Silent Night, DEADLY Night

"Whats wrong, you just have a religious experience or something??"

Last night my friend Lindsay and I went to a showing of "Silent Night, Deadly Night" at the Loft. It was great because I've been trying to get a copy of the movie forrrever and have had no luck, so we both had never seen it before! And all we knew was that there was a killer Santa Claus in it, and that it was made in the 80s, so we HAD to see it, especially at the theatre.

The movie- Made in 1984, is about this kid Billy who sees his parents brutally murdered one Christmas Eve night by a maniac wearing a Santa Claus outfit. He spends his youth in an orphanage getting treated like real crap and is traumatized by any image of Santa. When he turns 18 he's set up with a job at a small toy store and it's here, at a Christmas party, that he SNAPS. He KILLS anyone thats been naughty (or annoying), and does so in awesome creative ways. Whats great about the killer in this one, Billy Chapman, is that he's 18 years old and VERY attractive. He's not all old and gross like all the other killers, he's cute and stuff, so it's okay when he kills people see? Haha, nah but really, the kids a looker and I wouldn't mind him being the last thing I ever saw. Even if he wasn't so good looking, it was interesting to see an 18 year old kid killing like the best of em.

Seeing this at the theatre was it's own special part of the movie. The theatre was PACKED and the audience was SO into it. Scenes that would have gotten just smirks in a private viewing got HUGE laughs and literally tons of applaud, totally deserving, it was great. The scene with the little girl that Denise is babysitting was especially awesome. Blast!!!

Everyone loved it, awesome movie. Plus now I'm totally in the holiday spirit, nice!

"Joyride"

Or: "How I found something great and learned to shoegaze from a mediocre movie".

And when I say "mediocre" I mean "I liked it!". Last week, on thursday, I was looking through the movies on OnDemand's FearNet channel. After watching "You Better Watch Out!", a christmas set horror movie with a killer santa clause, I thought it'd be cool to watch "Joyride", don't ask. Thinking I was about to watch that one scary movie with Paul Walker and the semi-truck, the "Joyride" I was actually about to watch was very, very different. It's this 1996 film starring Tobey Maguire and that one girl from Felicity (Amy Hathaway!), and this other guy. It's about this teenaged motel clerk (Maquire) who steals one of his guest's car one night with his friends, for a joyride, and the car turns out to be that of a female assassins!! No joke! Very 96, about a step up from the trash level of "The Doom Generation", and the acting is funny. So I enjoyed it very much. The best thing about it though was its SOUNDTRACK, which is just awesome. I liked a few of the songs throughout the movie and when the credits rolled I figured I should see who some of the artists were for fun. I wrote down like, all the names, and noticed that pretty much every artist was signed to 4AD, which is the label that originally took in the Breeders, and I was intrigued. Long story short- I did a few amazon seaches, dl a ton of albums, read some stuff, dl more, and noooow I'm like a bona fide shoegazing shoegazer!! Haha, the soundtrack included artists like Lush, Pale Saints, Spirea X, and Swallow. I didn't know it then, but these are all bands that were pretty well loved in the shoegaze community around the early 90s, and have all made some really incredible music. From there I got into Rollerskate Skinny, Chapterhouse, and Slowdive, also very popular with the shoegaze kids, and also all very good. I can't get enough of them! And I feel I've only scratched the surface of this thing called Shoegaze. Not like it's hard to love though, it's all washey and dreamy and noisey, with beautiful melodies and whispers and all, but it's sure got me hooked. It's pretty funny, last thursday I hadn't even heard of any of these bands, and now I prob couldn't live without em. And all from some cheap movie on tv that I had no intention of ever watching! It's great!! I love movies!!

Where I'll go from here I have no idea, yeah i'm a changed man now. Well not really haha, but it's still awesome the things movies can do for you, even when you don't expect it. It's all magic...

Burning 4 U, Jason Alexander

Tonight I watched the 1981 slasher flick The Burning. Directed by Tony Maylam, it's got the basic 80s slasher film plot, and the basic 81 slasher film GORE. So basically- Its AWESOME. It also has a foxy 21 year old Jason Alexander (with hair!!), Tom Savini on special effects, a very eeriee synthy 80s score, over-sized shirts and baseball tees galore, and LOTS of boobs. Thats not the best part though, the best part is that Holly Hunter is in it and you would never even know it! In fact, I still don't even know which girl she was!! and I watched the entire thing! It's great!

Plot is simple- One night at Camp Blackfoot, a group of boys decide to give the nasty ol caretaker Cropsy a good, mean ol scare. They do this by leaving a flaming, worm infested skull on his dresser as he sleeps, and then awaking him by tapping on his window. The plan, surprisingly, goes horribly wrong and leaves mean ol Cropsy looking like some melted macaroni and cheese. Icky. Five years pass and Crispy is finally ready to be released from the hospital, and apparently ready for some sweet, sweet revenge, too.

The rest of the picture is set at a summer camp, revolving around a new set of fresh-faced, fun teens. The killing begins, and so goes another slasher movie. It isn't terribly original, but are many slashers movies? Or many horror movies for that matter? In some ways I found it to be a lot more effective than Friday the 13th, which is obviously very similar, although that could be just because I've seen Friday a million times now. Still though, I found a lot to love in this one, and overall just a lot more enjoyable than the first Friday the 13th. Maylam does a good job of keeping the kids around for awhile, which is nice, letting the mayhem begin when the kids go on a canoeing trip rather than just when wondering around the camp. I was watching the commentary after and what the director says is really true- save for one or two obnoxious assholes, all of the characters are extremely likeable and great, and it hurts to see them go. The effects are obviously amazing, and the movie is also full of some great jump moments that really scare, too, with one that'll prob make you spill your pepsi all over like I did. Excellent!

When the film was released in 81 it was docked with the Video Nasty term, a name given to films that were extremely explicit and like, really gross. And it's true, this one really delivers the nasty goods, so to speak, and it's wonderful. What is also wonderful is that now I'm able to refer to my bed as Bed Nasty because I spilt pepsi all over my comforter, and thats pretty gross!

And I was joking when I said that Holly Hunter was the greatest part about the movie, as if that could ever happen, hahaha. No really, the greatest part about it is the foxy 21 year old Jason Alexander, because it proves that every star in the 80s was attractive. And that I have crushes on the weirdest people.

Other things of note- this was Miramax's first film, and the Weinstein brothers were behind it! Nice! Yes, the raft scene IS incredible, and the fade to red was especially beautiful. Also, this is NOT Friday the 13th, but if you see this movie alone...You'll never be the same again!!! Nor will your favorite comforter!!! So thanks Jason Alexander, and thank you Burning.

Oreos, Slushees, and "Lolita"...

I'm not sure why, but when I rented Stanley Kubrick's "Lolita" yesterday, despite really wanting to see it, I was a little put off by it's length. Not because a 2 and a half hour film is that hard to get through, but because a 2 and a half hour Kubrick film can be hard to get through, haha. What was there in A Space Odyssey, like 20 minutes of that one shot of monkeys or something? Haha, not to say thats bad, obviously, if I had been able to get through all of 2001 yet...I'd probably say it's really good!! Lol, I loved Clockwork, Full Metal Jacket, and looove The Shining, like every one should. These are obviously just pure, well made films. I guess I just wasn't ready for a story as interesting as "Lolita" to put me to sleep. Well, fortunately, I was completely wrong!! Ha, "Lolita" was 2 and a half hours of straight, well paced goodness!!

The film, released in 1962, is apparently really tame compared to the novel, which is really racey, due to the time it was released and the strict censorship laws around at that time. Some might say this hurts the film, but it didn't really bother me. It's not hard to figure out whats about to go down when the screen fades to black, ha. I didn't mind seeing Humbert as a sympathetic character, either. A man who just happens to fall in love with this bracing, blistering young girl. It almost seems that, in the film anyway, it was Lolita herself that took the relationship from lust to love, not Humbert. I'm not sure how it plays out in the novel, but I wonder that if Lolita hadn't initiated anything...would anything have ever happened? Humbert seemed more fascinated with her, and it was Lo that took that to the next level. Humbert's obsession on the other hand....well, lets say he gots it baaaad, and this is not good. It makes for an interesting story though!! And pretty much drives most of the film. Back to my point though, I really love that the film doesn't explain how or why he becomes so obsessed with Lolita, which he does in a matter of seconds, something I've read the novel does do. Do we all really know exactly how or why we become enamored with some of the people that we do? No, and it always really does happen in a matter of seconds, too.

The character of Lolita herself, film version anyway, is just incredible. She's cute, she's bratty, she's smart. She's the kind of girl who at 14, has already got herself completely figured out. She's like part Donna and part Lux Lisbon...and aren't those the two greatest types of girls? Humbert knows whats up, too bad he's not, you know, a freshman in highschool haha. Anyway, Sue Lyon plays her perfectly, and I think she half way makes her. Noone else could have done it as good, I'm sure of it. She's awesome.

Looking back, I'm not sure if it was coke sippin bombshell Lolita or and the amazing appearence of Lolita Coleslaw that sealed the deal for me, but I loved it!!

Great film, the cherry slushee and oreos I had during it were delicious too. Boy do I like a well paced Kubrick movie...