The Essentials: An Introduction

March 2021 Update: Sadly, my friend Fidel Gomez, Jr. died in 2017. It is an immense loss that I still feel. However, I think it would serve as a good memory to continue our long-hoped for project. 

A few years ago, my friend Fidel Gomez, Jr. and I started working on a project. It was a simple one: write about 52 films every person should see. The total came from the number of weeks in a year, to show that watching a great movie did not require hours and hours of one's time.

We wanted to have a wide variety of films: not just a list of "important" films but films from all sorts of genres. We found there are people who are terrified of musicals, of documentaries, of silent films. We also found there are some people who dismiss action films and/or Westerns and wouldn't consider them worthy of their time. 

These two types are the real film snobs: not the ones who hold up Cleopatra to Citizen Kane, but those who declare a movie to be bad without even seeing it merely because they don't have subtitles or have people singing and dancing. Fidel & I never considered ourselves film snobs. Just because we love the work of Akira Kurosawa or Orson Welles didn't mean we would automatically reject Die Hard or The 40-Year-Old Virgin. In short, we believed the problem wasn't with the movie itself, it was with the perception of the movie.

In the time we knew each other, I think both of us expanded each other's views on certain films & filmmakers. I learned to love Werner Herzog and Federico Fellini with the passion that Fidel had, and he gained an appreciation for the work of my beloved Alfred Hitchcock and John Ford. Of course, sometimes we still couldn't agree: I still find Stanley Kubrick an acquired taste and he was still resistant to Buster Keaton. That is what happens when you step out of your comfort zone and give these films a chance, going in with an open mind and leaving your notions out of the viewing.

This is what we wanted with The Essentials: 52 (More or Less) Films Everyone Should See. Fidel & I were very concerned that too many good movies were being ignored or forgotten because people wanted to stay within what they knew. We also feared that truly great films were being sacrificed in the place of truly awful work.

When we compiled our two lists, the ones that appeared on both automatically went in. It was just a matter of sorting out which ones would go in and which ones would go home. Sometimes we agreed real quickly, sometimes we argued fiercely until one or the other gave in, and sometimes we were reduced to flipping a coin because no matter what we said we couldn't convince the other. Eventually, we came up with 52 titles that we could live with. Now, in total there are 58 films altogether, but because we consider some of them to be part of one story we skated by with that reasoning to justify it being 52.

We went through all genres: documentaries, musicals, silent films, animation, comedies, action, science-fiction, foreign-language, and some that one or the other just loved for itself. Overall, we both thought it would be a good way to introduce people to films and directors and stars we think are worth your time. Eventually we used this as a standard to judge other films. "Would you make it an Essential?" one would ask the other if he thought it was really great. "That will never be an Essential," would be code for "What a lousy film".

As it is, Fidel Gomez, Jr. has disappeared from my life. I have no idea what happened to him after he said he was leaving to 'visit' his sister in Colorado. He may have moved up there permanently but he left no forwarding address or phone number. I miss him terribly. I assume he's still alive. In any case, I decided to go ahead and write about the films we came up with. If he is still alive, I'd love to see a Volume 2 of The Essentials. If he isn't, I hope to honor him by completing the work we started together.

The Essentials Collection

The Best of 2009 So Far Version One

Update (December 2016): As I saw more films from 2009, I opted to revisit my 2009 List and rework it to make things more in line with my actual list.

Update (March 2021): I am reworking and re-cataloging all reviews, so this Best of 2009 List was current at the time originally written and reedited. A second list will be published once the cataloging is complete.

Well, it's a New Year, so we feel obligated to trot out the best films of 2009. This won't be easy, since I didn't see that many films and some good ones I haven't written a review for yet. Therefore, I ask you to indulge me, but at least I figure they will serve as teasers for the future when I DO write on them. Here they are in descending order:

Number 10:
The Princess & The Frog

A return to traditional 2-D animation that was once the hallmark of the Disney Company, The Princess & The Frog not only does a wonderful thing by creating the first African-American Disney Princess in Tiana, but also by making Tiana a more career-oriented character.  The film also mixes the varied musical styles of Louisiana: jazz, zydeco, Cajun, and gospel, into a wonderful gumbo that makes this film a delightful entry to the Disney Canon.

Number 9:
Star Trek

I have as of today not seen a single episode from the original Star Trek series or its various adaptations. I recently received a Best Of Classic Star Trek as a Christmas gift, so I will watch, though I plan to make Spock's Brain the first one I watch. Isn't it the Citizen Kane of Star Trek episodes? In any case, the series had been floundering under its own mythology and it took this "reboot" to make the saga fun again. This film is perfect for the long-time Trekker/Trekkie as well as a great introduction to someone who has little to no knowledge of the saga.

Number 8:
Notorious

Biopics can be a tricky thing, but Notorious, the life story of Christopher Wallace, aka Notorious B.I.G. aka Biggie Smalls, is a fascinating portrait of a man rising above his circumstances while at the same time never quite escaping them.  With strong performances by the cast, we get a sympathetic portrait of an artist gone too soon.

Number 7:
An Education

An Education might not be strictly a biopic, but this portrait of a young woman becoming herself through experiences both physical and mental has a brilliant performance by Carey Mulligan.  It is a study of the growth of an individual, a portrait of a girl who becomes a woman in every sense of the phrase.

Number 6:
The Hangover

You take a somewhat clichéd situation (four guys go on a bender in Las Vegas) and you take it to the most extreme, outrageous level (a baby in the closet, a tiger in the bathroom, the groom missing). You then follow these average guys as they try to sort out the previous night and throw in crime lords and Mike Tyson into the mix, and you give it an actual logic (albeit a completely insane logic) and you get a first-rate comedy. What is especially good is that you relate to the characters...though hopefully not the situations. When a film can have you laughing during the closing credits, you've got a great film on your hands.

Number 5:
The Young Victoria

Perhaps I have a weakness for biopics, and ones involving royalty.  Don't let what might be thought of as a dry history lesson with elegant costumes (though they did win the film the Academy Award for Best Costume Design as royal-based films tend to).  The Young Victoria is an elegant film about the machinations and struggles the heiress to the British crown endured to reach a level of happiness with her beloved Prince Albert.  With excellent performances all around, The Young Victoria becomes a tour de force of passions within the confines of monarchy.

Number 4:
Michael Jackson's This Is It

The weirdness that surrounded Michael Jackson was like a fog that hid his enormous talent. The trials, the surgeries, the spending sprees, the baby dangling, the accusations, all overshadowed just what a first-rate singer/songwriter and dancer he was. One always wonders if things had gone differently, if he were able to have been pulled into reality instead of his "Never-Land", things would have been so much better for everyone concerned. As it stands, This Is It is his artistic final will and testament, showing that he still had exceptional abilities. A terrible loss, especially for his children. I don't believe that genius and madness have to be related, but Jackson seems to have lived that...and died with that.

Number 3:
(500) Days of Summer

Love is a many-splendored thing. Love hurts. Love is strange. I'm sick of love. People will say we're in love. I'll never love this way again. I will always love you. Love was when I loved you. This can't be love. Is this love, that I'm feeling? (500) Days of Summer is a love story that is honest and true. Anyone who's been in love or been in love with love or has fallen in and out of love can relate to the story of a guy and a girl who go through the ups and downs of an affair to remember, for good or ill.

Number 2:
Precious

Precious is one of the most simultaneously heartbreaking and uplifting films. As we watch the title character struggle with horrific abuse and neglect, condemned to die due to the AIDS virus, we still finding herself freed from the misery of her world through her own will. With brilliant performances by newcomer Gabourey Sidibe and Monique, Precious is haunting, hauntingly beautiful, and emotionally impacting.

Number 1:
UP

Few films have been this moving, this funny, this brilliant as the latest Disney/PIXAR film. It may be old hat, but it's true: I laughed, I cried. UP hit you on a deeply emotional level, but it also was wildly funny and endearing and touching and well-written, even well-acted. Animation is not for kids, and neither is UP.  It was a tough battle between two emotionally impacting films, but by the thinnest of margins, UP is still my Best Picture of 2009.

Well, there it is. These are some of the films that I saw this year. Perhaps there were better films that I missed at the time of the writing (I think The Hurt Locker, for example), but I can't judge by reputation, only by what I see. I hope that 2010 is a great year for everyone concerned. I hope that films get better, people stop remaking films, come up with original ideas, not treat the audience like zombies, and that movies stop being entertaining only and start being entertaining and good.

THE WORST OF 2009 Version One

2009: Some Odds and Bitter Ends

Personal Reflections on Sherlock Holmes

When I was in middle school, I was into Agatha Christie and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.  I loved mysteries and the Sherlock Holmes, Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple stories were some of my favorites. I admit thought that Holmes was my favorite. He was a hero: someone who used reason and logic to uncover great mysteries. 

I did my best to model myself after Holmes. I aimed to be a cold, thinking machine. I played the violin. Mercifully I didn't take Holmes' cocaine or morphine habits, so even I had my limits. Even today, I adopt the adage that if it's of no use to me I don't bother learning something. That I think has led me to make some ridiculous mistakes, but I digress.

 

In time, my passion for Holmes dissipated, but never my affection for him. I'm too much of a soft touch to be totally impassionate (though I still remain a bit distant emotionally), and I've long since hung up the fiddle & bow.

It was inevitable that I would find and seek out the various television and cinematic interpretations of Sherlock Holmes. There have been several interpreters of Conan Doyle's best-known creation on stage, screen, and television, from the comedic (Without a Clue) to the faithful (the Granada television series). Out of all the actors who've given life to Holmes, three versions now come immediately to mind: Basil Rathbone, Jeremy Brett, and Robert Downey, Jr.

I figure that when people think "Sherlock Holmes", they see Rathbone. He made fourteen pictures as Holmes with Nigel Bruce as Watson. I'll say that he most definitely looks the part. His face shows a keen intelligence with a touch of haughtiness. He also had the costume most associated with Holmes: the deerstalker cap and cloak. 

While I haven't seen many of his films, there was always an element in them that I always disliked: Nigel Bruce's interpretation of Watson. He made him into this fat, fat-headed tottering old imbecile who couldn't think his way out of a paper bag. He never struck me as right for the part of an action-oriented war veteran and respected doctor. Instead, Bruce made Watson a figure of ridicule, and to be frank the good doctor's reputation has only recently recovered. Watson is still seen in the contemporary mind as an idiot, and that's a terrible disservice to the stories themselves.

I look at Nigel Bruce's version of Doctor Watson and I think this is where the idea of "Watson as boob stooge" originated. Just as many future Sherlock Holmes find themselves in Rathbone's shadow, so do future Watsons. 

I also never liked the idea that Holmes lived in the present-day rather than Victorian & early Edwardian Britain. In retrospect I can see why it was done, but somehow to me a bit of magic was lost. Similarly was the decision to create stories for them rather than adapt the original ones. It all boiled down to money, as it was cheaper to make current-day films than period films. Despite that however, I think the Rathbone films serve as a decent introduction to the stories, minus Nigel Bruce.

I came along when Granada Television brought the series to the small screen. Jeremy Brett was not the first to play Holmes on television, but to my mind, Brett is the Sherlock Holmes. It was Granada Television's intention to make all the stories and novels, but tragically, Brett's death prevented this. No one to me, except Rathbone in a close race, can match him. 

His Holmes was obsessed, sometimes uncouth, but always on the side of right. He showed Holmes to be someone of fierce intelligence but also more human than before. The adaptation of The Devil's Foot features as part of the story Holmes fighting, and ultimately quitting, his cocaine habit, and is one of the few times that I can remember Holmes ever referring to his associate by his first name of John. It is a credit to Brett that he asked for Holmes to face his cocaine addiction due to his concern that children who would watch would be influenced to take drugs. 

In The Empty House, we can see the humanity Brett brought Holmes. The Great Detective apologizes for playing a trick on Watson and tells him that while he is as trustworthy as Holmes' brother Mycroft, "you have a kinder heart".

David Burke and Edward Hardwicke also do more justice to Watson. In the series, he's hardly stupid, albeit not as bright as Holmes. They are men with guns and are not afraid of a fight. Again, in The Empty House, it's Watson that comes to Holmes' rescue. Watson even gets his own: in one story (I can't remember which), Watson ends the story by telling him, "Elementary, my dear Holmes". 

If it were not for Brett's death, we could have seen what could have happened once all the stories had been made. There is one caveat to Jeremy Brett: I wonder if his interpretation consumed him emotionally and psychologically.

That bring me to the most recent Sherlock Holmes: Robert Downey, Jr. To my mind, he did a wonderful job in making Holmes more action hero than intellectual machine as I think that was the intent. It is a Guy Ritchie film. Still, I can't help think that it all could have been better. 

This is prime example of when you give a good actor a good part but in a lousy movie. You keep thinking he could do more, show why he can solve these mysteries in a rational manner rather than being all rush-rush-rush, quick-quick-quick. He falls short of Brett and Rathbone, but if he continues with better stories and better direction he could reach their level.

 

Jude Law's Dr. Watson, on the other hand, is a mile high better than Bruce's. Here, he's almost totally action and nobody's stooge. Law makes his Watson a man of intelligence, action, and loyalty, things that he was in the stories. It's hard to believe Nigel Bruce could knock down a door to get in or to tell Holmes to stay out of his private life. I suppose that the best qualities to both Downey, Jr. and Law is that they are younger than the team of Rathbone & Bruce or of Brett and Burke/Hardwicke. At 44 and 37, they show a more youthful duo than either Rathbone or Bruce, even though Rathbone was only three years older than Downey and Bruce was actually Downey's age when they started their films.

Out of the limited number of Sherlock Holmes I've seen Jeremy Brett is the standard I measure all others. I don't think any future Holmes will measure up to his interpretation. I can hope that the new Sherlock Holmes despite my dislike of it as a film will introduce people to the novels & stories, eventually the television series. I fear that is a vain hope, since reading for pleasure seems to be a dying art. Still, I hope.

**February 2021 Update: Since the 2009 Sherlock Holmes premiered there have been more Pretenders to the Throne. The BBC released the television series Sherlock, with Benedict Cumberbatch as a modern-day Sherlock Holmes. Likewise, CBS had Elementary with Jonny Lee Miller in the role. I know many who think Cumberbatch is the best Sherlock Holmes of All Time, but I never warmed to him. It does not help I hated Sherlock is in my view downright nonsensical. It's to the point where even the biggest Sherlockian thought Series/Season Four was a total mess.

Elementary lasted seven seasons, building a slow and steady case for being the superior of the two modern-day versions. It's most worrisome aspect, that it gender-swapped Dr. John Watson for Dr. Joan Watson (Lucy Liu) has proven to be one of its stronger elements. For all the fears of romance between Holmes and Watson, there's more erotica about Sherlock's John Watson and Sherlock than Elementary's Joan Watson and Sherlock. 

As time has gone on, I've learned and seen more Sherlock Holmes interpretations, which I look forward to reviewing and cataloging. 

Sherlock Holmes Retrospective

Sherlock Holmes (2009): A Review (Review #29)

SHERLOCK HOLMES

Quite Baker Street Irregular...

Guy Ritchie's version of Sherlock Holmes is if someone had read various Sir Arthur Conan Doyle novels while drunk and attempted to retell it while still drunk. Sherlock Holmes has a lot of action but hardly any sense. 

Sherlock Holmes appears to take elements from both The Canon and Sir Arthur's life for its story. There's Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams) from A Scandal in Bohemia. There's bits from another story, The Sussex Vampire, which has the element of the undead. You could even see bits of how in real life Sir Arthur was very much into spiritualism & the supernatural and a hint of The Lost Symbol: the secret societies, the dark rituals. 

The sinister Lord Blackwood (Mark Strong), has been murdering women in some vaguely occult rituals, is caught, and executed. Within hours however, he has apparently returned from the dead. This surprises Dr. John Watson (Jude Law), who not only helped capture him but was the attending physician at Blackwood's execution. Blackwood's ultimate plan is to take over the world (or at least the British Empire) in some plot that involves knocking out any opponents in Parliament with poison gas. 

Into this mix comes Sherlock Holmes (Robert Downey, Jr.), fascinated by this bizarre case. Holmes not only has to fight Lord Blackwood, but American criminal and adventuress Irene Adler. His frenemy with benefits is somehow involved in all the machinations, though on whose side is a mystery. This mystery doubles as we know she is working for the mysterious Professor Moriarty, who might be playing both sides.

I figure that the majority of the audience has never read a Sherlock Holmes story. Instead, they saw it for what it was sold as: an action film with cool fight scenes, story secondary. Perhaps the mind boggles at Guy Ritchie tackling the legendary literary character, but it's really not a shock at all. 

Ritchie has a passion for the criminal underworld, and Victorian London offers him a chance to revel in his frenetic style while "branching out" by having a different time period. Perhaps this is why I cannot warm up to him as a filmmaker: he keeps making the same film over and once more. It's one thing to make films in the same genre: Ford was a master at Westerns, Hitchcock of the suspense thriller. However, they told different stories and by and large tried to keep the story at the core of the film, not their cinematic style.

Ritchie, on the contrary, is all about style. You can tell that straight from the get-go, when Holmes explains how he's going to knock out someone and you get to see it in slow-motion, and then again at regular speed. This he does twice during the course of the film, and oddly he doesn't seem to do it that much when he explains how he reached his correct deductions. It's as if Holmes would be wasting his time explaining how he solved a mystery because it would get in the way of the physical action.

That is only a symptom of the poison coursing through Sherlock Holmes. The real disaster is the story. It's a damn idiotic one.  Four people came up with this (Michael Robert Johnson, Anthony Peckham, and Simon Kinberg with the screenplay, Johnson and Lionel Wigram with the story), yet it doesn't look as if they actually read the source material.

They didn't have to go through all this patent nonsense of quasi-Satanic rites and Masonic-type shadowy organizations. It's as if they didn't trust the material and felt it needed more fighting, less thinking to make it palatable. Perhaps they wanted to take some of the stuffing out of old material, but went about it the wrong way. It would have been easier to introduce their Holmes with creepy undertones and stay with Canon by adapting The Sign of Four or The Hound of the Baskervilles. 

I don't blame them for wanting to come up with an original story, but it was needlessly complex and convoluted to the point where it becomes flat-out idiotic. It also violates one of one of my Golden Rules of Film-Making: Never End Your Movie By Suggesting There Will Be A Sequel. Here, they used it without needing it. Why couldn't Professor Moriarty be the villain and escape? There would have had the suggestion of a sequel without having us go through all this nonsense.

The performances were far better than the movie itself. Robert Downey, Jr. is having a renaissance in his career, and his Sherlock, while flawed by relying more on muscle than on brain, still manages to project a quick witted, obsessed consulting detective. Jude Law's take on Watson is first-rate, less the idiot stooge and more an intelligent man who doesn't mind a good fight. I can't recall if he had the flaws of a gambling addiction in the stories, but they did right by having him be an Afghan veteran which he was in the stories. Curious, how some things remain the same more than a century later.

The interplay between Holmes and Watson, which was more in the vein of a buddy comedy, had a quality to it which made it believable that these two had an affection for each other that neither fully acknowledged. Mark Strong rose above the silliness of his Lord Blackwood, delivering a performance that almost makes you believe he truly is some sort of Satanic entity. 

The one name that comes off badly in this is McAdams: pretty to look at, but adding little to nothing to the actual story, what there was of one.

The fight scenes were done in Ritchie's frenetic pace, and if you like that you might enjoy them. One can't help but wonder, however, if there weren't too many fights that went on too long, stretching the movie needlessly. 

Hans Zimmer's score was rare in that it was quite pleasant. He's never been a personal favorite but in Sherlock Holmes he gave it an offbeat, almost playful score that suggested a genuine romp the film didn't deliver. Perhaps there is something wildly wrong when you pay more attention to the score than to the screen.

My sense is that Sherlock Holmes is not a film but a franchise starter, with an inevitable sequel. They'll ignore all the good work Conan Doyle wrote and decide the best thing to do is make Holmes an action hero rather than the cold, logical, thinking machine he's described at.

Of course, this is done not for those who've read and loved the stories, but for those more inclined to G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra than The Sign of Four. I have a great deal of affection for Sherlock Holmes, the character. I was tempted to do something the great detective would not do: let his emotions overrun his reason. While Downey, Jr. and Law make Sherlock Holmes well-acted, the movie itself is quite, yes I'll say it, elementary.

DECISION: D+

Sherlock Holmes Retrospective

And the Honorees Should Be: Part 1. Kennedy Center Honors Suggestions

*Updated February 2021. Once upon a time, I cared about the Kennedy Center Honors. I've grown disillusioned with the entire system since I originally posted this essay. As I revisit past essays, I will keep as much as I think necessary while correcting any spelling, grammar or factual mistakes. This is the first set of recommendations for the Kennedy Center Honors, one of a series of essays on the subject.

Every year, a group of artists in the fields of film, television, music, theater and dance are trotted out and given a big "Thank You" from the United States, a nation not known for great culture. Some of their choices have been right on the money: Fred Astaire, Lucille Ball, Bob Dylan. Some I find to be a bit, well, curious: Roger Daltrey & Pete Townshend. Here, I present a list of artists, in alphabetical order, who have not been so honored. They may have been approached and declined (Doris Day and pianist Vladimir Horowitz come to mind), but if not, they should be there, at least in my view.

Albert Finney
1936-2019

Finney has had wide acclaim for his performances since his debut in Saturday Night & Sunday Morning, but really entered into the world's mindset as the rakish Tom Jones. Since then, think of his films: Under the Volcano, The Dresser, Murder on the Orient Express, The Browning Version, A Man of No Importance, Miller's Crossing, The Gathering Storm, Erin Brockovich, The Bourne Ultimatum, and even Annie. Five Oscar nominations, a continuing career on the stage, a true actor.

Philip Glass
Born 1937

Few American composers have earned the respect that Glass has. His minimalist music, a term Glass rejects, has also been highly influential in modern classic music. His scores for such films as Kundun, The Hours, and Dracula have exposed him to a wider audience. Finally, his work for the cause of the Tibetan nation should be applauded.

Sophia Loren
Born 1934

It's a rarity to have a great beauty who is also a great actress. Sophia Loren is both. It is her Neapolitan features that lure us in, but her performance in Two Women focuses on the suffering of ordinary people in war, stripping away any loveliness of her face or body. Some of her best work is in Italian: Two Women, A Special Day, and Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow but she has had great success in English-language films such as El Cid, The Pride & The Passion, and even Grumpier Old Men. Loren is not just physically gorgeous but she has graduated to one of the truly great actresses.

Bob Newhart
Born 1929

The original "buttoned-up" comic, his deadpan humor has been his hallmark, one that has gotten him not one but two successful television series. The Bob Newhart Show and Newhart have been placed as some of the best and funniest series on television. There is no argument I know that disputes the ending of Newhart being among the greatest of all time.

Betty White:
1922-2021

Betty White is one of the last pioneers of television still working, making her television debut in 1949. Along with Lucille Ball, White is one of the first females to have control of her first series, Life With Elizabeth. Her acting skills are showcased by the two wildly different characters of  man-hungry "Happy Homemaker" Sue Anne Nivens on The Mary Tyler Moore Show and the perpetually naïve Rose Nylund on The Golden Girls. She is still going, and is instantly recognizable. Finally, her work for animals has been at the forefront of humane treatment for God's other creatures.

Of course, these are all suggestions, and there will be more coming. These performers are legends because of their hard work. I therefore submit their names for consideration.

*February 2021 Update: Albert Finney died on February 7, 2019 at age 82. Philip Glass was honored in 2018. The others named, still living as of this update, have not received a Kennedy Center Honor. 

*July 2023 Update: Betty White died on December 21, 2021 at age 99. Loren and Newhart (89 and 94 respectively) have yet to be selected. LL Cool J and Queen Latifah, however, have. 

A Christmas Carol (2009): A Review

A CHRISTMAS CAROL

In The Christmas Spirits...

Director Robert Zemeckis seems determined to use motion capture in his films and get audiences to love it as he does. So far his forays into this technology have not met with great critical or commercial success (The Polar Express, Beowulf) but perhaps this version of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol may get him over the hump. A primarily family-geared film that adapts one of the best-known and loved Christmas story could lend itself to a more fantastical take. A Christmas Carol isn't a bad film, and there are some things to admire. However, I can't get into motion capture the way Zemeckis has taken up with it. The film captures both the possibilities of the technology and its limitations. The question is whether they will balance each other out or will one cancel out the other.

A Christmas Carol sticks close to the familiar story. Miser's miser Ebenezer Scrooge (Jim Carrey) is visited by three Ghosts on Christmas Eve: the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future (Carrey in multiple roles). Each shows Scrooge how he came to be, how he is now and how he may end up. We also see Scrooge's beaten-down employee, Bob Cratchit (Gary Oldman) and his large family. Among them is Bob's youngest child Tiny Tim (Olman again). 

Tiny Tim has some ailment that makes it hard for him to walk, but in spite of this he's a cheerful lad, wishing "God bless us, every one" on all mankind, even Scrooge. After his long night of the soul, Scrooge discovers a new joy for life and the True Christmas Spirit.

There have been endless film versions of A Christmas Carol; it's an irresistible story to filmmakers. Among the myriad of Hollywood versions have been the iconic 1951 version with Alastair Sim as Scrooge, the animated Mickey's Christmas Carol, Scrooged, A Muppet's Christmas Carol and the film musical Scrooge.  It's ubiquitous in the Christmas season and I venture to say it's one of the stories most connected with the season ('Twas the Night Before Christmas and the actual story of Christ's birth being the others). One should not be surprised that the story now has received the motion-capture treatment.

In theory, this version of A Christmas Carol should open up the story to all sorts of visually arresting images. Up to a point, that is the result: the shots of flying over London are beautiful, and if you look at the people from a distance, they do look like actual people. You also have a greater range with characters. This is certainly the first time I've ever seen The Ghost of Christmas Past as a candle. Zemeckis has been able to open up the story to a greater range because he isn't limited by what is physically possible. The resemblance to real people is good at times. 

It's on closer inspection that the resemblance ends, and the people start looking like those animatronic robots on a Disney theme ride.

Take for example Colin Firth as Scrooge's nephew Fred. As seen on screen, he looks like Colin Firth, only inflated to a point you wonder if he is suffering from an illness. Oldman as Cratchit has become almost a midget, and it's speculation whether this was done to show how small he is compared to Scrooge or just because they could make him smaller.

Whatever the reason, A Christmas Carol really is Carrey's show. It gives him the ability to do what he's always wanted to do: play many characters without being hindered by things like make-up. Like a lot of A Christmas Carol, it is hit-and-miss. I found it worked best when he's the Ghost of Christmas Past as I didn't recognize his voice there as I did when he was the Ghost of Christmas Present.

Despite its positives I found there were problems with the film. I know Zemeckis is in a passionate love affair with motion-capture, but as much as he may want to make it work at the moment it still is not at the level to where it looks totally real. I doubt it ever will be. 

The result is that sometimes the believability factor breaks, as when during the past Mr. Fezziwig (Bob Hoskins) leaps and does some somersaults. Also, while it may be marketed as a family film, I think the scene that ends the Present section of the film may be quite terrifying to children. You also have a chase scene in the Future section that was totally gratuitous. 

Finally, I didn't like the ending. I didn't believe Scrooge's conversion. It all felt too fake, too rushed, to forced. Even though it stays within the traditional story it oddly didn't ring true.

Interestingly, while I saw the 3-D version, I took my glasses off from time to time and found I had no problem watching it. Surprisingly I found this as a positive, since unlike other 3-D spectacles (no pun intended), it works on a flat screen. However, I don't even see why they opted for 3-D when it wasn't necessary. Not even that chase scene, which was suppose to be a highlight in the Third Dimension, was impressive. I would advise against paying more for the 3-D experience since you really don't get enough bang for your buck.

As it stands, A Christmas Carol is good but not great. It won't challenge other versions of the story let alone be the definitive version. As in all technology, A Christmas Carol can work quite well on occasion. However, just like all machines, it doesn't have true emotions at its heart. There's enough to admire, but not enough to truly love.

DECISION: C+

Twilight Series: Early Thoughts

For the life of me, I fail to understand the hold the Twilight series has over what I would believe to be reasonably intelligent people. I confess to having gone through only the first part of this behemoth lust story. For better or worse, at many points while listening to the audiobook, I burst out laughing at the overwrought dialogue.

Twilight is a love triangle, but a most curious one: between a girl, a vampire, and a werewolf. I am told by its defenders that it really is more than that. It is suppose to be about this great love, how Edward Cullen (the vampire) has waited for close to a hundred years for this one girl, Bella Swann, how he does not want to turn her into a vampire and condemn her to his kind of existence, and how they must overcome all sorts of obstacles to be together.

My private theory on how Twilight has gotten this hold on readers is simple. It is exclusively about identification: Bella is the Every Girl and by extension, the reader. 

Bella is not beautiful, not super-smart, doesn't like all the girly things her classmates/friends are into and is not cheerleader material. In short, she is like all the girls who aren't "popular".

You then have this perfect man, and he's perfect in every way; he's extremely attractive physically, the muscles are not excessive but fit into his clothes smoothly. He is gentle and kind, thoughtful, and above all he is interested in Her, this "plain Jane" who sparks erotic fascination for him. 

On top of all that, this ideal boyfriend does not want to take advantage of her.

Edward's not interested in purely carnal pleasures or won't use Bella just for sex only to forget her. Instead, not only has he waited for her, but will spend time and eternity with her. Here, we can see Twilight scribe Stephanie Meyer's Mormon faith creeping out. This is not saying that Twilight is Mormon propaganda, merely that Mormonism encourages celibacy until marriage and teaches that married couples can be "sealed" forever, even after death. An undead boyfriend who won't have sex with a girl until marriage? I sense a subconscious Mormon theological lesson.

Take this for example. Whenever Bella says, "I want you to change me, Edward", I translate that into "Screw me. Screw me NOW. Screw me like I've never been screwed before  because I've never been screwed before". It's a subconscious cry for sex.

When Edward responds, "I don't want to", that means "I love you so much I don't want to use you just for your body and then move on. I've waited for you, kept myself sexually pure for you for so long when I finally screw you it has to be our first time, not just yours. I need to know that no one else has had you. I've never had anyone else and I long to know no one else has touched you, the most special person in Creation".

All these elements I imagine can prove very psychologically erotic to female readers who find escape in fantasies about "the perfect man".

I think of it as subconscious narcissism, this idea that this "unappealing" woman (like the reader) can inspire whole wars between two hunky men and whole communities. There's Edward the Vampire, and there's Jacob Black the Native American/werewolf. It may even play into the idea that a heterosexual male friend is really secretly in lust for the reader.

This is Jacob's role. He's obviously very sexually desirable, the films showcasing Taylor Lautner's physical perfection. However, he is also a shoulder to cry on, a friend who yearns for Bella in the same way Bella yearns for Edward. He cares about her, wants to protect her, is willing to fight another man for her...and it doesn't hurt that he's built like a brick house.

Again, subconscious narcissism by the reader, who can place herself squarely in Bella's shoes as these two warring factions and hunky men fight for her. 

If I look at all this, the story is insanely popular because it's so insanely narcissistic. It really is All About Bella.

This is the reason in my opinion that the rabid fan base takes no note or cares how awful the writing is. Stephanie Meyer may have graduated with an English Literature degree from BYU but it looks like she learned nothing. I might be wrong about that given that the writing sounds like a brain-dead fourteen year old, which Meyer may have been writing with that in mind. Certainly this doesn't look like it came from a White Anglo-Saxon Mormon housewife, yet why the erotic musings of a Mormon hausfrau are so insanely popular puzzle me. 

I can only remember a few lines from Twilight, and not because they were well-written, but because they were so funny. "I can't believe someone as beautiful as Edward Cullen would be speaking to me" had me laughing uncontrollably for five miles. "His skin...literally sparkled" is another howler. 

The most amazing thing about the Twilight series is that it has taken Mrs. Meyer four books, the last one well over 500 pages long, to tell a very basic, simplistic, and bad story. What this says about both the educational level of the readers or the state of present-day American literature is frightening.

I note with dismay how popular the books are, how girls read and reread them again and again while not bothering to read anything useful. Granted, beauty is in the eye of the beholder but I have yet to hear the case as to how the Twilight Series is good literature.  For myself, I see the Twilight Series of Twilight/New Moon/Eclipse/Breaking Dawn as one of the signs of The End of Western Civilization.

The films are terrible, and I don't expect them to get better. I just hope that the fixation will pass and we move on to better books and film adaptations.