Right! So:
Connery: "Working out what the franchise is going to be and then blowing it up to one billion."
Lazenby: "Making a proper movie but bungling the transition."
Moore: "Nailing the transition but bungling proper movies."
Dalton: "Grr."
Brosnan: "Extremely idiotic villain plots."
Craig: "Giving Our Hero yet another psychological scar."
Alternatively:
1962-1967: "Setting up the formula and pushing it as far as it can go."
1969-1974: "Getting burned, falling back on proven routines, and going inane."
1977-1979: "Spectacle."
1981-1989: "Increasingly cheap-looking decline that not even a recast can save."
1995-2002: "JAMES BOND, isn't that enough?"
2006-present: "Not Yo Momma's Bond Film."
Alternatively alternatively:
Before watching it: "It's getting overhyped."
While watching it: "They ripped that part off from Thunderball and that part off from Live and Let Die and that part off from TWINE, where it was ripped off from OHMSS..."
After watching it: "Well, it wasn't terrible."
Friday, March 27, 2015
Sunday, March 15, 2015
Wednesday, March 4, 2015
50 Shades of Moondust?
For those of you who don't know, my three favorite novels are Michael Crichton's Jurassic Park, Terry Pratchett's Night Watch, and Robert Heinlein's The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.
The last of those three is getting an adaptation. And they're changing the title.
Now, if you look at a certain recent adaptation of a certain recent book, and then immediately go to The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, you'd be forgiven for imagining Luna dressed up as a dominatrix (and for those of you whose thought processes didn't go there, who lead saner, more normal lives: you're welcome). I can understand why you wouldn't want that image.
But come up with something at least as provocative, idiot!
Oh, wait, this is Hollywood, they're going to f*ck it up anyway. A big big big big big big big big BIG plot point of that novel is how gravity is different on the Moon (and before you ask, yes, Heinlein, like Clarke in Rama, had an obsession about what low gravity does to boobies). Ask yourself if they're really going to go through the expense of portraying that realistically.
Meantime, go check out Moon, a totally fantastic no-budget sci-fi thriller that pretty easily earns a slot on the Best Five Films Of My Lifetime list (it didn't address the gravity problem, but that's okay; it wasn't crucial to the plot). Or, go check out Moonraker, an over-the-top farce that is nevertheless hugely entertaining. (Or go read the book, which is probably my favorite Bond book.)
The last of those three is getting an adaptation. And they're changing the title.
Now, if you look at a certain recent adaptation of a certain recent book, and then immediately go to The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, you'd be forgiven for imagining Luna dressed up as a dominatrix (and for those of you whose thought processes didn't go there, who lead saner, more normal lives: you're welcome). I can understand why you wouldn't want that image.
But come up with something at least as provocative, idiot!
Oh, wait, this is Hollywood, they're going to f*ck it up anyway. A big big big big big big big big BIG plot point of that novel is how gravity is different on the Moon (and before you ask, yes, Heinlein, like Clarke in Rama, had an obsession about what low gravity does to boobies). Ask yourself if they're really going to go through the expense of portraying that realistically.
Meantime, go check out Moon, a totally fantastic no-budget sci-fi thriller that pretty easily earns a slot on the Best Five Films Of My Lifetime list (it didn't address the gravity problem, but that's okay; it wasn't crucial to the plot). Or, go check out Moonraker, an over-the-top farce that is nevertheless hugely entertaining. (Or go read the book, which is probably my favorite Bond book.)
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