Pop Culture - Do You Ocelot

Again, spoilers will be kept to a minimum...

Prophets of Dune

HBO's latest big budget TV series has arrived and it was marginally better than I expected. The biggest problem I had with Dune (parts one and two) - as someone who has never read Frank Herbert's books - was trying to fill in the blanks and understand the politics behind what was going on. There was obviously much more in the Dune Universe than we were witnessing, but time constraints and the need to make a film that put over a story was more important than world building. So, I expected Dune: Prophecy to fill in the blanks and do the necessary world building while telling a story that, while a prequel, would still be interesting and worth my time. It doesn't - or didn't - do that in the opening episode, nor did it feel particularly interesting. The Bene Gesserit are very much the cornerstone of Herbert's books, therefore having their 'origin' story seems like the logical way forward; the problem I have is I don't find them very interesting. I want to know about other families other than Atreides and Harkonnen, but the impression I got was that this is such a muddled story that even if I did it would make it no more clearer than it is.  

This is a big budget series and while it has a strong [ahem] cast including Emily Watson, Olivia Williams and Mark Strong, it also has Travis Fimmel in it, who I find fancies himself as a poor man's Heath Ledger and is always so fucking annoying whatever he's in. It also has a young, energetic cast and is trying to be both a series laying foundations but also something contemporary to interest less old viewers. It's essentially about the Benny Degenerates (as I like to call them) and their quest to put a woman on the throne of emperor who is one of them, to give them the power they need to make a better universe. Everything else in this series, I suspect, will be window dressing and irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. I didn't expect to enjoy the opener as much as I did, so I'll be tuning in again next week.

One Chance and You're Out - Twice

Here's a two-in-one review for you...

I'm a big fan of Mark Duplass - from Safety Not Guaranteed to The Morning Show, most things I've seen him in have been excellent and he's not only a great actor but his Duplass Brothers production company (with his brother... duh) has done some unusual stuff. The latest in that line of unusual stuff is The Creep Tapes, a comedy/horror series for Shudder consisting of six 25 minute tales of a serial killer (Duplass) who gets his victims to film their own deaths. In episode one, he offers a young film maker called Mike the chance to earn $1000 by helping him make a show reel to try and get into a renowned acting academy, but it eventually goes very wrong and ends up with Duplass killing Mike with an axe. We (because the wife watched with me) also had the second episode to watch, but given it is essentially the same idea every episode we didn't bother. It was just not that ... compelling and while Duplass is good, the 'found footage' aspect and the one note idea just didn't push any buttons for either of us.

Because we weren't going to watch any more of the above, I decided we should check out another recommendation from a friend, so we plunged straight into season one of The Afterparty, an Apple TV+ series about the death of a celebrity during a party celebrating the 15 year reunion of high school friends. Tiffany Haddish plays an LA detective who is clearly either incompetent or is a genius who just appears to be a sort of modern day Columbo/Clouseau. She's told by her superior that she is not going to be on this case and she just needs to go through the procedures until a better, more qualified detective comes in, but she ignores her boss and dives right in. The series looks at the death from the perspectives of different guests, some might have motives, some might be hiding motives, but someone (most probably) was responsible for the death of Xavier Duckworth, a singer and actor. It's unusual for us to give up on shows after just one episode... well, it always used to be but maybe not so much now. We just found it loud and very American; none of the characters were particularly interesting and it didn't grab either of us. I was slightly intrigued as to who was responsible for the death, but not anywhere near enough to wade through all the episodes and the knowledge there was a second season (albeit about a different death) didn't fill me with anything other than the feeling I could be spending my time watching something else... So that was Sunday night wasted.

Murder Holiday

After the two failures above, on Monday night we decided to try something else I'd downloaded on the hope it might fill a gap. This time the Cristin Milioti gap left by The Penguin having finished. What better way of doing that than with a Cristin Milioti series from 2022 called The Resort, a kind of existential mini-series about love mixed with a true crime scenario... Emma and Noah go to Mexico for their 10th wedding anniversary; their marriage seems to have fizzled out and there's definitely some tension there, especially with Emma who looks bored and like she doesn't really want to be on holiday. However, when a freak quad bike accident throws her down a hillside in the jungle, she happens across a very old mobile phone, rusty and very much out of place. This sets her interest off, so she buys an old phone, puts the sim card into it and uncovers a mystery that was never solved, when it happened in 2007 - 15 years earlier.

What happens is that while the two bored spouses begin to rekindle their love, you also get the story of the mobile phone and its owner - a boy who disappeared and died at a destroyed old resort, the girl he met on holiday, his actual girlfriend who was having an affair with her college professor, and a sort of Mexican Mafia family - who are also expert tailors - who might be involved. It's a punchy ride and Milioti again proves that she's a fantastic actor who is likely to be a big star for the next few years at least. We're only half way through this and I expect the 'reveal' during episode four is likely to not be the end of this story.

There have been a lot of series over the last few years that have either never turned out to be much or have passed us by, but from what we've seen of The Resort we might have stumbled on something that is worth putting the time and effort into.

The Bare Bones of It

[Did you see what I did there?] The film adaptation of any Stephen King novel is likely to be one of two things - exceptionally well made and excellent or leaving a lot to be desired (in other words, they're usually dire). However, Hearts in Atlantis is something of a strange exception. The novel, which was the longest of five novellas in a book of the same name spawned this movie, but it's actually based on Low Men in Yellow Coats, a story that ties directly into the Dark Tower novels as well as the book King wrote with Peter Straub, the sequel to The Talisman called Black House [which I think is one of the best books King has been involved with even if it reads in an altogether strange way].

Low Men in Yellow Coats - and therefore this film - is about Ted Brautigan (Anthony Hopkins), a strange man who comes to live in the rooms above Elizabeth Garfield and her pre-teen son Robert or Bobby; he seems to have an ability to know things and quickly becomes friendly with the boy even though Bobby's mother is highly suspicious of him. The thing is Bobby needs a friend, his father died when he was five and his mother is a used play thing for a group of despicable estate agents. Among Bobby's friends are Sully and Carol and the three of them are inseparable when they're young. Ted is being hunted by people who want him for his abilities and enlists Bobby to keep an eye open for strange men and odd posters around town - specifically looking for an old dog or cat.

The film is told through flashbacks as Robert Garfield, now a famed photographer, returns to his old home for the funeral of Sully and remembers that summer in the early 1960s. Like some other King adaptations in the late 90s and early 00s much of the supernatural elements have been removed, but is still hinted at, especially Ted's telepathic and precognitive skills. It's a great period piece, as many US films are and playing opposite Hopkins is the sadly tragic figure of Anton Yelchin, who died in 2016, aged 27, after essentially running himself over in his own car. This was his first role and he was excellent in it. So much of the actual story - and other novellas in the book were ignored and the Hearts in Atlantis name was used and had a reason shoehorned into it, but as a standalone feature unrelated to the King story it's a good attempt at making a film such as this without having to reference The Dark Tower. I've always felt that my favourite King book, Insomnia, has never been adapted because it is very entwined with is dark fantasy epic, yet in many ways isn't at all. I realise that makes little sense, but a lot of King's best books had nods and winks in the direction of his dark fantasy epic, but that didn't detract from their power or impact; they acted like Easter Eggs. 

It's Game Over, Man!

It's been over 25 years years since we last watched James Cameron's Aliens and while we had seen it at least four times before we had never seen the Director's Cut. We made up for that for our Saturday Night Feature Film. I suppose the key takeaway from this quite awesome movie was that in the late 1980s it was absolute state of the art for a sci-fi action film and, of course, in many ways the antithesis of the original Ridley Scott sci-fi horror movie. Sigourney Weaver was back as Ellen Ripley and the xenomorphs were back in multiples, but other than this there was little that was similar, although Cameron made a point of paying homage to the original with little nods. However, while this is an amazingly paced and tight action film, it really stinks the place out at times because it didn't matter how much time and ideas went into making it look considerably more futuristic than the original, it's still a 1980s film and there's no escaping that.

Cameron does a good job of keeping computer and technical stuff to a minimum, but he couldn't do anything about hair styles nor the inordinate amount of smoking; but thankfully this was mainly crammed into the opening fifteen minutes, although you did get the idea that perhaps Marlboro was one of the major product placement sponsors given how almost everyone - apart from Newt and Bishop, the android, were seen with a fag dangling from their mouths at some point. What the film lacks in tension and jeopardy that the original had it more than makes up for it with the action and body count and the emphasis on just how adaptable and clever the aliens are. It is one of the classics of late 20th century film making and probably should have stopped there, especially given how poorly received the third in the franchise was (even with David Fincher at the helm). The Director's Cut added some background to Newt's story and made her eventual death - off camera - before the third film all the more puzzling and pointless.

Now Even Duller

This is what I think happened. The Discovery Channel approached James May and asked him if he had any ideas for a TV series. James suggested a series about inventing stuff that's useful and mentioned that there were loads of men all over the world that come up with innovative ideas but most of them were really dull so you wouldn't ordinarily want them on a TV show, Discovery thought they could do something with this, offered May a contract (after his one from Amazon expired) and they came up with James May and the Dull Men. Then they all sat down and came up with ideas of dull things they could make interesting. Unfortunately they only came up with four things and after the first episode was made they were stuck with what to do for the other three. Subsequently after a really dull second part, the barrel got properly scraped on episode three. 

How so? I hear you ask (possibly). Well, James, his rather weird and creepy mate Seb and a couple of other blokes came up with a plan to convert an old phone box into a compact and bijou two story house - possibly a very stupid idea that was obviously done purely as a silly stunt - May even suggested as much. It was really just a silly stunt, but his weird friend Seb probably would be better off in a phone box* because I wouldn't want him anywhere near any of my friends children. The other two ideas were how to devise something to tell you your houseplants need watering - which was quite useful - and the utterly pointless segment, which took up over a third of the programme, about how many baked beans there are in different brands' tins and what James May thinks is the perfect beans on toast combo. I expect next week's final part could well be the final final part; this has, my old man used to say, grown hairs on and gone bald very quickly...

* Oddly enough, while having a look around the Tube of You, I stumbled (not literally) across a 15 minute 'programme' produced by DriveTribe, which appears to have at least two of the former Top Gear presenters on their books. This was Richard Hammond visiting James May's pub - in Wiltshire - and it was clearly filmed at the arse end of September, maybe even early October. However, it wasn't this that I found quite interesting, it was the other video from DriveTribe where Richard Hammond's daughter - a presenter on DriveTribe and her friend go to the pub to review it for their Tube of You channel. Please notice the thing stuck in the corner of the car park - in the picture to your right. It's telephone box shaped and is draped in a blue tarpaulin. The reason I mention this is because I said it was a stunt, they said it was a stunt and a few months after it was filmed it's just taking up a small corner of May's pub car park hidden behind a tarp acting as an ex-stunt. I wouldn't mind if the 'stunt' had been a clever play or had some George Clarke genius attached, it was just a shit 15 minute part of what has really been a let down since the bright start. I will watch the final part though.

Fangs For the Mammary

The wife wanted to watch Bram Stoker's Dracula as we hadn't seen it in over 30 years. By the time it had ended I never wanted to see it again. It is a truly crap bit of film making and despite Francis Ford Coppola's name being attached outside of the Godfather movies he is a director who struggles to make really good stuff. This was full of bad special effects, pompous scripts, overwrought performances and any excuse for the female cast - Sadie Frost in particular - to get their tits out. It's an absolutely awful film that you seriously struggle to stay awake throughout. If you treat it like a comedy it's almost funny, but the best way to approach it is to not bother at all. It's one of those occasions when Gary Oldman is worth missing and Anthony Hopkins should be ignored. How Winona Ryder hams it up like crazy and Keanu Reeves proves that he can't act and he can't do a British accent. It is just a load of really boring old shite.

In the Past?

I'm still none the wiser about understanding Before but maybe we're getting closer in the series to working out something; at least that's what the closing scene suggests. This really has become the mystery of the week show as we try to work out what Noah's secret is and whether something supernatural is happening to Eli or is he perhaps showing signs of dementia that are manifesting in strange ways when it comes to the boy. There's a lot of obsessing in this show, that and reflecting on things that happened in the past. There is a definite indication that Noah's problems might be similar to ones experienced by Eli's ex-wife Lin's boyfriend before Eli came along. As for the 'shock' ending last week, that was dealt with in a way that you'd believe possible in the USA but highly unlikely if it happened in the UK. Oh and that strange birthmark you might have noticed also has something to do with whatever is going on.

Highly Recommended

Right, there's a programme on iPlayer at the moment (but possibly only for Scotland) called Roaming in the Wild. The first episode of the second series is now only available for a further 12 days and the most recent is there for another 26 days and then they will disappear again until they get another airing on BBC Scotland. It features Andrew O'Donnell and his pal Mark Taylor roaming around parts of Scotland using not always conventional methods of transport. But, it isn't only that; it's also a showcase for Andrew's excellent skills as a wildlife photographer and filmmaker as well as using music he supplies from his band Beluga Lagoon. The available episodes are about 27 minutes long, will make you chuckle at some of the observations and scrapes they get involved in. It will educate you about some things (like you need to take your jobbies home with you if you take a shit in the Cairngorms in the winter when it's snowed) and that Scotsmen are hardy men able to face all manner of problems and usually in shorts and short sleeves. I've watched all available episodes at least twice now; it's gentle, humorous and stunningly beautiful at times.

Next Time...

Apart from current ongoing stuff and a few things we have yet to start (such as Shrinking because we want to watch it as a 'box set'), the outlook for the next six or seven weeks is dreadful because the schedules are filling up - earlier than usual - with nothing but Christmas shite. It seems that Hallmark, who had the monopoly on Christmas and festive movies is now in competition with everyone else as they vie to see who can win the most viewers with vomit that a large percentage of people do not want to see until at least the shortest day of the year. It's why I've been [ahem] stocking up with films that I'd ordinarily probably not watch just in case we're stuck for something to watch while there's nothing but jingling balls and out of tune bells cluttering up the [digital] airwaves.

Other than that it's going to be a 'play it by ear' kind of week/month/rest of year, I have no doubt.