figured I'd take a bit of a small break here to talk about something coming up - it seems as if there is going to be a Youtube Red series called "Cobra Kai" about the two main characters from the Karate Kid, what...33 years later now?
Disclaimer - I met Billy Zabka at a youth group retreat in the mid 90's and loved the Equalizer, so he always gets props with me.
but even without that I have to admit, I'm excited.
I was a preteen/teenager when The Karate Kid came out - I think at some point I even took Karate lessons on or around when it came out. The class was much more low key at the local Athletic club though.
But here's the thing - I was a REALLY UNCOOL kid growing up - like virtual leper/pariah - horribly nerdy and incapable of really holding down real friendships in rural redneck Montana where a bus ride with the kids who weren't going to do any better than fixing cars was hell for me until I got off the bus. Even as I got further up in the High School chain, I barely had the respect of my peers - a few of us nerds got together and played games over lunch. I never got in any full bore fights but I had a few assholes trip me and shit - and I was also one of the scrawniest kids around.
To this day I'm probably more successful than 90% of my tormentors and I won't go see them at the reunions - fuck those guys
So for me, The Karate Kid was a hell of an inspirational picture - it made me happy to see it and I probably have seen it almost a half dozen times? At the end, when Zabka's character tells Daniel Russo he's all right, there's a sort of small redemption in there for him as well - we never get to see how it plays out in the next two sequels, but what did he take of that moment. Did it define Johnny or did he revert back - initial indications in the teaser to me is he's old Johnny again.
(and it's probably too much to ask, but could we get Elizabeth Shue for a bit - bring that triangle back - LOL - but I haven't seen her in much lately)
We've had some bad luck lately with nostalgia coming back into fashion. I am still disappointed in how the new Star Wars trilogy is playing out - the new Indiana Jones a few years ago - more of the same - Rocky and Rambo back - meh.
But this could really be interesting - how do our successes as young men define us as we get older - has Ralph Macchio's character turned into a sad used car salesman, trying to see his kids on the weekend while Billy traveled the world seizing the day after college? I'm really curious to see how these two protagonists go forward at this point and what the story will be.
A movie shows us a picture of a life, but a sequel 33 years later - if done right, can paint a much bigger picture
AND we have Youtube Red here in the house...so score already!
Looking forward to it
RB
Saturday, February 17, 2018
#47 - Insomnia
This is a captivating thriller starring Stellan Skargard as a Swedish detective trying to solve a murder in Norway, above the arctic circle, in the middle of summer. As such, it's the land of the midnight sun. A number of choices and mistakes, as well as said sunlight disrupting his sleep, result in a tale of a man slowly struggling to solve a case while hiding secrets of his own all while slowly dragging down under the weight of said secrets and sleepness.
I knew this was remade - (5 years later with Al Pacino and Robin Williams) but I never saw it so I didn't know what we had going on - this was also kinda close to me as I lived in AK for a few years and even in Anchorage, you could have in the middle of summer enough light at midnight/1am to work outside if you wanted to - if you didn't pay attention you'd be up till midnight without paying attention so we def. got the blackout curtains.
This is a great film, and it held my attention thruout - there is an interview with the Director and Stellan several years later and it has been released on blu-ray. Being that the film is from 1997, it's a nice relief once in a while to see a film that isn't marred by 70 years of dust or obsolete film techniques
I'll get some more of these in - it's my oncall weekend and the wife is outta dodge so lots of chances to watch a few more movies
RB
Wednesday, February 14, 2018
# 46 - The Most Dangerous Game
Usually the first thing I do is look at the next film and see how long it is and the general plot - when I saw this one was 63 minutes I decided - "eh, fuck it" and just cranked it out
Probably me and about 200 million teenagers have read this story in Middle/High School - I remember reading it years ago. This was a film adaptation done about 8 years (?) after it was published?
Most of the names/directors/actors escape me but of course, Fay Wray as the damsel - (added for Hollywood's sake, not in the original book) - we all know from King Kong as well as the chap playing her brother, and there's a reason for that
When I first started watching this I was struck by how Fay Wray was once again running around in a jungle just like King Kong's - and I THOUGHT in my head there was some distance between these two films but in fact, they were shot at the same time - with one of the same directors, written by one of the same screenwriters, and used some of the same sets and three of the actors from King Kong - LOL
Designed originally to be a bigger production, cost cutting and issues at RKO took it down to this deeply condensed 63 minute time frame with some fast pacing and cost cutting measures. I listened to the Bruce Eder commentary - (I was curious and hey, it was only an extra hour - LOL) - and he stated the actual timelines for the two films shooting are kinda muddled - there's a good chance that a lot of Brian Armstrong and Fay Wray scenes, for instance, were shot during the long gap in special effects that were done after they shot some of their Kong scenes.
The film lapsed into the public domain, but you'll want to get the good copy from Criterion with the commentary if you watch it - not that colorized shit.
I thought of it initially as a suspense film but they're calling it a horror flick which I understand - some other interesting commentary in here about how some wardrobes/lines wouldn't have been allowed 18 months later after some movie censorship codes came in - but dat's life - I didn't walk away with the hots for Fay or anything - LOL
OK - now I gotta do some work - but then again...the next film is only 90 minutes too...hmmm
# 45 - Taste of Cherry
wife is out of town for a few days - expecting to get a few backlogged features in
This is a film I've never heard of by a director I've never heard of and may be the first film I've ever seen from Iran - in fact I'm pretty sure it is.
An interesting work by Abbas Kiarostami, it follows a man driving around on the outskirts of Tehran looking for someone to bury him after he kills himself - it took me a little while to get to this cause it, well, was a tiny bit boring for me - but I got thru it the next day - I guess Roger Ebert hated it
It was an ok film - it won the Palme D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival which is no slouch. (Some of my favorite winners are Kagemusha, The Wind that Shakes the Barley, and Farewell, my Concubine) - but it's presentation - primarily long dialogues shot from the alternate seat of a two seater, didn't leave a lot for me - there was also some interesting audio work done on here - my cats were very attentive to the sounds of some interesting birds/wildlife in Tehran - LOL
But not one I'd probably watch again in the future - there's a director's interview as a special feature - it was ok to me
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