Voight-Kampff Test Questions

Speaking of the famous Blade Runner turtle test, here is a list of questions from that movie -- questions that are used to tell the difference between a human being and a replicant. Of course, the scariest thing about this test is the way I can't help but wonder how many people today would gladly take pride in flunking it.

It’s your birthday. Someone gives you a calfskin wallet.

You’ve got a little boy. He shows you his butterfly collection plus the killing jar.

You’re watching television. Suddenly you realize there’s a wasp crawling on your arm.

You’re in a desert walking along in the sand when all of the sudden you look down, and you see a tortoise, it’s crawling toward you. You reach down, you flip the tortoise over on its back. The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can’t, not without your help. But you’re not helping. Why is that?

Describe in single words, only the good things that come into your mind about your mother.

You're reading a magazine. You come across a full-page nude photo of a girl. You show it to your husband. He likes it so much, he hangs it on your bedroom wall.

You become pregnant by a man who runs off with your best friend, and you decide to get an abortion.

One more question: You're watching a stage play - a banquet is in progress. The guests are enjoying an appetizer of raw oysters. The entree consists of boiled dog.

Gatekeepers

Every time I hear the word "gatekeeper," I can't help being reminded of Operation Gatekeeper. How odd that despite the many fans of a specific movie with whom I have talked online, it was Christine McConnell who reminded me of yet another meaning for the word "Gatekeeper."

James Bond Movies I Would Like to See

A Slow Gunboat to China

A SPECTRE Is Haunting Europe

For Spies Only

From Mecca, with Love

The Spy Who Drank Too Much

This Is Depressing

The same local movie theatre where I first saw La Femme Nikita, Como Agua Para Chocolate and Run, Lola, Run is now showing the grade-Z drug comedy Your Highness. And to think that there was a time back in the 1990s when said theatre actually bragged about having too many good foreign films and art movies for one theatre to show alone.

On the bright side, the same theatre will be showing The Muppet Movie soon.

Thoughts on the Movie Lists: Parte I

1. Gracias a Dios they're almost over. After the next three lists, I'll be officially done with these lists until next January.

2. Who knew I saw so many bad movies?

3. As embarrassing as the number of bad movies I've seen is, it's even more embarrassing to note how often the more important movies I've seen rarely come up the first time I make a movie list.

4. Once again I must note that my movie lists are of all the theatrical movies I've literally seen that were released within a certain year. They are not lists of all the good movies I've seen from a certain year. Nor of the best movies to be released during a certain year. And they're not even my favorite movies of a certain year. They're just attempts on my part to publicly sort out all the movies I have seen as opposed to all the movies I haven't yet seen.

5. Yes, I am embarrassed by the number of good movies that should be on these lists but aren't. I hope to remedy that in the future.

The Unified Field Theory of Film Criticism and Other Myths

Anyone who has ever noted how often critics disagree with each other and how often today's critical turkey turns into tomorrow's critical masterpiece -- and vice versa -- cannot help but think that the average movie-goer would be a lot better off if he or she only uses a critic's work as a general guideline. If critic so-and-so likes a movie, he or she might like it too but then he or she might not. There is no Unified Field Theory of Film Criticism and yet people continually act as if there is one -- or more importantly, as if there should be one.

Indeed, sometimes I think the main distinction people make between the average film critic and the friend they have who sees a lot of movies is that most people are willing to let it slide if their friend inadvertently recommends a movie that they did not care for but if a critic recommends the same type of movie, it is just another reason why you cannot trust those damned critics.

To be fair, we live in a world where money is getting increasingly tight and where most movie-goers are even more determined than ever to get their money's worth. Most movies nowadays are not just competing for Joe's beer money (to steal a phrase from the late Robert A. Heinlein); they also seem to be competing for his bill money to boot.

It does not help that few critics either build or keep a substantial readership by saying "this movie was okay" or "this movie was nice" or "this movie was not what I hoped for." Instead, there is a temptation to hype everything as the "best movie since The Great Train Robbery" or "the funniest movie I ever saw" or "the worst experience I ever had in my life". And of course, most movies cannot be accurately described that way.

Anyway, most of the time people complain about critics being too opinionated, what they really mean is that the critics do not express opinions that they can agree with.

My Love Life Explained in One Movie Still


Or at least it would be if my former bride-to-be wasn't a brownette.

That said, I'm not adverse to dating women who don't look anything like Ms. Kelly and Ms. Jurado but for some reason, the powers that be keep steering me away from them and towards Latina brunettes and white non-Hispanic blondes.

Except for the exception I mentioned above...

Trick or Trek

Oh, rats. All weekend long, I was thinking about how much the trailers for the new Star Trek movie reminded me of The Muppet Babies -- and for that matter, of all the similar "baby"-oriented cartoons that were popular when Muppet Babies was on the air.

And before I could write about it, someone beat me to it. And probably wrote about it better, to boot.

Yes, I know. It's not like those trailers haven't been around for a long while. But still...

So What's Up with All the Old Movies, Tonio?

And why are you always asking yourself all these questions on your blog?

Okay, seriously, I am quite aware of the irony of being a young -- okay, not-so-young -- Hispanic half and half who spends so much time writing about and praising movies that were made at least a decade or more before I was born. And yet every time I try to write about more recent films, I have difficulty finding the same enthusiasm that comes when I write about some of my favorite old movies.

Perhaps it's because I'm burnt out on recent movies and no longer find them capable of surprising me in the manner I have become accustomed to. Perhaps it's because I'm genuinely interested in old movies and welcome the chance to give some of my favorites the same publicity that the newest releases get. Perhaps it's because certain old movies remind me of the type of old movies I used to watch with my late father.

I don't kid myself that the filmmakers of yesteryear were more politically correct than today's filmmakers. After all, it was a time when Jim Crow was the law in many states and even a liberal northern city like Detroit was not above passing a law in my paternal grandmother's youth restricting Mexicans from sitting outside the balcony at a local theatre. However, I'm not convinced that today's filmmakers are all that liberal, either -- especially when it comes to people like me -- and I weary of the endless combinations of bad storytelling and stereotypes that pass for filmmaking today.

Perhaps the last straw came a few years ago when I had bought a ticket to see a much-praised movie called Sideways, only to realize that the movie wasn't all that entertaining and, in fact, quite dull. Halfway through the movie, a female character starts giving a speech about her wine and how it makes her think of where it came from and all the people who worked on it. It's a very inspirational speech -- but unfortunately, it's also an unwelcome reminder that movies like that were never going to concentrate on the type of people the woman was talking about, especially the migrant workers.

And when -- like me -- you're the grandson of a migrant worker and you're watching a highly praised movie that seems to have no problem dismissing migrant workers except when they're needed to provide material for the so-called "important" people -- who, surprise, surprise, are never Hispanic -- and no critic who reviews it seems to have a problem with that, you start to realize how unlikely it is that so-called "liberal" Hollywood is ever going to make movies about people like your grandfather -- well, there was La Bamba but nobody seems in a hurry to imitate that flick -- and it's hard to avoid losing all faith in the modern movie business.

Not going to bother with people like me? Then fine. Perhaps I'll find more entertainment among movies that don't even pretend to depict the modern world. Most of the modern movies I see get life all wrong anyway.

And yes, I realize movies are fiction and they're not supposed to be 100% percent accurate at depicting reality. But it would be nice if so many of them didn't automatically exclude people like me and my late grandfather. And even nicer if so many people didn't act as if they had no problem with such exclusion.

I don't expect all movies to be about people like me but it would be nice if movies that were weren't as rare as unicorns.