This Week in Geek (20-26/03/22)

"Accomplishments"

In theaters: Quite frankly, though there’s a pervasive sense of foreboding in X, I would have been quite content for it to remain a dramatic comedy about making an arty dirty movie in 1979. The director’s perhaps foolish ambitions are mirrored in X itself, which has artful editing, lighting and points of view. Across the way from that sensuality is an old couple who, despite the wizened old lady’s appetites, isn’t getting any for health reasons. Having this be a dual role for Mia Goth doesn’t really pay off - it’s too prosthetic - but a case could be made for them being the same person essentially, one longing for the past, the other refusing the future. The middle of the film makes you wonder who in this ensemble cast will be the “slasher”, but though there’s a clever play on Psycho to initiate events, I was much less interested in the gory third act. Perhaps the monster is too sympathetic, perhaps the film jettisons too much of what made it interesting in favor of well-worn slasher mechanics. Whatever the case may be, it was just better when it was Boogie Nights or Zack and Miri Make a Porno. Be sure to make X-Men jokes when talking about this movie because A24 is also coming out with a movie called Men. I kid you not. Have we run out of movie titles yet?

At home: A recent Disney+ addition, Parallèles (or Parallels if you prefer - it's a French show, better watched with subtitles and not the irritating dub) has an Amblin Entertainment feel with its engaging cast of 13-14-year-olds, but it's not quite what I thought it would be, i.e. Amblin Sliders. After a weird blip of physics, the world diverges and various kids in the group appear to vanish. We follow each of the timelines and the kids, their parents and community dealing with that loss, and of course the quest to set things right. I like the kids so much, it's a shame that time flies for several of them so they have to be replaced by older actors... but I like those too! There's the matter of a couple of them somehow getting quantum powers out of the deal, which is used to create perhaps needless complications, but overall, I quite enjoyed this little 6-parter. It plays its ending like the show will return, but it's not really a cliffhanger (nor do I know what's left to be told), so sit back, relax, you're getting a neat little done in one.

50 Years of Fantasy/1993: Hocus Pocus is a fun Halloween movie in which some kids accidentally release a trio of witches from the ether so they can be free to suck the life force of children. Generic teen Omri Katz, Hilary Swank lookalike Vinessa Shaw, a tiny Thora Birch, and a talking cat must stop them before sunrise. Also watch for Doug Jones as a zombie. Played for laughs, my one wish is that they'd actually made it into a musical. Aside from spell-casting rhymes, there are two bonafide musical numbers rather late in the film, one by Bette Midler, the other by Sarah Jessica Parker, and leaning more into that (as it often seems to want to) would have made the whole thing more of a lark. As is, the witches are sometimes completely out of their depth in the 20th Century, while other times able to make jokes like they know the 90s well. Approaching pantomime, the comedy is fairly broad, but also ghoulish. There's no gore per se, but gruesome deaths do occur, and there's a lot of dialog referring TO gore, so  this is definitely one to enjoy with kids who like to be a little scared and are fascinated by the gross and creepy stuff. And at its heart, though there's young love blossoming between Max and Allison, the real love stories are between big brothers and their little sisters - that's who Max has those story beats with - which is a nice family film take on the old cliché.
Also from that year: Groundhog Day, The Nightmare Before Christmas, The Bride with White Hair

1994: There's a timeless quality to The Secret of Roan Inish, in that it's the kind of family film they used to make in the 60s and 70s. Based on the folk tales of various Irish islands, a young girl moves in with her grandparents just after World War II, in a small fishing community where every NPC has a piece of the legend to tell. And in those legends of fairy seals (good animal actors!), she sees the possibility of her baby brother, once lost at sea, being still alive. It's a charming tale filled with sympathetic characters, beautifully shot and scored. There's a glow coming from the screen that puts you in mind of foggy shores and something magical just out of reach. By largely keeping the camera at the girl's level, we're brought into her world where much is possible that, to adults of the post-war era, would be too difficult to believe.
Also from that year: Pompoko, The Mask

1995: August in the Water is an atmospheric fantasy with science-fiction overtones, in which astrology is real and portentous of strange events, including a drought, people falling prey to a "stone disease", and a teenage diving start meeting with an accident, her fate redefined as a result. A striking ambient score and an indie vibe to the cinematography create a lot of interest, though the ending might be a little too esoteric for me. There's an awful lot of diving in the first half for the slim relationship it has to the climax - I don't think we needed so much of it to sell the metaphor or leitmotif either. That said, I'd rather watch a movie like, with an unfathomable plot, than one where you can see every beat coming like clockwork. August in the Water intrigues to the end, but does it yield the answers you crave? You'll have to decide that for yourself.
Also from that year: Jumanji

Books: I’ve not read a lot of Heinlein and mostly know him by reputation - his early work is foundational to science fiction, then in the 60s, it becomes Libertarian and polemical - but what about a latter-day cosmic satire like Job: A Comedy of Justice (1984)? It concerns Alex, a character who is tested by reality shifting around him and his lady love, a sure sign of a coming Apocalypse, and a Biblical one too, despite the quantum machinations of Who or Whatever. I’m rather glad I cast Alex sympathetically, because as it turns out, he’s a holier-than-thou hypocrite, his initial world quite Puritanical. Heinlein’s aforementioned reputation haunts the book, and it would take its conclusion to know exactly what was irony and what was sincere - beyond the Born Again world view of the protagonist, there’s the casual remarks about wife-beating and - on the other end of the quantum spectrum - worlds where sex with under-age kids and incest is not just allowed, but prescribed(???). The female characters are all either well-educated sex objects or dumb shrews. Heinlein refuses to use contractions so the dialog is wooden. I hear there are references to past books, and I think I’ve clued into some of them, but can’t be sure. That’s a lot of hurdles for the modern reader - modern, even in 1984 - to clear, but the prose is clear and the mystery intriguing enough to make this science-fantasy retelling of the story of Job a page-turner. I mostly wish it had gotten to the point faster.

Role-playing: Our Shiftworld campaign now using GURPS Swashbucklers (and specifically, the Pirates chapter) meant a couple things. Mechanically, it was a change to use the fencing rules, trying various maneuvers against stock pirates (a more able swordsman might come to bother them in the future, who knows). Tonally, I was aiming well under Pirates of the Caribbean's fantasy, but still allowed for the kind of supernatural elements pirate tales are full of. Curses, black spots, voodoo, etc. Things were desperate for our characters, having just lost their ship and being stranded with frienemy Lupita on a desert island. Well, a desert island with a cave system underneath that leads to a cursed ship that makes them its crew. Now, they can never return home, not until the curse is lifted. And home is where main villain Jeremiah Dark is building his reality-distorting machine! A bit of action in Tortuga, the return of a foil from the space days, and a price to be paid to get an elder's help gives them their next task. It's a pretty fun setting, with one player having "prepared" by playing the Sea of Thieves MMO, and going back to that game for more after we had to tap out.