Creature Feature: In Brief

Jaume Balagueró & Paco Plaza - REC 2 (2009)

The first REC, while by no means a masterpiece, was a solid and original piece of horror film-making, doing something a bit different with the zombie genre and making unwontedly welcome use of the hand-held camera – and indeed, managing to extend on the technology and hence the mise en scène. The second, to my lights, is even better – though straying outside the confines of the sealed-off apartment block in a way which breaks the claustrophobia which worked so well in the first instalment, the inclusion of further back story and character diversity makes for a more complex film without losing the simple momentum of the first (and now, with a twist…)

George A. Romero - Diary of the Dead (2008)

A disappointing Romero vehicle in which, unlike the aforementioned, the use of digital hand-held disappoints and irritates, encompassing all the typical flaws of these genres (i.e., severe frustration with the camera holder who however remains untouchable due to their status as such; unrealistic failure to put it down in life-threatening situations). Meanwhile, the internet themes fail to cohere into meaningful social commentary a la Dawn of the Dead. Watch Zombieland instead.

John McTiernan - Predator (1987)

Another in the ‘I can’t believe I’ve never seen this’ canon, this was a surprisingly atmospheric film, with the shadowy South American jungle as the main character – striated shadows dappling the blazing sun and the sweat and blood of the action film. The USA redeems its sanguinaceous Cold War interference in its ‘backyard’ through the trope of the pursuit of Latin terrorists (managing to allay the inhumanity of this killing and also feminize the victims even as we fear their violence by leaving alive the lone female terrorist as a prisoner who ultimately becomes an ally), while nodding to 80s political correctness, such as it was, in the black characters and, naturally the native American who has an intimate connection with the ways of the jungle (all of these sacrificeable, naturally). The ‘reveal’ comes surprisingly late in the piece, and the strangely honourable predator, before he (?) is revealed as an overgrown dreadlocked insect, segues in with the natural world as a ripple in the trees (with effects which haven’t dated too badly, unlike the technology he uses). Apocalypse Now, filtered through the lens of an unironic Schwarzeneggerian (gubernatorial?) all-Americanism.

Jon Harris - The Descent 2 (2009)

Another film in which the environment is the protagonist – in this case, the same cave system in which the protagonists of the first Descent (Neil Marshall, director of the original, returns only as executive producer) found themselves trapped – again, we spend somewhat more time outside the closed environment, here becoming a flaw, and there is also the somewhat unrealistic, but effective, choice to send the sole survivor of the first film back into the tunnels. Essentially we are re-exploring old ground in a less effective rehash of the first film, which was an entertaining diversion with some early moments of fear and claustrophobia before ‘descending’ into a fairly typical monster gore hunt (colour-coded, a nice touch) – here, without the benefit of that unfamiliarity, while the caves remain an original and atmospheric setting, despite a final twist there is nothing here which adds meaningfully to the film’s predecessor.

Wes Craven et al – A Nightmare On Elm Street 1-4 (1984-88)

I wasn’t actually sure if I’d seen the first, but I’d certainly never seen the sequels. And what pleasant – or should that be unpleasant? – surprises were in store! Unlike other the other classic protagonists of the genre – Jason Voorhees & Michael Myers – these films did not have the stigma of having given birth to the rather unnecessary slasher genre, but instead of playing an important role in the development of the blockbuster horror comedy (not to mention the ongoing horror-queering of the all-american dream suburbs) – and we love ‘em for it (and I’m not just saying that because we’re inhabiting here my favourite decade of the twentieth century – the 80s)! Camp as all get-out, with absurdist, ‘body horror’ pre-CGI special effects (reminiscent of other films of the era such as the unjustly neglected Society, or even Videodrome) which invoke a great deal of nostalgia – and a twisted, Burtonesque atmosphere to boot – not only the initial NOES, but also, unusually, the sequels, are extremely worthwhile. Part 2 is noteworthy really only for the extremely overt (and apparently intentional) homoerotic elements (with just a touch of B&D in the shower room), but 3 kicks into high and rather dark gear – featuring Freddy’s intended teenage victims in a mental institution as a result of their belief in the reality of their dreams, and the unexpected appearance of Patricia Arquette (not to mention Laurence Fishburne) - a punk edge, and rather nasty addiction and sexual violence themes (these latter in the development of Freddy’s backstory), also creep in. Part 4 can’t quite live up to the claustrophobic institutionalization and traumatic edge of the third film, but nonetheless it remains a romp, featuring particularly memorable scenes in which Freddy inhabits a roach motel and a pizza (!), as well as an extension of the theme, used to brilliant effect throughout the series, of the indistinguishability of the line dividing reality and fantasy, in a time-loop sequence. Oh, and I was forgetting, we also have a soundtrack showcasing Sinead O’Connor with MC Lyte performing the ultra-catchy I Want Your Hands (On Me) – not to mention the Are You Ready For Freddy rap by the Fat Boys featuring Robert Englund. Dark comedy of the absurd, accompanied by nostalgia for the tainted eighties.

Gus Van Sant - Elephant (2003)

In the heady days of my youth, I was a big true crime aficionado. But although I remained fascinated by perpetrator mentality, as my early twenties passed, I began to feel just a little too much empathy with the victims, and just a little too much of the uncomfortable voyeurism of the position of the true crime fan (in keeping with the pulpiness and sub-pop psychology of most of the writing, though not all), to keep pursuing this vein (having said which, interest in these things, I would argue, is an inherent part of human nature which a modern culture of sanitized medicinal miracles has – ironically – unhealthily shunted to one side).

So what was I to make of Elephant? This is the central film in Van Sant’s ‘Death Trilogy,’ (beginning with Gerry and closing with Last Days), each based on actual events and dealing with the eponymous event – though death is, of course, a major feature of virtually all of Van Sant’s films. In this case, the event in question is the infamous Columbine massacre, still perhaps the cultural paradigm for all the other mass shootings (including many in schools) to which the USA seems so tragically prone. While I’m not sure how I’d feel about such a work – released four years after the events – if I was personally connected to the tragedy, this work comes across as a thoughtful reflection rather than an exploitation, though there is always a certain question about purposefully creating a work of aesthetic beauty – which Elephant undoubtedly is – from such a subject.

In regard to Columbine, as was widely noted at the time of the film’s release, Van Sant offers no explanations (indeed, the killers as depicted here do not seem to fit any recognisable profile, for what such profiles are worth), and this is a strength of the film in that we are offered no pat explanations (nor resolutions), nor too-easy indictments of particular aspects of a society which produces such events. In any case, if we are to take Dave Cullen’s non-fiction work Columbine (2009) – which also uses fiction-style conventions (it’s been called a modern-day In Cold Blood) and has become the definitive work on the massacre – as a guide, most of what we think we know about these events is in fact mythical. So rather than watch analysis (and for that, after all, we have Bowling For Columbine), we drift in a leisurely way through the lives of various students in the period preceding the massacre, tension slowly building as we realize what is afoot. The film plays with time and perspective in Rashomon-esque fashion – scenes are presented numerous times as we follow different characters, and new aspects of each moment become apparent – although there are no secrets, no slowly unfolding narrative of truth or of revelation for the viewer – only a gradually mounting sense of unease which combines with an easy langurousness – slow, but never tedious – as we watch in extended tracking shots over the shoulders of the characters as their lives and social circumstances unfold.

The title itself comes from the (oft-misunderstood) Buddhist parable of the blind men and the elephant – Van Sant named the film thus in tribute to Alan Clarke’s BBC film of the same name (dealing with violence in Northern Ireland), as a reference to the way in which Clarke's and his own work explored one event as seen from different viewpoints – although he would later realize that Clarke’s title was in fact a reference to the phrase ‘the elephant in the room’ (and we may think here of the unexpected synchronicity of this denial with the incomprehensible US refusal to recognise the deadly consequences of the easy availability of guns).

Like many of Van Sant’s films – with the possible exception of Mala Noche – Elephant is somewhat imperfect – almost as if, as an artwork, it is realizing itself just a touch clumsily as it unfurls. This adds to the charms of Van Sant’s oeuvre, but keeps any one film from being a central masterpiece. Here, as well as occasionally unrealistic behavior in service of moments of drama, the addition of a homoerotic episode between the killers, despite making a stunning set-piece, seems a little too much like a rather queasy wish-fulfillment (the erotic object as embodiment of masculine violence), and sits uncomfortably with the real-life events on which the film is based, in which (as far as I’m aware) there was no suggestion of such a relationship between Eric Harris & Dylan Klebold, the actual killers – indeed, they seem rather to have been homophobic. In a similar vein, the scene in which they watch a television show on Nazism is unconvincing and indeed cliched and psychologically problematic - if watching material about 'evil' killers makes one a killer, then criticisms of Elephant itself would be grounded - though the connection with their actions is not laboured. The depiction of high school life is, if anything, somewhat idyllic (despite occasional moments of bullying), a too-vivid memory of a past full of promise in a way that is reflected in the gorgeous colours and languid cinematography – despite the troubled families and social ostracism, the pain of (some) teenagehood is elided in presenting a processual collage of the ‘ordinary’ which is contrasted to the murderous violence by which it will be shattered.

What this flaw reveals, though, is the way in which Van Sant’s work carves out a deliriously original territory which on the one hand is immersed in realism – the fragmentation, muttered dialogue, improvisation, lack of traditional narrative arcs, untutored actors, the naming of characters after the actors who portray them – and, on the other, a kind of hyper-real idealism expressed in the visual techniques he employs, the dramatic events he turns to and the stunning features of his male actors (in contrast to the everyday looks of female characters) – we might also think of his overt rejections of realism, as in the Shakespearian dialogue in My Own Private Idaho. In the character of John McFarland, indeed, we can see the germ of the way in which Paranoid Park – also dealing with death and teenagers – became virtually a paean to the features of Gabe Nevins. In refusing to reconcile these disparate tendencies – in its slipperiness, refusal to bow to emotional kitsch, low-key intensity and deeply memorable set-pieces – Van Sant’s work, of which Elephant is a stunning example, has a haunting quality of insinuating itself into the viewer’s consciousness.

Pedro Almodóvar - Tacones Lejanos ('High Heels') (1991)

As the film beginning a run of mid-period Almodóvar vehicles which, while interesting, were more problematic than the dark intensity of his earlier works but hadn’t yet developed the majesty and emotional kick of his finest later films (the trilogy comprising Todo sobre mi madre, Hable con ella & La mala educación), I wasn’t expecting particularly much from TL (particularly given the cold critical reception it initially received). Mistake!

The Almodóvar trademarks are there – the gorgeous design and vivid colour (in Almodóvar’s universe, the perfect interiors provide the ideal contrast to the messiness of human relationships, emotions and the body), as well as stunning lead performances by two notable Almodóvariennes, Victoria Abril & Marisa Paredes. Like his other films, TL quotes the classic female melodramas so adored by Almodóvar (in particular, here, Bergman’s Autumn Sonata), and echoes the narrative of such works, inflected through a sensibility which turns the transgression, sexuality and queer knobs up past ten.

The plot concerns the troubled relationship between Rebeca (Abril), a newscaster, and her mother Becky (Paredes) who is returning to Spain after fifteen years in Mexico (the Spanish title, Tacones Lejanos, translates as ‘distant heels,’ capturing the melancholy of this relationship in referencing Rebeca’s childhood memory of her mother’s presence, rather than the more comedy-oriented nature of the English title). In the meantime, Rebeca has married Manuel (Féodor Atkine), once a lover of her mother’s, and become close friends with a drag queen, Letal (Miguel Bosé), who pastiches Becky’s 60s persona. And when Manuel is murdered, things take a turn for the even-more-complicated, leading to the unraveling of facades within facades, an exploration of history and identity in terms of surface and reality (not to mention celebrity), delivered with the hysterical emotional lability which is also an Almodóvarian hallmark.

Unlike some of his other works, this narrative is compelling and never drags – a particularly impressive feature is the Rashomonesque untangling of Miguel’s murder – a theme which ties in to the central question of appearance and reality in world as hyper-real as its décor, where characters are ‘larger than life’ in the sense that their identity is lived out through stage or screen personas, and where events gain emotional reality and even truth status (only) by their enactment in such venues. Oh, and just in case there weren’t enough exploitative elements here, there are a number of set pieces (including a bizarre but strangely fitting choregraphed dance piece) set in a women’s prison. But here we can contrast Kika, Almodóvar’s next work – where Kika takes the (prescient) exploration of ‘reality’ and truth on the screen, as well as acts of cruelty and transgression, to absurd extremes in ways which, while intriguing, fail inasmuch as they betray a callous insensitivity to human emotions, TL walks this tightrope much more successfully. The soundtrack, which features various divas of the Spanish musical world and at times becomes powerfully diegetic, is also particularly strong, comparable only to Todo sobre mi madre, while the score, composed by Ryuichi Sakamoto, works well within this context (despite Almodóvar’s expression of dislike for it).

If there is a weak point, it is the performance of Bosé as the male lead – his casting was apparently a cause célèbre given his status as a famous Spanish-language singer, but his acting and indeed his ‘look’ seem stilted and banal, out of place in the lush and vivid environment of the film, while his transformation into various personas as the film progresses is obvious in a way which takes the omniscience of melodrama a tad too far. Despite this, however, this is a work which is beautiful and thought-provoking, one which fits beautifully into an evolving, yet circling, Almodóvarian project, yet at the same time holds its own in terms of the visceral and intellectual pleasure of the viewing experience, and in terms of originality.

Louie Psihoyos - The Cove (2009)

It took me some time to get around to watching this widely-hailed documentary, because I thought the scenes showing dolphin slaughter would be awful – and they were. Despite, or because of, this shocking footage, this is a work which deserves the plaudits which were heaped on it. The story begins with Ric O’Barry, a fascinating character whose relationship with dolphins began in the 1960s when he was the trainer for the dolphins who performed in Flipper. His moment of revelation came soon after the filming finished, when the dolphins were returned to aquariums where, like any creature in captivity, they were deeply unhappy – to the point that one committed suicide by choosing to stop breathing in his arms. The day afterwards, he was arrested for trying to free a dolphin.

But apart from the biography of a man who feels responsible for the dolphin mania which has resulted in the widespread capturing and use of dolphins for human amusement, and the concomitant deaths of captive or unwanted dolphins, this is a taut documentary in which the tension continually ratchets up, as the participants head to the Japanese town of Taiji and the secret cove of the title, a highly-secured zone forbidden to all but the local fishermen, where the slaughter of dolphins captured by batteries of sound (in another memorable moment, O’Barry says that he hears the banging of the metal poles in his dreams) is carried out. Using hi-tech equipment (from military-grade thermal goggles to cameras disguised as rocks) and low cunning, in constant danger from the local fishermen and the Japanese authorities, the team finally manage to film the slaughter in order to bring it to the attention of the world.

The slaughter of dolphins per se is not the only issue which this film explores – paths which lead away from this locus include fisheries and overfishing, mercury poisoning as a result of water pollution and public policy, dolphin awareness and questions of animal consciousness, whaling as an activity, and Japanese history and the relationship to the West, questions of tradition and ethics, and the cynical plutocracy of international influence. In opening out into such a broad spectrum, the film reminded me of another excellent documentary dealing with marine life – Sharkwater. Some accusations of racism or cultural prejudice toward the Japanese have been made toward the film, and there is perhaps an implication of enlightened Westerners journeying into the dangerous Orient in order to mitigate their barbaric practices, but on the balance I would say this charge is unwarranted – as the work itself demonstrates, most Japanese people are unaware of the slaughter and the dietary danger that it poses to them themselves.

Having said that, I was disappointed that in all of these complexities the question – which is raised by a Japanese advocate of dolphin slaughter – of why these Westerners find it acceptable to kill cows, but not dolphins, is not addressed. It may be the emotional attachment that Westerners have to dolphins as smart and cute animals (premised on Flipper and its inheritance) which make us want to keep dolphins in captivity, but it is these same traits which allow outrage over dolphin slaughter in non-Western countries while our own practices remain unexamined (I’m sure that footage of an industrial slaughterhouse would be equally disturbing and difficult to capture – though it is out there to some extent in works such as Meet Your Meat). I would suggest that, in order to get to the bottom of the relationship between humans and dolphins, so dysfunctional not only for dolphins but also for humans, a broader critique is needed of human relationships with non-human animals and ‘the animal’ more generally.

Nonetheless, this is a well-made, shocking and compelling documentary, one which is only now being screened in Japan itself, and one which makes up part of an increasing movement drawing attention to animal issues (we might also think, for example, of Jonathan Safran Foer’s widely-read Eating Animals) both from ethical and (somewhat more closely related to human self-interest and thus more likely to spur action) from environmental perspectives.

Matteo Garrone - Gomorra (2008)

This sleek and brutal film, like Roberto Saviano’s book on which it is based, is a work of docu-fiction, but it is only a light transposition of the everyday reality for Neapolitans and their ongoing relationship with the Camorra (while the Sicilian Mafia/Cosa Nostra are the best known, they are not the only Italian criminal organisation; others include the aforementioned, the Calabrian ‘Ndrangheta and the Apulian Sacra Corona Unita). The film traces a number of different individuals through their generally tragic trajectories through the poorer echelons of Neapolitan society (though while much of the ‘action on the ground’ happens on the streets, it shouldn’t be forgotten that the Camorra and other similar organizations exist at every level, including the highest, of Italian politics and commerce - in this film this is evident for the world of high fashion in particular, though in a way which can also be considered representative).

In this world of scummy, decaying concrete high-rise projects (Italian criminal organizations have a lengthy history with the construction industry, and concrete in particular), the Camorra are so deeply implicated at all levels of society that the attempt to remain disentangled, or worse, to disentangle oneself, may be impossible, except at the price of one’s life (not to mention the lives of one's family and friends). Rampant poverty and the standard social and economic alienation of urban underclasses only contribute to these patterns. While we are fairly familiar with this kind of narrative from films such as City of God or La Haine and television series like The Wire, it remains shocking to see the scabrous underbelly of an affluent European society revealed when the rest of us are more used to the Tuscany of tourist dreams and the Italian self-image as bella gente (although in Italy the social and racial tensions, sense of doomed inevitability, and corruption which permeate the society depicted here are equally apparent, and equally repellent, in politics and the media). The film itself is both violent and viscerally beautiful, a treat for aficionados of post-industrial decay and tawdry glamour, and anyone who has visited Naples will recognize, if not the scenery, the atmosphere greasy with fear, history and opportunity.

Italian criminal organisations in themselves are a fascinating subject – some of the books that I’d recommend on the topic include Peter Robb’s Midnight In Sicily, Toby Jones’ The Dark Heart of Italy and John Dickie’s indispensible Cosa Nostra, as well as the moving documentary Excellent Cadavers (based on the book of the same name), telling the story of heroic anti-Mafia judges and martyrs Giovanni Falcone & Paolo Borsellino - and I’m about to embark on David Lane’s Into The Heart of the Mafia – and they are important not only as interesting histories in their own right, but in any attempt to understand contemporary and historical Italy – not to mention all countries of Italian immigration, but in particular the USA and various South American nations.

The representation of the Mafia in documentary and fiction itself is worth considering, with all its connections with dietrologia (‘behind-ology,’ the Italian obsession with conspiracies and ulterior motivations for action, one which is hardly surprising given the history of moments and organizations such as the Calvi case, the P2 ‘shadow government,’ and the murderous intrigues of Rightist and Leftist terrorist groups during the anni di piombo, the ‘years of lead’). This sense of shadowy manipulation from behind the scenes is reflected in the Italian giallo (and, perhaps, deflected in the love for the Manichaean Western) – but there have also been (rare) Italian cultural figures (such as Dario Fo) who have more openly addressed the issue - in particular the Sicilian writer Leonardo Sciascia in works such as Il Giorno della Civetta ('Day of the Owl') and Il Contesto (published in English as 'Equal Danger'), which give a sense of the Borgesian, truth-defying mazes within mazes which are encountered when one delves into this subject. But the semi-fictionalised presentation given here - in the emerging Italian tradition of the Unidentified Narrative Object - is a novelty; one, however, which does not impede the seriousness of the topic at hand (Saviano himself has been subject to serious death threats and has been granted a permanent police escort).

Like the film itself, the present Italian situation can be seen as a tragedy garbed in beautiful raiments - particularly while a corrupt and well-connected Berlusconi continues to prosecute his war against the judiciary, the meaningful Left, and the independent media.

Sydney Film Festival 2010: In Brief

For me, the unquestionable pick of the festival was:

Raoul Peck – Moloch Tropical
It was, on the one hand, a youthful obsession with voodoo (come on, we've all been there), and, on the other, a passion for Graham Greene's underrated novel of Haiti, The Comedians which first got me interested in Haiti. This film is a fascinating dissection of the final days of a fictional Haitian dictator, an amalgam of the Duvalier authoritarians and latter-day ‘democrats,’ by a director who himself was briefly Minister for Culture under Aristide. In some ways, Downfall can be seen as a predecessor but this is by far the better film, set in a gorgeous mountain eyrie sitting not-so-comfortably above the palace torture chambers, and the slums of the Haitian people. A deeply thought-provoking meditation, both scathing and compassionate, on human weakness, political idealism, gender, race, violence and cruelty, and international politics as theatre and as cynical praxis.

And further, in order of impressiveness:

Sean Byrne - The Loved Ones
Fantastic and original Australian prom-night torture-porn. The horror which is only latently concealed in the ubiquitous pinkificated gender consumerism of the present childhood milieu is made manifest – and you’ll never hear Kasey Chambers’ Not Pretty Enough in quite the same way again.

Sylvain Chomet – The Illusionist
An unexpectedly bittersweet tale from the maker of The Triplets of Belville, based on an unfilmed screenplay by Jacques Tati, with perhaps the most gorgeous animation I’ve ever seen, and a surprising storyline, looking at the travails of a down-at-heel illusionist in the age of vaudeville, which beguiles you into thinking that it’s one kind of narrative before gently twisting into another.

Daniel Monzon – Cell 211
A taut, intense and brutal Spanish prison drama with some nasty twists. Reminiscent of the finest moments of Oz.

Sascha Bader – Rock Steady: The Roots of Reggae
A documentary on an unjustly neglected era of Jamaican music, sandwiched between the better-known ska and roots reggae, this film takes as its central premise a rocksteady reunion concert featuring various luminaries of the era, including Dawn Penn, Ernest Ranglin, Sly Dunbar, Marcia Griffiths, and Stranger Cole, an irresistible eccentric who serves as narrator. Every fan will have some favourite rocksteady moments which are left out (for me, where is the Techniques’ Queen Majesty?) but overall, a joyful and overdue celebration of an important moment in musical history and in the development of a globally influential Jamaican music scene, placed in the context of a particular moment in the development of historical, political and racial consciousness.

Apichatpong Weerasethakul – Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
An interesting failure – the use of Lynchian devices of fantasy weirdness mixed with domestic normality and hints of darkness to tell a tale based on Thai legend, mythology and religion. Particularly impressive was a central set-piece of stills from a repressive future (one wonders whether this was subversive political commentary), but ultimately an unrealised mélange whose triumph at Cannes is inexplicable.

James Rasin – Beautiful Darling
An ultimately tragic homage to Candy Darling – a dark fable of the unfulfilling nature of a life as an artwork and the cruel vagaries of Warhol’s Factory – but as a documentary, this work was itself equally unfulfilling inasmuch as the reason for the fascination Darling seems to have held for her contemporaries is never quite apparent in the film’s material.

Todd Solondz – Life During Wartime
A not-quite-worthy sequel to the stunning Happiness – some fantastic lines and domestic grotesque set pieces, with impressive performances by Allison Janney, Charlotte Rampling and Michael K. Williams in particular – but a confection which is ultimately light and unsatisfactory in comparison to its predecessor.

Ben C. Lucas – Wasted On The Young
A high-school film which looks at the timely issue of the dark side of the Australian obsession with sporting heroism and its golden boys, along with the ramifications of a crime reminiscent of the reagic and horrific Leigh Leigh case (later filmed as Blackrock) – but one which, despite some beautiful camerawork and an interesting and innovative incorporation of digital technology (one which the film industry in general ahs been behind the times in adopting) fails to move and descends to the level of troublesome gender politics in a rape-revenge story in which the female remains a fantasy object motivating male action stemming from pure love or pure lust, rather than a complete human being.

Patrick Hughes – Red Hill
A seemingly promising premise – an Australian Western/slasher genre pic set in small-town Victorian high country and starring Ryan Kwanten. But a promise which goes unrealised – despite the heavy-handed race politics twist, a film with a menacing indigenous killer who remains silent throughout? Really? No, really? Can anyone see the problem with that?

Alan J. Pakula - The Parallax View (1974)

I came to this peculiar film from k-punk (with roots in Jameson, Žižek, Kojin Karatani, Joyce, Lacan and Hegel – how’d you like them lucubrations?) Extremely prescient and deeply paranoid, the work, in the unravelling-the-thread theme familiar to the conspiracy thriller, follows reporter Joe Frady (Warren Beatty) as he investigates the assassination of a US senator, slowly becoming aware of the seemingly accidental deaths of witnesses and a conspiracy, taking on increasingly monumental and systemic proportions, behind which lies the hand of the shadowy Parallax Corporation, the depersonalised and a-responsible corporate institution par excellence.

There are some impressive Hitchcockian and schematic setpieces here, which, mingled with the scungy reality of Frady’s life, create a pleasing tension in their depiction of the interaction, central to the Western (post)modern condition, between the captivatingly sheeny surfaces of capitalism and antiseptic bureaucracy (one area, but one only, where Kafka now seems out of date), and the inevitable messiness of human existence (even if that messiness is ripe for colonisation and replication, a process which is currently well underway). The centrepiece is a fantastic, deeply disturbing montage which is shown to Frady during his (apparent) infiltration of the Corporation, featuring stills of political and religious figureheads, violence and trauma, and popular culture (and in this latter, foreshadowing the neo-fascist and neo-conservative tendencies of the present slew of films based on comics, most overtly works such as those involving Frank Miller, but not excluding the more subtle and unintentional reactionism of films like V For Vendetta).

We observe here the way in which the system incorporates rebellion, literally – that is, not only neutralising it, but using rebellion to make itself stronger – or, to paraphrase Žižek on the parallax, however much ‘I’ may want to be an observer of the picture, in being such ‘I’ inevitably find myself within it. While the Parallax Corporation itself can be seen as representing a fear of the growing power and lack of transparency or accountability of corporations – a fear which, in the intervening decades, has proven to be entirely well-founded – the film sees such an organization as inimical to Western democratic politics (in the fact of the assassination), whereas what seems to be the case (a long-term historical connection which was somewhat shifted from view during the period of the Keynesian consensus) is the increasing intertwining of these institutions. But perhaps we could view this assassination – which obviously has deep roots in the killing of Kennedy, Watergate, and even, to draw a somewhat longer bow, Martin Luther King – as a narratorial fear of purposive systemic blowback, that is, the methods which for so long have been employed in subject areas – the colonies – have created apt pupils now re-importing them to their land/s of origin. A further criticism might be that the Corporation’s induction process, whereby it seeks out rare individuals who are psychologically suited to its brutal and secretive practices, also strikes a false note inasmuch as these projects are not, in a sense, the aberrant or perverted underside of contemporary society – they are embodied in every part of it (the system replicating itself in the individual), as has been shown by scholars and practitioners including Zygmunt Bauman, Stanley Milgram and Philip Zimbardo (these latter two operating in the decade or so before this film was made, and in some ways addressing the same concerns). In saying this, it should be recognised that these moments of naïveté do not undercut the central cynicism (or perhaps we should say, cynical realism) of the film.

The characteristic American ‘one man standing for justice against the system’ narrative (along with the socio-personal dysfunctionality of that individual, which may be related to his – and it is generally his – stand against ‘society’), often so deeply conservative in its espousal of macho frontier individualism-libertarianism and in the positioning of the rebel as justified and outside the morality of means (and if we look at present conspiracy theories, they seem mostly of the rightist variant), is certainly in evidence here – but it doesn’t carry the aforementioned paradoxical underlying freight to a degree worthy of criticism, apart from its social message (gendered, in particular). However, even the patriarchal gender tropes inherent in the relationship between Frady and Lee Carter (Paula Prentiss) are thrown into a new light when Carter’s ‘emotionally hysterical’ revelations are revealed as truth.

The belief in conspiracy (where it is not justified, and it’s worth recalling how many political and corporate operations would have seemed like ‘conspiracy theories’ before their unmasking) is, of course, a response to existential fear (‘Frady’?), a desperate search for meaning, an infusion of symbolic significance and graspable pattern into the warp and weft of mass society (though drawing on premodern and religious superstition – think of the evolution of the medieval antisemitic trope of the Jew as well-poisoner, host-desecrator and killer of Christian children into the modernist Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Foundations of the Nineteenth/Myth of the Twentieth Century).

Indeed, as an aside, those of us who’d consider ourselves scholars with an interest in subversion of the dominant paradigm may well question the meaning of our own activity in this regard – and the use of interpretation as an heuristic which does little more than the task of re-integration (‘contain the rage’) by averting feelings of hopelessness and the maintenance of the structural dynamics of late capitalism is an ever-present problematic in which we are all, to greater and lesser extents, implicated (theory as sublimation of trauma). But, to return to the film itself, the message is not so much ‘you can’t handle the truth,’ as, ‘the truth can’t handle you handling the truth.’ Or, as Lovecraft famously put it, ‘[t]he most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents’ (though, I would add, this ‘mercy,’ which knowingly or unknowingly we grant ourselves, is one whose long-term cost is existentially near-unbearable – a need to escape from amorphous and ill-perceived confines, that vague feeling that something isn’t quite as it should be, which sometimes blossoms and bears bitter fruit). In fact – and this chimes with my personal perspective as a Buddhist, though with a political-systemic rather than individual-psychological interpretation (and, I would add, the second case provides a much more cogent state of solution and method for arriving thereat) – since we are none of us sane (in the sense of accurately comprehending reality; I don’t mean to trivialise mental illness, which is of a different order), insanity is in fact sanity and vice versa. For Frady, as for Lovecraft’s protagonists, the price for apprehending these patterns, for pursuing a separate perspective – a disruptive act inasmuch as it is a reterritorialising reclamation of an agential space outside them – is the incorporation of the space on which the observer stands, in the process of which that observer is disappeared as such (and, in this case, literally). A further disruption lies in the viewer’s role as observer of the film’s unreliable narration – like Frady, we also perform a Sedgwickian paranoid reading, doubting and constantly re-evaluating our own (‘one’s own’ might be more appropriate) interpretation, a dynamic which lends the film its queasy and unsettling mood.

Ultimately, in its conclusion ‘the parallax view’ is deeply pessimistic – the house always wins. Attempts at solidarity are crushed through the use of violence. The view of the near-omnipotent system and its methods of surveillance and action both looks back to the emerging countercultural politics of the 1960s, and forward to the post-disciplinary mechanisms of the contemporary control society. In other words, a parallax which proves paradigmatic.

Ti West - The House of the Devil (2009)

While the maxim that there’s nothing new under the sun is subject to itself, nonetheless, the last decade has seemed especially blatant in its carbon-copy revivals of old genres (in music and cinema, especially). On the one hand, one doesn’t want to revile this trend, because, despite the fact that I sometimes think that the more obscure corners of a past genre provide endless avenues of exploration, there is a limit to that material – whereas genre revival not only provides more, particularly for those with less access to rare or out of circulation material (these days often related to at least a certain level of tech savvy), but also gives the opportunity to participate in the existence of the work as a contemporary moment, which has its own pleasures. But one does wonder whether there isn’t a certain sterility to the entire endeavour – why one would set out to create an artwork which is as close as possible to an already-existing moment.

On this note, The House of the Devil is a film which, down to the last detail, recreates the eighties horror genre film – and we’re talking here not about the eighties revival which revels in its own kitsch excess, but rather a muted version which seeks to emulate not how we now imagine the period, but a work which was actually created in the period itself. In this, it is extremely successful, and there is an appreciable pleasure to the high-waisted, college-town, synth-rocked environment in which the action plays out. The plot revolves around Samantha (Jocelin Donahue), a college student in need of some fast cash, and a babysitting assignment in a spooky house in the forest outside of town, which is by no means all that it seems. The plot is entirely unoriginal (the title says it all), and the pacing is uneven – a very slow tension build followed by a sudden and extreme climax which, without sufficient introduction, seems ridiculously over-the-top (and I make this criticism as someone who’s generally a fan of the slow and moody build in horror, as opposed to the ultragore-heaped-upon-gore strategy). The house itself, as a space, is perhaps the film’s greatest achievement – neither a classically ominous pile, nor the incongruously haunted modern edifice of films like Paranormal Activity. There are some very fun cameos by Mary Woronov as the creepy Mrs. Ulman, and Greta Gerwig as Samantha’s Valley Girl-esque friend Megan, who features in an unexpected moment of violence in what is perhaps the film’s most successful scene. Overall, however, the period atmosphere alone doesn’t carry the film, while the plot is too unoriginal and uneven to take up the slack – as my friend put it, this is perhaps a truer facsimile of the bad eighties horror movie than the director intended.

Richard Wenk - Vamp (1986)

This camp horror-comedy gem from the 1980s lies unjustly neglected in the cult vaults… but, pursuing my mission to give new (un)life to the contents of the 1980s (Society, I’m looking at you), I bring you a film which features as its centrepiece an undead Grace Jones, with white and red body paint and props by Keith Haring, performing a striptease (Ms. Jones’ costumes throughout are provided by Issey Miyake, naturally).

The plot is simply told: a duo of likeable wiseguys, desperate to join a fraternity, promise to bring a stripper to the frat party that night. But, heading from their wholesome country town into the urban and moral decay of the big city in pursuit of this goal – or should that be ‘score’? – the strip club they choose turns out to be one in which they will become the objects of the wicked desires of the (vampiric) inhabitants, rather than vice versa. Visually, Vamp is a treat – particularly the spectacular presence of Grace Jones, as well as Billy Drago as an albino bad boy – and it features a rip-roaring synth-rock 80s soundtrack remniscent of others such as Once Bitten - I'm currently addicted to Stallion's 'Let My Fingers Do The Talking', a song which is not quite as sleazy as it sounds, but almost - not to mention a cameo by that stalwart of the Asian sterotype, Gedde Watanabe.

The gritty post-industrial streets, greasy spoons, and, in this case, sewers of the decaying 80s cityscape, familiar from other works including Batman and Howard the Duck, provide a nice sense of atmosphere. Despite the setting, the homoerotic (or should that be bromantic?) undertones (not to mention the classic conflation of sex and danger so commonly present in the vampire trope, here reworked in the service of the 80s teen sex comedy) are not far below the surface (gentle reader, have you ever found yourself insisting that you sleep in your same-sex buddy's bedroom with only honest intentions?), particularly in the oddly moving scene in which AJ (Robert Rusler), having been turned, begs Keith (Chris Makepeace) to stake him (and that pink tuxedo!) – while the suggestion of straight romance seems like a nod to commercial tropes rather than a heartfelt inclusion. Finally, who could not love a film in which a skeleton flips the bird? Fangs for the memories…

Argentriptychation

Suspiria (1977)
Profondo Rosso ('Deep Red', 1975)
Tenebrae (1982)

There’s probably little new to add to the vast reams of commentary on Argento’s work – but here am I, here you are - or, to put it another way, Dario where all men have gone before... I must admit, to my chagrin, that I’ve started watching Dario Argento films a number of times on DVD and turned them off. But I thought that a big screen festival might present the perfect setting to challenge my déclassé tendencies (not that all culturally acclaimed works are deserving of their status – Radiohead, Animal Collective, oh and Stephen Sondheim, I’m looking at you). And it was. The two great strengths of Argento’s classic films – visual and sonic aesthetics – mean that they demand to be appreciated in an immersive environment to have their full impact – while the faults of the less realized aspects of his work, plot and character, fade into the background.

In balancing these elements, Tenebrae was the most impressive of this trilogy (having already mis-spent some time with it, I gave the unfortunate Phenomena/Creepers a miss, despite the involvement of the divine Jennifer Connelly), inasmuch as the dialogue achieves a depth of B-grade camp which contributes to the perfervid atmosphere – my favourite line being that delivered by the conflicted femme fatale: ‘I feel so … sleazy.’ While the decadent fin-de-siecle atmosphere of Suspiria (the first in Argento’s ‘Three Mother Trilogy’) is beautifully achieved, it savoured just a little too much of the flocked wallpaper and overstuffed furniture so redolent of less iconic ‘70s B movies – whereas the modernist chic of Tenebrae, combined with Goblin’s synth soundtrack which, for my taste at least (I am a diehard fan of the synthesizers of the 80s), hit the spot just a little more closely than the admitted masterpiece produced by Goblin for Suspiria, and worked more perfectly with the overall aesthetic. Indeed, Argento himself intended the film as a ‘step into the world of tomorrow,’ set in a futuristic city a few years in the future, and while this isn’t clear from the film itself, the mood that this intention has created is clearly apparent.

Suspiria is renowned for its set pieces, which are indeed the strongest of this trilogy, but Deep Red, a strange mix of horror and comedy (but not quite a horror-comedy) which is otherwise the weakest of the three (though dealing with some interesting social issues – the artist through a Marxist lens, and homosexuality, even if the plot workings related to the aforementioned ultimately plays to homophobic stereotypes) also has some deeply memorable, and deeply creepy, tableaux: while the evil puppet is a masterful moment, for me it is perhaps the ‘eye in the wardrobe’ which is the most memorable and arresting scene in a film very much concerned with the gaze, the close-up as an inquisitorial device, one which transforms the everyday into the sinister and mysterious. Indeed, the relationship between the gaze (directed at the fictional text), and the film itself as an object, is one which is made manifest in both Tenebrae, where the murders follow those described by a thriller writer, and in Deep Red’s obsession with the ocular. A flaw in the latter is the language, however, which jumps from English to Italian (and even German) from sentence to sentence - at least in the print I watched - a device which never quite gels.

Of course, we should perhaps consider Deep Red and Tenebrae separately, as examples of gialli as opposed to Suspiria’s horror supernaturalism, but this distinction is somewhat nebulous given the supernaturalism which sets the plot of Tenebrae in motion, and the horrific deaths which are central to all three. Argento, as has often been noted, knew how to give his audience grue without making this the defining characteristic of his work – but, although the majority of victims are female, to my mind charges of misogyny are unjustified, except in the context of the comparison between the gender politics of the times and our own, as well as the masculinist themes of the hard-boiled detective, as embodied in the unsuccessfully comedic ‘sex war’ between Deep Red’s protagonists.

Apart from the audio qualities of Argento’s films – which includes not only Goblin’s soundtrack work but also, in particular, the precise employment of cuts between diegetic and exegetic sound – the colour is perhaps the most impressive achievement, drenching the works in lurid and glistening sheens which are not only deeply beautiful, but which are a highly effective tool, in creating the film as a self-contained world, another facet which tends to detract from their flaws (apparently this is a result of the use of imbibition Technicolor, if that means anything to you, gentle reader – to me it conjures only visions of overindulging film technicians).

While we may have Argento to thank for the unfortunate rise of the slasher flick, the present works, for all their flaws, are not only hugely influential and enjoyable – to return to my original point, they remain paradigmatic embodiments of the cinematic (in all senses) in film, a timely reminder in an age in which, as far as the cult film is concerned, we have traded the embodied experience represented by the arthouse cinema for the widespread choice and availability offered by DVD and the internet – a process with elements of the democratization of taste which I certainly wouldn’t want to sniff at, but nonetheless in some ways a pyrrhic triumph of the market.

Pedro Almodóvar - Volver (2006)

I’m coming to think of the three movies made by Almodóvar between the late 90s and the mid-2000s – Todo Sobre Mi Madre, Hable Con Ella and La Mala Educación – as his trinity of masterworks. Volver doesn’t achieve the giddy heights of those works, but it is still a work in which Almodóvar’s skills are evident. The convoluted narrative - which, in typically postmodern fashion, began as the novel which formed the crux of the plot in La Flor De Mi Secreto - follows Raimunda (Penélope Cruz), a working mother living in Madrid who, as well as concealing her own secrets, begins to discover those kept by her deceased parents, her good-for-nothing husband, her sister Sole, and other figures from her childhood in a small village in La Mancha.

The story contains all the Almodóvarian trademarks – the secrets of the past emerging to shape the present, the strong bonds of family, film and – especially – (reality) television as media through which the story refracts, a strong aesthetic sense – but here these elements don’t mesh in quite the same way as in other works, don’t have the vivid freshness which they take on in the different combinations in which they are employed in his earlier films – they feel a little tired, a little too worked over. The visual character of the film doesn’t have the exuberant but stylised joy of earlier works, but neither does the subduing of this tone function in concert with a succesful exploration of serious emotional issues as it does in the films mentioned above. The conceits begin to lack sustainability – in this case, in particular, the ‘ghost’ of Raimunda’s mother, Irene.

One of the problems, to my mind, is Penélope Cruz – one of the great things about Almodóvar’s films are his female actors, who are never stereotypical Hollywood beauties, about whom there is always something a little rough around the edges, imperfect. Cruz, however, although she is a fine actress, never looks less than a pampered, doe-eyed star – and this tells against her (and thus against the film) particularly in her role as an exhausted mother working three menial jobs. In other films where he has employed actors of this typical type – as with Antonio Banderas – it has functioned with the role given to the character, but with Cruz, as also in her appearance in Carne Trémula, this is inappropriate – and Almodóvar seems besotted, unable to recognise this problematic. Indeed, the appearance of other Almodóvarian favourites here – the wonderful Chus Lampreave, who steals the show in her smallish role as Aunt Paula, as well as Carmen Maura as Irene – leave Cruz looking paradoxically washed-out in comparison. To take an emblematic example, if one compares the scene here in which Cruz sings at a party after not having allowed herself musical voice for years, in comparison to the similar scene featuring Caetano Veloso in Hable Con Ella, it seems almost kitsch, maudlin – but in a way which is most uncharacteristically unintentional.

Having said all this, Almodóvar has set himself extremely high standards, and Volver is by no means a failure. In particular, Blanca Portillo is wonderful as Agustina, the unconventional village neighbour. It’s interesting to see this film move away from solely exploring the cityscapes which Almodóvar loves so much, to the small La Manchan village which is the setting for the backstory and to which the characters periodically return – the villa in the countryside has certainly been a staple of Almodóvar’s work, a space to which characters retreat and which may also represent the grasp of the past and the way in which it encompasses the present, but here that space is expanded and filled with life – or rather, with the untrustworthy, gossiping, black-clad widows who may be seen as representing the ghosts of the past, but also, conversely, as an inescapable community of survival in the face of grief and loss. An interesting piece, but one which leaves hanging the question, whither next? Has Almodóvar’s obsessive exploration of a small number of tropes – one revitalised by the deeper emotional dimensions of his later work – finally reached a point of staleness, or does the master of the reinvention of events we believed to be known still have surprises lurking for his throng of faithful spectators?

Russ Meyer - Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965)

I’m somewhat abashed at admitting that I have never thus far seen the film that John Waters called ‘beyond a doubt the best movie ever made.’ I must say, this was a better film than I expected – not only a kitschy classic, but also a compelling, fast-paced and well-filmed piece in its own right. The soundtrack itself, seeming a distillation about all that was good about sixties pop, sleaze and instrumental, is worth the journey, and the dialogue is witty, hilarious and eminently quotable. The landscape, too – the bare desert of California is deeply atmospheric, and adds a touch of Western gothic to the proceedings. The cinematography is excellent (leading to descriptions of the film as the Citizen Kane or Battleship Potemkin of trash) – in particular the technique of lending the proceedings a grandiosity by shots from below or shrinking the action within landscape vistas.

The story follows three go-go dancers, Billie (Lori Williams), Rosie (Haji) and the instantly memorable karate-trained, black-clad leader, Varla (Tura Satana), who get into a murderous random encounter during a drag race, after which one thing leads to another leads to a ranch inhabited by a paralysed old man sitting on a fortune, and his sons, the muscular but slow ‘Vegetable’ (Dennis Busch) and Kirk (Paul Trinka). The character of the aggressive and sexual woman is a trope which could also be seen in the sixties in music like Nancy Sinatra, and would emerge as a prototype, in particular, for many underground female performers in the punk, postpunk and no wave scenes of the late 70s and 80s, as feminism moved into the postmodern era. There is a cartoony pop-art aesthetic at work here which is evident in other works from the period such as Barbarella and Satanik.

The influence of this film on later work is immediately apparent (not to mention the influence of Varla on the femme fatale personae of later artists), from the underground work of filmmakers like Richard Kern (who also uses the Californian desert as a site of wildness and transgression) to the indie mainstream of Tarantino. As for the much-discussed topic of misogyny, I think the picture is by no means black and white. There’s certainly an objectification of women in the way that they are dressed and depicted as objectified objects of desire, in voyeurism of the female as sexually vulnerable (in the person of Linda), and in the scenes of ‘girlfights,’ showers and so forth, although, in Mae Westian style, there is very little actually revealed here – no frontal nudity, for example. The argument that women using their sexuality to get what they want as a form of empowerment is a tired furphy, but what happens here is more complicated – rather than a conservative depiction of female sexuality unleashed as the embodiment of depravity, what we see here (again characteristic of the films it would influence) is a delightfully jaundiced view of humanity where no characters are admirable – where the men are equally pitifully lecherous and weak, where the ‘moral’ characters – Tommy and Linda – are pathetic and laughable, and indeed where men are equally targets of objectification – the camera caresses the Tom of Finlandian form of Dennis Busch, depicted as little more than a fantasy of the mindless, biddable muscleman.

Ultimately, this is less a misogynistic work than a charming piece of misanthropy in which the sacred cows of morality and realism are sacrificed on the altar of spectacle and sensation – an offering which is richly rewarded.

Pedro Almodóvar - Kika (1993)

Kika was the first Almodóvar film I saw – late one night on SBS – and although I didn’t dislike it, it did make me pigeonhole his work… until I saw the amazing Hable Con Ella, still, I think, his best film. But as I draw near the end of my on-again off-again project of watching my way through his films, it seemed time to revisit the point of departure. Kika is, ultimately, a failure, one which is equally interesting and distasteful. The convoluted story involves Kika (Verónica Forqué), a chatterbox cosmetologist, her narcoleptic husband Ramón (Alex Casanovas), Ramon’s father Nicholas (Peter Coyote), his wife and Ramon’s mother (whose suicide opens the film), Andrea ‘Scarface’ (Victoria Abril), Ramon’s ex-girlfriend and reality TV host with an obsession for a story, Kika’s butch lesbian maid Juana (Rossy De Palma) and her imprisoned pornstar brother, Paul. You see why I use the term ‘convoluted.’

The film is aesthetically beautiful in typical Almodóvar fashion – indeed, one of his most visually spectacular - and also makes characteristic Almodóvarian references – Hollywood films of the 40s and 50s, the telenovela, Hitchcock, Weill, masochistic Christianity. As so often, the soundtrack is amazing, and is employed in ways which are integral to the narrative rather than remaining incidental. Again characteristic of Almodóvar, the trope of filming within a film, and the crime novel within a film, and the unfolding revelation of the secrets of the past and the present, are deployed to interesting effect. I also have an extremely soft spot for the fabulous Rossy de Palma (once a member of Peor Imposible). The use of the extreme reality TV show as a trope and a plot device is also an incisive commentary on contemporary culture, and one far ahead of its time.

Having said that, however, this is a confused film and one which is highly problematic. The social commentary aspect tends to become more confused as the film progresses. Almodóvar has suggested that each character belongs to a different genre, and, while an original conceit, in practice this plays to the sense of unintentional dislocation. More importantly, however, the tone throughout is one of high farce, vaudeville and melodrama, and the opening third of the film shapes up to be an excellent exercise in Almodóvariana. But when Kika is raped – in an extended slapstick sequence, which sets the rest of the plot in motion – the deft touch which has hitherto been apparent disappears in a welter of insensitivity. In a sense, one can see what Almodóvar is trying to achieve – if extreme violence and other forms of crime and cruelty can be subjects for this kind of treatment, as is so often the case, then should sexual violence be considered off-limits? But in fact, this treatment, which is misogynistic and highly distasteful, might well be the evidence that it should be so considered – or at least that to attempt not to do so is a task beyond the talents even of a filmmaker as skilled and canny as Almodóvar. Indeed, one can’t help thinking that the fact that the title of the film is the name of the main character, rather than Almodóvar’s usual tendency to more meaningful titles, is in itself a comment – and the director himself mentions that he rejected one preferred title, ‘An Untimely Rape,’ because ‘touchy people’ might misunderstand it as arguing for the possibility of a timely rape, a fact which suggests the lack of understanding or empathy apparent here.

From this point, the film cannot make up its mind whether to continue the light tone (à la Almodóvar’s earlier works) or to do some more serious exploration of human emotion in extreme situations (evident in his later work) and in the attempt to walk this tightrope verges into a heavier-handed melodrama. In this sense, we can read Kika as perhaps the central film in Almodóvar’s ‘bridging period’ leading up to the slew of extraordinary explorations which would begin with Todo Sobre Mi Madre (1999). Ultimately, as my own experience confirms, this is a film which has more to offer Almodóvar fans than the uninitiated.

Ruben Fleischer – Zombieland (2009)

While brains do seem to be the flavour of the moment – second only to fangs – that’s not to say that among the dross, there won’t be some moments which are entertaining, if not exactly original masterpieces. Zombieland does what it sets out to do very well – to entertain and amuse. The story, such as it is, follows an ‘odd couple’ – nerdy college student (Jesse Eisenberg) and a hard-living macho type (Woody Harrelson), thrown together by chance in the aftermath of the disease-based rise of the zombies – as they journey across a near-empty America (in echoes of the wonderful opening scenes of 24 days later, minus the poignancy, but also the incoherent self-importance) – on the way encountering two sharp-witted sisters (Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin) who serve as foils and provide the inevitable love interest (one does wonder why the male hero is an atypical unattractive nerd, while the female is a typical fox, but perhaps the good boy/bad girl role reversal makes this inevitable). The visual aesthetic, in particular, is very nicely done, with a cartoony feel reminiscent of Fight Club, while the humour is self-aware without giving the sense of trying too hard. The narrative is thin – and the Bill Murray cameo, though amusing, perhaps outstays its welcome – but overall, this is a simple film which is highly entertaining, the perfect popcorn experience – along with Shaun of the Dead, another one to chalk up for the fast-expanding genre of zombedy romcoms.

Michael Winterbottom – Genova (2008)

I haven’t seen any of Michael Winterbottom’s other films except for 24 Hour Party People, which I found disappointing (too much Happy Mondays, not enough Joy Division/New Order and Stone Roses, among other issues) – and, frankly, they didn’t much appeal to me. I wasn’t necessarily expecting Genova to be great, but because I have a deep regard for Genova (Genoa) – a Genet-esque city where medieval palaces and cobbled lanes are populated by sailors, junkies and sex workers, where the ancient meets the industrial – and because it doesn’t get much play amid the Tuscan and Sicilian fantasies of Italy as destination, I thought I would give this one a go. The story follows Joe (Colin Firth) and his two daughters, who move from the US to Genova after the death of Joe’s wife, and the sometimes-perilous social and romantic entanglements they form in dealing with their grief, guilt, and blame. Catherine Keener is particularly impressive as Barbara, Joe’s colleague.

This is an atmospheric film, shot in hand-held fashion which I at first found irritating and claustrophobic, but which grew on me throughout the film. It’s particularly effective in the memorable beach scenes, which channel perfectly a vivid haziness reminiscent of the ‘60s and ‘70s which we also see, for example, in the photographs of Mario Testino. The cinematography and editing are interestingly evocative of the disconnected, fraught and uncertain mood which pervades the work and characterises the characters’ emotional state (to which the well-judged soundtrack also contributes). There are heavy shades of Don’t Look Now in the re-appearances of the mother in the alleyways of Genoa, though in tragic and disquieting rather than horrific register. The cast are all excellent – both Willa Holland as the typical (that is, unbearable) adolescent Kelly, and Perla Haney-Jardine as the younger Mary, do an excellent job – with the singular exception of Colin Firth, who I found irritating throughout, making it difficult to believe the romantic entanglements which he negotiates. The classes he teaches, too, are a weak point, reading like cod-pop-sociology, though they give the Italians, who otherwise form the background, their main chance to be represented as people rather than scenery. While there is a climactic event and a re-emergence of hope, the film refuses to end neatly, and this too is a strength.

There are some hints here of the typical contemporary narrative of Europe as the dark and perilous other of the English-speaking world (think of Hostel or Eastern Promises), but nonetheless the depiction of Italy and Genova in this film is well achieved, and one which bucks prevailing trends – atmosphere is definitely the film’s strongest suite, and for that alone it is worth seeing. While it is flawed, this is never less than an interesting work.

Oliver Stone - Wall Street (1987)

As my list of a week or so ago might indicate, I'm currently undergoing an on-again off-again project of watching my way through important and/or cult films of the '80s which, for one reason or another, I haven't seen before - and the latest instalment is Oliver Stone's Wall Street.

This is, of course, an extremely apt film in the context of the present moment - the GFC and the impact that it's had both on voices opposed to the current socio-financial system, and the way in which the response has re-emphasised the massive power of business as usual. Wall Street, set in 1985 (two years before the film was released) is a reflection of the insider trading scandals which broke in that period ('85-'86). For those who haven't seen it, the film is a Faustian tale of Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen), a naive and unsuccessful but ambitious young trader who gets his break in the form of ruthless corporate honcho Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) - but at what cost?

In the present era, the film's stylistic aesthetic, which in the contemporary period would have signified wealth and luxury, seems a little cluttered and clunky in comparison to current 'classy' minimalist wealth-signifiers - as does some of the dialogue around this milieu. Of course, one often underestimates the farcical crassness of wealth. But the city itself, shimmering at dawn and dusk, is a more timeless signifier of the fantasy of fluidity as solidity and thus, power. The message itself - wealth corrupts, and a price must be paid, the authenticity of blue-collar union resistance, self-sacrifice as heroism - is rather obvious, as is some of the dialogue. Nonetheless, the tale itself is deeply engrossing - personally I have little interest in or understanding of the complexities of the financial world, but nonetheless I was gripped, despite Oliver Stone's trademark directorial self-indulgence.

For my taste, although this is a story of the way in which the system corrupts, it's essentially too much a critique of the immoral Randian individual (Stone cited Upton Sinclair as an influence, and, interestingly, the same critique has been made of the way in which Sinclair's Oil was translated into film in There Will Be Blood) rather than of the system which creates such individuals and provides them with a readymade framework of moral distance. I also find it difficult to believe Gekko's famous 'greed is good' speech (to a board of shareholders) would actually be a triumph - not because of its content, but because of the use of the word 'greed.' Rhetoric of justification, in my experience, tends to function because it labels actions which might appear to be immoral, as moral, and explains why they should be perceived in this way. Gekko's valorisation of the merciless market as the universally beneficial invisible hand fulfils the second, but not the first of these functions.

There are some intriguing flourishes - occasionally we are tempted to think that 'the lady doth protest too much,' that (as with other fictional works of social criticism, in particular Brave New World) the author can't help being seduced by the ostensible object of criticism - and what are we to make of Michael Douglas' excellent Gekko enjoying the beauty of a sunrise, the only scene where he shows a positive human emotional trait? The supporting cast are a veritable smorgasboard of eighties favourites - including Martin Sheen, the Blade Runner double whammy of Sean Young and Daryl Hannah, and old favourite James Karen, who to me will always be Return of the Living Dead's Frank.

Essentially what we have here is a classic film of the eighties dialectic, a rejection of the inauthentic and artificial world of untrustworthy fluidity and glittering surfaces which can't help being somewhat seduced by its own object.

PS ... did I mention the sublime Talking Heads song, This Must Be The Place, which plays over the closing credits? Or the fact that the soundtrack (somewhat incongruously, but I can't fault the choice) also features two songs from Byrne & Eno's My Life In The Bush of Ghosts? Swoony...

Mitchell Lichtenstein - Teeth (2007)

There is, of course, a long tradition of the horror movie as a metaphor for the disturbing bodily changes and desires of the teenager. And there are a number of (relatively) recent films in this genre which I esteem highly - particularly the excellent Ginger Snaps, and also Cabin Fever (shame about the execrable Hostel). I was hoping Teeth would fall into this basket. I didn't think that the film could possibly live up to the tagline, "a coming of age story via David Cronenberg," but I thought its presence might be a positive sign nonetheless. And so, after reading some polarised reviews, I thought I'd give it a go.

Having done so, I'd have to agree with the reviewers who called this film a missed opportunity. Speaking of metaphors, while the teen sexuality one is very much in evidence, as far as fear of female sexuality Lichtenstein (incidentally, the son of the famous pop artist) has decided just to dispense with the whole metaphor thing, and go straight for the vagina dentata. The film began promisingly. Twenty-year-old Dawn (Jess Weixler) is a teen abstinence advocate. There are some nicely done, though very heavy handed, early scenes satirising the 'promise keepers,' and throwing in some material on evolution (an evolutionary mutation is the nominal explanation for Dawn's, ahem, VD) and pointing out the sexism inherent in this kind of discourse. But as soon as Dawn's seemingly abstinence-supportive friend Tobey (Hale Appleman) forces himself upon her, we move into fairly standard horror territory. All men are sexual predators, except a girl's daddy - including doctors, and creepy stepbrothers (incidentally, I don't know why filmic purveyors of violence are so often portrayed as pierced - facial piercings have a nasty habit of getting ripped out in violent encounters); and they're going to get what they deserve (I don't intend to imply here, by the way, that this is a misandric story - that's not it at all).

It is refreshing, if that's the word, to see a film where the 'female rape revenge' story isn't played out in a context of brutal, bleak rape voyeurism, a la I Spit On Your Grave. But as soon as the violence starts, the story veers from quasi-realist to non-realist in a rather dissatisfying way (it's the veer I object to, not the one or the other); characters seem to have little or no motivation for their actions, and to behave out of character for the sake of the evolution of the predictable plot, while the interesting discussion about female sexuality and constructions of viscerality, religion, fear, humiliation, and sexual power is instantly jettisoned.

The film isn't worth rejecting out of hand; visually it's nicely done, and it remains an interesting concept which I admire for having a stab at revealing the subject matter which remains a misogynistic subtext in most horror films; and turning a spotlight upon that subject matter as an overt subject for a narrative, and for reflection, in its own right. But given that this somewhat valiant attempt is doomed to failure early on, the accomplishment of this film is to open up possibilities of further investigation of this kind of approach to the standard tropes of the horror genre, rather than to accomplish a meaningful investigation in itself.

William Asher (dir.) & Samuel Z. Arkoff (prod.) - Beach Blanket Bingo (1965)

I never imagined that beach party films would be a genre that I'd come to have an interest in - although I did have a lot of time for Charles Busch & Robert Lee King's erotic beach horror spoof Psycho Beach Party (2000), and I'm not averse to the more interesting manifestations of tiki culture, despite it's overtones of neocolonialist appropriation.

But having recently spent a lot of time listening to surf rock (despite the best efforts of Quentin Tarantino to put me off by featuring it prominently in his overhyped, unoriginal films) I thought it best to go to the classical sources of surf culture, so to speak, despite the fact that the music on display is much more sixties pop than surf per se. BBB happened to be staring up at me from the shelves at my local film purveyor, and so became the first candidate. It features the two major stars of the beach party series, teen idol Frankie Avalon as himself, and notorious Mousketeer Annette Funicello.

I have to say, there's not actually a lot of surfing in this one, which didn't particularly bother me. Each of the films is loosely set around a different activity, with this, the fifth instalment of the Beach Party series (made over the course of only two years), being nominally about skydiving (giving the opportunity for some nice romantic war-of-the-sexism duologues). I'm a general fan of sixties 'genre' pieces in music, fashion and film, and in this aspect BBB doesn't disappoint - the DVD transfer is nicely done and the colours are gorgeous.

It's hard to know how much of the camp is completely intended, and how much isn't. The villain of the piece, Eric von Zipper and his motorcycle gang, actually verges on frustrating, being even less realist in his acting than the other characters (oh, except for the character who's a mermaid, that is) with some 'humorous' catchphrases which I found irritatingly unfunny despite their awful B-movie characteristicicity (if you'll allow me the word). The musical numbers are randomly dropped into the plot; and at one point we seem to have suddenly left the world of teen movies and found ourselves in a James Bond, then in a horror spoof. The randomness of all of this is rather endearing in itself.

Ultimately, although at an hour and a half my full attention was a little overstretched, I'll definitely give the other films in this series a go for something lighthearted with all the genre, period and B-grade thrills that the aficionado could desire.

Richard Kelly - Southland Tales (2007)

Given that Richard Kelly is the director of Donnie Darko, a film I enjoyed a great deal, I had high expectations of Southland Tales - and it reached them in spades. DD is the more coherent work, but ST is much more interesting.

The film is set in an alternate-history 2008, in which the USA was bombed by nuclear weapons in 2005, and the Bush government has invaded Syria, Iran, and North Korea, reinstalled the draft, and emplaced other Fascistic security measures under the aegis of the Patriot Act. One of these, US-Ident, is a totalising surveillance system. Due to security measures, the states have, in effect, become separate administrative realms, nations within a nation. Meanwhile, a Neo-Marxist underground is becoming increasingly militant, and fast-dwindling fossil fuels are in the contested process of being replaced by an energy system harnessing the tidal power of the ocean. The action takes place on the eve of the 2008 election, in California, possession of which is vital for victory. We follow Boxer Santaros (Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson), an amnesiac action film star and the Californian candidate's son-in-law; Krysta Now (Sarah Michelle Gellar), a porn star trying to launch reality TV show; and the twin brothers Taverner (Seann William Scott); as they become embroiled in this heady mix of politics, science, and violence, and the world careers toward an apocalyptic cataclysm, as presaged in Revelations...

As will be evident from this description, political satire is omnipresent in the film and vital to the plot, but it's done very well, and is never heavy-handed. Indeed, at times this is an hilarious ride; Krysta Now's single, Teen Horniness Is Not A Crime is a highlight. Anyone who's concerned with the authoritarian tendencies of US politics, with international aggression, or with global warming will appreciate this aspect of the plot.

As will also be evident, the plot itself, which like DD involves weird time shifts, is heavily convoluted - I found it difficult to follow, though that's a tendency of mine, but although the narrative sprawls uncontrollably and is quite complicated, I didn't actually find this too serious a problem - the film is visually absolutely gorgeous, and you can kick back and enjoy the ride. The casting is also inspired; don't let the inclusion of actors like 'The Rock' put you off - Kelly knows exactly what he's doing. Other favourites of mine who appear here include Miranda Richardson, and Wallace Shawn (Vizzini from The Princess Bride, and his character here seems a conscious reference to that role).

As a work, I thought of various points of reference - Strange Days, Buffy, The Chumscrubber, A Scanner Darkly, Existenz, even Inland Empire in the sprawling lack of directorial self-discipline and welcome disconnect from 'realism' - but there's a lightness of touch here which gives the work a deft touch, particularly as a satire, while Kelly is obviously no intellectual lightweight, given the various references, credited and otherwise, to poets and artists that pepper the work. It's films like Southland Tales that the term 'post-modern' was invented for - so you can forget linearity and enjoy the glossy surfaces, which at the same time reveal their own sterility, but never in a way that's less than ecstatically playful...

John Hillcoat - Ghosts of the Civil Dead (1988)

I hadn't watched this film since I was a teenager, when I'd seen it mainly as a Nick Cave fanboy. I'm not sure I really 'got it' at the time, because it didn't leave a huge impact, whereas on reconsideration I was deeply impressed by this film - much more so than the more recent Hillcoat-Cave collaboration, The Proposition.

The story takes place in the close future, though this is by no means a sci-fi or even a futuristic film, in Central Industrial Prison, a maximum-security facility in the middle of the desert. The narrative conceit is a report detailing the events leading up to a total lockdown. There is not a strong narrative; rather, we follow the development of individual characters through periodical scenes of events in which they are involved. However, the film is neither boring nor slow-moving; and the violence, while at times extreme, is not presented in such a way as to make the viewer ethically complicit in voyeurism.

As the film opens, the prison seems a place of violence and oppression, but where camaraderie and humanity are nonetheless present. The focus is the degeneration of this state of affairs into one of complete dehumanisation, in which both prisoners and guards are caught up, as the management turns the screws for their own political purposes. The soundtrack was created by Blixa Bargeld and Mick Harvey, as well as Cave himself, and though minimal, plays an important part in the creation of a suffocating atmosphere of meaninglessness, inhumanity and extreme violence. Unfortunately, the character Maynard, played by Cave himself, is the only one which doesn't 'ring true,' being a psychopath-without-a-cause of fairly typical filmic derivation; whereas the other characters, however minimal their roles, are all complex and ring psychologically true. Cave's character introduces an element of melodrama into an otherwise realist, though extremely dark, piece, whose disturbing quality hinges on the reality of the world it creates.

Indeed, the characters are shown neither as devils nor as rough-hewn angels, but as complex human beings whose actions are determined not only by their character but by the system(s) which exert control over their environment; an important point in a society like ours, which would prefer to judge every action as being the result of individual disposition rather than situational factors.

According to Wikipedia, the film is partially based on the true story of Jack Henry Abbott; it is also based on the testimony of David Hale, a whistleblower and former prison guard in Illinois - the soundtrack features a number of interviews with Hale, who witnessed events very similar to those in the film in terms of management provocation of violence. In addition, apparently, the cast involves only a few professional actors, the rest being made up of real ex-crims, prison guards, etc - if this is in fact the case, it certainly works.

Thematically, a Foucauldian reflection is made (consciously referenced in the 'Foucault authority') on the modern prison as a place of surveillance, where regulation takes place through the psychologically-driven efforts of those within the system, rather than being a system where violence is institutionally inflicted from the outside in an organised fashion. This is emphasised by filming techniques like surveillance camera footage and the framing of shots through surveillance windows. There is also a heavy political critique of the system of imprisonment in itself, and of the political use to which an imprisoning justice system is put by politicians and other demagogues.

For an Australian in particular, the film seems eerily prescient of the barbed-wire concentration prisons in the middle of the desert into which refugees in the Howard era were abandoned, and left to self-mutilate, inflict brutality upon one another, and otherwise succumb to brutalised insanity, a situation created entirely for political ends. I also appreciated the uncompromising 'Australian-ness' of the work, in the dialogue and the few external shots, particularly unusual both for a science fiction film, and for a film which could have been easily set in a geographical 'nowhere' so as to highlight the universal aspects of the narrative.

This is not an easy work, but it's one which is both a stunning film as a film, and one which continues to be vitally relevant in the current political landscape.