Kong: Skull Island (2017) movie poster
Category: Movies
Brandon Lee in the makeup chair on the set of The Crow (1994)
Star Wars is officially cool again
I couldn’t imagine myself saying this a few years ago, but we are living in the age of Star Wars. Sure, the early 2000s were a big time for Star Wars too with the completion of episodes I to III but somehow what we’re experiencing right now feels different. Not only are there new Star Wars movies being released every year but, if last years’ Star Wars: The Force Awakens is any indication, these new movies have the chance of being pretty good too.
And it’s not like there’s been any time since the first movie was released that Star Wars was totally hidden from pop-culture. In the 1980s Return of the Jedi was released, a few TV movies and a slew of animated series were all out too. And in the 1990s the original trilogy was re-released in theaters to great fanfare plus in both decades were loads of Star Wars novels and comics too. And I think what kept Star Wars creative in those nearly 20 years between films were those comics and novels.
Before the age of digital special effects there were limits as to what was possible to show on screen since everything had to be practically done — models had to be built, sets constructed and matte paintings created. But with the comics and books there was no FX budget so anything was possible. The quote I’ve always heard is that those medium has a “billion dollar” special effects budget for each story. And so some amazing things happened in the pages of the comics and books that couldn’t have happened on movie screens then.
I especially remember the Star Wars paintings of artist Dave Dorman. Dorman created these wonderful pieces of art that graced a multitude of comic and book covers from the early–1990s to present And he didn’t just paint established Star Wars “things,” his paintings also helped to expand stories that had already been told in the movies and introduced new characters and situations as well.
Dorman illustrated things I’d always wanted to see like Darth Vader leading a mass of Storm Troopers in a charge, Han Solo facing off against Boba Fett and, more importantly, brand new characters as well. These new characters looked liked they’d spent a lifetime existing in the galaxy of Star Wars with all the grit and grime and wear to show for it.
In fact, when I first saw the trailer to the upcoming Rogue One: A Star Wars Story I thought it looked exactly like one of those 1990s Dave Dorman paintings come to life.
This new movie, due out December 16, is a prequel to the original trilogy and tells the story of how the Rebellion got a hold of the plans to the massive planet-destroying Death Star. Said plans were used in the first Star Wars to destroy said Death Star. All of which is great, and is a story I’ve been dying to see since I was five. But it’s the character designs and locations of Rogue One that really piqued my interest in the film, especially that of character Saw Gerrera (Forest Whitaker). Gerrera’s encased in a suit of armor that looks like it was left outside for a decade before being tossed down a flight of steps then set alight.
And Gerrera doesn’t look like he’s in the best of health, he doesn’t look much better than the armor he wears.
In fact, there are loads of characters and settings in Rogue One that looks like all those diverse and different things from the comics and book covers that are different from the previous movies come to life and I couldn’t be more happy.
All those things I have closed up in bookshelves around my house that I pull down and open and fawn over once or twice every few years when the mood strikes will finally be alive and breathing on the big screen. With the upcoming Rogue One: A Star Wars Story it’s like I’m a kid again and am counting down the days until Christmas until I can open up my presents and see what I got. Or, in this case, pony up a few dollars and go to the movie theater and see all this on the big screen.
Hunt for the Wilderpeople movie review
Grade: B+
Hunt for the Wilderpeople is not a perfect movie. At times the story seemed to drag a bit and I couldn’t help but thinking that if the movie were just a bit shorter with maybe a few of them being trimmed back or cut entirely Hunt for the Wilderpeople might have flowed better as a cohesive whole and been a better film.
That being said, I still thought Hunt for the Wilderpeople was pretty great and I’d rank it as one of the best movies I’ve seen this year.
Using a lot of the same “goofy” humor used in another great film he co-directed What We Do in the Shadows, writer/director Taika Waititi makes a story that could be really dark and disturbing instead something bright and slightly sweet with Hunt for the Wilderpeople. Here, pre-teen Ricky (Julian Dennison) is a juvenile delinquent in the making and is sent to live with an aunt (Rima Te Wiata) in the country since he’s got no where else to go and the next stop is juvenile jail. He quickly bonds with her but when she unexpectedly dies, Ricky and the aunt’s boyfriend Hec (Sam Neil) take a trip into the “bush” of New Zealand since Hec doesn’t have anywhere else to go either and Ricky doesn’t want to go back to the city. But the authorities think that Hec’s kidnapped Ricky and as the two run deeper and deeper into the forest and spend months on the run Hec finds that he needs Ricky as much and Ricky needs Hec.
I’m not sure that a movie like Hunt for the Wilderpeople could be made in the American movie studio system. There’s lots of talk about characters thinking Hec is molesting Ricky, Hec and Ricky both have guns and shoot them at other people and, shock of shocks, Hec smokes and he smokes around Ricky! All of which is taboo these days in American pop culture and especially in our films. But it’s all these things that we’d never see from American movies — I can hear the studio notes now, “Can’t Ricky and Hec throw stones or chuck sticks at people instead of shooting guns?” — that makes Hunt for the Wilderpeople so much fun to watch. That and Taika Waititi is such an interesting filmmaker with What We Do in the Shadows and his next movie being one of those big-budged American studio films of Thor: Ragnarok due out next year that makes him and his Hunt for the Wilderpeople one to watch.
HR Giger working on the Alien (1979)
