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August 06, 2007
BOURNE TO ROCK
The new BOURNE flick is just as awesome as the last two. Likes its superlative predecessors, it rocks with adrenaline, physicality, and the impact of things shaking when trained assassins land on them. This is simply the best thing going in the action genre now and according to this article in USA Today, it's revolutionizing the way these movies are being conceived.
Good, I guess. But after James Bond hit the scene in the 60s, there were a number of knockoffs, some of them iconic (THE MAN FROM UNCLE, THE PRISONER), some of them campy fun (IN LIKE FLINT), some of them horrible and misogynistic (The Dean Martin - Matt Helm movies). I can see the Bourne series spawning a lot of knockoffs featuring boring, physically gifted heroes with none of the defining features that made this (so-far) trilogy so excellent.
After reading Jon Krakauer's latest book, I've been reading his classic, INTO THE WILD. It's easy to see why it touched so many people. The story of an intelligent, personable young dude who ventured off into Alaska to die is, Krakauer argues, consistent with American mythos. We have always been obsessed with self-reliance from Emerson on and some, like Chris McCandless, have taken that to the furthest extreme. "Extreme" seems to be a term we throw around a lot in our culture. People who are extreme are generally characterized by zealous beliefs in things as diverse as Reformed Theology, Hang Gliding, or Organic Coffee. It seems we've added "Extreme"ness as a kind of bar to pass for masculinity; this is why so many youth groups like rappelling (which I, by the way, don't). But we should note that there's a weird romantic element to this that surfaces in stories like those that Krakauer brings up in INTO THE WILD. I'm interested in reading more about this.
Sean Penn is directing the movie of the book. I'm hoping that like Penn, it's thoughtful and interestingly portrayed, but unlike Penn, it's not dour and humorless. The trailer is here.
| By Andytown | 11:00 PM
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