Comic Review: The Chimera Brigade Book One

    Regular readers will know that I love the pulps, and a lot of pulp inspired stuff.  Movies like Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow and Raiders of the Lost Ark; comics like The Rocketeer and Hellboy; and of course adaptations of the originals, like Doc Savage, The Shadow, and the like.  I also enjoy a good referential, alternate history story, like League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.  So, The Chimera Brigade is right up my alley.   Set in an alternate 1938, where Europe was profoundly changed by the arrival of what seem to be superheroes and villains after the Great War.  Across the Continent, forces are gathering, spies are spying, and trouble is brewing.

    Though the book in no way feels like League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, that is the most obvious reference when comparing it to something else.  But instead of characters out of Victorian adventure novels, it features a different array of references (from Zamyatin’s We to Orwell’s Big Brother to Meyrink’s Golem), and a very different plot.  I like the setting a lot and am very curious where the plot is going to take the various characters that have been introduced.  The art isn’t amazing, but it’s not bad.  Though not as good, in my opinion, it often reminds me of Mignola’s work on Hellboy.

    Doing a quick bit of research, I found that this is the first of six volumes.  I’m glad that it’s a story that has been completed.  But not I’ve got to wait for it to get translated from the French and published Stateside, which sadly, might take a while.  Because it is only the first of six volumes, this serves primarily as an introduction to the world and to the players, with only hints at the overall story.  It has my attention; hopefully it can hold on to it for however long it takes to get the whole thing out.

The Chimera Brigade: Book One
Authors: Serge Lehman & Fabrice Colin
Artist: Gess
Publisher: Titan Comics
ISBN: 978-1-782-76099-3

-Matthew J. Constantine

Book Review: Hedy’s Folly

    Fans of Hollywood’s Golden Age will be familiar with Hedy Lamarr.  I first saw her opposite Charles Boyer in Algiers, and like most men do upon encountering her, fell in love.  Sadly, I was too young (10?), and she had long since retired (and was about 70).  It would never have worked.  As the years went on, I remained vaguely aware of her, seeing her in films too rarely as I built up my experience in classic cinema.  But I did note her passing with a bit of appropriate regret.  I knew, in the vaguest way, that she’d done some interesting stuff outside of acting.  I knew there was some WWII espionage or something, but I didn’t know the details.  And in spite of my love of orchestral music, I will admit, I had never heard of George Antheil.  Not once.  So this book, chronicling the unlikely meeting and collaboration of one of the most beautiful women to ever grace the silver screen, and the self proclaimed Bad Boy of Music, was enlightening, to say the very least.  It's a celebration of two wild lives and their world changing collaboration.

    This is not a biography of Lamarr or Antheil, though it does provide a good deal of biographical information for context.  Author Richard Rhodes jumps between two very different lives that almost seemed destined to cross paths, showing how each person grew, gaining knowledge and experience that would be invaluable when combined.  Lamarr grew up in Austria, the child of a well off family, in the years after the Great War.  Antheil traveled to Europe, part of that post War Paris community of American artists.  He had dreams of grandiosity, of changing the way music was made.  She had her eyes on the theater.  And all the while, War was brewing again.

    Though not written as a novel, one could very easily see this being turned into a film.  The backdrop of Europe in those heady days between wars, two charismatic young people, danger and secrets.  Fascinating stuff.  Hedy’s first marriage, to an arms manufacturer, exposes her to some interesting technologies.  And her technical inclinations are awakened.  Antheil marries, too, but faces money woes.  The two almost meet, even know some of the same people.  But it wasn’t to be, yet.  Of course, they do eventually meet, Antheil ‘selling out’ by doing movie scores, Lamarr hitting it big in Hollywood.  And together they would invent a technology that would go on, eventually, to shape the modern world.

    The book is an entertaining and informative read, but at the end, I was left a bit disappointed.  I think what it functions best as is a jumping off point for finding out more about the two central figures.  Hedy Lamarr remains a largely mysterious figure, with specific events being delineated, while little of her heart makes it onto the pages.  Perhaps the recent biography from Stephen Michael Shearer will accomplish that.  Whereas Antheil comes off as kind of a buffoon.  Throughout the book, it felt like the author was trying to cover for a friend; like he knew Antheil kind of a jackass, but he wanted us to focus on his good traits.  However, he dropped enough information about his bad behavior that the attempts to gloss over them ring false.  It does make me want to read Antheil’s own words, his biography Bad Boy of Music (yeah, seriously).  And reading this book prompted me to pick up a CD of his work, which I’ve enjoyed thoroughly.

    I think that both George Antheil and Hedy Lamarr are far more interesting characters than this book manages to capture.  However the story of their invention is presented well.  It’s a quick read, too.  Rhodes doesn’t mess about.  And as I said, it’s a good starting point for further reading.  More on Paris in the between war years, more on Hollywood’s Golden Age, more on Antheil’s futurist music, more on the technological advancements of World War II.  The best books make you want to read more, to learn more.  With that in mind, Hedy’s Folly gets my recommendation.

Hedy’s Folly
Author: Richard Rhodes
Publisher: Doubleday
ISBN: 978-0-385-53438-3

-Matthew J. Constantine

Matt’s Week in Dork! (12/2/12-12/8/12)

    Work continues to dominate my time.  Though I’m reading a couple really good books right now.  One on the Byzantine Empire and one the autobiography of the pretty awesome Ayaan Hirsi Ali.  And Friday boosted my Dork cred with another meeting of the graphic novel club.


Lincoln:  This epic of American history manages to make many of the names from the history books seem a bit more like real people.  Though still holding Lincoln up as the wise old god, passing down justice and always on the right, it is a bit less one-sided than most portrayals.  Not nearly as maudlin as the trailers would have you believe.  But getting past the cynicism, the film is uplifting and sweeping.  The cast is excellent, and the relationship between Lincoln, his friends, his opponents, and the common man is very powerful.  An array of ‘that guy’ actors lend support to the stars, and they bring their most excellent facial hair.  Good stuff.

Anna Karenina:  Highly stylized, even more than Joe Wright’s work normally is, this lavish production is beautiful, but perhaps a bit too concerned with visual flair than with story or character.  The actors all do a good job, but at the end of the day, Anna is a horrible, flip-flooping, self-involved bitch, and her boyfriend is a vacuous pretty boy.  It’s hard to feel for them, as they crush and destroy everything and everyone around them in the name of their empty passion they mistake for love.

Hugo:  I still find this a bit odd.  It starts out as a fairly typical kids’ adventure film, set in a train station some time after World War I.  There are hints of mystery, the magic of books, that sort of thing.  But then, about a half hour in, it takes this turn, becoming a tale of movies and the love we have for them.  A broken old man in a run down old toy shop is more than he seems, and a boy with noting left is driven to find out the truth.  For any film buff, this movie is a must.

Immortal:  This movie is certainly visually interesting.  Sadly, the script is absolute garbage.  The characters make choices and say dialog that doesn’t seem to have any logic.  The world created is interesting, but so vague that it’s nearly impossible to feel grounded enough to care about anything or anyone.  Egyptian gods, alien incursions, mutant red hammerhead sharks, a girl with blue hair (got to have blue hair), and lots of CG people.  You can kind of tell that writer/director Enki Bilal used to write comics that appeared in Heavy Metal.  It has that European comic feel (beautiful but stupid).  I can’t recommend the film if you’re looking for a good story.  But if you want to turn your brain off for a while and enjoy some interesting imagery, go for it.

Men in Black 3:  “You’re distressing.  Everything about you upsets me.”  It’s the sequel that nobody was asking for.  The boys are back.  Somehow J doesn’t seem to have come to terms with the nature of his job, in spite of more than 10 years passing.  The time travel gags are actually pretty funny, though.  And the 60s aliens are cool.  The villain, Boris, is genuinely disgusting.  The script was a heck of a lot more clever and the story more interesting than the second film.  All in all, a pretty entertaining film.

Dark Shadows:  Finally, Tim Burton had a chance to redeem ten years of spitting on his early success with a franchise nearly tailor made for his style.  With Dark Shadows, he could embrace the Hammer Horror vibe he reached for in Sleepy Hollow and run with it, ramping up the Gothic dread and mystery.  Or, he could do a crappy Adams Family rip-off.  Set in “Maine” (seriously, it’s totally not the England!) in the 1970s, I genuinely think this could have been something…other than crap.

Killing Them Softly:  Ouch.  This is a collection of sad bastards, dumbasses, and scumbags.  They all get together in the ugliest city outside of OCP occupied Detroit, to screw over, smack down, or murder each other.  And all while being depressing, awful people.  And the Ray Liota beatdown has to be one of the most horrible things I’ve seen.  He’s so sad, and gets so much kicked out of him.

The Package:  The Cold War is winding down, and an old soldier gets wrapped up in a conspiracy to keep it going.  A trip to The Fugitive’s Chicago and a team of crack character actors are needed.  Everything looks good and depressing as the chess board takes shape.  There’s really nothing especially good about this movie, but it’s a fine bit of action/espionage fluff.

Life of Pi:  Wow.  If you’re looking for vacuous pap, the kind of garbage some ‘spiritual healer’ might blather on about on Oprah, then you’ve come to the right place.  This is the ultimate expression of the idiocy, ‘it doesn’t matter what you believe (what silly, made up BS, that is) so long as you believe something.’  And as that ultimate expression, it is about as vapid and useless as it gets.  Basically a kid wanders around and stuff happens; he’s on a boat with a tiger and stuff happens; then he’s not on a boat and stuff happens.  Or not.  So warm up the drum circle, pop on the Shadowfax cd, spark up a doobie, and just let the universe flow, man.  And if the mumbo jumbo chicanery of the story isn’t condescending and trite enough, you can always watch the Richard Dryfus wannabe, hipster author listen with exasperated, ironic but sensitive interest to Yoda…I mean adult Pi tell his Grandpa Simpson stories (“I was wearing an onion on my belt!”).  Twelve years ago, Ang Lee made one of my all time favorite films, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.  Now he’s making something worthy of latter day M. Night Shyamalan.  What happened, dude?  You used to be so beautiful.

The Campaign:  “I crapped GOLD.”  Featuring the best baby punch I’ve seen in film, this goofy political send-up has its moments.  The jealous dogs crack me up.  Everyone seems to be having a good time being silly and saying stupid stuff.  But it’s not quite as tightly scripted or consistent as I’d have liked.  Worth a watch if you’re in the mood for some stupid comedy, but it’s not amazing.

    I watched another disk of Winds of War, this one dealing with the attack on Warsaw and the aftermath.  There are some interesting characters, for sure, but most of them drift in and out of the story for only the briefest of times.  The main cast is kind of drab.  Even Mitchum’s character has little to do but stand stiffly and look disapproving.  It’s just interesting enough to keep watching, but not much more.  And I watched another disk of Magic City, which is starting to grow on me.  The characters are becoming a bit more interesting.  I’m just hoping that at least one of the big ‘problems’ gets resolved by the end of the season.  I like Danny Huston, but his snarling ogre villain is too obvious and too pointlessly evil to stick around, and I’m hoping one way or another, he’s out of the picture in the finale.  We’ll see.

    Friday night, Lisa and Brad hosted another night of the Justice League of Extraordinary Book Club.  This time up, The Avengers: Children’s Crusade.  Opinions were split, with some people really enjoying it, and others totally hating it.  I fell on the hate side, as you’ll see in my full review.  We spent a lot of time trying to figure out the massive array of characters and any motivations they might have had.  And trying to figure out the good guy/bad guy ratio.

Gambiiiiiiit!!!

-Matt

GWAR Reviews WAR HORSE!

The below video of GWAR reviewing Steven Spielberg's War Horse is definitely the most amazing thing I've seen on the internet today.  Now, I'm even more psyched to see the WWI Equestrian Epic!

--Brad