Tag Archives: HBO

Jun 10 2018

Solo— a Star Wars Story

Solo posterOur son is a big time Star Wars fan, and he initially said he planned to skip this movie. Based on the box office stats, apparently a lot of folks felt the same way. However, a friend apparently convinced him to go see it, and he came back raving about how much better it is than Star Wars Episode VIII. Last evening, hubby and I went with him to our very small local theatre to see Solo- A Star Wars Story before it closes up and leaves for cable and the Red Box.

I did like it rather a lot. The cast is really great, from a decent likeness of the main character by Alden Ehrenreich to a fabulous supporting cast with veteran actors including Woody Harrelson and Paul Bettany, as well as modern favorites such as West World star Thandie Newton and Game of Thrones star Emilia Clarke. The look and feel of the film, although a bit dark, is up to Disney and Star Wars standards, too. While I thought there was too much action (if such a thing is possible in a summertime blockbuster film) all of it was top notch.

For real fans of the series, there are some pluses and minuses of course. The film does a good job of filling in the small and big pieces of the original trilogy, especially those that occurred in the original film, Star Wars: A New Hope. Example: Han Solo proudly tells Obi Wan Kenobi that the Millennium Falcon made the Kessell run in 12 parsecs. How? When? And why was that important? Solo fills in all those blanks. How did Han and Chewy meet? Again, this film supplies some answers. Overall, the script writers (father and son Kasdan and Kasdan) performed a minor miracle in getting so much into two action packed hours.

Although I’ve read that it was a marketing problem, or a saturation problem—no one knows for sure why Star Wars fans have not embraced Solo. That’s too bad, because it is in many ways very similar to the much better received Rogue One: A Star Wars Story— it fills in blanks in the original film, gives us new characters to love and hate, and is a visual spectacle with a very good musical score.

Beat the summer heat and go see Solo—A Star Wars Story soon. Very soon, because it will be moving to video in a few short weeks.

Apr 10 2018

Humor

The history of writing funny stuff stretches back into the earliest times. Humor comes in certain time honored forms: slapstick, exaggeration (a/k/a hyperbole), sarcasm, irony, and puns. Most any humorous work relies on one or more of these techniques. Until recent times, that is. Now, vulgarity seems to have overtaken all of these.

Hubby and I have been watching an HBO show called Veep and, while there are a couple of decent running gags, I have not been laughing much. After subjecting ourselves to four episodes, neither of us is sure if we want to continue. I’m not so easily offended, but this show doesn’t strike me as funny, and it is clearly supposed to be a comedy. The actors seem to be working very hard at maintaining a frantic pace, which may indeed be how things are in the White House, but there is no slapstick, little irony, few plays on words, and less sarcasm than one might expect in a political drama.

Oh, I do like the bit with the staffer who has an imaginary dog. That’s funny and a bit ironic. Also amusing is the main character (Selina Meyer) hoping that the president will actually need her (thus far he hasn’t.) The character (Tony?) who doesn’t even bother whispering a brief description of everyone the VP meets and does not actually know is a bit of exaggeration and his remarks sometimes make me smile. And, the pace seems so fast that perhaps the intent is hyperbole, but it is more intense than humorous.

So, what’s left? Lots and lots of cussing, and at least fifty percent of it is a verb/expletive that might be labeled as “for unusual carnal knowledge.” Not funny. It just isn’t. I guess the writers are lazy or haven’t ever seen anything funny.

It’s sad really. A re-run of I Love Lucy can still make me laugh, but Veep doesn’t.