(no subject)

[trinityvixen]

Stupid Entertainment Weekly putting Pirates of the Caribbean on the cover. I want to read it--I desperately do--but I have to not. I've already seen the one-two sentence summaries on Google News and the like, and I have an idea what the critics think, but I'm trying to remain open-minded. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: reading reviews ahead of seeing the movie biases my brain to think like the reviews. Hence, whatever they don't like, I'll notice and be supremely annoyed by. Anything they thought was funny or clever, I'll be expecting so it won't be. And bastards like Ebert just plain ruin the endings of movies (I hope he gets heart cancer, or cancer where his heart should be, the soulless bastard), so there's that.
ETA: jethrien informs me that Ebert is actually in the hospital with cancer. So, yeah, that ended up sounding a lot more harsh than I meant. Really, I don't wish cancer on anybody. I wish him a really bad hangnail and many, many papercuts.

And now I'm hyper aware of the fact that in about thirty hours, I will be seeing Dead Man's Chest. In about a day and a half, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl won't be the sole text in the fandom, and that's weird to me. The first Pirates movie was so wildly, unpredictably, eclectically wonderful, I am already worried about the sequels' power to maintain that level of romping energy, surprise cleverness, and notable acting.

As it stands now, The Curse of the Black Pearl is the only canon text. That means, for good or for ill, I could never see Dead Man's Chest and forever think of the adventures of Captain Jack Sparrow as ending with him sailing off on his hard fought-for ship, humming "A Pirate's Life for Me." Tomorrow night, I won't be able to do that. For good or for ill. Tomorrow, I will see Dead Man's Chest, and the canon, much as I liked to bark about ignoring the parts of it I don't like, will be forever shaped by the sequels.

This is not always a good thing (The Matrix Reloaded/Revolutions, Batman & Robin, X-Men: the Last Stand?). I just never really thought about it this way before. Most of the time, I'm a slobbering fangirl mess before I get into the theater for a sequel. Not that I haven't been with Pirates, but, as I'm not seeing it opening night or at a screening earlier in the week, I'm forcing myself to delay that much longer and leaving room for more introspection.

What if I didn't see Dead Man's Chest? What if fandom as a whole decided what it would or wouldn't accept as canon, regardless of what the studio put out? Since it's nearly impossible to banish things like Episodes I, II, or III, supposing instead we'd gotten wind of what Lucas was doing and said, "No. George, put down our universe. You are kicked out of the clubhouse. The Force is not with you"?

I suppose you can do something like by just exercising the power of denial (as teneda espoused just yesterday with regards to the Schumaker Batman films), but doesn't it sit in the back of your brain that the fandom really lived and then spectacularly impaled itself on its last, worst texts? I can't even watch The Matrix without griding my teeth. All that seemed new and special and quasi intellectual about it now seems packaged, a trick, a gimmick to sell a franchise that really didn't have the steam to make it past film one. The Mummy had the same thing happen--a delightfully self-mocking B-movie got turned into a yuk-yuk wangst-fest. Star Wars...well, okay, Star Wars has always had terrible acting, the irritating character or three, and an oversimplification of the good/evil divide. But damn it, Lucas ruined my ability to enjoy the first three. It will take years of not watching any movie in the SW universe before I can forget the prequels enough to not try and see how the fuck they resulted in the triology and book series I've enjoyed that come later in the timeline.

In essence, how do you train yourself to forget bad chapters of canon that ruin your enjoyment of the rest of it?

Comments

[moonlightalice.livejournal.com]

In addition to being in the hospital, Ebert is AMAZING what is your problem you crazy woman?! I heart him. He actually makes it a rule not to ever give away an ending, and he's required by his paper to provide a basic summary. But his actual critical reviews are truly fantastic. Some are beautifully written, and his bad reviews are absolutely hysterical. He is so damn witty and clever, it's so dreaamy. Ok, not really, but he's totally awesome.

My two favorite Ebert stories are 1) he blasted the movie "The Brown Bunny" after he saw it at Cannes for being one of the worst movies he's ever seen. The director went off on him and called him a fat cow. When Ebert wrote about it in his Cannes report the next day, he wrote: "I may be fat, but I can lose weight. You, however, will always be the director of 'The Brown Bunny.'"

(From his Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo review) 2) "According to a story by Larry Carroll of MTV News, Rob Schneider took offense when Patrick Goldstein of the Los Angeles Times listed this year's Best Picture Nominees and wrote that they were "ignored, unloved and turned down flat by most of the same studios that ... bankroll hundreds of sequels, including a follow-up to 'Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo,' a film that was sadly overlooked at Oscar time because apparently nobody had the foresight to invent a category for Best Running Penis Joke Delivered by a Third-Rate Comic."

Schneider retaliated by attacking Goldstein in full-page ads in Daily Variety and the Hollywood Reporter. In an open letter to Goldstein, Schneider wrote: "Well, Mr. Goldstein, I decided to do some research to find out what awards you have won. I went online and found that you have won nothing. Absolutely nothing. No journalistic awards of any kind ... Maybe you didn't win a Pulitzer Prize because they haven't invented a category for Best Third-Rate, Unfunny Pompous Reporter Who's Never Been Acknowledged by His Peers."

Reading this, I was about to observe that Schneider can dish it out but he can't take it. Then I found he's not so good at dishing it out, either. I went online and found that Patrick Goldstein has won a National Headliner Award, a Los Angeles Press Club Award, a RockCritics.com award, and the Publicists' Guild award for lifetime achievement.

Schneider was nominated for a 2000 Razzie Award for Worst Supporting Actor, but lost to Jar-Jar Binks.

But Schneider is correct, and Patrick Goldstein has not yet won a Pulitzer Prize. Therefore, Goldstein is not qualified to complain that Columbia financed "Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo" while passing on the opportunity to participate in "Million Dollar Baby," "Ray," "The Aviator," "Sideways" and "Finding Neverland." As chance would have it, I have won the Pulitzer Prize, and so I am qualified. Speaking in my official capacity as a Pulitzer Prize winner, Mr. Schneider, your movie sucks."

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Uh...Ebert gave away a major plot point to Superman Returns in his review. That's not the first time, either, though I can't immediately recall others, so I won't vouchsafe for how often it happens. Also? He liked The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift. Like "I enjoyed this movie" liked it, not like "this is so bad, you have to see it to laugh at it." I don't trust his opinions farther than I can throw the man.

I always liked Siskel better, anyway.