Volume 15 - Event Horizon and Being Blinded by Science

I'm not good at science, you guys. I paid a lot of money for a piece of paper that says I'm a bachelor of it, true, but the reality of the matter is that my talents more resemble another meaning for the acronym B.S. Heck, I don't even like science.

I'm not saying I don't like science like how a Republican doesn't like science; I acknowledge that it's out there. I'm just not the person to deal with it. Other people are better at science than me, and that's fine. Those people probably haven't played as much Tecmo Super Bowl as I have. Let's call it even and move on.

Despite my oppositional stance toward it, I spent a lot of time thinking about a movie with science in it this week. So, in the name of science - kind of - let's take a look at that movie and talk about how much of a non-sciencer I am.

HOW THIS WORKS
Step 1) I pick a movie.
Step 2) I tell you about the movie.
Step 3) I tell you what we're looking for in a double feature movie.
Step 4) Another movie!
Step 5) Victory!

Event Horizon

1997, Dir. by Paul W.S. Anderson

I'm not gonna say Event Horizon is an incredibly smart sci-fi movie. But it's got enough science in it to confuse me. Perhaps I should be embarrassed when I admit that, and maybe I am a little. I'm not to proud to admit it.

There are definitely people out there who understand Event Horizon much more than I do. One such person is a great writer named Elbee, who recently wrote this wonderful article celebrating the film's 20th anniversary over at the fine site Cinepunx. I've read this article, which spells out some of the film's science and some of its theory with great detail, a couple of times now. It makes me want to be a smarter person. It makes sense, which is something I gotta fight through like four edits to get to, and it even shows an understanding of the influences and themes at the heart of this deceptively tricky piece of pulp sci-fi horror. It's the kind of insight you readers deserve, yet it's not the type of insight you will get from me when we talk about Event Horizon. I have no tongue for it.

Event Horizon is the tale of a space ship named, you guessed it, the Event Horizon. It was sent to explore the edge of our solar system in 2040 - a place I thought had already been explored when the film was released in 1997, because science and I don't talk much - and disappeared. Then, in 2047, a rescue named "Lewis & Clark" (I understood that reference! It's not science!), is sent to rescue it when its distress signal appears. Accompanying the crew on their journey is the man who designed the Event Horizon, Dr. William Weir (Sam Neill, who apparently was heading to space to avoid dinosaurs), and he's there to explain exactly how much science the movie wants us to think about. My buddy Elbee makes a great point in her article that bears repeating here - you would assume that a bunch of astronauts understood something about science. But what Event Horizon presupposes is - What if they didn't?

I'm fine with that presumption, because I struggle to understand it. I like to think I'm smart, but the more technical terms Neill and friends throw at the screen the more I get a blank stare on my face. You know when your friends are all talking about that TV show you don't watch - in my case, we'll say The Bachelor, and you're not trying to be rude and just leave the party so you just sit there and nod and do one of those "huh" or "ohhh" noises every 27 seconds? That's me when dude starts talking about the physics of space travel...if that even is what he's talking about.

(Off topic, but the 27 second interval is the key to this method of polite disinterest. If you make it 20 seconds, someone else who's not paying attention is gonna be counting and they're gonna notice that it's an even number and they're gonna call you out on it. If you wait for 30 seconds you're gonna seem out of it for too long, and people will know. Trust me - 27 is the perfect number. Try it out sometime. You'll thank me.)

The things we learn when the Lewis & Clark gets to the Event Horizon are:

• Everyone on board is dead.
• The ship is creepy as hell.
• The ship has been to another dimension.

I understand the first two items there pretty well and then all of a sudden WHOA ANOTHER DIMENSION? If this was Twitter I'd throw some cutesy gif about my mind being blown into this paragraph, but this is the real world and I have to use words for my feelings. Apparently, as I understand it, The ship named Event Horizon (inside the movie Event Horizon, naturally) was just chilling out by Neptune, looking around, having a good time, when POOF IT WAS GONE TO SOME PLACE ELSE. And not some place else like Kentucky, but some place else that's not even on the same plane of existence as Kentucky. And not a plane that you fly on either.

When I put it that way it's not too hard to understand, but the more Weir and the confused crew, led by the super fantastic Laurence Fishburne as their no nonsense captain, talk about black holes and how things work with physics...the more I start to doubt myself. And then I see little details in the film that make me question the science even more. At one point a character gets jettisoned out into space and I look at all the little white lights behind him and the only thing I can think is "There's no way there's that many stars grouped so close together out there! It looks like something I would have drawn when I was five and just had my first Mountain Dew and couldn't stop putting dots on the paper so it looked like I used all the space and actually drew something!" Clearly, at this point I'm letting Event Horizon get the best of me and my science-resistant brain.

But, here's the good part. We learn pretty near the middle of the film that this other dimension the Event Horizon (the ship) went to - might just be Hell. And that's good for me. It can't be proven or quantified. I like that in my horror, and I like that in my sci-fi. That's where Event Horizon (the movie) - which has just as many creepy and gory images as it does arguments about physics and other sciences I don't get - works so well for me. 

Sure, it's basically Alien without an Alien (and with a far too spastic electronic musical score), but it does a good job of being that while freaking its characters out in unique ways. I can dig a movie like that, even if I don't feel like I'm smart enough to really understand what it thinks it is smart enough to tell me.

At this point I've said about all I can say about Event Horizon without sounding too stupid. (Well, maybe I'm already there.) So when I thought about explaining what I'm looking for in a double feature to go with it, i thought it would be best if I focus on the things I understand about Event Horizon, and how I can build off of them.

• The characters in the film and the things they are up against belong in two separate dimensions. While I don't quite understand the physics of that, I'm a big fan of movies that pit our reality and the expectations we have about it up against another place that's...to put it simply, quite different. 
• Outside of the seemingly all-seeing Weir, the characters in Event Horizon are kinda normal people who, despite being trained for the predicament they're in, are always playing catch up against the unknown forces they face. They try really hard, and I like that about them. I kind of wish they were more open to the things around them though, but they do their best.
• When things get really icky for the characters in Event Horizon, they come across some creepy black goo. There's something about horror and sci-fi movies with creepy black goo that just makes me smile, so I'm looking for another creepy black goo movie. (I probably won't talk about this again, but I felt like mentioning it here because typing "creepy black goo"is so much fun.)
• When in doubt, the crew of the Lewis & Clark have one of my favorite theories for attacking the evil they can't understand: burn it down. You can science me all you want, but most of the time fire is a great answer. Let's look for people who take on another dimension that way too.

The film I'm about to recommend to you certainly doesn't live in the same world as Event Horizon. But it's a movie that embraces the things I understand about movies like Event Horizon, and it's a movie that challenges reality while not relying on that pesky ol' science that I don't want around. We're making concessions for my inadequacies as a learner with this double feature, I admit it. 

Please stay with me. Because we're gonna have some fun doing it.

John Dies At The End

2012, Directed by Don Coscarelli

Don Coscarelli is my kind of director. When he wants to go to another dimension, he throws the science right out the window. The man made two of my very favorite horror movies - Phantasm and Bubba Ho-Tep - both of which challenge reality in playful ways. Yet his most recent film, John Dies at the End, might be the wildest thing he's ever made. Inside it, alongside two fantastic leads (Chase Williamson and Rob Mayes) and two iconic character actors (Paul Giamatti and Clancy Brown), is a character that understands the whole "other dimensions and evil" problem in a very similar manner to myself.

His name is Detective Lawrence Appleton (no one will ever convince me he's not named after Mark Linn-Baker's iconic character from Perfect Strangers), he's played by Glynn Turman (who starred in an underrated '70s gem, J.D.'s Revenge and deserves much love), and he easily gives my favorite performance in this insane, dimension-hopping, drug-induced vacation from reality. There's a moment in the middle of the film where he confronts the film's central character, David Wong (Williamson), about what's going on in this bizarre situation. His explanation of what he thinks is going on, quoted below, is pretty much the perfect representation of how a non-sciencer like myself thinks when faced with the kind of situations these two films offer up.

"You know, everybody's got a ghost story, a UFO or a Bigfoot story. Now what I think is that stuff is both real and not real at the same time. I ain't no Star Trek fan and I don't know about other dimensions and all that. But I am an old school Catholic and I do believe in Hell. I believe it ain't just rapists and murderers down there. I believe it's demons and worms and vile things; the grease trap of the universe. And the more I think of it, the more I think it's not some place 'down there' at all, that it's here, all around us. We just don't perceive it. Just like how the country music radio station is out there, in the air, even if you ain't tuned to it."

Take out the Catholic part - in the immortal words of Bob Dylan, "It ain't me, babe" - and Detective Appleton just described my understanding of other dimensions and the evils in the world to a T. Which is pretty amazing, since we've never met. I guess Detective Lawrence Appleton and I are (you guessed it) PERFECT STRANGERS.

Like Event Horizon, John Dies at the End is a movie I've seen at least a handful of times - it's a young flick, but it is incredibly rewatchable - and could not explain to you without using the phrase "AND THEN THINGS GET NUTS!" But while Event Horizon tries really hard to explain the science behind its madness, this one embraces a sort of lunatic philosopher role. As the film starts the narrator poses a conundrum, a rambling logic puzzle about undead beings and axe repair that has nothing to do with the rest of the film's plot, and this kind of logic (or lack there of?) never stops coming at the viewer as the characters face some of the most bizarre encounters you'll find in a horror film.

It would be unfair if I didn't list some of those bizarre struggles, so here's a quick run down of just a few of the things we encounter while following these characters:

• Meat monsters
• A flying insect moustache
• "Eyes Wide Shut World

If any of those things make sense to you based on any science class you ever took - God bless that teacher. If you have their number, send it on over to The Mike. I have so many questions.

Another major departure from the first film in our double feature are the two lead characters, Dave and John. Everyone on the Event Horizon - aside from the doctor, who obviously knew more about the titular ship than them - is hesitant when faced with the reality-altering visions they see throughout their film. On the other hand, Dave and John are carefree and open-minded. This horror comedy's best joke might be the presentation of how level headed these two ordinary guys are in the face of shapeshifting monsters and gateways to other worlds. There's very little fear shown by either character, and their calm approach to such a bizarre series of events keeps the viewer smiling throughout the film.

It might seem like a disservice to pair Event Horizon with a film that throws out any of the logic and science that it works very hard to incorporate, especially as I explain just how far the second film's tone deviates from the focus on terror that the first was built around. I'd argue that those departures are what makes this such a fun double feature, because Event Horizon is so effective in its use of science to create terror (even if I don't understand it) that following it up with another film with the same goals would maybe be a bit too heavy for even a horror loving viewer like me.

By the time you see the alternate dimension that John and Dave travel to late in their film, you'll understand that John Dies at the End is not interested in painting the same picture of Hell that Event Horizon did. And that's quite fine. Both of these films are nightmare scenarios that challenge reality and make things pretty gross and gory at times, but some nightmares are just weird and wacky and not as terrifying as some other nightmares. I think we've got room for both kinds of nightmares in horror cinema.

Both of these films will make you think, will make you squirm, and will surprise you. One will scare you more than the other, and one will make you laugh more than the other, even if it relies on a few too many dick jokes. If you want to see some science go wrong, but don't want to spend too much time trying to understand that science, try out this double feature and enjoy the ride through a few unique nightmare dimensions.

Volume 13 - Carrie and The Powerful Young Woman

We're running deeper into October with a very different double feature this week. In fact, when I came up with this double feature I decided it was "the best worst double feature" I could think of. It was pretty much a joke double feature; one that I thought would be a silly twist on some horror themes. But after I thought of this idea, life kept happening around me. As I read the news, and as I kept up with people in my personal and professional lives, I started to realize there might be a more important meaning to this double feature that I didn't catch when I first thought of it.

So, take this double feature as you will. Maybe you'll agree with my assessment of the themes of these films, maybe you'll just appreciate the different tones about people in the same kind of situation. Either way, I'm glad you're reading.

HOW THIS WORKS
Step 1) I pick a movie.
Step 2) I tell you about the movie.
Step 3) I tell you what we're looking for in a double feature movie.
Step 4) Another movie!
Step 5) Victory!

Carrie

1976, Directed by Brian De Palma

Does everyone in the room know how Carrie ends? I feel like everyone in the room knows how Carrie ends. It's one of the more iconic final acts in horror history, if you ask me. Well, JUST IN CASE YOU DON'T, THIS IS A WARNING THAT THERE WILL PROBABLY BE SOME SPOILERS IN THIS POST. Hence the all caps. I don't like to talk about spoilers, but I kinda think I have to this week.

If you haven't seen it - just go watch Carrie. Get the original. You'll be alright. I appreciate you reading this far.

"If only they knew she had the power."

Being a teenager is pretty rough, we all know that. But I also think it's rougher for young women. Some would say that's a generalization, but I think it's a fact. If you don't want to accept that, this post might not be for you.

If you know Carrie, you know it's the story of a seemingly ordinary young woman who has extraordinary powers. Carrie White is her name, and her power comes in the form of telekenesis, which allows her to move objects with her mind. Unfortunately for Carrie, the power seems to manifest the most when Carrie is upset. Like her first menstrual experience - which we see in the film's opening credit sequence, she's not prepared to deal with these powers when she recognizes them.

I emphasized the tagline from the film's poster above, because it gives us an important warning - no one knows that Carrie has this power. So she doesn't have a lot of support to deal with them when she realizes what she can do. The only person she seems to feel connected to is Tommy, a boy she's attracted to romantically (due to his gigantic curly hair and his poetic talent, obviously), and her feelings toward him are somewhat confusing to her. The reason for her confusion is obvious to the viewer - Tommy is partially being nice to Carrie because his girlfriend feels regret for bullying Carrie and wants Tommy to take her to the prom as a kind gesture - but Carrie only knows that one of the most popular boys in school is the only person who seems to be interested in being nice to her. Based on her past experiences, it's easy to see why she doesn't trust that.

If you're one of the people who knows how Carrie ends, you know what the biggest tragedy in the film is. But I'm of the mindset that this aspect of Carrie's existence - her inability to trust anything because she's so used to being treated poorly by the people around her - is a strong candidate to be the saddest thing about her story. It stems from the bullying she deals with, but more than that it comes from her overbearing mother, whose religious fanaticism blocks Carrie from her right to expect good, rational guidance from her mother. Her mother obviously cares about Carrie, but her care is based around what she wants Carrie to be, not who Carrie is. And that sets Carrie up to fail, despite her power.

Also involved in Carrie's misfortune are the educators responsible for preparing her for life, most notably Miss Collins, the physical education teacher at her school. Miss Collins is probably the most heroic character in the film; she does try hard to support Carrie. But she never really stops to ask what's going on with Carrie, she just tries to build Carrie up her own way and then focuses on punishing the bullies that are making Carrie's life difficult. That's not a bad thing - again, Miss Collins is certainly trying - but you have to wonder if things would have turned out differently if she had tried to understand Carrie more personally and find out what is actually going on in her life.

If you listen to discussions about the making of the film, you'll hear a few rumors about why Miss Collins, played by Betty Buckley, faced the fate she did in the film. Most of these are based on behind the scenes issues between cast and crew, so I might be reaching when I assign meaning to her fate in the film. It's a departure from Stephen King's novel, which gives some credence to the idea that director Brian De Palma had his own reasons for offing the character. Still, I think the choice to show her as one of the adults who breaks into laughter when Carrie is at her weakest - and most dangerous - point, does at least partially justify her fate to this viewer. Someone with trust issues with deep roots, like Carrie, only needs the smallest provocation to lose their faith in someone, no matter how helpful that person has been to them. This is another one of the film's great tragedies, regardless of the director's intent.

Carrie works as a horror film due to King's marvelous story and Brian De Palma's iconic style, and Carrie works as a character because young Sissy Spacek is able to make her so vulnerable and meek in the face of everything she has to deal with. The horror film aspect is more than enough to make this one of the all-time horror classics, but it's the character and her tortured journey through the film that really makes this a movie worth thinking about today.

Which takes me back to that ominous tagline: what if they knew she had the power? What if someone - anyone - was willing to help Carrie White along the way? What if her mother wasn't a nut job, or what if her teacher really talked to her and listened to her and helped her learn more about herself? What if her classmates who were upset by how their peers treated Carrie - and there are a few we see in the film - stood up for her and backed her up? Maybe Carrie could have controlled her power and used it differently. Maybe she'd have joined the X-Men (not sure if they're in this time line, but it's worth a shot) or maybe she at least would have been able to lead a relatively ordinary life, while maintaining the ability to get a beverage from the fridge while staying on the couch. (Let's be real, that's an ordinary life any of us could get behind.)

None of that happened, and that's what makes Carrie such a tragic story. Which, despite how great the film is, sucks. Carrie deserved better in the hands of the people in her life. She had power. We don't know whether she was chosen for this power, if she inherited it from someone, or any other explanation for how her life became what it was. But she never got the chance to harness it, because she didn't have support and she wasn't given the tools to be strong enough to deal with it. Again, that's a bummer.

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Now is the point where we diverge from the normal format of The Mike's Double Feature Picture Show. Because I don't want to have another movie that's a bummer. I want a young woman to succeed. I want her to have the confidence and support to use her power in a positive way.

So let's talk about a movie where that happens. It's a horror movie too - one with a comedic tone, but still a horror tale - and one that's been overshadowed (possibly rightfully, but I still defend it with all my might) by a remake. That remake - one of the most beloved horror shows in television history - probably builds a case for a sort of Anti-Carrie better than the film does. Alas, my heart still beats for this one.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer

1992, Directed by Fran Rubel Kuzui

If you know this movie, you can probably understand why I initially thought pairing it with Carrie was a bit of a joke. It's a flawed horror comedy in a lot of ways, especially if you ask its writer, Joss Whedon, who hated the final product (but still had the opportunity to turn his idea into the iconic series five years later).

If you weren't there when Buffy The Vampire Slayer hit the big screen - and especially if you were there when she hit the small screen - odds are you agree with Whedon and might not have much affection for the first adaptation of Buffy's story. I get that. But I was there, in the theater, back in 1992 - and I fell in love with Buffy that day. Sure, that's partially because Kristy Swanson was a gorgeous sight to 11 year old Mike. (In fairness, I fell in love with Sarah Michelle Gellar as a 16 year old too - I have a type, apparently, and that type is VAMPIRE KILLER.) But I also fell for her because the character was unlike a lot of the women I was used to from the few horror movies I had seen before that point in my life. She was strong, she kicked butt, and she was definitely a slayer.

We can't forget, however, that Buffy wasn't always a slayer. She wasn't as clueless as Carrie White was before she learned of her powers - yes, in this universe slaying is basically a super power - but she wasn't empowered. She was just a cheerleader, a shopper, and a young woman who was adapting to her world. Those are three things it's perfectly OK for any young woman to be, but Buffy was chosen for a greater calling. Unlike Carrie White, Buffy was able to harness her powers.

One of the many differences between Buffy and Carrie is that Buffy has a lot of support and is given a lot of knowledge about her gift. Like Carrie, she doesn't get that support from her mother, who seems to be completely uninterested in her life. She also doesn't get much support in school, the only scenes we see with her teachers there only makes us wonder why anyone would ever consider going to her school at all.

Things for Buffy get a boost when we learn that the gift of being the slayer comes with a built in support system, in the form of a mysterious "watcher" (it's less creepy than it sounds) named Merrick, played by Donald (Freakin') Sutherland. Buffy isn't ready to embrace her powers when she first meets Merrick, but he's patient with her while being persistent in trying to help her realize her skills. Sutherland's Merrick isn't the most inspirational character you'll find in a horror film, but he's kind and consistent and does the best he can to convince Buffy that her skills matter and can be used to help people.

Also supporting Buffy is her love interest, Oliver (Luke Perry). We know that Carrie also had the support of the young man in her life, it's just that Carrie didn't have enough confidence to trust that support, and when she did it was too late for her. Buffy has had her confidence built up through the successes in her teen years and her popularity, but she still has to open herself up to different experiences to harness her powers as a slayer and meeting and being understood by someone outside of her comfort zone is one of the keys that motivates her to face the (actual) demons she must stand up to.

(I do find it a little bit problematic that Buffy's main supports in the film are both male characters, and do feel like Whedon improved greatly upon this in the television series. The last thing I want this post to say is that women need male support and male protection only, because that's incredibly far from what I believe. We'll talk more about this later, but it felt like a good time to point this out.)

Buffy isn't a perfect person, and you could argue easily that Carrie White is a more virtuous character at the start of each of their journeys. The sad reality of these films, and of life, is that it really doesn't matter what someone's intentions are unless they are given the tools to use their own gifts in a positive manner. Buffy shines in her role as a slayer, fights off a bunch of intimidating vampires (I'd hate myself if I didn't at least shout out to Paul Reubens and Rutger Hauer for their turns in this film, which are as entertaining as you'd expect turns from Paul Reubens and Rutger Hauer to be), and finds love. At the end of it all, we get the sense that she's ready to take on whatever happens next.

I wish so badly that these things would have happened for Carrie.

I also wish that these things would happen for all the young women in the world, even if they aren't telekenetic masterminds or super-powered vampire killers. This double feature was originally intended to be a comical look at two films with similar set ups - young woman with surprising power, struggle to understand and harness said power, high school dance - that tackle the issues in radically different ways.

But inspiration comes in the strangest packages sometimes. The more I thought about this ridiculous double feature, the more I thought about the women in my life. I'm blessed to know a lot of strong women, and I'm blessed to know a lot of young women who need help finding their strength.  When I stopped to process my thoughts on these characters and these movies in relation to the women in my life, I couldn't stop myself from thinking of these women.

At the heart of both films, despite their supernatural themes, is a simple message: these young women need support. They are powerful. They are warriors. They are everything we need to keep society running, and they can preserve the good in the world someday. It is possible that they can do this on their own. But the odds are they're going to need someone to be there for them at some point.

From the moment we realize that, the challenge goes out to all of us. To the fathers and the mothers, to family members of all kinds. To Teachers, and to mentors. To friends, and to strangers. Will you be there for them? Will you support them? Will you accept them, no matter what their gift is, and be there to help them find their way?

If your answer to the above questions is yes, you're on the right path. It's probably not going to be easy, but you never know how much it might mean to them if you are there with your support and acceptance. It might help them avoid the fate of Carrie White and it might even help them fulfill their destiny, just like Buffy. It might save their life.

The poster for Carrie pondered what it would be like if "they knew she had the power."

I'm wondering why we can't just treat all women like they have the power.

I'm thinking the time to start treating them that way is now.

Volume 12 - Something Wicked This Way Comes and The Heart of October

It's October, which means the double features gotta get a whole lot spookier. This month we're gonna be looking at a few of my favorite horror movies - don't call 'em scary movies; I swear to God, if you call them scary movies I WILL judge you - and I'm going to try to cover a lot of stuff in a short amount of time. Unless my real world job drives me any crazier than it has of late. I'm tryin', you guys. Bear with me for the next little bit. I'll do my best.

To start October, I want to write about movies that make me feel like it's October. Because those of us that know the true meaning of October know that it's not just a month. It's a living, breathing, phenomenon; one where life is just a little more thrilling and you can feel something dangerous in the autumn breeze if you close your eyes tilt your head just right. Legend says that Halloween is the night where the barrier between the living and the dead is the thinnest - and October's the month where we get to spend 31 days dancing with that barrier and all the dangerous things that exist behind it.

HOW THIS WORKS
Step 1) I pick a movie.
Step 2) I tell you about the movie.
Step 3) I tell you what we're looking for in a double feature movie.
Step 4) Another movie!
Step 5) Victory!

Something Wicked This Way Comes

1983, Directed by Jack Clayton

"First of all, it was October. A rare month for boys. Full of cold winds, long nights, dark promises. Days get short. The shadows lengthen. The wind mourns in such a way that you want to run forever through the fields. Because, up ahead, 10,000 pumpkins lie waiting to be cut."

There are things that get my blood pumping - a beautiful woman, a Packers victory, any type of pie that's not pecan - and then there are words like that. Words from a narrator, written by Ray Bradbury, that make me want to go running through the fields too. Words that accompany a montage of orange-hued beauty that reveals the small town setting of Something Wicked This Way Comes. That setting is Green Town, Illinois, a fictional village that's not too far from Haddonfield (I think), a village that feels like it might be the most purely autumnal place in the world.

Green Town is the home of two young boys - Will Halloway and Jim Nightshade - and a whole lot of adults that seem kind of sad about their lives. The most prominent of these is Will's father, Charles Halloway, the town librarian. He's played by Jason Robards, who gives a vulnerable performance that makes him incredibly easy to relate to. I've always liked Robards, probably because he reminds me a little bit of my Grandfather, and seeing him here as an aging father who's trying to do everything he can for his son is pretty heartwarming. That might not be what you're looking for in a horror movie, and it's probably around this point that I should mention that this is a PG horror film released by Disney.

(A quick message to the "Only R rated horror is good horror" crowd - Don't run away, please. Let me finish. It won't hurt. I promise.)

The production of Something Wicked This Way Comes was kind of giant mess, which is amazing to me considering how much I love the final product. Disney was trying to get into darker features, after other studios' box office success with films like The Dark Crystal, and green lit this horror feature as a way to get in on that market - while still wanting to maintain their Disney image. Bradbury, who adapted his own novel for the studio, and veteran director Jack Clayton (The Innocents) were basically fired midway through production, and their friendship was torn apart by disagreements over the script. Clayton hired composer Georges Delerue to do the film's musical score, but Disney execs decided the music was too dark and brought in James Horner to write an entirely new score - which is actually one of my favorite musical scores in any film. When the film tested poorly with audiences Disney decided to admit some of their errors and brought Bradbury back in for some re-writes, including that opening narration I shared above.

The film still had a chance if they could all find a way to make it feel dark enough, and that starts with the casting of the sinister carnival proprietor at the center of the film - the aptly named, Mr. Dark. Bradbury has said how his choices for the role were Peter O'Toole and Christopher Lee, two names that would have probably pushed this production into both a different budget and a different conversation among filmgoers of 1983. Instead the studio went for the younger and cheaper Jonathan Pryce, a guy we all recognize now but also a guy who was relatively unknown at the time. And, because every argument on set apparently led to a surprisingly positive outcome - Pryce ended up being the brightest star in the film.

In fact, it's hard for me to imagine the magic of Something Wicked This Way Comes without Pryce walking around town with his fancy suit and cane and giving the most menacing looks to everyone he meets. He's a bully, but not in a physical or even cruel way. He's the kind of guy that just gets his way because you can tell he's going to get his way - and also because he has some mystical powers and a henchman with a mustache and a "Dust Witch" that's played by Pam Grier.

This film is far from perfect - like I said, I'm amazed it's as good as it is with all the behind the scenes drama - but there's a heart inside it that makes me fall in love with it instantly. To me, it feels like the heart of October and the Halloween season. I've never seen another movie that feels so much like the Octobers I grew up with. You can almost feel the autumn breeze coming off the screen when you watch this one. The leaves are a perfect orange-brown color, and the nights are as dark as you hope they'd be. The town feels alive, but also feels like it's dying. And, thanks to Mr. Dark and company - we're not sure it'll be reborn in the Spring. Oof. This setting makes me dream, you guys. And the rest of the movie's good enough, too.

If Something Wicked This Way Comes is the most October film I know - and it probably is - that makes it pretty hard to pick a double feature partner for it, right? Maybe. Let's take a look at some of the things I love about it that will play into our double feature pick.

• Robards and Pryce are the grown stars, and they definitely shine (as does the amazing Royal Dano in a brief role as a lightning rod salesman who I want to be best friends with), but the real stars of the film are the two young boys who are trying to confront the evil Mr. Dark. I'm not a big fan of child led horror films, but sometimes they work - and they especially work when the children at the center of the film are open to the possibility of the supernatural.
• I'm a small town kid, so there's something magical about a small town October to me. I'm looking for something else with that. 
• Halloween is obviously the big event of October, but I don't want movies that just focus on that. Something Wicked This Way Comes isn't really a Halloween movie, it's an October movie. I want another movie that isn't directly about the holiday, even if we can feel its presence when we watch it.
• There are a lot of grown up themes in this film, mostly dealing with loss and the cruelties of aging. The message the challenge the characters face, of course, is that the young are open to possibilities and the old are just too worn down to care. That's a neat concept, and one I know some other horror movies deal with.

When you sum that all up, it sounds to me like we're looking for a campfire tale. And I think I found a pretty good one. 

Lady in White

1988, Directed by Frank LaLoggia

I'm cheating a little bit here - the events of Lady in White run over several months and only begin in October - but when you watch the first act of this small town horror story it's impossible to not think about the ghosts of October. That's kind of obvious, since the film is a ghost story, but just look at the orange leaves and the pumpkins and the Halloween masks. You'll get that October feeling

Set, via flashbacks, in the fall of 1962 - coincidentally, that was the year when Something Wicked This Way Comes was first published - Lady in White is the tale of a young boy named Frankie, who has since grown up to become a famous horror author. After a little narration (by writer/director Frank LaLoggia, who also plays the adult version of Frankie) sets the mood for this small town, there's a marvelous moment where the cab driver that's bringing him home asks "You don't really believe all that spooky stuff you write about, do you?" 

Buddy, that's a question you should never ask someone in a horror movie.

We know young Frankie is cool from the beginning of the film, partially because he's going to become a famous horror author but also because he's already a child horror author who happens to be dressed up as a vampire for Halloween. His stories as a child need a little work, but there's a pretty fantastic flair for the dramatic in his work and the film does a marvelous job of letting us know that Frankie is a special kid by showing us the effect his writing has on his classmates.

An old proverb says that the nail that sticks out gets hammered down - which is a good analogy for why so many bullies do what they do - and it's true in the case of Frankie. A couple of his "friends" decide to play a trick on him and get him locked inside the school's coat room after school (Note to young folks: A coat room is exactly what it sounds like), and while he's trapped in that room overnight he gets his first glance at one of the ghosts that would change his life over the next few months.

If you guessed that it was a lady in white, you clearly read the movie's title. Also, you're wrong. The ghost Frankie meets in this setting is a 10 year old girl, who he soon learns is one of the victims of a killer who's been targeting children in the area for years.

The town knows there's a murderer among them, but the adults - including Frankie's father, played by The Godfather's Alex Rocco - just seem to be too beaten down to do much about it. Like Something Wicked This Way Comes, everyone just seems to accept that their life is too tough to do much about anything. There's a little scene where Frankie's father is watching the news on TV that seems like a throwaway moment in the film, but - much like today's news cycle - it gives us a quick insight into how exhausting it can be to try and face everything going on in the world. There's also a surprisingly harsh subplot about the African American janitor who is accused of the murders, which feels a little out of place in the PG-13 film but also adds to the feeling of lost innocence that plagues the adults of the town.

Frankie doesn't have that problem; he's young and he's motivated to solve this ghastly mystery. So he starts digging into the case, and with an assist from the young ghost and her distraught mother ghost (she's the lady in white of the title), he begins to figure some things out. This leads to a pretty great scene where he first realizes the identity of the killer - one that kind of feels like a similar reveal in Twin Peaks a few years later - and a somewhat ham-fisted finale that wraps up the story well but has some effects that really haven't aged too well.

A shared theme between both of these films - one that I didn't necessarily intend to hit on here - is that they sure aren't perfect. Both are a little longer and a little tamer than the average horror film of the 1980s, while also not quite hitting on the emotional highs of classics of the genre that came before them. But you know what, that's fine. Few things in this world are perfect, and I'm OK with tying myself to a couple of scrappy flicks that overcome their own faults.

Nobody ever sat at a campfire on a dark October eve and heard a ghost story that didn't make them groan with a little doubt. But, as the October wind blows and the night gets that unnatural chill - a lot of people think back to those imperfect stories and the wonders they imply. It might not be rational or logical to believe in them - but what if there's a chance? October's different. October means it's possible those stories, despite all their flaws, could still have some kind of impact on us.

This isn't a double feature for the closed minded. This is a double feature for people who, like the children at the center of the films, believe in the mystical appeal of this season. I've grown up since my small town October days, but I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who craves stories like these when October comes around. So grab some blankets, some firewood, and some marshmallows, and join me for this double feature.

If you dare.

Double Feature Picture Show Freestyle Party, Volume 1

Some weeks do not lend themselves to great thought. Unfortunately for yours truly, this is one of those weeks. So we're about to shake the pillars of heav....well, just of this site, really.

Fun The Mike fact: I started writing about movies online way back in the fall of 2002. My first assignment was a weekly roundup of new DVD releases with a couple of capsule reviews and a lot of zaniness. These columns were probably my favorite thing I've ever written (possibly because they no longer exist and I can't go back and see them now), and I've often wanted to go back to doing a kind of rambling column where I just wing it and let my heart tell you things my brain might not usually let me say.

So, welcome to the Double Feature Picture Show Freestyle Party. I'm gonna talk about some movies and throw out a whole bunch of double feature suggestions, with some help from some fine folks from around the globe. That's right - be ready for THE LIGHTNING ROUND.

You've been warned.

What's up at the Theater?

Over the last two weeks I had the chance to take in two of the most high profile horror films released in a long, long time. For starters, I just need to reiterate that - YES, THESE ARE BOTH HORROR FILMS. Don't be a genre snob. Just don't. It's not nice.

It
2017, Directed by Andy Muschietti

Horror fans have been waiting a long time for the big screen adaptation of Stephen King's It, and it's safe to say that the energy level among them was off the charts a couple of weeks ago when this thing finally hit the big screen. You could almost taste the love in the air; it was like Christmas but with a big scary clown whose lap no one wants to sit on. Hell, that's not even true. Some of you lady horror fans out there have some unique tastes - and I'm OK with that. You do you.

I left work early on a Friday afternoon (don't worry, I did my time) to catch It, and I enjoyed the experience a whole bunch. For starters, this update of King's novel - which moves the story's first half from 1958 to 1989 - feels genuine with its nostalgia act. Comparisons to Netflix's smash hit Stranger Things are obviously out there - based on the setting and shared star Finn Wolfhard - but I'm the kind of guy who will take King's writing over pretty much anything else. And the best thing about It is that it certainly feels like a Stephen King story. 

There are some changes to King's story - that's going to happen any time you adapt one of his books - but I'm pretty confident in saying that It sits alongside the best adaptations of King's work, mostly because director Andy Muschietti and crew were given such a long rope by Warner Bros. and New Line when making the film. Though the film only covers the first half of the It story, it is still allowed to run nearly two and a half hours. The script makes sure every one of those minutes count. The young cast is great, and Bill Skarsgard gives a turn as Pennywise that will be iconic on its own strengths. The scene where he entices young Georgie early in the film erases all memories of Tim Curry's (rightfully loved) performance in the 1990 miniseries, and his first appearance to The Loser's Club in a dark garage made me jump. I am not a big jumper!

The film has some definite flaws - especially in the final battle - that I won't go in to here, but I will say that I felt the film's strengths outweighed them in a big way. The biggest strength is how it handles the young characters, and how it attacks the experiences and feelings that led them to label themselves as The Losers Club. The characterization of the real life predators that live in the town of Derry - ranging from bullies to abusive fathers to imposing elderly librarians - are haunting, and it certainly helps anyone who's ever been bullied to relate to these young idealists. I had my share of traumas from some real life predators growing up in a small town, and I felt a lot of peace watching The Losers Club build the strength to face off with their demons. 

The best thing a horror movie can do, in my eyes, is to make us uncomfortable and make us afraid while at the same time reminding us that we can beat our fears because we are strong enough to defeat them. That's the central theme of It, and this adaptation hammers that message home. I don't care what else the movie's doing after that, because if it achieves that goal it's clearly doing enough to make me look at it as a huge success.

If you're going to the theater this weekend, It is clearly the movie I'm recommending you check out. If you're going to the theater looking for a double feature, you're in luck too. Because there's another horror movie out right now that, if nothing else, is worth talking about.

mother!

2017, Directed by Darren Aronofsky

I'm not gonna review Mother - I know I'm supposed to write mother! like I did above, but that's gonna confuse the heck out of me if I do that every time - as much as I'm just gonna talk about Mother, without any spoilers of course. And I'm darn sure not saying that It and Mother make a good double feature under any other circumstances, they go together like lamb and tuna fish.

(I just snuck a Big Daddy reference into my commentary on Mother. I don't know if I trust me either. But roll with it. It'll probably be fine.)

Darren Aronofsky's Mother - the film, not the lady - is first and foremost a film that makes me happy because of its existence. You can go to a movie theater and see a comedy with someone from a TV show any week or a drama about an animal or a war or an animal in a war (Thanks, Spielberg) any week. You can not go into a theater and see a movie like Mother any week. You simply can't. You guys know I live in Iowa, right? We've got 12 screens in town. We were lucky to get The Beguiled or The Big Sick here. And yet here's Mother, opening on 2300 screens across America, starring a bunch of Oscar nominees, and making viewers as uncomfortable as a dead squirrel that got dropped on the banquet table at Thanksgiving dinner.

Jennifer Lawrence and Javier Bardem star as a married couple living in a beautiful secluded house in the middle of beautiful nowhere where there are no roads coming in or out and no cell service (don't worry though, they've got a land line!). He's a writer, she's responsible for keeping the house nice after it burnt down before. Then some people - starting with a couple played by screen legends Ed Harris and Michelle Pfeiffer - show up. And things get uncomfortable for her. Really quickly.

I'm not going any further with the plot of Mother, but I will tell you that the two hour film becomes a nightmare for Lawrence's character. And it's a damn cool one to watch. Aronofsky knows how to direct insanity, and the camera moves around the house following the lead in such an uncomfortable way for most of the film. The film's sound design! I swear this might have been the best sounding in theater experience of my life. Surround sound does some good work for most movies, and some big movies - like Christopher Nolan's acclaimed summer hit Dunkirk - really excel in that department. But Mother sounded like the house was moving around me. I don't do drugs or drink - really, I'm naturally this weird! - but I felt that house in that theater.

(Random side story: About an hour into Mother a huge thunderstorm broke out in my town. I could hear it through the walls and ceiling of the theater. I was pretty sure it was a storm - but I wasn't ruling out the thought that Aronofsky and company put that storm under the soundtrack of the movie. I spent several minutes trying to figure it out. I'll never forget the moment that storm kicked up and I thought the movie was coming alive around me. It brought my heart to life.)

And it was just an hour into Mother when my heart started to soar because I was lost in its wonderful nightmare. It got crazier from there. A lot crazier. And then it told us what it was talking about in the final minutes - or at least told us as much as it was willing to in those final minutes - and that kinda brought the movie back a notch. After a whole lot of thought the allegory that is at the center of the film makes perfect sense - Aronofsky has even gone on record explaining it - but I kind of wish it didn't. This is such a wonderful nightmare of a film - it made me paranoid and uncomfortable in the best "I'm safe in a move theater so I can feel these things and still walk out of here fine" kind of way - and I wish it was just left as a nightmare after the fact. Who gave Aronofsky the right to make sense out of a nightmare? Who wants that? Just let us think about it for a while and make it our own. 

I guess it is Aronofsky's nightmare, after all. I just wish he'd kept his explanation to himself. I'm gonna watch Mother again and again and enjoy just how intense and insane it is at times - there's a sequence where it even makes us look at comedienne Kristen Wiig as a monster from some other place! - and I just wish I didn't have the writer/director's answer to it hanging around in my mind. What are movies for, if not for the viewer?

What's up on Home Video?

Snapshot - 1979, Directed by Simon Wincer

The coolest thing I've seen on blu-ray lately is Vinegar Syndrome's release of Snapshot (aka One More Minute, aka The Day After Halloween, aka Any Other Damn Title Some Greedy Distributor Of Its Era Can Think Of). Vinegar Syndrome has become one of my favorite niche labels over the last couple of years. Their commitment to restoring random grindhouse titles from the 1970s and 1980s (as well as pornography of the era, but you all know I WOULD NEVER) is something no one really ever asked for but also something people like me who love wild, weird movies from the past should have been asking for their entire lives if they had only known what they were supposed to be asking for.

Snapshot first came to my attention because of one of those alternate titles I listed above, The Day After Halloween. Anything "related" to Halloween is sure to get me to look into it, so when I heard there was a foreign flick out there that sounded like it was trying to capitalize on what John Carpenter created in 1978 I got really curious. Thankfully, like a good genre fan, I read some stuff about the film before jumping on it, and found out that not only does the film not have anything to do with Halloween....it's not even a slasher film! I KNOW!

What sounds like a bad thing about a film that wants to be like Halloween turns out to be a good thing when you realize the film isn't actually a film that wants to be anything like Halloween. What Snapshot actually is is the story of a young Australian woman who decides to try modeling, and who ends up getting her photo used for a full page magazine ad. The two problems that arise from this are a) her face appears in the topless photo against her wishes and b) someone is stalking her and she can't figure out which creepy dude in her life it is.

The film plays out as an uncomfortable mystery, and while it doesn't really hum with intensity all the time it sincerely feels like there's a sleazy entity waiting around any corner in her world. It builds at a slow pace to a couple of strong final reveals, and the journey that the lead, played with an innocent charm by Sigrid Thornton, goes on wraps up quite nicely. It's not the kind of film that will rewrite genre history, but seeing it in a shiny new package from a studio that has taken such good care of it makes me smile a lot.

Let's say we want to pair Snapshot up with a double feature, since that is kind of the gimmick of this site. Here's a quick bullet list of things about it that stick out.

• That sleazy grindhouse smell. (OK, you can't smell it...but it feels like you should be able to.)
• Models and creepy stalkers
• A girl who's really just not having a good time at all even though thanks to them creepy stalkers.

Which brings me to....

The Centerfold Girls - 1974, Directed by John Peyser

We're doing a grindhouse style double feature here, which obviously makes me think of the Tarantino/Rodriguez double feature, Grindhouse. When that film came out it paired Rodriguez' fast paced, ultra violent Planet Terror with Tarantino's slower, more talky, but eventually violent Death Proof. Snapshot is more of a Death Proof paced film, so if we want a double feature partner with more carnage and more violence we need something like The Centerfold Girls. 

The Centerfold Girls is also about the danger of being a model, but it's far more direct in its approach than Snapshot is. Here we have one man - Andrew Prine of The Town That Dreaded Sundown and Grizzly and a whole lot of other cool stuff - who decides to put on a nice suit and some nice shoes and go kill each of the women in an adult calendar, because that's what God would have wanted him to do. He articulates his beliefes quite nicely, actually. But before we talk any more about the film, here are those shoes. 

I thought they was relevant to share.

Unlike the slow paced Snapshot, The Centerfold Girls feels more like an anthology film. The killer sets his sights on multiple girls, but is picking them off one at a time in different settings, so really the film is broken up into three pursuits. Each of these are effective in different ways - the first segment is as brutal as The Last House on the Left, the middle section feels slightly Italian, and the third stars my favorite grindhouse bombshell of the '70s - the gorgeous and talented Tiffany Bolling.

The Centerfold Girls is a tough movie to watch - that first segment treats its centerfold so poorly that we're almost relieved when she runs into the killer - and it certainly has that same icky feeling that's at the heart of Snapshot. It's probably a better second half to this double feature than Snapshot would be, especially when the star power of Prine and Bolling collides in the film's final act.

The Centerfold Girls is actually available on a double feature blu-ray disc from Gorgon Video, paired with my favorite Tiffany Bolling film, Bonnie's Kids. This disc came out on my birthday last year, which makes me believe that someone out there loves me. And that's nice.

Now...let's talk about you guys. That's right. It's time for.....

THE LIGHTNING ROUND

Yesterday I asked the fine folks who follow me on Twitter to name some movies they love, hoping I've seen them. A few people stumped me, but a few didn't. 

How this works:

1) Someone suggests a movie

2) In one paragraph or less, I pick a double feature title to go with that movie.

3) Everybody dances!

(Maybe there won't be dancing.)

Here's 12 flicks people suggested to me, and 12 double features you might (or might not, it's your time) want to watch:

The Last Starfighter

— Jr Rodeo Daredevil (@JrRodeoDaredevl) September 20, 2017

I haven't seen The Last Starfighter in way too long. But I love Catherine Mary Stewart. Let's pair this one with Night of the Comet.

Fright Night

— Micah (@MicahR_) September 20, 2017

This is an easy one. I adore Fright Night so much for it's Rear Window-with-vampires charm. Another great '80s neighbors and killers movie goes perfect with it. That movie is The 'Burbs.

Bone Tomahawk 🤠

— Liam ☯️ (@Illiaminati) September 20, 2017

Man, Kurt Russell in a cannibal horror western is a tasty treat. Love this movie. I'm gonna pair it with another dusty horror, the Civil War zombie flick Exit Humanity. More people need to see that.

John Wick

— Heeeere's J.K. (@JKNicholson1) September 20, 2017

Dude. You obviously wanna double John Wick with John Wick Chapter 2, but let's take that out of the equation, just for fun. I'm a BIG fan of Keanu Reeves' directorial debut, Man of Tai Chi. You might want to play it first and then end on Wick though, because Wick can't be followed by anything but Wick. Wick begets Wick, I believe that's how the proverb goes.

Everybody wants some!!

— Ted Flint (@TedFlintKansas) September 20, 2017

This is another one with a natural double feature (Dazed and Confused), but you all know I'm unnatural.  Everybody Wants Some!! (the second film in this post who's title ends with an !) is a little sweeter and more romantic than D&C - and that kinda reminds me of Greg Motolla's Adventureland, which I think a lot of people slept on unfairly. (I had to think about this a while, thanks Ted!)

Re-Animator

— Caleb Garrett (@bad_garrett) September 20, 2017

Re-Animator always makes me smile. Because it's so gross and so funny and so cool. You know what else is those three things? Evil Dead II: Dead By Dawn.

umm, LIFEFORCE!!!

😈

— GeezerHatesYou (@GeezerHatesYou) September 20, 2017

Lifeforce is a reallllly hard double feature. There's nothing like it. So I'm gonna go with another movie from the same era that I used to get confused with it because both titles start with L - Leviathan. (I never said all of these double features would be winners! But you should still watch both of these movies.)

DUNE

— Mr. Cupcakes (@gimetzco) September 20, 2017 

Let's go with a super '80s sci-fi double feature here. Dune and Brazil. Make it wild. Pick whichever version of Brazil you like.

Satan's Cheerleaders

— Joe Gore-in 🎃 (@LexxHunter) September 20, 2017

Ahhhh, the 1970s. When you could want to make a movie called Satan's Cheerleaders and someone would give you money to make a movie called Satan's Cheerleaders. God bless the 1970s. Let's go with another Vinegar Syndrome title - Malibu High. Not much Satain, but this much cheese in one double feature seems like a great idea.

Fight club?

— 🎃 Eli Phipps 🎃 (@elimphipps) September 20, 2017

Man, I gotta tell you guys - I haven't seen Fight Club in over 15 years. Was never a big fan of it at the time. Been meaning to give it another shot, just haven't got around to it. But hey - let's do Office Space and follow it up with Fight Club. Show the progression of how bad being a guy in a white shirt and tie can be when you're fed up with life.

Body Double

— Lindz-Oh-Lantern👻 (@readandgeek) September 21, 2017

Alright, another Rear Window homage! Y'all love me today, clearly. I adore Body Double. It's about as great as sleazy De Palma can be. I kinda want to pair it with another De Palma, even though that's too simple. But do I go with Sisters or Femme Fatale? You know what - let's make this a TRIPLE FEATURE and throw Body Double in the middle. Bring a towel.

REPO MAN

— Courtney Penley 📼 (@_courteroy) September 20, 2017

Alright, everybody stop what you're doing. We gotta break format here.

I'm breaking my own rules for The Lighting Round, but we gotta pay tribute where tribute is due. Last week we lost the great Harry Dean Stanton, who passed away at the age of 91 after living a life that saw him become one of the coolest dudes in the history of movies. The dude just had it. I don't mean the "it" that studios talk about it, the thing that makes you look good on magazine covers and make money selling tickets. I mean the "it" that makes someone look at an actor and say something like -

"That guy right there. That guy gets it. That's the guy I want to be like."

Man, I love Harry Dean Stanton. My best suggestion after Repo Man is to watch anything else he did. Look at that man work. The odds are he'll make your day better and make you smile. Because he had that kind of "it."

We've used the word it in a lot of different ways today. Are you sick of me? That's fair. Let's call it a day. There's 14 double features here when I usually only give you one. I don't believe it either.

Come back next week when we'll get back to normal and finish up Alfred Hitchcock Month! And keep an eye out for the next time we decide to do The Lightning Round and have one of these Freestyle weeks, you could be part of it!

As always, thanks for reading. I could do this without you guys - but I'd really rather not. You have "it."

Volume 11 - Rope and the Privilege of Murder

When you're having an Alfred Hitchcock Month!, as we currently are, there are certain topics you have to bring up. Women, suspense, mystery, and humor are certainly among them. But, in most situations, you can't talk about Hitchcock without talking about murder. I haven't done the math on this topic, but I think it's entirely possible that all of Alfred Hitchcock's films have some kind of murder going on, even if sometimes it's a murder of crows. (We'll get to that one of these weeks, I promise.)

While more than a handful of Hitchcock's films are built around a murder, there's one particular Hitchcock film that stands out because the entire film is devoted to a bunch of people, in one room, where a murder has just happened. It's not a mystery who did the killing, and why the murder happened is spelled out pretty neatly for us early on. If you're thinking that this doesn't seem like the formula for a Hitchcock thriller, you're right. And that's one reason why the film we're about to talk about stands out as one of the director's most interesting projects.

HOW THIS WORKS
Step 1) I pick a movie.
Step 2) I tell you about the movie.
Step 3) I tell you what we're looking for in a double feature movie.
Step 4) Another movie!
Step 5) Victory!

Rope

1948, Directed by Alfred Hitchcock

If Hitchcock's films were a line of toys, Rope is one of the ones that would have been sent to the island of misfit toys. It has a lot of the things we often expect from his films - murder, intrigue, a marvelous James Stewart performance - but it's certainly his most contained film. I don't mean that in regard to its themes, I mean that the action is literally contained in one room. Even Rear Window spends more time outside than this one does, and that's the movie where Mr. Stewart is confined to a wheelchair.

Rope opens in a dark New York City apartment with the murder of David Kentley, strangled to death with a length of rope by two of his college classmates, Brandon and Phillip. The two killers aren't the type of characters you'd expect to find as the killers in an Alfred Hitchcock film, they're simply two Harvard educated guys who thought murder could be an art. They're also obviously gay lovers, though the film never mentions this, which is one more reason Rope felt like such an outlier when it was released in 1948. Several theaters banned the film, not because of the murder, but because of the implied homosexuality.

Brandon and Phillip become the focal point of the film from the first frame, and they're two of Hitchcock's most vibrant characters, but for very different reasons. Brandon, played by John Dall, is smug and confident, laughing off the murder because it was so perfect.

"Nobody commits a murder just for the experiment of committing it. Nobody except us."

Brandon's glee is countered by Phillip, played by Farley Granger, who immediately regrets the couple's decision and begins to assume the worst. Phillip has a good reason to be concerned, because the second part of their plan involves hosting a dinner that night, in the apartment, with David's body resting as peacefully as possible in the chest from which dinner will be served. The guests for this dinner party include David's parents, David's girlfriend, another classmate, and Rupert Cadell (Stewart), the headmaster from school who gave Brandon the idea that murder could be justified in the right situation.

If this one-setting dinner party sounds like a stage play, that's because it originally was. And Hitchcock, eager to experiment while making his first color film, worked meticulously to frame the film as a play. Running at almost real time - there's a little bit of speeding up time during the evening to keep the film at a crisp 80 minutes - Hitchcock managed to shoot the film in a series of 4-10 minute takes, concealing the cuts as well as possible to make it appear that the camera never stops rolling inside the apartment.

Much like the camera, the conversation at the dinner party never seems to stop either. Brandon and Phillip allow their guests some time to talk about simple things, like books and movies - including a humorous sequence where Stewart attempts to talk about movie stars like James Mason and Cary Grant with the two female guests - but eventually the topic of murder finds its way into the conversation.

It's at this moment that Stewart gets to shine as only he can, preaching the idea that murder should be used for personal gain by certain enlightened individuals as the other guests in the room wonder if they should laugh at his idea or fear him. Brandon, still riding the high of finally testing this theory, leaps at the opportunity to guide the discussion, and his back and forth with Rupert leads the conversation to a rather abrupt end when David's father - who still expects his son to show up at this party - becomes shocked by the implications of it.

"Who is to decide if a human being is inferior, and therefore a suitable victim for murder?"

Brandon backs away from saying too much at this point, but he continues to push the envelope as the night goes on, particularly when he brings the rope that was used as a murder weapon back into the film. The viewer knows that he's taunting the guests and especially focused on Rupert, who he obviously respects and may even have feelings for (the original play implies that Rupert also had homosexual relations with one of the killers, but this is muted in the film). Brandon is kind of an ancestor to those overly talkative villains we're used to seeing in super hero and James Bond films, seemingly wanting not only to get away with a crime but have his crime understood by the people who could stop him. Dall shines as he does this, and Hitchcock's choice to pair him and Stewart against Granger's crescendo into drunken anger throughout the evening creates a intriguing game of cat and mouse as we watch to see if Brandon and Phillip's perfect plan will go off as they intended.

It's sad that the controversy that was most notable about the film upon release was its homosexual overtones, because the philosophical debate about murder and where it can rank on the scale of right and wrong is really the most interesting thing about Rope. There aren't a lot of films - especially films from the 1940s - that are willing to sit on the screen and debate whether or not murder is a good idea or not. It wasn't a comfortable topic then - Stewart even said after the fact that he wished he hadn't made the film - but today it still feels like one of the most fresh topics in any Hitchcock film. The script handles the debate expertly - even though it clearly guides us to understand the wrong in Brandon and Phillip's action - and Stewart's work in the final sequence is among the best he ever did. If you know anything about James Stewart (I think he's the greatest actor that's ever lived, but that's a debate for another day), that's a big accomplishment.

The problem with Rope - that's a very good problem to have - is that it's that misfit in both Hitchcock's filmography and in cinematic history. There are not enough films like this; films that are willing to challenge the viewer to think differently about macabre topics. Which made finding a double feature partner for Rope one of the more difficult decisions I've made since I started the Double Feature Picture Show. Here are a few of the things I considered:

• Murder is the centerpiece of Rope, and murder needs to be a topic of debate in the film we're pairing it with. But we don't want a movie that's just about murder for the sake of murder, we need something that focuses on not just why the murder is happening but why the murder matters in the film's world.
• As I've already said, Rope makes it pretty clear that we shouldn't sympathize with its killers, even though poor Phillip really does seem like he knows from minute one that he's made a huge mistake. Despite that, Rope still tries to keep us thinking about whether or not the murder could be justified. That's a theme that not a lot of movies are willing to attempt, so I want something that follows that lead.
• I thought long and hard about the real time(ish) and one-setting aspects of Rope, but they don't really work with a lot of films. I love the technical gimmicks at the center of Rope, but I'm willing to abandon them in favor of a film that manages to convey some of the same themes.
• The idea of murder as an "art" that only the gifted should be able to perform is a common theme in a lot of movies - especially when it comes to serial killers and sociopaths - but it's the romantic attachment to that art that Brandon shows throughout Rope that really sells this film's approach toward justified murder.

And it's that last point, where I started thinking about characters in film who murdered because they believed they had the right to do so, that led me to a film that's very different than Rope, but very committed to the same idea that some murders...well, they just have to happen.

Frailty

2001, Directed by Bill Paxton

Rope took us into the minds of two murderers, one giddy about the opportunity he has been given and one repentful. Frailty, the 2001 directorial debut by legendary character actor Bill Paxton, also gives us multiple murderers who have varying levels of commitment to the actions they are a part of. Like Rope, the motivation for these actions is clearly vocalized by one character, but the reasons for killing, the amount of killing, and the actions of the killer are all handled very differently in this religion-based horror feature.

Matthew McConaughey - in that awkward phase between his early career success and his rise to Oscar status in the 2010s - stars alongside Paxton, playing the adult version of Fenton Meiks, a man who walks into an FBI office late one night to tell an FBI agent (Powers Boothe, an acceptable substitute for the late James Stewart) the story of how his father and recently-deceased brother lived as "The God's Hand Killer" in a rural part of Texas. 

As a cold and beaten down Fenton relays his tale to the agent, we spend most of the film in flashbacks to his childhood, where Fenton and his brother Adam watch their father (Paxton) change from a simple life as a mechanic to a motivated serial killer who wants his boys to help with a series of murders. Why on earth does this man decide he needs to kill a list of people who he's never met? 

Because he was chosen by God to dispose of people who aren't people. They're demons.

Dad (his name is never spoken by his children, so that's all we have to go with) spends a lot of the movie explaining what is going on to his sons, and most of the film' s drama comes as young Fenton (Matt O'Leary) struggles with the fact that his father and younger brother (Jeremy Sumpter) believe that they are serving God by murdering people they've never met before. The two child actors do a fine job and carry most of the film, while Paxton manages to make Dad a brutal man who is surprisingly tender and straightforward with his sons.

Things start to get weird as Frailty goes on, because some of Dad's predictions are incredibly accurate. Adult Fenton explains this away to the FBI agent by saying "Sometimes, the truth defies reason," and that's about the best explanation we can get for why the father and sons seem to be able to carry out kidnappings and murders with little to no resistance. Dad and the young Adam are convinced that God is protecting the family and sending them everything they need to complete their crimes - including a now iconic axe with the name Otis carved into it - and one of the coolest things about Frailty is how it manages to sell this concept to the viewer.

Rope was a film about two killers with very little room for error, but Frailty flips that concept on its edge as everything just seems to go right for these killers. It's ridiculous to think that what this father is telling his sons is true, but Paxton and screenwriter Brent Hanley (who has, shockingly, never written another feature) do a wonderful job of keeping us guessing as the film goes on. I might have said too much about the plot already - seeing this with no knowledge of what it was about back when it played in theaters is still one of the great shockers of my cinematic life - but even if you haven't seen it and you're starting to make guesses about the film as I write this, I'm willing to bet you'll probably be wrong.

Frailty and Rope are both movies that are best experienced by open minded viewers who know little about them and are ready to get philosophical. This means that I've possibly made viewing them less enjoyable by talking as much as I have so far - way to go, Michael - but I'm pretty excited by just how unique this pair of films are together. One film is about murder that's justified by intellect or class, and the other is about murder that's justified by dedication and belief. You could even re-title them as Liberal Murder Story and Conservative Murder Story, as these are obviously killers on two different ends of the spectrum in American society.

In Rope, Brandon explains away his indifference toward his action by saying "Good and evil, right and wrong were invented for the ordinary, average man - the inferior man - because he needs them." He might as well have been talking directly about Dad from Frailty, because there's no reason this man kills anyone without his belief in good and evil. This isn't a shock - religion has probably been the cause of more deaths than anything else - but it does perfectly explain the difference between why he's killing and why Dad is killing.

While introducing an episode of his own show, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Master of Suspense once quipped "I think everyone enjoys a nice murder...provided he is not the victim." That's a nice way of reminding us that murder is going to happen and if you're on the receiving end it doesn't matter if a killer is Harvard educated or an auto mechanic. Both of these films spend very little time humanizing their victims - but we're not here to enjoy their work anyway. These are two films about getting away with murder and why murder can happen for reasons you might not expect. Hitchcock made enough money selling murder that he could confidently remind us that murder is a completely nonpartisan affair, and I think he'd appreciate the opposing approaches to killing that exist in these two films.

So, if you're ever feeling particularly morbid and want to sit down and see some people from different walks of life commit murders for some unique reasons, this might just be the double feature for you. I hope you don't get too morbid and too inspired by them, but if you do - just know that I also wouldn't enjoy being the victim.