Watching: Time Bandits S1

2024, download

So, a re-imagining of something precious from my youth, Terry Gilliam's Time Bandits which cannot be all that precious because I haven't felt compelled to watch it in decades. But I remember the reaction I had back in  1981-ish (more than likely saw it on VHS first) when I was an adolescent. It was crazy, confusing, astounding and invigorating. That excitement still carries through as a tangible memory, but... unlike, say, Star Wars only a few years earlier, I did not scramble to rewatch constantly as I few older. Honestly, I felt that way about all the Python-esque films -- they were great in small doses and often not oft repeated.

But when I heard this was coming out, and by Taika Waititi (and his usual gang; wonder how they feel tha he is the name on the "brand") no less, I was excited. But also reserved. I can take Taika in small, controlled doses. I am not a huge fan of Our Flag Means Death but more so of What We Do In the Shadows; Marmy loves Wellington Paranormal but I can take it or leave it. And remember, I have never been able to effectively rewatch Thor: Love and Thunder. But again, back to excited -- I could do with some wacky, ensemble, time jumping hijinks. OK, they are not little people, that's fine. OK, Lisa Kudrow (?!?!?) as their leader, that's fine. I think.

I usually do the above paragraph or two as italics, where Kent does a Meta tail-end, but I only remember I usually do that AFTER I wrote it, with already so many italics. So... that's that.

What 100. Kevin is a nerd, basically me at that age, minus the talkative -- I was and will always be, very quiet except in certain circumstances. His parents love him but don't understand him; his sister tolerates him. And then his wardrobe rumbles and the Time Bandits tumble into his life. They have a Map to Space & Time, barely know how to use it, and are on the run from The Supreme Being (Taika Waititi, Jojo Rabbit). His nemesis, Pure Evil (Jemaine Clement, Avatar: The Way of Water), also wants the map and has sent demon Fianna (Rchael House, Foundation) after it. The Bandits want to jump around in time stealing its greatest treasures, proving themselves as more than just gardeners, and Kevin is begrudgingly dragged along.

1 Great. Really, just the imaginative, silly escapades. I loved loved loved the concept of what was going on, and obviously a lot of thought went into it. It looks "appropriately" good, as in not terribly high on the special effects scale, acceptable on the sets and costuming. Something about only a middling attention to detail fits with something silly like this show, because if it was much better, you would be expecting more from the show.

1 Good. The characters. I didn't expect to actually like Lisa Kudrow as Penelope, their erstwhile "leader" (they're a collective, no leaders) but she ... kind of worked? Much of this show works to some degree and fails in others. I hesitantly enjoyed pretty much every episode. Its not so much as comedic as it is silly. The mix of weirdoes as Time Bandits is great, but non-sensical, and the Waititi-Clement usuals are always spot on when brought together.

1 Bad. There is just something.... missing. Again, I wonder if its my tempered fondness for the Waititi-Clement model of comedy. Its not always my bag. I have to allow for my irritation with some characterization (the Bandits themselves are confusing, callous, incredibly stupid beings, but I have to remind myself, they aren't humans, despite appearances and affectations.... no, no idea what they really are) to be ignored so I can just enjoy the romp, but sometimes my irritation reigned.  Just ... something didn't always work for me. I wonder if that's what Kent noticed and ultimately dropped the show.

Watching: The Umbrella Academy S4

2024, Netflix

We find this show charming enough that we continue to watch even though it usually ends up disappointing us entirely. I stated it in the Season 3 post, and I will state it now -- they always end up losing steam, fucking their own continuity and appearing to get bored with writing their own show. 

Never wrote about season 1 or 2.... wonder why.

What 100. They've returned from another apocalypse to another, different, timeline, but without powers. Dad (Colm Feore, Face/Off) runs a megacorp, but no matter, they all go their own, usual, dysfunctional directions. Allison (Emmy Raver-Lampman, The Beekeeper) is (barely) an actor, sober Klaus (Robert Sheehan, Mortal Engines) lives in her basement, Five (Aidan Gallagher, Nicky, Ricky, Dick & Dawn) is in the CIA, Diego (David Castañeda, The Tax Collector) delivers packages, Lila (Ritu Arya, Barbie) is a housewife, Viktor (Elliot Page, Close to You) runs a bar in Nova Scotia and Luther (Tom Hopper, Black Sails) is a stripper. But then, five years later, another Impending Doom draws them together for more weirdo hijinx, more and more dysfunctional sibling disputes, the deaths of countless henchfolk and eventually the end of the world... again. But for good this time?

1 Great. For me, the best things about the show have always been the whackadoodle characters and situations. This season we get Jean and Gene Thibodeau, played by IRL couple Nick Offerman and Megan Mullaly. I am not entirely convinced they are a couple but maybe the same person from alternate timelines. All the hijinx of the previous seasons is jamming in alternate timelines into this one. In fact, they run an organization/conspiracy/cult that researches and finds examples of it, such as books, movies and music that are two entirely different copies of the same thing. Think of finding a copy of Bladerunner where William Hurt played Deckard instead of Harrison Ford. These two characters are out there, a little extreme, but ... onto something.

2 Good. The characters. The mains are what always have me forget how dissatisfied I was with each season and still come back for more. They are so utterly broken and dysfunctional, you would think the cringe factor would turn me off, but there is a caring between them even when they hate each other. And all the actors pull it off so very very well. My fav is still Five, the non-named perpetual youth. Actor Aidan Gallagher is 21 and probably, finally, playing something akin to Five's body age. In actual lived aged, the character is in his... 70s? And the acceptance of Elliot Page as Elliot Page, and therefore Victor, is wonderful -- they had their chats about it last season, and have moved on, while not discounting that Victor was Vanya in season one. Probably a rare example of tight continuity in this showed being acknowledged.

3 Bad. Said general lack of continuity. This show has me constantly yelling at the screen, as each season (except the first; I remember that being tighter) just loses steam before they reach the final few episodes, losing focus, cutting plot elements to the wind and generally just being bad writing. Now that Kent has revealed, to me, how much of a shitshow the writing room was on this show, and how it basically torpedoed the season cutting it down to almost nothing, it explains things but doesn't get my forgiveness. No more than in any other season does this one's last few episodes shit the bed, story telling wise. Five and Lilah go on a time journey through the multiverse TTC with intent to find their original timeline where their Ben was killed. After one upset that thread is ignored entirely and while its a beautiful standalone plotline, where the two spend years and years together lost on the TTC (note, that is actually a recurring thread in my own dreams; maybe I will bump into them someday), its forgetting the point of it being introduced in the first place. And Daddy Hargreaves. He did not create an Umbrella Academy in this timeline, there not even seemingly any example of these kids here at all, and yet he interacts with them as if he is aware of it all. And BTW isn't he supposed to be an alien or something? I could go on and on about my frustration but I will just some it up with a loud, "aaaaaargh !!"

Ken't spake. 

3 Short Paragraphs (Or Not): Prisoners of the Ghostland

2021, Sion Sono (Love Exposure) -- download

I haven't finished watching the movie yet, but I needed to get something down. The entire movie, as I imagine the entire director's repertoire, is akin to a fever dream full of seemingly random imagery and utterances. 

I don't know anything about Sono. That Guy would have known him quite well, or at the very least, had already had seen a handful of his movies, probably in rep theatres, probably FantAsia. As Kent has emerged as the IRL replacement for the mythical That Guy, maybe he has heard more about the director than I have. But, if everything of his career is like this then, woo boy, the guy is whackadoodle. That Nic Cage eventually ended up being associated with a movie from this director is entirely expected.

Plot summary? In a post-apocalyptic future The Governor (Bill Moseley, Repo! The Genetic Opera) rules over Samurai Town. Think of a theme park designed to look like a Japanese town but populated by cowboys, samurai and geisha. One of the geisha escapes. The Governor calls upon a jailed bankrobber, who we see in an intro committed a massacre in a candy-coloured bank, including the death of an innocent child. He (Nicolas Cage, Color Out of Space) is tasked to go into The Ghostland to retrieve his geisha/granddaughter Bernice but the criminal is clothed in a rubber suit with bombs at key points on his body, which will trigger if he doesn't return in time, or he makes any moves on Bernice (Sofia Boutella, Hotel Artemis). To get some extra time, if Bernice speaks into a mic on the suit, he will get a couple of extra days. The border to the Ghostland is patrolled by a horribly disfigured mutant, his colourful bus, and the Ghostland itself is the ruins of a nuclear holocaust populated by people trying to hold back time. Our "hero" gets there, gets Bernice, gets a testicle blown off, and returns. Alas The Governor betrays him and pretty much everyone kills everyone, but with the death of The Governor, the Ghostland is freed.

Nic Cage is "Hero"

Now, if you take the above at face value, its not any crazier than any other PA 80s/90s movie, and that is likely what Sono was going for. Except, despite having a great cinematographer, everything is entirely random and chaotic. Things happen, dialogue happens, melodrama constantly happens. Nic Cage is the least weird aspect of this movie, if that says anything.  This is the kind of movie where critics may either say they love every aspect of it, because they aren't willing to admit they didn't get it, or others are going to hate it because... well, there isn't much to actually like beyond the visuals. There are attempts at camp, attempts at gonzo but...

Obviously Sono has fans, lots of them, considering the production value here. But I am not sure he gave any value to getting his first English-language film.

What I Have Been Watching: Back to the TV - Pt C

 What I Have Been (or Am) Watching is from The Domein of Toast, he (i) admittedly spending too much (almost all?) time in front of the TV. Kent's not stepping on toests but yeah, he (me) has a piles of TV shows in progress (and done) and maybe doesn't have has too much to say about it.

Pt. A is here. And Pt B is there. 

The finished.

Tales of the Walking Dead, 2022, AMC+

I stopped watching The Walking Dead after a single episode left me despondent. Yes, it was that episode in Season 9, Episode 15, a climax in the Whisperer's storyline, as adapted from the comics. I just found it all so unnecessary, it surpassing even my immense capacity for bleakness. I have many times been tempted to pick it up again, but always refrain, as I know it will treat me badly again.

But a contained series of short stories unrelated to the other series but in shared world? I am always up for anthologies!

mid-writing insert -- I am thinking your 1-1-1 format works really well for anthology commentary where you need to get it out, but might not have a lot to say, as I often do not.

Evie/Joe begins with Joe (Terry Crews, Brooklyn 99), a prepper who was ready for the zombie apocalypse, who finally reaches his limit of solitude, and decides to make the 700 mile trek to meet face to face with another prepper whom he kept in contact with, while it was possible. Joe is not good with people, but he was good with her, so off he goes. And then he bumps into Evie (Olivia Munn, X-Men: Apocalypse), whom he is very not good with.

Its a road story, a dialogue between two contentious people, which is helped along because they are such recognizable faces. Its funny and its touching, and sets the tone for what this series wants to be - to approach living in this apocalyptic world, and how it affects people, without all the dramatic baggage of the main series. In the end both of them arrive at their destinations, neither gets what the expected or wanted, but maybe they found something better, in each other.

Meh. Good summary, but it doesn't actually SAY anything about the episode. What really makes the ep is how different the two characters are. Joe is paranoid, anti-social and defensive while Evie still somehow remains upbeat and positive, almost hippie dippie, despite all that is going on. And yet both of these traits are walls the pair need to maintain to keep sane.

Blair/Gina is probably the best of the lot, but I am biased because its a Loopty Loo! No, they don't try and explain the why or  how a time-loop connects to the Zombie Apocalypse but it does have a trigger, and it does have a break, and that's all that matters. 

Blair and Gina work together; technically, Blair (Parker Posey, Lost in Space) is Gina's (Jillian Bell, Workaholics) asshole boss. Despite hating each other, the two are tied together at the start of the Zombie Apocalypse, with each loop ending in their deaths. Once they stop trying to kill the other, they try to figure out how to not only move forward but perhaps even end the loops. Dark comedy was not something I expected the bleak zombie series to riff off.

I skipped over Dee because I wasn't interested in revisiting what made me quit the main series (The Whisperers storyline). You are allowed to not watch things.

Amy/Dr. Everett must be set at some future time in the world of the Walking Dead for it centres around a Dead Sector, a large swath of land surrounded by a trench where the dead walk but humans are not allowed. So, that implies outside the sector there are ... fewer walkers? Anywayz, Dr. Everett (Anthony Edwards, Top Gun) is a reclusive scientist in a (the?) zone, studying tagged & tracked walkers. Things must be bad outside the sectors because Amy (Poppy Liu, Sunnyside) is part of a group that has decided to live in this one, despite the dangers. She needs help after losing contact with her friends, is rescued by Everett, but he would prefer she just piss off.

Its a story about loss and dedication, isolation and madness. Amy thinks Everett should reconnect with the world, connect with her people in their makeshift camp of tents, camper vans and trailers. Alas, the walkers have other ideas...

Davon is built around the idea that he wakes up with no memory of how he got where he is, in a village that seems surprisingly walker-free but also disconnected from reality. He (Jessie T Usher, The Boys) has a head injury but is unsure how he got it. And the villagers are just weird, dressed almost period, speaking French, but the village itself seems to be normal suburban homes. The episode has an eerie Outer Limits feel to it, otherworldly and disjointed, which tracks with a head injury. It is part murder mystery, part horror movie.

Its not worth going through the details of the story, given it is about revealing. Why does he have a head injury, why was he in the village to begin with, why is handcuffed to a zombie who doesn't try to bite him and whispers words to him? So many questions appear only to dissipate as his head clears. Its typical of horror anthology episodes and works decently enough, with some fun easter eggs for The Walking Dead universe.

And the final note is La Doña, a haunted house story.

TWD fans probably hated this, as it adds proper supernatural elements to their vague universe of "it's not about zombies, it's about people!" conceit. Idalia (Daniella Pineda, Cowboy Beebop) and Eric (Danny Ramirez, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier) are running from the dead, as all good people in TWD are, and come across the well protected house of La Doña Alman (Julie Carmen, In the Mouth of Madness). They are not welcome, nor does Idalia want to be there, as she's heard stories of the house and the woman who owns it. But Eric has to have his way.

The two are haunted, both literally and metaphorically, as the house and the spirit of its owner tries to drive them from it. Finally, it has its way.

As a series, I had hoped it would explore the world of the TWD universe more, giving us stories that expanded on things happening elsewhere, but for the most part, exploring other types of stories in that universe was.... well, as TWD universe stories are, only mildly satisfying and often frustrating.

American Born Chinese, 2023, Disney+

Of note, I had to correct what I had titled this, previously Chinese Born American, which would be an entirely different, but similar identity issue.

One of the most fun things we watched this year. And that it comes on the heels of Everything Everywhere All At Once is purely intentional, and I love that it makes use of the cast while also addressing some of the challenges Asian Americans still live with living and working in America.

Jin Wang (Ben Wang, Chang Can Dunk) is a typical American teenager dealing with identity, bullies, crushes and the new "exchange student" who happens to be the son of the Monkey King. Wei-Chen (Jimmy Liu, Light the Night) is hiding out on Earth looking for a mythical Fourth Scroll to assist his father against the rebellious Demon Bull, who's pissed at Monkey King for stealing his thunder all those years ago. He is supported by goddess Guanyin (Michelle Yeoh, Tomorrow Never Dies) and is convinced that Jin is destined to help him.

The show navigates the avenues between the action-comedy of the Monkey King story and Jin's family & school life brilliantly, with background commentary of a returning sitcom from the 90s called Beyond Repair about cliche Asian Freddy Wong (Ke Huy Quan, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom). The actor Quan plays mirrors his own real life, and Jin is desperate to not be the joke his character was, and just wants to Fit In.

Pacing, acting, action sequences and the balancing of heart-felt stories was just brilliant here. I am not sure how close it followed the graphic novel by Gene Luen Yang, but I suspect it was severely condensed. The Ke Huy Quan story thread did seem a little inserted, especially the exposition that obviously drew from his own real life story (he left acting because he was only getting one type of role), but it just felt.... necessary and important.

Chemistry of  Death, 2023, Paramount+

The bleakness of British crime drama of late is disappointing (to you, cuz the market just laps it up). I think I would prefer more procedural Death in Paradise than Broadchurch which is interesting, because all those years ago when I began searching for interesting crime drama from the UK, it was the hard hitting series I searched for. But I think the depressing nature of these "single theme to a show" series that finally got to me. At least Luther still had episode to episode investigations, for the most part. 

Again based on a novel series, by Simon Beckett, we are introduced to David Hunter (Harry Treadaway, Star Trek: Picard), a forensic pathologist who escapes to rural Norfolk after a deeply traumatizing personal tragedy, where he works assisting a simple country doctor. But he cannot escape death and is asked to help investigate a local murder which, of course, goes down a dark rabbit hole, revealing a long darkness in his seemingly quiet community.

The first investigation is followed by him being asked to travel to the Outer Hebrides to assist in another death investigation, to find out if the burnt remains of a young woman were accidental or murder. Yes, murder, yes another rabbit hole. Yes, bleak underbelly of isolated rural communities. Yes, tragedy abounds and one death leads to more leading to a darkness he seemingly cannot escape.

All the while the series is only hinting at what happened to him. His wife died, his child died. But was it an accident? Or at his wife's hands? Or at his own hands? We never find out.

Satisfying acting, brilliant settings but please provide an uplifting Murder of the Week next time, please?

Rabbit/Hole, 2023, CBS

Oh look, a Kiefer Sutherland thriller shot in Toronto! Oh look, there's a TTC bus in the background! Oh look, there's a place on Queen W I recognize! Alas, its not set in Toronto. We will leave that to the Star Trek: Strange New Worlds episode.

Sutherland (24) is John Weir, a ... corporate fixer? Freelance business espionage expert? Professional Ruiner of Lives? His exact job defies easy description but he runs a small company of people adept at manipulating situations, changing perceptions of reality in order to change outcomes. Being investigated by the SEC ? Why not set up a row of dominoes wherein the SEC agent doing the investigation is caught on camera seemingly accepting a bribe. Doesn't matter he didn't nor that there's no evidence he did, as long as the public perceives he did, it will change the validity of his investigation.

Except his own methods are turned against him and he is framed for murdering his own team. This begins a twisting serpentine tale against a shadowy enemy who is literally out to control the world. Weir's supposedly dead dad (Charles Dance, A Game of Thrones), once a CIA agent after the shadowy enemy, is mixed up in it all so Weir has to work with him despite hating the man with unmitigated passion. It doesn't help that Weir is a broken man, caused partially by his father's faked suicide during his childhood AND the recent suicide of his best friend, all part of The Conspiracy.

This show quadruples down on the deception and misdirection often leading us to question each scene and the outcome of each episode. Nothing is What It Seems is too mild a term for what the show wants us to believe. Its somewhat successful, and unlike many other shows going this way, it actually does pull everything (well, most) threads together. And Sutherland is ... well, his own type-cast character, but still does it wonderfully.

The Muppets Mayhem, 2023, Disney+

Muppets shows since the 70s success are a grab bag of quality. I thought, at first, it was because they tried to tie Story to the comedy and gags and funny characters, based on the success of the movies, wherein I enjoyed the one-liners and intentional Vaudevillian comedy. But even a later rendition of "variety show" did not do so well, and that is probably because nobody really knows what variety shows are now, at least in English North America. Last I checked, they were still popular in Quebec. But in American and English Canada, the concept was already dying out when Muppets: TOS started.

When this limited series started, I was somewhat turned off by the story, the gimmicky, "let's get the band to record an album" focus on Doctor Teeth and the Electric Mayhem. They were never my favourite buncha muppets, but I get that its a decent plot to hang a series on. But as more and more episodes went by, I found myself chuckling more and more and even guffawing a few times. Its not the story that matters, nor the humans involved, but as long as they sink enough of the one-liners and gags, I was satisfied with it, as a muppet show.

Oh, the humans. Lily Singh (A Little Late with Lilly Singh) stars as the "record label exec" (not quite) trying to get them to record. Taj Mowry (Baby Daddy) is the band's superfan. And there are a ton of celeb cameos because what would the Muppets be without celebrities pretending they are real.

Wait, dude, they aren't real?

Mrs Davis, 2023, Peacock

O... M... G... This will be in my top 5 for the year, a totally WTF, funny series about destiny and AI and religion and spirituality. To summarize it will not do it justice, but can be a whole lot of fucking fun anyway. 

So, a nun named Simone (Betty Gilpin, GLOW) living at a strawberry jam making convent is tasked by Jesus Christ (Andy McQueen, Coroner), who runs an other-worldly diner, to deal with an emerging AI, calling itself Mrs. Davis (in the US), which is ... well, taking over the world. Assisted by a child hood friend (Jake McDorman, Limitless) who happens to be working for a covert organization of extremely macho, but not toxic, men also tasked with taking down Mrs Davis, she also comes to learn of a group of women who care for the Holy Grail, which happens to be semi-sentient and demands to be shown to the world. These women are assisted by men with aprons. Mrs Davis makes a deal with Simone, that she will turn herself off, if Simone destroys the Holy Grail. Simone is also dealing with her traumatic upbringing by a pair of grifting Vegas-style magicians. She witnessed her father (David Arquette, Scream) die in a horrific Houdini act, and her mother (Elizabeth Marvel, House of Cards) refuses to believe it was real, and blames Simone for being in on it. Meanwhile the Grail has actually been swapped out with a fake, the real one eaten by a whale. Also, Simone is actually married to "J", like literally, doing all the normal husband & wife stuff (y'know, sex), and that's sort of complicated as he is Jesus, and Jesus loves EVERYONE.... biblically. Eventually they do find the Grail, understand its origins and .... well, go watch ! Because, there is also a great TV commercial for British Knights sneakers, a sweet scene about a man finding his wife's piano, a heist episode, a rollercoaster of death, a "keep your hands on the car" contest but with a giant representation of Excalibur, and a conspiracy involving The Pope.

Almost every episode is a WTF episode, and some are almost entirely WTF. Even the characters begin to catch on to the gonzo style uttering their own WTFs as new stuff is revealed. In standard Lindelof style, he likes to introduce more questions than answers, but honestly, in this utterly bonkers context, its a perfect choice. And I loved every moment of it.

n Paragraphs: Moonfall

2022, Roland Emmerich (Stargate) -- Amazon

I was bemoaning my personal state of things the other day, as I am wont to do, thinking that I don't really have anything in my life that excites me anymore. I have things I mildly enjoy, and most other things just distract me or are barely tolerated. The rest I complain about constantly, ad nauseum. I look at Kent and all the stuff he references occasionally in this movie/TV blog, things that capture his attention constantly, keep him enthusiastic about them for YEARS. And what, on that rare occasion it happens, do I get excited about? This stupid movie about THE... MOON... FALLING... DOWN. So much so that here I am writing a pre-amble for it, before even seeing it. So much so that I downloaded it last night, when it is available for free on Amazon. But I didn't watch it because Marmy was going to roll her eyes so badly, she would hurt herself. So, it will be my Saturday morning watching!

Some 24 hours later...

So, yeah, that was spectacular, a spectacularly stupid, wonderful, silly, bombastic experience!

Preamble, 2011. Astronauts Brian Harper (Patrick Wilson, Watchmen), Jocinda Fowler (Halle Berry, Cat Woman) and Marcus (Frank Fiola, La Maison-Bleue) are fixing a satellite in orbit, when they are attacked by a big CGI nanomachine storm. It kills Marcus and Harper barely escapes with the unconscious Fowler. Back on Earth, Harper is disgraced as nobody believes his incredible story and he loses his family, etc.

Ten years later, NASA has discovered that the moon has broken orbit, and we only have a few months or ... weeks till it destroys the Earth. They corrected the estimate from months to weeks, because "as the moon gets closer, the months will get shorter". Wow; that is "do your own research" level thinking, as our clocks and calendars wouldn't change just because lunar months had drastically changed. No matter, full on panic, Director of NASA quits, tosses his badge to Fowler (now working as Asst Dir) and tells her to go look something up in the Top Secret Files, where she bumps into the man who carried out the biggest coverup in history (slumming Donald Sutherland, Astro Boy), when they hid the fact that lights had been seen from inside the moon, during the first moon landing. And yes, they knew that Harper had seen the alien nanoswarm, but also covered that up. Why? Who knows, don't matter.

Meanwhile harmless conspiracy theorist KC Houseman (John Bradley, Game of Thrones) breaks into a scientist's lab to steal data and then releases the "proof" about the moon's impending crash on Twitter. The ENTIRE... WORLD... BELIEVES... HIM. The cat is out of the bag and the world instantly begins looting Walmarts. Moon Panic !!! But that's alright, Fowler has a plan.

Time becomes somewhat fuzzy, probably because... The Moon (!!!) and they are fast-track a launch using, which gets derailed by equipment failures and Fowler sending everyone home (I kid you not), and then a giant Moon Wave, but that's alright because Harper, Fowler and Houseman are still around to go into space and defeat the Moon Monster with an experimental EMP device, via an old museum housed Space Shuttle with an experimental Chinese lander/buggy that ... doesn't use electronics? You see (and I am already past the point where recapping the movie sounds like a fever dream of a FreeDumb Trucker), the Moon Monster is attracted to electronics, and apparently old Space Shuttles can be flown without electronics, and for some reason the Chinese had developed technology that runs... without electronics? Maybe its the same technology the Moon Nazis use? 

They believe, that by defeating the Moon Monster, it will allow the Moon to course correct, because, the Moon is in fact ("...that's no Moon. It's a space station...") a giant "megastructure", basically a DysonSphere that the Moon Monster is sabotaging because... ? Oh yeah, because the Moon Monster was created by a precursor race of humans who lost control of their AI and it went Evil, as they are wont to do, and they had to create Moons to travel the cosmos and seed other star systems with their own DNA. We were the only one with successfully completed "seeding". We learn all this when our intrepid team goes inside the Moon and meets its own Not Evil AI. Together they all save the Moon and the Earth. And they all lived Happily Ever After, including Fuzz Aldrin.

Despite my mockery, and probably more because I have the opportunity to do so, I loved this movie. Sure, it had SyFy / Asylum level plotting and acting but the production values more than allowed us to ignore that. It was almost as much a gonzo good time as Godzilla vs Kong. I wonder what my rewatch recap will be like.

The only thing that disappointed me was that it was more a scifi actioner, than disaster movie, as most of the disaster material happens in the background as they rush from one scene to the next. The Human Element is relegated to a rather tiresome chase in Aspen as Harper & Fowler's families (and inserted Chinese Exchange Student -- funding secured !) run from looters and Moon Gravity.

3 Short Paragraphs: Space Sweepers

 2020, Sung-hee Jo (Phantom Detective) -- Netflix

There is an early 2000s anime I am fond of, called PlanetES, about the Space Debris Section. They are tasked with the cleanup of NEO (near Earth orbit) as it has become increasingly full of junk that can endanger satellites and orbital stations. Its a rather low-tech near-future kind of story, about the crew of a small ship that goes about collecting nuts & bolts before the become hurtling projectiles of doom. This movie sort of hinges on the same premise, but only in the thinnest of uses. They collect, competing with many other crews & ships, the massive scrap that seems to be out there, derelict ships and space stations and whatnot. The movie never really gets into why there is so much debris, as it focuses on the melodrama of the scrappy crew finding a possibly walking bomb, in the shape of a little girl, left behind in an abandoned ship cargo hold.

Space Sweepers is a bombastic, over the top, often silly, scifi spacer flick along the veins of Luc Besson meets Michael Bay. Its the distant future, Earth has become near uninhabitable, but few living in the orbital structures can afford more than subsistence living. There is a rebel force against the ruling body / corporate force that controls everything and a scientific endeavour to ... transform Mars? Replenish the Earth? To be completely honest, I lost track of the plot very early on, eventually only looking up from my phone for the action sequences or any sequences with the sentient robot who was a member of the scrappy crew.

Don't get me wrong, this movie looks incredible and if I can enjoy the visual pleasures of space operas like Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets or Jupiter Ascending then I can enjoy this. It was just that there was soooo much going on, so many nods to other movies, so much on the screen competing with the family melodrama of the ex-govt/corp soldier who just wants to raise the money to find the body of his little girl, in amongst the space junk, that I short-circuited and tuned out. Still, there are so many enjoyable set pieces, characters and scenes in this flick, it was still an enjoyable watch, and maybe even a more-focused rewatch will come in the near future.

(Kent's view in among the 10)

3+1 Short Paragraphs: Shadow in the Cloud

2020, Roseanne Liang (My Wedding and Other Secrets) -- download

I saw the trailer for this and thought, "OMG I have to see this!" with its Twilight Zone-ish premise of a secret agent type making her way onto a WW II plane full of men who don't want her there, bat-faced gremlins (vampires in the skies?) and gonzo survival action sequences (hanging off the bottom of a plane during combat) where an extremely capable girl (Chloe Grace Moretz) saves the day. Oh, it looked crazy, but my kind of crazy. I also saw that Max Landis had written the movie, and I knew I would like it, as he wrote one of my top ten TV series of all time - Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency.

Maude (Moretz, The Equalizer) sneaks onboard a WWII B17 in Auckland, New Zealand (it bears stating that this is a NZ movie) with a peculiar case. Immediately after getting caught she presents orders from a base commander telling of her top secret mission, and despite all of their misogynist arguments against it, Captain Reeves lets her stay, but has her locked in the belly turret, where she gets to overhear some of the nastiest conversation between the men, and what they want to do with her. They are not happy a woman is onboard. Not long after takeoff, she sees a gremlin on the wing (shadows of Willam Shatner?) and shoots down a Japanese spotter plane, sealing the fact of her skills and capability. Alas, once they decide to let her out, the gremlin has done its work, and she is trapped down under when the shit (Japanese Zeroes) hits the fan (propellers?).

*spoilers*

I have serious reservations about liking this movie. Max Landis revealed himself to be a nasty misogynist piece of work in recent years, which probably made that eavesdropping dialogue rather easy for him. But here he was making a fun, gonzo action flick with a VERY capable female lead. But then the premise was turned on its head -- Maude is revealed NOT as a super-spy on a secret mission, but just as a single mother desperate to get her newborn baby away from a place she was not wanted. While you could argue that Landis was just saying that even "average" women will perform great feats of heroism to save their children, I more thought it of it as him not seeing a woman capable of being a super-spy, and the only motivation he could see for a woman being so heroic was to save her baby. At first, I thought, "producer meddling", and then I remembered what the Internet has been saying about Landis. I don't like to condemn on the words of the Internet, but the evidence seems... evident - the guy's scum.

Still, its a great fun romp of a movie, shot during COVID restrictions, and very apparent. A lot of the movie takes place while the characters are separated, with Moretz only ever being in the forefront. And she is very very good as Maude Super-Spy crawling under the belly of the plane, making me squirm and twitch on the sofa, as my fear of heights got to me. The movie never really tries to be anything other than a Small Action Flick with an outrageous plot, but excels at it.

3 Short Paragraphs: St. Trinians

 2007, Oliver Parker, Barnaby Thompson (Johnny English Reborn) -- Amazon

This is an oldie I should clean out, as we lean into 2021. We watched this during The Pause of 2020, after a few heavy weeks of the Pandemic weighing down on us, and it looked like something silly and British and light hearted. Also, Gemma Arterton doing a Gothy look. Rawr. 

It is the latest film in a series of films, since the 50s, based on a gag comic strip from the 40s, about a girls boarding school where the most insane things happen -- delinquency, deaths and other forms of mayhem, from both the girls and headmistresses. This movie, some 20 years after the last, is considered just another in the series, not a reboot nor resurrection. To us, it was just a typically gonzo, wacky British comedy.

There are hints of a caper flick here, the formula for many school based ensemble movies, where something is going to close the school down, and the kids have to put aside their differences to save the school. But really, the movie is just about showing us these wacky kids doing wacky things, such as selling bathtub vodka, prostituting themselves, blowing things up and just being the bad seeds that only St. Trinian's seems to be able to deal with. And there is Rupert Everett playing the headmistress, for no reason other than to be wacky. Maybe cross dressing actors was a thing in the earlier movies? The flick isn't terrible, but nor does try and be anything more than nostalgic for something I am completely unaware of. I think this movie wanted to be a Revenge of the Nerds meets Kinky Boots but was more like a mockbuster of such.

3+1 Short Paragraphs: Mortal Engines

2018, Christian Rivers (Peter Jackson's art dept) -- cinema

There is a subset of gonzo (def. outlandishly unconventional, outrageous, or extreme) scifi movies that seem to have been created for me: The Fifth Element, Buckaroo Banzai, Sucker Punch, Jupiter Ascending, etc. The definition of the sub-genre is in debate (just try Googling lists) but 'unconventional' is the best description. This movie, if it could be called anything, is definitely from unconventional source material, but tries to make a much more conventional adventure movie from it.

Get this. In the distant future, after an apocalyptic war, the great cities of the world made themselves mobile: wheels, treads, tires and tracks. Entire cities are set upon engines and wheels, and rove across the countryside eating each other. Yes, eating. For with the fall of the world, resources could not be gathered, but had to be taken. So cities have hunted other cities until few were left. And London is the greatest.

Tom (Robert Sheehan), an apprentice historian, gets mixed up in a revenge plot between the city's greatest hero, historian Thaddeus Valentine (Hugo Weaving), and Hester, the young woman he tried to murder ages ago. Valentine seeks control over London and a great power from the past, a weapon great enough to allow London to challenge the greatest of the Anti-traction League cities, Shan Guo in the far east. Along the way they meet an odd ball collection of heroes and villains.

That last sentence is as mundane as the movie wants to be. But why? It could have gone all Terry Gilliam and embraced its outrageous premise, but instead it tried to establish a more classic adventure scifi movie. Now, to be honest, so did the source material and the books are kind of disappointing considering where and when they are set. Easily digested is what they, and the movie, were seeking. So, in the end, not so gonzo afterall.