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Is it a little clumsy to market a movie with "movies will never be the same," in a month when many people like to watch their traditional favorites? Well, I guess not too clumsy--James Cameron's "Avatar" seems to have edged out "I am Legend" for the biggest December box office opening on record, despite some predictions that the weather would slow business.
I'm not a sci-fi or fantasy fan, and my kids aren't asking to see it. Among teens I know "The Last Air-Bender" promises to be the real "Avatar" movie (the preview does look pretty cool). So I'll need to see those awesome effects in "Avatar" sometime, but not in any hurry. Does it look like Halo? I think it kind of looks like Halo. And I've never played Halo.
The term "blockbuster" originated with the movie "Jaws" but, a little before that, the blockbuster motion picture was born when John Banvard's moving panorama, the great "3 mile" painting, the "greatest achievement of individual enterprise on record" opened in Louisville, Ky. His moving panorama of the Mississippi River debuted on a Monday evening, 8:15 pm, June 29, 1846. It rained, and nobody came. But he soon built up a packed house.
On record as the largest painting in the world, it was rolled by, giving the audience a feeling of moving down the river. People came distances to see it, extra trains were run to bring crowds. Banvard moved on east, to Europe, to fame and fortune, then wrack and ruin. It's a rags to riches, riches to rags story. Imitators sprung up all over with giant moving pictures. Longfellow based his description of the Mississippi in "Evangeline" on Banvard's picture. In the 1850s Banvard was the most famous artist in the world, very likely the first millionaire artist. Eventually people thought panoramas were silly--there was kind of a popularity backlash, even before movies appeared. He's almost entirely forgotten now, and nobody knows what happened to his most famous painting. Early on he predicted his work would be of historical interest to future generations, and it certainly would have been, if we still had it. It was a hobby of mine for a while, looking up Banvard-related history. It's fun to know a few things nobody else knows, even if nobody cares.
Reviews of "Avatar" are mixed.
Dana Stevens of Slate.com says it's the "first broadband blockbuster."
Roger Ebert says the Na'vi characters are individualized, and avoid the eerie Uncanny Valley effect--how very sophisticated effects tend to make you notice the little things that are off, and can seem unintentionally creepy. I felt "Polar Express" had trouble with that. The thing that bothered me most was the teeth didn't catch light the right way. It looked like they had been eating soot, and I predicted when it was shown on t.v. they'd have a hard time selling ads to toothpaste companies. Anyway I have a theory that Roger Ebert is kind of creepy, and I didn't need to know he thought a blue-skinned giantess with golden eyes and a long, supple tail was sexy.
Some of the more snarky remarks about "Avatar" include "If I wanted to hear endless nonsense spewed from something good-looking, I'd watch 'The Tyra Banks Show,"' and "the most smurftastic nudity since 'Watchmen,'" on newyork.metromix.com.
In other local Blockbuster news, the Blockbuster on Bardstown road now carries some books, while the Borders has gotten rid of their DVD racks, and have maybe a few more DVDs than Blockbuster has books. If you look through the magazines it's kind of amazing how many of them aren't out of business. It's a tricky thing to predict how much innovative mediums really change things.
For me, "Toy Story" is the most technically innovative movie I've seen that happens also to be a really great movie. It's hard to even think of the story and the technical innovation as separate elements. And it's one of those holiday favorites I can watch again and again.
On "All In The Family" I seem to remember they liked to watch "Citizen Kane" every year, and it was very innovative, the cinematography was brilliant--but the story fails for me. The script seems cramped, maybe by the legal issues, and it's full of portentous commentaries by secondary characters we have no reason to believe or distrust, so the comments don't advance the story, and it plods to an unearned conclusion. In the end the real Hearst seems far more interesting than Kane, after the buzz of the movie's referrence to a real guy has long faded.
A number of people told me they watch "Elf" every year, so we watched that again. Paul Schafer treasured a Christmas memory of Cher singing "O' Holy Night" and we couldn't find a clip of it on Youtube last week, but when I walked into Wild & Woolly looking for "Elf," there it was, playing on their t.v. Naturally I rented it and gathered the family around. O' the bluesy inflection is frightful. And... wait for it, wai... Yes! We have lip lick.
Another classic is "It's a Wonderful Life" but I suffer from a rare condition that makes me need to watch "Death of a Salesman" right after it, as a double feature. Or at least the SNL extended ending.
A few of my own favorites.
"Tomorrow"--based on a Faulkner story similar to the Lena Grove part of "Light in August."
"Groundhog Day"--This movie has something for everyone in the family, and is genuinely artistic in that understated, authentic way.
"Shattered Glass"--If you're looking for something really good to watch with kids, I was surprised how much my own kids got into this. And pleased. I'm not a very protective parent about viewing. I think there's a bit of drinking and drug use represented in passing. It's mostly about telling the truth, responsibility, and friendship.
"Black Robe"--This is a pretty intense movie, but very good, and it would make a good counterbalance to the boyish fantasy of "Dances With Wolves." People aren't all the same, but are stubbornly different, and they believe what they believe. So they have some trouble understanding each other. Unlike thousands of movies which make things appear easier than they really are, in this movie things are hard. It may be an odd choice for a Christmas movie but I'm going to watch it again, and maybe my kids are old enough for it this year.
None of the books or articles I read about John Banvard said exactly where the painting was shown. It was here, in a place called the Apollo Rooms, on the east side of 3rd street, upstairs, somewhere between the Eon Building and the Old Spaghetti Factory.
And of course "Sherlock Holmes" opens Christmas day, with that likeable nutcase Downey Jr as a Holmes with a little extra badass thrown in. A few weeks ago I was talking to a precociously literate middle school student who said her Dad doesn't read, but likes her to read to him. At one point he'd bought an enormous set of Sherlock Holmes, which had bored her immensely. So I said I'd heard that Holmes had never really said "Elementary, my Dear Watson." Is that true? Yeah, she told me, he never says it.
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frederic