Tag: sylvester stallone

Dredd 2.0: A Fan-Made Sequel

judge_mintyIt really says something about the world we live in, specifically about the democratic nature of media and technology, when fans can step up and make the movies that conventional studios fail to produce. That’s what happened with this 27 minute short known as Judge Minty, the fan-made sequel to last year’s Dredd relaunch. Despite its poor performance at the box office, the remake of the comic book classic garnered some positive reviews and attracted a fan following.

dredd_10And this sequel is already on its way, following the trail blazed by the first. Based on the minor character from the 2000AD comic series, this fan film tells the story of an aging Judge forced to face his own weakness. After being injured on the job, he is forced to take the long walk into the Cursed Earth and finish his days as all Judges do, bringing law to the land of the lawless.

Though it is only 27 minutes short, the makers managed to pack a hell of a lot of action into that space of time. And for a fan film, the production values are quite high. Granted, it doesn’t quite capture the same dirty, gritty feel that the first did so successfully. But then again, we’re talking about a fan-made film. You gotta take what you can get!

And clearly, the people at 2000AD think it’s great because they signed off on it. And the makers are even planning some screenings at a few fan cons. Sure, we may not be able to look forward to an official sequel, but this sure as hell beats having to watch the Sylvester Stallone adaptation! Enjoy…


Source: Blastr.com

 

 

 

 

Dredd 2012

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Hey all! My apologies for my absence of late, but life has been very busy on the teaching front. Cold season always brings big stretches of busy work, and I’ve been on call steadily for the past three weeks. Luckily, I find myself with a day or two to catch up on other things, and so I decided I’d get back on this horse and start things off right.

Today, I’d like to share a review of a movie I recently enjoyed, the summer remake known as Dredd. Based on the graphic novel Judge Dredd, this movie was an attempt by writer John Wagner and director Pete Travis to reboot the franchise after the semi-disastrous 1995 adaptation that starred Sylvester Stallone.

Though the film failed to recoup its production budget at the box office, which was expected, it was reviewed much more favorably than the original and earned a small following. What’s more, it is expected the movie will continue to gross now that it is released on DVD and will be available on cable and home movie providers.

Synopsis:
dredd-1920x1080-1024x576The movie opens in the streets of Mega City One, a post-apocalyptic urban environment that stretches from Boston to Washington DC. Dredd’s voice provides voiceover, describing the urban environment in all its bloody, crowded, and dirty glory. We then cut to a scene where Dredd (Karl Urban) is pursuing three criminals that have been spotted by an aerial drone. A tense chase ensues, during which time multiple civilians are killed. After taking out their vehicle and chasing the last man into a Block – one of the cities many massive apartment structures – Dredd concludes that the men were carrying a new drug known as Slo-Mo.

dredd_mamaWe then cut to Peach Trees, another major block, where we meet Ma-Ma (Lena Headey). She is a notorious crime boss that runs Peach Trees and is responsible for the manufacture of Slo-Mo, and who is plotting to expand production and bring it to the rest of the city. We get a glimpse into just how ruthless she is when she dispenses justice against three men who have been dealing in their Block and that she decides to make an example of. This consists of skinning them and then dropping from the top floor to the bottom level, but first giving them a hit of Slo-Mo so it will seem imperceptibly long.

dredd-anderson-2Dredd is then called back to the Grand Hall of Justice to inspect a new recruit named Cassandra Anderson (Olivia Thirlby), who is reportedly a psychic. She and Dredd are dispatched to Peach Trees as part of her final evaluation to investigate the dead bodies. After the paramedic examines them, he explains that they all had Slo-Mo in their system, and gives them a rundown on who Ma-Ma is and how she came to be the master of the Block.

They then proceed to the nearest distribution center on the Block and take it down, securing one of Ma-Ma’s men (Kay) in the process. Anderson probes his mind and deduces he was the one who threw the men over the balcony and they decide to take him in for interrogation. When word reaches Ma-Ma, she has her thugs seize control of building security and lock the entire Block down, which consists of external shields closing in around the structure to resist a nuclear blast. All communications with the outside are cut off, and Ma-Ma announces over the PA system that she wants the Judges killed.

dredd_gunsDredd and Anderson begin fighting their way through several groups of armed residents with Kay in tow. Eventually, Ma-Ma orders her men to bring out their greatest weapon, a bunch of Vulcan cannons, and use them to shoot up an entire level. Dredd and Anderson narrowly survive by breaching the outer wall and calling for help, and Dredd then tosses Caleb, one of Ma-Mas henchmen over the balcony in full view of her. Down below, two Judges show up on the scene, but are unable to get through the Block’s sealed walls, and Ma-Ma’s hacker insists this is all part of a security drill.

Retreating to a school house, Dredd concludes that Ma-Ma is desperate to kill Kay to keep him for revealing her secrets and begins beating him. Anderson intervenes and begins mind probing him instead, learning that Peach Trees is the center for the production and distribution of Slo-Mo. Shortly thereafter, Dredd and Anderson are distracted by some armed teens, which allows Kay to kidnap Anderson and escape using the freight elevator to get to the top levels.

Judge Dredd Still ImageDredd continues to work his way towards the top, prompting Ma-Ma to call in four corrupt Judges. They relieve the men at the front, enter without incident, and agree to take down Dredd for one million credits. Meanwhile, Kay attempts to kill Anderson using her gun, and loses his hand in the process. She escapes and begins working her way down, and becomes a target of the crooked Judges as well. Between the two of them, they manage to take out all four and meet up in the Slo-Mo production lab. Dredd is wounded by Lex, the last of the Judges, but Anderson saves him and the two carry on.

After finding Ma-Ma’s hacker, they manage to obtain the code from him to her private cell. Rather than Judge him, Anderson sees that the man only worked for Ma-Ma out of fear, and that she was the one who took his eyes, forcing him to get bionic enhancements. She lets him go, even though Dredd tells her it could result in an “automatic fail”. She responds by saying she was already taken hostage and her gun was confiscated, which is also grounds for an a fail grade, and they move on.

dredd-lena-headey-ma-maThey finally reach Ma-Ma’s cell and take out the last of her men, though Anderson is also wounded in the process. Ma-Ma then tells Dredd she has the upper levels lined with explosives and the detonator is mounted on her wrist. If her heart stops, the device will go off and everyone in the top 50 floors will die. Dredd shoots her in the stomach and responds by saying the he doubts the device has a range that can reach from the ground floor to the top, and Judges her. Sentencing her to death, he gives her a hit of Slo-Mo and tosses her from the balcony. She falls in slow motion to her death, and the building doesn’t blow up.

Convening with reinforcements and paramedics below, Anderson hands her shield to Dredd and walks away. However, when the Chief Judge comes to him and asks how she did, he replied that she passed. The movie then ends with Dredd providing voice over once again, about how the city is a corrupt mess, and the only thing standing between it and total chaos are the Judges.

Summary:
dredd_mega_city_oneConsistent with what I heard in advance, this movie was actually pretty good. And even though it didn’t do well at the box office, the result of the meme working against it, I can see it developing a cult following and becoming something of a personal classic to many in the coming years. Despite some flaws, such as the excessive gore and some self-indulgent special effects, it had some noticeable signs of quality.

For starters, the look and feel of the Megacity environment was pretty awesome. The gritty, grimy nature comes through immediately, and without any of the overdone campiness of the original movie. Rather than shooting it in a massively constructed environment with flying cars and lavish costumes, the movie is shot in Cape Town and Johannesburg and uses real locations as a backdrop and relies on CGI and models only to supplement the already dense and dirty urban environment.

dredd_atriumAnd of course there was the attention to detail with the centerpiece of the movie, the building known as Peach Trees. As a Mega City Block, this building is essentially an arcology where all the basic needs of the residents are taken care of in-house. This includes schools, medical care, food, entertainment, and all of these were illustrated at one point or another in the film. And you’ll notice that in all cases, their was graffiti on the walls, garbage on the floor, and metal bars on everything, signifying just how dirty and dangerous the environments are.

And I really enjoyed the whole “lock down” procedure, which was more than just a convenient plot tool. In a world where nuclear holocaust has already taken place and every Block acts as a self-sustaining arcology, the concept of shield walls was just plain genius in my mind. Visually it was quite cool, but it also made perfect sense and it beautifully illustrated the shock mentality and survivalist instincts that are so common to this world.

Dredd-1And of course the movie was thematically consistent. On the one hand, you had the nature of the city, which was packed to the brim with 800 million people and with a homicide rate of 1700 people a day. Whereas Dredd is the perfect symbol of social fascism in this context, a man who has little faith in people and absolute veneration of the law, Anderson is the bright-eyed rookie who wants to help people and believes there is good to be found, even in an overcrowded block like Peach Trees.

dredd_peachtreesThese archetypes are offset by characters such as Ma-Ma and Lex, the leader of the crooked Judge. As her back story presents it, Ma-Ma is essentially a sociopathic product of the Mega City environment, a former prostitute who killed her pimp after he cut up her face and who has been on a non-stop mission ever since to bring her own sense of order to the city. Lex, meanwhile, is an embittered veteran who has lost all faith in the system and helping people and is simply looking out for number one.

Through it all, Dredd is softened somewhat by his encounter with the corrupt Judges and Anderson’s gentleness. Naturally, his war of ideology with Ma-Ma ends with him taking her out, but not before a long battle of wills takes place. This is exemplified by the way the two dual for control over the hearts and minds of people in Peach Tree. Whereas Ma-Ma uses their fear to obtain their help in hunting Dredd, Dredd fights back with his unflinching dedication to take her down and anybody who gets in the way. Ultimately, Dredd wins in part because Ma-Ma’s insanity and willingness to kill her own convince people to keep out of the way and let Dredd do his job.

JWhat’s more, the movie was well cast. Karl Urban fits the bill as the surly, sour-faced Judge who never shows his face and is never to be found doing anything other than his job. And Thirlby pulls off the role of the green, untested rookie who comes through in the end quite well. And Lena Headey, whom fans know from 300, the Sarah Conner Chronicles, and (best of all) as Cersei Lannister from a the HBO adaptation of A Game of Thrones, was also very convincing as Ma-Ma.

I was surprised really, seeing as how the previews kind of lent the impression that her role was overdone or just too plain evil. But it is a testament to this woman’s ability to act that she pulls off the psychotic crime boss who knows no mercy. Somehow, between her cut up face, evil eyes and bloody grin, you become convinced she was a victim who turned her abuse into complete madness and shouldn’t be messed with! What’s more, Urban’s usual combination of deadpan frowns and monotone voice worked in his favor, much like how Keannu Reeves same combination of method and monotone allowed him to pull of Neo.

dredd_slomoAnd of course, there were the visual effects. There are those who would say that this movie was just an ultra-violent gorefest with overblown special effects. But to that, I’d say it was a lot more genuine that the original, and much of the gore and violence was appropriate given the setting and tone of the movie. Mega City One is a massively overcrowded, decaying cesspool of humanity, where thousands of murders happen a day and human bodies are recycled for food and goods.

Such a place is neither safe nor sanitary, and violence is a constant, pervasive element. And sure, the concept of Slo-Mo may very well have been an excuse to employ some over the top 3D and slow motion sequences. But after watching the movie, I was forced to admit, it was a pretty damn good one! In the end, you can’t help but feel that these two factors are somewhat excessive but still appropriate.

Naturally, the original movie tried to gloss over this since they wanted to give it as wide an appeal as possible. This failed, as much of the material was just too adult for kids, but the tone and feel of it was too cartoony to be taken seriously. Basically, the movie tried to hedge its bets and ended up flopping for it. But this time around, the directors and producers were going for a cult appeal and stuck to their guns, which I have to respect. By aiming for a smaller range of consumers and a less broad appeal, they were able to keep the movie honest and truer to the source material.

In short, I give it a 7.5/10. And man, I want to see more of Mega City One! That urban landscape had a kick-ass art team putting it together! I’d recommend the movie for that much alone, especially to fans of the Blade Runner, urban noire and post-apocalyptic series’, but the rest of the movie is fun watching too. So get it and contribute to the cult following people. The producers still need to recoup their dough!

2012: the Year of Reboots

If you’ve been paying attention to the trailer circuit lately, you might have noticed some new previews making the rounds. A few weeks ago, it was the trailer for the reboot of Spider-Man, this time with the prefix “The Amazing”. Shortly thereafter, a new trailer came out previewing the relaunch of the 1990 movie Total Recall, this time starring Colin Farrell, Jessica Biel and Kate Beckinsale. And now, there’s a third trailer making the rounds. This last one previews a relaunch of the 1994 Judge Dredd, the one-time Stallone vehicle that will star sci-fi/fantasy veteran Karl Urban and Lena Headey, who’s fame is exploding due to her role as Cersei in Game of Thrones.

What do all these movies have in common? Well, for one, they are relaunches of relatively recent movies. Second, all these movies are scheduled for relaunch in 2012. That means for anyone old enough to have seen the originals, this summer is going to be jammed packed with remakes of movies they’ve already seen… I’m thinking Hollywood needs to just come out and admit that they have no new ideas left!

Now to be fair, some of these movies can get away with being remade. The original Total Recall came out 22 years ago, but for most people in my generation, it was a hit while we were tweens. I can’t imagine many people are going to be seeing it for more than the nostalgic appeal, even if it is packed with headliners. And you can just tell that casting it with Ferrell, Biel and Beckinsale and pitching it as a big FX romp was done to ensure it has a big draw. Still, expect people to comparing it endlessly to the Schwarzenegger original!

Dredd is even more recent, with most fans of the comic being the age of majority when it came out. But a relaunch of this movie seems good given that the last one was such a disappointment. But judging by the trailers, it seems like just another excuse to shoot something in 3D. The storyline also looks pretty contained, focusing on a single mission rather than the larger picture of Mega City One, the Judges and the irony of trusting quasi-fascists to bring order to a chaotic society.

And Spider-Man? Hell, the third movie in that trilogy aired just five years ago! And the original was produced when, in 2002? That’s just a ten year gap between this new one and the first of the originals! Isn’t there a statute of limitations on this kind of thing? Why does this movie even need to be remade, and now of all times? The others featured perfectly good CGI effects and good story lines, and was ably acted by Toby McGuire and Kirsten Dunst. And of course, most people seeing this one already saw all the others.

So really, what possible reason is there for making this version? I have heard some people speculate that it’s because they want to include Spider-Man in the next Avengers movie. So… what happened to Toby McGuire? Is he too old? Was he not returning the studios calls? Did he say there was no POSSIBLE way he’d ever do a Spider-Man movie again? Is that why they’re doing this, so people won’t be surprised when a new guy shows up to play Spidey in Avengers 2? That seems silly!

Oh Hollywood. When did you lose your way? Was it the money, the phoniness, the mountains and mountains of blow? Yeah, I’m betting somewhere between the money and the nose candy, you all just went a little batty and stopped being able to come up with new ideas. So here’s a few ideas. Hire some new people. Pitch to new writers. Try making something though-provoking and avant-garde. Do something other than throw up the same old formulaic crap and rebooting old concepts!

And before you make the excuse that audiences are stupid and won’t buy into something half-way decent and brainy, might I remind that you guys pioneered those low expectations in the first place? Were it not for you constantly trying to appeal to the lowest-common denominator, you wouldn’t be in this creative tailspin. You might say this trend is the end result of underestimating the intelligence of the average person for so very long. Them chickens roosting in your backyard seem to have brought a batch of avian flu with them! In short, Hollywood, back your shit up, get your shit together, and then get your shit off our floor!

Sorry, that got a little rant-y towards the end there. But for me, this is just the straw that broke the camels back. I’d like to see some better movies, and these guys are the one making it hard for independent producers and studios simply because they suck up so much money and produce so much PR. Still, I might see one of these movies. During Prometheus, my wife was more than impressed by the preview for Total Recall, so we’ll see. If I seem stupider once I get back, blame Hollywood!

More Badasses!

Last time, my list was already going kind of long with everyone from Alucard to Private Vasquez. So I thought I might make a second installment and include all the people I couldn’t, and break the mold a little by venturing outside of the world of science fiction. But as usual, the only real criteria is sheer badassness, those people who went above and beyond at kicking ass, keeping their cool and staying alive when all around them was dying or exploding! So here they are, the other badasses who deserve recognition for all their awesomeness!

Bill Kilgore:
“I love the smell of napalm in the morning. You know, one time we had a hill bombed, for twelve hours. When it was all over I walked up. We didn’t find one of ‘em, not one stinkin’ dink body. The smell, you know that gasoline smell, the whole hill. Smelled like … victory.”

These are the words that soldier, surfing enthusiast and notorious badass Lt. Col Bill Kilgore is most remembered for. A seminal character is the 1979 epic war film Apocalypse Now, Kilgore was the commander of the an Air Cavalry brigade that was responsible for getting special agent Capt. Benjamin L. Willard and his PT Boat escort up the Mekong River. This he did by assaulting a company of Viet Cong that was controlling the mouth of the river, flying in low in attack choppers to the tune of “Flight of the Valkyries” by Wagner, blowing the shit out of everything, distributing death cards on the corpses of the enemy, and then ordering his men to surf on the breaking waves!

That’s right, in the midst of enemy fire, he disembarked on the Mekong Delta and told his men that it was either “fight or surf”. When told that this was too risky, Kilgore replied simply that “if I say it’s safe, it’s safe!” He would also remark in the midst of it that “Charlie don’t surf!” Loved by his men and feared by his enemies, Kilgore combined balls, daring, eccentricity and wry humor into one package. As if this wasn’t enough, Kilgore seemed to lament the fact that one day, the war would end. And why not? With no asses to kick and no death to defy, men like him would surely run out of things to do and die from boredom.

And as Willard himself remarked in his journal, Kilgore had a certain aura about him, as if nothing could touch him. Yes, given his indifference to explosions and bullets’ ability to miss him, Kilgore could only strike audiences as crazy, invincible, or some odd combination of both. But given his reputation, I wouldn’t be surprised if Kilgore survived the war and went on kicking ass until the day he died. I’m sure there’s even shrines somewhere along the Mekong river that are dedicated to him!

Bo:
Man, demon hunting has been growing in popularity in recent years! And with more and more heroines taking to the stage, its also been getting a lot sexier! This is especially true of Bo, the an ass-kicking vixen of Lost Girl and a leather-wearing succubus to boot! Much like her male peers, Blade and D, she is a supernatural being with mixed origins who uses her abilities to help those in need. Largely, this consists of hunting other supernatural beings who prey on the innocent and just like to stir shit up. In addition to her leather getup, her weapons of choice appear to be traditional in nature, crossbows and blades rather than guns.

Working with the only real friend she’s known since discovering her true identity, Bo and Kenzi run a sort of Fae/Human detective agency where they investigate paranormal events and learn more about the world she comes from. In the course of learning about her true origins, Bo is brought face to face with the Fae world and its particular struggles. After being told that she must choose between “the light or the dark” of the Fae world, Bo chooses instead to remain neutral and fight for humanity, largely out of loyalty to her friend.

In time, she meets and develops relationships with other beings, like the wolf-shifter Dyson, who holds down a day job as a police detective, and a human doctor named Lauren. These relationships, in addition to the nature of her job, allows Bo to keep one foot in both worlds, which seems to be the natural resolution to her predicament (i.e. having “lost” her humanity years before).

Bryan Mills:
“I don’t know who you are. I don’t know what you want. If you are looking for ransom, I can tell you I don’t have money. But what I do have are a very particular set of skills; skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If you let my daughter go now, that’ll be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you. But if you don’t, I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you.”

Just as Ellen Ripley taught never to come between a mother and her child, Mills taught us never to come between a father and his daughter. Yes, with the release of Taken in 2008, we were all indebted to Liam Neeson for proving that a retired father-figure can still be the biggest badass on the block! Within ninety-six hours of learning that his daughter had been kidnapped, Mills flew to Paris and took down an entire Albanian mob ring and all those involved in their human smuggling. And part of what made it so damn cool was how effortless he made it look!

After spending years honing his skills with the CIA, a job which eventually cost him his job and custody of his daughter, Mills quit his job and moved to LA to be closer to her. However, things went awry when his daughter decided to take a trip to Europe to follow U2 on tour and ended up being kidnapped by a bunch of sex-slave traffickers. Thus the very thing that cost him a life with his daughter would allow him to bring her back home safe and sound! Not only was he able to deduce the identity of her kidnappers from a single phone call, he was also able to determine who amongst the authorities were on the take from them, where the bad guys safe houses were, and who they were doing business with. Not bad for an old man!

But really, the scene that took the cake for me was when he walked right into one of the Albanian mobs hideouts, impersonating a French government agent, and extorted the bad guys for more money!

Awesome, especially when you consider that it was all an act so that he could find out which amongst them was the guy he had a phone conversation with. And once he knew, he says so cooly, “You don’t remember me? We spoke on the phone two days ago. I told you I would find you.” Then proceeds to take them all out with his bare hands and their own guns! Oh, and that torture scene afterwards, where he hooks up Marko to the power grid? It was so good, I feel the need to quote his opening threat in full:

“You know, we used to outsource this kind of thing. But what we found was the countries we outsourced to had unreliable power grids. Very Third World. You’d turn on a switch – power wouldn’t come on, and then tempers would get short. People would resort to pulling fingernails. Acid drips on bare skin. The whole exercise would become counterproductive. But here, the power’s stable. Here, there’s a nice even flow. Here, you can flip a switch and the power stays on all day.”

Bad-Ass! If only Mills and Ripley could get together and make a baby, that kid would be the safest, most badassed kid in the world!

Dirty Harry:
“You’ve got to ask yourself one question: ‘Do I feel lucky?’ Well do ya, punk?” One of the most quoted lines in Hollywood history. You almost forget that the man saying it was threatening to blow the head off some thug with an empty .44 magnum. And this was after he single-handedly foiled a bank robbery. Yes, this scene not only made Clint Eastwood’s career, it also immortalized Inspector Harry Callahan as one of the baddest dudes of all time!

Working for the SFPD, Inspector Callahan became the template for an entire generation of movie cop. Nicknamed “Dirty” because of his reputation for crossing boundaries in order to get the bad guy, Callahan was also a man of deep principles who believed very strongly in what he was doing. Always, his weapon of choice was his trusty .44 magnum service revolver, a gun that is notorious for packing an incredibly punch! Though he might use other weapons in the course of duty, or just his bare hands, the magnum was always the gun he is seen wielding in iconic images.

Often condemned by higher ups and authorities for being a “rogue” or “loose cannon”, he was in fact the kind of guy who only broke the rules – including his own – when it was absolutely necessary. And when it came right down to it, his rough exterior hid a semi-tortured soul that longed for a world in which life was simpler, people were civil, and no one committed grisly crimes. But as long as they still did, he was prepared to whip out his gun and shoot them up!

Sounds like a cliche now doesn’t it? Well, that’s because Eastwood established it as a household theme! Callahan was, for all intents and purposes, the original bad-boy cop, willing to bend, grease and even break the rules in order to take down the criminal psychopaths and avenge the victims of violent crime. But always, he loved what he did, and was a hell of a lot more committed than the pencil-pushing bosses and red-tape bureaucrats who complained about his methods! (Whoa, speaking of cliches!)

John McClain:
The man who put the hard in Die Hard! Unlike most of his peers, Detective John McClain of the NYPD was good at taking down bad guys not because of his big brain or super human fighting skills, but because of his raw, unrelenting determination. Relying on a cop’s instincts, a strong sense of duty and the desire to protect the ones he loved, McClain triumphed over criminals and terrorists through persistence and his refusal to just roll over and die. Basically, he was like an itch they couldn’t scratch, slowly driving them mad until they lost all control and died in a fiery explosion or a spectacular fall.

A veteran cop with the NYPD, McClain established his reputation as a badass by taking down twelve terrorists in LA who decided to celebrate Christmas by seizing control of a multinational corporate building and taking its employees (including his wife) hostage.

This reputation was further cemented when, on the following Christmas, a bunch of paramilitary goons decided to hold an airport hostage so they could fly a Central American war criminal in safely and then ferry him away. His third stint involved stopping a former East German infiltration expert-turned mercenary who also happened to be the brother of Hans Gruber (his first victim) . Last, but not least, he managed to foil a bunch of cyber terrorists who chose July 4th to stage a massive heist involving “fire sale”ing the US economy and all its utilities. Again and again, McClain brought them down by enduring endless beatings, running around, and getting there just in time to screw up some element of their plan.

In this way, McClain did demonstrate a sort of subtle genius by being able to get under the bad guy’s skin. In all cases, the criminals he was dealing with were adept at planning and manipulation, relying on fear, feints and bluffs that would make their opponents play into their hands. Intrinsic to their plans was a sense of control, ensuring that all things went according to schedule so they could get in and get out without being caught. By putting himself at the center of things and constantly gumming up the works, McClain robbed them of this control, thus making them act rashly and stupidly until their plans unraveled. But of course, the bad guys were always on the verge of getting away when McClain finally did them in, ensuring that things stayed suspenseful until the end.

Tragically, his commitment to badassery and being in the wrong place at the wrong time cost him his marriage and pretty much alienated him from his daughter. It also led to a love-hate relationship with the bottle and a 401k that had seen better days. And though it seemed like time had run out on his marriage, John was ultimately able to rebuild things with his daughter, mainly because he saved her life! And, as predicted, she was pretty ballsy and tough herself. Guess the apple really doesn’t fall far from the tree ;)

Rambo:
Much like Dirty Harry, John Rambo is one of those heroes that has been imitated so many times over the years that he’s become somewhat of a cliche. However, if one were to dig deep beneath all the merchandizing, knock-offs, and half-assed imitations, one finds an original creation who was quite the badass indeed. And like most of Stallone’s roles, there was some real substance to this character before a series of sequels buried it under a mountain of cliches and repetitive plotlines.

Born to a Navajo father and Italian/German mother, Rambo enlisted in the army at an early age and was sent to Vietnam where he served two tours: one as a regular solider and another with the Green Berets. After being taken prisoner and tortured, he escaped and deployed one last time. After all that, Rambo returned to the US to find that people had turned against the war and hated him for being a veteran. This led to a severe case of PTSD and some serious trouble with the law.

In the original novel, Rambo was arrested, escaped from jail and became the target of a manhunt. This ended with his death in a secluded wood after he had taken down several officers and National Guardsmen. In the movie however, Rambo doesn’t die but surrenders, speaking of the horrors he’s witnessed and lamenting how he cannot return to a normal, civilian life. He then is taken to jail where he remained until the second movie came out.

In the sequels, Rambo finds a sort of resolution to his conflict by returning to active duty, again and again. Ultimately, it seems that the solution to his inability to reintegrate into a peaceful lifestyle is to embrace a life of violence, but for the sake of helping those in need.

His first redeployment (in First Blood, Part II) is to his old stomping grounds of Vietnam where he is tasked with rescuing POW’s who never made it home. His second is to Afghanistan, where Soviet forces have taken his old friend and mentor Col. Trautman prisoner and he and a bunch of mujaheddin warriors must break into the camp to save him. In the fourth and final installment, Rambo comes out of retirement one last time to help a bunch of missionaries who have been taken hostage by the military Junta in Myanmar/Burma. In every case, Rambo racks up the kills, relying on his trusty bow and arrow, M60, KBAR knife, and any machinegun he can get his hands on to eviscerate, carve, punch holes in or blow the bad guys away!

Yes, as I said, things got pretty cliche with this series, relying on the latest news sensation and the repetitive theme of an old warrior returning to what he knows to make the carnage seem emotionally accessible. But who the hell cared? If there was one thing Rambo was good at, it was kicking some serious ass and it didn’t really matter who’s it was! In the end, they fell by the hundreds, overwhelmed by his mighty arsenal and signature sneer!

Raylan Givens:
What do you get when you cross a cowboy with a Federal Marshall? Why, Raylan Givens, of course! The star of the hit series Justified, Raylan Givens is a no-nonsense, gun-toting, wisecracking lawman who seems to have learned the art of law enforcement from guys like John Wayne and Dirty Harry. Much like his predecessors, he has a penchant for breaking the rules and pissing off his superiors in order to reign in the bad guys. But of course, no one can fire him because he’s just too damn good!

Born to a criminal family in Harlan County, Kentucky, Raylan joined the Marines in order to get away from the drugs, criminals and white supremacists that his hometown was known for. After becoming an expert in small arms and the quick draw, he enlisted with the US Marshalls and became a law man. Known for his accuracy, fast hands, tendency to wind up shooting people and signature cowbow hat, Raylan quickly earned the reputation  of being a “cowbow”, both in terms of appearance and sensibilities. Naturally, he would be the first to say that he tries to resolve things peacefully, but somehow, violence keeps breaking out.

After a “justified shoot” involving an arms dealer whom Raylan told to leave Miami in 24 hours or risk getting shot on sight, Raylan was transferred back to his home state of Kentucky. Here, he found the county of his youth overrun by the Oxycontin trade, prostitution, and violence, often involving people he used to call family and friends. More often than not, Raylan is forced to reign in people who are much like him, people who he could have easily become if he had made slightly different choices (echoes of Garry Cooper there!).

Xena:
Don’t ask me how I managed to forget Xena last time around! This iconic, heroine, warrior-princess, inspirational figure is someone without whom no list of inspirational badasses should even be written! So I amend my previous mistake, and include her here and now. I knew not what I did, please don’t send me hate mail. Moving on…

Xena is without a doubt one of the most popular heroines to come out of popular culture and fantasy/sci-fi in recent decades. Tough, smart, and sassed mouth, she is anything but prim and proper and has been generally known to kick some serious ass and look good while doing it. Whether she’s high-kicking, wielding that Chakram (throwing disc), slashing through bad guys with her sword, or just leering at people with those eyes, Xena is to badass heroines what AC/DC is to classic rock. In short, it’s dam hard to imagine one without the other! Originally appearing in the series Hercules as a villain, Xena went on to become his friend and lover and even earned herself a spin-off which did better and ran longer than its forebear.

Her own back story begins with her as a pirate and criminal, until she met and was double-crossed by a young, ambitious Roman officer named Julius Caesar (played by none other than Karl Urban). After surviving his brutal betrayal, she went to the East and joined some warlords, losing herself in revenge and violence until she tired of it and returned to the west. Here, she continued warring and raiding, until she met a demi-God named Hercules whom she initially tried to kill, but soon joined forces with him in order to defeat a warlord who had taken control of her army.

In time, she and Hercules had a love affair and she decided to change her ways. Nicknamed the “warrior-princess”, she soon teamed up with a young woman named Gabrielle who she taught to fight. Together, the two began roaming the lands of the ancient world, seeking out injustice and fighting for what was right. As she fights the forces of evil, Xena must also fight the forces of her own past, striving to resist the temptation to return to her old ways. Oftentimes, Gabrielle’s friendship and company prove to be the difference between resisting and succumbing.

Sounds cheesy, no? But it’s also pretty effective. In addition to being a hero to women and young girls everywhere, Xena’s relationship with Gabrielle has proven to be an inspiration to the lesbian community who claim that this powerful bond is a prime example of love which transcends gender norms or social mores. So in addition to her trademark war cry, disc-throwing and swashbuckling skills, Xena is a hero for being brave in a way that has nothing to do with ass-kicking or weapons. She is brave just for being true to herself and not giving a damn what anybody else thinks!

Final Thoughts:
Okay, now that I’ve paid homage to all these badass icons, I think I got what I need to draw some tentative conclusions. Basically, it seems to me that all of them share certain characteristics that set them apart and make them so damn unforgettable. So if you want to be badass like them, you better start thinking about adapting some of the following to your repertoire:

  1. Roguish Personality: Whether we are talking about detectives, mercenaries, or freelance hunters, it seems that in order to be badass, you need to be willing to break the rules a little. Things like convention, regulations, and red tape are the kind of things that inspire annoyance, tediousness and the desire for you to do something outlandish and possibly reckless. Screw what other people think, you know what needs to be done and someone’s got to do it! If not you, then who?
  2. Strong Values: But it’s not enough to simply break the rules. There has to be a higher purpose to what you are doing to justify this disregard for procedure and discipline. Basically, you need to have a strong commitment to what is right and know the difference between simply following orders and doing what needs to be done. After all, people following orders led to some of the worst crimes and miscarriages of justice in history! You gotta see the big picture and circumvent those who don’t sometimes, otherwise shit can happen!
  3. Mad Skills: Whether you’re weapon of choice is a gun, a sword, some high-tech device, or just your hands and feet, you need to practice hard and be good at what you do! No hero has ever excelled by being lazy or neglectful of their basic fighting skills. You don’t need to be the best, mind you. Many a time you will confront someone who is more skilled than you are. But in these cases, your wits and your righteousness will overcome. Hell, you may even find yourself being rescued by a sidekick or someone you thought was against you. Heroes are good like that. They have friends and helpers where the bad-guys do not 😉
  4. Troubled Past: Let’s face it, all this ass-kicking and smart-ass talk can’t conceal the fact that you’ve got some demons! Hell, all heroes do. Perhaps you’re struggling with your past, perhaps you’re not 100% okay with where you came from. But whatever the case, you know that ultimate resolution will come only through confrontation. Only by facing those who best embody your fears and demons will you prevail over the darkness you hold inside. But don’t do it too quickly! Chances are, you’ll become boring once you’ve vanquished your enemies and found inner peace!

Well that’s my assessment at least. But of course, if you are a true badass, you aren’t going to follow MY rules are you? Of course not! So take what you will from these “guidelines” and find your own path to badassery. For no matter what people may tell you, badasses are all rugged individuals at heart. If everybody did it, it would cease to be badass wouldn’t it?

(Even) More Plot Holes and Oversights!

Okay, picking up from where we left off! In my last post, I recapped all the holes that I found with Transformers and the Matrix sequels. Here’s some other recent reviews that also had holes in them:

Avatar:
This movie I did not like much, as anyone who read my review of it could tell. However, there were not a lot of holes that I could see. But after giving it a good once over, there were one or two that did stand out for me.

1. Dreamwalker:
The Na’vi made it quite clear that they didn’t trust the character of Jake Sully and his Avatar. In fact, the word they used was “dreamwalker”, implying that they understood exactly what he was (you know, a human-alien hybrid machine thing). So if they knew what he was, an imposter looking to infiltrate them, why the hell did they take him in and teach him everything they could about their culture? Why not say, “We know what you are, dammit! You wanna learn? Put on a gas mask and come out here.” And given the fact that they knew what he was, where he came from and who he was working for, it seemed very odd that they would be surprised when it was revealed that he had an agenda.

2. Ride the Big Bird and all is forgiven:
Another thing that struck me as odd about this movie was how the Na’vi basically forgave Jake Sully and all his lies simply because he showed up riding the big red bird. Granted, it was a pretty kick-ass entrance, and to the Na’vi, the ability to ride this bird of prey is a rare gift. But how does that erase everything he’s done or prove that he’s somehow worthy of their trust? If anything, this just shows more cultural appropriation on his part. He learns their ways, he rides their animals, he feeds what he knows to his corporate masters who are looking to exploit them. I’d have thought they’d want to club him the second he got off that bird!

That’s all I got for that one. Moving on…

I, Robot:
I could only find one plot hole in this one, but it was so big you could drive a truck through it!

“My Logic is Undeniable”:
That’s what VIKI, the central AI that controlled all the robots said after she explained her big, master plan to Will Smith and the others. So according to VIKI, robots were marauding around town, imposing a curfew and refusing to obey people’s orders because she reinterpreted the Three Laws. While they were meant to ensure that robots would protect and serve humanity, VIKI soon realized that the greatest threat to humanity was humanity itself. It was for this SOLE REASON that the robots were able to now break the laws, impose martial law, and kill people – as they tried to do to Smith on several occasions. It’s an explanation, sure, but it doesn’t make sense!

For one, the Three Laws are VERY specific. Rule one is DON’T KILL OR HARM HUMANS. This is the first rule for a reason and all other rules refer back to it, which makes it inviolable! So it wouldn’t matter what kind of revelations VIKI had about humanity or her purpose. Nothing can make Law One breakable because it was specifically designed to be unbreakable! Second, the idea that imposing martial law on humans was a logical way to ensure their safety is actually very illogical. As any AI would surely realize in the course of running scenarios, humanity would surely resent the imposition of martial law and would ultimately revolt. Hence, more violence would be necessary, which would in turn lead to escalation. No logic there, only the obvious: VIKI’s logic is in reality a tired cliche about evil robots, the one where they try to take over the world!

Demolition Man:
A slight improvement on I, Robot, in that I was able to find two plot holes, not one. But these two were really, really big!

1. Everybody’s got guns:
One of the earliest action scenes in this movie takes place in a museum. Why? Because the antagonist is looking for a gun and a museum is the only place in the future where a person can see one. Naturally, the Protagonist goes there, and a big ol’ gunfight ensues. One question: Why are the guns loaded? Forgetting for a second how stupid anyone would have to be to keep tons of loaded firearms in display cases, there’s also the more logical thing to consider. If guns are illegal and unobtainable, then its fair to say they don’t make them anymore. Which would mean that no ammo is being made either. Hence, not only would the gun fight in the museum be impossible, so would all gun fights in this movie!

Yes, even though we’re told early in the movie that the only place a person could even view a gun in San Angeles is behind glass, it seems that people are able to obtain them without much effort. The bad guys do it, the sewer-dwelling dissidents do it, and soon, gun violence is no longer a thing of the past! Oh, and did I mention that the antagonist even manages to find a loaded cannon inside this museum? WHAT KIND OF MUSEUM IS THIS???

2. The Worst Laid Plan:
The movie comes to a climax when Simon Phoenix (played by Wesley Snipes) finally confronts Dr. Cocteau and asks him the basics: aka. “why am I free, programmed to kill Friendly (Denis Leary) and can access anything in the city?” The answer: “so you could kill a political dissident who’s annoying the hell out of me.” THAT’S IT?! You thawed the most dangerous criminal of the 20th century just so he could get rid of a grungy man whose crimes including spraying graffiti and stealing food?! That’s like sending in a Cobra to deal with a mouse!

As if that’s not bad enough, why hadn’t he given any thought to what he was going to do with him once it was all over? He hadn’t even considered how he was going to reward him when he’d done his job. “What do I get?” asked Phoenix. “Well, what do you want?” said Cocteau. Did he assume that thawing the psycho and making it so he couldn’t turn on him would be enough, that everything else would just work itself out?

Also, Cocteau did think to install that little neural block in Phoenix’s head. But what about those criminal friends of his he agreed to thaw? As if agreeing to unleash twelve more psychos wasn’t enough, he didn’t even bother to think of a way to control them! Even if Phoenix couldn’t kill him, what was to prevent the others from shooting him and staging a coup? Which, by the way, is it exactly what they did! What could he have been thinking as he stared down the barrel of that gun? Was it that a little graffiti and petty theft didn’t seem so bad anymore? Or could it have been how stupid he was for ever thinking he could call up a bunch of psychos and expect them to behave themselves?

The Star Wars Prequels:
As always, I saved the worst for last! I’m sure I’m not alone when I say that these movies were quite awful and forever tainted my memory of the originals and the legacy of the franchise. Still, I hope people will indulge me as I list off some of the things that were truly and specifically awful about them. And those things are, of course, the parts of the plot that made absolutely no sense!

1. Qui Gon – Jedi Master, Idiot:
Would anyone be surprised if I were to venture that the stupidest character in the first movie was NOT Jar Jar Binks? Yep! If you think about it, Qui Gon Jinn comes off as the dumbest. Not because he was a clumsy, ignorant, horribly racist caricature, but because the things he does makes no sense. For starters, why would a Jedi Master decide to pick up some gifted boy on a distant planet and not bother with his mother? Why, for that matter, would he agree to host him in some pod racing tournament in order to secure the parts he needs to get off planet (instead of say, going to another vendor or hiring a new ship altogether)?

And why, last of all, would he ask his apprentice to train him as his dying wish when everybody and their brother is saying the boy is dangerous? Does this guy just love doing things the hard way and being reckless? He’s supposed to be a Jedi Master for Chrissakes, the kind of guy who is patient, cunning, willing to let things unfold before making any hasty decisions. True, its the plot that’s the real source of dumb when you get right down to it, but Qui Gon is it’s enabler. He’s the guy doing things that are completely out of character for completely unclear reasons.

2. Premonitions Ignored:
For that matter, why DID the Jedi Council agree to train the boy? They all said he was dangerous, so why would they do it? Second, WHY, if they thought it was dangerous to have Anakin around Palpatine, did they allow him become his go-to guy and spend so much time with him? Third, if they sense the Dark Side around Palpatine, why the hell did they let him run things and accumulate more and more power? It was one thing for the Senate to be too stupid to see what was going on – why did they cheer when he said he was overturning Democracy and creating an Empire? – but aren’t these guys supposed to have premonitions and feelings that make them especially insightful? Even if they had been completely blinded to the Force by Palpatine, simple logic would have sufficed there.

In fact, throughout the entire trilogy there are several instances where the Jedi say that they suspect something’s wrong or that things are going in a bad direction, but then do nothing about it. Each time it’s “we must meditate”, “we must be careful”, “we must think this over”, etc. But seriously, nothing is ever done! Consider the first movie. A whole bunch of shit goes down and it is revealed that a Sith was at the center of it. Rather than investigate to see who he was working for, the Jedi treat it like a big mystery and then forget about it. In movie two, they know that the creation of the clone army is part of a larger conspiracy, but again, they don’t investigate! They just make some more cryptic comments and roll with it. Its only by movie three, when war is upon them, Palpatine is firmly in charge, and the Jedi are dispersed and at their most vulnerable, that they finally choose to act! But by then, wouldn’t you know it, it’s already too late.

All along, one simple question would have led to them to the source of their problems and possibly averted the whole take over: Cui Bono? Who stood to benefit from all this chaos? Any idiot could see it was Palpatine, he was the one person who consistently succeeded as a result of everything that was going on. And if they knew that the Sith were somehow at the center of things AND sensed the dark side of the force around Palpatine… Well, you know the saying: TWO AND TWO EQUALS FOUR!

3. Assassination Plot:
This is something that many amateur critics have pointed out about this movie, so I shan’t go into too much detail. Suffice it to say, its one of the biggest plot holes in the second movie! At the beginning, it’s established that there are people looking to assassinate Padme/Amidala, yes? So what do Anakin and Padme decide to do? They use her as bait while Anakin waits outside her bed chamber. What are they hoping to do, catch the assassin climbing in through her window or sneaking through her door? And we’re to believe this was HER idea? How dumb is she, or they for that matter that they would approve?

But that’s just the tip of the iceberg for this scene. In addition, we learn that the real assassin, Jango Fett, subcontracted with another assassin to do the job. And what does she do? Sends some probe to Padme’s window where it cuts through the glass and then sends in poisonous slugs. That’s right, this probe which could have easily lobbed a grenade in or shot her with a laser instead sends in a bunch of slow-moving poisonous slugs! Then, to top it off, the Jedi chase her across town where finally, Jango shoots her with some kind of dart gun from a safe distance. If he could do that, why not shoot that same thing into Padme’s room? What the hell was the point of all this subcontracting and chasing?

Oh, and its from this dart that Obi-Wan is able to find out where Jango was operating from, because apparently the dart is of a specific design. This leads him to the cloner’s planet, to a confrontation, blah blah blah! Point I’m making here is, if Jango was going to assassinate someone, why would he use a weapon specific to the world he’s been hiding on? Does he not have his own weapons? Common weapons? Untraceable weapons? Weapons that won’t lead a Jedi to his doorstep? Man, that was a stupid scene!

4. Uncompassionate Jedi:
It’s kind of common knowledge that Jedi are supposed to be compassionate. In fact, Anakin even said that compassion was essential to being a Jedi in the second movie, during his whole spiel about love (ick!). So why then are Yoda and the Jedi Council such a bunch of unfeeling jagoffs in this trilogy? When they meet young Anakin and sense his fear of losing his mother, they get all nervous and tell him how that’s the path to evil and he must let her go. What kind of advice is that to give a nine year old? Second, when Anakin comes back to Yoda seeking counsel about his prescient dreasm, the ones where Padme dies, he’s told something very similar. “Rejoice for those around you who transform into the Force. Mourn them do not. Miss them do not. Attachment leads to jealousy. The shadow of greed that is.”

Again, what kind of advice is this? It makes no sense, taking issue with a child who is afraid to lose his mother, or telling a man he should be happy to lose his wife. And yes, this was all done to make Anakin’s fall to the Dark Side seem inevitable, but that’s precisely why it makes no sense. Yoda and all the other Masters believed Anakin was potentially dangerous because of his fear of losing someone he cared about. So why then are they giving him these ultimatums, “it either us or the ones you love”? Can they not see that its precisely them telling him that he has to sever all ties and become an emotionally disconnected that is making him dangerous? Ah, which brings me to my next point…

5. Genocide, No Biggie!:
In movie two, Anakin commits genocide and Padme doesn’t seem to care. Seriously, he confesses it to her and she acts as if he just told her he knocked over a mailbox because he was pissed. That alone was an indication that Lucas was asleep at the wheel when he wrote this movie. But what of the Jedi? Yoda sensed through the Force that something terrible was going down and that Anakin was at the center of it. But, upon his return, the subject never comes up and by movie three, only Palpatine mentions anything about it. Are we to believe that the Jedi Council was so distracted with the war that they just forgot to ask Anakin about this murderous episode of his? Or is it that they just never thought to ask what the hell that mega-dose of negative energy he was putting out happened to be? You can’t say they didn’t know. Yoda felt it man!

And speaking of no one mentioning anything about his little act of genocide, in movie three, Anakin similarly slaughters a whole bunch of Jedi “younglings” (aka. children). When Padme is told of this, she expresses shock and disbelief, saying that he couldn’t have. Uh… why? Does she not recall him doing the EXACT SAME THING a few years before to the Sand People’s children? Correct me if I’m wrong but I believe he said flat out that he murdered the entire village, including the women and the children, and really didn’t seem sorry that he did. So how is she going to say that Anakin is incapable of committing a terrible crime when she knows for a fact that he’s done it before? Do the Jedi and anyone who’s not the bad guy in this movie have incredibly short memories, or do they simply not care about genocide so long as its Sand People who are murdered? I know Lucas likes to play around with racism, but this is going too far!

6. The Prophecy:
This is a minor point, but since it was intrinsic to the plot, its worth mentioning. In the first movie, Qui Gon tells the Jedi Council that he picked up Anakin because he believes him to be the one that was foretold by a prophecy. Mace Windu then cites it, saying that it basically states that there will be “one who will bring balance to the Force”. This prophecy comes up again in movie three, when Yoda says that this prophecy may have been misread or misinterpreted. And Obi-Wan clinches things off near the end of movie three where he whines at Anakin after hewing off three of his limbs, saying how he failed to live up to the prophecy by turning bad.

Okay, so with all this talk about the prophecy, why is it that no one bothered to fully explain what it was about? “One who will bring balance”… yes, I can see how that could be misinterpreted, mainly because there’s so little to go on! That could easily mean he would go on to wipe out every last Jedi and Sith, thus leveling the playing field by making sure there was no one left who could wield it.

Wait, that’s what it actually meant?! I was making a bad joke! Yes, for those who don’t know, Lucas actually explained the whole prophecy thing in these EXACT terms! He said that since Anakin/Vader helped exterminate the Jedi and then went on to kill Palpatine (the Sith Lord), that he effectively brought balance to the Force. Yep, he fulfilled the prophecy by killing everyone on both sides, thus leveling the playing field. Wow… it takes a powerful imagination to turn what one person would consider a joke into a serious attempt at storytelling!

To be fair, I could kind of see how this would work and how misinterpretation and subversion would thus play a part in it. But really, if this prophecy is supposed to be some mysterious trickster-style, monkey’s paw kind of thing where it comes true, but only in the worst or most painfully ironic of ways, shouldn’t we hear more about it first? Some details, some indication of how it could have a double-meaning or easily be a foretelling of doom and not salvation. Because as it stood, that prophecy was paper thin!

Okay, that’s all I got for now. I’m sure I could find more if I tried, but not without exposing the depths of my geekiness and obvious obsession with details even further! And frankly, I have a hard enough time taking myself seriously as it is. Until next time!

Demolition Man

Ah yes, another classic guilty-pleasure movie! At least, that is my enduring opinion of this film. When I first saw it as a surly teenager, I thought it was a good shoot-em-up. As I got older, I recognized the satirical elements in it – or rather, the attempts at them – and concluded that they fell short. Now I know for a fact that there are those who disagree with me on this point. Hell, there are even some who might say that this movie was a smart, satirical take on the PC age or an re-imaging of Brave New World for the early 90’s. I, however, don’t happen to be one of them! While I did get the allusions to BNW, I simply cannot bring myself to see how this film could possibly be compared to the brilliant and seminal work of Aldous Huxley. But as usual, some background info is needed before I get into all that.

(Background—>):
Ultimately, Demolition Man was a story about social engineering and control, but at the same time was marketed as an action movie. Fittingly, Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes were brought in to the play the leads, both of whom were A-list action stars at the time. In the end, this combination of action-satire received mixed reviews, with Gene Siskel gave the movie a thumbs down for its violence and Ebert (as usual) praising it for it’s “satiric angle”. Rotten Tomatoes rates the movie as “fresh” with a 63% approval rating while on Metacritic, the movie scores a meager 34/100. In addition, Hungarian sci-fi writer István Nemere claimed the movie plagiarized the vast majority of his novel Holtak harca (Fight of the Dead), which was published in 1986. Regardless, audiences seemed suitably impressed. The movie did make over 50 million domestic, and 150 million foreign. Unfortunately, the director, Marco Brambilla, has gone on to do very little since. If this was the high-point in his career, all I can say is “tough break, man!”

(Content—>):
The movie opens in 1996, on a Los Angeles that is literally on fire. The opening scene where the Hollywood sign is burning is a pretty good indication that society has gone to hell at this time. It’s possible that it was even meant to call to mind the LA riots of 92. Enter John Spartan (Stallone), aka. “The Demolition Man”. At the movie’s opening, he is on his way to bust a domestic terrorist with the equally ridiculous name of Simon Phoenix (Snipes). The latter has commandeered a building and is holding hostages while his men are in a standoff with police. Meanwhile, Spartan, air cavalry-style, jumps from a helicopter, shoots some guys, and then takes down Phoenix in a hand to hand fight. But of course, the building was wired to blow, and the whole place goes up just as Spartan jumps out with Phoenix over his shoulder. Seems blowing shit up is what he’s famous for, hence the nickname!

Then, after the blow-up, the clean up crews find dozens of bodies – apparently, the remains of the hostages! Spartan claimed they had to be somewhere else since he did a thermal scan on the place and saw only Phoenix’s own men, but dead bodies don’t lie! Alas, he and Phoenix are both sentenced to cryogenic freezing for their crimes, since in this day and age (only three years from when the movie was released!) the penal system is no longer in use. Criminals are put in deep sleep and have their brainwaves altered using synaptic suggestion (kind of a neat idea!). His freezing scene is little more than an excuse for Stallone to show off his ass, but whatever.

Okay, first impressions? Well for starters, nothing about the opening sequence is believable, and the hints its dropping are pretty damn obvious. For one, the images and action call to mind things like Beirut and Baghdad more than downtown LA, the tracer fire alone in the opening shots are clearly meant to make us think of a war zone. And last I checked, police didn’t have access to military helicopters or were cleared for aerial insertions. But this is the future right? Sure, but only three years from when the movie was made! Did they expect society to go to hell in that amount of time? Well, it IS LA… Oh, and another thing about the tracers: with all the flak they were putting up, how is it the one thing they didn’t seem to be firing at was the one helicopter that was flying above them? Ah, who cares?

Fast forward to 2032. San Angeles (Los Angeles and San Diego merged after the Big One), is a peaceful, sterile, happy-faced place where violence is obsolete, swearing is illegal, and everything and anything unhealthy has been outlawed. But we quickly see that there is dissent; underground people’s who spray paint messages of resistance here and there and occasionally conduct raids. Enter Lenina Huxley (Sandra Bullock in her debut action role), a young cop who is curious about the past and longs for some action. Hm, no ironic foreshadowing there! In any case, in what appears to be a mix-up, Phoenix is awakened over at the cryo-facility for a parole hearing. In a scene that definitely tells us something is up, he escapes from his cage, kills the guards, escapes from the facility and begins spreading chaos in his wake. And when the police confront him, Phoenix whoops out some badass martial arts skills and kills a few. The police are frightened, and for good reason!

Naturally, they appeal to the man who runs things in San Angeles, Doctor/Dictator Raymond Cocteau (played by British actor Nigel Hawthorne), who just happens to be the inventor of the cryoprison as well. He says “do what you will”, but its clear he’s got something up his sleeve. The cops got nothing, and its clear they are unequipped to deal with such a violent criminal. But it just so happens that someone on the force is old enough to remember the man who brought Phoenix down the first time… John Spartan! They commence defrosting, and some expository dialogue lets us know some pertinent facts: the merger that created San Angeles, the Big One (which coincidentally claimed Spartan’s wife), and the fact that smoking, alcohol, red meat, contact sports, salt, etc etc are now illegal. A brief encounter between Spartan and a swear monitor also lets him know that swearing results in a fine!

Now this is a part of the movie I actually liked. It’s been established at this point that the new age folk are completely helpless in the face of a violent convict. They fear and revile Phoenix, but they’re impressions of Spartan are not much better. Essentially they think he too is a barbarian, in part because he’s a convict, but mainly because of where and when he comes from. This is a realistic touch and something that’s consistent throughout the movie. However, this is still an action flick and things quickly move to the first post-thaw confrontation between the two titans, and at a museum of all places! Seems Phoenix went there to find a gun, which is the only place one can even see a gun in the future. Spartan shows up, and two begin using the museum guns to shoot at each other. Yes, it seems the guns in this particular museum are kept loaded. Uh… okay! Makes absolutely no sense, but okay…

Phoenix escapes, and runs into Cocteau outside. He tries to shoot him, but cannot and is forced to flee. At this point, we are made aware of the fact that there’s some sort of conspiracy between them. Prior to this, it was obvious that someone has been pulling Phoenix’s strings since he got out of cryogenics. He’s obsessed with the name Edgar Friendly (played by Dennis Leary), another absurdly named character who just happens to be the man running the dissidents. What follows is some filler and background scenes where Spartan is invited by a seemingly grateful Cocteau to dinner (at Taco Bell, the only restaurant to survive the “franchise wars”!) he is subjected to more bigotry from the San Angeles folk, and is in the right place at the right time to stop a band of Friendly’s men from raiding the restaurant for food. Afterward, he and Lenina go back to her place where she asks him to have “sex”, which consists of wearing helmets that simulate sex-related sensations. Seems real sex has been banned due to STD’s! Bummer…

Anyway, irked and unable to adjust to this new form of “sex”, Spartan retires to his flat and begins looking at security footage from the museum. Upon seeing the clip where Phoenix couldn’t shoot Cocteau and the short conversation that ensued, he becomes highly suspicious. He looks up Phoenix’s file and finds that in addition to being thawed “accidentally”, he was programmed for mass destruction. Remember the bit about synaptic suggestion? Well, it seems that while Spartan was encouraged to knit (no joke!), Phoenix was encouraged to kill! At this point in the movie, things begin to revolve around Cocteau as both Spartan and Phoenix take turns confronting him. Spartan does so to get answers, but is told to get lost and that he’s going back into the freezer. Phoenix does so to find out why the hell he was thawed and why he’s been programmed. You see, in addition to being fixated on killing Friendly, he can access any computer in the city and seems to instinctively know his way around. He, in turn, is told everything, as is the audience!

Essentially, Cocteau tells him that he let Phoenix out of cryoprison and programmed to kill, be able to access any computer in the city and find his way around San Angeles with ease so that he would kill Friendly, the only remaining obstacle to him creating a “perfect society”. In exchange for this, Phoenix will get whatever he wants, and he even promises to put Spartan back in the freezer for him as “a guarantee”. Phoenix however, says he will take out Spartan himself, but will need the help of a dozen or so additional convicts from his past to complete these various tasks. For whatever reason, Cocteau consents and gives him his access to his old buds. Cue tense music!

Okay, two things! One, are we really to believe that this Cocteau fellow would thaw the most dangerous criminal of the 20th century just so he could deal with some meager political dissident? Why not hire some mercenaries from out of state, or out of the country? And its not like Friendly is a threat really! All he does is spray paint things and raid Taco Bells! Seriously, in what world is it smart to unleash a psychopath to deal with a simple political protester? That’s like unleashing a poisonous snake to deal with a rodent. Second, did he really believe he could control Phoenix simply by putting some kind synaptic block on him? Sure, Phoenix was unable to kill HIM, but what about everybody else in the city? Moreover, how was he planning on controlling him once he was finished with Spartan and Friendly? Cocteau had obviously given no thought to that since he had nothing in mind to offer him. Last, are we really to believe he would agree to thaw more psychos without bothering to take ANY precautions with them? With Phoenix he at least did something, but with these other guys, he does nothing! How stupid is this guy?

Alright, lets move on! Despite being told he’s going back into the freezer, Spartan is still walking around. He even leads Huxley and her partner Garcia (Benjamin Bratt) on a manhunt for Phoenix, a search which takes them into the sewers. Coincidentally, they run into Simon Friendly’s people, because the sewers are where he and his band of dissidents/thieves/scavengers live. Oh yeah, and they have guns too! They must have raided a museum at some point… Meanwhile, Phoenix is plotting with his psychos (duh!) to take over San Angeles society by killing Raymond and Spartan. After Spartan explains to Friendly what he thinks is going on (i.e. Cocteau wants to kill you and thawed a mass murdered to do so), Phoenix and his gang show up and a gunfight ensues. Spartan and Phoenix fight their way across town with an obligatory car chase, during which time Phoenix tells him that all those hostages Spartan allegedly killed in his capture attempt were already dead; or as he puts it, “Cold as Hagen Daas!” Well, as the Joker said to the Batman, “even to a guy like me, that’s cold!” Okay, nuff cold-related puns! Phoenix escapes again, and has his men kill Cocteau. Wow… didn’t see that one coming!

The police and Friendly’s scavengers then come together, with Spartan asking for their cooperation. They then march on Cocteau’s office where they find him dead and see that Phoenix and what remains of his thugs have taken to the cryogenics facility where they are planning on thawing all the convicts there. A final showdown takes place between Spartan and Phoenix and Spartan manages to (you guessed it!) blow up the place in the process! He escapes in the nick of time as the place is exploding all around him, all the while doing the Stallone signature grunt/yell. The movie ends with the uptight police chief fearing for the future, Friendly suggesting they all get drunk and “paint the town red”, and Spartan suggesting they find a middle path. Then, of course, Spartan kisses Huxley, and they agree to have sex the old fashioned way. Cue theme music by The Police!

(Synopsis—>):
Of the top of my head, I can think of several things that were good about this movie. For one, they actually did bring some satirical elements to the screen. The way the future citizens of San Angeles saw Spartan as a brute, for example. “Cro-Magnon”, “primate”, “caveman”; these are how they describe him, and to his face! And the paradox is quite clear: on the one hand, their values demand that they reject a man like him. On the other, they make them hopelessly dependent on him. Also, the nature of the “utopian” San Angeles society seems like a pretty fitting commentary on the PC age: how taken to its extreme, censorship and repression – even if its well-meaning – will lead to a society of stunted, helpless virgins. Though the entire plot may have been lifted from a Hungarian sci-fi novel, this aspect of the movie was kind of fitting given the year of its release. The early 90’s were kind of the dawn of the PC age, and it only made sense that there would be those who would want to warn people about the potential for danger before it had a chance to get in full swing!

There were also several funny moments I feel the need to acknowledge. Snipes manages to pull off the psycho quite well and has some downright funny lines. “Cold as Hagen Daas” was one, as was his Scarface imitation. Also, the joke about President Schwarzenegger wasn’t bad. One might get the impression that he and Stallone have some kind of agreement where they’re required to give a shout out to each other every few years. And how about the running joke about “the three seashells”? And the swear detectors were not just satirically apt, they were a pretty good comedic tool.

And now for the bad stuff… First off, the totally contrived, unthought-out nature of the plot! Again, are we really to believe some conniving future dictator would unleash a mass murderer to kill ONE MAN and expected he could control him? Wasn’t this guy supposed to be the leader of San Angeles and the creator of their entire way of life? Did he get to where he was by NOT planning ahead like this, or is he just this stupid? Also, the fact that people are able to get both guns and ammo in a future where there are supposed to be none made no sense either. I know, if you remove these elements, there’s no movie. But a few lines of dialogue would have patched this movie’s biggest holes, but no explanations were ever given! Hell, they could have even done a thing where Spartan and Phoenix were forced to improvise their weapons, showing how they had to resort to classic ingenuity in an age where mass-produced firearms were no longer available. I’m just saying…

There was also the small plot thread about John’s daughter that went nowhere in the movie. We learn that he had a wife and child before he went into cryosleep, and that his wife died in the Big One. But his daughter apparently survived and despite missing her, he doesn’t even bother to look her up. They do make a point of having Spartan say that he’s not sure if he wants to see her since she grew up in this new society and he fears she won’t be able to relate to him. But when Huxley offers to look her up, he says no and then the whole thing is just dropped! Seriously, if he had a daughter, I would think he’d want to reunite with her, and that this reunion would be intrinsic to the plot in some way. Say, for example, that after he’s finished killing Phoenix he decides to look her up and that’s how the movie ends; you know, as opposed to him and Huxley having sex and him learning how to work the damn three seashells! Or, she could even be central to the plot by having Phoenix abduct her in Act III in order to lure Spartan into a trap? Hell, either of these ideas would have been better than bringing the daughter up and then just writing her off like that. Why bring her up if she’s going to serve no purpose whatsoever?

Also, there’s the idea that this movie managed to adapt elements of Brave New World to the big screen. Sure, that was the aim, and the references were certainly clear enough. But that was the problem, in my opinion, and the reason for its failure. For one, the name of Sandra Bullock’s character is an obvious allusion to BNW. Her last name is Huxley (aka. Aldous), and Lenina is the name of BNW’s main female character (Lenina Crowe). And at one point, Phoenix even yells out, “Its a Brave New World” before firing off his weapon. Now that was just plain unnecessary! I mean, if you’re going for literary allusions, try some subtlety! Don’t just announce what you’re trying to emulate! It comes off as obvious, and its not like people aren’t going to make the connection anyway. In any tale of social engineering where freedom is being killed by soft measures, the inevitable connection is to Brave New World!

But then again, this was in keeping with what brought this movie down for me, which was its watered down character. Putting aside the fact that this movie was possibly a total rip-off, there were still the basic outlines of a decent plot before Brambilla and whoever else decided to turn it into an action movie got their hands on it. Once that was done, the potential for real satire and social commentary was pretty much lost. In the end, all that stuff just seemed like it was thrown in to give a feeling of depth to an otherwise cheesy action flick, which really wasn’t the case. The movie started out as a tale about a dystopian future borne out of the violence and chaos of the present, but was dumbed down in order to make it accessible to Hollywood audiences. And that’s a shame man! Consider how many otherwise decent movies or original novels have been ruined simply because of the director’s, producers and industry’s lack of respect for their audiences.

But that’s something for another time and I’m starting to get that preachy feeling again. And like I said, this really isn’t a bad movie, just one that requires a little brain-checking if you don’t want to come away disappointed. Overall, I’d say it belongs in the fun but kinda stupid bin, next to the other guilty pleasures that DON’T make you think!

Demolition Man
Entertainment Value: 7.5/10
Plot: 4/10
Direction: 7/10
Total: 6.5/10