Interstate 60
Here’s the next movie in my series of comments/reviews on movies and tv series I’ve seen recently. I’d never heard of Interstate 60 until a friend recommended it to me.
It’s about a guy who’s got a birthday coming up. He happens to run into a creature who’s a real, genuine trickster – one of the few all American creatures who grant wishes. Not a genie, a human-type guy who calls himself O W Grant (One Wish Grant).
Just like all tricksters, Grant is unreliable. His wishes are often tainted and contains a trap. Many who have had a wish granted get killed or are tricked one way or another. A man that we get to see, gets run over by a car, immediately after having his thoughtless wish granted. Another one wanted to eat as much as he wanted, but hadn’t taken into consideration that he’d be constantly hungry and that it would get incredibly expensive.
The main character of the movie, Neal Oliver, wants an answer to what he’s going to do with his life. For once, this makes O W Grant take an interest, so he sends the guy off on a long trip through an America he doesn’t really know. You might say it’s an alternate universe.
Here Neal finds a town where drugs are legal – at least one – and it turns everyone into zombies who live for dancing in clubs and during the day they walk around like robots, sweeping floors or emptying garbage cans around the town. One difference between this town and the real world is that kids become adults at 16. A desperate mother hitches a ride with Neal to get her 16-year-old son back, but when she realizes she can’t, against his will, she uses the drug too and after that she’s happy again, but her mind’s a blank.
You also get to see a girl who has become obsessed with finding the perfect sex. She tries to get Neal first, but when he realizes that he’s only going to be a number in her notebook, he refuses, and claims that he’ll be the one she remembers because she couldn’t get him.
That makes her have a go at seducing Grant, but gets a nasty shock.. I won’t go into exactly what that is. The movie is full of crazy, drastic jokes, but there’s an underlying theme.
When Neal wakes up – because he seems to have dreamt it all, yet not – he has his answer. He knows what to do with his life. (Lucky guy!).
The movie is quite fragmented, but it’s all connected somehow, and besides, most of it’s fun and interesting. I can really recommend this movie, though I don’t know for sure that you’ll all like it as much as I did. At least try it and see what you think.
Heroes
Heroes is an American science fiction series. To tell the truth, after seeing the trailer with the blonde cheerleader jumping from a bridge or whatever it was, dislocating her shoulder, then popping it back again, I had no intention of watching the series.
I thought ‘just another Buffy’. Yawn. Then I discovered that practically all the guys in the show are totally hot, or at least cute or funny and charming. (Guess who’s who. LOL)
Of course the plot is great too. Much more interesting than I thought. I love most of the guys – Mohinder, Peter, Isaac and naturally Hiro. Even the cheerleader’s pal is quite sweet in his geeky way.
I don’t like the females though. They’re just too – I don’t know – yucky. But that’s just me. I’m sure most guys and plenty of female viewers will like them. Even if you don’t, it’s still a good series.
In case you haven’t seen it yet, it’s about a group of people, young for the most part, who suddenly discover they have unusual abilities (‘superpowers’). They try to come to terms with how their lives have changed, and will soon be forced to decide if they want to be a force for good or evil. If that sounds interesting, watch the series when it comes on in your country or on your channel. I think you’ll like it.
Dr Who
Dr Who is a British science fiction series, which is quite new. If you haven’t seen it yet, you might be curious about what it’s about. First of all: it’s quite different from the American tv series. The English have a pretty unusual sense of humor, and it takes a while to get used to it.
Because I’m not completely in tune with it, not just the humor but the style in general, I think the quality is a little mixed. Some episodes are scary and sad, others are a little lame. A few are actually pretty creepy. Now that I’ve seen (almost) the whole series, I’ve grown used to it.
If you get a chance to watch this series, and you’re not sure you want to follow it, I suggest you give it a chance. Watch a few episodes before you make up your mind.
Here’s a brief description of what the series is about:
In the first episode, you get to know an English girl, Rose. She finds out that something odd is gong on at the store where she’s working. The dummies from the window displays are acting a bit out of character, not to mention in a menacing way.
Suddenly, a man in his forties shows up, at least that’s the way he looks. He helps her get away from the scary dummies. She soon learns that the dummies are just a part of a bigger problem.
The man introduces himself as the Doctor. She finds out that he tends to show up when the population of the Earth is in danger. When everything’s ok for the time being, he invites Rose to go away with him on his phone booth-like space ship, the TARDIS. It can travel in space and in time, so Rose accepts. She ends up in many dangerous situations with the Doctor.
I won’t say anything more about the plot. Just remember, give the series a chance. Like all British tv series it’s good quality, like the humor or not.
The series has a cult following in its home country, at least the ‘old’ series, which began in the 1960’s and kept on going all the way until the late 1980’s. For some reason, maybe because the Doctor is pretty ‘gay’, it’s particulary popular with gay men.
Howl's Moving Castle
The movie Howl’s Moving Castle, by the Japanese movie maker Hayao Miyazaki, is based on the Welsh fantasy writer, Diana Wynne Jones’ book by the same name. There’s quite a bit of difference between the movie and the book. Many of the DWJ:s fans hate the movie. Some of the movie fans have never read the book, and don’t know what they’re missing. I’m among the few people who like both the movie and the book. There’s a lot missing, but at the same time, it’s fascinating to be able to see what you’ve only been able to imagine before.
Howl – who is reputed to steal young girls’ hearts – really is as vane and as metrosexual as he appears to be in the book. Really pretty. Naturally he doesn’t actually steal the girls’ hearts, he merely seduces them, make them fall in love with him and then leave them.
The main character of the movie is actually the castle from the title. Wouldn’t you love living in a castle that can move to any place you like? It can also change appearance, according to Howl’s will. The reason for that is the fire demon Calcifer. In a way, he has a sort of symbiotic relationship with Howl, or rather with the castle. Calcifer is what makes the castle live.
Perhaps I ought to begin with a brief resumé. The main character – unless you count Howl – is a girl named Sophie. She’s the daughter of a now dead hatter. Her mother died young, but her father remarried, so Sophie has a stepmother. In the book, there are also two sisters, but in the movie just one. That can make the movie a bit confusing, but I guess not everything fits into a movie.
Sophie knows that an oldest daughter never does well for herself, so she doesn’t have any high expectations. She does however have plenty of common sense and both feet on the ground.
One day she meets a very handsome young man who helps her get to her sister, who works at a pastry shop. She also meets a witch – The Witch of the Waste – who curses Sophie. Suddenly, she’s not a hat maker apprentice, but an old lady. She doesn’t want to stay on like that, so she wanders off.
In the wilderness Sophie sees the famous moving castle and meets a scarecrow, who keeps showing up wherever she goes. The scarecrow helps her get into the castle by its back door. Once there, she hires herself as Howl’s housekeeper(/cleaning lady.
She hopes to find a way to break her curse, but to do that she has to help Calcifer break his. The plot is quite complicated. It gets worse, because everything feels rather fragmented due to the film maker trying to fit everything into the movie.
Despite that, I like the movie. It’s a fascinating, exciting adventure. If you like fantasy and animated films, I’m sure you’ll like this one. You should probably read the book too.
I just want to mention something about the voices. Whiny Calcifer’s voice is done by Billy Crystal. I watched the Swedish version with a Swedish comedian as Calcifer, but I can easily imagine Billy Crystal being just right for the part.
Bleak House
This time I’d like to mention Bleak House, based on a Charles Dickens novel. Very nice series. Personally, I love historic series as much as cop series – some of them anyway. For those of you not familiar with the series, Gillian Anderson from the X files stars as Lady Dedlock. There are other famous (and excellent) actors, too, mainly British ones.
This is a sad story about three orphans with a mysterious past, a court case that has been dragging on for generations and unrequited love, to name a few ingredients. It might sound like an ordinary soap, and in a way, that might be what Dickens intended, but I think it’s much better done.
There’s a lot of misery and injustice, but I suppose that’s how Dickens’ time was. Another thing which might surprise modern viewers is the excessive affection between many of the girls in the series. Perhaps people were more demonstrative back then or Dickens simply didn’t know much about young women.
Another thing that might not always come across for modern viewers is the way Dickens humourously named some of the characters. Dedlock – deadlock, Flite – flight (for a woman who keeps a great number of birds). Nemo – an alias for a man with a secret past. The list goes on. Some names might simply have been chosen to sound absurd, others have a meaning behind them.
In any case, if you like historic series, you can’t miss this one. Of course, if you love the classics, even more reason to see Bleak House. Go on, you know you want to.
Abhorsen
Abhorsen is the last book in the trilogy about Sabriel. There isn’t that much more to say about this book. It continues the struggle against the powers of evil. Sabriel’s son finds out his true calling. He was the Abhorsen-in-training but is that really right for him?
In this book Lirael returns and so does the Disreputable Dog. She does what she does best – being ‘Disreputable’. Even when there’s a price to pay, she finds a way of – circumventing it, or close enough.
You’ll meet more ‘living’ dead and what’s even more frightening – a human who’s been contaminated by the evil. He’s good, but something inside him isn’t and there isn’t much hope for him. It’s obvious from the start that his journey can only end in tragedy. Unless his friends, Lirael and Sabriel’s family, can do something to save him.
At the end of the book I’m still satisfied with the story and the characters, so I can recommend it to anyone who likes fantasy with a difference. In fact, this trilogy can be counted among my favorite fantasy reads ever.
Lirael
Lirael is a Clayr without The Sight. She can’t see into the future. The Clayr are a people of ‘Seers’ who live under a glacier far to the north. Basically near the North Pole, it seems. Lirael is an outsider among them. When she’s grown up, and still hasn’t had her ‘Sight’, she finds work in the great library.
The library is an enormous place, filled with locked rooms and chambers that aren’t safe to go into. It’s been created over generations and not every librarian even remembers every single room in it, or the safeguards placed on their doors.
Here is an example of how huge and dangerous the place is: when Lirael first begins to work in the library, she’s given a whistle, so she can call for help if she needs to.
Quite soon after beginning her work there, Lirael finds a small figurine of a dog. It has the unusual characteristic of being able to come alive – at full dog size. The dog tells Lirael her name is ‘the Disreputable Dog’.
She becomes Lirael’s only friend, and helps her explore the vast library, after hours. That part of the book is sort of an adventure of its own.
Then one day, Lirael learns her true destiny. Not until then does the reader find out her connection to Sabriel.
Lirael has to leave her home and travel far away to help stop a great evil from spreading. There she finally finds out what her true calling is.
Her quest takes her beyond the boundaries of life itself.
This story is very dark and frightening. You’ll encounter many ‘living dead’ and several of the characters are in grave danger.
Like the first book in the series about Sabriel, Lirael is very well written, exciting and scary. I immediately liked Lirael and to some extent identified with her. I haven’t found my place in life either. Not that I think I’ll ever find my ‘destiny’, like Lirael did, but it makes it easier to understand her situation, despite the obvious differences.
I liked the mysterious and even ominous library and most of all ‘the Disreputable Dog’. A very good companion for such a dangerous quest.
If you liked Sabriel, I’m sure you’ll like Lirael too.
Sabriel
I’m really glad I discovered the book Sabriel by the Australian author Garth Nix. After I’d read that, there was a sequel – Lirael and by then I was keeping my fingers crossed the next book in the trilogy would be out soon. I don’t remember how long I had to wait, but it wasn’t too long, I think.
All three books are fantastic. Well written, imaginative and filled with detail. I especially love the maps and the culture. The world Sabriel comes from is credible and even in a way realistic.
I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned this before, but I’m beginning to get a little tired of the typical ‘sword and sorcery’ fake-medieval setting in fantasy stories. That doesn’t mean I can’t be hooked by an exceptionally well written story if it happens to be like that.
It’s just that if there is another well written story with a kind of late 18, early 19 century setting, I generally prefer it. I also like 20th and 21th century settings in fantasy books. Some of those might come across as a sort of mix between science fiction and fantasy. Normally I’m not too keen on modern SF, but this sort of thing usually works for me.
Back to Sabriel. In the first book, she’s a young girl, who’s still at boarding school – boarding school, because her father is the Abhorsen – a sort of good necromancer – in any case a man with strong magical powers. He lives in a sort of magic world that – literally – exists next to the ‘modern’ world – in this case a sort of early 20th century one. When I say literally, I mean that there’s a border – a real border – you can cross to enter the world of magic. The borderland between modern and magic is sort of special.
Technology doesn’t work very well, so the soldiers watching the border can’t use their rifles there. Instead they use bayonets and other blades. Depending on how the wind blows, strange, dangerous creatures can cross into the ‘modern’ world and the soldiers are there to prevent them from doing so.
Sabriel herself has entered the kingdom of the dead learning necromancy from her father. At least she’s gone beyond the first gates. Further on, it gets trickier. She can – in theory – wake the dead or at least call back their spirits, but she’s not supposed to do that. It’s too dangerous.
Still, when a rabbit belonging to a little girl from Sabriel’s school, is hit by a car, Sabriel can’t resist bringing it back. No danger follows on that, but soon enough danger seeks out Sabriel anyway.
She’s studying ‘ordinary’ magic at her school, which isn’t too far from the border. Her teacher is called ‘magistrix’ which to me sounds like a cool title. Only the older girls are allowed to take magic, but naturally, Sabriel is already skilled in various types of magic.
When danger comes to seek her out, she has to return beyond the border and try to stop the evil that has crossed over from another dimension. A strange cat creature helps her. It’s really a demon that’s been trapped by an earlier Abhorsen. He’s quite reluctant to help, but is bound to obey the Abhorsen or the Abhorsen-in-training.
There are plenty of ‘undead’ – something that I’m not too keen on – a mysterious sleeping person, swords and bells and all kinds of magic in this story. I won’t tell you too many details about the actual plot, but it’s certainly not for very young children. Certain parts of the story scared me and I was relatively grown up when I read it.
Sabriel is a heroine to my taste. She’s tough, but not cruel and she has integrity. It’s clear that she’s made of the ‘right stuff’ to succeed her father when that day comes.
If you think you’d like a slightly different fantasy world, go on. Read Sabriel. If you like the first book, I’m sure you’ll like the two sequels.
C.R.A.Z.Y
On Christmas Day, 1960 Zac is born, as the fourth son in a family that eventually has five sons. Just when he’s been born, he dies, but the doctors manage to bring him back. Then one of the older brothers drops him to the floor. During the following twenty years, Zac almost dies twice more.
From an early age, Zac turns out to be different from his brothers. For instance, he has a white lock of hair. His religious mother soon has the impression that he can heal the sick. What he can do, without a doubt, is making his youngest brother stop crying and go to sleep quietly.
Zac has trouble getting along with at least one of his older brothers, but other than that, everyone loves him. He loves his parents, but soon he realizes he has character traits which make his father regard him with doubts and concern. Is Zac not a ‘real’ man? Even before Zac is grown up, he has to struggle with his personality. He doesn’t want his father to stop loving him.
Before long, Zac finds out that he isn’t like others. He’s attracted to other boys, for instance his cousin’s sexy boyfriend. The two of them smoke marijuana together in a rather intimate way.
In the end, Zac can’t hide his true preferences anymore, and there’s an explosive confrontation with his father, who tells Zac to get lost. Zac leaves the country (Canada) and goes to Israel to complete the pilgrimage his mother has always dreamed of making.
At the same time, the family is hit by a disaster, right when Zac has almost managed to make friends with his older brother.
In this movie, you get to see twenty years of youth subculture. There’s a lot of music and the fashion of the 1970’s. Something I really appreciated was that the movie was in French.
I really liked this movie, even though it was quite sad. Despite that, there’s a bit of hope at the end. If you’re interested in modern history and music, you might like this movie.
Cool new book
I just read a fascinating article about a 93-year-old woman in the UK who just debuted as a novelist. Yeah, you read that right. She’s 93. She says she’s been writing ‘forever’ or ‘for a hundred years’ or close enough. I guess it will be that long until I get published…
The book she wrote seems really interesting too. It’s a feminist thriller. That wouldn’t have been my first guess, when I learned that the author is 93…
I can’t wait to read her book.
I guess older people are becoming trendy these days. Young people want to be old. (I read that in the paper the other day). Personally I can’t see why though. I’m always going to stay young. And I’m also going to be a famous, celebrated best selling author. Yeah, right.
Anyway, it isn’t all that long ago that we in Sweden were stunned to realize that we had a 93-year-old rapper. Greta the Rapper, who raps about Jolly Bob from Aberdeen. All in her Gothenburg dialect, naturally. She has a very exciting past. A bit of a freedom fighter. Again, a little like Lorna Page, the author.
If 20 is the new 50, as I read in the paper, maybe 90 is the new 30.
