Jan 24 2008
Six Degrees of Suck
Watched terrible Kevin Bacon revenge fantasy Death Sentence. Brain hurts. Reduced to telegraphic sentence fragments as a result. Usual bourgeois man becoming-criminal to avenge wrongdoing against nuclear family. Gang leader very mean, but also family-oriented. Bacon character preposterous: a bullet-proof risk analyst. Cops completely incompetent, like Bacon escapes from guarded hospital with nothing but his hospital robe to go kill gangsters and the cops manage to show up at his house some time the following day, giving him plenty of time to go home, get clothes, and plot strategy. Absurdities pile up; John Goodman character less believable than a Scooter Libby autobiography. Repeat: brain hurts. Only clever twists on the genre involve a chase scene in a parking garage and the visual transformation of Bacon into scar-bodied gang member. Yes, both done before. Skip it.
So 7 Red prefers Zodiac’s celebration of due process and The Wire’s attention to bureaucratic and historical baggage to the rejuvenated revenge fantasies offered by Kevin Bacon and Jodi Foster?
Take THAT, liberal media!
I like revenge fantasies. They’re fun. I just don’t like crappy and preposterous revenge fantasies like Death Sentence. I’ll have to get back to you on Jodi Foster when I get around to seeing that one. Indeed, one of the most interesting revenge fantasy moralists in our culture appears on The Wire itself in the character of Omar, whose motivations from even Season One are tied into classical revenge fantasy tropes. But interesting, see. Who can forget the revenge he exacts for shooting off his grandmother’s church crown! Come on, now. As Season Five unfolds, we see him now engaged in another revenge plot, this time centering on Butchie. Revenge and moral code are clearly the guiding features of the character. You can do it, point being, without being silly about it. Cheers, now!