52 for '22: Where the Buffalo Roam

Movie: Where the Buffalo Roam (1980)

Method: Netflix DVD

The drugs starting kicking in around Barstow
Jk they do not go to Barstow in this movie

Why Did I watch this?

I forget what got me into Hunter S. Thompson. It was either Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) or Hunter Gathers from The Venture Bros. But I great an appreciation for his world-bending gonzo journalism, as any teenage boy who wants to strike out against the establishment does. I wouldn't say I was like a diehard, consume every bit of writing he ever did, but I thought Fear and Loathing was funny and I appreciate the hippie-adjacent culture of subversive truth and drug use.

I had heard about Where the Buffalo Roam years ago, probably from Wikipedia scrolling of both Thompson and Bill Murray ephemera. It always stuck out to me - like how was there this movie of early Bill Murray playing Hunter S. Thompson just sitting there with no cultural appreciation? It's been on my radar for a long, long time (I need to start logging when I put these movies in my Netflix Queue. It's probably been 10-11 years), and I really wanted to pull the trigger on this.

What Did I know ahead of time?

Pretty much exactly what I mentioned above. 1980 Bill Murray, released three months ahead of Caddyshack (1980), during his last spring at SNL. He had been in Meatballs (1979) the year prior, but this is just a forgotten gap in his early resume. But I knew Bill Murray played Hunter S. Thompson, that they were friends and his performance was heavily praised at the time.

How Was It?

This is not a good movie. But it's so close to being a good movie. All the elements are there, but it's missing some thing. It's hard to place your finger on it, although quite frankly, it's missing the element that made Thompson's writing so memorable sixty years later (seriously, the list of 1960s and 70s magazine journalists we're still talking about today is very short). It's missing energy, it's missing pizzazz, it's missing GONZO!

This movie feels as if it they thought they could just shoot Bill Murray on screen for 99 minutes and that would be enough. It almost felt reminiscent of 1941 (1979) where the thought seemed like just having John Belushi would be enough, but there's no material to work with. And to be fair, Murray does carry this movie. But it's amazing that even though he's trying, this doesn't feel like a Ghostbusters (1984), a STRIPES (1981), or even a Meatballs. It feels so flat.

This kind of thing drives me nuts, so let's get into it. It really comes down to the direction. The screenplay doesn't have a great drive to it - it's ostensibly about Thompson and his relationship to Carl Lazlo (Dr. Gonzo in Fear and Loathing, Oscar Acosta in real life). Supposedly this screenplay grew out of an attempt to capture Acosta's life, and you can tell that here. The film is split into three big chunks - the first is a courtroom drama of Lazlo attempting to defend some young hippies, Thompson covering the 1972 Super Bowl where Lazlo distracts him and sells guns to revolutionaries, and then Thompson on the Nixon campaign trail where Lazlo again comes and distracts him, getting him kicked off the plane.

The first segment relegates Thompson to a supporting character role. Peter Boyle plays Lazlo with great effect, and it's really compelling court stuff that reminded me of The Trial of the Chicago 7 (2020), but again, it had no spirit, no energy. Scenes linger either too long or two short, there's no comedic timing of the cuts, blocking, or line delivery, and at its heart, it doesn't really know what it wants to be. Is it a comedy, a dark comedy, a dramedy, a drama? Who knows. It can never quite pin itself down. Murray parading around with his bloody Marys that he eventually gets all the law students to drink is genuinely amusing, but he also just isn't much of a factor here.

From there their relationship begins to fray, as Lazlo starts running guns, which pushes Thompson over the edge. He maintains his aloofness, but that doesn't gel with the actual tension in the scene where Lazlo and a bunch of Mexicans are trying to escape from a shady airport from the police in a helicopter above them. Immediately preceding this is the closest we get to the more familiar Thompson legend, his insane hotel escapades all on Rolling Stone's dime, and the bit where he trades his Super Bowl VI Tickets and press pass for a bottle of wine and a hat is inspired.

But it's just all over the place. We are essentially looking at their relationship at three different points in time, and there is an arc there, but it's not developed. The final segment may be the best in this movie, where Thompson is on the campaign trail of "the Candidate" (Richard M. Dixon) and ends up drugging and swapping places with a more respectable reporter from the Washington Post to get on Nixon's plane. He then runs into the big dude himself, where the gag I guess is that he has painful urination? Lazlo shows up and starts ranting about buying land in Mexico where they can do anything. Thompson says that's stupid, and then the movie just sort of ends.

It's disjointed in focus, but there is a throughline there in the degradation of their relationship. But is this what anyone wants in a Hunter S. Thompson movie? It seems bizarre to stick it with a plot at all. Reading more about the production seems very troubled and doomed from the start. I wanted to like this, but I think there's a reason Fear and Loathing remains the definitive take on this dude.

Murray as Thompson is cool, though. It's a perfect marriage of two cool dudes whose personas were largely based on being tricksters who didn't give a fuck about anyone else. I think it's easy to say that ends up being problematic in today's society. Like, we would definitely have people on Twitter saying that you should treat hotel staff better. But it's also what makes them really cool. And Thompson, at least in this movie always seems to rope the unwilling staff into his shenanigans and eventually has a fun time. But really, the idea of not giving a shit about anyone is so liberating, isn't it?

I was also intrigued watching this film as ideas and concepts bubbled in my brain - in the 60s and 70s the idea of subversive going against the grain anarchy was a thoroughly leftist affair. It's the classic slobs vs. snobs mentality that Murray built his career around. It was always these hippies or hippy descendants who would rile up the stodgy old establishment. This is still a great mine for comedy. But in modern times, it feels like the right are the mavericks, not caring about anyone else, and riling up the precious PC-obsessed left. It's bizarre to me that this switched and to me it's just a gaslighting fallacy, since conservatives do in fact want the stodgy old order to remain, like that's the whole point. It's disruptive in a way that caters to a specific group of people instead of acceptance of all. But liberals are painted as the stuffy ones who can't take a joke. And that might largely be true. It's a fascinating development. Why can't we just laugh at rich people getting sprayed with a fire extinguisher anymore? I dunno, maybe I'm part of the problem, my thought during that was also that there were plenty of respected journalists who had done nothing wrong except not be weird. Also there is some problematic unconsensual drugging in this film. I'm definitely getting old, when the old guy from the Post was clearly annoyed at people playing football on an airplane my thought was just "that's so reasonable, he's just trying to do his job!" Is there a line between cultural subversion and just being a dick? Probably.

Anyway, this movie was kind of fun, but largely deserves its forgotten reputation. It remains an intriguing little bit of what could have been, but for the full Hunter S. Thompson experience, probably just reading his collected works or watching Fear and Loathing is the way to go.

Check out more 52 for '22 right here!

Ghostbusters 3: Feminist Revolution or Distaff Counterpart?

There were a few big announcements in the upcoming movie world yesterday - the first was a long-awaited trailer for Fantastic Four (2015), which is a franchise no one really cares about (and Fox looks like it's going the DC self-serious spandex route rather than the Marvel doofy route...rough choice for this brand), but much more important was the casting announcement for Ghostbusters 3: Vaginathon. That's really only a working title, my guess is that the final title gets rid of the "3," because it doesn't seem to actually be a direct sequel.

This is one of those projects that I'll only really believe is happening when I sit down in the theater. Actually I probably won't believe it until the movie is over - I'll always have some part of me waiting for Dan Aykroyd to walk into my theater and announce that they didn't actually finish it halfway through its premiere. All signs, however, point to this headed in a great direction, with director Paul Feig injecting some much needed life and energy into the project and the casting of four very talented comic actresses to inhabit the lead roles.

Somehow most of the Internet has avoided this, but I totally want to pair up each of these four ladies with the original leading men. I thought about this long and hard and eventually couldn't really do it, which is a good sign of strength for the project. Feig isn't grafting women onto the original roles, he's creating new ones (hopefully) based on their own comic personas. At this point it should be said that I am kind of against the all-female casting simply because I don't think it's really pushing feminism to just do a girl version of a guy thing. That's not really innovative. Why can't we have an entirely new property centered around women and just have that be popular? This has really happened with Feig's other work, even if it didn't quite turn out to be true. Bridesmaids (2011) was seen largely as the female Hangover (2009) and The Heat (2013) was the female buddy cop movie.

See the problem here? Female buddy cop movie is a really cool idea and The Heat worked better than it should have, but when will we reach the point where we call that "buddy cop movie?" Probably never, simply because the formula had been created and done to death with dudes for like thirty years. So, that's my major gripe with just casting women to fill in for men. I may have actually been more okay with a mixed cast that didn't seem so obvious in creating a gender flip.

The counter-argument is, of course, the fact that none of this should matter if the film is actually funny, well-made, and provides roles and launching points for funny women, which in the case of Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones, it ought to do. That's really what Bridesmaids was about - it was billed as the female Hangover but is really its own movie. I'm not sure you can do the same with a big franchise, especially one whose tone is as tricky as Ghostbusters, but I have the kind of confidence in Feig that I have in Phil Lord and Chris Miller, who have an uncanny ability to turn any terrible-sounding property on its head.

Getting back to the casting, with the knowledge that this isn't really a perfect mix, I want to establish those distaff counterparts more directly. This runs counter to everything I said above, but it is a nice character exercise and it ought to help us understand the range and roles of these women. Let's try to take it from that angle. Let's begin with a review of the original cast:

Harold Ramis as Egon Spengler: The straight man, although his esoteric nature is played for laughs. The brains of the group who can make their gadgets.
Dan Aykroyd as Ray Stantz: The heart of the group and the most filled with hope, wonder, who believes in ghosts more than anyone.
Bill Murray as Peter Venkman: The player, the smartass, the cynical sardonic breakout star, and the only one given a love story.
Ernie Hudson as Winston Zeddemore: Mostly used as the audience stand-in, the guy other characters can explain things to. He's also the only non-scientist, so more of a blue collar working dude.

Time to a take a whack with these ladies:

Kristen Wiig as Egon Spengler: For some reason Wiig is the only one I can picture doing totally straight-faced line read and inventing gadgets. She has an ability to go really really big, but is also probably the best actual actor amongst the lot and can do stoic really well while still being funny. She's obviously not Harold Ramis (who could also play real loose, such as in Stripes [1981]), and should add a bit more flair to the role.
Melissa McCarthy as Ray Stantz: There's no one else in this cast with more heart than McCarthy, who also filled this kind of role in Bridesmaids. She can also do outrageous, which is more Venkman, but Ghostbusters isn't really known for its fecal humour or potty mouth. Rough. There's no telling if this will be an R-rated Ghostbusters (we can only hope...no, there's no way in Zuul that's happening with this tentpole), but she ought to be dialed down. If that makes her more of a Mike & Molly McCarthy, I can see her being the Ray-type gullible innocent soul more than anyone else.
Leslie Jones as Peter Venkman: These last two were pretty tough because neither really has many roles to observe other than bits from SNL. While it's really obvious to pick Jones as Zeddemore (c'mon, people), I can see her more as a fast-talking skeptic than the blue collar audience surrogate. Like this as a matter of fact. Bill Murray and Leslie Jones seem like really strange comic siblings, and Murray has always been far more subtle and sly than the boisterous Jones, but I think she can pull it off. Although I like to think of Venkman another way - after the Stay Puft Man explodes, who is going to emerge looking perfect and not covered in goo? I can see Wiig doing that, but no one is a better Spengler.
Kate McKinnon as Winston Zeddemore: Here's a real oddball choice. McKinnon could slide easily into either Venkman the brash young, quick-witted sarcastic scientist or Spengler the stoic brain, but she also randomly excels on SNL by playing old down on their luck but extremely positive women, which is really Zeddemore-like, in a way. He's a hard-working dude but he's also really open-minded and a true team player. That's surprisingly McKinnon-like.

So, what do you think? Am I encouraging the lens of distaff counterparts over true original feminism? Or was that something that the new Ghostbusters was always doomed to face? I'm kind of curious about everyone's opinion, to be honest. And do you think I have these characters nailed down or will they be totally new? I do lean towards totally new because no one quite fits into a mold. At all. That's actually the most encouraging sign when you get down to looking at this, to be honest. It will be a whole new property because no actress here can fit snugly in the shoes of the 'Busters who came before.

Or they'll try to force it and this movie will suck hard.

We're waiting something outrageous like July 2016 for this one, so sit tight.

An Analyzation of the Targets of the Past Forty Years of Comedy Films

It's interesting to determine what spurs the conversation on the Internet. You'd think that in general, with instant and continual access of every bit of information known to humanity, we'd talk about everything all the time. Instead, there is a steady stream of contemporary events that inform pop culture discussion. This week, even though it hasn't really been a domineering critical or commercial success by any means, everyone seems to have either the revitalization or desolation of sword-and-sandal epics in the wake of 300: Rise of an Empire (2014). Likewise, a few weeks ago in the wake of the death of Harold Ramis, everyone couldn't stop talking about the monumental influence he had on the modern comedy, even if Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Doug Kenney, and John Landis are probably equally to blame.

Still, I was attracted to this piece by the New York Post, which essentially lamented the fact that the comedy films of old drove their satire through targeting venerable but corrupted institutions while the comedies of today only target poop and vaginas. While any kind of nostalgia-thumping like this is basically selective remembering (if you look at a list like this, most of the films we remember and talk about today are mostly satires - which is fair to say that they have perpetuated in our culture, but were far from the only films being produced or popular), it also drew me into a larger conversation - how do we judge the evolution of the modern Hollywood comedy film based on its target?

1970s: Institutional-Smearing Comedy

If we're looking at the big 70s films that we remember today - Robert Altman's M*A*S*H* (1970), a few Mel Brooks opuses (Young Frankenstein [1974] and Blazing Saddles [1974]), a few Monty Python opuses (Holy Grail [1975] and Life of Brian [1979], Burt Reynolds' role-defining Smokey and the Bandit (1977), Ramis' aforementioned Animal House (1978), and the greatest comedy of all time, Steve Martin's The Jerk (1979) - we do see a lot of busting on the stodgy and pompous institutions that control aspects of society, social customs, or even the acceptable narrative structure of Hollywood films themselves.

The target in a comedy is the butt of the joke. The Post piece suggests that targets in the 70s and 80s were great and powerful, compared to the crass subject matter of today. That's largely true. From the list above we see targets including the Korean War, racism, zealous religious followers, good ol' boy law enforcement, and academia. I'm for a bit of a loss, though, who the targets were for  Young Frankenstein, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, and The Jerk. Do we have, respectively, Old Hollywood, English Legend, and uh, biker chicks?

The 70s were full of irreverence. As New Hollywood emerged through the collapse of the production code as well as the advent of modern blockbuster filmmaking, comedy reflected these thrown off shackles through its gutting of societal structure and thriving on high concept ensemble pieces. There's no central star in most of these films - it's more groups of people getting together and lampooning an established part of society.

1980s: The Satire Evolves on a Grand Scale

Comedies from the 80s explode a bit, though that may be due to the fact that as of late the 1980s have sort of been canonized as this decade where everything awesome originated - after all, the toys of the 80s are the biggest films of today. We have this strange adoration for the slick veneer of the 80s, even though it was really as shallow and money-driven as it's usually stereotyped. It still offered some of the best big-movies of its time - what other decade could we find so many forgettable Best Picture Winners and so many adored blockbusters?

When I think 80s Comedy my mind turns to Airplane! (1980), Caddyshack (1980), The Blues Brothers (1980), Stripes (1981), Vacation (1983), Beverly Hills Cop (1984), Ghostbusters (1984), This is Spinal Tap (1984), Back to the Future (1985), Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986), Planes, Trains, and Automobiles (1987), Coming to America (1988), Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988), and Major League (1989). Who are our targets? Or another way we can look at it - who are our villains?

There is a bit of a mix here for sure. From this list we can see country clubs, Illinois Nazis, the Army, the police force, the EPA, and school administrators. There are, however, already a good mix of the kind of personal comedy that would define the Apatow era. Vacation and Planes, Trains, and Automobiles are both disastrous road trip movies where the greatest obstacles to the characters' final destination are the characters themselves. The high concept for Coming to America is an African Prince traveling to the United States to find a bride, but neither love nor Africa is really lampooned. Well, maybe the latter. Other films like Airplane! and This is Spinal Tap have achieved immortality through defying convention and digging more into specific characters with quick and dirty jokes than having a major target.

The 80s still evokes a lot of ensemble, but there's a bit of a paring down throughout the decade, so that eventually we see all these duos popping up. Doc and Marty, Neal and Dell, Eddie and Roger. Hell, Eddie Murphy's Black Cop / White Cop shtick defined a whole genre of buddy action films. There is still a lot of institution-bashing, but there is more introspection going on. More than that though, there are actually strong themes of convention shifting, whether it be from the improv-driven Spinal Tap, the animated Chinatown-esque Roger Rabbit, or the slapstick-or-bust rapidfire nature of Airplane!

1990s: The Megastar Era

These films keep paring down. From the 80s duos we see instead these big star-driven vehicles in the 90s, mostly for Jim Carrey, Adam Sandler, or Ben Stiller. There is still this mixture of targets, though, and the most successful of these 90s films are those that emulate the standards of the 1970s. Our list of general 90s comedies we're still talking about includes, Home Alone (1990), Wayne's World (1992), Cool Runnings (1993), Groundhog Day (1993), Ace Venture: Pet Detective (1994), Dumb & Dumber (1994), Clerks (1994), Billy Madison (1995), Friday (1995), Tommy Boy (1996), Happy Gilmore (1996), Austin Powers (1997), The Big Lebowski (1998), There's Something About Mary (1998), American Pie (1999), and Office Space (1999).

Now, feel free to debate my selection here (Why for instance, do I feel like Tommy Boy is more relevant than Black Sheep [1995]? I don't know. It just seems to me based on no evidence that more people like it and it's a bit of a better movie. Ditto with leaving out The Mask [1994]), but I'd call these in general the crop of 90s Comedy Films that peaked commercially (sometimes critically), but everyone's pretty cool with still watching today. So, what kind of institutions are we still targeting?

Olympic bobsledding...and uh...school administrators and golf again. That's about it. Suddenly these movies are about one central doofus character, sometimes a duo again like Wayne and Garth or Harry and Lloyd. Gone are the teams or camaraderie, though it returned a bit with fare like Lebowski, Pie, and Office Space by decades' end. The 90s are probably our most vapid decade. It's fitting for a decade where we were on top. With a booming economy and a Cold War victory in hand, it seemed like for all our angst, our institutions seemed to be working - so why target them? We lost a bit of that critical eye, because we weren't in fact as angry as we probably should have been. We had a pot-smoking, saxophone-playing president and Arsenio had his own TV show. We're pretty close to that point again, so who knows how the rest of the 2010s will play out.

There is some saying that comedy fails during really good times, which is perhaps why when looking over this list you don't get quite the feeling as you do when checking out the flicks from the 70s and 80s. These are classics, but more in a really frat-y way, and even though There's Something About Mary is really just as classy as Animal House it loses some charm, maybe because Stiller somehow is less charismatic and more neurotic than John Belushi. Or maybe it is because the 90s asks us to question less. It's more complacent with its authority figures. EXCEPT for Adam Sandler movies - which is why in the 90s Sandler was really the most brilliant auteur out there and truly emulating Ramis' efforts a decade and a half earlier.

2000s: Character and Self-Reflexive Comedy

This is tricky, because as I pick the most representative films of the 2000s there is sure to be more debate over what has really had the most influence. Still, when I think of 2000s people still talk about today, I think The Replacements (2000), The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), Super Troopers (2001), Wet Hot American Summer (2001), Zoolander (2001), Old School (2003), Anchorman (2004), Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (2004), Napoleon Dynamite (2004), Shaun of the Dead (2004), The 40-Year Old Virgin (2005), Wedding Crashers (2005), Beerfest (2006), Borat (2006), Talladega Nights (2006), Knocked Up (2007), Superbad (2007), Tropic Thunder (2008), Pineapple Express (2008), Forgetting Sarah Marshall (2008), Step Brothers (2008), and The Hangover (2009).

Now, how come I can only name eight films from the 70s I'd consider relevant and twenty films from the 2000s? Well, time hasn't yet sorted out the best from the only very good yet. But to be honest, if you look at what these films are doing, you'll find a couple things that begin to circle back to what the 70s was doing - ensemble satires, with most importantly, the addition of a ton of character-driven comedy.

Ensembles are most visible in Wes Anderson, Broken Lizard, and Judd Apatow films. Even Will Ferrell comedies are pretty scared of leaving him up there alone to do Jim Carrey-like shtick. It's why the Ace Ventura-like extremely annoying character was brilliantly lampooned in a film like The Cable Guy (1998) - because in reality, no one could buddy with that kind of person and emerge with a complete life. Ferrell is much softer, and has made headway into these sort of buddy comedies reminiscent of the 80s. So, targets?

NFL Unions, family structures, highway patrolman, summer camps, male models, the fraternity system, local newscasters, racism, nerds, horror films, antisemitism and jingoistic beliefs, NASCAR, big budget Hollywood filmmaking, and anti-marijuana laws. I would contend that a film like Pineapple Express encourages questioning of authority at least as much as Stripes does. For the rest, the targets are smaller, more intimate. You can see a clear declining of really solid targets from about 2006 on. Forgetting Sarah Marshall and The Hangover, again the largest obstacles characters face are themselves. These films really dig into interpersonal relationships across their ensemble as the cause of conflict rather than an outside antagonist. I do, however, want to focus on one more decade, even three years' worth, to at least suggest that we're starting to be encouraged to question again, perhaps because we're once again in a time of absolute shit.

2010s: What the Hell do We do Now?

We're far too close to the past three and a quarter years of film to really figure out who is influencing who and how this decade is developing. I can, however, give you three films that have succeeded in being just as subversive as anything the 1970s gave us. For better or worse, they are three Will Ferrell movies: The Other Guys (2010), The Campaign (2012), and The LEGO Movie (2014).

The Other Guys had a lot to say about the foreground and background characters of action films, but as per Ice T's narration, the core Madoff-esque scheme that drives the plot, and the end credits infographic, it's really taking a very sly dig at the financial industry under the silly sheen of a buddy cop comedy film. In an age where we're more ostrich-like than ever while getting screwed over a rapidly growing income gulf, it's startling that such a mainstream comedy featuring A-List actors of both comedy and drama would contain such a subversive message.

Likewise, The Campaign is one of the more underrated films of 2012 with its virulent but believable take on the rigors of political office-seeking. It offers a brutal glimpse into the insane lengths it takes to win one of these contests, the rapid reaction of middle America to slight changes in public figure perception, and of course, the vested interest of nefarious corporations looking out for not the country's interest, but their own. It's another film that strongly asks us to question everything about our electorate institution.

Finally, The LEGO Movie is probably one of the most subversive films of all time, as I've recently and neatly outlined here. It pleads for a line to be drawn between creative thought and stuffy mind-destroying cultural oppression. Its largest target is the banality and unoriginality of pop culture itself.

You know, we could also throw in Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues (2013) for its succinct skewering  of the 24-hour news cycle, but that would be a little much, wouldn't it? It also features an ensemble cast and a tendency towards slapstick and silliness over crudity. So, why would anyone complain about this film? It's everything the 70s and 80s wanted to be. Which is why it's set in 1980. Adam McKay and Will Ferrell are truly the Ramis / Murray of this generation. Actually, it's more like Ramis and Murray were the McKay / Ferrell of their generation.

I have a lot of confidence for the future of comedy. I'm not sure that institutionally-targeted comedy makes the best kind of film, or that satire is even justifiable in the sense that it leads to comfortable inaction rather than actual policy change. In the end, none of this really matters. As long as it's funny.

Movies That Are Really Two Movies

There are a handful of films out there that offer a two-for-one deal when you buy the ticket. These are certain films that take a left turn around the middle essentially offer two high concept premises. Sometimes these are two distinct ideas and sometimes they are variations on a single premise. Mostly these are films that either shift locales or characters, or sometimes big plot revelations. Essentially these are all films with very late or multiple inciting incidents. Now, none of these films are films-within-a-film like Bowfinger (1999) or something. Yes, Bowfinger is the first example that comes to mind. These are contiguous films that have radically different front and back halves. Some are weaker than others, thus in that order we follow: As we're talking about whole film structure here there are certainly some spoilers that follow of any film mentioned, so beware.

Weak: Sports and Training Films

This includes about every sports film ever made, from Space Jam (1996) to The Longest Yard (2005). Yes, again, those were the first two that popped in my head (what is wrong with me). Essentially these films are about a group of people getting together and training, and then the big game. Some films like Beerfest (2006) have very distinct halves, the first gathering a team and witnessing their reactions to their own local, controlled locations. The second half, the eponymous Beerfest, isolates them in a foreign land under a limited period of time, characters, and location.

The Invincible Iron Man faces down Tom Morello

Superhero films also follow this narrative. The modern superhero film, or at least the first installment, follows two major beats - the Origin and then the Adventure. The most clear example of this is Iron Man (2008), which is at first about one white man's escape from Evil Brown People, his training, and then victorious return. The latter half though, becomes a white man vs. white man struggle that is between competing intra-corporate entities as it is among physical rivals.

Less Weak: Two Will Smith Movies

Both I Am Legend (2007) and Hancock (2008) fit into this mold. It's odd that both of these recent Will Smith vehicles have excellent first halves and atrocious second halves. I Am Legend is about the life of the last man on earth...until he meets a useless chick and her son to replace his dead dog (somehow a more interesting character) halfway through. Suddenly the meaning of his work is altered dramatically and while this alternate ending comes close to saving it (staying true to the source material, the title, and giving more meaning to Will's earlier struggles), the ending as it stands makes it a very different film. Instead of adhering to the core premise that he struggles to understand throughout the first half (Will remaining the last man on earth and a "Legend" to the new species that calls it home dealing with his acceptance of that fact), the introduction of human characters and the self-sacrifice of Will makes him a "Legend" to a human race that has little to hope for and in fact moves the story out from a Last Man on Earth-thing to a whatever-living-in-Vermont-thing. It sucks.

This is where the rape scene went.

Hancock is similar. The high concept of a homeless, alcoholic superhero is really interesting. As it stood originally, Tonight He Comes sounds like a fantastic premise, although far too dark for a big budget flick for mainstream audience. Instead, we're taken on this fair ride through PR, a prison sentence, and the socialization of Hancock for the first half of the film. For the second half though, he fights Charlize Theron who he's actually in love with but forgot and she also has superpowers. None of it really makes sense and there's really two films in one here. My personal judgment is always apparent but you can decide which one was more suited for the big screen.

Purposeful Meta Splitting

The Charlie Kaufman-penned film Adaptation. (2002) is an interesting case. This may be one of the most Meta films ever made. Kaufman wrote the film, which is about a character named Charlie Kaufman (played by The Cage) trying to adapt the book The Orchid Thief into a screenplay, as a way to deal with his own inability to adapt The Orchid Thief into a screenplay. When his fictional (in real-life, not in the film), hack brother Donald Kaufman takes over though, the latter half of the film also shifts to accompany his writing style.

What turns into a personal tale of ruminating writer's block and self-pity becomes a suspenseful action thriller. This was done as revelations to characters in the movie create wrinkles in the screenplay of the film itself. Adaptation. in its way offers two films in one - the Charlie and Donald versions of adapting the same work, or one could say the process of adapting the same work.

The Plot Shift in Excellent Movies

There are three more films here that simply have very late or multiple inciting incidents that cause the characters to go on to do something radically different for the latter halves of the film. For those uninitiated to screenwriting terminology, an inciting incident is whatever spurs the protagonist to action. It's Luke finding Princess Leia's distress message, or the government guys recruiting Indiana Jones.

The first and most obvious is Rocky (1976). Rocky takes a surprisingly long time to get going. It's certainly one of those Sports Films that is divided between training for the Big Fight and then the Big Fight itself, but before even all the training Stallone has the most awkward courtship ever with Talia Shire and does nothing for almost forty minutes before he's recruited to fight Apollo. You get a sports movie, but also a great moronic love drama all in one.

This may be unexpected, but Stripes (1981) also fits this mold. Everything anyone remembers from Stripes happens in its first half. Bill Murray and Harold Ramis join the army and proceed with training far goofier than Full Metal Jacket (1987). Once Bill gives one of his greatest inspirational speeches, and then the best graduation march ever it's as if writer, Ramis suddenly remembered he had another thirty-minutes of screen time to fill. So they go to Czechoslovakia and have a minor international incident. It's kind of a bizarre segue, I suppose they figured they needed some kind of action in order to justify their training, although I hate to say that Police Academy (1984) worked the action into a coherent high concept with more skill. Did I just really admit that? Fuck.

Let me guess - "Mother!" (high-pitched cackle laugh)

The final film that is really two films we have for the day is JAWS (1975). The first half of the film centers on the effect of a Shark's attack on a small sleepy summer town. The public reacts, government and law enforcement react, and even science and technology react to the intrusion of the underwater menace. All of these reactions boil down to three men leaving the island with intent to kill the leviathan. Thus, while the first half can be seen as "A Shark's effect on a town," the latter half is "A Team quests to kill a Shark." It's notable that after Quint, Brody, and Hooper leave the dock, land is not seen again, and all interaction flows between the three (four, including the Shark) characters. It takes them out of their element and provides a much different movie.

Out of all the examples listed here, JAWS handles the split-film idea with the most precision. One movie flows into the other, despite all reluctance of some characters like Brody to the contrary. After introducing us to plenty of supporting characters the second half lets us know that these four are the most important and lets them grow off each other in new ways (particularly the Indianapolis scene, which is notable not only for Quint's monologue, offers character growth for both Hooper [increased masculinity, giving his character depth], and Brody [the awkward isolation that Brody feels and his inability to contribute to the dialogue affirms his "fish out of water" {had to use it} status and makes his final valiant stand against the Shark all the more important]). The film splits itself with confidence and wholly separates its two necessary high concepts.

The Long Halloween Vol. III: Obscure Edition - Hermit Day

Greetings, Internet lovers! For the past two years Norwegian Morning Wood has had special holiday posts for every month of the year. We call it The Long Halloween, as it's always started and ended with October (It's a damn Batman joke). At this point we've really gotten to the point where we've done Holdiays like Halloween and Christmas to death. So for the next 12 Months we're looking at obscure, random Holidays and picking out the best movies to watch.

Today, October 29th, as you all no doubt know, is National Hermit Day. It's a day intended to inspire people to give up the world and live in a shack in the woods, devoting oneself to misanthropy and self-sufficiency. Naturally, the best flick to slide in the VCR on this day is Get Low (2009).



The film stars Robert Duvall as a simple, old-timey Hermit (the kind of grizzled character Duvall should always play) who has carried a hefty burden inside him for many winters. Bill Murray doesn't have nearly as big of a role as the trailer implies but like many of his more recent roles he puts in just as much as he needs to without overdoing the sass. Annette Benning and that old dude from those Heinekin Light commercials also make some brief appearances. You gotta give it up for Peter Cetera. Finally there's Lucas Black who is actually ok in a non-Tokyo Drift role here.

It's a great film for Hermits who have good reason to retreat from the world and perhaps a better reason to come back to it. It was somehow largely ignored by Academy voters although Duvall had been getting some buzz and the entire cast is splendid. It's also a greatly shot film with a relatively simple story that plays to characters who aren't naïve or one-dimensional but certainly small-town traditional. It is also immensely entertaining and lighthearted considering its macabre premise, although there are plenty of scenes with heavy and sincere gravitas. It's Duvall, after all.

So turn those confounded radios down youngins and turn this flick up for those bitter old ears.

Happy Hermiting!

Tops: Bill Murray's Greatest Speeches

Maybe it's just because Vh1 has been playing a lot of Stripes (1981) and Comedy Central has been playing a lot of Ghostbusters (1984) but I've been more attuned to the incredible trend of one of the greatest comedy icons of all time, Bill Murray. He always gives the greatest monologues. Whether it's inspiring a group of campers into action or developing character during the Holiday Season, Bill Murray's speeches tend to be effective, engrossing and hilarious. Here are my top picks:

#6: Scrooged (1988) - Holiday Cheer



I struggle with whether or not Scrooged is an underrated or overrated Christmas movie. It's not exactly hilarious considering what its premise is supposed to be and nor is it completely heartwarming. People seem to mention it often but it's not like it's regarded as a Holiday Classic. Anyway, this final speech is about as dramatic as Bill's going to get on this list, although he has certainly had his fair share of eloquent dramatic roles, but not many with huge speeches. This monologue is really a plea for Holiday Hospitality and Bill uses enough charisma to pull it off after being a huge dick for the entire preceding film. It's just desperate yet hopeful enough to be pretty charming.

#5: Rushmore (1998) - No Backbone



Simple and effective, Bill advocates, not for the first time, to take down the rich people of the world. He's certainly getting through to Jason Schwartzman, whose reaction really completes this speech. It's decently inappropriate for a Chapel Speech to most of the people he's talking about taking down and Bill delivers it the sort of dry sincerity that his later roles morphed into. There are plenty of Steve Zissou moments where he uses this tone, but no real epic speeches besides the crossing the line bit.

#4: Ghostbusters (1984) - Dogs and Cats, Living Together, Mass Hysteria



A fragmented speech but nonetheless effective. Bill Murray is so immensely likeable in Ghostbusters because while he's a constant huge smartass he also knows what he's talking about and can convince people through intelligent reasoning if he wants to, despite his goofball nature. This clip is worth it almost as much for the little quips he's making in the background as well as his inability to take even the end of the world seriously, although dogs and cats living together puts him over the edge. In the end it's only through his appeal to the Mayor's political future that the Ghostbusters get out of there and save the day.

#3: Caddyshack (1980) - BARK LIKE A DOG FOR ME!



It was tough to decide which is funnier - Spackler fantasizing about himself at the Masters while destroying flowers or his rambling insane story about meeting the Dalai Lama that actually doesn't really go anywhere. Again, the kid's reaction as Bill taps the pitchfork into his throat inadvertently really makes this worthwhile. However, I've embedded one of the weirder Carl Spackler moments, his oggling a trio of old ladies playing a round. I don't believe any of Bill's words were written down in script, he was just allowed to spew whatever twisted thoughts came to mind and his continual creepy harassment of these ladies is just a small insight into how insane this guy really is. Spackler is actually a role Bill seldom revisited, he often played smooth charmers rather than dirty bums in his middle-career period.

#2: Meatballs (1979) - It just doesn't matter!



This goes without words. You don't really even need to see this movie to understand what's going on. After the first guy's completely ineffective speech, Bill really shows what he can do in rousing a crowd. It's a perfect capsule of what Bill's all about - no matter how well he tries, it really just doesn't matter. Everything this film has been leading to and with every rivalry, it just doesn't actually matter at all. Of course that's because all the really good looking girls would still go out with the guys from Mohawk because they've got all the money! That's one of the truest statements ever spoken in film. More flicks need this philosophy - it just doesn't matter!

#1: Stripes (1981) - We're mutts.



No greater patriotic speech has ever been given. We're 10 - 1! Bill has a great ability to turn something negative and spin it into something positive and inspirational, as well as relating to his troops, commanding attention and admitting when he's made a mistake. He also has fun with words an awful lot ("Something very very wroooo--ooonng with us!") as if you know, this speech and everything maybe just doesn't matter. He's showing that he's having fun and really at this point in the ovie he's the only one left having fun. He's able to take control of the group although he's really more of a slacker and unwilling to until Harold Ramis screws it up enough. Of course the graduation scene is also epic for weirdness but nothing really inspires one to be both a true American and as the Army says, all that you can be like this monologue.