Black Adam

D.C's Black Adam takes a turn for the ruthless as opposing extremists seek absolute victory, the feuding opponents having been unable to forgive for thousands of acrimonious rage-fuelled years.

The lack of concern for human life malevolently maintained by characters within, sets a maniacal distressing precedent not often seen in fantasy-adventures.

Of course they're countered by caring individuals definitively dedicated to preserving life, who don't calculate with vicious reckoning absolutely composed through righteous might.

When both sides in an age old conflict that sees no prospect of ending soon, view their adversaries with reckless contempt there's no way out of the malignant cycle.

Without leadership willing to withstand the bitter force of paralyzing prejudice, on both sides, the peaceful populace just trying to live has no laidback recourse to cultural stability.

Most people that I've met aren't irate belligerent militaristic madmen, they'd rather live a productive life in prosperous peace with their friends and families.

A stable economy, routine work, a dependable living to support domestic endeavours, aren't these things much more valuable than obsessed hatred and compulsive chaos?

You only have to momentarily consider something as wholesome as a community park, and the far-sighted caring commendable people who preferred such an idea to sequestered solace. 

Is the park not freely available to everyone, regardless of race or religion?

It would be cool if far-sighted knowledgeable politicians kept track of radical war mongers, the people advocating for the spread of war, using words like "natural" and "inevitable".

They could keep a list of these people and should a horrendous day come when war actually broke out, ensure that they're sent to the front lines for the entire conflict, where they'd be given plenty of opportunity to prove their mettle. 

Life's the most valuable asset we have after the choice is made to have a family, and real men and women opposed to wars and conflicts know the value of peace and stability.

They know it's a much more divine conception of honour to peacefully and compassionately love friends and family, to uphold traditions and seek continuity within playful reason generation after generation.

The love of good food, a glass of wine, the reliable networks that cultivate consistency.

Why listen to politicians who would challenge that?

To profit people who have nothing but contempt for you?

Superman shows up during the credits so there may be hope for the sequel.

But the Rock is too influential a star.

And I didn't like his character's contempt for life.

The Lost City

A famous adventure/romance novelist (Sandra Bullock as Loretta Sage) begins to question her professional identity, when the launch of her latest book fails to inspire commercial motivation.

She's done it so many times that the book tour and associated hoopla, seem too superficial to sincerely entertain even though her adoring fans can't wait.

She's jealous of the easy going male model (Channing Tatum as Alan) who adorns the covers of her texts as well, he loves the media sensation, this doesn't evince discerning pageantry.

After she turns the anticipated launch into a dire ill-fated farce, she seeks in vain for heartfelt felicity, before a covetous mean-spirited billionaire (Daniel Radcliffe as Abigail Fairfax) suddenly has her kidnapped. 

She's flown to a tropical island and tasked with locating enticing treasure, local Natives imploring them to leave it alone, the alarming obsession metastasizing madness.

Alan soon follows along with an Indiana Jones/James Bond type rescuer (Brad Pitt as Jack Trainer). 

Ill-prepared for the ensuing task force.

Still improvising with resonant throng. 

The Lost City embraces traditional stately oft criticized tropes and accessories, yet effectively makes the age old adventurous point, that its principal goal is to just entertain. 

Therefore, I had to ask myself, am I genuinely enjoying this film?, beyond multivariable criteria, and I had to admit, I was.

I was lightheartedly reminded that novel bizarre stylistic independence, and counterintuitive literary jigsaw, don't imaginatively motivate some, who are more concerned with intuitive fun.

I suppose a lot of the time it isn't the mischievous wordplay, but just hot bods and romantic adventure that make people interested in watching films.

I also suppose it isn't the goal of many to only enhance the authentic aura, of low-budget brainiac films perhaps one day destined for whimsical cult status (it doesn't make any sense!).

The pandemic's cut me off from theatres and my lifestyle changed as time moved on, and I found for the first time in over a decade I had what is known as free time.

I love the free time I have to just to sit back and listen to music.

But movies are meant to be seen on screen.

The direct experience deconstructing cynicism.  

*Loved the Raiders/Terminator pastiche near the end.

Planet of the Apes

Explorers sleep quietly slumber for millennia while swiftly passing through space, bravely uncertain as to where they might eventually end up, adventurous and daring, expeditionary finesse, they dream civilization incarnate, and sedately persevere. 

Crashing suddenly in a lake roughly 2,000 years after their departure, they have just enough time to escape, boldly paddling unencumbered to the surrounding desert shores, with enough food and water to last three days, and the pioneering spirit to endure and then some.

They trek for quite some time until enthusiastically finding life, a single plant unassumingly declaring the probability of others.

Vegetation is soon abundant and fresh water readily available, they soon jump in to freely bathe, before encountering a disturbance.

Their clothes are gone they wildly dash to catch the entities who stole them, only to discover a race of humans rather primitive and mute.

The humans are raiding crops but from whom remains undetermined, until furious apes lithely riding horseback appear with nets and horns and rifles.

Suddenly shocked and separated the startled travellers quickly flee, one shot in the neck with a non-life threatening wound then brought to a nearby village. 

He can't talk and he swiftly learns that on his newfound world people surge and struggle.

But there are other forms of communication.

To employ before regaining speech.

I can't discuss how this film ends because I'd rather not spoil the fun, it was one of my favourite cinematic surprises in my youth, and I'd hate to spoil the ending for others.

Not that hundreds of people will be madly rushing to see a Planet of the Apes film from 1968 anytime soon, when several new ones have recently been released, nevertheless, it's worth checking out if you haven't seen it (and somehow never heard what happens in the end).

Simultaneously, the film's far off agrarian inhospitable planet includes parts that been devastated by war, and as I've mentioned before,  after choosing this film at random one evening when I was perhaps 10, it seemed like nuclear war would no doubt be an impossibility on our world, if wiser heads historically prevailed.

Which is another reason this war in Ukraine is so horrifically devastating.

If a country's leader is threatening to use nuclear weapons, how does that leader still have a country to lead?, why hasn't he been arrested?, and why is that country still a member of the United Nations?

Baffling.

Perhaps stranger things have happened.

But certainly not within my lifetime. 

The Dig

A forthright curious widow seeks to investigate ancient mounds, their presence a striking imaginative catalyst radiating mystery and fascination (Carey Mulligan as Edith Pretty).

A sturdy local excavator well-versed in trowel and spade, is eagerly sought after to conduct the dig personally (Ralph Fiennes as Basil Brown). 

He's archaeologically acclimatized and has learned his trade at home in the field, years of thoughtful constructive labour cultivating multivariable know-how.

He patiently sets to work unaware of what he'll find, it must be exciting to take part in such projects, blind trust generating vision.

He finds something.

It's big. It attracts the attention of the British Museum. Soon his modest dig is a going concern fraught with picturesque potential and rapscallion regard.

Interpersonal dynamics hedge various particular outcomes, love and romance intermingling, along with questions of birth and status.

World War II looms on the horizon with haunting chaotic disregard, members of the dig to be called up, others embracing resignéd sorrow.

It was Basil's work that discovered the treasure yet the upper echelons do not approve, since he's self-taught and lacks social standing, that hasn't been passed down through the haughty ages. 

A solemn film intriguingly attired humble examinations of quote and culture, feminine strength and adroit awareness revealing august historical resolve.

The entrepreneur can attain recognition as his or her sales demonstratively increase, even if they built their business from nothing and had no contacts moving things along (many thanks to the people who like reading me blogs).

Perhaps after they've become established and their determined workforce starts creating new ideas, the CEO or the president may take credit for their marketability.

But in Basil's case (not mine, I'm not playing some metaphorical game, perhaps there are some people who like my writing, that's cool, I'll continue doin' my best within a limited time frame), he was often associated with an institution, who at the time, from what I gather from the film, gave credit for discoveries to whomever was responsible for leading or financing the dig.

It's a simple matter of just creating a list of individuals involved and showcasing it as well in the museum, like film credits. It makes culture much more social. Much less feudally disposed.

But Basil's discovery in The Dig is made while leading his own private excavation, and the higher-ups still refuse to acknowledge him, likely calling him proud for hoping for recognition. 

It's an excellent film first rate drama I was beginning to forget what they're like 😜, I love action-adventure and sci-fi, but they still lack dramatic prestige.

There's nothing quite like sustained stoic resonance sombrely deconstructing perplexing absolutes.

Focused upon will front and centre.

Netflix continues to expand and impress.

*Great performances.

Hochelaga, Terre des Âmes (Hochelaga, Land of Souls)

In the 13th Century, a vicious battle having claimed the lives of many young men, a wise First Nations Prophet (Raoul Max Trujillo) chants out through the ages, pleading for peace to flourish eternal within his realm, his words planted on the winds with fertile simplicity, harvesting paradise in war torn isolation.

Who could have predicted what would happen in the following centuries, that another people would come and carve an alternative civilization out of the wilderness, and then another would land and attempt to transform it to their liking, and then others would appear and industriously cultivate traditions of their own, united by the prosperity of a distinct French culture, its multidisciplinary environment, adventurously preordained?

The island of Hochelaga slowly transformed into a metropolis, several of its epochs colourfully brought to life in François Girard's Hochelaga, Terre des Âmes (Land of Souls), sport having replaced destructive battles long passed, an incomparable nightlife spiritually enlivening working days, respect for nature thankfully lambasting fracked revenues and nuclear energy, a versatile collective creatively redefining culture on a mesmerizing weekly basis, orchestrated and executed, with transcendental evanescence.

Terre des Âmes follows a young First Nations archaeologist as he presents his thesis before a gathering of academics, a thesis based upon discoveries made at Percival Molson Memorial Stadium, after a sinkhole opened up during a feisty Redmen's game.

The sinkhole gave Baptiste Asigny (Samian) the opportunity to excavate the field, and the discoveries he made led him to reasonably piece together a convincing historical narrative covering Cartier's discovery of the island, missionary/fur trading clashes in New France, and the Patriot Rebellion of 1837, while also evidencing dynamic First Nations settlements on the island, the film complete with intriguing theoretical associated dramatizations of the periods.

If you find Canadian history somewhat boring, try reading books focused primarily on Québec. If you're at an age where the study of history is becoming more interesting (around 28 for me), you may thoroughly enjoy reading them as much as I do.

I've obviously wondered how long bears survived on the island after its population exploded, and I've never been able to find the date when they disappeared in the books I've read, which weren't about wildlife, but I imagine it was in the late 19th Century or the early 20th, fox, skunks, raccoons, groundhogs, opossums, coyotes, and squirrels still living on the island.

Even though I find Montréal's current composition fascinating, my favourite images from Terre des Âmes show what it may have looked like when it was still predominantly forested, indistinguishable from the massive mainland forests surrounding it, so many centuries ago.

Do some landscapes have a spiritual significance similar to that of Percival Molson Memorial Stadium as it's presented in Terre des Âmes, a kind of undetectable mass accumulation of positive spiritual energies which generate sincere subconscious synergies, like a hub or a server?

Can't answer that question myself.

I've always loved the idea though, since reading about it in Morgan Llywelyn's Druids, and I absolutely loved what Terre des Âmes does with it, how it beautifully unites Montréal's history in a thought provoking contemporary hypothesis, which speaks to the best of what Québecois culture has to offer, has always offered, and will continue to offer.

All down the line.

*With Siân Phillips (Sarah Walker) and Linus Roache (Colonel Philip Thomas).

Prometheus

And a group of scientific diplomats and their escort departs on a trillion dollar mission financed by Weyland Corporation towards a planetary alignment discovered by a team of archaeologists upon several ancient culturally isolated works of art.

In search of those who brought life to their home world.

But their investigative proclivities awake volcanic slumbering behemoths whom are intent upon annihilating their planet.

Which has functioned as their laboratory for millennia.

In the end, only a devoted non-denominational Christian (whose faith still burns) who at one point initiates a self-inflicted abortion and a brilliant amoral android who was responsible for infecting her husband with the fertile extraterrestrial virus, remain.

Still determined to make contact.

Still driven, to carry on.

Ridley Scott's Prometheus has its moments but on the whole functions like an amorphous geyser, patiently stratifying different levels of neuroses before startlingly expelling their searing undulations.

Several approaches to handling the unknown are precipitated, each exemplifying differing degrees of prohibition.        

Thereby carnally creating within a paranoid social constellation.

And intergalactically quarantining exploratory consonance.

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Was pretty surprised last year when Live Free or Die Hard turned out to be a fun movie. I was expecting a hackneyed, meandering, pointless attempt to rekindle a flame that extinguished 12 years ago, and, as it unrelt, I was glad to have brought some smores with my popcorn. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, unfortunately, quickly snaps its flint, and the residual warmth left over from The Last Crusade is doused in a misguided homage to Raiders of the Lost Ark. In the opening moments, we return to the warehouse where the Ark was placed at the end of Raiders and catch a glimpse of the Ark itself; Karen Allen is back as Marion Ravenwood, and it’s nice to see her again, but I would have preferred it if she'd been left out of the script entirely, since their reunion lacks every piece of feisty bravado that made their relationship the only one to stand out in the original trilogy (note how the Die Hard series avoided this temptation to its advantage). And speaking of characters who should have been removed from the script, whose idea was it to keep the insufferable 'Mac' George McHale (Ray Winstone)? He’s initially set up as a treacherous foe against whom Indiana must battle, but then he's transformed into comic relief that is anything but funny. I love red-herrings and things that don't really have anything to do with anything else. But there needs to be some kind of witty charm built into the purposeless purpose for this kind of plot device to work, and after hearing 'Mac' say 'Jonesy' for the 15th time I was ready to let a den of cobras fill me with poison before leaving me to be devoured by a pack of particularly sadistic hyenas. John Hurt's character (Prof. 'Ox' Oxley) is wasted as well and while Cate Blanchett (Irina Spalko) puts in a strong performance, I'm surprised she didn't bail after her first reading of the script.


But it's not all bad. Lucas and Spielberg keep the laughs coming throughout although their commitment to comedy ruins the adventure (which is why Raiders of the Lost Ark is so much better). It was cheerful and lovey-dovey to the point that I never felt the heroes were in any danger. Shia LeBeouf (Mutt Williams) staggers and stammers his way through a passable performance, but don't count on him taking over the franchise just yet.

One scene struck me as the antithesis to the ridiculous opening to James Bond’s Goldeneye, where Pierce Brosnan moves faster than gravity to catch up with a falling plane. While this scene ruined Goldeneye by directly turning Bond into an impossibility, the scene where Indiana survives a nuclear blast almost saves Crystal Skull, since it seems impossible but still maintains a resonant proportion of possibility (the realm wherein successful comic-book-fantasies thrive). Ridiculous but fun, not ridiculous and ludicrous.

Oh, and along racist lines, the ending of the film embraces the extremely racist theory that aliens taught the Incas and the Mayans everything they know. Note as well that no mention is made of Sallah (John Rhys-Davies), Indy's Arab friend, even though they could have easily brought him in for a cameo in the concluding moments. In a film that takes the time to pay tribute to Denholm Elliot (Marcus Brady) and Sean Connery while doing its best to throw in every little 'we're a loving family' moment it can, it’s odd that they wouldn't make one reference to Sallah (obviously he couldn't come along for the journey, they're in South America, not the Middle-East, but why wouldn't they bring him in for the ending? It’s like not having Robert Duvall in Godfather III).