Random Places

Steve Andrews. Polk undercover drug investigators play Wii during raid. Tampa Bay Online. Retrieved September 23, 2009, from http://www2.tbo.com/content/2009/sep/21/undercover-drug-investigators-embarrass-polk-sheri/…….

Less than 8 hours since I posted my last journal entry, I came across this gem. Not only are the criminals good at multi-tasking these days, but even the law enforcement officers as well. They didn’t even bothered to put the remote strap on, just unprofessional.

Whedon, J. (2009). Dollhouse. US: Fox Broadcasting Company.

“If I think I can figure things out, is that curiosity or arrogance?” – Topher Brink (3 min clip from “Epitaph One”)

* NOTE: Contains spoiler for the Dollhouse TV show.

The Dollhouse is an underground organization (owned by Rossum Corporation) that employs various individuals as “Actives”, wipe their minds and then program them to do whatever mission is needed at that time. These missions can include sexual encounters, negotiation, friendship, and so on. When the Actives are not “imprinted” with a memory, they spend their time in a calm, spa-like environment and mostly have the intelligence of a child.

When the show first started, similar to Adelle DeWitt (highest ranking official of the L.A. branch Dollhouse), I was able to rationalize the morality behind such an organization. Each Actives signed a contract to work with the Dollhouse for 5 years and at the end of the contract they get paid a large sum of money. Some were recruited as an alternative to spending their life in prison, while others possibly just wanted to escape their past. In general it was a win-win situation for the Actives and the Dollhouse.

It was unclear whether the Dollhouse would honour their contract however, since once you’re wiped, ideally you won’t even remember entering this contract in the first place. Later in the season, it was revealed to the audiences that some Actives were actually forced into this job. Some were also sexually abused (either in the state of imprint or not) by the Dollhouse staff. The ethic became murky in an instance. The Actives may have signed up to do any mission, including those sexual in nature, but to be taken advantage of by staff was another matter. With that trust broken, you can’t pretend to be righteous anymore.

It wasn’t until the last episode of the season “Epitaph One” (not broacasted, only available on Season 1 DVD) that Rossum’s ulterior motive was finally revealed. By imprinting someone else with your own memory, essentially there would be immortality as you can live on in another body once your old body dies. It’s a good question whether you consider this immortality in the first place, but something else is more important. Not only was the contract broken (ie. Active gets to return to their own lives after 5 years), but you can claim that the Actives, even though their body is still alive, living as another mentally, are essentially dead, “murdered”. The problem became even worse as the episode revealed, but I will refrain from disclosing more of the plot in case anyone would like to watch the show.

This “take-over-the-world” plan, unintentially, was hatched due to Topher Brink’s (scientist at L.A. branch) advancement of the imprint technology. In this last episode, Topher, now mentally unstable from his guilt, said “If I think I can figure things out, is that curiosity or arrogance?” Even though scientist have the knowledge to do something, does it mean they should apply them? Specifically, was it wrong to invent nuclear bombs? Should we clone human and other animals? I don’t think technology and invention need to be stifled because we as human beings are innately programmed to be competitive and to survive (sometimes destroy ourselves in the process). If it were, we wouldn’t have cars as transportation due to so many accidents or knives to cut food as it can be used to stab people. Whether to use something for the good of society or for nefarious reasons should ultimately be left to individual decision. The scientists should not be blamed for how other people use their invention. In fact, war and military-funded research have advanced many technology we enjoy today.

First Impression: No idea this exist until we went to Ellen’s house one day.

Afterthoughts: It’s hard to support indie films, when they’re the same cliche tripe produced in Hollywood, except with a crappier budget. I’m sure back in the 50s white people were really as mentally ugly (racist) and retarded (about environment) as portrayed but geez can the pilot be any more clueless about flying and survival? Even without Ellen’s expert opinion, everybody in the room knew you never leave the scene of the crash! And the pilot fought in WWII, so there’s no reason for him to be so stupid throughout the movie just to play on our sympathy for the Inuit. The location was beautiful sure, but if there’s all there is to it I might as well have watched a documentary. Ha, I just checked IMDB and it turns out Michael Buble was in it, and I didn’t even know. Gah, and I was also digging my brains where I’ve seen the pilot’s boss before…he was played by Jack Bauer’s father!

First Impression: As most of you know, Neil Gaiman is my favourite author and naturally I’ve been waiting for this film since forever. The film premiere weekend coincided with Hailey and Jessie’s birthday, so we decided to watch this after snowshoeing at Cypress.

Afterthoughts: I really wanted to like this film A LOT, but sadly came away a little disappointed. It is inevitable for fans of the book to know exactly what’s going to happen. I didn’t have a problem with Stardust, but with a horror movie such as this, I guess it didn’t work in its favour. It’s nice to see other people in the theatre, such as Ellen, who genuinely got creeped out by the film. I’m also not really a fan of 3D…it worked fine for a little while, but after my eyes got a little tired, the images started to blur. Though it’s probably impossible (or impractical) to do so, I think the movie would be even scarier with real people. One last annoying thing would be Coraline herself. I don’t remember her ever being this insolent, unsympathetic child in the book. I’m not sure if it’s just Dakota Fanning’s interpretation or Henry Selick’s direction. The last time a character “rankled my ass” (borrowed the words from BSG’s Cavil) similiarly would be Ellen Page’s Juno. Flaws aside, the film was visually stunning, with tiny things like the popcorn-pooping chicken and the angel-wings-wearing dog to tickle your fancy.

We went into the theatre about 10min before the screen time and it was pretty much full already, so our group had to sit separately. Which was fine really, because it meant Ellen won’t be able to grab my arms. I did have to question people’s common sense for bringing their crying 2 year old baby into the movie, well any movies for that matter. It’s a scary movie, and I don’t think your 2 year old would understand much anyway.

First Impression: At first I was going to settle on “Up the Yangtze” when Ellen was at Rogers, but then Kimmy vehemently opposed to watching documentaries and we settled on this unknown little movie.

Afterthoughts: This movie was a pleasant surprise. If I had looked at the DVD cover or watched the trailer, I would never have rented it. Cillian Murphy to me was always the dude with the creepy eyes, and Lucy well, I just didn’t like her. The romance worked solely because of Cillian’s adorable portrayal of such a gullible yet lovable character. It would’ve been even better to cast someone else as the femme fatale (maybe Charlize Theron??). Lucy’s attempt at (faking) drunkenness just made me want to fast forward the scene. A lot of the frontal and overhead shots were a nice nod as well to the film noir genre…which also sadly reminds me of Veronica Mars (dammit!). The story was pretty simple yet quite effective (Kimmy would disagree) because I think deep down everyone craves an adventure…or ten. I have to change my mind about Cillian too; when he was spotting his shades and rocking out in his backyard he was just drop dead gorgeous…ok maybe it’s because I couldn’t see his eyes in that scene.