Professor of archeology, expert on the occult, and how does one say it? Obtainer of rare antiquities.

If you read movie blogs, and if you're here it's a good bet that you read one or two, you may have seen a meme going around. Basically, people have been writing 10 movie based facts about themselves, and then tagging other to do the same. I was not tagged. I'm not surprised by this as I write pretty infrequently these days. And besides, if I really cared all that much, I'd just do the damn meme anyways.

Now before you start yelling at me to 'quit your whiny whining whiner', let me explain something. The whole point of that last paragraph (other than linking to 3 other blogs) is because something came to mind this evening and, well, it made for a good lead in.

I have one movie related thing about me that I want to tell you. One thing that I want to write about tonight. See, I was looking for a movie to watch tonight. I'm bored. That's all there is to it. So, it occurs to me that I could watch a movie. Ok, sounds like a plan. I'll put a movie in. Well, I don't want to pay too much attention to it. See, I almost want background noise as much as I want anything. So, whatever movie I pick, it has to be something I've seen before. And it can't be Evil Dead 2 since I just loaned it out. It's been a long time since I saw Amelie and I've been wanting to watch it again for some time.

So I pull the DVD out of the DVD drawer. I put it in the DVD player. The menu comes up. I press play. I wander off momentarily. I come back. I press the audio button on the remote. As much as I love the sound of the French language, I know less than 30 words any more. And besides, like I said, I don't really want to pay that much attention. There is no dub on the DVD. French audio and English subs only. Now. This wouldn't normally bother me. Not even a little. Like I said, I love the sound of the French language. Subtitles don't bother me, not even a little. I just didn't want to pay much attention.

See, this happens to me a lot. I want to watch a movie, but not something new. Something I've seen before. Something that I've seen many times. Something that, if I leave the room and come back, or turn my attention from for a little while, I'll know just what's going on when I come back in the room.

This brings me up to the real reason for this post. My assumption is that I'm not alone in this. That other people do this with movies as well. And, well, I thought that it might be fun to share some favorites. I don't really have a good name for the list, but I'm going to list a few that I always fall back on, and if anyone else is so inclined, comment, or write about it on another blog and let me know.

My List Of Movies I Like To Watch When I Want To Watch A Movie But Don't Want To Watch Something I'm Unfamiliar With (in no specific order):

• Raiders of the Lost Ark (tonight's choice (Temple of Doom and Last Crusade are just as likely))
• Star Wars (any of the six)
• Lord of the Rings (any of the three)
• Shaun of the Dead
• Serenity
• Doomsday
• Event Horizon
• Hellboy II
• Planet of the Apes (the Chuck Heston original)
• Resident Evil

Alright. What have you got?

Monster Movie Poster Monday

Okay. Sure. Technically...NOT a monster movie, I guess. At least, not in the way one might think. No 80 ft tall beasts trampling through cities or anything, but it is the type of movie in which the monster is US! Or something. As you may have heard, Chuck died over the weekend. He was 83. I never met him, but I liked a couple of his movies.

Random conversations while watching movies...

I managed to find myself a copy of Chuck Heston's Planet of the Apes today, which I promptly watched to get the taste of the remake out of my head.

My friend swung by while I was watching it, and we got to talking about how many sequels they made.

There was

Beneath the Planet of the Apes
Return to the Planet of the apes
Revenge of the Planet of the Apes
The Planet of the Apes Strikes Back
The Planet of the Apes Menace
Attack of the Planet of the Apes
A New Planet of the Apes
Back to the Planet of the Apes
Planet of the Apes Runner
The Planet of the Apes Reloaded
Planet of the Apes Revolutions
Planet of the Apes Park
The Lost Planet of the Apes
Raiders of the Lost Planet of the Apes
Temple of the Planet of the Apes
Planet of the Apes High
Godzilla vs the Planet of the Apes
Planet of te Apes of the Dead
Army of the Planet of the Apes


There were a lot of sequels. Did I miss any?

In which an otherwise enjoyable movie is ruined by an inexplicable ending

I watched Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes last night. I had never really been incredibly interested in seeing it. I mean, I liked the original. I'm not a huge remake fan (sorry, it was a re-imagining), nor am I incredibly into Tim Burton's movies. So, as I'm sure you can tell, I wasn't in a great hurry to see the movie. Hell, I only picked it up because it was free (buy 2, get 1 free (I also picked up Constantine and Lake Placid for the curious)).

That said, hell, I liked it well enough. It was entertaining, in a 'I like Chuck Heston more than anyone else in this movie' kind of way. I just had, really, a few questions.

1) Why was Thade always so pissed off? Every time he spoke, he was growling. He just sounded mean and, as a character, completely unsympathetic. The most intimidating characters are never the ones who are just full out bad. The really good bad guys are the ones that you can see their side a little. When you start to sympathize with the villain, and you start to see a little of yourself in him, that's when the bad guy gets interesting. There are, of course, exceptions. Zombies, velociraptors, sharks. They don't care if you sympathize with them. They will just fuck your shit up. This is because, unlike humans and the apes in the movie, they don't posses the same cognitive abilities as us. Therefore, while a possible exception, they are excluded from the category. Once again proving that Darth Vader is the ultimate badass.

2) When the humans, led by Marky Mark, are trying to escape Apeville, why do they run through everyone's bedrooms? Wouldn't there be a more direct route through town? One that didn't involve waking everyone up? Sure, I understand the desire to stay off the road so that the Ring Wraiths don't find you, but surely there is an alley or something. It just seems silly to have to go through so many bedrooms.

3) Why bother rescuing the little girl? She only gets sent back to the house anyways, and is never mentioned again. It's like making yourself a really nice dinner and then throwing it out because you weren't really that hungry in the first place. One could simply have removed the three scenes involving the little girl and made the same movie. The story would not have been any different.

4) Why did Helena Bonham Carter look so good while made up to look like a monkey? She looked hotter than she does as a human. What kind of weird bestiality fetish is Tim Burton trying to inspire?

5) Alright, yeah, the ending. Holy crap, what was that? It's one thing to do a twist ending and then let the audience put the pieces together, it a whole other thing to say 'Here you go! I'll explain what happened if we do a sequel!' It's as bad as declaring Darth Vader the ultimate badass when you've done nothing to support the argument.

And, while the ending is a bit of a puzzle, and lord knows I like a puzzle, the movie itself wasn't good enough to warrant trying to figure it out. There's a big difference between making the audience think and telling the audience 'fuck you. figure it out yourself jackass'. Unfortunately, the ending seems to fall into that second camp.

Imagine a crossword puzzle. 5 across reads: 5 letter word for monkey. You know from reading that that the answer is chimp. However, there are only 4 boxes. The puzzle isn't able to be solved because you are automatically disqualified from giving the correct answer before you start. That is what the movie was like.