Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Tags

2011, Benedict Cumberbatch, Colin Firth, David Dencik, England, espionage, Gary Oldman, John Hurt, Mark Strong, MI6, Toby Jones, Tom Hardy

I’m a big fan of England, generally speaking. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy earns my love right off the bat for being so delightfully British. First off, you have this fantastic cast of British actors, all being very British. British spies nonetheless. Then there’s the fact that it’s set in the seventies, one of my favorite eras. The whole thing gets even better from there. I was worried that I was going to find this film impossible to follow, but having a slight knowledge of the story and making sure I paid close attention to what was going on avoided that. I did get confused at the end, but it’s nothing a trip to wikipedia couldn’t clear up.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is first and foremost about a mole hunt inside that British secret service. It’s set during the height of the Cold War, so a lot is at stake. One of the reasons this film can get confusing is their code names for everything. “The Circus” is MI6, and “Control” (John Hurt) is the guy in charge of it. At the film’s start, he sends one of the agents, Jim Prideaux (Mark Strong) to pick up a guy who’s defecting in Budapest. Unfortunately, the whole thing goes south, causing quite an embarrassment for Control. To save face, they force out Control and George Smiley (Gary Oldman), among others. Control dies soon later, but Smiley is brought back in to investigate a mole in the Circus. He’s perfect for the job since he knows everybody but isn’t technically on the inside.

There are a number of possibilities, and they are each given a code name based on a nursery rhyme. “Tinker” is Percy Alleline (Toby Jones) who’s taken over in Control’s absence, “Tailor” is Bill Haydon (Colin Firth), his right hand man, “Soldier” is Roy Bland (Ciaran Hinds), who is evidence that I still don’t fully understand all of this because I can’t remember what his function is, “Beggarman” is Smiley, who is clearly not the mole but Control originally thought he could be, and “Poorman” is Toby Esterhase (David Dencik). The term “Spy” goes to whoever turns out to be the mole. Helping Smiley is Peter Guillam (Benedict Cumberbatch), who is still in the Circus so he has access to information, and is in charge of Ricky Tarr (Tom Hardy), a man with a lot of information.

Smiley has to go run a lot of people down and send in Guillam for a lot of top secret files and such. Guillam sneaking into the Circus were some of the most tense and suspenseful moments in the film. This is a very patient film; it takes its time letting you in on what’s going on. It’s hard to keep track of everything that goes on, so let’s start with Ricky Tarr. He was also supposed to get somebody to defect, but he realized this person was another spy so he started in on the wife instead. She knew about a mole in the circus, as was going to defect herself in return for this information. Before she could however, the Russians got her back and Tarr never heard from her again. There is someone who did however…. and that person later turns up and helps flesh out the whole story, though some of Smiley’s own experience is needed as well.

Smiley approaches this thing from all sides. It’s a challenging film to keep track of, as I’m just fully realizing now, but one thing the film does really well is give you the right feeling. Even if you don’t know how everything’s adding up and such, the film has a great spy feel to it. It really reminds me of All the President’s Men, because that had a lot of mundane investigating in it that was hard to keep track of too. What that film did is the same thing that this one succeeds in doing: keep you involved even when you’re confused. A lot of the time I suppose I thought I knew what was going on, but maybe I didn’t because I’m having a hard time recounting it, but at the time I was fully immersed and that’s what counts!

There is something that’s pretty easy, or relatively easy, to understand though, and that’s the toll all of this takes on their personal lives. Ricky Tarr tries to pretend he doesn’t care much about the women he failed to protect, but it’s clear he does. Smiley runs into some trouble about his ex-wife, and it’s doubly depressing to realize that she ended up cheating on him for no good reason. And I’m pretty sure Guillam has to forgo someone to stay in the game too. It’s not really dwelt upon too much, but understating it so much made it more emotional for me. I really felt bad for these guys!

I have tried to read the book, and I have to say, for me at least, the film was a lot easier to follow. At least you could keep track of the different actors even if you couldn’t keep track of the names. This cast was pretty familiar to me; there were only a couple people I’d never seen before. It’s about five million times harder to keep track of everyone in the book because they are all faceless characters. That said, I was able to remember some of the names and functions even though I started reading the book a couple years ago and never finished.

I especially delighted in John Hurt’s character. He wasn’t around too often, but he did show up a bit more in flashbacks. He was able to bring a little bit of humor to the party scenes which really helped the film in my opinion. I couldn’t help thinking that Alleline wanted Control gone because he told him he didn’t know how to make punch! Clearly not true, but I was having fun with this idea. Also I noticed that Control has one of those Union Jack bulldog statues on a shelf behind his desk; I remember one of those making an even more central appearance in Skyfall and it made me wonder how/if the two British spy films were connected.

I really enjoyed Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. The cast was great and did not disappoint. I loved the spy feel throughout, which I think will save the movie for those who are confused. Apparently the original books are a trilogy, and Wikipedia has a tantalizing idea of adapting those as well at the bottom of their article. I don’t know how accurate that is, given that it’s two years now from when the film was released, but I hope that happens! I’d love a sequel to this fantastic film.

“Don’t you think it’s time to recognize that there’s as little worth on your side as there is on mine?”

Quote of the Day

“For your information, Pete Townshend, at one point, almost quit The Who. And if he had, he would have ended up in this group, thus making it Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick, Tich and Pete. And if you ask me, he should have.”

Season 1, Episodes 11-15, Star Trek: The Original Series

Tags

1966, DeForest Kelley, George Takai, Gerd Oswald, James Doohan, Leonard Nimoy, Marc Daniels, Mark Leonard, Nichelle Nichols, Robert Butler, Robert Sparr, Sci-fi, Vincent McEveety, William Shatner

Boldly going into the next five episodes! *cue theme music*

Season 1, Episode 11: “The Menagerie, Part 1″

Original Airdate: 17 November 1966
Directed by: Marc Daniels
Wikipedia synopsis: “Spock hijacks the Enterprise to take his crippled former captain, Christopher Pike, to the forbidden world of Talos IV. He then demands a court martial where he uses the events of “The Cage” to tell the tale of Pike’s captivity on the planet years earlier.”
Favorite quote: “In all the years of my service, this is the most painful moment I’ve ever faced.”
Tumblr commentary

This is a big episode, mostly for the reason that Spock goes off the reservation, big time. I think this is the first time that it happens, ever, so it’s a pretty big deal. Not only does Spock hijack the Enterprise, but he puts everyone’s career on the line and even his life as well! It’s unclear exactly why he’s doing this, but it has something to do with Captain Pike, who is pretty different than in the reboot. I knew he was an original series character, but he’s not in any of the movies, so I’ve never seen him outside of the reboot. Here he’s about the same age as Kirk, but he was in an accident and is now immobile and horribly deformed. The flashback tells about stuff that happened to him when he was the captain of the Enterprise. It’s all told when Spock is getting court martialed (that’s right, this is serious business here), and there is one heck of a cliffhanger both in the flashback and the present day. Lots of Kirk and Spock relationship stuff here, good things all around.

Season 1, Episode 12: “The Menagerie, Part 2″

Original airdate: 24 November 1966
Directed by: Robert Butler
Wikipedia synopsis: “Spock continues detailing the events of “The Cage” to the tribunal. After witnessing the Talosians’ capabilities of mental illusion, Kirk realizes that Spock intends to return Pike to the planet to live a life of illusion, unencumbered by his crippled condition.”
Favorite quote: I guess I was too absorbed in the episode to get a favorite quote…
Tumblr commentary

I watched this immediately after the first one, because that one was such a cliffhanger. Binge television watching for the win! Anyway, this one gets a lot more into the flashback portion of it, and it kind of reminded me of The Matrix, except it was more sinister somehow. Basically the aliens control the minds of humans so they can live vicariously through them, and then somehow they want to make a race of human slaves as well. They turn out to be not so bad in the end, but there’s still the issue of facing reality or retreating into illusion that is interesting to think about. And of course there’s the Kirk and Spock drama! There was also a character in the flashback part that I really liked, Number One. I don’t know if she was supposed to be an android or what, but that was her name anyway. She was really smart and awesome; I was a fan.

Season 1, Episode 13: “The Conscience of the King”

Original airdate: 8 December 1966
Directed by: Gerd Oswald
Wikipedia synopsis: “While visiting an old friend, Kirk suspects a Shakespearean actor may actually be the murderous former governor of Tarsus IV where Kirk grew up. Kirk invites the acting troupe aboard the Enterprise in order to investigate, but soon assassination attempts are made on Kirk and another crewman who was an eyewitness to the murders.”
Favorite Quote: “The captain is acting strangely, I’m wondering if you’ve noticed.”
Tumblr Commentary

This one had a lot of Shakespeare references in it; I was a big fan. The only thing I really have a problem with is that I was able to predict who was behind everything that was going on here. I usually can’t predict things so I get even more disappointed when I can. I was also initially feeling that the normal logic vs. emotion stuff was a bit forced here, but it developed really well so that didn’t turn into a problem at all. Also, Spock does some really nice detective work in this episode, always nice to see.

Season 1, Episode 14: “Balance of Terror”

Original airdate: 15 December 1966
Directed by: Vincent McEveety
Wikipedia synopsis: “While investigating a series of destroyed outposts, the Enterprise discovers a lone Romulan vessel with a cloaking device. The Romulans, having never been seen by humans, are revealed to visually resemble Vulcans, casting doubt on Mr. Spock’s loyalty as the two ships become locked in a cat-and-mouse battle through space.”
Favorite quote: “Leave any bigotry in your quarters, there’s no room for it on the bridge.”
Tumblr commentary is sadly absent on this one, blame it on my eating ice cream. It was delicious.

This was really good episode, more action packed than most, but it didn’t suffer from that in any way. It reminded me a lot of Star Trek Into Darkness with its themes of the militarization of Starfleet. Also surprising is the appearance of the Romulans. In Star Trek, Spock says they “share a common ancestry” with Vulcans, but in that film they didn’t look exactly the same as they did in this episode. It was also extremely uncomfortable to have the commander of the Romulan ship be played by the same actor (Mark Leonard) as Sarek in the original movies (at least I think he was the same guy). Very off-putting. Also I really appreciate, and I was made aware of it in this episode when Uhura was made the navigator, that everyone on the Enterprise seems to be able to do everyone else’s jobs at the slightest notice. It’s pretty awesome.

Season 1, Episode 15: “Shore Leave”

Original airdate: 29 December 1966
Directed by: Robert Sparr
Wikipedia synopsis: “Captain Kirk orders shore leave for the Enterprise crew on a seemingly uninhabited planet in the Omicron Delta system. The landing parties begin to see strange sights, such as a White Rabbit a la Alice in Wonderland, Don Juan, and a sword-wielding samurai. Also, Kirk sees (and fights) an image of Finnegan, a rival from his Starfleet Academy days. Spock discovers that the planet seems to be drawing a large amount of energy from the ship’s engines, placing the Enterprise in danger.”
Favorite quote: “After what this ship has been through in the past three months, there’s not a crewman on board not in need of a rest. Myself excepted.”
Tumblr commentary

This was a pretty good episode, but there is an unexpected death that occurs which momentarily made me pretty emotional. It all turns out fine, as I knew it would, but I was pretty worried for a few seconds. Also, it’s pretty interesting to learn that Kirk was the victim of a practical joker back in the Academy. I really wish JJ had figured out how to add this in in the reboot; it could have been hilarious! The annoying thing about this episode, which happens a lot in Star Trek, is that it took everyone forever to catch on to what was going on down on the planet. It was obvious to me after the second freak occurrence, but they were literally almost through the episode when Spock finally figured it out. Ah well, it was still pretty fun. And just for the record, womanizer McCoy is about a million times more entertaining than womanizer Kirk.

These episodes were all really good. I got through them in record time; it only took me four days! They are definitely picking up momentum as they go and I’m really excited to see what they come up with next. Hunter out.

Quote of the Day

“I’m a concert pianist. That’s a pretentious way of saying I’m… unemployed at the moment.”

Call for Reviews… Bringing Out the Dead

Bringing Out the Dead reviews

Some bloggers don’t read other reviews of a film before they review it themselves. It’s a policy I understand and admire in a way, but one I cannot follow. I have a hard time just diving into the abyss of reviewing a film, for fear I’ll miss something. I tried not reading others’ reviews before reviewing Star Trek Into Darkness, and writing that was excruciating because I didn’t know how to orient myself. That was the first and last time I’ll ever be doing that.

Sometimes I review obscure films, and I have no choice in this matter. Usually I can depend on Ebert (or his site now days) for at least one review, but if the film is pre-1967 and not a “Great Movie” then usually I’m out of luck. When this happens, I have to resort to Rotten Tomatoes and that website aggravates me to no end. All things being equal, I’d much prefer to go to the blogging community for background on a film. For a film like Funny Face, I’m not surprised that it doesn’t get that much attention from bloggers today. It’s a 1957 musical, and not a particularly notable one either, despite the stars attached (Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn). When I go looking for a Scorsese film that blew me away, however, I expect to find something.

After I saw Bringing Out the Dead, Scorsese’s 1999 film starring Nicolas Cage and Patricia Arquette, I couldn’t wait to read what people had said about it. Where people intrigued or offended by its similarities to Taxi Driver? Did Cage manage not to go over the top in most viewers’ eyes? Did most think the supporting characters were as colorful as I thought they were, or were they just ridiculous? Was the bright whiteness of the uniforms and the distortion of the city lights appreciated? Did Marty’s voice part as the ambulance dispatcher amaze and tickle anyone else? After checking a few of my regular sites, the question became: did anybody see this movie?

So I went through my whole blogroll, and I only found one review. One. In my view, this is unacceptable. Obviously everybody has different tastes in films, and I respect that, and obviously I don’t follow every blog out there but I follow a good few. So, now we come to the purposes of this post. If you are reading this, and are hoarding (lol just kidding) a review of Bringing Out the Dead, link to it in the comments RIGHT NOW! If you haven’t written one, and would like to, I will gladly link to it on my site. This is sort of like a mini blogathon in a way, with only one movie. It’s pretty low key, all you have to do is review the film. I don’t even need a lot, just a few! This is a really great film in my eyes, and I think it deserves to be talked about more.

My review is currently scheduled for the thirtieth of June. If you send me a link of your review before then, either through email (souloftheplot@gmail.com, twitter (@SoulofthePlot), or as a comment in this post, I’ll put it in a special post that will come out later that same day. I also promise to read them, and comment on them. I don’t have a ton of followers compared to most blogs, so I can’t really promise you a super wide audience, but I think it is really important that this great film gets its day in the blogging sunshine, so to speak. I would really appreciate any and all contributions. If you don’t have a blog of your own, I may be persuaded to make a guest post here.

Here are the reviews I was able to find, they’re both really excellent:

http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/bringing-out-the-dead-1999

http://rorschachreviews.com/2013/04/13/scorsese-spotlight-bringing-out-the-dead-the-code-is-zeek/

Quote of the Day

“When you leave, you should forget me.”

Man of Steel

Tags

2013, Amy Adams, Diane Lane, Henry Cavill, Kevin Costner, Michael Shannon, Russell Crowe, superhero, Zack Snyder

I’m very new to the superhero genre in general, and as such this is my first Superman movie. Superman is clearly the biggest superhero ever, I mean he is “super” after all. I went into this film not really knowing what to expect. On one hand it could be your general superhero movie, but on the other hand Nolan’s name was tossed around a lot in the advertising, so they could have gone all Dark Knight on us. It’s somewhere in between, giving Superman a lot of issues to grapple with without really having a dark or depressing tone throughout.

I thought the first half of the film was much stronger than the second half, but it all depends on what you want out of your superhero movies. I personally thought the origin story part of the film was more compelling, and it really dropped off in the second half. The second half was mainly comprised of almost nonstop CGI fighting which started to wear on me after a while. Of course, big huge fight scenes with cool special effects showcasing all of the superhero’s and villain’s abilities are half the point, so it makes sense that it would be a major part of the film. Nevertheless, it seemed to me that they were just dragging things out at the end for the sake of it, and it could have been wrapped up a lot more quickly. It was similar to Django Unchained in that there was a clear place where it could have ended… but it didn’t. It just kept going!

The film starts off with the origin story, obviously. Krypton, Superman’s home planet, is dying. The people on Krypton have simultaneously depleted their natural resources and stopped exploring the universe for other options. I thought there was a really interesting parallel here to Earth, because it can be argued that that’s exactly what we’ve been doing. To save their son and their race, Jor-El (Russell Crowe) and Lara send their newborn child Kal-El (Superman) to Earth, which is close enough to Krypton for him to be able to survive. Before they do this, they inject the genes of the whole Krytonian race into Kal so that when the time comes, he will be able to rebuild it. I don’t really know how he’s going to accomplish that, but whatever. It’s still a cool idea.

Through flashbacks mixed in with present day action, we see how Clark Kent grew up. He struggles with not knowing how to control his powers, who he is, where he came from, and what his responsibility to the world is. Guiding him through this are his adoptive mother and father, Martha and Jonathan Kent (Diane Lane and Kevin Costner). This was a very heartwarming part of the story, and for once I get to see Costner portray actual emotions onscreen! Really, I could not be more impressed with his performance here, as I generally think he’s wooden and inexpressive in all the roles I’ve seen him in. While Jonathan expresses worries about his son’s future, being an alien and all, it’s clear that he loves his son and wants what’s best for him, even if that means possibly disregarding the safety of others. It’s a problem that plagues Superman throughout the film, should he reveal himself as an alien and trust humanity to accept him, or should he remain hidden and only do a limited amount of good? Because as Lois points out, saving people gets you noticed, especially when the people you are saving are technically unsavable.

Lois Lane (Amy Adams) is the Pulitzer-prize winning journalist who is tracking down Clark after he saves her at the crash site of an unknown object (turns out to be a ship from Krypton, and this is where Clark figures out his true identity). They develop a relationship that felt very forced to me. I understand they have the source material to deal with, but I thought they could have made their relationship a bit more natural, maybe even delayed it until the inevitable sequel. The whole thing just seemed awkward, like they felt they had to put the romance in there, and that’s why they had to fall in love. This was extremely apparent to me earlier in the film where there is a very abrupt cut from Superman being interrogated to Lois and Superman standing really close together in the middle of the desert. I laughed out loud during this because it was such a jarring change and their positioning was so straight and narrow.

It wasn’t just the romance that felt forced to me, in a way it was Lois’s whole presence in the second half of the film. I was not buying into the fact that they would let Lois go on all of these military missions just because she was a reporter that discovered what was going on. I recognize that the film did this because Lois is a character in Superman and she has to be there to fall in love with him and get saved and everything, and generally I support giving female characters more to do, but here I didn’t think it worked. You don’t need to put her into unrealistic situations for her to be a strong female character. If the filmmakers were of mind to they could make her a strong female reporter within the realm of possibility, instead of just stuffing her into situations that her character normally would not be allowed to be in.

A superhero is often only as good as his villain, and the villain of this film, General Zod (Michael Shannon), was adequate. His evil scheme to rebuild Krypton at the expense of Earth and Superman himself was a threatening enough one, but Zod himself seemed more preoccupied with destroying Earth at some points than rebuilding Krypton. Superman points out to him that they could probably learn to coexist with humans if they gave it shot, but Zod does not listen. This is not really a complaint; villains are generally not very logical. One of the frustrating things is how the Kryptonians deal with Zod in the beginning; they decide to send Zod and his followers who have just attempted a coup off planet, so the outlaws live while the society as a whole meets its demise. That type of sloppiness is usually reserved for villains, who make a trap for the hero so elaborate that he is able to escape “certain” death while they make the dangerous assumption that the death they planned was actually certain. Ah well, that society was clearly flawed, they destroyed their own planet so I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised.

Another aspect of this film I found fascinating was the religious undertones. I thought they did a great job with them, as they were there if you cared to see them but didn’t go around smacking you in the face. Other than the obvious set up of Jor-El sending his only son to Earth to save it and everything, there some more subtle things about it that furthered the comparison between Christ and Superman. There is a reference to Superman being 33 years old, which is supposedly when Christ was crucified, and the possibility of Superman dying to service humanity is a distinct possibility, as the government turns Superman over to Zod when he asks them to. Superman goes willingly of course, but it can be seen as a betrayal. Also, I remember noticing Superman coming out of a ship at one point with his arms outstretched as if he were on a cross (sadly I don’t remember exactly what was happening at the time). Also when Clark was seeking guidance in a church, a stained glass window behind him depicts Christ wearing a red cape or something similar, just like Superman. Maybe it was a bit preachy, but I took it as way to understand what Clark was going through. I thought it was successful for the most part and pretty interesting.

And yet, all of this interesting stuff is suffocated by the endless fighting in the second half. I understand that it’s good to finally see Superman fighting with the power of CGI on his side, but after a while I got tired of it and I couldn’t care anymore. That really brought the picture down in my eyes, especially because I was pretty invested in the beginning. While I enjoyed the film, I don’t think it will ever become one of my favorite superhero movies for this reason, as well as the awkward romance and unrealistic look at Lois. It’s still a fairly good superhero movie, and brings Superman into today’s film industry. If and when there is a sequel, I would be interested to see it.

“Imagine how our world would react if they came face to face with this…”

Quote of the Day

“We’ll get there Pop. We’ll get there.”

Quote of the Day

“Obi-Wan never told you what happened to your father….”

The Game

Tags

1997, David Fincher, Deborah Kara Unger, James Rebhorn, Michael Douglas, San Francisco, Sean Penn

I wasn’t expecting too much from The Game going in. I thought the premise was cool, and I generally like Michael Douglas, but based on how I’ve been feeling about Fincher’s films lately I wasn’t that excited for this one. I could not have been more wrong; The Game ended up being as good a film I could ask for from Fincher. The atmosphere is there, the performances are there, and most importantly, the suspense is there. After being slightly disappointed with Se7en, horrified by Fight Club, and not affected at all by Alien 3, The Game was just what I needed to get excited about Fincher again and remember why I decided to go through all of his films in the first place.

The interesting premise of the film is this: Nicholas Van Orton (Michael Douglas), an uptight San Franciscan investment banker, receives a mysterious present from his younger brother Conrad (Sean Penn). This present is a chance to participate in “the game,” which is something life-changing, but that’s all Van Orton can really get out of anybody about this thing. It’s like a game you play, but with your own life in the real world, but no one will really give Van Orton any more specifics than that. He probably would have just dismissed the whole thing and never given it another thought, but he ends up in the company’s (Consumer Recreation Services, abbreviated to CRS) offices the next day and decided to check it out. The salesman he talks to, Jim Feingold (James Rebhorn), sort of talks him into it by saying he can just call out of the game at any time, so he might as well give it a shot. Van Orton doesn’t really agree, but he doesn’t really disagree either, so Feingold gives him a bunch of psychological and physical tests for his application and sends him on his merry way.

Before Van Orton is officially in the game, we get some background information about just how depressing his life is, only he doesn’t necessarily realize it. He goes back to empty house every night, says good night to his housekeeper on her way out, and watches CNN all by himself. This is his birthday, too. He has an ex-wife who calls, but that’s about it. They only talk for like a minute. And oh yeah, he has just reached the age that his dad committed suicide at. That’s unsettling, and as the film goes on it seems he has been trying to live up to his father this whole time, and it’s turning him into a cold human being.

In the middle of a business meeting, he gets a call from CRS saying his application to the game has been rejected. He doesn’t really care one way or the other, he was only a bit curious in the beginning anyway. He’s more upset that his meeting was interrupted. It’s pretty clear though, after a while, that this is just a trick that’s part of the game. In fact, that’s what most of what to follows is, a part of the game. Van Orton doesn’t stay unrejected for very long however. He gets back home, and finds a creepy wooden clown in his driveway. A key is inside its mouth, engraved with “CRS.” Definitely a part of the game. Then his TV starts talking to him, and confirms as much. It still won’t tell him what the object of the game is, besides that it’s to find out what the object of the game is. The whole thing is bizarre, creepy, and a little bit funny in a twisted sort of way.

Things start slow. First, he goes to an important business meeting and can’t open his briefcase with crucial papers inside. He freaks out trying to open this thing. I forget the exact order of things because most of it is really strange and doesn’t make sense. He goes to meet his brother again, but he doesn’t show. A waitress (Deborah Kara Unger) spills a drink on him and he is told to follow her. They end up saving a man in a car accident and getting stuck in an elevator after the power goes out. The next day, his American Express card turns up at a hotel he hasn’t been to. In the room reserved in his name, there seems to have been a wild party, complete with drugs, scandalous photos, and a gigantic mess that’s sure to cost a lot. He thinks he’s been set up by a business rival, but that turns out not to be it. He meets up with his brother and the waitress again, but they’re not helping him much. Conrad seems crazy and the waitress is just misleading him. It’s hard to tell just what this game thing is, and the final suspicion Van Orton has is that it’s a con to get all of his money (he is rich after all). Unbelievable stuff keeps happening to him, and it all culminates in a way that I did not (fully) see coming.

My favorite scene has to be when Van Orton comes home to find his place completely vandalized. It’s spray painted with glow in the dark paint, all over the place, and blaring is Jefferson Airplane’s “White Rabbit.” I really love that song, and nothing says “I have no control over my life” quite like it. Van Orton doesn’t know what to do for awhile, and just looks around at the damage. Fincher’s camera spins chaotically, perfectly capturing his state of mind. It ends with a horrible reminder for Van Orton, as well as a crucial bit of foreshadowing. The whole thing is ridiculous, a bit funny, but mostly horrifying, just like the entire film. The spray paint plays into the chosen Fincher color scheme for the film, which is mostly on the blue side of gray. At other times its more of a brown-yellow, but for the most part I think it’s blue-gray.

The only real problem I have with this film is the ending. It doesn’t quite jive, in my opinion, with what comes before. Without going into spoiler territory, because you really don’t want to be spoiled on this one, trust me, I’ll just say that Van Orton seems to behave rather uncharacteristically at the end, meaning he has actually bought into the game when all is said and done. Looking back on it, this bothers me a lot actually. It’s something I think Fincher has a fondness for in his films, and it’s something I don’t really agree with: the characters in his films often seem to get their whole lives completely messed up and out of their control, and generally they’re completely fine with it. That’s exactly what happens here, but it doesn’t happen until the end. It only last a couple minutes while Fincher is wrapping everything up. I suppose that’s why I didn’t have such an issue with it as I did with Fight Club, because Van Orton was very unhappy with the whole idea of the game when it was going on, which to me seems like the sane reaction.

Another thing about this film that I’m not really sure about, is how it will stand up on repeated viewings. I’m inclined to think at this moment that there is enough suspense here that it will be able to hold up, but I can recognize even now that a lot of it is simply surprise, very well executed and surprising, but surprise nonetheless. There were several moments in this film where I was taken off guard by some element of the game, but I’m unsure if I will be quite as taken in on a second viewing. Hopefully Douglas’s performance will help with this, because I thought he was very good at showing how everything was getting out of control little by little, and how crazy he seemed by the end was fantastic. He built it up perfectly, and even more importantly, I was able to get behind him as a character even though he wasn’t the nicest guy in the world.

The Game is a really strong movie in my opinion. It helped me put a lot of things together in terms of Fincher’s filmography as a whole, and gets me really excited to see the rest of the films on his list. I really needed to get motivated again in regards to him, and The Game certainly managed to do that. It was dark and twisted, two Fincher must haves, had the color scheme, and used a slow build in insanity and a great performance by Michael Douglas to give the viewer one heck of a ride. Maybe The Game really is onto something, because it was messing with me for its entire run time and I couldn’t have been happier when it was all over.

“I am extremely fragile right now.”