Wednesday, April 18, 2012

P is for The Proposition (#388)

The Proposition (2005) raised Westerns to a new standard.  A genre that went out of fashion decades ago (died along with the Duke, is more like it), Hollywood had tried to figure out what exactly Westerns mean in the modern era, but the answer was found Down Under.  Director John Hillcoat tapped musician Nick Cave to craft his vision, which pits Ray Winstone and Emily Watson against a landscape neither wants, and a clan of brothers against each other: Guy Pearce is coerced into betraying his brother Danny Huston (thus the eponymous agreement), and really, nobody wins.  That's what this genre really represents.  For a long time, it was portrayed as a landscape of black-and-white morality, but the frontier was settled by people simply trying to survive.  Apparently the truths of frontier life are universal.

Star Trek bonus!

P is for Picard, Jean-Luc
(from Star Trek: The Next Generation)
There would be no Star Trek today if not for the gentleman captain played by Patrick Stewart.  And funny enough, Star Trek would not need to have been reinvented by J.J. Abrams had it not been for the same character.  Simply put, Picard was a force of nature, the total opposite of James T. Kirk, and while his series launched to dubious acceptance from existing Star Trek fans, Picard became a phenomenon unto himself.  And his success was so great, Star Trek expanded and then contracted around him.  The only way to recover from this phoenix was rebirth.  And there is no Picard without Patrick Stewart, so long as he's still living (even Tom Hardy couldn't change this Prime Directive).  So the story went back to Kirk.

A-to-Z Challenge!

3 comments:

Michael Abayomi said...

Yet another movie I'll need to check out. Thanks for bringing my attention to this one.

Kate OMara said...

Love Picard! He's so much better as a Captain than Kirk. Just my opinion.
Kate
Follow & A to Z http://whenkateblogs.blogspot.com/

Tony Laplume said...

Picard had the advantage of experience. The closest Kirk ever came to his depth was in the first three movies.

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