Some Boys Run Away, But I Wouldn't Advise It: The Devil's Backbone (2001)

Including a Guillermo del Toro film in a month of horror films is almost a giving, considering that despite his movement through a few different genres, he manages to perfectly entrench himself within the horror film tropes, often using them in wildly inventive and engaging ways both in terms of pulling from a classical understanding of Gothic style horror, while also infusing it with his own understanding of the supernatural as it emerges within Mexican culture.  Indeed, at this point one can even begin considering the particularly auteur elements of del Toro since it is possible to pick up visual and narrative themes between something like Cronos and his much larger, yet equally engaging Pacific Rim.  Furthermore, I had all but convinced myself that del Toro's masterpiece was Pan's Labyrinth one of my earliest emerging cinephile experiences, and quite possibly the work that pushed me into an understanding that film could be something much larger than the traditional three act structure and move a viewer towards a more profound understanding of the themes at work.  I was, as such, surprised when The Devil's Backbone, his 2001 offering began to unfold in front of my eyes, because what I was viewing was not only excellent, creepy and indicative of all things praised aside del Toro's name, but it was miles ahead of the stunning and near perfect Pan's Labyrinth.  In this film, which doubles as a consideration of the Spanish American War through a paranormal metaphor and orphanage setting, becomes a clearly sentimental, albeit in a somewhat unsettling way, film that possesses a view of the world that could only exist through the eyes of somebody who understands the innocence and, at times, ignorance of youth.  Yet, del Toro realizes that his films are not at all intended for a young audience, although I am sure he revels in the thought of them encountering their oneiric, surreal feel, thus fusing his films with a high degree of psycho-sexual tension, doubled in wild ways through the steam punk world he has come to embrace.  This particular composition never allows for viewers to feel a sense of safety, despite it being a visually sumptuous film, often inserting the presence of spectral figures with no warning or non-diagetic cue, to del Toro, the other side of perception is constantly present and to awake to its intrigue and possible threats would be enough to drive a movie comfortably, the fact that there is also a well-developed and engaging storyline is yet another factor speaking to the proficiency of del Toro as a filmmaker.

The Devil's Backbone focuses on the existence of a minimally ran orphanage for boys during the Spanish Civil War, one that exists purely out of the goodwill of its founders Casares (Federico Luppi) and Carmen (Marisa Paredes).  Growing considerably in age, both Casares and Carmen rely on the help of their groundskeeper Jacinto (Eduardo Noriega), as well as his romantic love interest a teacher at the orphanage named Conchita (Irene Visedo).  The boys at the orphanage seem quite content to go about their lives in a rather desultory manner, despite their limited space, always minding the presence of a ghost they purport to exist.  Indeed, when a new child arrives named Carlos (Fernando Tieve) they make sure to bully and haze him into encountering the presence of the ghost named Santi, although they are unaware that the hyper-prescient Carlos noticed the ghost the moment he arrive at the orphanage, marked by its unique possession of a defused bomb sitting in the center of its courtyard.  Despite an initial confrontation with the orphanage bully Jaime (Inigo Garces) Carlos is able to befriend him through proving his trustworthy nature, while also showing a genuine interest in the whereabouts of Santi and precisely what led to his disappearance, or as Carlos and Jaime assume demise.  Meanwhile, it is revealed that Jacinto and Carmen have been in cohorts, the decidedly younger groundskeeper engaging in sexual acts with the disabled Carmen in exchange for the promise of sharing in the large amount of gold stashed away in the orphanage's safe.  This all happens as the Spanish Civil War slowly begins to encroach upon the space of the orphanage, causing paranoia amongst the children, as well as Carmen and Jacinto who see their wealth becoming threatened by the invasion of greedy soldiers.  Furthermore, during a confessional moment on the aprt of Jaime, Carlos discovers that Jacinto is actually the one responsible for the death of Santi, attacking him when he is caught rifling through the safe by Santi who had been spending the evening catching slugs with Jaime.  This leads to an act of vengeance that is jointly executed by the young boys of the orphanage and Santi's spectral presence, but not before the destruction of the orphanage by a vengeful Jacinto.  Yet, considering that Santi proves to be far from the only ghost in the space of the orphanage, the group is able to overpower Jacinto and leave the orphanage to engage in a quest all their own, clearly grown from the experience.

A lot of things could be stated about del Toro movies, doubly so when he clearly situates them within such an event as the Spanish Civil War.  As such, perhaps the most obvious way to consider this film is to look at the way trauma affects a persons bodied identity, especially intriguing within the context of the film being about paranormal presences.  Carlos and the fellow boys at the orphanage reflect a group of children suffering from abandonment, some by their parents choice, while others were drawn to the space when their parents died in the violence of the war.  Not having a means with which to speak to their anxiety and pains of loss, they work actively to reject any sense of oppressive forces or authoritative figures occurring, whether it be through embodying silence in face of authority figures, or acting out violently against one another, whom they deem equal enough to fight, a survival of the fittest mentality kicking in, not because they are animalistic, but because they only understand individualistic survival they faced after loss and abandonment.  Gender embodies itself far more fascinatingly through a figure like Carmen, who herself has become a victim of amputation, although the narrative is far less specific in how this occurred.  What is made clear through her character is the way in which her lack has caused her to feel considerably less worthy as a woman, doubled by her age in relation to Conchita, with whom Jacinto is romantically involved.  Realizing that her power is fading, Carmen asserts power through the incorporation of money and its power, accepting her advancement and bodily privilege must be bought, nevermind that she hides the gold in her already heavy prosthetic leg, the castration element to this metaphor becoming wildly clear.  Ultimately though, the most interesting character is the spectral figure of Santi, whose association with the deformity known as "devil's backbone" causes his already paranormal spatial existence to become a thing of impossibility.  By causing him to be a figure floating through the world, doubled by his blood constantly flowing and rising upward with an airy quality, del Toro infuses Santi, the same sort of wandering nature of the other boys in the orphanage, although where they seek survival and hesitation to bond with others, Santi only wants two things, to rekindle with his friends despite being bodily detached form doings so, while also exacting revenge on the threatening patriarchal figure of Jacinto.  The fact that del Toro adds on scenes of killing and execution happening in the war only make the narrative idea of body, identity and to a degree sacrifice that much more fascinating.

Key Scene:  Carlos' first lengthy encounter with Santi is something fresh and eerie in terms of paranormal horror cinema and del Toro executes it with perfection.

But the Criterion bluray for this film. It is absolutely mesmerizing.

My Revenge Will Seek You Out: Black Sunday (1960)

Also known as The Mask of Satan, Black Sunday is essentially how the world became aware of Mario Bava, horror provocateur and cult cinema mad man.  Now I am fully aware that he made movies well before this work, as well as even more output following, but with its recent bluray release and the access it has to horror fans via Netflix Watch Instantly, it has gain a new level of adoration.  Admittedly, I was far from completely enamored with this film, but it does have me curious about undertaking more work by the Italian director, primarily as a means to see how much German Expressionism might seep into this other work.  Also, I am deeply intrigued by some of the special effects that unfold during this film, proving equally baffling to Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity which I also saw yesterday, although the spectacle is certainly favored in the latter, the execution is no less dynamite.  I guess my hesitation in fully embracing a work like Black Sunday resides in having a considerable trouble getting behind works of gothic vampire horror, because in my mind their dreary setting, ambient soundtracks and general appeal is often squandered in some half realized narrative of sex and lust, which is overemphasized and always undermines anything worth a damn in the film.  While Black Sunday certainly has moments where this threatens to be the demise of the film, for the most part, the narrative manages to side step any egregious errors and remain watchable and poignant.  I am also completely aware of the film having a now fifty year history behind it, making its pristine look that much more captivating considering the life and rediscovery of horror films to be a less than prevalent act since it is a genre that seems content to begin its history within the late seventies.  While Black Sunday will never be on the level of something like Carnival of Souls it does manages to contain several moments of pure cerebral and surreal intensity, and at this point the dubbing in such a film is more endearing than grating, say nothing of the absolutely ethereal performance delivered by Barbara Steele who may or may not have had the aid of a prosthetic mask.

Black Sunday begins with a historical event focusing on a series of executions in a non-descript Moldovan town, where villagers and clergy men use various tools and religious iconography to destroy a series of demons in their village, one an older man and the other a younger woman, suggesting their ties to satan.  Using masks that are lined with spikes, the villagers slay the creatures dubbed vampires and bury them within coffins in an underground labyrinth.  The narrative then flashes forward two hundred years to focus on Dr. Thomas Kruvajan (Andrea Checchi) and Dr. Andre Gorobec (John Richardson) who are traveling through Moldova in hopes of making up time in route to a medical conference.  A minor vehicle accidents leads to their having to hole up in a local castle, where they immediately discover the tomb of Asa (Barabara Steele) the woman murdered for being a vampire some two centuries earlier.  This bizarre discovery is only made doubly so when they return to their carriage to find Katia (Barbara Steele) who takes on an uncanny resemblance to Asa.  An accident earlier, involving Kruvajan, results in his blood reawakening the vampire of Asa, who begins wreaking havoc on the two doctors as well as Katia, eventually even bringing back to life Javuto (Arturo Dominici) her partner and half of a Hall and Oates vampire cover band.  Between the two of them, they attempt to offer the doctors a chance at eternal life in exchange for their blood, while the fascination implemented by both Asa and Javuto is strong the two doctors are able to deny the advances, instead turning to Katia for suggestions on how to slay the assumedly immortal beasts.  After a series of scenes with Asa attempting to pass as Katia, only to fail to turn her when she finds a crucifix around Katia's neck, the return of Gorobec affords him the ability to slay the real vampire in Asa, turning her in the moment to an shriveled up corpse, while Kruvajan knocks Javuto into a fire, burning his body permanently. Katia now free from the spell of the vampires, awakens as young and jovial as ever.

I have not seen nearly enough gothic horror films and only marginally more vampire flicks, so I would be hard pressed to claim myself an authority on either.  Furthermore, I am hesitant to appropriate things such as tropes to such a specific genre of films.  Nonetheless,  I have the space and certainly cannot help but consider the particular way in which the "intellectual" figure emerges within the space of these films.  Of course, since they are classic works in gothic horror the figure of the intellectual is always male, driven by his unbridled desire for truth and scientific fact, he often finds himself in curious situations only to become involved out of a quest to explain that which is inexplicable.  In many of these films, particularly the Dracula films "proper," this intellectual is represented through the figure of Van Helsing, but even in these instances there is an acceptance of the paranormal as a fact in the world, one that is confronted with goodness to overcome the evil.  In Black Sunday one can certainly pull many elements of the traditional good versus evil narrative, but it is clear, particularly in their dual presence, that the intellectual is intended to be seen as the ultimate savior in a world of violence one exacted by and upon all involved, whether it be the blood thirsty vampires or the villagers who kill these creatures without even the slightest attempt to understand their actions.  Indeed, that is not to say that the intellectual within the space of a gothic horror film is void of character flaws.  The major cause for concern with such figures, despite their deep understanding of science, human nature or archaic folklore still seems to revolve around some degree of sexual repression, whether by choice or social situation.  The relationship between Gorobec becomes particularly fascinating as one watches him fall for Katia, and assumedly Asa in the process, it is precisely this infatuation that nearly leads to his point of intellectual privilege becoming undermined and leading to his own turning into a vampire, void of any sense of rational thought when, in such a scenario, his need to devour would overcome his desire to learn and understand.  Interestingly, this film also reconsiders the intellectual to a degree by affording Katia a considerable opinion in how to slay the creatures, one that proves both well-reasoned and useful.

Key Scene:  The simultaneous aging and return to youth of Asa and Katia is cinematic magic even by contemporary standards.

This is on Netflix, take a chance to watch it as it is an undisputed classic and certainly a higher end work in vampire film.

Vagina Dentata! It's What's Inside Me: Teeth (2007)

It is perhaps fitting that I close out this month of women oriented film with the 2007 pseudo-horror thriller Teeth, first, because it plays nicely into the triple threat of metaphor that has been this and the last two films I reviewed.  Second, it is a great bookend with I Spit on Your Grave, which began this month of film, because they both deal with sexual oppression, particularly acts of sexual violence, and the subsequent revenge one woman undertakes to correct such issues.  Both very much consider what constitutes revenge, and do so with a decidedly gritty attitude and complete dismissal of any value in their respective culture.  In I Spit on Your Grave, the film seems to condemn a lack of education and rural seclusion as the means to women being degraded and defiled, setting up a certain vision of the world in which rape and violence occurs.  While Teeth is certainly a little more broad in its constructs, its semi-rural setting, doubled with two oppressively present nuclear chimneys, is no more specified.  Both films, do draw upon the very visceral and terrifying experiences of rape, yet, both also manage to make it central to one figure.  Where Teeth proves slightly more revolutionary than its precursor, is in its attempts to negate a certain sort of moral looseness with the type of woman who would be "subject" to rape.  The main character in Teeth is decidedly conservative and certainly does not seek out sexual encounters, furthermore, her acts of vengeance, in many instances are not entirely a result of her own fruition, instead; something her body naturally rejects, because unwarranted sexual aggression is always wrong...always.  It would be one thing if the film simply used the plot of a woman with vagina dentata as a means to make an exploitative film, however, Teeth rarely uses the main woman and her nudity as a visual element, as opposed to its rampant use in I Spit On Your Grave.  Instead, director Mitchell Litchtenstein clearly takes the narrative and discussion he posits seriously.  The film jams issues of conservative ideals of sexual censorship, a rape-positive culture and the problematic medicalization of the woman's body into a fast-paced film which is surprisingly dense with commentary.  One could read the closing moments of the film as nihilistic, but it, in my opinion, says much more about a challenge to continuations of sexual violence and instead embraces an outright destruction of their possible occurrences.

Teeth focuses on a girl named Dawn (Jess Weixler) who is coping with the trouble of growing up with her sick mother, stepdad and lecherous stepbrother Brad (John Hensley).  Dawn is a simple young woman who finds solace and understanding by serving as an abstinence coach at her local high school, promoting purity and the wearing of a promise ring, in order, to save herself for the beauty of her marriage night.  While Dawn clearly has an affect on the people she speaks with, it would appear as though her family and those in her town are far less inclined to embrace such ideals, whether it be Brad, who continually spends his days getting high and having sex with his live-in girlfriend, whereas when Dawn is at school she is ridiculed for being chaste and choosing to abstain from sex.  However, Dawn finds support in a fellow abstinence supporter named Tobey (Hale Appleman) whom she begins to grow fond feelings for, even at one point intensely sexual ones.  When the two take a trip to the local creek for a swim, it is revealed that Tobey is a born-again virgin, and when the two swim into a secluded cave, Tobey attempts to engage in intercourse with Dawn, despite her repeated yelling of the word no.  It is during the rape, that Dawn's vagina appears to bite off Tobey penis, much to both of their surprises, which leads to Tobey bleeding to death, while Dawn hermits herself in her house, feeling gross and unsure about her body.  Research leads her to discover that she possesses an anomaly known as vagina dentata, which essentially means that she has teeth inside of her vagina, a myth arising from various pre-modern civilizations.  During a trip to the gynecologist, Dawn assumes that everything is fine, until the doctor becomes a bit to abrasive and forceful with his "inspection" leading her vagina to bite off his fingers.  Dawn is now incredibly worried about her safety, and seeks solace with a young man from her school who had shown interest in her, eventually engaging in willing intercourse with him, resulting in no damage to the man, yet when they go for another round of sex and it is discovered that he had a bet going on his ability to land Dawn, her instincts kick in and her vagina dentata kicks in.    All the while it is revealed that Brad through indifference and focusing on sex, allows his stepmother to fall over sick to the point of needing hospitalization.  Knowing that Brad has expressed sexual interest in her, Dawn seduces him and uses her "mutation" to castrate him, a last hoorah against terrible male oppressors before she escapes town via her bicycle.  When it breaks down, she hitches a ride with an old man, leading to the closing moments where the man makes sexual gestures towards the man.  Instead of feeling threatened, Dawn simply looks out the window and smirks, knowing well that she possesses a means to ward of his advances.

The film is obviously a metaphor, it is rather clear in the title and poster/box art.  However, to simply focus on the vagina dentata element would be to tragically overlook the other layers of symbolism and authority that would make Lacan proud in their execution.  The idea of circles plays very much into the themes of the film, suggesting an image and notion of unbroken perfection.  When Dawn is initially a spokesperson for abstinence she makes continual note of her purity ring, not to mention the image of the circle that covers all the pamphlets, posters and paraphernalia involved in their campaign, but this metaphor certainly extends beyond this moment.  When Dawn's class discusses the genitalia of the respective sexes, the students are confused when they are shown a male's penis, only to turn the page and find the vagina covered by a censorship sticker, that is, of course, a circle.  The teacher claims that the school board voted to censor such imagery.  The circle as pure, ironically, covers up the anatomical object which is responsible for birth.  The circle continues to be relevant when Dawn makes an effort to remove the sticker to discover the image of the vagina and its anatomical correctness, which viewers are to assume does not reflect the mutated version she possesses.  Finally, the circle emerges brilliantly in the form of a solar flare, when Dawn attempts to give an abstinence talk after her being raped, in this instance the burden of purity shines upon her almost as if to draw attention to her lying.  Of course, other imagery emerges within the text, the obvious one being phallic symbols of oppression, again in a very literal sense in the anatomy discussion Dawn's class engages in, however, it also emerges in regards to the nuclear power plant chimneys that rise into the air directly over Dawn's residence, penetrating the sky and the sensibilities of everyone in contact, in the case of Dawn they affect her in a very biological sense.  This all leads to the clear castration metaphor, one, entrenched in a rhetoric of evolution.  Dawn's body is not an abnormality, per se, but as her teacher suggest when referring to rattle snakes a means to evolve to survive.  In this metaphor it is clear, that the film is reminding viewers that sexual violence occurs far too frequently and it is only a matter of time before women's anatomy learns to adapt to stop its occurring.

Key Scene:  Dawn's unveiling of the female anatomy is well-shot and seems to drive home the commentary on women's oppressed sexuality, which is the overarching commentary of the film as a whole.

This film is intense, clever and reflective of the possibilities of the horror genre to consider social issues.    It is quite worth checking out and certainly cheap enough to justify owning.

Now That's An Oogie Mess: Misery (1990)

I am really having a lot of fun exploring where the category of "women in film" has taken me and I am only six days into this marathon, hopefully, this time around I can have a sort of reflection on the last day, something I had hoped to do with the Halloween month, but failed to do when caught up with some school priorities.  The next stop on my unplanned list brought me to a Stephen King adaptation, something I have blogged about before with the surprisingly watchable The Mist.  However, The Mist was a film I heard about within film critic circles and from various film based podcasts, as opposed to Misery which had a reputation that more than preceded itself, due almost entirely to a scene involving James Caan's ankles and a sledgehammer.  I say it has a reputation for this alone, and it is somewhat of a shame, because Kathy Bates is a revelation in this film, it is one thing to play a crazy woman who entraps an author in her house to write texts, however, to add layers of delusion and religious based madness, is a whole other thing.  I do not believe that I have seen any of the other Oscar nominated performances from that year, and, to be honest, it really does not matter, since it clearly deserved to go to Bates.  I was glad to catch up with this role, because Kathy Bates has come to the point in her career, that she is essentially playing roles predicated upon her being Kathy Bates, her recent cameos on The Office come to mind immediately.  Yet, in 1990 when this film was initially released she was still establishing herself as a well-known and respected actor and was still years away from her empowering role in the overtly problematic, but, nonetheless, cinematic Titanic.  It is one thing to act along side Richard Farnsworth and James Caan, but is even more a feat when you act circles around them in the process.  Of course, considering that it is being reviewed now within the framework of women in film, the problems the narrative creates relating to a rhetoric of hysteria and women's outlets of desire must be acknowledged, not to mention the very self-engratiating manner with which Stephen King demands his readers, in this case viewers, comprehend the woes of writing creatively.

Misery focuses on well-established author Paul Sheldon (James Caan) who has recently finished a text in his prolific Misery series, focusing on a woman and her experience in 19th century America.  Concerned with being pigeon-holed by this particular sort of text, Sheldon decides to write a book focusing on the experiences of his childhood in New York, a far cry from his previous work.  Although his subject has changed, his methodology has not, taking up shelter in a remote lodge in Colorado until he completes his text, enjoying one cigarette and one glass of Don Perignon after.  Unfortunately, he complete his task in the dead of winter and must travel in a heavy snow storm to return home.  On his trip he crashes on a snow bank, presumably left for dead to the elements.  Sheldon, however, is rescued by Annie Wilkes (Kathy Bates) a local nurse, with excellent hospice care, who openly admits to being Sheldon's "number one fan" a statement she validates by quoting passages directly and debating the most minor of details with Sheldon.  It appears as though Annie has the best of intentions, yet when she reads Sheldon's new work she is disgusted by its foul language and lack of dignity in relation to the Misery series, only to be pushed over the edge when she purchases the final installment of the Misery series to discover that the protagonist she has invested much time into has been killed off by Sheldon.  At this point, Sheldon realizes that Annie has been quite deceptive about her contact with the community and their being made aware of his forced inhabitation in her home, even leading to a concern by the local sheriff Buster (Richard Farnsworth).  Annie, however, in her deep web of delusion manages to plan far ahead of any escape Sheldon could hope to make, going so far as to infamously "hobble" him into staying.  Yet, Sheldon realizes that he can dangle the final chapters of his "revised" Misery book, in order, to play at Annie's affections, a methodology that allows him to attack her and eventually kill her.  He returns to New York, now crippled, and finds his texts receiving critical praise, although he is completely dismissive of the possibility of recounting his experiences of entrapment, especially since he finds himself still paranoid about seeing Annie even in high-scale dining establishments.

The film is excellent and certainly is a thrill to watch and it is impossible to deny the horrific nature of a delusional woman entrapping an author as a result of a devilish cocktail of delusion and fandom.  However, it cannot be overlooked that the film problematizes the image of the single woman living alone, something which is often depicted problematically in an urban setting, and only worsened by the secluded rural setting.  While one could certainly glean moments of sympathy from this film which are directed towards Annie, it is clear that she is a villain and somewhat less clear, but, nonetheless, suggested that it is a result of her feminine instability.  Her fandom, within the context of the film, is clearly rooted in her loss of a husband, assumedly to infidelity.  It is not necessarily her adoration of Sheldon, so much as her love of the figure and idea of Misery, an independent and successful, all be it fictional, woman.  The film appears far too concerned with noticing how particularly "feminine" her madness is, constantly tying her break downs and mental issues to the domestic space, even though her large, domineering nature visually contradicts the demure assumptions about domesticity and femininity.  One also cannot help but consider this film as a text about the problem of acknowledging non-physical disability, especially since viewers are provided with Sheldon's character as an example of physical disability, therefore, deserved of outright pity.  To borrow from feminist disability theorist Susan Wendell, Annie also suffers from a disability, but because it is mental and not clearly quantitative, aside from her violent outbursts, society, or in the case of this film viewers, is unwilling to accept it as a serious problem or issue to acknowledge within a social conversation.  Annie is certainly a demented character and is to be reprimanded for trapping a person against his will, yet the film fails to really consider the emotional distresses faced by her years before that may have been overlooked because of their decidedly non-physical elements.

Key Scene: As hyped as it is and well known, there is no denying the cinematic intensity of the "hobbling" scene.

This is a solid film that I own on DVD, however, it is more than acceptable to check out on Neflix, where it is currently Watch Instantly.

Your Dog Is Alive!: Frankenweenie (2012)

As I get closer to compiling the ever important best films of last year list (at least in my head I have blown it to such proportions) I considered creating a tie at number ten for Django Unchained and Moonrise Kingdom, two solid films by well-established directors that were not their greatest work, but managed to prove quite decent...and then I saw Frankenweenie.  Now I am quite aware that Tim Burton is tied to Dark Shadows, for which I have not seen, but have, nonetheless heard to be quite bad.  I say that this changed my opinion of Django Unchained and Moonrise Kingdom only because while those films were good they failed to depict either Tarantino or Anderson taking any serious leaps as directors.  What viewers are provided with in regards to Frankenweenie is a film in which a director has clearly chosen to create something fresh, new and has certainly attempted to expand artistically.  Frankenweenie is, of course, a visual masterpiece, something that is often assumed with the work of Burton and its clear homage to the classic era of monster movies is much welcomed by myself and from what I have been able to glean, pretty much anyone else either old enough or film literate enough to appreciate the references.  However, the visual elements are only a minor factor in the larger magic of Burton's pseudo-remake of a short film from earlier in his career.  It is much more than the story of attempting to reattain a dead animal and becomes a deeply sobering consideration of the larger concept of loss, as well as a fitting comfortably within a world of ill-fitting conformities.  The film demands that viewers consider their own implications within a society of oppression and condemnation for anything even remotely unconventional, while also challenging the notion that to question anything is to inherently desire an undermining of systematic order.  Also, the very adult nature of the images, as well as the themes, makes one consider its category as a Disney film, particularly an animated one at that.  In fact, if it were not for the existence of The Straight Story within their production collection, I would outright call this the biggest surprise in regards to Disney films to date.

Frankenweenie focuses on the aptly named young Victor Frankenstein (Charlie Tahan) whose desire to make homemade sic-fi movies on his low budget camera that star his dog Sparky seems to be more than enough to make his life happy, even though is parents seem somewhat concerned about his rather introverted lifestyle.  Victor lives within the town of New Holland which is overseen by the rather cantankerous and fear-mongering Mr. Burgemeister (Martin Short) whose hopes for New Holland being a land of ideal living are forced upon the community as well as his niece Elsa Van Helsing (Winona Ryder) who attempts to befriend Victor on multiple occasions.  During one of his days at school, Victor becomes fascinated with the possibility of winning his school science fair supervised by the ghastly Mr. Rzykruski, for whom Victor has taken a liking.  Victor's dad, also voiced by Martin Short, encourages his interest in the sciences, but also suggests that the young boy attempt sports as a means of making new friends and rounding himself out.  It is during his first game that Victor finds success hitting a ball out of the park, yet when Sparky chases after the ball gleefully he becomes victim to an car accident, dying on the spot.  Victor, is understandably devastated by the occurrence and takes to living as a hermit yet again, until he learns about the power of electricity to revive the muscles in a dead being.  Creating his own traditional Frankenstein experiment on Sparky, Victor is able to successfully revive his dead dog, although the bizarre nature of such an act forces him to sequester the happy pup into hiding, leading to suspicion from his classmates, parents and Elsa who desperately attempts to gain his attention.  A young boy named Edgar "E" Gore (Atticus Shaffer) learns of Victor's secret and exploits him in order to gain information for his own science project, leading to larger suspicions on the part of the youth in the community, eventually resulting in their own bizarre science experiments that, ultimately, lead to giant turtles, mutated sea monkeys and vampire cats roaming the town of New Holland, much to the frustration of Mr. Burgemeister.  Victor is required to put his scientific brain to the test in reversing all the experiments, eventually leading to an intense final climax at the towns windmill, which is now in flames and he learns a larger lesson on sacrifice from Sparky in the process.

This film is a veritable prose poem on the nature of loss both in terms of innocence and a close intimate connection.  While it does not outright say it and I have not done any researrch to verify it, I would imagine that the concept for this story came from a very personal part of Burton's soul as the means by which he depicts losing a childhood pet is quite accurate.  I never personally lost a dog, but I know the devastation of losing a cat at a very young age, something that is often a child's first experience with death.  The second element of this narrative seems to suggest a passion for refusing to give up on anything you love, even if that thing changes, sure this is evidenced in Victor's desire to bring Sparky back to live, but it also rings true in his quest for scientific truth.  As Mr. Rzykruski reminds him, no truth can occur in science without a person truly loving the experiment with which they are engaged.  The town of course is entirely opposed to this concept as they see it as a cause in one local boy being injured, although the narrative seems quite intent on suggesting it a result of some rather direct bullying.  Victor's parents are certainly loving towards the troubled youth, but even their liberal and progressive mindset proves challenged when they are asked to not only go against an entire anti-science community, but also accept that their son has brought an inanimate object back to life and expects it to be treated like part of the family.  Burton's choice to set the film within a clearly fifties setting, while also making it a contemporary dialogue is likely intended to cause viewers to consider their separation from the fear and blindness of Cold War America, something that the various monster movies referenced within the film reinforce beautifully.  I cannot begin to list the other commentaries existing within this film as they are both broad and specific to scenes, suffice to say this is the single best thing offered by a Disney subsidiary since Up and reminds me that there is a clear division between this and some of the conservative oriented crap they tend to release.

Key Scene:  The introduction of the various science experiement monsters will make any lover of old sci-fi/horror movies gush with enjoyment.

Buy this bluray, I certainly intend to at some point, even if it does have a bit of a hefty price tag.  Until its release date I would suggest renting it from a Redbox.

Where Is Your Male Driven, Fact-Based Logic Now?: Red Eye (2005)

I am enjoying the recent string of thriller/horror films I have been encountering, in so much as quite a few have proven to be rather incredible pieces of social commentary and genuinely enjoyable genre works.  More so, viewing quite a few of the movies have been in an attempt to expand my film consumption to more middle-of-the-road works that I had dismissed upon initial release based on either their trailer or assumedly lackluster premise.  Red Eye was certainly a movie that I scoffed at upon its initial introduction, a vague trailer about plane hijacking and a then unknown to me actor named Cillian Murphy simply did not prove enough to make a, then film illiterate, teen venture to undertake the film.  However, as I have come to appreciate both the theoretical approaches, as well as the means by which films are created, I must admit that I was quite enthralled by Wes Craven's surprisingly non-violent horror film.  To be honest, it is nowhere near a perfect film and certainly suffers from some wishy-washy performances, mostly on the part of Rachel McAdams and clearly has some plot gaps in an effort to make it a quick fix thriller, but the creation of tension within a small amount of space for more than a half of the film.  I have also been quite unfamiliar with how to conceptualize what is becoming an extensive field of post-9/11 cinema discussions, most of which center on disaster and horror films, Cloverfield being perhaps the most notable example.  I mean to say that as a film Red Eye works in the collective memory of viewers who have a particular concern for depictions of terrorist attacks, especially those centered around flying.  Of course this is not the only extent to which something exists within the post-9/11 framework, but I will elaborate on that in a bit.  Regardless of how one discusses Red Eye theoretically or critically, it is nearly impossible to discount how solid of a thriller it proves to be by combining some of the traditional methods of horror/thriller filmmaking along with just enough of an espionage twist to provide for a film that is as fresh now as it was almost a decade earlier.

Red Eye begins with the act of a wallet unassumingly being moved from a dresser drawer, quite ineffectually, before viewers are introduced to Lisa Reisert (Rachel McAdams) a headstrong hotel manager, who knows the ins-and-outs of working in the customer service industry so much so that she is able to guide her seemingly inept employee through dealing with particularly unruly customers while also reeling in the emotions from recently attending her grandmothers funeral.  Meanwhile Lisa is subject to the constant inquiries and concerns of her loving father Joe (Brian Cox) as he knows she is under heavy amounts of stress both from her recent loss, as well as the preparing for a big name political guest.  The addition of plane delays only add to her headache and all seems quite set for a spiral into emotional insanity, until a man named Jack (Cillian Murphy) appears.  Jack's natural charm and seeming ability to predict Lisa's every concern and hesitation causes her to spring at the opportunity to seek solace in his lack of frustration.  While they simply share a bit of chatter over drinks at the airport bar, it is not until Lisa realizes that they will be sitting next to one another on the flight that she feels the connection to be more than a coincidence.  Jack continues his charm well onto their flight, but once they reach an altitude were landing is out of the question, Jack's persona takes a dark turn as he reveals that he has been stalking Lisa in order to blackmail her into moving the high profile guest into another room of her apartment allowing his fellow hired hands to kill him for big name clients.  The narrative then moves into Lisa and Jack's battle for the safety of the guest, as well as Lisa's father who is being carefully watched by another hitman prepared to kill him if she fails to adhere to Jack's demands.  Quick wits and determination allow for Lisa to escape from Jack when the plane lands, as well as allowing for her guest to avoid death, but she is not free of Jack quite yet as his desire to succeed at his job is superseded by revenge, although with the help of her father, Lisa is able to get the best of the insane man and return to her job, however, her ways of dealing with unruly customers are certifiably different.

What then makes Red Eye a specifically post-9/11 thriller aside from the obvious ties to airplanes and the threat of political terrorism, well, in order, to really conceptualize this we must first consider how Craven formulates characters within the narrative, primarily Lisa who is the protagonist within Red Eye.  It is no accident that she is returning from a funeral at the films beginning a indirect reminder of the deaths occurring on that tragic day, yet she is also attached to various psychiatric consultations and forms of depression, initially suggested by her father and reaffirmed by Jack who mentions her relationship with psychiatrist, while not directly mentioned this could have a post-traumatic element about it, in so much as it is a character attempting to deal with the irrationalities of her existence against an illogical humanity that could in her case be so cold and distancing, but also so inhumane as to blow up buildings.  The various persons on the plane as well as some of her hotel's customers help to reconsider the face of America in the wake of the terrorist attacks, particularly the means by which frustration, paranoia and a general concern for escapism emerge within the parts of the narrative focusing on the airport and the airplane.  Hell, even the flight attendants make comments about their self-identies and their projected social identity with heavy post-9/11 implications.  However, the largest element that can be drawn from this ideology emerges through the reasons for Jack's violent actions, for  a better portion of the film they revolve around financial gain, although even he is unsure why a political figure would need to be murdered, he simply understands there is profit to be made in volunteering to assure its execution.  The factual nature of the desired acts, without a theoretical framework for doing so certainly emerges within a post-9/11 discourse considering that America was well aware that they needed to exact revenge upon their wrong doers, yet were not sure of were exactly to do so, nor how to best achieve this, leading to a series of financially heavy actions with a mixed bag of results.  Finally, it is no accident that the attempted assassination is directed at a whole family, invoking an American ideal in the process, not to mention the Russian mercenaries engaging in said assassination attempt, using a RPG of all things.  I have yet to do any formal research on post-9/11 film theory, as I am sure this post shows, but I just wanted to conceptualize some of its points as they seemed fit to Red Eye in a multitude of ways.

Key Scene:  The tension in the power outage scene on the airplane is palpable and certainly not the only emotionally heavy moment in the film, which again relies so little on heavy violence to get viewers anticipations heightened.

This is a cheap pickup on DVD and at the moment no bluray appears to exist, nonetheless, it is a solid fixture in any collection, either well-established or burgeoning, and like so many reviews seem to agree, do not trust the trailer for this film, it completely fails to sell what your really receive with this excellent work.

Maybe If You Stopped Getting Drunk And Buying Stuff Off Craigslist: Entrance (2012)

I will openly admit that the first half an hour or so of this film had me really confused as to why the guys over at Battleship Pretension would even have the nerve to suggest this film, let alone fall out of their seats demanding that people go out of their way to watch it, of course I came around to their statement, especially for the back half of this movie which proves to satirically slap everything viewers have come to signify as low budget indie filmmaking.  Of course, Dallas Richard Hallam and Patrick Horvath's purposefully slow-paced horror film is by no means perfect and fails to properly deliver its premise in a timely manner, making a considerable amount of the film seems like superfluous, begging the question as to whether or not the last thirty minutes would not serve themselves better as a short film.  I am quite baffled by the clear disdain that has arisen towards this film, primarily from two parties, the indie film elites who find the horrific closing portions of the film unnecessarily gory, while on the other end horror fanatics who are incredibly dismissive of the lack of plot and terrible acting.  I wish to criticize both parties in their indictment, in so much as those who think the film is a travesty to indie film need to remember that most major success in the style often rely on a major absurdist event to bind the plot, where as horror films (at least the die hard ones) should never complain about inadequate acting and misguided plots, because they are a staple of the genre.  I will admit that the twist becomes rather predictable early on into viewing, yet no amount of assumption could prepare me for the very real intensity which happens when the film's bottom falls out and all hope of normalcy and reason disappear.  While Entrance has nothing on the absolute brilliance of Cabin in the Woods as a satire, it certainly manages to offer a new way to consider a filmmaking style as well as a genre, ultimately, making for a welcome and brief viewing experience far from the terrible film so many people seem insistent on reviewing.

In traditional indie film fashion Entrance begins by incessantly focusing on the most monotonous and irrelevant actions of a woman named Suziey (Suziey Block), a name I will admit is a bit excessive.  She seems content to drink heavily and work a few hours at her barista job, barely making enough to afford rent.  Her only point of happiness seems to exist with her close connection to her dog named Daryll, yet again not the greatest name choice ever.  Yet during a shower one night and overarching feeling of dread seems to consume Suziey and she hobs out of the shower to search her house, a quest that yields no results, but does little to avert her paranoia.  Seeking some sort of explanation for her disdain she resorts to a variety of actions, but when her dog goes missing she loses all sense of rationality and engages in some rather destructive behavior, some of which involves drunkenly sleeping with a man who attempts to leave unnoticed the next morning.  During one night of sleeping in a bed with her friend a light comes upon them off camera suggesting somebody is watching her, an act immediately followed by a photograph being taken.  While she cannot verify that any of these paranoid feelings are valid, Suziey, nonetheless, knows that she cannot stay in Los Angeles and plans to leave, but not without having one last party of drunken decadence.  During this party the lights go out and assuming it to be a circuit break, Suziey heads down to fix it, only to be attacked by a masked man upon successfully turning them back on.  After the unknown individual confesses his love for her he proceeds to kill the attendees of the party one by one, leaving only Suziey to share in his vision of unity.  In a disturbingly poetic last scene, the killer forces Suziey to look upon the L.A. nightscape with his arms around her, suggesting that her future, despite her misgivings, will invariably involve staying put.

The metaphor in this film is a beautiful thing, often in the works of indie filmmakers it is blatantly obvious and obnoxious, at least I felt this to be the case with something like The Pleasure of Being Robbed wherein the metaphor of robbing people was to reflect the main characters own inability to engage with society in a productive manner, yet her well-to-do appearance and unusual means to escape the malaise of her life just did not equate to a decent film.  Entrance instead uses the idea of being "killed" by your surroundings in a very literal manner to undermine the half-inspired diatribes of indie kids living in cites and situations which they think themselves always above.  The film completely displays that the monotony and "tragedy" of these hipster kids lives are actually not worth of being dead over, especially when they indeed die and plead for their well-being to magically return.  Of course, the film could have established this notion much earlier instead of making the paranoia be the main narrative focus for nearly an hour of the film, yet I cannot help but enjoy the means by which an intensity is built from the moment the shower scene occurs up until the final moments on the balcony.  If I were to produce any single critique about the metaphor it would easily be directed at the somewhat passive means by which the film deals with Suziey's apparent alcoholism, especially since in the death metaphor her own addiction proves the sole factor, aside, of course, from mass murder in keeping her stationary.  She could stop her path of destruction and move away when she pleases, but she is far to indifferent and attached to monotony to do so and a very real act of destruction forces her to accept that disconcerting fact.  Hell, Entrance really does some clever things with its cinematic output and it should really be reconsidered by the many parties who seem intent on dismissing if for single factors.

Key Scene:  The killer reveal is obvious in its timing, yet it is so intense that it still manages to be the best portion of the film, not to mention that it involves some rather impressive single shot takes.

This is a quick watch on Netflix and well worth spending an afternoon with, I am still somewhat on the fence about completely liking the film and would love to hear some more thoughts on its nature and execution.

My Dear, You Cannot Live In Isolation: Carnival Of Souls (1962)

For the final film of my Halloween oriented cinema spook-fest, I decided to go with the indelible cult classic, Carnival of Souls, which has become one of the premier scare movies that is....well, criminally under-appreciated.  For some time Carnival of Souls fell the way of dubbed copies and public domain twenty set movie releases, only to get somewhat of a resurgence after being shown at various independent theaters, as well as making constant appearances as a midnight movie.  In a matter of no time, Carnival of Souls became the movie to watch if you thought you were cool and knew the classics of horror, and deservedly so, Herk Harvey's only feature length work is something to be witnessed.  As is the case with many a b-movie, it starts off quite bland with some lees than stellar action shots and some of the worst dubbing imagined in a movie where the actors are speaking the same language.  However, less than ten minutes into this cinematic wonderscape, it becomes very apparent that Carnival of Souls will not be your run of the mill work and exists as something far creepier and thoroughly inexplicable.  It is hard not to see the clear influence this film has on directors like David Lynch and Steven Sodergbergh who love taking a completely normal scenario and inserting incredible amounts of absurdity into them without the characters seeming to completely fall apart in the wake of said deconstruction of the natural.  It could be argued that Carnival of Souls has very few scary moments within its entire seventy or so minute narrative, but I would contest that it is a far greater thing than simple scares when it comes to Carnival of Souls, for the entire diagetic world created within this film is scary, the landscapes defy logic, the characters interact in a vapid and disconnected manner, often engaging one another with such levels of paranoia that it is hard to feel comfortable.  Not to mention we are watching a woman slowly fall into such a existential mentality that her sanity begins to blatantly betray her, it is scary in a way many films are not, it does not provide you with explanations as to why ghost A is showing up or why ghost B is so damn mean, it simply places you in media res to a horror story directly consuming on persons life, and in this case Carnival of Souls may have been the first to commit such an approach, and is certainly yet to be challenged.

Carnival of Souls follows a young woman named Mary Henry (Candace Hilligoss) who is still centering her world after being the sole survivor of a rather unfortunate accident in which a car including her and her friends goes spiraling off the side of a bridge.  Shortly after her lucky survival Mary discovers that she will be taking a job in Utah as a church organist, something for which she somehow managed to get a college degree.  Upon her arrival to the small town things seem underwhelming with the exception of a rather contentious land lady and a incessant neighbor who feels it necessary to hit on her at what appears to be literally every waking moment.  During a trip to work, she notices a carnival in the horizon, which causes her to experience heightened states of paranoia, something that was initially signaled by her seeing a ghostly deep-eyed male apparition.  During a day of shopping, Mary experiences a delirium in which nobody seems to acknowledge her existence, despite her yelling and calling attention to herself.  This inspires her to investigate the carnival she previously saw on the road, an event that takes her through a bizarre house of illusions and on one of the most decrepit boardwalks ever filmed.  All the while she attempts to travel through her daily life, eventually being fired from her organ job after falling into a daze dreaming about the carnival and playing what the priest describes as profane music.  Furthermore, she has a falling out with the neighbor who takes her on a date and complains about her cold demeanor and disconnect, taking particular disdain in her refusal to to drink the beer that he paid out of pocket for her to have.  Eventually after another bizarre vision of being unable to contact the living Mary returns to the carnival only to find herself being chased by ghastly apparitions from the carnival.  After falling into the sand, the scene cuts to detectives as they attempt to track down Mary's body, noting that she seems to have just disappeared into the sand, while we are then shown Mary's corpse being extracted from the river, along with her friends in the car of the original accident.  It may be an overused plot twist at this point in film, but I can imagine it was quite the twist fifty years ago.

Carnival of Soul's in notable in its approach to a uniquely female experience of haunting and paranoia.  While the film does problematically incorporate notions of hysteria a bit more than is justified, it does manage to make it quite distinct that much of the experiences of horror plaguing Mary are a result of her  detachment from society based on gender.  To some degree, one could incorporate Simone de Beauvoir's notions of "the second sex" in order to explain why Mary is so distraught.  Sure she is seeing ghosts, but all of the threatening ghosts are notably male and could represent a means of patriarchal oppression, which relegates her to a position of lesser being and therefore irrelevant to societal discourse.  If we consider Mary as an other in the context of this film, it helps to explain her moments of being ignored by society as not her being a ghost, but rather; a being who realizes that in the context of the early sixties that her body is not only defined as lesser than a male, but also so arbitrary that it is literally overlooked by males who do not want to lose their point of power, as well as by women who have internalized the notion that they are lesser than their penis bearing counterparts.  Even the scenes of Mary's interactions with her neighbor reek of the sexual assumptions of the era, in which a man is able to traipse about sexually preying upon women and chastising them when they do not put out, going so far as to call Mary cold, a clever play on her being deceased, as well as a common term for a woman who even remotely cared about her sexual identity during the time.  Sure the film is absolutely a ghost story and a very good one at that, but it is not impossible to read heavily into the revolutionary questioning of gender constructs and performance within the text, after all it was a B movie that is where one could break free from the mold of normalcy with great success.

Key Scene:  There is a particular scene in the dance hall involving sped up dancing that is, factually, the scariest thing ever put on film.

Buy this movie, I would love to tell you that Criterion is going to re-release the work in high definition, but it tragically does not appear to be the case.  As such the DVD will have to suffice.

This House Has Many Hearts: Poltergeist (1982)

Yet another of the many movies I only have brief memories of watching during my childhood and of course I can only remember the parts that scared the living hell out of me, Poltergeist has also managed to cement itself centrally into the greatest horror films of all time, and deservedly so because it is genuinely quite good.  Upon initially watching this film one will find themselves worried that it is not only an incredibly cheesy film, but that the overall plot provides for some characters that are damn near impossible to relate with.  Yet about an hour in the movie shifts tones and appears to begin taking itself quite seriously, resulting in a combination of what can only be describe as high-intensity family drama and special effect heavy horror.  Sure a good bit of the film is dated, between the obvious fake gore and some of the animation based spectral effects, but for as many obvious tricks that are incorporated within Poltergeist, so to are some genuinely amazing tricks, particularly in the sequences involving crossing through to another portal.  While at some point in its production, Steven Spielberg, who while not the director, although he clearly has a heavy hand in helping Tobe Hopper make this film, probably decided that he wanted to give a shot at making the film family friendly, or at least heavily oriented towards a family commentary, however, the grotesque nature of many of the films moments, as well as a few to many drug and sexual references cause the film to be a bit more adult than I think Spielberg intended and the film was famously contested for its initial R rating, eventually earning a PG-13, I am sure the prolific director had to pull a few strings to make that happen, as the documentary This Film Is Not Yet Rated Shows, he basically committed the impossible.  Overall, Poltergeist is a film clouded with urban legend and schlocky special effects, but somehow still manages to capture the imaginations of viewers twenty years after its initial release, it is a welcomed reminder that not every horror movies main focus needs to be explicit sexual and violent imagery,  although there is a tad sprinkled into this classic.

Poltergeist centers around the experiences of The Freeling's a family living in a a suburb in what can assumed to be somewhere in the midwest.  The father Steve (Craig T. Nelson) is a realtor in the area and is credited for the boom of sales in the area, his wife Diane (JoBeth Williams) is a stay at home mom who seems far more concerned with her continuing vanity, while their oldest daughter Dana (Dominique Dunn) and son Robbie (Oliver Robbins) prove troublesome with their incorrigible attitudes and undermining demeanors.  It is only their youngest daughter Carol Anne (Heather O'Rourke) who seems to be void of a disobedient bone, yet when she starts acting in an unusual manner by starring into a snow filled television or talking to people who are not around the family becomes worried and this sense of dread is only heightened by the clear occurrence of paranormal activity within the house, whether it be moving chairs or attacking trees.  One night the acts become so intense that Carol Anne is kidnapped into another realm, causing Steve and Diane to seek out help from a parapsychologist team led by one Dr. Lesh (Beatrice Straight) whose own expectations are altered when she quickly realizes that the heightened level of paranormal activity occurring in their home is unlike anything witnessed before, particularly in the ever increasing malevolence of the entities involved.  After a realization that many of the homes in the area were built near burial grounds and the complete psychological breakdown of one of her crew members, Dr. Lesh calls on the help of a renowned paranormal investigator named Tangina (Zelda Rubenstein) who helps to exorcise the ghosts from the house and return Carol Anne to safety.  The Freeling's after this fortunate rescue quickly plan their flight from the suburbs and seem assured in their escape until on the last night Robbie and Carol Anne are yet again attacked.  While trying to save them Diane falls into their unfinished pool ultimately revealing that the land they are living on is indeed on on coffins, the owner of the land was gracious enough to move the headstones, but not the actual corpses.  The end of the film is action packed and thrilling and eventually sees the escape of the family to a motel on the outskirts of town, one in which they remove the television from on their arrival.

One could read into the various commentaries on the decaying suburb ideology in America during the early eighties, which is reemphasized by the character of Steve who is simultaneously depicted rolling a joint and reading a book by then president Ronald Reagan, or the disconnect of a family in the wake of technological advance as is evidenced through each of the children's attachment to some form of electronics, although it can be said that the parents are equally guilty.  However, my favorite and perhaps the most fun reading of the film is the one in which the whole narrative serves as a metaphor for a couple struggling with the loss of a child to what can be assumed either an abortion or a miscarriage.  In the case of this reading it is clearly Carol Anne and both Steve and Diane suffer from its ramifications, going through their actions with a blasé attitude, often ignoring the children they already have, only to become so racked with desire to reunite with the lost child that they are willing to welcome bizarre fantasies into their daily thoughts.  Furthermore, the entire rescue scene plays out like a rebirth of sorts, with the closet to Robbie and Carol Anne's room serving as a womb that Diane must reenter, with the aid of Steve in order to rebirth their child.  The presence of an umbilical-like rope and a severe amount of afterbirth-like blood drive this ultimate metaphor home and the placement of Diane and Carol Anne into water after their rescue is only a greater addition.  Of course this is just one very specific reading of the work and is by no means a certain commentary within the film, but it would be interesting to stack this work in relation to Tobe Hopper's other works, Spielberg aside and see what they collectively say about birth, I know Texas Chainsaw Massacre has a few, at the very least backhanded, comments.

Key Scene:  There are one or two well placed monologues in this film that help completely reset the pace of the film and make the two hour movie seem all to short.

This is a classic of horror cinema and a must own to any one who claims to be a buff of the genre.