I Stand Alone is truly one of the greatest, harshest, funniest, and most brutal films ever made.
Director Gasper Noe followed it up with Irreversible and Enter The Void.
The film's protaganist, 'The Butcher' (Phillipe Nahon) is a chap I'd love to spend some time with. His world view is cynical and as raw as a freshly fucked orifice.
I was fascinated by a recent Gasper Noe interview (from Britain) in which Noe cited the relentless voiceover of Gerald Kargl's mind-bending Angst as being the inspiration for the relentless voiceover used by 'The Butcher' in I Stand Alone.
It's an extremely interesting and understandable revelation because the voiceovers of both movies serve to undermine and counterbalance what we're seeing on-screen. They don't simply underline what we're seeing.
Angst, a sadly obscure film, also influenced some of I Stand Alone's stylistic flourishes.
In the film's climactic moments, 'The Butcher' becomes disoriented after he's engaged in sexual relations with a family member. Noe conveys the mental state of 'The Butcher' by attaching a camera rig to his body. The rig mimics the erratic movements of the character, and, by design, puts us inside his head.
In Angst, director Gerald Kargl conveys his character's instability with a similar rig.
This, of course, was done fifteen years before Noe used the concept in I Stand Alone.
Although Angst and I Stand Alone share some stylistic similarities, they are very much the works of original, uncompromising artists.
I do find it curious that the protaganists of both films fail to bite as savagely as they bark.
Kargl's killer, just released from jail, plans an unholy rampage that he fails to pull off.
Noe's 'Butcher' has fantasies of revenge that are thwarted by fate and his own confusion.
Both characters have spent time in jail, and, as a result, are trying to make it in a world that appears to have passed them by.
Their violent actions represent a desire to be acknowledged and taken seriously.
The films are masterpieces, and would make a perfect double feature.
Prior to Xmas, I was kindly invited by the actress Renae Boult to attend a performance of Dennis Paoli's Nevermore, "An Evening With Edgar Allan Poe". Directed by Stuart Gordon, who was in attendance, and starring Jeffrey Combs, I found it quite mesmerizing.
As you can see in this beautiful portrait of Poe by talented and underrated photographer Ward Boult, Combs' resemblance to Poe is quite uncanny.
The actor's reading of The Tell-Tale Heart and The Raven were especially striking in light of the fact that they have been done to death over the years. Combs brings a startling authority to these pieces that made them sound as if he were composing them out loud for the first time.
Ward Bolt's striking portrait of Poe (Jeffrey Combs)
I have seen Poe performed before, but never with such disarming physicality and humor. Yes, there is some self-deprecating humor sprinkled throughout the initial stages of the play, and this negates the usual stodginess often associated with the character.
Writer Paoli wrote Gordon's ep of Masters of Horror, 'The Black Cat', as well as Re-animator, Dagon, Castle Freak, and Abel Ferrara's excellent version of Body Snatchers.
Watching Combs, you are watching Poe, and Gordon stages everything with unbridled clarity and feeling.
The evening, rubbed thoroughly in alcohol, progresses through readings of stories and poems, and gets especially intimate when Poe discusses the loss of his late wife.
I'm sure the great writer would have approved of this wonderful exhumation.
After the show, I spoke briefly to the genuine Mr. Gordon, and complimented him on Poe and and his recent forays into genre cinema. I also asked him if he'd considered turning Nevermore into a film. He said it's something that's of interest to him.
Unlike so many horror directors we have long admired, Gordon has not succumbed to blandness and rehashes of old successes.
On the contrary, his last three movies have been works of extraordinary originality and energy.
I have so much respect for Stuart Gordon, and it's clear he has much respect for good work.
When I behold the astonishing work of Samura Hiroaki, I reflect on the pointlessness of debating High, Low, and Fine art.
Samura's The Love of the Brute (and Bradherley's Coach, another towering work) are mind-bending ero-gro (guro), and definitely Great Art.
Those who engage in the demeaning practice of relegating works of art to ghettos, galleries and museums often base their judgments on their own personal comfort levels with the subject matter. They seem incapable of evaluating the skill of the artist because they are blinded by the glare of their own inhibitions and they fear the career consequences of championing what they've been schooled to consider "trash".
The solution is to render irrelevant those who ghetto-ize material such as this, those nose-in-the-air tragics handicapped by a moral barometer that has no place in art.
These self-appointed guardians of mainstream acceptability spend their lives canonizing saints of artistic blandness while stitching circles of influence around themselves and their fawning acolytes.
Much of Samura's work, and the work of artists such as Jun Hayami, is unavailable in America because printers refuse to handle it, and most publishers fear the repercussions of publishing it.
What type of free society have we become that we fear written and illustrated expression? Why is freedom so damn conditional these days that the word itself is being redefined?
We should be shot for using it so loosely.
Why have we allowed our tastes and choices to be decided by an invisible cultural dictatorship whose only desire is dominion?
Who canceled the human race, and substituted it with a backwards human crawl to oblivion?
With exceptions, our planet has become a complex support system for frightened, paranoid, uninformed, ignorant lemmings. The exceptions are the fuckers raping these lemmings and a small minority who see it as it really is.
Great art shakes us like a bawling baby and questions everything we've been taught.
It peels the epidermis back and rubs our face in the excrement of our dreams and nightmares.
Most importantly, Art slaps us awake, and reminds us that most of what we know isn't... going... to... fuckin... save us, but it will sure make the journey fascinating.
Samura's The Love of the Brute and Jun Hayami's...
... are remarkable for their purity of vision and total indifference to the irrelevant sensibilities of a world that has exchanged truth with commerce.
Although it's the right of any publisher or printer to refuse to take a job on, the tragedy is that they clearly equate art such as this with criminality and immorality; they're unable to separate the work from the reproduction of the work.
The separation and understanding of the differences between what is private and what is public are keys to why extraordinary art such as this has emerged from Japan.
The production of er-gro (Erotic-Grotesque) art like this is not in any way considered akin to criminal or immoral behavior in Japan. The country has a rich tradition of work of this nature, a tradition launched by a movement in the 20's and 30's. Focusing primarily on the malformed and horrific, it broadened its definition to include sexuality, deviance, and bodily corruption.
And as depicted in these scans, Western cinema has had a potent influence on the genre also. It is impossible to experience these images without reflecting on Ruggero Deodato's Cannibal Holocaust...
... a film whose poster art is re-imagined with glee in the work at the top of the page.
In a peculiar way, ero-gro reinforces the status quo by illuminating its stark opposite (the "corruption" of the status quo), but let's not kid ourselves that it doesn't also express our inner anarchy, and let's not pretend that it doesn't raise a wet, dripping flag of truth about our primal selves. And by existing, I would argue, provides a catharsis.
Without that catharsis... well, you figure it out. Then take a look at sex crime figures in Japan versus sex crime figures in the U.S.
What other so-called High Art does all this so brilliantly?
There is some right and much wrong about Chris Walas's The Vagrant, a '92 example of dueling tones.
I suspect it's meant to be a black comedy, but it's not consistent. When it gets serious, it just feels stupid. When it tries for over-the-top, it undercuts its virtues with characters such as a straight cop played by Michael Ironside; he drops in now and then from another movie and acts according to the scriptwriter's demands.
A film that walked the tonal line with greater dexterity was John Avildsen's Neighbors, a long-time favorite of mine. That was a terrific black comedy that knew what it was (and wasn't), and did its mean-spirited best to deliver on that promise.
The Vagrant, from exec producer Mel Brooks, is about a slightly paranoid analyst (Bill Paxton) whose life is turned upside down by a hideous homeless man (Marshall Bell). When corpses begin turning up in the area, he's sure the vagrant is the murderer. The police aren't so sure. And therein lies the drama. Sort of.
The 'vagrant' (Bell) is a fine example of what can be done with latex and an eager make-up effects team. Every time he's on screen, he's disgusting, and his initial appearances are amusing and creepy. Clearly, he's not disgusting enough, though, because he's required to hiss and cackle non-stop to further underline his disgusting status. After a while, he's not funny, scary, or disgusting -- he's a joke! (in a bad way)
Paxton has fun with his role, and goes from corporate ladder climber to trailer park trash in a single bound. Never once did I feel director Walas had a handle on what type of film this was supposed to be. A black comedy is usually played straighter than straight; this isn't. A serious thriller attempts, at least, to get its logic in order; this certainly doesn't. Instead,it test drives every tone in the book and arrives no wiser for the journey.
Even the artwork screams for direction!
In March, '95, this short story by Douglas D. Armstrong appeared in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine; a fairly serious piece, it focused on the main character's descent into madness with much greater consistency and strength.
Despite my misgivings about The Vagrant, I was still glad to spend a few hours in his company.
Sometimes there is truth in advertising. When I first discovered the Asia I love, I could not have described it more aptly than the copy above. With the advent of the internet, Asia's exotic cultural treasures have become even more apparent.
I first encountered Shocking Asia when I was a night dubber of VHS videos in the mid-80's. Our biggest client was K-Tel Video, and, oh boy!, did K-Tel have some fan-tastic titles.
The moment I looked up from my tape checking and saw a wrestling dwarf sliding across a canvas on his forehead, I was hooked on this goodness. The film also featured a visit to a Japanese sex museum, victims of leprosy (a favorite disease of Mondo filmmakers), a sex change operation, and the piercings and stabbings of sacred flesh.
To make matters even juicier, the Shocking Asia score is bombastic and catchy, a rousing celebration of all that is weird and wonderful in our world.
Absolutely one of my favorite Mondo movies, and if you want to see even more of the same, pick up Shocking Asia 2. Both have just been released (together) in Australia on DVD.
Although titled Zombie in the U.S., it was titled Zombie Flesh Eaters in Australia, New Zealand, and the UK. Was that because zombies were less understood outside North America?
"What in the blazers is this Zombie flick about, mate?" went the conversation (perhaps).
"Got me buggered, mate. Wouldn't know."
"Then take a look at it, ya bludger. We're releasing it next week."
One day later:
"So, mate, did ya get a chance to take a gander at that Zombie picture?"
"Yeah, mate, I did. Not bad. Not bad at all."
"What was it about, mate?"
"Well, mate, these zombies eat human flesh. One even eats a bloody shark."
"Strewth! A shark?! Ya fuckin' kiddin'?!"
"No, mate. Takes a big bloody bite out of it while some bird's swimmin' around starkers."
"Fuck me drunk! Sounds like a bloody good show."
"Too right, mate. They'll be chunderin' in the aisles with this one."
"But we can't just call it Zombie."
"The Yanks called it that."
"Yeah, but the Septics are into that weird shit."
"So what are we gonna call it?"
"Fucked if I know."
"You can't call it that, Cobber."
"Shut up! Alright. How about we call it Zombie Flesh Eaters?"
"What for?"
"Because that's what they do, isn't it, dickhead?"
"Yeah."
"Then that's what we'll call it. We don't want punters getting confused."
"I suppose you're right."
"Of course I'm fuckin' right. I'm the boss!"
Employee looks defeated.
Boss nudges him.
"Hey, why the long face?"
"I don't know. I was gonna suggest Jaws 4 -- Zombie Casserole"
Boss thinks for a moment, then looks at Employee:
"You idiot."
They retire to the pub for a beer.
***
It was a masterful stroke adding Island of the Fishmen to the drive-in bill (I raved about this like a lunatic in a previous blog).
This is how I saw Zombie for the first time. Unfortunately, it was cut to smithereens, but that didn't stop me loving every magical minute of it, including, of course, the opening with the fat zombie (who, by the way, is interviewed on one of the special edition DVD's), and a cut version of the eye splintering.
Censorship of horror films in Australia was at plague levels in the 70's and 80's.
Even now, the government is trying to enact a Draconian censorship regime of "forbidden" internet sites.
Great film, average poster.
An odd Aussie film that attempted to capitalize on the success of War Games.
Draping a woman across a computer console seemed like a good idea at the time, I guess, because Michael Crichton's Looker did it.
Ultimately, rather undercooked genre piece, and would have been better if it borrowed from Demon Seed instead.
Mary Higgins Clark's effective suspense novel was reduced to cliches by Sean Cunningham. Not a terrible film, but not particularly successful, either, in achieving its goals. Rip Torn, however, is good as the killer, and the subterranean setting is atmospheric.
The Fan was based on a novel I liked of the same name. The film is boring.
Director/Producer Arthur Davis was an international sales agent who bought and sold films in Asia.
Nice to see Riz Ortolani getting first credit on the poster.
As many will remember, Riz composed the score for Mondo Cane, the film that kick-started the Mondo genre, and grandfathered Reality TV.
Easily one of the most striking film posters of the past forty years.
The Inugamis, from Kon Ichikawa, director of Princess of the Moon, Harp of Burma, Enjo, and Nobi (aka Fire on the Plain), was an Agatha Christie-style murder mystery.
Based on a best-selling novel by Seisha Yokomizo, it was produced by the book's publisher, Haruki Kadokawa, in 1977. Kadokawa used this first credit to create a production company.
Ichikawa, who is now 94, remade the film in 2006 with the same title and some of the same cast members. Although the original is slower, I prefer it to the remake. I urge you to track the original down and behold its brilliant direction and doom-saturated mood.
These two pieces of poster art for the remake make a perfect case for returning to the illustrated movie poster. Their impact is negligible compared to the aesthetic pull of of the original film's striking art.
This mag, published by Fantaco Enterprises Inc, was not terribly well printed, but the content was great.
Now and then, I stumble across magazines that feel like I was consulted on the content. The sensibility is uncomfortably close to my own. This '83 issue ticked every box for me.
Excellent contents page. Superb layout.
Some art from the underrated, obscure shocker Blood and Lace ('71), and a very fine ad mat for Mansion of the Doomed ('76), an American Eyes Without A Face. This "Obscurity of Humane Horror" article, which is a rebuff to comedienne/actress Carol Burnett's comment that horror films "Have no regard for human life or sensibility" crystallizes the thinking behind the magazine's editorial choices, and what excellent choices they are.
"There are horror films out there other than Friday the 13th, Rosemary's Baby, and Scanners," writes editor Barry Kaufman, "and it's only here that you'll read about many of them."
True to his word, Kaufman includes a review of House Out Frontiers (someone chopped the 'With' off), which, in fact, is House Without Frontiers (La Casa Sin Fronteras), a rare, obscure film from director Pedro Olea. I have wanted to see this film for years, having once seen Olea's quite amazing The Ancines Woods (El Bosque Del Lobo, '71)...
...a thoroughly amazing "werewolf" pic, based on a true story, set in the 19th century, that may have inspired Christopher Gans' Brotherhood of the Wolf.
English translation is 'The Forest of the Wolf'.
A Spanish DVD is available.
Prolific filmmaker Donald Farmer contributes an intelligent article on Salo, a film I admire for its audaciousness, but always find a little bit boring. I like individual pieces (the graphic pieces!), but the rest I have a hard time trudging through.
Blood and Lace review. Nobody's ever been able to figure out how the film earned such a mild rating (the equivalent of a PG).
Lemora - A Child's Tale of the Supernatural ('74) is one of my favorite films of all time. In his article, Kaufman argues that its blunt anti-Catholicism may have been one of the reasons why the film failed to connect with audiences at the time of its release. I'm not so sure I agree.
Do devout Catholics flock to see such films? Is an anti-Catholicism stance (in a horror film) potentially hurtful to a film's chances?
My feeling is Lemora didn't connect because it's such an unconventional horror film. Its languid, dream-like pacing, simmering eroticism, not--exactly-overt lesbianism, and refreshing climax, in which Evil wins, may not have satisfied the viewers expecting a neat little shocker with a neat, conservative conclusion. Who's to say? Moreso, the film just wasn't well distributed and advertised, so didn't stand a chance of catching on.
I totally adore it, and find it to be one of the most subversive mixtures of horror and sexuality ever committed to the screen.
This great still from Andy Milligan's Bloodythirsty Butchers adorns the back cover; unfortunately, the movie did not live up to the promise of its promotional imagery.
It was sad to see the demise of Demonique. Fortunately, it still lives on paper and inside the scans above.
The only person stupid enough to believe that sexual addiction therapy works is the the cuckold who has chosen to live in a state of denial.
What a damned joke!
Yes, Tiger Woods has entered sexual addiction therapy in Mississippi because Elin, his wife, has made it a condition of his returning to the marital bed.
This unfortunate woman, who should be taking some sensible advice, is so fixated on remaining with golf's Rocco Siffredi, she's willing to ignore the 18+ plus foreign holes he's driven his balls into over the course of their marriage.
It isn't Elin's fault that Tiger has pursued other options and openings. Elin isn't to blame for the Woodman's lies, deceptions, whoppers, and fairy tales, and she's not responsible for the holes he's played outside the golf course.
To a man with a Rocco Siffredi-sized sexual appetite, you have to ask: Why the fuck did you get married, dude?Are you nuts? Are you stupid?
Then, to further complicate matters, you went and had kids, too? Again: WHAT THE FUCK?!
Pal, you can have every bird you want. It's a buffet out there. You have the money, the power, and the pussy at your fingertips. Why complicate all that with marriage to a woman who's not cool with you swinging your woods and irons behind the clubhouse? A stop for drinks at the nineteenth is acceptable, but you've chipped your black balls into so many vaginal sand traps, anal bunkers, and Las Vegas rough, your scorecard needs a lateral extension.
Sex addiction therapy is a joke. It works for the shrinks who make millions from it, and the hopeful wives and girlfriends who crave the lie it tells, which is: The only thing he'll be banging from now on is you and his head (against the bathroom wall).
Seriously, if you want to fuck around, buddy (and there's nothing wrong with that!), it's best not to fuck with a woman's cranium. It's cruel and it's costly. She doesn't deserve it, the kids will despise you for it, and you don't need the aggravation that a life of lies, half-truths, and bold-faced bullshit entails.
For mine, the sexual addiction therapy gets off on the wrong footing from the get-go because men are not permitted to masturbate during the process.
Hello!?
Not permitted to masturbate?! You mean Tiger and Co. have to live with the distorted sense of reality that not masturbating, not releasing, creates in a man? Are these clowns fucking nuts? These experts are supposed to understand the way men think!
A no-masturbation clause will create a Tiger who will lie, cheat, bullshit, fabricate, and fantasize around the clock while getting distracted every time the window next door is blown slightly ajar.
For God's sakes, Mississippi Sex Therapists, as his unofficial adviser, I implore you to let the Woodman come!
A man is most honest immediately after coming because he's not distracted by his penis and its anarchic, anti-social, fuck-you-and-your family, I-Don't-Care-If-It-Costs-The-House ambitions. Isn't the point of therapy honesty? Well, there won't be an ounce of honesty when a raging boner is riding shotgun with the Woodman's best intentions.
To understand how Tiger really feels about his marriage, his wife, and his infidelity, stop the wanting, put an end to his insane, natural desire to want to slam his balls against the next pink sandtrap who struts through the therapy room door. Then, if you truly want to know how he really feels when he's not thinking about sex, get him between coming and his next erection, and suck the Truth (not semen) out of him. If you miss that opportunity, it's over. Sayonara, baby! You can take your bat and ball and go home.
Getting a guy like Tiger to stop fantasizing about other women will have as much success as getting him to switch teams for a week so he can bang Phil Mickelson and Jack Nicklaus on the 18th tee at Pebble Beach. It ain't gonna fuckin happen, folks. There may come a time when Tiger will cool his sexual heels, but no amount of "therapy" is going to facilitate that transition.
No one wants to admit it publicly, but fucking is great, insane, amazing, and men (and some women) enjoy (to put it mildly) a menu of strange and familiar. That's reality. Monogamy attempts to ignore that, and so does marriage, but it's the truth, and it's why so many marriages end in a heap of shattered, emotional pieces. There is no existing institution that accounts for the reality of human relations. So humans live in a permanent state of semi-denial, and for much of the time, manage to replace primitive cravings with proxies such as pornography, movies, video games, flirtations, sports, keg festivals, and masturbation.
A hundred therapists (say it: 'the rapists') will get filthy rich "rehabilitating" the Woodman, the injured wife will convince herself he's cured of an impossible-to-cure virus, and society will continue to sink under the weight of its straw institutions.
PGA does not mean Pussy Go Away; every golf widow knows that.
This might be the only solution to Tiger's so-called "problem"; he'd have to swim for trim.
I Stand Alone is truly one of the greatest, harshest, funniest, and most brutal films ever made.
The film's protaganist, 'The Butcher' (Phillipe Nahon) is a chap I'd love to spend some time with. His world view is cynical and as raw as a freshly fucked orifice.
It's an extremely interesting and understandable revelation because the voiceovers of both movies serve to undermine and counterbalance what we're seeing on-screen. They don't simply underline what we're seeing.
Angst, a sadly obscure film, also influenced some of I Stand Alone's stylistic flourishes.
Although Angst and I Stand Alone share some stylistic similarities, they are very much the works of original, uncompromising artists.
I do find it curious that the protaganists of both films fail to bite as savagely as they bark.
Both characters have spent time in jail, and, as a result, are trying to make it in a world that appears to have passed them by.
