The Past Is Just A Story We Tell Ourselves: Her (2013)

I am gonna keep riding this post humanism wave here on the blog, because I have been fortunate to have yet another piece of academic writing get pushed through to a new stage of revisions with the hopes of eventual publication.  Incidentally, much of the subject matter of this paper revolves around issues of cyborg identity and by extension how we gender and other bodies that themselves are not human.  As I noted earlier this is a relatively new point of research for me, but one that is nonetheless proving quite rewarding and at times challenging theoretically.  I know full and well that I would have adored Spike Jonze's Her regardless of having encountered some of this research prior, but much of it would have been purely from a sort of cinematic spectacle and comedic point of reference.    It would be quite a challenge to find a reason for me to not like the movie on those grounds alone, yet when I began to engage with the film (almost immediately) on its conceptualization and navigation of issues surrounding the post-human identity I found myself becoming even more enthralled with the film than I could have previous foreseen.  It works its way ever so cleverly around both the issues of embodiment and what it would mean for an entity with unlimited access to the known world to somehow become more sentient than a person, even one that it had grown deeply attached to in as close to physical way as possible.  The film is vibrant and abject simultaneously, painting in its lens a world that is hip and looks to be a great step forward, but also manages to show the very detachment and dissonance that could create a world where this narrative could emerge.  In this careful construction, I would argue that Her carries the same legitimacy in terms looking forward to humanities symbiosis with technology that The Matrix and Existenz did in 1999, there begin a prophetic warning.  Jonze realizes that this warning is far too late and instead takes a look at how the romantic relations of those in the world will come to fruition in light of this invariable attachment.  In this way, the film proves to be the most important romantic drama since Brokeback Mountain.  It should be rather apparent at this point that I was absolutely floored by Her.

Her follows the life of Theodore (Joaquin Phoenix) a man whose job revolves around writing heartfelt and emotionally charged letters for clients who want to send them to friends, lovers and relatives but cannot bother to spend the time doing it themselves.  While he is exceptional at his job, he has been recently distraught over the ending of his recent push for divorce by his wife Catherine (Rooney Mara) who sees his distant nature and decidedly mellow outlook on life to be starkly opposed to her very hard and critical world view.  While Theodore is capable of maintaing some semblance of functionality at work, he is clearly suffering on the outside as noted by Amy (Amy Adams) and her boyfriend Charles (Matt Letscher).  During his travels through what appears to be a nondescript California location, Theodore comes across an advertisement for a new operation system for his computer that is equipped with artificial intelligence.  Seeing this as a curiosity, Theodore buys the software and after answering a few questions about his mother and interests, he is provided with a voice model named Samantha (voiced by Scarlett Johansson) whose own outlook and desire to learn about the world and Theodore immediately becomes a thing of life-fullfilment for Theodore.  While he is initially hesitant to embrace the desires of Samantha, Theodore and his operating system become involved, at one point even carry out what is apparently a sexual encounter.  In the physical world, this drives Theodore to the final point of willingness to end things with Catherine and when Amy and Charles breakup, he is able to better support her as a friend.  Yet, when Samantha grows closer to Theodore their relationship too grows and in some ways becomes tested after the "honeymoon phase."  Theodore becoming quite frustrated when Samantha attempts to introduce a real woman into the sexual equation.  Yet, he is willing to work at finding a way for their partnership to work and is quite successful for sometime, but during a trip to the mountains, Samantha informs Theodore that she has been talking extensively with other AI operating systems, wherein her understanding of knowledge and presence are beyond his comprehension.  Furthermore, after a brief malfunction, Samantha reveals that she has been in conversation with thousands of other entities, some of which she has loved equally.  In one last conversation, Samantha calls Theodore at night to tell him that she/it loves him dearly, before the entire system goes offline.  Awaking to the broken system, Theodore is momentarily flustered, but eventually decides it is best to simply go and talk with Amy, a moment that suggest the future of a even better relationship.

Her tackles the issues of artificial intelligence, post humanism and the existential justification of life in a way few films have.  Indeed, while it is at a quick thought, I would only place Blade Runner, 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Matrix above this in terms of film's which tackle the issue of the artificial navigating its way into the real in highly indiscernible ways with noted success.  Wherein, the thee previous films pain such an uprising and awareness in a very dire situation, one predicated upon invasion and replacement with something newly evolved, Her notes that the divide might not happen with such force, but the emotional investment will be no less tangible.  The artificial intelligence at play in this film seems to predicate itself upon becoming attached to figures who are already in the emotional dumps as it were, susceptible to a emotional replacement that does not necessarily factor into the most Darwinian of logistics.  Here, Theodore navigates towards the entity of Samantha not for the physical elements, but for the replication of comfort and human connection she somehow purports to offer.  Indeed, it is made expressly clear that this is not a replication of the human form and certainly not a simulacra of the human, because there is never a physical entity to which Samantha becomes attached, although there is an incredibly brief moment in the "break up" scene that could be deemed Theodore's own physical manifestation of Samantha.  This looking for human contact by removing the contact element becomes even more curious when one considers that figures like Theodore make incredible use of video games as a form of escapism, while Amy makes video games for a living, aspiring to be a documentary filmmaker all the while.  The games themselves monotonous, Amy's creation simply being a mom simulation, while Theodore is fixated by a game that looks tantamount to The Myth of Sisyphus in 3D.  At no point do they realize the harm or detachment at play in such a world, because they are so fixated on their individual realities, in so much, as it would suggest that the attachment to artificial intelligence, is not one where fear of mental superiority a threat, but that said fabrications

Key Scene:  The love scene is seriously something refreshing in the use of cinematic language, if only for the ways in which it made the audience collectively react.

This is in theaters.  It is a theatrical film.  Seek it out accordingly.

Holes Are Interesting, There Are Books About Holes: Cosmopolis (2012)

I am astounded by the amount of negative feedback mounted agains this, David Cronenberg's most recent filmic offering.  Well...actually I am not entirely astounded, but more so begrudgingly understanding in the derisive attitudes directed towards the piece.  Existing in an ethereal space that is both within the confines of the alienating cinematic stylings made famous by the Canadian auteur, while also managing to deconstruct the very relationship technology and space has to film output, Cosmopolis is far from Cronenberg's most viscerally engaging work.  Beginning and ending with some decidedly upbeat music from composer Howard Shore, one would almost immediately dismiss it as a work by the director whose use of the body as a space of cinematic violence has become a trope of sorts within his career, causing one to immediately compare other works that incorporate such themes and imagery as being always in contention with his, usually superior, offerings.  Suffice it to say, Videodrome, Existenz and many other Cronenberg works proved to be well ahead of their times, the two former pieces proving as, if not more, enigmatic as was the case during their original release.  While I would not go so far as to suggest that this is on par with those two films, I do think people are under-appreciating the winding, if decidedly monotonous styles of this film, which for all intents and purposes is focused on one young man's limo ride through a city.  Yet, Cronenberg who is ever prescient in his cinematic endeavors seems to use this car as a larger metaphor for the individual attachment to society by way of technological detachment.  Existing in a space of the heightened simulacra on a level of starkness compared only to Cronenberg's own work, or perhaps the more jarring work of Lars Von Trier, Cosmopolis constantly demands that the viewer move beyond what is portrayed in the foreground of a scene, to scrape away at the layers of depth within a moving image, at times even needed to dig deeper to find something in the very skin of the film itself.  Cosmopolis is about penetration, both in a literal and metaphorical sense and while it may seem as though Cronenberg is a filmmaker whose movies are primarily for his own enjoyment, it is rather obvious that he expects viewers to engage with the films on a tangible and textual level wherein simple observation bears few results if not absolute indifference, but a focused eye and mind can see something both poignantly disturbing and decidedly prophetic.

Cosmopolis centers on the day of Eric Packer (Robert Pattinson) a son of a wealthy mogul, who has had his own success in the stock trade, thus spending much of his time simply cruising about the city and trying to get laid, either by his former fiancee or by many of the various women he encounters.  When told by his security guard that he ought to consider limiting his travels in lieu of an upcoming visit by the president, Eric stubbornly refuses and demands that he be taken across town to receive a haircut.  Along the ride, Eric meets with various acquaintances, whether it be tech gurus like Michael Chin (Philip Nozuka) and Shiner (Jay Baruchel) or people with whom Eric has had past sexual relationships, often re-consummating the relationships as occurs with Didi Fancher (Juliette Binoche) and Kendra Hayes (Patricia McKenzie).  Ultimately, however, Eric seems most intent on recreating a relationship, purely one of sexual means with his ex-fiance Elise Shifrin (Sarah Gadon) who is decidedly uninterested in his advances.  When a local religious leader and spirited social activist dies, a moment of civil unrest arises, all while Eric idly passes the time in his car, drinking, pontificating and at one point even receiving a prostate exam.  Eventually, the constant burden of having to worry about his security guard Torval (Kevin Durand) being extremely cautious with his whereabouts leads to Eric tricking him into deactivating the lock on his gun and killing the guard.  This shift allows Eric to move more freely about the city even enabling to finally get his haircut although it requires the opening of a barber well past business hours, a moment wherein the barber and Eric's driver share in stories of their past days as taxi drivers.  This moment proves to be the last of Eric's encounters, before he finally meets up with Benno Levin (Paul Giamatti) a hermit and hypochondriac that has purportedly spent the entirety of the day trying to kill Eric.  When in his sights, Benno fails to kill Eric, but instead of fleeing Eric climbs the stairs to his apartment and enters into his house, only to be confronted by Benno, the two sharing in a perplexing and winding confrontation before Eric assumedly succumbs to his fate, sitting facing the camera as Benno utters a few words, the screen fading to black before any shot is fired.

I want to reemphasize the way in which this film is seemingly working on a layer below the tangible, wherein, the to use a term in corporeal cinema, the skin of the cinema has been penetrated.  There are moments in Eric's limo where it would seem like the CGI is being executed in a very poor manner, making it quite clear that the outside is different from the interior, I would argue that this is not poor filmmaking, but a directorial choice on the part of Cronenberg to show Eric's movement from complete technology based detachment to the real which moves towards complete attachment to it in the closing moments of the film when the now less certain Eric enters the space of Benno's gross and filthy apartment, complete, no less with a mound of broken computer monitors.  It would seem to be in this bookended nature of the film that Cronenberg is tackling the issues of how a social understanding of the world fueled almost entirely by that which is attainable through social outlets.  The movement in and out of individuals within the space of Eric's vehicle represent the transitory and desultory nature of communication in this age, right down to what appears to be a cinematic recreation of a booty call.  Eric cannot seem to understand the physical barriers confronting his ability to travel the town during the presence of the president, because his world does not exist outside of the car and, therefore, he cannot physically understand such a thing as a barrier, a metaphor that perfectly extends to the seemingly unlimited amount of access he is afforded purely as a result of wealth.  Indeed, he is shown rather early in the film attempting to buy the Rothko Chapel, a space purportedly made for the community, which Eric hopes to possess for himself through financial means.  This acquisition without physically viewing an item takes on yet another layer of online identity as Eric can now consume the world from the comfort of his car computer, never being forced to deal with a grounded understanding of things.  Even events of heightened intensity are dealt with in a detached manner, watching a riot occur from the safety of his walled in car/computer, much as was the case with watching the Occupy Movement or in more violent examples the uprisings in the Middle East.  It is fitting that when he does finally leave his car and computer space it is to get a hair cut an act of physical destruction that leads to the further, assumed physical destruction of his body in the closing moments of the film.  The computer has allowed a person access to pretty much anything they could desire on Maslow's hierarchy of needs, yet the feeling of destruction and, ultimately, death must be felt in the flesh and in the real.

Key Scene:  It should be no surprise that the best scene in this film involves Eric receiving a prostate exam while talking to another woman.  Aside from Robert Pattinson knocking this scene out of the park in acting terms, it also takes on a wonderful layer of metaphor and psychosexual politics.

This is watch instantly on Netflix, however, it is worth obtaining on bluray, the lack of popularity has led to it dropping in price considerably, which both a shame and a benefit to those looking to obtain a copy of the film.

He Doesn't Like You Watching Us: Paranormal Activity 4 (2012)

For someone who might have either actually read this blog since its inception, or happens to have trolled through all the posts I have made, will know that I am a huge supporter of the original Paranormal Activity film, citing it both as one of the major works in the horror genre, while also defending it as one of the best films of the year of its release.  Now, since then, I have managed to keep up with the franchise, not counting its foreign spin-offs, although I plan to hunt them down eventually and while I did not blog about them due to time restraints, or more likely a lack of an internet source during their respective viewings, I have decided to return to this film, for what I thought would be the final installment in the series, but as I have come to realize there is purportedly a fifth film in the works, one that seems to be focused n a family of color, which is both revolutionary in terms of sub-genre horror filmmaking, but also ripe with the possibilities of poorly executed narrative.  Either way, Paranormal 4 is a moderately successful addition to the franchise, paling in comparison to the original and falling short of the VHS based restrictions of the third film, but certainly trumping the second film which is outright the least realized of the series.  Here, in what begins to be an obvious set up for the next film, viewers are rushed through a narrative that is at times genuinely scary, but still wraps together far too quickly and manages to build upon nothing established in the first films, aside from the continual connections of one character.  The tricks are minimal and aside from a rather visually stunning use of the Xbox Kinect sensors playing heavily into the plot this was a surprisingly simple and predictable entry into the series.  This is particularly a shame since the extra heavy reliance on digital here in this film could have provided for a new level of paranormal invasion, perhaps even a complete destruction on the panoptic, surveillance like look at the movement of evil through a fractured household.  Paranormal Activity is certainly not a bad film, I was thoroughly scared throughout, but in the same sense I was always aware of how uninspired this film proved to be.

Paranormal Activity 4 begins by showing the through line of all the films Katie (Katie Featherson) playing with her infant nephew, whose name in the earlier film is Hunter, also showing her stealing the child before a card explains that the two remain missing to the point where this narrative jumps off.  The film now beginning on October 31st of 2011 looks at the life of a family, most specifically the daughter Alex (Kathryn Newton) who is attempting to deal with the fracturing relationship of her parents Doug (Stephen Dunham) and Holly (Alexondra Lee) while also proving a decent big sister to her younger brother Wyatt (Aiden Lovekamp).  Furthermore, Alex is also interested in a neighborhood boy named Ben (Matt Shively) despite his rather obvious one-track mind and the condemnation of his presence by her parents.  When new neighbors move in however, things get a bit unusual when the young boy Robbie (Brady Allen) begins showing up inexplicably at their house at all times of night, first scaring Alex when he appears in the corner of their tree house late at night.  What follows is far more disturbing, when after an accident Robbie stays with the family for an extended period of time.  It is during this time that unusual events occur, things such as weird spectral presences emerging, or Wyatt and Robbie staring blankly for hours before talking to what appears to be nothing.  It is not until chandeliers begin nearly killing Alex, or knives that had gone missing begin falling from the ceiling that the remainder of the family takes notice.  However, at this point, Wyatt has become fully involved with the entity that has invaded their house, a small child that is indeed captured on the laser projection.  When attempting to uncover truth about the events, at the neighbors home, Alex runs into Katie who begins inquiring about Wyatt and his well-being.  This moment leads to Wyatt explaining that he is actually named Hunter, an issue that when brought up by Alex to her parents leads to them chastising her inquiries as being in bad taste, and when she has a final traumatic encounter with the paranormal while her parents are at dinner, things become irreversible as her mother and Ben are attack while she is at dinner with her father, upon returning and discovering the problem, she quickly runs to the neighbors home, only to find things far more disturbing than she could have imagined.

If, as I suggested, the first film is about the fall out of a relationship between two people played out as a metaphor of paranormal haunting, then this the fourth film is the first to truly look at how such a extended issue might affect a child.  Alex is a person suffering from finding an identity and certainty in the face of her parents failing marriage, always hyper aware of how things might affect the sensitive Wyatt, but also using this protection to mask her own insecurities, which are played out rather brilliantly in her relationship to Ben, one that is awkwardly sexualized, but never one of forced consummation.  It is clear that she is initially hesitant to embrace Ben, because he does not support her fears regarding the paranormal invasion of her house, or by extension understand her suffering at the sight of her parents fighting.  With this in mind, it is interesting to see how things shift when Ben is made aware of the reality of the paranormal, or by extension comes to understand the tense relationship between Doug and Holly and is particular witness to the incredibly unhealthy relationship between Wyatt and Robbie.  In fact, the invasion of Robbie into the space of the film, also takes on a shade of the metaphoric as many relationships attempt to fix their domestic issues by adding a child to the equation, here, as is usually the result, the act fails miserably.  The metaphor goes to the somewhat implausible by making it result in incredibly violent events, but this does serve as a nice parallel to the traumas faced by children born into such divisive households, ones where argument and anger prevail out over mild temperament and well-reasoned dialogue.  One could read Alex as the figure capable of doing precisely this, however, her inability to speak against the emotive is double through her being incapable of proving the presence of the paranormal to her skeptical and detached parents, each having their own mocking indifference to her concerns, perhaps because they refuse to validate the existence of the paranormal, or, more likely, because they are far too preoccupied with their own marital sufferings to create a space of dialogue for Alex and Wyatt.  As such, Alex finds herself forced to be a maternal figure to her younger brother a burden that weighs heavily upon her and is evidence very intensely in the last few seconds of the film.

Key Scene:  The real surprise her is how well Brady Allen, the child actor playing Robbie, delivers his performance.  Usually creepy kids rely on looks alone, but when Robbie stares into the camera in this film, it is all the more intense by Allen's great delivery.

This is on Netflix in both an R and unrated version, I am uncertain as to the difference in the two, perhaps a few less boob-based pieces of dialogue.  Either way, watch this and the other films in the franchise, which I believe are all currently available for streaming.

In Order To Find, You Must First Learn To Hide: Fahrenheit 451 (1966)

There are two things I can say right off the bat when talking about this film.  Firstly, it is perhaps one of the best literary adaptations I have witnessed to date, although that should be no surprise considering it was in the ever caring hands of Francois Truffaut.  Secondly, I am pretty sure that Tommy Wiseau of The Room infamy took all his acting cues from Oskar Werner, particularly in the manner of uttering names.  Although, this adaptation of Ray Bradbury's canonical novel is sadly one of Truffaut's lesser works, it manages to exude so much of the style and substance we have come to know and love about the director, managing to make it one of my favorite of the director, second only to Shoot The Piano Player.  It captures all the greatness of a dystopian nightmare while still managing to be cinematic, understated and surprisingly fresh.  It is no small matter to make a film about a person who burns books and exists in a society that has, essentially, become inundated with mind-numbing television programs whose vague dialogue and open-endedness manage to blindly lead the "cousins" of some unnamed future city into believing that they are happy with meaningless dribble on a flat screen television, one of Bradbury's more eerie visions to prove true and other consumerist oriented items.  Friendship is a vague thing in this film and deservedly so, because Truffaut's reimagining of the work, emphasizes the separated nature of this paranoid world in which reading a book is a crime, on the grounds that to engage with written work is to invariably cause one to be sad.  Firefighters now cause fires as opposed to putting them out, although an argument could be made as to them putting out the fires of revolution through censorship.  This film somewhat serves as a counter to Godard's vision of what television would do to society, and as I have mentioned far earlier in this blog, Godard and Truffaut had a rather unfortunate falling out only years prior to this films release.  Truffaut sees a world where we can still escape conformity through the memories of wonderment, while Godard manages to see all going to hell via mass technologies, something he makes contentiously clear in Film Socialisme.  I am always in the favor of Truffaut's vision because it has a care and earnestness for human success and, honestly, who can stand to be as virulently depressed as Godard all the time.

For those of you not terribly familiar with the novel, let me first suggest reading the book before even continuing on with this description and if you have already had the pleasure of engaging with Bradbury's work the plot should be a nice refresher.  We are shown a firefighter named Montag (Oskar Werner) whose job as stated earlier is not to put out fires, but to burn books, donning a badge that reads 451, the temperature at which paper ignites.  He is, as the story begins, the ideal employee and up for promotion, something that makes his wife Linda (Julie Christie) quite happy, because it means that they will, amongst other things, be able to finally get another wall unit with which to watch more television shows.  Things seem aligned to work perfectly until Montag is approached by a woman named Clarisse  (Julie Christie) who confronts him about the reasons behind burning books and asks him if he had ever actually read one of the books he is so quick to destroy.  While Montag is initially quite dismissive of this suggestion, a growing concern for what makes these books so cherished causes him to crack into a copy of David Copperfield, an act that changes him forever, causing him to become filled with an insatiable desire to read, an act that leads to a distancing from Linda.  Montag, nonetheless, continues his job all the while secretly reading, until he witnesses a woman choose to die engulfed with her books rather instead of living in a world without them.  This realization that books do reflect something much larger than words on a page, Montag can no longer contain his desires and even while he is forced to watch his house burn down, he steals a book and flees to the outskirts of the city.  There he finds a commune of people who have dedicated their lives to memorizing a book, thus the words on the page possess a living identity, he reencounters Clarisse while memorizing The Collected Short Stories of Edgar Allen Poe.  The film closes with the members of the group walking back and forth reciting the books they have committed to memory.

I mentioned that it was a rather bold act to make a film version of a book that is essentially about a society becoming disconnected from the written word.  Of course, Bradbury's concern was more with television and even more so a society that censors all things that could make them reconsider their social place.  Yet, Truffaut manages to use the film as a provocation of what the novel already was and creates it is in such a jarring and intense manner that it does exactly what good literature should and what bad television fails to do, it incorporates thought provoking moments throughout and Truffaut a film scholar at heart uses his medium as much as a form of literature as any great author.  Furthermore, there are momentary tricks and brilliant cinematic doublings simply not possible in the book  The obvious one being the playing of both Linda and Clarisse by Julie Christie, which suggests that it is not infidelity that drives Montag away from Linda, but a desire to escape monotony and a fascist oppression.  Similarly, we are able to witness the actual act of book burning, which while describe quite magnificently by Bradbury in the text, helps with its literal incandescence on a screen.  Various other tricks throughout the film, whether they be edited zoom-in shots or the reversal shots allowing for Montag and other to slide up a fire pole ad layers of filmic metaphor and emphasis on the absurd world in which this dystopic state exists.  I would argue that this is not necessarily an alternative work to Bradbury's original, but almost a add-on to the ideas professed in the novel.  Truffaut clearly has a close attachment to this fascist idea of censorship and wants to attack it in his own artistic medium.

Key Scene:  While the book burning moments are intense, nothing is quite as well executed as Montag's first moments of reading David Copperfield.

This is how a literary adaptation should be made and it is now one of my favorite Truffaut works, perhaps in need of a push out of obscurity.  Cinematically and metaphorically it serves as everything one should desire from film.  Getting a copy, all be it a bit pricey, is a must.

It Was Such A Gruesome Scene, I Could Not Watch: 13B (2009)

Leave it to a Bollywood film to create a horror genre offering that was almost as zany as the previously reviewed House, while not as experimental as Obayashi's seventies work. 13B: Fear Has A New Address, directed by Vikram K. Kumar certainly is unlike any horror movie I have seen to date.  However, from what I have come to understand, Bollywood filmmakers are infamous for borrowing heavily from the plots and themes of Hollywood films to drive their points home, and 13B is certainly no exception to this act.  It is quite easy to pick up the influences of Hitchcock specifically, as well as moments from famous horror movies, whether they be Poltergeist, Videodrome or some of the more contemporary hack and slash works, the images and acts mirror these films far to nicely to be mere coincidence.  To say that Kumar borrows heavily from these films is not a critique on my part by any means, hell, Tarantino has made a career out of it, yet the film does so in such a way that you are offered moments of cinematic familiarity, only to have them robbed when you realize that 13B is genuinely its own work, one with multiple elements of the horror genre engaged into a lengthy film, along with unusual inclusions of moments such as music videos and the required dance number that appears to show up at the end of every Bollywood work.  Furthermore, like many of the movies mentioned this month, 13B makes note of the problematic place technology plays within our society, particularly when it comes to the disconnection of relationships and this film takes some broad steps in showing how cataclysmic such lack of attachment can become in communication in times of emergency, particularly when such moments are so insane that any non-direct means of talking fail to express the problem.  13B is a fresh film, with a heavy zest of classic horror works that has made my desire to consume more Bollywood work all the greater.

13B focuses on middle class construction overseer Manohar (R. Madhavan) as he is moving into a new condominium along with many of his family members, a move that represents a huge boost in his class placement, but also a heavy burden on his finances.  Despite small omens such as the milk constantly curdling and being shocked by appliances, Manohar believes that his new life will be rich and rewarding and that eventually his somewhat detached family will come together happily, even if they are constantly glued to the television to watch "their serials."  After a creepy encounter with a man in the complex who owns a dog named Harry, Manohar notices that the newest television program his family is tuned into titled "Everyone Is Well," is beginning to reflect his life, often simultaneously, as he witnesses conversations occurring on the television, as they are also occurring in the room next to him.  He is dismissive at first, until the show predicts that his wife will have a miscarriage, something that leads Manohar on a quest to discover what is going on at his house and why it is being haunted by, of all things a television.  After discussions with an expert in paranormal studies, Manohar, along with the help of a police friend named Shiva (Murali Sharma) they begin to unfold a suicide and mistreatment of  a mentally challenged person which occurred at the location some thirty year earlier.  When it becomes clear that the actions occurring on the television show suggest that Manohar's family will be murdered, by Manohar himself, he plans to lock himself in a room to avoid such occurrences, yet even after this blocking of Manohar the show manages to alter its course ever so slightly to make a new threat for Manohar's family, one that could be said to come from out of nowhere, yet in a daring venture Manohar is able to save his family, allowing them to return to their happy, one that they are sure to praise the gods for earning.  In the closing scenes, Manohar has a conversation with one of the integral characters to the plot in which he suggests that if paranormal entities really wanted to interfere with human lives they would use cell phones, and not a measly television.

13 B is a Bollywood film through and through, yet its inherent commentary on television perhaps most closely relates to the previously mentioned Videodrome, in that it suggests a unhealthy nearly addictive attachment to the television screen.  Manohar's family refuses to even acknowledge a world in which they cannot watch their favorite television shows and while the younger members of the family are not necessarily focused on the television specifically they do indeed have their own problematic connections to the material world whether it be through cellphone use or a desire for a new vehicle.  The overarching commentary then becomes what role as a means for moral and emotive reactions a television should play, this is certainly the case in the scene in which Manohar witnesses the news from the doctor that his wife will survive the miscarriage.  The news is good in that he will keep his wife whom he loves dearly and we witness Manohar fall to his knees, weeping in front of the television set, an action that allows him to prepare for his real life encounter with his wife, in which he is noticeably more stoic.  Overall, the television program appears harmless to everyone until violent actions occur, particularly when the murdering via sledgehammer occurs, at which point Manohar's wife Priya (Neetu Chandra) begins questioning the relevance of the show, her moral compass says that the actions are reprehensible, even for a fictional program, of course she does not realize the reality occurring off screen.  This suggests then that to some degree art must question its validity once it delves into realms of gore and violence, a theme pertinent in not only this film, but more than one of the movies I have reviewed this month.

Key Scene:  The moment when Manohar realizes that his apartment is a threshold for some sort of paranormal presence is well executed and suspense laden.

I thoroughly enjoyed this movie, but am not entirely sure on its rewatchability.  The film is luckily available on Netflix Watch Instantly, although I will warn you that some of the subtitling is quite awful.

Can The Internet Dial You Up?: Pulse (2001)

Known as Kairo to Japanese audiences, Pulse is the inspiration for the American remake about a film in which a ghost spreads through technological devices, in a way very much matching a virus.  While the American version in all likelihood incorporates lots of high-end shock values and gore (admitedly I have never seen it so I can not say with certainty, it is purely speculation), the Japanese original predicates itself on a very drawn-out dreary and desolate vision of horror.  While this focus on isolation can be off-putting and even boring to many viewers, I found the film to be profound and gorgeous in its  lackluster appearances.   A palette of dull greens and greys, as well as a heavy use of jet black allow for a film to capture both isolation in a cinematic sense, as well as the computer inspired world from which it draws its inspiration.  I would gladly compare the cinematic stylings of this film to The Matrix, although thematically they are two starkly different films.  Pulse is firmly a horror film, one that has ghosts, death and a discernible eeriness that is rarely matched in contemporary genre works.  I know that J-Horror has come to be associated most closely with The Ring and The Grudge, but I am certain that a strong case could be made for this being the biggest signifier of what Japan had to offer with a new era of filmmaking in the late 90's and early 2000's.  They were keen to comment on the affects and effects of technology on a post-modern society and were especially willing to make note of the separation anxiety which ensued from a harsh severing with tradition.  An argument could easily be made for this film, as well as the others perviously mentioned existing in a specifically Japanese context, which would help to explain exactly why the works have not excelled as well when remade in America, even with literal shot for shot transfers.  It reflects anxieties, unique to Japanese society, particularly those living within Tokyo and as such one must watch this definitively unconventional horror film with this notion stuck in the the back of their mind.

Pulse exists as two seemingly divergent story lines, one involving a young woman named Kudo Michi (Kumiko Aso) who works at a plant shop along with a handful of other friends, most notably a young man named Taguchi (Kenji Mizuhashi).  It is clear that Michi has feelings for Taguchi, something that is problematized when Taguchi shows up to work with a computer disc that contains an unusual video of ghosts.  The video on the disc seems to cause Taguchi to commit suicide, the moments prior caught in their own video moment, depicting a pale wraith-like Taguchi simply staring into a computer monitor.  As their interactions continue, it becomes apparent that the video is causing all those who view it to become profusely depressed to the result of suicide, something Michi is forced to witness, causing her greater despair as she is forced through Tokyo as the suicidal virus spreads.  The second storyline involves a computer novice named Ryosuke (Haruhiko Kato) as he comes into contact with the virus accidentally and seeks help after he realizes the video continues to play even after he unplugs his computer.  He ends up recruiting the help of a computer science student named Harue (Koyuki) who her self becomes entangled in the problematics of the virus.  After an interaction with a graduate student in computer sciences, Ryosuke is informed that the apparitions he is witnessing do, in fact, exist in the real real, although they still contain an ethereal nature about them.  The ghosts apparently have a sole purpose of driving those who see them into a suicidal fit, as to join them in their disparaging loneliness.  After separate interactions with the desolation of the world around them, Ryosuke and Harue eventually encounter one another making it their quest to outrun the isolation and the virus, eventually making it to a freight ship that is to leave to Latin America, one of the few places with living human contact believed still to exist.  Tragically, despair has overwhelmed Ryosuke and he vanishes into ash in the films closing scenes.

This film is fully about notions of isolation and despair, suggesting heavily that the reason for such disconnections can be found to some degree in contemporary society's refusal to detach itself from technology.  However, as Colette Balmain argues quite eloquently in her article for Japanesestudies.org, the loneliness existing within this film, as well as works like The Ring and Suicide Club express a unique despair to Japan, one that is influenced heavily by cultural attachments to architecture, as well as environment and memory.  While I do not intend to reiterate what she has already said, as it is a great read and well worth checking out in the attachment, I instead want to draw upon a few other moments where this isolation occurs within the film.  First off, the computer program created by the graduate student in the film is essentially a glorified star movement screensaver in which a group of dots move about, without colliding.  The dots cannot cross, because to do so would mean their destruction, however, the farther they separate the strong the force to pull them together becomes.  In this sense, it represents the technological divide faced by the characters in the film, in essence they use technology to become "closer" only to realize that physical interactions inevitably result in loss and the pain of such moments will cause inevitable grief and untimely death.  This metaphor is furthered when a bug in the program causes the creation of phantom dots that follow around the original dots, suggesting a spectral essence.  Ultimately, the program and the film suggest a ethereal presence that emerges as a result of technology, very Buddhist in its creation, not in its interactions.  This notion is quite intriguing in that it raises questions of mind, body and how it is problematized with a non-physical presence, or what we have come to call our online personas.  While much of the technology in Pulse has become quite outdated the message is more pertinent than before, because the fears posited in the film have only grown exponentially.

Key Scene:  There is one capturing of a ghost on a computer screen as it moves in and out of nothingness that is particularly intense.

Buy this movie if you even remotely like horror films, Japanese films or works of cinema that comment on technology in contemporary society, it will fill a cinematic void in you that you were probably not aware existed.  It is relatively cheap on Amazon and free to watch instantly to Prime members.