Hell in the Pacific (John Boorman, 1968) features in the entire film only two actors, Lee Marvin and Toshirô Mifune. The premise is simple; during WWII’s Pacific War Theater, an American pilot (Marvin) and a Japanese naval officer (Mifune) become stranded on an uninhabited Pacific Island. They have to either humiliate, imprison, and kill each other, or rely upon each other to survive. So it’s the fact that they are wartime enemies, compounded by their inability to communicate (neither speaks the other’s language) which drives the narrative; it’s not just the body language or physical acting, but also the silence and vast spaces which make this film so effective. It’s the question of whether these two abide by the wartime enemy lines when they exist in this outside of (historical?) time and (political) space place, and what happens if they find reentry.
Firefly: A local academic says this is the greatest Western ever. The appeal for me is, in addition to that curious mix of retro Western genre and futuristic space, the particular syntax and diction this mix entails. The dialogue is so interesting! In theory, it might work that everyone’s speech is peppered with untranslated Chinese, given this futuristic world in which world powers have consolidated into the Alliance, but then what of the glaring absence of Chinese people in this retro future? Don’t tell me Simon and River Tam are Chinese.
Angel: We’ve just finished the series. At first, I thought Cordelia Chase was the most compelling character, but truly, this show’s most interesting character arc was that of Wesley Wyndham-Pryce, who started off as the bookish and socially misplaced Watcher, then morphed so gradually into no bullshit. The show’s best moments for me really have to do with the testosterone of the lead male characters, living and undead alike; dudes who kill demons, and are alternately macho (or bombastic in the case of Lorne), self-effacing, and comedic.
Yes, we’re easing out of the Whedon-verse. We’d finished all of Buffy the Vampire Slayer a few weeks back. I read somewhere that Whedon is a feminist, or that people think he is a feminist. Really? How many of the previously empowered woman main characters have as plot device been violated and/or used as shells or containers for demon spawn? How shrill, bitchy, and unlikeable was Buffy? How catty and petty, or alternately cliché were the the bulk of female interactions? What about the ongoing bad sex with Spike, what about the unnecessarily prolonged scene of the attempted rape in the bathroom and her subsequent battered woman syndrome that carried itself all the way to the series end — “He’s different now. He’s changed.” Please.
As Oscar has pointed out, if she can easily, single-handedly dust 20 vampires, then how can this happen? Who lets it happen, and for what purpose or (again) plot device? As a local speculative fiction and feminist writer told me, Whedon has no problem with girl power (think of Buffy and the slayers contrasted against the Spice Girls), but it’s another story with strong women. I agree with this to some degree; some of the women in Firefly for the most part hold their own, especially Zoë (Gina Torres). Also, I haven’t watched Dollhouse.
So I know my penchant for the science fiction/fantasy/speculative fiction film genres has to do with escaping and even transcending the confines of “realism,” and imagining no holds barred possibilities for the human condition, but then of course our own gendered, political, and social limitations limit the successful execution of these possibilities.
It’s like listening to the J.J. Abrams et al DVD commentary for Star Trek, and thinking about this demographic of middle-class, university educated, 30-something artsy American white dudes, reflecting and amplifying our current culture (as they determine it) back to us. I liked this film so much better before I listened to the commentary.
It’s like looking at comic book art’s impossible and pornographic female physiques, thinking on women not as meaningful characters but as foils and plot devices, and remembering that these guys are all about hormones and blowing up shit. I prefer the hormones and pyrotechnics to be just what they are, rather than presented to us in some half assed, weak sauce allegorical social commentary. It’s a plus if the storytellers are telling us a good story. For example, the Dominion War of ST:DS9 worked because most of the characters, who were well conceived to begin with, were pushed beyond their limits and had to make hard choices, rather than because of any resemblance to any contemporary geopolitical situation.
This brings me to yesterday evening’s viewing of Russell Mulcahy’s Highlander II (Roger Ebert’s awesome review here). Virginia Madsen’s character inhabits space as a female body who spews throwaway fluffy lines; never mind that she started out as the leader of a terrorist organization. Once Connor McLeod bangs her against the brick wall in a totally pointless sex scene, she as a potentially meaningful character is done. Don’t even ask why H2: The Quickening had to be remade into H2: The Renegade Version because both are busting at the seams with implausible and ridiculous plot premises.
The only questions I ask are these: (1) Why bring Ramirez (Sean Connor) back from the dead, when all you are going to do is give him a stupid death scene? He already had a perfectly good one in the first film. (2) Why in God’s name must there be a Highlander story tackling the destruction of the ozone layer, when all we want is to be satisfied by seeing how burly men decapitate other men with antique broadswords, katana, and battle axes. (The (campy) first film’s successes: Clancy Brown! The Queen soundtrack!)
Goodness. Who knew I’d be ranting this morning?
So back to Spike TV’s Deadliest Warrior — men killing other men because that is what they do. Give me this any day.
[Oh, and yeah, Oscar and I also watched The Prophecy; you know, the film with Christopher Walken as the Angel Gabriel and Viggo Mortensen as Lucifer, but that's another blog post.]
You are brilliant.
:-) You’re very kind, Paul.