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Westworld

good, bad, ugly: nostalgia edition

December 14, 2016 by Matt Hill Leave a Comment

re

some say
we live in an age
of nostalgia

round up the recent remakes,
the reboots, the revivals,
the side stories,
the things even just
intentionally reminiscent
of other, older,
more established things,
and prepare to be
flooded in the fond feels,
deluged in the delights
of yesterday, of yesteryear

remember Star Wars?
you don’t have to.
Disney will ensure
a regular fresh hit
from here on out.

want more Harry Potter?
no problem.
muggles everywhere
will always need educating
on fantastic beasts.

need you some Dory again?
some female ghostbusters?
girls of the Gilmore persuasion?
a differently, yet still
extremely packed abode?
Westworld for the 2010s?
all them stranger 80s things?
for some reason,
a bazillion different spider-men?

you are super. duper. covered.

i kinda bet you always will be

and sometimes, tbh, such things
are bad;
bad as in lack-of-quality bad;
maybe it’s a lack
in the original source,
maybe a misfire –
a spoiling of legacy –
maybe just
too much
too soon
of a good thing;
whatever the case,
let’s agree:
sometimes,
nostalgia is bad

and sometimes,
unfortunately,
nostalgia is ugly;
South Park‘s recent
memberberries storyline
reminds us what a
short walk it can be from
simple nostalgia to
nationalism,
racism, sexism –
of the inherent danger in
seemingly innocent desires like
“make America great again”

but sometimes,
nostalgia is good;
good as in quality good;
good as in
more-of-a-great-thing good;
good as in –
South Park be damned –
i think the new Star Wars
was cool,
and yeah, Rogue One probably
will be too,
and yeah, J.J. Abrams
could probably reboot
the “Star Spangled Banner”
and make it awesomer

and,
sometimes,
most importantly,
nostalgia is even
more good than that;
way even more good

sometimes it’s good in a
that’s-where-i-come-from
sort of way, a
this-is-what’s-important
sort of way

an
ah-yes-that’s-what-i’m-about
sort of way, a
that’s-who-we-are
sort of way

an
i’m-still-the-same, but
i’m-not-the-same
sort of way, a
this-means-this-
for-me-now
sort of way, an
i-own-this-anew
sort of way

you know:
a nostalgia-as-ritual
sort of way;
a vital,
bread-and-wine-
in-remembrance-
of-me,
write-my-words-
on-your-heart-and-
teach-them-to-your-kids,
everything-old-is-new-
is-old-is-new-is-old-
-(is-new)-
sort of way

you know:
the way where –
far from not
being able to look forward
for looking back –
unless we look back,
we don’t even know
what forward means

Filed Under: Editorial, Featured, Reviews Tagged With: abrams, Christian, Fuller House, gilmore girls, Harry Potter, nostalgia, south park, spiritual, Star Wars, stranger things, Westworld

2307 WINTER’S DREAM: Finding God in the Snow

November 26, 2016 by Steve Norton Leave a Comment

2307-winters-dream-1

Directed by Joey Curtis, 2307 Winter’s Dream takes place in the distant future when Earth has become a frozen wasteland and humans live underground to survive the sub-arctic temperatures. With no “man power” on the Earth’s surface, scientists bio-engineer Humanoids that possess great strength, speed, and tolerance to extreme cold. When a rogue humanoid named ASH-393 escapes from captivity and leads a rebellion against mankind, an elite team of soldiers led by Bishop (Paul Sidhu) are dispatched onto the ice to brave the elements and terminate the threat.

Playing out like a hybrid of numerous entries into the sci-fi genre, 2307 doesn’t break any particularly new ice… er… ground. Still, the film is fun and does offer characters to root for, particularly the ragtag band of soldiers sent out into the icy apocalypse. (In addition, after Timothy Lee Depriest shared with me the challenges they faced while filming, I have a much greater appreciation for the visuals themselves.  You can read that interview here.)

2307trailer6

What I found most surprising, however, was the film’s search for the soul. Taking place 120 years ‘after man killed God’, the film begins to set itself up as an argument for mankind’s ability to survive as a testament to his own efforts. Feeling abandoned in their fight for survival, it is clear to them that they must be alone in the universe. Combined with their ability to clone the humanoids through their own scientific efforts, humanity has decided that the belief in God has become irrelevant. After all, with the power to create life in his hands, man has placed himself in a position to take on the role of God himself, despite his wintery wasteland.

Curiously though, 2307 isn’t content to leave the conversation there.

2307trailer2

In fact, much of the film makes a case that despite man’s delusion of power, there remains an element of life that can be neither contained nor eliminated. Although the humanoids may have been engineered by men, they begin to demonstrate aspects of a ‘soul’ that were not programmed into them by their creators. Through their ability to feel love for one another, bear children and even develop religious practices, the humanoids begin to reveal unexplainable spiritual fingerprints. For a world that unquestionably ‘killed God’, this creates a fascinating tension between man’s self-delusion and the reality of something more. Regardless of whether or not he believes there is a God, Bishop finds himself caught in the middle of this spiritual battle and forced to accept the truth. This new reality allows Bishop to reinterpret his entire understanding of the world and, more importantly, the value of the humanoids. What’s more, in doing so, Bishop also regains a part of his soul that has been missing for a long time.

While 2307 is hardly a game-changer in the Sci-Fi world, it does carve out its own space within the genre. More importantly, however, it also wants to have a conversation about the nature of our souls that doesn’t leave you cold.

cover-2037-750x400

 

2307: Winter’s Dream is currently playing the festival circuit and is looking at a wide release in the spring.

Filed Under: Film, Reviews Tagged With: 2307 Winter's Dream, Bishop, cold, humanoids, ice, Joey Curtis, sci-fi, science fiction, Timothy Lee DePriest, Westworld, winter

Westworld & Trump, Optimism & Hope

November 16, 2016 by Matt Hill Leave a Comment

westworld_2
i’m highly optimistic about
HBO’s new hit show, Westworld
 
(if you’ve not seen it,
imagine a
sort-of sci-fi,
cyberpunk Western,
steeped in
J.J. Abrams style
cerebralism and cliffhangery;
a deliberately paced show
full of sweeping
panoramic shots,
shootouts, sex, robots
(rinse, recombine, repeat),
acting clinics put on
by a superb cast
(Anthony Hopkins
can do no wrong),
and enough intrigue to
[insert your own
cowboy-themed
capper here]
 
of course,
i’ve obviously seen the show,
so it’s not its
continued quality or excellence
i’m expressing optimism about, no
 
i’m optimistic that –
though at present
the plot has the
titular theme park
twisted into a knot
so dense and
so tending towards a
negative, gloomy,
“dark” view of things
(the future,
human nature,
etc.) –
it will
(eventually, ultimately)
take a turn towards a
positive, upbeat,
“bright” view of things,
or at least
use this view
to sweetly temper itself
and give us that
at-least bearable last look
 
i have this
optimistic opinion
for multiple reasons, chiefly:
i’m familiar with people
and with stories
 
i know the
showrunners,
the creators,
the people behind
Westworld
will want that
at-least bearable last look,
because that’s what people want;
so too this is what
watchers of Westworld will want;
so too this is
what stories uniformly give us
(why this is so
is a great question, though
attempting an answer
belongs elsewhere)
 
i have this
optimistic opinion,
in other words,
based on evidence –
previous knowledge,
experience, etc. –
and it seems to me
that it makes sense to be
optimistic in such cases
 
d6d107341a8cb99e2fe6be48fff69ee56898ed8a
on the other (small, orange) hand,
i’m not highly optimistic about the
USA’s new hit show,
Donald Trump, Prez Elect
 
(if you’ve not seen it,
imagine a
post-truth “reality” TV show
so unimaginable,
you’d never be able to
imagine it happening
in actual reality,
and then
imagine it happening
in actual reality)
 
if it makes sense to have an
optimistic opinion
based on evidence –
previous knowledge,
experience, etc. –
then it seems to me
that it doesn’t make sense to be
optimistic in this case
 
quite the opposite, in fact,
unfortunately
 
however
 
though there may not be
reason to be
optimistic about
the prospect of a
President Trump,
there is always
reason to be
hopeful
 
hopeful in that old
Bibley, Christiany, Jesusy
way, where –
despite current
circumstantial evidence,
despite lack of evidence
that might lead to an
optimistic opinion –
you still know that
*it’s going to be okay*
because how things go down
in this world (and beyond)
isn’t ultimately up to us humans
 
hopeful in that old
it’s-Friday-now-but-Sunday’s-coming
kind of way,
that old
“in this world you’ll have trouble,
but i’ve overcome the world”
kind of way,
that old
“God will wipe away every tear”
kind of way
 
hopeful, in other words,
in that old kind of way that
optimism,
for all its
sometimes sensible charms,
can only aspire to
 
are you hopeful like this?
not optimistic, but hopeful?
if not, you can be;
would you like to be?
 
would you like to have
an option beyond
understandable pessimism?
justified fear?
anger?
an option beyond
bemoaning on social media,
assuaging pains with
Obama Biden memes?
 
an option beyond
the current
irrationality of optimism?
an option beyond
just another shot in
just another four years?
 
you can;
would you like to?
 
all it takes,
humbly, hopefully, friend,
is a ride west of
present perspective,
on a horse of a different color,
made just for you,
just for all of us
 
a horse with a new name
for a new world
 
a horse that you don’t have to drive
alone
 
a horse that alone can take
us to a place
where actual action can happen
 
from here
right now

Filed Under: Current Events, Editorial, Reviews, Television Tagged With: Christian, Donald Trump, HBO, hope, Optimism, President, review, spiritual, television, Trump, TV, Westworld

Surviving Winter’s Dream: An Interview with Timothy Lee DePriest

October 30, 2016 by Steve Norton Leave a Comment

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Timothy Lee DePriest isn’t new to the Hollywood scene.

With guest roles in shows like Sons of Anarchy, Southland, and many more over the years, he’s more than familiar with the challenges of breaking into the industry. However, with starring roles in the sci-fi film, 2307: Winter’s Dream, and HBO’s mega-hit series Westworld, DePriest has finally stepped into the limelight. With all the attention, he admits that the sudden notoriety has been somewhat overwhelming.

“I’m [thinking] ‘What just happened to me?’” he remarks. “That [first] Westworld episode aired on a Sunday. On the Wednesday, I got a call from a director that wanted to meet me and that’s never happened to me before. It’s just so weird.”

tve102982-3847-20161002-0

“Just to be on set with Ed Harris, Evan Rachel Wood, Geoffrey Wright, you learn so much. You see how it’s really done. Ed Harris is the coolest guy in the world and it just looks effortless to him. He’s just being [so] natural. So, that came along around the same time [as 2307] and it takes a couple of years so I wasn’t even sure what would happen with those things.”

With the release of 2307: Winter’s Dream, DePriest continues his work within the sci-fi world. Still, what excited him most about the project wasn’t the post-apocalyptic storyline or the epic action scenes. For him, the most appealing aspect was the opportunity to work with director Joey Curtis.

“I was really excited because [of] Joey,” he responds. “When I first learned about the project, just hearing his name and that he was involved with BLUE VALENTINE was a big sell for me because I love that movie. I’m always looking to do more quality stuff.”

408656

 2307: Winter’s Dream takes place in the year 2307—or 141 years ‘after man killed God’—as earth has become a barren, frozen wasteland. Forced underground by the extreme cold with a depleted population, mankind creates the ‘Humanoids’, superhuman slaves bio-engineered to stand up to the harsh conditions. When rogue humanoid named ASH-393 escapes from captivity, a team of elite military operatives, including Ishmael (DePriest), is sent into the ice-covered wilderness to eliminate the leader and the ensuing Humanoid threat.

Although science fiction isn’t necessarily his favourite genre, DePriest admits that the chance to star in films like this (or series such as Westworld) is something that he really enjoys and wouldn’t want to pass up.

“It’s odd because the films I like—and the reason I got into the business— are these scrappy, weird little films like Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, I love Jim Jarmusch’s early films, Aronofsky, Jonathan Glazer, Noah Baumbach. I like these indie, character-focused films but, of course, I love to have fun. When you’re doing sci-fi, you’re [basically] playing a superhero and that is extremely fun.“

Of course, ‘fun’ isn’t always the case when shooting a film like this, especially when it takes place in the midst of a glacial, post-apocalyptic desert.

While many of the indoor scenes were shot in a Los Angeles studio—DePriest muses that it was funny to be wiping away their sweat “because we were all bundled up shooting in Southern California”—the majority of the film takes place outdoors.

In the middle of nowhere.

In the snow.

Amazingly, the director found what he needed in an almost unexpected location: Buffalo, New York. Filming shortly after the infamous ice storm of 2014, DePriest explains that they were able to get the right effect by shooting on top of frozen Lake Erie.

2307wd-still-0004

“We had to wait until we could actually physically go there,” he recalls. “[Due to the weather], we would have died because it was so cold. We came in the spring but it was still cold, and we shot on frozen Lake Erie. We were just outside Buffalo and we stayed in the cabins [of a nearby Christian camp]. The lake was right behind there and they would take us a mile out in snowmobiles to the sets that they’d built out there and we shot on Lake Erie. It was about negative 20 with wind chill. I was wondering how they would do that and it made so much sense being out on a frozen lake. It looked like there was no one out there. It was such a great location.”

With this in mind, DePriest also feels that science fiction also opens up doors for conversations about our current culture as well. In other words, while the film maintains an aura of fun, he also believes that 2307 also speaks to issues about human rights and how we treat the disenfranchised in our world.

“I had a friend who just came back from Greece and she was working with Syrian refugees. We’re all trying to find a place and, man, when you’re not wanted. Her frustration was that nobody wants these people. Why don’t we want them and how do we deal with that? It’s kind of the same deal with the humanoids. We created them and we think we own them and that we can just toss them out.”

2307wd-still-0003

Somewhat ironically, while 2307 claims to take place in a time after ‘man killed God’, the film also lands on a distinctly existential question by asking who has the right to a ‘soul’. Although he, himself, doesn’t hold any specific spiritual worldview, DePriest also recognizes that this search for the soul can be a source of hope and healing.

“I went through a really dark time in my life where I was going off the rails in Hollywood, throwing myself into every excess, and I kind of hit a wall. The only thing that saved me was kind of going within. I guess that… every religious practice is like that where you try to find meaning and that soul within is probably a good place to start. For me, that’s what it feels like.”

With a hard-working attitude and a strong sense of hope, Timothy Lee DePriest seems ready to leave his mark on Hollywood. From Westworld to 2307: Winter’s Dream, he is grateful that he continues to have the opportunity to tell stories that matter.

photo by Audi England

Filed Under: Film, Interviews, SmallFish Tagged With: 2307, Anthony Hopkins, Aronofsky, Aronovsky, Blue Valentine, Ed Harris, Evan Rachel Wood, Geoffrey Wright, humanoid, Michelle Williams, Noah Baumbach, Ryan Gosling, Sons of Anarchy, Southland, Timothy Lee DePriest, Westworld, Winter's Dream

Most Intriguing Shows of Fall 2016

September 12, 2016 by Jacob Sahms Leave a Comment

lifeinpiecesLet’s get this out of the way early: there aren’t many returning shows that actually have me excited about the return of television shows and streaming episodes. Sure, I’ll be watching the fourteenth season of NCIS and the third season of Scorpion because they’re like a good pair of old slippers: I know just what I’m getting. Absolutely, I’ll dive back into Longmire which Netflix saved from the A&E dumpster. Yes, it’ll be funny to watch Michael Rosenbaum fumble his way through church and pastoral care in Impastor, and Life in Pieces is the funniest ensemble comedy no one is raving about. [And just because Supes shows up along with the ‘real’ Wonder Woman, Lynda Carter, I’ll tune in for Supergirl.]

It’s the new shows that still hold hope for something truly good. But we have to clear some air first.

lethalweaponWith apologies to movies-turned-television, my hope is not in Lethal Weapon, Frequency, or Van Helsing.

It’s not in a female baseball player pitching for the San Diego Padres in Pitch, although I do still think Mark-Paul Gosselaar is saved by the bell.

No, here are my half-dozen shows – weeded out of the nearly 150 shows debuting in the next two months – that my full focus is on.

goodplaceThe Good Place (NBC) stars Eleanor (Kristen Bell) and the kind architect Michael (Ted Danson) who designed the place Eleanor wakes up in. But she can’t curse – or have any fun the way she expects to. Is this heaven? I’m not sure yet. But it looks funny, and it’s bound to provide me with some sermon talking points about what the writer thinks about the life eternal.

timelessTimeless (NBC): A history professor, Lucy (Abigail Spencer), a soldier, Wyatt (Matt Lanter), and a scientist, Rufus (Malcolm Barrett), chase Garcia Flynn (Goran Visnjic), a criminal aimed on changing history… through time. Butterfly Effect? Let’s go crazy, in a show that sounds like it’s Doctor Who-meets-Quantum Leap only we don’t have to deal with Scott Bakula or Max’s cigars. I’m in. I bet it only makes it a season… if that… but I’m intrigued.

convictionConviction (ABC): Hayley Atwell (Agent Carter) plays Hayes Morrison, a former First Daughter who now leads the Conviction Integrity Unit investigating wrongfully accused innocents who have been sentenced to prison. This seems political – and timely – given the number of people who are wrongly convicted. I’m always game for a social justice television show, even though this seems to be a storyline that cycles through periodically (see the 2006 Stephanie March series starring Alexandra Cabot in her Law & Order role). Given Atwell’s ‘stage presence’ and growing issues with wrongly incarcerated innocents, this show could challenge us to get involved.

bullBull (CBS): Michael Weatherly playing a character based on Phil “Dr. Phil” McGraw? Tony DiNozzo would be proud. There’s bound to be some clever banter there – and Weatherly wouldn’t have bailed on his NCIS paycheck if this didn’t carry the goods. While I appreciate Weatherly’s panache, I’m curious to learn more about Dr. Phil before he was Oprah’s first TV offspring.

westworld

Westworld (HBO): No Yul Brynner or Sean Connery, but Anthony Hopkins? The story of a glitching fantasy amusement park has some interesting sci-fi elements that will have me intrigued – when it finally comes out on Blu-ray. Once again, like The Running Man, it seems our love for reality TV may be getting a fictional critique.

lukecage

Luke Cage (Netflix): The Marvel shows are better than the Marvel movies. Daredevil, Jessica Jones. Just saying. But with impenetrable Luke Cage, we have an African American hero who has some issues – including the death of his wife. Not as cerebrally tormented as Jones, those with a comic background know that Jones and Cage end up as a couple. Having seen their mutual falling out, once has to question how that will happen. What will it take to get these two to be a power couple?

I’m sure someone will have a bone to pick. Bring it on. I’ll be fiddling with my DVR.

Filed Under: Editorial, Featured, SmallFish, Television Tagged With: Bull, Colin Hanks, Conviction, Goran Visnjic, Haley Atwell, HBO, Life in Pieces, Luke Cage, Michael Weatherly, Netflix, The Good Place, Timeless, Westworld

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