Movie update

Here’s a few movies I have seen lately and a brief word about each.

Far From the Madding Crowd

Short answer: this movie caught my interest early. I enjoyed the English countryside and the subtlety of the main characters. So despite my final criticism, I can recommend it.

I have not read the classic book, although Thomas Hardy is one of my favorite authors, which I consider a kind of guilty pleasure since he was so relentlessly pessimistic toward human fate. What is exquisite about Hardy is the nobility, endeavor, and the search for redemption in the main characters who inevitably are foiled by a cruel fate; perhaps there is just the slightest uptick at the end of his novels. And Hardy’s poetry is usually as black as the night.

This movie, however, had a very uncharacteristic happy ending. The rest of the movie was very Hardian with its twists of fate, but at the end it became Hollywood. Let me just say, if the book ends with the guy getting the girl, then I will move it to the end of my reading list.

Mad Max: Fury Road

All I can say is, I am too old for this kind of movie. I would have enjoyed it when I was younger. But my requirements have increased in 20 years, and Mad Max is a not much more than a roaring, mutant, post-nuclear war, road rally. I felt like I had sand in my mouth by the end of it. And character development? What? What!? Char. Act. Er.  Dee-VEHL-up-MINT? Sorry, wrong continent. This is Australia, and we got a desert to cross with 5 hotties in the boot and a band of maniacal, thirsty bounty hunters on our tail. We don’t got no time for no Kar-akt-er Di-vel-oop-munt. An none of that snooty moteefs or whatnot.

Avengers: The Age of Zoltron. Or whatever

Same as above. I’m too old. The problem with this movie is that I never came to care about anything—not the Avengers themselves, the many humans who died, the robots, the future, life, the planet, meaning, literature, philosophy. Nothing. I’m afraid this is Joss Wheadon’s signature, condemned 400 years ago by Shakespeare himself, sound and fury, signifying nothing. And this from the guy who recently wrote a novel about superheroism and the plight of mankind. Superheroes themselves are not as interesting as what they say about us.

As I see it, this movie is a signal of Marvel Comics running out of gas. I can virtually see the throngs of 15 year-olds coming out of the theaters with a rapidly fading buzz of excitement, rapidly. Forgotten before their moms arrive to pick them up outside the mall. That’s exactly the point about this series. It has killed itself by having to continuously outdo the last episode. It’s so overwrought, it’s trying so hard, it’s following such a long trail of previous blockbusters, that there just aren’t that many eye-popping scenes, there just aren’t that many concepts left. I think if Marvel wants to have any more movies with traction, they need to dump Joss Wheadon and hire Christopher Nolan, who seems to be the only guy in TinselTown who can pile on enough layers to keep modern viewers happy with action thrillers. He’s managed to pull the mind-blowers out one after another for a while now; I think even his days are numbered.

But about the Avengers, I don’t care! I don’t bloody care about the Avengers. I don’t love them! I don’t support them. If they died I would feel the same as if my video game character died. Just press restart. That’s what this stupid franchise ends up with. Compare this to James Bond. Now, we all love James Bond. We have for years. Especially Daniel Craig. I don’t know. The masses are fickle, Joss. We are a fickle bunch.

Age of Adeline

This is a clever and sophisticated movie. I enjoyed it even more the second time I watched it. Adeline herself is totally classy. Harrison Ford plays himself in his character (whose name I cannot remember) and therefore he is delightful. The premise of the movie is tough for a skeptic of human infinite perfectibility such as myself (Adeline hits about 28 and ceases to age. Then lives that way in secret for 80 years for fear of becoming a government specimen). You can always find some Deepak Chopra or Andrew Weil or Ray Kurzweil who thinks we will inevitably discover the “aging gene” and learn how to stop the aging clock, and humans will effectively become immortal. But I would stake a bag of Doritos that science will never find a “cure” for aging. But anyway, even though this movie is based on this idea, and Adeline’s transformation is a freak of nature which has no basis in anything, it is still a clever idea and the filmmakers turned it into a charming film with charming characters and good, old fashioned drama and tension.

The Spectacular Now

[This post has been edited.] I knew after I wrote my original comments about this film that I maybe, just maybe, didn’t know what I was talking about because, truth be told, I was not entirely conscious for the last third of the movie. So, I have watched it again, and want to say that my first round was completely obtuse, ridiculously obtuse, I mean, Donald Trump obtuse. This is a good movie, full of real human struggling and growth. Yes, it was all very high-school-ish, with popular young, Divergent actors, but it delivered the kinds of things that I really look for in a movie. It wasn’t Lawrence of Arabia, but it was a meaningful contemporary film. I recommend it.