Psychedelic Get Smart

While I didn't find the summer movie Get Smart very funny some people did. They're wrong of course. The Love Guru had bigger yucks and that was hardly a laugh riot. But if only the movie Get Smart had captured the satirical essence of the original 60s spy spoof, which took pot shots at the then psychedelic culture by joining the craze.
In the above video we see an episode of Get Smart where mad pharmacist for KAOS Vincent Price has invented a drug that makes Washington D. C.. hallucinate. The Chief is in a black dress playing pool with George Washington and Max (Don Adams) and Agent 99 (Barbara Feldon) are experiencing what could only be politely described as a heavy acid trip. Max is dressed as an Inuit Indian complete with parka and snowshoes and painted face, He's holding a baby that turns out to be a stuffed baby alligator. When he crawls into bed with Agent 99 (they're married by this time) she's painted half white, half black. The Chief tells Max all of Washington was hallucinating. Evidently the Pentagon hired the Jefferson Airplane to be the Joint Chiefs of Staff. When Max asked what was wrong with that the Chief replies: "They showed up for work this morning."
If that didn't blow your fragile mind consider this other Get Smart episode (video below) where a hippy dippy Larry Storch (an unsung 60s comic actor) uses a rock group called the Sacred Cows to brainwash its listeners. Believe me, the new Get Smart does not get it, nor is it very smart. In this sequence notice the "Obey" neon sign - a catchphrase that was also recently used by Shepard Faire (Obey Giant) on his way to graphic designer fame

The Who rock the Summit

Sometimes I forget how much I love The Who. The original line-up of the group opened The Summit, nee Asspaq Center and now the Lakewood Church, on the 20th of November in 1975. In these two videos, viewable on YouTube, The Who shred an audience with versions of "Behind Blue Eyes" followed by excerpts from Tommy. Pay special attention to Keith Moon's monologue after the top video, and notice Townsend's signature guitar play at the end of "Sparks" on the video below.
Other 70s performances at The Summit that survive into the 21st century include a widely bootlegged concert from Queen recorded December 11, 1977.

The Dark Knight

Even when being constantly bombarded over the head by exposition and explosions The Dark Knight's undertow of emotional rescue gives the film a permanence that will outlive typical summer blockbuster status. Because director Chris Nolan has presented the story as a cross between a Michael Mann's Heat/Thief mode of crime thriller against a backdrop of operatic overkill the film exists outside the world of slick comic book adaptations (Iron Man) or even more intellectualized versions of same (Hellboy II).
The Dark Knight was partially shot in IMAX and that alone will put asses firmly in surround sound seats. The sheer enormity of the establishing city shots (Gotham and Hong Kong) and the opening bank robbery sequence in the IMAX format, mixed seamlessly with regular widescreen, puts this film on an entirely different playing field. It's not unlike the 3D attraction of films like Journey to the Center of the Earth. You certainly want to see this Batman installment on an IMAX screen if you see it at all. When Nolan switches out formats the movement is subtle enough that you really don't notice. They film opens with the first sequence in IMAX and then that larger format sets the tone (said wide aerial establishing shots) for each succeeding movement. The image expands top to bottom but again the effect transition spreads smoothly. In a movie like Brainstorm or the beginning of Bad Education where the image expands horizontally your eyes notice it to a slightly greater degree.
To date most of the blog talk has been blah blah this Heath Ledger blah blah that Oscar. The only person in recent history to have been nommed for an Oscar for a role in a comic book movie was Al Pacino for Dick Tracy. Where The Dark Knight will clean up with nominations are the superlative tech accomplishments (camera, sound) and the Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard score.
Yes, Ledger is great but he's always shown extreme range in movies, so that's nothing new. The Joker does exude a rebel kind of charisma, especially in a nurse candystripper look.The character with the widest arc is Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) and frankly the Dent/Two-Face ordeal is the best reason this film works during its last hour. You'll know what I mean when you see Eckhart with half a face, one side handsome the other barely holding the sinews and eye socket together. Rightly so Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) comes off as a dick and the lurid way he and Joker taunt each other shows they both harbor borderline personalities.
The action consists mainly of fist fights, cars crashing and buildings exploding. The fight sequences are notable for the sound design. You'd think Batman had fists of fury with the constant shellacking he gives baddies. It's not unlike they took the thought balloon exclamations (Pow! and Biff!) from the 60s television show and replaced them with steroid enhanced sound tweaks. Nolan brings an exuberance to this although there's a PG-13 mojo at work that dictates little actual blood or gore. Still if you're thinking about taking a pre-teen to The Dark Knight prepare to deal with their nightmares.
The Dark Knight offer a bizarre love triangle between Bale and Eckhart and Maggie Gyllenhaal who replaces Katie Holmes as Rachel Dawes. There's a dramatic intensity to their lover's angst that Nolan uses to counter the action hyperdrive. Other than Gyllenhaal the continuity matches Nolan's previous Batman outing Batman Begins. Since Wayne Manor was burnt to the ground Wayne now works all night in an industrial lab located underneath one of his factories and the manor is a sweet penthouse. Michael Caine and Gary Oldman are back too.
The mobster versus mobster action will skew non-superhero fans while the drama knocks the acceptance rate for the more serious minded up a notch. Prepare to be exhausted though by the time you walk out. The third act throws a lot of details our way at fastball speeds but that's because this is a Batman that respects our time and intelligence.

War, Inc.

War, Inc, is my kind of movie. This film reeks of sarcastic wit, smart ass (as opposed to smart) dialogue, satiric comparisons of the current war in Iraq and with the bloodline of Dr. Strangelove, The President's Analyst and Lord of War running in its veins. Lead player John Cusack made a similar style film about a decade ago with Grosse Point Blank, and War, Inc. with Cucsack and sister Joan Cusack and Dan Aykroyd, along with Marisa Tomei, Hillary Duff and Sir Ben Kingsley feels like a re-imagining of that film.
Cusack plays Hauser a mercenary working for a global conglomerate that's used to outsource modern wars in all aspects. The fictional country of Turaqistan becomes Hauser's personal battlefield as he fights off demons of idealism even while wasting just about everyone he meets. At one point Cusack defends his company's liquidation policy by offering the axiom: American knowhow alleviates the suffering it creates.
Other howlers remind us that Anderson Cooper is a Vanderbilt, that scorpions can be dangerous as well as sexy and that Duff might actually have a future as an actress. We're constantly being bombarded by images of American culture morphing one into the other. The one lone honest character, Tomei, all but loses her head. Kingsley struts with a Southern accent like he was born in Mississippi.
Just when you think War, Inc. will veer into sentimentality it still has a few storefronts to explode, a few political jabs to throw, and terrorists to gun down. In limited release War, Inc. should be hunted down (it's at the Angleika) and seen immediately.

Sir Ben triptych

Sir Ben Kingsley knows how to walk the walk. He's currently stealing scenes in three current films: The Love Guru, War, Inc., and The Wackness.
For the latter he's a psychiatrist who blows reefer with a young client. The Love Guru obviously doesn't stretch any acting muscles for Sir Ben yet his portrayal of Guru Tugginmypudha deserves at least a glance if only to see the name pronounced without stuttering,
In War, Inc. he nails a Southern accent while lending credence to that satirical film's spine. Here's an actor who can turn characters on a dime and his presence only lends credence to bad movies and charm to good ones.