Robs' Blog: incoherencies from an american ex-pat in exotic beijing,
  or: how i learned to stop worrying and love bureaucracy

I heard somewhere that Obama actually liked The Weather Man. If that doesn't make him totally out-of-step with the rest of American society, or a full-blown terrorist bent on the destruction of all life on this dear dear dear planet which we call home, whichever is worst, I don't know what would.

• Battleship Potemkin (1925)
• Casablanca (1942)
• High Noon (1952)
• Seven Samurai (1954)
• The Caine Mutiny (1954)
• The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
• Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
• Patton (1970)
• Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970)
• Midway (1976)
• Apocalypse Now (1979)
• Kagemusha (1980)
• Boot, Das (1981)
• Full Metal Jacket (1987)
• The Hunt for Red October (1990)
• Courage Under Fire (1996)
• The Thin Red Line (1998)
• Saving Private Ryan (1998)
• Letters from Iwo Jima (2006)

So, I'm on the stairclimber in the gym, thinking about my top twenty list and the comments I've gotten, when I see this bald guy who works out there on a regular basis, and it dawns on me that I left the bald one out... and, I ain't talking about Telly Savalas, Bruce Willis, or Ving Rhames for that matter...

Nope, I'm talking about the man who put magnificent in The Magnificent Seven, the king in The King and I, and, of course, the west in Westworld.

Yeah, I forgot Yul Brynner as The Gunslinger.

I mean, as much as I dig Arnie, I just don't think his role could have existed without the pioneering work that Yul did. I mean, take a look at this:

---

btw, since the anti-smoking message hasn't hit these parts as hard as it has in the US, I thought I'd include this clip as a bonus:

Here's my list of the top 20 Sci-Fi Movies that I've seen, listed by year:

• 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
• A Clockwork Orange (1971)
  
• Silent Running (1972)
• Soylent Green (1973)
• Sleeper (1973)
  
• Dark Star (1974)
• Young Frankenstein (1974)
  
• Damnation Alley (1977)
• Star Wars (1977)
• Alien (1979)
• Mad Max (1979)
  
• Blade Runner (1982)
• Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan (1982)
• Tron (1982)
  
• The Terminator (1984)
• Short Circuit (1986)
• The Running Man (1987)
• Total Recall (1990)
  
• The Matrix (1999)
• Serenity (2005)

I put together the list based upon my memories of the films, as well as browsing through these web sites:

• The 10 Most Prophetic Sci-Fi Movies Ever
• The top 10 sci-fi films
• Top Rated "Sci-Fi" Titles
• The WIRED SCI-FI TOP 20

I had the distinct displeasure of watching The Forbidden Kingdom this past week. The displeasure is that I had such high hopes for it... I mean, Jet Li, Jackie Chan, and Yuen Woo-ping working together on the same flick... wow. Well, ugh.

So, let's look at the major elements:

• A white kid gets something of mystical value from a Chinatown pawn shop (Gremlins)
• He's transported to a mystical land (The Wizard of Oz)
• He has to learn martial arts from a wise Southeast-Asian teacher (The Karate Kid, Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins, Kill Bill, etc)
• There's a scene which Jackie Chan is guiding him through the fighting (Rush Hour)
• A whole bunch of very well choreographed and well shot fighting (anything by Yuen Woo-ping)
• A person he cares for is mortally wounded, and needs an enchanted drink of immortality to save him (Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade)
• His love interest dies tragically near the end of the movie (The Matrix Revolutions)
• He completes his mission, and is transported back to his own land (The Wizard of Oz)
• He stands up to and defeats a bigger opponent by using his (now) superior martial-arts skills (The Karate Kid)

I really had thought we were past the point of needing a white kid as a draw for a movie. I mean, crap, we're talking about Jet Li and Jackie Chan here, in a post Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon world. Also, I found the couple of times in which Mandarin was used to be really jarring... again, after the success of the aforementioned movie, why was there a need to use English at all? I just don't get it.

The last scene in which I referenced The Wizard of Oz was something like this... he's learned fighting from two ancient masters, saved a land from evil domination, and gets told by the Jade Emperor that he could have anything he wants. His reply is, "I just want to go home".

I found myself thinking... just click your ruby slippers together three times, Dorothy...

---

I looked at the movie briefly again, more to let a friend see the martial arts of Jet Li and Jackie Chan towards the beginning of the film, and noticed something that I'd not before... when the Jason Tripitikas character is being harassed by the bully referenced above, the pawn shop owner is referred to a couple times by an ethnic slur. I positively just don't get it. Imagine a parent of Chinese-American decent taking their kid to see the flick, and having to deal with that.

Awful, simply awful.