Suiting up to fight (day 242)

Is it a coincidence that there's been a few movies about vigilantes lately?  Movies like Defendor and Kick-Ass that have flawed real-life superheroes take the restoration of justice into their own hands? Defendor was bittersweet.  The superhero, a little slow but honest, was looking for Captain Industry.    Kick-Ass I think was supposed to be funny but it left me feeling uncomfortable.  The portrayal of a killer young kid (9 or 10?) was a natural progression of other violent movies we see but I don't think it's a progression we should be proud of.  Surely there is a better role model for young girls between that and Britney Spears. What I did like about the movie was the fact that the superheroes found and created each other.

Someone taking justice into their own hands is a familiar theme in movies but what I'm seeing is the bringing down of the hero to the level of the every day person.  I wonder if this is a response to latent anger in the population.  Even the term Robin Hood tax being bandied about lately is interesting in that respect.  The vigilante movies are still using very personal motivations for the superheroes so maybe I'm reading too much into them.  Is there a point at which the clumsy everyday hero decides to take on more than 'bad guys'?  Maybe the superhero trope is just an extension of individualism and it never amounts to much.  We'll have to see where it goes.

Here's a game based on the flawed superhero theme (via pardenarden).

A song for this post.

Life is a battlefield (day 180)

I saw the movie The Hurt Locker last night.  I'm not sure what I think about it.  I experienced a kind of boredom and confusion throughout, like it wasn't fitting into any trope I was expecting except maybe a video game.  No soundtrack makes it deadpan.  Camera manipulation is slightly reminiscent of a home movie.  No story arc aside from the guy who's afraid to die and indirectly involves an unprepared officer in a dangerous situation.  The thread is a macho bomb diffuser who can't get enough.

I know I'm supposed to like it because it's directed by a woman and for a war film that's doubly amazing.  But honestly I didn't feel it.  If I'd had to guess I would have said 'directed by a man'.  I know I'm supposed to like it because it's a different kind of war film that is more 'real'.  I agree that it's different.  I'm not sure it's more real.  We are still only shown Americans doing their jobs.  I agree that it doesn't glorify war in the same way but in the end, the macho dude goes back to war because it's the only thing he loves.  I guess that ending is easier because he's a bomb diffuser, not just another soldier asked to kill or be killed. Before he goes back to war we are shown the comparison between choosing cereal in a large fluorescent-lit mostly empty supermarket, and diffusing a bomb.  Yes life is mundane sometimes but seriously, choosing cereal is not representative.  Then we are shown his son and the implication in the monologue is that he does not love him.  Yet the admission doesn't even seem callous because the baby is not of talking age yet, and the soldier shows almost no emotion.  The last shot of him returning to war again reminds me of a video game.

There is seemingly no value judgment about the war itself.  I would argue that making no value judgment leaves it to the default of the war film genre -- war is necessary and aren't our soldiers brave.  The fact that war is incredibly traumatic for all soldiers in the field has never been in question.  I don't think we need a film to bring that fact home.  What we need is a film that makes us think about why it's ok for a country to ask its countrymen to get a gun, put themselves at risk, and potentially kill someone.  In any other situation, killing results in life in prison.  So yes there is a big difference between regular life and war, but it's not found in the grocery aisle. 

A song for this post.

Wild things (day 58)

"Mommy that was a sad movie".  That's what a little boy said at at the closing credits of Where The Wild Things Are.  He repeated it, looking for confirmation.  I didn't hear what his mom said but I imagine she didn't say "that's just real life, Sam".   But, just as Max realized in the movie, that's exactly what it might have been.  It wasn't sad in a tragic way, it was just sad in a regular disillusioned way.   What did surprise me is the slightly psychotic character of Carol.  He was a mixture of paranoid schizophrenic and bipolar.  The line "he doesn't mean to be that way, he's just scared" is a little too close to an excuse you give for someone's abusive behaviour.  The character of KW was good but it was never clear why she wanted out except to get away from psychotic Carol.  She was the most grounded of them all even though she had her own escapes (shooting owls out of the sky?!?).   I guess in the end I have to agree with the little boy.  The movie was sad.   It was sad because everyone was looking elsewhere for happiness.  To the king, the owls, the boat, the utopic city, the dirt clump war.  No one gets happy in the end but they are one failure closer to getting there maybe.

I never read the book.  I wasn't even aware of the book as I was growing up.  Perhaps because I grew up in Quebec?  Perhaps it wasn't translated?  I wonder how close the movie is to the book or the spirit of it anyway.  It's got me curious. 

A song for this post.