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Sensory Overload, Part One.
Apr. 14th, 2004 10:58 pm
Sometimes we get forcibly reminded of our senses. This week for example, whenever I entered the car, I was met with an increasingly pungent citrus smell, which while not quite unpleasant, gave me the feeling that an orange was on the borderline of transitioning from snack to bioweapon. I tore up the upholstery trying to find the burrow where it had gone to ground, before realizing the problem wasn't an orange at all; someone, after spraying her roses, left a bottle of neem oil in the trunk . The bottle having ruptured and spilled the stuff all over the place, the trunk is well protected from aphids and other pests- and my entire car will be permeated with the smell for weeks.
A similar smell greeted me in the theatre the other weekend when I saw "Starsky and Hutch". Not necessarily unpleasant, but potentially so. It was the smell of money found in old properties. The smell of the sweat of producers desperate enough for ideas to steal old TV series for the easy recognition factor. It permeated the film with a subtle odor of faux nostalgia, and if it had been heavier, the film would have been awful..
Things could have been much worse- the film was competently written, had some extremely funny elements in it, and as Sandy said, Snoop Dogg was "magisterial", easily stealing the film (and Sandy would be willing to kill for any of his clothing). It was amusing to see the tropes of the action film satirized, though they could have pushed the idea a bit further. Instead, it settled for making fun of the seventies-which it did much better then I expected- and pushing the Starsky and Hutch slash angle (rightly so- along with Star Trek, S/H slash is the progenerator of all slashfic) . The film's awkwardness was concentrated in the last thirty seconds, with the presence of original stars of the TV series "handing over of the reigns" in a scene that stretched for hours. It reminded me that in general, when a studio creates a satire of an old program, it means that they have no real idea of WHAT to do with it. That it succeeded well enough to be worth spending matinee prices on, was a small miracle. It could just as easily have been Disney's "Haunted House". I enjoyed, it, and that's saying something.
Right now, I'm considering what else is going to be coming down the pike. "Thunderbirds" is on the horizon, and already I am catching a whiff of something that might be concentrated sewage, based on it's "Spy Kids" riff (and the fact that they evidently couldn't afford marionettes, and had to use live actors instead). Wishing to punish my nose further, I typed "Six Million Dollar man movie" into Google, and got back "Jim Carry stars in remake of...". There is really nothing I can say that is as damning to that film as that little sentence. It’s a weird feeling to see two series I obsessed over as a small kid have been treated like breadcrumbs in a sausage, filler for a collection of action scenes and jokes. Not that I have had any real desire to see the original product again, I'm well aware they were schlock. And I suppose I should be happy that Hollywood's so efficient at recycling. Still, I don't want to type in the names of other old series into Google. I have faith that "Chico and the Man" and "Mork and Mindy" movies haven't gone into production. Not yet. I think so at least, I'm afraid to check.
A similar smell greeted me in the theatre the other weekend when I saw "Starsky and Hutch". Not necessarily unpleasant, but potentially so. It was the smell of money found in old properties. The smell of the sweat of producers desperate enough for ideas to steal old TV series for the easy recognition factor. It permeated the film with a subtle odor of faux nostalgia, and if it had been heavier, the film would have been awful..
Things could have been much worse- the film was competently written, had some extremely funny elements in it, and as Sandy said, Snoop Dogg was "magisterial", easily stealing the film (and Sandy would be willing to kill for any of his clothing). It was amusing to see the tropes of the action film satirized, though they could have pushed the idea a bit further. Instead, it settled for making fun of the seventies-which it did much better then I expected- and pushing the Starsky and Hutch slash angle (rightly so- along with Star Trek, S/H slash is the progenerator of all slashfic) . The film's awkwardness was concentrated in the last thirty seconds, with the presence of original stars of the TV series "handing over of the reigns" in a scene that stretched for hours. It reminded me that in general, when a studio creates a satire of an old program, it means that they have no real idea of WHAT to do with it. That it succeeded well enough to be worth spending matinee prices on, was a small miracle. It could just as easily have been Disney's "Haunted House". I enjoyed, it, and that's saying something.
Right now, I'm considering what else is going to be coming down the pike. "Thunderbirds" is on the horizon, and already I am catching a whiff of something that might be concentrated sewage, based on it's "Spy Kids" riff (and the fact that they evidently couldn't afford marionettes, and had to use live actors instead). Wishing to punish my nose further, I typed "Six Million Dollar man movie" into Google, and got back "Jim Carry stars in remake of...". There is really nothing I can say that is as damning to that film as that little sentence. It’s a weird feeling to see two series I obsessed over as a small kid have been treated like breadcrumbs in a sausage, filler for a collection of action scenes and jokes. Not that I have had any real desire to see the original product again, I'm well aware they were schlock. And I suppose I should be happy that Hollywood's so efficient at recycling. Still, I don't want to type in the names of other old series into Google. I have faith that "Chico and the Man" and "Mork and Mindy" movies haven't gone into production. Not yet. I think so at least, I'm afraid to check.