I usually get around to watching about two horror movies a year, so I like the experience to be extra horrific. Not only do I expect the thrills and chills to be spine-tingling, but I love it when the horror (as Brando would have cooed) permeates the film-making. There needs to be a certain element of cheese added to the process. Now this usually takes two forms: intentional cheese, as exhibited by such horror greats as Armies of Darkness or Bubba-Hotep (anything with his Chin-ness in it, really), or incidental cheese, as shown in any adaptation of Stephen King's work (excluding Kubrick's The Shining, which King hates, incidentally.) Often horror focuses on a group of folks enduring some sort of phantasmic tribulation. The group is necessary since a bunch of them will inevitably get killed off. In Stephen King stories, I have often found this process to be a bit morally heavy-handed, almost puritanical. King's stories are full of people getting their "come uppance."Take the 2004 TNT production of Stephen King's Salem's Lot, starring the white-guy-in-the-leather-jacket Rob Lowe, as well as a host of others including Amy Smart, Donald Sutherland, Rutger Hauer, Andre Braugher, and that British guy from Babe. There is so much delightful awfulness in this 3 hour wreck of a TV mini-series that I never wanted it to end. From Rob Lowe's "book on tape" voice-over, to the orange-vortex flashbacks, to Smart's and Lowe's stilted dialogue ("...you came home to a town you thought you knew, and a town that thought they knew you." So basically a lot of thinking going on.) There's a great scene in a cafe where the two brainiacs discuss architecture and the "soul of buildings." Donald Sutherland is creepy enough sans beard and even moreso avec le barbe. Oh yeah, there are delightful little outbursts of French in the film, too. And this is all before the VAMPIRES even start showing up!
The movie seems to mix up vampires and zombies a bit because there are scenes where alternately there are junior vampires are crawling upside down on the ceiling of their school bus while at the same time there are vampires night of the living dead-ing it out in the street.
Braugher actually turns in the best performance of all next to Rutger Hauer (but all Hauer has to do is play the evil master vampire and how hard is that if Tom Cruise can do it?) Braugher's character neatly portrays the "minority" character in the small white Northeastern town. Conveniently for the script, he is both black and gay. And an English teacher. It says all the more for Braugher's acting prowess that he was able to elevate his acting above the token-level of his casted role.
Despite the movie's moments of supreme awfulness, or perhaps because of them, I didn't even notice the three hours of my life slipping away.... The horror, the horror.
So like Nosferatu at dusk, I am off to seek my second B movie of the season....
2 comments:
Where to begin?
1. I think you probably are in agreement with me that Kubrick's adaptation of "The Shining" was not only a great movie, but also freaky as all get-out. The fact that King doesn't like this adaptation is sort of ridiculous, but I think it's probably because it is very different than his book. From what I understand, the book is written from the perspective of the little boy where as the movie is from the father's point of view. Also, the ending is totally different. While you're watching lame TV miniseries adaptations of Stephen King books, you may want to check out the one of "The Shining" (1997) staring that guy from the TV show "Wings"; which, by the way was a great TV show.
2. Children crawling on ceilings is actually quite scary. Sort of like the girl in "The Exorcist" walking upside down on all fours down a flight of stairs in fast motion.
3. Tom Cruise didn't pull off a scary vampire. John Malkovich in "Shadow of the Vampire" was pretty scary as was the guy in the original Nosferatu (very scary).
4. Have you seen the adaptation of "The stand" starring the big blond guy from "Coach"? I kind of like it.
5. You should see "Maximum Overdrive". It's the ultimate in Stephen King cheese. All the machines come to life and kill people. If it sounds like a lame premise, just wait until you see what was actually done with it. Stephen King says about his directorial debut, "a lot of people have directed Stephen King novels and stories, and I finally decided if you want something done right, you oughtta do it yourself." Nothing more need be said of his artistic vision. Oh yeah, and it stars Emilio Estevez. Let me rephrase it, you NEED to see "Maximum Overdrive".
PS. Where can I rent a copy of this. Please don't say Netflix.
PPS. We should get together and watch all of these some time. Although, "The Stand" is something like 10 hours long.
Also in the Stephen King/Wings category is "Storm of the Century" starring the great Tim Daly.
I got Salem's Lot from Blockbuster, which has a rich and voluminous collection of really BAD horror movies... including one titled "A Mexican Werewolf in Texas."
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