When 30 years old you reach...

Many stories and articles have already been written about how a little doomed-to-fail "space opera" movie that debuted on May 25, 1977 changed the way we would watch motion pictures forever. There is little doubt that that is true. Perhaps the greatest influence was on that of the imaginations of those who would behold the galaxy far, far away and dream of creating something similar or at least as captivating.

It's hard for me to imagine life without Star Wars. OK, that sounds awfully close to a border on idolatry. It's more an observation. As a four year old boy, I saw SW in the theater for the first time. I spent the next decade playing with Hasbro toys and playing video games where the star fighters were drawn with lines. That was the first ten years. The second decade was dormant as we all wondered if there would ever be a continuance to the saga. Well, it came in 1997 with the release of the Special Editions back in the theater. Going to see those rekindled a love for all things Star Wars. It was compounded when a little movie called Phantom Menace came out in 1999. And now it's hard to believe that it's already been two years since the saga concluded with Revenge of the Sith. Since then, I've been toying with idea of making my own fan film. One day. May be.

And although I enjoy all of the film-making aspects of the movies and the story and characters and sound and special effects, I would have to say that the greatest influence was the music. I can not imagine SW without John Williams' score. With SW began a love of film scores that continues today. And most of the time, if you hear music from my truck or iPod, that's what I am listening to. You know, it's probably that early influence that led me to pursue music by being in the band in middle school, high school, and even marching band in college.

Well, I could go on and on. I'll post more thoughts in the days ahead.

Spider-man 3: "Hang up the suit?"

"What in the world just happened?" That's what I was asking myself on the way home from the World Golf Village IMAX theater last night after seeing Spider-man 3. It's not a bad movie, but it's not the great one I was hoping for. Part 2 was great. This one was a hodge-podge of loose plot devices and over simplified coincidental meetings. Throw in the corny dance and music scenes and you've got a storytelling mess. It would have been nice if the angst was settled. Isn't that what 2 was about? Oh well, the villains were cool, though certainly under-developed. Hopefully they'll learn some things from the critics and do some more preliminary work at the beginning of the process rather than waiting for the cool effects to save the movie.

As one critic put it:

After the end of that second film, I thought for sure this entry in the series would show us a Spider-Man at peace with who he was, enjoying the way his life is working out, facing down threats with new confidence. Mary Jane by his side should not be the source of every single bit of misery in his life. It’s a drag to sit through, and that’s something I never thought I’d say about a Raimi SPIDER-MAN film.

My sentiments exactly, but, all in all, it's still better than most of the other junk coming out of Tinseltown. And if you have a chance, see it at the IMAX.

I give 3 out of 5 webs for Spider-man 3.