Re-Animator: 1985, dir. Stuart Gordon. Seen at Alamo downtown (Oct. 11).
I decided I had better see Re-Animator because it’s one of the better known horror cult films, because I hadn’t ever seen any Stuart Gordon films, because I don’t see enough horror movies, and because this is one of my little brother’s all-time favorite films and he would just die if he found out I missed the opportunity to see it in a theater. Not to mention it was Dollar Night at Alamo Downtown (part of a tribute to the film’s art director, Robert A. Burns, who recently died).
I don’t always agree with my little brother (he adored Napoleon Dynamite) but I definitely enjoyed this movie. “Enjoyed” is kind of a weird word to use about a movie that contains graphic images of brain surgery, the use of a bone saw to kill a reanimated corpse, a very sad and gory little cat, a decapitation with shovel that eventually resulted in a reanimated severed head, sexual assault involving the aforementioned severed head, reanimated decomposing corpses with gore streaming from their mouths, and other nasty stuff. But I had a good time and even laughed a lot at some of the more outrageous gore.
Night of the Living Dead (1968)
Night of the Living Dead: 1968, dir. George A. Romero. Seen on DVD (Oct. 9).
It seems that October is, appropriately, Undead Movie Month for me. Mostly the movie Shawn of the Dead is to blame. My boyfriend and I want to see the movie, but we decided that we should see a couple of the Romero films beforehand so we could appreciate all the jokes. He suggested it and he is not even a film geek. Perhaps I am a bad influence.
Also, Alamo Downtown is showing a lot of horror movies this month. No other theater chain in town seems to be acknowledging Halloween very well, but at Alamo they’ve got all kinds of goodies planned. I’m really pleased about this.
I thought about lumping all my thoughts on these undead/horror movies into one big review but first of all, it would be way too long and second of all, when in the hell would I finish that? And should I include all the horror movies I see this month, or just the ones with undead/re-animated corpses/evil dead? So I’m splitting up my thoughts on these movies by movie, but will probably have a lot to say about my general feelings on the genre.
House of Games (1987)
House of Games: 1987, dir. David Mamet. Seen on DVD (Oct. 6).
My boyfriend rented this one, and watched it alone, but advised me to see it because I like heist films and caper films and con films. I thought it looked interesting but I really had to talk myself into watching it. It is difficult to get in the right mood to deal with Mamet’s particular style of dialogue.
It was worth the effort, though. I liked House of Games a lot, more than my boyfriend did. It was a little cold and distant, in the way some noir films are, but without the morality of noir (arguably dictated less by the genre than by the Production Code of the 1940s).
The Bourne Supremacy (2004)
The Bourne Supremacy: 2004, dir. Paul Greengrass. Seen at Gateway (Sept. 18).
Oh, lord. How long has it been since we saw this movie? I didn’t write about it right away because I didn’t have much to say. I don’t have much to say now, either.
This was a summer action movie, but we didn’t see it until the end of summer, at which point it lost a lot of its allure. I feel like movies like this should be seen in the middle of the day, so that part of the enjoyment is that you have walked across the glaringly hot parking lot into a dark, cool theater. Instead, it was dark outside when we went, and we saw it at Gateway, which has a theater lobby that sounds like a bus station.
movies this week: hmmm. interesting.
It truly has been one-week-on, one-week-off in Austin theaters. Perhaps this is a nice gesture on the part of film distributors to allow us to catch up on the good films during the off weeks.
Most of the movies this week look interesting. Not loads of thrills, not full of stunning visuals or amazing special effects, but the kinds of movies that keep your brain occupied and absorbed for a couple of hours. (I’m not counting the Hilary Duff movie. I’m ignoring it. Or the Jimmy Fallon movie, for that matter. Okay, maybe this was a dumb generalization to make, but I can’t think of anything better right now.) And if you want something a little more fun, there are good movies still playing in theaters from previous weeks.
Napoleon Dynamite (2004)
Napoleon Dynamite: 2004, dir. Jared Hess. Seen at Alamo Village (October 2).
Okay. Hands up. Who has seen Napoleon Dynamite?
Okay. Who liked it? You did?
Why, in God’s name, why?
And why did some of you tell me to see it? Were you drinking? Were you partaking? Did you have your hand up someone’s skirt? Were you suffering from Friends deprivation and desperate for some sitcom, any sitcom, to make you laugh?
movies this week: go back to last week
I think I was spoiled by last week’s movies. I cannot muster much enthusiasm for the movies opening in Austin this week. Fortunately, last week’s movies and some other goodies are still in theaters, and since I didn’t get time to see them then, there are plenty of good movies available for me in theaters.
movies this week: I need more time
The universal forces that control film (no, I don’t mean Sony and Time-Warner, either) must have looked down from their celestial screening rooms last weekend, shuddered at the number of mediocre films opening in theaters, and decreed that this would be a better week. And believe me, I am truly thankful. (Also, I finally got my expectorant from Amazon yesterday … no more formula! yay!)
Most of the movies opening in Austin this week look very promising. I can think of at least two that I want to see while they are in theaters, and a few more I think I’ll enjoy on DVD. And of course there are still some movies hanging around from previous weeks that I haven’t seen, like Garden State and Silver City.
Why is the weekend only two days long? Why are night movies so expensive? How will I make time for everything I want to see? How important is a good night’s sleep, anyway, if you’re lying down watching movies instead—isn’t that sufficiently restful? I wish.
beyond the tits of the Meyer vixens
In my high school and college days, several books had a marked influence on the films I watched and the way in which I watched them. These books introduced me to directors and movies that I hadn’t heard of before, causing me to seek out all sorts of obscure films—and this was in the late 1980s when such movies were very difficult to find on video.
The four books:
- Harlan Ellison’s Watching, by Harlan Ellison
- Joe Bob Goes to the Drive-In, by Joe Bob Briggs (John Bloom)
- Joe Bob Goes Back to the Drive-In, by Joe Bob Briggs (John Bloom)
- Shock Value, by John Waters
movies this week: formula in bulk
I ordered some Mucinex from Amazon last weekend. Mucinex is an expectorant, or as my doctor calls it, “the mucus thinner,” which is the kind of pills you get to take all the time if you have crazy-bad sinuses. It was weird ordering something so boring from Amazon, and I did consider buying the fourth season of The Simpsons in order to get free shipping, but the practical, dull part of me pointed out that if I ordered two bottles of the stuff I could get free shipping anyway.
Yesterday I found the box from Amazon hidden near the front door when I got home. I scooped it up with the rest of the mail and wondered how two small pill bottles could be so heavy. Maybe they packed them in lots of stuff so nothing bad would happen? Still, it seemed suspiciously weird.
I opened up the box and found … three tins, about the size of medium paint cans, of Isomil Advance formula. Powdered baby formula. (No, you don’t get babies if you add water, smartass. It’s for babies to drink in their little bottles.) Formula everywhere. I have to take the box back to the post office today and hope that next time I get something resembling my actual order.
In Austin theaters this week (you knew I’d get to movies eventually, didn’t you? What a surprise), it’s formula everywhere, too. Instead of Isomil Advance, we have Advanced Sitcom Formula in cans of film.
When I write these weekly movie previews, I write the summaries for the movies before I write the lead-in. After writing three or four summaries where the storyline reverted to that old film-school cliche, “Hilarity ensues,” or better yet, “Wacky hijinks ensue,” I realized that a pattern was emerging. A pattern of the standard formulaic (unfunny) comedy.
It’s like wanting The Simpsons, expecting something less interesting that’ll at least make you feel better, and ending up with an enormous amount of useless formula.
Add water—or better yet, strong drink—and enjoy.