Or sitting a fully poseable Daniel Plainview down in front of a room full of townsfolk and acting out the “You might say I’m an oilman” speech. Or, with the Oil Well Prospector’s Kit, working a dig and experiencing the heady rush of a full oil strike!

And who could get tired of setting up the final scene in the Oilman’s Bowling Alley and explaining “drainage” to a mortified Eli Sunday?

Good times.

The first time I saw Alien: Resurrection, I remember thinking a few things: 1. Ripley’s character was destroyed. Not just killed, the character itself was ruined for all-time, forever and ever. She cannot be brought back for any other sequels again, ever. Not even with a different actor. (ok, maybe a long-lost relative bearing her name could stand-in, but it’d still leave a bad taste and you’d want to look away — and the new character would have had their name changed several generations ago and would only be revealed to be a descendant during a particularly awkward and embarrassing scene, so horrid would that revelation be) 2. The science was even more implausible than in any of the previous films. This says quite a bit about how poor the science in this film was. 3. The new alien iteration was unbelievably bad. Comically bad but in a not funny way. Cringeworthy. This was on top of an already queasy feeling I had from watching what I considered to be a butchering of a franchise that I’d really quite liked. I actually enjoyed Alien 3 quite a bit unlike a lot of other fans.

And now I’m going to drop a spoiler alert. I realize this movie’s been around for awhile now, and anyone who’s reading this has probably already seen the Alien movies and knows what I’m talking about here, so I’m just going to go ahead and divulge plot with wreckless abandon.

How did my original impressions hold up ten years later? First, Ripley’s character was definitely altered and given the script it was fairly understandable and made sense within that context. As a clone given some sort of inherited memories through the alien DNA she was carrying, I can allow for that. I have to give Whedon a little credit here for trying to execute something a little different within the confines of the Alien universe. Whedon’s talent is in writing series and comics and generally doing interesting character treatments within those confines. His treatment of Ripley took her up a notch and imbued her with super-powers not unlike a character in, oh, the X-men. She’s a bonafide mutant — a human-alien chimera, so she’s bound to act a tad weird.

As for the science bits, well, I think the above paragraph kind of gives you an inkling of what we’re dealing with here. There were bright points though. The revealing bit in the middle when Ripley finds room I-7 containing the 7 previous attempts at reincarnating her is actually pretty interesting for the first few minutes. It shows the various failed attempts in differing stages of mutation held in human-sized formaldehyde test-tubes. Disfigured humans with alien tails and the like. It’s creepy and it kind of works. Until the still-living horror-show is discovered and Ripley, in an act of compassion, incinerates it and the rest of the room, the scene is pretty effective.

The genetic experiment, while still implausible in the extreme sort of worked within the story. The other science-fiction implausibility is, like in Whedon’s other space stories, “Firefly” and “Serenity” the apparent lack of distance in space. That was the one thing that never really made sense for me in Firefly: the vastness of space seems to be actually, quite small. I sort of assumed that in Firefly and then Serenity that the amount of space that was actually colonized was quite small. I believe they even explained that somewhat in one of River’s flashbacks. They showed the solar system and a bunch of planets that had been terra-formed somehow and was led to believe that the entirety of that universe was actually a single solar system.

In Alien: Resurrection, that sense of diminutive space is again present. While the USM Auriga was undergoing its experiments, they commented that they were in “unregulated space” (implying distance). Then, after the shit broke loose, we’re informed that the ship was set on a return course to Earth and would be there in a mere 2 hours (cut to a shot of the ship passing Jupiter). OK, I guess we can just allow space travel to be nearly instantaneous, but it really doesn’t give a viewer the impression that we’re dealing with any kind of distance. Some explanation is always nice. Or maybe that’s just me and my particular brand of nerdiness requires extra coddling. In any case, I’m the nerd writing this review and I declare Whedon to be deficient at writing space scenes and travel that make sense on any kind of intellectual level. He just leaves it out, unwilling or unable to deal with it. He’s a pussy when it comes to writing space travel. Prove me wrong, Joss!

It is here that I will make a quick diversion to mention the part of the movie that I did think worked. There was about 10 minutes of film when Ripley rejoins the rogues from the small pirate ship in the hall after their captain had been gutted by one of the aliens. At this point, you’ve got a group of characters that start to interact like characters in a Joss Whedon script. They’re cohesive. They’re kind of interesting. They’re quippy. They’ve got an established tension between them. For 10 minutes, they work together to try to make it to the dock and their ship, The Betty. Then Ripley finds room I-7 and the whole cohesiveness kind of falls apart.

I have to wonder if the director, Jean-Pierre Jeunet was responsible for butchering Whedon’s script or if the script itself was just bad. Some of the action sequences were pretty well done. The underwater sequence with the swimming aliens was pretty neat, if over-long on screen. The characters themselves were not bad and followed the typical Whedonesque team of archetypes. We had the muscle played by a scar-faced Ron Perlman, we had a crack-shot weaponer with an uncanny skill at ricochets played by Gary Dourdan (of CSI fame). We had a crazy scientist portrayed by the always entertaining Brad Dourif. We had a cute and spunky young woman who was more than she appeared in the form of Winona Ryder. To their credit, they did what they could. What the director (or writer) couldn’t seem to do was effectively kill them all properly. C’mon, it’s an Alien movie! The conventions demand that each and every one of them should die in a horrible frightening way. I think Whedon, early in his career made the mistake of liking his characters too much. Or, in the case of Dourdan’s character, not liking them enough to give them a decent death. Some acid on the face? That’s no reason to kill yourself, man.

Anyway, this has gone on long enough, so I’ll get to the final bit. The latest alien iteration. I had forgotten just how bad this part of the movie was. I had literally blocked it out as I do so often with things that aren’t worth being remembered. Ripley’s abducted by a convenient hole in the floor and taken to the alien queen (who’s in pain, Ripley tells us before being swallowed up by the floor panelling). Her chamber is strewn with typically alien biogoop encasing a couple of the ship’s scientists including a crazy Brad Dourif. Dourif’s character, in crazy-person fashion informs Ripley that she’s given the queen a great gift, the ability to birth like a human. Then we’re given a shot of the alien apparently in the throes of labor with a distended belly pouch which is moving about threateningly. This is bad. What comes next is just, frankly, unbelievable. The alien queen gives birth in what is probably the most revolting bit of film I can think of. Think Rosie Perez giving birth during an episode of Will and Grace kind of revolting. With the screaming and the pushing and the sweating and the cursing. I’m surprised there wasn’t a laugh-track as the alien “baby” rips itself out of the queen’s (mommy’s) … womb-pouch and begins making cooing noises. It looks kind of like a cross between Nicolas Cage in Ghost Rider and the Elephant Man with some extra long fingers and reverse-jointed “chicken” legs. There’s a brief, tender moment where the new alien coos at momma while Brad Dourif yells crazy stuff from his cocoon on the wall until the new baby gets pissed off and rips a chunk of the alien queen’s head off.

This is bad stuff. Nobody should have to watch this. It’s not bad science-fiction horror. It’s not bad horror. It’s just bad. But wait, it gets worse!

The new alien sees Ripley on the floor and starts making googoo faces at her. It recognizes it’s real momma! This is a tough thing to convey with a skull-headed, bat-nosed, alien face, but the special effects team spared no expense on articulating the most human of expressions on this unwieldy construction of theirs. They must have felt very proud at that moment, watching it mewling and drooling there on screen. Then it notices Brad Dourif still talking and saying crazy stuff and eats his brain affording Ripley a chance to get away.

There’s more. Ripley gets onto the escaping ship as the Auriga approaches earth’s atmosphere. Eventually, the Auriga crashes into a continent and explodes in a huge mushroom cloud visible from space, surely annihilating most of the population on whatever hemisphere that was. Meanwhile. the newborn alien gets onto the escaping ship as well and there’s another sickening scene with it and Ripley as robot-Ryder watches on from the corner, cowering. Then they kill it by breaking a window and we have to watch Nicolas Cage get sucked out of the ship like an egg blown out through a pinhole in its shell for, oh, several minutes, at least. Ripley cries a little because, yes, she feels a bit of motherly sadness at having to kill baby Ghost Rider.

So, after 10 years, I wanted to like this movie more than I did the first time. For those brief 10 minutes or so, I think I did. But really, in the end, I think I just like Joss Whedon a little less.

boolean is listening to: Lightning from the album “Everybody” by The Sea And Cake

As a diversion from playing EVE and Munchkin, my latest gaming obsessions –one of which doesn’t even require a computer! I went to see the movie Ghost Rider yesterday. It was every bit as bad as you could imagine, with a few humourous scenes (intentional and that other kind) thrown in for good measure. As one internetizen claimed, Eva Mendes’ breasts put in an excellent performance. Shame about the rest of her.

And that’s about all I can say about that!

I am eagerly awaiting its arrival and the illumination of some of the changes to the Brutes that will be forthcoming in the next game.

Technorati Tags: Entertainment, Games, Xbox360, Video

So, what’ve I been doing with myself? Well, there’s always work, you know how that is. There’s also been some video watching and the playing of the video games. It’s what I do. Through it all, I listen to the rock and roll music. It keeps the blood up.

This weekend, I watched Miami Vice, the latest piece of existentialist cinema from Michael Mann. As usual, Mann, directs a stylish picture. Lots of night-shots, vibrant colors, sparkly lights. But the content… this is a dark movie. Bleak, even. The reworking of the classic tv show 20 years later is full of nihilism and violence. And a fair bit of the sex. If you like Mann’s movies (Collateral, Heat, …) you’ll like this one.

For a change of pace, I’ve really be into The Cartoon Network’s The Venture Bros.. It’s a hilarious cartoon about an incompetent scientist and his two sons (the titular brothers). They’re all under the care and protection of insane muscle man, Brock Samson and occasionally assisted by the Beaker-like droid, H.E.L.P.eR — and no, I have no idea what that acronym stands for. These shows got me through the long month of November, and had me giggling in airports while watching them on my iPod. The first season is a riot, culminating in an extra special Christmas Episode. For a larf, check out the IMDb quote page.

My personal favorite from evil super-villain, The Monarch:

I met her on the LiveJournal, which i kept in prison. I have been blogging! after posting an especially attractive picture of my prison sculpted abs, she commented that i was not only “Pwn”, i was “Teh Sex”… whatever that means.

So, if you’re stumped for xmas gifts and have some film-loving, cartoon watching geeks in your family, maybe these’ll help. Not for me though. I’ve already seen ‘em.

PS, as that blockquote proves, this CSS still needs some work.
boolean is listening to: Take It or Leave It from the album “Is This It?” by The Strokes

Technorati Tags: Entertainment, Film, TV, Video

They’ve toned it down a little for the new show. The glitzy products are still there, but not quite so flagrant. And really, how can you expect a modern man to go through 2 hours of film without mentioning his Omega watch or smoothly caressing the buffalo hide interior of his Aston Martin? I couldn’t.

So, that problem rectified, how did the rest of the film shape-up? Pretty well, in my opinion. The new Bond, Daniel Craig wore the tuxedos and watches very well. And why shouldn’t he? The man’s built! Sure, he’s blond and blue-eyed, but this is not the heresy the british press would have you believe. He works as the double-Oh-seven and isn’t afraid to get his hands dirty.

Very dirty.

Unlike the previous few incarnations of the character, this is a Bond that is not only capable of getting physical with his quarries, he revels in it. In an attempt to revitalize the franchise, Daniel Craig is run through the wringer in one of the most acrobatic and athletic foot-chase scenes in recent memory. What’s best, is that he’s actually believable in it.

In an interesting nod to the body of work that came before him, a brief scene at the beginning of the movie (shot in stylish black and white) dispenses the origin of how Bond got his double-0 status. What’s interesting about the scene is that it came from the last film that actually had a physically-capable Bond in it, “In Her Majesty’s Secret Service” with the much-maligned, and rather under-rated George Lazenby.

The title sequence was simply brilliant and I won’t spoil it for anyone. Even the cheesy, Foreigner-esque rock intro by Chris Cornell couldn’t ruin it, and in fact, kind of worked.

That said, there were flaws. The movie suffers from some severe pacing issues. The obligatory romantic add-on in the middle almost slows the movie to a halt. An extended recovery period seems down-right surreal in its writing and presentation. An abortive car-chase ends inexplicably and abruptly, with what could only be about a hundred miles of road missing from the beginning and end. Bond exhibits a high degree of stupidity in several scenes in the movie, usually to disastrous result.

The main villain, “Le Chiffre” was interesting enough though not a classic “Bond Villain” in the sense that he didn’t have any super-powers other than some high-order math skills. Some people found this unsatisfying, but I actually liked it. It was only too bad that his deformities were over-played. He would have been more interesting had he been more normal.

As for the Bond Girls, there were a few in play and not too hard to look at. Oddly, the most fan service in this movie came from Craig himself in full speedo in a parody of Ursula Andress’ appearance on the beach in Dr. No.

This is a different James Bond. He’s wild, a little out of control, a danger to himself and others and clearly enjoying his work a little too much. Is this the best Bond movie ever? No, probably not. I think Thunderball still owns that spot. Is it a close second? Quite likely. Not since Connery have we had such a powerful Bond. Even with its flaws, it’s the best Bond movie in 30 years.

Technorati Tags: Entertainment, Video

I won’t say anymore about it here, not wanting to drop spoilers for anyone. If you haven’t seen it yet, go watch it right now. Get it done.

So, my favorite new television show this season is the impressive super hero story called “Heroes” on NBC. The pacing has been slow so far, small parcels of information being delivered every week about the 5 or 6 main characters the show is focussing on, but it is picking up. It’s covering a lot of similar ground to The X-men and feels similar in some ways to Unbreakable. Don’t let that stop you from watching it though, if that movie wasn’t to your liking. If you like comic books, (or liked them as a kid and don’t feel stupid about it now) give it a try. Tonight’s episode should be a good one.

Technorati Tags: Entertainment, TV

“The French Connection (Widescreen) [2 Discs]” (William Friedkin)

Today I’m going to give my secret lab a bit of a working over to rearrange some things that have piled up and then move my gear around a bit to favor music construction. My keyboard is too far. I must bring it closer. Still later, I am hoping to watch Kill Bill 1 & 2 on my couch with dria. And maybe some Zatoichi movies.

“Kill Bill Vol. 1 (Widescreen)” (Universal)

“Kill Bill Vol. 2 (Widescreen)” (Alliance (Universal))

This is how I play May two-four.

Technorati Tags: Entertainment, Games, General, Video