Click images for desktop size: "Contrasting Sounds - Detail" by Kandinsky I watched the new "3:10 To Yuma".
I like westerns. I like that the future is nothing but possible.
The best thing about it was how easily it forced me to recall the original Delmar Daves, Glenn Ford, Van Heflin western.
This one held my interest the most when it did direct quotes from the original. In the end the new version merely pointed out the weaknesses of the new director, James Mangold. It became a trite entertainment instead of the assertion of humanity that the minor original contained and exploited.
Russell Crowe's portrayal of Ben Wade was too much of a sociopath to ever feel comfortable with. glenn Ford's Ben Wade was an outlaw, an intelligent killer but not a bad man. His actions were always true to himself. Ford's Wade was a western sensualist and the movie's ending seemed wish fulfillment and natural, a satisfying conclusion to a play where he cast himself as the hero.
Christian Bale's Dan was weak and deceptive. Heflin's Dan was weak but infinitely true to himself and his self image. Most irritating in this new version was the use of the son. It was manipulative to cast the kid into the company of danger merely because Mangold had no faith in the intelligence of his audience and mainly because Mangold has no faith in people. He used the kid as a club. A man would not follow through on an impossible task for his own self esteem , his own pride and his own vision of the world, a man would only be brave to perpetuate a deception and to promote a lie.
In terms of ability to tell a story, Mangold clearly had no faith in his own abilities. He erased all the tension. Tension is tough to convey to an audience. It takes skill. Mangold turned away from the tension and turned it into a "road movie". Road movies require the least skill. Every film student has at one time or another made a road movie. They're easy. All you have to do is keep moving, keep your characters extreme and unnatural.
The movie made me sad. American films have stopped believing in people as heroes.
We are heroes.

Tomorrow I'm excited. I'll get to see USC play Arizona on TV. I'll get to see Sanchez make his first start and hope to see something magical that might save the Trojan's season.
It will make up for the incidental stress of this week. Nothing really, just fighting with the same stuff we all fight with. Getting the cable to look right, getting the internet to work right and dealing with the out-sourced customer support.
I've been feeling sicker and more in pain this week, but I've been happy so it doesn't seem so bad. I keep waiting for something shattering to happen and hoping it won't.
I'm taking my bike in for repair. It didn't do well in the moving van. I miss my E-Bike. I have to do laundry tomorrow.
Tough life, huh?
The only real worry is my puppies paw. Its healing fine but I want it well. She's so happy but still worried about me. She's worried too much and still struggling to fit in to this new world. She loves me and tries her hardest.

Click images for desktop size: "Run Home" by Kernhal And here it is coming up on week six in the NFl and none of my kids have been cut from their teams. I don't see them getting playing time yet but they're still out there having a chance at a dream.
So my life is something that can only be described as good. Too fast and too . . . too . . .
I don't know, it just is and there's everything right about that.

Technorati Tags: football, movies, puppy