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The Internet spat the dummy last night. It happens after power failures and bad electrical storms. I can only surmise that the fiberoptic modem goes wonky from the power fluctuations and needs to regain its bearings. Last time it happened, the tech had to come out and do a hard reset. Hopefully, that won't be necessary this time around.
I saw Jack Reacher today because I wanted to see fistfights and explosions. In that, I was not disappointed, though they could have easily cut twenty-five minutes from the running time. I certainly would have axed the absurdly-ham-fisted "I'm freer than the miserable drones in their cubicles" speech Reacher gives Helen in her office. All he needed was a pair of aviators and an American flag flapping majestically in the background; maybe park a Harley in one corner, forlorn but possessed of a rugged nobility as it leans on its kickstand. And maybe I'm a vigilante turdbucket, but I could muster not one iota of sympathy for the group of private contractors picked off by an unstable military sniper as they emerged from a "rape rally". Sorry. The sniper needs help and confinement in a supervised facility, but I'm not going to shed a single, stingy tear for a gaggle of unrepentant gang rapists.
The motives were murky, and the movie felt unfinished in places, as though the writers never finished fleshing out the story or the characters. Maybe it was a stylistic choice by Werner Herzog, because life is hardly so neat as the movies. If so, it's laudable, but it was clumsily done, and ultimately unsatisfying for me. It was a good movie, and more thoughtful than most action thrillers, but it could have been better. Maybe I should check out the book on which it was based.
I also watched Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon. As a blackly-comic sendup of horror tropes, it's scathing and irreverent and ingenious; as a horror movie, it's decidedly mediocre. It does a remarkable job of making you temporarily root for and connect with terrible, twisted people. I liked the retired bogeyman and his cheerful, domestic wife who doled out sage advice on how to be a better killer, and I even liked Leslie Vernon, who just wants to realize his dreams of joining the immortal horror pantheon of Freddy, Jason, and "Mike". The goodwill faded once the killing started, of course, but it never disappeared entirely. Maybe it would have if the bogey fodder had been likable, but as with most modern horror flicks, they were a merry band of interchangeable morons, so to hell with them. No one deserves to die for being stupid or obnoxious, but I'm not going to mourn their passing and rage against the monster for wiping them out, either. Just once, give me a person who isn't willing to throw their friend in the monster's path to save themselves or to blame them when the baddie comes crashing through the side of the house with a rusty scythe.
I saw Jack Reacher today because I wanted to see fistfights and explosions. In that, I was not disappointed, though they could have easily cut twenty-five minutes from the running time. I certainly would have axed the absurdly-ham-fisted "I'm freer than the miserable drones in their cubicles" speech Reacher gives Helen in her office. All he needed was a pair of aviators and an American flag flapping majestically in the background; maybe park a Harley in one corner, forlorn but possessed of a rugged nobility as it leans on its kickstand. And maybe I'm a vigilante turdbucket, but I could muster not one iota of sympathy for the group of private contractors picked off by an unstable military sniper as they emerged from a "rape rally". Sorry. The sniper needs help and confinement in a supervised facility, but I'm not going to shed a single, stingy tear for a gaggle of unrepentant gang rapists.
The motives were murky, and the movie felt unfinished in places, as though the writers never finished fleshing out the story or the characters. Maybe it was a stylistic choice by Werner Herzog, because life is hardly so neat as the movies. If so, it's laudable, but it was clumsily done, and ultimately unsatisfying for me. It was a good movie, and more thoughtful than most action thrillers, but it could have been better. Maybe I should check out the book on which it was based.
I also watched Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon. As a blackly-comic sendup of horror tropes, it's scathing and irreverent and ingenious; as a horror movie, it's decidedly mediocre. It does a remarkable job of making you temporarily root for and connect with terrible, twisted people. I liked the retired bogeyman and his cheerful, domestic wife who doled out sage advice on how to be a better killer, and I even liked Leslie Vernon, who just wants to realize his dreams of joining the immortal horror pantheon of Freddy, Jason, and "Mike". The goodwill faded once the killing started, of course, but it never disappeared entirely. Maybe it would have if the bogey fodder had been likable, but as with most modern horror flicks, they were a merry band of interchangeable morons, so to hell with them. No one deserves to die for being stupid or obnoxious, but I'm not going to mourn their passing and rage against the monster for wiping them out, either. Just once, give me a person who isn't willing to throw their friend in the monster's path to save themselves or to blame them when the baddie comes crashing through the side of the house with a rusty scythe.
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