The Revenge Job

For me, personally, when it comes to the cat-and-mouse genre, I'm a snob, and nothing less than The Day of the Jackal will do, and maybe Munich in a pinch.  Michael Lonsdale's the connecting link between the two, incidentally... okay, Freejack as well.  Gattaca has some of that as well, but... damn.  I'm trying to think of another one.  It's certainly not an uncommon construct; if I were better at my craft, I'd say To Catch a Thief is probably the best.
Anyway, Jason Statham, when he's not appearing on "The Tonight Show" talking about "The Situation" or appearing in either a Luc Besson or Guy Ritchie picture, makes the occasional reach for greatness beyond mere ass-kickery.  Don't get me wrong, of course; I'd lose instantly in a fight with either Statham or Fedor Emilianenko.  But his (The) Killer Elite starts out promisingly enough, then dies the death of a couple dozen plot holes.  For the greater good, of course, but I'm still picky about that kind of thing.
Now, Statham may seem like his usual Transporter self here, but in fact, like Wesley Snipes in Passenger 57, he's the best of the best... even though he botches the opening scene a bit.  He and De Niro are an unstoppable hit man duo, although I've been questioning the whole genre lately.  I guess if you're a hit man in a third world country, it's easier to get away.  The Beltway Sniper of about a decade ago is as close we'll come in real life to a gentleman hit man of the cine.
And so, after the opening introductory episode, we get the Mission Impossible: Statham has to take out members of an elite British unit called SAS who were responsible for the deaths of an Oman shiek's sons.  That's right... it's time for Saving Private Riyadh... sorry, that was either awfully corny or terribly racist; I swear I was going for the former... oh, right, almost forgot.  It's the old saw about a guy coming out of retirement to do one last job, but this movie's got a nice twist to it: Statham has to come out of his clearly premature retirement to save De Niro, because De Niro backed out of the job, so they're holding him prisoner in an ad hoc Oman prison.  Apparently all these shieks have prisons built right in to their oil-funded palaces.  Contractual thing.
And so, Statham gathers up his old crew to do the job: nerdy guy, and guy more extrovertly manly than even Statham... hmmm.  Could he be hiding something?  Got closet?  Anyway, now for the impossible part: Statham and company are supposed to get confessions out of the SAS members before killing them.  We're told that this is impossible, because these guys are trained to lie.  Lie under pressure.  Spoiler alert: it doesn't take much to get them to go "Okay, I did it, but so what.  Stuff happens."  I mean, Clooney lost a fingernail in Syriana over much, much less... spoiler alert.  Movies move too fast these days, but for some reason, that special hammer covered in tiles is still stuck in the craw of my mind.
Enter the detective, Clive Owen.  Much like the detective Lebel in The Day of the Jackal, Clive Owen has to go to this group of guys to report that someone is going after our SAS boys.  In this case, the group he meets with is some kind of secret cabal of ex-SAS guys, as opposed to a group of politicians, official law enforcement, and DeGaulle's private army.  Now, Statham quickly gets a chance to kill the Clive Owen character, and gouge out his good eye... but, spoiler alert, no killing takes place because 1) it's still too early in the pic, and 2) Clive Owen's a big star, too, and he's contractually obligated to survive to at least the end of said pic.  So begin our plot holes through which logic, then credibility, is allowed to escape.
This whole story is based on a book by a character named Ralph Fiennes... I'm sorry, that's Ranulph Fiennes.  It's a legitimate typo, however, because they're not-too-distant relatives of each other.  The IMDb will tell you all about it.  After all, The Day of the Jackal is based on a book by a guy named Frederick Forsyth.  The only other movie of his that I can actually vouch for is called The Dogs of War.  I hate to outright call it a stinker... let's say it's stinker-ish.  And, of course, because Christopher Walken's in it, it could've used a little more cowbell.  Ranulph himself figures into the plot of Killer Elite, and he ends up having the worst book signing of his life.  I think the screenwriter(s) punched up this scene a little bit, as they did with some of Statham's stunts (particularly the part where he's tied to a chair)  There is a lot of excitement in Ranulph's IMDb bio, but I just hate to think that this noble, upper-crust-type Brit had to suffer such an undignified incident of bad excitement as does his surrogate in this movie.  I mean, an unattended book signing in the third floor of some nondescript building in the middle of Bum-Rogering Nowhere?  Cheese and crackers!

**1/2
-so sayeth The Movie Hooligan

Duck Cassidy and the Trichinosis Kid

Of course, for a maniac like me, I'm used to cartoon Westerns such as the Tex Avery stuff for MGM, and that one Bob Clampett one where Bugs doubles as the Masked Marauder and as the guide who helps the hero try to catch said Masked Marauder.  Then there's all those Western skirmishes between Bugs and Yosemite Sam, silly me.  And what do all of these have in common?  Fast-paced, ultra-violent, and completely insane.  About 180 degrees opposite of our next Looney Tunes called Drip-Along Daffy.  Some might call it another Chuck Jones masterpiece, and they'd of course be right.
And being the hipster that I am, I can't help but notice the poking fun of genre conventions, the usage of archetypes (and the poking of fun at it, thereof)... very rare for one of these cartoons to point out the usage of "comedy relief"!  It's almost like the Zucker team made this one, but surely they learned from it.  As in Bugs Bunny Rides Again, there's a gag involving stop signs; personally, I prefer that one.  But the gags with bad horses kick ass!
And even though the cartoon pokes fun at the Western genre conventions, it still can't help but rely on them as well.  Daffy and Porky arrive in town, and Daffy takes it upon himself to be the new sheriff.  Reminds me of the recent stand-up of Jerry Seinfeld on Colbert's "Late Show" about the insanity of wanting to be President of the United States in the first place.  For one thing, Donald Trump would take a big cut in salary, and even though he tells me he's really, really rich, he's still going to rely on funding for catering at town hall events.  I mean, he's not literally made of gold!  And if he were, he's not going to hock a golden arm and a golden leg just to feed a bunch of losers for one meal!
And so, Daffy tries to introduce himself to an indifferent saloon public.  The public is disinterested.  And so, Daffy gets some refreshments from the bartender.  Daffy's drink gets shot by the bad guy.  Again, some genre conventions can't be made fun of.  Also, this is another opportunity to appreciate the genius of Carl Stalling.  Listen to the band when the bad guy, "Nasty" Canasta gets visually introduced.  It's not all Spike Jones-esque fun and games, folks.
...oh, I'm so behind.  I gotta wrap this up.  I guess the backgrounds are the secret star of this one, especially during the last big sequence.  The background artist put in some serious overtime on this one.  Again, sticking to genre conventions, poking fun at others.  I guess the setup ones are up for grabs to be poked fun at.  We were recently watching an old ... what's it called, with Steve McQueen?  "Wanted: Dead or Alive"!  That's it!  One of my viewing companions pointed out that, on these old TV Westerns, they would distinguish themselves from one another by the type of weapon that the hero would use.  For McQueen, it was a sawed-off shotgun.  For "Have Gun Will Travel," I guess it was a regular six-shooter, but with an ivory knight (chess) on it... something like that.  The episode they were watching was "Montana Kid."  I know this because I recognized Jean Willes, who appeared in a couple Stooge shorts.  Well, some of the Stooge actors actually had big careers!  Go figure.  Anyway, the bad guy gets his, but in a slightly surprising way.  I won't spoil that for you... is he really dead, though?  I thought these cartoon things were light, comical affairs!  Dayamn... cold-blooded.  Another Jones classic, and yet I can't seem to bring myself to giving it four stars... okay.  Four stars it is.

****
-so sayeth The Movie Hooligan

Auteur Watch - Ivan Dixon

Sadly, Mr. Dixon has passed on to that great Director's Guild in the sky, where D. W. Griffith and Ed Wood are still playing that epic game of ping pong.  "Best 38,275,431 out of 76,550,861?" asks Ed, even though it'll take him a half an eon to even begin to catch up.  But the game goes on anyway, because hell, there ain't anything else better to do, man!  They've seen all the old movies, all the new movies... and a director knows better than to come back from the dead, apparently.  Too many enemies, willing to give up the afterlife's big secret.  But... there was a black dude on "Hogan's Heroes"?  That's a new one!  Reminds me of that story about how Nichelle Nichols... it's right there in her IMDb bio!  She was going to quit "Star Trek"... the very first one, that is.  But none other than Dr. Martin Luther King talked her out of resigning from the show.  I doubt if Ivan's got a story like that.  Of course, "Hogan's Heroes" doesn't quite rise to the same level, but whatever.
It probably does him a disservice that his IMDb Top 4 is all stuff from the '60s.  He worked in other decades, you know!  And he, along with only the coolest, epic cast in the history of '70s movies, appeared in a little something called Car Wash.  Hel-LOOOOOOO???!!!!!!  And he was in 1998's Clay Pigeons with Vince Vaughn... I'm sorry, that's 1971's Clay Pigeon.  Totally different movie.  Vinny would've been too young for that one.  And yes, he played the blaxploitation game a little, if only as a director, of such hits that Quentin Tarantino has memorized like Trouble Man and The Spook Who Sat by the Door... wow!  I memorized that correctly!  I usually get one or two words wrong in these longer titles.  I'm turning into my dad, what can I say?
Yes, a toast to Ivan Dixon.  Born and raised in NYC, died in North Carolina.  He didn't move to Beverly Hills and stay there like some celebrities... oh, right.  Actually, they're getting quite liberal these days in Beverly Hills!  Why there's two, three African American residents already!  I'm kinda proud of myself; I didn't even mention Ivan's work with Bill Cosby... damn it.  Okay, to be fair, Cosby probably wasn't going to stop just because one director told him to.

S. W.

Now available in hardback! ...oh, right.  Normally, this is where I talk about the box office.  Almost forgot to do that.  Well, I was only half right.  The latest installment of Star Wars is the fastest film to a hundred million, probably... but the one they're more interested in is being first to a billion.  Take that, Peter Jackson and your Lord of the Rings!  And yet, we've got FIVE debuts this week.  We're in uncharted waters, people.  We've got one film clobbering all the others, AND we've got a bunch of new debuts getting in. That's Christmas for ya!
So, among the proverbial acts also appearing with The Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show include Will Ferrell's latest called Daddy's Home.  Kinda looks like he's trying to siphon off a little of that Seth Rogen-Zac Efron Neighbors magic.  Well, if Seth doesn't mind, then I don't mind.
Meanwhile, in Jennifer Lawrence's universe, it's time for another one of those David O. Russell projects with De Niro and James Lipton's best pupil ever, Bradley Cooper.  It's a film called Joy and, well... you know how it is.  J. Law doesn't get paid enough for American Hustle, and she probably got overpaid for Joy. 
Strikes and gutters, ups and downs.  But how to segué to the Point Break remake?  Well, Patrick Swayze was indeed in a film called City of Joy.  Hope that helps!  He stars as either the city or the joy, I just don't know which.  But I think it's safe to say that, much like the remake of 1990's sci-fi classic Total Recall, this remake will probably fall by the wayside, quickly forgotten.  Why, they didn't even let Gary Busey reprise his role as Pappas, the wise detective who gives Johnny Utah the tip that helps them catch the surfing bank robbers in the first place.  Director and cinematographer Ericson Core doubles here as his own cinematographer... who does he think he is?  Peter Hyams?  Mary Ann Bernard?  Time to hit the bars with Eric Brevig and commiserate, dude.
What else?  Well, there's Will Smith's latest small film between big projects, and it's called Concussion.  Here he tries out Trevor Noah's accent.  Best Actor Oscar, people?  Is that asking so much?  Just give it to him and maybe he'll go away, kinda like Renee Zellweger and Kim Basinger.  There's also SNL alum Adam McKay's film called The Big Short.  He took the idea from the end credits of his The Other Guys and spawned a new film.  Welp, if the Oscar community snubbed Stew Beef and his Rosewater, what chance does McKay have?  Apparently, very, very good!  After all, the guy's got a track record now, even if it is with Will Ferrell, so the Oscar community knows he's not afraid to make money.  Personally, I kinda don't care about the Oscars anymore.  I don't know what it will take to draw me back in, but I think I'm out.  Permanently.

Porky in Remakeland

See now, for someone like me, it's Porky in Wackyland or nothing.  Maybe if I saw Dough for the Do-Do first, of course, I'd think that it was the better of the two.  And maybe if I saw Laurel and Hardy's Perfect Day without the extra music first, I'd think it was the better of the two.  I can't think of an example off hand where I changed my mind and thought the second one I saw was the better... see?  First impressions really are that important!  Remember all those documentaries you saw about birds and their elaborate mating displays?  Well, the same thing applies to people and movies.  Now eat your bacon!
Anyway, you're probably going to kill me for this, but I think I'll save a more in-depth analysis for Porky in Wackyland, the film upon which Dough for the Do-Do is almost completely based.   But I would like to point out that, much like the Stooge shorts, there seems to be some slightly new sequences here.  First of all, the close-up of the "Wackyland" sign seems to have different audio.  In fact, the audio of Dough for the Do-Do seems, in general, to be a lot less wacky.  The big musical number doesn't quite sync as well to the animation this go-round.  Also, they cut out all the times that the dodo bird screams in panic when trying to escape Porky... damn.  Now I gotta calculate the percentage of new footage.  Nice going, The Movie Hooligan.
Anyway, so I think the Wackyland sign's different, and I know for sure that the part where Porky falls before getting introduced to the dodo is different here.  In Porky in Wackyland he slides down a long chute.  Here, he gets the Screwy Squirrel treatment.  Porky's fall is faked with a phony backdrop, and yet, his pain and suffering is real.  I'm thinking of Screwball Squirrel where the dog rolls down the big hill in a barrel, and Screwy Squirrel's at the bottom of the hill providing the musical accompaniment to the dog's epic roll.
As for the third difference, well... SPOILER ALERT.  In Porky in Wackyland, if memory serves, Porky tricks the dodo with a fake newspaper... see, newspapers used to be how people got their news, and yes, to the detriment of our nation's forests.  Now forests are in peril because of architects and their lust for locally sourced materials.  Some things never change.  Here in the instant case, arguably Porky's ruse is much sneakier.  Hint: it's like Wimpy in Hello, How Am I.  And of course, the joke's ultimately on Porky and the last dodo, because a slightly smaller gang of dodo birds comes out of the woodwork and says "Hey!  He got the last dodo!  Dough-de-dough...."  Again, I'm slightly preferential to the finale of Porky in Wackyland... or am I?  I just don't know anymore.  But I will ask, because everyone's on the lookout for stuff that's creepy these days... there's that part where the dodo dances all over Porky and kicks him in the stomach repeatedly, and it's all Porky can do to clutch his stomach in pain and keep his eyes closed.  So, for the sake of all the pork pie hat hipsters out there, I ask... man!  WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH THAT?!!!!!  And now that I think about it, I can see the dodo's point.  I mean, say you're the last of something.  Wouldn't you get tired of the umpteenth person coming up to you and asking, "Are you REALLY the last of... fill-in-the-blank?"  It's like that time Homer and Apu went to the Kwik-E-Mart headquarters and the guy said "You may ask three questions..."  For some reason, I didn't get the joke about Apu's angry reaction after that one at the time.  Maybe I should drag it out of storage again.

***
-so sayeth The Movie Hooligan

Auteur Watch - Vin Diesel

...oh, please.  Well, as that old saying goes, everyone wants to direct.  And just as Spielberg calls himself a "TV director" with tongue firmly in cheek, so too can Vinny claim to be a director first and foremost, with a short film called Multi-Facial and a feature called Strays to his credit.  But then... fate came along and, as you can tell currently from his IMDb Top 4, 1998's Saving Private Ryan is one of the four things he's known for... the other three being the latest installments of the The Fast and the Furious film series.  In a way, it's like how Malcolm McDowell is known for A Clockwork Orange and three other things within the past decade!  Of course, Ryan was probably a cakewalk for Diesel compared to the stuntwork Malcolm had to endure over the course of that year it took to shoot A Clockwork Orange, but never mind.
So Diesel seems to have put his directorial dreams on hold while the Fast and Furious series continues to wind down... or does it?  Eight installments?  Before you know it, the rest of the cast of The Expendables is going to follow Statham into this thing!  Now that would be something.  Of course, it'll involve a lot more action near handicapped ramps... sorry, but yes, I'm just trying to get headlines, I guess.  Why, I couldn't get one if I paid for it!  How about changing it to 'getting in and out of courtesy shuttles' instead?  After all, being an expendable is hard!  It's hard work!  I feel their pain, though.  I need a little Gold Bond medicated powder myself!
Anyway, Vin's a star, no question... but an auteur?  Arguably, yes, in the '90s, but what I'm waiting for... as are a few other Hollywood insiders... is his purported Hannibal project.  And I'm not talking about Anthony Hopkins' most famous role, or Hannibal Brooks.  No, I'm talking about the elephant one, Hannibal Barca, I believe he was named.  And why that role?  Well, I suppose it's like playing Cleopatra, but for guys.  Diesel proudly mentioned that he was hard at work working on his Hannibal project the last time he was on Stew-Beef's "The Daily Show."  I swear it happened, and maybe the IMDb will bear me out... I think it was the 2006 one.  Apparently, all the clips are online someplace, but maybe someone else can do all the hard work and due diligence of looking it up and what not.  I think he failed to mention that he got the idea for the screenplay when he was in 3rd grade and heard the story... LIKE THE REST OF US.  See?  Sometimes procrastination's a good thing!

Star Wars - The Box Office Awakens

I'm assuming that all of Hollywood is waiting with baited breath.  Accountants are busy working overtime, crunching the numbers, and J. J. Abrams and company will be positively damned if the headline's not something like "Fastest $100 million of all time!"  Of course, $100 million doesn't go as far in Hollywood these days.  Probably the unions' fault; they'll get blamed for it, anyhow.  And hey!  What about Mother Nature?  Surely, she cares about rich people and hopes that their profits increase exponentially forever and ever until the end of time too?  No?  Wotta bitch!
(Sunday proper).... yeah, it must be nice being J. J. Abrams.  Notice how, in his latest appearance on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert," he made a reference to his early '90s work, having written the script for 1991's Regarding Henry.  Well, his days of reality-based stuff are far behind him, as his transition from so-so writer to the new Spielberg-Lucas hybrid is finally complete.  And yet, directing the next one isn't his top priority.  Figures.  Meanwhile, Llewyn Davis continues his stay at the top of the A-List... how did he get in Star Wars?  How do the Coens' casting choices get so influential anyway?  And will February's Hail, Caesar! suffer a similar fate as The Big Lebowski going up against Titanic at the box office?
Anyway, despite the fact that the latest installment of Star Wars made probably about as much money as a movie can these days over one weekend, we've got, what?... FOUR other debuts this week?  I'm just sayin'.  Last week, Ron Howard's little Moby D... Richard movie managed to be the only debut, and two weeks ago Krampus was the only new debut.  Okay, so the distinction doesn't guarantee good performance at the box office.  Still, I can't help but wonder if the people behind these big blockbusters get a little jealous when a couple new debuts get a little bit of the thunder for themselves.  Take the latest installment of the Chipmunks saga, for example.  One of Ebert and Roeper's replacements wondered if Walt Becker's next pic was going to be called Bumps on Logs, seeing as how he directed Old Hogs and Wild Dogs all previous-like... I'm sorry, I'm being told that it's Wild Hogs and Old Dogs, actually... damn.  Even I have to admit the cleverness of that poster: "Sit.  Stay.  Play Dad."  It's exactly this kind of gumption and gung-ho attitude that got him the latest Chipmunks movie.  Oh my God... apparently Jason Lee has reprised his role as Dave in all four Chipmunks movies.  Now I'm starting to check if the same three guys have done the same voices for the movies!  Justin Long apparently has... I thought the whole point of the Chipmunks voices is that they're relatively interchangeable.  You could have Mariah Carey and Barry White doing the voices and no one will be able to tell the difference because they're sped up at twice the speed.  Next thing you know, you'll be able to buy all eight seasons of the '80s animated "Alvin & The Chipmunks" show at the theater.  They could probably jam all of it onto one or two Blu-Rays, right?  Damn, I'm good.  No, the sanctity of the multiplex would never stoop to selling DVDs of anything.  Concession stand, video game section for the kids and juvenile delinquents, that's how it will always be, forevermore.
...man, I hate that.  I keep forgetting I have to wait to click on something now, because the page hasn't finished loading and it has to make that jump where everything gets pushed down a few pixels.  All the buttons I want to click have ads for adult diapers above them that I end up clicking.  Anyway, believe it or not, going up against the latest issue of Star Wars magazine at the box office is a coveted spot for films to get.  That way, they can always say, "Well, of course it didn't make any money!  It was going up against Star Wars!  Duh!!"  One of the finalists is the latest from Tina Fey.  But bear in mind, this is no Admission, mind you.  It's more in the vein of Baby Mama territory, so it's not for smart people only.  And, why look!  It's Amy Poehler!  People like her, right?  She's Marisa Miller, but with comedic chops to boot.  As for Tina, well, she seems to have all but ditched her trademark glasses from the 2000s, and is going for kind of an Annabella Sciorra vibe... or Sarah Silverman, either one.  I always get them mixed up.  As for me, I can't get out of my head the time I started to watch Brian De Palma's 1973 effort called Sisters.  It starts with this horrible medical footage of conjoined twins, and I had to bail on it.  May this new one not suffer the same fate.
What else?  Well, there's two other debuts called Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani, which I better make links for, because I won't be able to find them later on.  These results will probably get changed at some point this week, and Prem Ratan Dhan Payo will make a brief reappearance.  Gotta run!!!

What Makes Daffy Duck

I'm telling you, you young'uns out there!  You're living in a golden age of video, especially and particularly if you purchase the Looney Tunes Golden Collection... all of 'em, that is.  I have yet to get Volume 6 myself, full disclosure.  Maybe Santa will smile down upon me and... ah, who'm I kidding.
Anyways, it's time for Duck Amuck, the veritable great-grandfather of Fight Club, one of the greatest late '90 mindf... -messing-with movies made in 1999.  Yes, the turning of the years seemed to be a big deal, leading up to it and what not.  Personally, I think when it turned into 2000, and Jesus didn't show up, well... I hate to say an Atheist triumph, but it seemed to be a bit of a setback for the Christians.  I personally felt like Danny DeVito in Ruthless People when he admonished the kidnappers, saying "No... you told me that if I didn't pay, my wife would be in the morgue.  Well, today, I went down to the morgue, and she wasn't there!"
As for the whole 2012 Mayan stuff, well... I think Bill Maher probably said it best.  The Mayans didn't see their own demise coming, so why take their prediction seriously?  Personally, I hope I don't live to see the year 2048.  Oh, that's going to be fun, because I'll be about 76 years old, wearing a grey hoodie, and screaming about Y-ACTUAL-2K with the rest of the computer geeks... see, 2K is short for 2048 in some circles, and I'm sure some institutions probably thought it was a good idea to skimp on the computer hardware, and only code years in 11 bits.  "Oh, 2048 will never get here," they said.  "Oh, surely we won't still be using the same old freakin' stop lights in 2048!" they said.
Now, sure, you might be thinking to yourself right about now, "Geez Louise, The Movie Hooligan!  You're rambling like an incoherent old man!  What's with all the straying from the topic of Duck Amuck?  Geez Louise!"  And you'd be right... and, of course, if you're at all familiar with Duck Amuck, you know that it's a film devoted to the very act of straying from the topic.  Take the beginning, for example.  Seems like a Musketeers-type deal, judging from the title card font and the music, right?  Right.  And Daffy seems to think so at first as well.  And now that I think about it, going right into a fight scene right out of the gate is rather silly at that.  A Ph.D dissertation could be successfully made about the psychology of this cartoon.  Personally, I think its genesis comes from, for example, the endings of two other Chuck Jones semi-classics, Rabbit Punch and My Favorite Duck.  I also thought of the story of how Ray Charles happened to compose his classic song "What'd I Say"... something about how he'd finished playing a long, long concert... and just ran out of songs.  "What'd I Say" was born.  So, too, was Duck Amuck... way ahead of Woodstock, as was Jones' 1962 effort, Now Hear This.
So what's my favourite aspect of this cartoon?  Well, if I had to pick just one, gun to my head... I'd have to say it's the part where Daffy's angrily jumping around.  Of course, he does that a lot in this one, but when he says "NOT ME, YOU SLOP ARTIST!" and "A CLOSE-UP, YOU JERK!  A CLOSE-UP!!!!!"  They're spoiling us by putting all the classic ones on the first volume.  As for the ending, well, I suppose anyone who's endured any amount of rejection in their lives might find some perverse pleasure in the simplicity of a closed door, spoiler alert.  Just as the waterworks were flowing for me and some of those old Popeye cartoons, I got a wee bit weepy with the finale of Duck Amuck.  Mostly because of the music, I think.
Apparently this cartoon was bourne from Chuck Jones thinking about backgrounds.  "What if we ran out of backgrounds?" he thought.  I think I prefer his way of thinking, as compared to, say, Hanna and Barbera when they jumped into the deep end of the television pool with both feet and said, "Screw the backgrounds.  Quick and dirty's the way to go for this little box.  Repeat the same crappy background forever!  Who cares?  Who'll notice?"  It took Warner Bros. a while to catch up, but sometime in the mid 60s, their backgrounds were gone too.

Good double bill with: Kick Me..... oh, right, and of course, Rabbit Rampage.  Sheesh.

An obstruction-free path to Michael Barrier's website

****
-so sayeth The Movie Hooligan

Auteur Watch - Damon Diddit

With the help of a co-director, that is.

Hijacking Hollywood

The final installment of The Hunger Games closes at #1, but it limped over the finish line, frankly.  Still, better than the last Harry Potter did, right?  Okay, so The Hunger Games might not go five weeks at #1.  Few films do.  This year, for example, The Martian spent the first 2 weeks at #1, then dropped to #2, then stayed at #1 for two more weeks.  Jurassic World spent 4 weeks at #1.  Furious 7 also did 4 weeks consecutively.  I'm reminded of last year's Guardians of the Galaxy, but it was #1 the first week, then 2 weeks at #2, then 3 weeks at #1.  Of course, it raked in money like nobody's business.
Anyway, the only debut this week is Ron Howard's latest.  He's found his latest leading man in Chris Hemsworth.  That used to be the job of Russell Crowe and Michael Keaton.  But unlike Rush (2013), which sank like a stone, In the Land of the Blind stays afloat at #2... I mean, In the Name of the King... sorry, it's called In the Heart of the Sea.  Anyway, the point being is that I also saw, scattered higgledy-piggledy all over the web, a thing that said "Ron Howard's 23 films, ranked in order."  Now, when you're ranking 23 of anything, it can be a formidable task, let alone the psychological implications of it.  But I think when it comes to the films of Ron Howard, it's best to have three categories: the good ones like A Beautiful Mind, Cinderella Man and Apollo 13; the bad ones like Gung Ho, Grand Theft Auto, Far and Away, EdTV, The Dilemma, Angels & Demons, How the Grinch Stole Christmas... and then the vast, obscure middle, where films like Kingpin, A Bug's Life and David Fincher's 1997 film The Game go... holy Carp!  They're all a few years apart!  Anyway, I'll be very surprised if In the Heart of the Sea sweeps the Techie Awards like the 2nd or 3rd installment of Pirates of the Caribbean did.

What's Opera, Doc?

Rabbit of Seville is a fun one.  Think of it, of course, as a warm-up to the much celebrated What's Opera, Doc?  I once saw the Seattle Gay Men's Chorus sing the verses to What's Opera, Doc? while it was projected on a giant screen.  Alas, there's not as much for a chorus to work with here with this one.  Also, it kinda doesn't work if you've got a couple dozen guys trying to do an Elmer Fudd impersonation, but whatever.  It's the thought that counts, right?
And so, we start with the wide expanse of the outdoors, with the worlds of Mother Nature and the recreational exploits / artistic ambitions of the Dominion of Man at odds.  Faceless crowds flock into the arena to see some damn opera.  Meanwhile, far off in the adjacent mountains, shotgun shots ring out, accompanied by their companion flashes of light.  For some reason, I think of that one oft-copied scene from Schindler's List where various windows are lit up by gunshots.  Shame on me.  But Bugs is in peril, no question, and, without a Daffy to take the bullets for him, Bugs needs a ruse to trick the easily tricked Elmer the Fudd.  Can dressing up in drag be far behind?
The ultimate irony, of course, is that Bugs' actual natural habitat is the stage.  We sort of get that from Stage Door Cartoon and probably others.  And when Bugs is on stage, well... Elmer just doesn't stand a chance.  But that's adaptation for you.  After all, spiders would rather be indoors with us, apparently!  Imagine My Dinner With Andre with spiders.  You know, the Andre spider going "Comfort can lull you into a dangerous tranquility" and the Wally spider saying "I'm looking for more comfort because the world is very abrasive!"  And then, of course, one of them telling the other, "Oh you, you always know how to get a reservation..."
Chuck Jones has a thing about extreme expressions with eyes.  Why, someone ought to do an internet meme about that... Yahoo Image Searches are a little risky.  It takes a while, but Elmer eventually gets over his stage fright, and gets back to his original goal of killing Bugs Bunny.  Meanwhile, Bugs takes to his stage profession of barber with a vengeance.  He massages Elmer's bald head, gives him a shave, Bugs even gives Elmer the full Carmen Miranda treatment (an arrangement of fruit upon his head)... but is Elmer grateful?  Of course not!  Then again... Bugs was a little rough with that first shave, even incorporating it into the lyrics: "There!  You're nice and clean, although your face looks like it might have gone through a machine."
Here's a sequence worth noting... probably because I'm a guy.  So, as often happens, Bugs and Elmer race each other in the barber's chair to the ceiling of the place.  Cartoon barber chairs are infinitely tall, you know.  Elmer's just about to catch up to Bugs, when Bugs lets loose one of those sandbags common to the stage that act as counterweights for the curtain.  And where does the bag land?  Right on Elmer's junk!  Oh, dude... pretty tawdry gag for Chuck Jones, I must say.  For those of you who are fans of Chris Farley's Tommy Boy, you'll remember what happened to Rob Lowe's character at the end.  Similar type deal.
Which brings me to the excellent sound in this cartoon.  Elmer drops his shotgun after getting hit in the schnutz, and it makes a great clang when it hits the ground.  On the other hand... when Elmer's clopping around the stage looking for Bugs, sure, it sounds echo-y and all, but it's totally unsynced.  Totally.  Sloppy work, guys.  But allow me to congratulate the animation, especially at this one part.  Elmer spins through one of those rotating doors real fast and gets dizzy.  Then he and Bugs do a little dance back to the barber's chair... now, that sequence is the kind of thing that gets taught in animation schools.  Rotoscoped, but neat.  A lot of the early rotoscoped stuff, the borders of the people involved move around too much.  Not here.
As for the ending, well... we start to get a Pink Panzer-style finale.  Elmer and Bugs get axes, guns, and cannons.  When Bugs can't out-cannon Elmer, he goes for love.  Flowers, candy, wedding ring... that type of thing.  Here's the twist: Elmer goes for it!  Elmer returns in a wedding dress!  Good Lourdes.  This changes everything.  Alas, we don't get a finale like Johnny Smith and Poker-Huntas, where we see Bugs and Elmer sitting round a hearth, with little baby Elmer-Bugs hybrids crawling all over the place.  Bugs gets in one last prank on Elmer and says "Next!"  Well, they can't all be serious, can they?

***1/2
-so sayeth The Movie Hooligan

Auteur Watch - Ernest Dickerson

For some reason, I'm put in mind of the latest attack on the dreamers.  I hate to quarrel with Stephen Colbert... but I guess he'll never know about it.  I forget who the guest was, but he mentioned a quote by artist Chuck Close... something like, screw the dreamers, I came here to work.  Well, his pieces are rather labor-intensive.  And I couldn't help but think of former Spike Lee cinematographer turned director Ernest Dickerson.  I don't know if Spike's that much of a dreamer anymore, but Dickerson is a guy what goes to work!  Fifty-nine directing credits?  Dayamnnnn... and two of 'em are in the works right now!
Hard to say what Ernest's favourite decade is.  Was it the go-go 80s when he was just happy to be getting work?  Or the go-go '90s when he finally realized, hey.  I don't need Spike anymore!  I'll be my own damn director?  And then he actually did it?  He led the way for John Singleton, in a sense; no shame in doing a brainless actioner, brother!  Bulletproof, for instance.  Silly me, I thought Surviving the Game was the one that was going to last.  Well, maybe on Spike TV.

Krampy Holidays

The Hunger Games saga is still tops this weekend, bug sirprise... big surprise.  The Cineplex is crowded this weekend!  The only fresh sapling that got any light was Krampus, debuting strong at #2.  Now, I know what you're thinking... Champ Kind?  It's him, right?  Damn straight it is!  Wow, my memory's not completely internet-based yet.  Comforting in a way.  Welp, the Oscars typically frown down upon horror pics, but they do occasionally give Oscar gold to those rare comedians who successfully make a transition from the yuk-yuks to the serious stuff.  Robin Williams, for example.  Then again, they tend to string guys along like Edward Murphy, Bill Murray and fellow Anchorman co-star Steve Carell.  Still, the future's at the door and it's knocking away.  Who will be the first of the Anchorman guys to win Oscar gold?  I'm thinking Paul Rudd for Lifetime Achievement.  Apparently Spike Lee's going to get one!  Although he's apparently going to get it next year, so if he keeps appearing on talk shows this year, and having the hosts refer to him as "the Oscar-winning filmmaker" they might have to disqualify him.  Kinda like how they disqualify a film that appears on TV in the same year or something.  Sorry, just the sour grapes talking, I guess.  But I'm old enough to remember how Chris Rock... I mean Nat X gave Spike Lee a Buster on "The Dark Side."  Sorry, Nat, but when it comes to Oscar gold, he's gotta have it... see how I did that?  Had to work up to it, of course, like the hack that I am.
Well, that's it for the debuts this week.  Still, I can't help but see the James Bond film in the top 10 and recall how Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace couldn't quite get to #1 when they were first released.  I forget what they were going up against, but apparently people just weren't ready to accept a new, different in any way James Bond.  But at least Daniel Craig doesn't have to be one of these guys who, when they're talked about on the news, they say "The man who was once slated to play James Bond..."  I think Ralph Fiennes used to get that.  Hugh Grant, too.  Yeah, Hugh Grant would've been good.  "Oh!  Terribly sorry, terribly sorry."  Which reminds me!  I've officially become a Hollywood phony in my dreams, because I was dreaming about doing an interview with a girl who appeared in a Terry Gilliam film, and I asked her if she's competing with Saoirse Ronan for the same roles.  What can I say?  That's the type of softie I am.  I take a lot of crap from my dreams.  Look, kids!  There's three moons in the sky, and they're moving around like an amoeba under the microscope.  That's not unusual, right?  So what else is new?

Short Reviews - December 2015

The Bachelor - Well, I hate to say it, but... Chris O'Donnell's clearly no Buster Keaton.

Hellhole - Girl, get me out of this...

Jaws - ...am I the only one who finds similarities between films like Jaws and The Silence of the Lambs?  In this case, the similarity is ... SPOILER ALERT... at some point, the hero finds a severed head in both movies.

Joy - According to the IMDb, Joy is the story of four generations of one family, and the woman who rises to become founder and matriarch of a powerful business dynasty.  In that case, I'm officially calling for someone to use the Sherman Anti-Trust Act to keep David O. Russell from making any more films with Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, and Robert De Niro.

The Leisure Class - Haven't seen it yet, but it better be on celluloid film stock, that's all I know...

Lucy - As with Feckless or whatever the hell it's called... Revolver!  That's it.  Anyway, Luc Besson once again tries for greatness disguised as a bad movie.  Yes, it's Animal Kingdom rules among men, we get it.  Lucy's being hunted by cheetahs in her cheetah-print dress.  So ironic.... holy Crap!  He directed it?  Tell me more!

The Revenant - Similar to The Hateful Eight, but slightly different time period.

The Revenant (2009) - Very different from this year's Revenant.

A Royal Night Out - Rupert Everett returns from relative obscurity!

"The Shannara Chronicles" - This time, MTV's finally gone too far.  Too far from their original programming mission.

This Never Happened - ...hmm.  Is this Effie Brown's way of exorcising the demons from her "Project Greenlight" experience?

Two Weeks in Another Town - Sequel to The Bad and the Beautiful?  Kinda!!!