Cinephemera

So here we are. Another roundup. Didn’t see much this week. I really really have to see Benjamin Button soon. Hopefully this week. I also still need to see Slumdog Millionaire and The Wrestler. If only people would pay me to see movies.

House of 1000 Corpses
Rating: Unworthy

I remember seeing the trailer for this movie when it first came out and it scared the crap out of me. It looked absolutely creepy. I imagine that I might have liked this better had I not seen several other horror classics which this movie emulates perfectly. The only thing new this movie brings to the table is a modern sensibility toward gore. This movie is about 80% Texas Chainsaw Massacre. What made TCM so effective was that you never directly see the gore involved so it’s left to the imagination. The other thing that made TCM a better movie was that it doesn’t spend 90% of the movie grounded in reality only to throw in a ridiculously stupid supernatural element at the end. Essentially, this is a conglomeration of other horror movies.

You’ve also got to be an idiot to think that Sid Haig’s character isn’t in league with the family. I knew the second that the one survivor got into his car at the end that she ain’t safe. The survivor also must have been a complete imbicile to not see the guy who’s been tormenting her the entire movie laying down IN THE BACKSEAT OF THE FREAKING CONVERTIBLE. Rob Zombie is clearly in love with this psychotic family that he’s created. At several points during the movie, he interrupts the story and lets members of the family rant about… stuff. He also uses random solarization effects and split screen at odd points during the movie.

The only redeeming factor? Being surprised to see Rainn Wilson in this. Oh, I guess I just ruined the surprise. Oh well. Best not see it now.

Pineapple Express
Rating: Worthy

So I’m not the biggest fan of the myriad of Apatow produced comedies. For some reason they all seem like they do the same business and don’t differentiate from each other all that much. This movie though, felt different thanks mostly to director David Gordon Green and star James Franco. Franco is nearly unrecognizable in his role as the lovable drug dealer to Seth Rogen’s character. This isn’t your typical stoner comedy either. It’s also a buddy film and an action film. Generally when the two mix, the action portions are rather light and used mostly for a punchline. In this though, the action is actually quite good and while jokes are made, they are actually very funny and fit with the action. It isn’t a particularily raunchy movie either. There are still moments of raunch comedy but for the most part, really great stuff. The chemistry between the two leads is better than in most romantic comedies which now that I think about it, is kind of disturbing.

Carrie
Rating: Worthy

I’ve complained about the current state of horror movies in at least one blog post here and numerous other times to certain friends. I’m sure that these people are already completely sick of my complaining and will punch me in the face if I bring it up again. Give it a few more posts and I’m sure you too will want to punch me in the face. I beg your indulgence for just a moment because this movie is the reason why I hate our current horror films. They used to be so good!

While it’s not straight-up horror until near the end, the film is extremely tense and even tragic. This isn’t some horrible monster stalking people, it’s about the horrible monsters that we can be to others. That’s about as philosophical as I’m going to get. The tragedy of this movie is that a sweet, innocent girl is constantly terrorized not only by her peers but her religious nut of a mother too. For the better part of the movie, you know that the kids are going to do something horrible to Carrie and this makes waiting for that moment to happen practically unbearable. There’s nothing you can do but watch their manipulation take place and know that it will all end in tragedy.

Even more than The Shining, this is the best adaptation of a Stephen King horror work. The best adaptation of any Stephen King story belongs to The Shawshank Redemption.

I read a news story recently about the death of Polaroid film. The Polaroid company has announced that they are ceasing production of their Polaroid film effective December 31st. I’ve wanted to purchase a Polaroid for a while because I love the way that the pictures turn out and it is now perhaps too late. The passing of physical film most likely due to the prevalence of digital cameras.

Of course this is not entirely unexpected. The writing has been on the wall for quite a while. You can find digital cameras now in mid to high double digits. Seems everywhere you look now teens and even kids are sporting point-and-click cameras (usually pointed toward themselves and a group of friends all throwing gang signs). While it is not a complete surprise, it is still a rather sad passing of an era.

I am certain that the film medium will never really die. There are still far too many artists and filmmakers who still use it but there is definitely a huge shift to digital media not only in regards to photography, but music and movies as well. Thanks primarily to iTunes, digital music and movie rental has gotten a major boost. A lot of major DVD releases now come with digital copies.

All of this makes sense financially of course. If you shoot everything on a digital camera, you don’t have to worry about buying film, developing it and having to store it. I know some people who swear by digital media and wonder where it has been all their lives. I also know people who will cling to their film and CDs until they die. I happen to fall in the middle. I own a digital Canon Rebel and I love it to death but I also cling to my DVDs and CDs and rarely ever buy digital music.

So let us have a moment of silence for the passing of Polaroids and remember to hug a CD.

Ah, the Christmas holidays. A time of joy and good will to men. A time for food, family and festivities. A time to focus on those things that are most important to us. It’s also a good time to consider recent trends in American horror films.

What? Don’t tell you’ve never thought about this very topic on many a Christmas Eve as you listened to your favorite carols in front of a crackling fire. Really? Just me? You are all strange people.

You look at horror movies these days and American cinema is severely lacking in originality. We lean on our “heroes of horror” (Freddy, Jason and the like), we ruin remake any foreign film that made a decent amount of money and we copy redo our own movies of old. I can’t remember a recent American horror movie that wasn’t either a remake or just copying elements of other horror films.

I’m not entirely sure if this is a purely American phenomenon but we just can’t seem to help making countless sequels featuring Freddy Krueger (8), Michael Myers (9), Jason Voorhees (12). All of which have recently made or are planning to make “reboots”. One could make the arguement that the dozens of Godzilla movies shows that Americans are not the only practitioners of this horor sequel frenzy. However, Godzilla has become more of a benevolent protector of Japan rather than the destroyer of civilization that he was in the first few. We just can’t get enough of our beloved serial murderers.

Attention film makers of the world! Make a decently profitable horror movie in a language other than English and you too could have your work absolutely wrecked by American cinema in less than 5 years! Seriously though, this is getting nuts. We had the J-horror remake craze a few years ago where we laid our grubby hands on every single Japanese horror film that we could find and this trend continues to this day. The Ring, The Grudge, Dark Water, Pulse, The Eye, and One Missed Call have all been given the Hollywood treatment. We’ve gotten a much better turn around rate in recent years. The Spanish horror film REC was released in November 2007 and the remake Quarantine was released less than a year later in October 2008. The recent Swedish hit, Let The Right One In, had a remake being planned even before its release.

Not only do we remake everyone else’s movies, we are constantly remaking our own movies. As I mentioned before, we have had recent remakes of Friday the 13th and Halloween. In recent years we’ve also had remakes of Black Christmas, House on Haunted Hill, The Hills Have Eyes, Prom Night, When a Stranger Calls, House of Wax, The Fog, The Amityville Horror, the list goes on and on. You know what all these remakes have in common? They were all HORRIBLE!

Is there no end to this madness? Will we ever be able to recognize a good horror film even if the actors don’t speak English? Will we ever be able to come up with original ideas again? Will our horror icons lay down their weapons before they make it to movie #20?

What do you think about our seemingly endless remakes and sequels? Is there hope for American horror cinema or are we just whipping a horse that died back in the 80s?

So I’m late getting this list out but Christmas pretty much extends to the end of December anyhow. Yeah. That’s a good enough excuse. And now, in no particular order except as they come to me, 8 Christmas movies that bring on the cheer.

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Santa Claus Conquers the Martians

Despite the title, there is no war between little men in green and little green men. That would have been so much more awesome but no! In fact, Santa conquers the martians with the joy of Christmas! This is a good one to watch when you need a good Christmas laugh.

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Die Hard

Yes! This is a Christmas movie! It takes place during a company Christmas party, therefore it is a Christmas movie. Not only that, but it is likely the best Christmas movie ever made! Eat that, Miracle on 31st Street!

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A Christmas Story

This is a classic. Nothing can ever beat that leg lamp. I’ve wanted one for myself ever since I first saw this movie.

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The Muppet Christmas Carol

The Muppets + Michael Caine = massive amounts of win. Michael Caine can make any movie good and the Muppets can make any story fun. Combine them both and you get good fun. Muppet Treasure Island is my favorite muppet movie but this one comes in at a close second.

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Jingle All the Way

Yeah, yeah. It’s a pretty bad, cheesy movie but there are a lot of moments in this that still make me laugh. It has Arnold beating up a freaking midget Santa for crying out loud! And watching Arnold Schwarzenegger act is always at least amusing.

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It’s a Wonderful Life

The Christmas movie to end all Christmas movies. If you don’t like this one, you either don’t have a heart or your heart is so black and twisted and evil that you probably spend all day plotting some superhero’s demise in your fortress of solitude. Where was I? Oh yeah. Love it or go away, you grouch!

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The Nightmare Before Christmas

The great thing about this is that it works as both a Christmas movie and as a Halloween movie. Besides that, it’s freaking Tim Burton. Pay no attention to all those goths who have taken over this movie as their own. Enjoy it for what it is: a joyous, claymation romp through the imaginations of Tim Burton and director Henry Selick (that guy never gets enough credit for this)

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Elf

I don’t remember this one at all. I think I remember it being good though.

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What are some of your favorite Christmas movies? Let me know in the comments.

Greetings old and new readers. For the uninitiated, the  “Week End Movie Roundup” is a weekly feature where I review the various movies that I have seen over the week. These will be posted on every Monday. Rather than dealing with the mostly subjective 1-5 star rating system, I decided to take the more simple approach. Movies are rated as either “worthy” or “unworthy”. Clear, easy to understand rating system. Enough gabbing though. On to the reviews!

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The Fall
Rating: Worthy

I knew little coming into this film (a preferable position for me to be in) so I had no idea what I was in for. It begins very slowly and it never really picks up the pace all that much. While the pace is rather slow, the story gets more interesting and it becomes fascinating to watch the two leads interact with one another. As their friendship grew, I cared less and less that the movie seems to be taking its sweet time getting from one place to the next. It is fascinating how genuine both of these actors feel together. Despite (or maybe because) the lead actress being only 6 or 7 years old, she is incredibly believable and I never felt that she was “acting”. This is to say nothing of the spectacular visuals that are crammed into this film.Maybe crammed is too harsh a word. Littered? Nah, too eco-antagonistic. Whatever, the movie’s full of them. I cannot possibly do justice in describing the incredible style that is on display here so I’ll say only that you must experience them for yourself. I will say only that there are things on display here that you have never seen before and will probably not see again anytime soon. I know that some view this as pretentious but I see it as a great example of film as art.

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Mr. & Mrs. Smith
Rating: Worthy

It seems like most critics just can’t sit back and enjoy movies unless they are, a) artsy, b) depressing, or c) 3 hours long. This is of course a blatant generalization on my part but I do think that it’s true that most critics can’t seem to just have fun anymore. Speed Racer, one of my favorite films of the year (look for that list in January), received only 36% on Rotten Tomatoes. God forbid that a critic actually recommend a movie that wants only to entertain you for an hour and a half. Mr. & Mrs. Smith is one of those movies.

This movie knows what you want to see. Explosions, action, chemistry (sorry, nerds. not that kind), and more explosions. And explosions ye shall receive. The movie expects nothing of you so you shouldn’t expect so much from it. Pitt and Jolie have good chemistry together and it’s fun to watch them dance around each other with their secrets. Brad Pitt especially appears to be having fun and come on, he’s playing the husband of one of cinema’s more attractive ladies. What guy wouldn’t be loving that? Overall, a good action flick with a little bit of romance sprinkled on top.

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Carnival of Souls
Rating: Worthy

There are a number of things that American cinema does not do well. It can’t (for the most part) make good sequels, it can’t stop catering to the lowest common denominator, and it just can’t stop remaking every single, somewhat popular, foreign film. It also does not do psychological horror very well. The American idea of horror is having some dude in a mask chase teenagers around with a knife. Oh the terror. This type of horror has been done well (see: Nightmare on Elm Street) but for the most part, “same old, same old.”

Every so often though, we get a movie like Carnival of Souls. Unlike most American horror films, this is in the “psychological horror” vein. There aren’t crazy guys with machetes running around chasing screaming, half-naked teenagers and subsequently killing them in a variety of fantastical ways, and there are no demons jumping out of the darkness with the obligatory “jump scare” musical cue which consists of every instrument in the orchestra playing at once for one second. What this movie does have is some incredibly creepy sequences and a feeling of dread for almost the entirety of the film.

While the ending should be no big surprise (I’d figured it out within the first 10 minutes) it is still fantastically developed and never feels like a cheat. There are hints of this all over the place but it really doesn’t matter whether you know it or not. The whole thing really felt like an expanded version of a Twilight Zone episode. As it was wrapping up, I was expecting to hear Rod Serling’s distinctive narration giving a word of wisdom and warning.

“…when you pass by that carnival make sure you steer clear or you too may find yourself trapped on the Ferris Wheel of the afterlife… in the Twilight Zone.”