Galaxy Quest

          Take a moment and recall a conversation you are almost sure to have had, about what makes a book a classic book. If you've never had this conversation, I suggest you avoid it. Without fail, an otherwise intelligent person will offer the following opinion, which is, just under the surface, a willful rejection of all cultural achievement since the Egyptians and the Phoenicians created and disseminated written language: that a great book is defined by being a "page-turner." That really good writing engages your attention and keeps you involved. That the quality of a book is equal to how fun it is to read. Please don't misunderstand me, I am not suggesting that great books cannot have this quality. No, the problem with this standard is that it does not apply to most of the books that we recognize as a culture to be classics.  (Richardson's Clarissa somehow made it in to the top ten novels of all time according to The Guardian.) Without getting into a critical debate over whether cultural authority means anything, I'd like to claim that it is in fact the best standard. And, while acknowledging that this is a generalization with numerous exceptions, I also claim that anyone who believes they can disregard cultural authority in favor of their "page-turner" standard does so because they realize they hate most of the greatest books ever written and they don't want to accept the basic fact that they don't understand things they wish they did.

          Great books can indeed be ponderous, boring, tedious, and frustrating. These qualities are not what make them great, but the fact remains that sometimes the reason a book is difficult is that it is good. Sometimes the literary and philosophical themes of a book are a challenge even to the best prose stylists. Sometimes being forced to read slowly gives you the chance to engage something deeper, something more worthwhile than cheap thrills.

          I am a slow reader. I have the bad habit of sub-vocalizing when I read, and I find it difficult to focus if I don't. Without any pretension, this is the reason that when I read (I read as much as I can, but it doesn't ever amount to as much as I would like to) I generally read only good books. And by that, I mean books recognized by cultural authority. Reading already requires that I put the effort necessary to read great books, so why waste my time? If I am going to spend an hour reading ten pages, they had better be good. Nothing is aggravating to me as a bad book. This may be why I enjoy reading philosophy.

          You may be wondering why it is that I am explaining this, especially since you have no doubt deduced from the title of the post that this is about the movie Galaxy Quest. Basically, I am drawing an analogy between a common attitude about books, and a common attitude about movies that I am about to get to. While this cinematic disposition is far less pervasive as the idea that good books are "page-turners," it is not hard to observe that a fair amount of movie watchers like what can be argued to be "good" movies. Perhaps it is because we have an annual award that usually recognizes dependably good dramatic movies as the "best" of the year, but the top grossing movies are usually those well acted, well directed dramas (and a few mindless, idiotic summer blockbusters). It may be the case that in our busy modern world, if people are going to take the time to watch a movie, as well as the rising expense of doing so, it had better be good. And now I get to my point, I have exactly the inverse relationships to books and movies.

          While people who embrace "page-turners" don't in my opinion really appreciate the finer qualities of books, they aren't fools. Thrilling, attention grabbing books require talent to write, and can't be entirely cliched or formulaic. Even formula fiction still needs a bit of creativity to be enjoyable. Likewise, when it comes to a movie I want to see, it needs to be well made. Creativity, and sentimentality is usually a benefit. Serious people, or at least serious movie watchers tend to reject my favorites, for largely the same reasons I reject the books that many people love. When I watch a movie, I want to be entertained, I want to relax. I want to be able to focus on something pleasant and let everything else fade away. Escapism? Sure. But only because spend the rest of my time dealing with real things. I am not blind to the world. Perhaps I'll explain in a philosophical post sometime the idea that the only sincere response to truly seeing the world is sadness. So, yes, I want to escape.

          This is why a movie like Galaxy Quest is perfect for me. Why is it that this movie is worth loving? Ask anyone who has ever seen it. It's frakking hilarious. While it may not make any Sight and Sound lists anytime soon, it is almost impossible not to enjoy this movie. It is the cinematic equivalent of a "page-turner." While the premise is silly, actors from a Star Trek clone who eke out a living by attending continuous conventions are recruited to confront a real alien threat by the galaxy's most devoted fans, it is also strikingly relevant in the current age of the geek, ruled by hipsters. It used to be difficult to be a big sci-fi fan. Few places offered the volumes of trivia demanded by fandom before the internet. Now everyone can instantly digest every episode of their favorite show, no waiting around for re-runs or travelling hours to a store that may have a VHS copy of episode 75 for sale. We have streaming video. We have wikipedia. And, as it turns out, there are a lot more geeks out there than anyone realized. As well as a lot more opportunity to think about fantasy and reality.

          It also features a wonderfully talented cast. Sigourney Weaver plays essentially a parody of her badass sci-fi persona. Justin Long plays Earth's biggest fan, who gets to use his encyclopedic knowledge of the technical specs of the show's space ship to literally save an alien species from extinction. Sam Rockwell, who brings a great deal of depth to a character who is little more than a pun, plays Guy, "the crewman who dies just to show the situation is serious." He literally goes through his character arc by deciding to be a different character. I could go on. Tony Shalhoub, Alan Rickman. But these award winners have gotten their props elsewhere. Still, I would like to take a moment to recognize how great Tim Allen is in it. This is a guy whose resume is far more impressive than he is, mostly because he happened to land the role of Buzz Lightyear at the peak of his career. I don't really think that casting in movies is as brilliant as it is sometimes given credit. It is too much of a stretch for me to believe that certain actors are given a role because their character in a different movie was a certain type, and there is something interesting about comparing the two movies. While that may happen from time to time, I think it is more likely that casting directors just do the best with the limited resources available to them. Nevertheless, Allen is perfect in this, as the aging former TV star who knows he'll never have it better than he did in the past. He is a washed up actor, searching for meaning that he can only find by pretending to be someone he is not. And then aliens show up.

          Now is the time I should end the post with an appropriate quote from the movie. While it would be easy to use the TV show's tagline and Allen's character's character, Peter Quincy Taggart's motto: Never give up, never surrender. I won't. That doesn't make any sense here at all. Rather, I'll go with: By Grapthar's hammer, you will be avenged!