Hamlet, Hamlet, and more Hamlet
So many movies—so much time. Let’s get going with Hussein’s Insanely Speedy Movie Reviews.
Great idea, Hussein, but first, do you ever use spell-check?
No.
I suppose you subscribe to what a futurely famous movie blogger once said about something like, “Pity the person who only knows one way to spell.”
Mark Twain had a movie blog?
No, but you could start channeling him and give me something else to do, like write an advice column on how to get into heaven.
Right, but still I should acknowledge an earlier defect in which I misspellede sobriety and even worse, mistakenly put a still-stunning, ravishing red-haired Georgia native in a socialist-sisters ski club at Vassar. For the record, my mother was not a member of the Communist Party at any time nor was she ever a sorority sister. Further spelling error detections should be directed to the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest which just announced its 2008 winner and which inexplicably refers to both Checker cabs which is the model that Dad had in Maryland after ditching the VW bus and also to our continuing theme of utility hole covers otherwise known as “manhole covers.”
Hence the just announced winning entry:
“Theirs was a New York love, a checkered taxi ride burning rubber, and like the city their passion was open 24/7, steam rising from their bodies like slick streets exhaling warm, moist, white breath through manhole covers stamped "Forged by DeLaney Bros., Piscataway, N.J.’”
Did you write that? No? Sounds like it could be. Movie reviews, please, Hussein.
Will Smith (note the initials) as Hancock in the revolutionary role of a black super-hero who also happens to be a drunk and along with the real Hamlet plays a tortured iambic soul who can't make up his mind. Co-starring with Charlize Theron’s cleavage (which easily out-acts Will Smith’s puckered lips). Literate movie-goers will not be looking at her earthly assets when she gets into bed wearing a tank top but will, of course, be reading the message on the tank top which bears the name of Macalester College, a pre-eminent school blocks from our house in St. Paul and the alma mater of the director, Peter Berg.
Theron’s father was an abusive drunk in real life which makes her role next to a drunken non-Scientologist all the more emotive. Will Smith claims to not be a Scientologist but he has (apparently) funded a school for budding Scientologists and (apparently) gave out free personality test coupons to the cast after the shooting was finished. Also, the entire story line in Hancock is about undergoing a personality change. So, make up your own mind. As in, does it make a difference in choosing to see a movie?
But in another incredibly coincidental convergence, Theron’s character’s name is Mary which happens to be Shakespeare’s mother’s name. As we all know, Freud said he based his Oedipus theories on Hamlet (as well as some old, dead Greek guy). So if Hamlet was mad at his uncle for marrying Hamlet’s mother because Hamlet wanted to marry her then the Hancock movie must be carrying the theory forward. But anymore and I’ll give away the vastly complex plot line. See this one at your own risk. Not really worth it as it makes "action movie" into an anagram for "I'm no actvoie." Spoiler alert: The movie does make a nice connection to angels and how they might interact with us. A much better movie is City of Angels with Meg Ryan and Nicholas Cage which was a remake of Wim Wender's Wings of Desire which I haven't seen yet but have heard is very good.
Things got really weird after seeing Hancock in the drive-in with Get Smart as the second feature. I loved the TV show. Not the movie, which was a huge disappointment. However, erudite fans will note that the actress who plays Agent 99 is . . . . Anne Hathaway. Which is . . . Drumroooolll. . . . the same name as Shakespeare’s wife!
Bartman Hussein O’Berlin, you are nuts!
Which leads us to Batman, O’Dark Knight.
Also Hamlet?
Yes, with the exception that it’s true to the Comic Book Code which says the hero never directly kills anyone. Too bad, since Michael Caine as Alfred could have been the exception. Caine was much better in Children of Men with Clive Owen. I loved Children of Men and will spend more e-mail ink on that Hamlet connection later. If you do see it, remember that it is very sad and depressing but also one of the most hopeful and joyful movies that I’ve seen. I did have an interesting emotional response when I watched the YouTube attachment about the dancing guy that Tish sent out a few months ago. I had just watched Children of Men and then re-watched the YouTube clip for the 10th time. The idea that an individual can bring people together in joy was the perfect real-life antidote to the possible near-future real-life of the “infertility of the individual soul” that is the story within Children of Men.
In anther stunning coincidence, the commentary to Children of Men (all the special features are worth watching) has a shot of the director wearing a sweatshirt from . . . drumrooolll . . . Vassar. We wonder what that means.
Hussein, another incredibly nebulous blog.
What the hell does nebulous mean?
Not clear.
Then why use the word?
Nevermind. And stop getting your jokes from the newspaper comics. And what the hell does “emotive” mean?
What?
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