Posts tagged Harrison Ford
“Ender’s Game” Is Game Over
Nov 16th
“Game Over”
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
Ender’s Game is based on Owen Scott Card’s novel of the same name for young adults, and so if you are not a young adult, meaning a teenager, you can skip this movie.
In my opinion, even if you are a young adult, a teenager, immature, or even fascinated with video games, you can skip this movie.
Sure, Harrison Ford, Viola Davis, and Ben Kingsley appear in it, but they are there only as adult window dressing for a story that is about kids and for kids.
The hero is Ender Wiggin, the time is in the future, and the plot is that Earth has to be saved from a future invasion of aliens.
Already, I can hear the room filling with a loud chorus of Ho Hums.
We are told that the world’s smartest children are the planet’s best hope, and the reason is that the future invasion will be fought like a video game, which is strange when you think about it, because the only reality casualty in playing video games is something that might just be called “remote thumb” in order to correspond to tennis elbow.
Anyway, don’t think about it, because there is nothing in this movie worth thinking about, except that the filmmakers are probably hoping that this will be the first in a series of franchise movies and there will be more coming, on which they can lose money.
Anyhow, Ender is a young teenage boy who is bullied at school, but who is clever enough at playing video games that he is singled out for special training in anticipation of the future alien invasion.
Ender has a sister, and he tells her, “All I could think was, what would Peter do?”
Peter is their brother, who was selected for training before Ender, but he washed out of the program, which consists of being treated like privates in a military boot camp, but with training that consists of floating around in huge zero gravity sets and firing weapons at each other.
Can I get a “Ho Hum”?
Of course, there are one or more kids who give Ender a hard time, of course there are other kids who support him, and of course Ender succeeds and advances to higher levels of more rigorous training.
Ender’s Game just makes me say “Game over!”
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
Ender’s Game – Movie Trailer
Nov 10th
In the near future, a hostile alien race (called the Formics) have attacked Earth. If not for the legendary heroics of International Fleet Commander Mazer Rackham (Ben Kingsley), all would have been lost. In preparation for the next attack, the highly esteemed Colonel Hyrum Graff (Harrison Ford) and the International Military are training only the best young children to find the future Mazer. Ender Wiggin (Asa Butterfield), a shy, but strategically brilliant boy is pulled out of his school to join the elite. Arriving at Battle School, Ender quickly and easily masters increasingly difficult war games, distinguishing himself and winning respect amongst his peers. Ender is soon ordained by Graff as the military’s next great hope, resulting in his promotion to Command School. Once there, he’s trained by Mazer Rackham, himself, to lead his fellow soldiers into an epic battle that will determine the future of Earth and save the human race. Based on the best-selling, award winning novel, ENDER’S GAME is an epic adventure which stars Asa Butterfield, Hailee Steinfeld, Ben Kingsley, Viola Davis, with Abigail Breslin and Harrison Ford.
“Morning Glory” Delightful Look at Today’s Television
Dec 9th
“Delightful Look at Today’s Television”
MORNING GLORY is an amusing little comedy about the people in charge of a television network’s morning show trying to increase their ratings and keep from being canceled.
Starring Rachel McAdams, Harrison Ford, and Diane Keaton, the movie can bring back memories of when these morning shows were more about news than they were about entertainment, more about information than they were about ratings, and when they didn’t require their hosts to become buffoons.
Good times.
McAdams plays Becky Fuller, who gets fired from her producer’s job on a morning show in New Jersey and finally gets an interview in New York City for the job of executive producer of “Daybreak,” the morning show on IBS, the fourth-place network.
Jeff Goldblum plays Jerry Barnes, the head of the news division who interviews Becky, and he tells her that her boss in New Jersey had said that Becky was the most promising producer he had ever fired.
Despite that less-than-glowing recommendation and despite the fact that Jerry tells her she has never been an executive producer before and she is too young, she gets the job of executive producer of “Daybreak.”
However, when she shows up for her first day of work and tells the guard in the lobby who she is, he tells her, “Another one? Don’t unpack.”
Becky’s first meeting with her staff is chaotic, but after she takes control, she surprises everybody by firing the male co-host on the spot.
Now she has to find someone to replace him who won’t cost a penny and still get the ratings up, which leads her to Mike Pomeroy, played by Ford, who is still under contract to the network after being fired from the network news desk.
Mike refuses to be the co-host at first, but Becky finds a loophole in his contract and essentially blackmails him to join the show, which annoys the other co-host, Colleen Peck, played by Keaton.
Mike refuses to say the word “fluffy,” Colleen insists on being the one to say “Goodbye” at the end of the show, and you can see where all this bickering is going to end.
Even so, it is very funny getting there.
MORNING GLORY is a delightful look at today’s television, and for some a wish that it would become as serious as it used to be.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
