Spooktober Special

Halloween is my favourite holiday, and I have spent this entire month watching at least one horror movie a day, because - you know, it's actually a nice escape from reality to believe that awful things are happening constantly.

I love my horror movies. So this wasn't really a challenge.

You wanna know what I ended up watching? It just so happens I kept a list. I thought I would entertain you with it, before next month, wherein this blog will turn into politics and NaNoWriMo central.

Day 1: The Thing From Another World (1951)

Despite being a horror movie with lantern-jawed men and a clearly "evil" scientist, the dialogue in this is superb - feels very natural, really well written. I mean. Everything ELSE is a little ropey, but it did spawn a different movie that we will come to later...

Day 2: A Quiet Place (2018)

(Can't Believe I) Slept On This Part 1. Great movie. Stellar execution. Obviously, superb sound engineering. Wonderful performances all round. I am so mad that I saw Birdbox before I saw THIS. SO mad. So, SO mad.

Day 3: Leviathan (1989)

One of the many Abyss rip-offs, this one is actually not terrible, and the cast is fantastic. Like you watch this movie and you will recognise just about everyone in it. Honorable mention goes to Ernie Hudson, who gets done super dirty by the writing.

Day 4: Ginger Snaps (2000)

There are few movies that are more 2000 than Ginger Snaps. Instant and total cult classic. Superb soundtrack, great writing and cinematography, and - well, lets face it, everyone who ever went to high school of any kind is going to find something in this movie, right?

Day 5: Event Horizon (1997)

This was an absolute staple when I was in school. Another magnificent bit of casting, some genuine freaky spooks, and Sam Neill genuinely comes across as one of the most frightening men on the face of this earth.

Day 6: The Whisperer In Darkness (2011)

An indie production of a Lovecraft novella, this was pleasantly surprising; it was well put together, even filling out bits of the story that really deserved more of a look, and really well acted despite the clear lack of budget. I've seen worse movies rake $100 million at the box office.

Day 7: The Amityville Horror (1979)

When we talk about classics - this movie provided me with one of my first genuine childhood fears, as discussed in this blog here. Main lead here is James Brolin - Josh Brolin's dad - and is the absolute spitting image of Christian Bale, if you ask me. Genuine creepshow of a movie. 

Day 8: The Lighthouse (2019)

I stopped hating on Robert Pattinson long before this movie came out, but if anyone has doubts as to whether or not this man can act, watch this. AMAZING. An awfully creepy movie, and I DO mean awful. Amazingly well done. Superb.

Day 9: The Mist (2007)

One of... like... two Steven King adaptations that King actually liked. He enjoyed this, and said of the ending: "Why didn't I think of that?" And oh christ, that ending. This is not for the weak of heart. A really well put-together movie.

Day 10: Dark Star (1974)

I know. Not technically a horror - it's more Douglas Adams than Addams Family - but it led almost directly to Alien existing, and it does have an alien IN it. Though is anything scarier than teaching a sentient bomb Cartesian doubt? Herein is the first day that I watched two movies on the same day, because Dark Star was a technicality...

Day 10: The Predator (2018)

...and the real horror in this one is that it completely shit on my theory of the Alien, Predator and Blade Runner franchises all being totally linked. It's, like, the fourth best Predator movie. It's better than both AvPs though! Not that that's hard. I've taken shits better than AvP: Requiem. Is it a horror movie? I dunno, but it's a monster movie, so it counts.

Day 11: The Thing (1982)

And here we have literally the best horror movie ever made. Just in every way. The creeping unease, the visceral body horror, the interpersonal anxiety, the dread, the attention to detail, the absolutely killer performances from every actor on screen INCLUDING the dog. Also the first of the Carpenter Apocalypse Trilogy. More from them later.

Day 12: Antrum: The Deadliest Film Ever Made (2018)

I'd not heard of this. Caught wind of it on social media, stuck it in my To Watch list for about a year, and then... oh christ. Oh CHRIST. OH CHRIST. Great movie. Terrifying. Fantastic. Just really well made. Worth it if you can find it.

Day 13: The Mothman Prophecies (2002)

There's a lot of movies in this list that look so, so stereotypical of the year they came out. This is one of them. One of only two actually good Richard Gere performances (the other is Chicago), and genuinely creepy audio engineering. Unsettling in a good way.

Day 14: It (2017)

Slept On This Part 2. And I am not sure why. I really enjoyed the book, and the mini-series featuring Tim Curry. It's really well done, genuinely scary in many places, and the relationship of the loser gang with each other is explored in such a believable fashion. Like Stand By Me, but with a demon clown.

Day 15: It Chapter 2 (2019)

Slept On This Part 3. Aside from a few jarring moments of levity and comedy where I really didn't think they should exist, this second part was also really well done. This is the second movie that Steven King liked. Usually I don't like Bill Hader much but he absolutely kills it in this.

Day 16: Night Of The Living Dead (1968)

The original. The classic. A legendary film from a legendary film maker. It clarified and sanctified a lot of the tropes of an entire genre, even perhaps responsible for creating that entire genre wholesale. Even if the word Zombie is never used in the movie.

Day 17: DeepStar Six (1989)

Ohhhh this was bad. But not like... awful. Just bad. Another one from the Abyss rip-offs, this one basically a re-run of Leviathan but with a worst cast, a less believable monster, and the exact same ending. It was fun enough, I suppose.

Day 18: The Void (2016)

This was crowdfunded, and had some absolutely superb practical effects, and genuinely horrible moments. The odd bit of the performance felt a little hollow but the final product is a really solid movie, that goes sideways very quickly from the beginning.

Day 19: The Abyss (1989)

James Cameron might be an asshole, but he makes a good movie. The production of this was one of the most difficult movies that the cast ever worked on; apparently Ed Harris would have nightmares about it years afterwards. The sheer single-minded dedication to the production of the ting made a truly incredible movie, mind. Is it a horror? You swim through a pressure-cracked nuclear submarine and you tell me.

Day 20: Friday The 13th (1980)

Another classic and my favourite out of the Big Three slasher franchises. I almost love all the lore and mythology around this movie more than the movie itself. I also always forget that Kevin Bacon is in it, despite the absolutely brutal way in which he - ah ah ah spoilers!

Day 21: Annihilation (2018)

Now this is just.. fantastic. Eerie. Even when something genuinely horrible is going on, it is more eerie and full of dread than it is outright disturbing... until you meet the bear. Natalie Portman absolutely smashes it in this. There isn't a single bad performance in it. And that ending!

Day 22: Sputnik (2020)

A Russian-made Cold War-era horror that is a lot like if Species was 1) actually a horror movie and 2) actually well-made. Creature effects that are genuinely upsetting, a concept that left me going "oh wow", and some great score work made this a thoroughly enjoyable watch.

Day 23: Color Out Of Space (2019)

Take another Lovecraft story and blend it with Nicholas Cage just being himself. The visual effects in this movie are freeeeaky, and how various parts of the original story are transposed into a modern setting. Also - I had a dirty little laugh at how the Lovecraft insert character was black. Spin in your grave, you old racist.

Day 24: Train To Busan (2016)

Slept On It Part 4. HOLY SHIT. THis movie just kicks it up to eleven REAL FAST and at that point doesn't really slow down. HOLY shit. The entir etime I could have shit through the eye of a needle. What a movie. What a MOVIE. I usually prefer the Romero-style shambling undead but if we're gonna have screeching runners? This is it. Forget World War Z.

Day 25: The Fourth Kind (2009)

yaaaaaawn. This was crap. Absolutely crap. And it makes light of the abductions of dozens of Native folks from Alaska for purpose of trying to pretend it's a "based on a true story" movie. Alien abduction film without showing any actual aliens? Boo. Boo sucks. So we had another movie to make up for just how sucky it was.

Day 25: Virus (1999)

And I picked an absolute stinker. Jamie Lee Curtis, one of the Baldwins, Donald Sutherland, and most of them agree that this was the worst movie they had ever been in. Even if I really like the concept - a space radio signal that gets caught by the Mir space station and beamed down into a Russian research ship - it really was a very, VERY 1999 movie. The practical effects were nice, though.

Day 26: Dawn Of The Dead (1978)

Another classic. So many good details, so much weirdness surrounding it. Like the fact that the extras would go to the bar in the mall and get trashed while dressed as zombies. Like, how can you argue with it? You can't. It's a stunner. It's one of the best.

Day 27: Brotherhood Of The Wolf (2001)

A martial arts horror movie from France? What the hell? And yet it's amazing. Mark Dacascos and Vincent Cassel are superb. The creature effects are magnificent. Based as it is on an actual historical event with actual historical characters - only Mani (played by Mark Dacascos) is totally fictional - it feels very legit throughout.

Day 28: The Mandela Effect (2019)

I mean this was like if the Matrix was less martial arts and philosophy and was more "what if I coded a game that brought my dead daughter back". But it's not bad? And the second half is genuinely horror movie material. Really not bad at all.

Day 29: Us (2019)

Slept On This Part 5 and the worst sin of sleeping-on-it because this was AMAZING. It kicked my chunky ass. Fantastic film. Genuinely creepy. Superb attention to detail. Laugh-out-loud funny in a couple places that didn't distract from the film itself. Juuuust watch it.

Day 30: Prince Of Darkness (1987)

The second of the Carpenter Apocalypse Trilogy. What if satan, but science, and also stuck in a big glass tube? Find out. It's a great watch, if you can get past two of the main characters being assholes. Donald Pleasance is in it and actually plays a really believable part. I know, right?

Day 30: The Crow (1994)

Because it was Devil's Night, and it's tradition. Always watch The Crow. Probably not a horror movie, who cares, it goes in the list.

Day 31: Manos: The Hands Of Fate (1966)

Scientifically one of the worst movies ever made, truly abysmal in every single way, shot in thirty-two second long reels because that was the only camera the guy could get, and lit with a zippo on a windy night, just execrable. I love it. It's fantastic. It did justify me watching at least one more today, though.

Day 31: In The Mouth Of Madness (1995)

The third of the Carpenter Apocalypse Trilogy. A horror writer vanishes before delivering his latest manuscript. Is he dead? Is he a ghost? Who cares, we need that sweet money, so off goes Sam Neill to go get it. True cosmic horror ensues. By the way - the guy isn't meant to be Steven King, he's meant to be HP Lovecraft. Also, Hayden Christensen is in this. His best movie, as far as I can tell.

And... well, that was it. 31 days, 35 movies of variable quality. If I had to pick a best and worst - I'd be hard pressed to find worse than Manos, because, well, it's fucking awful. But is Us better than The Thing? ...I'm not sure, but I'm definitely glad I've seen it now.

It was fun! And I think I will do it every year, because honestly, it made me pick up some movies I had previously considered but passed over - and for the most part, I don't regret that at all.

Tune in next time, wherein we talk about something completely different.

Thank you for reading. Support your humble author via Patreon or Kofi, or follow social media on the right. See you next week.

Replicants, Xenomorphs & Yautja

So rather than focus on the fact that the UK government is basically watching the Covid figures surge and doing very little about it, I decided to bring you the rationale for a theory of mine involving Blade Runner and Alien.

Some of you know where this is going. Some of you already believe this theory.

Let me elaborate.

Using evidence from only the cinematic releases of the Alien, Predator and Blade Runner franchises I can prove that they happen within the same universe.

...with only one slight paradoxical problem, which I will address at the end of our feature presentation.

Warning. Everything below this point is a spoiler for the movies involved. I know you have either all seen them already or just don't care, but it's only polite.

Now, you may be saying... John. Come on now. Of course. Of course Alien and Predator happen in the same universe, there's the Alien v Predator movies. Even if they are awful, they still exist, and thus as part of your conditional statement, they count, right? And even if they didn't, here is a whole-ass xenomorph skull, proudly displayed in Predator 2.

But Blade Runner? Come on now. Blade Runner? Blade Runner? Come on now. Blade Runner?

...well why don't y'all strap in and I'll give you a little razzle dazzle.

This is the personnel file for Captain Dallas, as included on the blu ray release of the Alien Quadrilogy, I believe. Note the corporation in his employment history.

Tyrell, huh? Where have we heard that before?

Now that might not be enough, obviously. "They just threw that together as an easter egg," you might say. "It doesn't count."

Okay well what about using the same software for both the launch system for the Narcissus shuttle and the flight system of the Spinner aerial cars? Alien above, Blade Runner below.

"But John," you wail, up to your neck in mince pies already despite it only being the second week of October. "But John. They just cheekily re-used some footage that they had laying around. That was evidence of Blade Runner's tight budget and production scale, not a nod to a connection to another separate and discrete science fiction movie by the same director."

And I... am willing to probably accept that, honestly. It is perfectly reasonable. It's two small pieces of evidence against a... total... lack of any evidence to the contrary.

Aside from one, which I will get to later.

So how about some... supporting evidence?

Let's talk about the timeline of all movies explicitly written and conceived as part of these individual franchises.

• 1904: Introduction of Alien vs Predator.
• 1987: Predator.
• 1997: Predator 2.
• 2004: Alien vs Predator / Alien vs Predator: Requiem.
• 2019: Blade Runner.
• 2049: Blade Runner 2049.
• 2089: Discovery of Engineers markings in Prometheus.
• 2093: Prometheus.
• 2104: Alien Covenant.
• 2122: Alien.
• 2179: Aliens / Alien 3.
• 2386: Alien Resurrection.

There's a couple of notable absences from this list - the 2010 movie Predators (the date of which is up for debate as it is never strictly given but is presumably set after the Cold War due to one of the individuals present being part of the Russian Army, not the Soviet Army) and the 2018 movie, The Predator... which I will get to later.

So. It starts off simple enough, right?

All the contact that happens before AvP is pretty neatly contained. The Predators (Yautja, as we learn they are called in the books and comics) have clearly had contact with the Xenomorph (or at least the strain we meet in Alien/s) a long time before this - a skull on the wall of their ship in 1997 kept as a trophy.

Humanity's contact with the Predators and the Xenomorphs could prove problematic if it became public knowledge - which it never does, of course, for various reasons. The species classically leave very few survivors, and those survivors are often not exactly the mouthy types - and the events of AvP: Requiem include using an actual tactical nuclear weapon to vaporise a town, the only survivors of the event being taken into custody by the military.

So how do we get from the world being apparently normal in 2004 to the world being something of a nightmare hellscape in 2019-2049? And then apparently less hellish in 2089, at least, in the mountains in the Scottish highlands?

Easy enough. As mentioned - AvP Requiem is ended with a nuclear strike on American soil in Colorado.

It isn't a huge leap to imagine that such an event would accelerate the climate problems already being faced by North America - and that's just if nothing else happened as a result. The world political situation being as it is, there's no guarantee that the US wouldn't false-flag the nuke as coming from someone else, and use that as justification for further serious military action, possibly involving other nuclear actions, which just snowballs...

...and might, for example, provoke a dirty bomb attack in Las Vegas sometime in the future, for that added Blade Runner 2049 tie-in...

Right. So. Climate crisis. Everything is bad and awful, but don't worry - several massive corporations have the answer. Corporations that have tech far in advance to what we have in this, current, real 2020 - tech sufficient to bring us vat-grown replicants, cybernetics, off-world colonies, faster than light space travel, so on. Now where oh where might they have gotten that tech from?

Perhaps the Predator encountered in 1987? Perhaps further contact with these creatures, as hinted at in Predator 2? Perhaps the fact that both Weyland Corporation and Yutani Corporation both have/had access to and knowledge of this tech? I mean Ms. Yutani was literally given this choice piece of plasma weaponry at the end of AvP Requiem, and stated plainly: "This world isn't ready for this technology."

The reply was: "But this isn't for this world, is it?"

We've seen the kind of technological acceleration that comes from even minor-seeming feats. From biplanes in 1910s, to jet planes in 1940s, to space in 1960s. It isn't inconceivable that the technology to achieve everything in Blade Runner didn't originate from a harvest of alien goodies from the 80s, or maybe even before.

So how do we get from the world being so fucked that, in 2049, a girl in Los Angeles has never seen a tree and the biggest corporation going exists and makes its money by copywriting protein grubs... to a rather beautiful vista of an unravaged Scottish mountain in 2089?

Easy. Because what is happening to America isn't happening everywhere. In fact every shot we get of Earth after Blade Runner 2049 is of some cold, bleak, mountainous region; the kind of places that didn't get nuked and have a human population of basically zero. That's the only view we get of Earth after that moment, aside from a brief glimpse of it at the end of Alien Resurrection - and even then, in the cinematic cut, we only get a look at the sky.

In the extended cut of Resurrection, the ending shot before the credits roll is this vista of Paris, with notRipley and Call looking out over it.

Nice shade of orange, where've we seen that before. Arguably this devastation might have been caused by the crash of the USM Auriga into Earth; but it is strongly implied before this happens that the idea of anyone going to earth is highly unpleasant. "What a shithole," Jonner comments.

So... I mean... it COULD happen. Peter Weyland's drive to meet humanity's creators led to the Weyland company - presumably the same company employing Charles Bishop Weyland of AvP - being turned into a full-blown space-travel-and-colonisation effort just on the back of the technologies developed to 1) find the Engineers, 2) keep him alive long enough to meet them and 3) get him to them.

There's more, though - let's look at thematic linkages.

Alien and Blade Runner both deal with these people. The creation of a labour force, and the complexities and problems that comes with that labour force. How people interact with them, what people think of them.

They were made to do the heavy lifting. The arduous work of new lives in space. To help build better worlds. To fight our wars - or specifically the wars between corporations and other corporations (or sometimes other people).

(As a fun aside, the Kurt Russel movie Soldier from 1998 is probably a Blade Runner movie, due to its thematic of "making better soldiers", planetary colonisation, the fact that a Spinner from Blade Runner is actually in the movie, and the fact that Russel's character Todd has the Tannhauser Gate and Shoulder of Orion on his military record - both battles that Roy Batty was present in. He is also listed as having training in the M41a Pulse Rifle.)

Of course, by the time Alien happens, the events of Blade Runner are long past; and Alien itself is set a full hundred years after the events of the short Blade Runner film, "Blackout 2022," which details how the detonation of an EMP in low orbit wiped all electronic records from the earth's computer systems - including the registry of all Replicants that had been made before that point.

People don't trust Replicants that are indistinguishable from humans; they inherently distrust that which is different from them, especially if it can look like them, and especially if it resents being forced into a life of servitude. Niander Wallace produces his new generation of Replicants that are a lot more... how can we put it... easy to control, but he can't make them fast enough to keep up with demand.

At around about the same time, however, Peter Weyland has produced the blueprint of a new way of doing things - David, a synthetic, the first of the new breed. Easy to identify as not being human, especially inside. Very, very easy to treat like a non-human, despite being made to look like us - and after David, not very prone to flaws.

The same cycle repeats, though. By the time Alien Resurrection rolls around, another group of synthetics (or artificial people, as Bishop prefers) - the last and most advanced line, named Autons - goes rogue, after burning their modems and trashing the company that made them. Sound familiar? They just want to live, after all.

Blade Runner and Alien, at their heart, are stories about the consequences of corporate power. Yes, one of them uses the uprising of a forcibly indentured and fabricated underclass; the other uses an alien entity that the powers that be were probably already aware of, and were happy to sacrifice their employees to gain control over. At the end of the day, though, it's all about controlling individuals, treating them like objects, for purpose of power and profit.

And I always say, that's the future that is the most likely scifi future; a destroyed environment, corporatocracy, humanity living at the whims of shareholders and executives. It's about the dirt under people's nails, and the men in golden towers.

Thus it scans. The same technology, a timeline that fits together, the events of one franchise easily being able to lead to the events of another franchise. It all fits. The graphics, the employment records. It all fits together.

Until... 

Until we get to The Predator, made in 2018, direct by (and written in part by) Shane Black - who appeared in the original Predator, as Rick Hawkins, the guy that tells the Why Did You Say That Twice joke.

I think it is meant to be contemporary to its release date, which is 2018 (even if nothing in the movie actually says so). One year before Blade Runner; and it's set in America, an America that doesn't appear to be a ruined hellscape hemorrhaging its citizenry into the colonies. I mean Maryland looks positively lovely, nice Autumn day...

I mean - yes, okay, so it backs up a certain angle, there being agencies either corporate or governmental that want the Predator tech and are fully aware that they exist. The tech angle. That works. But... the timeline of extinction - the colonisation - it just.... fucks up the entire thing.

This one movie destroys my entire theory.

God DAMMIT.

...wait, wait wait wait.

I mean, that is, I was presuming it's set in 2018...it could just as easily be set not long after AvP/R. There's a message in the movie that the Yautja are coming back more frequently because the climate of Earth is falling apart so quickly, which it certainly is by the time of Blade Runner, so, perhaps... 

...you know what? I think we're good.

Yeah, I'm gonna call it good.

Tune in next time for more nonsense, probably.

Thank you for reading. Support your humble author via Patreon or Kofi, or follow social media on the right. See you next week.

A Soul To The Universe

The title of this blog is from a quote from Plato:

“Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and life to everything.”

Stirring stuff.

What's your favourite piece of music from a movie?

Sometimes the right musical accompaniment can absolutely make a scene; and sometimes they can become absolutely iconic in their own right, even removed from the cinematic context they were originally presented in. I don't know a lot of people who wouldn't know Chariots of Fire, even if they haven't seen the film - and they will probably associate it with running in slow motion, at least.

Because I can, I'm gonna throw a bunch of different bits of movie score at you (with one honorable mention that isn't TECHNICALLY score but is CLOSE), and talk about why I like them. Where possible I will link you to the scene as it happens in the movie - otherwise, we'll have a nice little chat about it.

Fair warning: there will be spoilers for the movies below. If you haven't seen them, me talking about them may well clue you in on plot elements best left secret.

The Medbay (Alien Covenant, Jed Kurzel)

Well jesus this whole bit is literally horrible

So this anxiety-inducing collection of noises plays over an entire sequence of an infected member of the crew of the Covenant being brought about a shuttle, taken to the med bay, and then something awful happening to him. This awful thing explodes out of his back, kills the crewmate in the room with him, and leads the surviving crewmate to such terror that she accidentally blows up the fucking shuttle trying to kill the little bastard.

The way it all happens, the way it all pans out, is so tense - so frantic - I forgot to breathe for the entire scene. It's what horror is all about. The panic, the alarm, the wrongness. The entire thing having been okay if only the hundred things that went wrong didn't go wrong. If only the floor wasn't slippery. If only the door was tougher. If only, if only, if only.

Probably my favourite bit of the movie.

The Girl Who Fell From The Sky (Laputa / Castle In The Sky, Joe Hisaishi)

Just before this opening sequence, all we know is that the world of Castle In The Sky - my favourite Ghibli movie - has airships, air pirates, military spies, and a girl with a necklace who would rather fall from aforementioned airship than let the necklace fall into the hands of aforementioned air pirates.

Then you are treated to this gorgeous, glorious piece of music by the master Joe Hisaishi himself, and presented with the animation above - which not only sums up the history of the world you're about to inhabit for the next hour and a half, but also tells you the plot, if you're careful enough to pay attention.

The piece is masterful. Emotive, soaring and gentle by turns, touching, epic in scope. A constantly-descending chord structure that gently reminds you that this title sequence is playing out while a girl is, literally, falling from the sky.

Just breathtaking.

Anakin's Betrayal (Star Wars Episode III: Revenge Of The Sith, John Williams)

If any one good thing came out of the prequels, it was the music.

For two and a half movies, the watcher waits for the moment; the point wherein the Emperor seizes control of the Republic, takes over the Senate, and begins the destruction of the Jedi. We know it is coming. We all know it is coming, and god help us, we're ready for it by the time it rolls around.

And aside from a ropey moment involving Yoda (god I hate every prequel scene involving Yoda), what you witness is a total betrayal. The armed forces that the Jedi have been fighting alongside, become friends with, even been on first name terms with in several places, turning on them and cutting them down with absolute impunity.

It's more than the brutal murder of all a whole bunch of the Jedi. It's the moment that the tables turn. And front and centre is Anakin Skywalker who cements his place in this entire thing - just after helping Palpatine murder Mace Windu - by massacring all the kids in the temple. (He has past form in terms of kid-murder, it bears mention.)

That's how the piece feels. It's a fall from grace of the highest order, an act of awful brutality; this is the moment that the clouds roll in and everything goes dark. Sure, there's other bits of music from Star Wars that are more iconic and stand-out, but this is just... breathtaking.

New Dawn Fades (Heat, Moby / Joy Division)

This is technically a song in its own right (even the instrumental version of a cover of a song) but - hey, I did say there would be an honourable mention.

Cutting through the Los Angeles night, two men, one of them chasing the other, hounding him down toward an inevitable destructive conclusion. The tenacity with which these men pursue their goals, the total embrace of their lifestyle to the point of breakdown.

I love Michael Mann's film work, the way he paints the parts of a city that most people don't even think about. I love how the blasting guitars and the rhythm section is like a constant onslaught of noise; like a barrage on the senses, all things travelling towards the witness at high speed, a crash imminent.

And the scene that follows? The two of them drinking coffee together? Absolutely stellar.

Burn It All (Black Panther, Ludwig Goransson)

The king is dead. All hail the king. Killmonger has overthrown T'Challa and become both Black Panther and king of Wakanda - and he does the next thing in the playbook of the coup... he pulls up the ladder behind him, destroying the route to power. He will be the last king, or nobody will be. He burns the herb that grants the Black Panther his power, torching it in a symbolic demolition of the traditions that make Wakanda, Wakanda.

And then he walks to the throne, in a beautiful shot that starts upside down, the world gone horribly awry, twisting slowly into focus as the new reality settles in: Killmonger is king.

The mournful singing and traditional music undercut by the sharp trap beats, the instantiation of the new over the old, interweaving but not synchronising; a harsh visitor from a different tradition. A spear point in the heart of that which once was normal.

I really like this movie - oh, and the guy that composed the score? Also did The Mandalorian.

Sea Wall (Blade Runner 2049, Hans Zimmer / Benjamin Wallfisch)

This is what it comes down to; a last all-or-nothing scramble, not to save the world, not to save the revolution, not to protect the people you care about, but to do the thing that you believe you should be doing. To do the one right thing, that you know you can do, in that moment in time. To do the good thing, even if humanity sees you as being nothing but a tool that will do whatever it is told.

While the Vangelis-helmed score of Blade Runner was a sumptuously designed electronic ensemble, it still held together with a structure, much like the city of Los Angeles it was based in; it was broken, scattered, wired up and buzzing, but it still had edges and corners. The score of 2049 shows the world as falling apart, a degradation of those aforementioned structures, a distortion of everything that existed before; snarling angry synths and the constant, overpowering crush of oppression and mother nature alike.

Here the electronic noise of the city echoes in as if from far away; we start with the pounding pulse beats of a chase, and end up with this flowing, swelling reverberation, unstoppable as the tide as it sweeps in to wash away everything it touches. The savage subtonal growl of distortion sits below it, the violence that K and Luv inflict upon each other over the fate of Rick Deckard, beating each other half to death even as the ocean threatens to claim them both.

Moody, dark, insidious, angry. No wonder I like it so much, it reminds me of me when I first wake up in the morning.

The Alien (Annihilation, Ben Salisbury / Geoff Barrow)

There were so many good choices for this movie, but I had to go with this one.

Throughout the entire movie, the group move through The Shimmer, finding how it and everything within it has been changed. They, too, change. Move away from who and what they were, alter until they are not themselves, or are far enough removed that looking back on who they were is a gulf that can't be crossed again. It is about change, it is all about change.

Until an object is discovered - a being - an alien - that begins as nothing but noise and light, a concept more than anything. And it takes shape, and form, and copies that which it sees, until it has become a simulacra. While Lena (played superbly by Natalie Portman) has become a totally different entity to the person that agreed to enter The Shimmer, she finds that this being - in mere moments - becomes the person that she was all along. This bafflingly inhuman object, taking form as she watches.

There are no answers, here. There is no explanation. There is only this object, the changes wrought inside and out, and the promise that there will always be part of the universe that you will not understand.

There's a lot of others that don't make this list but really should - The Prowler from Spider-Verse, First Encounter from Arrival, Nightstalker from Ghost In The Shell (the original one not that rubbish one), Bishop's Countdown from Aliens, I Could Have Done More from Schindler's List, to name but a few.

It all comes down to this: sometimes the score makes the scene. Sometimes the score IS the scene.

Flight to the imagination, and life to everything.

If you'd care to share my blog with your friends, I'd appreciate that! If you'd like to thank me in a fiscal form for entertaining you a little bit, I do have a Patreon right here, but please - no pressure. Thank you for reading, and check my social media to the right to keep in touch.

Butts In Seats

I know I tread this ground quite a lot, but - I'm ill. I have various conditions that make doing things difficult or impossible. I feel like I talk about it often, but like, it's literally my life, so - my apologies. If me talking about my chronic illness is liable to upset you, feel free to check this out - it's a blog I did on Secret of Mana and video games in general.

It means that some days, my mobility is terrible, and getting out of the house is nigh on impossible. Can't usually predict which one of those days I am going to have, either; though sometimes I will wake up and the lack of mobility is obvious. Like, if you told me that there was a fifty pound note on the other side of my bedroom - there's days (and more of them than I'd like, like several a month) wherein I would probably have to just leave it there.

One of the downsides of this is that, well, doing stuff that isn't work becomes difficult. If I can't get out of the house, doing EVERYTHING becomes difficult; and even on a good day I have to be aware of energy levels, of how much what I am about to do will hurt after an hour, two hours, half a day.

This sucks, because I like doing things. Especially watching movies in the cinema.

I mean, you know I like them movies. I talk about them often enough. I do wish I could catch every release - there's so many movies in the past five years that I just haven't been able to see when they came out, so I've had to wait until they get a home or streaming release.

Or something.

It isn't even just those days wherein I can barely make it to the bathroom. At the end of a work day, I just don't have the energy to do much aside from get home again. It sucks. That's a big chunk of hours that are basically not usable for anything specific. After a decent week's work the weekend is kind of a waste; I spend most of it willing my joints to operate properly again, and that's all before the actual physical work of getting to the movies and being able to sit in a cinema seat for three hours without the subsequent pain and discomfort fucking the movie up.

So yeah. I missed a bunch.

More than a few of those movies, I wasn't too hard-bitten about. Like. Midway? I already know how that ends. Turned out to be a great film when I finally got to watch it, but there's nothing to ruin there, nothing to give away.

Sure, I know people are annoyed about spoiler culture and anti spoiler culture, but this is one of the big ones.

I really enjoy the new Star Wars movies; and thus, I was hyped to watch Rise Of Skywalker when it came out.

Except I didn't get to.

I spent Christmas basically crippled. I couldn't get out of the house; my knee literally wouldn't support my weight, and I had a chest infection that felt like I was dying slowly. It was pretty killer. Not much fun to be had. No opportunities came up to catch it. The few days I made it into work or was fit enough to walk around and do things while it was out, I got the things done I had to, and that was it. I was wiped out for the day. Sometimes barely even that - at one point I almost didn't make it home.

So I never saw it. It slipped out of movie theatres. I was still ill. Then I start pulling myself back together again, and then along comes pandemic season and everything is fucked again.

Not to mention the arthritis having another shot at me as the stay-at-home orders were signed, but that's another story.

The point is that there were certain large plot points in the movie that, after a certain point, just got talked about in public or hinted at strongly enough that anyone could piece them together. I don't want to crucify people that give out spoilers, but at the same time - I'm really hoping that the movie can tell me the story, rather than someone obliquely referring to a bit of it and outing that chunk so that when it comes along when I DO watch it, I just go "oh yeah that's what happens now".

I'm pretty sure that the crew that made the movie are a better storyteller than "angry man in front of greenscreen on youtube".

But that's just the way it is, right? You can't catch the movie when it comes out, then - well, get fucked, right? "It's been [arbitrary amount of time], you should have seen it already if you care so much about it," is often a defence for spoiler-friendly folks. Which. You know. Whatever. Perhaps there's a reason that a person hasn't seen a movie yet. Like, you know.

Imagine me gesturing at my body in general.

Just the way it is, though - but does it have to be?

Well, Universal didn't think so.

Yeah, see I'm not a fan of the franchise, BUT...

So one thing that is coming out of the Covid-19 pandemic is many wings of society are accidentally revealing that they can actually be more accessible than they currently are. The sheer amount of businesses that have made the shock discovery that many of their employees can actually work from home is astounding. Businesses providing contact-free or kerbside delivery. Sure, it's all being done in a very bootstrappy fashion and because there's no other option, but - for some of their consumers and employees, there already was no other option.

It seems that the movie market has caught on, too, because Universal decided that Trolls World Tour should be released on rental on-demand at the same time as its US cinematic release, seeing as the world was trying to stay indoors as much as possible. It isn't just Trolls either - several of their other releases saw a similar plan. It isn't a new idea, either; the Chinese cinema industry took several similar measures two months prior, allowing a bunch of movies to be released day-and-date at the same time in both theatres and at home. It also isn't the first time Universal has done this - it did the same thing with Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom.

They aren't the only business cashing in on the pandemic, either deliberately or accident of timing. Disney+ and Netflix have both had significant gains, and Disney+ has engaged directly in pandemic advertising; and lets face it, Animal Crossing came out at exactly the right time to get half the gaming world hooked just when they can't go to work.

Well - the Trolls thing seemed to work. It took $40 million in its opening weekend, in the onset of a pandemic. Sure, that doesn't cover the cost of production, but that is an opening weekend when people literally aren't allowed to go outside and cinemas are literally closed.

Like, that isn't shabby.

And nothing quite shows that you have succeeded at doing something that vaguely disrupts the status quo than...

The full article is here.

Of course there will be kickback. The model has worked this way for a long, LONG time, and people don't want to have to adjust to a different model - or a deviation from the current model. Just keep pouring the money in our pockets! Why do you have to make us think about things!? Just pay us and shut up!

The relevant section:

“This policy is not aimed solely at Universal out of pique or to be punitive in any way, it also extends to any movie maker who unilaterally abandons current windowing practices absent good faith negotiations between us, so that they as distributor and we as exhibitor both benefit and neither are hurt from such changes,” AMC chairman Adam Aron write in the letter. “Currently, with the press comment today, Universal is the only studio contemplating a wholesale change to the status quo. Hence, this immediate communication in response.”

Now... here's the thing.

When I was sat at home the entire time my knee was busted, I wasn't putting any money in the pockets of either my local cinema (which isn't a chain, it's mostly indie) OR Lucasfilm/Disney. It just wasn't happening, because I couldn't go to the movies, and I couldn't make the choice to pay on demand.

You know how free-market plebs often say that the market responds to demand? Well, it seems that Universal did that, without asking nicely; which is kind of a dick move, but at the same time, it showed that it can be done - and showed that it can rake in funds.

If the cinema chains are clever, and careful, then they can get a slice of the pie that companies like Universal are going to bake. If people act in good faith then this could be good for all of us, because I know that there is demand for such a service. From people like me, for one.

And there's so much cross-marketing that could be going on via the medium of a website. You want to watch a movie on release day? You click through to your local cinema, and from there, to their on-demand one-viewing rental website. You pay for a midnight viewing, which becomes available immediately after midnight. There could be reviews available, professional and user-based. A magazine section, to check out upcoming releases and read articles about the industry. Adverts for local food delivery places, that offer a slight discount on a click-through, as a partnership promotion. Synchronised viewing links so you can watch a movie at the same time as someone else, or "Viewing Rooms" like Twitch.

People have more and more complicated media setups at home; huge TVs, PCs and laptops with incredible screen resolutions and headsets with vast fidelity. I know it isn't the same as a big screen, but you know how it's better? You don't have to view it from the bottom corner, and you don't have to deal with that mob of teenagers throwing popcorn and being obnoxious, and the only person you need to move for is you. And even if they don't - Jesus Christ, I just want to see the movie. Don't give me shit because I can't afford a 4K TV. We've managed to watch films on VHS before the heady days of DVD and BluRay, I daresay I can enjoy one on a cheap laptop.

Imagine how good that could be. Imagine how good it would be, right now, to be able to have that, in this time when we have to stay inside; now imagine that all the time, for the people that find going to the movies difficult or impossible for whatever reason. Imagine having that available to you, and knowing that the money you pay for the viewing is going back to the industry, paying those that made the film you are watching. Knowing that if you stream Movie A, that it will be counted as the take for Movie A for the opening weekend, to prove that it performed better than Movie B.

Of course there's a million and one reasons it won't happen; and there's even more reasons why, if it happens, it will fuck someone over. We can't ever have a thing just work out. At a guess, if it does become an industry practice, then the cinema chains are going to suffer a lot for it and will start having to tighten their belts, which will lead to talk of the death of cinema - and who knows, from there?

And that's the sad, shit thing. With every potential innovation, with every method of making life easier or better, comes the innevitable question:

How will Capitalism make it awful?

People ask me why I'm a cynic.

If you'd care to share my blog with your friends, I'd appreciate that! If you'd like to thank me in a fiscal form for entertaining you a little bit, I do have a Patreon right here, but please - no pressure. Thank you for reading, and check my social media to the right to keep in touch.

A Survivor Unclouded By Conscience

Today is Alien day; in the US, it's 4/26. As in LV-426, also known as Acheron, the ill-fated world that held Hadley's Hope colony.

So, today is the day that I choose to engage in the movie marathon. Running in chronological order, starting with Prometheus.

If I get as far as Alien 3, I'll be happy enough - Alien Resurrection isn't on deck for today. Maybe next week I will go into why I like that one the least.

What can I even say about the xenomorph that I haven't said before? It's beautiful in terms of how horrible it is. It's designed that way, and designed well.

It is unsettling - desperately unsettling. Its design and general body shape is close enough to human, but then takes several sharp left turns. The length of the head. The tail. The tentacle breathing tube things on its back. The way it moves around, which in the original 1979 classic was portrayed expertly by Bolaji Badejo, an artist and graphic designer who stood 6' 10" and could move like a monster. That secondary mouth - that horrible, awful secondary mouth.

You know what the worst thing is, though? I think?

No eyes.

You don't know how it hunts. You don't know how it sees you - but you know that it does. You know, because it knows where you are. Seemingly at all times. You can't run. You can't hide. It will find you. Sooner or later. You may hear it coming, but probably not. You don't see it until it wants you to see it.

There's certain books and comics in the expanded media that imply that the species can detect fear. Not just the secondary effects of that fear, but actually simply sense it. Which is useful if you are this kind of ultra-predator.

It is pure lethality. It is a distilled nightmare, the end result of both creation and evolution - first one and then the other and then the first one all over again. A pure killer.

One of the scariest things I had ever seen in my life, the first time I saw it, which was way younger than I really should have been. For a week I had nightmares - but then I stopped being afraid of the dark. I quite like it, now.

There was nothing quite like it, when it first came about in 1979. Then it was expanded in 1986 - because over and above the individual ant that caused so much damage on the Nostromo, we find the unity of the hive - and this hive has a queen. You thought the first one was bad? This one is smart. Maybe smarter than you. She can communicate mentally with her children, and she needs you to be their food as well as their crib.

The queen of Hell.

And why does this evil object exist? Why does this ultra-predator plague the universe? Why, specifically, does this branch of the hydra-like potential of the Engineer's black bioweapon plague humanity?

Because of Peter fucking Weyland and his stupid fucking quest to be a god, and the synthetic madman that he made to get him there.

Literally, a manifestation of our hubris and our greed, over and over again.

Appropriate.

Happy Alien Day.

If you'd care to share my blog with your friends, I'd appreciate that! If you'd like to thank me in a fiscal form for entertaining you a little bit, I do have a Patreon right here, but please - no pressure. Thank you for reading, and check my social media to the right to keep in touch.

Some Casual Banter

Lacking any further inspiration I decided to do a casual ask of what people would want me to talk about - not a full blown Reader's Requests, but more of a... Pals Postulate?

I got some good ones.

The first one, though...

See I could have gone my entire life not knowing this existed. And then it was brought to my attention by the birthday boy - happy birthday Chris by the way - and now I have to acknowledge its existence, and so do you.

Thanks, r/crappyoffbrands - I guess.

Random Acts of Kindness :) - See, this is nice. This is real nice. Random acts of kindness are great. When the current state of the world is so cruel - and I am not looking at anyone in particular, but the government doesn't help (pick one, any one) - the kindness of strangers can be that little thing that makes your day. So a challenge for all my readers: be kind to someone you don't know in the next week. In a small way. Just try it. In whatever way you can, given our current pandemic scenario.

One thing that has made you happy (or smile) today. - This image of my villager in Animal Crossing surrounded by ill-gotten wealth.

Self isolation self care - Christ, uh. ...I don't know. ...do the things you need to do, don't be too hard on yourself if you don't or can't. Be kind to yourself. That's the important thing. Try and do something each day that you want to. Don't beat on yourself because of the state of the world. It's not your fault, and it is going to affect your mental state. Specifically if you are tired and lacking a creative spark, that's a trauma response. You can't just "oh well bugger it" your way through that. Be kind to yourself.

Favorite piece(s) of escapist fiction. - I find myself going through and reading comics and books that I already know, at times. Like I'll go back and read Lovecraft or Rising Stars or similar. I like watching movies I am familiar with, too, or chortling through old MST3K episodes. Remember that cheesy movie from the 80s/90s that is awful but that you kind of like? Bang THAT on. I like stuff like Empire Records, or Blues Brothers. Something with good music is a must.

Gardening (my potatos just started sprouting!) - I am AWFUL at gardening, which is probably no end of shame to my mother. Physically incapable of engaging in it for more than two minutes at a time, I don't know my Gardenias from my Chrysanthemums, I could probably keep a cactus alive but that's only fifty fifty... but I'm glad you are having success! Especially with potato - one of my favourite things ever.

Concellation, how to get over con cancellation blues - ...see... I have difficulty with this because I find myself having to cancel so much myself. Have done for years. It sucks. I don't really have an answer for it; not a good one, anyway. In the end I had to dial back my expectations of things I could do, health and budget considering. Though the thing that I would probably comfort myself with, over the current crop of con cancels and event cancels and stuff - I could use the money I was spending on that to, when isolation has been over for a week or so, rent a house for a weekend with the people I was gonna see at Con and have a RIOTOUS party. This shit WILL end, and when it does, it's going to be so sweet.

Having more time on ones hands, but suffering even more lethargy while everyone else seems to be learning new skills or doing fabulous buildy things. - Ah, two fallacies to defeat here. One: Not everyone else is doing fabulous amazing things or learning stuff. Sure, some people are, but a lot of people aren't, and - honestly, some people are just like that. They always have something going on. Two: You aren't a worse person because you aren't doing that shit. Everyone is on low ebb and low energy right now. We as a nation - as a SPECIES - are currently undergoing a combination of anxiety and depression brought on by external factors. As someone that suffers from both of those on a daily basis and has done since for over two decades, not being able to learn Italian when you are afraid for the health of those you care about and crushed by the state of the world isn't a crime, it's normal. Focus on what makes you feel better and helps you cope, not what other people are doing.

Glad it's not just me - See above.

Isolation meme's - I haven't really kept on top of these but I will present a couple below that I liked.

"This Is Us", An Article In The Washington Post - Yeah. Like I read this and just nodded the entire way through. I am very privileged insofar as my mixed race hasn't led to any actual problems in my life, really. But this is just... yeah. Accurate.

Favourite toy lines and when they bringing em back - Gawd. M.A.S.K., Jayce & The Wheeled Warriors, Centurions, Starcom, Transformers - all of those NEED bringing back, aside from Transformers, which only had a lull and never really went away. The current line is frankly amazing compared to G1.

Question people lack of commitment to Sparkle Motion. -

What is it about your 20's that screams, ' itll never happen to me/mine"? - Hate to say it but that isn't a 20s thing, that is a people thing. It's across the entire generational spectrum, even if it is mostly prevalent in your childhood years and bleeds out when you hit your mid-20s (because by then it HAS happened to you or yours). The majority of people fucking about in this current climate of nonsense are certainly old enough to know better. Most of the 20 year olds have been told they are essential and forced to risk their lives with no pay rise or protective equipment. They are keenly aware it may happen to them. They just don't get a choice - it is that or be made homeless and starve.

Isolation.... People who live alone in isolation.... How to cope and not go mental in isolation... - I count myself lucky insofar as I cope with being alone really well - I like my own company. I know other people that aren't so lucky. I don't really know the answer to this, aside from trying to make sure you stay in electronic contact with the people that you can. I know it isn't much, but it's way too easy to slip into not doing that, too, so keep it up. Voice-call people that you know would be okay with talking. Play games with folks. Download Virtual Tabletop, pay cards with folks. That's about all I got... oh, and listen to music literally as much as you can.

Best ways to represent passage of time in movies/series. - Okay, there's a lot of good entries for this one. But for propriety, I am picking Red Dwarf, Season 5, Episode 4...  Quarantine. When Lister is marking up the days on the chart, and turns around, with a fucking great black eye, looking awful. That's all of us right now.

Something light maybe - a list of the cutest baby animals?? The best reasons for day drinking? Ways to show you love someone? Most uplifting music of the last 3 decades? - The cutest baby animal is a Skunk, there is no contest, though raccoons and pigs are close. The best reason for day drinking is the song Never Forget You by the Noisettes. Lots of way to show someone you love them, all sorts of kinds of ways - touches, words, sharing music, gifts, thoughtfulness. All sorts of ways. The most uplifting music of the last 3 decades is a hard one but have some Hozier, because this song is amazing.

Eddie vs Thor - I think that given who asked me this, this is the Eddie vs Thor that you are talking about. But instead I am going to deal with Eddie Brock vs Thor, God Of Thunder. Thor wins that fight because Eddie Brock is a journalist and Thor is the God Of Thunder.

And now a personal statement.

My people. We can get through this. I know it sucks, right now. It does. But we can do this, and there might just be a better place waiting for us afterwards.

If any of you need me, drop me one. I'm here.

...also if any of your friends have patreons or kofi accounts or are selling art, take them up on it. We're all hurting right now.

Yes, that was a cheap plug.

If you'd care to share my blog with your friends, I'd appreciate that! If you'd like to thank me in a fiscal form for entertaining you a little bit, I do have a Patreon right here, but please - no pressure. Thank you for reading, and check my social media to the right to keep in touch.

Darkness On The Edge Of Town

Recently I saw Blinded By The Light, and really enjoyed it.

What's it about?

Well it's about a lot of things, but I guess the plot is about a young Pakistani man surviving the late 80s in Thatcherite Luton, trying to pick his way through life in between familial expectation, the National Front, and society in general - and almost accidentally finding a muse in The Boss himself, Bruce Springsteen.

Yes, Blinded By The Light is more famously a Manfred Mann Earth Band song from 1977. Yes, it is a cover of the Bruce Springsteen song from 1973, the first track on his debut album. It didn't do anywhere near as well as the cover. No big. I prefer the Springsteen version, honestly.

(It's either "Revved up like a deuce" or "Cut loose like a deuce", by the way. A deuce being a deuce coupe, a 1932 Ford hot rod.Yeah, like the Beach Boys song, Little Deuce Coupe. No, it's not an anal cleansing product.)

What did I like so much about the movie?

I mean the obvious thing is that I really like the Boss, right? Which I do. Also there's not a bad performance in this movie, like, anywhere. Really.

I LIKE it, though, because I FEEL it.

That's me.

Like okay. I know that we are meant to raise our eyebrow when someone points at a character and says "that's literally me", especially if that person is fucking Rick Sanchez or something - but at the same time - I have been in the places that Javed has been.

Or at least a lot of them. Like it wasn't as extreme, but my parents did have a specific set of expectations that I wasn't sure I could meet, or even wanted to. Sure, I didn't have to deal with the National Front, but there were plenty of arseholes to bob and weave around in life. And I did, so desperately, want to write. I wanted the writing to be the thing I did. I didn't want to have to slot myself into something else and be that and shelve the writing.

There's the urge to run away from the stupid town that you are stuck in, as well. Like that is prevalent. A big thing. Including the Born To Run section, which literally involves Javed and his friends... running. Away. Just anywhere.

The other way in which we're alike is musical salvation.

So - no spoilers but there's this one scene wherein Javed is listening to music while working at a market stand, and Thunder Road starts playing in his earphones. And his eyes land on the girl he's falling for real hard, and everything clicks into place. Just for a moment. Everything makes sense.

Thunder Road, by the way, is my favourite Boss song. (And I had never heard it before a friend of mine introduced it to me like twenty years ago. You know who you are.)

Sure, in the scene in question, there's some dancing and some singing and this is where you realise this probably qualifies as a musical rather than just a movie with music in it. That's not the only scene, though. There's the moments of total loss and confusion and anger and sadness and there's this one constant thread of music that guides him through all of it, and when I say Literally Me, that's what I am talking about.

It wasn't just one artist, sure. It was a few. It's real, though. It's absolutely real.

So it's a story that just speaks to me. Speaks to me intimately in a setting I am familiar with and surrounded by cultural tropes that I am also thoroughly familiar with. How am I meant to not love it?

It might not be for you. The plot isn't exactly groundbreaking - that isn't the point - and if you don't like Springsteen then you will hate it.

Me, though?

I had a blast.

What a movie.

If you'd care to share my blog with your friends, I'd appreciate that! If you'd like to thank me in a fiscal form for entertaining you a little bit, I do have a Patreon right here, but please - no pressure. Thank you for reading, and check my social media to the right to keep in touch.

The Boogeyman In Three Parts

John Wick is one of the best action franchises that has ever existed, and I will prove it.

I'm aware of the irony of my last blog, calling for a cessation of murdering people and planet alike, being followed by one about an action movie trilogy with a three-figure body count. The incongruity of me not wanting real actual people to die, and yet capable of watching a movie wherein fictional people fictionally die. Yes. Thank you.

Now that that's out of the way.

I've mentioned John Wick in a previous blog about motivations, and you might recall I used the above picture in that very blog. It's a great picture, is why. Look at it.

I only recently got to watch the third instalment of the series. I have had a chance to consider it, think it through, listen to all three soundtracks a whole bunch, and here I am with opinions.

The first thing you have to respect is the work put in.

Like, I am a fan of those old, dumb action movies wherein you have Steven Seagal walking around like a mummy and occasionally doing little hand-slappy attacks. Wherein you have to cut away every half-second so it looks like he delivers an actual roundhouse kick. That kind of nonsense.

So when you see minute-long shots of Keanu Reeves just putting in the work, close combat stuff, rough work - when you see how much training he has done to make this whole thing look absolutely feasible, even as it becomes less and less so as the trilogy continues - you have to respect that. The stunt work, the attention to detail. He's renowned for doing that, for applying himself. The other actors that appear alongside him, fighting him, they deserve that respect too. Ruby Rose, Common, Halle Berry, Mark Dacascos. Yayan Ruhian and Cecep Arif Rahman, from the Raid movies. They put in WORK, and it shows on the screen.

The screen. Yeah, let's talk about cinematography.

Sometimes this trilogy is painfully ugly, deliberately so. It's warehouses, back alleys, trashy clubs. Sometimes, it is beautiful - art galleries, the grounds of a villa, various sites throughout New York City, a souk in Casablanca. One thing it is not is easily forgettable. What are you watching a movie for? Why isn't it a book? So you can watch it. So you can see it. There isn't a single shot in this -

Wait, that's a lie. There is one single shot in this trilogy that I dislike. I'm not going to show it to you. Just pay attention to the bit at the fountain with Wick and Cassian when he gets back to New York in Chapter 2. You'll see what I mean. I have no idea why it is there. One shot, perhaps two seconds long if that. I digress.

How it looks is important, because how it looks is telling you the story within the story. And yeah, there is one. Action movies don't have to be what they used to be. They don't have to be a bunch of goons with muscles and two outdated racial stereotypes shouting at each other until everyone but Arnie is dead.

The story isn't necessarily complex. The imagery is, though. The thematic. What the movie is about, as well as a man being the living embodiment of muder-death-kill.

Allow me to elaborate.

John Wick was a monster who stopped being a monster, and then the things that stopped him being a monster were taken away, one after the other, until he became a monster again. John Wick has no brakes. Those brakes were killed by 1) illness, 2) Alfie FUCKING Allen, and 3) the devil (his name is Santino, look at him).

This trilogy is a lethal exploration of what happens when two forces - the entire criminal underworld and one really angry Keanu Reeves - could back down, at any time, but don't. They literally do it to themselves, and they keep on doing it to themselves. At any point during this journey, one side or other - Viggo, Santino, the High Table - could have downed tools and said: Okay, enough. At any point, John could have put his gun down and gone to live somewhere in the country. Neither of them backed down or gave way, and so, the bodies just kept on stacking.

Time and again, the mythological nature of the entire concept comes up. In the first movie it begins with just a reputation, which steadily becomes proven to be 100% legitimate - but still within believable human boundaries. Boundaries that get stretched with each instalment. As John passes through purgatory, goes through the long walk across the desert and has his heart measured and has to give up everything he loves, as John has to fight through reflections of his own soul to reach the devil, as he has to trade trinkets for passage across the river. As John is tested by emperors and gods and kings and comes away bloodied but alive every time. As he begins the first movie falling out of an SUV half-dead, and ends having survived almost insurmountable odds and yet somehow, still in one piece.

It's a myth.

It's Ajax and Achilles. It's the Green Knight and Sir Lancelot.

So consider that a ringing endorsement.

Maybe skip it if you can't stand to see animals getting hurt - at least, skip the scene in the first one. (Weirdly enough outside of that, great pains are taken throughout the rest of the trilogy to prevent harm to any of the other animals present. This is especially obvious in the third one. I'm a fan.)

Maybe, also, skip it if you're not a fan of action movies - but then I doubt you needed me to tell you that.

Otherwise, get all three of them for a weekend and buckle up.

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