Today's Fine Thing(s): Movie Trailers

Today's Fine Thing: Star Trek

Okay, I saw Star Trek two nights ago, but I was just too lazy to actually write about it. So here we go. I have never been a fan of Star Trek, always seeing it as a lesser version of Star Wars. The old TV show always seemed so campy and pointless and The Next Generation seemed alright, but still had an amount of distance that kept me from engaging with it. It happened when I saw the trailer for this Star Trek that I thought to myself "holy cow, Star Trek is about to be cool." Soon the reviews began to pour out, each one more praising than the last. I said to myself "holy beans, I need to see this movie in theatres" and that, my friends, is exactly what I did.

The film opens with a spectacular sequence in which George Kirk must save his crew from certain death including his wife and soon-to-be son James Tiberius Kirk. This opening is filled with images of sheer awe and sets the bar for the rest of the movie. The rest of the movie then begins with Kirk joining starfleet after a barroom brawl and the film kicks into high gear introducing us to all the staples of Star Trek such as the vulcan Spock, the beautiful communications officer Uhura, the hilarious Chekhov, Sulu and his combat skills, the spunky Scotty, and the everything-phobic Dr. Bones McCoy. I could explain the story but frankly don't feel like it as what makes this movie such a delightful ride is the characters and the casting. Not since Hairspray a few years back has a movie relied and banked so heavily on its intelligent casting in which each member plays its part fully and only adds to the overall. They make the film move and the audience move with it. Okay, so maybe I should explain the story a little which is about a romulan (bad guy) who wants revenge on the person who let his planet die in the explosion of a dead star. The crew of the Enterprise must stop him. The rest is all character development at lightspeed.

This is the kind of movie the summer needs to kick it off right, like Iron Man did last year. Here we have a movie that has officially made Star Trek cool and it is one fine thing.

Today's Fine Thing: Miroir Noir

Back in 2004 no one could have predicted the impact on music that The Arcade Fire would have. Upon the release of Funeral that year critics hailed The Arcade Fire as the future of music. 3 years later the same band released Neon Bible which was still raved by most critics, but not as much as their previous entry. During the recording and touring of their second album the band had a couple gentlemen follow them around with cameras. What resulted is the film Miroir Noir (french for Black Mirror, one of the album's tracks). Miroir Noir is a beautifully crafted work of musical art, it is neither concert film or documentary. There are clips in the stylings of both but they are meshed and melded together as more of a collage of the life of The Arcade Fire during the 3 years of making the album. It is true that the film is more for fans than virgins to the music, but I believe someone with an open mind can come to love the band through seeing them in this way. Notable moments are such times as when Regine's face delights in the violin orchestra playing Intervention or during the song Rebellion(lies) when Will Butler climps one of the towers on the side of the stage. The film pours so much delight out and depicts much of the brilliance and uniqueness of the band and their approach to music. This DVD is a fine thing indeed.

The Finer Things

Welcome to my newest blog and hopefully my last one for awhile. The idea behind this blog is stolen from an episode of The Office in which they have a "Finer Things Club." This blog, like the club, will be here as my exploration of all things "fine" such as books, or movies, or music. It will be a place where we can all have discussions through commenting and where I hope to have active readers, thought I do not cling to that hope. More than anything this blog is just to help see life through the filter of art, sadly I have nothing to post on at this moment but things will come.