Aaron Sorkin, the Christian Right and Women.

I'm going to start this blog with a quote I can completely relate to. "My wife is smarter than I am in every way imaginable and it never makes me mad. I don't feel a crippling inferiority complex turn into rage and bad decisions when I think about her being smart" - Will McAvoy

When The West Wing hit in the late 90's, people were showering it with praise and rightly so. Writer and creator Aaron Sorkin was the main man on the show for four seasons. He had less success with Sports Night which came out at the same time. It ran for two seasons and shares a lot of what made The West Wing so great. It had energy, it was funny and it had many of those "fuzzy" moments that only Sorkin can do and get away with. These shows passed and he came back with a show that, on reflection, never really stood a chance. Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip was the show that started the Sorkin backlash. It was a behind the scenes look at the weekly creation on an SNL-esque show which gave Sorkin the platform he needed to get an awful lot off his chest and he wasn't pulling his punches. He was going after the Christian right and he didn't seem to care that it would kill any chance the show had at longevity. He even predicted it in the second episode. One of his characters, Jack Rudolf (Steven Weber) chairman of the "National Broadcast Systems" (we know who he's talking about) is explaining to Jordan McDeere (Amanda Peet) the president of NBS why you shouldn't always take on the right: "They never lose Jordan, they always win".

It was about five episodes in when the God squad started their, ahem, crusade. They were being picked on and someone had to pay. So they went after the show and then they went after its creator. Among the many insults they flung at Sorkin (and the cast) and one that I'm still baffled about was that he is sexist. They decided he hated women and all he could do was write damsels in distress. This, coming from people who would take away a woman's right to choose... Sorkin probably didn't help himself by admitting he has a love of 50's screwball comedies but again what they focused on here was the 50's not the fact that in most of those screwball comedies the women are much smarter than their male counterparts. The voice of right wing reason in Studio 60 is the character Harriet Hayes (Sarah Paulson) who believes the world was built in six days and that God has a plan for everyone. She is a pillar of strength in the show because she respects non believers but more importantly she plays down her belief system while at the same time leaving you in no doubt that she is a follower of Christ and you will not deter her. It's a fine line but it's written to perfection by Sorkin (something the right wing army seem to have missed) and Paulson is top drawer in the role. Below is the beginning of a scene where her charm and disarm offensive is dismantled by the equally charming and way too enjoyable, Martha O'Dell (Christine Lahti):

So what exactly were they talking about? Probably not a lot but some "experts" not just on the right but overly sensitive leftists (usually college going types who are so sensitive that comedians refuse to play their campuses) also bought into this theory. Suddenly CJ Cregg's (Allison Janney) clumsiness was an issue. Ainsley Hayes's (Emily Procter) sexiness was being exploited. From Sports Night, Dana Whitaker (Felicity Huffman) was just a mess of a human being and therefore weak. It wouldn't be truthful of me to say there was no substance to these claims. CJ was a klutz, Dana's private life was a mess and Ainsley was enormously sexy. However, these women were so much more than these traits. How many times did we see Ainsley Hayes turn Sam Seabourne around on a huge issue? How many times did CJ Cregg own the fucking room no matter who she was dealing with? Dana Whitaker never got a handle on her private life but then a great many people don't. Professionally though, she was a giant! It also seemed to go completely over the heads of the detractors that the men Sorkin was writing were absolutely riddled with imperfections. It's what makes them human. Take Danny Tripp (Bradley Whitford) from Studio 60 on  the Sunset Strip. He's a recovering cocaine addict. Does this disgusting facet of his personality mean that Aaron Sorkin hates men? How about the philandering Vice President Hoynes (Time Matheson) Why does he get a pass? See, I don't think Aaron Sorkin is sexist, I just think people who don't like him got so annoyed at his success that they flung as much garbage at him as possible.

There is a very popular belief among his most ardent critics that Harriet Hayes (above) was one hundred per cent based on his ex, Kristin Chenoweth and he should be ashamed of how he wrote her... Well, did anyone ask Chenoweth how she felt about it? Turns out many people have. Time magazine: I'd love to know about the role he created for you for his show Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Were you accurately portrayed? "I think a lot of people thought, "Oh, that's Kristin." But it wasn't — it was very loosely based on me. It was difficult for me seeing the character doing things like not believing in gay rights when I so do. It's weird to see fights played out on TV that we had, but it was also an honor. He asked me first. He said "I think you're one of the most wonderfully complicated fantastic women, and I think there's a character here. Can I loosely" — and that's the key word, loosely — "base a character on you?" And I said sure." If it's good enough for Kristin, maybe you should entertain the possibility that it's good enough for you.

In his last television show, The Newsroom, he again went after the right and again they responded with their vitriol. What they didn't count on was HBO just not caring and the show saw three wonderful seasons. They said Sloan Sabbith (Olivia Munn) was a horrid character who represented the worst personality traits of women and she needed to be rescued by a man. Now, I don't know what the fuck they were watching but Sloan Sabbith was nobody's victim and as I saw it, she did the rescuing... Olivia Munn: "I had Aaron Sorkin's support to not take the "girly" route. The director and I were not on the same page but I had Aaron on my side and having him back me meant everything".

There's just something very off about right wingers throwing rocks at a liberal legend like Aaron Sorkin and tainting him with the very traits that makes them so vile. If we look at the movie that made Sorkin famous, A Few Good Men, we again get an amazing female character, Lt. Cdr. JoAnne Galloway (Demi Moore). She has the unenviable task of trying to get Lt. Daniel Kaffee (Tom Cruise) to take an unwinnable case and turn it into a win even if it means making an enemy of Col. Nathan R. Jessup (Jack Nicholson). She does this by calling him out on his bullshit:

Kaffee goes for funny with his retort but he knows she is right. I suppose you could argue the Sorkin trait of a great man being made greater by a great woman is sexism but I think if you're a woman and Aaron Sorkin is in your crosshairs as apposed to something like Sex in the City or anything with a Kardashian in it, you really should start to ask yourself how many different kinds of stupid you are. Maggie Jordan (Alison Pill):

Aaron Sorkin has a quite magnificent body of work. He won an Oscar for The Social Network. He was nominated for Moneyball. Steve Jobs hasn't made a bean* but Sorkin has been nominated for a Golden Globe for his screenplay. The American President is a wonderful movie which opened the door to The West Wing's liberal fantasy world. Charlie Wilson's War isn't my favourite of his movies but I have watched and enjoyed it several times. Granted, these are male orientated movies but that does not make him sexist. All of these movies are quality. Moneyball aside, they all feature men who are better for having strong women around them. This isn't a bad thing. If you are offended by the smart woman making a slightly less intelligent man great dynamic, maybe you're just someone who likes to get offended. Because if he wrote a movie about a smart man making a slightly less intelligent woman great you'd probably be angry that he was smarter than her and that she needed a man at all.
If you're the kind of person that gets offended by Sam Seaborne saying to Ainsley Hayes that her outfit is "enough to make a good dog break his leash" then you will always consider Sorkin a sexist. If you're this kind of person you probably also get offended when CJ compliments Sam Seaborne for his ability to wear a suit. It's impossible to please you! Ainsley Hayes: "The point is that sexual revolution tends to get in the way of actual revolution. Nonsense issues distract attention away from real ones like pay equity, childcare, honest to God sexual harassment..."  

I think we have to give the last word to Allison Janney: "I love her (CJ Cregg). I wish that I carried more of her with me than I actually do. She is kind of my hero. What a great woman to get to play! I wish that she could have lived on and done other things. She's just such a truly great role model for women and that's one of my characters and one of those instances where you felt like you got to give back. I feel like I really got to inspire young girls. I get so many letters and see people on the street who come up to me and say, "Oh my God. You changed my life. I was majoring in this and I changed it to this and now I'm going to work in Washington." Aaron Sorkin really inspired a lot of people with that show. Getting to play C.J., that was an important female role on television and I am still really, really proud of it in a different way than I am of my other characters. Like in Mr. Sunshine, I loved my character, but she was the exact opposite. C.J. will always be the role that I'm maybe most proud of in terms of what it said to the world. "

Cheers,

G.

*Steve Jobs has finally made it's money back and earned about $1.5m.



Dawn of the Civil War's Awakening.

Big budget blockbusters! We love them. Well some of them. How much do we love them? Well take Spectre. I'm not a huge Bond fan and certainly Spectre did nothing to convince me I'm wrong about that but already the enormous budget of €245m has been paid back to the tune of €752m and counting. That's how much we love them. We certainly love talking about them and given that  Captain America Civil War and Dawn of Justice clips came out recently I'm all blockbustered up! Add to that, we're a few weeks away from The Force Awakens!!!

Let's start with Star Wars. As far back as I can remember, George Lucas has occasionally been a bit of a dick when it comes to his own fans. Not always... but occasionally. His latest dig came when he was talking about why he wasn't allowed direct Episode VII. The studio said they wanted to do something for the fans. Lucas: "I wasn't interested in doing a movie for the fans". Now, maybe I'm being a bit precious but that just seems like a bit of a cuntish thing to say. I mean, if you're going to make a new Star Wars movie, who are you making it for if not the fans who put you in your ivory tower in the first place? Not that it matters. Common sense prevailed, the studio picked a director who knows what he's doing and all of Georgie boys ideas were rejected by the director. This may seem a little harsh on the guy who created the whole fucking thing but given how disconnected he has become from what made Star Wars great in the first place, perhaps we shouldn't be too surprised. Think I'm wrong? Check out his own reaction to The Phantom Menace:

Ultimately, I'm very psyched for The Force Awakens. I got everything I wanted. I got the characters I love back. I got the director I wanted. I got George Lucas removed from the project and I got a sense of hope that was so violently taken away by the wretched prequels. Excitement level: Very high.

Let's do something franchises do to rescue themselves from horrid entries and go back in time. Let's talk X-Men. Now, anyone who knows me knows I don't read comics so I don't wanna hear any of this "If you'd read issue #347 of the Mystique is actually Magneto chronicles, you'd understand the movie more" bullshit. I go to see these movies at face value and as a movie goer I expect to be catered for. A few years ago I went to see X-Men First Class...was kinda dragged actually but I'm glad I was convinced to go because I got a powerhouse of a movie with excellent performances. First Class had everything an X-Men movie should have but it also had a cool factor thanks to the presence of Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy. Kevin Bacon didn't hurt either. As you know, the movie is an origin story. How did Magneto emerge? Why is Professor X in a wheelchair? Unlike most "hero" movies it also makes you consider the possibility that the bad guy, Magneto, actually has a fucking point. Or as I tell anyone who'll listen, Mathew Vaughn perfected in one movie what George Lucas fucking destroyed in three.
First Class was well received and on the back of this Bryan Singer had a bit of a whinge and set about wrestling control of the sequel. He got his boxers in a twist when Brett Ratner was going to make a Superman movie while he was prepping for X-Men Last Stand. They swapped, both movies disappointed...
So Singer went back to his X-Men pals and while I was disappointed that Vaughn wasn't given the gig after his excellent work in FC I did allow that Singer had made two really good X-Men movies previously so I was on board. I went to see Days of Future Past and I enjoyed it well enough. BUT, and this is huge for me, fucking time travel. It's just a horrid device. Now, it's okay in a movie like Back to the Future which is solely about time travel but no matter which way you cut it, it's used here to erase the awfulness that is X-Men: The Last Stand. Maybe that's not an issue for everyone but it kills tension... there's nothing at stake if you can fix it with time travel. First Class didn't need time travel, it got by on excellent writing and great scenes like the one posted.



Apologies for the shaky camera there, it's the only one I could find. The scene is wonderful. The acting is top drawer, the relationship between these two would be enemies is laid out raw for all to see. There's nothing like this in DOFP. In its defence, it looked great and the fx delivered but that's kind of a given these days. What I want, and what I suspect comic book fans want, is more of a focus on the relationships between the X-Men. Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart did their best with limited time in DOFP. Guys of that calibre need to be used more. And so X-Men: Apocalypse is coming next year and Bryan Singer is at the helm again. Can he match Vaughn's magnificence? I doubt it. Excitement level: Luke warm.

So we've all seen the new Captain America: Civil War trailer by now. Like Winter Soldier, the movie looks like a lot of fun. What's pleasing me about this movie is the absence of so many characters. The movie will have time to play some jazz with these guys. Of course there are sub characters but by now we've spent time with all of them and so we're at least somewhat invested in them. Obviously we care more about Black Widow than Scarlet Witch but at least I know who she is now. I had no idea who she was in Age of Ultron. Actually, we really should talk about Age of Ultron as it was huge! Not as huge as Jurassic World but huge all the same. I quite liked Age of Ultron. But my enjoyment of it was tempered with frustration. Firstly, I'd no idea who some of the characters were. Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver and Vision were all new to me. I still don't really understand Vision's origins or what he's supposed to be but he's there now so I guess I just need to shut up and get used to him. The other two baffled me completely. I actually had to go to imdb to get Quicksilver's name. Scarlet Witch I remembered... not sure why. But they were a huge part of AoU and I simply didn't care about them. The more characters added, the more bizarre the storylines get, the harder it will be to retain anyone but the real die hard comic book fans. The next Avenger movie will be a huge challenge for all concerned. Too much of a good thing is still too much and it's probably why I preferred Ant-Man to AoU. Ant-Man was a truckload of fun and everyone got a chance to make you like them. Mind you, Paul Rudd is always likable. As for Civil War, I really think it'll be a great movie. It has all the tools needed to deliver. The bar was set pretty high by Winter Soldier but I expect this to clear it. Excitement level: Very high.

And so to Batman v Superman. I've watched and enjoyed the first clip but I backed away from what came out since as I want some mystery when I sit in my IMAX seat. Batman will hopefully be a little sneakier than Zod in his quest to tame Super-man and given how Man of Steel ended I think we can look forward to something different to the usual stoicism that Super-man has been trapped in for years. There's a gravity about these two characters that demands your attention. I know Aqua-Man and Wonder Woman are in there too but they are not why I'm buying my ticket. This is rightly being billed as a scrap between the two biggest super heroes there has ever been. Affleck as Batman is fucking inspired casting and I cannot wait to see what he brings to the role. Excitement levels: Very high.

So this is where my attention will be for the next six or seven months. Obviously I'd love to go to the cinema to see more movies but having a kid really eats into that free time so whenever I get to the cinema it tends to be for an event movie with one or two exceptions. If I'd known about Krampus sooner, I'd have organised a babysitter :)
Cheers,

G.

Halloween Movies and Memories

Black cats and goblins and broomsticks and ghosts,
Covens of witches with all of their hosts,
You may think they scare me you're probably right, 
Black cats and goblins on Halloween night...

Halloween means different things to different people. There are those who loathe the entire enterprise and can't wait for it to end. There are those who build a bonfire and run naked around it hoping to connect with druid overlords. Those are the extremes. Most of us enjoy it for the bit of fun that it is and every now and again something happens... a smell, a noise... but every year something happens to remind me of that feeling I had as a kid when the day arrived. I loved the whole thing because I was all about ghosts and monsters and the promise of sweets didn't hurt either. These days we put up the decorations and come Halloween night we hand out sweets to kids who are just as excited about Halloween as we are! I used to hand out treats wearing a Michael Myers mask. I've had to downgrade to a Jason Voorhees mask because the Michael Myers one was too scary for some of the kids. True story!

                                                      It is a horrifying mask
                                

Michael Myers took a thoroughly enjoyable night for a kid and made it terrifying. But then, that was the point wasn't it? We wanted something to scare us and it never really did. It was the hope of being scared by something that made it special. When Michael Myers finally delivered on the promise I didn't sleep properly for a long time! And, of course, I loved every second.
I'll try not to beam about Halloween in a technical way because it's been done to death. Rather, I'll tell you how I came to see it for the first time and how that impacted on me.

                                                         Finglas, Dublin 1982
Halloween hit cinemas in 1978 and aired on television in 1980 but I was too young to know about it. However in 1982 at the tender age of 6 (coincidentally the same age Michael committed his first murder) my oldest brother, Colin, was bragging about watching it on Saturday night (Oct 30th) while the rest of us (my other brother and two sisters) would be in bed and my parents were on a date night. Now, by this stage I'd already seen Jaws and had become a bit of a Hammer Horror fan. I figured this couldn't be any scarier... So after listening for the umpteenth time to my brother's continued bragging, I went to my parents and asked could I stay up and watch it. In fairness to them, they played it perfectly. They didn't make a big deal out of it, just said "No, maybe next year" and told me to be in bed by 9pm. If they'd made a big deal out of it, I'd have snuck down but, like I said, they played it cool and it went off my radar... Until about 10pm...

I was tucked up in bed on the edge of sleep when I had my first experience of John Carpenter's Halloween. The scariest score in cinematic history was 5/4ing its way into my semi conscious state and after a few bars of it I heard my brother shout up the stairs at me, "Graham, do you want to come down to watch it? Mam and Dad will never know." This wasn't Colin doing me a favour. Oh no! Colin's role as the oldest brother was torturer and chief. But I heard something in his voice... he was pleading. The fact was, the opening of the movie had frightened him and he wanted company... any company. Even me. His youngest brother. My company was never requested, unless there was a trick involved. There was never a treat at the end of Colin requesting my presence. So that, coupled with the terrifying music, I did what any self respecting 6 year old would do... I pretended to be asleep. To Colin's credit, he stayed down stairs and watched the whole fucking thing. Poor guy was bombarded with questions from all of us the following day. He answered all of them. His use of description made me want to see it...

                                                   Blanchardstown, Dublin 1984
Back in the 80's when a big movie was shown on television, it was a genuine treat. We didn't have a VCR so screenings of Super-man and its sequel, Jaws and its sequel, Star Wars, Indiana Jones  etc. were to be savoured. They generally didn't hit the television until Christmas time and part of me misses the feeling of excitement I'd get when RTE, BBC and UTV would show adds for their Christmas movies. Halloween was no exception. It was a movie that everyone was talking about but I suspect only half the people had the balls to actually watch and even though it was made in 1978 it was still a huge talking point in the mid 80's. I kept my mouth shut when I saw the television listings in the paper on October 27th 1984. There it was. I forget what channel it was on but there it was and I already knew my parents were going out. Off they went about 9pm and I was watching the movie with my sister and a friend of hers by about 10pm. It won't come as a surprise to anyone to read that it scared the living piss out of me! I'll attach some of the shots throughout this blog that stayed in my head and haunted my dreams for years after. Starting with this one: 

                                                Michael watching Laurie in school

As previously stated many people were still going without VCR's in the mid 80's. We just didn't have the money. Times weren't particularly tough but disposable income was minimal. This is why days like Halloween were such a treat. They truly were (and still are) a great distraction from the norm and while I was really, quite badly frightened by the movie I was also instantly obsessed. Of course by the time I got to see Halloween, the sequel had been doing the rounds since 1981 but I'll come back to that. I began reading the television section in the papers every Saturday in the hope that it'd be on television again. The following year, I was certain I'd get a screening... I got The Fog. I was so disappointed that Halloween wasn't on but as it happened, The Fog turned out to be a whole lot of fun and absolutely dripping with atmosphere. It didn't impact on me the way Halloween did but it was certainly more treat than trick.

                                                   Michael watching Annie and Laurie

It was about this time that I started looking at who was making these movies. Names like Irwin Yablans, Deborah Hill, Moustapha Akkad, Tommy Lee Wallace and of course John Carpenter were in my head, ingrained into my brain like a tattoo on grey matter. The Fog and Halloween shared most of these names and so my curiosity grew. Who were these people? Again, back then, information like this was at a premium in Ireland and it wasn't until I hit my teens and started buying movie magazines that I got to know a bit about them. But for years they were heroes of mine and I knew nothing about them. Imagine the frustration! Even now, when I see any of these names it triggers something in me. Just a tiny feeling in my gut to remind me that at one point, seeing these names on my television screen meant the fucking world to me.

                                              Michael watching Laurie in her bedroom

It was probably about 1986 when I first got to see Halloween 2. I've managed to stay away from the technical prowess of Halloween so I'll try to do the same about Halloween 2's shortcomings. It's not that it's bad, it's just that it's ever so slightly lazy at times. Still, at 10 years of age I didn't give a shit about lazy writing or excessive gore! I was getting another Myers movie and truly nothing else mattered. By now, my parents had accepted that their youngest boy loved movies and in particular he loved horror movies. They had let me watch The Fog so they let me watch this. And it was fine. I mean, I was scared... just not "oh my fucking God Michael Myers is going to come in the window and get me" scared. I'd been out to visit my grandad that day and I dared him to watch it. On the phone the following day I asked him if he had watched it. "I did son." "And did it scare you?" "Not really son." We talked for a while about the movie. I was testing him to see if he had actually watched it. Afterwards I told my Mam about the chat and she reminded me that grandad had fought in World War 2. He'd seen a lot worse and up close. As for me, I was getting far too used to slasher flicks for one so young. Halloween 2 served as a nice little addition to "the night he came home" and I was satisfied when I watched it.

Which way is he looking?

 

A Franchise on the wane

By the time Halloween 4 came out it was 1989 and I was positively gagging to see it. Halloween 3 was a fun movie but had nothing to do with Michael Myers or Haddonfield. Part 4, however, had Michael Myers all over the advertising. It was called Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers and once again an older brother would get the drop on me. My other brother Gavin was also a fan of horror so he was very excited to see the movie. I was 13 years old. No way would I get into an 18s movie! So off Gav went. He didn't brag. He didn't make a song or dance about it. He just went, came home and assured me I wouldn't be disappointed by it. I had to wait for what seemed like an eternity for it to come to video but finally it arrived and Gav went out and rented it for the whole family. I fucking LOVED it! Now, as I've gotten older I can see the many flaws in the movie but at that age this movie was just what I was looking for. Halloween was still such a hoot for me and this was something else to add to the list of things I loved about the day. Did it scare me? Not really, but I found it to be more effective than I expected and I've since seen it on the big screen where it holds up reasonably well.

 Laurie finds Annie

 

                                                      Best and worst of the rest

The rest of the Halloween franchise is hit and miss. H5, to my delight, came out a year after 4 and again at that age it was the absolute bollocks! Notice as I got older it stopped being about the scares and started being about fun. H6 took its time but when it did come out I was all over it. Again, I can see the hideous flaws now but I enjoyed it well enough at the time. It wasn't well received though and forced a reboot of sorts. Halloween H:20 disregarded H4, 5 and 6. When it came out I was 22 years old and I was excited to see this 20 year anniversary movie with Jamie Lee Curtis back to take on the scariest of all the horror icons. It's a solid movie made by people who care about this material. Its follow up was made by people who don't and is so bad that it buried the franchise and forced a full on remake. Enter Rob Zombie. He made two movies. The first, a remake of the original and the other was a direct sequel to that. Both movies are a source of much debate. I'm kind of torn about them. There are things I like and there are things I don't. Truth be told, 1981's Halloween 2 got by on the fumes of the original classic and everything since then has been poor by comparison.

                                                           Don't Fear The Reaper

The older I get the less time I have to look back at these memories. That's not sadness, that's just a fact of life. However, music is a powerful thing. How many times have you heard a song and suddenly found yourself remembering something you hadn't thought about in years? The first time I ever heard Don't Fear The Reaper by Blue Oyster Cult was in Halloween. Whenever I hear it I always think of Laurie and Annie in a car, smoking a joint, being tailed by Michael Myers... Every. Single. Time! And every time I hear that Halloween theme I have access to so many memories of Halloween's past. Not just the movies or the anticipation of watching the original that night as a kid. But as a teenager sitting around a bonfire with friends. Or drinking in town and realising Halloween is a spectacularly unsafe night to go drinking in Dublin City! Or doing a horror themed pubcast with my buddy Wayne Talbot. Or playing a gig in a bar in Rathmines dressed as "ghostface" from Scream... There are a lot of memories.

As for the waning franchise? Well, up next is Halloween Returns however, just this week the project was put on hold while the writers and the producers come to terms with the arrival of "new partners" (probably Platinum Dunes) who weren't entirely sold on the direction the movie was taking. Hard to know if this is a good thing or not. While Platinum Dunes movies make money, their quality is, well, questionable. This is all conjecture though, they may not be involved at all. What is certain is, whatever adventures lay ahead for Michael Myers, I will be in the cinema watching and once that classic theme hits I'll be consumed by a wave of nostalgia.

Happy Halloween everyone.

Cheers,

G.

Why I love Movies - (The Exorcism of Emily Rose Edition)

"Possession is 9/10 of the law"

The Exorcism of Emily Rose or as I like to call it, The Explanation of Emily Rose is based on a true story of which there is ample information to be found online. Suffice to say, it's a tragic event which I think we can all agree should have been handled in a very different way. I'll leave it at that for the actual events and focus on the movie from here on in.

Laura Linney, Campbell Scott, Jennifer Carpenter and Tom Wilkinson would grace any movie and it is rare that a horror movie can boast such a quality cast. Director Scott Derrickson must have felt like all his birthdays had come together to have such talented people to work with.

The movie opens with ominous shots of a house where clearly some awful shit has gone down. Derrickson deserves credit for imbuing the movie with a sense of dread using some beautiful lighting and deft camera work along the way. As it happens Father Moore (Wilkinson) has carried out an exorcism on Emily and tragically the 19 year old girl has died.

Soon after we meet lawyer, Erin Bruner who has just got a client who may be a killer off on a technicality but Erin is ambitious and wants to be a partner at her firm so she doesn't care, yet. Her boss, Karl (Colm Feore) is delighted with her work and dangles a partnership in front of her if she'll defend Father Moore who has been arrested for negligent homicide. Bruner is an atheist and hates the idea but with that partnership so tangible, she agrees.

The prosecutor, Ethan Thomas (Campbell Scott) is a true believer. He's a church goer but doesn't believe in demonic possession. He truly believes father Moore is responsible for the death of Emily and is seeking a maximum sentence. A quick meeting between the two lawyers sets the tone for the battle ahead. Thomas has the facts on his side, Bruner has her work cut out for her.

The movie plays out in three ways. Part courtroom drama, part flashback showing you the events leading up to Emily's untimely death and some "real time" events mostly involving Bruner and father Moore. I should state at this point that I went to see this movie as a horror fan so I was looking forward to all manner of supernatural shenanigans and while I got plenty of well executed moments of horror, I ended up being far more interested in the battle between Thomas and Bruner in the courtroom. It's tightly scripted with hardly any filler moments.

Thomas has one huge advantage over Bruner and it is this simple truth: religion does not belong in law making. If you apply your religious beliefs to common sense law making, you are Sharia Law. Even if your religion is (apparently) more tolerant, it has no place in a court of law. This is why Bruner cannot win this fight... and she struggles to find a way to make any sort of impact. She clearly has sympathy for father Moore but can't find a way to convey his decency to the jury. Partially because Thomas gives a very effective opening statement and partially because the lawyer in her refuses to embrace the theatrics that might win over the jury. She brings in an "expert" to convince us that possession and exorcism are part of the "human experience" but Thomas destroys the witness and brings in an expert of his own, Dr. Briggs played by the wonderfully smarmy Henry Czerny. He is convinced Emily was suffering from "psychotic epileptic disorder" and should have been forced fed her meds and food to live. He asserts the religious solution, ie the exorcism directly led to her death and that a combination of medicine and force feeding would have saved her life. Bruner falls into his trap when she asks, "so you'd feed her against her will?" the response is damning, "to save her life, yes".

Bruner knows she needs to change her tactics and she also knows (though it never comes up in the movie) that the jury will certainly have some religious people and if she can put on an effective show, she might convince enough of them to win this case. She's also been taken in by the charming father Moore. I feel this character is a genuinely decent guy who did what he thought was right and Bruner is starting to wonder if he isn't telling the truth.

He tells her how he saw Emily's experience and he talks about his own terrifying run ins with a hooded figure. He's very convincing. Furthermore Emily's boyfriend, Jason (Joshua Close) comes across as entirely sane and speaks of some truly horrifying moments spent with Emily. In one she begs him not to leave her and as he says himself, "I never did, I stayed with her until the end." See below:

There comes a point in the movie where Bruner decides to go spiritual. A key witness, a doctor who believes Emily was possessed, is killed "Omen style". Bruner has been rocked by the fact that the guy she got off on the technicality has killed again and she is starting to wonder what the fuck she's doing with her life. The partnership offered to her starts to mean less and less and despite being told by her boss that she'd lose her job if she allows Moore to testify she does what she feels is right rather than what is right for her career. So, she takes the shackles off and with nothing left to lose she lets father Moore take the stand. In fairness to the priest he doesn't seem bothered by the fact that this will almost certainly mean incarceration. He says he just wants to tell Emily's story. So he plays a tape recording of the Exorcism and we, the audience, are treated to the actual events. It begins in the house but things quickly turn to shit and Emily ends up hysterical in the barn. Father Moore continues the ritual and Emily, it seems, has been possessed by six demons. Father Moore doesn't back down from them and a dialogue of sorts begins. It is a superb scene, Jennifer Carpenter is so utterly committed to the scene that I started to feel very uncomfortable when I first saw it.

Actually, let's talk about Jennifer Carpenter's acting in this movie. She is incredible. The physical aspect of her performance is absolutely staggering. She bends and twists herself into all manner of shapes. In the quiet moments she shows an innocence which is essential to the movie. You believe the witnesses who say she was a wonderful person. The performance, for me at least, was worthy of an academy award nomination but this is horror and horror doesn't get the love at the major award shows. That's a real shame. It's not that there's a lot of amazing performances in horror but there are some and this is certainly one of them. It won a Scream award and an MTV award.

Back to the movie, father Moore testifies and does well considering his position. Ethan Thomas watches and listens like a spider watching its prey in the web. Thomas drops the ball here as he comes across as kind of a dick, mocking the priest for his beliefs. I found this odd given the lawyer is a practicing catholic but maybe he just got caught up in the moment. He absolutely rips the defense to shreds but he is heavy handed and he makes Moore look sympathetic.

As the movie comes into its final moments there is one scene that I'm completely torn on. Father Moore reads a letter, written by Emily, to the court. Moore's voice narrates as the scene begins. In the scene, Emily, by now on death's door, manages to sneak out of the house and into the nearby field. There she collapses by a tree and, pretty violently it must be said, her soul leaves her body. There she speaks to "Holy Mary". You see her having a conversation with the iconic catholic figure but you never see Mary. Moore reads the letter and the conversation is revealed. Mary has given Emily the option of dying where she is and going with Mary (presumably to heaven) or she can stay as she is and die in the clutches of six demons. Why? Well, if she sees this through to the end, she'll help convince people that there is a spirit realm etc.

I have problems with this scene. I'm not talking about my beliefs here. I'm happy to watch a movie like this and not let my personal belief system spoil my enjoyment of it. Or think of it like this, if I can walk into Lord of the Rings and get drawn in by that fantasy, I can just as easily get drawn in by this one. So, as stated, Mary asks Emily stay possessed to convince people that there's a spirit realm or to die and go with her there and then. Emily takes the martyr route, deciding that she'd rather endure further suffering to help bring religion to the masses. Firstly, people just believe in religion. For no rhyme or reason whatsoever and without the benefit of proof, people just believe. A kid enduring further torture by six demons won't change that. Secondly, there's a theory put forth in the movie that the exorcism failed because Emily was taking medicine which shut down the part of her brain that would be open to receiving the benefit of an exorcism. Let's follow this madness to its conclusion. If Mary wanted Emily to remain possessed to her end, surely nothing would have worked, rendering everyone trying to help Emily, including father Moore, pointless.

What I do like about the scene is the the way Thomas pays attention to the details and uses them to his advantage. Moore has stated that Emily got the stigmata after seeing Mary. Thomas points out that the field is surrounded by a barbwire fence and Emily simply cut herself on the fence on her way into the field. There is blood on the barbwire to back this up. I also love the way the scene looks. It's so haunting, almost other-worldly. A still from the scene is used as the main poster of the movie (shown at the top of this blog) and it is one of my favourite movie posters. I also like the hint at the power Mary has at her disposal. I assume Emily's outer body experience is something Mary orchestrates which is cool enough but the violence of the soul coming out of and going back into Emily's body is quite scary. Nice touch as you do get the feeling that if she wanted to Mary could handle this whole six demon thing with minimum fuss.

And so the stories have been told and the closing statements are upon us. Bruner gives a solid closing. She's played the only card she could, the theatrical one and she's played it beautifully. There's nothing more to add except variations on "I can't say for sure if these things are real or not" which is a great ploy for the reasonable doubt argument. It's a decent closer but not as rousing as you'd expect.

Surprisingly enough the rousing closing speech comes from Ethan Thomas who absolutely wipes the floor with Bruner. I don't know if it was intentional as you did feel the tide turning toward Bruner during father Moore's testimony and maybe they felt they needed to bring things back toward common sense in order to add to the suspense as we wait for the verdict. Or maybe it was just Campbell Scott being amazing, I don't know but he is brilliant here. Simply pointing out the reality of the situation is damning to Bruner's defense and she does look a forlorn figure sitting there while he rips the theatrical efforts of the defense apart.

And so we come to the verdict and oddly enough both sides win. Thomas gets his guilty verdict which was all he could do at his end but Bruner has also done her job and has reached the "believers" in the jury who decide the priest should have his sentence reduced to time served. The judge agrees. The movie closes with father Moore and Bruner at Emily's grave. It is sad and it hit me right in the face when I first watched the movie. Afterwards when discussing the movie with the person I first saw it with we both agreed that Dr. Briggs was right, if Emily had been force fed and treated by professionals she'd probably still be alive.

Once you've seen this movie the question of whether or not she was possessed is also an obvious topic. Let's be clear, the exorcism scene in this movie is terrific. As are the Emily in possessed mode scenes. I found them to be expertly shot, acted and edited. Credit again to Derrickson and Jennifer Carpenter for producing the goods in a world where we've all seen "The Exorcist". What is surprising though is the way the movie offers up common sense explanations for what you initially feel must be supernatural occurrences. It's to the movies credit that it does this and Campbell Scott's deft performance as the "well actually here's what really happened" guy is top drawer because he could have come across as a kind of kill joy but he never does.

So there's something for everybody here. Religious people will get the God versus Devil thing expertly delivered by a talented director who knows exactly what's required to make a movie of this ilk. He is helped by a talented cast who commit to the material, not least by Jennifer Carpenter's spectacular performance. Those of us who look for less creative and more rational ways to explain our existence are also catered for in a very reasoned analysis of what exactly is wrong with someone who seems to be possessed. The real trick here, however, is the attraction for people who maybe aren't big on horror but love a good courtroom drama. This is an excellent one with Linney and Scott both reveling in their respective roles.

I really feel this was the last good exorcism movie. There's been a slew of them since all pretty terrible. Even Derrickson's Deliver Us From Evil is by the numbers and more drivel than devil. I've avoided the inevitable comparison to The Exorcist up to now. Obviously The Exorcist is a better movie,  I mean it's the fucking Exorcist. But this one dares to delve a littler deeper, asking more questions of the audience and for a horror movie, that can only be applauded.

Cheers,

G.

The Trifecta: Snake, MacReady, Burton!

If you google "best trilogies" you'll get the usual. Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, The Godfather... A friend of mine recently sent me a photo message of her 55" television and on it was a map of Middle Earth. She was tucking into the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I was so jealous as I don't seem to have that kind of time these days and it made me think of movie sessions I'd done and enjoyed. Obviously Lord of the Rings has been done several times. But there was also "theme days", like creature features or Spielberg only or Christmas movies... you get the idea. In the spirit of this I think the Kurt Russell/John Carpenter collaboration is a worthy addition to the list. Contrary to the title, they've worked on five projects together but the middle three are an exercise in movie making perfection and should be watched by anyone with a shred of cinematic dignity (and you know, the time).

                                                        Escape From New York
I'm a bit freaked out by the start of this movie now. A bunch of militant assholes hijack Air Force One and crash it into the heart of New York. Bear in mind, this movie was made 20 years before the attacks on 9/11. Anyway, for the uninitiated: As mentioned above Air Force One has been crashed into the heart of New York. That's bad enough but what's worse is, due to a continued spike in crime, The Big Apple is now a maximum security prison. Walls have been built up around it and are manned by police. Mines have been placed on bridges and anyone hoping to get out on a raft will be blown out of the water (literally) by a lurking helicopter. You'd assume there's boats out there too... So, the President (Donald Pleasance) has managed to escape in a pod and with him is a tape which he needs to bring to a summit involving USA, China and Russia in order to restore world peace.

Enter the coolest anti hero in the history of cinema, Snake Plissken. Snake is a gun fighter, thief and all round badass! He wears an eye patch. I've been told it's because his eye is sensitive to light but I always assumed he only had the one. Either way it matters not because it's fucking COOL! Snake has finally been captured by the establishment and is being transported to New York Prison to serve out his life sentence... When the President's plane goes down, Hauk, played by the amazing Lee Van Cleef, helicopters into the prison city to try to negotiate with one of the inmates. He's given one of the President's fingers and told, "if you're not up in the air in 30 seconds he dies"...

Optionless, Hauk dangles freedom in front of Plissken. All he has to do is sneak into New York and rescue the president using any means necessary and deliver him within 24 hours. Snake reluctantly accepts (see clip below) As you can imagine hi-jinks ensue. Isaac Hayes, Harry Dean Stanton, Adrienne Barbeau, Tom Atkins are all excellent additions and what a genius piece of casting it was to get Ernest Borgnine in as the eccentric "Cabbie".


However, the biggest piece of genius in a movie riddled with it must go to Kurt Russell who decided to play Snake like Clint Eastwood because Lee Van Cleef was Eastwood's enemy in The Good The Bad and The Ugly. To say that decision paid off is a huge understatement. Snake's quiet sibilance is extremely effective and only adds to his coolness. As for the movie itself. It is a quiet riot. Fast paced but not without moments to gather yourself. And, apart from the inferior sequel, there really isn't anything else quite like this. Just bad character imitations. Riddick enthusiasts have EFNY to thank for paving the way. I'll leave you with a Plissken quote, "I don't give a fuck about your war or your president". Still relevant? Oh hell yes. Great way to start the trifecta!

                                                                The Thing
The Thing is that rare beast. A remake that is not only good but improves upon the original. Oddly enough, as good as the movie is, when it was released in 1982 nobody went to see it. Why not? ET. That's why. Spielberg's favourite alien was winning the hearts of movie goers all over the world and when The Thing came out, nobody wanted to watch a movie about a shape shifting alien that becomes a copy of the person it infects. They missed out. The Thing is a powerhouse of performances, special fx, pace and story telling all under the watchful eye of a director at the very top of his game.

You'd have to feel sorry for Carpenter. To make a movie this good only for everyone to turn on you (the critics called him the pornographer of violence, a title he now adores) must have been tough to absorb. But The Thing is much more than a sci fi horror. It's a commentary on AIDS, the alien in this movie infects you and takes you over cell by cell but it doesn't reveal itself until it needs to fight. It's also a commentary on the fear of Communism. In 1982 America was still suspicious of Russia and vice versa. Trust, is a huge plot device in the movie and MacReady alludes to it in the scene below which, despite being a basic "recap of events" scene, is nonetheless perfectly lit by DP legend Dean Cundey. Check it out:

Russell plays MacReady as a tough pilot who doesn't say anything unless it's worth saying and doesn't do anything unless it's worth doing. Unfortunately for "Mac" shit gets real in a big way in this movie and from the moment an infected dog arrives at their base in the Antarctic, his gruff and tough ways are called upon. From flying a helicopter out to the nearby Norweigian camp in high winds to torching aliens left right and centre, Mac is kept pretty busy. It all leads to the now legendary "petri-dish scene". Mac takes everyone hostage and demands a blood sample from the remaining crew. Each are assigned their own petri-dish. He dips a hot needle into each dish and if there's a reaction, they'd be able to identify who the "thing" is. It's pure brilliance! If Spielberg or any of the "top men" wrote this scene, they'd still be banging on about it. It's not just the special fx (which are spectacular) it's not just the acting (also top notch) but the way the camera moves. The way it leads you into every incident in the scene. It's easy to miss how smooth a job Carpenter does because the shocks come fast and furious but when you've watched it for the umpteenth time, you start to grasp just how much of a genius Carpenter was...

The music by Ennio Morricone is predictably excellent. Not what you'd expect but it really fits. Rob Bottin (picture) was 21 when he did the fx for this movie. He got a little help from Stan Winston who took over for the famous dog kennel scene. The fact that Winston's scene which is horrifically brilliant, isn't the best fx scene in the movie says a lot about Bottin's work.

The movie is not for everyone. It has dollops of humour for those of a darker disposition but everyone else may find it all a bit too grim. It's extremely shocking and that's too much for some. But the talent involved is too big to ignore and the class of the movie overcomes the idiotic reviews it initially received. Time has also been really good to the movie: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1021244-thing/  and it's an excellent "middle movie" in this trilogy. Where do we go from here? Bonkers town!

                                                    Big Trouble In Little China
When you've just watched The Thing and you've another movie to go you need something different. You need something special. You need something, dare I say it, happy. Big Trouble In Little China is described as "A mystical action adventure comedy kung-fu monster ghost story". It's all those things and more... so much more. For this is the movie of Jack Burton! And Jack Burton means hilarity to those of us who get him. Sadly, we live in a world where not everybody gets him. As heroes go, Jack is a guy who thinks he is the absolute bollocks but in actual fact doesn't succeed because of himself but succeeds in spite of himself and the size of his delusions are matched only by the size of his truck which he lovingly calls "The Pork Chop Express". All aboard!

Did I mention that Kurt Russell is a genius? Having played Snake Plissken like Clint Eastwood he decided to play Jack Burton as a full on John Wayne piss take and it's wondrous! We meet Jack Burton on his way to San Francisco, Chinatown in the Pork Chop Express and he's "talkin' to whoever is listening out there" gabbing pearls of Burton wisdom out through his CB radio. None of it making any sense, all of it immensely quotable. So he meets up with his buddies and they immediately start gambling. Jack comes out on top (for once) but his good friend, Wang, has no money so they go to the airport together to pick up Wang's girlfriend after which he'll pay Jack his dues (ahem).

Anyway, Wang's green eyed lady gets kidnapped and shit escalates.... big time. Turns out Jack and Wang have stumbled into a battle that's been raging for thousands of years. David Lo Pan (played hilariously by James Hong) is a demon cursed to walk the earth as a kind of ghost and the only way he can lift the curse is to marry a green eyed Chinese girl and then kill her... hence the kidnapping. If he does this he then intends to rule the world because, ya know... demon. Good guys come together to fight him and with Jack Burton leading them, what can go wrong? Well lots actually and all of it is hilarious. Thanfully Egg Shen (Victor Wong also superb) is on hand to give aid. You find out as the movie progresses that he has been fighting Lo Pan forever... If you don't know what's happening in the movie don't worry about it. It's kind of the point. Jack Burton has no idea either. Take a look:                              

You may have noticed Kim Catrall by now and, hard as it is to believe, she was attractive once. She also had "cracker jack (comic) timing" and contrary to the dreadful persona that's attached itself to her like a disgusting arse barnacle (I am of course referring to Samantha from that hideous show) she was more than a one note actor. She plays plucky lawyer, Gracie Law (no really) and her chemistry with Russell is hugely enjoyable. It really helps to centre the movie and give you a plot point to hold onto when everything starts going insane... which it frequently does. David Lo Pan takes a fancy to Gracie and you really can't blame the old guy.

There's an abundance of joy in this movie for those who give it a chance. There's serious re-watch value too. It has nothing in common with the previous movies in this trifecta and it feels utterly original. It's another Carpenter movie that nobody went to see but did well with audiences years later. http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/big_trouble_in_little_china/

Ahead of its time? I don't know. I just think there's a sense of humour in here that isn't for everyone. I put it to you like this, if you can't see the humour in a centuries old demon using phrases like "now this really pisses me off to no end" then this movie probably isn't for you.

So there you have it. A trifecta of movies that should be savoured by all. If you find yourself with a spare 6 hours, you could do an awful lot worse.

Cheers,

G.

Are You an Atheist? Not Exactly.

I'm not really sure why but I've been asked several times recently if I am an atheist. People just assume I am because of my loathing of organised religion. The truth is, I don't think it's as easy as placing a label on someone and summing them up with a title. "There's Graham, he's an atheist." I'm not actually but I will allow that I hold more in common with atheism than any "person of faith". Still, a question has been asked so here goes.

Short answer: I'm a humanist. If you must label me, label me that. To quote Al Pacino (ironically enough playing Satan) in Devil's Advocate, "I'm a fan of man". Stick me in with the guys who like evidence to back up their beliefs. Put me in the category of people who think what's happening at NASA or what a pediatrician does every day is way more inspiring than any religious concept. The problem with this thinking (for some) is that proof puts us on firm ground in any existential debate and if you are continuously backing your beliefs up with facts while the other side revert to Book of Mormon type soundbites like, "I just believe", you start to look like a bit of a dick. "Stop insulting my faith" is an oft used line. "I'm not insulting it, I'm merely backing mine up with facts. What have you got to back yours up?" No matter what they come back with you will end up listening to unsubstantiated drivel. And again, you'll look like an asshole for pointing that out. It's worth it though and I've always been comfortable being right. If you want a more long winded answer, read on.

Long answer: Born in '76 a Catholic, I was never really sold on its teachings. Too much judgement and damnation for my liking. Couple of serious plot holes in there too... Fast forward to the 90's and the child molesting scandals were all over the news. At that point, priests who had always made me pretty uncomfortable with their "forgiveness powers" (how anyone ever let their kid go into a confession booth is beyond me) and generally crazy opinions were exposed. Some of them were molesting children. The rest of them were apologising for the crimes. Hardly any of them went to jail. Catholicism, which had been on life support anyway was, at that point, dead to me. You only need watch one History Channel documentary to see what a destructive force it has been through the centuries. Burning women for being witches, The Crusades, Magdalene Laundries, cover ups and continued child abuse etc. It is literally drowning in innocent blood.

I'm also uncomfortable with how relaxed we are with people who say things like "God spoke to me and told me to run for President"- Michele Bachmann. Now, I know this woman is crazy and maybe you do too but many people believe her. It doesn't occur to them to follow that statement to its conclusion. Here's Maggie in The Newsroom, she's a Christian but isn't afraid to ask questions:

While we're at it, doesn't the Pope have a direct line to Heaven? There are people who believe he hears the voice of God. And I remember as recently as the 1980's this was a commonly held belief. Now, since then people have changed their view on this but they still see the Pope as a beacon of hope. Before I get into why he isn't, shouldn't we give this whole Pope thing a serious rethink? Most of us agree that the Pope doesn't talk to God. That being the case, why should his opinion hold any weight at all? Because he's the head of a corrupt organisation? Granted, this latest Pope seems to have a firm grasp on the reality that we are destroying the planet and he's also trying to make Catholicism more accessible. The problem is, the rhetoric remains the same. Allow me to paraphrase Pope Francis: "Gays, single mothers, women who've had abortions you are all welcome in the house of God... as long as you seek forgiveness". How dare he! How dare he ask a gay person to beg forgiveness for being what they are. How dare he ask a woman to apologise for making a choice only she can fully understand! He also thinks smacking kids is fine... nice chap, eh.

Lastly, on Catholicism. Let's have a little chat about sex. The Catholic church is fucking obsessed with it. They don't want you to have pleasure sex. You're only meant to screw if you're married and trying to have a baby. This is a very worrying concept. Sex is healthy. It's good for you. It's not some dirty, wretched thing that will corrupt you. Marriage isn't for everyone either. There are some people who simply don't do well in long term relationships. Are they to go without sex? The joke here of course is that many priests in Ireland were and still are in very healthy relationships and are screwing all around them while enjoying the benefits of safe sex. Some of them even have children. There's absolutely nothing wrong with this. It's natural. What's unnatural is the idea that having sex with an adult* is somehow cheating on God. It's fucking mental!!! There's always been craziness when it came to sex though. For example: Women used to have to visit a priest after they'd had a baby to be "churched." I'm not making this up. The priest would bless the woman which would mean she was cleansed and at that point it was okay for her to go have sex with her husband again (as long as it was in the name of trying for a baby). The woman would have to do this even if the child had died while the mother gave birth. It all stems from this obsession they have with sex. For some reason, they see it as a bad thing. I honestly do not get it. Sexual repression is a tragedy and can cause real harm. There's a lot more I could say on this subject but I'll leave it there. You may view this as Catholic bashing but these are facts. So, yeah, I opted out of Catholicism and I can't understand how intelligent and otherwise sane people accept it as a legitimate "thing".

Am I going to go through all religions? No. Just the one that did its best to poison my mind. But having looked at them all I don't buy into any of them. There's just nothing there for me.

Let's move on to the "things happen for a reason" stuff. For me this is complete bollocks! Things that we have no control over just happen... constantly. Bad things, good things, insignificant things. To apply some master plan, logic or intelligent design to this is fucking insanity and downright insulting to anyone who has ever endured true suffering. How we react is what shapes who we are. That reaction is on you. It is not on some higher power or some ghost or angel looking after you. You choose how you respond to any given situation and this makes you the person that you are. At least, that's how I see it. And in my world seeing is believing. If anyone has any physical evidence (not some anecdotal ghost story) to the contrary, I'd love to take a look at it.

World events have had a huge bearing on me too. I think if we apply God to what's happening with Syria today we'd have to say "how fucking dare you let this happen." Of course, that doesn't apply to me as I don't believe he's up there anyway. I'm not sure when I came to the conclusion that there was nothing out there looking after us but I suspect the break up of

Yugoslavia and the ensuing war had a lot to do with it. Or maybe the half million slaughtered Rwandans pushed me over... I'm not sure. I'd like to think that intelligent, open minded people of faith would look at what is happening in the world today and ask themselves is the convenient "god gave us free will" argument really good enough? Or is it time to accept that we have free will because we just fucking have it.

There's a line in the underrated Mike Nichols movie Wolf where a guy says, "life is mystical, it's just that we are used to it". That's a throw away line in the movie but it stayed with me and has done for 20 years now. At the time, I was a believer in a "higher power". But I began to really dwell on this line. Do we really need to read the bible to get our miracles? It is pretty fucking amazing what we can achieve when the need or desire is there. I mean for fuck sake, we just sent a robot to Mars. We landed a probe on an asteroid, we have photos of Pluto. James Cameron has explored the Mariana Trench. We've cured countless diseases. We created languages, music and literature. We've climbed Everest and we're bouncing signals from satellites that put moving pictures into your living room 24 hours a day just to keep you abreast of what's happening. Amazing!


For all that though, scientists allow for things to happen and change their views accordingly. It's no use sticking rigidly to one view as you cannot grow, adapt or evolve (it's also why I don't like belief labels). I think this is the main problem with religious belief, there's just no flexibility there. The text remains the same. So you're left with three kinds of religious people. Those who use their faith as an excuse to be scumbags, those who just believe despite all reason and those who know on some level the teachings are bullshit but go along with it anyway for reasons known only to themselves.

So what happens when you die? I don't know. Many people say they've had outer body experiences. Others say they flew on the wings of a giant butterfly on the way to heaven and that it felt beautiful. Others say their whole life flashed before them... I think that your body is going through some serious trauma and your brain is frying. So, with all that activity you could see anything and think it was real. That's not to say that there isn't something out there after you die. There may very well be something more, I just feel like your brain frying while it shuts down is a more reasonable explanation and until someone can prove to me that there is life after death I'm going to stick with the more reasoned explanation.

Finally and quite simply, I'm going to continue to bask in what's happening here: "The world is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper."

Cheers,

G.

*the fact that I had to put the words "with an adult" into that sentence tells me all I need to know about the Catholic Church.

RIP Wes.

It was almost like a sporting rivalry. Who's better Wes Craven or John Carpenter? This was a question that horror fans asked each other for years. For the record it has to be Carpenter but while the "master" hasn't made a truly great movie since In the Mouth of Madness (1994) Craven managed several hits with the Scream franchise and worked with Meryl Streep in Music of the Heart.

But we'll come back to those. Wes Craven was a talented film maker with a very dark sense of humour. For all his talent though he's made, by my count, one essential movie: A Nightmare on Elm Street. Since then he's made some really solid movies and some really terrible ones. For every Scream (I like all of them) there's a My Soul to Take. For every New Nightmare there's a Cursed.

What he did do was pave the way for other film makers to play in the horror yard he helped build.

In 1972 he directed The Last House on the Left which was also produced by Friday the 13th creator Sean S. Cunningham. Steve Miner also worked on the project. With that trio involved it was always going to be nasty. However, I felt it was just exploitation and it repulsed me. I'm sure that's what they were going for and they succeeded admirably. However, the movie didn't once hint at the talent within Craven. For me, it detracts from a decent legacy... I'm sure the man himself would disagree. People still cite the movie as hugely influential and it was remade in 2009 with Craven and Cunningham producing.

In 1977 he fared better with The Hills Have Eyes. The idea is similar to The Last House on the Left. Normal people forced to fight for their lives, this time against mutant cave dwellers. It started a kind of "love letter" relationship between Sam Raimi and Wes Craven. Raimi saw The Hills Have Eyes and loved it so much he put a poster of it in the basement in his classic The Evil Dead. Craven returned the favour in A Nightmare on Elm Street when we saw The Evil Dead on television in that movie. Eagle eyed viewers of The Evil Dead 2 will find Freddy's glove hanging over the door of the tool shed...

After "Hills" he lumbered from one bad project to the next. It's a pretty terrible list of movies actually: Deadly Blessing, Swamp Thing, Invitation to Hell and an ill advised sequel to The Hills Have Eyes. However it was at this point that he managed to pull a rabbit out of the hat... and what a rabbit. Craven had read about this kid who was convinced he would fall victim to whatever was chasing him in his dreams. When the kid finally did fall asleep, he never woke up. He apparently died screaming. Craven, like any of us was deeply upset by this story. Unlike any of us he decided to make a movie based around the concept.

The first time I saw A Nightmare on Elm Street I was completely absorbed. Terrified but unable to take my eyes off the screen. Suffice to say, I LOVED the movie (and still do). There's just so many fucking amazing visuals in it... too many to mention here. Freddy himself is pure genius. A nasty irredeemable bastard who is going to get you and he genuinely is the stuff of nightmares. It feels like a cross between Halloween and Phantasm. It has that Halloween slasher feel (though isn't quite as scary) and it has a lot of the fuckeduppedness of Phantasm (again not quite as effective) However when you combine the two and add Freddy Krueger to the recipie, it is every bit as effective.

The success of the movie basically built New Line Cinema and gave Johnny Depp a decent start. It also became its own animal as Freddy Krueger became a household name and the biggest of all the horror movie icons. While Freddy became the new rock n' roll, his creator's career seemed stuck. His next picture would be the well meaning but ultimately forgettable Deadly Friend. Okay, we'll never forget that basketball scene but by and large, it's a poor enough movie.

Wes wasn't really happy with the sequel to A Nightmare on Elm Street so he wrote part three. You could tell. It's a really fun horror movie and solidified Freddy as the new dog in the yard. Jason and Michael were starting to feel very old hat (pun intended). He'd stay away from the franchise until the New Nightmare. More on that later.

1988 saw him direct The Serpent and the Rainbow. Again, it's a well meaning attempt but ultimately must go down as a failure. And Shocker, while full of interesting ideas was an attempt to bring forth the new Freddy... It failed. 1991 saw him come back to form with the unusual but rather good "People Under the Stairs". Again, Craven was moved by the true events of a couple who kept their kids locked in a basement. His movie, while horrific is also riddled with darkly comic moments and showed Craven's use of humour which would become a bigger part of his career. "People" made a few quid but it also showed how good he could be. He proved it again in with his next flick...

In 1994 Wes Craven went back to the Freddy well. To his credit though, this was no cash grab. Craven was happy with the success of the "Nightmare" franchise but less happy with what Freddy had become. He was, for all intents and purpsoes, a joke. This had to change. Craven wrote and directed The New Nightmare and with this movie he showed he had a lot left in the tank. First up, Freddy needed to be scary again. Now, given that Freddy had his own lunch boxes by now, this was a big ask. However, Craven writes Freddy as a menacing bloodthirsty nightmare in the movie and uses the pop culture aspect that made him so famous as the "energy" that ultimately brings him to life. It's a genius concept, executed to perfection by Craven. He goes after the actors from previous movies in the franchise and Craven himself is in the movie explaining just what is going on... Craven is also smart enough to know that humour is expected in these movies now but rather than have Freddy deliver yet another awful pun, he straight up pokes fun at previous sequels. Poking fun at horrors would become a nice little earner for Craven but I digress, despite being a truly fantastic movie Wes Craven's New Nightmare made fuck all money. He followed it up with the risible Eddie Murphy vehicle, Vampire In Brooklyn. He needed a hit. It didn't seem like it was going to come. A lesser man may have thrown in the towel...

Make no mistake about it, Scream was a fucking sensation when it hit. It was cool, it was scary, it was funny and it brought horror movies to a whole new audience of people who'd usually never watch them. Scream was a very simple concept. A teenage "whodunnit" set in a small town. You've all seen the movie, you don't need me to remind you of how much fun it is. What I will do is tell you about my experience of it when I went to see it on preview night way back in 1996. Cinema was half full. I was waiting for my favourite horrors to get a mention. They all did with Halloween's amazing score being used to excellent effect in the last act. I had to bite my hand so as not to scream the answer to the question that sealed Drew Barrymore's fate and over all I had a hell of a time.

Craven and his writer Kevin Williamson didn't back away from the big issues either. "Movies don't create psychos, movies make psychos creative" is a fucking superb line. The movie was a deserved success and launched a four movie franchise. Scream 2 was even more successful and was for me an improvement on the original. Parts three and four also had their moments but, as you'd expect, the magic dissipates with the later installments. That's okay though. All of these movies know what they are and they aren't ashamed. Nor should they be. Scream kept horror alive and Craven was deservedly proud of his creation.

Craven and Kevin Williamson teamed up again for what we all expected would be a fantastic horror. It was a werewolf movie called Cursed. It proved, if nothing else, that Craven was just as capable of soiling the nest as he was of building it. Cursed is a fucking awful movie. One hilarious gag in the final minutes is not enough to save it. How this creative team put this garbage together is beyond me, but they did and it can't be erased. Lost its bollocks too!

Moving on. On the back of his Scream success Wes Craven got to make a movie with Meryl Streep. When Madonna backed out of Music of the Heart (something the studio must have been happy about) Streep stepped in. Suddenly Craven was working with the world's best actor. The movie itself is the usual "kids in shit neighbourhood have awesome teacher" and it's fine but the point here is, Wes "last house on the left" Craven was working with Meryl "better than everyone" Streep. If that's not a bucket list moment for a director I don't know what is.

Soon after he put together the serviceable thriller Red Eye starring Rachel McAdams and Cillian Murphy. The movies best moments are, predictably enough, on the Red Eye but the last act falls into the absurd and very nearly undoes all of the good work of the previous hour. Still Red Eye must go down as a success. If you haven't seen it, I won't ruin it. Worth a look.

His last two movies that had him behind a camera were My Soul to Take and Scream 4. My Soul to Take is such a terrible movie that I simply refuse to give it anymore air by talking about it. Scream 4 on the other hand is a much more worthy epitaph for this man. It's rock solid fun. It flirts with genius and has some great moments... This for me, sums the man's career up.

Cheers,

G.