Archive for the 'Movie' Category
Award-winning Video
February 19
Check it out!
OK, let’s try this again. It’s a video I made some 4 or 5 years ago for a contest in Tulsa. I won. My grand prize was a gold glitter-coated cordless telephone handset. Video after the break.
Incredible Petrified World
January 9
Incredible Petrified World is one of those supremely dumb “science” fiction movies from the 1950s. This one has a pretty basic premise, no real special effects (save some tumbling rocks and lights pulsing outside of a window), and…well, not much else.
The story goes like this: Scientist designs a diving bell to check out the ocean below the level where sunlight penetrates. Said diving bell works great until it hits about 1,400 feet, then the cable snaps, sending the four passengers (among whom the scientist is not) plummeting down to their crushing death, right? Right. Except not. It stops at 1,700 feet, caught on some “phantom layer” that a narrator spoke about at the beginning; a layer that hangs out almost 2,000 feet below the surface during the day, but comes all the way up at night. Rocks that are scared of the sun, or some such nonsense.
Once on this level, they realize they can see sunlight in the water, so they must not be too deep. The two male scientists and the two females — one a scientist/assistant, the other a reporter — put on wet suits and make a break for it. But not to the surface, where their ship is waiting, it’s crew all convinced of their deaths. No, they swim to a cave that’s nearby. Inside they find that it’s full of air and dry. So out of the wet suits and off they go exploring.
Then they find the only redeeming value this whole movie has to offer. This guy: 
He’s some crazy underwater hobo that’s been here for 14 years. He takes the men to see some volcano that’s apparently on the island/level/whatever with them. I’m not really sure if they were IN the volcano or if it just had a separate chamber underwater with them. I hope the first, ’cause a volcano would make a shitty neighbor, up all night with the rumbling and having to deal with leaks in your kitchen ceiling ’cause his lava got out of control again.
I won’t spoil the ending for you, the hobo gets killed by the volcano after trying to rape the reporter and planning to kill the other people, then they all get saved by a second diving bell that the scientist’s brother just happened to have created at the same time but I’m sure you don’t feel too left out.
The Truth in Horror
October 4
I love horror movies more than a lot of people I know. Just today I sat and watched Re-Animator (and on a side note, if you look at the source code you’ll see a perfectly valid use of the <i></i> tag, since movie titles are supposed to be italicized). I have serious problems, though, with this recent trend in remaking the horror “classics.”
I think the worst offender lately is The Amityville Horror which came out this year. I didn’t watch it. I don’t watch remakes (for the most part). Especially not ones where the producers didn’t even do basic research.
Research? For a horror movie? Normally I’d say that’s overkill; after all, who doesn’t love a good, mindless scream? But for America’s most famous haunting/demonic posession (at least of a house), you need to do at least a couple inches of digging. Namely you need to realize that the book behind the movie is a fiction novel. Yes, I know it originally (and may still) say “Based on a true story” but the authors have admitted to making the story up with the lawyer of the guy who murdered people in the house. If you don’t believe me (and why should you?) here’s a Snopes article and one from the Wikipedia. Oh, and for one final nail in the coffin (no sort of pun intended), how about a link to the documentary exposing the story as a lie? Here it is Notice that it came out 5 years before the new movie was made.
Anyway, just wanted to bring that to people’s attention. It’s all a lie and wasn’t based on any truth other than the fact that people were murdered in the house. This is a lot like The Exorcist in people’s belief that it really happened. Yes, there are really cases of demonic possession (or at least people who believe they are possessed. Whether they are or not, I can’t answer). But the actual events in the story are made up and aren’t based on any fact at all. Still, a damn good book and a truely scary movie.