When Sarah (Jennifer Connelly) makes an ill-advised wish to the Goblin King (David Bowie) to take her infant brother, he obliges the wish.  It is then up to Sarah to venture into his Labyrinth to try to rescue her brother.

The last film directed by Jim Henson, Labyrinth is something of a mixed bag.  I have never liked the film, and re-watching it with my son, I find that the film is actually missing the magic that The Dark Crystal, and to a lesser extent The Neverending Story, have.

When a fantasy obsessed teenager gets stuck staying home to watch her infant brother while her parents go out, her anger and frustration get the best of her and she wishes to the Goblin King to take her brother.  He takes the baby boy to his castle beyond the labyrinth and gives Sarah to the stroke of 13 on the clock to make her way through the labyrinth to rescue the boy.  Along the way she meets Hoggle, a grumpy dwarf, Ludo, a giant gentle hearted creature, and Sir Didymous, a dog knight who rides a dog for his mount.  Together, the four of them work to solve the labyrinth.

I think that a lot of my problem with this movie has to do with David Bowie and his songs.  They are unabashedly ’80′s, pop synth music that are not very good.  Like much of Bowie’s ’80′s music, they are not well written and unfortunately are a centerpiece of the film.

The film also suffers from too much going on.  It drops Sarah into the labyrinth, and the labyrinth changes.  One minute she’s walking through a brick walkway, then she is in a foliage labyrinth, then in a junkyard, then underground, then navigating The Bog of Eternal Stench.  There are just too many set pieces here.  Instead of focusing on Sarah’s journey, they seem to have focused more on creating strange places for her to visit.  Never once do you feel the threat that she will not solve the labyrinth and rescue her brother.

While the film is a kids film, it is also very harsh for children.  The designs of the goblins and myriad creatures of the labyrinth are frightening and creepy.  I had no recollection of how chilling some of these designs are.   It had been years since I had watched this, and bought it for my son to complete his ’80′s fantasy triumvirate (Labyrinth, The Dark Crystal, and The Neverending Story).  Honestly, he didn’t seem as into this as I expected him to be, but he also wasn’t frightened by what was going on on screen.

The video quality on this disc is probably as good as this film will ever look.  The colors are bright, but there is still a film grain that they probably couldn’t get rid of.  While this isn’t the best looking blu-ray out there, it certainly is better than the VHS copy that I watched this on last. (I haven’t owned a VCR since DVD was released.)

The sound was well done, though.  There was a nice breakup in the 5.1 channels, and the dialogue was crisp and clear.  It did have the problem where the action was very loud, but the rest of the movie wasn’t.  This makes this disc not very apartment friendly.

There are quite a few special features on this disc.  I haven’t had a chance to dig into them, but there is a picture in picture track, commentaries, making of documentary and more.

I realize that this film has become a cult classic in some circles, but much like The Boondock Saints, I do not see the fascination.  It is a nice light-hearted fantasy film, but there are some missteps that keep the film from being as good as it could be.  Of the ’80′s fantasy triumvirate I stated above, I feel this is the weakest of the bunch.

Movie ** out of ****

Blu-Ray **1/2 out of ****

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• A-Z: Labyrinth (poolsidemusings.wordpress.com)

Today’s film is a beloved cult classic…that I just wasn’t connecting with.  I love Jim Henson’s work to a point.  I LOVE Labyrinth (although most girls my age do…Bowie) and I liked Fraggle Rock more than The Muppets (I know…sacrelige).  So I’m not sure if that pre-determines my enjoyment of The Dark Crystal or not.  To me it felt like Lord of the Rings and Dune smushed together and watered down for children.  The story was far too dense, the characters meandered for the majority of the runtime, and the ending seemed anticlimactic.  The puppetry is great and the sets are beautiful, but I don’t think this movie is for me.

A group of evil warlords Skeksis are beholden to a dark crystal that gives them immortality.  In an age of chaos a young man of a peace-loving tribe known as the Mystics, comes to learn a prophecy foresees him returning the final shard to the dark crystal and restoring peace.  With the help of another of his kind named Kira (voiced by Kathryn Mullen), the two will have to defeat the Skeksis and restore the dark crystal.

In 1982 Jim Henson and his gang wanted to make a long-form movie and came out with The Dark Crystal, four years before Labyrinth.  Having seen both these two films can’t be anymore different.  While both are fantasy based, Labyrinth deals more with a coming-of-age story via magic, goblins, and one all-powerful character.  The quest of the heroine in the film is straight-forward, and while the plot does meander and goes off the rails, the movie is fairly focused.  The Dark Crystal has a twisting and intricate history that takes over six minutes of voice-over narration to be told and I still had to focus intently and remember certain points.

The aforementioned narration is the first hurdle you’ll get to in discovering if you’ll make it through this film.  We learn of two tribes, the Skeksis and the Mystics and how both are dying.  Every line in this narration seems important but you wouldn’t know that unless it’s one of a handful of things we hear repeated at least ten times in that six minutes.  We know everyone is dying, the groups are pretty much the same and both leaders are dying…did I mention the earth is dying too…there’s a lot of dying to be established!  The intro is embedded below.  Tell me you couldn’t play a drinking game with all the repetition.

So both leaders are dying (okay I’m done with the death imagery) and while one group sucks the power from various species and the crystal, the Mystics are a peaceful group.  We then meet Frodo Jen (voiced by Jim Henson himself), a mild-mannered Gelfing and the star of our story.  Jen brings me to the second question I had in this film.  I know Henson’s group is predominantly puppets but are Jen and Kira marionettes?  They seemed very stilted in their movements almost like a puppet with strings from the top.  It was either marionettes or robotics but I’m not sure.  I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if I got a comment saying they were traditional puppets which I guess shows how amazing the work was.

The movie is definitely not the go-to kids film you’re expecting.  I wouldn’t say Labyrinth is a good kids film either (unless you’re a 13-year-old girl and then it’s pretty much a right of passage).  The Dark Crystal is bleak at times.  The opening scenes with the Skeksis involve the emperor, who looks and sounds like the Crypt Keeper dying and then crumbling.  The movie is incredibly dark in certain spots and characters have their essence sucked out in a pretty cool sequence which I’ve included if you’d like to scare your kids.

The sets are all sumptuous and detailed.  The Skeksis lair is dank, subterranean and it’s easily an inspiration for Fraggle Rock.  The puppets all convey grandiosity next to the tiny Podlings, Jen and Kira.  The outside, open-air areas are also beautiful and ethereal.

My problems mostly lie with the story.  If I had to sum up The Dark Crystal I’d say it’s a tween version of Lord of the Rings or Dune.  There’s just so much packed into a small runtime and the script seems very separated until almost an hour into the movie.  The stories are firmly divided between the Skeksis and Jen/Kira for over 25 minutes and those first twenty minutes are heavily in favor of the Skeksis.  I wondered a few times where Jen was and if he was our hero, why wasn’t I seeing him?  Jen is a pretty weak hero as well.  I rooted more for Kira than him.  He seemed to just go around saying the most obvious things like “What is this?”  ”Where are we?”  and “This is weird” (thank you for voicing my thoughts Jen).

The voice over acting between Jen and Kira is veeery slowww and delibberate.  They convey their lines like they’re super important or, in Jen’s case, like he might bust into a British accent at some point.  The dialogue just sounded like a high school production or something out of a B-movie Medieval fantasy.  Other characters like Aughra just shout their lines or there’s the annoying Skeksis who makes this mmh-hmmm sound that annoyed the shit out of me.

I will give the movie credit for being incredibly dark towards the climax, but at the end Jen saves things and everyone’s all….okay.  I just didn’t connect with this movie.  Maybe it’s one of those films you had to see at a certain age (I know that many of my friends in their 20s hate The Witches which I love because I saw it as a kid).  Maybe because I’m not a big fan of epic fantasy.  Either way, I’ll stick to Labyrinth.

Grade: C-

ANNOUNCEMENTS: So I have a few more questions for our upcoming tourney.  I’m thinking of looking at the 30s-90s but does anything think there are enough leading men from the 2000s to include them as well?  Since this is my first tourney I’m going to limit the choices to five per decade (I know the more ambitious blogs break it down to certain genres within the decade but let’s start small). Also, I’m assuming we’re encompassing all forms of what makes an actor/actress great so in picking our nominees I’ll be looking at the whole body of work and not just looks (hard I know).  With that if you have any actors (let’s face it with a 5-0 lead it’s going to be actors) from any decade you think HAVE to be nominated comment away!  Till tomorrow!  BTW…Cabin in the Woods….SEE IT NOW!

Putting up the second to last pre-written review I have.  I have a midterm today so no time to throw up an in-depth one.  This is a great movie though!  I should have seen Being Elmo last year but sadly the world of the documentary is a small one and it never came to any area I could visit, thus I had to wait patiently for it to become available on DVD (or Netflix Watch Instantly where you can watch it now!).  Being Elmo is a film about the love of childhood, puppeteering, Sesame Street and, ultimately, Jim Henson.  I didn’t know even at 23, a performance by Elmo could make me laugh and cry as much as it did before showing me the man behind the Muppet.  Fans of good documentaries, kids at heart and Elmo fans (and really who isn’t) should seek this out!

Being Elmo tells the tale of Kevin Clash, the man who created and has provided the movement and voice for Elmo.  Clash tells about his poor upbringing, his early love of puppeteering and his eventual meeting and employment with Jim Henson and Sesame Street.

Can I just preface this with saying “puppeteering” is a bitch to spell?  Everytime I type it the red squiggle lines underneath pop up because I forget an “e” or placed the “t” in the wrong spot.  Anyway, my spelling woes aren’t the reason you’re reading this review.

Being Elmo is such a sweet movie showcasing a man who is often ignored in his contributions.  I don’t know any children who would be able to tell you who is the man behind Elmo, but as many say in the documentary, Kevin Clash is Elmo!  The man grew up knowing exactly what he wanted to do, that is making puppets.  Clash has known all the “greats” in the puppet/Muppet field including acclaimed Kermit Love and Henson himself.  As a Disney fan and someone who’s read the amazing book Street Gang: The Complete History of Sesame Street, these names just dazzled me as Clash has some wonderful stories to tell about these people who are unfortunately no longer with us.  The heartbreak and sadness of him revealing how he learned Henson had died is just sad to watch.  The film expertly blends Clash’s story with that of Henson, showing that without Henson there would be no Muppets.  All this Henson story also allows some footage to be shown behind the filming of Labyrinth (one of my FAVORITE movies).

Returning back to the role of puppeteering, the documentary also looks at what a dying breed puppeteering is in the world of CGI.  Clash is aware of how bizarre he must be ever since he turned his father’s coat fabric for a Muppet.  When a young boy comes to meet Clash at the end of the film and starts rattling off the names of these puppeteers from the 70s (to the point that he can identify them from a picture), that spark saying “the magic of puppets is there” is restored.  Being Elmo is a love letter to the world of the puppeteer, something that can’t be replaced by a computer.

The world of Clash seems to pale in comparison to the rest of the story presented (and at a 80 minutes it packs a lot while not being boring) and I would have enjoyed a bit more about Clash’s later life.  You can tell he’s probably holding stuff back about his troubles with his ex-wife and other things.  But regardless, the man loves being Elmo and providing joy and happiness to children.  Scenes of Elmo on Sesame Street still made me laugh, proof positive that Clash and Elmo are one.

Being Elmo is a delight of a documentary in every sense of the word.  The story is unique and what bad can be said about Elmo?  It’s available on Netflix Watch Instantly now!

Grade: A

There was a movie quite a few years ago called The Dark Crystal. In it were these little inoffensive, innocent creatures called Podlings. The evil Skeksis keep themselves alive by draining the Podlings of their vital essence after which they sort of existed like ghosts of their former selves. I have felt like one of the drained Podlings for almost two weeks.  Here’s a link to a scene of draining if you want to see Muppety horror: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPaKNafdJ18

The really obnoxious thing about this cold? Boy child came down with it Monday afternoon, stayed home from school and watched Doctor Who all day Tuesday, and by Wednesday was bouncing around like a flea. Me? I’m down for the count for 12 days. Getting old sucks.

     If you have seen Labyrinth and The Dark Crystal you are already familiar with Brian Froud‘s unique style (and David Bowie’s equally unique tights).

     To celebrate all things Faerie I’ll be featuring a link to The Realm of Froud in the sidebar of my home page all month.

     Don’t forget that the Disney backed television series Once Upon A Time premiers on Channel 5 in the U.K. tonight!

     P.S.  A little extra treat, a Froud inspired animated curio (view it all on YouTube) …

Gary Kurtz yesterday: maybe thinking about Mr Methane’s act

“Why did Gary Kurtz split with George Lucas?” I asked someone in Edinburgh just before the final session of the Guardian weekend event during which Gary Kurtz , producer of both Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back, explained how the first movie was conceived, produced and marketed.

“They fell out over the plot of the third film, Return of The Jedi,” I was told. “Gary Kurtz wanted to show the more realistic after effects of war, with Han Solo killed and Luke Skywalker left alone. George Lucas disagreed. He said Han Solo toys are doing great business!”

It seemed impolite to probe Gary Kurtz about it, but he did admit George Lucas wanted more of a rollercoaster ride feel to Return of the Jedi and a more upbeat ending to the trilogy. The original script had seen Han Solo dead and Princess Leia going off to rule, accompanied by her two robots C3PO and R2D2, leaving Luke Skywalker to ride off into the sunset alone.

Gary Kurtz went off to produce The Dark Crystal for Jim Henson rather than Return of the Jedi for George Lucas and so the third Star Wars film got its rollercoaster plot ride and happy ending although, yesterday, Kurtz pointed out that the Han Solo character actually has no real effect on anything in the movie’s plot; the character was, really, just hanging around while things happened around him. And Kurtz did say the toy manufacturers had had an effect on the way the Star Wars trilogy developed.

Toy manufacturers and commercial factors affecting creative decisions does not worry me too much. After all, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle actually did kill off Sherlock Holmes but was forced by public opinion and against his better judgment to un-kill him.

We live in a commercial world, which brings me to farting.

Today is the birthday of my chum Mr Methane, the world’s only professionally-performing flatulist (a ‘farter’ to me and you). He has an entrepreneurial air about him and is quick to spot a new opportunity. He tells me he has now started a Personalised Fart Greetings service.

“I’ve had a lot of requests for personalised fart video greetings,” he claims, though I suppose it could all be hot air.

“Basically,” he says, “all you have to do is fill out a form with details of the special oral greeting that you’d like me to convey and this will result in a personalised and very special video greeting from my rear end.”

I can think of nothing warmer nor more meaningful than sending a fart greeting to your loved one(s) personalised in this way by Mr Methane.

And, talking of farts, that brings us to comedian Bob Slayer.

We have twice failed to meet up since he returned from out-drinking and outraging Australia (as partly-chronicled in this blog).

I got this e-mail from him last night:

“Just back from a lovely weekend of gigs,” it read.

“Swansea seemed particularly happy to hear about Australian bans and goats and mayhem and I ended up doing a two hour / seven pints of Guinness gig. During the opening acts, I popped to the shop down the road and was nearly mowed down by a fella on a BMX bike with a laptop under his arm. He was closely followed by a hot police woman at full sprint.

“The man on the BMX bike then did something which I just cannot fathom out. He was getting away from PC Hot Pants but, when he got to the junction, he stopped at the red light! Why? Juliet Bravo rugby tackled him and his BMX and then sat on him until reinforcements arrived.

“It is remarkable that a burglar could be caught for respecting the Highway Code!”

But then Bob ominously added:

“I am going to South Africa on the 6th of April. Can we meet up before then?”

If anyone reading this lives in South Africa and is of a nervous disposition, I urge you to leave the country for the whole of April, just for your own personal safety and sanity.

You have been warned.

To cheer you up, though, here is a video which Gary Kurtz screened in Edinburgh yesterday:

By Elizabeth C. Bunce

If there’s one thing these lists demonstrate, it’s that great fantasy stories are enduring.  All four of us have named several films that reach deep into the literary and oral tradition of myths, legends, traditional bedtime stories, and classics of fantasy literature.  It’s not surprising that what makes a great fantasy movie is the same stuff that makes a great story, period: amazing worlds, epic quests, doomed romance, and soaring imagination.  More than half the movies on my list are direct retellings of well-known tales, and all of them are adapted in one way or another from earlier source material–be that a novel from the 1990s or a play by William Shakespeare, or anything in between.

It’s neither accidental nor surprising that my personal favorites list went this way, but there are plenty of contenders that just narrowly missed the cut and are worthy of mention, at least in passing.  I’ve been thoroughly impressed by recent films Stardust (adapted from the Neil Gaiman novel) and Prince Caspian (from CS Lewis’s beloved Chronicles of Narnia), but I haven’t seen either film often enough to declare it a favorite… yet.  Likewise, two classics from my childhood deserve a nod, and would have made the cut if this were a Favorite 15: the glorious Jim Henson/Brian Froud collaboration The Dark Crystal; and Willow, which is just as good as any other high fantasy film made in the last century.  Lastly, because I feel someone should mention it, yet it somehow gets overlooked whenever we start talking about great fantasy films, is one of the few mermaid movies ever made (surprisingly enough), 1984′s fantastic classic Splash.  It gets overshadowed by Hanks’s Big from a few years later, but it really is a wonderful movie that deserves to be better remembered for its contribution to the genre.

But. You’re looking for the ones that did make the cut, so here is my winnowed-down list of my ten alltime favorite fantasy films:

1.  The Princess Bride
Art has suggested that we define great fantasy by the age at which we’re introduced to our favorites, and I tend to agree.  This Rob Reiner masterpiece came out when I was thirteen, which is the ideal time to experience this wickedly smart, hilarious, and romantic fantasy romp.  But viewers can enjoy it at any age!  There are no roles in film history to rival Carey Elwes as Westley/The Dread Pirate Roberts or Mandy Patinkin’s iconic Inigo Montoya, but Robin Wright, Chris Sarandon, Billy Crystal, Andre the Giant, Wallace Shawn, Peter Falk, and all the others turn in perfect performances, too. T he memorable scenes and imminently-quotable catchphrases ensure this film’s status as a fantasy legend.

2.  Ever After
When you’re a fairy tale fan, the golden goose (so to speak) is, of course, Cinderella.  No other tale so captures our love of the genre and our hope for true love to lift us from the drudgery of our daily lives.  Everyone knows this story, and making it fresh and new and wonderful is hard!  But Ever After was up to the challenge, and more.  Set in the intensely naturalistic setting of early Renaissance France, this adaptation builds on the basic rags-to-riches framework to deliver a complex and deeply satisfying tale of smart lovers who complement one another, yet are set apart by a nearly unconquerable divide.  Also, it doesn’t hurt that Dougray Scott makes for a Prince Charming any woman would swoon over.

3.  A Knight’s Tale
Carrying on with the argument that retellings fit in the fantasy genre, magic or not, I’m sneaking one of my very favorite movies–period–onto this list.  Turned off by the truly dreadful previews, I nearly missed this one–and I’m so glad I didn’t.  From the ensemble cast (Heath Ledger!  Rufus Sewell!  Paul Bettany!  That guy from Firefly!) to the wacky rock soundtrack, Chaucer has never been so much fun (and he was no wet blanket to begin with).

4.  Mary Poppins
No film explores the power of childhood make-believe adventures better than this Disney classic.  Who didn’t want their toys to put themselves away?  Or spend an afternoon popping in and out of chalk drawings, riding magical carousel horses and winning the derby?  Or laugh themselves into flight?  A spoonful of sugar and the confident wink of a magical nanny makes it all possible.

5.  Indiana Jones & The Last Crusade
Tales of King Arthur and the Holy Grail have been centerpieces of Western fantasy as long as we’ve been telling stories.  The third, and arguably the best, installment of the Indiana Jones franchise brings that classic quest to the screen better than any film, ever.  (I’m talking to YOU, da Vinci Code.  You too, Excalibur. *shudders*)  (The second-best film adaptation of the King Arthur legend is, of course, the 1960s classic Camelot with Richard Harris and Vanessa Redgrave.)

6.  Portrait of Jennie
For pure romance and starcrossed lovers, you can’t ask for more than William Dieterle’s sweet Depression-era tale of a starving artist and the doomed model who shapes his career, and his life.  It has all the makings of a gothic mystery–but the tender performances of Joseph Cotton and Jennifer Jones make this instead a sweeping story of the power of love to reach beyond time and death.  Fans of Jane Seymour and Christopher Reeve’s Somewhere in Time should look this one up.  (And fans of Portrait of Jennie should look up the marvelous children’s novel Tom’s Midnight Garden by Phillippa Pearce.)

7.  Harry Potter & The Prisoner of Azkaban
The best installment of one of the most beloved fantasy series of our age.  Need I say more?

8.  Beauty and the Beast
No one was surprised when this Disney adaptation of Gabrielle-Suzanne de Villeneuve’s classic French fairy tale became the first-ever animated film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture (and thus changed the awards structure forever).  The lavish production, with its marvelous soundtrack, brought this tale as old as time to life with all the wonder and beauty we expect in our fairy tale films.

9.  Arabian Nights
I have expressed my love for these stories on borg.com before, and this made-for-TV miniseries starring Mili Avatal absolutely swept me away.  The production is gorgeous and epic, with a bold and brilliant cast that includes fine performances by Jason Scott Lee, John Leguizamo, Rufus Sewell (!), and Andy Serkis.  It offers up all our Arabian Nights favorites: Ali Baba, Aladdin, and, of course, Scheherazade and her deeply disturbed husband, played with heartbreaking madness by Dougray Scott (who, really, we could stand to see A LOT more of.  Just sayin’.).

10.  Much Ado About Nothing
This is last on my list not because it’s my least favorite of the ten; far from it–it’s actually my alltime favorite movie!  But of the ten, it’s the one that feels the least like fantasy to me, although it has neither more nor less magic than The Princess Bride, Ever After, or A Knight’s Tale.  Directed by and starring Kenneth Branagh at the height of his early career, this utterly perfect adaptation of Shakespeare’s lusty romantic comedy is set against the breathtakingly beautiful Tuscan countryside and features fantastic performances by Emma Thompson, Brian Blessed, Kate Beckinsale, Robert Sean Leonard, Michael Keaton, and Denzel Washington.  I want to step inside this movie and live there, every time I watch Much Ado–and if that’s not the very definition of fantasy, than I don’t know what is.

By C.J. Bunce

Fantasy movies have been around since the beginning of cinema itself.  The earliest filmmakers themselves were magicians of sorts, and what better way to dazzle an audience than show them something amazing and… unbelievable.  But it’s not until the last ten or so years that fantasy was fully realized, rich and realistic, with classic stories finally matching the imaginations of decades of readers.  There are of course exceptions.  Big ones even.  Like The Wizard of Oz.  Only The Lord of the Rings trilogy gives The Wizard of Oz a run for its money, but does any single LOTR film compare to the one, classic Oz?   I think that film still holds up today against any other film made since.

This is the first of four articles where each of the borg.com writers discusses their ”ten favorite fantasy films” as we did with our favorite Halloween films last fall.  Note this is a favorites vs. a “best of” list.  We may have to do a “best of” list later, but “best of” lists are everywhere and often look exactly alike.  When you’re discussing “favorite fantasy films” as opposed to “the best” you are bound to see some of the best films straddle both lists.  But “favorites” lists allows you to fold in guilty pleasures, and maybe those films that, as quality is concerned, don’t hold their own to today’s audiences, considered from a more objective standard.  Hopefully you can pick up a fantasy film or two you either haven’t heard of or haven’t seen yet.

What is fantasy?  Our criteria was that there should be some element of magic in the film, and that the film wouldn’t better fit in another genre list like sci-fi or horror, etc.

Exclusions

My list excludes several genre films that could arguably fall into a fantasy list.  I’ll save holiday fantasies like Elf and Miracle on 34th Street for another day.  I also did not include superhero movies or action/adventure films, which I see as their own separate genres, or historical fiction, like Braveheart, despite that film often topping fantasy genre lists.  Finally, I have not included movies that are also predominantly science fiction, otherwise the “greatest space fantasy of all time”–Star Wars, would be on the list.  So my goal is including only “plain old classic fantasy movies.”

Honorable Mentions that made nobody’s Top 10

Because you can’t just list your top ten (why leave it at that?) I want to mention a few films that would have made the list before the advent of modern big fantasy films.  Jim Henson’s Dark Crystal stood by itself for a time as real, incredible fantasy, with strange creatures and places.  This film, and the strange Labyrinth, were the kind of romping fantasy that seemed to skip by an entire generation of baby boomers.  Goonies is sure to make a favorites list for me but I am not sure there is any magic there to technically merit placing on a fantasy list.  Great acting by Dennis Quaid and a great dragon voiced by Sean Connery made Dragonheart a solid fantasy film that was easy to watch over and over, and City of Ember and the better than average Disney film The Sorceror’s Apprentice with Nicholas Cage are newer fantasy films that I liked a lot but haven’t re-watched enough to have it make my list–yet.   I’d watch any of those films again today.  It’s the “over and over again watching” that I looked toward to finally nail down the order of my top ten.  So here it is, from 10 to my current favorite at the number one spot:

10. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.  What defines fantasy as a genre is the presence of the magical or supernatural.  Captain Jack Sparrow is a dead pirate captain, like the ghost pirate we loved in Scooby Doo, and what Lord of the Rings: Return of the King revealed to be that production’s coolest creation, the brilliantly executed army of the dead.  From a completely over-the-top but cool performance by Johnny Depp to a fun voyage, a great ship, and a whole stew of solid actors, Pirates is fun fantasy in a historical setting, with a rousing soundtrack by Klaus Badelt that will stick in your head long after the credits have rolled.

9.  Alice in Wonderland.  I’ve never been much of a fan of Tim Burton’s unique style, until I was blown away by his take on this classic story.  Burton was born to create Wonderland for movie audiences.  Johnny Depp is completely mad as the Hatter, Anne Hathaway perfectly cast as the White Queen, and Helena Bonham Carter vile and insane as the Red Queen.  They also went all out with voice work for the digital characters with Stephen Fry, Michael Sheen, Alan Rickman, Imelda Staunton, Christopher Lee, and Michael Gough all supplying great characterization.  Beyond stunning visuals and sets, the story masterfully blends Alice in Wonderland with other works of Lewis Carroll as if they always belonged together.  Burton’s audacity pays off and Alice can be watched again and again, each time finding incredible nuances.  Burton joined Peter Jackson and Victor Fleming in an exclusive club of masters of the most classic of fantasy books to make it to screen.

8.  Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves.  This movie was written and created to get it into theaters as quickly as possible, in only a matter of literally weeks.  So how can such a thrown-together film stand the test of time?  I give a lot of credit to Kevin Costner as a believably viable, yet oafish and sincere Robin.  His merry men are all well cast.  And we got to see Alan Rickman as the most classic of villains, playing the role of the Sheriff of Nottingham.  One of the best surprise endings gives us Sean Connery as we’d like to see him in an entire feature-length role (The achingly, poorly cast First Knight didn’t cut it, unfortunately).  Who cares if the cast isn’t British and their costumes don’t make much sense?  OK, this wouldn’t make any “best of” list, but I love watching it whenever it is on TV so it belongs right here.  And it also has a great soundtrack by Michael Kamen.

7.  Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.  In one sense, taking away the last three Harry Potter films, which to me are lesser works, the first five all sort of merge together–except for the story of Azkaban.  Professor Lupin is probably the best of Harry’s professors, and his greatest role model is Sirius Black.  Of all the Harry Potter films this is the only one I will stop and watch again.  It’s a standout film in the biggest mega-fantasy franchise ever.  Here you have cool tools of fantasy like the Marauder’s Map and Hermione’s time-turner.  And the Dementors are rivaled in their quiet dark creepiness only by the Nazgul from The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring.  And although there are some minor story problems involving the time-turner and the killing of an innocent with little commentary, the digital realization of a Hippogriff named Buckbeak becomes one of the best executed fantasy animals ever.  John Williams was able to make a throughly creepy mood with his darkest (and final) Harry Potter soundtrack here.

6.  Field of Dreams.  “If you build it, he will come.” “It’s not heaven, it’s Iowa.”  Not only did Field of Dreams give us some of the best catch phrases ever, it got people who don’t like baseball to like baseball (me included).  Of all the ten movies on my list, Field of Dreams may be the most transformatively magical, and possibly the most unique because it is so off-the-wall.  How did anyone sell this as a movie?  Ghostly baseball players coming out of a cornfield to get in another game of baseball?  The one-two punch of Kevin Costner and James Earl Jones (and Burt Lancaster!) put this film up with Jaws as a film that you can’t walk away from once you start watching it, even for the 100th time.

5.  The Jungle Book.  Rudyard Kipling’s 1894 book of stories called The Jungle Book included the story of Mowgli, and it comes alive in a very wonderful way in 1942′s Disney animated movie.  Mowgli’s life is the ultimate in escapes from reality for young viewers.  Who wouldn’t want to be raised by wolves?  Who wouldn’t want a giant friend who was a bear, and a wise advisor who is a black panther?  The music made the simply detailed animation more frolicking and fun.  And even the sinister villain, the tiger Shere Khan, need not meet his end in this film in order to round out a well told story of friendship, manipulation, and trust.  And the hypnotic Kaa remains unmatched as the clever manipulator until we meet Wormtongue in The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. 

4.  The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers.  What’s the best of the three movies of Middle Earth?  My hope is one of the two movies being made right now into The Hobbit series.  I have issues with both Fellowship of the Ring and even more issues with The Return of the King, but it all amounts to nitpicking.  As a series, it is the best fantasy series ever.  As stand alone film, The Two Towers makes my list for the same reason The Empire Strikes Back would trump the other Star Wars films.  Introductions of incredible places, like Rohan.  And where my eyebrows wrinkled at killing off Gandalf the White in Fellowship of the Ring to only bring him back with a different name, Gandalf the Grey knows how to lead an army into battle at Helm’s Deep.  My favorite character of the series gets a full story arc here–the classically regal and noble yet flawed Theoden King, leader of Rohan.  The brother of the frustrating Boromir is introduced as David Wenham’s Faramir, who both kidnaps and then frees the traveling Hobbits.  Merry and Pippin recruit the help of the awesome Ents–talking, walking trees that march into battle to protect what is theirs (also seen in The Wizard of Oz).  Although the main journey of Frodo and Sam and Gollum finds them moving from point B to point C in this installment, the real adventure is what happens to the other six remaining members of the Fellowship.  Whereas at the end of Return of the King the several denouements had me cheering for Gollum, in The Two Towers the excitement and pacing was just right, leaving audiences hungry for more at the end.

3.  The Muppet Movie.  A perfectly magical film.  Jim Henson can’t be overstated as sitting among the kings of creating the fantastical.  The Muppets had already been known to us through The Muppet Show, yet this movie brought laugh out loud humor to a fully realized classic hero’s journey–a drive from the East Coast to Hollywood.  With a frog and a pig and a bear and a dog and what the heck are all those other guys like Beaker and Animal and …?  Not since It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World had Hollywood comic actors united behind a single important film with too many cameos to count, and all brilliantly funny.  I like all the Muppet movies but this remains my favorite.  We don’t analyze it but Henson did the unimaginable by making fabric characters as real as any human in any film and without the realism required by all other fantasy films of make-believe characters.  Instead it just has a lot of honesty and heart, to make this movie beloved by audiences for generations to come.

2.  The Wizard of Oz.  I have likely seen only Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, the Star Trek films, and Jaws more times than The Wizard of Oz over the years.  Before video tape and DVDs I remember watching once a year on a Sunday night when The Wizard of Oz was re-broadcast, waiting to watch closely again to see how they changed from a black and white Kansas farm to the technicolor land of Oz.  Along with The Jungle Book, I watched this film as a young kid (unlike 8 other films on this list that came much later) and saw first-hand what magic in fantasy was all about.  So many elements make this movie work, many from the source story by L. Frank Baum, like the long journey leading back home.  A giant village of extras with the Munchkins.  Crazy scary flying monkeys and arguably the best villain ever filmed in both the Wicked Witch of the West and the equally evil Miss Gulch.  Good costumes from 1939 meant we didn’t need CGI or animation–the Tin Man, the Scarecrow, and the Cowardly Lion are all believable and real.  And of course the soundtrack and songs are unmatched and memorable, led by a perfect performance by the young Judy Garland.  The Wizard of Oz is the Citizen Kane of the fantasy genre.

1.  The Golden Compass.  A perfect, elaborate fantasy story in an incredible, new parallel universe of Earth.  A perfect cast.  Beautiful, unreal sets.  Historically inspired costumes that span different worlds.  Special effects that merge reality and fantasy seamlessly.  An often overlooked brilliant fantasy masterwork.  When I first saw this I instantly thought this was the finest, most enjoyable fantasy film I’d ever seen.  If all steampunk was this good I would be a true believer.  Look at the cast:  A stately Daniel Craig’s Lord Asriel, a beautifully striking but sinister Nicole Kidman’s Ms. Coulter, the perfect helpers along the voyage in Sam Elliot’s Lee Scoresby and Eva Green’s Serafina, smaller roles with gravitas by Derek Jacobi and Christopher Lee, and stellar voiceovers by Kathy Bates, Kristin Scott Thomas, and Ian McKellen.  The design work is lavish with a textbook fantasy component talisman in the magical alethiometer, animals that share your journey and wear armor into battle with you.  Gyptians!  Flying witches with bows and arrows.  A cool airship.  A big, exciting ride.  What more could anyone want?

One big element I see across my list?  Talking animals (and other things that don’t normally talk like trees and cornfields and dead people) are in 9 of my picks.  Also, I must like Christopher Lee and Alan Rickman who show up in three films, and Johnny Depp, Ian McKellen, and Kevin Costner show up in two films.  Tomorrow… come back for day two of our favorite fantasy films and click on the Comments to let us know your favorites.

Failing is the best thing I ever did.  Doors don’t magically open after you fail big.  They don’t crack open gently and lure you in.  I had to want it, and the only way I could realize that I wanted it, was by failing.

After my exciting fun filled night at the hospital, I returned home to an eerie calm in my apartment.  School would resume Monday.  I’d had a test to study for.  Nothing had changed.  Except me.

I didn’t think about Keith anymore at night.  I didn’t whisper his name before I fell asleep.  I slept, not better, but I slept.

A few of my friends had stayed in town to endure the heat and catch up on their own hectic class schedules.  One of them was Daisy.  Always off beat and funky to the extreme, Daisy was a human house cat.  She came and went as she pleased.  She loved being petted and stroked, had no hang-ups over men, came over and watched 1960s movies with me on my apartment’s crappy futon.  Her obsession with Orlando Bloom was impressive, including a card board cut out of him as Legolas from Lord Of The Rings.

Crazy Daisy and I lived it up for the next two months.  I didn’t always get her.  I saw other men get drawn into her charm.  She was very charismatic with short and spiky bleached blond hair.  It was as if she’d taken it right off the head of a Hentai drawing and plopped it on her head.  I envied that about her.  Not her hair, but her charisma.  We didn’t know how to cook for ourselves, so we ate at IHOP a lot.  A month before the fall semester, I watched an IHOP waiter fall for her.  He was boyishly handsome and I may have had a few hots for him.  When he called her up instead of me, I’d had it.  Again.  I couldn’t win.

Why Crazy Daisy?  Because she was laid back.  She didn’t have any expectations for men.  She was just going along for the ride.  I couldn’t let loose.  She was adventurous, but at the same time she didn’t have an end goal.  I did.  I wanted a boyfriend.  I wanted stability and commitment.

I didn’t know it at the time, but I was becoming disillusioned by the casualness of relationships people have in their early twenties.  I’ll admit it is a time to experiment, but I’d just been dragged through six months agonizing over a crush who I felt never indicated or told me he wasn’t interested until he was moving away.  I would have appreciated a little honesty upfront, even if it was negative.

Throughout summer, I would go to a few house parties, meet guys, some were interested, some were not.  In the back of my head, I couldn’t help but think, “I am a play thing.  I am a toy.”  They’ll play with me, then go home to marry their high school sweet heart.  I was the in between, the occasional hook-up, the girl they never thought about again.  I didn’t want to be this girl.  So I didn’t give out my number, I didn’t sleep around.  I pushed the cute white girls who they’d end up with to the fore front.  “She” was their end game.  Not me.

I got stronger by focusing more on myself.  In doing this, I regressed a bit.  I’d been dating consecutive boyfriends since I was 15.  I’d forgotten who I was, who I wanted to be.  If finding myself meant reaching back to my childhood when I was damn sure I wanted to be a writer, I would try to bring that back.  I bought movies that inspired me from my youth, Drop Dead Fred, Labyrinth, Dark Crystal, and TV shows like Pete and Pete.  I met people who loved the things I did.  We had something in common.  I didn’t need to have a sexual relationship with them.  I didn’t have anymore than the expectation of a friendship and common ground.

As summer came to a close, Crazy Daisy had a pregnancy scare which shook both her and I.  I realized she was not only loose with her sexual relationships, but with her values and morals as well.  It’s not that I was upset about her getting birth control, I was taking it, too, or her asking for an abortion had she been pregnant.  Deep down, her main focus was herself.  It had always been about her.  I was just riding side car in her life.  I didn’t feel like strengthening our relationship anymore.

As school started an exboyfriend had started popping up everywhere I was.  He sat outside on the sidewalk every time I walked by.  He came and purchased items at the store I worked at.  He was like Visa, everywhere I wanted to be, and I did not appreciate it.  He had a new girlfriend, too.  They held hands, sipped coffee, and were altogether too cute. I was over him, but I didn’t want to see him all the time either.

Lane worked part time at my job.  We parked on the same level of the same parking garage.  I didn’t want to date him.  I didn’t want to date anyone.  I was reluctant to it, but eventually, I started to go over to his house.  Sleep there.  But I wasn’t ready for the deed.  As the relationship progressed, we found more and more disagreements.  He didn’t like the movies I wanted to go see.  He chided me for making bad choices.  We weren’t compatible.  Eventually, he called me up to say he couldn’t do it any more.  I knew what “it” was.  “It” was the rebound I had thrown myself into.  “It” was pretending we were supposed to like being together.  “It” was over, and I was okay.  Lane still worked with me.  He ignored me there.  He was still at school.  Everywhere.  He ignored me there, too.

It was a little too much to duck behind counters when I saw my ex boyfriends out and about.  One ex with his perfect cute girlfriend, the one he was supposed to end up with.  Lane pretending I didn’t exist.  I was starting to wish I didn’t.  I didn’t want to go through the hospital again.  I didn’t think a therapist would help.  I just wanted pain to be real.  Not just my heart playing games with my mind.  I started scratching at my wrists with sharp objects.  Nothing deep, just something to cause a little pain, a little blood.  Something to take my head out of thinking I wasn’t worth it anymore.  It had other problems to figure out.

          There are many theories as to what might happen on December 21, 2012 of this year.  Some say nothing, some say it will be the end, and others say it will be a new beginning.  I wanted to share with you what I have been told through spirit and other intuitive’s in hopes that this may give you a greater understanding of what is about to unfold for us.

          It is said that on December 21, 2012 there will be a great conjunction where all the planets within our solar system will line up perfectly.  Due to this great conjunction there will be three days of darkness, most likely due to the planets blocking the sun and each other from receiving light.  With that said this reminds me greatly of a movie I watched often made in the 80’s called the Dark Crystal by Jim Henson.  In the movie a great conjunction is said to take place in which three suns line up perfectly and within the proficiency the dark which are played by the Skeksis will come together with the light which are known as the Mystics.  This movie displays wonderful symbols of how the yin and yang will come together and become one which in return will allow them to ascend and allow the world to once again return to peace.  In my mind this is what has been occurring to many already around the world and will continue. 

          In the coming months we may just see such a conjunction take place and if indeed this does occur I do think we should prepare our mind, body and souls for this occurrence.  It is said that this conjunction has already occurred once before on our planet and it will return.  Some may believe that this darkness will be doomsday and might just go crazy while others who are connected to their intuition and are grounded will know that they are safe.  It would be important to stay balanced within ourselves and use our common sense and prepare for if and when this might occur.  During the three days of darkness it is said that the magnetic system in which surrounds our earth will be turned off and it will greatly disrupt our electronics.  That may mean our electricity will not work and quit possibly batteries too.  The only thing that we will be able to use as light will be candles or oil.  Some also believe that you should not go outside during the three days of darkness due to the unbalanced energies that will be roaming our earth.  At first when I heard this I instantly thought this is fear based information however after I really thought about it might just make sense.  The unbalanced energy may come from other humans who can not understand what is going on and will in return act crazy.  There have also been offers of help coming to some during this time period from the star people.  They have shared that during this period of darkness or if the land in which you are on becomes unstable they will offer to take you up in their ships for safety and bring you back down once it is again stable.  The key will be not to be afraid of these beings but breath stay calm and trust in your heart what feels right to you. 

          Staying balanced and using your common sense will be the key to making it through such an occurrence.  Buy extra water and candles, close your doors and windows and lock them, and keep your pets inside with you.  With four children and two dogs in my household it will be like camping and I can see a lot of games being played.  It is important to remember that after these three days of darkness will come a new beginning for us all.  Like in the movie The Dark Crystal Jim Henson shows how the world becomes more beautiful and more peaceful than we can ever imagine, that is not to say that it won’t take work on our part but this conjunction will be a wonderful display for people to return to how things were at some point on our planet.  For after December 21, 2012 and three days of darkness will come the dawn of a new era.  This new era will bring peace and a new age.  With something to think about…  

Love Always…Tamara

Tonight dog lovers across the galaxy tune in to their screens for the annual Super Bowl of dogdom, the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show.  Here at borg.com, this is serious TV viewing, and this year our thoughts naturally turned to… dogs in space.  Like Laika, the first dog in space who beat mankind into the outer realms, these dogs have gone… where no man has gone before.  So we bring you our very own contenders for Best in Show–our picks for best dogs from genre fiction in TV, movies, and comics (in no particular order).

1.  Toto – Who better to start our list than the little terrier feisty enough to take a bite out of Miss Gulch and accompany Dorothy on her journey down the yellow brick road in The Wizard of Oz?

2.  Einstein – Doc Brown’s faithful sheepdog companion, like Laika, was the first to make a historic voyage there and back again in a Delorean in Back to the Future.

3.  Fluffy – Two heads are better than one, so three must be exponentially better.  How can you not like this lovable cerberus from Harry Potter & the Sorceror’s Stone?  Just don’t let thieves know their secret, that music will lull them fast to sleep.

4.  Fang – Speaking of Harry Potter, we can’t pass up the loyal and large pal to Hagrid, Fang the boarhound (played by a Neapolitan Mastiff).  Although Hagrid calls him a bloody coward, in The Sorceror’s Stone he took Harry and company through the Forbidden Forest.

5.  Krypto – Strange how themes repeat themselves.  Originally, Krypto, like Laika and Einstein, was Jor-El’s first foray into creating a vehicle to get Kal-El (our Superman) off of the planet Krypton and on his path to Earth.  Although a mishap sends Krypto off-course, fortunately he makes his way back to his best friend.

6.  Porthos – We would later learn Porthos would have a pack of offspring of his own per Scotty in Star Trek 2009.  This fellow accompanied Captain Jonathan Archer on many a mission where no man had gone before in the earliest Star Trek stories on the series Enterprise.

7.  Astro – Maybe the first family dog we were introduced to in the future of our past, Astro loved Elroy, Judy, Jane and George Jetson and showed there are no bad dogs today and hundreds of years from now.

8.  Commander Kruge’s targ - We never learned her name, but this fiercely loyal friend helped make all of us cheer for Kruge when he went up against Admiral James T. Kirk in Star Trek: The Search for Spock.  Unfortunately, she represents the one four-legged companion on our list that doesn’t make it, thanks to that dastardly Kirk and friends.

9.  Fizzgig – Seemingly cute and innocent, Fizzgig is the Muppet companion to Kira in The Dark Crystal.  Like Kruge’s targ, although not technically Canis familiaris, he had all the qualities of a good buddy and did not hesitate to bear his fangs to protect Kira when he sensed danger.

10. Butler – James Kirk redeems himself in his last mission when he is sucked into the Nexus in Star Trek Generations.  His reaction to seeing his dog Butler at his old home shows there was a real guy in that Captain Kirk.

Honorable mention:  All greyhounds, since they look like AT-ATs from The Empire Strikes Back.

Do you have any others you think should make the list?  Let us know, and enjoy the Dog Show tonight! The 135th Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show airs tonight and Tuesday on USA and MSNBC. Only dogs from Earth are eligible.

C.J. Bunce

Editor

borg.com

In the previous weeks, I illustrated that my kids — a girl and a boy, 4 and 1, respectively (tack on a “half” to each of those numbers if you care to) — my kids leave books all over the house. Their books are everywhere. They are as bad as I am. I indicated at the beginning of this year-long series that the documentation would never be stable or absolute; that books float through my house, come and go like bad house guests or silly ghosts—this is probably more true of the children’s books in this house than any other kind of book.

This week, I photograph the book shelves in my kids’ rooms, starting with my daughter’s. This is her big bookshelf:

I did not photograph the big pile of books that set to the left. A close up of any of these shelves would reveal a mix of classics—stuff that my wife and I read and cherished as kids—and newer stuff as well. Here’s a shelf, sort of at random—it’s unusually well-organized:

There’s a lot of Studio Ghibli books here; most narrativize Hayao Miyazaki’s films (we’re big fans in this house). My daughter loves these. The bible was my bible; the blue-spined book is this:

You might also note a book version of Jim Henson’s creepy classic The Dark Crystal; this was mine as a kid and it disturbed the hell out of me, so I gave it to my daughter, of course:

The Studio Ghibli books combine beautiful stills of the film with narrative prose and comic book speech bubbles. From the standpoint of a fan of the films, they’re really interesting because they explicate some of the ambiguity. Our daughter loves them and asks for them (too much!):

Another shelf from another book shelf—the only shelf with books on it in this piece of furniture, actually. Not interesting, but I said I’d photograph all book shelves as part of this project:

Before my wife and I married, we lived in Tokyo for a while; we bought a bunch of these board books at a 100 yen shop. Here’s one:

Night stand: always a place of shelving instability:

The book shelf in my son’s room—lots of board books, Eric Carle, stuff like that. He likes trains and dogs:

So, I covered both of the kid’s rooms in one post in the hopes of getting to more interesting volumes in the next few weeks. On deck: the den/kitchen space, featuring cookbooks, art books, and travel volumes.

Despite having been born in 1990, only a little over a month before Jim Henson died, he and his work have been a humongous influence on me.  I was exposed to The Muppet Show and Fraggle Rock through reruns, and even before that, I had a healthy serving of some of the Henson fantasy movies (Labyrinth, The Dark Crystal).  And of course, who can forget Sesame Street, arguably the most popular children’s show of all time?

The more and more I look back on my childhood influences, the more obvious my academic pursuits become to me.  In recent years, I’ve done a lot more “research” on Jim Henson, the man.  I become so thrilled when I discover that someone whose work speaks so strongly to me turns out to have been an amazing person.  I have a great deal of respect for Jim Henson, and in so many ways, I feel as though I know him through his work.  And that is the kind of creator I strive to be all the time – someone friendly and relateable, someone whose being is in tune with the message they are sending out, someone genuine.

Image taken from Muppet Wiki

As I try to figure out the kind of work I want to do, I look at the incredible work of the Jim Henson company.  I want to be able to create work that touches people, that makes people think, and that is honest.

Even in terms of aesthetic, the company has influenced me greatly.  I love that their productions, while often ambitious, never take themselves too seriously.  Corny jokes and flashy costumes are the norm, and it’s absolutely wonderful.  I don’t know how they do it, but I wouldn’t mind learning how to do the work and have the fun.  I’m sure it has something to do with having people who think along the same lines.

Anyway, I don’t feel as though I can talk more about Jim Henson and his company without just repeating how incredible I think the whole of it is.  I opted out of posting a video this time because everyone knows The Muppet Show opening, and I wouldn’t be able to pick just one or two really influential scenes from any of the movies or shows.  Perhaps I’ll post Henson-related videos one-by-one in the future, as I come upon them and decide that they are relevant to something specific.

For now, just know that I’ve been seriously weighing the possibility of sending in an application for employment to the Jim Henson Company for quite a while.  The downside would be having to move, so it might have to wait for a while.  But what I wouldn’t give to be a part of something so incredible.

A year or so ago, I posted up on Facebook that I had finally gotten a chance to watch Tron, and asked people what movies were worth looking into. The response was overwhelming, and I’ve come up with a long list of films that I should watch, along with some of my own research into cult classics and gems from the science fiction / fantasy genres. When Megan moved in to my apartment, we began what we jokingly referred to ‘Bad SciFi Movie Night’, running with the idea that most of the films from that time period are bad films.

It’s entertaining, that whenever I post up something about Bad Scifi Movie Night, there’s an inevitable flood of replies that the films that I’m watching *aren’t* bad. It’s true: while there have been some films that I’ve come across that have been hard to get through, most are outstanding. So, here’s an explaination to what I can point to.

So far, Megan and I have run through an excellent list of films:

12 Monkeys, 2001, 2010, Alien*, Aliens*, Alien Nation, Batman, Blade Runner*, Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind*, Dark Crystal, Dune, Enemy Mine, 5th Element*, Forbidden Planet*, Jason and the Argonauts, Gattaca, Highlander, Last Starfighter, Logan’s Run, Omega Man, Outland, Planet of the Apes, Predator, Silent Running, Starship Troopers, Supernova, Soylant Green, The Thing, Tron, Total Recall and Westworld. (* indicates that I’d already seen and owned it, but rewatched it.)

Of those, there’s some real classics that I’ve really, really loved: Alien, Alien Nation, Omega Man, Outland, Silent Running and Soylent Green. Others, I didn’t like: Enemy Mine, Dark Crystal and Supernova. Win some, lose some.

What I’m enjoying about this watch-list is that it’s an excellent opportunity to go through some of the roots of science fiction classics. Movies such as Alien, 2001, Blade Runner, Forbidden Planet and a couple others are real classics in the genre that have absolutely shaped the films that come after it. Part of this came out of my love for the film Moon, by Duncan Jones. In some of the interviews and commentaries that I’ve read/listened to, he’s cited films such as Silent Running and Outland as direct inspirations for his first, brilliant film.

As a historian, my instincts are to look at the roots of what form the present. The films of the 1950s through the early 1990s form the basis for movies and popular culture of today – it’s easy to recognize the phrase ‘Soylent Green is People!’, but it’s also important to see some of the roots and themes of the stories from these movies. Understanding the past is important to understand the present, especially in something such as popular culture.

So, while Bad SciFi Movie Night is titled as such, it’s not reflective of the quality of the films that we’re watching: if anything, the films that we’ve gone through are just as good – better in some cases – than films that are coming out today.

G is for Garthim:

Hope you enjoy.