Maybe my head is still in the clouds? My drive and ambition are still that of a twenty year old, yet my body is one heading toward middle age. I didn't start thinking about this dichotomy until recently, which has begun my nostalgia for my childhood. There's a freedom you have as a kid. It opens the world and the universe to all sorts of possibilities. You don't know what you don't know, so life is this boundless one of possibility. I could spend hours outside, running through our woods and pretending to be Han Solo or Rambo. That felt like an achievement. I would create something new everyday, conjure up some story, and act it out, free of judgment and reality. Discoveries were constant. I was a perpetual explorer. This can't last, though, and the bitch of living long is learning how screwy things actually are in the world. That freedom evaporates the more you learn.
Arena is the kind of film that restores that childhood glee for a few hours. It feels like the kind of film a five year old would dream up, hoping to convince his friends to join him in acting it out. This is a joyful movie, a lighthearted pulp adventure that brought me back to those long gone moments of my youth. Here, the good is good, but evil isn't so evil. It's a place where even the bad guys are really just mild annoyances. The problems can be solved easier, and common sense and justice is returned. Complexity is a great thing to have in fiction; it better represents the truth of the world. There's something to be said, though, for brief moments with stories unencumbered of emotional baggage.
Arena is just plain fucking awesome. The effects are great, even though modern audiences would call them "cheesy," a term that annoys me more and more with each passing year. There's some really impressive make-up and puppet work on display, a lot of it as good as anything Jim Henson or the various Star Trek series every produced. The filmmakers paid attention to detail, which saves a film like this. A real culture was developed. There are class systems, businesses, and a real way of life. The station looks like an inhabitable environment. In a move of real commitment, the boxing matches have actual rules and regulations. Light beams are projected down to the fighters, giving them handicaps and ensuring the boxers can perform as actual competitors.
Satterfield makes an excellent square-jawed hero. His blond hair, Captain America face, and physique work well with his roguish charm and humor. Claudia Christian is great, as usual, giving the film's best performance as the no-bullshit Quinn. The rest of the cast is equally cool, even though they have to act beneath layers of make-up. Empire Pictures really put effort and money into Arena. This isn't a cheap time filler; it wants to be a cosmic adventure, and it succeeds magnificently. During its running time, that childhood freedom returns.