The October Project 2: Day 5

The Call of Cthulhu  (2005)
Directed by Andrew Leman

 

The Whisperer in Darkness  (2011)
Directed by Sean Branney

 

Whatever his faults as a writer Howard Philips Lovecraft is inarguably one of the most important and influential figures in the history of horror and fantasy. However, his unique combination of ornate verbiage and feverish "cosmic horror" has proven difficult to translate to film. Other than Stuart Gordon's wonderful, schlocky films from the 80's (more about those later) Lovecraft adaptations have mostly been a big snooze. So, for anybody with even a passing interest in his work, these films are cause for real excitement.
Both are low budget black and white films shot in a manner recalling early cinema. "Call" is a silent film recounting perhaps Lovecraft's most famous work. An investigation into strange occurrences worldwide uncovers a bizarre cult built around a horrifying squid-headed alien god.
"Whisperer" resembles an early sound production like a Universal Studios Gothic classic and portrays the correspondence between an academic and man convinced he's being stalked by otherworldly creatures.
The filmmakers are avowed Lovecraft fanatics and the movies have a handcrafted feel, charming enough to overcome their occasional amateurishness. I'm recommending them as a double feature as "Call" clocks in at a mere 47 minutes.
Not for everybody, but for fans of Lovecraft and lovers of early black and white cinema, these are a lot of fun.

The October Project 2: Day 4

"You will not be saved by the holy ghost. You will not be saved by the god Plutonium. In fact, YOU WILL NOT BE SAVED!"

Prince of Darkness  (1987)
Directed by John Carpenter

John Carpenter was on some kind of a roll in the 80's. He gave us, amongst others, "Escape from New York", "The Thing", "Big Trouble in Little China", "They Live" and this one-of-a-kind horror classic.
A weird priest, played by Donald Pleasence, recruits a physics Professor and a group of grad students to investigate a strange find in the basement of an abandoned church. It turns out to be an impossibly ancient cylinder of swirling green liquid the origin of which I wouldn't dream of divulging here. What I will say (and I hope you find this sufficiently fascinating) is that this is the only film I know that posits the existence of Satan at a quantum level. Huh? Pretty cool right?

Also, Alice Cooper straight-up murders a guy with a bike frame.
Seriously.

 

The October Project 2: Day 3

 

 

"Christine is dead. She is dead! Dead! Dead! Dead! Dead! Dead!"

 

Don't Look Now  (1973)

Directed by Nicolas Roeg

 

 After yesterday's awesome but skanky (awesomely skanky!) zombie epic, here's a classy Daphne Du Maurier adaptation to cleanse the palate. In an eerie, off-season Venice a grieving couple, played by Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie, try to process the drowning death of their daughter (no spoiler it's literally the first thing that happens). While Sutherland attempts to lose himself in restoration work, Christie befriends two eccentric English sisters, one of whom is blind and claims to be a medium in touch with their dead child. Things grow progressively more strange and until the blind psychic claims to sense something terrible looming unless the couple leaves Venice. Also, who or what is that small figure in the red coat that Sutherland keeps glimpsing out of the corner of his eye? Could it be?......but that would be telling.

I don't want to say anything more except that the film builds to a truly unforgettable conclusion.

The October Project 2: Day 2

Zombie  (aka: Zombi 2) (1979)
Directed by Lucio Fulci

Welcome to the delightful world of Lucio Fulci, full of demented fun for the whole family. I'm sure you've all seen your share of zombie movies so I don't need to do into great detail about this particular entry. There's a tropical island, flesh eating undead and some amazing low-budget gore gags. That's pretty much all you need to know. However, I do have a few thoughts:

This is a Fulci movie so there will be eye trauma! You should know that going in.

Best tagline ever! (See poster above)

If you've ever wanted to see a zombie fight a (real) shark then this is the movie for you!
Think I'm kidding?

Told ya!

 

Did I mention the eye trauma.?

......don't look at me like that. Were you expecting Shakespeare?

 

  

The October Project 2: The Sequel

Well it's October again, my favourite time of year and a good excuse to dust off this long-ignored blog thing and create yet another list of 31 horror films for you to enjoy. Perhaps this time I should say 'horror" because after the last 31 this list will, by necessity, be a little more eccentric, filled with oddities, cult items and a few ancient classics. Still, I stand by my choices, be they acknowledged cinema milestones or the most disreputable trash. So lets begin:

"I've seen things you wouldn't believe. Things a boy shouldn't see. I was like any other kid; I didn't believe in the boogeyman. Then the world woke up to a nightmare."

Stake Land (2010)
Directed by Jim Mickle

A survival-horror tale set in a world overrun with feral vampires, Stake Land doesn't exactly break new ground but is executed without a false step. The tone is tough and gritty and the danger, whether from the undead or fellow humans, always seems terrifyingly real. All the characters are well drawn especially the charismatic vampire hunter known only as "Mister" played by Nick Damici the film's co-writer. In terms of world building his film accomplishes in 98 minutes what has taken The Walking Dead 3 seasons. An underseen gem waiting to be discovered.

When someone says this....

....what I hear is this:

"I speak my mind." = "I am rude."

"I'm a spiritual person." = "I am pathologically self-absorbed."

"Everything happens for a reason." = "I've never had an original thought in my life."

"I am such a bitch!" = "No, really, I am a bitch."

"I don't watch television." = "I think I'm better than you."

"I'm not much of a reader." = "I am boring."

"You think you're better than me?" = "Clearly, you are better than me."

"I couldn't identify with it." = "It's not about me, so I'm not interested."

"It was pretentious." = "I didn't get it."

"You think too much." = "I don't think nearly enough."

"I don't want to think." = "I'm everything that's wrong with the world."

"I have a blog" = "I am a narcissist."

HITCH (1942-2011)

This past Thursday, Dec. 15, 2011, journalist, orator, raconteur and professional contrarian Christopher Hitchens finally succumbed to complications arising from esophageal cancer. He was 62 years old. With his passing, the world has lost one of the great public iconoclasts, a man singularly devoted to the pursuit of truth and the utter destruction of hypocrisy in all it's forms. His targets included Henry Kissinger , Bill and Hillary Clinton, the Dalai Lama, the current Pope, and even Mother Theresa. Not always an easy man to like or admire, Hitchens could be smug, supercilious and blatantly rude. He was, also, the champion of  several controversial and, seemingly indefensible, positions, including an unwavering support of the War in Iraq. He was a complicated man for a complicated world.

I suppose I first took notice of him on Bill Maher's "Politically Incorrect" show. I remember being quite struck by this rumpled Englishman saying outrageous things about President Clinton (basically calling him a rapist) but dismissing him as some kind of right-wing whack job. How wrong I was. In Hitchen's youth he was a committed socialist and political activist against the war in Vietnam. It is to his credit as a nuanced writer and thinker that his later support of the war in Iraq seems neither contradictory nor hypocritical.

If you bother to read his various essays and articles leading up the war, you will see that his support is not based in some kind of rah-rah-go-America patriotism or a desire for post 9/11 revenge against the Muslim world. This is a person who spent a lot of time in Iraq, understood the culture, and had many valued friends in that country, and his hatred of Saddam Hussein and his Ba'ath party is based in that experience. In Hitchens' opinion it was the long overdue moral responsibility of the U.S. to remove Hussein from power, the sooner the better. You may disagree, (as I do), but this was not the opinion of a republican war monger, but rather that of a committed humanist outraged on behalf of a nation about which he cared deeply.

If Hitchens was well known for anything in the States it was his tireless and vocal promotion of aetheism and his distaste for religion. This debate is particularly illustrative, as it represents him at his best and worst. When debating religion he could be arrogant and dismissive, taking his anti-god stance as a moral and intellectual given. Conversely, he was, also, at his wittiest and most passionate. I recommend trolling youtube for anything involving Hitchens and religion. There are literally hours of footage of Hitchens debating religion, all of it entertaining, enlightening, and intellectually stimulating. There are worse ways to spend a cold winter afternoon.

As I feared, this post is far too literal and plodding to do justice to such a talented polemicist, but I do want to mention one more important aspect of his writing. He was also a fine literary critic, and I highly recommend any of his essays on great books and authors. This is Hitchens at his happiest, discussing what is really important to him. Of course it helps that he and I are in agreement on many of our favourite writers. I've been thrilled over the years to read his thoughts on such figures as James Joyce, Jorge Luis Borges and Patrick O'Brian and find them so close to my own. It was this, more than his political stances or his anti-religious activities, that made him a personal hero of mine. Well, that and his utter fearlessness in the face of, not only political and intellectual opposition, but his own mortality.

This last observation I will allow Mr. Hitchen's to illustrate in his own words.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbBVB66DC5k&feature=related

Anyone interested in sampling Christopher Hitchen's work will want to check out his archive on the Slate website. Further reading should include his excellent autobiography Hitch-22, his essay collection Love, Poverty and War, his stirring anti-religion polemic God is Not Great plus: Letters to a Young Contrarian, Why Orwell Matters and Thomas Paine's Rights of  Man: A Biography.