The 2006 Nebraska Football Team

Jon:

There was this line Bill Callahan used to describe the Oakland Raiders football team he coached... it was ““We must be the dumbest team in America in terms of playing the game.”

Yeah. Maybe it was just a line, out of frustration, but here’s what happens when you suck. Everything you say and do is scrutinized beyond what it’s worth. If you’re successful, everyone takes what you say as if they are chewing on the best chocolate chip cookie ever made.

What comes to mind from the 2006 season?

Plays, especially that one.

Like a movie review, I watched the ‘06 Nebraska -Texas game again. I was sitting in my basement at 11:00 pm, and I screamed “OH FUCKING GOD” when I saw the play. I’d already lived it. Many of you have. It still hurts. Or not. I don’t know. Maybe you were young. A babe.

If you are a young Husker fan and you asked about 2006, it wasn’t about the 9-5 record. Maybe if you looked it up... you might say to yourself, “9-5”, that’s not so bad.

All these years later, it’s been about that play.

There was a lot more to 2006. There was the 28-10 loss to USC, where it was clear Bill Callahan might have understood the NFL, but not college football.

There was the loss to Oklahoma State, but ol’ Bill got us into the Big 12 championship game where we lost to Oklahoma. Then we lost again to Auburn in the Cotton Bowl.

The most beautiful thing about the 2006 football season...???

Corn Nation was born.

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Jon: I loved this movie. Who doesn’t love a post-apocalyptic movie with a hippie Michael Caine in it. It’s an interesting concept - a world without children. Like Japan or something. There are tons of Christian references. And then there is hope. Clive Owen is incredible.

Evan W: To be honest, I don’t know where to start with this movie. It wasn’t bad, and it really wasn’t good. There was a MAJOR plot-hole in my opinion, that really made the whole point of the movie seem insignificant.

Key was trying to escape the fascist country of Britain because she was pregnant. In this universe women were unable to get pregnant so she needed to get somewhere safe. Unless I missed it, the reason why women couldn’t get pregnant was never explained. That wasn’t a huge deal to me. My main point of confusion came from the fact that Key wanted to save her child, like any parent in that situation would, but they were trying to get to a sanctuary. This mysterious place wasn’t explained at all, it left me wondering if there were other women there who might be pregnant.

Another problem I had with the movie was that the British Army just stopped firing and let Theo and Key escape. If a fascist-run country’s military saw the first baby in 18 years it’s safe to assume they wouldn’t just let it escape. I have no idea why they just let them walk. I understand they were shocked and in awe of what they were seeing, but it just doesn’t make sense to me.

Another minor problem I had was when the uprising started. Theo ran into a bus and someone got shot, which caused blood to splatter on to the lens of the camera. This stayed on the screen for a good two minutes and it was pretty distracting to me. “Children of Men” had a great idea, but I think it was too short to do the story justice. Which is weird because I felt there were times in the movie where it drug on.

Patrick: I really enjoyed the psychological and sociological impact of dystopian literature and film when I was younger. For some reason I was drawn to the idea that society has fallen to the point of neglect and the future truly was bleak. The idea where society just shut down to the point of nihilism and anarchy intrigued me.

At some point in my mid to late 20’s I quickly grew away from these themes. Maybe it was a fact that I was starting to realistically become a functioning part of society. Or, maybe I was just getting older to the point where these ideas no longer seemed novel to me. I should probably go deeper into this but we really do not have the space and I do not think I would have the time to complete and decent analysis into this.

I have noticed that many of these stories have had a hard time making it properly to film. Maybe it is tough for filmmakers to channel what the story is really trying to get across in roughly two hours? I mean, to fully understand the downfall of a society one must get a rough idea of why thing are the way they were and dive deep into the human condition that is formed from it.

Some of these films do well. A Clockwork Orange comes to mind. In it they focused on a small microcosm of the society at hand. Maybe because of that it was easier to bring to the big screen. Then you also have The Handmaiden’s Tale. In it’s case it was made into a series which probably helped get it’s story across through multiple episodes.

This is another movie that does this well.

Children of Men takes a very well received novel and make it into a full length feature. It takes many of these themes and tries to make the audience understand the issues physically and mentally as the movie goes along. That is, society is no longer reproducing and we have no clue what to do about it.

For the most part, it does this. The director takes you emotionally into the current state of society where the outlook is bleak. Bleak to the point where there are suicide kits are available to the public. A society where there are very few operating governments left. The fact that Great Britain is one of them should tell you how bad things are (I kid, I kid...).

We find that one refugee woman is with child and that getting her safely to a place where she can give birth is the objective. Many groups want her and it it up to Clive Owen’s character to make the right decision and deliver her into the correct hands.

It has been awhile since I saw this. I do believe it was around the time that my interest in this genre was waning. It’s my guess that this fact made it tough for me to watch this through. Overall, it was a good movie that brought up many quandaries that are involved with the human condition.

Watch it if you want to see where humans can take themselves. Good and bad.

Nate M: This was my last submission of this series.

I’ve seen it before, but I don’t think I truly appreciated it because time and time again the movie came up as one of the top sci-fi films of the past decade or so.

Maybe we should do a top list of the the top science fiction films of the last decade. Unfortunately, the climate of films has actually probably hurt the sci-fi industry the most because with science fiction you are either going to have the Matrix (which was hated by film critics) or you’ll have some other films (which there are many) which earned no money. Film studios appear to not be willing to invest in science fictions films as much as they used to.

Just think if they tried releasing 2001: A Space Odyssey today. There’s no way.

Is Children of Men the last great science fiction movie? I’m sure some will say District 9, Ex Machina, I am Legend, the Martian or Inception.

I love Interstellar, but I think that’s a completely different type of science fiction movie than Children of Men.

The actual last great science fiction movie is Arrival. Such a good movie.

Underrated is Lobster and Upgrade.

I LOVE SCIENCE FICTION SUGGESTIONS SO PLEASE PUT IN THE COMMENTS.

Andy: Children of Men snuck up on me. I didn’t watch it until it came out on DVD and the main reason for that was that Clive Owen was starring. In the late 2000’s, I became a huge Own fan after watching pictures like Children of Men, King Arthur, Derailed, the wonderfully violent and wacky Shoot ‘Em Up and the outstanding Inside Man with Owen, Denzel & Jodie Foster.

Much can be said about the story, themes, politics and a world where many just soldier ahead day to day in a world that is basically on the clock. What I remember about this movie most is the action and the way it was filmed.

The two escapes first from the ambush, when Julianne Moore is shockingly killed, and then from the farm/safehouse when Clive Owen learns they plan to kill him & use the baby as a political tool as well as the street combat between the British troops and the rebels near end - these scenes made me feel as if I was in the middle of the action and stressed me out and caused me to tense up every second as strongly as any movie I ever saw.

During the ambush and the farm escape, the POV is solely from the escapees and you watch in horror as more enemies constantly appear and close the gap. There’s no wide shot of typical chase scenes, rather a claustrophobic feeling of having to find an escape route and watching helplessly as the enemies grow in number and close to within inches. The same can be said of the battle scene.

In all of them, there is no excitement or exhilaration involving the special effects, stunts, gunfire and explosions. There’s just a sensation of being chased right next to Clive and company and wanting nothing more than to make it a few more yards, find an opening, survive and escape.

We’d love to hear thoughts about “Children of Men,” at least I would because I’d like to get some more opinions. Next week we’ll be watching the first movie I’ve picked in this series “Superbad.” I’m a huge comedy fan, and this one is a classic.