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Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
Club Notice - 04/28/00 -- Vol. 18, No. 44
Chair/Librarian: Mark Leeper, 732-817-5619, mleeper@lucent.com
Factotum: Evelyn Leeper, 732-332-6218, eleeper@lucent.com
Distinguished Heinlein Apologist: Rob Mitchell, robmitchell@lucent.com
HO Chair Emeritus: John Jetzt, jetzt@lucent.com
HO Librarian Emeritus: Nick Sauer, njs@lucent.com
Back issues at http://www.geocities.com/evelynleeper
All material copyright by author unless otherwise noted.
The Science Fiction Association of Bergen County meets on the
second Saturday of every month in Upper Saddle River; call
201-447-3652 for details. The Denver Area Science Fiction
Association meets 7:30 PM on the third Saturday of every month at
Southwest State Bank, 1380 S. Federal Blvd.
===================================================================
1. A piece of email I got criticized the film REAR WINDOW and asked
me to defend the film. I did not put up much of a defense. That
got me thinking about one of the great icons of film, Alfred
Hitchcock. There are two directors in Hollywood history whom I
think most fans believe could do no wrong. One is Frank Capra and
the other is Alfred Hitchcock. Even Capra does not have what would
be called a "cult following." Hitchcock's name still resounds and
his films are as popular as ever. Somehow as much as I like film I
am not the great Hitchcock fan other critics seem to be.
Recently I went to the Film Forum in New York City to see the
restored version of REAR WINDOW. It was restored about the time of
the 100th anniversary of Hitchcock's birth. He was born Sunday,
August 13, 1899. That should forever put to rest any belief that
there is a special grace to people born on Sunday. Hitchcock was a
man without much personal grace. He was an unattractive man. He
was overweight and did not carry the extra weight well. His work
brought him in contact with some of the most beautiful actresses in
the world. And because he could choose they were just the sort of
women with the sort of pristine beauty that fascinated him. But
beyond that he could frame them on the screen, dressing them up,
making them up, and lighting them in the way that he and most of
the rest of the world found the most attractive. It was a little
like playing celebrity paper dolls with the real people. And it
was more frustrating. He could make one of his women as appealing
as any woman in the world, but he could not attract them. There is
no sex beyond a kiss in REAR WINDOW, but that scene is as sexy as
any scene in any film made today even with the benefit of a much
looser code.
Hitchcock, made Grace Kelly so attractive under the gaze of the
camera that the girl from the Philadelphia was chosen to be a
European princess. She had appeared in other films. She is
attractive in HIGH NOON. But she is a thing of perfect beauty in
her Hitchcock films. Hitchcock made her beautiful and then lost
her. And that was a problem for him because he was not through
using her beauty in films. Apparently even after she was married
he tried to get her back for MARNIE, hoping he could get a then
European princess to return to America to play a sexually mal-
adjusted kleptomaniac on the screen.
So Hitchcock crafted his films from the best materials available.
Some of his films, like VERTIGO, are thought to be absolute
paragons of the motion picture art. Next week I will take a look
at this belief and ask if the film really are as flawless as the
critics seem to think. [-mrl]
===================================================================
2. U-571 (a film review by Mark R. Leeper):
Capsule: This film is essence of submarine war
film. In fact, the one serious problem is that
it seems inspired so much more by submarine
movies than anybody's real wartime experiences.
This solid action adventure really has too many
scenes familiar from other films, particularly
the great DAS BOOT. But still how can you go
too far wrong with action scenes set on
accurate renditions of American submarines and
German U-boats? Rating: 7 (0 to 10), low +2
(-4 to +4)
Well, let's get this out of the way immediately. It did not really
happen this way. If you read the statement at the end of the film,
even the film tells you that it did not happen this way. The first
Enigma machine was captured months earlier than this film's Spring
1942 setting. It was the British H.M.S. Bulldog whose 1941 mission
in the North Atlantic captured the first Enigma. Americans did
capture a U-boat with an Enigma machine, but not until 1944--much
later in the war. In fact, even that was a total foul-up. If the
Germans learned that the Americans had captured an Enigma they
would have changed their codes and ruined the precious work done by
the British cryptographers.
It was the British who cracked the German military code Enigma in
World War II (building on pervious work by Polish mathematicians
earlier in the war). That task required a chain of extraordinary
feats, not the least of which was capturing one of the machines.
When Michael Caton-Jones wanted to make an exciting film about
flying bombing runs over Germany he fibbed and made it the last
flight of the Memphis Belle in the film MEMPHIS BELLE. The real
last flight was not so dramatic. It is a sort of dramatic license.
Similarly when Jonathan Mostow wanted to make a film about
submarine warfare in World War II, he invented a fictional American
mission to capture an Enigma box in 1942. And for those who think
that it is so terrible for Americans to claim what was really a
British accomplishment, I suggest they look up David Lean's 1952
film THE SOUND BARRIER. So now we are even with the British.
It is spring, maybe four months after Pearl Harbor, and the crew of
an American submarine, the S-33, is called back early from leave
for a special mission that will not wait. Commanding the submarine
through this world of rain, wind, steel, fire, and water, a world
of heavy machinery, darkness, and loud explosions, is Captain
Dahlgren (played by Bill Paxton) and his second in command, just
passed over for promotion to his own command, is Lt. Andrew Tyler
(Matthew McConaughey). Tensions arise as Tyler knows that the
reason he was not promoted is that Dahlgren would not recommend him
for command. But Tyler is going to get his taste of command this
mission.
The S-33 has been modified to look like a German U-boat in a
deception intended to help the crew capture the disabled U-571.
This U-boat has an Enigma code machine. The plan is to capture the
machine and scuttle the U-boat so the Germans assume that the
Enigma machine is lost. But as the title suggests, the U-boat will
play a more important role in the story than that. Once the
American crew finds the U-571 the pace of this film is non-stop up
to the closing credits.
The real problem with U-571 is the amount that has been recycled
from previous films. The very first shot is just an eye staring.
In a second or two we realize that it is an eye staring into a
submarine periscope. It is very similar to the opening scene in
THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING, THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING. In the next
seconds the U-boat torpedoes a ship and then looks around to see a
destroyer headed straight at the periscope. Seen almost from the
level of the surface of the water it is a sobering sight. It
certainly was in the film DAS BOOT. The filmmakers have used very
little imagination to show us situations we have not seen before.
Perhaps DAS BOOT used up all the good anxiety scenes that one can
have with a U-boat. But all the classic submarine film scare
sequences are somewhere here. The submarine is depth charged as
the crew sits and listens waiting for the concussion that will
spell their death. There is the sequence with a submarine sinking
too deep. The water squirts in as if from a fire hose and gauges
crack. A bolt flies like a bullet. (That is why submarine hulls
are welded, not bolted. That would not happen in real life.)
Jonathan Mostow, who is best known for having written and directed
the very different film BREAKDOWN, repeats those functions in this
film. The script calls for Paxton to be mature and McConaughey to
be a little less self-possessed. They do that reasonably well, but
neither gives a memorable performance. McConaughey looks like he
is under pressure and sweats well, but does not make the audience
identify with him. Harvey Keitel is a good actor who almost always
plays someone unsavory and somebody who lives outside of society.
It is something of a departure seeing him playing a good decent
career navy man with nothing but decent intentions. His few major
scenes are really the acting that I will remember. Jon Bon Jovi is
hardly noticeable in the film and that is probably just fine.
Richard Marvin's score sounds brassy and martial, but unlike the
characters, the score plays it safe and takes no chances. Mostow,
however, does take some chances and the biggest is making this film
that will obviously invite comparison to the modern classic
submarine film DAS BOOT. He loses but, it is a competition he
could probably never have hoped to win.
Perhaps we should consider U-571 to be just a fanciful thriller set
in World War II in the style of Alastair MacLean. It is a "could
have happened but didn't" sort of action tale like THE GUNS OF
NAVARONE. But for the familiarity of the situations I would have
rated it fairly well. I give it 7 on the 0 to 10 scale and a low
+2 on the -4 to +4 scale.
[In November 1999 PBS ran a very good documentary, "Decoding Nazi
Secrets" on what all was involved in breaking the code. Details
are available at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/decoding.] By the
way, capturing a U-boat is one thing, figuring out how to run it in
a matter of minutes is something very different. It should have
taken days. That is one more place where this film takes liberties
with the truth. [-mrl]
===================================================================
3. Here is the complete 2000 Hugo Awards and John W. Campbell Award
Nomination List:
Best Novel (334 nominations for 183 novels):
* A CIVIL CAMPAIGN by Lois McMaster Bujold (Baen)
* CRYPTONOMICON by Neal Stephenson (Avon)
* DARWIN'S RADIO by Greg Bear (HarperCollins UK; Del Rey)
* A DEEPNESS IN THE SKY by Vernor Vinge (Tor)
* HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN by J.K. Rowling
(Bloomsbury; Arthur A. Levine/Scholastic Press)
Best Novella (191 nominations for 58 novellas):
* "The Astronaut From Wyoming" by Adam-Troy Castro and
Jerry Oltion (Analog 7-8/99)
* "Forty, Counting Down" by Harry Turtledove (Asimov's 12/99)
* "Hunting the Snark" by Mike Resnick (Asimov's 12/99)
* "Son Observe the Time" by Kage Baker (Asimov's 5/99)
* "The Winds of Marble Arch" by Connie Willis
(Asimov's 10-11/99)
Best Novelette (168 nominations for 130 novelettes, six nominees
due to a tie):
* "Border Guards" by Greg Egan (Interzone 10/99)
* "The Chop Girl" by Ian R. MacLeod (Asimov's 12/99)
* "Fossil Games" by Tom Purdom (Asimov's 2/99)
* "The Secret History of the Ornithopter" by Jan Lars Jensen
(F&SF 6/99)
* "Stellar Harvest" by Eleanor Arnason (Asimov's 4/99)
* "1016 to 1" by James Patrick Kelly (Asimov's 6/99)
Best Short Story (189 nominations for 158 short stories):
* "Ancient Engines" by Michael Swanwick (Asimov's 2/99)
* "Hothouse Flowers" by Mike Resnick (Asimov's 10-11/99)
* "macs" by Terry Bisson (F&SF 10-11/99)
* "Sarajevo" by Nick DiChario (F&SF 3/99)
* "Scherzo with Tyrannosaur" by Michael Swanwick (Asimov's 7/99)
Best Related Book (167 nominations for 74 related books):
* Minicon 34 Restaurant Guide by Karen Cooper and Bruce Schneier
(Rune Press)
* The Sandman: The Dream Hunters by Neil Gaiman and
Yoshitaka Amano (DC Comics/Vertigo)
* Science Fiction of the 20th Century by Frank M. Robinson
(Collectors Press)
* The Science of Discworld by Terry Pratchett, Ian Stewart,
and Jack Cohen (Ebury Press)
* Spectrum 6: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art edited by
Cathy and Arnie Fenner (Underwood)
Best Dramatic Presentation (304 nominations for 106 dramatic
presentations):
* BEING JOHN MALKOVICH
* GALAXY QUEST
* THE IRON GIANT
* THE MATRIX
* THE SIXTH SENSE
Best Professional Editor (203 nominations for 66 editors):
* Gardner Dozois (Asimov's Science Fiction)
* David G. Hartwell (Tor/Forge; Year's Best SF)
* Patrick Nielsen Hayden (Tor Books; Starlight)
* Stanley Schmidt (Analog Science Fiction and Fact)
* Gordon Van Gelder (St. Martin's Press;
Fantasy & Science Fiction)
Best Professional Artist (196 nominations for 103 artists):
* Jim Burns
* Bob Eggleton
* Donato Giancola
* Don Maitz
* Michael Whelan
Best Semiprozine (168 nominations for 38 semiprozines):
* Interzone edited by David Pringle
* Locus edited by Charles N. Brown
* The New York Review of Science Fiction edited by
Kathryn Cramer, Ariel Hamion, David G. Hartwell,
and Kevin Maroney
* Science Fiction Chronicle edited by Andrew I. Porter
* Speculations edited by Kent Brewster
Best Fanzine (195 nominations for 94 fanzines):
* Ansible edited by Dave Langford
* Challenger edited by Guy H. Lillian III
* File 770 edited by Mike Glyer
* Mimosa edited by Nicki and Richard Lynch
* Plokta edited by Alison Scott, Steve Davies, and Mike Scott
Best Fan Writer (191 nominations for 147 fan writers):
* Bob Devney
* Mike Glyer
* Dave Langford
* Evelyn C. Leeper
* Steven H Silver
Best Fan Artist (164 nominations for 101 fan artists):
* Freddie Baer
* Brad Foster
* Teddy Harvia
* Joe Mayhew
* Taral Wayne
John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer (110 nominations for
72 writers):
An award for the best new writer whose first work of science
fiction or fantasy appeared during 1998 or 1999 in a
professional publication. Sponsored by Dell Magazines.
* Cory Doctorow (2nd year of eligibility)
* Thomas Harlan (1st year of eligibility)
* Ellen Klages (2nd year of eligibility)
* Kristine Smith (1st year of eligibility)
* Shane Tourtellotte (2nd year of eligibility)
Mark Leeper
HO 1K-644 732-817-5619
mleeper@lucent.com
If absolute power corrupt absolutely, does
absolute powerlessness make you pure?
-- Harry Shearer
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