Weekly Report from the N.T.A.B. Division of Media Review

The Kids in the Hall/Pig/Severance/Ridley Scott

Director’s Note: We would like to thank the Director of Bunker Operations for her insight into the Apple miniseries Roar, which ran, inexplicably, in the Weekly newsletter instead of the Media Review’s Weekly Report. Administration has assured us that any and all future media-related business will be handled by this department in our usual Monday overview. We apologize for any confusion this created.

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The Kids in the Hall (Amazon Prime)

I should start this review with an admission: I’ve only watched the first episode. The reason for this is simple: There’s only 8 in total, I and don’t want them to end. I am not sure anyone who isn’t a Kids in the Hall fan already will “get it,” because they are firmly back in their wheelhouse, doing their kind of sketch comedy, with the expected side-of-the-mouth snark at contemporary culture, because, as we all know, old people are only funny to old people now. It doesn’t come off as “these whippersnappers with their micro-aggressions” but that’s exactly what it is.

Mostly, I was just over the moon that Brain Candy was used as the on-ramp to start the new series. If you know the joy that is Brain Candy, I highly recommend you watch it first, before you watch the new show. You’ll be glad you did. It’s not currently available to stream (not even on Amazon, which is so weird), but I’m sure you can YouTube it and get what you need.

I am going to tell you, however, that I never, ever, not once, wanted to know what Dave Foley’s junk looked like. And yet, here we are, in 2022, and now I can’t un-see it. Consider yourself full-frontal-male-nudity warned.

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Pig (Hulu)

This is not a new movie, but it’s new to me, and I’ll bet most of you, as well. Nick Cage plays a hermit who lives in the Pacific Northwest wilderness, whose prized truffle pig is stolen, and the movie is about his single-minded quest to get her back. I don’t want to give you anything more than that. To do so would inadvertently peel back an onion layer that I’m sure you’d rather I not touch. Instead, we’re going to talk about why this is one of my favorite Nick Cage movies.

So, Nick Cage goes through cycles. He stars in one or two, or sometimes even three, small, art-house movies (Leaving Los Vegas), or films with noted directors (Wild at Heart), and he gets these great notices. He may even get an award or a nomination, but those don’t pay for his comic book collection. So then he chases the almighty buckola, and we get National Treasure and Con Air, and then we let it slide because despite himself, these are kinda fun, even though we all know they are empty calories. Then he does a movie like Face/Off, and we put our head in our hands and go, “Why, Nick? You’re better than this!” and then he goes dark for a bit. Maybe he sells off those comics because of a divorce. And then, weirdly, he turns up in an unexpected place. Some arthouse movie. Some small budget thing. And people go, “You know Nick Cage is a goofus, but he can be good when he wants to be.” And the cycle starts all over again. If that’s my proposed model for Nick Cage’s career, you can decide where on the cycle you fall. Do you like Edgy Nick Cage? Do you like box office gold Nick Cage? Or do you like “What the Hell, Nick?” Nick Cage?

Pig is at the top of a new cycle. It’s quiet, thoughtful, heart breaking, and I couldn’t take my eyes away from it. And while the plot revolves around finding a pig, the film is universal in its themes and underpinning message.

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Severance (Apple TV)

Mark S has two lives. His “innie” that works a major global company, and his “outie” that goes home, watches TV, hangs out with his sister and her annoying husband, and helps his elderly next-door neighbor with her garbage. These two sides of Mark have been “severed,” and have no memory of each other. But something happens that brings the corporate world into the real world, leaving both Marks questioning what is going on and why.

Apple continues, despite what we might think of Roar here at the Bunker, to be the best entertainment value for your dollar on any streaming platform. This series is the kind of social commentary science fiction that J. G. Ballard and Phillip K. Dick were most known for.  It’s a slow, slow, sloooooow burn, and I nearly bailed on it twice in the first episode. I’m glad I didn’t.

Halfway through, most of the pieces are in place and many questions are asked and answered. It’s deep-seeded SF, disturbing and fascinating in turn, and highly relatable. The cast is fantastic, and includes John Turturro, Adam Scott, Patricia Arquette and Christopher Walken. And finally, it’s directed by Ben Stiller, who doesn’t direct enough. If you like weird, dark, SF, don’t miss this.

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NTAB Directorial Culture Exchange Update: Ridley Scott

Ridley Scott is one of those directors that is very hit and miss for me, and it’s frustrating, too, because it’s obvious he’s a technically accomplished director who knows how to put a film together. I just always find myself asking, “Is this a story I wanted to experience?” The answer, it turns out, is always “sometimes.”

It was tempting to pick movies we both knew we’d like, or that have inarguable merit, such as Alien (1979). But I wasn’t feeling it, and neither was Janice, who threatened me with a viewing of Legend (1985), one of my least-favorite films of the 1980s, never mind Ridely Scott’s career.

Instead of re-opening Blade Runner wounds, Janice chose one of his historical movies, Kingdom of Heaven (2005), about Jerusalem and the Crusades, which worked out great, as it was one I’d not seen before.

The film concerns a blacksmith who is called to serve in the 12th century Crusades to liberate the Holy Land. Orlando Bloom, who has made a career out of sword fighting, gets to play opposite Liam Neeson and David Thewlis in this “men of honor” clash of cultures between the English and the Moslem ruler  Saladin. The warfare is sufficiently epic and brutal, and also, inevitably, somewhat pointless, at least from a historical perspective. There were three periods of the various Crusades that stretch some two hundred years, and they were all bloody and riddled with death and conflict, just as it ever has been. All that aside, it’s a well-made, somewhat sad, epic film.

I chose Scott’s first film, The Duellists (1977), based on a story by Joseph Conrad, and starring a very young Keith Carradine and an equally-young Harvey Keitel as Napoleonic soldiers (!) who initially quarrel over a trifle and end up crossing swords, again and again as they advance in years and in their military careers.

Told primarily from Carradine’s perspective as he tries to initially avoid, and then encounter, Keitel, in the hopes of resolving their conflict, the film is a character study, punctuated by realistically staged swordplay, no derring-do and swashbuckling. Each man takes their share of damage and accumulates scars from both the war and their encounters.

This film, it seems, was the first time Scott remarked on the futility of honor and battle. These men’s lives are impacted, altered, by a refusal put down their swords and speak plainly. It’s a great movie, but it ends sadly, and not for the reason you might think. There’s a real sense of so much time wasted in pursuit of this grudge. I can’t help but look at the rest of Scott’s historical films, including Gladiator (2000), through this particular lens and wonder if this is an intentional theme that I’m just now seeing in his work, or if there’s a subtext not even he is aware of. Lord knows it wouldn’t be the first time he missed the point.