Wow! That did not work at all! Ha!
SD
Monday, August 27, 2012
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Sunday, August 12, 2012
TEN: Ten Things I Noticed from seeing Halloween on the Big Screen for the first time, thanks to Atlanta's Splatter Cinema at the Plaza!
ramble alert!!!
that says halloween, i swear
no slides! hooray!
2. That being said, and you all know Carpenter is my boy, but I can not imaging the movie being able to rise in classic status if it had come out today with 2000 channels, Internet, instant streaming, and all the million of diversions. It's not just movie theaters and TV anymore. I think this one would get lost in the glut of "5 instant cult classics" that come out weekly. Not saying it wouldn't, and hard to say since Halloween is the face that launched a million ships, every horror movie steals from it. I'm just saying, this movie was not an immediate sensation, and was allowed to grow in reputation while still in the theater.
3. And! I never noticed how bear bones this movie is. It is really low budget, and seeing on the big screen really brings it home. Few locations and actors, and very talky and walky. People walking and talking, while some one is stalking. That's the whole movie. Not much going on. I know I'm seeing this through jaded horror saturated eyes, but really, this is not about telling a nuanced story.
4. I never noticed how much the camera is swarming around in the first half of the movie. The movie is designed to be more claustrophobic as it progresses, but man the camera is very dynamic, almost verite in the beginning. We are constantly moving.
5. Everytime Donald Pleasence opens his mouth, magic happens. He is batnuts insane, talking that cop's ear off. "More fancy talk", saith the cop.
6. Every man in this movie is a total moron, or a psychopath. I think Debra Hill is the magic ingredient to this mix. She adds this strong feminist undercurrent. Without her contribution to the script, this would be pretty nondescript horror film. The only real people in this movie are the women. The film focuses on the three teenage girls and as they slowly walk into the path of this truck.
7. Everyone has a date except for Laurie Strode. Even the kids are a pair. Laurie says that men think she's too smart. Everyone else paired up and are on their way to living happy little suburban lives. Debra Hill was producing Hollywood movies in her twenties. The idea of marrying some moron and getting him a beer while he watches the game would have made her puke. So here is Laurie, with this spectre date slowly getting closer. By Laurie striking at the Shape and defeating him, she is lashing out and rejecting the status quo. The Shape for me now represents the inevitability of life, of the excepted and the unexamined roles we take. Of birth, marriage, work, carriers, and just general conformity. The Shape is death by loss of identity.
I'm rambling film school bullshit, but that is what the Internet is for dammit!
8. I never noticed that the whole reason that The Shape even starts after Laurie is because she comes to his house to drop a key off for her dad who is in real estate. Some how I never made that connection, the plot entangled in my brain with the wacky stuff from the sequels about Laurie being his lost sister. It is scarier that this is just some psycho stalker, and him coming into her life is just a random bit of bad luck.
9. In the 70s I guess you could stalk around an elementary school and stare at the students while wearing a scary mask. Those were different times.
10. In conclusion, I love this movie, but now more because of Debra Hill then the Carpenter influence. Carpenter has always been better with a good collaborator at the script. They Live being a great example of having nothing to say once the first 20 minutes have played out, the first twenty being an awesome adaption of the the short story source material. Great movies are like this. They grow with you. I got a lot out of this screening but not for the reasons I was suspecting.
BONUS: The jack o'lantern during the opening credits is huge on the silver screen. I mean, BIG man!
sd
Wednesday, July 25, 2012
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
Saturday, July 14, 2012
CLOWN VERSUS MONKEY: Clown Versus Monkey in the Grip of Power!
CLOWN VERSUS MONKEY: Clown Versus Monkey in the Grip of Power!: high level decisions are being made at this second -sd
Saturday, July 07, 2012
Friday, July 06, 2012
Wednesday, July 04, 2012
Sunday, July 01, 2012
Saturday, June 30, 2012
TEN Reasons you have to see ABRAHAM LINCOLN: VAMPIRE HUNTER
1. Bowler Hat! I'm a sucker for a good bowler hat. A character wears one.
2. Jimmi Simpson is the actor who wears the bowler hat, and the only thing I know him from is a scene in David Fincher's Zodiac, where he plays a shifty loser. I like shifty losers in movies. This actor has a weird vibe that I like.
3. You gotta love all the black long coats and top hats going on. All the vampires wear leather and have awesome sunglasses on. Oh, the vampires can walk around in daylight, that confused me at first. Just warning you. In closing, great costumes.
4. Marton Csokas is a great vampire character and he walks around in the daylight (confusing at first). He has some nasty teeth in the first scene and plays a really slimy dude. He seems less slimy later, but still, that first scene is great.
5. Marton fights Abe Lincoln in the middle of a bunch of stampeding horses. It was CG as hell, but I must say I have never seen a fight scene that takes place in and over stampeding horses.
6. All the fight scenes are pretty neat. Great choreography. AX-FU! There is a great ax in this. For me, the star of the movie is the ax.
7. Zack Snyder must be proud that action scenes love his speed up/slow down method these days. I only mention it because because the CG blood erupting in slow mo was actually quite beautiful and badass. And I usually hate CG blood.
8. There is a great old creepy plantation in this. I'm a sucker for a creepy moonlit plantation with the orange lamp light glowing in the windows. Total Sucker.
9. So we are telling revisionist history here, and the sweeping wide shots with recreations of famous battles and old cities are really impressive. The camera glides over these insanely detailed digital paintings and you go "Ohh-Ahh!"
10. Speaking of "Oh-Ah", the ending battle on a speeding train climaxes in a real orgy if chaos and boom boom bam! It is pure spectacle, and not really convincing, but like the horse scene, conceptually really neat. Mainly, the little red embers coming from the locomotive fill the air and are really cool and made me wish I had watched this in 3D. I would say watch this in 3D (i hate 3D) just because...
THIS MOMENT BROUGHT TO YOU BY WTF! - the day scenes are so over-lit everything looks flat and boring. If you are looking at it through tented 3D glasses, it is probably fine. The night scenes are great, but in the day this looks like bad History Channel Reenactment Theater. Bluh. PLUS! I like the digital projectors that have been coming along, giving movies this vibrant clean perfection, but!
ONE MORE WTF! You shoot it on digital and show it through a digital projector, man I see every pore on your face. It freaks me out. It doesn't look cinematic. It's too freaking perfect. I know its progress, but it looks cheap man. I respect all the work and artistry that goes into these movies, but I sat in my favorite seat, forth row up the stadium, and I was totally taken out of the movie by the perfectly defined inner contours of the actor's nostrils. I see too much now. I need some glaucoma so I can start enjoying movies again.
Showstopper - Share an ax with a buddy, kill twice the vampires!
Friday, June 29, 2012
Thursday, June 28, 2012
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
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