The demise of film and the seeming triumph of digital has been a hot topic of discussion for insiders and hardcore enthusiasts for a number of years. But Keanu Reeves is taking the topic into the mainstream(ish) realm with his latest project, Side by Side , which bowed recently in Los Angeles and is set to hit cities around the U.S. in the coming weeks. Co-produced and narrated by Reeves, the 98-minute documentary landed the likes of James Cameron , David Fincher , David Lynch , George Lucas , Danny Boyle , Martin Scorsese , Christopher Nolan and Steven Soderbergh to weigh in on movie-making’s (d)evolution. Nolan, he noted, was the most difficult to reach among the people who appear in the doc, which features interviews with 70-plus filmmaking powerhouses. To lure The Dark Knight Rises filmmaker, Reeves went snail mail. “I actually wrote to him on an old-fashioned typewriter,” Reeves told Reuters . “I think he got a kick out of that and we finally shot him in his trailer on the Batman set in LA.” Reeves noted that Nolan’s schedule was “so crazy” because he was in the midst of filming The Dark Knight Rises , but wanted the filmmaker because of his long-standing opinions about the film vs. digital debate, which caught Reeves’ attention in earnest while finishing on a previous project a couple years back. While working on Henry’s Crime , which he also produced a couple of years back, Reeves and the film’s production manager, Chris Kenneally, began talking about the rise of digital technology. “We were sitting in the post-production suite trying to match the photochemical image with the digital image, side by side, and it just hit me – film is going away, and we should document this whole evolution,” Reeves told Reuter. “So Chris and I gradually put a team together to make the documentary.” A champion of film himself, none other than Martin Scorsese said earlier this summer he’ll probably go digital with his upcoming projects including The Wolf of Wall Street . His previous effort, Hugo was a de facto call for film preservation, something near and dear to the filmmaker’s heart. His longtime editor Thelma Schoonmaker told Empire magazine at the time, “I think Marty just feels it’s unfortunately over, and there’s been no bigger champion of film than him.” And as Side by Side gets set to expand, Reeves appears to agree that film will continue to disintegrate into the annals of movie history. “Even Chris Nolan admits that film, if not dead, is now on life support, and it’s just going to become more and more difficult to even get film. Personally I’m a big film fan and it’s sad to see it go but the future is digital.” Reeves himself is directing a big screen feature about a a young martial artist set in Beijing titled Man of Tai Chi and he has apparently also accepted – even if begrudgingly – the comparatively cheaper technology. “”We did [go digital],” he said. “I developed this project for five years and we’re shooting on location in Beijing and Hong Kong. I’m having a great time directing and I definitely plan to do it again.” [ Source: Reuters ]
Nepotism strikes again (but that’s okay): Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt ‘s 4-year-old daughter Vivienne Jolie-Pitt has scored her first movie role. The tot will play a young version of Princess Aurora, later played as a teenager by 14-year-old Elle Fanning, in Disney’s live-action Maleficent , which stars Jolie as the famous evil witch of Sleeping Beauty lore and is in production gearing towards a 2014 release. According to The Sun , it was mama Jolie’s idea: “Ange thought it would be a fun experience for her and Viv to share, and Viv is a natural.” [ The Sun via The Insider ]
There’s a lot of “auto” in Dax Shepard ‘s debut as an auteur. Shepard (who previously co-directed the mockumentary Brother’s Justice ) wrote, co-directed and stars in the action comedy Hit and Run ; he even cast real-life love Kristen Bell to play the role of his cherished girlfriend, but their romance is not at the center of this movie — rather, it’s the deep love between Shepard and the many cars that populate the film that drives Hit and Run . It’s only when these machines rev their engines that the soundtrack fills with sultry ballads and the camera switches to slow mo — all the better for us to admire the sleek undercarriages and sexy lines of the movie’s many four-wheeled stars. But this is far from a good thing. The movie’s human stars can’t compete with such auto-erotica; cartoonish characters and a thin plot are mostly vehicles to get from one stretch of highway to another, in a chase through the kind of cinematic America where fleabag motels have parking lots filled with easily-stolen luxury sports cars and roadways are always adjacent to abandoned airports that provide plenty of space for nifty driving tricks. Shepard stars as Charlie Bronson, a likeable guy living in a non-specific American everytown. Although Charlie doesn’t have a job, he does have a devoted girlfriend, Annie (Bell), and a bumbling U.S. Marshal (Tom Arnold, looking increasingly like a nerdy version of Meat Loaf) to watch over him. Charlie, you see, is in the Witness Protection Program, a fact that is supposed to prevent him from leaving his safe provincial town. But when Annie has the opportunity to interview for a big job at a university in Los Angeles, Charlie decides to chauffer her towards her dreams and away from his own safety. The fact that he decides to do this not in Annie’s inconspicuous sedan but rather in his highly noticeable 1967 Lincoln Continental (complete with expired plates registered to his former identity) is only one of many questionable moments in the thin plot. It’s the plates on the car that allow Gil (Michael Rosenbaum) Annie’s meticulously groomed and spiteful ex-boyfriend, to uncover Charlie’s former identity. And thanks to the wonders of Facebook, where one assumes all dangerous criminals have easily-searchable profiles, Gil is able to track down Charlie’s former bank-robbing associates and tip them off as to his whereabouts. The chase is on, with Annie and Charlie trailed by Marshal Randy and Gil, picking up extra characters (including a pair of extraneous cops and Beau Bridges in a cameo as Charlie’s father, who keeps a fleet of monster ATVs in his big red barn, of course) along the way. Will the baddies from Charlie’s former life catch up with him? Will Annie make it to her interview? Will she discover that Charlie’s story, of only being an innocent witness to a crime, isn’t the whole truth? Will they stay together in the face of shock revelations and inevitable car sickness? ( Will that ATV get to climb a giant staircase?? ) The movie kicks up no real tension in the search for the answers to any of these questions, and when plotlines do swing back around, they come with more of an “Oh right, remember that ?” than with a satisfying snap. One senses that the movie doesn’t quite have the chutzpah to be what it wants to be — a Fast and Furious -like sequence of balletic car chases — so it periodically halts to wedge in some romance. (The charming Bell and Shepard don’t have much to do but enjoy a lovely on-screen chemistry, a rarity for offscreen couples, that rises above their underwritten characters.) Jokes stay mostly in the range of the strictly puerile (naked old people!) with occasional forays into the mystifyingly icky (an extended joke has Charlie obsessed with the nationality of the man who raped Bradley Cooper’s bank-robbing baddie in the prison shower.) The talented cast is game and deserves better, especially Cooper, who is saddled with a dreadlocked fright wig that gives the impression he is performing all his scenes with a spongy blond octopus sitting on his head. But at least he gets to drive, swerving around in his little red car like he’s in a bumper car ring. From this we know his character is unpredictable but ultimately in control, because the movie’s most complete character developments come through the cars the characters drive. It’s a cinematic stand-in for masculinity that would make Freud proud: We know Arnold’s U.S. Marshal is a mess because he drives a minivan that he can’t even park competently (he also wildly fires off his gun all the time, in case one mishandled phallic symbol wasn’t enough). Dax Shepard’s Charlie, as befits the hero and the part played by the writer/director, gets the broadest spectrum of vehicles, from the kickass black Lincoln to a shiny ATV. It looks like he’s having a great time up there, getting to drive them around. If only he had brought the audience along for the ride. Anika Chapin is an NYC-based dramaturg and writer. She has contributed pieces to The New York Times , and blogs about theater and pop culture at http://bloggledygook.wordpress.com . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Jessica Biel is a prime example of a girl who looked like a dude when she was younger, all fit and broad and muscular who I used to laugh at, before realizing that muscle has memory, and when everyone else gets older, sloppier and fat, her version of sloppy becomes tight and amazing….it’s like you gotta look out for the skinny rock hard ones you may feel gay fucking from behind despite their vagina…which is probably what Timberlake liked in her….but they are the ones who age proper….fit is good….and here is her ass on TV… To See Some Pics of Jessica Biel Hot Booty in Tight Jeans FOLLOW THIS LINK
Madonna travels everywhere with an anit-aging machine because she fears getting old…even though she is old. Makes sense. This picture is beyond fucking crazy…but expected because Madonna is fucking crazy…something went wrong when she sold her soul to the devil via her vagina in the 80s and became a big fucking deal that she just can’t let go of well into her 50s….pushing 60….still performing….instead of being a normal washed up popstar who dies of a drug overdose or marries a billionaire and talks abotu he good days…and when she’s not recognized in malls, she can scream “Do you know who I am or who I was”….in efforts to get some kind of discount….cuz you can’t take the star away from her…even though it should be mandatory….to avoid all he awkwardness…. Well….it turns out she travels with something they call and ANTI AGING MACHINE…because she’s old and needs to stay fit to humiliate herself on stage…it may be Michael Jackson rich person weirdness, or it may be medical necessity…or a glimpse into the cloning process or transition of her becoming a robot she needs to be….I don’t have the answers…but I blame ancient aliens and I know this represents serious evil. Modern Science has wronged us – this is the proof. TO SEE THE REST OF THE PICS FOLLOW THIS LINK
Say what you will about Michael Jackson. He was the self-anointed King of Pop, but legions of fans around the world were his willing subjects for decades, crossing generations. So there is at least a reasonable in-house audience just itching for more about the moon-walker and Spike Lee is just the man to deliver. Lee and Jackson were friends in life and the filmmaker, whose Red Hook Summer opens next month, is working on a documentary tied to the 25th anniversary of the release of Jackson’s Bad album. And Lee has apparently come across a lot of material for the film-in-progress. He told the A.P. it’s a “treasure chest of findings” including footage the star shot himself from behind-the-scenes. “We had complete access to the vaults of Michael Jackson,” Lee said. “He wrote 60 demos for the Bad record. Only 11 made it. So we got to hear a lot of that stuff, too, so it was just a great experience.” Still untitled, Lee said that the film will be appealing to those who are not Michael Jackson fans. The doc will also show a personal side of the pop legend. “He had a great sense of humor and he was funny,” said Lee who interviewed Kanye West and Mariah Carey for the film. He also spoke to Sheryl Crow who was a background singer during Jackson’s Bad tour. “We really divided it into two things: Artists today who were influenced by Michael and then people who worked side by side…” Loyalists and new converts have been gobbling up Michael Jackson’s music since his death in 2009 at age 50 and the powers-that-be are very happy to oblige. The follow-up to the singer’s Thriller album, Bad includes hits “Smooth Criminal” and “The Way You Make Me Feel.” It will be re-released with additional tracks, a DVD and other goodies September 18th. Jackson would have turned 54 on August 29th. [Source: A.P. ]
Why do we believe, or need to believe, in the possibilities that lie beyond the laws of physics and known science — the unlikely, irrational hope that suggest something more exists in the universe, be it spiritual or simply supernatural? Actor Cillian Murphy explores these Big Questions in Rodrigo Cortes’ Red Lights as Tom Buckley, a paranormal debunker who goes head-to-head with a powerful pop psychic (Robert De Niro) whose self-proclaimed powers to bend spoons and read minds may be mere parlour tricks compared to what he’s really capable of. In researching the role of a paranormal investigator for the twisty thriller (Cortes’ follow up to Buried ), Murphy found himself studying real-life mentalists, magicians, and self-proclaimed seers. But while the self-described “boringly rational” skeptic may not believe in the existence of the supernatural, one encounter gave him an understanding of how these magnetic personalities inspire whole-hearted devotion in legions of hope-seekers. Murphy only met the magician David Copperfield for a few brief moments backstage in Vegas, but their exchange made an impact. “The man’s got an aura for sure,” he marveled, though De Niro’s Simon Silver combines the charisma of Copperfield with the mysticism of Uri Geller to create a much more intimidating onscreen adversary. Movieline spoke further with Murphy about what drew him to the storytelling and themes of Red Lights , acting opposite film legends Weaver and De Niro, and rumors that he’ll pop up in Christopher Nolan’s upcoming The Dark Knight Rises . What was your initial reaction to the concept of Red Lights ? Part of what’s intriguing about the script is how it plays with viewer expectation — what hooked you? Every script that you get, you always have to judge it on the word on the page and that’s always been my sort of mantra. A lot of the time when you read scripts you can kind of predict where they’re going to go pretty quickly, and with this one I couldn’t. And that’s no fun, when you can guess at a story’s secrets. No! But that tends to be the majority of scripts. You kind of know what’s going to happen and what the character is like. This one took turns that I was pleasantly surprised by. And I’d also seen Rodrigo’s two other films, and you could see he was the real deal — he was a real director. And obviously you throw in a couple of legends, and the whole package was very, very appealing to me. By legends, you mean Sigourney Weaver and Robert De Niro. Of course, but unless the part and the director and the script is any use, that’s immaterial. But the fact that they were already signed on to do those parts … that was definitely appealing. Rodrigo has said that he wrote Sigourney’s character with her in mind, which is great — those interesting kinds of female characters don’t come along that frequently. Did her character and De Niro’s character leap off the page as much for you early on? It was really well written, and it was very smart; it didn’t pander to an audience. And the twists and turns were surprising to me, and as you say that’s a great strong female part — where her character goes, you don’t expect. I enjoy the way in the TV debate equal credence is given to both camps, and it wasn’t about ridiculing or pointing fingers — it was about rigorously looking for the truth. I like scripts that presuppose a level of intelligence in the audience, and again they’re sort of rare. When it comes to the themes in the film — faith, skepticism, these huge ideas — how much did the chance to play with those ideas factor in for you? I think they’re obviously big questions in the film, but for me I focused on the character, and for me the character the two driving forces are obsession and self-acceptance, or the lack of self-acceptance. Those were the two things for me that drove Tom Buckley’s character and I focused in on those, because those are quite universal. The broader picture about skepticism and belief and blind faith and science and all those things, I would personally be very much in the skeptic camp. I’d be very much about proof and logic and reason, that’s always been my boringly rational approach to life, but I’m fascinated by why people needed to believe in these things. The need to believe was the thing that really struck me — the need to believe, rather than to understand. To many people that’s a need to have something to believe in, in order to get through. To get through — and that’s absolutely fine and valid, but where it becomes darker is where that is preyed upon. If people are ill, or people have lost loved ones, and then people are willing to set aside logic and reason and rational thought and bankrupt themselves because some charlatan is promising them relief. Rodrigo did a fair amount of research into real world healers and the like; did you do much of the same, and how did what you learned affect your perspective? I did a lot of reading about it, a great deal in fact. I also went to Vegas to see the more showbizzy aspect of it. Like a Criss Angel show? Criss Angel, David Copperfield — that stuff is good, harmless fun. It’s like showbiz. But De Niro’s character is more an amalgam of the televangelists, the psychics, Uri Geller and all these sorts of guys who claim something beyond what the Copperfield and Criss Angel do, which is pure entertainment and great fun. But you can see there how they use their aura, or their personality — which is large anyway — and then magnify that on stage. I do think there’s a power of personality that’s important in this, that we haven’t talked about that much. I met David Copperfield afterwards very briefly backstage in Vegas, and the man’s got an aura for sure. You put that up on stage and magnify it and that’s what De Niro’s character Simon Silver plays on. That’s why it’s great casting to put someone like De Niro in there because the man’s presence is immense, it’s just massive — so you put a camera on that and it’s magnified tenfold. Certain people do have that sort of charisma that’s palpable in the air, in a room, on a screen — but it’s interesting to hear this from you, being an actor. Some might say the same about you, given the nature of your work. Well, I don’t know if they would or not! Obviously when you’re playing a part, there’s a part of your personality in it, but you try and sort of project different sides of it. You use whatever aspects of the personality that work. I don’t have a clue — its’ very hard for me to talk about acting, or the process of acting. What was David Copperfield like? Well, that was a really brief thing, and for whatever reason we were backstage and it was really dark. It was like in a little corridor and he came out, and — yeah, he definitely had an effect. You felt it. Yeah. And I’ve seen that, people walk into a room and they change the energy. And it’s not anything paranormal or extra-sensory, it’s just that they have, like you say, this charisma. Red Lights is interesting in that it’s a genre movie that doesn’t act like a genre movie. No, it doesn’t — and I’ve been in plenty of so-called genre movies and never for a moment thought they were science fiction or a zombie movie or whatever, I just thought they were about character and story. It’s easier for people to slot them into genres because they can sell them easier that way. What was your impression of Rodrigo as a director? Rodrigo is ferociously intelligent, very clear in his vision, very clear in his aesthetic, and luckily, our sensibilities were kind of the same. I think that when someone has that clear a vision, you feel safe, then — safe to experiment, to sort of improvise because you know that within that structure he knows what every frame of that film is going to be like. And I like working with writer-directors because they’ve lived with the character, they’ve lived with the story, so they have a deeper sense of it. They might not have all the answers, but you can really knock it around with them and you can ask them, “Why?” or “What does this mean?” We really got on; he’s got a great sense of humor, too, and shooting in Spain we shot very, very fast. It was very intense. It was something like ten weeks… Yes — it was eight in Spain and then some in Toronto. I like the immersive experience of acting, I like just completely disappearing into a character, into an environment, into a role — that’s always appealed to me, and this was very much like that. Are you an actor who takes this disappearing into character off-set as well? I don’t know. I’m not sure. I’m probably not that easy to live with when I’m working on something very intensely, but you know, you’re working 16-17 hours a day, so you just come home and go to bed. And then you get up and go to set. I love that. It’s pure concentration, and they say happiness is concentration. I love that. Seems like it might be something like an extended adrenaline rush. It kind of is! And we were working, we did a crazy amount of set-ups a day, it was very fast. It’s exciting. You said part of what drew you in was the opportunity to work with Sigourney and Robert — what was that like for you when you finally got to shoot with them? Amazing. You’ve got to just observe and learn, don’t you? And they were beautiful and warm and generous, and ultimately you really have to put aside the legend thing as best you can when the camera turns over and it’s “Action!” you’ve got to serve the scene and the character, but they were all about that. I think they must be aware of the effect of their legacy on an actor of my generation, but they were never anything other than people there to do the work. But it was fascinating getting to watch actors that good. You’ve got to learn from that. Was it fun shouting at De Niro? Hey, he shouts at me, too! [Laughs] Lastly, folks have been wondering if you’ve been working with Chris Nolan again on The Dark Knight Rises . I love working with Chris. I’ve been lucky to work with him a few times, and any time, I’ll be there. But listen, it comes out [soon]. So let’s try and be patient! People are so impatient these days! Let’s wait and see. I do believe there were reports of you being spotted on the set… [Smiling] Look, I’m not going to add to any speculation. I just think that it’s going to be a phenomenal film, and the best way to watch a film — surely — is by going in there hugely excited and not knowing anything about it. I suppose in a way that brings us full circle with Red Lights and the idea of the filmmaker as a sort of magician, keeping tricks up their sleeve. Yeah, I do think this is a film sort of about filmmaking. Rodrigo talks about distracting here, and showing something there, and it is all smoke and mirrors. But I wouldn’t get too into that metaphor, because I didn’t make the movie. Red Lights is in limited release this week. Follow Jen Yamato on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Dear Bossip , I am fan of reading your articles. Here is my dilemma. I am in love with a married man. Although I know he loves his wife because they been together for 20 plus years, he feels he is obligated to be with her. I can’t help but to feel like I have been dealt a bad hand. I had gotten pregnant by him but decided to abort it. There isn’t anything in the world that he won’t do for me. He doesn’t work, and his wife works not 1 but 2 full-time jobs and takes care of us. When I need something he calls me and say, “Don’t worry about it because “Mariah” gets paid today.” I love him like there is no tomorrow. I have met all of his family and even some of hers. What am I to do? – In Love With A Married Man Dear Ms. In Love With A Married Man , There is a special place in hell for you and him. Y’all are some ole trifling low-down worthless pieces of –ish!!!! He’s ain’t –ish because he doesn’t have a job, and his wife is working 2 full-time jobs to take care of the home, and then he takes her money and spends it on your home-wrecking sleazy a**. You ain’t –ish because you’re running your goofy whore-ish self into a married man’s arms, and then brag about meeting his family and some of hers. I hope when you both get to hell that the devil and his minions spit nothing but fire on you both! Then you have the nerve to say that life dealt you a bad hand. Well, boo-freaking-hoo! That doesn’t make it okay for you to sleep with someone else’s husband! All of you folks running around here with this woe-is-me attitude and how life is so damn hard, well, guess what? It’s ain’t easy for everybody else either! But, guess what, sweetie, there are those who rise above and stick it out, and learn to play the hand they were dealt and they don’t complain, or make other people’s lives miserable. They do something about their situation, and turn it around. Life ain’t no crystal stair. It’s got some nails and splinters in it. Don’t play victim, and then use that as some sympathy card to go and f**k up another woman’s marriage by sleeping with her husband. That doesn’t do anything but let all of us know that you a low-life, spineless, wreckless bish, and now that we know who are you we will keep a watchful eye on you! And, for the record, this man does not love his wife, and he doesn’t love you. I don’t care what he is telling you, and what lies he’s filling your head with, but if he hasn’t left his wife by now, then guess what, Missy, then he isn’t going to leave her! And, you don’t love him. It’s just lust. And, your vaginal walls need to collapse. You’re asking me what to do? Girl, don’t play with me today with that asinine question. How about his wife punches you in the back of your damn head!?! And, she clips his damn nuts off! How about leave him alone and go find yourself a man who is single and eligible. Stop dating married men, and destroying a home regardless if he wants to have an affair or not. You don’t have to stoop to that level and play yourself, and play second fiddle. How does it feel when he’s with her and their family during the holidays and your a** is sitting at home hoping he will call you or come and spend some time with you? How does it feel waiting for him to come by and then leave and go home to his wife each night? You’re nothing but a side piece, with no biscuit, and no syrup and no jam. Just a piece of dry a** chicken. Why do you women do this to yourselves time and time again by sleeping with someone else’s husband? Why do you fool yourselves into thinking he will leave his wife and come spend the rest of his life with you? That –ish is not going to happen. No matter what he is telling you. Those empty broken promises are nothing more than a ruse to keep you around as his jump-off, and mistress while he gets to have his cake and eat it too. Don’t you think you’re more than that? Don’t you think you deserve better? Don’t you want a man who will fully commit to you, and only you? If this man doesn’t have a job, then how the hell can he take care of you? You and his wife are taking care of him. He can’t bring anything to the table, and has nothing to offer you but his penis, and your simple dumba** thinks you’ve hit the jackpot. Yeah, you are riding the slow bus and deserve to be in special education classes. Just a simple a** trick. And, he’s a pimp. He’s pimping his wife, and pimping you. And, if he’s your pimp, then guess what that makes you? (Jeopardy’s theme music begins to play) Look, it’s time you take inventory to find out what you’re missing, and why your self-esteem is so low. Why are you allowing yourself to be in this situation and ruin another woman’s life and marriage? Your spiritual house is out of order, and until you cleanse your spirit, and readjust some things in your life, then nothing good will ever happen for you. You’ll always wonder why you don’t have a good relationship with other people. You’ll always wonder why your finances are consistently low, and you’re not blessed with more. You’ll always wonder why health is deteriorating and you can’t seem to get well. And, all you have to do is look at your relationship with this married man and you’ll get all your answers. – Terrance Dean Hey Bossip Fam, what do you think? Share your opinions and thoughts below! Also, e-mail all your questions Terrance Dean : loveandrelationships@bossip.com Follow Terrance Dean on Twitter : @terrancedean “LIKE” Terrance Dean on Facebook , click HERE! Make sure to order my books Mogul: A Novel (Atria Books – June 2011; $15), and Straight From Your Gay Best Friend – The Straight Up Truth About Relationships, Love, And Having A Fabulous Life (Agate/Bolden Books – November 2010; $15). They are available in bookstores everywhere, and on Amazon, click HERE!
Ridley Scott’s Prometheus opens stateside today, which means no more tiptoeing around spoilers for those who’ve seen it. ( Obviously, spoilers will follow. You’ve been warned. ) The number one complaint among folks who have now seen the highly anticipated Alien kinda-prequel? So. Many. Unanswered. Questions. So let’s jump right into the spoiler goo and get to deciding (and, hopefully, answering) the biggest question prompted by Scott’s gorgeous, murky space opus that is left yet unanswered. I’ll start: WHY? Why does pretty much anyone in Prometheus make any of the decisions they make? Like… – Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green) with the helmet-taking off. Really, is sniffing (and contaminating) the alien world atmosphere on the planet you just landed on and know nothing about such a good idea? – Vickers (Charlize Theron), running in the one direction that will lead her to being squashed by a giant falling spaceship? – Millburn the dumb biologist (Rafe Spall), who just wants to reach out and make friends — even with the squishy alien penis-snakes? – Space crew guy, walking straight up to his recently deceased, re-animated fellow shipmate who has spider-crawled his way across a space desert to space-murder everyone? Most of these aren’t necessarily unanswered questions, just incredibly stupid decisions that inform and support the characters in facepalm-worthy strokes. Holloway is a risk-taker! Vickers is a sheltered, prideful ice queen with probably little field experience who would rather try to outrun death than roll, like her unassuming and practical brunette counterpart, out of its way! Crew guy is, well, a redshirt, for lack of a better term. Yes, yes. There are reasons to be found here, if not particularly great ones. The bigger questions have to do with two still-opaque entities: The Engineers and David, the increasingly creepy mayhem bot, Lawrence of Robotica. In the prologue we see one Engineer take a dose of black space goo and tumble, dead and transmorphing, into the water — thus presumably starting human life on Earth. So what is the goo? Prometheus builds a tech-driven world filled with great flying ships and alien holograms and C-section machines but is more concerned with ideas: Of creators and creation, of life and death cycling endlessly across the universe between humans and aliens, parents and offspring, scientists and their inventions. All children want to see their parents dead, according to David, who seems to be counting himself in that equation. What is the goo, then? Is it the proto-material of a xenomorph? How does it work, exactly? Why would anyone feed it to the cute Tom Hardy-looking guy? And who created the Engineers, anyway? Does it even matter when the real question is asking why we create, and in the process, destroy? The brilliance of Prometheus ‘s stubborn insistence on not feeding us the answers is that they’re not really important in the grand scheme of things, unless you require your movies to make sense. You know what else refuses to share vital information, instead choosing to provoke and see what happens? David. David, who has spent years in space flight amassing the breadth of human knowledge and yet cannot feel (or can he?), who has the answers — or, at least, the instructions the Engineers have written in their mystery language on the sides of their sweaty weapons of mass destruction like how-to manuals — and yet can’t understand why it is that Noomi Rapace’s Elizabeth Shaw MUST understand. David, played marvelously by Michael Fassbender, remains the biggest mystery . He’s tasked with one directive: Help Weyland find a way to live forever. You could build a strong case that everything David does is indeed in service of this goal. Weyland’s mistake is in trusting a machine that doesn’t think in human terms, but in practical ones; if there’s no alien magic out there to Benjamin Button old man Weyland back into handsome, young Guy Pearce, David finds another way to help his master live forever: Through his legacy, by altering the course of human history (gladly, it seems) via one or two devious deceptions. Consider the legacy of the man at the center of David’s favorite film, as seen in Prometheus ‘s sublime opening sequence. T.E. Lawrence was born in 1888, helped upset order in the Arab world in 1916, was immortalized on celluloid in 1962’s Lawrence of Arabia , and then, years later in the world of Prometheus , inspired an android to not only imitate his blond coif but instigate the beginnings of the Alien universe in 2093. Lawrence is really the key to understanding David; in helping Weyland achieve his immortality by way of launching the destruction of humanity, David is immortalizing himself, and a part of me thinks that a part of him yearns to express this measure of often foolhardy human emotion. Or maybe he’s just designed to be a close, but not close enough, imitation of the humans who built him? The more I think of David as a stand-in for Prometheus the movie at large, the less I care that Idris Elba figured out in five minutes what the Engineers were up to on this rinky dink planet, or that we’ll never know what David whispered to the last remaining Engineer, a la ScarJo and Bill Murray in Lost in Translation . Those quibbles seem minor given the vast provocations the film leaves behind. To an aggravatingly obvious extent, the gaping abyss of understanding that Prometheus leaves puts us, the viewer, in the position of Shaw — still searching, desperately, for answers, with only a soulless computer brain as her guide. We are Shaw, and maybe the internet is our David, offering knowledge and spoilers at our fingertips but, unless Ridley Scott and writers Jon Spaihts and Damon Lindelof hop on a Reddit AMA session, no ready answers and plenty to be wary of. Big things come in small packages, and that goes for space goo, blond robots, and universe-expanding ideas. So, all that said, what unsolved mysteries irked you the most in Prometheus ? Sound off in the spoiler-friendly comments below and let’s figure this sucker out. — Our colleagues at (PMC-owned) Beyond the Trailer pose a relevant question: “Is Prometheus an intellectual sci-fi thriller, or a pseudo-intellectual sci-fi thriller?” See what other real folks say in their impromptu exit poll. Follow Jen Yamato on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Ridley Scott’s Prometheus opens stateside today, which means no more tiptoeing around spoilers for those who’ve seen it. ( Obviously, spoilers will follow. You’ve been warned. ) The number one complaint among folks who have now seen the highly anticipated Alien kinda-prequel? So. Many. Unanswered. Questions. So let’s jump right into the spoiler goo and get to deciding (and, hopefully, answering) the biggest question prompted by Scott’s gorgeous, murky space opus that is left yet unanswered. I’ll start: WHY? Why does pretty much anyone in Prometheus make any of the decisions they make? Like… – Holloway (Logan Marshall-Green) with the helmet-taking off. Really, is sniffing (and contaminating) the alien world atmosphere on the planet you just landed on and know nothing about such a good idea? – Vickers (Charlize Theron), running in the one direction that will lead her to being squashed by a giant falling spaceship? – Millburn the dumb biologist (Rafe Spall), who just wants to reach out and make friends — even with the squishy alien penis-snakes? – Space crew guy, walking straight up to his recently deceased, re-animated fellow shipmate who has spider-crawled his way across a space desert to space-murder everyone? Most of these aren’t necessarily unanswered questions, just incredibly stupid decisions that inform and support the characters in facepalm-worthy strokes. Holloway is a risk-taker! Vickers is a sheltered, prideful ice queen with probably little field experience who would rather try to outrun death than roll, like her unassuming and practical brunette counterpart, out of its way! Crew guy is, well, a redshirt, for lack of a better term. Yes, yes. There are reasons to be found here, if not particularly great ones. The bigger questions have to do with two still-opaque entities: The Engineers and David, the increasingly creepy mayhem bot, Lawrence of Robotica. In the prologue we see one Engineer take a dose of black space goo and tumble, dead and transmorphing, into the water — thus presumably starting human life on Earth. So what is the goo? Prometheus builds a tech-driven world filled with great flying ships and alien holograms and C-section machines but is more concerned with ideas: Of creators and creation, of life and death cycling endlessly across the universe between humans and aliens, parents and offspring, scientists and their inventions. All children want to see their parents dead, according to David, who seems to be counting himself in that equation. What is the goo, then? Is it the proto-material of a xenomorph? How does it work, exactly? Why would anyone feed it to the cute Tom Hardy-looking guy? And who created the Engineers, anyway? Does it even matter when the real question is asking why we create, and in the process, destroy? The brilliance of Prometheus ‘s stubborn insistence on not feeding us the answers is that they’re not really important in the grand scheme of things, unless you require your movies to make sense. You know what else refuses to share vital information, instead choosing to provoke and see what happens? David. David, who has spent years in space flight amassing the breadth of human knowledge and yet cannot feel (or can he?), who has the answers — or, at least, the instructions the Engineers have written in their mystery language on the sides of their sweaty weapons of mass destruction like how-to manuals — and yet can’t understand why it is that Noomi Rapace’s Elizabeth Shaw MUST understand. David, played marvelously by Michael Fassbender, remains the biggest mystery . He’s tasked with one directive: Help Weyland find a way to live forever. You could build a strong case that everything David does is indeed in service of this goal. Weyland’s mistake is in trusting a machine that doesn’t think in human terms, but in practical ones; if there’s no alien magic out there to Benjamin Button old man Weyland back into handsome, young Guy Pearce, David finds another way to help his master live forever: Through his legacy, by altering the course of human history (gladly, it seems) via one or two devious deceptions. Consider the legacy of the man at the center of David’s favorite film, as seen in Prometheus ‘s sublime opening sequence. T.E. Lawrence was born in 1888, helped upset order in the Arab world in 1916, was immortalized on celluloid in 1962’s Lawrence of Arabia , and then, years later in the world of Prometheus , inspired an android to not only imitate his blond coif but instigate the beginnings of the Alien universe in 2093. Lawrence is really the key to understanding David; in helping Weyland achieve his immortality by way of launching the destruction of humanity, David is immortalizing himself, and a part of me thinks that a part of him yearns to express this measure of often foolhardy human emotion. Or maybe he’s just designed to be a close, but not close enough, imitation of the humans who built him? The more I think of David as a stand-in for Prometheus the movie at large, the less I care that Idris Elba figured out in five minutes what the Engineers were up to on this rinky dink planet, or that we’ll never know what David whispered to the last remaining Engineer, a la ScarJo and Bill Murray in Lost in Translation . Those quibbles seem minor given the vast provocations the film leaves behind. To an aggravatingly obvious extent, the gaping abyss of understanding that Prometheus leaves puts us, the viewer, in the position of Shaw — still searching, desperately, for answers, with only a soulless computer brain as her guide. We are Shaw, and maybe the internet is our David, offering knowledge and spoilers at our fingertips but, unless Ridley Scott and writers Jon Spaihts and Damon Lindelof hop on a Reddit AMA session, no ready answers and plenty to be wary of. Big things come in small packages, and that goes for space goo, blond robots, and universe-expanding ideas. So, all that said, what unsolved mysteries irked you the most in Prometheus ? Sound off in the spoiler-friendly comments below and let’s figure this sucker out. — Our colleagues at (PMC-owned) Beyond the Trailer pose a relevant question: “Is Prometheus an intellectual sci-fi thriller, or a pseudo-intellectual sci-fi thriller?” See what other real folks say in their impromptu exit poll. Follow Jen Yamato on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
