY”, where he plays LBJ. Still,  enjoyable on the whole. 

Star Trek: Insurrection, 1998. “Can anyone remember when we used to be explorers?”   The crew of the Big E receive word that Data has gone slap-ass crazy and exposed a previously-concealed observation of a pre-warp planet.  The Enterprise crew discover that (1) this planet is hella weird, with an atmosphere that can heal injuries and aging and (2) Starfleet, or a part thereof, is entertaining a sketchy-as-hell plan to remove the people on the planet so the atmosphere can be commodified.  “How many people does it take, admiral – before it becomes wrong?”   is Picard’s response. He is outraged by this perverse application of “the goods of the many outweigh the needs of the few”, and so he must battle F. Murray Abraham….to the death.   My favorite part of this movie remains Picard and Data singing “A British Tar”, but it’s a good all around story.  I’ve heard it claimed that this is a good TNG episode, but not quite up to snuff as a movie;  the  practical stakes are definitely lower than in the prior two TNG movies,  but the moral argument – that the ends can never justify the means, that good ends cannot be achieved through the devil’s tools –  has lingered with me for nearly thirty years now.  Frankly, one reason I love TNG so much is because of its morality plays – whether that be “Measure of a Man” or “Drumhead”.    The theme here is one that is echoed in SF films like Serenity, or in human history –  the poisoned chalice of doing evil to serve The Greater Good.  Also, we get to see the Big E a lot. Pity she gets plowed into Shinzon’s Scimitar in the next film. I really wish TNG films had a longer lease, but Star Trek had been ridden long and hard by the mid-2000s.   Also, this movie established what a “drone” was for me, and I was extremely weirded out to realize we’ve made the damn things now, just with more irritating noise. 

Not Patrick Duffy: We believe when you create a machine to do the work of a man, you take something away from the man.

Picard: We are betraying the very principles on which the Federation is founded.
Admiral Doherty: Jean Luc, we’re only moving six hundred people.
Picard:  How many people does it take, admiral, before it becomes wrong?

Star Trek Nemesis, 2002.  Riker and Troi want to get married. Then an evil clone of Picard interferes and forces Picard to drive the bloody Enterprise-E right into his Villain Ship of Evil to stop him. The death of Data, and alas, the death of the TNG movies.  I was SO HYPED to watch this when it first came out, but it basically ended Star Trek for nearly a decade;  Enterprise, regardless of its virtues, was just rehashing the same formula of TNG and VOY but to more and more marginal results. I think Hardy is brilliant these days, in films like Bronson and The Drop, so it was interesting to watch him in this first film where even in the full flush of my Trekkie-dom,   I felt….The Cringe, as gen-z peeps might say. Unlike the other TNG films, I didn’t feel a difference watching this one, except for appreciating Hardy a little more – possibly out of habit since he’s become a favorite.   It still frustrates me that we were given fantastic ship models, a great new character in Donatra, and then –  we never see them again. 

The Big Lebowski, 1998.

Oh reader.

Dear reader.

You know how they describe movies as a cult classic?

…I’m a Big Lebowski cultist.  I once spent four hours dressed as Walter Sobchak quoting the movie.  The Big Lebowski is about a Dude – the Dude – whose rug, which, like, totally tied the room together, is peed on after a case of mistaken identity.  The Dude reaches out to the Big Lebowski, some old man whose catchphrase is “THE BUMS WILL ALWAYS LOSE!”,  for recompense.  Things happen.   Bowling. Toes. Scenes that feel like an acid trip.  I’ve been watching this movie for twenty years and have yet to tire of it. 

“THIS IS NOT ‘NAM, SMOKEY,  THIS IS BOWLING! THERE ARE RULES!”

“THE CHINAMAN IS NOT THE ISSUE HERE, DUDE! I’m talking about drawing a LINE IN THE SAND, Dude, ACROSS THIS LINE YOU DO NOT – also, Dude?  ‘Chinaman’ is not the preferred nomenclature. ‘Asian-American’, please.”

“You want a toe? I can get you a toe. There are ways, Dude, you don’t want to know. I can get you a toe by 3 o’clock, with nail polish.”

Girlfriends Day.  I found this not through my love of Bob Odenkirk (Better call Saul!) but because I searched for Amber Tamblyn looking for some movie about traveling pants. (I like Tamblyn from Joan of Arcadia, but I was looking for movies about female friendship for writing reasons.)  A greeting card writer loses his mojo after his wife leaves him for some other guy; he loses himself in moping and the bottle until he hears about an emerging greeting card category, and by chance he also runs into Amber Tamblyn who evidently likes jaded alcoholics who hang around in bars.  And then….MURDER! Murder most foul. Enter mood whiplash and general entertainment. 

“I’m a cynic.”
“No,  I’m a cynic. You’re cynical. There’s a difference. I never believed in the first place, but you – you wake up every morning disappointed to find the world the way it is….because you’re a dreamer.”

The Karate Kid, 1984.  I am a terrible Millennial, as I’ve never watched this, despite growing up with martial-arts oriented stuff like TMNT and the Rush Hour movies. A boy (Daniel)  and his mother move to Cali; Daniel meets a girl (Allie) and hits it off, but when he’s beaten up after trying to stop a blonde bully from antagonizing Allie,  Daniel becomes a near-pariah and is relentlessly bullied by the bully (Johnny) and his crew.  After an older Japanese neighbor witnesses Daniel being beaten up by Johnny & co, and teaches “Daniel-san” to defend himself.  At the same time that Daniel is being schooled in karate through…unorthodox methods, he’s also trying to date a girl who is several classes above him.   Ultimately, Daniel and  Johnny will face off in a regional karate competition.  Watching this in 2026 (forty-two years later) added the eighties aesthetic to its original karate appeal – especially the music. There was also unexpected character richness in it, like Mr. Miyagi being a grieving widower whose losses probably owed to FDR’s order that Japanese-Americans be interned in camps during WW2.  

Also, this prompted me to start watching COBRA KAI. Strike hard! Strike fast! NO MERCY!  It’s surprisingly good.  The principle actors from Karate Kid,   Ralph Macchio and William Zabka,  reprise their roles – but they’re both middle-aged men in the grips of triumph, parenthood, and failure. Both manage to be extremely sympathetic despite being antagonists.  Zabka’s Johnny Lawrence is stuck in the eighties, which is both sad, sympathetic, and hilarious for storytelling: he has no patience whatsoever for modernity’s infinite neuroses.

People will Talk, 1951. Cary Grant plays a physician with a mysterious past who falls in love with a patient (oh dear) who is unwed and pregnant (oh dear) and who tells her she isn’t so he has time to tell her father.  (Wait, what?) Then she runs off and he runs after her and they get married, but some  professor at the university believes Cary Grant was up to no good in his mysterious past, and he’s bound and determined to expose him.  Great story;   I’ll stick this as my 2nd favorite Cary Grant, the first being (forever and always) Philadelphia Story. (It displaced His Girl Friday, for the curious.) 

“He was a duck.”
“A duck?”
“He healed people.”
“How?”
“If I knew that I’d be a doc myself.”

“It’s not much fun, gettin’ to be old.”
“It’s even less fun not getting to be.”

“Funny. This calls for tears, and I haven’t got any.”

“Elwell, you can use more words more unpleasantly than any irritating little pipsqueak I’ve ever known!”

Emperor, 2013. Tommy Lee Jones plays….eh, Tommy Lee Jones, but answering to the name Douglas MacArthur. Mac has to decide whether or not to persecute Emperor Hirohito for Japanese war crimes. This an eye-opener; I’d never heard about the Kyūjō Incident, in which a small group of the Japanese army attempted to seize the palace and stop the Emperor from surrendering.

“If you understand devotion, then you will understand Japan.”

My First Mister, 2001.   I watched this twenty years ago purely for Leelee Sobieski, aka ‘Young Helen Hunt”.   Somehow talked the ladyfriend into watching it with me.  It’s about a troubled teenage girl  deep into goth culture and piercings who becomes friends with Albert Brooks, who is….as square as square can be. For him, being a square is aspirational.    There’s a kind of paternal relationship that emerges, and it’s why I thought of this movie after watching Welcome to the Rileys. One thing I like about this movie is that it shows emotional intimacy that’s not romantic. It’s also…tragic, so much so that I lost movie-picking privileges with the ladyfriend for the rest of the month.  In my defense, I hadn’t seen it in 20 years.  It’s brutal but beautiful. 

“She was a troubled teenage girl. She chose indifference as a state of mind.”

“Who do you talk to? Who are your friends?”
“…you?”
“Me? I’m 49 years old!”
“I’m 17. Nice to meet you.”

“It’s one of those small….but enormous, things.”

“I’d like to propose a toast to all the special F-words – to friends, family, fate, forgiveness, and – forever.”

Ike: Countdown to D-Day, 2004.

Tom Selleck plays Dwight Eisenh–

Tom Selleck? 

Okay. Tom Selleck plays Dwight Eisenhower, planning D-Day. He’s also having to manage  his peers and subordinates,  like the prickly Bernard Montgomery and the pugnacious Patton.  The Brits are chomping at the bit to give Jerry a little what-for,  but Eisenhower has to manage spirit and logistics, as well as keep mum as the word. Selleck’s voice provides an appropriate gravitas for Eisenhower; although as with Frasier I did not lose him in the role, his drastic change in appearance (bald Selleck is odd Selleck) went further in that purpose.

“It’s Churchill’s job to make the decisions. It’s mine to make them work.”

“Whaddya say, Beetle? Want to show the reporters your ‘human face’?”
“I wasn’t issued one, sir.

“‘Anglo-Saxons to Rule the Postwar World’. The hell is this, George?”
“The straight skinny, sir.  After this it’ll be us and the Brits who have to put things back together.”
“That will come as a surprise to Joe Stalin!”
“Communism’s for the next war, sir.”