Oh Charlton (Film #7) 9 October 2012

Ben-Hur, Wyler, 1959, 6/10
I'm working my way through Ben-Hur, the William Wyler epic from 1959 that is all of 212 minutes.  I have to say that the music is pretty damn classic.  Miklos Rosza knows what he is doing, and there can be no doubt about that.  Overture opens on Michaelangelo's Creation of Adam (just their hands) and once the nativity scene is through, we get a more distanced view where you can see the cherubim and the figures of God and Adam much more fully.

To believe in a Christian god is tenuous.  The exact origin of the religious impulse is impossible to know, it seems, but if Christianity has been with use for about 2,012 years, it would be safe to say that we've practiced religion or its proto- form for at least 100, 000 (Blombos cave is 80,000 years old, for instance).  Another interesting red herring is the idea that Messala says to Sextus that god isn't in every man, only one man.  Obviously meaning the emperor, this implies that their society worships the emperor as a god and that conditions were worse for the everyman.  The subtle capitalist message here is humorous.  They then discuss how to "fight an idea," and Messala embodies Joseph Goebbels, Henry Ford, etc. in his answer: "With another idea."  Welcome to the information age.


The Last Films I've Seen
1. Lemmy, Olliver and Orshoski, 2010, 8/10.
Well, what can be said about the godfather of speed metal? He's a bit of a hoarder, he still drinks and does drugs like a crazy sob, but he has integrity and seems like a genuinely good soul. Highly recommended.
2. How to Steal a Million, Wyler, 1966, 6.2/10.
Audrey Hepburn. Peter O'toole. Recipe for success, right? Sort of. No real moral, message, or directorial flair. Video quality was ho-hum. Worth seeing.
3. River of Grass, Reichardt, 1994. Actually haven't finished this yet.
4. Dexter, Season 7, Episode 1, 2012, 10.0.
Not sure how they do it. Dead in the water, only to rise on the tides of Neptune. Or something. Seriously fucking brilliant, and more than makes up for the turd of episode 2.
5. The Avengers, Wheedon, 2012, 7.2/10.
The fanboys cum dumpster. Umm good but nothing revelatory. See below.
6. The Dark Knight Rises, Nolan, 9.4/10. Revelatory. See above. Terrorism, nuclear war, evil, good, human nature, pain, redemption, environment vs. genes, love, betrayal, consumerism, schadenfreude, and more. So much better than the dark night returns. Nolan taps into it in his piece de resistance.