Jarret's Frank Film Forum (FFF) -- A General Review

March 22, 2011: So many movies -- so little time!

If you're like me, you want to do whatever you can to keep at bay the maddening voices that pollute your head, and quell the tumultuous mix of turbulent emotions that constantly bombard your spirit and tea-stained psyche. Toward this end, nothing gets the job done (short of heroin and pornography) like the always-captivating enticement of the big blue screen.

(NOTE: In my case it's a relatively little screen, but it is blue, which is the important thing. It's also mesmerizingly heavy, consisting of ancient tubes and, I suspect, giant hunks of metal that simply weigh it down in the event of great windstorms.)

Anyway, since my youngest days, I've found great solace and security in the hypnotic intoxication of television and all its holy offerings. And while we don't currently even have cable owing to my humiliating inability to earn a decent income, thanks to our expansive DVD collection -- (and our wonderful local library's considerable catalogue) -- I still manage to secure ongoing comfort, constructive therapy and the emotional medication I so sorely need on a daily basis.

That said, I wanted to share some of my more profitable viewing experiences of late, starting with a very satisfying vampire movie called "Blade." Yes, this is the one with the great Wesley Snipes as the Daywalker, abetted by the great Kris Kristofferson as the cigarette-smoking, tattooed stereotype he so aptly embodies. What a marvelous array of effects and action this classic offers, including several scenes where Snipes grins maniacally at the oddest of moments, promising more strange turns and dashing images of vampiric execution. All told, I highly recommend this 1998 classic, which features a standout performance by Stephen Dorff (what an awful name ... almost as bad as co-star "N'Bushe" Wright!) as a very nasty vampire, and a weird performance by Udo Kier, whom I suspect may actually be a real vampire after all.

Another keg of fulfillment has been found in the first two "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies, which I'd never seen before now, but have proven to be very joyous romps all told. Johnny Depp, of course, is generally grand, and while his wonderful Captain Jack Sparrow is much more Hunter Thompson than Keith Richards (as he claimed), how can one possibly tire of Depp's Thompson, and so I'm simply looking forward to the next two installments in the series to see more of it. Orlando Bloom is all chin, but that may be why we like Depp all the more and keep rooting for Bloom to be skewered in each sword fighting scene. And Keira Knightley ... is ... soooo .... f***ing ... gorgeous!

Finally, I've just been re-watching a slick David Mamet flick called "Spartan." (The nice thing about having brain damage is you can watch movies once and then forget everything about them a couple of years later.) It's quite a solid suspense/action film, and while I like to think I would have done a better job playing Jim Morrison in "The Doors" movie, Val Kilmer was acceptable there and really does a very fine job with this role. Mamet is a pretty solid film maker and writer -- and I don't praise many, actually -- despite what I hear are some strange personal behaviors. (He actually wrote a solid book on acting, as well, which I found enlightening; yay Mamet, you old legend you!)

So that's all I've got tonight, except now I can't stop thinking about Keira and her chin. I'm going to finish this "Spartan" movie and hope it carries me comfortably toward my bedtime with a minimal of distractions -- thoughts, feelings, ideas, imposing images of the future, the past, the present ... Y'know!