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Author Topic: Shocktober Group Marathon 2016  (Read 27932 times)

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2016
« Reply #30 on: October 07, 2016, 09:21:49 PM »
Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)
"Junior's not going to drag me into another one of those scary pictures."
"No, they ought not to be allowed to make those pictures just to frighten people."

Is there anyone following this thread who hasn't yet seen Arsenic and Old Lace? I watched it again today and it's another great film to kick off a month of Horror. I've watched it over a dozen times over the years and continue to gain new perspectives on it. This time I noticed there are a number of meta touches where someone comments on how similar their current situation mirrors something they saw in a film or play. I also saw the genius of the structure, which begins as a screwball comedy, then becomes a dark screwball comedy, then the two sisters lower the lights and the film goes horror for a while. It's only in the 2nd half when Capra combines the genres with laughs served chilled.

The performance by Cary Grant is big, but by being bigger and more shrill than he usually is, it creates moments I've never seen from Grant anywhere else, like the famous triple-double take, which is part of a lengthy wordless dawning of the situation, or the scene where a fight breaks out, but the camera stays on him, sitting on the stairs and mumbling to himself.

I'm amazed by Priscilla Lane, in the impossible role of a woman in love who is constantly pushed aside. Her job is to take abuse and quickly forgive it, and Lane is just able to keep to the side of forgiveness even though her husband makes her wait all night for a honeymoon that never happens and in one moment picks her up and literally throws her out of the house. It's a film full of great performances, but if I had to give an award the winner would be Peter Lorre, who is menacing, and sad and hilarious all at once. If you haven't yet seen Arsenic and Old Lace I can recommend it simply on the basis of this being Lorre at his best.
RATING: * * * 1/2
« Last Edit: November 09, 2021, 03:05:50 PM by 1SO »

oldkid

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2016
« Reply #31 on: October 07, 2016, 09:33:40 PM »
I was comparing a drug dealer I know yesterday to the women in this film.  They all think they are providing a benefit to their "men", but they are really making misery.  I love the way this film successfully brings humor to a horrific situation, thus reducing the awful reality.
"It's not art unless it has the potential to be a disaster." Bansky

1SO

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Shocktober Group Marathon 2016: The Nightmare Before Christmas
« Reply #32 on: October 07, 2016, 09:55:02 PM »

The Nightmare Before Christmas - Twas a Long Time Ago
"Now, you've probably wondered where holidays come from.
If you haven't I'd say it's time you begun."


I don't know what I expect to find giving The Nightmare Before Christmas the "One Chapter At A Time" analysis. It's a film I watch every year around this time. A Top 100 for me and for Mrs. 1SO. I first saw it in a Sneak Preview the night before it officially opened in 1993. I've seen it in 3D and IMAX. On VHS, Laserdisc, DVD and Blu-Ray. I owned the soundtrack on cassette and CD and mp3, where I also have the cover versions of songs by Marilyn Manson, Fiona Apple and Panic! at the Disco.

What I hope is that I can cut through all that nostalgia and articulate some of the reasons why I think the film endures as a classic, often under-appreciated as a movie because it's become resentable as the backbone of a Hot Topic merchandising machine. My theory for the film's greatness is the right amounts of Tim Burton, Henry Selick and Danny Elfman, and it all begins here, in the opening narration. I remember this being Patrick Stewart on the CD. In the film it sounds like the voice for Santa, but I couldn't find any credit on IMDB.

The circle of trees, each with holiday-specific theming down to the doorknob and rocks in front of each tree, hints at more worlds beyond just the two that we see. I would love to see these other worlds, though I'm glad plans for a sequel never materialized.

There's a lens flare between Thanksgiving and Christmas. I don't know enough about the technical details of the film to know if this was something that had to be artificially created. The opening shot is one of the few that could be created with a miniature camera without having to do any stop motion animation. Must've been nice for them to get 45 seconds over with so easily, when the rest of the project requires incredible patience.
Rating: * * * - Good

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2016
« Reply #33 on: October 07, 2016, 09:58:26 PM »
I was comparing a drug dealer I know yesterday to the women in this film.  They all think they are providing a benefit to their "men", but they are really making misery.  I love the way this film successfully brings humor to a horrific situation, thus reducing the awful reality.
The two ladies are incredibly sweet and everyone sees Jonathan as the true evil in the family, but the ladies are mass murderers and when we meet them they are starting to become casual and over-eager about it, attempting murder within moments of meeting someone.

Sandy

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2016
« Reply #34 on: October 07, 2016, 09:58:42 PM »
Arsenic and Old Lace! Wonderfully strange movie!


1SO, I chalked the wolf kiss up to showing how her heightened libido was kicking in. Taking her top off in front of all the spectators seemed much more degrading.

Bondo

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2016
« Reply #35 on: October 07, 2016, 11:32:26 PM »
Darling (2015)

This film is what I imagine would be the senior film from some dude film studies student whose favorite films are The Shining and Eraserhead. Unfortunately, because he learned from bad, overrated films, he thinks that the key to horror is eerie music and a bunch of quick cuts. He must have skipped the classes that taught story or character (you know, the true sources of suspense, stakes).

One review capsule at metacritic says people who found The Witch boring may have the same reaction, which is just cruel toward The Witch which has a clear narrative and very strong thematic context. The Witch may well be the best horror film of the year, and this may well be the worst.

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2016
« Reply #36 on: October 07, 2016, 11:40:38 PM »

Murder Party (2007)

First feature by writer/director Jeremy Saulnier (Blue Ruin, Green Room) about a guy bored with Halloween who finds an invitation to a party where the other attendees are art students competing for a grant by demonstrating the most creative way to execute and present their surprised guest. Unlike Saulnier's thrillers, this is a comedy, though it features some of his original flair in regards to the presentation of violence. There are shocks in both the suddenness of death and the level of detail of some of the wounds. Besides that and the welcome presence of Macon Blair, there's very little that reminds me of Saulnier's later work.

Though the premise suggests torture porn, the story focuses on a group dynamic and not at all about pain infllcited on the guest. Having no money, Saulnier was smart to keep the location simple and the camera moves constantly to make the film more cinematic than usual first efforts. It also gives the film a manic energy I don't find in his more deliberate, tightly-controlled follow-ups.

Performances are uneven and often too broad. Even Blair suffers in this regard, coming off like an angry Zach Galifianakis. The best performance is by Stacy Rock, who also appears in Blue Ruin. The Halloween setting means Saulnier gets to pour on the cinematic references, though it's done in an affectionate Edgar Wright way. None of it is scary, though the violence is extreme at times, including an original bit of body horror that compares to the toxic man in Robocop.
Rating: * * 1/2
« Last Edit: June 25, 2020, 09:02:53 AM by 1SO »

1SO

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2016
« Reply #37 on: October 07, 2016, 11:45:01 PM »
While I have no interest in Darling, I'm curious how someone influenced by The Shining and Eraserhead would favor quick cuts? It seems easier to draw a line from The Shining to The Witch in terms of mood and sense of time and place.

Bondo

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2016
« Reply #38 on: October 08, 2016, 12:13:10 AM »
Umm...there are tons of quick cuts in The Shining...the twins flashing in and out, etc. Eraserhead was more a reference for the musical side. Of course, there are more than just stylistic comparisons to be made to The Shining.

oldkid

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Re: Shocktober Group Marathon 2016
« Reply #39 on: October 08, 2016, 12:33:16 AM »
The Nightmare Before Christmas, I

1SO, I think you hit the nail on the head: Burton, Selick and Elfman, at their very best, balanced in this classic, glorious film.

Part of it has to do with the background.  There is a nostalgia to the film, even when I saw it the first time in the theatre.  This is because the context is the claymation Christmas specials that many of us grew up on in the 70s and 80s.  The most popular of them was Santa Claus is Comin' To Town and Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, but NBX draws heavily on two lesser known holiday-themed specials: Here Comes Peter Cottontail and The Year Without a Santa Claus.

Here Comes Peter Cottontail is an origin story of the Easter Bunny, where Peter has to travel through time with a worm companion in order to defeat Iron Tail, the evil bunny.  In this travel, Peter goes from one holiday world to another, delivering different kinds of colored eggs, all holiday themed.  This, plus Rudolph's Happy New Year, introduces the idea of different holidays having different worlds, all reflecting the different holiday themes.  If anyone wanted to see the different worlds, they are found in Peter's story, plus the New Year world in Rudolph's story.

Here, the thought is to bring a consistency to the worlds, with a "wood between the worlds" idea drawn from The Magician's Nephew by C. S. Lewis.  A wood with doors allowing one to pass easily from one holiday world to another.  Much less clunky than diving through a calendar with a flying worm.
"It's not art unless it has the potential to be a disaster." Bansky