Beijing 2008 Olympics: Opening Ceremony (Available on DVD)--4/5

For thirty (or so) years, computer effects in movies have been striving for realism. The 2008 Summer Olympics Opening ceremony, directed by filmmaker Zhang Yimou, is an instance of real people successfully impersonating computer effects. People are the pixels, creating one small part of a tapestry of thousands. The ceremony uses this idea over and over, with increasing complexity. Each new iteration brings gasps, followed by "How did they do that?," followed by a speechless appreciation.

The moveable-type-blocks chapter may not be the most complex (or it may be; that's like asking which Shakespeare play is the best), but it is a good example of the ceremony's style. In a large rectangle, 897 of these blocks move up and down in a complicated series. They can be in more than just two positions--it looks like low, high, and mid, although there may be even more. In a sort-of analog computer screen, the blocks spell out Chinese characters, form the Great Wall, or just animate waves and geometric patterns. This is a task only a computer could control. Each block has its own motor controlled by a CPU, right? I would still believe that if 897 people didn't pop out at the end, waving cheerfully.

(This gets a 4 rather than a 5 only because of the lengthy Parade of Nations. It is part of the ceremony.)

The Bad News Bears (1976)--3/5

It's hard to watch Walter Matthau, especially in "The Bad News Bears," without thinking of Homer Simpson. Dan Castellaneta famously based Homer's original voice on an impersonation of Matthau. Here, Matthau is Morris Buttermaker, pool cleaner, Little League coach, alcoholic. His inept, grumbling tirades are one "D'oh!" short of a Homer-monologue.

"The Bad News Bears" is one of those glorious seventies PG-rated movies loaded with rude behavior and swearing. The Bears are outcasts throughout the film, showing only marginal growth as athletes and even less as individuals. The biggest smart-ass on the team is just as likely to get into fights at the end of the season. And the few *heartwarming* scenes are peppered with beer-drinking and a noticeable lack of resolution.

The whole thing has a kitchen-sink approach to comedy, clearly abetted by the cheap production costs of the whole thing. It seems like the entire movie takes place at public locations: the Little League diamond, City Hall, the side of a street, and others. I'm sure this looked attractive to the film's producers. (How they got talked into traveling to Japan for a second sequel is anyone's guess.)

More T-Shirt Archaeology

This one's from "The Bad News Bears."

It's an old "Wacky Packages" image! Thank you Internet.

Career Girls (1997)--4/5

In college, Annie (Lynda Steadman) nervously stared at the ground, her overgrown bangs covering half of her dermatitis-afflicted skin. She wouldn't always be like this. We know because she comes back to London six years later to visit her old roommate, Hannah (Katrin Cartlidge). Hannah was no less insecure, channeling her problems into a quick temper, never saying exactly what she meant. About half of "Career Girls" is scattered with long-form flashbacks, with Annie and Hannah as best--sometimes only--friends in college. In the present, they reconnect just as strongly, as if no time has passed.

Steadman and Cartlidge perform impressive feats of acting. In each case, they have to show monumental change. Unlike most movies that show people at different ages, they're not mimicking their younger selves. Enough does bleed through--a nervous habit or a way of talking, for example--to connect young and old.

The title "Career Girls" makes the film sound like a sexy farce or a sequel to "Working Girl." It's a title that Annie and Hannah would mock, equally in college and in the present. They have grown up, have gotten jobs. But the jobs are a small piece of the whole. Mike Leigh (Happy-Go-Lucky) is more concerned with creating people that live and breath in his cinematic world. He shares just an hour and a half of time with Annie and Hannah. "Career Girls" ends just as you realize you could watch it for days.

Twilight (2008)--3/5

Surprised?

I can see how this is The Hottest Movie Ever for teenage girls. Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) is one calculated creation--pale and smoldering, with super-strength, color-changing eyes, and a fashion-sense cultivated over the last ninety years. Bella Swan's no slouch either; she's just as pale and beautiful. They're the ne plus ultra of emo kids.

In the liberal serving of Gothic cheese called "Twilight," they're created for each other. Edward is a seducing predator (but in a good way!) and Bella has an intoxicating aroma (to vampires) and an inscrutable mind. This is important because Edward's also a telepath. Clearly, subtlety is not one of "Twilight's" strengths.

"Twilight" is all about sexual tension that can't be broken. In so many words, he can't lose control around her delicious blood. Tragically, they can't keep their hands off of each other.

The diverting first hour of the film is composed mostly of Edward and Bella animalistically fixating on each other. It loses some momentum once the computer effects creep in. Edward's sprint up a mountain looks like a crude cartoon, with a single cel Scotch-taped onto different frames of film. And then there's the baseball scene, in which these mediocre effects are used for vampires in old-timey jerseys.

"Twilight" has its roots in Harlequin novels and Ann Rice, of course. Using the damp mountains of Washington and a high school setting, it does manage to eke out a sufficiently new look for vampire stories.

The Cullens: a rational parent's worst nightmare.

What I Can Remember From Arnold Schwarzenegger Movies Watched In My Youth

Commando: Arnold has to save his daughter and he robs a gun store with this woman he just met. They go to a mansion and kill people.

Conan the Barbarian: Decapitation. Arnold walks in circles for years. There's a big snake.

Junior: Arnold is wide-eyed in amazement. (That may be just the poster I'm thinking of.)

Kindergarten Cop: Kids are annoying. Dissonance. There's a fight in a bathroom. A urinal is involved somehow (the bad guy gets knocked out on it?). Out of all the Arnold movies, this one seemed the most inappropriate for children!

Predator: Arnold throws a knife into someone's neck. A guy's arm gets blown off. The Indian guy cuts his chest. Nuclear bomb.

Red Sonja: Where's Arnold?

Terminator 2: Judgment Day: I still remember everything.

The Running Man: Arnold's a helicopter pilot. Some guy's head explodes. A hockey player villain is choked with barbed wire.

The Terminator: Arnold has to cut out his eye. Sarah Connor and the guy have sex. The metal skeleton is crushed in a steel factory.

Total Recall: "Stick it up your nose." "You make me wish I had three hands."

Twins: A pulley/chain mechanism thing falls on the bad guy's head.

Arnold, wide-eyed in amazement.

The Big Bounce (2004)--2/5

For longer than you’d think, “The Big Bounce” coasts on the shaggy charm of Owen Wilson. Wandering around Hawaii, Jack Ryan (Wilson) is unable to work up the energy to turn down any felony that passes by. His slightly more proactive libido guides him towards Nancy Hayes (Sara Foster).

Cast primarily because she looks great in a bikini (or less), Foster equals Owen Wilson in the sun-drenched drifter department. She’s unfortunately tasked with carrying “The Big Bounce” as a femme fatale. This proposition fails partly because she undersells pertinent dialogue, mostly because of the disposable heist supposedly at the center of the film.

The heist predictably involves a pile of pathetically guarded money, a hidden key, and some other stuff. It could very well be straightforward, but its introduction, planning, and execution are, just like the rest of the film, excessively lazy. At one point, Walter Crewes (Morgan Freeman) has to stop mid-heist to explain to his partner in crime, in careful detail, exactly what’s going on, who’s working with whom, and why anybody cares. It still doesn’t make any sense.

Earlier in “The Big Bounce,” Walter takes an interest in Jack and offers him a job. Jack hangs out on the beach, occasionally repairing flirtatious guests’ showerheads. He has a salary and a spacious bungalow of his own. Why couldn’t he just stay here for awhile?

All the pictures of this movie are boring, so here's a volcano.