Word: actioner
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Soldier, Warner Brothers' new film starring Kurt Russell, is a futuristic science fiction action movie. What would someone going to the movie expect to see, given this premise? Special effects and outer space settings are pretty likely. So are violence and a romantic twist somewhere in the story. And, as usual, audiences at science fiction movies are ready to set aside notions of realism and plausibility in order to enjoy the film as an entertaining spectacle rather than an intellectual experience. Soldier makes use of most of these assumptions, but in the end turns out to be a disappointing film...
Kurt Russell's newest action movie delivers a typical science fiction story line. Russell's character, Todd, is a futuristic soldier, reared in a sophisticated training program designed to produce the best fighters possible. But Todd's unit is soon replaced by genetically-engineered soldiers, who are more advanced in every way. That is, they are stronger, more persistent and have chests that suggest they grew up eating creatine three times a day. Todd, thought dead after a confrontation with the biggest and meanest of the new breed (Cain 607, played by Jason Scott Lee), is sent to a waste...
Despite its knee-slapping moments, this intense physical style can be a bit disconcerting in a play like The Misanthrope, which derives so much of its appeal from the verbal thrust-and-parry modeled after the wits of Moliere's France. Action often interrupts the rhyme and rhythm of the verse, and constant physical exertion occasionally leaves actors too flustered to deliver their lines smoothly. The play's periodic farcical episodes and silly characters can be amusing though, as long as they are timed so as not to interfere with the dialogue. For example, when director Jerry Ruiz '00 mixes...
...committee to develop free speech guidelines, expressed the committee's view that it should be within the authority of Dean of Students Archie C. Epps III, to remove a banner hung from the windows of Holworthy Hall that read, "Some group, get out." Others might argue that such an action should fall under protected free speech...
...would certainly presume that the Harvard administration wouldn't tolerate such action, but more importantly, one would hope that Harvard students are committed deeply enough to the principle of free expression on campus so as to not let their strong offense to another's views prompt them to respond in such a fashion...