hhs-3 Reviews

Taken (2002)

Does the rating system go into negative numbers?

[1/10 · 3 December 2002]

SPOILER WARNING: FOR THOSE WHO HAVE NOT SEEN THE FIRST EPISODE, SOME PLOT DETAILS ARE NOTED HERE.

Two hours was enough. Turgid, ridiculous, with totally unsympathetic characters. The girl walks through a flaming crash site with no wreckage larger than a foot of alien metal, but somehow misses a ten story saucer half embedded end up in the ground. And just how _did_ they get a 150 foot saucer out of there intact with no one noticing? The base commander of RAAF (Michael Moriarty) somehow morfs into the overall project director at Wright-Patterson, and a captain decides he is going to take the project away from him; what, are these the only two officers in the whole USAAF, rotating hats as the need arises? If you're interested in returning WWII vets, see "The Best Years of Our Lives;" if you want ETs, stick with "Close Encounters." If you want realistic first contact, catch the B-flick "Alien Cargo" with Missy Crider and Jason London, which was on the SciFi Channel last week. As for Roswell, give me Max and Liz any day- the lost journal episode was some of the best TV in the last decade (and when will the SF channel begin reruns of that glorious first year- how about tonight, between 9 and 11 EST.)

And what is it with this new trend of high profile directors suddenly trashing real people whose shoelaces they'ld have trouble reaching? First, we have James Cameron doing a number on Charles Lightoller, an authentic hero of both the Titanic and Dunkirk, and now Spielberg turns the 509th's intelligence officer, Jesse Marcel, into a homicidal psychopath. Changing the rank and name won't do it, Stephen- the post is still the post.

Earth to the Grays: Take these people, PLEASE!!!!

The War Is Over (1966)

stunning psychodrama

[10/10 · 3 December 2002]

CAUTION: NOTES ON PLOT INCLUDED

Well, if you think this movie is about hot sex and Franco, then you could stick to Hemingway. A stunning psychodrama about a man who has seen his life burned out after decades of fighting a "good" but hopeless war, recognizes the futility, and sees another generation committing itself to figurative and literal suicide. Does he stop them? Join them? Can he have any effect at all? Does he try? See the movie. If you're into political drama a la Frankenheimer, Zinnemann, or Costa Gavras, this one is a "ten."

But you're right about Genevieve Bujold. Are you ever 8-)

The Sandbaggers (1978–1980)

why "sandbaggers" stopped abruptly

[26 November 2002]

The abrupt end of the series generated enough talk among fans here in NYC that the local PBS station that broadcast it (WLIW) issued a release that the driving force behind the series, Ian MacIntosh, died suddenly and the production company decided not to carry on with it- MacIntosh had written 17 of 20 episodes. One seemingly reliable web source says MacIntosh was lost on a plane flight in Alaska, but I have also heard it was a heart attack.

BTW, one point in the series simply does not ring true- the fate of Laura Dickens, played by Diane Keen. Intell services that go around killing their own non-defecting agents don't have agents for very long. There might be rare exceptions, but this wasn't one of them. Witness the extreme efforts even the Russians made to get back their own, such as George Blake. it is one thing to lose people in the field- that is expected (although the CIA, in fifty-plus years, has lost about 80, and a number of these to accident); it is quite another for an agent to go out there thinking his own people may be gunning for him. Until I see documented cases, its pure Hollywood.