eclipse - The Movie

Minor spoilers ahead!

The movie's story begins with a shot of a young man we never met in either of the first two films and we soon realize that we are not in Forks but in Seattle witnessing part of the creation of Victoria's army of new Vampires.  Soon we are relieved to be taken to a much more familiar location and see Edward and Bella in their meadow which has been much more generously stocked with prop flowers and therefore seems much more sunny, happy and well, meadowy.  You can almost hear fluffy bunnies hopping and chewing on daisy stems just out of frame.

I don't want this to turn into a movie report instead of a review so I guess I'll stop now with the play by play. (Can't promise 100% but I'll do my best.)

I enjoyed twilight.  I thought new moon was better and still do.  eclipse blows them both out of the water!

Yes it really truly does.  I'm not just saying that because it's the newest one and is freshest in my mind.  And if you'll be so kind as to continue reading I'd like to tell you why.

First, more than ever before, we can feel the closeness and dare I say it, the love between Edward and Bella. new moon got it much better than twilight did but in eclipse their relationship really starts to bring the feeling that the book did in that regard.  They really feel like a couple who know and love each other.

I hated Jcub in this book and was sincerely dreading the parts where I knew he would be messing with Ed's girl but I'm tempted to say that this is one particular area that the movie did even better than the book.  Sure we have to watch him force himself on her and watch him keep her warm through the night in the tent but in the end Bella leaves no doubt about who it is that she loves most and the movie lets her explain why.  Although we have to watch her bounce back and forth between them with a frequency and speed that would make a Wimbledon season ticket holder dizzy, the way she confesses her love for Edward in the end is completely believable and totally satisfying.  Edward and Jcub also have a good talk and although it is still obvious that Edward would give Bella up if he thought that would make her happy and that Jcub will forever try to steal her away, I ended up loathing Jcub slightly less than I did in the book.

There is a lot of back story included in this movie. We get to know why Rosalie treats Bella the way she does. We are shown the tragic history of Jasper and the closeness he and Alice share.  The history of the werewolves is expounded upon as well.  We are taken much deeper into the histories of the ones who merely dazzled as they walked by in the cafeteria and those who mostly just caused teen girls to scream whenever they took their shirts off.  All the familiar characters just become much more real and we can't help but care about them more.

We, as well as Bella are finally told why Edward is so adamant about getting married first. The moment when Bella finally understands this is one of the best in the movie. 

eclipse also has the best action so far. The big fight scene is cool but of course ends with the inevitable death of sweet little Bree.  In the book I think she was 15 but the little actress who plays her looks only about 11 or 12 which makes it even more sad. I beg you to read the short second life of bree tanner before you see eclipse. It will make an otherwise possibly forgettable moment one of the most heart rending in the whole movie.

Have I said enough? Have I said anything at all?  I thought twilight was good and new moon was better. eclipse is definitely best! (If this trend continues all that will be left for breaking dawn parts 1 and 2 is bestest ever and bestest ever extreme I guess.) The story is entertaining, exciting and romantic. The characters are more interesting and we care about them more than ever before. There is a believable and satisfying resolution to the sticky triangle between Edward, Bella and Jacob.

To sum up. when the credits rolled I heard several sighs from the females around me. They were partly the usual sighs of swooning but I felt they were mostly sighs of relief, resolution and satisfaction, above all satisfaction. Yes, eclipse is a very satisfying movie! 

The Far Side and Loony Tunes

I was off work today and the weather was much too nice and it was much too hot to stay home so I once again found my way out to Waterton.  (I think my park pass has officially paid for itself already.)  Just after arriving in the village I met TJ walking down main street.  It is strange how we so often seem to run into each other in the strangest places.

In the afternoon I made my usual drive up to Cameron lake and was thinking that today I might take a walk around to the far side.  Gazing from the north end it always looks so exotic, cool, grizzly bearish yet tranquil all the way down there at the Montana end of the lake with the snow, waterfalls and impossibly vertical mountain face. 

Once I actually got to Cameron I found it so nice and inviting that instead of walking I convinced myself that I absolutely had to splurge and rent a kayak.  Although I have done canoeing many times I had never ever been in a kayak so what better place to try it for the first time ever than somewhere where the water is so cold that tipping over could very well mean I'd end up like Jack Dawson. 

I had my tiny camera in my pocket so when I got to the far side of the lake after about 25 minutes of paddling I took it out to get some evidence of my grand achievment.

The sound and motion of the waterfalls soon convinced me to switch to video mode even though I knew it wouldn't be great quality.  If you watch it I would recommend clicking on the YouTube logo in the bottom right corner of the screen to view it in the best size and quality possible.

In this video clip you will first see a bit of footage of snow and waterfalls at the end of the lake. Then I started to head back but stopped to shoot a bit of the remaining avalanche snow which is doing its best impression of an iceberg.  After that the camera was tucked securely back into my pocket and the button flap well fastened and I was heading back full steam ahead to the touristy end of the lake when the totally unexpected highlight of my day occurred.

Off in the distance I saw a couple of tiny black and white heads on the surface of the water. I hadn't seen them on the way down but did definitely see them now. I wasn't yet close enough to tell for sure but I hoped that they were loons instead of just a couple of lame ducks.

Tangent - As you will see in the video I can kind of do a weak impression of a Loon call using my hands.  A few years ago I happened to be doing a bit of it beside Emerald lake in Yoho NP for a couple of clients.  Another tour guide who was with clients of his own on the other side of the lake heard my "loon call" and told his clients that they were hearing the rare call of the bird which is on Canada's dollar coin.  A few minutes later we happend to meet up and he asked if I had heard the loon too. Um... yeah... I did. Actually that was me... What? No way... Awww man! etc.  Now back to our story.

 I put down my Darth Maul paddle (kayaks apparently have these nifty little grooves for just such an occasion) and gave my best loon call hoping they might just answer.  I didn't really think it would work but boy did it ever. They hadn't made a peep the entire time I was on the lake but as soon as they heard my fake loon call the male started yapping and I could hardly get him to shut up.  I figured I might even get some genuine loonage recorded so out came the little camera that could again and I started filming.  I know they are hard to see but it's the best I could get with what I had.  I had to put the camera down while letting it continue to roll a couple of times to show that they were responding to me.  Since I didn't get the camera out until I had already got them started I know it looks like they are playing with me rather than the other way around but I promise that I made the first call and one or both of them then joined in.

Sorry about the "I'm awesome" comment near the end. I wasn't truly talking to myself at that point because by then I already knew that this would be going onto my blog.  I do know that I'm not actually awesome but I was just so happy that this little interaction had worked out that I just couldn't help myself.

Toy Story 3

Pixar's flagship franchise finally returns after a nearly unforgivable eleven year absence.  At least the wait was well worth it.

I know you surely don't need me to convince you to see this movie and if for some reason you are set against it I probably couldn't change your mind anyway but I thought I'd give you my two cents worth just the same.

I actually have mixed emotions about TS3 and am honestly not yet sure if it is my most or least favourite of the trilogy.  These three films are all so good that is very difficult to choose between them, at least for me. To be sure it had mammoth expectations to live up to and upon seeing it the fact that it had the full might and full attention of the Pixar juggernaut behind it became obvious. 

Perhaps my indecision and inability to choose a favourite has to do with the fact that TS3 may be slightly less consistent than than 1 and 2.  Its good parts are wonderful but I thought that it also contains the weakest bits of the three movies as a whole.  To be more specific, the beginning and ending may just be the best ever in the Toy Story trilogy but some of the middle parts seemed just slightly off to me. The magic, innocence and imagination that shone through brightly and consistently from beginning to end of both of the first two films seemed to dim just noticeably in the middle of TS3. Please keep in mind that this is all relative to Toy Story standards and if it were any other movie I would probably have nothing bad to say at all.

Sure 1 and 2 had villains and scary parts but only as much as was necessary to provide excitement and suspense. On the whole I remember them both for their humour and sense of childlike adventure.  This time it's a little different.  The dark parts are more sinister and continue longer. The villains are badder and creepier because, as they are in the adult world, they are not immediately and obviously evil.  The meanness is a bit more real and Toy's struggle against it seems to go on long after your thinking "enough already" and their situation actually just keeps getting worse until you begin to wonder how and if Pixar is going to be able to make it all good in the end.

But, of course they do pull it off.  This is of course Pixar and Toy Story were talking about right?  TS3 is definitely the darkest but also is the most poignant of them all. I won't tell you whether the ending is happy, sad or even a bit of both but I will tell you that it is wonderful and you'll be glad you were there to see it.

Be sure and stay for the credits as the story continues well into them.  If you leave the moment the credits start to roll you will miss out and be left wondering what happened to certain characters and how certain things turned out.  Also, keep an eye out for little details here and there that Pixar is famous for including in its movies.  Very small children may be genuinely frightened a few times.

Also from what I've read, although TS3 is available in 3D there are very few times it is actually used effectively and most people have said is wasn't worth paying the extra price for.  I saw it the old fashoned way in 2D without any uncomfortable glasses, washed out colors or eyestrain and it was awesome.  I would definitely recommend saving your money and seeing it in 2D.

Waterton, Bears, Wild Flowers etc.

Today was a beautiful day in Waterton. I drove up to Cameron Lake and found it almost completely melted with just a few stubborn “icebergs” remaining.

I saw the obligatory black beer on the way up and even stopped my car in the middle of the road like a tourist and took a few pictures.

The recent monsoon (in cooperation with some rare warm weather) is proudly presenting super sized versions of Cameron Falls and Upper Waterton Lake, which is full to the brim.

I finally decided that today I wasn’t just going to visit all the same places and drive the same roads. (Yeah, this was after I’d already been to Cameron Lake, Cameron Falls, and The Prince of Wales.) I parked my car and started walking, looking for roads, lanes and alleys that I’d never been down before. It is amazing how much more there is to see when you walk down a street rather than drive it. There is so much more detail to be discovered. Most of all I guess I wanted to get a closer look at some of the cabins there. Many of the newer ones seem like they came straight from any modern suburban subdivision of your choosing. They just seem out of place and I am unable to think of them as cabins. I guess that these must be what all the people out east refer to as “cottages”. Just take your average house - and plop it out somewhere that has no more than ONE broadband internet service provider and/or where FedEx packages are delivered in an unmarked minivan and brought to your door by a four year old ‘cause “mommy can’t leave my new sister Emma in the van by herself” - and it becomes a cottage. I guess for a house to be a considered to be a cabin mountains must of course be involved and there must be real wood of some kind and in significant quantity visible on the exterior. Speaking of cabins…

You now know what I think of some of the newer ones in Waterton. Then of course there are a lot of really old ones that have clearly been neglected and look as though they would surely fall over if the wind did ever happen to change direction. Strike two.

Thankfully there are those that still retain their old cozy charm and character. There are quite a few in fact. I love the old fashioned windows and the log cabin style. Of course the importance of a nicely treed yard shouldn't be underestimated. I like how many of them have names. I remember visiting Waterton as a kid and wondering what was up with the names on the cabins thing. Now a lot older and only slightly wiser I do think it would be fun to have a place with a name rather than just an address to get away to.

Sadly, now it seems so many of them have also grown a satellite dish. If I were to ever have a cabin I always imagined having no TV, only a real wood burning fireplace and a well stocked bookshelf full of old hard cover novels like Robinson Crusoe and the Prisoner of Azkaban. In fact now that I think about it, considering the severely limited space and therefore opportunity to own a cabin in Waterton I think anyone caught watching American Idol, The Bachelor or any version of CSI in a cabin there should be evicted immediately and the spot given to a proper book worm who would be better able to appreciate the gift of nature that is Waterton. (Survivor would be allowed since it is set in the wilderness.) Anyway…

I took a stroll down some of the roads less traveled in Waterton today. I have always thought it would be nice to spend a day in a cozy little cabin with a good book and a nice fire as the rain fell and the wind blew outside. No phones, no TV and no internet. I thought so again today.

In conclusion, these are four out of thousands of these little flowers (whose name I do not know) that were blooming beside the lane that runs behind the Northland Lodge. They seemed so happy to be found and to have their photo taken as they had been sure that no one would ever notice them among so many and so far off the beaten path. I promised them that at least four or five other people would see their photo too and I noticed them stretch out their petals just a bit wider as I took their picture. I think I heard them singing as I walked away.
 

Waterworld

It's been raining for a while.



At least the snow is finally done.

Do You Have Black Beer In Waterton?

I made my second trip of the season to Waterton today. The weather wasn’t as nice as it was yesterday but it looked like it might still be a fairly good day out there. I was excited to use my new Waterton pass at the automatic gate and bypass all the lame tourists buying their silly little plain paper day or week passes that they’d have to plaster to their windshields with scotch tape. As it turned out, some “local” with a barcode pass was having trouble opening the gate and there was not even one car in line at either of the two staffed booths so I ended up going through the touristy way. Hopefully next time I’ll get to open the gate all by myself.

Speaking of passes, I got my single adult pass a few weeks ago while it was still at the early bird price of about $31. I’m sure I’ll visit Waterton at least two more times before the end of next May so it will have been well worth buying. There’s just one thing, I’m not crazy about the color, it’s bright yellow.

Until now when people would see me driving, say back towards town from Cameron lake or Red Rock they may have assumed I came solo but there was also at least a small chance that they may have generously supposed that my wife had been eaten by a bear or fallen out of the canoe because she was texting while paddling or even killed by a vampire whose last name wasn’t Cullen. Now with my bright fluorescent yellow pass they will immediately know that I came alone. Even when my car is parked in town families will gasp in horror from hundreds of feet away when they spot my single loser person pass. Whatever.

I drove (with my pass in the glove box) up to Cameron Lake which was about 90% melted. There was a bus load of tourists (hey, I said buS load) there when I arrived. While I was washing mosquito entrails off my hand in the lake a woman, who I would soon find out was from El Salvador, was so surprised that I was touching the water as there was still ice in the lake. She asked if it was cold and I said yes, yes it is, ice cold in fact, but you know, I’m so very brave… Then she completely changed the subject and asked if we had beer here. All the buildings were still boarded up and nothing was open so I thought her question a bit odd but I told her that there was a liquor store in the town. She didn’t seem satisfied and started to ask about black beer. I was getting more confused until I finally realized that she was asking about bears, which would have made a whole lot more sense right from the start. I assured her that we do have several colors of bears here and even the grizzly variety. “Even here, at this lake?” she asked. When I raised my eyebrows, opened my eyes a bit wider and gave her one nice big vertical nod she started meandering slowly but obviously back toward her bus.

I climbed up path on the right side of Cameron Falls, went down to the end of the road and skipped four rocks into the lake and bought a Snickers at Pat’s. I did see a few Mule deer and a couple of White Tails…meh. I was way more excited to find a couple of baby Ground Squirrels (Columbian) playing in the grass. They were quite cute.

I did take several pictures along the way but after deciding they were all lame I deleted them all before I started writing this post. Maybe I should have kept at least one of the baby squirrels. Oh well.
 
BTW, maybe you noticed or not but, I changed eight things on the park pass to make it less "copy friendly". Can you tell what is different?

5 Centimeters Per Second

I wonder if any of you has heard of this little gem from Japan.  I surely hadn't until today but I was lucky enough to stumble across some high praise of it on IMDb.  The person was basically saying how wonderful it is but was lamenting how few people have ever heard of it much less seen it.  Apparently the DVD is nearly impossible to find although Amazon will hook you up with people selling rare new copies for anywhere between $160 and $220. (And no there are no missing decimal points in those prices.)

Fortunately it is on the YouTube (at least for now.)  It is just over one hour long and I have included the links to the six parts it is broken into.  These are not the only postings of it but I think it's probably the best quality you'll find. (Be sure to open it up into full screen if you watch it. Even on U2b it looks very good.)

It is a story of growing up.  It's about the relationships we have along the way and maybe it's even more about the ones that we miss.  Of course you know that I don't want to give too much away but I do hope that you will find an hour sometime to watch this.  The animation is truly gorgeous and the story will touch you in the best kind of way; the way that Hollywood forgot how to so long ago.  Seeing this movie only made me realize further how far Hollywood movies have sunk.  It is so far removed from the constant diet of vulgarity sold as comedy, slut culture paraded as romance, sarcasm, hostility and general meanness pushed as drama.  But I guess that topic is for another time...

Of course this movie is in Japanese with English subtitles. I hope that won't deter you.  There are three parts (episodes) to the story which are connected by the characters in them.  So be sure you don't shut it off after you see the first credits roll, there are still two more episodes left. 

It was particularily interesting to me because some of the story takes place where I lived in Japan. I saw the same station signs and visited many of the same places.

Anyway, you will probably need to use only the first link and will find the next ones once you're there but just in case here they all are. Embedding was disabled for these so that's why you can't watch them here.

I hope you'll watch it. I think you'll like it.

Update: The YouTube version I found is no longer available.  There may still be others but I didn't bother to search for them because the good news is that the DVD has been re-released and is available on Amazon and possibly at other places as well.

the short second life of bree tanner

In eclipse Bree Tanner is a minor character who I admit I’d pretty much forgotten about. This book is her story told from her point of view. It begins a few months after she becomes a vampire and continues of course right up to where her story merges with eclipse and to her very end. I was hoping it would have started before she got bit but I guess that would be a little too much to ask and probably turned it into an actual novel instead of a novelette or novella or whatever it’s called.

I’m not going to say it is awesome or amazing but it is a good little story which starts out with say… a small Grinch™ sized heart that does indeed grow three sizes the day the story merges with eclipse. The old familiar twilight feel and tension build gradually with only vague references and allusion to any of our well loved (or hated) characters through most of the story. Finally, when a Cullen does appear on the page and is actually called by name you will suddenly find yourself once again in that twilight world you thought you’d never get to visit again. It is a piece of the original story made new by seeing it through a different set of eyes, a set of eyes whose owner you probably didn’t give a second thought to the first time you met her. This time though, you may find yourself hoping and rooting for a red eyed killer vampire, now that you know her and her story.

In her introduction to the book Stephenie Meyer writes “The closer I got to the inevitable end, the more I wished I’d concluded eclipse just slightly differently.”

Yeah, that pretty much sums it up for me too.

By the way, you can read this book for free here.