The House of Sparrows

HELL NIGHT

2012-02-12T00:06:00.001-08:00

Any College, U.S.A. - Greek Row is rocked by a wild, wild night of costumed partying. A contingent from Alpha Sigma Rho splits form the festivities and brings four pledges to a house shrouded in horror. And what a house it is:

Previously owned by the Garth family, the mansion has been empty ever since Mr. Garth killed his entire family (including some seriously deformed children) before hanging himself. The four pledges must spend the night herein to prove their worthiness. The gate is locked behind them, and a long night begins.

The 1981 film combines two sub-genres of horror, melding the then-fashionable slasher horror with the somewhat outmoded spooky house horror. Watching the film I was struck by the effectiveness of the location shooting - between the lovely, well-dressed sets and the costumes affected by the partygoers, the film plays like a strangely time-tripping, almost Gothic effort.

It's a modest film, to be sure, but it comes by its passionate cult honestly, balancing some genuine shocks with some quietly realized characters and plot details. Some details are left for us to figure out (the details of what really went down at Garth Manor twelve years ago are hinted at but never pieced together - a remake would surely kill its pacing by over-explaining these matters). The weirdly conservative morality of the slasher model is nicely upended when the bullies are killed first.
Stock characters exhibit reservoirs of decency, including a sex-crazed goofball (Vincent Van Patten, natch) who comes thru in the end, sneaking into a police evidence room to retrieve weaponry to bring to the rescue. Even the inevitable sex is put off by characters who wanna get to know each other first.

I watched this (and I'm glad I did) on assignment from the Final Girl Film Club, run by the recently relocated Stacie Ponder. A discussion surfaces there now and again debating whether 1977 or 1981 is the better year for horror. Hell Night is a compelling argument for 1981: a deft balance of two horror formulae, making effective use of a few locations, and telling a simple story with a smart eye to detail and a surprisingly deep capacity for atmosphere.

Diaz.

2012-02-08T11:53:00.000-08:00

I've long maintained that Joel Shepard, the film/video programmer at San Francisco's Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, is a national treasure, bringing to his 90-odd seat room the kind of remarkable and diverse film/video program that I wish every town in America could have. I would say this even if we had not been colleagues at one point - though I haven't worked at YBCA in years, Joel's film program keeps me coming back, despite the exciting, and occasionally charged, differences of opinion that occasionally emerge between us.

Joel is currently on a tour that includes stops at Rotterdam and the Philippines. He's excited about the work that he's planning on showing at YBCA in the coming months, and so am I. BUT: one work he's excited about possibly bringing is Florentina Hubaldo, CTE, a five-hour opus by Filipino filmmaker Lav Diaz.

There are times when the differences between Joel's perceptions and mine are somewhat painful, and this is one of those times. Here's what I wrote after seeing Evolution of a Filipino Family, a ten-hour film widely regarded as Diaz' masterpiece.

"Some things to remember if you're making a TEN AND A HALF HOUR MOVIE -

--Cinematic conventions are your friend. Especially when you're making a movie this long. Making repeated statements that you hate conventional stories within your movie (by, say, interrupting stories coming from radios, or even the mouths of your most likeable characters ever chance you get) is a great way to alienate your audience.

--No matter how long your movie is, something needs to happen in every scene. It doesn't have to be splashy, it can be quite sedate, but something needs to be happening. If your audience is willing to engage your day-long opus, you need to give them enough to keep them anchored and interested. You should avoid shots of roads, and watching people walk down them for three minutes. And you should avoid having a long chain of such shots with nothing else happening.

--If your audience is going to have any kind of empathy for the painful death of one of your characters, you need to make sure that you've given the audience enough reason to care about the character. Particularly if the character's death scene is at least fifteen minutes of him stumbling down an endless street, bleeding.

--"Slow motion shot of a river flowing. A big log falls from the sky and splashes in the water. A voice says "I'm falling." The river flows. A couple minutes later, another log falls from the sky and splashes in the water. A voice says "I'm floating." The river flows. A couple minutes later, another log falls from the sky and splashes in the water. A voice says, "I'm falling." " Do not put a scene like this in your movie.

"Lav Diaz's 630-minute film EVOLUTION OF A FILIPINO FAMILY has some amazing stuff in it, including a strong and surreal portrait of life under the Marcos regime (and a harrowing look at the violence after), a palpable fear that the horrible stories being played out in the film have befallen thousands in the Philippines (thousands of children-turned-murderers, thousands of old women dying surrounded by photographs of departed loved ones, thousands of sisters waiting forever for missing brothers), and a hell-bent determination to portray reality in its rawest form.

"Alas, such rawness manifests in a Dogmaesque B+W video style, with very little to distinguish the story's present from its various flashbacks. Diaz eschews camera filters with an aim towards portraying brutal, unfettered reality, but it winds up bleaching out his images at the exact points they need to resonate. Actors are forced to do absolutely nothing for long, long stretches of time.

"There are enough instances throughout where Diaz keeps his scenes brief and to-the-point, where he does pay attention to cinematic convention, and these scenes are a joy. None of the problems with the film can be blamed on the cast, all of whom are completely natural. The eleven years over which this film was made are evident in the final product - this thing was given plenty of room to grow, and seeing the actors age before your very eyes on screen does lend the whole project a certain (though by no means unique) gravitas.

"But it is frustrating that Diaz is too often willing to subordinate his cast's performances, his own fine filmmaking, and the history of his country to a style that doesn't serve it. Particularly when the film is this fucking long."

I've never felt so at odds with a movie that so many have felt is a masterpiece (and not even a movie universally derided as terrible has left me gibbering and screaming outside the venue afterward, as this film left me). Praise for this film became a sign of a critic I couldn't trust. I'm amused, and not surprised, that even a Rotterdam Film Festival programmer admits to being put to sleep by Diaz' work.

And yet...

I can't help but be curious about Florentina Hubaldo, CTE. It seems that at least some of my issues from my previous encounter are lifted, with Diaz shooting on HD instead of whatever B&W shit EVOLUTION was shot on. Plus FHCTE is half as long as EVOLUTION, clocking in at a mealy five hours. Joel's painful earnestness in describing it would be enough to make me check something out, and even though a ten-hour ordeal can be hard to forget, enough years have passed to dim the memories of that fraught, painful screening. Plus my words remind me that there were many worthy things in the film - perhaps a half-as-long film won't bury such things under so much indulgence.

Diaz' supporters agree that they demand much of the viewer - we're at odds on whether what the viewer gets in return for the time investment is worth it. Perhaps FHCTE will change my mind. We'll see.

BACCANO!

2012-02-07T22:27:00.000-08:00

New York, 1930ish. Amid the violence of Prohibition, gangs battle for control of territory and booze. But there's a very special brew making the rounds much more potent than alcohol. And various Mafiosi simply aren't dying, despite the bullets being fired into them. Added to this already volatile concoction are an assortment of passengers battling aboard a transcontinental railway, as well as a pair of decidedly wacky and costume-crazy thieves.

Spun from a series of light novels by Ryohgo Narita, BACCANO! plays fast and loose with chronology, plot, time, storytelling, maybe reality itself. Its bizarre structure lets its characters roam and act freely, and its nonlinearity is constantly shedding new light on previously established events. Which would be maddening if it weren't so damn fun - for all the bloodshed, the series manages to keep tongue firmly in cheek, and heart stapled to sleeve. Without losing any of its suspense, the story is generous to its characters, rewarding the innocent and even allowing its myriad psychopaths to discover their hearts (on their own neurotic terms, of course).

The generosity extends to us, as well: the open-endedness of its story, and its insistence on non-endings, allow the characters to remain with us even after the series stops. Not ends. Never, ever ends.

RIP Eiko Ishioka

2012-01-26T17:11:00.000-08:00

I loved (and still love) her work. Heaven's about to get beautiful.

Monday, Monday

2012-01-23T15:05:00.000-08:00

It can all be a bit much. 2012 is looking to be an apocalyptic year indeed for cinema - the death of 35mm film exhibition is reported to be imminent, with even so active a proponent of classic film as Eddie Muller talking as if this year's Noir City festival will be the last in its current form.

I'm somewhere between the rabid 35mm diehards and those longing for the death of it and the dawning of a new, digital age. Actually, the embrace of digital filmmaking technology by some of my favorite filmmakers speaks well at least to the future of moviegoing (mine at least). And the huge number of rep cinemas in my area ensures that I'll probably be enjoying classic film in its original format for a little while longer than most. But I realize that this is a privileged position, and that the nature of the marketplace means that most filmgoers are having this choice made for them. And I can't help but feel like we're going to lose much in this transition, and that much of our cinematic history will simply be lost in the shuffle.

Add to this brew of uncertainty the far-from-welcome news that San Francisco Film Society director Bingham Ray has died while attending the Sundance Film Festival. The man had brought some fantastic films to American screens, and that he should die so young (and soon after accepting the mantle of the SFFS) is insanely cruel (compounded by the fact that he was hired to replace the fondly remembered Graham Leggat, who died mere months ago). One can't put the sadness of those who never knew him over that of his family and friends, of course, but the fact remains the cinema has lost one of its real champions. I never knew the man personally, but reading lovely tributes like this make me wish I had, and make me mourn his passing all the more.

And I notice a feeling of restlessness as I look at the local film schedules - the various rep houses and film festivals are engaging in fantastic programming, and there are the usual conflicts (the Castro Theatre screens 35mm prints of THE FRENCH CONNECTION and YEAR OF THE DRAGON the same day that the Mostly British festival shows GUMSHOE and STORMY MONDAY, for example). Already a difficult choice for some cinephiles, but made more so with questions of the future of 35mm looming over our heads. All of these films exist on video, of course, but the choice of which movie to see is strongly colored by the knowledge that this may be the last shot at any of them in a theatre.

But even those who don't live and die by their local rep schedules are going to be affected by the imminent changes to our cinemascape. And so we wait.

THE DUELLISTS

2012-01-15T23:52:00.000-08:00

Keith Carradine and Harvey Keitel are intriguing casting choices for this, Joseph Conrad's tale of a pair of forever-fighting French soldiers. A mild spat over soldierly duty turns into an ongoing feud that the men take across numerous Napoleonic battlefields and through three decades, eventually achieving notoriety among their countrymen even as they observe the strict protocols governing such feuds.

Casting a pair of Americans was a savvy move on director Ridley Scott's part: perhaps there's some subtle commentary on American militarism intended, or perhaps their Americanness serves as an alienness that sets our heroes (heh) apart from their countrymen (who, in turn, are played mostly by British thespians). In any event, the story of the conflict waged by these two men is absolutely engrossing; the characters that surround them are uniformly well-played (Tom Conti stands out as a gentle physician all too familiar with the toll of warfare on men's bodies and spirits); the combat scenes are suspenseful (including a bizarre interlude in which Carradine and Keitel must fight side-by-side); and it ends with what is surely one of the most gloriously ambiguous sunrises in film history. This is a favorite of many of my peers; after finally seeing it theatrically it may well be one of mine.

SEPARATE LIES

2012-01-12T23:36:00.000-08:00

(Many of my online friends were posting about the season premiere of DOWNTON ABBEY with an online fervor usually only seen on Super Bowl Sunday. I haven't had the pleasure of ever seeing the series, though I hope to rectify that one day, since I've enjoyed other work by DA creator Julian Fellowes in the past. Many saw GOSFORD PARK, but few, I suspect, took in his film SEPARATE LIES, about which I wrote the following clumsy but heartfelt appraisal over six years ago.)

Beautifully realized domestic drama/whodunit by Julian Fellowes (writer of GOSFORD PARK). Quiet and intimate, with Tom Wilkinson and Emily Watson delivering powerhouse performances as completely ordinary people. A pair of performances with absolute clarity and honesty - we totally understand why these people can't stay married, and why, despite some flagrant infidelity, they can't hate one another, either. Wilkinson and Watson lay their souls bare with a minimum of histrionics.

The film could never have been made in America. Not without our heroes shouting at each other or sweaty love scenes between our heroes and their flings. We just don't appreciate acting that isn't showy.

Anyway, Fellowes is great with details and dialogue - if there was a director born to give us a perfect film adaptation of a Pinter play, it is Fellowes.

2012 afterword: My good friend Aaron Luk, when talking about this film post-screening, gently observed "There are no small problems." Which neatly encapsulates the gentleness and the urgency of this film in addition to so much else beyond cinema. I'm pleased that the film elicited such a strong, sage response, an aphorism that has continued to reverberate over the ensuing years. This, among other things, is what the movies are for.

WEEK END

2012-01-08T19:11:00.000-08:00

It is a vindictive and unpleasant film, representing Jean-Luc Godard at his angriest and least playful. It starts as gentle as it's ever going to get, with an unhappily married couple travelling out of town to care for a sick relative (mainly to ensure their presence in his will). They encounter increasingly violent and chaotic conflict en route (including a memorable traffic jam that seems to stretch for miles), until they wind up in the middle of several revolutions from which their material comforts are no longer any defense.

A friend I saw it with said that it was the closest Godard's come to making a horror film, and I can't disagree. It's as pissed off a response to capitalism as anything this side of von Trier - it's like Godard imagined his fellow Frenchmen becoming Americans, and pursued the fancy to its logical ends. Perhaps to one observing the French middle class in the mid- to late-1960s such a notion wasn't too much of a stretch. Sadly, Godard's misanthropy extends to the revolutionaries who take over the final reels of the film, who are depicted as assholes at best and cannibalistic rapists at worst. Such vivid anti-humanism only dilutes his polemics - you can feel Godard's contempt for not being able to name the authors of the texts that his characters read from, word for word.

It's a film that makes Pasolini's Salò seem optimistic by comparison. At least there some sort of perverse love bloomed from the wreckage of the film (even if just two soldiers dancing in a clumsy embrace). Here a wife devours her husband's flesh and asks for seconds. Godard offers no comfort here, or any solutions. The film, in the end, comes off as petulant and childish as his fight choreography.

[REC]2

2012-01-04T22:16:00.000-08:00

Picking up apparently seconds after the end of the first film, a Barcelona SWAT team gears up to enter a quarantined building. Recording their incursion with video cameras, the team captures both the escalating horror within the building and the unusual actions of a doctor ordered to accompany them. Also entering the building are a trio of kids whose own video footage captures still more horror, including the startling arrival of a survivor of the plague's previous onslaught.

It's always a bold move to begin a sequel right where its predecessor left off, and the makers of the [REC] series move quickly to keep us engaged. This, happily, is no mere rehash of the previous film; though the SWAT team offer new viewers a perfect anchor to the carnage, there's quite a lot of callbacks to the previous film. This includes a moment that effectively upends [REC]'s brilliant closing image. Happily none of these reveals completely undermines what we've previously experienced.

I couldn't imagine a sequel to the previous film, which ended its story so beautifully. Though I can't imagine where a sequel to this one would go either (two are planned), I gotta say I'm eager to see what they cook up next.

2011: The House of Sparrows Top 20

2012-01-01T09:42:00.000-08:00

The Golden Sparrow: MYSTERIES OF LISBON

The 20 (in order seen):

AND EVERYTHING IS GOING FINE
EVANGELION 2.0: YOU WILL (NOT) ADVANCE
UNCLE BOONMEE WHO CAN RECALL HIS PAST LIVES
OF GODS AND MEN
FAST FIVE
DIRTY DIARIES
TRIGUN: BADLANDS RUMBLE
THE TRIP
THE GUARD
ESSENTIAL KILLING
BELLFLOWER
CONTAGION
DRIVE
THE HOLE
THE SKIN I LIVE IN
INTO THE ABYSS
LE HAVRE
J. EDGAR
MELANCHOLIA
THE DESCENDANTS

Underseen, Undervalued, Underetc.:

THE BEAVER
RESTLESS
THE WAY

and a Happy New Year

2012-01-01T09:10:00.000-08:00

Your proprietor wishes you nothing but goodness for 2012. There are a couple of posts percolating, but I'm happy to say I'm too enmeshed in goings-on with family and friends to really sit down and generate them. At least one end of 2011 list is forthcoming, and should hit by the time people are well and truly sick of 2011 best-ofs.

I'm not sorry to see this year end by any stretch (dig back in the archives to late September if you wanna see why), but I'm eager to share the bounties of 2012 (be they cinematic or otherwise) with you. I hope you're well!

A CHRISTMAS CAROL

2011-12-20T20:52:00.000-08:00

It's a gorgeous production, really. I think the original story is absolutely foolproof in the horror and the humanity it evokes (and that its message is timeless), and all an adaptation really has to do is commit to the characters and the words, but my goodness. George C. Scott gives a full-blooded, totally human Scrooge - cold-blooded at the start, but every little reaction he gives on the way back to humanity's embrace is well-calibrated, building on the one before it. And the whole damn cast commits - among others, who knew that David Warner had such reservoirs of vulnerability to draw upon?

A mention of the late Edward Woodward (yes he died two years ago, but I miss him still). I remember watching this with my mom, the first night it aired. Budding cinephile that I was, I was digging the period detail, the effectiveness of the performances and photography, and just having a nice pre-holiday with mom and this story. But good lord, when the Ghost of Christmas Present bounded in, Mom and I were both agape. Who the hell is this guy? Bedecked in white fur, holly laurels, and an impossible mane of hair, Woodward is the ultimate, pre-eminent party animal, both Lord of the Dance and one of the pubgoers from Wire's "A Serious Of Snakes". Watching him playfully fucking with Scrooge on their tour of Christmas present, and then seeing that mischief turn vicious as he delivers a WITHERING judgment on him, is an absolute joy. I wasn't at all surprised when Woodward returned to CBS the following year in his own series, and I like to think that some executive saw him booming through A CHRISTMAS CAROL and, for some beautifully obscure reason, said "Holy shit, this guy, THIS is our Robert McCall."

(Thanks to fellow Woodwardian Stacia at She Blogged by Night for the second image above.

And Merry Christmas to you.)

the Cassavetes dream

2011-12-08T23:07:00.000-08:00

In the dream I'm watching a Cassavetes film.

It is the opening night of a play (so I assume the film is OPENING NIGHT, which I've never seen). I'm watching the film from within, travelling like a camera through various rooms backstage.

I note a tuxedo'd Cassavetes as director, pacing with a strange focused aimlessness. He is the director, after all. Gena Rowlands is in this lovely purple costume. Everything's tension and hushed excitement.

I slip alone into a small ready room and start crying. I'm aware that this moment is lost, even as I walk within it.

The show, now an opera, begins, continues, and ends.

Everybody's buzzed after the show. I'm offering congratulations to passing cast members. Soon I am brought to John, lucid but reclining on a brown sofa. He's happy to see me. He asks me if I'd ever seen "Prucci" (the opera just performed). I tell him no - he recommends it. I ask him if he conceived a fully mountable production of "Prucci" for the film. "Not quite," he says, allowing that he wanted the production to look full and convincing for the film, but that he stopped short of basically mounting the whole thing.

A huge rainstorm outside. Getting home will be tough, since I walked to the venue. It clears a bit, and I'm offered a ride home by one of the performers. She's a striking, dark-haired woman in black leather jacket and the tightest, shiniest, thickest black vinyl trousers I've ever seen on someone (in either reality or in dreams). "Come on," she says, and splits.

John gives me this warm but knowing look, chuckles, and says, "Yeah, you gotta go." I do of course.

Outside the woman has turned into a more earthy, but still charming woman who speaks to me in a recognizably East Coast accent. She asks me if I live in the dorms. I tell her I do. She laughs, says she hasn't lived in the dorms since she was older than me. She's 29. I tell her I'm forty. Visibly impressed, she tells me that clearly my battery's still running. And then the alarm clock goes off and fucks it all up.

Housekeeping

2011-12-08T22:24:00.000-08:00

You may recall that your proprietor was recently displaced from his apartment by a fire that tore through the building a couple of months back. I'm pleased to report that I've secured a place to live (after rooming in the homes of three different, dear friends), and am moving into a room in a Victorian just 1.5 blocks from my former-and-ideally-future residence. I move in early next week, and am relieved to have a space for at least the immediate future that is mine.

Thanks to everyone who wrote or tweeted their support. I'm blessed to have such thoughtful well-wishers, and your friendship has been a beacon through a darker period than I ever hope to experience again.

MELANCHOLIA

2011-12-08T12:35:00.000-08:00

Justine isn't happy. Surrounded by family, friends, and colleagues during her wedding dinner, Justine's profound sense of depression and alienation casts a thick pall over the proceedings. This is evident to no one so much as Justine's doting (if frustrated) sister Claire, and Claire's husband John (who financed Justine's wedding). An untold number of days later, Justine's mood seems to change as a mysterious planet pulls dangerously close to Earth's orbit.

While watching MELANCHOLIA I couldn't help but flash onto Hitchcock's THE BIRDS. Like that film, the supernaturally-driven disaster of the second half seems indirectly caused by the heroine's actions and moods during the more realistically domestic first half. (Further Hedrenism comes in a painful horseback riding scene that recalls MARNIE.) But outside this atypical rhyme of another filmmaker's work, MELANCHOLIA is a Lars von Trier film through and through. The shifts from gorgeously rendered effects shots to documentary-styled scenes of domestic disturbance are familiar from BREAKING THE WAVES and THE KINGDOM, and the completely ineffective intellectual, aggressive male (played effectively here by Kiefer Sutherland) is a staple of Trier's work all the way back to EPIDEMIC.

Trier's use of an overture (music from Tristan und Isolde accompanying scenes of the film's cast amid apocalyptic images) is particularly deft here. Setting up our expectations from the very start, allowing that yes, indeed, the world will end in this film, we become more alert to the story unfolding. We're attentive to the strong performances of both Kirsten Dunst (who powerfully nails both Justine's depression and her eerie tranquility) and Charlotte Gainsbourg (whose groundedness gives way to all-consuming desperation). We look for hints that Justine's moods are tied into the events transpiring around her. We become more deeply engrossed, hoping that the stylized opening was only a fantasy, that maybe we're not doomed after all. And we take comfort in the weird grace and strength that ultimately radiates from Justine, seeing the futility and pointlessness of the world's rituals through her eyes and feeling an odd calm as we separate from them.

For all the film's stylization, it's in many ways Trier's most human film. I can't think of a more true-feeling representation of depression (this is surely aided by both Trier and Dunst's experiences with it) in film, or the reactions to it. There's something oddly upbeat in the very realization of this film - I don't recall Trier ever realizing a project this quickly that resonated with such depth.

[REC]

2011-11-30T17:34:00.001-08:00

A comely reporter for a late-night news show is trying to make the best of what promises to be a boring night covering the lives of firemen. An emergency call to the station has first responders (with their documentarians in tow) rushing into an apartment complex to aid an infirm old woman whose peculiar behavior has her neighbors fearing the worst. The video camera captures events as they escalate from bad to worse: the woman seems in the throes of a disease that is making her violent; the authorities have quarantined the building; and those trapped inside are dying horribly one by one. And they aren't staying dead.

If anyone is even thinking about making yet another first-person, shot-on-DV film about the zombie apocalypse, they need to take a good, long look at [REC], and be honest about whether or not their project will bring anything new to the table. Though filmmakers Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza are treading paths well-worn by low budget horror auteurs, their attention to character details, pacing, and documentary realism bring a bracing freshness and real suspense to what could have been yet another zombie flick. All genre familiarity goes right out the window as [REC]'s long horrible night unfolds, and even a final reel reveal that threatens to undermine the realism of the piece only serves to heighten our anxiety. The thing fucking works.

MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE

2011-11-22T21:29:00.000-08:00

Chadzilla has posted like four different times about this movie, and who can blame him? Adapting his short story "Trucks", author Stephen King admits to having made a moron movie (and that he was coked up for pretty much the entire shoot)(as you did when making a genre picture in the 80s). But he sells it like a motherfucker in this, one of my favorite movie trailers ever:

Your proprietor makes no bones whatsoever about loving this film. Experienced theatrically during its original run, this movie, the tale of a desperate group of people held hostage at a truck stop by motor vehicles animated by sinister forces, charmed me with its low-key humor and anything-can-happen automotive violence. Even the score by AC/DC (which I was too jaded to admit to liking at the time) has grown on me over time - I dig particularly the ripoff of Herrmann's PSYCHO score that slashes through the film's bloodier moments.

A number of memories tied into screenings of this film also keep it solid in my esteem. For a long while (until last year, actually) it held the distinction of being the last film I saw at a drive-in theatre. Saw it with my grandfather, George Baker, in the summer of '86 at a Salt Lake City drive-in, in fact. George was a big Stephen King fan, and had mentioned that "Trucks" was his favorite King story on a number of occasions. When I told him about MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE he was hot to see it, even as I volunteered, though willing to see it again, that it wasn't what one might call a good movie. It was playing at the bottom half of a double bill, and though we were willing to venture out late, my grandmother guilted us into leaving earlier, on the argument that it would be silly not to see the movie at the top of the bill as well. Never mind that the movie in question was FRIDAY THE 13th PART VI: JASON LIVES - such things didn't matter to her. George was stoic through that film (though I did quietly admire the face-into-metal-sheeting killing), but grandfather and grandson both had themselves a time during MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE.

The movie lingers in my consciousness for a number of reasons, and I suspect it's stronger than I'm giving it credit for (any movie you like isn't a bad movie). When Stacie Ponder solicited her readers for their favorite single horror character over at Final Girl, I vacillated too long for my entry to be counted in her Shocktober event. Every day I tried to come up with a single favorite character I'd come up with a list, and each day different characters vied for supremacy. But one character showed up each time I thought about it, lurking through all of the debate like Richard in KING HENRY VI, and on the basis of that ongoing presence in mind I decided my favorite horror character ever is the Green Goblin truck from this very film. Maybe King was totally coked out for the making of this thing, but dammit, whatever crazy suburb of Ideatown he went to to conceive a bloodthirsty truck with a supervillain face was a worthwhile stop.

Right?

DUNE

2011-11-13T20:49:00.000-08:00

The movie just holds up, though it's not hard to see why it was less than successful. It condenses an awful lot of material into its running time, and brother, if you don't pay heed to the dense exposition of the first few minutes you're gonna be lost.

I remember being amazed by the film when I was younger, though having read the novel in anticipation of the film certainly helped guide me through its complicated politics and galaxy-spanning setting. I'd seen THE ELEPHANT MAN and was even at 13 enough of an auteurist that I was excited about seeing a new David Lynch film.

Returning to the film with fresher eyes (and a greater understanding of what, exactly, a David Lynch film is), it's impossible to dismiss the film, as compromised as it is. Though Lynch would never have final cut on a movie this massive, there are plenty of his tropes and obsessions that ring loud and clear, from the grotesquerie of his villains and their setting (the Harkonnen home planet Geidi Prime looks much like the Philly of ERASERHEAD) to the wide-eyed innocence of its hero (and his journey toward wisdom). The power of Paul's unconscious, rendered in vivid dream sequences that no other director could have realized, and the strength he derives from it may indeed be one of Lynch's most direct on-screen corollaries to his own spirituality. (Though D. reminds me that just about every Lynch film features a protagonist confronting his/her subconscious - I immediately remembered Dale Cooper's dreams in TWIN PEAKS, but was further reminded of Betty's dream world in MULHOLLAND DR., and a mess of other examples come to mind just sitting here.)

And even if the thing is choppier than it should have been, torn as it was between Lynch's desires, those of the di Laurentii, and the demands of the marketplace, there's an emotional throughline that feels as tapped to the Unified Field as anything else Lynch has made. It's not clear in the film why it's important that it rain on Arrakis; that it's powerful and moving when it finally does is undeniable.

Given the vast amount of material shot for this film, one wishes Lynch would return to the project, and reshape what was there to something closer to his intent. But his disappointment with the project as a whole is well-documented, and as tantalizing as the notion is it'd be folly to put too much stock in it. What we have is all we're going to get of that particular film. But Kyle MacLachlan's growing divinity; Kenneth McMillan's goony malevolence; the majesty of the sandworms; the beatific but creepy presence of the prematurely mature Alia Atreides; hell, even the guitars that swell up during Eno's Prophecy theme at key moments are more than enough to make this thing, as it stands, feel complete.

Penn State, Paterno, and Polanski

2011-11-11T18:27:00.000-08:00

Like many of my peers, I've been sickened at the details and the fallout of the Penn State football sex scandal. There's a timeline of the charges here, helpfully culled by author CC Finlay from the lengthy but clear (and harrowing/nauseating) Grand Jury Presentment here.

I find myself thinking back to two years ago, when filmmaker Roman Polanski was arrested in Switzerland and facing extradition to California where he would presumably finally be judged for his 1977 offenses against then-13-year-old Samantha Geimer. There was what felt like a deafening roar among those who were grateful that Polanski was finally going to receive proper justice. The fervor felt like that of a lynch mob (though only Jonathan Rosenbaum was brave enough to point this out), as did the outrage prompted by a petition of filmmakers from around the world asking for Polanski's release.

Back in the present, the charges leveled against Penn State athletic officials, including the allegations of a cover-up by many including beloved football coach Joe Paterno, have finally grown too big for Penn State to ignore. After Paterno's dismissal, thousands of outraged Penn State students took to the streets for a violent riot...in support of Paterno. There's been some disappointment expressed, but nowhere near the level of outrage expressed over Polanski's crime.

I'm wondering why the multitudes (and there were an awful lot of people) who were howling for Polanski's blood upon his 2009 arrest are not downright apoplectic over both the multiple sex crimes perpetrated within Penn State's athletic facility, as well as the institution-level cover-ups of those crimes. At least from the vantage point of my Facebook account I see scant few of those among the anti-Polanski mob sounding off with any of that fervor regarding the Penn State atrocities. I feel like the media coverage is similarly skewed, with far less bandwidth being used to cover the ongoing Penn State scandal than was used to pillory Polanski.

I'm asking myself if I too am biased - I engage film with the same religious fervor as many Penn State fans (and sports fans in general) engage football, and I've wondered more than once if I'm giving Polanski something of a pass simply because he made CHINATOWN and THE TENANT. And yet comparing the two cases, I can't help but feel like Polanski (who did submit to arrest, serve a court-ordered psych evaluation, and spent several weeks in jail) has held himself more accountable, and comported himself better, than anyone involved in the Penn State scandal.

Which, in and of itself, speaks to the depth of their depravity.

---

On whosever side you stand in this matter, be you film freak or football fanatic, if you're moved to outrage by anything you've read about this case, be it here or elsewhere, I hope you'll consider contributing time or money to a local charity in support of survivors of sexual assault. The crimes continue, and those affected by them could use your support.

bats!

2011-11-07T12:22:00.000-08:00

THE BAT WHISPERS, one of my favorite films, is spun from a comedy whodunnit called THE BAT by Avery Hopwood and Mary Roberts Rinehart. It offers an expressionistic take on the genre, framing its characters in bizarre architecture and inky shadows (in addition to seeding the character of Batman in the mind of the young Bob Kane). I'd known it was the second take on the material by director Roland West, but his first - a silent film made four years prior - had eluded me.

Happily, last Friday the San Francisco Film Society had a 9:30pm screening of the first film, so I was pleased to finally catch up with it. It is something of a rough draft for the more ambitious and accomplished later film, but it still offers a remarkable (if rougher) visual take on the proceedings. With the dialogue confined to title cards, the mysteries permeating the film are given somewhat scant treatment, but there's enough there to keep the details interesting amid the experiments with light, shadow, and setting. And the shorthand necessitated by the silent film format works to the film's advantage as the Bat is finally captured thanks to a hilarious detail planted in the first reel.

Adding to the event was the musical accompaniment by Bay Area guitarist Ava Mendoza and her drummer Nick Tamburro. There's a healthy amount of silent film/live music pairings here throughout the year, and the music more often than not leans towards a kind of cutesy whimsy. Mendoza and Tamburro were much more daring, and their looping technology and improv energy served West's mise-en-scene beautifully, often electrically. Rather than preserve the film in a kind of amber, their music truly brought the film to life. It was my first encounter with their work - here's hoping it won't be the last.

DIARY OF A COUNTRY PRIEST

2011-11-01T11:23:00.000-07:00

D: Why're we the youngest people here?

Me: Because young people aren't being taught that Bresson matters.

D: (pause) Bresson's all that matters.

Dr. Phibes puts your proprietor to the Test...

2011-10-31T06:24:00.000-07:00

Dr. Phibes is in...

...and administering a Halloween horror test through the indispensable continuing ed program run over at Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule. And the questions suggest that he's as queer for Dark Shadows as your proprietor, which is no less than Halloween deserves. ONWARD!

1) Favorite Vincent Price/American International Pictures release.

Gonna go with The Haunted Palace, mainly for the post-production gymnastics the film went through to shoehorn it into Corman's ongoing Poe cycle, and for the joy I had seeing it in San Pedro last month. It is a lovely piece of Lovecraftian cinema, though, and Price is just fine in it.

2) What horror classic (or non-classic) that has not yet been remade would you like to see upgraded for modern audiences?

Though many might argue that it's science fiction, The Incredible Shrinking Man is a dandy horror film. Though I'm extremely wary of the notion of Keenan Ivory Wayans and Eddie Murphy remaking it (as has been threatened for years), I'm not averse to a contemporary take on it. In my mind's cinema it retains the original dialogue (including Grant Williams' achingly gorgeous final monologue), and boasts a new Radiohead score.

Another remake I would like to have seen is the proposed Tim Burton/Lisa Marie remake of Bava's Black Sunday. Marie really should have been the star of one of her lover's films - one of those rare instances where I think intimates should collaborate, considering the amazing work she did in others of his films - but it wasn't meant to be.

3) Jonathan Frid or Thayer David?

The 1795 storyline put me in awe of David's incredible sensitivity. But Barnabas Collins is the fucking Man, so I gotta go with Frid.

Believe it.

4) Name the one horror movie you need to see that has so far eluded you.

I won't count movies I've seen on video but not theatrically (would love to catch up with An American Werewolf in London on film, someday) or films that are famously lost (like London After Midnight). I suppose it's a bit strange that I haven't seen the original Friday the 13th, but I feel greater pangs over having seen so few of the giallo flicks on the incredible list posted on Sound On Sight today.

5) Favorite film director most closely associated with the horror genre.

I gotta go with Dario Argento. The stylization of his best films sends me, and even his worst films are quite watchable. This blog was originally to be called the House of Peacocks, located in Brussels, Belgium, as an homage to the man but I decided to change up the name to give it its own flavor.

6) Ingrid Pitt or Barbara Steele?

No damn contest: Barbara Steele. Black Sunday clinches it alone. Plus her eyes are incredible:

7) Favorite 50’s sci-fi/horror creature.

Next week I intend to buy a lush sushi dinner for my host and watch some of the films featuring this creature, on its birthday. Through all of his iterations, my fondness for Godzilla remains unabated.

8) Favorite/best sequel to an established horror classic.

Whether or not Child's Play is an established horror classic is open to debate, but Bride of Chucky absolutely transcends it. Ronny Yu packs the thing with a cornucopia of fine choices, from the blue lighting to Jennifer Tilly's fetishwear to the deployment of a bubble machine during the transformation sequence.

Of all the Hong Kong expatriates who worked in Hollywood following the 1997 changeover, Yu's output may be the most curious. I very nearly picked his Freddy vs. Jason to answer this question - like Bride, it eschews any attempt at scariness to instead focus on artfully crafting a bloody fantasy.

9) Name a sequel in a horror series which clearly signaled that the once-vital franchise had run out of gas.

My threshold for watchability is very low, i.e. it takes a lot to make me want to write off a franchise. That said, per my previous entry, Halloween: Resurrection is absolutely tedious, and (among many other problems) wastes the talents of a former classmate.

10) John Carradine or Lon Chaney Jr.?

With respect, Carradine.

11) What was the last horror movie you saw in a theater? On DVD or Blu-ray?

As of this writing (executed piecemeal, over several days), Nadja was the last horror movie I saw theatrically. And though it doesn't count as a horror film per se, the "Just A Dream" two-parter from the Justice League cartoon offered some surprisingly-strong-for-Y7-rated imagery, and a beautifully nuanced voice performance by William Atherton as John Dee/Doctor Destiny.

12) Best foreign-language fiend/monster.

Rather than repeat myself, I'll say Kayako/Toshio from the Ju-On/The Grudge series. Each of the films has at least somewhat unsettled me, and I think taken together they're one of the most notable bodies of work in the genre of the last thirty years.

13) Favorite Mario Bava movie.

Oh, goddammit. Shit. Black Sabbath, then, for style, variety, genuine scares, real laughs, and that mind-bending coda.

14) Favorite horror actor and actress.

Lugosi. The aforementioned Steele.

15) Name a great horror director’s least effective movie.

Clearly recognizing that The Card Player is the least of Argento's features didn't keep me from wishing it were the pilot to an ongoing TV series. I also note that I had kind of a fucked up experience with his most recent film, Giallo, put off as I was by the false spoiler in the film's IMDB page. And that tacked-on ending undermines what could have been Argento's most powerful finish.

16) Grayson Hall or Joan Bennett?

Joan Bennett brings class to Collinwood, but there's a scene toward the end of the first Barnabas arc where Julia is beset by low-tech, ghostly visions. It's basically Grayson Hall just riding a fucking crazy train - for ten glorious, unbroken minutes, the only thing you saw on ABC was Grayson Hall losing her shit. I would LOVE to have been in the studio the day that scene was shot.

17) When did you realize that you were a fan of the horror genre? And if you’re not, when did you realize you weren’t?

God, I don't even remember. I'm not sure it was a single epiphany as much as it was a gradual process. I steadily weathered all of the images that schoolmate Yuri Lowenthal savvily collected as the root of our generation's cinematic trauma (specifically: the daughters in The Shining; the clown in Poltergeist; the sister in Twilight Zone: The Movie [see below]; and Ralphie Glick at the window in Salem's Lot) and just gradually developed a taste for it.

18) Favorite Bert I. Gordon (B.I.G.) movie.

It doesn't boast the giant insects/creatures run amok that most people associate with the Gordon oeuvre, but I thought Tormented was a nicely effective little spook show. Plus it had a fun role for Joe Turkel.

19) Name an obscure horror favorite that you wish more people knew about.

I want to share Bigas Luna's film Anguish with everyone, but need them to not read reviews and to just fucking trust me.

20) The Human Centipede-- yes or no?

I'm going to go with "fuck, no." Not because of its disgusting premise, but because it offers no wit or insight along with its gruesomeness. I've said before that if Tom Six was so influenced by David Cronenberg, then how come his films aren't smarter?

21) And while we’re in the neighborhood, is there a horror film you can think of that you felt “went too far”?

I've no desire to see A Serbian Film. Or to link to it.

22) Name a film that is technically outside the horror genre that you might still feel comfortable describing as a horror film.

Billy Wilder's Sunset Blvd., in addition to being my favorite of his films, gives me the fucking creeps. Norma Desmond is a glorious mess whose plight transcends camp, and her need to take down others with her is nothing short of vampiric. Terrifying.

23) Lara Parker or Kathryn Leigh Scott?

Like'em both, but Scott gets a slight edge. Not sure why.

24) If you’re a horror fan, at some point in your past your dad, grandmother, teacher or some other disgusted figure of authority probably wagged her/his finger at you and said, “Why do you insist on reading/watching all this morbid monster/horror junk?” How did you reply? And if that reply fell short somehow, how would you have liked to have replied?

Mom would give me this too-pointed glare when she didn't approve of something we'd seen together. I just ignored her. I love her dearly, but when she put that glare on, I ignored her.

25) Name the critic or Web site you most enjoy reading on the subject of the horror genre.

The House of Sparrows would not have opened without the abiding influence of Arbogast on Film and Final Girl.

26) Most frightening image you’ve ever taken away from a horror movie.

27) Your favorite memory associated with watching a horror movie.

The applause that busted out in the Castro Theatre the third time she said "Bastard."

28) What would you say is the most important/significant horror movie of the past 20 years (1992-2012)? Why?

The Blair Witch Project. It established a template and a spirit for 21st century, low-budget, off-Hollywood horror. And, after the hype and backlash, it was scary as hell.

29) Favorite Dr. Phibes curse (from either film).

Beasts (from the first film). Phibes kills a guy by shooting a brass unicorn at him from across the street, for crying out loud.

30) You are programming an all-night Halloween horror-thon for your favorite old movie palace. What five movies make up your schedule?

This is the question I'm most eager to read the responses to.

An American Werewolf in London - Because I've never seen it projected.

Phenomena/Creepers (Argento, 1985) - Likewise.

Anguish - Because I want to feel an audience's reaction to the halfway point again.

The House With Laughing Windows - Wanna fatten the program up with a movie I've never seen.

The Sleeping Car - Never saw this either, though its mention in a trailer for a month of horror on Cinemax back in the early 90s intrigued me. So my horror-thon is framed by David Naughton pictures. Clearly he's pleased.

Naturally, this exhibition would be loaded with at least two horror trailers before each film, and short films scattered as entr'actes. Including Peter Tscherkassky's Outer Space.

So that's a wrap on this, right on time for Halloween! How'd I do, Doctor? ...Doctor?

Oh, never mind.

Halloweens

2011-10-19T23:57:00.000-07:00

Some extremely random notes on the franchise:

-The first film is simply a masterpiece. John Carpenter had copped to the influence of Howard Hawks with Assault on Precinct 13, and it's interesting to think what Hawks would have made of this assignment. The thing is buoyed by its mythic antagonist, youthful sister-killer turned embodiment of ultimate evil Michael Myers, and as realistic and well-realized as the town of Haddonfield, Illinois feels, it is but a setting for a highly formalistic exercise in suspense. The movie is a well-calibrated tool with the purpose of keeping its audience on edge. More than thirty years on it remains absolutely fresh and involving, and impossible to skip by on television without being absorbed into it anew.

Credit to the two lead performances: Jamie Lee Curtis is a completely relatable heroine, filled with recognizable neuroses. Her reactions to the mounting terror around her are nothing but believable. Laurie's arc grows richer with each viewing: among other things, knowing what she goes through in the final reel gives significant weight to her assurance to her young charge that "I'm not going to let anything happen to you." Believe it.

Donald Pleasance is at the other end of the innocence spectrum, the sole voice of reason and experience that goes under-heeded until it's too late. Though Michael's an imposing and menacing presence throughout, it's the terrified intensity that Pleasance brings to Loomis that makes the threat real. And dig the little arc of Loomis' stakeout of the Myers place - scaring off the kids from behind the shrub, then seconds later getting a scare of his own from the sheriff's hand. Perfectly executed comic miniature.

Add to all of this the film's substantial musical accomplishment (with Carpenter himself providing the most recognizable and insistent horror movie theme this side of Jaws), plus the invaluable contribution of director of photography Dean Cundey (whose work on this immediately catapulted him into prominence) and you've got a pretty terrific little horror film. Given the quality of the film, plus the insane box office it reaped back (after such a minimal investment) during the first years of the franchise era of American filmmaking, it was inevitable that its forumlae would be copied. And that sequels would follow.

-Halloween 2? Not so good. Mired in an unnecessary deepening of the bond between Laurie and Michael, the film is too much a by-rote slasher. One can't help but be a bit disappointed that the movie abandons both the abstraction and the realism of its predecessor to follow the template of its imitators. There's a sense of fatigue, here - even Pleasance, whose pronouncements gave the first film real weight, is just firing them off over his shoulder, like he's trying to get to the pub at the end of the shoot. Perhaps in response to the growing popularity of the Friday the 13th films, a bunch of gore effects were added outside Carpenter's involvement - the film plays a bit better without them. As to the film's invocation of Samhain (and Pleasance's surprising mispronunciation of same), it pretty much captures the movie's overambition (in explaining too much) and half-assedness.

-Halloween 3: Season of The Witch was a GREAT fucking idea, trying to spin the title into a Michael Myers-less franchise of Halloween-related tales, guided by many members of the original creative team (particularly Dean Cundey, and Carpenter himself present as producer and composer). The story of a sinister plot to unleash a pack of Celtic demons upon the world through a toy company's mask promotion is, um, more than a little muddled, but Cundey's gorgeous photography and some spirited performances more than make up for any problems at the plot level. Special mention to Daniel O'Herlihy, who's on the record saying he didn't think much of the material but that he had fun making it anyway. It shows.

-Halloweens 4-6 were quickly ejected by many fans from continuity, but hold up as a watchable (if over-complicated) trilogy of low-rent horror films that nonetheless have their own pleasures.

For one thing, the credits sequence for Halloween 4 is one of my favorite cinematic depictions of autumn:

They're more entertaining than 2, on the whole, and are mainstays on cable television these days. I must admit that when one of them rolls onto television on my nights in, I wind up watching through. The triptych involving Michael's pursuit of a niece (while being pursued, in turn, by Sam Loomis) while a weird cult starts to manifest around him is undemanding but engrossing. Donald Pleasance takes it very seriously, which helps to no end. He clearly felt a bizarre kinship with the series, stating at one point that as long as Michael kept coming back, Sam Loomis would necessarily be there. Halloween 6 was among his final films, and is, sweetly, dedicated to his memory.

-Speaking of which, there's also a strange cult surrounding the producer's cut of Halloween 6. I can't speak to the differences between the versions (though this post has been months in the writing, it was only ever intended to be a quick run-through), though I will say that, despite even this cut being a bit muddled (thanks to the film's insanely troubled creative history) there are a few noteworthy pleasures in 6 that make it more than worthwhile, including an engaging supporting turn as Tommy Doyle by Paul Rudd. Rudd brings a little humor and soul to the kind of resourceful, smart male we really rarely see in slasher films, and the film culminates in a THRILLING fight scene between Tommy and Michael. Directed by Joe Chappelle, before his tenure directing THE WIRE.

--The oddly titled Halloween H20: 20 Years Later, like many horror fans, completely ignored the continuity of Halloweens 4-6 and returned the focus to Laurie Strode, seen struggling as a single parent while working as a teacher at a scenic prep school. Save for the omnipresent theme music, John Carpenter's touch is absent from this film, which has a weird Scream-like pacing and look (the casting of various attractive TV-ready young things doesn't help - Laurie and her high school friends in the first film looked, acted, and FELT like late-70s teenagers). But the movie has some of Scream's verve and wit, as well, with Adam Arkin scoring considerable points as Laurie's lovelorn colleague (the TV edit cuts a hilarious piece of dialogue he has with his students, where he cheerfully matches their wrongness with playful sleaze of his own). The film juices the duality between Laurie and her supernaturally evil brother (a confrontation through a porthole clinches it), and Jamie Lee Curtis plays the final reel like it's fucking Medea or something, stalking her brother through the empty halls of her school, and indeed, her very consciousness.

--The rest of the franchise is sadly pretty crap - Halloween 2 director Rick Rosenthal was brought back to helm the profoundly ill-conceived Halloween: Resurrection, which begins with a well-paced but detestable prologue that dispatches Laurie Strode (and, by natural extension, Jamie Lee Curtis) from the series entirely. As if following the example of fans who have therefore decided to banish the film from memory, the rest of the film strives to be absolutely forgettable, with Michael stalking a group of kids filming their tour of his house as part of an internet reality show you know what just fuck this

--Rob Zombie's reboot of the series doesn't interest me a whole lot. His two films continue to call up the things that I admire about aspects of his style (his knack for capturing a very particular and very lively white trash patois and dialogue) while reminding me of all that I dislike about his style (like putting that particular and lively patois in the mouths of damn near all of his characters). And all that shit with the white horse in his second film was just fucking stupid.

And given that I've been handling this piecemeal for more than a year, I think it's time to just publish the fucker. Thanks for reading.

IT'S A FUCKING DINOSAUR.

2011-10-17T18:47:00.000-07:00

Today's entry in the annual 31 Screams series at Arbogast on Film enshrines a fabulous reaction shot from The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms, wherein a lady on the street has a completely understandable reaction to the rampaging creature that has suddenly arrived on the scene:

My favorite moment in any of the Jurassic Park films comes near the end of The Lost World, when a Tyrannosaurus Rex is just kicking around suburban San Diego. It happens before the carnage and the chase, and Spielberg takes a quiet moment to just let us take in the sight of, as Arbo would say, A FUCKING DINOSAUR WALKING DOWN THE STREET. It gives us just enough time to project the creature onto our own hometown, and though it offers enough frisson to juice the chaos of the final reel, it's this minute that lingers.

In describing the end of this film some critics mentioned allusions to Godzilla or even BF20KF, but this moment was more like Dali. For all our CGI and jadedness, a dinosaur walking down the street just isn't something we see every day. It's not the huge, effects-laden climactic moments of these movies that really resonate; it's the quiet ones where the makers take a second to let us reflect that yes, if this were actually happening, it'd truly flip our shit.

love goes to a House on fire

2011-10-03T16:16:00.000-07:00

To clarify, the House of Sparrows is alive and well, if a bit quiet.

The real house lived in by your proprietor, however, is otherwise.

Not a pretty sight, and a truly unhappy thing to return home to. My apartment is not one of the ones on fire there - I live deeper inside the building, and my immediate living space was untouched by fire. Water and smoke damage, however, have claimed much that was within my living space (though I was able to get in and quickly retrieve some necessary and/or precious things left within).

I'm fine, as is everyone else who lives in the building (and their pets). An incredible community of friends, neighbors and well-wishers has assembled to support us.

At the moment I am sheltered, clothed, and fed (with adjacent house-sitting gigs lasting thru the end of October). I'm hoping the ball will roll toward a quick resettlement - happily, I live in San Francisco, a renter-friendly town that seems to be working hard to accommodate me and my neighbors.

Just dropping a note here, should you find this House darker and quieter than usual in the coming weeks. I had not wanted things to be this way in the weeks prior to Halloween, but it really wasn't in my hands.

I hope you all are well, and safely ensconced this Halloween season.

three films.

2011-09-19T20:36:00.001-07:00

Chillerama is an anthology horror film, and man, anything fucking goes. There's a contagious joy as each movie attempts to up the one previous for sheer bloody-minded wrongness (the most clever is The Diary of Anne Frankenstein), and various bodily fluids and parts fly with abandon. But the thing's informed by no shortage of love for the drive-in movie experience - the framing sequence sets the movies as the offerings on a drive-in theatre's final night, and emotion and action fuse the caricaturistic but keenly-felt characters wind up making their own desperate bid for survival as a zombie plague sweeps the rows. Chillerama stands tall as a monument for this kind of batshit-crazy experience, and the audience I saw it with at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery offered the kind of enthusiasm and warmth you just can't get watching a movie on your fucking iPhone.

Drive is a lovely film, indeed, from the cold open heist/getaway through the last shot. Ryan Gosling plays his role with Terminator efficiency, but his thawing is absolutely credible. Just about every shot in this thing is suitable for framing (my favorite is the look on Christina Hendricks' face as the pursuing vehicle wipes out through the windshield behind her). Much is being made (quite reasonably) about Albert Brooks' against-type performance, but Bryan Cranston is equally strong - there's not even a shade of Walter White in his broken-down but earnest mechanic. I'd been eager to see how Nicolas Winding Refn (of the PUSHER trilogy, BRONSON, and my favorite FEAR X) would fare in his Hollywood debut - handpicked for the job by Gosling, and given resources and skilled craftspeople than I think he'd ever enjoyed, he's crafted his best film. An 80s-style crime film that nevertheless feels totally fresh.

Restless is an intimate step back by Gus van Sant from the epic period piece trappings of Milk. It's a quiet, quirky (but not overly so) tale of a young misfit whose life is transformed by his relationship with an imaginative cancer patient. There's absolutely nothing in it that hasn't been seen before, but Mia Wasikowska and Henry Hopper are a charming pair of young leads, and the thing is played so quietly and honestly that it earns each of its melodramatic hits.

CONTAGION

2011-09-11T15:37:00.000-07:00

A friend recently was worried about today, fearing that the tenth anniversary of September 11, 2001 would be a time for another attack. I told her that we couldn't just sit and panic in anticipation of such an attack. Walking forward was the only thing we could do. Also, I added, it's the best thing we can do.

This weekend would seem to be a perverse time to premiere CONTAGION, Steven Soderbergh's tale of a deadly virus that sweeps the globe during a tumultuous autumn and winter. It would be difficult to divorce one's feelings about today from the feelings evoked by this remarkable and spare film. Soderbergh plays expertly on personal and social phobias, capturing both the societal breakdown in the face of disaster and the tiny gestures by which the plague is spread. But its moments of light prove just as potent, similarly tiny gestures that speak to our capacity to stand tall and resolute in the face of chaos.

Though I'd thought I'd put most of my emotions about today behind me, I braced myself for a potentially rough ride. The movie was involving from the first minute, and its artful deployment of the caption "Day 2". But it was one of its artful turning points (a moment involving Jennifer Ehle and a chimp that offered a curious mirror to similar moments in RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES) that truly took me over. After the film I took a much-needed break in the lobby and wept for a moment. After straightening up, I wiped away my tears and, though perhaps not entirely purged, walked forward, out the door into the sunlight.

JOHNNY STACCATO: Evil

2011-09-08T22:26:00.001-07:00

"Evil attacks you through your television sets."

This is the suitably ballsy first line of this television episode, and it's delivered by this man:

Brother Max (Alexander Scourby) is addressing the congregation of an inner-city mission on the dangers of Evil, and the threat it poses to us in our daily lives. His spiel is caught in a bracing, uncut 2-minute take:

"You say 'Hallelujah', you say 'Amen'...but what you say and what you do, my friends, they can be very different." And Brother Max should know, as we find someone special waiting for him after the service...

Our hero saunters into the frame, captured, unsurprisingly, in a stolen shot from a handheld camera, in the true Cassavetes manner:

In VO, Johnny tells him that he's been asked to check out a mission to which the girlfriend of a pal has given all her savings. Johnny asks around, eventually winds up in the orbit of the VERY drunk Brother Conrad (Elisha Cook):

Johnny is taken to the congregation of Brother Max, seen holding forth against Evil:

Brother Conrad stands to testify, but finds his repeated drunkenness too many lapses into Evil, and he is cruelly ejected by Brother Max:

Johnny takes the stage to do some testifying of his own, insisting that "nobody was ever that far gone that he couldn't be forgiven." And when he directly charges Brother Max with lying to and exploiting his flock, the faithful descend upon him, knock him unconscious, and leave him in the alley outside:

Brother Max briefly steps outside and cheerfully comes clean to Johnny: he is, indeed, a fraud, who has taken these good people for every penny he could get.

Ironically, this hipster detective's moral compass is more functional than that of the false man of God, and Johnny knows Max is right when he says that to expose him would be to shatter the faith of the parishioners. At the moment, only Johnny and we see Brother Max for who he is.

But their conversation has been observed:

This is Brother Thomas (Lloyd Corrigan), the original founder of this modest church. After 20 years of little success in attracting much of a parish, Thomas found his ministry taken over by Max. And though Max has filled the pews with the devout in a way that Thomas never could, Thomas has always suspected that Max wasn't completely on the level. The shame of these new revelations shatter him.

Johnny knows that if Max is going to be exposed, and if the faith of the parish is to be preserved, Brother Thomas is going to have to be the man to do it. Max is too weak, too ashamed to fight. "You don't have the faith in those people that you expect them to give to you," chides Johnny. "All we can do is try."

Brother Thomas takes the stage to make a last, desperate plea for the souls of his flock...

...and the last we see of Johnny before this final conflict makes us wonder if even he's saying a little prayer:

The seventh episode of Johnny Staccato, starring John Cassavetes in the title role, might as well have been filmed last week. It's a powerful piece of filmmaking, and its portrait of religion abused and faith exploited for the benefit of charlatans is, sadly, as timely as ever. And it's an insanely well-crafted episode, completely jettisoning Johnny's jazz milieu (which had framed the series thus far) to enter some downright Rod Serling territory. Richard Carr's script stays safely off the side of polemic, letting the episode's two main characters remain human even as they embody Good and Evil.

I'd been bothered by the tendency of the show to background its leading man, a tendency that Cassavetes himself seems to acknowledge with the funny framing of this shot:

Johnny emerges here as a conscience, observing the conflict (like us) from the sidelines but still wholly invested. And there's a downright utopian confluence in this episode, as Johnny's moral hipster and Corrigan's meek but resolute man of God find common ground. It's a powerful moment that resonates in these fractious times, and though greed hides behind a number of faces (including a few of those who were debating last night), there's more than one kind of faith, too.

Take a bow, Johnny. And tag it:

going retro

2011-08-17T22:39:00.000-07:00

I've been more and more concerned about the ongoing recycling across popular culture, wondering when a truly new trend, art form, genre of music, etc. etc. etc. would hit (the arrival of Simon Reynolds' RETROMANIA in the mailbox today may help me put words to my anxiety). But I've always been (perhaps too) nostalgic by nature, and I'm always happy to experience new work by creators I've enjoyed in the past. At its best, this experience reveals that my old favorites continue to create vital work (as Wire, Gary Numan, and Ryuichi Sakamoto, among others continue to do).

So when DC Comics announced DC Retroactive, a series of special, single-issue stories returning creative teams from the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s to the characters they worked on, I was intrigued. Particularly by the return of writer Alan Grant and artist Norm Breyfogle to the Batman book.

The original Grant/Breyfogle run on Batman (with Grant's JUDGE DREDD co-writer John Wagner) was at a fortuitous time. I was as excited about Tim Burton's then-forthcoming BATMAN movie as any of my peers, so excited that in the run-up to the movie's release I resumed reading the Batman titles after years away. At that time, the books included the Wagner/Grant/Breyfogle run on Detective Comics, which I took to instantly. These issues remain something of an unsung classic - Wagner and Grant released all kinds of their Dredd-styled pop madness on the book, combining the street-level grit of Dredd with a weirdly cartoonish darkness (their run is a nice bridge between the classic, pop-artish Englehart/Rogers run and the Bruce Timm animated series). The writers also introduced a mess of new villains to Batman's sizable rogues gallery, including Scarface and the Ventriloquist, who've been revisited by other writers and artists many times since. And Norm Breyfogle was a perfect artist for their run, creating a mise-en-scene of high energy darkness for the stories and realizing the characters with a sometimes cartoonish style that included a downright expressionistic take on physiognomy.

Plus, some of Breyfogle's covers were truly stunning:

The new book, sadly, falls into a number of traps that plague many "retro" style adventures. Grant and Breyfogle resurrect Scarface for their story, but his fate is left weirdly unresolved in Batman's battle with new foe Big Mel (whose origin - given deadly powers after being dunked in chemical goo, he seeks revenge on his criminal former employer - is too close to too many other comic book villains, including Wagner/Grant/Breyfogle's own Corrosive Man). Breyfogle's shapes and staging are as striking as ever, but his lines are a bit too think, and the coloring too soft to recapture the bleeding darkness that served his Batman so well. But the thing works, mainly thanks to the introduction of a sympathetic cab driver, once a criminal, now an expecting father. If his constant intersection with the action of the main story breaks credibility (I was reminded of the Mambo Taxi driver of Almodovar's Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown), his humanity offsets the superheroics nicely, and helps give the final page a modest but genuine lift. (Which rhymes well with the downbeat ending of "Trash," the 1990s Grant/Breyfogle/Mitchell story also included in the book.)

So though your proprietor's not quite down with the package as a whole, I can't help but be pleased to have a new issue of the Grant/Breyfogle Batman in my grasp. Hollow or unsuccessful as it often is (you can never really go home again, after all), there are joys, even fleeting ones, to going retro.

Orson Welles: A Crash Course

2011-08-01T19:00:00.000-07:00

(cross-posted from The VHive, from a thread seeking a three-movie crash course in a genre, body of work, etc.)

Orson Welles

I suspect many could use a crash course on Welles' work - CITIZEN KANE looms in the minds of many as his greatest and sole contribution to cinema, but it's only a part of a much larger (and still evolving) story. Welles remains one of our most notorious and least understood artists, and though footage survives of many of his thwarted/incomplete projects, a string of bad luck and bad choices kept Welles from realizing most of them.

The crash course, then, is but a place to start, a solid first step compiled from the works of his that are most readily available.

CITIZEN KANE - A movie that many are tired of hearing about, but Welles' cinema (and much else) begins with it. Less a Hollywood movie than an independent realized with studio resources, the film was considered an expansive, expensive misfire upon its release. It was, of course ahead of its time. As remarkable as Welles' technique was for his first time out - some scenes look filmed in a magic box, others in a stadium, and all of it coheres so damn well - his touch with his actors is as assured (not surprising, given his expansive theatrical experience). Also impressive from a 25-year-old storyteller is his empathy for any number of characters, his understanding of the toll of age, his eloquent grasp of human suffering.

Bonus added here: Welles' own, crazy, essayistic trailer for this film, a compelling piece of filmmaking in its own right:

THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI - Like many Welles projects, a compromised work, taken out of his hands during the editing process, and greatly reduced from its now-lost original form. What remains, however, is an essential noir, complete with doomed protagonist, alluring femme fatale, a world in chaos, and some gorgeous, shadowy photography. A true work of pulp art, and, compromises notwithstanding, a wholly satisfying Welles film.

MacBETH - Welles returned to the well of Shakespeare many times over his career, and this film (made for Poverty Row studio Republic Pictures) shows what Welles could do given free reign (if minimal budget). Though lambasted by critics who preferred Olivier's more stately, "respectable" take on the classic text, MacBETH serves the text gloriously, and finds within it a nourish heart of darkness that colors everything within BLACK. The film exists in two versions (both cut by Welles) - seek out the longer (107 minutes) version, which contains thick (but completely intelligible) brogue accents and the first-ever, ten-minute take in a released film (predating Hitchcock's ROPE by a year).

Most of Welles' stylistic tropes can be found here - his overlapping dialogue, his psychologically-oriented camera work, his theatrical mise-en-scene - as well as his keen grasp of tragedy (which informs all of his films, as well as, sadly, his own life and process off camera). And, most importantly, they're all insanely entertaining.

TRIGUN: BADLANDS RUMBLE

2011-07-18T00:14:00.000-07:00

A daring robbery spearheaded by the hulking, ambitious bandit Gasback is interrupted by the notorious gunman Vash the Stampede. Twenty years later, Gasback is settling scores against his henchmen in that robbery, and a rogues gallery of bounty hunters assemble to take their shot at the bounty on his head. Vash is also waiting in the wings, but seems more interested in a gun-toting young woman with her own score to settle.

This was your proprietor's first trip into the insane world of Trigun, but God willing it will not be the last. The energy on display in this film is unmistakable, and the clever script plays a very long game over its brisk 90 minutes. The film is filled with faces familiar to longtime Trigun fans, but enough of the backstory is suggested to keep newcomers up to speed. The western elements are well-maintained within the film's colorful, sci-fi desert milieu (FIREFLY fans note: this is the Real Deal), and the various showdowns, character moments, and reveals are an absolute joy, each and every one.

Happy Birthday, Warren Oates.

2011-07-05T21:56:00.000-07:00

I was but a lad of twelve when my folks took me to BLUE THUNDER. I remember my dad gasping a bit at the film's dedication to the memory of Warren Oates. By that tender age I'd gained a very basic familiarity with death. And I remembered Oates from STRIPES and a couple of others (possibly THE BORDER, certainly 1941).

What happened at that moment was something I felt more than understood, but for the first time in my life I took a moment of respectful silence to acknowledge, with sadness and gratitude, the passing of someone I felt (again, more than knew) was great.

I've seen enough of his work to know that he was, in fact, one of the greatest. And I'm delighted that so many of his films await me (and I look forward to the Monte Hellman series the Roxie's hosting later this month).

And since it's still July 5th in San Francisco for a couple more hours, I believe I will have a drink.

Happy Birthday, Warren.

(image courtesy the fantastically titled Tumblr Fuck Yeah, Warren Oates. And many thanks to Arbogast for the heads up on the date.)

transition

2011-06-24T22:14:00.000-07:00

--Couldn't help but feel a "good news/bad news" sensation when I read that the San Francisco Film Society had finally found a year-round theatrical home. As delighted as I am that they've partnered with New People to run their programming in the basement cinema, I guess the space is now formerly Viz Cinema. The space has had a rough go of its own programming of classic and contemporary Japanese cinema, but were starting to revamp their program with a series of weekend matinee screenings. Perhaps I'm being blindly optimistic when I hope that Viz's programming team will continue to have at least a say in what goes up in the space; I've grown more than accustomed to the fresh anime screened there.

--Perhaps I'm being similarly naive with regard to the Red Vic Movie House, but the programs I've experienced there recently (and the sizes of the midweek audiences they've attracted) are not in keeping with the space's numbered days. The thirty-year-old venue is set to shut down next month, and I'm wondering if maybe people are experiencing the place while they can. Monday's screening of Wings of Desire was very well-attended, as was Jesse Hawthorne Ficks' eye-opening Woody Allen program (including two features and a stunning collection of trailers). The dreamer in me believes that this kind of late-inning attendance could save the theatre; the realist in me knows that even if the Red Vic survived, they wouldn't be back.

--Revisiting Wings of Desire was a curious experience. I found in retrospect that I'd both enshrined the film and taken it for granted, happily declaring it a masterpiece while completely forgetting why I'd done so in the first place. And so I became completely swept away in it, moreso than ever perhaps. The story of the angels that walk among us, and one angel's forsaking of his divinity for earthly love, remains absolutely timeless, and every single character in the film remains a cherished friend.

--Sad, indeed, then was it to say goodbye to one of those friends yesterday. May Peter Falk rest in peace. Adios, compañero.

--Sad, too, am I to mourn the passing of comics artist Gene Colan. Among a number of other accomplishments, his Dracula I consider definitive.

--And yet during the writing of this the New York state senate passed the Marriage Equality Act and its corresponding amendment. Some transitions your proprietor can totally get behind.

Missing Persons, round 2

2011-06-18T02:07:00.000-07:00

Pleased as I was to see Dale Bozzio and Missing Persons (despite the conflicted and unforgettable night it proved to be), I strongly doubted I'd ever get a chance to see them again. I could not have been more surprised to see that they were back on tour just months later, this time in celebration of their 30th anniversary, with original guitarist Warren Cuccurullo in tow.

Though I'd only recently come to appreciate Cuccurullo's considerable talent (and his rightful place as THE Duran Duran guitarist), I had been wanting to see him play live in any setting. Knowing that he would be back playing with Missing Persons made the show a must see (D, no surprise, was absolutely in agreement). And yet the strong memories of the last show lingered, and I wondered if the band would pull it together.

No worries, no worries at all. Within two songs of the band's set I'd completely forgotten about either of the crappy opening bands. From our vantage point (the host venue, the Red Devil Lounge, has powerfully shitty sightlines) we had a clear view of Cuccurullo, and it was a delight to see how his trademark, glassy synth guitar sound was made. His interplay with Bozzio built on their decades of history, and the band felt complete (though happily they retained drummer Jake Hayden and bassist Doug Lunn, the sterling rhythm section from the previous gig). D had stated that Missing Persons were first and foremost, new wave electronica notwithstanding, a guitar band, and Cuccurullo's presence pulled everything together beautifully.

Mental Hopscotch tore through powerfully, Destination Unknown was delivered with confidence (with Jake, the drummer, executing those fills during the chorus one-handed - awesome), and a powerful "Color In Your Life" featured from their late era. Gone were Dale's long between-song rants - tonight you could recognize her as the vixen of the early eighties.

And good god, the encores - a robust cover of Gary Numan's "Me! I Disconnect From You", transposed remade into a version only MP could have conceived. And the show wrapped with a short instrumental vamp on "Come Undone," Cuccurullo's great contribution to the Duran Duran corpus.

There's less to say about this show than the previous, as my emotions are less conflicted. We left the show swept away by what we saw (rather than doubting what we'd seen) and certain of a number of things: that Warren Cuccurullo remained one of the finest, most unsung guitarists of the last few decades; that there remains life in the Missing Persons corpus; and that the band presently on the road can really, really fucking cook.

Thanks, D.

DAVID HOLZMAN'S DIARY

2011-06-16T00:39:00.000-07:00

New York, July 1967. A somewhat anomic young man with too much time on his hands and too much film equipment in his home begins a film diary. Even as his project captures some of the more mundane aspects of his life, his involvement in his project threatens his relationships, and, indeed, his very soul.

Jim McBride's notorious but little-seen indie is both of its time, and timeless. It captures both its moment and our own tech-fuelled alienation of 2011. (I'd also place it as a film of the early 80s, as McBride and crew's subversion of filmmaking technology and practices qualify as a form of hacking, as indeed does David's.) As fun as the movie often is, it touches on fears both modern (alienation via our increasing dependence on technology) and ancient (the camera does appear to have captured David's soul). The film is weirdly prescient about the present tendency to relate to the outside world through technology - David's obsession with filming his girlfriend eventually creeps her right out, and he soon stalks women with the same camera. David's eventual meltdown is a powerful moment, but seems preordained. Fittingly, David's meltdown can now be found online along the Youtube rants, diaries, and explosions of his virtual children. Even the film's credits, supposedly a relief, only shatter the illusion, and rather than let us go they only seem to mire us in the labyrinth even further as we contemplate the labyrinth of reality and untruth we've just navigated, and the one that awaits us outside.

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS

2011-06-13T22:48:00.000-07:00

It's my favorite Woody Allen film since MATCH POINT. A weary Hollywood screenwriter hangs out in Paris with his fiancee and finds himself taken to the 1920s, where he encounters many members of that city's literary set. It's breezy and gentle, and though you see its moral coming a mile away it still registers powerfully upon arrival. There are some fine performances in it (when Adrien Brody slid onscreen as Salvador Dali I could only smile in anticipation), but Owen Wilson is particularly fine as Allen's on-screen surrogate. He's particularly relaxed but totally engaged, and as easily as he gives voice to Allen's philosophy (and he does it better than any of the other substitute Allens) it's his quiet moments that truly register - the moment that Wilson finally accepts, with a gentle smile, that yes, his dream is coming true is the best thing I've seen him do.

this is only a test

2011-06-07T23:26:00.000-07:00

From our friends at Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule, a blog that's as much fun as its title, comes this huge summer film test. Since the House has been a little barren of late, and since answering tests like this feels, at some shameful level deep within your proprietor's venal heart, like an interview, my answers follow.

1) Depending on your mood, your favorite or least-loved movie cliché
Favorite: the love-conquers-all ending. If it emerges naturally from the story (Shyamalan's The Happening is the one that comes to mind), I find it fresh and moving. Most people I know find it as much a cop-out as I find the nihilism in the movies that they like. But anyway.

2) Regardless of whether or not you eventually caught up with it, which film classic have you lied about seeing in the past?
If I've ever done this, I'm too ashamed to recall it. I'm pleased to admit that there are plenty of worthy films I haven't seen - something to look forward to.

3) Roland Young or Edward Everett Horton?
Horton for longevity - respect a man who went from the silent era thru Top Hat to Playhouse 80. Young, however, was in And Then There Were None, so there's love there too.

4) Second favorite Frank Tashlin movie
Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?

5) Clockwork Orange-- yes or no?
Yes, certainly.

6) Best/favorite use of gender dysphoria in a horror film
Back in 1996 when I was living in Washington DC, there were some huge blizzards that blew through and paralyzed the city. I used the opportunity to catch up on movies that I'd taped off cable. "Nice, I can finally watch Polanski's Repulsion!" Perhaps because I was snowbound and stir-crazy, the movie fucking scarred me.

7) Melanie Laurent or Blake Lively?
Laurent.

8) Best movie of 2011 (so far…)
So far, BOONMEE. But the year ain't half over yet.

9) Favorite screen performer with a noticeable facial deformity
Tina Fey. She never volunteered info about the scar, and I don't think any of us who knew her ever asked (though the answer's now easily found; she wasn't a celebrity yet when we knew her, and celebrities have no secrets.)

10) Lars von Trier: shithead or misunderstood comic savant?
Yes. But that's not all.

11) Timothy Carey or Henry Silva?
Silva's a "better" actor (nothing but love for Johnny Cool) but Carey's extremism takes him to deeper, more moving places.

12) Low-profile writer who deserves more attention from critics and/or audiences
I keep hoping that Kenneth Branagh will one day film any of the Yellowthread Street mysteries by William Marshall.

13) Movie most recently viewed theatrically, and on DVD, Blu-ray or streaming
Theatrically: Midnight in Paris
DVD: don't recall - lately have been watching mostly TV on disc (DARK SHADOWS and TWIN PEAKS, most recently)
Blu-Ray: oh, fuck blu-ray
Streaming: work movies don't count, so let's go with Killdozer

14) Favorite film noir villain
Let's go with Helen Thimig from Strangers in the Night.

15) Best thing about streaming movies?
They're the bread and butter of the company that's employed me for going on four years now.

16) Fay Spain or France Nuyen?
Only one of these women played Elaan of Troyius:

Nuyen, definitely.

17) Favorite Kirk Douglas movie that isn’t called Spartacus
PATHS OF GLORY.

18) Favorite movie about cars
VANISHING POINT.

19) Audrey Totter or Marie Windsor?
Windsor.

20) Existing Stephen King movie adaptation that could use a remake/reboot/overhaul
King's works are often problematic in that what works on the page seldom translates effectively to the screen. Rather than reboot one of the films, I'd rather see someone take a stab at filming "Mrs. Todd's Shortcut" from SKELETON CREW.

21) Low-profile director who deserves more attention from critics and/or audiences
Richard Kwietnowski has a too small body of work, but each of his films has an abundantly delicate touch, and should be shared theatrically.

22) What actor that you previously enjoyed has become distracting or a self-parody?
I tend to stick by my actors. The only artist whose ego has ballooned to the point that I can't enjoy his earlier work isn't an actor, most of the time.

23) Best place in the world to see a movie
Weirdly, I don't have a favorite venue. Anywhere with decent projection, good refreshments, and seats for people I care about will do.

24) Charles McGraw or Sterling Hayden?
Hayden, but I understand the McGraw camp.

25) Second favorite Yasujiro Ozu film
Decline to answer.

26) Most memorable horror movie father figure
Genre being relative, I'll go with Kirk Scott's memorable, funnycreepy turn as J.D.'s dad in Heathers. Scott and Slater suggest not a familial relationship so much as a symbiosis, and it speaks volumes to J.D.'s pathology. The backstory of J.D.'s home life is one of that film's more evocative mysteries, thanks largely to Scott's performance.

27) Name a non-action-oriented movie that would be fun to see in Sensurround
Irma Vep, from the chaos of the production office to the otherworldly transcendence of the final montage

28) Chris Evans or Ryan Reynolds?
I've found both enjoyable in a number of films - Reynolds seems to have a bit better range, from the gently obscene comedy of Waiting to the moralistic Fed-in-crisis in Smokin' Aces, so he gets he nod.

29) Favorite relatively unknown supporting player, from either or both the classic and the modern era
I'd love to see Arthur Stone get a little more appreciation outside classic movie circles - his turn as the comic relief but capable con man in 1927's Valley of the Giants seemed to anticipate the works of Pee Wee Herman, Martin Short, and many others.

30) Real-life movie location you most recently visited or saw

31) Second favorite Budd Boetticher movie
Can't answer. My favorite BB movie, however, is Ride Lonesome.

32) Mara Corday or Julie Adams?
Corday.

33) Favorite Universal-International western
No preference.

34) What's the biggest "gimmick" that's drawn you out to see a movie?
The fourteen-hour running time, multi-day staging, etc. of Rivette's OUT 1.

35) Favorite actress of the silent era
GISH

36) Best Eugene Pallette performance
SUSPENSE!

37) Best/worst remake of the 21st century so far?
Best: Takashi Shimizu's own remake of his JU-ON: THE GRUDGE as, simply, THE GRUDGE enabled him to continue his already fascinating and under-way process of remixing his own work. The resulting sequel, THE GRUDGE 2, came too late in the American wave of J-horror remake but provided a perfect capper to that onslaught with he ghosts arriving in Chicago.

Worst: I hate, on principle, to pile onto the work of a female director, but Julie Taymor's THE TEMPEST was a misfire in nearly every conceivable way.

38) What could multiplex owners do right now to improve the theatrical viewing experience for moviegoers? What could moviegoers do?
Just stop treating film like easily-ladled product - take pride in presenting an experience, from the correct aspect ratio and sound volume to decent refreshments. Moviegoers: stop putting yourself over the movie, stop texting/talking in the damn thing, and be present in the experience with your neighbors.

twenty-five

2011-05-21T00:06:00.000-07:00

The age of 14 was difficult (though probably not any more difficult for me as for anyone else). I'd been taken out of the private school I'd become used to and enrolled in a public high school near my family's home, and though I accepted the reasons for the change, I was resentful. It's likely, being age 14, I could have found anything else to be resentful about, but this huge change was enough.

I knew full well how I came across: my big glasses, already quiet and studious nature, and general awkwardness. My anger at this huge change in my life, coupled with apprehension about the public school experience in general, prompted a fairly aggressive response on my part. I was determined to soldier through, to take no shit from anyone, to keep myself to myself. This largely went according to plan - though routinely harassed, I gave as good as I got, and my mouth got me out of any number of scrapes (though it made me some enemies).

And yet.

As the months wore on, cracks started to appear in my misanthropy. I was surrounded by too many good people to be totally isolated, and though a couple of people noted that I was a nerd who took no shit, quite a few of my fellow students broke through with little effort. Some of them were attractive females who were able to get my attention with no effort - many others were genuinely friendly individuals, some of whom I'm honored to still call friends.

My 15th birthday, May 5, 1986, saw me emerging from my self-imposed funk. I sometimes think that the very act of turning 15 took me out of that problematic year, but the fact is that the kind of exile I imposed on myself simply couldn't last. I was at a crossroads, not quite sure where I was going next.

A suggestion came via MTV...

Quite an eye-opener from the man behind "Shock the Monkey", a great video and an insanely catchy song. I was jazzed enough that I seized up the album, and wound up listening to it pretty obsessively the rest of May.

The album couldn't have come at a better time. Though my familiarity with Gabriel's work at that point was pretty surface, the album's pointedly upbeat tone wasn't lost on me. Nor was its overriding message of openness, of warmth, of love. It pointed in a number of directions (including musical ones, nudging me toward music by PG's collaborators on the disc, including Stewart Copeland, Bill Laswell, and Laurie Anderson), but the most crucial one was well out of my self-imposed darkness.

To this day the album's opener, Red Rain, gives me chills. Telling the story of emotions left too deeply buried, manifesting themselves as outward, otherworldly trauma, a rain of blood on the houses of the repressed. Every single sound in the track - from the opening tics of Stewart Copeland's hi-hat through Jerry Marotta's just slightly ahead of the beat drumming to Gabriel's stretched-to-the-limit vocals - expresses some tiny image from this emotional, epic story. Today the song serves as a reminder. In 1986, it tore open doors within me for good.

The album turns 25 this week. And perhaps, because of how profoundly it changed who I am, I turn 25 this week as well.

TWENTY THOUSAND LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA

2011-05-16T18:18:00.000-07:00

The Disney adaptation of the Jules Verne classic remains lively and exciting. One wishes that they hadn't had to make it kid friendly - the jigs and songs (and the adorable seal) distract somewhat from some surprisingly deep moral questions addressed throughout (the darkness is unsurprising, considering director Richard Fleischer's previous work on various films noir). That said, James Mason's a fine and driven Nemo, Kirk Douglas' energy is infectious, and the underwater scenes still play beautifully on the big screen. I'm kinda surprised that none of San Francisco's sizable steampunk contingent came to the screening - one'd think they'd be all over it.

to a hero on his birthday.

2011-05-16T07:29:00.000-07:00

"May we trust the inexpressible benevolence of the creative impulse.

"Don't be helpful: be available.

"When a musician believes that music is a commodity, music dies in them.

"We pay our own tab.

"In the creative leap, history waits outside.

"Define the aim simply, clearly, briefly, positively

"Anything within a performance is significant, whether intentional or not.

"May the quality with which we live our life honour the lives of our parents and mentors.

"If we can define our aim, we are halfway to achieving it.

"We may not have an equality of talent.
We may not have an equality of experience.
But we may be equal in aspiration.
We can be equal in commitment."

Happy Birthday, Mr. Fripp.

101.

2011-05-11T17:32:00.000-07:00

Jesus feckin' Christ, that last post took it out of me. That's what happens when you sit on pieces of writing - I note that this blog started up about two weeks after I saw SORORITY ROW theatrically, and I dug up a comment I posted around that time to Stacie Ponder in Final Girl about Mrs. Crenshaw. That comment may well be the seed from which this humble house bloomed.

So the thing's been worked on over the last two weeks (though all of the twenty-odd images from the film were grabbed last night), and since I wanted it to be post 100, I haven't had a chance to write about any of the awesome things I saw at the San Francisco International Film Fest. Or talk about turning 40 (which I did last week), though that particular milestone has informed my recent writing on a number of older characters, including the aforementioned Mrs. Crenshaw or former Detroit Tigers pitcher Billy Chapel or ongoing Missing Persons vocalist Dale Bozzio.

So I'm gonna end this rant here-ish, as the woman I love is about to grab me for the Eno-doc tonight at the Roxie, in keeping with this season of aging Taureans. More very, very soon.

Thanks for reading.

Post 100: The One I Might Have Saved.

2011-05-11T02:30:00.000-07:00

If anyone's keeping track, yes, this is the hundredth post here on The House of Sparrows. That the House is open at all can be blamed, if you wish, on the inspiration of two leading lights in the horror blogosphere: Stacie Ponder (proprietor of Final Girl) and Arbogast (of Arbogast on Film).

Indeed, the latter has an ongoing blogathon called The One You Might Have Saved, inviting any and all to describe a horror film victim whose plight stirred unusual empathy. I've been meaning to post my own entry in this (this blog was started in large part out of a desire to do so), and believe that this is an ideal occasion for it.

Though the movie that contains this person does not, at the outset, seem auspicious...

...it was smarter than I'd hoped, offering an engaging whodunnit mystery alongside its old school slasher thrills. There's an interesting subtext throughout the film as we're made to wonder what our future will be like as these uniformly horrible young women, our best and brightest, take the reins of government and business in the ensuing years. The film's cynicism in depicting the sisters' ongoing betrayal of the social values the sorority was ostensibly established to uphold is deliberate, and often bracing. (I also noted that Claire, an Asian-American character played by Jamie Chung, had a number of character details that fleshed her out more believably than non-white characters in many, many other genre films.)

In any event, it begins with a rather lovely, though one doubts seamless, single take crawling through Theta House, taking in all manner of debauchery during a party. The camera ducks into a quiet, dark kitchen, the music is muted, and we see her for the first time.

This is Mrs. Crenshaw, the house mother of Theta Pi, played by Carrie Fisher. She's beautifully captured here, holding it down in the (moral?) center of Theta Pi, quietly mixing a drink even as her charges are indulging far lustier vices throughout the house. It's a good hook for older viewers of this teen-oriented (if R-rated) slasher, and those of us who came of age when this actress was in her prime share, perhaps, her isolation from (but presence within) the youth-heavy antics surrounding her.

Which include the murder that drives the film, and the secret forged by the film's numerous heroines (all Theta Pi sisters, all seniors). We catch up with Mrs. Crenshaw at the end of senior year, sternly but lovingly giving her end-of-year address to the sisters...

..along with some bracelets to the graduates, bearing one link for each of the 22 graduates. Clearly unaware that it's the spirit of generosity, and not the gift that counts, the girls junk the bracelets as soon as Mrs. C splits:

But Mrs. Crenshaw's feeling more wistful, and generous, and is captured (alone, again) taking a final look at the house as she's known it.

And she's off. A huge and insane party, with DJs, bubble machines, and lots of sex begins at Theta House.

And before night falls, the killer strikes. And again. And again.

Back at the house the sisters realize that their past is coming back for them. And the aforementioned Claire suffers the film's most visually weird death.

Amid all the carnage two of the girls have time for a catfight over a boyfriend, but the return of Mrs. Crenshaw is clearly a signal to Cut The Shit:

"Wow, who knew Mrs. Crenshaw was such a bad-ass?" Some belated and unheard respect from the girls, as Mrs. C goes downstairs to save the fucking day.

She enters the kitchen, finds the killer, and starts blazing away:

For the first time in the film, the killer retreats.

And Fisher gives us the best lines in the film:

No, she is not. Why?

Damn right.

The killer throws his pimped-up tire iron at her and misses, wedging it in the wall behind her. She's about to kill him and give the movie an awesome fucking ending. Until her gun jams:

She's trying to fix the damn thing, and her desperate grunts in the next few seconds tear a gasp from me. Faster than 7capture can grab it, the killer runs over, shoves the table against Mrs. Crenshaw, thus impaling her with the weapon wedged in the wall behind her.

There's a weird, sad silence here:

Is the killer gloating? Quietly paying respect to the awesome, otherwise unrespected woman who simply deserved better than she's getting here? Taking a moment to acknowledge the genuine sacrifice of the sole decent person on his/her long slate of victims, past and future?

God love her, she rallies for one last, desperate shot against the departing killer, but we feel how empty her threats are now, and mourn how widely her last shot misses its mark.

And finally Mrs. Crenshaw dies as we found her: in the kitchen. Alone.

I'm not completely sure why she resonates with me. Though it's a three-scene role, Fisher plays it more than solidly. Mrs. Crenshaw's the most clearly (if not the only) sympathetic character in the whole film (an intentional ploy of the film's design), and, as suggested earlier, perhaps she was the only character in this film that I, in my ever-increasing dotage, could really latch onto. Maybe it's her resemblance to my mom.

All I know is that as I grabbed images for this piece I could easily speed through the film, but found myself gripped anew by her scenes. Too involved to really break down Fisher's performance, or Stewart Hendler's direction of her scenes. Instead I was simply struck by her gentle but tough humanity. And, particularly, saddened by her death.

So here's to you, Mrs. Crenshaw.

You, dear, are The One I Might Have Saved.

INSIDIOUS

2011-04-21T23:38:00.000-07:00

Happy couple Renai and Josh Lambert (Rose Byrne, Patrick Wilson) have moved into a new house. Their domestic bliss is shattered when, after taking a tumble in the attic, their son Dalton falls into a coma. Josh retreats into his work (ostensibly to pay the debts incurred by Dalton's ongoing treatment). And Renai finds herself increasingly agitated by a number of unsettling disturbances that threaten to shatter the Lambert household for good.

Though I was never quite on board with either Saw or its various sequels, your proprietor has followed the work (and become something of a fan) of filmmaker James Wan. The revenge drama Death Sentence confirmed that Wan's interests extended beyond gore and violence, and though scant few gave Wan credit for it, his grip on the conflicted morality of his protagonist (as well as the ultimately soul-destroying void left in the wake of the film's violence), coupled with some masterfully-executed set pieces, showed that he was a genre filmmaker with increasing sensitivity and broadening focus.

Reuniting with Saw-scribe Leigh Whannell, Wan crafts a haunted house film that is mindful of its traditions (with nods to THE HAUNTING, POLTERGEIST, and the more recent PARANORMAL ACTIVITY) while laden with the patented Stygian imagery that has figured in all of Wan's films. But there's a strong sense of ordinariness to the Lambert's domesticity, which is slowly and knowingly upended as the film unfolds - Wan is just as confident showing the internal sources of conflict between the Lamberts as the malevolent external forces that shadow them. And though some have blanched that the movie shifts its focus from Renai to Jeff in its last half, the shift is more than earned by a lovely scene in which Jeff, confronted by the truth of his son's drawings, finally accepts his responsibility as a parent. It's a great turn by Patrick Wilson, and maybe the finest acting moment in Wan's oeuvre so far.

The main criticism leveled against this film is that its second half over-explains the story and loses steam after the masterfully sustained suspense of the first half. I can only say bullshit: the arrival of a downright goofy pair of ghost hunters followed by their extremely grounded boss (an excellent supporting turn by Lin Shaye) adds some nice variation and raises the stakes considerably, and whatever losses are incurred by fully exposing the previously little-seen spooks are more than balanced by the drama of the Lamberts fighting to save their son. The emotional intensity of the climax, a startling coda, and finally a gorgeously malignant post-credits shot seals the deal, and closes the circuit on the thing.

Wan's next project appears to be FALL NIGHT (or perhaps NIGHTFALL), about a Texas criminal sent to a prison run by vampires. And yet I'd be keen to see the musical that Wan says he's ready to make. And as I said before, I'd love to see him remake Gaslight.

PEE-WEE'S BIG ADVENTURE

2011-04-18T22:05:00.000-07:00

The tale of everyone's favorite manchild and his cross-country search for his beloved bicycle is a perfect film, really, and of a piece with my favorite Tim Burton films. Like those films (Ed Wood and Sweeney Todd, The Demon Barber etc.), Burton's sensibility is not the main auteurist spirit. With Pee-Wee Herman's stock riding so high at the time this film was made, there was pretty much no way the film's director was going to commandeer the thing with an over-riding vision. But by all accounts the collaboration was one of equanimity: there're many of what would become Burton's familiar touches throughout the film (the grotesque stop-motion bits would certainly bloom in Beetlejuice, for example), and yet Burton's gift for directing actors lends itself well to the chaos surrounding Pee-Wee.

Mention should be made of the script (co-written by Phil Hartman) and the uniformly splendid cast, from Judd Omen's intense turn as a fugitive from justice to Elizabeth Daily's weirdly smitten bike shop clerk to Alice Nunn's sensational cameo as the mysterious trucker Large Marge. The genius in this road movie is that each of these characters has a completely different relationship with Pee-Wee; some adore him, some hate him, some develop a grudging respect for him, and still others are crazier than he is.

Many of Burton's recurring collaborators began working with him here, including composer Danny Elfman and cast members Paul Reubens, Jan Hooks, and Diane Salinger. (Burton's CalArts classmate, animator Rick Heinrichs, made his feature debut with Burton here as well.) But the conflation of talent around this movie was a once-in-a-lifetime group, every member of which is firing on all cylinders (even James Brolin and Morgan Fairchild lend their celebrity to the film's divine final scene, giving themselves over to the joke completely). Most remarkably, it's all so damn seamless, everyone finding stake in this berzerk and hilarious story of a boy and his bicycle. Rarely do star vehicles feel like such a powerful group effort while offering such a warm and hilarious showcase for the presence at its center.

Missing Persons

2011-04-14T15:32:00.000-07:00

This was one of the strangest fucking nights of my life.

This is the kind of story that I think is better heard in person, but I have to write this down, 'cause I'm still not totally sure it happened. I've never seen a band fall apart the way Dale Bozzio and Missing Persons did last month...and I've never seen a night where artists and audience came together so powerfully.

Advance word, from a friend who'd seen the band in San Diego three nights prior, wasn't positive. Apparently Bozzio was still in good voice, but quite intoxicated onstage, and prone to lengthy rants. As keen as I was to see the show, and cautiously optimistic about the night in general, I'd prepared myself for a difficult night. Missing Persons had been one of THE new wave bands of the early 80s, boosting a plastic, high-gloss and high-tech image with real musicianship and a knack for complex rhythm and melody (since all musicians were veterans of Frank Zappa's late-70s ensembles, such skill is hardly surprising).

But even though Dale Bozzio had co-written all of Missing Persons' songs, from a distance a 2011 tour might seem desperate, a clinging of a washed-up musician to past glories (particularly with the other founding members Terry Bozzio, Warren Cuccurullo, and Patrick O'Hearn having moved on, all enjoying more professional clout and respect than Dale Bozzio ever received). That her most recent release had been a collection of remakes of MP tracks, as well as other hits of the 80s, would also lead one to expect the worst.

But we steeled ourselves and soldiered on. Though I showed up at Yoshi's an hour before the gig, scant few people had shown up. We had ordered seats at a table on the first tier behind the dance floor, and were surprised to enter the space to find the floor filled with the usual table setup. Not enough tickets sold. Bad news. A bunch of open tables right in front of the stage. Good news for us.

As usually happens at Yoshi's there wasn't a GRAND ENTRANCE of the band - just a bunch of musicians taking the stage and getting set up. So we got a good look at the people filling the shoes of Missing Persons: Mike (I think), a non-descript guitarist; Doug, an older bass player (his instrument had five strings); a keyboard player who looked more like a roadie, save for his purple scarf and zebra-print platform boots; and Jake, the youngest member of the group, a drummer who, it would turn out, was a fine, fine musician.

As the show started Dale looked a bit disoriented. She reminded us a couple of times that it was her birthday. She kept moving around the stage, and looking at the ceiling like she was trying to remember the words. (D suggested that perhaps she was looking up to not be distracted by the smallish crowd, which may well have been the case.) This said, there was NOTHING wrong with her voice - it still carried the range and the weird mix of innocence and sexuality that it had always had. And though she would continue to down flute after flute of champagne (brought out by a dutiful roadie who seemed to have no other responsibilities), her voice remained strong, and by the fifth song ("Words", the band's earliest hit), everything was falling into place. The show was truly well under way, the band continued, and the audience were into it. But I think everyone was still keeping an eye on Dale, half expecting that she could flame out at any time.

So we were all caught by utter surprise when, about five bars into "Give," the guitar player fell over his amplifier. He got to his feet, played a couple more chords, and then fell against the wall. The band stopped and everything was chaos for the next few minutes.

Perhaps you've seen something like this happen, but when when a live performance goes THIS spectacularly wrong it's quite, quite disorienting to the viewer (to the people onstage, as well, sure). I felt weirdly concussed as the ensuing minutes unfolded, but I do remember these things:

-The band members struggling to get the guitarist offstage and into the hands of suitable attention.

-Jake in particular springing to action to nail everything down. ("You're our EMT, Jake, take care of it," quoth Dale.)

-Some strange things from Dale: "Get him a stool, he'll be fine." And ultimately "It's not like he's a drug addict or anything." These are not words you want to hear anyone say under any circumstances.

-And finally, a couple of fans, undaunted by the carnage unfolding before their very eyes, bringing some Missing Persons records for Dale to sign.

What we pieced together was that the guitarist had been in a fight (!) a couple of days prior, and was taking painkillers, which mixed badly with the beer he'd had earlier. So there was a lot of frantic activity (you could see the zebra boots running back and forth beneath the rear curtain), and there was quite a conflicted vibe coming from the stage - it seemed that Mike was determined to retake his place on stage but that the band wanted to just get him some medical attention. Eventually they said that there'd be a liability if he were to resume, and so finally, it was clear there would be no guitarist for the rest of the performance.

So we reached a point where you get whenever things go wrong onstage (somewhere in there we all sang "Happy Birthday To You" to Dale), and Jake played a 3-minute drum solo to fill the space. This is a sign that the band is desperate, but 'twas good. Jake was, in fact, an exceptional drummer (and certainly capable of filling Terry Bozzio's drum throne).

And then the remaining band launched (tentatively, at first) into the album track "U.S. Drag", more intimate and spare without a guitarist to fill it, and yet...

An acting teacher told me that an audience loves to see an actor recover from a flubbed line or some other disaster. I remember thinking at the time that I'd rather see a smooth performance. But this moment in this show made me rethink this.

Because what I saw in "U.S. Drag" at this moment was simply magical: the four remaining musicians were at a point of no return, no way to undo what had just happened, and so they thrust themselves forward. Something resembling a performance gelled before our very eyes, the music rose up from the ashes and took these four wayward souls (and the unbelieving/faithful/coked-up audience members) into its confidence. At that moment, Dale and band resealed the compact with the audience, and made it work. They'd gone over the cliff but reached out for a post, and the momentum pulled them back up on the road.

And from that point forward the show was just fucking solid. Dale continued her between-songs rants, fueled by champagne, endorphins, fearlessness, and utter carnage, but I don't remember her squinting for the words that point forward. The reduced band played on, motivated by a clear "fuck it, we're gonna do this", and it sounded like nothing was missing. Powering through the set, offering a perfectly appropriate and wonderfully rendered "Destination Unknown," ending with a SOLID "Walking In L.A." then covering a Zappa track as a coda. And thank you, good night.

Crazy applause from all of us, particularly a clearly coked-out contingent in their best neon 80s-wear sitting behind us. At my table we just looked at each other, delighted but still not entirely sure that we'd seen what we'd seen. As we lingered to process it, some roadies and a couple of band members came out to strike the set. Jake made the rounds, and there were a couple of us who wanted to compliment/congratulate him. One of the 80s contingent wanted to give Dale something: "Can you give this to your mom?" "She's not my mom." (Jake probably heard that at every gig.) He came over to us and thanked us for coming, asked us if it came off all right. I told him exactly what I wrote above: that after the chaos, something opened up and took us all in, and that the band had more than made it worked. He was pleased, and thanked us again.

On the way home, D had to pull the car over so that we could process. We laughed. This was not a derisive laugh at the band, but the somewhat hysterical laughter of the shellshocked. To this day we still can't quite believe that we saw what we saw. I've seen a fair amount of on-stage chaos (be it Link Wray falling off the stage at Bimbo's, or a typical Testicular Momentum gig at dc space), and even weathered my own share of backstage chaos during plays (one day I'll spill all about THE NIGHT) but this qualified as the most protractedly weird, gloriously uneven, and full-tilt bizarre performance I'd ever seen.

But we were both happy to have seen it.

Because there's no way in hell Yoshi's will ever have them back.

RUBBER

2011-04-09T18:05:00.000-07:00

Tedious.

Under the watchful eyes of a rag-tag, binocular-equipped audience, an abandoned tire comes to life in the middle of the desert. Wandering aimlessly across the landscape, the tire discovers an ability to inflict harm, which it cheerfully unleashes upon a bewildered set of human targets. The hunt is on for this head-exploding killer, even as the nature of his reality becomes more and more questionable.

Your proprietor was as taken with the weirdness and energy of the trailer for this film as anyone else, but was disappointed to see it reveal itself, very very quickly, to be this year's Dot The I. Though the effects and filmmaking skills are there to fully fulfill its promise, director Quentin Dupieux immediately informs his audience that they're in for navel-gazing, coy gamesmanship, and tedious self-reflexive commentary that promises to undermine any thrills they might experience in the movie's running time. This promise, alas, is the one that Dupieux ultimately keeps, and it's sad to see a film that could easily have supported its outre premise fall into a self-congratulating rut of half-assed philosophizing; worse still the manner in which it talks down to its audience. Too dim to take any of its conceited games anywhere of interest, too arch to be any damn fun, there's no fucking reason for this movie to exist, or for you to see it.

CARANCHO

2011-04-07T20:43:00.000-07:00

Argentina is rotting from within, thanks both to a seeming epidemic of car accidents and a shadow industry of insurance fraud. Two desperate souls manage to connect in this sad, sordid world: Sosa, a disgraced lawyer reduced to chasing ambulances on behalf of a greedy company; and Lujan, an ambitious but drug-addicted EMT he meets at the scene of an accident. Though Lujan is initially disgusted by Sosa's profession, the bond between them remains undeniable. And when Sosa launches a scheme to free himself from his shadowy employers, both lovers find themselves on the firing line.

CARANCHO is a beautifully executed Argentinean noir, with director Pablo Trapero finding just the right mix of grit and restraint. Stylistically there's little to root CARANCHO among its noir forbears; as powerful as Trapero's long takes and command of atmosphere are, his style doesn't distract from the immediacy of his story (Alfonso Cuaron could learn much from studying Trapero's economy). Ricardo Darin and Martina Gusman lead a uniformly strong cast, which adds to the film's realism and the impact of its story. CARANCHO is informed by very real despair, and cuts deeper than most other noir.

fuck.

2011-04-01T01:10:00.000-07:00

No, it doesn't look like an April Fools joke - this thing's really coming out today. Heartening to read that the brothers Weinstein appealed the film's original R rating, even though his decision to re-release THE KING'S SPEECH in a PG-13 cut smacks of greed.

Outside the ways that this fundamentally dampens some of the film's most salient themes (as clearly and persuasively outlined by Owen Gleiberman at Inside Movies today) one wonders why the word "fuck" is still so scary to the MPAA. Particularly in the context of this film, in which it's used solely out of any offensive context. Such language gives the film some welcome grit, and isn't anything anyone who's been near a middle school playground in the last 40 years hasn't already heard. One wonders if the MPAA will ever stop treating audiences like children.

Raimifest: FOR LOVE OF THE GAME

2011-03-28T22:59:00.000-07:00

(For Raimifest, run by Bryce Wilson over at the witty and wonderful Things That Don't Suck.)

"...you get the feeling that Billy Chapel isn't pitching against left handers, he isn't pitching against pinch hitters, he isn't pitching against the Yankees. He's pitching against time. He's pitching against the future, against age, and even when you think about his career, against ending. And tonight I think he might be able to use that aching old arm one more time to push the sun back up in the sky and give us one more day of summer."

Forty-year-old Detroit Tigers pitcher Billy Chapel (Kevin Costner) is at the very end of his career. Pretty much everything has collapsed around him - his tumultuous baseball career is ending with a losing season, and his long-term but difficult relationship with New York career woman Jane Aubrey (Kelly Preston) seems to have similarly, and permanently, hit the skids. To make matters worse, the poor bastard is throwing his last game in Yankee Stadium, where thousands of fans have gathered to jeer at him. Though focused on the game at hand, Chapel recalls key moments in both his career and his relationship with Jane, and becomes so involved in his memories that he doesn't immediately realize that he's pitching the best game of his life.

The last of Costner's baseball movies grows a little schmaltzier with each viewing. The romantic stuff gets longer and more irritating every time I see it - Costner and Preston do their best with the often leaden dialogue, but the hideous MOR pop tunes on the soundtrack oversell the emotions at too many moments.

That said, it's a thoroughly adult romance - we're not asked to believe in a younger woman's attraction to an insanely older man, and Costner and Preston are totally credible through the ups and downs of their believably difficult relationship. The then-15-year-old Jena Malone offers a nicely realized performance as Jane's daughter Heather, a sweetly human foil for both characters.

And, AND, the baseball scenes remain some of the best ever made. The acting really sells the in-game action, with Costner totally believable as a pitcher facing his final game, as is John C. Reilly as his catcher - their relationship feels like one that has been built over years (and JK Simmons, in his first of many appearances in Raimi films, is a joy as their coach). These scenes gain authenticity and dramatic heft with the longtime voice of the Yankees Bob Sheppard and veteran announcer Vin Scully thrillingly calling the game.

You're basically on the mound with Chapel, and his ongoing monologue offers as vivid a sense of the game's mechanics as you'll get anywhere else. The film captures the odd sensation of being completely alone in front of 50,000 people.

Basil Poledouris' theme is a great piece of film music, the perfect accompaniment to the end of an era, and to a tired man's last desperate fight. The brass that ascends beneath the strings is the perfect musical reflection of the conflict within Billy, mirroring the rise of his spirit against his exhaustion and the considerable odds against him. The script from Michael Shaara's novel is generous with character moments, and Costner savors each one. And there's some gorgeous photography as well (from veteran DP John Bailey), as here where Chapel makes a rare plea for divine intervention, and the lights of Yankee Stadium come alive as if in response:

And Reilly's "Just throw" speech before the 8th inning is an impassioned and beautiful monologue, surely one of the cinema's great declarations of heterosexual male-male love.

It's directed by Sam Raimi, and it's challenging to place it comfortably in his oeuvre. It falls in the middle of what one might call a "realist" period in his work, bookended by the modern noir A Simple Plan and the effective character piece The Gift. But though it lacks the gonzoid energy and freneticism of his best known work (from the Evil Dead films through the Spider-Man trilogy), it's no less effects-driven: much CGI was used to fill the seats of Yankee Stadium during the film's off-season shoot (along with actual Yankee fans who showed up to heckle Costner and Reilly for local colour). Most impressive is the sequence in which Chapel "clears the mechanism", a mental means of shutting out the stadium's noise section by section. And one wonders if a more realistically-inclined filmmaker would have brought as much viscera to the film's most harrowing scene in which Chapel receives a career-threatening injury at the wrong end of a table saw.

The scene brings out the best in Jane as she fights to save Billy's hand, tapping into a heroic desperation we've seen in Raimi's films before:

In the end I keep thinking back on Zhang Yimou, who was called upon to defend his retreat into martial arts territory with Hero and House of Flying Daggers. He explained that every Chinese filmmaker has at least one wuxia film in him. Perhaps every American filmmaker has at least one baseball film in them. Given that Raimi himself is a fan of the national pastime, who're we to begrudge him this film?

I first caught For Love of the Game theatrically in October 1999, at the end of the first baseball season I'd followed with any interest. Pretty much every year I watch it shortly after the baseball season winds down, a perfect film for the twilight of the season. And though its flaws become more evident with each viewing, I still get caught up in it, and the 9th inning still makes me cry. I dislike The Natural for the way it deifies its hero, and I find the climactic home run overdone and bland. The characters in For Love of the Game are more recognizably human to me, frail, vulnerable, prone to bouts of total assholishness, capable of greatness, and truly at their best in the company of kindred spirits.

Evil Dead 2 was a staple of my high school years, but For Love of the Game is the Raimi film I've spent the most time with. In some ways, as I draw perilously near to Chapel's age (and I note that Raimi himself turned 40 the year the film was released), I find more real resonance in his conflicts than the cartoonish battles of Ash against the undead. It thrills me to see someone with whom I find more and more familiarity with each passing year finding (and proving) that he's not yet done. It's a solid story, beautifully told, informed by a maturity and gravitas one doesn't often see in Raimi's work. And yet Chapel possesses a likable charm, an often self-defeating capacity for error, and a movingly human strength, all of which he shares with the most memorable of Raimi's heroes. And his goal is no less heroic: to use that aching old arm one more time to push the sun back up in the sky. And give us one more day of summer.

OFFSIDE

2011-03-20T22:59:00.000-07:00

The entire nation of Iran is transfixed by a World Cup qualifying match against Bahrain. Though forbidden by law to attend the game in person, several devoted female fans attempt a variety of schemes to gain admission. A few of them are caught, and held in a makeshift pen just feet away from a gate to the stadium in which this crucial game is unfolding.

Jahar Panafi's 2006 film is a thriller. It's an incisive examination of Iranian sexual politics (giving voice to both the women who are practically enslaved by them and the men who find themselves frustrated having to enforce them. As powerfully as it exposes the double standards of Iran's laws, the film never lapses into polemic: Panafi's humanism means none of the film's disparate, desperate characters are cast as villains. It's an essential look at the social policies and lives of the citizens of Iran, and, because of how it powerfully shows the power of football to unite people across such artificial lines, it happens to be a great fucking sports movie.

UNCLE BOONMEE WHO CAN RECALL HIS PAST LIVES

2011-03-10T22:58:00.000-08:00

Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, last year's Palme d'Or winner from the internationally acclaimed filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul, seems to be getting released in the States on a slow but steady schedule thanks to the stalwart distributor Strand Releasing. Case in point its San Francisco run - after its screenings today, its last day on the SF Film Society screen, it's moving over to the Presidio where San Francisco good guy Frank Lee is showing it for another week.

So this is one of those times where criticism turns into promotion, 'cause having seen the film your proprietor can only urge my fellow American cinephiles to RUN. RUN to any screening near you and let yourself live in this gorgeous, otherworldly, amazing film.

Weerasethakul has become the poet of the Thai countryside, capturing both the lives of the people who live and work there (or are simply passing through) and the mythology that informs those people's spiritual lives. Uncle Boonmee is spun from a 1983 book in which the title character discussed visions of his past lives experienced during meditation, but the movie expands into Weerasethakul's own life, crafting a fanciful tale that encompasses many of his tropes, including Thai soap operas and mythological creatures. A friend who saw Uncle Boonmee with me noted that all of Weerasethakul's films seem to begin with the same foley: the sound of insects gently but insistently buzzing in the forest, with occasional interruptions from nocturnal human activity. I observed that the film ends, as many of his others, with its characters adrift in the modern world, with canned music and blinking lights abuzz with a similar electricity. Weerasethakul's films are all animated with a lifeforce that carries from the mythologized past and, optimistically, beams even from the gaudiest, most obnoxious present. (He seems as tapped into the Unified Field as David Lynch.)

Weerasethakul continues to spin tales close to his heart in his own unique, quiet language. Minimal gestures - a hand on a shoulder; a fish breaking the surface of a water - land with volumes of emotion. The natural world comes to life in colors that simply don't exist in any other film. Weerasethakul poignantly chose to shoot Uncle Boonmee on film (suggesting that a tale that confronts mortality should be shot on celluloid, a dying medium), but the end result is tumescent with lifeforce, and as hypnotized as one becomes watching it one can't help but feel uplifted by its spirit and warmth.

The film is the culmination of a years-long project centering on the town of Nabua near the Laotian border. Phantoms of Nabua, a short film Weerasethakul shot earlier as part of the project, can be viewed here.

LOST HIGHWAY

2011-03-07T21:46:00.000-08:00

It was fun to revisit this film at the end of a very busy weekend, which saw your proprietor in Los Angeles for a cleverly conceived, stealthily executed birthday party for a dear, dear friend. During the trip we headed up to Hollywood and stopped by the three houses owned by David Lynch, one of which served as a set for his mid-90s noir psychodrama Lost Highway. About 24 hours later we were back in San Francisco, entering the house, and the fractured mind of deeply troubled saxophonist Fred Madison, on the Castro's screen.

Having rewatched a number of Lynch's films recently, I found LOST HIGHWAY less compelling than some of the others. We might safely attribute the film's more overtly noir flourishes to the influence of writer Barry Gifford, from the more clearly delineated underworld within which Mr. Eddy lurks to the elusive machinations of Patricia Arquette's alluring femme fatale. But on the whole it's built as instinctively as any of Lynch's other films, and just as dually-obsessed. Just as Fred, in extremis, transforms into the bewildered young Pete Dayton (Balthazar Getty), so does Fred's wife Renee reappear as Alice, a moll for Mr. Eddy who proceeds to upend Pete's already tenuous existence.

The film is bookended with lovely but frantic shots of a highway's line disappearing under the headlights of a speeding car (and scored beautifully by David Bowie's "I'm Deranged", perhaps marking the film as a vent of pre-millennial angst). But the linearity this suggests is thwarted constantly. Left is right in this section of Lynch's universe, right down to the casting: counterculture icon Henry Rollins appears as a prison guard, and the similarly iconoclastic Gary Busey turns in a lovely miniature of a performance as Pete's quietly concerned and clearly loving father. The music is similarly fractured, from Lynch mainstay Angelo Badalamenti's orchestral malaise to Barry Adamson's hypercharged noir jazz to Trent Reznor's horrordrones. But the biggest sonic imprint is left by Rammstein, whose forthright German vocals and heavyheavy guitars prove a perfect coup de grace for ultimate chaos (Lynch put the songs in after discovering that the crew had been listening to them obsessively during the shoot.) As intuitively conceived and unexplained as they are, Lynch's films always feel smooth and reasoned, but even as the film seems to close the circuit, ending as it began, Fred twitches and shifts, ready to explode and derail. Hurtling us and all our questions into a black, unanswering abyss.

It's entirely possible that my remove from LOST HIGHWAY (and disinclination to put it up with Lynch's best work) is some kind of defense against its unrelenting darkness. But one wonders if Lynch himself was put off by what he unleashed here: after creating his darkest features back-to-back (TWIN PEAKS: FIRE WALK WITH ME and this), he crafted the genial and G-rated (if still thoroughly Lynchian) THE STRAIGHT STORY for Disney.

THE ANIMATRIX: A DETECTIVE STORY

2011-02-17T01:42:00.000-08:00

(What you are about to read is a contribution to For the Love of Film (Noir): The Film Preservation Blogathon, the details of which can be found at post's end. I have made a donation to the Film Noir Foundation, and hope you will do the same - link's at the end.)

When the brothers Wachowski commissioned some of Japan's finest animators to add short films to their ever-expanding Matrix franchise, director Shinichiro Watanabe was an ideal collaborator. Watanabe's landmark anime series Cowboy Bebop quickly found a devout cult audience for its story of planet-hopping bounty hunters, leavening its stylized anime action with a strident musical score and a generous dose of film noir style and fatalism. Watanabe's noir influences move front and center for his tight, nine-minute Matrix prequel, A Detective Story...

A Detective Story's protagonist is Ash, a put-upon private eye to whom we are introduced near the end of "the case to end all cases..."

But first things first: we go to the beginning of the case as Ash fields a client's call in a P.I.'s office straight out of Noir City:

Though fearing another domestic case, Ash finds that his generous client wants him to track down a mysterious computer hacker known as Trinity. Familiar as we are with Matrix lore, we know immediately that Ash is being set up as a pawn to pursue an agent of freedom by a conspiracy larger than he could possibly imagine. But like so many noir heroes before him, Ash takes the money and goes to work, unaware of the bad, bad hand fate has dealt him.

Ash's tools of the trade are both classic...

...and downright avant-garde, including a weirdly high-tech rig with multiple flatscreens and phone tech from some alternate universe's 1930s...

Ash soon finds out that other investigators seeking Trinity have wound up either dead or, in the case of one poor bastard, insane. A visit to the latter man's home does yield a disturbing, if visually striking, clue:

Several online, Lewis Carroll-coded communications later, Ash finds himself on a train to nowhere and, finally, face to face with Trinity:

Ash quickly realizes that there's much, much more to Trinity than he could have imagined. Just as, in The Matrix, Keanu Reeves' Neo was awakened to the world underneath his perceived reality, Ash finds the world he knew slipping from his grasp, and having made the trip through the looking glass finds himself in the grip of a reality that is simply beyond his comprehension. Ash is forced to make a crucial decision when several of their fellow passengers turn into Agents that move to eliminate them both.

As the agents draw nearer, Ash feels himself being physically transformed into one of them. Trinity must defend herself, and thus executes the function of femmes fatale from across the years.

Like other noir heroes before him, Ash seems to find a kind of comfort in the shadow of death's oncoming embrace, though he remains bewildered by his too-short life beyond the looking glass.

And Watanabe again engages our familiarity with the Matrix's overall story to give Ash what many noir creators refused their heroes, a simple moment of grace as Trinity confides in him her highest compliment: "For what it's worth, I think you could have handled the truth."

And so Trinity leaves, and even as the agents encroach on Ash, Watanabe's streak of generosity leaves him a final burst of energy to buy Trinity some time, to look death in the eye, and to enjoy one last cigarette.

Lights out.

Watanabe's most distinctive gift is his talent for combining disparate genres and cultures into bizarre but effective hybrids. That he would reach across decades to bring the high-tech, colorful, and action packed world of The Matrix into the lower tech, black-and-white, and somber world of film noir in A Detective Story only seems perverse in retrospect. In fully embracing the noir aesthetic Watanabe has crafted a lovely Matrix miniature, both a fine self-contained prelude to that sprawling (some would argue over-extended) franchise and a dark little gem in its own right. Pleasingly mind-bending, and simply noir as hell.

For the Love of Film (Noir): The Film Preservation Blogathon is hosted by Marilyn Ferdinand of Ferdy on Films and the Self-Styled Siren. You can go here to read more about the Film Noir Foundation, here to read a cogent interview with FNF head Eddie Muller about its preservation projects and why they matter, and you can go here to make a donation.)

on Buzz

2011-02-15T18:46:00.000-08:00

The formula seems pretty steady: there's going to be a big show. A horde of hopeful performers line up to audition, sometimes cruelly judged, each one holding out hope for a big break. Pressures mount backstage, with creators trying to stay focused and producers scrambling frantically for cash. The conflict escalates right into opening night. The show everyone's been waiting for finally starts, and, fueled by the frantic energies of the hour that preceded it, takes on a life of its own, exploding into an organism that grows beyond the boundaries of the stage, of the screen, of reality itself.

Choreographer/director Busby Berkeley is best known for the spectacular dance numbers conceived for several Depression-era Hollywood musicals. Though he was quick to deny any high art intentions, Berkeley's numbers remain some of the most mind-bending and surreal sequences ever created for Hollywood's blockbuster entertainments. His kaleidoscopic choreographies of an impossible number of dancers are so intricate and expansive that one almost expects to come to the end of a tunnel of chorus girls' legs to see the Starchild staring back.

Toward the beginning of Dames, recently screened at the Castro Theatre (the final in a four film BB series), noticing themes of choreographed group labor, mechanized sexuality, and class tension, I mused to my companion that Berkeley and cohorts seemed to be remaking/sequelizing Fritz Lang's Metropolis with each film. (Five seconds after I said this a bodyguard played by Arthur Vinton, a dead ringer for The Tall Man from Lang's film, appeared on screen.) But Berkeley's the only creator involved in these films that works to match Lang in scope and vision. One can't discount the work of the directors and creative teams on these films, but they're all best known for Berkeley's sequences, which absorb even a powerhouse, name talent like James Cagney into their design. In Footlight Parade, Cagney moves heaven and earth to stage his latest spectacle, but in the end he falls down a staircase and winds up accidentally cast in his own number. Just like the audience he's carried headlong into the mind and worlds of Busby Berkeley. And just like us, he gives in completely.

all my love

2011-02-14T18:38:00.000-08:00

RECORDED LIVE

2011-02-11T14:42:00.000-08:00

Way back during the dawn of cable, HBO ran short films between features to fill the hour. One of my favorites was this, which I'm pleasantly surprised to find was a student film made by TREMORS scenarist S.S. Wilson.

THE GARDEN OF SINNERS

2011-02-05T23:11:00.000-08:00

Spun from a visual novel by Kinoko Nasu, this gorgeously atmospheric anime series chronicles the efforts of a closely-knit group of individuals to take on an array of disturbing crimes. The story skips back and forth over a five year period, and hinges mainly on the relationship between the mildly schizophrenic and mystically powered Shiki Ryōgi and the physically average but perceptive young man Mikiya Kokutou. Though Shiki is the strongest member of the group, evidence points to her as the most likely suspect in a spree of killings early on, and Mikiya sets out at extreme personal risk to prove her innocence. To Shiki herself as much as anyone else.

Blood runs red, and deep, in these films, and yet the overall mood is one of quiet alienation, melancholy. There's a pleasant lack of distracting fanservice, and a powerful attention to the quiet moments and character details. During a presentation of three chapters of this saga at San Francisco's Viz Cinema, key creative team members confirmed that it is the quieter moments, rather than the intricate and supercharged action scenes, that often pose the most creative challenges to the makers of anime. Given their devotion to the original vision of Kinoko Nasu, the Garden of Sinners team have realized an abundance of such moments, crafting a dark but precious jewel in the anime corpus.

NOIR CITY rundown

2011-01-31T14:14:00.000-08:00

The wrap-up of the annual Noir City festival leaves this writer with mixed emotions. The festival's customary gaudy, self-aggrandizing showmanship continued unabated, which may be an inducement to a number of the festival's loyal, diehard fans, but has always left me cold. I have no interest in winning prizes, in the stale jokes surrounding this (or any) year's Miss Noir City, or in the tired, TIRED wisecracks of the hosts. As dire as a more po-faced presentation would be, I can't help but feel that the irreverence with which Eddie Muller and co. continue to approach the films they purport to love so much only diminishes them, and stokes the unfortunate tendency of the Castro Theatre audience to regard the films in a campier light than necessary (though it seems I'm not alone in feeling so - one patron, during a screening of SECRET BEYOND THE DOOR... made my day by yelling in response to the titters that were steadily streaming through the audience, as did the woman who meekly offered: "I concur.")

That said, my consternation with the Film Noir Foundation's self-congratulation (and the same they cultivate in their audience) doesn't blind me to the nobility of their mission, or the quality of the films they present. There is a thrill that comes with these particular films unrolling during the usually cold month of January (among other things, it's nice to see Anita Monga, ousted years ago from her position as the Castro's programmer, bringing her curatorial intelligence back to its screen). The festival's balancing of classic noir (such as Otto Preminger's ANGEL FACE) with recently restored classics (like festival-closer THE HUNTED, starring actor/ice skater Belita) is as knowing and strong as ever, and the chance to catch up with favorite films and take in new films to the canon is, indeed, precious.

What I saw, briefly:

GASLIGHT - less a noir film than a murky period drama, the film of Patrick Hamilton's play benefits from solid characterizations, including one of my favorite performances from Joseph Cotten, believably smitten and, unlike Holly Martins, able to do right by the film's embattled heroine. I'm probably alone in wanting to see James Wan remake it.

STRANGERS IN THE NIGHT - cheap but credible Republic Gothic, with a returning WWII soldier tracking down his lady pen pal only to become enmeshed in the increasingly insane schemes of her mother (a gloriously unhinged Helen Thimig). Beautifully paced and packed into 56 suspenseful minutes by director Anthony Mann, but where similar stories would end with a house on fire, the danger of this one culminates with a painting falling on somebody. Beautiful.

THE TWO MRS. CARROLLS - For reasons I don't understand, Muller apologized for this one in advance. But Humphrey Bogart is completely believable as a conflicted, artist-blocked painter, as is Barbara Stanwyck as his increasingly concerned and endangered spouse. The reveal of the portrait is a truly unsettling show-stopper - I wonder what became of the actual painting.

MY NAME IS JULIA ROSS - made the name of director Joseph H. Lewis, and it's easy to see why. If it's too similar to GASLIGHT (the setting of the "madness" theme for the festival resulted in a few cases of deja vu), its inversion of the amnesia storyline makes for some powerful suspense.

SECRET BEYOND THE DOOR... - sorry to hear of the backstage conflicts between Fritz Lang and his creative team. If it's less visually ambitious than even the weirdest of his Hollywood films, it remains an assured and creepy take on the Bluebeard myth, with a lovely, dreamy Joan Bennett confronting the inner demons of perfect stranger Michael Redgrave. This one ends in flames. Muller and crew's insistence that the film is "incomprehensible" demeans it and them - the psychological throughline is completely credible, and its mirror to actual events in architectural history is fascinating (and I hope D., my fellow fancier of fetish and film, will sound off on these elements in the comments).

BLIND ALLEY - a very intriguing early Hollywood foray into the Freudian realm, with hostage psychologist Ralph Bellamy probing the psyche of desperate gangster Chester Morris.

ANGEL FACE - attractive but innocent fall guy: Robert Mitchum. Alluring but deadly femme fatale: Jean Simmons. Obsessed and overbearing filmmaker: Otto Preminger. Feeling that Mitchum is just utterly, completely fucked: Check. In some ways a by-the-numbers noir, but each of the tropes is so beautifully, even realistically realized that it just carries you down its spiral. The unhappy ending so often promised by Muller finally, gloriously manifests here.

THE HUNTED - there's something charming about how, in Monogram's grab for respectability after its rebirth as Allied Artists, the studio put so much faith in ice skater Belita as an A-lister. She's paired here with Preston Foster as the tough but smitten cop who sent her to prison. Though I couldn't really buy Foster in this role (he's fine as a cop, but too old and too grizzled to carry a torch for anyone for quite that long), there's something about Belita's not-quite-A-list looks, something real about her charms that carried me along. And the obligatory ice-skating sequence is just charming.

On balance, I'm pleased that Noir City continues, and I'm glad I got to see a third of the festival's total offerings. And yet for the first time we saw signs that the future is catching up to the venerable fest. The night he introduced THE TWO MRS. CARROLLS Muller mused that in addition to being the first time many of the audience had seen the film theatrically, it will more than likely be their last. Whatever my issues with Mr. Muller, I happily acknowledge that he's closer to aspect of the film exhibition game than I, and to hear such an enthusiastic proponent of film preservation and exhibition so tentative about the future of the festival in particular and exhibition in general does give one pause.

But hey, as long as the Film Noir Foundation continues to fight the good fight in keeping these films in the public eye and up on screen, I'll happily go see them.

KILLDOZER!

2011-01-19T21:47:00.001-08:00

Your proprietor was smitten with this film as soon as Stacie Ponder posted the above image during the stellar Shocktober list-o-rama last year. The name rang a bell from my (now-ended) years of MST3K viewing, but some research showed that it was based on a story by Theodore Sturgeon (an accomplished science fiction writer, and author of some fine episodes of OG Star Trek). And it was not available on video. But some stalwart soul grabbed it on the SciFi Channel back in the day, and put it up on YouTube in eight parts. And so tonight, recovering from an illness, I finally went through the thing chapter by chapter.

And the thing just moves, briskly introducing an otherworldly menace that sets down among a half dozen American construction workers on a Pacific island, infecting one of their vehicles with malevolent life, and then setting murderously upon them one after another. At 75 minutes it's a novella-length film, suffering from none of the padding or dead spots that plague similar made-for-cable productions today and benefiting from richly (if economically) written characters, salt of the earth men played by salt of the earth actors. Each actor makes the most of the morsels given him, including some downright Hemingwayesque philosophizing.

Which plays into one of the film's strengths: these characters behave in completely logical ways given the bizarre circumstances they're in. They're stunned with disbelief. They mourn. They bicker. They drink. They confiscate alcohol. They fight. They joke. They share their darkest, deepest thoughts. In one devastating moment, one resignedly closes his eyes as mechanized death bears down upon him. And in the last minutes, the survivors scramble to make a last, desperate grab for life.

The film's joke-status notwithstanding, there's much to be appreciated here, even (especially) from a non-ironic perspective. The movie doesn't try to live down its low budget, but delivers an economical and thrilling little story that it's smart enough to reach. If The Criterion Collection decided to release this on disc, complete with the Sturgeon story in a booklet (like they did with Patriotism or Mr. Arkadin) and maybe (just spitballing here) an optional new audio track by someone like, say, Robin Rimbaud, I'd pre-order that sucker immediately.

SUMMER WARS

2011-01-17T22:58:00.000-08:00

An invitation from comely classmate Natsuki brings young Kenji to the Japanese countryside, where he tries to balance working remotely on the super-social-network Oz with the challenges posed by Natsuki's family (particularly her formidable grandmother). But all of these concerns quickly evaporate in the face of a threat posed by the Love Machine, a sinister program that Kenji unwittingly unleashes upon Oz and the world.

The latest feature from venerated anime producers Madhouse, Summer Wars is an absolute delight. Madhouse runs riot in the scenes set in Oz, with colorful icons waging ongoing battle against the escalating threat of the Love Machine. But the film's real world sequences are every bit as moving. The film's extended supporting cast, including what feels like twenty members of Natsuki's family, are all vividly realized, and each has a role to play in the film's intensifying battle scenes.

The comparisons that have been drawn between this film and the work of Miyazaki are misleading - the film is as madly inventive, but not rooted in Miyazaki's whimsy. The film takes in myriad genres and subgenres of Japanese film - anime cyber action dances between seasonal scenes straight out of Kurosawa. Though profoundly sensitive viewers may take issue with the film's quiet endorsement of Japanese militance, Summer Wars is a rare anime that examines Japanese traditions and values in terms of today's globally interlinked cyberworld. Your proprietor was pleased by the film's balance between its gentle attack on American isolationism and its keenly-expressed family values.

two by Hitchcock

2011-01-12T16:48:00.000-08:00

I CONFESS - had never seen Hitchcock's tale of a priest (Montgomery Clift) forced to keep mum about a murder confessed to him - a lovely series of lesser-seen Hitchcock films unfurling at the Castro Theatre's helping me fill in some blanks. I liked this film - was pleasantly surprised at the ensemble nature of the film, less centered on our conflicted hero than taking in all of the people in his orbit, including the authorities brought in to investigate the case and the surrounding community. Strong though it often is (and unusually serious for a Hitchcock film), one does long for more contemporary characterization. In the mid-50s it was enough to simply show Clift as a priest, but we need more details these days to really understand WHY he doesn't just divulge what he knows. There's very little insight into why Clift became a priest, thus little tactile understanding of what he'd lose by breaking the seal of the confessional. A remake penned by George Pelecanos (or even Richard Price), an author with a knack for that much character detail and grounding in both religious and crime stories, would not be remiss.

ROPE - the problem of characterization continues here. It's just impossible to buy James Stewart as a professor who espouses belief in murder as a right of the superior being. But the mechanics of storytelling in the movie, presenting the action as in a single, mostly-unbroken take (save for a truly high-impact close-up) move the thing along beautifully, making for a dense and entertaining 80 minutes, the last three of which are absolutely stunning.

BLACK SWAN

2011-01-04T12:06:00.000-08:00

Your proprietor extends this open invitation to everyone who's trying to recast BLACK SWAN as a campy, overwrought, SHOWGIRLS-for-the-21st-century:

Go fuck yourselves.

the House's top 20, 2010

2011-01-01T12:10:00.000-08:00

The Very Top Two:

HENRI-GEORGES CLOUZOT'S INFERNO
REDLINE

The Top 20ish:

I:

44 INCH CHEST
I AM LOVE
THE LOVED ONES
THE DISAPPEARANCE OF HARUHI SUZUMIYA
ECCENTRICITIES OF A BLOND HAIR GIRL
WINTER'S BONE
THE SOCIAL NETWORK
CARLOS
FOUR LIONS
BLACK SWAN

II:

THAT EVENING SUN
the RED RIDING trilogy
35 SHOTS OF RUM
VENGEANCE
WHITE MATERIAL
THE A-TEAM
TOY STORY 3
WE WERE HERE: Voices from the AIDS Years in San Francisco
SOUL KITCHEN
HEREAFTER
TODAY'S SPECIAL
TRUE GRIT

Undervalued:

THE LAST EXORCISM
DEVIL
TRON: LEGACY

and again thru the House...

2010-12-24T20:57:00.000-08:00

Three minutes to the 25th here at the House of Sparrows, and your proprietor, and all within the House, sincerely wish you all the best this holiday season.

MODUS OPERANDI

2010-12-19T01:16:00.000-08:00

Shot piecemeal over several years on 8mm, this movie tells the story of an assassin brought out of retirement to chase two briefcases in exchange for the name of the man who killed his wife.

Aside from genre mainstay Danny Trejo and a couple of other veterans (including Mark Metcalf), there are few professional actors in this movie, giving the blocky setups a leaden and weird vibe. Filmmaker Frankie Latina seems to have drafted acquaintances at his various locations (including Milwaukee, Tokyo, and Taipei) - the film may well have been shot on different vacations, which is borne out by the home movie feel of the thing. Most of these performers are at least enthusiastic, and give Latina credit for including as much male nudity as female.

It's completely devoid of polish, chock full of filler, and listlessly acted...but it's never, ever boring, with a few action scenes that pop up out of nowhere. One never knows what's coming, and the off-kilter delirium does pay off come the action-packed, profoundly insane climactic shootout (though there's still about fifteen minutes after that, including a couple minutes of low-budget sci-fi and a final explosion that, disappointingly, we don't get to see.)

The cult that is allowing Tommy Wiseau to control their responses to his shitty, shitty, shitty movie THE ROOM would do well to discover this movie - it's less pretentious and a lot more fun.

DEAD & BURIED

2010-12-15T22:08:00.000-08:00

A smart little 1981 horror flick, with tourists being waylaid in a small Northern California town and murdered by the locals. The sheriff gets a bit dismayed as it becomes clear that the victims are coming back to life, and assuming roles in his otherwise sleepy town. It's an effective and funny little flick that plays a number of notes very well, from the quietness of the opening to the good-humored quirkiness of the townsfolk, everything deliberately and smartly building to a gloriously hysterical finale. The Mendocino settings are evocative, with even interior shots seemingly shot through a thin layer of fog. More than worth a look, and utterly deserving of its cult status

SLEUTH

2010-12-05T17:46:00.000-08:00

Come on in.

An ideal film for winter, as icy and chilling as a perfect gin & tonic. Anthony Shaffer's play gets rewritten by Harold Pinter, restaged by director Kenneth Branagh and production designer Tim Harvey, performed by Michael Caine and Jude Law, and observed by you.

The story unfolds in a gorgeously chilly, always-in-motion house filled with surveillance technology, contemporary British art and reflective surfaces.

Indeed, Caine and Law serve as mirrors to each other in myriad ways...

...not the least of which is Law playing a role essayed by Caine in the film's previous version. The house, as many cinematic interiors before it, is a reflection of a character's psychology, though whose psychology exactly is open to question - the battle of wills between Wyke and Tindle rages unabated, with the house changing allegiances and favoring each in turn throughout.

...but the house is a liminal zone that fills the whims of Pinter and Branagh as well.

This ladder, for example, exists within the house for no apparent practical purpose but to serve Wyke's frame job in act I. Was this plan in the cards during the house's design phase?

The film serves gorgeously as an ambient film, drawing you into its vicious spaces thru screen upon screen. It's bound to its single set like a stage play, but takes you through it in a way only possible in film. The set reveals its spaces just as Pinter's languages opens its own pit traps. Fall in.

KURONEKO

2010-11-26T22:59:00.000-08:00

Pleased was your proprietor to see, hot on the heels of last month's Onibaba review, that Janus Films was touring a print of another period horror piece by Kaneto Shindo.

KURONEKO's story is as lean a folk tale as ONIBABA's, with a wife and mother of a samurai returning as vengeful spirits after being brutally raped and murdered by a gang of 17 soldiers. Waylaying samurai outside the Rajomon Gate, the two angry ghosts drink the blood of their victims to sate the vengeful demon that returned them to human form. Things become complicated when their long-missing son and husband, a successful samurai, is charged to investigate and eliminate them.

Shindo's tale is captured in a setting as powerful and evocative as ONIBABA's susuki fields, but the world is expanded to include artificial settings that frame its ghostplay perfectly - the gorgeous bamboo forest doesn't suffocate its characters as ONIBABA's susuki, but seem to push them into these gorgeous, metatheatrical worlds. Shindo unleashes an arsenal of cinematic and theatrical effects to capture the movements of his spectral characters, and briefly gives way to a thrillingly lush romanticism when two of his characters reconcile on a more earthly plane.

From the two films mentioned here I suspect that Shindo's a bit more restrained than his contemporary Seijun Suzuki, but he's no less visionary. I'd be keen to see a retrospective taking in more of his work (like the one on the work of Masahiro Shinoda that seems to be making the rounds). The Janus tour of KURONEKO suggests strongly that a Criterion Collection release is forthcoming - more economical than a full-tilt retrospective tour, to be sure, but after experiencing these two films in such close succession one does long for a more running cup.

now Whedon-free

2010-11-22T14:41:00.001-08:00

The 'net's abuzz today with news of the forthcoming reboot of Buffy The Vampire Slayer. The word that creator Joss Whedon is officially, and angrily, not involved has many of his fanbase up in arms.

Your proprietor is a lot less invested in the Whedonverse these days. The plot mechanics of the last episodes of DOLLHOUSE felt like twists-for-the-sake-of-twists, and had the weird effect of completely disengaging me from everything the man's ever had a hand in (the evangelical fervor of the WWJWD? crowd sealed it as well). And yet the proposed reboot does hold my interest, as it is a remake of the original feature film from which the series was loosely spun, rather than the series itself. There were aspects of the film that I wish had carried over to the series (during a recent rewatch of the film, I particularly found Luke Perry's Pike a much more effective and vastly less cutesy foil for Buffy than Nicholas Brendon's Xander), but each iteration has its strengths and weaknesses.

So I'll be interested to see how it all develops. And I'll call it right now: if the new BTVS makes it to the screen, it'll get a higher box office gross than SERENITY.

WESTWORLD

2010-11-16T23:21:00.000-08:00

The futuristic theme park Delos, for $1000/day, caters to the traveler's wildest fantasies. Three different realms, capturing life in ancient Rome, medieval times, and the American West, are people with androids whom guests can kill or have sex with. A pair of vacationing businessmen take a trip to Westworld, where they encounter comely barmaids, brawlin' desperadoes, and a taciturn gunslinger (Yul Brynner) that won't stay dead.

One assumes that first time feature writer-director Michael Crichton was paying serious attention to the films made of his earlier work, because Westworld is an assured fucking filmmaking debut. Crichton is as adept at showing as he is at telling - Westworld's decent from tightly-controlled paradise to hellish technological riot is expertly paced, reflected in the increasingly frantic performances of the actors playing humans (which itself is terrifyingly offset by the steady stillness of the actors playing androids). Crichton lets his scientists tell us the mechanics of what's going wrong, but the larger reasons why they're going wrong (and the implications for our lives outside the theatre) are left for us to ponder. And the film balances its philosophizing with a profoundly visceral feel, making us feel every death and escalating the stakes as the lone survivor makes a desperate run for survival, dogged by Brynner at every step. The sound design is particularly fine, with beautifully canned cowboy music gradually being overwhelmed by sinister electronic drones that hum with the same kind of semi-organic malevolence that animates Brynner.

Westworld is not widely heralded as a classic, but its influence can be felt on may classics that followed it, from the work of John Carpenter (who modeled unstoppable killing machine Michael Myers on Brynner's gunslinger) to James Cameron to, hell, to Crichton himself (Jurassic Park really is Westworld with dinosaurs). There's really not much attention paid to Crichton's work as a filmmaker, and Westworld suggests that a retrospective would not be remiss. Among other things, it'd please your proprietor to see Looker projected.

THE FUNHOUSE

2010-11-06T13:57:00.000-07:00

Four teenagers - the virginal Amy, her first-date Buzz, her friend Liz, and Liz's schmucky boyfriend Richie - take in the attractions at a sleazy traveling carnival. On a dare from Richie the gang decide to spend the night after hours in the carnival's funhouse, but after witnessing a murder find themselves running for their lives through a very dark ride.

Your proprietor wishes more movies were made like this, with a competent but largely unknown cast (peppered with a couple of veterans) doing solid work in a film whose creativity and atmosphere trumps its low budget. There's a good script at the heart of this: the story observes the tropes of the slasher genre that was in full swing when the film was made, but the scope of the film includes a healthy dose of carny life (the family) to flesh out its antagonists, and locates its horror not in a single rampaging killer but more diffusely, throughout a carnival and into the very film itself.

That many of the characters are believable help immeasurably, starting with Amy, a final girl played with complexity, innocence, and just he right amount of knowning sexiness by Elizabeth Berridge. Cooper Huckabee brings a nice curiosity to Buzz (look at his reactions during the freaks-of-nature scene). For all his lower-class manliness ("...works in a filling station," Amy's parents observe), there's a soulfulness and sensitivity to Buzz; you can see why Amy likes him, and there's a nice willingness-but-awkwardness to the start of their date. A number of veterans fill out the carnival's staff, from Kevin Conway's chameleonic performances as three different barkers to the always-game Sylvia Miles' wild turn as a raunchy fortune teller. All of the actors bring their characters' shared histories and little pieces of business to bear, and I suspect that director Tobe Hooper presided over a fair number of solid improvisations.

Unsurprising that Hooper, director of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Salem's Lot before, is as adept at maintaining pace and atmosphere. The carnival is brought to vivid, grimy life, offering any number of experiences both joyful and creepy. The film itself is directed like a darkride, a winding trek through dissociated shocks and weirdness before building to a frenetic finale. From the childish antics of young Joey to the animated dummies that populate the funhouse (vivid, otherworldly characters in their own right) to the final laugh from the funhouse's Laughing Sal-style figurehead, the film leaves us dazed and entertained, and reeling from the touch of something weird and sleazy.

Written for the Final Girl Film Club, presided over by the lively and lovely Stacie Ponder.

happy birthday, G.

2010-11-03T15:51:00.000-07:00

August Ragone reminds me that today's a holiday, of sorts.

Not coincidentally, perhaps, Crackle has over a dozen Godzilla and related films available for free streaming. GODZILLA: FINAL WARS is a thing of joy and wonder, and GODZILLA VS. KING GHIDORAH has your proprietor's favorite special effects shot ever.

Happy Birthday, Gojira-san.

a murder of crows

2010-10-20T12:39:00.000-07:00

Two years ago your proprietor wrote the following:

"On the spur of the moment, after videotaping two shows at the Dark Room I grabbed a cab up to the Clay Theatre, where they were screening Alex Proyas' The Crow at midnight. This film was a staple of a short but memorable time in my life - I saw it four times when it screened back in 1994. A friend visiting briefly during an overseas gig was surprised that the thing had been released, in light of star Brandon Lee's on-set death (mirroring that of his father, Bruce Lee). As powerful as the film was, with its star's death paralleling that of his character, opinion was split of this curious film, among critics and among our friends: Sean thought it was a waste of time; Josh though it was too, unrelentingly dark; a woman I know had an orgasm during the nightclub shootout.

"As for me, I cried every time I saw it - the very act of watching the film was magic, its star a ghost haunting his final film, brought back to life every time the thing unfurled, projected on a screen. Those screenings remain precious memories, and solidified (though I was too young to realize it at the time) my belief in the cinema as an act of worship, as a tribal magic.

"And now fourteen years later, I returned to watch the ghost animate one more time (I could never watch the film on video). Tonight's service had maybe twenty attendees - even a pre-screening performance by a punk cabaret ensemble wasn't an inducement (hell, maybe the audience knew something about the band that I didn't, and went the following night).

"The film has dated all right, I'd say - Proyas' mise-en-scene is still remarkable, as artificial and lovely in its own dark way as the scratchy art and fragmented script of James O'Barr, creator of the original graphic novel. The songs and soundtrack still moved and amazed. The film's weaknesses, to which even as rapturous a convert as I back in '94 wasn't blind, still remained, and have not been made any less clunky by the passage of time. The whole "destroy-the-crow-and-you-destroy-the-man" thing remains an unhappy means of developing third act tension, despite the fact that Eric Draven, as invulnerable as he is, has already had everything taken from him, and could not possibly be more destroyed. The film's good points and bad points were remembered, and taken in with my older, more discerning eyes and more detached heart.

"But when the crow takes flight, propelling Eric toward the first fight in his quest for vengeance, Trent Reznor's cover of "Dead Souls" (itself haunted by original singer Ian Curtis) taking all of us over this damned city, carrying us along the rooftops as Brandon/Eric leap, stride, and run across them, the ghost lives again. I breathe in, softly, and cry."

The thing was wide open for sequels - any number of dead souls could be brought back for vengeance, and sequels proliferated across the screen, yes, but also in comics and novels. The cinematic franchise immediately saw diminishing returns: Vincent Pérez was just dandy in the lead (and much of the supporting cast were more than game), but the screenplay seized on and amplified the "destroy-the-crow-and-you-destroy-the-man" and collapsed into a mess. Further sequels went straight-to-video, and many of them had their moments. But none of the subsequent films could come near to capturing the ethereality of the first: the thing's too charged with the ghost of its star, rendering any sequel a pale, too-solid imitation.

Maybe for that reason I'm having a hard time getting worked up over the news that Mark Wahlberg is rumored to be cast as Eric Draven in a forthcoming remake/reboot. Perhaps I'm just numb to Hollywood disintering yet another franchise in lieu of paying a screenwriter to come up with something new. Perhaps because the original film is too close to my heart, too fast, too ghostly, too keenly felt, to be anything but unassailable.

REDLINE afterglow

2010-10-13T13:42:00.000-07:00

4F: 4F is up
House: heeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
House: that is a gorgeous piece of writing
House: it's a difficult film to write about without giving too much away, or sounding insane
4F: I love that film
4F: I do
House: me too
House: happily, it seems that it'll be widely released next year
4F: Yayyyy
House: its international and US distributors seem to know that they have something truly special on their hands
4F: Fab!
House: i feel like i had your hand in a vice-like grip thru the whole second half of the movie
House: i apologize for any discomfort
4F: Haha. Me too.
4F: No. I mean I was squeezing too
House: when the mechanic busted into the gangster's room to save frisbee, making the two of us gasp at once
House: i think that'll turn out to be my favorite moment at the movies this year
4F: Ha!
4F: Excellent
House: capping the night off watching the fiery moon descend to a tiny ember in the fog was the icing on it
House: thanks, d.
4F: Yes. XO

REDLINE

2010-10-12T23:21:00.000-07:00

The eyes of an entire galaxy seem to be on Redline, a superturbocharged racing event featuring a disparate array of contenders. Notable among them is 25000-to-1 long-shot Sweet JP, a racer who had lost a qualifying event when his car exploded inches from the finish line. Like JP, whose youthful dreams of racing glory have been largely quashed by the criminal entanglements that have ensnared him, all of the Redline's competitors bring colorful and dangerous backstories to the event. And all of their dreams may end prematurely when Redline's unwilling host, the ruler of the militarized Roboworld, hires a psychotic colonel to annilihate all competitors.

Showing simultaneously in San Francisco with its Japanese premiere, Takeshi Koike's anime racing film is seamless, energizing, absurd, thoroughly entertaining, and completely uplifting. For all the insane details that are jammed into the film, its narrative line is surprisingly clean, hitting the beats well-established by other sports movies. Koike delivers a striking ensemble of colorful, driven characters (any of whom could hold the center of their own film), introducing each one and establishing their respective personalities, goals, and ambitions with efficiency and verve, giving each one focus and fleshing out a number of fantastic and bizarre subplots.

After the qualifying Yellowline event sets a high bar for action, Koike and his collaborators push the story and design of the film to more and more extreme and absurd realms. But the ongoing propulsive action never becomes numbing - it's so engaging that something in you seems to accelerate to accommodate the unique pulse of the unfolding spectacle. And yet the balance of the film's brief oases of quiet creates a powerful emotional stake in the action, and when the film finally reveals its romantic side, you're grabbed by the heart as strongly as the eyes.

So much contemporary cinema seems flaccid, sexless, joyless next to REDLINE. The film never flags, never cops out, and always has something batshit crazy and wonderful coming right up. The seven years the film spent in development were well spent, and yet it feels like it's inventing itself and exploding fresh before your very eyes.

ETA: From Anime News Network comes the welcome news that Manga Entertainment, clearly aware that they've got something special on their hands, are releasing the thing subtitled across the U.S. next year.

CREEPSHOW

2010-10-10T12:03:00.000-07:00

Thoughts upon revisiting this, one of your proprietor's favorite horror films, 28 years later:

--My mother, God love her, took me to see this theatrically. I'd first heard about it from a friend of her who was staying at our house, and told us excitedly about how they were filming this crazy movie called CREEPSHOW up in Pennsylvania where some guy killed his wife and her lover by burying them in front of the tide. Mom was appalled - I knew I had to see it. Mom remained appalled even after the film had finished (EDIT: hell, she got appalled all over again just reading this entry), but I was scarred for life with love for this crazy crazy movie, which had exceeded even my own weird expectations. Seeing it with adult, more analytical eyes, I still feel the same joy at revisiting it that I did during its frequent cable appearances during my youth. And my studies of film and storytelling have opened my eyes to other strengths of the film that I was too young to appreciate.

--It's dated, yes, but it remains George Romero's most ambitious and overtly stylized film, and balances a relative seriousness of purpose with a real willingness on the part of everyone involved, from scripter Stephen King to the experienced cast, to make it something crazy and special.

--Some segments are better than others, as with any anthology, but each piece serves its purpose in the whole. A friend with whom I watched it felt that the curtain raiser, "Father's Day", was slight enough to have been excised altogether, but I really don't think "The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill" would work as an opener. "Father's Day" schlocky and gore-crazed as it is (setting a rotting ghoul loose upon his remaining, rich family members), establishes the film's visual tropes beautifully, and firmly, ungently lets us know that some crazy shit's about to hit, and anything can happen at any time.

Seriously, can there be a clearer statement of purpose than the severed head as holiday cake served up by a vengeful, rotting corpse? Like the slashed eyeball in Un Chien Andalou, it just puts you on edge for the rest of the movie. Fuck, yeah.

--There is absolutely nothing subtle about Stephen King's widely-lambasted performance in "The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill", but you gotta love his bug-eyed, out there commitment. Such fearlessness on the part of a first-time actor is to be praised. And listen to the television that plays during the segment - a clever and funny chorus recalling similar commentaries elsewhere (like the downright manic telethon in Karlson's TIGHT SPOT).

--"Something To Tide Your Over" changes the mood effectively, beginning as an almost noirish tale of infidelity and revenge. Lovely acting in this piece, with a pre-Cheers Ted Danson one step behind an angrily pirouetting Leslie Nielsen (whose balance between his Airplane!-style nuttery and some real, simmering rage encapsulates the film's dual shocks and silliness beautifully). Nielsen's hysteria upon receiving his comeuppance is glorious to behold.

--Though part of my love for this film is apologistic, I have no problem joining the mass opinion that "The Crate", the film's fourth and longest segment, is the most compelling reason to watch it. It offers a more complex plot than the other segments, pairing its supernatural story (of a ravenous creature in a crate discovered in a university basement) with that of a college professor's mounting frustration with his shrewish wife. Tom Savini's creature design is effective, more than matched by the performances of the segment's three leads: Hal Holbrook as the put-upon prof; Adrienne Barbeau in a fearlessly raunchy turn as his wife Billie; and particularly Fritz Weaver as Holbrook's desperate, increasingly hysterical colleague. Though many of the performances in this film successfully walk a difficult line, I have to single out Weaver's work as the finest (and possibly most believable).

--"They're Creeping Up On You" offers a perfect coda, with E.G. Marshall in fine cantankerous form as a hypochondriac/corporate tyrant who gets his in spectacularly creepy fashion, thanks to an ever-growing legion of cockroaches that invade his sterile uptown penthouse. Lovely contrast between the scuttling of the bugs and the metallic sheen of Marshall's apartment, with Marshall offering just enough real spite to give his just deserts that much oomph. David Early is just fine in a one-scene role, giving hilarious voice to a loathing of Marshall that is more than mutual.

--Plus cranky, uptight dad Tom Atkins gets his in the framing sequence. (Very happy to see, in the generous extras accompanying the film's British DVD release, that Atkins and his on-screen son Joe King had a warm and close relationship off-camera, that continues in emails from one to the other to this day.)

--In the end, no bones at all about Creepshow - my love for it continues unabated. It's a pity the franchise didn't really pan out, and though I'm not terribly optimistic about the rumored remake (thinking that the original's EC Comics source material may draw a blank from its intended audience today), I suspect I'll continue to return to Romero/King's original well into my dotage.

ONIBABA

2010-10-03T21:08:00.000-07:00

Japan, the Warring States period. A peasant woman and her daughter in law scratch out subsistence by slaying wayward soldiers and bartering their weapons for food. Into their midst comes Hachi, a neighbor/AWOL soldier who tells them that their son/husband was killed. The triangle that forms between these three characters has sharp corners indeed, and the intensifying jealousy, lust, and hatred between them kicks into overdrive when one of them comes upon a terrifying demon mask.

Kaneto Shindo's Onibaba treads similar territory to a number of Japanese films of the 50s and 60s. Films like Fires on the Plain capture soldiers and civilians alike on the run from conflict, their desperation to survive turning them to extreme behaviors that reveal the ultimate darkness within the human soul. Perhaps because its supernatural aspects are more overt, Onibaba is less effective and horrific than similar films. Though understandably driven to desperation by ongoing lives of trauma, the uniformly unpleasant characters of the film are difficult to feel for on a visceral level, diluting the impact of their ultimate fates.

But Onibaba is a visual marvel, making maximum use of its evocative susuki field settings. As fond as your proprietor is of the theatrical, artificial mise-en-scenes of Japan's most audacious filmmakers (and their art directors), the wind-swept susuki creates a lush but threatening presence that is a striking and ever-present character (a chorus, perhaps) in its own right. Superstition reigns powerfully over the film's characters, with summer frost rendering crops barren and two-headed calves portending danger. This free-wheeling chaos has turned gender roles topsy-turvy (Freudian imagery plays powerfully throughout): men are reduced to fleeing cowards, and the two women turn phallic spears on their male victims, and dispose of their prey in a gaping, yonic maw that lurks in the scenery like a shark. It's an effective liminal zone, and one becomes as tense and lost in the on-screen bewilderness as any of Shindo's characters.

If the simplicity of the script belies its origins in a short Buddhist parable, the actors hit their respective one notes with gusto. Sketchy though Onibaba sometimes is, aspects of it linger, be it the silent-then-batshit score of Hikaru Hayashi or the susuki, restless but quiet as it shakes ominously in the wind.

This review is part of the Final Girl Film Club, run with efficiency and verve by the wild and wily Stacie Ponder.

a simple list

2010-10-01T10:08:00.000-07:00

Sent to Final Girl Stacie Ponder for her Shocktober event, which looks to be one of the horror blogosphere's finer offerings this month, this is a simple, quickly sketched but fairly accurate list of your proprietor's top 20 horror flicks, in no order.

Suspiria -- 1977, Dario Argento
Dawn Of The Dead -- 1978, George Romero
The Brides of Dracula -- 1960, Terence Fisher
Creepshow -- 1982, George Romero
The Beyond -- 1981, Lucio Fulci
Ju-On: The Grudge 2 -- 2003, Takashi Shimizu
The Brood -- 1979, David Cronenberg
Sunset Blvd. -- 1950, Billy Wilder
The Fog -- 1980, John Carpenter
The Bride of Frankenstein -- 1935, James Whale
The Black Imp -- 1905, Georges Méliès
Séance -- 2000, Kiyoshi Kurosawa
C.H.U.D. -- 1984, Douglas Cheek

Demon City Shinjuku -- 1988, Yoshiaki Kawajiri
Carnival of Souls -- 1962, Herk Harvey
Fright Night -- 1985, Tom Holland
An American Werewolf in London -- 1981, John Landis
Outer Space -- 1999, Peter Tscherkassky
Dust Devil -- 1992, Richard Stanley
Black Sunday -- 1960, Mario Bava

HANGOVER SQUARE

2010-09-10T14:25:00.000-07:00

George Harvey Bone is a composer whose work is obsessing me this week, mostly through his "Nocturnes 1-3" for piano and clarinet. The mood of the pieces is strikingly dark, but there's a certain amount of romantic yearning in them. These are mostly expressed through the clarinet parts in 1 and 2 (which dance almost along the surface of the skittish and somber foundations laid by the piano), but in 3 something in the piece seems to break free - one would almost call it hopeful.

I'm distressed by what I've read about Bone - the man was apparently given to blackouts, during which he would commit acts of murder. There's something in his music that does suggest this, moments where the notes seem to jump out of the framework to the point that they sound almost improvised (but further listening reveals that the work is very tightly structured - his work calls to mind some of Bernard Herrmann's soundtracks, particularly those with jazz elements such as TAXI DRIVER). His work seems to be eclipsed by his notoriety, and there's a certain amount of derision that seems to be leveled at Bone, at those who would perform his work, and even those who would give it ears.

But there's something genuinely soulful, almost optimistic at the heart of his work. Interestingly, some suggest that the few popular songs he wrote at the end of his career speak to something larger, giving his romantic side a full airing only hinted at in his more "serious" work - there's some division in the small, passionate cult that surrounds his work as to whether or not these songs can be considered part of his canon.

I'm intrigued by what I've read about Bone's "Concerto Macabre" - clearly its sole performance was a spectacular event, culminating as it did in Bone's death. His detractors hold this up as further evidence of what has been called his "loopiness", an over-the-top manifestation of a humorously unhinged mind. But as lost in his music as I've become these last few days, the notion of this makes me strangely sad, the idea of this brilliant but hopelessly fucked up man, giving his life to give expression to the only thing that made sense in his world. The "Concerto Macabre" was lost along with Bone, and today remains, like its creator, a ghost lost in murder and time.

Though today's audience tends to laugh when (and if) confronted with Bone and his work, I only see a kindred spirit, a tragic figure doomed in spite of his genius. I like to presume that he was able to find some satisfaction in finally realizing his masterwork in his final moments, that it took him to a place beyond pain. But Bone's romanticism is only out of our reach if we will it to be so.

(A more straight-up review of John Brahm's Hangover Square, by one of my favorite bloggers, Arbogast on Film, can be found here.)

CENTURION

2010-09-06T23:02:00.000-07:00

Your proprietor had been less than thrilled with the films of horror/fantasy auteur Neil Marshall: I'd always faded out of Dog Soldiers after about ten minutes, and I admired The Descent more than I actually liked it. And yet Centurion, Marshall's tale of Roman soldiers of the Ninth Legion waging a desperate escape attempt deep behind enemy lines, seemed an interesting game changer for him, and I'm very glad I checked it out.

There's a curious vogue for blood-soaked tales of war in ancient times, and Marshall dives straight into widescreen battles and captures every CGI bloodspurt with care. But this thing sneaked up on me, offering some generous space for its talented cast to flesh out their characters. Particularly pleasing was seeing Michael Fassbender and Liam Cunningham (whose twenty-minute conversation offered an oasis of humanity in Steve McQueen's Hunger last year) back together in the trenches. Marshall also captures gorgeous tableaux of war and peace in direct, simple images that offer an earthier, smarter counterpart to Snyder's slavish Miller-copies of 300 (and gets bonus points for offering a soundtrack without a single lick of overblown faux-metal). It's not a great or original story, but Marshall and co. put every foot right in telling it. Even Fassbender's voice-over narration, which comes very close to overexplaining some of Marshall's more profound images, brings it all full circle in the final moments, drop-kicking this simple, mythic story into a place of genuine grace.

BLUE COLLAR

2010-08-30T20:36:00.000-07:00

Three Detroit auto plant workers - Zeke (Richard Pryor), Jerry (Harvey Keitel) and Smoke (Yaphet Kotto) - lead lives of debt and desperation, alleviated only by booze, parties, and the friendship they share. When they decide to rob the union that they're pretty sure is screwing them, they discover evidence of higher-level criminality than they could have imagined. And when they try to blackmail the union for a bigger payout, their hopes are dashed, and the dark side of the American Dream is slowly revealed.

As eager as your proprietor, a Paul Schrader booster, was to see this film, I was somewhat dreading the experience. As one of millions whose fortunes have rollercoastered (mostly downward) in this problematic economy, I've been both intrigued and a bit dismayed by what I'm calling the cinema of despondency: films that accurately depict the lives of everyday people caught in the kind of trying economy we're experiencing today. Some of these films have been rep classics, but a number of striking contemporary films have enjoyed a high profile (like WINTER'S BONE) or been boosted by A-list talent (such as Michael Douglas for SOLITARY MAN) to depict the lives of characters days away from homelessness with debtors on their heels. And as bracing as it's been to see such relatable and timely stories playing in theatres around the world, such stories can hit close to home and make one long for a little escapism. Going into BLUE COLLAR, I thought (classic heist/noir narrative notwithstanding) it'd be another depressing/despairing portrait of souls battered by a faltering economy.

Instead it was a bracing, angry polemic exposing the bullshit that rains on the working classes, and the management forces whose best interest is to keep them angry and divided. Even when the film goes from its more quietly observed first half to its overtly noirish second, it's speaking directly, and angrily,

After Glenn Beck's bullshit this weekend, shitting on the legacy of Martin Luther King to create a toxic and idiotic lie that will only deepen the divides that are sinking this country, Schrader and co. put that shit into perspective, advocating passionately for those being drowned. A wake-up call set 32 years prior. Stay angry.

THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE (FIRST SEQUENCE)

2010-08-13T21:33:00.000-07:00

Despite my taste for weird fantasy and artful horror, your proprietor is by no means a gore-hound. Squeamish? A bit, perhaps, but I'm more averse to the depiction of cruelty and suffering than I am viscera and blood. So I was never in attendance for a screening of any of the films in the more sanguinary horror franchises in recent memory, but did belatedly catch up with SAWs and HOSTELs 1 and 2. I found the films neither as vicious as I'd feared nor, weirdly, quite as bad as I'd been told.

So when this film (the first, apparently, in a planned series by Dutch auteur Tom Six) hit the circuit, I was initially dismissive. But the movie's killer mad scientist concept lingered, and when the film resurfaced for a three-night run at the nearby Red Vic Movie House, I girded myself, and, ready for the worst, went in. I was not expecting to feel how I feel about the film, and leave it up to you to decide what this reaction says about the writer, but...

Here's the thing: You've got a juicy, if disturbing (and, the press mordantly, if wrongly, warns us, medically accurate) premise, and a doctor deranged enough to graft three humans together in a chain, mouth to anus. You've got an impressively weird German actor (the exquisitely named Dieter Laser) who looks like his mouth was carved out of his face by a scalpel. And you've got three actors willing to submit to the demands of the title role (who each give excellent panic and disgust when called for).

But it's not enough.

I'm willing to give Six the benefit of the doubt, and assume that he had a limited budget and timeframe to realize this thing. And yet the listing of a rehearsal space in America gave me pause, since there's no evidence on screen that anyone really engaged the concept. When you're working (for the most part) on a single set with a limited budget, it's time to tinker and flesh out details, but Mix hasn't set his sights any higher than his (admittedly outre) concept. Laser's ready for anything, and is a good mad scientist, but there's very little indication why he's putting humans through this. A little bit of a Frankensteinian relationship between creator and creation would have given the film some much needed texture. And I realize how oddball this sounds, but there was plenty of space to explore the relationship between the three segments after joining. It's a huge challenge for the actor (which Uta Hagen could never have anticipated), and there's considerable suspense in the final reel as we watch the segments finally figure out unified motion as they make a desperate bid for freedom.

A movie with this batshit a concept is not going to attract a mainstream audience. If you have people in seats who know that they're going to see some folks get sown ass to mouth, you gotta get ahead of them. And not just the cerebral shit I'm a bit appalled to hear myself advocating for in the previous paragraph; Six grabbed me with an explanation of the science of the thing, but some fairly obvious outlets for gore and viscera went weirdly unexplored, and I can't imagine I was the only one disappointed that I was coming up with images that were never matched by the action on screen. And though I don't hold the marketing of the film against Mix, it's weirdly crushing that "the most shocking film of the year" should wind up playing its concept so half-assed. Six has sworn up and down that David Cronenberg was a huge influence on his work, but there's a hell of a lot of thought behind Cronenberg's viscera, and none behind Six's.

Unless, of course, Six is in fact playing a long game to be fleshed out and more deeply explored in subsequent segments. Which may be possible, but though I can't deny I'm curious to see where he goes next, there's no evidence in this movie to suggest it'll be a worthwhile voyage.

NIGHTHAWKS

2010-08-10T21:20:00.000-07:00

San Francisco film programmer Jesse Hawthorne Ficks, in addition to being one of the good guys, has a cultural memory that intersects with that of your proprietor in many places. The films that I saw on Cinemax back when I was but an impressionable youngster were eagerly devoured by Ficks as well, and the man endeavors to bring many half-remembered gems back into the spotlight (and on the screen of the Castro Theatre).

When programming his massive, day-long series, his usual tactic (by his own admission) is to open with a lesser-known film. NIGHTHAWKS was the film that opened a quintuple-feature of manly-man films. (The others were BLOODSPORT; the John Carpenter two-fer of BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA and THEY LIVE; and a secret midnight screening of the late-80s Hulk Hogan vehicle NO HOLDS BARRED.) At a glance NIGHTHAWKS looked like the most nuanced film on the bill, and I was pleased to find that it was, in fact, a quieter, beautifully-observed action film, with a novelistic scope, three-dimensional performances, and a faint but present distrust of authority that make it a film more of the 70s than the 80s.

The tale of New York plainclothes cops (Sylvester Stallone, Billy Dee Williams) taken off decoy duty to track a vicious freelance terrorist (Rutger Hauer) has plenty of scope and grit, and could easily have filled a three-hour film with suspenseful stand-offs and character development. This may well have been the plan, but by all accounts the movie was butchered by a studio that didn't appreciate what it had. The patchy, under-two-hours film that's left drew positive notices, but lukewarm box office, and the movie it could have been is lost to time.

But despite Jesse's warnings that we'd have to fill in some gaps on this one, there's still plenty that stands tall. The effective and well-depicted procedures of both New York law enforcement and European underground. The lovely sequence in which DaSilva (Stallone) and Fox (Williams) initially resist their counter-terrorist training, but become noticeably less rowdy and more absorbed as it continues. The INTERPOL terror specialist Peter Hartman (a completely believable Nigel Davenport) driven by duty, but noticeably human. A spiffy chase scene through New York's subway system (apparently directed, at least in part, by Stallone himself). Economical but effective performances by all involved, including Hauer's assured Hollywood debut as the supermonster Wulfgar and Williams' sedate but earthy cool...

...but it's Stallone's name atop the bill, and DaSilva's a character unlike any I've seen him play. We first see DaSilva in old lady drag, on decoy duty to catch a trio of muggers. It's as clear a signal as one can get that Stallone's playing against type, and the character doesn't disappoint. DaSilva wears his Vietnam service proudly (he's a ringer for SERPICO-era Pacino, really), but is fundamentally a man of peace - the film's most interesting conflict is between him and Davenport, who impatiently waits for DaSilva to accept that civilian casualties are inevitable in the quest for a psychotic terrorist. Stallone balances DaSilva's man-of-action qualities with his nuanced morality deftly - when the time comes for his final showdown with Wulfgar, we wonder how he'll proceed and we fear for his safety.

I'd never completely written Stallone off - my usual line was that he was a committed artist, but not a good one. NIGHTHAWKS has me seriously rethinking this stance (which many would believe is already generous), and though I strongly doubt such nuance will be in evidence in THE EXPENDABLES, I was delighted to see it on such confident display here. And happy that Jesse gave a damn enough to give the movie another chance. Here's to you, gentlemen.

IDENTIFICATION OF A WOMAN

2010-07-21T23:59:00.000-07:00

Though the mysterious quest has formed the basis of many films in the corpus of Michelangelo Antonioni, there's very little talk of him as a fantasy filmmaker. Given the weightiness of his usual themes (alienation in the modern world, the ultimate incompatibility of the sexes) and the seriousness with which they're regarded, one's inclination is to resist putting Antonioni in the same camp as, say, George Lucas.

Your proprietor more often than not takes a literal approach to interpreting Antonioni's films, engaging the images on their own without outside cross-references. And though the more literary-minded of Antonioni's fans may balk, I've found a great deal of meaning and resonance in the man's work through this approach, and the interpretations of the films, or at least where I go naturally within them, always wind up in the realm of the fantastic. The spray-painted sands that surround Monica Vitti in Red Desert suggest an alien landscape to me. The otherworldliness of Irene Jacob (suggested throughout the final story in Beyond the Clouds) is made literal by a throwaway gag in which an oncoming mugger immediately repents and leaves her in peace. And though many see the explosive finale of Zabriskie Point as a manifestation of Daria's emerging revolutionary conscience, I see it as an apocalypse wrought Carrie-style on the straight world that killed her lover; indeed, the final title card suggests not the beginning of her revolutionary struggle but a definite and all-encompassing "END" to everything.

I don't intend to make the case that Antonioni is a great unsung genre filmmaker, but consideration of the fantastic often opens up or intensifies his themes. With this in mind, I recently re-watched Identification of a Woman and was struck to find it as upfront in its use of fantastic elements and themes as I remembered, both in overt uses of special effects and in more subtle fantasy imagery.

The film was made in 1982, a year in which Antonioni's countrymen were also pursuing fantastic agendas. Lucio Fulci had just finished an impressive run of fantastic, dreamlike, and very violent horror films (including City of the Living Dead and House By The Cemetery). More to the point, Dario Argento released his Tenebrae that year, his return to the giallo genre. Though IOAW lacks the overt and colorful violence of these filmmakers, it is no less dreamlike or surreal than their work. The protagonists of the films of all three directors fall into their own worlds, often of madness. Though Antonioni doesn't eschew classical settings in his film the way Argento did in Tenebrae (opting for shooting at modern locations for a science-fiction feel), he is as adept as any genre filmmaker in warping his locations to suggest the darker psyche of his protagonist.

From the beginning of IOAW, Antonioni's protagonist (the delightfully working-class filmmaker Niccolo Farra [Tomas Milian]) is beset by a number of mysterious external forces. His pursuit of the perfect female lead for his current project is mirrored by his amorous pursuit of a lover, and the high society femme Maria (Daniela Silvero) seems to fit the bill. But Niccolo finds himself pursued and threatened by shadowy men who want him to sever ties with Maria.

Just as worrying: what the fuck is that...thing growing on the tree outside his flat?

Niccolo's frustrated search for these mysterious agents (and their escalating actions against him) parallel the growing mystery of Maria (Mavi) herself. The class difference between them is the clearest difficulty, but Niccolo is increasingly restless as Mavi becomes more and more unknowable. Nearly halfway into the film, the two enter a fog-shrouded labyrinth straight out of Fulci:

Spies lurk in this dreamy twilight zone:

And it finally proves too much for Maria, whose resulting breakdown could have been edited in from a contemporaneous giallo:

She leaves the car but shortly returns, weirdly shaken by the ordeal. Possibly not the same person. A pod person (as suggested by the growth on the tree)? Perhaps. But she soon disappears from Niccolo's life, leaving a gap in his life and his film that he continues to try unsuccessfully to cast.

And though shadowy presences lurk on the periphery of his senses (flowers are mockingly sent continuously to his apartment), more positive forces enter his life as well. Specifically his young nephew, who brings a stamp to his uncle's attention with a challenge.

And the soundtrack shifts from John Foxx's original, deliberately flat and ambient electronic music, to the burbling, mysterious, and alive "Sons of Pioneers" by Japan. The insistent pulse of Japan's rhythm section (fretless bassist Mick Karn and drummer Steve Jansen) pushes Niccolo into new territory, and he chases the idea from the comfort of his home office.

And in that telescope he sees one of the most otherworldly and fantastic images in Antonioni's oeuvre:

Life continues. Though Niccolo's work on the film continues to hinge on the ever-elusive lead, a bevy of would-be lovers enter his orbit. The stand-out is Ida (Christine Boisson), an actress (not right for the part it seems, but a fellow creative/kindred spirit). And though Ida's centered enough to help Niccolo track down the people involved in the conspiracy around Maria, she ultimately possesses a secret that drives a wedge between her and Niccolo. As their affair nears its undoing, they're increasingly separated by windows, frames, and (in a solidly fantasistic touch) mirrors:

Niccolo is alone in his own world. He's free of the conspiracy, and of any ties to anyone, but his burning questions, and his loneliness, still linger. Compelled to enter his office/studio, he reboards the vehicle offered by his festering sci-fi opus, and, looking straight into the sun, he lights out for new territories:

Though Star Wars was firmly entrenched in the public consciousness by now, Niccolo's sci-fi film is as removed from it as Antonioni's. Like other filmmakers before him, he embraces an out-and-out genre film to directly address the questions that plague him most. Though looking directly into the sun, it's as unknowable as Navi. But Niccolo's ship orbits it ever closer. Offscreen his nephew asks, "Why towards the sun?"

"To study it. If man one day can discover how matter is distributed in the sun and its dynamics, he'll know how the universe is made, and the cause of many things."

"And then?" the nephew asks.

There is no answer. Once again Niccolo is consumed by his quest, and the ship vanishes in the sun.