fullmOonfilms: An American Werewolf in London

What is it about An American Werewolf in London?
I watched this several years ago in the "Cowie Hill" days - some great times when I was lucky enough to have a an awesome film fan buddy named Will( not really but he doesn't like Ern). He made latex masks and obsessed over movies I had no interest in. Or so I thought...
We watched An American Werewolf in London, and like a lot of later favorites, I was underwhelmed. I thought it was weird and the pacing wasn't quite my style so I dismissed it and moved on. I liked Wolf a lot, and even The Howling had seemed a bit more intriguing - more to it maybe, but the simplicity of AAWiL might be the actual answer. I eventually watched it again and still couldn't quite ...I dunno - love it. I saw more but still wasn't getting it. Some movies are strange like this - take Zoolander ..I hate it, but people tell me all the time how great it is. I don't want to like it - who cares? ..but there was something about AAWiL ..something I wanted to like. That was the difference.
I've watched it a lot of times now - especially the first half hour since that's usually how long it takes to fall asleep if I put it on late. I love it now ..I just can't help it. it's like a marriage where we fell for each other about ten years in ...strange but true.

Another beauty of a good movie, and of film in general, is that it acts as a Time Machine - visiting the time it was made, the time it was written, and perhaps another period detailed within the film itself - amazing. We're just watching stories that are two hours out of any given day, but the worth...the cultural sense that is carried within, as well as whatever personal history we attach, can end up being a weirdly valuable two hours. As we get older they contain our youth, where I'd probably end up arguing with myself over this one ...and a maybe few others. Perspective changes.
Okay - Blue Moon ..great opening and just one of the many telltale signs this might not have a happy ending. The song works like the a capital letter at the beginning of the sentence, a comma in the middle and a period right at the end ...very cool.
gain, one of the many things I didn't "get" before, much like the exit from a truck full of sheep and The Slaughtered Lamb Pub where the tale really begins. The bright coats are a nice touch, as is the fact that it's shot in the UK and it feels it. The two friends remind me of traveling Europe a few years back, and not really having a clue ...great adventure where we were definitely closer to trouble than we understood ...couple times fer sure.
Anyway, it doesn't take too long before we hear the howl of a wolf and I like that. A very effective setup that leaves you ready to follow these two anywhere ..my kind of storytelling - the Stephen King way of creating characters I actually care about. I note this for the fact that in so many of today's pretty-people horror films I can't wait to see them get fucked-up ...different approach, I guess. The goofball humour and the sense of "fun" disappear when the Werewolf is stalking them in the mist, and the attack itself still holds up - scary and fast. The men from the pub frame the end of the sequence like a shot of Tales from the Crypt cover art. Cool.
Upon David's awaking in the Hospital to find out his friend was dead I immediately assumed he'd come back as a Werewolf - the undead buddy with a conscience is another especially nice touch.* Some people's favorite aspect of this film are it's effects, and Griffin Dunne is great.
The Doctor treating our protagonist is excellent, as is Jenny Agutter in the role of the Werewolf's lovely nurse/love interest. Then come The Muppets - any Werewolf movie with an original Muppets sketch ...well, how can one resist? Then there's the crazy dreams - bizarre and awesome - all adding up to my best reason for liking this flic ...one Director's vision. John Landis wrote this little opus and fought for years to get it made. It feels like one guy's story ...it's simple and unique and a perfect example of what I'd like to do - write good stories and then bring 'em to life. The more mainstream a movie the more fingers, it feels, were in the pie - usually resulting in the Harrison Bergeron effect ...down low for the dummies. Ugh.
This is not to discount the amazing design work of Rick Baker but it was Landis' movie - unlike say, his buddy George who is mostly the sum of others parts. A good Director gets together with awesome people and sometimes they make something that has something ...the energy, maybe, of one person's drive.
*It took me a couple viewings to be able to watch the "chat with Jack" scenes ..harsh effects ..impressive.
The "boy meets girl" has just enough time to be interesting ...enough so to really not want the ending to go the way you can kind of feel coming. The decidedly different tone of the Doctor's visit to The Slaughtered Lamb is fun and feels like it could fit nicely into any Werewolf story ...new or old. Don't Go 'Round Tonight ...niiice.
And back to the effects - just when we want to see what the Doc is going to unfold we're back to David under the full moon, and one of the best man-to-werewolf transformations ever. Real effects done in daylight - now that's a mandate, and incidentally cool about The Ruins too. The Werewolf attack scenes in nighttime London are cool though I suspect only Landis would write a british couple as 'drunk and care-free". Once their romance resumes we know it's doomed, but we're in for the ride - maybe he can escape the curse with his new love...
Alas, Piccadilly Circus - juxtapose the guns and sirens against the moors and the pub ...throw in a lot of humour and you've got one rich little Horror film. In it's final moments our tragic romance gives us "the moment" of all love stories ...and then the curse is ended forever. Like Chinatown, American Werewolf gives us that creepy ol' thought ...some places you wander in ...you're not going to wander back out.

While I was trying to figure out why I liked this movie so much it became one of my favorites...
and then the perfect punctuation of a John Landis Horror Comedy ...the uptempo Blue Moon as a final "..told ya so..."
Fantastic.

Z O D I A C part two

Zodiac is pretty pictures glued to a filing cabinet. I look at it and I question ...in fact, every time I watch it I get a few more pointers - arrows towards the truth. The opening scene alone does explain so so much(listen to the commentaries and you'll be more inclined to pay close attention to the opening scene), but leaves you with sooo many questions. Detail upon detail the average filmgoer doesn't see - doesn't need to see ..they don't matter to the narrative, and most would seem arbitrary anyway...
But they are not. To read Robert Graysmith's books and to explore the facts on your own - maybe crazy, but fun as hell. Each audio track features so many extra pieces along with the docs ...especially the interviews. It is absolutely compelling ...the serial killer known as "the Zodiac" was not a genius, and the men trying to catch him were not stupid ...so why don't we know who he is?

I very much like the fact that the screenwriters, the cast, the crew, David Fincher himself, all had theories on the "truth"...I've watched the film 4 times since, and I still don't know. I know what the film postulates ...it's 99% sure it's Arthur Leigh Allen, and I think it was too. Rather, I think it was two.
I believe he had help. Watching the interviews, one would might guess it was Don Cheney as well, but having read so much now, I think there might be someone out there who ...helped ...licked the stamps, two "MO"s at once. Cheney seems smart and creepy enough, but is it him? I love the fact, and thus my obsession, that comes from the ultimate question out of all of this - out of the possibility both Greysmith and Fincher acknowledge which is that may never know the absolute truth ...so the question as fact still remains ...Who was The Zodiac Killer?

Play Misty for Me

I was a '70's kid, so I grew up on Clint Eastwood. My generation grew up on Clint Eastwood. I remember my mother taking us to see "Firefox" at our grubby, but most awesome, Spryfield Cinemas ...& despite Mom's obvious crush, Dad loved Clint too - back then every guy would've liked to be Clint for five minutes...

"A Sensitive Director" - apparently this is the most popular current thought on Mr.Eastwood ...awesome. That at 80, he is one of the most respected filmmakers in the world is well ...a proper thing. He's been doing it, and doing it well for almost 40 years. From MISTY thru 70's and 80's tough guys to Unforgiven - the end of his men without names, to the swan song for his violent characters provided in Gran Torino(I'm sad we won't see him act again, but not really - it was a perfect ending, and that song ...amazing - one classy exit). No other actor/director has achieved anything even close to this kind of career.

But, way way back ...Clint decided that "directing" a movie might be fun. He told his agent, and his agent told Warner Brothers - they said "Cool, sounds great, but we're not paying you." The rest is history.
The script for "Misty" by Jo Heims is fantastic - tight, and smart, and timely. Fatal Attraction borrows heavily, as do probably many I haven't seen. The story is of a Cali coast DJ who sleeps with one of his loyal listeners, beginning an odyssey of obsession and terror. We get to know Dave Garver and his world, as Evelyn Draper invades it. This nuanced descent into madness, by Jessica Walters, is brilliant, as is the pace and direction leading her there. She will always be my favorite version of "the stalker", but I looove JW(Arrested Development, c'mon..)and I could watch her do anything ...from the bushes, or across the street in a phonebooth...
Anyway, there are 3 excellent characters here - Dave, Evelyn, and a very young Donna Mills as Dave's on-again-off-again girlfriend. She turns in a performance every bit as subtle and honest as Jessica Walters is sexy and psycho. The love-scene is deftly handled - not the obvious work of a gun-toting tough guy. And then ther's that "wave scene" as the duo walk and talk:
"The success of "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" essentially launched Flack's career as a popular singer, and the single became one of her signature songs. Flack's slower, more sensual version was used by Clint Eastwood in his 1971 directorial debut Play Misty for Me during a lovemaking scene. With the new exposure, Atlantic Records cut the song down to four minutes and released it to radio. It became an extremely successful single in the United States, hitting number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in the spring of 1972 and remaining there for six weeks; the song also spent six weeks at the top of Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks [2]." Wikipedia.
Exceptional Scene - To shoot them together, with that wall of water behind them, and that song - the enormity and power of nature used to illustrate "love" as just as powerful a force ...again, the instincts of a natural director. Amazing.

So many nice character touches in this story - from Don Siegel's presence as a bartender/advisor(little Director's help for Clint, too..) to John Larch's classic smart cop, and James McEachin's pot-smokin' DJ friend, it feels like a slice of life at the time, where any adventure Dave might've had would be watchable. Enter Jessica Walters - with as much screen charisma as Clint himself, and as I watch it again I realize my "crush" on JW now eclipses even Joan Allen and the legendary Helen Mirren. I am in love with Jessica Walters... & Arrested Development only cements it. She is awesome. From coy groupee to absolute psycho, and everything inbetween ...my only problem is that her character reminds me of more than one ex-girlfriend ...such is life.
A nice piece of the character day-to-day, and a nice slice of the era, is the montage shot at the Monterey Jazz Festival. It's long and freestyle, like the music - a very nice touch all around, and clearly a personal touch by Clint. He's indulged his jazz passion more and more over the years, and I can't help but think this inspired closing his last performance with a personal tune. Super cool.
TBC

The 10 o' '10

The Ten so far...

I. Kane (1941) - Education / epic / character study - 100 books wouldn't cover it all. Can a movie destroy a life? ...yes, two, in fact.
II. Duel(1971) - 1st film / man(n) v man / nature / machine - Focus is what we have here.
III. Misty(1971) - 1st film / style / suspense / location - My single most inspirational film.
IV. Thing(1982) - Small / scary / tight / open - I love love love The Thing.
V. Buckaroo(1984) - Smart / fearless / committed - This film is absolutely unique - true to itself.
VI. Razor's Edge(1984) - Personal philosophy / experience - Life is beauty.
VII. Psycho 3(1986) - Sequel / dirty / curio strange - Mother talks on her own ...c'mon, how awesome is that?
VIII. Shawshank(1994) - Hope and despair / Stephen King - That a kind man possesses "one of the greatest imagination of our time" is extraordinary. I am a genuine fan of his work.
IX. Zodiac(2006) - Obsession / period piece / real history - What is the truth? ...and why do I need to know? Can obsession destroy a life? Oh, yeah..
X. A Team(2010) - Adaptation and expansion / reverence - If you're going to do something - do it right, but do NOT forget to have fun...even the bad guys.

Now that is one weird list ...but I do believe it is time to look more closely at why I want these 10 movies to influence my future filmmaking skills ...
Starting with the guy who, at 40 in '70, decided to direct his first feature...

LEt sLeePing CorPses LiE: a zombie interlude

Zombies scare me. Fact. I'm not sure why ...they always have. I think it's the inevitabilty ...their patience, if you will...
Night of the Living Dead scared me & it is the classic - no denying it - like The Thing, it's that ending that caps it perfectly, creating a "WTF?" instead of an "aahhh, everything's ok..."
From that I would've jumped all the way to 28 Days Later or Dawn of the Dead(06), but Jorge Grau's Let Sleeping Corpses Lie is my personal favorite in the genre. I watched it again last night(partially in response to my spiritual tirade earlier) back to back with Slither, which I'll yammer on about at a different point, but I've sampled a lot of Zombie movies, and I think this is the one that both borrows and inspires best.
For starters, Danny Boyle is clearly a fan of this movie - with the "rage" eyes and faster "dead", 28 Days Later is almost a remake...
A friend commented that the movie looks like an Agatha Christie movie ...'til the Zombies show up. It has a very British/70's storytelling element to it ...with just that dash of Italian darkness ...almost like a Stephen King story.
They do some different things here, with the homicidal babies, and the relentless hobo ...things that stay with you a little longer, and despite it's tone, we eventually see blood aplenty.
The acting is great, and the inspector(played by Arthur Kennedy) is a fantastic character, making the film feel more like a mystery featuring the undead, as opposed to a "horror" film. The score is excellent, the suspense genuine, and the outcome is unpredictable. This is an excellent movie by almost any standard, and as I write this I can't wait to show it to someone new...

My Ultimate Zombie Fest would read something like this:

Night of the Living Dead(1968) Let Sleeping Corpses Lie(1974) Dawn of the Dead(1978) 28 Days Later(2002) Dawn of the Dead(2004) Shaun of the Dead(2004) Zombieland(2009) Let Sleeping Corpses Lie(2012) - A remake and functioning sequel/follow-up to Shaun of the Dead(by the same team, of course).

If you look for it - it has about 30 titles ("The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue" /"Don't Open the Window"), so you can pick your favorite...

It's worth it ...watch it on a misty night ...trust me.

Bill Murray & THE RAZOR'S EDGE

"America" - The last line of my favorite film.
Movies can inspire us ...affect us ...and sometimes they can answer questions we didn't know to ask...
This film, more than any other, sums up my truest philosophy on the human condition:

We all get what we truly want.

I was handed this new perspective at a time I was indulging something I thought I wanted, and it grabbed hold quickly. I was left with the question - what do I need(not want) and what does that need want? They are different. Our "learned personality" covets, and I believe this to be the downfall of North American culture.
I read a story by Kurt Vonnegut years ago called Harrison Bergeron ...about society bringing everyone down to the same level ...I think we do this to each other, but mostly to ourselves ...not so much misery loves company as impotence and fear adore company...
"Keeping up with the Jones'" has tragically created about a billion Harrison Bergerons ...only measuring ourselves against others - the "successful " ones, with no core sense of who or what we really are ...what we really need, to be the best possible version of this assemblage of gifts that any of us is.

Is life distracting us from obtaining our goals? ...or is distraction what we seek? Why does someone stay in an abusive relationship? ...what interior question is being addressed?
We measure ourselves against what we see to be success and decide it's too much ..too hard, and the fear is so warm ...

I believe we are searching, both consciously and un- , from the moment we wake til the moment we sleep, for what we truly desire in this world...
But what is it you seek ...what experience is guiding you? ..what pain or inspiration? ...what self-imposed limitation keeps that goal forever planted in the realm of the someday...?

"I didn't know I was lying, but I was." - I love that line.

Our protagonist, Larry Darrell is still a mystery to me ...but one I think of often. If honest answers are what we seek, how can life not be immeasurably rewarding?
What will make me happy? What will make this experience valuable while I'm in it? How do I affect others?
I honestly believe Bill Murray made Groundhog Day as a thematic sequel(or perhaps a philosophical follow-up) to Razor's Edge ...What is the value in anything ..anyone? How do I engage this experience unselfishly?
Beautiful.
But the lesson itself is not soft. What do you truly want? Honest answer...

At one point he visits an old friend who is not well ...listen to Larry's answer when his friend thanks him...

As for the film itself, John Byrum's direction is subtle and strong, allowing the film and the performances be patient when it's necesarry. Denholm Elliot could do no wrong in the 80's and the cinematography is gorgeous. My long-standing crush on Catherine Hicks remains undiminished ...Child's Play, Star Trek IV ...and she's great here(don't hate her)...as is Teresa Russell - lovely, vulnerable, sad.
And...
I love Bill Murray's performance as Larry Darrell, but I just love Bill Murray ...I think he knows who he is ...or at least, he's not afraid to look.
I could have discussed Ghostbusters - I think it's a perfect movie - Life Aquatic, Broken Flowers, etc...amazing, and I would give him the "best cameo of all time" award for Zombieland, but between the ultimate messages of Groundhog Day and Razor's Edge I think it's the personal philosophy of the actor that gets me most. GD feels more European in tone every time I see it ...and what a message - value what is valuable. That's it.
All the players in RE seek, and recieve ...but, like a great number of our lives I suspect, you have to look back at the question, and realize, that this and only this, provides the answer that is your day to day existence. What do I want?

Mr.Murray indulges both the exquisite beauty and the exquisite sadness that is life ...and honestly evokes that old idiom: If I didn't laugh I'd cry. I thank him and my friend Mike Goodfellow, who knew I should watch this movie...
It's like Jeopardy - sometimes the answer prompts the question itself.
I'm left with a question upon writing this. Do I want to be a filmmaker who measures himself against the works of others? No, I want to answer myself. The way the people on this list have, and then let the world form it's own questions to my answers.

There is a moment in The Razor's Edge when Larry is atop a mountain, burning his books to stay warm ...his last possessions. He is smiling - I envy that smile.