JOURNAL: MCWagner (Matthew Wagner)

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  • "Sometimes I think it's a shame/when I get feeling better when I'm feelin' no pain..." 2002-02-11 01:08:44 Probably won't get to a review this time...just to warn ya'll.

    OK, let's say that you agree to do a favor for a fellow-worker of yours while they are out of town. This involves tending to an experiment that needs to run for 36 hours, but only needs to be checked on twice by you at the 24 and 36 timepoints. Unfortunately, that puts the points at 4:10 pm on Saturday...and 4:10 AM on Sunday. OK, good for you, right? Well, what's the worst thing that could happen while you're waiting around at 1:00pm for the 4:00pm timepoint? How about the power goes out? How about it's a scheduled poweroutage that you just forgot about? What if power isn't ENTIRELY out because there are standard emergency outlets with a secondary supply since this is a research laboratory? But the nearest outlet is 35 feet away and you don't have any extension cords? So, good guy that you are, you don't just give up, you scrounge and beg cords and power strips from other labs and manage to get the microscope, pump, both waterbaths, the air curtian incubator, the counter, the tv, the camera, and the VCR all plugged into a single extension cord without setting anything on fire or blowing a fuse. What's the worst that could happen?

    The power comes back on an hour later.

    *Sigh*

    So you transfer everything over and plug the cords back into the original lines. The timepoint comes up and you get everything ready. What's the worst that could happen?

    The VCR breaks.

    At what point am I allowed to curse loudly and just give up?

    On the other hand, I have the best gaming group in the world. I run a little Call of Cthulhu gaming group a couple of weekends a month for a group of four friends. The most recent adventures have been taking place in and around New York in August, 1922. My gaming style is rather free-form, sorta the opposite of a dungeon crawl. They are allowed to pursue any avenue of investigation they desire and I provide them with ABSURD amounts of information whether or not their investigations are red herrings. Keeps 'em guessing and interested. Thing is, they've been showing a lot of initiative without any prompting on my part. I mentioned that they'd be traveling to a town called Rickwell, Massachussets at the end of the last game. I just pulled the name from the top of my head and wrote it down so I wouldn't forget it. This time I walk in and James hands me a map. "Rickwell is the red star," he says. "It is?" say I. "Yeah, I looked it up on Mapquest. Oh, here's some satelite photos of the town."

    Even better is the fact that Hil has been bringing along printouts from MICROFICHE COPIES OF THE NEW YORK TIMES!! Good heavens! This has provided a wonderful sense of having the characters dealing with "the normal requirements of everyday life" in addition to their investigations. For example, it just so happens that August 1st 1922 was the date by which all motorists in NY had to acquire a "traffic card." As far as I know, this is the first instance of a required driver's license in any city. We found in a later edition (he prints out a handful of random pages) that the deadline was extended to the fifth, in response to numerous complaints of "long lines and excessive waits" at the police station to recieve the cards. Looks like the DMV was like that from the very beginning.

    Also, and this was just astonishing to me, I think it was August 3rd, 1922 had, as the daily headline and cover picture, a story detaling the marvelous scientific wonders surrounding a celebrated French PSYCHIC and her skill in the manipulation of ECTOPLASM! Ectoplasm was a weird substance of the popular pseudo-science culture in about the 1910's-1930's (much like space "ether" and "phlogiston"). It's rarely treated today according to what was believed then. According to the paper and my own knowledge of the subject, ectoplasm was a strange, etherial, slighly luminous, damp, dense fog that was either exuded or vomited up by the psychic that would then extend outward (while remaining attached to the psychic) and form rudimentary hands or tendrils with which it could manipulate physical objects or brush up against the paying seance-ists. It wasn't really telekinesis, as the psychic was manipulating the material like appendages. I find it a pity that such utter weirdness of a supernatural idea has been completely forgotten by a media (TV, books, etc.) obsessed with mining past ideas for entertainment. Ah well.

    Gotten the final rules for the AWA contests assembled, but will have to wait for a draft of a permission slip for minors to participate in the pro contest before posting them.

    Just finished watching the first DVD of Boogiepop Phantom. Was really worried when the first episode was taking forever to GET TO THE POINT, but it shows a lot of promise, especially in the interesting non-linear way of telling the story through crosslinking with other episodes. I love the way it takes to dealing with the smaller, everyday horrors. The biggest problem with a lot of anime horror is the tendancy to make the stakes the ENTIRE WORLD. That and the tendancy to complete fuck up western horror cliches spectacularly. Most good anime horror sticks to eastern themes (much like Boogipop thus far). I think I could count the instances of good anime horror on one hand: Vampire Princess Miyu, Mermaid's Scar, Mermaid's Forest, Pet Shop of Horrors,....uh.....someone help me out here. Mind gone blank. Vampire Hunter D's really just a western with vampires, Lain is more existential art film than direct or even indirect horror (although it has some wonderful images of pure horror...especially her sister imitating the dial-tone... Hm.

    HEY! THEY DIDN'T SHOW THE ANDY EPISODE OF CB! WHAT THE HELL? I WAS WAITING FOR THAT! Damnit, that's the only episode I haven't seen.

    Next time: The movie that's a fetishist's wet dream. Literally. 
  • "I'm sorry Sir, but I seem to have mailed my hat." 2002-02-09 00:11:23 I had a really crappy day today, so I'm just gonna keep writing until I feel better. This could take a while.

    Actually, it was pretty good until, on the way out the door, I run into my boss, who accosts me about something that I told him about LAST WEEK and, when caught out in the fact that I had told him about it before, he takes that opportunity to berate me for fifteen minutes on the front step of our building about my lack of progress. WELL SOOOORRRYYYYYY. I only have three new students in the lab who I've just now gotten to the point that I can trust them not to break the $20,000 equipment they work on and not contaminate the entire incubator and actually run experiments on their own without me looking over their shoulder for the entire sequence. I managed a slight turn of the tables on him during our conversation and managed to point out the fact that -I- had been doing all the educating around here and if he had something specific in mind for their projects maybe he should have told ME instead of assuming that I'm psychic enough to deduce his desires on my own. He countered by standing with his back to the sun and blinding me everytime he bobbed his head to the left, leaving me at a tactical disadvantage. NOW that everything is back in place, maybe I can get around to analyzing my own data and writing up my proposal properly. None the less, this left me feeling terribly depressed about most everything (it's just one of those things that can knock the day away if it's timed properly) and instead of working on any of the numerous things I should be working on, I'm here doing this. Oh well. It's better than playing Unreal (1/2 way through). And MUCH better than playing "The Sims" which is what my roomate is doing right now. I saw this for the life-sucking lamprey it was and am determined to keep away from it lest it destroy me as well, although the concept of playing an individual with a much better life than mine is starting to have something of an appeal.

    Kusoyaro: I'm pretty sure it was EK who started the thing with the song titles...

    Also, there is a far too common habit these days to misinterpret the criticism of another's hobby or favorite book or movie as direct criticism of the person in question. I've never made that mistake, so you don't need to couch your words in your previous critique of "Blue Velvet." If you don't like it, you don't like it, and I have no intention of trying to make anyone feel like less of a capable anylist of film for disagreeing with my entirely amature opinions here. I've also got no intention of insisting someone "watch again" a film that they disliked the first time through because I'm convinced that "they didn't get it." Their life's too short to sit through a second showing of a movie they don't like, and mine is MUCH too short to force them. This is also my policy with people who don't like anime. I give them one shot, and if they don't like it, I never bring it up again. Leads to longer friendships.

    Bowler: READ DK2 AGAIN! (Kidding) Seriously, you keep bringing up that fight sequence. Honestly, I kinda liked it. I've never been really clear as to what exactly kryptonite did to Supes, and I liked this representation of its effects. It sorta looks like it's melting him off the page and making all the colors run. Isn't that the real weakness of all superheros? :) Anyway, to each his own, although this is making me think it's time to dig out my old copies of the first series.

    In other news, it appears that I'll be doing some more of the covers for the "Lone Wolf and Cub" trade paperbacks. Better get out my crayons.
    http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/article.php?id=1648

    Gonna try to get started on actually watching the source material for my next video tonight. It's gonna take me a good long time to get through it, so don't expect much word on the progress for a while.

    The troops have gone off to "Lostcon" this weekend. Funny thing is, I hadn't even heard what it was until today, and yet it snatched away both of my subdirectors for the AMV track. *Snif*

    You know, you can disagree with Dave Sim on every aspect of his artistry, religon, and personal politics, but damn if he can't hit the nail on the head sometimes: "Of course there are political disagreements across the spectrum, but it is only the terminally insensitive, the terminally self-absorbed, who fail to recognize in the face of a Monumental Tragedy that Now Is Not the Time: who fail to recognize that there are Moments in Time which entirely supersede, "Well, you know what -I think-?" Where the mere fact that they find it not only allowable, but necessary, to tread all over just such a Moment and to infect it with their own disproportionate sense of self implies (it seems to me) that not only do they NOT think (in any meaningful sense of the term), they are not even capable of a level of awareness outside of their own self-absorbed and -yes- sub-human little perceptions." That is one hell of a pair of sentences. (He was referring to Susan Sontag in specific, and a number of other people in general.) I hadda approximate the quote, as he does italics and underlining stuff in his essays.

    Feeling a little better now. I'll move on to the review. Today it's the other half of that Vincent Price DVD, and the review I'm about to give will NOT make it look like my mood has improved. The movie is "The Last Man on Earth." Yes, that's right, Mr. Price is the last man on earth, trapped in a world of (gasp) ACTORS under crappy direction. Jimmy (Lord Rae) told me a few weeks ago that he'd rather enjoyed this film (turns out we both got this DVD for christmas) which shows him to be a better man than I, posessing of greater endurance and tolerance for awquard scene sequences.

    There actually is a good story lurking in here. A good story called "I Am Legend" by Richard Matheson. The basic concept is that Price is the only human left in a world devastated by an airborne virus that kills indescriminately and then, mysteriously, brings its victims back from the dead with an aversion to sunlight, an allergy to garlic, and an insatiable (although strangely undefined) hunger. Yup. Vampire world. Even worse, vampire world of the "contagious disease" brand that looked upon by KZ with such derision. I'm not normally much of a vampire flick fan, as most of the concept has been played out rather thoroughly, especially in recent years, but that's not the reason I found this film such an endurance test. The problem is that the star IS the Last Man in the World. As such, there isn't much in the way of interaction for the entire first half of the film. There's Vincent working at his Lathe, Vincent calling out randomly at his radio, Vincent eating, driving, going for more food, keeping the generator running, etc. etc. etc. Thrill-a-minute hunh? Of course, he is talking. There's his voice constantly narrating his every move as he wanders around the city gradually getting rid of all the dead bodies that scatter the streets and line the roads, and gradually adding to them himself by staking those diseased individuals he ferrets out during the day. At night he must fend off the shambling hordes of arthritic old vampires with bad knees by locking his door. In fact, there's so much narration and so little actual dialogue, that I didn't notice something really funny until the flashbacks started. This movie isn't in english. Originally, I mean. Sort of.

    The original title is "L' Ultimo uomo della Terra" making it an Italian production. I get the wierd feeling while watching this film that everyone was re-dubbed back into English after it was dubbed into Italian, but, looking at the fact that the film had two directors, one Italian and one American (www.imdb.com lists two, although the film only lists one, with a mysterious bar across the credits in one section), what more likely happened was that everyone was directed so that the Italian dub would be easier and was told to REALLY ENUNCIATE EVERY WORD. It's also possible that some technical snafu with the recording slightly mis-synched with the film, although that goes beyond my own technical knowledge. The script itself is really rather dreadful, with most of the lines being from "my first book of acting" ("Our problem right now is to cut that cake.") and strange, limp-wristed, half-attempts at meaningful moments with badly-spoken lines. Something thrown in frustration is just sort of tossed hard. A scene that's supposed to be moving just doesn't work. In fact, a lot of this film just doesn't work. I've never really seen what an honestly bad director could do to a film, and now I know. It's not overly bad acting per say (although Mr. Price is definitely not at his best here) or a bad script (although there is some of that), the film just doesn't come together very well. In the end, it feels very amaturish, with scenes just pasted end to end without any feel of the flow of the film. The entire middle third of the film is one excessivly long flashback that would have worked better broken up throughout the film. Every line feels very coached, like the first attempt at the scene, and another take was just never done. (The worst is his daughter in the flashbacks, although I'll cut child actors SOME slack, this one was just bad.)

    To top it all off, the film shifts gears from first to fifth in the final act and grinds out the transmission. Vincent finds someone else! A young woman (of course) who then imparts "THE TERRIBLE SECRET OF THE FILM" unto him. This secret is the payoff of the film, so I won't ruin it. Anyway, there follows an almost comical chase through the streets as Price is pursued (his opponets have Thompson SMGs, of all things), happens upon a police ARMORY (conviently labled) stocked with smoke bombs that he tosses around with the aplomb of a western hero tossing dynamite, and, well, exits on a pretty lame line echoing the title.

    The sad thing is that there is a good film buried in here. A couple, in fact. The film was remade as "The Omega Man" in 1971 (this one is 1964) with Charlton Heston, and the scenes of the rock-throwing, plywood plank-weilding undead malcontents assaulting the outside of Vincent's house served as inspiration for Romero's greatly superior "Night of the Living Dead" (I'll get to it, it's just lower in the pile...). The fact that people were able to see past all the faults of this film to extract the good bits for much better movies is to their credit. I don't think I could have spotted them without help. It's filled with really good scenes that could have been but just aren't, like a man struggling to save his daughter's corpse from the army men taking them to be burned, or there's the return of his wife, Verge, (Verge? Who names their kid Verge?), or the daily stalking of the sleepy undead, and the ultimate horror of "THE TERRIBLE..." etc. etc. The only really good scenes in this film occurr when Vincent finally has someone else to talk to in the desolate, barren city, and......wait, I was wrong. That's it.

    The film really has more in common with post-apocalyptic films than horror films. This feels like a progenitor more of stuff like Soylent Green, A Boy and His Dog, or On The Beach. In the end, what could have been a brilliant film is made essentially into a waste of time by bad direction and silly plot holes. 
  • Now it's dark..... 2002-02-05 23:08:37 Damn, Buffy got DARK outta NOWHERE! Yeah, it's been a bit more angsty this season, but just as we get used to the inherent comedy in Buffy's slipping out for a bit of the ol' self-depreciating fun with the local leather-clad undead brit and the fact that Buffy is never really gonna have a chance to advance any higher than minimum-wage-slave in today's corporate structure due to her nightlife cutting into her education opportunities, they go and hit us with tonight's episode! Damn! Wouldn't a thought that the darkness would have been eminating from the geek patrol either.

    EK: Hey, did Merril come out to Ushicon, or was it an "approved" Anime Hell? Also, I can grok all of your con quotes except the following:
    * Security Go-kart Pikachu
    * Sex Omelet
    * "Bum bum ba-bummmmm... waaaaaaah"
    * Symphonic lounge Mario Brothers
    Expect severe interogation of your con report unless you explain these...:)

    Strange cross-section of wrong I encountered on TV tonight. During the current turnaround of wrong on Buffy, I spotted a 10-10-2-20 ad featuring ALF! (You remember Alf, right Bart? Well he's back! In Pog form!) This was followed up by an ad for the upcoming "Queen of the Damned" film, the film I have subtitled "really exciting for everyone who hasn't read the book." I have no idea if they're going to keep the central concept of the book, but it was easily the worst of the three original "Vampire Chronicles" and has turned me off of reading Ann Rice for the next several years. The worst part of it is the fact that the central theme of the book isn't revealed until 270 pages in, and when you finally get there, you discover a cache of feminist supremicist propaganda. (Men are to blame for everything that has ever gone wrong in the world. Obviously, women would never have made those mistakes and would be able to run everything much better if they were given the chance. Gag me with a spoon.) THEN I flip to the Sci-Fi channel and see the opening strains of "Ravenous," a wonderfully good and terribly wrong story of cannibalism on the wild frontier. I may write up a review some time.

    No review this time, or not exactly one. Kusoyaro made a few comments on David Lynch's "Blue Velvet" (which happens to be one of my favorite films) and I thought I should offer a counterpoint, or perhaps answer a few questions he posed.

    "Finally watched Blue Velvet last night. I'm not sure why people hail it as possibly THE best movie of the 80's."

    OK, first off, remember it WAS the 80's....

    Just kidding. I'm in kind of a unique position with regard to this film, as I was required to watch it for a class back in undergrad, and we proceeded to discuss it and read critisism for several classes afterwards. (Hey, science degrees can crush the spirit out of you if you let them. I say, if your college offers a course called "The Look of the Preverse" why the hell NOT take it? Same professor offered a course on "The Horrorshow" the semester I left. Still pissed about missing that.)

    IF YOU ARE EASILY OFFENDED, DO NOT PASS THIS POINT_________________

    Anyway, Blue Velvet benefits from reading the cliffs-notes after seeing the film. I can understand why a lot of people hate that, since you can easily argue that, if the audience can't comprehend the film, it's a sign of shoddy merchandice, but I think that there's just so much going on that you can't be expected to catch more than a little of it. In fact, more than anything else, I enjoyed the mood aspect of the film that I always felt like I was watching something that I couldn't really comprehend all the nuances of. (that was convoluted...) Kept me thinking and intently analyzing the film as I watched. The opening scene is the best example of this. All of the iconography of the idyllic, prosperous late 50's displayed satyrically in oversaturated hues, and then to move in intense close-up to the rot and the insects crawling through the interior of this painted facade gave a beautiful cinematic overview and foreshadowing of the rest of the film. I just appreciate the artistry of the film in moments like that. Every single aspect of the film is carefuly thought through and positioned to meet with one or several of the themes running through the plot. In the famous rape scene where Kyle McLaughlan is watching from the closet (no coincidence there) it is in actuality a creation of certian fairly preverse Freudian themes of familial sexual attraction and oedipal desire. (Aside: Freud is a bit like Plato in that everyone appreciates the trails they blazed, but most of their theorms have been proven wrong.) The scenes between Kyle and Isabella manage similar preversions on a truly astonishing scale, but only when inferences are taken into account, and mostly due to the carefully alligned acting on either's part. To some degree the "party" Frank takes his young friend on IS an attempt to bring together as many f***ed up individuals as possible, but in the process it has so many connotations that it would take forever to go over them. (Just to start...you are aware of the connotations of leather jackets in the mid-80's right?)

    One of the real problems with the film is that it's nearly impossible to approach without expectations any more. If you've actually heard of the film, you've heard how strange it is, and that prepares you (to some degree) for what's coming. I watched it as part of the assignment, but I had no real idea what was coming, and thus was more than a little disturbed when Opie from "The Andy Griffith Show" comes back from college to visit his prim and proper girlfriend whom he hasn't so much as kissed yet, and then goes on to find an ear in a vacant lot. Everything that follows is supposed to be cast in that light, but the effect is ruined by everything you've heard about the film.

    In essence, the film tries to be a great big bucket of distilled wrong. It's the "coming of age" story viewed as a violent, intrusive, frighteningly preverse experience. If you look real close, you might be surprised how close it came through careful allignment of every aspect of the film. However, it could have been "wronger." There were two revisions to the script that I know of, made at the insistance of the actors, and because it would have just gone too surreal. First, at the end of the "ride" Frank wasn't supposed to "beat up" Jeffrey.....from the following scene I think you can figure out how the original scene ran. Secondly, Frank's oxygen tank was originally supposed to be helium...

    Some critics have described this film as an "expose" of the seething underbelly of everyday life in our sanitized world, rotting from the inside out. I think there's a little of that in here, terribly over-quoted by the angsty faction in film review, but frankly I think it's a fairly minor theme. To some degree I think Lynch decided he was going to make a film containing all the dirty humanity behind the fairly polished themes that hollywood has been presenting us with over the years, like a desire for a "knight in shining armor," "love" of one's parents, and the concept of "coming of age."

    On the other hand, from Lynch himself: "It's better not to know so much about what things mean or how they might be interpreted or you'll be too afraid to let things keep happening. Psychology destroys the mystery, this kind of magic quality. It can be reduced to certain neuroses or certain things, and since it is now named and defined, it's lost its mystery and the potential for a vast, infinite experience."

    Of course, all this is colored by the fact that I saw Corn Pone Flick's "Blue Peanuts" before I ever saw the film. Seeing Snoopy shout "Heinekin? FUCK THAT SHIT!! PABST BLUE RIBBON!" while downing one puts everything in a new light. :)

    Damn, it's been a while since I had to write like that. I need to stretch those brain cells more often. This looked like crap.

    Hsien, again, I ain't trying to change anyone's mind on this. Art is entirely subjective and I can't warp your brain to match mine in these respects unless you're within reach and willing to undergo elective brain surgery. I just thought you might like to hear some "why" reasoning from someone who actually did like the film. 
  • Heinekin? FUCK THAT SHIT! PABST BLUE RIBBON!!! 2002-02-04 16:39:53 You know, I just remembered exactly how the remake of "House on Haunted Hill" ended. Knock the complimentary attitude of my review down a notch. That was a really stupid ending.

    Kusoyaro: I've got a comment or two on Blue Velvet, but it'll be elaborate enought I don't want to try and sort it out here at work. It'll probably be in my next update. 
  • "This may hurt a little, but it's something you'll get used to..." 2002-02-04 02:50:50 KZ: Ehh....heh. Sorry. Damn. I kept all the other comments innocuous, but couldn't resist going for that one. I shoulda known better.

    EK: Are we all gonna get a report on the con?

    It may not appear that I've been neglecting this again, but trust me, I have. Picked up a copy of "Unreal: Gold" this weekend and have spent the day running through the first couple of levels. So far I'm not all that impressed. Very few enemies (playing one level below hardest) the "puzzles" aren't all that clever, etc. I supposed I shouldn't expect much from a game this old, but I'm starting to wonder if I'm gonna get my six bucks worth, especially since it took so long to get to the first "boss" critter (the titan in the arena).

    Anyway, I've decided to review the same movie AGAIN! HAH! House on Haunted Hill was remade in 1999. If memory serves me correctly, a whole string of old William Castle properties came up for sale simultaneously, and the producer of this film snatched up a handful. The only other one I know of was last year's "13 Ghosts" which I reviewed earlier. (Short version: come for the ghosts, ignore the actors.) Amazingly enough, the two films had the same writer, despite the gulf in skill represented. Also, this remake was released within a week of ANOTHER horror film remake, "The Haunting." Do not get these two films mixed up (as I did for nearly a month). This is a good film. "The Haunting" was a REALLY BAD film.

    Every time I refer to this film as a "remake" of the original, I keep feeling that it isn't an adequate description. Despite the fact that nearly all the trappings are there, nearly the same characters, and nearly the same plot, the two films are very different kinds of horror film, and this one feels much more like a film-length homage to the original film. Like all of the pieces of the first film were stretched apart on strings and wrapped around another film.

    Perfect example: Remember the rich crazy who sponsored the party in the first film? The one played by Vincent Price? Well, he's here, played by Geoffrey Rush (the guy who played the REALLY GOOD character in "Shakespeare in Love"). Except the character's name isn't Frederick Loren. It's "Stephen Price." Clever, no? The film is littered with little nods to the previous film or the previous characters throughout in addition to the basically similar plotline. There's the same deadly lighting (skylight=chandelier), the same reprisal of Watson Prichart's hilarious "I know I'm in a horror flick" character (the actor reminds me mostly of a drunk, nervous Jeff Goldblum), another character plunging into a vat (although this one is filled with blood), and another elaborate scheme going on behind the scenes. The details are switched around, though. The falling skylight nearly kills Price's wife, not "Nora"'s stand-in, and a completely different character goes for a swim in the vat.

    There's also the same seething hatred between rich husband and scheming wife, with Carol Ohmart's stunning performance replaced by a merely adequate Famke Janssen. (Jean Grey) In her defense, the role was somewhat "modernized" from the fairly deep civil-in-public-but-seethingly-venemous-in-private role Ohmart played to the swearing, fuming, slimy, dismissive and impertenet "pissed-off bitch" that's supposed to symbolize the typical "tough chick" presented by Hollywood today. The character ends up sort of dumbed-down from it's original conception to a common modern stereotype.

    Geoffrey Rush's character suffers a similar decline, although mostly through his inability to measure up to Vincent Price's performance, rather than a similar dumbing-down of the character (in fact, the character gets a bit more complicated than the original, showing actual grief at his wife's death). In addition, the fact he spends a good portion of the last 15 minutes in a paniced run means he can't keep the Price-like composure. Most of the rest of the characters are rather laughably underdeveloped rather than stereotyped, and thus ultimately forgettable (epitomized by the fact that I've forgotten about most of them) except for one. The House.

    The differences between the very structure of the two films can be seen in this point. In the first film, the House was really just the set, the place where terrible things happened. Here, the "House" is the living, breathing center of the film, interacting with, and revealed to be the ultimate originating cause of, all the events in the film. At the end of the film, the characters literally break through a wall and fall out of the fairly mood-and-innuendo-driven world of the first film and land in another movie...one where the ghosts aren't content to stay off-screen, and are apparently really pissed about SOMETHING. This difference is foreshadowed at the beginning of the movie, as we are given an elaborate and hideous flashback illustrating, in the goriest of details, the origins of the haunting at the "house," a concept mostly ignored by the first film. The second section takes place at an amusement park, further distancing itself from the first film. This is the way remakes SHOULD be done. Not in an attempt to REPLACE the original (as could only have been the motivation behind the laughable remake of Psycho a few years back), but in an attempt to add to the concept by a differing interpretation.

    While the centrality of the House is the second film's biggest difference from the first, it is also it's greatest strength. This is a MAGNIFICENT house. It's not really a house, you see, but an old burned-out criminally-insane asylum. The head of the institute, a Dr. Richard Vandacutt who, when the inmates were driven to riot by his abomnible surgical and vivisectionary experimentation, threw the "escape countermeasures" switch, sealed everyone inside and ensured that they all roasted togeather in the resulting fire. The movie takes place in the partially-rebuilt remains, with exactly the same plotline as described in the previous review (replacing $10,000 with $1 Million). Long cement corridors, crumbling brickwork, blackened and burned lighting and structures, and esoteric collections of preserved specimines from Dr. Vandacutt's collection line the corridoors. (The collection pieces are actually replicas of a series of shellacked humans from a museum in France.) Junk and refuse pile up in old operating rooms, and the "House," situated like a great vertical slash down the length of a shear seaside cliff, seems to strech for miles underground. This house outranks the one in the previous film by several orders of magnitude. It just looks so COOL! There's stuff! and things! and stuff!

    The main deviation in the plotline has to do with the fact that...well...the body count rises. A lot. Quickly. You can rest assured, however, that, for once, the most annoying character gets it first. AND we get to watch it on videotape!

    The visual effects and cinematography really dominate this film. The title sequence is really, really cool, as is the "flashback" sequence at the very beginning. A friend of mine who otherwise hated the film thought it was made worthwhile by a single scene of the good Doctor in a supernaturally frenetic fit of thrashing about as he moves throughout the house. This domination of style over substance isn't really a bad thing, as the horror genre can make good movies out of every end of pretention, acting, or plot twists. But. At several points in the film, the desire to show the audience "really cool stuff" explodes the credibility of the storyline, much like the overacting of the original did. (Hey! Another homage!) An experimental device of Dr. Vandacutt's is discovered in the basement which consists of an enormous cell-like zoetrope (sp?) that is just silly and leads to an hallucinatory sequence that, while cool-looking, just didn't really work in the story. The hallucinatory sequence goes rather nonsensically over-the-top in gore when previously it had been used sparingly to excellent effect. There's an entire chase sequence at the end (which should highlight HOW different these films are) that just works weirdly in the story as the director blows the rest of his budget in computer animation all at once. At least it works better than in "The Haunting."

    Fortunately, this film does not commit the previously mentioned "severed head foul" of the first film, although there are a few similar events (does NO ONE want to find out what it was in the vat that grabbed her?), and does commit one comically common horror film mistake. The "good money after bad" mistake.

    "Well, that was a neat tour of the basement....hey, where's Melissa? Better go back down to find her."
    "Did you find Melissa?" "No...have you seen Eveyln?" "Better go back and find them."
    "Hey....where did Don go?"

    "I have an idea...let's not go back in the basement."

    Finally, this is a personal peeve, but the final sequence of the film contains a joke. The joke is central to the scene. It is a bad joke in light of the rest of the film, and especially in light of the continuous attempt up to this point to build terror and fear in the audience. Humor had no business being there. It invalidated the entire desired effect and fed that maddening habit in recent years to equate horror films with humor, and the teeny-bopper idiocy epitomized in the late 90's spate of slasher films. (Begun by Scream). I'll probably rant at length on this later, so the abridged version is: No, I'm not a horror elitist, and I do not object to the presence of humor in horror, but I do object to the assumption that horror itself is "bad" (low in quality) and thus needs to be laughed at, and I especially object when the filmmakers decide to encourage this attitude through rewrites of the films themselves.

    I could really go on for quite a bit here about the various historical factoids of treatments for the insane the film touches on, or particularly cool ideas and sequences, but I'd really only be talking to myself. The DVD version has a TON of extras on it, including comparisons of the two films, a history of William Castle, and subdivided commentary sections reviewing each major effect or prop. THIS is the reason DVDs came along.

    Thus: In comparing the two films, I would likely go back and re-watch segments of the first film for the excellent acting, and segments of the second for effects and mood. It rests firmly in the upper ranks of "high budget schlock". Is it "classic horror?" Hell no, but look at that HOUSE!

    Next time: ? Getting tired of guessing at this. 
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