Collateral Damage

I know that I have not posted in a long while, but it is time for me to speak again. Usually I work towards sparking thought and informing my few readers into what is the going-ons and trends in film, reviews, personal quips and rants. Am I particularly notable? No, but I feel I have enough of an educated foundation in this field to share why I am as passionate about my hobby as I am. Today I am going to be stiff, wooden, and verbose; but this is something I feel needs to be taken into account if you want to find credibility. So before I continue to barrage my readers with more concrete input on film culture, I want to talk about myself, and how this industry has been a psycho-reactive tool in the foundation of the American psychology. And to be able to explain that, I need to be the guinea pig for you guys. So let us talk about fear.

American Humorist, Evan Esar once stated "Anger is the feeling that makes your mouth work faster than your mind." Every bit of that statement is true, but anger is not an element, it is not the carbon which physically creates the beings that we are, it is not the air that we breath. Anger is a state of mind, a psychological reaction to our fears. The fear of loss leads to frustration and depression. Culmination of different stresses lead to fear, and because of this, panic leads to fear, and in turn creates anger. Anger towards the human mind, the sense of self, towards other people. Those two closely related emotions allow us to fabricate a sense of morality which tells us that we, as people who are in a vulnerable state, need to take control. But that control is self destructive. A panic attack for instance, sets in because of anger, frustration, and fear, but those are just the excuses for the attack. The real reason the human mind triggers a state of panic, is because the control that one's self presumes they have, is stripped away from them, or it never existed to begin with. In a state of panic, every one feels alone, and the reality is that they are not. Every one has fears, every one has panicked.

Film is a reflection of who we are as people, both the good and bad parts. They allow us to invest a part of our committed attention into relating to the characters, yet at the same time, withdraw ourselves from our own issues. At times they remind us we need darkness to differentiate from light, so that we may remember that personal psychological balance is a key part to being a normal, healthy human being. But what happens when the projector is finished, what happens when the theater lights slowly saturate your surroundings after the credits? That is a not a question as much as it is a fact of life for any film-goer. A healthy person carries away from the film nothing but pennies for thought, adjusted to the targeted mood the movie was trying to portray. But some people (myself on occasion, admittedly) leave with the ideology that the themes in the film may easily be applied to their lives, no matter how sensationalized or unrealistic the subject matter is. Now don't get me wrong, I never stepped out of "Transformers" or "Scott Pilgrim vs The World", thinking I could become a robot or fight some chick's evil ex's. But like any matter or substance we enjoy, these pieces of work are meant to be enjoyed, on a positive or negative level. When Scorsese made "The Taxi Driver", he did not want to formulate or design Travis Bickle to be a hero or a villain, nor a role model for that matter. He understood that the environmental factors in a person's life may slowly destroy them, and it was something he wanted to share because it held no direct consequence.

Now I may be flying off in all directions here, but the bottom line of what I am saying is, if you love films, remember, that is all they are. You are not paying them 10 dollars to be a 2 hour therapist, nor are they trying to reformulate or modify what is going on in your life. Just sit back, enjoy the experience, and if you carry something realistically positive away from the story, do so, just tread lightly over the ice you just have created. Good day to all, Marxer out.

Why So Blu?: Scott Pilgrim vs. The World vs. the Blu Ray vs. Me

I am a die hard fan of Scott Pilgrim vs. The World by Bryan Lee O'Malley, but, I did not become a die hard fan of the graphic novel series until after seeing the film meticulously created by one of my favorite directors, Edgar Wright. This man single-handedly stopped me from making many regrettable decisions with his television show "Spaced", during a very dark period in my life. After seeing his film "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World", I fell in love with it (seeing it twice in one night, 3 time total in the same weekend, and one last time a week after its release). Of course after the first viewing, I progressed to blow 50 U.S. dollars (67 C.A.) on the graphic novel series, and as time drew closer to a home release, a DVD rip slipped my way from a friend of mine. But I am a true fan, so this weekend, I dropped 80 bucks on a Blu Ray player, and a copy of the film in Blu, just so I could delve into the extras, commentaries, all of that bullshit. I refuse to review the film for the blog, primarily because I feel it would be unfair and unbiased, but for those who are interested, or those teetering on the edge of whether to drop the cash on this film in BD, I will give you a breakdown of what this 25 dollar disc has to offer.

The deleted scenes granted are mostly great, stuff that really should have made the original film to be a little bit closer to the source material, but it is understandable that they were left out to cut a time on what was already a close to 2 hr long film made for viewers with ADHD. These scenes have optional commentary with Edgar Wright which is always nice. In terms of commentary, the film itself has 4 separate tracks, 3 of which obviously are cast and crew, but the most notable is the one with just Wright and Lee O'Malley. It is interesting to hear the novel's creator delve into the films little subtleties that only a hardcore Pil-geek like myself would enjoy to hear.

Most impressive in the set of extras definitely has to be the 2 centerpiece documentaries. The main documentary clocks in at close to an hour and fifteen minutes, and covers pre-production to action choreography, and the second just focuses on just the music from the film that was created for the fictional bands in the movie. This piece really explores how the whole cast was trained professionally to play their tracks, which after viewing, I hold even more respect for the cast.

The rest of the extras a tid bits that still add justification to the purchase of the film; marketing archives; bloopers; and mini-docs that focus on visual effects and costume design. If you haven't seen this film though, get the hell out there and at least rent it, but if you have a BD player, watch it in hi-def, the transfer is damn near flawless, and it is really meant to be viewed in at least 720p. In an interview with Guillermo del Toro and Edgar Wright, he [del Toro] was asked by a fan about the film, and why Hollywood doesn't make more creative films like it, his response was, "It's the audience's fault, someone like him [Wright] makes an awesome film, and not a single mothefucker sees it, then films that change the face of cinema will not be made."

Well, thats enough of this dissection, time to go back to watching one of my other favorite films almost everyone else hated, "Watchmen:The Directors Cut", in hi-def baby! And on that note... later this week I will bitch about why I hate to love director Zack Snyder.

Under the Radar:"Cropsey"

A few months back I was scanning through my usual film-whore websites and read about a documentary called "Cropsey" on Bloody Disgusting which details the story of a child abductor and serial killer on the grounds of the Willowbrook Mental Institution on Staten Island. On the surface, it very much is a documentary that you would expect to see on The History Channel or Court TV, but what makes it so special is that the two creators, Joshua Zeman and Barbara Brancaccio, were raised in the surrounding neighborhoods. Solidarity of the community is what separates Staten from the other Boroughs of the city and this community pulled together back in 1987 when 10 year old Jennifer Schweiger goes missing. The results of their efforts has a man named Andre Rand who was once also a patient at Willowbrook arrested for the murders, and the documentary investigates the history of this man and the resonance of Willowbrook's presence on the island.

The Marxer Report: The Due Date

When you have the opportunity to see a film before other people, in the case of someone who does not work professionally in the industry this would be called a midnight showing, as a reviewer gets an opportunity to inform his peers about the quality of a film first-hand, before any Ebert or Shalit can. Sometimes though, as in the case of "The Due Date", director Todd Phillips' ("The Hangover", "Old School") new film, it just does not warrant staying up until 4 or in the morning to develop a review.... or even the next day.

A Very Special "The Marxer Report": The Walking Dead: Pilot Review

Okay, lets get something out of the way before I review this show. I am a huge zombie-anything fan, be it a video game, a film, a comic, standing at a mall on Black Friday. Anything that used to be released involving flesh eating, shambling corpses, I had a grade-school hard-on for. In recent years though, the "zombie" genre is getting stale and I recognize that, so please, see where I'm coming from.

Recently, due to some very slick connections, and the anticipation to see this show, I was able to view the pilot episode for The Walking Dead, a television adaptation of a successful comic series written by Robert Kirkman and inked by Tony Moore. I have read up to 3 volumes of this series (going onto 13 now), so I was not only elated to see and adaptation in the works, I was anticipating this like a Star Wars geek for the Phantom Menace release. In short all I can say is, WOW, AMC has titanium balls.

Rant:The Memorial Cop-out

Just like in our lives, celebrities die also. It sounds mean, it sounds stoic, but it is true, but being a little too addicted to blow can apparently kill a celebrity also, I mean, with their bodies apparently harvested out of pain killers to look so young all the time, eventually they gotta go also right? Well, I really do not want to continue sounding this mean, but lets face it, we all seem to drop what we are doing when someone like Heath Ledger goes.

Straight from the Park Trailer Analysis: True Grit

I am not the type of person to say I am never wrong, so I am going to go on the record to be the first to say I was wrong when I discussed with a friend of mine that the new Coen Bros. film, True Grit is not a remake of the 1969 film with John Wayne, because as research has proven, it is. So there. In reality, the 1969 film itself is an adaptation of a novel by author Charles Portis.