David Loves Empire. You know

Old is new again.

A bunch of lists.

Top Five Songs by the Clash. At the moment.

1. Clampdown.

2. Complete Control

3. Janie Jones

4. I’m So Bored with the USA

5. Police On my back.

One note here… It’s something tremendously clichéd to fathom, but it’s possible that “Train in Vain” may be the greatest song the Clash ever wrote. It’s not the best Clash track, and their original rendition is rather plain, the vocal incantations are short and brisk, they aren’t framed by the power of the note sung, but by the context of the delivery. There is a Joe Cocker to the Beatles “With a little help from my friends” on this one potential.

This is the ultimate, angry post breakup pop song for men. In 40 years we have been given hundreds by women, another top 5.

1. I will survive - Gloria Gaynor, Really, is anything close? Like in the same book. When comparing the next to this is like comparing The killers to Springsteen. It’s a laughable distance.

2. Smile – Lily Allen. Between the “wine and a moan” line and the na-na’s at the end, this really is a great song.

3. Stronger – Britney S. Sure she is like Hurley on Lost, she needs a win now. Why not. That and the video was awesome.

4. Though not a single one of them are worthwhile, every song Beyonce and Destiny’s Child have ever done.

5. Car Wash – Rose Royce. If you want to see this is not a joke, rent Les Cousisns by Chabrol and apply it women. Then realize it’s as good of a joke possible.

Anyway. Train in Vain tops ‘em all. It’s the “you lied to me” song. But this one doesn’t throw accusations, it doesn’t make anyone better. In fact the forlorn side is desperately missing the other and telling them to piss off but they want them back. It’s a plea of desperation and pain, it’s a fuck you for making me feel so bad, yet there is no sense of belittlement, nothing derogatory, just a scream at the heavens about fate.

++++

For some nerd in me.

Top five Battlestar moments.

5. The Pegasus hitting the Cylon Basestar/ Galactica into the New Caprica Atmosphere. Sometimes, when the setting is cool enough, it’s nice to have SFX blow your mind. In 10 years this will be commonplace and the magic of illusion will fade forever.

4. Starbuck brings the raider home.

3. Starbuck brings Lee home.

2. Baltar’s speech condemning Zarek. It’s one thing to create a villain from day one, it’s something entirely different to engender hatred against a likable character. Baltar is a heel of a man, a geek whipped by his dick, a genius at self survival. This speech is so pure and genuine when it comes to politics that when watching it again, the coming change seems all the more painful. This is the character at his best; this only makes the worst in him the more devastating.

1. The “So say we all” speech.

If I have learned one thing in the last few years, it’s that I only now appreciate Star Wars and Empire as they should be. Star Wars (New Hope) is such a wonderful rags to riches story; it’s easy to overlook the clichés.

But then comes Empire. I really don’t know, and I am saying this as a film student, if there is a film that has ever been better made for a mass audience. Sure there are films that can strike the heart of some… but Empire is one of the few films where even after the immediate story joy is gone, I enjoy watching the film for its rhythms… if you can understand that, we’ll talk.

I am saying this. I may see more important, more meaningful, and more intelligent films that Empire, but I doubt any of them will be as watchable or expertly crafted.

Yet, if Battlestar can stick the landing, if it can deliver a great product all the way through, then we can talk about which is better on the whole.

Of course this is a lie. If anything tops Empire in my lifetime, I will be grateful beyond life and shocked.

Hell, I’ll list. (From 1981 on)

5. Band of Brothers / Saving Private Ryan

4. Grand Theft Auto 3, Vice City, and San Andreas

3. E.T.

2. Ok Computer

1. Empire Strikes Back

And on that note:

Five things I think are the penultimate, i.e. the best of the best ever instance of usage of one element or another in this film in regard to the history of film.

5. Han Solo’s Barking (at C3po, at Leia, at Chewie): From “Never tell me the odds!” to “We don’t have time to discuss this with the committee” and finally: “You’ll die if you go out there!” “Then I’ll see you in hell!”

No anti hero will ever approach this level in any film. He’s not just a swashbuckler, he’s the ultimate male badass. He is the ultimate guy to have in your corner.

4. The Score. Sure Williams is ripping off Holst for 120 minutes. But this one is a winner from note one. And it’s one of five scores that immediately recall the movie.

A. Star Wars Saga

B. E.T.

C. The Godfather

D. Lawrence of Arabia

E. The Bridge on the River Kwai

3. The last 40 minutes. The odds are suddenly stacked so high against the good guys, and the only reasonable end without dues ex machina is failure. And it’s almost failure. Almost. Of the many reasons I keep watching this film is because how this ends. The only other film that does this for me is Dr. Strangelove. In both films, it’s so close to having a happy ending, but at every juncture, something bad happens.

With Dr. Strangelove, it’s all summed up with George C. Scott’s great Col. Buck Turgeson. In the moment when he is talking about the bombers and their capability to fly under the radar, he starts making airplane arms and then suddenly realizes that, his flyboys are going to drop the bomb. His macho giddiness is ruined by the nature of his business, which is to kill. He stammers and then quickly realizes he and the rest of humanity is fucked.

The gears in Strangelove are fixed on one thing, the end of humanity:

And this, I included the first one because of Sellers.

It’s a set point and Kubrick doesn’t flinch from it. The movie ends with humans ending the world. The only thing in the way of this is human goodwill. Which fails.

In Empire, the end point is the bad guys winning. The only thing in the way is Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Leia, Lando, and the droids. In the end, it’s bad overcoming good. And it happens in some of the closest, almost there moments ever recorded. There are so many instances when all they need is a simple break to get ahead… only to have the escape ceiling raised higher (see #1).

2. Yoda. I have four Yoda figurines surrounding me as I type. I am a snob, which means I am an educated dork. Even if I wasn’t educated, I’d still have them. This is the ultimate teacher figure in film. Another list:

5. “For my ally is the force, and a powerful ally it is. Life creates it, makes it grow, its energy surrounds us, and binds us, luminous beings are we, not this crude mater. You must feel the force around you, here between you, me, the tree, the rock, everywhere, yes, even between the land, and the ship.”

Not so much a lesson, as it a beckoning to a higher path. And what a beckoning.

4. “You must unlearn what you have learned.” Short of the army and NFL notion of stripping a person down to their bare elements and then building again, this is about right. You go on the new instinct, not on the old.

3. “This one, a long time I have watched. All his life has he looked away, to the future, to the horizon, never his mind on where he was, what he was doing! Adventure, heh, excitement, heh. A Jedi craves not these things, you are reckless!

2. “Try not. Do or do not. There is no try.” It doesn’t matter whether you are right or wrong, you are.

1. Luke: I… I don’t believe it.

Yoda: That, is why you fail.

That is the best teaching any character has ever given. Dead Poets be damned.

And for #1.

We have a TIE.

The best moment in Empire is clearly:

It may be the best moment in film. Not the film, but film history overall. When have 5 words ever meant so much in film? The three year wait may have both sustained this moment before the adequate ending of Jedi, but really, what moment in film could ever get the viewer heartbeat higher. Everything we were lead to believe was compromised with 5 words!

That’s never, ever going to be topped.

And yet there is one other moment in the film I must include. And it ties into #5.

If not for Han Solo, this series would have been a Sci-fi legend, and not a cultural phenomenon. Han Solo is Michael Jordan to the 96 Bulls, not Luke Skywalker. He is the one who did things no one else could in a great collection of talent.

When Han is going into the Carbon Freeze he has one last word with Leia.

“I love you!”

“I know.”

In the 100 years that proceeded it and the 100 that will follow, this will never be topped.

There may be another Luke Skywalker that we tie our dreams to, but there will never be another Han Solo.

(continued...)