The Boat (1921)

Gotta love The Boat.  Even though I wouldn’t quite put it up with my absolute favorite Buster Keaton shorts, like One Week, Neighbors, or Cops, it’s very Buster, and it just tickles me.

The plot is very basic.  Family man Buster has built a boat, the Damfino, in his cellar (because reasons,) and the short depicts the misadventures that ensue as he, his wife, and his two small boys take it on its maiden voyage.  The Damfino leaves a trail of destruction, against itself and other structures, wherever it goes, and when a storm kicks up, things really go south.

In a way, this short is a more focused, seafaring version of the train sequence in Our Hospitality.  As with the train, it’s mainly a series of vignettes showing how ill-equipped the Damfino is for being on the water and how Buster and his family face the problems it sends their way.  I’d say it’s not quite as funny as Our Hospitality’s train stuff (so much love for that film, it’s ridiculous,) but it builds better to a comedic/dramatic head with the climactic storm and its fallout.  This is as it should be, since The Boat is a self-contained short and not an extended comic sequence in a feature film with a bigger story to tell, but the comparison itself is maybe a slight critique of The Boat – though it comes around in the end, it does mostly feel like a sequence rather than a story.

Still, you can’t knock the fun it has in the meantime.  I’ve already talked at length about the famous “Damfino” jokes and the hamster-wheel-esque, superbly executed Buster-in-the-cabin-of-the-revolving-boatscene, so I won’t get into those again.  There’s plenty of other stuff to talk about.  Right from the beginning, the Damfino is clearly trouble (Buster has built it too large to fit through the cellar door,) but bless him, Buster is determined to get the better of it.  There are some fun mechanical gags, like the boat’s collapsible fixtures and the bathtub lifeboat, and the image of Buster stoically going down with the ship as they’re still launching it is classic.

For me, much of the beauty of this short is in the little touches.  I love Buster literally pulling himself up by the seat of his pants when he falls overboard, and there’s something so delightful about Buster and his sons all hiding their inedible pancakes in their hats.  There are some great moments during the storm sequence, too, like Buster trying to light a candle in the middle of a howling gale/downpour.  And as much as I love Buster struggling against the hole he’s drilled into the bottom of the boat (to funnel out the water from the hole he made in the side, obviously,) what really kills me are his attempts throw the water out the porthole one teacupful at a time.

Once again, we have Sybil Seely as Buster’s wife, being a nice, charming presence in a role that doesn’t give her too much to do.  I absolutely love the two little boys playing Buster’s sons – not for any particular acting that they do, but for the great extent to which Buster uses them as glorified props.  I adore the fact that they wear matching porkpie hats, and it cracks me up every time Buster hauls one of them around like a sack of potatoes.  I’d say Buster probably required more acting from most of the dogs, horses, and cows he worked with, but those boys sure add a lot just for what he does with them.

Warnings

Slapstick peril and a little implied swearing.

Doctor Who Revisit: Series 9, Episodes 10-12, Now with Spoilers!

As the last few Sunday Who Reviews have shown, it’s nearly impossible to discuss these arc-heavy episodes without spoilers.  It’s all an inevitable exercise in, “Well, can’t talk about that.  Or that.  Or that…”  Now, though, the season is over, and it’s time to hash this out.  We’re looking at spoilery elements from the episodes in general today, saving the larger Doctor stuff and Clara stuff for separate posts.  (Spoilers, obviously.)

Where to start?  I enjoyed seeing Me/Ashildr again in “Face the Raven” and “Hell Bent,” although her characterization is a bit all over the place.  I suppose one could argue that, each time, we’re seeing her so much later in her timestream that whoever she previously was doesn’t matter, as seen in “The Woman Who Lived,” but that’s not really how it feels here.  It feels like the show just does whatever it wants with her, reshaping her to suit their needs of the episode.  That said, setting up a hidden alien refugee camp is pretty awesome, and her conversation with the Doctor at the end of the universe, implausible as that scenario is, is an excellent scene.

All the Hybrid stuff is basically a waste of time.  We don’t really know anything more than we did at the start of the season, including whether or not we’re ever going to hear about this arc again.  I’m annoyed that everything discussed about the Hybrid in these episodes is either a lie or a speculation (although, on that front, I hope the Doctor is lying when he cites his fear about the Hybrid as the reason he originally left Gallifrey.  This plotline in no way deserves to screw with the Doctor’s origin story, and after the retconning in “The Name of the Doctor,” nothing should interfere further with the TARDIS’s account of their beginning in “The Doctor’s Wife.”)  For me, it’s one of the least satisfying season arcs the show has done.  It’s somehow framed as OMG Super Important!!! and completely “meh” at the same time.

I’m also irritated that, after “The Day of the Doctor” rewrote the previous seven seasons of the show and set up the whole “missing Gallifrey” thing, the return of the Time Lords is such a non-event.  There’s no explanation as to how they got back to this universe, no real sense of how the Doctor feels to be home after all the angst/guilt/despair its absence has brought to the new series.  And really, the entire reason for the Doctor being brought back to Gallifrey – so the Time Lords can get his intel on the Hybrid – is 1) not that interesting, 2) ultimately pointless, and 3) nothing more than a way to facilitating the handwavy reason to bring Clara back from the dead.  Cheap, disinterested plot fuel rather than any sort of organic narrative.  On the plus side, the cloister and the cloister wraiths are pretty cool.  It’s one of those things that sort of comes out of nowhere in terms of the show’s history, but I like the idea of the TARDIS cloister bell is rooted to a physical place on Gallifrey (which I suppose supports the theory that, rather than changing the past in “The Day of the Doctor,” the Doctor(s) just closed the time loop that, unbeknownst to him, had always been there – would’ve been hard for the cloister bell to ring if Gallifrey had been destroyed.)  By the same token, I like the idea of the Time Lords’ enemies getting captured and wired into the same system they tried to attack, becoming part of the cloister’s internal security. 

Lastly, I’m of two minds on the cross-gender/racial regeneration in “Hell Bent” (more on the specifics later.)  While I like the acknowledgement that Time Lords aren’t bound to a single race or gender, the continued demonstrations and references with minor and supporting characters really underline the fact that the Doctor himself has never been anything other than a white guy.

X-Men (2000, PG-13)

*Disclaimer: I was a fan of Bryan Singer for a number of years, and although his was a case where I did hear about allegations against him years before MeToo and TimesUp, I’m sorry to say that I bought into his counter claim, that allegations against him were lies motivated by homophobia. I believed that the accusations of abuse were attempts to tear down an openly-gay director, and so I continued to watch his films without guilt for many years.  It wasn’t until a more recent article came out detailing allegations against him from multiple accusers that I really faced up to it.*

 
Since the trailer for Apocalypse just came out (young Storm!  young Nightcrawler!  squee!,) it’s as good a time as any to start looking at the original X-Men trilogy, before the current McAvoy-Fassbender prequels came along.  In general, they’re a mixed bag.  This film gets the franchise off to a middling start, but the pieces are in place for better things to come.

Our main ins into the world of mutants are teenage runaway Rogue and amnesiac drifter Wolverine.  The girl who sucks the life force out of anyone she touches and the man with an adamantium skeleton who can heal from any wound find one another amid a society that’s less-than-sympathetic to their kind.  The pair are brought to Professor X’s school and safe haven for mutants.  There, Rogue wrestles with understanding herself and coming to terms with her powers, while Wolverine is introduced to the war being waged by those like the professor, who want to live in peace with humans, and Magneto, who believe in mutant superiority and want to destroy the humans who try to persecute them.

We’ll start with the casting.  As Professor X and Magneto, Patrick Stewart and Sir Ian McKellen are so right for their roles, it’s uncanny, and Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine isn’t far behind (his extreme overuse in the franchise can rankle, but he still is very good.)  Of course, it helps that all three characters are given fairly strong material to work with.  The intense friend-turned-enemy-but-despite-everything-still-friend connection between Xavier and Magneto is a highlight of the film, while the franchise has pretty much always done well with the way Magneto’s past damage informs his present actions.  Rebecca Romijn also stands out as the shape-shifting Mystique.

Meanwhile, I have a hard time connecting with Famke Janssen’s Jean Grey, and Anna Paquin and Halle Berry feel miscast as Rogue and Storm.  James Marsden as Cyclops and Shawn Ashmore as Bobby do all right, but they don’t have a whole lot to do.  And I know it’s not supposed to be a huge role, but Ray Park does action scenes so well and he’s kind of wasted as Toad.

The story generally excels when it focuses on mutants as a metaphor for actual marginalized groups – showing the discrimination they face, the comfort they can find within their own community, and the resentment that, in a few, leads them to lash out against the distrustful majority.  It also tends to do well with interpersonal relationships.  Like I said, Professor X and Magneto are excellent, and the wary connection between Wolverine and Rogue is interesting.  Unfortunately, the film seems less interested in the comic-book stuff.  The world-building is rather thin, and there’s an almost-tentative feel to some of the action and heavier comic-book elements, like the movie is a bit self-conscious about it.  When a work shies away from its geek cred, it actually tends to feel less cool, because it comes across as reluctant to own itself for what it is.  However, what does work works well, and there’s enough additional potential that, with some finesse, the franchise takes a nice upturn with its next installment.

Warnings

Comic-book violence, language, and sexual content (including mutant nudity.)

Hamilton’s Parallels to 21st-Century Politics

One great thing about Hamilton is its demonstration of The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same principle.  Politicians may no longer challenge one another to duels, but highly-charged issues that come between characters in Hamilton are still relevant in U.S. politics today.

Topping the list is the driving force of the Hamilton/Jefferson and larger Federalist/Democratic-Republican conflict:  the debate over government size.  Hamilton and the Federalists believe in big government.  If Hamilton can’t help to create “a strong central democracy,” he opines that he’ll be “Socrates / Throwing verbal rocks / At these mediocrities.”  And he doesn’t play around – he wants to set up a National Bank and have the federal government assume the states’ war debts, opening a new line of credit for the Union and getting some government revenue through taxation of the people.  This is his way to helping the country, providing strong leadership and a solid framework for everyone to follow.

Which, of course, freaks the Democratic-Republicans out hard.  They just fought a war to gain independence from a demanding, overbearing tyrant, and when they see someone coming in wanting to dictate what all the states do, they’re reminded of that tyranny.  Like Jefferson says, “When Britain taxed our tea, we got frisky. / Imagine what gon’ happen if you try to tax our whiskey.”  They back away from that at all costs, instead advocating that each state takes care of itself.  They’re all about decisions made at the individual state level, with the federal government keeping its nose out of it.  The less power the federal government has, the safer they feel.

In other news, I get a strong whiff of dramatic irony from Hamilton and Jefferson’s debate over whether or not the U.S. should back France during its revolution.  You can see where both men are coming from – Hamilton points out that the Reign of Terror is a crazy-dangerous maelstrom that the U.S. shouldn’t touch with a 10-foot pole, while Jefferson thinks that the U.S. has a duty to “fight for freedom” and that it particularly owes a debt to France, which played an instrumental role in the American Revolution.  But Hamilton’s words at the end of this argument are what really get to me:  “If we try to fight in every revolution in the world, we never stop. / Where do we draw the line?”  That, it seems, has been the story of American wars for most of the country’s existence. The U.S. has had its hands in so many revolutions and foreign struggles, from Vietnam to Iraq, and its presence is often divisive at best. 

A final important aspect of Hamilton’s politics, woven into the fabric of the story from the opening number, is the matter of immigrants.  The show is of course very supportive and celebratory on this subject – there’s that fabulous “Immigrants: / We get the job done” line from Hamilton and Lafayette – but it also acknowledges the ugliness, denigration, and mistrust that can be born out of xenophobia and directed at immigrants.  This has been an unfortunate trait in America throughout its history, with the most recent arrivals in the largest numbers often on the receiving end of hate or fear.  It follows Hamilton throughout his career:  the sense that he doesn’t have a right to his success, that he’s some sort of interloper, or that he’s somehow less because of where he was born.  When Hamilton says “immigrant,” it’s a badge of honor, but when the Democratic-Republicans say it, it’s something between a sneer and a slur.  John Adams calls Hamilton “creole bastard,” for goodness sake; he isn’t short on reasons to despise Hamilton, but Hamilton’s national origin shouldn’t have anything to do with a single one of them.

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (2014-Present)

As I mentioned in my review of the revamped Daily Show, YouTube clips of John Oliver were my gateway drug back into news media satire shows.  Before I sat down to watch an episode of Last Week Tonight in full, I’d wiled away quite a bit of time watching clip after clip of Oliver’s feature stories.  Still, I figured I’d better at least get an actual episode or two under my belt before I gave Oliver’s show its own review.  So, I watched the recent season finale (the program’s third season will be premiering in February) and have slowly started catching up on other episodes from this year.  Initial verdict?  Big thumbs up!

It’s interesting how these shows that were born out of Daily Show talent are reminiscent of the original, but each has a unique flavor.  The Daily Show, under both John Stewart and Trevor Noah, the now-retired Colbert Report, and Last Week Tonight (I haven’t seen The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore) all have the same basic format of skewering news media through shrewd commentary and sly pop culture references, lambasting anyone who deserves it but having a generally left-leaning bent.  Noah’s Daily Show has many of the same trappings as Stewart’s version – a combination of news-desk commentary, pre-taped stories, two-hander back-and-forths with correspondents, and nightly guests – but Noah’s voice is already being felt, with a stronger emphasis on looking at America through a newcomer’s eyes, increased impressions/accent work, and greater attention paid to issues of race.  The Colbert Report was astoundingly dedicated in its parody, with Colbert committing 100% to the bullheaded portrayal of his Bill O’Reilly-esque character and using it to shine a spotlight on hypocritical posturing and harmful fearmongering.

So what’s John Oliver’s thing?  In a word, I’d say it’s “passion,” and in six words, I’d say it’s “passion and an inexhaustible work ethic.”  Since his show is only on once a week, he can’t keep up with ongoing news the way that something like The Daily Show can, so while he opens his episodes with a bit of a general news round-up, the big draw is always his main story of the evening.  These are in-depth looks at one particular issue (from the state of sex education in America to the extreme challenges/prejudices facing Syrian refugees to the deplorable condition of the U.S. mental health system;) each one is a good 10-20 minutes in length, delivered with anything from impassioned fervor to righteous indignation, and backed by a mountain of fastidiously-thorough research.  The statistics are both fast-flying and staggering, highlighting lies, cover-ups, loopholes, inequalities, misperceptions, and bald-faced ignorance with astonishing exactness.

The lengths Oliver and his team go to for these stories can be pretty remarkable.  On air, Oliver has waded through the immense sea of paperwork, out-of-pocket expenses, and red-tape BS it takes for an Arabic translator to make it to safety in the U.S.  He’s made a herculean effort to make sense of the numbers the Miss America Foundation claims it gives out annually in scholarships, trying to figure out how he can possibly get all the drops to add up to the full bucket they insist is there.  He’s shared the fruits of his months-long correspondence with an opportunistic televangelist, airing all the balls-to-the-wall crazy letters he got filled with entreaties for money and guilt trips fueled by appropriated religious beliefs.  I enjoyed John Oliver back when he was on The Daily Show, but he’s really come into his own here.