Dopplegangland

All over the news, we’ve been watching and reading about the effect sky-high gas prices have had on tourism. Flight bookings are down, hotels are half-full, airlines are downsizing, and people are having “stay-cations” more and more.

“STAY-CATIONS” — what a mind-numbing word. So much for the imagination of journalists.

So what have I been doing for the last two weeks? Racking up over a thousand kilometers on my car (SOB!), chauffering my mother and my visiting Polish cousins around the province…busy being tourists (not extinct yet) & flying in the face of current vacation-rationing trends.

That’s a lot of gas money, I’ll have you know.

Still, because all of the doom-and-gloom about tourism is actually TRUE, I’m not likely to be going anywhere for the rest of the summer. Perhaps a short road trip sometime in August…but other than that, I must wait until Japan comes calling in March 2009 before I once again break free of the continent.

In other words, I’m going to be in massive, addictive need for further reading material this summer…starting with a refresh copy of the graphic novel Watchmen — a graphic novel that re-wrote the rules about comics. A work of literature (yes, literature!) that sits comfortably on various “100 best reads of the century” lists…

…which is now harder to find than the lost city of Atlantis, after the movie trailer played just before the showing of The Dark Knight. Every comic store, ever Chapters, every Indigo I’ve been to visit…NOTHING! This has completely irritated me. All these new trendy comic readers coming out of the woodwork…when I was there when the actual comic came out in 1986!

Ok, at the time, I was too busy re-reading my issues of Crisis on Infinite Earths, but that’s a geeky-youth story for another day…

Posted by Dan Kukwa on 12:19 PM | View Related Articles | Permalink
Categories: Geek Out! | General Thoughts

Written by Josh Kilmer Purcell

“Soon enough, Jayson would be on his way to Hollywood. He would escape all of this small town nothingness. The petty domestic dramas. His insufferable unpopularity. The strangers who would stare at his strange clothes and strange brother and strange mother in the A&P.”

This is a book that will be most appreciated by those people of my generation — anyone who remembers growing up in the pop culture universe between 1978 and 1985.

A world of Atari games, Betamax cameras & tapes, Three’s Company and Laverne & Shirley — a world where people would understand references to “the third Chrissy”. A world of Chevy Citations and Ford Mavericks. A world before child stars fell hard back to Earth. A world that didn’t yet have a name for AIDS. A world of drugs and sex, hid behind childlike innocence.

This is the world of Candy Everybody Wants. It’s actually a simple story of a boy’s coming out: sexually, artistically, and emotionally. It’s a story about his rag-tag family and friends, his escape from a small town to the big city (New York, naturally), and cold splashes of water that time and again offer sobriety to his occasionally self-centred dreams.

Nothing we haven’t seen before, but this time, definitely worth the read. For two simple reasons:

(1) The entire story is written as a hybrid sitcom. Our protagonist — Jayson (with a “y” for extra flair) relates all of his experiences and situations to what he has consumed from the television of the early 1980s: a time when TV was entering the final phase of the golden age of sitcoms…slowly giving way to prime-time mega-soaps such as Dallas and Dynasty. The trick is that real life constantly gets in the way, forcing Jayson to realize that the sitcom world and the real world are constantly at war. It does so with blistering amounts of humour, dazzling wit and wordplay, and scenes that alternate between joyful enthusiasm and staggering poignancy. In short, this is a book that revels in the (often brilliantly profane) language that results from the conflict between fantasy media & cold, hard reality.

(2) The pop culture of the time infuses everything. It’s a living, breathing time capsule that spoke to me so powerfully, it might as well have been a pristine VHS tape of random events from my own 1980s childhood. Brand names, TV characters, specific magazines, knowing parodies of famous actors of the time…my head was shaking from the memory assault. There are also ominous references to events yet to come…occasionally buried with insidious dexterity.

I honestly don’t know how anyone younger than 30 is going to react to this novel. I’m sure they will thoroughly enjoy it, but the layers of historical melancholy that permeate the action will speak (and DID speak) volumes to anyone of my generation. Part love letter, part requiem, all heart. Candy Everybody Wants was a book I burned through in 3 hours. Now that I’m finished, I want to go back and read it again.

It’s one way of reliving childhood memories of that time, short of watching my Dallas DVD’s.

Posted by Dan Kukwa on 9:18 PM | View Related Articles | Permalink
Categories: Book Reviews

Screenplay by Jonathan Nolan & Christopher Nolan

Story by Christopher Nolan & David S. Goyer

Directed by Christopher Nolan

“You crossed the line first, sir. You hammered them…and in their desperation, they turned to a man they didn’t fully understand. Some men aren’t looking for anything logical. They can’t be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.”

OK…let’s get some of the fluffy requirements out of the way first…

COMPLAINT #1

The film is (ever-so-slightly) TOO long. About 20 minutes could have been trimmed in various places, which would have increased the pace beyond the speed of light, yet maintained the intensity and the integrity of the film.

COMPLAINT #2

Rachel still doesn’t quite do it for me as a character. Maggie Gyllenhaal is better in the role than Katie Holmes…but her chemistry with both Aaron Echhart & Christian Bale isn’t exactly scorching.

COMPLAINT #3

Bale’s Batman voice remains…odd…and there’s still no hummable, iconic theme tune.

Other than that, this is near-mathematical PERFECTION. From the late Heath Ledger’s astonishing performance as the Joker, and going down from there…no other mistake was made to bring us this masterpiece of drama. And make no mistake…this IS drama. Shocking, brilliant, twisted, magnificent drama. The kind of drama that is worth the (expensive) price of admission to a modern movie theatre.

Which leads me to the rest of this critique. I could go on and on about why I enjoyed The Dark Knight. Instead, I’m going to take a different road: the reason recent DC Comics films are so much more satisfying than their Marvel Comics counter-parts.

In the Marvel movie universe, they have refined the popcorn movie into high art. All three Spider-Mans, Fantastic Four, The Incredible Hulk, and (from all I’ve heard, and its box office results) Iron Man have followed an colourful action-adventure format, with a few washes of emotions…with a very hit-and-miss approach to the latter element.

All Marvel attempts to reach for something more…something deeper, and more resonant, have fallen victim to various failures. The first two brilliant X-Men films degenerated into a third and final runaround of bloated cliches and shoot-em-up bangs and flashes. The original 2003 version of The Hulk ended up being far too psychologically deep and dark for its audience. Since then, Marvel has stuck to its more successful popcorn format. Successful & a hell of a good time…but not exactly earth-shattering. The string of disappointments (Daredevil, The Punisher, Elektra, Ghost Rider, even Spider-Man 3’s critical mauling) speak as loudly as the successes.

On the other hand, since 2005, DC has taken advantage of the fact that it owns, as comics and graphic novelist extraordinaire Frank Miller himself states, the iconic GODS of the comic universe. There is Superman, there is Batman, and there is Wonder Woman. Everyone else falls somewhere below…

These characters are mythic: archetypes that have resonated over generations, and become part of the pop culture in a way only Spiderman has managed to achieve from the Marvel universe of characters. The DC gods represent all the best and worst facets of humanity, and they offer a canvas far deeper and far more interesting than most of the Marvel line-up, the X-Men aside (at least, when directed by Bryan Singer).

Batman Begins set the tone in 2005 - it wasn’t a kids movie. It’s an adult drama, epic in scope, epic in emotional resonance, and set Batman as the god of the human underworld. All our fears, phobias, and base emotions…wrapped up in a black cowl and haunting the streets, fighting the darkness with an even greater darkness.

Superman Returns presented the flip-side in 2006. Whereas Batman is needed but unwelcome - even despised - by the ambivalent people he protects, Superman returns like an eagle descending from heaven. The god of light and power, the protector of all that is good and pure: in short, the saviour. Everyone wants him, yet their equally-fearful awe keeps him at a distance…and leaves behind the uncomfortable question of whether human destiny should be left in the hands of such super beings.

This trend intensifies in The Dark Knight. The world Batman defends is now the world Batman has created. It has spawned a terrible beast (in the form of the psychotic Joker) that takes advantage of his new rules by ignoring them…and daring the gods to play along or be swept aside. At the same time, the everyday citizens of Gotham try to control their destiny as best as they can, in the shadow of a battle between demons and dark gods they can only barely comprehend. The Marvel Comics universe doesn’t even come close to achieveing this Tolkein-esque depth that the DC gods offer to the audience. Certainly, no Marvel film comes close to the moment on the river ferries, where two separate human decisions validate Batman’s faith in the citizens of Gotham, in spite of the hell in which they find themselves.

The Dark Knight is not a movie to bring children to watch. This is a movie that explores the raw, unhinged power of darkness, depression, shattered dreams, and madness. It takes the everyday paranoia of terrorist threats, fears of crime & human weakness, and twists it like a sponge, squeezing out every last drop of black gold from such story potential. It’s a movie filled with actors who embrace & dance with its tragic-yet-uplifting depths of operatic & Jacobean potential. It has a writer/director with such a powerful, clear vision that the rhythms of the film literally pulse from the screen.

DC made its choice. It has chosen to reach for depth, for art, for something that is worthy of the iconic characters that lead the roster of its fictional universe. With The Dark Knight, they have easily gone 3 for 3 over the last three years. All that needs to happen now is for a film to reflect the team up & astonishing friendship between its two god-like characters (as shown in its most popular comic - Superman/Batman) and I may very well die happy.

The film … 9.5

The DC renaissance … 10+

Posted by Dan Kukwa on 1:00 PM | View Related Articles | Permalink
Categories: Movie and Television Reviews

Yes, that’s me, on the sands of Rotary Cove Beach in Goderich, Ontario…relaxing. NOT blogging.

So sue me. If it makes you feel better, THIS is what I was reading. At least I’m consistent.

It’s been years since I’ve made it to a beach on Lake Huron, but having visiting cousins from Poland makes for a good tourist excuse to visit (once again).

Now that I’m rested (and sunburnt yet again), we’re off to see The Dark Knight this evening. Stay tuned for a review…soon.

Posted by Dan Kukwa on 3:36 PM | View Related Articles | Permalink
Categories: General Thoughts