Posts tagged Movie
“The Invention of Lying” And That’s the Truth
Oct 8th
And That’s the Truth
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
THE INVENTION OF LYING is a delightful little film that examines how life would be boring if everybody told the truth all the time and how life would be so much more interesting if we just bent the truth in small ways or in large.
Yes, it is a romantic comedy with social overtones.
Ricky Gervais plays Mark, and he is going to have the distinction of telling the world’s first lie when he is put in a situation in which he realizes that he could improve his circumstances if he just said something that didn’t reflect how things actually were.
However, before we get to that momentous event, we watch Mark go out on a first date with Anna, played by Jennifer Garner.
Only the audience is surprised when Anna greets Mark at the door and says, “Hi. You’re early. I was just masturbating.”
Now, you might think that the movie starts off slow, but it gets better as it goes along, especially when you pay attention to the background and all the signs and advertising. Truth in advertising might be refreshing, but it also sure would be boring.
Well, one day Mark needs to clean out his bank account of $300, but when he gets to the bank, the teller says that the computer isn’t working and asks him how much money he has in his account.
Mark has a brilliant thought, and he tells her a number other than 300, and she gives him that amount while apologizing that the computer is down.
Mark is able to turn his life around just by saying things that aren’t really, well, “true,” and he convinces Anna to go out on a second date with him.
But the biggest change occurs when Mark visits his mother in the “Sad Place Where Homeless Old People Come to Die,” which we would call an “Old Folks Home.”
His mother is concerned about dying and her life turning into black nothingness, and so Mark comforts her by making up a story that she is instead going to go to a wonderful place of happiness that is watched over by a “Man in the Sky.”
The story spreads, other people learn about it, and Mark’s life changes completely.
THE INVENTION OF LYING is funny, will ruffle some feathers, and that’s the truth.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
The Invention of Lying – Movie Trailer
Oct 2nd
Ricky Gervais directs himself in The Invention of Lying, a comedy in which everyone in the world tells the truth except for one misfit in the film industry, who after discovering the act of lying, milks it to become the world’s most phenomenal performer. Matthew Robinson will co-direct from his own script, which he and Gervais collaborated on. Jennifer Garner, Rob Lowe, Jonah Hill, and Louis C.K. co-star in the Media Rights Capital production, with John Hodgman, Tina Fey, Christopher Guest, and Jeffrey Tambor rounding out the rest of the cast.
“Surrogates” Derivatives
Sep 30th
Derivatives
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
SURROGATES is a classy looking science-fiction thriller starring Bruce Willis, and the first thing you are going to notice is all the weird-looking blond hair he has.
No, wait! That isn’t Willis’s character with all the hair. That is his surrogate, a realistic android that most people use to go out into society in place of them while the owners stay at home in a room hooked up to a device that allows them to be the “operators,” the eyes, ears, mouth, and flesh of their surrogate.
So, right away the audience is going to be confused between knowing what is a surrogate and what is a real person, and that confusion is going to result in more than one plot point.
Now, here is where I should say that the film is based on a series of comic books–Excuse me! “graphic novels”–called “The Surrogates,” written by Robert Venditti, who went to college with the dream of becoming a novelist.
In fact, in an interview Venditti said, “I was going to be the next Hemingway.”
Venditti is 35, and I am surprised he even knows anything about Ernest Hemingway.
Anyway, back to our movie.
Willis and his surrogate play FBI Agent Tom Greer, who are investigating a seemingly random murder that involves an unregistered surrogate.
Agent Greer has a partner, Agent Jennifer Peters, and she is a beautiful young woman played by Radha Mitchell.
After all, this is based on a comic book, remember?
Their investigation leads them to Dr. Canter, played by James Cromwell, the man who invented surrogates and ran the company that built them.
But before you say, “Uh oh! Wasn’t this already done in the 1982 BLADE RUNNER?” you are going to be reminded of the 2002 MINORITY REPORT when we learn about Agent Greer’s dead son.
And, in fact, when Cromwell shows up, you are also going to be reminded of the 1996 STAR TREK: FIRST CONTACT.
Now, I used to make fun of recycled plots by saying that Hollywood has run out of ideas. Now I am going to say that writers have run out of ideas.
The frame of reference for young writers isn’t literature anymore. It is old movies, and by “old,” I mean within the past 30 years.
SURROGATES is not bad, but should be called DERIVATIVES.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
