Rage

I'm here to say right now, and I don't care who knows it, that I like actors who yell. Big, loud, gut-bustin', ear-bendin' yelling. I feel like I'm getting my money's worth that way.

I've seen my share of old movies, being something of a Renaissance Man and all, and I've seen my share of actors who yell. I guess it all started with Marlon Brando in that movie A Streetcar Named Desire, whatever that means. He yells real good in it. Then there's Lee J. Cobb who's quite a yeller, unless he puts on his wavy toupee, smokes a pipe, and starts acting all avuncular. And then there's Rod Steiger, who not only yells, but gets all sweaty, and twitchy, and studdery, and talks real fast. Very cool. But the best of them all, in my opinion, is George C. Scott.

Boy, can this guy yell. Sure, he does other things, like acting and such, too, but he sure is good at yelling. The best ever. He could make you pee in your pants, just a little. And yell he does in Rage, a movie he also directed in 1972. He doesn't yell much in Rage, but when he does, you sit up and take notice, and maybe pee your pants, just a little.

Without too many spoilers, Rage is a story about a gentle sheepfarmer (with awesome caterpillar-like eyebrows) and his son who are accidentally contaminated by Government nerve gas. The dose is fatal to the son, and the sheepfarmer (George C. Scott) ain't none too well. Of course, seeing how it's George C. Scott, his first reaction in finding out about it is to yell. Awesome. Then he decides to wreak some serious havoc. And wreak it he does.

Well, here's where things get a little twisty thematically, as my English teacher might say. Although, as actor and director, George C. Scott delivers on the violence, it's not emotionally satisfying, as we all know violence should be. To use a word that my psychotherapist is very fond of, it's not cathartic. We're all set up for this emotional release through violence, the best way if you ask me, and we don't get it, because he kills mostly innocent people, and although he destroys the facility where the nerve gas tests are conducted, the nerve gas survives. Bummer. And a rip-off.

Or is it? The violence seems pointless because none of the guilty parties are punished. But maybe that's the point? The pointlessness of violence, especially against an all-powerful enemy? Maybe having no point is the point? All I can say is I don't like my pizza deep-dish.

So shame on George C. Scott for promising to deliver a movie where a man gets a little justice and satisfaction from an irresponsible and unfeeling government, and instead gives us a movie that asks us to think. It's not fair.

                                                    George C. Scott fixin' to get all rage-y and such.