Review: Green Zone

A bonus review this week! And a new release at that! Even better, an opening weekend release! Been AGES since I've seen something that new :) So, here you go: Green Zone.

Plot: Matt Damon stars as Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller, a U.S. Army officer serving in Iraq and involved in the search for and disposal of WMDs. As Miller struggles to clarify a web of conflicting intelligence reports concerning the WMDs, he becomes drawn into power struggles in an unstable region.

The movie is "inspired by" Rajiv Chandrasekaran’s Imperial Life in the Emerald City. According to it's Wikipedia entry, the book focuses more on the occupation and American activities following the invasion. The book itself is non-fiction. Doesn't seem like the basis of an action-packed thriller, does it?

I honestly didn't know the plot when we went. Just vaguely adventure-ish, set in the current war in Iraq. Zach likes thinking, discussion-type dramas, so this was one of his picks. Figure I drag him along to enough random stuff in my taste that I could watch one of his "serious" movies :)

The cast was the strongest point in the movie. Matt Damon has really grown into an actor I like. Shame that he wasn't given as much to work with here. Greg Kinnear is a lovely bureaucrat. The supporting cast is very strong as well, nobody really jarring but nothing really exceptional either.

The movie itself lacked something. I think had it been more inspired by the book (which was described as similar to Catch-22 by some reviewers) it could have crossed more into the political thriller arena, something making more of a statement. Instead, it seemed... a repeat somehow. Jason Bourne set in Iraq. Just another action movie, not a classic. Not that it was a bad story or anything, but that it just wasn't making a statement like the source material could have been used to do. Add to that, the same star and same director (with same signature camera work, which I shall vent about in a moment) and you get something that doesn't feel as fresh as it could have.

My biggest problem with the movie: The camera work drove me absolutely CRAZY! I actually left the theater irritated, not with the subject or the writing or the acting, or any of that, but with the dang filming. Why does this director feel that if a character is running, then the camera has to be bouncing up and down and jerking all over too?? Yes, I suppose it's 'artistic' in terms of capturing the chaos of a wartime attack or a foot chase through a crowded train station, but it's obnoxious as all get out for those watching! If you didn't like the action sequences in the second and third Bourne movies, then you won't like this one. In fact, the last action sequence even ups it - less people than some of the Bourne sequences, but here it's at night with gunfire, so you have dim lighting and distracting flashes in addition to jerky camera movements and rapid-fire editing. I honestly had to look away from the screen several times in the action sequences in this movie because it was making me head hurt trying to focus.

And was it just Zach and I and the theater we were in, or did one of their night time cameras seem broken? There were stretches in that last sequence where the film was grainy, then it would be clear as they cut to another camera. It wasn't consistent enough to seem intentional, like if it had always been the same view that was grainy and the same views that were clear. It just seemed like one of the cameras wasn't filming clearly. Did not help with the whole hard-to-see thing.

I realize that there are other opinions however. A.O. Scott of The New York Times colorfully described director Paul Greengrass's direction, writing in his review that:

"There is plenty of fighting in Green Zone, most of it executed with the hurtling hand-held camerawork and staccato editing that are hallmarks of Mr. Greengrass's style. From Bloody Sunday through the second and third Bourne movies (which turned Mr. Damon into a minimalist movie star), this director has honed his skill at balancing chaos with clarity... [He] choreographs foot chases and gun battles that unfold with the velocity, complexity and precision of a Bach fugue played on overdrive" (New York Times, 03/12/2010)

I found that quote as I was looking for a picture of the movie poster to use. It sums up the issues I have with Greengrass's filming: hand-held camerawork and staccato editing. Scott makes it sound so impressive and classic, pulling in Bach to compare, but as a viewer, I can't stand it! It makes it so hard to follow what the heck is happening on the screen! Trying to focus actually gives me a headache, and I have good eyes. I can't imagine trying to follow one of his movies if your eyes are weaker!

Overall: 2 of 5. Lots of potential not met. Good cast, but they could have been used better. Source material would have made for a great political thriller, but instead, we end up with another formulaic war action movie. Really irritating camera work - not for those with bad eyes.

Lake Mead!

Another weekend away from post heading to water! This time back over to Lake Mead, where Zach ran his first half marathon! First I dragged Mom into one, now Zach! Bwa ha ha! Just spreadin' the fun :)

We were heading over to the lake for Six Tunnels to Hoover Dam Half Marathon. My second time running it, and Zach decided to participate too! So proud! He totally kicked my butt too. Had a very good first race. Learned a bit about himself, too (like, how to plan fuel for the next race, so he doesn't hit the wall at mile 11!) Which means that when we run one together again, he'll TOTALLY blow my time out of the water! Still, I'm glad I have company on these now. Zach's always good at races with me - even if we don't run together, he'll be waiting at the end for me. And now I don't have to feel guilty about dragging him along! :)

My time was actually the worst I've ever run. But, at least I had reason for it! The being-sick-the-entire-week-prior certainly didn't help, for starters. Still, I'm glad I ran it. That's a pretty race, though it was definitely on the windy side this year, as compared to last. Besides being pretty, by being at the lake, though still in the desert, is already noticeably more humid and easier to breathe, so it's definitely a more enjoyable run. Amazing how quickly we can see a difference in our breathing just by getting out of the High Desert and even slightly closer to water. Zach noticed it too. Of course, that easier-to-breathe thing only applies to those who haven't been fighting colds all week :\ The wind really kinda killed me. The first race where my lungs were hurting before my legs! Stupid cold... Anyway, like I said, a very pretty race.

And I needed the kick in the butt, anyway, to get me back into my workout routine. Crazy schedules, travel and then being sick have kinda thrown me for a loop this last month. Doing these big runs always helps reset my motivation. 5Ks I can wake up and do, you know? Even if it's not my fastest time, I can run 3 miles without hurting too badly. The 13 miles runs, though, I WILL be hurting at if I don't train for them.

So, Zach and I are starting to look down the road to see what other races we want to do while we're here. In August there's the E.T. Midnight Marathon (and Half) in Rachel, NV, north of Vegas. Yes, I know it's in August, but it looks like a lot of fun. C'mon, aliens encouraged at a race? Gotta give it a try while we're out here! And then Labor Day weekend has the Disneyland Half Marathon in Anaheim. 5th anniversary this year, so you know there will be a few fun extra goodies. And Barstow and Daggett usually hold the Get Your Kicks on Route 66 Half Marathon in November. Was cancelled last year for whatever reason, but it's the closest thing we have to a local race, so we'll keep our eyes open for it this year! December has the Rock and Roll Vegas again and the Great Santa 5K Run. Couldn't do them last year, but by golly, I'm gonna do them this year! Of course, all these races depend on where and when we're traveling this year, and when we get moved from this post to our next (hopefully we're due soon??) but right now, those are the ones I'm looking at. Should be enough to keep me running through this year and into 2011!

Lake Havasu!

KAYAKING!!!! Really, that sums up this trip. :)

Zach's working in AZ for a little bit, so we met up halfway at Lake Havasu for the weekend. The town itself is not much, just your average little waterfront tourist town, but that in itself is something right? It means there's water to play at, for starters! And the weather really was perfect. Clear and warm and sunny the day we were playing, and then rainy and drizzly as we were just hanging about the town (yes, living in the desert we really do get excited about rain on trips - weather!! Wheeee!).

I was so excited to get back on the water! Kayaking was just a perfect day. The tour we took put us in at the top of the Gorge, about 13 miles upstream from the top of the Lake. It was about a 5 hour day to paddle all the way. I can't even begin to explain how happy I was to get back on the water. Not that I've done tons of kayaking back east, don't own my own or anything (yet!) but I have done a lot, and I've definitely done tons of canoeing each summer in FL. I may have grown up on the beach, but I've realized as I've gotten older that I'm more of a Big Water person than an Ocean person, if you understand. Lakes and rivers make me just as happy as the ocean. I just want to see water!

Oh, this picture of me here is just about the only one we got of me that day. It's a lot harder to pass the camera back and forth between boats than it is to just hand it back and forth when hiking. Didn't think to bring the second one, but don't think it would have made too much difference. I'm the shutterbug, Zach likes looking at the pictures later :)

And the most fun? I can keep up with Zach paddling, unlike hiking :) Not when he launches himself all out, just to go fast because he can, but there are much fewer times paddling than hiking when he gets carried away and leaves me in his dust.

And of course we saw the London Bridge there crossing the water. It really is the London Bridge (well, the 1831 edition) which a developer in Havasu purchased from the City of London and rebuilt in AZ in the late 1960s. Was looking for a tourist attraction for the expanding town of Lake Havasu City, and London was willing to sell the bridge, since they were expanding that bridge anyway. Everyone wins! Oh, and apparently the urban legend that they thought they were purchasing the Tower Bridge instead is just that: an urban legend. (More at Wikipedia.) We got a kick out of it, because it was grey and rainy the day we were seeing it, so the bridge suited the weather perfectly. Of course the palm trees and other desert flora there in the picture make me chuckle, but it is still AZ after all!

Lake Havasu is apparently home to more lighthouses than any other city in America, something I didn't realize until we got back. These are all 1/3 scale replicas of other lighthouses in the country. You can see some of the other lighthouses they've replicated here. All I could think when we were driving around the Island and saw them was "Cute! Wee and small!" Our route took us past 2 different ones, but we only walked out to the one below because it was cold and rainy after all :) They were kinda an optical illusion when we first saw them, because it is hard to tell how far away something is in the desert, so you can't tell at first if it's just far away or if it really IS that small. Well, here, they really are that small!

Side note on tourist towns. I swear that every water based tourist town has the same cheesy t-shirts in their shops. Like an unwritten rule, or something. Just one of those quirks, you know, but having grown up in a tourist area (not it's only industry, like Havasu, but still a lot of tourists) it makes me laugh when I travel across the country and see the same T-shirts in AZ that I see in shops in VB.

Oh, and all of this would've been written up last week, but Zach was very kind and sharing when we met at Havasu, and thoughtfully gave me his cold. So, last week was spent coughing and sniffling instead of sorting pictures. :\ Still, they got up eventually, right?

Review: Reilly: Ace of Spies

And the productivity with miniseries continues! This one was one first watched on Netflix awhile ago and then found online at a STEAL! Very excited about that one :) Here you go, Reilly: Ace of Spies.

This is an epic telling of (as they advertise) The World's First Superspy. Sidney Reilly is an actual historical figure, who really was very instrumental in the development of intelligence methods at the turn of the century. Doubtless these adventures have been exaggerated for dramatization, but the events do actually follow Reilly's real life activities. He was the character whom Ian Fleming used as inspiration for Bond - ruthless, womanizing, and still very effective. (On the last disc of the set, there is an 'extra episode' worth of documentary on the real Sidney Reilly)

Yes, it's a 12 episode miniseries, but it's totally worth the watching. If you are picking specific episodes, looking for a quick fix, The Visiting Fireman (episode 3) is my favorite. 'Guest stars' include Joanne Whalley (very small role, took me a few viewings to catch that one!) and Bill Nighy. Dreadnoughts and Crosses and Dreadnoughts and Doublecrosses are two episodes that kinda form a 2-part adventure, not stand-alone like some of the other episodes. I liked those two because everything he's doing is so planned, and watching it all fit together is very much like a long con or heist film. As the series progresses, Reilly is working less for the British government and more independently for anti-Soviet efforts in Russia. The series becomes a bit darker, since as history classes taught us, the Soviets did take power, so we know already that Reilly won't win.

Sam Neill is perfect as Reilly, as if it was written for him. Sardonic, ice water in his veins, manipulative, a perfect spy, and Neill is perfect for those roles of manipulative-but-charming. I think that goes back to the first role I saw him in, Brian de Bois-Guilbert in the 1982 version of Ivanhoe (the one with Anthony Andrews and Olivia Hussey). Anyhoo, it works for him :)

Other cast members are great. You get to see a lot of very strong British stars in smaller roles, since this was 20-some years ago. Joanne Whalley and Bill Nighy I've already mentioned. John Rhys-Davies is in the first episode, and David Suchet has a role in one episode too (very oddly cast as a Chinese officer, but that's just my opinion). One of Reilly's great Russian friends is played by Clive Merrison, who owned the roles of Sherlock Holmes on BBC Radio (he and Michael Williams are the only Holmes-Watson duo to have performed the entire Holmes canon!) Leo McKern is there, and David Burke appears in the last few episodes, well cast as Stalin.

The writing is very well done. Sidney is written to be a very well rounded character. He's charismatic, but at the same time so cold and ruthless that you feel allowed to dislike or hate him. Despite having a less-than-lovable lead, the story still thrives. There are movies I watch where you hate the characters, but still love the movie because you love the stories around them and the acting and all. There are also movies where you hate characters and it is to such an extent that you can't even finish the movie it's to such an extent. This is definitely one of the former.

Overall: 5 of 5. Time well spent.

E is for...

Enabling!

This could also be E for enthusiasm, but enabling covers so much more! According to dictionary.com, to enable is to

1. to make able; give power, means, competence, or ability to; authorize: This document will enable him to pass through the enemy lines unmolested.
2. to make possible or easy: Aeronautics enables us to overcome great distances.
3. to make ready; equip (often used in combination): Web-enabled cell phones.

Think of this in the knitting context. Knitters (and crafters in general, I think) are big sharers of information, technique, ideas, opinion, what-have-you. Websites like Ravelry and Crafster thrive because of this! And how many people have you struck up a conversation with based on yarn colors, yarn choice, technique questions? These are perfect strangers in the aisle at a LYS or Micheal's or on a bus ride or waiting in line at the DMV or pharmacy, but a bit of KIP-ing and you are getting new knowledge or sharing your own quite readily. Probably also getting part of their life story, while you're at it :)

And then there is also the addiction-feeding sense of enabling too, isn't there? Are you really gonna turn down those skeins of gorgeous hand-dyed yarn when you have a friend oohing and aahing there with you? It becomes so much easier to justify that purchase and see that stash grow when you have someone looking at the yarn with the same mindset!

For me personally, this post falls at a particularly enabling time! I just got back from Stitches, so had a fellow fiber fanatic to browse with in Market, and tons of really experienced knitters to learn from both as instructors and fellow class mates. And yes, Sarah and I probably were bad influences on each other at Market :) That's her above with her new spinning wheel. I'm below there with two of my instructors, Melissa Leapman (L) and Edie Eckman (R). I had two classes from each and learned so much!

And then back home, we've gotten Mom knitting again! Mom used to knit a bit before we were born, but then Anne and I came along, and the knitting kinda fell by the wayside. In fact, one of the yarns in my stash (not yet inventoried on Ravelry, as I've no idea how to catalog it) is a kids sweater, partially completed, that she had been working on! Anyway, she's been hitting up the yarn shop where Anne works part-time when Anne comes into town to visit and on one trip was admiring a scarf one of the ladies had been working on. From what I gather, it's a simple sock yarn knit-in-the-round pattern for a scarf that lets you show off all those lovely sock yarns you have stored up. For Mom, it was a great project for her to (as she put it) "get back on the horse." So, that's the picture up there that she sent of her scarf. She's been trucking along on it, as has about 6 inches or so left. Yay for Mom! Yay for Anne and I being good influences! (We got her into caving the same way, come to think of it!)

Stitches!

Awesomeness!! Really, what more can I say?

Sarah and I had a blast all week. Lots of knitting and non-knitting related fun! Sarah was laughing all week at being starstruck by the knitting celebrities. Like designers we are fond of - I love both Melissa Leapman's cables books, for example, and was able to get her to sign both! (She's got 2 color reference books coming out this year, that I might have to take a look at too!) And from the tech-savvy knitting world, several podcasters were present, and Joan Schroeder who any KnitLister recognizes as a wealth of techincal information. With Sarah below is Dr Jenna, who hosts one of the podcasts that Sarah's a big fan of. So, yes, the knitting world does have celebrities too.

First priority, though - classes! I had some fun classes (playing with self-striping yarn), expanding my knowledge on my stronger points (cabling, etc), and then I had a few that just worried me heading into them! Like this one: I learned to crochet!! Had two classes on it, actually. That's me and Edie Eckman, my instructor with my first bit of crochet! The white is the crochet, if you can't tell. The class was Crochet for Knitters, so we focused on crochet as borders and edgings off of a knit sample. I'd never really had an instructor for crochet, and being a lefty, I'd had some difficulty translating instructions to my hands. Basically, if you took away one of my needles, I created a giant knot, and not an ordered crochet-type knot, but just a knot. But now, I actually have made crochet stitches! I still have a hard time getting it started, from chain stitch to a piece I can work with, but once it's big enough to hold, I do alright.

And steeking! That was my second intimidating subject. Just the thought of spending all that time and effort and money creating something so involved, and then cutting into it... Well, I successfully steeked my sample piece in class, so I do know that I can do it! However, I'm still nervous about it :) Our instructor said that she had a friend who would have a steeking party when she had a piece ready to cut. Basically, everyone gather, have a glass of wine, and offer moral support as she cut open her knitting! I think, if I can get into another class or two (maybe not at Stitches, but at a LYS, if we can get moved near one), I will feel ready for it, and I still feel like I'd like to do a practice piece in cheap yarn, but I do feel a bit less nervous! The pattern that I really wanted to learn to steek for is More Stripes from Knitty, but I really couldn't bring myself to try the pattern until I'd had someone explain carefully how to steek first. So, I think I'm getting more ready for it now - might see that vest in my projects sometime soon!

This class below is my self-striping yarns class, one of my non-intimidating fun classes. Sandi Rossman (far right) was the instructor. First time I learned to miter! The strip of squares below shows my first efforts, and gotta say, LOVE them now! They are so simple, and so impressive looking, especially in the striping yarns. And they have that lovely feel of completion. It's not 3 ft of stockinette in a sweater, but a 30 row section, and then oh, you're done again! You just do it over and over ;) Left that class with several projects added to my queue playing with miters, including a scarf (probably Lorna's Laces, lovely self-striping fun that it is) and the Sock Yarn Blanket of Craziness, as I think of it. Granted, the sock blankie will be several years down the road, so that I can have the space and enough sock yarn accumulated to do it, but it's certainly on my queue now :)

Brought home a lot too. And my lovely little car still had space! I love my Pitbull :) (yeah, that's the car's nickname - don't know if I've mentioned that). It was really nice wandering Market at Stitches, and seeing all the lovely yarns and toys. Got a chance to handle a lot of yarns, so that when I order online as we often do out here, I know what I'm getting. And Zach even let me off my yarn moratorium for the trip! Isn't he sweet? Even better, he was away from post when I got back from Stitches, so he didn't even see how much yarn I brought back! Bwa ha ha! One of the best moments of the whole trip was seeing the security guard at the post gate glance in the car's back seat as they always do, and seeing his eyebrows go way up as he was trying not to look so surprised at all the yarn behind us (the biggest bag of Sarah's haul was right behind the driver's seat, so he definitely had a lot to raise his eyebrows for!) Funniest part, although he saw the biggest bag from where he was standing, he didn't see all of it! Can you imagine his look if he DID see how much yarn these two girls were bringing back home? Made us chuckle :)

We hit up a LYS in Campbell too. As if we hadn't had enough yarn shopping, right? We kinda have LYS here, but "local" for the High Desert means an hour and a half away for one shop, and 2 hours to another. And both have very nice staff, absolutely lovely ladies, but the one 2 hours away is a bit small, and the one closer to us is just not organized the way our minds think. You know how that goes. We like it, but it's just not the type of place that's as, I dunno, inspiring, to our minds. So we were thrilled to find a good sized yarn store in Campbell that DID work the way our minds do - Green Planet Yarns. Definitely worth the stop, if you're in the area. They had a good section on non-wool fibers too (cotton, bamboo, silk, etc) including one I hadn't seen before, sugar cane! This stuff is so silky, so drapey! And it comes in some lovely pastel colorways (the one I picked up was roses and greys). I had an impulse buy right there :) First banana fiber yarn, now sugar cane! It's too hot for much wool here, so I'm definitely having much fun trying alternative yarns. I think milk fibers will be my next crazy yarn to try...

And we had lots of non-knitting related fun too! We were in a city again! We ate like pigs... I mean, kings! Really, breakfast and lunch were always very sensible, but dinner (if not provided by the conference) was on us, so we took full advantage of being in a city again. Sushi, Thai, good Italian... we were thrilled. That's what a vacation's for though, right? See and do things you can't do at home? It was funny though - the doorman as we were arriving was chatting and asked if we'd ever been to Santa Clara before. We said no, and he (as a local) said something along the lines of "It's not much." I guess from his point of view, it's more suburb-y than San Francisco, just to the north, but from where we were coming from, it was perfect! Restaurants, stores, greenery, weather...! What more could you ask for?

And the conference center and hotel in Santa Clara were right at an access point for a bike/running trail system. That was an unexpected bonus! I had several mornings outside running along the trail, which parallels a stream and joins into a city park. Running outside, with moisture in the air, and birds and squirrels and snails out and about... It was a lovely surprise! I thought I'd just be running on the treadmill in the hotel, but instead, trail!

And as a final silliness, penguins! There was a nail art person at Market too, among all the other stands. She's a swimmer, too! So we chatted and got our nails done. Sarah got some flowers and pictures of her two dogs, and I got two penguins :) The girl's sister loves penguins too, and hadn't heard of Tacky the Penguin yet, so I spread the word! The final touch? One of the girls on the team I coach saw my nails when we got back and said they were cute. And if an 11 year old girl approves, they must be cute, right? Oh, the shirt that they are posing with below was one of my Christmas presents from Zach. He does know his girl, doesn't he?

I'm particularly fond of muffins!

One of my favorite plays EVER. In this case, it's the 1952 film version. Here you go: The Importance of Being Earnest.

The story centers around two young men, John Worthing and Algernon Moncrieff, as they each pose as a fictional man (Earnest) to escape social obligations and win the girl they love. Chock-full of social commentary of marriage and Victorian society, and filled to the brim with wonderful one-liners.

One of my favorite plays of all time, as I said. Oscar Wilde is a genius, and this is one of his best. The first time I saw it was at the Wells Theater in Norfolk, with the local stage company putting on a production. The family went and saw it, and then I went again to see it with my best friend, who STILL reminds me of Algernon, even after all these years (we've known each other since we were 14). Glib, sarcastic, wrapped up in himself but still somewhat concerned about others, always eating, and inordinately fond of muffins... yup, that's him.

Since we all know the source material is wonderful, any comments to be made really deal with the cast here, which was a total score!

I really like Michael Redgrave in the lead role. He was suitable stiff and pompous without being irritating. A genuine John Worthing. John is a harder role to play, now that I watch it again you're the straight man to so many good lines from Lady Bracknell or Algie, so it could be so easy to overdo it. The only downside would be his age (early 40s) but that is a minor objection. Joan Greenwood (who I had only seen as an old lady in Miss Marple's At Bertram's Hotel) is beautiful as Gwendolyn - arch, calculating and yet somehow innocent. I had seen her in Kind Hearts and Coronets as well, in a similar sort of role, and she plays they beautifully! I hadn't realized that Margaret Rutherford had played Miss Prism either! So perfect for that role.

Dame Edith Evans is absolutely splendid. There's a reason that she owned this part for so much of the 20th century. How many other people could put so much inflection into "A handbag?" I was very excited when I found a down-loadable version of the play on emusic.com in their books section. She, of course, was Lady Bracknell, and John Gielgud was John (Earnest) Worthing. Very exciting find indeed.

Thinking of casting, as I was looking up for the movie poster online for this post, I found pictures from a 1993 production of Earnest. Maggie Smith as Lady Bracknell and Richard E Grant as Algie. Not filmed, only the stage production, but Man, I would have loved to see that one!

Overall: 5 of 5. As much as I love Colin Firth and Judy Dench, this beats the newer version by far. Definitely one for the shelf. God bless you, Criterion Collection!