Why Can't Movies Get Motorcycles Right?
Without reviewing the whole thing, I just got back from the new "Indiana Jones" film.
There's a motorcycle chase scene and I have to say: it's a decently fun scene unless you think about it.
As in: even back in 1957, you cannot tell me that a Harley wouldn't leave sedans in the dust without trying. Especially being able to weave around cars in traffic, there's simply no way any car could keep up. The quicker acceleration, the nimbleness, being able to go through much narrower passages...
Hollywood just will not get it right, will they?
Other than "The World's Fastest Indian" (one of my favorite films ever made), I just cannot think of a movie that gets motorcycles right. I mean, maybe I could if I racked my brain... okay maybe not.
But then again, Hollywood gets guns (the Jamie Lee Curtis / Mac-10 scene in "True Lies", anyone?) and music-related stuff wrong all the time too. If I ever made a movie, I'd give the relevant parts of the script over to someone that can REALLY ride (or knows guns or plays guitar or whatever specialized knowledge that's being bandied about).
I would much rather bust my brain figuring out how to make improbable reality exciting than let my work devolve into a cartoon.
Oh well.
EDIT: How pathetic is THIS? Harrison Ford waxes his chest in solidarity with the anti-Amazon deforestation movement? And sadly: No. I am not joking.
EDIT: EDIT: regarding waxing, if you're a homo and are considering waxing... DON'T DO IT! I was making fun of these two skanks once about how waxing "couldn't hurt that much". I let them wax my ankle. It hurts. A lot. A whole fucking lot, thank you. And it wasn't even kissably smooth either. So that was a lie too.
There's a motorcycle chase scene and I have to say: it's a decently fun scene unless you think about it.
As in: even back in 1957, you cannot tell me that a Harley wouldn't leave sedans in the dust without trying. Especially being able to weave around cars in traffic, there's simply no way any car could keep up. The quicker acceleration, the nimbleness, being able to go through much narrower passages...
Hollywood just will not get it right, will they?
Other than "The World's Fastest Indian" (one of my favorite films ever made), I just cannot think of a movie that gets motorcycles right. I mean, maybe I could if I racked my brain... okay maybe not.
But then again, Hollywood gets guns (the Jamie Lee Curtis / Mac-10 scene in "True Lies", anyone?) and music-related stuff wrong all the time too. If I ever made a movie, I'd give the relevant parts of the script over to someone that can REALLY ride (or knows guns or plays guitar or whatever specialized knowledge that's being bandied about).
I would much rather bust my brain figuring out how to make improbable reality exciting than let my work devolve into a cartoon.
Oh well.
EDIT: How pathetic is THIS? Harrison Ford waxes his chest in solidarity with the anti-Amazon deforestation movement? And sadly: No. I am not joking.
EDIT: EDIT: regarding waxing, if you're a homo and are considering waxing... DON'T DO IT! I was making fun of these two skanks once about how waxing "couldn't hurt that much". I let them wax my ankle. It hurts. A lot. A whole fucking lot, thank you. And it wasn't even kissably smooth either. So that was a lie too.
Labels: motorcycles, movies
posted by mmaier2112 at 4:24 PM
6 Comments:
So, how was the movie?
Film is film.
Real life is real life.
They are two separate things.
Certain things have to be altered (dumbed down) for film audiences, or for dramatic purposes. There are flaws in every film - no matter how good they are. I'm sure with a little searching, you could even find a few mistakes in "The World's Fastest Indian".
Once upon a time, I used to belittle films for getting little things wrong. Then, I decided to just enjoy the films, and stop looking for things to nit-pick. It's made my film-watching much more enjoyable.
Don't get me wrong, some things are just HUGE and wrong. But, making a Harley and a car roughly the same speed, for the sake of a chase sequence... It was fun to watch.
I don't feel like reviewing the film. I am trying not to offer my unsolicited opinions on films anymore because a few reasons.
One, apparently I'm a crusty, picky bastard. I like what I like and really dislike what I don't like.
Two, I've come to realize that others' opinions can colour my own and I don't like to do that to anyone else. Sometimes (like Transformers or Funny Games) I don't care and just blab on here how much I hated something. But more often anymore, I'm holding back mouthing off in case someone might like it.
I know... consideration for others from ME? World must be ending or something.
Classy, dude. Classy.
It's an adventure movie, a work of fiction about a larger-than-life hero who searches for supernatural artifacts, cheats death several times an hour, nails gals who are waaaaaaay too good-looking for him, and who must've single-handedly offed more German soldiers than Alvin York and Audie Murphy put together. A little something called "suspension of disbelief" is required equipment.
That being said, if I ever go up against another man with a gun, I want him to have learned to shoot from movies.
Enough Bitching About My Bitching About Movies.
That's enough. Really, it just is.
I "get" suspension of disbelief. Real life has no mutants, Terminator robots, Vampire Slayers, spaceships, lightsabers or chest-bursting aliens. They just are not there to be found. Yes, I get it. To enjoy the movie I need to accept that these things do exist for the purposes of that film.
Got it.
But I refuse to accept my criticism of films as being some sort of fault of MINE for not carrying an oil tanker's worth of suspension of disbelief.
The film making community gets only so much slack from me as a movie viewer. After that, they need to give me some simple things like character consistency, decent motivations, actor chemistry and no "COME ON" moments.
When Episode I came out, I didn't have a problem with Anakin accidentally destroying the Battle Droid Control Ship's reactor or Jar-Jar stumbling his way through destroying the enemy.
I do now. Because it's very simply BAD WRITING. It takes only a little more effort to devise something that will look good and make sense on film than it does to make eye candy that is fundamentally retarded in nature.
Having four or five guys open up on the hero with full auto weapons - within spitting distance - and having him escape unscathed is just BAD WRITING. (See "Commando" for a pathetic example of this stupidity in action.)
John Millus (screenplay writer of some Dirty Harry movies and the 1st Conan and other classic films) called this the hero being "the Saint". The hero is not surviving because he's smart or skilled or clever. He's surviving simply because he's the hero. Because you can't have your hero shot dead in the first act. Millus knew he was guilty of writing such parts at times because they sold, but he really didn't seem to like writing them.
That's BAD WRITING.
Indy in Raiders got hurt. At times he made gambles with his life and they paid off. But he didn't wade through gunfire willy-nilly.
The few John Wayne westerns I've watched didn't let him stand in a hail of gunfire like he was Superman.
Movies owe us better. Especially at $9 a ticket.
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