"The Host" With The Most

Right from the beginning, when the buzz first started to come out of the film festival circuit and filter through the internet, there was something about the Korean horror movie “The Host” that intrigued me. In an era of flicks with armies of zombies, honked-off ghosts, demon-seed kids, and worse, the endless series of deplorable “Saw”-like productions obsessed with sadism for its own sake, here was a good old-fashioned mega monster movie.
How long has it been since a new version of the I-can’t-believe-you-didn’t-see-it-comin-it’s-so-friggen-huge, citizen-stompin’, military-mashin’, one-monster tornado movie? The last new one I can recall Peter Jackson’s “King Kong” remake in 2005. Bfore that, probably the ‘98 “Godzilla” remake starring Matthew Broderick but where Jean Reno stole the show complaining about the lack of croissants. If there’s been anything since then, I can’t remember it. Help me out here, folks, have there been any other building-bashin’-sized monster movies lately?
It’s as though movie industries around the world decided that this genre of film just wasn’t cool any more – that audiences wouldn’t appreciate it ‘cause it wasn’t scary and the potential to be lame was too high. It’s as though “King Kong” was a one-off allowed in deference to Jackson’s “Lord of the Rings” clout more than an appreciation of cinematic history. It’s as though the genre almost died.
And then along came director Joon-ho Bong with “The Host”.
Just like those famous beasts that stomped across the silver screens of yesteryear, the mega monster genre has risen again (if only for now) with this Korean gem.
The film centres on a Seoul family that’s pretty much like gum stuck to the bottom of society’s shoe: The grandfather at the head of the clan is a former carouser now eking an existence out of his snack shack in the park with his stupid and sleepy oldest son. His daughter ought to be a gold-medal archer but lacks the confidence to fully realize her potential. The younger son is an unemployed university graduate. The sole redeeming member of the family is number-one son’s 12-year-old daughter, Hyun-seo, who alternates between the roles of parent and child. The family is thrown into turmoil when a gigantic creature leaps out of the near-by Han River and begins its rampage, mashing some victims underfoot and swallowing others. One of those who winds-up in the belly of the beast is young Hyun-seo. The catch is that this critter seems to have a fairly slow digestive process, and if a person isn’t killed in the initial gulp, there’s a chance they may still be alive when the monster decides it’s eaten too much and regurgitates some of the bodies later. The girl, vomited up with a couple of corpses in a pit in a sewer, does what any smart 21st century kid does and scavenges a cell phone to call for help. But while her family members attempt to pull themselves together for a rescue, they’re hampered by government officials who refuse to believe the girl is alive, and who claim that anyone who’s been near the creature is now infected with a mysterious illness that makes SARS look like a summer cold.
“The Host” has it all: “gotcha” moments of thrills that make you jump in your seat, brooding atmospheres, well-rounded and realistic characters that you can believe in and cheer and worry about, social and political commentary (and while plenty of this is overt, some is couched in image and metaphor and requires some thought – something that helps give this creature feature a bite), a nod to monster movies of the past (there’s a clear connection of tradition between the original “Gojira”/”Godzilla”, awakened by nuclear testing and sent on a path of destruction through Japan, and the pollution-spawned creature of ‘The Host” which savages Seoul’s riverfront – it’s merely an update of the zeitgeist fears – what horrors will man’s irresponsible tinkering unleash), and best of all, it’s absolutely hilarious. And that’s not because the movie mocks itself. Far from it, the plot stays in character the whole time. The humour comes from the humanity… from the bickering, the bitterness, the misunderstandings and the natural stupidity of people, even those in tense situations.
A lot of the gags come from the main characters, but it’s a treat to see what’s happening with the supporting cast. I certainly wouldn’t want to spoil any of the laughs, but some of the funniest moments involve what’s happening in the background. In fact, it’s this layering of activity that shows just how smart this movie is. You’ve gotta have a huge amount of respect for a director who deliberately gives scene-stealers (whether they’re laughs or moments of terror or sadness) to the tertiary actors and extras, and who, by extension, gives the audience quick insights into a larger world involving more than the protagonists who we’re with for the ride. This is a crucial part of the success of this movie.
So let “The Host” invite you into its world for a while. It’s certainly worth the full price of admission.

The Shape Of A Few Good Yarns - "Tesseracts Ten"

It doesn’t take much arm-twisting to get me to take a break from novels for a little while and dive into a short story collection or two. They’re a great way to get a quick fix of favourite authors, to sample up-and-comers and to detect the occasional poseur who’s made it through so you can avoid him/her if they somehow pull off a novel. And best of all, you get to see writers rising to a different set of challenges to their craft than novels pose: how to cobble together an intriguing plot, how to develop multi-dimensional characters we actually care about (flying in the face of the nonsense regularly spouted by high school English teachers that short stories are all about plot with lean to non-existent characterization), and how to pull this off in the confines of an editor’s word limit. It’s the mark of a successful anthology when most of the stories within it can pull this off. “Tesseracts Ten”, edited by Robert Charles Wilson and Edo van Belkom and published by EDGE Science Fiction and Fantasy, rises to this challenge.
Veteran authors Wilson and van Belkom have assembled a group of 19 new Canadian writers offering various shadows of unsettling futures cast by the uncertainties of today. Wilson says it best in the opening segment of his introduction to the collection: “The going gets tough, and the thoughtful get nervous.”
The anthology gets off to a strong start with Scott Mackay’s “Threshold of Perception”, a cometary armageddon tale of faith amid ruin. And it’s the human focus to the story that makes it so great… where others might be tempted to go the disaster movie route and centre simply on the damage caused by the comet, Mackay makes his tale one of human beings challenging each other and themselves to look at reality in new ways. He skillfully paints us a picture of people dealing with these challenges in shades of Asimov’s famous “Nightfall” (both the short story and the collaborative novel with Robert Silverberg). I’ll also admit I really liked this as a kick-off story because I’m a sucker for a well-written alternate history.
The poem “Frankenstein’s Monster’s Wife’s Therapist”, second in the lineup, packs a solid punch that sent me reeling. Here’s an example of how effective and sharp a really short contribution can be to an anthology like this. This kind of selection is like an onomatopoeia in a comic book – if it doesn’t get your attention, then you weren’t really paying attention to begin with.
I also liked “Buttons” by Victoria Fisher (did Dickens’ Sydney Carton have a collection like this after his appointment with the guillotine in “A Tale of Two Cities”?), Mark Dachuk’s “Permission”, and Rhea Rose’ creepy take on how Spiderman could have turned out (if Peter Parker was a farm wife) in “Summer Silk”.
But every anthology has its weak links. In the ho-hum category were Allen Moore’s “Donovan’s Brain” and Jason Christie’s “Ideo Radio Poem”. And Scott Mackay, while scoring with a great opener, falls a bit short the second time around with “The Girl From Ipanema”, which should have ended sooner.
On the balance though, Robert Charles Wilson and Edo van Belkom’s “Tesseracts Ten” (really the 11th in the family – though I try to forget about “Tesseracts Q” with its tedious separatist sentiments) is an enjoyable and intelligent collection. It’s a worthy addition to the line begun 22 years ago under the careful hand of the late Judith Merril and mentored through its successive incarnations by powerhouses like Phyllis Gotlieb, Robert J. Sawyer and Nalo Hopkinson. For all the dark omens threatening to seep out of the pages of this book, van Belkom is correct when he points out at the close of his afterword essay that the remarkable variety of these tales shows a bright future for Canadian speculative fiction (and I would add, especially the tradition of writing fine short stories) with new authors such as these to nurture it. “…that child is coming of age and entering adulthood with its best and most fruitful years lying ahead with only the sky serving as the limit to their creativity and ambition.”

An Empty Monkey House

Just got the word from Sci Fi Wire and SF Signal that author Kurt Vonnegut has died.
First impressions count for a lot, and that’s certainly been my experience with Vonnegut. The first tale of his that I ever read, and the one that sticks out the most in my mind for some reason, was his short story on an egalitarian nightmare “Harrison Bergeron”, from the collection “Welcome to the Monkey House” (originally published in “The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction” in October 1961). The story revolves around the life of the title character, a physical and intellectual superman in shackles to keep him at humanity’s common denominator (which in this story happens to be the lowest leveling of the playing field) and his eventual slipping of his bonds, obtaining his perfect mate and rising above the rabble. More than the caution of the perils of insuring that all people are equal, I think the theme in this story that stuck out most in my mind was that humanity’s own worst enemy can easily be itself, and in unexpected ways. In order to prevent individuals from dominating their peers or their country, the society depicted opts for stagnation. In trying to keep balance and prevent a fall in one direction, the pendulum has swung too far the other way.
Some of Vonnegut’s other well-known works include “Slaughterhouse-Five” and “Cat’s Cradle”.
Sci Fi Wire quotes the New York Times as reporting Vonnegut had suffered brain injuries as a result of a fall a few weeks ago. Kurt Vonnegut died in New York on April 10th at the age of 84.

Speculative Fiction At Work

You know it’s been a good day at the office when you’ve been able to have in-depth, intelligent discussions with coworkers about speculative fiction. Today was just such a day for me.
The lunchroom conversation ranged from literature to film, stuff with pop culture status as well as selections quite a bit more obscure. We browsed on Tolkien, David J. Lake’s short story “The Truth About Weena” (which I first encountered in the Australian SF anthology “Dreaming Down Under”) and its different take on the tale of H.G. Wells’ Time Traveler, “The Matrix”, Bradbury and “V for Vendetta”, to name just a few.
And what made the chat great was that it wasn’t just a tete-a-tete between myself and the other SF nut on staff – everyone had something to say. Some wanted to hear more about authors or films they hadn’t encountered before, and I picked up a few titles that I’m eager to look into. A very refreshing change from other workplaces where the cattle merely graze in silence, or where legitimate points made using speculative fiction examples are met with snobbery from literati poseurs. It’s been said many times before that you can learn a lot about your peers from what they read and what they watch, and I must say I learned quite a bit today.
A good day at the office, indeed. Somebody cue Bachman’s “Takin’ Care of Business”!

Choosing Among Favourites

Here’s a note I added to SF Signal’s discussion about a recent poll in SFX (a UK science fiction magazine) on the best science fiction film ever. The top three on the poll were Star Wars, Serenity, and Blade Runner, respectively. 2001 came in down in 8th place. It’s hard having to choose from among your favourites – especially when the list provided is by no means complete!

“In some ways, I think Star Wars vs Serenity is one of those apples vs oranges questions: they're very much different kinds of movies and shouldn't necessarily be on the same set of scales. The appeal of Star Wars (when it first came out) was very visceral - it dragged you onto the rollcoaster for an unapologetic popcorn romp and any subsequant metaphorical/intellectual dimensions are just that - afterthought. Serenity, on the other hand, despite the action and humour, is right from the get-go more of an intellectual picture. The characters are full-flushed (especially with the series' background) and the issues raised demand some thought. In any case, I think Star Wars and Serenity are really duking it out for third place. If we're talking about the best SF flicks ever, 2001 and Blade Runner have first and second place, respectively, in my books.”

Working The Bugs Out Of "Eifelheim"

First of all, I’d like to apologize, folks, for the long gap since my last posting. I try to find something to babble about at least once a week, but things have been hectic for the past little while. My grandmother had a massive stroke two weeks ago and my wife and I, out here on the Wet Coast, had to grab a flight back to my hometown of Cambridge, Ontario to visit her in the hospital and to say goodbye. She’s still holding on and fighting to improve (the family doesn’t affectionately call her The Velvet Sledgehammer for nothing) and is fully aware, but the stroke has left her partially paralyzed and at 93 years old, you just never know. If I hadn’t gone back, I probably would’ve regretted it. Add to that a heavy workload at the office when I returned, and I haven’t had any time lately to indulge in the pleasure of logging on and spouting off.

But I’m back now, so let’s get to it.

A while ago I finished Michael Flynn’s “Eifelheim”. I know, I know, some of you are probably pointing out that this book’s been out for a few months, but I’ve got a ton of new books to plough through, and when there’s fresh servings of Dan Simmons and Minister Faust to be had, other stuff from author’s I haven’t read yet gets pushed to the side of the plate.
At any rate, when I did finally get around to it, “Eifelheim” wasn’t bad. Not great, mind you, but not bad.
Flynn’s story alternates between the events in a Medieval Black Forest village when an alien ship is wrecked nearby shortly before the onset of the plague, and the lives of an academic couple: he trying to unearth the history of the German hamlet, she wrestling with quantum mechanics. While intertwining the plot lines, the book also deals with how we form impressions of people based on limited information (whether it’s the personalities and motivations of individuals who lived in a town in another part of the world hundreds of years ago or the relationship a modern historian has with his research assistant), tolerance for that which is alien (be it an extraterrestrial, someone from a neighbouring village, a new and contradictory philosophy, or a different religion), and the way in which people face crisis and possible death.
Flynn does an excellent job of bringing to life the various characters in his village of Oberhochwald/Eifelheim. Normally, when one thinks of the peasantry of Europe in the Middle Ages, faceless, dirty, rude, dumb, drudgery comes to mind – probably because the education system spends more time on the exploits of nobles, conquerors, inventors and explorers or philosophers within or against the Catholic Church. And yet by flushing out the personalities of his various secondary characters, Flynn points out to those of us in modern times (who fancy ourselves as somehow unique and memorable when future generations will likely pass us over as we do the serfs and freeholders of 800 years ago) that these villages were populated with people who were as complex (or simple) as we: some that were intelligent (if uneducated), some who were narrow-minded, some who questioned the order of things, some committed to duty, the scoundrels, the dedicated workers, the healthy and the sick – all of whom had unique reactions to whatever life had to throw at them: from the joys of festivals to the horror of pestilence. What’s more, the author tries to make as many of the characters as multi-faceted as possible in order to make them believable. A prime example is Pastor Dietrich’s ward Theresia, who has a sweet personality and loves to hear stories and practice herb lore until the arrival of the alien Krenk, when her religious narrow-mindedness makes her quite hostile to them and the priest himself, but not to the other villagers who see things the way she does.
As for the insectoid Krenk themselves, Flynn falls a little short in trying to flush them out to the same degree as his human characters. To be fair, our experience of the Krenk is through the eyes of Dietrich (and thus limited by his Medieval mind’s education and perception of the universe), and is centred on the Krenk’s attempts to survive on Earth and interact with and understand their human neighbours. And yet I was left feeling that the author could have done more to give us a better sense of Krenk culture and what it is they miss about their home (except for vital nutrients to keep them alive or perhaps rarely-mentioned loved ones).
And while the present day plot lines were necessary to reflect some of the issues raised by the Medieval story, I thought this part of the story needed some more work. Sharon’s explorations of quantum mechanics added a hard SF flavour to the story, but one that was ultimately unnecessary (don’t get me wrong, I love a well-done hard SF yarn a-la Clarke or Sawyer – there was just no need for it in this book). I’d be tempted to call this hard SF afterthought a kind of mathsterbation. The novel would have lost nothing without it.
Also, the relationship issues raised between Sharon and Tom (and to some extent Judy) throughout the book are suddenly dropped at the end, leaving their portion of the story feeling somewhat flat and unsatisfying. It’s as though Flynn was suddenly rushed to finish his book and thought “Oh, if I deal with the spousal issues and love triangle possibility that I got into in the previous 290-odd pages, this book will get too long – I’d better just slam the door on it and concentrate on the Krenk stuff – then I can cap this sucker at 313 pages!” Or like the author suddenly got worried about having spousal relationship tale cooties infecting his alternate history tale and worried that if he didn’t drop that end of the story then it might supplant the alien focus of the book. Then again, maybe that was the editor’s call. I don’t know. But it seems fairly obvious that if you’re going to get into character subplots that detailed, even if you don’t tie-up their loose ends at the close of the book (because a pat ending would be equally unsatisfying), an author should make some effort to show that these concerns are still in some way weighing on his characters minds – that they’ve had some impact on the characters. Instead, Sharon seems to disappear once she’s had her scientific revelation while Tom happily goes cavorting around the Black Forest with the other woman giving us no sign as to whether this is going to be trouble.
That being said, don’t let the weaknesses of the modern plotline prevent you from enjoying “Eifelheim”. Overall, it’s certainly worth the read.

Passage Through "The Terror"

How do you create suspense in a novel based on a real tragedy? Dan Simmons does an admirable job of showing us in “The Terror”, a fictional take on the events of the ill-fated 19th century Franklin Expedition to find the Northwest Passage.
History tells us the British Empire dispatched H.M.S. Erebus and H.M.S. Terror in 1845, under the command of Sir John Franklin, to find the fabled Northwest Passage – a coveted hypothetical route through the labyrinth of islands, pack ice and ice bergs choking Canada’s arctic waters. The brutal arctic had hurled back many previous attempts (including one by the legendary Captain James Cook via the Bering Strait) and would block many others to come. Franklin’s voyage was beset with bad omens; serious command errors were made; the ships became ice-locked; coal supplies ran low; food poisoning, scurvy and the elements ravaged the crew; the vessels had to be abandoned; and eventually, those desperate men left turned on each other in cannibalism. None of them made it out of the arctic. Many questions about the tragedy still remain unanswered.
As if the hardships suffered by the crew weren’t enough, Simmons, while sticking close to the facts, seasons his tale with a supernatural element of suspense: some thing is also out there in the snowy wastes… not a polar bear (as if they weren’t deadly enough), but something larger, ancient, and full of malice and cunning. Some thing that is deliberately stalking the crew, and not merely for a single, bloody wipe-out, but rather in a seemingly careful strategy designed to deprive the men of the most skilled and stabilizing of their number and of their morale.
On one level, Simmons is masterfully indulging in his love of the tale of Beowulf and Grendel. And yet there are other ways to interpret the nature of the Terror. John Clute has done an excellent job of shedding light on the beast in his Excessive Candour column on the SciFi channel site entitled “In the Belly of the Thing”, so there’s no need for me to repeat him.
Rather, I’d like to explore some of the ways in which the metaphor of passage opens up in the story. For passage in “The Terror” refers to far more than just a route through a geographical obstacle course. To be sure, there are plenty of passages over water (of the usually frozen, but on rare occasions liquid, variety) – that of Erebus and Terror across the Atlantic to the Arctic Ocean and their eventual passage to the bottom There’s the treacherous weather and Terror-plagued run between the two ships once they’ve become ice-bound. There’s the trek from the abandoned ships to King William Land. Then there are the many other voyages across the island and finally away from it as the survivors go their separate ways. It’s been noted untold times that a water journey is metaphorically a trip into the self and that certainly holds true in “The Terror” – these ordeals across the ice are merely backdrops for the real passages throughout the novel.
The entrance tunnels into the igloos of Lady Silence, the mysterious Inuit who haunts the expedition, serve as a literal passage from the world of the British crew into that of the native people able to live off the land. They also serve as bridges for understanding between two of the explorers and the woman.
The coloured maze of Carnivale tents inspired by Edgar Allan Poe reflects the crew’s descent into hopelessness and terror amidst the dark of their winter prison where time passes but the outside never changes and death strikes with sudden, shocking violence.
There are passages from books. Doomed Franklin aboard the flagship Erebus is fond of sermonizing and bores or downright loses his crew with excerpts from the Bible about the road to salvation. Captain Francis Crozier of the Terror, on the other hand, has little use for religion and rouses great interest from his largely uneducated men with quotes from Thomas Hobbes’ “Leviathan” about life being “solitary, nasty, brutish and short”. While Crozier’s choice may be more obviously appropriate in the context of the story, in a strange and unexpected way, Franklin’s sermon about Jonah isn’t necessarily off either.
There are numerous points with a number of characters where we focus on the passage of air/breath and thus soul into and out of bodies: from the nearly-decapitated young seaman whose body refuses to quit breathing, to the frightening music of the Terror with its special “instrument” on the ice, to the Terror’s encounter with the vicious Mr. Hickey.
And there are rites of passage. Hickey uses manipulation and worse to rise in status. Dr. Goodsir, who begins the novel as somewhat effete, volunteers to engage in physical toil with the other men and over the course of his journey proves his mettle and earns respect.
Given our foreknowledge of the fatal outcome of the voyage, we also know that in signing on to the expedition, the men have booked passage not on Erebus or Terror, but rather with Anubis.
Captain Crozier himself navigates many passages throughout the course of “The Terror”. Among them is that of his final days drunkenness, through detox delirium (plunging into memory and drifting into prescience) and into cold sobriety. His greatest journey though is into understanding of and resignation to the frightening and alien road necessary for survival.
And these passages through terror are but the tip of the iceberg.

Lucas' Galactic Empire Conquers Real History

It seems neither history’s greatest conquerors nor even the generally subdued shores of present-day Nova Scotia are safe from the scourge of Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader.
Canadian sketch comedy “This Hour has 22 Minutes” ran a segment in tonight’s new episode highlighting the failed Halifax bid for the Commonwealth Games. The gag also concerned, strangely enough, fallen empires.
Viewers are now being encouraged to take part in an online poll to rank dead empires, including those of the Romans, Ottomans and Mongols. Squeezed in at the bottom of human history’s most ambitious conquerors is a fictional option: the evil Galactic Empire from Star Wars.
And it hasn’t taken long for the geeks of the internet (yours truly included) to come swimming up to take a nibble at the bait. In just a couple of hours, the Galactic Empire has taken a huge lead over the competition with (at the time of this posting) 62% of the vote. The nearest competitor is Rome, coming in at just 11%.
They can build all the walls they want, but the Caesars just ain’t no match for the power of the Dark Side.

BSG Enters The "Maelstrom" Of Suicide

(warning: spoilers)


Here’s a note I posted to the SF Signal site recently in response to a thread about the March 4th episode of Battlestar Galactica, entitled “Maelstrom”.



I think Moore and his writers have put a lot of thought into the presentation of Starbuck's suicide. Putting aside speculations about her supposed "destiny", the writers have deliberately tackled the very human tragedy of suicide head-on with this episode as part of their efforts to create and develope realistic characters and a believable story line.

Starbuck's decision to kill herself came as no surprise. The story lines have been building her death by suicide as a real possibility since the beginning. Starbuck has displayed many signs of someone who is at risk of suicide including erratic behaviour and mood swings, increased use of alcohol, depression, sense of worthlessness (the "screwup"), agression, giving things away (the statue of Athena given to Adama shortly before her death), isolation from loved ones, and previous attempts (the dual with "Scar" was clearly more than just an enemy threat elimination or a competition with Kat to be the top gun). Let's not forget also that we've been told she has a history of childhood physical and emotional abuse (Leoben's cross examination in the interrogation room and the doctor Cylon's medical analysis on the Caprica "farm") which she constantly surpresses. And then there's the added stress of the annihilation of the Colonies and possible accompanying survivors' guilt, imprisonment and personal violation on the "farm", imprisonment and psychological torture on New Caprica, the loss of Apollo as a potential lover (during the conversation in the hanger where Lee says things with Dee are great, Kara looks like she's trying to hide the fact that she feels like she's been kicked in the gut), and of course, frequent, intense battle with the enemy. The manipulations of the apparent Leoben who appeared to her in the cockpit were just the last straw. The writers have been showing us a very fragile, much pained Kara Thrace for a long time.

Given this long history of building stressors, the pacing of the episode was entirely appropriate. Once Starbuck began moving in the direction of suicide, things proceeded very quickly. The pacing also puts the audience in the position of many of her friends who may not have seen the suicide coming, or who may not have suspected that she was hurting that much and who are thus all the more shocked at the apparent suddeness of the death.

As to comments to the effect that Starbuck's actions are "selfish and ignoble" or that she is a "quitter", while these are commonly-held opinions about suicide, it's important to understand that suicide is not about death, it's about finding a way out of pain. People who attempt or complete suicide are in so much emotional pain that they're desperate to rid themselves of it and they can't see any other way out. This is why most people who die by suicide send some kind of warning first - at some level they're looking for another option that they can't see. The problem is whether others understand the warning in time, whether they can get the person to help, or whether they see the warning at all. In Starbuck's case, Helo seemed to have some sense that she needed help (he suggests she see the psychiatrist he's taking Hera to) though he didn't see the imminence of the danger. When Kara gives the Athena statue to Adama, that's a warning too, Adama just doesn't see it, especially given Starbuck's quick shift from being downcast to buoyant. In this sense, Starbuck was trying, on some level, right up until she got in the cockpit, to get help. In real life, of those who die by suicide, some are people who we call heroes - police officers, members of the military, firefighters - people under increadible stress, usually on a daily basis. While we, as survivors, are upset when a person kills him/her self, it's important to remember that everyone, including our heroes, has different tolerances for stresses and different degrees of support to overcome those stresses. Moore and his writers have realized this, and in presenting Starbuck as someone in a highly stressful job who dies by suicide, they have created a painfully human character who has reached her limit, doesn't feel she can talk about it, and can't see another way out.

In the end, I think Moore and his writers are to be praised for tackling the issue of suicide in "Maelstrom". They presented Starbuck as a real human being struggling with, and ultimately overwhelmed by, real problems. In dealing with the subject, they have not glorified her death - the crew (even Tye, who's come to blows with Kara) are visibly shaken and grieving, and whatever this "destiny" alluded to is, the fact that it's pushed on Starbuck by Leoben in a time of emotional fragility should make us highly suspicious. We may ask, what is this supposed "destiny", but ultimately, does that make any difference to grieving shipmates who have just lost a friend? In dealing with suicide on BSG, Moore is helping to remove the stigma our culture has placed on its discussion. By talking about the causes and effects of suicide, we become more aware of the problem and are in a better position to stop it. We can reach out to others and offer to help them help themselves overcome these feelings. To that end, SF Signal is to be credited too for bringing this discussion into the open.

If anyone reading this thread is considering suicide, remember that you can get help to overcome these feelings; there are people out there who will listen to you and who will support you and help you explore other options. If you need help, call your local distress line/crisis centre, speak with your doctor, a counsellor or someone you can trust to help you get to safety. If you are a person who is worried a friend or relative may be suicidal, talk with them, ask them if they are thinking of killing themselves, listen to them without judging them, get them to help (such as a doctor or counsellor) who can help them overcome these feelings, do not leave them alone without making sure they have help, and you can also call a distress line/crisis centre for assistance.

A Wild Night At Thermopylae

The steady march of the cinema popcorn season continues like the tramp of an army of sandled feet towards the sea with yesterday’s release of “300”. Based on a Frank Miller graphic novel retelling the ancient Greek tale of the Spartans’ battle against the invading Persian army at Thermopylae, Zack Snyder’s film is so uproariously gory that you almost need a splash guard in front of the screen and garbage bags for everyone in the first ten rows to keep the blood off.
The story is a simple one: the Persians come to town looking to leverage a controlling interest. For Sparta’s King Leonidas (played by Gerard Butler), the choice appears simple: kneel and be given a place at Emperor Xerxes’ (Rodrigo Santoro) right hand, or fight and be annihilated. What the overconfident Persians don’t quite understand, is that the Spartans get off on facing insurmountable odds and certain death. For them, it’s the path to glory and immortality. But Leonidas has to contend with traitors among his senate who use customs and the laws to block him from taking the full might of his army to battle. So, with a gaggle of his 300 best, the king heads off to Thermopylae, where he thinks he can hold the invaders at a natural bottleneck long enough for the rest of the Spartans to shake off the distractions of the traitors, mobilize themselves and rouse the rest of the Greek city-states into joining the party. The question is, will Leonidas’ 300 last long enough to give the others a chance to get their act together?
There’s a lot to like about “300”. Relentless action from start to finish creates a good pace and keeps the movie honest – it’s a slugfest and doesn’t try (much) to be anything else. The fight sequences are choreographed nicely, although it would have been better if the Persian forces had been allowed to display a little more skill. The special effects were also pretty cool: from the epic grandeur of the landscape to the chaos of a sea storm, the swarming of arrows that blot out the sun to the menagerie of grotesque minions that Xerxes hurls at the sweaty Greeks. And, as with Miller and Robert Rodriguez’ take on Miller’s “Sin City”, “300” has some very slick shots and sequences pulled right out of the comic book. This movie is an impressive thing to look at. Let’s also give credit to the voice-overs of the soldier/narrator Dilios (David Wenham) that add the feel of the classic oral storytelling tradition to the images unfolding before us.
But while the story succeeds as a pure action flick, it lacks depth. Leonidas does a lot of talking about living free and refusing to tolerate tyrants. But aside from its effects on the king himself, you never really get any concrete sense that life for his people would be much different under Xerxes if the king surrendered. Because we don’t really get to see what makes the Spartans’ lives worth living, “300” lacks the emotional punch of “Braveheart” or “Spartacus”. It never really tells us how is one warrior king different than another. Sure, a lot of Xerxes’ people have enough body piercing to keep a whole block of tattoo and piercing parlours busy for a year (at least they have the sense to wear armor – it’s a miracle the Greeks, as portrayed in the film, weren’t dead within days of all the infections they’d pick up in all the many, many wounds they’d receive running near-nude into battle), and yeah, he does keep quite the freak-show of monstrous warriors in the elite units of his army, and to be fair, he does push his pawns carelessly into the face of death, but how is that really more menacing than the psychotic bloodthirstiness of Leonidas and his Spartans? Does Leonidas pride allow him to think for a minute about the slaughter of his people that would ensue if his men lose? We didn’t see any real portrayal of day-to-day Spartan life that would make us feel there was any great value to their way of life, or that life under Xerxes would have been significantly different – especially when part of the Persians terms were the offer that Leonidas would be allowed to continue to rule his people, and, in fact, all of Greece. How precisely, then, do the Spartans stand to lose their way of life? In fact, given what we are shown – a corrupt senate that’s unwilling to defend its people, the heartless disposal of “unfit” infants and the brutal training of the young – it would seem the Spartans are equally savage as the Persian opponents. Xerxes may be a cruel, manipulative megalomaniac, but Leonidas is no prize either: he strongly defends a culture which, as mentioned above, readily practices infanticide, he relishes in unnecessary bloodshed (killing the rude Persian messenger and all his attendants when he could have simply sent him packing) and clearly enjoys the slaughter of battle, and he refuses to allow the hunchback (a human resource with as much potential as the untrained ally Greeks who show up to help – potential that Xerxes was smart enough to see) to fight in the battle, using the formation-fighting techniques as an excuse when let’s face it, most of those engagements degenerated quickly into one-on-one melees where an extra spear-thrust would have been useful to the Spartans, and let’s not forget that by turning the hunchback away, the king insulted a man who knew the tactical weakness of his position! Xerxes and Leonidas are both brutal men living in brutal times. Don’t get me wrong, folks, I’m in no way advocating that people facing invasion should capitulate – far from it. I’m only saying that if a story hinges on the audience siding with one group over another, it is absolutely necessary to convince the audience that one way of life is superior to another. This movie wants us to be sympathetic to the Spartans, but it doesn’t really convince us that we should be.
Is “300” a bad movie? No. As an action movie, it’s an entertaining way to spend nearly two hours. Is it memorable? Not really. Given that special effects and big battle sequences like these are best seen on the big screen, “300” is certainly worth going to a theatre to see, but I think if I had to do it again I’d wait for a matinee or cheap Tuesday.

"Ghost Rider" Ignites The Popcorn Movie Season

Do you hear that revving, low and loud enough to shake your bones out of your skin? Is it the sound of the hell cycle lashing the pavement in the distance, or the start of the big budget, big action, popcorn movie season?
My wife and I took my parents’ teenaged godchildren to see “Ghost Rider” on Friday, and while it flickered for the first 30-45 minutes, once it caught, it was smokin’.
Admittedly, I’ve got a bit of a bias. As I’ve mentioned in a previous post, back when I was collecting comics in the late 80’s and early 90’s, the revamped “Ghost Rider” was my favourite in the superhero genre. It even led me to a grudging appreciation of the original 70’s series. To be sure, the original was pretty cheesy at times, what with the bone-headed biker demon slugging it out with evil clowns and other third-rate bad guys, but it had its moments. But the second series had a tougher look and an edgier plot that left the original eating its dust.
So it was with cautious optimism that I went to the screening last week.
The story combines elements of both series, with the look of the 90’s version – definitely a good call. I did think the hell cycle, with its skeletal face on the front end, looked a little more like its interstellar incarnation presented in the “Guardians of the Galaxy” issue where the Ghost Rider of the future makes a guest appearance (ah, there’s nothing like a crossover with a hot title to try to boost the sales of an obscure ‘book!).
To some extent, my caution was justified. The movie suffers from backstory tedium right off the top, liberally spiced with corny “young lovers” dialogue and shots. Scenes like the heart-broken, rain-soaked girl staring wistfully at her troubled lover fleeing into the distance leave you wondering whether you should wince in disgust or laugh. Then there’s the gaggle of demons, who we’re told can’t tread on hallowed ground, but who don’t seem to have a problem waltzing into a church to light a votive candle or two and push a priest around (unless, of course, this is a deliberate potshot at the Vatican from the writer/director and producers). Then there’s Eva Mendes, who does an admirable job of showing her… journalistic integrity? No. Depth of emotion and intellectual turmoil as she struggles to make sense of a suddenly re-appeared love interest and the supernatural terror that follows? Nope. How about her ability to adapt to unprecedented demands on her courage? Still cold. What about showing off her… attributes? Yep. That’s it. There’s no relationship angst or physical danger that can’t be dealt with by pushing her breasts as close to the camera as possible (although I’m not sure if that was her decision or writer/director Mark Steven Johnson’s call). Not that I’m complaining or anything… I just wanted to see a little more. Of the acting, people! Sheesh! And naming the devil’s son “Blackheart” was pretty unoriginal. Then there’s the ongoing debate about Nick Cage’s hairpiece.
But none of this is out of line. It’s all perfectly reasonable for a comic book movie because it’s standard comic book fare (except for the hairpiece). Sure, the film could’ve been great instead of merely good if they would have corrected these and other problems with better writing, editing and acting/directing, but keeping these little flaws keeps the movie true to the original source.
And there’s lots that make the story a real blast. Great special effects for starters. The Ghost Rider looked amazing (in transformation, as well as final presentation), as did the hell cycle. Okay, the quick demon-face shots on Mephistopheles and Blackheart looked like they could have been cut-and-pasted from the Dracula face shots in “Van Helsing”, but at least they were CG’d well. I was quite impressed with the way in which the infamous penance stare was presented; that was about the best way to illustrate a criminal’s mind being crushed by the pain he’d inflicted on others without the filmmakers losing their PG-13 rating or swinging too far the other way and making it dumb.
Sam Elliot was perfect as “the caretaker”. You just can’t find another actor with that voice, look, and all-around aura of tough old cowpoke.
The fight sequences were great eye candy. And, like any popcorn blockbuster, there were a lot of laughs amid the action. Despite being an integral part of the film’s trailer, the line with the goth girl mumbling about how her flame-headed benefactor managed to pull off his “real edge look” is still a hoot. Much like Bill Murray’s famous “he slimed me” line from “Ghostbusters”, if a joke can still be funny after the audience has seen it a million times in commercials ahead of time, you know the writers are on the ball.
Let’s not forget Nick Cage’s tribute to Johnny Blaze and pretty much every lone-wolf-style superhero. Cage plays the trope with respect, but never takes himself too seriously, mugging for the camera in all the right places. And how could you not love the decision to make Blaze a militant fan of “The Carpenters”? Not only is it a perfect counterpoint to the fearless stuntman/bountyhunter-of-hell image, but it shows a real courage in the character to openly insist on being allowed to listen to the 70’s crooners, where pretty much anyone else would quietly regulate this fetish to their secret guilty pleasures files (I still remember times during my early childhood in the 70’s when “The Carpenters” were played around the house, and I have to admit, while I’m not a fan, Karen did have quite a beautiful voice).
Last but not least: a soundtrack capped-off by a rip-roarin’ version of “Riders in the Sky”. A very worthy rendition of the old Stan Jones tune indeed - second, of course, to the masterful performance of the late Johnny Cash (and maybe that nice tribute done a few years ago by The Blues Brothers in “Blues Brothers 2000”).
Ultimately, the sign that “Ghost Rider” is entertaining is that it passed muster with the uninitiated. My wife and the 14-year-old boy (who admitted with a little embarrassment that he’d never heard of Ghost Rider until the trailers hit the airwaves) and 12-year-old girl (who knows even less about comics) all said they’d had a lot of fun.
“Ghost Rider” is certainly worth seeing on the big screen, but I’d suggest going to a matinee or a cheap night.
Is “Ghost Rider” an intelligent and deeply moving film that will resonate through the ages? No. But as a solid comic book movie, it’s done a worthy job of starting us down the road of big SFX popcorn flicks through the spring and summer. Pass the butter, would ya?

Self-Help Superhero Style - "From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain"

Minister Faust is at it again.
Three years ago the Edmonton, Alberta author unleashed his hilarious, frightening and poignant “The Coyote Kings of the Space-Age Bachelor Pad” upon the speculative fiction scene. It was an epic tale of two regular guys with big dreams trying to understand their lives and come to grips with their relationships with each other and those around them, and who, along the way, just happen to stumble into the roles of superheroes as they’re thrust into an adventure that would make Jack Burton or Indiana Jones think about throwing in the towel.
Now Faust spins us a different yarn: that of superheroes cast into the relatively normal realm of people in need of counseling… with a civil war thrown in for good measure. And it’s all taken “From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain”.
I’ll whole-heartedly admit that I couldn’t get into Faust’s latest book fast enough when it hit the shelves last month. And it didn’t disappoint. “From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain” tickles the funnybone even as it “punches you in the soul” (to borrow from Faust – and his sister). True, the city of Los Ditkos and its alternate version of Earth are populated with “hyperhominids” who, on the face of it, are often so silly in their names, costumes and powers that they should be rubbing shoulders with The Tick, the Mystery Men or the denizens of the old Normal Man comic. But this book isn’t just a 387 page comic. Rather, in true comic fashion, it’s a crossover. It’s a collision of the comic with popular, flavour-of-the-week self-help books (or “self-hurt books” as an old friend of mine once wryly observed), and more subtly, it’s very much a Shakespearean tragedy.
Presented as a self-help book written by Dr. Eva Brain-Silverman (foremost psychiatrist for the extraordinarily abled, headquartered at her Hyper Potentiality Clinic) for superheroes battling psychological and existential issues, the story introduces us to a group of ubermensch tossed into group therapy by their organization, the FOOJ (Fantastic Order of Justice), in a last-ditch effort to exorcise their disruptive behavioral traits. To make matters worse, one of their most respected allies has been murdered, they’re at the centre of a criminal and political plot whirling towards a civil war among superhumans, and one of them is the arch-villain behind it all.
There are a lot of reasons why this novel excels with all the force of a spandex-clad, genetically-enhanced vigilante.
The heroes themselves are brilliant caricatures of classic pop culture stereotypes: the Super Man, the angry black man, the cut-throat industrialist, the frosty goddess, the jive-talking hipster and the pop-star airhead. But while it’s fun to laugh at their flaws, there is something sympathetic about their suffering. Despite the psychobabble labels slapped on them and the supernatural means that they came about, these people’s problems (like substance abuse, relationship issues, coming to grips with sexuality) are very real and very common.
And yet that’s not enough to propel these people (and the story) beyond the comic book level. What’s more interesting than the details of their alleged conditions or the roots of their personal pains, is the decisions they make outside of the therapy sessions that result from the fundamental natures of their personalities, rather than from their mental illnesses or social defects. It may seem clumsily obvious to state that the book would not have ended the way it does if the heroes’ personalities were not fundamentally predisposed to make the decisions they do. If some would have been less narcissistic or distracted or petty the balance of power might have shifted, if personal ambitions and grudges had not led to brinksmanship and scheming, and most tragically, if the person cast as the canary-in-the-coal-mine was less of a boy-who-cried-wolf, more would have paid attention to the warnings and evidence and the slaughter of the civil war might not have happened. But as much as these people live in a fantasy world of super powers, these are the very flaws that make their actions inevitable despite the tantalizing hope of something better, making them three-dimensional humans and making the novel a work of substance.
But of all the characters in Faust’s novel, it is the narrator herself, the “author” of the “notebooks”, Dr. Brain, who really gets inside the reader’s head. She is more worthy of study than her self-help book.
Faust takes us down a winding, contradictory track over the course of this novel in his portrayal of Dr. Brain. The reader is at times suspicious of her, in agreement, forgiving, dismissive and unsettled. And it is this difficulty in pinning her down, in labeling her the way she labels others, that makes the doctor human and dangerous.
Right off the bat, this character is overtly sinister because of her name: Eva Brain-Silverman, generally shortened to either Dr. Brain or Eva Brain. Eva Brain being disturbingly (and deliberately) close to the monicker of Hitler’s mistress Eva Braun. The Silverman part of the last name may initially take the edge off, but the sourness of the Nazi connotation never goes away. Dr. Brain sounding like the tag of some mad scientist from an over-the-top 50’s sci-fi flick about giant beerbugs manufactured in a lab to corner the market on pilsner; reminiscent also of “The Brain”, an intellectually-enhanced lab mouse bent on world domination (from “Pinky & The Brain” by Spielberg’s crew – one of the best cartoons ever). “Dr. Brain”, as a title, also has an elitist ring to it, as though the person possessing the name were trying to put herself in a superior, judgmental position above others – which Eva Brain does as she probes and evaluates her subjects.
Dr. Brain’s job also imbues her with a fair share of untrustworthiness. In general, psychiatrists, psychologists, counselors, therapists and others in the mental health field are, in fact, trustworthy and do an admirably job assisting people in overcoming their emotional challenges. But Dr. Brain isn’t some clinician in a hospital psychiatric ward or a dedicated school counselor. No, she’s a mover and shaker and outright promoter of psychological quick-fixes in the cult of therapy that’s latched itself onto western culture in recent decades, a fad-book-of-the-week and live-analysis-on-TV movement that’s cheapened the image of legitimate practitioners.
More to the point, Brain’s professionalism is questionable at best. She is all cold intellectual dissection and no empathy as she badgers her clients, drops them into potentially emotionally dangerous confrontations which she fails to resolve or include support or final safety check, and, horrifically, she ignores clients when they reveal serious trauma (such as sexual abuse) which is not part of her therapeutic agenda. This often leads her to completely misinterpret why one of her clients has made a comment or done something, and by extension, she doesn’t place appropriate value on that comment or action. One gets the sense that “healing” to Dr. Brain is a mechanical function leading towards validation of her own “expertise” and allowing her greater self-promotion.
And in the end, it is Dr. Brain’s single-minded drive to demonstrate her expertise to the world that is most chilling. She closes her book by explicitly choosing self-promotion over what’s right. Dr. Brain does not call attention to the facts of the final battle, they are stated and left behind, much like the afore-mentioned sexual assault revealed by one of the heroes during a therapy session. She does not emulate what are supposed to be the finest qualities of her patients – she does not make a call for truth to come out and justice to be done. She fails to do what she has constantly pontificated about throughout her narrative – she has not exposed the ugly truth in order to bring it into the light to study and overcome it so that it will cease to be a problem. No, the truth behind the civil war is not as important to Dr. Brain as her closing claims of how much she’s helped her patients overcome their emotional obstacles. By allowing the politically convenient story of the winning side to go unchallenged, Dr. Brain is complicit in a murder and its cover-up, and a lie to the public and the damage it will do to society by allowing the wrong people to run the show.
In this, “From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain” is Faust’s timely warning to the reader about the responsibilities of citizens (whether they be heroes or normal people) to care about what happens to each other, to make sure the truth is known, and to question those in authority and hold them to account.

How Cell Phones Are Preparing Us For Virtual Reality

It seems there has been a lot of discussion these days about the ramifications of virtual reality. George Dvorsky’s been heralding possible “perils of a digital life” on his Sentient Developments blog. Over at SciFi.com’s “Sci Fi Weekly” page, Michael Cassutt worries that massive multiplayer online games (MMOs) like “World of Warcraft”, “Second Life” and others will cause people to start turning their backs on books and film, (which present a finished story), in favour of these other existences online where they can create idealized versions of themselves and not only seek out their traditionally favourite types of stories (be they high adventure or complex personal relationships), but actually take part in them and affect their outcome. Even SouthPark has recently taken a crack at the virtual reality phenomenon and its effects on relationships, personal priorities, the issue of whether the “real world” has primacy, and hygiene with an episode where Stan, Kyle, Cartman, Kenny and their pals have to save the world of “World of Warcraft” from a seemingly unstoppable delinquent player.
In fact, while the issues surrounding alternate/virtual reality, of which the current MMOs are the first significant step (the equivalent of homo erectus on the long evolution towards modern homo sapiens sapiens, which might be technologically analogous to a fully sensory-immersive and interactive artificial reality where the user can create complex features and companions without the necessity of outside programming), gained popularity with the general public in the 90’s with movies like “The Matrix” and widely-publicized predictions by high-tech firms looking to make names for themselves, the phenomenon is well-worn territory in the world of speculative fiction. Take your pick of the cybernetic torture chamber of Harlan Ellison’s “I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream”, the datumplane of “Neuromancer” and William Gibson’s other books, movies like “Tron” or “The 13th Floor”, the Disney-like holodeck of the recent Star Trek series, or any of a hundred others.
But in all the explorations of the dangers and delights of these optional parallel worlds, it seems that there isn’t a lot of exploration of how human beings will prepare for the experience. Most stories generally either present a situation where a character is literally dumped into the new reality (“Tron”) or knowledge of its existence (“The Matrix”) and has to adapt like Alice in Wonderland to an alien environment. Or we’re offered a character living in a world where virtual reality and its issues have been around for some time – a person who’s adapted to his environment (or fighting against it) naturally since he/she has always been a part of it (take your pick of the Gibson books). I haven’t seen any evolutionary-style alternative to the “surprise, you’re in a different world” trope - nothing that tells us how people initially adapted to the long-established alternate consensual reality. I’d be interested to see if there are stories, shows or movies dealing with the possibility of gradual, subtle cultural adaptation to the new optional life. If there’s something out there, let me know.
That being said, I think there’s something that’s already preparing our culture in some ways for the virtual-versus-real/virtual-interfacing-with-real experience, though inadvertently. That’s the cell phone.

(Sorry, folks. I know it took me a long time to get to the point. As a former radio news dog, I’m kicking myself for burying the lead, but I thought the set-up was necessary this time.)

More to the point, it’s the evolution in conversational etiquette driven by the cell phone, and most obviously in the young.
It doesn’t take the greatest observer of detail to look around and see that, in the industrial nations of the world at least, most young people (teens, people in their early 20’s, and even some kids younger than 10) have got cell phones and are more than willing to use them. In fact, it’s highly likely that Arthur C. Clarke and Stephen Baxter are right on target in their prediction in the “A Time Odyssey” books that it won’t be long before every kid in the world has a cell phone.
And it’s this complete willingness of the young (and even some middle-aged business and information junkies) to answer the cell phone call or text message right away, regardless of the task or person in front of them, that’s been infuriating older folks for the past few years (in fact, ever since production of the devices got to the point where they could be sold cheaply and in many cases given away free with a connection agreement, prompting wide-spread use – this in combination with the increasing emotional need of parents to be able to reach increasingly independent kids anywhere, any time). There are many people who get intensely annoyed when talking to a younger person who hears the ringtone/feels the vibration, reaches for the cell faster than a gunfighter drawing his piece on a dusty, tumbleweed-strewn street at high noon, and instantly diverts his/her attention to the call display, putting the conversation completely on hold until they’ve dealt with the call/text message/email. To the older person forced to wait, this is a highly insulting and invalidating experience.
And yet it’s one done, for the most part, in total innocence by the young person.
To be sure, in some cases, there is some degree of insult (or at least indifference) intended in giving the phone a higher priority than the person/task physically in front of them. It’s also equally reasonable to say the young person’s reaction can also be an inability to focus on one thing at a time and ignore distracting stimulus.
But I think for the most part, it’s something entirely different: it’s really a modified version of party socialization. Think of it this way: when you’re at a party, you may, in addition to all the other typical activities, engage in group discussions. But you’ll also have several one-on-one interactions with other guests. Now, at some point during one of these tête-à-têtes, it’s a given that some other partygoer will mosey up to the both of you and attempt to horn-in on the conversation. Like him or hate him, you can’t ignore this third wheel. Your interaction with your initial conversational partner must be either suspended while you deal with the interloper, or adapted to include him. I’m convinced that’s what happening with youth and cell phone calls/text messages/emails: they’re not differentiating the physical communication in front of them from the electronic, these are assigned (at least initially) the same value and the new communicator (the cell) is seen as something that must be acknowledged as much as another physical person would have to be.
In all the years since the popularization of the cell phone among the young, this behaviour has not fizzled out. It has become the norm and there is no reason to expect that it will change. In fact, as today’s youth become older, it will be a culture-wide standard for conversational etiquette. Conversational etiquette is evolving.
And herein lies the key to how the cell phone will lay the foundations for society’s ability to handle the coming reality-artificial reality interface.
I suspect this change in behaviour that puts electronic communication on an equal footing with physical communication will allow people in future years to interchange the physical world with its custom-made, electronic parallel dimensions without much anxiety. Going from interactions and sensations in the physical world to interfacing with one of the many man-made consensual realities at the flick of whatever proverbial “switch” used will be to them the same as saying “Just a sec.” in a conversation and picking up the cell, or turning to the third partygoer and acknowledging him.
To bring the evolution metaphor back for a second, if today’s MMOs are the homo erectus of virtual reality and total sense-immersion electronics/software the equivalent of modern man, then the cell phone would be the ape coming down from the trees considering whether to shamble across the savannah.
Because it is a consumer product that’s affected this change in personal interaction, one might wonder whether this points to some sinister global social-engineering program run by high-tech manufacturers aimed at smoothing the transition, acceptance and acquisition of new consumer goods. I would say definitely no. That kind of conspiracy theory doesn’t wash because it wasn’t a given at the advent of the popularization of the cell that young people would behave this way. Certainly they would have been tempted to, but any number of factors, such as role-models showing a disdain for the quick-fix of the cell phone’s demand, or direct education by elders, the annoyance of distracting ring-tones or vibrations, detrimental effects of increased communication on school grades or job performance, or a desire for more private time, could have spurred youth to view the cell phone as an inconvenience rather than an essential extension of natural communication abilities. However probable, it was never a given that this change would happen.
In the end, as alternative realities become more pervasive, and perhaps even necessary in some circumstances, and the march towards fully immersive custom-made options continues, there will be many opportunities and dangers that individuals and society will forced to stop and consider. But the societal changes already wrought by the cell phone mean that, for the most part, the up-and-coming generation probably won’t be too concerned about the journey itself.

When To Throw In The Towel - A "Gormenghast" Groan

It’s been eating at me for a while now, this great shame of mine. I thought I was tough – one of the toughest, but I’ve been confronted with an adversary I just can’t overcome. I’m not normally a quitter, but this is just too much. It’s time to throw in the towel. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, Mervyn Peake’s “Gormenghast” novels have gotten the best of me.
Now, I don’t admit defeat easily. In fact, up until now, I’ve never failed to finish a book. Oh sure, I’ve been known to take breaks in the middle of books sometimes when they were bogging me down: half-way through Homer’s “Iliad”, after what seemed like the hundredth roll call of the names of each of the six hundred zillion warriors trudging out to the field of battle for another day’s slaughter, I grew a little weary and put the epic down for a month or so. Not that I’m saying that it was a bad story, far from it, rather that the endless name-dropping interfered with the pacing a bit. But I picked it back up and finished it with relish. When I was a teen and blown away by Herbert’s “Dune” after reading it for the first time, I was so enthralled that I went out and bought all the other books in the series and tried to go through them all back-to-back. Bad idea. “Dune” was great. “Dune Messiah” and “Children of Dune” were good. The back three, though, were an exercise in suffering. So much so that I halted in the middle of “God Emperor of Dune” for several months and went on to other things before resuming. But I picked it back up and finished the series eventually. And those are the good ones. As an English major back in university, I had to slog through a fair amount of insufferably dull stuff as a rite of passage. I mean, if you’re ever looking for a cure for insomnia, having to plod through Mary Anne Evans’ “Middlemarch” is a pretty good start. I did manage to get through it though.
But “Gormenghast”, oh “Gormenghast”, that’s a whole other kind of beast. The first installment, “Titus Groan”, drags on for endless pages about the utter dank entropy of the great slouching hulk of a castle/fortress/uber-basement and the mouldering grotesques within. It drags us on an unending tour to meet this cast of wretches (like a carnival boat-ride tunnel of terror that you can’t climb out of) as they find out about the birth of a new baby and react to the news and the intrusion of other characters into their routines.
Sixty pages in, I’d had enough. I could take no more of this immense ode to decrepitude. I threw the book down in disgust and grabbed something, anything else off the shelf.
That was about eight months ago.
Since then, I’ve tried to pick the sucker up again a couple of times, but with no success. I’ve tried to keep an open mind (“Maybe it’ll get better in a couple of paragraphs. All I have to do is keep on plugging!” ) – I mean, after all, I like all kinds of SF and other types of literature, and a wide variety of narrative styles; I should be able to adapt to this presentation. But it only takes a page or two before I start to feel like I’m being mummified at the bottom of a peat bog.
I don’t think I can do it again. I fear I have met my match.
There are some who would say on a purely mechanical basis of reading that this is enough justification to put the book down. Some have a “100 pages rule” where if they’re not interested in the story by the time they hit that benchmark, it gets put down. Some have a similar 1/3 rule. Others are even more mercenary, pointing out that if a person has a backlog of other reading material which could in all likelihood be better, it’s okay to turn one’s back on a book at any point where one feels unreasonably overwhelmed with boredom. All of these approaches agree on a central premise: why waste time with something you don’t appreciate it, like it and are not getting anything out of it.
Nonetheless, the idea of retreat still annoys me to no end. Part of it is ego – I don’t like to admit failure when it comes to a book. Part of it is fear – I worry my literary spider-senses are getting near-sighted and that I’m missing something terribly profound that would be the key to understanding and enjoying this sprawling tome. And part of it is respect for the canon – how many respected elders have called this book brilliant? How many have raved on and on about the detail of Peake’s world-building or characterization? And what does that say about me as an SF critic if I am found wanting in my ability to wrestle my way through a classic of the genre, no matter how big and boring?
But the obeisance to canon argument is fraught with peril, because a person’s opinion isn’t worth much if they’re always following the pack, especially if the commonly-held opinion is flawed or flat-out wrong. It also demands that an individual’s literary preferences (no matter how heartfelt or rationally justified) kowtow to the dictates of some elite that were themselves based upon an individual preference. I’m not saying that a canon doesn’t have a purpose as a starting point for discussion, but to give it status as an absolute authority on quality is unwarranted hubris. We have to be wary of the canon, because it’s this kind of establishment snobbery that’s unjustly relegated SF to the literary ghetto for decades.
Which brings me back to my original position, which is that in my opinion, “Titus Groan” is so insufferably boring that it’s not worth finishing.
But my guilt still makes me reluctant to toss this omnibus onto the donation pile.
Help me out here folks. Please.
Tell me if I should be giving the “Gormenghast” novels a reprieve. Tell me what I’m missing. Tell me if it’s worthwhile to persevere. Tell me if there’s a wondrous new land waiting to be discovered beyond this ghastly mountain range of literary drudgery that’s reared out of the opening chapters. Or am I right to pass this pulp wad on to someone else who might enjoy it?

From The Old School Of Fairy Tales: "Pan's Labyrinth"

I left the theatre tonight with my mind running around like a rat in a maze. My wife was weeping. We’d finally managed to get around to seeing Guillermo del Toro’s “Pan’s Labyrinth”.
This film is a fairy tale in the finest old tradition of the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Anderson. A perfect yarn for a winter’s night where the cold, clear stars are gradually shrouded by a fog as thick as concrete that’s come skulking in off the sea. There are children in peril, a wicked step-parent, castles in the woods, ancient relics, hidden identities, monsters (both human and otherworldly), sadistic and bloody killings, heroes in the rough, desperate escapes and plenty of magic. In the course of the story, del Toro frightens us, plucks at our heartstrings and gives us hope.
Don’t look for a syrupy, Disneyfied romp with giggling fairy godmothers in pastel blue ballgowns who burst into song every ten minutes. The atmosphere of this movie is as dark and heavy as the air under a pile of blankets at two o’clock in the morning when you’re five and worried the boogeyman’s creeping out of the closet.
The story is set in fascist Spain of 1944. Young Ofelia (Ivana Baquero) and her pregnant mother are taken to a small castle/big house in the forested mountains to live with her mother’s new husband (and the baby’s father), the cruel Capitan Vidal. At the edge of the yard lies the entrance to an ancient maze. As her mother’s pregnancy is wracked with problems and the Capitan brutalizes the locals in an attempt to weed-out rebels who some of the civilian household staff are conspiring with, Ofelia meets an insect that morphs into a pixie who leads her through the labyrinth to a portal watched by a lanky faun. The mysterious creature offers the girl a chance to escape from the harshness of her new home to a mystical underworld where she will reign as princess. But to do this Ofelia must undertake some frightening tasks using magic that has very serious consequences. Life under the Capitan gets worse, the pressure from her supernatural guide mounts and soon Ofelia must make some tough decisions about which path she will take.
There are many fascinating elements to this yarn, my favourite of which is the character of the faun (played by Doug Jones). He offers Ofelia hope, encouragement, comfort and a sense of greatness in a world that repeatedly marginalizes her. And yet this fae guide is rather menacing. He evades the girl’s question when she asks for his name (a nod to the belief in many cultures that to learn a thing’s name is to gain power over it). The household’s chief maid Mercedes (Maribel Verdu) notes that local folklore says fauns can’t be trusted. He’s gangly, twisted at odd angles, moves strangely, creaks like a tree in a wind storm and looms tall over the child. On one visit to the heart of the labyrinth, Ofelia finds him chomping indifferently on a hunk of unidentified meat. The megalith at the centre of the portal has a carving of a girl and a baby with a man standing possessively behind them which the faun points to and says “That’s me.” The faun orders the girl to descend into terrifying supernatural lairs haunted by horrible beings, to retrieve arcane artifacts that are sometimes unsettling and to use magic that is sometimes disturbing in appearance of its ingredients and requirements. This faun is about as far from the sidekick “Newton” on the old “Hercules” cartoon (from the same crew that inflicted “Rocket Robinhood” on us) as an anaconda is from a worm. And yet, that is in keeping with old style stories where magic wasn’t for the squeamish, heroes were in genuine danger, hope didn’t come for free and otherworldly companions were quite alien in their presentation and motives. And when it came to his motives, I admit, the faun had me fooled for a while.
As for the fact that the film is in Spanish, I don’t mind reading subtitles when they’re well done, and the text at the bottom of the screen in this case is impeccable - well-paced and most importantly, presented with proper grammar (there’s nothing more distracting to a viewer and more destructive to a foreign-language film than clumsy translation). I am left wondering (as is the case with many translated works) if some of the subtleties of the story have been washed out in translation. Regardless, I enjoyed what was presented immensely.
“Pan’s Labyrinth” was worth every cent of the full price of admission. Oh, this fairy tale isn’t for the faint of heart, kids. It’ll keep you up at night listening to every creak in the floorboards as the house settles. But sometimes that’s what a really good fairy tale does.

A Bad Blind Date - "The Divorce of Buddy Figaro"

Cracking open a new book is kind of like starting a new relationship. Sometimes, regardless of whether you’re absorbed in it for a long or short period of time, it’s intriguing and seductive – you put everything else aside to give it your full attention. Sometimes, as the story gradually reveals its inner secrets to you, not only are your emotions stimulated, you also learn more about yourself and the world – this is something you always want to have at your side. Or it can be a quick, shallow fling that you enter just for fun. Others are ho-hum experiences where you’ve clocked your time going from cover to cover but won’t be revisited and will never stand out. And then there are those really bad reading experiences where you’re left angry and annoyed at why you wasted your time on such trash and you might even be tempted never to go back to where you found the thing – and that’s if you even manage to get to the end of the story. And good or bad, the impact of some books can stay with you forever.
By extension, trying a book which hasn’t been reviewed, or where you’ve missed the review, is rather like a blind date. “The Divorce of Buddy Figaro – A Taoist Comedy Novel” was just such an experience. And, as many people have bemoaned about blind dates, this book was a gamble that didn’t pay off.
David Silverberg’s story centers around Buddy Figaro, an overworked Moncton, New Brunswick neurologist with a love of music, bad puns and windsurfing, three kids and an alienated wife who’s about to ditch him. One night a tiny, marble-like entity – something called a “chi transducer” – named Taro comes sweeping in from the farthest reaches of the universe, nestles itself in Buddy’s ear and proceeds to tell him he’s humanity’s last hope in a cosmic trial of merit adjudicated by a superbeing (really a collection of independent bodily organs working in concert – sort of) with the monicker of Peng. Seems Peng’s taken a dislike to humanity because it sees mankind as a potential rival. Peng’s already decided to unleash its hordes of Fierce Creatures (the prototypes of Mongolian warriors, as it turns out) to put an end to the Earth’s upstarts, and Buddy’s been summoned simply to go through the formalities of a show-trial. Things don’t go over so well for old Peng when Buddy decides he’s had enough and beats the big guy to death (from the inside-out no less) with its own penis. And returns victorious to a safe-and-sound Earth, right? Nope. See, these Mongols, er, Fierce Creatures, made invulnerable by their own chi transducers, already had their marching orders and have taken up residence in the woods outside Moncton, waiting for the right time to unleash their fury upon an unsuspecting Terra and harvest human beings for the buffet tables of the starving masses on their barren homeworld. With a lot of pluck and the help of the beautiful alien princess Tyger Tyger, Buddy sends the baddies packing with a plan to rebuild their planet into a kinder, greener place. And, oh yeah, amidst all that he gets divorced, develops a real hate for his ex, then eventually learns to accept the hand Fate has dealt him, consider his ex-wife’s point of view, and more-or-less move on with his life. One plot line is supposed to be the background for the other, and they sometimes switch places to establish primacy.
In the hands of a more skilled author and a determined editor, this story might have had some hope. Coulda/woulda/shoulda. Instead, this tale was like one of those dates where you listen to the other person’s interminably boring recounts of their failed relationships, you nod politely at the end of the evening, get in your car and promptly forget the whole thing. If this book were a person you were dating, it would need a lot of therapy.
First, there’s the endless repetition. The plot is re-summarized nearly every chapter. Is this some profound metaphor for the circular nature of life and the physics of space curved back on itself? Nope. Just bad writing.
Then there’s the clumsy gear-shifting between Buddy’s intergalactic adventures and the challenges of life at home and his divorce. I think doing a more subtle job of interweaving the two plot lines would have been more effective. Silverberg could have also chosen the tack of keeping one plot permanently in the foreground and left the other as a backdrop to highlight events or insights.
And then there’s the repetition. Did I mention that already?
How about the legion of spelling mistakes? There’s no excuse not to use a spellchecker before mailing or emailing ye olde manuscript in these modern times. Still less if you’re an editor sending a book to print.
I also got real tired real fast with Buddy’s bad pun fetish. Somehow I doubt it was a deliberate character device to make the reader more sympathetic to the ex-wife. Buddy’s puns aren’t even smart, which is odd, given that his high level of education and love of a variety of types of music should show that he’s got an active and flexible-enough mind to be quick on the draw and inventive in his word play. Nope. We get to hear his rehashes of the happiness/ha-penis double-entendre from Marlon Brando’s “Last Tango in Paris” again and again and again (and uncredited, might I add). This isn’t good writing. It’s self-indulgence.
Then there’s the idea that these Fierce Creatures, the ancestors of mankind, have been plaguing the universe at the bidding of Peng for so long that they wiped out the dinosaurs and left a human colony on Earth (never mind how scientifically problematic that is and a rather tired old SF trope to boot), have continued to survive on a wasted planet, and yet have undergone no physical, spiritual, intellectual or cultural evolution in that entire time? This Peng can’t be that powerful, especially if it couldn’t even predict or notice the rebelliousness of its stomach and some of its chi transducers, or prevent Buddy from bludgeoning its other organs to death with its, well, organ.
Did I mention the repetition?
At one point while reading the novel, I wondered if it was the product of a vanity press that had somehow been marketed with a huge amount of personal coin to the point where, incredibly it had bought itself a space on the shelves of the Chapters big box chain across Canada. Surprisingly, no. Turns out it was published by a legitimate small press company, Manor House, that even gets a little funding from the federal government. I feel disheartened (and not in a weird, Peng-like, internal battering kind of way) that some of my tax dollars may have gone into this book.
Admittedly, because I know very little about Taoism, there might be any number of deep insights and cute inside jokes buried in this collection of pulp that I’m missing. Somehow I doubt it though. This book reads like a stoner’s ramblings scribbled onto a coffee-stained Post-it note pad in a college dorm the Friday night a week before March break.
Well, after a bad date we always tell ourselves or our forlorn friends that there’s plenty more fish in the sea. And that’s certainly true right about now. No more blind dates for me. Some nice-looking new novels by top-notch authors like Minister Faust, Dan Simmons and Cory Doctorow have just come smiling into the bookstore looking for an attentive reader like me to take them home, and who am I to say no?

A Strawberry Cough Amidst The Screams

It took long enough, but I finally got around to seeing Alfonso Cuaron’s “Children of Men” last Friday and I’m glad I did. What a fine piece of storytelling.
The movie is set in the not-too-distant future (please, no singing the theme song of MST3K) where for some reason human beings aren’t having babies anymore. Anarchy runs amok because the world has lost hope. The madness of the species is so ramped-up that it’s inconceivable there will even be a last human being at the burnt out candle end of humanity’s life (to paraphrase Bradbury’s “The Halloween Tree”) dying of old age because this degree of chaos will leave no-one alive to reach old age. In fact, the government even encourages extinction by distributing euthanasia drugs for free and crushing political or social opposition with wanton slaughter. As the movie lurches on, the picture painted is of a world is so full of violence and despair it could only be more bleak if Pink Floyd’s “Welcome to the Machine” had been included in the soundtrack. In the middle of all this, the protagonist, Theo Faron (played with great control and feeling by Clive Owen) is roped into helping his ex-wife (Julianne Moore) smuggle a girl out of a totalitarian Britain. What makes the girl special is that she’s the first woman in years to a) get pregnant; and b) successfully carry the child to term.
Now, there are those who took potshots at Cuaron early on for altering the story or reconceptualizing that laid out in the original novel by P.D. James. But I don’t think that’s fair. Admittedly, I haven’t read James’ book yet. But I’ve never subscribed to the theory that a movie that’s based on a novel has to be exactly the same as its forebear. I think deviation is perfectly acceptable as long as the movie’s storytelling can stand strongly on its own. Take Ridley Scott’s “Bladerunner” (the Director’s Cut, naturally). Quite a few deviations from Philip K. Dick’s original “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep”, but a truly brilliant story in its own right. Same with Peter Jackson’s “Lord of the Rings” trilogy. While Jackson tried to stay close to Tolkien’s masterpiece, he did do some tinkering and it did work. In fact, I’d argue that there are some cases where the film is actually better than the text that inspired it. Case in point (you might want to look away if you’re a slave to the canon): John Harrison’s Sci-Fi Channel production “Frank Herbert’s Dune”. While I enjoyed reading Herbert’s “Dune”, and have done so several times, Harrison’s tribute is more fluid with characters who are more believable. To be fair, many movie adaptations flop – like David Lynch’s take on “Dune” – but Cuaron’s film isn’t one of them.
Getting back to “Children of Men”, one thing I noticed was that it resembles Don McKeller’s quieter, much lower budget, but non-the-less high-quality “Last Night”. Both films take an orgy of violence as a given for the backdrop for the fall of humanity caused by some force of nature we’re seemingly powerless to stop. And yet, in the midst of it all, both films are about hope and redemption.
In the final six hours left to McKellar’s world, society is but a memory as mobs party in the middle of highways, youth kill because they can, suicide pacts are made, the incompetent take centre stage, families turn their backs on their fellow man and hipsters dive head-first into every hedonistic whim they can conceive of – all because there’s no point in self control when the end has arrived. And yet there are still moments of humanity - “music in the dark” as Sheridan and Kosh would say on “Babylon 5”. Sandra Oh’s character is willing to walk the length of the city to try to reunite with her husband. McKellar’s widower gives in to his better nature and puts his self-indulgent moping aside to help her, reconnecting with humanity and compassion and rediscovering purpose. A power company employee stays behind at the office to make sure the lights stay on right up until the end – or at least, until the prospect of one last passionate connection comes up moments before the final flash. The ubiquitous radio station DJ stays at his post too. And in the end, Oh and McKellar’s odyssey brings them together in a kind of determined love.
Similarly in “Children of Men”, Clive Owen’s character is literally yanked out of his alcoholic slump of depression over the loss of his long-dead son when he’s kidnapped at the behest of his ex-wife who needs his help to smuggle the girl Kee (Claire-Hope Ashitey) out from under the government’s nose to the safety of the scientists of “the Human Project” aboard their ship where she can have her baby. For all intents and purposes, Theo Faron goes from being dead to resurrected. In some ways, the “Strawberry Cough” strain of marijuana bred by Faron’s hippy father (played wonderfully by Michael Caine) is a metaphor for what happens to the protagonist – while the initial reaction to the experience is a harsh cough, it surprises him with a forgotten sweetness that makes him sit up and take notice. Amidst the deafening explosions, loss of his old life and loved ones and the constant terror of being hunted on all sides, Owen’s character is forced to truly live – to think quickly and protect and care for people other than himself. This film is not so much about the deathknells of a species or the birthpangs of a new hope for civilization as it is about a man’s rediscovery of himself and reconnection to other people.
Some critics have argued that both the film and the book suffer because their founding premise, that human beings are not having babies, is inconsistent with current trends in biotechnology and computer science which will likely offer a number of solutions to this kind of problem in the very near future. These could come in the form of cloning, genetic engineering, consciousness uploads into individual computers or entire consensual software realities, cybernetic replacements, life prolongment (perhaps indefinitely) through drug or retrovirus cocktails or nanotechnology, or a host of other possibilities.Fine. The story doesn’t take good old-fashioned human ingenuity in the face of extinction into account. So what? What’s important though is that despite a flimsy premise, the film tells a good story about human drama. And when there are so many stories out there based on rock-solid premises, but which suffer from boring or one-dimensional characters interacting with their world and each other in uninteresting, unbelievable or unsatisfying ways, personally, I’ll take the good yarn with the shaky starting supposition.

Winter Is Coming - To Your Television

Permit me to engage in a bit of fanboy gushing. A few days ago I was scrolling through SF Signal and came across word that George R. R. Martin has inked a deal with HBO to produce a limited television series (one season per book, as I understand it) for his “A Song of Ice and Fire” books.
Woohoooooooo!!!
Given the quality of productions like “The Sopranos” and “Rome”, Martin made the right choice in going with HBO.
On the downside, it’s going to be a long, long wait for some of us. As Martin notes on his “Not A Blog”, it’s still really early in the process and it’ll be a while before the project goes to production and eventually hits the air. Longer still for those of us up here in the land of winter – Canada’s cable companies won’t carry HBO, so we either have go try our luck with a satellite system or wait until Space or one of the other cable channels decides to pick the series up, likely a year or two after it’s already begun airing in the US (witness the sad example of how long it took to pick up “The Sopranos”) or hunt for bootleg taped copies provided by our neighbours to the south.
They say patience is a virtue. Well, I have a feeling there will be a few of us fans up here in the Great White North who will be extremely virtuous by the time we get to lay eyes on the “A Song of Ice and Fire” television series. I hope it’s worth the wait.

Farewell To Yvonne De Carlo

I hadn’t thought about Lily or the other Munsters in years, but it all came back today when I read the news that Yvonne De Carlo had passed away.
Born Peggy Yvonne Middleton in Vancouver, BC in 1922, she had a long list of acting credits, including the role of Moses’ wife Sephora in 1956’s “The Ten Commandments”, but most of us will remember her best as Lily, vampirish matriarch of the 60’s classic: “The Munsters”.
I think my earliest memory of De Carlo and “The Munsters” comes from when I was a kid living in the country in Ontario. On Sundays around noon, one of the few TV stations (I can’t remember which) that we could pick up on the aerial tower would air old comedies like the Abbott and Costello or Laurel and Hardy or Three Stooges features and shorts, and one rainy afternoon it was “Munster, Go Home”. How could I not love it? The flick was mock-horror silliness at its campy best. And there, in the middle of it all, clad in her pale gown and calmly steering her ghoulish family through the chaos like the captain of some great, ugly scow, was the darkly beautiful Yvonne De Carlo as Lily.
Years later as a teen in BC’s Lower Mainland I would watch “The Munsters” TV series airing in syndication on one of the cable stations out of Bellingham or Seattle, alongside equally ancient reruns of “The Addams Family”. It was obvious that even under all that makeup, De Carlo was still quite a beautiful woman, even though she was in her early 40’s when the series was shot and they didn’t have all of the youth-prolonging treatments (which, granted, often have hideous results) available today. In fact, as monstrous TV moms of that era go, Lily Munster was far more attractive than her counterpart, Morticia Addams. While the needy Morticia primped, posed and did her feline best to show she had it, Lily’s normal behaviour was vastly more sexy just for her even-keeled confidence alone, never mind her breath-taking looks.
That big lump Herman Munster was a lucky guy to have Lily. All of us in the TV and movie audience were lucky to be able to watch Ms. De Carlo.
Yvonne De Carlo died in the Motion Picture & Television facility in suburban Los Angeles on January 8th of natural causes. She was 84.

"Night At The Museum" A Sweet Dream For Kids

We went to see “Night at the Museum” on Friday and while I didn’t regret it, I wasn’t blown away by it either.
You’ve probably heard the plot by now… Ben Stiller signs up as the overnight security guard only to find out that the museum’s contents come to life at night, mayhem ensues, and it’s his job to make sure nothing gets out and everything’s back to normal come morning. The trio of retiring guards, played by Dick Van Dyke, Mickey Rooney and Bill Cobbs have more on their minds though than just handing over the keys and wishing the kid luck. Stiller not only has to figure out how to keep a skeletal Tyrannosaur happy, how to keep the peace between a cowboy and his neighbour the legate Octavius, how to unite a former president and a famous First Nations guide, how to appease Attila the Hun and how to foil the schemes of the three elderly guards, but also how to hold down his job and regain his son’s confidence at the same time.
Overall, the kids in the audience, and many of the adults, got a lot of laughs out of this flick. I’ve gotta admit, I chuckled a few times myself. Ultimately, it’s very much a family-oriented movie and I can’t say it’s a bad one at that, because it’s not. It does what it sets out to do – tells a funny, heart-warming story with a lot of action and reasonable special effects.
But in the end I found it forgettable. It wasn’t funny enough, or surprising enough, or enough of a unique story that I’ll be running out to rent it as soon as my nephew’s old enough to understand it.
I think there are family movies out there that do a much better job. Take Miyazaki’s “Spirited Away” or “Howl’s Moving Castle”. What about “The Incredibles”? All of these movies were very entertaining for both kids and adults and their depth of imagination will ensure they won’t date easily. Better yet, how about that 1979 masterpiece “The Muppet Movie”? When I stumbled upon this gem buried at the bottom of the shelf in a store just after Christmas, I didn’t hesitate to fork over some gift money to buy it while I could. Hensen and his crew took the well-worn trope of the American road movie and turned it into a rolling festival of Muppet wackiness filled with their signature double-layered humour. My only regret is that recent generations of kids have had only sporadic exposure to the genius of the Muppet productions and thus won’t likely know to look or ask for this classic. Case in point: during our honeymoon last year at Disneyland, my wife and I made a point of going to the park’s Muppet Theatre. Despite a good production, the joint was nearly empty and the kids who were there didn’t seem to have any recognition of what they were seeing.
Getting back to the point though… I certainly wouldn’t discourage people from seeing “Night at the Museum”, if you’ve got kids, it’ll probably be a good night out for the bunch of you. If you don’t, wait for it to air on TV where you won’t have to pay for it.

Travel Assistance For SF Bookworms

I caught a great little footnote on SF Signal today about a website designed to help all of us speculative fiction bookworms when we’re abroad. Collecting Science Fiction Books is cobbling together an interactive map to help you find bookstores dedicated to selling science fiction, fantasy and horror books, well, anywhere. Let’s say you’re taking a vacation/you’ve been kidnapped by little green men and released in a small potato field in a town that’s not your own/you’re away on a business trip/you’re on walkabout/whatever, you finish or lose the book you’re reading, you don’t have a replacement, the news stands or chain bookstores nearby only have crap and you really need a fix of something good: all you have to do is go online (okay, fine, since you’re hitting the net anyway, you could go to any one of a number of online magazines or e-book sites, but I’m one of those old-fashioned types who’s just gotta have the security blanket feel of paper [hardcover or soft] in hand), punch in the web address, point to where you are and you’ll find the nearest SF book emporium. And because it’s interactive, we, the book-buyers of the world, can add our favourites to the list. Genius!

BUT THEY NEED YOUR HELP!

As you can see, (at the time of this posting) the list of locations is still pretty small – a rag-tag band of bookstores huddled in California and the lonely little point of White Dwarf Books up here in Vancouver, BC, Canada (which I added to the roster just this evening). That’s why all of you have got to head to the site and make that list more comprehensive! Whether you live in Newfoundland & Labrador, Ohio, Brazil, Denmark, Turkey, South Africa, Hong Kong or New Zealand, it’s time to tell speculative fiction nuts from around the world where we can go to buy the best SF books if we’re in your neck of the woods.
Now, you may be worried that his site is or will turn into some kind of freebie marketing billboard for bookstore proprietors to shill their wares. And yeah, for a cynical second, so did I. But you know what? As long as the site stays focused on listing the whereabouts of SF-oriented bookstores, so what? Most of these specialty bookstores are independents and the men and women who operate them work damn hard to keep their businesses alive against the crushing competition from huge corporate conglomerates which may be able to discount prices, but have poor selections, no older stock and staff who rarely know what they’re selling. Think of it this way, your local SF niche bookstore comes through for you in terms of keeping a wide variety of stock on hand and by giving you recommendations for new titles and authors that you can trust because you’ve probably built a relationship, so, it isn’t asking much to go a little bit beyond giving these small merchants your business and recommend them to the world. We’ve gotta look out for each other.Log on to Collecting Science Fiction Books and add your local SF specialty shop to the list.