From Voyageurs National Park on FB: Called “Catamaran” by locals, Bert Upton is among the strangest of historical characters on area waters. He lived in a hut built over a dug-out at Squirrel Narrows. Found frozen to death in the 1930s by Kettle Falls pioneer Oliver Knox; Upton was perched lifeless in the snow just a half-mile from his home. Shunning civilization, Upton defined the word hermit. First spotted rowing his crude log raft on Namakan, no one knows how he got there. Upton’s accent implied an English heritage but any personal inquiries brought a stony silence. Some suspected him a man fleeing the law; others saw a bizarre outcast; everyone knew he was peculiar. Just five feet tall and wildly unkempt, Catamaran wore hacked-off pants and walked barefoot with a stick. Winter demanded shoes but no socks, a cast-off Mackinaw, and a trailing cap made from the leg of old underwear. He was oddly religious, and suspicious of being poisoned. Surviving on snared rabbits and fish, he ofte...
Year One is still his finest Batman work and we got a good animated movie out of it so we should be done with him.
ReplyDeleteGood article, and I agree, except that I don't think that Burton's Batman movies were as Milleresque as this author gives them credit for. LAte 80s Tim Burton was a canny choice to direct a Batman movie, because he could toe the line by directing in that comic book pulp/camp style without losing his dark Gothic style. But Burton's trademark zaniness shows up in those films giving them a much brighter tone than Miller's comics.
ReplyDeleteI wish they mined the Neal Adams stories from the 70s instead.
ReplyDeleteThey didn't copy Miller hard enough. And now they're being asked to move on? I fucking hate nerd film critics. None of these critics seem smart enough to notice it doesn't matter what villain they cast or what "tone" they hit or what the message is--what matters whether the movie, as it appears on the screen, is good . Once they hit that even once, then they can demand they, in addition to that, hit some abstract thematic goal.
ReplyDeleteThat's true. If it's a half-assed effort, it's half-assed no matter what themes the movie maker is aping.
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