Channeling Bruce

I can't believe that I haven't written about this season's version of "American Horror Story: Coven" before now. Because holy hot hell, this show is on fire (literally) this season. 

I suppose because they are the most visible, I should start by talking about the cast. I don't know a director who wouldn't gladly give up a yank of hair or a few drops of blood to work with any and all of the amazing actors who've ever been a part of this show, but this cast in particular is... well, a director's wet dream. 

First off, there's the returning ensemble, headed by the astonishing Jessica Lange as the 'Supreme' Salem witch, Fiona and last season's star, Sarah Paulson as her daughter, Cordelia. Season one's burn victim (the highly underrated character actor Denis O'Hare) is back, this time as a cross-dressing, tongueless, necrophiliac version of Riff-Raff along with Taissa Farmiga as Zoe, the obvious 'Supreme-in-Waiting;' Lily Rabe as the Stevie Nicks-obsessed healer Misty; Jamie Brewer as a telepath with Downs; Evan Peters as the Teenage Frankenstein Frat Boy with rage issues and the glorious Frances Conroy in crazy flowing costumes, cat's eye spectacles and a crimped-to-death ginger fright-wig, as Fiona's mortal enemy Myrtle. 

As if that wasn't enough, add Academy Award winner Kathy Bates as the most vile woman in the history of New Orleans who has been cursed with eternal life by Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau (Angela Bassett!); Academy Award nominee Gabourey Sidibe as a 'Human Voodoo Doll;' Emma Roberts as a Pyrokenetic; gay imp Leslie Jordan as a member of the coven's High Council and Patti Freakin' Lupone as the holier-than-thou Uber-Christian new neighbor... Every director in Hollywood should be pounding on Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuck's door, begging on their knees and offering up blood sacrifices to direct an episode of this show.

Of course, the best cast and director in the world mean little if the writing isn't up to snuff. Season One was daring and amazing and creepy and sexy and fairly linear, with glimpses into the past to fill in the gaps while maintaining a fairly singular plot. Season two, on the other hand -- while still amazing -- was a bit all over the place, taking on too many subjects for one story. There was alien abduction; sadistic nuns; demonic possession; Nazi experiments; lesbian empowerment and two serial killers!

'Coven' marks a return to the more focused story line of season one, this time telling the story of an old rivalry between witches forced to move south from Salem and the Voodoo witches who followed, soon after. Fiona is the headmistress of a witch boarding school, run in her long absence by Cordelia. When Zoe (Farmiga) is brought to the school after killing her boyfriend with sex, Fiona returns and all sorts of hell breaks loose. This season's writing team has just amped it up again, giving these incredible actors some powerful scenes and unironic (unless it needs to be) genre dialog.

Which brings me to why this post is titled "Channeling Bruce."  

SPOILERS AHEAD 

Last week's Halloween episode ended with Cordelia having acid thrown in her eyes at a bar while the school was surrounded by zombies raised by Marie in revenge for the death of the minotaur Bastian.  This week, while Fiona waited at the hospital for word on Cordelia, Zoe stepped up and took control at the school. And as Fiona was wandering the hospital and resurrecting a dead child for another grieving mother, Zoe took up a chainsaw and went nuts on the zombies, channeling Bruce Campbell in his most gloriously blood-covered glee and all I could think was "Zoe went Ash on AHS!" Too much?

Holy crap, I almost forgot about Danny Huston! Keep the brilliance coming, boys! So glad that FX has already announced Season 4!  I can think of a certain East Coast legend they could explore...

If you aren't watching "American Horror Story: Coven," you're missing some truly extraordinary television. Forgive me for repeating myself, but I really want to see what happens when other genres take up AHS' 'repertory' format. And I really can't wait to see what other powerhouse actors show up for Season 4!

More, anon.
Prospero

Everything Groovy Is Bad Again

James Franco and Bruce Campbell

A movie I really wanted to like, Sam Raimi's Oz The Great and Powerful was rather disappointing and now I (as you will, soon) partially know why. 

The original Evil Dead  trilogy ended with 1992's Army of Darkness; which took the camp level up another 10 notches by making Ash (Bruce Campbell) a genius among idiots while forever cementing his status as a cult icon. And while I am a devout Raimi fan (hell, I love The Quick and the Dead), I must admit that Army of Darkness is my least favorite of the three. Unlike Evil Dead II's perfect blend of horror and slapstick, the third movie just tries a little bit too hard, if you know what I mean. Oh, don't get me wrong; it's hilarious and bizarre and horrific and evokes so many other genre films of the past, but of all of Raimi's earlier films, it is the most self-aware and consequently the least effective.

Regular readers know how much I adored Raimi's 2009 return to Horror, Drag Me to Hell. And while I was truly looking forward to seeing Raimi's visual stamp on the Oz franchise, I was truly disappointed to see the horribly over-produced mess that was Oz: The Great and... No, Not Really So 'Great,' More Like... 'Okay,' I Suppose.

Thankfully, the video embedded below helps explain at least part of what was wrong with the director's latest effort.

I somehow lost the link to the site where I found this. If you saw it somewhere else first, please let me know where. And please join me in hoping Raimi sticks to Horror from now on.

More, anon.
Prospero

Review: "Evil Dead"

Jane Levy in Evil Dead

In 1981, director Sam Raimi and his brother Ted put together a very low budget horror movie called The Evil Dead. The movie caused a bit of a sensation, despite its terrible acting and laughable effects (it also scared the crap out of Uncle P's sister). 1987's Evil Dead II wasn't so much a sequel as a deliberately funny re-make (think The Three Stooges meet The Exorcist). Raimi's last movie in the trilogy, 1992's Army of Darkness, was a full-out horror comedy, combined with a medieval fantasy. The movies made Bruce Campbell a cult star, legitimized Raimi as a director and even spawned an hilarious stage musical. All this from the simple story of five college friends who unwittingly unleash an evil force by reading from a human skin-bound book of spells. Rumors of a fourth movie have taunted fans for decades, but Raimi was busy making the original Spider-Man trilogy, the very under-appreciated Drag Me to Hell and this year's disappointing Oz the Great and Powerful. When it was announced that he would be producing (along with Campbell) a reboot, written and directed by Uruguayan director Fede Alvarez, fans were up arms. Today, Dear D and I saw the new version, and I'm happy to report that Alvarez and company (with a few exceptions) got most of it right.

Mia ("Suburgatory" star Jane Levy) is a drug addict trying to go cold turkey with the help of her brother David and their friends, who have chosen Mia and David's family cabin in the woods to seclude themselves while she goes through withdrawal. What they don't know is that the cabin was recently the site of a ritual to... well, the less said about that, the better. The performers of said ritual have left behind a dozen or so dead cats and a book wrapped in plastic and barbed wire. Unable to contain his curiosity, Eric (Lou Taylor Pucci), the scholar among the group, unwraps the book and reads aloud from it, opening the door for a terrible demonic entity which invades Mia and basically dooms them all.

Approaching the story as a full-out Horror movie mostly pays off for Alvarez, working from a script he wrote along with Rodo Sayagues and an uncredited Diablo Cody (Jennifer's Body). The four friends have vowed to keep Mia at the cabin, no matter how much she begs to go home. When she starts behaving strangely, they attribute it to withdrawal and ignore her pleas to leave. Of course, things quickly escalate and it is soon apparent that something is very wrong. The violence and gore escalate, with plenty of stabbing; gouging; shredding; dismemberment and enough blood to fill an Olympic pool (this isn't a movie for the faint of heart, kids). There are demonic voices, slamming doors and exploding mirrors; raping trees, scalding showers and more than a few homages to the original (Mia is first discovered sitting atop Ash's dilapidated car, for one). I was fine with all of it, until the movie went and used two truly ridiculous cliches that drive me crazy - SPOILERS AHEAD: Skip to the next paragraph to avoid them. Cliche #1: Nail guns cannot fire nails like a firearm! There is a safety catch on every nail gun ever made which makes this impossible. Cliche #2: Shooting a plastic gas can will never cause an explosion! Gasoline itself is flammable, but not explosive. Gasoline fumes are explosive, but require a flame or a spark to ignite them and neither can be achieved by shooting through a plastic container. I don't know why Hollywood continues to perpetrate these fallacies. They are insults to the audience's intelligence and they should go away forever (though I'm sure they won't). 

The actors in the new version are certainly better than in Raimi's original, with Levy going all-out to make Mia as different as possible from the character she plays on "Suburgatory." Shiloh Fernandez (Deadgirl: Red Riding Hood) is fine as David, Mia's conflicted brother. Pucci (Carriers); Jessica Lucas (Coverfield) and newcomer Elizabeth Blackmore are all more than competent in what must have been physically demanding roles. Alvarez's direction takes several cues from Raimi's original, including running shots through the woods and close-ups of painful-looking slicing and dicing. D and I both winced more than a few times at the imagined pain the characters were put through (not that she would, but my dear Q should avoid this one at all costs). Alvarez thankfully eschews CG imagery and opts for physical FX which far outshine Raimi's original efforts. All in all, I had a great time, though D was disappointed at the lack of camp. *** (Three Out of Four Stars). And fans of the original should stay for a special Easter Egg after the credits.

On a personal note, I was horrified to see a family bring a young boy who couldn't have been more than 8 or 9 to see this movie. Inappropriate on so many levels for such a young kid, I hope they are kept awake all night by the boy's nightmares. Evil Dead is rated a hard "R" for language and extreme gore, violence and horror. Anyone who brings a child to see it should be reported for abuse.

Oh - One more thing... why do filmmakers allow trailers to contain material which doesn't actually appear in the final cut? 

More, anon.
Prospero

Two Very Different Tales of Horror

Jane Levy ("Suburgatory") in The Evil Dead

After five and a half years, regular readers know how much I love Horror Movies and how much I loathe hypocritical homophobes. Yet, they have something very much in common: they're both scary, though in very different ways.

Horror Movies are escapist nonsense, tapping into fear of not just death, but losing control of the circumstances surrounding our lives. Fighting against forces from beyond; escaping and/or killing the homicidal maniac; sending the demon(s) back to hell or beating the devil at his own game allows us a vicarious sense of empowerment. And even when a Horror Movie ends with the villain(s) victorious, we know that when the lights come up in the auditorium at the end we have survived and our own lives are better than the victims of the maniac/demon/ghost/monster that killed all those horny teenagers.

The same can't be said for the hypocritical homophobe. These people are far more insidious than any film monster, gnawing away at the truth like sewer vermin and spewing their own self-loathing in an attempt to feel better about themselves, regardless of the pain and suffering of their targets. Such behavior couldn't be more apparent than what 'Reverand' Joseph Sciambra (who claims to not only be an 'ex-gay' but a former gay 'porn star) has to say in the repellant video (via) posted below (probably NSFW):

Yes, most professional sex-trade workers probably suffer from low self-esteem -- though I personally know of at least one retired adult performer who loved what he did while he was doing it. Still, without the right mindset, porn actors rarely end up as successes in their later lives. But that certainly doesn't mean any one of them gave 'anal birth' to demons. Sciambra (obviously still gay, despite his claims of 'redemption') proves my point with his looney claims. The dangerous notion that one can change sexuality through prayer continues to be one of the leading causes of suicide among young LGBT people who feel guilt at having failed to live up to the ridiculous religious standards set by their families and churches. I can't imagine anything scarier than hating myself just for being who I am.

Personally, I prefer my horror to be gory, gruesome and fictional. I was living in CA when Sam Raimi's The Evil Dead was released in 1981 and my (very liberal) Christian sister called to tell me about the 'scariest movie' she'd ever seen. Of course, I had to go. Imagine my surprise and disappointment at seeing a rather silly, low-budget movie that hardly made any sense at all. It wasn't until Raimi's 1987 satirical sequel that I truly appreciated what he and his brothers were trying to say about the genre. And while I do have a special place in my heart for Army of Darkness, the concept had pretty much been reduced to the equivalent of a Three Stooges haunted house short by the time it was released. Indeed, that was long before "This is my boomstick!" became an internet meme.

Of course, the musical stage version of Evil Dead was nothing short of brilliant and remains on my short list of shows I desperately want to direct:

When it was announced that a reboot was on the way, I joined the haters in denouncing the need for it. But having now seen the red-band trailer for director Fede Alverez's film, I think I have to take back everything I said about it, previously. Given the advances in SFX technology and the support of Raimi and original star (and genre legend) Bruce Campbell, I honestly cannot wait to see the new version of the story. The trailer, in all it's gory glory, is below, though I must caution those who are the least bit squeamish.

I've already scheduled a long-awaited man-date with my friend James, to see the new version. I can't wait!

More, anon.
Prospero

Drag Me to Sam Raimi

Director Sam Raimi has always had a distinctive style. For those of you only familiar with his Spider-Man films, I suggest you might want to check out his upcoming return to horror, the genre that made his career, Drag me to Hell. Allison Lohman (Big Fish; Beowulf) stars as Christine, a young loan officer who is bucking for a promotion and in the process, denies a mortgage extension to an old woman who turns out to be a lamia, a female demon who curses Christine to be literally dragged to hell for all eternity. Her boyfriend (Mac commercials cutie and Live Free or Die Hard co-star Justin Long), doesn't believe in curses, though he may be on his way to changing his mind. Check out the trailer:

I'm most excited to see this film because it heralds Raimi's return to his horror roots. He first made a splash with the indie horror film The Evil Dead n 1981. But it was the sequel (actually, more of a comedic re-make), Evil Dead II: Dead by Dawn that garnered him a cult following (along with its star, Bruce Campbell). Some critics have described Evil Dead II as "The Exorcist meets The Three Stooges"

Raimi's first foray into the superhero genre, 1990's Darkman starred Liam Neesom as a disfigured scientist who creates artificial skin, allowing him to assume any identity he wants and Raimi learned many of the tricks he would employ in Spider-Man while making it. Next came the third in the Evil Dead series, Army of Darkness. Personally, I think Raimi pushed the comedic envelope a little too far here. It's an amusing film, but disappointing on many levels. I think they all just tried too hard to be funny, and forgot the horror.

After Army..., Raimi switched genres and made The Quick and the Dead, a western starring Sharon Stone; Russel Crowe; Leonardo DiCaprio; Gary Sinise and a fellow we would eventually come to know as "Jigsaw," Tobin Bell. Critically derided, it featured Raimi's signature travelling POV shots and plenty of dark humor. And I'm probably one of maybe 10 people who actually like it. He followed up with A Simple Plan, based on Scott Smith's (The Ruins) novel, which is just a terrific movie about greed and how it can destroy us. Then in 2000, Raimi made a quiet little horror movie, The Gift, starring Cate Blanchett as a small town Southern psychic caught up in a murder plot. Giovanni Ribisi, Greg Kinnear, Keanu Reeves and Katie Holmes are among the supporting cast and it's the first time Raimi cast the excellent character actor J.K. Simmons, who would go on to play J. Jonah Jameson in the Spider-Man franchise. Raimi is set to next write and direct a big-budget a re-make of The Evil Dead, according to IMDb, to be followed by Spider-Man 4. And in case his work as a writer/director wasn't enough, you should also know that Mr. Raimi is also responsible for bringing us Kevin Sorbo and Lucy Lawless as Hercules and Xena, respectively, to the small screen (c'mon boys and girls, you they're hot!)

I have to also admit, Raimi is responsible for inspiring my most recent favorite musical "Evil Dead: The Musical." You'll find two clips below. The first is an hilarious commercial for the Toronto revival (watch the arm on the lower left of the screen). And the second is a bunch of scenes set to the show's opening number, "Cabin in the Woods."

If you only know Raimi's work on the Spider-Man franchise, I seriously suggest you get caught up on his full body of work. Sam Raimi may well be the best unknown director working today. I know I'll be first in line on May 29th for Drag Me to Hell. Wild horses couldn't drag me away (sorry, couldn't help myself there).

More, anon.

Prospero