Top 25: War Films You Should Know

In honor of Memorial Day, let’s talk about the Top 25 war movies you should see to be well versed in war movies. This is an interesting list because it mixes some patriotic films with some anti-war movies, and it includes movies that are fairly accurate and some that are complete fantasy.

Interestingly, there are few war films that deal with the American Revolution, the War of 1812, the Spanish American War, the Mexican American War or Korea. And those films that do touch on these topics can hardly be considered memorable or influential. You may also note that there is nothing about Iraq (for which I recommend the miniseries Generation Kill). Let us begin. . .

1. Apocalypse Now (Redux) (1979): This movie sits atop many greatest war movies lists and it deserves its place -- but make sure you see the redux. Based on Joseph Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness,” Apocalypse Now is a criticism of the Vietnam war. But it is not anti-war or anti-American, despite what many people believe (I should do an article on this point). What it is, is critical of distant commanders living in luxury as they send troops to fight wars on a part-time basis. It is a criticism of starting wars but not fighting to win. Now’s characters, all played by top-notch actors, are iconic, and you literally can’t escape its most famous quotes, from “the horror, the horror,” to “Saigon, I’m still in Saigon,” to “I love the smell of napalm in the morning.”

2. Platoon (1986): I don’t like starting this list with two Vietnam movies in a row, but they both deserve their places. Platoon is the movie that changed the relationship between the public and Vietnam veterans. Even though Oliver Stone intended this as an anti-military diatribe, Americans took this film as an opportunity to embrace Vietnam Veterans and to make peace with the war. It’s also an extremely well done movie that became the template for all future movies based about Vietnam. Incidentally, this is not the only film to backfire on Stone, see e.g. Wall Street which had a generation of Americans idolizing Gordon Gekko. “Somebody once wrote: ‘Hell is the impossibility of reason.’ That's what this place feels like.”

3. The Longest Day (1962): This movie is one of those shining moments. This movie features a who’s who of Hollywood leading men from the 1950s/1960s, who work their way through American’s crowning moment in World War II -- the D-Day invasion. It’s well written, well acted, well shot, and it doesn’t cheapen the Allies’ achievement by making the Germans into subhuman creatures or idiots. And all of this adds up to a movie that feels as real as a documentary, but is as entertaining as carefully crafted fiction. “The thing that's always worried me about being one of the few is the way we keep on getting fewer.”

4. Gettysburg (1993): Gettysburg the battle is the most pivotal moment in our nation’s history: a Southern victory would have meant British recognition and a permanent split. Gettysburg the film is easily the greatest Civil War movie. Filmed before CGI, the producers gathered thousands of historical recreationists to create the most realistic Civil War battle scenes you will ever see. This movie shows all of the insanity of combat tactics in that era and the hardships the troops faced. It shows you how the armies differed, and how these really were citizen armies. And unlike movies like Glory, Gettysburg has no agenda; it presents a highly nuanced discussion of the nation’s politics and it gives all sides a fair presentation. “To be a good soldier you must love the army. To be a good commander you must be able to order the death of the thing you love.”

5. The Great Escape (1963): Despite its seemingly fantastic plot, The Great Escape is an amalgam of true stories combined into one giant escape. This movie presents some of the coolest leading men of its era but, unlike other ensemble films, this one is plot driven and it makes the actors work for it, rather than the other way around. This movie also, to its credit, presents a nuanced view of the Germans, showing the historical distinction between the treatment POWs received from the Luftwaffe versus the treatment received from the SS and the Gestapo. “It is the sworn duty of all officers to try to escape.”

6. All Quiet on the Western Front (1930): Based on the most important novel about the life of average soldiers, All Quiet follows a group of German boys who happily go off to fight for German in The Great War, WWI. They quickly learn that war is not what they thought it was. This is the first major anti-war film of the “talky” era, and this book/film set up the genre conventions and themes that continue to this very day. “War isn’t the way it looks back here.”

7. The Dirty Dozen (1967): A story of twelve convicts who are given the chance to earn their freedom by taking on an impossible mission, this is more of a tough guy film than a war film, but it’s become a classic war movie. This movie also shows how America was changing from the post-WWII era to the counter-culture era, as many counter-culture elements made their way into this film. In many ways, Dirty Dozen signals the end of the patriotic war film. “Killin' generals could get to be a habit with me.”

8. Das Boot (1981): Originally a German miniseries, this movie is the only realistic movie about submarine service. This film covers all the bases of the German U-boat campaign in the North Atlantic during WWII, and it does so accurately, from showing the privileges extended to submariners (beards and the fact that they did not adopt the Hitler salute), to showing the hardships of life on board, e.g. the cramped conditions, the stench, the boredom interspersed with shear terror, and it showed the terrible dangers, e.g. submariners had a 75% casualty rate. “ALARM!!”

9. Patton (1970): Ok, I have to admit, I don’t like this film. I find it dull, simplistic and uninteresting -- kind of like The Big Red One. But millions of people love this film and it is considered George C. Scott’s finest film, so it belongs here. “Now I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country.”

10. Bridge On The River Kwai (1957): Alec Guinness plays a British commander who, through power of personality, all but takes over the prison camp where he and his men are being made to work on a bridge for the Japanese. . . until Guinness starts to go insane. Beautifully shot by David Lean, tremendous acting and highly dramatic, this is a brilliant film, though this film really angers the veterans who were there, who point out that none of it is factual (even the river is misnamed) and that it completely ignores the horrific brutality of the Japanese. “We can teach these barbarians a lesson in Western methods and efficiency that will put them to shame. We'll show them what the British soldier is capable of doing.”

11. Saving Private Ryan (1998): I have serious problems with the characters in this film, who are far too cynical and far too modern to accurately represent Americans of the WWII generation. I also despise the emotional manipulation that permeates this film. But I can’t deny its place on the list. This film opened the door for more gory, realistic war movies, and would reset the template for future war movies. Still, I much prefer the far superior miniseries Band of Brothers. “James Francis Ryan of Iowa? Your brothers were killed in combat. . . all of them.”

12. Sands of Iwo Jima (1949): Sands is the story of a group of American Marines as they island hop in the Pacific. It climaxes with the invasion of Iwo Jima. This movie captures the resolved spirit of America at the time, a spirit symbolized by quiet determination and unselfish sacrifice without glory-seeking. I also see this as John Wayne’s finest performance. Interestingly, this film has recently come under fire for its portrayal of Japanese soldiers in ways that are now considered racially insulting and its use of the term “Jap.” "That’s war. . . trading real estate for men."

13. Stalag 17 (1953): Staring William Holden, this is the drama that inspired Hogan’s Heroes. This is a tremendous story about justice in a POW camp and how easily people are turned against each other when they suspect a fellow prisoner of being a German spy. “What is this anyway, a kangaroo court? Why don't you get a rope and do it right?”

14. Full Metal Jacket (1987): Jacket follows a group of recruits as they go through Marine Corp training and ultimately end up in Vietnam. To me, this film suffers from Kubrick Syndrome, i.e. I respect it much more than I like it, but its images and quotes have embedded themselves deeply in our culture. A good, but much less well known substitute that follows similar lines is The Boys In Company C. “What is your major malfunction?”

15. Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970): An ensemble piece that established the template for movies like Midway and miniseries like The Winds of War, Tora tells the story of the bombing of Pearl Harbor from both the Japanese and American sides. As a typical ensemble film, Tora suffers from having too many characters and trying to give them all equal time. It also works for its actors rather than the other way around, e.g. each actor gets to play smarter, wiser and more noble than the people they are portraying really were. “I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.”

16. Sergeant York (1941): This film is a biography about America’s biggest World War I hero, Sergeant Alvin York, whose life parallels American thinking at the time of WWI. York, a pacifist, wanted nothing to do with the wider world, but when he found himself drafted, he did his duty and he did it with modesty and American practicality. York became a true American hero, and Gary Cooper plays him perfectly. “Folks back home used to say I could shoot a rifle before I was weaned, but they was exaggeratin' some.”

17. Zulu (1964): Filmed as a protest against imperialism, Zulu is the best film about colonial armies. The story involves the Zulus who have massacred a British column and are now headed toward populated areas in South Africa. Standing in their way was a small British detachment at Rorke’s Drift. Combining incredible cinematography, with a true story, a fair presentation of both sides, and filmed with the participation of actual Zulu warriors (and their king), this is a compelling film. It was also Michael Caine’s first major role. “If 1,200 men couldn't hold a defensive position this morning, what chance have we with 100?”

18. Black Hawk Down (2001): A true story of when a small group of American special forces soldiers found themselves surrounded by thousands of Somali gunmen, this film is the modern American version of Zulu. We also know now that many of these gunmen were trained and equipped by Al Qaeda, making this the first battle of the modern war on terror. “Nobody gets left behind.”

19. Kelly’s Heroes (1970): One of the few “capers” films to use World War II as a setting, this is a truly entertaining film about Clint Eastwood and his merry band of malcontents who decide to skip on ahead of the American army so they can steal a vault full of gold bars. “Then make a DEAL! . . . maybe the guy’s a Republican. Business is business, right?”

20. The Dawn Patrol (1938): This is the first film to my knowledge which dealt with the loneliness of command. Staring Errol Flynn and David Niven, Flynn finds himself going from carefree WWI fighter pilot to commander of a squadron and soon needs to send his friends to their deaths. “You know what this place is? It's a slaughterhouse, and I'm the butcher!”

21. The Guns of Navarone (1961): This was written as an anti-war movie by a writer with communist sympathies during the cold war. But, as so often happens, it actually makes a very different statement. Indeed, the main theme to the movie ultimately comes across as “it’s time to take a stand and stop sitting on the sidelines,” which is actually a rather pro-war statement. “You think you've been getting away with it all this time, standing by. Well, son, your bystanding days are over! You're in it now, up to your neck.”

22. Where Eagles Dare (1968): More a spy film set in WWII than a war film, Eagles is nevertheless an excellent movie about the less conventional aspects of WWII. Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood are sent on a mission to expose traitors in British Intelligence. “Broadsword calling Danny Boy.”

23. The Green Berets (1968): The only pro-Vietnam War film made, this John Wayne film follows a small detachment of Green Beret soldiers as they train South Vietnamese soldiers. The movie does a good job of laying out why we were fighting, but the film is overly simplistic and lacks realism. Still, it’s worth seeing. “That's newspapers for you, ma'am. You could fill volumes with what you don't read in them.”

24. A Bridge Too Far (1977): Bridge is the true story of an overly-ambitious paratroop attack that went wrong. This film suffers from being an ensemble film with too many characters, each being too over-the-top heroic, and it is difficult to accept anti-war types like Robert Redford playing heroic American soldiers. But the film is entertaining and it is well known. “We haven't the proper facilities to take you all prisoner! Sorry!”

25. They Were Expendable (1945): This John Wayne/John Ford film is about the PT boats that defended the Philippines after Pearl Harbor, and how the Navy came to respect their value, particularly as they became essential in evacuating senior personnel from the advancing Japanese.


There are, of course, others that did not make the list for various reasons. I did not include Schindler’s List because it’s not really a war movie. I didn’t include Paths of Glory and Cross of Iron, two excellent films, because they simply aren’t that well known. If I could add one film that everyone should see, it would be a Finish movie: Talvisota (The Winter War) (1989). This is the story of the Soviet invasion of Finland in 1939 told from the Finish perspective. It is an excellent film.

Anything you would add? Anything you would remove?

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Liberalism Kills. . . Hollywood Careers?

We all know that Hollywood is hostile to conservatives. From the liberal-only political contributions, to the scarcity of conservative messages in films, to the abundance of liberal garbage inserted into almost every movie, to the anecdotal stories told by conservatives of being blacklisted, there’s simply too much evidence to support this theory to think that people are just being paranoid. But is being an overt liberal also bad for your career? I think it is.

Let me start by admitting that I have no statistical evidence to back up this article, so this is merely supposition. But over the past 10-15 years, I’ve begun to notice a trend: Hollywood stars seem to kill their careers when they start spouting nasty liberalism.

Hollywood has always bent left. They’ve always made movies like Wall Street to blast “Republican” bankers, China Syndrome to blasted nuclear power, and a slew of movies to hate Nixon. . . boy do they hate Nixon! And there have always been actors who are primarily political, like Robert Redford, who hates Nixon. But these were relatively tame political ventures until the last two decades.

In the 1980s, it became fashionable to support causes: stop pollution, don’t eat dolphin-flavored tuna, boycott South Africa. . . shave the whales. These were the causes that Hollywood types espoused. In fact, it became such a big thing that many stars (who typically are too stupid to tie their own shoes) hired trained public relations firms to find causes for them to “have always felt deeply about.” A few carefully scripted public service announcements later, and bingo -- social relevance.

But everything began to change somewhere around the time the Clintons brought Hollywood into the Lincoln Bedroom. Maybe Hollywood got excited by the idea that they could influence politics? Maybe the politicization of our culture made it easier to be an extremist? Who knows? In any event, Hollywood stars ditched their do-gooder projects and their PSAs and they jumped headlong into politics. Suddenly, political endorsements and campaign commercials were the order of the day.

Then they started getting nasty, and that’s where the problems began. Soon Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon were doing hatchet jobs on Republicans. Then, one by one, the likes of Sean Penn and Danny Glover set out to fellate dictators, Matt Damon and George Clooney went overseas to attack our country as evil, racist and corrupt, and Janeane Garfalo and a dozen others started using “hate speech” against anyone on the right every time they opened their mouths.

And during this whole time, a correlation began to appear: the more these actors spoke, the more their careers collapsed. Look at Penn. Post-Madonna Penn was respected and slowly but surely was establishing himself as an A list actor. . . until he opened his mouth. Now he works in political flicks, but it would be inconceivable to put him into a mainstream movie.

Damon and Clooney were both huge. In fact, I would honestly say that Clooney (and later Damon) was on his way to becoming Hollywood’s biggest present-day star until he started shooting off his mouth. Suddenly, all of his films began to flop. There were no boycotts, no protests; he just lost the ability to get people to come see his films. Could it be that he suddenly couldn’t choose a good film? Or was the audience responding to a growing dislike for his politics? Ditto with Damon, who is now also running on a curious losing streak (apart from his Bourne franchise).

Robbins and Sarandon all but vanished from film, except for bit parts in ensemble pieces. Garafalo, never exactly a star, is now non-existent. And what was the last movie Danny Glover starred in? Alex Baldwin was chased from film around the time of his “move to Canada promise,” and was only rescued by sit-coms.

And there are more. Brad Pitt’s star seems to have faded with his increased political activity. Megan Fox may have killed her career with a combination of hate-filled statements about flyover country people and criticism of her directors. Steven Weber never had a career, but what he had seems finished now that he’s joined the Hollywood Haters Club. Kevin Costner collapsed after Dances With Wolves, and Meryl Streep’s career all but fell apart after she became a verb (“the Streeping of science”), until she was saved by Satan, i.e. The Devil Wears Prada. Tom Hanks hasn’t faded yet, but he’s only recently started to say really stupid things. . . and average people are commenting on it. But these are only some examples.

What I can’t say for certain is whether these stars faded because they began saying stupid political things that offended large parts of the population, or if they started saying stupid things because their careers were fading? Or said differently, did the public begin to shun these actors when they crossed that line into anti-Americanisms? Or did they cross that line hoping to draw attention to themselves to revive moribund careers? Pitt, Damon and Clooney certainly still seemed to have their best years ahead of them when they opened their mouths and began their slides. Moreover, since making these political statements seems to hasten the career decline, it doesn't make a lot of sense that stars would be doing this to save a sagging career.

Could it be that once these actors became “established,” they started taking “riskier films”, i.e. less commercial films, which makes all of this just coincidental? That doesn't seem likely. That could arguably be the case for Clooney, but not for Damon or Costner. Damon and Costner kept right on churning out purely commercial films. It’s just that no one wants to see them anymore.

It’s hard to say anything definite on this because it’s hard to tell exactly what came first -- -- decline or diarrhea-mouth? It’s also hard to tell at what point they first crossed that line into anti-Americanism, and when their views first became well-known to the public. Not to mention that many of these actors still work, just at a much lower level than before.

But putting on my educated guess cap, I would say that this trend that I’m noticing indicates that when actors start spouting off things that offend middle America, middle America simply stops seeing their films. Take for example the total failure of all of Hollywood’s Iraq films. Damon’s Green Zone had a budget of $100 million and pulled in about $26 million domestically in theaters ($86 million total gross), despite being made by the same people who made the highly successful Bourne series. Look at some of these other numbers: The Hurt Locker $21.3 million despite all of its awards, Body of Lies $39 million, Stop-Loss $10.6 million, In the Valley of Elah $6.7 million, Grace is Gone less than $1 million, and The Messenger less than $1 million.

Maybe this just means that people don’t want to be reminded of Iraq? A more likely reason for this level of failure is that people are voting with their wallets and they are tuning out films that they see as being insulting to their values. That would certainly back up the idea that overt, nasty liberalism is a career killer.

Thoughts?

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How Not To Build A Spaceship

One of the most important aspects of story telling is establishing something called “suspension of disbelief.” This is the point where the storyteller overcomes the viewer/reader/listener’s natural inclination to disregard or dismiss stories that don’t ring true. This is particularly important in science fiction, where the story already contains many fantastic aspects. Unfortunately, in horror-based science fiction, one of the biggest flaws is often the spaceship itself.

When it comes to spaceship design in films, the sky is literally the limit. You can choose to follow the rules of science and the laws of physics, or you can ignore them. You can come up with any kind of shapes, capabilities, sizes, or even purposes. But one rule you can’t break is that you can’t ignore human nature. Sadly, all too often, this is the one rule that horror science fiction films do break.

We know many things about human nature (unless you’re a liberal economist, then you really don’t know jack about humans). We have a good sense of what makes us happy, what makes us sad, and what scares the heck out of us. We know how people will react to certain circumstances and conditions. And in this regard, it is inconceivable that someone would build a spaceship that ignores human nature and which puts people into a place that we would consider dark and creepy. . . a labyrinth of terror. No one would design such a ship because no one would voluntarily board it.

Yet, filmmakers all too often make the mistake of creating ships that are horrific even before anything has gone wrong. I’m particularly thinking of two ships (though this applies to a great many more): (1) the Elysium from Pandorum and (2) the Event Horizon from Event Horizon.

The Elysium is built like your average video game horror house. It is dark, with near-black walls, trap doors, hiding places strewn liberally about, pointless catwalks and swinging things, an abundance of human-sized vents to crawl through (wiping out the point to the airtight hatches), and large rooms that look like food processors meant to kill characters. Its hallways meet at strange angles, which allow the bad guys to head off the good guys at the pass, and encourage surprise attacks. Its hatches open and shut randomly, and the speed with which they open or shut depends on how badly the fleeing characters need to get through them. This is not a ship anyone would ever design, and it’s not a ship anyone would ever agree to board. So while the imagery created does generate the spooky feel the director needed, you spend the whole time thinking that the ship was specifically designed to satisfy the needs of the film rather than the needs of the crew.

The Event Horizon took a similar, though slightly different approach. Whereas the Elysium is a maze, the Event Horizon is a dungeon. Unlike the Elysium, the layout of the Event Horizon at least makes some sense, but the overall dungeon effect makes the design ridiculous, e.g. its walls are black and they are decorated with large spikes that only have the purpose of impaling characters, there are torture devices strewn about, and lots of coffin-like objects abound. Flying the Event Horizon would be like taking Dracula’s basement for a spin.

An infinitely better ship is the Nostromo from Alien. The Nostromo was brilliant because Ridley Scott grasped the human condition. Above, where the crew lives, you have accommodations that are really quite pleasant, if workman-like. Indeed, the crew quarters and command deck are very typical of what you find on modern ocean-going freighters today. Below decks, where the Nostromo is darker and more sinister, you have bulk containers, equipment storage rooms, and narrow service passageways. These areas are more creepy, but they still make sense. Indeed, these things are again consistent with a freighter, and it is easy to see a normal human crew sign on to work on this ship.

Moreover, just because a ship has to start as not-terrifying, doesn’t mean it can’t change; even if it take a few minutes to explain what happened, this is time well spent. Consider the movie Ghost Ship, where a salvage team finds an Italian ocean liner adrift after 40 years on the ocean. They don’t cheat and design the ship like an incomprehensible maze or dungeon, they really do stay true to the layout and design of a cruise ship. But with the ship adrift for 40 years, everything has rusted and rotted, creating a very creepy yet entirely believable setting.

And let’s not forget that a ship doesn’t have to be dark and twisted to be terrifying. The Odyssey in 2001 was pretty creepy and it was well-lit and entirely ergonomic. The space station in Solaris was creepy (until you figured out what was going on) and it was brightly lit. Even the Picard Enterprise could be made kind of creepy when the mood struck.

The key to creating a worthwhile spaceship for any movie (horror or otherwise) is to remember that the ship must be designed to account for human nature. If no normal human would board the ship in the first place, then the film will have a hard time overcoming the viewer’s disbelief. And frankly, if the film needs to cheat in this way to make itself scary, then maybe there are bigger problems that need to be fixed with the story first.

The Labyrinth of Terror class starship should be decommissioned.

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Film Friday: Impostor (2002)

Impostor is a little-known movie staring Gary Sinise, Vincent D’Onofrio and Madeleine Stowe. It’s an enjoyable film for the most part, with excellent acting, good sets, and an engaging enough story. But it has a serious flaw that bothers me to no end, a flaw that is common to much science fiction: failure to think practically.

** spoiler alert **

Based on the Phillip K. Dick short story of the same name, Impostor is the story of scientist Spencer Olham as he struggles to prove he’s human. The story is set in the near future at a time when the Earth is at war with an evil alien race. Oldham (Sinise) is developing a super weapon. The story begins as Oldham recounts his weekend get away with his wife to his best friend and fellow scientist Nelson (Tony Shalhoub). His wife Maya (Stowe) runs the local military hospital.

As Oldham and Nelson go about their business, which includes preparing for a formal visit from the Prime Minster, a security team shows up, led by Major Hathaway (Vincent D’Onofrio). Hathaway claims his security forces intercepted an alien transmission, which revealed that Sinise is a replicant, i.e. he’s an organic machine that has been grown to think, act, look and feel like Oldham. Moreover, these machines don't even know they're machines, they actually think they're the people they replaced. And deep inside each replicant is a nuclear bomb waiting to go off when the replicant comes into contact with their target -- though the bombs can't be detected until they are ready to explode. Essentially, these replicants are unsuspecting, nuclear suicide bombers.

Hathaway’s job is to catch these replicants before they activate and explode. Thus, he plans to cut Sinise open to remove the bomb before it can explode. But Sinise isn’t down with that plan, so he escapes. The rest of the movie involves Sinise running from Hathaway, trying to enlist the aid of his wife, and trying to get a full body medical scan done of his body so he can prove he's human. Along the way, he befriends Mekhi Phifer, who lives outside of the dome in the ghetto and who wants to steal medicine to help the people the government forgot.

I won’t tell you the ending because I think you might enjoy the movie and some of the twists and turns near the end. Sinise is a great actor who gives his all. D’Onofrio isn’t far behind. The effects are good, and interestingly, many of the ideas in this story also appear in Minority Report, another Phillip Dick story made into a movie in 2002.

So what’s the problem? The problem arises when you start thinking about how the aliens are using the replicants. Ostensibly, the aliens are using the replicants because they have no other way to reach targets on Earth because the Earthers built domes around their cities as soon as the war began. By replacing people with these suicide-bombing replicants, however, the aliens can destroy targets on Earth. And that’s the film’s hook.

But it’s also kind of stupid. These aliens have found a way to replace anyone and smuggle nuclear bombs anywhere on Earth. So they come up with an elaborate plan to replace Sinise, let him wander around for a couple days until he meets the Prime Minister and then blow up? Hello! These are nuclear bombs! Are these aliens stupid? Why not just replace a couple hundred janitors. Tell them to report for work. The moment they all clock in at 9:00 am, POOF. . . no more cities.

This is a problem that is particularly common to science fiction. Too many times, the writers focus on their one really cool idea and they never really think about the world that surrounds it or how rational people would use their idea. It’s Rube Goldbergian. It’s like the idea that the government does secret scientific testing at midnight on animals belonging to unsuspecting farmers in Montana. . . when they could just as easily buy a dozen cattle and do the same test in the comfort of a private lab. It’s like the idea that brilliant James Bond villains need to invent elaborate ways to kill Jimmy B. . . when they could just shoot him. Yes, it creates a plot point, but not a valid one.

I’m not saying the idea of nuclear replicants isn’t a good one. I think it is. It just didn’t make a lot of sense how the aliens used it.

Think rationally people, you’ll make better movies.

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Film Friday: Terminator Salvation (2009)

Terminator Salvation (“TS”), apparently, was written by machines, because there's little in it to interest humans. Like so much of what comes out of Hollywood’s sequel generating computers these days, TS is a soulless, halfhearted film that squanders a tremendous amount of potential. It goes wrong at the outset, in its basic story, and keeps going wrong(er) with poor story telling, indifferent characters, and wasted talent.

** spoiler alert **

As I’ve mentioned before, science fiction is one of the most interesting forms of story telling because it can touch upon any topic and it can delve into the kinds of questions that fascinate us. Terminator introduced the very cool premise of what happens if a bad guy from the future goes back in time to kill the parents of the good guy before he was born. Can you save the future? Terminator 2 expanded on this premise by asking whether you could change the future for the better now that you know what will happen. Terminator 3? Well, T3 did a “by changing the past, you cause the future” thing, but mainly they just wanted to see Arnold fight a chick in tight leather pants.

TS follows these films with the promise of moving the franchise into the future, after the machines have struck. So far so good. It follows John Connor (Christian Bale), who leads the Southern California branch of the human resistance against the machines. At this point, the Arnold terminators have not yet been created. Still good.

But then the problem starts. The machines have created a terminator, Marcus (Sam Worthington), whose job is to lure Connor to Skynet headquarters so he can finally be killed, because all their prior efforts failed. Yet, at this point, the machines wouldn’t know who Connor is. Indeed, the writers just assume the machines know exactly what happened in T1, T2 and T3, even though, from the machines’ perspective, none of that has happened yet and won’t until after they build the Arnold terminators, until after Connor become the leader of the resistance, and until after Kyle Reese grows up. For all the machines know at this point, Michael Ironside (who plays himself) is the leader of the resistance. So why are the machines fixated on Connor and why do they know how T1, T2 and T3 turned out?

This is a plot hole. But it’s more as well, it’s squandered potential. By skipping the time travel questions and assuming that everyone knows everything, the writers made the story much easier to write, but they also sucked out the very thing that made the first three movies so interesting -- the paradoxes. Moreover, in so doing, they sacrificed the chance to use the audience’s knowledge of Connor's importance, and the machines’ lack of knowledge, to add tension to the scenes. Wouldn’t it have been more interesting if the machines somehow made a decision that let Connor survive because they didn’t know his value? They also toss aside the chance to use Connor’s knowledge to tell us something interesting about his character, like how he might struggle with issues like fatalism or cockiness since he knows the future. Wouldn’t it have been more interesting to see how Connor handles having knowledge of the future? No, not to these writers. . . they just wanted simple plot points that moved the story from fight scene to fight scene.

And what about Marcus? Marcus is a prototype infiltrator terminator, who doesn’t know he’s a machine. This is classic science fiction story telling, because it lets the writer explore what it means to be human. But once again, these writers aren't interested. They just have Marcus move from scene to scene engaging in fights until he finally faces the difficult decision of “do I side with the machines or the humans” -- an "agonizing" decision that takes him 1/10th of a second to make and which he makes without ever sharing his thoughts with the audience. I guess the writers figured the audience wouldn’t care?

This lack of interest in the story is compounded with very poor storytelling. One of the axioms of storytelling is “show, don’t tell.” Yet, this movie has it backwards. Connor is the “prophesized leader of the resistance.” How do we know? Is it anything he does that makes him stand out? No. They tell us. That's it. Connor is married to Kate Connor (Bryce Dallas Howard). How do we know? They tell us. Is there a single scene that makes their marriage real? Nope. Connor is a great threat to the machines? Yep. Does he do something special? Nope. How do we know? We’re told. And they don't even bother telling us that much. Where did this resistance come from? Where do they get their weapons? Why isn’t Connor the leader? Don’t know, they don’t tell us.

Imagine how much better this movie would have been if they’d fleshed out the characters by trying to show us who they are and what they believe? What if they dealt with the time travel question rather than skipping it? What if they let Marcus explore his inner conflict? Naw. . . look shiny!

That’s why this movie stinks. It’s not Bale’s one-note acting (his best work from this film came here (NSFW)). It’s not the effects, which were quite good -- though they heavily ripped off War of the Worlds with their visual and sound effects. It’s not the good actors who were wasted in this film -- I am a fan of Bale, Howard (The Village) and Common (Smoking Aces), but they did nothing. It’s the total indifference to story telling. In fact, TS was so bland I thought long and hard about ditching this article and instead writing about Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance” video instead, which I found more interesting. Sad.

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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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