Seth Harris

Movie Review – Zama

Zama (2017)
Written & Directed by Lucrecia Martel

Don Diego de Zama was sent by the Spanish crown to a remote colony in South America to serve as a functionary under the governor. When we meet Zama, he is standing on the shore, staring off into the ocean anticipating a vessel to carry him back to his family, a ship that will never arrive. This is the living nightmare that Zama exists in, a place where the governors come and go but where he is trapped. He suffers the temptations of the flesh, has belongings stripped from him, and has to reside in a haunted shack. Finally, Zama volunteers to be part of a doomed expedition to capture the infamous Vicuña Porto.

Movie Review – The Last Black Man in San Francisco

The Last Black Man in San Francisco (2019)
Written by Jimmie Falls, Joe Talbot, and Rob Richert
Directed by Joe Talbot

San Francisco has existed since 1846, formerly the Spanish town of Yerba Buena renamed in the wake of the Mexican-American War. The city boomed with the Gold Rush and despite destructive earthquakes hasn’t seemed to stop growing ever since. These days, San Francisco is at the center of the tech boom, neighborhoods gobbled up by startups and associated service industries that cater to these companies. The long-time residents of San Fran, whose family lineages go back to the first boom of the Gold Rush and the subsequent migrations, are being pushed to the fringes. The gentrification is even crossing the Bay into Oakland. Like every city center in our nation afflicted by “urban revitalization,” the result is always the local is pushed out for the transplant or the tourist.

Movie Review – Lethal Weapon

Lethal Weapon (1986)
Written by Shane Black
Directed by Richard Donner

I was looking over the films that came out in 1989 to find some 30th-anniversary content and saw Lethal Weapon 2 came out this weekend that many years ago. I realized I’d never seen the first Lethal Weapon and decided to sit down and watch this flick finally. I like both gentlemen involved in the making of this picture. Shane Black is a pretty good screenwriter, and I enjoyed both Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and The Nice Guys. Richard Donner is the filmmaker behind The Omen, The Goonies, and one of my all-time favorites Superman the Movie. I am a bit more negative on one of the film’s stars, Mel Gibson for obvious reasons if you have kept up with pop culture for the last twenty years. But I decided to give the picture a shot and see if it made sense there’d be three more movies and television series in this franchise.

Comic Book Review – 52 Book Two

52 Book Two
Reprints 52 #14-26
Written by Geoff Johns, Grant Morrison, Greg Rucka, and Mark Waid
Art by Keith Giffen, Dale Eaglesham, Shawn Moll, Joe Bennett, Chris Batista, Eddy Barrows, Patrick Oliffe, Drew Johnson, and Phil Jimenez

Book Two of 52 is all about building out the world of the story without really answering any questions. It’s only the halfway point, so there’s plenty of wandering around to stretch out the narrative. That said, there are great moments, and some plots are much better than others. One thing I’ve tried to do through this second readthrough of the series is trying to determine who wrote what and that has led to some deep internet dives to confirm or deny my assumptions. On the surface, it’s relatively easy to determine the authors of individual plots. Based on subsequent comics Greg Rucka is most definitely writing the Montoya/Question/Batwoman story. Geoff Johns is penning the Black Adam story continuing plot threads he started back in JSA. Grant Morrison is mainly writing the Lost in Space story featuring Adam Strange, Starfire, and Animal Man. I’m reasonably sure Mark Waid is over the Steel/Luthor/Everyman plot.

Movie Review – Alita: Battle Angel

Alita: Battle Angel (2019)
Written by James Cameron and Laeta Kalogridis
Directed by Robert Rodriguez

Alita is a movie almost 20 years in the making. In 2000, James Cameron registered website domain names that involved this property as a film. In 2003, he confirmed he was going to direct a movie based on the early 90s manga. And then delays began, and Avatar went into production, and other projects came about. Eventually, Cameron stepped aside, taking credit as screenwriter and producer. Robert Rodriguez came onboard in 2016 with the film set to be released in July of 2018. That didn’t happen, and the movie was delayed to a primo January release in 2019. All this is to say that this film has had so much time to be worked on tweaked and improved so it should be great. But there is a common theme in Hollywood where a film has a window between enough pre-production and too much that it overbakes. Alita was burnt to a crisp.

Movie Review – The Square

The Square (2017)
Written & Directed by Ruben Östlund

Modern art is the topic of many heated discussions. Once upon a time art was just landscapes and Greek sculpture but if you step into a museum of contemporary art now, you’ll find video installations and seemingly random assortments of clutter. The reason why modern art draws the ire of so many is that it doesn’t offer easy answers or even poses questions in ways that are accessible in a single glance. Modern art makes demands of the viewer to look beyond the surface and, sadly, so many people don’t like doing that. To look beyond is to be uncomfortable and enter a realm where you can never be sure of previous assumptions. However, there is a bizarre marketplace at work that injects billions of dollars into modern art and creates inflated value for these objects. In turn, a sense of elitism centered around wealth and prestige has taken old and twisted art into something to be hoarded rather than shared with all.

Movie Review – Lady Macbeth

Lady Macbeth (2016)
Written by Alice Birch and Nikolai Leskov
Directed by William Oldroyd

This is not a movie about Lady Macbeth. It’s not an adaptation of Shakespeare. It’s not a reimagining of the events of his play. This is a film noir, set in the English Victorian era, about a classic femme fatale, told from her perspective coldly and neutrally. She’s a child bride, sold off to a wealthy man so his son can have a wife. The problem is that the son has no attraction to her; we later learn why, and it’s not what you expect. Left alone in a dusty manor house, our protagonist seeks out the affections of a gruff stablehand, someone like she used to know before this life. The two engage in a torrid affair, the house staff knowing exactly what is going on, and this all leads to murder.

Comic Book Review – JSA by Geoff Johns Book Three

JSA by Geoff Johns Book Three
Reprints JSA: All-Stars #1-8, JSA Annual #1, JSA Secret Files and Origins #2, and JSA #26-31
Written by Geoff Johns (with David Goyer)
Art by Sal Velluto, Phil Winslade, Barry Kitson, Mike McKone, Adam DeKraker, Stephen Sadowski, Dave Ross, Wade von Grawbadger, Javier Saltares, Derec Aucoin, Rags Morales, and Peter Snejbjerg

In recent years, Geoff Johns’ writing has taken on a more epic tone with his lengthy runs on Green Lantern & Justice League as well as his place as the main man when it comes to company-wide events (Infinite Crisis, Forever Evil, Rebirth, Doomsday Clock). Twenty years ago he was the man who brought us great character-centered books like Stars and STRIPE & JSA. JSA, in particular, is an excellent example of how good early Johns was. He told stories based on the histories and legacies of his cast but also built new characters from the ground up. The result was something like the best of Claremont’s X-Men run, where personalities were clear and interpersonal conflict was some of the best stuff in the books.

Movie Review – Columbus

Columbus (2017)
Written & Directed by Kogonada

Finnish architect Eero Saarinen designed the Irwin Union Bank, and it was built in Columbus, Indiana in 1954. Before this, the design of banks was centered around making them impenetrable fortresses, a visual assurance to the depositor that their money was safe. The Irwin Union Bank is striking in its fluid wall of glass, revealing the interiors of the building. This defiant gesture exudes confidence that the bank does not have to hide behind walls of brick and mortar. The building is surrounded by trees helping to pull the customer out of the harsh urban landscape and into a more natural, pastoral space. Saarinen didn’t want to impose a bank upon the community; he wanted to make something that felt like it had always been a part of their lives.

Post-Stranger Things 3 Movie Marathon

Stranger Things is an unabashed recycler of 1980s movie tropes, so it is worth our time to explore the films that inspired the show. It’s easy to see the influences of Steven Spielberg, Dungeons & Dragons, Stephen King, and George Lucas in the show, but here are some inspirations that are not in the mainstream public sphere quite as much.