Genre Character of the Week: Major Alan “Dutch” Schaefer

One of my favourite things about showing my kids classics of Fantasy, Horror and Science Fiction is when they see something that is pretty amazing and it blows them away now just like it did me years ago when I first watched/read/played the thing.  Case in point?  Predator.

A year before he would direct my favourite Christmas movie of all time, John McTiernan directed a film that followed one of the simplest premises you can do in horror.  Man vs. Monster.  The monster is some sort of alien, which has come to Earth to hunt us, and the man in question is the leader of a team of army specialists, a man who never loses his cool, Major Alan “Dutch” Schaefer (played by Arnold Schwarzenegger).

Dutch leads a team of five men specialized in rescue missions, and it is for this reason that they have been called to Guatemala.  A Cabinet minister has been kidnapped by guerrillas and needs to be quickly and quietly brought home.  The problem is that the mission is a little more complicated than that, and oh yeah, there is a horrible alien running amok hunting humans.

Here’s what I love about Dutch.  The guy is incredibly good at his job – yes he does overlook one obvious plot hole about the creature, but other than that he is a man limited to his own abilities in fighting a clearly superior enemy.  After twenty-five years the film still totally holds up, and yes, I hope when they’re old enough I can show it to my (potential) grand kids.

Things I've Noticed: Good things come to those who wait

For years now I've been holding off some of my favourite Holiday films from my kids - mostly due to age. A few years ago I got to show my oldest daughter my favourite Christmas movie of all time, and this year I get to show it to my youngest.

Waiting for my kids to be age appropriate has been pretty rough, as many of my favourite holiday films are not for kids, but this year I can finally show them all of my favourite (except for Bad Santa - I love that movie but my kids will only be allowed to watch it when I'm no longer in a position to stop them.)

So this year we get to see three of my favourites, and for your reading pleasure here they are:

1. Die Hard - best Christmas movie ever, seriously, I cannot think of a better film to get the holiday cheer rolling. You have holiday songs, explosions, and machine guns.

2. Gremlins - second favourite Christmas movie, gifts, mogwai, references to The Time Machine, and a young Corey Feldman! Man, Horror mixes well with every season.

3. National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation - I don't even know where to start with this one, Grizwalds, the best sledding scene ever and one heck of a Turkey.

Honestly one of the best parts of my kids growing up is no matter what age they are, I've got all sorts of genre stuff I get to show them!

Genre Character of the Week: Columbus

Deep down I think everyone would like to believe that in a crisis we would act like Bruce Willis in Die Hard. While all hell was breaking loose we would steadily and methodically take care of the problem and save the day. To be fair, I do love Die Hard, it's one of my favourite Christmas movies, but at the same time, lets be honest, I'm no Bruce Willis. When looking around at characters in these kind of terrible scenarios, I think the one I come closest to is Columbus from Zombieland.

Part of what really appeals to me about the character, despite his inherent awkward sweetness, is his collection of rules. Very much in tune with the attitude of my very first post, he has decided to be the very best Zombie apocalypse survivor he can be, and to do so he follows a pretty specific list of rules. These rules have allowed him to survive far longer than many others in his terrible new world, and in the end, they rarely let him down.

As a character (played very well by Jessie Eisenberg, pictured right), Columbus starts out as a University student with very few actual social connections. He lives in the comfortable bubble of his apartment and does most of his social interactions through the computer. In fact it is only after the world has been overrun by zombies that he is willing to step out of his door.

As with most other Genre Characters of the Week, I love the fact that the character has a story arc, that he changes throughout the film, and even in a world where mankind has lost, he begins to find hope, friendship and the ability to change into a better person.