Brightest of the Dark

For my reviews from '98 through mid 2000, click here.

MOVIES:

CHECK OUT MY CHOICES FOR THE TOP 20 HORROR FILMS OF ALL TIME

(Click here to see my list of the Best Films (and the Best DARK Films) of the 1990s and my 1998 and 1999 Top Ten Lists. My 2000 Top Ten list will be posted shortly!)

BOOK OF SHADOWS: BLAIR WITCH 2 - ** - Lots of good ideas and images lost in a morass of narrative incoherence. Nice to see a sympathetic Wiccan and a Goth, but the movie's implication that they were succeptible to evil influence undercuts the message.

BEDAZZLED - **1/2 - Lots of funny bits and clever situations lost in a morass of directorial laziness...hmmm, this sounds familiar. Brendan Fraser demonstrates a gift for over-the-top humor, but his initial rendering of overeager loser Eliot Richards is just too unlikeable.

REQUIEM FOR A DREAM - **** - Almost a leadpipe cinch to top my year end best dark films list, this film virtually embodies the overused adjective, "harrowing". Darren Aronofsky expands on the visual and musical vocabulary he developed for PI to suck the viewer into a nightmare exploration of the seduction and the cesspool of addiction. Ellen Burstyn will probably get an Oscar nomination for her work here, but it is Jared Leto, Marlon Wayans and, especially, Jennifer Connelly, who are revelations here, far surpassing their respective previous work. The score, a collaboration between Carter Burwell and the Kronos Quartet, is every bit as important to the movie as the cutting edge cinematography and editing.

UNBREAKABLE - *** - The similarity in tone to THE SIXTH SENSE hangs like a pall over this third film from M. Night Shyamalan, a quality exacerbated by Bruce Willis' presence in both films--here he is workmanlike but unengaging. In the early going, Shyamalan reaches for too many self-conscious shots, hampering the pacing and distancing the audience (note especially the monotonous back-and-forth shuffle on the train and the single-shot examining room scene). The final twist is anything but organic to the story--and unlikely to reward repeated viewing like the shocker at the end of THE SIXTH SENSE--but is nevertheless reasonably satisfying. Robin Wright Penn acts her ass off in an impoverished supporting role.

QUILLS - *** - This exploration of societal sexual and artistic repression looks good and has a "good-for-you" air to it, but it still feels hampered by the windiness of its stage play origins. Joaquin Phoenix is a talented guy, but is a bit too offcenter to play the saintlier beats required through most of his performance. Geoffrey Rush is excellent, but would be more effective on the stage.

THE GIFT - ***1/2 - Some might find this Southern Gothic piece from Sam Raimi too slight to sustain its occasional histrionics, but its hard for me to imagine a more effective piece in the genre. This falls somewhere just above EVE'S BAYOU and just below ANGEL HEART. Cate Blanchett's performance might be the year's best by an actress.

THE HOUSE OF MIRTH - *** - Gillian Anderson leaves Scully behind in a generally well-judged and engaging portrayal of an American woman born too soon. The piece is more intellectually than emotionally statisfying, eschewing the flamboyance of Scorsese's treatment of Edith Wharton's Gilded Age New York for a more honest and realistic one.

SHADOW OF THE VAMPIRE - *** - Nice conceit: what if mysterious actor "Max Schreck" of Murnau's NOSFERATU was really a vampire hired by the great director to play...well...himself. Willem Dafoe is a hoot as the dim and dissipated bloodsucker masquerading as a "method actor" direct from training with Stanislavsky. Loses steam whenever John Malkovich's Murnau is given room to discourse on the artist and his work. Visually top notch, making good use of unusual filming location: Luxembourg.

MULTIMEDIA
The X-Files Game - ***1/2 - As Agent Craig Willmore, you hunt for Scully & Mulder (missing after a cool prologue), aided by Skinner and others. Full of quirky detail and cool graphic design.

BOOKS:

Hannibal - **** - Erudite...graphic...horrifying...funny...and, for me, not a disappointment after a 10-year wait. Thomas Harris expands the personal mythologies of Clarice Starling and Hannibal Lecter in unexpected ways and only a couple of dropped narrative threads and a couple of caricatured characters keep this from being the masterpiece that RED DRAGON was and SILENCE OF THE LAMBS bordered on being. The ending is surprising, dreamlike and disturbing, and the story as a whole is indeed the dark romance many fans have expected (and perhaps feared). Viewed against the vast disappointment of the other long-anticipated sequel out this summer, HANNIBAL is a real testament to Harris' craftsmanship and integrity of vision.

Slave of My Thirst - *** - Tom Holland's sort-of-sequel to his "Lord Byron as vampire" debut, LORD OF THE DEAD, is so jam-packed with cleverness and Eminent-Vic in-jokes as to be nearly overwhelming. Holland follows confidently in the footsteps of such acclaimed books as THE ALIENIST, THE LIST OF 7, and THE SEVEN-PERCENT SOLUTION in deconstructing both Sherlock Holmes and Bram Stoker's DRACULA. Rewarding, though occasionally pretentious.

Midnight Blue - *** - If you haven't read Nancy A. Collins three "Sonja Blue" novels
this collection is a great buy. These tales of a punk vampire-cum-vampireslayer are out of print individually.
Available from Amazon.com.

The Magician's Companion by Bill Whitcomb - ***1/2 - Exactly what it says it is:
"A Practical & Encyclopedic Guide to Magical & Religious Symbolism". No-nonsense, ethical guide to systems of magic ranging from the Qabala to Crowley to I Ching, organized in an ingenious and thought-provoking format.

Finally reading...after 20 years of meaning to get around to it:
A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century by Barbara Tuchman.
More gruesome than a lot of horror novels--the 14th century was the birthplace of many of our collective nightmares.

The Triumph of the Moon by Ronald Hutton - **** - A fascinating and indispensible history of modern pagan witchcraft (i.e., Wicca) that manages to both slaughter numerous Wiccan "sacred cows" and be sympathetic to the religion as being valid. Hutton is a controversial figure in the Neopagan community, but he shouldn't be. He has, over the course of three books, done more to bring sound scholarship and validation to the cause of Neopaganism than virtually any other author.

THE TUBE:

WITCHBLADE - * - Just when THE X-MEN restores one's hope for the potential for decent comic book movies, along comes this piece of lifeless (and pretentious) crap to remind us all how much these projects normally blow. Failed-series veteran Yancy Butler is meant to look tough and tortured, but mainly looks constipated. The whole concept of the Witchblade is reduced to a plate-armor gauntlet which appears to have been bought at the local Ren Faire.

SOUNDS:

V.A.S.T. - **** - Dramatic blend of Morrison-esque vocals/lyrics with a wide variety of samples (chant, Bulgarian choir, etc.) and Goth-tinged rock arrangements.

Love and Rockets: "Lift" - *** - Cool collection of techno and ambient riffs from the former Bauhaus boys.

Sci-Fi's Greatest Hits, Vol. 2: The Dark Side - ***1/2 - Thirty-six of the greatest themes from TV shows and movies dealing with the paranormal and the unexplained. Terrific liner notes. Worth the price for: HALLOWEEN, SUSPIRIA, KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER, THE X-FILES, THE PRISONER. Loses a half-a-star for: DRACULA: THE SERIES (disco slime), "Carol Anne's Theme" from POLTERGEIST (nursery rhyme jingle out of context).

Josh's BLAIR WITCH Mix - ***1/2 - An excellent little Valentine to Goth, industrial and dark metal from the BLAIR WITCH folks. Loses half-a-star for the crassness of the concept (a soundtrack from a movie that had absolutely no music?).

Tori Amos: "To Venus and Back" - ***1/2 - Tori Goes Techno! Not since Dylan went electric... OK, listen, it's not the end of the world. Actually, the techno-tinged keyboards add a welcome new dimension to Tori's musical world, though they do put the breaks on her emotional range to some degree--a fact made apparent by her live performances of older material on disc 2.

Nine Inch Nails: "The Fragile" - ***1/2 - Wow, Tori and Trent...I guess I done died 'n' gone to heaven. NIN's newest recalls DOWNWARD SPIRAL in tone and packaging, but lacks a grabber cut a la "Closer".

Inkubus Sukkubus: "Wild" - ** - As their career progresses, pagan Gothsters Inkubus Sukkubus fail to bring any new life or dimension into their guitar-driven Wiccan rock. Nonetheless, explicit and devout Wiccan lyrics make this a must for any Pagan rock collection.

Check out my "Grab Bag" page for some Celtic music picks in the L.A. area.

...from whence you came