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Gran Turismo (2023)
Bored vs. Ferrari
Gran Turismo is the greatest formula racing movie ever made. Wait, scratch that. What I meant to write was Gran Turismo is the most formulaic racing movie ever made. It is the product of a paint by numbers approach to making a sports movie; an underdog story, filled with self-doubt, overwhelming odds, montages, and every cliche you've ever seen. But there is a twist to Gran Turismo, something that I wasn't expecting at all, something that actually made the movie even more terrible. But more on that later...
The movie is about a young gamer ("sim racer") who is exceptional at the video game ("race simulator") Gran Turismo, and wants one day to be a real life race car driver. He soon gets his chance when Nissan sponsors a Gran Turismo tournament, the winners of which will be trained to compete in reality based racing, you know, with actual cars. So, you guessed it, he wins the video game tournament and goes on to win Le Mans, the greatest achievement a professional racer can achieve.
That's the plot, minus a few hackneyed details. Gran Turismo is essentially nerd porn. It shows the journey from gaming in mom's basement to real life fortune and glory; from dominating in a virtual reality to dominating in the real world; from watching internet porn to interacting with human females. It feels so fantastical and lazily contrived that I was shocked when the movie took an unexpected turn.
If you're not one of the forty two people who follows professional racing, you'll be as shocked as I was to find out that this terrible movie is, in fact, based on a true story. Gran Turismo feels so fake and seems so stupid that I was shocked to find out that it has any basis in reality. This makes the movie worse, because, in real life, the story it tells is actually interesting. So, when the movie turns out this bad, it means filmmakers didn't just execute their own idea poorly, but instead they took an interesting and real story and made it suck.
Now, why does the movie suck, you ask? To save myself (and the two or three people who will ever read this) some time, I will give a bulleted list of my grievances with Gran Turismo:
-Lots of cliches: "Can I do it," the hero asks himself. "Can he do it," those around the hero ask each other. "He can do it," the mentor tells the nay sayers. "Your dreams are a fantasy," the dad tells his son. "No they're not," the son tells his dad. Almost every second of Gran Turismo is something you have seen before in a better movie.
-Absurd levels of product placement: It is easy to figure out who paid for GranTurismo, because there isn't one minute in the entire movie without the Nissan or Sony logo in it. And there also endless discussion about how Gran Turismo "is more than a game."
-Montages: Once the movie gets going, it is non-stop montages with licensed music. There's at least seventy two mintages in the movie.
-Unexciting driving scenes: I understand that watching a whole race would be boring, that's why no one does it. But the race scenes are also, you guessed it, just montages. Gran Turismo does not translate the excitement of driving at hundreds of miles per hour onto the big screen. The racing scenes are cut together with shots that are on average a half a second long. There is no excitement and no tension builds, despite the incredible efforts to manufacture some. There is also a terrible shot in Gran Turismo when the main character is about to execute a crucial maneuver on the track. The shot shows a profile view of the car racing forward, then the car becomes digitized and starts to fade away leaving only the main character. Then the background fades and we see him playing the Gran Turismo game in his room. It's as though the filmmakers are saying, "no need to feel any excitement; all of this is a digital and fake. Just thought we'd let you know." Why call so much attention to the fact that 99% of the driving in the movie is filmed in front of a green screen? It's a really dumb use of digital effects-actually, it's pretty much the opposite of what they were made for.
-Dishonesty: At the end of Gran Turismo, the main character wins Le Mans. I did some research: he came in third. This leads me to wonder what else did the filmmakers take liberties with? I didn't care enough to look it up.
If you want to watch a great racing movie based on a real story, watch Ford v Ferrari. If you just want to watch a racing movie that's better than this, it's a safe bet that any of them will do.
The Office (2005)
Starts Great, Becomes Unwatchable
I don't get how people love The Office in its entirety. It's great for the first three seasons. At season four, the show's quality begins to decline slightly. Then, in each successive season, the decline accelerates at an astounding rate.
Characters start acting more and more outrageously, becoming parodies of themselves-Jim is the sole exception to this rule, but watching someone be the coolest and most likable guy in the room gets old after so many years. The plots for the episodes go from believable scenarios to incredibly contrived and stupid situations that in no way feel realistic. These two downfalls ruin the humor value of the show, which, for the first three seasons, was based on subtle, relatable moments of social discomfort and annoyance.
The constant stream of guest stars and new characters is a clear sign that the writers didn't have any worthwhile new ideas for the show. I don't mind a show introducing new characters, but they have to be good and fit the tone of the show. In The Office, all of the add-ons are these cartoonish and over the top personalities that in no way feel believable in a mid-level office environment (or anywhere else, for that matter). Kathy Bates, James Spader, and Will Ferrel just wasted their talents on these terribly written characters.
One other aspect of The Office I find irritating is its insistence on happy endings for all the characters you are supposed to like. There's an old saying, "tragedy plus time equals comedy." I get that people like to have things wrapped up in a way that makes them feel good, but it's not funny. And in The Office the writers don't even attempt to make the happy endings funny-it's just pandering. It's easy to do, much easier than writing good comedy. In the early seasons, you were laughing at the general unhappiness of the characters, in the later seasons it's feel good stories with some bad jokes thrown in. A television show's integrity is lost when the writers seek to give the audience what it wants instead of taking them where the story naturally goes, especially to the point where the genre is altered.
The Office isn't exceptional in terms of holding onto its audience despite losing its integrity and quality. Once a show has been on long enough, the people who watch it keep on watching it out of habit, forgetting what drew them to the show in the first place.
The score I gave The Office is the average of all of the seasons' scores. There were a few great seasons, a few mediocre seasons, and a few unwatchable seasons. Overall, far more bad than good. Like I said, I don't get how people love The Office in its entirety. How can someone recognize how great the first few seasons are, and not see the rest of it for the garbage that it is?
RoboCop (2014)
Strangely Boring
Robocop starts with promise. For the first thirty minutes, there is all of the normal set-up required for this type of action flick. It's the basic superhero formula: an upstanding citizen is introduced and then, through tragedy or dumb luck, acquires sensational physical abilities that allow him or her to combat the evils of his or her particular world.
All or the premise building for the creation of Robocop is handled well. Anticipation is built for the coming of a hero who will arise from the ashes to avenge himself and and bring about justice. The problem is, that when Robocop arrives, he is too lifeless, efficient, and dull to enjoy.
It's hard to pinpoint exactly why this movie doesn't work, as the visuals are crisp, and the direction is handled with style and energy. What it comes down too is that Robocop takes no vengeful joy, nor feels any pain or fear, during his quest. This makes him hard to root for as a character, and also makes it almost impossible to raise one's pulse in any of the action sequences.
Many of my favorite scenes in these kinds of action flicks are those in which the hero gets to explore and hone his or her new abilities with low-level foes. (Spiderman handling street thugs like it's child's play. Iron Man busting a tank and broodily walking away.) Robocop has those scenes, but since he feels nothing, the audience doesn't either. Only one of these scenes in Robocop, in which he confronts some crooked cops who betray him, has any life in it.
However dull the final product is, there were some worthwhile elements in Robocop. The special effects and performances are all up to par. Gary Oldman is solid, as usual. Michael Keaton, playing the now tired archetype of an amoral super-capitalist villain, does a good job. And Samuel L. Jackson in his (very on the nose) parody of a Fox News anchor is also entertaining. The set-up, as previously mentioned, is handled well and creates a level of plausibility for the events to follow.
Still, I ultimately found this movie not worth watching. Robocop is simply too formulaic and, yes, too robotic to be much fun.
The Problem with Apu (2017)
The Problems with The Problem with Apu
The Problem with Apu makes a rather weak case, if you ask me.
Hari Kondabolu, the comedian who authored this documentary, seems to be willfully ignorant of what the Simpsons set out to do, which is to satirize all aspects of suburban American life. No prevalent social group or institution was spared from the satire of Matt Groening's creation. Springfield was a synecdoche of (primarily middle) America, and its cast of characters was a funny, yellow, four-fingered, funhouse mirror of the types of people an average American might encounter every day, including bible-thumping neighbors; depressed public educators; doughnut-eating cops, and, of course; the obese, beer-drinking, television-addicted, American male.
That being said, the character of Apu (and the group he represents, work-devoted, first-generation Indian immigrants), in my opinion, receives better treatment from the writers of the Simpsons than any other characters (and the groups they represent). The aspects of Apu's character that are exaggerated for comedic effect are all positive; he is hard-working, intelligent (notably in comparison to the yellow (white) Springfielders that he price gouges with glee), and family-oriented.
Apu's character features, aside from being positive, also seem more indicative of the group he was representing, if you look at the prevalence and success of Indian (family) owned businesses in America. So, I don't see much of a problem here.
On a different note, Hari also states his outrage over Hank Azaria, a white man, being the voice of Apu. He compares Apu's presence and casting on the Simpsons to minstrel shows from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. I disagree with the comparison, as minstrel shows were aimed at entertaining people through white performers mocking the art and physical features of people solely of African descent. I don't think the Simpsons intentions are so cruel, nor their execution so crude. The bigger distinction between Apu and minstrel shows is that the Simpsons took shots at all cultures, not just one; Hank Azaria alone voices Australians (with an accent that is more South African than anything), just about all male French characters, and Bumblebee Man (based on the Mexican comedian Roberto Gómez Balaños). I can understand if Hari is offended by the casting, but, again, I don't see much of a problem here. Indian people do not seem especially targeted, let alone singled out.
The biggest issue with this documentary is with the people Hari selects to interview, and with the people he neglects to. He interviews random people on the street about their general opinions regarding Apu and the Simpsons, and he interviews Indian celebrities. The street interviews are fine for filler and scene transitions, but, in my opinion, the celebrity interviews fail to be compelling. The celebrities just come off as whiny, even if they are cogent in stating their objections to the character of Apu. It's just hard for me to feel bad for a movie star boohooing over anything short of actual sticks and stones.
The fact that Hari didn't interview one single Indian convenience store owner or clerk struck me as a massive oversight. I am much more interested to hear their thoughts on Apu. It also would have been more compelling hearing their objections to the character's portrayal than to hear the objections of rich and famous Indian entertainers. Not interviewing the people in society that Apu most directly mirrors is a huge missed opportunity, to generate the kind of sympathy that Hari is, presumably, going for.
The Problem with Apu lacked compelling content and humor. I wouldn't even bring up the humor if Hari didn't identify himself as a comedian. His demeanor and perspective in the documentary strikes me as pretty much the opposite of how a comedian should be. All in all, the documentary is mediocre and has some very obvious room for improvement.