Showing posts with label a dracula. Show all posts
Showing posts with label a dracula. Show all posts
Monday, October 27, 2008
A. Dracula
This past friday I saw one of the worst original run Frankenstein movies Universal put out, House of Frankenstein. The movie was followed by a direct sequel named House of Dracula which miraculously resurrected all the characters from its predecessor. Anyways, all these monsters got me thinking, "it's been a while since we've seen my favorite friends..."
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Do the homeless drink our blood at night?
There is a point when desperation stops being French and romantic and becomes something much more real and scary. Is it so surprising to think then that maybe the homeless, displaced, and down trodden of the streets just might drink our blood at night? And if they do, is that so bad? Can you really blame them?
Sure, maybe they’re a little dated. It seems that the dark, horny, beauty of draculas in the 90s has been replaced by the swashbuckling flamboyance of pirates in the 00s. As Anne Rice made room for Roller Coaster rides the importance of blood and blood drinking was lost and now may be found in a less desirable place, on the dirty and dry lips of those retched wrecked souls called the walking homeless, those modern day street roaming nomads, those transient vagrants, the homeless.
Gone is the once kind playfulness of the run down tramp, and replacing that once romantic life of freedom and carelessness a life overflowing with the horrors and sadness of vampirism, night walking, and the curses of the changeling. No more can we look to shelters and parishes to protect and feed our lost brethren. No, oh no, for now no soup but blood soup can sustain these crazed people and fill there sickly stomachs teeming with maggots, rat fesses, and the skin from some poor souls neck. If anything these shelters have become the breeding grounds in this epidemic of homeless blood sucking terror as much as the streets of each and everyone of our great cities has. Gone I say, gone is the tin can and billy goat beard, gone is the train depot, the “sacked lunch” and the homemade fishing rod. All gone, all of them, everything, gone.
Do the homeless drink our blood at night? Sure they do, and why shouldn’t they, wouldn’t you? There’s nothing left to lose, and the sweetness of fresh blood is equal to any peppermint schnapps or three day old muffin crumbs. When you’re at the bottom of the income bracket it’s nice to know you’re at the top of the food chain.
Do they? Hell yes they do, or at least the ought to.
Cml, scared
Sure, maybe they’re a little dated. It seems that the dark, horny, beauty of draculas in the 90s has been replaced by the swashbuckling flamboyance of pirates in the 00s. As Anne Rice made room for Roller Coaster rides the importance of blood and blood drinking was lost and now may be found in a less desirable place, on the dirty and dry lips of those retched wrecked souls called the walking homeless, those modern day street roaming nomads, those transient vagrants, the homeless.
Gone is the once kind playfulness of the run down tramp, and replacing that once romantic life of freedom and carelessness a life overflowing with the horrors and sadness of vampirism, night walking, and the curses of the changeling. No more can we look to shelters and parishes to protect and feed our lost brethren. No, oh no, for now no soup but blood soup can sustain these crazed people and fill there sickly stomachs teeming with maggots, rat fesses, and the skin from some poor souls neck. If anything these shelters have become the breeding grounds in this epidemic of homeless blood sucking terror as much as the streets of each and everyone of our great cities has. Gone I say, gone is the tin can and billy goat beard, gone is the train depot, the “sacked lunch” and the homemade fishing rod. All gone, all of them, everything, gone.
Do the homeless drink our blood at night? Sure they do, and why shouldn’t they, wouldn’t you? There’s nothing left to lose, and the sweetness of fresh blood is equal to any peppermint schnapps or three day old muffin crumbs. When you’re at the bottom of the income bracket it’s nice to know you’re at the top of the food chain.
Do they? Hell yes they do, or at least the ought to.
Cml, scared
Thursday, April 10, 2008
I want to believe
A couple of months ago Biasman decided to get me all excited by lying to me about a new film, a sequel to the 1998 X-Files, X-Files 2. I don't know why he said this. I guess he's just a mean hearted kind of guy. Even the joking jab about another X-Files movie got me so excited that when I considered how unbelievable that FOX didn't cancel the series when it was on, and how unbelievable that there is a 1998 movie based on the series of course I didn't believe the news of the sequel. I was heart broken.
Turns out Matt wasn't just having a go with me, for once he knew what he was talking about. I still don't know if I believe it. But there it is, and I want to believe it.
Matt and I are both big X-Files fans, though for the most part we have contrasting opinions about the show. None the less, we're excited. So I wanted to take this opportunity to both wax a bit and talk about sci-fi news; because thats the kind of nerd I am.
I got a bit of a head start on the X-Files compared to Biasman, but there is no doubt that Matt long ago surpassed me in knowledge about this show. While Matt's been able to see what I can only guess is every episode thanks to DVDs, torrents, and FOX at two in the morning on saturdays I had much more difficulty reaching the show. When I was younger my parents both watched the X-Files, and I did too... sort of, through closed eyes and gapping fingers. I was scared shitless by nearly every episode, except any that went along with the main story arc or had anything to do with Aliens. The reason I didn't find these very terrifying or interesting wasn't because they weren't any good but because not only was I just generally confused by the stories and regularly missed entire episodes but also because when you do watch a show through tightly closed eyes anticipating the worse it's usually quite difficult to bring anything away a program after about an hour.
I think that's what I really loved about the show though, how for a whole hour I was sitting there, torturing myself, just waiting to be scared. Why does everything that has ever terrified me in life have to be so damn interesting and intriguing?! It's just like nearly everything else I've talked about on this blog- just like the draculas and the wolf men and the old Parisian man- I liked the feeling of being scared but I also wanted, desperately, to know what was waiting in the dark for me, even if it killed and ate me after I saw it at least I'd finally know!
The X-Files doesn't scare me any longer but it does get me excited. Much the same way that when I was little the Goosebumps books and television show would excite and scare me, and truth be told the music from the TV program still does send a shiver down my spin. I remember first getting my library card, I rushed over to the 'young adult' section, what ever that meant, and grabbed everyone of the R.L. Stine's books that I could, as many as they'd allow me to take out. I'd lay them all down on my bed and just look at them, stare at there covers, too scared at the age to read them even if I could have. I did this every two weeks for nearly a year.
Anyways though, other exciting news about the new X-Files film is that Callum Keith Rennie is in it, that's right Leoben form Battle Star Galactica. Which also reminds me, BSG is back for a fourth and final season having made it though the Writers Strike. Don't the NBC CEOs kind of remind you of Cylons? ("I once put a laugh track on a sitcom that had no jokes in it" Side Note: Futurama is back on TV and has four all new extended episodes.) I haven't gotten a chance to watch the latest episode of the show but I plan to soon. If you haven't watched the re-imagined series of BSG before I highly recommend it, it's one of the best shows on television, has great political commentary, and is just a fraking good hour of hard sci-fi. Click here to see what you've been missing.
Also Xzibit and Billy Connolly are going to be in the X-Files sequel. But frankly I'm just glad that David Duchovny is working, wether it's X-Files, Californication or even another Connie and Carla, anything is good.
Well, it should be a good summer for sci-fi fans. If you've got any news leave it bellow of email us. If you're interested in a good read for the summer try listening to Billy Joel for once and pick up Robert Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land.
Happy Birthday again Matthew
Caleb, fan
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Halloween, Part one
When I was young, very young, I dressed up as Superman for every Halloween. Understand though that when I saw “ young” I mean before Superman suits had fake muscle chest, but also before I had memories. When I was young and all of my thoughts were framed through my father's camera and slid projector I dressed as Superman for Halloween. I do have one genuinely honest memory from those Halloweens though, I remember my mother knelling down in front of me and pulling my curl down over my forehead, just like Superman’s.
We were in the hallway of our old house, at the bottom of the stairs, standing on the long rug that ran between the bathroom and the playroom. The bathroom shone a glorious white. White lighting, and yellow light bulbs and white, slick, smooth, cold porcelain tiles glared out of the bathroom and into the halls and out all the windows of the house. I doubt it was late enough at night for it to be dark out, even for a night in late October, but in my memories it was pitch black outside.
After years of being the man of steel my curl would evolve, transform me, straighten and lengthen itself, pressed down to my forehead with my brothers hair gel, a tight widows peak, an orange devilock draping down my little Halloween melon head. For many years I put on a new cape, black and red replacing gold and blue, that I tied tight around by throat, damp with sweat and rain all October. For a month I lived as a little Dracula child, hiding under beds and behind trees, falling end over end into piles of leaves, stealing away with lengths of rope to hang bodies from trees and build giant spider’s webs. Halloween would transform me too, evolve me, turn me into little beasts, raise me from the dead, turn my face whiter and my blood redder, and let me walk out at night, set lose, a full fledge vampire sucking down sugar and ready to eat the black out of the sky, to unhang the moon and drop it in my pillow case like some treat I’d claimed as mine that night.
For a long time I spent Halloween with my best friend, my brother, Jake. Jake was my best friend from one Halloween to the next, not because he was my brother, or because for years he was the only other person in life I knew besides my parents, but because he was exciting. Jake was what Halloween was supposed to be: trouble. Lots and lots of trouble. Once in a psychology class someone asked me where I learned what it meant to be a boy from and my first thought was that no one has ever taught me more about getting into trouble than my brother, the kid who taught me what it was to be a boy growing up, who through torture and demonstration showed me how to hurt people, hide things, steal junk, dig holes and run from anyone. My older brother Jake showed me not only how to be a monster on Halloween, but how to be a terror every other day of the year too.
...to be continued.
Caleb Michael, ghoul
We were in the hallway of our old house, at the bottom of the stairs, standing on the long rug that ran between the bathroom and the playroom. The bathroom shone a glorious white. White lighting, and yellow light bulbs and white, slick, smooth, cold porcelain tiles glared out of the bathroom and into the halls and out all the windows of the house. I doubt it was late enough at night for it to be dark out, even for a night in late October, but in my memories it was pitch black outside.
After years of being the man of steel my curl would evolve, transform me, straighten and lengthen itself, pressed down to my forehead with my brothers hair gel, a tight widows peak, an orange devilock draping down my little Halloween melon head. For many years I put on a new cape, black and red replacing gold and blue, that I tied tight around by throat, damp with sweat and rain all October. For a month I lived as a little Dracula child, hiding under beds and behind trees, falling end over end into piles of leaves, stealing away with lengths of rope to hang bodies from trees and build giant spider’s webs. Halloween would transform me too, evolve me, turn me into little beasts, raise me from the dead, turn my face whiter and my blood redder, and let me walk out at night, set lose, a full fledge vampire sucking down sugar and ready to eat the black out of the sky, to unhang the moon and drop it in my pillow case like some treat I’d claimed as mine that night.
For a long time I spent Halloween with my best friend, my brother, Jake. Jake was my best friend from one Halloween to the next, not because he was my brother, or because for years he was the only other person in life I knew besides my parents, but because he was exciting. Jake was what Halloween was supposed to be: trouble. Lots and lots of trouble. Once in a psychology class someone asked me where I learned what it meant to be a boy from and my first thought was that no one has ever taught me more about getting into trouble than my brother, the kid who taught me what it was to be a boy growing up, who through torture and demonstration showed me how to hurt people, hide things, steal junk, dig holes and run from anyone. My older brother Jake showed me not only how to be a monster on Halloween, but how to be a terror every other day of the year too.
...to be continued.
Caleb Michael, ghoul
Monday, November 5, 2007
The Super Smash Bros. Project
With the advent of Super Smash Brothers Brawl close approaching we here at BSD decided to team up with CWTB, E and make a few bids for characters which felt should be featured in the game. Here are my three picks for Super Smash Brothers Brawl, if I had it my way:
1. Prince / The Artist formerly know as Prince:
As a response to the over abundance of Zelda characters in the Smash Bros. lineup (Link, young Link, Sheik, Zelda, Ganondorf, and Pit [who although not a Zelda character is essentially Link with wings]) Prince and The Artist formerly know as Prince are the perfect adversaries. A more magical and imaginary pair of fighters cannot be found. I know what you are thinking, “But BSD, Prince and The Artist aren’t in any video games?” This is true, but they should be. If Aerosmith can be in Revolution X, at least one incarnation of Prince should have a game.
Super Smash Attack: Purple Rain, ability to change sex and name, and blasts of ecstasy from the Symbol of Love Guitar.
2. Nien Nunb:
Torn straight form the screens of Super Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, Nien Nunb is the smooth and skilled Sullustan co-piloting the Millennium Falcon with Billy D. Williams. Quick reflexes and amazing spatial reasoning Nien Nunb is a keen opponent and fittting match for any fox or Scotsmen. Nunb’s presence in Super Star Wars can be contested due to the inability of anyone to confirming his role in the game. This is largely because no one can make it far enough into the game to be sure he shows up. It is also contested if these levels were ever even programmed. However, would Lucas Arts allow such a grievous error in cannon as forgetting this perky Sullustan? Oh wait… Anyways, Nien Nunb: if Eli or you were an alien, this is who you both would be.
Super Smash Attack: De dedo du.
3. Bizarro:
Bizarro Superman, the perfect imperfect clone of superman. Or, if we are to go pre crisis, some sort of alternate reality Superman, or something, who knows. Easily the most misunderstood character in all of literature, trumping Jaques, Macbeth, and Darth Vader. No one can ever really tell where Bizarro is coming from; he is a raving lunatic and a tragic ill-guided hero, a suicidal child and prince of good intentions. Why is he Smash Bro. material? He’s bluish, can shoot ice from his eyes, and can kick anyone’s ass that Superman can. With Bizarro whether he’s winning or losing, he’s still winning.
Super Smash Attack: BIZARRO AM WINNING ALL GAMES!
Characters of Honorable Mention:
Al Gore-First Emperor of the Moon and his Moon worm,
Kafka-Half man half bug,
Alucard, HE'S A DRACULA!
Check out Paul's choices over at Careful With that Blog, Eugene. The link is in the side bar. Matt's picks are sure to follow and also the absolutely bat shit insane conversation where all these decision were made. I recommend reading as much as you can, it's sure to scramble minds.
YKSnilalmc, winner of all the games
1. Prince / The Artist formerly know as Prince:
As a response to the over abundance of Zelda characters in the Smash Bros. lineup (Link, young Link, Sheik, Zelda, Ganondorf, and Pit [who although not a Zelda character is essentially Link with wings]) Prince and The Artist formerly know as Prince are the perfect adversaries. A more magical and imaginary pair of fighters cannot be found. I know what you are thinking, “But BSD, Prince and The Artist aren’t in any video games?” This is true, but they should be. If Aerosmith can be in Revolution X, at least one incarnation of Prince should have a game.
Super Smash Attack: Purple Rain, ability to change sex and name, and blasts of ecstasy from the Symbol of Love Guitar.
2. Nien Nunb:
Torn straight form the screens of Super Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, Nien Nunb is the smooth and skilled Sullustan co-piloting the Millennium Falcon with Billy D. Williams. Quick reflexes and amazing spatial reasoning Nien Nunb is a keen opponent and fittting match for any fox or Scotsmen. Nunb’s presence in Super Star Wars can be contested due to the inability of anyone to confirming his role in the game. This is largely because no one can make it far enough into the game to be sure he shows up. It is also contested if these levels were ever even programmed. However, would Lucas Arts allow such a grievous error in cannon as forgetting this perky Sullustan? Oh wait… Anyways, Nien Nunb: if Eli or you were an alien, this is who you both would be.Super Smash Attack: De dedo du.
3. Bizarro:
Bizarro Superman, the perfect imperfect clone of superman. Or, if we are to go pre crisis, some sort of alternate reality Superman, or something, who knows. Easily the most misunderstood character in all of literature, trumping Jaques, Macbeth, and Darth Vader. No one can ever really tell where Bizarro is coming from; he is a raving lunatic and a tragic ill-guided hero, a suicidal child and prince of good intentions. Why is he Smash Bro. material? He’s bluish, can shoot ice from his eyes, and can kick anyone’s ass that Superman can. With Bizarro whether he’s winning or losing, he’s still winning.
Super Smash Attack: BIZARRO AM WINNING ALL GAMES!
Characters of Honorable Mention:
Al Gore-First Emperor of the Moon and his Moon worm,
Kafka-Half man half bug,
Alucard, HE'S A DRACULA!
Check out Paul's choices over at Careful With that Blog, Eugene. The link is in the side bar. Matt's picks are sure to follow and also the absolutely bat shit insane conversation where all these decision were made. I recommend reading as much as you can, it's sure to scramble minds.
YKSnilalmc, winner of all the games
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes: A short piece on fear
Some of the scariest things in life aren’t phobias but necessities. When people grow up they put better names to things, but when we’re young we don’t have sociophobia, agoraphobia, and necrophobia, you’re just scared, of things like strangers, being alone, and bogeymen.
I do not know about you, but most of my greatest fears in life are those same things I was afraid of when I was just a little kid. But I’m not talking about losing a toy or a person or yourself, I’m talking about that feeling you got every Halloween that’d cause you to bring your legs up close to your body in bed just in case a madman tried to chop off your legs. Before I even knew what a madman was, what was really mad, what Friday the thirteenth meant or why white vans were terrifying I knew I was scared of all of them, with no little help from my older brother. For years I slept in the center of my bed, clutching a heavy flashlight (and in later years a police baton), my arms folded over my chest like some ancient honored pharos, just out of reach from any hands from any place under my bed. Before I knew what anxiety was I had seen hell’s fires, Bram’s asylum, crazed dogs and lost children, greater fear’s than fevered dreams, things far worse than Goosebumps, X-files, and Are you Afraid of the Dark?, horrors unheard of but ever imagined since the first sons of man were old enough to torment the second sons, because what else are older brothers good for. Shit! It’s a wonder any of us ever left our rooms on some of those darker nights. But through it all there has only ever been one fear that has always stayed with me, that one fear (besides seaweed) introduced to me by 1941’s The Wolf Man: Gypsies!
I’m not too worried about strangers or being alone any longer, but bogeymen and gypsies still scare the daylights out of me. I don’t know what did it, if it was the ragged clothes, the eeriness of the fortuneteller’s eyes, all black and white, a Dracula in different clothes Bela Lugosi nearly plays himself, a wild European madman staring out of cursed eyes. Or, maybe it was just the fact that they traveled in wagons, lived in them, from village to village, like some sort of communist trailer park carnival people, which is quite possibly the most evil amalgam of Euro/Anglo/Americana trash known to man. The Wolf Man’s story draws it’s plot and circumstance from folk lore, making use of myth and storytelling to build the Wolf Man as an ancient evil. And that’s what gypsies are- ancient evil folk people. So you know they’ve got nothing to lose, and that is scary.
Most fears are irrational, and the scariest stories, murders, monsters and ghouls are spun of spider webs already in our heads. But even so, this one fear of mine, this one real fear I have left over from childhood I think I’d rather like to hold on to for as long as I can, no matter how irrational it is. There are far worse things in life to be afraid of than gypsies, and once we get past all our irrational fears all that’s left are the rational ones, and all those are truly terrifying.
Oh, look out you rock 'n rollers
Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes
Turn and face the strange
Ch-ch-Changes
Pretty soon now you're gonna get older
Time may change me
But I can't trace time
-Caleb, un-truly terrifying
I do not know about you, but most of my greatest fears in life are those same things I was afraid of when I was just a little kid. But I’m not talking about losing a toy or a person or yourself, I’m talking about that feeling you got every Halloween that’d cause you to bring your legs up close to your body in bed just in case a madman tried to chop off your legs. Before I even knew what a madman was, what was really mad, what Friday the thirteenth meant or why white vans were terrifying I knew I was scared of all of them, with no little help from my older brother. For years I slept in the center of my bed, clutching a heavy flashlight (and in later years a police baton), my arms folded over my chest like some ancient honored pharos, just out of reach from any hands from any place under my bed. Before I knew what anxiety was I had seen hell’s fires, Bram’s asylum, crazed dogs and lost children, greater fear’s than fevered dreams, things far worse than Goosebumps, X-files, and Are you Afraid of the Dark?, horrors unheard of but ever imagined since the first sons of man were old enough to torment the second sons, because what else are older brothers good for. Shit! It’s a wonder any of us ever left our rooms on some of those darker nights. But through it all there has only ever been one fear that has always stayed with me, that one fear (besides seaweed) introduced to me by 1941’s The Wolf Man: Gypsies!
I’m not too worried about strangers or being alone any longer, but bogeymen and gypsies still scare the daylights out of me. I don’t know what did it, if it was the ragged clothes, the eeriness of the fortuneteller’s eyes, all black and white, a Dracula in different clothes Bela Lugosi nearly plays himself, a wild European madman staring out of cursed eyes. Or, maybe it was just the fact that they traveled in wagons, lived in them, from village to village, like some sort of communist trailer park carnival people, which is quite possibly the most evil amalgam of Euro/Anglo/Americana trash known to man. The Wolf Man’s story draws it’s plot and circumstance from folk lore, making use of myth and storytelling to build the Wolf Man as an ancient evil. And that’s what gypsies are- ancient evil folk people. So you know they’ve got nothing to lose, and that is scary.
Most fears are irrational, and the scariest stories, murders, monsters and ghouls are spun of spider webs already in our heads. But even so, this one fear of mine, this one real fear I have left over from childhood I think I’d rather like to hold on to for as long as I can, no matter how irrational it is. There are far worse things in life to be afraid of than gypsies, and once we get past all our irrational fears all that’s left are the rational ones, and all those are truly terrifying.
Oh, look out you rock 'n rollers
Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes
Turn and face the strange
Ch-ch-Changes
Pretty soon now you're gonna get older
Time may change me
But I can't trace time
-Caleb, un-truly terrifying
Sunday, June 3, 2007
Me, a Swimmer, and The Creature From the Black Lagoon: An Unnatural Love Affair
What’s wrong with the Creature From the Black Lagoon is everything that is wrong with science and religion. Love.
I can still remember when I first saw this movie. It was a long time ago. Throughout six and seventh grade I spent many Friday nights with my best friends Joshua and Nathaniel. We’d stay up “late” at Josh’s, sitting on his floor watching old movies his father had rented for us. We’d watch the classics: Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man, Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy, Abbott and Costello Battle Racism and Oppression in White Hollywood. And we’d watch the creature features, like The Creature From the Black Lagoon.
Remember when you were little, and you were never sure whether something was going to be really scary, or just exciting and funny instead? Watching The Creature From the Black Lagoon is very much like that. When you’re young so many things that shouldn’t be scary are scary, like dead bodies, and missing links, and girls. But when we get older the really terrifying stuff in the night comes out, like loneliness, and lose, and woman. And if we’re lucky those things can still be funny too. But what was nice was that back then they always were funny and scary. Back when we were little everything scary had the possibility of being funny, and that’s the way it should be. We should be able to laugh at ourselves over the stupid stuff we get torn up and freaked out over. I remember hiding in Josh’s closet, wound up in a curtain, waiting for Nathaniel to come out of the bathroom so I could jump out at him. And remember that feeling you used to get, that feeling when you’re trying to scare someone, and you’re so tied into it, so excited and young and funny that you’re scared too? Scared of your own tricks, of your own jokes, of how young and stupid and sublime you are. I had that felling. And it was wonderful, wonderful to be scared.
That’s what The Creature From the Black Lagoon is like. You don’t know if you should be scared or laughing. And usually it changes every time you watch it. Just like when you’re trying to scare someone else, if you want it to be scary, if you’re willing to let yourself go, let yourself be a part of it, it can be as scary and exciting as anything in life can be.
The last time I watched The Creature From the Black Lagoon I decided to get a professional opinion on the movie. So I went to Wynston Rose McCreary- The Swimmer. And right away she hit it right on the head:
“I don’t get it…is it supposed to be funny?”
Wynston is completely right, sometimes you can’t tell! The Creature From the Black Lagoon doesn’t always make sense. The character himself…its self, really is a contradiction between science and religion. And no, not like the way Nightcrawler is a Catholic, or John McCain is a Republican, but the way Jesus is the son of God, or Orion is the son of Darksied, or Luke is the son of Vader.
You have to understand; the level of weirdness in this film is of that like you’ve never seen before. It isn’t a horror film, or a slasher, or a thriller; it’s a creature feature. The villain isn’t evil, or demented, or a Dracula, they’re just weird. They’re blobs and flies and gillmen. The Opening scene of Creature is the creation of the heavens and the earth…and then all of a sudden WHAM! they cut to the primordial sands of evolution and start talking about how all life evolved out of the sea, pulling itself up from the dregs and the muck and pretending to be man. They even say the world is over 15 million years old. See? They’re coming at us from all angles!
The Main character, The Creature, Gillman, is no less confusing when you think about him. He’s a sort of missing link, part man, part fish. Have you ever watched a fish in a tank? They’re fucking crazy! And so is Gillman. Fish are like retarded hairless dogs that can breath underwater. They go all over the place, eat all sorts of stuff, chase and roll and scrap with one another, and what do they do at the end of the day? Die on you. And Gillman is the same way.
In the film a group of scientist travel to the Amazon searching for The Creature. And, of course, they have to bring along a young, pretty, she-scientist. And of course, Gillman falls in love and tries to kidnap her. Which makes no sense! I’m not sure what he wants with her, he has no penis. So why is he kidnapping her if he can’t rape her? What, is he going to wait for her to drop her eggs and swim up stream so he can then fertilize them? Or, of course, maybe he’s just a little curious and wants to dry hump her a bit.
Honestly though, I find it pretty upsetting that the science crew and I totally expect Gillman to rape the girl. Why can’t he just kidnap her? Why can’t he just want someone to talk to, some company? Why is that so unbelievable? Oh yeah, because he’s a fish man. And that is exactly what makes Gillman so tragic: He’s a fish that is in love with a woman… not even Shakespeare could have written a story that compelling. Gillman, the eunuch child of creationism and evolution, is in love with a white woman in 1954. And, in the end it isn’t tragic, or cute, or anything lasting, it’s just unnatural, unreal, unbelievable. But, like any good love affair, totally frightening and worth dying for.
Sitting there in my room watching the movie for the first time in years with The Swimmer I had to consider our own unnatural love affair and how deep and weird and wet it was. I had to think about how long I’d known Wynston, how I’d met her, and how we’d gotten where we were, sitting there across my bed. When I first met Wynston I was all over her, just like Gillman. But unlike Gillman, her and I are really good friends now, and I didn’t get shot and lit on fire and drugged and killed for loving her.
I really do love her; she’s my best friend. And it really is weird and wet and deep, but it’s also real, and like any good friendship totally frightening sometimes and absolutly unnatural.
I think in the end what is most upsetting about The Creature’s story is that the very people that came looking for him kill him. They chased him down, they cornered him, they made him fall in love. And isn’t that the way it always is? We ask for it, we want it, we know the score and the price, but we still fall in love, we still go looking for it. That’s the point though. We fall in love and risk the weirdness of it all, the possible pains and growths and fears, but we still do it. And like we’re being transported through the Amazon or back to childhood we’re struck with the sudden fear and excitement and thrill of being scared. And it’s that thrill, that horror, that funny feeling that makes us laugh out loud when we know we love someone and are scared as hell that we do. And it’s that laugh that makes the search and the pain and the black waters all worth the while.
“Why is a movie about a black lagoon so reflective to me?”
“I wonder what color their clothes are.”
-Caleb, The Eunuch Child of Creationism and Evolution + Wynston Rose, The Swimmer
I can still remember when I first saw this movie. It was a long time ago. Throughout six and seventh grade I spent many Friday nights with my best friends Joshua and Nathaniel. We’d stay up “late” at Josh’s, sitting on his floor watching old movies his father had rented for us. We’d watch the classics: Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man, Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy, Abbott and Costello Battle Racism and Oppression in White Hollywood. And we’d watch the creature features, like The Creature From the Black Lagoon.
Remember when you were little, and you were never sure whether something was going to be really scary, or just exciting and funny instead? Watching The Creature From the Black Lagoon is very much like that. When you’re young so many things that shouldn’t be scary are scary, like dead bodies, and missing links, and girls. But when we get older the really terrifying stuff in the night comes out, like loneliness, and lose, and woman. And if we’re lucky those things can still be funny too. But what was nice was that back then they always were funny and scary. Back when we were little everything scary had the possibility of being funny, and that’s the way it should be. We should be able to laugh at ourselves over the stupid stuff we get torn up and freaked out over. I remember hiding in Josh’s closet, wound up in a curtain, waiting for Nathaniel to come out of the bathroom so I could jump out at him. And remember that feeling you used to get, that feeling when you’re trying to scare someone, and you’re so tied into it, so excited and young and funny that you’re scared too? Scared of your own tricks, of your own jokes, of how young and stupid and sublime you are. I had that felling. And it was wonderful, wonderful to be scared.
That’s what The Creature From the Black Lagoon is like. You don’t know if you should be scared or laughing. And usually it changes every time you watch it. Just like when you’re trying to scare someone else, if you want it to be scary, if you’re willing to let yourself go, let yourself be a part of it, it can be as scary and exciting as anything in life can be.
The last time I watched The Creature From the Black Lagoon I decided to get a professional opinion on the movie. So I went to Wynston Rose McCreary- The Swimmer. And right away she hit it right on the head:
“I don’t get it…is it supposed to be funny?”
Wynston is completely right, sometimes you can’t tell! The Creature From the Black Lagoon doesn’t always make sense. The character himself…its self, really is a contradiction between science and religion. And no, not like the way Nightcrawler is a Catholic, or John McCain is a Republican, but the way Jesus is the son of God, or Orion is the son of Darksied, or Luke is the son of Vader.
You have to understand; the level of weirdness in this film is of that like you’ve never seen before. It isn’t a horror film, or a slasher, or a thriller; it’s a creature feature. The villain isn’t evil, or demented, or a Dracula, they’re just weird. They’re blobs and flies and gillmen. The Opening scene of Creature is the creation of the heavens and the earth…and then all of a sudden WHAM! they cut to the primordial sands of evolution and start talking about how all life evolved out of the sea, pulling itself up from the dregs and the muck and pretending to be man. They even say the world is over 15 million years old. See? They’re coming at us from all angles!
The Main character, The Creature, Gillman, is no less confusing when you think about him. He’s a sort of missing link, part man, part fish. Have you ever watched a fish in a tank? They’re fucking crazy! And so is Gillman. Fish are like retarded hairless dogs that can breath underwater. They go all over the place, eat all sorts of stuff, chase and roll and scrap with one another, and what do they do at the end of the day? Die on you. And Gillman is the same way.
In the film a group of scientist travel to the Amazon searching for The Creature. And, of course, they have to bring along a young, pretty, she-scientist. And of course, Gillman falls in love and tries to kidnap her. Which makes no sense! I’m not sure what he wants with her, he has no penis. So why is he kidnapping her if he can’t rape her? What, is he going to wait for her to drop her eggs and swim up stream so he can then fertilize them? Or, of course, maybe he’s just a little curious and wants to dry hump her a bit.
Honestly though, I find it pretty upsetting that the science crew and I totally expect Gillman to rape the girl. Why can’t he just kidnap her? Why can’t he just want someone to talk to, some company? Why is that so unbelievable? Oh yeah, because he’s a fish man. And that is exactly what makes Gillman so tragic: He’s a fish that is in love with a woman… not even Shakespeare could have written a story that compelling. Gillman, the eunuch child of creationism and evolution, is in love with a white woman in 1954. And, in the end it isn’t tragic, or cute, or anything lasting, it’s just unnatural, unreal, unbelievable. But, like any good love affair, totally frightening and worth dying for.
Sitting there in my room watching the movie for the first time in years with The Swimmer I had to consider our own unnatural love affair and how deep and weird and wet it was. I had to think about how long I’d known Wynston, how I’d met her, and how we’d gotten where we were, sitting there across my bed. When I first met Wynston I was all over her, just like Gillman. But unlike Gillman, her and I are really good friends now, and I didn’t get shot and lit on fire and drugged and killed for loving her.
I really do love her; she’s my best friend. And it really is weird and wet and deep, but it’s also real, and like any good friendship totally frightening sometimes and absolutly unnatural.
I think in the end what is most upsetting about The Creature’s story is that the very people that came looking for him kill him. They chased him down, they cornered him, they made him fall in love. And isn’t that the way it always is? We ask for it, we want it, we know the score and the price, but we still fall in love, we still go looking for it. That’s the point though. We fall in love and risk the weirdness of it all, the possible pains and growths and fears, but we still do it. And like we’re being transported through the Amazon or back to childhood we’re struck with the sudden fear and excitement and thrill of being scared. And it’s that thrill, that horror, that funny feeling that makes us laugh out loud when we know we love someone and are scared as hell that we do. And it’s that laugh that makes the search and the pain and the black waters all worth the while.
“Why is a movie about a black lagoon so reflective to me?”
“I wonder what color their clothes are.”
-Caleb, The Eunuch Child of Creationism and Evolution + Wynston Rose, The Swimmer
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Lou-Thor
Even Lex Luthor pops his collar....and wears purple.
He must be pimpin'.
He must be a dracula!
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
"Check it out… he’s a DRACULA!!”
So, you know the Universal Monsters? Yeah. Me too. And, for a while, I thought everyone did. But no.
I’m not even going to get into Frankenstein (that’ll come another time), but Dracula; aw boy. He’s a pimp, that’s a fact. Not only does he live in a castle swerving game all over some nasty vixen , dress to impress rockin’ a cape, and suck on necks like it ain’t no thing, but he’s also been the father to more horror stories and creations than any other of the Universal Monsters. Don't believe me, check it out: Blacula, Count Von Count “the Count”, Dr. Acula, Alucard, and any guy that whore Buffy ever got down with. Oh, and about a googolplex of porno characters. Yeah boiiiiiii! Oh, and Batman. Oh, and Nelson too.
But honestly, Dracula, he’s taking a beating. I kind of feel bad for him. No, I really do feel bad for him. Bram Stoker wrote him as a caricature of evil, a stereotypes of the dark and the dirty and the incredibly sexy. Dracula was those things that go bump in the night, who actually could go bump in the night, and did.
-“I don’t see nothing wrong with a little bump and grind with a little bump and grind”
Dracula was a frustration and contradiction, and it must have worn on him. He was a lover who could not love, an undead living out death as a man of action who was not a man. And he did it all in the dark… in England…with a bunch of protestants….sort of…for a little while.
But what is Dracula now? As I said, Stoker wrote him as a caricature of other, short sighted fears. But now, he is even a caricature of that, of his once strong self. He’s a joke. A sharp orifice with a widow’s peak. That’s not sexy, that’s not money baby.
And Count Dracula was money baby. He was fresh.
So looking past Stoker and Nosferatu, and Batman and Manbat, and Count Dooku and Saruman and let’s talk about the man, the one that deserves the credit, the love, the cash and the women: Bela Lugosi. The man made Count Dracula, Dracula. Lugosi is the reason some little kids and foreigners and those people I mentioned who don’t know the Universal Monsters yell “he’s a DRACULA!,” and not “he’s a vampire!” Because Dracula’s the only one that even matters! BECAUSE HE’S A DRACULA! HE IS DRACULA!
Bela Lugosi was a holy cross burnt on film. A ghost, so lifeless and empty of anything but evil his character wasn’t a reflection of light on film, but a burn mark or a vacuum. Lugosi was Dracula, he did travel to America from Eastern Europe, and I bet his boat had a few dead crewmen and rats, and he couldn’t really speak very well, and he kind of looked sickly and grotesque, but he was rolling in it. Yeah boiii. Yes boy.
And people don’t know who he is? HE’S A DRACULA!
So that’s it, I’m going to tell them all. A piece for each, of last words, or a eulogy, an epitaph, or a salute, or a shout out; for the biggies, the masters, those monsters, the terrors and inspirations. Who? The Universal Monsters! Those DRACULAS!:
-Frankenstein’s Monster
-The Phantom
-The Mummy
-The Invisible Man
-The Bride of Frankenstein
-The Wolf Man
-And The Creature from the Black Lagoon
…but fuck the hunchback, and his Disney gypsy…
So, if you have no idea who the Universal Monsters are, if you don’t know Dracula's a vampire, or you think that the Invisible Man is the same thing as the Headless Horseman, or that Frankenstein "has bolts in his head an shit...and he's green, right?”, and you have no clue about the Wolf man, or you just think mummies look like “someone wrapped in toilet paper or something... and they walk around with there arms out...or something...no those are zombies right? Or do mummies do that too?”…
Or, if you just think that, well, "monsters are green,” than you might enjoy some of this. Or you might just want to pretend you’re a little kid again, and that all of this is true, and is happening in your neighborhood, and in your closet, and under your bed, and you might just want to enjoy that feeling instead, while you still can. Because one day the only thing that’ll be left to be scared of, will be the really scary things, those things that really are a Dracula.
Oh, and remember, like my good friend Wynston taught me one frightful night:
“Monsters are green…Apples are green. Apples, are green.”
(…and no Biasman, she wasn’t high)
-CML, The Invisible Dr.Glogger’s Monster from the Blacula Lagoon…. Returned….’s bride….
In Black and White
I’m not even going to get into Frankenstein (that’ll come another time), but Dracula; aw boy. He’s a pimp, that’s a fact. Not only does he live in a castle swerving game all over some nasty vixen , dress to impress rockin’ a cape, and suck on necks like it ain’t no thing, but he’s also been the father to more horror stories and creations than any other of the Universal Monsters. Don't believe me, check it out: Blacula, Count Von Count “the Count”, Dr. Acula, Alucard, and any guy that whore Buffy ever got down with. Oh, and about a googolplex of porno characters. Yeah boiiiiiii! Oh, and Batman. Oh, and Nelson too.
But honestly, Dracula, he’s taking a beating. I kind of feel bad for him. No, I really do feel bad for him. Bram Stoker wrote him as a caricature of evil, a stereotypes of the dark and the dirty and the incredibly sexy. Dracula was those things that go bump in the night, who actually could go bump in the night, and did.
-“I don’t see nothing wrong with a little bump and grind with a little bump and grind”
Dracula was a frustration and contradiction, and it must have worn on him. He was a lover who could not love, an undead living out death as a man of action who was not a man. And he did it all in the dark… in England…with a bunch of protestants….sort of…for a little while.
But what is Dracula now? As I said, Stoker wrote him as a caricature of other, short sighted fears. But now, he is even a caricature of that, of his once strong self. He’s a joke. A sharp orifice with a widow’s peak. That’s not sexy, that’s not money baby.
And Count Dracula was money baby. He was fresh.
So looking past Stoker and Nosferatu, and Batman and Manbat, and Count Dooku and Saruman and let’s talk about the man, the one that deserves the credit, the love, the cash and the women: Bela Lugosi. The man made Count Dracula, Dracula. Lugosi is the reason some little kids and foreigners and those people I mentioned who don’t know the Universal Monsters yell “he’s a DRACULA!,” and not “he’s a vampire!” Because Dracula’s the only one that even matters! BECAUSE HE’S A DRACULA! HE IS DRACULA!
Bela Lugosi was a holy cross burnt on film. A ghost, so lifeless and empty of anything but evil his character wasn’t a reflection of light on film, but a burn mark or a vacuum. Lugosi was Dracula, he did travel to America from Eastern Europe, and I bet his boat had a few dead crewmen and rats, and he couldn’t really speak very well, and he kind of looked sickly and grotesque, but he was rolling in it. Yeah boiii. Yes boy.
And people don’t know who he is? HE’S A DRACULA!
So that’s it, I’m going to tell them all. A piece for each, of last words, or a eulogy, an epitaph, or a salute, or a shout out; for the biggies, the masters, those monsters, the terrors and inspirations. Who? The Universal Monsters! Those DRACULAS!:
-Frankenstein’s Monster
-The Phantom
-The Mummy
-The Invisible Man
-The Bride of Frankenstein
-The Wolf Man
-And The Creature from the Black Lagoon
…but fuck the hunchback, and his Disney gypsy…
So, if you have no idea who the Universal Monsters are, if you don’t know Dracula's a vampire, or you think that the Invisible Man is the same thing as the Headless Horseman, or that Frankenstein "has bolts in his head an shit...and he's green, right?”, and you have no clue about the Wolf man, or you just think mummies look like “someone wrapped in toilet paper or something... and they walk around with there arms out...or something...no those are zombies right? Or do mummies do that too?”…
Or, if you just think that, well, "monsters are green,” than you might enjoy some of this. Or you might just want to pretend you’re a little kid again, and that all of this is true, and is happening in your neighborhood, and in your closet, and under your bed, and you might just want to enjoy that feeling instead, while you still can. Because one day the only thing that’ll be left to be scared of, will be the really scary things, those things that really are a Dracula.
Oh, and remember, like my good friend Wynston taught me one frightful night:
“Monsters are green…Apples are green. Apples, are green.”
(…and no Biasman, she wasn’t high)
-CML, The Invisible Dr.Glogger’s Monster from the Blacula Lagoon…. Returned….’s bride….
In Black and White
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