Blogorium ( re-)Review: Midnight Movies

I'm opting to call this a re-review in that the Cap'n "sort of" reviewed Midnight Movies: From the Margin to the Mainstream almost two years ago. At the time I wrote the following blurb:

I've also been watching Midnight Movies, which is so far a fun documentary about the birth of the "midnight" cult film phenomenon. It begins with Jodorowsky's El Topo (the first "midnight movie"), and also covers Night of the Living Dead, Pink Flamingos, The Harder They Come, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and Eraserhead, with shout outs to Reefer Madness and Bambi Meets Godzilla, among other movies that played at the Elgin in New York and the Orson Welles theatre in L.A*.

The directors are all involved and it's half about how the films came to be and half interviews with theatre owners, distributors, critics, and fans. Interesting tidbit: Roger Ebert gave Night of the Living Dead a harsh review because he watched it with parents who brought their children to the show. Just let that simmer a little bit, and imagine the review you might write after seeing the reactions he did.

I'm not done yet but they've just transitioned from Rocky Horror to Eraserhead, and it's particularly interesting to hear the overlap with people involved. Richard O'Brien talking about watching Eraserhead is almost as interesting as John Waters talking about seeing NotLD first run at a drive-in in Baltimore. For that, this is a definite "must see".

For the most part, this covers my impressions of watching the doc again - as I did last night - but as my motto is increasingly becoming "do your homework before you write a review," it seemed apropos to fill in the considerable gaps in that initial write-up.

The documentary is a condensation of J. Hoberman and Johnathan Rosenbaum's book Midnight Movies, which understandably has more room to work with in order to properly cultivate the inception, release, and second life as a late night attraction (Rosenbaum and Hoberman appear in interviews). While the film adaptation attempts to distill the book, sacrifices are made in order to make the transition: much of the opening history of cult and exploitation films are dropped in order to focus specifically on the period between El Topo (1970) and Eraserhead (1976), centering around Ben Barenholtz's Elgin and Larry Jackson's programming at the Orson Welles Cinema. The depth of coverage for the films vary, but the six central "midnight movies" are El Topo, Night of the Living Dead, Pink Flamingos, The Harder They Come, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and Eraserhead.

Midnight Movies is a Starz production, which is not to disparage the work of writer / director Stuart Samuel or co-writer Victor Kushmaniuk, but I've noticed a trend with Starz related documentaries: they attempt to cover a considerable amount of information in a minute amount of time (Midnight Movies is 88 minutes long). In this instance, the film covers six films, plus an intro and outro in less than 90 minutes, leaving roughly 15 minutes per film, which needs to cover the making of the film, its entrance into the "midnight movie" circuit, and its lasting cultural impact.

Not all of the films get that, either; Night of the Living Dead's "making of" portion is considerably less in-depth compared to The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and is more focused on the social forces at work surrounding Romero's seminal "zombie" picture than the film itself. Romero's segment is topped off by a cynical comment that the film had no copyright and could therefore make money for any distributor who had a print (with text overlays of grosses for Night of the Living Dead in various territories), while the fact that Night's creators saw none of the revenue is left out.

Larry Jackson (who programmed the Orson Welles Cinema) suggests that his choices in "midnight movies" were based on "ironic" movie going casts a dubious shadow over Reefer Madness, Bambi Meets Godzilla, and makes his advocating of The Harder They Come slightly confounding. Jackson appears to be a genuine fan of the film, but the rationale behind midnight programming at the Welles seems counter-intuitive to the Jamaican made, reggae infused crime drama. The Harder They Come actually feels the least explored of the six subjects, with more time devoted to its distribution than the film itself.

Because I had not finished the film when writing about it, I also neglected to mention the more interesting connection between Eraserhead and John Waters: while promoting Desperate Living, Waters was so enthusiastic about Lynch's debut that he devoted most of the interviews to talking up Eraserhead rather than his third feature. The fact that many of these directors intersected thanks to the "midnight movie" phenomenon is in and of itself a component of the documentary worth watching.

While I understand the point that Midnight Movies: from the Margin to the Mainstream makes, the title can be taken two ways, neither of which I completely agree with: the documentary asserts that the subversive elements of "midnight movies" has become the mainstream, and accordingly their impact is dulled by a tendency towards hyper-irony in modern cinema (this is the central reason Roger Ebert appears in the film, albeit in an extremely limited capacity). The other argument one could make is that the "midnight movies" covered in the film have become mainstream in their own way, particularly as their respective directors elevated in stature.

The arguments bleed together in some ways: I strongly suspect that mainstream audiences have never seen The Harder They Come, Eraserhead, Pink Flamingos, or El Topo. They may have some inkling that Eraserhead and Pink Flamingos exist, but it is incredibly unlikely that simply because David Lynch moved on to make The Elephant Man - the film's primary evidence of the "mainstreaming" of the margin - that the cult films have extended as far as Samuel would like us to believe. Waters makes the point that the subject matter of his films hasn't changed, but culture changed to accept the "freaks" he showcases. This is fair, but the argument is not universal across the doc's subjects: Jodorowsky, Henzell, and Romero (to a degree) are still relatively outside of the "mainstream," and while Lynch occasionally taps into the cultural zeitgeist (Twin Peaks), his idiosyncratic filmmaking often scares off the audiences Samuel assumes have come to accept "midnight" culture. I also find the argument that Jaws and Star Wars are "midnight movies" that went mainstream a bit specious - it suggests that there was no precedent for these kinds of film before the "midnight movie" era.

Waters also makes a salient point about the death of "midnight movies": the advent of VHS functionally rendered the midnight experience moot by giving audiences greater access to "cult" films, coupled with the ability to do everything they would do at a late-night theatre in the comfort (and safety) of their own home. In a sense laziness, rather than a shift of values, killed the "midnight movie" (as well as the Drive-In, although that's something I prefer to save for another time).

Accordingly, Midnight Movies: From the Margin to the Mainstream is a cinematic Hors d'oeuvre, a taste of "cult" cinema that covers six major films in the history of the midnight movement to a relatively satisfying degree. It functions as a primer, designed to interest you in the individual histories of the films covered, and while I may not concur with the assertion it reaches, with the limited running time, it packs in enough valuable morsels of trivia** that film fans will leave the film hungry for more information.



* The Orson Welles Cinema is not in Los Angeles, but Cambridge, Massachusetts.
** George Romero openly refutes a misleading rumor featured in Nightmares in Red, White, and Blue, which is also suggested in Midnight Movies before he corrects it: that Duane Jones was a deliberate casting choice to comment on race relations in the 1960s. Nightmares edits Romero interview footage to suggest that WAS the case, where he directly corrects the misconception in Midnight Movies.

Winnebago Man vs. Best Worst Movie

As I alluded to yesterday in my review of Ben Steinbauer's Winnebago Man, I'm slightly perplexed why none of the reviews I've seen have compared the documentary to another, very similar type of film, Michael Stephenson's Best Worst Movie. While they differ in the medium addressed, Best Worst Movie and Winnebago Man are functionally about the same thing: a long-forgotten piece of media has taken on a new life, separate from the people principally involved with it, and a filmmaker sets out to connect with one specific person and build a documentary around their reaction to new-found fame (or infamy).

Both films begin with an introduction to the "cult" following, including interviews with critics, media personalities, other people involved with the production, and then set about focusing the film on one person who the director feels is impacted most. Both films feature directors who are personally involved in the narrative of the documentary and both feel they have a stake in their subject. Best Worst Movie and Winnebago Man also deal in the culture of "to be laughed AT," a relatively popular phenomenon in the age of the internet and of "viral videos," where the subject(s) of mockery are largely removed from their audience, especially in the case of Troll 2 and Rebney's Winnebago outtakes.

Where they differ is on two key distinctions: the type of media (and the way it is /was disseminated) and the reaction of the film's "subject" (in Winnebago Man, Jack Rebney; in Best Worst Movie, George Hardy). These differences are critical in the success or failure of each film, in part because they frame the "subject" of the film and their audience well before the two ever meet on camera.

The first distinction is an important one, and it explains to some extent why Winnebago Man stumbles in its mid-section. The "viral video," and specifically Rebney's outtakes, are generally speaking viewed on an individual level. One person watches the video on Youtube (or videocassette, as is explained in the film), and passes it on to someone else. We watch them alone, we enjoy them alone, and don't tend to think of these videos as a truly "shared" experience. Gatherings to view the footage, like the Found Film Festival which is featured in Winnebago Man, are fairly rare events.

Troll 2, on the other hand, expanded from an initial home video run to appear regularly in theatres as a "midnight movie" like The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The experience of Troll 2, unlike the Winnebago outtakes, is inherently communal. In nearly every instance during Best Worst Movie, it's clear that fans enjoy watching the film together, laughing at the film together, and sharing the experience of Troll 2. The audiences also seem much more invested in the idea of meeting a George Hardy or a Michael Stephenson than a Jack Rebney, who the founders of the Found Film Festival assumed was dead.

This brings us to our second distinction, and the one that benefits one film and seriously undermines the other: the subject(s). I understand why Ben Steinbauer was interested in finding Jack Rebney: it's a fascinating project to track down the "lost" star of one of YouTube's most popular videos, and to find out how he feels about his indirect fame. The problem is that once it is apparent Rebney has no desire whatsoever to interact with Steinbauer on those terms, Winnebago Man struggles to move forward. Jack Rebney offers no insight into the questions Steinbauer hoped to answer, and moreover, he refuses to interact with the fan base the director planned on connecting him to for almost three years.

George Hardy, on the other hand, is a relatively benign subject who has fond memories of making Troll 2 and an inkling that people seem to like the film now, partly because Stephenson was also in the film. Michael Stephenson lucked out, in some ways, by choosing Hardy to expose to the screenings of Troll 2 he'd been observing prior to making Best Worst Movie. Hardy is easygoing, gregarious, and clearly a little struck by the sudden popularity he encounters, and he has the benefit of knowing the director as they experience Troll 2's resurgence together. Best Worst Movie can then accordingly document Hardy's rise and fall as a quasi-celebrity, complete with a narrative arc right out of classic Hollywood: the humble hero who brushes with fame, becomes consumed with it, and then realizes that it isn't all it's cracked up to be. Stephenson has a willing participant and Best Worst Movie becomes something more than a document of a twenty-year-old stinker's "cult" status, and as luck would have it, no one needs to be prodded to make it happen*.

Trying to manufacture an event with the mercurial Rebney moves the film out of the realm of "what would happen if" and make it a "let's see what happens when I drag someone who clearly isn't interested in what I want to do out of his comfort zone and put him face to face with people he doesn't want to meet for reasons he has every right to express. It reminded me of something that hasn't happened yet - but could - tied to Best Worst Movie.

During a post-screening Q&A, one of the producers indicated that Fragasso wanted to make a Troll 2: Part 2 (in 3-D), and if that were to happen, they would certainly document it for a Best Worst Movie 2. And that's a horrible, misguided idea, I have to say. It's not simply trying to catch lightning in a bottle again; the concept as presented is trying to create it, and that never works. Troll 2 isn't the endearing train wreck it is because the writer, director, cast, and crew set out to make the "best worst movie": it was simply the accidental byproduct of their efforts.

By making a Troll 2: Part 2, everyone involved (and especially the people making Best Worst Movie 2) is going to have the reputation of Troll 2 in their minds, and many of them will be trying to replicate it - or worse, play it up. The documentary crew is certainly hoping for this (and if you doubt me, they also expressed hopes for a reality series with George Hardy and The Room's Tommy Wiseau that fortunately never came to pass) and the result will be a film trying so hard to be bad (on a conscious level or not) that it lacks the necessary "it" that makes Troll 2 the "best worst movie." It's like expecting Jack Rebney to show up at a screening of his Winnebago outtakes ready to spew profanity and swat at flies.

Winnebago Man dances around the nature of Rebney's "fans" by portraying them exactly as he suspected while waiting in line but then soft-pedaling the Q&A and post-screening. Only one person expressly states their perception of the "Angriest RV Salesman in the World" was way off, while other people exiting the theatre substitute for earlier interviews (who sometimes appear taking pictures with him but saying nothing, thereby neither asserting or refuting their earlier opinions). Best Worst Movie doesn't directly address the fan reaction with Stephenson, but the film certainly shows you the ugly side of how the "laughing AT" audiences regard Fragasso, Hardy, and Troll 2 in general. The fans move from genuinely enthusiastic near the beginning to partially hostile (or at least incredibly judgmental, as with the case of the "how come it's called Troll 2 when there are no trolls?" question) to the people involved. There's an ugly undercurrent to the fan relationship in Best Worst Movie that Steinbauer avoids addressing during the second half of Winnebago Man**, much to the latter's disadvantage, in part because the film struggles to find its footing at that point.

I do feel that Best Worst Movie is successful in ways that Winnebago Man is not, but I would like to point out that this is not the fault of Ben Steinbauer: he found himself in the unenviable position of changing a documentary midway through his search with a subject that continued to throw him curveballs and refuse to meet him halfway on almost every decision. Winnebago Man is a well constructed documentary that lost its sense of purpose and has to push onward. Best Worst Movie has the tremendous benefit of everything falling into place in a compelling manner, but this is not to belittle or undermine Stephenson, who put together a consistently entertaining, endearing, funny, and disturbing documentary. It takes just as much work to make either film, and I think they both handle their subject manner in the best way possible. One has a better go at it for me, but I understand why the other one exists, and more importantly, deserves to be seen.



* It doesn't hurt that Best Worst Movie is also populated with a host of interesting supporting characters, from the rest of the cast of Troll 2 to its egotistical director, Claudio Fragasso. Winnebago Man ultimately rests on Jack Rebney's shoulders, and he's clearly less interested in being the subject of that particular documentary than anyone in Best Worst Movie.
** Early in the film, he interviews two hosts of a "found video" cable access show that state upfront they have no interest in ever meeting Rebney or anyone else in the tapes they receive. To meet the person associated with the injury or embarrassment would remove any joy taken from their suffering, they explain, which is a telling comment the film never again explores.

Maybe I didn't...

I've been revising the paper on Movie-going as Ritual, and I could have sworn I put up the second part of the research that you'd find interesting, but for the life of me I'm not seeing it in the archives. If somebody was patiently waiting for the section on The Rocky Horror Picture Show as a subculture collective experience, I apologize for not getting that up sooner. Since no one is biting on the SYWHT (I'm not giving up on you good readers yet!), let me share that with you tonight:

The Rocky Horror Picture Show: Collective Experience through Open Participation.

For over thirty years, The Rocky Horror Picture Show invites audience member to become one in the most overtly ritual movie-going experience. After a dismal first-run in 1976, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, based on a wildly successful London stage production, by all rights should have vanished into obscurity. Instead, the film and its midnight movie audience took on a life of their on, starting in the Waverly Theater in New York.

Regular audience members, noticing pauses in the dialogue, began shouting one-liners back at the screen. J. Hoberman describes the “back talk” in his book Midnight Movies:

The counterpoint backtalk… had varying rationales. Some was a direct response to the erotic tease of Tim Curry’s Frank… Others were the equivalent of Bronx cheers, mocking the camp sobriety and unruffled authority of Charles Gray’s very English and vaguely parental Narrator… or ridiculing the meatball straightness and uptightness of the juvenile Brad. Whatever the source, the movie seemed to be asking for it; and whenever the repartee went over well, it would be repeated the following Friday or Saturday, become absorbed within the general text. The more one listened to the movie’s dialogue, the more it seemed to offer an invitation, or even a dare to throw in your own two cents and see if it glittered. (176)

Rather than engaging with the stage, ala a theatrical production of a play, the “cult” of Rocky Horror was engaging in something quite different:

the Rocky Horror reaction was the reverse of [audience engagement within story, as in Peter Pan], because it wasn’t being directly solicited, was spoken to a screen instead of a stage, and came closer to being a dialectical response – a real dialogue between screen and spectator, and not a mere consensus. (176)

If the line was popular, you could expect to hear it the following week, and so on. Before long, the Rocky Horror ritual brought about a new level of audience solidarity:

Still, it was more like cheerleading at school than reciting a prayer in church… but also a bit of teaching, too, such as when he began making announcements about matters of general interest to the cult before he even started the cheers – laying out a few ground rules for newcomers (or “virgins,” as they were identified), calling attention to new parts of the twice-weekly ritual, and helping, like any good theater director, to keep the kids in line and groom their performances. (179)

Meanwhile, another ritual began at the Waverly, “[q]uite independently of [counterpoint backtalk], members of the audience had begun turning up dressed like some of the screen characters.” (177). The “cult” of Rocky Horror also brought props to share, based on lines from the film, while a separate set of actors onstage re-created the film as it played.

As the ritual continued, it became clearer this was more than simply a film-based event; “More importantly, some people would turn up periodically at the Waverly because they made friends there… standing in front of the Waverly, they’d swap information, sing and dance on the sidewalk, compare their costumes, discuss potential line and prop ideas” (181). Rocky Horror fans became a fully fledged sub-culture movement, and “the demarcation line between insiders and outsiders was clearly drawn” (184).

Group identity within this sub-culture is based on defining oneself against “conventional” audiences, particularly the “rules” of movie-going, even if the end result is identical. The behavior grew in popularity, and so did the size of crowds, although the Rocky Horror ritual was not always welcome:

People outside the cult were beginning to take notice. Some were sympathetic, but some of the older visitors to the Waverly found the whole spectacle too nihilistic and noisy – too boisterous about opposing everything that they held sacred about sex, art, and life – to take much pleasure in the madness, which they often found dumb or foolish or just plain sick. (182)

The ritual spread across the nation, and I must admit to have been a regular attendee of the Rocky Horror Picture Show for several years. The collective experience is akin to an evangelical church – with fouler language – and the bonds between long time ritual attendees are strong. The film continues playing every Friday night in the Rialto in Raleigh and as a once a year tradition in the Mary Foust Residence Hall on the UNCG campus. As a ritual, Rocky has become “a kind of cultural hand-me-down that has passed through all these identity changes en route to another style and generation” (188).

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So there's that. Sorry about setting up the second piece and forgetting about it, but the Cap'n gets a little scatterbrained from time to time.

Midnight Movie Breakdown

The Cap'n is feeling a lot under the weather this evening, so I'm going to keep this short. Of course, if I nod off in the middle of writing this, the only way you'd know is that it won't appear for a few more hours. Anyway...

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One of the things I forgot to mention in my Haunted World of El Superbeasto write-up was that using it as a good example for my anthropology project collapsed as soon as we sat down. I deliberately chose the midnight showing over the 10 o'clock because midnight audiences have a different vibe about them, as anyone who attends "early" showings or The Rocky Horror Picture Show can attest. I thought this would be no different, but what I discovered instead surprised me.

Other than the people I dragged with me to see El Superbeasto, there were two people in the theatre. That's actually less of a turnout than when I saw Last Action Hero on opening day. In that case, it was maybe ten people. Five people for a late night showing of an animated Rob Zombie joint tells me one of two things were going on:

1. Everyone who would have seen it stayed home because the dvd is coming out next week. Maybe it wasn't worth paying for the ticket and popcorn and everything else for an 80-something minute movie when you can get it for $15 on the 22nd. It was also on a Saturday night, was really only advertised on the internet, and there were no signs in the theatre.

2. This is just speculation, but maybe the poor box office showings for Halloween 2 signal a backlash against Mr. Zombie. I haven't seen Halloween 2, but the impression I got from reviews is that people are pretty evenly split between loving it and hating it. I didn't get much in-between, although I hear what people hated was exactly why I wanted to see it (ghost mom). It's possible that people who saw Halloween 2 were pissed off and didn't want to see an animated enactment of all of Zombie's exploitation fetishes. This might work out in his favor though, since I could see a crowd turning against El Superbeasto upon first viewing. I really do think this is the kind of toon you need to let sink in before you render judgment.

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Either way, I doubt the Carousel made much money off of 5 people by staying open an extra two hours or so. Then again, those geniuses are showing The Room soon, and that's just a waste of time and money for anyone willing to pay for it. I saw it for free (or parts of it, until most of us got bored and Cranpire skipped around), and can honestly say I'll never pay for that experience.

Not to pick a fight with the programmer of these movies, but I couldn't help but notice Shark Attack 3: Megalodon is in the Carousel's horror festival. Had we not already seen it during Horror Fest two years ago and weren't planning on watching it again this year, I might think about seeing it. Maybe you can show Blood Car next...

Five Movies: MST3K Edition

In honor of finally completing my MST3K dvd collection (at least until volume XVI comes out in December), I thought I would share with you my five favorite movies that Joel, Mike, and the bots have given the once over to. Appropriately, let's start with one of my very favorites and newly announced boxed set movies:

1. Warrior of the Lost World - The general awfulness of a movie being riffed on is often not enough to sustain an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000. There has to be something compelling enough in the film to keep you watching while the jokes cascade over your lowered expectations. Warrior of the Lost World is just such a movie: it's a Spaghetti Post-Apocalyptic film starring Robert Ginty (The Exterminator), Fred "The Hammer" Williamson, Donald Pleasance, and Persis "Star Trek: The Boring Picture" Khambata.

The movie itself has something to do with Ginty tooling around on a talking motorcycle and getting his ass kicked by people. Then, for reasons I can't remember, he's recruited into helping take down the evil government run by Pleasance, and there's some huge truck thing called Megaweapon. Megaweapon was kinda-sorta ripped off in Paul W.S. Anderson's Death Race sequelmake last year, but the original is once again much cooler. Or stupider looking.

Warrior of the Lost World features Joel, Servo, and Crow in rare form. Jokes range from a running gag about no one being able to remember Robert Ginty's name (including a host segment where Megaweapon calls in and say "Ah geez guys. I mean, we always just called him 'The Paper Chase' guy." The episode also features this classic line: "This fall on NBC - Black Nazi, White Ninja, and the Beige Brigade."

2. Pod People - This Spanish ripoff of E.T. has all of the inane things that Steven Spielberg's adorable alien does with none of the budget or effects work. Instead, Pod People has Trumpy, a doofy looking alien with the body of a gorilla and the face of an anteater with human eyes. Trumpy mostly sucks up peanuts and does dumb tricks for the kid who finds him, causing variations of the phrase "Trumpy, you are magic!" Meanwhile, Trumpy's brother is killing poachers in the woods. This is a kids movie, I think.

My favorite moment from MST3K's Pod People treatment is a running gag early in the film that takes the goo Trump hatches from and turns it into Smuckers commercials. Pod People is currently available in Volume 2 of the dvds.

3. Laserblast - This is actually the last episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 to air on Comedy Central, as well as the last time Dr. Forrester or original Crow appeared on the show. The movie itself is about this slacker who has a girlfriend that he doesn't seem to interested in. Instead, he tools around in his van and feels unappreciated, at least until this green alien is killed by two E.T. looking-bastards. Loser guy finds the green dude's laser arm piece, turns green himself, and starts killing just about everybody he comes into contact with, even if it's just Roddy McDowall.

While the host segments are more consistent (in part because of the uncertainty that the show was moving to Sci-Fi or coming back at all), Laserblast has a lot going for it in the post-Joel era. Mike gets ribbed a lot by the bots for tooling around and taking bong hits (Crow and Servo frequently ask if Loser guy's tooling around "brings back any memories?" for Mike), and much ado is made about the fact that Leonard Maltin gave Laserblast three and a half stars. During the credits, Mike and the bots read a list of movies that Laserblast is "better than", according to Maltin.

Also, the two aliens that hunt down and *spoiler* abruptly kill Loser guy get me every time. They have this ridiculous, high pitched yap that just makes me laugh when I hear it. The film / episode is available on the 20th Anniversary Edition boxed set.

4. Santa Claus - Not to be mistaken with Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, which is also excellent, Santa Claus is a Mexican production about Old Saint Nicholas facing off against the Devil to win the affection of children. No, seriously. Satan is frequently being thwarted by Santa Claus, according to this movie. It's nearly incomprehensible thanks to the dubbing, but is surreal in a way that keeps you watching.

To be honest, it's been such a long time since I've seen it (my VHS copy is pretty worn out) that I can't point to specific riffing, but MST3K does just a good job (maybe better) with Santa Claus as it does the Martian variation. This should be available on Volume XVI.

5. Werewolf - I started watching the show on the Sci-Fi Channel when it moved, but as the air time kept jumping, I found myself drifting away from MST3K during those last three years or so. It may have also been that I never warmed to the dynamic of Mike, New Crow, and Normal Servo, nor was I immensely fond of Pearl Forrester, Bobo, and Brain Guy, but I've always regarded the Sci-Fi era of Mystery Science Theater as "less than."

Boy howdy, did Werewolf correct that judgment. For a late-era episode, Werewolf is firing on all cylinders. As they moved to Sci-Fi, the movies available to them became increasingly more recent and much, much shittier. Werewolf doesn't make much sense to begin with, but after the film starts introducing bizarre characters that have little-to-nothing to do with the plot (and who disappear for long stretches of time), the end result is a film ripe for riffing. The transformations are laughable at best, and I'm still not sure I can explain the plot development about two thirds of the way in, or what it has to do with the end of the movie.

Mike, Servo, and New Crow (look, he says "I'm different!" in the opening credits. I can call him what I want!) really let Werewolf have it. I guess late in the show's run they became obsessed with Martin Sheen's brother, Joe Estevez, and ran several movies featuring the Roger Clinton of the Sheen/Estevez family. He's not in Werewolf to the degree he appears in, say, Soultaker, but he overacts just as hard. Also, I have to point out the host segment song "Where, oh Werewolf", which reminded me of the olden days and songs like "A Patrick Swayze Christmas."

Werewolf is also on the 20th Anniversary Edition.


I hope no one took great offense that I left off Manos, The Hands of Fate, Mitchell, or Santa Claus Conquers the Martians. I love them too, but everybody knows about those episodes. I thought it would be better to share some old favorites and newer discoveries here. While it's not on dvd (and may never be), I'm also fond of Attack of the Eye Creatures, as well as Ed Wood's Bride of the Monster. The Beginning of the End, which is unfortunately out of print, is another fine episode, as are The Killer Shrews, Tormented, and the likely to never materialize Gamera run of episodes.

Also of note, with varying degrees of find-ability are I Was a Teenage Werewolf (with Michael Landon), Eegah!, Teenagers from Outer Space, Terror from the Year 5000, Prince of Space, Cave Dwellers, Parts: The Clonus Horror, The Amazing Colossal Man, Revenge of the Creature (sequel to Creature from the Black Lagoon), and Last of the Wild Horses, which features TV's Frank and Dr. Forrester from a mirror universe watching the "experiment." Speaking of which, Gypsy appears in theatre during Viking Women vs the Sea Serpent, which is also a very good one.

For a pretty good list of episodes, click here.

Summer Fest Day Two: Friday the 13th Part 3

This was a much better 3-D experience than My Bloody Valentine, and really just a better movie. Oh sure, Friday the 13th 3-D is not a great movie, and I'd say 90% of what happens is totally arbitrary, from the way Jason stalks and kills his prey to why characters end up doing what they're doing at any point or the completely random use of 3-D technology.

For example, here's a quick list of things you see jump out at you:

A laundry pole, a TV antenna, a plastic snake, a rat, some guy's fist, a baseball bat, a wallet, a yo-yo, some juggling apples and oranges, a fireplace poker, several moths, a speargun spear, two separate eyeballs, and a joint.

Most of these have nothing to do with people being killed in any way, shape, or form. The characters don't really conform to any "types" other than I guess "Stoner", "Biker", and "Obnoxious Jewish Guy".

During the film, we found ourselves debating the relative merits of Friday the 13th part 3's anti-semitism, product placement, whether "paying for it" counts as "losing it", the "Girlfriend Experience", the continuing argument about whether Jason is alive or undead, and whether or not he's actually retarded or just a mongoloid. It was also pointed out that Shelly looks like what would happen if you smooshed Jonah Hill and Seth Rogen into one person and drained out the funny, and how snarky the stoners were.

Still, the film looks surprisingly good on Blu-Ray and the 3-D worked out nicely. It was a fun, if somewhat distracted, experience.

Adventures in Projectioneering (part one)

One of the many jobs the Cap'n worked was in a movie theatre. Technically, I worked three jobs inside of the Park Place 16: that of concession salesman, usher, and projectionist. The first two are interesting in their own right, to be sure, but the job of projectionist brought me into a relationship with film that's unlike any you'll find in front of a tv screen.

It's very easy to forget that movies - despite their inherent artificiality - are tangible things. In order to "run" a movie, you first need to take the film delivered to your multiplex/theatre/drive-in and splice it together. They come in separate reels, so a projectionist needs to know the best way to cut one end of a reel with the other so that you, the audience, doesn't notice. If we've done our job wrong, there will be a black frame or, worse, a clear frame. For a good example of the "clear" frame phenomena, watch the beginning of Grindhouse, which does it intentionally to remind you "this is just a movie."

But I don't want to bore you with the details of getting to know a movie frame by frame or how you feed the film through the projector. That's interesting on some technical level, yes, but most of you already know how it works anecdotally or you've done it yourself. It does create a strangely personal relationship with the films, and I think that's what I want to focus on. For this, the first part, let's talk about movies that just won't behave.

Like a stubborn child, a movie can decide not to do what it's supposed to, either jumping frame or coming to a halt and making the audience angry. The worst, especially if you're running sixteen screens by yourself, though, are the films that refuse to run on time.

Now, I hear you saying, this can't be possible. A movie has an alloted running time and there's only enough film to cover that time. I agree, and yet I had no less than five films that REFUSED to end when they were supposed to, even if I started them early. They were:

Bait
Space Cowboys
The Exorcist: The Version You've Never Seen
The Patriot
and Urban Legends: Final Cut

No matter what, I could count on each of those movies ending ten minutes later than they should have, even if I started them ten minutes early (it's a multiplex and to be honest how many people do you think came to the average 3 o'clock showing of Bait?) I'd have every other movie timed exactly so I knew when to start one, to thread another, and to stop another. But then I'd have that showing of Bait that just wouldn't end on time, so I'd spend valuable minutes watching Jaime Foxx in that stupid baseball stadium doing whatever it was he did.

I've seen the endings of Bait and Space Cowboys innumerable times without any sense of context. No idea whatsoever what's going on, but I need to be able to hurry it up and get things started over again for the next crowd. I did eventually see all of The Patriot and Urban Legends: Final Cut, although the "twist" in the latter was utterly ruined for me by that point. Of course, with that movie, it really didn't matter.

Still, it would have been nice if The Exorcist had maybe played nice during those late showings so that I wasn't alone in the dark while all the other projectors were silent. It can get creepy, even if you have a book to read. Speaking of which, that's another good tale to tell one day; I got a lot of reading done in between movies back then. I also had some late showings of movies with friends, including two that you'll never have to, and neither of them were God's Army. True story. Cranpire was there.

I'll save those for another day, as there are plenty of days and plenty of stories to come. Why I don't write about that job more boggles my mind, especially the Eyes Wide Shut stories. Or the number of times I saw the same part of The Phantom Menace over and over again. But they can wait for another day...

Inconceivable!

Blogorium readers, I'm reaching out to all of you. The Cap'n needs to find a movie in the worst way, and only you can help.


Please, seek out Ganjasaurus Rex!

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"Wait... did the Cap'n just say he wanted to watch a movie called Ganjasaurus Rex?! Is this some kind of a joke? Such a movie can't possibly exist..."

Ah, dear readers, I understand you confusion, but I assure you that such a movie exists! I first heard of this incredibly hard to find movie in Mick Martin and Marsha Porter's Video Movie Guide: 1990, and in their "Turkey" rating, they explain

"A prodrug propaganda film about a prehistoric monster that awakens when the authorities begin burning marijuana crops. The heroes, of course, are the drug growers. The film's production values are so low that even its intended audience will have difficulty enjoying it. Not Rated. 1988; 88m."

If that isn't enough to woo you in (and it was for me!), then check out the following review from IMDB's page:

"Several years ago while visiting in Atlanta, GA, I was browsing the BookNook at Clairemont and Buford and in their used VHS movie section I spotted the title Ganjasaurus Rex. It looked really bottom-barrel terrible so I bought it, figuring my friends would have a ball watching this as one of the worst films ever produced. It is so terrific as a bad film that you can get stoned just watching it. The basic concept is that a pot farmer in the remote West Coast stumbles across an ancient marijuana seed the size of a Volkswagon and decides to plant it. The plant is the size of a sequoia tree, and it's aroma awakens the sleeping Ganjasaurus Rex that feeds on it. The monster is an actual toy Godzilla with an always visible hand causing movement, and that should be a key reference to the special effects, the acting, and the plot line."

Okay, now look at the VHS Cover:


How could you not want to see this? Combine stupid premise with cheap toy and shot-on-camcorder production values, this is a no brainer! It may be the only pro-marijuana horror movie that employs a "giant" monster, and the Video Movie Guide actually bothered to rate it "Turkey". That's an impressive feat for something I bet none of us have ever seen.

So what's holding the Cap'n back? Well, for one thing the movie is not available on dvd (shock!), but worse still, the VHS isn't even easy to locate. Oh sure, if I had a time machine and lots of gasoline I'd travel video stores across the 1980s for a copy, but I have neither and the cheapest copy on Amazon is $39.75.

I'm not saying that it probably isn't worth every penny but, sight unseen, that's a lot to ask. I beg of you, Blogorium faithful, to scour your local video stores, Roses, gas stations, and anywhere else that still bothers stocking cheap-o vhs tapes. Help the Cap'n find Ganjasaurus Rex, and I will hold the most glorious party to celebrate this classic-to-be*!

Together we can find out just how much of a Turkey Ganjasaurus Rex really is, and I'll even make copies for all of you! How's that for incentive to help me?

Gang?


Where did you go???

Okay, how about just a copy for me and anyone who wants one? Is that better?



* there will probably not be marijuana though. sorry.

Remastering continued.

Sometimes a subject bears more discussion. In the instance of last night's ruminating over "digital scrubbing", regular reader Tom D. had some interesting comments about the issue of remastering (visible here). His particular interest comes from two Criterion releases: By Brakhage, an anthology of Stan Brakhage's experimental films, and La Jetee / Sans Soleil, two films by Chris Marker.

The Cap'n highly recommends you read the comments in full before continuing, and I'd prefer to not paste edited versions here, even for space considerations. What it did do was get me thinking about further examples, but particularly the issue of "director's choice".

Given that both of these remasters were done with and approved by their respective filmmakers (Brakhage and Marker) if the intention of the director supersedes our own personal preference. It is true that unintended consequences, be they print damage, fading, poor projection, or video mastering, can create a separate version of the film that audiences come to rather than the director's desired product.

David Lynch has famously indicated that unless he can control the image output of every tv set in the world that he has no interest in pursuing another series. Both Twin Peaks boxed sets reflect his desire to control the precise image, down to "home tests" which allow you to adjust the image to his "ideal". So if we are to respect, in some ways, auteurial influence, where is the line?

George Lucas is the frequent punching bag in this conversation (not merely for Star Wars but for THX 1138's "new cut") but I am deeply conflicted about what William Friedkin did to The French Connection. His newly remastered version for Blu Ray started by splitting the negative: creating a new black and white negative which was meticulously cleaned up for the sharpest possible image. What Friedkin did next is where I find myself troubled by this "intent" discussion.

Friedkin took this black and white master and added the color back, but not in a matching system. Instead, he allowed colors to appear smudgy and bleed (particularly strong reds, like on Popeye Doyle's Santa suit), giving the effect of a "colorized" film. Frank Capra and Orson Welles notoriously threw fits when Ted Turner tried to do similar colorizations to their films in the 1980s, but this is a separate issue. The French Connection was made in color, and the image available on this High Definition release is not reflective of what the film looked like when released in theatres. Hell, it doesn't even reflect the dvd version released four years ago!

William Friedkin is well within his rights to do this but I have great reservations about buying The French Connection on Blu Ray because of his "tinkering" with the film. Unlike Lucas, who makes fairly noticeable digital additions to his older films, Friedkin erased the original picture's color palette and replaced it with something that looks like poorly synched colorization.

Similar changes have happened at Criterion, even on "director-approved" editions, most noticeably The Last Emperor and Chungking Express. Both films were re-adjusted in different ways by their cinematographers, rather than directly by the filmmakers. The framing of Emperor was opened up from 2.35:1 to 2.00:1 by Vittorio Storaro, under the claim it was the "intended" framing of the film.

What is not mentioned on Criterion's site is that Storaro developed "Univision" - a film stock designed to be shot at 2.00:1, and that accordingly demands all films he shot be transferred to 2.00:1. Which, in case you were wondering, is why no version of Apocalypse Now released on dvd has ever been framed at its original 2.35:1 aspect ratio.

Chungking Express is more directly related to color timing. Criterion had been working on Express, but Kar-Wai was too busy filming Ashes of Time to personally oversee it. Criterion producers discovered the film's cinematographer, Christopher Doyle, was in New York working on a Jim Jarmusch film and showed the BD-R to him. From their blog, On Five:

"Now, by this point, we were already at our initial DVD-R and BD-R stages for Chungking. That means that . . . we were done. Basically, we just had to go through the discs and check them to make sure there weren’t any errors or problems.

But the prospect of getting Doyle’s stamp of approval on our transfer was too tantalizing, and important, to let slip by. So our tech director, Lee Kline, contacted Doyle and persevered until he got the cinematographer to find time in his hectic schedule to swing by and check out the results of our work. Not surprisingly, Doyle did request some changes, ones that only someone closely involved with Chungking’s overall visual presentation would’ve known. They weren’t anything too major: dialing out some green in a few shots, warming up Kai Tak airport interiors, fixing a couple of skin tones. Still, it meant we’d have to “start over” to a certain extent, inserting those fixes and reauthoring both the standard-def and Blu-ray discs. "

Now, admittedly, Chungking Express does not have a "director's stamp of approval" as some of their releases do. Wong Kar-Wai was personally involved in the sound mix, but it appears that only Doyle saw the temporary work on the picture and addressed some changes. I don't have much of an opinion one way or the other on this; it is, however, interesting because we have an example of remastering that is not specifically the director.

There are a handful of other examples of this, the one that comes to mind immediately is the dvd release of Terry Gilliam's Tideland. In this case, the company who released the disc (ThinkFilm) decided not to wait for Gilliam to reframe his 2.35:1 picture into a 2.00:1 image, so they cropped the film to a 1.77:1 picture and released it on dvd as a "16x9 Full Frame" presentation. More insulting than this erroneous decision is that all of the deleted scenes and making of material on the second disc is still presented 2.35:1, so it's not like we'd never know.

When ThinkFilm received complaints from fans (and Gilliam), they acquiesed and claimed they would release the film, but they still gaffed it up. Rather than do the right thing and honor Gilliam's request to reframe the image, they said that Tideland would be released "in its original 2.35:1 format".

To add insult to injury, I've never been able to find a copy of this "fixed" version of Tideland. Amazon still lists the 1.77:1 version and no store I've ever been to carries a different version. ThinkFilm may never have released it, assuming that we were too stupid to bother checking up on that. In the meantime, Tideland is only availble with half of the image missing, a result of impatient dvd mastering.

Admittedly, this is a complicated issue. I'm sure there are people who prefer the scratchy, fuzzy versions of Eraserhead and Night of the Living Dead, among many others. I happen to prefer the newer editions, ones that reflect some degree of revisionism on the filmmakers part. Or maybe it doesn't. It's truly hard to be certain.

Remastering: A Grand Conundrum

How times change. As recently as six years ago, I used to think it was cool for movies to be on video in grainy, shitty, beat-up condition. It added to the "ambiance" of the film, particularly if it was something many of us considered to be a grungy underground movie. Who cared if Eraserhead or Night of the Living Dead was swimming in grain with deep scratches or missing frames? That's the way they ought to look, right?

While I still periodically pop in washed out videotapes of movies that are all chopped to hell and riddled with defects, a big shift came when dvd finally took off. Movies were getting remastered, and maybe you still say "why", as I do every now and then (Faces of Death, anyone?). On the other hand, I suddenly had access to films the way they were shot. While the grimy, "hidden" quality was gone, it became clear the films were just as good (and often better) when you could actually make out what was going on.

Night of the Living Dead and Eraserhead were prime examples; each film was a revelation of details heretofore obscured by persistent print damage. The stark photography of Romero's first "zombie" film accentuated the bleak finale. Watching the film in a clean print made me aware that there was no other way Night of the Living Dead could end. There was no hope, and Romero's documentary-like coverage inside and outside the house watched passively as the world went to hell.

Sometimes I wish I could have seen Eraserhead with an audience during the heyday of its "midnight movie" run. That film is a trip even with a small group of people, and I can only imagine what being in a hazy, pot smoke filled auditorium surrounded by a midnight crowd forced to deal with David Lynch's debut projected against the screen. Lynch, perhaps sensing that this could never be, worked dilligently to clean Eraserhead up frame by frame for four years and remixed the audio for home speaker systems. The result is probably different from Eraserhead as it appeared in theatres, but I'll be damned if I've put my grainy as hell UK bootleg back in the dvd player since.

Why I find this Eraserhead (re-named Eraserhead 2000 on the dvd cover) so amazing is that every detail emerges, often confounding the nightmarish quality of the film. It would be a safe assumption that if you could see more of the picture, much of the mystery would go away, but Lynch is fastidious in cramming tiny details into his films, ones that when visible are frequently as confounding. I've watched this new, cleaner version of Eraserhead more times than the beat up dvd and vhs bootlegs I've had, basking in the details and trying to work out the visual non sequiturs. It may be a revisionist version of the film, but it turns out that Eraserhead can handle the polish.

There are a number of other films I've come to appreciate from cleaned up images: Apocalypse Now's dense opening unveiled a whole new layer when I saw a widescreen remaster (Martin Sheen's Willard was a bail bondsman before Vietnam. Who better to send after Kurtz?) and Taxi Driver continues to surprise me when properly framed. I've caught things in films I never noticed, reveling in their "beaten up" status for too long.

All things considered, I still have a soft spot for the trod upon dvd picture. To be perfectly honest with you, I can't imagine Chopping Mall would look better with a widescreen remaster. Right now the disc is a straight-up port of a Vestron Cassette Tape, right down to the logo after the credits. It looks okay, but frequently leans dark and is clearly panned-and-scanned. Would I trade it for a minty fresh remaster? It's hard to say. Chopping Mall is such an obviously cheap movie that I have to wonder just how much of an improvement is possible.

The Driller Killer is widescreen, claims to be "remastered from 16mm negative" and still looks like shit. It's way to dark in most scenes to even figure out what's happening, and the sound mix buries dialogue so far down that at times I couldn't tell you what anyone's saying. A comparably cheap film, Maniac Cop, looks much better than the old "full frame" dvd I rented from Netflix. I can finally make out kills in the night scenes. I'll take the remastered Metropolis and Nosferatu over any third rate public domain cheapie any day. The remastered Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer improves on its vhs antecedents, so these things are a toss up.

I guess in the end it comes down to the movie. Does every film bear a top-to-bottom scrubbing? I honestly don't know. Clearly there are good arguments for why one should; when done correctly, the difference can be eye opening. On the other hand, I do suppose that some films continue to have "cult" followings because of their dingy, time-worn picture and muddy soundtrack. Even as home video moves in the "high definition" direction, this question is going to persist, because you can face (at times) a startlingly good shift in picture quality. Evil Dead 2, for example, looks pretty good for such a low budget film on Blu Ray, even if the string holding objects is now readily visible.

I suppose if the movie is good enough, it can transcend even the worst transfer.

Thoughts?

Movies at Midnight? What a Concept!

Weird neck pains irritate me. Stop it, neck.

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Not even a score by Daft Punk can deter my interest in Tron 2. Nothing against Daft Punk, and certainly it's a step up from Journey, but it's not like this movie needs a big "name" attached in the score column. I'm down anyway.

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I watched The Foot Fist Way last night. While I did enjoy it, the film reminds me of Bottle Rocket in some ways, in that it's a dry run of better things to come. In Bottle Rocket's case, Wes Anderson went on to make Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums; in The Foot Fist Way's case, Danny McBride really went on to showcase the unbridled form of his comedy.

Don't get me wrong: McBride is playing the cruel, rude, sociopathic bastard you'll recognize from East Bound and Down or Tropic Thunder, it's just that he and director Jody Hill don't push the character as far as he has since. I could almost sense them pulling their punches to keep Fred Simmons from being totally unlikeable, so the film goes far but then holds back.

It's still funny as hell most of the time and if you like McBride, Foot Fist Way is most definitely worth checking out. If you've seen any of the Conan O'Brien "king of the demo" material, you'll know what to expect from Foot Fist Way, only more cruel and profane.

KING OF THE DEMO - watch more funny videos

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I've also been watching Midnight Movies, which is so far a fun documentary about the birth of the "midnight" cult film phenomenon. It begins with Jodorowsky's El Topo (the first "midnight movie"), and also covers Night of the Living Dead, Pink Flamingos, The Harder They Come, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and Eraserhead, with shout outs to Reefer Madness and Bambi Meets Godzilla, among other movies that played at the Elgin in New York and the Orson Welles theatre in L.A.

.. The directors are all involved and it's half about how the films came to be and half interviews with theatre owners, distributors, critics, and fans. Interesting tidbit: Roger Ebert gave Night of the Living Dead a harsh review because he watched it with parents who brought their children to the show. Just let that simmer a little bit, and imagine the review you might write after seeing the reactions he did. I'm not done yet but they've just transitioned from Rocky Horror to Eraserhead, and it's particularly interesting to hear the overlap with people involved. Richard O'Brien talking about watching Eraserhead is almost as interesting as John Waters talking about seeing NotLD first run at a drive-in in Baltimore. For that, this is a definite "must see". --- Finally, there's a new Jim Jarmusch movie coming. Here's the trailer, since I don't want you to have to wait for Sunday. .. Good night.

It’s not Just About "High Art" (an essay about The Drive-In)

Sometimes The Cap'n just has to disagree with his textbook, no matter how authoritative the source is.

In James Naremore's otherwise quite thorough book More Than Night: Film Noir and Its Contexts, he devotes a portion of Chapter 4, "Low is High" to attack Joe Bob Briggs. For those of you not familiar with Briggs, he prides himself on being a fan of "low" cinema; you can find him providing commentaries for movies like I Spit on Your Grave and Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter. He is also the author of a handful of books, including Profoundly Disturbing, Profoundly Erotic, and Joe Bob Goes to the Drive In, none of which I have read, but I'd like to.

Naremore considers him to be the very worst kind of champion for "low art", a far cry from the days of Manny Farber. In "Low is High", which is about the blending of low rent crime films and artistic criticism, Joe Bob appears as a figure of derision who "seems to be making fun of both the establishment and the Bible Belt yahoos, but in reality his cultural politics are quite safe". Naremore calls Briggs an "ersatz good old boy - a crefully contructed persona who enjoys redneck camp and who writes about a 'drive-in' culture that no longer exists (if it ever did)"(161)

I do not challenge Naremore's right to look down upon Joe Bob Briggs, and it does not surprise me that a "serious" film critic would do so. There is little toleration in the critical community for artifice or rebelliousness, so he's welcome to accuse Briggs of playing it "safe". What did raise my ire is the second half Naremore's contention, that a drive-in culture never existed, or that it is a fabrication on the part of Briggs.

Most of "Low is High" is devoted to refuting the myth that much of film noir consisted of "B" pictures interspersed with a few "A" movies. Included in that is a breakdown of the difference (both in stature and in budget) between the two kinds of movies, the history of Republic Pictures, Alliance Entertainment, and the birth of American International Pictures towards the end of the classic "noir" cycle.

It also gives me the earliest written usage of the term "grindhouse", from 1947, although Naremore points out that the movie the critic refers to a "typical" is actually a Hollywood A picture based on an Ernest Hemingway story (The Killers).

Naremore does not refute the existence of the grindhouse in large cities, but conveniently ignores the fact that smaller towns and rural areas did not typically have more than one movie theatre downtown. The local theatre would, in fact, play the "A" picture and a "B" picture with cartoons, newsreels, and short subjects. They would be extremely unlikely, however, to play the kinds of movies Briggs champions. Those films fell into the domain of the Drive-In.

I remember well into the eighties a drive-in somewhere in Raleigh called The Starlight* listed in the newspaper. I don't remember when it closed, but since we didn't have a "grindhouse" so to speak**, movies that would never play in a first run theatre or the burgeoining multiplex would show up at The Starlight.

But to actually cover the "drive-in culture" that Briggs defends and Naremore denies, we have to go back before the Cap'n was born. It brings about the crucial distinction between the drive in during its heyday and the dying days of the scene during the 80s and 90s: home video.

The reason I believe the "drive-in culture" had to exist was because there was no such thing as home video in the late seventies, and it wasn't widely available until the mid-to-late eighties for most middle class families. This didn't stop movies from being made that no Downtown movie theatre would play. The 70s is a repository for all sorts of "B" to "Z" cinema that wasn't made to go "direct to video", because such a thing didn't exist. The existence of Z Channel or HBO does not support the idea of films being made for television in the late seventies. So where did movies like I Spit On Your Grave, Robot Monster and Last House on the Left play? The Drive In!

Did "A" pictures play there too? I'm certain they did, but I bet you couldn't find Night of the Living Dead playing at the theatre next to the drugstore. In big cities, sure it probably made it to a smaller theatre or even a "grindhouse", but where that option doesn't exist, the drive-in is the logical alternative. Not to mention the ability to hang out in your car, smoke, drink, make out, or generally kick back and watch a movie.

All of this leads me to believe that there was such a thing as a "drive-in culture", if for no other reason than it would be fun to go to one every week. They offered different choices, double bills, and provided a more relaxed atmosphere than the local movie house. As the multiplex grew in stature, the option to see more than one movie clearly cut down on that angle, and the popularity of home video allowed people to enjoy movies at home in an even more relaxed atmosphere. The Grindhouse and The Drive-In faded, and are now both something of an abstraction; a memory.

James Naremore is quite right to differentiate between our conception of the "B" movie and the reality, and to shed some light on how we understand the history of some films, but I cannot agree that because one is misunderstood, the other cannot exist. There are simply too many movies produced in the era of the "B" film which serve no other purpose but to help support the "drive-in culture", whether he chooses to believe so or not.



* Please feel free to correct me, but I swear it was called The Starlight Drive In. We drove past it once or twice, and I'm almost positive that was the name.
* the closest Raleigh ever had to one was The Studio, which was technically two screens but otherwise pretty much fit the criteria

Horror Fest III, Day Two: The Orphanage

Our final movie tonight, after many a folk decided sleep was in their best interest (despite the extra hour) was The Orphanage, a bedtime story / fairytale that is in many points quite creepy. Thankfully, not creepy in the way you'd expect it to be (at least in the end), but still unnerving and occasionally enough to unsettle you.

What you don't hear as much about the film is how the story is more about dealing with loss than uncovering some kind of ghostly mystery (although there's a fair share of that too). In a lot of ways The Orphanage reminded me of Lady in White, but the crucial distinction for the former is that while it is spooky and quite suspenseful, there's also a pervasive sadness, even in moments like the psychic trance.

It's an easily recommended movie, even if you get spooked without much provocation. Watching it alone in the dark might not be ideal, but it's a fine film and well worth checking out.

For now, the Cap'n is uncertain about how long (if at all) the fest will continue into tomorrow. Unlike Summer Fest, I have schoolwork which must be attended to and looking forward to the week ahead is paramount.

After Trailer Sunday recaps our movies, I might throw up some pictures of Shecky the Halloween Skeleton, DJ Spooks, and the little red demon dude, along with a handful of other pictures (and maybe video) of the Fest. What didn't necessarily get coverage was Adam's awesome selection of alcoholic beverages and the drinking game that pushed The Happening way into the stratosphere*.

How much of The Wickeremake and Horror of the Blood Beasts we got through is another tale worth telling, but right now I'm keen on bed. Sure, the clock says 5:38, but it feels like 6:38...

Since I'm unsure about tomorrow, I'd like to go ahead and thank our Horror Fest III spooksters: Adam, Neil, Tom, Liz, Randy, Andrea, Ben, Nathan, Chris(?), Barrett, Phillippi, Riannon, Dominic, Mike, Paula, and dude who's name I forgot but he was here with the Rianimator. As always, a Horror Fest is only as much fun as the people who come to it, and I have to say it was fun.



* hint: if you're wondering why there was such an emphasis on "deez nuts" after Freddy's Dead, it had a LOT to do with The Happening drinking game...

Horror Fest III Day 2: Blood Feast and Child’s Play 2

Blood Feast remains about the sleaziest horror movie you can make. Herschell Gordon Lewis is half interested in showing bad torture scenes with fake blood and even faker body parts, but let's be honest here: the focus of Blood Feast is the buxom ladies in bathing suits and underwear.

The masculine gaze is in full, perverse effect during Blood Feast, and story is a distant second. Admittedly, Lewis is working with a very low budget, and when you don't have much for effects or actors or anything else, sometimes the best defense is to aim for the male libido. The egyptian blood feast itself (or the ridiculous flashback sequence) is secondary to cheap titillation. It's similar territory to Wizard of Gore, but lacking the sadistic comedy of Two Thousand Maniacs.

All this in a scant sixty-seven minutes.

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Child's Play 2 remains the shiznit. The movie's too short for flaws to have any time to creep in, so you're free to sit back and enjoy Chucky's reign of carnage. Better still, the production values, camerawork, and score actually trick you into thinking Child's Play 2 is a higher rate film than any horror sequel has any right to be.

Think about it: Freddy's Revenge? Looks like crap. Friday the 13th Part 2? Low budget all the way. Halloween II? Well, I don't know what the hell was going on, but still pretty cheap. Child's Play 2, on the other hand, looks like a movie that the studio cared about, and that's kind of surprising considering we're talking about the sequel to a killer doll movie.

It's still awesome, and I will hear no ill spoken of it. Any time it's on tv, I'll be there. Yessir.

Horror Fest III Day 1: The Mist (in glorious black and white)

Although Mssrs Davis and White slept through various portions of The Mist (it was 3am when we started), I believe both of them enjoyed the film. Liz and Randy did as well, and I'm just going to have to disagree about the "top 4 worst ending" ever that Mr. Cranpire feels the film deserves.

Turns out that black and white really suits the film well. Not only do the dodgy cg effects look better, but the grocery store feels more claustrophobic. The mist itself becomes more oppressive when the grays are drained out; the impenetrable whiteness makes shapes in the distance all the more unnerving.

As everyone is turning in, The Orphanage will have to wait for tomorrow, but we're off to a good start. The Cap'n and friends will be back soon with more updates from the Season of the Beast.

G'nite.

Five Movies: Inaugural Edition

The Cap'n realizes he's sounded a bit grouchy in the last few days, which is not what the Cap'n wants readers to think he is all the kind: cantankerous, grouchy, and ill at ease with the current state of movies.

It is true that movies the new Friday the 13th, Watchmen, and Saw V are not my thing. But that doesn't mean many of you might not enjoy them, so I'll lay off for at least one day and try to share with you five movies that I think you might enjoy. Five movies that maybe weren't on your radar, or maybe that you'd never considered seeing before. If I'm recommending them, I think they're worth your time, and unless you see the word "Ironic" in the subject, it's not because they're actually terrible.

Since we're only a week away from Halloween, it's only fair to start with five horror movies. Horror is a vast genre that covers all kinds of films, and everybody's had the chance to see something others haven't, so it seems fair to share the wealth every now and then. I hope to turn you on to at least one movie, even the most die hard aficionado.

5. The Hitcher (1986) - Forget what you've seen on dvd shelves everywhere: this is The Hitcher to watch! No one this side of Gary Busey can play unhinged like Rutger Hauer, and this is the man at his maddest. Even if you saw the remake, do yourself a favor and watch Hauer terrorize C. Thomas Howell and Jennifer Jason Leigh on the open highway. I promise you the ending to this one is better!

4. Prince of Darkness - The often forgotten chapter of John Carpenter's "End of the World" trilogy (along with The Thing and In the Mouth of Madness), Prince of Darkness has the bad luck of falling between Big Trouble in Little China and They Live, two cult favorites. That's too bad, because Prince of Darkness is every bit as good as those two, and scarier than either. To explain the story, about something sinister buried beneath a church, would undersell the movie. It's not the plot synopsis so much as the way Carpenter unfolds the story, alternating between a straight-forward narrative and cryptic flash forwards in the form of video from an unspecified time. If you rent this, don't watch the trailer; it gives away part of the ending!

3. Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed - I frequently recommend Ginger Snaps to people, but rarely do I take the opportunity to recommend its sequel, which is in many ways as good if not better. What Unleashed does that is so rare in a sequel is to take the premise of the original, twist it, and come up with a novel alternate narrative. Instead of lycanthropy as a metaphor for puberty, now it becomes a metaphor for addiction, as Bridget tries to suppress the urge to transform (like her sister). The ending, quite out of left field, is akin to something like Neil Jordan's The Company of Wolves, and sets up the fairytale bookend that is the third film.

2. Tombs of the Blind Dead - If you think Dario Argento has the market cornered on dreamlike atmospheres and nightmarish imagery, you might want to check out Amando de Ossorio's Spanish entry into Gothic Horror. Made six years before Suspiria, Tombs of the Blind Dead (La Noche del terror ciego) delivers the Knights Templar as monsters, decaying and blind. Every time the Knights appear, the film takes on a hallucinatory quality, and coupled with the ambiguity what they want or why they exist, the film is perfect for the middle of the night when your mind begins to drift.

1. The Black Cat (1934) - Of all the team-ups between Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi, this is my favorite. Neither of them play conventional monsters, but are more horrifying as victimizer and victim of war set on destroying the other. In the middle is a couple who had the dumb luck to share a train car with Dr. Vitus Vedergast (Lugosi). When the young bride is injured, they are forced to join Vedergast in the home of Hjalmar Poelzig (Karloff), an architect, war hero, and something much more to Vedergast. To say much more would be spoiling the ending, which was so harsh by 1930s standards no uncut version of the film is known to exist. If you're a fan of either legend, you owe it to yourself to see The Black Cat.

In the future I hope to bring you more of Five Movies, as well as future installments of Four Reasons, and maybe even Three Guilty Pleasures (I just made that up, but it sounds like fun). If this was helpful to you, or you have some suggestions for horror movies (or any other) unseen, feel free to share it with the others.

Yours,

The Cap'n