Everybody is - Kung-fu fighting

Kung Fu Panda – the Review

Let’s face it. I’m a sucker for a martial arts movie. Unless there are any blood, violence against women, completely implausible and unnecessary love sub-plot, goofy special effects, people yelling “Aii-yah!”, and/or the inclusion of a white dude just to make the flick acceptable to a wide audience. As if white guys are the only ones going to the movies. They don’t go to the movies, Mr. Mitchell. They download that sh*t through Netflix.

Naturally, my persnickety tastes make it a bit difficult to settle down and enjoy a movie about the mystical ways the cryptic people of the mysterious east kill villains and villagers alike. Oh sure, I like Hero. I probably would like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon if I ever saw it, and I’m sure I would enjoy Enter the Dragon if I could remember it. But when it comes to hard-core knuckle-busting, vein-popping, wise-cracking, zen-finding awesomeness, I want to see the kind of badass I know every red-blooded American kid wants to see.

A panda.

If I have to watch Jack Black do anything besides play the guitar, this is what I want to see him doing. Hiding behind a big mass of furry black-and-white loveableness, encouraging us to believe that underdogs can come in all shapes and sizes, that fat can be a defensive mechanism (I believe penguins and seals knew that a long time ago), and that if you believe in yourself and work out for a couple of hours, you can take on Shere Khan. Mowgli should have tried some dumpling recon.

So what else does this entertaining and extraordinarily beautiful piece of cinematography and comic book elementals teach us? What can we learn from a kids’ movie?

Plenty.

First off, there is a lot to be said for Capital Punishment. Let’s be honest with ourselves – sure, Po got to figure himself out and become a Kung-Fu master (is it Kung-fu? Kung fu? I should do more research, but I’m won’t until I get paid to do this). In the meantime, however, the villagers were displaced, the village (thousands of years old, and just reeking classical architecture) was partially destroyed, and a score or more lives were lost at that prison out of which the tiger escaped. I know they are just government employees, but still. They’re endangered rhinos. How many more have to die before we say, enough! Let’s just Wu Shi Pinky Hold his neck over a chopping block and save the citizens the extra taxes.

And Rhinos do die when you throw them over cliffs, and when huge stones crush them to tiny leathery pieces. Do not pull that “it’s a kids’ movie” crap on me. I know how physics and anatomy work.

Oh. My. Ga-. Kids are starving in China and they just threw away that last dumpling?! Those wasteful bastards!

Everyone in China speaks excellent English. Except for Oogway. “Noodles. Don’t noodles.” Yup. He went to my English class.

Damn. Captain Hook’s got some moves. Even after his unfortunate reincarnation as a chipmunk.

Ultimately, though, Kung-Fu Panda asks some really important questions. For instance, is Jackie Chan cooler in monkey form than he is in real life? Is adoption such a dangerous topic that even noodle fowl won’t address it? And if you come across one endangered animal beating the crap out of another endangered animal, are you obligated to intervene and violate the Prime Directive (not to mention breaking the fourth wall)? Or do you make some popcorn, pour a bottle of pijiu, tell the kids it’s non-alcoholic, sit back and watch the extremely unlikely demise of Ian McShane at the paws of Jack Black? Decisions, decisions. Thank goodness, I love Kung-fu.  

なになになになに。。。oooh! Godzilla!

I'd never seen the original Godzilla (ゴジラ) and I had no intention of watching the new one.
Then something broke inside of me and I got homesick for Japan. So I figured a ticket to a 3D flick, albeit deathly extravagant, was cheaper than a flight back to Osaka. And for the record, I don't like 3D. If I wanted 3D entertainment, I'd read a pop-up book.

But I went. And I enjoyed it.

It was Memorial Day, and I can think of no better way to celebrate the brave men and women who defend our country than to watch them do their trained and proficient best to master that which cannot be cowed by human forces. Because like it or not, doing your best against an insurmountable foe is a part of every person's life, and unfortunately a not unknown occurrence when you defend your country and your country's allies against all comers. I salute you, and thank you.

Because I know that if San Francisco is attacked by anything more ferocious than a five-year-old waving daisy-chains and spitting antibacterial spit-wads, nobody is gonna save us except the U.S. armed forces. No way are those Silicon Valley nerds going to pick up anything except their iphone so they can twitter "OMG. Obese Non-vegan stamping through the Financial District. IDK what 2 du. #theGoldenGateisFallingDown."

Thankfully, I know in the event of alien or prehistoric invasion, we can rely on one or two megastars to give us something to feel emotionally invested in while a plethora of expendable, face&name-less extras sacrifice themselves for that weekly paycheck. Nobody we love dies, but we still feel the dramatic impact of all those sad - wait. Did the dog make it? Tell me the puppy outran the tsunami!

And I love me an international cast that is easily recognizable because of their English-language movie credits. I mean, sure Ken Watanabe had only one face through the whole movie, but it has so much depth and expression of shock and awe that one believes he could have produced any facial expression and be convincing with it - if only the director had asked him to. Good thing he was in the picture at all, because otherwise we would have forgotten that Gojira was originally a Japanese monster. Not a native Californian. (Nobody is actually from here after all.)

Now, don't get your prehistoric panties in a wad. I liked the movie. Way more than did my dad who complained that it was too cheesy and hokey to hold up to canon (which, as far as I can tell, is so solidly cheesy as to produce lactose-intolerant farts in the most die-hard dairy consumer).

What did I learn from Godzilla? The new one?

Westerners don't understand Japanese houses. Juliete Binoche wears shoes inside a very traditional-teki house. Go back and check. I promise I heard her heels click on the wooden hallway floor right before her kid got disappointed because dad hates getting old and is too obsessed with mothra look-a-likes to care about homemade birthday banners.

Americans are the only ones who care about spousal relationships. As far as I could see, there was only one lady who died in the whole thing and her husband would just not let the damned dog lie. But apparently all the Japanese widows whose husbands gave their all for science were content to just pick up their pension checks and not launch an inquiry. What could two or three hundred of them do to demand answers anyway?

Remember when I said you should never live in New York because of all the super-hero destruction? Don't live in San Francisco either. If you must live in the Bay Area, go to Morgan Hill. Godzilla ain't gonna rampage that far down 101.

Come to think of it, San Francisco is an incredibly hilly city. It's famous for cable cars and Lombard street, but the real thrill is driving up any one of those mini mountains in a convertible and looking out the back. Makes you think Christopher Nolan wasn't making stuff up in Inception. So I imagine that Godzilla is going to return to the sea to nurse his aching calves.

Prehistoric monsters, after sleeping for millions of years and osmosis-ing nuclear energy, will still find a mate before I do. And have millions of creepy-crawly glow-in-the-dark babies. Not that I begrudge them the babies.

Of course, they will also be ravaged by a lizard-lion-eagle-looking beast. Okay, we'll call it even, Mr. and Mrs. Muto.

Prehistoric monsters eat nuclear warheads like a rich teenager pops painkillers. And probably washes them down with vodka-and-Pepsis. Some people will do anything for a high.

The Olsen twins got mighty tall overnight.

If you are going to evacuate your city, consider your enemy. All of those monsters wreaked havoc on downtown and the financial District, but nobody made it out to the neighborhoods - Sunset, 19th Ave, etc... were all safe. And while this is surprising, because you can walk the whole of San Francisco in a few hours - so Godzilla could monster mash his way through in a matter of minutes - it is also comforting to know that Hollywood only hates businessmen. With a passion. Thousands must have died.

The ultimate point of Godzilla, however, seemed to be that humans do not do anything to alter the course of the natural world. We might mess around with our little toys and cause mild destruction to each other, but it takes a big dog to show us that when it comes to full-scale catastrophe, we still piss like puppies. We don't make tsunamis, earthquakes, or wrecking balls that can do so much damage to the world we live in (there's a Miley Cyrus joke in there, but I refuse to encourage things like that in writing - so just fill in the blanks for yourself) as one bent-in-on-itself claw from a generic-looking giant insect.

Of course, we don't do a whole lot to help either. As far as I can tell, if you had left the humans out of this story completely, nothing about the outcome would have been altered in the slightest. It would have played out the same way. We just wouldn't have been around to see it.

Star Trek: To Absurdity and Beyond

I am a trekkie. Not one of those crazy ones who follows William Shatner around asking him to recite the Prime Directive. Although I do know the Prime Directive. And I have read "Get a Life!"

But I'm not a psycho.

I like my franchises (francheese) to be age-proof and creative - which is why I tuned out half-way through Voyager - and I appreciate Mr. Junior Abrams' modern take on a time-traveling pre-quel-assic. He could have done a lot worse. Look at Star Wars. Or The Hobbit. Or Star Wars. (Please, not Star Wars...)

Still, the hokey alarm was a-wailin off the hook last night as we made our uber-critical way through Star Trek: Into Darkness. Basically, the Federation is attacked by Wrath from Fullmetal Alchemist, Spock and Uhura (Ohura? Ohara?) play house, and the other characters run around yelling, except for Sulu who has the good sense to stay seated. There was other important plot sh*t, but I don't know what it was.

Oh yeah, the blond chick takes off her clothes as a fan-service. It didn't advance the plot, but I'm sure it

When the credits started to roll and T asked us, "what was that movie about?" the resounding reply was "Sherlock expanding his range." (Or "Pissy Sherlock", was the condensed version according to Nate.)

So a few things I learned from this pre-quel that weren't covered by Cinema Sins:

Federation uniforms used to look a lot like German SS officer uniforms. I don't want to draw any parallels between the Prime Directive and the Final Solution, but I think I saw a few extras goose-stepping around in the middle distance.

It is dangerous to be an ethnic minority in Hollywood. The black dude was the first to go. More than that, his daughter was really almost the first to go (or maybe she really did die, I didn't watch too closely)! Not only is it murder to be black in the land of skinny blonds, but it is no longer safe to be a minor.

Speaking of almost dying, if they sneaked a damn tribble reference in so that we could see how Harrison's blood cells reproduce, what low and dreadful canon-insulting thing are they going to slip into the next one? And if Harrison's blood brings dead things back to life, wouldn't it be too much for a little kid, or a tribble for that matter? I mean, they just figured out the dosage of valium needs to be
adjusted depending on how many chromosomes you have, so the same must apply to children and rodents. What happened to genetic-specific medicine? Is that an idea that just dies out in the next two centuries?

Extras are a dime a dozen on the Enterprise, but there were quite a few that surprised me, including the gaggle of women with the myriad of hairstyles on the bridge. The Federation is basically a really fancy military, so along with uniforms come regulation haircuts - I bet you cannot buzz your head, I am sure your bangs cannot impede your vision, and while we're at it, blue shirts don't work on the bridge. Come on, people.

And Kirk's hair always looked like he stepped out of the shower and ran Bed Head gel through it. And a bit of lemon juice to keep his highlights up. I bet it's because he is the captain. The captain's hair always looks barber-shop-exiting immaculate. Just look at Picard or Sysco.

And just for fun, did anybody else cheer, "Run, Fat Boy! Run!" when Simon Pegg dashed across the cargo bay? Because I did.

Alright, that's all I got right now.

The Two Towers

But not those ones in New York ( too soon?...).

Winter means hot chocolate with baileys, tea and cookies, a blanket, a warm puppy, and an old leather couch, eternally imprinted with the ass-marks of devoted movie fans. All of the above is true, in my house, excepting the hind-end impressions, since my siblings fall prey to Portuguese Flat Butt Syndrome.

It's a wonder they can sit on the sofa without slipping right off.

Winter also means feeling perfectly justified marathoning it through the Lord of the Rings trilogy, especiallyin preparation for shitting on the second installation of the Hobbit.

I mean, going to see the Desolation of Smaug and enjoy it in an impartial and uncritical manner.

So, a few nuggets of thought about the Two Towers, or the one that has all the fighting, a butt-load of extra plot shit, and almost redeems itself by including Sean Bean in numerous flashbacks. His agent is a true pro.

You got to hand it to Rohan. On the march to Helm's Deep, the guard of twenty is intercepted by a host of two hundred orcs and wargs. Challenge accepted.

I have never understood why the daughter of Elrond half-elven, granddaughter of Galadriel, keeper of the ring Nenya (and wisest and mightiest of the elves in middle-earth, master horse-elf, and physician can't find a properly supportive undergarment for her up close and personal telepathic communion -vision with her long-distance boyfriend. Are there no Victoria's Secret in Middle Earth.

It says a lot for a fictional universe that all the good guys are played by handsome gents and all the bad guys are ugly as sin. I wish God had just taken that as a protoype for the real world. It would sure make it easier to find a quality boss.

And speaking of Elrond, I had no idea he was such a competent Jewish mom. " Would it kill you to follow your family across the sea? You're no Nimrodel, you know."

And on a more serious note, if Faramir had gone to Rivendell, made it through the counsel, been chosen to accompany the Nine Walkers, he wiuld have resisted the temptation of harrassing Frodo to give up the ring. In which case, the company would have continued on, Legolas and Faramir and Gimli would have gone to Gondor, Frodo and Sam would have gone to Mordor with Aragorn, and probably Merry and Pippin. Fangorn would have been overwhelmed by Saruman's forces, Gandalf would have had to overthrow Denethor with violence, probably having to kill Faramir in the process, Aragorn would have insisted on killing Gollum and all of Middle Earth would have fallen.

Which just goes to show that Boromir, by being a selfish bastard, saved the world.

There's hope for all of us, yet.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (No commas - just like the DVD case)

Trust me, I wasn't the first to decide to throw my hard-won cash at Focus Features just to endure two hours of the film version of a book it took me three days to read and which I still don't fully understand. But then I saw the beautiful man-candy peopling the advertisements.

Colin Firth, you say? Michael Fassbender?! Benedict Cumberbasodiugqhdjkbnjhdskcxx?!?!

Take my money! PLEASE!

In the spirit of creating an experience that I could use as blackmail for the rest of my dad's life, I volunteered to watch one of his favorite movies with him in a kind of at-home Father-Daughter date night. As long as he made white russians and told me in advance when the scary head-shooting scenes and scarier British sex scenes were, so I could shut my eyes and not carry disturbing mental images around in my brain until the time when I should I finally lay my tormented soul in the grave.

In all seriousness, and the movie was ALL seriousness, it was a great flick. It would have gone well with a warm Guinness or better yet a Springbank 10 year pour. All I had was blackberry beer.

I think I would have understood more if I had had the single malt. Or ten of them.

No, no. You misunderstand me. I understood the movie, the characters, and the plot. I get it, I get it. Control ran the Circus until Percy the Scarlet Pimpernel started trying sneak into the main tent with his invaluable font of golden-gilded information. Jim is out there risking his nuggets to help Control track down the mole in the operation, and everyone except Smiley is poking everything with an orifice.

Seriously. Everybody is gay, straight but open to alternatives, having affairs, or just penetrating strangers, or breaking up with long-time lovers and partners so as to have no vulnerable spots in ones private life that could hamper ones professional world.

I just don't understand how they have any time to get the wire taps onto all those phone lines. Or how any of them have time to do their proper job, let alone spy out information to pass off to those damn Commies.

But the British are resourceful little bunnies. They seemed to make it work and in the end, of course, Smiley delivers on his goal of clearing up Control's legacy.

What was not delivered was pretty men. Or at least not in the excessive amounts I would have thought reasonable, considering those TV spots.

Of course, Colin Firth is a man apart. Especially when his parts are splattered all over the brick wall of the not-so-safe-as-we-thought-safe house.

Michael Fassbender was unrecognizable as Ricky Tarr, probably because the last thing I saw Mr. Fassbender in was a Hercule Poirot from the early 90s. And because Ricky Tarr was played by Tom Hardy. Who up until now, I thought was a professional football player.

The vast majority of the rest of the cast were, well... too realistic to be pleasing to the eye. Everybody looked like an old British spy, an old Eastern European spy, or a middle-aged office worker. It was depressingly believable.

I don't remember enough of the book to draw any parallels or comparisons or even commentary. And I have to jump on a plane any minute, anyway. So we'll leave it at that. A very good post-war/cold war espionage flick. My father should appreciate this until the day he dies.

And I'm still waiting on that White Russian.

Things I Learned from the Avengers

Just realized I never posted this here. I should have done. 

Better late than never. 

I only recently saw Marvel's (Disney's?) the Avengers, directed by the murderous Joss Whedon. Seriously, Agent Coulson? Really? REALLY?

I know I'm a bit out of the entertainment loop, but I've been busy and I live in the middle of nowhere. And movies in Japan are expensive. It costs about 17 US dollars to go to a flick at the mall. The little theatre in the forrest in Yasuda is probably cheaper, but I worry a bit that it might not be playing English films, which would be okay if difficult, and more that I might get murdered on my way back through the jungle after the picture, which would not be okay.

Anyhoo, so I rented the Avengers and spent all of my daikyuu time watching Mark Ruffalo apologize for being emotionally unavailable and listening to the cheesiest dialogue I've heard since Adam West commended the dolphin who gallantly sacrificed itself in front of that torpedo so Batman and Robin could save the world from the Yellow Submarine (or however that one went - Pow! Bam!).

Nay! That was not a slam against the comic cohort of assembled avengers! That was just the third paragraph. I really liked the movie and thought the dialogue was a compilation of all the things you wished they would say, especially Tony Stark's conversation pieces, but that usually get left out of movies. Like all the actors knew they had to take it seriously, but not too seriously or they might not be able to face themselves in the mirror when it was all over.

I'm trying to figure out a way to work the movie into my sixth-grade class. They'd love it and it would make English MUCH more applicable to them.

So a list of things I've learned:

Do all your banking online. Never go to the bank. Ever. Captain America can’t always be there to save your ass when you’re cashing your pension check. (And if you happen to live in Gotham, just never leave your house. Unless you’re moving.)  

As long as we're on that one, just don't ever live in New York City. Yeah, it sounds romantic and wonderful, but let's face it. It's always the first to go, whether from the bad guys (see ID4, King Kong, etc...) or from friendly fire (see Failsafe).

Learn English. Because that’s the only language in which your alien attackers will bother to speak to you no matter what country you inhabit. They will assume you know it and will get irrationally pissed if you don't instantly kneel when they demand this of you. 

Get a headset and NEVER be without it. Girls, we’re lucky, most of us can hide it in our hair. Boys, go get yourselves helmets or super-hero masks, while you’re out there getting the headset. Nobody wants to be the last to the alien-destroying party and there is simply NO TIME to speed-dial your cell.

If you happen to prefer distance-killing (as opposed to hand-to-hand combat) figure out life’s cheat code for arrows and bullets. Legolas isn’t the only one who never runs out. Hawkeye obviously googled that one before he went to work for S.H.I.E.L.D and where Agent Romanov stores the extra cartridges on that uniform, well, I’m too much of a lady to ask, but as a lady, I have some ideas.

If you happen to be human and you have access to a super-suit, make sure all the other parts of your domicile are easily breakable and non-body-damaging. Because when the evil demi-god from planet F-ing Nowhere throws you headfirst through your plate-glass windows, you are going to get your face cut off, unless it’s that candy-glass they use for stunts in Hollywood. Especially if the super-suit launch is a tad delayed. Thanks, Jarvis.

Always carry a knife and don’t go out without your cover. Okay, I learned those from Gibbs, but they're totally applicable here.

Learn to fly a jet. If you don’t have access to a jet, just learn to fly a regular non-commercial aircraft of any form. This will allow you to fly top-secret-state-of-the-art-paid-for-by-your-tax-dollars military grade aircraft. You bought it and if you break it, hey! Uncle Sam will buy you another. 

If you're looking for trouble, you might try Budapest or Marrakech. Because that is where all the fun stuff happens.   

And if you absolutely must live in NYC or any of those other cities constantly besieged by alien forces, get to the gym but quick! Being ripped will be the single defining factor in whether you survive the fallout or get shredded like cheddar cheese over a taco in the next war of the worlds. Don't worry so much about your lower body, if you're a gentleman. The super-hero physique is an upside down triangle for men. Focus on your biceps and pecs; this was the only movie I've ever seen in which almost every male character had boobs as big as the female characters' (boobs). 

I watched the damn thing about five times today. Itunes really messes with you over this whole 24-hour expiration thing. That should be my super-power, actually. The ability to magically keep rented movies in my itunes library forever for the price of the rented picture. Will ask Mr. Stark about it...

Alice in What-the-@#!$% land

Some movies make you want to cheer for the bad guy. Some do this intentionally, in a Usual Suspects kind of way, and some do it accidentally in an Alice in Wonderland kind of way.

I actually like the writings of Lewis Caroll, and think Alice and her adventures are entertaining enough without delving too much into psychosis and prepubescent muchness. Although the dresses that keep falling off the main character don’t help keep those thoughts in their quiet midnight of the mind. 

But I have other bones to pick with this inconsistent picture. 

Some of the characters are romping in camp, which is quirky and almost entertaining, except for the other stoggedly (that’s “staid” and “dogged” getting it on) serious ones, the principal player of whom, sadly, is Alice herself. Almost Alice, mostly Alice, Alice in Chains, whomever.

The scenery is pretty, but completely lacking any realistic framework and mostly it looks as though several sets were poached from the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Except for the Red Queen’s palace, which is apparently behind the tar pits in the shadow lands at the back of Mustafa’s pridelands.

The story is more or less the same as the original, with the framework being that Alice’s father has died, leaving them more or less destitute because his shares were bought by a business partner…for not enough money to keep the family afloat? And who wants to shore up the alliance by marrying the brainy and beguiling Alice off to his pasty son (not that you should judge someone based on their skin conditions - I myself am a Victorian creamy, which is "pasty" in a much more posh voice).

First off, Alice, don’t trust a dude who was trying to pass his genetic code to you down by way of his insipid spawn. And most definitely do not go to CHINA with said individual hoping to expand your father’s business vision – if the partner-guy was really interested in your father’s vision, he would have paid a proper price for his investment so your mother wouldn’t be hawking off your ovaries the minute you turn twenty.

But such two-faced supporting characters are not the only inconsistency in this strange and twisted tale. In fact, there are so many crazy little inaccuracies and discrepancies that I had trouble focusing on just one thing to drive me crazy. But I came up with it.

The whole premise of the picture is that the Red Queen has gone crazy and ravaged Underland, while banishing her sister to what seems to be a very safe and secure hideout somewhere in Tokyo's Ueno garden during cherry blossom season. Red holds the kingdom in thrall (am I using that correctly?) and all the underlings, who resemble Disney characters after five weeks of heavy heroine use and Matt Lucas, are waiting for a champion to return in the form of a grown-up Alice who will slay the Jabberwocky and restore the White Queen to the throne.

Nota bene: looks like the White Queen's got it going on. I mean, she enjoys a great palace, clean clothes, running water, and the love of her disgruntled subjects while her sister does all the backbreaking work of day-to-day governing. Cry me a river, Whitey. 

Somewhere towards the end of the picture, after we’ve been to Rivendell and back (kid you not), we end up at Weathertop and Alice pulls out Biter, while the Mad Hatter somehow got his badly manicured paws on Beater. (Which now that I think about it, sounds a little dirty…) Anyhoo, the Red and White Queens meet each other on the checkerboard of battle and the White Queen tenderly begs Red to give up the crown peacefully. Red replies bitterly that the crown is hers – she is entitled to it of course, since she is the elder sister.

Back the cracked tea pot trolley up.

Are you telling me the Red Queen is the elder sister? That the crown is actually due to her based on the succession of oldest issue of the full blood of the king?

What the hell, Alice?

All of a sudden, our fantasy-land coup (staged with the necessary help of huge bullfrogs and carpucian monkeys) is moved from the realm of trying to throw off Machiavelli to subverting Divine Right. And just because she's killed a few subjects and a nameless king. 

Some people are so picky. 

My other major issue with this flick is that Alice is spending this adventure nerving herself up to reject a marriage proposal because she doesn't want her life decided for her by people around her. 

But the whole reason the White Rabbit came to get her is because the Oraculen (either a kind of spider or an alien race from Star Trek) scroll, which looks like it was stolen from Hyrule’s Public Library, depicts her lording it over the Jabberwocky on Frabjous Day (Calloo, Callay! I chortle!) So that Alice's original act of independence and self-government is rendered completely mute. She tries to stand up for herself and say no one is bossing her around, only to remain blind to the fact that  she has no say in the matter. In fact, she’s bullied, bribed and egged on until she defeats the Jabberwocky – Oppan Gandalf style – so that the White Queen can banish her blood relative to a place where “no one will ever be [her] friend.”

That’s telling her.

And then the Mad Hatter turns into CGI Michael Jackson.

I rarely want a movie to end just so I can start writing a cynical message about it. But by the end of those very long 108 minutes, I was really looking forward to climbing out of that ridiculous rabbit hole.