Offered in tribute...

There are many people, including many keen Church members, who want to see the Church of England's link with the State abolished. They want disestablishment. At one time I was of this opinion myself. In this day and age, it is said, there should be no place for an established Church. Hardly anyone now, people say, believes in Christianity, particularly as expressed in the national Church. And why, if you are a firm believer, should the State have any part in the appointment of the Church of England's Bishops?. Above all, why should this group of a minority religion have a crucial role in the crowning of the Head of State?

The government is now proposing to bring in a bill for constitutional reform which would end the current rule giving preference to male over female heirs to the throne and doing away with the requirement that the monarch should be a member of the protestant Church as established by law..

On the face of it these seem utterly reasonable reforms and for my part I see no objection at all to the first of these proposals. After all our most successful monarchs have largely been female. The second proposal is in fact much more controversial. Currently and for the last 400 years the monarch has been the titular head of the Church of England and there is still a firm link (though looser than formerly) between the government of the day and the Church of England with its senior bishops having seats in the House of Lords. Wouldn't it be much fairer if the non-conformist Churches, not to mention Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs were equally privileged? Wouldn't non C of E citizens prefer to do away with this link altogether? Actually the answer to this last question is a resounding “No”. The Jews, the Roman Catholics, the majority of the non-conformist Churches and representative Muslims have all said that they are glad to have the established Church to stick up for all people of faith against the secular humanist culture in which we have to live.

A final small but significant question: “Who wants to get rid of the ceremony of the coronation service as performed generation after generation by the Archbishop of Canterbury? For my part I remain an antidisestablishmentarian and now, if not always, I stick with the proverbial saying:”If it ain't broke don't fix it”.

--Peter Graham

E-mail: peter.graha[at]bucklandnewton[dot]com

...so I obliged

Since there was no tape in the machine, it was thankfully immaterial, but that's what I think of when I hear "rec" said out loud as a word.

QUARANTINE is probably a better title. I don't know if the movie's better or not, but it is pretty fun. Sadly, due to critics being obtuse and publicists being protective, even decent horror movies don't get screened for us any more most of the time. Except Magnolia Films...you guys rule. As for Sony Classics -- there once was a time when you let me see RESIDENT EVIL in advance, and I gave it a good review too. But now you spurn me from zombie horror, which is too bad because this is what the Resident Evil sequels should have been. The only key difference being that QUARANTINE ends shortly after giving you its first big hint about the larger story that's at work, while video games are usually just getting warmed up at that point.

As far as story, think CLOVERFIELD with zombies, only better because it's not a cop-out PG-13, but bloody R. Oh, sure, 28 DAYS LATER purists will get all anal about the fact that disease-ridden crazies who bite you aren't technically zombies if they haven't undergone an actual resurrection, but fuck 'em. For all intents and purposes, you're dealing with zombies here, even if they're not called that and are technically just victims of mutated rabies. A TV news reporter (Jennifer Carpenter) is doing a feature on fireman (and we get a nice leisurely set-up with her joking around the firehouse) when an emergency call brings her, and her subjects, to a run-down apartment building where the "zombies" have sprung into action. Before too long, the building is sealed from the outside, with various tenants, cops, firemen, and our TV news crew trapped inside. When cable and Internet are disconnected, they learn via the quaint, soon-to-be-discontinued analog TV signals in one room that the government is lying, pretending everyone has already been rescued.

Though these aren't the toughest zombies in the world -- as living-yet-infected people, they can be killed in any manner that a normal human can -- our heroes are not well prepared, so it's a reasonably fair fight. The only question is: can they find a way out that the riot squad outside has not already blocked?

Cowriter/director John Erick Dowdle has already gone the "found footage" route with THE POUGHKEEPSIE TAPES, a movie I haven't seen but have heard bad buzz on. Maybe he learned some lessons from it, because this is a fun ride, almost like someone made an R-rated movie out of a really good amusement park horror maze. You don't know who will live and who dies, and the way the terror is slowly ratcheted up is spot-on. Also good to see characters get developed a bit before they get thrown into a world of shit.

I saw this movie in a rare packed midnight showing at The Block in Orange, and people were screaming, yelling at the screen, and having a good time in exactly the way you'd hope they would. I don't mind that kind of audience noise when it comes from genuine enthusiasm, and there was plenty to go around.

The most obvious caveat here is that if you're one of those people who complains about motion sickness from any kind of handheld shot, you must stay far away.

And I do have one major plot quibble: how does the elevator work after power has been shut down in the building?

Aside from that, good job.

For what it's worth, I don't believe the "that one" remark was intended as racist. But it definitely was condescending and demeaning; the type of tone appropriate among friends over beers, but not a public debate.

Much like Ross Perot, a few elections ago, using the term "you people" in front of the NAACP. I don't think he meant it as racist either, but there was no way to spin it as positive.

I'm particularly surprised, I have to say, at those who say that this movie could have been great, but it isn't because Maher is so one-sided and snarky. One-sided and snarky is what Maher does. He isn't Michael Moore, a crusader with a strong point of view but compassion for the regular folks onscreen. He isn't using sugar to make the medicine go down -- this is a candy buffet for agnostics and atheists. Maher could not have made the fair-minded movie you might imagine -- it's simply not in his DNA to do so. Being disappointed that he didn't is like being disappointed that DISASTER MOVIE isn't funny.

And I was laughing all the way with him. Another way that Maher is not like Michael Moore is that Moore always seems half-embarrassed when asking tough questions or barging into corporate offices, like he's uncomfortable to be there but know he has to go through with the plan. Maher is as completely unabashed as a non-secular evangelist might be, asking pointed questions that I, and probably most people, would feel uncomfortable asking someone of faith. That said, they are mostly questions that need to be asked, and that the faithful should ask themselves in order to ensure that their beliefs hold up to scrutiny.

There's plenty to say on the subject that a documentary film looking to inform might have told us -- the difference between European churches and the more literalist American ones, the effect having a state religion versus freedom of religion has on faith, and so on. But don't expect Bill Maher to make those points. He's out to lampoon the worst excesses of organized religion, and succeeds mightily, though I probably could have done without the pot-smoker whose church revolves around drugs. His mere existence is funny, but nothing he says is.

One might assume that the faithful will hate this movie, but I suggest they might not. If you are a strong Christian and have an interest in seeing the movie, try to look at it as a demonstration of what an agnostic believes. Look at it as a chance to learn what Maher believes, whether you agree with him or not. If you don’t like his arguments, develop counter-arguments. But I think we can all laugh at a guy in a fancy suit who claims he is the direct descendant of Jesus.

Warned in advance that the film concludes with a self-righteous tirade, I was braced for its offensiveness, but then failed to find any. Maher’s summation [SPOILER, kinda] leans heavily on the idea that it’s scary as hell that people with access to weapons that could end the world believe in End Times prophecy, whether from Allah or Jesus. He may go further than many of us would when he suggests that if you don’t believe literally in the scriptures of your faith, you should leave the faith or consider yourself an enabler. Will Maher leave America if a president he doesn’t like is elected? I doubt it, and that’s a similar principle. Working for change within a religion strikes me as a more positive solution than abandoning it to the fundies. But if you’re not scared that believers in a literal End Times prophecy have access to WMD, there’s something wrong with you.

As for me...I would love to believe that the force(s) which created the Earth once took human form in order to feel mortal pain, advocate peace, and experience death so as to better relate to us and forgive our frailties. I just can’t quite do it.

UPDATE:

A couple of things since I posted this review. Ella Taylor did a cover story on Bill Maher for LA Weekly, and reveals this --

“People think that when you criticize America, you’re being unpatriotic,” he says. “Which is ridiculous. Obviously, I talk more about America because it’s my country. This is the country I’m trying to fix and improve. I have no intention, like some other liberal celebrities, of leaving this country if the elections go the wrong way. I’m too Irish that way. I’m going to stay here and make this into the country I want, to my last breath.”

Given this statement, I wonder why Maher cannot respect the fact that some of the faithful choose to stay in their church to try to make it into the faith they want. And good job by Ella on the feature.

And then, I got an email forwarded from Scott Foundas at the LA Weekly, citing him and me as the main exceptions to the rule of "the inherent bias of a lot of the movie critics against faith-based films."

Given all of the Mormon movies opening only in Phoenix that I've sat through over the years, I appreciate that.

The DVD is out in stores today. Go get it.

And if you're not yet convinced, check out this new interview with director Zach Passero (it includes some new pics of me and the gang that haven't been shown anywhere before.)

This is one of those movies that has been out long enough that they just send me the commercial DVD, rather than a specially watermarked screener of something that's still in theaters. And I noticed something strange about it.

The disc features widescreen AND full-frame versions of the movie.

Look, I get that there are still people out there who insist on clinging to the cropped-for-TV image. But how many of them would seek out an art-house drama by David Gordon Green? Unless the company engages in some hugely misleading marketing by slapping on a sticker that reads "from the director of PINEAPPLE EXPRESS," only serious cinephiles are likely to watch this.

And by the way, let me pre-emptive about this: When it comes to the watermarked screeners, I CANNOT lend them to you. Period. Last year around this time, I got a lot of requests from nearly everyone. Please don't ask.

If he lived in the U.S., he could probably make a partial living selling signed photos at conventions.

You'd think being an iconic Star Wars character would pay better.

(via Movie City News)

It's a copyright violation to reprint an article in its entirety, but here is the most important part:

And before anyone asks, I have no recollection what the hooker in the boxspring reference means. I must have been drinking heavily when it came up.

The full article isn't online -- but you can read it in the hard copy, which is available now.

then, Greg Kinnear has a FLASH OF GENIUS

sigh