Sam Downing

He has a pretty good body for a street rat who never has anything to eat.

In Disney’s 1992 classic Aladdin¹, Robin Williams’ Genie can do pretty much anything – except, as he points out shortly after meeting the eponymous hottie, grant more than three wishes, kill people, or force them to fall in love. Those exceptions aside, his powers are pretty much limitless.

(Or are they? What would happen if Aladdin wished that the rule banning wishing for more wishes no longer applied? Surely Genie would have to grant it; that Aladdin can wish Genie free at the end of the film demonstrates that it’s possible for “commanders” to wish genies to overcome their limitations.)

So, on the face of it, it makes sense for the archvillain Jafar to wish to become the most powerful genie in the film’s climax. He thereby gains that limitless (for all intents and purposes) power. “Ah ha!” you might point out. “It’s actually stupid of Jafar to wish to become a genie, because genies can only wield the full extent of their powers when a commander wishes for them to do so!”

But we know this isn’t so: when Aladdin is trapped with Genie in the Cave of Wonders, he tricks Genie into freeing him without wasting a wish. This proves that, in the Aladdinverse, genies can use their powers under their own steam. They may not like doing so – even when Aladdin is unconscious and drowning, Genie doesn’t save him until Aladdin kind-of-but-not-really “wishes” to be saved – but there doesn’t seem to be any penalty for granting these “freebies”.

(If you wanted to fanwank a little, and I do, you could make out like there’s some “genie equivalence rule” which dictates that, since Aladdin scored a free wish from Genie, Genie is thereby obliged to “trick” Aladdin into making a wish – which he clearly does in the above scene, by almost literally putting the words of the wish into his mouth.)

The magic carpet really is magic: it transports Aladdin and Jasmine from Egypt to Greece to China in (what appears to be) a single night. I'd calculate its average speed if I a) were good at maths, and b) weren't so lazy.

However. Further analysis reveals that your initial impulse to believe Jafar is stupid is correct, albeit not for the reason you supposed. It is stupid of Jafar to wish to become the most powerful genie in the world – because he had already wished to become the most powerful sorcerer in the world, which is already powerful enough.

(Jafar’s first wish to become sultan of Agrabah was a total wash, by the way. First, why not just wish to become ruler of the whole world? Granted, we don’t know big Agrabah’s empire is, but it’s sensible to cover one’s bases. Second, why not just wish to become a sorcerer in the first place, then use all that sorcery to usurp the Sultan?)

It’s telling that, after Jafar becomes the most powerful sorcerer, one of his first acts is to strip Prince Ali of his ersatz royalty and transform him back into plain old Aladdin. In other words, Jafar undoes the effects of Aladdin’s first wish. In other words, he overcomes Genie’s powers. In other words, at this point of the story Jafar is at least as strong as, if not stronger than, Genie.

The fact that Jafar – who is ostensibly a clever man, having managed to rise to the position of Grand Vizier in the Sultan’s palace, though in hindsight he probably only managed that because he had that hypnosis-snake-stick-thing – is then stupid enough to allow some riff-raff street rat to trick him into eternal imprisonment in a lamp, basically stripping him of the benefits of all his wishes, means he deserves what he got.

(Note that when Jafar wishes to become a genie, he’s immediately trapped in a lamp, suggesting imprisonment is the “natural” state of geniedom. Thus, the freed Genie at the end of the film represents a perverted abomination of nature. Furthermore, is it reasonable to assume that Genie was also once a man who was somehow turned into a genie, or do genies exist as entities separate from humans? Sadly, the film provides few hints to the answer – unless you assume it’s set in the far distant future, and Genie was somehow trapped in his lamp sometime around the late 20th century and has languished there for millennia. It’d certainly explain all his relatively contemporary pop-culture references, which would be lost on Aladdin.)

So while from Aladdin’s perspective the moral of the story is “wishes can’t grant happiness”, from Jafar’s perspective the moral is “wishes can grant happiness, but only if you choose your wishes carefully, you idiot moron.”

1. Which, by the way, is the only source this post references. I haven’t seen the 1994 direct-to-video sequel or the spin-off TV series, and I don’t intend to. [↩]

Richard Harris, Michael Gambon: FIGHT!

I contend that, in the Harry Potter film adaptations, Michael Gambon is a superior Albus Dumbledore to Richard Harris. HOWEVER. This is a controversial matter. (more…)

Is “Phil and Claire” Hollywood’s new shorthand for “average suburban couple”? The evidence:

Modern Family‘s Claire and Phil Dunphy. (Apologies to the kid whose face I had to chop off when I cropped this photo.)

Date Night‘s Claire and Phil Foster.

I’m sure there’s got to be plenty of characters who fit into this category: on first reading/viewing, they seem like bang-up guys (or ladies), but a few re-reads/views later you start to realise that they actually kind of aren’t. Three examples off the top of my head…

Ariel, The Little Mermaid. After bragging to Flounder about all the cool shit she has stashed in her cave, Ariel laments “But who cares? No big deal. I want more.” Jeez, Ariel – you’re already a beautiful mermaid princess whose father dotes on her. What more could you possibly want, you spoiled bitch? (This also kind of applies to Simba, though at least he’s meant to sound bratty when he sings ‘I Just Can’t Wait To Be King’.)

Luna Lovegood, Harry Potter series. In Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the intrepid trio visits the home of their schoolchum Luna, who up till this point has seemed like a spacey but innocent weirdo. But when they stumble into her bedroom, they discover “ceiling portraits of [Harry], Luna, Ron, Hermione, Neville and Ginny entwined with the word ‘Friends’”. Cue creepy stalker music. (This is nothing against Evanna Lynch, who is brill.)

The parents, The Parent Trap. So here’s the deal. Nick and Elizabeth (Dennis Quaid and Natasha Richardson, RIP) hook up, have identical twin daughters, then endure a break-up so painful they can never see each other again. Each returns to their respective country – America and England – each taking a daughter with them. And they both agree never to let the twins see each other, nor tell them about the other’s existence. That is horrible. And we’re meant to root for these abusive chumps to get back together?! No wonder Lindsay Lohan is so fucked-up. (For the record: I love The Parent Trap. But, wow, the titular parents are jerks.)

Sherlock Holmes

Robert Downey Jr is… the drawcard of a film which is otherwise a bit of a muddle. Director Guy Ritchie’s trademark gangster talk and slick visuals don’t quite mesh with the richly visualised 19th century London of the film, though he nevertheless does an admirable job of transporting audiences back in time to a world of cobblestones, steam and stagecoaches.

But it’s the overly complicated storyline that’s the biggest offender. For starters, there’s no actual mystery to solve – which is a crime when your leading character is the world’s most famous sleuth.

The Lovely Bones

Peter Jackson and fellow screenwriters Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens (the trio also penned the Lord of the Rings trilogy) are mostly concerned with adapting Sebold’s tone of poetic whimsy, because they excise many of the book’s darker, more morally grey moments.

That’s a mistake, because the resulting film lacks both conviction and emotion.

A Photoshopped android stands in for Sarah Jessica Parker

If there’s a Sex and the City rerun on TV, I’ll usually watch it. I’m not an obsessive fan of the show, but I like it fine. (Even though after all these years, I still get mad at Carrie for breaking up with Aidan and later settling for that dick Big.)¹

So I find this sad:

Ugh.

Sex and the City, the TV series, was about four female friends who talked a lot about the guys they were sleeping with, and looked good doing so. Sex and the City, the movie, mostly overlooked the strongest part of the show – the friendship – and instead presented the foursome as glamazons who live expensive lives few actual women could actually afford. The film isn’t awful, but it’s wildly different in tone to the TV series: the pace is slower, the dialogue has lacks snap, and even the fashions seem out-of-place. (TV-Miranda would never wear the stuff movie-Miranda gets around in.)

The sequel looks even less promising. That last shot of the gals strutting through the desert? Full. Body. Cringe. When did the franchise become so… tacky? Does anyone still find Sex and the City empowering? And if the answer is yes: why?

1. I also blame the show for the apparent rash of weirdly picky, crazy-analytical single women out there, but that’s a whole ‘nother post. [↩]

Last week I indicated that I really, really, really liked Avatar. Exactly how much did I like Avatar? So much that when I reviewed it professionally, I gave it five stars out of five.

I have never given anything five stars out of five before. I always swore I never would, because no film is perfect. Avatar isn’t perfect, but it deserves every one of those stars.

Here are some of the words I used to describe it: “Masterpiece”. “Immersive”. “Wondrous”. “Game-changing”. “Amazing”. “Lush”. “Stunningly emotional”. “A film like no other”. So now I have to go refill my supply of superlatives.

Go see it (then come back here afterwards and complain that I ruined it for you by hyping it up too much).

World's dumbest genius serial killer, pictured with family

Anyone who consumes fiction must have some very high hooks on which to suspend their disbelief. This is especially true for fantasy and sci-fi aficionados – you can’t buy into that malarkey about magic and spaceships unless you’re willing to accept the impossible.

However. Suspension of disbelief only stretches so far.

I pondered this during the week while catching up on the fourth season of Dexter, which was pretty excellent (and horrifyingly bleak) – except for some sloppy writing which pulled me out of the world. Mildly spoilery examples follow.

So in one instalment, Dexter sets up a kill room in a hotel bathroom. Because cheap hotels, as we all know, are bastions of privacy. Later in the episode, Dex stalks his victim to a construction site and prepares to attack. Suddenly, the victim attempts suicide! But Dexter rescues him at the last second, aided by onlookers who rush in to help. Onlookers who Dexter apparently didn’t notice while he tracked his victim; onlookers who apparently would’ve done nothing had Dexter attacked the victim before the suicide attempt.

Contrast this with Avatar (WHICH I LOVED), a film populated with blue-skinned cat-eared aliens who live on a planet overhung by huge floating mountains. How did the aliens, who evolved on a world light years from Earth, evolved to be (for all intents and purposes) exactly the same as Homo sapiens? How do those rocks float in the air? You might ask a billion questions like these – but ultimately the answers don’t matter, because the little details serve the story. They aren’t its sloppy byproducts.

It goes back to that old saying: audiences will believe the impossible, but not the implausible. I can believe blue cat people live on floating rocks. But I can’t believe a so-called genius serial killer would make such dumb mistakes.

I saw Avatar last night, and I’ll write about it in more detail after my professional review is published later in the week, but for the moment I’ll merely say:

Wow.

Last night I watched My Neighbour Totoro, and this has to be said: CATBUS FTW!

That’s all.