CULT MOVIE REVIEW: Halloween 2 (2009)

"Hell is a teenage girl."

-- Anita "Needy" (Amanda Seyfried) waxes philosophical in Jennifer's Body (2009)

Well, here's a toughie...

The funny quote about teenage girls -- excerpted at the top of this review -- reflects the element I most appreciated about Jennifer's Body (2009), a bracing, black horror-comedy from writer Diablo Cody and director Karyn Kusama. 

In the spirit of that line, Jennifer's Body is droll, cynical, harsh-to-the-max, and undeniably clever. 

However, the film doesn't quite work as a horror piece, and the pervasive (if delightful politically-incorrect...) humor engenders an overall sense of distance from the material. 

Indeed, many aspects of the film's narrative are handled with such kookiness that the viewer ends up feeling wholly removed from the characters and their dilemmas. Some viewers may interpret this sense of distance from the nuts-and-bolts horror aspects of the film as actually making fun of the genre. Which probably explains why so many horror-conscious critics panned Jennifer's Body. Some viewed the piece as a slap in the face. And they may have a point: for horror to work well, it can't be scatter shot and inconsistent; you can't just throw anything and everything at the screen and hope it all sticks (unless you're Sam Raimi engineering a blood flood).

Yet, Jennifer's Body boasts something I find infinitely valuable in horror films: a distinctive world view...an original voice. Too many horror movies today rely on recycled world-views and conventional wisdom, and Jennifer's Body, for all the flaws it plainly evidences is determinedly different. Although it is garbed in the costume of a horror film, the movie's purpose is plainly satire in the mold of Juvenal, meaning it is contemptuous, abrasive, savage and in-your-face.

Personally, I wholeheartedly approve of that.

Here, the target is America's high school culture and the changes mores of our young people. Specifically, the film involves a floundering, obscure indie band, Low Shoulder, that can't make it big and thus resorts to Satanism for dummies to achieve fifteen minutes of fame. Such Satanism requires the sacrifice of a virgin, only the band can't find one...

Surely, this is exactly how Ashlee Simpson, Paris Hilton, the Gosselins and other non-talents achieved their place in the spotlight...right?

Rather daringly, Jennifer's Body also contemptuously gazes at our society's tendency to first rubberneck at human disaster; and then move on with touchy-feely, popcorn platitudes and mock catharsis. We saw it after Columbine; we saw it after 9/11 too. Between endless, exploitative footage of bloodied students at a high school shooting or the Twin Towers falling down, the news networks spouted truisms about "faith," "American strength," traditional values," etc. We were thus permitted to gawk at tragedy, and then turn around and feel good about ourselves. Yay us!

In Jennifer's Body, Cody comments on one town's "tragedy boner" after a tragic bar fire (brought on by the Satanists' agenda), and the media's obsession with the accident...at least until another tragedy comes along. Then, when it's time for someone else's fifteen minutes of fame, "sorrow" proves to be "last week's emotion" in the town of Devil's Kettle. The movie even delves into the strange myths that the media creates and perpetuates during such national tragedies. Remember how CNN reported on a non-existent Trench coat Mafia at Columbine? Or told us how one brave Christian girl dared to tell the Columbine killers she believed in God before she was shot? Pure fiction both. Here, the pure fiction is that the band Low Shoulder bravely rescued townspeople from the fire. Of course, this myth just makes the performers that much more famous. They even give the tragedy a theme song...

Jennifer's Body also gazes at our society's disturbing trend of sexualizing younger and younger females; the way that attire, pop music, and societal expectations transform adolescent girls into powerful objects of male sexual desire. That's almost precisely what vapid Jennifer (Megan Fox) becomes after becoming inhabited by a demon.

Only this sex object bites back.

In the end, when some of Jennifer's power (not the evil part, I guess..) is transplanted into nerdy Anita, the movie provides an unmistakable message of female empowerment; a taking back and controlling of the mini-skirted, skinny, bare-midriff Bratz/Britney Spears image society relentlessly forces on our young girls. If you think I'm making too much of this trend, go to any Target or Wal Mart store and just take a gander at the clothes being designed and marketed to ten year old girls. You won't doubt me. It makes me glad I'm raising a boy, not a girl. (And hell, I'm a liberal...)

Jennifer Body's secret weapon is Megan Fox, who -- let's face it -- has been a willing vehicle for the exploitation of the young female form in pop culture cinema. As such, she's perfect in the role of wolf in sheep's clothing. Only Nixon could go to China, and all that. And I'll say this for any doubters: Fox can act. Her performance here is quite accomplished because it takes the material at face value and doesn't camp it up, which would have been disastrous. Instead, Fox cheerily spouts the most cynical, filthy, sexual dialogue you can imagine, and does it with the aura and attitude of total naivete and youth. At one point, she discusses the physical after-effects of anal sex with the wondrous, guilelessness...of a virgin; a paradoxical contradiction. When demonically possessed of voracious appetites, Fox's Jennifer is a warning to the youth-obsessed, male-dominated culture that inappropriately sexualizes these girls: be careful what you wish for.

Given the message of female empowerment and the distinctive mode of communication here (Cody's zippy, pop-culture heavy dialogue), Jennifer's Body is clearly this generation's answer to the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992) -- the movie, not the TV show. And interestingly, it shares in common that old movie's central flaw: it isn't scary in the slightest. Jennifer's Body makes the terminal mistake of playing the villains and their evil plans for laughs. Rutger Hauer and Pee Wee Herman kind of camped it up in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992) and the result was that the bottom fell out of the satire; the horror wasn't grounded in anything genuinely horrific. Though Fox doesn't play her villainous role in campy fashion, the movie's other villains -- a group of "emo" "Satanists with awesome hair cuts" -- are so silly, so over-the-top, so obvious, that -- again -- the bottom falls out of the movie. There's no sense of menace. Without it, the movie just kind of bops from one set-piece to another, with half-thought-out ideas taking the forefront. For instance, Anita is mildly psychic..sometimes.

I would also be remiss if I didn't point out a lesbian kiss late in the film that -- entirely contrary to the movie's thematic point --panders the male culture's interest in seeing two hot women get it on.

I understand that there's been a kind of backlash against Diablo Cody; the belief that Cody's dialogue is too hip; too glib. I disagree: the dialogue is the best thing about Jennifer's Body, in tandem with Fox's blunt delivery. This may be a matter of subjective taste, but I would rather watch a film witha distinctive (even if occasionally annoying) voice, than a cookie-cutter product extruded from the Hollywood assembly line. Finally, I'll offer this caveat: Jennifer's Body may play better a few years from now, once we've separated ourselves from this particular moment in history and can thus more easily detect the very context that Jennifer's Body satirizes.

So how's this for a guarded recommendation: Jennifer's Body is "freaktarded." It' a pretty good comedy and a pretty lousy horror film.

CULT TV FLASHBACK #97: Harper's Island (2009)

In the annals of terror television history, we've seen vampiric soap operas (Dark Shadows, Kindred: The Embraced), paranormal investigations (The X-Files; Fringe), monsters-of-the-week (Kolchak: The Night Stalker), and even a super-powered "final girl" kicking demonic butt (Buffy the Vampire Slayer).

But Ari Schlossberg's Harper Island -- which aired in prime time last year on CBS -- is the first and only attempt I can recall that faithfully adapts the 1980s slasher movie paradigm to a weekly dramatic format.

It's an interesting and brash experiment: all thirteen hour-long episodes of this drama tell --essentially-- the equivalent of one highly-detailed slasher story. Accordingly, the series skillfully deploys the familiar symbols, misdirections and tricks of the paradigm popularized by such films as Halloween, Prom Night, Friday the 13th, My Bloody Valentine, as well as more recent additions to the sub-genre, including Scream (1996) and I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997).

The central narrative (or organizing principle) of Harper's Island involves wedding nuptials: the union of two different "classes" on the small coastal island off Washington State.

Wealthy socialite Trish Wellington (Katie Cassidy) -- a so-called "swell" plans to marry seasonal "worker"/fisherman Henry Dunn (Christopher Gorham). And her tyrannical father (Richard Burgi) is none too pleased about that.

With huge wedding party in tow -- both groomsmen and bridesmaids -- the youngsters descend upon the island, party beyond all reason, and plan for the big day. Also returning to Harper's Island for the first time in seven years is Abby Mills (Elaine Cassidy), Henry's best friend and childhood playmate.

Why has Abby been away from home so long? Well, in keeping with the slasher paradigm, it's "the transgression" or "crime in the past" that holds the answer. Seven years ago, an unstoppable bogeyman named John Wakefield (Callum Keith Rennie) went on a killing spree on the island, and massacred several people with a head spade (a fishing device used for decapitating whales...). On his spree, Wakefield hanged Abby's mother (Sarah-Jane Redmond), and basically destroyed the economy of the island in the process. Abby's dad is the island's sheriff, and he supposedly killed Wakefield (think Harry Warden). But to this day, the Sheriff is obsessed with Wakefield.

Then, on the week of Trish and Henry's wedding, Wakefield-style killings begin again on Harper's Island -- using the head spade (and the killer's m.o. of hanging...), and soon all the would-be victims suspects that a) Wakefield isn't dead. Or b.) there's a copycat in the wedding party.

Also in keeping with the slasher paradigm, the villain of Harper's Island is a mad killer or bogeyman who has been wronged and suffered a terrible transgression or crime. This act/crime in the past is the precipitating factor in "flipping" said individual from normal to homicidal (think Friday the 13th, Mrs. Voorhees, and her vendetta against camp counselors after their negligence towards her son in 1958).

Other characters here are also pulled right off the slasher shelf...in concept anyway. We have bitches (sassy, attitudinal and pulchritudinous young women...) in the bridesmaid party, plus practical jokers and smarmy jocks like Sully (Matt Barr) on Henry's side. These characters form much of the initial victim pool. The series also offers a Cassandra figure and final girl in tortured Abby; a personality who warns people again and again that Wakefield is back, but is met with disbelief or skepticism.

Also in accordance with the familiar slasher formula, the first big death in the series premiere (after the gory face severing by boat propeller...) involves a well-known but affordable celebrity: guest star Harry Hamlin (as Uncle Marty). Again, think Drew Barrymore in Scream.

There's plenty of partying here too, so vice precedes slice and dice, . And did I mention that there are multiple red herrings? Clues point away from the culprit, there are blind alleys about stolen "drug money" and other assorted sub-plots that keep us off the trail of the real killer and off-balance as the murders pile up.

And finally, what Harper's Island truly concerns is family matters (think Laurie Strode as Michael Myers' sister...). The new quasi-Wakefield murder spree centers around relations; relatives and family members both known and secret.

The other conceit here is that every week, a major character dies...horribly. No exceptions. And the episodes are (amusingly) titled after the sound of the week's brutal demise. Thus various installments are titled "Thwack," "Sploosh," "Gurgle," "Seep," "Snap," Splash" and my personal, macabre favorite: "Thack, Splat, Sizzle."

So indeed, Harper's Island is a knowing slasher pastiche, and the pertinent question becomes this: why extend the repetitive, narrow slasher formula (usually limited to 90 minutes, tops) to a duration six or seven times as long? The answer is simple: characterization.

Oftentimes (at least in the lesser examples), slasher movies are accused of featuring cookie-cutter characters of limited dimension. Yet the 13 hours of Harper's Island allow for a deeper sense of identification; so that audiences truly get to know and like some of the victims; the people we're "losing" on a regular basis. It's not such a big deal in the early episodes, when you don't know the victim so well. But by episodes 11 thru 13, when the head spade falls (always rigidly between the 37 and 40 minute point...), you feel authentic terror and remorse as you realize only few characters are left; and you're likely going to lose somebody you care about. I should add that Harper's Island boasts a mean streak a mile wide, doesn't play favorites, and almost never relies on narrative cheats. It's...relentless.

The thirteen episode format provides Harper's Island with some great and entirely unexpected character development, actually. The aforementioned Sully starts out like every obnoxious frat guy you've ever seen in a slasher movie since Reagan was in office, but by the end of the series becomes something quite different. And there are two great characters - Chloe (Cameron Richardson) and Cal (Adam Campbell) -- that you will absolutely fall in love with over the span of the series. Even Trish -- the spoiled little rich girl -- ultimately proves to be a figure far more tragic and touching than her shallow character description would indicate.

The danger in extending the slasher movie formula to a thirteen week series is, of course, that the writers lose focus; that the sense of danger dissipates; and that the blind alleys take away from the overall pace. Surprisingly, Harper's Island very ably avoids these pitfalls. One subplot involving drug money that starts out as the reddest of red herrings has a throwaway punctuation that is breathtaking, ironic, and pretty damn clever.

Harper's Island also attempts to adhere to the realm of plausibility as much as possible given the permutations of the format. For instance, is never really explained in most slasher films how bogeymen like Jason or Harry Warden always manage to get to the right place at the right time -- unseen and unnoticed - to kill the one victim who happens to be vulnerable at that instant. In this series, the killer utilizes a series of tunnels honeycombing the island, built during the Prohibition Era. Perhaps not a perfect solution, but at least reality is addressed.

I can't (and won't) make the argument that Harper's Island is deep, artistic, or socially relevant. All I can say is that - if watched in its entirety over the course of a few days -- the series proves highly diverting, and entertaining. It's a kick. As my wife Kathryn said when we finished the final episode: "I can't believe I'm saying this. But that was really, really fun..."

So bottom line: Harper's Island is a bloody (and really, really gory...) riot. It's perfectly structured, so that you unwittingly respond like Pavlov's Dog every time the 37 minute mark hits, wondering who is going to die next. The last two episodes are titled "Gasp" and "Sigh," and are perfectly named. A fter the final credits roll, you kind of catch your breath, shake your head, and fight the urge to giggle. Audacious and creative, Harper's Island is gloriously violent, gleefully frivolous, and a hell of a good time.

CULT MOVIE REVIEW: Jennifer's Body (2009)

"Hell is a teenage girl."

-- Anita "Needy" (Amanda Seyfried) waxes philosophical in Jennifer's Body (2009)

Well, here's a toughie...

The funny quote about teenage girls -- excerpted at the top of this review -- reflects the element I most appreciated about Jennifer's Body (2009), a bracing, black horror-comedy from writer Diablo Cody and director Karyn Kusama.

In the spirit of that line, Jennifer's Body is droll, cynical, harsh-to-the-max, and undeniably clever.

However, the film doesn't quite work as a horror piece, and the pervasive (if delightful politically-incorrect...) humor engenders an overall sense of distance from the material.

Indeed, many aspects of the film's narrative are handled with such kookiness that the viewer ends up feeling wholly removed from the characters and their dilemmas. Some viewers may interpret this sense of distance from the nuts-and-bolts horror aspects of the film as actually making fun of the genre. Which probably explains why so many horror-conscious critics panned Jennifer's Body. Some viewed the piece as a slap in the face. And they may have a point: for horror to work well, it can't be scatter shot and inconsistent; you can't just throw anything and everything at the screen and hope it all sticks (unless you're Sam Raimi engineering a blood flood).

Yet, Jennifer's Body boasts something I find infinitely valuable in horror films: a distinctive world view...an original voice. Too many horror movies today rely on recycled world-views and conventional wisdom, and Jennifer's Body, for all the flaws it plainly evidences is determinedly different. Although it is garbed in the costume of a horror film, the movie's purpose is plainly satire in the mold of Juvenal, meaning it is contemptuous, abrasive, savage and in-your-face.

Personally, I wholeheartedly approve of that.

Here, the target is America's high school culture and the changes mores of our young people. Specifically, the film involves a floundering, obscure indie band, Low Shoulder, that can't make it big and thus resorts to Satanism for dummies to achieve fifteen minutes of fame. Such Satanism requires the sacrifice of a virgin, only the band can't find one...

Surely, this is exactly how Ashlee Simpson, Paris Hilton, the Gosselins and other non-talents achieved their place in the spotlight...right?

Rather daringly, Jennifer's Body also contemptuously gazes at our society's tendency to first rubberneck at human disaster; and then move on with touchy-feely, popcorn platitudes and mock catharsis. We saw it after Columbine; we saw it after 9/11 too. Between endless, exploitative footage of bloodied students at a high school shooting or the Twin Towers falling down, the news networks spouted truisms about "faith," "American strength," traditional values," etc. We were thus permitted to gawk at tragedy, and then turn around and feel good about ourselves. Yay us!

In Jennifer's Body, Cody comments on one town's "tragedy boner" after a tragic bar fire (brought on by the Satanists' agenda), and the media's obsession with the accident...at least until another tragedy comes along. Then, when it's time for someone else's fifteen minutes of fame, "sorrow" proves to be "last week's emotion" in the town of Devil's Kettle. The movie even delves into the strange myths that the media creates and perpetuates during such national tragedies. Remember how CNN reported on a non-existent Trench coat Mafia at Columbine? Or told us how one brave Christian girl dared to tell the Columbine killers she believed in God before she was shot? Pure fiction both. Here, the pure fiction is that the band Low Shoulder bravely rescued townspeople from the fire. Of course, this myth just makes the performers that much more famous. They even give the tragedy a theme song...

Jennifer's Body also gazes at our society's disturbing trend of sexualizing younger and younger females; the way that attire, pop music, and societal expectations transform adolescent girls into powerful objects of male sexual desire. That's almost precisely what vapid Jennifer (Megan Fox) becomes after becoming inhabited by a demon.

Only this sex object bites back.

In the end, when some of Jennifer's power (not the evil part, I guess..) is transplanted into nerdy Anita, the movie provides an unmistakable message of female empowerment; a taking back and controlling of the mini-skirted, skinny, bare-midriff Bratz/Britney Spears image society relentlessly forces on our young girls. If you think I'm making too much of this trend, go to any Target or Wal Mart store and just take a gander at the clothes being designed and marketed to ten year old girls. You won't doubt me. It makes me glad I'm raising a boy, not a girl. (And hell, I'm a liberal...)

Jennifer Body's secret weapon is Megan Fox, who -- let's face it -- has been a willing vehicle for the exploitation of the young female form in pop culture cinema. As such, she's perfect in the role of wolf in sheep's clothing. Only Nixon could go to China, and all that. And I'll say this for any doubters: Fox can act. Her performance here is quite accomplished because it takes the material at face value and doesn't camp it up, which would have been disastrous. Instead, Fox cheerily spouts the most cynical, filthy, sexual dialogue you can imagine, and does it with the aura and attitude of total naivete and youth. At one point, she discusses the physical after-effects of anal sex with the wondrous, guilelessness...of a virgin; a paradoxical contradiction. When demonically possessed of voracious appetites, Fox's Jennifer is a warning to the youth-obsessed, male-dominated culture that inappropriately sexualizes these girls: be careful what you wish for.

Given the message of female empowerment and the distinctive mode of communication here (Cody's zippy, pop-culture heavy dialogue), Jennifer's Body is clearly this generation's answer to the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992) -- the movie, not the TV show. And interestingly, it shares in common that old movie's central flaw: it isn't scary in the slightest. Jennifer's Body makes the terminal mistake of playing the villains and their evil plans for laughs. Rutger Hauer and Pee Wee Herman kind of camped it up in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992) and the result was that the bottom fell out of the satire; the horror wasn't grounded in anything genuinely horrific. Though Fox doesn't play her villainous role in campy fashion, the movie's other villains -- a group of "emo" "Satanists with awesome hair cuts" -- are so silly, so over-the-top, so obvious, that -- again -- the bottom falls out of the movie. There's no sense of menace. Without it, the movie just kind of bops from one set-piece to another, with half-thought-out ideas taking the forefront. For instance, Anita is mildly psychic..sometimes.

I would also be remiss if I didn't point out a lesbian kiss late in the film that -- entirely contrary to the movie's thematic point --panders the male culture's interest in seeing two hot women get it on.

I understand that there's been a kind of backlash against Diablo Cody; the belief that Cody's dialogue is too hip; too glib. I disagree: the dialogue is the best thing about Jennifer's Body, in tandem with Fox's blunt delivery. This may be a matter of subjective taste, but I would rather watch a film witha distinctive (even if occasionally annoying) voice, than a cookie-cutter product extruded from the Hollywood assembly line. Finally, I'll offer this caveat: Jennifer's Body may play better a few years from now, once we've separated ourselves from this particular moment in history and can thus more easily detect the very context that Jennifer's Body satirizes.

So how's this for a guarded recommendation: Jennifer's Body is "freaktarded." It' a pretty good comedy and a pretty lousy horror film.

A Matter of Order: A Survey of Anti-Matter Men in Classic TV Space Adventures

One concept that has obsessed the writers of space adventure television over the decades involves a tricky substance (or anti-substance?) known as anti-matter.

Here's a short, simple (and hopefully accurate...) definition of anti-matter: it's a substance that, when combined with an equal amount of matter, converts all substance to energy.

Also, every particle of matter has a corresponding anti-particle of anti-matter. Got it?

Anti-matter actually exists in our galaxy, but is relatively rare. For instance, NASA has reported the existence of an anti-matter cloud 10,000 lights across -- one generating the energy equivalent of 10,000 suns -- near galactic center. (If it hasn't been named, may I humbly suggest: "The Great Barrier...?")

Encoded in this definition and concept of anti-matter is the tantalizing seed of dramatic invention. If every particle of matter boasts an opposite anti-particle of anti-matter, then we all possess anti-matter duplicates, right?

And if we possess anti-matter duplicates, that must mean that there is an anti-matter universe where all our anti-matter counterparts dwell, no? See? The possibilities in storytelling are endless. Consider, would an anti-matter duplicate of yourself have your personality, or the antithesis -- the negative -- of your personality?

There's an implicit and dramatic danger inherent in the concept of anti-matter too: if matter and anti-matter should touch, utter annihilation (energy output...) results (likely in the form of x-rays and gamma rays, I think...). So, if we should extend our reach into the world of anti-matter, would man acquire knowledge, or only actualize his own self-destruction?

The Alternative Factor: Everything Within Range of Our Instruments Almost Winked Out...

Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek (1966-1969) was one of the first genre TV series to tackle the concept -- and the dramatic possibilities -- of anti-matter. In terms of background information, we learned in the classic series that the starship Enterprise was powered by the energy created from a matter/anti-matter intermix reaction in Scotty's beloved engines.

But anti-matter itself became a central plot point in a first season episode entitled "The Alternative Factor." In this story by Don Ingalls and directed by Gerd Oswald, the Enterprise (on stardate 3087.6) experiences a cosmic winking out -- a literal brush with cosmic non-existence. The terrible phenomenon is felt in every quadrant of the galaxy simultaneously, and seems to center on the very planet the Enterprise is orbiting. Kirk and crew soon encounter on the planet surface a madman, a humanoid named Lazarus (Robert Brown), who claims to be hunting a "creature" who is "anti-life," who "lives to destroy."

Spock and Kirk soon deduce that Lazarus is actually stalking his own counter-part from an opposite universe; an anti-matter universe. Worse, if the two Lazarus counterparts should meet -- in either physical universe -- both universes will be destroyed. It will be the end of all existence. Everywhere.

"The Alternative Factor" also posits a bridge between matter and anti-matter universes; a a kind of "magnetic corridor" or "safety valve that keeps eternity from winking out." For a being of the "minus" universe to enter the "positive" universe (and vice-versa...) this safety valve must first be breached. "The Alternative Factors" resolves with Captain Kirk trapping both Lazarus counterparts in that safety valve for all eternity; essentially destroying the only entrance and exits (Lazarus's time ship, which is powered by dilithium crystals) with the ship's mighty phaser banks. There, in that sealed-off safety valve. the good and evil Lazarus will battle for all eternity, but matter and anti-matter universes will be safe, at least.

The name "Lazarus" originates from a Hebrew word or name, meaning, essentially "God's Assistant," and that's the role that Lazarus explicitly plays in "The Alternative Factor." Or, at least one Lazarus fulfills that role. In offering to spend an eternity at the mercy of his evil self, the good Lazarus preserves all of God's handiwork: creation itself, for all time.

The word "Lazarus" -- in science -- also refers to a thing or organism that is mysteriously resurrected after being believed dead. The Lazarus of Star Trek also fits that particular bill. Here, Lazarus re-appears on his home planet generations after all his people have disappeared...after they have become extinct due to the matter/anti-matter conflict. So Lazarus is resurrected in the far future of his own time-line; after his very race is dead.

What remains most interesting about "The Alternative Factor," -- which is generally considered a weak episode of classic Trek -- is that, in keeping with the series' humanist, psychological bent -- the resolution of the cosmic, existential crisis comes from humanoid sacrifice and selflessness. The entire universe -- all of creation itself -- is preserved by the act of one mortal man. There is no God or God Being controlling this universe; but rather a fallible man who has "sacrificed" himself for the rest of us.

Ironically, this also means that all successive generations of Star Trek exist in a universe wherein existence itself is held in the delicate hands of one, fallible man (Lazarus). We have occasionally seen in Star Trek how Starfleet has issued a few draconian directives: the Omega Directive (which results in a search and destroy mission should a particle of a substance called Omega be discovered...) and the General Order that establishes a death penalty should any Starfleet officer visit the planet Talos IV. Given the fragility of the universe itself, and Lazarus's importance to that survival, it seems that every Starfleet captain would have standing orders to kill him on sight, should he re-appear. Why? Because if Lazarus ever meets his counterpart in our space (or negative space...) all is destroyed.

In the case of Star Trek's "The Alternative Factor," we learn something about the structure of existence itself: an anti-matter universe exists; and a bridge to that universe exists too. Ultimately, dealing with either is playing with fire. Exploring the anti-matter realm (or even opening the door to the anti-matter realm) is equated literally with letting the genie (or Lazarus) out of the bottle.

Planet of Evil: You've Come to the End of Your Piece of Elastic

In 1975, during the Tom Baker years, the Time Lord known as the Doctor also had a brush with anti-matter and the order of existence. The serial was called "Planet of Evil" and it was written by Louis Marks. In the year 37,166, on the planet Zeta Minor, "at the very edge of the known universe," a fallible Morestran scientist named Sorenson (Frederick Jaeger) has discovered what he believes to be an energy source that can replace his planet's dying sun. That inexhaustible supply of energy comes from -- you guessed it -- anti-matter.

When Sorenson attempts to leave Zeta Minor with several canisters of anti-matter crystals in his possession, his action activates a kind of Monster from the Anti-Matter universe whose job it is to retrieve those crystals. The creature arises from a gaping black pit on the jungle surface of the planet, and it carries out this mission with murderous intensity...even able to hold a powerful spaceship in orbit. The Doctor unwittingly falls into the pit on Zeta Minor, but is able to engineer a truce: the return of the anti-matter fcrystals or the safe evacuation of the Morestran rescue ship.

Also, in a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde touch, Sorenson physically changes due to his exposure to the anti-matter crystals. He is "infected" by the anti-matter, his "brain cells" destroyed, rendering him a "murderous brute." In other words, he pays the price for tampering in the order of things.

As in the case of "The Alternative Factor," the universe of Doctor Who thus posits an anti-matter universe "opposite" to our own domain of matter. Here, there is not a magnetic corridor or safety valve to reckon with, but rather the black, bottomless pit, which seems to bridge universes too. And again, we get the implicit notion of an ordered existence. Anti-matter is to remain in the anti-matter universe (or on the cusp of the anti-matter universe: Zeta Minor) no matter what, and there are mechanisms in place to assure that is so (the rampaging monster). When man (or Morestran) transgresses this law, he activates the mechanism that keeps matter and anti-matter from combining in annihilation.

Matter Never Dies: Life and Death, Balance and Imbalance.

The denizens of Moonbase Alpha twice had brushes with anti-matter life-forms in the series Space:1999 (1975 - 1977). In the first season episode by Johnny Byrne (based on a story by Art Wallace) -- "Matter of Life and Death," --- an anti-matter sentinel takes the form of Helena Russell's husband, Lee (Richard Johnson) and cryptically warns the wandering Alphans not to settle on a planet of anti-matter called Terra Nova.

In the episode's final act, after the sentinel's warning is ignored, we see what Doctor Who and Star Trek only hinted at: total, absolute, fiery annihilation. On the surface of Terra Nova, the planet is ravaged by earthquakes, and the Alphan exploration party is killed. In space, the moon itself explodes. All is lost. Fortunately, a last minute re-set occurs after Lee Russell appears to Helena again and warns her not to let Commander John Koenig make the same mistake twice. Terra Nova cannot be their home; physical laws must be obeyed at all costs. Order must be restored and matter and anti-matter must remain forever separae.

In the second season episode, "A Matter of Balance," -- set 1702 days after the moon's breakaway from Earth -- an anti-matter population is far less helpful (and forgiving) than Lee Russell was. A sinister alien named Vindrus (Stuart Wilson) of the planet Sunim ("Minus" spelled backwards) exeutes a plan to drag the Alphans into the anti-matter universe. This is necessary because the anti-matter universe is a true opposite to ours: instead of evolving "forward" it is devolving...backwards...to a time before the big bang and to non-existence itself. Eventually, according to Vindrus, all life in his anti-matter universe will "revert" to the primordial slime of pre-existence. Thus Vindrus hopes to land the Alphans in this degenerating universe of death. But to do so, Vindrus must obey the laws of nature: he must maintain "balance." For every Sunim individual who comes into the matter universe, one Alphan must be transported to the anti-matter universe in place.

In both of these Space:1999 stories the underlying principal is the order of the universe; the belief that physical laws that must be obeyed if existence is to continue chugging along as it is. Even the villain, Vindrus must obey the laws of the universe, in this case, preserving a balance. And Lee Russell was, in a sense, preserving order as well: keeping matter out of contact with anti-matter on a remote world.

In each of these four examples of sci-fi programs featuring anti-matter then, there is an unspoken law that seems corollary to the old sci-fi movie canard "do not tamper in God's domain." Only in these cases, it is not God or a supreme being that is being tampered with, but the nature of existence itself. Each story posits a brand of "repair" mechanism that can heal existence if man is foolish enough to tamper: a safety valve between universes ("The Alternative Favtor"), a monster that collects anti-matter should it be dispersed in the matter universe ("Planet of Evil"), a lonely sentinel warning against matter-anti-matter mixing ("A Matter of Life and Death"") and even a physical law of "one for one" that prohibts large scale crossing over of universes or realities ("A Matter of Balance.")

Other space adventure programming of the classic period (1965 - 1980) also deployed anti-matter as a narrative device. A Lost in Space episode entitled "The Anti-Matter Man" (written by Sutton Roley and airing December 27, 1967) created a villainous doppelganger of Professor Robinson, one who casts no shadow and is a "bad father." In this case, opposite or "anti-matter" was equated not just with being "negative" in physical nature, but evil in psychological nature (like the mad Lazarus of "The Alternative Factor.") The balance that was restored was not just universal; but personal...the balance of the nuclear family.

Each in uinque fashion, Star Trek, Doctor Who, Space:1999 and Lost in Space viewed Anti-Matter universes and Anti-Matter Men as forces of disorder; ones that threatened the very existence of our universe. These were forces better left alone, or at least respected, the various series concluded. One might extrapolate this edict as a kind of "space" environmental message. A warning not to plunder resources we don't understand; not to harness an energy source more dangerous than "nuclear fission," as the Doctor described anti-matter. When we go forward into the mysteries of space; we must tread responsibly.

Albert Einstein once wrote that "there is no logical way to the discovery" of elemental laws; that there is "only the way of intution, which is helped by a feeling for the order lying behind the appearance." Every one of these fictional TV encounters with anti-matter may be scientifically inccurate, even occasionally ridiculous, yet each narrative helps us to understand -- through intuition and imagination -- the "feeling of order" behind the existence of anti-matter; behind the secret order of the universe itself.

Sick Days-s-s-s-s-s

Hey everybody,

Sorry for the dearth of substantive posts this week (especially so early in the new year!) My three-year old son Joel and I returned from our holiday travels with ear infections, bronchitis, and fever. Yikes! We've each been to Urgent Care, and I can't hear a bloody thing out of my left ear.

We're both being medicated to the max, so hopefully we'll get better soon. (I better get well soon: I'm supposed to see Avatar this weekend!)

Sci-Fi Wisdom of the Week

"Ladies and gentlemen, attention! There is a herd of killer rabbits headed this way and we desperately need your help!"

-Night of the Lepus (1972)

CULT MOVIE REVIEW: Paranormal Activity (2009)

I am very much aware that many mainstream critics and horror bloggers whom I respect did not care much for The Blair Witch Project (1999). I've listened to their careful arguments and I do understand and appreciate them. But for me, the film remains an absolute masterpiece, even ten years later.

Yes, The Blair Witch Project is a messy and chaotic film, I readily acknowledge that fact. But it is gloriously messy and chaotic; in a fashion that is extremely frightening to me; in a manner that reflects some cogent truths about our human existence (and the American cultural experience...) circa the mid-to-late 1990s.

The film either concerns three students who are bedeviled by their own arrogance and incompetence; or it is a film that concerns three students who are bedeviled by something infinitely worse. It is either a shaggy dog, chasing-your-tail story about three kids who get lost in the woods and come to a bad end, or a story about three kids cursed by a witch and led to their inevitable doom, Hansel & Gretel-style.

Whichever answer is the "right" one, The Blair Witch Project is a living, breathing paean to ambiguity. It is open to multiple interpretations, and the visuals of the film artistically reflect that.

Sometimes we're watching events unfold on film stock; sometimes we're watching them on videotape. Sometimes, the players in the drama "stage" their surroundings (for a mock documentary...), and sometimes they are overcome by the reality of nature (or is it the witch?) surrounding them. In short, the film splinters the narrative both visually and thematically, and then asks us -- as the primary percipients -- to find facts. Because of the tabloid nature of television in the late 1990s, and the increasingly "he said/she said" political-spin of the new 24-hour news cable shows (commenting endlessly on such matters as the Clinton Impeachment), The Blair Witch Project said something about us. It reflected our sudden inability -- even with abundant and easy technology -- to easily see "truth."

Many, many good friends and colleagues of mine complain because The Blair Witch Project concludes without explanation and ultimately reveals nothing. For me, that's not a problem. On the contrary, that's part of the movie's incredible charm and enduring power. Like The Birds (1962) or 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) the answer to many a riddle is left to the viewer here. The mission is to grab the dangling threads of an ambiguous narrative and somehow tie together strands in hopes of finding meaning or order. This is an activity I cherish as a viewer and as a critic.

This is also, as I've noted, an activity that reflects our human life and explains one reason our existence can be so scary. We don't get answers all the time for why things happen. Often, events that most dramatically affect us happen outside our vision; outside our control. Why do planes crash? Why do some unlucky souls board planes that crash? Why is a person we love afflicted with a brain tumor, or some other disease, when we would prefer it happen to a stranger? In an aggressive, post-modern, technologically-savvy way, that's what The Blair Witch Project is all about: the struggle to assemble a sense of order out of pixelized images that don't make sense in a traditional or conventional way. In the hyper, information-overload era of the Internet and 24 hour news cycles, The Blair Witch Project asked us to fill in the blanks, to imagine the horrors that our eyes didn't actually witness.

Now, a full ten years later, along comes Paranormal Activity, a horror film that utilizes the some m.o. as The Blair Witch Project (found footage and a cinema verite approach to what seems a spontaneous, "real" story). Unfortunately, however, Paranormal Activity goes to absurd lengths to satisfy the still-vocal anti-Blair Witch Project crowd by positioning every demonic "event," -- every horrifying moment in the film -- literally front and center. This way, no one can complain the film doesn't deliver the "goods" that were expected, I suppose.

In truth a sort of anti-Blair Witch Project Project, there is precisely nothing left to our imaginations (or speculation) in Paranormal Activity, a fact which -- for me (and for my wife, who watched alongside me) -- rendered the film intriguing but ultimately powerless to scare us. The film did not rattle either of us in the slightest. I slept soundly last night after viewing the film, my psyche entirely untroubled by what it had witnessed. By contrast, I have watched The Blair Witch Project probably a dozen times over the years and every time I do so, it haunts me. It perplexes me. If The Blair Witch Project comparison doesn't work for you, I also felt the same way after seeing the brilliant [REC] (2007). Hell, I was was even suitably rattled by Cloverfield (2008).

All those films looked like real life unfurling before your eyes, in all its messiness and half-glimpsed madness. But again, not so Paranormal Activity (2009), which spoon-feeds you a traditional, predictable narrative, and satisfies the urgent audience need for "closure" with a sad aesthetic capitulation: A CGI close-up of a demonic visage.

I want it clearly understood: I am not part of some Paranormal Activity backlash. I have no horse in that particular race. I'm simply responding to a film I just watched.

I suspect that a central problem here is that Paranormal Activity is very stagnant in visualization, an admittedly interesting opposite conceit to the shaky-cam aesthetic of Blair Witch, REC and Cloverfield.)

In other words, much of the film is static: photographed from a stationary camera planted firmly on a tripod. Therefore, much of the demonic activity in the film occurs right in front of that unmoving camera, even symmetrically-framed at points. Accordingly, the film's weakest moment finds a Ouija board planchette come to demonic life -- in the center of a frame.

But it doesn't just move imperceptibly. It hops, dances, turns around, and then even catches fire, going up in flames before the camera's unblinking eye. Because of the staging, the moment plays more like an amateur magic trick than an authentically scary moment. If the staging had been different, if we had been forced to seek a less egregious bit of paranormal activity in the corners or background of the frame, the moment would have proved frightening. What's missing is ambiguity...and subtlety.

Later, an invisible demon actually pulls one of the lead characters, Katie Featherston, out of her bed, and, in the same vein, we see it all happen without impediment: perfectly framed, perfectly lit and perfectly clear. Moments later, her boyfriend Micah goes after her, and the demonic entity obligingly tosses his body right into the camera. The camera falls over and still captures the action perfectly, as the demon -- now visible in a human body -- gets ready, literally, for her close-up.

I don't want to be unkind and call this approach Blair Witch For Dummies, but Paranormal Activity is certainly a Blair Witch-style film designed for -- shall we say -- more mainstream audiences. No one will walk out of this film with any questions, uncertainties about what happened or any disappointment that the monster wasn't revealed.

And that's to Paranormal Activity's deficit. The film also shoots itself in the foot by almost immediately attributing the pervasive demonic activity to a "connection" between the unseen monster and Katie. She tells us how a supernatural entity has followed her from house to house since she was eight. Then a paranormal expert interviews Katie and explicitly tells her that it is "basically connected" to her.

Some critical quality of the horror genre is our capacity to "universalize" the horror on screen and identify with it on personal terms. Jaws is so damn frightening because we all swim in the ocean...and can imagine ourselves in the position of a shark attack victim. Ditto Psycho...we all understand the vulnerability of a shower. On and on it goes. We must, eventually, sleep, so Invasion of the Body Snatchers gets under our skin too. Even The Blair Witch Project -- a movie about getting lost in the woods -- harks back to something primal and powerful in our human nature; a fear of what's out there in nature; a fear of being lost.

Almost from frame one, Paranormal Activity goes to great lengths to stress that this horror is happening to Katie and only Katie. We could all show up for afternoon tea or a nightly sleep-over and be treated to quite the show...safe and sound (since the demon doesn't want us.) This plot-point reduces Paranormal Activity to something akin to a freak show.

There's also a huge gap in verisimilitude inherent in the film's aesthetic choices. I'll put it this way: For the last quarter century, hand-held video cameras have been everywhere. They've been affordable...and ubiquitous. And not once -- NOT ONCE -- in a million-upon-a million-instances, has a video camera recorded anything as overtly supernatural as the most simple "paranormal" incident featured in this film (for argument's sake, let's say the bedroom door swinging open of its own volition.)

Yet here, Micah's always-filming camera records doors opening and closing, demonic footsteps appearing in powder on the floor, a shadowy mass moving across the bedroom wall, a Ouija board planchette spontaneously moving and then burning for several seconds. And, finally, the whopper: a human being tugged out of bed, down the hall, by an invisible force. Oh, and the smiley demon face in close-up.

I should stress, these events do not happen at all once. They happen over a period of something like twenty-one nights according to the film's time-line. After the spontaneous explosion of the Ouija board planchette, wouldn't any reasonable person start uploading this footage to YouTube? Or contact the local news? Nothing even approximating this scale of supernatural intervention has EVER been captured anywhere, and yet Micah and Katie remain sequestered and alone in their house, increasingly vulnerable to attacks.

I hasten to add, this decision doesn't seem to ring true with Micah's character: he's in this "game" for the fun and the excitement. "Do you know any tricks to make it happen?" he asks Katie early in the film, considering the whole thing a lark. Later, he insults the demon ("you're worthless!..."I'm calling you out!") after explicitly being warned not to do so. The underlying and implicit idea here is that Micah -- ever the confident day trader -- wants to capture on film that which has not been filmed before and make a name for himself in the process. He's the Balloon Boy Dad, only with demons instead of dirigibles.

So why -- when such incontrovertible proof exists on camera -- would Micah not immediately produce it for the world? What good is all the fancy, expensive AV equipment if he's never going to actually show his footage to anybody? What's he waiting for? An Actors' Studio-style one-on-one interview with a Demon?

I often write here about how form and content should intertwine; how images and visual style should interact meaningfully with a narrative. This is the fatal disconnect of Paranormal Activity: it is mounted as a "realistic," experiential film like Blair Witch in visualization (the static camera and cinema verite-style), but the characters make unrealistic choices. Furthermore, especially during the demonic attack sequences, the camera work proves absolutely untrue to life as we experience it: providing us crystal-clear proof of that which has never, ever been proven conclusively with our technology: the existence of demons. Listen, I've been fisked up-and-down about this topic before from another blogger: I'm not saying that movies that reveal demons, vampires or monsters are bad; I'm saying only that Paranormal Activity suffers from two opposite impulses: it wants to be an experiential, cinema-verite film (like REC or Cloverfield) and yet it also tries to give us the clarity of vision in terms of the supernatural that we are afforded in a more traditional horror film, like The Exorcist, for instance.

Despite these concerns, I don't want to give the impression that Paranormal Activity is a terrible or awful film. I was intrigued throughout, and enjoyed elements of it. But ultimately, it simply didn't scare me.

In fact, the parts of the film I appreciated the most occurred outside the demonic attacks and horror elements. I was fascinated, for instance, by the constant push-pull-tug between Micah and Katie as they each sought to be the dominant partner in their relationship. Micah pushed and pushed, beyond reason, to get his way (again, he's a confident day trader...) and Katie -- who spent her whole life being terrorized by the unseen (a demonic man?) -- permits her boyfriend to terrorize her again with his perpetual disregard for her safety and her wishes. More than anything, Paranormal Activity is about the game of control in a romantic relationship. It's about a woman who has lived her life has a victim and the boyfriend who knows that; and who uses that quality against her to push the agenda that what he wants.

The performers playing these leading roles don't hit a single false note. They are uniformly good and utterly believable. I just wish that the screenplay had trusted them a little more, and not felt the need to rely on perfectly-captured supernatural parlor tricks during the horror moments.

The real crux of Paranormal Activity is revealed early. The ghost hunter asks Micah and Katie if there is any negativity in their relationship. They falsely answer no, and the ghost hunter is relieved. The demon feeds off negativity, he warns. The remainder of the film is actually about this conversation and about this lie: about how totally dysfunctional the Micah/Katie relationship really is. Micah constantly bull-dozes over Katie's wishes and betrays her trust again and again. He lies about the camera being off; he lies about acquiring a Ouija board, and on and on. These "little" lies add up to the very negativity that allows the demon into their house. At the same time, Katie is so passive that she permits Micah to run roughshod over her. He possesses control over her life. And so, accordingly, when her body stands to be possessed, literally, by a demon, it hardly looks like an effort. Once you lose control of your life, control of your spirit isn't far behind.

That is a great, human story. Yet Paranormal Activity is finally so unsubtle, so without nuance in its approach to the horror elements, that the character story is all-but sacrificed. A line is crossed. In this film, our eyes should be scanning every frame, every background and foreground, for signs of Katie's demon. The filmmakers should be making us hunt out evidence of the demon. We should be working hard; engaged.

Instead, the film doesn't trust us to pay attention. The paranormal activity is so obvious, so unreal, so-in-your-face, that the movie sacrifices the cinema-verite approach it covets. I'm delighted the film will spawn many new low-budget genre efforts. I'm thrilled it has launched the career of director Oren Peli, and that we can expect more from him in the future. But I still wish Paranormal Activity had been more....skillful.

Because Paranormal Activity comes across as a Cliff-Notes variation on The Blair Witch Project formula, one designed for those among us who prefer our ghosts served up front-and-center, our answers lined up neatly in-frame, and ambiguity forever banished to the nether-realms. I guess it comes down to this: do you want your horror movies to engage and deal with the questions we face in real life; or do you simply want them to serve as an "escape?" Ultimately, I judge The Blair Witch Project far superior to Paranormal Activity because it engages the questions of real life. Paranormal Activity passes the time well-enough, and has a nice jolt or two, but there's nothing about the demon (and the depiction of the demon) that I ever recognized as "real."

Now Micah? He's another story. I have a friend who's dating a guy just like that. And that's why Paranormal Activity works as well as it does. The characterizations and relationships are indeed very human. It's just the staging of the horror -- of the inhuman -- that totally undercuts the film's suspension of disbelief.

The Future is Fantastic

Some good news here for long-time admirers of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson's mid-1970s space epic, Space:1999!

Powys Media is releasing a number of new, original Space:1999 novels, anthologies and even an audio-book throughout 2010.

Back in 2003, I authored the original novel, Space:1999: The Forsaken (now sold-out and out of print, alas...), but more recently, I also penned a short story called "The Touch of Venus" for the upcoming Shepherd Moon.

The short story anthology also features works by authors E.C. Tubb, Brian Ball, William Latham, Michael A. Faries, Stephen Jansen, and Emma Thomas.

Check out Powys Media's web site to see the other series titles being released this year, including the Maya story Born for Adversity by David A. McIntee -- with a foreword by actress Catherine Schell -- and the Resurrection audio book narrated by the late, great Barry Morse.

The Year We Make Contact?

Happy 2010 Tomorrow!

Recapping 2009: Year Four of Reflections on Film and TV

We're rapidly approaching the end of 2009 and -- at least by one way of counting -- the end of the first decade of the 21st century (2000 - 2009) too.

Accordingly, I'll be assembling my "best of" lists regarding television and film for 2009, and for the decade too. However, I still have to see Avatar, Moon and Paranormal Activity, so I'm not rushing to judgment here....

But in the meantime I wanted to look back one last time at the year that was, especially here on Reflections on Film and Television. 2009 was the blog's biggest year ever, with a whopping 41,000+ more visitors than in 2008. The last quarter of 2009 was, in fact, the biggest quarter ever on the blog. The year saw approximately 316 posts here, and covered a variety of film and TV-related topics.

Early in the year I looked back at some genre "classics" from my mis-spent youth, including Jaws (1975), Logan's Run (1976), Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979), The Black Hole (1979), John Carpenter's The Thing (1982), Tron (1982), Alien Nation (1988), and Enemy Mine (1985).

This year also saw my retrospective of John Carpenter's later career span, including the director's more controversial films: Prince of Darkness (1987), Village of the Damned (1995) and Ghosts of Mars (2001).

A good portion of 2009 was also taken up with my detailed study of the career of another favorite director, the amazing Brian De Palma. I reviewed many of his films including Sisters (1973), Carrie (1976), Dressed to Kill (1980), Blow Out (1981), Scarface (1983), Body Double (1984), The Untouchables (1987), Raising Cain (1992), Mission: Impossible (1996), Snake Eyes (1998), Mission to Mars (2000) and Redacted (2007).

Early in the year, I also undertook a survey of Jules Verne's Captain Nemo in the cinema, beginning with book and film reviews of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and leading into productions such as Mysterious Island, Captain Nemo and the Underwater City and even the 1978 TV mini-series The Return of Captain Nemo.

In the world of TV, I continued my investigation of the intriguing, thematically-valuable (and consistent) universe of Chris Carter and Ten Thirteen Productions, with two essays on Millennium (Enemies Within, and Snakes in the Grass and Snakes in the Open), as well as a retrospective of the late, lamented Harsh Realm (1999-2000) and "Via Negativa," a late-era X-Files installment starring Robert Patrick. The year ended with a personal and professional high point for me: an in-depth interview with Chris Carter himself.

In other TV-related posts, I dissected the first four episodes of the new V, was underwhelmed by The Vampire Diaries, The Prisoner, as well as the pilot for FlashForward. I also remembered nostalgic cult favorites including Mission: Impossible (1967), The All-New Super Friends (1977), Twin Peaks (1991), Dracula: The Series (1990), Werewolf (1987-1988), At The Movies (1982-1986), One Step Beyond (1959-1961), She-Wolf of London (1991), Automan (1983), The Man From Atlantis (1976), Monster Squad (1976), V: The Series (1986), Firefly (2002) and more.

This was also the year of new cinematic favorites including Knowing, Star Trek, District 9 and Drag Me to Hell. Additionally, 2009 was also the final year of production on my independent, dramatic web series, The House Between (to be released on soundtrack CD and DVD in 2010...). My no-budget but big-hearted show (in the third and final season) was nominated for "Best Web Production" at Airlock Alpha (formerly Sy Fy Portal).

Finally, some of my personal favorite posts this year involved in-depth, lengthy essays. I particularly enjoyed writing The Tao of Michael Myers regarding Halloween (1978), Of Men, Morality and Microwaves (concerning The Virgin Spring and the different versions of Last House on the Left), and Don't Tell Them What You Saw, which concerned the two film versions of Diabolique.

Ahead in 2010, I have two new film books in the pipeline, as well as some other exciting appearances and events coming up. More announcements on all that will follow soon. Here on the blog, I intend to launch another directorial retrospective, and will continue looking back to over 50 years of genre TV programming.

I hope that you'll stick around, and also that 2010 will be as exciting, as fun (and busy...) as 2009 turned out to be in these parts. As always, thank you for reading, thank you for commenting, and thanks for coming back to see what's new. To quote Dirk Diggler, "I'm gonna keep trying if you keep trying..."

Happy New Year!
JKM

CULT MOVIE REVIEW: District 9 (2009)

In 1915, Franz Kafka's now-famous novella, The Metamorphosis was first published. The narrative revolved around a character named Gregor Samsa -- an average man of little power or influence -- who felt beholden financially to his employer, a sales company called "The Firm."

Well, powerless Everyman, Gregor Samsa awoke one morning to discover that he had inexplicably transformed into an "insekt." A very large insect...but with human emotions.

Over time, Gregor began to witness his humanity (his language; his appetites; his understanding...) slip away as the insect within took over. Like famous Brundlefly, Kafka's hapless, helpless hero was an insect who dreamed he was a man.

In Kafka's literary work, Gregor Samsa was dismissed and betrayed by his family and completed his transformation to bug (or "vermin") isolated...alone in his room; a dark secret. Finally, his family did away with Gregor all together so it could move on and flourish financially. Economic welfare was prized over loyalty to family. Over human decency itself.

In short, The Metamorphosis was a parable about the human condition as Kafka viewed that condition in the early 20th century; and -- in particular -- one man's place in his nation's economy and power hierarchy.

From stories such as The Metamorphosis (and also from the novel, The Trial), scholars, literary critics and historians have derived the eponym "Kafka-esque."

Today, we all have a pretty good understanding of what that term implies (especially if you've ever stood in line at the DMV...). To be legitimately "Kafka-esque," a work of art must concern the impossibility of individual liberty or freedom inside a bloated State of enormous reach, power and influence. Kafka-esque stories are often surreal and feature bitter ironies (not to mention circular logic, especially on the part of the State's "representatives.") Finally we equate with the term Kafka-esque an impenetrable and inhuman maze of bureaucracy, one from which there is no escape or respite for the individual.

Simply stated, I have never witnessed a more imaginative, more stirring, or more dramatic Kafka-esque vision (and quasi-re-telling of Metamorphosis) than Neil Blomkamp's genre film and parable for our 21st century days, District 9 (2009).

The film concerns the arrival of a massive alien spaceship in Johannesburg, South Africa, and the manner in which the extra terrestrial passengers on that ship -- giant insects called "Prawns" --are quickly marginalized and segregated from the human population in a slum, dubbed District 9.

That district, that ghetto, is to be torn down by global corporation MNU (think Blackwater or Haliburton...) and be replaced by Sanctuary City, a new ghetto that one MNU official readily admits is the equivalent of "a concentration camp."

District 9's central character, a human named Wikus van de Merwe (Sharlto Copley), is a true descendent of Kafka's Gregor Samsa. He is a simple, ultimately powerless man who works for the impersonal -- nay imperial -- corporation, MNU. Van der Merwe has been promoted beyond his competency level (because of cronyism/nepotism) and, on one outing to District 9 to obtain waivers for the Prawn relocation, is exposed to a strange alien "fluid" that begins to transform Wikus --just like his Kafkaesque predecessor -- into a giant insect.

The State, here represented by MNU, comes to consider van de Merwe "The most valuable business artifact on Earth" because his new alien DNA allows him to operate powerful Prawn weaponry. MNU -- commanded by van der Merwe's father-in-law -- wants to take ownership of Wikus and surgically exploit him for his Prawn/human DNA. MNU even concocts the false charge that van der Mewe is a dangerous (and infectious...) sexual deviant...and sells that lie to the gullible mass media to assure that none of van der Merwe's fellow men in Johannesburg will come to the fugitive's rescue.

So, a once "average" man has become prized possession of the State and a scapegoat of the State simultaneously, and what he wants and desires for himself no longer matters. Instead, Wikus finds himself an outcast, one separated from his wife and cut adrift from his fellow humans in the slum of District 9. In the film's haunting final shot, we see the Kafka-esque "metamorphosis" completed, and Wikus is now an overgrown insect fashioning metal flowers out of trash...a haunting reminder of his love for his wife and of his lost humanity.

When I first heard about District 9 last summer, the film's premise sounded to me uncomfortably similar to a movie I reviewed on this blog recently, Alien Nation (1988). In both films, a large extraterrestrial population emigrates to Earth aboard a vast mother ship, is treated with ugly racial prejudice (and given a slang name, whether it be "Slag" or "Prawn.") And in both stories, the aliens are assimilated into indigenous cultures with "human" names, whether it be "Sam Francisco" or "Christopher Johnson." Lastly, both films involve a substance with the capability to mutate DNA: the dangerous drug of the Newcomers in Alien Nation and the Prawn fluid in District 9.

Yet about half-way through my viewing of District 9, I understood that Blomkamp's film actually has far more in common with another celebrated sci-fi movie of the 1980s: RoboCop (1987). You may recall that RoboCop was actually a blistering satire of the Reagan Era, not merely an action film. The Verhoeven film depicted a future United States in which Big Business called all the shots; in which the mass media was insipid to the point of lunacy, and in which every public institution -- even police departments -- had been "privatized" to be run as a business (for profit). RoboCop was a nightmare vision of Reagan's laissez-faire dogma run amuck, extrapolated into the near-future. Why, RoboCop even featured gas-guzzling, over-sized vehicles the likes of which we've all seen! They weren't called SUVs though; they were SUXs. But the point, oddly enough, was that a machine -- RoboCop himself -- was more human than the corporations and avaricious, backstabbing executives of his world.

What I mean to suggest here is that the makers of RoboCop in 1987 gazed at the world around them and made -- admittedly from a standard action formula -- a parable that critiqued the American culture on virtually every front imaginable. Far from being a slavish copy of Alien Nation, District 9 undertakes the same difficult task, only for us, here...now. For the first decade of the twenty-first century, just ending. Careful writers and critics have noted the many similarities between the film's District 9 slum and Capetown during the Apartheid era, but the film's critique goes much deeper, even, than that specific historical context. The critique is...global.

For instance, District 9 aggressively takes on corporate cronyism. As I noted above, Wikus is not really competent to be dealing with alien life forms; but rather was hired because of family ties, and does a "heck of a job," just like poor old Brownie did after Katrina in 2005.

Racism is also a major issue. The Prawns are essentially termed lazy by employees at MNU. We are actually told they possess "no initiative," a common (and racist) refrain against Africans and African-Americans. Accordingly, humans treat the aliens shabbily, allowing them to be exploited by Nigerian profiteers who sell food (cat food...) to them at exorbitant prices. Even Prawn children are deemed less worthy than human children, and there is a disturbing scene in the film during which Wikus and his MNU team thoughtlessly (and with great amusement...) knowingly abort several Prawn hatchlings. Because the Prawns aren't human in appearance (read: non-white;), it is easier to disregard and destroy them.

District 9 also takes on the corporate media and the abundantly false memes it often pushes at the expense of truth. Specifically, the JHB Network terms Wikus a sex criminal, and a firefight in District 9 miraculously becomes "a terrorist bombing!" In real life, we've had reports of death panels, FEMA camps, terrorist fist bumps, the War on Christmas, the trenchcoat mafia, "she said yes!"(Cassie Bernall) and other proven falsehoods propagated on 24-hour news channels without a lot by way of official retraction. Why this week, Mary Matalin went on TV and said that George Bush inherited the 9/11 attacks from Bill Clinton, when in reality the attacks occured after Bush had been Commander-in-Chief for more than eight months. The media's mission in many such instances: to frighten us; to tell us who are "enemies" are so we can fear them. So we can destroy them (and then take their resources with impunity and not feel bad about it...)

We also get commentary in District 9 about the questionable policy of governments outsourcing military jobs to corporations and private security firms (again, think about unaccountable Blackwater and the company's history of abuse in the occupation of Iraq). Many Americans believe Blackwater was forced out of Iraq following a massacre of 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad's Nisour Square in 2007. Guess what? Blackwater just changed names to Xe Services and is still operating there. In District 9, MNU is the iron-hand forcing segregation, relocation, genocide...and secret weapons research.

And of course, there is commentary on absurd bureaucracy in Blomkamp'sfilm as well: Wikus must acquire Prawn signatures before evicting the aliens from District 9, a ridiculous notion given that the Prawns are incredibly strong, nine-foot-tall insectoids. Basically, he's asking creatures from another planet permission to put them in concentration camps. It is patently absurd. And, in the tradition of Kafka, utterly surreal.

A blazing, incendiary film, District 9 takes a long hard look at the world we've built in the new millennium and concludes that it is, finally, in the truest sense...Kafkaesque. Wikus -- who was no more than an insect to MNU to begin with -- literally transforms into an insect. Our species, the film seems to acknowledge, has truly jumped the shark.

Accordingly, District 9 implicitly asks the question: how can we expect humans to be decent to aliens when humans are so rotten to each other? When they keep their neighbor's children starving? When they send businesses to foreign lands to exploit resources? When the truth is lost and partisanship and "spin" replaces it? When the bottom line is more important than morality? Make no mistake, District 9 concerns segregation and the circumstances in South Africa in the 1980s, but the film is also about much more than that: it is a universal critique of humanity on the precipice; of global humanity as it exists today.

By pointed contrast -- as we see -- the Prawns at least seem to believe in traditional "human" virtues such as family...and loyalty. Even patience, actually. Christopher Johnson loves his young son and has toiled for twenty years to escape the slum in District 9 by repairing a buried spaceship. When he learns that his people are being subjected to Nazi-like medical experiments by MNU, Christopher's first thought is to bring help; of saving his people. Wikus's first thought when transformed into an insect is for himself: for getting cured so he can resume his life. And when Wikus seems to finally develop loyalty for Christopher Johnson and his son, we must ask an important question: is it because his humanity has vanished? Is it because he has become more "Prawn" now -- and thus more noble -- than man?

In terms of visuals, District 9 is a highly dynamic film. The aliens aren't what I could "realistic," per se (kind of hoary in concept, actually...), but how they appear in the frame, in the compositions themselves, is incredibly realistic. The camera doesn't make a big deal of the Prawns; doesn't focus on them, or even center them.

Instead, the aliens appear in the background of shots; in a soup line behind the main character, for instance; almost as part of the landscape itself. The effect is stunning; our eyes take the creatures for completely "real." I haven't seen Avatar yet, but I can state with confidence that the visual integration of the Prawns into the real life (live action...) settings of District 9 is jaw-dropping.

I also enjoyed the fact that director Blomkamp encodes his critique of modern, globalized humanity in many of the visuals he crafts. For instance, during a military raid by MNU, Blomkamp cuts to a "gun cam," a first-person-shooter-style perspective that closely resembles contemporary video games like Call to Duty: Modern Warfare 2. That's what this raid really is to the hired guns of MNU: a game in which they get to kill Prawns. One character (the villain of the piece) even rants about how he loves to kill Prawns, and the video-game-style action sequences reflect this lack of humanity on the part of the soldiers.

The mockumentary approach utilized often by District 9 -- consisting of "B-roll" footage of interviewees, fake archive footage of the mothership's arrival 20 years earlier, and "live" newsfeeds -- also contributes to the film's critique of modern man. We know what is happening to Wikus; even as interviewees make blatantly false statements, or news feeds pop-up with BREAKING NEWS ALERTS of the most dramatic (and incorrect) variety.

In some corners, District 9 has been criticized because of the film's final act. Basically, the climax involves a sustained (and dramatic) shoot-out between Wikus (in an armed, Prawn robot suit...) and the forces of MNU. The problem, according to some reviewers, is that all of the interesting satire and social commentary goes away, and the film degenerates into mere "action."

Personally, I didn't feel this was the case, and I can point precisely to the reason why: emotional investment. By the time of the final, lengthy gun battle in District 9, I felt heavily invested in the survival of Christopher Johnson and his son. The gunfight was about their survival; about their escape, and -- at least for me -- there was real suspense in that equation. Up to that point, District 9 had been so hardcore, so viciously true to its critiques of human nature, that I expected something terrible to happen. And in the vicious gunfight -- where Prawns are just inhuman targets to be blown apart -- tragedy was certainly a possibility. And the final shots of the film: involving Wikus and the metal/trash flower sculpture, are positively lyrical (and on point, thematically).

Way back in 1915, Franz Kafka worried about how the individual could possibly survive -- let alone flourish -- within an aggressive, overreaching establishment. He feared governments, judiciaries, and yes, corporations. District 9 is a clever realization and updating of Kafka's vision; one created with the very symbols Kafka himself deployed (particularly the metamorphosis of man into insect...). The result is a film that stands shoulder-to-shoulder with genre landrmarks such as Planet of the Apes (1968) and RoboCop (1987). All these films (popular entertainments, miraculously...) hold up a mirror to the audience. All of them ask us to look at the world we've made; and what might become of that world if we don't change trajectory. District 9 is pretty hard on the human race (but then, Planet of the Apes didn't exactly let us off the hook, either...) but maybe Blomkamp's film also serves as a wake-up call.

Are you a man? Or just a bug underfoot, ready to be stamped out by agendas much larger than your own?