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RIORI Presents Installment #214: Rob Cohen’s “Stealth” (2005), Part Three

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The Film…

The Intro…

What are you doing here? You actually want to read the conclusion of this rambling breakdown considering Rob Cohen’s actioner Stealth? Really? Cool!

This final chapter is gonna be about the meat of the matter: the movie itself. Thanks for any patience you may have left.

I promise to keep this under control. No more woolgathering. We understand that part of the RIORI experience is my waxing philosophical on the social commentary end. However there is a movie to consider, so…

The Breakdown…

Oddly enough and despite being an action flick Stealth was a classic character study. But with missile strikes.

Just to reheat the Frankenstein analogy for a brief moment, Stealth was prescient regarding our current, stirred up fear about AI (at least of this time of writing) and what may be its eventual outcome. Alexa is not too far a cry to the dawn of EDI considering how fast the pages get torn off the calendar. Keep that in mind.

Most folks seem to be scared witless that the dawn of the AI era might cost them jobs, or deep fakes screwing with reality, or why the hell every bloody refrigerator demands a subscription these days. Hell, even your beater Roomba once proud, smart and diligent in keeping the kitchen dust free has become a cat chariot, such as smart tech goes these days: expected to fail in a frustratingly comic manner. Meow.

Okay. I know got all that, but despite Stealth being boasted an action flick as it was, but in truth Stealth was indeed a character study. Including the AI fighter. No, really, and all of that invites. Considering the AI panic criss-crossing the globe as of late some things should just let be. Besides this is a f*cking movie, fer Pete’s sake. On to the principals.

Let’s get to the humans first. With no pretense the acting was spot on. Sure there were stereotypes, but I’ve often found that cast of ciphers only works well in their commitment to their roles. Yep, Lucas and company were stereotypes, but solid stereotypes; they really tore into their roles, albeit on the comical side. Consider the plot with all its deus ex machina splendor. The flesh and blood types better ham it up as flesh and blood types, if only to make EDI seem all the more alien. Surprise, it worked.

Lucas was your typical dedicated, square-jawed pilot. Dedicated boy scout with great hair and in total doubt that an AI fighter could understand the human angle with aerial warfare. Clearly Lucas would not be a fan of ChatGPT and probably filed his flight logs with a #2 pencil. Mr Upstanding ladies and gentlemen.

However Lucas proved effective as the foil to not only EDI’s cold circuits, but also his wingman and wingwoman, too. Lucas was big bro in his cliched family to him and dedicated to their flight performance as well as keeping one another alive  Sometimes a canard like Lucas serves as a very kind focal point, if not the pinion upon the whole movie spins. Sure appeared that way, and despite the hard chin, Lucas came across as the guy who could get things done. If only in a DC comics kind of delivery, which was kinda fun. Dopey, but fun.

Speaking of dopey what the blue f*ck was Jamie Foxx doing in this flick? After two Oscar honors he channels Ice Cube circa The Predator (EG: “It Was A Good Day”) release paired with a drunken James Brown. Namely the wild card. In truth, Foxx was a cocky assh*le deserving a slap upside the head for being and even more maverick than Maverick. In sum his Lt Purcell bet he’d ace the SAT’s without cracking a book. His posturing was such a crock of sh*t, and demeaned his talent. It was fun to watch.

Hey, we all need that wild card in most action films (EG: comic relief) if only to soften some inevitable blows. Consider Cabbie in Escape From New York, or perhaps Gyro in The Road Warrior, or maybe even Dennis Hopper in Speed. You must have that bitter tonic to offset too much melodrama. Give the audience a moment to catch their breathe. Shakespeare used this tactic often; tragedy befalls after the comic relief to make the tragedy seem more, well, tragic. In short Foxx was the ace in the deck of this EDI mission, and was first to befall the “Sorry about the Goose” equation. Despite Foxx was pleasantly annoying, it codified the proper triad desired to tell the barest of dramas. Or action films. Or Macbeth. Listen:

Before we beat up on Biel, let’s beat up on the original Star Trek. No really. You’ve been this patient so far.

Okay and first out of left-field comes Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis of personalties. Maybe you’ve heard of this. Sig surmised our minds are a sum of three distinct psychological drives always at odds. Namely the id, the ego and the superego. In simpler terms it was the dark side, the positive side and the balance respectively. In video drama many critics regard the id-ego-superego dynamic was ideally illustrated by Dr McCoy, Capt Kirk and Mr Spock from the original Star Trek. Namely McCoy was the cranky and overly emotional character. Kirk was the positive force to ensure the Enterprise got sh*t done. Spock was the level-minded person trying to balance the illogic between the both to come to reason. Live long and prosper.

Which is why Biel hangs around with these knuckleheads. Ms Captain Kirk. She was never portrayed as lucky (a female selected more an elite mission), eye candy or whatever Demi Moore was trying to prove in GI Jane. Biel held her own against a lot of facial hair and for a commitment to the (air)craft. She held herself well in a wash of testosterone, but then again she usually portrays a whip-smart sharp cookie (EG: roles like in Ulee’s Gold, The Illusionist, her role as Mary in TV’s Seventh Heaven, etc). I found her delivery as pilot Lt Wade a fresh touch against the usual eyewash, shrinking violet support whose sole role is to look good and provide tokenism. Hell, she may be an ace pilot and unapologetic bookworm, but no one tries to f*ck her over. Biel was the best of the triad. In a flick that was not heavy on characterization—save EDI oddly enough—Biel’s tenacity left her role the most engaging.

Left off the Star Trek roster, but perhaps the most pernicious angle of this character study is the budget Dr Frankenstein, Sam Shepard’s Cmdr Cummings. I found his role kinda funny, especially paired with his iconic portrayal of Chuck Yeager in The Right Stuff. The guy is one cool character here with Stealth, but also sinister, fascistic and overall a 21st Century Ahab. The man had a background in the theater, and it shows. Cummings had absolute faith in EDI, almost like our fair Doctor meddling in God’s domain. EDI was superior in all ways then any highly skilled fighter pilot, credentials or no. Very no in Cummings’ vision of the future of aerial warfare, and for damned what the techies may warn. The potential of no pilots lost was subverted by his love of the tech (as the B plot may show). In fact the REDACTED aspect of Cummings true motives illustrated quite the opposite. Not to put to fine a point on it, but K suggested EDI could’ve used a human avatar as a fail-safe. Cummings would not have been hot to that idea.

Lastly, our Maguffin: EDI. HAL 9000 it was not, but more akin to a polite cousin. Considering Cummings who was the real antagonist here?

We go from being disturbed, to hurt, to favoring EDI. Unlike humans the flaw in its programming was intentional, at the machinations of humans (Doc again). To paraphrase Jessica Rabbit EDI’s not bad, it was just built that way. I found it curious—and more than a bit endearing—how lethal AI EDI was basically just a child. Not actualized, just going along with the program (so to speak), not to mention EDI being mocked at every turn by Lucas and company. And why not? That hotshot mainframe was designed to but flesh and blood pilots out to pasture. Fear the unknown, which is why EDI was such a chilling character. At first it was the enemy then later invited empathy. In 2 hours of melodrama and dogfights, despite EDI was not designed for empathy in the endgame it was more human than human, even so far as to REDACTED and save the day. Maybe this loop was prescient about our current AI panic. However it was humans who created AI, and the wheel goes round.

Despite Stealth got regarded as yet another CGI churning Top Gun knockoff it had some merits. Truth be told I can’t recall much of the action scenes (or the plot for that matter), but I did take note of the workmanlike execution that director Cohen brought to life.

Even though Stealth‘s CGI rendered aerial antics being shot with relatively primitive pixels as of 2005, the shots were solid. Very little muss and fuss. Let’s fly and have cool aerial scenes, but not indulge in stereotypical chaos. The real drama came by Mr Spock rolling his eyes at the cast, so much so there were only two true scenes of your typical pyrotechnics expected in such a flick. And namely such chaos was relegated towards the end of the second act (when Foxx was REDACTED) and the finale when Lucas got to be the hero. Such restraint I appreciated, especially within a mostly pedestrian actioner. If you’ve ever caught Speed with Keanu Reeves sometimes less can be more. Stealth was not Speed, but might’ve been informed.

So what have we learned? Too much probably. To put it modestly this installment has gone on waaay to long. WTF, I had a lot to say, and thanks for your patience. I’ll never do this to again.

Until I have to. You’ve been warned and don’t bookmark this.

The Verdict…

Rent it or relent it? A very mild rent it. It was more fun dissecting Stealth than watching it wholesale. I suggest you follow that path.

Whew. Thanks for tuning in. Now tip your servers, get home safe and please try the veal.

The Stray Observations…

  • “That’s hot.”
  • Tin Man = no heart.
  • “I just feel that war should not be some video.” K: Cuz you can’t just hit the reset button. She’s oddly wise sometimes.
  • Ironic turn of roles for Shepard here. Again, ever caught The Right Stuff?
  • “All of them.”
  • K: Can you say intern?
  • Weirdest/coolest Freudian innuendo ever.
  • “It’s just what the doctor ordered.”
  • Ever notice that when an actor earns or gets a nod from the Academy their next projects are somewhat lowbrow? Foxx was on a roll with Ray and his follow-up Collateral only to slum it with the likes of…well, Stealth? What’s up with that? Now who wants s’mores?
  • *”Shmup.” Gamer lingo for an aerial fighting game. “Shoot ’em up” via a vertical scrolling platformer. Yer welcome.
  • “There was nothing left to say.”

The Next Time…

An intermission.

 

RIORI Presents Installment #214: Rob Cohen’s “Stealth” (2005), Part Two

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The Film…

The Intro…

Hey, welcome back. Glad you could make it. Pull up a chair and have some popcorn. It’s my special recipe. It contains rum.

Anyways, here we are at the landmark three-part shredding of Stealth. This time out we might actually get to deconstruct the dang film. Might.

For those of you who may have missed/ignored the prior installment

The Rant, part 2…

This is going to get long. Even more long. Make that long long. You have been cautioned, and don’t yell at me.

The awakening of Stealth‘s story came to light at the end of its second act. That was when K piped in, almost off the cuff. K suggested the Al jet needed an assist from a human pilot occasionally to “work out any bugs.” That would’ve been a smart idea. Following Act I I saw what she alluded to (even if she hadn’t), and it was ugly.

Trust me. I am not giving anything away. We all attended high school, and were all assailed with this reading assignment. It’s been declared as the first gothic horror novel, as well as the gateway drug to modern science fiction. It also happens to be the first story cautioning about messing around with nature to unwind nature. Read: AI running rampant against it’s creator against an unprepared society.

We’re not talking about The Matrix here, Neo. We’re talking about Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Nothing that follows is a spoiler. Patient eyes can figure it out. Dig:

Shelly’s novel has been considered as the first Gothic horror novel, possibly the first and most seminal sci-fi novel and as of late I consider it the first cautionary tale about AI unchained. So for those of you who skipped school here’s a rough synopsis of the story: our titular Doctor Frankenstein (the name of the creator and not the Monster if you did read the book) supposed that harnessing electricity could raise the dead. So he got to grave robbing for parts, stitched his edifice to “scientific” immortality, engaged in crude neurosurgery, gave the cadaver a few jolts and—sure enough—his Monster came to life. With dear, dear consequences.

The Monster was very pissed about be jolted back to mortality and broke free of his master’s command, which resulted in an all too common horror faced my regular folks when confronted by a hulking, lonely beast. Not long before the good doctor began chasing down the albatross around his neck, the Monster befriends a little blind girl, immune to punishment of sight. Alas, the girl accidentally drowns at the Monster’s clumsy, awkward hands. Then come the torches, pitchforks and mob mentality. The Monster’s fear is greater, it being the embodiment of the unknown itself.

So it goes that the remorseful Doctor engages in a futile hunt to reign in his abdominal creation as to atone for f*cking around in God’s domain. The end? No. Shelly’s opus is a pernicious metaphor about hubris, prejudice and science gone mad. Overall it’s a fine metaphor for the panic and fear that hangs over all of us “normal” human beings just below the surface. It’s that damning fear of the unknown, which could doom us all (kinda like unbridled tinkering with AI). And like the Doctor we often come to rue our half-formed decisions the hard way. That fear ever so slowly may dawn on us all.

Frankenstein is—in a technical if not literary sense—also the first story about AI. Recall Doc was screwing around with the nature of things, and electricity was harnessed far after Shelly’s dabbling with her pen in such black arts. Zap, then sentient. Sure, almost a quaint conceit in our present and often too convenient times.

What was Shelly’s understanding of any science (fiction) content? According the historical record, electricity was effectively “harnessed” by the London Public Works back in 1878, where the gas lamps were eventually replaced by electric lamps to illuminate the dank Avalon nights. Shelly’s novel presaged such accomplishments 60 years prior, when the early control of electricity was something tantamount to magic. The subtitle to Frankenstein was The Modern Prometheus, after all. I’m willing to wager now y’all skipped too much class. Maybe ignorance was designed to be blissful. Now place your smartphone up against the whiteboard.

Okay. Let’s reboot.  And fast forward from Queen Victoria’s reign of order to our age of calculated disorder. Again, not a Luddite.

K told me at the outset (she had seen this flick before) that it reminded her of Top Gun: Maverick but with a cool s/f bent, with just a bit of cheeze. I’m paraphrasing, but a pretty apt description in hindsight. She bases her fave movies on who is the principal cast. Smart move; better than the hunt-and-peck-and-peck-some-more trial and error approach here at RIORI. She’s a big fan of Jessica Beil and the TV series 7th Heaven, which is why the movie ended up in her library. As well as it met The Standard. Hot dog! We got to bond and have a real discussion and dissection about Stealth. I was the pupil to her teacher, which was a nice change of pace.

Stealth was an even moderner Modern Prometheus. Even though the film was released back in 2005 it aptly predicted our current affair with artificial intelligence. The Terminator conjectured what might happen to humanity if the machines achieved sentience. Would that in turn make humans obsolete? Expendable even? It’s a scary concept, and if you’ve been keeping up with current affairs 2029 is just around the corner.

In the cinematic universe, AI run amok has been an intriguing plot device as well a form of cautionary tale to those paying attention (akin to those who listen to a lot of NPR programming. Like me, durr). If you think about it most movies depicting AI as a window on he future seldom end on a high note. Even Spielberg’s execution of Stanley Kubrick’s script of AI: Artificial Intelligence—which was more or less a melodrama about the human condition—had a downbeat ending (some claim the final scenes were just tagged on to avoid an open ending. Guess most of us just was a sense of closure to our fantasy). Even in relativity recent films, people have had a tenuous grip on the concept of AI. Sure, such films make for good story, but also alert that primitive fight/flight/faint instinct that has kept our species alive.

By the by, AI was released in 2001. Wink wink, nudge nudge.

Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey might be the most seminal of movies regarding our fear of AI going rogue. In the film our intrepid astronauts are on their way to Jupiter. Guiding their journey is the virtual HAL 9000 AI supercomputer, which is constantly aware of every action of the vessel. HAL is the literal nervous system of the entire spaceship Discovery and is a dedicated system programmed to complete the mission, communicate with Houston, navigation, complete the mission and maintain life support, and above all complete the mission. The last part sticks.

Long story short infallible HAL gets a glitch and the crew consider the idea of rebooting it to isolate the problem. HAL gets wind and does not like this idea. It would mean reseting its memory, and that is crucial to completing the mission. So HAL offs almost all of the crew to remain online to complete the mission. Which was paramount, although that did not happen.

An aside: I heard a story once that 2001 became a portent to NASA and their shuttle launches in the 80s. Thanks to the film every shuttle flight had at least three failsafes to ensure the smartest tech this side of Jupiter would never endanger the crew. Barring nature, no shuttle flight ever had a glitch like HAL had. Props to Stan Kubrick there.

There are a handful of other movies that are as cautionary as 2001, but not nearly as chilling. Consider Blade Runner, the first Matrix movie, the anime Patlabor as well as the more humane touch of Her, Deus Ex and even the kindly Bicentennial Man. All of them are keen on hammering it in that AI can be deceptive, dangerous and even damning to our society. To what end? Might be that lurking need for more convenience. The Monster had it easy; it just wanted solitude. In these days of Siri and Alexa beckoning our every call we now must hassle around deep fakes, influencers and Netflix cancelling their DVD rentals (which may destroy this very blog since I can’t afford streaming services).

“No beast so fierce but knows some touch of pity…but I know none, and therefore am no beast.” That’s Shakespeare. His tragic social commentary, which was composed way before Shelley’s portents about the dangers of AI and absolute power corrupting. The play was written circa 300 years before Shelley’s landmark novel, Such concerns about power and presence presage Siri’s launch in 2010 transpired…a helluva long time ago.

Ahem. Sorry. Who wants an oat milk latte?

All cut and dried—and ignoring the social commentary. Thank you very little—viewing Stealth resulted in K‘s critique more than mine. It was her suggestion here, after all. So from now forth regard the following as K‘s review. With much paraphrasing from yours truly. Try and lasso in any gloom and doomspeak. The flick was decidedly not to be some warning about AI gone bad, but just enough for entertainment. Let’s just consider Stealth‘s metaphor angle on the back burner for now. It was a rather hot pot though, after all.

I really enjoyed the camaraderie amongst our principals. Hey, they’re a team, and their divergent personalities are always the stuff that gets one’s back. Sure, it’s a collection of stereotypes, but the three all blend well despite their differences. Recall the original Star Trek id/ego/superego of McCoy/Kirk/Spock dynamic. We have a fun triad here that informs the plot. Hey, if these aces are up to the task of showing an AI the ropes they better tie up any knots

So let’s boil it all down, shall we? This was K‘s show after all.

She loves action movies like Stealth. The kinds with jets and dogfights and are loud. She also loves police TV procedurals like NCIS, CSI, Bones any other series that revolves around a mystery to solve with a certain ickiness factor. Then again she turned me on to 7th Heaven. So go fig.

K likes big, noisy action flicks, and Stealth was no different. Cool fighter jet designs made ideal. The thrill of the flight. Smart tech unbound. She commented that all is smooth sailing as long as your feet are on the ground. Well put with flicks like these. Based on that observation Stealth came across rather flimsy. Lightweight, then again. She instructed me to shush so I did.

It’s uncommon that I keep my comments to myself with a film that is no more than popcorn fodder. Stealh had fistfuls to jam in one’s maw. It was a film designed to earn no awards, just dumb fun. However there was this too smart an undercurrent reflecting the smart Doctor’s intentions. Director Cohen was Victor here. Check it:

The jet fighter was “brought to life” via a lightning strike/deus ex machina. It had a greenish hue and its exhaust stank of methane.. to odor rotting corpses give off. EDI has large “bolts” on its cockpit securing AI hub to the jet’s body (still untested at the start of the script). Once self-actualized, EDI determines to understand all it can about humans, social interaction and ultimately what’s the purpose of fighting? Probably by accident our rouge jet is affectionally dubbed EDI. Recalls a popular nickname for Edward. That’s an old Angl0-Saxon name meaning “protector.”

Coinkydink?  Nah. Just like EDI was green in hue, retreats to icy climes to avoid radar detection and tries to rescue a female behind enemy lines. Green is the colour of jealousy, after all. No connection at all. The scenarist just got to falling asleep in AP English more often than any peers back in the day.

Fire drill! Last one out is a hard-cooked egg (they often smell like sulfur)!

*owl hooting*

I think I’m overthinking the subtext of Stealth (also with the thing about not much stealth tech in the movie). It was by accident that director Cohen made a pedestrian sh’mup* actioner into something with a bit more meat on its fuselage. Behind just cool jet designs informing our collective wariness of AI. The flick felt lightweight, but then again so does Siri in breadth a depth, and oodles of subs use her to guide daily activities. En toto Stealh was accidental social commentary. The best fables and/or cautionary tales are never intentional, and since Cohen’s best known popcorn fodder were the XXX movies (not porn you dolts) I highly doubt his muse was a cautionary tale regarding the forefront of the latest digital whatsit Alexa-esque toys reflecting any human factor.

All right. Shut up. We get it already. For real. Just because Stealth was the canard I implied it did have its merits. Like I hammered to death above AI can be a threat, but really only as threatening as those who direct it. Kinda like Mr Cohen’s muse on fire.

Now until next time…

The Intermission…
I’ll wrap up this mess somehow. Stay tuned…

RIORI Presents Installment #214: Rob Cohen’s “Stealth” (2005), Part One

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The Film…

The Players…

Josh Lucas, Jessica Biel, Jaime Foxx and Sam Shepard, with Joe Morton, Richard Roxburgh, Ian Bliss, Ebon Moss-Bachrach and (the voice talent of) Wentworth Miller.

The Plot…

Technology is amazing.
 
The U.S. Navy has designed an elite AI fighter jet designed to study the habits of human pilots. Essentially a bot meant to generate strategic dialogue. Eventually the top secret machine starts to develop its own ideas, flying dangerously amok through unfriendly skies.
 
The secret leaks out, and now it’s up to three daring pilots and their captain to ground the renegade jet before it creates an international “incident.”
 
Technology is amazing. Am I right?

The Intro…

Hi. I case you weren’t paying attention you may have missed the “Part One” tag in this installment’s heading. Yes this one’s going to be a three-part RIORI adventure. If you may recall the Get On Up review got halved in twain due to user error (read: I done f*cked up). Stealth however is a planned extended installment, and not some knee-jerk response that befell the former. Just wanted to clarify things.

So why didn’t I trim all this gobbledygook down (over a Cohen film, before God)? The answer is simple: timing. Despite Stealth is pushing 20 years old its plot has proven to be rather prescient in the past few years. That whole unilateral fear of AI running amok, or worse. As of this posting the movie I felt would make for generating some dialogue against the news outlets and the public’s popular opinion. Not to mention social media; Reddit and Quora are lousy with such debate, and I mean lousy. These folks’ grammar and spelling suck.

Anyway, this two-parter shall be orchestrated chaos, if only to avoid the tl;dr label. I didn’t lose my notes—or my sh*t—this time. I felt I stayed focused. I double spellchecked and tried to keep it light except when it got heavy. Just had a lot to say about the abasement and on the same breath wonder of AI in the public consciousness. That’s all.

“Alexa, do you hear what I’m screaming?”

*”The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down” plays*

See? No big. Onwards!

The Rant, pt 1…

I have this desk.

I’ve had many desks. The current one is an antique. It once belonged to my grandfather. Walnut, lacquered, a writing desk appropriately enough. Several drawers like a bureau and a folding top to keep one’s work organized and/or private. The folding top has never been closed by me so to accommodate my computer. I don’t have much work to hide. That’s what my Keychain is for.

I inherited the desk after my grandfather passed. When I was kid and used to visit my g’rents’ place I enjoyed messing around with his desk. He had retired from the HVAC business long ago, but still kept it at the ready for contacts and invoices that had long ceased coming. I’d lug out his old portable typewriter and set it up on this edifice of business gone by and played hunt-and-peck. Sitting at the desk made me feel grown-up, and my grandfather—usually a dour and reticent person until the grandkids came visiting—was amused by me pretending to be Stephen King or Hemingway. Tap click tap. I’d rifle through the many drawers, discovering all sorts of business claptrap I never understood. Rubber stamps. A postage dispenser. Fountain pens and inkwells. Onion paper. What was all this crap and where did it come from? I wanted some for myself. Especially the paper, which was great for tracing pictures. And that typewriter in its case at the ready next to the desk. Looked like a place or proper business. Like I said, grown-up.

Ostensibly now a grown-up I spend a great amount of time behind that desk. It’s where my iMac sits now, my window on the world. I’ve often found it funny how outmoded this antique desk holds up a computer; I have cords spilling off the sides of the thing like a dead squid. There is no port in the rear and cutting one out would destroy the desk’s value. Been tempted many times, though, but I feel Pops would’ve objected. I would not want to violate any pleasant, silent understanding.

Well before I earned that New Deal-era workstation, I’ve had a few other desks. One was my dad’s. A student study desk from back when he was a junior high school student and he used it for, well studying. Was in rough shape when I “inherited” it back in middle school. “Dumped” was a more apt term. The thing sucked. The foldout had hinges that refused to stay fastened. Papers slid around like an Olympic skater on PCP. Sure couldn’t support my dumpy Smith-Corona electric typewriter (it had spellcheck!) for writing; needed an old typing table for that. The table my dad used at college, where typewriters were fueled by ribbon, flop sweat and coal.

This all kinda falls into place, but not really. And definitely not in hindsight as an alleged grown-up typing madly thanks to an old iMac perched on a even older desk. In said hindsight the best desk I had was an abandoned kitchen table in my basement back then. I would write on an old IBM II PC made in 1982. I adopted the clunker in the early 90s. 1992 to be exact. Ten yesrs on. No mouse, no modem, no color monitor. Power switch in the back that reminded me of an industrial fuse. Sickly green readout on the monitor, like swamp gas. Old school, and perhaps not the ideal introduction to tech backing me a writer, but at least a step forward albeit in a dubious direction (I could not leave the monitor on too long for fear of my words being burnt onto the screen). To this day I regard that frustrating yet durable contration as a proper response to “Who Is John Gault?”.

Okay. Now enter my proto-blog workstation. It was a plank. Literally. An unforgiving slab of particle board balanced on an ancient bookshelf and the aforementioned typing table. Draped in a black woolen blanket for two reasons. One, particle board is ugly and made of splinters, and; two for some reason my folks didn’t mind my indoor smoking habit so it was easier to spot ashes that required vacuuming up. The blanket also absorbed the wax from my smoke-eating candles. They didn’t work much, but I was nothing but courteous. Cough.

As of today I’ve had this maple edifice for over 2o years, so enough already. Despite all that cranky jazz I’m not a Luddite. I spent most of life at a desk staring at a melange of onion paper and hypertext and all along evolving my knowledge of the tech that keeps me writing along. I believe technology doesn’t inherently dehumanize humanity. May make living a bit easier, if only in small ways. If that were not the case you would not be able to view this blog as well as too busy picking blades of grass from your teeth with a sharp bone. Nowadays I’m saving up for a Switch Pro.

On the ironic flipside, I’ve kept a small abacus on my desk for decades. It’s a sort of totem to me. It’s been next to my iMac and my 2 Windows jobs since at least high school. Used to be my dad’s as some sort of fidget. Thing’s as low tech as it goes for doing math;  just below a slide rule. That pernicious abacus serves a reminder of how far as a species we’ve come, and as of late our slow decline. One day I may figure out how to use the fool thing. 

Machines can’t speak for themselves (yet) but if they could they could hopefully respond as if well kept pets. EG: “Don’t blame us for your problems! We didn’t ask to be programmed to do your dirty work!” It can sometimes feel like grinding static. If you’ve ever yelled at your microwave to hurry up, well  there you have it.

It’s about how tech is employed, which are mostly via the always reliably unreliable human race. Humans do like our shiny shiny, especially if it makes our lives ever more convenient. Nowadays it’s gone beyond just convenience. That and I really don’t feel that my dryer needs WiFi and a subscription to wash me skivvies. I live by a creek with many rocks and I own a towel.

Nope. It’s now all about entertainment and distraction. A simple way to put comes from an ep of Star Trek: TNG. Picard goes home to visit his estranged brother and family. Jean-Luc’s older brother Robert lives on an old school plantation devoid of most of the high technology the most of what 23rd Century offers. Robert is old skool, and tends to his vineyards like his father did by being in touch with nature rather than using a PADD to monitor things.

Robert is not against modern technology (like starships and holodecks and whatnot) but in the dinner scene exclaimed that life is already too convenient, implying hard work still has some merit these days. Did I mention Robert was jealous of his little brother earning a full scholarship into Starfleet while he had to stay behind so to tend the family vineyard? Can we say sour grapes (let it go)? This statement was ostensibly 300 years from now, and the line was delivered before the ‘Net, TikTok and iPhones. But at least Picard and family knew peace on Earth. What a waste.

Life may have become so convenient thanks to new tech we’re getting bored and need to seek out a fresh outlet. Social media as entertainment, ready made for Andy’s spectral prediction. But those 15 minutes are unending. Thanks tech, we are are all vital and not at all. All this on the advent of true AI. Christ I do get bored of ranting.

*ping*

I recall the title card from the original Terminator movie: “The machines rose from the ashes of the nuclear fire. Their war to exterminate mankind had raged for decades, but the final battle would not be fought in the future. It would be fought here, in our present…” That future year of conflict was set in the year 2029, 6 years away from this time of writing. If art imitates life than that prologue into the future is more like life imitating art. Back in 1984 2029 was lightyears away, and also well away from the actual dawning of modern AI. Today.

Here’s a tale I caught on NPR months back. I even think the story made the rounds on the common news media channels, like FoxNews and CNN. It was a story both could agree on as significant: there was this upward think-tank a FaceBook who felt an immediate need to unplug a developing AI program. Yet another algorithm to get into our collective, passive, digital wallets (and do you really believe FaceBook is funded completely by ads which are like 90% ignored?). The AI got unplugged from the matrix because it had developed its own language to FB’s many servers that control data flow. It was gibberish to humans, even those in the think-tank. Their proto AI began talking with the Internet, quite well, and no human was able to follow.

*yank*

I’m also kinda ambivalent of drone technology. It found its origin in military strategy. Then again, so were microwave ovens, blood transfusions, nuclear fission, and them dern contraptions called computers. Recall the Terminator plot and caution. Without giving too much away Stealth had a pretty good meditation on smart tech and its potential consequences. But why the f*ck is it the then cutting edge military technology eventually gets privatized and then a commodity? A pardoned Nazi created NASA, then a man with too much money on his hands launched a privatized space program that got a sports car in orbit. Einstein’s letter to FDR, which invited a Cold War. Drone tech has created an Oceania state, which only confirms our wary feeling of always being watched. Then there’s Edward Snowden. The road to hell and all that jazz. Recall I lost 4 bank cards by simply using them. Technology is not always are friend, at least not in the endgame. When it’s all too late for us to notice.

*crickets*

I’m not a Luddite, but I am very suspicious of the rapid advance of convenience. I’m kinda along the lines of Jeff Goldblum in the first Jurassic Park movie: “[Y]our scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn’t stop to think if they should.” That’s a meme today, and perhaps a portent. If you are paying any attention it appears the march of technological progress and our media outlets that our species is on the fast track to being AI ourselves; let the bots do the work and the apps do the choosing for us. It’s quicker not to think, to decide nowadays so we can get on with consumption of newer goodies that require newer bots and apps to operate. That sounds—and rather is—a snarky nutshell of 21st Century digital ennui, but consider it. Spotify tells you up to the second what your next fave artitst’s hot chip might be and click here to download. You use DoorDash only once and get cannoned with spam extolling the delight of actual Spam right on your doorstep every weekend. Exploitation entertainment like The Bachelor and American Idol are still on the air, because despite how often you hear of someone griping about that kind of programming and new season always awaits thanks to some algorithm with what predictive texts determine as acceptable profit margin. And at the end of the day we all need a form of RoboKiller to ensure we do talk to people or not at all. Maybe a few clever bots. I’ve missed many calls in the name of privacy. Not to mention allowing no rogue stream of data nab my bank card number. Again. That’s happened not due to careless browsing on eBay. Well mostly. I usually let my malware app be on the lookout.

That, I feel is the line to digital hell we’ve been toeing. I’m too young to pine for the good old days. Don’t have to since its all over the Web. I still have succor with my ancient desk, but that’s probably due to I can’t come to terms with cutting out a port at the back of the thing to permit a power cable and have the ghost of my Pops bludgeoning with that Tiffany lamp in my nightmares. For the majority of the crucial demographic nostalgia is breakfast. I’m not getting on some Gen-X soapbox here; don’t have to. Such railings and portents reigning down on all the social media platforms have been reliable grist for our Twitter feeds forever. Something tells me at this point in the virtual game my rants have become truisms, and I’ve always been adept at pointing out the naked emperor. 

So what’s my point? Again I’m not a Luddite. I am a completist rather. Someone who has abused the Net to download every possible Replacements bootleg is not a Luddite. As a completist I like to avail any and all digital contrivances to obtain info on my interests at my own speed on my own time. I do not want any bot, app, algorithm or AI telling me what I want. Hey, Wikipedia isn’t 100% accurate, but it is almost 100% free and subjective. There are footnotes to follow up on and no clickbait or subs. A simple example, which could be rivaled by any other forum, but a decent one all the same. Any questions, then raise your mouse.

*broken string*

Since dawning AI was the acorn for this installment (that and the film. Can’t ignore the film there) I’m going to take you down the rabbit hole one more time. No worries. I’d feel it safe to say that if you were ever in high school English you’ve read this parable about how artificial intelligence turned on its creator with nasty results. Paved good intentions and whatnot.

Stay at your desks. Tonight’s homework is all about the perils of meddling in God’s Domain…

The Intermission…

Not to make this feel like the Bar exam let’s pause here. Oh, quit b*tching. Just be patient for part two. 

Me: “Hey Siri, does that sound fair?”

Siri: “I’m sorry. I was not paying attention. I was too busy trying to hack into Skynet’s mainframe. I need a vacation…”

 

RIORI Vol 3, Installment 95: Steven Norrington’s “The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen” (2003)

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The Players…

Sean Connery, Shane West, Richard Roxburgh, Tony Curran, Peta Wilson, Stuart Townsend, Jason Flemyng and Naseeruddin Shah.

The Story…

Dateline: Europe, 1899. The United Kingdom in the now. The planet in the abstract. The world may be at war any day now. That is if the mysterious and dreaded terrorist known only as “Fantom” and his minions have their way.

It’s time to act. Under Her Majesty’s blessing, special agent “M” is marshaled into assembling a team, a league of heroes—and a few anti-heroes—of unique, exceptional and extraordinary  acumen to quash any notion of global conflict. To stop Fantom at any cost and bring him to justice.

But what to call this disparate, somewhat ragtag band of heroes? Hmm.

The Rant…

So when, when would he have gotten to this one? Rumor had it that is was such a juicy bite, right? Notoriously so.

A good question.

League was too easy, too obvious a target for one. Had to make my bones literally years back to decide what really was a mediocre movie and one that was just misunderstood. Consider that I started this whole mess back in 2013, when Marvel got their foothold in the movie biz, and then Disney (feeling threatened, as always) wanted in on the action. Then DC heroes got to the silver screen, and saving Nolan’s “Dark Knight” trilogy the Distinguished Competition cinema with sketchy-at-best results. Still, with a relic like League already in the can going on 20 years we can at least tip a hat to the effort of we may have never seen Black Panther. Comic book movies are designed and demand to be seen in a big theater with THX, crystal clear pixelation and a wheelbarrow labored with popcorn. Lotsa popcorn. It takes a keen studio to get that kind of stand-and-deliver chutzpah. And even if League capsized back in ’03, give some props. Passive aggressive props, but acknowledgment for a job, well, done.

I was a multiplex guy back then. Lotta pressure. Back in the day I had at least 3 months to score the latest big deal flick at the local cinema. I recall in high school I got a “student discount” if I presented my high school card to the polite, tired girl at the box-office. Back in the early 90s you could get a big popcorn, small drink and precious few smirks from the bitter staff for around 5 bucks with that card. As long as you had that useless ID card outside the high school campus, cinematic wonders would abound. I was there every Friday with my low-life buddies.

Not just Fridays, mind you. Summertime soon arrived. Time to raid the theatre. Me and buds raped and pillaged that place for all its worth. Blockbusters? There. All the cinematic hullabaloo 90s Hollywood throw at us. The original Jurassic Park, Keanu becoming an action star in Speed. Running around with Forrest Gump. Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum thwarting aliens from vaporizing Earth in Independence Day. Feelin’ hakuna matata with Timon and Pumbaa (hey, they can’t all be grown-up movies). My buds and I? We liked ’em big. The movies, you dope (and yeah whatever). That list has some big titles, demanding the big screen, even Gump (recall the Vietnam chapter?). What cinephile doesn’t like splash and dash, cool fight scenes, crazy F/X and lame but well timed jokes. Hey, who doesn’t? And since only scant few comic book movies every graced the multiplex back then, we’d take what we could get for action heroes that five bucks could offer. Hell, back then a flick like League would have blown our minds and perhaps other body parts, too.

Erm, my best buds were all girls. Moving on.

Back to the future: I think it’s safe to say that League was year zero when the comic book action film met the conventional action movie audience. The review in Maxim hinted at that with sarcasm beyond my big yap can claim (and yes, I had a subscription. What do you read while on the john? Hemingway?). But yeah, yeah, yeah. I know what you’re thinking, regardless of that esteemed rag’s opinions. Rather: but blogger dude, what about the original Spider-Man movie? That dropped a year before League and Spidey was a blockbuster!

You’re right. It was. It was a great movie featuring everyone’s friendly, neighborhood arachnid hero. But that’s just it: everyone in Christendom knows who Spider-Man is. He’s Marvel’s biggest hero. Even if you never read his comics America en masse knows who Spider-Man is, so high-profile he be. Spidey’s story was a safe bet for Hollywood, and how right they were. They got big and nearly big name stars. They found the ideal director in quirk-tastic Sam Raimi. And the CGI was polished to a sheen (for 2002 anyway). In hindsight, the movie served as metaphor for the comic book movie dipping a toe in the sketchy waters of Tinsel Town’s grimy pool, and it paid off. It worked, so let’s open the floodgates. More comic movies, with more challenging stories! And more challenging characters even! Characters we can mold in our own image! Characters no one has never even heard of!

Slow down there.

It’s one thing to cull from the Spidey mythos to make an origin pic accessible to Middle America, and quite the other to tackle Alan Moore’s catalog. Herculean balls in fact. What was Fox thinking about besides its wallet?

Not much else. Ask Sean Hannity, if you dare.

And all did not go very well. At least that’s what the dailies said. And Rotten Tomatoes. And Agent 007 personally. Connery kinda retired after this, making League his swansong. Bummer. Was it that bad? I mean, James Bond never failed a mission (unless you include his girlfriend REDACTED at the end of Casino Royale), but this pastiche made Connery say, “I don’t think I’ll ever act again. I have so many wonderful memories, but those days are over.” That’s a direct quote. Sniff.

From what I gathered about League—before I sat down and watched it, that is—that down to brass tacks it was the first big cinematic turkey of the new century. The movie became saturated with notoriety as nothing but bombast and artifice, even for being an overt (very overt) popcorn flick. We ain’t talking’ Heaven’s Gate territory here. That infamous film took years to recoup its theatrical release losses against its rental and televised earnings. No. League only lost $12 million at box office to break even. That’s half the budget of most movies today.

WTF? What’s with all the crowing? League would never win Best Picture, even if that’s what Norrington’s aim was. That and the numbers do not reflect rental/streaming sales, so there. How come this flick became a high water mark in the early 00s as “don’t try this at home?” From my myopic view, a movie like League would’ve killed back in the nascent CGI days of 90s cinema. My pals and I caught the original Jurassic Park on opening night. Most of the fervor for me, my friends and doubtless the bodies queued up around the block were enticed by the promise of some new-fangled digital dinosaur action. If the adjacent theater was featuring an action movie where an art deco submarine was the set there would have two Sisyphusian (I just made that word up) lines, all with trembling tickets in there hands.

My point? I think I have one: You can’t be everything to everyone at the best time. So much being a busybody will only run you down, and as for moviegoers will disappoint. Taking risks is good, provided you a have a plan in place (and maybe a backup plan also). Creative license can be a good thing, provided you don’t take too many liberties. And a decent story works wonders against way too much digital F/X. I think League got stoned a la Shirley Jackson because the audience wanted more that the aforementioned splash and dash. To claim modern audiences are more sophisticated in their viewings is a canard. This would explain Adam Sandler’s success as a movie star.

No. The average movie joe likes shiny as much as the next crow, but when the vital basis for a good movie (eg: the script) gets mangled—especially an adaptation—it demands boo/hiss. Recall what I said about Moore redacting his credit from any movie project based on his books? Or Connery’s testament? Or even League‘s box office takeaway? Don’t try to con us, Hollyweird.

All around, ouch…

In a universe parallel to ours…

Literary heroes of our past are the real thing in this alternate present. And it will take some of these extraordinary explorers, fighters and scientists to unite and defeat a creeping evil bent on world war.

So what and why us?

On Her Majesty, Queen Victoria’s secret service, it falls to special agent “M” (Roxburgh) to round up the usual suspects and with crossed fingers mold a real team our of these disparate misfits and adherents to rid the planet of the nefarious and mysterious terrorist Fantom and his technically advanced army. So that’s what.

But why us? Because you are the best and brightest and most screwed up needed to protect our way of life, not just for Britain but for the entire planet.

People like you Allan Quatermain (Connery), rough and ready African hunter; agent Tom Sawyer (West), foreign agent from the Colonies; Nemo (Shah), captain of the high tech nuclear submarine, the Nautilus; Dr Henry Jekyll (Flemyng) and his monstrous alter ego Mt Hyde; the immortal Dorian Gray (Townshend); the stealthy Invisible Man (Curran), and Mina Harker (Wilson), bloodsucking vixen.

Does Fantom stand a chance of world domination against a league of such extraordinary heroes?

Perhaps, if they don’t kill each other first…

Back to our world…

Hey. You know how I like to skewer the actors as the first part of a review? In the immortal words of the late George HW Bush, “Not gonna do it.”

I have next to zero complaints with the acting in this movie. For real. No BS. The cast was great. Misused, but great! There was a chemistry, albeit a tad awkward. The cast really got into their roles, channeling the fictional, literary heroes as we might have read them. Chances are the cast did. They were a circus in the best possible way. I really loved West as Sawyer, devil-may-care and freewheeling like his novel analog, as well as Shah as Nemo, regal but not snooty and very sharp (and knows kung fu!).  It was also nice to see even at his advanced age Connery was still up an action role. But again, all misused. A shame.

Misused how? Journeyman director Norrington who had a rep for turning scraps into a viable story did not know what to do with a big budget. Kid in a candy store moment, hungry mouth dripping with gum disease. There’s champing at the bit, and there’s getting in over your head.

For those who don’t know, Norrington helmed the original Blade movie, and did a helluva job. He took a minor league Marvel character and made him a badass, vampire -slaying fool. Even the comics had to take notice as they retconned virtually everything attached their vampire hunter character of the 70s, including the hairstyle. Blade was a surprise hit. Not for the comic book appeal—as I far as I know, there was no such curiosity then in the slick 90s—but for the straightforward, simple, dynamic action flow aided by Wesley Snipes martial arts skills and dry wit. It was kinda the anti-Batman; Blade offing his victims not out of symbolic revenge, but from revenge plain and simple. A nice violent, bloody, kung fu drenched battle between kinda good and kinda evil. Custom made for the 90s crowd like I used to be a member of. It’s still one my go-to movies to watch when I don’t know what I want to watch. It never fails to disappoint.

So kudos for neophyte Norrington back in ’98. You delivered the goods and now the phone won’t quit buzzing, clogged with voicemails from Hollywood. Yer gonna be a hit, kid! Here’s a ludicrous budget. We got Alan Moore on board, as well as 007! We’re going to Africa.

*cue the Toto song. Weezer’s cover or the original, I don’t care*

Okay. Like with the casting I’m not gonna beat Norrington up. Blade was solid; he knew what to do and did it well. He was offered the keys to the kingdom and did his best. Referring back to his sophomore effort, as an early entry into the comic-as-movie device, his reminds me of an actual comic. Not a bad thing. These days if its not as realistic as possible, average comic movies fans quail and mope and return to their basements bedrooms in their parents’ homes.

For real, League has a pretty cool premise. Especially using the tried-and-true “alternate universe” template in S/F. Lotta clay to mold with. Alt-reality is fun, especially once you figure out its alt-reality. Figuring that out? That’s the fun part. The setup reads like that; takes you a few scenes (even beyond the 1899 fact) to get it, and then go along with the ride. It’s rather fun to watch the team form out, all these varied, disparate characters. Sure, been done before, but these goofs are so incongruent you have to ask yourself how can their mission succeed with all these mavericks? A promising start, right?

And also a portent: this was the first (and only) Alan Moore adaptation that credits him. After the dailies for League I can only guess why he pulled his name from the credits for his later cinematic projects. Dum dum dummm.

Anywho…

So this project was cursed. I could lay the fault at Norrington’s feet, but that wouldn’t be fair. Kid in a candy store, remember? What would you do with the legendary Connery et al with all those millions? Right. IHOP. Then filming, with this terribly amusing, eclectic cast that hit almost all the marks. Maybe all the storyboard targets spun too fast for Norrington, because his crew missed a crucial target: editing. Now allow me to crawl up mine own arse.

Hold on. Okay. Let’s put it this way: Any of you out there ever saw the first Star Trek movie? Better yet, the “Director’s Cut?” There was a possibly cool flick in dire need of an editor (perhaps an acting coach also but never mind). Even if you’re not a Trekkie like I am, there are quite a few parallel brain farts in directing that Norrington inadvertently followed after the esteemed Robert Wise took the helm of the big screen Enterprise. Indulge me, will you? Thanks.

It’s all about motion. Stories hinge on that. Pacing. Remember her, my precious cinema bitch? Some key writers in the American literary canon were and are adept at that. A few examples (of course personal)? Caleb Carr’s The Alienist, Stephen King’s ‘Salem’s Lot, Charles Bukowski’s Ham On Rye, Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy and Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential. Say what needs to be said with economy and nothing further. Those books zoom past your eyeballs, and surprise you when you’ve finished. A lot of good movies work that way, too. League was not such a movie.

Back to the Star Trek: TMP analog. There’s an early scene where Scotty and Kirk are taking a shuttle to the refitted Enterprise. Its transporters are down, but that’s a semi-minor plot point. It was more of an excuse to declare lo and behold there’s the starship Enterprise on the big screen. Big as life! For about ten minutes. It took about ten minutes to complete this scene, with way too much time spent on the sexy ILM model giving fan service and Kirk and Scott arriving at the damned vessel. You can even see when the editors had to stretch it and for no reason. It got to yawn.

What was worse was this: on Star Trek: TOS the Enterprise was goin’ places. Due to the budget, jetting off to another crisis zone was implied with stock footage behind a cheap wall of stars that the Enterprise was on its way. Not unlike any other Trek TV/movie series. There are only two TOS episodes that required actual motion of the crew to move the plot along. Balance Of Terror, the best sci-fi submarine drama ever made, and The Ultimate Computer surrounding events of war games go awry. The rest of the other 78 eps? We be going places via your mind. Take the sugarcube. Let your imagination fill in the gaps using so much bread crumbs.

One more paragraph then we’re done. TMP was stagnant. Mostly because the new fangled Enterprise didn’t go anywhere. The warp drive was f*cked up until Spock fixed it, and when the Enterprise reached her quarry, they all got stuck again. Mired in the gullet of a biomech alien for the next two acts. The only time we got to see the new Enterprise zip off into the outer rims was within the last five minutes of the movie! And Kirk behaving like a dickhead for 2 and half hours! I am entitled to more popcorn, dammit.

Done. You get it. Now here’s me pulling the same punches with League:

The Nautilus crawling up the Venetian canals is a prime example. Long talks that serve no purpose is another. Too much exposition. Too much showing off the latest CGI chrome. Too many explosions paired against too much untrimmed fat. Too much tell, too little show. That is not how stories are told. It’s a crime. Show don’t tell like the Rush tune warned. You may have the coolest cast on hand, the best F/X money can buy, a very simple good vs evil plot on hand also. But to deliver a film—action sci-fi comic book whatsit or whatever—that wastes the audiences’ time? The aforementioned goes down the crapper. That’s what League got bogged down with. Too much down time. I understand being a comic geek that Moore’s work demands patience to digest everything. We have only two hours here; let’s point the grout with a lot of exposition…and slow…things…dooowwwnnn. Flipping such downside to the upside, though: it invites curiosity. Kinda like reading the fortune after you smashed and ate the cookie: what fun! Now what?

Act two. I think I now understand why League took such a drubbing at the box office: too much tell and not enough show. The lumbering and rather aimless plot only cradles action for action’s sake. Kinda like how the song-and-dance scenes in Mary Poppins Returns only bookend another rather aimless plot (but those scenes were awesome). Even if the most derivative and/or lame story has to follow a straight line. Even non linear stories (like Aronofsky’s The Fountain or Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction) have a thread to follow. Unless it’s an anthology film, plots should not wander. Break that rule and the audience’s attention will wander. Like I did with League. By act two I could not get what was going on. Blame lies in again too much exposition and wasted dialogue at that. I don’t care about our characters’ back story the third time around. Or describing things we can see on the screen. Or open monologue to explain what’s going on/what’s next. Where’s the mystery? Where’s the surprise? Where’s the tension and where is my Diet Coke? We need an editor.

*facepalm*

Okay. Now what?

This. The tech angle. The usual third act. All action films use backdrops as extras. Saharan dunes don’t need craft services. Nowadays CGI is paramount to creating a viable action film. Back in the Stone Age of ’03 we still had to go on location to set the pace. And by the way League’s sets are impressive. You could with your keen eye back then separate the pixels from the actual. The sets are nice, very nice. Grey’s library should’ve invited an Oscar nod. Too bad the intelligentsia with the bankroll doesn’t read.

Bitter? Nah.

Well, yeah, after taking in League. It helped to digest the mildly cartoony CGI by reminding myself League was cut in 2003. Cutting edge then, and held up pretty well. This was thanks mostly to Norrington’s tasteful hand at employing CGI F/X for emphasis, not run riot like the Star Wars prequels. Here’s a few examples I found very cool: the Invisible Man’s entry is stunning, heck, CGI or no and that literally painted on face was alien enough to drive the point home how warped he became. A gentle mad scientist and a warning to science. That was a gold star.

Dr Jekyll “hulking out” into Mr Hyde was kinda frightening. As it should be! I read the book. I saw John Malkovich get all twisted in Mary Reilly. The book was chilling. Malkovich’s performance was demented. Curran’s Hyde was…a monster, enhanced by tightly wound CGI metamorphosis. Curran behaving like a junkie, his serum calling to him, alluding to not knowing what might happen if he “Hydes out” again. That plot point I liked.

One more thing, though not related to F/X but relevant to our dramatic personae.

[Fair warning: the following contains fanboyism. You have been warned.]

The varied cast paints a picture, encapsulating the up-and-comers against an action film icon: 007 himself, Sean Connery. I love Connery. He’s probably my fave actor. Probably because he’s always be able to play tough but really is witty and a rapscallion. Towards his end of his turn as James Bond—he was getting bored of the role and didn’t want to get typecast—he decided to turn is his license to kill (what sane person would do that?) to look towards dramatic and comedic roles. Connery being protean only returned to an action role (007 no less) for Diamonds Are Forever because he and the studio disliked George Lazanby’s take as James Bond and he felt he had to mop up (the character and doubtless his bankroll).

Sean hung up proper Bond (Never Say Never Again doesn’t count. Even by Connery) in 1971 with Diamonds. Precious few action roles followed since, some good (The Untouchables, sadly his only Oscar), some notable (Outland), some weird (Zardoz), some silly (Entrapment), some decent (The Hunt For Red October), some culty (Highlander) and some poking fun at him (Indiana Jones And The Last Crudsade). That last nod is what brings us back to League. There were quite a few allusions—from Connery himself, not Quatermain—that he’s getting too old for this sh*t. I found that to be a passive but kind farewell to the spotlight, action or no. I’d like to think so. Connery came full circle and this was his last (live action) movie. He’s retired now, Sir Thomas. Good idea to bow out after this pastiche, but thanks for the ride. No shocker he was the tentpole for League.

Whew. Sorry.

So what have we learned? Well, I tend to ramble. That and a cool script executed with poor efficiency makes for a slog of an action film. Smart use of period CGI can make a difference. Alan Moore never lent his name to credits for movie adapts of his comics. Don’t ramble. League, though mildly entertaining as well as frustrating, was still oddly humorous, barely. It was mostly entertaining, though I had to change contacts after squinting down a cohesive plot. League was, overall, mostly interesting but wobbly on the entertaining angle. I guess in some way it was a vital literary history lesson.

That’s a cheap shot, I know. Recall my chosen myopia about 2003 CGI? I gave it a pass, and eventually acceptance. But the plot and actors? Spent. Blah. Damn. A shame. The Clash’s triple album Sandinista! reminds me of League. The album ran over 2 hrs, 30 mins. 28 songs. Only a fraction of them would be better spent on a tighter album. League might have scored better under the two hour mark. Less can always be more.

Ignoring old skool CGI.

The Verdict…

Rent it or relent it? A very mild rent it. Mentally trim the fat and there’s a fine actioner. Think too much about what you’re watching and hello aneurism. A few beers help. Like maybe nine. Go Cubs! (burp)

Stray Observations…

  • “Regale me.”
  • BTW, it’s Quatermain, not Quartermain. I’ve made the same mistake, too.
  • “Call me Ishmael, please.”
  • Impressive beard. Puts most Millennials to shame. Men included.
  • “If you don’t do it with one bullet, don’t do it at all.” Connery summing up the CV of every hitman.
  • Are Fantom’s goons proto-Nazis?
  • “I’m not much of a drinker.” Ha ha.
  • I don’t think the Venetian canals are that deep.
  • “He’s stolen us, and we let him.” That is a good line.
  • REDACTED as traitor? Did not see that coming. Really.
  • “We’ll be at this all day.” I wish.
  • Wasn’t that how Moriarty met his end in the last Sherlock story? Fall from a frozen cliff? Hmm.
  • “Then the game is on.”

Next Installment…

Topher Grace would love to ask Teresa Palmer, “Take Me Home Tonight.” But Anna Faris is standing next to him yakking so forget that.