Movies

It seems that the latest premise 20th Century Fox is considering for X-Men 2 concerns the Legacy Virus, a man-made disease that is only infectious to mutants, eventually resulting in their deaths. I’m assuming this was a story arc that originally appeared in the comics, as Michael Chabon’s proposal (see below) also used the Legacy virus as a major story element. It is only a treatment and could very well be passed over in favor of something else. Of all the rumored story lines, I think the most interesting is the Wolverine Solo pic which focuses on the Logan character and a search for his identity (fitting in perfectly with the ending of the first film). There are several advantages for Fox:

1. Not having to reassemble the massive cast dealing with schedules, negotiations, etc would free up time and allow the shoot to begin sooner.
2. Wolverine’s massive popularity among fans would ensure a good box office and omitting the other 5 or 6 X-Men would streamline the story and keep the budget down.
3. When execs see the possibility of expanding the franchise while keeping the budget and cast concerns to a minimum, they try and do so.

Not to mention how much Hugh Jackman kicks ass as Wolverine. Whether or not that would make a good movie, I don’t know. I would be really worried about their explainations for Wolverine’s past, so maybe we’d be better off with another ensemble film.

The X-Men and I: Michael Chabon’s thoughts and proposal for the X-Men movie. It never saw the light of day, but its interesting to note that Chabon’s 4 elements that are essential to the X-Men are present in the version of X-Men that did make it to the screen. Chabon’s actual proposal is a good read, but I don’t know if it would have been any better than the filmed version. Chabon wrote last year’s Wonder Boys, a movie friends have been hounding me to see; I shall have to do that.

Special thanks to Metascene (Meatscene?), which has been updated more times in the past few weeks than it has this year. Good work Fred!

The Oscars happened last night. Ho hum. Gladiator won best picture. Ho hum, big suprise. Rather than ramble on about how Gladiator was good, but not best picture good, I’ll speak about Steven Soderberg’s win for best director, which, I felt was well deserved. Now, I’m going to admit, I haven’t seen most of the movies nominated this year, but I did see Traffic and I felt that it was superbly directed. I was extremely impressed. I feel for Ang Lee, however, since he was probably also deserving of the award. From what I’ve heard about Requiem for a Dream, Darren Aronofsky (director of Pi) was also deserving, and he wasn’t even nominated (thats what you get for making a brilliant but relentlessly brutal film).

Since I probably won’t get around to doing a year 2000 movie roundup until August (like I did last year), I’m going to link to Widgett’s, which is entertaining and honest and a good read. He makes the point that the year 2000 wasn’t as bad as everyone made it out to be, and overall, I think he might be correct. But 2000 had 2 things going against it: a slow start (first impressions count) and even with the strong ending, the year still wasn’t nearly as strong as 1999…

Today is National Pi Day and also the birthday of one Albert Einstein. I plan to celebrate by popping in Pi, one of my favourite movies of recent years. A kinetic, grainy, paranoid masterpiece, Pi strikes a certain cord with me and for some reason, appeals to my personal philosophy (3.14 stars; sorry, couldn’t help myself). 8:54, Press Return {insert cool Clint Mansell Music here}.

A homemade MST3K episode (complete with familiar silhouettes) lambasting Dungeons and Dragons among other role playing games. Don’t let it pass, its a riot (even if you don’t like D&D)! I miss MST3K a lot. Its just so much fun seeing them tear a bad movie apart. I’ve got a couple of episodes on tape (including the infamous Manos:The Hands of Fate) and, of course, the Movie, but there are over 200 episodes out there. I think I might even be tempted to watch TV if someone started airing them again…[via boing boing]

In some completely unrelated news, I’m beginning to worry about the mutant fungus from space (well, ok, maybe its not completely unrelated). Biologists are worried about virulent new strains of fungus which the russian space station Mir will bring back to Earth.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot, David Hasselhoff is the AntiChrist.

John Shirley, known to me through his script adaptaion of The Crow (a comic book by James O’Barr), argues the finer points of the film Fight Club with underground film maker Ethan Wilson. The article contains Shirley’s original comments, Wilson’s response, and Shirley’s response to Wilson. A quote:

“It�s fucking with you right from the start�it�s daring you to notice it�s a movie all along. It doesn�t care; it wants you to question the media continuum; question your cultural assumptions.”

Personally, I agree more with Shirley, not just because pointing out the “rage” is a significant contribution in itself, but because the lack of a constructive alternative makes its own statement. Does it even lack a constructive alternative? In losing everything, didn’t Ed Norton’s character gain something? All this discussion proves is that Fight Club is most certainly an artistically and philosophically significant film. Why else would it elicit such an (emotional) response? Ahh, the joys of a film that doesn’t spell everything out…

Blood Lust Snicker Snicker in Wide Screen: Dennis Hopper interviews Quentin Tarantino while he was editing Pulp Fiction. It really doesn’t seem like an interview; its more like two guys just chatting. Maybe its just Tarantino being garrulous, but I wish more interviews would turn out like that.

Why Act in Theater? The famous film and theater actor Willem Dafoe addresses this issue quite frankly in this article. Basically, theirs ups and downs in both mediums, and sometimes when he’s on stage he longs for the camera, and sometimes when he’s sporting the Green Goblin costume in the upcoming Spider Man movie, he longs for the stage…

A lengthy study of Stanley Kubrick’s final film that sheds some light on just what the hell is going on during the movie. Extra attention is paid to the symbolism present in the film (don’t miss the Final Note on Symbolism, Theme, and the Legacy of Kubrick) and as such, many small details and references are discussed. Personally, though I don’t believe it to be the best of Kubrick’s work, I loved EWS. What isn’t discussed in the articles is the sheer mastery of Kubrick’s direction (or maybe I’m thinking of cinematography here), as in the conversation after the party. The article points out the symbolism of red and blue in the scene (which I understoon to be Hot and Cool colors representing turmoil and calmness respectively), but the framing of that scene is just brilliant. At the beginning of the scene Alice and Bill are both on screen (smoking up). Then, as tensions between them mount, the become farther apart until only one at a time is on screen. As the discussion becomes more and more heated, the camera zooms in closer and closer, almost suffocating Bill and Alice and furthering their isolation. Brilliant work dammit.

If you like testicular humor, check out this parody of The Blair Witch Project. Its quite funny, in a scrotal kind of way.