My Thoughts on The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

I went to a midnight showing of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and thoughts about the film have been rolling around in my head ever since.  I don't think I can call this a review of the film (though I did really like it and encourage everyone to go see it).  Instead it will be more musing on the process of adapting a work that has been much on my mind over the past several months.  There will be plenty of spoilers for both the movie and the book.

I was pleasantly surprised at how much of the text actually made it into the movie.  Peter Jackson gives us most of the "Good morning" scene from the first chapter of the book.  The movie trolls are very similar to those in the book.  We get the "Chip the glasses" song.  Half the riddles made it into the movie and all were unaltered from Tolkien's prose.  Bilbo loses his waistcoat buttons (though in a slightly different way).  The goblins call Orcrist and Glamdring "Biter" and "Beater."  And we even got Bilbo saying, "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit."  All of these gave me a thrill of happiness when I saw them.  (Though I was disappointed but not surprised that both the talking purse and the "Tra-la-la-lally" song did not make it into the movie.)

Of course the problem with Peter Jackson putting so much of the book into the film is that it makes for a really long running time.  There were many times that I felt I was watching the extended edition of the movie instead of the theatrical edit, especially in the first act.  Jackson opens with a fun scene of old Bilbo reminiscing about his past as he prepares for his eleventy-first birthday party.  While it was a fun treat seeing Ian Holm and Elijah Wood again, the scene went on far too long and added nothing to the narrative other than saying, "This is a prequel, not a sequel."  Then the Unexpected Party happens, and it also goes on longer than it needs to.  It never stopped being entertaining for me, but it could have covered the same narrative purpose and had the same emotional impact at half the length.  In the extended edition of Fellowship of the Ring, Frodo finally heads out on his journey about an hour into the film.  I wasn't paying attention to the running time, but it felt like at least 45 minutes until Bilbo finally leaves Bag End.  With so much narrative ground left to cover, I felt it was a misuse of the limited running time to give so much of it to the opening scenes that could have all been told more efficiently.  The longer edits should have been saved for the extended edition.

In many ways, the pacing felt more like Jackson's King Kong than the Lord of the Rings films.  In Lord of the Rings, there was so much story he had to tell that he was forced to be as efficient as possible.  So even though the movies were all really long, they never felt long because of the fast pace.  On the flip side, there was much less story to tell in King Kong, so he was able to fill it with all the extended action scenes he wanted.  While it never got dull and only the dinosaur stampede scene seemed gratuitous or overlong, the movie had a bloated feel that could have been alleviated by tightening up the scenes by shaving a minute here, two minutes there, to reduce the whole running time by half an hour.  The Hobbit could have used more fat trimming.

The idea of making Azog a major villain almost works for me.  In the books he plays a pivotal role in the Battle of Azanulbizar, and his son, Bolg, is the leader of the goblins in the Battle of Five Armies.  Conflating the two characters is something I don't have a problem with.  What I didn't like was him tracking them across Middle Earth.  It involves creating scenes that are nowhere to be found in the book, nor do they fit in alongside what is in the book.  (And the shot of him being held back by his minions in the Battle of Azanulbizar was so out of keeping of my vision of goblins that it completely threw me out of the movie.)  He is serving a similar role to that of Lurtz in Fellowship of the Ring.  Lurtz was not in the book, but was added to give more drama to the climax of Fellowship.  (And his death is one of the most satisfying decapitations I've seen.)  But Lurtz was inserted more organically.  There was already a group of orcs trying the find the fellowship and a showdown between Aragorn and an orc captain made a lot of sense.  But the showdown between Thorin and Azog was a forced attempt at turning a scene that ends in a deus ex machina (or eucatastrophe if you prefer) into a more satisfying climax.  If Thorin had defeated Azog I might have felt different, but as it stands, I felt like there wasn't much of an ending to The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.

I think the biggest flaw of the film is its structure.  In my previous post I said I would end the first film with the battle with the spiders.  The reason I chose that as my climax is because it is the first time that Bilbo really takes charge and becomes both a leader and an action hero.  Also, it's the first point in the story that I felt was worthy of being the climax to a movie as being rescued by someone else doesn't make for a compelling climax.  After seeing the ending of the movie, I am more convinced that I was right.  They tried valiantly to make their climax work but too much of it just seemed forced.  And my big worry is that making Bilbo be more proactive here will give his battle with the spiders less of an impact.  And Thorin's "I didn't like you but now I do" speech was cheesy and too close to his powerful deathbed scene.  I'm afraid when that scene comes in the third movie it will have less of an impact because of the climax of this movie.

But the structure issues go beyond the misplaced climax.  There was an awful lot of setup in this movie, so much so that it felt less like a contained movie and more like part one of three.  The second scene in the film is a flashback to the destruction of Erebor by Smaug, which delays even longer our introduction to Martin Freeman as young Bilbo.  That could have been moved to later in the movie, doing what the animated film did and putting the flashback footage on top of the dwarves singing their song.  That could have been really powerful, would have given us more of that awesome song, and could have kept the beginning tighter and less information-logged.  And while it was cool that they incorporated the flashback to the Battle of Azanulbizar, it came so late in the film that I found myself wishing that they had moved it to another film.  After all, the three Lord of the Rings films all start with some kind of flashback, and I think the Battle of Azanulbizar could have made a wonderful opening flashback.  Fellowship of the Ring is my favorite of the Lord of the Rings movies largely because it has a tighter, more streamlined narrative.  I have a feeling An Unexpected Journey is going to be my least favorite of the Hobbit movies because it is too concerned with the movies that will come later.

A few random thoughts:
When Bilbo had trouble pulling the dagger soon to be known as Sting from the head of the warg, was I the only person to think, "Who so pulleth out this sword of this skull is righwise born king of Middle Earth"?
Why are all the goblins CG?
The chin bag on the Great Goblin is disgusting.
When they showed Thror succumbing to dragon sickness, I half expected him to start turning into a dragon (and becoming Smaug) much like Eustace in Voyage of the Dawn Treader or Fafnir in Norse mythology.  (And possibly the dragon in Beowulf.)
Bilbo and a goblin fall down a crevasse.  The goblin suffers serious injury.  Bilbo is largely unharmed.  The dwarves are also unharmed by their large tumble (and getting squashed by the Great Goblin's body).  Mythbusters would like to have a word with you, Peter Jackson.
While the inclusion of the stone giants was cool, the sequence was overblown and added nothing to the narrative.  It is as useless and contrived a scene as the "Nobody tosses a dwarf" sequence in Fellowship.
I was hoping Glorfindel would make a cameo in Rivendell.  Oh well.  There's still hope he'll show up in the later movies.

I've spent much of this post bagging on the movie, but I really liked it and there were lots of things they did really well.  I think my favorite scene was the Riddles in the Dark scene.  It is the longest scene in the movie and yet I didn't want it to end.  Smeagol has never been cuter and Gollum never as nasty.  However, Bilbo's mercy scene would have been more powerful had not Gandalf practically told Bilbo, "Don't kill Gollum when you meet him," way back at the beginning of the film.  I also liked that they were able to keep things light, unafraid to occasionally go silly with the dwarves.  After all, Tolkien does that all through the book.  The dwarves' song is amazing and I liked that it wove a spell on Bilbo similar to how it happens in the book.  The scene of Radagast spying out Dol Guldur was well done and provided a nice contrast for the character, showing him in a more competent and less silly light.  Martin Freeman was excellent as Bilbo.  I was already a fan before this movie, and when I heard he had been cast as Bilbo I thought it was a fabulous choice, but I liked him even more than I was expecting.  I also liked how they played with the Took/Baggins dichotomy.  This is a big theme in the book, but I was unsure if it would get any lip service in the film since it's largely an internal conflict.  I'm glad they're doing something with it.  And while I have serious problems with the end of the film, I really liked the moment when Bilbo pledges to help the dwarves get their home back.  I am very pleased they only showed glimpses of Smaug, saving the big reveal for later.  (I'm hoping we don't get a full look at him until Bilbo has his conversation with Smaug.)  Smaug being covered up by the treasure was a nice visual touch.  And of course it is a visually sumptuous film.

That's just about everything I have to say right now.  I'm sure I'll have more to say once I see it a few more times, and my opinions are likely to change after more viewings allow me to better divorce the movie from the book, judging it on its own merits.

Musings on Tolkien: The Hobbit Trilogy and How I Would Do It

Peter Jackson announced that what was originally going to be two Hobbit movies would be expanded into a full-fledged trilogy because he had so much footage.  As of this writing, I haven't heard anything about how he plans to organize the material and structure his three movies.  But looking at all the material he wants to or might include in his movies, this is how I would structure the three films.

The first movie focuses largely on Bilbo.  He is in all but one or two scenes.  Movie one also lays the groundwork for the White Council storyline.  The climax is the fight with the spiders in Mirkwood and ends with Bilbo and the dwarves getting captured by the elves.

The bulk of the second movie covers the White Council storyline.  Gandalf and company expel the Necromancer from Mirkwood.  This is the big climax of the second film.  Meanwhile, Bilbo breaks the dwarves out of prison and they escape down the river in barrels.  There might have to be some contrived set pieces added to this sequence to flesh it out.  Plenty of time is spent in Lake-town, convincing the residents of Lake-town to help our band of adventurers.  This gives plenty of opportunity to introduce Bard the Bowman as a major character and offers ample screentime to Stephen Fry as the Master of Lake-town.  It ends with Bilbo and the dwarves heading off the the Lonely Mountain.

The third movie focuses on two major set pieces: Bilbo's conversation with Smaug and the Battle of Five Armies.  This allows for plenty of screentime to be devoted to the politics that lead up to the battle and Thorin's case of dragon fever.  The movie opens with a flashback to the battle of Azanulbizar.  The movie ends with Bilbo saying, "Thank goodness."

Possible titles for the three movies: The Fellowship of the Burglar, The Two Fortresses, and The Return of the King Under the Mountain.

The big problem I see with this structure is that movie two has very little of Bilbo.  However, the book states that Gandalf is "finishing up" his business with the Necromancer as Bilbo and the dwarves are floating down the river in and on barrels, so the chronology works pretty well.

Of course, if I was in charge, there wouldn't even be three movies.  I would try to do the whole thing in one movie, sticking to the material in the book and ignoring the material in the Appendices and other works.  Hopefully I could get the run time down to about two hours and get a PG rating.  After all, it's a children's book, which means it should be a children's movie.

Musings on Tolkien: The Hobbit Movie and How I Would Do It

Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings movies are excellent, and it seemed like only a matter of time before he directed a movie version of The Hobbit.  However, there are some problems with the source material that make it difficult to just jump right into The Hobbit with the same vim and verve as the Lord of the Rings movies.  For one, the books are very different.  The Hobbit is a children's book; a faerie story with a light-hearted tone, plenty of humor, and songs that help carry the plot.  (You could even argue that The Hobbit is a musical in book form.)  The Lord of the Rings by contrast, is a much more serious and darker book with a more adult audience in mind and is considered the first modern fantasy novel.  By going back and doing The Hobbit second as a prequel, the difference in tone and content between the books causes a serious problem.  If Peter Jackson goes with the epic qualities of his Lord of the Rings movies, it can come across as a betrayal of the source material.  However, if he treats The Hobbit like the children's book it is, he'll end up with a movie that is out of step with the ones he's already made.  And that doesn't even take into account how Tolkien's concept of the One Ring changed: in The Hobbit it's just Bilbo's magic ring while in The Lord of the Rings it's the most powerful instrument of evil in Middle Earth.  These are problems that Peter Jackson is going to have to work out and I'm sure he'll do a fine job.  But this is how I would tackle the problem.

INT. BAG END - NIGHT

Sam Gamgee settles down in his armchair to smoke his evening pipe.  His children crowd around him.

ELANOR: Daddy!  Tell us a story!

SAM: Would you like to hear the story about how Mister Frodo and I journeyed to Mordor to destroy the Ring?

ROSE: You always tell us that one!

GOLDILOCKS: Tell us a different story!

SAM: Well, have I ever told you the story of how Old Mister Bilbo went on an adventure and found the Ring?

HAMFAST: No you haven't.

DAISY: Tell us that one, Daddy!

Sam picks up a large red book and opens it to the first pages.

SAM: (reading) In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit...

FADE TO:

EXT. BAG END - MORNING

Bilbo Baggins sits on the front porch of Bag End, blowing smoke rings.

This opening scene serves multiple purposes.  It ties The Hobbit in with The Lord of the Rings, establishing this as a prequel.  But since it is framed as Sam telling the story to his kids, it allows for The Hobbit to be more of a children's movie.  The book takes a very pro-Bilbo stance, treating the Thorin and Company as a bumbling band of misfits.  If Sam were narrating the movie, it would only make sense for him to build up Bilbo as one of the most famousest of hobbits and the only one with any real amount of common sense.  The narrator of The Hobbit has several good lines and making Sam the narrator would help get those lines into the movie.  And it could also provide a means to address some of the inconsistencies between the books as the children could interrupt Sam's story on several occasions, much like Fred Savage does in The Princess Bride.  Sam could then provide an explanation for the differences, he could essentially say, "Shut up.  I'm telling a story," or he could even say, "That's how Mister Bilbo wrote it and so that's how I'm telling it," which would be a sly way of shoving the blame back on Tolkien.  And I think Tolkien would approve of this approach because he was obsessed with framing narratives.  Of course I would have to restrain myself from inserting a scene right after the "Tra-la-la-lally" song in which one of the kids asks, "Is this a singing book?"

Top 5 First Lines

It's been a while since I've done a top 5 list, so I decided to dust it off and give it another go.  These are my five favorite opening lines from the books and short stories that I've read.  I've probably forgotten something brilliant from Dr. Seuss or another semi-forgotten children's author, but these are the five that came most readily to mind.  In chronological order:

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
The Bible

Marley was dead: to begin with.
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis

William Shakespeare, later known as the Beard of Avon, was born in 1564, on April 21, 22, or 23, and all his life kept people guessing.
Twisted Tales from Shakespeare by Richard Armour

Feel free to psychoanalyze me in the comments section for what my choices say about my deepest fears or other nonsense.

Musings on Tolkien: Mingling

Most of the time in Tolkien's works, the Free Peoples of Middle Earth keep to themselves.  Elves hang out with Elves, Men with Men, and Dwarves ignoring as much of the rest of the world as possible.  But every so often there are instances of different people groups mingling with each other, and this is always a Good Thing.

Gondolin was the greatest of the cities of the Elves.  One of the marks of its greatness was that in was inhabited by both Noldor and Sindar.  And when Hurin and Huor, and later Tuor, came to Gondolin, they were treated as valuable members of the community, even though they were Men.  At the Gates of Moria, Gandalf wistfully recalls a happier time when the Elves of Hollin were in close friendship with the Dwarves of Moria.  At the beginning of the Hobbit it tells of a time when the Dwarves of the Lonely Mountain and the Men of Dale lived in close friendship before Smaug laid waste to the countryside.  And by the end of the book, that friendship has been reformed with the added close allies of the Elves of Mirkwood.

All the great love stories of Middle Earth are romances between the races: Thingol and Melian, Beren and Luthien, Tuor and Idril, Aragorn and Arwen.  And one of the great relationships of The Lord of the Rings is the friendship between Gimli and Legolas.

But the best example of mingling is embodied in the Silmarils.  The Trees of Valinor were among the greatest of the works of the Ainur, and Yavanna's masterpiece.  But they were at their most beautiful when the golden light of Laurelin and the silver light of Telpirion mingled.  Feanor, the greatest craftsman of the Elves, captured the mingled light of the trees in his Silmarils, the greatest work of craftsmanship by the Elves.  After Beren recovers one of the Silmarils and delivers it to Thingol, Thingol takes the Silmaril and has it set inside the Nauglamir, the Necklace of the Dwarves, the greatest work of Dwarven craftsmanship.  So we have the greatest of the works of the Ainur encased in the greatest of the works of the Elves, encased in the greatest of the works of the Dwarves.  And it is possibly even more beautiful when worn by Luthien, the daughter of an Elf and an Ainu, married to a Man.  And when that exact Silmaril is delivered to Valinor which sets off a chain reaction that ends with the final destruction of Morgoth, it is delivered by Earendil, the son of Tuor and Idril, and his wife Elwing, the granddaughter of Beren and Luthien.

Batman Full Circle

Four years ago I promised the world that I would give them my idea for a trilogy of movies to follow up Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins.  I gave synopses for the first two movies but never got around to writing the third one.  With The Dark Knight Rises opening soon, I figured that time was running out for me to finish this.  I have intentionally avoided all news and spoilers about The Dark Knight Rises as much as possible and these ideas are basically the same ones I intended to write but never did way back in the weeks before The Dark Knight came out.

Bruce has no friends.  All his time and energy is consumed with his life as Batman.  An atmosphere of fear covers Gotham.  And there is always more crime to fight.  Like a break-in at Arkham Asylum that releases several prisoners, including the Joker.  While investigating, Batman finds clues that the League of Shadows might have been involved.

Later, Bruce is introduced to a woman named Talia.  He takes a liking to her and they start a relationship.  But unbeknownst to Bruce, Talia has re-formed the League of Shadows and has taken up the title of Ra's al Ghul.  She is the daughter of Liam Neeson's character from Batman Begins, and her mission is to finish the task her father started: the destruction of Gotham.  While her father wanted to use Bruce as the main instrument in Gotham's destruction, Talia has chosen the Joker.  Unfortunately for her, the Joker quickly gets out from under her influence and starts doing his own thing once again.  He starts running amok, distributing his personal brand of mayhem: enough to keep Batman busy and frustrated, but not enough to bring Gotham to its knees.  Meanwhile, Talia's feelings for Bruce are growing.  They were initially feigned in order for her to spy on him and distract Batman, but she is now growing fond of Bruce and starting to question whether her father was really right about him.

Among the victims of the latest Joker attack are a family of acrobats.  Young Dick Grayson is the only member to survive.  He has no other family and is all alone.  Alfred learns of this and invites Grayson to stay at Wayne Manor for a time.  Alfred hopes that Bruce will be able to help Grayson get through the loss of his parents since Bruce also lost his parents.  Alfred also hopes that it will help nudge Bruce into an act of humanity.  But all Grayson cares about is exacting revenge on the Joker.  Bruce sees a lot of his old self in Gryason and realizes that Batman can't offer him any healing, only revenge.

Eventually, Grayson figures out that Bruce is Batman and demands that Bruce let him help take down the Joker.  Bruce relents, mostly because he really needs another person for his take-down plan, but not before exacting a promise from Grayson that they are doing it for justice, not revenge.  Working together they capture the Joker and send him off to Arkham once again.  During the take-down, Grayson gets the perfect chance to kill the Joker but doesn't because of his promise.

Talia realizes that there is enough goodness in Gotham to make it worth saving.  Her relationship with Bruce has blossomed into a full-blown romance.  (Are there wedding bells in their future?)  Bruce begrudgingly lets Grayson stay on as his partner.  Grayson takes the name of Robin.  Batman was supposed to be a symbol of hope to the downtrodden, but instead he became a symbol of fear to everyone.  But just as the first robin of the year is a sign that winter is over and spring has begun, Robin is a symbol of hope and new beginnings.

Batman Begins was in part the story of Bruce and his fathers.  Even though Thomas Wayne was his biological father, Alfred and Ra's al Ghul (and to a lesser extent Falcone and Fox) were all father figures for Bruce.  At the end of this movie, Bruce is now the father figure.  At the beginning of the movie Bruce has no family.  By the end he has a son and a potential wife.  And by the end Bruce has regained himself.  Batman is once again a part of Bruce instead of the other way around.

So there you go.  I hope it was worth the wait.

Musings on Baseball: The Pitcher Win

Many of the serious baseball analysts I read and listen to deride the pitcher win stat, saying that it says very little about how well a pitcher actually pitched, especially since starters rarely pitch more than six innings.  There are so many other people playing the game and so many other variables that go into winning a game that giving one player credit for the win is just ridiculous.  I am in complete agreement with this assessment.  When I hear people on the radio or television saying, "So-and-so is going for his fifth consecutive win," or "Such-and-such is still looking for his first win of the season," I find myself screaming at the voices who can't hear me, "That doesn't mean anything!"  However, I think the pitcher win is here to stay.

Let's look at three statements:
(1)  Pitcher X has a win in 7 of his last 10 outings.
(2)  Pitcher X has a quality start in 7 of his last 10 outings.
(3)  Pitcher X has a Game Score of 70 or higher in 7 of his last 10 outings.

What do these three statements actually tell us about how well Pitcher X actually pitched?

In order to get a win, a pitcher must be the pitcher of record after the fifth inning.  To be the pitcher of record a pitcher must be the pitcher who was pitching when his team gained the lead for good.  So, if a team took the lead in the first inning and never surrendered it, the pitcher who pitched the fifth inning would get the win.  If a team took the lead in the eighth inning and never surrendered it, the pitcher who pitched the eighth inning would get the win.  (It's a little more nuanced and complex than that, but that's the gist of it.)  So for a starter to get a win, he has to pitch at least five innings, have a lineup behind him that scores more runs than his gives up, and have the relievers that come after him not give up the lead.

With so many variables in play, the pitcher win can be a pretty fickle stat.  Sometimes, the pitcher who pitches the worst in a game is the one who gets the win.  This happened on the first day of the season this year.  Justin Verlander pitched eight shutout innings for the Detroit Tigers.  Jose Valverde came in to pitch the ninth inning with a 2-0 lead.  He proceeded to give up two runs in the top of the ninth.  The Tigers scored a run in the bottom of the ninth to win the game, but because Valverde was now the pitcher of record, he was the pitcher awarded with the win.  But who was more deserving of the win, the pitcher who gave up 0 runs in 8 innings or the one who gave up 2 runs in 1 inning?

Also, lack of run support can lead to a pitcher not getting any wins.  In 2007, San Francisco Giants pitcher Matt Cain was one of the best pitchers in the National League.  He was among the league leaders in several pitching stats.  Except wins.  Because of the Giants' anemic bats, Matt Cain got a measly 7 wins in 2007.  In 2008 he was just as good, and even tied for the league lead in games started.  He got a whopping 8 wins.  Meanwhile, in 2007, Jamie Moyer of the Philadelphia Phillies pitched almost exactly the same number of innings as Matt Cain, yet gave up more hits and more runs than Cain while striking out fewer batters.  His win total?  14.

So statement 1 says that Pitcher X pitched at least 5 innings in those 7 games and got good run support.

In order to get a quality start, a pitcher must pitch at least 6 innings and give up fewer than 3 earned runs.  (For those of you not in the know, an earned run is a run that has been determined to be the fault of the pitcher.  Unearned runs are runs that are not the fault of the pitcher, usually scoring as a direct result of an error on the part of one of the fielders.  The idea being that a pitcher should not be penalized for the failures of his defense.)  If a starter pitches a quality start, he puts his team in a good position to win the game.  In April of this month, teams whose pitchers got a quality start had a combined .648 winning percentage.  That comes to 105 wins in a 162 game season.  To put that into perspective, the Philadelphia Phillies last year had the most wins in baseball with 102.

The big advantage of the quality start is that it completely removes run support from the equation.  And it's hard to be dissatisfied with your pitcher's performance if he gets a quality start.  However, the quality start is still imperfect.  It ignores unearned runs.  Also, if a pitcher does the bare minimum requirements for a quality start, his stats end up being pretty pedestrian.  Also, a pitcher who pitches 9 innings but gives up 4 runs does not get credit for a quality start, even though that's an overall better performance than a six inning three run start.

In 2007, Matt Cain had 22 quality starts, tied for sixth in the league.  (Jamie Moyer had 18.)  He had a quality start 69% of the time.  In 2008 he had 21 quality starts.  While they don't tell the whole story, his quality start totals are a much better indicator of his performance than his win totals.

So statement 2 says that Pitcher X pitched at least 6 innings in those 7 games and gave up no more than 3 earned runs in each one.  (Or, pitched like Matt Cain in 2007.)

Game Score is a statistic that was developed by baseball statistician Bill James.  It awards points for innings pitched and strikeouts, and subtracts points for walks, hits, and runs allowed.  Most quality starts get game scores in the upper 50s and 60s, with an average around 64.  A game in which a pitcher pitched 7 innings with 1 run, 4 hits, 1 walk, and 6 strikeouts would get a Game Score of 70.  That is a really nice outing, one that fantasy baseball players covet.  Roughly one quarter of all quality starts have a score of 70 or better.

Last year, Justin Verlander led the majors with a 65.9 average Game Score.  The first game of the season where he was brilliant but did not get the win, he scored an 84.  In 2007, Matt Cain had an average Game Score of 54.7, good for ninth in the league.  This year to date, Cliff Lee is the highest ranked pitcher in average Game Score with exactly 10 starts.  In those 10 starts he has 0 wins, 7 quality starts, and 3 games in which he got a Game Score of 70 or better.

So statement 3 says that Pitcher X pitched like an ace 7 out of the last 10 games.  And unless the other 3 games were really ugly, over his last 10 games, Pitcher X has been one of the best pitchers in baseball.

If I was to rank the three statements as to how much they actually tell us about Pitcher X's performance over his last 10 starts, I would rank them 3, 2, 1.  But if I was to rank them how they sound to a casual fan, the rankings would reverse.  Because I am guessing that only the hardcore stat-heads are even aware of or interested in Game Score and a score of 70 doesn't mean much without any context.  Quality start sounds better but unspectacular.

But when I say that Pitcher X won 7 of his last 10 starts, it sounds amazing.  It says that Pitcher X is a dominating force.  It says that when Pitcher X starts, his team has at worst a .700 winning percentage.  It says Pitcher X will carry his team to victory because Pitcher X is a Winner!  And after all, isn't it all about winning?

Which is why the pitcher win is here to stay.  No amount of number crunching will ever sound better than, "Pitcher X got a win!"

Musings on Tolkien: The Golden Child and the Silver Child

After listening to hours and hours of lectures by the Tolkien Professor, reading plenty of Tolkien, and even auditing a couple classes on Tolkien, I have had Tolkien on the brain for over a year now. One result of that is that I have come to several observations concerning themes in his work that I have not seen discussed anywhere else. And now I get to foist them on you, my critical readers. This is the first in what will hopefully be a series (I make no promises as to how long or short the series will be) looking at the things I've been thinking about on Tolkien and his works. A couple procedural notes: I will be writing these assuming my readers have read or are at least familiar with The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion. Therefore I won't explain who anyone is, nor will I post spoiler alerts. If you're looking for a bit of a refresher on anything I'm talking about, the Encyclopedia of Arda is a great resource.

The whole idea for the golden child and the silver child got its start several years ago when I was looking at this painting with the Platypus. The title of the painting is "Faramir at Osgiliath," and it was immediately clear to us that Faramir was the guy at the right of the painting decked out in silver. But my eye was also drawn to the guy in the center of the painting who is wearing a golden helmet and brandishing a spear. He is given a place of prominence in the picture. Could that be Boromir?* As I discussed this with the Platypus, he thought it was an interesting idea because Boromir was the golden child and Faramir was the silver child.

*The more I look at the picture, the more I'm convinced that he is not Boromir. For one, if it was Boromir, the painting would be titled "Boromir and Faramir at Osgiliath." For another, the more I look, the less prominent his position in the painting becomes.

One of the themes that the Tolkien Professor likes to talk about is that those who are the greatest almost always fall. Melkor was the greatest of the Ainur, but he turned to evil. Feanor was the greatest of the Elves, yet he fell too. But in all these cases I noticed that there was always a younger brother who was nearly as great who took the place of the golden child who fell and became great in his own right. This silver child did the things that the golden child should have done and earned the love of the people they commanded (and the reader as well). There were three examples of this that immediately came to mind plus two more that followed not far behind.

The first example, the one that pretty much provides the archetype for the golden child and the silver child, is Melkor and Manwe. Melkor is the greatest of the Ainur, yet he deems his will more highly than Iluvatar's and wishes to dominate the wills of others. Manwe is the second-greatest of the Ainur and is described as "the brother of Melkor in the mind of Iluvatar." But instead of pursuing his own agenda, Manwe chose to do Iluvatar's will, doing his part in creating a world that is good to live in. As the ruling Ainu, Manwe ends up the king of the world while Melkor is chained and thrown into the Void.

Next we get Feanor and Fingolfin. Feanor is the greatest of all the Elves. His work as a craftsman could not be rivaled. His crowning achievement is the creation of the silmarils, three gems that are the most beautiful things any Elf has made before or since. But he became too proud; too full of himself. As a result it was Feanor who instigated the first killing of Elf by Elf, and who swore (and made his sons swear as well) the Oath of Feanor, which caused all kinds of strife among the Elves, even long after his death. And when he died, Tolkien says, "Thus ended the mightiest of the Noldor, of whose deeds came both their greatest renown and their most grievous woe." On the other hand, Fingolfin, the younger half-brother of Feanor, was beloved by his people. When strife broke out between Feanor and Fingolfin, it was Fingolfin who was the better man and did what he could to make peace (even though Feanor was the instigator). It was Fingolfin who led his people across the Helcaraxe after Feanor had abandoned them. And when Fingolfin dies in single combat with Morgoth (a fight he might have been able to actually win had Morgoth not been ten times as large as Fingolfin) the Elves cannot even sing songs about it because their sorrow is too great. And the love of Fingolfin extends to the readers. There are debates as to who is the most awesomest of the Elves: Fingolfin or Finrod. No one even bothers mentioning Feanor in these debates.

Then there is the pair of Boromir and Faramir. Boromir is a mighty warrior. As the oldest son of the Steward of Gondor, Boromir is next in line to be the leader of the most powerful nation of Men in Middle Earth (provided the Heir of Isildur doesn't bother showing up). In fact it's not entirely inconceivable that Boromir would have himself crowned King of Gondor at his father's death. And then Boromir falls under the prey of the One Ring and tries to take it from Bilbo. Faramir, on the other hand, welcomes the Return of the King. He is a valiant warrior in his own right, but would much rather live in peace. And he says of the Ring, "Not if I found it on the highway would I take it." Boromir is able to find redemption by defending Merry and Pippin, but it is Faramir who gets to marry the princess and live happily ever after. And readers adore Faramir. If I did a poll of favorite characters from The Lord of the Rings, Faramir would come in no lower than second on the list. In fact, the biggest criticism I hear about Peter Jackson's version of The Two Towers is, "They ruined Faramir!"

After these first three pairings immediately jumped out at me, I went in search of other examples. The next one I found was Saruman and Gandalf. Saruman is the head of the White Council and the most learned of the wizards. But he desired too much power and set himself up as a second dark lord in a tower. Meanwhile, Gandalf spends his time travelling all over Middle Earth, doing what he can to empower people to fight the Enemy. And when Gandalf dies, he is sent back as Gandalf the White, taking on the mantle that Saruman rejected.

Then I started looking at Turin. He bears all the marks of a golden child gone sour. He is the most beautiful of all the Men, very charismatic, and a powerful warrior. But everything he does goes horribly wrong. Maybe it's because he's been cursed by Morgoth, or maybe it's due to his own pig-headedness and impulsive nature. But he accidentally kills Saeros and Beleg, unwittingly marries his sister, is directly responsible for the downfall of Nargothrond, and generally leaves chaos and destruction in his wake. But if Turin is the golden child, who is the silver child? Turin had no brothers and his sisters don't fit the bill of a silver child. But he did have a cousin: Tuor. Tuor does many of the things that Turin was supposed to do. While Turin was directly responsible for the destruction of Nargothrond, Tuor is instrumental in saving a remnant of people from the fall of Gondolin. While Turin failed to marry Finduilas, the daughter of the Elven king (and the text implies that things would have been better for all involved if he had), Tuor marries Idril, the daughter of a different Elven king. And through this union Earendil is born who is vitally instrumental in the final defeat of Morgoth.

So here are my five examples of the golden child and the silver child. Does anyone have any other examples?

Top and Bottom of 2011 - #1

Best

The Big Heat (1953)

This is one of the first “obsessed cop does whatever it takes to bring down the bad guys” films and also one of the best. Glenn Ford stars as Dave Bannion, a cop on a mission to take down a local drug lord. Along the way he encounters damaged dames, truly evil thugs (especially the one played by Lee Marvin) and corruption that goes all the way up to the police commissioner. I especially liked the scenes of Bannion interacting with his wife; they are so warm and amusing they paint a wonderful portrait of marital bliss in the midst of an otherwise very dark movie.

Worst

Troll 2 (1990)

Every once in a while a movie comes along that is famous for being so bad. This movie is so inept that someone made a whole documentary about how bad it is. First of all, there is not a single troll to be seen in this movie. Instead we get a town full of goblins. The goblins look like cheap Halloween costumes and apparently their favorite food is half human half plant. The acting is bad across the board, especially Deborah Reed as the goblin queen, who chews so much scenery that it’s a wonder there were any sets left by the end of the movie. All the characters are idiots, none of them even approaching likability. And then there is the script, full of clunky dialog and loads of “as you know, Bob” exposition. But the absolute best part of the movie comes during a car trip. Mom tries to cheer up her son by getting him to sing. “Sing that song I like so much.” Taking a page from Manos: The Hands of Fate, I mockingly started singing “Row, row, row your boat.” And then the kid started singing. “Row, row, row your boat...”

Coming up next: I'm not sure. I've been mulling over some posts about themes in Tolkien's writing, so those might be next. I've also got a couple long-abandoned projects that I could dust off and finish. And of course there's the 25+ movies I've already watched this year (that I still haven't written blurbs for). So there's bound to be more stuff coming down the pipeline, though I'm not going to commit to anything specific just yet.

Top and Bottom of 2011 - #2

Best

Ip Man (2008)

This is a fictionalized account of Ip Man, a martial arts master who trained Bruce Lee (and many others). The first half is a whole lot of fun featuring plenty of martial arts hijinks in a largely pre-industrial Chinese town. Then the Japanese invasion of WWII happens, and the film takes a decidedly serious turn. Ip Man and his fellow countrymen struggle to get enough food to feed themselves while still maintaining their honor in occupied territory. Ip Man is fascinating to watch, both in moments of quiet dignity and when he is laying down some martial arts smack-down.

Worst

Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2010)

How is it that a movie can be as inept as this one is in every single aspect possible? The acting is flat, the dialog is clunky at best, the sound is worse than most student films, and the effects are less convincing than the grasshoppers-on-a-postcard shots from Beginning of the End. The story is the illegitimate child of The Birds and An Inconvenient Truth as birds attack a small town for no reason while the main characters spew environmental propaganda. And for some reason, all the birds explode when they run into things. I have a hard time coming up with the worst scene in the movie. It could be the one where our heroes defend themselves from hovering CG birds by randomly waving around coat hangers. It could be the one where the protagonist extolls the benefits of solar panels (or as he calls them, “sorpaos”). It might be the scene where our heroes walk out of a screening of An Inconvenient Truth and one of them says, “That was a really good movie. I’m going to buy a hybrid now.” But my vote probably has to go to all the scenes devoted to either parking or cautiously pulling into traffic. No other film I have seen has devoted so much time to these two activities that are marginally more entertaining than watching paint dry.

Coming up next: The best of the best and the worst of the worst.

Top and Bottom of 2011 - #3

Best

Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010)

This is a fascinating look at the world of street art and the artists who make it. It starts with a montage of street artists plying their craft - some clever, some vulgar, and some outright vandalism - all while a song plays in the background declaring that “Tonight the streets are ours.” Then we are introduced to Thierry Guetta a clothing shop owner/documentarian/aspiring street artist. He’s quirky, full of life, and enjoys almost unlimited access to some of the biggest names in street art. But when he starts doing his own street art it’s derivative and repetitive (and most if not all of the actual artwork is done by other people). Is he a true artist, or merely a flamboyant hack? What results is a wonderfully entertaining look at several interesting people and the work that they do, even when their art is completely illegal.

Worst

The Adventures of Hercules (1985)

THIS is the Hercules movie that has him turn into a cartoon as the climax. In the sequel to 1983's Hercules, Lou Ferrigno once again stars as the Herc, this time tracking down the seven thunderbolts of Zeus which have been scattered across Greece. The plot is no better than that of a video game; Hercules defeats a monster to reclaim the thunderbolt then instantly travels to the next place where he faces off against the next monster. There are visual effects all over the movie, but they all look terrible, especially the scene in which Hercules battles a glowing ball of light and when he faces off against a gorgon in a blatant (and terrible) ripoff of Clash of the Titans. The dialog is laugh out loud atrocious, and for reasons known only to the filmmakers, every time Herc lands a punch, the screen flashes red. But the absolute cinematic pinnacle of the movie is the climax. Hercules and Minos battle each other in the stars as bad rotoscoped images of themselves, occasionally transforming into various animals to make everything more thrilling. Then, once Minos has been defeated, Herc gets huge and stops the moon from colliding with the earth. I was wrong earlier; THIS is the worst Hercules movie ever made.

Coming up next: Defending yourself against a horde of invaders.

Top and Bottom of 2011 - #4

Best

Wait Until Dark (1967)

Audrey Hepburn is amazing as a blind woman who unknowingly gets caught up with a group of drug dealers. There is plenty of thrills and suspense throughout the movie, and the way Hepburn’s character finally deals with her antagonists is wonderful.

Worst

Hercules (1983)

I remember seeing the ending of a Hercules movie some time ago that featured as its climax Hercules going into space and turning into bad animation to defeat the bad guy. It was really bad and I was interested in seeing the whole thing. I hoped this would be it, but sadly it wasn't. Fortunately, it was as bad as I remembered the other one being. Lou Ferrigno stars as the worst Hercules I've ever seen. From the neck down he actually looks like Hercules should look, but his face is too soft to be convincing as a hardened warrior. Add to that wooden acting and only one facial expression of dull bemusement and Ferrigno brings the world of beefy action stars to a new low. Herc fights ridiculous, laser-shooting mechanical monsters, travels from one place to another for no apparent reason, duels King Minos with a light saber, and gets huge. The screenplay has no narrative cohesion with things happening merely due to the screenwriter's whim. This is the worst Hercules movie I've seen. (And it has a sequel!)

Coming up next: A movie where a man is turned into an artist and one in which a man is turned into art.

Top and Bottom of 2011 - #5

Best

The Muppets (2011)

I’m a big fan of the Muppets, especially their work on The Muppet Show. One of the things that I noticed with their movies starting with Muppet Christmas Carol is that the humor wasn’t quite as sharp. It was as if the Muppets had been tamed. I was hopeful when the screenwriters claimed they were trying to recapture the feel of The Muppet Show and the first couple movies, but they were the same screenwriters who did very adult comedies. Would they be able to reign in their baser instincts and deliver a movie fit for the whole family? Fortunately, they did. The movie does an excellent job of keeping the feel of the television show. The jokes are funny, the songs are fun (with “Life’s a Happy Song” being an especially catchy standout), and there are some wonderful celebrity cameos. It was like spending time with old friends again, and I had a smile on my face through the whole movie.

Worst

McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971)

This is an ugly, depressing story about unpleasant, unhappy people who wallow in an unclean world (until the bathhouse/brothel gets up and running, making the uncleanliness more metaphorical). I didn't like anyone in the film, and the background music was both out of place and annoying.

Coming up next: A movie carried on the shoulders of its actress and a bad movie made worse by its actor.

Top and Bottom of 2011 - #6

Best

Gran Torino (2008)

Humor can come from a lot of places. It happens when people say funny things (like Groucho and Chico Marx), it happens when people do funny things (like Harpo Marx), and it happens when funny things happen to someone (like Bringing Up Baby). Humor also can happen on a more subtler level when you get folks just being folks (like most of Garrison Keilor’s Lake Wobegon stories). There is plenty of this final kind of humor in Gran Torino. Not to say that it’s a comedy since the movie deals with some serious subject matter as Walt (played by Clint Eastwood) tries to keep his next-door neighbors from getting caught up in a destructive gang world. But I was surprised at how much I laughed as set-in-his-ways Walt was continually nudged out of his comfort zone. I loved watching the characters interact with each other, especially the scenes of Walt teaching his neighbor how to be a man. (There is a disappointing dearth of scenes like this in movies today, though that’s a rant for another day.) And I loved the ending. Too often a movie like this may end up with an ending that is either too contrived to be believable or too convenient to be satisfactory, but this ending feels so right I can’t come up with a better one. Every once in a while a movie comes along that completely surprises me with how much I like it; this is one of those.

Worst

Samurai Cop (1989)

This is a gloriously bad movie. The action scenes fail at being thrilling or believable, the cinematography is shoddy, the dialog is awful (with lines like, “I will bring you his head and I will place it on your piano.”), and it even features Robert Z'Dar and his incredibly huge face. Samurai Cop's sidekick can't decide if he's the stoic silent type, or the wise-cracking black guy, and he manages to pick wrong in every single reaction shot. But the best part about Samurai Cop is the Samurai Cop's hair. The actor sports gloriously long 80s locks, but halfway through filming he cut his hair, so wears cinema's worst wig for half the movie. The great thing is that it switches back and forth between real hair and wig throughout the movie, even in the middle of some scenes.

Coming up next: A movie with enough joy for two movies (which is a good thing since the other one doesn't have any).

Top and Bottom of 2011 - #7

Best

The Social Network (2010)

This is a slick movie that is full of energy. The opening scene between Mark Zuckerberg and his soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend is immediately arresting with dialog so quick it would make Howard Hawks proud. The conversation continually goes on tangents then loops back around in a way that reminded me of reading a comment thread on facebook. Jesse Eisenberg is electric in the role of Mark Zuckerberg, graduating from “poor man’s Michael Cera” status to becoming a force to be reckoned with. The Social Network is engaging all the way through, with fascinating characters, memorable performances, and a taut script, all held together masterfully by director David Fincher.

Worst

Gymkata (1985)

Who comes up with these ideas? An American gymnast is enlisted by the US government to compete in a dangerous competition so they can build a Star Wars satellite station. He is able to come out victorious by combining his skills in gymnastics with martial arts. The movie is full of cliched or implausible moments, the absolute best scene being the one in which he fights off a village full of crazy people by using a stone pommel horse that just happens to be in the middle of the village square.

Coming up next: Two unexpectedly funny movies (though not for the same reasons).

Top and Bottom of 2011 - #8

Best

Tangled (2010)

This is a really fun movie. The animation is gorgeous and features several wonderful moments of pure character animation (with the animators constantly coming up with new and inventive uses for Rapunzel's hair), the songs are all pleasant (though none of them are particularly memorable), and Rapunzel spends most of the movie barefoot. Really, what's not to like?

Worst

King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962)

This movie is terrible. King Kong looks like a man in a bad monkey suit and his face makes him look incredibly stupid. The fight scenes are uninspiring, the models look like models, and the whole idea of electricity making King Kong stronger is just laughable.

Coming up next: A movie that has no business being as good as it is, and a movie that had no business even getting made.

Top and Bottom of 2011 - #9

Best

Contagion (2011)

This is the kind of movie that Roland Emmerich keeps making, but done right. A mysterious illness spreads over the world at an alarming rate, killing millions. The film tells the story of a wide variety of people and how they respond to living in the worldwide epidemic. The bulk of the screen time is devoted to the doctors and scientists who work trying to isolate the disease and develop a vaccine. Each is a hero in his or her own way. But we also get Matt Damon as the husband of the first person to die of the disease as he tries to keep together what’s left of his family and stay alive. We also get Jude Law as a conspiracy theorist/blogger who tries to profit from the epidemic. There’s Marion Cotillard as a World Health Organization agent who is kidnaped and held for ransom so that a village will be the first to get the vaccine. Director Steven Soderbergh deftly weaves all these story threads together to tell a story of how the world might cope if faced with a similar crisis in real life. Each storyline is compelling in its own way and is believable every step of the way. Which makes the movie all the more chilling as I left the theater wondering if this could actually happen.

Worst

Reds (1981)

This movie can’t decide what kind of a movie it is. It starts with a series of real life people talking about journalist and communist John Reed and his girlfriend/lover/not wife Louise Bryant. Then we get Warren Beatty and Diane Keaton running around as Reed and Bryant, doing the things that the talking heads were just talking about. Then we get more talking heads. Then another dose of Beatty and Keaton. Just pick one: documentary or biopic. And at over three hours, the movie is interminably long. The filmmakers really needed to remove the talking heads (or even better, the Beatty and Keaton melodrama) to give the movie a more taut running time. Of course then I started to wonder what was the purpose of even having this movie at all. I disagreed with almost everything Reed said, and the relationship stuff was an unending cycle of fighting, moping, and making up.

Coming up next: Two movies about overgrown things.

Top and Bottom of 2011 - #10

Best

Disney Live-Action Movies

I was brought up on the live action Disney films of the 70s and 80s, and have seen most of them. But there were still a few glaring holes in my Disney watching history. That, coupled with an anemic Netflix queue, led me to start filling those holes. This journey through the Disney vault reminded me of why I liked the live-action Disney movies so much as a kid. They are pleasant and almost always leave you with a smile on your face, even when the humor falls flat. They are trying to be fun entertainment that the whole family can enjoy without talking down to younger audience members or boring the older crowd. When I thought about these movies, the word that kept coming to mind was charming. The particular stand-outs of the crop that I watched last year are The Cat from Outer Space (1978), Toby Tyler (1960), and Freaky Friday (1976), though any and all of the ones I watched this year are worth a look. Even the not-so-good ones.

Worst

Wizards (1977)

I consider the animated movie of The Lord of the Rings to be one of the worst movies I have ever seen, but I was willing to give director Ralph Bakshi another chance. This time around he was telling his own story and didn't have to adapt something as massive as Tolkien's masterpiece into a reasonable running time. Unfortunately, free range Ralph Bakshi isn't much better. The fantasy world he creates makes little sense as most of the rules seem made up on the fly. The animation is cheap, often relying heavily on rotoscoping and stills. (Not-so-small side note: I categorically dislike rotoscoping in animated movies. It's as if the director can't decide whether to make an animated movie or a live action one so says, "Let's do both!" But instead of getting the best that each medium has to offer, what we are left with is the worst of both worlds. Rotoscoped images almost always look woefully out of place once they are placed into an animated world. And one of the main reasons for doing an animated movie as opposed to a live action one is the freedom animation affords filmmakers. Rotoscoping throws that freedom right out the window and deprives animators of the chance to fully ply their craft. Rotoscoping can occasionally be used for interesting stylish effect, most notably in Waking Life, but 99% of the time it is just garish.) Characters flip-flop their allegiances on a whim, powerful magical people don't even know how to use their own magic, the bad guy motivates his army using the power of Hitler, and the fairy princess spends the whole movie dressed in extremely revealing lingerie. It claims to be a kids' movie, but I don't find it suitable for people of any age.

Coming up next: Two single-word titles with sprawling stories.

Top and Bottom of 2011 - Honorable Mentions

The time has come to reveal the best and worst that I saw this year. In all I watched 147 movies (plus a couple more that I didn't record here on the blog). Far too many of them were mediocre, but a select few stood up and demanded to be counted on both extremes of the spectrum. I will get to those soon, but first I wanted to give out a couple honorable mentions. These were both pieces of note that for different reasons I deemed them ineligible for either list. But since I'm the one making the rules I can bend them any way I like. So without further ado, here are the official honorable mentions from this 2011.

Best

The Doctor’s Wife (2011)

The best thing I saw all year was actually an episode of a television show. This episode of Doctor Who is funny, thrilling, sweet, and heartbreaking, and all in about 45 minutes. While I’m not sure this would make a good first episode for someone looking to get into Doctor Who, it has become an instant favorite. And I highly recommend the show. There’s a reason an episode of Doctor Who has won the Hugo award for “best dramatic presentation - short form” five times over the past six years (with a total of sixteen nominations).

Worst

Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny (1972)

Back when I started making these end-of-year lists, I decided that any movie I saw that was an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 would be ineligible for consideration for the bottom ten list. I made this decision mostly because it would be just too easy filling the list with the dregs of cinema that Joel, Mike, and the Bots found for me instead of using films I sought out myself. Mystery Science Theater 3000 is no more (pause for a moment of silence) but Rifftrax has come to take its place. While they make downloadable commentaries for recent big-budget blockbusters, they also continue the spirit of MST3K by unearthing really bad movies from yesteryear. This was one of those movies. Santa’s sleigh is stuck in the sand and his reindeer have flown away. So he enlists the aid of the neighborhood kids who try to pull his sleigh out of the sand using various barnyard animals while Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn look on. When everything fails, Santa says, “This reminds me of the story of Thumbelina.” So he tells the neighborhood kids the story of Thumbelina as they look on in boredom, wishing they could be doing something exciting and interesting like homework instead of listening to the old man drone on and on. The story of Thumbelina is an entire short inside this movie with its own credit sequence and is mostly a long commercial for a defunct amusement park called Pirates World. When the story is done, the Ice Cream Bunny drives up on his fire truck. Santa says, “Of course! The Ice Cream Bunny! Why didn’t I think of that?” Then everyone is happy and the movie ends. This was hands-down the worst movie I saw all year. The plot has an IQ of -3, no one can act worth a lick, and the whole thing is interminably slow. However, I deemed it ineligible since it was essentially another episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Coming up next: Movies that are fun (and not-so-fun) for the whole family.

My 2011 Movie Odyssey - Part XV

Drive (2011)

This is a surprisingly smart action movie with some really slick driving and shockingly brutal violence.

The Help (2011)

This film examines what life was like for African American women in the South working as maids in the 1960s. This is the type of movie that seems to be made to get lots of end-of-year awards, dealing with an Important subject and featuring a cast of notable performances. Fortunately it is still quite entertaining and very rarely does it scream, “Look how Important I am! Give me lots of golden statues!”

Hot Lead and Cold Feet (1978)

This is a fun little western comedy with Jim Dale playing three different roles. More Disney fun.

Ip Man 2 (2010)

This is a pretty good follow-up to Ip Man that follows a very similar story structure. The first half is devoted to lots of mostly light-hearted kung fu hijinks while the second half has Ip Man defending the honor of the Chinese people. But this time his opponent is not the Japanese but the British Empire.

The Sleeping Beauty (2010)

It starts out as a kind of interesting re-imagining of the Sleeping Beauty story. I liked some of the fairy tale aspects as Sleeping Beauty dreams a series of adventures for herself while she sleeps for a hundred years. But then things got really weird and it felt like an entire act of the story was missing and the whole thing stopped being interesting in any way.

David Copperfield (1935)

I don’t know if I’ve seen a bad movie based on a Charles Dickens novel. He fills his stories with so many wonderfully quirky characters that they are just begging to be performed by an all-star cast. This movie is no exception. There are wonderful characters galore, with my absolute favorite being Edna May Oliver as the somewhat cranky, set-in-her-ways yet lovable Aunt Betsey.

Best Worst Movie (2009)

I am fascinated by bad movies. In fact, I am almost more excited to compile my bottom ten of the year than my top ten. So this documentary was right up my alley as it looked into the cinematic atrocity that is Troll 2. It was fun to watch interviews featuring the actors in the movie as they told stories of what it was like on set. Most of these actors were fully aware both of how bad the movie is and how bad their performances were. But the ribbing was all in good fun. We also get to see a bunch of fans of the movie who love it because it is so bad. Unfortunately it does get a little painful when they interview the director of Troll 2. He is under the delusion that it is a good movie and doesn’t seem to understand that the only reason people love the movie is because it is so bad. I felt a little sorry for him since he was the only person in the room not laughing at the joke.

And so ends my 2011 Movie Odyssey. Coming up soon is my top and bottom ten of the year. Any predictions?

My 2011 Movie Odyssey - Part XIV

The Last King of Scotland (2006)

Forest Whitaker puts in an all-out performance as African dictator Idi Amin, a man who is instantly personable yet morally repulsive.

Contagion (2011)

This is the kind of movie that Roland Emmerich keeps making, but done right. A mysterious illness spreads over the world at an alarming rate, killing millions. The film tells the story of a wide variety of people and how they respond to living in the worldwide epidemic. The bulk of the screentime is devoted to the doctors and scientists who work trying to isolate the disease and develop a vaccine. Each is a hero in his or her own way. But we also get Matt Damon as the husband of the first person to die of the disease as he tries to keep together what’s left of his family and stay alive. We also get Jude Law as a conspiracy theorist/blogger who tries to profit from the epidemic. There’s Marion Cotillard as a World Health Organization agent who is kidnaped and held for ransom so that a village will be the first to get the vaccine. Director Steven Soderbergh deftly weaves all these story threads together to tell a story of how the world might cope if faced with a similar crisis in real life. Each storyline is compelling in its own way and is believable every step of the way. Which makes the movie all the more chilling as this could actually happen.

Summer Stock (1950)

Judy Garland and Gene Kelly put on a show! The story is amusing if nothing special. The main reason to see this movie is the scene in which Gene Kelly dances with a squeaky board and a newspaper. (Trust me, it’s amazing.)

Do You Like Hitchcock? (2005)

I do. Quite a lot, actually. Which is why I don’t recommend this movie. It makes direct homage to Strangers on a Train, Vertigo, Psycho, Rear Window, and Dial M for Murder but is vastly inferior to each of those films. If you like Hitchcock, watch more Hitchcock, not this second-rate imitation.

Hanna (2011)

It’s fun watching Saoirse Ronan kick butt, but I wish movies like this didn’t have so high a body count. The good guys kill random bystanders almost as frequently as the bad guys.

Marjorie Morningstar (1958)

The first half feels like a musical without any musical numbers and is kind of fun. Of special note is Ed Wynn who is very good as a protective, somewhat eccentric uncle. But the second half goes into full-on drama mode and gets really boring.

The Muppets (2011)

I’m a big fan of the Muppets, especially their work on The Muppet Show. One of the things that I noticed with their movies starting with Muppet Christmas Carol is that the humor wasn’t quite as sharp. It was as if the Muppets had been tamed. I was hopeful when the screenwriters claimed they were trying to recapture the feel of The Muppet Show and the first couple movies, but they were the same screenwriters who did very adult comedies. Would they be able to reign in their baser instincts and deliver a movie fit for the whole family? Fortunately, they did. The movie does an excellent job of keeping the feel of the television show. The jokes are funny, the songs are fun (with “Life’s a Happy Song” being an especially catchy standout), and there are some wonderful celebrity cameos. It was like spending time with old friends again, and I had a smile on my face through the whole movie.

King Kong (1976)

It’s not so much that it’s a bad movie, but that it’s not interesting, and the guy in a monkey suit is not nearly as convincing as the stop-motion Kong.

The Mummy (1932)

The makeup on Boris Karloff is really good, but the story is rather lackluster. And I never really understood the whole Egypt craze back in the day.

Les Girls (1957)

This musical takes the idea of the unreliable narrator and runs with it. The same basic story is told from three very different perspectives and it is quite fun watching the story unfold from each unique perspective. There are also some fun musical numbers including “Ladies in Waiting,” a surprisingly risque number for the time period.

My 2011 Movie Odyssey - Part XIII

Vampyr (1932)

There is some wonderful use of shadows, but the movie really wishes it was a silent film and the story is confusing.

Gran Torino (2008)

Humor can come from a lot of places. It happens when people say funny things (like Groucho and Chico Marx), it happens when people do funny things (like Harpo Marx), and it happens when funny things happen to someone (like Bringing Up Baby). Humor also can happen on a more subtler level when you get folks just being folks (like most of Garrison Keilor’s Lake Wobegon stories). There is plenty of this final kind of humor in Gran Torino. Not to say that it’s a comedy since the movie deals with some serious subject matter as Walt (played by Clint Eastwood) tries to keep his next-door neighbors from getting caught up in a destructive gang world. But I was surprised at how much I laughed as set-in-his-ways Walt was continually nudged out of his comfort zone. I loved watching the characters interact with each other, especially the scenes of Walt teaching his neighbor how to be a man. (There is a disappointing dearth of scenes like this in movies today, though that’s a rant for another day.) And I loved the ending. Too often a movie like this may end up with an ending that is either too contrived to be believable or too convenient to be satisfactory, but this ending feels so right I can’t come up with a better one. Every once in a while a movie comes along that completely surprises me with how much I like it; this is one of those.

Destiny (1921)

There are some striking visuals in this silent movie as a woman tries to convince Death to return her beloved to her.

Aelita: Queen of Mars (1924)

Called the first Soviet science fiction film, I was interested to check it out. It starts out promising enough as a scientist tries to build a rocket to fly to Mars. But by the time he gets to Mars and starts a Communist revolution there, I had lost all interest in the movie. The visuals are interesting only in a “this is what Russians in 1924 thought futuristic and exotic looked like” way as they look rather silly today.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011)

I just couldn’t get over how bad the scientists were in this film. First they start off making rash assumptions and promises due to incomplete research. Then, when one of them gets exposed to the airborne version of the “make monkeys smarter” drug, do they put him in quarantine, or at least under observation? No. He just continues on his merry way. And then when he start showing unusual symptoms, does he go to a doctor or tell the other scientists? No. Instead, he tries to continue on his merry way, and is ultimately responsible for the future destruction of the human race. There are some fun action sequences and Andy Serkis’s motion capture performance as the main ape is very good, but the poor science just reeked of sloppy storytelling.

Source Code (2011)

Time travel stories can be really tricky. This one mostly works though the ending was too convenient.

The Last Unicorn (1982)

I’m glad I read the book before I watched the movie, as I’m not sure I would have liked it as much had I not known the kind of story it was trying to tell.

Strange Days (1995)

While some of the science fiction ideas were interesting, the movie goes into some really dark and gruesome places.

The Adjustment Bureau (2011)

I really liked this story about a man who tries to defy fate to be with the woman he loves. I liked how simple and subtle most of the effects were and it asks some interesting questions about the nature of free will and even God. I also liked how it ties in neatly with Tolkien’s concept of the music of the Ainur from the Silmarillion.

Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2010)

How is it that a movie can be as inept as this one is in every single aspect possible? The acting is flat, the dialog is clunky at best, the sound is worse than most student films, and the effects are less convincing than the grasshoppers-on-a-postcard shots from Beginning of the End. The story is the illegitimate child of The Birds and An Inconvenient Truth. And for some reason, all the birds explode when they run into things. I have a hard time coming up with the worst scene in the movie. It could be the one where our heroes defend themselves from hovering CG birds by randomly waving around coat hangers. It could be the one where the protagonist extolls the benefits of solar panels (or as he calls them, “sorpaos”). It might be the scene where our heroes walk out of a screening of An Inconvenient Truth and one of them says, “That was a really good movie. I’m going to buy a hybrid now.” But my vote probably has to go to all the scenes devoted to either parking or cautiously pulling into traffic. No other film I have seen has devoted so much time to these two activities that are marginally more entertaining than watching paint dry.

I'm almost done with 2011!

My 2011 Movie Odyssey - Part XII

Wizards (1977)

I consider the animated movie of The Lord of the Rings to be one of the worst movies I have ever seen, but I was willing to give director Ralph Bakshi another chance. This time around he was telling his own story and didn't have to adapt something as massive as Tolkien's masterpiece into a reasonable running time. Unfortunately, free range Ralph Bakshi isn't much better. The fantasy world he creates makes little sense as most of the rules seem made up on the fly. The animation is cheap, often relying heavily on rotoscoping and stills. (Not-so-small side note: I categorically dislike rotoscoping in animated movies. It's as if the director can't decide whether to make an animated movie or a live action one so says, "Let's do both!" But instead of getting the best that each medium has to offer, what we are left with is the worst of both worlds. Rotoscoped images almost always look woefully out of place once they are placed into an animated world. And one of the main reasons for doing an animated movie as opposed to a live action one is the freedom animation affords filmmakers. Rotoscoping throws that freedom right out the window and deprives animators of the chance to fully ply their craft. Rotoscoping can occasionally be used for interesting stylish effect, most notably in Waking Life, but 99% of the time it is just garish. I'm also left wondering if motion capture is the new rotoscoping.) Characters flip-flop their allegiances on a whim, powerful magical people don't even know how to use their own magic, the bad guy motivates his army using the power of Hitler, and the fairy princess spends the whole movie dressed in extremely revealing lingerie. It claims to be a kids' movie, but I don't find it suitable for people of any age.

Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

This is a very entertaining movie and Steve Rogers/Captain America is quite a compelling character. I liked how they went with a historical context for him, placing the movie during WWII. Unfortunately, the final scene felt out of place and tacked on. It really should have been the first scene of the next movie or the post-credits scene.

Machete (2010)

What started out as a fake trailer in Grindhouse has become a full-fledged movie. It's quite enjoyable as mindless, over-the-top entertainment.

Waiting for “Superman” (2010)

This documentary takes a sobering look at the state of public education in America today. While it does a great job at pointing out many of the flaws, there aren't a whole lot of solutions to be seen. And I've never been advertised to so much during the closing credits as half a dozen times I was encouraged to send a text to number X "for more information" (not to mention the number of times the film's website was thrown at me as well).

Batman: Under the Red Hood (2010)

Maybe I was just expecting too much, but I was rather underwhelmed by this movie. It tells a fine story, but it left me wanting more.

The Cove (2009)

A group of animal rights activists team up to do their part to stop the systematic slaughter of dolphins at a cove in Japan. Many of their efforts to capture the killings on camera are as thrilling as many spy movies and as intricate. But through the whole thing I found myself disagreeing with almost everything they said. After all, they're just dolphins. If dolphins are as intelligent as the filmmakers claim, couldn't they figure out a way to not get trapped by the dolphin fishermen? All the time, energy, and money they spent trying to save those glorified fish could have been better spent digging wells in Africa, teaching English in China, or working at a homeless shelter in Denver.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (2011)

With all the boring stuff out of the way in Part 1, Part 2 ends up being a fast-paced, action-packed thrill ride that barely gives its audience time to catch its breath. I could quibble with some of the ways the narrative was translated from the book, but they would be little more than sour grapes. This is easily the second best of the movies (after Prisoner of Azkaban).

Kick-Ass (2010)

This is a slick, energetic movie that is loads of fun.

The Colossus of Rhodes (1961)

Sergio Leone does a sword and sandals movie! While some of the sets are really nice, there's very little that separates this movie from the other films of the genre.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920)

John Barrymore does an admirable job at portraying both the virtuous Jekyll and the despicable Hyde. It's also interesting to note that the musical took many of its narrative cues from this movie.

My 2011 Movie Odyssey - Part XI

The Gnome-Mobile (1967)

This is a fun little movie as two children (the ones from Mary Poppins) and their grandfather (Walter Brennan) try to help a group of gnomes find a new home. I keep using the word charming to describe these live-action Disney movies, and it’s starting to sound redundant, but that’s the best word I can think of to describe them. They are pleasant and almost always leave you with a smile on your face, even when the humor falls flat. They are trying to be fun entertainment that the whole family can enjoy without talking down to younger audience members or boring the older crowd. I find it very disappointing that Disney nowadays seems to be content aiming for the lowest common denominator with its live-action fare.

Paul (2011)

I was really looking forward to this one. I really like Shaun of the Dead and the televison show Spaced, and I love Hot Fuzz, so the latest teaming of Simon Pegg and Nick Frost was a guaranteed success. Except it wasn't. The humor was not nearly as sharp as in previous efforts and too often aimed for the lowest common denominator. But was really irked me was their treatment of conservative Americans, especially in the character of a sweet, Bible believing young woman. She is shown the enlightened truth of atheistic evolution and suddenly she is swearing up a storm and trying to jump into Simon Pegg's pants. It is supposed to be funny but it really comes out as just pathetic writing. There were some good sci-fi references, but mostly the whole thing was a giant disappointment.

Cowboys & Aliens (2011)

I really liked the first half as Daniel Craig tries to figure out who he is and why he has a weird metallic object strapped to his wrist. The second half, however, is pretty run-of-the-mill action stuff, with the answers to the questions asked in the first half being far less interesting than the questions. The whole thing is still a pretty fun summer action movie.

Splice (2009)

Once I got over how short-sighted and impulsive the scientists acted, this turned out to be an interesting piece of sci-fi/monster horror.

The World’s Greatest Athlete (1973)

The Disney formula doesn't always work. Sometimes you get a movie like this one, that has a couple good sequences, but ultimately is just too silly for its own good.

The Singing Ringing Tree (1957)

I read an article that claimed that this might be the best children's fantasy movie ever made, so I decided to check it out. It is a very pretty morality/fairy tale with lush production design. Some of the costumes and effects are extremely dated, but they rarely look cheesy as they are still interesting to look at. It was quite an enjoyable movie (though I wish I could have watched a subtitled version instead of one with an English narrator). And for the record, The Wizard of Oz is still the best children's fantasy movie ever made.

Beverly Hills Cop (1984)

Eddie Murphy is engaging, but there was very little to distinguish it from similar 80s movies.

Blade II (2002)

I was eager to see this since it was directed by Guillermo del Toro but was very disappointed. The story was unengaging and the big plot twists were dumb.

Oldboy (2003)

In the middle there is an amazing fight sequence. It takes place in a hallway where the main character fights off about a dozen attackers, armed only with his fists and a hammer. The fight is brutal and is staged in one continuous shot. It is an astounding piece of filmmaking. I just couldn't connect with the rest of the film. And by the end, when all the secrets are revealed, I was repulsed by the directions the narrative took. It also didn't help that Netflix streaming only had a dubbed version of the film.

The Adventures of Hercules (1985)

THIS is the Hercules movie that has him turn into a cartoon as the climax. In the sequel to 1983's Hercules, Lou Ferrigno once again stars as the Herc, this time tracking down the seven thunderbolts of Zeus which have been scattered across Greece. The plot is no better than that of a video game; Hercules defeats a monster to reclaim the thunderbolt then instantly travels to the next place where he faces off against the next monster. There are visual effects all over the movie, but they all look terrible, especially the scene in which Hercules battles a glowing ball of light and when he faces off against a gorgon in a blatant (and terrible) ripoff off Clash of the Titans. The dialog is laugh out loud atrocious, and for reasons known only to the filmmakers, every time Herc lands a punch, the screen flashes red. But the absolute cinematic pinacle of the movie is the climax. Hercules and Minos battle each other in the stars as bad rotoscoped images of themselves, occationally transforming into various animals to make everything more thrilling. Then, once Minos has been defeated, Herc gets huge and stops the moon from colliding with the earth. I was wrong earlier; THIS is the worst Hercules movie ever made.

My 2011 Movie Odyssey - Part X

Toby Tyler, or Ten Weeks with a Circus (1960)

Disney regular and ultimate precocious redhead Kevin Corcoran finally gets a movie all to himself. It's a joy to watch him as he learns the ins and outs of the circus business while charming every adult in sight. Toby's pet monkey gets a little too much screen time, but overall the movie is quite entertaining and a wonderful showcase for one of cinema's more underrated child actors.

The Illusionist (2010)

An animated Jacques Tati roams the countryside performing a series of mediocre magic tricks. I really wanted to like this movie, since I love Tati and it was directed by the director of The Triplets of Belleville, but the whole thing was far too melancholy for my tastes and an animated character is no substitute for the real Tati.

The Greatest Movie Ever Sold (2011)

The movie is fun to watch, and director Morgan Spurlock is a wonderfully engaging character, but the movie didn’t tell me very much about the world of product placement that I didn’t already know. I also wish Spurlock had been more biting in his analysis of product placement; the whole thing came off disappointingly tame.

Gymkata (1985)

Who comes up with these ideas? An American gymnast is enlisted by the US government to compete in a dangerous competition so they can build a Star Wars satellite station. He is able to come out victorious by combining his skills in gymnastics with martial arts. The movie is full of cliched or implausible moments, the absolute best scene being the one in which he fights off a village full of crazy people by using a stone pommel horse that just happens to be in the middle of the village square.

Zardoz (1974)

The screenshots from this film of Sean Connery wearing massive red boots and not much else are all over the internet and I was curious to see if the actual movie was as bad as the pictures promised. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been, as some of the story ideas were interesting, but mostly it was just silly. We get a giant floating stone head that vomits guns, trippy, psychedelic visuals in lieu of conflict, and lots and lots of running around for no apparent reason.

Freaky Friday (1976)

This is another winner from Disney. Barbara Harris and Jodie Foster are both very fun as the mother and daughter who switch bodies. The whole movie is full of laughs, and while the climax ventures from preposterous into absurd, the film is very entertaining.

The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996)

I don’t know whose idea it was to make Geena Davis into an action star, but I wish whoever it was would have kept his or her ideas to him or herself. She already proved a year earlier in Cutthroat Island that action was not her forte, but here she is again beating people up and then blowing up their houses. The premise is kind of interesting, but each new plot twist got more and more ridiculous and by the end I just didn’t care about anything.

The Happiest Millionaire (1967)

This is a flawed but at times entertaining musical. It is full of quirky characters and a few fun songs, but it is far too long for its own good and the narrative needs actual structure. Fred MacMurray stars as the titular millionaire who combines boxing and Bible study, keeps alligators as pets, and is a very patriotic American. He’s fun to watch, but he can’t sing very well, and when he tries to speak his songs it just sounds awkward. The movie can’t decide if it’s about the millionaire or his daughter, as long stretches (and many of them rather dull) focus solely on her and her efforts to become a lady after being brought up as a tomboy. The problem is that we never really get to see her act like a tomboy - we just hear her complaining about it. We are also introduced near the beginning to her two brothers who have a really fun musical number, but then disappear for the rest of the movie with almost no explanation given. At almost three hours long in its full version, the movie could really stand to lose about an hour of running time, focusing the plot on Fred MacMurray.

Winnie the Pooh (2011)

I was wary when I first heard about this movie. The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh is one of my favorite Disney films and I am a fan of A.A. Milne as well. Most of what I had seen of previous movies trying to bank on the Winnie the Pooh name (like The Tigger Movie and Pooh’s Heffalump Movie) they bore very little resemblance to both Milne’s original stories and the look of the first movie. So I was quite pleased to find out that the story was taken from three of the original stories and the look was a return to the 1977 film. The movie is quite charming and I was very pleased that they kept the characters’ interactions with the narrator, never letting the audience forget that these stories originally appeared in a book. It is a worthy sequel to the original.

Good Hair (2009)

This is a fascinating look into the time, effort, and money that African American women (and some men) put into making their hair fall down straight instead of frizzing up in an afro. The documentary is very entertaining and informative, though it made me sad to see an entire culture of people trying to model themselves after other people instead of trying to do things with their hair that are uniquely their own and that white women can’t do.