Little Moment, Big Meaning: The Tragedy of Davy from The Alamo (2004)

There are some historical topics that keep coming up in films. The Normandy Invasion, the crime waves of the 1920s and 30s, and the Battle of the Alamo. It's actually kind of amazing how this one historical event has been adapted and talked about more than others. There are so many that there's even a book that talks about it.

By the way, yes, I do have a copy of this book.

In 2004, we got the Ron Howard produced The Alamo (dir. John Lee Hancock) which to date is probably the most accurate version to date. 

This obviously didn't sit well with some since this movie was a bomb at the box office and the critics didn't show favor towards it. 

My guess for that is a lot of people wanted it to be like John Wayne's version where there's a ton of men in raccoon skin caps and Crockett goes down in, I guess you could say, a literal blaze of glory. 

I would give a spoiler warning but, for one thing, this movie is nearly 60 years old and its based on an event that I think most people know about already.

Same thing with the '04 film. That's the closest to a spoiler warning you're going to get.  

With the '04 film, we see our heroes acting uncertain about themselves and not always in the best light. The main highlight of this is with Billy Bob Thornton's portrayal of Crockett. 

In the film, we see Thornton's version of David Crockett (he prefers that according to his friend and fellow volunteer Micajah Autry) able to put on his "King of the Wild Frontier" persona for the masses. But there's something eating away at him. 

This scene basically summarizes the tragedy of David Crockett. He was a simple man from Tennessee who wanted a fresh start on things but could never escape it. At least in this film. 

Sure, he's still a people-person and enjoys a good chat. But you get a sense that he's tired putting on that dime store version of himself.

The first time we see him in the movie is during a big party where there's also a show based around the legendary tales of Crockett starring an actor named James Hackett - played by the late Lynn Mathis in what would be his last feature film. 

As the actor takes the stage he acknowledges Crockett's presence by saying "Good evening, Mr. Crockett." Crockett in return, playfully says, "Good evening, Mr. Crockett." A foreshadow to how the actual Crockett won't escape his folk hero status. 

Even when he arrives in San Antonio he almost instantly gets put on the stage to chat and tell stories. He's asked for autographs and asked to recite lines from the aforementioned show that he had no involvement with. 

Throughout the film, many shots almost give scenes at the Alamoa an almost stage-like vibe. This could possibly symbolize how the fort basically became the center stage for the Texas Revolution and a major symbol for the state. 

Probably the biggest indication of this is during the final stand in the chapel when it's just Crockett and four other defenders. 

At this point, Crockett and others have been trapped in the fort for 13 days and are exhausted and scared. Crockett, in particular, has a very uncertain look on his face but he looks down and sees the son of fellow defender Gregorio Esparza looking up at him. He looks at him almost like he wants Crockett to save them. So, he puts on his hero face one more time in this final moment. 

But that was not his final moment. Later we see Crockett as the only surviving garrison member and even the last moments of his life just before his execution he's put on a stage. In those final moments, he caves in and becomes gives in to what people expect. He knows that he can't escape and that he never could escape.

Personally, I've grown to really appreciate this film and it truly is a shame that this movie did so poorly. It's stuff like this that made me like it more. I highly recommend this film, especially if you're a history buff - this may be the closest we get to a completely historically accurate Alamo film. 

Feel free to share your thoughts and the article as well.

Follow me on Twitter @DocJohn90. 

Little Moment, Big Meaning: The Chef Special from Moonlight

One of my favorite channels on Youtube is Binging with Babish. It's creator, Andrew Rea, re-creates and sometimes improves upon dishes seen in movies and tv shows. I was hooked on this series instantly. He has cooked up dishes seen in Creed (2015), Big Night (1996), Elf (2003) and even tackled stuff from Game of Thrones. This is series where any chance I get I'll tell you about it.

One such instant happened a few months ago when I was chatting with a friend of mine. I mentioned to her that there was an episode on how to make the Chef Special in Moonlight (2016). She then told me that scene actually made her cry. At first, I thought that it was a bit weird because while it was a well-made scene I didn't think it was that emotional. But the more I thought about it the more I realized that it was a truly impactful scene.

How so? Think about it. The character of Chiron seemed to get the short end of the stick at every point in his life. His biological father is out of the picture entirely, his mother grows more distant from him as her drug addiction becomes worse, he's bullied at school, betrayed by his only friend, and his loving surrogate father turned out to be supplying his mom the drugs.

During his adult years, Chiron (Trevante Rhodes in this segment) lives in Atlanta and basically became like Juan, his surrogate father (Mahershala Ali). He gets a call from both his mother (Naomi Harris) and his estranged friend, Kevin (Andre Holland) who he hasn't spoken to since high school. He goes down makes somewhat amends with his mother and sees Kevin at a restaurant he works at. Kevin then whips up the Chef Special for him.

The dish itself is grilled chicken, beans and rice. Nothing really that special, right? But think about it, this meal that was made for Chiron. There's no catches or tricks. Nothing bad came about because of this meal. It was a nice meal made by a friend because it was a nice thing to do. This was is a rare thing for Chiron.

It brings to mind this Aesop quote, "no act of kindness, no matter how small, is wasted."

Kevin probably knows a little bit of Chiron's troubled life - mainly the stuff from high school - but he probably has no idea what his psyche is like. It has damaged him to the point to where he's blocked off any and all emotions outside of a tough guy persona.

This meal may lead to Chiron opening up more to Kevin, to others and will probably lead to a healing journey for him.

If you haven't watched Moonlight please check it out and watch a great film that features this magnificent scene.

Also, check out Binging with Babish: https://www.bingingwithbabish.com/

Little Moment, Big Meaning: The people in Wonder Woman's picture.

Like many of you, I greatly enjoyed Wonder Woman. One reason is because I was happy to see a good movie in the DC cinematic universe. It was a well-written, action packed story with a great leading lady. It also showed you could handle heavy topics while maintaining a sense of fun.

Much like other great movies, I started to think more about it and found a lot more to praise. One, in particular, was the picture Diana (Gal Gadot) received at the beginning from Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck) which was referenced in Batman v Superman. Obviously, the photo shows that Diana has a long history and that at one point these four men were a part of it. But the more I thought about it and heard others opinion the more I thought about these guys and what they meant for Diana. Not just them being her friends but also how they may have affected when she entered the non-mortal world.

To start, each character is unique and has a different background. Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) is that prototypical good looking American, Sameer (Saïd Taghmaoui) is a rather eccentric French-Moroccan, Charlie (Ewen Bremmer) is a brash Scotsman trying to hide his demons, and Chief (Eugene Brave Rock) is a kind of cynical Blackfoot Native American. Each of these guys show Diana that the Earth is made of different people with different backgrounds. S

When the movie premiered there were a lot of comparisons made to Captain America: The First Avenger (2011). Both feature heroes from different time periods and "different worlds" who fought in a World War with a rag tag group of soldiers. While Steve Rogers's group - The Howling Commandos - is certainly more diverse and shows that America is made of diversity, Wonder Woman actually went deeper with the characters and what they meant. I'm not trashing the first Captain America movie, I still love it. Matter of fact, I'm still waiting for a Howling Commandos tv show. But each member of Diana's group was explored more, thus growing a stronger connection amongst the team.

This show would be awesome and you know it!

Let's talk about each member individually and my interpretation. First up, the Chief.

The Blackfoot smuggler was the last member to join the group and gave Diana a rather harsh lesson about the world. That being, not everyone is treated fairly. It's well established in the movie that Chief basically acts and travels on his own. He'll sell guns to almost anyone. 

This confuses Diana given that Themyscira seems to be all about remaining loyal to your homeland and the warriors who fight for it. But Chief makes it obvious that his native country hasn't treated him or his people justly. 

Because of this, he has left his home country and go off on his own. That's not to say he doesn't have friends or associates, given how he greets Trevor in the movie, but he can't commit to ideals that he can't fathom given what's happened to him and his people. This shows Diana that injustice comes in multiple forms and what it can do to a person/group. 

Charlie is the most tragic. As stated above he's brash Scottish sharpshooter who hides his PTSD under his drunken, and somewhat selfish, demeanor. But we later see he does still have a humane side to him when he plays the piano and sings. 

This shows Diana that people handle fears and trauma in their own ways. But even if a man displays buffoonery and roughish behavior he could still have that sensitivity to them. Diana even wishes for him to show more of that side.

"Charlie, who will sing for us?" 

The dandy dressing, master of disguise Sameer is probably the most confident of them. When he first meets Diana he hits on her - can't blame him - and talks about showing her the world and such. There's never a sense that he's degrading Diana or anything but he's just a romantic. As the film continues the two of them do form a strong bond and in a way, as he grows to respect to Diana's spirit and she starts to admire his spirit and love of the finer things.

Sameer could have had an impact on Diana love of art and human culture. As we see in the opening and closing of the movie, she's working at the Louvre in Paris and we see she works in art restoration in the Justice League trailer. Given Sameer's fancy stylings, dreams of acting, and use of language, it could be seen as an influence on Diana's interests. 

And last but not least, Steve Trevor. 

I'm sure we can all agree that Trevor is one of the most important characters in the film. He's not only the first non-Amazonian she meets, but the first male she's ever met. He's also the person that gets the plot in motion with talking about the possible destruction brought upon to innocent lives. His determination makes her want to go and bring down what she believes is Ares. 

It's through journeys she sees many of her own traits in Trevor, mainly in stopping an evil foe. A big difference is Trevor is a weary man. A man who has seen the horrors of war, but continues to fight regardless. 

There's one scene between these two in particular that handles a difficult subject. While in the trenches, Diana wants to rush out and save a village in peril but Trevor says they should stay on task. When asked why he gives a very blunt response,"we can't save everyone in this war." You can sense he hates saying it and she doesn't want to believe it, but as a later scene shows, Diana faces that reality. This complex topic is handled way better than the "maybe" stuff in Man of Steel. 

But later in the movie, after seeing Diana determination to fight and carry on, he says to her words that could be seen as the movie's message. 

"I can save today. You can save the world."

The final note I'll end is another reason why the photo itself was so special. I didn't think about it till after I watched a review from Doug and Rob Walker of Channel Awesome (heads up this review is an hour long). Her four friends in that photo have all since passed away. These were among the first friends she made in this new chapter of her life, ones that made a huge impact and added to this already courageous character. 

I can't wait to see what Wonder Woman does in future installments. I'm sure no matter what her spirit will continue to shine. 

Little Moment, Big Meaning: 1 - Arthur Christmas

This is a new series of articles I'm doing where I pick a relatively small moment from a movie that I think has a great meaning in the movie, at least to me. The moment in question could be a little thing the actor did, a lighting decision, something in the background, anything. This could be a moment that speaks volumes about a character, the story, the themes, anything like that. With that said, since it's still the Christmas season, and this was the film with the moment that inspired this article series, Arthur Christmas (2011, dir. Sarah Smith).

As some of you know I've already done a review of this film, which you can read here, and I'm sure some of you are wanting me to cover a different Christmas film, but I noticed something about the film when I made this picture the cover photo for my personal Facebook page,

This scene takes place in the office of the eponymous Arthur (James McAvoy). Which is much more cramped and modest when compared to the main control room and sled that are occupied by Arthur's older brother Steve (Hugh Laurie) and his dad Santa (Jim Broadbent).

These large and high tech bases are obviously more modern and are of grander scale. But one difference I noticed about Arthur's office and the other offices is that pretty much everyone is working through their computers, while Arthur isn't. Obviously Arthur has a computer on his desk and given that his job is writing return letters to children who wrote to Santa you'd think he'd use it to make his job I tiny bit easier, but instead he decides to hand write each letter.

To me this can represent the characters of Arthur and Steve very well. While Steve does the deliveries in a quick and time efficient way it's all rather impersonal. While Arthur is taking his time and hand writing each letter to the child, knowing that it would mean the world to hear back from them, and making it a hand written letter can mean so much more than just printing out a form and just filling in the blanks. Which is something that Steve pretty much does later one when he decides to deliver the missed child their gift, though it turns out to be the wrong child. 

He doesn't even notice it's the wrong child until after he's done reading his dull and impersonal statement letter. 

In the end, even though Arthur is clumsy and makes mistakes, we see how he is clear fit for the position of Santa because he wants to take the time and make it special to each child. While Steve, who is technically more competent and organized, is just a guy who does stuff by the books and thinks about the numbers and not who those numbers are. 

It's stuff like this that really do add a lot to a film.

What do you guys think of this series? Want to see more of this? 

If so let me know in the comments and feel free to mention movies that have great little moments like this. 

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And follow me on Twitter: @DocJohn90. 

Thanks for reading.