Weekend Viewing

My Darling Clementine is a stupid title for a pretty great movie. There's a supporting character named Clementine who figures into very little of the action and there's the song which is sung or played a couple of different times through the film. I'm not sure why the producers chose that title but who knows why they do anything.

The point is, the movie is great. It's a very lean, economical telling of the shootout at the O.K. Corral and features a mustachioed Henry Fonda as Wyatt Earp. I've only seen 12 Angry Men and On Golden Pond so I'm not much of an expert on HF - but I was surprised to find what an effective Western protagonist he is. I guess it should have gone without saying but he is the very epitome of "laconic." But he's also immensely likeable. There is an authenticity to his performance that I found really persuasive.

I'd never seen Victor Mature in anything but was pleased with his appropriately Byronic take on Doc Holliday. Mind you, (cinematic heretic that I am) it was not superior to Val Kilmer's version in 1993's Tombstone but it was still really good. Walter Brennan is also great at the patriarch of the lawless Clanton brothers

Apparently, my mother-in-law was named after Linda Darnell who plays the ill-fated Chihuahua. She is a looker, for sure, but unfortunately she's about as convincing as a Mexican woman as I am. Nice to look at though.



My other movie-viewing experience this weekend was with the most recent version of Journey to the Center of the Earth. I wasn't expecting ART by any stretch and it wasn't a wretched waste of time like, say, the most recent version of The Time Machine. But it wasn't really good either. The thing that bothered me about it is that there were no characters. None of the three leads were given anything except the thinnest of backstory and wardrobe and makeup. Josh Hutcherson, the teenager, is actually a good actor. He has the right amount of youthful glower and vulnerability to make him a pretty convincing actor. He did nice work in Zathura and Bridge to Terabithia. But here, there's no reason for his behavior, no connecting line that draws together into a coherent character. The blond, Nordic, hot mountain guide gets especially short shrift. She's nothing more than a pleasing-to-look-at blip on the screen. When she kisses Brendan Fraser at the end, the audience is left to wonder why in the world she would do that. It makes no sense except that's how movies like this are supposed to end. That's all.

The thing that makes Brendan Fraser perfect for a movie like this and for not much else is the fact that he's not a convincing action-oriented leading man. He's got too much goof in him and, even though he's a pretty big guy, he always looks a little doughy. There's no sense of gravitas or danger to him. He's just a shrug-of-the-shoulders, golly-gee kinda of guy which makes him just right for producers who want to make "family friendly" films (which means non-threatening on any level). For me, it just makes him uninteresting to watch because he can't seem to give the sense that anything is at stake in the story he's playing.

The special effects were fine. They were obviously designed for the theatrical 3-D experience and, without that, there were moments that were just hokey and lame. Still, the girls seemed to like it well enough - and if a 6 year old and an 8 year old can be entertained and it's by something that doesn't involve Hannah Montana or the Witches of Waverly Place, I'm a happy man.