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Updates
French Cinema Nudity is updated.
Halloween
(2007)
The Rob Zombie remake of Halloween is not one of those Gus van Sant
frame-by-frame recreations. It is a re-imaging of the story with a strong focus
on Michael's childhood, and as such it invites us to have some compassion or at
least understanding for the killer who was just an aloof masked icon, almost a
ghost, in the original film. Yes, he's still a vicious killing machine in the
remake, but now we get some handle on why that is true.
Childhood life in Michael's white trash home consists of nothing but incessant
screaming and arguing. School life isn't any better, since Michael gets bullied
regularly and taunted about his promiscuous sister and his stripper mom. The
cumulative effect of bullying from schoolmates as well as from his no-good
lowlife stepfather finally cause Michael to snap one Halloween when he bludgeons
a bully to death, then slaughters his stepfather, his slutty sister and her
boyfriend. He spares his stripper mom and a baby sister. Although Michael takes
no responsibility for his crimes and even denies that he committed them,
institutionalization seems to go along peacefully until Michael kills a member
of the hospital staff, whereupon his mother realizes her sweet little boy will
be in the loony bin for life, and kills herself. The loss of his beloved mother
causes Michael to snap into yet another state of consciousness and he spends the
next fifteen years as a virtual vegetable, working quietly in his room painting
and gluing mask after mask.
That changes one night when two redneck warders rape a new female inmate in
Michael's bed as he glues his masks together. Something about the violence of
the incident rouses Michael from his virtual coma, and he goes on a killing
spree inside the institution, then escapes and heads back to his childhood home,
in search of the baby sister he can barely remember. She's now living as Laurie
Strode, the original Jamie Lee Curtis character.
Once Michael arrives in his home town, the film assumes more or less the same
direction as the original Halloween, with the madman killing horny teenagers by
the busload, coming ever closer to Laurie while the local sheriff and the
psychiatrist try to figure out his next move.
One of Rob Zombie's most interesting casting choices was to use Danielle Harris
as one of the horny teenagers who gets attacked. This provides some continuity
with the earlier Halloween films, because Danielle played a pre-pubescent kid in
Halloween 4 and 5. "Wait a minute," you might be thinking, "How could she have
been 12 years old in 1989, and be playing a teenager in 2007?" Fair enough
question. She did play a high school senior in Zombie's film, but she's actually
30 years old. She has an unlined face, she's very tiny, and she handled the
lines right, so she pulled it off. To tell you the truth, I never gave her age
any thought while I was watching the film. I completely bought in to her
performance as a high school girl. It was only afterward, when I was preparing
to write my comments that I looked at the math and realized that something was
amiss.
Danielle's casting was one sign among many that Zombie is a real horror fanboy
who knows his screen history. The background cast includes just about everyone
who has ever made a B movie and is still alive: Leslie Easterbrook, Danny Trejo,
Udo Kier, Clint Howard, Malcolm MacDowell, Dee Wallace, William Forsythe, Brad
Dourif, Sybil Danning, Sid Haig, Ezra Buzzington, Mickey Dolenz ... the list
goes on. I read somewhere that Adrienne Barbeau was also in this at one time,
but appears to have been left on the cutting room floor.
Zombie has delivered all the genre requirements and followed the genre
traditions meticulously to make Halloween an old school horror film in the
70s-80s style. For example, teenagers who have sex get killed, but not before we
see them naked. If you ever wake up and find yourself cast
as a teenager in a horror film, make sure you're the one who wants to study for
the priesthood. Three young couples have sex in Halloween, then get attacked.
Those characters supply
virtually 100% of the film's nudity, and Kristina Klebe goes the extra mile,
offering full frontal and rear views as well as plenty of naughty dialogue.
Unfortunately, although Halloween offers guilty pleasures to enjoy, you will
need to ignore some of the details along the way, because the script is not
punctilious. For example, Michael has attained almost superhuman strength
despite having sat in the same chair like a vegetable for 15 years. For another
example, Michael is somehow able to determine instantly that the adopted child
Laurie Strode is his long-lost sister, even though virtually nobody knows that,
including the psychiatrist who wrote a book about Michael.
Those penny-ante plot points didn't really bother me, but something else about
the film did. The biggest change from the original film is that the new script's
re-allocation of screen time refocuses the story significantly. The original
film had a very short back-story and focused on the Halloween night murders. The
new film is about 1/3 childhood, 1/3 escape night, and 1/3 home-town Halloween.
The cumulative effect of that is to make Michael the main character while
pushing Laurie Strode into the background, which in turn reduces audience
involvement and identification with the characters. There is nothing to like
about Michael, Michael's family, or the psychiatrist. The characters in the
escape night sequence are all strangers to us, and we don't much like what we do
know of them. And we don't meet the teenage version of Laurie until the film is
past the halfway mark, so we do not establish a strong empathy for her either.
That leaves the film with a void where its core should be - in establishing some
kind of bond with the audience.
- Only 26% positive reviews, and an even worse 18% from the cream of
the crop.
- The film didn't have a lot of legs, but it did have a $30 million
opening weekend on Labor Day weekend, which shattered all the records
for that time of year. It experienced a steep drop in weekend two
and failed to reach $10 million, eventually finishing with only $56
million in total after that hot Labor Day start.
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OTHER CRAP:
Catch the deluxe
version of Other Crap in real time, with all the bells and whistles,
here.
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Livre de Marie
(1990)
Le Livre de Marie (1984) or The Book of Mary is a short film included on the
DVD with Hail Mary. It is directed by a Godard disciple named Anne-Marie Miéville, and
is a portrait of a family disintegrating, and specifically how it affects the
precocious Marie, a pre-teen. Mom and Dad don't get along so they debate whether
to separate or stay
together for the sake of Marie. Finally, they split, and Marie
lives with her mother but spends weekends with dad.
I found this a delightful film, giving a real feeling for exactly how a
parental split affects a young child, with true insight into her feelings and
coping mechanisms. The Mahler soundtrack is a perfect choice. This short film is
worth the price of the DVD by itself.
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Notes and collages
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The Hottest State
Billed as a coming-of-age drama, but really more of a
romance-gone-wrong, 2006's The Hottest State, written and directed by
Ethan Hawke, is overly talky and philosophical, but hidden within is a
brief but sweet romance. Unfortunately, the 40 or 50 minutes not devoted
to the romance is boring.
A young man leaves Texas for New York to make his name as an actor.
He's the product of a broken home and a broken heart, so in New York he
goes through untold women without really getting involved with any, until
he meets Sarah (Catalina Sandino Moreno), a singer/songwriter also trying
to make a name for herself.
Although he falls deeply in love with Sarah, the baggage of his past
keeps getting in the way, and they eventually drift apart.
The film has its moments, and there is a brief period where the
sweetness of the romance captivates the viewer. Unfortunately, it quickly
gets buried under a ton of irrelevance. Careful use of the fast-forward
button may be the best way to view this movie
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| Catalina Sandino Moreno |
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Just a note: Heidi Hawkins will also be in "Recon 2023: The Gauda Prime Conspiracy."
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Here, finally, is an uncensored take on the Heather Mills spread shots which
have been recently unearthed by the Brit Tabloids. I have to say that I don't
find them "sickening," like News of the World. In fact, I think she looks pretty
hot.
 
Eva Mendes is not "pretty hot." This girl is
s-s-s-s-mokin' hot.
 
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A very young and very beautiful (albeit kinda spooky)
Isabelle Adjani in La gifle. Film clip
here. Sample to the right. |
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The Comedy Wire
Comments in yellow...
Researchers from the University of St. Andrews say elephants never forget,
and they've discovered what they use their long memories for: the smell of
family members' urine. They say elephants pee often, and a lot, and they can
recognize the scent on the ground and use it to keep track of up to 30 family
members. Elephants who were exposed to unrelated elephants' urine seemed
unmoved, but they showed a lot of interest when it was from a family member.
They said to humans, the urine smell is gross, but to an elephant's relatives,
it's comforting.
* Same reason Britney Spears lets her kids run around the
house naked.
Some stereotypes are true: a report by the Committee for Modernization of the
French Hotel Trade found that French hospitality workers are among the surliest
in the world. 24 percent of hotel guests and 38 percent of restaurant clients
regularly complain about the rude way they're treated, from snotty maître d's to
long waits. They blame it on the workers getting low wages and having to depend
on tips. The report said the rudeness has remained unchanged for years, but one
Paris restaurant patron told the Daily Telegraph that the tradition of French
rudeness is something people love about France, as shown by the fact that so
many people visit year after year.
* If that were true, the snottiest waiters would get the
best tips.
The Detroit News reports that US Prosecutor Kym Worthy has issued a list of the
ten video games that parents should boycott as holiday gifts. She said these
games contain a lot of gruesome violence and lessons that will turn your kids
into criminals. The games are "Grand Theft Auto," "Manhunt," "Scarface," "50
Cent: Bulletpoof," "300: The Video Game," "The Godfather," "Resident Evil 4,"
"God of War," "Hitman: Blood Money," and "Killer 7," which she said experienced
game players call "the most violent and twisted game ever played."
* That's an exact quote, taken right off the box.
* So just give your kids "Killer" 1 though 6.
Police in Gela, Italy, shot a top Mafia boss to death, but before he died, he
managed to eat a list of secret mob members and their phone numbers. The paper
was recovered from his throat, but it's not known if it's readable.
* It stuck in his throat because it's the size of the
Sicilian phone book.
* In fact, it IS the Sicilian phone book.
* Wednesday, the US Post Office announced plans for a
first class stamp honoring Frank Sinatra.
* And a third class stamp honoring Joey Bishop.
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