Movie Pet Peeve

(First in an undoubtedly unending series.)

And, mirabile dictu, it doesn’t even involve guns!

First, mea maxima culpa for going dark here for so long. (Nothing like tossing in gratuitous Latin phrases to make you look smarter than you are. And if anybody’s smarter than I am, it sure isn’t me!) Things got on top of me. I’ll try not to let it happen again.

Anyway, one thing that bugs me in movies is when the elevator cable breaks, and the cage falls like an anvil toward Certain Doom. Oh, if only anyone had ever thought to invent an automatic safety brake!

Someone did. Elisha Otis. In 1853.

It’s a fairly simple system, which causes the rollers to lock up if the thing goes too fast. Because it’s mechanically simple it’s highly reliable. It’s not perfect, but what is?

Of course some people, even certain good friends of mine (who, granted, probably never read this blog) will rush in and say, Well, it’s for dramatic effect! Duh! Sorry, enablers; it’s sloppy writing. You can always bother to do it right. If by nothing more than a three-second scene of the rollers catching – and then failing. Even mysteriously. Oh my! Suspense! And without imbecility!

Perhaps oddly, one flick I know that got it right was Speed. Now, I like Speed. (Okay, I know that’s a risky statement to make in our happy police state. To belabor what’s obvious to all but informers and ambitious prosecutors, I mean the movie. As far as stimulants go, caffeine is just all right with me. And then some.)

In general I like Ted, I mean Keanu, as an action star: cope. Die Hard on a Bus was one of your better takes on our definitive modern action flick: not quite as good as Die Hard on a Boat (Under Siege), nor even Die Hard on a Train (Under Siege 2: Dark Territory.) But still pretty good – better than any other Die Hard until the most recent – in spite of that Amazing Flying Bus Sequence. Which as utter goofiness goes was at least highly entertaining. And despite the fact that they enjoyed ending the movie so much they went and did it a second time, to the tune of twenty minutes’ worth.

Anyway, the elevator bit: some good guys (LAPD SWAT buddies Keanu and Jeff Daniels, if I recall correctly – and whoa, only in speaking of fantasy am I ever likely to use the phrases “good guys” and “LAPD SWAT” in the same sentence) were in an elevator. Mad Bomber Dennis Hopper blows the cables with a charge he’s foresightfully placed. The cage falls – about four feet. Then the safety brakes lock up.

And what do you know? Our Evial Villain, who’s actually read a book, rigged them too. Crack-crack! (Again: not a drug reference.) And now our elevator can, in good conscience, plummet toward destruction.

That’s more like it. A minor touch – but it adds not only that element of realism (not to mention “the writer actually gave a fuck”-ism) but adds to the character and menace of the bad guy. He’s meticulous. And he does his research. How do you beat a guy like that?

(It’s been a while since I’ve seen this, as you can probably tell. But I’m pretty sure it involved a fistfight. Heavy sigh. Ah, well: nothing’s perfect. Anyway, if Speed was, I’d be pumping it as the Definitive Modern Action flick, wouldn’t I?)

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