(Parker 2007) South Park: Ep.163 — Imaginationland, Part 1
(Parker 2007) South Park: Ep.164 — Imaginationland, Part 2
(Parker 2007) South Park: Ep.165 — Imaginationland, Part 3
(D’Elia 2004) Boston Legal: Ep.1 — Head Cases
(Ewing & Grady 2006) Jesus Camp
(Parker 2001) South Park: Ep.72 — Proper Condom Use
(Wincer 1996) The Phantom
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Category Archives: DN - Viewing 2008
FILMS OCTOBER – DECEMBER 2008
(Huston 1956) Moby Dick
Critics were not kind to John Huston’s 1956 filming of Melville’s symbolic masterpiece, but it has much to commend it. Gregory Peck looked awkward in the role of Ahab, but in the scenes where he whips his crew into a collective frenzy (where Starbuck sees “a madman beget more madmen”) he was very effective. Ray Bradbury wrote the script, and I think it one of his most brilliant accomplishments, for it remains very true to the intentions and style of the book. Richard Basehart was fine as that simple soul, Ishmael, and Leo Genn performed brilliantly in the role of Starbuck. The special effects were superb for their time, though they might embarrass a film-maker today. Visual detail was accurate.
The world of the New Bedford whalers in the 1840s holds many surprises for a modern viewer. It was strikingly cosmopolitan — the whaling ships sailed every sea in the world, and Africans, Native Americans, Asians, Polynesians, and Europeans crewed the ships and walked the streets of New Bedford. People were genuinely, profoundly religious. Unlike the phony-balony “Christian fundamentalists” of modern America, who never actually read the bible, these people knew it by heart. Melville expected his readers to get every one of his thousands of biblical references in the novel. The movie captures both these elements exactly.
(Davidson / Palin 2004) Himalaya With Michael Palin [six episodes]
I want to kill Michael Palin — purely out of envy. He gets to travel everywhere, see the coolest things, and talk to fascinating people, and makes a fortune doing it. Palin was recently ranked number nine in the list of the world’s top ten travelers of all time by Wanderlust Magazine. It’s been claimed that travel agencies anticipate sharp spikes in bookings for any destination that he visits, after an episode of one of his documentaries. Himalaya is his best documentary series to date. This one takes him to the Northwest Frontier states of Pakistan, to Amritsar in the Punjab, to Simla, to Kashmir and Ladakh, through Nepal into Tibet, and from thence eastward to Yunnan in China, back through Nagaland and Assam, into Bhutan, and finally to the shores of the Bay of Bengal. In this spectacular journey, he meets and talks to a variety of people: an enterprising dentist in Peshawar; the Dalai Lama; Namu, a pop singer from the matrilocal Mosuo people of Yunnan; a Southern Baptist headhunter in Nagaland; dancing monks in Assam. Palin’s easygoing affability gives everyone he talks to dignity, which I think is the secret of his success. You always get more than just scenery and platitudes. The series tiptoes around politics, but its focus on individual lives and personalities makes it an impressive document. For example, his visit to the Sikh Golden Temple doesn’t focus on the splendour of the building, but on the volunteers preparing the customary meal, given to anyone who comes to it.
(Ewing & Grady 2006) Jesus Camp
One of the creepiest documentaries I’ve ever seen. It follows the activities of a fundamentalist childrens’ camp that employs grotesque brainwashing techniques to indoctrinate children, largely for obvious political ends. The organizer, a monstrously evil woman, makes you sick with every word she spouts. Also included are a famous pastor, Ted Haggard, one of the most influential evangelicals in the country, preaching anti-gay hatred at the children. Haggard was later discovered having sex and doing hard drugs with gay hustlers, and resigned. Another disgusting scene involves children babbling “in tongues” while worshiping a card-board cutout of George Bush, Jr. It should be noted that the movement’s leaders considered the documentary to be a fair representation of their views.
FILMS JULY – SEPTEMBER 2008
(Chaffey / McGoohan 1967) The Prisoner: Ep.1 ― Arrival
(Honda 1966) The War of the Gargantuas [ American release version of Furankenshutain no
. . . . kaijû: Sanda tai Gaira]
(Cregeen 1999) MidSomer Murders: Ep.10 — Death of a Stranger Read more »
(Cragg 2007) Boston Legal: Ep.77 ― No Brains Left Behind
Boston Legal has been doing a good job of opposing the status quo in the United States, and is brilliantly funny in the process. My thanks go to Isaac White for drawing my attention to this series, and bringing over files of it to watch. This particular episode is the funniest I’ve seen, and the best example of standing up to the morons. It not only takes on the Iraq War, but Bush’s idiotic and destructive education policies. While all the acting is good in this series, the best parts are when James Spader and William Shatner interact. Shatner has, over the years, matured into a brilliant comic actor.
(Anderson 1995) Mortal Kombat
HBO’s “Rome”
HBO’s Rome is a superb series. There are some historical inaccuracies: Octavian was shipwrecked in his youth, but never kidnapped, and he was not in Rome when Caesar was assassinated. Neither was Cicero. Caesar is shown offering to give land in Pannonia to the 13th Legion, though Pannonia wasn’t in the empire at that time. But as far as presenting Roman society, and the mores and behaviour of Romans, the series is quite accurate. It quite properly shows the casual violence and brutality of a society that was not informed by any real ethical principlrs, but merely by custom, caste consciousness, vengeance, and barbaric concepts of “honour”. Much of our world remains like that, today, and it is a profound distortion of history to ignore it, as most historical film and fiction usually does. The reality of slavery and Roman sexual practices are shown with reasonable accuracy. The death of Caesar is shown as it is in Plutarch’s account, rather than Suetonius. Read more »
FILMS APRIL — JUNE 2008
(Benedek 1953) The Wild One
(Nicholls 1995) Alien Empires: Hardware
(Nicholls 1995) Alien Empires: Replicators Read more »
(Bay 1998) Armageddon
Oh My Gawd what a horrible film! Oil riggers equipped with no skill or knowledge save the earth from asteroid impact by flying to the asteroid in the Space Shuttle and drilling a hole a mere 800 feet into it (as if this would make a difference?), to plant a nuclear bomb . They and NASA and various military types save the Earth by competing in how loudly they can shout at each other and who can say the toughest things. A soppy romance is thrown in — one that makes you cringe whenever those characters show their faces. Annoying acting, annoying music, annoying everything, and scientific illiteracy so profound that NASA uses the film to train astronauts. They are required to identify as many of the 167 major violations of physical laws and probabilities as they can. Yes, 167.