BARACK-NID

Time for another edition of my infrequently recurring feature "Weird-Ass Old Comics." This time, we're looking at...

...The Amazing Spider-Man, issue #583, from March of 2009. This is a much more latter-day vintage of comic than I would normally collect; obviously it was the presence of President (then President-Elect) Barack Obama, sharing the cover with Spidey, that made me pick it up. But I had never gotten around to reading it.

Last week Obama was the guest of Stephen Colbert in a prerecorded interview from the Obama Presidential Center, slated to open on June 19th in Chicago. The comic was shown on display at the Center--Colbert teased Obama about having been featured on a Spider-Man cover before Obama was (issue #573, November of 2008)--so I dug out my copy and read it.

Obama doesn't appear in the comic's main story, a sweet feature about Peter Parker's long-suffering office pal Betty Brant. Betty is weary of Petey's tendency to stand her up or be late, little knowing that he's off battling villains while she's waiting.

According to an editorial note, the brief "Bonus Back-Up Feature" about Obama, scripted by Zach Wells and drawn by Todd Nauck, was a last-minute add after the Marvel folks learned from an interview in The Telegraph that Obama was a fan of the webslinger. In the Colbert interview, Obama mentioned his superheroes of choice as a kid were Spider-Man and Batman, which made me swell with pride; same two for me.

In the short saga "Spidey Meets the President!" Petey, in D.C. to photograph the inauguration, switches into Spider-Man to prevent The Chameleon from impersonating Obama and becoming President 44. When Obama realizes that, his Secret Service detail notwithstanding, Spidey is the right man for the job and gives him the green light to take action, Spidey delivers the tale's best line: "Ya hear that Chameleon? The President-Elect here just appointed me...SECRETARY OF SHUTTIN' YOU UP!"

It was poignant to see the Obama interview last week, even though I'm not a 44 fanboy. I've always liked him, but he was never anywhere near as boldly progressive as I wanted him to be, or as I think he could have been, especially if he had acted decisively early on. I'm not at all sure Biden, doddering but clear-eyed and out of  f*cks, wasn't more decisive. Even so I think that, graded on the curve of what he accomplished versus what he was up against, Obama was likely the best American President of my lifetime.

But when you see a man of Obama's poise and grace and reflective intelligence and plain decency in contrast to what we have now, it's both terrifying and mortifying. If The Chameleon had successfully impersonated Obama's successor, we might well be better off.

CAGE, FIGHTING

Check out my review of Mortal Kombat II...

...online at Phoenix Magazine.

SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL

Here's my review of The Devil Wears Prada 2...

...online at Phoenix Magazine.

PROCESSED HAM

In the multiplexes this weekend:

Animal Farm--Seen in a political and historical vacuum, this new movie is a strange but enjoyable enough animated feature for kids. But it's nearly impossible for many of us to see it in a vacuum.

The film is an adaptation of George Orwell's 1945 allegorical fable set on a farm in which the animals have run off the oppressive humans and set up a new society based on such rules as "ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL." What follows, of course, is the slide into selfishness, corruption and classism that seems to inevitably follow even the most high-minded of revolutions.

It's one of the great works of 20th-Century fiction, and the love that Andy Serkis, director of this new version, has for his source material feels unmistakable. But there's no way around it; Serkis and screenwriter Nicholas Stoller have turned Orwell's hard, unsentimental vision into just another kiddie flick. They've given it a star-studded cast with the likes of Kieran Culkin, Steve Buscemi, Glenn Close, Laverne Cox, Kathleen Turner, Jim Parsons and Woody Harrelson as the saintly horse Boxer.

They've added a character, a young pig named Lucky (voiced by Gaten Matarazzo of Stranger Things) to serve as the movie's conscience. They've filled the story with contemporary elements like cell phones and drones, and added a long action finale in which Lucky and the kingpin pig Napoleon (Seth Rogen; excellent) face off for the soul of Animal Farm.

Giving happy endings—well, not happy, but less dispiriting—to Orwell adaptations is nothing new. The 1956 version of 1984 offered an alternative ending used in some markets, in which Winston and Julia are shot down protesting Big Brother instead of surrendering to their brainwashing. A harsh but visually beautiful 1954 British animated version of Animal Farm (partly financed by the CIA!) ended with a second revolution by the animals, this time to overthrow the pigs.

So it's almost easier to excuse Serkis for offering a less gloomy and cynical Animal Farm, and certainly for adding flatulence jokes and other lowbrow gags, than for flexing Orwell's masterpiece to the standard template of the commercial animated feature. You can look from this Animal Farm to such rural tales as Barnyard and Ferdinand and Rock-a-Doodle and back again, and already it's impossible to say which is which.

POP OF THE WORLD, MA!

A happy Friday to everybody! Check out my reviews of Michael...

...and Mother Mary...

...online at Phoenix Magazine.

THE SUN'LL COME OUT TOMB-MORROW

Now playing:

Lee Cronin's The Mummy--No fewer than four earlier horror movies have been titled The Mummy; this new one comes with a onscreen directorial signature. Cronin is the Irishman who wrote and directed the 2023 Evil Dead Rise. His mummy flick should please fans of that movie, as it's essentially Evil Dead Rise with some Egyptian trappings. For the rest of us, though, it's likely to be a tough slog.

An expat American family--TV reporter Dad (Jack Reynor), medical Mom (Laia Costa) and a daughter and son--live in Cairo. The daughter, Katie, is abducted from the family's garden by a witchy presence. Eight years later, poor Katie not having been found, the family has moved back to Albuquerque, and added a new adorable daughter, as well as the sassy gramma (Veronica Falcon).

When Katie turns up alive back in Egypt, catatonic and desiccated, they bring her home and try to care for her there. Gruesome mayhem ensues. Meanwhile back in Egypt, a police detective (the striking May Calamawy) probes the mystery of what happened to her. As might be expected, it's not pretty. 

Cronin is by no means without talent. He has a fine eye, and he can generate atmosphere. His script is nutty but coherent on its own terms, unlike, for instance, that of the recent undertone. There's nothing really new here--the story seems indebted both to The Exorcist and to John Carpenter's 1987 Prince of Darkness--and many of the plot points, starting with but not limited to the idea that a child in this condition could be cared for at home, are deeply stupid. But that in itself wouldn't be a dealbreaker if the movie weren't so rotten-spirited.

Again, this may just be what the market will currently bear for contemporary horror fans. But, as with Evil Dead Rise--I'm a big fan of the original Raimi Evil Dead flicks--I seem to have lost my stomach for this sort of extreme horror shtick; I can't find the terrorizing and torture of little kids entertaining.

The smug, nervy way the director uses wonderful, comforting elements as a supposed ironic contrast to his shocks also soured me on Lee Cronin's The Mummy. He doesn't seem, for instance, to share the Mel Brooks 2,000 Year Old Man's enthusiasm for nectarines. And Cronin uses maybe the most uplifting of American popular songs, The Band's "The Weight," as the background for a scene of ghastly gore.

Fortunately, "The Weight" is more powerful than any splatter that Cronin can muster. But of all this movie's sins, that may be the hardest to forgive.

FEST RESULTS

Check out my short article, online at Phoenix Magazine, about this year's edition of the Phoenix Film Festival...

...which runs through April 19.