The Dotted Logline

Just finished watching the Oscars, and overall, I was really pleased this year. The Incredibles won Best Animated Feature (and I have the same pin Brad Bird wore), Edna Mode livened up the presentation of the award for Costume Design, the screenwriters got to accept their awards like normal human beings, and Chris Rock was pretty funny. Though I sadly haven’t seen ANY of the of the nominees for Best Film as of yet, Million Dollar Baby is the one I most want to see so I was glad it garnered the awards that it did.

Maybe next year, Mr. Depp.

Having just seen my third Mel Brooks movie, Blazing Saddles, I once again find myself wondering what I’m missing. For me, Mel Brooks is just too heavy handed for work funny. Maybe it’s just that I prefer comedy that plays it straight. I will say that I though Gene Wilder and Cleavon Little gave wonderful performances.

My good friend Alexander Danner, the writer of the web comic Picture Story Theatre hosted on ModernTales.com, has made available two stories as free samples, “The Little Bear Who Knew Fear” and “The Unusual Education of Suzy Finnegan.” I encourage everyone to check them out. Modern Tales has quite a few excellent web comics and is definitely worth the low subscription fee.

A friend convinced me to watch a repeat of the pilot of a new anime-inspired series on Nickelodeon of all channels called Avatar: The Last Airbender. The story isn’t particularly original; four countries based on the four elements, each with people known as “______ benders” who manipulate that element and an Avatar who can control all four elements and maintains a balance.  When the Avatar disappears, the unchecked Fire Nation spends a century taking over the world.

But what I like about the series is it doesn’t have that pressing despair that so many similar fantasy stories have. It might be because it is aimed for a younger audience, although the complexity of the world and the politics somewhat dispute that. It’s simply that the hope outshines the overwhelming odds. There is no question that the current Avatar, a 12 year old Airbender named Aang, will save the world. It will be a hard journey, but a fun one, and one that will be enjoyable to watch.

Also, the fight/magic use scenes are SO COOL.

I’ve seen a lot of not-great movies as of late, but I was hoping I would actually enjoy Van Helsing. I did to some extent; the character designs were interesting, especially Dracula’s Brides and the way they switched between forms. But I did have trouble with the fact that the movie didn’t take itself seriously for the most part. If it hadn’t taken itself seriously for ANY part, it would have been so much better.

If there’s one thing studying screenwriting has done for me, it’s given me the ability to peg down what it is that makes a movie suck. For example, Little Black Book has awful awful pacing. Isn’t it helpful to know specifically why you shouldn’t watch a movie?

Yeah, I know it isn’t, but I still like being able to say “The pacing in that movie is terrible, don’t bother.”

It’s really sad when a movie’s marketing completely ruins its appeal. For example, the previews implied that Wimbledon was yet another disposable RomCom, not worth a second glance. However, when forced to sit and watch it, I discovered it was actually a well done British sports comedy with some fascinating and inventive camera work. It’s always good to be pleasantly surprised by a movie, but it’s useless if it comes across as so mundane or downright bad in the ads that you will never voluntarily watch it.

I am a writer at heart. I’m not one of those people who has an all-consuming need to be a director. But I do feel that directing is a good skill to have, if only to avoid situations like this.