Ohh the irony

Just the thought of Indian director T Rajeevnath approaching Paris Hilton to play Mother Theresa brings a smile to my face (read a notice of it here). Just as placing Britney Spears in the role of a conservative right wing Christian in a Will & Grace episode. While the Paris thing has passed rather unnoticed the Britney episode brought some unwanted attention to NBC (read some here)

This illustrates the increasing blur between fictional characters and the celebrity persona behind them. As the media and the celebrities become more and more intimately connected this problem arise due to the dualistic nature of their relationship. One day a celebrity makes front page news because of a sordid scandal and the next day you see the same face playing a timid character in the drama you choose to see at the local multiplex.

Today we see a media industry that feeds of the celebrity culture. It’s not an easy task to avoid these tabloids even if you make a conscious effort. The media landscape is so saturated with this iconoclasm that the supposed line is so blurred that no one can see it anymore; Your name is also your brand (more on that some other time).

With this image of the media fresh in mind it’s not hard to understand why people react to Britney playing a Christian talk show host or to Paris Hilton playing the saint Mother Teresa. Today people can’t see past the tabloid image of any of these girls and they see the personas not the roles they play. This is not a new phenomenon but in recent years I feel that this problem has grown out of proportions.

One could argue that this happens to any actor/actress that is caught up in the media circus. Take Ben Affleck for example. His association with J lo made his career sky rocket but ultimately also was his downfall. He became famous for being married to Lopez. This made his face famous and by implication also more worth in the eyes of the Hollywood studios. He then received roles that he ultimately could not do honour and therefore fell from grace.

This teaches us that fame is deadly because in the end you need to prove your worth. Wow that conclusion was pretty far from where I started this blog wasn’t it? Remind me to tell you all why I love the word Connotation soo much...

Living in a fantasy (take two)

I think the technological advancement is the single most important factor in the recent success of fantasy films. Fantasy as a genre has always been popular (see my other article about this) but the technical aspects of the special effects have been limited to more primitive ways of creating the illusion of another reality. So even if Willow or Conan were well received films there simply wasn’t a way to recreate a book like Lord of the rings or Narnia. There was an attempt to make Lord of the rings back in 1978 but it failed even to gather the smallest of audiences before fading into history.

It seems to me that most people think that the pressure of living in today’s society is the single most important factor in the success of films such as Lord of the rings. If this is true most movies where we are transported to another world would be popular today because of the need for escapism. I find that the recent success of the documentary contradict this argument. If we wanted to escape reality we wouldn’t go to the cinema to watch a documentary about war or other wrong doings would we?

So why didn’t more directors make fantasy movies in the eighties when they knew that those movies made a healthy amount of money? Could it be the difficulty of converting the penned reality into a visceral experience? How would one create fabled monsters or mass battles with thousand participants? One simple answer could be that the stories people wanted to adopt were too complicated visually.

Today the special effects are so complex that it is hard to distinguish between our reality and the recreated one. This is a powerful tool for directors to use when they want to immerse their viewers. It was simply not possible to realise the books of our favourite authors ten years ago so we had to wait until now to be able to recreate the image in peoples mind on the silver screen.

The price of fame

Above is a picture of a Swedish artist named Marie Serneholt. She was once part of a pop group called A-teens (left image) but now she has gone solo (right image). Gone are the healthy looking girl I used to like and now all we see is a reality show contestant look alike with more in common with Mrs Beckham than with her old self. So what happened? Could it be the PR department of SMI records where she resides who decided that she was to change her image to that of a blonde bimbo?

A-teens have always been a healthy looking band with a younger target audience. When I survey the bands with similar audiences I find that most of them focus on the having fun, looking healthy aspect instead of the sexy and erotic aspects of their image. Examples like Spice girls, early Britney Spears and Aguilera comes to mind. When the artists then need to focus on a more mature audience out goes the wholesome image and in comes the highly pornographic image bent on selling copies with sex instead of the actual music. This pattern can be seen in both Britney and Aguilera’s case as in many others.

It's sad to see that the record companies no longer have faith in the music they put out but feel the need to wrap it in eroticism to sell. It's a clinical view where the music has become a product much like a perfume or a pair of sneakers. No longer is music a creative way of expressing one self, it’s a product created in the labs of our record companies and spread to us through commercial channels like MTV much like a shopping network try to sell the latest Ab-flex.

Today almost anyone can be a star the question is really how much of your personal integrity you are prepared to sacrifice.

Living in a fantasy

This post is inspired by an assignment posted on this blog. It felt just right talking about a supposed trend within the movie industry. Give my two cent so to speak.

As a kid I remember watching movies like Conan and Willow with big wondrous eyes. Even with the stop motion and simple animatronics used in those days they spellbound me. Stories of lands far away where big Austrians with even bigger swords and furry briefs fought evil men. But was I alone in liking what I saw? Were the fantasy genre really a fringe genre only including the Dungeon and dragon geeks?

It’s easy to think that fantasy was a genre on the fringe of Hollywood but with names like Max von Sydow, James Earl Jones, Val Kilmer and Kevin Pollack the genre competed with other contemporary films in gross sales. If you read the gross estimate on imdb.com you see that Conan did well cashing in around 39 million dollars while movies like Blade runner did far less ending on around 26 million dollars and the always prestigious Woody Allen’s film A midsummer night’s sex comedy only grossed 9 Million at the box office. In 1988 Willow grossed around 57 million while Dangerous Liaisons only grossed 34 millions even with names such as Glenn Close, John Malkovich, Michelle Pfeifer, Uma Thurman and a young Keanu reeves.

So while the genre is incredibly popular today I dare to say that it has never been on the fringe. The stories are accessible to people of all ages disregarding previous knowledge and experience. Since no one has been to the fantastic worlds depicted on screen the suspension of disbelief is closer at hand that say Armageddon when everyone knows (or think they know) that it’s harder to fly in space that drilling for oil.

It might not have answered the question ‘why fantasy is so popular today’ but I think it countered the 'on the fringe' statement with satisfaction.

Hollywood in a gay frenzy

2003 Hollywood wasn't ready for John Singleton's seminal take on the gayness of the macho culture. His film, the sizzling 2 fast 2 furious, starred the handsome Paul Walker as an undercover cop infiltrating the male world of street racing. What could be manlier than fast cars and broad chests? But instead of being showered with praise and awards he was ridiculed for what essentially would be a mile stone in Hollywood history. The question is if we would have Brokeback mountain if Singleton hadn’t laid the foundation.

Instead we had to wait until 2005 and Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain before the gay frenzy would hit tinsel town. In Ang Lee’s movie we explore another bastion of maleness, the Marlboro man and his lonely life on the prairie. Ever since we were old enough to understand the concept of macho there have always been jokes about what happens in the showers of our favourite hockey team or how the fire men make the time pass before they have to descend the pole for another sweaty encounter. So in reality Ang hasn’t really done something to help the gay community. Instead he has chosen to explore the male stereotypes and their thinly veiled homosexuality just as the teenagers laugh about the prospect of Peter Forsberg soaping up another player in the shower.

Stereotypes or not Hollywood has jumped the bandwagon and I would bet that every script writer in Hollywood is thinking hard how to create the next gay John McClane at the moment. Rumour has it that even Brad Pitt wants to be gay so there is always the possibility of a homosexual fight club or some hard vampire action to look forward to.

In the past gay people have been confined to roles such as serial killers or hair dressers but now Hollywood is open to those who dare to further strengthen the prejudice concerning macho culture and its hidden world of gay love. this might be a good time for Dolph Lundgren to make a comeback.

Who is responsible?

As we speak Hell is on its way of creating another circle in its ever open hotel of damned souls. A circle dedicated to companies that sell ring tones to the modern (damned) consumer. I can't understand the need to change ring tone every other week for the next "hot" MTV song. As if I didn't hear Beyonce enough every time I turn on the TV. Now I must hear her songs on the buss, in the grocery store, in the ticket line to my favourite cinema, in the restaurant where I try to enjoy a good meal and even in the library. The Devil has found a way to desecrate every last sanctum known to man with the choir of "I’m so unique" ring tones spreading the commercial gospel of the record companies.

So all of you who dance to the pipes of Jamba and other such peddlers of cellular porn mark my words you will all burn in hell for your heinous acts of treachery against mankind. And in Hell there are no polyphonic ring tones… Oh the sweet sound of thousands of damned souls drowned in the cacophony of Nokia 5110 ring tones.