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When I learned that French director Luc Besson had made a remake of "I Love Lucy" I was intrigued. I was curious to see how Besson would bring the essential human comedy and drama, which is love, into this age of CGI-obsessed troglodytes. After viewing this wretched piece of trash, I believe the future of cinema is doomed. Everything that was great in I Love Lucy has been cut away in an effort to appease the sensibilities of the modern film goer. To appeal to modern ideas of political correctness, Lucy is no longer a daft housewife. Instead, she has been transformed into an action hero. Rather than prat-falls, she performs martial arts. Rather than a ditz, the 2014 Lucy is a college student who evolves into a genius. This occurs in an inane sub-plot involving an experimental narcotic that Lucy is accidentally dosed with, which through some completely unrealistic means, somehow accelerates her brain and unlocks hidden potential in her mind. Lucille Ball needed no such gimmicks to win the hearts of viewers. In an effort to appeal to 14 year olds in Asia, the movie is set in Taipei and filled with nonsensical CGI, particularly in the later stages when Lucy becomes almost a parody of The Matrix, another film that equates drugs with attaining a higher state. As with Neo and the Red Pill, so with Lucy and the experimental crystal methamphetamine. Clearly a nod to the currently trendy notion of legalizating drugs. The message is obvious: do drugs to achieve enlightenment. In my view, audiences will not be fooled. This movie is a complete disaster that bears no resemblance at all to the I Love Lucy that we remember. There are few laughs here. Indeed it is some sort of absurdist action adventure. Such is the state of today's cinema that even the quintessential American love story can't be told without being completely rewritten to appeal to drug-using 14 year olds in Hong Kong. There is no romantic chemistry between Johansson and Freeman. Indeed, they are not even on screen together until the final minutes of the film. Scarlett Johansson is no Lucille Ball. Morgan Freeman is no Desi Arnaz. And Luc Besson is no Frenchman. -k

Frozen is one of the most successful films of recent years, and one of the most successful animated films ever-- in the same company as Shrek or Lion King at the very least. It was top 10 at the box office right from its release in November continuous to the DVD release a couple of weeks ago. It's pretty much a global phenomenon, with huge commercial success internationally as well as in North America. I gather that the soundtrack has been very successful as well, and they just won Oscars for best song and best animated picture. I watched it last week, and really enjoyed it. It's visually stunning, and I loved the characters. I'm not usually big on musicals, but the songs in this were very good. I had to go on IMDB afterward to find out who sang Kristen Bell's character Anna's songs. Kristen Bell sang them. I had no idea she could sing. Idina Menzel (or Adele Dazeem, as John Travolta introduced her at the Oscars...) provides the voice of Elsa and sings the "Let It Go" song that is one of the movie's high points. They originally intended to make a movie based on the Hans Christian Anderson story "The Snow Queen", but the end result bears no resemblance to the fairy tale, other than having both snow and a queen. I read somewhere that Elsa was originally intended to be a villain, but the songs the songwriters wrote for her changed the writers' perspective about her and they came up with a story that makes her a very sympathetic character. So... after watching this thoroughly enjoyable and seemingly innocent movie, I was shocked to learn that it is actually a source of controversy -- CONTROVERSY!! -- as various people with axes to grind came after Anna and Elsa to further their various causes. The first of these causes: the shocking amount of white people in Frozen has outraged people who feel that there should be an affirmative action plan for animated characters or a racial quota for Disney princesses or something. Just because it's set in a little Norwegian town of centuries gone by doesn't mean they couldn't have had African princesses, I guess. So there was a thing on the internet where people posted their Africanized pictures of Anna and Elsa with the hashtag #thiscouldhavebeenFrozen because snow and African princesses go together like peas and carrots I guess. When I think of Hans Christian Anderson stories, I usually picture African characters, obviously. Perhaps they could have had Arabian princesses. And instead of Norway it could have been set in Arabia, and instead of snow, Elsa's magic covers everything in sand, and instead of an ice castle, Elsa builds herself a sand castle, and instead of Frozen, it could have been called Sandblasted. That would probably have worked well too. Slightly more rational criticism pointed out that the male lead-- Kristoff-- was modeled after the Saami-- Scandinavia's indigenous people. Kristoff wears traditional Saami garb and travels with a reindeer-- just like the Saami did. Yet Kristoff is blond! Surely Kristoff should have been a person of color! Well, as these photos of Saami demonstrate... ...it turns out that "indigenous" is not a synonym for brown. The other complaint about Frozen is that it's SATANIC GAY PROPAGANDA aimed at INDOCTRINATING young girls into HARDCORE MAN-HATING LESBIANS. That was how one American pastor described it, anyway. Others have present this idea without the hyperbole. The argument is this: Elsa lives in fear of everyone finding out she is different, afraid that they'll hate her if they find out-- this could be a metaphor for a gay person living in the closet, afraid of bigotry if they are found out. The "Let It Go" scene where Elsa embraces her magic power could be a metaphor for coming out of the closet. Elsa only finds happiness when she embraces her magic-- the movie is metaphorically telling gay people that they have to come out of the closet to find happiness, right? Well, it could be symbolic of those things, but it is actually symbolic of experiences that are almost universal as people grow into adulthood. The "Let it go" scene is really about the decision to put aside other peoples' expectations and choose your own way in life. It could be about someone coming out of the closet, but it could equally be about telling your dad "I'm quitting proctology school and joining the rodeo" or quitting your job as an accountant to start your own business. Elsa's experience as a child growing up hiding her terrible secret could be symbolic of a gay person, but it is equally applicable to any shame-inducing experience that people struggle through, especially children. The idea that Elsa finds happiness by "coming out of the closet" actually doesn't follow from the movie. Her life actually gets a lot worse. What saves her is that in the climax of the movie, she finally understands that she is loved, unconditionally, just as she is. Accepting that we are worthy of being loved is an important thing, and sometimes a difficult thing, and not just for gay people. -k