Movie Monday: Argo

I was horribly ill last week, but I felt well enough by Saturday to sit through a movie so my mother rented Argo.  (I seem to be totally better now, thankfully.)  I've wanted to see Argo since I first saw the trailer, so ending the long wait did help make me feel better.  (And less out of the loop.  It won the Academy Award for Best Picture before I got around to seeing it!)

Argo begins with a comic-book style sequence imparting the basics of modern Iranian history.  I was pretty impressed, because if there is one thing I've learned from FLCL, comic-book style sequences are hard to animate.

The Argo leaps into a riveting sequence, when a mob of students breaks into the US Embassy in Tehran - and six employees in a side building manage to escape the hostage situation.  They find refuge with the Canadian ambassador and the CIA decides extracting them isn't a priority.  Then the situation changes.  And no one has a clue how to get them out.  Their best idea?  Create a fake movie and say the six are a film crew scouting locations.

Argo does a good job of keeping the tension high, but not so high that the movie is a pain to watch.  There are spots to breathe.  Even before Tony Mendez (Ben Affleck) goes to Hollywood, there's humor in the scene where the State Department presents their ideas for extraction to the CIA.  But the majority of the humor does come from the Hollywood scenes.

I particularly enjoyed how Argo used period music.  Films set in the seventies tend to go for the same songs.   It's a storytelling crutch nowadays.  Those recognizable bits of classic rock are there, but they tend to punctuate a scene instead of playing out over an action montage.  Late in the movie one song is allowed to play on, and I'm not sure whether I like it or not.  The song is perfect for the scene, but the lyrics are so on the nose that it's hard not to feel like you're being nudged with the clue hammer.

I find the real story behind Argo fascinating.  I knew about the Iranian Hostage Crisis from school - and my mom from being alive in 1979 - but I'd never heard about the six.  I enjoyed reading up on the situation and finding out what was real and what was invented to make the movie more dramatic.  Honestly, I think the movie could've dialed back on the invention a hair and been even better.  Many of the added bits stuck out as artificial, messing with the movie's realistic tone.

I liked Argo because it's a fascinating story and it was told with style, humor, and urgency.  I can't say whether it deserved to win the statue since I haven't seen many of its competitors yet, but I don't think it's a film someone would regret watching.  And it's kind of sad that the Argo cover film was never to be because it sounds like something I would love.

Review: The Namesake

By Steven Parlato
Available now from Merit Press (F+W Media)
Review copy
Winner of the 2011 Tassy Walden Award for New Voices, young adult category

Reading THE NAMESAKE was an emotional experience.  I had to read it bit by bit over a couple of weeks, lest I be overwhelmed.  Evan Galloway is haunted by his father's suicide, and the more he discovers about his father's secrets the worse it gets.

Evan was named for his father, although their middle names are different and he isn't a true Junior.  He looks like his father, aside from his ears.  He attends the same Catholic school his father did.  He's interested in art too, although he prefers writing instead of painting.  Evan wants to know that he isn't going to follow in his father's footsteps and to know that he has to know his father and why he did it.

THE NAMESAKE is beautifully written.  Debut author Steven Parlato evoked several images that are going to linger in my mind.  It's a story that tackles a lot beyond the big issues of suicide and sexual abuse.  It is truly Evan's journey even if it is underpinned by his father's tragic story.

Some parts of THE NAMESAKE are very graphic.  I don't regret reading the novel, but I do wish I could cut some of the details out of my mind.  Parlato does not pull his punches, which makes the catharsis more powerful if more difficult to reach.

THE NAMESAKE is powerful, moving contemporary fiction that will appeal to fans of Beth Kephart and Laurie Halse Anderson.  It is a very strong debut, and Parlato has left a mark even if he never writes another novel.

Waiting On Wednesday: April Fairytales!

Waiting On Wednesday is a meme hosted by Jill of Breaking the Spine.

I Am A Reader, Not A Writer, The Book Rat, and A Backwards Story are hosting the Fairy Tale Fortnight.  In honor of that very fun event, I decided to highlight three new fairytale retellings coming out next month.  All three are middle grade and all summaries are provided by the publisher.

FROGGED by Vivian Vande Velde

How can I resist a new book by Vande Velde? She's tackled fairytales before, so I'm sure FROGGED will be fantastic.

One should be able to say of a princess “She was as good as she was beautiful,” according to The Art of Being a Princess (third revised edition), which the almost-thirteen-year-old Princess Imogene is supposed to be reading. Not feeling particularly good, or all that beautiful, she heads for a nearby pond, where, unfortunately, a talking frog tricks her into kissing him. No prince appears, as one might expect. Instead, the princess turns into a frog herself! Thus launches a funny, wonderfully spun fractured fairy tale in which Imogene wonders if she will be forever frogified.

THRICE UPON A MARIGOLD by Jean Farris

This is the third book in Jean Ferris' terrific Marigold series. Not a direct retelling, but the series has a fairytale sensibility.

Princess Poppy, the bouncing baby daughter of Queen Marigold and King Christian of Zandelphia-Beaurivage, is in terrible danger. The kingdom’s former torturer-in-chief and poisoner-in-chief have joined forces to kidnap the baby as an act of revenge for their exile! Can a ragtag parade of rescuers—including the king and queen, the evil kidnappers’ mortified children, five dogs, a white elephant, and a washed-up wizard—save Princess Poppy in time?

RUMP: The True Story of Rumpelstiltskin by Liesl Sutcliff

I am not familiar with Sutcliff, but this novel looks super cute!

In a magical kingdom where your name is your destiny, 12-year-old Rump is the butt of everyone's joke.

Rump has never known his full name—his mother died before she could tell him. So all his life he's been teased and bullied for his half-a-name. But when he finds an old spinning wheel, his luck seems to change. For Rump discovers he can spin straw into gold. Magical gold.

His best friend Red Riding Hood warns him that magic is dangerous—and she's right! That gold is worth its weight in trouble. And with each thread he spins, Rump weaves himself deeper into a curse.

There's only one way to break the spell: Rump must go on a quest to find his true name, along the way defending himself against pixies, trolls, poison apples, and one beautiful but vile-mannered queen. The odds are against him, but with courage and friendship—and a cheeky sense of humor—Rump just might triumph in the end.

An inventive fairytale retelling, perfect for fans of Gail Carson Levine or Shannon Hale.

Review: Strange Fates

Nyx Fortuna (Book 1)
By Marlene Perez
Available now from Orbit (Hachette)

STRANGE FATES is the first book in a new adult urban fantasy trilogy to be followed by DARK DESCENT (later this year) and FORTUNE'S FAVOR (early 2014).  I love reading about the Fates, I've heard fantastic things about Marlene Perez's young adult books, and I was excited by a trilogy that would be published within the year instead of stretched out over three years.  Plus, the ebook was at a bargain price.  Unfortunately STRANGE FATES was not everything I'd hoped for.

It wasn't all bad.  The world Perez created is fascinating.  There are four houses of power, and Nyx Fortuna belongs to the strongest: the House of Fate.  That's not a good thing for him, because his mother was the fourth Fate, murdered by her sisters and forgotten.  He wants revenge and then he wants to die himself.  But the remaining Fates are up to something fishy and a missing scientist might be the key to it all.

The biggest problem with STRANGE FATES was Elizabeth.  When Nyx meets her, he knows that she's a liar and using him for her own mysterious ends.  She does nothing but confirm this impression.  For some reason, he decides to begin a relationship with her anyway.  He falls for her soon enough, despite the fact that Elizabeth shows no qualities other than being a manipulative liar and does everything she can to betray his inexplicable trust and on top of everything else he's apparently never fallen in love before in his long life.  There is no character-based reason for Nyx to be in love and it's this hollow core at the center of his motivation.  His friendship with Willow, a murderous naiad, isn't much more developed.  But Perez clearly has the skills to show people getting to know and like each other, considering how Nyx and Talbot's relationship grows closer as they work and hang together.

The second biggest problem is that Nyx seems to change his priorities part of the way through the novel without much explanation.  He's very clear about his desire to kill the Fates and determined to get revenge for the first half of the novel, but then when things start falling into place to destroy the Fates he does the exact opposite of jumping at his chance.  I am all for Perez throwing some nuance into the relationship and broadening Nyx's perspective, but I was honestly baffled by most of Nyx's decisions in the second half of STRANGE FATES.

There is a lot of talent behind STRANGE FATES.  Perez created a nifty world and a great main character.  She has an interesting take on mythology and immortality.  But the execution isn't there at all.  The romance is mind-bogglingly bad and Nyx goes against the entirety of his characterization for the tiniest, least-convincing reason.  I kind of want to read the second to see if Perez manages to save her world, but STRANGE FATES started strong and finished very weak.

Movie Monday: Skyfall

Confession: I have only seen the Daniel Craig James Bond movies.  I like them, and I keep intending to watch the other Bonds, I just never have.  I feel guilty for missing out on the history when I watch them.

Skyfall definitely has old-fashioned pacing.  After the dynamic train sequence at the beginning of the film, it's a slow burn to the explosive finale.  Oh, there are some little action sequences here and there, but director Sam Mendes keeps it simple until its time to break lose and let Bond, Silva (Javier Bardem), and M (Judi Dench) have it out.

I am enamored of the lighting and color in Skyfall.  There are several terrific uses of silhouette, but none better than when Bond grapples with a hitman in a skyscraper with an open window.  It's blue and beautiful and has lingered in my mind.  So many action films are utterly forgettable and interchangeable, so I'd love Skyfall for that sequence alone.

But Skyfall isn't overly arty.  It delivers everything a Bond film promises, what everyone expects whether they've seen a Bond movie before or not.  Chases, a cool car, beautiful women, inventive attempts at murder.  It's frequently funny, even the ruthless M providing plenty of humor.  There is some musing over whether the ends justify the means, but the heroes of the movie are still unquestionably the heroes.

Some elements of the story are weak.  One part of Silva's plan relies on Q, the genius of M1-6, to do something rather dumb.  Of course he does it.  But the characters aren't repeatedly stupid, so I can forgive a few missteps made for the sake of pushing the plot forward.

I really should watch the other Bond films, given how much I've enjoyed Craig's outings as the famous spy.  And I'll definitely keep watching his tenure, and probably that of his successor.