Monday, August 15, 2005
Good Ol' Boys?
I saw the new "Dukes Of Hazzard" movie recently with fairly high hopes. I wasn't expecting an epic on the scale of "Lawrence of Arabia," but I figured it would be some good, dumb fun. I left the theatre fairly disappointed. It was pretty dumb, but, well, I just didn't think it was funny. Was it supposed to be? It sure as hell was marketed that way. Johnny Knoxville and Seann William Scott both did fine work and were charming as heck as Bo and Luke Duke, but I just didn't laugh. Not once. Cool car chases? Check. Completely brain-dead plot? Right on. Burt Reynolds and Willie Nelson as Boss Hogg and Uncle Jesse, respectively? Perfect. Laughter? Completely absent. All in all, I guess it was an O.K. film, just not quite what I expected going in. My 11-year old loved it. Whoops, I just remembered, I did laugh once: If you've seen both this film and "Super Troopers" then you got the joke and loved it as much as I did. If not, explaining it would do no good.
I also saw "March of the Penguins." I'm not a huge documentary person or particularly interested in nature normally, so a nature documentary seemed to be exactly up the wrong alley for me. This was really super, though. Narrated by Morgan Freeman, "Penguins" documents an annual ritual for Emperor Penguins in Antarctica: a 70-mile walk across unforgiving terrain to the breeding ground where they mate once a year, only to try and keep the egg and, later, the chick that hatches from it, safe from the harshest winter on the planet. It's not the kind of movie I would necessarily want to buy on DVD and watch over and over again, but it is a fascinating look at a subject most people probably know nothing about. At different times it manages to be touching, sweet, sad, and funny. Highly recommended.
I also saw "March of the Penguins." I'm not a huge documentary person or particularly interested in nature normally, so a nature documentary seemed to be exactly up the wrong alley for me. This was really super, though. Narrated by Morgan Freeman, "Penguins" documents an annual ritual for Emperor Penguins in Antarctica: a 70-mile walk across unforgiving terrain to the breeding ground where they mate once a year, only to try and keep the egg and, later, the chick that hatches from it, safe from the harshest winter on the planet. It's not the kind of movie I would necessarily want to buy on DVD and watch over and over again, but it is a fascinating look at a subject most people probably know nothing about. At different times it manages to be touching, sweet, sad, and funny. Highly recommended.
