Clued In & Clueless

For all the current readers of Critics at Large, we've resurrected the Luna Sea Notes website to publish previous C @ L posts. The idea is to introduce readers to pieces they may have missed from earlier in our incarnation. Since we now have a huge body of work to draw from, the goal is to post articles that may also have some relevance to events of the day.

What happens when a concept for a game becomes a concept for a film, designed only for movie theatres, finds itself on home video? Andrew Dupuis ventured forth in this short Critics at Large post two years ago to ponder the effect.

Whodunit!: Clue: The Movie

http://www.criticsatlarge.ca/2010/05/whodunit-clue-1985.html

Thank goodness for videotape. After watching Clue: The Movie (1985) for the first time this past weekend I find myself conflicted, not unlike a guilty man pleading innocence before an unforgiving jury of his peers. On one hand I found myself thoroughly enjoying the cavalcade of familiar faces, Madeline Kahn, Christopher Lloyd, Martin Mull etc., chewing up the scenery, while on the other hand I couldn't help but think about how much I would have despised the film if I'd caught it during its original theatrical run.

Jonathan Lynn's film used an interesting advertising tactic to raise curiosity; he offered viewers three different endings which would be equally distributed and randomly attached to every film print. Surprise! The problem with this tactic is that with any other film it would promote repeated viewings but by the halfway mark in Clue you should realize that this film's conclusion will prove somewhat irrelevant. It never really mattered if it was Colonel Mustard in the observatory with the candlestick or Ms.Scarlet with the knife in the kitchen. Being offered one of three endings gave the impression that ‘whodunit’ was a question we cared to have answered. We were being told a joke for an hour and a half but the filmmakers missed the punch line. No wonder most critics panned it and its box office numbers were lackluster upon its initial release.

Voice of the Disinherited

For all the current readers of Critics at Large, we've resurrected the Luna Sea Notes website to publish previous C @ L posts. The idea is to introduce readers to pieces they may have missed from earlier in our incarnation. Since we now have a huge body of work to draw from, the goal is to post articles that may also have some relevance to events of the day.

Bruce Springsteen is back out on tour with a new album to promote and performing with who is left from the E-Street Band. Even if every new record is acclaimed, or panned, his legacy as an iconic American artist is still firmly in place, as attested to in Andrew Dupuis' thoughtful examination in Critics at Large.

Who’s the Boss? Bruce Springsteen’s Promise

http://www.criticsatlarge.ca/2011/08/whos-boss-bruce-springsteens-promise.html

When I was younger I thought with blistering sincerity that Bruce Springsteen was justtoo American. While I was only ever familiar with his hit song “Dancing in the Dark,” from his 1984 record Born in the USA, that iconic album cover of his denim-clad posterior presented him prominently before a star-spangled backdrop. Ignorantly, I wrote him off as flag-waving, gun-toting American without much to offer outside of trail-blazing patriotism, something of little use to an adolescent Canadian boy growing up in the suburbs. As with anything else I've learned growing up, I was at least partially wrong in my earlier years. (So was Ronald Reagan, as you may recall, but for a different purpose.) Bruce Springsteen is without a doubt a patriotic American, but in a way I never would have suspected. The performer known as “The Boss” made himself the voice of the disinherited in America.

His popular label “The Boss” always seemed peculiar to me. I never understood why my dad referred to Springsteen with the label he also used to describe the man he was working for. But I was naïve. My dad was planting the seeds of an uprising in my unwilling ears. In The Promise: The Making of Darkness on the Edge of Town (2010), we can see perfectly why Springsteen is known as “The Boss.” The documentary, which explores the trials and tribulations behind that career-defining album, opens a window into how The Boss shrugged off guaranteed rock stardom and fought valiantly, passionately and perhaps insanely for what he believed in. The Promise captures a moment in time over thirty years ago when a fresh-faced musician did the unthinkable: He became his own boss.

Goodbye to Childhood

For all the current readers of Critics at Large, we've resurrected the Luna Sea Notes website to publish previous C @ L posts. The idea is to introduce readers to pieces they may have missed from earlier in our incarnation. Since we now have a huge body of work to draw from, the goal is to post articles that may also have some relevance to events of the day.

We hear far too seldom from Andrew Dupuis these days at Critics at Large. But when we do it's usually with thoughtful pieces that beautifully weave together memoir and critical commentary as in his take on Toy Story 3.

Every Road Leads Home: Toy Story 3

http://www.criticsatlarge.ca/2010/06/every-road-leads-home-toy-story-3.html

When I was extremely young my parents gave me a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle action figure for my birthday. My friends and I would get together and create these fantastical situations with all of our toys and face the wrath and ridicule of our siblings in the process. My Ninja Turtle would woo the Barbies and join forces with the Ghostbusters to vanquish evildoers which existed solely in our overly imaginative minds. As time faded, Leonardo lost his plastic katanas and the paint on his body began to scuff and peel. Before long I had simply outgrown him. When the time came I tossed him away in a box with the rest of my plastic memories without remorse. His blue bandana was frayed, his legs and arms were scratched and my name written in permanent marker along his bottom foot had all but worn off.

Dangerous Words

For all the current readers of Critics at Large, we've resurrected the Luna Sea Notes website to publish previous C @ L posts. The idea is to introduce readers to pieces they may have missed from earlier in our incarnation. Since we now have a huge body of work to draw from, the goal is to post articles that may also have some relevance to events of the day.

One of the great power of books is how the author's voice can often possess us, making us believe in the imagined world they've drawn us into. For Andrew Dupuis, that book just happened to be Ray Bradbury's cautionary tale about a world without books.

Smoke Without Fire: Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 (1953 & 1966)

http://www.criticsatlarge.ca/2011/02/smoke-without-fire-ray-bradburys.html 

Books used to scare me. Ray Bradbury’s famed science-fiction masterpiece Fahrenheit 451 recently reminded me of why. Books are highly influential especially when you let them fester. I remember nights in elementary school spent past my bedtime re-reading line after line of Mark Twain, or Robert Lewis Stevenson, to the point where Long John Silver and “Injun Joe” would chase me in my sleep. These works were brimming with creativity and adventure and sparked a curiosity that was bewildering, but their painted words also had the misfortune of scaring me stiff. Bradbury’s novel was set in a future where firemen reek of kerosene and burn books rather than cherish their beauty. Upon reading it, for the first time, I, too, re-discovered my worn out love for the printed page. I also discovered, quite accidentally, that a film adaptation made in 1966 existed. Initially I thought the film’s existence alone was contradictory to the book’s divine message. But after watching the film, I realized I was both right and wrong.

Fearless Laughter

For all the current readers of Critics at Large, we've resurrected the Luna Sea Notes website to publish previous C @ L posts. The idea is to introduce readers to pieces they may have missed from earlier in our incarnation. Since we now have a huge body of work to draw from, the goal is to post articles that may also have some relevance to events of the day.

It's been clear for some time now that we're not living in fearless times. With economic uncertainty and political cynicism and indifference ruling the day, protest has become proscribed rather than instinctive and most people are looking for the safest route home. All is not lost, however, as Andrew Dupuis discovered when he wrote about censorship and the TV show South Park.

The Killing Joke: Censorship in South Park

http://www.criticsatlarge.ca/2010/04/killing-joke-censorship-in-south-park.html

On April 21th, 2010 Matt Parker and Trey Stone were boldly unable to go where they've gone before. A week earlier, they had celebrated their 200th episode with a plot revolving around the Muslim prophet Muhammad's invincibility from ridicule and the town's desire to harness similar powers within South Park. The episode, inoffensively named "200," directly asked us if whether they were portraying Muhammad in an offensive manner or not. They placed him in a U-Haul van, in a mascot's outfit, behind a black bar labeled "censored." He does remain silent. They asked us if we would be offended hearing him speak or if we could allow ourselves to see his legs move. They weren't mocking Muhammad. They were mocking how we've come to censor our thoughts and ideas, not out of respect for the subjects brought up, but instead because of fear.

Film Criticism, Where is Thy Sting? (Part Five)

For all the current readers of Critics at Large, we've resurrected the Luna Sea Notes website to publish previous C @ L posts. The idea is to introduce readers to pieces they may have missed from earlier in our incarnation. Since we now have a huge body of work to draw from, the goal is to post articles that may also have some relevance to events of the day.

Back in the spring of 2010, when Andrew O'Hehir of Salon wrote a piece about the rapid cutting of film critics from various publications, his tone told all of us to get over it. Since we wouldn't and didn't, Susan Green first stepped up to address it. By the next day, everyone wanted a shot beginning with Kevin Courrier. On the third day, David Churchill came to the podium. Not originally planning to write anything, Shlomo Schwartzberg followed after reading the previous days' posts. To complete our response, Andrew Dupuis provided a philosophical reading of how the film industry has affected the art of criticism.

Is Film Criticism Dead? #5

http://www.criticsatlarge.ca/2010/04/is-film-criticism-dead-5.html

My colleagues [Susan, Kevin, David & Shlomo] have previously and majestically destroyed Andrew O' Hehir's ignorant article "Film Critics: Shut up already!" I support them and their opinions whole heartedly. But I feel as if my position on the subject would be trite, so I'm shifting the looking glass from film criticism to the film industry's impact on it. Here are some disparate observations.

(1)

We've been focused so intently on whether film criticism is on its way out or not that I think we've somewhat neglected an important point that we wouldn't have anything to write about were it not for the films themselves. The steady decline in the quality of films has paved the way for many a harsh word. In other words, it's becoming increasingly more difficult to stay positive when pretty much every film that projects itself onto the silver screen simply isn't worth the time it takes to attack it with the mighty strokes of a keyboard. This may be partly why film criticism just isn’t being taken seriously anymore. Criticism today examines the mediocrity of mainstream cinema but doesn’t often look at how we got here.

The Paradox of Nostalgia

For all the current readers of Critics at Large, we've resurrected the Luna Sea Notes website to publish previous posts. The idea is to introduce readers to pieces they may have missed from earlier in our incarnation. Since we now have a huge body of work to draw from, the goal is to post articles that may also have some relevance to events of the day.

For many of us, the television shows we discovered when we were young continue to have an enduring effect on our lives. When people write about those shows, however, they often tend to cure it in nostalgia. Andrew Dupuis, on the other hand, when discussing The Twilight Zone, cleverly called into question the appeal of nostalgia. 

The Future of Nostalgia: Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone

http://www.criticsatlarge.ca/2011/07/future-of-nostalgia-rod-serlings.html

Whenever a film, television show or book captures something genuine and unique it runs a risk. Like most classic art, it carries an unfortunate weight as it becomes ingrained in popular culture –  we parody it to tame its power over us. To do that, we usually dilute it. In attempting to recapture its magic, to hold it dear, we ironically tame what attracted us to it in the first place. Nevertheless its power still remains because the work exists independent of time and our need to possess it. One such example of this paradox is The Twilight Zone. It wasn’t just great television, it was one of the most indelibly imaginative programs created. You couldn't tame its power.

Rod Serling.

Chances are if you haven’t seen a single episode of the original series (that ran from 1959-1964), you've likely come across some reference to a parody of it over the past fifty years. The Twilight Zone has been referenced in everything from Leave It To Beaver to Seinfeld and The Simpsons. I'm remembering, in particular, an episode of The Simpsons where Bart is the only boy who can see a gremlin on the side of the bus. That episode cleverly parodied The Twilight Zone thriller originally immortalized by William Shatner in "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet." But homage is a tricky mistress. The Twilight Zone didn't have any recurring characters outside of its creator and host Rod Serling, who acted as the connecting thread. Without any discernible characters then, the show relied on the surprises from their dramatic twists at the end. Serling’s stories essentially focused on real people in extraordinary circumstances. He illustrated men and women who were awarded a second chance to rise up, or fall further into the doldrums of their lives. These stories reached an audience fifty years ago and – in spite of the many parodies – they haven’t missed a beat since.