Serenity

If you haven't noticed by now, I'm a guy. And as a result, I like guy things. I like guy movies. I like guy cars. I like guy music. I like Ray Guy. I like Guys and Dolls. (What?!! Wait a minute...) When someone says to me, "Hey guy." I'm likely to respond with a slight head nod and a monotone "'Sup."

The reason I am stating the obvious is just so that you will be aware, as I am, that my movie selections and preferences are definitely guy-biased (not to be confused with bi-guys). That being said, I *do* prefer a good film of any genre over a stupid, mindless action flick. For example, I saw The Bridges of Madison County and thought is was pretty good, though I will admit the only reason I watched it was to gain brownie points with my then fiancee. (It worked, btw. Plus Dirty Harry was in it, so how bad could it be?)

I guess I just felt the need to justify or explain the preponderance of sci-fi, superhero, war, westerns, action, and thriller movies in my blog. Not that these are necessarily the sole domain of guydom, but you probably won't be seeing my review of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants anytime soon. (Unless the pants' travels leave a lot of panty-clad, pillow-fighting women in its wake.)

So that brings us to Serenity. The only reason I picked it was because it came up as a pretty highly-rated movie in the sci-fi category on Rotten Tomatoes. (Though I will watch them on occasion, I will never perform a search in the "chick flick" or "romance" categories--see how that works?) I'm not saying that Serenity was bad, because it actually is pretty entertaining, but I would have never have picked it had I not found it in the sci-fi search results. (Ah! I think I've *finally* made my point!) Now that I've beaten that to death, let's get on with it.

All I knew when I picked Serenity was that it was based on some TV series called "Firefly," and since I don't have cable, I'd neither seen it nor heard of it before. As I started watching it, I thought it was a made-for-TV movie--maybe a two-hour pilot or something. The "cinematography," sets, acting, dialog, direction, editing, and camera angles all reeked of TV fare.

Now there are some very good shows on TV (so I hear, because, again, I don't have cable...), but I don't consider them art. Despite the fact that there are some very talented and artistic people working in television, there is something about the medium that does not allow it to rise to the level of an "art form" for me. I'm not entirely sure why that is; perhaps I'll examine it more in a future post. I think it might have something to do with the serial nature of television, as the ultimate goal is not to create a single, self-contained masterpiece, but rather to create an entertaining and ongoing series that will be on the air for a long time.

Serenity would be a very good made-for-TV movie, but it just doesn't pass muster on my movie scale. That being said, I did enjoy it very much, and was shocked to learn afterwards that it was actually a cinematic release and cost $40 million to produce. I had assumed it was a TV movie and took it at face value. Writer/director Joss Whedon's entire resume consists of TV shows (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly), and it is painfully obvious in Serenity. (Apparently Whedon also has an obsession with pretty girls that kick ass...not that there's anything wrong with that.)

The acting, storyline, and witty, humorous dialog were actually pretty good, but the unimaginative camera angles, editing, cinematography, and music, though acceptable for television, were completely sub-par for cinema--even when compared to movies of lesser quality. Whedon seems to have a knack for engaging story telling, crisp pacing, and snappy dialog, but if he wants to succeed in the movie world he's going to have to up his game considerably. Perhaps he should consider writing and producing movies, but leaving the directing to someone else.

In spite of my feelings on the production value, I did enjoy watching Serenity, and it did make me want to see the entire (and only) season of Firefly. It's better than a lot of shows on TV, but had I paid money to see it in a theater, I would have felt rather cheated and pissed off--like going to a concert and having the performers lip sync...if I wanted to see that I could have just stayed home and watched them on MTV.


Serenity (2005)
Starring: Nathan Fillion, Gina Torres, Summer Glau
Directed by: Joss Whedon

(5 out of 7 skinks on the teleskink scale)