Comments on "Bubba Ho-Tep" - Faerye Net

Re: My take [spoiler alert]

2003-10-06T17:01:28+00:00

You’ve said all the things I’d have liked to have said if I hadn’t been too preoccupied wondering whether or not this sentence was or wasn’t turning into a super ultra quadruple double negative.

No, really though, I agree. I expected another Army of Darkness, but, after some reflection, I think what I got was something altogether more complex and, while still funny, at the same time more serious, and with deep hidden meanings and cool literary stuff like that.

Those tricky bastards.

Re: My take [spoiler alert]

2003-10-06T14:59:36+00:00

I don’t really think about old age that much. I’m 22 and healthy. My family is pretty long-lived. I don’t plan on dying for quite some time.

And that’s the problem. If all goes well, if nothing else kills me, my body will slowly age into a state where I am no longer able to take care of myself. I will persist in that state for years, decades maybe, supported by the wonders of modern medicine. Eventually, something in me will fail and I will die.

That’s scary. That’s a kind of scary that one does not experience all that often in a movie theater. I look at the screen in the movie theater. I see a crazy old man who thinks he’s Elvis (and maybe is). Elvis walks with a walker. He has “a growth on his pecker.” He hasn’t had an erection in a decade. Elvis has been unmanned by time. I look at the screen and I know I’m seeing my future, or something like it.

I went expecting horror-movie scary. There was some of that. But more importantly, there was real scary. There was, over and over again, the realization that some day, I will be old. I will have lived the better part of a century, but people young enough to be my grand children will think nothing of me. I will be less than human to them, because my time has passed. And yet, I will depend on them for everything.

The film is masterfully crafted. The very concept of a Mummy movie about defeating old age is deeply clever.

The construction is such that the Mummy is old age personified. In battling the Mummy, the characters battle against old age. The Mummy sucks your soul out your ass if he gets you, which personifies a loss of both dignity and liveliness in the rest home. The mummy is physically powerful, whereas old age robs you of your strength.

In the end, both characters die. They have defeated old age, but it cost them their lives.

This is the sort of film that I think should win awards, but won’t. It’s not a fun movie. You don’t feel good afterword. But it’s a fine example of film communicating indirectly, rather than directly with images and dialogue.

Even the fact that it feels really long and progresses slowly fits thematically. I give this one 9/10.

Advertising

2003-10-06T14:42:43+00:00

The advertising for the movie certainly didn’t match the movie. I take it from your “I was tricked into seeing a really good film” remark that you think it was a deliberate mismatch - and you may be right. Judging from the savvy of movie marketers en general, I’d be tempted to say THEY messed up or tried to capitalize on Bruce Campbell’s zombie fame - but I think, in the end, it’s a hard thing to market—you HAVE to market the shell, not the heart.

And note he gave up an evening of video games WITH HIS WIFE. That’s some serious sacrifice. I gave up an evening of video games with my husband and breaking in my new PS2 controller. That’s REALLY serious.

My take

2003-10-06T14:20:30+00:00

Last night, as I left the theater, I felt kinda disappointed. I had rushed through dinner and given up an evening of video games to see Elvis-and-JFK-do-Evil-Dead. That’s not what was playing though, and all through the movie I couldn’t help but wait for it to get exciting. It had moments. It had jokes, and I laughed. But it wasn’t Army of Darkness meets The Mummy, which on some level is what I had gone to see.

Today, having slept on it, I think what happened is I was tricked into seeing a really good film. The remainder of the review will contain spoilers, so I will put it in a reply. The plot of the move is not terribly important. It is the themes I will discuss.