Reay Jespersen

By sheer luck, I came across an article about a new website dedicated to new and emerging Canadian writers. I checked it out briefly and saw they had a contest for short childrens’ stories. It deadlines in a couple of weeks, so I’ve got to get cracking. Happily, I seem to work much better when deadlines are imposed on me for writing. Happier still, I got an idea out of the blue a couple of nights ago that I think could work really well as a short story for kids.

Already working on it.

More updates on contests as they come up…

I find myself in a new, and pleasant, headspace this morning.

While I continue to bat a thousand on the 100 words a day challenge, I confess that I generally still have to make myself do the words, or at least remember to do them, and the nighttime alarm on my watch - set to go off as a reminder to do my words if I hadn’t done them previously from one day to the next - has saved my bacon an embarrassing number of times. Point being, the daily writing isn’t yet a habit, which is frankly a bit disappointing.

There are causes for it not being a daily routine, of course. Some of which are genuine reasons, but some of which, were I to take a bit of time and consider them at all seriously, are more likely excuses. There’s all too often stuff I’d rather be doing with my time, and when it comes to free time, I find writing is one of many things that appeal. A lot of that time, the other things win out.

What I’m rather happy about, however, is that this morning I find myself in a new headspace about writing. Not that I felt (at least, often) that daily writing was a chore, but it was all too rare that I was actively looking forward to doing it. Today, I find that’s rather drastically changed. Even though I’m in the midst of a page 1 re-write on what will work out to be a kids’ novel - perhaps a couple of dozen pages in on the first crack at it, I didn’t like the way it was developing, and figured starting from scratch would be a better approach than patching up what I’d done - there’s something now new and appealing about it. Perhaps it’s the result of the re-write itself; being happier with the way it’s working out. But it feels like it’s more than that… as though I want to write (vs. the all-too often desire to complete writing projects; a notable difference).

Hopefully it’s a new, and long-lasting, outlook talking, and is inspired by the work I’ve set ahead of myself instead of by the Excedrin I took an hour ago for the headache I woke up with. Should know by tomorrow. Hell, should know within a few hours, after the Excedrin has run its course and if I still have the itch - which I haven’t had in far too long, and have dearly missed - to get back to writing.

Here’s hoping it’s the latter.

Ok… people… friends… brothers and sisters… work with me here. I’m seeing more and more of this, and it’s driving me nuts.

It’s really not hard: generally speaking, when you’re talking about a single group of people, you refer to them in the singular form.

For instance - to get right to the most common phrasing I see this used with - it’s not “Metallica are playing here tonight”. That’s using a single name, Metallica, with a plural verb, are. You don’t say that a group are playing; it’s that a group is playing. So it’s properly said that “Metallica is playing here tonight.” It’s the same as the way you’d say, “the choir [singular name] is [singular verb] performing” or “the army [singular name] is [singular verb] going to Toronto because the mayor thinks Torontonians can’t shovel a bit of snow for themselves.”

Another common mistake: “the staff are coming to the kitchen for birthday cake”. A staff is a single group of people with a singular name. Thus, “the staff is coming to the kitchen for birthday cake.”

A group is referred to as a plural when the name of the group itself is plural:
“The geese [plural name] are [plural verb] coming back north again.”
“The Police [plural name] are [plural verb] playing here this weekend.”
“The Smurfs [plural name] are [plural verb] three apples high. Also, annoying.”

Point being, a group of individuals with a collective, singular name will almost always get a singular verb. A group with a plural name will almost always get a plural verb. There are going to be some exceptions, I’ve no doubt - this is English, after all, and what’s English without exceptions to every rule? - but it’s a simple enough rule to go by and arguably even more trust-worthy than “i” before “e” except after “c”.

I get that English is difficult. I’ve heard some say it’s the most difficult language in the world, doubtless attributed at least in part to those very ubiquitous exceptions I mentioned. It even seems to be tricky for some folks who grew up with it as a first language, which is odd, given a childhood and adolescence of schooling and exposure to learning it. And singular verbs for singular groups are both key and learned early on, so where does it go once people reach their teens and adult years? Why do the fundamentals become lost for some; too many, and I daresay perhaps a growing number?

To wrap, let me just as that you please try to use proper grammar, especially if you’re involved in any kind of publishing or broadcasting. It really does matter, it makes you (and your company) sound more intelligent and professional than if you get it wrong, and it will save me from totally losing my mind.

It’s 1985.
Over the years, America has had a number of costumed heroes in their midst - everyday people who dress up to protect their identities as they fight crime. A handful of these heroes have collected into organized groups, the most recent of which, including members from an earlier group, is called the Watchmen. After some members had been called upon by (still-reigning) President Nixon to help America in times of war, masked criminals were made illegal.

Cut to the current day, when nuclear tensions between America and Russia are at an all-time high. Someone has killed the aging Comedian, the gun-toting, violence-loving member of the Watchmen. Enter fellow Watchman Rorschach, a man of extreme social and political beliefs whose face remains unknown even to fellow members, always hidden behind a shifting, blotted mask. He believes that the killing was something more than just a grudge. Someone killed the Comedian for a bigger reason. While the theory is played down by his former partner Nite Owl, it’s underscored when another Watchman, the god-like Dr. Manhattan, chooses to remove himself from Earth after he’s confronted with having been the cause of cancer in past companions. Then Rorschach himself is set up, framed for murder and caught by police; not only finally unmasked taken out of action, but put into a prison with a lot of people he brought to justice. And as he fights to survive, we and two other Watchmen - Nite Owl and Silk Spectre - realize that he’s right: someone is taking out masked heroes, maybe to get them out of the way. Something’s going to happen. Something big.

Having waited twenty-odd years for this story to jump from the comic page to the big screen, fans of the published version certainly won’t be disappointed by the movie. It doesn’t capture everything that the comic portrayed - forgoing the subplots of the pirate story-in-story and its vociferous newsstand man tie-in, as well as the literary excerpts found in the comic - but instead focuses purely on the main storyline. The widely publicized comment from Terry Gilliam that the Watchmen was unfilmable isn’t disproven here, because what we see on the screen isn’t everything that’s in the comic. Nor could you likely capture everything that’s in the comic in a movie while still keeping the timing realistic and maintaining viewer interest. As featuring just the main story goes, however, the movie does an excellent job.

The performances are generally top-notch. Billy Crudup beautifully captures the detached Dr. Manhattan, Jeffrey Dean Morgan is a great Comedian, Patrick Wilson is very well-suited to Nite Owl, and a tip of the hat to Jackie Earle Haley as an absolutely perfect Rorschach. Haley doesn’t top Heath Ledger’s Joker as my favourite comic movie support character (it’s arguable no one could), but he isn’t too far off the mark. He puts in a flat-out excellent performance.
Less impressive, unfortunately, were Malin Akerman as Silk Spectre - she looked great but lacked a bit of passion, fading into the background a bit - and Matthew Goode as the brilliant and dangerous Ozymandias, who plays a role which simply felt bigger than his charisma could carry.

The music in the movie makes its presence known. Clearly the choice had been made to have it help both the feel of the story - the 80s pop reminding us when this is all taking place - as well as certain scenes, such as the subtlety of having “Everybody Wants To Rule The World” playing softly in the background when Ozymandias is confronting top drawer business icons about his intent to devise a way to give the world free power. The music isn’t always on the money - Jimi Hendrix’s classic “All Along The Watchtower” makes an appearance during a jail riot setting, arguably both too precisely apt and totally out of the 80s context - but it’s generally quite well done. It marks the first time in years that I’ll probably hunt down the soundtrack on CD to at least see what it features, if not buy it.

For all its exceptional execution, however, the Watchmen isn’t perfect. The effects, for one, were generally very well done but at times seemed like effects. As movie-goers know, the best effects are the ones you don’t notice, and here, for all their fine detail, they unfortunately made themselves obvious at certain points. A few times, Dr. Manhattan seems wholly superimposed on the background, wrinkles in aged heroes played by younger actresses look artificial, and the overhead reveal shot of Ozymandias’s Antarctic retreat looks every bit like the miniature version that was shot.
Also, for what’s generally done as a story where the real world is dark and troublesome and these real people in costume are standing up and trying to protect the public that hates them anyway, Nixon was portrayed as borderline cartoonish, complete with oversized nose and never assertive - at one time buffoonish - presence. That aspect totally lost the heavy feel of a looming threat of doomsday which was so integral to the feel of the comic.
And finally, what will likely be the biggest point of contention for comic lovers, is the much-buzzed-about change at the end of the movie. I’ll not spoil it for those who’ve read the comic but haven’t seen the movie (or who have now seen the movie but haven’t yet read the original story), but suffice to say it’s an aspect which purists will certainly have an issue with. For me, it was an unneeded change but one which, if they were going to make the change anyway for their own reasons, was handled very well. It essentially takes an alternate route around one aspect of the story and brings it back around to wrap same way anyway. As an aspiring writer, I can appreciate the craft and execution used to manage that so well, even if I don’t understand why it was done.

All told, Watchmen is a very well made movie adaptation of one of the most - if not the most - significant comic stories ever written. They didn’t set out to put everything in the original story on the screen, but instead stuck to the story that moviegoers would most want to see. And in that, combined with some exceptional acting and genrerally great effects, they certainly succeeded admirably.

If you’re a comic or superhero fan, it’s simply must-see.

So I’ve got a lot happening these days, creativity-wise.
Along with the usual writing projects I’m pecking away on, Jackie and I have teamed up with some friends to work on one creative outlet - a potential money maker, if we can get out collective asses in gear and actually put the idea in motion - and I’m working with another friend on a comic strip idea. Not a comic book, mind you, but a 4-panel strip like you find in the Comics section of newspapers.

It’s kind of cool because I’ve never worked in that format before, which always interests me. It’s a pretty specific discipline. Having written up a couple dozen by this point, though, I think I’m getting the feel for them.

The friend’s name is Eric Kim. He’s got a pretty cool website that showcases some of his work, and he’ll definitely bring a professional level to the artwork which my stick figures just wouldn’t get.

I’ll post a link when the strips start showing up on his site.

Meanwhile, I’m just trying to find a balance among all these things, plus life and a job, and writing away…

Louis Salinger (Clive Owen) is an Interpol agent who’s working with Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Eleanor Whitman (Naomi Watts) on what’s become an extended investigation into a mega-bank dealing in the international weapons trade. The problem is that everyone who gets close to the truth - or is willing to tell it - is showing up conveniently dead. Added to that, both Salinger and Whitman are getting threats of another nature from their respective superiors: either make this case stick, or it has to be dropped once and for all. Neither of them is willing to simply drop the case, but how far will they go to bring justice to the guilty?

Though The International sets the audience loose into the story right off the bat - Salinger and Whitman are actively investigating the bank in order to secure their case - it still has a broad development arc. It doesn’t follow the usual patterns of movie formats, but instead keeps setting up our heroes for success before they’re confronted with a failure roadblock, which takes them on a detour to apparent success before another failure roadblock turns up, etc. Then the filmmakers throw in an extended gunfight that seems oddly juxtaposed with the scenes around it, as though it were tacked on after the fact (as it perhaps was; early screnings determined people wanted more action in it, and what little action was shot later on seems to have been spliced pretty ham-fistedly into the story), which only helps underscore the odd pacing of the movie.
It’s perhaps from this unconventional approach that the climax a) doesn’t feel as climactic as previous scenes had and b) rather fizzles. It ends with what can’t truly be said to be a deus ex machina moment, but feels almost that unsatisfying anyway for it not ending the way it feels it should end. And really, when you have people sitting for two hours for a movie these days, they’re going to want a solid ending. What we’re given instead didn’t feel like an outright cheat, but it did fall pretty flat given the lengthy story and process we’ve seen.

If you’re a big Clive Owen fan, The International’s worth checking out at some point. If you’re a conspiracy or thriller fan, you’d probably do just as well to take a pass. After all, Angels & Demons is just a few months away…

World War Two Germany. The Nazis continue to experiment with human psychic abilities in the attempt to create an army whose collective minds are the true weapon. The Nazis are ultimately defeated, but the experiments are continued, Stateside and around the world in what are known as Divisions. Some of those people with psychic abilities who’ve escaped have had children, even as governments track down and capture or trace as many as possible who are known to have these abilities. And the abilities are myriad: those with telekinetic abilities are known as Movers, while those who can see glimpses of the future are Watchers. Pushers are people who can make you believe anything they tell you, as though you’re remembering it as reality. These abilities are joined by Smiths, Stitches, Bleeders, Sniffers, Shadows… the list goes on.
A drug has been created which should greatly enhance the psychic power of these people. Ongoing experiments prove fatal to those who are forcefully injected. That is, until one woman is injected in the current day setting and survives, then is barely able to escape the Division facility. Those with psychic powers working for Divisions help track down those with psychic abilities, but it will take time to find her, and there’s not much time to lose.

Nick Gant (Chris Evans) was told ten years ago by his Mover father that he was “special” just before his father was killed by Division agents headed by Pusher extraordinare Henry Carver (Djimon Hounsou). Nick has been living on his own ever since, trying unsuccessfully to master his Moving skill. Division knows where he’s staying in China, and two of their Sniffers show up looking for the woman who escaped a few days earlier. Just as they leave, Cassie (Dakota Fanning) shows up at his door. She’s a Watcher who’s still honing her own skills, and offers to help both of them become rich. She’s seen where six million dollars is being stored, and with his help, they can get it and split it. Nick is walking away before she even has a chance to explain the plan. She runs to catch up with him but then sees a glimpse of the future: there are people already in the market with them who are going to attack them. A Chinese family, themselves a group with psychic powers, have been tipped off about Nick and Cassie’s future windfall and want a piece of it.
Barely surviving, Nick and Cassie finally connect with the woman who survived the injection and escaped from Division; it turns out to be Kira (Camilla Belle), Nick’s former girlfriend and a (newly drug-enhanced) Pusher. The three of them go on the run, now pursued by Division and the power-hungry Chinese family who not only want what the trio have, but what they’re soon going to get.

Push worked for me better than it may for others, in part because I’m a sucker for psychic powers that are handled well. I’ve actually been working on a similar idea to this for a few years, though clearly I’m not the first one to tap the “government experiments on people who(se children) gain psychic powers” concept. The main problem that I had with the movie was that it was good for the first half and plateaued too much in the second half. Once we’re introduced to the abilities and the characters who have them and the set-up is made - all of which was handled pretty well - it feels like it winds down too slowly, rather than winding up toward the climax.
Added to that was some confusion about what exactly the powers were. Watchers are supposed to be able to see the future, which potentially changes with every choice made. Yet the daughter of the Chinese family, herself a Watcher with more finely-honed abilities than Cassie has, later on sees not only the future but what has just happened in the immediate past, letting her close in on her selected target even when choices aren’t being consciously made for her to pick up on. A Stitch shows up early on to heal Nick’s battered and bruised body, yet shows up later to inflict a great deal of pain upon him, the same sound effect suggesting that she’s perhaps un-doing (or re-doing) that damage back to him.
Early in their partnership, Nick and Cassie approach a friend of Nick’s to ask for his help. He has the psychic ability to turn one physical thing into another (evidently really, not just as a mind trick), but it only stays changed for a limited time before reverting to its actual state. And not that the audience has to be told everything about everything, but it struck me as odd somehow that such an ability was limited. If his altered physical state reverted after a time, why wouldn’t a Pusher’s influence only last a limited time, rather than apparently being long-lasting, if not a permanent fixture in a person’s mind?
Finally, Nick is supposed to be a Mover, but there are hints that he may be more than that. His father tells Nick he’s special, perhaps suggesting that he’s special beyond inheriting his father’s Moving ability. Later on, as they’re re-connecting, Nick playfully asks Kira if she’s Pushing him. She tells him to just Push back. And as the movie approaches its final confrontation, Nick writes out personal instructions for each of his ragtag group which they’re to open and follow at specific times, and then has his memory of writing them wiped out so he can’t be Watched. The way the instructions play out is clockwork perfect. Yet how would he have known precisely when they needed to open and follow their instructions without knowing what events and twists would be happening in the future, a Watcher’s ability?
I understand that there are enough powers at play here that the use and limitations of them can’t be itemized for the audience, or it could get very dull very quickly. But as with any other universe created for a viewer/reader, once the rules are introduced and put into play, they must be adhered to. Changing them out of the blue later on will only serve to confuse people who have been dutifully playing along and think they know what’s what.
That aspect, along with the hints but no follow-through on Nick’s “specialness”, and with the unforunate winding down feel from the half way point, only serves to make Push an alright movie but not nearly as good as it could’ve been, had it revved up what it started off with.
It’s left with enough open-endedness that a sequel could be written for it pretty easily, but unless the writers tie up some fat loose ends regarding the abilities, and ramp up their story to a true climax next time, they’d do as well to not bother putting in the effort.

In short, an alright rental if nothing else on the shelf grabs your attention, but as cool as some of the stuff in it may be, taking a pass on it completely wouldn’t leave you missing a whole lot.

Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) is a father who has retired from a special ops combat life in order to try to get to spend more time with his daughter, Kim (Maggie Grace). He realized too late that his time in the military kept him away from his family too long. Bryan’s ex-wife (Famke Janssen) has since married to a very well-off man who she and Kim now live with, and encouraged by his former combat buddies, Bryan is striving to connect with Kim in spite of his ex’s jibes.
Bryan signs off on Kim going to Paris despite his reservations about her going abroad, and though things start off well, they quickly turn. Kim sees her travelling companion kidnapped in another part of the palatial apartment where they’re staying, explaining what’s happening to Bryan on the global cell phone Bryan had given her. Kim herself is taken as well, and while recording the ordeal, Bryan has a brief conversation with the kidnapper, explaining that he has a very specific set of skills from a very specific career; that he will find this kidnapper, and he will get his daughter back. “Good luck” the kidnapper mocks before destroying the phone.
Bryan flies into action, uploading the recording to one of his buddies and explaining the situation to his ex-wife and her husband, who gets Bryan on a private jet to Paris.
His friend has pinpointed the group that Bryan is looking for; Armenians who moved into Paris some years before and have since become a criminal force which even local underground groups don’t mess with.
Armed with only his special ops experience, Bryan hits the ground running in Paris. There’s no time to waste. His friend’s research concluded that Bryan has 96 hours before he’ll never see Kim again.

Taken works better than I’d first expected it would’ve. Liam Neeson is one of the least likely actors for making my Top 5 List Of People Who’d Be Awesome Former Commandos (were I to have one), but it’s to his credit that he makes it work, and work well. He doesn’t come across as cocky in everyday life, nor when he’s on the job; he’s just all business. But he’s also not depicted as a superman who can take anything that’s dealt to him and walk away from it unscathed. The man takes his lumps. And it was frankly a refreshing change to see him getting out of breath. Granted, it was only toward the end as the climax was approaching (all the better to draw the audience to his plight and pull for him), but it was nice to see a touch of human limitations in a character with such impressive abilities.

In that vein, a tip of the hat must also be made to writers Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen. Besson has written or been connected to a few of the best action films in the last twenty years, including La Femme Nikita (both original film and the television series), Leon (aka The Professional), and The Transporter. He worked with Kamen on a number of projects, and Taken will surely remain one of their better collaborated films.

All in all, a definite must-see for action film fans.

Echo (Eliza Dushku) is a woman who has agreed to go into a covert ops program in order to make up for - or perhaps get out of jail time for - a mysterious something she’d done previously. We don’t know how much she’s told about the program, but what we soon discover is that it involves people having their memories and personalities wiped clean in order to pave the way for later programming. If a client of the program’s company front needs any kind of professional catered to his particular situation, the company can program one of their agents to fit the bill perfectly.

In this series opener, a millionaire’s daughter is kidnapped for randsom. The millionaire approaches the company, needing a negotiator to ensure the transaction goes off problem-free. Echo is called upon, and programmed with the designed personality and history of someone who would be ideal for this kind of job. Echo shows up at the millionaire’s house and immediately takes control of the situation, clearly unaware that she’s anything except who her memories and abilities say she is. It’s only when the millionaire brings her programmed “expertise” into question that things begin to go wrong: Echo has a couple of flashbacks to seeing another woman in pain, being prepped in the Dollhouse’s programming room.
Meanwhile, we find out that there’s a cop who’s determined that the mythical Dollhouse is a real thing and is getting raked over the coals by his superiors for having gone to dangerous and case-threatening extremes in order to prove it. He’s told to back off and agrees to do so, but only before continuing on the investigation as he had regardless.
When Echo and the millionaire show up to make the exchange of money for the young girl, the problems increase: Echo recognizes one of the kidnappers and starts to come unravelled. It turns out that the personality which was tailor-made for her happens to include the personality of one of the childhood victims of the same kidnapper, who it’s revealed is also a pedophile.
As the covert ops team reels from the blow of this faux pas combined with the client almost being killed during the exchange-gone-wrong, Echo and her former cop handler (Harry Lennix) push forward to help resolve the situation as quickly as possible.
When all is dealt with, Echo is wiped clean again and is put to bed with the other mindless/personality-free agents.
At the very end we get a small taste of things to come, however: the company has become aware of a problem with Alpha, who we find in an apparent residence where he has killed the occupants and is watching a college video of the woman Echo once was as he puts a picture of her in an envelope.

As big a splash as the show had every right to make - Joss Whedon has a number of pop and cult TV shows to his credit - there were unfortunately a number of problems with this premiere of Dollhouse. First and foremost is the fact that the main character, played by Dushku, is effectively a non-person. The only personality she has, save the hinted-at troubled woman off the top, is programmed into her. And when she’s not programmed, she’s a hollow being who drifts dream-like around the Dollhouse, along with all the other agents. That the audience can’t connect with the main character of a new show was an odd choice to make.
Secondly, there were a number of minutes near the top of the show which had Echo and some mysterious guy racing around town on motorcycles; apparently part of his birthday celebration, where he and Echo then danced with friends before he confesses he seems to be falling for her. He gives her a small gold heart on a necklace shortly before she leaves the party. The mystery man, for his part, seemed to be understanding, telling a friend of his that the time was up and she had to leave. But does he know who or what she is? We’ve no idea. All we do know is that this seems to a program she’s playing out, as it then gets wiped out and isn’t referred to again.
And finally, while we get to see a glimpse of Alpha - someone who will apparently be a villain (or at least foil) for the company or Echo personally - it felt like too little a hint to go on. That absolutely everything about this person has to be revealed in pending episodes feels an unnecessary amount of detail to have to wait for. Who is he? Why does he seem to have gone rogue from the company? Why is he focused on Echo? Why does he apparently not mind killing people in the pursuit of that focus? A bit more information to go on would’ve gone far in helping build the foundation of this world. Perhaps the company could’ve mentioned his name earlier, or had a brief discussion in passing about Alpha’s mis-programmed obsession with Echo and how he’s still at large or causing problems for them, or hints that he and Echo had a past together which he’s started remembering and which he wants her to remember as well. Something - anything - rather than just a mysterious someone doing a mysterious something for some reason (with respect to a character the audience thus far can’t connect with) would’ve helped.

I’ll catch the next show or two to see where it takes us. But without any must-see moments to be had or character/story arcs, and unless we get some insight and something to care about and tune in to follow in pretty short order, I’ll take a pass on the series.