Marathon of the Lost: Week 1

It’s January 2014.  It’s the beginning of the year and a time when everyone looks back upon what happened in the year before.  They look back at things that happened to them, the highs the lows, their favourite things, and all that jazz.  I decided to take the month to think back upon those we lost over the previous twelve months.  This Marathon of the Lost will consist of a lot of movies, with a movie picked for each person that can represent their career in a satisfying way.  Let’s get started.

The Hunt for Red October

There are a few reasons that I began the marathon with this movie.  One reason is that it was a movie that I had never seen before.  I had always heard good things about it, but had never taken the time to watch the movie.  It was a blind spot in my movie viewing.  That’s two reasons; I hadn’t seen it and I’d heard good things.  The other reason was the death of Tom Clancy, the man who wrote the Jack Ryan novels.

On October 1^st of 2013, Tom Clancy died in Baltimore of an undisclosed illness.  He left behind a legacy through both his bibliography and the films based upon the books.  The Hunt for Red October was the first novel he published, and was fittingly the first film adapted from his work.

I quite liked the film adaptation of The Hunt for Red October.  There was a simplistic charm to the story of a Soviet submarine crew defecting from their nation, and an American CIA agent trying to prove that they are defecting.  It never got overly complicated in its plot.  It was easy to follow and a fun ride.  What I especially like is how it felt reminiscent to an Americanized version of James Bond, which is a feeling that becomes more prominent in the two sequels that follow it.

Patriot Games

Yes, this is also based on the Jack Ryan novels that Tom Clancy wrote.  Sure, I could have used this as the tribute to him.  However, The Hunt For Red October was the book that made him famous, and the movie that made him a movie money-maker.  This movie is dedicated to another great contributor to the world of film, David R. Ellis.  You might know Ellis for his direction of movies such as Cellular, Final Destination 2 and 4, Snakes on a Plane, and Shark Night 3-D.  Before directing those, however, he was a stunt coordinator on films such as Patriot Games.

David R. Ellis passed away on January 7^th, 2013.  He was found on the floor in his hotel room in South Africa, where he was filming a movie called Kite.  I’m not sure what he died from.  All I can see is that they’ve said there was no foul play involved in his death.

I said earlier that the Jack Ryan movies are like an Americanized version of James Bond.  That’s not entirely true.  Jack Ryan is not the male fantasy that James Bond encapsulates.  There isn’t an overabundance of alcohol and women.  He’s not as suave and filled with one liners.  Jack Ryan is a reluctant hero.  The characters of Jack Ryan and James Bond couldn’t be more different.  It’s the situations and the feel of the films that make me believe the two franchises are alike.

In Patriot Games, Jack Ryan is up against a faction of the IRA.  He uses espionage to try and take them down.  It leads to some great action.  All of the supporting roles have some meat to their bones, including a villain played by Sean Bean, Jack Ryan’s family, played by Anne Archer and Thora Birch, and Jack’s coworkers, who include Samuel L. Jackson and James Earl Jones.  The villains are memorable and well written.  The stakes are high.  The action, as I said, is great.  There’s a highway car chase that, though not too fast-paced, has some of the best tension I’ve experienced in a car chase.  There’s a boat chase that is reminiscent of the best in the Bond franchise.  The movie might be more low-key than Bond, but it still plays out like a Bond film.  I liked that.

Clear and Present Danger

The third and final Jack Ryan movie in this marathon marks the third tribute to someone who died in 2013.  This time, the person being remembered is a man by the name of Ray Dolby.  You might not recognize the name.  If you do, you know why he is important to film.  Ray Dolby created Dolby Laboratories and helped pioneer surround sound for home theater systems.  Clear and Present Danger was the first film released on home video that featured Dolby Digital Surround Sound.  That was a big landmark for film.

Ray Dolby passed away passed away in San Francisco on September 12^th, 2013 after battling with leukemia.  He was eighty years old.  In memory of Ray Dolby, Kevin Yeaman said “Today we lost a friend, mentor, and true visionary.”

I don’t know how well done the surround sound was for Clear and Present Danger since I watched it on Netflix through my computer.  What I can say is that it is a well-made action/spy thriller.  In much the same way as Patriot Games, Clear and Present Danger feels like a James Bond film.  The action scenes, interspersed with espionage and well-characterized villains help to give it that feel.  You can basically take any general statements I said about the previous film and toss them onto this one as well.  I wish that the series had continued from this point and not been rebooted twice, because this series was going interesting places.  I would have liked to see it grow even more.

Fluke

This was an interesting choice for the marathon.  Fluke is based on a novel by James Herbert, an author who passed away last year.  He is better known for his book The Rats, which has also been made into a movie.  I decided to choose this movie instead.  I had no idea that James Herbert was the reason that it existed.  I had never seen it.  Both of those factored into my choice.  James Herbert, this choice was for you.

Herbert passed away on March 20^th of 2013 in Sussex, England.  Once again, I don’t know what the cause of death was.  He left behind a bibliography of twenty-three novels and a few other works.  He also left behind a wife and three daughters.

The strange thing about Fluke is that it is supposed to be a family drama, but plays out as a horror film.  The movie begins with the death of what seems like the main character, and his resurrection as a stray dog.  His dog family gets caught by the pound.  His entire litter gets taken in by people before he does, and he overhears the workers saying they will have to put him down.  After escaping, he gets taken in by a homeless woman who then dies.  This is all in the first fifteen minutes.  As a child, I would have been traumatized watching this movie.  It is a well thought out story, but I’m not so sure it works as a family tale.  Still enjoyed it.

Lawrence of Arabia

Now onto the one that everyone will care about more than probably any other movie I watch in this marathon.  I haven’t seen too many Peter O’Toole films, and I can’t say that I’m a huge fan of him.  I’m always calling him Laurence Olivier by accident.  I’m only not a fan of O’Toole because I’ve seen so little of his work.  He’s great in Lawrence of Arabia.  I’ll say that much.  It’s a shame he passed away in 2013.

Peter O’Toole passed away on December 14^th, 2013.  He was 81 and had been fighting an illness for years.  It was only a matter of time.  I saw a lot of people mourning the loss of Peter O’Toole online.  He was someone they looked up to, someone they respected, and someone they enjoyed watching.  They said he was the bomb in Phantoms, yo.  They watched Lawrence of Arabia.  This month, as I look back at the deaths of 2013, I also watched Lawrence of Arabia.

This film is an epic.  It’s nearly four hours long, has an extremely large scope, tells a big story, and looks magnificent.  The performances by Peter O’Toole and the rest are all top notch.  The movie is entertaining, beautiful, tense, and exhilarating.  There isn’t much I can say about the movie that hasn’t been said a million times over.  It’s one of the best movies out there.  I’m glad to have seen it for a second time.  It’s sad that Peter O’Toole died, but he left behind a movie that will always highlight why he is someone to remember.

That’s one week down.  There are still three weeks and a little bit in January, which means that there is a lot of time to watch movies made by, inspired by, and using the work of famous people who passed away in 2013.  I might not say much about the people, but I’m watching these movies in memory of them.  I’ll miss having new work from many of them.  Come back next week to see what other movies I watched.