broken_klaive

• 23:29 Anyone else have their Stimulus (rebate check) denied #

mkb_technologie

Originally published at Hydrogen Economy. You can comment here or there.

Two playlists from weeks past, plus a new podcast from last week, featuring a guest mix from M50!

Bookmark to:

cuteoverload

http://mfrost.typepad.com/cute_overload/2008/05/get-ready-for-t.html

Tiny mews, odd monochromatic body fur and paw chewing. GO!

Ross and Jo-Lynn L., exquisite work with the tiny mews.

steve98052

Since the next three paragraphs include progressively stronger SPOILERS, I'll use small text to make them easier to skip without reading.

Soon, Stuntman Mike reveals his dirty secret to Pam: although his "death-proof" car is absolutely safe for him, it's not at all safe for her. He drives wildly, bouncing her around in the unsafe passenger seat, until she's battered unconscious. Then he finds the other women and smashes into their car; he's the sole survivor.

Later, he finds Zoë Bell (as herself), Abernathy (Rosario Dawson), Kim (Tracie Thoms), and Lee (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) at a Tennessee convenience store. Zoë has them go to see a muscle car she wants to drive; it's for sale and her pretense is that she wants to test-drive it before buying. Not only that, she wants to try out a wild stunt she calls "Ship's Mast". They leave Lee behind as collateral to convince the seller they won't steal his car.

Stuntman Mike follows them, and attacks them with his death-proof car, while Zoë is playing Ship's Mast. But Kim and Zoë are stunt-women, so they're not easy victims like the five in Texas. After an extended road battle, both cars skid to a stop, and the women turn tables on him. Who will win the battle in the end? (Even in small print, I'm not telling.)

Quentin Tarantino wrote and directed this film, which was originally released as Grindhouse in combination with Robert Rodriguez's Planet Terror and a number of trailers to nonexistent films. The intention of the project was to make a pair of "B" movies, in a combination of homage and spoof of genuine 1970s grindhouse "B" movies. This film is a much better movie in most respects. One weakness is in the spoof aspect: although it borrows a lot from exploitation films (including some typical flaws), its execution is a bit too good for the joke to work. On the other hand, I didn't think the joke was very funny anyway (as I wrote in my Planet Terror review), so I don't see this film's failure to be bad enough for the spoof to work as a serious shortcoming.

The is almost good on the plot side; there are some plot holes, but I'm never sure whether they're mistakes or intentional as part of the exploitation film joke. But the idea of a spree-killer who uses a stunt car as his murder weapon is very clever, and the premise is well executed. The biggest dramatic fault is the encounter with the first group of women; foreshadowing undermines the emotional strength of the scene's outcome.

The dialogue side of the writing is very good, particularly among the second set of women. Although fans of exploitation movies might regard the talk scenes as a bothersome interruption of the action, I found it more interesting. Better still, parts of the main action segment were spiced up with the sharp dialogue, so fans of the dialogue and fans of the action could have fun at the same time. Overall, I rate the writing good.

The directing is a mix. The bar scene is good, but nothing special. The action scene that follows has a shaky stretch, with a spectacular (though somewhat repetitive) conclusion, and a great moment of comic relief. The non-action scenes with the second group of women are very good. The final action sequence is excellent.

Kurt Russell was excellent; his changes in tone were tough to get right, but he pulled it off. In the first group of women, only Rose McGowan was memorable; she was good if her intention was spoof, but fair if she was supposed to be taken seriously. The others were collectively good, but not individually noteworthy. In the second group of women, Zoë Bell was rather stiff, even though she was playing a version of herself; I rate her performance almost-good. Rosario Dawson and Tracie Thoms were very good; Thoms deserves extra credit because her performance elevates Bell's work. Mary Elizabeth Winstead was excellent if her intention was spoof, but fair if she was trying to play serious.

The stunt work was excellent – much too good for the exploitation movie premise. The other technical work was very good – again a bit too good. The music was good, and unobtrusive.

After seeing Planet Terror, I expected not to like this movie. But the solid directing, spectacular stunt work, and mostly-good acting aren't dragged down by bad writing. The main fault is that it tried to have it both ways on the exploitation movie spoof premise; it was in many respects too good to play as a spoof, but still had enough holes that it wasn't clearly trying to be more than a spoof. That makes it feel like less than the sum of its parts, but I still rate it good.

I chose to watch the film in the first place because my wife and I met McGowan's aunt at the SIFF preview the other night. It's odd that although I liked this movie much better than Planet Terror, I thought McGowan did better work in the lesser movie.

Credits: The first point about the credits is that there's one brief, final scene after the big names in the credits, but before the long-list credits begin.

The credits didn't follow the style of genuine exploitation movies very well. Rather than being a couple of screens full of names, including a lot of duplications of people doing several jobs, this one had a credit scroll that went on and on. But since it's much better than the movies it spoofs, I don't think that's a problem.

Rating: The film's US rating of "R" is reasonable, based on the violence. There's a lot of foul language, and some talk about sex, but no actual sex or nudity. The violence is reason enough for the "R" on its own.

Screening: Monday morning, finished Wednesday morning, at home (Starz! on demand cable television).
Audience: One.

Snacks: Decaf tea.

Ads: I didn't pay attention to the Starz! self-promotions. This version didn't include the fake trailers.

batwrangler

I just dropped the little dog off at Dr. K's to have his teeth cleaned, which makes me mildly anxious because it involves anesthesia, but he's a Maltese and needs regular dental care.

ETA: Cleaning was uneventful and he is yodeling as he emerges from anethesia (the vet's office called and I could hear him seranading them in the background, poor boy). I can pick him up around noon.

Kameko had her annual vet apt Monday, and is doing pretty well for a 14-year-old cat. Everyone at Dr. B's was surprised at what a brazen strumpet she is: so long as you (meaning anyone) rub her cheeks and generally makes much of her, she's as mushy as a queen in heat and doesn't care what else you do to her. "Clearly she hasn't read the tortie manual," was the universal reaction to her.

I've been insanely, but prosaically, busy the last two+ weeks, and too tired to spend much time online.

Tomorrow, I will most likely observe the second anniversary of my mother's death by staying home and catching up on house work. Mom would probably be pleased.

ogre_san

As slushmaster announced yesterday, "The River of Three Crossings" went to Shawna at Realms of Fantasy. It'll be the fifth in the Lord Yamada series to be published there, following:

"Fox Tails"
"Moon Viewing at Shijo Bridge"
"A Touch of Hell"
"Hot Water"


A sixth, "The Bride Doll," is scheduled for the PAPER BLOSSOMS, SHARPENED STEEL anthology, but that won't be out for a while yet.

steve98052

However, a guy we sat near at today's screening of Continental, a Film without Guns caught the Baghead screening. He didn't immediately recall the title, but mentioned that it was done by the Duplass brothers, who previously made The Puffy Chair (which I still need to see; my wife said was very funny). That was enough for us to figure it out.

Anyway, he had a mini-review of Baghead. The essence of it was, "don't miss the first minute of Baghead, but the rest of it isn't much good."

So, we'll try to see if it works out to catch the first minute, then slip out in time to see something more interesting.

It's quite possible that the movie is good in terms of its genre, but neither my wife nor I are into it. I should have asked the guy whether it was something fans of the genre would like, but I didn't think of it at the time.

(I'd like to give the mini-reviewer proper credit, but although we know him from previous SIFF events, neither of us can recall his name. I'm not sure we've even introduced each other by name.)