Written, Illustrated and Screen-Captured by Koriander Bullard Last week, an episode of Sailor Moon Crystal marked a turning point for the series, as they revealed that Sailor Uranus is not actually a female, but is "Transgender" in the way that she was born with both male and female genitalia, but she can switch between the two genders at will. This is why her girlfriend, Sailor Neptune, can alternate between calling her as a "she" or a "he" at will in every other episode. Those who read the original manga, which was first put into graphic novel format in 1995 in Japan, and then translated in English in 2000 and again in 2012, already knew about Sailor Uranus and her dual gender, and were just happy that unlike 1994's Sailor Moon S anime which saw Uranus as a female only, in Sailor Moon Crystal, Uranus, known also under the name Haruka Tenoh, is finally being showcased as a strong, transgender teenager who is satisfied with the way she was born. However, newer fans of the series lost their minds on Twitter and Facebook, unable to accept the fact that Haruka's gender has been altered to match the original manga instead of the more popular 90's anime. Some say the term is wrong for her, and that a softer term, such as "Gender Fluid" should be used instead. And it goes without saying that Conservatives are sharing a group-coronary over the issue, but this comes as no shock, considering that the current season is based on the Infinity Arc, which features heavier and darker overtones. Infinity and Sailor Moon S both feature new character Sailor Saturn being accused of being the Deity or Messiah of Destruction, and Sailor Moon needing to acquire the Holy Grail in order to save the world. Add to it a Transgender and more than one new lesbian character, and we have a show fit to be crucified on the 700 Club. Another group of fans in a tizzy today are fans of the Toonami edit of Sailor Moon S. Back between 1999 and 2000, Cartoon Network and YTV Canada aired a watered down edit of Sailor Moon S, in which Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune were still allowed to be touchy-feely with each other, but were edited as "cousins" who touch each other, rather than lesbians…… because according to Cloverway, the now defunct Toei Animation subsidiary responsible for the change, cousins touching each other is more "kid friendly" than lesbians touching each other. Sense made? None. But getting back on track, the subject of Haruka's gender has been the source of confusion for years, not because of what she is, but by what name is socially acceptable.
Back in 1994/1995 when the original manga was drawn, Haruka was known as a "Hermaphrodite" which is a medical term for those who are born with both male and female genitals. But by 1999, the term Hermaphrodite started creeping up in songs and TV shows on MTV as a slur, meaning someone who is "stupid" because of their dual-gender nature. Other medical terms such as "midget" and "retard" also became slurs on the trash television network, prompting public outcries. All three medical terms while still used in hospitals the world over, are now banned from daytime TV due to trolling. A few years ago, the term "Transgender" started being used to explain both people who are in the process of changing genders and those who are born as both a man and a woman, while "Gender Fluid" is a relatively new term meaning those who are still questioning their sexuality, identity or those who do not wish to have a title put upon their gender at all. Haruka's character is not questioning herself at all. When she is on the race track or at school, she chooses to be seen as a boy, and wants others to address her as such. She is comfortable in the role of a man in these two, mostly male-dominated areas. When she is Sailor Uranus or relaxing, she is fine with being seen as a girl and is fine with being called as such. She chooses her gender based on role, and is perfectly comfortable in her own skin as either gender. She is confident in herself, her choice and in how she sees herself, and her girlfriend is always first to comply with calling her as a "he" or a "she" depending on whatever Haruka has chosen for that day. The other characters as this episode seem fine with Haruka's duel-gender nature, and literally no questions have popped up about it since. Her transformation scenes only show her female side, as it is still heavily frowned upon in Japan to draw male genitalia on any character who appears as an adult or late-teen, and so far, every nude shot has also been drawn from her feminine side, but in all other segments, her gender is addressed based on her choice and not by how anybody else feels about it. Sailor Uranus has always been a strong character for the LBGTQ community, but as of today, even more so. Those who are not flipping out over her newly restored gender role are embracing her. Koriander Bullard is an author, cartoonist and human rights advocate. Keep up with her on Facebook!
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Written and Illustrated by Koriander Bullard Earlier this morning, I was nursing a migraine. Once the episode ended, I found myself wide awake at seven in the morning, the result of drinking a caffeinated beverage to nurse my aching head.
So I stumbled through the internet, still quiet in the early hours without a soul in sight texting or blogging. I read one of those "click-bating" articles that take me through 1990's nostalgia while also blowing through the minutes, when I saw an ad that led to an ad that led to a Google search on Tamagotchi. Curiously, I followed, landing on a fan Wikia page for the virtual pets. And there before me, stood something I could never have fathomed. My old Tamagotchi had a name I never knew, Kusatchi. But more baffling than knowing it had a name, was knowing I never really knew my pet very well at all, despite the hours I spent caring for it. Kusatchi it seems, was something of a cross between a Venus flytrap and a duck. But back in 1997, I didn't know this. And if you can see the diagram above, then you probably wouldn't have guessed that either. For 19 years, I've been trying to explain Kusatchi to other Tamagotchi parents, and all I've gotten back are odd stares, funny faces and laughter.But let me go back in time a bit to explain and remember Kusatchi. It was 1997. My father was working long hours at a Service Merchandise store several hours away. This was our second Christmas in Reading, Pennsylvania, in a gated community where I was the only little girl on the block, and part of the only minority family in the whole community. We lived in a nice townhome, but our neighbors were rich, racist and snobby. They had caused us plenty of chaos that entire year, but it was Christmastime, meaning that they were temporarily out of our hair, and Santa was dominating television. I didn't care that I had just turned eleven years old. Santa was a rock star in my eyes, and I had been extra good for most of the year, despite hitting puberty equally as hard and having gone through the hormonal angst usually reserve for teenagers much beyond my years. I had a mile-long wish list, filled with every toy and video game that would have deemed me "the cool kid" had there been any other kids my own age on the block. Well to my wonderment and surprise and for the first time ever, every single wish was granted that Christmas morning. In fact, Christmas was so awesome, I even had wishes granted from years prior, and wishes I hadn't even wished yet! My stockings ranneth over with video games, action figures, dolls and so many amazing and awesome things from Japan that hadn't even become popular yet! I had an official set of Pokemon figures long before the craze hit the states, an N64 that still to this day plays Starfox 64, and so many wonderful items from Mattel and Hasbro. And there, just behind the Christmas tree…. Was a Tamagotchi. I thought I was going to faint! The little plastic egg had been sold out in every store. I couldn't believe it was right there in front of me! Opening the package, I found a blue and white pamphlet that curiously, only had a battery warning and a partial chart of what my little LCD screen "could" produce. Quick as I could, I ripped out the paper tag holding the battery, set the clock and watched a little pixelated egg hatch. What was it? Could it be that cute puppy I wanted? A bunny? A kitty? …. It was a blob. I looked at the chart to find that this was the baby stage. Okay, not a problem. I went to Yahoo and searched for tips on how to raise my new blob, who was screaming at me the whole time I was looking for how to care for it. I had no directions, no owner's manual, not even a proper guide. Just a slip of paper, wishing me the best of luck in Japanese. So I did the best I could. I fumbled through the controls until I could figure out the "Clear Poop" button, fed it, gave it medicine and accidentally scolded it when my finger slipped on the menu. Smacking it by accident made it spout legs. (Tongaritchi) Finally, after hours of it beeping non stop in anger, it started to grow up. What would it become? A puppy? A bunny? A kitty? Maybe it was becoming a frog? …. Well, if you saw the above picture, it became a Kusatchi. Since Tamagotchi was new at the time, I had no idea this was supposed to be a Venus flytrap. Instead, my heart sunk, my eyebrows knitted together in an angry-sad combo, and my lips curled like over cooked bacon at the sight of what I assumed was a duck with a stick up it's butt, glued to a dinner plate. But, it was MY pet. And since it was my first and only pet, it was my responsibility to take care of it. I figured if I could show my parents I could be responsible with a virtual pet, that maybe I could snag a real one next Christmas. The following year, I got a Golden Retriever….. doll. With a puppy….. doll. Every day, I made feeding and taking care of Kusatchi part of my everyday routine. When my father came home from a business trip a few months later, he gave my brother (not yet six) and I each the Tamagotchi rip-off "Dinky Dino" which was a Russian keychain where you raise a dinosaur that only lives seven days. I was so responsible, I raised Kusatchi, my seven-day dino, my brother's dino, and I still had plenty of time to do my schoolwork and comfort my brother, who was two and a half years two young for the age warning on all 3 digital pets, who had nightmares every time his extra creepy dino died. I suffered migraines even as a child, and the endless beeping of Kusatchi and the dinos was annoying. I gave up on the dinos, but found a pause function on my Tamagotchi, which let me cheat the programming and keep Kusatchi alive for an unreasonable 396 days. I would wake her, feed her, pause her, put her to bed, and all was right with the world. She would nag at me, beep obscenities and demand extra food, but only for as long as I let her. And after a few months of cheating, she actually seemed to like me, and would sometimes play a game with me. But 396 days is well past the reasonable age for a Tamagotchi. Like it's younger sibling Digimon, one day is a whole year for a Tamagotchi, so my Kusatchi could have been named Methuselah by the time she passed away. For as much nagging and grief as she caused me, I was heartbroken when she died. I actually mourned as though this was a flesh and blood pet. I watched her soul go into an 8-bit spaceship, and fly away to the stars above, just as the battery finally died with her. I had a toy coffin leftover from a kids meal Dracula set. I placed my egg inside the red box, set up all of my dolls, and held a small funeral for Kusatchi, whom I nicknamed "Picasso" due to her abstract image. I played "Amazing Grace" on my Barbie faux-CD player (which played birthday card music from a chip) and then buried Kusatchi in a sweater in my chifferobe. I later lost the egg in a flood, granting her a burial at sea. A month later, still raw, I saw a TV ad for a new Tamagotchi. "Tamagotchi Angel" where you could raise the dead Tamagotchi on a white egg, until it was time for it to be reborn. It would go through a "death" in Heaven, only to be reborn as a new Tamagotchi on your older egg. For the low price of $20 per egg, you could digitize the circle of life, and keep raising a pet several lifetimes into the future! I declined to ask Santa for the egg housing the soul of Kusatchi. Instead, I enjoyed playing with my soft, battery-free plush dogs. They never asked me to clean digital poop off of anything. With Tamagotchi being back in style, many have asked me if I would like to go back to owning an LCD egg. But I smile and decline. Kusatchi left me with enough plastic egg on my face to last a lifetime. Instead, I'll just wait until I can find a real pet, one made of flesh and blood that doesn't beep at me if I forget to clean up after it. I just wonder who else had Kusatchi? Koriander Bullard is an author, cartoonist and human rights advocate. Keep up with her on Facebook!
Movie fans and comic readers alike are still gnashing their teeth at the dramatic mess that is Batman vs. Superman. While the film has earned an unreasonable eight hundred, thirty million dollars at the box office, the film leaves ticket buyers asking the same question.
Why did they kill Superman… AGAIN?? Now granted, I know I'm in the minority here, but I have never liked the “Death of Superman” books from 1992. Or any other year for that matter. The killing and re-killing of Superman highlights a serious flaw with DC Comics that needs to not only be addressed, it needs to be solved. And re-writing the universe again is not going to fix it. Starting in the 1970's, DC began letting their characters dip into darker territories. Part if it was in response and retaliation towards Marvel, which had already gained ground with comics that openly talked about drug use, violence and death, but another part of it was a desperate, but successful attempt to gain new readers, who wanted less to do with the “kid's stuff” of superheroes and more to do with edgier, more taboo story-lines. By the 1980's, DC had allowed Frank Miller, better known at the time for his writing for Marvel's Daredevil, a four issue shot at re-envisioning Batman as a more darker, brooding soul, while their usual staff was hard at work writing out the sad story of Starfire, kidnapped princess and child sex slave turned leader of the Teen Titans and tortured girlfriend of Nightwing. But while these off-putting topics were a break away from the usual “good vs. evil” DC had been known for, they were stories all written within a clear, linear context. There was a reason why these stories were being told, and it wasn't just to deliver some after-school special PSA. They served their purpose. We learn about Starfire being sold into slavery so we can understand why she has a troubled relationship with her older sister, Blackfire, who is responsible for her sale. We learn about Raven's father being the demon Trigon so we can better understand why she is a polarizing character. These are all stories that flesh out the superheroes and the cast surrounding them, making their brawls make more sense. If not everyone can have a clean cut story, such as Batman foiling the Catwoman because she's trying to rob the museum, then we can have a dark story with twists and turns, but again, with respect to context. And then in 1992, the shelves of my local comic book store began to look very bleak. It started with the Doomsday arc, concluding the following year with the Funeral for a Friend story. During that tumultuous time, we saw a monster named Doomsday beat the pulp out of Superman with little story behind it. With a paper-thin plot and little explanation, the pages began to fill with the gory images of Superman being beaten to death, followed in later issues with his body being entombed, stolen, preserved by Lex Luthor, discovered again by Supergirl and Lois Lane, and then buried again. The “shock jock” move led to a dip in the sales of DC titles, since nobody wants to read about depressed, grieving characters. So they un-killed Superman and gave him a mullet just a few months after the final funeral for the fallen hero. This cop-out may have set the universe back in time to score a new TV deal for the Man of Steel, but the damage was done. And not learning from the lesson of the Death of Superman fiasco, DC has kept up with the mistakes they made in 1992. Consistently. For 24 years. Since the first death for the Man of Steel, Superman has died several times, in more than one universe. More than twice in TV and DVD cartoons, a few times in video games, and now in live action film. And when DC is not satisfied with killing Superman, they're killing his adoptive parents, re-killing his birth parents and the planet he came from, killing Supergirl and all of her bubbly, blonde replacement clones, and you know what? They've even killed Lois Lane a few times. In fact, while she's the only Superman-themed character asking for it, they weren't happy just killing her off alone, either. In the video game Injustice, they let The Joker kill a pregnant Lois, because what fun is killing Superman's loved ones without throwing a fetus into the mix, right? They've killed Batman, Terra, Speedy's nine year old daughter, and a long litany of superheroes and civilians, only to bring them back later. And when they start running out of people to kill for little to no reason, they re-write the universe, just to do it all over again. By consistently hiring in writers with clear and obvious “Daddy didn't hug me” issues and making their comic world more gritty and dark, they've tried to retain those edgy, Goth and Emo kids that used to dominate comic shops in the 90's and early 2000's, and the brooding, whiny “If it's not miserable it's fake, if it's miserable it's real” Hipsters of the current millennium, who quite frankly, don't read DC comic books to begin with. But by caving in with the constant, depressing, cop-out writing, DC has done plenty to alienate the fans that actually were buying their merchandise. And while initial sales aren't bad for the current live action film, there is no chance the company can hope to real where Marvel is in the terms of cinema. And while I don't need for DC to return to a campy, kid-friendly “Super Friends” state like they were in the early 1970's, I don't need to be bored to death with another over-blown drama. Marvel has drama, yes, but within the context of a story that usually ends with a twinge of hope, leading to a more positive sequel story or bright ending. DC's drama is ~ even for a superhero story ~ unrealistic. As a kid, I initially turned to DC comics to get away from real life drama. I loved reading comics that didn't have “50 Shades of Grey” behind every character. Everything was black and white. You were either a good guy or a bad guy, and it used to be that the good guy would win, without having to wrestle with the grim reaper in doing so. When I was having a lousy day, I would watch the Superman Fleischer cartoons, because I wanted to be whisked away to a world where everything was clear-cut. There was a Superman who could do anything and would always take down the bad guys, and there was little threat to his life. I wanted to be in a world where my heroes could hold back the terror humans could not. Someone to make it better. With the current state of the world, movie goers don't need more drama. Most of us already deal with death, depression, angst and people in our lives with unreasonable trust issues. We don't need the death of a childhood hero thrown on top of it, when we already deal with the real-life deaths of our childhood celebrities on a weekly basis. We don't need another moody man. We don't need another dead man. We need a Superman. Koriander Bullard is an author, cartoonist and human rights advocate. Keep up with her on Facebook!
Before I start, I think it's only fair we cover a few facts.
First of all, Saban's Mighty Morphin Power Rangers was directly taken from Toei's Kyōryū Sentai Zyuranger. Zyuranger ran in Japan from 1992 to 1993, while Power Rangers started in 1993 and in one form or another, has been running off and on ever since. Zyuranger had an all Japanese cast, but to create Power Rangers, Haim Saban and his team would splice in the original action segments with newly filmed non-action segments from California. These new segments replaced the Japanese Super Sentai fighters with multi-cultural American Rangers, leaving the stock footage of the Japanese villains and background victims as the only Japanese characters on the show. Halfway through the original run of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, stock footage of Machiko Soga as Witch Bandora/Rita Repulsa ran out, prompting Saban to hire in Filipino actress Carla Pérez to continue in the role of Rita up through Power Rangers in Space except for the last MMPR movie, which had Filipino-Australian actress Julia Cortez take over the role. Grifforzar/Goldar, Lamy/Scorpina, Tottopatto/Baboo and BukkuBakku/Squatt would alternate between actors of different ethnic origins once their stock footage had also run out. Needless to say, all incarnations of Power Rangers have done a fair amount of race-swapping, to the point where the average fan may not even notice or care about the actor change when the latest Super Sentai series ends up cut up and re-packaged on Nickelodeon or Netflix, the new homes for the meta-series. But despite this history of race-swapping, even the most forgiving MMPR fan was seeing red when the new version of Rita Repulsa debuted in the form of blonde-haired and blue eyed Elizabeth Banks. The first problem is the fact that we have an Aryan-Caucasian in a role usually reserved for Filipino and Japanese actresses. Now don't get me wrong, she is a cute actress with a bubbly wit, and she does very well in most of her roles, so it isn't a stretch to say she “might” gain her own branch of Power Ranger fans out of this, but replacing a Filipino-Japanese character with a Caucasian actress, even in the most forgiving of settings, is a slap in the face. The second problem bleeds into the rest of the cast. Costuming. Not only did the new Rita costume fail to match the original by any stretch of the imagination, it's a blatant rip-off of Batman villain Poison Ivy. No thought, no direction, just a shameless theft of costume. Considering this film is going to be aimed at adult fans for the original series, wouldn't this be the time to allow Rita to saunter across the stage in her original, Madonna inspired cone-bra? And yes, as a straight woman, I would have approved of the cone-bra. And yes, in this day and age. But this image foreshadowed two more issues I have with this movie. One being that also in the spirit of ripping-off, Lionsgate and their hired writers are promising to rip-off of other lifeless, boring, gritty, Emo re-envisioned films such as The Dark Knight and Ninja Turtles by re-writing the universe of Power Rangers, refusing to follow the original story and adding wasted “trust issue” and “I'm moody for no reason” segments to make a darker story, in which you're “fake” unless you're miserable, then you're “real”. These elements only seem to appeal to those with unresolved “daddy” issues, and yet they insist on keeping this up, to appeal to the Hipsters who were born after the original went off the air. You know. Those fresh 20-somethings who love everything to be as dark and hopeless as the DeviantArt pages they felt pressured into having to fit in before they hit college and sent themselves into debt in an effort to prove to themselves that they know more than the rest of us. This is in contrast to the desires of the writers, who have tried to promise a more lighthearted movie, in spite of the studio's claims. The clash between Emo and Silly is likely the reason why the film has gone through a revolving door of writers and directors, adding to my frustration with the film. The second problem I had was basic. If this is how they were mishandling Rita's costume, which was basically a dress with feathers and a cone-bra, then how would they handle the Power Rangers' costumes? Well if you saw the above photograph, then you already know the answer. Not only can't they seem to figure out how to hire a non-White actor to play Rita, they also can't seem to figure out how to make spandex costumes look good in HD. Now this isn't the first time Hollywood has failed to put together a snug leotard with an overgrown bicycle helmet. In 1995 we were treated to an alternate universe Power Rangers film, in which the actors were forced to wear 30-to-50 lbs costumes, complete with hefty armor, the likes of which had never been on the TV show before or since. Did you hear that? That was the sound of peels of laughter from the Toei Studio in Tokyo, Japan. And why? Because they've been finding ways to make Tokusatsu and Kaiju related costumes look believable since 1959, and has been using spandex for all things Sentai related since 1983's Kagaku Sentai Dynaman, and has had no problem with making Super Sentai/Power Rangers movies since 1975, again with spandex and other, less bulky costumes. The new costumes look less like Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, and more like the studio tried to shave the Power Rangers: Dino Thunder costumes the wrong way down. The Red Ranger's new costume specifically has more in common with Marvel's Iron Man than with anything Sentai related, and again, comes across as a cheap rip-off. Without seeing the full trailer yet for the repeatedly pushed-back film, it's hard to say what direction we're going in. But if the costumes and the development issues are any indication, this film is set to please only those who are too cheap to watch the original on Netflix. It certainly doesn't bode well for the 2017 movie season, when Hollywood has resorted to re-envisioning an already and repeatedly re-envisioned series. Koriander Bullard is an author, cartoonist and human rights advocate. Keep up with her on Facebook!
Forgotten amid the high-profile deaths of music legend Prince and revolutionary woman wrestler Chyna was the death of British director Guy Hamilton, who passed away on April 20 at the age of 93.The name may not be familiar to the casual film fan, but here’s a roll call of some of his most familiar titles: ‘Goldfinger’, ‘Diamonds Are Forever’, ‘Live and Let Die’, ‘The Man With the Golden Gun’, ‘The Colditz Story’, ‘Remo Williams’, ‘Battle of Britain’ and ‘The Devil’s Disciple’. All of which have been familiar staples in the well-stocked family video store or local television back in the days when movies reigned supreme on the airwaves.
Hamilton was born in Paris, to British diplomats living abroad. It was there where he would be bitten by the movie bug, becoming a clapperboard boy at the Victorine Studios in Nice. He would move to London to work in the British branch of Paramount. Then World War II broke out and Hamilton felt the urge to serve his country by joining the Royal Air Force. Once the war concluded, Hamilton resumed his film career. He would find himself taken under the wing of distinguished director Sir Carol Reed, serving as his assistant director for three of the best British films ever made: Odd Man Out (1947), The Fallen Idol (1948) and The Third Man (1949). It was at Reed’s urging that Hamilton turned to film directing, making his debut with the 1952 thriller 'The Ringer'. Hamilton began his career making two kinds of movies: suspense flicks and war dramas. In 1961, Hamilton was offered the premiere James Bond film ‘Dr. No’, but he turned it down, feeling he couldn’t pull it off. However,things had changed enough by 1964 that when an offer to direct the Bond film may feel is the best in the series, ‘Goldfinger’, he gladly accepted the project. Hamilton would crucially add a dose of sardonic humor to the Bond character that had been portrayed with dead seriousness in ‘Dr. No’ and ‘From Russia With Love’. With his reputation for delivering well-crafted action movies on time and on budget and fresh off three successful James Bond movies, it was no wonder why Hamilton was the first choice of producers Alexander and Ilya Salkind to direct the much anticipated ‘Superman’. Disaster struck during pre-production when the Salkinds, notorious for pinching every last penny whenever possible and seldom letting anyone else know about it, moved the production from Italy’s Cinecitta Studios to England’s Pinewood Studios. This was bad news for Hamilton, who was a tax exile that could only spend up to 30 days in England a year. ‘Superman’ was actually scheduled to film simultaneously with ‘Superman II’, so there was simply no way Hamilton could stay on as director. Hamilton would rebound with another high-profile project of sorts, the long anticipated sequel to the popular war epic ‘The Guns of Navarone’. That sequel, ‘Force 10 From Navarone’, was a troubled production that had taken well over 15 years to finally find financing. A complicated deal led to Columbia Pictures having European distribution while American distribution fell to the last place an expensive war actioner should have wound up: American International Pictures. While Columbia released Hamilton’s preferred 126 minute director’s cut in Europe to solid business, AIP decided to tamper with the finished film, removing scenes at random and rearranging others to create a sloppy 117 minute cut eviscerated by American critics and audiences when it finally showed up on domestic movie screens in 1979. Hamilton’s directing career quieted down after that. There was a pair of Agatha Christie mysteries: 'The Mirror Crack’d' (1980) and 'Evil Under the Sun' (1982). In 1985, Hamilton directed what was an attempt to launch a franchise from the popular “Destroyer” pulp novels, 'Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins'. It was a very good film, but it just didn’t take off at the box office the way Orion Pictures had hoped, although it wound up finding its’ audience on home video and TV airings (the latter of which is where I first caught it). He was Warner Bros. first choice to direct what would become the 1989 blockbuster ‘Batman’, back when the studio was reaping the box office bonanzas of the first three ‘Superman’ movies. They had hired screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz, who had worked with Hamilton on the first three Bond films of the 1970s. The duo conceived of a darker vision that what the studio at the time wanted, ending with both men parting ways from the project. Hamilton, increasingly tiring of the cutthroat attitudes of the film business, only made one more feature: 1989’s little-seen ‘Try This One On For Size’. After that film disappeared without a trace, Hamilton decided to retire to Majorca with his second wife Kerima. He never disavowed his earlier film career, continuing to participate in supplemental material for DVD releases of his classic titles, particularly the Bond series. The word has been mum as to what Hamilton was ailing from at the time of his death, other than he had been in and out of medical care for the past year. I imagine that at age 93, it was just his time to go. As a director, Hamilton was never considered one of the all-time greats by the cineaste crowd. The reason is quite simple: Hamilton never employed a flashy directorial style that called attention to itself. He focused on telling a good story as simply as possible and with a firm balance between acting, character development and stuntwork that felt organic instead of plastered on-screen by force. He made movies efficiently, seldom going over budget. All of which is heresy to the auterist film snob crowd. I’ll take substance over style any day of the week. Hamilton was a solid craftsman who made some good entertainments that helped one forget one’s troubles while watching. That’s more than good enough for me. He left the cinematic world a better place than when he entered it. His best films will continue to live on forever. That’s a good legacy for any filmmaker. |
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March 2017
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