Why am I going to pay $10 to see this movie?
This isn't about baseball, it's about the American economy, and the way American's are changing the game of earning a living. Baseball is the all-American sport, and so is capitalism. Socially, this is going to be an important film because it's about us, Americans in the tight grip of an ugly recession that never seems to end, and encourage us in our quest to invent a new game out of the series of circumstances we've found ourselves in.
But Moneyball is primarily a story of conversion: taking the "old" game and "converting" it into a new game with new rules and new possibilities. Conversion stories are the most difficult to tell; that's why I am so disappointed that my two local mega-theaters which normally have all the films, are not getting in Machine Gun Preacher, another conversion story. Okay, it has a terrible title and lousy poster art, and it sounds like a mullet-wearing self-proclaimed preacher going around with some watered-down morals and forcing it down everyone's throat; that's what I thought until I was forced to sit through the trailer at another film I went to see:
This film isn't about Sam Childers, this is about America: just as Sam is coming out of a "bad time," so too are we, and the way to pull yourself out of a bad spell is love. When our own lives are filled with nothing but darkness, the Lord shows us how to give love, and by giving that love, we ourselves are healed. The reason conversion stories are the most difficult to narrate is because they have to completely depend upon the audience drawing upon their own experience and emotions to relate to the main character; cliches and devices don't work well or the film fails, totally. Especially when the story involves that greatest intimacy of all: our relationship with God because it's so unique and individualized that it takes a very carefully crafted screenplay to keep afloat without becoming dribble.
But it doesn't look like I will be able to see it until it comes out on DVD.
So, in the meantime, my mega-theaters are playing Sarah's Key:
Children always represent the future; Sarah's Key reaches back to the Holocaust in order to understand how we got to where we are today, because we can only understand today in relation to yesterday.
The big question I am asking myself is: why am I going to see Killer Elite?
There is one clue I am looking for in this film: motive. Motive in this action-film will provide an interesting insight into moral standards and what identifies an enemy in today's world. That's a difference between films of the 2000s and films of, say the 1990s: in the '90s it was easier to come up with a villain that everyone could hate and agree on, but today, that's a little trickier to do, and just trying to identify a villain or, at least, someone "behaving badly," can become a needle-in-the-haystack search.
I will be tweeting about this week's new releases as I get out of the theater, so sign up for The Fine Art Diner feed on Twitter to get them!
Just a note: I will be posting on The Wind in the Willows (and the rest of the British Imperialism series I have promised, including Mary Poppins: Frankenstein and Animal Farm) it's just taking a bit longer than anticipated, and I will quickly get reviews of the films I am seeing this weekend on the blog.
If you are not going to the movies this weekend, you should watch Ben-Hur on Turner Classic Movies this Saturday at 1:30 Eastern time. In my post How to Become a Film Connoisseur you can find Ben-Hur listed on the American Film Institute's Top 100 Movies of all Time list. It won a record 11 Oscars and has some of the most important--and often referenced scenes--in film history, so try and catch it. The first half (everyone seems to agree the first time you watch it) is slow, but every scene is necessary to building the conflict; the second-half is amazing, so bear with it and you will be well-rewarded!
This isn't about baseball, it's about the American economy, and the way American's are changing the game of earning a living. Baseball is the all-American sport, and so is capitalism. Socially, this is going to be an important film because it's about us, Americans in the tight grip of an ugly recession that never seems to end, and encourage us in our quest to invent a new game out of the series of circumstances we've found ourselves in.
But Moneyball is primarily a story of conversion: taking the "old" game and "converting" it into a new game with new rules and new possibilities. Conversion stories are the most difficult to tell; that's why I am so disappointed that my two local mega-theaters which normally have all the films, are not getting in Machine Gun Preacher, another conversion story. Okay, it has a terrible title and lousy poster art, and it sounds like a mullet-wearing self-proclaimed preacher going around with some watered-down morals and forcing it down everyone's throat; that's what I thought until I was forced to sit through the trailer at another film I went to see:
This film isn't about Sam Childers, this is about America: just as Sam is coming out of a "bad time," so too are we, and the way to pull yourself out of a bad spell is love. When our own lives are filled with nothing but darkness, the Lord shows us how to give love, and by giving that love, we ourselves are healed. The reason conversion stories are the most difficult to narrate is because they have to completely depend upon the audience drawing upon their own experience and emotions to relate to the main character; cliches and devices don't work well or the film fails, totally. Especially when the story involves that greatest intimacy of all: our relationship with God because it's so unique and individualized that it takes a very carefully crafted screenplay to keep afloat without becoming dribble.
But it doesn't look like I will be able to see it until it comes out on DVD.
So, in the meantime, my mega-theaters are playing Sarah's Key:
Children always represent the future; Sarah's Key reaches back to the Holocaust in order to understand how we got to where we are today, because we can only understand today in relation to yesterday.
The big question I am asking myself is: why am I going to see Killer Elite?
There is one clue I am looking for in this film: motive. Motive in this action-film will provide an interesting insight into moral standards and what identifies an enemy in today's world. That's a difference between films of the 2000s and films of, say the 1990s: in the '90s it was easier to come up with a villain that everyone could hate and agree on, but today, that's a little trickier to do, and just trying to identify a villain or, at least, someone "behaving badly," can become a needle-in-the-haystack search.
I will be tweeting about this week's new releases as I get out of the theater, so sign up for The Fine Art Diner feed on Twitter to get them!
Just a note: I will be posting on The Wind in the Willows (and the rest of the British Imperialism series I have promised, including Mary Poppins: Frankenstein and Animal Farm) it's just taking a bit longer than anticipated, and I will quickly get reviews of the films I am seeing this weekend on the blog.
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| It won 11 Academy Awards. |
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