Review: A Good Day to Die Hard

Unlike the previous films in the series, A Good Day to Die Hard was widely panned by critics. Based on 177 reviews collected by Rotten Tomatoes, the film received a 16% approval rating from critics, with an average score of 4/10. By comparison, Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating in the 0–100 range based on reviews from top mainstream critics, calculated an average score of 29 based on 39 reviews, indicating "generally unfavorable" reaction. On both websites, the film ranked lowest among the Die Hard films. CinemaScore polls reported that the average grade cinemagoers gave the film was "B+" on an A+ to F scale, and that audiences skewed slightly male and older.

-Wikipedia

Warning! Spoilers ahead! This is not a drill!

Actually, I liked it. No, I didn't think the latest film in the Die Hard franchise was terrific or fabulous, but it's a pretty good way to kill 97 minutes and watch lots of chase scenes, shootouts, and explosions. In the opening scenes, Bruce Willis shows his age (he'll be 58 next month) with very visible grey in his beard and hair (both remarkably short but visible), which I suppose is to highlight the fact that he has just discovered that his estranged son Jack (played by Australian actor Jai Courtney) has been put in a Russian prison for murder. Of course, John has no way to know that his son is an operative for the CIA and this is all a clever plot to put him in the same Moscow courtroom as Yuri Komarov (Sebastian Koch), a former terrorist and former partner of corrupt Viktor Chagarin (Sergei Kolesnikov) who "grew a conscience" in prison and is now going to testify against Chagarin, implicating him in some unmentioned (at the beginning of the film) chicanery.

John shows up in Moscow just as Jack is being taken into court. He manages to get to the outside of the courthouse, but the courtroom with Jack and Komarov is sealed, presumably to prevent another assassination attempt against Komarov.

John looks around and spies a rather unusual vehicle but doesn't put two and two together in time before the plot is hatched and a gang of Russian thugs led by Alik (Radivoje Bukvić) blows up a ton of parked cars, blasts a hole in the courtroom freeing Jack and Komarov, and kills just about everyone inside.

Jack manages to get out of the courthouse with Komarov, avoiding a hit squad that was sent in to make sure of Komarov's death and steal a van. The problem is, as Jack and Komarov are making their getaway, John steps in front of the van, thinking his son is a fugitive from justice, and stops them. During the delay, even though Jack and Komarov escape John, they miss their exit window and are stuck with "plan B," a safe house in Moscow.

The usually competant John McClaine gets egg on his face on multiple occasions early in the film as he realizes he's blundered into a scenario far outside his normal "cops and robbers" scope. This does nothing to help repair the already trashed relationship John has with Jack. Even after John manages to stop Jack's pursuers in a spectacular car chase that you'll have to see to believe, Jack still thinks his father is a total screw up. Thus the three of them arrive at the so-called "safe house," which is where John finally sees who and what his son really is...a CIA agent.

But Jack's partner is abruptly killed before getting "the file" from Komarov, so with no allies left in Moscow, John, Jack, and Kamarov go it alone in search of "the file" that Kamarov is supposed to have and will give to Jack in exchange for getting him and his daughter Irina (Yuliya Snigir) out of Russia.

Of course, it's not that easy. One key acquired, one double-cross, one beating, one shootout, and one helecopter attack later, Komarov, Irina and the key to the file are gone, in the hands of the bad guys while Jack and John are left battered and bleeding with no "plan C" or any other letter of the alphabet left. Jack, who up until this point, has always played by the rules, is out of options, but this is where his "shoot from the hip" Dad feels right at home.

The film seems a little forced or awkward during the conversations where John and Jack are supposed to be trying to relate to each other as father and son, but then again, their relationship as father and son is forced and awkward, so it fits. Neither of them know what to say to each other and when John finally says, "I love you boy," you can feel the weight of his age and the long years that stand between them in his words and his voice.

But there's another double-cross. Komarov and Irina aren't the victims, they're the predators. The prize never was a file full of evidence, it was a crap-ton of weapons grade uranium hidden in a vault in the one place in the world no one in their right mind would want to go: Chernobyl.

The place should still be incredibly radioactive, but except for protection suits worn by Kamarov and his party while locating the vault, that doesn't seem to be a problem. Irina uses some sort of device to "neutralize" the radiation, then all protective gear is no longer required. Komarov caps Alik and has Chagarin's neck broken by his own masseuse.

Then the McClaine father and son team, who have providentially stolen a car loaded with body armor and weapons, drive the twelve hours it would take to go from Moscow to Chernobyl, Ukraine, and kick ass.

The good guys win but not until a series of death defying feats that should have put them bothin intensive care and lots and lots of bodies, bullets, and explosions happen, which is why we watch these types of films anyway.

There's a horrible hint that Jack might take over the "Die Hard" films, retiring Willis and replacing him with Courtney (and possibly Mary Elizabeth Winstead playing Jack's sister Lucy who was featured in the previous film and who briefly appeared in this one). I really hope I'm wrong.

On a scale of 1 to 10, this film is solid "OK." It was entertaining, but I really didn't need to see it on the big screen. It would have been just as good as a DVD and that's probably when I'll see it again.

I tend to think that the original film Die Hard (1988) and Die Hard with a Vengence (1995) were the best in the series. The fourth film was pretty good and certainly one, three, and four beat the current film, not to mention the terrible Die Hard 2 (1990), which was just a lame recycling of the first film.

Yeah, it was a good shooting, explosion, thrill rush film for guys and I'm not sorry I saw it, but if you don't want to blow your hard earned dough on seeing it in the theatre, I'm sure it'll look just as good on the small screen at home.

Oh, the one thing I would have liked a little more of is the "steamy" side of Irina. But her hottiness is revealed just in passing.

DVD Review: V for Vendetta

Last November, I reviewed the V for Vendetta graphic novel. I was generally impressed, but a lot of "dystopia" material came out of the latter half of the 20th century, so by the time I got around to reading Moore and Lloyd's work, I found it hard to be overly impressed. Also, the length of the story and the numerous elements introduced made it difficult to follow at times. That figures prominently into my review of the film V for Vendetta (2005).

First of all, who wouldn't be excited to watch a film starring Hugo Weaving (as "V"), Natalie Portman (as "Evey") and particularly John Hurt (as "Adam Sutler")? I was really looking forward to the experience but at the same time, worried because films almost never do justice to their original print or graphic novel source. This time, I'm not so sure the rule holds.

I mentioned before that I believe Moore was a bit too lengthy in his writing of the graphic novel. It made it difficult for me as the reader to be able to grasp and hold all of the various threads he introduced and have them all come together in a cohesive manner by the last page. As a film where everything had to be introduced, expressed, and resolved in 132 minutes (the film's running time), brevity and economy was forced upon the story, making the movie version of "V for Vendetta" quite a bit more efficient than the print version. Of course, part of the motivation behind cutting down the length was to accommodate modern audiences, both in how long they can tolerate sitting on their bum in a movie theatre, and in appealing to a wider population than might be attracted to Moore and Lloyd's production.

Any film or other creative work is not only a product of the artists involved but of the point in history in which it was made. The graphic novel was written over a period of years in the 1980s while the film version was released in 2005. While the span of two decades didn't overly affect the content of the film compared to the graphic novel (although the film "tightened things up" quite a bit, it was still pretty faithful to its source), the world in the film wasn't quite as dark and depressing as the graphic novel.

It made "V" somewhat less "scary" in the film and it allowed for the police, and particularly Chief Inspector Finch (played by Stephen Rea) to actually portray "good guys" rather than government stooges, wife beaters, and homicidal maniacs.

There were weak spots. I thought it was a little too convenient for Creedy to be able to deliver Adam Sutler, the dictator of the UK in the film, to "V" more or less on command. Someone like Sutler would have had multiple layers of protection and I can't believe someone as paranoid as Sutler would have allowed himself to be put in a position not only to be captured, but spirited away from his stronghold to an underground train station just to be shot in the head.

I understand that "aging" Evey was probably necessary, but in the graphic novel she was 15 years old. Making her an adult took away some of her vulnerability and the "transference" of her dependence to "V" as a father figure after the assassination of her parents (this dynamic is shifted into a "beauty and the beast" type of love story). Yes, I previously acknowledged Portman's star power and audience attraction, and comprehend why she would have been cast as Evey, but it made especially the scene where she had to dress up as a little girl to be used as bait to set up pedophile Bishop Lilliman a little ridiculous.

Not everyone is good at accents. When I first saw Bob Hoskins in the role of Private Detective Eddie Valiant in the film Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988), it never occurred to me that Hoskins wasn't an American. In fact, if someone had suggested to me back then that Hoskins was British, I would have bet any amount of money against the possibility...

...and I would have lost my shirt. The guy played the drunken, down-and-out, "cheap detective," brilliantly.

Which brings me back to Natalie Portman who is also a brilliant actress and an asset to this film...but her British accent was awful. First of all, even when she was able to maintain the accent for more than a minute or two, I just knew by listening to her that she wasn't British. Then too was her inability to maintain the accent consistently throughout the film. More often than not, she spoke her lines just like Natalie Portman would have spoken her lines in a dozen other films where she wasn't expected to pretend that she was a native of the UK. Frankly, if the accent was such a problem, Portman should have just ditched it. The story writers could have created a line or two of dialogue explaining her American accent or just ignored it completely and let the story tell itself. After all, who even cares about Arnold Schwarzenegger's accent, regardless of what role he's playing? For the purposes of this movie, Portman's usual speaking voice would have been fine.

I didn't like the ending, but I understood it was the sort of populist stuff the film makers thought the audience would want. In the end, "V" dies, but in the graphic novel, no one realizes this since Evey takes over his role, mask and all. At the end of the film, Evey never dons the mask and even partners up with Finch! At the end, all of the "rioting" citizens take off their masks, revealing ordinary human faces (even the people who had died in the film were in the crowd). I'm surprised that all of London didn't break out into a chorus of We Are the World.

No mass shootings. No atrocities at the film's climax (plenty of them during the film, however). The soldiers, lacking their dictator and his number one henchman to guide them (they're both dead, victims of "V" by this point in the movie), they stand down and just let the crowd sort of wash over them. We know from the much more tame Occupy Wall Street movement that when police and soldiers are confronted with an advancing mob of thousands or tens of thousands, all wearing Guy Fawkes masks, who have an uncertain intent, people end up getting gassed, beaten, arrested, detained, restrained, and shot. Something like that should have happened here, but it wouldn't have been the happy ending the audience wanted to see (or the happy ending the film makers thought the audience wanted to see).

And who was going to be the new leader?

I know what the film was trying to say. It was trying to say that "the people" would run their own lives. However, history shows us that in any revolution (from the American revolution in the U.S. to the Communist revolution in Cuba), the revolutionaries create a temporary state of anarchy when they overthrow the corrupt government, but then the revolutionaries form the basis of the new government. Even if that government is supposed to be by and for the people, eventually, it will take on a life of its own, establish its own priorities, and enforce its own existence.

At the end of the graphic novel, just as in the film, "V" realizes that he isn't the one to be part of rebuilding the nation. He is perfect for introducing anarchy, but rage, hate, and revenge aren't a good platform upon which to build the people's utopia. That's where Evey comes in. But in the novel, she dons the mask, the hat, and the cape and she becomes "V". No one knows the difference but she's a different "V", one who has the capacity for love, tenderness, and hope. Everyone was looking to "V" for the future once he ended the corruption of the past. If Evey doesn't fill the void, then who will?

Beyond the film and the graphic novel (and the Occupy movement for that matter), there is no sustainable "happy ending." After the ending credits roll, in real life, real people will still live on and people tend to form systems, from family systems to governmental systems. That might not make a good movie, but not addressing that reality made the "conclusions" of the stories for "V for Vendetta" ring hollow.

All that said, the film is a worthwhile watch. Given the events occurring in the world today, revolution is hard not to think about. "V for Vendetta" speaks to those thoughts and feelings, so I can understand the popularity of this film. It is well written and except for what I've already mentioned, well acted. I'm glad that I saw the film and read the graphic novel. I just don't believe it would have all ended so well.

DVD Review: Smallville Season 1, The Pilot

Somebody, save me. No, not really. I was in the public library the other day looking at the DVDs and saw that the Smallville season 1 collection was available. That's kind of unusual. Almost none of the Smallville DVDs are on the shelves for very long and in fact, season 1 was the only season of Smallville there. On a whim, and because I have only seen each season once, I decided to check out the first season of Smallville from the library. Figured it would be entertaining holiday fare, since I took a few days off for Christmas.

I remember the first time I saw the pilot episode. I had no idea what to expect. Well, scratch that. I had an idea of what to expect. I was just wrong. For one thing, I didn't expect a meteor shower of kryptonite. I didn't expect Lana's parents to be blown to bits. And who the heck is Aunt Nell?

I thought casting John Schneider and Annette O'Toole as Jonathan and Martha Kent was brilliant but unexpected (a young Ma and Pa Kent). I didn't realize just how much of a divergent trajectory Smallville would take from previous Superman canon. Actually, I wouldn't realize that for quite some time and eventually, it would get to be a real problem, but in the pilot episode, it worked out well.

Smallville has always been an uneven series. Some episodes just rocked while others were total dogs. So far, I'm about halfway through the first season and some of them are just ridiculous. It's amazing how kryptonite gives individual "meteor freaks" abilities that go so well with their personalities and personal problems (a fat girl who suddenly loses weight but has to eat a ton of fat to keep from starving?).

In the pilot, Clark already has powers but they're not fully developed. This was a real boon, since the audience can experience Clark's evolution toward becoming Superman along with him, which is the point of the series. He's fast, he's strong, he's durable, but that's about all he's got in the pilot. Oh, and he's very charming in a shy sort of way. Having achieved his abilities slowly and having been raised by parents who are caring and strong, Clark has been given the perfect platform for not abusing what he's got while at the same time, struggling to be popular in high school like any other 15 year old boy (I had some trouble picturing Welling and a number of the other "students" as that young, though).

Nobody knows what kryptonite is. They do know about meteor rock, but only Chloe suspects that the stuff has anything to do with the weirdness that's been happening in and around Smallville for the past twelve years or so. Meteor freaks would be the main catalyst in the first season, providing Clark with most of the foes he would battle. Most of them aren't bad people, just human beings whose bodies have been involuntarily changed and mutated by radiation exposure. The annoying thing about these freaks though is how they just disappear after Clark beats them. Sure, some die, but others are just (supposedly) taken away by the authorities. I think that's explained in subsequent seasons, but never entirely to my satisfaction.

These are super-powered metahumans, many who know that Clark is "special" himself. No one ever tells the cops, "Oh, by the way, the kid who stopped me has a punch like a crashing jet plane and can move about as fast?"

Lex Luthor.

More than any other character in the pilot and first season, he stands out as the somewhat dangerous but loyal big brother Clark never had. While driven by his own conflicts with his father Lionel (wonderfully played by John Glover), Lex is positively affected, not just by having Clark save his life, but by who Clark is. For most of Lex's life, he's been influenced by people who were primarily interested in power and manipulating others. Clark, super powers or no, is a truly transparent (except for his secrets), authentic human being (well, he looks human) who doesn't want anything from Lex except just to be friends.

Lex does everything he can do to help Clark and his family, though his methods definitely come from the "dark side" of being a Luthor, his intentions at this point are good. Lex's behavior shows us that he loves his friends (and as far as we know, Clark is his only friend) and hates his enemies. He's a great guy to have in your corner, but never, ever cross him or he'll find a way to get you.

Chloe Sullivan.

I hadn't realized just how annoying she was in the beginning. She's bitchy, and cranky, and sarcastic, and geez, would somebody shut her up. Quick to judge, slow to forgive, opinionated, and kind of full of herself. In some ways, she's like Lex in that she doesn't care who she hurts to get what she wants, which in her case, is the next "wall of weird" story. Unlike Lex, she's not calculating about it and in fact, she is rather careless, pursuing the goal without seeing the consequences. She matures as the show continues, but as I recall, by the series ending, she was still a little cold-hearted and goal driven.

In the beginning, she's a bright but unpopular person. Her hair always looks like a small explosion has scattered it at odd angles. She's the ugly duckling who is jealous of Clark's attention to Lana's beautiful swan. At one point in the first season, she calls the school paper her identity and in another episode, she refers to her laptop as her life. At age 15, Chloe is only as good and as interesting as what she writes about, which is probably why she goes after the unusual stories, rather than sticking to typical school activities. She's a proto-Lois Lane and is displaced by Lois in season four and afterward, which is why she has to develop other skill sets to stay interesting as a character. But in season 1, the writers of Smallville seemed to think Clark needed to play off of a Lois-type character from the very beginning.

Lana Lang.

Cute. Not as superficial as she seems for a cheerleader. Like most kids, she's trying to find out who she is and where she's going, which is another big point of the first season, since that's Clark's quest in spades. Having her parents die in the meteor shower when she was three mirrors Clark's own mystery, not having known his birth parents at all or even what planet they were from. Lana at least has Nell to fill in the blanks, along with pictures, diaries, and other documentation. Clark has a spaceship that, as of the middle of the first season, he's seen only once (as the series progresses, we get to see tons and tons of Kryptonian stuff and people and it finally gets rather oppressive how much we learn about a planet that blew up a long time ago). And of course, Lana has to wear that pesky little kryptonite necklace which disappears at odd times allowing her and Clark to actually have a conversation while standing closer than five feet apart. By the middle of season 1, Clark is weaning her from wearing it, which makes developing a friendship that includes more than phone calls and email easier to film.

Whitney Fordman.

He's not as big a pain as I remember him. Most of the time, he's actually a nice guy, for a jock with limited internal resources. He's authentically devoted to Lana, insecure enough to be jealous of Clark, worried about his future, and struggling with his father's heart disease (something Clark will have to deal with in his own Dad as time goes on). He's actually an OK guy and I can see why Lana likes him. On the other hand, Lana is smart enough to outgrow Whitney in a few years which is why it's a good thing he's eventually killed off. Oh, and that makes room for Clark to move in and hook up with her...until Lois shows up by season four.

Pete Ross.

Every guy needs a buddy and Pete is Clark's. Besides Lana and Clark's parents, Pete is one of the few people that comes from the silver age comic books. Of course, back in the 1960s, Pete is tall and blond and white...kind of like how Whitney looks. Of course, this is the early 21st century and in real life, even Smallville has a diverse population. I also didn't realize how well actor Sam Jones III was built. We expect the occasional beefcake shot of Clark in the boys locker room, but I noted Pete looking really buff himself.

Truth be told, Pete is really Chloe's buddy more than Clark's. In the pilot, Pete and Chloe bet whether or not Clark makes it to the bus stop in time to get his ride to school, and again whether or not Clark will stumble and act like a buffoon when he gets anywhere near Lana. Chloe and Pete are most often the two people you see actually working on stories for the Torch (Smallville High's school paper) and just as friends, they go to the homecoming dance together (neither being popular enough to score their own dates). Pete joins the football team to increase his popularity, which is natural, but you never get an impression that he's there to do much more than back up Clark and Chloe.

Relationships.

The whole "shipper" emphasis of Smallville wasn't in full swing in season 1 since the audience is still trying to figure out who people are supposed to be. We do see the beginnings, though. Whitney and Lana are dating, but Clark is totally pining for Lana. Somewhere inside, Lana realizes this but it doesn't come to fruition this early in the game. Lex, for his part, sees all this and repeatedly tries to set up situations where Clark and Lana are together. Chloe has a "thing" for Clark, but it's not so overpowering that she doesn't have interests in another guy (such as womanizing student Sean Kelvin, played by Michael Coristine in the episode Cool). Eventually, this will develop into a "shipper" issue of Clark/Lana vs. Clark/Chloe, but we aren't there yet.

And thankfully, that's all of the "shipper" drama we get to see in season 1. At this point, there's still a strong teenage angst thread running through the series, which I'm sure is present to satisfy the demands of its target audience, but for me, Smallville season 1 is mainly about watching Clark discover who he is as the future "Man of Steel."

Conclusion.

I particularly like the pilot episode of Smallville and a number of developments in Clark as a person and a "superhero" in season 1. It's "good clean fun," so to speak. I'm even thinking of getting season 2 after I'm done with this set of disks.

DVD Review: The Amazing Spider-Man

I suppose it was OK. The odd thing about The Amazing Spider-Man (2012) is that I neither really liked it or disliked it.

OK, I liked it. The film was watchable and entertaining. I enjoyed it and would watch it again, but it wasn't "amazing" or "spectacular" or anything like that. It was just another superhero movie. It had its good points and its flaws.

Warning! Warning! Major spoilers ahead. If you're like me and waited for this film to come out in DVD before watching it (and you haven't watched it yet), I will give away a ton of secrets in my review. You have been warned.

I like that there was a mystery. So many superheroes get their powers by accident and I guess Peter did in this film too, but not quite by accident. In a way, his father created him.

When Peter Parker is four-years old, his parents suffer a home break-in. Someone specifically was looking for something in his Dad's office. Fortunately, Richard Parker hid the really secret stuff in a false bottom of his desk drawer (a trick older than Stan Lee, but the thieves still didn't tumble to it). Pawning little Peter off on his Uncle Ben and Aunt May, Richard and Mary Parker disappear into the night, never to be seen again. Later, Peter learns they died in a plane crash, but no one ever talks about it.

Richard Parker's work had something to do with cross-species genetics...and spiders.

It's interesting that teenage Peter Parker was interested in photography before becoming Spider-Man. In the original, silver age version, he started taking news photos as a way to support himself and Aunt May after his uncle's death. I found it particularly confusing though, when Peter webbed his camera to a wall to take shots of Spider-Man's battle with the Lizard, that the film had never established why he did it in the first place. In this movie, he is never shown to have a relationship with the Daily Bugle or making plans to sell his photos to them or anyone else.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Andrew Garfield did a very good job playing the geeky, socially awkward (to put it mildly) teenage Peter Parker. Of course, the audience has to get past the fact that all of the actors depicting high school students are really twenty-somethings, but we should be used to that by now. In fact, Garfield's Parker is so awkward, I found it amazing that the beautiful and quite articulate Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone) ever found him attractive in the first place. Sure, Peter had just heroically tried to save some kid from being bullied by "Flash" Thompson (Chris Zylka) and gotten pounded into the pavement for his troubles, but that should have just made him look like a loser to most high school girls.

In some ways, I was more interested in Garfield's Parker than in his Spider-Man. It was very easy to see how Peter, abandoned by his parents over a decade before, was an alienated, malcontented, loner sitting on a lot of rage. He wasn't the "nice kid" that Parker was originally created to be by Lee and Ditko 50 years ago. Yeah, Garfield's Parker will stand up for the underdog, but that's because he is the underdog, not because he's intrinsically a nice guy. After all, at various points in the film, he blows off both his aunt and uncle, humiliates Flash Thompson just because he can, and even ends up on the school principle's "bad boy" list (although performing community service isn't such a "bad boy").

So you take all of that and give it "spider powers." What happens?

Oh, but wait. The mystery.

A water leak in the Parker home's basement leads Peter to discover his father's old briefcase that had been left to gather dust in some forgotten corner. Infinitely curious and desperate to know more about what happened to his parents, he examines the filthy old thing and, perhaps remembering the false bottom of his Dad's desk drawer, discovers a hidden pocket with a "secret formula." He also discovers a photo of Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans), his Dad's former lab partner at Oscorp, and he aims himself in that direction to try and learn more.

By amazing coincidence, the day Peter goes to visit Connors at Oscorp, Connors is supposed to be lecturing new interns who are being taken on a tour of the place by (another amazing coincidence) head intern Gwen Stacy. Peter takes another kid's pass to get in (getting that kid subsequently thrown out) and gets his first look at Connors...and impressing Connors with his knowledge of cross-species genetics. It's the first time that the audience sees Peter has a brain built for science. It's never mentioned before this, and Peter might just have been another angry high school kid for the first thirty minutes of the film.

Speaking of amazing coincidences, Peter just happens to run into (literally) Norman Osborne's top henchman Rajit Ratha (Irrfan Khan) and sees that the folder Ratha is carrying contains the same "secret formula" symbols that Pete found in his Dad's briefcase.

Even though Peter has a stolen intern pass and has left the rest of the intern tour, no one seems to question him as he follows Ratha through the corridors of a private corporate building with lots of trade secrets and watches him manipulate a touch pad to open a door to some secret room. Two guys come out and go with Ratha but for whatever reason, Peter decides to stop following Ratha and to get into that room.

I must say that it was lousy security that let Peter gain access. No smartcard, retina scan, or voice recognition software was required to open the door, just a series of finger movements across the pad, which Peter saw briefly and remembered. And what was in that room? Just a bunch of spiders on webs inside some sort of machine. Naturally, Peter decides to touch and spiders fall all over him. He manages to get out of the room again without setting off any alarms but takes an eight-legged hitchhiker with him, which manages to "put the bite" on Peter's neck right before Gwen catches him and kicks him out of the building.

I should mention at this point that Connors later tells Peter that no animal subject of cross-species genetic experiments has survived, yet, once bitten, Peter seems to do OK. (Should I mention that Peter actually gives Connors the secret of his father's formula at their first one-on-one meeting, making the Lizard possible?) But then, Connors also tells Peter that it was his father's breakthrough with the spiders over ten years ago, that enabled the project to survive. Maybe that's why there was a special room with spiders. They were the only ones who could pass on their genetic traits to another species without killing that species. But why were Richard Parker's spiders (or more likely their descendants) still around at Oscorp and if they were such a breakthrough (even if Parker Sr. took all his research with him when he disappeared ... apart from one briefcase), why in over a decade, were no experiments done with those spiders that would have ultimately created another Spider-Man?

The spiders were there for Peter to get spider powers, then that was that. Bad writing.

The film spends a lot of time showing us how Peter develops his powers. He doesn't immediately decide to become a hero or an entertainer or anything else. The fact that he gained new abilities is cool and a terrific clue as to what his father and Connors were up to, but he didn't decide to do anything with them at all (except mercilessly tease Flash Thompson and shatter a basketball backboard) until his Uncle Ben is killed.

And yes, Peter could have stopped the killer and no he didn't and yes, it pisses him off.

But he doesn't become a hero yet, he just becomes a guy looking for revenge. Ironically, he never finds it. He busts a bunch of guys who kind of look like the murderer, but he never finds the actually guy. Maybe the shooter blows town after he blows away Uncle Ben, but we never find out.

In the process of refining his vigilante role, Peter first develops a crude mask and finally the entire costume. Smart as he is, he can't actually create a "spider web formula" as in the original comics, but he "borrows" some from Oscorp after becoming chummy with Curt Connors.

Which brings up the question of what happens when Peter runs out of his supply? The only place he can get more is Oscorp. Once Connors is put away at the end of the film, his only other way in is his girlfriend. Sure, he invents the shooters, but he has no ability to independently create more webbing.

It's little details like this that kind of bugged me (yeah, that's a bad pun).

Peter finally becomes a hero, not while fighting a bad guy, but by rescuing a bunch of people who the Lizard endangers by throwing their cars off a bridge. Peter's webbing is strong enough to suspend the cards from the bridge, but he only rescues one kid from one car. I have no idea how the kid got stuck in the car when his Dad made it out just fine. I have no idea why Peter didn't rescue anyone else from any of the other cars (and if they were all empty, why did he stop them from falling into the water in the first place?).

But in saving the little kid and seeing the father's gratitude, he gives himself a name and a more noble purpose.

Gwen's father Police Captain George Stacy (Denis Leary) was a jerk for most of the film but he was supposed to be. Peter's dinner with the Stacy family was a total disaster, but what teenage boy hasn't been humiliated by his girlfriend's father at one point or another. It was kind of cool to see the face of "Diego" (Ice Age films), though.

And how the heck doesn't Aunt May know Peter is Spider-Man? Her first clue is right after she and Peter watch Captain Stacy issue a warrant for Spider-Man's arrest during a TV press conference, Peter storms out of the house. May looks at him like, "what they heck is that all about." Later, when Peter comes home all banged up after his last battle with the Lizard, she looks at him, doesn't ask why he looks like he went ten rounds in the ring with Mike Tyson, and just hugs him. I tell you, that woman was smart enough to put it all together. She has to know.

By the way, I really liked Martin Sheen's Uncle Ben, especially when he's teasing Peter in front of Gwen and calls himself Peter's probation officer. Everyone needs an uncle like that. I was also pleased that Sally Field's Aunt May wasn't constantly at death's door. In the Lee/Ditko version (and later), May always has one foot in the grave and the other on ice-coated Teflon. At least this Aunt May is a fighter (although I get the impression she's a lousy cook).

Another thing I liked was that Flash wasn't just a two-dimensional bully. After Uncle Ben dies (and everyone at school knows), Flash tries to make amends. Sure, Peter picks him up and slams him against some lockers, but everyone, including Flash, understands why Peter's so angry and hurt. Just a nice little bit of realism.

Another nice bit of realism was Gwen confessing to Peter how afraid she was growing up, watching her Dad leave for work as a police officer each day, and wondering if he'd ever come home that night. How could she stand being with Peter if he insisted on being Spider-Man and going after the Lizard?

This is a nice echo (though the filmmakers probably didn't intend it as such) to Betty Brant, Peter's first girlfriend in the Lee/Ditko comics. They eventually break up because Peter's job as a freelance crime photographer (Betty never finds out Peter is Spider-Man) is so dangerous. Her brother was also some sort of thrill seeker and was ultimately killed because of it (actually, he was in deep with some thugs and couldn't pay them back the money he took and they killed him). Peter finally left Betty because he knew she'd leave him if she ever found out what he really did every night.

Why did Peter put "Property of Peter Parker" on his camera? Who does that? It was a lame way for the Lizard to find out Spider-Man's secret identity.

Connors survives the film, saves Peter's life in the end (after killing George Stacy) and goes to jail. I'd love to see his defense attorney's strategy. Technically, Connors was under the influence of a mind and body altering substance when he committed his crimes, so can the court really convict Curt Connors for what he did when he was the Lizard? Well, probably, since Connors injected himself with that stuff in an attempt to regain his lost arm. If a junkie shoots up and is high when he kills someone, he's still libel for the murder after he stops being high.

Promises you can't keep are the best kind. OK, it would have been a lousy promise to try and keep, and I don't really remember Peter agreeing to stay away from Gwen as her dying father's last request, but Peter just plain blew off the seriousness of a father's genuine love for his daughter and desire to protect her.

Lots of little interesting developments. Stuff for the future. Supposedly Ratha was pressuring Connors to begin human trails on cross-species genetics because Norman Osborne (owner of Oscorp and usually the Green Goblin) is dying...but we get no details on what's killing him and how the Connors experiments are supposed to help.

Does Peter ever go after the guy who killed his uncle again?

If Aunt May knows Peter is Spider-Man, what will she do about?

It's strongly implied that the plane crash that killed Peter's parents was no accident and that it was arranged because Richard Parker refused to start human trails on his formula. Connors is alive at the end of the film and has this knowledge, but will he ever tell Peter? If Peter finds out, what will he do, go after Norman Osborne? If Osborne wanted the secret of Parker's cross-species formula, why kill him? Why not kidnap his wife and son and hold them hostage (or some other equally evil plot) and force Parker to give up the formula?

And if Osborne wants human trials to begin now because he's dying, was he dying ten years ago when Parker also refused to perform human experiments, or was there another reason (like lots and lots of money)?

I understand that The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is in pre-production and scheduled for release sometime in 2014.

Maybe we'll find out some answers then, and get a look at Mary Jane Watson...and maybe Electro.

Graphic Novel Review: V for Vendetta

I've never seen the film V for Vendetta (2005) starring Natalie Portman and Hugo Weaving (though I should get around to it one of these days) but I just finished Alan Moore's and David Lloyd's graphic novel (originally a ten-issue comic book series) and thought, given the wide use of the Guy Fawkes mask by "hacktavist" group Anonymous and some protesters with the Occupy Wall Street movement (which is worn in both the comic book and film versions of the story by the main character), that it was high time to look at the source material for these modern, real-life responses to what we think of as oppression in our world.

The original comic book series was developed and published in 1985 by writer Alan Moore, a self-proclaimed anarchist, and artist David Lloyd. Essentially it is one in a long series of dystopian dramas set in the near future (the late 1990s in the comic book series), this time in England. A nuclear war has destroyed much of the developed nations of the world but left England untouched, at least directly. In response to the war, a totalitarian government has come to power, styled after the Nazis, and has seized total control of the country. Much like Orwell's 1984, omnipresent government surveillance observes the public, while a propaganda campaign continually feeds the citizens the usual "the government is on your side" messages, underscored by threats for thinking otherwise. Headed by "the Leader" who uses organizations called "Nose," "Ear," and "Mouth" as detection and communication conduits, and an information system called "Fate," every aspect of an individual's life is monitored and controlled.

Anyone belonging to virtually any group one might consider oppressed, including people of color and the LGBT community, has long since been rounded up, put in camps, and ultimately eliminated. It is out of one of these camps that the anti-hero known simply as "V" has emerged. It eventually comes out that V is a brilliant but mentally disturbed person who was "created" in one of the camps; a victim of chemical and psychological experimentation (sort of a fusion between Batman and the Joker). Over a period of years, almost everyone associated with his camp (which has since been destroyed) has been eliminated. Finally, V in full mask and regalia, "goes public" with the rescue of a 15 year old girl from government police who were about to rape and murder her. As his sometimes unwilling protege, Evey descends into V's shadowy world, learning all but his greatest secrets and even unwittingly, trying to counterbalance his darkness with her drive toward the light.

The story is complex and even a little confusing at parts and I won't attempt to recount the plot in any sort of detail. At first, it seems as if V is attempting to murder those last few who could possibly identify him from the camp, but once they are gone it becomes clear that he has a much greater agenda; to disassemble all organized government control of the populace and to throw England into a state of chaos and finally anarchy. Obviously this is something of a reflection of Moore's philosophy (hopefully exaggerated given the level of violence employed by V), sort of an anti-version of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged (fortunately Moore isn't nearly as long-winded and boring as Rand).

Through a long series of twists and turns, V goes increasingly higher up the governmental chain of power, destroying the video and audio spy devices, empowering the population (through threat of mass murder) to take back control of their lives and holding them responsible for voting their oppressors into office and then following their orders (interestingly enough, a very libertarian perspective, speaking of Ayn Rand), with the final goal of completely destroying the governmental infrastructure, leaving only human beings to pick up the pieces.

V's tactics against not just his enemies, but the people he's supposedly freeing are equally as brutal. I was constantly reminded of just how dangerous and insane V was, and how at any moment, Evey could be his next victim. At one point, he abandons her on the street and only after she re-establishes herself with another protector (only to watch him be murdered), does V enter her life again...without her knowledge. Believing she has been imprisoned by the police for attempting to kill the man who murdered her lover, V tortures Evey in an apparent attempt to get her to betray...V. She endures it all and continues to refuse to "confess," even when she believes she will be killed. Finally, V reveals himself and tells her that he has been putting her through these trials to free her from the "prison" of her mind (I was reminded of the Matrix (1999) and how the mind creates illusion, prison, and freedom inside the machine).

But Evey has a very special purpose and there is a sort of logic to V's madness. He knows he is the destroyer, but that's only one-half of the task at hand. Once government has been reduced to ashes and rubble (literally), someone has to assume the mantle of V and rebuild (again, reminiscent of the end of Rand's novel). V (the original) allows himself to be morally wounded but remains alive long enough to give Evey her final instructions. He dies but the reader is only allowed to see different versions of how Evey imagines removing his mask. Only Evey knows for sure that V is dead. His true face is never revealed.

Then, in donning the Guy Fawkes mask and appearing as "V" to the public, do we realize that everyone has the capacity to be a "V" in some fashion. In Evey's case, it was as the rebuilder, the one who gives a future to a fragmented humanity. I suppose this is why people in the world today sometimes wear "the mask" during protests, to represent the opposition of oppressive organization and the power of the people to fight back.

I don't know if Moore meant to suggest anarchism as a sustainable social movement or if this was all allegory to (once again) expose the dangers of totalitarianism and particularly politically and socially conservative totalitarianism. In any event, after every revolution, when every oppressor has been killed or exiled, whoever is leading the revolution becomes the next dictator. Maybe that's why V had to have a more benign successor. V himself, given the lakes of blood in which his hands were soaked, would certainly have been no kinder to England than the government he obliterated.

Was it worth my time to read? Relative to the impact V for Vendetta continues to have on modern protest movements (maybe just the Guy Fawkes mask at this point), yes. However as social commentary, this story has been told, before and since, about a million different times in a million different ways. It didn't seem like anything new. Dystopian stories are like street cars. There'll be another one along in five minutes.

DVD Review: Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol

I loved Brad Bird's work on The Incredibles (2004). But I hated what he did to Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol. Yes, I actually purchased the DVD because I heard this film was so good and planned to write what I thought would be a glowing DVD review. Boy, was I surprised.

The beginning of the film was confusing, but that's not a problem because it's OK to start out with a mystery and have it reveal itself as the story progresses. I was surprised to see Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg) in the field at the very beginning of the action. I had envisioned this "inside man" being forced outside with Hunt's (Tom Cruise) IMF team after some dire emergency resulted in all of the IMFs being disavowed. That particular surprise was not a pleasant one.

No, I like Simon Pegg's work a lot but let's face it, he's a comedian. He's supposed to be funny. He was used for comic relief, but he was too comic. His quips, babbling, and fubars would have gotten Hunt and the rest of the rogue IMF group killed if all this was a real-life op. In fact, when Dunn was distracted while guarding assassin Sabine Moreau (Léa Seydoux), he very nearly did get himself, Carter (Paula Patton) and Brandt (Jeremy Renner) killed. I would have been fine with Dunn having an active role throughout the film if Bird would have directed him to be just a little more competent (Dunn did redeem himself by saving Brandt's life late in the film, however).

But that wasn't the only problem.

At first, I couldn't put my finger on it. I knew there was something wrong with the film, but I didn't know what. It had all of the right elements, but I just wasn't as engaged with the action as I should have been. My first clue was the pay phone Hunt used after he was rescued from prison. He's in the middle of Moscow and there just happens to be a pay phone that, when you punch in the right code, turns into an IMF mission assigning device. Don't Russians ever service pay phones? If that was a permanent device, sooner or later, some telephone repair guy was going to come along and find out that the U.S. had at least one secret dispensing machine in Moscow. Of course, it did "self destruct," but only after Hunt had to bang on it like an old radio with a bad connection.

What finally clued me in was the fake freight train car. OK, you've just escaped from Russian security after they think you've blown up the Kremlin. The "Secretary" (Tom Wilkinson in an uncredited role, who I recognized as "Carmine Falcone" from Batman Begins, 2005) has just been murdered and you're on the run with a know-nothing (or so you think) analyst, trying to find some resources that the Secretary said (right before dying) that he would "overlook" so you could "re-avow" yourself after the President has disavowed all IMF teams everywhere.

So the U.S. Government just happens to put a secret, high-tech train car in the middle of a Russian train yard, hooked up to a Russian freight train, and it just happens to be in the right place at the right time. Doesn't anyone inspect trains in Russia? Isn't there some kind of inventory of how many cars a train is supposed to be transporting, what they look like, what they are supposed to contain? This one just happens to get overlooked all of the time?

That was bad enough, but the retina scanner was an insane security addition, as evidenced by how difficult it was to use in order to get in the car while the train was moving.
That's when I figured it out. I was watching a cartoon!

It's OK for The Incredibles to have ridiculous people, devices, and circumstances and still be suspenseful and exciting because it is a cartoon, but Mission: Impossible, although it does have its improbable elements, is supposed to be a tad more realistic and even gritty.

I kept thinking back to the original Mission: Impossible (1996) film. It was gritty, and bloody, and action packed without being ridiculous. It had its little "comedy" moments to lighten the mood, but they didn't distract from what was going on and I never got the impression (well, almost never) that any key member of the IMF team didn't know what he or she was doing.

Oh, and I didn't care that Agent Hanaway (Josh Holloway) got killed. I know it really broke up Agent Carter, but there was no time for any character development of Hanaway, so the audience (including me) had no time to become attached to him in any way, shape, or form. There was also so little development of Moreau, that I didn't really find her all that interesting, let alone dangerous. She didn't creep me out the way she should have. And even though there was a little bit of development of the "bad guy," Kurt Hendricks (Michael Nygvist), I didn't really hate him. I mean in Mission: Impossible III (2006), I really hated Owen Davian (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and would have put a bullet in him myself if I had the chance (the character, not the actor). But I just didn't care what happened to Hendricks. It didn't matter to me whether he lived or died.

I have to say, I liked the character of William Brandt early on in the film. It was nice to see Jeremy Renner play someone not superbly confident, super-skilled, and totally bad ass. However, all that (most of it) was a cover for an agent who thought he'd blown his mission to protect Hunt's wife. He was just pretending not to be super-skilled and bad ass (he was still not confident, but that will no doubt change). I also read that Brandt's role was specifically included so that the character would be available at whatever point Cruise decides to leave the Mission: Impossible franchise. As crummy as I thought Ghost Protocol was, Hunt is the IMF in the franchise. Not sure how Brandt (or Renner) is going to carry it or if I even care (now that Renner is associated not only with the MI franchise, but "Bourne" and "The Avengers" as well, he seems to be the "flavor of the month," so I guess he's not crying about all the attention).

Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames). I love the character and the actor, but what's the deal with the cameo? I mean, what's the point? You could have filmed the entire scene without him and it would have worked. There was no reason whatsoever to include him except that you could.

And Hunt's wife is alive, the ultimate "Mission: Impossible" ending, the ultimate illusion, the ultimate result of misdirection, but I didn't care about that, either. By the end of the film, I was tired and disappointed. Please don't make anymore Mission: Impossible films, Hollywood. I'm done with making movies out of old TV shows. Try something new for a change. Please?