At The Movies -- "Armageddon"
By Eric Vinegärt
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http://www.bigfoot.com/~thevinegar
TEMPE, AZ -- I wanted to see American History X today, with the idea of writing a review for The Vinegar, however, Brandi and I have been hiking in Phoenix's South Mountain Park too long, and now we've run out of time in order to catch the beginning of the movie. A quick check of the cinema listings in the newspaper lets us know that Armageddon starts in 15 minutes at a nearby theater, so we settle on that plan, instead.
Brandi and I have been spending the day together (her only day-off since last Sunday) in the beautiful outdoors of 80-degree Arizona in what must now be winter for most other parts of the U.S. Both of us absolutely love hiking, especially the remote reaches of Arizona, and had Brandi not discovered a nice little cave accessible by only employing small lie-back and arm-bar moves (that's technical rock-climbing parlance for the extreme-sport-challenged), we would've never been delayed to miss our plans to see American History X.
Oh well. Ask me if I care! I'm approaching mid-life-crisis age, and when I'm in the company of a beautiful 23-year-old woman, I'm happy to be anywhere. If I were serving a life-time prison sentence, it'd be Seventh Heaven so long as a woman like Brandi was in my cell with me.
For any of you wondering what quality I may posses that attracts Brandi to a man roughly the age of her father, you might be better served to find the answer by directing your curiosity not towards me, but instead to Brandi and her qualities. She's not easily impressed by popular-culture bullshit. In other words, she's a thinking woman, fully capable of arriving at truthful and accurate conclusion -- unaided by back-seat coaching from all the know-nothings on media pedestals. And if she suspects a man wants her only for her body, he's dead meat. Even if he's smarter than her, she can't be fooled.
Anyway, Armageddon has been out now way too long to demand another review. The Internet Movie Database lists more than 140 already, and who the hell needs another critic? But in Armageddon there is one scene (actually a thread) that Brandi reacts to in exactly the same way I do. It's what I want to focus on today, and it's what helps illustrates an interesting point. And I'll bet real money that none of those other reviews makes mention of it.
Armageddon is about a Texas-sized asteroid on a collision course with earth. NASA recruits a roughneck drilling team (not unlike the Dirty Dozen, but who prefer crap tables, tattoo parlors and whore houses), fast-tracts them to become astronauts, then launches them via space shuttle into slingshot orbit around the moon so they can land on the doomsday asteroid. There they drill an 800-foot core, implant a nuke, detonate it, and save the world. The crew (what's left of them) returns safely to earth, where they are given a hero's welcome. Each crew member has been facing deep personal issues, and it is the challenge of Charles "Chick" Chapple (Will Patton) that caught Brandi's eye (and mine).
On the eve of their launch, roughneck Chick shows up on the doorstep of his ex-wife (Judith Hoag) who has had a restraining order against him. Playing in the front yard is Chick's small son who he sees for the first time. It's obviously a last-ditch effort to finally see his 7-year-old child, knowing full well he'll probably be killed on the asteroid mission he's about to embark upon. The mother, not wanting her son to know his father, introduces Chick as a salesman. Obviously delighted to meet his son under any circumstance, Chick only wants to see him for the first time, and perhaps the last. He tells his ex he's going on a mission tomorrow that might make her proud, and presents his son with a model copy of the space shuttle.
Because the audience already knows where this scene might go, it's a moving moment for everyone, I'm sure. Will Patton superbly conveys Chick's anguish of loneliness and the empty life of a person denied the companionship of those he loves. Contrasted to the fact that this man may well never return to realize happiness with his son and the woman he has loved, it's a powerful, pivotal message. It's obvious that Chick has been at wits end for ways to please his former wife. When he said that he's going on a mission that may make her proud, we know that he has always wanted her and that he has been living a hell in isolation and loneliness. Patton has no trouble conveying this message to all but the brain-dead in the audience. And for anyone wondering why men commit suicide at four times the rate that women do, the movie should illustrate the gut-wrenching frustration leading to it -- but probably doesn't.
Brandi's comment while watching this scene is one word, "Disgusting!!!" "Disgusting" that any woman would hold so much contempt for a man to not let him ever meet his very own son. Disgusting because his ex once held Chick in high enough regard to marry him, but then discarded him because he had not lived up to HER expectations. In other words, a low-life roughnecker isn't exactly the man portrayed by popular culture that even the lowest form of woman should aspire to for her Mr. Right, and instead is an expendable animal easily replaced.
"Yeah right." "So why is she still single?", wonders Brandi.
Brandi lost her father to an automobile accident when she was about the age as Chick's son, and who knows better than her what it's like to live in a world where everyone has had a father but her? It's one thing for God or fate to take your daddy away, but quite another for your mother to do it for you. Obviously, Brandi sees not Chick as an evil monster here, but his ex-wife as a despicable, belly-low-to-the-ground critter wrought with enough anger sufficient to deny a fatherless life for her own flesh and blood.
"I wonder how many people see this scene for what it really is?", Brandi wants to know.
When I comment that the screen writer probably inserted this scene as satire against modern-day relationships, Brandi is not so sure and wonders how many others see this scene as we do. Given the trash and fluff that's been coming out of Hollywood, Armageddon's screen writer may be just as clueless.
Scenes like this one have been all-too-common during the last 30 years. And it's not just portraying all but heroic men as outcasts, but all except the most beautiful women, too, as losers. Hollywood has made a lot of money using women with narrowly defined qualities to portray that which should be desired by all men. Unfortunately, the qualities more often than not center on physical attributes -- hair color, breast size, height, and facial features -- and the harshest form of satire is unleashed against virtue and asset as exemplified by the likes of a Margaret Thatcher, for example. In other words, unless you're a Cindy Crawford, a Claudia Schiffer or a Liv Tyler, you're trailer-park trash and should go away.
On launch day for the outerspace-ward roughnecks, every media organization in the world dominates the news outlets, and when Chick's ex-wife and his son surprisingly see him on television decked out in an astronaut uniform in front of the space shuttle, Chick is no longer a salesman. Oh no. The boy's mother now says, "That's your father". It's a happy moment not for the father, but obviously for the boy who for the first time learns that his dad is -- what else in any American kid's life -- AN ASTRONAUT, for chrissakes.
Again, Brandi and I see this scene for what it really displays: greed, selfishness, vice, betrayal and the worst form of child cruelty -- denial for a boy who wants his father.
At the end of Armageddon, the crew returns home to a hero's welcome, and Chick finds on the tarmac his son and an ex-wife glee-stuck that her ex-husband finally realized pay dirt. This scene really gripes Brandi who says Chick is the exact same person he's always been. And only now that he's rich and famous does his ex-wife once again accept him. Chick isn't any better looking, any smarter, and his ex has no proof he won't need daily doses of Viagra, but he's rich and famous now, so that's all that matters. And boy, does she want him back. We're left thinking she'll need knee pads for a long time to come.
Fuel-my-hedonism-or-you're-a-sack-of-shit message is what popular culture bombards the young, impressionable minds with daily. People are trash, zeros, scum and no good -- unless, of course, they have blonde hair, big boobs or are rich and famous. All other men and women need not apply.
The plot-thread is a good ink-blot test, and an excellent tool for anyone to see the source of their own reaction as either by-product of bullshit or wholesome, mature outlook.
Brandi's healthy perception of life is why she accepts me as a person. And she would've accepted you, too, for richer or poorer, had it been you who drew the card on the day I met her. So long as there's one person left in the world to accept us as we are, we'll always be blessed with at least a friend -- a friend hopefully who is generous, forgiving, patient, realistic and accepting.
One last footnote about Armageddon. Both of us absolutely love the soundtrack. Aerosmith's I Don't Wanna Miss A Thing puts Brandi's head on my shoulder, and provides one of those moments, which I will always recall whenever I hear the music, the same as many of us remember what we were doing on that moon-lit night when Neil Armstrong first set foot on the moon. Brandi is impressed with Liv Taylor's presence, and points out for me that she is the daughter of Aerosmith's Steven Tyler.
After the movie, which we really enjoyed with reservation for some of the unrealistic plot and special effects, neither of us is in any mood to end the day. A little hungry, too, we wander over to The Outback in Tempe for a little vitals and libation.
There are scores of affluent people here -- even on park benches outside -- waiting to be waited on and fed. Most hail from the surrounding neighborhood, which has homes complete with kitchens that alone cost more than the average price of a single-family dwelling in Arizona. People pretty much around here no longer use their kitchens, preferring the likes of The Outback, complete with cooks, waiters and busboys -- all of whom are held in about as high regard as Chick enjoyed from his ex-wife. It's unlikely any family here tonight is supported on roughneck salary, and from the looks of the size of some of these families, complete with kids in tow, in toys and in diapers, Brandi thinks some will be coughing up $200 and $300 just for Sunday dinner.
Brandi and I are willing to eat at the bar, so we get to dispense with that waiting-to-eat bullshit. I'm always amazed how people haven't time to mow their own lawn, but always plenty to wait in line for food -- and every day for many.
Brandi helps me notice the spoiled students in here, obviously on generous allowance to afford $4.50 for a mug of imported beer, equivalent to an hour of after-tax minimum wage for those who have to work and go to school. Brandi was disgusted by the sight of a blooming onion, which the gal down the bar a ways consumed all by herself (about 2,000 calories, folks). And I cringe now when I see the same gal carving away and wolfing down what appears to be a Porterhouse cut. Her boyfriend seems to be competing with the steak for her attention, but she's not yielding, not even between bytes. Her obvious eating disorder may explain the thunder thighs and ugly cellulite at the ripe old age of about nineteen.
The salmon we order arrives quickly, and it's a good thing because we're tired of watching a bunch of gluttons on suicide missions. It's not like we're not culpable for our own vice. After all, we are drinking beer ($4.50/mug).
If I (or we) ever make it to see American History X, you can be sure
you'll know about it here.
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Copyright (c) 1998, "The Vinegar"
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