Sephy’s Platzish

I had the TV on tonight and I managed to catch a movie that wasn’t terribly bad - and it had some nice and funny moments.

However, since I did watch it on TV, there won’t be any screenshots of the movie. If I knew it was on, I probably wouldn’t watch it, but I started watching it and I got sucked in. The movie is Bubble Boy, starring Jake Gyllenhaal as Jimmy, the boy in the bubble and Marley Shelton as the first “outsider” he meets and who he falls in love with.

I didn’t pay attention to the beginning, but the point is that Jimmy’s been forced to live in a bubble because he had no immune system, and he has grown up in the bubble, being taught by his mother, who is quite the “purist” when it comes to religion and insularity (for example saying that any woman outside of the house is a whore and he’d die if he would touch her).

When Chloe is introduced, she is seen washing her car in her driveway, in quite a provocative way; Jimmy feels the need to wash his window (just as a cover to watch her - and I can’t say that I blame him ). Eventually, as what would happen with us blokes after a certain point, there comes some excitement. Of course, his “pure” mother has apparently sheltered him from anything related to the reproductive system, so he screams. What’s her solution to the problem? Say the Pledge of Allegiance - it apparently works for his father, and it does work for him (and thinking about it, it probably would work for anyone)…

Eventually, Chloe does decide to meet Jimmy and she finds out that he’s no different to any other person, just that he’s in a bubble. Then, she comes over and wants to get into the bubble with him - he declined the offer, and then he finds out that she is going to a dance with Mark, who is a complete jackass, constantly making jokes about Jimmy being a charity case and that Chloe only liked him out of sympathy.

After not meeting for what would be a couple of years, Chloe comes over and says that she’s getting married in the period of a couple of days in Niagara Falls - literally the other side of the country from where they are at the moment.

Here is where the great parts of the movie begin - Jimmy takes the initiative to assert his feelings to Chloe. Of course, he’s stuck in the bubble, but he creates his own suit, complete with ventilator and arm and leg extensions. The first stop for him is the front yard - where he steps in dog crap, which he finds quite a thrill!

He gets to the bus station and is told that the amount of money he has would get him all the way to the end of the curb, and definitely not to Niagara Falls. Luckily, he gets picked up by a bus that has this amazing ability to back up on queue, and find targets it wants. The occupants of the bus, all called Todd and Lorraine, followers of the amazing Gil and a theology that they’re not exactly certain of are on their way to Vegas. Somehow Jimmy susses them out as a cult and is promptly booted out of the bus. They would come around again and again, as it turns out, Jimmy is the mystical all-powerful person who will prevent them from going to Planets PX41 and PX42.

As he continues his trek across the country, he encounters a whole host of characters including a motorcyclist who has a mere less-than-moped for his current travel who brings Jimmy to Vegas and gets him to gamble and gives him a great lesson - don’t have any regrets. This lesson would definitely come to fruition at the end of the film.

When his parents catch wind of him going off on his quest, they start in chase, and catch up to him in the desert east of Las Vegas, causing him to jump onto a train filled with freaks who travel with a doctor; Doctor Phreak - played by Vern Troyer who Jimmy’s Mom eventually takes a bit of caring to, until it’s time to meet Jimmy once again, at which point he’s shuffled out of the stolen truck they were using and out onto the street, bolted into his car seat.

Jimmy then frees himself from the travelling circus and gets a ride in a combination ice cream/curry van which goes bust when they hit a cow and the proprietor has to honor his religion and treat the fallen cow with the utmost respect. He gets to Illinois and a taxi is there and the fare to Niagara Falls is $500 and a packet of Depends underwear. Luckily there’s a parlor across the street with the money on offer. He wins a mud wrestling competition and goes on his way with Pappy, who after a night of driving, dies.

At this point, he had only a short distance to go, but made a call to Chloe’s phone and got Mark, who reminds him of the charity case bologna causing Jimmy to lose hope and call Dr. Phreak. He goes to take a can of soda or possibly beer, and is allowed to because, I mean, why would the robber care if some kid in a bubble took a can of somethig from the refrigerated case?

He’s put back into the truck with his mom and dad and while she’s off to go to the bathroom, his dad reminds him of what home was like, and he bolts off towards Niagara Falls once more. He’s picked up by Pippy - Pappy’s brother and is flown almost into the falls but the straight vertical flight is too much for him.

All in all, the movie ends with the happy ending we all would expect, including an intriguing revelation about Jimmy’s immune system - one which if it were me, I’d have been quite angry with my mom, but for Jimmy, he shows amazing compassion.

If you get a chance to see Bubble Boy, it’s good for an hour-and-a-half of distraction and is a happy movie to watch. The only lingering question is what happened to the Todds and Lorraines? The last time we saw them, they were in Illinois getting tricked by the freaks that they were mutating. It would have been excellent if they had the cult come back and find Jimmy out of the bubble and rejoice in the news…oh well.

It’s been quite a while since I’ve done a movie review around here. In fact, I think it’s been about four months since I watched the second part of the Indiana Jones trilogy - The Temple of Doom.

Obviously, I’ve had quite the hectic time between then and now, and haven’t given myself time to watch a movie, but I did recently. As had been noted in the comments on the other two reviews of the movies, the finale would be the best of the bunch. Those declarations are definitely not unfounded.

As it so happens, I had seen bits of this film as well - in particular the last section where Indiana has to cross the stone bridge by spelling Jehovah. I also remembered seeing where he had to cross over the pit based on faith alone. The strangest thing though is that I could have sworn that I had seen the actual bridge that they used to cross the pit. Maybe my eyes were just deceiving me.

Well, now that I’ve started with the end, let’s go back to the beginning and talk about the awesomeness of the opening sequence where we see a young Indiana being chased by some, well, hoodlums after his discovery of a gold cross which, as it turned out, was being sought after by its supposed original owner. Part of the chase involved going through one of the things that I hold close to my heart - a train. Not just any train, a circus train.

Part of the brilliance of the sequence is how all of them get into the snake pit. Granted, it was quite eerie to be sent into the snake pit, it certainly helped Indy get out with the cross.

After the flashback to his youth, we go back to the present where he is teaching another class of students, who, like in Raiders of the Lost Ark, were completely enamored with Indy as a teacher. Maybe we need teachers like him for archeology in today’s schools, eh?

Anyway, he’s delivered a message about his need to be helped and, while in his office (after fighting off the hording masses of students) he finds a package from Venice containing his father’s “Grail book”, which was a diary of his search for the holy grail. What had happened is that him, along with a fellow archaeologist, had found one part of the “grail stone” whose inscription had information on where to start from to search for the grail.

Once in Venice, Indiana meets up with a woman who would turn out to be more trouble than necessary (and, really, a woman who was having way too much fun apparently). He winds up in a boat chase with some people whose mission in life is to protect the grail. Unfortunately, this almost ended up being the end of our hero when he was too busy with fighting to notice a small problem. Can you see the problem? Yeah, generally heading into a propeller isn’t going to do the hair, body or anything else any good..

Another really cool part of the film comes after quite a while - they’ve found the rest of the grail tablet (of course, after almost getting incinerated in a sewer filled with rats), finding out that the woman had a dual purpose–specifically a need to be friendly with the Third Reich. Indiana and his father are on a convenient Zeppelin flight from Berlin to somewhere outside of Germany, when some Nazi agents come after him.

Brilliantly, he decides to commandeer the uniform of the ticketing agent and check for tickets. Of course the agent didn’t have a ticket, so when he’s booted off of the flight, everyone heeds attention.

Soon enough, it’s discovered that they are still on the flight, so they do an about face, which leads to Indy repeating something he’s done in the past - fly a plane. Of course, landing? That’s a different matter. Let’s just say that the landing goes much smoother than the last plane he had tried to land

Some more time passes (I’d guess a few days or weeks, but it’s only a matter of minutes; it’s a movie you know ), and then the third chase begins - an automobile chase. Granted, Indy, his father and Salah are somewhat overpowered. Tank v. Car. Who do you think has the advantage here?

If you guessed Indiana, you’d be right. Though, I think the fact that the tank’s fall down the cliff looks like it was put in via Photoshop might have something to do with that…Just saying

Of course, the movie ends with everything being set right, and everyone riding off into the sunset. Really, everyone but the Germans are happy - the Hatay Republic has use of a new Rolls, the grail was found then lost thanks to the Germans wanting it to go past the threshold, and Indy’s father was saved thanks to grail water.

So, why should you watch this movie?

Well, why shouldn’t you? The music is brilliant (as you would expect from John Williams), the acting is amazing. Even though the special effects might look a bit “cheap” - it adds a lot to the quality of the movie (consider that it was made in 1989 so CGI was still in its infancy). Lastly, there’s a fourth movie coming out sometime in the near future. Why not remind yourself of the greatness of the original trilogy.

The whole trilogy is out on DVD on a three disc set - and it mustn’t be too expensive (I’d venture to guess it’s priced at around $25 for the set, but with Christmas sales you should find it cheaper).

Do yourself a favor this weekend (or sometime in the near future) and watch Raiders of the Last Ark, The Temple of Doom, and The Last Crusade. If you’re crunched for time, watch the Last Crusade

The second movie in the Indiana Jones series is certainly an interesting one, but it brings up a few questions as well. While it was a great movie, I don’t think it was as good as Raiders of the Lost Ark.

First off, the movie starts with the whole “Anything Goes” sequence. While I appreciate the use of the scene to introduce us to Willie as a character in the movie and as an opportunity to get all the initial credits out of the way, the sequence doesn’t really fit in with the rest of the movie. The rest of the scene in the nightclub only advances the plot a little bit, but being the beginning of the movie, my guess would be that it was a great way to ease into the movie, unlike in Raiders where you had spiders and skeletons within the first ten minutes.

Fortunately, we leave the nightclub and head in a car driven by Short Round to the airport and a flight out of Shanghai operated by the same guy we were just dealing with in the nightclub. That leads us towards the main plot of the movie - a crash landing into India, and the search for the stone.

However, there is a major problem - poor special effects. I’ll try to explain it in words, but a video would really help here. Unfortunately, I’ve tried to upload the clip three times now and I’ve had no luck, so here goes

The first problem is that when the plane crashes into the mountain, you see the fireball, but there isn’t much evidence of the plane crashing apart. I know it’s being picky and pedantic, but it’s just not convincing. Then, as they go down the mountain in the snow, the raft has this magic quality of constantly changing colors between bright yellow and dull yellow. Back and forth, and really no purpose to it. Then, you see the raft hit the dirt, but fortunately they thought of throwing some dirt in front of the raft to make it seem like they were on dirt.

However, where that didn’t go too well, the rest of the movie was quite good, especially, as in with Raiders, mixing the adventure and the creep-you-out factor. Particularly when Willie is trying to get the trap room to stop closing in on Indy and Shorty and she has everything crawling around and on her, then having to reach through the bugs and things to hit the lever is sensational and freaky.

Another great “creepy” moment is when they’re presented with the meal in the dining hall. With everything from snakes filled with eels to claimed monkey brains, it’s everything a horror film could have asked for. Lest we forget that there were also the scenes where you have Mola Ram pulling hearts out of people which then spontaneously combusts when the hapless victim hits the molten rock below the platform.

While I could go into a full discussion of child labor, I’ll just leave it at it’s wrong, especially if they’re being chained up in order to do the work.

A couple of questions -
- Since the movie was set in 1935, we know that it’s a prequel to Raiders. In that case, what happened to Short Round and Willie? Did they fall off of the face of the earth?
- When was the auto-inflating plane raft invented? I would have sworn that those were invented after 1935.

All in all, it was a really good movie. It did seem to move a bit slow at times (particularly the opening scene). But like I had said at the outset, I liked Raiders more than this one, but both are definitely on the list of movies you need to watch at least once.

If you’re like me and haven’t watched this movie before, you need to watch it. You will not be sorry. Honestly, it’s one of those essential movies that you need to watch to have experienced the world. And seriously, you should stop reading and go watch it. I’ll wait for you.

Having said that, those of us (now that I can include myself in this group) who have seen the movie know why it’s such a great work. Here’s my take on why I think it’s so good.

Mixing of adventure and scare

Ok, so maybe “scare” isn’t the best word for it, but there are definitely some moments that make you tingle. For example, right at the beginning of the movie when Indiana and his Peruvian counterpart are exploring the cave and all of a sudden tarantulas appear on their backs. Like I said the other day, I don’t mind small tiny spiders that don’t do much, but tarantulas give me the creeps! Of course, then the wall comes out with the decomposing skeleton hanging off of it. Which moves. Need I say more about that?

From there you move to the adventure of grabbing the idol and getting it out of the cave, and the escape from the rainforest. That leads into the race to get the Ark and trying to beat the German expedition team (I’m not sure that they were referred to as Nazis in 1936, even though it is three years into Hitler’s rule).

Then, when Indiana finds the Ark’s true location (the Germans having erred on the calculation on the height of the staph), he finds a pit of snakes. Nothing but snakes which are slithering along the floor. He even faces down a (what looks to be) cobra, but they just mention asps in the dialogue. Then Marian falls into the pit, and while leaving, she winds up in a hall of more moving skeletons, including one that has a snake coming out of the mouth. Again, very creepy!

However, it all winds up balancing perfectly as there are only a couple of moments where you want to ball up but the rest of the movie keeps you so engaged that you keep your focus on the movie and nothing else.

Little bits of humor

You could say that all movies have some elements of humor in them, but Spielberg is one of the best to do it. For example, when Indiana is teaching after his quest for the idol, he gets distracted - first by his head teacher, and then by a girl who has put “LOVE YOU” on her eyelids. Even today, that’s a pretty creative way to signal your feeling, and one that is very blunt but would probably land you in hot water for sexual harassment. Then, after Indy gets out of the Well of Souls and gets back to Sallah, he says that he’s going to get the truck. How? Sallah asks. “I don’t know. I’m making this up as I go.” Simple line, and in the context of the movie, completely accurate, but it’s worthy of a chuckle.

The rock chase

Now, even if you haven’t seen the movie (What are you doing reading down here if that’s the case? I told you to stop reading and watch it! ;)), you are probably familiar with this scene. I had been under the impression that it came towards the end of the movie, but it comes right at the start. It’s still amazing to think that Indiana didn’t get run over by it. Of course, it’s been immortalized as part of the ride at Disneyland, which I took when I was there in 2001. One of the things that they said is that there are infinite combinations of the ride to go on. As it happens, I wound up on the one where you go past a wall of snakes, which do move. Below is a great clip of the ride and the area around it - there are a couple of other videos on Youtube of the ride, but this is the best of the ones I watched.

A couple of questions
- Why did Indiana keep the monkey after he was the cause of the first attack in Cairo? (Of course, not that it was a bad thing considering that it found the “bad” dates)
- What happened to the ship that Sallah had hired to take the Ark, Indiana and Marion to London after the encounter with the U-Boat?

I got to thinking tonight about the movies that I have watched over the last year, and it’s interesting to look at what I’ve actually watched. Some of them I’ve reviewed on the blog, others I haven’t. Some of them are movies that most people have watched, others are ones that were wildly popular in some parts of the world and never made that big of a splash here, and others are just good movies.

This is the list of movies that I’ve watched over the last year or so; if I’ve done a review, I’ll have it linked:

• Back to the Future
• Back to the Future II
• Back to the Future III (I’ve got to go back and watch them again one day soon ;))
• Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure
• The Client
• Romeo + Juliet
• Strictly Ballroom
• Dead Man Walking
• Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
• Dead Poets’ Society
• Top Gun
• Short Circuit
• The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert
• I Am Sam
• Pump up the Volume
• Titanic

The next movies in my queue for watching however, are BlueThunder (though I suspect I’ve gotten the fullscreen version instead of the proper widescreen version), The Blue Lagoon, and the Indiana Jones trilogy.

I’d love to hear your suggestions for movies that I should/have to/need to watch. Don’t be afraid to make obvious suggestions; chances are that I haven’t seen it (and may not have even heard of it). The last movie I watched in a theatre was (if I’m remembering correctly) The Santa Clause.