10 - The Michigan Daily - Monday, June 29, 1998
'Future' is excellent extension of 'X-Files' season."

By Gabe Smith
Daly Arts Witer
"This is weird," said Fox Mulder as he attempt-
ed to trek through the cornfield. About a second
later, the unMistakable voice of his partner is
heard.
"I agree. This is weird," remarked Dana Scully as
she brushed aside blades from the manyr com plants
that surrounded her. That the two were walking
through a cornfield wasn't weird in itself, but it was
weird that the comfield was in the middle of the
Texas desert.
Such, is the nature of "X-Files: Fight the
Future," the feature film that opened up June 19 to
a whopping 31 million viewers at the box office.
For Twentieth Century Fox, this is yet another
coup in a long line of quality shows and movies.
The film picks up where the finale of the fifth
season left off. The X-Files have been burned
down and closed. The two fabled F.B. agents,
Fox Mulder (played wonderfully by David
Duchovny) and Dana Scully (played equally as
well by Gillian Anderson), have been reassigned
to an anti-terrorism unit investigating a bomb
threat in the heart of Dallas. The bomb is a cover-
tip to a much bigger plot concerning alien colo-

nization and the destruction of the human race -
nothing that Earth hasn't already faced.
In a nutshell, aliens landed on Earth at approxi-
mately 35,000 B.C. and have
laid dormant for millennia.
The aliens exist in the form of f
a pathogen that travs s X-fileS
through a black oil medium.
Recently, the pathogen has Fight the
mutated, and when the black Future
oil medium invades a human **'k
body, the alien begins to form At Showcase and
inside the human host. Briarwood
The Syndicate, a group of
elderly, shady government 4
agents, has been secretly,
negotiating a treaty with the
aliens and creating a vac-
cine. They have also been
creating clones that are inunune to the alien black
oil.
The movie is a lot to digest in a 2:10 time frame
that also includes killer bees, transgenic corn
crops, ghost trains, the Federal Emergency
Management Association (FEMA) and shady con-
spirators.

One of these conspirators is Alvin Kurtzweil
(Martin Landau). Landau's perfornance is done
well as are performances by other supporting cast
members such as Strughold (Annin Mueller-Stahl),
Cancer Man (William B. Davis) and Well-
Manicured Man (John Neville). And yes, the Lone
Gunmen do make an appearance.
Perhaps a little less dark in appearance than a
typical "X-Files" episode, the film still portrays a
forbidding scenario for the future of mankind.
Yet, this movie is not really a movie at all. It is
merely a - $63-million, s'ell-done, extended
episode. It is a bridge for the upcoming new sea-
son beginning on November 1 - another piece in
the intricate puzzle that fans have grown to love
and respect.
Fans will not be disappointed as many answers
are revealed, but casual movie-goers will be
extremely confused about the details of the movie.
Explanations are given, but the shear amount of
detail will leave movie-goers wanting simplicity. It
is an unattainable task to please both the hard-core
fans of the show and the casual viewer out to enjoy
a flick.
X-Philes are intrinsically spoiled. The show has
jumped in leaps and bounds in creativity, putting

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out a good product each week for viewers. But the
show is so intricate that casual viewers are left out.
So what comes next for the hit series? Critics
are already hailing the X-Files as the next Star
Trek The longevity is possible; the scenarios, end-
less.
But major changes will come soon. The show,
which has wrapped up filming for the upcoming*
season, has moved to Los Angelas on account of
the whining of David Duchomny, who wanted to
be closer to his wife.
Duchosus's contract is also up at the end of the
season, and he has made it vehemently clear that
he does not want to come back for a seventh sea-
son.
"The X-Files" without Duchovy is a lot like
Star Wars without Harrison Ford.
Gillian Anderson is locked in for two more sea-
sons, so fans will be able to see the ever-radiant
Dana Scully for a little sshile longer.
Much is set to come, as foreshadowed at the
end of the movie when the X-Files are reopened.
Mulder and Scully are back on the job. The mosie
both sheds light on the series by supplying long-
awaited answers. and leaves fans to us onder shat's
next.
LEONARD
Continued from Page 9
him. Ile cas just thenin riing 'PulpV
Fiction' but he liked Rum Punch'
because there sere three characters in
it from a book called ihe Suitch'
slich he stole from a Iokstorew hen
li s"as a teenagerr and non he inds
them againiin this book.
Leonard's agent put thie book's rights
onnholdd forTaranino an dldftie film-
maker to see ihat happened with his
next picture. Pulp Ficioni became an
inernational smash. and. sh>rtly afer
its release. Miramax and Tlarantino
snatched up the rights to four o'f
Leonard's books.
The Coen brothers, the team behind
the )sear-winnting Fargo. are aiaplt-
ing I eonard's "Cuba fbrec' the stor'
of a gun salesman in Cuba at the end of
the 1800s. The project is for Universal
and Leonard said that as of now. "they
don'td ink thLN'll direct it
Fans can look for the teleisioi*
series "Maximum Bob this fail on
ABC. Beai Bridges plays the title
character in the shos based on the
Leonard novel.
eonard also just finished his work
on Be Cool," a sequel to "Get Shorty."
Be started researching the book last
summer, finished it about three weeks
ago and expects it totte released some-
time by January.
The story centers around Chili
Palmer's dealings swith an unhapp
member of a music group called
Chicks Intenational, which does Spice
Girls covers.
1998 MGM, the company behind "Get
Shorty'" is in the process of getting the
sequel into production, and John
Trasolta has expressed an interest in
reprising his Golden Globe-'inning
role..
For all the aspiring writers out there
Leonard's advice is simple: You ha'c
to read."
So grab one of Leonard's 34 novels
and prepare for a trip to the land of
cool characters and crackling cnver-
nations.

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