Newairbus

Attended the premiere, Nov 1st, without expectations. Ismo is 3 years my junior, so we belong in the same approximate microgeneration, sharing it with the celebrity likes of Lauri Ylönen, Ville Valo or Kimi Räikkönen.

The Ismo Film tries to show what a "clown" is made of, whether there are tears behind the façade of one. And - there are. A young Ismo used to cry to his mother that he is "terminally shy; something which is father's (genes') fault..!", thus accusing his mother of wrong paternal choice. But, he turned out alright in spite of this, come the blooming into that happens during college years, in his case in neighbouring university town Jyväskylä, which is the "Athens of Finland", maybe corresponding in some way to Athens, GA.

Ismo knows how to woo the fastidious and fussy American audiences. Unlike American comedians, he does not dive into bigotism, cheap caricatures and class. His humour is about semantics. He dissects words from many angles, milks them for what they're worth (like rappers do?) and this way gets applauded by his audience. His "ADHD" brain makes all these connections that he forges between performances. So, in a way he offers a formula for becoming a standup comedian to those who could conceive of doing that. The downside of discoveries is that Ismo has a hard time going to sleep during his sleepless nights, and he dopes himself up with whatever pharmacies offer over the counter. Something young John Belushi might have confessed to as well... before AD 1983.

This movie employs the "hero's voyage" narrative, known from literary theory, to divide Ismo's journey up into convenient bits - as if Ismo was Frodo in LotR. It is well cut, edited and narrated, often by Ismo himself. For all that, a lot of the immersion comes from trying to reflect how I myself would behave and feel in his shoes rather than watching his "exploits" mouth agape.

Three stars off because Ismo keeps speaking over the end credits, something which is a cardinal sin. When the movie is over, it is over, and before that any stunts can be pulled, and the wool over the audience's eyes.

WHY wasn't this movie simply called "Zack and Miri Make a Blu-Ray Movie" or "Z & M Make Porno"? I don't think I grasp the neo-syntactical dimensions of the title. Maybe it has the same "chique" as "I'm With Stupid"? Even that line has more logic to it, since it most often involves a pointing arrow, if I'm correct. This movie depicts a co-habiting, sex-free couple who drive around in their awful beat-up car until they finally fall on hard times as their junk bank of unpaid bills gets shucked off the wall into an empty barrel of oil. They decide to move into adult entertainment via a school reunion, at which it's permitted to plead sex shamelessly with just those same characters who weren't willing to provide it in the heat of '89, because they possibly knew even then they were gay. What a bellyflop. A moral hangover ensues for Zacharias and Miriam, but they hire local people who are susceptible to their rotten idea and thereafter after some difficulties come up with the great flash of genius of shooting porn in a cafeteria. (Chain cafés have lost their luster, haven't they? Hence not a service station, which used to be a hot spot for coffee and "coffee" in the past.) Ultimately the love Zack and Miri have grown to share during their prolonged flatmate-checkmate gets the better of them and... the end credits tell the rest. I can hint that they might start a certain kind of vanity production company. Which I might be interested to pay as a customer. It must be said that this is Seth Rogen's movie. His maniacal monologues as part of the dialog that he is simultaneously having with someone act as both his contributions and a narrative voice-over, not unlike Harrison Ford in the "Blade Runner" (1982). It's also his relationship with Miri (Elizabeth Banks) that the rest of the cast is kind of only supportive of. (They don't have mutual squabbles.) In a lot of ways the movie resembles "Bad Santa", in which Billy Bob T. starred. If you liked it, you'll sing in the shower to the soundtrack of this movie (including even The Pixies' "Hey"). "Bad Santa" and "Zack and Miri" share foul language, foul aims, foul derrieres, filthy lucre and a central black "fundraiser". There is also a similar gregariousness and camaraderie underneath it all, which functions as the counterpoint to the filth and fury of the young-turk storyline.

Bond is a fragile creature. He can take an unlimited amount of battering in character but a limited quantity as a serialised story of an MI6 hero. With time, he has been fashioned to meet the "requirements" of an ever-changing audience, even though those on the cutting edge and in the vanguard probably don't watch Bond. We could stomach the shift to Pierce Brosnan, because he replaced the useless Timothy Dalton. We could bear the introduction of the female M, because we knew that Barbara Broccoli is at the producer's helm for these movies. We could grasp rather than gasp at the short-haired, homely Miss Moneypenny, because, well, the odds were that our own girlfriends sitting next to us in the cinema would look like her.

I suppose the newest modifications have come as a result of the belief in "anything goes" as long as the product has enough action and some decent girls in it. This belief extends even to the 007-song, which is much worse, if you believe, than Madonna or Chris Cornell's -- it sounds like a studio outtake and is instantly forgettable.

This time Bond is out to avenge the death of Vesper Lynd. From the earlier one, I can vaguely remember that she was an attractive young, sophisticated lady, who had gone to all the right schools, who teased Bond and who ultimately faced a horrendous death being handcuffed to an old elevator that went down into water in a tumbling house in Venice. Now, if that is the case, newcomers should at least be treated to a scene of Vesper's painting on the wall with Bond silently kneeling in front of it, or something, to remind us what really motivates Bond and a string of these brutal, fast-paced, immoral, licensed but M-disapproved killings. We're offered none of that but an endless parade of disposable villains and sidekicks, too (ref. Mathis and Fields' deaths, the latter executed in such a glib way evoking "Goldfinger"). It's telling that in this newest one, we won't see even a glimpse of Q, who designs the weaponry and cars. The closest tech thing to Bond is his mobile phone.

Namely, male audiences of the Bond franchise respect the action, but they also want a bit of nostalgia, humour, logic, dining, tech, music and depth. Logic and depth here are sorely M.I.A. The sequences have been edited into such fast-paced runs that it's not at all clear whether what Bond just did would have destroyed his enemies or backfired on himself. If he farts, it does not automatically mean that the villain be decapitated. The old Bonds were beautifully constructed, using period pace as the bricks and contemporary logic as the mortar. Those of today seem to be a bit too much to bear.

I would endorse Bond even if he read poetry to his now-or-then-squeeze or played Spanish guitar or went to the Sex Fair with Miss Moneypenny. Instead, Bond has returned as something of a modern, dysfunctional, ADHD-crippled, emotionless, humourless, tradition-amnesiac "scaffolder" (he fights more these days on scaffolds than in submarines.) His evening dress seems to be dirty more as a rule than an exception. The old Bond wore a nice tuxedo each time. He's scarred and he can't even order a Martini anymore but drinks anything with enough vodka in it. Have they blended "Auf Wiedersehen, Pet" into Bonds? What an unlikely shandy.

The marriage is ugly. Daniel Craig should be divorced. Bond actors seem to come in two categories. The prime threesome is Connery, Moore, Brosnan. They lasted, the last of them until 2004. The inferior cast consists of Lazenby, Dalton, Craig. They were fired or should have been after one or two movies. Lest we forget, a lot of the 001-006s have gone M.I.A., K.I.A. or D.O.A., and this applies to the actors as well. This leaves room still for another Bond, the seventh one. If he were any good, he'd truly earn the 007 digit.