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jflxster
Reviews
Eye of the Dolphin (2006)
Response to Matthew's Rant
(THE SPOILER DOESN'T COME UNTIL THE END, AND IT'S WELL MARKED)
Matthew, you're to be commended for your concern for marine mammal welfare but your comments miss the mark and are unfair to the movie.
You say: "The film portrays dolphins in the wild as friendly and sociable with humans, in fact wild dolphins prefer to keep clear of human contact if possible and can pose a threat."
You seem to be saying, among other things, that you view it as implausible that a wild dolphin would behave in a friendly manner towards a human, yet there is much evidence dating back centuries showing that occasionally dolphins do in fact seek out humans in the manner depicted in the movie. There is a scientific term for a dolphin who enters bays and inlets and seeks out human interaction -- "lone sociable dolphin". You can read an interesting summary of these cases at http://www.mmc.gov/reports/ contract/pdf/samuelsreport.pdf -- there are over thirty documented cases.
As for a "lone sociable dolphin" possibly posing a threat -- Hawk is clearly worried about that
when he forbids Alyssa from seeing the dolphin again. He also makes the point that this behavior is an aberration, not normal, and that a dolphin doing this is "psychologically unstable". He says "it's bad for the dolphins, Alyssa", and eventually "somebody gets hurt" -- which is the other point, and that is that lone sociable dolphins frequently become a local tourist attraction (it recently happened in Ireland, by the way), and sometimes things get out of hand to the detriment of the dolphin.
The film depicts another aspect of interaction between humans and wild dolphins when it shows the tour boat captain bringing in tourists, then feeding the dolphins and letting his tourists swim with them. This type of "food provisioning habituation" of dolphins by tour operators is another thing the film, through Hawk, seems to be against. It certainly doesn't seem to be promoting it.
(BEWARE POSSIBLE SPOILER FOLLOWS)
There's one other point to consider, and this concerns the film's position on dolphin captivity. At the end of the movie the film suggests that instead of captivity, it might be possible for dolphins to be hosted by humans, and interact with them, but not be captive. What is depicted in the film is very close to the "Third Phase Alternative" to dolphin captivity developed by Ken Levasseur. In Levasseur's program, captive dolphins are trained and, over time, allowed to return to the wild and interact with humans on their terms, not the humans. This is depicted in the movie as a solution, and thus the film seems to be taking an enlightened position on captivity issues. You might want to read Levasseur's "Third Phase" paper. It can be viewed online at http://whales7.tripod.com/policies/levasseur/ levass3a.html.
The Bourne Ultimatum (2007)
Pretty Good but not a "Top 250"....
I saw this on Saturday in a full house of Bourne enthusiasts and I have to say that the first 30-45 minutes had me enthralled. The story was compelling, acting was great, and the camera was alive in a way that really drew me into the story.
Somewhere about half-way through it, though, it began to get repetitive and the bond that had developed between me and the movie was broken, and I found myself thinking, and questioning some of the logic and "tradecraft". Now these are small things but I'm going to mention them here because eventually they became problematic for me.
First of all -- major plot point -- after the car bomb Jason Bourne goes to New York because in the wreckage of the dead guy's briefcase he sees a scrap of a top secret cover sheet of a "Blackbriar" file that has the actual address of the "deep cover" CIA NY Anti-terrorism unit on it. Guys, I've got to tell you -- no way.
Secondly, when Nikki Sparrow comes into the Madrid sub-office Noah and company KNOW there are two dead or unconscious bodies there, minimum, and Jason Bourne somewhere in the area. Yet when he does the "authentication" question: "are you okay" and she has a choice "ruby" meaning "I'm under duress" or "everest", I'm okay -- it's silly that she says "everest" and they just accept it. A), Bourne would understand and they would know he understands the drill, B), whether Bourne is there or not, it's certainly not a normal situation. This goes on a bit as they, after this scene, just ignore Nikki and leave her with access to all systems even though they would have to be very concerned that she's not controlled any more.
Thirdly -- I'm no CIA specialist but over the years one thing that is clear is that the CIA doesn't put sensitive offices on the outside of buildings in Manhattan where there is line of sight into the offices. Yet in this movie (and all the Bourne movies), he always manages to get on a roof across the street and can look right into Pam Landy's office (or Noah's). This is great dramatically but I think it would work better if the film-makers made it the way it really is -- with sensitive offices being buried deep within the bowels of a building (particularly if it's a city building) rather than on the perimeter.
Anyway -- my point is not so much to take issue with the film-makers on these points, but rather to illustrate that the repetitiveness caused my mind to wander into these areas rather than stay locked in the story.
Seven Years in Tibet (1997)
A good one -- worth another look
I missed this film the fist time around and saw it for the first time last night on DVD. I was pleasantly surprised. It seemed to me that some extraordinary effort went into creating an accurate portrayal of the forbidden city of Lhasa, and the lives and culture of the Tibetans who are at the core of the movie.
On the acting side, Brad Pitt was not quite totally believable as a German but, accent-quibbles aside, he did inhabit the character in a way that was compelling and interesting. I thought the supporting cast of Mako and (mostly) Tibetan unknowns was good and the use of these unknowns added credibility to the movie.
The scenery was as beautiful as you would expect it to be -- breathtaking shots of the Himalayas dominating throughout much of the movie.