"Accomplishments"
In theaters: Though it naturally owes a debt to the 1954 original, it's with confidence that I declare Godzilla Minus One the best Godzilla movie ever made. It's certainly the most emotional, and in a franchise where the human story is often lacking, that's where Minus One shines. This Godzilla, appearing a few years before the original attack, represents the post-war guilt and shame of an entire nation (note how civilians have to stage a kind of Dunkirk as they are abandoned by their own government and the U.S.), but it's also personal to our lead Koichi for whom the big G is his own PTSD. Minus One is crafted like a straight war drama. It just happens to have a giant monster in it, and I've got to say, I don't think I've ever seen this good an effects picture coming out of Asia. It is absolutely gorgeous and more photo-real than the Monarchverse efforts despite their surely having more money to work with. That's because the monster action is doled out in the right proportion, and doesn't mind casting the light of day on the beast. As a 70th Anniversary project is also knows to use the original Godzilla's two themes (which I always miss when absent), recreates the train scene (except this time we're inside it!), and even pays homage to the now-silly oxygen destroyer, but with a plan that feels entirely novel and believable. But again, no matter how well the kaiju stuff works, it's our caring for the cast that makes this work as well as it does, and that's something few if any Godzilla movies have EVER done.
At home: In Bottoms, Emma Seligman creates a poisonous parody of teen movies in which co-writer Rachel Sennott and best friend Ayo Edebiri are gay girls willing to be "superbad" their senior year so they can bed the hot cheerleaders they've been lusting after all through high school. The scheme involves starting a "fight club" where they might learn to defend themselves in the preposterously violent rivalry between their school and another, which is all going to come to a head at a potentially lethal football game. Edebiri is thankfully sympathetic, since Sennott gives herself the a-hole role, but then this is a world where popularity reigns supreme, teachers are universally terrible (Marshawn Lynch hilariously so), and no one really cares that all these girls are walking around with broken noses and black eyes - well, except the jocks who don't like feminism upsetting their world order. You'll recognize the basic tropes, but they're refreshed by Seligman's gleeful contempt for them, the cutthroat satire, and the prevalent queerness. Off-putting at first, once you're into it, Bottoms is very funny.
Theater Camp is an amusing mockumentary about, well, a theater camp that faces being shuttered when its founder falls into a coma and her dumb son runs its already precarious finances into the ground. That's just the ground level premise, because the film features a bunch of side-stories, like the original show based on the founder's life (so musical fans will get their due), the two teachers connected at the hip wanting different things, the new teacher (Ayo Edebiri having an incredible year, release-wise) who doesn't know what she's doing, and even some key moments for the kids of various ages who attend the camp. All laced with a fun mocking tone that takes digs at "theater types" that, if you've ever been around amateur and professional theater people at all, are rather fair even within the comedy. It's what I call the Myth of the Artist - some people in the arts aren't so much artists as people who tap into the Bohemian ideal and see it as a lifestyle/attitude, but produce nothing. And they definitely deserve to be sent up. Theater Camp is funny, but it also has heart, so it's not a complete tear down either.
Despite having grown up on Choose Your Own Adventure books, interactive movies aren't for me. I always feel like I missed some parts. Yes, you can "play again", but in the case of We Lost Our Human, I don't think the gags were good enough to make me want to. This branching animated feature stars a cat (Ben Schwartz) and a dog (Ayo Edebiri) who don't get along who lose their Human in the Glitch, a cosmic event that erases humanity from the universe and sends them on an adventure across space, time and gonzo dimensions. The Quiet Earth meets Bill & Ted, this loud and hyperactive cartoon has a lot of insane ideas, but they're playing to a younger audience. Kids will like it more than I did, for sure. For me, the jokes were underwritten and the characters rather obnoxious. It KNOWS it's branching off into different directions and makes it part of the plot, but that means it doubles back on itself, seems to undo the lessons the characters have learned, and repeats the same information a lot. Within the play time, it makes you replay the adventure three times, and that's less than half the content. But the jokes are crisp enough for me to want that second go-round.
Britain's first talkie, Blackmail has Hitchcock start production as if it were a silent film, then makes an about-face that you can sort of spot, and its silent film heritage is where its weaknesses lie. Anny Ondra, as a woman weighed down by guilt after she kills a man, is definitely acting in that mold, which is to say over-emoting. And the dialog can be, overall, a little slow, in order to match lips to looped sound (and by looped, I mean on-set simul-recording). That said, it's hard to imagine parts of this film as silent, hinging as it does on key conversations, like the blackmail negotiation. (Not to say most of it is quite visual, of course, but even the visual fixation on the knife is supported by sound here.) But even at this early juncture, Hitchcock is still creating potent tension builders, most cleverly in just WHO will be blackmailed and WHY - the answer keeps changing. Hitch also gives us an early chase through a landmark to a vertiginous spot, which would not only become one of his personal tropes, but eventually become a cliched element in 75% of action movies.
What if Henry Fonda was bullied to come up with the same verdict as everyone else in 12 Angry Men? And then felt so guilty about it that he spent the next few days trying to solve the theater-related crime before an innocent woman goes to the gallows? That's essentially the premise of Murder!, a very early Hitchcock talkie that has its charms - the jury deliberations, the gallows humor, seeing the play from backstage, the tense audition scene - but generally jumps around too much for it to work as an effective whodunit. Herbert Marshall makes a good effete detective - an actor himself so he can read people - and there's value in showing how the police in this case were lazy in their pursuit of the evidence. I don't know why Norah Baring (as the accused Diana... ALSO Baring? That's so weird!) is so ethereal. I suppose this is from the book being adapted that she doesn't really defend herself, but you never really connect with the character and therefore neither care nor believe people are so taken with her. What tricks Hitchcock 'ports over from silent film-making are interesting, but this is one of his lower-tier efforts.
I know Rebecca is highly regarded, but to me, it's strident melodrama, as per the Du Maurier novel. Hitchcock nevertheless brings a certain Gothic flavor to it that reminds one of Jane Eyre, albeit with the mad woman in the attic a "ghost" that psychologically haunts the various characters. When events finally take a thrillery route, the master of suspense creates some tense moments, but they're largely smothered by exposition. Joan Fontaine plays a young, guileless woman who falls for a rich aristocrat ( Laurence Olivier) whose wife, Rebecca, is dead. But a whirlwind romance on vacation isn't the same as being married to the melancholy, mercurial man, nor living in his household filled with servants who have their own agendas. Fontaine has to navigate all sorts of social dangers while competing with the dead woman, the nature of which isn't exactly what we thought. But by the time the twists and turns arrive, it's a bit late for me. I respect the craft, but the source material just isn't my cup of tea.
There's no question that what Suzuki means with the title Everything Goes Wrong is that the trouble started with World War II. War footage is in the opening credits and then we jump to 1960, the Japan of baseball, apple pie, and jazz bars. It's also the Japan of street gang and disaffected youth, a Japan where American culture rules and morality has deteriorated. On a more personal level, Jiro is a young man angry that his father died in the war and his mother's lover works for the war machine. His anger will take him far, or rather, low. He's a James Dean type whose rebellion might as well take him to criminal places. The other focus of the film is Etsuko, a young woman who has become pregnant and is desperate for an abortion, if she can only raise the funds for one. Though the two hang with the same crowd, they're not directly related, but her need will act as a catalyst for Jiro's wildest days. Suzuki cleverly ties them together in their desperation and rudderless existence. A bit bleak, but a potent manifesto about post-war Japan.
RPGs: COVID struck two of our number last month, which means we missed a session and had some catching up to do in our Torg Eternity game. Ran it a bit fast and long, and tired players were less pone to get into long conversations like they usually do, which may have felt like this bit of When Cosms Collide was on rails a little. At this point, the players encounter "reality weavers" from an unknown cosm that use people's collective unconscious to create reality, no stelae required. From 1001 Nights to Perrault and the Grimm Bros., they have all sorts of wonky encounters as a result, and one of them even ends up with his own fairy godmother who's so proud, and made him a suit for the upcoming ball, and oh won't he look sharp in his new suit of clothes partially made from... creatures made of lightning?! It does fit his theme. He's a regular Thor, this one. Some light fighting, some chuckles at trying to use fairy tale logic against the scenario, but also some desperate moments where it was time to just run away. This was a night of very low rolls (for the players, at least) and they consequently used up their Possibilities very early in the Act. By the end, they couldn't do the cool stuff, and taking Wounds with no hope of Soaking them. They'll be heading into the climax pretty beat up, at this rate.
Best bits: First, some of the best bits that didn't happen. The Realm Runner had some great ideas that just didn't pan out, and I want to give them their due. Like sticking a homing device on the alien probe by way of his mobile phone and a Reality roll to keep it from going inert. Failed the skill roll. To get up to the to of the rainbow, he floated the idea that magic beans might create a handy beanstalk, but the idea was predicated on a market that didn't exist based on a prior description. Had he insisted, I would have allowed an Alteration roll on any old beans, but he didn't. The Paladin once again tried to romance someone - the Nile Empire field leader - but without a Romance card in his arsenal, and a failed Persuasion roll, she seemed more interested in SCIENCE! than love. The Wrestler jumping into the NE halftrack and knocking the Tharkold mercs off of it with a wheel spin was pretty cool. The Monster Hunter complaining that he was hungry after "woven" kebabs disappeared from reality, and thus his stomach was funny. Also overheard: "How did our team member die? Well, you see, one of our guys had this fairy godmother, see? And she made him a suit, but needed us to walk on clouds to get the final touches, and well..."
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