The M-Files Issue 2: The Fast and The Furious and the rest of my Top 5 Movies

The M-Files is a weekly divergence from talking about the Mets.  Even The Mets Police have a life outside of The Mets.  These are the sort of things we talk about.

Man I love The Fast and The Furious.

That sentence usually makes people mad.

It’s seriously in my Top 5 Movies.

What are my Top 5 movies you ask?

1.  Raiders of the Lost Ark

2.  Star Trek II: the Wrath Of Khan (I can do that entire movie off the top of my head)

3.  The Empire Strikes Back

4.  The Fast and The Furious

5.  The Dark Knight (Joker one)

People get really really angry that TF&F is on that list.  Really really angry.

 

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63tg_R4qi2k]

I rented it one night at Blockbuster Video (remember that?) when there were no good new releases and fell in love with it.  It just looks great.  It sounds great.  It has Vin Diesel at his best and his newest.

@mediagoon and I got obsessed with the movie for a while.  A while is three years.

I would greet him with “Dude I almost had you!” and he’d spit back “You almost had me?  You never had your car.”

Then we would get in our cars and sit next to each other at a light and stare at each other during the red.

Once the light turned green we peeled out to our maximum 40mph.  There are laws you know.  We are not rogues.

Fast and The Furious 2 probably has a proper name but it was only OK.  No Vin Diesel.  Come on Vin, what else were you doing?

Tokyo Drift shouldn’t even count.  It’s the Mr. Met 1.5 of F&F movies.

But then something amazing happened….they got their act together and made Fast & Furious.  Sure the title was kinda lame and unimaginative and confusing, but Vin Diesel was back.  It’s lots of fun.

But then…only one thing…could make a F&F movie even better….The Rock!

They added The Rock to a F&F movie!!!  Amazing!

I’m looking forward to Fast Six (the Rock is back) but I really want to write the screenplay for the shark-jumping seventh episode….

 

EVEN MORE FAST, EVEN MORE FURIOUS

EMFEMF co-stars Justin Long playing his typical Justin Long “how did I accidentally wind up here” role (see Die Hard 4).  I’m going to have him accidentally wind up in a car with Vin Diesel for the entire movie – kinda like Sally Field in Smokey and The Bandit.

You have seen Smokey and The Bandit, right?  Look – drop everything and get a proper copy of Smokey and The Bandit.  Not the TV version.  You need to hear Jackie Gleason drop curses left and right.  Tremendous.  Plus Burt Reynolds at the height of his powers.

EMFEMF will go something like this..picture Vin as the cool guy and Justin Long as Sally. Watch Jackie curse at the 1:13 mark and tell me that’s not awesome.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-pHuT2666s]

You know what? The more I think about it, the only thing that could make EMFEMF even more awesome than having Vin, The Rock and Justin Long in it is to actually include Bruce Willis. Bruce you’re in.

….

Other movies we should talk about.

The Caine Mutiny.  Man what a great flick.  If you’ve never seen this one it’s probably on AMC/FMC/TCM right now.  Bogart as his best (yes go ahead and argue that one.)

Basically a split movie, the first part is the drama of a captain over his head and the decisions leading to the second in command to take over (yeah that was a spoiler – the title of the film is The Caine Mutiny, and you had 60 years to see it.)  The second half is a wonderful trial that will make you question what you saw in the first half.  An all-time fave.

How about Patton?  That’s a relative new-fave of mine, but I watch it once a year now, and it’s waiting on my DVR for the upcoming Christmas break at MI6.

Speaking of MI6, what about On Her Majesty’s Secret Service?  Yep, I like the Bond movie with George Lazenby.  No, he’s not Connery (who is?) but he does a good job (his film aged better than any of the Brosnans sure did).  Telly Savalas!  And that last scene after Bond’s wedding….yeah Bond gets married.  Again you had 40+ years to see this one.

The movie I would love them to remake is Capricorn One. Another one from the 70’s.  In this one NASA is sending a manned mission to Mars.  Except they don’t think the technology will work so they force the astronauts to fake the mission on TV.  One of the astronauts sends a hidden message to his wife – picture me saying “man I miss the Mets and their cool black uniforms” – you’d immediately be suspicious.  Conspiracy ensues.  Plus it stars O.J. Simpson.  Great flick.

….

Last week’s discussion of Star Trek: The Motion Picture actually struck a chord with some folks.  Some questions which go unanswered…

Decker tells Kirk nobody is fully trained at the science station on the new Enterprise.  (Seems surprising, no?).  Kirk says Decker is.

Then Spock shows up and everybody is ready to hand Science over to Spock.  I thought only Decker was trained?

Decker doesn’t listen.  After Kirk b-slaps him down to Commander he says “report to the bridge, Commander, immediately.”  Two seconds later the alarm goes off and Kirk runs down the hall to the transporter room.

There we see Rand, who is now a transporter chief.  Rather than let the transporter chief try to save the people beaming up, Kirk pushes her aside to run it himself.  Douche.

Sonak dies, Kirk condescends with “it wasn’t your fault” and leaves.

In a great scene Kirk is lost and can’t find turboshaft 8.  He gets directions and runs smack into Decker.

Why is Decker still hanging around?  What happened to reporting to the bridge?  Did he just blow Kirk off?  Why didn’t Kirk yell at him.

Kirk’s totally off his game.  I love it.

We have to talk about the new Trek movie again…

I lost my mind when they announced the villain is John Harrison.  Who?  What?  John Harrison sounds like a name a blogger would make up.

I spent most of Monday emailing @mediagoon with crazy theories.  I was totally convinced the bad guy is Gary Mitchell but now I have no idea.

And now…
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkMPZ7WeDck]

All week I have been sucking up to the fine folks at M&M’s. Wouldn’t they make an awesome sponsor of the M-Files column?


Cy Young Award winning pitcher R.A. Dickey makes his own M&M’s mix using the personalized printer before unveiling the new Holiday Village at M&M’S World in New York, Tuesday, Dec. 11, 2012. The new M&M’S World Holiday Village offers a variety of seasonal-themed merchandise including dispensers, clothing, ornaments and holiday-themed M&M’S Brand Chocolate Candies. (Diane Bondareff/Invision for M&M’s World)