Mike Salsbury’s Blog

This past Sunday afternoon, I watched the new J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie. From the hype leading up to its release, I understand this was intended to be “Star Trek for the rest of us”, meaning that it was intended to be a version of the Star Trek story that would be accessible to those who aren’t Star Trek fans. It’s also intended to “reset” the original Star Trek universe by placing it in an alternate reality. Thus, what we should expect from it is a universe that’s similar to what we’re familiar with, but different in some ways. I think it’s fair to say that the movie succeeds on both fronts. Its box office success seems to indicate that a lot of people were intrigued by it, and the story is definitely different from the universe of “Star Trek: The Original Series” (as it’s referred to today).

Looking at this installment of Star Trek as a movie, it delivers a lot of excitement and action, backed by a lot of interesting visual effects, and punctuated by moments of humor. If you’re a science-fiction fan who looks for a great story, lots of character development, and an interesting message, you’ll be disappointed. In order to pack as much action as possible into the movie, the writers took a lot of liberties with the story and characters. In fact, apart from the use of phrases like Federation, Romulan, Vulcan, warp drive, etc., and the setting in space, this could have been any big-budget action film. It could have been “Die Hard in space” with very few changes. It bears little resemblance to the Star Trek movies of the past.

For example, in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, we learn that Captain Kirk is the only Starfleet Cadet ever to beat the Kobayashi Maru “no-win scenario” test. We’re told that Kirk “changed the conditions of the test” so that it was possible to rescue the crew of the Kobayashi Maru. In the end, he received a “commendation for original thinking”. Based on this description, we can infer a few things. First, Kirk’s modifications were probably very subtle. Had Kirk made very blatant, obvious changes like having the Klingon ships crash into each other and become disabled, his tampering would be easily detected and would hardly be seen as clever or original thinking. Second, Kirk would not have wanted to get caught, so while his modifications made it “possible” to rescue the Kobayashi Maru crew, it shouldn’t have made it “easy” to do so.

In the J.J. Abrams Star Trek universe, Kirk has apparently lost quite a few IQ points. Not only do his modifications make it “possible” to save the crew, they practically make it impossible not to. And, far from trying to conceal his tampering with the test, the “new” Kirk loudly munches an apple during the test, practically ignoring everything that happens around him until the lights go out and his “cheat code” takes effect. Then, he suggests they check the Klingon shields, which just so happen to be down at the moment and allow for a devastating attack. He then half-heartedly makes the attack and rescue orders to the crew. It’s an amazingly cocky, stupid, unoriginal, and inelegant way to “beat” the “no-win” scenario. It’s no wonder that this Starfleet doesn’t award him a commendation for original thinking but instead puts him on trial. More than anything else, it shows that “new Kirk” is first and foremost a stupid, cocky, overly-confident ass. He doesn’t deserve the respect of his peers or his superiors.

But there’s more wrong with this movie than that single scene. I also found myself wondering what the heck was wrong with the new Spock. Leonard Nimoy’s Spock was logical, tormented by (and ashamed of) his feelings, and very much a “by the book” guy most of the time. The new Spock openly falls in love, becomes enraged, and lets his feelings control him. In a sense, everything that made Nimoy’s Spock an interesting, compelling character was tossed out the window for an awkward love scene in a turbolift and a make-out session on the transporter pad with a character the original Spock never showed an interest in. Why did the writers feel the need to shoehorn a love scene into this film? Is that supposed to make it appeal to women? Are women so easily entertained that a couple of quick romantic scenes in an action film are supposed to appease them? I think not. The women I know are smarter and more sophisticated than that. I’m married to one of them.

But Spock’s love life wasn’t the only bit of nonsense surrounding that character. When placed in charge of the ship, Spock and Kirk are at odds over what to do about Nero. Spock wants to follow orders and reconnect with the fleet. Kirk thinks this is suicide and wants to go on the attack. Kirk attempts and fails at a mutiny. Rather than place him in the brig, Spock orders him tossed off the ship. Excuse me, but even in an “alternate” Starfleet, aren’t there rules about locking up prisoners first so they can stand trial? Maybe if Kirk escaped from the brig you might toss him off the ship if you think he’s a threat to the safety of the crew, but only then. And marooning him on a planet so dangerous that the escape pod recommends staying put seems just short of sentencing him to death. I know Spock was supposed to be distraught because of the destruction of his home world, but that’s no excuse for him to virtually kill a fellow crew member.

Nero’s motivations and actions are questionable as well. Romulus is destroyed (in the future) by a supernova. That’s not the Federation’s fault. Spock even attempts to save Romulus, even though they’re enemies of the Federation, but fails. Instead of focusing on taking that supernova out of commission centuries before it can do harm, Nero decides to blame Spock and go on a rampage against the Federation. He waits decades to catch Spock and his ship full of “red matter” (whatever that is… wouldn’t the more-real “dark matter” have made more sense?). When he has Spock and the red matter under his control, his plan is later reported to be to have Spock watch helplessly as Vulcan is destroyed. How does Nero achieve this? By releasing Spock on a nearby planet with a Federation outpost! Not just any planet, but one so dangerous that it’s not safe to travel around outdoors. What if Spock is so busy fighting for his life that he doesn’t even see Vulcan destroyed? So much for Nero’s “clever” revenge. What if Spock makes his way to that outpost and manages to stop Nero (since, after all, Spock apparently knows how to transport across vast distances with a “common” transporter now)? Wouldn’t it have made far more sense for Nero to have kept Spock aboard his ship, chained up next to a viewport, under heavily armed guard to prevent his escape, to ensure that he has nothing else to do but watch as his world is destroyed? Dropping Spock on the planet was nothing more than a device for the writers to explain how Kirk would rejoin the Enterprise crew when doing so should have been impossible.

How that little miracle was accomplished was nothing short of ridiculous as well. We’re led to believe that Scotty has known for years how to beam someone across vast distances in space onto targets moving at warp speed. If that’s the case, why go back to the Enterprise where you might just be tossed out again or slapped into irons? Why not beam to Spock’s ship in Nero’s hold, and use its weapons to destroy Nero’s ship from the inside? Why go back to the Enterprise, waste time getting Spock to show his emotions, and then play catch-up to Nero? For that matter, if we can beam across the universe, why is it we need starships at all now? Why not just beam from planet to planet? It’s like the writers wrote themselves into a corner and pulled this magical tech out of nowhere to save themselves. It’s poor writing if you ask me.

We have to wonder about just how Nero figured out how to carry out his plan., too By his own admission, he was a mining ship captain, not a scientist. So exactly how did he know how to work with “red matter”, how to get the right amount to implode a planet without getting his ship sucked into it, etc.? The story just doesn’t seem that well thought out.

I’m aware this little rant has likely painted me in the role of “typical fanboy”. So be it. The problem with many recent science fiction shows and movies, this film included, is that Hollywood executives want to make science fiction appeal to a wider audience so they can make more money from it. To do this, they think it’s necessary to shun career science fiction writers in favor of people who have no interest or experience in the genre. Being unaware of what makes for good science fiction, they cram their shows full of action, one-liners, and special effects… While this may sell, it’s not science fiction, and it’s not Star Trek as far as I’m concerned.

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I admit that I’m one of the millions of Americans who doesn’t know much about, think much about, or really care much about international politics.  I don’t often watch the news, and rarely enjoy it when I do.  Nevertheless, I saw this movie as an inexpensive download from Amazon.com for my TiVo and decided to give it a look.

While the story it tells leans to the right politically, I think it does a compelling job of explaining both points of view and gives some justification as to why we have a military presence in these places.  It has little to do with oil and more with promoting freedom and stability in those foreign governments.  I found it interesting and educational.  It’s clear from the comments on Amazon.com that there are other ways to look at this film and I intend to keep an open mind when I hear those arguments as well. 

If you have an open mind, or think you do, it’s worth taking a look at this film if you get the chance.

The World Without US – With Niall Ferguson

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Those of you who can remember back to the days when Mike Myers was a regular on Saturday Night Live may remember him as I do, which is that his skits were either very funny or completely NOT funny. While I’ve found that opinions are mixed on whether his “Austin Powers” movies are funny or not, I enjoyed them and found them to be pretty funny on balance. I can’t say the same for The Love Guru. It’s really not funny at all.

Austin Powers used a lot of sophomoric humor that, while a little tired by the third movie, seemed to work. The same type of humor is used in The Love Guru, but it just doesn’t work. For example, the joke in Austin Powers about him being “in a nutshell” is corny, but in the context of the movie it works. A similar joke in The Love Guru, where a dessert involving nuts placed inside a piece of pastry are described as “nuts in a sling” falls flat. It doesn’t fit the situation in which it’s used, and comes across as the writers stretching too far to make a joke.

Similarly, the character of Guru Pitka is inconsistent as well. After telling the hockey star he’s supposedly helping that it’s important for him not to fight anyone on the ice for any reason, a few minutes later he’s giving exactly the opposite advice for no obvious reason. In fact, what I know of gurus tells me that in general they’re against violence. For some reason, Guru Pitka starts bar fights, hockey ice fights, etc.

My guess is that someone gave Myers too much control over this film, and he delivered one of those performances that on SNL would have been the “not funny at all” variety.

If you liked Austin Powers, I think you’ll be disappointed by this film.

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I really enjoy the original “Get Smart” television series, and it’s no wonder. There were some amazing acting and writing talents behind the episodes of that show. As Maxwell Smart, Don Adams played a perfect bumbling blowhard who somehow manages to save the day for CONTROL and defeat the agents of CHAOS. I’m not saying it was the ideal sitcom, but it was definitely funny and enjoyable to watch. I can’t say that for the new “Get Smart” movie starring Steve Carrell. I’d like to, because Carrell’s a nice guy and can be really funny, but I just can’t.

I think the reason this movie fails is that it takes the elements that key to the television series and throws them out the window. For example, the “television” Smart might bend down to tie his shoe, causing an enemy agent to trip over Smart and fall off a cliff. The “movie” Smart in one scene uses a fire extinguisher to blind his victims and hits one in the head with the device. The “bumbling oaf” has become a clever and resourceful spy in the film. Unfortunately, this “reasonably poised, reasonably confident, capable agent” can’t deliver the classic Maxwell Smart lines the same way, and when he tries, the result isn’t humorous.

If you’re thinking about plunking down some cash to see this movie, my advice is to save your money and go buy DVDs of the television series. Even at its worst, it was funnier than the movie.

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Recently, I rented “Destination Moon” from Netflix. Today I finally had the opportunity to watch the movie in its entirety. I have to say, given that it was produced decades before we actually set foot on the moon, it’s an amazing film. Most of the critical issues of early space travel, such as intense calculations, weight and safety considerations, weightlessness, spacewalks, gravity variations, and more are all considered. The movie gets many of the little details right, such as the fact that it takes seconds for a radio signal to reach Earth from the Moon. Even its prediction of the appearance of the lunar surface isn’t far off from reality.

The basic story of the film is that a military general comes to the conclusion that the moon could be used as a base of operations from which to launch missiles (presumably nuclear) at the Earth. On this premise, he convinces several leaders of “American Industry” to band together to solve the problems of space travel in record time. In a somewhat realistic depiction of our government in action, the pioneers are told that they can’t test their rocket, which is based on nuclear technology, because of the public’s fear of radiation. Never mind that the rocket’s location is in the middle of the desert. Never mind that those in charge of the project made sure no one was living within a distance that radiation could reach them. No, the government bows to pressure from protesters and denies permission to test the rocket. Faced with a crippling delay that could bankrupt them, the team decides to launch the rocket untested, before the government can outlaw the launch. Just as they’re making final preparations, some bureaucrat shows up with a court order to stop the launch. However, warned that he’s coming, the project team rushes to the launch pad and takes off in the rocket.

Without spoiling too much of the movie, I can tell you that they do make it to the moon. However, in getting there, they find themselves in trouble. They had to use too much fuel to land. Now they can’t escape the moon’s pull. They have to find a way to get rid of tons of weight.

Video quality on this DVD release is decent for a 1950s film. The sound is also quite reasonable for films of the time. Also, as we would expect from a 1950’s sci-fi flick, the music is at times overpowering. For that matter, some of the acting is a bit over the top too. All in all, though it’s a decent film and scientifically probably very accurate.

One amusing “treat” in the film is a short animated sequence featuring Woody Woodpecker. Woody’s job is to explain to the stodgy industrialists how the flight to the moon and back would work. It’s a cute cartoon and I expect it was created specifically for the film.

Perhaps the main reason the film does an excellent job of depicting the issues related to a moon trip is that Robert Heinlein (of Starship Troopers fame) helped to write the script, based on a story he had written previously. This makes the film far more intellectually interesting than much of today’s “science-fiction” coming from Hollywood, where it’s more important to pack in lots of celebrities, explosions, and love interests than to make a film that’s even slightly realistic and believable.

I’d say this is probably the best 1950’s era science-fiction film I’ve ever seen. It provides drama, emotion, and inspiration without taking the story line off track to tell love stories, show fantastic special effects (though there are special effects where needed), or blow things up.

Definitely worth renting or watching if you get the chance.

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I watched the Harrison Ford vehicle “Firewall” recently.  In general, I think Harrison Ford does a good job of choosing roles that suit his appearance, acting style, and presence.  Firewall is no exception.  He plays the part of a computer security expert whose family is taken hostage in exchange for him helping a group of crooks steal millions of dollars.  Ford plays the part similarly to his role in “The Fugitive” and does it convincingly.

On the whole, this a decent and entertaining film.  Where the film falls down, however, is in its depiction of technical information.  For example, even though Ford’s character has been suspected of doing something highly illegal, he’s still able to login to the bank’s computer systems from a remote terminal at an airport.  In the real world, that account would have been locked down within seconds of the suspicion.

Even ignoring that, his “clever” solution for capturing account numbers off a computer screen is insanely stupid.  It’s claimed that by removing the scanning element from his home fax machine and connecting it to his daughter’s iPod, he can create a device that will scan account numbers off a computer screen and store them as digital image files.  Yeah, right.  First, the scanner element alone will only create an image in conjunction with the right interface hardware, which an iPod doesn’t have.  Second, even if the iPod had that hardware, it doesn’t have scanner software built into it to interpret the signals coming from the fax machine’s scanner.  This means Harrison Ford’s character would have had to design in mere hours a custom hardware and software setup to enable the capture and storage of lots of bank account numbers.  Not gonna happen.  If he had that kind of skill, he wouldn’t be working in computer security – he’d be out there designing and building electronic hardware.

Read more…

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The first X-Men movie was decent.  I had a hard time believing that Hollywood could pull off a convincing X-Men movie, but I was wrong.  They did.  The second movie was less interesting.  This, the third installment, is slightly better than the second movie but less interesting than the first.

The basic gist of the plot of “X-Men: The Last Stand” is that the tension between normal humans and mutants have grown considerably.  The humans have discovered a mutant whose only power is that he reverses the mutations of other mutants.  Using his DNA, the humans are able to create a “cure” for the genetic problems that cause mutants to have their unusual abilities.  While humans openly claim that this “cure” will be entirely voluntary, some have secretly created weapons that will fire darts with the cure in them.  When Magneto learns this, he decides that it’s time for the mutants to begin their war against “homo sapiens” (normal humans).  He enlists the aid of all the mutants he can to his cause.  Their first goal is to find the boy who is the source of the “cure” and eliminate him so that he is no longer a threat to them.

Along the way, we learn that Jean Grey isn’t dead.  However, she’s apparently losing her mind.  She gives in to her “dark side” and joins Magneto in his quest to rid the world of normal humans.  Since she’s by far the strongest mutant on Earth, she becomes his most valuable ally.

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Not long ago, I read reviews of another animated film that complained about the fact that Hollywood actors’ voices were used “as is” as the voices of the animated characters.  The writer said that there are many good voice actors out there who aren’t getting work because Hollywood has decided that it’s somehow better to have “real actors” voicing animated characters than to have voice actors like Billy West doing it.  At the time, I didn’t think much of it.  Now I understand.  I’ve seen “Cars”, the latest from Pixar.

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When I was younger, it was commonplace for local television
stations to air old monster movies on Saturday nights.  On a given
Saturday night, you might catch Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Vincent
Price, or any number of other famous actors.  You might also catch
a Japanese monster movie, like Godzilla.  Somehow, I don’t think I
ever caught Rodan until now.

Rodan
is a “cautionary tale” that attempts to warn the world what
will happen if we continue to create and test more devastating nuclear
weapons. 

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Welcome to my “top 10 list of cool animated movies you may not have seen”. For the record, I’m not an “anime” fan.  The superfluous use of shadows, the “big eyes, small mouths” art style, strange movie titles, bizarre story lines, etc., in anime simply turn me off more than the clever animation techniques draw me in.  As a result, you’ll not see much here that an anime fan would appreciate (I’m guessing).  Still, I think these are all amusing films that you should have a look at if you get the chance (and since most of them are a bit obscure, you can pick them up for about as much as it would cost to rent them at your local Blockbuster Video):

admin Movies animated films, animation, cool animated movies, good animated movies, good films, top 10 list