Red: A Review

Release year: 2010

Original title: Red

Rating: PG-13 for intense sequences of action violence and brief strong language.

Tagline: Killer company man.

Genre: Action, comedy.

The introduction is quaint in its simplicity. We see Frank Moses (Bruce Willis) going around and doing his tough-guy thing. He puts up a few decorations after noticing that his is the only house lacking them and shows us a glimpse into his softer side during a conversation with Sarah Ross (Mary-Louise Parker), a customer service worker for the place handling Frank's pension checks.

Due to Sarah's direct involvement, Frank is growing an avocado plant in a jar and has been keeping abreast of a series of romance novels, Sarah being the sole motivation.

Frank's house is visited in the middle of the night by some very well-trained assassins.  Frank is prepared, though, and gets the upper hand very quickly. I won't tell you what he does or how he does it because the movie is an action-comedy. Telling you the action would be the same as ruining the jokes, the two are pretty much the foundation the movie is built on.

So anyway, that happens. Frank predicts that his phone line has been bugged and goes to Kansas City. The interaction between Frank and Sarah is absolutely priceless. I won't go too much into the comedy here, but I will say that their chemistry is strong, and maintains a decent level throughout the entire movie. You end up liking them both individually and as a couple.

Somewhere around this point is a pretty awesome car chase scene.

Next Frank goes to New Orleans to find Joe (Morgan Freeman) his mentor. Joe is currently living in a retirement home and later reveals he's terminally ill, though the casual nature that he does this in suggests that Frank already knows as he rightly should. Following clues left behind by a deceased reporter, whose death they suspect is no accident, the duo find a hit list. One that leads them to track down Marvin (John Malkovich), easily the most likable character in the entire movie.

Now I will say this. I feel that, as of late, it seems that group movies need that one off-kilter character that funny, crazy, but still dangerously skilled. In the A-Team it was Murdock, and here it's Marvin. I wouldn't put it beyond the staff of Red to have done this on purpose as some sort of parody, given how obvious the allusion is, but I think it's just good ol' fashioned character-type casting.

They continue onward, track down someone on the list, and this eventually leads to the next action scene. This one is a doozy, so hold on to your seats and keep your eyes peeled. A lot of stuff happens all at once and you want to make sure you squeeze every bit of enjoyment out of it.

I've left out a lot at this point, and I've also stopped quite some time before the end of the movie. I do this because the plot is not horribly complex or involving. It, and the characters inside of it, are entertaining and novel but only just enough to carry the movie forward. It is an action-comedy almost to a fault, with the best parts of the movie being the action and the comedy respectively.

The dynamics between the characters, though, are a rich source of characterization and their development is not at all static. The dialogue might be the best part of the movie. The top action shots for involves Willins in one and Malkovich in the other, so keep your eye out for those two.

If you've seen the movie post comments about what you thought, what you liked, and what your best action picks are.

The Legend of 1900: A Review

Release year: 1998

Original title: La leggenda del pianista sull'oceano

Rating: R for language (and NOTHING else)

Tagline: A beautiful story of a man who could do anything... except be ordinary.

Genre: Drama, fantasy, music, romance.

Let me just start off by saying that I love this movie, that it dominated the number 1 spot on my personal top 10 for a good, long while and that it currently contends with some of the greatest movies of all time on said list.

Max (Pruit Taylor Vince) was the trumpet player aboard a ship that ferried illegal immigrants from Europe to America, through New York, about five times a year. His introductory monologue is well-paced, ripe with emotion and vivid in the message it wants to convey. After his introduction, our story continues with Max walking into a pawn shop to sell his trumpet. Begging the owner to let him play his trumpet one last time, the owner recognizes the tune Max plays and pulls out a shoddily stitched together vinyl record. The tunes match up. The frame narrative is set up and the second story begins.

The transition is beautiful, the flashback here executed without the clumsiness that soap operas are known for. Throughout the film, time is toyed with through the use of flashbacks and quick-cuts back to the present but is handled beautifully all throughout.

The story-within-a-story begins with coal stoker Danny Boodman (Bill Nunn) picking through the ground of the upper-class party room after all of the immigrants unload. Here he finds a baby in a hand basket. You read it right. Danny decides to adopt the abandoned baby and raise him as his own. He names the child Danny Boodmann T.D. Lemon Nineteen Hundred '1900' (Tim Roth).

At this point you might be asking just how much I'm going to give away. Well the answer is, not that much really. So we're going to blur over the finger and coarser details of things here and flash forward in the plot a little bit. 1900 is now grown and, as it turns out, a musical prodigy. He is said never to have stepped foot off the ship in all his years on it.

Introduce Max. Again we're going to gloss over some details, but if you like characterization then you'll love the following scenes. The audience is given a very comprehensive grasp of 1900 as an adult. The thirst for wonder and magic, the ability to make it happen even (figuratively) and the raw, musical genius. We also get a good idea of Max, and more importantly of the bond of friendship between them.

Well, then it happens. What happens exactly? Piano duel. You read it right, and if you've never managed to conceptualize a piano duel before, let the notion detonate in your mind for a little bit.

Ready for more? Well alright then. Jelly Roll Morton (played by Clarence Williams III, Morton's real life persona is credited as a pivotal figurehead in early Jazz and who credits himself as the inventor of Jazz in the movie) hears about 1900 and challenges him to a piano duel. Three rounds, no holds barred. Slow to start, tense middle, and strong finish. Everything you could want in a piano duel, and believe me, that's saying a lot.

There is a lot of tension mixed into this as in the first story, the one with Max and taking place after the events of the ship, Max is in a race against time to convince a crew not to blow up the now defunct ship and save the man he is sure remains inside. And, to add even more punch to the bowl, inside of the second story (where we see 1900 in action), a short-lived but undeniably intense romance is interwoven into the man's legacy.

There's a LOT I've left out and with good reason. The rest of the movie is powerful and might truly inspire you.

Watch it.

Chile Miners...sure hope they bundled up...get it?!

Rob's recent blog about earthquakes got me thinking about the miners in Chile. http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2010/10/13/chile-second-half-rescues/ Apparently, all 33 of them have been rescued, for those of you who were wondering. While plenty of other sites are getting their news on, I feel the need to take a more personal twist on it.

I first heard about the whole incident from my boss at work. We were eating lunch one day and he mentioned it, I saw it on the news later that day but I remember him (my boss) and correspondents on CNN talking about all the psychological trauma these guys were expected to go through and exactly how long they were going to be stuck down there. While I know it was quite some time, I feel it's very fortunate that the 33 miners made it out alive. I can't imagine it was easy for them, but in a world where we tend to see so much more bad news than good, it's refreshing to see that we (as humans) aren't completely ignorant and incapable of assisting one another.

I dunno, I was pleased to see it all worked out, even if the guys did end up taking some serious blows to their psyche, at least they'll get to go home and see their loved ones again. And if they don't have loved ones, at least they'll get to smell fresh air again and see the clouds and interact with people again. Jack London wrote a short story called "How to Build a Fire." It's about a man who's a part of a transport crew, carrying something (I think it's some guys coffin...I'm sorry if I butchered this summary i haven't read it in ages.) through Alaska or antartica and he stays behind for whatever reason. Everything is going good until a snow storm hits and he starts making not so good time. The man finds it increasingly harder to build a fire, not only for lack of dry wood, but his fingers just aren't working properly any more and he can't strike a match. He's certain he's lost several toes to frost bite and eventually he sits down and resigns himself to his fate. (Here's where i'm going with this) As he slowly freezes to death he marvels at his hands, at the world around him at all he took for granted and would begin to appreciate more once he's saved. (Wanna know how it end? Read it or wiki it!)

I got into a car wreck several years ago, one I probably shouldn't have been able to walk away from, yet I did so unscathed. It changed the way I looked at the world and I can only imagine how these Survivors are looking at it. The man in to build a fire went through a few brief moments where he was certain he was going to die, I had less than a second to comprehend everything...these guys had what? Like a month?

Either way, makes me glad for the little things...(that's what she said--ahthankyou)

-Alex (paradigm)

A lot has been going on with Valucre, but not very much of it that can be seen right away or that the members will be exposed to immediately without putting in a bit of elbow grease themselves. The first thing I want to draw everyone's attention to is the relatively new article Forum Know-How, which you will find in the link below.

Valucre forum roleplay know how

There were a couple of questions that kept coming to staff from new members and old members alike. Despite having the answers readily available for the new member, that is. I came to the inevitable conclusion that the material, though present, was not in the user's face and so would likely be ignore, or that the information is hard to find. Whatever the case, things needed to change.

So on the Homepage's side navbar, you'll see a link called Rules. In Rules you'll see a few more links to reference articles such as the definition of Mild Powers that we allow here on Valucre, the Roleplay FAQ for any member that has questions about the canon world of Valucre, the Code of Conduct, how to contact administration and then some. Forum know-how is an adaptation of the This Is How It Is article I wrote before, which I will also link to.

Valucre's "This is how it is" document

I wrote up both of these articles in an effort to bridge the communication and information gap that seems to be the biggest problem attacking forum roleplay as we know it. I can only hope that these articles receive the proper attention due to them so that the staff can focus on more intensive issues with the board rather than answering the same questions over, and over, and over again.

Not that we mind helping members out, but keep in mind what it must be like on this side of computer screen. You're asking a question and, hopefully, receiving a prompt and comprehensive answer. We, on the other hand, have to promptly and comprehensively answer the same or similar question a dozen times. It's not fun.

I'd like to bring your attention to some changes made in the Newsletter and in the Open Threads listing.

Valucre Newsletter, August 24th 2010

Valucre's Open Thread listing.

Namely the change to keep your eye out for is that the Current Events has been changed to a simple Open Threads list, which will have the list of open and available threads throughout each newsletter cycle. I do this because an open thread can go on for weeks and months, so it's alright to have that aggregate listing.

The Open Threads listing in the Free Chat forum will be used a continuously updated capacity. Meaning that this thread will be updated on the fly as new open threads come up and will act as a more current listing. It has been modified to include interest checks and coliseum updates as well.

The attentive user will also notice on the Homepage navbar that there is now a Newsletter link which leads to an archive of all the past newsletter, for easy reference.

The insomnia is starting to get back to me. I don't much complain about it like other people do though. Then again, I don't suffer the most extremes of it again. I don't stay up three days in a row for example, and I know some people that can't help but do so. That's gotta suck. Instead, I just lose the motivation to go to sleep and stay up reading or writing or listening to music. With a healthy mix of Cartoon Network of course.

Oh, speaking of, has anyone else taken the initiative and checked out Adventure Time? Given the fact that it was originally made for a 12 year audience, I can see why many people wouldn't be inclined to give it the time of day. But it's a truly great cartoon. It's hilarious, thought provoking, and just downright bad-ass. I love the attitude of the characters and their reactions to their unusual stimuli. It's got adult humor. Kind of like our generation of Ren and Stimpy, but not nearly as dirty. Just clever.

That said, I recently saw that one of the episodes of Adventure Time was Emmy-nominated. So I'm not the only one that thinks this fucking awesome cartoon show should be critically acclaimed! My girlfriend likes it a lot, and so do her younger nieces and nephew, so it really reaches across the age borders. I just gotta get some adults on it, and it'll be all gravy.

There's this song called Tree of Life by Debaser that I'm just in love with. I've listened to it something like five times a day for at least the past three or so days. That's a pretty good record for me, especially considering that I like to keep the music moving, always taking in new stuff and making sure that the new generation is on point with their music making skills. If the song doesn't get you bumping, then your neck is broken. Put plain and simply.

I was watching Catch Me If You Can the other day with Cynthia. The movie was a lot better than I remember it to be, and really well thought out. I mean, I always enjoyed it but just gained a new appreciation for it. I didn't realize how long DiCaprio's character was when he get caught. Totally forgot the fact that he pleaded to get tried as a minor. That means he did all of that in just one or two years lol. What a crazy life to have.

I'm almost done reading my Lovecraft collection of short stories as well. When I first started reading the collection, I didn't find much of Lovecraft's writing impressive and neither did I find his plots particularly captivating. It took me a while to realize, though, that this is mostly because the surplus of horror that our technological age has allowed me to access kind of ruined the suspense. Every time that someone is biting someone else I automatically think zombie, so when that's kind of the big surprise, it doesn't do much for me.

But as I got deeper and deeper into the stories, I could see what draws so many people to him. He's a master of suspense. He's also an amazing writer, capable of giving particularly vivid descriptions without losing you in purple writing. I like it a lot. Cthulu's a champ.