Dark & Twisty

I’m going to praise the slasher movie.  I don’t often talk about them, and maybe there’s reason.  They are hokie in a murderous kind of way.  They are predictable, but that is part of their charm.  They rarely run over 90 minutes, which is great in my ain’t-got-time-for-nothing life. 

The greatest to me still remains Halloween.  The story is simple and so are the characters.  Michael Myers never speaks more than a grunt.  We never get insight into his madness, and he wears that creepy white William Shatner mask.  He is a killing machine with no known reason or motive (in the original).  He just seems to want to kill fornicating teenagers and babysitters.  There is the plot of most every other slasher made.

The great thing about Halloween is that it is the daddy of the slasher.  Psycho really brought the genre about, and there are a few movies along the way the contributed to it, but when you look at the murders in the slasher movies nearly all are based off of Myers in some way. Jason wears his white hockey mask.  Ghostface has his special mask and even seems to admire Myers.  The Fisherman from I Know What You Did Last Summer has his own motives more like those of the original Friday the Thirteenth,  but he keeps his face covered.  He also moves with pace and cadence of Myers. The slasher is international.  Argento made them in Italy and several J and K films have been of this variety

Long live the slasher I say.  There is always a place for it.  The slasher in so many ways has become our campfire tales and urban legends.  “Did you hear the one about the killer with the hook?”  “This man escaped from insane asylum and started killing babysitters.  He was upstairs while they were unawares in the living room.”  “Did you hear about all those strange murders at Camp Crystal Lake?”   “I know what you did last summer was written on the slip of paper.”

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I have to say that silent movies can be a drag.  I’ve seen quite a few, and being the noisy person I am, give me a talky any day. 

I cannot say that for two great silent classics: The Phantom of the Opera and Nosferatu.  The two classics of horror cinema should always be considered the granddaddies of the creature features.

The original Phantom of the Opera uses one of the most talented character actors to ever grace Hollywood, Lon Chaney, Sr.  Even though he made few talking pictures, he was very versatile.  I would interesting to see in today’s culture how he would do.  With the make-up effects of his day, which were primitive at best, he was able to make himself into one of the most icon images of horror.  Even to today, when the Opera Ghost is mention Lon Chaney’s image comes to mind. 

The beauty of that picture was the scope of the images.  In silent movies, so much relied on the setting and costumes.  Sure, they were over acted, but they had to be.  Without the body language of involved in vocal cues, the actors had to over dramatize their movements.  In many ways this made this film version even scarier.  It was over acted with the grace of William Shatner, but what an effect.

If you’ve never seen this version of the movie (or Claude Raine’s version which is a good one too.  Claude Raines is a superior actor.  Also reference: Casablanca, Spellbound, The Wolfman [original] ).  You can’t beat this movie version.  Try it out if you can find it. 

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In a strange turn of events, our reading course had us watching a film.  But not just any film, The Brood.  Before I get into the details of my anaylsis of this film, I'm going to make a few general comments.  One is that this was hard to find.  I had to finally buy it off of Amazon because no store in Alabama apparently carries this title.  Two, it stars Oliver Reed, who I greatly enjoy in movies. Three, later that night I was watching Star Trek: TNG and Nola was a character. 

Now to The Brood.

This film continues this sememster's study of insanity in horror.  The probably with this film in this category is that Nola, the mother character, isn't really the bad guy.  The brood, themselves aren't the bad guys either.  They are both just victims of the real bad guy, which is the doctor. Don't misundertand me Nola and the brood are the characters that cause all the gore and horror of the story.  Nola even provides us with a great disgust moment when she births one of the brood then licks the after birth off of it.  Oliver Reed, however, is the true cause of all the horror.

This story really seems to be more about a mad scientist and his plan for perfection.  Sure that is done through the somatic expression of psychological rage, but he is still little more than Dr. Frankenstein.  Reed's character works hard at his theorectical form of psychotherapy.  In reality it is a strange mixture of Freudian theory and Gestalt therapy.  He does everything wrong according to how therapist and psychologist are trained.  He purposefully always transference and countertransference to occur.  For laymen, this means allowing the patient to act toward him as they would a family member or cause of psychological distress and he in turn responds as that family member or psychological stress would.  This is bad business from the start. 

Reed's character takes this a step farther.  He then has trained this ever disturbed people to physically express their psychological stress.  At the beginning of the movie, the fat red haired man bursts out into large bleeding welts akin to stigmata.  Later in the film, we see that he doesn't need the doctor for this because he can do it himself when under extreme distress. 

Now to Nola.  The problem with Nola is that her somatic expression of rage is imp children.  She produces like spores from her body a small army of evil ski suit wearing children who kill who is focused her rage on.  She is unaware this is happening.  She knows that she is producing the brood but she doesn't know that they are carrying out her unconscious whelms. 

This is a frightening idea.  It takes the idea of a fugue state to a new level.  The patient can be completely coherent even dealing with other people while sending out unconcious vibes to her minions to do her evil will.

The truly scary part about this movie is that people do express psychological issues somatically.  I titled this entry "horrific vision of IBS" because irritable bowel syndrome is a somatic expression of stress.  Stress is heavily psychological. In IBS, the body response with rotating bowel trouble and severe GI cramps.  The brood are little more than this, except they kill people. 

The strange thing is that therapist can train their patients to do just about anything.  That is the way with things like progressive muscle relaxation.  You train a patient to recognize how it feels not to be tense and then imitated that.  It is a well documented fact that a borderline personality disorder patient can be trained to have multiple personalities.  Nola in this film seems to have a bit of BPD.  She would the perfect candidate for such training and manipulation.  The character of Nola isn't at fault for anything she has done until she becomes aware of her power.  This is because her husband tells her about it.  Then she turns it toward people purposefully.  That is truly when the insanity on her part becomes the true problem.  Until then, Reed's doctor character is to blame because he trained her to use the brood.

The brood is frightening because what if people could do that.  We know people can be trained to do many things psychologically.  Although, creating little imp children isn't possible, how about a fugue state where people kill other people.  This was a sort of issue in Psycho but Norman wasn't trained for it.

The Brood has several "crazy" characters in it, but Nola and Reed's character are the true evil because they let the killing and rage take over.  That is the truly frightening issue of the story.

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 These are entries from my original blog.  There are several on Dr. Moreau.

Who is the monster on Dr. Moreau’s Island? - 3.10.09

The answer to the topic is, everyone.

Everyone on that island is a monster in some way. The narrator becomes one trying to frighten the manimals into obedience. Moreau and his sadistic vision is easily defined as monsterous. Montgomery, of course a monster. The manimals are by definition monsters even though they are mostly good. Then there is the real monster

The island is the monster. I said it there it is. How can an island be a monster, Jared?

Thanks for asking.

Easy. Everyone there goes nuts. Sure Moreau was nuts before he got there, but look at the effect on the others. Of course the island drives them crazy. They are stuck in the middle of the South Pacific with no help and no way of communicating. I’d go crazy to. Dr. Moreau’s Island is like the hotel in The Shining. It isn’t haunted, but it is a malevolent character that drives the other story characters into doing horrible things. So it is the ultimate monster. One last point, this kind of stuff wouldn’t have happened on any other island or location. I like when location is monster.

***

The Island of Dr. Moreau (1995) - 3.10.09

Jared

Where else would you find Val Kilmer and Marlon Brando in a movie but on Dr. Moreau’s island? No where. Only something as weird as this tale could get these two giants of the cinema together.

So this movie not so good, but an interesting take on Moreau’s twisted ideas. The movie moves away from vivesection to genetic manipulation, which is good because it makes more sense. The problem is everyone is either a loony tune or a drug addict. There was more dope smoked on screen and in the making of this movie than Up in Smoke. There was also a lot of monkey love.

The story carries it own. The evilness or madness of Moreau’s idea still carries over in this adaptation. Brando is not very convincing. I keep thinking about Dom Deluise in Robin Hood: Men in Tights. “You should come over for a canolli.”

So as I have reviewed movies based off the works we have read. I liked the book better than the movie. The movie to me is also not as well known as other works which makes it a bit obscure for most movie viewers. The concept and special effects were wonderful. I loved the pregnant manimal giving birth and having 6 nipples. That was sweet. The little rat people were good too. The love story was too much for me, and like all American movies, has to be there to please the masses. Stupid masses.

***

Fall of the House of Pain - 3.10.09

Besides being a band from the 1980’s or 1990’s (with such good music who can remember), the house of pain was the major disciplinary hut for Dr. Moreau.

Moreau was a sadist, no doubt about it. He wasn’t even a fun sadist either. There was no spanking or ball gags for him, nope just straight cut you up put you back together fun. Nothing says sweet delicious pain like that. The house of pain was his lab. He performed his sadistic rituals here and called it science. Like Callie said in her poem, the ideas were heavily based on evolutionary theory, either Darwinism or something else. The author is a product of his own beliefs. H.G. Wells didn’t care too much for religion. Some people might call him an atheist. He probably was. He put his belief in science no matter how brutal. His story mixed the two. Although Moreau doesn’t seem to have religion, he passes himself off as a god and gives the manimals he created 10 commandments of sorts. Not to walk on all fours that is the law.

The story seems to be this is what happens when science and religion try to mix. Science always wins. In this story it did. The house of Pain fell because the animals went back to their instincts proven scientifically.

Is Wells saying this? I think so.

***

A psych analysis of Dr. Moreau - 3.7.09

Arznen wanted it, so here it is.

In my professional opinion, Dr. Moreau was a nut job. That’s technical professional terminology.

In the truest since of things, Moreau does not have a diagnosis as such. He is not schizophrenic because he wouldn’t be able to do what he has done if he was. Schizophrenics are too loose to be able to make human-shaped animals. The fact is, he suffers from personality issues if not disorders.

The first disorder I think he would suffer from would be narcissism. It is obvious that he thinks very highly of himself, but when challenged has very little underneath to support it. This is the reason he fashions himself as a god if not God himself.

I think as we delve deeper in Moreau that he also suffers from Antisocial personality disorder. As many know, this is called the serial killer disorder. I don’t think Moreau was a serial killer and that title for the disorder is a misnomer. The true traits of this disorder is a total disregard for rules and life. Moreau makes his own rules and has no regard for life human, or manimal. We know that early on people who suffer from this personality disorder torture animals. I would say Moreau fits this. He just never stopped.

Oftentimes if not always, we find antisocial and narcissistic personality disorder walks hand in hand. They are as we say professionally “comorbid”. This is reason most serial killers get caught. They feel that they can’t (the narcissism) and do something over the top. (Think about the Unibomber and his manifesto, the BTK killer and his letters written from his church’s computer, or the Cheryl Tate slayings of the Manson family). Moreau does this and it gets him killed by his manimals.

So for an analysis of Moreau this is it. He has no Axis I diagnosis (ie typical mental illness). he suffers from at least two Axis II diagnoses (personality disorders) Antisocial and narcissistic. Some might argue he also suffers from Schizoid PD due to his hermit type life but he doesn’t seem to have the psuedo-psychotic features for this. If he has a third PD, it would be avoidant, which is a shyness type PD which migh explain his want to live alone on a island with manimals.

***

The Planet of Dr. Moreau - 3.6.09

In my strange wonderings, I thought what would happen if Dr. Moreau landed on the Planet of the Apes. I would watch this movie. Would he be bent to make the humans more ape like? Would Dr. Zaius turn around and make Moreau in his own image.

I think that it would be an interesting idea for a story. Imagine a man who has made men from apes on a planet where apes have evolved past men. It is great. He would caught up in a strange version of his own story. In ways it reflects what happens. The creatures Moreau make kill him, doubtless the Apes from POA would do the same, but they might vivasect him, which would be only his just rewards for the cruelty he instills on this victims

***

Let’s make Manimals - 3.5.09

Dr. Moreau was a good man. He liked animals so much he decided to make them human by experimenting with them and causing them considerable pain. That’s a great way to say I love you. Here kitty, kitty, I’m going to make you a manimal. Not only that I’m going to not give you guidance but expect you to know the ways of man and act like him.

I think that Dr. Moreau should have read or seen The Jungle Book. King Louie would really like to be like you. See Moreau wouldn’t have to made Manimals. H.G. Wells meet King Louie.

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I finally made it to see the new Star Trek movie.  I have to say that I really enjoyed it.  I had heard good things about it, and how it would appeal to not only the Trekkers (like myself) but to the layman.  They were right. 

This movie does an excellent job of capturing the character of the orignal series.  The casting was done well for the most part.  My biggest problem was that all the Vulcans and Romulans looked like vampires.  This upset me somewhat.  These characters have always had the creepy undead appearance but this was to the extreme.  Beyond that everything seemed to work well.

I had wondered how the writer and director would relaunch such a storied series and be able to keep it fresh.  They suprised in the way they did it.  I was delighted.  I'm not going to give it away because I don't want to be that spoiler guy.  I loved that now we can have a whole other series of adventures with the original characters that made history so long ago.

Now, I didn't like some things.  Uhura wasn't ballsy enough for me.  She needed more of that I've got a razor in my boot attitude that Nichols had in the television series.  I was displeased with her character in that way.  The villian as well was too one dimensional.  I didn't fully feel why he was doing what he was doing.  In all actuality, the villian and his plot almost seemed to me to be a non-issue in this mostly character driven action adventure.  I cared more of the development of Kirk and Spock than anything else.

What about the USS Enterprise?  I love it.  The designers kept the television style with a more technilogical advatange.  It also fixed some of the issues that plagued the original.  The engineering room looked much more like an engineering section.  The original never seemed to be realistic.  The bridge seemed much better as well.

The last thing I'm going to say about this movie is this: The USS Kelvin really took it for me.  The ship was claustrophobic and old school looking.  It reminded me of the WWII battleships.  This was great in showing the evolution of starships.  I loved it.

See Star Trek.  If you are fan already, you'll still like it.  If you aren't a fan, you'll love the action.

Posted by Jared at 09:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Can they make a good musical?  You know a musical that a man doesn't mind watching, well you know a Southern man.  Yankees are a whole different sort.  Unless they make a musical called, "Full Frontal Barely Legal Nudity Review", then the only answer is Sweeny Todd.

I have to admit I have seen film versions of this story that were not musicals and liked them.  But the Musical version from Tim Burton (always known for making pretty movies creepy or not) is a man's musical.  This is a horror movie that I can get my wife to watch because she knows all the songs and sings along with it.

Anytime that you can have singing and dancing and of course throat slitting you've got a musical.  The movie goes along the lines of the story.  Todd was framed and his wife stolen.  Todd comes back to have his revenge.  Then, he and his landlady make meat pies from corpses left from his bloody swath of seriel murder.

The song about what each person seen on the street would taste like in a pie is wonderful.  "Try a little priest."  "This one is thicker; it must be vicar."  Come on; this beats "Time Warp" anytime.

The only thing that they could do to make this movie better is to morph, the Rocky Horror Picture Show with Sweeny Todd.  They could have all the sweet transvestites being slaughtered by the demon barber of Fleet Street.

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It's not a horror movie, and that makes it an unusual review for my site. But before there were horror movies in my life there was Casablanca.  I may have seen this movie more times than some film critics.  I love it. 

It isn't the patriotism of the story that I like so much.  It is the humor.  My wife put it in for me last night because I had a bad day. As I watched, I remembered why I liked it so much.  Sure there is the overwhelming positivism of the the Allies.  The characters seem to have no doubt that good will win the war, but a strange thing occurred to me.  When the movie was made (1942), we had no idea who would win.  That would make viewing this movie a lot different. 

I like the arogance of the movie.  Every character has his or her own swagger.  Rick is assured of himself until Ilsa comes back.  Victor Laslo has evaded the Nazis more times than not.  Renault is his own snivling master.  Major Strasse has that Nazi quality that so many did.

Then there is the end.  I've never figured it out.  Does Ilsa really love Rick?  Does he really believe that she does love him?  Was he always planning on letting Laslo escape, at least once he learns who is wife is.  That is why I love this movie.  It is great in it's own vagueness.  We never know what happens to the characters.  What happens to Sam after Rick leaves.  Does he still play "As Time Goes By"?  Is that the beginning of a beautiful friendship?  Do Isla and Victor make it to America?

I leave you with two of my favorite lines from the movie.

"What nationality are you?"

Rick: "I'm a drunkard."

and of course.

"Major there are certain parts of New York I suggest you not invade."

Play it Sam.  Play as time goes by.

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Okay, so I'm getting to the end of my reading course for Seton Hill.  I've read a lot of good books and a bad one.  I've seen my fair share of movies that are based on the books, and I've discovered that sometimes the books are better than the movies and sometimes the movie is better than the book and sometimes there about equal.  Let's talk about these today.

Book better than the movie:

The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys.  Possibly my favorite book.  The movie is good but cannot compare to the this novel, whose author died before publication and never had the chance to shine.

The Scarlet Letter. Okay, so I hated the book too, but what was up with the movie?

Frankenstein None of the movie productions are as good as the book, none.

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Chamber of Secrets, Prisoner of Askaban, and Goblet of Fire. The movies are good and magical, but the books are so much better.

I Am Legend.  It's better than all the movie versions, especailly Omega Man and I am Legend.  The Last Man on Earth was good though.

The Movie is better than the book.

Jurassic Park.  The book was far too techincal for my taste.  Give me the movie anyday.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix. This is my least favorite of all the books, but is pretty good as a movie.  It made more sense.

A Series of Unfortunate Events  I much prefer the movie version even with Jim Carrey.

Movie and the book are about the same.

Rosemary's Baby. The movie is almost word for word with the book.

The Virgin Suicides. This is one of the most vouyeristic books I've ever read.  The movie, by Sophia Coppola did an excellent job with it.

Romeo and Juliet (Zerelli).  I like the film althoug not a big fan of the play.

Titus. Based on Titus Andronicus by Shakespeare.  I liked both of them very much.

Movies and Books that were bad.

The Exorcist.  Both bad.

The Haunting of Hill House.  I didn't get the point of the book nor the movies.

The Da Vinci Code.  All I can say is OMFG!!!

This was just a few of the selections.  There are a lot more crapfests out there, but who has the time.

Posted by Jared at 09:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

This is where I need to make a confession.  I had never seen the Exorcist until last night.  I bought it a few weeks ago used from Movie Stop (Shout out to Kristin, although I know it's Game Stop.) I have never seen the film because since I was very young, I've been scared of it.  It always ranks as one of the scariest of all times.  I had put it on my list with such gems as the Faces of Death films and the Texas Chainsaw Massacre (I'm terrified of chainsaws).

So I watched the movie with my wife the biggest scaredy cat in the world, and she wasn't scared and neither was I.  The movie follows very closely with the book, which is very boring and takes  a long time to build up to the point.  The movie does the same thing.  There is little bang for the hours of investment.  I think that this was terrifying throughout the 1970's and partially through the 1980's but too much has changed.  Life have become to horrific for this movie to continue being scary.  I din't even find it that creepy.

I wonder if this movie suffers what many older "terrifying" movies suffer from, overexposure.  It's been only a few years ago since I saw the orignal Psycho for the first time in its completeness.  Again this is a movie I have been told was terrifying.  It kept me more interested than the Exorcist, but it didn't deliver much bang either.  I believe the Exorcist has the been the movie to beat, and it has been too many times to be scary. We get the images of the head twisting and the vomit.  We don't get the masturbation scene too often though, but it wasn't really so scare as mildly amusing. I really think the invention of the slasher movie did this film in.  Those movies are full of jumps and scares, even the bad ones.  I think that movie goers except scary music and something jumping out at them.  That's what we want, and the exorcist doesn't give that.  It has the creepy music.  Tubular Bells is one of the creepiest themes ever, but the movie comes up short. 

I blame Freddy, Jason, Michael, and of course Bruce (the shark from Jaws) for this.

Posted by Jared at 09:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

You’re Francis Ford Coppala, and it’s the early 1990’s and you’ve not won an Oscar in years.  What do you do?  Make a version of Dracula.  What will I call it?  Bram Stoker’s Dracula.  That way no one will mistake it for the 5 million over Dracula and Dracula knock offs out there.  (My favorite, Blacula). 

“I’m FFC and I’m going to start a trend in movies where the author’s name gets tacked on to give it academic cred.”  This led the way for William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet, a true cinematic accomplishment. Of course the true horror fan knows that FFC stole this from Roger Corman and all those Edgar Allen Poe movies.  Corman would take EAP’s name of a movie that had nothing to do with one of his stories.

So now to the summary.

Coppalla’s film is more true to the original text that the Tod Browning 1931 film.  There are exceptions.  Like all good Hollywood movies, a love triangle had to be put into the movie. This one involves Mina, Jonathan, and Dracula himself.  Of course Mina is the reincarnation of Dracula’s wife who killed herself.  Dracula is in this film Vlad the Impaler, using what many people thought Stoker used as his inspiration and tying the two together forever. 

The film has a very good performance of Dracula by Gary Oldman.  Oldman made one of the best Dracula’s ever.  His has an ability to play a very evil character and his seems to take glee in his portrayal of the villain.  Most of the other characters left a lot to be desired.  Needless to say any movie that puts Keanu Reeves into a starring role risks the bad review. The man cannot act his way out of wet paper bag that may or may not be part of the matrix.  Anthony Hopkins could have done a better job as Van Helsing, but he did seem to enjoy the job all the same.  I think he should have play Van Helsing like Hannible Lector. 

Despite the flaws in the story line, this version of Dracula  does a fairly good job of keeping true to the text.  It remains a period piece something other versions did not do.  The special effects are better, and there is a superb performance by Oldman as Dracula.  He is more memorable than even Legosi in the role. All in all Bram Stokers Dracula is worth the time to watch if for nothing else the wonderful delivery of my favorite line from the movies: “For I have already eaten, and I never drink, wine.”   

Posted by Jared at 06:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Universal Studios produced Dracula in 1931.  It starred Bela Legosi in his most famous role.  The role he will be remembered forever.  His image has become the image of Dracula himself.  That is a remarkable thing for a hack Hungarian actor that should otherwise be forgotten, but now the movie.

The 1931 version of Dracula was based off a stage play.  It featured very little real scare.  The vampire has no fangs.  You never see him turn into a bat or bite a neck.  He is supposed to be sexy and women want him.  The character names are mixed up. Lucy and Mina are interchanged.  Also Dr. Seward becomes Lucy’s father.  The movie ends with Dracula’s staking in Carfax Abby instead of Castle Dracula.  Renfield, one of the greatest minor characters ever is in this production.

The real star of the movie in my opinion is Renfield .  The actor who performs him does a very good job.  He later played Fritz in Frankenstein.  He did not have very many parts or scenes in the movie.  Renfield gives it a good go with the scenes he has. 

Dr. Van Helsing in this movie is not very good.  He is not the sly and wily character from the book.  He isn’t even Dutch. 

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