Clownhouse

Hollywood is full of perverts, degenerates, and antichrists. I can only imagine Steven Spielberg dressed in a messianic cloak surrounded by such satanic showmen as Michael Bay, James Cameron, and Jerry Bruckheimer. Their chore boy would be Clownhouse director Victor Salva. During the filming of Clownhouse, Salva thought it would be ok to molest 12 year star Nathan Forrest Winters. I always thought the random shot of Winters ass in the film was out place and slightly disturbing. Victor Salva left his dirty stamp on it.


It has also been rumored that during the filming of Apocalypse Now, Francis Ford Coppola and Victor Salva would have sex with a 14 year old prostitute from the Philippines. That’s probably the reason it took so much money and time to finish Apocalypse Now. All the excitement may have even given the heartache Coppola suffered during the films shoot. Love is a heartbreaker.

Clownhouse is a somewhat awkward film. Three undesirables escape from a mental institution and decide to put on clown outfits. The clowns decide they want to kill a couple kids. Clownhouse has the feeling of a kids film gone wrong. Bad brothers get the punishment they deserve. Director Victor Salva is a man that has values! He know how to differentiate between good guys and bad guys.

Nathan Forrest Winters is the young boy on the far right

Clownhouse is nothing new. The film was obviously the work of a textbook film school technician. Clownhouse has the same contrived and calculated feel as John Carptener’s Halloween (which I am still a fan of). The only real appeal of the film is if you know the dark behind the scenes story surrounding the film.

Hollywood has confirmed that it is pro-pedophilia. Despite what Victor Salva did, he still continues to work in Hollywood. He is most famous for Powder (Nathan Forrest Winters tried to start a boycott at it’s release) and the Jeepers Creepers franchise. Hollywood could easily get thousands of different other “director for hire” filmmakers. Instead they choose to keep giving Salva work. It's not the most pleasant thing to think about when considering that Hollywood virtually sets the moral codes for America.

-Ty E

Willard

The way acting supports a film is like the way condiments make food better. Some brainless films don't need incredible acting; like Jumper. With Willard, another remake of a classic horror film, the above par notch for remakes is set even higher by the eccentric headliner Crispin Glover who completely reworks the film at it's foundation.

The plot is familiar. Willard Stiles is a man whose life has been destroyed due to his fathers death and his mothers ailness. Similar to Jackson's gorefest Dead Alive, both children have much maturing to do and leaves them with a distorted sense of reality. Willard works a deadend job with no friends. His boss happens to be R. Lee Ermey, and as this role applies, a lot of emotional damage occurs from this bastard.


Eventually he finds solace in an incredibly intelligent white rat he named Socrates. Using his new friends, he decides to bite back at everything that has caused him pain over the years. So we have a "When Animals Attack!" film with a deep psychological burning inside of it. This by itself makes it a great movie. A beautiful though occurs within all of Glovers films. When you think about him acting in all these common popular films, it's nice to see his privately funded artistic visions being produced with his own brand of sacrifice.


The acting is phenomenally deranged and poignant. Willard is truly a disturbed man. There is no real sense of accomplishment for him, only sorrow, which he uses to fuel his silent rage. Willard is a landmark in mainstream cinema, bringing harsh realities in touch with the common viewer. This film is perfectly complimented by Crispin Glover's music video "Ben". In the music video, you will see trademark Glover, as philosophers and Hitler make an appearance.

-Maq

Orozco el Embalsamador

Orozco The Embalmer is a film unlike no other. Do not get this one confused with a mondo film. On the outer shell, It is a bizarre shockumentary that features grotesque embalming, foul treatment of the dead, and a fucked environment, but at its core, it is a commentary on many things, including both spectrum's of life and death. The genre of shockumentary is plagued with generic grindcore based outings of simulated and non-simulated death footage. The result is wholly shallow and unapologetic.


The guideline of the film is following the legendary Orozco. He is perhaps the worlds greatest embalmer who resides in Colombia. Each day he wakes up and embalms anywhere from 5 to 10 corpses a day, leaving him at a number over 50,000 that he has embalmed throughout his life. The very parallel idea of being able to sleep peacefully with the blood of thousands on your hands perplexes me. Orozco is a man of legend.


Tsurisaki Kiyotaka is a reporter turned corpse photographer who gets his kicks by photographing the dead and compiling it into films that mainly exploit the fear of death. See his film Junk Films for a collection of shorts. The original plan was to just document a short on him but the society claimed otherwise. The area in which he documents is of the worst social order. People get murdered in the streets in front of the innocent eyes of children. No taboo is left intact throughout this film. Babies are mishandled and disturbing samba music just ups the mood to a level of extreme unfelt in modern documentaries. The reason for Kiyotaka's prolonged stay was due to the fact that Orozco could mourn everyday of his life. Such an intimate connection between man and death, perhaps the most personal ever documented.



To this degree, it seems to contradict itself. Orozco violently tugs on his victim’s obese flesh, laughing at dead children, posing with them, and manages to not have the slightest expression change. Orozco the Embalmer can be considered a vast exercise in anti-art. The violence is graphic and in your face. You will not leave this experience without being marked. This film does something that none other has; made me fear death in it’s entirety.


I never really pondered the effects of death. The nothingness. What does it do? These thoughts have sent me into mild panic attacks, and to think all this because of a documentary? Does death really boil down to being assaulted by a disgustingly over-age Colombian? Orozco The Embalmer is a gripping documentary capturing the horrid quality of life that goes on, and what we should really fear about death.

-mAQ

Django

The western is a genre the offers me not type of thrill or inspiration. When I do decide to watch a western, it is of the Italian persuasion. Spaghetti westerns added new elements to the western. They double the violence and emphasize atmospheric artistry. The contrived stoicism of John Wayne has always made me sick. That man never once fought in any American war yet propagated war time propaganda.

Django is a western that I can get into. Any rebel cowboy that drags a coffin deserves recognition. Django wastes no time in wasting over thirty men and an equal amount of seconds. He is a heartless criminal that does everything in effort to benefit his own interests. He makes John Wayne look like a disgruntled sideshow cowboy clown.


Mexican target practice is an exciting event found in Django. American filmmakers wouldn’t dare feature such a politically incorrect act (a little in the early Hollywood studio system days). I can only assume that the Mexicans were played by Sicilians. Northern Italian has always considered them second class citizens. Pier Paolo Pasolini was most likely the only director to show them love.

Like the majority of Italian films, Django features an impressive soundtrack. The Django theme is quite triumphant. I couldn’t help cheering for psycho killer Django. Out of all the gringos in westerns, Django might just be king. That’s why he has his own theme song.


Cannibal Holocaust director Ruggero Deodato acted as assistant director on Django. He seems to have taken a couple cues from Django in his obsession with brutal violence. I would argue that Django is more of an Italian exploitation than the typical spaghetti western. Quentin Tarantino borrowed the ear cutting in Django scene for his film Reservoir Dogs. We all know that Tarantino is an exploitation thing.

-Ty E

Paranoid Park

Gus van Sant seems to be going the route of Larry Clark in adoring young skater boys. This odd trend of obsession still has me perplexed. I hope that van Sant is not a member of NAMBLA. He is one of my favorite Hollywood directors. Gus is a director that has managed to bring interesting subversion to the mainstream. Drugstore Cowboy, My Own Private Idaho, and Elephant are all films that I have come to enjoy over the years.

I grew up as a skater in a small redneck county. My skateboarding obsession lasted for over 8 years. Skaters were the most despised group subculture (and probably the only real subculture). Like the skaters in Gus van Sant's Paranoid Park, we were always in trouble. The teachers had blacklisted us essentially as future criminals (which many of my former friends ended up). We never ended up killing a security guard. I couldn’t imagine if I saw a crawling torso heading towards. I probably would have found it very cool.

Paranoid Park is sort of a trip down nostalgia lane for me. I couldn’t help but enjoy the film. It brought me back to the days when my skater friends and I would make gritty skate videos. Everything was about skating. Paranoid Park’s slow motion skate sequences were very mellowing and dare I say poetic. The film featured a lot of slow motion scenes which actually worked to the advantage of Paranoid Park’s very soothing flow. I can already hear people calling Paranoid Park pretentious a mile away. If they can’t enjoy a beautiful film than they can enjoy the commercial like “qualities” of a film directed by Craig Brewer.


Last Days was a disappointment for me and a good number of Van Sant fans. The director has now redeemed himself with Paranoid Park. The film opens up with beautiful music composed by Nina Rota which was originally in Federico Fellini’s masterpiece Juliet of the Spirits. Nina Rota was one of the greatest (if not the greatest) music composer for films. Paranoid Park also features music from Elliot Smith (which can be heard in Van Sant’s Good Will Hunting among other films). The music perfectly compliments Paranoid Park’s scattered and flowing feel.

Paranoid Park features various kids quoting popular TV shows and movies (South Park, Napoleon Dynamite, etc.). Gus van Sant brings up the staleness of American life. American’s grow up (including myself) living their lives through television and film. The skaters of Paranoid Park learned more values from watching television than they did from their own parents. Skateboarding is a loner sport (if you want to call it that) and its participants confirm that.


Gus Van Sant is not as perverted as Larry Clark. Clark’s Ken Park, I suspect fulfilled many of the directors dark fantasies. Although Gus van Sant obviously has a thing for skater boys, he at least respects them. Keep in mind I am a fan of Ken Park. Gus Van Sant acted as an executive producer on Larry Clarks’s first film Kids. I hope that Clark won’t call Van Sant a theft like he basically called Kids and Ken Park screenwriter Harmony Korine. Paranoid Park owes nothing to Larry Clark.

-Ty E

M

M is Fritz Lang’s best film. Lang has admitted this in multiple interviews and even in Jean-Luc Godard’s Contempt (which I think is Godard’s best film). M was also Lang’s second to last early German film (The Testament of Dr. Mabuse being the last) before fleeing Nazi minister of Propaganda‘s Josef Goebbels offer to direct films for the Reich (keep in mind Lang‘s Mother was Jewish). Most of Lang’s later films (especially American) would have much smaller budgets (especially in comparison to films like Metropolis).


Despite being released over 75 years ago, M is still the best film dealing with a child murderer/molester. Peter Lorre does an excellent job portraying the killer Hans Beckert. His pathetic and gentle nature fit the profile of a real life child killer. Lorre’s froglike eyes give off the intensity of an uncontrollable murderer. I believe Killer Hans when he says he can’t control his behavior. His mannerisms are uncontrollably suspicious to say the least.


Nazi propagandist Fritz Hippler utilized Lorre’s end speech for his failed propaganda film The Eternal Jew. The reason for this was that it confirmed Jewish “degenerate art” and mental illness. It was also used as evidence that Jews were prone to criminal behavior and showed no desire to take responsibility for their crimes. Peter Lorre is probably most famous for his role in American propaganda film Casablanca. Quite interesting that Lorre played a part in both sides of wartime propaganda (whether he agreed to or not).

One of the most telling scenes of M is when the child murderer Hans takes refuge in the shadows of a clustered room. He is a scared and pathetic individual. You almost even feel sorry for the killer. However, his horrible acts are unforgivable. Director Fritz Lang ultimately seems to blame the parents of the children as expressed in the M’s conclusion. I really hope Lang wasn’t an apologist for criminals of the worst type.


M has a feeling like no other. The film is set in a shadowy city that feels undeniably claustrophobic. As M progresses, you feel that the capture of Hans is inevitable. He has nowhere to hide. The networking used by the citizens (most being criminals themselves) hunting the murderer makes for an intense capture. When the murderer is finally caught excitement reaches it’s climax.


Fritz Lang is my second favorite German expressionist director (F.W. Murnau being my favorite). His varying range of cinematic achievements confirm Lang as being one of the most interesting and innovative directors in film history. Peter Lorre’s voice would later be the inspiration for Ren Höek of the now classic The Ren and Stimpy Show. Fritz Lang’s M is without doubt one of the greatest films ever made. David Fincher and his film Se7en need to take notice!

-Ty E

A Closer Look at Blaxploitation

Blaxploitation is one of the more colorful genres of films that instead of exploiting nuns or frequent sex, it exploits blacks. The genre of “Blaxploitation” was born in the early 70’s from with the urban youth in mind. Arguably, the very first Blaxploitation film was “Sweet Sweetback’s BAADASSSSS Song”. Many claim due to it being directed by a Negro, if refutes the whole purpose. If you notice, Whites & Jews directed many of the cult or more obscure blaxploitation films.

For instance, Note Williamson’s classic “Boss Nigger” being directed by Jack Arnold, the infamous director of Universal classic “Creature from the Black Lagoon”. This was a tactic picked up to make a mass amount of money by appealing to the urban kids. Upon the discovery of this, there was a “boom” in the market spawning Superfly, Black Caesar, and other classic titles. Bone from Larry Cohen is another film of this stature. The massive meaning of this film aims towards being an anti-white film and mainstreaming racism.

Aside from Bone, Cohen also directed the rebirth mash-up “Original Gangstas” with classic Blaxploitation stars such as Pam Grier, Fred Williamson, Richard Roundtree, and Jim Brown. The film is an interesting view on urbanization. If you view each of the characters, you can imagine them actually coming back to the “hood” to find it in flames. It seems like a loose ending to every Blaxploitation film they have starred in. They once were hood rats, now they have come back to clean up the streets.

The afore-mentioned Boss Nigger was one of the Blaxploitation films that showed its militant black character on a step above whites with the slogan “Black Man’s Law in a White Man’s Town” In this film, Fred Williamson and D’urville Marin play a duo of bounty hunters who force the role of sheriff and deputy among themselves. Through out their journey, Williamson beds up with a white teacher and Martin with an obese lady; exaggerating the fact that black men love a big woman.

The director of the cult-animated spoof “Coonskin” was born in what is now Israel. Coonskin was the main target for controversy due to the mass amounts of character models based off of Jolson’s immortalization of blackface. Coonskin was not the first animated feature to use the “coon” archetype. In fact, Disney was doing it long before. Many now banned clips feature blackface caricatures devouring watermelons in church then in turn, spitting them on the poor white folk in front of him.



The influence of Blaxploitation soon spread, generating Richard Roundtree’s classic SHAFT featuring a magnificent score from Isaac Hayes, thus paving the way for soul and funk soundtracks for these features. The formula for these films involves urban violence, explicit profanity, frequent drug use, and the famed “pimp” role. Rudy Ray Moore played the most notable role of a pimp in his hit “Dolemite” based off one of his stand-up characters. Dolemite was such a hit; it spawned countless sequels, records, and a new film due out later this year called “The Dolemite Explosion!”

The plot of Dolemite is simple and campy. Dolemite is released from prison to catch the man who framed him there in the first place, Willy Green. Along the way, he will train all his “bitches” in the art of Kung-Fu, come across crooked white cops, and manages to keep his wardrobe colorful and distinguished. Rudy R. Moore might have even created the look for a pimp with this series. Many of these Blaxploitation films have a political message, if you notice, either a major or minor villain is set against stereotype. I.E: The perfect white crooked cops in Dolemite who abuse their power and ultimately get their ass beat by Dolemite. Us genre-fans are not the only ones that Dolemite has entertained. More mainstream rap artists such as Snoop Dogg and Wu-Tang Clan have admitted their inspiration from Dolemite. To quote Snoop Dogg,

"Without Rudy Ray Moore, there would be no Snoop Dogg, and that's for real." - Snoop Dogg

Even after all this time, Blaxploitation is not dead, nor does it look like it will die in the near future. Films like “Black Devil Doll” ensure the snagging of new fans to the genre. This one sports the excessive nudity, frequent profanity, and the lost language of jive. Director Jonathan Lewis obviously wants the urban feel, hence his incorporating the funk group “Bamboo Gods” in the soundtrack. Blaxploitation has come a long way from being directed by white men to make blacks mainstream. It’s only very exciting to see what effects time will have on this genre.

-Maq