Nowhere to Run - 1993

Jean Claude Van Damme hasn't been mentioned in this blog yet. I think. I rented a JCVD double pack dvd with this and The Order.

Jcvd plays a criminal who in the beginning escapes jail with his buddy. Jcvd is a good guy though and once he escapes he becomes a drifter and camps out on land owned by Rosanne Arquette. She soon discovers him and once he beats up some hunters she knows he's good.

So then this movie becomes a classic good versus bad with the girl everyone wants to fuck thrown into the middle. And she does get nuuuuude.

I had a really good time watching this despite the fact it's a pretty stupid sub par action flick.  I was in the right mood. It's kinda lame though and probably 2 stars.

Interview with the Vampire - 1994

There's new horror, there's old horror, and then there's "formational" horror.  I'm coining this right now, and it simply means the horror from when you were young, perhaps getting introduced to the genre, and you watched these movies, and they helped you understand what the genre was.

I don't know what exact age I was when I saw Interview for the first time.  I do remember that even then, the cast was a huge deal.  The cast is, in retrospect, probably one of the biggest things about this film, and very much helped it achieve success.  That and direction by Neil Jordan helped the film gain mainstream attention.  I don't have to google it to know this film must've been a financial success.  It simply HAD to be.

Brad Pitt stars as Louis, a downtrodden and defeated man who gets munched on by Tom Cruise and becomes a vampire.  Louis relates his story of vampire life to Christian Slater, and as the story unfolds we see Antonio Banderas and Kirsten Dunst play other leading figures in the vampires chronicle.  And you know what?  It holds up.

I remembered most of this film.  What I didn't know at the time, and on rewatching really stands out, is that it's shot extremely well, and the pacing is such that a two hour film simply flies by.  There is an odd mysticism to the characters, there is small attention to deal, there is nudity, there is a bit of violence, but overall it's remarkable how tame this film is.  IMDB classifies this as a Drama/Thriller moreso than horror, and I agree with that definition.

I'd say, on rewatching, there a few moments of plotholes, and some parts that don't make too much sense, but overall it is fantastic world-building, and it's believable as a vampire movie can be.  It made me want to read the book, and it also made me wonder about these characters more.  Also, I forgot that the Interview segments take place in San Francisco, so that was a fun bit.  I have walked by the building where the interview takes place many a time, shit, it's right on Market Street.

I sorta wish this had generated a few sequels and/or more of a legacy.  We got Queen of the Damned, but I don't think that had any of the same characters, and for sure was not as good.  This is something where I'm frankly shocked it didn't make a bigger impact in the media and sell some film rights to Anne Rice adaptations.  I give it a nice, 4.5 star rating.

The House that Jack Built - 2018

I remember when I worked at the independent theater we got the movie Dogville directed by Lars Von Trier.  Although I did not see it, this was my introduction to him as a director.  Later, I found Antichrist on a list of "disturbing films" and watched it.  I don't really remember my thoughts on it.

I gave Melancholia a shot, didn't like it, and I also thought about watching Nymphomaniac but I never got around to it.  But given that I heard about The House that Jack Built (THTJB) and I heard it was horror, I was killin' time at the video rental store, saw it on the new release shelf, and picked up a copy.  Fuck it, eh?  How bad could it be?

I put it on with zero expectation and the movie reminded me of why I happen to think, though often under-utilized, forgotten about, and given a bad reputation, horror can truly be as expressive a genre as anything else worth appraisal.

We hear some voices talking in the beginning and the tale unfolds.  It is the story of Jack, played by Matt Dillon.  Jack is a serial killer and intelligent, interesting person.  This film is not the story of a serial killer though, it is the story of an artist, and it is a story of the pain of being human, the pain of creation, and the pain of what we all do when we are forced to live through this world and this existence.  It just so happens he is also a sadistic killer.

And I do not mean to say he is not vicious, and I do not mean to say the film doesn't focus on the killings.  Through a thorough examination of five (actually more than five, but whatever) incidents in which he killed someone, we see the portrait painted of a strange, withdrawn, though charismatic and likable man.  He has Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and his relationship to himself is surprisingly detailed and tender.  He knows himself, for better or worse, and he understands us better than we do ourselves.

The gruesomeness and the sense of tension is the first thing I noticed.  With such a wildly unpredictable main character, there are several moments where I felt a profound sense of dread and doom for Jack and the people he'd interact with.  The movie also goes through lengths to establish his chaotic and dysfunctional nature.  We see the childhood version of him, for example, in a display of the psychotic beginnings of killing and showing the "way he has always been".

I knew the ending would be divisive from early on, as I realized that we took a step into weird territory via the narration, which happens between Jack and (I thought at first) god.  Towards the end, he meets this godlike character, and the movie takes a weird arthouse bizarre introspective turn.  It wasn't the best nor the strongest end to be honest, and it does feel like the director must've wanted to show Jack was in fact not a good person who would not come to a good end.  In a way it feels a bit tacked on, sort of like they wanted to have a redeeming factor to the film.  Eh.

Amazing that even from a perspective such as mine, someone who "has seen it all" there are still new, interesting, and unique horror films that manage to inspire, upset, and disturb as well as they always have.  Four stars.