Top Ten Movies of 2009

It’s time, again, for the top ten movies of the year. As usual, because of the way they release these things, there are several films that I might love that haven’t come to Portland yet, so I can really only judge what I’ve seen. But, for now, here it is, in no particular order, except I saved the best for last.

THE HANGOVER (Todd Phillips)

Everyone loved this flick. I’m no exception. Bradley Cooper, opened up to do some wacky comedy instead of playing a total dickhead, showed his true star quality for the first time. But of course the real star is Zach Galifianakis, who steals every scene. I’ve been a fan of Todd Phillips’ brand of comedy since I first saw OLD SCHOOL, and although there have been some missteps along the way, HANGOVER takes the promise of OLD SCHOOL to the next level.

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE (Spike Jonze)

This movie is sad and a little confusing. People sometimes forget that childhood isn’t always rainbows and sunshine or puppy dogs and ice cream. Sometimes, childhood is sad and confusing. That’s one of the reasons imagination is so important to young people. What better way to make sense out of a complex world that most adults, let alone kids, don’t understand in the first place, than to imagine solutions to problems, imagine explanations for things that don’t make sense, imagine connections between the things that don’t seem to connect. Imagination can organize the chaos around us. It can make sense out of the senseless. It can soothe the savage beast.

It seems like the kids’ movies that are memorable to my generation tend to be the ones that are a little strange, a little edgy, a little creepy, a little challenging. People remember the nightmare visions as fondly, if not moreso, as they do the warm and fuzzy ones. Hopefully in ten or twenty years there will be a generation of kids who grow into adults who love WILD THINGS as much as people my age love LABYRINTH, DARK CRYSTAL, NEVERENDING STORY, RETURN TO OZ. WILD THINGS is a better film than all of those, anyway.

WHIP IT (Drew Barrymore)

The complaints I’ve read about WHIP IT mostly say it is too formulaic and that it’s too nice. That’s why I like it. Despite the strict adherence to formula and despite how nicely everything turns out, WHIP IT still manages to be a great film with a unique point of view.

The other reason I liked WHIP IT: Ellen Page. More than any movie so far, this film has made me fall in love with Ellen Page. Her face is so genuine that with seemingly no effort she can make your heart break with a glance, or put it back together again with a smile. The trick is that it looks like she’s not working. When she’s sad, you’re sad. When she’s happy, you’re happy. It’s all in her eyes, and her cheeks, and her smile. Hopefully she’ll still be working in a couple decades when her face will have some mileage on it. Imagine what kind of stories she’ll tell.

There is one key scene in WHIP IT where the movie actually defies convention and formula, and it has to do with the love interest. Without giving too much away, there is some question as to whether he cheated on Page’s character or not. He makes a fairly good case that he didn’t. What’s her response? It doesn’t matter. She didn’t like the way the relationship made her feel, regardless of the details behind it, and that’s enough for her to end it. She knows what she wants and what she doesn’t want, and it’s not defined by the guy in her life. Teenage girls should be listening to this message, and not the one in TWILIGHT. I could stand to learn from it, myself.

UP IN THE AIR (Jason Reitman)

There’s truth in this movie. That’s why it’s beautiful. Sure, the movie is gray, overcast, about aging, about the death of the economy, about corporate detachment. Sure, the main character, played by George Clooney, has a side job convincing people they don’t need anyone but themselves. Sounds ugly. But, it isn’t. Sad, yes. Tragic, sure. It is that. But, not ugly. I can think of some supposedly heartwarming family films that are quite ugly. UP IN THE AIR is the opposite of that.

I’m guessing most people will exit this movie taking a long hard look at themselves. I say that because that’s what happened to me. My heart moved along with Clooney’s journey, and it didn’t go where I wanted it to go, and my heart broke right along with Clooney’s. But, me and Clooney thought about it, and we realized our hearts had already been broken, anyway. So, time to move on.

Some of the best movies ever made are about people who realize they’re lonely and decide they don’t want to be lonely anymore. The story comes from the choices they make to end their loneliness. The lesson comes from what they learn from the choices they make.

AVATAR (James Cameron)

There isn’t a moment in this movie where there isn’t something awesome to look at. And, a lot of this awesome stuff also happens to be totally unique to this movie. So, for the entire running time, the audience is seeing things they’ve never seen before. And that, while admittedly going a little above and beyond, is what seeing a movie should be all about. The whole movie is beautiful, but it is also action packed and breezes by at a good clip, despite the length. It’s deceptively perfect in its simplicity, basically a text book example of Ebert’s old rule, “It’s not what a movie is about, but how it’s about it.” The reason you see AVATAR is how it tells its story, not what the story is. AVATAR tells its story in a way you’ve never seen before. It’s a multi-course meal in a sea of fast food movies. It’s an event in the true meaning of the word, not the fake meaning that’s been applied to every would-be blockbuster of the week.

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS (Quentin Tarantino)

“It’s like writing history with lightning.”

That’s a famous quote about an infamous movie, BIRTH OF A NATION. The quote referred to the thrilling way D.W. Griffith told his story, when the medium was still new. The quote probably did not refer to the way Griffith took liberties with history to paint a racist and pro-KKK picture of reconstruction.

In any case, that’s the quote I think of when I think of INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS. The film is painted in broad strokes, with primary colors, larger than life characters and gleefully takes liberties with history in a way that might be offensive if the movie wasn’t so damned entertaining. Of course it helps that the film ends with one of the greatest revenge sequences ever, including a most satisfying death scene for a villain who never gets the death scene he deserves in any other WW2 flicks.

As usual, Tarantino bends genres until he’s basically made up his own and all of this flaunting of convention seems so obvious that it’s a wonder no one ever tried it before. But, that’s the beauty of it. The movie is so deceptively simple and straight forward that it has room to breathe, and it’s in this room that all the details and specifics get filled in, the way Tarantino loves to fill them in, until the movie is so particular you can’t imagine it ending with any other line than:

“I think this might just be my masterpiece.”

THE HURT LOCKER (Kathryn Bigelow)

This movie is badass. That’s all there is to it. If you want to see a movie about a badass doing badass things, this is the one to see. Don’t get scared away from all the awards attention and good reviews. I know sometimes that means the flick is boring or weird or whatever. Not in this case. Yeah, it’s a little movie – the main guy, Jeremy Renner, isn’t a star (though he should be) – it didn’t do a lot at the box office (though it should have) and it probably didn’t even play in a theater near you (which is a crime). Good news: it’ll be on video before you know it.

You like suspense? You like action? You like stuff blowing up? You like death metal? You’ll love HURT LOCKER. It has good acting and is beautiful to look at, as well, and, hell, all the technical credits are superb – writing, directing, editing. But, that’s just that artsy fartsy critic stuff.

(500) DAYS OF SUMMER (Marc Webb)

I’m a sucker for a good romantic comedy, and this is one. You can tell, because it’s also kind of sad. The best romantic comedies are. Why is that? I guess that’s because the ones that really understand relationships know that romantics are gluttons for punishment. Without the lows, would the highs be any good? Seems like my favorite romantic comedies are about break ups – ANNIE HALL, ETERNAL SUNSHINE, CHASING AMY.

This one benefits not just from a knowing and insightful script, but also from the beauty and grace of Zooey Deschanel as Summer. You could argue she’s up front with the male lead, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, from the beginning and he sets himself up for disappointment, but I’d argue when it comes to relationships you have to listen to what people tell you without words as well as listening to what they tell you with words, and usually the truth is somewhere in the middle.

This one’s a real crowd pleaser – the audience I saw it with sighed on cue, laughed on cue, exalted on cue, despaired on cue. We all wanted to climb into the screen and hug the movie.

After she saw the movie, my mom asked, "Does Summer remind you of anyone?"

Yes, mom, she does.

STAR TREK (J.J. Abrams)

Speaking of crowd pleasers.

Now, you could say it's a foregone conclusion that a STAR TREK nerd like myself should love this movie. But, judging from some reaction by nerds on the Internet, it looks like "real" STAR TREK nerds actually DON'T really like this movie. Even though it takes a dead franchise and returns it to glory with lots of color, life, vitality, and spark, the movie is getting flack from nerd audiences for playing fast and loose with the established STAR TREK story and for being more about spectacle than intellect.

Well, news flash: the deep STAR TREK episodes and movies were never that deep, and the spectacular ones weren’t, either. But, the well made ones were always well made, and the bad ones were always bad, and guess what? This one’s well made. That's all I ask for when it comes to STAR TREK -- I want good TREK, not shitty TREK.

Anyway, I don’t put much stock in how deep or shallow a movie is. The greatest intellectual or emotional pleasure I can get out of a movie is when the movie simply works. If it works and it’s dumb, great. If it works and it’s genius, great. If it works and it happens to be STAR TREK, sweet.

One of the main reasons I love this movie, aside from the fact that it is irresistibly fun, endlessly entertaining and constantly coming up with new things to keep the story moving, is because it goes back to the holy trinity of Kirk, Spock and McCoy. After those guys left the scene, STAR TREK was never the same. Yes, I love NEXT GENERATION and DEEP SPACE NINE. But I don’t get the emotional reaction to those characters that I get from a good old Kirk/Spock/McCoy interaction. And, as others have said, they nailed the casting, striking a perfect balance of paying homage to the original actors and characters while being bold enough to try something new. Like that one NEXT GENERATION episode, it’s the best of both worlds.

The only thing that could have made it better would have been a little more of Eric Bana as the bad guy, but who am I to argue with the Captain of the Enterprise.

ADVENTURELAND (Greg Mottola)

This was my favorite film of the year. I love a good coming of age story. This one stars Jesse Eisenberg, who is quickly becoming my favorite young actor, as a kid fresh out of college who ends up working at a run-down mom and pop theme park to earn money for grad-school. This is ADVENTURELAND, already losing its luster by the mid-80s, when the film takes place.

Eisenberg’s character made it through college as a virgin, but the quest to lose his virginity is a red herring. This is not that movie. It’s made clear in the early scenes that Eisenberg’s biggest obstacle to overcome is himself, not the women he’s dated or will date. This character is a romantic to a fault -- so in love with being in love, he ends up cock blocking himself at every turn. In this film, women aren’t inaccessible creatures who only exist for men to conquer. They’re real, three dimensional people and Eisenberg has to learn to become a real, three dimensional person himself before he can really relate to the world.

Take the Kristen Stewart character, Eisenberg’s main love interest: yeah, she’s confused, probably depressed, unhappy at home, involved in a dead-end relationship. But she also stands up for what she believes in, is loyal to her friends, and has a voice that wants to be heard. She is not an empty symbol for Eisenberg's attraction, she's a fully realized character who has her own shit going on. And, that's rare in movies -- usually supporting characters only exist to serve every whim of the protagonist. Rarely do you get the feeling the rest of the cast has stuff to do independently of what the plot requires.

This narrative generosity is extended to the whole ensemble cast, but one character who benefits from it a lot is Eisenberg's work-friend played by Martin Starr. Like most of the rest of the movie, Starr's performance is low key, but it's so well observed I feel like he's a real guy I met one time, instead of some dude I saw in a movie. He's the perfect sarcastic antidote to the otherwise dull and obvious world of ADVENTURELAND. There's truth to the relationship between Eisenberg and Starr -- they're the kind of buddies who meet out of a lack of anyone else to hang out with, who have enough in common to bitch to each other but not quite enough in common to really understand each other when it counts.

There's also Ryan Reynolds in what I believe is his best role to date. Ironically, the role is kind of a deconstruction of his usual roles -- the cool, aloof guy with a crooked smile and a twinkle in his eye. Only, in this flick, the audience can see through him. We can see he's not as cool as everyone thinks he is, and not as funny either. We can see he knows he's lost whatever he once had, even if the people around him haven't caught on yet. This vulnerability adds another dimension to a character who would otherwise just be a wisecracker who can't be touched, and the characterization gives Reynolds more to do than he usually has to do -- Reynolds is a performer cursed by being so naturally charming that directors usually forget to ask him to work.

What else? Above all, the movie is funny. But, it's not broad a gross-out, laugh-a-minute extravaganza. It's more observational in its humor, letting funny moments grow organically from character interactions. There's also a great soundtrack.

If the movie has one fault, it's the fact that the ending is just a little too happy. It feels tacked on and a little less grounded in reality than the rest of the film. That's not to say there aren't happy endings in real life, but with this film I would have felt satisfied with things up in the air, with an uncertain but hopeful future in front of Eisenberg.

As someone who tries to write, there's tragedy in a movie like this. It's so good, so well observed, so much like what I wish I could create, that it makes me wonder what I'm doing. I wrote a novel in college and it never quite worked, and when I saw this movie I thought, "That's what my novel wanted to be. I just didn't know it until I saw it."

Still, it's nice to have examples of art to strive for. It's tough work, trying to say the stuff that can't be said, especially when you don't have any examples of others who have said it close to the way that you want to say it.

That's one way you know you've found a movie you love -- if the movie is able to articulate something you always wanted to say, or always felt, but never knew exactly how to put it.

That's ADVENTURELAND.

We Three Kings of Orient Aren't

As I approached Wal-Mart with my old friend Levi and his brother, Luke, Levi said, "How's it feel to be the three coolest guys at Wal-Mart on Christmas Eve?"

"Not one of my finer moments," Luke said.

"Look, a phone booth," I said, pointing to the first phone booth I'd seen in a while. "And it's not being ironic or anything."

After browsing for a while, we were on our way out of the store when an older gentleman who was following us down the aisle spoke up.

"You look like the three wise men," he said.

I wasn't sure whether or not he was speaking to us so I continued walking.

"You look like the three wise men," he repeated. "You left the nativity scene unattended. You better get back to the manger."

Levi and I laughed nervously in half-acknowledgement.

When the man was gone, Luke said, "Did that guy just say we look like the three wise men?"

"Yes," I said. "He did."

I looked us over. Sure, there were three of us, and we're definitely men, and I guess you could even say we're all wise in one way or another. For instance, I'm a wise ass.

But, aside from that, I'm not sure what else made us look like the three wise men, presumably the ones of Biblical fame, though unless I'm mistaken the Bible never really decides how many dudes there are, or even if they're wise. But for whatever reason everyone decided there's three of them, and they're wise, and they're kings.

But, they're from the East. And me, Levi and Luke are three dudes from the West. Also, in many traditional portrayals, one of the wise men is almost always a token black man. Kind of like Winston in GHOSTBUSTERS. But there are four Ghostbusters and three wise men. Even in the movie, THREE KINGS, one of the dudes is black (Ice Cube) though I could never figure out which three of them are the three kings -- Clooney, Cube and Wahlberg? Does Spike Jonze count? Or are Cube, Wahlberg and Jonze the kings and Clooney is kind of like the leader of the Three Musketeers, of whom there were four?

I guess when you get right down to it there isn't that much that's Biblical about me, Levi and Luke except for our names.

Mine's Paul, by the way.

The Giant Kitty

All right, next up in my series of transcriptions of “films” I made when I was 12 – THE GIANT KITTY. I was inspired one afternoon after seeing a rerun of GROWING PAINS in which Ben Seaver gets his whole family to help him make a monster movie about an alligator they flushed down the toilet who came back for revenge. What follows is a transcript of the video that resulted, with some commentary along the way. I tried to keep all of the spelling errors from the title cards for authenticity.





THE GIANT KITTY

Production date 5/29-5/31/93

FADE IN

MAIN TITLE SEQUENCE

CUE MUSIC: Theme from “Phantom of the Opera”

NOTE: I was really into Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Phantom of the Opera” at the time. But hey, I was 12, it’s not like I’m one of those adults who thinks it’s awesome. When I was 6 I though “Howard the Duck” was the best film ever made.

(OPENING CREDITS are written in blood-red Mr. Sketch marker, on pieces of paper taped to quaint, flowery, wallpaper.)

TITLE CARD:

SOMEWHERE IN SPACE. . .

STOCK FOOTAGE

SPACE STATION FROM STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE

(Varying shots of a station floating in space, with space men flying around.)

NOTE: the voice of the space station commander, along with nearly every other voice, is played by yours truly. For the space station commander, I spoke in that bored, disinterested tone that pilots use.

SPACE STATION COMMANDER
USS Murray, do you read? This is Space Station Outpost 300. Yeah, we’ve spotted something really strange around here. In the Pacific Ocean. Heading somewhere near SanFrancisco. Yeah, you’re gonna laugh at this, but it looks like a giant cat.

EXT. PACIFIC OCEAN

(An aircraft carrier floats on the waves.)

NOTE: The Pacific Ocean was played by my family’s hot tub, and the aircraft carrier was played by the off-brand Micro Machines aircraft carrier I got for my birthday one year.

CAPTAIN OF USS MURRAY
This is USS Murray. We read. But we don’t see anything like a giant cat out here. Besides, don’t cats hate water?

STOCK FOOTAGE – KING KONG VS GODZILLA

(A Japanese crewman reads from a piece of paper.)

JAPANESE CREWMAN
(me doing voice over)
Here’s the facts on where the cat was headed – it’s heading for SanFrancisco – it should be in this area any time.

HYSTERICAL JAPANESE DUDE
(fainting)
Oh no, I see him!

EXT. USS MURRAY DECK

(A crewman sits on the deck. The deck is played by my hot tub’s lid. The crewman is played by my Han Solo action figure.)

HAN SOLO CREWMAN
I see him! I see him! Oh no!

(Suddenly my hand sweeps into view and knocks Han Solo into the water. Bubbles come to the surface, Han Solo makes horrible drowning noises.)

EXT PACIFIC OCEAN

(The aircraft carrier sinks while the GIANT KITTY lurks nearby.)

NOTE: The giant kitty is played by a Cowardly Lion action figure, in this instance.

CAPTAIN OF USS MURRAY
We’re going down!

STOCK FOOTAGE – KING KONG VS GODZILLA (again)

(A newsman reads the news.)

NEWS REPORTER
This may concern some of the Americans in America because this monster of a cat is headed towards SanFrancisco, California through the Pacific Ocean. We have a feeling that this is not the first casualty in its wake.

NOTE: Despite the voice over discussing California, the news reporter is clearly pointing to a map of Japan.

TITLE CARD

A SUBERB OF SANFRANCISCO

INT THE KID’S HOUSE - DINING ROOM

(The Kid (played by yours truly) sits at the dining room table, looking through a photo album. There are photos of him playing with his cat while wearing sweet Trail Blazers sweat pants, along with a photo of The Kid and his Dad visiting the Golden Gate Bridge.)

THE KID
(Sighs)
She was a good cat. Too bad she had to go and jump off the SanFrancisco bridge. Oh well.

(Suddenly the kid’s dad runs in)

DAD
(panicking)
On the news! They said there’s a giant cat coming! Run for your lives!

(He runs out)

KID
What?

(runs to front door, opens it)
STOCK FOOTAGE – TERMINATOR 2

(The T-1000 stands in the doorway.)

T-1000
Have you seen John Connor?

(The kid slams the door, screams, then runs down the hall to the garage door.)

NOTE: Yes, I stole that joke from “Wayne’s World.”

EXT DRIVEWAY

(Kid runs to car, gets in.)

KID
Oh well, I don’t know how to drive but – okay.

(Grabs mini tape recorder from passenger seat)

KID
Better check the portable radio.

(Turns on the tape recorder)

VOICE ON RADIO
-- Golden Gate Bridge –

KID
Oh well.

(throws tape player away, looks out window.)

NOTE: I think I had carefully recorded some radio commentary about the cat attacking the city, but when it came time to shoot the scene I had the tape cued wrong and messed it up. Apparently a second take wasn’t in order. In fact, most of the movie is messed up by timing – being 12, I either hit “record” one moment too late or turned the camera off one moment too soon in almost every scene, rendering a lot of the movie unintelligible. Since I was editing in camera as I went along, I only shot what I thought would be final cut.

KID
(looking out window)
Oh no, there it is!

(A furry ball of fluff flies through the window and the kid catches it)

KID
(in disgust)
Eew. Talk about hair ball.

(Throws the fur ball away.)

NOTE: The fur ball was played by this weird stuffed animal I had that was seemingly just a ball of fur. I could never figure it out. It was kind of like a Tribble, but it wasn’t a tribble. I don’t know what it was. It was weird.

TITLE CARD

US ARMY BASE

(A MASK action figure stands in for the GENERAL, against my bedroom door with an American Flag sticker on the wall behind him – bargain basement PATTON rip off.)

(The music is the part from TEMPLE OF DOOM where Indy saves all the kids in the mine.)

GENERAL
(voice over by me)
All right men. There’s a giant cat in SanFrancisco and someone’s gotta stop him, right? Well, we’re the ones for the job. This may be the toughest fight of your life, men, but I’m counting on you to rid the city of all giant felines. He’s heading for the bridge so be warned and be careful. Now, good luck to you all.

TITLE CARD

AT THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE. . .

Note: Now, this scene was supposed to be the crux of the whole movie but it didn’t work out. Let me see if I can paint a picture for you. First, you might notice a preoccupation with SanFrancisco in this movie. Why? Am I from there? No. Maybe it was because they went there in my favorite movie at the time, STAR TREK IV. Maybe it was because I had recently been there on vacation myself. But most likely it was because I had a sweet Micro Machines city that included a bridge that look a lot like the Golden Gate Bridge, and it was the perfect size for me to get my cat, Shadow, to rampage through.

I figured, set up the camera, let the cat loose, and make cinematic history. In my excitement I forgot my cat was lazy, so it spent most of the time sitting around. You can see my mom sitting in the corner attempting to get the cat’s attention with a Micro Machines airplane tied to my bow and arrow string. My hands also come into view every now and then attempting to feed action figures to my cat. At one point you can hear my blue Conair phone ringing.

Finally, I give up and cut to. . .

STOCK FOOTAGE FROM TERMINATOR 2 (again)

(Shots of Los Angeles exploding during a nuclear attack.)

INT CAR

(The Kid stops “driving” (bouncing up and down in the seat) and gets out of the car, looking up.)

KID
Oh jees, that cat’s destroying this place. Wait a minute. That’s MY cat. The one that fell off the bridge and drowned and we haven’t seen her since. Great, I gotta call Dad!

NOTE: That was my GROWING PAINS homage. In the episode that inspired me, Ben and all the other characters kept referencing the alligator they flushed down the toilet “and haven’t seen since.”

KID
(runs towards house)
Maybe I can use their phone.

INT HOUSE

(Kid runs in. It’s clearly the same house he just left.)

KID
Where is everybody?

STOCK FOOTAGE – TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES

(Several ninja bust through several windows.)

(I hit PAUSE on one Ninja and dub his voice.)

NINJA
Somebody call for the FBI Ninja Force? Wait a minute. Hey kid, what are you doing in here? You’re supposed to evacuate the city. Now we’re gonna have to fight you.

(I UNPAUSE the movie and the ninja goes through an impressive and intimidating display of his nunchuck skills.)

KID
Oh yeah? Well, I’ve got some tricks up my sleeve too!

(Kid pulls a Foxtail out of his sleeve.)

NOTE: Remember Foxtails? They were tennis ball-ish things with a rainbow colored streaming coming out from behind them. They came with a book of games you could play with them.

KID
Wait a minute, where’s my nunchucks?

CREW MEMBER
(my dad, from behind the camera)
Sorry, sir, that’s the best prop we could find.

(The Kid shrugs and awkwardly swings the Foxtail in an attempt to be menacing, hitting himself with it several times.)

BACK TO PAUSE-BUTTON NINJA

NINJA
I see you have a weapon, too. Why are you here?

KID
That’s my cat out there destroying the city!

NOTE: At this point you can hear my mom in the kitchen doing the dishes. Clink, clank.

NINJA
Oh it is, is it? Well you better call it off, because we’re about to all die here.

KID
Okay, okay. I’m trying my best. I just gotta stop her somehow.

NINJA
Listen – the general will get you a plane. Is that okay?

PAUL
Sounds great.

EXT SKY

(A Matchbox jet flies through the sky.)

JET PILOT
Okay, we’re coming in on the cat. Prepare to parachute out.

EXT SKY

(The Kid parachutes out of the plane.)

NOTE: This was accomplished by having me stand against a white wall, waving my hands in the hair, standing on the couch. The couch was supposed to remain out of shot but the camera man pans down at one point, revealing everything. Thanks a lot, mom or dad. I’m wearing my sister’s leather bomber jacket, a winter scarf, winter gloves, a pair of swimming goggles and a backpack. My good old Jansport. We went through a lot together until I eventually puked on it in college and threw it away.

KID
Oh, oh, there’s the cat down there! I better let out my parachute so I can land on her! Hey! Hey, cat! Up here! Oh, I’m about to land.

STOCK FOOTAGE

OLD BATMAN SERIAL

(Black and white footage of a guy parachuting)

QUICK CUT

(My cat, Shadow, looks up into the camera.)

CUT TO

TIGHT ANGLE – THE CAT’S BACK

(Kid lands on the cat’s back.)

NOTE: This is an action figure on the back of one of my stuffed animals.

KID
Hey kitty. Remember me? Your old owner? Please stop rampaging through the city. Please, you’re destroying everything. Just go back in the ocean where you came from.

ANGLE ON

CAT WALKING AWAY

KID
She’s going away! Into the ocean. Goodbye kitty. There she goes, into the unknown.

(Shot of my cat, Shadow, wandering around my bedroom.)

TITLE CARD

US ARMY AWARD CERAMONY

(The general presents an award to the Kid. This time, instead of being played by an action figure, the general is played by my Dad, wearing a blue blazer and a t-shirt. I have my hair parted to one side, instead of straight down over my forehead, I guess to show that I dressed up for the ceremony)

GENERAL
For your bravery in leading the giant cat away from our fair city, I present you with this medal of honor.

PAUL
Thanks, General!

NOTE: I re-watched this scene to see if I could tell what prop I used for the award, but I couldn’t figure it out. Oh well.

CUT TO

TITLE CARD

THE END. . . .

INSERT

PHOTO

(I cut and pasted together a photo of my car looming above the ocean, the old fashioned way. It actually looked pretty sweet.)

TITLE CARD

OR SO WE THOUGHT

ROLL END CREDITS

Back in 6th grade I was so proud of this movie I actually brought it to class and made my homeroom watch it. For some reason my teacher let me. Sorry, everyone.

Kid in Shining Armor

When I was home for Thanksgiving, my mom had me dig through a couple bags of VHS video tapes to see what was okay to throw away and what wasn't. I came across one tape with several short movies my friends and I made in junior high school and reviewed it tonight. I've decided to transcribe the videos into screenplay format. The screenplays might not do them justice, but I'll make sure to include notes in an attempt to get the full experience across to the reader.

First up, a flick we shot for a school project, though I'm afraid it has basically nothing in the way of educational material:

(Note: the feature presentation is preceded by a video of my sister and one of her friends conducting an experiment on mice for school. The mice are running through a maze, first with Red Hot Chili Peppers blasting, then with no music at all, and finally with classical music playing. Unfortunately, we don't find out the result of this experiment as the video abruptly and unexplainedly cuts to my sister and the same friend on a mini-golf course checking out dudes. Then, our feature presentation begins)

KID IN SHINING ARMOR

production date 2/13/93, from 4:01 to 5:51

INT. CODY'S BEDROOM - NIGHT

(Junior high schooler, Cody, is studying at his desk.)

(Suddenly he throws off his head phones and slams his text book in disgust.)

CODY
Three hours and I still don't know what the code of chiva-- chiv -- WHATEVER -- is.

(He puts his head down on the desk and falls asleep.)

CUT TO

EXT FIELD -- DAY

(Cody is lying in the grass. He sits up, confused.)

CODY
Where am I?

(A paige boy in medieval dress approaches (played by yours truly).)

(Note: I'm wearing a pair of my sister's boots with fuzzy trim around the tops, black tights, also probably belonging to my sister, and an oversized white t-shirt cinched at the waist by a clunky belt. I have a canteen over one shoulder and my fibreglass long bow over the other. Levi and I both sport bowl-cuts and appear to be chewing large amounts of gum.)

PAIGE
What art thou doing on the land of Lord Burch?

CODY
Don't ask me.

PAIGE
What are you eating?

CODY
It's gum. Here, try it.

(He pulls out a piece and hands it to the paige.)

PAIGE
(examines gum)
Hmm.

CODY
You chew it.

(Paige sticks the gum in his mouth and chews.)

PAIGE
It's good!

(He over-exageratedly swallows, then holds out his hand.)

PAIGE
Can I have another piece?

CODY
No, that was my last piece. Sorry.

(Cody blows a bubble.)

PAIGE
You must be a magician if you can do that. We don't allow magicians around here. I'm going to go warn the lord!

(Paige runs off.)

(Cody shrugs.)

ABRUPT CUT

NEW ANGLE ON FIELD

(Suddenly, Lord Burch appears behind Cody, leading his horse by the reigns and carrying a menacing axe.)

(Note: As I recall, one of the major reasons we shot the movie at Sam's house, aside from the fact that it was in the country so it was a good setting, was because his family had horses. So, it was a good way to get some killer production value, having a real live horse in a medieval time travel flick. Unfortunately Sam wasn't too comfortable with the horse, so he wouldn't ride it, and although he led it around by its reigns, he tried to keep several feet between himself and the horse, and any time it came near him he took a few steps away.)

LORD BURCH
What art thou doing on the lord's land?

CODY
Uh. . .

LORD BURCH
You are on our land.

CODY
So?

LORD BURCH
Where's my paige?

CODY
Paige?

LORD BURCH
Okay, my squire.

CODY
Uh. . . I don't know. He ran off.

LORD BURCH
Why?

CODY
I don't know. I just blew a bubble, and he left.

LORD BURCH
Why did he leave from your bubble?

CODY
Don't ask me.

LORD BURCH
What did he say?

CODY
I don't know.

LORD BURCH
You look like some kind of sorcerer or magician to me.

CODY
I was just chewing gum.

LORD BURCH
You will be executed at high noon tomorrow. We do not allow magicians on here. That is final.

CUT TO

EXT PRISON TOWER -- DAY

(Cody holds onto the bars, looking out the window, still chewing an ass load of gum.)

CODY
I don't wanna die! No!

(Suddenly, with much grunting and effort, the Paige climbs into view.)

CODY
Huh?

PAIGE
Hi. Remember me?

CODY
Uh. . . yeah.

PAIGE
Listen -- I know you're not really a magician. 'Cause you're too young 'n' stuff. And I've never seen a magician as young as you. And I know you're not evil, 'cause you don't act evil. You may wear some weird clothes 'n' stuff but that doesn't mean anything. So, tomorrow, I'm going to rescue you before you get your head chopped off. 'Kay?

CODY
Thank you!

PAIGE
You're welcome. By the way, do they feed you anything here?

CODY
Nothing.

PAIGE
I brought some water, if you're thirsty.

CODY
Yeah, now that you mention it.

(The Paige goes to get his water bottle, but in doing so lets go of the prison tower with both hands and falls out of frame, screaming.)

CUT TO

EXT EXECUTION STUMP - DAY

(Cody kneels with his hands behind his back.)

(Lord Burch approaches with his axe.)

LORD BURCH
Get your head on the stump!

(Cody puts his head on the stump.)

LORD BURCH
You have any last words to say before I behead you?

PAIGE
(off screen)
Stop!

(Cody and Lord Burch look around in confusion.)

(Cody takes advantage of the confusion to run away.)

ABRUPT CUT

NEW ANGLE -- EXECUTION STUMP

(Lord Burch is confronted by his Paige.)

LORD BURCH
Why have you broken the code of chivalry!

PAIGE
Because, after seeing what you do to innocent people, I don't want to be a knight anymore.

LORD BURCH
What makes you think he's so innocent.

PAIGE
Because he's too young to be a magician. Now, prepare to eat -- taste the bite of my arrow.

(Paige pulls back the string on his bow.)

LORD BURCH
What arrow?

PAIGE
Oh, uh -- I knew I forgot something --

(Paige lowers his bow and runs.)

(Lord Burch runs after him and corners him at a tree.)

LORD BURCH
I'll get you!

(He takes a swing with his axe and misses, hitting the tree instead.)

LORD BURCH
I'm gonna let you live this time. But you have been banned from this kingdom. You've been banned from knighthood. You'll never be allowed in this land again. Now go.

(Paige runs off.)

CUT TO

NEW ANGLE -- WOODS

(Cody wanders through the woods, hands in his pockets, looking at the ground.)

(Paige catches up to him, out of breath.)

PAIGE
There you are! He let me go.

CODY
Thanks for saving me.

PAIGE
All in a day's work. But, I had to break the code of chivalry and now I can never become a night.

CODY
Oh! That was it! Chiv -- chivalry!

PAIGE
Huh?

CODY
Nevermind. It's an inside joke.

PAIGE
Well, all right. Well, I'll be, uh -- out of this kingodm. 'Cause I'm banned. So, see ya.

(Paige wanders off.)

CODY
(To himself.)
However will I get back home?

CUT TO

NEW ANGLE -- WOODS

(Lord Burch suddenly appears and attacks.)

LORD BURCH
I've found you! You've escaped!

(He takes a mighty swing with his axe as Cody cowers and suddenly -- )

CUT TO

INT CODY'S BEDROOM - NIGHT

(Cody wakes up from his dream.)

(His brother stands over his shoulder, shaking him awake -- it's THE SAME ACTOR WHO PLAYED LORD BURCH!!)

BROTHER
Hey Cody! Cody, wake up.

CODY
(startled)
It's you!

BROTHER
Hey, chill man. Hey, you know what, I just saw this really awesome movie preview about this kid who goes back in time and meets this squire and a paige and this evil lord who wants to chop off his head because he thinks he's a magician. Oh yeah, and they say it's based on a true story, too. Oh yeah, dad says it's time to go to bed, so I'm gonna go brush my teeth. Good night.

(Brother exits. Cody flops on his bed, exhausted.)

THE END

Horrorfest 31: The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939)

After watching the silent Lon Chaney version of HUNCHBACK earlier this month, I read a bunch of stuff about how great the Charles Laughton version was, so I decided to give it a look.

The 1939 version, directed by William Dieterle and starring Charles Laughton as the Hunchback, is actually superior to the famous silent version with Lon Chaney. The story-tellers chose to cut some of the extraneous characters and plot lines and focus on the basic story of the Hunchback's love for the gypsy girl, Esmerelda (Maureen O'Hara).

But, the movie is opened up a little beyond the walls of the Notrde Dame cathedral as the writers chose to focus on some of the unique aspects of the period the film took place in -- Paris, in this film, straddles an era that is still coming out of the middle ages but hasn't quite embraced the modern world, either. There are not only clashes between the upper and lower classes in the city, but also between the promises of new technology (like the printing press) and the security of old spirituality (the church).

The portrayel of King Louis XI by Harry Davenport is particularly interesting as he's shown to be fairly progressive, for his time, but also naive. Davenport gives him a quirky personality and avoids the royal boredom of the previous film.

The chief villain and most vocal voice towards steering away from the modern age and holding onto medievalism as long as possible belongs to the judge, Frollo (Cedric Hardwicke). His own unrequited love and lust for the gypsy Esmerelda combines with his basic intolerance for change, and this adds up to a lot of destruction that could have been avoided.

His brother, the arch bishop, is portrayed by Walter Hampden as a pious and just man, but he's ineffectual. When he tries to save Esmerelda's life, the villagers, nobles and authorities just shrug and sentence her to death anyway. He also has a weakness when it comes to trying to protect his evil brother.

Charles Laughton's Hunchback, Quasimodo, is more effective than Chaney's. Yes, Chaney's was a masterpiece of makeup at the time, but Laughton brings childlike innocence, pathos and humanity to the character. He also has his frightening moments, but we get a lot more of a glimpse into who Quasimodo is as a person than we do in the previous version. The makeup is also slightly more realistic, re-creating somewhat true-to-life facial deformities rather than the monstrous face of Chaney.

Possibly thanks to the fact that this is a sound film, including an orchestral score and recordings of chants and bells from the real Notre Dame, the big dramatic moments of this movie are much more effective than the same scenes from the silent version. My favorite is when Quasimodo rescues Esmerelda from execution by swinging across the town square, scooping her up, and the swinging back up to the towers of the cathedral. There, he screams, "Sanctuary!" to the villagers below, then holds Esmerelda above his head and screams, "Sanctuary!" again. It's heartbreaking and heroic at the same time, and the music swells at just the right moment.

Another strength of the sound design of the film is the fact that it gives Quasimodo a voice. The character is deaf, so he doesn't talk often, but when he does it is effective, and Laughton finds the right voice, within the limitations of the makeup, to effectively communicate both the reservations of a shy soul with the excitement of a young man beginning to see other sides of life for the first time. His last line is a little over the top, but still heartbreaking.

The movie makes interesting, if simplistic, points about the power of the printing press and written word to bring a unified voice to an otherwise disorganized and chaotic public. You could draw a a parallel here to the power of the Internet as the King observes that the press is giving the common people the power to have their direct opinions heard by royalty without a filter. Frollo claims, "Public opinion is dangerous." The poet, Gringoire (Edmond O'Brien) sees the power of this new medium stop injustice, but the thief Clopin (Thomas Mitchell) thinks physical force is still the way to go for quick results. Additionally, there are interesting parallels drawn between the use of torture and humiliation and logical reasoning and compassion when it comes to communication between opposing sides of an argument.

The one strength this film has most in common with its predecessor is the magnificent sets. Once again, Notre Dame, the town square, and the village streets surrounding it, are re-created from scratch. There isn't a single shot that was made on location, but you can't tell. These sets look like the real thing and are wonders to behold.

As the movie came to a close, I thought about my decision to watch 31 horror flicks in 31 days, in honor of October, the month of Halloween. When I started, I thought I'd just watch all the horror DVDs I already had, of my favorite films -- revisit each of them and share my thoughts on why they're my favorites. But, as I got going, I got hooked on watching films I've never seen before, or only seen parts of, and only ended up reviewing a handful of my favorites. I think if I would have stuck to my original plan, I probably would have gotten bored and given up. Sure, I'd like to share my thoughts on why KING KONG is great and why I love the EVIL DEAD trilogy, but I think ultimately it was more fun to watch things I'd always wanted to see but never got around to, for whatever reason.

Also, I would have never seen crazy flicks like LIFEFORCE, otherwise. And it would suck to die without having seen LIFEFORCE.

Horrorfest 30: Werewolf of London

WEREWOLF OF LONDON was the first of the Universal werewolf films, but it's not the most famous -- that honor goes to THE WOLF-MAN, which has a remake set to come out in the near future.

I've seen THE WOLF-MAN a bunch of times, but never saw WEREWOLF OF LONDON until the other night. I remember I had a book when I was a kid that told the stories of both movies, and WOLF-MAN always seemed more exciting. Now that I've seen both movies, I can say I prefer WOLF-MAN, but WEREWOLF OF LONDON is still interesting.

In many ways, WEREWOLF OF LONDON is more similar to the other Universal horror films than THE WOLF-MAN is. It focuses on a mad scientist. As always, his work is keeping him away from his love, in this case his wife, and there's always a boring douchebag in the sidelines just waiting to swoop in and take the wife away, in this case, his wife's childhood friend.

This time around the scientist is Dr. Glendon (Henry Hull), a botanist searching for a rare flower that only blooms under the light of the moon and only grows in Tibet. During his search in the foreign land, Glendon is attacked and bitten by a werewolf. He returns to London with the flower and attempts to make it bloom with an immitation-moonlight machine but gets mixed results.

A mysterious Asian scientist shows up, Dr. Yogami (Warner Oland) who seems to know quite a bit about werewolves and moon-flowers. He also seems to know Glendon has been bitten by a werewolf. Hmmmm.

The story surrounding this film tells us it was originally conceived as an answer to Paramount's popular DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE films. This is clear as the story unfolds -- once Glendon makes the transformation from man to werewolf, he is clearly more man than wolf. He has the presence of mind to don his cap, overcoat and scarf before going out on the prowl for victims, for instance. He lurks in the shadows of London city streets, cape over his face, waiting to pounce on unsuspecting women. He's even able to speak plain English while he's in wolf-mode.

Later, THE WOLF-MAN took a more supernatural and less pseudo-scientific approach to the material, including plenty of folklore (created for the film). The whole werewolf thing was treated as more of a magical curse, the werewolf was more of a wild animal, stalking forests at night.

The undercurrent of WEREWOLF OF LONDON seems to be about the very British idea of keeping a stiff upper lip. Even as Glendon is clearly afflicted with the curse of the werewolf, he spends most of his time attempting to keep his shit together and deal with his problem secretly without asking for help from anyone else. Meanwhile, his wife's childhood friend is clearly making his move, but Glendon seems to allow it to happen, to a point, almost as a way of calling some kind of bluff, attempting to "stay the course" as a way of combatting this intrusion.

Anyway, in the end, you can see why Universal decided to take another stab with THE WOLF-MAN, though this movie isn't bad by any means. Just not as spectacular as the movies it followed and not as memorable as the ones it inspired.

Horrorfest 29: Lifeforce

I'd never heard of LIFEFORCE until the Laurelhurst decided to run it for a week as part of their October series of horror flicks. Turns out it's a pretty cool sci-fi/horror flick directed by Tobe Hooper, who directed POLTERGEIST (Horrorfest 15) and the classic TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE.

LIFEFORCE is the story of a space shuttle crew sent to intercept and study Halley's comet. They find a strange space craft inside the comet, and discover giant bat-like monsters, long dead, as well as the well-preserved bodies of three seemingly comatose humans, two dudes and one hot chick. The movie doesn't waste any time getting into the action and suspense, cutting quickly from one scene to another, leaving out all the fat. The tone of the opening scenes is effective and the special effects are impressive. The technology all looks fairly realistic, clearly designed after actual space faring technology of the time.

The shuttle mysteriously returns to Earth without any living astronauts on board. An investigating crew recovers the comatose humans from the comet, and bring them to a space center in London for study. That's when the hot chick wakes up and starts running around stealing humans' life forces. The humans with stolen life forces wake up roughly 2 hours after "death" and go looking for someone else's life force to steal. This chain reaction starts a zombie-like epidemic and apocalypse, as the hot space chick gains the ability to jump from one body to another and the craft from the comet menacingly enters into orbit above Earth.

One surviving astronaut from the original Halley's comet mission turns up and seems to have a strange connection with the female alien. As played by Steve Railsback, he's almost always on the brink of insanity, delivering his lines with manic desperation. He teams up with the comparatively cool, collected and logical investigator for a super-secret division of the government, played by Peter Firth. The two attempt to track down the alien woman and put an end to the potential apocalypse, eventually leading them to an insane asylum run by a doctor played by Patrick Stewart (SWEET!!!!!!!) who isn't what he seems.

Probably the most notable (and weird) thing about this movie is that the hot alien chick (Mathilda May) spends almost all of her screen time completely naked. Most of this is in the first half hour, or so, of the film, as she eventually starts hopping from body-to-body and later even dares to wear some clothes (kinda) in her last couple scenes. Still, it's an interesting footnote and she is incredibly beautiful. On one hand you wonder how a naked chick could cause so much havoc, but on the other I guess it kinda makes sense everyone freezes when they're suddenly approached by an incredibly attractive naked woman. I mean, what would you do? Sure, once she starts shooting lightning out of her eyes and mouth there's trouble, but by the time she gets to that point, it's too late.

As the movie unfolded, I had to admire it. It doesn't really make any sense, and it wobbles wildly from good production values to bad, from good acting to awful, but the sheer audacity of it is impressive. And, most importantly, it's fun. There are a couple good scares and every ten minutes or so the movie throws something new at you, giving a new twist to the material, that sends the story in an unexpected direction.

I'll give it this: it never stops for a breather. They edited the hell out of this thing. If a movie this uneven was bloated by even a few extra minutes of screen time, it'd sink. Since it stays light on its feet and never stops, it works.

Horrorfest 28: The Man Who Laughs

This is another in a long line of flicks I've read about but never watched until recently. Back when I was a kid, reading horror movie books from the library, silent films like this were basically impossible to come by, even at the video store. Now, thanks to DVD and other technologies, these titles are widely available for anyone curious enough to check them out.

THE MAN WHO LAUGHS is probably most famous for the grotesque makeup created by Universal's master, Jack Pierce, who went on to create the famous Frankenstein's monster look. Lon Chaney, from HUNCHBACK and PHANTOM, was originally slated to star but that didn't end up working out. Even though Chaney is well-known as the man of a thousand faces and created several insane makeup effects of his own, Jack Pierce's work here is a step above.

The film stars Conrad Veidt as Gwynplaine, the title character, THE MAN WHO LAUGHS. As a child, he had a cruel grin carved into his face in an act of revenge, so he's left with a devilish smile that he can never get rid of. He grows up to become a sideshow carnival attraction of some acclaim. Veidt was also in the immensely influential German expressionist film THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI, widely regarded as the world's first horror film. In that film, his bony frame and hypnotic movements delivered the chills. In this one, the makeup twists his mouth into a menacing grin for the entire film, so he does most of his acting with his eyes.

To be honest, THE MAN WHO LAUGHS isn't really a horror film -- sure, the idea of having a monstrous grin carved onto your face permanently is horrific, and the sight of Gwynplaine's gaping smile is also terrible. But, beyond that, the story is mostly a romantic melodrama, as Gwynplaine falls in love with a blind girl (Mary Philbin), who loves him in return. But, he can't trust her love because she can't see him. When a good-for-nothing party-girl of a Duchess (Olga Baclanova) decides to flirt with him, Gwynplaine decides if he can prove to himself a woman like her would be into him, then that's proof enough that he also deserves the love of the beautiful blind girl.

So, because of the romantic melodrama, it's okay the Veidt's eyes do most of the work, and boy do they ever work. Despite the fact that he has a ghastly grin plastered on his face for the entire running length of the film, Veidt accomplishes the nearly impossible feat of making the audience feel his emotions and sympathize with him. You never forget that he's human under that grin, and his performance transcends the terrifying makeup while also being enhanced by it. There's little more tragic than a dude who's smiling even though he's in pain.

These days, the movie is probably most often referenced with its connection to BATMAN, specifically, the story that the face of THE MAN WHO LAUGHS was the inspiration for the Joker character. The latest film, DARK KNIGHT, even goes so far as to have the grin carved into the Joker's face, making the character that much closer to Gwynplaine. However, Gwynplaine's scars produce a romantic hero while The Joker's scars produce an unbalanced psychopath bent on revenge.

Another effective, if hammy, performance in the film comes from Brandon Hurst as the villain Barkilphedro. He starts as a sinister court jester and works his way up the ranks of royalty until he's a close advisor with the most powerful people in England. It's his discovery of a royal link between Gwynplaine and his deceased father, a rebellious Lord, that moves the treacherous plot into motion.

Somehow this flick seems a little more advanced than Chaney's epics, HUNCHBACK and PHANTOM. It was produced in 1928, so it has a few years on the Chaney films, and that might be it. Or, it might be the direction of Paul Leni, who was straight out of the school of German expressionism and added a level of weird gothic grandiosity to the whole affair.

Horrorfest 27: The Shining

Another flick based on a Stephen King novel, THE SHINING benefits from the glorious direction of Stanley Kubrick and a manic performance from Jack Nicholson.

Nicholson stars as a recovering alcoholic writer who accepts a job as a caretaker at an isolated mountainside hotel during the off-season in order to hopefully get some work done on his latest novel. He brings along his naive, wide-eyed wife, played by Shelley Duvall, and son, played by Danny Lloyd, who has an imaginary friend named Tony who speaks through Danny's mouth in a disturbing groan.

It is revealed early on that Nicholson's character, Jack Torrance, gave up alcohol after an "accidental" moment of abuse in which he pulled his son's shoulder out of its socket. We sense the family has never quite recovered from this incident, as mother and son seem fearful of a relapse and father seems clearly guilty and indignant about the incident.

There are a few catches to the seemingly peaceful, if isolated, winter retreat. First, a previous caretaker went mad and murdered his own family (a wife and two daughters) with an axe. Secondly, it quickly becomes clear that son Danny doesn't just have an imaginary friend, but he seems to have a special gift for seeing into other peoples' minds, as well as seeing nightmarish visions of the past and prophetic visions of the future. The hotel chef, Halloran (Scatman Crothers) senses this gift, and calls it "shining." He explains to Danny that some people shine, and some places, like the hotel, shine as well. Then, he warns Danny to stay out of room 237.

So, of course, Danny's drawn to room 237. He also sees disturbing images of what might be the past or future of the hotel, including the disturbing vision of two girls asking him to play with them -- "forever." Meanwhile, Nicholson's character slowly starts to slip into insanity while his wife tries to understand what's going on, to no avail.

Kubrick revisits some of his favorite themes here, including the sense of isolation and suspense built from repetition, showcased so well in 2001, as well as the ideas of murder and insanity as explored in A CLOCKWORK ORANGE. The deserted winter hotel setting is perfect for Kubrick's penchant towards brightly lit, sterile settings with clean, sharp lines and symmetrical shapes, turning tacky hallway carpeting into art. The camera constantly floats down corridors, following characters around corners for surprising reveals, fully exploiting the steadicam work of steadicam inventor Garret Brown.

The film sets an unsettling tone from the beginning with its detached, cold dialogue, distanced shots and methodical editing, typical of Kubrick. The suspense is heightened with the otherworldly music, cobbled together from several contributors, always seeming to hit the dramatic notes at moments when you least expect it, filling in the quiet moments instead of amplifying the loud ones. The movie seems to delight in unsettling the audience by following big revelations with sudden chapter breaks with under-stated subtitles like "Tuesday" or "One Month Later" punctuated with an orchestral sting.

Ultimately, I'd say most of the scares come from the idea of a family's father turning against them. Somehow, the ghosts of the past seem to infect the family of the present, and whether they're all descending independently into madness, or if all of this is really happening, it's still freaky to have the dad chasing the family through the abandoned hotel with an axe. Nicholson is an actor who succeeds in remaining endlessly charming even when he seems creepy, so to see him ratchet the insanity up to 11 here is a treat.

Duvall has a somewhat thankless role of an increasingly hysterical mother, but the amount of emotional work that must have gone into her performance shouldn't be underestimated. And, young Danny Lloyd turns in a remarkable performance. The rumors abound about Kubrick's raw treatment of actors, but if there was ever a testament to his method paying off, THE SHINING would be it.

I guess one of the most interesting things about this film is how it works both as an art film and a genuine horror movie. It's scary and unsettling enough that kids still pass down rumors of how frightening it is, despite the inflated running time, stretches of quiet, thoughtful moments, and lack of actual body count. But, it's beautiful enough that even the stuffiest, most pretentious film nerd has to admit it's possible for a ghost movie to be great.

Horrorfest 26: Murders in the Rue Morgue

Of all the Edgar Allan Poe inspired Universal horror films, this one is by far the best. Not only is it the closest to the source material (even though it's not all that close), it's also the only one with real atmosphere and artistic flair behind the camera. Despite the great acting of Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff in THE BLACK CAT and THE RAVEN, both of those flicks feel flat and bland in comparison to the Universal classics like DRACULA, the FRANKENSTEIN series, and others. This is not the case with MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE -- it seems to fit right along, visually, with the best of them.

This one stars Bela Lugosi as mad Dr. Mirakle, a sideshow carnival hawker with a captive gorilla named Erik to show off to his Parisian audiences. Many claim this film's striking cinematography by Karl Freund (who also shot METROPOLIS) and direction by Robert Florey owe a lot to the German exprossionist films like NOSFERATU and CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI from the 20s. These claims seem to be true, and the set design also seems to be heavily influenced by the trippy, nightmarish style of those earlier films, with the overly exaggerated crooked roof tops and towering windows casting even more towering shadows. But, it's also clear the plot seems to be at least halfway ripped off from DR. CALIGARI, with Lugosi's Dr. Mirakle replacing Dr. Caligari, and a gorilla replacing Caligari's sleepwalking manservant.

Turns out Mirakle has a plot to somehow mate his captive gorilla with a human female. He kidnaps prostitutes from the streets of Paris, tests their blood, and discards them, murdered, into the Seine, if they prove to be unacceptable for his experiments. These experiments remain vague, probably to avoid making the references to bestiality any more over than they need to be. This, coupled with the fact that Mirakle happily spouts pro-evolution claims to an audience of 1840s Parisians, sets Mirakle clearly in the realm of blasphemy.

This movie is genuinely creepy in parts, specifically in an early sequence in which Lugosi kidnaps a prostitute from the street and takes her back to his lair, where he straps her up to a cross and performs sinister experiments on her.

So, the flick is clearly inspired by CALIGARI, but it also clearly serves as the inspiration for KING KONG, especially during the climax, in which Erik the gorilla falls for his latest potential mate, Camille (Sidney Fox). He escapes with her and makes a death defying flight across the roof tops of Paris, swinging from pipes and chimneys as he avoids his would-be captors.

Meanwhile, young medical student and lover of Camille, Pierre (Leon Waycoff) systematically attempts to solve the mysterious murders with the powers of science and deduction. Some saw Poe's short story created the genre of modern detective fiction, which means this is probably one of the first examples of detectives in the cinema.

Horrorfest 25: The Raven

Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi return for THE RAVEN, another movie with the title of an Edgar Allan Poe work that has basically nothing to do with the source material. I gather this one is generally less well-regarded than THE BLACK CAT, but I'm pretty sure I liked it better.

Lugosi stars as Dr. Richard Vollin, a brain surgeon who has retired from his practice but who is called in at the last moment to perform surgery on the daughter of a prominent judge who has been nearly-fatally injured in a car accident. Although Dr. Vollin would rather spend his days building torture devices inspired by the tales and poems of Edgar Allan Poe, including THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM, in his secret basement, he finds himself falling in love with the judge's daughter once he's saved her life.

The daughter, Jean (Irene Ware) is engaged to be married to Dr. Holden (Lester Matthews). So, when it becomes obvious to the judge (Samuel S. Hinds) that Dr. Vollin is putting the mack on his daughter, the judge steps in to make sure his daughter ends up with the young doctor rather than the old, mad scientist. Of course, this rubs Dr. Vollin the wrong way, and he vows revenge against basically everyone in sight for keeping him away from his love.

Dr. Vollin has a theory: Poe's story were obsessed with torture because Poe himself was tortured by the death of his lover. Only through writing about horror and torture could Poe free himself from his own torture. Similarly, Dr. Vollin reasons, only by inflicting pain on his victims can he lift the pain of rejection from himself.

You might be wondering where Boris Karloff comes into all of this. Well, he shows up as an escaped convict who wants Dr. Vollin to change his face for him so he can elude the authorities. As Vollin, Lugosi cruelly disfigures Karloff's face until he's a hideous monster. He promises to fix the face if Karloff will help him in his elaborate revenge plot, which involves inviting all of the key players to his booby-trapped mansion for a night of torture.

Once disfigured, Karloff is somewhat reminiscent of his famous Frankenstein monster character. Acting as Lugosi's servant, it's interesting that Karloff was considered the biggest star at the time, and even got top billing over Lugosi, who has most of the heavy dramatic lifting, starring in almost every scene of the movie and delivering more dialogue than probably all of the other characters combined.

THE RAVEN is reminiscent of THE BLACK CAT, probably on purpose, since THE BLACK CAT came first and was such a hit for Universal. Both films feature a battle between Lugosi and Karloff and a "normal" couple who get caught in the cross-fire. In THE BLACK CAT, Lugosi is the hero and Karloff is the villain. In THE RAVEN, Lugosi is the villain and Karloff isn't exactly the hero, but becomes heroic as he ultimately betrays his master.

Lugosi quoting the original text of Poe's THE RAVEN in the first few minutes of the film is worth the price of admission alone, but there's plenty more here for classic horror fans. Specifically, Lugosi is at the height of his mad-scientist mania here, delivering his threatening lines with such relish that you'd think he was quoting Shakespeare. Similarly, Karloff does what he does best, bringing sympathy to an almost mute monster, using his body language and the look in his eyes (or eye as the case may be).

The climax feels a bit rushed, but I guess if I had to choose between a nicely brisk running time and an overblown climax, I'd rather go with the rushed feel. Thanks to the mad torture plot, the over the top acting, and the fast pace, THE RAVEN and its predecessor THE BLACK CAT are reminiscent of a good comic book or piece of pulp fiction -- short stories crammed between the dusty pages of an old horror/sci-fi magazine.

Horrorfest 24: The Black Cat

When I was a kid, and I was into monster movies, I'd read books from the libraries about the history of the genre. So, I was exposed to all kinds of movies, but I only ended up seeing a fraction of them. I'd naturally want to watch DRACULA, FRANKENSTEIN, KING KONG -- the big ones. But, other titles, like THE BLACK CAT, just didn't have the same draw.

So, now I'm playing catch up, and I've finally seen THE BLACK CAT -- one of many Universal horror pairings of the two kings: Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff.

In this one, neither of them are playing classic monsters: Lugosi is a recently released prisoner of war who is traveling back to the place of his defeat to confront the man who betrayed him. This is Karloff, who, creepily enough, has built his sprawling estate on the very battle field where he vanquished his enemies and betrayed his allies.

Meanwhile, an innocent honeymooning couple is accidentally thrown into the mix, played by David Manners and Jacqueline Wells as a light-hearted couple very much in love. Karloff, who turns out to be a Satan worshipper who keeps preserved bodies of his victims in the catacombs of the house, sets his sights on the female half of the married couple. Lugosi, meanwhile, has to plan his revenge against Karloff while also attempting to protect the happy couple, which is difficult because Lugosi is at least as creepy as Karloff is and doesn't always come off as the hero he think he is.

On top of all of this, Karloff has married Lugosi's wife while he was in prison. She died, and then Karloff went on to raise and then marry Lugosi's daughter. Of course, he tells Lugosi his daughter is long dead, but she's really lurking around the house. Lugosi's already bent for revenge but he goes COMPLETELY mad when he realizes the depths of Karloff's betrayel.

The movie isn't expertly directed or shot, but the script is witty and the performances are great. Karloff and Lugosi both chew scenery with the best of them, and there is a climactic fight between the two of them that is a horror fan's dream come true.

Horrorfest 23: The Thing (John Carpenter's)

I've seen the original THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD, from the 1950s, multiple times, but I only got around to seeing HALLOWEEN director John Carpenter's 1980s version, THE THING, until last night. I've been aware over the years of the film's cult following, popularity, and influence on other movies, so it's nice to finally see it. Video game designers must have been influenced by this film and the original, whether they know it or not -- tons of games involve wandering down claustrophobic hallways with a shot gun, waiting for aliens to jump out at you so you can blast them.

It follows the basic plot of the original: American scientists isolated at the South Pole stumble across a flying saucer buried in the ice, bring a seemingly dead alien back to the lab, and find out too late that it is alive and knocking them off one by one.

The best part of this version is the hook that The Thing not only kills its victims but also gains the ability to imitate all varieties of life, from dogs to humans. So, the characters are not only fighting a powerful alien, but they spend a lot of time getting paranoid and suspicious of one another, wondering who is still human and who has been taken over by the monster. This leads to one of the best scares in the film in which the scientists devise a blood test and slowly test each sample one by one until. . . but I don't want to give it away.

These transformations, from alien to human, provide a lot of opportunities to exploit gory special effects. Additionally, The Thing has the ability to continually adapt -- if you cut off part of it, that part will grow new parts and become its own monster. The effects shown here are top notch. Divised by Rob Bottin with an assist from Stan Winston, they're always super gross and never look dated. Why throw in computer animated blood splatters in current thrillers when the art of gore was perfected over two decades ago? Like a David Cronenberg flick, the amount of gore and fetishistic attention to detail almost becomes a subject or a theme unto itself, which, if you buy into it, can actually make up for the sparseness of some of the rest of the film -- lack of character development, for instance. Maybe the point is, humans ARE just interchangeable shells, bumbling around the world, surviving by luck.

Then again, maybe not. I mean, there's still Kurt Russell, kicking ass. He plays a helicopter pilot and becomes the main character of the film through process of elimination -- his natural sense of leadership and willingness to fight keep him one step ahead of the other scientists and the alien itself.

Don't call him an interchangeable shell or he's liable to shoot you in the face.

Horrorfest 22: Haxan

HAXAN is a strange, silent Swedish/Danish documentary from 1922, written and directed by Benjamin Christensen. I first heard about it in connection with THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT as the independent filmmakers who produced that film named their company "Haxan Films." Because of this, there was a resurgence of interest in HAXAN, and I often saw it advertised in the pages of cult film magazines like FILMFAX when I was a teenager.

Over the last decade, I've always assumed this film was nothing but superstitious exploitation -- a credulous look at "real" witches, a "documentary" in name only, promoting paranormal claims in a more naive era. Still, the idea of a silent documentary about witches was creepy enough for me to add it to my Netflix queue, whether it's bullshit or not.

I couldn't have been more wrong about the film. As it opened, it quickly became clear that this was as close to a scholarly study as you're likely to get from a 1922 silent film. There are elements of shock and exploitation in the film, especially for its era, as we see some semi-nude women, some sac-religious images, and re-creations of medieval torture. But, the point of the film isn't to thrill the viewer with the possibility that witches and witchcraft are real, but to examine why medieval people believed in it, what might have really been going on to cause these beliefs, and why it's dangerous to allow these beliefs to impair mankind's judgement.

Basically, it's a skeptical film, which is great.

Yes, it's a little simplistic and out-dated by today's standards (the issue of sexism is never directly addressed), but it appears to be very forward-thinking for the time in which it was shot. It even goes so far as to indict the then modern idea of clinics and asylums as not much better than medieval torture. The film explains why the superstitions of the past were dangerous and unfounded in fact, but doesn't let present day superstitions off the hook, either, drawing effective parallels between the way deformed, afflicted and hysterical women were treated in medieval times with the way they were treated in 1920.

The film starts off with a review of the history of images of the devil in medieval paintings, drawings, wood-cuttings, etc, but then moves into reenactments using actors and actresses showing different examples of how women were persecuted in medieval times, and how witch hunters and religious leaders extracted confessions using torture.

In 1922, the film must have been effective partially due to the sensationalistic nature of the subject matter but also because of its structure, unique to the time as it avoided traditional narrative story and plot. Today, it's effective for different reasons -- modern audiences are accustomed to seeing the most depraved, sensational and exploitative images in the most mainstream films, so that aspect of this film won't thrill them. What is interesting about the film, as viewed today, is that we're seeing people from almost 100 years ago reenacting scenes frmo medieval times, instead of what audiences in 1922 saw, which was contemporary people reenacting these scenes. I guess what I'm trying to say is, the inherent creepiness factor of a movie this old, combined with the creepiness of the subject matter, puts an added prism on top of the movie itself that modern audiences view it through. To someone in 2009, viewing these medieval reenactments may as well be actual documentary footage from medieval times.

The other thing about the film as viewed by a modern audience is that it not only shows how attitudes of the 1920s weren't all that far removed from medieval attitudes, but also goes to show how almost 100 years later we're still dealing with a lot of the same problems. People are still persecuted for being different, misunderstandings are still exploited for personal gain, and religion is still a powerful force that can be used for evil. Writer/director Benjamin Christensen is careful to point out that humankind still has its problems, but I think he lets religion off a little too easily. Maybe that's because this is more of a European view than an American one. Or, maybe we've regressed since 1920, and superstition has made a comeback.

This is one of those films that gets more interesting the more you know about it. On its own, it can be difficult for a modern audience to sit through, like most silent films. If you want to watch it, I suggest you check out the Criterion Edition DVD, which is crammed with so much information about the film that it becomes impossible not to appreciate it as a historical artifact and important moment in filmmaking.

One insight I particularly liked in the film reflected a thought I've often had when considering some of these issues, and that's the idea that the more fervently you believe in the devil, the more the devil becomes real to you and the more power he has. This theme runs throughout the movie, implying that the intense belief in demons and devils in the middle ages caused so much fear and anxiety that it eventually caused nervous breakdowns and hysteria among desperate people with little or not control over their own lives and led to disaster.

I've often thought, over the years, that the best way you can combat supposedly evil supernatural forces is to simply not believe in them. There's nothing to prove they exist anyway, so why allow them to control your life when you can simply believe that they don't exist? Is it better to teach your kids that DUNGEONS & DRAGONS, Ouija boards and HARRY POTTER really have black-magical properties that can open gateways to hell? Or, is it better to teach them that that's ridiculous and the natural, scientific world simply doesn't have time to waste on black-magic? You want your kids sitting around worrying about Satan, or would you rather have them disregard him out of hand and not waste a second thought on him?

I know, to some the very idea that you can take power away from a demon by simply not believing in him is a dangerous, naive notion.

But, there is nothing more empowering than truth and knowledge, and in the search for truth and knowledge there is no time to waste on the supernatural.

Horrorfest 21: Poltergeist II: The Other Side

Even though I’ve seen POLTERGEIST about a billion times, I’ve only seen POLTERGEIST II: THE OTHER SIDE maybe once or twice. It was recently showing at the Laurelhurst, so I checked it out again for the first time in years.

My memory told me it wasn’t quite as good as the original, but still okay. Boy was my memory wrong. This movie sucks.

To be fair, the filmmakers make a valiant effort but they miss the mark at almost every turn. Jobeth Williams and Craig T. Nelson are back as the mother and father of the Freeling family who have now moved in with grandma (Geraldine Fitzgerald) since the spirit world ate their last house.

The kids are back, too, with the exception of Dominique Dunne, who was tragically murdered between films. Unfortunately, Heather O’Rourke as Carol Anne and Oliver Robins as Robbie are no longer as effective as they once were. In the movie only one year has passed, but in real life the kids have aged by about four years, which means they’re old enough to realize they’re supposed to be acting. And make no mistake, you can tell they’re acting. That’s not to say they’re any worse than any other child actor or even very bad at all, but it is a marked difference between the naturalistic performances of the first film and the cutesy, self-conscious performances of this one.

The plot makes a major misstep as it spends most of its time answering questions that don’t need answers. This ends up robbing the movie of all of the wonder and fantasy that the previous one had. We get explanations as to why the hauntings are happening, and why they happened in the first film, but the explanations are extraneous to the central action and the movie wastes too much time telling the audience why instead of showing the audience how. The climax of the movie delivers on the movie’s subtitle by taking the audience (and main characters) into the “other side” which was only barely glimpsed in the first film. And guess what? It’s underwhelming. That’s the kind of thing best left to the imagination.

Still, two new characters are introduced because of these plot contrivances, and they liven things up when they’re on screen, so it’s not all bad. The best addition to the series is Julian Beck as Kane, an old, evil, skeletal Reverand who seems to be a ghost from another time even though he’s able to interact with the land of the living. Beck’s performance is super creepy and leaves an impression, even if it puts a face on an entity that doesn’t really need a face.

Will Sampson as the Native American Shaman, Taylor, is the other new character, sent by pschic Tangina (Zelda Rubenstein) to help the Freelings out this time. He’s not quite as cool as Tangina was in the first movie, and there are a lot of clichés and mumbo jumbo surrounding his Indian ways that haven’t aged well in the last couple decades. Tangina’s still on hand to help out in the spirital good guys department, but she’s strangely ineffectual and, appearing in almost the first scene, doesn’t have the dramatic presence and great entrance she had in the original film, which takes some of her power away.

There are a couple freaky fright scenes worth mentioning but they pale in comparison to the similar sequences in the first film – Robbie’s braces attack him, and Craig T. Nelson barfs up a monstrous tequila worm.

I guess the biggest weakness of POLTERGEIST II is that the tone is off. The movie wastes time attempting to explain away the mysteries of the first film, transforming abstract concepts into literal people and places. This deflates the whole movie. The first one transcended genre to become something special, but this one is happy to just wallow in mediocrity. Spielberg’s name, all over the credits of the first flick, is conspicuously missing from this one.

Note: I totally meant to mention how hot Jobeth Williams was in the original POLTERGEIST review, always running around in cut-off shorts, showing off her shapely legs. Somehow I forgot to do so. I figured I’d take advantage of this second review to mention her hotness, but I was disappointed to find that in this sequel she mostly wears ugly sweaters, mom jeans and a bad perm.