Halloween: Vampire Vs. Werewolf

If you and I are Facebook friends (a good step above false friend, but not as good as "huckleberry friend") you may have read this before, but it's topical!
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When trying to decide between two equally desirable options, it is best to outline the positives and negatives.

Werewolf positives:
1. Only transform at full moon, so you get to spend most of your time as a normal human being.
2. Get to hang out cool places like London or Paris.
3. Fewer people know your weaknesses - and even if they do, where are they going to get a silver bullet?
4. If you are in a movie, you might be Michael J. Fox, Jack Nicholson , Gary Oldman (not technically - that's for you Allyson!), or, uh Lon Chaney, Jr.

Werewolf negatives:
1. Transform into mindless slobbering beast
2. Often lose clothes in transformation, wardrobe replacement expensive
3. Wake up from transformations naked in the woods, wondering if you ate someone - if so, who, and what was their health history?
4. If in a movie, might be Danny DiVito (see Big Fish)

Vampire positives:
1. Charismatic - ladies love you!
2. Tend to be well dressed, have spacious living quarters
3. Sleep in coffin - surprisingly comfortable
4. If in movie, might be Bela Lugosi, Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise, Antonio Banderas, Wesley Snipes, Willem DeFoe, Christopher Lee, Leslie Nielson, Gary Oldman again, Keifer Sutherland, Jason Patric, or, if a lady vampire - Selma Hayek, Aaliyah, Peta Wilson, or Kirsten Dunst.
5. Able to transform into wolf, bat, or intangible mist (at least in the Dracula book you can) - a handy trick
6. If in TV series, hunted by Sarah Michelle Gellar.

Vampire negatives:
1. Suffer from eternal blood lust
2. Neither truly alive or dead
3. Generally live in Transylvania - sometimes in New Orleans.
4. If in movie, might be Paul Reubens, or be hunted by Cory Feldman.
5. Everybody knows how to kill you - any scrap of kindling or piece of fence post could be the death of you
6. Never eat garlic bread again
7. No more days at the beach - or days, period

So, there you have it! The choice is yours - but for me, the negatives of being a vampire vastly outweigh the positives - even if it would be cool to be Antonio Banderas. But the possibility of being hunted by Cory Feldman - that's just chilling...

Movie Moment: Violence!

My wife occasionally goes out of town for a weekend at a conference, or retreat of some kind. When she does, I like to buy some of those really cheap oven pizzas, and rent a bunch of movies that I want to see, but she doesn't. The consistent theme in such films is that they feature people committing acts of violence against each other. Now, Jeni is not against violence in movies per se. She liked "V for Vendetta" and all the "Lord of the Rings." I watched "The Departed", and even though it featured three of Jeni's top ten Least Favorite Things to see in Movies (1.horrible violence, 2.flagrant swearing, 3.an unhappy ending - the others are 4.gratuitous sex, 5.Japanese animation, 6.animals being hurt, 7.a heavy metal soundtrack, 8.a gratuitous hip hop soundtrack, 9.gratuitous vampires, and 10.Nicholas Cage as an action hero), I made her watch it because I knew she would think it was good. And even after seeing multiple shootings, arm breakings, face smashings, and one man dropped off a building, she agreed that it was a great film. In contrast, we started watching "Kung Fu Hustle," and one guy gets his leg chopped off with an axe and she refused to watch any more. So when it comes to violence, I have to pick and choose carefully.

Here are the movies I watched during my last bachelor weekend, and my favorite elements of each:

"Iron Monkey"
Hong Kong action. A teenage boy battling adults with an umbrella. An evil Shaolin monk with telescoping sleeves which could punch through walls. A climactic battle between three men balanced atop ten foot wooden posts - which were on fire.

"Once Upon a Time in the West"
Sergio Leone's very....slow....camera....moves (Westerns are about space). Henry Fonda as the bad guy. Henry Fonda's line, "Suspenders and a belt? You can't trust a man that can't trust his own pants." After which he shoots the man twice in the chest and once in the gut, severing his suspenders and belt, and making the dying man's pants fall down.

"Leon: The Professional"
Jean Reno as a hitman who apparently subsists entirely on milk. Gary Oldman as crazy bad guy. 12-year old Natalie Portman using a sniper rifle.

"Spirited Away"
Miyazaki masterpiece. Utterly bizarre and ultimately touching story about a haunted bathhouse, growing up, a boy who is also a dragon who is also a river(?!), living soot balls, a monster named "No-Face," and frog people. One the most original and engaging imaginary worlds I have ever seen.

My list of violent movies (or anime, or both) to see is quite long - so you'll probably see one of these again...

P.S. Guess who learned to use the link button! Thanks, Dani!

Belated Purpose Statement: Movie Moment

I love movies.

They are the twentieth century art form - a fantastic blend of all the arts of drama, stagecraft, music, art, and photography. A collaborative effort of (usually) hundreds of people to create a lasting work. They can be ridiculous or sublime.

Basically, I really love movies, and like talking about them. This seems like a good place...

And as long as we're here, did you know Gary Oldman was in "The Scarlet Letter?" The 1995 one with Demi Moore and Robert Duvall? The one that was really, really, bad? The one that completely changed the ending of the book, and I'm not saying the end of the book was good, because it wasn't, and I'm still not sure what exactly happens in it, but still, it wasn't what happened in the movie.

I hadn't thought about that movie for years (thank God), but I was looking at Oldman's filmography after being impressed by him again in "The Dark Knight" and lo and behold, there's the "Scarlet Letter." I remember the one redeeming part of that terrible, terrible film being the guy who played the minister, and there's the reason - because it was Gary Oldman.

Other Gary Oldman favorites: "Batman Begins" (of course), "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" (make sure to include Gary in your 'people who have played werewolves' list), "The Contender", "The Fifth Element", "Lost in Space" (shut up - I liked it!), "Air Force One", and "Leon: The Professional."

Can't Believe I Haven't Seen These: "Immortal Beloved" (Beethoven!), "Bram Stoker's Dracula" (Dracula!), and "JFK" (Lee Harvey Oswald!)