Stalker (1979)

This film, by Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky, is apparently based on a novel called The Roadside Picnic (1971), by Arkadi and Boris Strugatsky. I have not read this novel but I just might, now that I’ve seen this adaptation. The film is classified as Science Fiction. And I would say this is correct insofar as 1984 (novel and film) is also considered SF. Meaning, of course, that neither films are SF. It appears as though the novel, The Roadside Picnic, is pure SF, however.

This is a pretty long film, at 2  1/2 hrs.  And, considering I’ve seen Tarkovsky’s Solyaris (1972), I considered myself in for a slow ride with Stalker. I’d like to note here that having read Stanislaw Lem’s novel Solaris (1961), and seen the Clooney/Soderbergh (2002) remake of the film, the 2002 film is more committed to the novel’s narrative, and Tarkovsky’s film is more abstract.  From this I can perhaps intuit something about the potential for Tarkovsky’s artistic license with his adaptation of The Roadside Picnic.

With that being said, the most prominent thing about this film is clearly the cinematography. There is a stark contrast between the Town and the Zone. The Town is filmed in sepia-tones (sometimes perhaps in B/W) and the Zone is filmed in color. In Town, the atmosphere is muddy, grey, povertified (seems like a good time to coin a new term). All of the floors have mud and water on them in Town. Everything glistens with mud. A complete look at the setting itself is obscured from the viewer, and even when the Stalker is driving the Writer and the Scientist around, avoiding the police, there is no real perception-of-space-or-place because of the way the scenes are shot. This gives way to a feeling of limited space; in other words, of a sense of living and existing in confined quarters, in a confined neighborhood, in a confined city, in a confined country; in a confined psyche perhaps?

The Zone, once they get there, is richly green. Trees and grasses everywhere. Then the viewer notices that all of the characters have blue eyes, characteristics otherwise obscured from the viewer in Town. There is clearly a difference between what goes on in Town and what goes on in the Zone. As the film progresses, it becomes perhaps a little more obvious as to why. Strewn throughout the Zone are downed power lines and rusted out tanks and automobiles. Apparently a meteor fell to create the Zone, and all of this devastation must have been the aftermath. However, there isn’t sufficient information provided to the viewer about the meteor, the fallout, why the Zone was created, other than civilization is sectioned off from the Zone, behind barricades, in order to keep people away from it (nature, the mysterious) out of fear of the place. Very much in a Brave New World sort of way in terms of the reservation; or in a 1984 sort of way with the Prole sectors. Or better yet, exactly like Yevgeny Zamyatin’s novel, We (1921), with its cordoned off sector for civilization hermetically sealed off from the wilderness (i.e. disorder and nature).

Something that becomes obvious in the Zone is that it is also a muddy, wet place, like in Town. Eventually the three men make their way to some buildings, where the elusive Wish Room is, and it is full of water and mud and discarded objects, and old sewer-looking tunnels, and ponds of chest-high stagnant water that must be trudged through. The entire environment is damp and muddy. A cesspool. A beautifully-lit cesspool, I might add.

The way the three men make their way through the Zone to the Wish Room is very interesting. The Stalker is the guide, but his process is very meticulous and rigid to the rules he has learned from his predecessor (the late Porcupine).  The Stalker has to first throw a bolt with a bandage attached to it, one of his companions must go first toward the bolt, then the rest of them follow. Then the Stalker picks up the bolt, throws it, and this is how they make their way. They do not go straight. In this way, they sort of “test” their path first before embarking. Almost in a way that they are notifying the Zone itself that they are going in that particular direction, along that particular path. The Zone is apparently an ever-changing place, full of tricks and traps and mystical happenings. They zig-zag up and down and all around. It is the process itself that is the most important part. It is the respecting of the sanctity of the Zone’s temperament that is the most important rule.

When the three men finally make it to the Wish Room, there is a peripatetic moment : The Scientist (a.k.a. the Professor) has been carrying a bomb, intending the entire time to blow up the Wish Room. The Writer seems to be in agreement with this action because he cannot yet bring himself to enter the room and be granted his innermost wish. The Wish Room grants you what you want deep inside of you, not what you think you want. This is something he is not ready to accept so he feels the Scientist’s decision to blow it up is better for everyone involved (so that maniacs and aristocrats can’t come to the Wish Room and get what their perverted hearts truly desire). But the Stalker cannot let this happen. Eventually, the Scientist is talked out of this drastic measure by means of the other two talking it out.

So what is this film about? The final scene in the Zone presents the viewer with an interesting position: while the three men (the Stalker can not enter the room anyway) sit outside the room, staring in, the camera brings the viewer inside the room, deep. What does the viewer see? Nothing; just the three men on the ground, in the water, crying, sulking. But then, as the viewer, you realize you’re in the Wish Room!  Tarkovsky is forcing the viewer to reflect on his/her innermost wish.   And as all of this is taking place, as the viewer is in the room, the room which the viewer technically cannot see all of, cannot see what the men are seeing, the Writer gives part of the mystery away: the Wish Room is essentially faith in God, and battling to destroy God from the outside is science and logic/reason, represented by the Scientist (he’s a physicist) and the Writer (he’s a novelist). It is the Writer who reveals this truth to the viewer in an abstract way. I can’t quote here because first of all, the subtitles were clearly off because of their poor grammar, and I didn’t write any of it down; you’ll have to trust me.  The Stalker, then, represents a conduit to God that is unable to attain, for whatever reason, that which is available to everyone else. He does not appear to represent the clergy, for instance. But the Stalker is the most faithful. He leads people there at his own peril. But he is sworn to not enter the Wish Room.  One thing is for certain: a theme of compassion is presented throughout the film in terms of the Stalker’s dialogue. A need to understand and practice compassion in the world. He is somehow a conduit to God via compassion. Perhaps the answer is this: he is compassion and compassion is a conduit to God.  Something like that maybe.

At the end of the film, the three men return to the Town, after none of them entered the Wish Room, the Stalker’s wife comes and gets him (and his newly acquired Zone dog–clearly a metaphor for something), and they return with their daughter (a.k.a. Monkey), past a smoking 3-4 stack nuclear plant, to their home where the wife proceeds to tell the viewer directly that her husband has always been touched by God, and therefore ridiculed for it, that he is a prisoner of the Zone in the sense that he is so faithful to leading people to it, that he can do nothing else. Then the film ends on Monkey (who has crippled legs) out on the porch moving drinking glasses using telekinesis while a train rumbles by (same train rumbling by that began the film).

I think the Dalai Lama would like this film for its message of compassion.  It really is beautifully filmed. The dialogue is such that it needs to be re-watched in order to really understand the ultimate goal of the film. The viewer can walk away at the end with an idea about compassion and God and science and logic trying to kill God, but there’s much more in there to find out by re-listening to the characters’ words.

Dark Star (1974)

This film, directed by John Carpenter, has all of the elements of an exquisitely-made, cheesy, outer space, science fiction film. It really reinforces the notion that just about ANYBODY can make a film, with pretty much any prop they have lying around the house, and have that film be distributed and cultified throughout the generations.

I’m a big fan of 2001: A Space Odyssey (the film and the series of books), and this parody of 2001 was a real treat. But the term parody is used quite loosely because the part of Dark Star that was trying to imitate 2001 was a very short segment that ended quite differently than the Kubrick/Clarke endeavor. 2001 had the super computer, Hal. Dark Star had, I guess we could call them, ’smart bombs.’  The crewmen would talk to the bombs (they were interstellar detonation devices), ask how they were doing, and ask them to arm themselves. Of course, one bomb developed a sort of self-awareness (due to none other than a human mistake) and ended up blasting the ship to bits along with one of the crewmen (oh, wait, two of the crewmen: one was in cryo-freeze).

Speaking of cryo-freeze, John Carpenter also capitalized on another theme from another SF great: Philip K. Dick’s 1969 novel, Ubik, in which talking to individuals in cryo-freeze was part of the narrative.

The absolute best part of the entire film, besides Lt. Doolittle surfing into the atmosphere of the planet they were going to blow up ontop of a surfboard of spacecraft debris, was the gas-bag alien that Sgt. Pinback had an extended scene with.

This gas-bag alien was just an orange beach ball, probably 2 feet in diameter, that someone airbrushed a bunch of brown spots onto, and attached monster feet to. The gas-bag alien was unusually nimble and dextrous, able to move around quickly and in tight quarters. It also was quite smart and led Sgt. Pinback almost to his own death.

It is props like this that make the not-so-special effects in this film remarkable. It’s pure. It’s unadulterated. It’s silly. It’s brilliant. It’s simple.

There isn’t much to say analytically about this film other than to point out that Carpenter appropriated elements from other successful SF texts into this one. As far as the plot and dialogue goes, it was a relatively simple film. But it induced a lot of laughs and stupefied moments of perplexity.

9 (2009)

We live in a truly awful world. Not because we are headed for Armageddon but because the Culture Industry keeps feeding us the same plotlines and we keep gulping them down like starving pups suckling on the incontinent teets of the She Wolf.

I like that they put it into animation form, at least. Change the characters into non-humans, okay, but still give us Frodo, and the plotlines from LOTR and The Matrix and even WALL-E, and scores of other texts.  Still give us religous zealots who pervert ethics and morals. Still give us the dark, post-nuclear metaphor.  Is it even metaphor anymore? At some point this metaphor has transcended into something else because the C.I. has presented it to us so many times it has lost its original intent as metaphor or allegory. What is it? I don’t know. Falling on deaf ears, perhaps.  And by deaf I mean dumb.

It’s so sweet and romantic: the human soul that is the key to the survival of humanity. It’s also obvious.  But the world won’t remember us when we’re gone. It won’t care. And a memory of the fragments of the human soul can’t nourish the planet, like rain. Rain nourishes like rain.

Something that sticks out in this film, however, is that there is only ONE female character: #7 (Jennifer Connelly).  She’s the most agile one; the one who kicks the most butt. The one who comes in and saves the day in a narrative otherwise completely dominated by the male perspective.

I think perhaps the message I can glean from this film is that a world full of men caused the problem(?). That comes with a lot of baggage. The film also presents us with no solution, really, but to wait for life to start itself over(?).  Perhaps it is trying to tell us not to do this to ourselves in the first place. This would be obvious. But then again, maybe I am expecting too much from filmmakers. Metaphor is perhaps cliche and outdated.  Allusion is more appropriate perhaps:  all I know is that Frodo went into the fiery forge, Neo and the Architect were there in spirit, and WALL-E was left to pick up the pieces.  Oh yeah, and the flying, scouting machine had Edward’s Scissors-hands for a mouth. Thanks, Mr. Burton.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)

Okay, so I do get out to the cineplex every now and then. But, I’ve got to admit that I really do not like the $9.50 ticket price! I mean, really!  And I won’t even go into the debacle at the refreshment counter over a gold-plated bottle of water.

This film was what it was: blockbuster action, shoot ‘em and kill ‘em and stab ‘em and slash ‘em. Was it good: yes. Was it bad: no. But, it was very disturbing somewhat late in the movie to hear a little kid in the theatre say “Why’d he shoot him?” When Wolverine took one of many bullets. Yes, I’m talking to you, you crazy viewing public who takes 6 year olds to movies like this…shame on you!  

What I’d like to say about this film deals with our current need for heroes. I thought frequently during the film about the TV show, Heroes. If we can channel Mr. Jameson’s theory about the ‘absent cause’ here, then I think we can begin to surmise that superhero stories/remakes/prequels are feeding into, and out of, our collective unconscious in a way that is trying to pretty much scream out at us that we need some dang heroes!  What’s the absent cause you say? Look at the black hole that was the last 8 years in this country and we can find lots of reasons to justify wanting to manifest real heroes.  

And, I further justify this theory because a major part of this film was centered around a corrupt Colonel who was torturing and experimenting on mutants for his own selfish gains, and at whatever cost necessary.  Hmm….

I’m not a big fan of the overpowering cacophony of machine guns coming from the surround sound system, or the actual shoot-em-up sequences that pervade the film. For instance, the first 10 minutes of the film is all killing. Wars and killing, killing and more wars. 

Why?!  Why?!  Why are we still killing?! Why do filmmakers make films with all that killing?! Why do audiences want to see all the killing?! We’re just falling further and further down the rabbit hole of numbness to real death. Dagnabbit!

Fiend Without A Face (1958)

This film is campy 50s Sci-Fi at its greatest. It is billed as having some of the most grotesquely explicit special effects of its time so I was looking forward to maybe some arms or heads being dismembered, or something like that.  Well, I guess I should’ve kept my hopes in check for 1950s campy SF. 

The film was actually pretty good.  The setting is an American military base in Canada that is doing nuclear experiments; there are some suspected and completely unexpected effects from the nuclear power experiments on the surrounding village and that gets the plot rolling.  It was interesting to watch this film because it embodied fear of Russia, fear of the unknown effects of radiation, and of course, the overpowering nature of LOVE.

As far as Russia goes, turns out the purpose of the nuclear experiments was to try to use the nuclear power to power a long-range radar that would scan Russia from the vantage point of Canada. As far as the fear of the unknown effects of radiation goes, these nuclear radar experiments had insanely unexpected results due to unrelated mind experiments that were already being done by a local professor. Turns out the professor inadvertently was able to tap into the surge in nuclear power being given off from the military base, and that caused the fiends to come into being.

The fiends were actually brains with tentacles, and the gory special effects were the brains spurting out blood. Not a lot of gruesome imagery by today’s standards, but nonetheless sweet.

And the icing on the cake was that two people (An American and a Canadian…Oh Ally, my Ally!) fell in love over a sea of mutant brain-fiend corpses!

The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008)

I’m wondering why Keanu Reeves accepted the lead role in this film because it’s so similar to the story line of his character, Neo, from The Matrix.  I’ve seen and taught The Matrix so many times it’s not funny. I’ve only ever seen one other film more times than The Matrix and that’s The Neverending Story.  So as I was watching this film, although clearly the main story line was different, I couldn’t help but think to myself: type-cast!

My point is that the “birth” of Reeves’ character in this film is lamely similar to Neo’s pod-awakening in The Matrix. And, he’s a “savior” in both films.  I’m just saying that there oughta be some new ideas out there. 

Honestly, the main thing I wanted to say about this film is a critique of filmmaking today: when did our imaginations become so non-functioning that filmmakers stopped making movies with metaphors in them? This film had no subtext. It was all clear: change your dirty ways, Earthlings, or you’ll kill the planet. I mean, are we that stupid that we have to have it told to us literally? Where’s the metaphor? Where’s the allegory? Where’s the thinking hard about it to figure things out?

I know what you’re thinking: but they were using allegory when they had the aliens come to kill us. Not good enough.

This all stood out the most especially with all of the politicians and their poor decision-making skills, like the intent-to-torture and their idiotic decisions to attack the sphere and its protector. Clearly, the filmmakers have captured the idiocy of politicians with this.  Big surprise.

I guess what I’m saying here is that I’m disappointed that a filmmaker could type-cast Keanu Reeves using the Matrix model, and yet still make a crappy movie. 

Lame!

First Men In The Moon (1964)

This was a delightful film, filled with truly spectacular special effects. Actually, the Special Features documentary on Ray Harryhausen, the creator of the film’s stop-motion animation effects, was a highlight of the disc.  Harryhausen created the memorable effects on films like Clash of the Titans, the Sinbad series, Jason & The Argonauts, 1 Million Years B.C. etc. I’ve said many times on this blog that I love older special effects because they are raw and unadulterated by digital manipulation.  Needless to say, I’m adding a few of these, that I haven’t seen lately, to my queue. I remember watching Clash of the Titans as a child, with that frightening Medusa scene, and it’ll be great to see it again.

The main thing I want to say about this film is that it has an interesting moral at the end. I haven’t read H.G. Wells’ original story so I don’t know if the film correlates with what he was getting at also, but I find it infinitely amusing that Humans were able to contaminate and exterminate the inhabitants of the Moon with a simple cold.   I say amusing not because I think it’s funny, because it’s not. But amusing because “we” have cross-contaminated many civilizations throughout the ages. Smallpox from the Americas back to Europe, syphyllis from Europe to the Americas (or maybe it was the other way around).  Regardless, the point is that this film (and its corresponding novel) documents the deleterious effects of our explorations and colonizations on the unknown. 

Mel Gibson’s film, Apocalypto, comes to mind because in the final shot of the film, the viewer knows what will happen. An “A” for dramatic irony for that one.  And, in First Men In The Moon, it is also the final moment of the film that reveals the secret, though this secret occured 60 years ago, not in the next hour. What I mean by this is that the Professor’s cold killed the Moon people 60 years ago; therefore the tragedy happened in the past, though the biggest travesty is that the Moon people are extinct for everyone in the “present.”  In the final shot of Apocalypto, the Mayan civilizations still have an hour before the Spanish/Portugese  arrive on shore, though they have no concept of who they are or what they’ll do to them.  Same thing with the Moon people. It was assumed that the Moon people were the threat to the Humans, but it was the other way around. Same thing with the Native Mayan tribes and the Spanish/Portugese.  

For both films, the sentiment is the same: apocalypse back then, or apocalypse now.  Either way, annihilation of culture means everyone loses out in the present.

Hellboy II (2008)

I have mixed emotions about this film. On one hand, I love the costumes and characters that Guillermo del Toro creates for his films. Pan’s Labyrinth was also great in terms of that.  What I’m struggling with in terms of Hellboy II is the fact that there are many aspects of the film that have been more-than-just-slightly appropriated from at least two other epic stories: The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars.  I’ll explain my reasoning (which has not been tainted by the outside world, by the way):

In terms of The Lord of the Rings connection, you have the very obvious “ring” metaphor, which in Hellboy II is the three-part “crown” that was created to reign supreme over the Golden Army of mechanical, indestructable monsters.  The three parts were divided up: two to the Elf King’s two children, and one to the Men.  I mean, come on Mr. del Toro, don’t you know we’ve already seen this trope and it has been cemented in our subconscious by Peter Jackson (not to mention J.R.R. Tolkein)?!  Also, in Hellboy II, the animated sequence with the wooden-looking Men versus the Elf King and Trolls was creative in terms of its aesthetics, but it was just a retooled LOTR, even down to Sauromon’s “making” of the Orc Army.  In Hellboy II, the subterranean Golden Army factory was exactly the same as what we saw in LOTR.  And the Elves & Trolls vs. Man thing…c’mon?!  I just don’t get why del Toro did this.  It really brought the overall quality of the film down.

And, is it generally recognized everywhere that all Elves have long blonde hair, or was that del Toro just riding piggyback some more.

In terms of Star Wars, del Toro re-used a few tropes: Liz Sherman’s pregnancy & Hellboy’s destiny.  Liz’s pregnancy is a secret to Hellboy for most of the film. And, when we get to the final scene of the film, as they’re all walking away, Hellboy says something about the “baby” and Liz says, “babies.” Hellboy turns around and she flashes two fingers up and mimes “two,” then the film ends on Hellboy’s stunned face.  So what does this have to do with Star Wars, you say?!  Only everything!!!  Padme ushers in the twins, Luke & Leah, in 2005’s Revenge of the Sith, and their destinies are all tied to the fate of the universe (as we all know from watching all of the films).    So, like Padme, Liz Sherman’s twins will no doubt have an effect on the fate of the world, especially because of the information she receives about Hellboy’s destiny, via  ”The Angel of Death,” who heals Hellboy’s wound so he can live to eventually destroy the world….???  That screams the Anakin-Darth-Vader-destiny-trope to me, loud and clear. As the Angel of Death was telling Liz about Hellboy’s destiny, and how she would suffer the most, I couldn’t help but think of Padme laying on the table dying after giving birth to Luke & Leah, while Anakin was out on the burning plain, dismembered and prostrate, primed for his destiny, anger palpable and growing exponentially after being defeated by Obi Wan.

The last thing I’ll say about this film is that there were loopholes in the plot and dialogue that do not explain why the Elves & Trolls are living under Manhattan, especially when the secret hideout for the Golden Army is in Ireland.  I just don’t get why del Toro places this mythical world under NYC.  And it certainly isn’t explained for the viewer.  At least that part is original: I doubt anyone would believe the locations for Star Wars or LOTR were ever in Manhattan. Despite that originality, it still leaves the viewer wondering:  why?!  

I’m just saying that Hellboy II, despite its very funny moments and decent cinematography, was a re-rendering of other films.  I’m not saying it was a bad film. It was okay. I just wish we could get a good action-superhero film with great costumes and interesting characters, that was at least not a near-exact duplication of other films we’ve already seen.  Can’t we watch films like this and not feel like the director takes us for mindless Trolls?

Woman in the Moon (1931)

So, I’m embarassed to say that I didn’t finish watching this film. I’ll tell you that off the bat.  It is a long film, 3 hours I believe.  And, I think it might be a feat of endurance, on certain days, to watch a 3 hour long silent film.  I had watched about half of it and got the urge to fast forward through it so I could watch the rest.  It’s not that it’s a bad film. In fact, it’s brilliant: the concept, the acting, the sets, the cinematography.  But, when I started fast forwarding, I also started feeling guilty and decided I should watch it some other time when I could devote my full attention to it. 

I’ve liked the other Fritz Lang films I’ve watched (Metropolis & M). We’ll give it another try some other time…..

“V” the TV Miniseries (1984)

Ahh…this is good television, let me tell you.  There is too much to cover, really, but I’d like to tell a tale of a green reptilian alien baby hand puppet, and I’d like you to sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride!

Okay, I’m not going to say much more about the green reptilian alien baby hand puppet other than to merely mention it, but I will say that that was a highlight of the series for me.  Well, the whole birthing scene was fantastic with the “regular” looking human baby and its evil green twin.  But, even the human baby had a few moments of monsterdom when she came out and hissed with her nasty reptilian tongue, and then later as she “grew up” very quickly, she spat poison on another little girl, paralyzing her.  But the green reptilian alien baby was a feat of superb special effects. I’ve said before on this blog, and I’ll say it again: I LOVE older special effects.  The ones that are so obviously unreal that it really crowns the occasion because they couldn’t come up with anything better. No CGI, no problem!

I suppose a lot was going on in the real world when this TV miniseries was on.  We can make some plausible connections between the alien Visitors and Communists, for sure, because the Visitors wore red and they were “aliens” who not only were sucking the oceans dry, but they also stored and ate us.  I’m pretty sure those were the major complaints against the communists, right?!  And the Visitors recruited young’uns for their police brigades, which very nearly resembles our friend George Orwell’s sentiments in 1984 (oh, irony and coincidence!) about the propensity of Youth to be spies, etc.  And, the Hitler Youth.  And on and on.

What I liked about this series was that it:

1. Had a cheese factor of 10 (on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the highest).  Cheesy effects, Cheesy dialogue, Cheesy character development.  REALLY cheesy acting.

2.  It was Science Fiction!

3. And, it showed the humans working with the rebel Visitors to overthrow the tyranny. 

The only thing I didn’t like was that in the end, it didn’t show what life was like getting used to living with the Visitors who were left behind. Maybe there’s a sequel that I don’t know about. Maybe I’ll make one in my back yard.  Anybody seen the Beastmaster lately?!