I'm Trick or Beat

What my rather forced pun-based title is trying to say is that I'm sort of tired of Halloween related stuff. It probably has something to do with the fact that me and Aiden had a little horror movie marathon over the weekend. I find that I obsess over the horror genre for most of the month of October, then I usually get kinda depressed afterwards (horror can be a pretty negative genre) and usually spend most of November watching upbeat comedies (Steve Martin's the Jerk is always a pick-me-up) . But nonetheless I love a good horror story when I'm in the mood for it.

Frankly, I was very tempted to purchase a $64 hardcover of Weird Science which collected the first twenty issues of the classic '50's anthology series from EC comics, a company known for it's incredibly edgy story-telling that inspired countless writers and film-makers. Surprisingly, the book is being released by Gemstone, a company that publishes almost exclusively Disney-related material. I have to applaud Gemstone for their fine treatment of the material: the book itself is quite handsome, the coloring has been cleaned up and for each book they've gotten a HUGE name to do a forward for the books. Well, not all of the books. Weird Science has a foreword by George Lucas, Crime SuspenStories will have a foreword by Steven Spielberg and Tales from the Crypt will have a foreword by John Carpenter. Now I guess I'm making to much of a big deal out of famous creators saying that an acclaimed comic is cool but I just appreciate that these lauded creators are giving thanks to the comics that inspired them. Maybe I'm just looking for more people to legitimize my favourite medium.

My one problem is that the first volume of Vault of Horror has a foreword by Goosebumps creator RL Stine. Really? Don't get me wrong, I read his Goosebumps books in elementary school and enjoyed them at the time, but he's really not that great of a writer. I guess he's still popular, and I have no problem with him thanking those comics for inspiring him, but shouldn't someone... better do a foreword there?

Still, as I've stated I've never even read an EC comic yet of seen enough bits and pieces of the books as well as pastiches and homages to fall in love with the books and their tragic history. But it's sort of like talking about how Citizen Kane is the greatest film of all time without having seen it, but have seen countless references to it and documentaries about it. I really should get this book but... $64! Geez. Looks like you're on my Christmas list.

Anyhoo, Aiden and I watched some horror flicks over the weekend to sate our horror lust and while most of the movies floundered (despite being famous) they were fun.

The first one we watched was Cube Zero, the prequel to the clever (though imperfect) Canadian sci-fi horror film Cube. For those of you who don't know, the premise of Cube is that people wake up finding themselves in a cube with doors on each side that leads to a similar room (though some of them are trapped). There is no food or water, but there is a pattern to the cubes that hint at an exit. Cube Zero tries to do some interesting things, but ultimately fails. The biggest problem is the unbelievably silly villain who is essentially (as Aiden pointed out) the same bad guy from Last Action Hero. It really feels like a relatively good Cube prequel is being interrupted by a really bad episode of Lexx (and keep in mind I like Lexx). I do like how it ties into the first film, but it really wasn't worth the movie. The first one worked better because we are given very little information about what the Cube is and the viewers only have the characters' theories and their own to work with, while this film just tells you how and why the Cube is. Disappointing.

Friday the 13th was pretty funny, but that wasn't really what they were going for. Don't get me wrong, there are parts of this movie that are scary, but I just don't like the characters enough to want them to win. Also, Ralph, the local loony who tells the kids there all doomed is hilarious and really should have appeared in the movie more. "You're all doomed... DOOMED!" I don't think the film makers intended him to be as funny as I found him but I still think the writers wanted us to laugh at him a little. On the negative side, we see Kevin Bacon's ass and various guys dressed as nevernudes. If you're gay and you're looking for a healthy mix of horror, titillation and Ralph, then I highly recommend it. Still, the final battle is a bit silly and drags on due to the fact that the Last Girl is constantly given chances to either finish off or further subdue the killer but she doesn't take them. The pattern goes like this: girl is chased and cornered by killer, girl finds something to beat the crap out of the killer who drops the weapon, doubles over and seems to be temporarily knocked out or stunned or something, girl runs away some where else with no real plan. This happens like three times and it gets pretty tiring.

Hellraiser was also rather disappointing, especially because I liked the only book I read by Clive Barker. Said book was The Thief of Always and when I read it it quickly became obvious that the book was aimed at younger readers, but I still enjoyed the book quite a bit. Hellraiser, however, is just sort of boring. It's about some jerk named Frank who opens a portal to the afterlife in a run down house and finds himself facing grotesque divine torture at the hands of the Cenobites (not to be confused with Cinnabites, which are a delicious cinnamon treat). Later, Frank's brother moves in with his ice cold wife who secretly had an affair with Frank. A twist of fate has Frank partially resurrected and he convinces his Sister-in-Law to seduce poor idiots so she can take them home and Frank can kill them and drink their blood, which will give him more flesh. Unfortunately, because this is Britain, any scene of passion in this movie is about as sexy as a luke warm fish. Any scene where people are kissing was about as sexy as church. Characters talk about sex but when I look at them I can imagine it being anything by dry, cold and uninteresting. I mean, for a film about pleasure and pain they could have tried to spice it up a bit. And I'm not even asking the characters to be attractive. I just need to believe that these characters would fuck each other.

Finally, we watched Land of the Dead, which was easily the best movie of the four that me and Aiden watched. A lot of Dead fans didn't like this movie but I thought it was a great way to end the franchise, even if the characters weren't all that deep this time around (I can't speak for Day of the Dead, which I have yet to see) but I like the story and it is surprisingly the most upbeat of them. I actually like the fact that the zombies have evolved and have become tool users and in a way shows that the zombies are actually close to becoming human. Sure that might take some of the scariness out of the zombie concepts, but it makes the film more interesting over all. The humans aren't that interesting this time around but there is a lot of great moments. There's a scene in which a character is given a choice between being shot and becoming a zombie and I found it interesting that he chose the zombie, wanting to know "how the other half lives". Not nearly as good as Dawn of the Dead, but still pretty good.

Well, most of the films weren't great, but being able to laugh derisively at them with a friend made it much more enjoyable.