Earlier in 2009 (during April 2nd to April 23rd to be precise) Los Angeles-based art gallery Gallery 1988 hosted the Idiot Box Art Show. 100 artists contributed work inspired from various old (predominantly 80's-early 90's) TV shows that have become ingrained in the minds of many who grew up in that era, or were exposed to such shows later on in perpetual rerun hell. There were some really cool artworks included in the exhibition.
Here is a link to where you can see a whole bunch of them. They range from the cute to the absurd to the sinister.
Unfortunately it appears a fairly substantial chunk of these pieces are no longer available to view on the site I just linked you. But there are still plenty of gems in there. The names of the pieces and the artists who created them are still listed under the pictures that are no longer there, so a bit of copy/pasting into google should sort you out if you're absolutely dying to see what a particular missing artwork looks like. Vortex fave Jim Mahfood was one of the contributing artists. His piece isn't included in that link, but you can see it here.
I admit I don't watch all that much TV, and some of the shows referenced I'm not at all familiar with. But that's fine, I still enjoy the art as it is. I find it interesting to see how a pop-culture force such as a successful television show inspires people who express themselves in other mediums such as pictorial images and sculpture. Even though the shows have finished their run they continue to live on in the hearts and minds of many. Sometimes this a good thing, sometimes not (I hate you Urkel). However, I find it even more interesting how certain artists in this collective have filtered these shows through their own twisted psyches to end up with unique creative product which at times can be amusing, captivating, and in some instances... rather disturbing.
But also very entertaining. So go check it out won't you pleeeeease?
My cousin Zöe has been bugging me for a while now to do a guest column for Randomitronica, so after much whining about it on her part I have finally decided to concede to her wishes. So take this as a warning people. I’m just going to leave her entry the way it is and not proof read any of it. I have added some pictures to this post though. As its Randomitronica tradition to have pictures with these things. There wasn’t any fire by the way, it was just me forgetting about how Zöe’s toaster is incapable of doing anything but burning toast. -Chloé
Greetings folks, I’m Chloé’s cousin Zöe. That’s all the introduction you’re gonna get from me. I don’t know you people!! No names have been changed to protect anyone. I’m writing this on Sunday morning. I currently have a hangover that could crush the skull of a less seasoned individual than myself. I can hear someone stumbling about in the living room coughing and muttering something about “dancing pants.” Guess who that is. Cousin Chloé and I got up to a few things this weekend, so seeing as I was going to do a guest Randomitronica I’ll write about that. On Friday night we went to see Pearl Jam in concert, as I needed to do a review of the gig for work. That was fine by me. I got two free tickets out of the deal. I gave one to Chloé as a birthday present, despite her protests that she’d “rather have [her] tits ripped apart by weasels than listen to one single second of any of the languorous pap Pearl Jam has shat out for the last 13 years”. I cared not for her whinging. It saved me having to actually pay for a birthday present for her. I finally managed to convince her to come with me by letting her know that a certain guy she fancies (we’ll just call him “Simon P. Southberry”) would be coming along too. Ah lust. It can be so handy when it comes to getting people to do what you want them to do. Liam Finn plus Ben Harper & the I dunno, Deflated Ballsacks or something were playing support for Pearl Jam, but they’re both rubbish so we just stayed near the bar while they were playing. Jesus Christ the beer there was expensive. $11 for a bottle of Corona? That’s insane!
Where was I? Oh yeah, so Pearl Jam started their set only about 25 minutes after the tickets said they would, so that was pretty good going. Some giant sasquatch of a man drunkenly stumbled into me during Pearl Jam’s first song (Daughter) which wasn’t too cool because I’m small and was already half pissed by this point. So I did the only decent thing I could do really, and tripped him up as he careened out of my personal space. Ha ha! What a dunce. Chloé wasn’t too happy about that cos by tripping the big guy up it caused him to fall onto Simon, who spilled his drink (red wine) on Chloé’s white blouse. But who cares. Whoooo! Pearl Jam! Pearl Jam put on a very solid performance, the band played pretty much flawlessly, and Eddie Vedder was in fine voice. But they were at the end of a tour, so you’d expect the band to be tight and firing on all cylinders. It was also good to hear the road hadn’t worn out Vedder’s vocals. About two thirds through the gig it looked like he was soothing his throat with some kind of spirit from a big-ass bottle he had near him. Probably why he invited Neil and Liam Finn up on stage with him during the second encore for a rendition of that Chris Knox song “Not Given Lightly”. Which was a moment that was both patriotically rousing and incredibly fucking cheesy. Some people held their lighters aloft during this song. I wasn’t sure if they were trying to be ironic, they were full of boozed up silliness, or if they were just idiots. Probably all three. I wanted them to die.
They had a huge monitor on either side of the stage so you could see the band members clearly as various cameras focussed on what various members were doing at any given time. This was very much appreciated by me, even though it made me realise just how much of a walking cadaver Stone Gossard looks like nowadays. Seriously. If you shaved that guy’s head he’d be Nosferatu incarnate. But Nosfuratu with a guitar. In other words, getting dangerously close to farcical territory, ya hear me Gossard? It was cool to see Matt Cameron live again. He’s one of my fave drummers, and the only other time I’ve witnessed him live was during a Soundgarden concert many years back (coincidentally at the same venue this PJ gig was at). I prefer his drumming in Soundgarden though, his beats in Pearl Jam are more pedestrian, not as inventive. But whatevz. You adapt your style to suit the band eh. I’m a drummer myself, I know how it goes. I wish it had been Soundgarden playing. That would’ve cheered Chloé up. The grizzling bitch.
Pearl Jam played for quite a while, about two and a half hours or so. We left a few songs before the end of the concert in order to avoid a huge crowd of people all leaving at the same time. We could still clearly hear the band playing when we were way down the street from the venue. We then had to wait as a multitude of taxis went past us while Chloé was stubbornly smoking a cigarette. I tried explaining to Chloé that we needed a taxi that could accept credit cards so we shouldn’t be mucking about, but she wasn’t having a bar of it. Well we finally managed to get an appropriate taxi, so Simon, Chloé and I went back to my place. The rest of my housemates had gone down to Taranaki for the weekend so it was just us in the house. Which was good, cos we felt like being rowdy. We proceeded to hang out in the living room, threw the old I-Ching, ate some chips, drank some daiquirís and had some whippets. Chloé didn’t have any whippets though, because she considers them to be “retarded”. We had the music channel playing on the TV, they played a bunch of Pearl Jam, which was nice, although I was kind of glad when the Pearl Jam stuff finished as Chloé was giving me the evil eye after a while. Then they started playing a Billy Idol marathon, which we were thoroughly entertained by.
By this time we were all starting to get pretty sloshed. I remember Rob Zombie’s “Foxy Foxy” clip came on the TV, which made Chloé stand up and roar “goddammit what the fuck is this turgid dross? Rob Zombie’s had a fucking lobotomy!” at the top of her lungs, spilling chips everywhere. It was really funny. I think the outburst scared Simon a bit. Or maybe it was just the whippets making him look a trifle unsettled. Simon wanted to play truth or dare but its no use playing that with Chloé and I as we’ve known each other since we were little kids, and pretty much know all of each other’s sordid little secrets. My recollections of the night get fairly blurry after that. I got up to go to the loo at some point and when I returned Chloé and Simon had disappeared. I assumed Chloé had squirreled him away in the spare bedroom to have her wicked way with him, but she soon returned, complaining that Simon had passed out on her. Boys. Useless.
So then we watched Pumpkinhead. I woke up several hours later on the couch feeling like someone had shanked me in the head. Chloé was busy burning toast. After we’d both had showers, woken Simon and kicked him out of the house sent him on his merry way I got a text message from my pal Johnny who was having a barbeque round at his place. Chloé had a whole bunch of mp3s that she wanted to give to him for his radio show, so we took a bus round to his house at about noon. We sat about in Johnny’s “man cave” (a smallish sunroom in the front of his house) for a while drinking Coronas and watching random bits of Samurai Jack episodes. At some point one of Johnny’s mates arrived and we watched a clip on youtube he’d directed of some local political rally. There was an angry heckler guy in this video who got escorted from the premises by some rather large security dudes. Johnny’s mate had filmed the whole debacle. The angry heckler dude called out one of the security guys (“whatcha gonna do now ya fat maggot?!”) which I found so funny I laughed beer through my nose.
There were about ten of us hanging out in the house at this point. We all decided to go down to the park near Johnny’s house, as there was a free concert happening down there and you could bring your booze along. Johnny still had the 3/4 full bottle of Chivas Regal that I’d left at his house a few weeks earlier, so I took that along with me. Chloé wasn’t too keen on the idea of me bringing the whiskey along, she was all like “you shouldn’t take that with us, remember what happened last time you drank that stuff”. But she needn’t have bothered as I wasn’t going to listen. Because I don’t remember what happened last time. We got to the concert thingy, and Johnny and his mate went off to find some people to film. A bunch of us sat up on a hill drinking and watching the various musical acts perform. Che Fu played a set. He was in Supergroove y’know. He was called Che Ness back then. His set was really lame and boring MOR RnB shit. I got frustrated with it after awhile and kept yelling that he should “shut up and fuckin’ play Scone Farm” until Chloé pointed out that Che never sang on that particular Supergroove song. Ah tits, man. I wish he’d played it anyway, that would have been something. Don’t get me wrong though, to each their own with their personal music tastes. I just flat out don’t care for RnB. Che’s a pretty decent, versatile singer and his voice suits the RnB style, I just miss his “rock vocal” style he employed in Supergroove. By that point the whiskey was starting to kick in so we thought it best that we walked back up the hill to Johnny’s while we were still able to stand. I think we lost a guy on the way.
Johnny and a couple of his mates tended to the barbeque while Chloé and Johnny’s missus Trudy played Tekken 6 on Trudy’s Xbox. I just walked around the house talking to myself and humming Depeche Mode songs. I was to find out later that rather than humming the songs like I thought I was I was actually singing them very loudly and out of tune. And apparently my house wanderings had cumulated into me sitting in the empty bathtub for about forty minutes. But hey, at least I didn’t fall into the barbeque.
I don’t remember if I managed to get out of the bathtub myself or if I was dragged out, but I do remember that by that point there were way more people there and all the barbeque had been eaten. Bastards. At some point I had a cigarette, I think, as there is half of one in my pocket. I must have been pretty soused to have done that.
And that’s pretty much all I remember. I’ll have to ask old Coughing Girl out there what went down during the rest of the evening, all I know is somehow Chloé and I made it back to my house. I can hear her yelling. Something about Rob Zombie. Must be that clip on again. Holy shit the fire alarm just started up.
A fine example of the sort of things people got up to for the sake of entertainment before television, video games and the Internet arrived to wreak havoc upon us all. Click on the photo and see it full size I say. It was taken circa 1929 at Revere Beach, Massachusetts, in da US of A. My (admittedly brief) research on lion dromes indicates that during the time period when this photo was taken, one could buy a ticket to watch this sort of inspired lunacy right under one's nose for around 10-15 cents, which was about the price of a movie ticket in those days. Motordromes are still operating today (although they're not nearly as popular as they were back in the 1930's when these events were at their peak of public interest), but minus the lions*.
Ladies and gents, I would like to play a video clip for you.
Its a song about meat. Or, more specifically, the processing of meat. It was written by a band named Skeptics (or The Skeptics), who formed in 1979 in Palmerston North, New Zealand. The song featured here is entitled AFFCO, which is an acronym for Auckland Farmers Freezing Company Ltd. Here is a brief description of the company AFFCO, taken from their official website: "AFFCO is one of New Zealand's leading food companies, having operated in this competitive and innovative sector of New Zealand’s primary sector since 1904. AFFCO processes and exports more than 150,000 tonnes of meat products and by products every year and is a major earner of foreign exchange earnings for the country."
I shall warn you now, it is a video that depicts, in a very graphic way, what goes on every day in a meat processing plant. The video itself has stirred up quite a lot of controversy over the years, but its worth noting that the band (and film makers) are not making a case for animal rights here, nor are they celebrating the killing of animals for human consumption. This is a song about people who "pack meat", and thus the video clip and the song itself are merely a reflection of the band's impartial stance on this issue. Plus it features lead singer David d'Ath (who died of leukaemia on the 4th of September 1990) wrapped in glad wrap and covered in baby oil and food colouring. That's got to be good for you all to see.
The song to my ears is a wonderful thing. I love the graunchy, stuttering and propulsory nature of this tune. The scuzzy, buzzing guitars, the clunky bass, the barked vocals and the claudicant drums all combine to make a rather selcouth aural experience. Especially for New Zealand in 1987. It comes from the excellent album Skeptics III, which is well worth checking out. If you can find it, aahahahaa. I have it on one of my hard drives in mp4 format.
What interests me is the sheer amount of public umbrage that has been stirred up over the years over this clip. Sure, some portions of it are by no means pleasant to watch, but this is what happens in an abattoir. I'm not going to sit here and judge anyone if they happen to enjoy eating meat, or if they are vehemently opposed to the practise. That's their business. What I do find rather ridiculous though are people who eat meat and yet get all upset when shown how the meat gets to their table. The picture below that I've slapped together is a fine representation of the process, but notice how it misses a very important step, which is how the meat goes from animal to that fancy shit people pay too much money for at restaurants.
OK, so that's not sheep meat he's eating there, but you get the idea. He looks like a putz anyway.
I myself also have a very nonpartisan viewpoint on the issue of animal processing for human consumption. This post is merely about the song and its video clip. Hopefully I have come across as neither for or against this particular practice. Whatever views you may personally hold on this issue are none of my concern, and I'm certainly not here to judge either way.
You can read more about how the video was conceived and made by clicking here to read an account of the video's production by the guy who initiated, directed, shot, and edited it. A well written mini-history of the Skeptics can be found here.
Right then. A few days ago Jimmy Misanthrope started making up useless monsters on his twitter, with the hashtag #uselessmonsters. This was primarily just for the sheer hell of it, but also it was a reaction to the usual boring and stupid things* that end up being hashtagged to the point of ending up in twitter's "trending topics". Things such as Bad Romance, #rihannasforehead, Zenyatta, Jedward, all of which I've just this moment culled from twitter's current trending topics. For those who are unfamiliar with twitter, adding a hashtag to a word or phrase will automatically add that hashtagged word/phrase to a list automatically generated by twitter that includes all the examples of that word/phrase that have been hashtagged and tweeted. *Boring and stupid topics, as a great deal of people are themselves boring and stupid, yes?
Twitter hashtags are yet another odious example of humankind's innate herd mentality. Something that is ripe for people like me to take the piss out of then. But whatever. This post is about a hashtag subject that started with "werepotato" and fairly rapidly expanded to include all sorts of wondrously creative examples of sheer silliness. Some were awesome, some were facetious, some were just plain stupid. And some my friends were utterly, utterly useless. In keeping with the spirit of the thing in other words. Listed below are all the twitter entries (and the people who tweeted them) that came with the hashtag #uselessmonsters that actually listed a useless monster and weren't just replies or reactions to the topic itself. They are listed in the order from the first person who started tweeting useless monsters to the last person who did.
@Bryn_Colvin Pretty much any Disney cartoon monster. The Black Cauldron is especially bad, ruined a good book that. The basalicks.
@Dagger_Arcana A one winged, bubble breathing dragon. Cerberus, the foofy poodle guardian of Hell. A blind basilisk. A blind cockatrice. A mute banshee. Paraplegic mummy.
@Tom_AIAC Brittany Spears. Flava Flav, yeeeeah boy! The Toxic Meanderer.
@LaBarceloneta The Adorable Snowman. Cerberus after a bizarre dumbwaiter accident. Baronet Kong. Cthulu's Friend, Skippy the Huggable Lil' Bunny. Frankenstein's Mopper. The Appendix-less Horseman. The Chupacabriolet. Jack the Inadequate-Tipper. The Minotard. Were-Wolfgang Puck. Swamp Thingy. Vampire Hugger D. Dorcs. Medouchea.
@mkmiddleton Were-Wolf Blitzer. Larry King Kong. iPodzilla.
@joangeluk In far off transylvania there lives a vampire duck. It's not his bite, that turns you white, but a very nasty suck. Were-Wolf Blass. Codzilla. Dr Jekyll and Dr Jekyll.
@essjayess Talos made of jellybeans #harryhausenFTW #godIwishtherewasoneofthese
So there you go folks. An example of the avalanche of odd that one little werepotato is capable of creating. Notice that there was not one single mention of sphinxes. That is because nobody fucks with The Sphynx, OK?
The most tenebrous of Halloween greetings to you all! To mark the occasion I've prepared an interview with Julz, a comic making lady from Cape Town, South Africa, and the artist and writer for the glorious spookycute webcomic Something to Cry About.
Something to Cry About focusses (so far) on three young ladies of the goth persuasion, cheerful Serah Tonin, sharp-witted Medi Kate, and main character Anne Aesthetic, a somewhat moody and introspective lass, who is dealing with the recent ending of a romance. Dealing with it very much like this:
I stumbled across this comic a few weeks ago purely by chance (I was browsing through someone's twitter friends and came across the StCA twitter, and my curiosity was piqued by the twitter avatar), and I can say in all confidence that I'm very pleased I did. As someone who is myself very much a hopeless romantic (the operative word in my situation being "hopeless") I can really relate to what she's going through. Anne's starting to come around a bit though. Thankfully she has the aforementioned two friends to help her through this. The fact that its currently Halloween has probably helped her state of mind as well. Personally, I'm a huge fan of the look of this comic. I love the big pupil-less eyes, the girls' various outfits, and the little details included within the comic, such as boxes of tissues being marked (t)issues. And despite it being rooted firmly within the aesthetics of "goth culture", the comic is very lively and genuinely funny. It has a playful sort of humour which I love to bits. So I decided to email Julz and ask if she'd like to do an interview, to which she agreed to. I then sat down and tried to come up with some interview questions that were interesting to both Julz and anyone who might read the interview, and that would also make for an informative interview experience. Julz graciously emailed me back with some mighty fine answers. But enough of my rambling and gushing. On with the interview!
Chloé Kovac:By the look of your site, and the subject matter contained within, its apparent that you have an affinity for the, shall we say, "spookier" things in life. What lead you down the path of spookydom? Was there a pivitol moment in your life that led you towards this particular appetence? Or was it a combination of things?
Julz: I was always a bit of a ghoulish kid, fascinated by anything spooky, even if it gave me nightmares. I always loved how ghost stories and the idea of monsters hiding in the closet stirred my imagination and gave me the shivers. I hope it doesn't sound too clichéd, but an awesome moment for me was the first time I watched Tim Burton's Nightmare Before Christmas. It was just the perfect combination of weirdly eerie and totally loveable, and I've been smitten with Mr. Burton's work - and the spooky/cute aesthetic - ever since.
CK:Its always good to get a creator's thoughts on their comic. How would you sum up Something To Cry About?
J: I'm hoping it's something that will make people laugh and see the lighter side of some of life's big, dramatic, heartbreaking moments. And sometimes it's just an excuse for me to whine about something!
CK:How do you go about constructing each page? How long does a typical page take to do?
J: My methods are really primitive! Originally I wanted to do the whole comic by hand, but after scanning a couple of my character images and re-drawing them in FreeHand, I found the result was much smoother and easier to work with. So once I decide what's going into a comic, I draw the characters in their various poses in FreeHand, then drop those images into my PhotoShop template, which includes the 4 panels and their borders. The amount of time it takes depends on the content of that comic - the quickest so far has been 1 or 2 hours, and the longest took about 7 hours.
CK:How long have you been developing this comic?
J: I've been drawing pictures of Anne for a couple of years now, but she never had a name or personality. I started thinking seriously about working on a webcomic about a year ago, and eventually came up with the title, concept and characters in April this year. I spent a couple of weeks working on the first few strips and getting the site set up, before launching in May.
CK:Is this your first comic, or have you worked on other comics prior to this?
J: No, this is my first. Although I do have some rather insane and illegible childhood attempts stashed away somewhere.
CK:Besides drawing StCA, what are your other interests? Do you find these extra curricular interests infuse the energy of your comic in a helpful way?
J: I'm a graphic designer and copywriter, so I'm in a fortunate position where my work and hobbies blur into each other. I love drawing, scribbling and doodling, which sometimes helps me find the inspiration I need. Sometimes it helps to get away from my desk and get some exercise - I'm lucky enough to live close to the beach, so taking a walk there really clears my head. I'm also a voracious reader; beautiful prose often inspires me, and I'm totally mad about comic book art. Occasionally I also paint truly awful paintings and bake disastrous cupcakes - which really are worth crying about :)
CK:Do you have any creative pals and/or people who you find influential that you'd like to include some links to in this interview?
J: There are so many awesome webcomics and talented artists out there! Check out StCA's 'Links for the Lonely' section for a list of my favourites. Two webcomics I'm really loving at the moment are Eerie Cuties (http://www.eeriecuties.com/), an adorable horror-comedy about teenage monsters in high school, and Evil Diva, (http://www.evildivacomics.com/) about a super-cute little demon who just wants to be good. Both of them have that spooky/cute combination that I love.
So there you have it folks. A little bit of background info on the creator and her creative process, which should serve you well when you go and have a look at the eldritch delights contained within the Something to Cry About website.
Halloween is drawing near, so what better time to celebrate with a couple of fine filmic examples of spookystuff? With that in mind, I've decided to post a couple of clips of a creepy nature. Creepy as in "designed to give the viewer goosebumps" not creepy as in "old man lurking around a park wearing nothing but a long raincoat" creepy. Hopefully its dark where you are so you can turn off the lights, put on some headphones and turn up the volume in order to enjoy the full effect. Mwooohahahahhaaa!
First up Smile, is a short CGI enhanced student film from Israel by Yuval Markovich and Noam Abta, produced at Bezalel Academy of Arts & Design in Jerusalem some time ago. Warning: the preceding link is to their showreel, which features various instances of at times rather graphic animated violence.
Egads, that cat!
Personally, I regard Smile as being a fine example of creeping paranoia in action.
Next up is a trailer for the excellent 2007 French animated film Fear[s] of the Dark (Peur[s] du noir) which is all kinds of gorgeous.
If you enjoyed that I highly recommend you track down a copy of it. Its masterfully constructed and works on a number of visceral levels, really worming its way into one's subconscious in a delicious fashion. You can read a bit more about it here. Official website (in English) is here. And (at the time of writing) you can see a segment of it on youtube right here.
There are three main reasons why movies are remade. One is money. Two is that the producers/director/writer wants to present a new twist to an older version of a film. The third, and possibly stupidest in my opinion, is when a foreign movie is remade in order to be more palatable to the audience of the country(ies) remaking it. For example, the huge proliferation of Asian (predominantly Japanese) horror films remade for Western audiences.
Before I go any further with this post I'd like to point out that in most cases I hate remakes, and believe that in many cases they do a great disservice to the original movies. Having stated that though, there are a bunch of notable exceptions to this opinion of mine. John Carpenter's The Thing and the David Cronenberg directed 1986 remake of The Fly are two examples of remakes which I love to bits. But for every well crafted movie that takes the original source material and does something truly outstanding with it there are a myriad of insipid, drivel riddled and asinine remakes of classic films that really, really fuckin' irk me, that drag the good name of the original film through the mud, and generally serve to make the culture of which I am a part just that more stupid. I mean, the Shutter remake? WTF was that? The original was genuinely unsettling, but the remake is about as scary as a plate of Grandma's scones.
Now me, I ain't no film snob. Sure, I love a lot of obscure, hard to find, esoteric, "arty" and non-mainstream/commercial films. A lot of films with (gasp!) subtitles, that aren't in English. A lot of films with subject matter/approaches that aren't considered to be all that palatable to a lot of folks. But there's a vast array of popular and commercially focused films which I love also. I could say in all seriousness that I'm somewhat obssessed with films. I adore the act of watching movies, to me its not at all a passive experience. I get very wrapped up in it. A really good film to me is a life altering experience. A really good film can change a person, affect them deeply in their souls. A quality film sticks in one's mind long after its been viewed, rolling about in the conscious/subconscious. A good film can be watched time and time again, rewarding the viewer by revealing new elements/layers/things to discover about it with each subsequent viewing. A good film is a richly rewarding experience, and I spend a fair old amount of time and energy seeking out films to get into, and add to my collection, which is... large. So in short, I'm very passionate about the medium of film. And this is why the subject of cack-handed remakes raises my ire more than most.
Now, its no big revelation that studios can oftentimes be a pretty fuckin' lazy lot. There's the mode of thinking that goes like this; "hey, that movie was pretty successful. If we remake it its quite likely the remake will also be successful! Its a surefire winner! Why risk money on something new when we can just play it safe and redo something that was a proven winner the first time round?" Well, studio executive people, that original movie you feel would be so bankable if was remade, in the majority of cases it was the first version of that movie. Which means it wouldn't exist to be remade if a bunch of jerks had decided it wasn't worth putting money into to making in the first place.
I know all about the art vs commerce quagmire. I know how risky it can be for a studio to invest capital into anything that they don't have a good idea will make them money, or at least make back the money they invested in it. But Jesus Christ, if we just go on remaking films, or making films that are of a similar premise to other films (a la that whole "swapping bodies" pack of films; 1988's Vice Versa [itself a remake of the 1948 film directed by Peter Ustinov], 2003's Freaky Friday [a remake of the 1976 film. Notice a trend developing here folks?] the list goes on and goes on further still), then the medium of film itself just slides further and further on down into bland and homogenised rubbish, with all the excitement, entertainment and thought provocation sucked clean out of it. Then you may as well just give up and go watch television. Do we really want this to happen? Really? So movie remakes are a (sometimes) financially successful enterprise. Whoop-dee-fuckin-do. Its pretty damned lame if you ask me.
So, on to the second main reason films are given the remake treatment, which is the old "filmmakers wish to present an updated/new interpretation of/alternate take on an existing film" scenario. Some of the films in this category are excellent, such as the two films I mentioned at the start of this post. Some are completely pointless, such as Gus Van Sant's almost shot-for-shot reamake of Hitchcock's filmic interpretation of the Robert Bloch novel Psycho. Most are pretty dire. Some of these remakes are made by the same directors or producers or writers (or a combination thereof) as the original (or the version of the film that immediately preceded it). For instance, the director of the 1986 The Fly, David Cronenberg, is the guy who's attatched to direct and potentially write the new remake. Whatever dude. The version of the film you did in the eighties is one of my all time favourite films, but if you think you can improve on it... Will you be inviting Jeff Goldblum back to reprise his pivotal role as Seth Brundle, as Goldblum's performance was one of the main things that made the movie so awesome? Will Geena Davis also be in this new version? Surely she doesn't have anything better to do at the moment right? Please oh please don't screw it up Cronenberg. You don't want to break my wee heart now do you? OK, enough rhetorical questions aimed at a guy who won't ever be reading this blog. Let's move on to the third main reason films get remade.
The "audience won't understand this/won't like to bother reading subtitles/are a pack of xenophobes" notion. Plenty of film remakes in this category. The American remakes of The Ring, and later The Grudge are both popular examples of this. Interestingly, Takashi Shimizu, the guy who directed the Japanese The Grudge (Ju-on 呪怨) series of movies also directed the American version. And Hideo Nakata, the director of the two Japanese Ring films, went on to direct the American remake of The Ring 2. He's also on board to direct the American The Ring 3, but who gives a fuck, right? There are many many films out there that deal with the classic Japanese horror trope of the "vengeful ghost", including the original version of that movie Shutter that I mentioned before, though that was a Thai film. Actually, if I may digress briefly, if you're a fan of those "creepy Asian ghost" films, I highly recommend you check outHonogurai mizu no soko kara (仄暗い水の底から or Dark Water in English), its very well done and is deliciously creepy. Of course, it too got the American remake treatment, but the less said about that the better.
I ask myself why there are so many non-Western films that get remade by Western film companies. OK, so a lot of people seem to dislike reading subtitles if the movie happens to not be in English. But a lot of such films also have versions that are dubbed into English. Personally I prefer to watch a film with subtitles if the film is in a language that I don't speak. Preserves the vibe of the film much better I reckon. But that's beside the point. No, the main reasons for the remake approach in this case, as far as I can figure out, are either that its just generally harder to find foreign films in places such as Blockbuster et al, and that a big chunk of the Western populace (I'm looking at YOU, mainstream America) really can't see past their own country and its culture, and are just plain uninterested in seeing a film that stars people from another country, especially a country that doesn't have English as its main language. Either they don't understand the culture of the the country where the original films come from, or they plain just don't wanna know about films from places they're not at all interested in familiarising themselves with. There's also a whole bunch of people out there who (whether or not they like to admit it) are a bunch of pathetic racists too, but let's not get into that today. But take a film from overseas, remake it with a couple of popular actors (or at least actors that the audience is familiar with) and voilà, people will part with their hard earned to see it. It doesn't matter to them that the remake is often a watered down version of the film its redoing. These people won't ever bother to check out the original so they're unaware of what they might be missing. Not that I'm saying that I think all the original foreign films that are remade are good films and all the remakes are bad films. But generally speaking I have a good point here eh?
There's a film that was made in South Korea back in 2006 called The Host (괴물 - Gwoemul) which I happen to think is bloody brilliant, and is one of my very favourite monster films ever. It was a huge hit in its native country, and yep, looks like its gonna get the Western remake treatment. If you, like me, happen to think the US remake of The Ring was pretty average, and the Pirates of the Caribbean sequels to be exercises in ham-fisted twattery, then you'll understand why I take such umbrage at the notion of Gore Verbinski quite possibly lousing up one of my favourite films. He's only slated to produce this remake, but still. The point is, The Host is an awesome film as it is. It doesn't need to be remade*. It set a new record in South Korean box office performance during its opening weekend. By the end of its theatrical run in South Korea it had sold over 13 million tickets, in a country with a population of 48.5 million. This from wikipedia: With a limited American release starting March 11, 2007, The Host garnered very positive reviews, with a 92% "Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes. In addition it was ranked one of the top films of 2007 on Metacritic with a score of 85. The key words here being "limited American release". Its not a film that deals with esoteric elements of South Koran culture. You could take the plot and apply it to any country and culture. If it had been promoted more in the USA it would have done far better. I guarantee it. I'm psychic, remember? *But then the studio remaking it won't stand to make any money off of it now will they?
Can you imagine a band you really like releasing an album, then a different band re-records the same album and releases it and a whole bunch of people go and buy the remake album because its more palatable? Of course, there are cover songs all over the place, but a whole album? Oh, wait... OK, what if people started rewriting classic books? Umm, ahh. And of course there are the vast amount of copies of paintings and such out there.
Will there be any place for original creative works in the future? Will everything be a copy of a copy of a copy? Will our cultural artefacts be homogenised to Big Mac™ proportions? I dunno about you, but such a scenario, as far fetched as it may seem at this point in history, scares the living daylights outta me.
Well guys, I reckon I've said all I need to say on this subject today. Thanks for bearing with me while I had this little rant. I don't usually like to get up on a soapbox about things to this extent, but this is a subject that is very dear to my heart, and quite possibly something far more enjoyable to read than other topics that really piss me off, such as humankind's intolerance to its fellow humans and so forth.
To finally ram home the points I have been trying to make today, here is a three page list of List of 60 Upcoming Horror Remakes. That's right, sixty. And those are just the films that go under the horror category (I dunno about Total Recall being on that list though, its more of a sci-fi thriller innit). A big chunk of these films are films that I believe to be quite fine just the way they are thankyouverrahmuch.
Kiwi (kē'wē, pronounced [kiːwiː], "kee-wee"). The kiwi bird. Flightless, small, ancient. Endemic to and national symbol of New Zealand. And sadly, due to various factors such as introduced predators and the increasing loss of their natural habitat due to human activity, on the endangered species list. I was born and raised in New Zealand and I've only seen a kiwi in the flesh once. In a zoo. Mind you I don't tend to spend any time in the sorts of places one might come across a kiwi in the wild. I have a great deal of affection for the ol' kiwi bird. It was walking about in New Zealand for far, far longer than any of my species have been. Here are a few facts about the kiwi:
• The kiwi is the smallest member of the family of birds called ratites. This group includes some of the worlds biggest birds like the emu, ostrich, as well the extinct moa and the elephant birds of Madagascar. • Kiwi cannot fly (I assume the great majority of you already knew that), and lives in burrows on the ground. Like all ratites they have no keel on the breastbone to anchor wing muscles, and barely any wings. • They have a highly developed sense of smell, unusual in a bird, and are the only birds with nostrils at the end of their long beak. • They're about the size of a chicken and live in pairs. They weigh from 2 3/4 to 9 pounds (1.25 to 4 kg). Once bonded, a male and female kiwi tend to live their entire lives as a monogamous couple. • Kiwi eggs can weigh up to one quarter the weight of the female. The kiwi lays the biggest egg in proportion to its size of any bird in the world, roughly six times the size of that of a domestic chicken egg. • The kiwi has a life span of up to 40 years. • They're predominantly nocturnal, but in areas that are protected from predation they're quite often seen about in the daytime. • They are featured on the New Zealand one dollar coin. • Kiwi eat small invertebrates, seeds, grubs, and many varieties of worms. They also may eat fruit, small crayfish, eels and amphibians. • There are five accepted species of kiwi (one of which has four sub-species), plus one to be formally described. The five accepted species are the Great Spotted Kiwi (or Roroa), the Little Spotted Kiwi, the Okarito Brown Kiwi (or Rowi), the Tokoeka and the North Island Brown Kiwi. • The plural of kiwi is kiwi, not kiwis. Just so you know I'm not making any kiwi typos in this article.
The kiwi bird is a New Zealand cultural constitution. To the extent that the colloquial name for New Zealanders is "kiwi". When referring to New Zealand people as kiwis the s is used for the plural. Back in the day before New Zealand television channels broadcast 24 hours a day, the clip below was played every night just prior to the end of the day's broadcast. Its ingrained in my childhood memory as deeply as Santa Claus.
D'awww, wasn't that lovely? This animation was played on Television One and Television Two between 1981 and 1994, with its last screening on October 19, 1994. I guess the kiwi and cat slept elsewhere on rainy nights. Its a fine example of humankind's proclivity to gloss over the realities of life with cutsieness. In reality of course, that cat would have eaten that kiwi the fuck up. Surely I was not the only child to have grown up with that particular thought in my mind about that animation.
Go to any tourist shop in New Zealand and you're guaranteed to find the kiwi's likeness plastered over all sorts of things, Tshirts, postcards, buttons, kiwi plushies of various sizes and so on. Its image is all over New Zealand really, from business logos to anti-littering signs to coats of arms and all manner of artwork.
One other thing I've noticed about the kiwi over the years is that it has a funny sort of pull on people. It tends to crop up now and then in some pretty random instances, not just in New Zealand but internationally. Like this drawing by a certain California based cartoonist for instance. And it is with that in mind that I'd like to present these two animations. The first one is by this fellow here. At the time of writing its had 23,773,920 views. Wow I say, wow:
Pretty poignant huh?
And then.. then there's this fucked up thing:
Heeee hee hee that wee kiwi he so hyper. There are 3 seasons worth of these 4 minute animations. A kiwi in an animated Italian cooking show. Fucking. Random.
Hopefully you've enjoyed this brief write-up on the kiwi, a critter that is really quite dear to my heart.
And with that, I shall leave the final word to the kiwi itself.
You uhh, might wanna turn your speakers down a bit prior to clicking that link.
Troll is a 1986 horror movie directed by John Carl Buechler, written by Ed Naha and distributed by Empire Pictures. It is also featured in the 2004 DVD documentary, The 50 Worst Movies Ever Made. Truth be told, it sure is a pretty bad film, but also rather entertaining to connoisseurs of Bad Films such as myself.
I mean, there are bad films which are just cinematic crap, like the US remake of Godzilla, and then there are Bad Films which are so bad they're awesome. This film sits somewhere in the mid point between those two types of bad film. Its not nearly as bad nor as entertaining as the unrelated movie Troll 2*, but its still definitely worth a look in. Its currently playing in the background as I write this.
The film centers around the Potter family, dad Harry Potter Sr., mum Anne Potter, son Harry Potter Jr., and cute wee daughter Wendy Anne Potter, who at the start of the film have just moved into an apartment complex. I don't know what city this film is set in, I don't think the movie ever mentions it, but I do know the actual filming took place in Italy.
So anyway, the Potters have just moved into this apartment, like any good North American the Dad goes off to get burgers (which he jokingly refers to as "Ratburgers"), Mum finishes up lugging boxes of stuff into the apartment and in the opening minutes young Wendy has already managed to play her way down into the building's basement with her ball. This in hindsight was a pretty bad move on her part, because there's a nasty little troll lurking down there, because lurking about down in basements is just what Trolls do, OK?
This film was produced prior to the advent of the Internet, so I guess he couldn't find a suitable bridge or goats to bother in the area.
So, the Troll attacks Wendy, and alters his form (via the use of a magic emerald ring he just happens to have) to replicate that of Wendy's. Now he is free to assume Wendy's identity and carry out his diabolical and quite frankly ridiculous little scheme.
Here, watch this while I take a cigarette break:
Pretty rockin' huh?
SO, TrollWendy goes back to the apartment to dine on burgers with her fam'. Her first hilarious act as TrollWendy is to question her burger's contents before completely pigging out on it, and then she runs off out of the apartment with Harry Potter Jr's burger.
Disgusted by his sister's sudden complete lack of common decency, Harry Jr. (played by Noah Hathaway, whom you may remember as Atreyu in The Neverending Story) takes off after her. TrollWendy then sets off the fire alarm and then proceeds to run and jump about like a lunatic, roaring and repeatedly yelling "RATBURGERS!!" very loudly and with great gusto. It's fuckin' awesome, and reminds me of the energy contained within my own little blonde bunches-wearing prepubescent pal Hope, but far brattier and more feral than Hope could muster.
This is also a handy plot device, as we are introduced to almost all of the other apartment complex residents as they come out of their apartments on account of the fire alarm and its clamorous yammering. Its important that we get to see the other residents at this stage of the film as we will soon see a bunch of them being fucked up by the Troll. One of the residents is a '70s throwback swinger played by Sonny Bono & his awesome PornMustache, and another resident is played by a 24 year old Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Seinfeld's Elaine, etc) and her sassy derrière.
After Mr & Mrs Potter have introduced themselves to the rest of the residents, and the fire alarm is shut off by resident cranky old lady Eunice St. Clair. The Potter parents manage to get their errant "daughter" back into their apartment, where she trashes a couple of boxes full of stuff and bites her dad on the arm, roaring and grunting all the while, then laughs and says she was just playing a joke on everyone (or words to that effect), and then everything's all cool again, just like that. The Potter parents pretty much continue this trend of oblivious '80s movie parenting throughout the film. Although slightly concerned, they put Wendy's unusual behavior (roaring, biting, tossing people across rooms) down to "the stress of the move". I suspect the Potter parents of overindulging in the same pot smoking behaviour exhibited by the Freeling parents in Poltergeist. Either that or they're just idiots. Probably the latter.
Only Harry Jr. has any real suspicions about Wendy's sudden change in behaviour, suspicions which are heightened the next morning when TrollWendy gets weirded out about a bottle of milk in the fridge being cold before picking her brother up and throwing him into a wall. She then goes upstairs to Sonny Bono's character's apartment, annoys him for a bit before reverting back into troll form and turning him into this weird green pod thing (via the use of some pretty cool trashy special effects), which then splits open and turns the apartment into a magical woodland, replete with various mini troll critters. The main troll and his little minions are all voiced by überprolific voice actor Frank Welker, whom I will always remember as being the voice of the Stripe in Gremlins.
Look at ol' Trolly calmly sitting there browsing through whatever magazine '70s throwback swinger dudes have on their coffee tables while this transmogrification takes place. Maybe its an interior design/outdoor landscaping hybrid magazine?
Hahahahaaa who am I kidding, it's porn. Because of course it's porn.
While all this is going on, Harry Potter Jr. goes upstairs to introduce himself to Eunice St. Clair, and to tell her about his sister's out of character actions of late. Eunice has this nifty little toadstool thing with a face and high pitched voice which she hides from Harry before he comes in, like any woman would do with her mewling phallic symbol before company arrives, by sticking a lampshade over its head.
At this point the fact that there are two characters in this film referring to themselves as Harry Potter gets a little odd. I've always questioned the idea of fathers naming their sons after themselves. Having two fuckers named Harry in a small apartment would just get confusing at times.
Anyway, Harry Jr. and Eunice St. Clair are now pals. That's just dandy. The next scene sees TrollWendy outside, again playing with her ball, only this time she's out in the middle of the road, where she almost gets wiped out by a car, but is saved by a 3 foot tall fellow named Professor Malcolm Malory. Malroy is played by Phil Fondacaro, who also fills the role of the guy in the Troll suit. He also has a mustache, which is not quite as porntastic as Bono's, but eh its fairly decent. TrollWendy is quite taken aback at the appearance of this small dude, and asks if he is an elf. Malroy asks her if she believes in elves, to which she replies with an emphatic "0h yes", so Malroy says that "well then perhaps I might be one after all". From this point onward TrollWendy refers to this guy as "Brother Elf". The first time she calls him that seems so on the nose its hilarious.
Meanwhile Harry Sr. decides to show his concern for his daughter's wellbeing by rocking out in the living room to a bit of Blue Cheer (he's meant to be this record collecting music aficionado and he's listening to Blue Cheer? Fuck's sake).
While this is going on TrollWendy is around at macho ex-military guy Duke's apartment, killing him and turning his place into another hinterland playground.
It is later revealed to Harry Jr. by Eunice that this is the Troll's big plan, going through each apartment and turning the whole building into a forest. Once all the apartments are turned into woodland, a fourth dimensional fairy world will be created, and the Troll will be able to lead a troll army out of the building to wipe out humanity.
Because he's a troll. And that's just what trolls do OK? Personally I'd rather be wiped out by a bunch of Gremlins, or even Critters, but whatever.
After knocking off ol' Duke, TrollWendy has Brother Elf Malroy round for dinner. Harry Jr. feigns illness so he can lie in bed in his room and watch Pod People From the Planet Mars so he can get some wild notion that his sis' is actually a pod person. Meanwhile the rest of the Potters and Malroy are gathered round the dinner table, where TrollWendy gets Malroy to recite the entirety of The Fairy Queen for her. Because literary geeks like Malroy just happen to memorize such things.
It is during this recital that we are treated to the trollish equivalent of Bohemian Rhapsody, a portion of which you can see here:
After this rousing little ditty Harry Jr. goes back to Eunice's apartment for another chat, whereupon he flat out asks her if she's a witch (what is is with these Potter kids and their penchant for presumptuous questions?), to which she pretty much admits to being. She tells Harry Jr. that back in the days of magic and fairies she was once romantically involved with a handsome young wizard name Torok, but details of this are not revealed at this point. But Harry Jr. does find out that the day he and his family moved into the apartment was Walpurgus Night, and that his sister's behavioural change on that day was not a coincidence. Eunice then ushers him out of her apartment without any further explanation.
Later on it is revealed that the wizard Torok and the Troll are one and the same, but sadly Torok was turned into a troll after he and Eunice stopped getting it on. However, I'm still going to continue referring to the Troll as TrollWendy, because I much prefer that name.
Meanwhile, TrollWendy is round at Julia Louis-Dreyfus' character's place, turning her into a semi-naked dancing woodland woman, giving new meaning to the term "away with the fairies".
Julia's dopey boyfriend comes round for a visit, where he is seduced by Dancing Naked Julia in her now forest covered and seemingly much larger apartment, where she runs about in a film loop giggling away while being repeatedly covered by a badly animated yellow glow type thing and.. its all just a bit asinine, and probably only really there to show off Julia's naked butt. Or butts I should say, as there are now supposed to be a number of Naked Julias in there. Wooo.
TrollWendy then goes off to visit Malroy, where she learns that he's got bone marrow cancer and is on his way out. Shocked by this, TrollWendy asks Malroy if he ever truly wanted to be an actual elf, to which her responds that he did very much when he was her age. So of course, she turns him into an elf too. Malroy elf puppet looks pretty cool. He still has his mustache, and that's what really counts. "Welcome Brother Elf" says the Troll as this fuckin' little puppet homunculus Malroy emerges from his leafy cocoon. Troll bonding. How lovely.
Maybe this scene has been placed in here to show a softer, more caring side to the generally wicked Troll's personality. That's the only good reason I can see for its inclusion, because after this scene one doesn't see any more of Malroy. I wonder if he still needs his social security number now that he's a troll? Does he still pay taxes? Does this affect his retirement pension?
So now all the apartments besides Eunice's and the Potter's have been turned into enchanted woodlands by TrollWendy, part of a scheme so farcical I'm actually quite impressed it managed to get written into a film that's meant to be taken somewhat seriously.
Plenty of absurd action follows for the last quarter of the film, but I shall stop my review of this film at this point, so as not to spoil the ending for anyone who might be interested in watching it. AllMovie.com sums up the last portion of the film thusly:
"The stage is then set for inevitable battle between the good witch and the evil troll for control of the world, but first she and the brave family must combat a twenty-foot tall übertroll who looks akin to a Furby™ doll left in the sandbox over a long, hard Minnesota winter."
Which describes it pretty well I reckon.
Needless to say, its one of those films that you have to be in the right mood for, and should never consider paying more than 5 dollars (or whatever currency your country uses) for if you happen to see it on sale anywhere. I bought my copy on DVD for a buck. The plot is ludicrous, the special effects are for the most part very substandard, and the only decent acting performance is given by Jenny Beck as Wendy Anne/TrollWendy. She somehow manages to come across as sweet, sinister, playful, endearing, conniving, subtle and completely over the top, often all at the same time.
A dollar well spent I say!
Apparently its slated to be remade with a bigger budget by the same director and as many of the original cast/crew that he can manage to convince to take part in it. It will probably lose a lot of its crappy charm if its remade, but I guess it remains to be seen if it does get off the ground how well they do this time around.
Chloé
*J. Misanthrope has already done a very brief review of Troll 2here.
Hullo hullo. Today I'd like to tell you about something truly cool.
The above image is from HOPELESS:Book One - Personal Demons, the first major part of COPPER AGE, an epic manga ka series written by Bryn Colvin and illustrated by Tom Brown. The wee moppet in the picture is Salamandra. She's an experimental occultist. Which means she has skill in wielding magical powers. She lives on the island of Hopeless, Maine, an island cut off from the outside world by a thick fog, an enchanted fog that may very well be sentient, or at least possess traces of sentience.
Above are the main cast members for Personal Demons. That's Sal in the middle, with her friend Owen below Her. The lady to the right is Annamarie Nightshade. I'm not about to tell you who the lass on the left is!
See, that's the thing. I've learned a great many things about this comic via Jimmy Misanthrope's friendship with Tom Brown. I've seen a bunch of upcoming pages, but as this comic has just started its public run there isn't much I can tell you about the comic's storyline or characters yet without giving away too much. So you're gonna have to just trust me when I say that this comic is brilliant, and is exceptionally well constructed. Bryn Colvin is a masterful writer, her command of character development, scene setting and mood evocation is to me highly impressive. The Hopeless world is a rich and lively one inside the layers of gothic gloom that surround it, which is testament to the lady's prodigious writing talent. I love the dialog she comes up with too. Its just so fresh and vibrant and just right. The art of the comic is done mainly in pencil, with a few little bits of photoshop rendered things here and there when required. I freakin' love Tom's art! ^-^ Its just so soulful, gloomy, lively, bright and subtly sinister, oftentimes all on the same page. Stick a pencil in the man's hand and he'll give you something truly meaningful.
All in all Copper Age is a highly original and spellbinding piece of work, and I highly recommend you go to the site and check it out. If you're anything like me you're gonna fall in love with it.
OK guys, I've been a very busy lady this week, and my energy levels are close to zero, so this week's post is gonna be pretty brief. In fact, its just gonna consist of a couple of links to some rather interesting things. Why am I bothering to type out something that you're about to realize anyway?
First up, an oldie but a goodie, the highly entertaining and thought provoking David Wong's take on Dunbar's number, What is the Monkeysphere? This is an essay I first read a few years back on Wong's old site pointlesswasteoftime.com, and its something that if you haven't read it before, you owe it to yourself to check out. It will do wonders for elucidating your understanding of the twisted and sickening convoluted mess that is social relationships.
Randomitronica — what's it all about then, eh?
One of the largest cogs of The Vortex Machines, Randomitronica ran from May 8th 2009 until July 15th 2010, and was written in the "voice" of Chloé Kovac, one of the main characters in Maxwell Vex's Agents of the Endtimes webcomic (which can be found here).
Randomitronica contains a bunch of opinions, reviews, interviews, general musings on various topics that Chloé found of interest, and probably more than a handful of now-defunct hyperlinks.
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