THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
06/14/13 -- Vol. 31, No. 50, Whole Number 1758
Chong: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
Cheech: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
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Topics:
Personalities (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Comments on Watching FRANKENSTEIN (1931) (Part 1)
(comments by Mark R. Leeper)
How "Star Trek" Has Damaged Our Future in Space (comments
by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)
MUD (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
SHE DEVIL (1957) (film retrospective by Mark R. Leeper)
THE STROLLER STRATEGY (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
DESIGNER GENES by Steven Potter, Ph.D. (book review
by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)
Remembering Jack Vance (letter of comment by Greg Frederick)
This Week's Reading (THE CIVIL WAR BOOKSHELF and THE PERILS
OF SHERLOCK HOLMES) (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
==================================================================
TOPIC: Personalities (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
There are two kinds of people. Those for whom when all they have
is a hammer, everything looks like a nail, and those for whom when
all they have is a hammer, everything looks like a thumb. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Comments on Watching FRANKENSTEIN (1931) (Part 1) (comments
by Mark R. Leeper)
I took part in an on-line discussion of the 1931 Universal film
FRANKENSTEIN. These, barely formatted are observations I made on
the film. This week I will talk about the style of the film and of
the scientific basis of the story. Next week I will talk more
about the production.
FRANKENSTEIN, together with DRACULA the year before, really started
the second great cycle of horror films. It drew heavily on the
first horror cycle, the German Expressionist film movement in
Germany. The movement would continue for about five years, peter
out as new management at Universal decided to get away from horror
films, and then return to them for about seven years starting with
SON OF FRANKENSTEIN (1939). All the while it would be Universal
Studios leading the way for other studios to copy. But
FRANKENSTEIN and DRACULA would still be their major successes.
In style FRANKENSTEIN is a little early for the recognizable
Universal style we are used to. There is no opening banner with
Universal globe. There had not been one in DRACULA the year
before. Soon the globe with a plane or the word "Universal"
encircling the world would be the trademark opening touch.
What Universal does have at the beginning is a post-production
opening. It is a stage with a curtain and Edward Van Sloan coming
out for introductory comments, warning the viewer that the film may
strain their nerves. I always thought this was a sort of insincere
warning and having women dressed as nurses present in the theater
was the kind of exploitation marketing that others like William
Castle would later imitate. A recent commentary on the film says
that at previews people really were frightened by the film and that
the warning was sincere.
To further build tension, director James Whale has under the titles
pictures having nothing to do with the film. One has a man with
claw-like hands and rays coming out of his eyes. The next title
has an evil-looking man surrounded by eyes rotating around his
right eyebrow. I cannot think of another film that had such
creative credits until the 1960s.
In the credits they say that The Monster is played by "?". That
may have added temporarily to the aura of the film, though
Universal would soon be going to the other extreme billing Boris
Karloff as just "Karloff" to say of course you know whom we are
talking about. I believe the only other actor who was billed with
just a last name was Greta Garbo. It is an interesting point that
Karloff did not get the name Boris in the opening titles of a
Frankenstein film until SON OF FRANKENSTEIN.
The actual story starts with an extended scene of a funeral with
Henry (Colin Clive) and Fritz (Dwight Frye) hiding a short distance
away, waiting to undo the burial. THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN had
only a tiny flash of the funeral, but it has footage of the
peasants approaching the graveyard that was not actually in
FRANKENSTEIN.
The fact that this film shows Frankenstein stealing bodies defines
a point that Mary Shelley had left ambiguous in the novel
FRANKENSTEIN. In that novel Shelley never attempts to pin down
whether the monster is created by science, magic, or alchemy. She
played it safe and it made the story more believable. The film
ties down the process to being one of parts of dead bodies pieced
together and animated with electricity. So while FRANKENSTEIN was
considered one of the earliest science fiction novels, it is in
fact left ambiguous as to whether it is science fiction at all.
Outside of the text Shelley leaned toward the interpretation that
Frankenstein used scientific means, but it is never told in the
book. The monster could be a large homunculus or a golem. One
thing nearly certain is that the creature in the novel is not
supposed to be pieced together from parts of bodies as he is in the
film. Frankenstein would have had to find a large number of
bodies, each of nearly matching super-human size. Where would
Frankenstein find so many cadavers of human giants? You certainly
could never build one gigantic man out of pieces of three or four
short men. Actually in the book the monster is about eight feet
tall, much taller than he is ever portrayed in film. (It is
interesting to note that Shelley uses the word "stature" seven
times in the novel. Five of those usages accompany it with the
same adjective, "gigantic".)
Then there is the use of science in the film. I believe that any
science you get from the film is best left at the door when you
leave. In the real world there are, for example, no visible
differences between a normal human brain and a criminal brain.
The flat top of the monster was inspired by the idea that Henry
would have taken the top off of the monster's head to perform brain
surgery. Are we to believe that Henry never put the top of the
skull back and the monster has no bone across the top of his head?
Is it just flesh stretched like a drum?
It is not clear why a creature raised in darkness would for that
reason walk backwards and when he gets light he would walk
forwards. I will say the idea of putting electrical leads in the
creature's neck is an inspired piece of makeup concept and design,
but scientifically it probably makes no sense.
The script, written by Garrett Fort and Francis Edward Faragoh
based on the play by John L. Balderston, is really very short,
making the film only 70 minutes long. Balderston also wrote the
play DRACULA was based on and the screenplay of THE MUMMY. He wrote
the screenplay or contributed to a large number of classic horror
films, though he does not have much name recognition today. It has
never been clear to me why he should rename Victor Frankenstein
Henry. A friend of Elizabeth not appearing in the novel he gives
the name Victor. And then it seems to be a totally superfluous
character. Presumably he is there to marry Elizabeth when Henry is
dead. But then after the early release the film was modified to
have Henry live. I personally take an immediate dislike to Victor
when he says it does not matter much if Henry kills a few dogs and
rabbits.
I will have more comments on the film next week. [-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: How "Star Trek" Has Damaged Our Future in Space (comments by
Dale L. Skran, Jr.)
"Star Trek" is widely credited with the inspiration of a generation
of scientists and engineers. A recent Popular Science article
suggests that Alcubierre of Warp Drive fame was directly inspired
in his work by watching "Star Trek". This is only one of many
examples that might be assembled to make this point.
However, "Star Trek" has also seriously set back humanities
spaceward journey in a fashion that is not widely appreciated. It
has been clear for some time that the super-heated atmosphere of
the Cold War space program, with NASA being written a blank check
and the best and brightest flocking to build moon rockets, cannot
be maintained and has not been maintained. We need to admit that
the Cold War resulted in a super-acceleration of the first moon
landing, moving something that might otherwise have occurred in
2069 to 1969. Sadly, with the end of the Cold War in 1989, the
air went out of this balloon.
NASA has trudged onward, striving to re-create the spirit of the
1960s, but to only modest effect. Many space supporters and fans,
see, for example, SF writer Mark Whittington, but many others as
well, are unable to conceive of a space program in any terms but
those of the 1960s - a large, expensive, publicly funded program,
centered for the most part around a giant rocket and specific
destination and timetable. These individuals often detest so-
called "New Space"--companies like SpaceX, Blue Origin, and Bigelow
Aerospace that are bent on building a private road to space. You
can find a nice introduction to "New Space" in a recent New York
Magazine article titled "Welcome to the Real Space Age"
(http://nymag.com/news/features/space-travel-2013-5/).
Behind the hopes and fears of many of these space fans lies Gene
Roddenberry's expansive "Star Trek" future. Roddenberry's vision
was based not just on public funding, but on a positively socialist
future. Private enterprise has virtually no role in the "Star
Trek" universe. Essentially all the characters live either on
Federation starships or Federation colonies. They are amply
supplied with food and other necessities by replicators, and seem
to have no money or retirement concerns. In SAR TREK: THE VOYAGE
HOME Kirk says "We don't," when asked if they use money in the
future. They appear to have no private property beyond a few
personal effects. Their work revolves around the goals of the
Federation--scientific or military, and any advancement is via the
military-style ranks of Starfleet. There are various references to
"credits" being used to obtain items, but the overall impression
left is of a socialist utopia in which the only businesses are
small ones like Quark's bar in DEEP SPACE 9. Quark himself is a
most unflattering stereotype of a business owner, supposedly based
on old Yankee traders, but to many an anti-Semitic parody of a
greedy Jew, endlessly obsessed with "gold-pressed Latinum" and
sporting an enormous proboscis. Original "Trek" brought us the
trader Mudd ("Mudd's Women", "I, Mudd") and an unscrupulous tribble
dealer ("The Trouble with Tribbles"), which unite in presenting
capitalists as shady, decadent, overweight, dishonest, and
untrustworthy.
A positive spin can be put on Roddenberry's vision by describing it
as a post-scarcity economy such as that envisioned by Eric Drexler.
Capitalism as we know it has been destroyed by the widespread
deployment of cheap and perfect replication technology. Since all
material goods are free, there is no further need to be concerned
about resource extraction or land ownership. Energy is amply
supplied by fusion power plants or Dilithium crystals, apparently
"too cheap to meter." There are no waste products and hence no
pollution.
This is a wonderful goal for technic civilization. However, we are
a long way from any of these wonders. We still live in a world
where material goods are not free, there are no replicators, and
property ownership is the bedrock of our society. Any movement
into space over the next 100 years will bring with it the same
economic ideas and forces that shape our world today, including
capitalism and property rights. This will create a very different
vision for our space future.
For starters, no one is going to do any kind of large-scale
activity in space unless money is to be made, one way or another.
This need not imply that manufacturing or mining will be done in
space and the products returned to earth. There is a web site out
there run by an individual who appears to have dedicated a good
portion of his life to proving that space mining will never occur.
He analyzes at length the cost of flying out to an object in space,
mining the minerals, and returning them to Earth. The energy cost
of doing this with materials lifted from the Earth always turns out
to be prohibitive. The problem with this line of argument is that
it is correct, but vacuously so, as mining the asteroids for gold
is not what is going to open the high frontier. Most materials
mined in space will be used in space.
A capitalist future in space implies a kind of scruffiness that
space fans often recoil from. Yes, there will be advertising on
everything you can see. Yes, large sums of money will be made from
unseemly activities, just as on Earth. Think of gambling, porn,
sports, Japanese game shows, and so on. Moreover, nothing will
happen unless at this very moment it makes economic sense. Fifty
years from now after the moon has been industrialized, it will
probably be possible to use that infrastructure to manufacture
solar power satellites and beam power back to Earth, but today,
lacking the space infrastructure, it would be unprofitable, or
perhaps less profitable.
Finally, it has to be possible to make money in space and to keep
the money you make. This means that a legal regime exists to allow
you to own property and keep the profits you make. Things like the
so-called "Moon Treaty" which envision no private property and a
big chuck of profits being funneled to the so-called "Third World"
may act to prevent any movement into space at all. Also, there
needs to be some assurance that your home and belongings will be
secure from piracy. This suggests some kind of "Space Guard" that
enforces at least minimal property rights.
The current focus of most space activity on science leads many to
the false impression that science will be a major driver of the
human movement into space. Instead, we have become better and
better at using robots to explore space, and may already be at
"tipping point" beyond which on a global scale we as a species are
already spending as much on scientific space exploration as we can
reasonably afford to spend. I wish the Planetary Society good luck
in their efforts to advocate for more such spending, but I think it
foolish to rely on this motivation.
Let's start by asking what (other than science) do we do now in
space that must be done in space in order to provide value.
Weather satellites come quickly to mind. There is no obvious
substitute for them, and as the recent storm Sandy showed, we
really need accurate weather predictions! Alas, there already
exists a fairly substantial network of weather satellites, and a
modest launch industry to support it. However, although this
industry is an important part of the "space baseline" supporting
commercial space efforts, there is little prospect for further
growth. Earth-sensing satellites can be lumped in with weather
satellites as they function in a similar way and face similar
growth prospects, although they are clearly less essential.
Next we consider Arthur C. Clarke's "great idea" for exploiting
space--the communications satellite. There are two major
components to this market--geosynchronous orbit and low-Earth orbit
satellites such as the Iridium network. There are only so many
geosynchronous orbital slots and most are filled. The low-Earth
orbit networks require many more but smaller satellites--Iridium
has 66 satellites. They are used to provide telephone, television,
service, radio, and Internet access, especially to remote or moving
users such as airliners or cruise ships. Satellite TV has proven
to be a strong competitor to land-based systems, but the invention
of high-capacity fiber-optic cables has reduced the need for
communications satellites significantly over what would otherwise
be the case. In total, the communications satellite market
sustains a considerable and modestly growing launch industry, but
provides no motivation to put humans in space.
The third major commercial usage of space is position-based
services. These services, typically based on the US GPS network,
currently consisting of 31 operational satellites, have become
increasingly important as the basis for mobile-phone based location
services. These services allow the user to know where they are at
any moment, supporting a large number of mobile applications, and
allow the US military to strike anywhere on Earth with great
accuracy. It is safe to say that the GPS network was relatively
unanticipated by science fiction writers and space prophets, but
has led to a revolution in how we live at a relatively modest cost.
There have been 61 successful launches related to GPS since the
service was inaugurated in 1978, and there are currently an
additional 36 planned starting in 2014. Replacing and updating GPS
satellites is a key part of the baseline of necessary and
economically vital launches that support the global space launch
industry. Alas, GPS services neither require humans nor are likely
to grow significantly in numbers, although some non-US services are
currently planned.
Thus, in 2013 was have reached a kind of equilibrium where three
all-robotic services--weather predication, communications, and
positioning--support a modest global launch industry. This "space
program" will continue even if the NASA budget dropped to zero.
However, there are no commercial activities that require humans in
space or that appear to lead to a significant growth in space
launch capacity.
With the completion of the International Space Station and the
retirement of the expensive and trouble-prone US Space Shuttle, a
new opportunity arose--lifting supplies and crews to/from the ISS.
COTS--"Commercial Orbital Transportation Services/Commercial Off
The Shelf"--was initiated by President George W. Bush and brought
to operational status under President Obama. Two vendors, SpaceX
and Orbital Sciences, have contracts for significant numbers of
supply runs to the ISS. Currently, SpaceX has made two operational
Falcon8/Dragon runs to the ISS, and Orbital has just successfully
tested their new Antares launch vehicle. With one more Antares
test, COTS should be fully operational, ending complete dependence
on Russian, Japanese, and ESA cargo vehicles. It appears that by
allowing SpaceX to bootstrap itself forward, COTS has led to a
significant lowering of launch costs. Although the full effects
will not be felt for several more years, the traditional launch
providers--Ariane and ULA--are running scared, with the prospect
looming of SpaceX significantly underbidding all other competitors,
including the Chinese. This must be viewed as an extremely
positive development, as each incremental decrease in the cost to
low earth orbit will enable more economic development in space.
A second phase of COTS, now called CCDev (Commercial Crew
Development), funds three competitors in their development of a
means to send up to seven astronauts to the ISS, and return them to
Earth. The competitors are SpaceX (Dragon/Falcon9), Boeing
(CST100/Atlas V), and Sierra Nevada (Dream Chaser/Atlas V). This
program promises significant cost savings over the Russian Soyuz or
the Space Shuttle, but at tens of millions per head, it surely
cannot be counted as "cheap." Still, the presence of operational
private orbital taxis may enable Bigelow Aerospace and others to
support modest private space stations, a major leap forward.
This pretty much exhausts current "space applications." Various
kinds of research are being done on the ISS, but as yet nothing has
been identified that has the potential to drive the economic
development of space. The most likely "next big thing" is space
tourism. A number of companies, notably Virgin Galactic and XCOR,
are well advanced in the construction and testing of single-stage
suborbital rockets to support this market. Both have long-term
plans for orbital tourism at prices well below those that can be
achieved via CCDev.
In a more speculative vein, two companies have been formed to
pursue asteroid mining, with the market envisioned as being oxygen
and rocket fuel in the LEO system. This is clearly not a short-
term prospect, although one of the companies, Planetary Resources,
appears at least potentially well funded by a large number of
strong backers. It can be stated with confidence that no lunar or
asteroid mining enterprise will be successful without private
property rights in space, and the exact legal framework of such
mining remains obscure
To push the development of an extensive in-space infrastructure,
significant additional economic development must occur, initially
in the Earth-Moon system, and eventually beyond. One of the
greatest challenges in bringing this about revolves around
convincing the general public that making money in space is the
axis around which the real future revolves. For this to happen, we
need to put the fantasy of "Star Trek"'s socialist space future
behind us, and begin the hard work of extending a regulated
capitalism into space. Only then will humanity have an expansive
future in space.
One final word--this essay should not be taken as an eternal
endorsement of capitalism as we know it. Just as capitalism
replaced mercantilism which in turn replaced feudalism as economic
systems, there may well come an improved economic system, perhaps
birthed into existence by combination of nano-tech replicators and
mass utilization of intelligent robots making jobs as we know them
untenable going forward. However, this future economic system will
come when it comes. It is minimally decades in the future, if not
centuries, and it may not come at all. Our expansion into space
begins now, and we can't afford to wait for such a speculative
development. [-dls]
==================================================================
TOPIC: SHE DEVIL (1957) (film retrospective by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: This is a nearly forgotten "sci-fi" (as opposed to
"science fiction") film of the 1950s, based on a story by popular
SF writer Stanley Weinbaum. A dying TB patient is given an
experimental serum derived from insects that allows her to adapt to
her disease. Far TOO effective it allows her to break the law and
adapt to any consequence, allowing her to make herself an
indestructible killer. Rating: low +1 (-4 to +4) or 5/10
SHE DEVIL was a sort of a family joke when I was quite young.
Someone saw it on a drive-in marquee and someone thought it sounded
like a terrible film. SHE DEVIL and YELLOWNECK were the archetypal
bad films, but at least we had seen YELLOWNECK. A few years later
I actually saw SHE DEVIL and discovered that it was actually a
science fiction film. At that time I liked almost any sci-fi film
I saw and I found I quite liked this one. Then for several years
if I heard of the film at all it was in a list with other films.
Nobody seemed to be talking about this film.
The film is an adaptation of a popular science fiction story, "The
Adaptive Ultimate" from the November 1935 ASTOUNDING STORIES
MAGAZINE. The story ran under the name John Jessel, a pseudonym
for Stanley Weinbaum. The story was frequently adapted to radio
and television. It was on the radio program ESCAPE as "The
Adaptive Ultimate." STUDIO ONE on television ran it as "Kyra
Zelas." TALES OF TOMORROW adapted it as "The Miraculous Serum."
SCIENCE FICTION THEATRE also did their version "Beyond Return." It
was dramatized one last time in 1957 as the movie SHE DEVIL.
The premise is not very good science. Fruit flies adapt to new
environments very quickly. The reason has to do with large numbers
and short generation time. The premise of the story is that a
serum can be developed from fruit flies that will work to make
humans adaptable to any situation. If you are shot with a bullet,
you "adapt" to it in seconds. The first human experimental subject
is Kyra Zelas, a patient dying of tuberculosis. With only painful
hours to live she gives her consent to being used as a test
subject. Apparently it was the right decision. The serum is too
successful. In minutes she has adapted to her disease and has
recovered. In fact, more than mere adaptation she has becomes
nearly indestructible and she knows it. It gives her the power to
quickly heal from wounds and when it suits her purpose she can at
will change the color of her hair in seconds. The serum may have
also mentally warped her. Now she can make life give her what she
wants and does not care who is hurt along the way. She kills and
her powers help her escape punishment.
In the film she marries wealthy Barton Kendall (John Archer of
DESTINATION MOON) after killing his wife. When she gets bored
being his wife she kills him. Finally Scott and Bach decide they
have to find a way to stop her... through scientific means, of
course. For the most part this could be just a standard crime film
with very little modification.
The film stars two actors who should be familiar to fans of mid-
1900s science fiction films. Jack Kelly played the troublesome
Jerry Farman in FORBIDDEN PLANET. He was also Bart Maverick in the
Warner Brothers TV western "Maverick." Albert Dekker played Dr.
Thorkel in the film named for his nickname DR. CYCLOPS. Director
Kurt Neumann made a name for himself when he squeaked in with
ROCKETSHIP XM just ahead of George Pal's more widely publicized
DESTINATION MOON (1950). His best films are ROCKETSHIP XM and
KRONOS.
The film was shot in Regalscope. Regalscope is black and white but
widescreen Cinemascope. Regal made the film and released it
through 20th Century Fox as they did with their next film, KRONOS.
There was little need for special effects for SHE DEVIL. The only
effect was the title character changing her hair color from black
to blond and back as the situation demanded. This was probably
done by the same process invented to turn Fredric March from Jekyll
to Hyde on-screen in 1932.
Each of the dramatic versions has a different plot for what Zelas
does with her powers. The story of her relationship with Kendall
is not in the Stanley Weinbaum original story. There she steals a
car and in getting away she accidentally kills a child. She has no
compunction in any of the versions, of course.
I had rarely been able to see this film but have always had it in
the back of my mind as another decent 1950s science fiction film.
Seeing it now I see it was probably not very good, perhaps on a
part with MOST DANGEROUS MAN ALIVE (1961) and INDESTRUCTABLE MAN
(1956), two similar sci-fi crime films. Until I saw it recently I
would have considered it a few cuts higher, but it really does not
stand up to memory. Today I would rate SHE DEVIL a 0 on the -4 to
+4 scale or 4/10.
Film Credits: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050958/combined
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: MUD (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: Jeff Nichols writes and directs a deliberate, well-
textured film set in Arkansas river country. Two boys get involved
helping a fugitive hiding out on a Mississippi River island and
trying to collect his girl friend. Arkansas-born Nichols knows the
rhythms of the South and the feel of the country and the people.
The languorous setting might capture the viewer by itself if not
for the strong performances set into it. Matthew McConaughey's
gristly performance stands above the atmosphere. Rating: low +3
(-4 to +4) or 8/10
MUD is set in DeWitt, Arkansas. That is river country, but the
story owes more than a little to GREAT EXPECTATIONS for its initial
setup. Two fourteen-year old boys, Ellis (played by Tye Sheridan)
and Neckbone (Jacob Lofland), go looking for a boat that a flood
lodged in a tree on a nearby Mississippi River island. They find
the boat and with it they find a mysterious stranger, a man on the
run, who for a few days is making the boat his home. "Mud" he
calls himself, and he is played by Matthew McConaughey, delving
deeper into a character than we have ever seen him go before. Mud
is in the area looking for his old girlfriend Juniper (Reese
Witherspoon) and hiding out from the police. This stranger is
wanted for murdering the man who had made Juniper pregnant and then
who had beaten her so she miscarried. Mud is hiding from the
police and also from the murdered man's family who want their own
kind of justice. Mud's plan is to lower the boat from the tree, an
engineering feat on its own, and once he has collected Juniper to
slip away from both police and the dead man's family.
Wherever one looks in this story there is more detail being added.
Ellis's parents are headed for a separation. If they do separate a
legal snafu says that the houseboat his family has been living in
will be destroyed and he will lose his home. At the same time
Ellis and Neckbone are getting interested in girls, and before the
story is done they we have a lesson about women that they will
remember.
The scenes shot outside are drenched in sunlight, but once you get
in out of the sun the lighting matches the mood throughout which is
solid film noir. Somehow the Southern atmosphere, the life close
to the river, even a feel of some menace later in the story, all
seem to go together. There is something of THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER
and of CAPE FEAR here, and perhaps it is even better handled here
since Nichols does not depend heavily on the score to create the
effect. The river country has its own dangers from reptiles and
from shotguns.
This is director Jeff Nichols' third film and his third film I can
recommend. Previously he did SHOTGUN STORIES (2007) and TAKE
SHELTER (2011), both films with strong atmosphere. In smaller
roles the film is packed with good actors from older films. Joe
Don Baker is around. He looks considerably older than I remember
him but he still plays someone whom I would not want to anger. Sam
Shepard is a local who is a man from Mud's past. Ray McKinnon is a
familiar face. Michael Shannon for once is reasonably balanced and
non-threatening. There is a lot to like in this film, but
McConaughey rises above it all with his tattooed and chain smoking
air of menace but still treating fourteen-year-olds like equals.
This is a film with a great naturalistic style and captivating
performances and which does just about everything right. I rate it
a low +3 on the -4 to +4 scale or 8/10.
Film Credits: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1935179/combined
What others are saying:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/mud_2012/
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: THE STROLLER STRATEGY (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: This film is very much a throwback to American 1980s and
1990s romantic comedies. Thomas Platz (Raphael Personnaz) is told
by a friend that a man looks better to women if he is a father.
When a baby (literally) falls into his arms and he has to take care
of the baby he decides to tell women he is a young father. THE
STROLLER STRATEGY never gets near any real humor, but it has a
pleasant whimsical tone. Rating: low +1 (-4 to +4) or 5/10
Thomas Platz has trouble finding girlfriends. This is hardly
surprising since he is very much self-obsessed. Up to a year ago
he was close to friend and lover Marie (Charlotte Le Bon), but she
left the boy who would not grow up. In specific, he did not seem
to want to marry and raise a family, so Thomas is still searching
for a girlfriend to replace her. Then a friend tells Thomas a
goofy theory that women are attracted to young single fathers.
Thomas gets a chance to test the theory when a neighbor is
hospitalized, and Thomas is the only person available to take care
of her baby, Leo. The man who did not want to think about starting
a family has to give himself a crash course in parenthood: How to
diaper a baby he can find on YouTube, but for more complex skills
he has to go to Bouncing Babies, a local school for parents of
newborns, and Bouncing Babies was founded by his still-beloved
Marie.
A script like this has dozens of possibilities, but most have been
mined out by other films. Yes, when Thomas thinks about his life
he will vacantly stare fixedly into space. Yes, babies need
disgusting diaper changes. Yes, Thomas has to learn how to feed
the baby and how messy that can be. Yes, he will learn that babies
make bad smells. Yes, Thomas will claim to Marie that he is the
father without first doing the arithmetic to figure when the baby
would have had to have been conceived. Yes, he will lead a life of
deception to maintain his lie. And since immaturity and self-
obsession are his problems, is it any surprise he overcomes them in
the end?
French filmmaker Clement Michel wrote and directed THE STROLLER
STRATEGY. He seems to have sewn the story together from parts of
other films. He did not provide a script with anything new to say.
Clement seems to have just wanted something that would pass for an
American romantic comedy and did not need any unique vision. He
has one joke that provoked a joke, and that was a film reference.
There is one very non-cliche incident in the film that would
probably not play well in the US. At one point for his own reasons
Thomas kidnaps baby Leo from right in front of his sleeping mother.
This is a little more serious than just trying to fool his girl
friend. I do not know French laws, but it would be a federal crime
in the United States.
Raphael Personnaz who plays Thomas has a bland, unshaved look. He
can also be seen--a little better tailored--as Count Vronsky in
ANNA KARENINA (2012).
What is familiar to the film critics from the 1980s and 1990s may
be more new and fresh to current filmgoers. And it may even be
nostalgic for the older viewers. On the right audience this film
would do well. The film is not doing well with United States film
critics, but then they have a longer memory for film than most of
the rest of the public. I rate it a low +1 on the -4 to +4 scale
or 5/10. The film is in French with English subtitles.
Film Credits: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2520516/combined
What others are saying:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_stroller_strategy/
[-mrl]
==================================================================
TOPIC: DESIGNER GENES: A NEW ERA IN THE EVOLUTION OF MAN by Steven
Potter, Ph.D. (book review by Dale L. Skran, Jr.)
I don't generally review books on this topic, but there seems to
have been a lot of interest in my review of FRANKENSTEIN'S CAT. I
think one reason for this is that there really aren't that many
good popular science books that you can read to understand the
genetics revolution that aren't either (1) a polemic or (2) a
decade or more out of date. Although DESIGNER GENES seems like it
is most likely a polemic when you read the jacket blurb, after a
closer examination it comes out much more on the educational side.
If the idea of genetic engineering disturbs you, this book is not
for you. However, if you would like to read a series of short,
clear, and self-contained essays on different topics related to
genetics, this is the book! Although the chapters are strung
together to make a book, they seem much more self-contained than is
usually the case, with the result that they can be read in any
order. I read the chapters backwards!
I'm going to focus on the chapters that I learned the most from,
but you may have your own favorites. "Dogs" details how extremely
recent (last 8,000 years or so) selective breeding by humans
created the entire vast current spectrum of dog breeds. Part of
the point of the chapter is that you don't need genetic engineering
to do some pretty amazing things--you don't even need to really
understand genetics. "The Surprising Embryo" was a revelation to
me. I knew that an early stage human embryo can split into
different people (identical twins, up to 8 it turns out!), but I
did not know that multiple embryos can combine to form a "chimera"
who has different genes from different embryos. This results in a
person patched together out of several rather different embryos, a
kind of natural Frankenstein's monster. Greg Bear used this idea
in his novel QUANTICO, but I somehow failed to grasp that this was
a real phenomenon. Part of Potter's point is, of course, that
given all the amazing things that can happen early in the life of
an embryo, and the wildly varying number of humans that result from
the process, considering an early stage embryo to be fully human is
not well founded. Seems obvious to Potter and St. Augustine, but
as I am sure you are aware, mileage varies.
The most mind-blowing idea comes in the "The Future," in which
Potter details how the efforts of anti-abortion/pro-life forces to
push research on adult stem cells has had a most unexpected result,
which, until I read Potter's book I didn't really grasp. All this
adult stem cell research has led (almost) to the ability to cause
adult stem cells to become sperm and egg cells. Then, the genetic
engineering is done *before* the egg and sperm are united, meaning
that no embryo is destroyed in the process. There is also no need
to extract eggs from women, which is not completely without cost
and risk. This introduces all sorts of possibilities, including
the idea of creating a "clone+" from your own cells. You create
sperm and egg from your own cells, and then use genetic engineering
to edit out (or add) small changes, resulting in a clone that is a
"better you." Another application of this technology is to
implement a kind of "super PGD." In pre-implantation genetic
diagnosis (PGD), a number of eggs are fertilized, and then one cell
is taken from the early stage embryo to allow for genome
sequencing. This technique allows the parents to only implant
those embryo's that, say, lack a fatal disease gene. There are a
number of problems with this approach, in that only a limited
number of embryos are ever available, and embryos are destroyed in
the process, which some object to. In "super PGD" a very large
number of sperm and eggs are produced from adult stem cells from
both parents. They are all sequenced, and perhaps edited, and then
combined into one super-embryo that is the very best possible
combination of the genomes of both parents, which is then
implanted. This technology is well along, but has not yet been
fully demonstrated. It seems like this is only a matter of time,
perhaps as little as a few years. For example, it appears that as
of October 2012 scientists had succeeded in creating mouse embryos
from adult mouse stem cells that resulted in the birth of healthy
mice. See http://tinyurl.com/void-stem-cells.
The book also contains an interesting analysis ("The Sequencing
Revolution") that explains the lack of success of the human genome
project thus far. It turns out that sequencing one person is only
helpful in finding single-gene traits. If the traits are affected
by lots of genes, you need to sequences 100s or 1000s of people to
be able to say anything about what a particular part of a gene
does. Fortunately, the cost of gene sequencing has been dropping
very rapidly, and we are at the point where we should start to see
the real results of the Human Genome Project.
Most of the chapters are very good, but a couple have problems.
"Is it Moral?" has a nice analysis but is sloppy about using the
term "soul." I don't think Potter really believes in a soul, but
it is hard to tell what he believes due to less than clear
definitions. He seems to use "soul" as a euphemism for "the point
at which an embryo is morally considered a full human being," but
he never comes out and says that. I'm sure any Catholic theologian
would have a field day poking at this chapter. My vote is that
scientists should use scientific terminology, and leave theology to
the theologians.
"Alternative Views" examines other visions of the human future,
including cyborgization and the Singularity. It is readily
apparent that Potter has only a superficial knowledge of these
topics, and as a result the chapter provides the reader with little
insight. Potter spends a few pages throwing cold water on the idea
that cyborgization will ever include memory prosthesis, but this
again seems outside his field and weak. This is also not a good
policy book, and has little discussion of what a world with
widespread genetic engineering might be like. Potter's focus is
more to argue that widespread, useful genetic engineering is
possible, safe, and moral, leaving policy discussions to others,
although he does suggest that eventually providing a child with the
best genome may be viewed in the same way we view pre-natal care
and vaccines today.
Overall, DESIGNER GENES is a good popular science book on the topic
of genetic engineering. Even if you don't agree with Potter's
arguments, you will find a lot of good factual, non-polemical
essays here. The way the book is organized, it is easy to skip any
chapter without much loss of continuity. One warning though--the
book was published in 2010, and probably written mainly in 2009, so
we all need to catch up to 2013! [-dls]
==================================================================
TOPIC: Remembering Jack Vance (letter of comment by Greg Frederick)
Greg Frederick writes:
After reading that last non-fiction book (CIVILIZATION) which I
sent you a review of recently; I plan to read my current non-
fiction book about chemistry and how human history was affected by
it. Then I plan to do something I rarely do these days. I am
going to re-read a couple of old Jack Vance books I have in the
basement. Vance died recently at the age of 96. I first got into
reading science fiction books back in the early 70's. A friend of
mine introduced me to Jack Vance books and this started me reading
other science fictions authors and eventually I got into reading
non-fiction. Reading about historical events and scientific ideas
in the science fiction books started this non-fiction trend for me.
Vance's writing was unique in style and he had a very good
imagination. He was prolific and wrote more then 60 books
including mysteries, fantasy, and science fiction. [-gf]
==================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
THE CIVIL WAR BOOKSHELF: 50 MUST-READS ABOUT THE WAR BETWEEN THE
STATES by Robert Wooster (ISBN 978-0-8065-2692-0) is a reasonable
listing and critique of a basic bookshelf on the Civil War, I get
the impression that he chose fifty books because with the amount he
wanted to write on each, that made the right length book. Ten
might make more sense as a beginner's list; a hundred is a
traditional number for a comprehensive list, but would make the
book too long. But fifty books are really more than the beginner
would read.
One finds interesting parallels throughout these works. Shelby
Foote had a contract with Random House to write a short history of
the Civil War. He ended up a trilogy of 1,500,000 words that took
twenty years to write. Douglas Southall Freeman was commissioned
by Charles Scribner's Sons to write a 70,000-word biography of
Robert E. Lee, which Freeman assumed would take a couple of years.
It took him twenty years and ended up as a tetrology. One starts
to see a pattern here.
One also sees repetition in titles: LINCOLN AND HIS GENERALS and
JEFFERSON DAVIS AND HIS GENERALS, not to mention LEE'S LIEUTENANTS
(which is, of course, about generals).
I do feel that Wooster's need to rank-order them seems unnecessary.
I also think his rule about no multi-volume works--which leads him
to list only one volume of Shelby Foote's masterwork, for example--
is overly strict.
And there are occasional slips. In reviewing Bruce Catton's A
STILLNESS AT APPOMATTOX Wooster writes about "Maj. Gen. Governor
Kemble Warren"; in reviewing Michael Shaara's THE KILLER ANGELS he
writes about "Gouverneur K. Warren". These are the same person.
More annoying, he consistently misspells Mary Chesnut's name as
"Mary Chestnut". It is possible that the transition from one
publisher to another during the final phases of publication meant
that proofreading fell through the cracks, since it seems
incredible that Wooster would make these mistakes.
Overall, this is a worthy overview of the most important works on
the Civil War for the layman (with the caveats noted).
THE PERILS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES by Loren D. Estleman (ISBN 978-1-440-
54414-9) is a collection of mostly previously published short
stories about Sherlock Holmes. Unfortunately, even those I had not
seen before often were a bit obvious in their solutions.
Estleman writes, "It is my belief that THE PERILS OF SHERLOCK
HOLMES is the first single author collection of short stories
published since Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's own THE CASE-BOOK OF
SHERLOCK HOLMES..." Well, no--June Thomson wrote several, and
Tracy Cooper-Posey, Ted Riccardi, Alan Stockwell, and Sebastian
Wolfe each wrote at least wrote one. And those are just the ones
I've run across. [-ecl]
==================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
Constant work, constant writing and constant revision.
The real writer learns nothing from life. He is more
like an oyster or a sponge. What he takes in he takes
in normally the way any person takes in experience.
But it is what is done with it in his mind, if he is a
real writer, that makes his art.
--Gore Vidal