BFS Reviews: Much Ado About Nothing (2013)

Movie Reviews Recommended Views

much_adoJoss Whedon has this weird way of going about making movies and TV shows. On the one hand, he’s known in the big networks and studios for success stories like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and last summer’s The Avengers (or “shows that shouldn’t have been canceled so soon” like Firefly that can make some fans perennially sigh over what might have been if the show had kept going). But on the other hand, he does stuff like… make some kind of movie broken into two parts during a writer’s strike (Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, a strange but endearing mixture of superheroes with musical, drama, romance, and tragedy). More, he can make this kind of thing work, as that odd, two-part movie grew into an internet sensation that’s followed as much as anything made by a major network.

And now he’s made a production of Much Ado About Nothing. Apparently Whedon has an amazing house and regularly invites actors and actresses to come out and perform a Shakespeare play. Why not? I probably would too, if I had a fabulous house and was a director. To add to the fun, this time around he’s made a film out of this practice. He chose a fine play to do this with, as Much Ado is one of Shakespeare’s best comedies (for the uninitiated, a Shakespeare comedy means there’s going to be lots of fun, humor, and romance, but… there’s going to be a fair amount of heartache as well: the travails of Jimmy Stewart in It’s a Wonderful Life have nothing on what Shakespeare will put his comedic characters through).

I’ll be up front and say that Joss Whedon had to win me over with this one. I like a lot of his work and it sounded like this adaptation was pretty good, but… I love Kenneth Branagh’s 1993 adaptation of this play: it’s what won me over to Shakespeare at a young age. Sure, it’s got some weird moments and Keanu Reeves… cannot do Shakespeare to save his life, but it is otherwise excellent. Kenneth Branagh and Emma Thompson are razor sharp witty in their roles as the two lovebirds that refuse to believe they are lovebirds, and they are excellently juxtaposed against the two lovebirds that very much know they are lovebirds, played by Robert Sean Leonard and Kate Beckinsale. To cap things off, Michael Keaton is hilarious as the hapless constable, Dogberry.

So I’ll admit I didn’t completely click with some elements of the movie. Alexis Denisof and Amy Acker were good fun as Beatrice and Benedick, but… they just couldn’t speak it and act it like Branagh and Thompson did, particularly early on (though let’s face it, those two are heavyweights in the acting world). Still, they began to spark more for me as the other characters in the story try to draw them together. The closely paired scenes where Benedick and Beatrice learn that the other loves them (or so they are led to believe as they eavesdrop on their friends…) are as entertaining as I’ve seen in any production. Benedick’s sudden attempts to look sexy for Beatrice are as amusing to watch as junior highers at a school dance (so much awkwardness rolled up in so much sincerity). The pair isn’t all humor, either: Whedon closes the movie with a shot focusing solely on them, an indescribably romantic moment.

That said, the standouts among the actors are undoubtedly Nathan Fillion and Tom Lenk as the constable Dogberry and his assistant, Valence. In Kenneth Branagh’s adaptation, Michael Keaton plays Dogberry hilariously over the top with growls and mannerisms reminiscent of his role as Beetlejuice. Nathan Fillion, on the other hand, is openly and honestly sincere in his ineptitude (though he still manages to save the day, of course). Both performances are completely varied but completely hilarious. It highlights the strength of any good play–and book for that matter–the stories and characters can be great no matter how many times you revisit them.

But what seals the deal is the cinematography and the music. Whedon went from directing a superhero summer Hollywood blockbuster–with all the big action shots that implies–to using steady, fixed shots and vivid black and white cinematography in this film. There’s some versatile directing for you. Of course, he’s filming a location he knows quite well–his own gorgeous house with a spectacular view–but he uses that knowledge to maximum effect. Joss also enlisted the aid of his brother, Jed, and his wife Maurissa Tauncharoen, to perform a couple of the songs from the play (this duo were responsible for the catchy tunes in Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog). Both songs are a clean and engaging fit with the modern setting Whedon chose for the play, and I wish a movie from earlier this summer, The Great Gatsby, had done so well with matching its music to its story.

In the end, there are things not to like in Whedon’s production of Much Ado, but this is no different from any other Shakespeare production I’ve seen (or heard commented on). For theatrical afficianados, every new production of a play can offer new delights and interpretations–even small, classroom productions–and this is a good thing in the end. Even better, Whedon’s production offers many new things to delight in.

Movie Previews: AKA What You Know Going Into a Story

Methods of Film Musings

3d_glassesThey’re everywhere. They’re in commercials and they’re all over the internet. They keep the movie you’re about to watch from starting for 15-20 minutes (unless you’re smart and show up 15-20 minutes late, like a certain Viking and Celt enjoy doing). And sometimes, previews do what they’re supposed to do, getting you excited about an upcoming movie. Frequently, though, you can wonder who put the darn thing together.

Like those stupid trailers that basically tell you the whole plot of the movie. Even if a story isn’t ruined for you if you know how it ends (there are apparently people like this–though I didn’t know there were until I met the Celt), this is just about the laziest way possible to make a preview. Cliffs Notes for the win, right? Because everyone reads those things because they’re entertaining…

Oh, and this approach forgets that a preview is supposed to be a preview… not a synopsis. Like this trailer I unfortunately saw once for Nicholas Sparks’s Safe Haven. You of course know what you’re in for with Nicholas Sparks, but come on. I know how the whole thing is going to go! What makes this even more annoying is that plot-focused trailers take the focus off the acting and the, you know, other important things that make a movie good. Plot’s nice and all, but it’s not the only thing to a story (although I will admit that the Safe Haven trailer does show off some well done cinematography).

The other thing to hate in trailers these days (or maybe the past ten years?) is how frenetic they can be. Of course, this style of trailer is common because studios want to build tension and a desire to see the story (and my heart can kind of go out to the editors that have to put these things together), but almost all of them throw a billion shots together in an effort to build up some kind of tension. This has even carried over into the action shots in movies themselves, and the result is more often a seasick mess than an actual, tension-filled moment.

Hmmm, that’s been a lot of complaining… so what do you like, Mr. Big Frickin’ Swede? Well, you pulled it out of me: I’ll tell you after the break.

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BFS Reviews: How to Train Your Dragon (2010)

Methods of Film Movie Reviews Recommended Views

dragonOkay, so… I got a little excited two weeks ago when the Celt found a preview for How to Find Your Dragon 2. A little. I might have been a little un-Swedish. But here’s why.

Trying to tell a story that draws in adults and younger folk isn’t as easy as some think (both critics and creators). You can’t get too stupid (or adults AND kids will hate it), and you can’t get too cerebral or the kids (and let’s face it, many adults) will hate it. But How to Train Your Dragon finds this balance point and soars away with it.

The crazy thing about it is that this movie kind of snuck its way into the movie landscape. Unlike Pixar films that are fanfared and publicized well in advance (a very small teaser trailer for Brave was out at least a year before it hit the screens), I didn’t hear of this one until I saw a trailer a mere couple of months before it was released. And rather than try to give us the whole plot of the movie, the trailer did what the trailer released for its sequel did last week: evoke a feeling.

It’s essentially the moment seen in the poster in the upper right, but better. Dragons (and this dragon in particular) in the movie have up until now been unknown and powerful and dangerous–tapping into centuries of storytelling that have made dragons touchstones of mystery and magic. But, this moment posits, what if you could reach out and actually touch that mystery… and while you were doing that, what if that mystery decided it wanted to reach out to you as well?

Wow.

And this undercurrent is felt throughout the movie. Sure, there are some moments that are more kiddie or more obvious than I’d like (I wasn’t quite sure at first what to make of the voiceover used in the opening), but these shortcomings are buoyed by the undercurrent of magic and mystery, and completely erased by the strong story. We understand why Hiccup–the boy in the poster–reaches out to the dragon, but we also know what this is going to cost him personally. Dragons and humans just don’t mix, it’s been made clear, and there will be repercussions.

Another fine element of the film is that the adults are allowed to be smart. What a concept, I know, but one thing Roger Ebert frequently noted in the last couple of years (I am really going to miss reading that man’s reviews…) is how often adults are made to be stupid when kids or teens are the protagonists of a movie. But in How to Train your Dragon, Hiccup’s father has feelings that are clearly understood and valued just as much as Hiccup’s. He’s not one dimensional, either, changing in reaction to the events of the story: just as Hiccup is allowed to change. True, the adults can be silly at times, but so can the kids (and this movie knows when it needs to be silly and when it needs to be serious).

The movie doesn’t stop imploding typical Hollywood fare there, either. Its characters often aren’t… pretty. Stoick the Vast (Hiccup’s father) is a big, beefy Viking warrior in the classic sense. He doesn’t have slabs of muscle Hollywoodily stacked on top of more slabs of muscle. His arms are thick but not defined, and also clearly strong–not unlike some arms you’ll actually see in the real world. And his skin… his skin is a bit pale and freckled and ruddy, not unlike some other people you’ll see in the real world. How strange to see a bit of real proportion in a cartoon, eh?

So, this movie knows how to be real, knows when it needs to get serious, and knows when it needs to fly (something its upcoming sequel seems to be remembering as well). Not every movie knows how to do that, so it’s a real treat when one does–if you haven’t seen this one already, you should.

I Don’t Think You Know What a Reservation Is…

Humor Slice of BFS's Life (memoir)

When you take a trip, particularly an airline trip, it’s common to be nervous. I’m sure there are some travelers out there that don’t have imaginations like the Celt and I do, who soldier through airports and car rental lines like nothing bad will happen, but, by golly, I have to believe they’re few and far between.

There’s a reason this Seinfeld clip is funny. Because it’s true, and it happens.

Reservations get lost, people. Airplanes get over-booked, airplanes break down, car rental companies accuse you of damaging a car you did not damage (*ahem* that’s a story for another time), you name it. It happens. And boy, did it happen to us, almost two weeks ago. The Celt and I were traveling to Vermont and… *shudders* so much happened. So very much.

First, we got up at 3 in the morning, because the airlines charge you a little less of an arm and a leg if you fly before even morning birds are winging from tree to tree and singing. Then, we stood in the fog, waiting for a cab that kept not arriving, even though I had made a reservation a few days before for an early pickup. Why? They had misplaced the reservation, they said (see Seinfeld clip above for the second time). Then we waited some more for a cab that was “on its way,” waiting and waiting as our flight time grew closer and closer and as we grew more and more nervous. Just when I was about to go get our car and drive to the airport–outrageous airport parking fees or no–our taxi arrived. Squealing tires through the fog and fifteen or so minutes later, we arrived, just when they were boarding. But we made it, and what more could go wrong…

Right?

Oh, but our plane in Chicago had a mechanical failure, so we sat for an hour while they investigated and fixed. The Celt and I kept calm, read books, tried to ignore the cramped nature of ever-shrinking plane seats and leg room. And luckily, they fixed the plane and we made it to Vermont’s Burlington airport. We had made it, and what more could go wrong…

Right?

We approached the car rental counter with some nervousness (Seinfeld clip reference #3), but surprisingly enough, nothing amiss here. The line was short, the reservation was ready to go, and we had a nice, little red Toyota Yaris to drive (admittedly a little clown-carish when you saw a Big Frickin’ Swede get into it). I had driven through the area before and we had printed out directions, so we were home free. We ate and then enjoyed the gorgeous Vermont mountain views as we drove to Montpelier. The B & B stay was going to be no problem. I had talked to the owner many times in March and we had made a large deposit on our stay. We were home free for the two weeks, right?

Wrong! *laughs sadly, deprecatingly* So wrong, Mr. Big Frickin’ Swede. So wrong.

No one was at the B & B when we arrived. No one. There was a note for current people staying and a cell phone to call, but the husband that it belonged to did not pick up (the B & B is run by a husband and wife team, of sorts). Backtrack from the country outskirts of Montpelier to somewhere we could get wifi and find some more numbers to call. Finally reached the wife, who was out of state and told us… they didn’t have our reservation listed. Oh, she could remember me from all our discussions in March, but she just didn’t have the reservation listed anywhere (Seinfeld clip reference #4).

Long story somewhat short, they stuck us in another room that night (not the one we had reserved, someone else was in it. …Seinfeld clip reference #5). The Celt and I were panicking, since all the hotels and B & Bs in the area were very, very full, and we didn’t particularly care for how this was going. The husband returned later that night and assured us they would make everything right, as “This has never happened to us before!”

Despite these assurances, they kept talking about how we could stay with them for the whole two weeks, but there would be some nights (okay, every night for a week) where they would have to move us to other rooms in the B & B and two NON-consecutive nights (!) where they wanted us to stay at another B & B because they were booked fully. You know, with people that made reservations after we had (is this really Seinfeld clip reference #6? Egads).

This continued over three days, thanks in part to the wife being out of town (and wanting to play hardball) and her being the one that runs the show and the husband trying to appease us whenever we talked to him. Three days, while I reminded them of my reservation for one room for a whole two weeks (#7). And I reminded them of the massive deposit I had made back in March for one room for two whole weeks (#8). Finally, finally they did the right thing and let us stay in the one room I had reserved (#9), something that was a little essential since 1) we were on vacation for part of our stay and 2) I was attending classes for my degree and the Celt was doing her own coursework online: we couldn’t be moving all over and into rooms that didn’t have anywhere to study.

At the end of our two weeks, the husband said he’d love to have us stay again… after charging us the rate quoted to me back in March (this rate despite our staying in a smaller, cheaper room our first night and having to deal with all the junk they put us through… oh, and Seinfeld clip reference #10!)

Did I mention I was sick for the last week of our stay, coughing and hacking and trying to breath while staying at this place and going to class?

Yeah, it’s good to be back home.

Dreams Can Come True: Taking Flight With How to Train Your Dragon 2

Methods of Film

*takes a deep breath* Keep calm, Swede. Keep calm–you can do this.
“Wooooooot!”
I said keep calm!
“Sorry.” *sits* “Ohmygoshthisisfantabulisticallyawesome! Yeeeeess!”
You’re totally ruining your image, dude.
“I have a Viking avatar with glasses. I’m way past hip–though hopefully I’m somewhere near endearing. And even if I’m not… thisisthecoolestthingsinceever!”
Tsk. There’s just no helping some people. *walks off in disgust*

It’s pointless to resist. If you’re a fan of How to Train Your Dragon (and if you aren’t yet,why aren’t you?), you are or you will be excited by this trailer, released late last week by Dreamworks. One of the finest animated films I’ve ever seen is getting sequeled.

What’s exciting is not just the sequel treatment. Let’s face it, that doesn’t always work well. It’s what you can see in the trailer. It’s not one of those trailers that stupidly reveals everything about the story–it conveys the feeling of the film, and in doing so, the makers show they know what made the first film great. The flight scenes in the first movie still give me tingles and the trailer delivers that feeling in spades.

More, it seems the film makers are moving the story forward. The main character is older than he was in the first movie, so hopefully this means they’re not going to simply rehash what the first movie did (as much as I enjoy Toy Story 2 and 3, there are elements of rehashed themes in both). Sequels are harder to do than people think, and there is enough there to make me hope.

And to watch the first movie again (like The Celt and I did this afternoon) because we can’t wait for whenever the heck this thing is going to come out.

There’s Too Many Non-Hobbitses in My Hobbit Movie(s)

Methods of Film Movie Reviews

hobbitJRR Tolkien is one of my favorite authors. The Lord of the Rings is full of the stuff of life: themes and values worth thinking about, running right along great characters and a fantastic story. The Hobbit is also great fun in a more lighthearted way, with a delightful focus on how Bilbo grows and changes over his journey.

I also enjoy the three Lord of the Rings movies. They’re a little off from the excellent approach of the books (more and more as the three movies progress, actually), with elves that are more arrogant jerks than intriguingly alien, and with lords of countries that are villainous, rather than shown in shades of grey. As is almost universally the case (though not always), the books are better. Still, the three movies are engaging, doing so by maintaining their focus on a small group of characters that we grow to understand and care about.

I wish I could say the same for The Hobbit movies. And that’s the problem right there, the plural. I was reminded of this when I saw the preview for the second of the three movies (you can check the trailer link here). The three Lord of the Rings movies somehow managed to cover the content in three large books, doing a fairly good job of paring things down while staying true to the source material. With The Hobbit, Hollywood has decided they’re going to take one book and make it three! Whee! Yet another trilogy!

To be honest, I could understand if they had two movies to cover the storyline of the book, because a lot of things do happen. But they’re doing these three movies by tacking on a lot of stuff found in Tolkien’s side writings and appendices, trying to make a united whole that goes over the course of three films. The problem with that is these side writings are good fun if you’re interested in Tolkien, but terrible if you’re trying to make a focused narrative: there is a reason they’re in appendices and side writings. Tolkien was notorious for following side plots and writing about random things (The Hobbit grew out of a random note he put on a student’s paper that he was grading!), but he knew pretty well that you couldn’t have all that stuff crammed into a good book. And when he didn’t, his editor wasn’t scared to say this isn’t going to work.

I wish someone had said this to Peter Jackson and the rest working on The Hobbit movies. You can tell there’s a good story in the first movie. It’s the one that’s like the book, just following Bilbo, the dwarves, and Gandalf on their way to The Lonely Mountain. But this great story loses focus on this small group of characters (that we could grow to understand and care about) to keep throwing in stuff about other things going on in Middle-Earth at the time.

I was doing my best to hold judgement on this trilogy process until all three movies came out, but there isn’t any real need. You can see from the trailer that the second is going to be like the first. We’re going to have some sideplot with Legolas, even though he has little to add to the narrative of The Hobbit, and then he’s going to have lots of moralistic discussions with some woman that has equally little to do with the real plot (if he just had a cameo like Frodo does in the first movie, that would be fine). And every time the storyline with the dwarves and Bilbo gets going, we’re going to sidestep over to Gandalf and Radagast doing some… other unconnected stuff.

Peter Jackson is clearly able to have focus–we can see it in his Lord of the Rings movies. But he’s just taking on too much to handle with this script. An over-bloated script will be an over-bloated script, no matter what you do with it. If this was in a writer’s workshop, everyone would be saying, “you have some interesting things in here, but there’s too much going on all at once. Try to trim out some of these side tangents, or at least figure out which story you want to focus on.”

Whether it’s the Hollywood movie machine, Peter Jackson, or some wicked combination of all, these three movies are going to try to do too much and satisfy no one.

Oh, and I’m not even going to get into the random action bits that don’t need to be action bits. The barrel ride scene could be full of fun, beautiful, and peaceful visuals (remember the majestic lighting of the signal fires in Return of the King?), but it’s going to be a chase scene. Yes, a chase scene. Does this even make sense? What were they thinking, and how do you even swing a sword in a barrel without it tipping you over completely? … oh, I started. *ahem* I had better stop.

But I’ll dream and wish for a DVD cut of The Hobbit that only follows Bilbo’s journey. Hey, Swedish-sized hobbits can dream.

BFS Reviews: Star Trek Into Darkness (2013)

Movie Reviews Recommended Views

darknessStar Trek Into Darkness is a sci-fi Hollywood blockbuster. The Hollywood blockbuster is basically a genre unto itself, loaded with its own pros and cons (“The action is awesome!” vs “Ugh, can they do anything but action?” “Shaky cams add realism!” vs “Enough with the shaky cams already…”). This becomes more of a problem for some because Into Darkness is a Star Trek film–and Star Trek is a thinking person’s sci fi, right? The debate has been encapsulated by fans with a quote from Captain Picard in the movie Insurrection: “Can anyone remember when we used to be explorers?”

In other words, Star Trek is not supposed to be about action.

Balderdash. I’m not a huge fan of the original series, but it had its share of action sequences (and Gene Rodenberry had to rework the pilot to put in more action and make it more palatable to TV audiences–read into that what you will, but it’s been there since the start). One of the best Star Trek films is still Wrath of Khan, and the action and fighting is front and center there. This has only continued over the years with all subsequent movies and shows. Action is a part of Star Trek, and that shouldn’t be a surprise when you consider how varied the show is. It’s a delightful mix of politics, morality, relationships, emotions, and action–focusing on what it needs to focus on to tell its story. Star Trek is populist sci fi, not a niche sci fi film like 2001: A Space Odyssey (no matter how well known that film is, it is not populist).

Star Trek’s stories can be hit or miss, of course, but the stories that come alive are the ones that use any of those elements to explore its characters and ideas meaningfully. This can work in a revenge and action flick like Wrath of Khan or a more cerebral one exploring mortality like Generations. And it can work with a Hollywood blockbuster like Into Darkness.

Speaking of which (that preface did have a point), Into Darkness is stronger than its other JJ Abrams predecessor, which had a villain that liked to sit and brood in some dark throne room before randomly killing some things. The opponents in Into Darkness are allowed more time to develop and establish their motivations, which makes them more interesting foes for the new Kirk and Spock to tangle with. I worry that the opponents might rely a little bit too much on knowing earlier Star Trek stories to appreciate some of the nuances, but there is enough there for relative Star Trek newcomers to enjoy.

The actors playing the protagonists are also stronger in their second time around. Chris Pine as Kirk and Zachary Quinto as Spock are simply a delight to watch. They’re frustrated and intrigued by each other, their friendship growing even as they collide over how they respond to broken Starfleet regulations and the various crises a Hollywod blockbuster is going to throw at them. There wasn’t a scene where they weren’t clicking on all cylinders together. Even better, while they hit on the classic characteristics we know from Shatner and Nimoy in the same roles, they are carving their own way with the characters, not bound to where two actors have gone before… *ahem* it’s all enough to make a jaded movie-goer look forward to seeing them in the next movie.

The rest of the protagonists are a little more hit and miss. Zoe Saldana is allowed stronger dramatic moments than the original Uhura, thanks to her relationship with Spock (a change in this new Star Trek universe that is a welcome one). The script has less room for Chekhov, Scotty, and McCoy, who are reduced to their somewhat cliched parts. Simon Pegg works well within his limitations (he’s good fun as Scotty, even if he’s mostly used for humor), but I just can’t like Karl Urban as McCoy… he’s got the mannerisms of the original, and that’s it. He honestly feels like a caricature or someone spoofing the original McCoy, rather than finding the man in the character.

To JJ Abrams’s credit, he is juggling many things at once, and he’s paying good attention to the main characters and antagonists. That said, like his previous Star Trek outing (and many of the shows and movies he’s made), there are plot holes and strange technological workings that make you scratch your head if you stop to think about them. How is a character able to teleport across the galaxy when the Enterprise generally need to be orbiting a planet before they can beam something to it? The script doesn’t talk about this, even though the script later on won’t allow the crew to teleport someone that is less than a mile away.

Things are going too fast and too fun to make little things like this truly bothersome. The actors all believe in what’s going on and we’re just having fun watching them do it. This is populist sci fi doing what populist sci fi does best–and while it would be nice to have a Star Trek film in the future that explores the quieter side of the universe (or at least something more cerebral), this is still an enjoyable romp in the Star Trek Universe.

An Education Is More Than a Degree

Education Musings

It’s not uncommon for people thinking about education to place an emphasis on the end point, the degree. That’s not a real surprise, of course, since a degree does reflect something tangible and beneficial. However, this focus does lead to some troubling ways of thinking, ways of thinking that are more detrimental than they might seem at first glance.

1. “Cs get degrees”
2. Everyone deserves a college degree
3. Life starts after you graduate

I’ve encountered these lines of thinking numerous times as a teacher and an educator. And while each one of these has an element of truth to them, their overall implications are much more troubling. So let’s take a look at these three statements more closely. Considering this is the season when a new group of high school, college, and graduate school students reach out their hand to get that degree at the end of a course of study, it’s worth putting some thought into what an education actually means.

1. “Cs get degrees”
This is an amusing enough phrase, and it startled me and made me laugh the first time I heard it, considering I was a “gotta get an A or at least an A-” kind of student most of the time. And I have actually had to point out to students that an A- or a B+ isn’t going to sink their chances of getting into law/med/whatever grad school or dream job they want. Employers and graduate schools look at more than just your grades: more, they want to know what you have done and what you can do.

That said, this phrase creates some much more insidious thinking in a lot of different students. They say it in different ways, but they’re all hitting on the idea captured in this phrase. “Eh, I can slack off in this class, it’s not in my major.” “I kind of showed up to most classes and got some things in on time, so I should pass this course.” “Your class isn’t as important as my other ones.” And there are more ways to say it, believe me (I’ve heard those examples and more).

The response to any and all of the lines students can come up with in this train of thought? Bull. Yes, there are times where you have to prioritize between all the classes you are taking, as well as the jobs you might be working to pay for your college (I know all these things well), so I can understand when these conflicts of interest happen. But they happen all the time, with many students every semester. That’s not an occasional pile on of work that can happen to anyone, that’s a consistent pattern of thinking among many different students–a consistent pattern of thinking that devalues what is happening in the education process. How can it not? Rather than being outside of the norm, it becomes the norm to say any class or any effort just isn’t worth it.

How sad is that? Rather than education being a place where students train to be focused and work hard, it becomes a place to set in the worst of habits: phoning it in, procrastinating, not seeing the value of the work you are doing. From the frequent complaints about young workers you hear and see in the news (not to mention all the talk about lost twenty somethings), this line of habit is not uncommon.

So don’t let the simple line fool you. Yes, Cs technically can get degrees (and Cs are average work, not the bad thing that everyone cuts them out to be). But an education isn’t really about a grade or even a degree, but what you have learned in knowledge and in habits. We have grades and degrees as an attempt to show what we have learned, but they are imperfect. If you are going to be able to demonstrate what you can accomplish you have to look beyond the grade and the degree and value the work. Educators aren’t putting in those requirements because they’re evil and want to find ways to waste your time. That knowledge almost always has a value, especially if you go look for it.

And I can say that as a student who has had to sit through the occasional, seemingly pointless class. There are classes like that out there, but if you go into every class thinking they’re going to be like that, you’re right back at “Cs get degrees.” If you try to make yourself and/or your class average, it’s going to be average.

I think we’ll save the last two points for upcoming blog posts.

BFS Reviews: The Great Gatsby (2013)

Movie Reviews

IGreat Gatsby 2013s it necessary to do a spoiler-free review of a movie based on a book that’s almost a century old? Probably not, but there’s inevitably someone out there complaining when someone spoils the end of The Empire Strikes Back (okay, that was me–I couldn’t believe someone had “ruined it” for The Celt. She hadn’t seen the movie, so how could she know who Luke’s father was? Darn spoilery people types…).

In case you’re an oddball (curmudgeon?) like me, here’s your short, spoiler-free review. Baz Luhrmann’s usual penchant for spectacle on an enormous scale is at times a boost and at other times a hindrance to this classic American novel set in the Roaring Twenties. But it’s able to find its heart when it stops trying to party and instead focuses on its characters.

There you go, end of no spoilers.

Seriously, why are you still here if you don’t want them? Spoilers, dead ahead!

*clears throat* While Luhrmann’s past efforts (most notably Moulin Rouge) show that he can use spectacle to enhance his story, he’s more hit and miss with this element in Gatsby. First of all, his modern/historical parties can feel tonally out of place with the 1920s setting. Where Moulin Rouge is frequently tongue in cheek and a musical, both of which allow for more leeway with anachronism, Gatsby is a more serious movie–so the DJs and occasional rap songs feel more out of place than they should. Where the songs work best is when they are integrated more naturally with the scene, with modern songs being sung like they were a current hit of the 1920s (if I’m not mistaken, Florence Welsh of current band, Florence + the Machine, is a singing partygoer lounging on a piano at mid point in the film).

The parties are also overly chaotic. This makes sense for some of them, but a later scene where Nick eats lunch with Gatsby and Meyer Wolfsheim has much of these chaotic party elements for no reason. Yes, it’s a speakeasy, but speakeasies were not continuously neverending parties and that’s not what the scene is about: rather than adding anything, the huge party atmosphere is more distracting than anything else.

Where the parties do work is in their contrasts. While the party Nick attends with Tom Buchanan early on in the movie has many chaotic elements that can detract from it, they do serve as an amazing counterpoint to Gatsby’s afternoon visit with Daisy later in the movie. You can’t help but compare the afternoon with all the party scenes, and this smaller focus on Daisy and Gatsby meeting for the first time in years makes it all the more delightful.

This is indicative of the entire film. Luhrmann’s interpretation first found its feet for me when Gatsby finally arrived. Leonardo DiCaprio’s Jay Gatsby is merely talked about for the first twenty or so minutes of the film, and once he enters, he is sympathetically human, understandable, and varied. He’s somehow the suave host of his massive parties, and also the overly dramatic and moody man that knocks on Nick Carraway’s door before meeting Daisy, soaked by a downpour and halfway certain that this moment–the one he has been working to for years–just won’t work. When the movie and its sometimes disparate elements allow him to, we can feel Gatsby’s “immense capacity for hope.” Both its beauty, and its misguidedness.

Its other characters are not always as strong, but a good ensemble. Tobey Maguire is much as we would expect here, but his good-natured moderateness fits Nick Carraway well. Carey Mulligan fits the bill as Daisy, and is much more easily seen as an object of Gatsby’s desire than performances in past films (I’m looking at you, Mia Farrow, you of the obnoxious “I can’t stand ’em” voice). Joel Edgerton is serviceable as Tom, but other than for the film’s final 30 minutes or so, he’s too much of a bad guy. We can see no reason why Daisy has married him or loved him in the past.

Enough. More could be said about the movie and its strengths and weaknesses. Why did Luhrmann decide to make Nick Carraway so traumatized by the events of the story that he is now in a sanitarium? Why did Luhrmann give Gatsby a moment of near murderous rage toward the end of the movie? Why does he over-narrate his movie (when the camera serves part of the function narration does in a book)? Heck, why is Myrtle yet another slender Hollywood actress, when she is described in the book as “faintly stout,” yet able to carry her “surplus flesh sensuously?” Trust me, I could go into these: I did a Master’s thesis on Gatsby, I love the book that much.

Such questions and thoughts would have a point, but miss the better point of the movie. Its soul (as is the book’s) is in Gatsby and his green light at the end of the dock. It comes back to this time and again and finds it once more at the movie’s end… and nothing, not all the unneeded narration or party scenes, nor any of the movie’s other small missteps, can take that away. This, if nothing else, make this version of Gatsby worth a look.