The Return Roar

Rumors of my disappearance have been greatly exaggerated. I did not think about the considerable amount of time it takes to keep up with a blog and to keep it fresh. The truth be told, I used this blog as therapy this past summer. I still love movies and have many things to write about or to share. I just want my TWO supporters to know that I acknowledge letting you down the past few months and will try harder to keep this blog new. It kept me contact with a few of you and I sincerely miss that.

There are several movies I have watched since my last post in October and I will give you a very brief rundown and few random and insignificant thoughts…

I Am Legend: Good with potential to be great. Will Smith is on the precipice of a truly breakthrough role it just isn’t this movie. The Fresh Prince needs to opt for a good script rather than a big pay day. There was too much emphasis on action in the last half-hour and the human side of things was lost. Combine this movie with Children of Men and I think a terrific movie may germinate.

Juno: Thoughtful and unpretentious. It might be the best screenplay written in many years. It showed the beauty of pregnancy as well as the immaturity of teens in similar situations. JK Simmons was priceless as Juno’s father. This was quirky, but honest.

American Gangster: Overblown crime drama. Too much in the same vein as Scarface, not enough of the two heavyweights dueling it out.

Charlie Wilson’s War: This movie was glossy in its portrayal of the Afghan/ Russian war, but it was damn entertaining. It was well worth the admission to see Phillip Seymour Hoffman. This is proof that good scripts can be great given great talent to carry out their purpose.

Up and coming: Horton Hears a Who

And You Can Quote Me...

Today’s Roar is for the guys. It is my belief that one of the most awkward situations to take part in is the dinner date with one of your wife/girlfriend’s good friends and her new beau. You see, this sets up for hours of elongated torture, but if you’re lucky, it can turn into something special. You are on the outside looking in and your wife/girlfriend has a vested interest. She wants to know if this guy is the “one” her friend will settle down with and she goes along to either give approval or the dreaded thumbs down. You go along because you are told you have to and you hope that the restaurant makes an abnormally sized steak so you don’t have to talk to this potential dweeb. As a man you know that the possibility exist that this particular guy may not have any of your interest, hell, he may not even like women and this thing could be a charade. Being the good soldier that you are, you smile and tell your wife/girlfriend this is going to be “fun.” The truth is that this fellow has a lot to prove to you. He has to pass your personal litmus test. In the back of his mind he is hoping you approve of him because if you don’t, chances are he isn’t getting to the “promise land” with your wife/girlfriend’s friend. Once the date begins you shake hands and you get over the lame introductions that are standard fare. After the appetizers come and you have already discussed your careers, he says something that catches your ear. You see, he ordered a steak just like you, but instead the waitress brings him the wrong dish with two center cut pork chops. He looks at you and says, “I don’t eat no swine.” You both look at each other and immediately you have formed a bond. Your heart actually flutters a bit because it has been so long since you have been able to quote movies and have someone actually “get it.” After all, you are a man and you pride yourself on the movie quote. You’ve practiced this skill for many years and it always seems to work among men. It is nice to sit with someone else who has also been trained in the art of the “quote.” As the evening rolls on, the quotes get more obscure and this guy gets about 95 percent of them. The “promise land” isn’t too far away for this guy you tell yourself. Once the dinner is over and you are leaving the restaurant you whisper into your wife/girlfriend’s friend’s ear and tell her “He’s cool.” This changes everything for your new friend, because your approval just got his passport stamped Ah! The power of movies!

Now I could get into quotable movies, but we have all heard the popular ones. For today’s roar I will post some of my favorites and hope you do the same.

5) “You will be…You will be.”-Scary Yoda

4) “San Diego...”-I could go on with this but I’d be doing a disservice to Ron Burgandy

3) “Hey Dorn, none of this ole bull****.”-Major League

2) Where do you think you're going? Nobody's leaving. Nobody's walking out on this fun, old-fashioned family Christmas. No, no. We're all in this together. This is a full-blown, four-alarm holiday emergency here. We're gonna press on, and we're gonna have the hap, hap, happiest Christmas since Bing Crosby tap-danced with Danny (bleeping) Kaye. And when Santa squeezes his fat white ass down that chimney tonight, he's gonna find the jolliest bunch of assholes this side of the nuthouse.” -Chevy Chase Christmas Vacation

1) “God darnit, Mr. Lamarr, you use your tongue prettier than a twenty dollar whore.”-Blazing Saddles (Mr.Taggert)

Trick or Treat?

I felt the need to see this movie as late in the fall as I possibly could. Its August 31st release date just didn’t cut it for me because it wasn’t close enough to the actual holiday. I had been increasingly anxious to see a “new” Michael Myers on screen and to celebrate the return of one of my all time favorite “creep out” films. I have said before that remakes are usually bad ideas turned into bad movies, but I was more than willing to give Rob Zombie a pass on this one. After all, I have always pictured Zombie as a teenager relaxing in his room playing death metal and reading the latest Fangoria Magazine. He was going to be the guy to pay the proper respects to the John Carpenter original. I spent time during the spring of last year reading articles and listening to interviews with Zombie. He exuded a confidence about HIS Halloween. He stated numerous times that this Halloween movie was HIS own with a slight touch of Carpenter. I trusted Rob Zombie. I saw the Devil’s Rejects and was impressed with the social commentary that the film put off. Sure, it was brutal, but it was funny and had a style. I must admit to liking House of 100 Corpses too. Halloween was in safe hands and once again I’d feel the uneasiness of Mike Myers prowling the streets of Haddonfield. As I watched Halloween, the thoughts of safe hands corroded into a laughable mess and Rob Zombie butchered an iconic super villain with the need to make HIS movie.
The first big mistake with this movie is the script. We are forced to watch a young Michael Myers come into his own as a psychopathic killer. It isn’t the least bit interesting. Zombie tried to create sympathy for the young man by giving him the most dysfunctional family ever created for the screen. His mother is a stripper, his sister could care less, and his mother’s live in boyfriend is a low life loser. Their house in Haddonfield is not a happy home, yet these people co-exist in the same habitat and frankly, it is rather unbelievable. Michael is picked on at school because his Mom dances topless at the local “Gentleman’s Club.” After receiving a beating in the boy’s bathroom, he is taken in by the principal and to our surprise they find a dead cat in his book bag. My sympathy for Michael is gone and now he is just a troubled kid. Enter Samuel Loomis played by Malcom McDowell. Now, Loomis was played by Donald Pleasance in the original and I believed McDowell would do the character credit. He did not because there was nothing in the script for him to work with. Loomis believes the boy needs to be institutionalized and says so during his conference with Ms. Myers. Meanwhile, Michael runs off and begins killing everyone in brutal fashion while wearing a clown mask. That is right…a clown mask. He later slaughters his entire family except for his baby sister, Boo. He is subsequently put into the institution where Loomis is to oversee his “rehab.” Flash forward 15 years and Michael is now grown up and when I say “grown up” I mean 6 foot 5 with a hulking frame. This is ridiculous because I believe the movie takes place before Balco. Myers is in the process of being “transferred.” To where? We never really find out and why should it matter? Myers gets loose, kills everyone and voila he is free. How convenient. When I said the script was lacking I meant it is abysmal. Myers returns home and Zombie gives a shot for shot remake of the original with slight variations to a few murders. I have a problem with this because this is HIS movie. I won’t spoil the big reveal or the surprise ending, but let’s just say you won’t be shocked.
The major problems with Rob Zombie’s Halloween aren’t necessarily with his idea of creating a psychopath. The problem is we don’t need an explanation of “evil” or why it walks among us. It is just scary to think that a person exists in our world like Michael Myers. As a viewer, we don’t need to know his intentions. Carpenter’s Halloween was a success because his Myers had no rhyme or reason. He was created out of need to murder and inflict pain. The original brought a presence more than a character and gave us a creepy stalker who was institutionalized and escapes in grand fashion. He isn’t given “super powers” and rarely bust through walls or appears out of no where. Zombie’s Myers is cartoonish and not frightening enough for today’s audiences. Zombie’s Halloween is brutal and that is HIS fatal mistake because brutality isn’t horror. Horror movies are supposed to be scary and when we sit through them we should feel uneasy as they tap into our adrenal glands. I’m starting to feel that the horror genre has gotten far away from being creepy and scary. We now have a slew of movies that are kindly called “torture porn” by critics. These movies do have their place and Eli Roth’s Hostel is an exploration into that area, but Michael Myers doesn’t belong in a movie just about brutality. I know this was an attempt by Zombie to make HIS movie and he did, but he lost sight of what makes horror frightening. A cartoon can be stopped, but PURE E…Vil (Donald Pleasance) cannot.

All Aboard!

The “old west” is as American as any one thing we have in our culture. It is exclusively ours. The west has its rightful place with apple pie and Fourth of July. Over the years the cinema has captured this piece of Americana with grandeur and wonderment. Yes, there was the spaghetti western trilogy of Sergio Leone, but they captured the essence of what the west was and what it would soon become, even though they were filmed in Spain and Italy. Westerns used to be common place in the movies and demanded iconic actors to take on the roles of Jesse James, Wyatt Earp, and Butch Cassidy. Recently, Hollywood has strayed away from the western because those films do not make money and our fascination with the west has dwindled. A lot of modern westerns have become stylistic with Matrix like action and have lost their charm in telling stories of good vs. evil. 3:10 to Yuma is that movie. It is the western I’ve wanted to see. Charming? No. Harsh? Yes. Stylistic? No. A tale of the good nature of some and the evil ways of others? Yes. This movie relies heavily on its actors to carry a simple story and it does so effortlessly.
Christian Bale (Batman Begins) plays Dan Evans, a rancher who is on the verge of losing his farm to a major railroad company. Dan is a man tortured by being discharged from the Union Army due to a “battle” wound. He has lost favor in his oldest son’s eyes and his wife has not looked at him in years. Yet, Dan holds onto hope and out of hope, he becomes a desperate man to save his family from certain demise. Bale plays Evans perfectly. He isn’t the prototypical hero that we have become accustomed to in most action epics. Dan’s whole story never unfolds into the final frames and this a true credit to the screen writers.
Evan’s life changes drastically when he runs into wanted criminal Ben Wade played by Russell Crowe (Gladiator). Crowe is as good as he as ever been. He is mean, nasty, and dangerous. There is also a sadness built into his character and it something we see on screen, however, we are not sure if his sympathies are genuine. For me, this is the strength of Crowe as an actor and it is what makes him special. When Evans and Wade first meet Crowe does not endear himself to Dan. He takes Dan’s horses and has accidentally killed two of his cattle. Later, the two meet as Wade is captured in town and 3:10 to Yuma begins to move.
The plot is simple. Get Ben Wade to the prison train in Yuma before his gang comes to free him. Wade’s escorts consist of a bounty hunter (played by Peter Fonda), a veterinarian, a railroad representative, and Dan Evan’s who takes two hundred dollars to help bring Wade to justice. A lot happens in between and we get classic camp fire scenes, horses riding across the mythical west, and a gang of the meanest bastards hunting down the convoy. It is in this simplicity that this movie works because there is an increasing tension throughout the journey, but the most pleasant surprise of the movie is Ben Foster (X-Men 3) as Charlie Prince, the loyal sidekick of Ben Wade. Foster probably won’t receive a best supporting actor nod, but he should be under consideration.
3:10 to Yuma worked for me on multiple levels. There is a rich, heart tugging story between a boy and his father, a villain who lives amongst codes and not laws, and the old west in all of its glory. This movie is very American and captures the essence of good action yarn. Yuma is a 1957 remake and I usually hate remakes, but this movie deserved to be treated with great actors such as Bale and Crowe. I am glad it received the proper respect it deserved and I am certain you’ll enjoy boarding the 3:10 to Yuma.

Battle of the Vacations

The next segment on The Daily Roar will be a “versus” feature. Everyday will feature a battle between movies, actors, and actresses. I will be requesting the help of guest writers to help with the process. For today’s Roar I’ll give you the lay out and the criteria. The segment will follow a boxing format and you the reader will be the judge of each “bout.”
Today’s bout features National Lampoon’s Vacation vs. National Lampoon’s European Vacation. Some of you will probably want to go with original others will go with the sequel. In my opinion both are comedic classics. This should be a hard hitting fight.

National Lampoon’s Vacation

Tale of the tape: Released in 1983 and written by John Hughes. This feature was directed by Harold Ramis. Vacation stars Chevy Chase as pop-culture father figure, Clark Griswold. You all know the story. Clark tries to plan the perfect vacation to Walley World only to have setback after setback along their trek cross country.

Jab: The cameos are portrayed with near perfection in this classic. Christy Brinkley is ridiculously sexy and I believe Clark agrees (swimming pool scene). John Candy is priceless has the Walley World security guard.

Combination Punches: Randy Quaid as Cousin Eddie is a demonstration of flawless comedic execution. The rapport between Chase and Quaid still makes me laugh.

Knockout Punch: The death of Aunt Edna and subsequently strapping her to the roof of the station wagon is very memorable. Clark’s arrival at the gates of Walley World only to learn that it is closed features the great spazz scene in movie history. It is hard not to laugh at Clark holding Candy hostage with a pellet gun.

National Lampoon’s European Vacation



Tale of the tape: Released in 1985 and written by John Hughes. This film was directed by Amy Heckerling. Chevy Chase returns as Clark Griswold. The Griswolds win a trip to Europe on the game show Pig in a Poke. The same set of circumstances seem to follow the Griswalds to Europe.

Jab: Eric Idle does a great job as the guy who is constantly getting hurt by Clark’s accidents. “It’s just flesh wound.”

Combination Punches: Rusty and Clark eating dinner in France is tremendously funny. “He’s going to pork her…”

Knockout Punch: The Big Ben Parliament scene is classic. I still quote it every time I get lost or pass the same structure as I’m driving. “Hey Dad, bedpans…”

Well, this is the format and will get more involved as the weeks go on. Please comment and vote for your favorite.

Bourne Again

Matt Damon has certainly made a career for himself playing a multitude of characters. His range has an actor has more than surpassed expectations and his decisions to do “good” films have carried him into acting’s elite class. The Bourne series has been one of those brilliant choices because it establishes him as a legitimate action star. Damon plays Jason Bourne with such intensity that it is hard to take your eyes off of him. There is an urgency to his character and that credit has to go to Tony Gilroy who scripted this third installment. Paul Greengrass (United 93) is back to direct with the “shaky cam” that the made the first two movies so popular. The Bourne Ultimatum does nothing new with genre, but perfect the art form. The first frames of Ultimatum are like receiving an electrical shock to your “ticker.” The set-up is done flawlessly amidst tons of action and there is no need for it to slow down. As the plot moves the characters are moving too from scene to scene. It may seem that you have “seen this before,” but not done in this fashion. There is a certain flare and definite violence to all of the fight scenes as Jason Bourne fights to recover his true identity.
Joan Allen (Pam Landy) returns for this installment along with Julia Styles (Nicky Parsons). Both do a fine job of keeping us informed of the “plot” as Bourne gets closer to the truth. David Straithairn (Good Night and Good Luck) plays the villain, Noah Vosen. Straithairn plays Vosen with the same intensity as Damon portrays Bourne and that is what makes this movie so effective. There is a willingness of the actors to play each role as if they were “hitting the ground running” and it certainly pours over into the audience.
The Bourne Ultimatum wraps up the trilogy nicely unlike some of the other three-quels we have seen this summer. It is hard to say that this is the best action movie to come along in quite sometime because bold statements like that leave things for debate. It can be said that this definitely the best in the series and surely the best of the summer. By the time the movie lets you go you will be breathless, but begging for a fourth and hoping to be Bourne again.

The Soundtrack

Soundtracks often make or break movies. They add emotion to the screen and when carefully executed, make a movie better than it really should be. Looking back at John Carpenter’s Halloween, it isn’t scary without the creepy Michael Myers music. Carpenter himself said so in numerous interviews and that movie depends greatly on the “musical ambiance” that is set forth. Movie soundtracks have a way of crawling into pop culture as they become more recognizable. Everyone knows that John Williams is the probably the master of the soundtrack. He has Raiders of the Lost Ark, Star Wars, E.T., Jaws, and many more to his credit. These soundtracks are all impressive in their own right because they identify characters and situations in such distinctive ways. Then there is the lyrical soundtrack. It has to be difficult to put together music from a collection to reflect the situations that exist on screen. Sometimes it is the director’s taste or it is music from a certain period. Think about Pulp Fiction and its glorious soundtrack. If different songs are chosen Tarrantino ends up with a completely different movie. The audience reaction is probably not as strong and Pulp Fiction goes down as an ordinary film. The point is that the soundtrack may be the most important part of film making. Today’s Roar is dedicated to the soundtrack and no, Dirty Dancing will not be in top five just in case you were wondering.

5) Star Wars Trilogy
Yes, I am a geek when it comes to this ,but the Imperial March gives me goose bumps. You know you’ve hit big when every college football band plays your music. The Cantina Band was very innovative for its time and I still love that scene in Star Wars. EVERYONE knows the main theme and its brief appearance in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off made that movie for me.

4) Resevoir Dogs
“Stuck in the Middle with You…” I cannot help but to think of ears when I hear that song. Michael Madsen is one psychotic wacko, but that was fun to watch. Put the Lime in the Coconut and Shake it All Up!

3) Oh Brother Where Art Thou?
I do not think there is a more unique soundtrack and this one is really just preference on my part. There is something calming about old blue grass/and field hollering music. I listen to this often and it soothes my sometimes aching soul. Not a bad flick either.

2) Pulp Fiction
Of course Pulp Fiction! Every song defines a moment in the film from Bustin’ Surfboards to Jungle Boogie. I must confess that I listened to this soundtrack more than any other for the dialogue. I now want a Royale with Cheese.



1) The Big Chill
When I was kid I’d steal this record from my mom’s collection and take it to my room. It was my first experience with Motown and I credit it for broadening my horizons beyond Mister Mister. Smokey Robinson’s Tears of a Clown is still my favorite song and I would have loved to experience Motown firsthand, but The Big Chill will have to do.