Review: Where the Wild Things Are

This movie, like the book that inspired it, is written in the language of children. I had a little trouble immersing myself in it and was really only able to grasp how it made me feel hours later. Being grown and accustomed to stories with a different structure--more complex, perhaps, but also with more obvious fundamental truths--I was at first put off by the seeming lack of foundation. After some time to think it over, though, I would have to say this is a good film for parents to watch with their children, if not something that's going to entertain adults.

The film tells the story of a boy learning that his way isn't necessarily the best way and that sometimes it's hard to understand or do anything about other people's pain. It's a story of growing up. But more than that, it's a story of finding and nurturing happiness through caring about others.

These conclusions aren't immediately obvious. There's no narrator, and no character steps up and says "treating people badly is wrong, and here's why". Instead, we see the moral obliquely, through the characters' actions and their consequences.

When Max's sister's friends destroy his igloo, he's hurt and angry. The boys have crossed a line--a line that is only visible to Max. To Max, retaliating to snowballs with snowballs was perfectly acceptable, but he doesn't comprehend why they'd chase him back to his igloo and then break it in to get to him. The audience can see that the boys think it's all in good fun, but Max interprets their actions as maliciousness, and his sister's lack of understanding as abandonment.

Later, Max urges Douglas to throw dirt clods at Alexander. Alexander protests, but Max pays this no mind and has Douglas throw more dirt. It's only when Alexander becomes extremely upset that Max realizes anything's wrong. He comes full circle in this scene--now he's the boys, and it's all in good fun, except someone inadvertently got hurt. And like the boys, he doesn't know what to do until much later, when he finally apologizes.

Having seen hurt from both perspectives, Max realizes it's not as simple as he thought it was. It's not that people choose not to do things Max's way because they don't like him. It's that everyone has their own wants and needs and feelings that are different from Max's.

The Max/Carol relationship is very important. Carol is Max's analogue in the Wild Things family--he's the one who feels lonely and scared and fights those feelings by acting out.

Max feels lost and alone at the beginning of the film. His dad's gone, his mother's busy, and his sister is going through her own kind of growing up. When his mom splits her attention even more, inviting a man over, Max feels abandoned. This is similar to how Carol feels about KW running off to hang out with Bob and Terry. Max feels that his mother should focus her attention on him. Likewise, Carol wants all of KW's attention.

To try and get that prized attention, Max acts out in the kitchen. His mother doesn't react the way he wants her to so he fights her. It ends with Max biting his mother, and his mother screaming "What's wrong with you?" It's a total rejection, one that sends Max running out the door and down the street and through the fence and onto the boat.

Later, Max sees similar behavior in Carol, behavior he can't understand or control. He's afraid...and that fear causes him to withdraw from Carol. At that point he begins to understand his mother.

While these are the two examples of role-reversal that stuck out to me the most, the film is rich with them. The structure is therefore quite simple: introduce a perspective, then answer it with an opposing one. But the conclusions are never expressed. Max leaves the island without teaching the Wild Things anything more than basic love. And we don't see Max and his mother talking about what happened; all we see are looks passed between them and a strong embrace. We are left to find the lessons Max learned on our own. The closest we get is Max's comment to the Wild Things, "I wish you guys had a mother."

Because the moral of the story isn't obvious, I imagine many parents' gut reaction will be to not show this movie to their children. If you ignore the reversals that teach Max to see more than one side of a problem, you're left simply with a string of wild and violent behavior, many times frightening, overlaid with the grim prophecy of Max's teacher about the death of the sun and the human race. It's a dark picture that parents might feel they want to protect their children from.

But the movie is highly teachable. It's certainly not a film to let children watch by themselves, and it absolutely must be discussed afterwards. But the structure of the film allows for some very good instruction on the nature of human relationships, what it's like to make tough decisions, and how to find happiness in an uncertain world.

I would suggest parents ask their kids questions about Max's feelings and motivations at different times in the movie. "How did Max feel when the boys smashed his igloo? Why did he act out in the kitchen? Why did Max run away? Why did he decide to go home?" Through discussion, parents can help their children reach the conclusions Max did.

Previews before Harry Potter

There were several previews before Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, some of which made an impression.

It was neat to see the 2012 trailer on a big screen. The effects looked just as spectacular as they did on my computer monitor.

When the trailer for the next Twilight movie came on, before I could even tell what it was, 90% of the theater had an orgasm. At least, that's what it sounded like!

I was horrified that no one around me seemed to have read Where the Wild Things Are. I heard no shouts of excitement or even murmurs of recognition. One of the teenage boys in front of me explained to his companions, "It's some sort of book."

There was an ad for a movie about a boy becoming a hero with a long name I can't remember, and an ad for a kids' movie. And that's about all I recall.

Really, none of the trailers that were new to me were all that interesting. I'm not sure what movie I'm looking forward to at this point...other than seeing Half-Blood Prince again :)

Edit: I forgot about the preview for Sherlock Holmes, mainly because it looks completely stupid and non-Holmesian and its mere existence is enough to drive me to throw things. I probably blocked it out of my memory ;P

The original Terminator

So apparently the next Terminator movie will feature Arnold Schwarzenegger...or at least a CGI version of him, created from a full body mold taken when he made the first movie.

I'm actually pretty excited about this. I love continuity and cameos. I was only mildly interested in the movie before; now I actually feel like seeing it.

When we first started seeing CGI in movies, I was unimpressed. It looked fake and, worse, like it was drawn on top of the scene rather than existing in it. I could spot even the best-rendered model.

Around the time of the Star Wars prequels, that began to change. Watching those movies, I knew that most of what I was looking at didn't actually exist...but it was all seamless. Nothing looked like it had been added in later. Part of that was surely due to more realistic modeling, but I believe the fact that the movies were filmed digitally also made a difference. After that, it started getting harder to tell what had existed tangibly and what had been created with a computer.

At one time, I believed CGI could never surpass stop-motion animation in terms of feeling real. Despite the sometimes jerky movements, stop-motion objects have always had a depth to them. You got a sense, looking at them, that you could touch them. But nowadays I am rarely jarred when I see a computer-animated portion of a movie, and sometimes I don't realize it at all.

I don't know if I'm just getting used to CGI or if it's improved to the point that it looks real, but whatever it is, it has changed my approach to computer animation. Ten years go, upon hearing that a CGI version of Schwarzenegger was going to be in a movie, I would have thrown up my hands in annoyance and despair. But today, I think it's going to be awesome.

Blackface

Today I learned, via Japundit, about a new comedy whose plot involves a movie being filmed about the Vietnam War. Robert Downey, Jr. is playing a actor who has taken a role originally written for a black man. Rather than having the role rewritten, his character, one of a group of very pompous actors, is playing it black.

Given my previous discussions of race issues, you might expect me to be upset about this. I kind of expected me to be upset about this. But this is actually pretty awesome, for two reasons.

1) It's hilarious. I mean, this has got to be one seriously self-involved character, to think he can "play" another race. I'm pretty excited to see what kind of jokes come out of it. Done well, this could be truly effective modern satire.

2) Look at this:

I think this is pretty successful. And I don't think the message is that it's easy to make a white person look like a black person. I think the message is that we don't really look that different.

Hair, eyes, skin color, size...those can all vary. But at the core, we're all human beings. We're made of the same stuff, just in a thousand beautiful variations.

I think that's a very positive message.

Images courtesy Daily Mail

Great Christmas movies

All the Christmas stuff going on lately has got me thinking about my favorite Christmas movies. Here's a list of the ones that get me into the spirit:

Home Alone - The original, of course. Quintessential Christmas.

An Affair to Remember

Die Hard - Yes, Die Hard.

Elf

The Nightmare before Christmas

The Santa Clause

How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

While You Were Sleeping

The Star Wars Holiday Special - Okay, this one's a joke.

What are your favorite holiday films? Here's a pretty good list if you need to jog your memory.

Sometimes it's weird to read my father-in-law's MySpace

So there's this thing on MySpace (and probably email) where you forward and add to a list. Reid sent out one recently where you pick a movie title and add a certain phrase to it.

I think his addition to the list was the best.

The Day the Earth Stood Still between my legs

XD

HPatOotP

Originally posted on the AMRN GenDis, here is my reaction to the Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix movie, written right when I got home from the midnight premiere:

Live it.

Love it.

There are, of course, the usual deviations from the original that people across the internet are no doubt already complaining about. But the story was brilliantly told, the scenes that were removed or changed made sense, the casting was superb, and the new music guy is outstanding.

If I have any quibbles, they're with the very beginning, which didn't have enough Harry-in-a-bad-mood (I was honestly looking forward to watching him mope around in the flower garden); the Sirius scene (you know what I'm talking about) which was more...final than the book made it out to be; and the lack of a conversation about what Harry saw in Snape's past.

Loved Dumbledore. And Tonks. And Luna. And Snape, of course.

It's all over next week ;_;

David Spade does it again

The mashup at the beginning is fabulous. (I also love how Spade knows and employs words like "mashup"!)

Because I'm a sucker for shot-by-shot remakes

I am becoming a real fan of the Showbiz Show. Too bad I don't have cable...

Spider-Man 3 = awesome.

I'll wait awhile to give my full report, since I know my friends are going to want to see the movie and they wouldn't want me to give anything away.

Here are some general, non-spoilerrific notes:

Fabulous opening titles.
Amazing visuals.
A lot happened. I mean wow.
Lowell got old.
Yay for more Spidey characters!

I really want to say something about something that happened to Peter...but I'll restrain myself.

TMNT

I don't have a lot of time, because I should be in bed already, but I wanted to mention that I went and saw TMNT today, and it rocked. That fight in the rain? So amazing. CGI has come a loooooong way.

There wasn't enough Donatello for me, really; as usual the plot was Leonardo/Raphael-centric. But the ending hinted at a sequel, so maybe...:)

I also wondered why April seemed to be a dealer in ancient artifacts (and a ninja) rather than a TV news reporter. But eh. I don't care that much. (And Sarah Michelle Gellar did a great job voicing her.)

Love Casey Jones.

One of the best things about the movie was how it meshed so well with the other movies. You can't argue necessarily that it's in the same timeline, but the characters' personalities, situations, and even their voices and trademark lines just seemed to fit.

The music was also great.

I just discovered that the VA for Donatello was Barry in Friends. Now that's scary.