Greetings loyal airmen.  Well once again Hollywood seems to be mining the comic book world for movies.  I'm sure all of you who enjoy films noticed that after Marvel's superhero, GHOST RIDER, reigned number 1 at the box office for two consecutive weeks, it was then replaced by another comic book movie.   300, which had the biggest March opening ever in film history, is a stupendous, graphic, wonderful adaptation of Frank Miller's graphic novel of the same title.  It tells of the amazing battle between a mere 300 Spartans, led by their king, Leonidas, against an army of thousands of Persian invaders.  True to the events, it relates how the Greeks were not convinced of the threat and would not listen to Leonidas call to arms.  Realizing that he cannot hope to defeat such a superior force, Leonidas then chooses 300 of his bravest warriors and sets out to fight a delaying action in hopes their ultimate sacrafice will allow the rest of the nation to awaken to the danger that faces them and rally a true defensives force.

Which is exactly how history records the events played out.   Leonidas and his brave 300 find a narrow gap through the mountains, which will empede the enemy's progress and offer his small force the ideal fighting ground to sustain a delaying action.  Thus for three days, while the rest of Greece was oblivious to the threat on their border, these few men held off an entire invading force.   The movie is magnificent in capturing the savagery and brutality of warfare but at the same time strikes a very powerful chord with its theme of bravery and patriotism.
Leonidas' love of Greece and the personal freedoms it expoused rings true to any American today.  Freedom, as the film poetic details, is never free.  It is always paid for in the blood of the brave.  Don't miss 300, it is by far the best movie of the year, and Gerard Butler as Leonidas is just amazing.  This is a film I plan on seeing again and again.

Now of course Hollywood doesn't always hit a bulls-eye every time it takes on a comic book property.   DAREDEVIL is a clear indication of such a misfire.   On the other hand, the folks in Tinsel Town every now then will surprise your old air crew chief, as is the case with a little known, and little viewed, gem based on a highly popular British comic strip.

Modesty Blaise is a female spy created by British writer Peter O'Donnell back in the mid-60s during the heyday of the James Bond craze etc.   Although she really isn't anything at all like Bond.   Modesty, and her sidekick muscle-guy, Willie Garvin, are ex-smugglers who, on occassion, work for the British Secret Service when their unique criminal backgrounds offer them an edge over the more conservative agents.  The strip has been a fan with comic readers since its debut and has been brought to screen once before with disastrous results.  In the 1970s a major studio obtained the license to the property and then set about completely changing the character for the movies.  MODESTY BLAISE starred Italian actress Monica Vitti as Modesty and Terence Stamp at Willie Garvin.  It was played for campy laughs and all the Blaise fans I know won't ever speak of it.   A decade later one of the big TV networks did a one hour pilot as a series proposal, making both Modesty & Willie American in the process.  I'm told it wasn't a bad show, just not the character.

So jump ahead a few more decades and we discover that the rights to a big-budget Modesty Blaise movie are now in the hands of Harvey Weinstein and Miramax pictures.  But nobody in their stables can produce any kind of a decent script for them to produce a feature from.  Weinstein wisely passes all such attempts by his young protege director, Quentin Tarantino, an avowed Blaise fanatic.  And he keeps giving these multiple scripts thumb down.  Lo and behold, 2002 rolls around and Miramax' option is about to expire.   Unless they make a movie, they will lose all rights to the property.  It is decided to rethink their strategy and rather than go full out on a blockbuster project, they will instead make a very small-bugeted, direct-to-video movie that will allow them to legally entend their option for a few more years, in which time, hopefully the big movie can be launched.

Writers Lee and Janet Batchler write a script which, rather than relate a current adventure of our daring Ms.Blaise, opt to tell the very private story of her beginnings.  An origin story, if you will.   Miramax makes a deal with a Rumanian company headed by Producer Ted Nicolau and green-lights the project with a minimal budget and all of 18 days shooting schedule.   It should be noted that somewhere along all of this 11th hour movie madness, Tarantino read the script and much to his surprise, loved it!   He called Weinstein to applaud it and in the course of their conversation, the studio chief suggested they hire Tarantino's friend, Scott Spiegel, to direct.
Two days later, Spiegel is on a plane to Europe reading the script while in flight.

The movie was made, on budget and on time and released direct to video in 2004.   I recently picked up a copy from a DVD retailer on-line, after hearing lots of good things about it.   Having now watched it, I am here to add my own enthusiastic thumbs up for this very real, little gem of a movie.  As indicated, the story is intimate, but excellently told and the cast superb.   Alexandra Staden, whom I'd never heard of before, is really terrific as a young Modesty starting out in the criminal world and Nicolaj Coster-Waldau as the sadistic villain, Mykolos,
holds the stage toe-to-toe with her, building suspense that never lags.  This is really a great comic book movie that is 100% true to the source material.   I'm told when Peter O'Donnell finally saw the picture, he gave it a big thumbs up.  That's no surprise, this is his Modesty brought to life.  The movie is called….MY NAME IS MODESTY.   It's relatively cheap at most internet DVD sites.   Check out my link to Deep Discount on the links page.  If you are a Modesty Blaise fan, do not pass this one up.

And that's it for another week at the old Airship 27 Hangar, airmen.  Take care until next Friday.
Ron, over and out.