Fangs

Screenwriting is troubling. It always has been for me. It has slaughtered entire evenings and spread their ashes deep into the early hours of the morning. It has made me irritable at times while feeding my stubbornness to no end. There is no justification for this. Other than my wife and a few friends, barely anybody in the "industry" has read anything I've written. The fault is mine and mine alone, a tattoo I carved into my own arm only to continuously oppose, as time went on, the ink's overall design and meaning. I've been writing screenplays for years and in that time have only sent a handful to producers who for a brief moment showed what kind of resembled interest. I've been rejected by agencies who refuse to accept unsolicited material, a widely known policy, or simply received no response at all. And this is how it should be.

I'm not promoting my brand here effectively, I know, and for any would be director reading this, I can't imagine it would inspire a great amount of confidence in the product at hand. But that's where it starts, confidence tucked away, waiting to be exhumed by that one great idea and nurtured nightly by vehemence and a little bit of madness. But for what? That's one of the many struggles screenwriters face, especially unestablished ones such as myself. We're often writing for a reward that has yet to manifest itself. We see the castle but not the bridge. And before we can begin, we have to face the desolate landscape known as the blank page, where guts are spilled on the coffee table and scabs picked at by the red pens of loved ones. This shouldn't suggest that the ideas aren't there. They just take time.

What follows are the first two pages of a screenplay I've been developing. It's comprised of years of wrong approaches, structure experimentation, the occasional idol rip-off and an absurd amount of frustration, all leading to countless hours of rewriting, where the fog of doubt can turn your ideas into mush. When you rewrite a screenplay, you create the wounds yourself. You rip the bandages away, review the progress just to pry them open all over again. But even with the stress that naturally comes, it can be enormously fulfilling. When you complete something you feel you've inserted so much of yourself into, you can't help but crown the process with a certain level of pride, all the while arousing your fear that it's really all for nothing. The screenplay that these two pages precede have bounced me back and forth within that very place.

This is a screenplay that has seen many changes in its lifetime, although changes I felt were necessary. But it's an original work, not one based on a novel or comic. With today's focus seemingly targeted at franchises, reboots, and sequels, it frightens me to think that the hunt for original material is slowly being laid to rest. Some recent releases based on original concepts which sadly resulted in lackluster performances at the box office have led some to believe that the oil the Hollywood machine runs on now only appears to flow through the veins of the typical blockbuster, leaving the smaller ideas out in the cold. The meat of the cash cow is certainly warranted, but the bones that provide the foundation are what, artistically speaking, can often appear brittle when profit begins to outweighs content.

I'm still a firm believer that smaller films need to exist, and can be largely successful on their own. Quentin Tarantino's widely revered Pulp Fiction, a huge influence for me, was budgeted at just over $8 million and reportedly took in over $200 million worldwide, an astonishing number. Many other smaller films followed suit with similar successes. Those were ideas that were worth the tightrope, and still are. I'm just not sure how many people share that same belief in today's industry. The optimist in me still has trust in that idea, that there are agents, directors, and even actors that still aim to take risks on unknown writers.

Some nights, if I fall victim to a bout of writer's block, I imagine punching the screen in a fit of rage, watching as the shards of glass slowly turn into small serrated teeth that bite down on my hands if I try to quit. But these moments I feel are what define an artist, no matter what the medium. It's a struggle I will always cherish. I don't know if a screenplay I've written will ever get sold or, better yet, committed to screen; I just know that it's a passion that doesn't seem to harbor a desire to go anywhere just yet, except on a computer screen at 2am while my wife and kids are asleep, where violence, romance and comedy can try to bleed from the same heart.

Sleepy Armor

This is not a story of heroism. There are no capes or large, commanding spot lights embracing the night sky as a city in chaos beckons its loyal protector. This is simply a recollection of an evening in which a good deed was attempted but ultimately, and sadly, poorly executed. The villain of this story is not a monster. It is laziness and second thoughts, a mask that has unfortunately become all too familiar. One evening, when driving home late from work, my wife asked me to stop at the grocery store to pick up some milk. For you married men, you know that this is a request that is instantly followed, as milk is often the lifeline of a household with children. As I was driving down highway 85, music from a band which I oddly can't recall pouring though the speakers, my attention briefly turned toward the far side of a parking lot between Cottle Rd. and Great Oaks Blvd. 

What I thought I saw was a man and woman arguing, his hand seemingly gripped around the woman's throat. This seemed odd considering the beaming light above them practically announcing their tryst to neighboring individuals. It could've been anything, I thought. Did I actually catch the beginning of a violent act or a couple enfolded in a passionate kiss? After all, my eyes were only on them for mere seconds. With my exit fast approaching, I let it go and continued on to my destination. I entered the Lucky, grabbed my gallon of milk and proceeded to pay the clerk. As I did this, that image, brief as it was, kept running through my mind. I imagined standing there with my items, a projection of the image painting the wall behind me and the clerk judging me for not only forgetting to use coupons but also failing to help a fellow citizen in distress. "What the fuck was that?" I pondered. 

The question lingered as I exited the parking lot, finally on my way home. A rapid kick to the gut is all it took to find my trajectory had changed, sending me careening into the left turn lane. I called my wife and informed her of the situation, bullshit or not, and that I was going back to the scene to check it out. One thing remained certain. I wasn't confident in my knowledge of their location. For as long as I've lived in San Jose and in my current home, I can be shamefully bad at directions. Not always, but often when it counts.

I turned down streets I never knew existed finding nothing but businesses and dead ends. No strange parking lot with a narrowed end near the freeway bathed in a million fucking lights. I didn't feel drunk or mentally compromised in any way but I knew this should not have been this difficult. As I made another turn, I saw a police cruiser enter the parking lot of a nearby business. I turned around and preceded to drive in its direction, eventually pulling into the lot where the cruiser stopped. As the officer spotted my approach, his car now facing my own, he slowly exited his vehicle and stood near the door.

As ours were the only two cars in the parking lot, and us possibly the only two human beings left in the world, I can imagine how odd it must have looked to find some weird dude driving toward him at 11:00pm on a Tuesday night. Caution commanded his stance as I rolled my window down. I told him what I thought I had witnessed, the validity of my report slowly discredited by the weakness of my delivery and all out storytelling. I was a fucking lunatic for all he knew. I couldn't describe the parking lot nor could I even point him in a suitable direction.

He thanked me for the crumbs I dropped him and sent me on my way. As I exited the street, I still felt the unease ballooning in my stomach. Instead of simply turning down a backstreet to go home, one I was shockingly familiar with, I decided to hop back onto Highway 85 and head in the opposite direction. Shortly into my pursuit, I located the parking lot and, to my surprise, found the couple still standing there underneath the lights, talking but now free of physical contact. I yelled to myself "Goddamnit, it was the light rail station on Cottle Rd, you dumb shit!" If music has done anything, it's seizing my complete attention.

I exited Cottle Rd. to make one last attempt to close out my investigation. I drove into the parking lot and stopped my car about fifty yards from theirs. The woman was sitting in the front seat while the man created a barricade by the door, through which she evidently could not escape. Whether or not she even wanted to was completely unknown to me. I just sat there and watched them. After a brief moment, the man slowly walked around and hopped in the driver's seat. With the stereo on mute, a rare occurrence in my car, I waited for them to exit the parking lot, which based on my current position, would require them to pass right by me. As they got closer, I pretended to talk on my cell phone, my head slightly turned to allow a glimpse of the girl's expression. My acting was phenomenal and should a nomination be considered for "best fake phone conversation" at the 2016 MTV Movie Awards, I will graciously accept.

Reacting to my vehicle's hazard lights, the man drove around me. Mid-laugh at a fake joke with my fake friend, I turned my head slightly and saw the woman crying, her hand resting over her right cheek. What was once unease quickly morphed into a ball of anxiety as I now felt even more obligated to further my pursuit. I followed them to a 76 gas station near Bill's Cafe on Cottle Rd. Gas being an actual necessity at the time, I pulled up to a pump, "actor mode" still very much intact. I watched the man leave the attendant's window, having just purchased a new pack of cigarettes. He returned to his car and waited a few minutes before slowly backing out of the spot. I returned the pump to its holster. As his car moved forward, I heard a woman's voice scream "You're fucking crazy, get me outta here!" This was followed by rampant sobs as she leapt from the car and went galloping through the parking lot.

I grabbed my phone and quickly hurried to the clerk's window, tapping repeatedly on the glass. But no one answered. At that moment, It dawned on me that I was going to have to take this guy out on my own. I weighed the possibilities. Would I have to jump on the hood of this dude's car like T.J. Hooker or Steven Seagal in Above The Law? I've watched martial arts movies before. A quick kick to the neck should do the trick. These stupid events raced through my mind as I tore the work uniform from my body and threw it in the front seat of my car.

Still sporting a black Mossimo undershirt, I raced to the scene, befuddled at the realization that, in less than a minute, she had already reunited with the guy in his car, even though in her words he was "fucking crazy." I yelled into the air as the car sped off. I returned to my car and immediately dialed 911, practicing every tailing method I've ever learned from cop shows I've seen on TV. As the dispatcher answered, I explained the situation. My heart was on a trampoline in the middle of my chest. I was pissed off, strangely excited and growing increasingly weary of the temperature of my son's milk.

I stayed three cars behind him, and in an asinine attempt to sound cool, made sure the dispatcher was aware of this. It was amateur hour on Cottle Rd. The dispatcher asked me questions as I relayed to her inch by inch my movements and current state of mind. There was a new projection displayed behind me. Only this time, it was of me saving this poor girl and pouring my son's spoiled milk over the bloody corpse of her attacker, Lou Reed's A Perfect Day playing in the background. This opportunity started to slip away from me as I got stuck at a light as his car continue on its path.

I had come to the conclusion that three cars may have been too many. Play by play hit the dispatcher's ear. As the light turned green, I noticed his car making a U-Turn at the light up ahead, now heading back toward the intersection from which we just came. I caught a glimpse of him as he passed on the other side of Santa Teresa and felt the time of my fifteen minutes slowly begin to dissolve. I made the same U-Turn and sped back toward Cottle Rd once again, this time communicating my inability to tail a vehicle like the big screen heroes.

I could no longer see his car and what I thought was him in the distance turned out to be a completely different car all together. Help was not going to come for this woman. At least not from me. I lowered my head in shame as I explained this to the dispatcher and drove around like an idiot for the next 25 minutes looking on my own for this douchebag. There was no reason for the officer to stay on the phone with me and even less of one for the officer who called me minutes later. I had provided all the assistance I could, and to my indignity, maybe of which I was probably even capable. I just didn't act fast enough. And not knowing what became of the women in that car lends only to the itch that still remains, a scar born of disruptive inaction.

Before I became a father, or even a husband, acting fast in situations like that was never easy, but it happened. I thought only of myself and the harm that could be done to my own body. Some moments ended in words, while others ended in blood. A bottle to the face will do that, as the barely recognizable scar on my forehead will tell you. But other people have entered the equation now, affected by any result. Inaction isn't always caused by responsibility. It's caused by laziness and your interpretation of it. And for alI I know, that couple is snuggled up on a couch somewhere as I write this, catching up on their Game of Thrones or reeling from last Sunday's episode of The Walking Dead. As they undress, descend on a bed while the Target bought incense masks the smell of their impending sex, I'll be hitting "post" and sharing this with all my friends. That's only fair. It's life that's not.

The Changes: Part 1

The floor trembles beneath us as a team of nurses scatter in and out of the room. A whiteboard, carved in black ink, shows the state of our affairs and I'm suddenly reminded that I've been here before. The date is April 13th, 2014, and my wife Josephine and I are preparing to welcome our second child, Joseph Michael, to the world. In the foxhole where we met three years prior to welcome his older brother Samuel, we unite once again, striking our fists on the pavement, a brash signature embracing the uncertainty ahead. As we do this, a question looms; What the fuck were we thinking? Plans often have a funny way of hiding from memory once the intended goal is achieved. 

Did we really just create another human being for which we would be responsible the rest of our lives? It's a question every parent asks themselves, I'm sure. Or just one I hope they do so we don't feel so alone. I watch this tiny creature open his eyes at me, adapting to every sliver of light and sound and oblivious to the possibility that I could very well fuck this all up. What he doesn't realize is that I plan to do my best to prevent that from happening. When you have a child, these are the realities you face. You ready plans that will forever alter your lives to which your children have no knowledge or preview. And it's all for them.

You can't expect gratitude, or some shitty Safeway Hallmark card declaring their admiration for all your hard work. All you can do is celebrate the fact that they're still around after that first year, all while under your strict management. The shit and piss you gather daily form the steps that advance you to the next stage of the game, with every stride you take being only for the betterment of your children. Some hurdles, you'll see coming. There are others, though, that develop in secret, far beyond your comprehension. And when that happens, you’ll curse everything for which the world around you stands.

Last November, my wife and I noticed something unusual about an area of our then eight month old son Joseph's body. His testicles looked swollen. Where one would expect to see a normal body part, a hardened mound of flesh appeared. While it didn't seem to bother him, regardless of whatever crazy position he found himself in, we decided to get it checked out. We scheduled an appointment with his pediatrician, various scenarios entering like shrapnel in our brains. As I waited in the car with our 3 year old son, Sammy, a decision only a toddler's tantrum could inspire, not to mention my coming down with the flu earlier that week, my wife took our baby in to get examined.

As Sammy and I waited, I half listened to an interview conducted by NPR's Terry Gross of Bay Area musician John Vanderslice, which surrounded the man's music career before founding the recording studio Tiny Telephone in San Francisco. Sammy spoke along in tandem, occasionally asking me what I was listening to. I couldn't answer him, though. The ability to speak escaped me, a temporary abandonment of fatherhood sparked by sickness and emotional unease. For that brief moment, I was officially just a babysitter.  As my wife returned to the car, I sprang from my seat to meet her. I could see the tracks lining her cheeks and the cloud of red suffocating her eyes. 

I counted six total seconds before any words exited her mouth where I imagined the worst possible outcome. Was my son an alien being whose twin brain was housed in his scrotum, secretly developing an evil plan to overtake the world and turn all of mankind into mindless slaves? Unfortunately, no. The initial conclusion was that it was a hernia, the removal of which I was told had already been scheduled for later that afternoon. We were immediately sent across the street to Lucile Packard to meet with the surgeon. After a brief wait, we were taken to a room in back where a man I had never met would illustrate how he would go about taking a knife to our son. 

Upon analyzing the area, the surgeon began to entertain other potential causes of the swelling, skeptical whether or not a hernia was in the cards. Following a variety of different scenarios, the doctor shuffled the deck and dealt a new hand on the table: a tumor. I never imagined a single word could be so terrifying. We were sent back to Good Sam so Joseph could undergo an ultrasound. We watched as the technician coated his skin with that weird gel, his young mind struggling to grasp what was happening. He cried helplessly. We restrained him as gently as we could and felt the strength in his tiny limbs slowly begin to flourish. 

After an excruciating 30 minutes, we were sent home through what felt like a black hole to face the weekend-long wait for the results. We just wanted answers. Unfortunately for us, they were to questions we hadn't prepared ourselves to ask. We took our son home that evening where we watched him laugh, smile, and remain completely unaware, as we were of the news to come.

Around 1pm, the following Monday, I received a call from my wife. Watching the screen on my phone, I began to think about the trivial nature of modern communication and just how strange actual phone calls seem nowadays. With text messaging, emojis and overall social media having commanded our lives, how we connect with one another has changed dramatically. And even though my wife's call was expected, receiving it at work on a Monday afternoon just felt odd.

I immediately left the store to take it. That I even bothered to answer with a typical "hello" I suppose was inspired by some desperate attempt to arouse a normal conversation, though something I knew this particular one would be far from. I was greeted with silence at first. I could hear her on the other end arranging her statement, tears already standing on the ledge, ready to jump. Through the jagged, almost breathless delivery in her voice, three words she let out were clear:

"… It's a tumor."

I tried to process this, briefly forgetting the person on the other end of the line was the boy's mother, not a doctor calling to communicate our options, but the woman who carried him for nine months, a bond unlike anything I will ever know. This was a difficult thing for her to have to tell me.

I tried to remain calm, something I knew she would be dependent on. What I wanted to do was scream at the gates and curse every religion known to man. But that wasn't an option. From the blackness of where I stood, under a piercing skylight in the mall, I assured her that everything was going to be okay.  After we hung up, I called my boss to inform her of the news. There, standing beside an enormous mural of a young, beautifully hip couple lining the side of a Michael Kors retail store, I lost my shit completely. A tumor, the origin of which we were completely fucking clueless, had invaded my son's body.

There was no army strong enough to defend against the onslaught of fear and worry that aimed to shatter every optimistic bone I had. The surgery was scheduled for Thursday, December 11th. That morning, we woke our son up and drove him to Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford in Palo Alto. After a brief consultation, we were directed to the pre-op room. We watched Finding Nemo on the small TV above his bed and for the briefest of moments, things felt normal. But we weren't parents seeing our son off on his first day of school, or taking him on a carnival ride as he enjoyed his first taste of ice cream. Among all the "firsts" we were anticipating as parents, sending him off to endure his first major surgery before turning nine months old was not one of them.

We kissed him goodbye and watched the nurse cart him away. During the mere seconds it took for them to reach the exit, I reflected on our normal morning routine: waking up to the bed shaking as our son Sammy wedged in between us, listening to the short chirps Joseph would make when playing in his crib at the beginning of his day, and preparing their cereal while brewing my required morning coffee. As his bed neared the door, these things began to feel more and more out of reach.  

On the contrary, I knew these daily rituals would return. I just didn't know how I would feel about it when they did. You stay positive for your children, but not always for yourself. Joseph looked adorable in his tiny gown, shooting smiles at all the nurses. This gave us comfort. Nothing was different for him. It was just new, an experience he'll never remember as he moved further out of sight. And like that, he was gone.

The waiting room swelled with family. Sammy's toddler mode was at full power and the grandparents were on high alert. As we had some time, Josephine and I walked to the cafeteria to refuel. We were told that after the tumor was removed, an examination would follow to determine whether or not it was malignant in nature. My plate was stocked with supposedly edible turkey meat smothered in gravy.

I slid my tray along the belt when I turned to find my wife's mother running toward the cafeteria's main entrance. As Josephine rushed to meet her, I saw the surgeon emerge from the hallway. I abandoned my tray of food and skirted over. The doctor took us aside and informed us that the operation had gone well and tumor successfully removed. A smile began to form, but felt somewhat isolated. I waited for the "but.", a word I've heard several times before...

"I love you too, but..."

"Your screenplay was good, but..."

"The sex was decent, but..."

I wasn't prepared for the one that followed. As I clutched my wife's hand, the doctor's voice crashed like a wave, submerging us in our new reality. The tumor he and his surgical team had just removed from my son's body was malignant, and with our consent, would require the removal of his right testicle in order to avoid any possible spread of the cancer. I didn't want to say the word at first. And I didn't, for weeks. Five minutes ago, we were stacking food on our trays, a very clear number of steps ahead of us. Now, I couldn't see where they ended. We surrendered our consent and for the next 20 minutes were bombarded by family.

The support was astounding. But I still felt helpless. I wanted to know that I could help my sons through anything and give them the advice they needed along the way, on how to treat their friends and know how to identify true ones, how to save money, or even drive a stick shift, something at which I'm actually not that great. I could teach them these things and more, except what it feels like to be diagnosed with a type of cancer called rhabdomyosarcoma.

This is what my son had. And the year long worth of treatments that he would be forced to endure is what we had to look forward to. The photos below were taken during his twelfth week of treatment. I'll admit, the one true silver lining that's practically guided us throughout this entire ordeal is how wonderfully he's coped. His treatments began last December and he's soldiered along ever since. His smile and laugh are infectious and remain as continuous as ever.

We visit Stanford's Lucile Packard Children's Hospital every Wednesday, the waiting room comprised of the personal struggles of so many other families, a group of which my wife and I are now members. This is our struggle, one that we continue to face until the end of the road can be viewed from solid ground, not the rooftop that's often required. We continue to be hopeful that these remaining treatments will be his last.

Before chemo began, Joseph's oncologist listed the many side effects that could befall him. One of them, obviously, was hair loss which she told us could occur within ten days of treatment. At the time of this post, he'll be going on his 36th week and has needed two haircuts. Whenever his oncologist sees him, she still can't believe it. With no answer given, we just decided to attribute it to damn good hair genes.

Joseph in downtown Santa Cruz sticking his tongue out for no apparent reason. July, 2015.

Joseph in downtown Santa Cruz sticking his tongue out for no apparent reason. July, 2015.

And now we’re here, with our son facing his final three months of treatment and the excitement this eventual milestone gives me. It seems so close and within reach. My hand aches from the grasp of something almost attainable. But I know a shadow will always be there, behind the grip, when I hold him close to my chest and kiss him goodnight, a shadow that can only be caused by a lingering anxiety, solidified and fully committed. One that will ride with us in the car and sit at the dinner table while we eat. A shadow I will always see. But it won't be that way forever. Fear, doubt, just like anything, can be impaired. The hope of one thing can permanently cripple the fear of another. And that may just be enough.

Punch Drunk

I sit on my couch, devoid of movement, a freshly made screwdriver thawing on the end table beside me, and stare at the spots sporadically dotting the red accent wall in my living room, like holes on a blouse teasing a hint of white skin underneath, the effects, obviously, of a shitty paint job. As I remain static, the room half-lit and only partially clean, I am stricken with an epiphany - five words that illuminate before me:

I do not know karate.

There should be no reason why this thought has entered my brain at this hour. But right now, it’s what I am screaming at my fourteen year old self, as if I had somehow discovered a gateway to the late eighties, stood in the middle of my old bedroom to watch the pathetic roundhouse kick my youthful counterpart was unloading.

Curtains spread, I watch the young me pose on a stage of delusion, his audience eyeing him ever so adoringly as he struggles to keep his right leg suspended in mid-air like Jean Claude Van Damme in Kickboxer. I watch in horror. Hilarity even. I want to slap this fucker silly, shine the hazards at the truth and have him repeat after me: ’I do not know karate.' When I was younger, I used to believe that simply watching the movies of Jean Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal or even Jeff Speakman, would be enough to magically awaken the martial arts master within me, all the while foregoing the need of any form of proper training. I’m sure I don’t have to tell you just how ridiculous this was.

I knew, even as I held the water in my mouth that I would spew onto my own face to simulate blood from an opponent’s strike, that this was total horse shit. This was the effect that those early action movies had on me. It belabored the fantasy, only making me believe I was tough while not encouraging me to actually prove it. I didn’t really want to beat anybody up. I just wanted to know that if required to, I could, unleashing a sweet crane kick like Daniel Larusso on my own feather-haired bully. Shadow punches and impact gestures became the nightly ritual. My parents, as they sat peacefully in front of the television, would be forced to listen to the racket piercing through the wall. It was exercise at its most embarrassing, fueled by an imagination that was free from distraction and the incessant tap on the shoulder that I now know as the internet.

The Digital Revolution

Back then, the internet was barely even a concept to me. It was a flux capacitor in the backseat of my dad’s Chrysler LeBaron, a reality that just didn’t exist. While I pretended to fight the bad guys in my bedroom following a viewing of whatever action movie I saw that week, the moment ended there, within my four walls, without the video selfie or World’s Best Knockout clips on YouTube to encourage the delusion. There was no trolling, no digital shield to provoke the completely baseless and mean-spirited jabs at one another, while guarding you from the repercussions one would surely suffer in a web-free world. The internet seems to have bred a flash mob of false confidence, continually strengthened by our own naivety and longing to be heard. It has turned seemingly peaceful individuals into robots of verbal mayhem, behavior of which over time, began to spill into their real lives, only intensifying the resulting douchebaggery.

Strangely, another by-product of this newly armored fellowship has been the scores of remakes Hollywood has released of these once classic films, all of which have been stripped completely of the charm that made their original counterparts so enjoyable. It may sound silly to blame the internet for this, but the ever-abated attention span that the 3 minute video clip gave birth to has done exactly that.  While every worn out idea rests at the center of the sandbox, leagues of writers and producers have been repeatedly pulled toward the core to exhume the same concepts over and over again.

A History And Essential Viewing

What I loved most about the action movies of the 80’s and 90’s wasn’t so much the action itself as it was the goofiness they portrayed. They didn’t take themselves seriously and often poked fun at the genre itself and had an appeal that simply did not translate to their re-imagined copies. When Patrick Swayze’s Dalton tells Kelly Lynch’s Doc that “pain don’t hurt” as she applies staples to a knife wound, my heart flutters with joy. These movies were ridiculous, gratuitously violent, and endearingly silly. They were also original. As idiotic as that may sound, their ideas were based on genuine concepts and the understanding that in the action genre, more is less, so truthfully, more is welcome (my apologies, but Michael Bay does not qualify). Sure, there were the occasional plot holes you could shove a bus through, but the execution of the story telling and humor is what made them all so addictively watchable.

The acting was often top notch and the villains were fun, shooting life into the veins of the story's hero. Hans Gruber was the hair on John McClane’s rugged chest and if Dalton had any hair on his, those sandy-coated locks of virility would belong to none other than Brad Wesley. Central characters were key and these films were riddled with them. Stars emerged from the trenches, aching to leave their mark, but before bathing in the ashes of the spotlight's nuclear embrace, a 10 year old boy from Belgium harbored dreams of becoming the next big action star in America, and would later be known worldwide as The Muscles from Brussels.

When Jean Claude Van Damme burst onto the scene, I wanted nothing more than to do the splits and work on my fake Belgian accent. I tried eagerly to perfect the actor's signature roundhouse kick. I would practice it in the backyard, wearing tiny shorts and Gumby t-shirt. I always felt the slow motion in Van Damme's movies was a bit overused, like dumping salt on an already seasoned dish. But I remained loyal, determined to get that kick right. I never expected to have to use it in real life, but I wanted a reason to show off for my friends and any cute girl who almost never gave two shits about action movies, or the fact that I could demonstrate a comically amateurish roundhouse kick.

1988’s Bloodsport cemented my admiration for just how silly (and awesome) these movies and their stars could be. You could argue that this movie was just plain bad. And although I won't challenge that sentiment, there was something so appealing about the movie's lack of any real storytelling while actually attempting to add heart, in addition to, although laughable at times, some pretty kick ass fight choreography. The movie follows U.S. Army Captain Frank Dux as he travels to Hong Kong to take part in an underground full-contact martial arts tournament called the Kumite, an event that takes place once every five years. Despite people having been killed in the tournament, Dux is determined to honor the memory of his master, Senzo Tanaka, and be the first Westerner to win the title of this highly exclusive competition.

Bloodsport became the ‘go to’ movie years later when a tradition was started with my friends called “bad movie night." The night would consist of us drinking, eating delicious bacon wrapped hot dogs and watching “bad” action movies all night. We would anticipate the final fight scene between Dux and the villainess Chong Li, played by Chinese actor Bolo Yeung, as well as the unintentionally funny dialogue between them. This forever classic remains one of my favorite line deliveries of all time. I watched all of JCVD’s movies up until 1995’s Sudden Death, when I began to lose interest. Pulp Fiction was released the prior year and altered the trajectory of my film watching priorities for good. But I still loved me some cheesy action flicks.

Following Bloodsport, Van Damme went on to make 1989’s Kickboxer, where he played Kurt Sloan, corner man to his brother Eric, a U.S. kickboxing champion, who in an ill-advised foray into the world of Muay Thai, is severely injured by the ruthless Tong Po, Thailand’s reigning king. Weeks after the film was released, I was still trying to master that goddamn roundhouse, only now adding Van Damme’s then famous mid-air leg hold to my list of life goals; I got as high as my chest. It wasn’t all bad news, though. That same year, another film was released starring the late Patrick Swayze, known by many as the pinnacle of wonderfully cheesy action flicks, Rowdy Herrington’s masterpiece: Roadhouse.

The arrival of Roadhouse was enough to feed any fifteen year old boy's obsession with these movies. The film told the story of James Dalton, a tough-as-nails bouncer from Memphis, arguably one of the best in the game, who operates by principles only a bouncer with a degree in philosophy could understand. The ideas behind this film were unparalleled in the action genre. The charm of the storytelling and balls out execution made it one of the most entertaining movies to watch.

The final showdown between Dalton and Brad Wesley’s equally skilled henchman Jimmy is one of the best choreographed fight scenes I had ever seen. Sure, you could find far more technically advanced fight scenes in many of the films coming out of Asian cinema, but when you watch two regular dudes duke it out like these two did amid the backdrop of a burning house, your attention is seized. And that fucking throat rip! Glorious.

A close second for me was the all-out slugfest between Roddy Piper and Keith David in John Carpenter’s They Live, a scene that seemed to last for hours. I walked out of that movie wanting to kick some serious ass. An attempt to carve my body out of wood only turned to my housing it in glass, the image I portrayed laughably translucent and farcical. But I was a kid. It wasn’t my job to give a shit about that. I was drawn to these films because, to me, the fights looked like something I could actually do. I loved the films of Bruce Lee and was entranced by the way in which Jackie Chan’s body seemed to always defy logic, but I knew that I would never be able to do any of that stuff, which made them less relatable for me. I was more drawn to the repetition of Van Damme's slow motion kicks or even Steven Seagal’s goofy arm breaks. (I’ve never broken a man’s arm before but it looked cool as hell). 

One moment in class, a young boy became agitated and began to berate another student behind me. As he lunged forward, I rose and immediately broke into a karate stance. I had no goddamn clue what I as planning to do next. As our eyes locked, he asked “Who the fuck are you, Mr. Karate?” We studied each other as he slowly began to recede toward the door. I thought to myself “Holy shit, did that just work?” I took my seat and sat through the rest of the class feeling like I had just stabbed the devil through the chest. My adrenaline swelled and my ego clawed upward, slaying every obstacle in its path. I was the master of all that was right. Truth be told, the teacher had already asked the boy to leave the classroom which was probably his main inspiration for doing so, but I chose to believe otherwise. I was “Mr. Karate” and I was not going to give that shit up.

Even when I got into a fight at the local Taco Bell the following year, a moment that did not go as planned, I could’ve very well been standing on the platform of the Kumite. That roundhouse kick was now officially within reach. The delusion was determined to grow, and had the internet existed back then, as I struggled to find or believe in myself, it could have. The skin of my former self would have been pulled back to reveal the bastard commentator underneath. It may have been me trolling for laughs, or harassing relatively good people for no reason at all. Fuck that, though. Restraint is not without its benefits.

As the internet has developed a bridge to a seemingly endless amount of information and opportunity, it also gave rise to a new group of people. Before, it was nerdy kids without an identity who just wanted to feel tough. Now, it's overly confident assholes who just want to kick the shit out of the world, erecting their own statues amid the self-congratulating podium of the future: social network. There was a time when we could move beyond the humiliating experiences, waving goodbye to the banal missteps we often took, but the internet immortalizes every embarrassing moment that befalls us, like an always active bully shoving a fist down our fucking throats. Applications, video services and websites primarily targeted at life fails and fuck ups cater to this demographic and the movies of the past are all being remade to appeal to this very group. Is it a shortage of ideas or merely a deficit of principles?

This may sound petty, or even premature in thought, but I can't help but long for the charm that saturated some of those early films, as ludicrous as they may have been, and what it means to watch my children grow up in a world so heavily dependent on recycled concepts. With the swell of distractions technology has created over the years, I wonder what my boys will pretend to be in the privacy of their bedrooms. Or will they pretend at all? The people who hound the comments section of today's blogs with their brainless attacks represent the worst of today's hyperactive culture. They pretend to be intelligent, thought-provoking and witty, but in the end only come off as rude, chauvinistic and utterly fucking stupid. And to think it all may have all started with a simple love of silly action movies.

Closing The Curtain

To be fair, I have yet to see some of the newer remakes that have been released, specifically 2012's Red Dawn, but only because I failed to wrap my head around why a remake of Red Dawn was necessary. Fairness lay in the rubble, I'm afraid. A rumor floated around recently of a plan to add Die Hard to the list of future reboots. The mere thought of this made my blood boil. I can only imagine the impact the FHRITP (research at your own risk) screaming crowd will have on the finished product should it eventually come to fruition. The reboots have to appeal to the new generation of fans, but those very fans may be the reason said reboots are so poorly executed. But maybe I'm wrong. I usually am. Maybe I'll leave it up to my children. 

A few weeks ago, I showed my son Sammy the latest film interpretation of Godzilla. It was actually a pretty decent movie, ripe with sweet, albeit skimpy, monster battles. And the big boy himself looked good. Though I ache to show him where the big lizard's character originated. Not "the water" like my son would most likely claim, but from the depths of an earlier imagination. I'll admit that some stories deserve to be commemorated by the eventual remake. It's what makes the recent advances in technology and special effects so exciting. But there's a drawback. The more stories we re-tell, the less impact those very stories will have on their audience. The copies will become more faded over time. Less significant. What used to be a source of inspiration will become ground zero for mockery. Visual elegance will need a voice, and so will your children.