So one shiny bright day my friend informed me that the hoidy toidy theatre up the street had installed an IMAX system into one of their theatres and just by chance that happened to be the week after the weekend premiere of the new Star Trek film! So off we went with his sister and her wife in tow for an evening of very sharp and quite loud entertainment.

So Star Trek it was and I was mighty excited to go see it! There had been nothing but good reviews and good word of mouth and I plunged into it fully expecting to be fully entertained with a roller coaster of entertaining 'splosions, witty dialogue, cutting edge effects, great characters, and some rather taut action scenarios. 

Unfortunately I really did not enjoy the film.

What went wrong? Why did so many people overwhelmingly enjoy this film while I just thought it was a big boring loud snoozefest? It's not as if I have these heavenly standards that can only be met by broadly paced esoteric foreign films. I enjoy watching Judge Dredd for goodness sakes!

I suppose I should state for the record that I'm not a big Trekkie-type person so I don't have any holy canon issues with the material or the characters. Sure, sure...I enjoyed the series when I was young but it's nothing that I have a deep emotional connection to in any way. The idea of a fresh more visceral approach to the genre sounded mighty fine to me.

Right out of the gate I was fine. Jumping into the chaotic action of the film was a really nice approach and it was nice to see some of that Battlestar Galactic aesthetic jump in there with the mixing of the intensity of the battle with the cold and silent embrace of the surrounding space. Unfortunately that was the moment when things slowly began to spiral downwards for me and I slowly began to lose interest bit by bit.

I really feel that other than Spock that Abrams just has no idea what drives the characters and doesn't really want to bother to develop them in any sort of natural way. Kirk, instead of being a intelligent wise-ass, is just an ass who seems to demonstrate very little intelligence most of the time and he just seems to run around being a huge ass, running around in a state of panic, or getting the holy hell beaten out of him (really did you notice how often he gets beat down in this film?. When he cheats on the Kobayashi test and is confronted by Spock in front of the conference I expected some sort of great exchange between the two, but instead the moment just faded.

Also -- Kirk was raised in Iowa right? Where the hell did the Grand Canyon come from that he drove his stepfather's car into? 

I really thought that the framing and many of the action scenes were poorly shot. Abrams still seems to think he's filming a TV show and has too many characters way too close to the camera and then employs the jitter camera quite liberally and as a result actions are at times confusing and hard to follow. 

There were a few characters I enjoyed. Karl Urban was bloody hilarious as McCoy and I really enjoyed him a great deal. I thought the Zachary Quinto was scary good as Spock and really enjoyed his portrayal of the character. He conveyed a high intelligence and carried himself with the proper airs, but you could just feel this feral presence in his character and you were ready to him to just explode. The internal struggle between his mind and his heart was a refreshing change from what I felt was a mainly cardboard cast. 

I understand the point behind the reboot. Abrams thought that Star Trek was too wordy and I thought it would be nice change of pace from the child-like humanitarianism that Roddenberry tends to espouse in most of his works. Just take the characters and thrust them into a giant space opera action fest! Sounds good no?

Unfortunately I think he went too far and I really felt that I was watching Star Wars by way of Star Trek. There were these random shots at bars or at station where suddenly you would see a quick shot of a super odd alien thing and then it's gone and off we'd go to another adventure. Then there's always that odd sidekick of Scotty's.  It all just seemed terribly out of place despite my love for iconoclasm. 

Scenes just seemed to present themselves for no reason other than the director's desire to create an action scene. Why was Kirk dropped off at a remote ice planet when there are plenty of solitary brigs on their ships? Why did a giant out of place creature that looks like a reject from Cloverfield grab a nice mouthful of a meal and then throw it aside just so it could chase this tiny, tiny human being all over hill and dale? 

And like the serial films that inspired Star Wars it all just seemed terribly shallow and lighthearted with very little real threat behind every situation of terror. Any time  a situation arose that would complicate things *bam* some deus ex machina type device, skill, or technology would present itself to fix it all up nice and shiny! All that neat fixin' just took all the tension away from pretty much every scene and it all just seemed rather sloppy.

Then there's this weird obsession with the need to have giant over-powered ships in science fiction movies. They are fine if explained and introduced properly. But I'm supposed to believe that the Romulans built a mining ship that's the size of a small planet? How could they possible run a ship that size? And how is a mining ship a mere 100 years in the future and retro-fitted with some missles so incredibly powerful that Federation war ships can't take it down?

In the end I just ended up feeling empty and hollow after watching this film. I liked Spock and Bones and I really liked the unexpected dynamic between Spock and Uhura. I was puzzled by her commands to him earlier in the film about what ship she was going to board and then laughed when I realized what was going on.

But overally I just didn't like the film. Adding a visceral kinesis to what a is generally a rather stoic universe was an interesting idea, but without the conviction that the threats are a real hurdle to overcome in the end it just felt cheap. Much like the serials it is emulating, the revelation of the solution tends to be largely unsatisfying -- and so was I. 

Title - Wendy and Lucy (2008 )

Director - Kelly Reichardt

Country - U.S

Plot - "A woman's life is derailed en route to a potentially lucrative summer job. When her car breaks down, and her dog is taken to the pound, the thin fabric of her financial situation comes apart, and she is led through a series of increasingly dire economic decisions."

I went into this movie blind not knowing anything about the director or the plot and I was quite pleased to be thoroughly affected by this film. It only clocks in at 80 minutes but the broad slow pace of the movie and the intensity of the main character's struggle left quite a lasting impression upon me and stuck with me for days. 

That may sound a bit misleading however as the movie is not a series of intense dramatic struggles in the traditional movie sense. Rather it's a series of increasingly difficult situations that play out quite naturally and logically but still manage to drag you deeper into the character as you become more and more involved with her struggles to survive. 

In a world filled with movies full of cutting edge special effects it's always nice to come back to the indie world of film making and revel in a more character driven vehicle. But the indie world is an easy trap to fall into as it can be an easy cop out to dismiss big budget films despite their relative value and embrace the smaller film for its ability to offer something different. 

But this isn't just a different film for the sake of it being small in scope and simple on plot. I feel it's special as it is a film completely free of superfluous scenes. Every moment you experience with Wendy, every situation she is involved in, every conversation she has, every second of her travel is incredibly vital to the viewer in the terms of expanding your knowledge of Wendy and the problems she is facing as well as the decisions she has to make. 

Yet the film is more than just a character study of a young woman. It's also makes a very understated but very powerful social statement about the economic nature of our world and the quiet and desperate struggles that some people have to make just to stay alive. The movie demonstrates how easily a person who has enough to scrape by, as so many people these days live, can easily have their lives upended by a very few small figurative potholes in the road. How close are so many of us from being homeless? And if we do become homeless, are we now non-persons as so many homeless people are generally perceived?

The acting by Michelle Williams is just flat out great. Far from a stand out overly dramatic role, she keeps her emotions well in check yet you can see the panic in her face and in her body movement whenever things start to take a turn for the worse. Her sense of calm panic are nigh palpable and pull you very close into the character as she desperately strives for a way to correct everything going wrong and get her life back on track.

In the end Wendy has to make some very tough decisions that will stick with you, and perhaps cause you to weep, as well as make you concerned for the character long after the movie has ended. The movie is peppered with great small characters all who are just trying to get by in their life and yet you can also see how they could easily end up in Wendy's shoes if the same few things went wrong in their lives. 

A great perfect gem of a film. 

Well...okay that's a bit hyperbolic of me, it's a very good gem of a film and one which I highly recommend. 

Fun fact - Lucy the dog is played by Lucy the dog who is owned by the director and co-writer of the film. 

Title - Circle of Iron (1978 )

Director - Richard Moore

Country - U.S. 

Plot - "In an ancient, mythic land, a martial arts warrior named Cord (Jeff Cooper) fights in a hand-to-hand combat tournament. The winner will be allowed to seek out "The Book," which is fabled to enable its reader to be the world's supreme martial artist. Cord wins and eventually is the man who must find Kitan, the keeper of "The Book." While on this quest, Cord must face several trials before being deemed worthy of meeting Kitan."

Dwelling upon David Carradine's recent departure from this world I wondered what I could watch to pay some sort of small homage to his passing if only in my tiny apartment. Kill Bill? Too obvious and too new for reflective attempt. The Long Riders? Too many other big name actors taking up the spotlight? Boxcar Bertha? That might be nice but I never did pick up a DVD of that movie and I failed to tape it the last time it was broadcast. Death Race 2000 was poised on my shelf ready for another viewing but then something clicked in my head "Circle of Iron?".

Hmmmmm.....why not?

The origin of this movie has a famous pedigree although some of dubious origin. It was originally an idea put forth by Bruce Lee and his student the great James Coburn. Then there's some conflict as to whether Bruce Lee abandoned the project or whether he just never got around to finishing it before his untimely death. Regardless, after Lee's death the project was picked up and the script was retooled into what eventually became "Circle of Iron" starring a very different sort of main character in the form of a fantasy barbarian looking Jeff Cooper.

The movie has some impressive talent packed within its sparse walls. Christopher Lee as the ominious Kitan, Roddy McDowell as one of the white robe keepers, & Eli Wallach as a very odd man with a lesson to teach by creating a very unusual solution to a very common spiritual problem. But their appearances are fairly brief and generally underused and they are almost a distraction in what overall is a fairly listless movie. 

David Carradine however really takes command of the film by playing four different characters throughout the film. He plays a nameless blind flute playing wiseman who confuses and challenges Kord with his actions and words as he desperately attempts to grasp the lessons he is being taught. He plays the main foe of the film Changsha the warlord who attempts to goad Kord onto the wrong path in order to test him to see if he is indeed ready to face him in combat. Then he plays a couple of odd side beings one being Death Panther, which I assume represents fear that Kord must overcome, and a monkey guardian which I assume represents the basic feral instincts of man that Kord must also master.

As you might have grasp this is not so much a martial arts film as it is an attempt to introduce the basic precepts of Taoism and Eastern thinking to a Western audience by way of a film packaged as a martial arts epic. Unfortunately the dull acting by its lead actor and sleep inducing pace that the film lumbers along at make this more of a Taoist movie for dummies which only serves to numb one's interest in the whole precedings. 

Then there's the martial arts action. Straight out of bad '80s film the martial arts presented in the typical Western "movement for moment's sake" fare in which no really special or interesting moves are demonstrated, but whenever the predetermined winner does the most basic of motions the effects are trule devastating to the opponent. Very frustrating especially considering the movies origins and the types of film they were making over in China at the time. 

So why waste your time talking about a particularly odd, but still very bad martial arts film? Well it all has to do with Mr. Carradine. Despite the rather dreamlike pace of the film, when Carradine is there I still find myself interested in what his characters have to say. His commitment to a very bad movie pull this rotten apple off of the ground and places it squarely into the Cult status -- in a good way. Sure there's lots of bad things one could say about this film, but yet I still find Mr. Carradine's perfomance oddly compelling throughout the entirety of the film. 

He could have just sleep-walked his way through the movie and collected his paycheck and gone home. But instead he brought the goods and I believe that's why this film is still known today albeit as a rather odd duck. To me this is why I will miss David Carradine. He may not have always been in the best of films, but when he was hired he did give it his all and that's why a crappy movie like this is a testament to a very interesting man. 

I will miss you Mr. Carradine. 

Title - The Last American Hero (1973)

Director - Lamont Johnson

Country - U.S.A. 

Plot -"Junior Jackson (Jeff Bridges) runs moonshine for his family but goes into stock car racing when the feds put his father Elroy (Art Lund) in prison for a year. Starting with the local demolition derby, Junior runs smack into cheapskate promoters like Hackel (Ned Beatty) who doesn't respect a man on his way up. After success driving his own Mustang, Junior moves up to serious stock car racing in a Chevy and breaks into the highly "organized" big time as an independent. He goes nose-to-nose with Burton Colt, a pro racing owner (Ed Lauter) who insists on telling Junior how to race and won't let him use his own crew, which includes Junior's brother Wayne (Gary Busey). Adding to Junior's confusion is track secretary Marge (Valerie Perrine), a cutie who thinks Junior the best thing she ever met -- when she's not sleeping with Kyle Kingman (William Smith), Junior's top competition."

  I'm not sure if it's just childhood nostalgia hitting me hard as of late as I take stock in my life and what I have wrought but I find it increasingly hard to turn away from films from the '70s. Perhaps it's just some misplaced hope of revisiting my youth and correcting a few things but perhaps it's just the realization that I think I really missed a lot of things as I was running around digging holes in dirt and hunting for snakes. This film is one of those missed items whose existence of which I was completely ignorant.

  Although disguised as a race car movie, it's really a study of a man reconciling with his father whose advice he constantly spurns and reconciling with the world that he needlessly rebels against without betraying his own sense of morality. Although there are a lot of big names to be found in the film, their perfomances are remarkably understated in keeping with the director's wishes which meshes well with the non-actors used to play a number of bit parts throughout the film. 

  At first I was a little put off by this technique as I had foolishly hoped for some numerous big conflicts to occur accompanied by what surely would be many a passionate speeches about selling out and keeping true to your own calling. But then it all slowly began to sink in and I realized that I was watching a studio film purposely created to reflect a more down to earth and wholly realistic environment. 

  There are numerous characters sprinkled throughout the film that trick you into assuming they are the stereotypical character that would normally fit that role in the movie. But when you finish the film you realize what a fool you have been and how talented the director and the actors really were in making this odd cookie of a film. There are no black and white characters to be had and not everyone is completely what they seem and in the end that doesn't make them either better or worse. 

  As realizations hit the characters instead of a maudlin scene of regret and fits of depression you are instead treated with slow expressions that fluctuate across the character's faces and slowly everything is revealed with little dialogue to confirm those points. Jeff Bridges very much impressed me and it's nice to see a director allow him to be so quietly expressive. 

Despite all of my accolades though I still feel that overall the picture did need a tad more energy and perhaps a bit more conflict and exploration of these conflicts. Although I dig the indie feel of the picture, I still can't shake the feeling that the film could've been something...more. 

But perhaps I'm just being a conformist and a sucker for a generic commodity. 

Either way an interesting picture that may not appeal to everyone but definitely a bit more interesting then I had at first pegged it to be.