1982: The Year that a Little Brown Dude Showed Us All the Meaning of Love, and There was a Movie About Gandhi Too

I was actually so excited about my title for this year that I almost wrote it in my 1983 title slot by accident. Because I was watching the winner for 82 (much-deserved unlike 83's nonsense) and one of the characters says something like, "how can a little brown man capture the hearts of so many people?" And I was like, "oh man! Just like the other iconic movie from this year about the extra terrestrial...what up!" That's probably the most exciting thing that's happened to me in weeks. Ah the life of the unemployed bachelor bum. Well thankfully, there's only one movie that's TBD for this year, because I'm still watching it. And it began with some synthetic music and what sounded like bad dubbing or bad ADR. So I figured I might have to multi-task to get through it. Before I get to that I'd like to say a word about another movie that came out this year: Blade Runner. You might be surprised, but I'm not the biggest fan. It's good and I like it, but just because it portrays the future as trashy and gross doesn't make it a great movie. Interesting, yes. Gutsy? Perhaps. One of the greatest sci-fi epics of all time? Nope. Right then, let's get on with it.

And what better place to begin than with everybody's favorite little brown guy: E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. Why oh why didn't it come out in 83? Then it might've had a shot, because sadly this year was pretty much a done deal before the awards were even announced (much like 84, 96, 97, and 2003. Check 'em!). I believe Spielberg called this his personal favorite of the films that he has made, and though it's obviously not his best work from a film perspective, it's certainly the most uplifting, heart-warming, and aesthetically pleasing. I'm oddly positive today...I began penning my autobiography last night so I guess that gave me a nice jolt. I'm sure I'll blather more about that later, for now let's talk about the movie. I'm ashamed to say I've only seen the 20th Anniversary Edition so I probably should've watched the original before I wrote this, just for the sake of being proper. The only main difference I remember is that they replaced the shotguns the cops are holding as E.T. makes his escape with radios. I go back and forth on whether I like that decision, because on one hand they wouldn't pull shotguns on a bunch of kids. But on the other hand, E.T. had some mojo in him and the cops didn't see the scenes with the Reese's Pieces so they might have felt threatened. Past all of that, this movie is just straight up charming. It features one of John Williams' most iconic and emotional scores, which is saying a lot considering his collected works over the years. Also, there's a stuffed animal of Yoda in the closet at one point and when he shows up, a little bit of Yoda's Theme plays. That's freaking awesome. Anyway, in case you don't know, the movie's about an adorable alien dude who is found by a lonely little kid and the kid helps him contact his home world so that he can be rescued. It has all of that potentially-cheesy plotlines about the alien helping the kid cope with his loneliness, and how all of this ties in to the kid growing up and moving on with his problems and such. This just goes to show you that the cheesiest of material can be absolutely outstanding when done correctly. The movie also features Drew Barrymore's first role, or first major role anyway. It's still her best role since she's usually just annoying now and though attractive, not attractive enough to make up for how annoying she is. I'm being a bit hard on her, I usually like her in most things. What's wrong with me today? Any more of this nonsense and I'll have to change my title to "The Understanding Critic" and that's not even alliterative! Okay, let's have a bottom line: if you haven't seen this movie there's something wrong with you. So fix that. It's wonderful. And if it had come out against anything other than a sure thing, it might've had a shot.

Now on to what was apparently a movie so controversial that it was only re-released to the public in 2006: Missing. Make no mistake, it's not that exciting. At least the first forty minutes aren't. And it wasn't controversial due to nudity or violence, so that's also boring. Because then at least you can say, "oh man! I can't believe they got away with that in 19xx!" It was controversial because it put forth some ideas about government cover-ups in the name of capitalism and yadda yadda. Boy there's an original idea. Some people who are suspicious of the government and think capitalism is bad. Man, they're so brave to be making a movie about that. Especially since there was never an entire decade of music, movies, and TV devoted to that. I'm just in awe. Well let's hit some merits before I go on a diatribe: well-written, and well-acted by Jack Lemmon. Sissy Spacek is a little annoying, but she's usually annoying to me. She does a good job too, but the accent gets me down. Anyway, the movie is about a journalist who goes missing during a right-wing regime takeover in Chile in the 70s. And the journalist's dad comes down to try to help find him. Prediction: by the end of the movie his political tune will be changing and he'll be branding a figurative peace symbol into his forehead. When the movie finishes, I'll put a sentence at the end of this paragraph confirming or denying. Let me take this opportunity to make a non-political political statement. I'd be the first one to tell you that the government is sketchy sometimes, but without every bit of information they have I can't say with absolute certainty that I wouldn't make the same decision. In addition: sometimes they don't have all the information or they have bad information, just like anybody. So I'm not sure what goes down in this movie, but it'll probably be one of those things. And who knows how many claims are legit anyway? One thing I do know is that if the government actually wanted to take over everything, who exactly would stop them? I'm thinking nobody, unless the Avengers have been biding their time and pretending to be fictional. Oh look! 24 minutes left in the movie and Jack Lemmon is starting to show signs of sounding like his son, whose politics he initially opposed. Nailed it!

Now here's a movie I thought would be silly, and it was. But I still liked it: Tootsie. It's a comedy, but I rarely laughed out loud during it. I still quite enjoyed it though, for whatever reason. Largely due to Dustin Hoffman's charming performance as Michael Dorsey: an actor who can't get a role as a man, so he dresses as a woman. The decision does seem a bit abrupt since it goes right from his agent telling him he doesn't have a hope of getting a job in that town, and the next second he's walking down the street as a girl. Although I suppose it's better to just cut to the chase instead of wasting a scene on some ridiculous scene that gives him the idea (like on House when he sees ice melting or something and thus figures out the ailment. It's only charming when it's episodic). I also kind of recognized with the guy, because he was pouring his heart and soul into every audition and everybody told him he wasn't good enough. So what did he do? He took it to the extreme, and that's what you need to do sometimes. Just like how I'd like to change my name to "Squatting Frog" so that people will think I'm Native American and I can get a job interview. Outcome 1: they're too embarrassed to ask how much of it is in my blood and I'm good to go. Outcome 2: they're not too embarrassed and I tell them I have none of the blood in me, but that I'm making a statement because I feel for the plight of the tribes of old. They'll love that. It's an ingenius plan really. Anyway, the movie takes the usual turn wherein he falls in love with his female co-worker on his soap opera but of course he can't reveal this without losing his job and so on and so forth. It's fairly predictable, but still charming. And I totally bought Hoffman as a woman, although not an attractive one. He reminded me of Alice from The Brady Bunch. So it was mildly ridiculous when several men were after her, I mean him...see even I made that mistake! When they were after him it was mildly ridiculous but at the same time I guess the men weren't too dashing themselves so it sort of makes sense. I could've done without the "Go Tootsie Go!" song that showed up at points, but that's really my only problem with the movie. It didn't reek of the decade as much as I thought it would. It even turned out to be quite touching at times, so it's a nice little movie. Not a winner, to be sure. But I suppose it's nice to see a movie of its type get some recognition every now and again anyway.

On the complete opposite end of the spectrum from the other good movies from this year is The Verdict. Cynical Domenic loves this movie, so that's refreshing. All of this being positive and talking about charming movies almost thawed my heart of ice, that's no good! Next thing you know I'll start caring about things and it'll be like that time that the Brain could've taken over the world but decided not to because Pinky made him feel all happy inside. Ah well, perhaps it's time to leave the curmudgeon behind, it's not like it's helped me out a whole lot. So we'll give this "being nice" thing a shot for a bit anyway. But only after we talk about this movie, which is awesome. It's about an ambulance-chaser (for those of you not in the know, that means a lawyer who's only interested in making money by finding wronged clients with easy cases. AKA most lawyers). Well this particular lawyer, played by Paul Newman in a largely overlooked and still outstanding performance, is on another one of these cases. He's an alcoholic and he's pretty much got no soul at the beginning of the movie. Gradually, he begins to fight for the case for "the right reasons" instead of just his own selfish purposes. But this isn't played in quite the way you might expect. He's frightened at this prospect. After all, it's a bit of a catch-22. He only stays with the case because he cares but he might only be able to win the case if he doesn't care. If you start caring, you start screwing up. The film wisely blends elements of character study and courtroom drama to create a really well-done piece of work. And (spoiler alert!) at the end of the movie they never tell you what the verdict is, you just see the phone ringing and him picking it up. I loved that, because it really wasn't relevant. What was relevant was whether or not he was capable of redemption. And the fact that he actually cared about the verdict beyond his own payment. Or did he? And if he did, will he stay that way? Only good movies cause you to ask questions. Well, that's not true. Bad movies cause you to ask: "why did that guy do that? Why did they make this movie? Why did I get suckered into watching this nonsense?" So I'll say that only good movies make you ask good questions.

This year's well-deserving winner doesn't raise or cause many questions but it tells a great story about as well as it could've been told. The movie is Gandhi, and it's a highly impressive piece of work. It's kind of a classically done film: herds of extras, relatively simple story drawn out and done wonderfully, great music score, etc. Ben Kingsley looks freakishly like the title man, and I mean freakishly. Apparently some locals thought he was the ghost of Gandhi, walking around. When I originally watched the film I was bothered that it didn't include some of his sketchier early days, but now I just don't care and I think it would've bogged down the film. Okay seriously, is someone slipping me pills? Because we're rapidly approaching that scene where the Grinch saves Christmas and whatnot. Much like a lot of other great movies, I really don't have a lot to say about this one. Career-making performance from Kingsley that rightly got the award. Incredibly well-directed by Richard Attenborough who also rightly got the award. You know the story, a man in India used peaceful protest to gain independence from Britain for his country. Isn't that the same Britain that occasionally gets on America's case for being oppressive and sketchy? And when does this movie take place? The 20th century you say? Yeah, there are few countries on the planet that have any business telling any other countries that they're being oppressive and sketchy, and Britain has no right whatsoever. Normally, I like to look at both sides of historical things. Especially when it's in a movie. But Britain was just straight up a bunch of douches in India, and they're lucky that it took a peaceful protest to get them out of there instead of a bunch of fighting (which also took place and is portrayed well within the movie). I feel like movies of this caliber should just get a whole separate set of awards. Because nobody has a shot against them. I know it's a long movie, but more people should really take an afternoon or a Saturday morning and watch a lot of these films. Because they're often the best that filmmaking has to offer, and exemplify the very qualities of humanity and the arts that should be recorded and remembered. Running time isn't automatically good though. Pearl Harbor sucks.

Even in 1982 you can't hide from me Michael Bay. Well, I hope you enjoyed this unusually positive (by comparison) entry in the escapade. Maybe these past weeks of sitting around the house have humbled me slightly. Maybe now that I'm writing a hilarious autobiography with some sort of narrative makes me happy because it gives me a purpose. Or maybe the viewers of the Truman-esque TV show that is my life got sick of my negativity and pumped laughing gas into the house. That's probably it. Well I can't say what state my mind will be in for the next entry, but it will contain commies, old people, and FREAKING INDIANA JONES! That's right, Indiana Jones. Pretty much the last iconic and awesome hero to brave the Academy's doorstep, should be awesome.

1983: The Year that The Chick Flick was Invented and Beat a Movie About Legitimate Accomplishments

I just find it hilarious that a movie about real-life American ingenuity and heroism was beaten out by a movie that exists only to make women cry. Think about that for a second. Inherently a movie that mostly exists to make people cry should be bad right? You would think so. I mean, if I said: "hey I've got this onion, want me to slice it in your face so that you'll cry?" you wouldn't want that! But if I said, "hey want to pay some money to sit for two hours and cry because producers have mortgages too?" that is apparently very appealing. Maybe not when you look at it in those terms, but few do. Actually, only one seems to do that (a clue: it's me). Ordinarily I'd be more upset but this was kind of a "meh" year for movies anyway. I think the scope of the film I mentioned in my title should have warranted a win, but in other years it wouldn't have deserved the award. So now that I've told you we're in for a schlockfest of mediocrity today, won't you join me?

First up we've got a movie that, contrary to what I said in my 1984 post, is one my mother thought I'd like and I actually didn't: The Big Chill. You realize of course that once I said I liked all of her recommendations it automatically had to be disproven ASAP right? Once I put something in print, the universe compensates to make me look stupid. Luckily, that means it takes the whole of space/time to do so. Take that cosmos! Funny I should mention the cosmos, as this movie couldn't be any less significant with its themes in the grand scheme of the cosmos. Actually, that's not true. The fact that they took the time to point out the themes is what is a waste of time. The theme is the whole "getting older, realizing things have changed, yadda yadda." This is literally THE most relevant theme to humankind in many ways, at least in modern society. That also makes it the least relevant when it comes to films. Because I'm still young and I don't need a movie to tell me that becoming an adult is painful on occasion, especially when reflecting on the way things used to be when you were a teenager. Now, if you're going to make a movie about that, make it funny! Make the audience laugh at those things that bother them so deeply. Instead, this film plays like the precursor to movies like Hot Tub Time Machine (easily the most random movie I've ever mentioned on the blog). It deals with the exact same things, but it's also ridiculous and funny. It basically says, "sure the 80s were great but they were also stupid." Whereas this movie says, "boy the 60s was a crazy time. Yeah, so...umm, crazy times. Let's reminisce some more." Of course, if they made it funnier then it wouldn't have gotten nominated. Or maybe it was supposed to be funny and failed miserably. Don't know, don't really care. I will say that the soundtrack is pretty awesome as it's basically the equivalent of a nostalgia playlist. Lots of great songs from the sixties, some from the fifties I think, so at least I enjoyed listening to them. Did the song choices serve any purpose other than to represent a time period? No, and that's a bit of a pet peeve of mine since I prefer song choice to hold more meaning but it actually works here. And it saved me from total boredom so that's nice. Anyway, maybe in 1983 they were trying to pick up viewers of the awards show and nominated some movies people heard of and not necessarily good ones. Let's hope that was the case.

This next one I had never heard of but it features two really incredible performances: The Dresser. This is entirely an acting movie and as such, functions very similarly to a stage play. Maybe it was based on one, I don't feel like checking (I'm lazy with my Wikipedia-ing today). Either way, it's appropriate that it functions this way because it centers around an aging Shakespearean actor and his dresser. His title is "dresser" but he bathes the man, helps him with his lines, and does basically everything for him all hours of the day and every day of the week. Albert Finney (in a performance that should have netted the Oscar) plays the actor and Tom Courtenay plays the dresser (never heard of him, he probably dropped into a depression after neither he nor Albert won the award). I'd like to think that they canceled each other out for the Oscar, because they both did such an incredible job. There was some year back in the 30s or something (which I'll probably get to on the blog sometime this decade) where they had two dudes share an Oscar. Bring it back! Not every year obviously, but sometimes you have special circumstances. In this movie, neither actor carries the show more than the other but their relationship drives the entire film. Finney is past his prime and can barely remember from day to day which show he's doing, let alone his lines. He is completely dependent on his dresser, but near the end of the film we're left with the question of whether he realized this or not. And if he didn't, was it because he was old and crazy or because he was a self-involved jerk? Either way, we're left with two men who have essentially wasted their lives on the theater. Finney was going to be married once but he chose the theater instead, and we can't really tell whether that bothers him or not. Certain scenes would suggest it does. The film leaves this ambiguous as well as his feelings toward the dresser. That's what makes the film so powerful. Because it doesn't matter what the answer is, the fact that there is any question at all is what creates the tragedy. To have to wonder whether or not you've made the right decisions with your life is something we all struggle with. Oh, wait...is that what The Big Chill was trying to do? Too bad it failed. Because this movie has great acting and is well-done. I normally don't go for movies of this scope to be the winner, because it's solely an acting movie and not a directing/screenwriting one. But if we're going solely on enjoyment and overall quality, this was the best of the nominees for me.

Easily in second place is The Right Stuff. Since I've already talked about two movies that are my favorite before getting to the winner, you can just feel that rant coming can't you? Because the winner is pretty terrible. But anyway, this movie is essentially three hours chronicling the saga of space travel from the time of breaking the sound barrier to the manned missions of the early sixties. Now, I've frequently referred to NASA as "a money toilet" and if you've been reading my blog since the beginning, you know how I feel about Pluto's demotion as a planet. And in case you want to get Freudian, yes I do recognize with Pluto's plight since its historical journey can be described as a decades-long "carrot and stick" approach and I have also frequently referred to the universe's treatment of my life as a "carrot and stick" approach. Just thought I'd share that since it may serve to justify my rant. And the reason I say all of that is because I need to justify crapping on NASA while praising a movie about its mission and also while being a person who has seen all 726 episodes of Star Trek (including the terrible animated series). Okay then, let's journey out of my psyche and into the final frontier. This movie exemplifies some themes that I find fascinating as pertaining to many issues, not just space travel. In the beginning of the movie, it has this real "down home American hero" feel to it because the guy breaking the sound barrier was just this ordinary guy from a small town, and it shows it from that small town perspective. Over the course of the film (which I'm happy to say, earns its length) it gradually becomes more of a "bread and circuses" type thing. It's not about human achievement anymore, although it certainly is to some, it's instead about beating the Russians or making for a great TV show. The character of Alan Shore on Boston Legal once referred to all news as "infotainment" and I can't tell you how perfect I think that statement is. This was the era when things were rapidly becoming less about what was actually happening and more about what entertained people. I've personally said on many occasions that the 1960 debate between Kennedy and Nixon was the death of sanity in America, because people came away from it favoring Kennedy not because of how many things they agreed with that he stood for, but because he came off better on TV. Once that happened, that was it for us. And it's the same with anything, why was the moon landing so monumental? Not because it happened but because it was on TV. A man being launched into space and circling the Earth a bunch of times (as we see in the movie) was pretty freaking impressive too, but I doubt many people remember where they were when they first heard about it. Anyway, every aspect of this movie is pretty well-done. Not overly well-done, but very solid. The music is good, good script, you name it. It has too much story to tell to get personal with the characters and thus stops itself from becoming a real classic, but they achieve what they wanted to achieve and they did it very well.

The last movie before the "winner" is one I actually happen to be still watching: Tender Mercies. Not because it's as terrible as those period pieces I blogged during, but because of time constraints. I'm almost done with the 1982 movies and I don't want to fall behind. And yes now I've let time constraints influence art just like those TV producers I hate, but there you go. Let me be clear, this movie isn't period piece bad but it's not very good either. And Robert Duvall stole an Oscar right out of Albert Finney's pocket which is totally not cool. Not that I blame him of course. And he does a fine job in this movie, mind you there's still 20 minutes left. But if you're actually reading that sentence then he didn't have a Mo'nique moment a la Precious which completely changes the game in the final scenes. But this movie pretty much feels like the greatest Hallmark movie of all time (if that can be dream't of in your philosophy). It takes place in the West in a small town, and stars one big star and some ansillary people, and pre-diabeetus Wilford Brimley is in it. What about that doesn't scream "Hallmark movie?" And Duvall's character is a recovering alcoholic country singer who finds redemption in his relationship with a widow? That's like every Hallmark movie put together. Or maybe, every Hallmark movie ever is a complete or partial ripoff of this movie. So basically, this film is either the equivalent of or opposite of Avatar because it either holds the record for ripping off or being ripped off. And yes I just found a way to insult James Cameron amidst a 1983 character study about hillbillies. I've got skills. This is a great example of a movie that does what it sets out to do, I just don't know why anyone cares enough to do it. It has to be based on a real person, either famous or not. And (this just in) he has about two lines of dialogue that I thought were heartfelt and interesting near the end, not enough but not bad. Anyway, if you like Robert Duvall I recommend it. Because at least it's only like an hour and a half, so it's tenderly merciful in that way. Get it? I just used the title of the movie to make a pun! They should hire me to write for Family Guy.

Right then, let us now discuss a winner that's very strange because it's not good and it sits exactly between two outstanding winners in 82 and 84. The movie is Terms of Endearment and if you like it because you're into that sort of thing, fine. If you like it because you think it's an achievement in filmmaking, then we can't be friends. In fact, we must be enemies. I would literally team up with William Hurt and James Cameron and all of my other nemeses to take down whoever decided this movie was worthy of Best Picture. Now, I've complained about winners and nominees before. But at my absolute extreme, and feel free to check, I've never said that a winner is a bad movie. That might be a lie, I might've said that in 87, but that was hyperbole! I've only said a given movie is not deserving of the award, but I've never said it's bad. This movie is bad. It's actually a bad movie. My Pop Culture teachers in high school once described a clever ploy people use in movies of little kids being involved in scenes to give the audience an emotional hook. And my Creative Writing teacher (great scribe that she is) always said that if you kill everybody in the end then it usually means you don't know how to end it. Well this movie doesn't kill everybody, but it's still dumb. It's pretty much like, "let's have a tumultuous relationship between a mother and a daughter, then give the daughter cancer so that the mother can pretend like they didn't dislike each other all these years, then the daughter dies so that the grandson can look like a jerk by mentioning that his mother didn't care about him." What a bunch of crap! Shirley MacLaine won the Oscar for what should've been called, "Best Shrill Old Shrew of an Actress." I will say that she and Debra Winger allegedly hated each other in real life, and so that helps with the scenes where they hate each other. But the only reason a character gets cancer like this in a movie is to provide an emotional hook. Instead of crying, everybody should be saying: "that's why you should've been nicer to her when she wasn't dying!" It should be upsetting and annoying, not emotional. And then Jack Nicholson is stuck in there, for an entertaining superfluous character in the movie. I'd complain, but his scenes were the only good ones. And then after Winger dies, her son says: "you know, mom never came to my baseball games." He then gets smacked by MacLaine (his grandmother) so hard that he falls down and rolls. She then reprimands him for talking ill of his mother, even though she spent the whole movie talking ill of his mother. And is it the kid's fault he was neglected? We're supposed to get mad at a kid because he wasn't loved enough? What a bunch of crap. I will agree with one thing people say about the movie, stuff like this does happen in real life. Bad stuff happens for literally no reason. Well films are supposed to make more of an artistic statement than that. It takes no talent to portray something everyone already knows (and we're dovetailing back to The Big Chill, very Seinfeldian). This is the type of movie that a bunch of women go to see and cry during, and like I said: that's fine if that's what you're into. I like to go watch Stallone violently kill terrorists and mercenaries. But I'd be the first one to complain if one of those movies got nominated for anything other than Sound Editing. I guess I've made my point.

Fear not, 1982 has some better stuff. Great winner, good performances. You'll be happy you sat through all this nonsense. I have one left to watch and then I'll put it up. Thankfully we're nearing the end of the 80s, as there are some movies in the 70s I've been looking to check out for a while and this will be the perfect excuse. But before we get too far ahead, next year will include aliens, crossdressers, and revolutionaries. That's more variety than the rest of the 80s combined so far.

1984: The Year that Alphabetization was My Friend and Mozart Killed Creativity

I really had to reach for the title of this post. Allow me to explain: the movie that won in 1984 was so freaking good that I think they either A) picked the other nominees out of a hat or (more likely) B) chose the four movies of the year that addressed the touchiest social issues. Why did I even separate that into an A and a B? That didn't even deserve the separation and snide hint at the answer. Because it's quite obviously the touchy one. It all worked out pretty well though, because these nominees are legitimately in the exact order of how good they are. I couldn't have planned it better myself, looks like this whole alphabetizing thing is finally paying off. And this is only my...25th post on the Oscars? Wow that's daunting...

Anyway, we start off with yet another Vietnam-era film: The Killing Fields. I say -era because it actually takes place in Cambodia and it's based on a true story and yadda yadda. After a while, one has to ask how many true stories need to be made into movies before people just start reading USA Today. Because if all anyone is going to do is offer a realistic portrayal of things that we've already seen portrayed realistically in slightly different circumstances, I might as well be journeying into National Geographic's heart of darkness. Not to say that the movie is bad exactly, but it has a few fatal flaws. One of the big ones being that it is scored by a synthesizer. And I know I sound like an uppity ponderous bore by saying that, but believe me it makes a difference. I'm not sure how subtle the differences are between various wines, nor do I care in the slightest, but a chimp could tell the difference between music done by a synthesizer and real music. At least, when it's this obvious. Nowadays synthesizers can sound like anything, to the point that Lost was pretty much the last TV show to use a full orchestra (and it showed). But back in 1984, synthesizers were on par with Roger Moore's concurrent efforts as James Bond. That is to say, really bad. So when I'm watching a scene that would've been stirring (and was) in movies like Platoon, instead it all feels like a TV movie with a bigger budget than most. And when the main character is played by Sam Waterston, the whole thing feels like the failed pilot of Law and Order: Cambodia. He does a good job, and he's a good overall actor, but I kept waiting for him to offer a plea bargain to get the prisoners back before giving a long-winded closing. Ah yes, I neglected to mention: the true story is about some journalists who risked their lives to bring the stories of the killing fields in Cambodia to public attention, including a hostage crisis that eventually ensued. It's a heroic story, no doubt about it. And I was certainly moved during the scene where Pran (Sammy's interpreter, also an Oscar-winning role) is reunited with his family. Overall though, the movie doesn't really break any new territory, which is probably why I hadn't heard of it before.

A movie I'd only heard of in passing, and I think in a class, (I say hesitantly, as that all seems so far away now) is A Passage to India. Basically, this is the precursor to Out of Africa. Except it's India instead of Africa, and they're going into it instead of coming out of it. Both movies go on WAY too long for the amount of story that they actually cover and both are entirely overrated. This one not as much, since it didn't win Best Picture (or much of anything really). But still, when I was reading up on it after I watched it today, I saw several write-ups from the time (from legit critics mind you) hailing it as "(director) David Lean's best work." Umm...ever heard of a little movie called Lawrence of Arabia? Which, incidentally, Steven Spielberg called the greatest movie of all time. I wouldn't go that far, but you won't see how far I will go until I get to 1962 (I have strange sentences in my blogs). Anyway, this is by no means his best work. It's not a bad movie, but it doesn't have any of the beautiful scenery that his other films have, or that 1985's winner had (despite its other shortcomings). It's basically an excuse for the British to once again flagellate themselves on screen over all the bad stuff they did. Well you know what? The only thing worse than being imperial douches for hundreds of years is reminding us all about it every time Oscar season rolls around. At least this actually shows things from the point of view of India, so we get that story instead of a bunch of British people going: "remember that time when we ruled the world? Good times." The story actually ends up being fairly tragic when one of the main characters in the movie, an Indian man named Aziz, is wrongfully accused of attempting to rape one of the British women. She ends up taking back all of her claims in court and he is freed, but he essentially rids himself of all things British and doesn't reconcile with her until years later. This was far and away the most interesting part of the story but it didn't really get going until 2 hours in! I wanted more of the bitter Aziz being forced to reconsider his views on life and his relationship with the British. Instead all we get is a bunch of setup, which is fine but when you take it too far then that doesn't work too well. In addition, I either wasn't paying enough attention or they didn't explain enough about why the girl said it was Aziz. These days, either could be true. I also read that most of Alec Guinness' scenes were cut. Who cuts freaking Obi-Wan Kenobi out of a movie? Mr. Lean had clearly lost his touch. Thankfully the composer, Maurice Jarre, lost none of his touch. And although his score isn't nearly as good as his iconic ones of the 60s it's still pretty great and adds a lot to the film. Overall, I wasn't exactly bored during the movie but I wasn't too impressed by it either.

A mercifully shorter film, and a pretty good one, is Places in the Heart. It's what my dad would call a "slice of life" movie. I know this because he told me: "that's what I like to call a 'slice of life' movie." It's mostly remembered for Sally Field's (in?)famously remembered, "you like me! You really, really like me!" speech. Although apparently that's a misquote and she actually said something that didn't quite resemble what a 3rd grade tuba player who won a talent show might say. Interestingly, I thought Danny Glover carried the movie a bit more than she did. She reminded me of a younger version of Miss Daisy, which is apropos since Miss Daisy is essentially the grown up version of women from that area of the country from that time period...but anyway, it takes place during the "dust bowl" era of the Great Depression. This was also done in the book, "The Grapes of Wrath" which is a book I despise enough to rant about somewhat briefly. Question: why is it that the mentally retarded brother in that book was the only one smart enough to suggest they make camp by the river so they could have water and fish to eat? Question: why did a legion of shotgun-wielding rednecks get pushed around by a few yuppies with an orange plantation? Question: why did I spend 3 straight days reading this book? That one I can answer: because it was assigned for summer reading and I procrastinate like a man with a death wish. End of rant. The woman in this movie actually does attempt to hold onto her cotton farm instead of going off West where, "there might be some work, maybe kinda." I say "cotton farm" and not "cotton plantation" because she enlists Danny Glover to help her pick the cotton and that raises some hairy issues...in fact, I'm shocked this movie wasn't criticized. Because even though he's a paid worker, it's still an old white lady getting a black dude to pick cotton for her (just saying). I wouldn't complain about it personally, because their friendship is developed really well and the KKK pop up and get scared off by John Malkovich and a theme of integration runs heavily through the movie without being too blatant. I'm just saying I'm shocked other people didn't complain (they probably did, but unless Wikipedia lists it under "controversy" I have no knowledge of its existence). I will say that this is one of those movies that has a far better ending than perhaps the movie deserved, but it's certainly put together well and enjoyable. I did want Danny Glover to set out picking the cotton and say: "I'm getting too old for this s**t" but they would have had to not only break the 4th wall but also the laws of space/time since Lethal Weapon came out 3 years later. Ah well.

This next one really surprised me with its quality: A Soldier's Story. I say it surprised me because the only time I heard of it before I knew I had to watch it on the escapade was from this guy who thinks that the government is tracking us with our iPods. I'd be the first one to tell you not to trust a lot of government stuff, but I doubt Uncle Sam cares that most of John Williams' canon is on my iPod and that I'm listening to it as I blog about blogging about how Uncle Sam doesn't care. Anyway, despite it being recommended to me by a man who probably thinks Abe Lincoln was a cyborg sent by the Russians, this is a pretty great movie. It features a young Denzel Washington who (unlike freaking Tom Cruise) is just as good whenever you watch him. The man was absurdly talented in 1984 and he still is. He has a fairly minor role in the film, but he steals the show. It centers around a WWII regiment comprised only of black men, and the murder of one of their commanding officers, who also happens to be black. It's told mostly in flashback, and raises interesting social questions without sacrificing story or character. It's based on a stage play, which told me from the beginning it was going to be an acting-driven piece. I've watched this fail miserably a few times in the past months, but this worked really well. And it's only about 100 minutes, a perfect running time! It doesn't waste time or leave you wanting more of certain aspects, it knows exactly what it is and it runs with it. It also doesn't have an "80s feel" to it, which is really good because I detest when something reeks of a decade. I shouldn't be able to tell when a movie was made when I'm watching it. Of course, effects can always be dated and actors I know are always younger, but I mean that the style should exemplify the story and not the decade. This movie does pretty much everything right, and it's easily the second best of the year.

But that still makes it a far cry behind Amadeus. It's been a long time since I watched a movie that good. It's one of my mom's favorite movies of all time, and usually when that happens it's a good movie (actually every time, not to suck up to mom or anything). But whereas I thought that maybe it was only good because it features the music of Mozart, it is an outstanding character study that is well-done on every feasible level. From Tom Hulce's incredibly annoying (and outstanding) portrayal of Mozart to F. Murray Abraham's astoundingly good (and Oscar winning) portrayal of Salieri, this film goes on for 3 hours but every second is incredible. The movie is told from Salieri's point of view, and it shows how he detests Mozart and spends a lifetime trying to best him. Simple plot, delivered brilliantly. Contrary to what I thought going in, Salieri doesn't think Mozart is a bad composer. Nor does he think he is better than Mozart. He knows precisely how good he is, and that's why he hates him. Salieri spent his entire life following the rules of God and the rules of man. Mozart is a drunkard who chases women and laughs like a hyena. And yet God blessed Mozart and not Salieri. This aspect of the movie turns it into an epic telling of the oldest dilemma in the book: "why him? What was it that was so wrong with me?" And yes I stole that line from one of my favorite scenes on Lost, but it fits. Whether it's Cain and Abel, Jacob and Esau, or Superman and Lex Luthor (not a joke): there's always one guy who gets the birthright and the other guy is a schmuck (and it doesn't always turn out how it should). This movie examines the incredibly depressing idea that no matter what Salieri did, he would never be better than Mozart. My favorite scene in the film is when he discovers some of Mozart's sheet music, and he notices that it's the only copy and there are no notes. He wrote it in his mind and then committed it to paper as though it had always existed. Abraham acts the scene entirely with his eyes (though words were spoken I'm sure) and it shows us his life's dilemma in a single moment. That was what made his performance so good: it was understated. You could tell he was holding in a range of emotions, because they leaked out at times. You could feel the emotions coming from him, he didn't have to spell it out. I'm going to go ahead and say that it was probably one of the best performances I've ever seen, not even hyperbolizing. I could go on and on about the film, but I'll finish by saying that its musical score is excellent (obviously, it's Mozart) and it actually deserved all 8 of its Oscars. This was the year that the Academy knew what it was doing, and it caused me to take a two week break from the other movies so I could see them for their own merit, instead of comparing them to this one and watching them fail miserably.

In case you were wondering, I said in my title that Mozart killed creativity because no other movie had a shot at winning and the Academy thus nominated some fairly boring stuff. Good things, but not particularly interesting overall. That's okay, because my experience while watching Amadeus has made the escapade worthwhile (except for the British whining). Let's hope we can carry all that positive energy into 1983 (probably not). I guess we'll see what the year brings us, all I know now is it'll bring 3 hours of people in space that have neither phasers nor blasters (sounds stupid), Joker and Penguin in a movie about pet names, and the return of my one-time nemesis and now reluctant-friend: William Hurt.

1985: The Year that Indiana Jones Put the Moves on a Hot Amish Chick

I'm sorry, I just can't get over that. Not that my scarce experiences with the Amish have led me to believe that they're ugly exactly, but this girl was pretty much right off the runway. I'll get to that point when I get to that movie. Anyway, this was a bit of an odd year. Nothing in it was bad per se. Some just didn't meet expectations or weren't as good as they could've been. Which still beats a year full of crap like I've been sitting through lately. So I can't complain. Although I probably will anyway.

Especially about this film: The Color Purple, which was a bit of a major letdown considering that it was directed by Spielberg. You know, Spielberg reminds me of Shakespeare a little bit. And yeah that's probably one of the more random things I've said and to tell you the truth, I actually find that statement insulting (not sure to which man though). But here's why: as I previously stated WAY long ago in a rant about Billy Shakes, when you read or see his super famous pieces of work like "Macbeth" or "Othello" you see why he's as famous as he is. But then you start to notice that he wrote about 30 more plays than the ones you usually hear about and that those plays aren't too impressive (at least by comparison). Spielberg is the same, he has such an impressive variety of work that he's done that we forget that he also did things like this movie and Amistad (which I haven't seen all the way through but it's not that great from what I've seen). Yet still, I expect a lot from the man because he's probably the most well-known director out there today. And this movie is by no means a bad movie. It just has a few things that drag it down, not all of which are its fault. I'm being very cryptic today...what I mean to say is that Oprah drags the movie down and so does Whoopi Goldberg. It's not the movie's fault that I know them as an annoying talk show host and the goofy center square. Because even if Oprah's show was on back then (don't care enough to check) it certainly wasn't as well-known as it is today. Yet still, she's suppoed to be playing this rebellious woman and I couldn't take her seriously at all. The scenes were supposed to be heroic and dramatic and they played like an SNL sketch. And Whoopi has largely become a caricature of herself. When I was running through the entire run of every Star Trek series, after 30-some episodes that she was in I still had a tough time buying her in the role of the wise bartender Guinan. Because she's just a nut, plain and simple. Does she do a good job in the movie? I honestly couldn't tell you. It would seem to me that she did a pretty good job but who knows? I'll tell you who was good: Danny Glover, stepping out of his usual type of role and playing the abusive husband. He pretty much saved the movie for me, even though he's mostly a supporting character. The film's focus is on Whoopi's character and her letters to the sister that was taken from her long ago. And I will say that even with my issues with the film, the events leading up to their reunion was still really powerful. Even with the sub-par music, which wasn't composed by John Williams! What's up with that? Pretty much every other Spielberg movie in existence is scored by Johnny, and his scores are a large part of why the films are so good. This is literally the only film of his that Williams didn't score, and it shows. The music sounds a bit like his, but not enough. A Williams score wouldn't have fixed the problems with the film, but it would've improved the film greatly.

Now here's a shocker for you, the movie that I thought was going to suck the most in this year turned out to be my favorite: Kiss of the Spider Woman. It sounds like a cheap Tarzan serial, but it's actually an intense character study. The reason I thought it would be terrible is because it stars William Hurt, my new least-favorite person. And he's playing a gay guy, so I thought it'd be 2 hours of Hurt putting on a bad lisp. But he gives a pretty incredible performance in the film, and I think it explains why his other roles are no good. He did such a great job here and rightfully won the Oscar, that people wanted him in everything. Even for roles that didn't fit him, like oh say...every other role I've seen him in lately. But let's be positive about the man, because it's probably our only chance. It's largely a two-man show between his character and Raul Julia's. And yes, his name has accent marks at various places but this website makes it annoying to put them there. So live with it. Anyway, Hurt's character is a gay man in a Brazilian prison for, ermm..."corrupting a young boy" and Julia's character is a political prisoner (a revolutionary against the government). The two form an unlikely respect and fondness for one another but not in a traditional "Buddy Cop" movie way. It's a tough road, and both actors are superb and totally sell the relationship. Though there are many differences between the two characters, one of the most interesting is the manner in which they deal with their imprisonment. Hurt decides to indulge in fantasy by "remembering" a movie, a Nazi propaganda film, and relaying it to his cellmate. There are interesting and subtle parallels between the story of the film-within-a-film and the film itself. That's really the whole movie and I know it sounds obscure, but to say more would ruin the experience. It's an excellent movie that can have its entire plot described in fewer words than I used, but the real substance of the film has to be viewed. I will say that it loses a little bit of steam in the last 15 minutes because it changes the dynamic, but it's an appropriate change so they really only lose you for a few minutes. All in all, it was maybe a little too out there to be a winner that year, but I think it was the best film of the 5 selections. It was also the first independent film to be nominated (and still one of the only I believe). So enjoy this nice William Hurt moment while it lasts. Take a good look, because it's the last time.

This next movie is pretty odd, but I loved it: Prizzi's Honor. I'd never heard of it before, not even in passing, but it's a bit of a gem. It stars Jack Nicholson and Kathleen Turner as a pre-modern Mr. and Mrs. Smith. Well, instead of spies they're mob hitmen but it's the same basic dynamic. They fall for each other and are eventually tasked with killing each other, for reasons that are deliberately convoluted and darkly funny. Which is how you could describe the whole movie. It sort of has a similar tone to Dr. Strangelove in that it's dealing with serious things in a completely not serious, and even mundane, manner. But it's either more blatant than Kubrick's masterpiece or less blatant, I'm not sure which. I'm not sure of a lot of things today, either 1985 was a glitch in the Matrix or I'm losing it. Either way, I'll explain the tone in this way: one of the best scenes is where everyone is sitting around plotting the demise of everyone else and then the head honcho mafia don all of a sudden says, "would you like a cookie?" and holds up a plate full of desserts. It's really not funny, but it's hilarious! He's this griseled old Don Corleone type dude, and he discusses killing people while offering cookies. Disturbing, yet awesome. This pretty much describes the whole movie, which has very little actual killing in it but a lot of dark themes. And I normally don't like to spoil stuff, but this is just too good (you've been warned). Instead of ending the movie where they both kill all the mobsters or they run off to Cabo or they both die, they do, in fact, carry out the hits on one another. She misses him with a gunshot and he hits her in the neck with a knife. So after a whole movie of: "I won't go after her, I love her!" and "he's my whole life, I can't kill him!" they just decided they didn't really care. And the movie ends about 30 seconds after Nicholson kills Turner, and he picks up the phone to ask out the daughter of one of the other mobsters. Maybe I'm disturbed in the head, but I thought that was awesome.

Now here's what I was talking about earlier, the little summer blockbuster that could: Witness. I phrase it that way because it has all the elements of a summer blockbuster: romance with hot girl, shootout, humor, warming of the heart, etc. I feel like some network executive pointed at one of his writers and said, "make me a blockbuster that involves the Amish!" Why do this? Because it hadn't been done I suppose. Wikipedia tells me it came out in February, but whatever. You don't have to come out in summer to be a summer blockbuster, plus in February it's summer in Australia or another such place. Anyway, I really found this movie to be a bit goofy. Not because it was bad, just because of the fact that it was nominated and really that it was made at all. I'm just baffled over how the idea for the film came about. Was somebody at a farmer's market while fantasizing about shooting bad guys? Did somebody with an action hero complex find himself oddly aroused by the Amish woman selling the fresh-squeezed orange juice? Maybe both of those things happened and those two screenwriters got together with another one who thought Harrison Ford was the man (this could describe any worthwhile human being). Whatever its inception stemmed from, the movie is definitely enjoyable. It's about an Amish kid who witnesses (oh snap! title of the movie) a cop getting killed, and so he goes into a makeshift "witness protection" (there it was again!) in his own community with Harrison Ford there to protect him, and flirt with his mom. Who was definitely pretty hot. See now, I guess it was impossible to get actual Amish people to play in this movie, given their beliefs, but a lot of it seems like socialites from the big city decided to move out to the country. The way that they speak and act doesn't really mesh with real Amish people that I've seen or with how they've been portrayed in other films/shows. In fact, there was apparently an uproar in the Amish community concerning their portrayal in the film. What the Amish were doing in a movie theater seeing an R-rated movie, I'm not sure. Anyway, the script for the film won for Best Screenplay (for unknown reasons) and the Netflix description touted it as the template for many modern script-writers to this day. I'm not sure why that is, but maybe that's the problem with my script. It could be I'm missing something that this script has and that's why my script won't fly (my best guess is a topless Amish lady). Okay, I've picked on it enough. It's fun and it's even touching at times, but that's all it is. Maybe they were struggling with the same issues back then as today: lacking viewership of the Oscars. So perhaps they wanted to throw in a popular movie just to get people to watch. I can't say I disagree with that as a business decision, and it's nice to have popular movies nominated sometimes. Too bad they couldn't have carried that mentality over to help Batman out in 2008.

I wish I could say that the reason a popular movie was included was because the winner was so much better than everything else, but I was kind of underwhelmed by this year's winner: Out of Africa. I'm a big fan of long movies, and you can't even say I'm opposed to ones that are romances. Because I thought The English Patient was outstanding and I even like Titanic (even though I have its director on my hit list). But this movie had what I call a "complete lack of surprise." Meaning, absolutely nothing happens in it where I go, "hmm that's interesting." I'm not even talking about plot twists, just interesting developments, or interesting scenes in general. There was maybe one in the whole movie, where they both kill a lion and it kind of increases their attraction to each other. That was moderately interesting, but the rest of the movie just sits there. It's beautifully filmed, there's no question about that. A lot of the scenery was just breathtaking, and the acting was really good, and the music was really good. Basically, the movie was done about as well as it could have possibly been done, but it wasn't drawing from anything that I find to be remotely worth telling. Or at least, anything worth telling for 2 hours and 40 minutes. And also, I really don't think Meryl Streep was a good choice for this movie. She put on a great accent, but she still sounded like Meryl Streep. She's like Jimmy Stewart, he always did a great job in a variety of roles but he still sounded like Jimmy Stewart. Jimmy as a lawyer, Jimmy as a killer, whatever. So Meryl always does a great job, but I always just feel like I'm watching her play someone. I never sit there and forget I'm watching someone act (exception: Sophie's Choice). I can't say as I've seen all of her movies, because I haven't seen a ton, but that's my impression from some of her roles. And let's get blunt for a second: I don't think she was attractive enough for this role. I'm going to try to explain myself without sounding like a complete jerk. Robert Redford is a very handsome man even today, back then he was especially handsome. When he was in the African countryside shooting lions looking all rugged and tough, I was about ready to switch teams and make out with this dude. And the woman who he falls in love with is Meryl Streep? She's not ugly, but she's not particularly good looking either. And there are enough ugly jerks going out with gorgeous and nice women in the world that we don't need that kind of dynamic on film too. Apparently Sydney Pollack had the same thought, and Meryl convinced him she was good-looking enough by showing up to her interview with a low-cut top and a push-up bra. Umm...yeah. If that was the only time he thought she was attractive enough then didn't he stop to think that the whole thing takes place in the early 1900s when such things didn't exist? But I digress (about cleavage of all things). Anyway, aside from that whole dynamic some other stuff doesn't work too. Except...wait, that's the whole movie. It's entirely based on their romance. No side plots, nothing. So it's a really beautifully filmed and well-acted representation of not much. Kinda strange. I feel like it had enough big people involved and wonderful scenery that it probably had its name marked down to win from day one, but if you really look at it I don't think there's much there. My mother told me I'd enjoy it more if I was a middle-aged woman. So umm...yeah...as soon as that happens I'll re-blog it and we'll see where we are.

Well I guess that wasn't too painful, as far as the 80s go. And we're halfway through! It seems like just yesterday that William Hurt was forcing me to contemplate which bridge to jump off of. We turned out to be buddies after all, for 1985 anyway. He's returning in '83 so the rivalry lives on...but before that we've got 1984. Which includes 4 movies I know so little about that I can't think up anything clever to describe them, and a winner which is probably one of the best movies I've ever seen. Enticing!

1986: The Year that Charlie Sheen Had Moral Integrity and...Wait, What?

You heard me. As we go farther back into time Tom Cruise gets more talent, Charlie Sheen gets less douchey, and William Hurt...well he stays bad it seems. When I was a kid we went to these caverns where they had this "ghost" stalactite (or stalagmite, yes I do know which is which but I forget whether this was on the ceiling or the ground) that was pale white and kept popping up throughout the tour. You'd be walking along, enjoying the tour and then WHAM! there it was again. And you thought: "oh sweet! That thing is pretty cool." William Hurt is like that, except he's not cool. Or interesting. He keeps popping up on my escapade and all I can think is: "what moronic casting director thought this man was talented?" Ah well, we'll discuss it later.

Nope. Let's discuss it now. The alphabet demands it, because this year's first offering is Children of a Lesser God. Pretty epic title, right? It conjures up images of feuding demi-gods vying for the affection of their parent, a less-powerful-but-still-well-known god of Greek mythology (like Demeter or Dionysus or someone). Well, it's actually about a dude trying to teach deaf kids how to communicate. Still an epic title though, right? Because it implies the film will carry questions such as, "why are these kids not blessed with hearing? Are they cursed by lineage or is it all just a cosmic joke of nature?" Well, let me clarify: it's actually actually about a dude trying to put the moves on a deaf girl whilst teaching deaf kids to speak. If Chris Nolan had been directing back then, maybe the things I mentioned would've come into play. Instead, we've got yet another freaking romantic drama with the real world's very own child of a lesser god: William Hurt. It starts off as a touching story about a man who finds a way to get through to kids that no one else could communicate with. But it becomes a story about a man who says, in sign language, "hey! You're pretty hot, can I take you out sometime?" To which she responds, "hey! I have issues because I'm deaf. Let's have sex just so I can yell at you because you're not deaf and then we'll have more sex and then we'll split up only to get back together about fifteen minutes later." I'd like to tell you that I'm being obtuse by putting it that way, but my way is probably more entertaining than the movie as a whole (and mercifully shorter). Now, I won't say that I didn't find their romance to be sweet on some level. Because I did. And I won't say that I didn't find the dialogue between them to be interesting and well-acted. Because I did, at least when it was being conveyed by Marlee Matlin. But that's the problem: I'd have much rather had subtitles for her sign language than constant interpretation by William Hurt. I know that sounds rather dumb, and feasibly insensitive (it's tough for me to tell because I spend almost no time worrying about being sensitive to such things). But here's why: her performance is very good, and maybe even deserving of the Oscar she received for it, but when WH translates it in his drawling and boring voice it just becomes annoying. First off, it would make no logical sense for him to be translating her if it were in real life. Secondly, it almost belittles her character and the performance by making it so that we can only understand her through him. And by "almost" I mean "certainly." Right then, let's go back to when I said "it's not that I didn't like (yadda yadda) because I did." I rambled more than I meant to and thus lost my segue, what I was going to say was: "but they spend so much time on the monotony of the back-and-forth canned drama of the romance that both stories lose their effect." On TV, and in films too I suppose, you've got the "A" story and the "B" story. The story with the kids should've been the A story. Then the romance wouldn't have gotten stale, and we would've been able to appreciate WH's character for the good work he was doing instead of constantly seeing him through the lens of "stop wishing I was a hearing person!" So to sum it up: I've seen worse movies, but this feels like another Prince of Tides job to me. And by that I mean: a movie where the studio decided to kill the good part of the story in favor of some box office mojo. I could be completely and utterly wrong about that, but I hope not.

A nice aspect of moving backwards through the Oscars is that I'll be able to enjoy some Woody Allen films, starting with Hannah and Her Sisters. Even though it's the last of his films to be nominated, I'm glad it was the first one I watched because it honestly wasn't a great way for him to bow out of Oscar history. It's an enjoyable film, but only in part. Much like the movie I just rambled about, there's a distinct A and B story and only one of them is good. Thankfully, the time they're allotted is much closer to being equal. One focuses on Michael Caine being a philandering douche (the not good story) and the other focuses on Woody Allen being classic Woody Allen (the awesome story). This dynamic led me to experience what I like to call "The Kim Bauer phenomenon." This is based on the infamous Kim Bauer character from 24. She was known for getting into increasingly-stupid situations on the show until she was finally written out. So the reason she gets one of my phenomenons named after her is that whenever I watched the show and her plotline would start up, I'd pretty much just sit through it and wait for the good stuff to return (like Jack threatening to shove towels down people's throats). That's how I felt here: everytime it'd come back to Michael Caine I pretty much just wasted time on my iPhone, half paying attention, until Woody Allen returned. The film's title refers to the story's three sisters, all of whom are truthfully kinda sketchy. MC is married to one of them and in love with another one. WA divorced one of them and had a horrible date with another one, but decided to rekindle things with the second one eventually. For Woody's storyline, it's very entertaining because he's a hypochondriac and he has misadventures with women and we can enjoy all of these things because of his neurotic delivery. If bad things happen to him: it's funny. Because they happen to him, as though by fate. Whereas when things blow up in Michael's face, I just thought to myself: "wow, you're a jerk. You kinda deserved that one." While this creates an interesting juxtaposition between the two, you're still left with the fact that annoyance by design is still annoying. This was the first Woody Allen film that I've seen the whole way through, but given what I've heard about him I'll probably enjoy all of his films. Because he's a kindred spirit to myself, as is Larry David. We're all dudes trying to be nice but who somehow get crapped on all the time or who end up in ridiculous situations beyond our control. Which is why I'm penning my own movie that's not-so-loosely based on my own life. Look for it in theaters sometime this half-century.

Right then, after all that self-promotion let's humble ourselves (or attempt to) with what my friend Erik would call a "pretty religious flick." When he said that, he was talking about The Boondock Saints (which is why it was funny) but he'd be more accurate by saying it about this film: The Mission. This was one of the select few films on the escapade that I had actually seen before but that I decided to rewatch for a specific reason. In this case, it's because I saw it in 10th grade when I was far more interested in people in movies getting shot than I was in artistry. I still enjoy lots of shooting and stabbing though (of course) but nowadays there needs to be something substantive behind it. Which makes it tough to enjoy some stuff I used to like, sadly. But it also adds an unusual amount of awesome to movies like The Matrix (believe it or not). Anyway, this film is about the spread of Christianity in South America. It's a beautifully-filmed movie with wonderful music and solid acting. I enjoyed and was moved by most of it, but I must say: the ending upset me as a shootout-happy 10th grader and it still upset me this time around. Because through the whole movie you have this interesting relationship between Robert DeNiro and Jeremy Irons, wherein DeNiro is the reformed mercenary and Irons is the compassionate missionary. DeNiro is the more interesting of the two because his character actually gets a journey: from crazed mercenary to reformed man of God. The movie keeps it realistic though, because even though he's come around to the brighter side of things, he's still a bit of a cynic/pragmatist at heart. The relationship reminded me a bit of the "man of science, man of faith" dynamic between Jack and Locke on Lost (although that obviously wasn't around for another 20 years almost). Basically anytime that there are two conflicting philosophies that manifest themselves as characters: I like it. BUT, I don't think they totally pulled it off here. Because DeNiro essentially ends up reverting back to his former line of thinking (in a sense) by leading an attack against the incoming British soldiers (who are looking to destroy the mission for reasons largely lost on me, but they were probably the usual "big bad empire" type things). And Irons decides to stay with his philosophy of non-violence, even going so far as to offer the epitomizing line: "If might is right, then love has no place in the world. It may be so, it may be so. But I don't have the strength to live in a world like that, Rodrigo." As a side note: "epitomizing line" is another one of my fabricated phrases that I use to mean: "a single line that sums up a character perfectly." All of this is well and good but both guys end up dead in the end, along with all of the native people (women and children alike). So there were a few directions they could've gone with this that would've been better: they could've had Irons and DeNiro switch philosophical positions much in the way Jack became the man of faith and Locke became the man of science (or at least lost his faith). That would've made it an interesting character study. Or they could've landed with one philosophy or the other by A) having DeNiro succeed in his attack and show that sometimes pragmatism is the way to go or B) having a cheesy-but-effective scene wherein the emotional church service that Irons leads amidst the attack actually touches the heart of the British general and prevents him from firing. Instead we're left with everyone dying, and maybe they wanted to leave these questions ambiguous, I really don't know. But either way it left a bad taste in my mouth in 10th grade and it did so again a few weeks ago. That being said, up until the end it's a very good movie and the musical score is hauntingly beautiful.

And on that note, let's get dark with this junk. I don't have the strength to deal with two nemeses at once. See like, Batman can fight the Joker and he can fight the Riddler. But if they collaborated it'd be a nightmare because J is an unpredictable psycho and R is a methodical narcissist. Well, I'm knee-deep in my fight against William Hurt and what should rear its ugly head? The British period piece. My old enemy lives again, and I wasn't prepared. This time it's in the form of A Room With a View. I'll be honest with you, I hardly even attempted to watch this movie. Because if the period pieces with Anthony Hopkins were bad enough, the ones without him must really suck. And at least Emma Thompson is moderately attractive but this film stars Helena Bonham-Carter, a woman who has logically made a career out of playing witches and women who bake people into pies. And her love interest is Daniel Day-Lewis. Now, I love that dude. But he didn't have much to do here. I also kept thinking to myself that maybe their future pieces of work would collide and he'd start to say, "my spoon reaches across the room and into your meat pie and I. Eat. Youuuuuuuur Meat Pie. I eat it up!" That would've been freaking awesome, even though it would only be possible in my mind or on Star Trek. So then, what is this movie about? Some girl who wants to marry some dude but she can't because society says she can't. WHO FREAKING CARES. That's what literally all of these movies are about, and all I want to say during them is: "if you British folk are so ashamed of your uppity past then maybe you should move on and make movies about other stuff." Much like I mentioned before: they used to run the world and now they don't. We get it. They used to be slave-trading, sexist, imperialist jerks. We get it. That's why we tossed the tea overboard, you don't need to keep apologizing by making crap movies that go on entirely too long. And there must be more than just five British actors, but you wouldn't know it since the same few people show up in all of these movies. Maggie Smith? Check. Judi Dench? Check. Hugh Grant? Sadly not check, he was probably my age back then. Point being: I'm not a spoiler type dude so I never look far ahead into what the escapade holds for me, but this better be the dying breath of this genre. Because 1985 has more William Hurt and I'm weary.

And "weary" is the unintentionally-perfect word to describe this year's winner: Platoon. I usually complain about Oliver Stone all over the place, I'm sure you've noticed. Well, this is the Vietnam movie that he did correctly. He just tells a story and lets you draw your own conclusions instead of having Tom Cruise ride around on his wheel-clad soapbox for several hours (that was mean). This film also centers on conflicting philosophies, there's Tom Berenger who is the man who has kind of lost his mind in Vietnam and takes the violence too far sometimes. Then there's Willem Dafoe, who is a bit more compassionate, especially as pertaining to the intentional killing of an innocent at one point in the movie. This leads to a rift in the platoon and people start picking sides. Charlie Sheen plays the everyman in this movie, the dude who is kind of stuck in the middle. He represents the hundreds of thousands of soldiers who had to live through Vietnam (or die through it) while people like Berenger and Dafoe bickered about how to run things. Because even though Berenger is obviously the villain, the underlying point is that Vietnam's problem was lack of solidarity with regards to planning. You're either all in or you're not in at all. Being "kinda in" gets you nowhere. But none of this is shoved in your face exactly, you figure it out as you watch it. Or even if you don't, it's a highly-atmospheric movie that depicts the jungles of Vietnam as a frightening and Hellish landscape. You can watch it and simply appreciate it on the level of filmmaking. There are some well-done battle scenes as well as some stirring and emotional vignettes. It depicts Vietnam about as accurately as any of the movies I've seen. Although it's not my favorite Vietnam movie (which I will get the opportunity to discuss a few blog posts down the road) it's probably the most realistic. Because it's also the only one that takes place entirely in the jungle. It starts there and ends there without flashbacks, prologues, or codas. Past lives don't matter, future lives don't either. It's just the soldiers and the jungle. And that's what makes it so good because the jungle was the only reality that the soldiers had, and only within that mindset can we even begin to understand the frame of reference from which they were forced to make every decision. The term "gray area" doesn't even begin to cover it. Although, like I said, Berenger is definitely the bad guy and it feels really good when Charlie machine guns him to death. That's right: as my title implies, Charlie was the good guy here. Heidi Fleiss must've really warped that dude's brain.

Well this year was pretty good, as far as the 80s go. I've been writing this during a tough-to-sit-through 1985 offering, so I'm not sure how well the next year will turn out. There's more WH, and hopefully I'll think of something funny that those two letters can stand for instead by then. But until that time comes, all I know is that the next year will include a National Geographic/chick flick lovechild, a Spielberg movie with music not by John Williams (what's the point?), and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Mennonite Mamacita.

My 5 Favorite Heroes Ever: Volume 3

It occurs to me that exactly 2 of the heroes on my list are actually "heroic." The rest of them are just characters I find fascinating. But this is one who is, in fact, heroic. He's pretty much the epitome of heroism, especially in America. Not just here, everyone around the world knows his name and knows what he stands for. And where is he on my list? Number 3...so that shows you the extent to which my mind is distorted (or the extent to which I know more than everybody about dorkdom). In fact, many would be shocked that he's on the list at all, given my taste for dark characters. And by "many" I mean "the three or so people who read this who are representative of the large amount of people who would also be shocked if they read it." But enough of this French falderal, I'm of course talking about...

3. Superman from...well, Superman. And many other films, shows, and of course comic books. Though the character is traditionally thought of (not inaccurately) as the boy scout who's too much of a wimp to really get the job done without some help from Deus Ex Machina. But this is what makes him interesting, and that's why I put him on the list. Because, much like my movie reviews, I'll end up talking about a bunch of interesting stuff that doesn't exactly relate to the initial subject matter. But you'll still be entertained though, I promise.

Let me begin by saying that I don't think they've ever made "the" Superman movie. Nor do I think there's been a definitive actor who has played him in the same way that we have the ultimate Batman with Christian Bale or Wolverine with Hugh Jackman. I think the actors who have portrayed Superman have all been good, but I'm not sure they completely get the character. Because in many ways, Superman is the most human of all of us. His heroism doesn't stem from his extraordinary powers, it stems from his farmboy upbringing. Think about it: almost no human being (I say almost because I'm keeping people like Mother Teresa in mind) would use Superman's abilities for purely benevolent purposes. Even the best of us would eventually start to descend, a little bit at a time, until we abused those powers. For instance, in Superman Returns Lois is raising a child with another man. And Superman suffers in silence. Sure, he tries to win her back in a quasi-romantic fashion but he mostly just kind of hangs back out of respect for Lois and her son. When I saw the film, the incredibly annoying guy in back of me said, "come on Supes! Just fry that dude and get your girl back!" I was, of course, infuriated at the time but you know what? That's probably exactly what I'd do if I was Superman. If I came back from a long journey to find that the love of my life had shacked up with some other dude, I'd want to kill the guy! So would most people, women and men alike. Most murders on TV and in real life are influenced by relationships gone wrong. So if you're an all-powerful being who can't be locked in a prison (stop thinking about kryptonite, I'll address that in the next paragraph) and can't be killed very easily, why wouldn't you fry the guy? It's no wonder Lex Luthor wants to destroy the guy, he's dangerous! He is a legitimate threat to Earth.

BUT we need him too much. And here's where the idea becomes truly interesting of how much power Superman really has. The existence of Superman is like a drug for the masses. Once he's there, you can't go on without him. In the abysmally horrifying Superman IV, Superman hurls all of the world's nuclear weapons into the sun. Which is a bit preachy within the context of the film, because if it was that easy in real life then it would've been done already. But within the world of Superman, it is that easy. And so if you have a person who can save you from almost any danger, wouldn't you go to any lengths to see that he still wants you around? To see that he's happy and has his way? So even though you could feasibly shoot him with a kryptonite bullet or keep him in a room lit by a red sun, why would you? Tomorrow there could be an asteroid hurtling towards Earth or a volcano erupting onto a small village or a frigging giant ant attack (remember, we're in the world of comics). And you know who's not going to help you anymore? Our man, the last son of Krypton. Because you locked him up for frying some douche that stole his girlfriend. Because he's so vitally important to the safety of Earth, Superman is quite literally a god among men. And this means that if he wanted to, he could get away with whatever he wants whenever he wants to do it. If Batman or Spider-Man start getting a little out of control, they can be cast out. Sure, they help the crime problem. But only on a small scale (like, one city at a time small). And with big things they're really no use at all. Train hurtling off a cliff and towards its doom? Forget it. Nuclear weapon launched by a mad scientist straight into the heart of San Diego? Yeah try tossing a batarang at that, see how it works out. No one worships the ground Batman walks on more than I do, but he is only human and he has limits. Superman is the savior of Earth, and Earth could never do without him after he started donning the cape.

But he doesn't do any of that. If the government locked him up, tortured him, and killed his dog Krypto, he'd still go out and save the planet a minute later. Even if in his heart of hearts he thinks humanity is worthless overall (for the record that's not what he thinks), he'll keep doing what he's doing because he knows there are good people out there like his parents and Jimmy Olsen. He knows he could never forgive himself for letting a tragedy occur, no matter the personal cost to himself. And he knows precisely how drunk on power he could become and that's why he stays restrained. He'll never take a life, he'll never hesitate to do anything he can to save a life. THAT is what makes him Earth's greatest hero, not what he can do but what he stops himself from doing. If his powers disappeared due to sunspots or solar flares or whatever sci-fi nonsense they came up with, and he had the opportunity to save someone from muggers (this time at actual physical risk to himself) I can guarantee he would. Because he's all heart (this is his actual weakness, which I'll discuss in the next paragraph). But let's put a dark twist on this, since it is me writing it. Superman was initially created as a representation of an immigrant who comes to America looking to do his best and fit in with the new society. He's come to represent more than that since his first appearance in 1938, but that's essentially still the core of his character. No matter how long he wears the glasses and pretends to be one of us, he's not. He might believe he's one of us sometimes, but he's really a strange visitor from another planet. He wants to be accepted as a human being because there are no more of his own people, and if we don't accept him then he'll be all alone. Even if he doesn't consciously think about it, in his mind I think he believes that if he didn't go out and put his best foot forward at all times then no one would care about him. There are probably plenty of days where he doesn't feel like going and saving a falling plane. And stopping bank robberies gets really old after a while, I'm sure. But I'm going to slightly contradict what I said before and add that in a moment of crisis humanity will always turn to him, when they need him most, but in the inbetween time they would most certainly turn their backs on him if he even screwed up once. That's part of the tragedy: he might not be incorrect in his assumption that if he didn't put his best foot forward at all times he'd be cast out. Because public opinion is very fickle, especially when literally everyone knows you. And so once he decided that he was going to be a nice guy all the time, he's stuck for life. Everybody loves a villain who's turned good again, and they can get away with any amount of being nice because anything is better than the way they were before. But if you start out nice then that's all you can ever be. So it's a heavy burden that Superman must bear, because he has to live with the knowledge that he could take full advantage of his powers at any time but then he'd lose the one thing that's important to him: acceptance.

And herein lies his true weakness. No it's not really kryptonite, which was invented on the radio show so that the regular voice actor could have a week off by the way (they brought in some other guy to cough and moan because Superman was "injured" and didn't sound like himself). People aren't brought down by physical weaknesses, they're brought down by emotional ones. Superman is smart enough to avoid being in any serious danger with the few physical weaknesses he has but his emotions often compromise him. Dealing with high-danger situations often involves a lot of gray area, and Superman does not exist in gray area whatsoever. That's not too good. Because in real life, magical solutions never present themselves where everybody wins in the unwinnable situation. I won't completely dork out on you and provide actual examples, but Superman's inability to be a pragmatist along the lines of my last hero, Captain Kirk, has gotten him into trouble on several occasions. He is so driven by his heart, that his mind often gets no say in the matter whatsoever. When he does the whole "reverse the planet and make everything right again" thing in the first movie, that makes me mad. Because A) it's a bit ridiculous even for that genre and B) it completely removes him from having to make tough decisions. I'm not saying I want Lois to die, but Superman is ripped apart by the fact that he can't save everyone. As was written in one of my favorite comics about him: "sometimes faster than a speeding bullet isn't fast enough." I love that, because Superman has to live with the knowledge that he can save more people than anyone else alive, but that's still not enough. Imagine being the greatest hero the world has ever known and yet still punishing yourself internally because you failed to save one person. This is why Superman's greatest weakness is his own heart, because that's no way to live. Although I suppose that's what makes him who he is. If he wasn't always striving for the impossible then he would get tired of saving people all the time. But somehow, he always gets up and does it time and again.

So there you go, Superman turned out to be a bit tragic after all didn't he? Those who are expected to do great things always have to suffer I suppose, especially in fiction. But no one does it in a more positive way and with more optimism than our buddy Kal-El. So even though he's a boy scout, I think we could all do to be a bit more like him. He's not as interesting or as complex as my top 2 heroes, but it's tough to beat him in terms of actually being heroic. Speaking as a man who tries to follow the rules and be a nice guy, it comforts me to think that though nice guys get a lot of crap in return, it's worth it for the positive impact it can have on the lives of others. And I'm not sure I'd feel that way at all if I hadn't grown up watching Superman go out and help people, even if he'd rather be doing anything else.

My 5 Favorite Heroes Ever: Volume 2

Might as well just crank out a bunch of these since I have the time. And it's not like I have to sit down and think hard about who my favorite heroes are, because I model myself after them every day of my life. Or I at least strive to annoy people with quotes from their movies and TV shows as often as possible. In case I forgot to mention it, the whole reason for writing about all of this in the first place is to respond to an article I read about the best heroes and villains ever and how I thought the list was crap. But then again people might think my list is crap (if they're dumb). True, there's a lot of childhood-induced hero worship going on here, but that's unavoidable. Oddly enough, today's hero I'll be mentioning didn't actually become a part of my life until early 2008.

4. Captain Kirk from Star Trek. You're probably all shocked that I haven't been a fan for longer than that. Well, I watched Voyager for the last few seasons with my mom when I was a kid, and I saw The Wrath of Khan with my dad when I was in my early teens, but I never really experienced the whole franchise. Until I was incredibly bored in early 2008 and decided that I needed 726 episodes, spanning 5 series and 28 seasons to watch. It all went by pretty quickly actually, except for the Animated Series which is horrible. Something that will shock you even more is that none of my top heroes are from Star Wars. Which is odd because that's the film series I watch when I'm depressed, sick, or once a year just for fun anyway. It's true magic, its music is what engrossed me in the world of film scores. And as you know, it birthed my number 1 favorite villain of all time. All the characters are mostly there for fun though, and they're iconic and they're amazing and if this was a list of 10 one or two would make it on here. But we're being objective here (or trying to be) so now I'm done with my exposition and here we go.

Captain Kirk is the ultimate pragmatist. Over time, Shatner has gotten a lot of crap from people for his portrayal of Kirk. These are mostly based on the film performances, which are way different from the show. This also comes from the same school of thought that coined the term "red shirts" and said Kirk was a big time womanizer, well I've seen the original series twice and there's really not much of either. But what there's a bunch of is pragmatism. Meaning: practicality no matter what that entails. I've seen Kirk lie, detonate, and vaporize in order to secure the safety of his crew. People usually point to Picard as the ultimate captain, but he's more of a diplomat. He'd send Riker to do his dirty work, and Riker is kind of a tool. Kirk is the amalgamation of both emotion and logic. Spock provides him with a logical course of action and Dr. McCoy gives him an emotional response. Sometimes he listens to one, and sometimes the other. Just as we all must contend with the battle between heart and head in every aspect of our lives. This conflict was dealt with in one of my favorite episodes, which was written by Twilight Zone writer and sci-fi legend Richard Matheson, entitled "The Enemy Within." And in case you were wondering, no I didn't have to look up the title and yes I am a huge dork. I'm not a Trekky though, they make costumes and speak Klingon, I'm a Trekker which means I'm far enough in to watch it all but I haven't fully immersed myself yet. Anyway, the episode in question split Captain Kirk into two people, each one focusing on a different side of his personality. One of them was a no-nonsense man almost to the point of being evil. The other one was pretty much a hippie wimp. Neither would be an effective captain, because sometimes Kirk's heart is what causes him to keep striving to save his crew or an indigenous people but when he's facing a ruthless enemy his brain has to take over.

Since the show aired in the 60s, it's true that Kirk rarely (if ever) made a mistake and so he's perhaps not as flawed as he would've been today. That being said, he was a kind of role model back then and he frequently lied to have his way. Not malicious gossip about all those scantily clad ensigns wandering around the ship, just misdirection. You know, the kind that's actually useful in life. Kirk reminds us that sometimes we need to bend the rules in order to get the job done. And not in the over-used Steven Seagal "bend the rules" kind of way. Kirk doesn't bend the rules because he enjoys it (well, maybe a little) he bends them when it's the best course of action to do so. In another episode I didn't have to look up online entitled "The Corbomite Maneuver" the Enterprise is about to be destroyed by some alien sphere that is being piloted by what turns out to be a baby with the voice of a man (don't ask). The important part of the episode though, is how Kirk completely invents a material called "corbomite," which allegedly makes up a big part of the ship and explodes on impact, so it'll destroy any attacking ships at the same time. There's enough jargon on the show that the audience would be buying this too if the rest of the crew wasn't looking at each other and thinking, "what the hell is he talking about?" It of course worked and the day was saved, blah blah blah. But there are plenty of other characters (Picard included) who would never have pulled a stunt like that. Because they don't want to give their superiors a bad name, they don't want to become as bad as their enemies, etc. Kirk could care less about arbitrary labels like that. And that's exactly what they are: arbitrary. If you choose to think of yourself as being as bad as your enemies for using a similar tactic, then that's your own perception. Kirk is on a mission of diplomacy, yes. But remember: he's going where no man has gone before. Who knows what's out there? Some friendly species, to be sure. However, if 28 seasons taught us anything it's that a large number of the species out there are either enemies in general or need help from their own enemies. There's some scary crap out there. And you can choose to hold on to the morals which work fine in your particular branch of the universe, or you can choose to adapt and ensure your survival. I've seen Kirk flat out murder members of another species (even if it's not played quite that seriously). I've seen him give weapons to locals and take sides in a war. He's blown up entire starships full of another species, none of whom were "evil" exactly and not all of whom were even hostile.

Given my descriptions, most would say that my #5 hero is pretty heroic and my #4 isn't. Well, consider this: for little orc children that grow up in Mordor and are raised from day one to be warriors against the world of men, Samwise Gamgee probably isn't too high on the heroes list. This is why I think we can't entirely base our ideas of what a "hero" is on just their actions. Because sometimes heroic or admirable actions are often stupid and morally questionable actions are the most logical course of action. For instance, in real life when Sir Thomas More refused to give King Henry VIII a divorce, that was admirable. But since our poor lad Thomas got his head lopped off and Henry ended up with a divorce anyway, it wasn't the smartest course of action (speaking outside of moral parameters, naturally). On the flipside of this is an occurrence within one of the most famous episodes of the original series: "The City on the Edge of Forever." The plot is basically that Kirk, Spock, and McCoy end up back in the 1930s (or maybe it was the 20s, since I don't remember there might be hope for me yet) and Kirk falls in love with a woman who helps the homeless. Through some sci-fi cockamame, they find out that this woman eventually became a diplomat and was able to stop Hitler from attacking Poland. Though this may seem extraordinary, it caused a chain reaction that eventually led to an even greater World War, the non-existence of Starfleet, and lots of other bad things. Initially, she had been hit by a car and killed before any of this could happen. And so Kirk must make the inevitable choice of whether to save her or not. He chooses to let history take its course because in order for many to live, she had to die (don't make me quote Khan at you to complete that sentiment). Most TV writers would have come up with some third choice whereby they would've transported her to the future, or left a crew member behind to ensure she didn't become a diplomat, or some other easily fixed crap which would've been completely uninteresting. Instead, viewers were given a far more interesting lesson in real life. Sometimes there is no "right" choice. Kirk understood that, but he never said anything about it. He simply remarked on their return to their own time that they should "get the hell out of here" which was an unusually blunt and cold thing for him to say. Outstanding stuff, from a viewpoint of fiction. And thought-provoking from a viewpoint of philosophy.

And that's something else a great character does: they make you think. Kirk was the only person to pass the "unpassable test" in Starfleet Academy, how did he do it? He cheated. But in real life the only rules are the laws of what's physically possible and what isn't. He said he didn't believe in unwinnable situations, and so he gave himself the advantage. Does that mean it's okay to cheat all the time? Obviously not, it just means to keep your options open. And this brings me to a large part of how I define "hero." It's not just measured by the inherent implications of acts themselves, but the motivation behind them. If you have a character who will lie, cheat, and wisecrack in order to save the crew that he loves dearly, I'd say that's pretty heroic. There are exceptions of course, as there are things that are wrong in any circumstance, but I think overall we can say that the people we admire are the people who "go to the mats for us." We like when people bend the rules because it means they care more about us than they do about societal norms. And I can guarantee you that if Captain Kirk has known you for his entire life or for a few minutes, he'd lay his reputation or his life on the line to help you out.