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ClinTalks ...
Silver Coin Collecting - Video Gaming -
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Writing Ruminations ...
22/02/25 Editorial Report on Punch the Devil ... Recently, I sent my novel, Punch the Devil, to Jericho Writers for a developmental edit. A developmental edit is when a writer/editor takes a look at a manuscript and gives his two cents on how I can make it better and more marketable. I found it a very good experience, if a little pricey. But when I broke down the cost over a four week period (the time it takes for the editor to produce a critique) it actually didn't work out too expensive. And to actually get a story in front of someone with a history of editing and publishing who wants to make my story better and sellable was a valuable endeavour. I wrote a Ruminations a while back about how I had a lot of plates spinning with this one because I didn't know if I could even write a novel. Unfortunately, all those plates were too distracting to the overall backbone of the story. I did write the novel with the thought that I would be chopping a bunch of it, so that's why the word count was high. I believe there are a lot of scenes that will end up on the chopping block, but it's not ready for publishers. He made some very interesting suggestions that never occurred to me. One was that I had spotlighted the wrong character. Leon Jones was my main and Jose Hernandez was my second. But Jose has the more powerful emotional arc, so why was I spotlighting Leon? Very good point! And he suggested I could get a more powerful story by gender swapping Jose for Juanita. Also, good point! He said that might help to bring in female readers, as well. Women tend to read more than men and quite enjoy cozying up with crime stories. And another standout in the 20 page critique was that I should chop my antagonist's POV altogether, making him a villain creeping around in the shadows. If we don't know what's going on in his head, he will be scarier. This one was tough to swallow, but the more I think about it, the more I'm coming around. One other was to add Felix, Jose's son, as a lead POV to show initiation into the cult. These were all very good suggestions. However, that all entails a significant rewrite. I'm not opposed to it, in fact I intend to do it. It all makes sense. It would definitely make the story stronger and more focused. It is something, though, that won't see the light of day for a while. I'm cranking out a few short stories right now and have another book idea, so unless I want to double-down on how much I write throughout the week, PTD will be in limbo for the foreseeable future. Not dead, not forgotten. Shelved, though. I'll let you know. ...
Moonraker (1955) - Ian Fleming
I've been going
about reading these books all wrong. Click Here For More Book Reviews
My Most *Liked* Review on GoodReads: 25/01/25 Nothing Lasts Forever (1979) - Roderick Thorp
After reading this, I am
now fully convinced that 'Die Hard' . . . is a Christmas movie. There are a lot
of movies that take place on Christmas, but only certain ones feel Christmas-y.
Right? Click Here For More Book Reviews
ClinTalks Hollywood Special Effects ...
10/08/24 I was initially excited by Computer Generated Imaging (CGI), having grown up in the '90s. There were some horrible examples of it in the '80s but it felt like they finally figured it out with subtle examples like liquid metal in "Terminator 2", or heavy examples like the dinosaurs of "Jurassic Park". For a while, it seemed like CGI was ever increasing in quality as they wove beautiful tapestries of imagination such as "The Fifth Element" or "The Matrix", bringing me fully and completely into these jaw-dropping theatre experiences. But then something went sideways. There quickly became a heavy over-reliance on cartooning movies. When the original "Spider-Man" first came out, I watched an early screening. At the time, I enjoyed watching our friendly neighbourhood hero swinging through New York on a strand of his own silk. Time, though, has not been kind to that movie's over-reliance on CGI. Perhaps, like I've noticed with movies of today, the CGI throughout the movie was slapped together haphazardly as the director needed all of the best CGI used for the climax. Better CGI seems to be more expensive, so animators approach everything outside the climax with a lazy lackadaisical quality. And there, yes there, is the biggest problem with CGI--lazy film-making. When I think of movies with practical effects, the practical effects done at the beginning or mid-point are as good as the climax effects. Model makers, makeup artists, puppeteers will put their full efforts into each effect, having been hired to do a job, while CGI artists apparently only do their best work at the point of full cartooning saturation. And this laziness is not necessarily just emanating from the artists, or the producers pushing them to work faster--it's coming from the film's director. The director of "The Fifth Element" lamented not long ago that his '90s masterpiece would have been much easier to make nowadays using modern CGI methods. Afterwards he churned out an unwatchable quasi-cartoon that shall go unnamed here. The general opinion now seems to be: film a few reactions from an actor in front of a green screen and we will insert something in Post. This essentially makes actors weathermen. There is something about seeing an actor react to something that exists at the same moment in the same frame. Early '00s saw a lot of actors looking from Point A to Point B, instead of following something slithering through the scene. Movie watching is all about suspension of disbelief. If a director can capture a genuine reaction on film, the audience can live vicariously through the actor. You may have heard already that the greatest actors don't act but react to their fellow actors and the monsters with whom they share the screen. An example of this would be the original "Alien". The director only had enough money to do the chest-burster scene once, so he didn't go into detail with his actors about specifics. The result was cinematic magic as the actors were forced to experience everything in real time at the same time as the audience. The special effect, though, doesn't always have to be present with the actor for me to suspend disbelief. It does, however, need to be present somewhere. Recently, I had a disturbing revelation: kids growing up today think CGI is the best way to make movie special effects. In twenty years they will be waxing nostalgic, like I am now, about how such-and-such new-fangled special effect will never be as cool as the one with which they grew up. Or, maybe they won't. Maybe they will look back, like I have, and watch a Ray Harryhausen movie and realize there used to be a better way. Those creatures in those stop-motion movies actually existed. They were governed by actual physics instead of a computer approximation. The shadows casting off their castings were borne from real lighting, aimed to coincide with the live-action already filmed. How they moved a little weird, without the fluidic smoothness of rendered images, made them just a little more terrifying as their bodies stuttered in an otherworldly manner. "The Thing" from the '80s, for example, was deeply disturbing thanks in full to the unnatural movements of its constructed parts. The AT-ATs from "Star Wars" in the '80s actually existed and actually walked, and actually brought about a feeling of dread to the audience. More and more I hear people applauding how good certain CGI looks, but they are no longer using a metric that was once used: does it look real? They want it to look like it was drawn by the same people who rendered their favourite video games. They want it to look like what they are used to seeing, which is not reality at all but the surreality of where they live more often than the real world. Does it look like my reality? The problem with that, of course, is that video games don't age very well either. We are not yet living in an age where "The Matrix" is real (depending on who you talk to), so I still prefer seeing models and puppets that exist in my reality. The Desert of the Real. Like all things, what once was old is new again and movies like "Star Wars" and "Jurassic Park" (World) and "Ghostbusters" and "Alien" are going back to their practical roots to bring audiences back to franchises that have strayed from what once made them great. Perhaps stop-motion and puppetry will not completely return your suspension of disbelief at the theatre, but at the very least it will make you wonder: how'd they do that? And if you can't figure it out ... maybe it's real.
18/03/23 Any fan of "Star Wars" knows to cringe when he hears the words 'Special Edition'. This was the term George Lucas used in the late '90s to bastardize his greatest creations by tweaking them into a demented, unrecognizable pretzel. Another term for this is 'The Director's Cut'. For this special cut, GL adjusted the colours of the original special effects, he adjusted character actions, he added unnecessary scenes, and, most unforgivably, removed all his practical effects in exchange for CGI. This is the most dramatic example of a director meddling in his creation that I can think of. It wouldn't be such a bad thing if he gave his fans this option, but also supported the original releases. Unfortunately, after he tweaked these movies, he stood by them so vehemently that you could no longer find the originals easily available on the most recent media players. Even finding them on DVD is an enormous, and expensive, undertaking. While so-called 'Special Editions' are unique to "Star Wars", Director's Cuts are not. One of the earliest examples of a Director's Cut was released by one of the biggest culprits of The Director's Cut: James Cameron. The movie was "Aliens", the year was the early '90s. I, like most the planet, have much love for the works of Jim Cameron, Jimmy, as I call him, as he shaped my childhood with his incredible Sci-Fi Action films in my formidable years. To this day, he still breaks records with his films and pushes the limits of what can be done on screen. But he is a habitual releaser of inferior cuts. The Director's Cut of "Aliens" was garbage. The scenes that were pulled before release were pulled for pacing, but JC felt his precious scenes needed to be devoured by the public. And in the '90s, giving the people additional content from a movie was unheard of, so the popularity of this cut took off. It became so popular that, much like "Star Wars", you had to search hard to find the original theatrical when you went to buy it on DVD. Now, don't get me wrong, I needed to see it myself, but once I had seen it, I didn't need to watch that version ever again. He also has Director's Cuts of "Terminator 2", and "The Abyss" that are equally abysmal. The "Terminator 2" cuts were excess crap that is completely redundant, while "The Abyss" added more information to the ending that made it a cliché movie, where it hadn't been before. At least with "Avatar" he called the other two versions 'Extended Cuts' as he must have known the theatrical was the best. As it always is. I have watched "The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly" dozens, if not hundreds, of times, so I know each scene by heart--one to the next. Imagine my surprise then when I had it on in the background as it played on TCM with scenes I had never witnessed before! How was this possible? Why have you stolen extra information from me, Hollywood? I immediately looked into this and found myself a copy on blu-ray for consumption. Seventeen minutes of footage not seen in North America was made available to me for the first time. I was elated. Well, the first time I saw it, I was elated. Maybe the second time, too, but I started to look at the new scenes objectively after that. First of all, the character voices had to be reproduced as the sound was lost to time, so, you had a very old Eastwood come into a sound booth to try to replicate what he sounded like as a young man, forty years ago. It was a little jarring, a little bit of a hiccup introduced to the film. And the scenes were, for the most part, forgettable and redundant. Not to mention, they took some of the mystery from the movie in places. The 'Extended Edition' was again quite unnecessary, but since some suit made the decision to spend the money, they tried to make the original disappear...yet again. There are two directors in particular who need to be given kudos for their Director's Cut efforts. Those men are Stephen Spielberg and Ridley Scott. Stephen Spielberg pulled a George Lucas on "E.T." with 'updated' special effects and regretted the finished product so much so, in fact, that he insisted the DVD release had both versions included for the same price. Let the consumer choose. Kudos, fine sir, kudos. And Ridley Scott started making Director's Cuts of "Blade Runner" in the '90s, but must have realized that people want to be able to see the movie they fell in love with, so every new release of "Blade Runner" usually includes the theatrical. Kudos. But extra kudos for being the only director who can make a movie better after the fact. Amazing what removing narration can do for the ambience of a picture. Not all Director's Cuts should be burned and forgotten, though. Besides "Blade Runner", another movie that comes to mind that benefited from a Director's Cut was "Star Trek: The Motion Picture". That film had a lot of problems and was never properly edited. The rumour was the final print was rushed to the extent that when it was delivered on opening night, the film was still wet in the canister. Robert Wise had to pull off the impossible and did so with that delivery, but wasn't able to give it that one last tweak. Wise once said that of all his films, the editing on that one was the one he most regretted. Fortunately, the appetites of Star Trek fans allowed enough money to flow back around so he could tinker with it again to release a proper cut, twenty years later. The cuts are subtle, but extraordinarily effective. I'm not saying seeing extra footage from my favourite movies is a bad thing. I imagine in the '90s, the fans of "Aliens", "Star Wars", "Blade Runner" and the others were as excited to see new footage as I was when I was re-watching "The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly" on TCM all those years ago. But it is only a curiosity. It is only worthy of watching the one time, to have a new experience with something familiar to reignite your passion for that theatrical experience. But once you've seen it once, you want to go back to the familiar, to the original love affair you had with the movie. Save the cut footage for the special features of the blu-ray, where they belong.
ClinTalks Mission: Impossible ...
11/06/22 I didn't realize that I had such a soft spot for Mission: Impossible until quite recently. Something stunning to consider is Mission: Impossible is almost exactly as old as Star Trek. It wasn't until a few years ago that I actually put some effort into exploring its earliest days. I've been a fan of 1960s television for as long as I can remember. After elementary school there was always a rerun of Gilligan's Island, or Batman that would assist in bringing me closer to dinnertime, and subsequently put off my homework assignments. When I was finally able to watch the original Star Trek from episode one, onward, as a teenager, I was thrilled. The movies with Kirk and crew were always near and dear to my childhood, so I needed to watch what it was all based upon. The same backwards approach is how I decided I needed to watch the 1960s Mission: Impossible. The Tom Cruise adaptation from 1996 was an incredibly important movie in my development. But more on that later. The first episode of Mission: Impossible was nothing short of terrific. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the writers of "Ocean's Eleven" (2001) used that episode as a template in plotting their movie, as there are a lot of similarities. At the time of this writing, I'm four seasons into the show, so I don't have a full reckoning of the series as a whole, but I would say the first season is my favourite. A fan of the show might think of that statement as controversial as the silver-haired Peter Graves, who was the figurehead of the entire series from season two, onward, had yet to enter. Once the series entered syndication, the network wouldn't even re-air the first season for fears of confusing the audience with a lead who wasn't Graves. Peter Graves had a much grander presence than Steven Hill, granted, but I still preferred season one's stories. The first three seasons of Mission: Impossible ran concurrently with Star Trek. They were even produced by the same team, and even on the same lot. The reason this is interesting to me is mostly for one reason--shared guest stars. Having watched every episode of Star Trek The Original Series (TOS) many, many times over, it was a lot of fun to see bit actors showing up here or there. "Hey, that voice sounds familiar ... where do I know him from? Oh, I got it! Star Trek! Nice!" They even shared directors and the odd time writers. There was a part of my brain that imagined it as some sort of alternate reality spin-off of my beloved TOS. Not to mention, once TOS was cancelled, the great Martin Landau was replaced with the equally great Leonard Nimoy--Mr. Spock--as the man with a thousand faces. The reason Mission: Impossible is so important to me is that very first movie from the '90s with my boy, Tom Cruise. Throughout my childhood, my parents could never agree on which movie to see with the family. My dad was mostly into sci-fi's, my mom was mostly not. My mom was mostly into comedies, my dad was mostly not. I was into both, however. When we went to Blockbuster, we usually left with a rental for my mom, for my dad, and for us kids. So, when we went to the theatre, someone was always disappointed by the choice. That's why it blew my mind when both my parents decided they wanted to see "Mission: Impossible". A theatrical movie that everyone was interested in? Wonderful! Not only that, but my parents had birthdays that were just two days apart in early June, right when the movie was coming out. So, scrounging together my paper route money, I took the whole family out for a movie as a joint birthday present. And it was amazing! The movie had a great director, great writers, and actors at the top of their games. I love the movie to this day, and not just due to its excellence, but its place in my movie-goer memory. I was incredibly excited for the sequel. But then I watched the sequel. No more excitement. It was a steaming pile of garbage. Not too much later, Tom Cruise suffered a fall from grace in no small part due to his couch dancing appearance on Oprah. The Mission: Impossible movie series was dead. Then, one day, a little known director and writer of a spy television series decided to make the move into movies--one J.J. Abrams. I wasn't excited to see the third movie since the second stunk bad enough to peel paint, but my roommate at the time was looking forward to it, so I went to the theatre with him. I was literally on the edge of my seat the entire movie. He actually asked me later on that night, "Why were you on the edge of your seat?" I told him, "Within the first five minutes I had to pee, but was too worried I would miss something, so I held onto it." The ending of that movie felt like the end to the movie series, but when a movie makes money a sequel is sure to come. The fourth installment had to be seen in the theatre now, and wouldn't you know it, "Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol" was one of the best action movies I've ever seen. I've seen it many times since. Once again, it was meant to cap the series until another writer breathed a new little life into it, and with that breath, a new life for the series. That writer, Christopher McQuarrie, is now the writer, director, and all-round shepherd of the movie series. Each sequel he makes has Tom Cruise performing a death-defying stunt crazier than the movie previous. Every sequel since "Ghost Protocol" has been as good, or debatably, better than the one before. I look forward to this movie series more than any other movie series since I know it will give me consistent thrills, excitement, stunts, writing, directing, acting and everything in between. It is the best movie-going experience available, and one that somehow seems to continue to have an impressive future. There have been a few conversations over the years about replacing Tom Cruise as the lead, but how and who could do the things he has opted to do over the years? Be it HALO jumps, free-climbing, piloting a helicopter, being tied to the side of a jet, rappelling the tallest building in Dubai, or whatever else the production team concocts ... will there ever be another Tom Cruise? They should look for him now, so the Mission: Impossible franchise can keep bringing me back to make new memories in the theatre for decades to come.
10/07/21 I was going to use this space to discuss my main television infatuation, Star Trek, when I realized Babylon 5 might be the one TV show that inspired me more than Star Trek ever did as a writer. Its inspiration wasn't just through characters, stories, allegories, and parables but also the incredible work ethic of its creator, J(oe). Michael Straczynski (JMS). (It took my teenage brain a long time to memorize the spelling of that, but if I could do it for Schwarzenegger. ...) J. Michael Straczynski had been sharing his words with me for much longer than I realized. Some of my favourite cartoons as a kid were He-Man and The Real Ghostbusters--his name happens to be attached to some of those episodes. Another show I liked as a kid was Captain Power, which his name is on, too. Then as a teenager, I liked watching the odd episode of Murder, She Wrote, and was obsessed with reruns of The Twilight Zone reboot. These are all items on his IMDb page! He is also a writer of many, many comics, of which I have read more than one. I didn't realize any of this until after Babylon 5 had ended in the late 1990s. When I first tried creating a television show in the mid-'90s, it was a show with a military crew dealing with the end of times. Babylon 5 was much like that, but it was also an exploration of religion and hatred and empires and destiny. It was a show ahead of its time in every way, not only in stories told, but also in production value. It was the first science fiction show to be serialized in nature, having a predetermined beginning, middle, and end. And not only was it the first television show to rely heavily on CGI effects, it was also the first to shoot in widescreen presentation. Not to mention each episode was available with Dolby audio. One thing of keen interest to me, too, was that it was all done under budget. Straczynski had taken his knowledge as producer on other shows and brought it to Babylon 5. He had very simple, but clever, solutions to set designs like naming a part of the station blue or green sector, then having production staff do nothing more than slip a blue or green card into the wall in the scene. By far, though, the greatest aspect he brought to his show was his writing talents. Not just a decent level of quality, but a heavy level of quantity. Nothing like it has ever been done to the extent he did it. Of the 110 episodes produced, he wrote 91 of them and shared credit with an additional 4, which isn't including the TV movies he wrote, or the short lived spin-off series, Crusade. That is absurd. Each one-hour script is about 45 pages in length, so do the math--that's nuts. This man is a machine. The show seemed, on the surface, to be similar to Star Trek just enough to attract Star Trek fans. A military space station on the fringe of the galaxy being used as we now use Geneva--a place for peace and diplomacy. But this wasn't the squeaky clean utopia Gene Roddenberry envisioned. Everyone on Babylon 5 gets a paycheque, first of all. Money still exists there, as does all the world religions, so, in that way, it immediately makes it more relatable to present day reality. Are we going to completely eliminate poverty, religion, capitalism, and all other sorts of strife in two hundred years? It would be very nice if we could, but highly unlikely. Babylon 5 wanted to show us that bad times could be overcome even if society hadn't evolved into perfection. Peace must still be fought for, and human beings will always make mistakes and must learn from the outcomes. Does that make the show less optimistic than Star Trek? I really don't think so; the same message is there. And the writers of Star Trek constantly shine lights down dark corners of that universe to reveal what's underneath that Roddenberry varnish. By nature, man is cautious to the point of cynicism, so getting everyone on board with creating a utopia is a challenge that might only be won in fiction. But the pursuit of perfection as seen in Babylon 5 might make it the more realistic of the two franchises. Straczynski really created something special with Babylon 5. Fortunately, he doesn't keep his writing techniques to himself. He published The Complete Book of Scriptwriting in the '90s, which I gobbled up as soon as I'd heard about it. Just recently, I discovered he published a new book on general writing called Becoming A Writer--Staying A Writer, so naturally I had to buy that one, too. Less than a year before that, he wrote an autobiography called Becoming Superman, which is supposed to be excellent. I have ordered that as well, so once I've read those, this examination of Babylon 5 and Straczynski may get an update.
10/06/21 The name Bond, James Bond is almost as popular in cinema as it is in literature. In literature, it is Ian Fleming's alter ego who wins at the tables as much as he wins with the ladies. A super-spy who fumbles his way through terrorists and terrorist organizations to a depressing finale. In cinema it follows a charismatic, charming, blunt instrument of the spy world through dangerous and exciting, big budget adventure who always gets the girl. As you might have guessed, I'm more into the movies than the books. Sacrilege, I know, but I have a lot of opinions on this matter. Ian Fleming's Bond is not the successful Bond. When Sean Connery brought Bond to the screen, he also brought himself--a man of great gravitas who swings a rapier wit. Women of the novels throw themselves at Bond as soon as they meet him, so you must assume it's his expensive suits, expensive watch, expensive car, or something equally tangible, but with Connery it was that thing Fleming couldn't put on paper. The way he moves, the way he speaks, the way he smirks were what made him a ladies' man. You might ask "What about the other Bonds? You've been quite favourable to only one." I don't just think Connery was the best Bond, I think he is Bond. He is the litmus upon which all future Bonds are measured. When I first watched all the Bond movies I came up with key criteria to determine who owned the role based mostly on the functionality of the lead. First, is he a believable ladies' man? Lazenby worked (as kind of a horny teenager); Moore felt a little too forced into the role; Dalton seemed kind of complacent; no complaints with Brosnan; and Craig felt a little complacent, too (maybe I'm tainted by his initial monogamy in "Casino Royale"). Second, can he believably beat down a group of thugs sent to work him over? Connery did it with panache; Lazenby's got a solid hook; Moore is an admitted pacifist and it shows; Dalton can do it, but seems a little out of his element; Brosnan can sell it well; and, of course, Craig crushes it. Thirdly is screen presence, or gravitas. Connery owns the screen, but Lazenby doesn't have the experience to come close to his predecessor; Moore is a stuffy Brit, but has a presence; Dalton has no problem carrying his movies; Brosnan owns; and Craig has quite hearty acting chops. It's too bad Lazenby only had one shot at the movies, as he could have grown into the character. Moore is a product of the stories that were being told, but is probably the most believable as what British spies must certainly be--stuffy. Dalton and Craig are very similar versions of Bond, and each have their own charm, but the only one who ever got close enough to Connery's Bond was Brosnan. The one thing every curious person, or casual fan, asks someone who's seen all the movies is: which one of the Bond movies is best? That is a complicated question seeing as no other English-speaking franchise has ever produced more than twenty sequels, but there is an answer. Each Bond movie has to be thought of as a slice of culture from its respective decade. Each Bond actor should be associated with the decade when he was at the height of his game (aside from one-and-done Lazenby). So, I would propose each actor has one movie to his name in particular that was the best of his run. For Connery, the consensus is "Goldfinger" and I won't argue with anyone who says so, but my own personal favourite will always be "Thunderball". It's usually deemed a little schlocky, but that just happens to be my style. Moore's best was "The Spy Who Loved Me"--there should never be any debate about that one and some even claim it to be the best of the franchise. For Dalton, it's tricky since I think "License to Kill" was hands-down his best, but it was dark and ahead of its time, so almost torpedoed the franchise. Brosnan's best was "GoldenEye", although some believe "Tomorrow Never Dies" takes the cake. For Craig, "Skyfall" is his crowning achievement, but that might be due to a lot of fan service scattered throughout, which I greatly appreciated having seen all the movies many times. You get the most appreciation out of that film if you've seen the rest, I think. There are very few that aren't worth a rewatch, and even when I force myself through one I thought of as garbage, I find a new appreciation for it. I'm looking at you: "You Only Live Twice", "A View To A Kill", and "Spectre". The number of times the Bond franchise has almost been stomped out of existence is staggering, but one must remember how long this cinematic franchise has been active--59 years as of this writing. One of the writers of "Thunderball" (one of the first screenplays submitted to EON Productions), Kevin McClory, claimed he was a co-creator of the Bond franchise as a lot of the elements that went into making EON money were his elements. He did the impossible and won the court case, so owned partial rights to certain aspects of the films. McClory loved to drag those producers through court. Some say his claims to Bond disheartened Fleming so much, it was responsible for the heart attack that took his life. But creator credits weren't the only obstacles to a Bond profit--the actors also tended to create trouble for EON. While Connery filmed "You Only Live Twice" in Japan, he had a few instances of extreme fandom that put him over the edge and, already at odds with the film's producers, he finally called it quits on the movies that made him a star. Eon productions went into a frenzy looking for a new Bond when they stumbled upon George Lazenby, or maybe he stumbled upon them. There are mixed scenarios told about what exactly happened after the filming of "On Her Majesty's Secret Service", but I think it can be diluted into the hubris of youth. The search was on again, but not before giving Connery one more blank cheque for "Diamonds Are Forever". After a lackluster start, Roger Moore continued the lacklusterness in "The Man With the Golden Gun" (which I personally enjoyed, by the way). The movie was a huge bomb, threatening to shutter the whole enterprise. The next movie needed to bring in a profit, or the whole series died with it. Fortunately, the following film was "The Spy Who Loved Me" and the series was saved again! For now. Once Star Wars was released in the late 1970s, everyone and their dog wanted to get in on the new sci-fi craze, so we were given "Moonraker". It borrowed from every sci-fi film it could find, then climaxed with a space battle (huh?). The EON credit card got worn out with that one, as they were repaying those debts well into the Brosnan years. Then, out of the blue, Kevin McClory released his own James Bond movie about an old Bond who is about to retire starring none other than chip-on-his-shoulder Sean Connery in a final display of spite against his old employer. Roger Moore was a year older than Connery, so McClory was obviously shining an aging spotlight toward the tiring franchise. After Moore's and Connery's Bond clashed in the same year at the theatre, EON recast the role with a younger Dalton (along with an expiry date) for their lead, but no one latched on to the new darker, book-accurate, style of Bond, which would prove to be ahead of its time. While Dalton waited for his next Bond script, the scriptwriter who had written 13 of the 16 Bond films beginning with the first, "Dr. No", died, and the director with the most Bond films under his belt retired from the franchise, and, oh yeah, the Soviet Union fell. Those must be the final nails in the coffin, right? How can Bond exist in a world where the Russians are our friends?--said the reviewers at the time. But Bond came back to poke fun at himself while giving us a wonderful adventure in "GoldenEye". Then, after September 11th, everyone thought movies would be changed forever. There must be no more explosions in movies, said some exec. What? Why? "Die Another Day" was pushed back so the writers could remove explosions, then fluff it with enhanced interrogation, invisible cars and Madonna. Brosnan was almost fifty, so his time was up anyway. When EON finally won the rights back to the first Bond novel, Casino Royale, they took a shot on a blond-haired, blue-eyed Bond, which I'm still sour about. Craig's a great actor, but his Bond seemed a little too emotional. Hey, the gamble paid off and they're making money, so why should they care if they get the character right? They almost gave Craig the Dalton treatment after "Quantum of Solace", but Craig got tipsy and started spitballing to an Oscar-winning director friend about how to do a good Bond movie--they joined forces and nailed it with "Skyfall". But then couldn't catch that same lightning in their bottle with the fizzling follow-up "Spectre". (Even though it is in the Guinness Book of World Records for most explosions performed at once. So much for the no explosions edict.) Should "No Time To Die" do well in its eventual theatrical run, which was almost cancelled thanks to covid-19, they might take some new chances with the franchise. Social pressures are conspiring to neuter this beloved character. Those keyboard warriors don't even watch the movies and definitely don't read the books. Bond is supposed to be a traditional male fantasy--that's why he's worked so well for so long. The world will always change, but Bond made money from a certain recipe. You should already know, or at least assume, that New Coke will fail. The only thing we fans can do is hope that there will always be room on the shelves for the Classic return. The challenges behind the screen have interested me as much as Bond's challenges on the screen. I don't look forward to new pastiche Bond books, but I do look forward to what they put in theatres next. Say what you will about Bond movies, there are a couple guarantees you get with a new Bond film: A charming lead, a great opening action sequence, a beautifully performed artistic interlude, a neat bad guy with an interesting motivation, beautiful women, practical (for the most part) VFX, and a nail-biting climax. It is one of the most reliable movie-going experience ever produced for the silver screen. 22/02/25 - Addendum This week came huge news in the world of Bond: Amazon is done with Brocolli. No, they aren't switching to a meat diet; they bought out Barbara Brocolli and Michael Wilson's creative control in the franchise. There has been a Brocolli at the reins of the franchise since its inception, so this is big. Not as big as the cheque Bezos had to write, though. At more than 80 years old, Wilson wanted to retire, and Brocolli couldn't decide where to take the franchise or who would next wield the Walther PPK. She was also dissatisfied with Amazon's position on creating a Bond universe after they had a sit-down following Amazon's recent purchase of MGM, so I've heard. But she and her half-brother are due for retirement. After watching "No Time to Die" I think Bond fans all know it is time for some fresh blood--some new meat. I'm not saying the movie was bad, nor was it as 'woke' as some reviewers claimed. It was, however, the least Bond Bond movie ever made. *SPOILERS FOR NO TIME TO DIE* Bond is a male fantasy. He is an indestructible super-spy who wears expensive clothes, expensive watches, and drives expensive cars. All women want to be with him, and all bad guys want to destroy him. But they will never have him. Bond will always win. In "No Time to Die", though, Bond is a retired father, a one-woman man (a beautiful woman even shows disgust at the thought of fooling around with him), and dies while destroying his enemy--which equals Bond's first loss. The most heavily circulated poster for this movie was Bond in a Mister Rogers sweater. Don't get me wrong, I liked the movie. I even thought the writers made some brave, if reckless, decisions. But it's not a Bond movie. The next Bond movie will be the most important of the franchise. If "No Time to Die" was an indication of where the future of Bond was heading, then I applaud the decision to cut out the vegetables. Amazon needs to go back to Bond Classic, or risk revoking his license to kill for good.
15/05/21 I have a lot of fond memories of playing video games with my family on the best gaming console ever created: the Nintendo Entertainment System, or NES. It might not be everyone's favourite machine, but it certainly was mine. One of its main draws was it was in-person and family friendly, which meant that not only my brother, my sister and I could enjoy it, but we would also play it with my Mom and Dad. When I think of my Dad, I definitely don't think of him as a gamer, but he got some amusement out of the console at times. There were even a few titles in which he managed to excel to higher levels than anyone else in the household. Nowadays, that family friendly vibe you got from the old NES is completely gone. When you buy a console, your expectations are that you will be playing in a dark corner by yourself, ignoring anyone around you except maybe your headset friend--that thirteen-year-old Chechnyan boy who can murder your character fourteen times within three minutes. The video game, in my mind, was meant to be an updated version of a game board; chess pieces that could move themselves. It was a new way to create camaraderie--a new version of family game night. However, now, like everything else, it relies on seclusion. In a covid world, I suppose it makes sense, but it has me yearning for the days of yore when you could kick your best friend so he wouldn't be able to use his finishing move on your character, or smack him with a pillow when his character steals that extra life-energy that you were in more dire need. I decided to buy an old NES a few years ago to relive the glory days. I still had a few games in storage, so I thought I should be able to play them. Once I had the machine, though, I knew those handful of games would not be enough to satiate my thirst for vintage gaming--I had to buy more games. I bought every game I liked from my childhood, then went further to ensure I had every game of high notoriety for the system. I don't play it a whole lot, but I do enjoy having it around for the days when I'm feeling particularly nostalgic. There's nothing like sliding a big, clunky cartridge into the console, pushing it down, listening to the squeak of the springs, then the squeak of the springs again and again as I tried to get the damn light to stop flashing. The console was built to outlast a constant onslaught of impatient children slamming the games into the socket; they built it strong in the days before a disposable society was the norm. When my new NES arrived, there was a cartridge already loaded--in fact, it had probably been loaded in there for the last twenty years since the 72-pin connector had been permanently relaxed to the thickness of the game. So, I did some research, took the machine apart, bent all 72 pins back to true, cleaned the contacts, cleaned all my cartridges, and blammo--the console worked like brand new. But its construction isn't the only thing about it that's resilient. The console is now experiencing a resurgence in popularity, so what was old is new again. Or maybe it's just that there are more man-children out there than ever before. With demand brings accessories, so I was even able to find a wireless remote for the machine. Who knew? Certain games are now becoming much more valuable, too. Recently, Chinese knock-off cartridges have flooded the market, making collecting legitimate games near impossible. Perhaps I wasn't the only one who wanted to play friendly again. I shouldn't say that the family friendly experience of video gaming is completely over. There was a recent attempt, and success, at bringing back that wonderful old flavour: the Nintendo Wii. I was quite impressed when Nintendo managed to put themselves back on top, looking down at consoles like the dominant X-Box, or the gaming freight train of PlayStation. I was even more impressed when I got to play the console. Sure, the graphics couldn't quite hold up to their competitors, but the experience of boxing while actually throwing your hands instead of manipulating thumb controls was like no other. X-Box and PlayStation made hurried attempts to catch up, but the Wii had, quite literally, beat them to the punch. When I had heard about the introduction of the Wii U, I had the mistaken impression that they were abandoning their motion controls in favour of the growing popularity of touchscreens. I thought that was a mistake and realized the Wii was about to become a collector's console--a gaming machine that changed the world of gaming much like the NES, or Atari before it. (Turned out the Wii U continued to use motion controls, but also had a touchscreen. It was mostly just what the Wii should have been upon release, but I was impressed with the Wii as it was. The Wii U didn't beat anyone to the punch.) So, I bought myself a Wii. And, much like the NES, I needed to have every game that sounded interesting, or was considered the best-of-the-best. I also remembered how disappointed I was to have the zapper gun for the NES, but never used it on anything beyond Duck Hunt. So I made sure I had as many Balance Board games as I could find, as well as all the coolest peripherals out there, like a flight simulator station, or a hockey stick, or zapper guns, or pistols, or even swords. It was like having an arcade in your very home! It was the opposite of the lethargy of thumb tapping; you could even get fit with a Wii. And the best way to play it was with a friend or group of friends. I can't wait to see what family friendly experiments Nintendo will come up with next. And don't try telling me it's VR. Virtual Reality is built to be solo emersion--even if there's someone right beside you, you are far away from each other. Bring back the in-person, friendly experience, I say!
ClinTalks Silver Coin Collecting ...
28/03/20 When I was a kid living in BC, I had a coin collection filled with random papers and metals from around the world, tucked away in a wooden fish box. It always fascinated me seeing different currencies from around the world, and must have fascinated my parents, too, as they were the ones who assembled it for me. Whenever we journeyed across the American border, while visiting my grandparents who lived close to it (my grandpa "Gunk" worked as a crossing guard), I would keep every dollar, quarter, dime, nickel, or cent that I got from the Wal-Mart-like Prince's Grocery Store in Orville, Washington. The fish box and all the money wherein was stolen when I moved to Alberta in 2006. My Mom knew that I liked Star Trek, so for my 32nd birthday bought me a fine silver starship Enterprise coin. Not long after that gift, my Dad died and left me some insurance money. I briefly considered investing some of it in precious metals. I liked the look and functionality of silver more than gold, not to mention it was much more affordable in 2016, so I was leaning toward silver bars. After some further thought, I decided RRSPs were the right investment. However, the thought of precious metals did not leave my mind. It occurred to me that collecting silver coins with depictions of things I was interested in might be a fun hobby and a way of creating a new kind of savings account. So, I logged on to the Royal Canadian Mint in 2017 to start my collection. After getting a few beautiful coins in the mail, I logged on to eBay to see what else was out in the world. I searched for more of my favourite things, then bought up coins with depictions of Superman, Batman, Typewriters, Submarines, Trains, Star Trek, Terminator, Dinosaurs, Ninja Turtles, and everything else I could imagine. The collection really exploded when I thought there was a chance I would get laid off from work before or after my hernia operation in 2018. I wanted to round out my collection before that happened, so I frantically gobbled up more favourites, but began running out of ideas. I realized that I had fine silver coins from five of the seven continents, so I bought a coin from South America to make it six. I even bought legal tender issued for Antarctica. The thematic collecting of coins had begun. Falling back to my early collecting days, one theme became international currencies of different denominations. From there, regions with different historical rulerships (Mongolian, Roman, Mayan, etc.), hopefully made with silver mined right from the area in which I was interested. But regional themes were still not enough for me, so I kept looking. What really blew my mind was coins with real chunks of meteorites on them. It didn't take long before they became some of my most valuable coins. In fact, most of my valuable coins have some sort of depiction of science or science fiction on them. Coin collecting seemed to be very trendy with the nerds. I started seeing other trends, such as how fast certain coins sold out or grew in value. I have noticed coins with a mintage under 1,000 seem to draw higher values than more mass-produced coins from say Canada, or Australia after a few years. But since the purity from those mints can't be beat, I don't mind collecting their coins with thousands or millions of mintings. Any coin I own that is less than 99.9% pure was bought as a concession since I felt I could not do without it. I still consider the collection a precious metal collection before a coin collection, so I try not to deviate from fine purities. Who knows, if/when the world ends people may crave my finer purity coins. My Superman silvers might buy me a loaf of bread and some gun powder. Or, I will sell them for twenty times what I paid for them to some lonely geek when I'm 80 and don't want to live in a nursing home. At this point, it has become more of an obsession than a collection.
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19/04/25
