Category: Movies

  • Personal Review: Batman Movies (1989 to 1997)

    My daughter is very big into superhero movies right now. Not sure how long this will last, but for now, I am happy to indulge her fandom. We have been through all the MCU movies, and we even did Superman (1978) and Superman II (1980), but pretty much fell off from the rest of the DC Universe. Then about two weeks ago, one of the kids at the playground was playing “Batman” and my daughter asked if there are any Batman movies. Well, it was time for my kid to learn about the wild world of Batman from 1989 to 1997; Batman, Batman Returns, Batman Forever, and Batman & Robin.

    Batman (1989): Out of these four movies, undoubtedly the best, and I would add that without this movie, there would have never been an MCU. It pretty much started the “serious” superhero movie. I will add that Michael Keaton is my favorite Batman. Sure, it might have to do with the fact that I saw this movie three times in the theater over the summer of 1989. The kid liked it, but didn’t get how Batman and the Joker “made” each other. I still have an issue with the Joker being able to shoot down the Batwing with one bullet. Either the Joker is a great shot, or the Batwing has some serious defects.

    Batman Returns (1992): The first question the kid asked as the movie started was if Joker was going to be in this one. I think that bodes well that Jack was a great Joker. For me, it felt like Burton was more interested in the villains than Batman, such as Batman was an afterthought. The kid liked it but wanted to know how Catwoman got her cat powers; magic, tech, or mutant? I’m not really sure. I will say that this movie does have a very slight touch of campy to it, which was a harbinger for the rest of the series.

    Batman Forever (1995):  The kid did not like it. She didn’t understand why Robin was a superhero, nor know who Two-Face was, and why The Riddler became an evil supervillain? Also, she really could not follow what the story was. For me, and I like Val Kilmer, but it seemed like Val was taking the role serious, and everyone else was camping it up. It also had a James Bond feeling of an ending, whereas the good guy goes to the secret lair to defeat the henchmen and the bad guy in a huge set that blows up. The movie was going in several different directions, never feeling like there was a cohesive style throughout. And then there was that “Bat Butt” shot, that my kid picked up on and laughed, and laughed, and laughed, and laughed…

    Batman & Robin (1997): Well… you know. It’s a mess, but we all know it’s a mess. About thirty minutes into the picture, my kid asked me if we had to finish it. Yes, I said, because this will make you a funnier person! Watching the movie, I don’t think there was a single idea that was shot down, everything went in it. And the puns. This movie might be the reason I hate puns so much.

    Now that we are done with these Batman movies, that will be it for the time being. The Christopher Nolan Batman movies are great, but just too adult for the kid right now. She needs to the good guy to win without question, but she is now beginning to understand that some movies are good, and some movies are bad. What I really hope happens next is that she learns to love bad movies.

  • Watching Movies

    I’m a big movie fan, and I especially love awful, really bad movies. As a huge MST3k fan, that should come as no surprise. But, I still remember the wonder, and awe of going to see “Empire Strikes Back” in a theater with my dad and brothers. When I think back on it, it was like I won the lottery with “Empire” being my first movie. It set the bar pretty high.

    I also love sharing the movies that I grew up watching with my daughter. Some movies hold up really well, and some were not as good as I thought they were. But not all 80’s movies for kids are created equal. I’m not sure my six-year old daughter is ready for a melting Nazi.

    And today, I started to wonder when I can start watching dramas with her. You know, grown up dramas where what all the adults do is talk a lot, and the movie usually ends hopeful, but also a little sad. You know, like “Ordinary People,” Chariots of Fire,” “The Verdict” “The Big Chill” “Places in the Heart” “A Room with a View” “Broadcast News” “The Accidental Tourist” and “Dead Poets Society.”  

    When I was growing up, we didn’t get cable, but we got a VCR, and rented movies. My parents would rent a movie for us boys, usually an action movie like “Jaws” or “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” and then the parents would rent a grownup movie, like from the list above. And out of all of those movies, the first one that I remember sitting through, and not leaving after the first boring talkie ten minutes, was “The Accidental Tourist,” which when I think about it, was an odd choice for 11 year old me to sit through, and enjoy.

  • Personal Review: Cocktail (Film, 1988)

    There is a winding path to this story, so hang in there and follow me. And I guess I should also say; SPOILERS!

    Last night, the wife and I watched Cocktail, the 1988 Tom Cruise epic of bartending and love in NYC and Jamaica. I knew full well going into this movie that it wasn’t good, but I had never finished it. Maybe I had seen about half of it, but that would have been about 1990 or 1991 when we got a free preview of HBO on cable. Anyway, the wife was kidding me about not knowing how the film ends, and I joked, “What, does Tom win a bar tending competition in the end?”

    I was correct, in that I had seen about half of it, up to the point to where the movie moves to Jamaica. Anyway, I’m not going to kick this movie as we all know it’s not very good, but when film makes the hard right turn and Bryan Brown’s character commits suicide, my response was “Really?”

    “And you thought there was going to be a bartending competition?” my wife added with laughter.

    That having been said, it still was what I thought it would be; something to watch and don’t think too hard about it. Sure, maybe if the story stayed lite, not so much spurn the rich parent cliché, or my friend’s death make me change my life trope, and had a bar tending competition, and there was a bad guy “corporate” bartender who had no soul, who didn’t really “get” what bartending was all about… I mean, every bar movie can’t be Roadhouse, but still, you know, the little guy beating the big guy is always a crowd pleaser.

    But, to be honest, I needed to watch a movie like Cocktail last night. I couldn’t do another round of outrage news, or political comedy from Colbert or Seth. I needed a clearly silly escape after everything that has happened; a year of Covid, an election, people ignoring medical guidance, and everything else that seems to be a harbinger of the end of the world. I actually needed to see pretty people make mixed drinks in the Caribbean, and witness their very melodramatic reactions to life. And in the end, it all works out.

    So, maybe I will watch Roadhouse tonight.

  • Revisiting Paul Simon’s “One-Trick Pony” – Film and Album

    I had trouble sleeping the other night, and thought it would be fun to revisit an old movie that I hadn’t seen in years; One-Trick Pony, staring and written by Paul Simon from 1980. The reason the movie popped into my head was that one of the songs from the soundtrack popped up on a playlist the other day. (The soundtrack, made up of original Paul Simon songs for the movie, is excellent, but more on that in a bit.)  Though I love this movie, it’s not a particularly good movie.

    To sum up, the movie is about a fictional one-hit-wonder singer/songwriter, Jonah Levin, in the late 70’s dealing with divorce, career disappointment, and general male midlife crisis where things didn’t work out the way he thought. I wouldn’t say this movie is autobiographical, though Simon in real life was dealing with a divorce, and switching record labels. For me, I see Jonah Levin to Paul Simon the same as Kilgore Trout to Kurt Vonnegut; a reflection by the artist as to who they would have been if they weren’t successful artists in real life.

    When watching One-Trick Pony again, I was struck by how tired everyone in the movie is, and feels. In context, the film was released in 1980, but was filmed in 1979, and most likely was written in 1977/78, which means America was coming out of the end of the Vietnam War, Watergate, the energy crisis, economic downturn, and the Iran Hostage Crisis. In the 1970’s, America went from crisis to crisis, and by the end of the decade, I think people just wanted normalcy and stability. This is what I see reflected in the movie, even to the point of having an unhealthy nostalgia for the 60’s.

    The reason I would say that you should check out the movie is the music. The scenes of Jonah’s band playing are the highlight of the film, as these are the musicians who actually did record and tour with Simon in real life. One of the songs from the movie “Late in the Evening” was a hit for Simon, and has appeared on several greatest hits compilations, but the rest of the songs on the soundtrack are rarely heard today. It’s too bad as “One-Trick Pony” and “Ace in the Hole” are truly great songs. Also, when looking at Simon’s catalogue of music, the One-Trick Pony album does mark the end of his 70’s sound, as his next album Hearts and Bones went in a new, more modern synthesizer sound that would dominate the 80’s.

    I still find One-Trick Pony as an entertaining movie, though it has a few inconsistencies. Some of the acting can come off as wooden, and all the female characters seem to only exist to support the male characters, which does make the narrative feel very dated. Yet, I found myself identifying with the themes of the movie; the onset of middle age, wondering if the best years are behind you, and learning that the way you have been living just can continue forever. All thoughts I have been contemplating while in lockdown.

  • Balancing Writing and Parenting:A Conversation with Playwright Isaac Rathbone

    Here is an interview with my friend, Isaac Rathbone, who is a playwright and screenwriter, conducted by Boomerang Theatre Artistic Director Tim Errickson. Their discussion is about the balance of writing and parenting.