It's been about two years since I've done any reviews, but here goes. I've been watching some popular movies that I hadn't previously bothered with just so I can understand some popular culture references better. And I m ight as well review some books I read last summer too.
The Hangover
Pretty classic movie about four guys who get drunk and black out during a night in Vegas and have to deal with the confusing consequences of their actions which they don't remember. The protagonist (Doug) is supposed to be getting married soon, but in the morning they can't find him. I call him the protagonist because he is the least eccentric character and the most relatable, he is the first to be introduced and the plot centres on his life situation.
However, his role (or lack thereof) is probably what sets this movie apart from others of its genre. Despite being the "main" character, most of the movie has him out of action and the interactions of the secondary characters is what carries the plot. Usually these movies have a character that the audience is supposed to relate to, and the presence of this more sane character creates a stabilizing effect on the plot so that the antics of the more eccentric support characters don't completely derail a story's basic structure (although these movies are usually meant to feel crazy and unstable). Getting rid of this character is like taking off a safety belt, and I think the movie was better for it.
One time, someone told me I reminded them of the little bearded guy (I only remember Doug's name, I know the beard guy's actor's name is Zach but I don't remember how to spell his last name) and I didn't know what to think. Now I watched the movie and I still don't know what to think. The weird loner guy that's not originally part of the group of friends, but grows on people. At the time, I was coming back from Mali and wearing my robes, sat across from a business guy. He decided to make conversation, I told him a few stories and he got scared and confused, thinking that I had gotten married and legally changed my name when I was abroad. Couple of younger people across the way overheard and made conversation with me when we got off the train in Guelph. They seemed admiring and the guy said I reminded him of the little beard guy from The Hangover.
In context I guess it makes sense because of the beard, the shameless tone, and the disjointed storytelling. But I'm way cooler than that little beard guy.
The Dark Knight Rises
I've watched The Dark Knight but didn't bother with this one. It opened with such an obvious twist. Some people capture a notorious villain's henchmen with bags over their heads, then one of the henchmen gets sassy and when the captor pulls off the bag, it turns out to be the villain. The Joker opened with almost the same twist... posing as one of his henchmen.
It was weird how Catwoman never gets called by her supervillain name, but she's called a cat burglar, she makes cat puns, and she has a super suit with cat ears. I guess they felt the name clashed with the grim feel of the movie.... But Batman still keeps his name.
I didn't think that prison that Bane was from seemed so bad. I question his whole "I didn't see light until I was already a man" spiel. First off, he wasn't the child who was born in there, so he must have been sentenced there and would probably have seen light beforehand... Secondly, the whole gimmick of the prison is that it's beneath the ground and there's a large tunnel that goes directly up, shining light down on everyone beneath it. The light of hope and simplicity of scaling the wall, but incapacity to follow through and escape is what the psychological torture is supposed to be... But since it shows light to the prisoners, Bane's claim of not having seen light down there is false.
They also have food and TV down there. And the community seemed supportive (so long as you're not a woman).
One of Bane's stations was in West Africa, and they mention the Tuaregs. Wonder if they're in Mali. Maybe those veiled guys were supposed to be Tuaregs.
Martial arts trumps firearrms so much it's ridiculous, but I guess that's not new in this genre.
It was cool that that scrappy cop guy (I don't remember names) turned out to be Robin.
All in all I thought it was kind of boring. I think The Joker's mocking attitude alleviated me of the urge to take the last movie too seriously. Bane's funny but has less of a light-hearted feel, which compels me to examine things more critically and then I get hung up on small things.
Good Omens
Collaborative effort of Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchet. It's about the end of the world, and an angel and a demon trying to stop it. For some reason, I paid a lot of attention to that Witchhunter Private, waiting for him to do anything of significance. At the end, I said something to the effect that his only contribution was having a car and driving Anathema (descendant of a significant prophet) around. I was then challenged to indicate what any of the main characters except for Adam and his gang had on the plot, including the two main characters, Crowley and Azeraphale. I couldn't really come up with anything concrete.
The main characters and supporting characters were all shaped by the plot, but the plot wasn't necessarily shaped by them. I was too hard on the Witchhunter Private, because even his role as a driver was insignificant because Anathema was ultimately insignificant as well.
I wasn't too fond of their idea of replacing Pestilence with Pollution. I mean, I understand that Pollution is a greater concern right now, but look at how creative they got with Famine. They managed to blame our obesity epidemic on him by saying he was starving people of nutrients, even while he was feeding them. They could have swung it like pollution belonged to Pestilence because pollution is a contagious disease of the earth. And his counterpart in the younger Four Horsemen was the least involved as well. What was it? Adam, Pepper, Wensleydale, and... Brian? Adam is the antichrist, Pepper's a hot-blooded young tomboy, Wensleydale's an overly-mature nerdish boy and Brian... Brian is a little bit messy. He just didn't add anything.
I caught the Four Horsemen theme... I think at the second introduction, with Famine, before anyone was named. I caught the parallels between Adams gang and the Four Horsemen real early on, and matched the counterparts.
War starts out in a peaceful West African nation and delivers a bunch of weapons so that it gets caught up in civil war. Probably Mali...
The book is really good at injecting little side things that you can pick up on, like with Elvis being mentioned to work in a burger joint and then later they run into him without really mentioning his name. Stuff like that.
It was generally a fun book.
The Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul
Fun, dry British humour type book by Richard Adams, same guy who did The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, although I never read that series. I think he was kind of a pioneer in writing in the style that Gaiman and Pratchett do. This book is about ancient gods and how they've adapted to modern society.
Generally good but they but I think he got sick of writing it and ended it too quickly. Built up a lot of mystery, and then kind of waved it away near the end. What was up with the kid with the television who broke Dirk's nose? He was so odd and I know they didn't forget about him because Dirk mentions that a good deal of his damage was done by a little boy near the end. He was in the house of the first guy to get killed and I don't think they even explained his relation to him.
Then there were those weird themes... The eagle that was out to get Dirk, that was shown to be trying to show Dirk the patterns on it's wings... It's peculiar behaviour watching Dirk, trying to get into the house, slamming itself against the door until it nearly damaged itself... Turned out to be a magically shifted fighter jet by Thor. Why would a jet be interested in Dirk?
The Coca-Cola machine Thor was lugging around with him? Turned out to be the airline receptionist that he accidentally transformed. That's fine, but like the bird, the mystery surrounding such a bizarre plotpoint and the insistence of mentioning it frequently comes out disappointing when it's put down to a random occurence that matches the same reason for the other unexplained plotpoints.
The hot potato thing was left ambiguous, and Toe Rag and the Green Eyed Monster was left ambiguous... and the refrigerator and it's Guilt God was certainly unexpected but also very much left to the reader's interpretation.
Basically, it was a fun journey and the mysteries were built up well, but there were so many solutions slapped down so hard and so fast right at the end, that it felt like Adams just wanted to be done with the book.
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