The Avengers Will Ruin Superheros/ WTF Marvel Studios?

It is said that once every millennia the beast is stirred from it's rest and CHAOS REIGNS Well it has not quite been an Millennia, but its been damn long, and it is time for this critical volcano to explode from its slumber and the aforementioned prophecy to be fulfilled ! I know it has been a long time since my last review, too long indeed, but I hope to begin the long process of healing with a generous pan-cinematical review of a whole bucket full of shit movies I have endured these past moons...Part of me is disgusted by the state of the film industry I once loved so dearly, yet I consider myself lucky because its never fun to write a positive review, nor is it all that relavent - if a film works, it doesnt need to be elaborated on because it speaks by itself, for a viewer, there is no need to read a positive review as it is is often nothing more than a false approximation of a pleasurable experience and when when you watch a good film, you experience it , therefore, anything that might be worth mentioning in a written review really just acts as a vapid place holder for the real thing.

So what exactly has incited me to lurch into motion once again? Well, despite the fact that you have probably already formulated your own assumptions based on the title of this post, ill put it this way: I am writing this review because I am fed-up with the consistent (and apparently long-term) flow of liquid diarrea shit that has been coming out of Marvel Studios...

There was a time when Marvels Studios was a respectable outfit, there was a time when Marvel Studios helped realize multiple generations' worth of dreams, imaginations and what-ifs with films like Blade, Spiderman, X-Men, X2: X-Men United, there was a time when I looked forward to seeing the next Marvel Studios film....sure, some efforts were better then others, but then one day it all stopped. thanks to none other than hollywood's favorite hack, THE RAT I distinctly remember sitting through X-Men: The Last Stand on opening night and suddenly being overwhelmed by the sadness of it all...You see, for me, I grew up with the X-Men, I was, like most proper nerds, at least aware of the many branches of the Marvel tree, but I was Obsessed with X-Men, I always thought Cyclops had the most bad ass power in the universe, and my first crush was a mixture of Rogue and Storm...needless to say, I was NOT happy to see Cyclops DIE (seriously? WTF!?! (Spoiler)), and seeing my favorite fictionally family handled so poorly and forced through such an ill-conceived and confusing "story" was truly heart breaking... But I learned an important lesson with X3, it has become a cliche at this point, but back in 2006 it was a novel concept to me: Hollywood's Greed and Marvel Studio's cheapness and disregard for its CHARACTERS are very real, and ruining films for your unenjoyment...im going to repeat one word for a second: CHARACTERS... ill get back to that in a bit. I always understood that Hollywood was a business first, and an art second...or forth, or fifth...but with X3, after reading about the budget skimping, casting disputes, directorial changes and script rushing for months only to be sharted-on by the final product, I suddenly began to question Marvel's motives...but again, more on that later.

That was 2006, the following year proved to be a real humdinger, in 2007 we were all rewarded with Spider-Man 3, Ghost Rider and that Fantastic 4 sequel... Suddenly I found myself completely uninterested in Marvel movies, I had all but given up hope...but just like any good Marvel story arc, just when the hopeless alcoholic hits rock bottom...he finds his salvation and is saved! by a hopeless alcoholic.

In 2008 Marvel Studios, together with Robert Downey Jr got their respective shits together. The result was Iron Man, a terrific film that was all but OWNED by Mr. Downey Jr, that plus a creative script and great practical effects, Iron Man stands alone as Marvel Studio's finnest hour...and based on what I have seen lately, it will probably remain that way.

Iron Man is a great comic book adaptation, it is a great film; it is the best film Marvel Studios will ever make, and it is the worst thing that ever happened to Marvel Studios. You see, the one caveat of Iron Man succeeding as a film, was that somewhere along the line, it germinated a seed of an idea . That Idea was to recreate the Marvel Universe on Film, specifically, The Avengers Universe.

Marvel's ludicrous dream to make an Avengers Film has wholly consumed Marvel Studios for the past 3 years and at the same time utterly destroyed its integrity. I am of course referring to films such as Iron Man 2, Thor, and Captain America: The First Avenger. Let me speak plainly, None of these three films are actually any good. Thor is pretty much objectively terrible all around, and Iron Man 2 and Captain America, although seemingly honest efforts both suffer from under developed characters, infantile editing, schizophrenic story lines and general lack of heart... and its all because of The Avengers. You see if Marvel Studios didnt have the moronic notion to intertwine all of its vastly different characters into one universe, and then to force itself into a ridiculous production schedule leading up to a summer 2012 Avengers film...maybe, just maybe Marvel could have actually made some decent films...The problem lies in the fact that Marvel appears to ignore the fact that its comic book Characters have been developed over decades, in long-form comic book series that dwarf the scope of a single film and which exist in a medium that lends itself to reinvention; rule bending, role reversing, dimension flipping, death and resurrection are routine in comic books, but they usually dont work out in films...Instead of devoting one film to one character's world, his thougts, emotions, motivations, decisions and consequences (Christopher Nolan has devoted 3 films to 1 character), Marvel has for some reason decided to hack apart its character's core, throw in some cheap SFX sequences, a few useless Babes and blend it all together in a choppy 3D mess that hurts your brain


You see, as soon as Marvel Studios realized it could hype-up its established characters, then put them in shit movies and still make A SHIT TON of money, they apparently decided to save time and money worrying about making good films, and just started to work out how it could cram as many of its characters into as many films as possible: Enter numerous multi-picture contracts with actors and que a mad rush to get as many films into production as possible before the viewing public figures out that comic book films dont have to suck, and stops watching Marvel Studios Garbage.

WTF Marvel*

*my sentiment is exaserbated by the fact that Marvel Studios can, infact, still make a decent film...

REVIEW: AVATAR

So the time has come. Lord Cameron has released a new narrative film! And it isn’t some smelly love story starring a pre-pubecent Leo DiCrapio, oh no, it is a futuristic SciFi (NOT SYFY…STFU NBC) epic set on a distant planet and features “Very Hard to Kill” aliens, combat Mecs, Sigourney Weaver and its directed by…JAMES CAMERON!!! –THAT SHOULD BE ENOUGH I SHOULDN’T HAVE TO WRITE THIS, I SHOULD BE WATCHIN THE FILM AGAIN RIGHT NOW!!!!!!! But im not. Instead im wondering why everyone is shitting all over themselves for this film…

First a few high points. If you want to hear about the technology that Cameron basically invented for this film, looks elsewhere…YES it is incredible, and YES one MUST see this Film IN 3D IN THEATERS, so just go for the 3D experience, its worth it, but im not interested in writing about it, I don’t like 3D and I never will. LONG LIVE 16MM REVERSAL! What I am interested in writing about is the design of the Navi…I distinctly remember when a close friend saw the first official images of the Navi, he was fraught with disdain, infuriated with what he interpreted as a clumsy, un-original sketch barely on the level of some high-school deviantART portfolio. At the time I was sympathetic towards his argument, but I have since seen the light. The design of the Navi is not the result of a untrained student, instead it is a truly skillful design. I will go as far as to say that it is perhaps the most brilliant aspect of the film. What Cameron did with the Navi was create a creature that is truly alien but at the same time undeniably human. Avatar is not a story about aliens, it is a story about humans…or at least that is how the Navi are perceived. And this is important because it made it possible for the viewer to truly relate to the Navi, to connect with them on a human level, and draw so much more from the film. Cameron walked a fine line between too outrageously non-human (which would defeat dramatic attachment to the characters) and too human (which would defeat the wonder of the film). Although one could easily argue that there have been countless non-human characters who have been personified in various ways to promote a dramatic attachment with the viewer (E.T., R2D2, Alf, Roseanne, ect.), my argument isnt that the design of a relatable character has never been done before, but rather it is that the Navi allowed for a unprecedented amount of human-ness in the characters, a quality that built a truly strong bond between the on-screen character and the viewer. The Navi were human enough to be understood as and related to in terms of human emotions, yet they were fantastic enough to transport the viewer away from earth! Admittedly my point is difficult to articulate, but Cameron has certainly tread new ground through the mythic Uncanny Valley, an achievement which is truly remarkable.

Also, I must say that the finest bit of writing in the entire screenplay -besides the “RoboShank” (thank you/Filmcast)- is the situation Sam Worthington’s character Jake Sully finds himself in. A former Marine, who as a result of an accident is now confined to a wheelchair, Sully is given a new body in his Avatar, all of a sudden he can not just walk but run, jump (and later fly around on dragons)! The prospects of such a miraculous healing are profound, I know it is just a film, but this narrative device is awe-inspiring.

And now for the Ugly… To be honest, I do admire this film, to really sit down and try to poo-poo on the film would really be quite trite-but the film wasn’t perfect, in fact, when and where it does faulter, it does so well, so very, very well:

Exhibit A: “Unobtanium” the retardednessity of this name is quiet impressive, but I guess Cameron felt that the rarest mineral this side of Alpha Centauri should really have a clever name that alluded to how magically unobtainable it is… but then again if Cameron had picked a slightly less redumbulous name for the earth-saving ore, he would have had to come up with a better name for the “Flux Vortex” (the electronic dead zone around the floating mountains) and that would have been too much work for the poor old screen writers, I guess.

Exhibit B: Remember when in the first Matrix movie it is explained that when you plug into the Matrix your body is connected to the Matrix and if you die in the Matrix you die in real life also? –What was great about this little screen-writing device was that it added Jeopardy to the film because even though our characters were in a computer simulation, there lives were in fact on the line, thus creating DRAMA…anyway, how did Avatar handle this out-of-body plot structure? It didn’t, there was never any mention of the Avatar-controller’s actual lives being in danger, sure their “very expensive” Avatars might have gotten destroyed, but as far as the viewer was concerned, the actually human controlling the Avatar was basically invincible. Then, at the end when Joel Moore’s Avatar is killed in the final battle, we see him in the very next scene emerging from his Avatar-control bed perfectly OK… The problem with this approach is that it completely zaps all of the DRAMA out of all the Avatar shots, I mean if the Avatar “dies” then so-what…the person controlling the avatar is perfectly fine…the Avatar is nothing more than a tool, and no one ever cried about a broken hammer. This human life-isn’t-on-the-line approach really killed a lot of the high-tension scenes for me, specifically when Sam Worthington’s Avatar is chased by the Pandora-Panther early in the film, or when Neytiri is trying to save Worthington’s “sleeping” Avatar from the giant bulldozer the morning after they totally boned...would it have been too much to switch things up a bit and add a quick line or two about peril the controller was in when using an Avatar, I mean Cameron went out of his way to explain that the Navi are hard to kill because their bones have a “naturally occurring carbon fiber” in them…

Did I like the film? YES. Is it a “Game Changer” NO! So why all the stink? WHY is everyone soo excited about this film?!? Has every movie critic in America forgotten about the importance of Drama, Jeopardy, or Intelligent Dialogue…Or was everyone completely blind-sided by a 3D planet full of Blue Cat People, Dragons, and Florescent Plants???-I believe the answer is the latter, and I also believe that James Cameron knew this would be the case all along.

Film is entertainment, more specifically, it is entertainment for the masses, although the medium of Film can be employed to entertain the Intellect, it must be accepted that Film and The Cinema are Entertainment for the Masses. James Cameron understands his audience; he understands that they work shitty jobs, endure empty relationships, depend on excessive drug, alcohol and food consumption to get by, and enjoy evenings at the Movies where they expect the explosions and orgasms that are missing in their own lives. And Cameron knows how to deliver.

GUEST REVIEW: Ninja Assassin

Today we have the ultra extreme exclusive, wonderful, AMAZING pleasure of having a world class guest review by the great "Ryan". Please enjoy.

~ Don

Let me start this review off by saying that I saw Ninja Assassin the day before Thanksgiving, almost a week ago. This is important for a couple reasons: one- I've had AMPLE time to let my emotions settle, two- I'll be reviewing purely from mental aftertaste, after my brain's been tainted by the thorough making-fun-of we laid into the movie after our screening.
I assure you HOWEVER that I have culled the BEST points for this review, it won't all be teasing, because that would be useless to YOU the reader. Also I fear and respect this blog's overlord and quiver to think what he'll do if disappointed.

SO BAM- Put yourself in my shoes: Your on Thanksgiving break, on your way to see NINJA goddamn ASSASSIN with your cousin, brother and friend on opening day. You LIKE the wachowski's movies [They're producing this], EVEN SPEED RACER (not so matrix 3, but their hearts were in the right place). And your willing to forget the fact that you didn't really enjoy director James McTeigue's adaptation of V for Vendetta. Also Predator is one of your favorite movies of all time (just so you're deeper in my psyche).
So I'm in a great mood. Every single bit of me wants to love Ninja Assassin. A movie about a Ninja assassin. How could you possibly fuck up a movie called NINJA ASSASSIN? I thought to myself. How indeed, well read on my friends:

Lemme summarize the plot so I can more thoroughly make fun of it. Spoilers and whatever:
Ninjas are fierce creatures of the night that can move between shadows. For the past 1000 years or something they've been accepting 100 pounds of gold as standard fee for assassinations. Somehow this leads an American forensic reporter (or something) to discovering the secret order of Ninja Assassins that have remained hidden for one million years until now. So her and her cheeky British interpol agent boyfriend start to unsettle some shit. One things leads to another Ninjas want to kill them next. So the reporter girl is saved from the ninjas by our protagonist, rogue ninja, and all around hottie: Korean pop-star Rain. The rest of the movie is divided between Rain killing the fuck out of an inexplicable endless horde of demon-ish Ninjas and flashbacks painstakingly filling us in on why Rain wanted to defeat the ninja clan and how all Ninjas are trained orphans or something. BIG SPOILER ALERT: He defeats the Ninja clan.
A COUPLE OF QUALMS (in order of recall):
-The fucking point of the movie is that Rain is the baddest mother fucker of them all, but not ONE of the flashbacks shows young Rain excelling, standing out among his ninja orphan peers, or really doing anything but whining. Later on in the movie this dude is unbeatable.
-They done did something that really pisses me off in a vengeance flick by introducing a love interest just to kill her. It was pretty clear from the beginning that this was that girl's purpose was to die. Their relationship seems non-existent and forced. SO in short, the REASON for Rain going rogue and risking the rest of his life in this vengeance flick written like an silly after-thought. Rendering most of Rain's rage the rest of the movie impotent.
-SOMEHOW everyone dies from interpol dies in a ninja attack EXCEPT the reporter girls interpol-buddy. Which is REALLY lucky for the plot.
-In the flashbacks its pretty clear that the head bad-ninja is training a single group of about 30 orphans. The rest of the movie is FLOODED by an endless wave of faceless ninjas that I guess were there and off-camera the whole time.
-Another moment of weird injected intensity is when they outfitted Rain with a nemesis, 3 quarters of the way through a movie. Somewhere along the line some ninja on Rain's tail starts calling 'Little Brother' and later on delivers some of the cheesiest lines in the movie, just in time for the audience to understand that this is an important bag guy.

SO ENOUGH of that, the story is fucked. The acting is silly and at some times painful. Almost impossible to overlook, because it took a lot of the zest away from the action, but WHAT ABOUT THE ACTION. What about the driving force behind the movie?
I'd say the most innovative point of the movie were the shurikens. They were flying like bullets and ripping people to shreds like machine gun fire. (except for when they were hitting Rain), but that shit was prety cool.
The blood was the second innovation, digitally enhanced to splurt and fly further than practical effects could allow. At first its cool as hell, but soon you realize that the buckets of blood pouring out of people's appendages isn't hitting the ground. A room where 4 guys were just dismembered has pretty much no blood on the floor. Takes away the oomph.
Sometimes it works.
That actually sums up all the action sequences: sometimes they work. There is some cool stuff every once and while.

So see it, why not right? I mean- what do you want from a movie called Ninja Assassin? They failed trying to get us to really feel for any of the characters, but the action is eye-candy. Bloody bloody eye-candy.

THANK you.

PS- Two other dumb things: the ninjas hiss like vampires in the shadows and somehow a legion of humvees make it to the top of an isolated ninja mountain. So, you know, remember to hate those things.

REVIEW: 2012

With my most sincere grievances I have ignored this blog for far too long; it is a crime to civilization to withhold my moviebrainthoughtsknowledge from the public for such extended periods of time, but, alas, the arbiter has come to rectify his sins.

So fear not! For your patients through this dark age will be rewarded: I submit to you me review of Ronald Emmerich's cultural chimera 2012.

Unfortunately the infamous TOMATOMETER has not been so kind to this character-driven plotastic masterpiece and I feel that it is my duty to tell you RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW that I liked it. "dont knock it before you try it"-a chinese proverb that i have chosen to illustrate my endorsement of this film...

Lesser critics have hailed this film for its visual effects but i am here to tell you that they all missed the true brilliance of 2012. Emmerich's transcending grace is not in the ludicrous SFX sequences, no, the true genius in this film is its un-paralleled ability to assram almost every single cinematic cliche' into a lean two and a half hour package. I have taken the liberty to create this brief and grossly inadequate list of some of the classic hollywood throw-backs I can remember all to well. (spoilers)

1. A scene where we find a young man who knows his life will soon end calling his Father to say goodbye

2. A scene where a Father attempts to call his long estranged Son only to be cut off at the last moment un-repented

3. A captain who chooses to go down with the ship rather than save his life (this reference is later explicitly stated after said captain dies)

4. "Dont Look BACK!"

5. A ridiculously hot supporting female character/love interest who is unimaginably hot compared to the main character who is a total loser(but soon to be hero, duh)

6. A broken family that is brought together under absurd circumstances only to reconcile and live happily ever after

7. A douche new boyfriend who is rich and successful compared to the loser(soon to be hero)exhusband/main character

8. A secret government/global cover up that goes perfectly for years upto the last moment thanks to a loser-turned-hero protagonist

9. A at first good-guy politician who then becomes an evil power-hungry tyrant

10. A righteous young scientist who is absolutely wise and selfless

11. A arrogant russian character who at first we all hate but then grow to love

12. "PULL UP!"

13. A crazy omnipotent Hippie who somehow has all the answers...and even a map

ect...

The sheer amount of cheese and bad acting in this film is mind-numbing- it leads me to ask why Ronald Emmerich allows it? Does he think he is producing a great work of cinema? Does he think acting and plot are irrelevant to his movies?- does he view his audience as so stupid that they will mindlessly lap up anything he throws in front of them as long as the women are hot and the explosions are big?!?

Why do I see these blatant flaws but still sit here perfectly content with my movie going experience? Have I lost my edge? I used to hate this kind of film, but why cant I hate 2012? Why does America watch this kind of movie? and why does the international audience LOVE this kind of movie???-arent they supposed to me smarter and more sophisticated than us?

In a film that is so ripe with ethnic stereotypes, terrible acting, preposterous scenarios and atleast an hour of (almost) unimaginable CGI sequences, it was very strange to walk away from it content. What does this say about the role/importance of theatricality in cinema? Can a film really be carried on CGI alone? In a way there was something incredible about watching LA Burn, Yosemite Explode and the rest of the world Drown...These images seemed to feed some repressed hunger for pain, chaos and death-what does this say about the audience, and what does it say about me?-and why was seeing a completely fictitious man call his father to say goodbye one last time so difficult to watch?!? its truly incredible to think that such a base film managed to provoke such emotional heights...this makes me wonder how far one could take that image away from reality and still achieve a string emotional response-how simplistic is our emotional wiring?

On this thanksgiving Ive found myself thankful for my father, and the opportunity to go out and watch 2012 with him. I love you Dad.

MiniREVIEW: Ponyo

Ponyo, Ponyo, Ponyo… Ah, the lovable Ponyo movie, how ever should I start..? It was the new Miyazaki film, I couldn’t help be excited for, and admittedly ready for this film. I mean the director behind Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke certainly commands a certain amount of respect. BUT THEN PONYO HAPPENED.

Lordly lord, where ever should I begin? Ive read up and down about how beautiful the hand drawn animation is, how wonderful the water sequences look, and how imaginative the character design is…and I have to say Yes! The film does have its pretty moments, BUT SO THE FUCK WHAT.

Absolutely nothing happens in this vacant, plot-less hallucination of a movie. The whole film seemed to be brimming with promise, each new scene loaded with the potential to shotgun the audience with a macguffin, but alas, that illusionistic plot device never appeared. Instead the audience was treated to scene after scene of increasingly improbable and bizarre sequences that moved the non-existent plot foreword steadily and safely...THEN! all of a sudden, at the end of the movie…get ready for it… IT ENDED!
I could “be fair” and acknowledge the fact that this is just a simple children’s film with a simplistic target demographic with low expectations and a base sense of quality…but you know what Hayao Miyazaki, CHILDREN ARE FUCKING SMARTER THAN THIS. And also, how the fuck do you come from Spirited Away and end up with PONYO!?!?

miniREVIEW: SilverDocs Pt2

Regrettably i have found myself to be exceedingly busy these past two weeks and unable to keep up my blogging duties on a regular basis. As a result time has deteriorated my memory and with it any hope of a legitimate review for any of the terrific docs I saw at SilverDocs. Because of the afore mentioned circumstances i will now basically wrap my SilverDocs thoughts in a much abridged form with this post.

To start things off on a particularly strong foot i will discuss my personal favorite of the festival first.

"Late is arbitrary." In three words this sentence causes one to question time and its relevance in the universe. After all, time is a manufactured metric created by humans to help us organize our world with-in an infinitely chaotic universe. But I have digressed, before i shovel this blog full of pretentious philososhit about time and space, i will attempt to speak coherently about Coco Schrijber's wonderful film Bloody Mondays and Strawberry pies. Narrated by the sonorous and enthusiastic voice of John Malkovich, Bloody Mondays goes far beyond the callings of documentaty films. Although it charades itself as a exploration of Boredom and the human condition, Bloody Mondays is in fact so much more. Through a series of delicious interviews that are unmatched this side of a Werner Herzog film and with Malkovich reading from both Notes from the Underground and American Psycho, This film touches thoughts and feelings that are rarely evoked in todays cinema. To try to put my own spin on the material presented in this film would be too self important even for this aptly (or perhaps not so much anymore) titled blog. Instead I will share a few ideas that the film roused during my viewing.

First, is it possible to be bored with out knowing it, or is it impossible to be bored and know it?

"Does every young person believe they will lead a fascinating life?"

Why does time matter? Why have humans created a abstract system to measure what we perceive to be "Time"? Because of Death time matters.

The best appraisal i can find for Bloody Mondays is that in many ways it reminded me of Errol Morris's transcending piece Fast, Cheap and Out of Control. In other words, Absolutely watch it.

Given my time restraints I will now have to curtail my review work and wrap with one final mini-Review.

Of all the films that played at SilverDocs, one will rise above the rest in terms of public success and perception. I feel compelled to speak about Louie Psihoyos' The Cove not because I found it to be a particularly good film, and not even because I agree with the themes in the film. I am speaking about this film because from a theoretical filmic standpoint, the film presents a very serious issue.

Before I get into the meat of my argument, i must elaborate on the content of the film. The Cove deals with a secretive cove and industry in a remote region of Japan that is responsible for the capture and slaughter of 23000 dolphin a year. From what the film tells me, it is apparent that this industry is a well guarded secret both in Japan and across the world. This film is designed to show the world what it does not know and to incite a movement to stop the capture and killing of dolphins. And this is exactly why I am writing about the film today. This Film is Propaganda.

I will admit that the film is very well made, it is paced well, beautiful, mature, captivating and tense-all excellent qualities that are hard to find in documentaries, but given its unyielding political agenda, I find it difficult to absolutely praise this film. It is no doubt effective, after watching the film I felt compelled to approach the director and his marketing personal to inquire about when this film would be available for campus distribution because I thought that students needed to be able to see this film NOW! But those feelings were not the effect of a particularly strong film, they were the result of effective propaganda, and I was the target and the victim.

This brings me to the most interesting aspect of a film like The Cove. Given its backing and run-away success across the festival scene, The Cove is getting setup to be a Box Office and TV Home Run around the world (even Japan). It will draw millions of views and create millions of Dolphin-activists. So is it ethical for a Film Maker to create this kind of a Film even if it is for a seemingly positive cause? I must say the answer is No. Propaganda is a political tool, it is more than a political tool, it is a weapon-and i dont need to elaborate on the merits of weapons.

I do not believe that The Cove handled its material ethically. To the general public this film may be understood as journalism and the Film Makers seem to have every intention to promote that view. So why didn't they just produce a piece with strict journalistic integrity?

miniREVIEW: SilverDocs Pt1

I experienced manyafilm at SilverDocs and despite my tremendous enthusiasm for many of them, my unyielding laziness will prevent me from reviewing each film on an individual basis.

To start things off, ill talk about the biggest fuking disappointment of the festival for me... Act of God by Jennifer Baichwal was a convoluted mess from the director of the rather fantastic Manufactured Landscapes. How one drops the balls so quickly and so drastically is really hard for me to grasp. Everything from the wondering tone and style to the poorly shot b-roll and the apparent complete lack of organization or script leads me to believe that this was a early working cut that got released just alittle to early. I will generally be very liberal with my acceptance of irregular works, but this film pushes it in the wrong way. Baichwal, who was at the screening prefaced the film by telling the audience that unlike most documentaries which "answer questions" this film "asks questions". At first this statement left me baffled and intrigued-baffled because I would never agree with this statement(?!?) and intrigued because I understood her to be saying that the film would be raising maverick questions that I would ponder for days...Right now I should probably mention that the film is basically about the phenomenon of getting struck by lightning and how people respond to it across the globe. A interesting subject but a terrible film. The only questions I found myself asking after the screening was why would a reputable director release this, and why did I take absolutely nothing away from such strong material? In the post screening Q and A the term "abstract" came up alot, and as is usually the case the A-word was used as a passive aggressive euphemism to disguise a descenting opinion.

*In hindsight I have come to realize that the only question I could really glean from this experience was Why did Baichwal open her film with her own view of this film? Was she perhaps insecure about the product??

Surprisingly that turned out to be much longer than I had anticipated, but for good reason-so stay tuned for further installments from SilverDocs.