Time for another roll-up of classics. I’m stretching the term classic here to include anything 20+ years old… so a couple movies from 2000 are here. I know that’s wrong. That’s a moral and ethical crime. But 20 years man. How did that happen?
1936 – Things to Come – Sci-fi filmed based on the HG Wells novel The Shape of Things to Come. A series of vignettes detailing the future history of Earth from a disastrous 30 year war starting in 1940 through a techno-industrial utopia that idiots try to ruin since they think we’ve advanced too far. Because of course they would. Cool use of miniatures, matte painting, optical effects, and goofy sci-fi costumes make this a little gem of a time capsule. I rather dug it.
1952 – Fear and Desire – Stanley Kubrick’s first (student?) film. Four soldiers on the wrong side of the front line have to wander aimlessly and muse pointlessly about… whatever the script was thinking about. I’m not sure. This is a pretty tedious, repetitive, and ultimately rather pointless movie. I really thought it was going to be an intriguing investigation of the human condition or what it means to fight in a war. But ultimately it was just mush – a mush of people aimlessly wandering in a forest. Musing pseudo-philosophical thoughts. Like… how did Kubrick get so much better by Paths of Glory?
1963 – Jason and the Argonauts – not technically a first watch but since I have zero memory of any frame of this movie, new enough. Which is crazy since I remember loving it as a kid… in the dark days before VHS where I must have seen it on theatrical re-release. But I realized I only remember short clips from modern documentaries about Ray Harryhausen. And Harryhausen’s effects still hold up as pretty neat and remarkably elaborate. Less impressed by a gang of unimpressive sweaty actors in loin cloths row, row, rowing a boat around a bunch of Greek Island though. It doesn’t age well in that respect.
1966 – Kill, Baby… Kill! – got to get that punctuation right! A Mario Bava film – the first of his that I’ve seen and actually liked. And I liked it a lot. A very effective and moody ghost story about a doctor and inspector investigating a series of deaths in a provincial, superstitious town. A little ghost girl is the cause of this curse (along with her bouncing ball and insistent giggle that all this is hilarious). Very eerie and hallucinatory flick.
1981 – The Loveless – Willem Dafoe’s first feature film AND Kathryn Bigelow’s directorial debut. Dafoe plays a 50s greaser who motorvates into a small town and hangs out with his crew. Not a lot “happens” other than a lot of oozing sex and a low-key possibility for violence. It’s all for the sake of creating a mood, especially with a great classic rock ‘n roll soundtrack. Cool, kind of fascinating movie.
1982 – Halloween III: Season of the Witch – somehow missed this one all these years even though I knew most of the plot. I thought I’d seen it but watching a History of Halloween video, I realized I didn’t. And now I wish I had. I was surprised how good this was, keeping in mind its synth-heavy era in which it was made. Much better than I expected.
1983 – Sleepaway Camp – I knew the surprise twist ending going into this flick so that swayed my overall feeling about it. Because it was meant to be a mystery as to the killer but the killer’s murderous gaze always seemed pretty on-the-nose. Otherwise, this isn’t too atypical for an 80s era summer camp movie AND 80s era summer camp slasher movie. Was surprised by the (comparably) limited splatter and the less limited number of crop-tops and short shorts. Guys, we need to talk…
2000 – Joint Security Area – A Korean drama by Park Chan-Wook set on the DMZ between N. and S. Korea. Brilliantly plotted. It starts as a movie you think you’ve seen before (I can handle the truth!) and then subtly shifts into something else. And that something is so profoundly human, humane, and genuine… but they planted that seed. We know this can’t last and will only end badly. It’s just the details we then have to learn… and sit though.
2000 – Versus – A lunatic Japanese action/zombie/yakuza mashup flick without a thought spent for story or character. Which, hey, at least they own up to it and just give us constant splattery mayhem shot with some gusto and creativity. A very low budget film by all appearances… and the only real problem is that it runs 2 full hours and this kind of nonsense overkill doesn’t work for me for that long.