Why Hollywood Loves Corporate Bad Guys

Ever notice that almost all bad guys in Hollywood these days are corporations? I know a lot of people on the right think this is an expression of socialism, an anti-capitalist instinct, but it’s really not. You’re reading too much into this. What it is, is lazy writing. Corporate villains are a crutch for unimaginative writers.

Corporations Are Not Your Friends

Before we delve into the reason Hollywood uses corporations as villains, let me point something out: there is nothing inherently “conservative” about corporations. In fact, the opposite is true. Conservatives believe in free markets economics. That means that we trust the decisions of millions of buyers and sellers to allocate resources. Thus, conservatives oppose anything that separates buyers or sellers from their natural incentives, because those separators distort the incentive system that makes markets work. Government support is a classic example of this because it reduces the risk to the person receiving the support and therefore distorts their incentives in favor of taking risks they otherwise wouldn’t.

Corporations are a form of distortion. Corporations separate owners from the costs of their actions, because of their limited liability feature. A normal person will bear the full cost of any harm they cause. But an owner of a corporation doesn’t. They are only liable up to the value of their investment. Moreover, the corporate structure, which provides decision making power to concentrated management teams, distorts decision making because managers and owners do not share the same incentives. Thus, corporations are not acting in the owners’ interests so much as they are acting in the managers’ interests.

Therefore, conservatives should be wary of corporations and should not be knee-jerk defending them. But that is neither here nor there when it comes to Hollywood because Hollywood doesn’t grasp anything about corporations or incentives, and it doesn’t care. Its only interest in corporations is that they are easy to use as villains.

Why Hollywood Writers Love Corporations

Hollywood uses corporations as villains because corporations have certain built-in traits that make them ideal for hack writers to use as villains. Consider this:

1. Inoffensive Villains. If there is one thing film producers don’t want in a blockbuster, it’s something offensive. They want everyone to see their “masterpiece.” Corporate villains are not offense. Why? Because corporations don’t instill loyalty in the public like countries, governments, ideologies, or even people do. If I make the United States the villain, then Americans will be angry. If I make the Pope the villain, then Catholics will be angry. If I make The Happy Bunny Munitions Company the villain, nobody gets bent out of shape. Indeed, the use of corporations is the easiest way to avoid offending anyone in the selection of your villain.

2. Easy Motives. Corporations also let you avoid the whole messy motive thing. Why does your villain want to blow up the moon again? If you choose religion or ideology, you’ll offend people. If you choose “because” or something that makes no sense, you’ll lose your audience. The use of corporations as villains lets you skip this problem. All corporations are motivated by money, everyone accepts that. So if you can somehow mumble enough words to make people think the plan will result in an improvement on the corporation’s bottom line, then you’re good to go.

3. No Troubling Back Stories. Best of all, corporations are born fully formed; they require no back story to explain how they got the things they have. Where exactly did Goldfinger (a noted sole proprietor) find all those henchmen? Heck, make him a corporation and you don’t need to worry about it. We all know that corporations all have military contracts, which will put them in contact with ex-military killers and give them access to high tech stuff. Right? Seriously, all the hack writer has to do is make the villain a corporation and they suddenly no longer need to explain (1) how the conspiracy formed, (2) how they got their facilities, (3) where they get their henchmen, (4) where they get their money, or (5) how they get all that cool stuff they use throughout the movie.

Indeed, because all corporations have secret “military divisions,” they can have access to the same sophisticated military hardware that the US military has and no one thinks twice about this. In fact, we’re even ready to believe they have stuff that even the military hasn’t seen before because they are developing it for the government. Problem solved without a word of explanation.

4. Easy Twists. Corporations have murky structures, thus they are rife for twists. Because corporate structure are malleable, it’s easy to create conspiracies within corporations where some people are aware of the evil activities and others aren’t. That lets the writer pick and choose who in the corporation is part of the plan and who is an innocent pawn. This allows the writer to place an unsuspecting person inside the organization who can help the hero at a critical time (usually with a computer code) without having to explain why one of the henchmen would suddenly change their minds and help the hero.

This also allows the writer to pull the old cliché of having people run to the boss, only to discover too late that the boss is in on it! Oh my, didn’t see that coming! Or it allows the cliché twist that the boss really is unaware of the evil under their nose and will now work to stop the bad guys. Again, no explanation of any sort is needed to explain the boss’s motivations in either direction except to note that they did or did not know about the conspiracy. Heck, this here movie almost writes itself!

5. Ease of Destruction. Finally, even a hack writer will need to end their movie. Sadly, this can be very difficult when you don’t know jack about the world and your characters are a mess. But using a corporate villain can solve this problem because anything can kill a corporation. Indeed, using a corporate bad guy gives you a maximum range of solutions from killing the right person, to exposing the entire corporation, to exposing just the right person, to bankrupting the corporation, or even just hitting the right delete key (because people never back up computers).

This comes in very helpful when you don’t have a clue how to plot your way from the initial discovery to an actual ending. Instead, after you blow some time, you just arrange a quick scene where the hero does the thing that will defeat the bad guy(s) and then let the credits role. Basically, by making the villain a corporation, the writer can tack on any sort of mindless ending and people will believe it.

Conclusion

Those are the real reasons Hollywood loves corporate villains, not ideological opposition to corporations. Corporate villains are nothing more than a fool proof crutch for hack writers that allow a movie to run from beginning to ending in 98 minutes with little or no depth or explanation, but with easy believability. Corporate villains don’t offend, they require no back story, they require little discussion of motive, and they are rife with ready-made clichés, not to mention that they require no careful plotting to be undone. It’s like a hack-writer’s dream!

It’s not about ideology, it’s about lack of imagination.

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Comic Book Movies: Nerd Porn. . . Literally

Over the past decade, Hollywood has increasingly come to rely on comic books as a source of inspiration for their films. Indeed, many more recent films than you may realize come from the pages of comic books, especially in the action film genre. And I am finding myself increasingly turned off by these movies. It’s not that I’m opposed to the genre, but I find the experience getting creepier and creepier, as these movies are turning into nerd porn.

Now I am not a comic book aficionado, nor am I a reader of comic books, but I am well informed. I’ve spoken with collectors at length over the years, and I’ve seen the evolution of comic books and the movies made from them.

In the Golden Age of comic books, comic book heroes were created with the idea of inspiring children. Television shows like Superman and the Adam West Batman epitomized this generation. They were wholesome, patriotic, and not-controversial. They were written at a level that was both simplistic and accessible for idealistic youth.

But by the 1960s, this was changing. Like everyone else in the counter culture, comic book creators wanted to expand the “social conscience” of their readers by introducing social justice themes. This meant different moral questions and some “edgy” issues that dealt with things like racism, feminism, drugs, and poverty.

In the 1980s, comic books changed again, this time becoming darker and edgier. The most famous of these was the conversion of Batman into the Dark Knight. This was also the time the nerds started calling these comic books “graphic novels.” Yeah, sure. This change happened for two reasons primarily. First, the animators wanted to tell “more grown up stories” and they found the requirement that their heroes be wholesome to be too restricting. So they had to free them from their wholesome images and belief systems. Secondly, they wanted to reach an older (read “more affluent”) audience: angst-ridden teenagers. The world sucks man. Shut up kid.

By the 1990s, most comic book heroes had been killed off and resurrected as evil versions of themselves. . . dressed like whiny little emos. . . oh sorry, dressed in really cool, joy-resistant black body armor!

Then it started to go wrong(er). I don’t know which one was the first, but soon goofy capes and costumes were giving way to fetish gear. Tight black leather body suits, anatomically correct body armor (a Batsuit with nipples? are you serious? Holy codpiece, Batman!), whips, chains, and erotic tortures that reeked of fetish clubs all became normal.

And it wasn’t just the costumes that were changing. The role of women in comic books was changing. Gone were the supposedly docile women of the 1950s, the feminists of the 1960-1970s, and the working women of the 1980s. In their place came a whole generation of dominatrixes, women presented as strange creatures to be feared and ogled (interestingly, Hollywood actresses mistake these for “strong roles”). At the same time, comic book “love” was redefined as violence with sexual overtones and an unhealthy dose of bondage tossed in. And everything became sexual. . . everything. That’s right Dr. Freud, in comic book land, cigars are never just cigars.

Basically, comic books and the comic book movies that love them became monuments to the sexual dysfunction of their creators. It’s become like watching your Psyche 101 class on the big screen.

Comic book movies today seem to have become pervert theater. They’ve become fetish movies, combined with snuff films. Watching one with your brain in the “on” position is like listening to some creepy dude tell you about his obsession with the woman he saw in the Sears catalog as he rubs his crotch. Yuck!

Now don’t get me wrong. I’m no prude. I don’t want to regulate anybody’s sex life. I’m not opposed to naked art or even films about sex. Heck, I’m not even opposed to porn -- I honestly couldn’t care less. BUT, I don’t want to know about your problems. If you can’t relate to the female of the species, that’s your problem, not mine. You are to blame. You are doing it wrong. Get help. Don’t try to pass your twisted fantasies off on me as a movie.

And that’s what’s bothering me.

You can disagree with me on this. . . but you’re wrong.

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The Problem With Hollywood Villains

These days, Hollywood villains suck. You know I’m right. They’ve all become cartoon villains. . . psychopathic Snidely Whiplashes. How did this happen? Actually, it’s simple. For all of its talk about “strong characters,” modern Hollywood doesn’t understand the first thing about human motivations. That’s the problem.

Why does motivation matter? Because conflict drives the story, and motivation defines the conflict. This is a critical point to understand. It’s not the object of the conflict that matters, it’s the motivation for the conflict.

The object of the conflict simply provides the background, a few details of how the characters’ lines will work and maybe a few extra hurdles that will be encountered. The object does not drive the story.

Consider, for example, the classic cops and robbers story. The object is whatever they are trying to steal or kill or whatever. Does it fundamentally change the story if they are robbing a bank rather than a casino or a jewelry store or even a pet store? No, it doesn’t. The conflict is the same in each case. Is there a difference between killing a witness, a businessman, a congressman or a foreign dignitary? Nope. What if two people are competing for the affections of a third? Would it change the story if they were competing for a man or a woman, friendship instead of love, respect or employment? Nope.

Indeed, in each of these instances, you could swap objects with very little change to the underlying story, just as you could swap time periods, races or genders of the characters, or any other number of details. But motivations are different. Change the motivation and the entire nature of the story changes.

The reason for this is simple, and it goes back to what I said the other day about humans judging stories based on emotion rather than logic. With rare exceptions, the object of the conflict does not trigger an emotional response in us. Do you care that someone might rob a bank, or kill a witness, or that aliens are fighting a war over Smurf 7? Not really. On occasion, a film might stumble into something that means something to you, like if you’re a bank aficionado, but that’s just dumb luck.

Where a story becomes meaningful to us, is when we start to learn of the character’s motivations. That’s when we begin to judge who is right and who is wrong, and we start to take sides. That’s the point that you become invested in the story, and it’s the motivations that do it.

And when it comes to motivations, the villain’s motivation is almost always the most important. It is the villain who gives the story meaning and sets everything into motion. If the villain’s motives are pedestrian or nonexistent, then the story is handicapped from the get-go.

Unfortunately, Hollywood is all about pedestrian villains these days. Despite its protestations to the contrary, Hollywood is afraid to be the slightest bit complicated or to delve into “shades of gray.” It wants villains who are undeniably evil, and it has decided that it’s safest to skip the motivation question -- as that may unintentionally inspire sympathy -- and to just define the villain by letting them commit a few clearly “villainous” act. Thus, Hollywood requires its modern villains to ooze evil from their pores. They must be sociopathic and psychopathic. They need to yell and scream and rant and do things reserved for villains, like kicking puppies and shooting uppity henchmen. And in those rare moments where they are called upon to provide a motivation, they mumble something about power or money.

The perfect example of this is Al Pacino in Devil’s Advocate, where Pacino takes the greatest threat to the human race and turns him into a goofball. His Satan is loud and obnoxious and spews nonsensical dialog, he’s way over the top. But he’s neither effective nor menacing, nor does he ever make sense. Indeed, he has no plan worth mentioning -- "I'm going to run a law firm to mess with New York City!" Yeah, ok, yawn. He's taken the most evil, most interesting character available and turned him into that annoying, drunk guy you wanted to punch at that party in college, not something you should fear.

What Hollywood’s missing by giving up on motivations are the truly interesting bad guys. Think of some of the best film villains and what motivated them:

• Captain Bligh in Mutiny on the Bounty who had a tremendous ego and could stand no disrespect.

• Sheriff “Little Bill” Daggett in Unforgiven, who thought he was the good guy.

• The Terminator in any of its incarnations, which was motivated simply by relentlessly following its orders.

• Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, who abused her power because she could and because she despised the people under her care.

• Norman Bates in Psycho, who was compelled to kill people by the psychological trauma of his relationship with his mother.

• HAL 9000 in 2001, who couldn’t resolve a conflict in his programming.

• Michael Corleone in The Godfather, whose problem was his lack of humanity.

• Darth Vader (pre-whiny Hayden Christensen), who thought he was defending the Empire against rebels bent on destroying it.

Do you notice something in this list? What made these characters memorable wasn’t what they did, it was why they did what they did. That’s why we remember them. And even more interestingly, none of these villains thought they were evil.

In the real world, evil people don’t think they are evil. Hitler never thought of himself as the bad guy, he viewed himself as the savior of the German people. Pelosi doesn’t think of herself as evil, she genuinely thinks her lies and demonizations will make a better society. Few humans do things that they consciously believe to be wrong or evil -- the human mind simply isn’t built that way. We either don’t do these things, or we justify that behavior to ourselves so that we can maintain our belief that we are doing the right thing.

This is something Hollywood no longer understands. In the past (as evidenced by the list above -- note the absence of modern villains from the list), Hollywood recognized that people could do evil, despite believing that they were doing the right thing. But, for the most part, modern Hollywood doesn’t recognize this aspect of evil anymore. It prefers to have its villains prance around declaring how evil they are.

Why do I think Hollywood has come to this? In all honesty, I blame liberalism.

The problem with liberals is that they seem incapable of realizing that other people have different views. Indeed, the one trait that almost every liberal I've ever met shares is a belief that their views are right AND that everyone knows they are right, and that those who disagree with them do so only for personal gain. The idea of genuine disagreements simply don't enter their consciousness.

Thus, when they set about creating villains, they realize that they would never act the way the villain does, thus they start from the premise that the villain must know that they are evil. And that is where the problem begins. Once you begin with the idea that your villain knows they are evil, you deprive them of all motivation except personal gain. From there, it's only a hop, skip and a jump to Clichéland, with carbon copy villains prancing around trying to show the audience that they are fully aware of how evil they are.

Sadly, until Hollywood wakes up to the need to think about their villain’s motivations, and to realize that no villain would see themselves as evil, we’re doomed to keep getting shallow movies with clichéd conflicts.

Ug.

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Film Friday: Jesus Christ Superstar (1973)

Jesus Christ Superstar is one of those strange movies that grows on you. When I first saw it, late, late, late one night, I thought it stank. I didn’t like the music. I didn’t like the actors. I thought the whole thing was done on the cheap. But I gave it a second chance, and before it was over, I was hooked. It's now become one of my favorite musicals.

** spoiler alert **

Directed by Norman Jewison, Jesus Christ Superstar is the big screen adaptation of the Andrew Lloyd Webber/Tim Rice musical of the same name, which is a musical based on the crucifixion of Jesus. Sounds like a hoot, right? Well, it gets worse. Jewison decided to go with minimal sets, minimal costumes, and unknown actors. Thus, the sets are little more than ruins and the costumes look like the casual clothes the actors wore to the first rehearsal. Moreover, where props are added, Jewison uses modern props, e.g. machine guns. Also, the soundtrack mixes some of Webber’s “kitschiest” bits with 1970s rock. What could possibly go wrong?

Interestingly, it is these choices that make the film. The minimal sets turn out to be a genius stroke. By giving us only hints of how these familiar buildings looked, Jewison lets the filmgoer fill in the details with their own views of how these places must have looked. This brings the viewer in and produces sets that are much more personal than if a team of workers constructed phony facades. Moreover, because the landscapes are spectacular -- it was filmed in Israel -- you spend the entire film lost in the impressive scenery, which easily takes you back 2000 years.

The music turns out to be a brilliant choice too. Whereas most musicals repeat one sound over and over, and which rarely lends itself to song that will work outside the musical, Superstar's use of rock music gives these songs a life beyond the film. Moreover, the choice of rock music lends the film a seriousness which the traditional vaudeville-like music of musicals can’t touch. When you have a guy pounding away at a piano stretching out his “A’s” (as in “raaaag time baaaaaaaand”) you just can’t deal with serious themes. But Superstar's songs are serious and philosophical, sometimes just plain beautiful. My personal favorite is “Could We Start Again Please,” which builds amazingly, though the most famous is “I Don't Know How To Love Him,” sung by Yvonne Elliman, who plays Mary Magdalene and went on to sing the hit “If I Can’t Have You” from Saturday Night Fever.

The story itself is quite good, though it upsets some people. Indeed, when Superstar came out, it was highly controversial, though its success has tempered the criticism today. At the time, some Jews claimed some of the lyrics were anti-Semitic. Catholics and Protestants were upset that Jesus was portrayed as possibly being interested in sex, though this is only hinted at, that Judas was portrayed too sympathetically, that Judas asserts that Jesus is just a man, and some considered it blasphemous that Jesus wasn’t shown being resurrected. Some also objected to having Jesus and the gang portrayed by dirty hippies, and that Judas was played by a black actor. Oh well.

If you require Biblical stories to be humorless, with one-dimensional characters, then this movie is not for you.

The lyrics are witty and clever, often with interesting bits of humor thrown in. The actors are excellent, though it takes a while to realize how perfect they truly are for the roles. Ted Neely, who plays Jesus, is infinitely better than “Thorazine Jesus” played by Willem Defoe. This Jesus has passion and he doesn’t confuse “meek” with “Holy.” Elliman plays a wonderfully conflicted Mary Magdalene, who loves Jesus, but doubts her ability to be worthy of him. And Judas. . . what can you say about Judas?

Many of the detractors hate this version of Judas. They claim he’s too sympathetic -- they apparently want the Snidely Whiplash version who foams at the mouth from start to finish. But Carl Anderson gives us a complex Judas, who presents both a believable betrayal and a believable contrition. Anderson begins by accusing Jesus of having lost his way. He sees Jesus as a man who is drunk with all the adulation, and who has deluded himself into believing he’s God. This allows Judas to fall under the spell of the Priests who tell him that they want to stop Jesus for the good of the Jews. But the moment he betrays Jesus, Anderson really turns up the volume, giving us an amazing guilt-ridden tantrum, followed by hopelessness personified, and finally suicide. In the end, Judas re-appears in the cleverest number ever to feature a tasseled white jumpsuit.

There is real emotion behind these actors. Their dancing is excellent, and their singing, which at first seems strange as it is an unusual style for musicals, really makes the movie stand out. In fact, I’ve heard other, more famous singers take on these rolls (there have been several versions of the soundtrack released and at least one remake), and those actors added a level of gloss that felt fake and made the roles less real. . . less emotional.

What the critics miss about Jesus Christ Superstar is that the movie approaches its subject matter with incredible care and a real love. Jesus is tested, but regains his faith. Those who have faith in him are rewarded. Those who have betrayed him suffer their own damnation. Yet, each of the characters is treated fairly, good guy or bad, and the actors play them with full belief in them as real people, not as props to hit certain plot points. Finally, the ending is so jarring that it does a good job of imparting the anguish with which the real story ends.

So if you haven’t see this movie, I highly recommend it, and Easter is a great time for it. If you saw it once and didn’t like it, give it a second try.

Finally, I mention the remake. Don’t watch it. They use the setting of a London street gang, and it’s highly politically correct. Moreover, the songs all have a nasty edge, particular the King Herod part, and the characters seem much more one-dimensional and, often, hateful.

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The Problems Of Action Heroes

Next week, we’ll get back to specific movies. This week, let’s talk about another problem modern movies face. This problem is associated with action heroes. Action heroes change with the times, and these days they’ve run into a wall. Between conflicting moral codes and the problems of “adrenaline addiction,” there isn’t much left for an action hero to do.

Action heroes have been around since Odysseus took his band of merry pirates to Troy for the Friday night fights. At that point, a hero was a man who was mortal, but also the offspring of a god. And action stories were about the exploits of these heroes, as they overcame challenges that were beyond mortal men. This set the ground work for much that followed.

Indeed, even today, action heroes need to be able to do things that regular humans can’t. It is the rare hero who doesn’t quickly demonstrate some far-above-average skill -- no matter how much the movie facially tries to sell the hero as “just a regular person” when the story begins. Moreover, action stories tend to be epic in nature as the hero goes through a series of successively more difficult challenges. And it is within these requirements that action heroes suddenly find themselves in a bit of a jam.

The reason humans suffer from addiction is the competing demands of two hard-wired behavioral responses within the human being. First, we seek pleasure. Pleasure sets off all kinds of chemical reactions that make us want more. That’s nature’s way of telling you to do something. If it feels good to eat something tasty, then do it. And if it doesn’t give you any pleasure, like that none-too-succulent rock you’re sucking on or the banana you’re trying to jam in your ear, then don’t bother doing that again. In this way, nature steers us toward the things we should be doing.

Secondly, humans have a coping mechanism that takes the emotional edge off our experiences. This lets us cope with trauma and loss, as it softens their sting over time. It also lets us put up with horrible conditions, like prison camps, as we grow accustomed to them. Without this, our suicide rate would probably be extremely high. Unfortunately, this dulling mechanism also dulls pleasure. Thus, we soon find that the things that brought us pleasure aren’t as pleasurable as they once were. That means we need more than before, to achieve the same high. This is true of everything that delivers pleasure, from foods to drugs to the adrenaline we derive from watching action heroes blow things up, engage in fights, and narrowly escape death. Action heroes basically make us adrenaline junkies.

As junkies, the more we get, the more we will need the next time just to recreate the same thrill. That means that each successive action movie must have bigger explosions, more frenetic fights and bigger stakes to keep us entertained. If an action hero simply did what the last guy did, we would be bored. And this creates a problem. How do you keep upping the ante to keep generating that adrenaline rush? Bigger explosions? Ok, so a car bomb turns into a huge car bomb turns into a semi-trailer bomb, turns into a city-wide nuclear bomb turns into. . . hmm. Ok, maybe we increase the shock level. The bad guy goes from being some dude to being some corporate lackey to a corporate president to a senator to the president to. . . shoot, not again.

Do you see the problem? As each film ups the ante, we slowly run out of room to keep upping the ante. As it is, the bad guys these days need to sit at the highest levels of power (always the most powerful person in the film), they need to plan to destroy the country or the world, and they need to set off explosions that bring down landmarks. Nothing lesser will do. But this doesn’t leave us any room to keep going up either. There just isn’t much “more” left.

That’s why a movie like Ronin was so refreshing. Unlike most action movies that traffic in bigger-is-better, Ronin went for realism. And in the process, it brought a whole new form of adrenaline rush because the action actually felt real, something you hadn’t really see before on the screen. But even there, how far can you go with realism before people get bored again?

This catch 22 is slowly killing action movies.

But there’s another problem too, and it deals with action movies falling into a very boring formula. And that formula derives, of all things, from the contradictory human moral code to which we subscribe.

On the one hand, humans love revenge. Forget the turn the other cheek stuff, we are all for an eye for an eye and bringing a gun to a knife fight. But on the other hand, we find it morally repugnant that someone would kill without a reason or that they would kill someone once they’ve been disarmed and defeated.

How does Hollywood reconcile this? Well, it’s found two mechanisms. Let’s call the first one drone slaying. To satisfy the audience’s blood lust without running afoul of the audience’s revulsion at unjustified killing, Hollywood has learned to take the humans out of the film. Now, the hero can slay an army of robots or orcs or zombies, and the audience doesn’t think twice. (Even in war movies, it is rare that we see the faces of the uniformed drones that get gunned down en mass by the hero.) Since the audience doesn’t see these as human, the moral code doesn’t kick in. Thus, the hero can kill all the drones they want -- which, not coincidentally, also gives the hero his (or her) bona fides as a hero, because they’ve shown themselves to possess skills that far exceed the helpless humans around them. But sadly, because these are drones, the hero’s actions still ring hollow.

Thus, the hero must kill a couple of “faced” humans. This bring us to the second mechanism. Hollywood has learned to manufacturer ways that the good guy can still kill the bad guy without running afoul of the moral code. Indeed, the two primary rules on this code are: (1) never kill without reason and (2) never kill anyone who has been beaten. So Hollywood always starts the movie by giving us a clichéd, easy to understand reason why the hero must act -- and forget doing the right thing, we want easy. . . they've got my daughter!. . . they're going to blow up the city! Gone is Clint Eastwood’s anti-hero in The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly who killed for money, and in his place are a series of heroes who need to suffer a proportional loss or threat of immediate proportional loss before they can kill the bad guy. Moreover, have you noticed how many movies end with the good guy defeating the bad guy, but not killing him -- because you can’t kill someone who has been defeated and is now helpless -- only to turn his back as the bad guy picks up a random gun, thereby allowing the good guy to turn around and blast him? This manufactured ending satisfies the audience’s blood lust, without making them feel morally uncomfortable about their choices. That’s kind of sad.

Indeed, this cliché changes the nature of the hero. The hero goes from taking command of the world around them to becoming a victim of chance. In other words, they no longer make their own destiny, they need to wait for the bad guy to make it for them. It’s like Lucas re-editing Star Wars to make Greedo shoot first. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. In one lousy edit, Lucas has changed Han Solo’s character dramatically. Gone is the rogue and in his place is the victim who acted in self defense. Yuck. Well, that’s exactly what Hollywood has done to the action hero generally.

Thus, the modern action hero faces a series of problems. Everything that can be blown up has been blown up, and there’s no higher authority that can be a criminal that isn’t already being used in movies today. Further, the action hero now needs to waste most of the movie picking on drones until he (or she) is ready to fight a highly choreographed main fight to end the movie in a morally acceptable way that still results in a dead bad guy. What a lousy time to be a hero.

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The Problem of Sequels

We all know that sequels are rarely as good as the original. But there is a more serious problem with sequels than just crappy writing. Indeed, there is something inherently problematic in the concept of sequels itself that not only can doom them from the start, but can also harm the original.

Hang with me here. Humans are creatures of logic and emotion. In the real world, logic is superior. Logic gives us reasoning. It allows us to build the world around us. Without logic, there would be no science, no math, and no order. It is only through logic that we can categorize and reason, that we develop patterns of thought, formulas, order and structure. Emotions simply cannot do these things because they are subjective, they vary from person to person and situation to situation. They lack structure, consistency and reliability. Thus, a society based more on emotions than on logic will be an unjust society and a failure.

But story telling is different. In story telling, logic plays only a limited role. It plays the part of the gatekeeper, informing us whether or not the events presented in the story are sufficiently likely that we can suspend our disbelief and accept the story as real enough that we may judge it on its merits. And what are the merits by which we judge a story? We judge a story on the basis of whether or not we "like" it -- which is an emotional decision, not a logical decision. . . you do not "like" an equation, it is simply true or false, but, at the same time, whether a story is true or false does not affect whether or not we like it.

What this means is that story telling is all about emotional manipulation. And since our emotional responses are hardwired, we tend to react similarly to certain emotional triggers. Knowing this allows good story tellers to create emotions, heighten emotions or even suppress emotions. Talented story tellers know how to play these triggers like a musical instrument to achieve the desired result.

What does this have to do with sequels? Consider this. . . movie makers follow a series of well known patterns to create the emotional highs and lows they want. The greater the high or low created, the greater the movie.

To maximize the highs and lows, filmmakers use two age-old tricks. First, they paint the challenge faced by the protagonist as nearly impossible. The reason is simple, the greater the challenge, the more likely the chance of failure, the higher the emotional high achieved when the protagonist succeeds. Thus, you will never see a film about a man planning to cross the street, but you will see a film about a man aiming to climb the highest peak in the world. Unless the challenge is extreme enough, the emotional content for the audience is simply not sufficient.

Secondly, nothing heightens an emotion more than being exposed to the counter emotion moments before the pay off. Think of it this way, a mountain looks a whole lot more impressive if someone digs out a valley before it -- just like you appear taller to someone standing in a ditch. It’s the same thing with emotions. The closer the hero comes to failure, the sweeter (emotionally speaking) the moment when success arrives.

That’s why couples in romantic movies always dislike each other before they fall in love, and why the audience is made to believe they can never be brought together right before they are joined. By giving the audience a negative emotion first, the positive emotion appears to be all the greater.

It’s the same thing in action movies. Ever wonder why the hero needs to appear to lose right before he wins? Because it makes his victory feel all the greater. The scientist in the drama must be brought to the point of giving up before he has his break through. The bad guy must have his moment of perceived triumph right before he’s defeated. The nerds must lose their frat house right before the moment of comedic revenge. In each instance, the film maker is putting you at the top of a mountain or the bottom of a valley before showing you the rise or fall about to come.

Indeed, when a successful film finally wraps up and the story ends, the audience should be brought to an emotional climax that is literally the highest or lowest emotional point of the film.

So what does this have to do with sequels? Sequels are made because the audience was so emotionally moved by the prior film that they want to experience the ride again. They want to relive the highs and lows that befell these characters. And therein lies the problem.

If the ending of the last film was truly the highest point, then the filmmakers must find a way to take that away so the audience can be brought emotionally low again before being lifted up once more -- otherwise the highs will feel flat, or worse, they'll feel like lows compared to where the character had been. What’s worse, the audience wants to repeat the exact type of action that happened the first time, i.e. the audience wants to see the lovers fall in love again, the band of heroes have to join up once more, and the every-man hero who never did anything in his life before must again rise up and meet the impossible challenge.

That’s why the characters who were in never-ending love at the end of Romancing the Stone needed to fall out of love to start Jewel of the Nile, why the Ghostbusters had to lose their business and be spread to the four winds to start Ghostbusters II, and why Ellen Ripley in Alien had to face a bigger challenge for which she was not prepared, but into which she could grow.

But there are two inherent problems with this. First, by undoing the ending of the original, sequels start on a poor footing. Right out of the gates, you’ve killed the never-ending love, and broken up the inseparable team. And how do you make the world’s biggest alien killer back into Joe-nobody? Moreover, when you do this, you change the nature of the characters. Before the lovers merely suffered from romantic mistakes, now we know they might not really get along as well as we thought. Suddenly, those four friends who clung together through thick and thin don’t seem as devoted as they once did? And do we really think Ripley can’t handle this current crisis. . . even though we never would have picked her to survive the first movie?

Also, why should the audience trust that your resolution will be any more real this time? How do we know the lovers won’t break up again the moment the credits stop? If you lied to us before, there is no reason to think that you might not be lying now.

Secondly, the film maker probably told the audience that the crisis in the first film was the biggest crisis of all time. So how are we now supposed to believe something even more challenging has come up? How fake does it feel to hear everyone warn us about the K-10 in the original as if that was the be-all, end-all only to now discover the K-11 standing right next to it. (FYI, you can’t just repeat the original challenge because the audience knows that your character can overcome that. So you must step up the challenge.)

Alien provides a classic example of this problem. In Alien we were told the alien was the most horrific creature in the universe. But Ripley overcame it. Thus, to raise the challenge level, she must now face something worse than “the worst creature ever.” To solve this, they made her face hundreds of aliens. But to make this work, they had to reduce the murderous potency of the creature itself or all the humans would have been wiped out in the first five minutes of the film. Yet, in so doing, the director has now told us that the first alien wasn’t as tough as it seemed. That diminishes her achievement. It would be like learning in Empire Strikes Back that Darth Vader was the sissy brother of Darth Super Vader.

That’s the problem with sequels. To recreate the emotional rollercoaster of the original, most need to begin by diminishing the highs and lows of the original ride. Not only does this leave you with a bad taste in your mouth right out of the gates, but it calls into question the reliability of what we are told about the highs and lows this time around. Moreover, it often requires tainting the characters in ways that make them less likeable or less potent.

That’s why most of the best sequels either avoid trying to repeat the first movie, or they are actually longer story arcs disguised as sequels. Take for example, Empire Strikes Back which doesn’t diminish Star Wars because it doesn’t try to downplay or undo what happened in Star Wars, it just builds on it by adding the next stage of a long struggle.

So if you’re a filmmaker and you’re looking at making a sequel, consider this advice. Do no harm.

Thoughts?

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Twisted Hollywood

Let’s talk about movie twists. At the end of the 1980s, a friend of mine told me I had to see the movie Black Widow. You probably don’t remember it, if you ever heard of it in the first place. The reason I remember this movie has less to do with the film itself than the trend it started. This movie seemed to begin the era of the twist, an era that has served the movie going public very poorly. These days, there's hardly a movie that doesn’t promise a twist.

Now don’t get me wrong, twists are great things. They have always been a feature of storytelling, and if done correctly, can take an otherwise excellent movie and raise it to a whole new level. Indeed, some of my favorite movies involve dramatic twists: The Matrix, The Sixth Sense, The Usual Suspects, Fight Club, and even The Caine Mutiny.

But few movie twists are of this caliber. Unfortunately, inserting a twist has become one of the biggest crutches for hack screen writers. By adding something “unexpected” to the movie, these pathetic scribblers convince a few gullible souls that they have in fact been watching a decent movie, when the reality is sadly different.

Indeed, most of what passes for twists these days are simply random information jammed into movies, near their ends, to give the director another car chase or an easy wrap up for a problem the unskilled writer didn’t know how else to resolve. It is not surprising either that these things have quickly become clichéd.

How many times have you watched a movie lately where the hero seems to solve the mystery and defeat the bad guy, only to discover that the hero’s boss/life-long friend/girlfriend/partner is the “true bad guy.” And how many times has this made sense? Gee, I never suspected that my ten year cop partner, who I see every waking moment of our working days, was really running the syndicate that controls the city’s underworld. Who knew? Or what about the young hero who finds meaning in the wise words of a janitor, who just happens to be the boy’s long lost father? Princess falls for a commoner? Don’t worry, he just doesn’t know yet that he’s really prince. Need a cause for some disaster? Maybe we brought this on ourselves? Hey, what’s that kid next door playing with? Why, that’s the missing piece of the very ancient weapon we need to defeat this here monster! Yee haw! If you’ve written any of these clichés, then you suck and you should go back to your day job. . . milking cats.

Unfortunately, Hollywood marketing departments have learned that inserting any surprising information near the end of the film (in its proper formulaic place of course) will generate a buzz -- whether it makes sense or not. Indeed, many a times I found myself reaching for my cell phone determined to find out the location of the nearest gun shop and the writer’s home address after seeing such a “twist,” only to hear some slack-jawed moron walk by saying: “I really didn’t see that coming. What a great film. You smell perty.” And I just wanted to scream at said moron: “Senator, you’re a [expletive deleted]!!”

A good movie twist needs to derive from a combination of factors, each of which must be present.

First, you need a well written movie regardless of the twist. Each of the movies identified above was a strong movie even without the twist. If you’re relying on the twist to save your movie, then you’re doing it wrong. Similarly, if you find yourself racing the story along just to get to the twist, then you’re doing it backwards. The twist needs to come naturally out of the story, the story should not be a crutch to support the twist.

Secondly, the twist needs to be deeply entwined with the story. If it’s just an add on to give your story a surprise, then you should give up writing and follow your true calling instead. . . marketing. Here are some examples of add ons that I see all the time: If the twist can happen to any of the characters, as if the writer threw darts to decide which team member will betray the others, then the twist is an add on. If the twist isn’t related to the themes of the film, then it’s an add on. If the writer can’t really explain why the twist is needed in the story without just citing the plot that follows the twist, then it’s an add on. In other words, if you’re asked why you included the twist, and your explanation is something like: “if we don’t expose the real bad guy, then the audience won’t know about the real bad guy” then it’s time to leave the writing to others.

Third, a twist must be foreshadowed. This is the hardest aspect of getting a good twist, but it’s also the most important. This is difficult because “foreshadow” doesn’t just mean you make a few passing references to the twist as the movie meanders along. But you can’t give it away either. A twist should be surprising, but it also needs to seem like it was always there for the viewer if they would have just stopped to think about it. Indeed, twists that have done this successfully are the ones that make you want to rewatch the movie for the clues that you missed the first time. The best way to tell if a twist is gratuitous is if the foreshadowing is forced. . . does it seem jammed into the story, or does it flow naturally from the story as it progresses.

Finally, the best twists need to change the meaning of the entire movie, not just drive the plot in a different direction. Each of the movies identified above does that. Consider The Caine Mutiny where you suddenly find yourself changing sides after the twist is revealed and you realize that you misinterpreted each of Queeg’s actions. Or consider the scene in Fight Club in the kitchen, after Helena Bonham Carter has slept with Durden, where you are convinced that Carter is a nasty, hateful woman, until after the twist, when you realize that she’s actually trying to be nice but Norton is the one who is acting insanely. Consider The Sixth Sense where a horror story turns into a touching relationship film, as you realize what Osment is doing for Willis. Or consider The Usual Suspects, which I need to review, where you suddenly learn that nothing you’ve seen over the prior two hours is true and every motivation you attributed to the characters was false. Those are well done twists, because they give you a new take on everything you just watched and let you see the movie again from an entirely new perspective.

If a movie can achieve each of these four factors, then it likely includes an excellent twist that will make a good movie even better. If it doesn’t achieve one of these factors, then you’ve probably got cat milker masquerading as a writer.

Come on Hollywood, it’s not that hard to do this right.

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Film Friday: Vanishing Point (1971)

Sometimes lousy movies are just plain lousy. Sometimes, they're lousy enough they actually become enjoyable in an odd sort of way. And sometimes, somehow, they hit on something that makes them fascinating. Vanishing Point falls into the last category. And interestingly, it’s what the movie doesn’t tell us that fascinates us.

** spoiler alert **

I first heard of Vanishing Point when Quentin Tarantino mentioned it in Death Proof. On the surface, Vanishing Point is a movie about a man driving a 1970 white Dodge Challenger from Denver to San Francisco. He needs to be there by three o’clock the following day. As he drives along, he runs into some strange characters and is chased by the cops. In the end, the cops set up a roadblock and he slams right into it. Doesn’t sound like much does it? But it’s oddly compelling because it's filled with little mysteries.

For example, we know the man’s name is Kowalski, but never learn his first name. They even make a point of not telling us. We know Kowalski needs to be in San Francisco the follow day (when asked if he’s joking, he tells us: “I wish to God I was.”). But the movie never tells us why. In fact, we have no idea what is motivating him. All we know is he is a former hero-cop and a race car driver, who hit rock bottom after his girlfriend died in a surfing accident. But that was long ago.

As he starts out from Denver, he antagonizes two motorcycle-riding state troopers by forcing one off the road. But we have no idea why he does this. As the cops hunt him down, he’s getting guidance over the radio from Clevon Little, who plays a blind disc jockey named Super Soul. Super Soul plays a variety of songs from some soon-to-be famous people. For example, the first ever recorded material by Kim Carnes appears in this soundtrack, Rita Coolidge and David Gates (Bread) appear on screen as revival singers, and Big Mama Thornton performs some of the gospel music. Super Soul knows exactly what Kowalski is doing at every moment, even though there is no way he could know this, and again we never find out how or why. Finally, the big mystery. . . at the end of the film, the police set up a roadblock. Kowalski sees the roadblock but drives right into it killing himself. And he does it with a smile. Why?

That is what makes this movie so interesting. Who is Kowalski, what is motivating him, and why does he commit suicide at the end of the film? Who is Super Soul and how does he know what he knows? The film never tells us and we want to know.

There are many theories about Kowalski. Some argue that Kowalski represents the last free American -- which is why he has no particular name. This explains why he meets with hippies and bikers and other people who live outside of society. He is the archetypal anti-hero, who drives for pure love of speed and personal freedom, and the police are hunting him down because America is changing and freedom is ending. Coming out in 1971, against the social upheaval of the 1960s, this argument makes a lot of sense.

But there is more to consider. The movie is strewn with religious symbols and gospel music. Super Soul is more like a guardian angle than a disc jockey. And when the locals try to stone Super Soul to shut him up, it feels metaphorical for Biblical punishments. Further, Director Richard Sarafian says he intentionally made Kowalski appear “otherworldly” as he charges the barricade. Moments before the impact, a bright shining light appears between the bulldozers and lights up his face. That’s when he smiles. Many have interpreted this as the Biblical Rapture and his smile as the moment he is saved. Though, this interpretation is troubling as Christianity does not condone suicide.

Barry Newman, who plays Kowalski, speculates that the entire movie is an essay on existentialism and that Kowalski gives his own life so he can define his own life:

“Kowalski smiles as he rushes to his death . . . because he believes he will make it through the roadblock. To Kowalski, [the small hole between the bulldozers] was still a hole to escape through. It symbolized that no matter how far they push or chase you, no one can truly take away your freedom and there is always an escape.”

Others have speculated that he is suicidal because of the death of his girlfriend. But then why choose now and why choose this method of killing himself?

In the end, there is no answer, and that is the biggest part of Vanishing Point's appeal. Hollywood convention tells us that films may never leave big questions unanswered. But Vanishing Point disproves this. Humans are inherently drawn to deep psychological questions because we struggle to understand ourselves and we desperately want to know why others make these kinds of emotional choices -- and suicide is the most dramatic act a human can undertake. Leaving Kowalski's motivation unexplained creates an irresistible mystery that draws people in and keeps them thinking when the film ends.

Finally, interestingly, we actually know how this film would have turned out if they had answered these questions. In 1997, Vanishing Point was remade with Viggo Mortenson replacing Barry Newman and Jason Priestly replacing Cleavon Little. Unlike the original, this movie tells us who Kowalski is (including his full name) and why he wants to get to where he’s going (pregnant wife). Priestly also has no supernatural ability to see Kowalski, and instead spends the film spouting off anti-government militia-type opinions on the radio while arguing with callers about what is motivating Kowalski. The 1997 version stinks.

So maybe Hollywood should rethink this convention that says that everything needs to be explained. Perhaps, sometimes, what we don’t say is even more interesting than what we do?

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Re-Booting The Star Trek Re-Boot

The new Star Trek movie didn’t thrill me. Sure, as shallow summer CGI-blockbusters go, it was acceptable, but it wasn’t anything more than that. This movie had none of the depth and sophistication of the original episodes, nor did it have the essence of what made the characters so great. It was little more than Pirates of the Caribbean In Space meets Star Trek Babies, and I guarantee you this new franchise has at most two more movies in it before the audience loses interest in the big shiny explosions. But I’m not here to rip this movie apart. Instead, I’d rather talk about what would have made a better re-boot.

What kind of Star Trek reboot would I have done? For starters, I would want something that kept the original spirit, only updated it with a more intense story and better effects. It would need to be something that both the fans of the original could like as well as non-versed new comers. So why not start by taking a few of the better episodes, combining them, modernizing them, and adding a few twists.

Just as importantly, we need to keep what made the characters work so well (there is no way that any of these Star Trek Babies grows up to become the series characters) and it would be a nice touch to explain some of their idiosyncrasies. Finally, because it costs us nothing, let’s respect the series history rather than throw in a ridiculous time change cop-out (which still can’t explain why they’re all at the Academy together and suddenly the same ages).

I would begin with the incident mentioned in Obsession (gas cloud monster) where eager young, by-the-book Lt. James Kirk of the USS Farragut freezes up for a split second, leading to the deaths of several officers including the captain he idolized (Captain Garrovick). Kirk freezes because shooting the gas cloud would have killed his then-girlfriend (who is the science officer on the Farragut). When he freezes, it attacks the rest of the landing party and kills them. This gives us the question of whether or not Kirk can make the truly hard decision of sacrificing someone he loves to save others.

Fast forward several years. A no-longer-by-the-book, Kirk boards the Enterprise for the first time as Captain. He is replacing the very popular Captain Pike, which gives us a chance to see if Kirk can win over the crew.

Spock, who is already on the Enterprise, was Pike’s science officer and represents the voice of reason. Sulu, also already on board, represents the voice of Pike’s crew. McCoy comes on board for the first time with Kirk, but has not previously known Kirk -- he will be the voice of the audience. Also coming on board with Kirk, as second officer of the Enterprise, is Kirk’s best friend from Academy days. These characters will let the audience see Kirk’s actions being judged from different perspectives.

Kirk’s first assignment is to take a science team to the outer rim of the galaxy to investigate and cross over an energy barrier that rings the galaxy and seems to hold it together. The science team includes Kirk’s (now ex) girlfriend from the beginning of the film. She still pines for Kirk, but he has an aversion to her because of the bad memories of the Farragut incident. This gives us a potential romantic interest and lets us see how Kirk is dealing with his own past. Moreover, you can add the element of him trying to resolve the conflict between wanting a relationship but simultaneously believing that would interfere with his duties as Captain.

Kirk tries to take the ship through the barrier, causing the ship to become damaged (see Where No Man Has Gone Before). Several people die and a handful of people start developing strange ESP powers -- including the ex and the best friend.

As the crippled ship heads to the nearest Federation outpost, things start to go wrong. First, they encounter the remains of an alien spaceship. During the next hour of the movie, Spock will slowly decode that ship’s logs. He will learn that the crew came under attack from both within and outside of the ship, and that the alien captain blew up his own ship, but they won’t know why until near the end of the movie.

In the meantime, strange things start to happen. They discover a ship following them on their sensors, but can’t get near it (like a sensor mirage). It’s like they are being stalked (see Balance of Terror). People also start to see visions of ghosts walking the hallways and hear things pounding on the hull. Soon people are hallucinating, with deadly consequences.

In this portion of the film, I would go for a level and style of horror similar to The Grudge -- uncomfortable and disturbing (a little shocking), but not gory.

As these events begin, the crew believes that they have intruders aboard. Then they start to think they brought something back from the destroyed ship. But as Kirk’s friends gain more and more ESP powers it becomes clear that they are manifesting these nightmares. Further, as their powers grow, they start “losing their humanity” as their powers corrupt their thinking. This lets you play with the “power corrupts” angle and the “fear drives us to do bad things” angle.

As these powers grow, they become increasingly menacing to the crew. Spock tells Kirk they cannot be allowed to reach a populated planet -- he also discovers that this is why the alien captain destroyed his own ship, so his ESP-enhanced crew would not be unleashed on a populated planet. At the same time, McCoy is working on a cure, but likely won’t find one in time.

Kirk is now facing THE choice -- egged on in multiple directions by Spock (“act now”) and McCoy (“give me time”). He can’t let his friends reach the nearest outpost, and he must protect his crew, but can he kill his friends in cold blood? That is the very issue Kirk could not resolve at the beginning of the film with the gas cloud.

In terms of adding a little action, as Kirk is making the decision, I would have the “sensor ghost” (now nearly fully manifested) finally attack the Enterprise. This would be the final trigger that pushes Kirk to make the decision. So does he kill them? Of course, because he’s Kirk and he makes those kinds of hard decisions. But if this is written well, the audience should not be sure until he does it that he will actually do it.

Then wrap it up with a speech about duty, and stressing that while space exploration is dangerous, it is in our natures to take risks.

The end.

I think this movie does a good job of keeping the spirit of the original, updating it, and creating a movie that is both challenging to the audience and yet accessible without being lost in Star Trek minutia. Also, this movie leaves the door open for all kinds of stories in the future because it’s character-driven and you can go in any number of ways with future scripts (kind of like the new Doctor Whos). By comparison, the reboot they actually made can only lead to more CGI action flicks.

That’s my opinion, and I’m sticking to it.

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Top 25: Romance Films You Should Know

Let’s talk about the top 25 romantic films you should know. Why? Because it’s Valentine’s Day and Commentarama loves you! What makes a film romantic? A romantic film pulls at your heartstrings. It gives you the warm fuzzies or the “Spock can’t die?” weepies. But most importantly, it’s about love, baby, love.

Romances began in ancient Greece as comedies, i.e. not-dramas. But it wasn’t until western Europe’s medieval period that romances came into their own. Not coincidentally, many of the conventions that we ascribe to romances today were created at that time. For example this period gave us the white knight stories and the noble sacrifice. The Shakespearean era added romantic mix ups and the star-crossed lovers. And the Jane Austen era finished us off with the cross-class romance, the couple who are already pledged to others, and the ugly ducking. With those final pieces, romances had everything they needed, and they’ve developed little since.

1. Gone With The Wind (1939): I don’t want to die, so I’m giving the mob what it wants. Yet. . . there are legitimate reasons this film belongs at the top of the list. With a stellar cast, an interesting story, and one of the most memorable lines in film, this film, one of the all time highest grossing films, continues to transcend generations. But even more importantly, this is the only film on the entire list that doesn’t fit into the conventions discussed above, and that makes it truly special. “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn.”

2. Casablanca (1942): Boy meets girl, Nazis invade Paris, boy loses girl, boy meets girl again, girl is married to unappealing jerk, boy and girl make sacrifice for greater cause, boy keeps Nazis as parting gift. Described by many as Hollywood’s finest moment, this is THE movie for anyone who’s ever been dumped without a lot of explanation. It also contains the most famous line never said: “Play it again, Sam.” “We’ll always have Paris.”

3. Pride and Prejudice (1995): Ok, I’m cheating because this was a miniseries, but rules were meant to be bent, and this miniseries brings Jane Austen’s classic novel to life better than any other version or remake. Pride is the classic struggle of two people who fall for each other despite initially disliking each other, and then can’t ever seem to get together because neither can express themselves -- though they are quite good at arranging the lives of others. Pride is one of the most copied works, as seen again in movies like Clueless, The Sound of Music and many others. “In vain have I struggled, it will not do. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.”

4. An Affair To Remember (1957): Ranked as the most romantic film of all time by the American Film Institute, this Spock-weepy classic staring Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr presents a true star-crossed lovers tale. Two strangers fall in love, despite being engaged to others, and promise to meet in six months to start anew. But things go wrong, as one suffers an injury, and fear of rejection threatens to keep them apart. “There must be something between us, even if it's only an ocean.”

5. Beauty and the Beast (1991): Am I kidding? A cartoon? Nope, not kidding. Show me a little girl. . . or a big girl for that matter, who doesn’t know this movie by heart? Beauty and the Beast is the classic princess fairy tale, mixed with a little Pride and Prejudice, a heaping dose of unrequited love and lovers' misinterpretations, and it plays on the idea that the right woman can turn a frog into a prince. “She’ll never see me as anything but a monster. It’s hopeless.”

6. Pretty Woman (1990): Pretty Woman is the most recent version of Pygmalion, later to become My Fair Lady. My Fair Lady, which I vastly prefer, could easily have taken this spot, but I chose Pretty Woman because of its more recent vintage and because it wasn’t a musical. This story embodies the modern version of the white knight tale, with Richard “Gerbil” Gere, the heartless corporate raider, rescuing Julia Roberts, the hooker with the heart of gold. This movie made Roberts into America’s Sweetheart, gak. “I want the fairy tale.”

7. Four Weddings And A Funeral (1994): The highest grossing British film up to that point, and the film that made Hugh Grant into an international star, this film follows Hugh Grant, who falls for Andie MacDowell after a one night stand. They keep running into each other thereafter at weddings and a funeral, each time with one of them engaged to another, until they finally put it all together. “The castle beckons.”

8. Ghost (1990): Ghost is the classic story of the separated lovers, with an interesting twist -- they are separated by Patrick Swayze’s death. Moreover, Swayze must work to protect his wife from his own killer. Add in the fact that he’s unable to tell his wife that he loved her until after his death, and this turns into one of the most memorable romance movies. This movie even makes Whoopie Goldberg likeable. Will miracles never cease? “Ditto.”

9. Titanic (1997): I found this cliché-riddled movie ridiculous, but it is known the world over. The highest grossing film of all time until Avatar, this film made Leonardo DiCaprio a star outside gay circles and it showed that nothing is more romantic than dying in a disaster after a gun fight. “I’m the king of the world.”

10. Dirty Dancing (1987): Here is one of the travesties of these kinds of lists. This is an ugly duckling story similar to Strictly Ballroom, but Strictly Ballroom is far superior on so many levels -- from the believability of the romantic interests, to the more sensual dancing, to the more intelligent humor. Yet, Dirty Dancing is on the list, and Strictly Ballroom is not, because it is more known. “Nobody puts Baby in a corner.”

11. Princess Bride (1987): How can a movie that pokes fun at romantic movies be in the top eleven? Because it manages to create one of the sweeter romantic movies of modern times. Everyone knows this movie, and even kids are ok with the kissy parts. “As you wish.”

12. Say Anything (1989): Lane Meyer, er. . . Lloyd Dobler is the classic underachiever. He wants to date Diane, who is going places, like England. Soon they fall in love. But her father does not approve. Will Lloyd have what it takes to win the girl? We do know one thing, he’s got a boom box and a Peter Gabriel cassette, and he knows how to use them to up the ante for teenage stalkers everywhere! “What I really want to do with my life - what I want to do for a living - is I want to be with your daughter.”

13. When Harry Met Sally (1989): Ok, full disclosure -- I hate this one. I’ve never see two less appealing people. . . they should have been hit by a train. Harry Sally follows two shallow, self-centered jerks over a twelve year period, and it introduces concepts like “the high maintenance girlfriend” and the “transitional person.” Oh goody. “Can men and women ever just be friends?”

14. The Philadelphia Story (1940): This one is listed at No. 5 on the AFI’s list of romantic movies, though I see it more as comedic than romantic. Still, this sharp-witted comedy provides plenty of romantic sparks as socialite Katherine Hepburn’s wedding plans are complicated by the arrival of Cary Grant, her ex-husband. At a time when the Hayes Code blocked any mention of extramarital affairs, Story was considered one of the best comedies about “remarriage” -- the 1930s/1940s substitute for affairs.

15. While You Were Sleeping (1995): Along with Speed, Sleeping launched Sandra Bullock’s career, and didn’t do too badly for Bill Pullman either. Sleeping is a mistaken identity story involving the perfect girl who is mistaken for the fiancé of a man in a coma. She meets coma-boy’s family and falls for his brother, Bill Pullman. But when coma-boy wakes up, the jig is up. Disgraced, Bullock goes back to her sad, sad life. Will love conquer all? “I want you. . . not to be unhappy.”

16. Shakespeare in Love (1998): This clever comedy deals with the forbidden love of William Shakespeare (Joseph Fiennes) and Viola de Lesseps (Gwyneth Paltrow). With an amazing cast that includes Geoffrey Rush and Judi Dench, this movie delivers both a hilarious take on Shakespeare and a parody of many of his works, and a touching star-crossed lovers story. This is perhaps the one movie that best encapsulates the entire Shakespearean era version of romance. And any move that makes cold-fish Gwyneth Paltrow seem human deserves to be on the list. “I love you, Will, beyond poetry.”

17. You’ve Got Mail (1998): A famous instance of product placement, AOL was a remake of 1940’s The Shop Around the Corner, where two letter-writing lovers don’t realize that their sweetheart penpals happen to be the co-workers they can’t stand. AOL updates this concept for the internet age. Starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan as competing book store managers, this film also was heavily influenced by Pride and Prejudice. “You’ve got mail.”

18. Sleepless in Seattle (1993): Before they managed competing book stores, Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan remade An Affair to Remember without the complexity. . . forget the disability, eliminate Hanks’ wife with extreme prejudice, and cue the compliant, cute kid to reflect the single-parent environment of the 1990s (and to give the easy seal of approval to Ryan). “Destiny is something we've invented because we can't stand the fact that everything that happens is accidental.”

19. Notting Hill (1999): Hill is a serviceable romance except for the twenty-minute smirkoff near the end, which significantly raised my tolerance for violence. Hill brings together smirking heavy-weights Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts under the guidance of the same writer as Four Weddings, to give us the highest grossing British film since Four Weddings. This tale of two people who don’t fit in each other’s lives but decide they can’t live apart revived the sagging careers of both smirkers, and showed that formulaic pabulum continues to sell. “Look at me, I’m smirking.”

20. Officer and Gentleman (1982): There were a series of romantic films that were huge about 20 years ago, but which seem to be slowly fading. This includes The French Lieutenant’s Woman and Love Story, but the best of this group appears to be An Officer and a Gentleman. Richard Gere woos Debra Winger as he goes through aviation officer candidate school. This one ends in the iconic scene where Gere walks through a factory to find Winger as the UAW applauds. “I got nowhere else to go!”

21. My Best Friend’s Wedding (1997): In this tale of unrequited love, Smirker Roberts and her college buddy Dermot Mulroney agree that they will marry if neither is married by the time they turn 28. But at 27, Mulroney tells Roberts he wants to marry Cameron Diaz. . . for some reason. This of course convinces Roberts that she really loves Mulroney. Thus, she must pretend to be the dutiful maid of honor while secretly trying to sabotage the wedding. “This is my one chance at happiness. I have to be ruthless!”

22. The English Patient (1996): How can a movie with the talented Ralph Fiennes, the beautiful Juliette Binoche, Mr. Pride Colin Firth, and two Jesuses -- Willem Dafoe and Jurgen Prochnow -- go wrong? I don’t know, but this one bored me to tears. . . not Spock-tears, but tears none-the-less. Maybe you liked it better than I did, many people apparently did. Enough in fact, that it makes our countdown. “Why are you so determined to keep me alive?”

23. Bridget Jones’ Diary (2001): Yet another Pride and Prejudice adaptation, this one centers around a woman who works in the publishing industry, where she fantasizes about her boss until she meets a lawyer she can’t stand (Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy. . . again). He thinks she’s a fool. So naturally, they need to fall in love. This film is mostly famous for capturing the angst of single-women in the 1990s. Avoid this one if you have a Y chromosome. “Bridget Jones, wanton sex goddess, with a very bad man between her thighs... Mom... Hi.”

24. City of Angels (1998): Angels is a remake of Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire, in which Nicolas Cage gives up being an angel so he can be with the ill-fated Meg Ryan, a surgeon who is anguished by her inability to save one of her patients. “I would rather have had one breath of her hair, one kiss of her mouth, one touch of her hand, than eternity without it.”

25. Breakfast at Tiffanies (1961): Breakfast gives us Audrey Hepburn’s most memorable role as she plays the naive, eccentric gold digger Holly Golightly, who seems afraid to fall in love. “Well baby, you're already in that cage. You built it yourself.”


Again, these are not necessarily the best romantic movies, but these are the ones you should know to be conversant in our culture. If you want a couple of great ones that aren’t on the list, try the Korean My Sassy Girl, which I’ll review at some point. Or, surprisingly, try Jet Li’s Hero, a martial arts film centered around a very strong love story. Or how about WALL-E, a touching romance between two robots? I’ve been told Until the End of the World is pretty good too.

Thoughts?

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TV Review: Caprica (2010)

Set 58 years before the remake of Battlestar Galactica (“BSG”), Caprica is the story of two families. One is the Adama family, with the focus being on Joseph Adama (Esai Morales), the father of future Galactica commander William Adama -- William is a young boy at this point. The Graystones are the other family. Daniel Graystone (Eric Stoltz) is the inventor of the Cylons. All in all, I’m not thrilled with the show and I think it has serious problems going forward.

** spoiler alert **

The story begins with the death of Graystone’s daughter and Adama’s wife and daughter in a terrorist bombing on a train. The terrorists are a militant religious fringe that believe in “the one true god” instead of the pantheon of gods that are generally accepted (though largely ignored) by the vast, vast majority of people in the colonies, of which Caprica is a member planet.

After losing his daughter Zoe (Alessandra Torresani), Graystone, a talented cyberneticist with a huge military contract to build the first combat robot, inserts an avatar of his daughter (kind of a mental imprint) into his robot’s meta-cognitive processor. This robot, a “cybernetic life form node”. . . “Cylon” for short, becomes the first Cylon. Because of this blending of Zoe and robot, the show intersperses images of the Cylon robot and Zoe, and we watch her reaction as lab techs respond to the robot, unaware of her presence. From there, wackiness ensues.

At this point, in the interest of full disclosure, I should point out that I do not like or respect Ronald Moore, the show’s creator. The man has serious issues. In several interviews, he’s stated that he believes characters should suffer and he would never allow characters to redeem themselves with their actions or to have happy endings (excepting, of course, studio demands). This was on full display in early BSG, where his characters entered a downward spiral with no end -- a downward spiral completely inconsistent with the human experience apart from a few true, manic depressives. Also on display in BSG was his creepy relationship with women. He claims to like “strong” female characters, but they always seem to end up cruel if not sadistic, corrupt, and with strong hints of lesbianism. His male characters fare no better, tending to be self-absorbed, pathetic alcoholics and whiny, über-wimps.

I also do not respect the way he used cheap marketing tactics to gin up interest in BSG -- he has admitted since the show ended that the changes he made to character races and genders were done purely to outrage fans of the original show so they would tune in. What’s worse, as a story teller, I think he’s a coward. I will admit that he flashed moments of brilliance in BSG, but he was always too afraid to take those moments as far as they should go. For example, (1) he started to toy with the idea that the Cylons, who are extremely religious, were the good guys; (2) he gave us a Starbuck who came back from the dead, (4) he gave us terrorists, out of control death squads, and a mutiny, and (5) he gave us Baltar, who started building a massive, twisted cult. Each of these was a moment of brilliance. Yet, in each instance, he dropped the story lines right before the hard choices had to be made, often relying on the age old hack-writer's tool of des ex machina to solve his storyline problems.

Yet, BSG had several things going for it. The first season was virtually unwatchable with the characters basically running around whining and acting like depressives at a two-drink minimum funeral, as they re-enacted each of the original BSG episodes while Moore did interviews disparaging the original show. But over time, he stumbled into ideas that gave the story interest: the realization that some of the humans were actually Cylon agents, the discovery that there were hidden Cylons (who did not know they were Cylons), the discovery that Ellen Tigh was not human, the discovery of Earth. These moments of brilliance and the tension they created made up for the whiny moralizing (like BSGs thinly veiled support for the Iraqi insurgency against US troops), the failing story arcs and the unrealistic, unpleasant characters.

Further, BSG benefited from some great acting: Edward James Olmos, Mary McDonnell, Grace Park, James Callis, and Michael Hogan all turned in stellar performances. And, most importantly, Tricia Helfer gave us a Number Six who was dangerously psychotic, wildly passionate, and absolutely compelling.

Why do I bring this up? Because Caprica has none of these benefits. In place of the compelling, manipulative and unpredictable Number Six, we have Zoe (Torresani), an erratic, monotone, dark-haired version of “save-the-cheerleader” Hayden Panettiere. She’s a poor replacement because her character just doesn’t have the range that Number Six did, nor am I convinced that Torresani can hold a candle to Helfer screen presence. By the same token, Eric Stoltz (Pulp Fiction) just doesn’t have the ability to carry off either a believable scientific genius or a grieving father. He’s more of a moody lab tech. The subplot involving young William Adama’s indoctrination into the mafia doesn’t seem all that interesting either: "gee kid, here's how you break a window. . . ho hum." As for Joseph Adama, Esai Morales is a weak trade for Edward James Olmos, and his character seems to have little more to offer than being the hot-blooded foil to Stoltz’s Doctor Thorazine. . . if they ever end up on screen together.

I am concerned about the plot as well. Whereas BSG was able to offer all kinds of mysteries and surprises, all central to the plot, Caprica seems more like a show that gave away the big surprise in the opening act and is now scrambling to remind you how surprised you were. What is left to reveal or to present a mystery? Nor are the intrafamily or interfamily dynamics very interesting. The show is set up to create tension between the two families and within the families, but the families don’t seem to be on an equal footing, they are bound together only by the thinnest of bonds, and they don’t necessarily interact. And the intrafamily relationships seem non-existent -- apparently, some of the characters are married, though you'd be hard-pressed to tell which. So while this is where the writers will likely look for drama, it seems like it’s going to be a stretch.

The world they’ve created isn’t all that exciting either. Whereas BSG followed the golden rule of unveiling slowly and keeping people wanting more, Caprica showed us their entire world right out of the gates. . . and it wasn’t all that interesting. Indeed, their world seems like a stylized 1950s with an incongruent mix of 1990s technology and far future technology, with a few taboos thrown in to shock the audience (like the nod to Hollywood’s new cause du jour polygamy).

Right now, I just don’t see the compelling characters. I see no story arcs that will keep you guessing. I see no drama or twists that will keep you on the edge of your seat. And I see little else to satisfy your sense of wonder. The themes are well trodden (racism, the pros and cons of religious extremism, power corrupts) and, even worse, the writers don’t seem to be offering anything new.

There are also strange moments you need to overlook to enjoy the show. For example, how does the Cylon, an eight foot tall multi-ton robot, escape the lab and go visit a friend of Zoe’s without anyone noticing? And why don’t the lab assistants seem to care that the robot appears to be psychotic and out of control?

Now, I could be wrong? It could be that the writers have something very different planned than what they’ve shown so far, but based on what I’ve seen at this point, Caprica made an ok short story, but has little to offer going forward as a series.

I guess we’ll see.

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