pquade Reviews

Eragon (2006)

What movie did I just see?

[18 December 2006]

Did I just watch Eragon or Star Wars Episode 4? Here's a list of plot points to compare the two.

A Princess is on her way to deliver a secret Thing that, if used properly, may be able to overthrow the current Evil Leader.

The Evil Leader sends his Second, along with some other Bad Guys, to recapture the Thing.

The Princess is stopped by the Second, but the Princess has sent the Thing away. The Princess is held captive by the Second, who tortures her in an attempt to find out where the Thing is.

The Thing finds its way into the hands of a Farm Boy. The mother of the Farm Boy abandoned him at an early age, for unknown reasons, and he now lives with his Uncle.

The Second sends his Bad Guys to the village of the Farm Boy.

Farm Boy meets Old Dude. Old Dude tells tale of past glory to Farm Boy.

The Bad Guys figure out where Farm Boy lives, go there and kills the Uncle in attempt to find Farm Boy.

Farm Boy goes back to home, finds Uncle dead. Uncle is cremated.

Old Dude has a Magic Sword that glows whenever it's used.

Old Dude tells Farm Boy that he has untapped magic powers. Farm Boy begins to experiment with magic powers.

Old Dude convinces Farm Boy to take Thing, overthrow the Evil Leader and save the day, but Farm Boy decides he first must save the Princess.

Farm Boy briefly encounters Bad Boy. Bad Boy is a dark mysterious figure, slightly older than Farm Boy and with obviously better fighting skills.

Farm Boy disguises himself as one of the Bad Guys and sneaks into prison where the Princess is being held captive. Fight ensues. Bad Boy helps with rescue, but ultimately it's the Thing that saves them. Old Dude dies at the hand of the Second during rescue and escape.

Farm Boy, Bad Boy, Princess and the Thing go to the Rebels that are waiting to overthrow the Evil Leader. Rebels prepare for Battle using the Thing to their strategic advantage.

Farm Boy takes to the skies to do combat with the Second, whom he does, in fact defeat and thereby saves the day yet leaves the sequel wide open.

At end of movie, Farm Boy and Princess exchange glances, but don't actually kiss.

Cutaway (2000 TV Movie)

Guy Manos' "Director's Comments" about "Cutaway" on DVD.

[18 January 2001]

Manos walks an interesting line between hype and facts all through the commentary. He stresses that Stephen Baldwin (Agent Vic Cooper) and Tom Berenger (Red Line) did their own stunts and without actually saying "all their own stunts", certainly implies it. Clearly that's not the case. He also implies that Dennis Rodman (Turbo) does his own stunts as well, but from what I understand from other sources, Rodman never even got near a plane in flight.

Manos does admit that he did -some- of the stunts for Red Line when Berenger was "unavailable." Manos' wife, Pam, does the skydiving for Maxine Bahns (Star), the female lead. Manos never fesses up as to who does the more advanced skydiving scenes (head down, swoop pond, ect.) for Baldwin. With the exception of Casper Van Dien (Delmira), those really are the Golden Knights and that's the wind tunnel at Fort Bragg, SC.

There are a couple of interesting factoids sprinkled throughout the commentary such as how so and so shot was done, how some of the action sequences were performed and that Marcos A. Ferraez (Ground Rush) was actually a skydiving buddy of Baldwin's before production was even given the green light. However, the really interesting stuff to me was how the script was developed and how some of the scenes and events were based upon Manos' true life experiences. I got the feeling that maybe at some point Manos actually had considered the tandem drug running scheme and he does mention that it had been done a couple of times maybe ten or so years ago to actually help finance a Nationals team.

I'm not sure where fact and hype merge here.

Manos does explain things about keeping the story, costumes and sport simple enough for the audience to understand yet "real", but he never explains his choice of the "8-way speed star" event. I'm thinking just 2 more people would have made that a lot more "real", but there was probably a budget consideration (23 shooting days x 2 people, costumes, hotel rooms, catering, pack jobs, ect.).

To my surprise, there are ALSO comments on yet another audio track from Baldwin and Bahns. I haven't yet fully listened to those, but it's clear from the sample I did listen to that they must have been having a -really- good time, maybe even a little tipsy (maybe a LOT tipsy), when they recorded them. I'll have to fully listen to those in the near future.

Paul