In Nolan I trust
...not Bryan Singer. Sorry dude, I think you'd be a blast to work with, but first of all I'll never forgive the shafting of the Storm character. And secondly, you made some plot decisions in
Superman Returns that I was fairly disappointed with.
Don't get me wrong. I really liked SR, but something was missing. It didn't move me as much as Batman Begins, not by a mile...and after mulling it over in my head I think I've finallly got it.
We were led to believe that SR was going to be about Supes finding his place in a world that had learned to live without him. We did not see that. We saw him trying to find his place in Lois's life because
she had learned to live without him. Small potatoes in comparison. That was a huge disappointment for me.
We were led to believe (thanks to trailers heavily featuring old Marlon Brando voiceovers) that Supes was supposed to represent good, and his purpose was to inspire good in other people. We did not see that. He inspires awe, like he should, but not much else. The entire good-evil conflict is between him and Lex Luthor. Same old superhero story stuff.
For me, BB was so much bigger than what SR was. It was about a man who could have had anything he wanted, thanks to a vast inheritance. Anything. But he gave it up to understand a world that was completely foreign to him, and all because he felt so much anger and guilt from the death of his parents. It was about a man singlehandedly taking on an entire city rotting with corruption and hate. At the end of the movie, he doesn't go as far as inspiring goodness. But he inspires hope, and that is all the people of Gotham could wish for at this point. And we see the inklings of Batman inspiring people like Gordon, Finch, and Rachel to take a stand.
Sure, BB had plot holes that SR had 100000x more of. At least Bruce had a month or two to ready up Bats while Clark just jumped right back into Superman mode. And nobody noticed?! But for me, the heart of SR could have been so much bigger, on par with BB and even beyond, and I'm really disappointed that it wasn't.
Not to say that SR doesn't have beautiful shots like BB did. It was a gorgeous film, but for me, that wasn't enough to overcome the underwhelming character arcs and story decisions.
Christopher Nolan cannot make the BB sequels fast enough! But, I shall have patience and trust instead.
A photographic journal depicting the drama of garden life
Mom's sunflowers apparently didn't get the memo about opening fractionally. Unless it does this in the early morning, in which case, tough luck regarding me capturing it on camera, LOL.
You! Ladybug! Stop moping around and wasting time....
..and starting eating the damn aphids!
Tell your kids to also!
"But we're outnumbered!" you cry. Have no fear, this evening we shall be dispensing the cavalry.
Some hope for politics after all
BARACK OBAMA FOR PREZ!!!That man will be president someday. He makes me feel like I matter. Like everyone matters. That at least someone is
listening.
I think George Bush loves this country. I really do. I don't think his administration is "full" of stupid people. ... The problem is not that the philosophy of this administration is not working the way it's supposed to work; the problem is that it is working the way it's supposed to work. They don't believe -- they don't believe that government has a role in solving national problems because they think government is the problem. They think that we're better off if we just dismantle government; if, in the form of tax breaks, we make sure that everybody's responsible for buying your own health care and your own retirement security and your own child care and your own schools, your own private security forces, your own roads, your own levees.
It is called the "ownership society" in Washington. But, you know, historically there has been another term for it; it's called "social Darwinism" -- the notion that every man or woman is out for him or her self, which allows us to say that if we meet a guy who has worked in a steel plant for 30, 40 years and suddenly has the rug pulled out from under him and can't afford health care or can't afford a pension, you know, life isn't fair. It allows us to say to a child who doesn't have the wisdom to choose his or her own parents and so lives in a poor neighborhood, pick yourself up by your own bootstraps. It allows us to say to somebody who is seeing their child sick and is going bankrupt paying the bills, tough luck.
It's a bracing idea, this idea that you're on your own. It's the simplest thing in the world, easy to put on a bumper sticker. But there's just one problem; it doesn't work. It ignores our history. Now, yes, our greatness as a nation has depended on self-reliance and individual initiative and a belief in the free market, but it's also depended on our sense of mutual regard for each other, our sense that we have a stake in each other's success -- that everybody should have a shot at opportunity.
Americans understand this. They know the government can't solve all their problems, but they expect the government can help because they know it's an expression of what they're learning in Sunday school. What they learn in their church, in their synagogue, in their mosque - a basic moral precept that says that I have to look out for you and I have responsibility for you and you have responsibility for me, that I am your keeper and you are mine. That's what America is.
