Earthling

Director: Clay Liford

A title like Earthling makes me think of  little people running around earth while they’re observed by matriarchal aliens from afar. We know that eventually the little earthlings will get themselves into trouble and need the wise aliens to come down and show them the way. Not so Earthling, which is actually about aliens who inhabit the earth — much in the spirit of John Sayles’ “Brother from Another Planet”.

I missed Earthling at SXSW this year since it conflicted with a film that I didn’t want to miss. I have to say that I was intrigued by the photo that they used as a teaser in the program guide. So I was excited to see it as a selection for the Santa Cruz Film Festival this year.

The film opens with a meteorite hurling through space towards an international spaceship just outside the earth’s atmosphere. The astronaut’s frantic warnings to earth go unheeded, and we soon discover that the atmospheric disturbance has effected those on earth as well as the astronauts trapped inside the spaceship. The initial scenes on the spaceship have a grainy, cramped feel that contrast nicely with the more cinematic scenes that take place on earth.

This is not a typical science fiction movie as focuses heavily on the relationships of the characters as well as the more traditional science fiction plot twists. We’re not dealing with aliens who want to eat us or kill us, nor aliens that just want to be friends. Here we have aliens who live among us and are struggling with complex relationship issues and the desire to return to their original state.

The plot is complicated and a little frightening. There is plenty of gore and there are weird space slugs and vague monologues that are hard to decipher. Sections of the film made me squirm — not because they were terribly gruesome, but because I was afraid that I had unwittingly brought my companion to a sci-fi horror film.

Blood and guts aside, the film vacillated from campy to serious and I spent most of the film rather confused. I think that I figured out the gist of the plot, but left the film wondering if I had not paid close enough attention to the first part of the story or if the gaps in the story were intentional.

I would classify this film as a thinking person’s sci-fi thriller. If you are willing to figure out the complex relationships between the aliens and between the aliens and the earthlings, then this film’s for you. If you like your sci-fi more traditional — the space slugs and alien appendages are still pretty fun.

Santa Cruz Film Festival 2010

The Santa Cruz Film Festival closing ceremony happened a little over a week ago. The awards were announced and flowers passed to the winners and everyone went home happy.

This was the ninth annual SCFF and the first without founder Jane Sullivan. As the film festival has grown, so has the quality of film and the organization of the festival itself. This year, under the new director of development, Jess Damsen, there wasn’t the begging for money that we’ve listened to in past years. Sponsorship was up and attendance was up as well.

Although I wasn’t able to attend as many films as I wanted to (a Laurie Anderson show precluded an entire Saturday’s films), I was able to attend quite a few. I was lucky enough to see many of the shorts programs and most of the narrative feature films. The shorts programs were very good, but I get tired of having the “sci-fi and experimental” films during late-night showings — I have a tendency to fall asleep on work-nights if I get bored.

In the next couple of days, I’ll be sharing some of my thoughts on the festival films. I didn’t write about all of them, but hopefully enough to give a fair representation.

Max Fleischer’s Superman

Director: Max Fleischer

Movie Night!

This week it was Michael’s turn to choose our film. As we settled in to the couch, Ruthie informed us that the cheese this week is from Safeway, not her usual Costco plate (Safeway was better than our usual Cosco fare).

You never know what Michael will bring as his selection for movie night. We were promised a four hour “superhero-esque” extravaganza, but it seems the formatting of the series was PAL and wouldn’t run on Ruthie’s player.

Instead, we were treated to six episodes of Max Fleischer’s Superman cartoons. Production for these short films ranged from 1941 – 1943. Each episode runs roughly 7 – 10 minutes in length and the stories follow a fairly straightforward formula. The villains are not Superman’s usual enemies, but robots, gangsters, Nazis, and the entire Japanese army!

Wanting to make these episodes as realistic as possible, Fleischer used rotoscoping to imitate live-action movement. Superman’s voice was acted by the same guy who did the Superman radio show — I love how his voice marks the transition from Clark Kent to Superman with “this looks like a job for <insert deep Super-voice here> Superman!”

Ruthie insisted that we watch the “really racist” episode, where superman single handedly befuddles the entire Japanese army. Clark Kent and Lois Lane are in some vague faraway place working on a news story. Each night, Superman sneaks out and terrorizes the Japanese army by destroying battleships, tankers, and fortresses. By today’s standards, it’s pretty offensive. In the WWII world when it was created, it makes a perfect American propaganda piece. Note that Max Fleischer had quit the project when the Superman propaganda pieces were made.

The shorts were fun and incredibly well made. Superman is especially fond of saving golden art deco buildings and the villains are shrouded in shadows. Lois Lane is pretty irritating as a character (also voiced by the same actor who did her for the radio serial), but we’re not talking deep character development here.

The “Mechanical Monsters” Superman episode was the inspiration for “Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow” (2004) and I’m fairly certain that the Superman version was much more interesting than the Angelina Jolie movie.