Dark knights all week.

MOVIE 103

The Dark Knight
(Christopher Nolan, 2008, 150 m.)

Not completely good and for complicated reasons. Too long by 45 minutes. (Cell phones went on all over the theater at the 120th minute.) Too many speeches about good knights and evil criminals. (We know why people need a Batman.) Too many plot complications. (If they want half a white knight, why not just make a new Robin?) I smell some half-baked franchising.

The big interest in the movie for most people has become Heath Ledger’s role as one frightening Joker. Yes, he is excellently creepy. He deserves the Oscar nomination he will surely get — now. But if he were still alive would he have been nominated?

Now an unofficial complaint: Can we just stop with endlessly blowing up buildings? Everybody knows that some viewers like to see big fireballs onscreen. We get it. Cars and big rigs and helicopters are bad enough. Has nobody in Hollywood noticed that, in fact, three blown-up buildings can change the world overnight?

MOVIE 102

Hellboy II : The Golden Army
(Guillermo del Toro, 2008, 120 m.)

Mostly, just a way to kill some time. The best part was Selma Blair as Liz Sherman. She’s pouty and cool in her little black leather outfit. Given the context, that’s probably a bad part. The worst part is that most parts came from some other movie. The CGI war at the beginning is from Lord of the Rings (oh, and an evil crown in pieces that must never be reunited), the street full of other-worldly critters is basically a Diagon Alley set into Star Wars and so on. Much of the story made little sense, so the script would announce an idea: a big green bean rolls around for a bit and someone says, “It’s going for water!” So, it gets water and turns into a supposedly big indestructo thing (Ghostbusters, Harry Potter), which Hellboy destructs, anyway, and so on. Also, a bunch of joking that I didn’t find funny, except for one lol Barry Manilow moment.

MOVIE 101

Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson
(Alex Gibney, 2008, documentary, 118 m.)

Hunter Thompson’s life and writing were good reasons for why we needed new words to deal with the 1960s. He gave us “gonzo,” which is even in my computer’s dictionary, though the word goes way beyond subjective, exaggerated, unusual and strange. The man became an actual cartoon character! He was an honest American outlaw hero to many people, a genuine thinker and a genuine drugged-out wacko. He put the loathing into "fear and trembling."

He seems to have earned his doctor’s degree from Rolling Stone. And this documentary is about his soul and work, not about his whole life. Among the people in this movie who give their personal memories, usually with some serious respect, are Tom Wolfe, Jimmy Carter and Pat Buchanan. And have you heard of any other reporters who have had four or five movies made about them?

MOVIE 100

Leadbelly
(Gordon Parks, 1976, 126 m.)

At the St. Louis Art Museum – always a good place to watch a movie.

Huddie Ledbetter was his original name. He became Lead Belly (his spelling), a hard black man in a hard Southern world. Many a jail sentence has followed two crimes of passion: sticking some man with a knife just before or after being with some woman. That combo probably covers most of the history of Lead Belly’s life in jail. He was also a natural-born musician who could play all kinds of instruments and wrote songs ranging from the simple and sweet “Goodnight, Irene” to the complicated “Midnight Special.” His 12-string-guitar magic apparently got him out of jail twice. That’s one way to saturate your life in the blues.

In this hard-to-find Gordon Parks movie, Lead Belly is winningly portrayed by Roger E. Mosley of Magnum, P.I. fame — he was TC, Magnum’s helicopter buddy. If you want to watch and hear the actual Lead Belly, you can go to YouTube.

Nick Otten is assistant director in the Theater Program at Clayton High School and adjunct professor in the graduate Communications MAT Program at Webster University. He consumes vast quantities of books and movies. In his description of Nick's List, he says,  "For every single work, I’ll quickly post a brief commentary — each week, at least 1 book and 2 movies, usually more. Maybe a paragraph, maybe a page. Sometimes, not often, I may go crazy and write some kind of extra, a page or so, on some movie or pair of movies or some genre, actor, or something else, or how one book relates to another or a movie or you or me or us. Such stuff will be just one click away, guaranteed." If you want to reach Nick, rather than comment on the articles, contact Beacon features and commentary editor Donna Korando.

To read the previous Nick's List posts click July 28 , July 21 , July 14 , July 7 , June 30 , June 23 , June 16, June 9 , June 2 , May 26 , May 19 , May 12,   May 5 , April 28 , April 21 , March .