Retro Review: "Battle Royale"

Over the years, several friends and fellow cinephiles have been telling me I had to see Kinji Fukasaku's 2000 Sci-Fi-Action-Splatter mashup, Battle Royale. Obviously an influence on Suzanne Collins' hugely successful YA novel "The Hunger Games" and its sequels, the tale is set in a dystopian future Japan where crime is at an all-time high, committed by bored and dangerous teenagers. The government passes the "BR Act" which calls for a class of 42 ninth-graders to be randomly selected each year and then taken to to a deserted island and made to fight one another to death, until only one is left standing. If by dawn on the third day, more than one is left alive then all are killed via the explosive monitor necklaces around their necks. 

They are each given basic supplies and a 'weapon' of some kind, not all of which are particularly useful (a pot lid and a set of binoculars, for example), or are they? Some are much deadlier; sharp and/or explosive. Some kids vow to find a way out without fighting and a few immediately bail and take their own lives. Pacifist Nanahara vows to protect sweet Noriko and they soon make an unlikely alliance with "exchange student" Kawada, who is surprisingly well-versed in all sorts of things, including emergency first-aid, weapons and survival techniques, claiming his father was both a doctor and a sailor. Other alliances form and fall apart and the number quickly dwindles from the original 42. The violence is brutal and unforgiving, though as in many Japanese splatter movies, the blood sprays often seem a bit Pythonesque. And while it's not always easy to judge the acting in a foreign language film, it seemed to me the young cast did a fine job with dialog that often translated quite hilariously, which unsurprisingly is part of what made it work so well. I only hope it's as funny in Japanese as it is in the subtitled version I saw tonight.

While hardly a Turkey, it was also loads of fun to riff MST3K-style with my sweet, Elvin friend Joel* (who I haven't seen in ages and who came down from NYC just to see me and spend time with me today and I love him very much for doing so!), who is one of the people who has been telling me I should see it for 13 years... D'oh!

Hilarious; sick; violent and an undeniable comment on the Human Condition and the power of the survival instinct, Battle Royale is a must-see for my regular readers who haven't done so, yet. I'm just sorry I waited so long. Composer Masamichi Amano brilliantly augments his score with well-known and ironic passages of European Classic music. The effect is often quite stunning.  It was almost immediately apparent why this film is a modern cult classic and I now must seek out it's sequel. ***1/2 (Three and a Half Out of Four Stars).

*I picked Joel up at the Hamilton Train station after working one of my two mandatory Saturdays a year at the Day Job and he accompanied me on a few errands and then home where I made us lunch (Vodka Penne); he tried to convince me to take up Vikram yoga -- Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha! --  and we watched movies on Netflix (thanks for helping me set that up, Sis!). We later ordered Chinese delivery for dinner. When it arrived, the very familiar owner was delivering and he could see the TV. "Oh! You're watching an Asian movie?" he asked, surprised.

"Yes. 'Battle Royale,'" Joel and I both said.

"Oh. I don't know. I don't watch that crap!"

I haven't grinned so hardily in several weeks. Thanks again, Joel! Love you! And I promise to be in NYC soon!

More, anon.
Prospero

Filthy Birthday to John Waters!

John Waters c.1969

Guerrilla filmmaker; trash auteur; social commenter and hilarious purveyor of outrageousness, Baltimore's favorite trashy son John Waters turns 67 today. Waters is single-handledly responsible for the career of plus-sized drag impresario Divine in his underground films of the late 60's and early 70's, while continuing to push the envelope after having gone more 'mainstream.' in the 80's and 90's.

Like many Waters' devotees, I first discovered his work in college in the 80's and his infamous (and career-making) Pink Flamingos. I remember renting it over Christmas break and watching it while my then teen-aged sister was baking cookies (even then, she was Little Betty Crocker). I kept telling her "Stay in the kitchen..." more than a few times. I haven't seen since, but have seen just about every other Waters' film available on VHS, DVD or on line. Some are very good (Cry-Baby; Serial Mom); some are fair to middling (Pecker; Cecil B. Demented) and one or two are downright terrible (A Dirty Shame). 

Regular readers know that I was lucky enough to play Edna Turblad (a character created by Waters and Divine) in a rather tumultuous though ultimately successful production of the musical version of Hairspray last year. If pressed to name my favorite Waters' movie, I'd have to split into three:

Of his early films, 1977's Desperate Living is probably the most insanely brilliant films of Waters' early works. He manages to create his personal version of Oz (he admits that The Wizard of Oz is the most influential film he's seen) in Mortville, a cardboard kingdom of criminals and perverts ruled by an insane Queen. One of Waters' few earlier films that did not feature Divine,  Desperate Living is certainly among  the most entertaining of his underground films. The trailer below is decidedly NSFW:

After 1988's Hairspray opened Waters to the mainstream, he made two more movies I absolutely adore.

1990's Cry-Baby is Waters' Rock-a-Billy musical parody starring a very young Johnny Depp in the title role and former porn-star Traci Lords in a Romeo & Juliet parody set in 1950's Baltimore. There are some amazing performances from  Polly Bergen; Amy Locane; Susan Tyrrell; Iggy Pop; Ricki Lake; Troy Donahue and even Willem Dafoe. That's not mention one of the best prison-set musical numbers since "Jailhouse Rock":

Probably my favorite Waters' film, Serial Mom is his 1994 parody of Suburban Perfection and sociopathology. Starring Kathleen Turner; Sam Waterston; Ricki Lake; Matthew Lillard; Traci Lords and a very unfortunate Patty Hearst, Serial Mom is Waters' first real (and only successful) exploration of filth in Surburbia:

Waters continues to write and lecture and can be seen in the documentary version of his one-man show, This Filthy World:

Happy Birthday, John!

More, anon,
Prospero

Science Fiction Double Feature

Tim Curry as Dr. Frank-N-Furter

Since tomorrow is the start of Shocktober here at the Revenge and I already made a joke about it in last night's post, what better movie to talk about tonight than the undisputed King of Cult Movies, The Rocky Horror Picture Show?

I was introduced to the movie in the summer of 1977, when it was first taking off as a midnight phenomenon (it had proven a box-office disaster when initially released two years earlier). It was the summer between my sophomore and junior years in high school and I had scored my first paid acting job at a dinner theatre owned by the father of a man who would much later become one of my dearest friends. The show was truly dreadful... some nonsense about a foreign exchange student (yours truly) being kidnapped and replaced with a professional football player. If an ASCAP rep had visited, we'd all have gone to jail - the show's writer/director (my friend's father) had simply written new lyrics to classic standards, making them fit the show's ridiculous premise. 

None of that really mattered. I was getting paid ($500.00 for the run - an enormous sum for 15 year old in 1977) and was introduced by my fellow cast members to Rocky Horror. The first night I went, they told me nothing - only that I had to see it for myself. We crossed the river into New Jersey and got in line at the long-gone Quaker Bridge Mall Cinema, where bewildered folks leaving the 10:00 shows of whatever first runs were playing, were shocked as people in line for the midnight show yelled "Lips!" and "Asshole!" and "Viesssss!" I was equally puzzled, but intrigued and excited. We finally took our seats and I was stunned as the opening number played and nearly every person in the theater sang along...

Not only did I now know what "Lips!" meant, I understood every Sci-Fi/Horror movie referenced in the lyrics. I immediately knew I was going to love this movie.

Of course, when people started yelling at the screen, throwing rice and dancing in aisles, I was beyond love. Then... oh, then... Tim Curry made his entrance (and what an entrance) and I knew I had found the only movie that actually understood me:

Transvestites? Gay sex? A hot muscle blond in a teeny bikini? And all of it a parody of classic Horror/Sci-Fi movies? They had me at "Let's Do the Time Warp Again." Here was a movie that celebrated the freak in all of us and I suddenly felt much less like a freak and much more like a special person. I finally belonged to crowd who shunned the mainstream and embraced the bizarre, even if it was only on Friday and Saturday nights at midnight.

I have no idea how many times I saw RHPS in the late 70's and early 80's. Enough to see it evolve with new shout-outs and live performances in front of the screen. I was actually interviewed by The Trenton Times while in line one night with several friends. By the time I paid nearly $100 for a VHS copy sometime in the 90's, the allure had worn off. I remember having a party the weekend I got it where one attendee yelled "Show us the midget!" every ten minutes (really?) and realizing the world had moved on. And so had I. 

But there was that brief moment of enlightenment, when I realized I wasn't alone in the world and that there were plenty of others who understood the world in the same context as I did, and I felt as though I had finally found my place in that world. And for that, I will always be grateful. Of course, insanity like this is always fun:

And let's not forget that star Tim Curry went on to play two more iconic Fantasy/Horror roles, while Susan Sarandon and Barry Bostwick have both had very respectable careers in film and television. Everyone has to start some where. And what a start for those three!

I hope each of you have had a youthful experience that let you realize it was more than okay to "Let Your Freak Flag Fly." I hold those times as among the best of my youth. And while it would be another 20 years or so before I finally let my Rainbow Flag fly for all the world to see, The Rocky Horror Picture Show was instrumental in my personal journey. Of course, the less said about its dreadful 1981 sequel, Shock Treatment, the better.

By the way - did you notice Barry "Dame Edna" Humphries among the cast? Take another look, if you didn't. Talk about rising above...

Tomorrow is the start of Shocktober here on the Revenge, and I have loads of creepy movies to talk about all month! I can't wait!

More, anon.
Prospero

The Gayest Thing You'll See This Week

This week's Gayest Thing is also quite possibly the Worst Musical Ever Made.  Thanks to my dear Stephen over at Post Apocalyptic Bohemian, who posted about producer Alan Carr's (Grease) birthday yesterday, I was flooded with memories of this 1980 stinker directed by none other than Rhoda's mom and paper-towel pitchwoman, Nancy Walker.

Can't Stop the Music tells the completely fictional story of how infamous disco group Village People came to be. Starring Valerie Perrine (Lenny; Superman: The Movie), Olympian Bruce Jenner (with his original gorgeous face), Steve Guttenberg (before he beefed up for Cocoon) and the Village People as themselves. It also featured gay icons Tammy Grimes, June Havoc and Barbara Rush.

The story is preposterous (a song writer wants to create a Disco 'Super Group') and the musical numbers are just plain ridiculous. The only reason anyone saw this movie was to ogle the literally hundreds of half-naked men in pools, gyms and various dance floors, grinding away at one another without a single mention of the words "gay," "homosexual" or "fabulous." The very closeted 19 year-old me was in awe. The very openly gay me of today is  simply appalled. Just take a look at this number, called "Do the Shake:"

Giant pornstaches; belly shirts; leather vests; short-shorts; showers and locker-rooms abound, but not once is it suggested that any of these fellows might be gay. Puh-leeze!

Is it any wonder that most of the people in this movie have fallen into obscurity? Of course, reality TV has brought Jenner back into the edges of the spotlight and insanity has kept Guttenberg from falling completely out of our collective memories. Walker passed away in 1992, and while Can't Stop the Music was her only feature film, she directed several episodes of "The Mary Tyler Moore Show," "Rhoda" and "Alice." 

If you love bad movies, half-naked men or Disco, you must add Can't Stop the Music to your Netflix queue. I only wish the folks at MST3K had been able to take a crack at this infamously bad musical, even if it actually failed to "launch the 80's."

More, anon.
Prospero

The 10 Worst Movies of 2009

This image is from an incredibly bad 50's Sci=Fi movie called The Brain from Planet Arous. The movies on my 2009 Worst list are certainly no better, though most certainly have bigger budgets and probably better production values (though I wouldn't count on the latter).

I actually only posted reviews of two of these films, mostly because I was embarrassed to admit that I had seen them. The majority were seen either On Demand or on DVD well after their initial theatrical releases. Again, I can only speak to films I have actually seen (with one exception), so there will be no mention of truly awful films like Paul Blart: Mall Cop or Miss March (which seems to top most professional critics' Top Ten Worst lists). No, these are just the 10 worst movies I saw this past year.

10. The Unborn

Screenwriter David Goyer attempts to make Judaism scary with this tale about a dybbuk seeking revenge on it's living sibling. With all apologies to my Jewish friends, but Jewish mysticism just isn't scary. Gary Oldman, James Remar, Jane Alexander and Carla Cugino should all have known better than to get involved with this mess.

9. Push

A shady government agency is out to get a hold of some young folks with extraordinary powers. Chris Evans and Dakota Fanning star in a movie already made by Brian DePalma.

8. The Ugly Truth

Please will someone tell Gerard Butler that he has no business making romantic comedies? Because he really sucks at them. Yeesh!

7. The Haunting in Connecticut

Supposedly based on 'true' events, this ghost story was sillier than an episode of "Happy Tree Friends." It's a shame, because I really love Virginia Madsen and think she deserves a better career.

6. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Even the presence of someone I know as an extra couldn't drag me to this mess in the theater, so I watched it on DVD. Noisy, disjointed and just as incomprehensibly plotted as the original, Transformers 2 is more of a commercial than an actual movie.

7. G.I. Joe: The Rise of COBRA

In what is possibly the least necessary toy tie-in movie ever made, Channing Tatum, Dennis Quaid, Ray Park and Arnold (The Mummy) Vosloo appear in yet another 90 minute toy commercial.

6. Friday the 13th

Marcus Nispel's "re-boot" of the 80's horror franchise explores no new territory, gives us no insights into any character and makes Steve Miner's original cheese-fest look good in comparison. The only reason to see this movie is Jared, and he never even gives us the pleasure of appearing half-naked. Boo! I wish I had spent my Memorial Day off doing almost anything else than seeing this piece of crap.

5. The Pink Panther 2

Steve Martin used to be funny. He gave it all up to become a Hollywood Whore. How sad. If a film was eaten, regurgitated, eaten again and the deposited as feces, it would have been this movie.

4. Funny People

The falsest title ever.



3. New Moon

The Twilight movies aren't just bad, they're insulting. Vampires do NOT sparkle and werewolves are NOT cute, cut and cuddly.

2. Terminator: Salvation

If you though Terminator: Rise of the Machines ruined the franchise, then take a look at director McG's turd of a movie:

1. Paranormal Activity

Made in 2007 for $11,00, Paranormal Activity was supposedly the scariest movie ever made. What it actually was, was a cheap, unscary and boring movie that tricked unsophisticated movie-goers into thinking it was much better than it was.

"What Kind of Idiotic Joke Is This?"

I have no idea who Claudio Fragasso is, or if he even exists. He has a lot of credits (including Terminator 2) under a lot of different names, which leads me to believe he may well be the Italian equivalent of Alan Smithee. And this infamously bad movie (made under the name Drake Floyd) may be the pinnacle of Fergasso's career -- and will forever cement him in my mind as the Italian Uwe Boll.

A family moves to the town with the unlikely name of Nilbog (Goblin, spelled backwards - but shouldn't it really be Llort?). Grandpa Seth has been telling young Joshua tales of trolls and goblins which turn out to be true, even if Grandpa is really dead. Bad writing; bad acting; bad special effects; bad soundtrack; bad editing; bad sound; bad sets; bad costumes and bad direction all equal a truly putrescent piece of celluloid rubbish so awful, it has the biggest cult following since Rocky Horror...

There's even a brilliant documentary about, called Best Worst Movie, written and directed by Joshua himself, Michael Stephenson:

I'm waiting for Best Worst Movie to come out on DVD.

I did find this amusing compilation of scenes from Troll 2:

And here's the original trailer:



Oh, dear. Can anyone deny this movie's craptitude? Four and a Half Drumsticks.

More crap, anon.
Prospero

Heads Up

I know I've briefly mentioned a movie that absolutely freaked out my sister, to the point where even the humming of it's sappy 70's theme song "It's Incredible," sung by Bobby Doyle, would drive her screaming from the room. I believe she was maybe five when we saw this movie at a drive-in with our parents. I have no idea what the other picture was. I certainly remember thinking it was bad, even then. Of course, ten years later I learned to appreciate its stank in a completely different way.

And since I'm on a Bad Movie jag, I ran across the trailer for The Incredible 2 Headed Transplant and thought I'd talk about it a bit, which I will in a sec - because as I started thinking about this movie, I realized there are lots and lots of bad Head movies - some of them are about multi-headed horrors, many of them are about detached heads, kept alive through the science of a mad genius and still some of them are beyond description.

The Incredible 2 Headed Transplant (or TI2HT as it shall hence be called), has the distinction of having some surprising talent among it's cast, chiefly Bruce Dern as the mad scientist who is experimenting on animal head transplantation. Why? Who knows? It seemed like a good idea at the time, I suppose. Somehow (I seem to have blocked most of it's plot from my memory, and for good reason I am sure), he ends up grafting the head of a criminally insane killer onto the body of mentally-challenged Hillbilly behemoth, with the usual disastrous results. Scooby-Doo's Shaggy, Kasey Casem is on hand as Bruce's old college buddy and Pat Priest (Marilyn on "The Munsters") is the Dumbsel in Distress. Quite simply, a terrible film from schlock-house AIP:

Of course, the following year, AIP came back with the same plot, this time grafting the head of a rich, White bigot onto the body of an African-American behemoth in The Thing with Two Heads. The once-great Ray Milland (The Lost Weekend; The Uninvited) is reduced to a comic foil alongside former NFL star Rosie Greer in a patently ridiculous exploitation movie:

Of course, long before either of those movies, two Americans made a 1959 Japanese horror movie called The Manster, about a man who (once again, thanks to a mad scientist) literally grows a second version of himself, starting with a boil that turns out to be an eye growing on his shoulder. Eventually, a head pops out and finally the new, evil version seperates itself, completely. The movie is paid homage by Sam Raimi in Army of Darkness, and was the inspiration for a two-headed man costume that won me three "Scariest Costume" awards when I was about 9, or so. Mom gave me a Styrofoam wig head which I decorated with paint and plastic face parts and a wig from Woolworth's and she helped me attach it to my shoulder with masking tape, if I remember. I wish I could have found footage from this film. If anyone knows of a site where I can get some, please let me know.

And while two heads may be creepy, one head can be pretty awful, all by itself. Take The Brain That Wouldn't Die, please. (Sorry, had to). A mad scientist (are you sensing a pattern, here?) is speeding with his fiancee in the car resulting in a wreck which decapitates the poor young lady. Of course, being a mad scientist in love, he takes her head back to his lab and hooks it up to wires and fluids and voila! she is alive (sort of). As the charming fellow tries to find a replacement body onto which he can transplant his beloved's coconut, she develops a psychic connection to her beloved's last experiment, a mutant kept chained behind a door. This 1962 piece of crap makes for a delightfully hilarious episode of MST3K:

And a head isn't always necessary... often, just a brain will do, as in 1963's They Saved Hitler's Brain (aka The Madmen of Mandoras):

The brain might even be invisible without the aid of special equipment. Hell, it might even have antennae:

Mmmm! Flying, giant, slimy-looking stop-motion braaaaiiiiinnnssss!

So, are two heads actually better than one? I suppose it all depends on your perspective. Personally, it doesn't matter, because a Head movie will never be good (unless it's a joke on "Futurama"). And while two heads aren't necessarily any worse, one can be pretty awful. Of course, there is one really bad Head movie that actually scares me:

More, anon.
Prospero

Did I Actually Just see That?

Two years ago, as part of my "Secret Santa" at work, a co-worker who knows me all too well gave me a DVD of the movie Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter. As you can see from the picture (and the embedded clips below), I am not making this up. Needless to say, I did not watch it, but put it in my collection in the hopes that no one would notice it was there. Of course, like the undead, it wouldn't stay buried forever. So tonight, as part of My Dear D's birthday celebrations, we watched Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter and were thoroughly entertained by its total awfulness.

After an intro featuring the Rasputin-ish "Ivan Freud" standing in amidst what looks like a marijuana grove, the real 'movie' starts. I'll try and make sense of it's plot for you. Vampires have become impervious to sunlight (we later find out this is because of skin-grafts from a mad scientist/doctor/looney) and are now feeding on Ottawa's LGBT community. Well, mostly lesbians, just so the filmmakers could include shots of lesbian kissing. The vampires think this is the perfect group to target since "they are deviants and won't be missed." Of course, nothing pisses Jesus off more than vampires killing lesbians, so He returns in the form Canadian "actor" Phil Caracas. After his first encounter with the vampires at a lake (featuring a mohawked-priest who blesses the lake so Jesus can throw the vampires in it), He gets a shave, haircut and a #8-gauge ear piercing. Who wouldn't? Then there's a big musical number with the citizens of Ottawa, featuring go-go girls and a skateboard (my hand to God).

Not long after moving into an apartment above a church, Jesus meets Mary Magnum, a pleather-wearing vampire hunter who takes him to a second-hand store for less conspicuous looking clothes. Oh, yeah - first, Jesus stops at a local hardware store to buy firewood to carve into stakes (I only wish I was making this up). Of course, this is right after Jesus has an encounter with a group of atheists in the world's first Clown Car Jeep in one the most pathetically choreographed fight scenes, ever:

Apparently, the head atheist had a coconut in his belly!

It goes on in much the same way, filled with horrendously ridiculous "special effects" (we particularly liked the medical tubing "veins" and panty-hose "intestines"). Jesus takes a terrible beating by the vampires at Dr. Preatorious' clinic and is rescued by a hairy transvestite Good Samaritan who is never seen again. Eventually, Jesus hooks up with Mexican wrestling star Santos and the weirdly silent Gloria Oddbottom (a woman whose gigantic ass is groped at every opportunity - even by Jesus) to battle the vampires in a junkyard, while simultaneously fighting the lumpy Dr. Preatorious at his clinic. But Jesus, being merciful, heals the vampires and sends Santos back to Mexico with his new bi-sexual ex-vampire girlfriend. WTF?!!!

If you've never seen Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter, I wouldn't recommend that you do - unless you're really in the mood to laugh at some pathetic acting, ridiculous dialog ("You're all up in the Kool-Aid and you don't even know what flavor it is") and the worst special effects that $40k Canadian can buy (in 2001, that was about $6.57 U.S.). I know that director Lee Demarbre and writer Ian Driscoll (who also plays a vampire named "Johny Golgotha") were trying to make a comedy. Sadly, Jesus Christ Vampire Slayer is funny for all the wrong reasons. Could Demarbre be the Canadian Ed Wood?

The best part of the movie? Probably it's haunting theme song: "Everyone Gets Laid Tonight." That, and the fact not one character is surprised or intimidated by the fact that Jesus has returned to Earth. "Body of Christ," indeed.

More, anon.
Prospero

The Night HE Came Home...

I bet you thought I was waiting until the 31st for this one, didn't ya? Nyah-nyah, fooled you!

Still, how can one have 'Shocktober' without mentioning the movie that's named for the holiday which has become a bizarre and gruesome celebration of all that is bizarre and gruesome. I guarantee that for every Fairy Princess, Philly, Yankee, Barack
and Transformer at your door tomorrow evening, there will be six vampires, 3 zombies, a werewolf, a Jason Voorhees and Michael Myers.

Director John Carpenter and co-writer Deborah Hill wrote and produced the movie that practically started a subgenre with their "Mad Killer On the Loose" horror movie, Halloween. I was 16, but passed for just old enough and went to see the movie all my friends were talking about. I was fine during the movie, but when I had to come home to a darkened house that night... I'll admit that turned on all the lights when I got there.

What is it about this movie that works so well? Practically everything, thank you. First there's Carpenter's and Hill's script: simple and suspenseful, with mostly believable late-70's "teen-speak" dialogue. Then there's the star-making performance of Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie. The first official "Final Girl," Laurie not only saves the two children in her charge, she also survives to fight the monster again.

And what a monster! We know his name is Michael, but he's referred to in the credits as "The Shape." His own psychaitrist, Dr. Loomis, has declared him to be 'pure evil' and he wears the mosy anonymous (and consequently infamous) mask he can find. His only desire is to kill and when he does so, it is with the dispassion of a coroner dissecting a corpse; cold, clinical and a bit curious. The Boogeyman, indeed.

As many before me have noted, the actual blood and gore in Halloween is practically non-existant, but the tension Carpenter manages to build is as high as in any Hitchcock thriller. Inferior (and even completely unrelated) sequels and remakes aside, Carpenter's first film still works 31 years later because its about character and suspense, rather than gore and special makeup effects. Classics are categorized as such for a reason, and Halloween certainly meets all of my (and just about everyone else's) criteria. Without it, Jason and Freddy would never have become the icons they did and movies like Saw and Hostel wouldn't even exist.

And you gotta love that Tommy and Lyndsey are watching a movie that Carpenter would re-make to much later acclaim, The Thing. Good times.

Boo!
A special Samhain terror, anon!
Prospero

The Blair Witch Project, or: How to Change Marketing Forever

Ten years ago (is it really 10 years?) a little no-budget horror film took the US by storm. The Blair Witch Project starred complete (and still) unknown actors, working from a mostly improvised script, relying on hand-held cameras and a director who who basically terrorized his cast for several days in the Maryland woods.

The production company, Haxan, knew they had something extraordinary on their hands. But how to market it? Some genius at Haxan (many have taken credit), decided to use the burgeoning Internet to take their film to the public, and the very first Viral Advertising Campaign was born.

Blair Witch had been a midnight fave at Sundance, but it was the Internet that really set it aflame. Some people (okay, a lot of people) thought it was real. The supposed 'found footage' of three documentarians who had disappeared while making a movie about a local Maryland legend went on to be the most successful independent feature film, ever.

I saw it first with a group of friends in rural New Jersey, and had to drive home through a mostly wooded region, afterwards. And I will be the first to admit that that ride home was extremely nerve-wracking. I remember thinking about a third of the way through the movie, "Enough! Leave them alone!" As an avid camper, the movie hit a nerve and I completely identified with the perils faced by the young protagonists. The best trailer I could find has Dutch or Swedish subtitles, but you get the idea:

The movie itself induced either terror or nausea, depending on one's sensibilities. In my case, I was scared silly. I saw it again with my then boyfriend, Rik, who I thought was going to pull my arm off (and yes, his name was really Rik) in fear. Needless to say, we cuddled a bit closer that night.

Like the best horror films (The Haunting) we never actually see anything in The Blair Witch Project. We hear lots of creepy stuff and we see glimpses of what may or may not horrific images, but there are no CGI ghosts or demons; no gore or splattered brains; no psychopaths waiting behind closed doors. And in those final moments, we see poor Mike standing in a basement corner while a terrified Heather screams, just before her camera falls to the ground. We never learn what exactly happened to our trio of filmmakers. We only know that they are missing. Creepy, scary stuff, indeed.

1st person POV to the extreme, Blair Witch changed the face of film, in more ways than one, forever. And a whole bunch of movies owe it a debt of gratitude. Last year's giant monster in New York movie, Cloverfiled, owes a huge debt of gratitude to Blair Witch, as does this year's phenomenon, Paranormal Activity, both in style and marketing. If it weren't for the Internet, neither film would have been nearly as successful.

Much was expected from both the cast and crew of Blair Witch. Little has come from it, for any of them. But recently, I came across this trailer for the newest film from Blair's co-director, Eduardo Sanchez. Seventh Moon looks like it could be an interesting and effective fright flick, though like Sanchez's last project, the surprisingly good alien horror film Altered, Seventh Moon looks like it will be released direct-to-video. Here's the trailer:

I guess the point is, no matter how good your movie is, and no matter how great your marketing campaign, in Hollywood you are only as good as your last hit. And that's a shame.

More terrors, anon.
Prospero

The Indonesian Chainsaw Massacre?

Oh, the delicious stuff that's out there...

Before I talk about the two upcoming movies this post is really about, I just want to let everyone know that new cities have just been announced to hold screenings of Paranormal Activity and Philadelphia is one of them. I will pass on info (dates, theaters, cities) ASAP.

Anyway... I came across a trailer today that was quite intriguing. A Fantasy Fest favorite, the Indonesian (?!!) horror movie Darah will be released in the U.S. as Macabre (not nearly as interesting a title, and one already used by the King of the Gimmicks, William Castle).

Watch the trailer and tell me if you don't notice similarities between Darah and a certain '70's classic directed by Poltergeist's Tobe Hooper. Hmmm...

A group of travelers pick up a young woman in need of a ride, who leads them to house filled with homicidal maniac cannibals who methodically cut them up with a chainsaw. I don't know that I have ever seen any Indonesian films (in fact, I am almost certain I haven't), though I have seen trailers for foreign rip-offs (see previous post). Regardless, the trailer makes me want to see it.

Earlier in the day, I came upon this truly disturbing and inexplicable clip from a movie I can't even believe exists, The Human Centipede (via):

The worst part about this for me, is the (for lack of a better word) "eating poop" factor. I am gagging just writing about it and apologize to all of you for not warning you in advance. The fact that a production company put out good money to make this movie makes me think the world has gone completely bonkers. Why, why, why would someone write this script and why, why, WHY would someone actually pay to produce it?

Maybe this explain why that exists:

Low-budget horror at it worst, folks. Wait... Bruce Dern and Pat Priest were in that movie? Damn! He was up-and-coming... she must have been down-and-out.

On a side-note, my sister was really freaked out by this movie when she was a kid, and even the singing of it's bizarre, ballady theme song "It's Incredible," would be enough to send her shrieking into her room (and remind me to tell you about the Don't Be Afraid of the Dark trick I played on her, some time...).

More, anon.
Prospero

I Miss '70's Blaxploitation Horror

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WTF?!?!?

This is a still from a 2007 Japanese monster movie entitled (I kid you not) Big Man Japan. The eponymous hero is some kind of mutant who can apparently inflate himself to Godzilla-sized proportions in order to fight surreally weird rubber-suit monsters like the pink squid-thing in the picture (is it me, or does the look on its face imply that it is relieving itself against that cardboard skyscraper?).

Anyway, I found the trailer below on a blog I visit daily and keep meaning to mention. BitsandPieces is a fairly random, but often funny collection of flotsom and jetsom from all over the Internets. I often post YouTube clips from them on my Facebook page. They're motto is "We Search the Web, So You Don't Have To." Blogger Jonco is a pleasant gentleman from St. Louis who often incorporates some very amusing Southern philosophy into his posts. If you haven't found his blog, I urge you to go. There is certain to be something to amaze and amuse almost everyone.

And now, without further ado, the latest WTF?!?!? moment. Ladies and germs, I give you the trailer for Big Man Japan:

Truly - do we need more proof that the Japanese have lost their pop-culture minds? Between this and films like RoboGeisha, I am convinced that modern Japanese Sci-Fi/Fantasy/Horror filmmakers have rejected the perterbing and inexplicable 'J-Horror' style of the late '90's/early 00's and re-embraced the over-the-top ridiculousness of Japan's Atomic Age cinema.

Along with the Universal Monsters pantheon, I grew up on Toho Studios movies. Godzilla, Mothra, Ghidra, Rodan and Gammera were both to be feared and revered and "Ultraman" was the world's greatest giant hero (even though by age 6 I knew they were just stunt-men in latex). Like Lugosi, Karloff, Lorre. Chaney and Price, those rubber monsters were icons of my youth and certainly influenced my appreciation of both the absurd and the inept... and how they often intersect.

Hope you got a giggle out of that, at least.

More, anon.

Prospero