How about some Dark Cinema?
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Just watched a movie called, Absentia. It was recommended via Lovecraft eZine and I must say it's an incredibly creepy, atmospheric movie that really crawled under my skin in good ways. At first I wasn't sure about the acting but slap me and tell me I'm wrong because as I got into it, the acting all made sense within the characters and the characters all made sense in a real way, not some Hollywood bastardization of what real people are like. The movie had layers we learned more about as we went along, something I really appreciated. There's a nice kick in the middle and the last third, man, let me tell you, I was on edge because of the revelations, the vagueness of things...or not. It's an incredibly well done Indie horror film that works on all levels. The director, Mike Flanagan, is somebody I will have to keep an eye on as all facets, from story to look, sound and performances, worked quite well and, again, that creepiness I mentioned above, yeah...it's still crawling underneath my skin.
But...
the funny thing for me is I have a story on the back-burner called, "The Land Lord," that has some similar elements. Perhaps just one, and perhaps that's just my perception, really, but since I've had a hard time working the story out, seeing the movie might force me to shift a few things and get it done because there are some excellent scenes in the story, just a matter of tying it all together.
Anyway, highly recommended! Here's the trailer which doesn't get close to hinting at the level of creepiness watching the movie inspires, but at least it teases a bit.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEpk6mcunsE
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Just skimming, still skimming, thoughts flowing:
David Cronenberg.
My favorite director, no matter the paths he takes with his movies. They are complete, 100 minute extrapolations of his current obsessions, utterly Cronenbergian affairs, even the ones that veer furthest from what one might think of as Cronenbergian, what with the changes he's gone through over the years. From the early visceral body horror--everything up to Naked Lunch, excluding Fast Company, though Dead Ringers is more clinical and with a stronger psychological foundation, the body horror is more realistic, even if it's dealing with some perceived gynecological abnormalities. Less visceral, but not less fleshy... Sure, I can roll with that--to the psychological body revelations of Naked Lunch, though the gist there is more surreal as laced with drugs, addiction, etc.; Madame Butterfly, like Dead Ringers, more realistically aligned; and the peak psychological body revelry attained by Crash, dear lord, a strange, psychological excursion that really messed with my head in fascinating ways upon first watching it, because to most people it might just seem like a movie about car crashes and sex, but it's So Much More Than That! But to me, the extreme psychological thread that weaved through the core hooked me: the measured pace and measured reactions: a car crash means as much as a conversation means as much as sex, sex, sex means as much as...it's almost a movie lacking in passion, yet more passionate in some oblique, deep, engorged brain way that...oh, not making sense (deep engorged brain? Hehe... What the heck, is this where the expression Mind Fuck comes from? No, wait, excuse my crudity...), but let's just say, my reaction after seeing that movie, in how it affected me psychologically (yes, quite the Mind Fuck) and physically, was profound.
Naked Lunch and Crash are my fave Cronenberg films, but I cannot forget the savage, surreal, mind and, of course, body mangling wonder that is Videodrome--it's right there tagging along with them.
Where was I?
I could write a whole blog on Videodrome, on each Cronenberg film, perhaps really think them out instead of this oh-I-feel-I-need-to-get-a-blog-out-today-because-I-cannot-go-this-long-between-posts kind of thinking. And what's with that, John Claude? Why? What makes it matter to anybody but your weeeeee addled head how often a blog gets posted?
Whatever, I have real writing to do, damnit!
Onward.
The 2000's brought Spider, perhaps his most overtly psychological film until A Dangerous Method. Spider, so meticulous in its portrayal of a mental condition and life gone sideways, questions of reality and how we perceive things wrought in the flesh of Ralph Fiennes' performance, almost too perfect to watch. The balance of storylines that makes A History of Violence and Eastern Promises shimmering bookends, each the mirrored thematic reflection of the other, highlighted by Viggo Mortensen's full immersion into the characters, his best acting performances so far.
Then, his tempered step into history with Jung and Freud in A Dangerous Method, though Knightley's Sabina Spielrein is much the Over-The-Top opposite of Fiennes' Spider...before she actually attains her balance, and here we are, with a teaser for the new Cronenberg film, Cosmopolis, based on Don DeLillo's novel, starring that shining fella from Twilight, Robert Pattinson, but oh, this will shake up his teenybopper fans...or assist in their coming of age or...let's just say, this teaser, 34 seconds long, looks like pure Cronenberg, like the film that could have followed Crash, though he often does this, loops around to places he's explored, yet often from a very different angle...and, really, it's just the look, for all I know, that makes me even think Crash, but who cares? I don't. This teaser is hot. I've seen the trailer for Prometheus, that looks like great fun, but this one, YES, as with most Cronenberg films, slips under the skin, haha, there's my loop, my nod to the movie mentioned above, which might simply mean
Yes
I enjoy movies, books, music, any- and every- thing that digs deep inside psychologically, physically, many more ways one cannot explain but are distinct to each of us. My own writing is indicative of this. I want to be touched, to be thrilled, to sense dread, to know passion in everything.
David Cronenberg. An auteur, sure; an existentialist, yeah; a creative individual always driven by his personal Passions and we are the better for it. Well, at least those of us who 'get' his work, his mindset.
I have No Idea how we ended up here, but gonna slip on out by leaving you with the teaser for Cosmopolis.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCFB-WPe9Ic&feature=player_embedded
And here's a cool shot of Cronenberg himself, with something in his eye.
What? Wow, you're correct, that's two blogs in a row with a photo reference to his film, Naked Lunch. So, what? You got a problem with that? hehe...
BTW, that script might be my fave script ever.
Okay, enough.
Enjoy!
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