diane, darin, and sophia explain it all for you.
Gary Oldman is considering doing a sitcom.
One year ago: I go to see a high school teacher who was a big influence on me. Two years ago: The first day of my non-USC life. Three years ago: I write so much on a script I can barely do an entry. Today's news question:
The Department of Justice proposed recently to break mega-company Microsoft into two separate companies. What was Microsoft's counter-proposal?
Whoo hoo! Multiple choice!
- Together the Department of Justice and Microsoft would break the company into 3 or more pieces, using the mathematical "pie-cutting" algorithm.
- The Department of Justice becomes a wholly-owned subsidiary of Microsoft and adopts the slogan, "Who do you want to sue today?"
- Microsoft would apologize for its behavior and pay a fine, and Janet Reno would vow not to get into a hostage standoff situation with Steve Ballmer.
- A couple of minor restrictions on the company's behavior, which would be sure to work, since Microsoft has been so good about paying attention to stuff like that in the past.
(Don't send me your answers. This is just a little way to expand your horizons. Honest.)
Diane's give-it-away business idea for the day: baby ear muffs. Allow your child to snooze in comfort at the theater, while you get to enjoy rich THX sound!
Darin and I decided to see Gladiator today. We had to see it on a weekday, because we were bringing Her Highness with, and I wanted to minimize the number of people whose movie-going experience might be annoyed by the sounds of an infant. I have always been annoyed by people who bring screaming babies to movies and I don't want to be That Guy.
(Note: yes, I have always been the person to say, "Get a babysitter!" and here I am, without babysitter. It's much harder than I ever thought. I'm going to have to begin the process of finding candidates, interviewing them, and then working with whomever I choose for several weeks before I will even consider leaving Sophia alone with this person. I know that with Baby Number Two I will probably just say, "Leave your references over there and hold this baby for an hour or two, would you?" But for right now I am having a hard time contemplating bringing a stranger in.)
We bought lunch at Gelson's next door and then settled down next to the aisle. Not too many people in the theater--cool. We scarfed the sushi we'd bought, while Sophia sacked out across Darin's chest. The previews began, and the ubiquitous LA Times preview came on.
"Hey, the sound's not too bad," Darin whispered to me.
That was the last frame of film we saw that had a reasonable decibel level. The trailers were all screamingly loud, as was the movie. Not quite to Armageddon-type levels, but close.
Ms. Pookie started fussing about twenty minutes into the movie, so I nursed her for a while. That calmed her down...until she started kicking up a fuss. I grabbed the diaper bag and beat a retreat for the lobby. I changed her diaper in the ladies's room (it didn't really need it, but what the hey, I was down there anyhow) and then walked around the lobby with her for a while. I made two attempts to go back into the theater, but each time she started crying within seconds of my walking in the door. So I walked around the lobby some more.
I discovered she really liked the poster of Mel Gibson as The Patriot--Mel just collects chicks wherever he goes.
Eventually Darin came out and made the command decision to flop her over his shoulder, like a caveman might, which immediately calmed her down. We went back inside and I was on pins and needles for several minutes, fully expecting a crazed Pookie, but she was fine. In fact, she slept for the rest of the movie.
On the way out to the car, Darin said, "I don't want to sound like I'm bragging, but I think we know where her favorite place to sleep is."
I guess an even better business idea would be to rent Darin out as a baby-sleeping perch, but that's not happening. No, really, it's not. He's all booked up.
So, as you can tell I missed about twenty minutes of the movie whilst making my tour of the theater's lobby. Gladiator doesn't have the world's most difficult plot to follow, so I doubt I missed anything other than extraordinary visuals.
Maximus (that's Latin for "Big Man On Campus" and he's played by Russell Crowe) is a general who's beating the crap out of the Germanic horde, but all he really wants to do is go home to the wife and kiddie. Marcus Aurelius (Richard Harris), the Roman Emperor, has a different idea: he wants Maximus to return Rome to being a Republic (something Marcus forgot to do during his twenty-five years in power). Marcus's son, Badius Guyus...err, I mean, Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix) is not too hep with this idea and decides to off Daddy, and while he's at it he wants to off Maximus and his whole family, who are back in Spain and not bothering anyone. Commodus's sister Lucilla (Connie Nielsen) frowns on this and other actions of her too, too affectionate brother.
(Spoiler spoiler spoiler: I hated Lucilla. Am I the only person who thought she was nearly as creepy as Commodus? Am I the only person who suspected she was setting up Maximus before the whole scene where Commodus gets the details of the conspiracy out of her? The whole character just didn't work for me. And I'm not even going to go on my typical This is the only female character in the movie? rant either.)
Maximus wakes up in North Africa, where he has been bought as a slave by Wilius Survivorus...errr, Proximo, the gladiator trainer (Oliver Reed). Maximus's new best bud is Juba (Djimon Hounsou), and the two of them become two bad-ass gladiators. Commodus, back in Rome, has decided to honor his peaceful philosopher father's death with 150 days of games, so Rome needs all the gladiators she can get. And so Maximus returneth to Rome, which is a convenient plot development for a guy who wants serious revenge.
Extremely buff Russell Crowe in short clothes. Constant awe-inspiring CGI of the glory that was Rome that had me saying, "What it must have been like to live in that matte painting." Violence-fu to the max: a definite eye-squincher at times. Pretty good acting: I could believe Crowe as a general, and Phoenix chewed scenery appropriately. Ridley Scott's amazing directorial style, with one extraordinary sequence (the wide shot of the Germania battle) and one rip-off of Blade Runner. Derek Jacobi back in a toga. Totally ridiculous dialogue, yet engaging scenes. True epic feel. And did I mention extremely buff Russell Crowe in short clothes?
It's a simple story that has all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. There are story problems out the butt (some of which are covered by Terry Rossio--I don't agree with everything he says here, but he's in the ballpark), and the dialogue is just silly at points. But I totally didn't care--I liked watching it and I liked watching the movie-making. There are plenty of visual tricks and stunning visual displays to keep your eye on the screen at all times. This is a big screen movie.
One big criticism of this movie is that it's not historically accurate. Newsflash! Hollywood movies rarely are. My personal belief is that the importance of accuracy depends on two things: a)proximity to the event (part of the reason U-571 has been so justifiably criticized--it was only 60 years ago, how could they screw up so badly?) and b)cultural importance. If they show events of the Revolutionary War slightly out of sequence in The Patriot, probably no one will care; if they show George Washington to be a cross-dresser, probably criticism will happen.
I don't much care about the historical accuracy of Gladiator. Is that how the Roman army conducted campaigns? I dunno--looks cool though. Is that what walking into the Colosseum from the underground chambers was like? Was Commodus that big of a fruitcake? (Answer: yes, evidently, if not even worse than suspected. While he never did what he does at the climax of this movie, evidently he used to do things just as weird. So it's historically truthful, even if it's not historically accurate.)
I guess that's important to me in a movie like this: does it evoke what was going on, even if it's not right down to the last detail?
Anybody using movies as truth deserves to fail their ancient history class anyhow.
I see that Karen stands alone in saying Gladiator is a smart action flick with big ideas behind it. I agree that there are some big ideas here--what's a good political system anyhow? But I think it's a weak story that has good bits dropped all along the way.
The answer to Tuesday's question: Sen. John McCain, erstwhile foe of Gov. George W. Bush for the Republican presidential nomination, has finally come around and endorsed Mr. Bush. No one knows what had to happen to make that come about, but I hope John isn't set on being Vice President.
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Copyright 2000 Diane Patterson
Send comments and questions to diane@nobody-knows-anything.com