Tag Archives: movies

Super Soaker?

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Super Soaker 50

Baby’s first water gun.
photo credit: Freeheelingstrider via photopin cc

I am not a child nor do I have children, so my sense of what makes a commercial for kids’ toys these days is skewed. My only reference for this is old Crossfire ads which are undoubtedly an inseparable part of any person’s brain who is around my age. The other day, this changed, as I went to see Star Trek Into Darkness. I was in the unusual circumstance of being alone in the movie theater, waiting for the person I was meeting up with. While I was there, I was watching that weird previews-while-waiting-for-the-previews thing that some theaters have implemented. Those previews containing things like 10-minute documentaries on how Rizzoli and Isles is made or whatever. Well, at the end of that mess, there was one ad that stuck in my head. An ad for beloved childhood brand, Super Soaker:

So, two new models in Hasbro’s Nerf Super Soaker series: the X-TREME Switch Shot and X-TREME Arctic Shock.

The first thing that caught my attention was the complete lack of interest in the announcer’s voice. The coy, self-negating dialog the narrator had to read.

So you can unleash a rush of x-treme cold in every blast to freeze your friends! Okay, maybe not that cold but it’s cold.

and

You can unleash waves of x-treme soakage! Well, not that much soakage but you’ll get soaked.

Have some purpose to your life, man who’s trying to sell me things!

Now as an adult who has seen an adjustable shower head and knows what a kid full of Popsicles is capable of, I also see: Switch Shot, because nothing says breakable toy like movable parts!

The end of the commercial I find especially weird, the part where the freezing gun is unfreezing the logo. Why does this happen? Is it a continuity error? In film, continuity errors happen for a variety of reasons. One of them is that in editing, stuff might be cut for timing, uselessness to plot, or changes to the story. These things that are cut out of the film might have originally explained some tiny change in a person’s clothes or something else more interesting. Could it be that this graphic comes from a deleted scene?

My hypothesis is that originally the new water guns were supposed to be a hot/cold dichotomy. X-TREME probably stood for temperature extremes. X-TREME Switch Shot was originally called the Hot Shot but after realizing no one likes being covered in hot water in the summer, they decided to rename it and forget about telling people to add boiling water to the reservoir. X-TREME Arctic Shock got to stay the same because it didn’t cause severe burns on children.

Remember, it’s Nerf or nothing! Alright, maybe not that nothing.

America says, “shove it England,” again

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photo credit: Stéfan via photopin cc

photo credit: Stéfan via photopin cc

The phrase, “the book was better,” is one of the most annoying things a person can say about a movie. An apple is not an orange and a movie is not a book. Most of the time I wonder if a person actually likes the book better or if a) they feel obligated to say that; or b) it was a self-fulfilling prophecy that they would like the book better. The main reason people have for liking books better is that movies cut things out or change things and people don’t like change. Just because the movie doesn’t have the scene where the mother bathes the son or some other “deeply meaningful” part of the book, it doesn’t mean the movie was somehow worse.

People romanticize things too much, just because something has always been someway doesn’t mean it’s the best or only way. The dirty truth is that I’m sure most of the time movie executives hate the names of novels and wish they could change them to something else but they know people who are suckers for the book will be subconsciously forced to see the movie. I’ve never seen The Hunger Games, but from what I hear it’s not good enough to be a success without the name recognition. Look at Precious: Based on the Novel “Push” by Sapphire. That is the most ridiculous full name for a movie ever. They wanted to call it Precious (a fine name for a movie) and they ended up adding that whole mess to the end of it so it would make a few extra million bucks.

If it makes a person feel better, they should always imagine movies based on books aren’t even based on anything. Enjoy the book and movie separately. Knowing the source material of a movie and being an ass about it will just ruin the experience. Don’t be an ass.

I digress, because as the title of this post will suggest, I have a different bone to pick. Right after, “the book was better,” in the list of annoying, pretentious clichés is the phrase, “I liked the British version.” This can usually be heard in conjunction with The Office but more recently with House of Cards. I can believe that some people might like the British version of The Office better than the American version though I’m not sure why people mention it other than to be condescending. People aren’t as serious when it comes to House of Cards because I have my doubts many people have actually seen both the American and British versions of that show.

Well anyways, it got me thinking about who has actually won this war of porting shows from one side of the pond to the other. My hypothesis was that the US probably has this down just from sheer quantity. I checked out the Wikipedia pages List of American television series based on British television series and List of British television series based on American television series for confirmation. So first, a sample of the competition, British shows that Americans re-made (with House of Cards added in since I guess it doesn’t count as a television series):

British Show American Version
Gladiators American Gladiators
The Office The Office
One Foot in the Grave Cosby
Pop Idol American Idol
Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? Who Wants to Be a Millionaire
Whose Line Is It Anyway? Whose Line Is It Anyway?
House of Cards House of Cards

There are some pretty good ones in there. It should be pointed out that Wikipedia acknowledges Cosby had “many differences,” but I do love the title of the British version, One Foot In The Grave. American Gladiators was pretty cool, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire was fun for a bit, and I really like both The Office and House of Cards. I put in American Idol because of its significance in pop culture but I don’t really find it all that interesting. Finally, there is Whose Line Is It Anyway which is probably just better seen in a person’s home country, for references or whatever.

Now the American shows with British re-makes:

American Show British Version
Win Ben Stein’s Money Win Beadle’s Money
Wheel of Fortune Wheel of Fortune
Who’s the Boss? The Upper Hand
The Soup / Talk Soup Celebrity Soup
That ’70s Show Days Like These
Saturday Night Live Saturday Live/Friday Night Live
The Price Is Right The Price Is Right
Married… with Children Married For Life
Law & Order Law & Order: UK
Jeopardy! Jeopardy!
The Golden Girls The Brighton Belles
Double Dare Double Dare
Family Feud Family Fortunes

First of all, the game shows: Win Ben Stein’s Money, Wheel of Fortune, The Price Is Right, Jeopardy, Family Feud, and even Double Dare? Seriously, Double Dare, that should end the debate right there.

Who’s the Boss might be the most intriguing show on the list. I love that it needed to be renamed The Upper Hand because, while that isn’t a great name on its own, that it was what they changed Who’s the Boss to makes it great. It makes sense how game shows or shows with a clear theme like The Office and House of Cards might be considered re-makes but what is so special about Who’s the Boss that it even has to be stated another show is a re-make of it?

Moving on, shows I enjoy: The Soup, That ’70s Show (which inexplicably could not be called “That ’70s Show” in the UK), Saturday Night Live, Married… with Children, Law & Order (though not great, very addicting). Plus another show I mention because of its place in pop culture, The Golden Girls.

So, yeah, America wins. I’d say, “Sorry, England” but I doubt they even care. It’s mostly just Americans who want to sound intellectual or something.

Seeing Movies Fashionably Late: Forrest Gump

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I am a huge fan of movies. I see lots of movies because I enjoy seeing them. I get movies in the mail, I DVR them, I go to the theater occasionally, et cetera. As many movies as I’ve seen though, there are literally thousands of movies out there and I haven’t seen most of them. I know there are a lot of movies that I should see and people give me suggestions all the time and the best I can usually say is, “Yeah, I’ll put it on my queue,” and maybe I’ll see it a year from then. A lot of the time the movie came out either before I was born or while I was too young to appreciate it and it can be hard to see these movies because eventually everyone has already seen them, except me.

Now that I got that out of the way, sixteen years after its release, I’ve finally seen Forrest Gump. Of course, ever since the 4th grade I’ve heard all the cliché lines from the movie over and over again; “Stupid is as stupid does;” “Life is like a box of chocolates;” and as a runner myself “Run, Forrest, run” to no end (and I had seen countless Bubba Gump shrimp restaurants before I was ever told it’s inspired by the movie). Still, the movie didn’t seem silly or over exposed to me. I’m a little disappointed I hadn’t seen the movie earlier because it’s now one of my favorite movies of all time, but I am happy I was old enough to understand it when I saw it. I mean, there was no way I’d understand the awesome Midnight Cowboy reference in the middle of them film up until a few months ago when I saw that long overdue classic.

Whenever I see a movie I like (and sometimes when I don’t) I’m forced to head over to Wikipedia to read all about the movie, production, cast, director, writer, and anything else I wind up thinking will be interesting. Well Forrest Gump’s Wikipedia page has a few things worth mentioning. There is a section of that page called “Political interpretations” and discusses how it is a pro-conservative film. This is funny to me because the only point in the movie that I thought was actually political was when the Army recruiter is trying to get Gump to register by asking him if he had given any thought to his future. My interpretation of this was they were insinuating that only mentally challenged people with no futures would join the Army (not that I endorse this idea, just what I picked out from it). One example cited on the Wikipedia page showing the film’s conservative tone is that Jenny ends up ruined because her “life is full of countercultural embrace.” While that might be true, the movie makes it clear that the reason for her behavior is the fact that she was abused by her father, a viewpoint I think more commonly shared amongst liberals as to why someone would have trouble adjusting to society.

Another thing (and something that caught me off guard) is the mention of a possible sequel based on the book’s sequel Gump and Co. The film was apparently canned due to not being relevant after the September 11th attacks, but I would go a step further and call it just a bad idea. The basic premise of the sequel seems to be a breaking the 4th wall of sorts similar to the movie Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back where it is admitted that a movie was created based on the story of the main characters. Strait from the article: “During the course of the sequel novel, Gump runs into Tom Hanks, and at the end of the novel is the film’s release, including Gump going on The David Letterman Show and attending the Academy Awards. It is mentioned Hanks plays Gump, and Forrest seems to have a positive view of the film.” Uh, what? I’d say this is the worst idea since Julia Roberts’ character in Ocean’s Twelve, Tess, impersonates Julia Roberts because they look alike, but it’s the same terrible idea. Dear Hollywood, I know this seems clever but it is the worst idea ever and ruins the entire idea of suspending disbelief.

If that wasn’t enough, I read the synopsis of the book and I had to check an old revision of the Wikipedia page because I was sure it had to be a prank, but it wasn’t!

As in the first book, Gump stumbles through important American events in the 1980s and early 1990s. He plays football for the New Orleans Saints, sells encyclopedias door-to-door, works on a pig farm, and helps develop the infamous New Coke. He accidentally crashes the Exxon Valdez, helps destroy the Berlin Wall, and fights in Operation Desert Storm with his friend, an orangutan named Sue. He meets many celebrities, including Colonel Oliver North, the Ayatollah Khomeini, John Hinckley, Jim Bakker, Ivan Boesky, Ronald Reagan, Saddam Hussein, Bill and Hillary Clinton, and Tom Hanks (who plays Forrest in the movie).

What? Alright, I’m just glad they never made that movie because it would have made a ton of money for all the wrong reasons and probably would have stolen $20 strait out of my wallet ($10 for the movie, another $10 for popcorn and a cherry Icee).

Forrest Gump is availible for pretty cheap on either DVD or BluRay from Amazon.

Doug Loves Movies

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This is the beginning of a series of blog posts about podcasts, for some background on why, check out my original post on podcasts.

The first podcast I ever listened to was Doug Benson’s Doug Loves Movies (iTunes link). I’m not sure why I started listening to it, I didn’t really know much about Doug Benson at the time. I vaguely remembered reading his short movie reviews on the defunct bobanddavid.com, but that’s as far as it went. Then one day I decided to get into podcasts (out of boredom?) and I found Doug Loves Movies to which I was instantly hooked. I ended up listening to every back episode and (most of the time) listen to it as soon as, in Doug’s words, an episode “plops.”

The podcast comes out on a weekly basis (normally Fridays) and consists of Doug and a panel of comics talking about movies, usually in front of a live audience at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in LA. It starts off with a short monologue by Doug, followed by the introduction of his guests with a few minutes of banter. Every episode concludes with the Leonard Maltin Game, which was created by Benson and his friends. It’s a “Name That Tune” style game with movies (instead of songs) which references Leonard Maltin’s Movie Guide to provide hints and actor names.

Thanks to Doug and his very funny friends, who can often give perspective on the business, the podcast is a must listen for anyone who can appreciate movies or are just looking for some quality comedy. Who doesn’t like comedy and/or movies? Boring people, that’s who. You aren’t boring are you? Give Doug Loves Movies a try and hopefully you’ll be hooked like I am.

kevinpollak