Monday, November 30, 2009

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

the funeral



just felt like sharing something beautiful...

Saturday, November 21, 2009

14. original pirate material

(2002)

a white british rapper on my top album list?
it's more likely than you think.

so yes, the streets, his first album has always stood as his strongest.
his lyrics are by far the best, i mean listen to turn the page or let's push things forward and tell me i'm wrong.
it's got the great serious epics, it's got the funny songs, it's got the songs about getting drunk and meeting women.



and i love it all.
i don't have much to say, so just listen to the album.
definitely check out a grand don't come for free as well, it was close to being on this list, as it's all just a day in the life of a geezer. however, the more epic feel and better rhymes on this album ended up winning.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

ra ra oh ah ah ro ma ro ma ma ga ga oh la la

is lady gaga a fan of let the right one in?




i mean granted she looks more like an anime character than a vampire in blood lust, however she does play a vampire in the video.





sure it's tied into the whole fame monster thing. but i couldn't help but notice some similarities.
and if it's true it might just be a clever joke about the rumours of her being neither male nor female.

that said, it's a pretty awesome video and the song has been stuck in my head for days.



just, damn.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

trick 'r treat



forgot i hadn't reviewed this one yet!
this was the last of my halloween inspired movie watching, and by far the best way to end it.
i actually got it a few days after halloween, but oh well.

this movie tries to recapture the spirit of creepshow, or the tales from the crypt series, complete with comic book opening.
it also has the most halloween spirit i've seen.

i don't have too much to say, it has four somewhat connected stories, it has all the right horror elements and everyone ends up gettings what is coming to them.

the killer principal, the fucked up little pumpkin kid, sexy chicks, they all make for an awesome night.

i can't imagine watching this movie over and over, but who knows, next halloween it might sound good.
it was a lot of fun and right mix of fucked up horror and campfire stories, i loved it.
also bonus for being the third movie with sexual evil chicks!

three out of five

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

15. you forgot it in people

(2002)

when this album first came out, i was hearing all sorts of great things about it, mostly from people's whose musical taste i generally trusted. so i rushed out and bought it, and was completely disappointed.
i don't remember now why i didn't enjoy it, perhaps the sound varying so from track to track, perhaps my tastes weren't highly refined yet.
obviously this album eventually grew on me, and it all started with the track anthems for a seventeen year old girl.
over the years i've actually introduced many seventeen year old girls to that song (it's sort of like how i listen to explosions in the sky on independence day.) it's not my favourite, but i love it because it's so unique, it was the first of the songs to stand out to me, the first to make me realize there was something good here.
and it grew from there and i was finally forced to admit this was a damn amazing album.



it's eclectic in it's sounds, the lyrics are odd and poetic, it's beautiful and mellow, perfect for putting on and getting lost in the music.
i love it so.

Monday, November 9, 2009

where the wild things are





omg! i had high expectations for this movie, it being a spike jonze joint and all. and you know, it met my expectations! this was a great film.
i have to be honest, i wasn't a big a fan of the book growing up. not that i hated it, it just wasn't my favourite. i mean sure the monsters were neat, i did like them:


but max just seemed like a jerk, and the book was so short the bit with the monsters was over before it started, i wanted to know more you damn book! i owned it, i read it a lot, i got the moral, i just wanted more monsters, it's obviously something i was into. my favourite childhood book by the way was: alexander and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. similar theme, only no monsters, and wanting to run away to australia instead of an island of monsters, and alexander was a crybaby, not a jerk.

so first off this movie scores big because you get to see max as an actual little kid, he's not a total jerk, just a kid that doesn't know how to deal, you connect to him, he brings you back to when you were a kid. so the backstory is now that his parents have split, his sister is becoming a teenager, his mom works late and has a boyfriend, so he's just generally feeling left out and alone. he acts out in a jerkish and kid like fashion. it's completely understandable, then he finds a boat and sails off for adventures, also monsters.

now the monsters in this film are amazing, nobody does monsters better than jim henson's company, every movie they touch the creatures are gold. and this is no exception, the monsters are real breathing creatures, they're frightening and they're cute, it all depends. you first meet them when carol (voiced by james gandolfini) is smashing up the odd wicker balls they live in, max decides to join much to the amusment of carol, and the other monsters get rather annoyed and decide they should eat max. max boats about how he has powers and carol dubs him their new king.
and the wild rumpus begins!

i have to say james gadolfini is amazing in this, he plays this part so well, it's so immature and child like. and he's not doing that annoying nasally thing that got worse the longer the sopranos went on.

everything that happens on the island is great, it's beautiful, fun, always an element of danger, sadness, that's the big thing there's a lot of sadness in this movie, max's situation at home, carol's broken heart over kw, the general anguish and malaise of the monsters, not knowing how to deal with the situation they're in. how can one keep away sadness?

no as for the issue of it being a kids movie, in an interview spike jonze said he was making more a movie about childhood than a movie for children, not that he felt it wasn't for kids, but it's more about them and their feelings, what's it's like to be a kid. mr. skullhead, described it as a movie that seemed like it was plotted by kids, a sort of movie by kids, for kids. and i agree, it really is a movie about childhood and it captures everything about it so well, as for it being too scary or too sad for kids, well i'll let the author of the book answer it, again from the interview on newsweek:

What do you say to parents who think the Wild Things film may be too scary?
Sendak: I would tell them to go to hell. That's a question I will not tolerate.
....
This concentration on kids being scared, as though we as adults can't be scared. Of course we're scared. I'm scared of watching a TV show about vampires. I can't fall asleep. It never stops. We're grown-ups; we know better, but we're afraid.

Why is that important in art?

Sendak: Because it's truth. You don't want to do something that's all terrifying. I saw the most horrendous movies that were unfit for child's eyes. So what? I managed to survive.
....
Grown-ups are afraid for children. It's not children who are afraid.

What makes a good kids' story?
Sendak: How would I know? I just write the books. But I do know that my parents were immigrants and they didn't know that they should clean the stories up for us. So we heard horrible, horrible stories, and we loved them, we absolutely loved them.

i even asked my mom if she thought this movie was appropriate for kids, her answer "well maybe not for really young ones, although you probably would have loved it."

indeed.
the only reason i can think of that young kids wouldn't like it, i mean really young, is because it's a bit slow in the middle, they might bored. i was thrilled however, appreciating all the beauty and splendor that's in this film. and you have to love how it works out, max realizing he's so much like carol, and how kw represents his mom, and how she feels when max throws his tantrums. it all comes together nicely, it's beautifully bittersweet. it all ends heartwarmingly though. so yay happy ending!

see to me the monsters were a group of lost kids, they pretend to be mature and together, but they're hopeless and lost. actually that's being an adult... shit. point being they're not figments of his imagination, that's silly, they're sand filled monsters that used to be kids.
or something like that.

so it definitely developed the monsters to my liking, giving them character but still leaving them mysterious and scary, and i've already stated my love of the soundtrack. beautiful visuals, fun story...

i loved this movie, that's all that really needs to be said.

five out of five

dance break



and shake that butt

ginger snaps




oh look, another movie where the female lead goes all evil and sexual when turned supernatural.
in this one it's tied with puberty!
but holy shit is this movie amazing, i've been hearing great things about it for years, so now i feel like such a fool for waiting so long to see it, it made for great pre-halloween viewing though, so there's at least that.
this movie is spectacular, it's creative, odd, sexy, disturbing, and most importantly; funny and scary.
it's scary in the sense that the characters are well developed, and you actually care what's going to happen to them. you just feel for them, and that's what's important for scary movies, random people dying and gore isn't really scary.
it's also clever because of the whole werewolf, lunar cycle, menstrual cycle thing, and how the werewovles actually work, she was becoming more and more wolf like as the movie progressed, fur, tail, heterochromio (which was hot) and even additional nipples! hilarious.
it was also mentioned the wolf that attacked her had a human circumcised penis, they're not pretty beasts.
werewolves have always been one of my favourite creatures of myth and horror movies, and this movie is fun and damn amazing, check it out if you haven't.

there's apparently also a sequel and a prequel of sorts, i have my doubts as if they'd be any good, but then again i had the same doubts about this movie, so who knows, perhaps next halloween (or whenever i get over my horror movie burnout)

five out of five

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

thirst




so i never did get around to my vampire post part 2: undead boogaloo. mostly because i got burned out on the vampire movies, and decided not to watch a bunch i likely wouldn't be crazy about.
i did however manage to catch this movie by one of my favourite directors, mr. chan-wook park.

so as the trailer explains this movie is about priest that gets infected with one disease and then with vampirism, which somehow saves him from the first horrible disease. the symptoms of the horrible disease (blisters, loss of fingernails, vomiting blood) all come back if he hasn't fed however, so his faith be damned, he needs to feed. he starts out by feeding on a patient in a coma.

there's this odd bit though, after he gets infected and "saved" it cuts to months later and he's back in korea and everyone thinks he's a miracle man. he stays bandaged for quite awhile but eventually reveals himself to be healed, and then one night after meeting the female lead, and smelling her blood, his vampire powers suddenly wake up and he can sense and hear everything around him, from the mites on his skin to one of his fellow priests masturbating. he soon passes out and wakes up in the morning when the sun burns his skin, so rightly so, he hides in the closet.
it's a bit confusing why it took so long, the wikipedia article, (which is just bad) says he died then and there, but that's not true, he died back in africa, his heart stopped, but he continued on praying and the blisters healed up. i guess it's the lust then, both of blood, and of this woman that woke up the vampire in him.

and there we get to the heart of this story, the love affair between the priest and bored neglected housewife. his inexperience lead to some of the most awkward and hilarious sex scenes that exist on film, the end of the trailer where she's sucking his fingers, and him on her toes, it's sexual, odd, funny, and just awesome. so we find out about this woman, her parents abandoned her and a woman took her in, and eventually married the girl off to her son. she had been raising the two of them together, so yes, awkward. the guy is a geek and completely reliant on his mother and his wife, and his mother is just a controlling bitch. so the girl was rightfully going crazy, and would leave at nights, just trying to run away. one night while she's gone she meets the priest after he discovers what he truly is. the affair springs from there and eventually they plot to kill the husband.

after that they're both haunted, in a series of hilarious and disturbing scenes. the mother is so grief stricken she suffers a stroke, leaving her in the care of these two. their relationship grows strained from both of these things and climax when the priest looses his temper and kills her. he decides to turn her into a vampire to save her, and she becomes this sexy, evil, and murdering monster. she was more the shy, reserved, murdering monster before. hijinks ensue.

this movie deals with so much, lust, faith, guilt, self mutilation... it's beautifuly shot, it's gory, and hilarious. it's also worth noting that the vampires don't grow fangs, they become immortal sure, and get burned by sunlight yes, even some fancy enhanced senses, with strength, agility, and such. but they don't sprout fangs. i think it's interesting the only reason they needed to keep up on the blood was to keep back the other disease, well except for the female of course, she found killing and drinking fresh blood thrilling and exciting "it's not a sin when a lion kills a gazelle is it?" she was an atheist so didn't fear hell like the priest. vampirism just made her true nature more apparent, the priest likely wasn't her first affair, and she cheated on him as well once the sex got awkward with guilt. she lied, dreamt of killing, and was generally unpleasant. with her life though, that's not really unexpected. the priest was an orphan as well, looking for acceptance, looking always to help. funny how that all works out.

i really liked the end of this movie, with both the priest destroying his reputation and taking them both out. it was fairly haunting, and a great end for this odd story of lust.

while i still enjoy let the right one in more, this is still a great vampire movie, definitely one of my new favourites.

five out of five

Sunday, November 1, 2009

another halloween bites the dust



and so continues my halloween tradition of watching rocky horror every year.
it's been going on since i was ten or so, so yes, at least forteen years of this excellent and twisted musical.
hope everyone had a fun halloween.

it's just not halloween without tim curry.