movies | Frank Scoblete

For the Birds

The critically acclaimed movie Birdman (or The Unexpected Value of Ignorance) starring Michael Keaton (a good actor) won the Academy Award for Best Picture. Here is the totality of my opinion, in short, this 2014 movie stunk. Even its long subtitle stunk.

It really stunk, as pigeon poop can stink from those city birds who value their own ignorance of the whole thing they are doing perhaps on your head while you walk under an overpass and – okay, let’s leave it at that; the movie stunk!

Birdman takes its place alongside another movie that gained huge critical raves, Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring which was released in 2004. This South Korean movie was supposed to be a profound look at a young monk being shepherded by an old monk during all the seasons.

Saying it is “slow-moving” makes this movie seem to be going fast. It is slower than slow, although (if I recall correctly) we do get to see a bird flying overhead during the movie’s interminable length. That bird was damn exciting.

So how is it that film critics can glorify movies that should never have made it out of their canisters to be put into projectors to frazzle normal folks such as me and my wife, the Beautiful AP? This is one of the great mysteries of my life, along with the origin of the universe.

Seriously, am I so behind in my intellectual capacity that I can’t wonder in absolute wonder at a supposedly fantastically wonderful movie that actually drags you through a year of dullness, using endless hours of screen time on seasons that don’t look as good as the seasons look right outside the theater where I saw the movie?

Or how about a movie that is so dull that the death of the lead character is aggressively prayed for by this member of the film’s audience? Please Lord, please God, please, kill Birdman. Kill him, please. Do that for those of us who are suffering through this horror. Even buttered popcorn can’t make this movie stomach-able.

I used to be a book reviewer for a newspaper in my early years of writing but I found it hard to nail a book as being awful. Books are one usually poor writer trying his or her damn best to create something good. If that book failed? I would just put that book down and read a different one to review. I don’t have that problem with bad movies. I’m not quite sure why. If a movie stinks I’ll tell you it stinks.

Frank’s website is www.frankscoblete.com. His books are available at smile.Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, kindle, e-books and at bookstores.

I Am a Prude

I have become a prude. I am so sick of good movies and good television movies and series capitalizing on sex. What a waste of time!

Okay, you may ask why is on-screen sex a waste of time? Sex is fun, right? In real life sex is, indeed, fun but more often than not in movies and series, it waylays the storyline.

Take The Americans, a good show, where the leading lady has sex with sundry men and the leading man (yes, our lady and man are wife and husband) has sex with all manner of women. Hey, that’s fine because they are Russian spies and they have to do what they have to do to get what they want from the enemy.

Great. But once the sex is stipulated to occur right now, why do we have to waste precious minutes watching them moan, groan and hump? We know what’s going to happen in the scene so why bother with it? It doesn’t further the plot one iota.

I just watched the first three episodes of True Detective. I liked the show but the husband who cheats on his wife has a scene where they do it (seemingly forever). She is totally nude and they are, well, you know what is going on because you see it and know the whole scene reduces the story to a glacial pace. The handcuffs he brings to our fair damsel’s house in episode 2, clearly show us that this relationship is going to get kinky; nothing more is needed. Once a scene indicates the character is having an affair, we can move on for crying out loud.

Let me juxtapose the scene in Casablanca where Rick and Ilsa illicitly meet in Rick’s room. Wow! That is sensuality to its nth degree. We didn’t have to see anything more than their kiss. Without a wasted moment, the scene drove the story further along. Compared to that scene, the movies and shows that burn up time with sex scenes prevent us from answering our burning question—what happens next?

The Americans could have been an “A” series but to me it fell to “B+” in my estimation. That’s a big drop. As for True Detective? I doubt I’ll bother finishing it.

Yes, I am now a prude—or perhaps I’m simply a guy who enjoys good writing and scenes that don’t waste my time.

Frank’s books are available on Amazon.com, Kindle, e-books, Barnes and Noble, and at bookstores.

Movie Scobe: The Black Panther

(Cedrica has joined me in reviewing and discussing movies, old and new. I welcome her aboard.)

Scobe: The Black Panther is up for an Academy Award. What do you think?

Cedrica: No way it wins although it is a good movie, far better than the Shape of Water which was last year’s winner. Comic book movies are too popular so therefore how good can they be? The Academy usually goes for what it considers a “deep” movie; not all the time but enough times that we can make fun of that institution. Some movies win the Academy Award as best picture and they aren’t even in my top twenty list.

Scobe: Certainly Shape of Water was deep since it dealt with a creature who lived in depths. Hold off on this right now and we’ll discuss this movie in the future.

Cedrica: Must we?

Scobe: Yes.

Cedrica: I do have a small problem with The Black Panther. I thought Michael Jordan’s character of Eric Killmonger was too streetie – if that’s a word – and not up to the task of taking on the real Black Panther in an epic fight. The character didn’t ring true. His character wasn’t big enough; not iconic enough. Think of how awesome the Abomination was in The Incredible Hulk (2008) to get an idea of how to structure a fearsome villain. Yes, Killmonger was given the same powers of the Black Panther but he didn’t have that epic quality about him. Jordan is a terrific actor but this role was not a great one and an actor can only do what he does. He was great as Creed.

Scobe: They gave him a back story where his intelligence and intellectual accomplishments were great but you feel that didn’t translate into his character in the movie. He was too below the quality of the other characters. The warriors and the heads of the other tribes had stature. The civilization had stature. His character didn’t.

Cedrica: Correct.

Scobe: The Black Panther is an godlike character and Wakanda is a super civilization. I did think all the other characters had that epic quality if you will. You may be right about Killmonger. He should have been more awesome.

Cedrica: You read my mind. Chadwick Boseman is amazingly good as the Black Panther. The script – with that one exception – is well written and the direction, cinematography, music are all first rate. I’d give this movie 3.5 stars out of four.

Scobe: I give it a four out of four. Killmonger did not ruin it for me.

Cedrica: Three and one half stars is not a ruined movie. It’s a better movie than Shape of Water.

Scobe: In that you are not all wet!

Movie Ratings:

4 stars: Top of the heap!

3.5 stars: Great movie with a little flaw

3 stars: Good night out or just as good watching on the television.

2.5 stars: Passing an evening without big regrets in the morning.

2 stars: Maybe one or two things are decent in this movie.

1.5 stars: Got a good book?

1 star: Being kind.

0 star: Seriously? I mean, seriously?

Teaching Grandchildren through Film

I am a firm believer that film can teach important lessons to kids and that’s why my wife, the Beautiful AP, and I love to show movies to our two grandkids, John is 11 and Danielle is nine.

Let me say first that my wife was an extraordinary teacher and I value her insightful expertise on anything to do with educating kids. I am with due modesty one of the greatest teachers who ever lived. So the two of us know what we’re doing.

We show our grandkids movies we think will educate them in the best of all possible ways.

Take the film Heat starring two of our favorite actresses Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy. Even though it was rated a solid “R” our grandkids understood the plot of this movie and seriously loved this flick, as Melissa McCarthy was a boiling comedic swamp of a character that cursed, swore and used all manner of crude language. The sexual innuendos flew fast and furious. The grandkids loved it.

“This is such a funny film,” said Grand AP, my wife.

“Oh, yes,” I said. “I agree completely.”

“John,” asked Grand AP. “What do you think of this film?”

“Well, I find that it has great cursing and vile language. It’s everything my father and mother are preventing me from seeing except I watch stuff on the Internet when I am at my friends’ houses,” John opined.

“I think it’s funny. The fat lady is really funny when she curses,” said the nine-year- old.

I could see that this movie was having a profound effect on them.

“Just do me a favor,” I said to them. “Don’t tell your parents what we’re showing you; they might not understand, okay?”

“You got it,” said John laughing at the latest disgusting quip by McCarthy.

“No problem,” said Danielle. “I like ‘R’ rated movies like this one. Our parents won’t let us watch any of these.”

The Beautiful AP and I smiled; our grandkids were learning an important lesson as we babysat them this night. Film can be fun…and educational.

Of course, John has a habit of not being able to keep a secret while Danielle is like a locked box; you have to pry stuff out of her.

As soon as Greg, our son, and Dawn, our daughter-in-law came home, John rushed over to them. “Dad, Mom, Grandpa Scobe and Grand AP showed us an ‘R’ rated movie! It was great.”

“Really?” said Greg looking at me.

“Danielle did you like the movie?” asked Dawn.

Danielle remained mute. (That’s my girl!)

“What movie did they see?” asked Greg.

“A very educational one,” I said.

“Very educational,” said the Beautiful AP.

“With a lot of cursing,” added John.

I wonder why we haven’t gotten many calls to babysit lately.

[Read Frank Scoblete’s book Confessions of a Wayward Catholic. Available from Amazon.com, kindle, Barnes and Noble, and at bookstores.]