Star Wars: Squadrons has Chris feeling like he's 20 years old all over again

For the vastest part I have moved on past video games.  These days if I play any game at all it's going to be something like a rewarding round of Go against a human opponent, or the miniatures game Warhammer 40,000 (either of which provides for keen exercise of the tactical mind).  You know, something physical with tactile sensation.  A few months ago I reviewed Gears Tactics, but then again Gears of War for me isn't so much a game franchise as it is an epic tale (along with the BioShock games and Halo).  And that came when we ALL needed something to keep from going totally bonkers from COVID sequestration from society...

But about that same time came word of Star Wars: Squadrons.  Electronic Arts' foray into what seemed like the first truly dedicated Star Wars flight sim since perhaps X-Wing: Alliance all the way back in 1999.  Oh sure, there have been others involving an element of space warfare.  But the still much-beloved X-Wing series went beyond "aiming and shooting" by adding power management, ordnance selection and other elements that made it truly feel like you were responsibly flying a real ship.  And then there was how 1994's TIE Fighter somehow made you glad to be blasting those Rebel insurgents into space dust!

No Star Wars game like that has come about in the more than two decades since X-Wing: Alliance.  In fact, the entire flight sim genre has seemed pretty much dead or at best in deep coma.  Would one be welcomed with eager arms today?

Based on the wild reviews and raving word of mouth about Star Wars: Squadrons, the answer to that question is an emphatic "Yes!".  So yesterday evening I took the plunge and bought the game.

And now?  I have felt like a 20 year-old kid all over again, that very first night when X-Wing installed on my MS-DOS machine (running on a 486-SX CPU with 4 megabytes of RAM and a 70 megabyte hard drive... yes, I'm ancient).

Star Wars: Squadrons is the X-Wing games all over again, updated to the nth degree.  I've played through the prologue and just a few missions into the main game but that's been enough to bowl me over.  It looks so new, and yet it is so beautifully familiar.  The cockpit layouts look almost exactly the same as they did for the X-Wing games over a quarter century ago: if you ever played TIE Fighter, your first moments inside Squadrons' standard TIE will be a rapturous return to warm surroundings.  The ever-trusty X-wing starfighter looks almost precisely as it did circa 1993.  Even the cargo vessels - those boxy ships we all thrilled to scan for legal goods or Imperial war materiel back in the day - make a faithful return to form.

Maybe I'm missing it so far, but the ONLY aspects from the X-Wings series that I've found absent from Star Wars: Squadrons are the ability to direct more power to front or rear shields, and getting to cycle lasers between one blast or the (slower but more powerful) four blasts at once.  Or maybe they're in the game and I've missed them.  If it hasn't been implied enough already, I've felt like a wide-eyed kid in a candy store playing this game.  It's been reliving a phase of my life that was well before all of the griefs and heartbreaks came over the years since.

Who'd have thought that a video game could make someone feel so spirited again?

There is the single player story mode.  There is also a multiplayer cross-platform function, which I haven't tried yet but some friends are due to be getting Squadrons soon and we'll likely be playing it together.  Which, I'm looking forward to hooking up with them and shooting those Rebel scu... errr, Imperial swine out of the sky.  Until then, there's plenty of time to practice with the single-player campaign.

Game studio Motive deserves a heap o' praise for not just delivering a solid combat flight sim, but making what some are hailing as one of the best Star Wars games in a very long time.  And from me especially, they get mega high marks for tapping into the vein of the X-Wing series and bringing that same spirit back to Earth for a new generation of gamers to discover and enjoy.

X-Wing: Squadrons is available now for XBox One, PlayStation 4, and Windows.  I know it's on Steam for PC users and it may be for sale on the online stores for the consoles.  It's perfectly playable via keyboard and mouse but for a more realistic feel I'll recommend a moderately priced flight stick.  I'm using an older Microsoft SideWinder Precision joystick and it works perfectly fine.

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Review of GREEN LANTERN: A mis-focused but fun movie!

Maybe I should disclaimer this by admitting that before going to see the movie, that I bought a Kilowog action figure just so I could have a Green Lantern power ring to wear while watching this flick. Well, that and to also have an action figure of Kilowog to pose on my desk, 'cuz he's my favorite member of the Green Lantern Corps.

But I don't think that would be enough to subjectively color my perception of this movie when I say that I for one enjoyed the heck out of Green Lantern: the live-action adaptation of one of the most classic and revered superheroes in the DC Comics stable, which opens today. But I would also have to admit that this movie is far from perfect, or what it should be at a minimum.

Green Lantern is mis-focused far too much for the film that it should be: about a high concept cosmic mythology. Thor pulled that trick off beautifully when it opened last month. Unfortunately the high concept mythos is there in Green Lantern but doesn't get played up nearly as much as it ought to be. The scenes on Oa, and our glimpses of the Corps and of the Guardians of the Universe and the bits about how green is the color of willpower and yellow is the color of fear, etc... I loved that stuff!! Heck, I could have sat for the entire 114 minutes of this film's running time with nary a glimpse of Earth...

...because we get Earth too dang much in this movie about Green Lantern. That's my biggest beef with this film. And it's sadly ironic: that for a story about choosing to be fearless, director Martin Campbell (who also directed Casino Royale a few years ago for the James Bond franchise) and his crew were afraid to let their baby take off and soar out into the larger universe where Green Lantern belongs.

Ryan Reynolds as Hal Jordan, the human entrusted with the Green Lantern ring by the dying Abin Sur (Temuera Morrison, perhaps best known for playing Jango Fett and his zillions of clones in the Star Wars prequels) pulls off the role admirably, if also with a touch of clunkiness. The thing about Jordan's fear after the freak accidental death of his father, resonated with me with all the grace of a rusted cowbell. It was definitely something that could have benefitted from some rewrite and better editing (or being excised completely). Come to think of it, quite a bit of this film could have been edited away and it would have felt much slicker. I also liked Blake Lively as Jordan's girl/boss Carol Ferris. Tim Robbins also appears as a United States senator and Angela Bassett plays Amanda Waller (a DC Comics character and I'm wondering if Waller's turning up here is helping to set things up for the Justice League movie I'm hearing whispers about, much as Samuel L. Jackson's Nick Fury has been crashing almost all the Marvel movies of late).

But by far the worst of the human characters, and the single most distracting element of Green Lantern, is Hector Hammond, played by Peter Sarsgaard. I don't necessarily blame Sarsgaard himself but... well, there's no way around it: Hector Hammond sucks. He's a character more at home in a David Cronenburg film than in a blockbuster comic book adaptation. But that Sarsgaard plays him like he's channeling Seth Brundle from The Fly doesn't help matters any. At best Hector Hammond comes across as just too powerful for his own good and at worst, like Rick Moranis' nerdy accountant in Ghostbusters after becoming the Key Master. Too much crap like this and not nearly enough of the Green Lantern legendarium...

...but when we do get pure-D Corps, the movie is an absolute hoot to behold. Michael Clarke Duncan is firing on all cylinders as Kilowog, the Green Lanterns' drill instructor. And for Sinestro, I really can't see any better than Mark Strong as the Corps' respected warrior, soon to become worst enemy. That doesn't happen in this film, but the setup is there (stick around during the credits). I'm looking forward to seeing Sinestro going full-tilt against the Guardians in the sequel (which, based on this film I do believe is merited).

The special effects in Green Lantern are CGI intensive, and at times a bit cartoony... but given that this is a Green Lantern movie, I can forgive that and even say that it's about what I expected. James Newton Howard turns in a fine score. Conceptually, the scale of this film is vast. It's just not exploited to the fullest hilt. As I said, Thor made it work and there's no reason why it can't in a Green Lantern movie. Maybe in the follow-up we'll see Hal Jordan hanging around on Oa more and on Earth less (and speaking of Oa, I thought the Guardians were handled magnificently: elder beyond reason and yet a vital and breathing component of the Green Lanterns' realm).

Green Lantern isn't the best superhero movie that I've seen, and it's somewhat frustrating that it's not the film that it could and should have been. But neither is it the train wreck or the bomb that I'm seeing too many other critics panning it as. I went in to see it braced for anything. Coming out, I realized that it is what it is: a fun summer popcorn flick. I won't say that I'm gonna give it my highest recommendation, but I will say that Green Lantern is worth considering plunking down some coin at the box office to see.

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Grand Theft Auto IV as a test of Christian conscience

No doubt I'm going to draw flack for suggesting this, but it needs to be said. Yesterday afternoon I bought Grand Theft Auto IV.

And having played it for a few hours, as a follower of Jesus Christ I would like to recommend that my mature brethren in the Christian faith (both spiritually and those who are not teenagers anymore, parse that as you will) play Grand Theft Auto IV as well. And not to gleefully look for reasons to condemn the game either.

Why?

Because I think that a lot of people who play Grand Theft Auto IV are going to end up condemning their own sense of self-righteousness instead. And I can't say that it would be a bad thing at all if they did.

Grand Theft Auto IV, whether by design or not, might be the closest thing there's been to an actual "Giant's Drink". In the classic science-fiction novel Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card, the child Ender Wiggin is given a computer simulation called "the Giant's Drink" as part of his battle training. Nobody is supposed to beat the giant. The whole point of the exercise is to test a student's morality. After countless times of getting killed in the game Ender finally tears loose from the constraints of his scruples and murders the giant in grisly fashion. He becomes the first student to defeat the giant but instead of elation he feels disgusted with himself and abject shame. Ender doesn't like the fact that in order to save his own life he had to kill another... even if it was just a computer game. He "wins" the game, but he finds himself crushed for violating his own principles.

It only took a few hours of playing Grand Theft Auto IV to finally understand what Ender went through after beating the Giant's Drink. And I don't know if I would have fared as well as Ender did either. Because every time I accidentally hit a pedestrian in Grand Theft Auto IV, I have to stop and re-start from my last saved game, and attempt it all over again from there. Because you can do lots of things in Grand Theft Auto IV: Drive cars, shoot guns, make calls on a cellphone, change radio stations or watch television, even eat food... but saying "I'm sorry" is not one of them.

And I'm feeling so bad about the people that I inadvertently hurt in this game, that I feel compelled to go back and try it again, and try to do it right this time, without the wrongfulness of my actions being something that weighs on my mind. If only real life could afford that kind of opportunity...

The technology of Grand Theft Auto IV at last drives the nail into the coffin for the clean kill in video games. This isn't the "twinkle and they're gone" effects of bygone days. When you hit an innocent person in Grand Theft Auto IV, and you hear their realistic cries of pain and you see them grimace in agony and trying to nurse their injuries as they limp away, it becomes a very hard thing indeed to want to have to experience that again. It's even worse when you run over a person and they don't get up again. Ever.

I bought this game expecting something like Death Race 2000. You know: over-the-top cartoony pseudo-violence. Instead Grand Theft Auto IV's graphic ultra-realism completely horrified me. Intellectually, I know that Liberty City doesn't exist. But the depiction of this world and its denizens is so convincing, that it's almost impossible to completely disassociate myself from having empathy for these people.

I don't know if God will ever judge me for an action that I take in a video game. And that's why I think that Grand Theft Auto IV might do a lot more good than harm for many of my fellow Christians. Make no mistake: the world of Grand Theft Auto IV is a lawless one where malicious behavior runs rampant. But the real world is no less vulgar and cruel, and rife with temptation.

But it's not the temptation itself that is sinful. Even Jesus was tempted in the wilderness by no less than Lucifer himself. It's whether we choose to succumb to the temptation that makes a sinful act.

Here, with Grand Theft Auto IV, you can at last confront the evil world like never before... and be confronted by it in turn. Without fear of eternal consequence: the ultimate exponent of the lure of temptation.

In Liberty City, there is no "Christian counter-culture" to run and hide behind. Not that you should try to hide either. It's just you and whatever conscience you can claim to bring, set loose in a world that will destroy you if you're not strong enough in your convictions and your faith. In short, it's exactly the kind of bold life that the Bible instructs us as believers to live in the real world. It's just too bad that it takes a video game to demonstrate that. Maybe Rockstar Games and Take-Two Interactive should have been given the rights for what became the disastrous Left Behind: Eternal Forces game instead, but I digress...

So if you are someone who considers himself (or herself, no chauvinists we!) a righteous Christian, consider this a test of your character. Either buy Grand Theft Auto IV or rent it or borrow it from a friend. Don't just merely play Grand Theft Auto IV: immerse yourself completely in the character of Niko Bellic. Let your own raw morality become his own.

Just know this: here, in the game, there are no everlasting consequences. You can be as sinful as you wish, and you won't be condemned by your peers. You can steal cars, beat up defenseless people, commit vehicular homicide, and brutally murder your enemies without turning the other cheek. You can supposedly even pay prostitutes for sex. And then kill them in order to get your money back, if the fancy strikes you.

All of these things and more, you can do in Grand Theft Auto IV.

The question is: Will you choose to do them if given the chance, if you knew for certain that there would be no real-world ramifications of your actions?

I have to wonder also: there are a lot of people in America who cheer for the war in Iraq, or even war in general. Too many of those are professing Christians. They cheer for war, I've little doubt, because they themselves have never had to face meaningless death. Deaths in a foreign land are just a statistic to them, and if "one of our own" is hurt or killed then all too often I only hear something about "prayers for the family".

These people don't see past their own lives. They don't bother to realize that God has blessed others with life too, deserving of as much opportunity to seek Him out as anyone else. To such people, a reasonless war in a foreign land is like a video game. And they don't particularly care to understand that those killed in the real world are neither a high score or flickering sprites that quickly vanish when shot.

Could a game like Grand Theft Auto IV actually soften the hearts of people who have such callous disregard for the sanctity of human life?

If there's the slightest possibility of a game like Grand Theft Auto IV driving it into these people's heads that the lives of others are precious and worth fighting for, even at the cost of laying down our own if need be, then all I can say is that I hope that Rockstar Games has many more Grand Theft Autos on the drawing board... because this world sure as hell needs 'em.

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Review of I AM LEGEND

They changed the ending.

And for that, I cannot forgive.

For the first two-thirds of the film, I Am Legend with Will Smith is pretty faithful to the spirit of Richard Matheson's original novel. I think that Akiva Goldsman (and whatever made it into this final draft from Mark Protosevich's original script) was hitting on the right cylinders so far as portraying Neville's loneliness and despair went. The scenes of Smith in the video store, where he's talking to the mannequins and trying hard not to gaze upon the adult DVD section, seemed especially inspired by the book.

And when we see Neville going to the dock every day at noon, waiting in vain for anybody who might have heard his signal: even though that was never something we saw in the book, it was a nice touch. It's something that I could see Matheson's Neville doing.

I don't even mind how the nature of the plague was changed from bacterial epidemic to a genetically-engineered virus that got loose (shades of The Stand). Part of me is even willing to overlook how this new film's Neville is already a scientist who was trying to fight the contagion, instead of being the average Joe from the book who struggles to grasp scientific methods out of dire necessity.

Heck, a tiny part of me is even okay with letting slide how the vampires of this new I Am Legend movie are mindless pack-animals instead of intelligent and well-coordinated former humans. I couldn't resist, however, saying aloud "Come out, Neville!" during the first nighttime scene.

But whatever good there is in this movie... which could have become something much more magnificent and haunting... is totally undone by the final minutes. Which not only brings the entire work to an anticlimactic halt, it completely undermines the very meaning of the title itself. If you've read the novel you know what I'm talking about. If you haven't then here's a chance to find out, but since this is major spoiler material, I'm going to have to do this in "inviso-text":

SPOILERS (click mouse and swipe over to highlight and read): By the end of the novel, a new race of humans - who are infected by the virus but are not truly "undead" - has gradually taken over. Neville has been going around during daylight killing the still-living, and to them he has become a terror. In the final pages of the story it dawns on Robert Neville that just as the vampire had been a myth preying on human fear, so too has he now become a myth to the new society that has arisen from the ashes of the plague. As Neville takes the suicide pills, he reflects in the very last words of the book that "I am legend." END SPOILERS

Why couldn't they have used that ending? Were Goldman and company too intimidated by Matheson's original conclusion? Did the possibility of sequels blind them on how to give this story the respect it deserves?

The novel I Am Legend is about loneliness and despair, but it's also a story rife with irony and, in my opinion anyway, about obsession and where that can take anyone. I think that too much emphasis was made on Neville's solitude and how he copes with it, to the detriment of everything else that made I Am Legend a classic horror novel. Unfortunately, I think this reflects a long-time trend on how Neville's character is handled. I saw this with my lifelong friend Chad Austin and his friend Aaron from church. On our way back to his home Chad said that he thought Smith's Neville was like a "Christ figure" in this movie. And he's right. Neville even gives his own blood so that others might live. And that's what Charlton Heston did in his take on Robert Neville in 1971's The Omega Man, too. The weird thing is, the Robert Neville of the original novel is not a Messiah-type character at all. By the end of the story, in his own way he's become a non-Christian (but not "anti-Christian") figure.

I would have loved to have seen that happen in this movie, and how during the story there's been this process at work, in spite of whatever Neville intended, that has made him into this kind of legend. But instead of being strong enough to give us that, we're shown another Neville: one that we've seen before, that comes as a result of lacking courage enough to tackle the book's ending. I didn't mind this in The Omega Man... but it's four decades later and Hollywood should have matured enough to take on the challenge this time. And it didn't.

This is a project that I've been following since 1997, all the way back when Ridley Scott was supposed to film this with Arnold Schwarzenegger with the original screenplay by Mark Protosevich. And in the minutes after watching I Am Legend 2007, I was immediately thinking back - with a lot of regret - on Scott's unfilmed version and how we'll never get to see it. That adaptation was going to be extremely faithful to the novel, right down to the end. I've still got the concept art for the Scott version's vampires somewhere, and trust me: his version would have rocked the house and given everybody bad dreams for days to come. When Matheson's story was first adapted for the screen as The Last Man on Earth (with Vincent Price in the lead), that was probably the closest anyone's come yet to the book's ending and ultimate meaning.

I was really hoping... and expecting even... that I Am Legend with Will Smith as Neville was going to be the definitive movie version of this story. Sadly, it's not. It's been a long time since I've looked forward to a movie, only to meet with such frustration...

I Am Legend does shine throughout most of the movie though. The scenes where Neville is going around a desolate New York City certainly outweigh what was technically feasible when Heston was driving around in his convertible in The Omega Man almost forty years ago. And the fate of Neville's dog will break the hearts of anyone who still cries when Travis puts down Old Yeller. Will Smith also puts his heart into this version's Robert Neville. I can believe in Smith as Neville, even if I can't buy into what becomes of Neville at the end of this movie.

Ultimately, I Am Legend is a very good technical movie that is wrecked by a failure to follow the production wizardry with adequate courage in the writing. For that reason, I would recommend I Am Legend as a study on how not to be too timid with how one tells a story. Get it through Netflix if you have a burning desire to see this new I Am Legend, but otherwise your money is probably going to be better spent this coming week when Cloverfield comes out (of which I am hearing nothing but crazy good news about).

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Review of Marco van Bergen's ZERO HOUR!

Something I've been saying for awhile: the next revolution in film-making won't be in Hollywood. It'll be coming from out of the hinterlands. There is something really wonderful happening across the world, my friends: a new breed of filmmaker, and I'm seeing them as young as 12 all the way up to their 50s and 60s. People armed with the new technology of cheap digital filmmaking who are doing incredible things around their hometowns and down in their basements... which are more often than not rigged-up with makeshift greenscreens. Regular people, no longer content to watch the magic on the big screen, are now telling themselves "I could do that, I can do that. Maybe I will do that!"

Marco van Bergen is one of those people. A mid-teen filmmaker in the Netherlands, van Bergen just finished his new movie Zero Hour. This past week I was honored to be granted the opportunity to give it a looksee.

Zero Hour is about a tidal wave that hits a research facility on an island, and how the survivors frantically fight to survive. That this sounds much like Poseidon is bolstered by how some footage from that movie (along with clips from Titanic and other major motion pictures) is used in van Bergen's film. But don't let that fool you: Zero Hour is defined by its own cinematography (and by a largely original score by German composer Ralf Wienrich, which won a whole slew of awards at a major competition in Amsterdam a few days ago). There are some terrific shots that van Bergen and his crew pulled off, including a number of great special effects. Yet Zero Hour doesn't make the mistake that many other productions on this scale fall to the temptation of doing: making the effects supersede the story and the characters. Indeed, the scene that stands out in my mind from Zero Hour is an escape through the ventilation system: there was a much greater sense of claustrophobia and dark humor in that part than I would have expected from an older, more experienced filmmaker.

I couldn't help but think while watching Zero Hour that I was being blessed to witness the early efforts of a very talented group of young people, that I've no doubt we are going to be hearing quite a lot of good from in the years to come. Heck, if I was a bigtime studio exec, I'd throw Marco and his crew a couple million dollars and really turn them loose!

If you want to find out more about Zero Hour, check out the movie's official website. Oh yeah, and there will be a soundtrack CD of the film's score coming out soon, too! If that were only true of some other movies...

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Finally saw THE SIMPSONS MOVIE

Over the weekend I got to catch The Simpsons Movie. It came out at the end of July and people who know me best had assumed that I would see this on opening day but I wound up waiting about three weeks. At one point I thought I'd just wait to see it when it came out on DVD.

I'm glad that I didn't! The Simpsons Movie was the funniest film that I've seen at the theater in quite a long time. I'm going to heartily recommend watching The Simpsons Movie during its cinematic run because the show's producers seriously play up the fact that they have a full-length motion picture to run around in (i.e. Bart writing on the blackboard "I will not illegally download this movie" on the classic opening chalkboard shot). The movie tends to "slow down" somewhat during the final third of the movie, but overall I was laughing pretty hard throughout the entire show. My biggest fear was that this would basically be one half-hour Simpsons episode strung out across 90 minutes, but gladly it doesn't feel like that at all: it's actually quite a lengthy and intricate plot for an animated comedy. And as a fan of the show who has - like many - lamented a perceived decline in quality over the past few years, I have to say: this certainly felt like vintage Simpsons from ten years or so ago. If they have been "saving the good stuff" for this movie, then I am feeling inclined to forgive the show's producers. Let's hope that The Simpsons Movie marks the beginning of the pendulum's swing back upward.

Great movie. I enjoyed it immensely. And I'm hearing that some people who don't even care that much for The Simpsons are liking it a lot too. Well worth seeing during its theatrical run.

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Dinner at Mama Dip's!

This is one write-up that I've been wanting the opportunity to do for quite awhile now. The very first time that I heard about Mildred Council AKA "Mama Dip" and her restaurant, it was when I spotted her cookbook Mama Dip's Cookbook eight years ago. Something about this woman's beaming smile on the book's cover screamed out to me that one way or another, I had to try her cooking sometime. And then I happened to notice that UNC-TV, the statewide PBS network, had her live in the studio every so often to demonstrate real southern-style cooking. I'm telling you here and now: I felt dire hunger pangs just from watching this lady make biscuits.

Well yesterday evening after Lisa and I saw Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in IMAX at Exploris in Raleigh, we made a stop in Chapel Hill. And at long last, I got to eat at Mama Dip's Country Cooking Restaurant. And this was, without a doubt, one of the best dining experiences that I've ever had! Everything about it was just darned perfect. Completely blew away my expectations. And even though it's an hour away from where we live in Reidsville, I can definitely see going back to Mama Dip's restaurant and bringing along more people who'll be new to the experience: as much to get a kick out of seeing them enjoy the place as much as I want to try more from Mama Dip's menu!

We got to Mama Dip's restaurant a little after 5 p.m. Here's the pic that Lisa took of me next to the sign outside the place...

Then we went inside. We found a wonderfully welcoming place with great country decor and a very friendly wait staff. And we had a terrific waitress named Persis who really did go all out to make our first time at Mama Dip's a memorable one...

Persis took our order for drink and I couldn't resist asking: "Is she here?" Persis said that "she's not here right now" but that Mama Dip would probably be in pretty soon.

So far as drinks go, they have a good variety at Mama Dip's and Persis recommended the peach/mango lemonade: a lil' home-grown concoction that she said was really good. So that's what Lisa and I ordered. The first sip of it was overwhelming. I can't think of anything else that I've ever drank, apart from a few alcoholic beverages, that has this kind of strong kick to it. Can't stress this enough people: the peach/mango lemonade is powerful stuff! We're talking tangy to the extreme. Here's a pic of Lisa after trying it...

I knew yesterday morning that if we went to Mama Dip's that evening, that I wanted to try the fried chicken and biscuits. I didn't know that this place had barbecue pork ribs also. I wound up ordering a combo plate of fried chicken, barbecue ribs, fried okra, and apple sauce...

And Lisa got the chicken-fried steak, mashed potatoes, and macaroni. This pic also shows the biscuits...

The fried chicken that I had at Mama Dip's is maybe the best fried chicken that I've had from any restaurant. It's real southern-fried chicken, exactly the kind that Granny (my Mom's mother) used to make in her own kitchen. In fact, Mama Dip's is the kind of place that I definitely imagine Granny would have run if she had ever gotten into the restaurant business. The barbecue ribs are, in a word, "exquisite". The barbecue sauce at Mama Dip's might be the best that I've ever found in North Carolina: it's a rich melange with strong portions of vinegar and tomato, mixed-in with Worcestershire sauce and assorted peppers and spices. This is something that I had to buy a jar of to take back home with me. The okra and apple sauce were also delicious. And Lisa let me savor a bit of her chicken-fried steak too.

Oh, and the biscuits? Heck, those alone would keep me coming back!

As we were winding down our main course, Persis came to the table and told me that Mama Dip had arrived a few minutes before. Persis led me to the foyer and there she was, Mama Dip herself: Mildred Council!

In case you're wondering why she's known as "Mama Dip", it came from when she was a child - the youngest of seven siblings - growing up in rural Chatham County, North Carolina. Mildred Council was called "Dip" by her brothers and sisters because she was tall and had long arms enough that she could dip all the way down to the bottom of the rain barrel to get a full scoop when the water level was low. We got to talk for a few minutes and I told Mrs. Council how much I had been looking forward to eating at her restaurant, and how much my Mom really enjoyed her cookbooks and how I couldn't wait to come again sometime. If I could describe Mrs. Council in just a few words, I would have to say that she is very "effervescent" and that her smile is as infectious as her personality and good cheer. Getting to meet Mama Dip, on top of the terrific food and service at her restaurant, is definitely one of the best experiences that I've been able to share on this blog.

After we finished talking, I went back to our table for dessert. Lisa and I had the pecan pie, which was warm and moist and extremely satisfying, coming on top of an already great meal. Then we left, after thanking Persis for the great job she did as our waitress and after Lisa got to tell Mama Dip as we were checking out that she really enjoyed eating there, too.

I will definitely be going back to Mama Dip's Country Cooking Restaurant, and hopefully sooner than later. And I'm going to recommend Mama Dip's to everyone that I possibly can, too. This is one place that not only deserves its terrific reputation, but that I think it could accurately be said that its reputation doesn't reflect on the place nearly well enough! It's very worth your while to visit the place, even if you have to drive a bit to get there (like we did).

Mama Dip's Country Cooking Restaurant is located at 408 W. Rosemary Street in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. If you're coming in from I-40 it's a very easy place to get to: just get off at Exit 266 onto NC-86 going toward Chapel Hill. This quickly becomes Martin Luther King Boulevard and after about 3 miles becomes Columbia street. You'll want to turn right onto west Rosemary Street not long after this, and Mama Dip's will be a little less than a half-mile on your right. Just look for the sign that's in the above photos and you can't miss it :-)

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HARRY POTTER AND THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX in big glorious IMAX!

Yesterday, Lisa and I had a fun lil' trip to Raleigh, where we went to the IMAX Theater at the Exploris Museum to catch Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in IMAX. This was the second time that we'd seen the movie and the third time that I've seen a feature film in IMAX: click here for my report from seeing Superman Returns at the same theater a year ago.

The first time that I saw the movie of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, I said that I had liked it but that I hadn't been completely satisfied with the movie. At the time I was right in the middle of the book, trying to finish re-reading the entire series before Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows came out. This is still the densest novel in the entire series and there's no way that a 2-hour movie can be done that adequately reflects everything in the book. I've no doubt that my reading it just then, on top of this being my favorite book of the series, affected my take on the movie. But, I was willing to give it another shot.

So what do I think of the Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix now, having seen it twice and this latest time in IMAX?

It's definitely starting to grow on me. I think that director David Yates and his crew have done a remarkable job in faithfully portraying the spirit of the book, given the time constraint they had to work within. The last time I saw the movie, I think that down on some level I was preparing to be disappointed 'cuz like I said, this is my favorite "regular" book in the saga (Deathly Hallows stands on its own as much as the Book of John stands apart from the "synoptic" gospels in the Bible). This time, I was a lot more relaxed going and willing to forgive any reasonable inconsistencies with the book.

The unforeseen consequence of that is that this time, I noticed much more detail from the book that made its way into the movie. The one that I can't stop thinking about is how this time, I did happen to notice that Percy Weasley was working as an underling to Minister of Magic Cornelius Fudge. If you've read the books you know how this is a big deal. Granted it wasn't given any verbal mention but seeing how that was Percy who was holding Harry in custody in Dumbledore's office, made me respect the movie much more. No one needed to actually say anything more after that. We know he's in tight with the Minister's office. It's already a perfect setup for what we know is going to happen later. I don't know how I missed seeing him before but maybe since this go-round we watched the movie on an IMAX screen, there really was no excuse to miss him this time.

There's not much more than I can say about the Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix movie that I could say that wasn't already articulated in my initial review. But there is one thing that seeing it this time had that watching the movie in a regular theater doesn't have: the amazing thrill of watching the Battle of the Department of Mysteries in full IMAX 3D! Everything from the moment Harry and his team leave Hogwarts, to when they return to the school is given the 3D treatment. I thought it looked even more beautiful and jaw-dropping than when we saw Superman Returns in IMAX 3D last year. It's only about 20 minute toward the end of the movie, but it's astounding enough to warrant the few extra bucks to see the movie in IMAX.

I'm glad that we did this. I feel like I can finally appreciate and enjoy this movie, and it was a really great experience made all the more fun by listening to the reactions from the kids in the audience, many of whom it was obvious had never seen an IMAX movie before at all. And I'm still chuckling at the little girl who said aloud "that woman's creepy!" during the scene where Dolores Umbridge is making Harry serve detention.

Go see Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in IMAX if you can. It's an absolutely amazing spectacle for the eyes.

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Review of 300 Two-Disc Special Edition DVD

300 easily ties along with Transformers as my favorite movie so far of 2007. I've seen it twice now (click here for my thoughts when I first caught it) and it's sort of taking hold with me just as The Matrix did some years ago. So I've been looking forward to the release of 300 on DVD this week. It also came out on both HD-DVD and Blu-ray but since I'm still waiting to see which way the market tilts before investing in a player for either of those formats, I'm still using standard DVD. Besides, we've got a nifty lil' "upscaling" DVD player that does a great job outputting regular DVD to our high-def set, and we're probably going to be more than happy with that for awhile to come. As I've said before, when it comes to new technology I'm very much like the Amish: I have to completely trust it before adopting it.

I've actually watched the 2-disc DVD set once now, but this is such an awesome movie that I've had it playing about twice more while I've been working on some things (George Lucas writes to music, and I often write and do video editing with movies playing in the room behind me :-). As a consequence some of the more memorable lines have been stuck in my head for the past day or so. Lisa can tell you that I'm already doing a terrific impersonation of that Persian emissary dude when he rasps out "A THOUSAND nations of the Persian Empire descend upon you! Our arrows will blot out the sun!"

Okay, 'bout the DVD ...

I like it a lot! The one problem - that may or may not even be a real issue - is that even for standard DVD upscaled for high-def output, the image quality looks pretty grainy. But then, 300 on the theater's screen it's rather grainy anyway: all part of the unique look of this film. But in comparison to most other standard DVDs lately, 300 still appears to have less-than-ideal image quality. A few times I wondered if Warner Bros. is encoding its regular DVDs as well as they could: I thought that the DVD of Superman Returns likewise could have used better encoding of the video. But having seen 300 twice in theaters, I'll still say that for this particular movie, if you're getting it already knowing what to expect, it should still satisfy well. The audio is also very good.

Disc 1 is the movie, in widescreen format (you can also buy this as a single disc or in full-screen, if that's what you prefer). You can watch the movie "bare-bones" or with audio commentary from director Zack Snyder. Disc 2 is the special bonus features, including 3 deleted scenes. Two of those feature the traitorous Ephialtes and the other is of this huge (we're talking bigger than Goliath) Persian warrior with this midget archer riding on his back and shooting arrow at the Spartans. There is also a terrific documentary about the historical background of 300: what we know of the real-life Leonidas and his stand at Thermopylae against Xerxes's Persian army. Other features on Disc 2 include a look at 300's creator: comic book legend Frank Miller. A few more are various takes on 300's revolutionary production, which involved using bluescreen on a massive scale and the lengths that Zack Snyder and his crew went to in order to faithfully adapt the 300 graphic novel for the big screen.

300 is an amazing movie, and one that I think is going to have quite an inspirational impact over the long run. It gets a great treatment on DVD and I'll definitely recommend it for your personal collection.

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Review of HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS

(NOTE: This review does not contain spoilers. Feel free to read without risk of having something revealed to you that you don't want to know about yet if you haven't read the Harry Potter books ... even though you should read them at some point :-)

The best magic is when the trick is done right in front of you, in plain sight where you can see everything, and still your mouth hangs open in utter amazement at trying to figure out "how did they do that?".

For the past seven years, ever since I first bought and read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, I've watched J.K. Rowling spin and weave her wonderful tale. She has made me look forward to each succeeding book with a wide-eyed wonder about what was going to happen next, where was this going. Always with the barest hint of mis-direction or sleight of hand on her part.

So at about 12:30 a.m. this morning (late last night in layman's terms), I finished reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, almost 24 hours to the minute after first buying it at Borders in Greensboro (full report with photos of that coming later today).

And now, the morning after, I feel as if I have watched the conclusion of the most magnificent magic act in the history of fiction. The way it unfolded, the way it was always playing out before our eyes from the very beginning even if we didn't know it. How everything, in the end, is revealed to have been working in glorious sync toward the act's climax ...

"How did she do that?"

How wonderful a performance was it? Right now, I think that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is a more fulfilling and uplifting end for a saga than Revenge of the Sith was to Star Wars ... and maybe even how The Return of the King wrapped-up The Lord of the Rings.

And the more I think about this book, the more I'm becoming convinced that the Harry Potter series is allegorical Christian fiction on par with C.S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia. After Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, nobody will ever again be able to claim that Harry Potter is "evil" or "promoting witchcraft" or whatever ludicrous things have been said about these books and their author. What Harry and Hermione discover in Chapter 16, and the very title of the next to the last chapter of the book (it's called "King's Cross") should be flashing sign enough about the considerably Christian element that has been at work in this series.

I'm very glad now that I took the time to re-read all of the subsequent books in the past few weeks leading up to the release of The Deathly Hallows. It refreshed my mind about a lot of details that seemed so minor then, but take on enormous new significance in this final chapter of the Harry Potter saga. I'm trying hard this morning to think of some thread from subsequent books that is still left dangling by the end of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. So far I can only think of one, and it's a pretty minor one (but something toward the end makes me wonder if Rowling left that hanging after all).

And this book, at long last, delivered solid answers on some things that I had been wondering a lot about since the very beginning. Want an example? Without giving away any spoilers to those who haven't read the books yet (you know who I'm talking about ;-) I'll offer this example: in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, when Harry and Ron meet for the first time, Harry reads something. This particular item has to do with a certain major character and it cites a name and a year. Mention of the year alone has piqued and ached my curiosity for the better part of a decade now, because it happens to have been a very significant year in real world history and I've been dying to know all this time "okay, what's the connection here?". Sometimes I've wondered if I was reading too much into it. And then it turns out, after reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, that I was right to have caught note of that and maybe I didn't give it enough thought, because it turns out to have been very, very important to the story as a whole (and I'm probably giving away too much already just talking about it like this).

That's what this book is like though. Whatever question that likely has tantalized you for so long during the Harry Potter series, is answered here. Including some things that I had never given a second thought to. It can never be said that J.K. Rowling was simply "making it up" as she went along: this kind of orchestration isn't possible unless there were years of planning and forethought behind it.

This book has heartbreak. It has horror. It even has humor. It satisfies in ways that I've never enjoyed out of a fictional saga before. And for what it's worth, I will go ahead and say that the greatest line of the entire series is in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, and it's spoken (actually screamed out) by Mrs. Weasley. You'll know it when you read it.

And so far as The Big Question goes, the one that has been foremost in the minds of readers these past two years - other than about if Harry is going to live or die in The Deathly Hallows - I can only say here that the answer is definitive and final and absolutely fitting in every way. But that's all I'm going to say about it until I'm confident that plenty enough people have read the book so that it can be discussed safely in the open.

I'm not going to say much more about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. It's still very soon after the book's release and there are plenty of folks who haven't even read the first novel in the series, much less this final one. Those people really do deserve to discover the world of Harry Potter as we first came upon it: with amazement and wonder, and as unsuspecting as we were as to how beautifully crafted this intricate world really is.

In the meantime, I've finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and soon my wife Lisa will be reading it for the first time too (she's currently finishing reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince again). And then the book will join the others on our shelf as the complete seven-volume collection of the Harry Potter saga: a story that we will be returning to many times over the years, not just for our enjoyment but also to share with our children. And, no doubt, that they will share with their own children.

I used to wonder if my generation would ever see a literary masterpiece like The Lord of the Rings be produced in our own lifetime. I wondered if there was still enough magic in this world to do something so beautiful and wonderful again. With Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows finishing this series, I am at last convinced: the magic is still out there. We just need to have faith that we can ... and will ... find it.

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Blunt review of HARRY POTTER AND THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX movie

I haven't struggled this hard with thoughts about a movie since writing my review of Peter Jackson's King Kong.

It was good, but too much of the book was missing for me to be completely satisfied.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is my favorite book of them all in the series (so far). It's also the one that I happen to be in the middle of reading as part of my quest to read all of the Harry Potter books before the release of the final one next Saturday. So maybe those things factored into how much I liked it. I've no doubt that if I had never read the Harry Potter books, I would have a whole different feeling about it's movie adaptation.

Tonally, they got this movie right so far as how it captures the spirit of the book. Especially with how corrupt the Ministry of Magic has become and how the realms of the magical and the Muggle (non-magic for those with no knowledge of the Potter lexicon) are beginning to overlap as Lord Voldemort's power increases. I thought Imelda Staunton as Dolores Umbridge - my all-time most hated literary character ever - and Evanna Lynch as Luna Lovegood were great. And the special effects were terrific!

The thing is, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is the most dense book of the series, and to cram the essence of the novel into a two-some hour movie required sacrifice. A lot of sacrifice. I understand that the producers didn't want to include Kreacher the house elf until J.K. Rowling herself made them put him in the movie (she said it would make things much harder later when they made the movie of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the final chapter of the Potter saga). There is nothing about Ron and Hermione becoming prefects and the side-story about how Percy has completely abandoned his family and is now siding fully with the Ministry is completely absent.

The scene where Fred and George flee Hogwarts: a lot of people consider this the single most thrilling moment in all the Harry Potter books. Well, Fred and George's mayhem is in this movie ... but it's changed significantly from how it is in the book. I think the book's scene is much better (the movies erred bigtime by not including Peeves the Poltergeist at all, and when the twins tell Peeves to "Give her hell from us", that would have been a great line to hear in the movie!).

But my biggest disappointment with the movie of Order of the Phoenix has to do with a scene toward the end of the book. In the next-to-last chapter of the novel, after the battle in the Department of Mysteries, Professor Dumbledore sends Harry to wait in his office at Hogwarts. When Dumbledore gets there, Harry ... loses it. He starts ranting at Dumbledore and proceeds to tear the office apart with his bare hands. "I WANT OUT!" Harry screams at Dumbledore, overwhelmed with grief at what just happened in the Department of Mysteries. Harry's tantrum, and then the dialogue between him and Professor Dumbledore ... that's probably the most heartbreaking scene of the Harry Potter books to date. It's definitely the most human, with its raw emotion.

That scene isn't in the movie. Oh sure, we see Harry and Dumbledore talking in Dumbledore's office, but there is no "wrathful Harry" and it's quite subdued. I was sure that this scene would have been in the movie. It would have been one that elevated the Harry Potter movies into a whole higher level of seriousness. And they didn't choose to use it. I'm really let-down that we didn't get to see this.

On the other hand, there were some nice touches that showed considerable thought: like the huge portrait of Cornelius Fudge, the Minister of Magic, that glowers down on everyone from the ceiling at the Ministry of Magic: that spoke volumes about what the Minister has now become. And the use of the zoom-ins on the Daily Prophet to convey the sense of what was going on in the magic world outside of Hogwarts) was an awesome idea!

I guess I have to say that I did enjoy the movie, but I thought that it didn't quite live up to what I was expecting and hoping for. There really needs to be a 3-4 hour long film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix to do the story the justice it deserves. Or better: someday there should be a complete re-doing of the Harry Potter movies, after the book series has been complete and there's a full understanding of the scope of the story and all its necessary details. I've noticed for the past few movies now that with each new film, there are problems because of details from the books that were ignored completely in the movie version. With Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix the movie, those small cuts are now threatening to become vile open wounds.

I'll say that I liked this movie. And maybe it will grow on me more as the last two movies did (it took me awhile to really like Prisoner of Azkaban's movie: didn't enjoy it too well at first but now I think it's the best of the series) with subsequent viewings. As it stands right now though, my favorite movie of this summer is still Transformers, which I want to see at least once more while it's in theaters.

For what some others thought about Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, my wife Lisa reviews it from an educator's perspective, Jenna Olwin talks about her experience watching the film in an IMAX theater, and Darth Larry can't say enough good things about the movie (actually his entire blog has gone a little Harry Potter crazy lately :-)

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Focus on the Family doesn't like TRANSFORMERS

I've mentioned this once or twice before on this blog. I'll do it again right now: I almost went to work for Focus on the Family.

It was several years ago. And I was a Christian still young in the faith, full of "spice and vinegar" as they say and eager to use whatever talents I have for the service of the Lord.

My my my, the myriad of ways in which we spiritually grow.

People who know me have said that my faith has come a very, very long way. But along the journey I've become a lot more disillusioned with many of the things that we perceive as "properly Christian". If we are going to follow Christ, then let us follow Christ for His sake, and not because we want a measure of political power out of the deal.

The Chris Knight of 1999 would have gladly gone to work at Focus on the Family. But the Christopher Knight of 2007 is a whole different person: one who thinks that Focus on the Family is so big a bunch of hypocrites, that real service for the Lord might be to march to Colorado Springs, set their compound ablaze and sow the ground with salt so that nothing will ever arise from the site again.

This is the kind of Christian you are dealing with here: if we call ourselves Christians, then we'd darn well better be legitimate about it. I don't take kindly to people trying to exploit the faith for their own gain.

(Don't even get me started with those loons who want to ban Harry Potter books. I'm just waiting for the right time to go unload on them.)

Well, lo and behold Focus on the Family is weighing in on Transformers via its Plugged In magazine. And I'm hearing that some parents are banning their kids from seeing the movie just on Focus on the Family's say-so. What's their beef? Among other things...

The President of the United States is depicted in a somewhat demeaning light as he asks a flight attendant, "Could you wrangle up some ding-dongs, darlin'?" In fact, many authority figures are stereotypically portrayed as either incompetent or belligerent. A policeman interrogating Sam sees the youth look at his gun and says, "You eyeballing my piece? Go for it. I will bust you up!" And a government agent holds his badge up to Sam and Mikaela, saying, "This is my do-whatever-I-like-and-get-away-with-it badge."

I must admit, the "masturbating" thing was very... inappropriate for this kind of movie. But that's about the only thing that really bothers me about Transformers. There is much more positive that outweighs the good in this movie. I thought it actually had a pretty strong pro-life message, believe it or not. I also thought that it was a movie that preached a great work ethic, and having some pride in your family's heritage. And there was a wonderful bit about the concept of self-sacrifice, that could even be called Christ-like.

But the people at Focus on the Family aren't willing to see the forest for a few pieces of rotting timber. Just another case of "we can't trust people to think for themselves so we'll think for them... in the name of Our Lord and Savior", my friends.

If you want to see another Christian's take on this movie, click here for my review of Transformers. In the meantime, don't deny yourself the enjoyment of this movie just because some starch-shirts whose sincerest prayers don't go further than for a Republican to be elected to the White House in 2008 tell you that you don't need to see this movie. See it for yourself, and if you think your kids can take it, let them see it to if they wanna.

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Review of TRANSFORMERS

For well over a year now, I haven't heard much of anything at all about Transformers except for how it would suck donkey's balls to no end (my personal epithet for something that is as bad as possible and can't get any worse) when it came out.

Let's see, since early 2006 there's been: "Bumblebee is a Beetle not a Camaro", "this movie must have Soundwave", "Megatron should transform into a gun", "the script is lousy", "damn you Michael Bay!", and the ubiquitous "flames on Optimus equals rubber nipples on Batman" argument. Along with literally dozens of other reasons about why Transformers, the 2007 live-action movie, was doomed to fail. How it was T.I.N.O. ("Transformers In Name Only").

You know what? I don't want to hear another bloody word about how Transformers is supposed to be a crap-tacular waste of celluloid and computer-rendered carnage. Because I just spent two and a half hours watching Transformers, and this is the most absolute awesome movie experience that I’ve had in many, many summers!

Transformers is huge. It is epic. It will leave you stunned with wide-eyed wonder in ways you haven't felt since maybe even E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial. It is twelve scoops of crazy with sprinkles on top. This is the movie that will bring out the kid in you like very little has ever done before.

And as a Transformers fan from the very beginning of the franchise, I will also say this: Transformers the 2007 movie is definitely the best depiction of the Transformers in any medium since the brand burst on the scene all the way back in 1984.

For those who still might cry foul about this not being true to "the Transformers of our youth", I will raise a mighty positive point in this movie's defense. Transformers, the 2007 live-action movie, does for its namesake saga what Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns did for Batman: it refines it, it re-defines it, and not only re-launches the story but for the first time ever perhaps gives the story the form it was always meant to have.

All of the classic elements of Transformers that we have come to know and expect are found in Transformers the (real) movie. But at last this feels like a serious mythology, and not merely something to sell gobs of toys.

And... well, what can I say: watching it with my wife Lisa and life-long friend Chad, I felt like a ten-year old kid all over again. I said a few days ago that Chad and I used to imagine what a live-action Transformers movie would be like. I have to say: during the scene where the Autobots come together for the first time and Optimus Prime does that magnificent transformation into his "upright" form, my eyes welled-up with tears. This was something I had never thought I would ever really behold, and there it was at last. I think Chad summed it up best when he said the experience of watching Transformers was "mesmerizing".

I defy anyone to tell me that this is not a good movie.

And finally, I feel like I can forgive Michael Bay after that abortion of a movie called Pearl Harbor. For six years I've been talking junk about Bay whenever I could and however hard I could muster it. You've no idea how much I loathed Pearl Harbor. It was one of the worst atrocities ever put on film. And I will admit to having that squeamish feeling when I heard that Michael Bay had been chosen to helm Transformers. Well guess what: Michael Bay proved me wrong. He pulled Transformers off almost perfectly. Not entirely perfect, but probably as perfect as anybody could do it. With Transformers, Michael Bay at last redeemed himself in my eyes.

Make no mistake, this is a Michael Bay movie: the man just can’t say "no" to shaky cinematography and those weird 360-degree revolving shots. I've heard some people say that his style is too hard to watch, especially with all the Industrial Light and Magic eye-candy going on just about every frame of the action scenes. I thought it was the perfect style for this movie. Think about it: a lot of the perspective in Transformers is from that of us humans. Now imagine us being suddenly thrust into the middle of this inter-stellar war, with no idea about what's really going on. In that sense, Michael Bay established this great sense of "fog of war" confusion and hysteria, especially in the later action sequences.

Okay, about the movie itself...

It starts off with the voice of Optimus Prime (voiced, as he was in the original cartoon, by Peter Cullen, sounding more majestic than ever before) giving a prologue about the war among the Transformers and Megatron's lust for the Allspark: the source of Transformer life and that of their home world. The Allspark was lost to the depths of space, and was thought gone forever... until it was detected to be on a planet known as Earth.

Cut to a U.S. military base in Qatar: while one soldier named Lennox (played by Josh Duhamel) is chatting on a video link to his wife and newborn baby, an MH-53 Pave Low helicopter is inbound and has sent the base scrambling. Seems that this particular chopper and its crew was destroyed in Afghanistan months ago. The copter lands on the base's pad... and then proceeds to transform into Blackout, a massive Decepticon who proceeds to lay down some smack bigtime on these pesky fleshlings. Lennox, Epps (Tyrese Gibson), and several other soldiers barely escape the mayhem, but not before being plagued by a nasty bug-eyed insectoid 'Con called Scorponok (who Blackout launched out of his back during the initial attack).

Meanwhile state-side, high school student Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) is hocking his great-great-granddaddy's stuff – including a certain pair of eyeglasses – on eBay so that he can try to get a car. Sam's dad takes him to a car lot owned by Bobby Bolivia (a great performance by Bernie Mac). After a series of events which I won't ruin the fun by spoiling here, Sam ends up driving off the lot inside an old Chevy Camaro... which is, shall we say, "more than meets the eye". Suffice it to say, this is a particularly useful car to have, especially since it seems to know all the right moves in helping Sam score points with girl-of-his-dreams Mikaela (Megan Fox).

I'm not going to say anymore about the movie's plot. It's much like one that we would have come up with while playing with our Transformers toys back in the day. But about that plot: I didn't find anything wrong with it. It was actually a lot deeper than what I was expecting. And it didn't have many of the gaping holes that are found in some Michael Bay movies (or any of Steven Spielberg – an executive producer of Transformers – for that matter).

I thought the human acting was terrific. Jon Voight is great as the Secretary of Defense (and looking much better here than he did as Franklin Roosevelt in Pearl Harbor). John Turturro is over-the-top as Simmons, the head of Sector Seven: the group that is to the Transformers what Area 51 was to the aliens in Independence Day. I thought Turturro's character was the most "Bay-ish" of the humans in this movie (thinking mostly about the ones in Armageddon when I say that). The interaction between LeBeouf's Sam and Fox's Mikaela is sweet and cute and a lot of fun on its own.

But as good a presence as the humans have in Transformers, the big draw is gonna be the CGI-splendor of the Autobots and Decepticons going full-bore at it against each other. This may be Industrial Light and Magic's finest work to date: the computer-rendered Transformers blend in seamlessly with the real environments to such a degree, that you will honest-to-goodness swear that those massive metal behemoths are really there pounding the crap out of each other...

Which is part of why Transformers succeeds so well. The Transformers from the 1980s onward were called "robots in disguise". Let the word go out: Transformers in 2007 are not robots. A robot is a dumb automaton that follows its programming and nothing else. The battledroids in the Star Wars prequels were robots. Artoo-Detoo was not a robot: Artoo was a character with a unique personality all his own. Well, the Transformers in this movie are what they were always supposed to be: living alien organisms with an exotic physiology far beyond anything we can understand. That they are made up of steel and chrome instead of carbon and nitrogen matters not: they are alive, with souls as individual as yours or mine. In every scene that they are in - especially Optimus and Bumblebee and I loved Jazz - the Autobots and Decepticons show off their individuality in spades. And the success of that personification owes as much to the efforts by the ILM crew as it does to the Transformers voice actors, which includes Peter Cullen, and Hugo Weaving as Megatron.

(By the way, the Megatron of the 2007 Transformers movie is bar none the best incarnation of Megatron, ever! This Megatron is focused on a real, tangible goal: something that no other Megatron that I know of boasted of having.)

Even beyond the performances, Transformers brings a sense of realism that the basic story has never known before. When I say that the Transformers in this movie are "alien", I mean that in ever sense. They don't automatically know Earth languages: I thought the scene where Frenzy (I couldn't stand that little twerp... in a good way!) is jabbering to Barricade in "Transformer-ese" while we see the translation in subtitles, and later on as the Decepticons are doing their "roll-call" again in their own language, was a brilliant detail! And elsewhere in the story where this one computer specialist is talking about how this technology is based on quantum computing, something that is beyond anything known to man: I appreciated that little detail too, for a number of reasons.

And those action sequences? I've never heard an audience react with such exclamation before, as what happened this afternoon when we witnessed all of that "Bay-hem"-style destruction. Give it up for Michael Bay: the man knows how to blow stuff up real good!

I don't know what else to say at this point, except that I will probably see Transformers at least twice more while it's playing in theaters. And maybe even more times than that.

Transformers may be the best reboot of a fictional franchise that I've seen in my life so far. Heck, if Spielberg and Bay and DreamWorks and Paramount and Hasbro play this right, I could see this going from Transformers the movie and becoming Transformers the cinematic mythology, one standing tall on the same level as Star Wars and Indiana Jones and The Matrix and Pirates of the Caribbean. My only real fear at this point is that Transformers as a movie "franchise" might lose its way somewhat come the third sequel, as seems to be happening a lot lately.

But if they can keep that same sense of awestruck going, and keep us humans in jaw-dropped gawking wonder at this massive battle between good and evil that has come to our world, then I think Transformers as a film series could last another five or six movies, easily.

Transformers is the best movie of the 2007 summer season by far. I don't recommend something lightly... but I can't recommend Transformers as nearly enough as it deserves. And yes, if anyone's wondering: it did meet, and even surpass, anything that I ever envisioned a Transformers movie would be as a ten-year old kid.

(By the way, there’s a trailer for J.J. Abrams’s upcoming movie Cloverfield attached to Transformers that looks pretty darned wicked, too!)

I give Transformers, the 2007 live-action movie, a full five energon cubes (in spite of the one problem - a certain word - that I had with this movie). Prepare to roll out and go see it. Now!

And whatever you do, don't be so quick to leave the theater: there's a few quick scenes as the credits roll, including a shot of something headed toward the stars that screams out "sequel" in a huge way :-)

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TRIBULATION HOUSE: Whacked (and wicked funny) Christian novel is a must-read!

A short while after finishing my review of Kingdom Come (thank heaven that's the last we'll ever see of Left Behind... hopefully) I found out about another book that was coming out around the same time. This one also dealt with Pre-Tribulation Rapture theology, but with a twist: it's story was about what happens when Christians obsess about the Rapture to the point of ignoring the work that God has provided to occupy ourselves with until He does come. That alone would have piqued my interest. That the book's page on Amazon described it as a "quirky apocalyptic gangster novel" only fueled my desire to know more. And that this was a Christian satire novel that was - gasp! - said to be uproariously funny settled it in my mind: I absolutely had to read Tribulation House by Chris Well.

It wasn't until two days ago that I found a copy: at the Books A Million in the Concord Mills Mall. Tribulation House is such a genre-bending story that most bookstores, even Christian ones, don't seem to have it in stock. They should though: especially the Christian outlets like LifeWay and Family Christian. With Tribulation House, Chris Well proves that Christian fiction can not only be rollickin' good entertainment when it really wants to be, but that it can share profound wisdom and insight that leaves a person more enlightened for the time spent reading it.

Did I mention already that Tribulation House is also the most hilarious Christian novel that I've ever read?

Did I also say that after the dreck that Left Behind became, that Tribulation House is the most spiritually refreshing Christian fiction that I've read in a very long time?

I can't believe how much more I hate Left Behind now. Not just that series, but a lot of stuff on the "Christian culture" front. We should be giving God nothing short of our best efforts, in everything that we do. Including the entertainment we create. Instead for years now we've had this bass-ackwards approach where we give a blunt-force sermon some thin veneer of "enjoyment" and then expect people to be hooked by The Message, as if that is what's going to draw the crowds. Except it doesn't work and those we are trying to witness to only end up laughing at us that much more. But I'm beginning to sense that a lot of Christians have realized what we're doing wrong, and are now actively working to do something about it. The recent movie Facing the Giants (read my review here) and now Chris Well's Tribulation House "get" it. And I'm especially glad that Well makes a good commentary about that in his novel: maybe others will pick up on it also.

Tribulation House has a number of storylines, at the center of which is Reverend Daniel Glory, the prominent minister of a Kansas City church. Reverend Glory has confidently announced to the world that he has calculated the exact date and time of the Rapture: on October 17th at 5:51 a.m., Jesus will come for the true believers. Which is joyful news for church member Mark Hogan. And since his days on Earth are numbered, why not enjoy them a bit? Hogan immediately begins an insane spending spree that culminates in his lust for a $22,428 dream boat... which he can't get right away because his credit was declined at the showroom. No worries, figures Hogan: he'll just borrow the money he needs from the mob. Then he can buy his boat and enjoy clear sailing right up to the Rapture. And when Jesus comes, he'll be in Heaven and won't have to fret about the gangsters coming to collect what he owes them. And that's exactly what Mark Hogan does.

And then the Rapture doesn't happen. And the details of Pre-Tribulation theology aren't something that organized crime figures usually care to hear about.

Rife with slick dialogue and rich in pop-culture references, Tribulation House is an engrossing tale about family squabbling, Mid-West mafiosos, urban politics, whodunit murder, and an American brand of Christianity that's much too fixated on the Second Coming for its own good. With that much craziness poured into one book, Tribulation House can't help but be a joy to read. This wasn't just the funniest Christian fiction I've read: Tribulation House was one of the funniest books that I've ever read! And the part of me that seeks out opportunity for spiritual growth in this kind of literature... well, I finished Tribulation House feeling quite satiated on that front, too. Chris Well seems to be a Christian writer who is seriously tuned-in to my wavelength (which may or may not be a good thing): some things that he writes about in Tribulation House, in a lot of ways they affirmed a number of things that I've thought about lately. I definitely feel blessed in that regard to have read his book.

Chris Well is the Elmore Leonard of Christian fiction. I don't know if Christian literature realized it had such a vacuum, but I am thrilled beyond belief to discover that Well has found it and filled it. This isn't Well's first book, nor will it be his last: Tribulation House ends with an opening for a sequel, and apparently this is Well's third book set in Kansas City featuring two police detectives - Griggs and Pasch - who investigate organized crime. I will definitely now seek out Forgiving Solomon Long and Deliver Us from Evelyn, along with his next volume when it comes out. I especially like the character of Charlie Pasch, who I identified with a lot so far as Christian struggles go. And in regards to Hank Barton, the candidate for public office in a race filled with over a dozen characters and who also has a wife named Lisa... well, let's just say that my jaw dropped more than a few times at reading about what he goes through (see my posts about running for school board if you want the full skinny).

The last really good novel that I remember reading was Michael Crichton's Next (you can also read my review of that here), and after that has been a six-month run of turkeys like Hannibal Rising and Empire (which was ESPECIALLY disappointing for me, given that it was an Orson Scott Card novel) and Kingdom Come (the Left Behind book by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins, not the DC Comics graphic novel masterpiece). Tribulation House by Chris Well finally breaks the streak. I give the biggest props that I can muster to this book. Absolutely recommended!

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Firehouse Subs: One HOT sandwich shop!

Yesterday afternoon Lisa and I were in the area around Concord Mills Mall in Concord, North Carolina and we decided it would be a good time to get something to eat. On the south/east side across I-85 from the mall, she got a burger from Wendy's and I spotted a place called Firehouse Subs. Since I'm something of a submarine sandwich connoisseur, I decided to give Firehouse a shot.

I'm glad that I did! Firehouse Subs is a fairly new chain out of Jacksonville, Florida. It has the distinction of being the only food franchise that I know of that's founded by firemen. One consequence of that is that Firehouse Subs has a great firefighting motif around the place... and judging by how the company presents itself on its website, it takes a lot of sincere pride in that and pays much homage to those of the firefighting profession.

I ordered the Italian Sub, minus mustard and mayo (a real Italian submarine in my book uses either oil and vinegar or some kind of Italian dressing, not mustard or mayonnaise). It took a little longer to make the sandwich than, say, a place like Subway does, but that's because like Quizno's they cook the meat at Firehouse. That gave me time to look around the place: as I alluded to already, there's a firefighting decor in the place. The soft drinks were Pepsi products and I got a large Mug root beer (a great root beer that I can only find in sandwich places around here, not in cans or bottles). And while waiting for my sandwich to be finished I noticed something: running practically the full length of the counter, Firehouse Subs has just about every brand of commercially available hot sauce. Including two varieties of Dave's Insanity! Which I have never tried before but have heard all kinds of wild tales about, like how it's supposed to burn the skin on your arm if you drip any on it. They sell most of these sauces at Firehouse, too. I wound up buying a bottle of Dave's Ultimate Insanity. Expect a full report on this soon... if I dare open the bottle.

And then my sandwich was finished and brought to me. How was it?

Exceptionally delicious!

I hope and pray that we get a Firehouse Subs somewhere in the Greensboro area soon. But until then, whenever we're around the Concord area, I'm going to make it a point to stop by Firehouse Subs and get a sandwich. We like going to the mall there every now and then already, and knowing about this new sandwich joint is going to make the two-hour drive there that much more terrific to look forward to!

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Review of PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: AT WORLD'S END

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End is the first movie of the 2007 summer season that I can honestly say I left the theater completely satisfied after seeing it. This, despite the dizzying Byzantine labyrinth of sub-stories and political schemes and double-crossing backstabs you have to navigate through in watching this movie.

The first advice I can give about going to see At World's End is to go to the restroom before the movie starts... and buy a small or medium drink at the concession stand, not large. Clocking in at very nearly three hours, this movie is a bladder-buster. But if you go away for even a few minutes during any part of the movie, you are assured to miss some critical bit of story or plot device. This isn’t like any of Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings where you could go "answer the call of nature" during some lengthy oration by Gandalf and still "get" the rest of the movie. No, if you leave for whatever reason... nay, even turn your head to look at your huneybunch for too long... you'll miss stuff in At World's End.

The second advice I can give about watching Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End is to go into the movie with at least a cursory knowledge of how World War I started. In case you don’t know, it all went screwy in 1914 because of a myriad of treaties and alliances between all the big nations and empires on the European continent so that when Gavrilo Princip fired his one tiny gun, it obliged all the countries to start shooting at each other. That's what happens in At World's End: a maddening number of intrigue and unlikely partnerships and competing motivations that slowly become obvious to everyone involved. By then it's far too late: everything is headed toward one hella cacophonous collision on the high seas. And when it does... man I haven't seen a climax that cool in a new movie in a way long time!

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End picks up the story some time after the last installment Dead Man's Chest. In an opening scene at Port Royal that could be seen by many to be a metaphor for what's going on in modern America, the right to free speech and Habeas Corpus have been suspended by Cutler Beckett (Tom Hollander), who begins to execute anyone suspected of being sympathetic to pirates (that all of this takes place near the present-day location of Guantanamo makes it even more ironic). Beckett, now in possession of the heart of Davy Jones (Bill Nighy), is already using Jones and the Flying Dutchman to enforce his will across the oceans. The sway that Beckett has over Jones is reinforced when it's learned that Beckett made Jones kill the Kraken.

Meanwhile Elizabeth Swann (Kiera Knightley), Captain Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) and the rest of the Black Pearl crew are in Singapore, hoping to convince Sao Feng (Chow Yun Fat), the Pirate Lord of the South China Sea, to lend them the map to World's End. Sao Feng isn't feeling too charitable, considering that Elizabeth's betrothed beau Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) was caught trying to steal the thing. During an ambush by the British Royal Navy, Sao Feng agrees to loan Elizabeth the map, along with his best ship, for the journey to World's End. Elizabeth, Barbossa, Gibbs (Kevin McNally) and the rest of the crew – including the mysterious voodoo priestess Tia Dalma (Naomie Harris) and the undead monkey – set off to rescue Captain Jack Sparrow.

Taking the story to far-off Singapore should have been the first clue as to the breadth of this third chapter in the Pirates of the Caribbean saga. At World's End is epic on an obscene scale. We see Port Royal and Singapore, and the twilight realm of the frozen Arctic (which was one of my favorite scenes of the movie) and quite a number of other places including the pirate bastion called Shipwreck Cove, where the Brethren Court – the nine pirate lords throughout the world – meet. Where The Curse of the Black Pearl and Dead Man's Chest took place in the Caribbean and Atlantic, At World's End spans the entire globe and beyond.

But then Elizabeth and her crew go over the literal World's End (guess the world is flat after all) and we get to see Davy Jones' Locker: the place where those who owe a debt to Jones go to pay it off. It's at this point that I totally forgot this movie was directed by Gore Verbinski and it became, instead, a film by Terry Gilliam. I thought that even before reading reviews from other people who thought the same thing, too. Here we finally get to see Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp, in maybe his best portrayal of the character yet). Davy Jones' Locker is a vast desert wasteland that wrecks havoc with one's sanity (just like a Gilliam movie is apt to do to the viewer). Quite a bit of revelation about Sparrow in this part: maybe more than we ever cared to know, even. Sparrow is rescued and just as important, the Black Pearl is recovered (I'm trying hard not to "spoil" too much of the details here) and after Sparrow figures out the World's End map, our heroes are back in the realm of the living.

And from that point on... I need to re-watch At World's End again, because this story was incredibly dense for a summer popcorn flick. There are still some things I'm not quite sure of (such as the importance of the people singing Hoist the Colors on their way to the gallows at the beginning of the movie). This is definitely a movie to watch and re-watch many times when it comes out on DVD in order to "get" everything that's going on. But slight confusion aside, I cannot but admit that I had a blast with Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. It makes watching the first two again something you're going to want to do, because very small details in those suddenly take on huge significance (the locket that Tia Dalma has f'rinstance, which I speculated about when I watched the DVD of Dead Man's Chest back in January). All the big dangling storylines get resolved in At World's End... usually after we come to find out that there was much more to the tale than what we’d previously known. We learn a staggering amount of stuff about this fictional world, especially when the Brethren Court meets (which I enjoyed a lot). Speaking of which, Keith Richards is a lot of fun to watch as Captain Teague Sparrow: the keeper of the Pirate Law and the father of Captain Jack.

I think Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End is the third installment in a movie series that Return of the Jedi could have and should have been. Because if this is going to be the last film in a series for awhile or ever at all, then everything should be poured into the story so far as the setting and geography and lore of the movie's "universe" goes. The only new things we really saw in Return of the Jedi were Jabba's Palace and a forest filled with pint-sized Wookiees. At World's End is painted with a much broader brush that doesn't leave us feeling wanting at the conclusion of the movie.

About the ending: yeah, I wasn't expecting that for an ending, either. I had always envisioned Will and Elizabeth to be married by Captain Sparrow on the deck of the Black Pearl after Davy Jones and Beckett had been taken care of, "and they lived happily ever after". If you've seen the movie, you know that this does not happen. That what does happen was something we never anticipated. But, it's starting to grow on me. The producers of the movie were bold enough to break with tradition and I think it's going to make At World's End that much more endearing with time.

The visual effects in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End are amazing. I was mighty impressed at how good Industrial Light and Magic had become with the CGI in Dead Man's Chest. In At World's End, they surpassed that even. So many shots in this movie that I have to wonder how they were done. You might be hearing some talk about that last scene with Cutler Beckett: that was definitely a fun one to watch.

I feel like I'm only able to give a half-hearted review of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End because I really need to see this again, if not two more times, to feel like I can fully appreciate all the nuances and angles of this movie. Maybe I'll write some more thoughts about it when that happens.

But in the meantime, I've spent each Saturday of the past four weeks watching a new summer movie (Spider-Man 3 twice and Shrek the Third last week). I had a good time with Spider-Man 3 in spite of its many problems and didn't think very much at all about "Dreck the Third". With Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, I can finally see that there may be some promise yet at the movies this summer.

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