Stop Frame

Sit back, relax, join me in a thought exercise. Normally I’d ask you to close your eyes, but if you did that you couldn’t read the instructions. Imagine you are sent to a foreign city, somewhere you’ve never been. It can be for most any reason: business, pleasure, etc. You are given a map that shows you the route from the airport to the hotel where you’ll be staying. So equipped, you start walking on your way. Over halfway to your destination, you face a long stretch of dark streets. You can see, off in the distance, the lights of your destination. Between you and it, though, all is dark. You have no choice, there is no other way, you must proceed along those dark streets to reach your destination. You step into the dark. Imagine how you would feel. Imagine the emotions racing through your mind. Imagine how your senses would expand, how you would begin to pay more attention. Imagine how alert your senses might become, attentive for any sound of danger, ready to react in response to...

Seriously. I’m San Francisco born and bred, though I currently live in the Sacramento Valley. I’ve spent my entire life in California. I’ve visited hither and yon and have always returned to the Golden State. I like it here. If you’re a motorcyclist, you’re never too far from a great riding road. If you like the sea, you’re never too far from the ocean, or some vast lake. If you like the mountains, well say hello to the Sierra Nevadas. If you like the desert, it’s right down there, and if you prefer gentle rolling hills, no problem. Love cities? Fine, we can accommodate that, too. Bright lights, big city, welcome to this corner’s Starbucks, better than the next. And did I mention movie stars, glitz, and glamour? And politics? Oh, boy, do we have politics. Which is the problem. California politics aren’t just left-wing – and they’re not even extremely left-wing if you really look at them – they are insane. There is a complete sense of disconnect from reality. “Let us initiate ...

Debbie Schussel calls it depraved . Kyle Smith calls it brilliant . Barbara Nicolosi walked out . John Nolte likes it and Movie Bob thinks it may be better than The Dark Knight . A friend went to see it during its opening weekend; she was utterly confused. Meanwhile, her daughter walked out. I’ve finally seen Watchmen and I think it may be brilliant. Hard to say, though. I’ve read the Alan Moore graphic novel. This gives me an advantage over the average viewer, but I think anyone paying attention can easily follow along. The problem for the average viewer, though, is that they’ll go in expecting to see another comic book, action hero thriller, e.g., Iron Man or Spider Man . Surprise, it ain’t! Let me get some negatives out of the way. Watchmen reaches new depths of excess. One of the things I found truly imaginative about The Dark Knight was how it didn’t show us things. It was stuffed to the eyeballs with violence, but blood didn’t spray across the screen, we didn’t...

Angst - Focusing on anxiety that leaves the character full of doubt and uncertainty. The new (and reportedly final) trailer for the upcoming Star Trek is online at Apple trailers . Check it out here . The film is due in theaters 5/8/09. This trailer simply rocks, for the first time making me excited about seeing the film. And yet, I can’t help being apprehensive. I’ve been a Trekkie since before there was such a thing. I watched the very first episode when it very first aired way back when. I watched the salt vampire try and suck Kirk dry, saw Spock attempt to smack it around, and saw McCoy blast it into eternity. I was hooked. Despite that, and my continued love of the show and several of the movies it spawned (everybody scream, “ Khan! ”), I’m not so fanatical as to object to any change. From what I’ve gleaned of the plot for this film, it sounds pretty intriguing. A Romulan is apparently more than a little pissed at how things have turned out for his planet. To correct t...

I know Taken has been out for a few weeks, but what can I say? I’m always late to the new release party. I have no excuse. What I do have are a particular set of skills. You know, sometimes it’s just fun to watch bad guys get the crap kicked out of them for no other reason than they are bad. Some people are very good at doing just that. Skills I have acquired over a lifetime. And at the same time, it’s fun to watch one of your favorite actors take on the role of the ass kicker. For example, it was all kinds of awesome watching Charles Bronson at work in Death Wish . It was amazing watching the hunters (muggers) become the prey. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. Here, that actor is Liam Neeson , someone I’ve enjoyed watching since I first saw him as an Irish terrorist on Miami Vice . He’s a marvel at playing a suave gentleman, whose face can be open and warm one moment, then close, frozen, and lethal in the next. Here, he plays a tired and re...

Today marks the 47th anniversary of John Glenn ’s flight into space. Last Friday was Chuck Yeager ’s 86th birthday. To celebrate both, it was only natural that I watch The Right Stuff . Written and directed by Philip Kaufman (from the book by Tom Wolfe ), the film chronicles the early days of the United States manned space effort. Like the book, however, it starts with test pilots, specifically Chuck Yeager. In 1947, the US is looking for a way to break the sound barrier. They design an experimental rocket plane, the X-1, which they believe is the right tool for the job. Now they just need a pilot, and they find Yeager. Kaufman, at the time a San Francisco Bay Area-based independent filmmaker, successfully made what is almost an anti-epic epic. While a big-screen production in every way, The Right Stuff has a certain gritty, indie film vibe to it. The majority of the film was done in the SF Bay Area. Kaufman sought, as much as possible, to use locations that were a close match to...

But before I get to that, let me say this: I don’t really like horror films. Tonight reminded me why. Christian Toto wrote encouragingly about two: Rogue and Eden Lake . I saw Rogue a couple of weeks ago and held off writing about until I’d seen Eden Lake . Well, that was tonight. Rogue is one of the best man-versus-seriously-nasty-beast films since, well, Jaws . What’s startling is that very little happens during the first 30 minutes or so, yet I was staring at my screen in rapt attention. It’s damn near a travelogue for the Northern Territory of Australia. It’s mind-bogglingly beautiful, yet somehow, amidst all this light and beauty, in wide open spaces, claustrophobia builds, a sense of dread creeps in, and in a splash, a man disappears and no one know how. He’s just…gone. Like Bruce the shark, the crocodile in Rogue is within the realm of the possible. What makes the situation horrifying is that the creature’s motivation is simple: Humans have invaded his territory and he ...