Avatar

It’s no secret to my readers (all two of you) that I love the work of Edgar Rice Burroughs. I especially love his works concerning Mars; or Barsoom as it is called. Yes, his plots are all the same, but the amount of imagination on display in those books compensates for the narrative simplicity. I understand Burroughs wrote other stories besides adventure stories, but really, the guy is known for adventure stories, I understand his fans love that romance novel he wrote, but seriously, he’s an adventure storyteller.




A typical Burroughs adventure would go something like this: protagonist finds himself embroiled in two warring cultures, typically they are a lost culture somehow, either living at the earth’s core, some lost civilization in Africa, or two warring races on Mars. Our hero eventually chooses a side in the middle of the conflict and using his superior intellect/muscles he helps the good side over come the other. There’s also a romance thrown in there for good measure. I’m over simplifying it to the extreme, but that’s the basic plot of every single Tarzan, or John Carter of Mars book.

Enter James Cameron, filmmaker. Oh sure, you may know him as the guy who wrote and directed the single most profitable movie ever made. But before that he was the guy who shaped science fiction cinema. I’d argue that Cameron, Ridley Scott, and George Lucas are the three filmmakers who came up with our modern vocabulary of science fiction cinema. Whether it’s the Vietnam inspired Aliens, or the gritty noir cityscape of Blade Runner, or the soaring, swashbuckling fantasy of Star Wars, you’re not going to find three guys who created the cinematic myths we’ve come to hold so dear.
After the massive success that was Titanic, Mr. Cameron waited for technology to catch up with his science fiction epic. Making a few underwater documentaries, and a Television show along the way. But when he felt that motion capture technology had caught up to the story in his head, he still wasn’t there, and never being a guy to just settle, he developed the technology for him to do it.

Enter Avatar.

I think I finally understand how people felt on May, 25th 1977 as that enormous starship sailed over an audiences head in Star Wars. I think I understand what audiences must have felt staggering out of theaters in 1933 after seeing King Kong. Hell, I haven’t felt this sense of sheer awe, and HOLY CRAPness, since I stumbled out of the theater seeing Jurassic Park. In the simplest terms I felt like a kid again. Believe the hype kids, this movie is the real deal.

Jake Sully is a crippled marine, a wayward and lost soul, trying to find his place in the world, or rather, universe. Sully is drafted to the planet Pandora a lush, forest moon, with an extremely complex eco-system, six legged things that can kill you, flying things that can also kill you, and a race off 12 foot tall blue cat-like people called the Na’vi who live on the largest supply of a precious mineral “Unobtanium” (yes it’s called that, and it’s actually a real engineering term). The Na’vi are not exactly happy about the humans being on Pandora in the first place. In order to learn about/get the Na’vi off the mineral deposit the humans have developed a program called the Avatar program where humans are plugged in(so to speak) to a genetically modified Na’vi.

Jake has been selected to take part in the Avatar program, because the hawkish colonel, Col. Quarich wants to keep an eye on the Na’vi and he’d rather not have the Na’vi standing at all. One gets the impression he’d rather just smell the napalm in the morning. Complicating Jake’s spying duties he falls in love with Neitri a warrior princess of the Na’vi, tribe.

You can see where things go from here.

Cameron has created a pulp adventure movie. Writ large across the cinema screen. He’s taken those simplistic tales of Burroughs at put them on screen. When I say that, don’t misunderstand, Avatar has an extremely simple story. But it is a story executed with wit, empathy and heart, it is a classic story in the Joseph Campbell mode. And when you’re reinventing the wheel visually it’s probably best not to do so naratively, our brains can only take so much.

I’m not going to do what other critics have done and gush about Pandora and the wonders found there. All I will say on the matter is this: Avatar MUST be seen on the biggest screen possible, and, if you can, in 3D. Simply put it is a visual feast for the eyes.

The actors are across the board fantastic, yes the script doesn’t give them a lot to work with, but the actors bring their A game to this. Stephen Lang as Col. Quarich was an amazingly evil badass. Sam Worthington is great as basically the audiences Avatar. But the real standout, is Zoe Saldana, who gives a tender, nuanced performance as Neitri the headstrong Na’vi princess.

I really didn’t expect to like this movie. Every single trailer, interview, and article about it left me cold. In particular the amount the film cost to make was very, very, disconcerting. In the end, while I don’t think a movie should cost the GNP of a third world country, all that money is up on the screen. Cameron has created a cinematic work of art, that from here on in will be studied, and take on a life of its own in much the same way Lucas’ Star Wars cycle has.

Avatar is pure genre cinema at its finest. I can’t recommend it enough.

Vowels Part 2

Another exciting trip through history!

Vowels

A new historical short from Stolen Donkey

THE: Vampire Hunter

My thesis film: THE: Vampire Hunter written, directed, and produced by yours truly.

THE: Vampire Hunter from William Morey on Vimeo.

A funny sketch

For those of you not in the know I belong to a comedy troupe known as Stolen Donkey here's our latest sketch, Highlander reviews are still forthcoming.

Thuvia Maid of Mars Review

I’ve been a terrible blogger. I made this big huge deal about going through the Highlander movies and reviewing each one, and I completely snuffed my readers, by distinctly not doing that.

I apologize for that, the reviews will happen, don’t worry gentle readers, to tide you over for the immortals here’s a review of “Thuvia Maid of Mars” by Edgar Rice Burroughs.



“Thuvia Maid of Mars” is the fourth book in Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Mars or Barsoom series. This series is only second to the Tarzan series in Burroughs’ oeuvre, and has been largely forgotten by the general public. Whereas you can walk up to any American and they’ll know who Tarzan is, if you walk up to an average American they would have absolutely no clue who or what Barsoom or John Carter are.

With that all in mind, let’s refresh shall we? The first book called “The Princess of Mars”, John Carter was an ex-confederate soldier who was hunting for gold in Arizona when he is suddenly attacked by Indians and miraculously astrally projects himself to Mars.



On Mars, John Carter meets Dejah Thoris, the beautiful Red Martian, the “princess” of the books title. Of course when Carter meets her she’s being attacked by giant green four armed creatures, called Tharks, the Green Martians of Mars.

Burroughs mars is a wacky place, it’s full of four armed white apes, Red Martians, Yellow Martians, Black Martians. It’s a world where swords, are used right along side pistols, and ships can fly. Remember the first book was written in 1912, well before there were such things as science fiction.

Carter quickly finds that due to the difference between Earth’s gravity and Mars, he can leap tall buildings in a single bound.

Of course Carter our scrappy hero, wins the heart of Dejah Thoris, and in the second and third books unites Mars(or Barsoom as the Martians call it) and becomes the warlord of Mars.



Let’s be perfectly clear here Burroughs was not a terribly good writer, imaginative, yes, good? Not so much. He relies very heavily on formula and the same plot. We can’t, exactly hold this against him of course, he was writing for the pulps, and when you are writing under that time frame it’s understandable you’re going to rely on what works, and what is the fastest to write.

Which brings us to the fourth Barsoom book, “Thuvia Maid of Mars”. What’s interesting here, is that the main characters of the book are not John Carter or Dejah Thoris, but their son Cathoris, and Thuvia a feisty minor character you meet in the second Mars book.



Our story opens with Thuvia in her home city of Ptarth, where Our Villain Astok Prince of neighboring city state Dusar tries to subject himself to Thuvai, she rebuffs him, but he still is not getting the hint, and Cathoris leaps to her rescue. Astok leaves, like a whiny little bitch and swears revenge.

After the commotion, Cathoris professes his love for Thuvia, but she of course is betrothed to another. This breaks Cathoris’ little heart, but he being a man of chilvary, decides he’s just going to go home.

Astok, then complicates matters by up and kidnapping Thuvia, and implicating Cathoris in the process. When Cathoris hears about this he jumps to the ready to find Thuvia and the adventure begins.

So we’ve got all the Burroughs plot elements, we’ve got the lecherous villain, in Astok. We’ve got Thuvia, he heroine who needs to be rescued, and we’ve got our noble hero, who after finding out that Thuvia has been kidnapped leaps into his flyer to save her, not out of some sense that maybe this will lead to her loving him, but literally he’s just doing it to keep her safe.


It’s like those day dreams I used to have when I was twelve, a cute girl in my sixth grade class would be threatened by bullies, space aliens, monsters, what have you, and I would swoop down in my jet pack, and it was always a jet pack. Save the girl from the threat. The girl would inevitably swoon, and fall head over heels for me, and offer a kiss, I would decline opting out of the kiss and flying into the heavens on another adventure. Which leads me to conclude that I would most likely be more neurotic than I am had I read these books when I was twelve.

Cathoris eventually finds Thuvia in a broken down flier, and being attacked by Green Martians. Cathoris gives chase, which eventually leads him to a hidden valley in one of the dead seas of Barsoom. The Green Men are suddenly attacked by the Lotharians and millions upon millions of archers, and Banths(a kind of six legged lion).

Cathoris having inherited some of Dad’s special gravity defying tricks (I think if I tried to figure out how this happened my brain might explode) leaps into the fray and saves Thuvia from the hands of the Green Martians who are quickly being decimated by those damn archers.

Cathoris and Thuvia escape. And Thuvia of course thinks Cathoris is the one at fault for kidnapping her. Which if you apply logic to the situation wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense. Thuvia implies that Cathoris had 1) Thuvia kidnapped, 2) Had his crew attacked by the Green Martians and 3) Risked his own neck to save her. I guess it’s not THAT far fetched, considering from what it sounds like, that’s exactly the type of plan most people on Barsoom come up with. Also, Thuvia gives in to her baser tempers every so often, so she’s just in the heat of the moment.

It should be pointed out here, that Thuvia is interesting because she’s a little bit feistier than most Burroughs’ heroines, resembling Burroughs other famous female character Jane in some of the later Tarzan books. Thuvia is feisty, self sufficient, and has this crazy ability to hypnotize lions, which is a nice little trick and gets Burroughs out of some narrative log jams in the story.

However, like all Burroughs female characters she still has to be saved by Cathoris, how the hell else are you expecting them to fall in love? Talking over a game of Jetan (martian version of chess)?

Despite Thuvia’s reticence about Cathoris they make their way to the city of Lothar, which is a lost city of Barsoom, where as the population started to die out, and by constant attacks from the Green Martians they’ve developed this technique of creating imaginary people, namely the archers. There’s a fun little moment where Cathoris asks what the hell is going on with this wacky place and the Lotharian tells them that are two factions of the Lotharians, the “etherialists” who believe there is no such thing as matter, only mind and the “realists” who believe the opposite. This weirds Cathorsis out. Which is amusing because the weird barometer on Barsoom is pretty high, so when something wigs a Martian out, it’s gotta be pretty strange.

Thuvai and Cathoris are separated but, Thuvia manages to escape the clutches of the Lotharians. Cathoris makes a new friend in Koar the once imaginary archer/ ancient legendary hero of the Lotharians. They after Thuvia and just when it looks like things are going to be okay, Thuvia is kidnapped by Astok.

Poor Thuvia suffers so much abuse in this book, that you could call the book “Thuvia and no good, very horrible, rotten day”, but considering through the first half, she’s insufferably annoying, I wouldn’t call the book that, I also wouldn’t call Thuvia poor either, I mean everybody wants to marry this chick, even though she’s a spoiled brat.

Meanwhile the implication of Cathoris as kidnapping Thuvia has literally set Barsoom on the brink of a civil war. Ptharth Thuvia’s city is sending its battle ships against Helium (Cathorsis’ city), and things look really bad.

I’m not entirely sure what Ptarth thinks it can accomplish, John Carter is of course the Warlord of Mars and he lives in Helium, he knows the Black Men of Barsoom, the Yellow Men, and they will all rally behind him, unless Ptarth just feels like getting their ass handed to them because of a slight of honor, which again makes some Barsoomian sense of logic, but wouldn’t make any strategic sense.

In other Burroughs touch Cathoris impersonates a Panthan(read Ronin). And of course through a series of events Cathoris and Koar manage to kill Astok, and they are running into the fray of the civil war, when they come across the Green Men attacking a ship. Cathoris being the most honorable man in the universe swings down to save him, and in an amusing plot contrivance it happens to be Kulan Tith Thuvia’s intended betrothed. Thanks to Cathoris, well, really thanks to Koar who without his imaginary warriors Cathoris would not have beaten back the Green Martians. Even more amusingly, Koar runs with his archers after the Green Men. Never to be seen again.

Cathoris professes his love for Thuvia, and Thuvia nearly cries because she realizes she does love Cathoris. Kulan Tith over hears all of this and instead of being pissed off that his bride to be doesn’t love him, he takes the higher road and says that’s okay, that it’s better to be with the one you love, and I won’t marry Thuvia.

And the book ends.

WAIT? WHAT? That’s it? I mean, okay, I can infer that the civil war was averted and Cathorsis and Thuvai got married, and may have had kids, but, I mean, it’s not like there are very good communication systems on Barsoom. Did half the planet go to war and then find out that they didn’t really need to do that? It was all fine!? Cathorsis was in a dead sea with his bride to be, while the rest of the world went to war?

So, “Thuvia Maid of Mars” is not going to win any literary awards but it is a rip-roaring fun adventure story. Barsoom is always a fun place to visit. This time out the Lotharians are a fun and amusing and present an interesting threat. Cathoris while being a John Carter clone has a better sense of humor than his super serious father, and Thuvia although being insufferable at the start of the book grew on me. Burroughs always seems to be having more fun on Barsoom than he ever does with his most famous creation, Tarzan. Which I find interesting, and sort of sad, while Tarzan is remembered, the Barsoom novels have been far more influential to science fiction, without them we wouldn’t have Star Wars.

There can be only one!

The other day, I was cruising around the internet and I read a reference to the Highlander series. I realized, me being the geek that I am, I had never actually seen the first Highlander movie. I saw most of it with friends, but we didn't pay any attention to it. I had seen the third movie in theaters when I was ten years old, and I remember distinctly thinking "This is the coolest thing I have ever seen! I have absolutely no idea what is going on". To this day I haven't seen the movie again, and I still have no clue what happened in that movie.

So here we are, and I have this blog. I figure I'll spend the next five days watching ALL five Highlander movies, and reviewing each one on this blog.

So, diving into the depths of madness that is the Highlander franchise I may as well watch the TV series too. And thanks to Hulu it has the entire series online.

Why am I doing this?

Boredom, and a desire to do something with this blog that's not completely random movie reviews.

So, expect a review of the first Highlander sometime this week, the second next week and so on.


So to close this post I ask my readers this one question: Can you name any other film franchise that has spawned: 4 sequels, 2 live action TV series, an animated series, and an anime feature film? The closest I can think of is RoboCop, but I'm not sure.

Now remember everyone; in the end there can be only one!

Watchmen

Imagine a 130 million dollar superhero studio film that has:

1. No superheroics.
2. Three different first person narrations.
3. Flashbacks within flashbacks.
4. A male character who is nude throughout the entire film.
5. A story that covers 40 years of history.
6. No pat answers to anything
7. OH and no happy ending.

Now, imagine you’ve just walked out of “Batman and Robin” in 1997, and you’ve just said to yourself “Wow, that movie was a piece of dog feces”. Then up comes some random time traveler from the year 2009 and says to you “In twelve years the studio that produced this movie, will produce the movie I just described”. You’d laugh in their face, and possibly hit them.

I first read Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons graphic novel Watchmen my freshman year of high school this would be 1999-2000. I think I picked it up because I was reading on the internet that it was finally going to be made into a movie, or it was because Terry Gilliam had been involved in the project, and Gilliam is one of my favorite filmmakers so I decided I’d pick up the book. I hated it the first time through. I found it, long, overblown, ultimately rudderless, and I also found it boring. I got what it was trying to do, but I was expecting something more along the lines of Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns. I mean, yeah Miller’s work deconstructed the superhero myth, but he at least had superhero fights in it! Was what I thought at the time. About two years later, for one reason or another I picked up Watchmen again. And I loved it. I suddenly GOT it, I understood the deconstruction of the superhero, I understood WHY the heroes in the novel never did anything particularly heroic, why there were no super villains, I was supremely affected by Dr. Manhattan’s existential musings on the nature of human beings. I got all the little jokes in there. Isn’t it funny how a work of art can completely change because of life experiences?

When I heard that Zach Snyder was going to direct Watchmen, I was quite terrified. I found his first film, the remake of Dawn of the Dead quite good, but his second film 300, was quite possibly one of the worst movies of the past ten years. I was scared that the adaptation of Watchmen would fall apart in a merge of hyper stylized CGI, and random gratuitous violence. I was positive he would get the material visually, but the one thing Snyder lacks as a director, was subtlety.

For those not in the know, Watchmen is a twelve issue comic book series by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, published in 1985 it is a deconstruction of superheroes. The question it ultimately poses is this: “If superheroes existed in the real world, what would have happened?” The graphic novel spans 40 years of this alternate history, it flashes back, has flashbacks within flashbacks, extra text material appended to the back of each issue. The novel has a comic book within the comic book that a character is reading. It has a ton of minor characters, acting as the Greek chorus to the apocalyptic superhero nightmare going on around them. If you are a screenwriter and you are tasked to not only adapt Watchmen to the screen, but also conform it to studio standards, I think I would have a minor heart attack. Which is why the screen adaptation has been in development hell for so long. In actuality it would be an interesting piece to have seen adapted to the stage.

Now here we are…it’s 2009 and the director of 300 has made Watchmen. All I can really say is…WOW. From the opening frames of the film where the superhero Comedian is brutally murdered to the strains of Nat King Cole’s “Unforgettable”. I was drawn right in. Then the opening credits began, I can’t talk about these opening titles enough, hands down it is one of the best sequences ever put to film. It is a montage of images starting in 1939 and leading to the alternate 1985 of the film, iconic images from our actual history, the World War II V day Kiss, the Kennedy Assassination, the moon landing, Studio 54, Andy Warhol, with the question behind it “What if superheroes existed during this time”. Set to the strains a very iconic song. The montage is stirring, moving, and funny.

Quick rundown of the plot: It is 1985 superheroes have existed since 1939, but recently they have been banned, except for two heroes who work within the government The Comedian a kind of mercenary soldier(think Nick Fury or Captain America), and Dr. Manhattan, the only superhero who has any super powers created in an atomic lab accident he is a blue glowing naked god-like being. And because the U.S. has this being on their side it allowed the U.S. to win the war in Vietnam, which in turn allowed Nixon to be president for three consecutive terms in office. Even so, the U.S. and Russia are still in an arms race and are more than likely going to nuclear war with each other. And the doomsday clock is inching ever closer to midnight. Amidst this someone is killing off the former superheroes, starting with the Comedian. Who is the murderer? Is there a bigger conspiracy? And what does it mean for the fate of the world.

I loved Watchmen. The film is powerful, affecting, funny, campy, and ultimately human. It worked as a film, not just an adaptation, but as a film. Yes there have been some changes, and cuts; some obvious (cutting the comic within a comic would be the first thing to go), and some not so obvious the specifics of the MacGuffin have changed, but thematically it’s all the same, and that’s all that really matters.

Across the board, the cast just nails it. Patrick Wilson brings the schlubby good natured, fighting paunchiness of Nite Owl II brilliantly to life. Malin Ackerman makes Silk Spectre II interesting, which she’s really not in the novel, let’s face it she’s really annoying in the book. Matthew Goode as Ozymandias is the actor who has been getting the most flack for his performance. I think the actor is too young for the role, but that being said he brings a dark sense of tragedy to the film, that the character had in the novel, but it’s not exactly the forefront of his character. Watch as he delivers the line “I feel every single life…” it’s heartbreaking and pompous in the right ways.

But there are three huge standouts in the cast, that just bring everything they have to their roles; Jackie Earle Haley as the vigilante known as Rorschach is terrifyingly brilliant, he keeps you on your toes and watch his delivery on “I’m not imprisoned here with you, you’re trapped in here with me” it’s chilling. Jeffrey Dean Morgan as The Comedian makes an extremely unlikable character, human. Here is a man who has done terrible things in the name of his country, and just as a person, he sees the dark underbelly of humanity, he is Kurtz from Heart of Darkness. It’s an amazing performance, and to be fair if his performance did not work the film would fall completely apart. Billy Crudup’s shy meditative voice is perfect for Dr. Manhattan the blue naked god, underneath the digital effects and motion capture, comes a sad haunting performance. When Dr. Manhattan finds himself tired of humanity and goes to Mars, Crudup brings the world weary sense of Hamlet to the role, “I have of late, but wherefore not know have lost all my mirth…”.

Okay, so I’ve just gushed all over this movie, but it’s not perfect. While on the whole the film looks absolutely stunning, some of the aging makeup really doesn’t work, and the guy playing Nixon, looks very cartoony, which I think was done on purpose, but it doesn’t exactly work.
All that being said, the movie is very good. I say see it, see it in the movie theater don’t wait for this one on DVD, see it. This is an important film and the things that it has to say about the use and abuse of power, do the ends justify the means, and human nature are important. Don’t forget this is coming from a 130 million dollar studio superhero film, and that my friends, is an amazing achievement.