More Movies, Why?

Because Bob Haney, that's why. I fervently believe that phrase will be even more effective, and true to it's namesake, if it's injected into conversations that have nothing to do with Bob Haney, or even comics in general. It's more random that way, right? Not necessarily reviews, as just general comments.

Grease - I should mention I don't really find musicals interesting. Not so much due to poor experiences watching them, though, since the only musical I've watched the whole way through was South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut. It's more that I'm generally not a fan of spontaneous outbursts of singing and dancing, where everyone else joins in as if it's the most natural thing in the world. Now if the instigator was looked at as being disturbed, and ostracized from society for it, maybe it would interest me, but as I understand their typically style, not so much.

So you might be unsurprised to learn this wasn't my choice. Alex was having a party, it became too noisy and smoke-filled for me, so I stepped out for a midnight stroll, and when I returned, one of his friends was watching Grease, and I was too tired to go someplace else. So I watched, and, well, it wasn't terrible. I still can't get into all the singing and dancing (I tried to fall asleep whenever it started up), but besides that it was OK. The part that sticks with me is when the girl that left high school to attend beauty school gets seranaded by some guy about how she needs to go back to school, I guess because she bombed out at beauty school. I didn't see what she could have done that was so awful she couldn't cut it, but then it occured to me that between all the X-Men comics I've read, and anime I've watched, someone having pink hair (due to an unfortunate coloring accident I suppose) wouldn't strike me as terribly unusual.

Hellboy 2 - I really needed the opportunity to watch this again, but I didn't get a chance. I had to make sure we got it returned before I left, since it was rented on my account. There were too many distractions, between Alex' phone constantly ringing, and one of his other friends bringing their 2 year old over, who proceeded to act like a 2 year old, throwing a hissy fit for no apparent reason, including overturning ashtrays and throwing his sippy cup at people (including me). This is why I do not like small children. Plus, Alex' dog was contantly around, getting into things it shouldn't, such as chocolates Alex had brought out for us. Why he would bring sweets out for a small child, I don't know, but his dog kept getting after them.

So things were missed I'm sure. Still, I enjoyed it, especially the drunken singing duo of Hellboy and Abe. It was amusing and touching at the same time. I didn't feel as though, prior to his meeting the princess, that Abe's sense of loneliness had been that well-established. Maybe it was something to take for granted, that Abe appears to be the only one of his kind, and all he ahs is his books and music, while Hellboy, who looks about as weird, found someone. Or maybe the point was that he met the princess and it just happened suddenly, revealed to him he was missing something he hadn't been aware of previously. It was sweet, watching the two of them feel somewhat awkward around each other. I thought the animosity between Hellboy and Kraus was a bit overdone, but Hellboy could have been unduly stressed with his relationship issues. I did think he and Maning had put aside their differences at the end of the last movie, after Manning explained the proper way of smoking cigars. Perhaps not.

The story itself was fine, but it was the character interactions that made it work for me. I wonder if it means something that in the aftermath of the fight with the Forest God, with all these flowers sprouting from its body, that all the assembled crowds can do is point guns at Hellboy and generally act like transplants from the Marvel Universe. I know, it's meant to make it more difficult for Hellboy to sympathize and protect humans, but I mean beyond that.

The Bank Job - This movie went an awful long time before Jason Statham busted out the whoopin' (whooping? whuppin'?) stick on anybody. Very surprising, but it's OK. It's a fairly standard story, involving a bank robbery, that is being pulled off for reasons beyond just the gathering of material wealth, except that many of the participants are unaware of this, some of them never becoming aware of it. It's fun to watch, as the robbers are doing their thing, while the cops search, and other organizations watch them, and criminals get nervous and desperate, and this small group don't realize how deep in they are until it's too late.

Things move briskly, as it's quickly established why Martine would approach Terry (Mr. Statham) with this job, and why he'd take it, and what the true purpose is, and how they'll accomplish the task, and so on. One thing that surprised me was that, as they find themselves expanding their group to fill roles as they crop up, this didn't really come back to haunt them. I expected that they'd bring in someone untrustworthy, or someone who would completely screw up, but by and large, that doesn't occur. Truthfully, they're in trouble almost from the start, due to one of the crew meeting a past employer outside the bank.

I'm surprised the ending wasn't gloomier than it was. I figured it would be a case of small group of moderately dishonest people being crushed by a vastly powerful, and much more dishonest government and/or criminal organization. Didn't quite go that way, which is quite fine with me, but I expected it would.