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A Consumer's Republic |
Lizabeth Cohen |
Here are notes I took from Lizabeth Cohen's A Consumer's Republic. Some added emphasis from me is bolded.
Chapter 1.
The history of the 20th century consumer republic is the battle between the citizen consumer and the purchaser consumer. The former fought for rights, standards, and fairness; the latter wanted purchasing power. Consumers strove for representation alongside business and labor in the 1930s New Deal programs and agencies. The first wave consumer movement took place in the Progressive Era; the second wave was in the 1930s and 1940s. Women and blacks were the primary citizen consumers. Housewives fought high prices, for instance, organizing meat boycotts in 1935. Blacks in Harlem, the Black Belt, and Chicago organized boycotts with the slogan "don't buy where you can't work". Cooperatives were a way to empower black businesses. Business was predictably hostile towards consumer councils, often red-baiting. Chevrolet was an exception with "From Dawn to Sunset".
Chapter 2.
In WWII the citizen consumer took over. The federal government took action to combat inflation with the Office of Price Administration & Civilian Supply (OPA under the War Production Board), created under the Emergency Price Control Act. This act set up a "General Maximum Price" on 6,000 commodities. The "responsible consumer was promoted to support the war effort. Such a consumer would not pay more than the maximum price for goods. They would conserve and recycle. A promise was made: "Conserve now, spend after the war". Consumer guides were published, pledges and mottos created. Women stepped up to enforce regulations, lead consumer organizations, and volunteer in implementing price controls.
Blacks were still denied access to consumer citizenship. Here we see Cohen's point that the consumer and the citizen are linked. Even black soldiers were denied access. In Harlem, black areas missed out on OPA protections. Civil rights leaders still saw the OPA and price controls as a way of being recognized as consumers and then citizens. Boycotts and protests now focused on businesses that didn't serve blacks, whereas before they were boycotting those that didn't hire them. At the end of the war people wanted to keep the OPA.
As the war ended, labor sided with the consumer movement over fears that inflation could eat up wage gains. Price controls mostly destroyed though. The consumer battle continued in reconversion.
Chapter 3.
After the war, mass consumption was promoted as the key to increased prosperity. This policy of consumption reconciled the difference between the citizen and purchaser. Thrift was now un-American. The citizen now bought instead of defending consumer rights. New house construction fueled a new mass consumption economy. The Veteran's Administration with the GI Bill and the Federal Housing Administration subsidized mortgages. Here we see government directing housing policy. Consumer credit and borrowing went up. The federal government linked mass consumption with political freedom as a way to show capitalism was better than communism. Capitalism was better at creating equality, the propaganda said. (Three such propaganda films were: "Despotism", "How to Lose What We Have", "Destination Earth"). Mass consumption was about creating a bigger pie rather than competing in a zero-sum world.
Traditional roles regain their dominance. The consumer movement was co-opted or red-baited. Women were relegated back to traditional roles. Businesses started targeting men. "Female", since housewives were the leaders, was used to diminish the consumer movement. The GI Bill discriminated against women veterans and helped men more because there were more male veterans. Denying someone full entry into the military is another way of denying them equality. The tax code was remade to favor single earner families, the single earner having to be the male (see page 146's discussion of the tax code).
Unions were more interesting in purchasing power than in having a say in the business (Fordist Compromise, Treaty of Detroit). The Taft-Hartley Act puts shackles on unions. The GI Bill helped the classes of people who were already ahead get more ahead.
Chapter 4.
Blacks returned from the war looking for the "Double-V", victory abroad and civil rights at home. The link between citizenship and consumption opened avenues to fight. They were denied equality of access to markets, worst of all in housing and education.
Chapter 5.
The rise of suburbia created a new market for mass consumption. The home became a mass consumer commodity. The suburbs exacerbated segmentation and inequality between classes and races in the same way the GI Bill did. Property values become important. The FHA and VA favored single family housing in areas with few minorities and lower class families. This means the federal government discriminated based on class and race. It means it engineered a way of life. The government decided that home building was the way to go. Programs created segregated, class based zoning. Localism, where property taxes pay for services, created vast inequalities especially in schooling.
Chapter 6.
Central urban marketplaces shifted to suburban shopping centers by the late 50s. These were the new community centers. Suburban malls could exclude the worst of urban areas - vagrants, prostitutes, poor, minorities, disruptive elements. Shopping centers were feminized spaces but the focus on the family experience meant men were making the purchasing decisions, reaffirming traditional roles again. Helped by cars these centers killed central business districts. Downtown business would try to harness state power with consumption laws and federal renewal money. In the suburbs public space was privatized. Commerce conflicted with community. Free speech may offend customers. Several court cases sought to settle this conflict: Amalgamated Food Employees Union Local 590 vs. Logan Valley Plaza Inc. (1950) and Marsh vs. Alabama (1946). In the latter, the "Marsh Doctrine" gave first amendment rights precedent over private property. Private property can be the functional equivalent of public space. Later, in Lloyd vs. Tanner (1972), leaflets were considered unwarranted infringement upon private property rights. Justice Marshall warned of private space overtaking the public. In Prune Yard Shopping Center vs. Robbins (1980) the court left it to the states but reaffirmed that first amendment did not guarantee access. Though it affirmed private property rights it decreased liberty with respect to the first amendment.
Chapter 7.
Product competition lead to new marketing methods. Product obsolescence became the garment industry's foundation. In the automotive industry it lead to constant redesign. Marketers embraced market segmentation. For example, David Yankelovich divided buyers into types who bought on cost, quality, or prestige. "Lifestyle branding" and "target marketing" aimed to get clusters of customers (sub cultures) rather than selling commodities on the mass market. An example of this was cable TV's rise over "Really Big Networks" that could serve everyone. On page 296:
By the time Thomas Robertson of Harvard Business School published his marketing text, Consumer Behavior, in 1970, he would conclude a key chapter with the statement, "The basic dilemma, in summary, is whether to adopt a policy of market segmentation or aggregation—whether to build generalized or ambiguous appeals into a product so that consumers can perceive it as they choose, or whether to concentrate on a specific segment, thus deliberately excluding a given proportion of consumers. Will 80 percent of a small market segment produce more revenue than 10 percent of a mass market?" The thrust of his book—and other writing of the era—was a resounding "yes." Note that although Robertson still entertained a mass market option in 1970, he acknowledged sufficient variation in consumer preferences to urge mass marketers to fashion "generalized or ambiguous appeals."
This was considered the democratization of the market (pg 309). It gave sub groups more voice but also pulled them into the commercial market and co-opted them. The power structures stayed the same. Social class became a lifestyle choices rather than economics (think rich hicks). Gender segmentation played on traditional gender roles & stereotypes. Age, race, and ethnicity were also targeted. Brand indoctrination sought to target children to get them in early. The African-American was a largely untapped market at the time. New responsiveness from national businesses killed black business. Business decided to create another market rather than trying to incorporate blacks into masses. The connection to modern political campaigning is obvious.
Chapter 8.
Third wave consumerism sought to protect consumers from new products. It wanted safety, informed consumers, consumer choice, and a voice in products. The era saw the rise of Ralph Nader. Twenty-five regulatory laws were passed between 1967 and 1973. With the "Keynesian commitment", demand was backed by government action. The three demands of the Third Wave were to 1) protect consumer in marketplace, 2) reorient government regulatory authority toward public interest, and 3) give the consumer political representation, "binding consumer and citizen ever closer". One and two were helped by the "responsiveness of the courts to product liability suits". Three failed in its attempt to get a cabinet level federal agency for consumers.
Market segmentation was linked to discontent because of more specific desires. If you didn't get exactly what you wanted you were not happy. Segmentation made it easier to mobilize distinct interests and create grassroots movements. This coincided with second wave feminism, civil rights, and war on poverty.
The rise of "consumer entrepreneurial politics" saw pro-consumer, anti-business activists get into the media, labor, non-profits, and congress as politicians and staffers. The plight of the low income consumer was explored by these liberal-minded activists. This is similar to what happened with women and blacks. Getting equal treatment and a voice in consumption was a key to fully realizing citizenship in America.
The broader consumer movement did not question mass consumption and capitalism. It used the tactics of radicals but wanted to enhance, not tear down, the system.
Government policy shifted to deregulation and privatization under Ford, Carter, and Reagan. Carter rejected consumption and the 70s saw demand collapse. Regulation was seen as a burden. The tide turned against the government and faith in the market's ability to regulate itself rose. Keynesian policies aimed at consumer demand were swapped for Reaganonics supply side policies like tax cuts to stimulate growth and investment. These focused on capital investment, not mass consumption, hoping that concentrated wealth would trickle down. The message shifted from the "Consumer Bill of Rights" changed to economic freedom. The Clinton government would view citizens as customers. Despite all of that, there has been a revival of government in financial regulation with the failures of Enron and Worldcom or airport security after 9/11.
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410 pages |
| 0-375-70737-9 |
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This product was released around 2003
by Vintage
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I consumed this around 2006 |
| More:
A Consumer's Republic |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 5/5/2010 7:14:24 PM |
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Being John Malkovich |
Spike Jonze |
Right away, even before anything trippy arrives, you can tell that Being John Malkovich movie is going to be odd. John Cusak is Craig Schwartz, a puppeteer who sets out to look for a job at the behest of his wife, Lotte (a well hidden Cameron Diaz); a woman with a pet collection that includes a monkey, parrot, and ferret. Craig ends up at an office on the 7th and a half floor with 5 foot high ceilings and a secretary whom can't seem to understand anyone. He quickly falls in love with his egotistical office mate Maxine (Catherine Keener).
It's only then that the movie turns into a modern fantasy story. Schwartz find a portal to actor John Malkovich's mind hidden behind a cabinet. After he tells Maxine she devises a way to make money off of it. Lotte, on the other hand, becomes obsessed with it.
It's clear that Being John Malkovich is on the odd side. What was less clear to me - and I think this is my deficiency - was what, if any, deeper meaning there was. The best theory I can come up with is that Schwartz does his best work when he acts vicariously through others, whether they be puppets or famous actors. Maybe the story is about different forms of transformation. Lotte comes to crave the transformation into Malcovich so much that she contemplates changing her own body. We know Craig does better as someone else. Maxine never gets into Malcovich's mind but her personality changes more than anyone. Later in the movie we find others using Malcovich to transform their age into youth. |
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112 minutes |
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This product was released around November 1999
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
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Being John Malkovich |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/26/2010 8:46:06 PM |
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Big Fan |
Robert D. Siegel |
Paul Aufiero (Patton Oswalt) and his buddy Sal (Kevin Corrigan) are a sad lot. Their lives revolve around the New York Giants. Paul builds up an anonymous reputation on a call-in talk show as a defender of the realm. Sal adores him for it but doesn't realize it takes Paul hours of writing and practicing his speech before he can call in to rip apart nemesis "Philadelphia Phil" (Michael Rapaport's voice). For every home game the duo rides out to the Meadowlands to watch the game...in the parking lot. The two follow Paul's favorite player, Quantrell Bishop, to a strip club one night. After meeting him, things turn sour and Bishop beats Paul into a three day coma.
This is the part of the movie where our protagonist takes stock of his life and re-prioritizes the important things. Life isn't like a movie though. People don't change. They rationalize cognitive dissonance. In Paul's case, the Giants are all he has. The situation says something about sports fan-hood. He can't disown them because he has built his adult life around the franchise. That means when they're up, he's up; when they're down, he's down. |
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86 minutes |
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This product was released around 2009
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I consumed this around March 2010 |
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Big Fan |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/26/2010 5:30:10 PM |
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Downfall |
Oliver Hirschbiegel |
Downfall is a dispiriting movie until you remember that you're watching the fall of the most evil empire of the 20th century. Still, watching a proud
civilization crumble before you is depressing. Once majestic buildings are riddled with holes. Families scramble for cover through rubble. High ranking
military officers relax their dress and take to the bottle. The vast records of an empire are set to fire. Again though, these are the Nazis.
It is not the simple fact that it's all coming down that is depressing. It's the fact that these people were so deluded. Not only did they buy into a heinous
ideology but they convinced themselves of their leader's infallibility. As the Soviets drive into the heart of the Reich the military leadership continues to follow its
maniacal leader. These are the leaders of one of the strongest militaries in the history of the world failing to see the writing on the wall. Downfall
is a lesson about how group-think saps people of their abilities.
Hitler's ego is what destroyed Germany. In the scene made famous by a thousand internet parodies, Hitler learns from his generals that Steiner, the general
he was resting his last hopes on, has failed to mount an attack. As he comes to the realization that all is lost Hitler scapegoats his generals.
Our generals are just a bunch of contemptible, disloyal cowards.
He believes everything Germany has gained was the result of his actions.
I never attended an academy, and yet I have conquered Europe all by myself
Only to have it taken away by others.
I've been betrayed and deceived from the very beginning
When generals come to him worried about the plight of the German people in Berlin Hitler treats them with scorn. The people failed him. They deserve
whatever happens to them when the Soviets come rumbling through. He will let them suffer rather than surrender. Referencing 1918:
I went through that before and once is enough
The generals who are with Hitler in those last days are portrayed as sycophants, unable to break Hitler's psychological hold even though they know their forces are done for. Up to the very end most of them
maintain their oath to the Fuhrer rather than to the German people - even after he has abandoned them with his suicide. As Berlin falls some Germans are smart
enough to run for cover rather than stand as fodder during the vicious urban warfare. Bands of SS roam the city rounding up and executing those "traitors"
and "deserters". At dinner Hitler speaks of the strong defeating the weak as natural. His ideology does not allow compassion for his people. The front lines are becoming younger but lack basic
weaponry to put up a fight. To the certain death these new recruits are facing Hitler says "that's what young men are for". It is amazing that he can even
muster platitudes about "the Reich" when it is clear his own legacy is all that matters to him. Hitler cares more about what will happen to his body when the
Russians find it. He kills his dog, Blondi, with the same poison he takes his own life with. Goebbels, ever the coward, follows Hitler's example but lets his
wife kill his children.
The main characters are like part of a World War II lesson plan. There are the truest of the true believers, Adolph Hitler and the black eyed Joseph
Goebbels. Some of the leadership who somewhat disobyed Hitler are given better treatment (Albert Speer, Wilhelm Mohnke, Eva Braun's brother-in-law Hermann Fegelein, and the doctor
Ernst-Günther Schenck). The generals Keitel, Jodl, Krebs, and Burgdorf barely leave the bunker. Goering and Himmler, who have escaped Berlin, draw Hitler's scorn for attempting to act
without his permission. Otto Günsche is Hitler's aide to the end. The odd duo of Robert Ritter von Greim and Hanna Reitsch, who defy death to get back to
the bunker.
Hitler oscillates between grim realization and absolute delusion. He actually finds out about Steiner pretty early in the film. At this point he knows it's
over. Later on though, he conceives a plan for Karl Dönitz to retake oilfields in the same conversation in which he admits defeat. He simply doesn't
understand how many troops he has, the Soviet position to the east, and, though the film doesn't go into this, the American response to any talk of anything
but unconditional surrender. In a final episode of self deception Hitler walks out of the most dire briefing from General Weidling, a man almost executed for
retreating against the Soviets but now the leader of the Berlin defense. Weidling informs Hitler and his generals that German forces can hold out for maybe a
day. Hitler walks out of the room in a daze muttering "Wenck will come", in reference to a general who in no way could save the doomed city. Watching his
shaking, twitching left hand it's clear that even before the revelation about Steiner he knew it was over. His ego keeps the truth down.
As it all collapses around them, the Germans in the bunker walk shell shocked through some of the most surreal scenes. Hitler, Eva Braun, and secretary
Traudl Junge have a polite conversation about suicide. Hitler gives Junge, who seems to be the only person shown compassion by the Fuhrer, a poison capsule
stating, "I'm so sorry I can't give you a better present" with no sense of irony. Later, as Junge walks through the bunker, we see dozens of officers openly
discussing the best way to commit suicide. Earlier, Eva rounds up people in the bunker for an impromptu ball. In the large opulent hall of a government
building women and officers dance. Earlier still, government documents rain down from buildings as the SS erases the regime's records. Forget your hatred of
the Nazis, think about what it must have been like. The sense of doom as everything is crashing down. Not only everything they built but everything they had
been taught, their ideology, their heroes, all gone. These people were seriously brainwashed. |
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156 minutes |
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This product was released around September 2004
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
| More:
Downfall |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/25/2010 8:25:26 PM |
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Skins |
Jamie Brittain |
I watched about five minutes of this British high school drama and had to turn it off out of annoyance. |
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60 minutes |
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This product was released around January 2007
by E4
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
| More:
Skins |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/25/2010 10:13:36 AM |
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Clerks |
Kevin Smith |
I don't know what I expected out of Clerks. It's the film that made the world aware of Kevin Smith. It's an icon of the 90s. I liked the idea of such a small venue (a convenience store and a movie rental store) in a shortened time frame (one day), low-key, and black and white. It just didn't work for me though. The dialog felt ornate and excessive. While watching I realized that I may have found the father of years of Dawson's Creek conversations. Dante (Brian O'Halloran) was a little too quick to exasperation; Randal (Jeff Anderson) knew a little too much about everything. They weren't terrible and maybe if I had watched Clerks when it came out I would have found it new and interesting. It was cool to see the origins of Jay, who never shut up, and Silent Bob, with his one line. |
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92 minutes |
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This product was released around October 1994
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
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Clerks |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/25/2010 10:08:55 AM |
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Crips and Bloods: Made in America |
Stacy Peralta |
It wouldn't have been hard to create a documentary about the Bloods and Crips that focused on turf wars and gun battles. Stacy Peralta and Sam George weren't looking to make a real life gangsta movie though. They wanted to trace the violence that plagues modern South Central, Los Angeles back to its inception.
The move out west for many African Americans came in the decades after the end of slavery. Away from the officially segregated and dangerously violent southeast blacks encountered a less racist and more economically viable existence. As the automotive industry - Ford, GM, Firestone - built up large plants in southern California blacks attained living standards that none had seen before. When the automotive industry fell on hard times and pulled out conditions worsened. Racism was less severe but it still existed. Segregation wasn't official policy but neighborhoods were still separated by race. Police used force and intimidation to keep blacks within their proscribed areas. Anger seethed because of racist cops until it bubbled over in the Watts Race Riots of 1965.
This race riot was different from normal race riots because it was the African Americans doing the rioting instead of whites attacking blacks. One of the people the filmmakers interviewed a lot was Kumasi, an original member of the Slausons, a street gang that preceded the Bloods and Crips. Kamusi got into gangs at a time when gangs in the area were smaller and less violent, fighting with fists rather than guns. Kumasi powerfully describes the riot after the National Guard was summoned:
We were opportunistic fighters. We didn't need stockpiles. We got dilapidated buildings. There's a brick pile just waiting to be thrown at your ass. There's a dilapidated building. Ain't nobody living there. You didn't fix it. You didn't remove it. OK it ain't nothing but a pile of bricks any how. That's coming at you. That whole building, brick by brick. That's coming at your ass. That's what we're throwing at you. The building. The bullshit. The rubble. The rubbish that we live in. That's what coming at your ass. Those are our weapons. The filth. The funk. The shit you can't stand. That you defend. That you put a barrier between us and yourself. That's coming at you. That's coming at you.
As I was looking for a transcription of the quote I came across a description of it by Cynthia Fuchs as "the literal becoming metaphoric". The neighborhood's infrastructure was as decrepit as the system that created it.
As African Americans took action and became radicalized throughout the country, their leaders were taken down. Civil rights leaders were killed. Radicals were imprisoned. Kumasi asks, what filled the void? In a tone of revelation he claims that it was the Crips, founded by Raymond Washington and Stanley Williams. As the gangs grew so did the War on Drugs. Imprisonment of black men skyrocketed. The film claims 28% of black men have been in jail at one time in their lives.
The discouraging part about this film is the interviews with gang members. These men understand what's going on. They may be thugs in one sense of the word but they're in no way dumb. In the shoddy system they live in you can fight to live in poverty or you can turn to a life of crime. Getting beat up by gang members, harassed by police, and barely getting by didn't appeal to them. They very simply and clearly present the rules that exist in their world. It is disheartening to see the discord between a nation that teaches children that they can do anything and a city where children grow up with no hope.
Most surprising was the candor with which many of the gang members described how they felt about not having a father around. It may strike some as looking for an excuse but I have a hard time believing a hardcore gang member cares about garnering sympathy from documentary viewers. If 28% of black men are in jail at one point in their lives then that's a lot of male role models out of the picture. It speaks to the tactics of anti-gang and anti-drug police actions. Locking up fathers, according to the filmmakers, really does stimulate a cycle of crime and despair.
Crips and Bloods: Made in America was narrated by Forest Whitaker. |
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93 minutes |
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This product was released around January 2009
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
| More:
Crips and Bloods: Made in America |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/25/2010 9:48:00 AM |
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Burn After Reading |
Ethan Coen & Joel Coen |
Burn After Reading has half a dozen great actors filling out the script and, as a result, is a character driven film. One of the interesting things about Burn After Reading is that George Clooney play an untypical role. Clooney is Harry Pfarrer, a twitchy ex-air marshal. Yes, he's a philanderer with a certain level of self-confidence due to his good looks but his self esteem is fleeting. He picks up women through internet dating and doesn't hold up under stress. We're so used to seeing Clooney owning a movie with great acting supplemented by an overwhelming presence. That cool Clooney demeanor is exchanged for a Coenesque oddness. Brad Pitt does the same as Chad Feldheimer. He's a dorky, water bottle slurping, pretty boy riding his bicycle and wearing a gym-employee maroon polo shirt. Tilda Swinton is good as Katie Cox, Pfarrer's cold lover who is divorcing Osbourne Cox (John Malkovich).
Frances McDormand and John Malkovich are the best though characters in life crisis mode. McDormand is Linda Litzke, a woman trying to recoup her youth through plastic surgery. Malkovich is Osbourne Cox, a recently reassigned CIA analyst who quits his job in order to write his memoirs. I've admired McDormand's acting since I saw Fargo and she doesn't disappoint here. Malkovich brings the same level of intensity he seems to bring to everything he does. No one will pay for Linda's unnecessary surgeries and no one wants Cox's stories of pedestrian goings on within the CIA. Their similarly adrift lives collide as they both attempt to right the ship. Everyone seems to want to be on another boat. Harry is cheating on his wife with Katie and still looking for more on the internet. Osbourne wants to write as his wife jumps ship. Linda is also searching the internet while her boss Ted Treffon (Richard Jenkins) longs after her.
J.K. Simmons (Oz, Law & Order) and David Rasche (of Sledge Hammer! fame) play a couple of CIA officers who get to watch the pathetic lives of the cast. "What did we learn from this?", Simmons' character asks Rasche's at the end of the fiasco that unfolds throughout the film. Both agree that they can find no discernible lesson. Simmons' character doesn't really seem to care. Taking the path of least resistance he green lights payoffs and other extrajudicial remedies to clean up the plot. In the end you have to wonder what anything amounted to. It's a sad little play. Whether it's a drama, a tragedy, or a black comedy is up for interpretation. The actors do a lot of spinning until they stop and then get swept away and pretty much forgotten before the Coens on zoom out |
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96 minutes |
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This product was released around September 2008
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
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Burn After Reading |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/22/2010 8:39:55 PM |
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Be Kind Rewind |
Michel Gondry |
Mike (Mos Def) is tasked with watching Elroy Fletcher's (Danny Glover) decrepit video store. Thought to be the birth place of famous jazz musician Fats Waller, Fletcher's store is on the brink of financial destitution. Jerry Gerber (Jack Black), a paranoid eccentric who lives in a junk yard, kick starts the shenanigans by erasing every video (Fletcher doesn't sell DVDs) in the store after a failed attempt to sabotage the power plant (why?) magnetizes his whole body. Afraid word will get back to Fletcher, Mike and Jerry quickly make a 20 minute rendition of Ghostbusters. The film is a success, starting the duo - and later Alma (Melonie Diaz), an employee from the dry cleaner's down the street - on a movie making spree. It looks like Mike and Jerry have saved the store. Unfortunately that's portrayed in a montage, capping off a weak, somewhat slow first half of the movie.
The movie is an oddball comedy that manages to say something about community. "Be Kind Rewind" is getting pressure to close from a developer who, with good intentions, wants to demolish the building to make way for a brand new complex. Mike and Jerry find a way to build support for their store by making their customers a part of their venture. While the new building may improve the area's look, the old one represents a piece of the community's past. |
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102 minutes |
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This product was released around February 2008
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
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Be Kind Rewind |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/21/2010 6:53:49 PM |
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Harlan Country, USA |
Barbara Kopple |
The footage of this coal miner strike felt like it came straight out of a time before the National Labor Relations Board. It was 1973 though when Duke Power Company hired "gun thugs" to intimidate and take pot shots at the miners of Harlan County, Kentucky. State police were brought in to protect the road for imported scab workers but none were sent to stop attacks on the strikers. The state cops (the local sheriff was more ambivalent), the courts, and even United Mine Workers of America president Tony Boyle (who would later be convicted of ordering the murder of union challenger Joseph "Jock" Yablonski and his family) sided with the employer.
Barbara Kopple's documentary starts off portraying the claustrophobic working conditions of a coal miner. Workers emerging out of a void in the Earth have black soot under their noses, underlying the poor air quality that often led to "black lung". Only five years earlier an explosion at an explosion at a Farmington, West Virginia mine killed 78 miners. The strikers joined a union and are fighting for a contract as a way to redress these conditions. A contract, one worker says after one of their colleagues is shot to death by a scab, is "what Lawrence Jones died for".
The movie is in no way a two-sided endeavor. It dignifies the miners and vilifies the employers. The former are the epitome of working class. With bluegrass songs coursing through scenes of rundown houses and unpolished country folk, the film takes on the character of rural Appalachia. Lest you think the long fight was endured and taken on just by the miners, Kopple shows some pretty intense, bad-ass wives standing not only behind but in front of their men. It takes the miner months of striking, of civil disobedience, and eventually of arming themselves to win the fight for their livelihoods. |
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103 minutes |
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This product was released around 1976
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
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Harlan Country, USA |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/14/2010 7:18:27 PM |
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The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo |
Stieg Larsson |
Stieg Larsson smoothly integrates a message about violence against women into this cold case crime novel. Mikael Blomkvist is a disgraced journalist hired by a wealthy industrialist, Henrik Vanger, to investigate a long abandoned missing person case. Lisbeth Salander is a pretty bad-ass private investigator who ends up working the same case. Blomkvist, a tough financial journalist, has lost a suspicious libel case against another Swedish industrialist, Hans-Erik Wennerström. Salander, an independent but talented social outcast, is intrigued by the case.
The remoteness of a conceivable resolution to the case intrigued me. Over the years Vanger became obsessed with the disappearance of his niece, Harriet. Each year he is taunted with a rose from the person he assumes killed his beloved relative. Blomkvist is hired to comb over the four decade old case one last time. I've never been into detective novels but Larsson was able to pull me along with his descriptions of detective/journalistic investigations. The meticulousness of Blomkvist's, and later Salander's, work filled up the text.
Inside this novel is a pretty powerful message against misogynistic violence. The main source of evil in the book is anyone who attempts to use their power to harm women. Salander, at less than 100 pounds, has been harassed by bullies and police alike throughout her life. She is further assaulted by an authority figure during the novel. Her retaliation is vicious though. Some of the scenes are very graphic, physically and sexually. At times I thought the payback made things turn out a little too perfectly but nothing much to the detriment of the book. While Blomkvist may start off as the main character, Salander is given equal treatment throughout much of the novel. The intellect of both is the most enjoyable aspect of the novel. Soon even the development of their relationship turns into another interesting side plot of the novel. Salander, because of her life on the edge of society, has trusted very few people. Her boss, Dragan Armanski, or her former guardian, Holger Palmgren, get close but Blomkvist inadvertently smashes the barrier that has acted as a mask for her past emotional trauma. |
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608 pages |
| 978-1-84724-253-2 |
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This product was released around 2005
by Vintage
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I consumed this around March 2010 |
| More:
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/13/2010 7:23:59 PM |
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Killer Klowns from Outer Space |
Stephen Chiodo |
Killer Klowns from Outer Space is a B-movie spectacular. The acting is awful, the dialog is corny, and the plot, in all of its absurdity, is summed up by the title. Beside the 1980s haircuts and attire there are some other hallmarks of bad 80s movies. John Vernon plays the cop - the overbearing authority figure - who hates the kids of the college town the alien clowns are hunting. In classic horror movie fashion, making out and having fun leads to the demise of the first kids we see.
This movie scared the crap out of me as a kid, in large part because the clowns are immensely creepy. Most of them are taller than the humans. Their faces are ugly, with evil eyes and gross teeth. Accompanying any attack is a heavy metal guitar riff. Every time they capture or kill a human they let out an insidious laugh.
If you think about it logically killer klowns from outer space would obviously just be evil representations of our beloved circus clowns from Earth. As a result the klowns cleverly use clown tools of humor as instruments of death. The main source of destruction is a gun that wraps humans in a cotton candy cocoon. The pink substance decomposes its victim into an edible liquid - apparently the reason the klowns have landed on Earth to begin with. Popcorn guns send out seeds
that grow into hideous biting klown sprouts. My
favorite was the shadow puppets that can actually attack people. A clown car transports an army of klowns. A parade acts as mop up duty through the town. Pies to the face melt human skin. A ball pit captures intruders. The klowns entice the old and young to walk into their demise with their clown-like actions. The only thing that can kill them - including the dinosaur like "end guy" - is a blow to their big red noses.
I remembered a lot of the scenes from when I was a kid. The prison scene where the klown cocoons a couple of prisoners and kills the guard really creeped me out. This may be the most enjoyable "bad movie" I've ever seen. It in no way tries to mask its corniness yet somehow doesn't try to play it up either. It's just the right level of bad to be humorous and fun. |
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88 minutes |
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This product was released around May 1988
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
| More:
Killer Klowns from Outer Space |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/13/2010 6:03:24 PM |
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Food, Inc. |
Robert Kenner |
I haven't read Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation but I did read Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma. Food, Inc. strikes me as the movie version of the combination of the two. It touches on the big themes of each book.
* There's the uncleanly conditions and inhumane treatment of animals that that the meat industry engages in.
* Michael Pollan's theme in the first third of Omnivore's Dilemma was that, rather than a cornucopia, many of the products we eat are actually corn based or corn fed.
* As far back as the 1950s Fast food chains like McDonald's, with its emphasis on efficiency, has driven the industrialization of the food industry.
* Introduced in Pollan's book, uber-organic farmer Joel Salatin makes an appearance to preach against the industrial system.
* The film also looks at the poor treatment of food industry workers, from undocumented manual laborers with few rights in bad working conditions to the owners of farms that sell food to the large companies.
* Like Pollan's book, the film gives a mixed treatment of the organic industry.
Food, Inc. reminded me a lot Walmart: The High Cost of Low Prices. At their hearts both are criticisms of the corporate industrial system. One of the things that disappointed me with Walmart was the breadth of topics it touched on. Food Inc didn't feel that cluttered but it did go beyond the topic of food production. Looking at them both now, I see that that was the point. While each filmmaker has his hobby horse - retail, food - what they are attacking is the entire process. You can't attack low prices that drive out competition (or any of the other issues) without tracing the entire chain back to the production lines. You can't talk about unhealthy food without finding out why that's what is produced. This is what it means to be a large company in America. This is how you have to play. Carelessness at one part of the process seems to indicate a propensity to carelessness in general.
Let's look at what the film provides as evidence against the corporate food industry, "from seed to supermarket". All of the companies talked about in this movie - Monsanto Company, Tyson Foods, Smithfield Foods, Perdue Farms - declined to be interviewed according to the film makers so we don't get to hear an opposing view.
The industry uses its size and power to influence government policy, regulations, and court decisions. In many cases regulators are former industry men. Major policy favors large producers. Corn subsidies have helped increase corn yields and lead to corn being used as the baseline product in everything from soda to cattle feed to diapers. A cheap, mass-produced all-purpose product fits the industrial system perfectly. Kevin's Law was a bill designed to give the FDA authority to shut down producers who don't meet the FDA's own standards. It was brought to congress after a mother lost her young son to an e coli infection. It never got to a vote thanks to strong lobbying by the industry.
Intellectual property and patent law give larger corporations an advantage over growers. Monsanto owns the patent to a soybean (that alone is something that would perplex many) that is resistant to its own brand of Roundup herbicide. The seed now accounts for 90% of soybeans grown according to the film. Growers, in order to use this seed, must agree not to save the seeds. Monsanto sends out investigators to check on farms and takes legal action against people like Moe Parr, who runs a "seed cleaning" business. Start up legal fees are enormous.
The companies have fought against giving customers more information about their food via labeling standards for things like health content, genetically modified content, and organic production. This is another one of the main themes of the film. The corporate system is hiding information - the food production process, food content - from the customer in order to better control the system. Food is not grown on a farm by a farmer, it is manufactured in a factory (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations, or CAFOs)with help from a lab under the direction of a board room. Monsanto controls 90% of the soybean seeds in America. Four companies today control the majority of the beef industry, chicken industry, more and more of the pork industry. Even the crunchier organic industry has become suspect. Once a smaller industry run by idealists, it is now being bought up by large food conglomerates. How much longer can previously organic companies sustain good environmental practices when they are run by large corporations trying to get their products into Walmart stores?
One of the scariest parts of the movie was when the film makers described so called "veggie libel laws" or "cheeseburger rules" that make it easier to sue for "disparaging food". Oprah Winfrey was sued under such laws by Texas cattle ranchers. According to the film, in some states laws have been proposed to make it illegal to take photos of a CAFO.
Workers have little control over their work. Manual laborers work in poor conditions often because they are illegal immigrants. They cannot complain or
unionize because they have no rights in this country. Farmers who sell to the large companies are in deep debt as they try to meet requirements for
growers. If they don't meet demands they get dropped.
Of course with any industrial system it all comes back to petroleum. "We eat a lot of oil", states one interviewee.
The end is a call to action. The two major regulatory agencies that control the food industry, the FDA and the USDA, work for you. Most importantly, you have a vote in what you buy. |
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94 minutes |
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This product was released around June 2008
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
| More:
Food, Inc. |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/10/2010 11:18:26 AM |
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The Darjeeling Unlimited |
Wes Anderson |
Anyone who has watched one of Wes Anderson's films
knows he has a distinctive style. Most of his films
(maybe not Bottlerocket) have the same
brightly colored, ornate style. This story is a
vehicle to apply his style in India rather than the
United States. The scenery is, as always, beautiful
even if its style is familiar. Unfortunately I think the scenery does too much heavy lifting in this somewhat slow, maybe meandering, film.
Francis (Owen Wilson) ropes his brothers, Peter
(Adrien Brody) and Jack (Jason Schwartzman), into a
cross country train trip through India in an attempt
to regain a past - or maybe build - kinship with
them. He tries to control everything, going so far
as to have an assistant create a daily itinerary for
the group. We learn later that his actions -
ordering food for his brothers at a table, making
everyone agree on tasks and rules - mirror those of
his mother (Anjelica Huston). I have to think his
quest is a way to get past emotional scars from his
father. It's tough not to see the dual nature of
Francis' statement "I guess I still have some more
healing to do" while he's looking at the literal
scars on his skull that are bandaged over for most
of the film. "The past is over", his mother pleads,
to which he replies "Not for us." Until that point
Peter probably doesn't realize what he is holding
onto. He's the one toting dad's glasses, car keys,
and razor - few of those possessions hold any value
on his trip. It is not until the end when they toss
their literal and figurative baggage to the side can
they embark on a new, again, literal and figurative
journey.
Francis bills it as a spiritual journey, treating
India as some sort of magical land. Anderson
employs a kind of hipster spiritualism. There is
heart in it but when taken too seriously - by the
audience or Anderson - it comes off as phony. The
trio encounters many minor Indian characters along
the way. "I love these people", Francis remarks.
Like the crowded Indian city or the sparse country,
the people are just another piece of scenery in
Anderson's movie. They fit in well with the
background he has created but have little depth. This is a story about three brothers on an adventure. Everything else - the women, the train staff - is part of the background.
Schwartzman and Wilson are veterans of Anderson's
films. So is Bill Murray, who makes a brief
inside-joke like appearance. |
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91 minutes |
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This product was released around October 2007
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I consumed this around April 2010 |
| More:
The Darjeeling Unlimited |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 4/1/2010 7:37:29 PM |
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Monsters vs Aliens |
Rob Letterman |
Monsters vs Aliens tried a little too hard. The animated film alternated between action scene and attempted jokes, often melding the two. The computer representations were a little less clean than predecessors like The Incredibles or Monsters, Inc.. The human eyes were way too big and the movements were just off enough to be noticeable. Behind the somewhat odd animations was some serious acting talent - Reese Witherspoon as the recently transformed monster, Ginormica; Seth Rogan as B.O.B. the big blob; Hugh Laurie as mad scientist Dr. Cockroach Ph.D.; Will Arnett as The Missing Link; Kiefer Sutherland as General W.R. Monger (get it, War Monger); Rainn Wilson as the evil alien Gallaxhar; and Stephen Colbert kind of self indulgently as President Hathaway.
There was a lot of action so the movie was visually pleasing and the jokes weren't so much bad as they were excessive. There wasn't any let up. You didn't get a chance to know the characters because every line was a joke followed by an action scene. Sure it's a cartoon but what has made this genre so good is that there's good writing behind stellar animation. Monsters vs Aliens doesn't really have that. |
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94 minutes |
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This product was released around March 2009
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I consumed this around March 2010 |
| More:
Monsters vs Aliens |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 3/21/2010 5:56:40 PM |
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Dracula |
Bram Stoker |
Jonathan Harker's journey to Castle Dracula is full of unintended dramatic irony. More than a century of movies, shows, plays, novels, comics, games, cereal brands, and mythology have rendered the plot of Abraham Stoker's novel transparent to the world. Rather than unraveling subtle clues the reader is pointing out century old standards of vampire behavior in the text. Let's take a look at some of the mythology the reader encounters:
* Harker's driver to the castle, later revealed to be Count Dracula, is distracted by a blue flame that doesn't seem to illuminate its surroundings. I'm not sure what that means in Vampire mythology but it is certainly an odd scene and probably significant.
* The driver is able to keep wolves at bay. Later, Dracula is able to call wolves to dispatch of someone at his door.
* Dracula cannot be seen in a mirror and has no mirrors in the castle.
* Dracula casts no shadow.
* Harker never sees his host during the day.
* There are no bells in the house either meaning there are no servants in this massive castle (maybe it also means that vampires do not like bells).
* In conversation he avoids many of Harker's questions.
* He is disdainful of the commoners who live in the villages below his castle. A "barren land" and "barren people" as it is described.
* Harker catches him making his guest bed and cleaning up plates, implying his obsessiveness about cleanliness.
* The sight of a crucifix enrages Dracula.
* Villagers give Harker garlic, wild rose, and mountain ash presumably because they think it will repel Dracula.
* Later it becomes more obvious that Dracula is supernatural. Harker sees him crawling on the outer wall of the castle. Finally he finds a crypt where the Count is sleeping in a coffin.
As the story moves back to England the mood gets darker. Dracula stays out of the plot for long stretches but the reader can tell that something is afoot.
* Stormy weather accompanies a ship arriving in England hinting at the evil that is about to descend on the town.
* A dog is the only living thing that escapes the ship, but it runs off before anyone can catch it.
* Later, a bat is seen at Lucy's window on several occassions.
* Lucy often sleep walks, leaving her vulnerable.
Mina and Lucy's encounter with a man, Swales, at the tombstone of a "liar" as he puts it. The deceased was lost at sea so there is no body underneath the grave, like Dracula's many coffins would be. Swales also foresees his own death.
* In Lucy's journal we learn that she has been hearing voices commanding her.
* Seward's mental patient, Renfield, gets increasingly agitated - becoming homicidal at one point - for no apparent reason. Though we see it happening after the arrival of the ship the characters do not put the pieces together.
* Mina notices a great myst about the town giving the whole setting an even more eerie feeling.
Later in the novel we get the full explanation of what Dracula is. Van Helsing drops the cloak of secrecy that has been hiding his theories from the group. More than the horrific battle sequence with the Count or the suspenseful scenes when Lucy's life is in danger, this is the most dramatic scene in the novel. The doctor tells Quincey Morris, Aurthur, Seward, Jonathan, and Mina what they are up against. Here the characters swear a pact to eradicate this beast, knowing that only his death can save the infected Mina from the fate that Lucy already met. These passages are the fundamental text of Nosferatu lore. Van Helsing opens up the mystery to all on page 304:
"There are such beings as vampires, some of us have evidence that they exist. Even had we not the proof of our own unhappy experience, the teachings and the records of the past give proof enough for sane peoples. I admit that at the first I was sceptic. Were it not that through long years I have trained myself to keep an open mind, I could not have believed until such time as that fact thunder on my ear.`See! See! I prove, I prove.' Alas! Had I known at first what now I know, nay, had I even guess at him, one so precious life had been spared to many of us who did love her. But that is gone, and we must so work, that other poor souls perish not, whilst we can save. The nosferatu do not die like the bee when he sting once. He is only stronger, and being stronger, have yet more power to work evil. This vampire which is amongst us is of himself so strong in person as twenty men, he is of cunning more than mortal, for his cunning be the growth of ages, he have still the aids of necromancy, which is, as his etymology imply, the divination by the dead, and all the dead that he can come nigh to are for him at command, he is brute, and more than brute, he is devil in callous, and the heart of him is not, he can, within his range, direct the elements, the storm, the fog, the thunder, he can command all the meaner things, the rat, and the owl, and the bat, the moth, and the fox, and the wolf, he can grow and become small, and he can at times vanish and come unknown. How then are we to begin our strike to destroy him? How shall we find his where, and having found it, how can we destroy? My friends, this is much, it is a terrible task that we undertake, and there may be consequence to make the brave shudder. For if we fail in this our fight he must surely win, and then where end we? Life is nothings, I heed him not. But to fail here, is not mere life or death. It is that we become as him, that we henceforward become foul things of the night like him, without heart or conscience, preying on the bodies and the souls of those we love best. To us forever are the gates of heaven shut, for who shall open them to us again? We go on for all time abhorred by all, a blot on the face of God's sunshine, an arrow in the side of Him who died for man. But we are face to face with duty, and in such case must we shrink? For me, I say no, but then I am old, and life, with his sunshine, his fair places, his song of birds, his music and his love, lie far behind. You others are young. Some have seen sorrow, but there are fair days yet in store. What say you?"
And on pg 306 to 309 he explains it more:
"Well, you know what we have to contend against, but we too, are not without strength. We have on our side power of combination, a power denied to the vampire kind, we have sources of science, we are free to act and think, and the hours of the day and the night are ours equally. In fact, so far as our powers extend, they are unfettered, and we are free to use them. We have self devotion in a cause and an end to achieve which is not a selfish one. These things are much.
"Now let us see how far the general powers arrayed against us are restrict, and how the individual cannot. In fine, let us consider the limitations of the vampire in general, and of this one in particular.
"All we have to go upon are traditions and superstitions. These do not at the first appear much, when the matter is one of life and death, nay of more than either life or death. Yet must we be satisfied, in the first place because we have to be, no other means is at our control, and secondly, because, after all these things, tradition and superstition, are everything. Does not the belief in vampires rest for others, though not, alas! for us, on them! A year ago which of us would have received such a possibility, in the midst of our scientific, sceptical, matter-of-fact nineteenth century? We even scouted a belief that we saw justified under our very eyes. Take it, then, that the vampire, and the belief in his limitations and his cure, rest for the moment on the same base. For, let me tell you, he is known everywhere that men have been. In old Greece, in old Rome, he flourish in Germany all over, in France, in India, even in the Chermosese, and in China, so far from us in all ways, there even is he, and the peoples for him at this day. He have follow the wake of the berserker Icelander, the devil-begotten Hun, the Slav, the Saxon, the Magyar.
"So far, then, we have all we may act upon, and let me tell you that very much of the beliefs are justified by what we have seen in our own so unhappy experience. The vampire live on, and cannot die by mere passing of the time, he can flourish when that he can fatten on the blood of the living. Even more, we have seen amongst us that he can even grow younger, that his vital faculties grow strenuous, and seem as though they refresh themselves when his special pabulum is plenty.
"But he cannot flourish without this diet, he eat not as others. Even friend Jonathan, who lived with him for weeks, did never see him eat, never! He throws no shadow, he make in the mirror no reflect, as again Jonathan observe. He has the strength of many of his hand, witness again Jonathan when he shut the door against the wolves, and when he help him from the diligence too. He can transform himself to wolf, as we gather from the ship arrival in Whitby, when he tear open the dog, he can be as bat, as Madam Mina saw him on the window at Whitby, and as friend John saw him fly from this so near house, and as my friend Quincey saw him at the window of Miss Lucy.
"He can come in mist which he create, that noble ship's captain proved him of this, but, from what we know, the distance he can make this mist is limited, and it can only be round himself.
"He come on moonlight rays as elemental dust, as again Jonathan saw those sisters in the castle of Dracula. He become so small, we ourselves saw Miss Lucy, ere she was at peace, slip through a hairbreadth space at the tomb door. He can, when once he find his way, come out from anything or into anything, no matter how close it be bound or even fused up with fire, solder you call it. He can see in the dark, no small power this, in a world which is one half shut from the light. Ah, but hear me through.
"He can do all these things, yet he is not free. Nay, he is even more prisoner than the slave of the galley, than the madman in his cell. He cannot go where he lists, he who is not of nature has yet to obey some of nature's laws, why we know not. He may not enter anywhere at the first, unless there be some one of the household who bid him to come, though afterwards he can come as he please. His power ceases, as does that of all evil things, at the coming of the day.
"Only at certain times can he have limited freedom. If he be not at the place whither he is bound, he can only change himself at noon or at exact sunrise or sunset. These things we are told, and in this record of ours we have proof by inference. Thus, whereas he can do as he will within his limit, when he have his earth-home,his coffin-home, his hellhome, the place unhallowed, as we saw when he went to the grave of the suicide at Whitby, still at other time he can only change when the time come. It is said, too, that he can only pass running water at the slack or the flood of the tide. Then there are things which so afflict him that he has no power, as the garlic that we know of, and as for things sacred, as this symbol, my crucifix, that was amongst us even now when we resolve, to them he is nothing, but in their presence he take his place far off and silent with respect. There are others, too, which I shall tell you of, lest in our seeking we may need them.
"The branch of wild rose on his coffin keep him that he move not from it, a sacred bullet fired into the coffin kill him so that he be true dead, and as for the stake through him, we know already of its peace, or the cut off head that giveth rest. We have seen it with our eyes.
"Thus when we find the habitation of this man-that-was, we can confine him to his coffin and destroy him, if we obey what we know. But he is clever. I have asked my friend Arminius, of Buda-Pesth University, to make his record, and from all the means that are, he tell me of what he has been. He must, indeed, have been that Voivode Dracula who won his name against the Turk, over the great river on the very frontier of Turkey-land. If it be so, then was he no common man, for in that time, and for centuries after, he was spoken of as the cleverest and the most cunning, as well as the bravest of the sons of the `land beyond the forest.' That mighty brain and that iron resolution went with him to his grave, and are even now arrayed against us. The Draculas were, says Arminius, a great and noble race, though now and again were scions who were held by their coevals to have had dealings with the Evil One. They learned his secrets in the Scholomance, amongst the mountains over Lake Hermanstadt, where the devil claims the tenth scholar as his due. In the records are such words as `stregoica' witch, `ordog' and `pokol' Satan and hell, and in one manuscript this very Dracula is spoken of as `wampyr,'which we all understand too well. There have been from the loins of this very one great men and good women, and their graves make sacred the earth where alone this foulness can dwell. For it is not the least of its terrors that this evil thing is rooted deep in all good, in soil barren of holy memories it cannot rest."
We learn of his background, on page 389:
"I have studied, over and over again since they came into my hands, all the papers relating to this monster, and the more I have studied, the greater seems the necessity to utterly stamp him out. All through there are signs of his advance. Not only of his power, but of his knowledge of it. As I learned from the researches of my friend Arminius of Buda-Pesth, he was in life a most wonderful man. Soldier, statesman, and alchemist. Which latter was the highest development of the science knowledge of his time. He had a mighty brain, a learning beyond compare, and a heart that knew no fear and no remorse. He dared even to attend the Scholomance, and there was no branch of knowledge of his time that he did not essay.
I read a little about the anti-sexuality themes Stoker was trying to expound on in his novel. I might not have noticed it otherwise except in one case. On page 272 Stoker lays it on pretty thickly:
It was an answer that appalled the most sceptical of us, and we felt individually that in the presence of such earnest purpose as the Professor's, a purpose which could thus use the to him most sacred of things, it was impossible to distrust. In respectful silence we took the places assigned to us close round the tomb, but hidden from the sight of any one approaching. I pitied the others, especially Arthur. I had myself been apprenticed by my former visits to this watching horror, and yet I, who had up to an hour ago repudiated the proofs, felt my heart sink within me. Never did tombs look so ghastly white. Never did cypress, or yew, or juniper so seem the embodiment of funeral gloom. Never did tree or grass wave or rustle so ominously. Never did bough creak so mysteriously, and never did the far-away howling of dogs send such a woeful presage through the night.
There was a long spell of silence, big, aching, void, and then from the Professor a keen "S-s-s-s!" He pointed, and far down the avenue of yews we saw a white figure advance, a dim white figure, which held something dark at its breast. The figure stopped, and at the moment a ray of moonlight fell upon the masses of driving clouds, and showed in startling prominence a dark-haired woman, dressed in the cerements of the grave. We could not see the face, for it was bent down over what we saw to be a fair-haired child. There was a pause and a sharp little cry, such as a child gives in sleep, or a dog as it lies before the fire and dreams. We were starting forward, but the Professor's warning hand, seen by us as he stood behind a yew tree, kept us back. And then as we looked the white figure moved forwards again. It was now near enough for us to see clearly, and the moonlight still held. My own heart grew cold as ice, and I could hear the gasp of Arthur, as we recognized the features of Lucy Westenra. Lucy Westenra, but yet how changed. The sweetness was turned to adamantine, heartless cruelty, and the purity to voluptuous wantonness.
Van Helsing stepped out, and obedient to his gesture, we all advanced too. The four of us ranged in a line before the door of the tomb. Van Helsing raised his lantern and drew the slide. By the concentrated light that fell on Lucy's face we could see that the lips were crimson with fresh blood, and that the stream had trickled over her chin and stained the purity of her lawn death robe.
We shuddered with horror. I could see by the tremulous light that even Van Helsing's iron nerve had failed. Arthur was next to me, and if I had not seized his arm and held him up, he would have fallen.
When Lucy, I call the thing that was before us Lucy because it bore her shape, saw us she drew back with an angry snarl, such as a cat gives when taken unawares, then her eyes ranged over us. Lucy's eyes in form and color, but Lucy's eyes unclean and full of hell fire, instead of the pure, gentle orbs we knew. At that moment the remnant of my love passed into hate and loathing. Had she then to be killed, I could have done it with savage delight. As she looked, her eyes blazed with unholy light, and the face became wreathed with a voluptuous smile. Oh, God, how it made me shudder to see it! With a careless motion, she flung to the ground, callous as a devil, the child that up to now she had clutched strenuously to her breast, growling over it as a dog growls over a bone. The child gave a sharp cry, and lay there moaning. There was a cold-bloodedness in the act which wrung a groan from Arthur. When she advanced to him with outstretched arms and a wanton smile he fell back and hid his face in his hands.
She still advanced, however, and with a languorous, voluptuous grace, said, "Come to me, Arthur. Leave these others and come to me. My arms are hungry for you. Come, and we can rest together. Come, my husband, come!"
There was something diabolically sweet in her tones, something of the tinkling of glass when struck, which rang through the brains even of us who heard the words addressed to another.
As for Arthur, he seemed under a spell, moving his hands from his face, he opened wide his arms. She was leaping for them, when Van Helsing sprang forward and held between them his little golden crucifix. She recoiled from it, and, with a suddenly distorted face, full of rage, dashed past him as if to enter the tomb.
When within a foot or two of the door, however,she stopped, as if arrested by some irresistible force. Then she turned, and her face was shown in the clear burst of moonlight and by the lamp, which had now no quiver from Van Helsing's nerves. Never did I see such baffled malice on a face, and never, I trust, shall such ever be seen again by mortal eyes. The beautiful color became livid, the eyes seemed to throw out sparks of hell fire, the brows were wrinkled as though the folds of flesh were the coils of Medusa's snakes, and the lovely, blood-stained mouth grew to an open square, as in the passion masks of the Greeks and Japanese. If ever a face meant death, if looks could kill, we saw it at that moment.
And so for full half a minute, which seemed an eternity, se remained between the lifted crucifix and the sacred closing of her means of entry.
Van Helsing broke the silence by asking Arthur, "Answer me, oh my friend! Am I to proceed in my work?"
"Do as you will, friend. Do as you will. There can be no horror like this ever any more." And he groaned in spirit.
Quincey and I simultaneously moved towards him, and took his arms. We could hear the click of the closing lantern as Van Helsing held it down. Coming close to the tomb, he began to remove from the chinks some of the sacred emblem which he had placed there. We all looked on with horrified amazement as we saw, when he stood back, the woman, with a corporeal body as real at that moment as our own, pass through the interstice where scarce a knife blade could have gone. We all felt a glad sense of relief when we saw the Professor calmly restoring the strings of putty to the edges of the door.
When this was done, he lifted the child and said, "Come now, my friends. We can do no more till tomorrow. There is a funeral at noon, so here we shall all come before long after that. The friends of the dead will all be gone by two, and when the sexton locks the gate we shall remain. Then there is more to do, but not like this of tonight. As for this little one, he is not much harmed, and by tomorrow night he shall be well. We shall leave him where the police will find him, as on the other night, and then to home."
Notice that "voluptuous grace" is evil that only the crucifix can repel. Sexuality has turned her into a Medusa, a dangerous monster. |
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486 pages |
| 0-14-043406-2 |
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This product was released around 1897
by Penguin Classics
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I consumed this around January 2010 |
| More:
Dracula |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 3/20/2010 10:47:03 AM |
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Sledge Hammer ! - Season 2 |
Alan Spencer |
Something about season two just did not click. The timing on the physical humor and the one-liners was consistently late. A bunch of the shows are take offs of other popular movies. "A Clockwork Hammer" is based on A Clockwork Orange and Max Headroom. "Play it Again Sledge" is Cassablanca. Sledge plays Crocodile Dundee in "Death Of A Few Salesmen". "Hammer Hits The Rock" is like Cool Hand Luke. "Last Of The Red Hot Vampires" is a vampire themed episode. "Wild About Hammer" = Fatal Attraction. "Vertical" is Vertigo. "Hammeroid" is Robocop. One absolutely glaring inconsistency is that season one ended with everyone being killed in a nuclear blast. At the beginning of the second season a message says that this takes place five years in the past. However Doreau and Hammer are partners whereas they meet for the first time in season one.
I noticed appearances by David Leisure ("Joe Isuzu"), Kurt Fuller, and Robert Moll ("Bull" from Night Court). |
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30 minutes |
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This product was released around 1987
by ABC
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I consumed this around February 2010 |
| More:
Sledge Hammer ! - Season 2 |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 2/19/2010 6:58:34 PM |
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Is Our Children Learning? : The Case Against George W. Bush |
Paul Begala |
I was cleaning up my bookshelf a while ago when I found this book. My wife had read it an entire decade ago so I decided to thumb through it a couple of pages at a time. As you might expect coming from a Democratic political staffer, it's red meat. Begala tears into Bush's past business dealings, specifically the fact that connections rather than merit propelled him. On politics Begala notes Bush's weak record on education, the environment, social security, social safety nets, the poor, health care reform, and the death penalty. His foreign policy knowledge was embarrassing. His support of corporate buddies discouraging. Though not a racist, he failed to lead on race matters. Even on a position of his I support, gun rights, Bush's record is pretty extremely against any gun control. He touches on Bush's service in the Air National Guard in Texas (which he commends) and that in Alabama which helped him avoid Vietnam (which he doesn't commend). Dick Cheney's ultra-conservative record is exposed. The text is peppered with disparaging remarks towards Bush's intelligence under a veneer of playful language. Make no doubt about it, Begala may say he likes the man but his disdain for his policies is on full display.
Ultimately this book doesn't really stand the test of time. The facts hold up but 10 years later it's not really interesting. It's a booklet that was written during the campaign and came out later that campaign. These days it's a "Don't Vote for Bush" blog. At best it's good for a 135 pages of cringing as you realize America voted for George W. Bush ... twice. At least in the second election there was a war going on and Bush was the incumbent. It's hard to understand how Bush got past the first election. |
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135 pages |
| 0-7432-1478-1 |
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This product was released around September 2000
by Simon & Schuster
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I consumed this around February 2010 |
| More:
Is Our Children Learning? : The Case Against George W. Bush |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 2/16/2010 6:57:45 PM |
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The First Men in the Moon |
H.G. Wells |
Mr Bedford stumbles across an eccentric scientist, Dr. Cavor, who is trying to develop a substance that blocks out gravitation much like a wall will block out radiation. Cavor, only interested in the discovery, is urged on by Bedford, who sees the economic implications. Somehow with helium Cavor succeeds in producing "cavorite". Instead of finding ways to make money off of it, Cavor convinces Bedford to build a sphere with blinds that turn the cavorite on and off so that they may travel to the moon.
Bedford and Cavor arrive on the moon to find a desolate landscape. However as the sun comes up on the moon an atmosphere thaws out giving life to the surface. They find rapidly growing plant life that rises and falls in the two week span that is the lunar day. The scene of the moon's surface coming to life is fantastically fictionally 100 years after its publication. It can't be taken seriously as hard science fiction almost half a decade after humans walked on the moon. It's a look back into the old vision of space adventure in science fiction.
Eventually (chapter 10) they come across huge worm-like "mooncalves" that are herded by the subterranean "Selenites", the moon's intelligent life.
I can't help but thinking The First Men in the Moon is a dig on colonialism. Bedford and Cavor, lost and hungry, first encounter the Selenites right after eating an intoxicating fungus. Angrily they decide that the Selenites have wronged them. There is no indication that the Selenites want to fight or even know of the humans' presence yet with drunken bravado Bedford and Cavor decide to assert their dominance. They are fairly easily captured at this point and taken down below into the fantastic subterranean world the Selenites inhabit.
After learning a little about their bug-like captors, in chapter 13 - "Experiments in Intercourse" - Bedford, Cavor stumble along with the Selenites as the two species try to communicate. Soon though the failure to communicate comes to a head. Bedford and Cavor mistake what we later learn to be harmless actions as an attempt to send them to their deaths. The inability to connect proves fatal as the scared humans lash out and destroy the physically inferior (due to the moon's weak gravity) Selenites. They are chased through the caverns and tunnels of the Selenite land. Finally, chapter 16, they make a stand and, in a scene of sickening violence, utterly demolish a group of Selenites workers in an industrial zone.
For a minute perhaps it was massacre. I was too fierce to discriminate, and the Selenites were probably too scared to fight. At any rate they made no sort of fight against me. I saw scarlet, as the saying is. I remember I seemed to be wading among those leathery, thin things as a man wades through tall grass, mowing and hitting, first right, then left; smash. Little drops of moisture flew about. I trod on things that crushed and piped and went slippery. The crowd seemed to open and close and flow like water. They seemed to have no combined plan whatever. There were spears flew about me, I was grazed over the ear by one. I was stabbed once in the arm and once in the cheek, but I only found that out afterwards, when the blood had had time to run and cool and feel wet.
What Cavor did I do not know. For a space it seemed that this fighting had lasted for an age, and must needs go on for ever. Then suddenly it was all over, and there was nothing to be seen but the backs of heads bobbing up and down as their owners ran in all directions. ... I seemed altogether unhurt. I ran forward some paces, shouting, then turned about. I was amazed.
I had come right through them in vast flying strides, they were all behind me, and running hither and thither to hide.
I felt an enormous astonishment at the evaporation of the great fight into which I had hurled myself, and not a little exultation. It did not seem to me that I had discovered the Selenites were unexpectedly flimsy, but that I was unexpectedly strong. I laughed stupidly. This fantastic moon!
I glanced for a moment at the smashed and writhing bodies that were scattered over the cavern floor, with a vague idea of further violence, then hurried on after Cavor.
The Selenites are like blades of grass to Bedford. He has no connection to them so he squashes them like the bugs he sees them as.
When finally Bedford is back on Earth it is Cavor who is able to establish communication. He is captured but never turns aggressive. There was no way that the humans could have established communication with the lunars in their earlier attempt because they had come as conquistadors under Bedford's influence. The application of Cavor's well meaning science by Bedford's greedy imperialism spells disaster for the Selenite culture. Bedford, when times are tough, curses science for not preparing them for their journey (pg 77) and for not having a purpose (pg 116). It is obvious though that it is Bedford's drive for money, fame, and power that has set them on this course. While science contributes to their predicament it alone could not have lead them anywhere.
The final five chapters are a bit anticlimactic as Bedford is relaying transmissions from Cavor. He describes the infrastructure and technology of the inner moon. The culture is very segmented. Each being has a specific task that their bodies are bred for. Some have arms for fishing. Others herd mooncalves when they are needed and fall into a drug induced sleep when they are not. Some are raised like veel (pg 159) so that they can fit in and power appliances. There are dozens, maybe hundreds or thousands, of other types of Selenites all fitting into different niches. None of the citizens of the moon clamor for a better job or more power. All "know their place". In a jab at his industrial homeland Cavor quips:
That wretched-looking hand-tentacle sticking out of its jar seemed to have a sort of limp appeal for lost possibilities; it haunts me still, although, of course it is really in the end a far more humane proceeding than our earthly method of leaving children to grow into human beings, and then making machines of them.
Finally there is the ruling class, a group whose brains have grown far beyond the size of normal Selenites, are broken into three groups:
The unlimited development of the minds of the intellectual class is rendered possible by the absence of any body skull in the lunar anatomy, that strange box of bone that clamps about the developing brain of man, imperiously insisting 'thus far and no farther' to all his possibilities. They fall into three main classes differing greatly in influence and respect. There are administrators, of whom Phi-oo is one, Selenites of considerable initiative and versatility, responsible each for a certain cubic content of the moon's bulk; the experts like the football-headed thinker, who are trained to perform certain special operations; and the erudite, who are the repositories of all knowledge. To the latter class belongs Tsi-puff, the first lunar professor of terrestrial languages. With regard to these latter, it is a curious little thing to note that the unlimited growth of the lunar brain has rendered unnecessary the invention of all those mechanical aids to brain work which have distinguished the career of man. There are no books, no records of any sort, no libraries or inscriptions. All knowledge is stored in distended brains much as the honey-ants of Texas store honey in their distended abdomens. The lunar Somerset House and the lunar British Museum Library are collections of living brains...
The lunar king eventually sees the danger in allowing more humans to arrive so, despite his culture's awe of Earth, he squelches any further communications. |
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176 pages |
| none |
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This product was released around 1901
by Berkely Highland
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I consumed this around January 2010 |
| More:
The First Men in the Moon |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 2/6/2010 11:39:56 AM |
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MST3K - The Starfighters |
Will Zens |
This movie falls into the category of a movie so bad that it becomes hard to riff on. Manos: The Hands of Fate comes to mind. There's a low density of riffs early in the movie. Extensive and painful scenes showing take offs, refueling, and training pervade the movie. Mike and the bots exhaust all possible sexual innuendo riffs on the refueling, and then have extra refueling scenes to discuss their exhausting of the jokes. "Welcome to minute six of the refueling scene", sums up that aspect of the movie. Overall, "We're at the point where something's got to happen", sums up the entire movie. One riffer remarks that they've seen more nothing than in any other movie.
A water survival suit is called a "poopie suit" in the movie (this isn't a made up term, by the way). The crew has an easy time with that for the rest of the movie.
The best riff of the movie is when an instructor shows a model of a starfighter. Mike or a bot quips "get in". In The Simpsons Monty Burns made this same joke in "$pringfield (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Legalized Gambling)".
Segments:
- Crow fails to get onto the information superhighway.
- Crow is waiting for tech support. Mike and the bots introduce "red hot ricochet barbeque sauce" while the bosses invent ports that connect their minds.
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Servo refuels Crow like the aircraft in the movie. Crow misses tech support picking up the phone.
- Servo and Crow "debrief" Mike.
- Servo directs the United Servo Academy Men's Chorus.
- Crow finally logs onto the internet. Mike reads a letter.
(model) this is the starfigher...get in
This movie falls into the category of a movie so bad that it becomes hard to riff on. Manos: The Hands of Fate comes to mind. There's a low density of riffs early in the movie. Extensive and painful scenes showing take offs, refueling, and training pervade the movie. Mike and the bots exhaust all possible sexual innuendo riffs on the refueling, and then have extra refueling scenes to discuss their exhausting of the jokes. "Welcome to minute six of the refueling scene", sums up that aspect of the movie. Overall, "We're at the point where something's got to happen", sums up the entire movie. One riffer remarks that they've seen more nothing than in any other movie.
A water survival suit is called a "poopie suit" in the movie (this isn't a made up term, by the way). The crew has an easy time with that for the rest of the movie.
The best riff of the movie is when an instructor shows a model of a starfighter. Mike or a bot quips "get in". In The Simpsons Monty Burns made this same joke in "$pringfield (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Legalized Gambling)".
Segments:
- Crow fails to get onto the information superhighway.
- Crow is waiting for tech support. Mike and the bots introduce "red hot ricochet barbeque sauce" while the bosses invent ports that connect their minds.
-
Servo refuels Crow like the aircraft in the movie. Crow misses tech support picking up the phone.
- Servo and Crow "debrief" Mike.
- Servo directs the United Servo Academy Men's Chorus.
- Crow finally logs onto the internet. Mike reads a letter.
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2 hours |
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This product was released around 1964
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I consumed this around January 2010 |
| More:
MST3K - The Starfighters |
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Posted by: Jeff Egnaczyk at: 2/3/2010 5:43:42 PM |
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