X-Philia on Parade
by Julie C. Roth
The first thing I learned when I started watching The X-Files
on TV was that David Duchovny has good lips. Not always, but often. On
a good-lip episode, they're full and just a little pouty and -- this is
the important part -- the ridge setting them off from the rest of his face
is particularly sharp. That ridge isn't so pronounced in every episode,
which either means that his lighting is sometimes off or that his makeup
person isn't always on the ball. Or perhaps it means some starlet kept
him up the night before, bruising them with her voracious, heather-plum
mouth that won't stop kissing him until the sun peeks in through the skewed
mini-blinds to cast its rays over their damp, spent bodies, which --
(Sorry.)
The second thing I learned when I started watching The X-Files was to make sure I finished eating before it came on. Creatures slithering under people's skin or getting coughed up in a clot of blood aren't very conducive to a healthy appetite. Nor are bowls full of bugs, or rotting corpses, or aliens coming out of people's mouths, or serial killers with odd metabolisms, regurgitating digestive juices on their overweight victims after luring them off of chat rooms on the Internet into cars, where they're found the next day all --
(Sorry again.)
And the third
thing I learned when I started watching The X-Files is that it's
a show with original plots, intelligent characters, clever dialogue, and
a strong female lead I'm not embarrassed to identify with (who, for extra
points, has red hair -- like yours truly).
I started watching The X-Files in its second season, back when the show was on Friday nights. My friend Karen and I would watch every episode together and debate which one of us could have Mulder when we got over our respective heartbreaks, and which of us could have country singer Lyle Lovett. This, and the occasional "Eeeeewwwwwww!" comprised our conversations those Friday nights, just like millions of people around the world.
At this point I think it proper to confess that I'm a fan. Not so much that I've been to the conventions or am a member of the David Duchovny Estrogen Brigade. But enough so that I've bookmarked the official X-files site and many unofficial sites as well. I'll probably buy the X-Files figurines when they come out. And I'm sure once the excitement dies down from the movie I'll stop dreaming I'm Mulder's new informant, feeding him information about alien pets and satanic moss and other otherworldly phenomena. I'm just a run-of-the-mill fan, like you.
So, as you can imagine, it was with great excitement that I took my seat in New York's famed Ziegfeld theater to see The X-Files Movie.
I was not disappointed. The plot revolves around aliens and conspiracies, and it makes room for all the familiar characters (except for Krycek and Scully's mom). None of the characters' intelligence or clever repartee was sacrificed in the transition to the big screen. In short, it has all the pieces in place to satisfy fans of both the series and of action movies in general.
Even so, it wasn't as good as the series. The pace of the movie is much faster, as befits action movies these days, but in this case that's not such a good thing. I hadn't noticed before how slow the pace of the TV show is. The characters think, they quibble, they follow false leads. The pace gives the audience a sense that Mulder and Scully really are puzzling out a mystery -- and in the process, the audience gets a chance to puzzle along with them and experience real suspense and wonder. Speeding the story to action-movie velocity does make everything more "exciting," I suppose, but it leaves the audience out in a way. We don't have time to ponder the mystery with the characters, we can only watch as they do it without us, at break-neck pace.
Another action-movie staple that hurts The X-Files is the plethora of special effects. We get to see the aliens in their true form, and they are indeed frightening. (Don't worry, your popcorn will be long gone by then.) But you know what? It didn't do it for me. Seeing the aliens proved to me a simple adage -- one that I think Chris Carter has been using to steer the series by: Nothing is as scary as the unknown. Even the most clearly wrought special effect hasn't the power that your imagination has to frighten you. And so I felt vaguely unsatisfied after seeing the aliens -- scary though they may be.
Finally, and perhaps worst of all the series-to-movie disappointments is this -- and I hesitate even to tell you this, because it may make you stay away from the film -- It's not a good-lip movie. I'm sorry, but it's true. Blame Tea Leoni.
Bottom line? The X-Files Movie is a good action movie with clever heroes, male and female, who use their brains more than their guns. But for the real goods, turn the tube to FOX on Sunday nights.
Julie is Executive Producer of NetGuide
(Cybergrrl originally posted this article on June 22, 1998.)
