July 8th, 2009
Simon Hsu isn’t just any film fan. When he’s not watching movies, he spends his time doing research on protein structure at the University of California San Diego’s School of Medicine. He’s been published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, and will be publishing in an upcoming issue of Biochemistry.
But he is a film fan, and in this post from The House Next Door, he lists and discusses five movie scientists. Skipping the usual subjects who tend to put the word “mad” in front of the word “scientist,” he comes up with some intriguing selections — including one of my personal favorites, Steve Zissou (Bill Murray) from Wes Anderson’s THE LIFE AQUATIC WITH STEVE ZISSOU. Sure, he’s more moviemaker than scientist (and more goof-off than anything else), but as Hsu points out, he’s on a constant search for the truth — not so much in Anderson’s deliberately fake deep blue sea as much as in his own head.
The more I think of it, the more I love THE LIFE AQUATIC. I’m putting together a list of the best movies of the decade for later this year, and this largely ignored oddball epic keeps bobbing up to the top. Here, in case you’ve never seen it, is a sample of its strange charms…
July 8th, 2009
I didn’t see TRANSFORMERS 2: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN. It’s not my sort of movie. Not that I don’t love giant robots fighting — who doesn’t? I just don’t like movies directed by Michael Bay.
But, given what I’ve read and given what I’ve seen (in the endless, endless promotional blitz), I’m guessing if I did pay my nine bucks and sit down to watch TRANSFORMERS 2, I’d probably agree with Roger Ebert. Normally, though I love Ebert’s writing and think he has a true — and truly admirable — love for movies, I think he’s been a little generous with the stars lately. But he panned TRANSFORMERS big time, and — no suprise — fans of the movie were not pleased.
Thankfully, Ebert responded with one of the best pieces I’ve seen about watching movies, loving movies and writing about movies. Here’s a sample…
It’s not a critic’s job to reflect box office taste. The job is to describe my reaction to a film, to account for it, and evoke it for others. The job of the reader is not to find his opinion applauded or seconded, but to evaluate another opinion against his own. But you know that. We’ve been over that ground many times. What disturbs me is when I’m specifically told that I know too much about movies, have “studied” them, go into them “too deep,” am always looking for things the average person doesn’t care about, am always mentioning things like editing or cinematography, and am forever comparing films to other films.
I’ve “forgotten what it’s like to be a kid,” another poster told me. One of the most-admired contributors to this blog, who signs herself “A Kid.,” is 12 years old. She hasn’t forgotten. Neither have many other readers of middle school age. Their posts give me hope for the future. For them, to be a kid is not to be uncritical or thoughtlessly accepting. They seek magic, and don’t find it in the brutal hammering of TRANSFORMERS.
Like most people who write about movies, I think most of what Hollywood delivers on a weekly basis is pretty awful. But that’s not because I hate movies. It’s just the opposite, in fact. I love movies more than just about anyone I know. I’ve sat through more bad movies than I can count, just to see a scene — or a single shot — that’s somehow special, somehow shows me the still-suprising power of cinema. And I’ve delved deep into film history to find the hidden gems, the still-thrilling movies that never got an Oscar nomination and were forgotten decades ago. Whenever I sit down to a theater, as the lights go down, I say a little prayer to the movie gods asking them to make this a good movie — maybe even a great movie — maybe even the best movie I’ve ever seen.
So when I write a column slamming the latest Hollywood blockbuster that made a quarter-billion dollars at the box office, it’s not to show everyone how smart I am, or how much better taste I have. It’s to say “Hey! Don’t fall for the hype! Don’t be satisfied with the same old glitzy crap! There are thousands of much better movies to see — watch one of them instead!”Â
In other words, I completely agree with Ebert on this matter.
Read his whole piece, “I’m a Proud Braniac,” here.
