I finally saw The Crow. And, surprisingly enough, it's something to crow about. Softly, at least. It's much more successful than Alex Proyas' next movie, Dark City. Because unlike that movie, it doesn't have a lot of pretensions of being deep and meaningful. Well, besides the "Love conquers all" voiceovers, which are fairly harmless. Basically, it's a revenge pic in which the instrument of vengeance is already dead, so he has nothing to lose. After the first twenty minutes or so, the movie really picks up and it wasn't until the point of Oh Wait I Need a Climax that I realized what a great job Proyas had done: he had sustained almost the entire movie with no narrative tension whatsoever. Eric is invulnerable; he dispatches his foes with relative ease. Yet, it's compelling, and there are some wonderful shots, especially the slow burn of gasoline as it forms the shape of the crow.

Of course, it's not perfect. People accept that this guy's back from the dead way too easily, and all Eric's flashbacks are generic They Were So Happy Together scenes. And while it's probably best they don't try to explain the mythology, a teensy bit more might have been nice. But all in all, it's nicely done, and it annoys me that there are so many rehash "sequels," the latest one starring David Boreanaz (and for some reason, ditching the Crow name).

Boreanaz playing an undead avenger?

Huh.

Boreanaz playing an undead avenger?

No, actually, he plays some murderous gang leader who wants to ascend to demonhood or something.

I like the anthology potential (it's keeping in spirit with the comics), but, yeah, they've all been crap.

I like the anthology potential (it's keeping in spirit with the comics)

Do the comics just have different characters being brought back? Okay. But yeah, if they're not done as well as the first, I won't bother.

Do the comics just have different characters being brought back?

They do have multiple Crows, yeah.

I liked the first Crow. And got all caught up in the tragedy of the Lee family prophesy. Plus, Michael Wincott is creepy-fun. But the rest were, indeed, crap.

Yet another example of terrific potential squandered.

Hmph. My dog has fallen heavily asleep on my foot, which has, in turn, fallen asleep. I take this as a sign that the rest of me should follow.

::comeon Bartleby, let's go chase squirrels in our dreams...::

That comment was just me not wanting to come off as a union basher.

Unions, like most things, need the occasional bashing. For all the good things they've done, they've also done a lot of shitty things.

Signed,
Not Bitter A Union Cost Me A Full-time Job

Boreanaz playing an undead avenger?

No, actually, he plays some murderous gang leader who wants to ascend to demonhood or something.

He's the Mayor?

The Crow was a tiny bit, um, baroque. But for all that, yeah, good movie. Imagine how much better a movie it could have been if the lead hadn't been killed a couple of weeks before the end of principal photography! Those first 20 minutes really obviously re-use the same close-ups again and again. (I mean, I don't know what else they could have done, given 1994 technology.)

One of the things I enjoyed most about the movie was Eric's sardonic sense of humor. I like the idea of dead people having a good laugh in the depths of their post-mortem depression. "Victims. Aren't we all?"