#96 on 2007 AFI 100 Greatest Movies of All Time
This movie came out when I was 11 and Mike was 9. Therefore, we had each seen various portions of the movie, but couldn't actually remember the whole thing. I wasn't particularly looking forward to it, because I often find Spike Lee movies boring (except Inside Man, which was awesome). Mike was looking forward to it, because he likes Spike Lee more than I do. We were both pleasantly surprised. This was a great movie. I'm sure that is why it is on the list, but it was really a lot better than I thought it was.
If you don't know, Do The Right Thing is about a really hot day in Bed-Stuy, focusing on racial tensions. What did I love about it? Mostly that it wasn't trying to talk about a solution or about how things should be, but instead was just showing things as they are (or at least how they were in 1989). What makes this movie great is that it throws it in your face. Here's some racism. It's ugly and uncomfortable racism. The movie doesn't try to tell us that it's wrong, it relies on our ability to understand that calling people these words and acting this way is wrong. It doesn't tell us what we should do, it relies on us to know what we should do. I guess I just like that it isn't trying to preach, it's trying to illuminate. That's what makes it successful. Are things better today? I have no idea. I'm sure that there are plenty of people that would say they are not, and they may not be. We certainly still have racism in the U.S., and with all the mass shootings lately, we have plenty of violence to go with it. Which means that this movie is still very relevant, even though it's over 20 years old.
I would also like to point out that when we saw "a Spike Lee joint" come up on the screen, we both went "wow, this was before people knew who Spike Lee was." Which is an interesting conversation on its own, and thinking about the 80s and what we didn't know then is always fun. I will also say that there is a conversation in the film about whether Dwight Gooden or Roger Clemens is better, which I found enjoyable, considering we have the benefit of knowing what happened for each ballplayer since the movie was released. Also, there is a lot of Public Enemy going on here. When is the last time you heard Public Enemy?
And speaking of it being over 20 years old and things that have changed, this movie had some young actors, before their careers took off. It has Samuel L. Jackson (as Sam Jackson), it was Martin Lawrence's first movie, it introduced Rosie Perez. There's John Savage (who I love), Danny Aeillo, and Giancarlo Esposito. Our favorite performance was certainly John Turturro. I think we can all agree that he's one of the top 5 character actors out there, and his performance in this movie is brilliant, especially when you look at which scenes were improvised. Now we need to watch some more movies with John Turturro. This movie is a great example of why we are watching the movies on this list. Because this is not something we would have chosen on our own, but we enjoyed it immensely and it was definitely worth seeing. For now, it will be taking over the top spot on our list.
Sunday, August 26, 2012
Sunday, August 12, 2012
AFI #97: Blade Runner (1982)
#97 on 2007 AFI 100 Greatest Movies of All Time
#6 on AFI's Top 10 Science Fiction Films
Can you believe that neither of us had ever seen this movie? I know that we seem like we've seen a lot of cult scifi movies from the 80s, and we have, but for whatever reason, this is not one of them. And now, having seen it, I can't say that's such a bad thing. Now, don't get me wrong, I didn't dislike the movie. But I also didn't love it enough to want to watch it over and over again the way I would with, say, Highlander. So, let's talk about watching the movie (and a good example of why we like watching movies together, but why a lot of you who don't like people talking would hate watching a movie with us).
[Opening credits roll. Stage is set in Los Angeles, 2019.]
Me: Wow, that is only seven years from now. So, we should have already created replicants by now... I guess, it's not going to happen then.
Mike: I bet Apple creates the cybernetic organisms that kill us all. Apple is Skynet.
Me: So true.
[Conversation ensues about how awesome Terminator 3 was for finally just letting judgment day happen instead of pushing it back again. Harrison Ford's voiceover starts, distracting us from our unrelated conversation.]
Me: Is one of the complaints about this movie about that voiceover? It's terrible.
Mike: [looks at IMDB on his phone] Dustin Hoffman was originally supposed to play Deckard.
Me: Really? Weird.
Mike: Apparently he didn't get the macho character.
Me: I am enjoying this vision of the future where the Japanese have taken over.
Mike: Yeah, we did used to think that.
Me: But it didn't actually happen. I was reading an article the other day about a Japanese company asking its employees to work in English so that they could compete in a global marketplace and how many Japanese people think that English is too hard. It's interesting that they think our language is hard and we think theirs is hard. They're just really different. Oh, weird. [attention goes back to the movie where we see the creepy owls for the first time]
[Continues for next two hours]
So, now that we have enjoyed our little taste of movie watching in our house, let's just say that we enjoyed Blade Runner, but mostly we enjoyed talking about science in fiction in general while watching Blade Runner. We liked the film noir aspects of the movie and Rutger Hauer was pretty awesome. Especially at the end when he was running around in his underwear making strange noises. The voiceover was pretty bad, but it made it more noir. Harrison Ford seemed really stiff to me, but I can see it if we are supposed to wonder whether he is a replicant. I didn't care for the ending, but I will add, because Mike was so proud of this, that he totally recognized the shots at the end as being the same as the Shining. As soon as he said it, he went to IMDB, and sure enough, the ending title sequence had unused shots from the Shining.
Would I watch Blade Runner again? Sure. If it were on Saturday afternoon TV, I would certainly leave it on. Would I rent it again? Probably not. Here's the thing... we didn't see this movie in the 80s, so we don't have any nostalgia related to it. And it's vision of the future was interesting, but obviously not correct, and it is so close, that it just really seems very make believe. This is why Star Trek is so far in the future. And why Star Wars is in the past. So that people can't say, wait, that should have happened by now. I think the only reason Terminator was successful with their dates being closer is that they kept pushing Judgment Day back and didn't have it actually happen until the third movie, when we were all comfortable with the world in the movies. They also didn't have everyone speaking some weird mix of English/Japanese/Spanish in a wasteland Los Angeles later this decade. Of course, it was 35-40 years in the future when they were making it, but that's why some SciFi movies just don't stand the test of time. I would posit that this movie does not stand the test of time. But it was fun, I can see why people like it so much, I'm sure that I would have if I had seen it in the 80s. We have put it into the #2 spot for now, just below Guess Who's Coming to Dinner.
#6 on AFI's Top 10 Science Fiction Films
Can you believe that neither of us had ever seen this movie? I know that we seem like we've seen a lot of cult scifi movies from the 80s, and we have, but for whatever reason, this is not one of them. And now, having seen it, I can't say that's such a bad thing. Now, don't get me wrong, I didn't dislike the movie. But I also didn't love it enough to want to watch it over and over again the way I would with, say, Highlander. So, let's talk about watching the movie (and a good example of why we like watching movies together, but why a lot of you who don't like people talking would hate watching a movie with us).
[Opening credits roll. Stage is set in Los Angeles, 2019.]
Me: Wow, that is only seven years from now. So, we should have already created replicants by now... I guess, it's not going to happen then.
Mike: I bet Apple creates the cybernetic organisms that kill us all. Apple is Skynet.
Me: So true.
[Conversation ensues about how awesome Terminator 3 was for finally just letting judgment day happen instead of pushing it back again. Harrison Ford's voiceover starts, distracting us from our unrelated conversation.]
Me: Is one of the complaints about this movie about that voiceover? It's terrible.
Mike: [looks at IMDB on his phone] Dustin Hoffman was originally supposed to play Deckard.
Me: Really? Weird.
Mike: Apparently he didn't get the macho character.
Me: I am enjoying this vision of the future where the Japanese have taken over.
Mike: Yeah, we did used to think that.
Me: But it didn't actually happen. I was reading an article the other day about a Japanese company asking its employees to work in English so that they could compete in a global marketplace and how many Japanese people think that English is too hard. It's interesting that they think our language is hard and we think theirs is hard. They're just really different. Oh, weird. [attention goes back to the movie where we see the creepy owls for the first time]
[Continues for next two hours]
So, now that we have enjoyed our little taste of movie watching in our house, let's just say that we enjoyed Blade Runner, but mostly we enjoyed talking about science in fiction in general while watching Blade Runner. We liked the film noir aspects of the movie and Rutger Hauer was pretty awesome. Especially at the end when he was running around in his underwear making strange noises. The voiceover was pretty bad, but it made it more noir. Harrison Ford seemed really stiff to me, but I can see it if we are supposed to wonder whether he is a replicant. I didn't care for the ending, but I will add, because Mike was so proud of this, that he totally recognized the shots at the end as being the same as the Shining. As soon as he said it, he went to IMDB, and sure enough, the ending title sequence had unused shots from the Shining.
Would I watch Blade Runner again? Sure. If it were on Saturday afternoon TV, I would certainly leave it on. Would I rent it again? Probably not. Here's the thing... we didn't see this movie in the 80s, so we don't have any nostalgia related to it. And it's vision of the future was interesting, but obviously not correct, and it is so close, that it just really seems very make believe. This is why Star Trek is so far in the future. And why Star Wars is in the past. So that people can't say, wait, that should have happened by now. I think the only reason Terminator was successful with their dates being closer is that they kept pushing Judgment Day back and didn't have it actually happen until the third movie, when we were all comfortable with the world in the movies. They also didn't have everyone speaking some weird mix of English/Japanese/Spanish in a wasteland Los Angeles later this decade. Of course, it was 35-40 years in the future when they were making it, but that's why some SciFi movies just don't stand the test of time. I would posit that this movie does not stand the test of time. But it was fun, I can see why people like it so much, I'm sure that I would have if I had seen it in the 80s. We have put it into the #2 spot for now, just below Guess Who's Coming to Dinner.
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