I remember the first time I saw "The Wicker Man". At the time I was in college, drunk on
Xmas break at a party upon which eve a bong made out of a watermelon was passed around like a surreal fruit blimp. The cult movie I then watched which, though the butt of countless jokes, for various reasons (other than intoxication) stayed with me. I mean sure the movie is funny... police dude who looks like Phil Collins' dad gets stuck on pagan island as the sacrificial lamb dupe only to be entrapped by Christopher Lee who wears a skirt... sorry KILT, I know I know I KNOW I am being culturally insensitive again. Damn, those mandatory classes didn't take.
Initially, as a youthful intoxicant, none of the film (other than the campy hilarity) really resonated with me other than I would totally sign up to live on some pagan island and dance around bonfires made out of republicans. What did resonate with me after the years broke my spirit and I had to look at most things with more analysis than before, was the mythological base upon which the film was laid. The lost child and the symbol of the rabbit, the belief in spirits and nature, the historical gore of what Romans describe the wicker man to be... it's not a surprise Christopher Lee sees this as his best film despite the same replaying clip of folk music in the background.
Ok let's face it. Foreign policy. The Brits have their shortcomings. Like cold pork pies, for example, stored for days/hours not in the fridge. I mean how unsanitary is that? And large masses caring about soccer. Lord, I hate American football, but soccer makes our farcical dementia-inducing national pastime actually interesting by comparison. And nobility. How hilarious is that sensationalized borefest descending from the folks who had the most money and land 500 years ago. At least in the states, we call a spade a spade, our nobility being... taaadaaa... the folks with the most money and land, not the Duchess of Cadburlingberrytshire. I mean at least Madonna earned her holdings and title (Queen of Pop, richest pop star), wtf did the Duke of Pisswick do other than fall out of his mum's ass? Note: British women also do not have vaginas, they have "fannys". This has been documented by scientists and pornographers.
NEVERTHELESS the Brits have one thing we poor Colonials do NOT have, and that is a
superwealth of LORE. It just so happens when you have relatively high population of the same folks in the same land for like a thousand years, you get a lot of weird myths and ghost stories because generally speaking, scary shit does down. Eventually, if the US of A doesn't get blown into space, we will be able to scare the marbles out of ourselves on film with ghosts of ancient times other than the Native Americans whose treasure trove of mythos has largely been exploited or ignored. What Brits can do is the eerie thrilling horror tragedy that connects its lineage to tragedies of yore.
*And speaking of yore, note: when I am talking about "The Wicker Man", I am of course referencing the original, not the confused remake starring Nick Cage.
Point being, what made the movie great was the basis of myth. Without that underpinning, all you have is humans doing a bunch of crazy shit to each other. Which we do all the time. A well-meaning police officer who is equally endearing as he is annoying in this tale is subjected to the will of a culture much older and darker than his Christian god, reflecting the clash of religion that came to the British isles and the subsequent wars over which god or gods to believe in. Also you have the hot chick "the landlooord's daughter" singing to the virgin policeman naked through the wall, which is both creepy and funny at the same time. Her song was creatively remixed by "The Sneaker Pimps" if you are a fan of this movie.
The terrifying commonality of old religions (which makes me sort of think it equally
cracked as the new ones) is that the ultimate sacrifice = flesh. That the gods or god may very well be the giver of life and sun and spring, but that there is a dark face of this all-knowing creator that requires of us to give that means the most to us in order to please his/her/their/its will, which for whatever reason is flesh. One may presume that the gods are definitely bar-b-cue fans. In the end, however, you have to confront the dark side of what be humans have believed for thousands of years about forces larger than ourselves. The characters of the island in "The Wicker Man", have resigned themselves and eventually embraced that darkness.
That same black starry river flows underneath "In the Dark Half", even though the stories are poles apart, there is a nocturnal similarity between the two that made me connect them. The plot revolves around this messed up adolescent girl named Marie whose homelife is in tatters and mind is full of fear. Each day she runs to a concrete building in the middle of nowhere to perform various mysterious rituals, the purpose of which we will come to know only as we begin to understand the reasons for her cracked life. She feels that tragedy befalls her primarily... because it does, like how we ask ourselves why Tom Cruise gets a private jet and the folks working to cure diseases and fight wars have to struggle. Living in a low income neighborhood of what appears to be a smallish town, with a basket case for a mother and a crush for an adult single dad nextdoor neighbor, Marie lives in the awkward bracket between childhood and teenagerdom where we don't quite know who we are or even what we feel and almost everyone around us is not what they seem.
Jessica Barden steals the show here: her character's pre-teen unpreparedness for the
sexual or substance conquests of her mates, denial/rebellion against aspects of life we come to accept but initially regard as unfair (because it is), and good heart are stunning. As bad things get worse, this girl faces what many of us avoid for life because the question is too big: is there always such a difference between intuition, and delusion? Yes, we can certainly all define the terms using a dictionary or DSMV but we have all had those moments where we (as Stephen King would put it) "shine" a tad. Moments, feelings, places, acts we cannot explain to anyone. Part of being an adolescent, or rather the part that is terrifying, is the feeling that you are going through this experience alone. While there may indeed be 1000 other kids in your high school, you experience the freshness of love, the intoxication of drugs and/ or sex, the pain of heartbreak and the first sour tastes of the catty cutthroat actual adult world all by yourself. And in those moments, it is up to you to decide what's real, and how to act.
This girl is more alone than most of us, and living in a small town it becomes natural for her to sneak away into the forest, and to manifest herself there. Part of that manifestation is the supernatural, paranormal, occult, or the age-old question: is it just insanity? Note to reader: I ask myself that question all the freakin time.
There are parallels in both of these movies and while I can't say there is a gigantic sacrificial burning man in the end of each, those parallels do speak over the glaring differences in mood and theme. For instance, both begin with the loss of a child and the question of what happened to an innocent person. Both pieces call into question why life has to be so cruel, and what if anything can we do to rectify that cruelty. Parallels of child and adult lessons, the occult, communion with nature, and sacrifice come into play as both tales unravel. In the end, that power of myth and history is there too, lurking and occasionally baring a white tooth or the glint of an eye from just beneath the surface.
Watch "The Wicker Man" first, then this modern piece. Two very different tales with roots in the same old forest.
WTF "The Wicker Man" = 26 W = 10 T = 9 F = 7 WTF "In the Dark Half" = 21 W = 8 T = 7 F = 6
I have been meaning to review this film for a long time. Another unexpected pleasure.
I really enjoy it when horror movies rationalize Christianity in a fun-sized thrill-kill neat n' tidy box. With its elevator music, sterile office building waxed floors, and cityscapes, I was reticent to sit back and take this one in. It seemed too easy to film. Like something that could be done in a day at some job site in Philly. Sometimes cheap equals cheap. So, yeah, I had my reservations.
But I persevered.
Take your average citizens, your average situation, a simple ride to whatever floor in an office building. Think about how often and absentmindedly we trust ourselves in these enclosed spaces that span hundreds of feet. Anything could go wrong. For that short amount of time, think of the freedom temporarily bestowed upon everyone in that steel box. No rules. No recourse to the law. No protection.
Think of the people we trust on a daily basis in general, and the assumptions we make automatically about strangers. I love this concept, sort of a recall to the "pod people" idea. But in a real sense, this is the truth. We ride on buses with molesters, we sit in restaurants with paranoid schizophrenics, we interact on the street with those who have drawn blood with fists and other implements. To deny this about the human race is to deny the human race for what it is.
And then we have the real evil, the Devil, that shadowy figure in history, myth, or religion (whichever you prefer) that channels the dark side in all of us. Christian lore is a treasure trove of excellent horror fodder, The Bible being a great start on blood, guts, and detailed instructions on sacrifice. The folks in the elevator stand against each other, but really, they stand against what we have deemed the darkest power there is. I liked the varied personalities of the trapped people, their histories, back stories, and how they unravel as time grows short and the menace becomes more and more apparent. Because I don't do so well watching stuff about enclosed spaces (partially out of boredom too, no scene change), as per usual I allowed my assumptions to make the judgment call about this film before I let the film speak for itself. Turns out evil speaks well enough for itself. Enjoy.
If I could shorten this review to one word it would be: yum.
It occurred to me the other day, in dialog with another movie lover vis-à-vis the ideology and use of gore, that horror movies...or should I say GOOD horror movies...are like PASTA. Go ahead and scoff at me, it's fine. But I'm right. Good horror is like good pasta. I shall explain: the componants of horror are varied, but you can reduce it down to two basic pieces that make up all of the horror related across time: substance and gore. The substance is the plot, characters, mythos, wordplay, and so on - the pasta. The gore...well, that's the sauce. Let's face it, in most horror (especially in the olden days) someone gets a'sliced up or eaten or burned at a stake and so on. A trueborn horror movie has the perfect blend of both substance and gore, pasta and sauce, those timeless ingredients of a masterpiece meal.
And oh is "Lovely Molly" a dish. Directed by Eduardo Sánchez (director/co-writer of Blair Witch...I know, I had my reservations too...Blair Witch was a product of its time and a valiant effort but...kinda overbuzzed for what it was), this film is in my humble opinion exemplary of the expert combination of character acting, mythos, mystery, local color, shock-horror, and that final saucy sauce: blood'n'gutz. I ended the film sated with the story, and sad that it didn't go on longer, in the same manner that one wishes a good book goodbye like some old friend. The plot twists in this thing are also bad + ass.
Centered on the life of Molly (Gretchen Lodge), a low income mall janitor with a closet full of secrets behind her, the movie begins with the pastoral images of her quaint wedding to her truckdriver husband Tim (Johnny Lewis), attended by a girl we soon discover is her sister Hannah (Alexandra Holden). Molly and Tim are that "even though we ain't got $" couple, as they move into their new home in a wooded area with quite a bit of land. I'm not sure where this setting is supposed to be, or if they make references to it in the film, but it reminds me a lot of the poorer rural areas of upstate New York, though that was just how it resonated to me. Since they do not have adequate funds to purchase their own home, they move into the empty house of Molly's parents, now deceased.
What endeared me to Molly, Tim and Hannah is their struggle and the past darkness that they just don't talk about but still visibly grapple with. These actors do not appear Hollywoodized. They do not look like they have personal trainers and eight hours of make-up done just to look like a perfect person pretending to be imperfect. The genius of these characters is the imperfections are plain, and painful to see. Put simply and without the political correct parlance of our time: they pull off poor people with just enough of a touch of white trash to convince you that they are representative of a huge portion of struggling Americans in the same grim chainsmoking minimum wage fucked up world.
That Tim and Molly have this seeming gift of a house should be a helping hand; instead the house is the harbinger of their undoing. Haunted houses are one thing, but this story is far deeper and more convoluted. Molly is witness to the flashbacks of her past experiences, many of which were blocked by trauma or child confusion. This leads her to undergo a transformation into both the stereotypical hysterical female (the woman no one believes until it is too late) AND the evil woman (the woman we blame it all on) and the victim (the woman who must bear the sins of those who came before her). That Molly combines all of these film/fiction personas is testament to the complexity of her character and the mastery Lodge demonstrates. Without spoiling, there are several places in this film where I remarked to myself that the scenes must have felt very invasive and self-degradating or maybe even cathartic to execute. All I know is I don't think I could have done them. Lodge can and does. Give her an award. Give her some good pasta.
The movie cleverly plays with use and disuse of the video camera, perhaps as a partial callback to the Blair Witch/reality/home movie simulation genre birthed into horror at the turn of the century. It also cleverly plays with camera angles and sound - particuarly subtle sounds, even more so than other horror movies I have seen using just a touch of some element to cast a shadow here and there.
What we ultimately have is the combination of decent into madness and something else, the question that makes every single human being shiver at some point or multiple points in our brief little lives, whether it has to do with daydreams, fears, nightmares, suspicions, rumors, sickness, lies, the past, hallucinations, and so on. That question: IS IT REAL? And I think in the case of Lovely Molly, perhaps this question is too easily answered, which would be the one little stick of criticism I would float in here, but it isn't substantial enough to fuck up the movie. If anything, that the movie does give you is a direction, in my case what I felt was a decisive departure from the camera flitting and somewhat arguable images of Blair Witch.
Lastly GORE. Gore is like cursing or yelling. Too much of either and people simply do not take you seriously. Without going into it, the gore in this piece is choreographed with care and precision, and yes oh yes, there IS THAT MOMENT where you want to jump out of your seat and scream "Ohhhhh! That did NOT just happen! AND I crapped my pantaloons!" (disclaimer: I did not just admit to crapping my pants)
Which brings me to what always gets my hairz a'standing on end: mythos. Molly's folly (teehee) is her exposure to that powerful element found in so many horror movies and is often underused and misused and misunderstood and undeveloped, etc.. In this case it's just elusive and mysterious enough that you want more, but don't feel like you've been cut short an explanation. You know it: the sinister dark presence. Hard to do right. Elusive as fuck. But when it's done right makes you scared of the ancient things on this earth. Scared of of the rocks you stand on and the trees behind your house and the darkness at the basement floor. That's horror people. You can spin it any way you want it and argue until you are blue in the face that campy stuff is equally wonderful but it is movies like these that burn holes in your brain in the shape of questions marks. Delicate, but effectual. Yum.
When I sat down on a tired Friday evening to watch this Western-themed horror, I admit, I was expecting something cheap and flat. A screensaver with some blood and guts and a bunch of yipping gunslingers saving damsels and such. Maybe I would get a few laughs at Blazing Saddles comparisons, etc.. So I hunkered down as the sun set and I sipped my moonshine, prepared for for the inevitability of turning off the movie when I got bored.
...dead wrong, Betty, dead wrong. The Burrowers (2008) is a unexpectedly wild ride through twisting unclaimed terrain. The haters will say this is just another version of Tremors...and they would be the kiddies who look up the wikipedia instead of reading the book so they can look smart in their shitty community college classes. Note: don't diss this movie around Betty. Why? Because you can see when a movie is half-assed. You can feel it when the actors don't care, when the directors are just collecting paychecks to buy another summer home in LA or the south of France or putting another notch on their lame resume. Some of those movies make it to the so-bad-it's-good list. Most are just insipid (hopefully) forgotten reels. But what I was taken by was that this movie is trying its hardest to put a new twist on a once-popular American genre that's more or less gone out of setting and style after the likes of John Wayne and Hi Ho Silver, etc.. That's why most of us (myself included) generally scoff at the idea of a Western horror, because its outside of the typical framework of where we are expecting to feel fear (haunted houses, spaceships, zombie-infested shopping malls, sunken cities, high school proms, republican conventions, honey-boo-boo and so on). But this is a powerful mix of both those elements, with a message to boot.
After the savage slaughter/kidnapping of members of a pioneer family, local law and gunmen set off to discover what they believe will be hostile Native Americans or bandits. What they discover is a creature whose history predates any tribe they might hold responsible for these acts. The men, consisting of an Irishman looking for his girlfriend, a freed slave, some prideful Calvary dudes, and locals who sense something is dreadfully wrong with the initial assessment of the crime committed. A girl found buried alive, in a state of paralysis, is the first signal they are not seeking a group of angry natives, but something far more sinister and - what surprised me - complicated.
The creatures these men seek are killers from before Western civ came to the Western world, beings as brutally foreign to the posse as the land is to newcomers from the East. Here we have hints of films like Alien, and yes, Tremors, if you must, but the main thread and connection to characters is unique onto itself. My one criticism of the piece is that, I wondered if it was almost too brutal, that there was too much of a sense of hopelessness. And also, I am never a huge fan of anything CGI, but I thought this was tastefully done in most parts. It's all offset by the dynamic within the hunting party; there is a LOT more going on between the group of characters than just a simple manhunt, which makes the film a period piece in its own right. Part of it is just the setting of the 'untamed' territory of the west itself, and how it must have appeared to settlers coming from what they termed as a civilized, orderly, and predictable world. I imagine that the kind of pride and self-assurance needed to exist in such uncertain and seemingly hostile terrain must have saved and/or killed a lot of folks back then. That same manifest destiny drives the group of hunters to a conclusion that I did not soon forget. Watch this one. It's a horror diamond in the rough.
I would recommend this movie for every pregnant woman. Because if you can't handle the horror of this film, you definitely can't handle 22 years of indentured servitude.
My guess is that most women don't have the words to capture the fear of childbirth and raising a baby. I certainly don't. But this movie does a good deal in taking those nightmares and magnifying them, from almost every possible angle. Women are pressured to have children by families, peers, and themselves, but for most parents, children actually create more stress, health issues, regrets, and misery than it is acceptable to socially admit. It's great to see a movie that unabashedly plays with those fears.
WTF: 19 W =7 T = 6 F= 6
Your main character is Madeline, the typical ticking biological clock so obsessed with the 'mother experience' that she's had three miscarriages, been on fertility drugs, and somehow the light bulb doesn't go off that if you are really intent on making the world a better place with your parenting skills there are bazoodles of homeless parentless kids out there in need that would be grateful to have the love of a forever home and family. But we live in a self-centered society, and it stands to reason that for thousands of years we've been biologically procreating for entirely selfish reasons. Back when we needed labor on our farms, kids made for the cheapest you could find and lack of birth control made it impossible to avoid sans celibacy. Even nowadays parents like Madeline will be easily understood by most viewers (aka not me). They will understand her 'plight'. I'm not sure why everyone including idiots, abusers, and talk show hosts believe it is somehow their 'god given right' to bring their squalling crotchfruit into existence like we don't have enough creatures ruining this planet, but for viewers like me, there's a certain satisfaction in watching this thing play out for all parties. To a degree the film brings parallels to The Walking Dead, taking a horrible premise and making it believable, almost banal is Madeline's resolve to keep her child at all costs.
Like anything in life, having a child comes with one hefty-ass price tag. Check out the New Yorker's article on unhappy parenting (I think it went out in 2010) and we encounter a slew of anonymous parents who confess (obviously is highly inappropriate to publicly wish your kid was never born) that things were better before kids were ever in the picture. But I refer to the baseness of life, the daycare costs, vomit, screaming, shit, more screaming, crashing your car, getting herpes at 14 from half the football team, then maxing out your credit card at a head shop. That MUNDANE kind of stuff that kids do. We don't get that far into the picture with Grace, and perhaps that is the point of view of the piece: that the beginnings of life are insane enough to speak for themselves.
Madeline is a whole different bag of monkeys. To begin with her family or 'support network' is strange and convoluted, her mother-in-law namely, and the doctors she seeks vs. the doctors she avoids. Her history with the vegan dharma namaste midwife unfolds, but the actress is fabulously serious. Her husband, interestingly, but I decided well-played, is kind of a non-entity. Often when you have a hankering woman ready to pop one out, you have a reticent man wondering wtf he is getting himself into. In the second scene, (weird sex scene), she clearly is looking for a fertility hose rather than an orgasm. Then comes the product of the whole exercise: when the baby is pronounced dead, she decides to carry it to term and go through the grueling and gruesome experience of a stillbirth. Pretty much every potential mother's nightmare. But Grace lives. She is soon to discover that motherhood, in her case, is far from what she or anyone could ever envision, that it means sacrifice on a whole new level. Because as many of us say, unknowing, and sated with wine at family dinners: "Blood is blood."
I like this movie because it is brave, because it manages to challenge the stereotypes of both liberal and conservative approaches to family planning while taking the viewer on a gory ride through an 'unexpecting' mother's life. While I must mention there are a few side characters whose acting is so poor and clearly waiting for a cue for a poorly meted out response they almost ruin the film (the midwife's assistant...needs to go back to the acting clinic stat...and a few others), the plot choices and the unraveling of this story make up for its shortcomings.
So kiddies and potential parents, consider this your first "informational" video in Nurse Betty Bloodletter's Parenting 101 ("What to Expect When You're Expecting: The Horror!") Course.
I'm still in a bookish mood (aka, my allergies are annoying the hell out of me and I'm pissed), and it's a rainy day at the end of May, so I figured I'd throw Susan Hill's The Woman In Black at you along with my offensive mood. I picked up this book a few months back when partaking in another episode of my search for the scariest fiction ever. People all over the world wide whatever have recommended this book claiming it was truly freaky. I guess I'm freakier than truly freaky, because I put this book (on a scale of craptastic to awesome) at meh/good.
WTF = 18 W = 7 T = 6 F = 5
The gist of the story is estate lawyer Arthur Kipps (in hopes that his ready ability to more or less kiss ass and take difficult jobs will land him a promotion) follows orders from his boss to go to this small town called Crythin Gifford to handle the affairs of the newly deceased Ms. Alice Drablow and her lovely property Eel Marsh House. At the time of reading this piece, the names of characters and places didn't make me laugh, but in retrospect it does seem a little silly. This is styled in kind of an Edith Wharton voice, so you have the prim and proper people besieged by the ghost of an undone woman, her tragedy, her vengeance, all told in prim and proper voice.
Anyway, Kipps soon gets drawn into the mess and ultimately pays his own price for assuming he can just doodle around with dead people's stuff, even though he's just trying to do his job. I'm not ruining the story (you know I don't believe in spoilers), as the story is told in retrospect from an aged and shellshocked old guy who's had to rebuild his life since his time in the small haunted town. Think of this as a really British Ringu.
The story, in some ways, reads like it was written in the first half of the 20th century, and I think I probably would have been fooled if not for the silliness of a name like "Eel Marsh House" to check the copyright date and discover it was written in 1983. That Hill received the W. Somerset Maugham award is also something. There's something brave about her writing in a style that is not contemporary, bringing it back to the early 20th century in voice and in story. But I also felt there was unreached potential for the story to be maddeningly frightening.
Perhaps it's the dialog, perhaps it's the character interplay. I do not know. And this is not to say that I don't like the ridiculous. I do really like the description of the woman herself, her wasted face, how she lingers on the edge of sight like an illusion. How people of the town shun anything to do with her out of total fear. How the children die. That's freaking awesome. But I put the book down disappointed, not with the story but how parts of it seemed rushed, like they were holding out on being completely mindbending because unleashing more would be completely...un British? I don't know. That's mean. But, I guess there's something to say for reading something that feels like there's a tennis racket wedged up your ass a little further with each new description of something that would normally drive a person batshit.
Is this a case for more realism? No. This book is what it is. And I'm being harsh. But for one second, picture yourself in a bed in a dark abandoned house. Outside the wind and sea beat against the land. You have never ever before in your life been so alone and you are a young person. You can hear what sounds like distant screaming but don't want to admit it to yourself. Suddenly you hear movement, the opening of a door. Footsteps. Creaking stairs. Tell me, just tell me you would not be more or less shitting your pants? I mean, depicting shitting one's pants would probably ruin the mood of the story, but you get the idea. You don't hold it together, rationalize it, or go to investigate. You hide. You run. People are more or less creatures that run away when they are scared. I'm not asking for realism: after all poop isn't really scary. But cut the paint by number, "I doubted what I saw and so I calmed myself down and went for a flashlight and a cup of tea" and scare me. This is the best I can do to describe why this book doesn't broach above a 20 on my scale. I read it always wanting more (not in the good way), and ended it with an, "...oh."
There have been adaptations of this book. One made-for-TV show that people claimed was scary but I had to laugh my ass off. I've included the clip that people claim was so terrifying that if you put it in replay it's the most hysterical thing. Another was a play adapted by this guy Mallatrat. Have not seen the play, though there have been many good reviews and it is something I'd be interested in seeing adapted given that most theater doesn't really aim to scare. It's just not the most common genre especially when you have so many idiots who want a fucking love story. But then again, I am reticent as Broadway generally makes me want to barf into my playbill. I've never seen a show that's good enough to convince me that the actual definition of a Broadway show (particularly musicals) is not the ritualistic translation of a story so that retards can understand it. I know, I'm being cruel again. I'm too sick to be politically correct. In other news, this review is well-timed because in December 2011, I believe Hammer (could not wrong, too lazy to check, do it yourself) is coming out with another version starring what's his face from Harry Potter who has grown up to look like Uncle Jessie from Full House.
Am I wrong? Ok, whatever. I actually do plan on seeing this movie (though probably when it's available on Netflix because I hate spending 10$ so I can have feet sticky with old soda and listen to someone's snotty kids ask stupid questions - they should see the Broadway version!) when it's available. My hope is that the directors will have picked up on that feeling of holding back that bothered me throughout the story. My hope is that they will give the actual storyline behind the woman in black more clarity and connection to why she seeks revenge to others, why her spirit is so unforgivably malign. For some reason or another, I think Radcliffe might be able to pull of the bumbling young Kipp, but we'll see. We'll see indeed.
Because it's so short and sweet, I would totally recommend reading this book on a rainy day like this. It's not by any means a bad book. Also when you check out this clip of the first TV adaptation below (totally not what happens in the book) watch the clip first, then go to 1:14 and keep replaying it a few times just for shits n' giggles. I know I'm twisted, but do it and tell me how ANY director didn't see how her eyes were crossed and how this has all the makings for a great comedy scene.
I have previously rattled on about how this guy is A 100% ACTUAL MASTER OF HORROR WITHOUT QUESTION, but only in agony at directors making craptastic crapflicks out of his stories. This review is all about his fiction, which countless other authors and directors have circled around in hopes of raising its darkness from the bottom of the abyss. You will have to trust me and take the time to read the insanely awesome works of Howard Phillips Lovecraft if you have any faith in any of the other horror stuff I've recommended. It is not an easy read at first (especially for people who are not very literate - we don't do much booklearnin' these days wen we gotz the teevee). I've known several college-educated people who could not really understand his sentences, and while I might say "that's okay, it's just not your style" to help them save face, I will also say to my esteemed readership that this book is not for you if you are not past an 8th grade reading level. At least. Ok nuf said.
One vein of thought that I will repeat is that there are not many writers out there who have managed to invent their own mythology. Lovecraft is one of them. Ironically, what got me into Lovecraft was the FANTABULOUSLY twisted and kinky conspiracy-theory of all conspiracy-theory books Wilson and Shea: The Illuminatus! Trilogy (also not for the feint of reading comprehension). I discovered in these two authors' heavily-layered fact-o-fiction the deep lures of many Lovecraft shout-outs, allusions I would later find in countless other books and movies and TV (X-files included, lol). I now take a huge amount of nerdy amusement in identifying the embedded Lovecraftian images in sci-fi, horror, and fantasy. After Illuminatus, I had to find out what all the fuss was about this guy, as isolated and tragic in his own way as Poe, and ever-surrounded by the mysticism that he helped create.
I should say that I'm not a huge Poe fan. I realize he was one of the greats to the audience that was his audience, and certainly a score for us American writers, but for some reason I never really bought in, much much much as I wanted to. Possibly because he was one of many blunt instruments used by one or two overpaid officials of the American public school system to ram "culture" into my brain. While I admit he was dark and creeptastic in his own pre-ghetto Bronx way, I always saw him as a tad bit of a drama queen. More melodramatic than hardcore, getting his panties all in a bunch because of a metaphorical bird and such. Yes, I'm dissing The Raven. I did it. It is rare that I find myself looking to be frightened by metaphorical birds. I can be saddened by metaphorical birds, but not necessarily frightened, and I guess that is one difference between the whimsical and the absolutely horrifying. I wanted the nitty gritty details of what exactly scared you shitless, not your description of the conniption you had after being scared shitless. I thought he'd do much better as a director of macabre theater in 1965 or something, curse my soul for saying it but it's true, as wondrous a wordsmith as he was. But then came HP, and I was knocked backward and upside the head. This was something that just felt intrinsically different than any genre of horror I had ever attempted before. It was like I was finally finding this essential piece of my love of horror fiction that was missing all the while. This was truly dark, as in dark under thousands of feet of black ocean current, dark as in dark beyond eons of cold glittering stars, dark as in the heavy metal lord of horror.
WTF = 29 W = 10 T = 9 F = 10
This was the kind of horror that had me up at night, feeling ill-at-ease. Written by a guy who died before 1940, his work is still as wild and relevant as it was when it was initially printed in the pulp mags. The eternal leavings of Lovecraft's self-termed "cosmicism" are items like the Necronomicon, and creatures like Cthulu, Dagon, and the Old Ones, including a language much more metal than Tolkein's elf talk that all those dorks buy rings with the inscriptions and such. That being said, I have fallen victim personally to Lovecraftian merchandise (though nothing as lame as some locket with something an elf said, I'll give you that at least.) For some reason I felt while reading all of this crazy stuff, that somehow, Lovecraft was basing his stories on some tangent of reality. That it could very well be that aliens landed here long before humans ever populated the earth, and that their technology or aims were unimaginable to our feeble linear minds.
While I continued to tell myself I was just reading epic and hysterically well-worded pulp fiction, I dug up the old X-Files phrase almost immediately, because I found I could not help but apply it to the pilots and scientists in the face of the "At the Mountains of Madness", or the poor fellow in "The Shadow Over Innsmouth", or the simple farmers in "The Color Out of Space". There was nothing else but to admit it to myself loud and clear, assuming that perhaps this was what other writers and directors were feeling when they pulled imagery and relics out of Lovecraft's prose either as a lovingly-made allusion or a half-assed attempt to pass off genius as one's own:
"I want to believe."
And oh did I ever. I guess if the slew of other famous names of those who profess him to be a complete genius and an influence to create does not convince you to read this stuff, hopefully my testament that this guy managed to scare the living shit out of me while keeping me interested in not only his twisted, gnarled plots but also his characters will add to the ranks. You may find at first that, like his drawn influence from Poe, Lovecraft's also a tad bit dramatic too with his lengthy flourish of language and multi-syllabic vocabulary, but when you are standing in the ancient dead hallways of a million-year old cavern built by all-knowing slumbering alien minds creating technology far exceeding anything humans could come close to imagining you just try not to have a panic attack.
As a new reader of Lovecraft stuff, I would start fairly simple. Had I begun with "At the Mountains of Madness", I might not have gotten far with his work, though that is definitely the place to end it with a bang! It seems all so archaic at first, like nothing out of the 20th century. You will stumble at first with his writing style unless you generally read stuff from pre-1900, and this is to be expected I think even from the seasoned reader despite our desires to make others believe our brains comprehend everything instantly. I'd advise starting with something like "The Colour Out of Space", or even "The Call of Cthulu". I remember "The Curious Case of Charles Ward" was also one of the early ones I enjoyed. There are several editions of Lovecraft collected short stories that are great, but I will suggest two sets that I have and quite enjoyed.
I would suggest starting with this edition titled Tales of H.P. Lovecraft (selected and edited by Joyce Carol Oates). This is a good little stack of Lovecraft stuff and a great way to get started before you go for the extended additions: Omnibus 1-3. These books are super-chunky with a huge cross-section of Lovecraft's writing, including some of the less-stellar stuff, so you'll more or less have to do some sifting. I don't care if Joyce Carol Oates or Jesus Christ did the intro for the book - the reason I picked this edition first is because the stories contained are good examples of Lovecrafty goodness. I generally don't read introductions as a rule unless I'm bored and stuck on a plane with nothing better to do than pick my nose. And even then, nasal spelunking is usually way better than the contents of most introductory material. If the author you are reading is THAT good, their work should usually speak for itself and I find biographical stuff online.
And here be the Omnibusssses. All told, you have about a year's worth (at least) of screaming space madness the likes of which will creep you out indefinitely. And while it would most definitely be one hell of an experiment to see what happens to your general mentality and life after one full year of reading nothing except Lovecraft...I probably would not advise it. You would inevitably fall apart like the author did.
I actually found that, as much as I loved his writing, I felt always a little sick when I read it. This is the only stuff that gave my husband nightmares...he's the logical type that doesn't dream. Possibly because the guy manages such an intense feeling of ominous foreboding that if you're into the stories you can't help but feel kind of ill with this dull kind of constant worry in the back of your mind. It's maddening after a while and I discovered that what worked for me is to vary what I read and when I have a random rainy day where I can get away with a good hour or two's delve into something epic, I'll grab one of these and see what I find.
Get into Lovecraft to get in touch with your ageless, slimier self, the part of you that wouldn't mind descending into a thousand-mile-deep oceanic abyss to learn the secrets of the Universe...and possibly be eaten alive by a creature four hundred times your size. Lovecraft awakens in all of us, through the Cthulu mythos and his other tales, the sense that everything on earth and in the space around us is so much older than we can really fathom. That we are at the brink of some insanely ageless magical violent and indifferent mystery. I think what ultimately draws readers into this kind of writing is the realization that we humans know so little of the truth of what makes us sentient beings in what often appears to be endless dead space. And so we ask: what else is there?
Heavy metal horror...
Nerd Alert: bought one of these cuties for my husband. An adorable fluffy eater of souls :)
And lastly, some old Metallica (before they became a country band)...
