[ Post a Response | EVEN DeepER Blurting! ]
Posted by DexterBG on 8/5/2008, 4:08 am
I recently came across some of those two movie DVDs being sold at Bestbuy. And one of them was "Moon Zero Two / When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth". Not a bad combo. Too bad the second feature wasn't also a MST3k feature, at one time. There were two other DVD 2-fer volumes. But I forgot their titles. One of those may have also been an old MST3k feature.
There's some advanced word that Disney might finally be releasing one of my favorites, "The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh". However they may have retitled it, as "Disney Presents...." or "Dr. Syn", or something, just to be confusing. And I doubt we'll see it until after the Election. As this feature could inspire political unrest.
It's basically the time of the Boston Tea Party and Ride of Paul Revere, told as a fictional paraphrase story, in a fictional town, in a fictional country called Ireland. The people there are as equally oppressed by the English crown, as we were in the Colonies. High taxes and Naval recruitment, threatening to drain the locals dry. A masked hero (aka The Scarecrow) helps the farm folk get by with smuggled goods. And occasionally rescuing an escaped political prisoner. It's fascinating to see how the local church Vicar transforms himself into this over the top hero, with his Solomon like wisdom, in settling disputes. It's Disney, so nobody gets killed. But you're always left believing it could happen any minute. And wondering how it didn't? It's just too bad our own colonial history couldn't have been told in a similarly exciting tale. But I suspect there were pressures not to. And those who would balk at Disney stepping on sacred ground, if it wasn't told accurately enough. So, instead, they went with this foreign fiction, of the same era. In case you're wondering, Patrick McGoohan plays the Vicar Dr. Syn (aka The Scarecrow). And that strange laugh of his (under a cloth mask) is enough to freeze anyone's soul. And so unlike the Vicar's usual calm register, that it's a far better disguise than Clark Kent's glasses. No one outside of his two closest helpers knows or suspects his identity. And as a churchman, he get to spy upon the very English military leaders that he opposes as the Scarecrow.
The only real drawback to this story was Disney's rather hokie theme song. More exhibition than anything. It's a little too sappy, after you've heard it once. And they use images from later in the story, to support it. Thus giving some of the plot away, too early. It has a kind of "Legend of Sleepy Hollow" meets "Robin Hood" style. But it's just not as scary or moody as some pirate story theme. And this Scarecrow basically is a land based pirate.
-Dex-
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