Criterion Year Week 9: Armageddon

The Criterion Collection, the last vestige of truly collectible DVD and Blu-Ray movies in existence. These are well produced, fancy pants editions of important and interesting films for the discerning film lover.

We continue our journey through Jim's collection of movies with...

Week 9:

Armageddon

Spine Number: 40

Director: Michael Bay

Genre: Disaster

Michael Bay is some kind of wizard. This is a man who makes visually stunning movies that make tons of money in spite of the fact that neither critics nor audiences really seem to like them. They are consistently poorly reviewed, and become a punchline about a year after they are released. But for some reason people cannot wait to line up and hand this guy money. He is by no means a bad filmmaker, and according to some sources like Jeanine Basinger (who some consider one of the most important film scholars working today, who is also a film professor who has taught people like Akiva Goldsman and Joss Whedon, and turned Wesleyan University into one of the top ten film schools in the world) he is a "cutting edge artist who is a master of light, movement, and shape." This guy, in his first YEAR as a professional director, created the first "Got Milk" ad and won the two most prestigious awards at the advertising portion of the Cannes Film Festival.

In short... this guy knows what he's doing, and even his most critically panned movies make absolute truckloads of money (he makes around $65 million a year, and is worth over half a billion dollars).

And it all began with a movie about an asteroid.

Granted, this was not his first movie, but this was the game changer. This elevated him into the rarefied air that he breathes to this day. This guy could get anything green lit. A movie about bodybuilders kidnapping someone to try and steal his life... done! A love triangle with Pearl Harbor as a backdrop... done! An unfinished script about robot dinosaurs being ridden by robots that turn into cars... you know it's done!

So, join us as we take in what is, at this point in the list at least, the most baffling Criterion release to date, "Armageddon."

Revel in space dementia, asteroid grand canyons, and just a boatload of other bat shit insanity.

Next week:

Spine Number 57: Charade

Also, check this out.

http://fantasymovieleague.com/
Looks like Summer Movie League has officially become Fantasy Movie League.
It looks quite fun. Here's how it works.
You have an 8 screen theater.
Every week you pick movies and have a budget/salary cap you have to stay under.
Then you compete against other theaters in your league.
It's fantasy football for movie people.

Our league is Film Thugs 2015 and the password is Porterhouse.

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Thanks for listening, and until next week...

Jim out.