Happy Halloween!

I am a sucker for this time of year, mainly because of all the lists of scary movies and scary books to help you while away the hours. While I liked my friend Marty's list, I was disappointed that he put "The Haunting" at number 1. Maybe it was too subtle for my taste, or maybe I am a victim of the MTV-ization of my youth, but I found it dull when I watched it a few years ago. The rest of the list is a tasteful and carefully chosen affair, one that any culturephile would be happy to cite at a "Dia de los Muertos" cocktail party. But there is one glaring omission. How could Martin Scorsese, perhaps the greatest living filmmaker, miss the scariest movie of all time?

I am of course referring to "The Watcher in the Woods."


For those of you who don't know, "The Watcher in the Woods" (aka "TWITW") is a terrifying tale - produced by the Disney corporation of all people - involving all the hallmarks of a superior horror film: a secret club, a seance gone wrong, solar eclipses, possessed younger sisters, and Bette Davis. It was Massachusetts state law in the early eighties that every elementary school watch it each October, which as a result prolonged my bedwetting years. But how could it not? It is an instructional movie about the dangers of being young. After watching it, my fellow second graders and I knew that we were vulnerable to evil. At any point, we too could be possessed by the spirit of a girl who had disappeared twenty years earlier, listlessly scrawling names backward on a frosted window pane

Now there are many things working against this movie. Number one, it is terrible. Its star is Lynn-Holly Johnson, a much-maligned figure skater turned actress who does not worry herself with the constraints of charisma. Bette Davis too quickly transforms from the terrifying neighbor to a sad old lady, when the whole point of having Bette Davis in a horror movie is that she will decapitate somebody or serve them a rat for breakfast. And the special effects are awful (on the DVD, there is a deleted scene of Lynn-Holly Johnson traveling to outer space to retrieve the missing girl's spirit, and the special effects consist of nothing more than her being superimposed on the laser-light backdrop for a GlamourShots photo). But the movie is still scary! How can you not be chilled by the falling church bell or the collapsing bridge? And to a second grader, the revelation of who the other female contingent of the secret society was like a pre-adolescent "She's my sister AND my daughter! moment."

So go rent the movie. And if you want a recommendation for a scary book, "The Thirteenth Tale" is a great modern day gothic horror with a very satisfying twist that I did not see coming. If Martin Scorsese wanted to atone for his inclusion of "The Haunting," he would snatch up the rights and make it into a movie starring Carey Mulligan and Judi Dench (since Bette Davis is unavailable).

*photo of the poster courtesy of Retrojunk

Fall Music: New Release Roundup

Monsters Of Folk
This was my most anticipated album of the fall, and I am happy to report I have not been let down at all! The “Monsters of Folk” (in spite of their stupid name) fulfill anticipations! The "supergroup" consists of Conor Oberst (Bright Eyes), Jim James (My Morning Jacket) and M. Ward (M. Ward). Mike Mogis, who works with Oberst/Bright Eyes is the fourth, lower-right-hand-corner-of-the-album-cover, behind-the-scenes guy. I’m sure he’s the glue that holds the whole thing together but because he doesn’t sing and isn't famous in his own right I don’t care about him at all. Take that, Mogis, you weirdo. Anyway, the Big Three all contribute songs, mixing and matching their vocals and sensibilities. And it’s a great mix of sensibilities, too, without being either a meaningless mishmash or overly dominated by one lead-guy. A steady current of religion and Higher-Power-questioning runs through the album, interestingly, but the whole affair never feels overly weighty. On the contrary, everything feels like a lot of fun – catchy, eclectic, interesting. The “Traveling Wilburys” vibe is undeniable, but at the same time it never feels like a rip-off or something silly these guys just tossed off. It’s both substantial and fun, and manages to highlight the best of these three talented dudes and largely leave their individual weaknesses behind.

Will Hoge - The Wreckage
I’ve been a Will Hoge fan for a while now, but there have been some somewhat lengthy gaps in our relationship. I found him back when I worked at the University of Chicago and got addicted to obsessively rating music on the online Yahoo Radio feature (my early pre-Pandora internet music source). His sophomore album, Blackbird on a Lonely Wire was my introduction in 2003, then he seemed to disappear for awhile and I read later that he had been in a bad motorcycle accident. Yikes. Safety first. Anyway, his next record, The Man Who Killed Love, was self-released, and I liked it fine, but it was missing some of that glossy rock sheen that I so often (guiltily) like. His return to the world of major record labels came in 2007 with an album (Draw the Curtains) I never got interested in, based on both reviews and some online listening. But Hoge’s latest is a return to 2003-form, with a big, straight-ahead rock & roll sound, and just enough sheen to take the edge off and tickle my eardrums right. The absolute home run track off here is the duet "Goodnight/Goodbye," with an unknown (to me) singer Ashley Monroe, who has got a great voice. A great voice, somewhere in Dolly Parton/Patty Griffin/Tanya Tucker/Mindy Smith mold (that’s not a mold at all, what’s wrong with me). On the surface, it’s a simple, sappy duet, but a winner nonetheless, and as I have often stated, I remain something of a sucker for sap. At any rate, with a slight Tom Petty-feel, and a great voice all his own, Will Hoge’s latest is a winner, full of hooks and heart.

Kings of Convenience - Declaration Of Dependence
Sometimes as I get myself through yet another workday I need some music that doesn’t drive like rock and roll, that isn’t uptempo like bluegrass, or experimental like indie-rock or sleepy like artificial nature sounds. Something that is soothing without being sleepy, music to relax the soul. Typically I will turn to classical music, choral music, pop standards, or someone like Mindy Smith or Rosie Thomas. Another great choice along those same lines are the Kings of Convenince, Norwegian pop-duo extraordinaire. Talk about soothing. Pretty, simple melodies with Simon & Garfunkel-like harmonies (that are really more like Garfunkel & Garfunkel-like harmonies, so closely and fluidly do Erik Glambek Bøe and Erlend Øye’s (!!) voices combine). Their 2004 album, Riot on an Empty Street is one of my favorites, but they have been totally silent since then, so far as I know. It was with great happiness then, that I picked up their most recent collaboration, Declaration of Dependence. The songwriting is probably not as uniformly tight as “Empty Street,” but the album is still lovely. Maybe it's just because Flight Of The Conchords has fundamentally changed the way we view folk-duos, but there is part of me, listening to some of these songs, that's unable to take it all seriously. I find myself wondering if there isn’t some tongue-in-cheek going on. (Sample lyric: Hey Baby/Mrs. Cold/acting so tough/didn’t know you had it in you to be hurt at all/you waited/too long/you shoulda hooked me before I put my raincoat on/OK I get it/OK I see/you were affronted 'cause you knew you’d find yourself vulnerable around me/OK I get it/OK I see/you feel vulnerable around me.) I mean, we can’t take that seriously, right? But it certainly is delivered absolutely straight-faced, so if it’s a Conchords-style spoof, they don’t tip their hand at all. Anyway, that’s probably the (questionable?) lowpoint, but the point isn’t the lyrics anyway. It’s the tight harmonies, lilting melodies, and soft mood that wins here – perfect for soothing the nerves (especially on a rainy Friday after a long week of work).

Brandi Carlile - Give Up The Ghost
I have become a big fan of Brandi Carlile’s big, thumping, heart-on-its-sleeve, country-tinged rock & roll. She and “the twins” – Phil and Tim Hanseroth, her guitarist and bassist and writing collaborators – specialize in catchy melodies, somewhat simplistic lyrics (I might call them “lyrics of empowerment” if I wanted to coin a phrase), and restrained bombasticism (not a real word, and also an intended contradiction in terms). Carlile’s like a good, solid meal at your favorite local restaurant: it’s not going to reinvent the wheel or amaze you, but you always leave satisfied and happy. And you always go back. Her latest, Give Up the Ghost, is more of the same, but still good. To my mind, the standout track is the collaboration with Elton John (you heard me), "Caroline," featuring a rollicking tempo, a bit of lightheartedness, and some barroom piano. You don’t realize how serious and somber the proceedings have been until you get that little breath of fresh, flippant fun. It’s enormously welcome. Anyway, it’s a good, solid follow-up to Carlile’s first two good, solid albums. I do have one quibble that I have to get off my chest: after working with IT-producer of yesterday, T-Bone Burnett (the O Brother Where Art Thou soundtrack among many others), Carlile traded up to the IT-producer of today, Rick Rubin (in his reincarnation as a producer of Americana albums). And it’s on track three, "Pride and Joy," that you hear simple, almost droning, repeated piano chords and you think, this sounds familiar, where have I heard that before? Oh, yeah, the last Dixie Chicks album…and the recent Dan Wilson album, Free Life…also those later-period Johnny Cash albums (which were the start of it all). What's the common thread there? All of a sudden you realize it’s the stock Rick Rubin-effect. His signature, or something. Those Cash albums were fantastic and wonderfully done, but as soon as you become self-conscious of production that production-style really loses something, to my mind. And by now it feels like a shadow of a shade of a copy of a copy. Mix it up, Rick Rubin! And while we’re at it, let’s try and stop any more artists I really like from setting up shop with the beardo-weirdo. That lightning is out of the bottle; Johnny Cash captured it, but it ain’t coming back at this point. Brandi Carlile needs someone to help her innovate, for sure, and I applaud her for roving in search of that innovation (I assume I can speak for her intentions like this). But Rick Rubin’s not innovating anymore, he’s retreading tires he put on the Cash-mobile in 1995. I look forward to where Brandi will land next, and hope it isn’t a return to Rubin. Don't stick with Rick, Brandi!

The Best Actress Experiment

A friend of mine recently asked me to be a friend on my Netflix account* and I accepted. After he looked at my queue, he posted on my facebook wall - a place I normally reserve for people to thank me for the amazing conversation we had the previous night - that my favorite movies all had strong female protagonists. What did I learn from this? Never to let people get too close. A few nights later, I decided I would show him and, in a drunken fit of rage, I rearranged my queue so that the top twenty movies were all Best Actress Nominees that I had never seen. Well, he might have ended up having the last laugh. The following is a sampling of what I have watched the past month:

Darling: This netted Julie Christie an Oscar for her portrayal of a manipulative model who uses the men in her life to get what she wants - or does she? I was a little bored and partly drunk by the time it ended; my big takeaway was that Julie Christie had surprisingly big bazongas for such a tiny lady. I watched most of Don't Look Now a few years ago, partly because I had heard it was such a scary movie and - to be candid - because of the rumors of the love scene between her and Donald Sutherland. My memories of their bedroom tryst were that both Christie and Sutherland were 85% shoulderblade. So it was nice to see Julie with a little meat on her bones. Other than that, I don't think the movie is worth seeing.

Mrs. Miniver - I am sure this was one of my grandmother's favorite movies. It is a very pleasant and very dull movie about life in World War II England. The first twenty minutes are about the purchase of a hat; you think it is going to figure into the plot later on or be integral to the movie's symbolism, but no, it is pretty much about buying a hat. As the titular character, Greer Garson is fine, but she seems very passive from a contemporary viewpoint. At one point, Mrs. Miniver comes across a sleeping Nazi in her garden (it's that kind of movie) and she stares at his gun which is lying right there beside him before deciding that no, she's not going to take it. Sure enough, he wakes up and holds her hostage in her kitchen before she can be rescued by the milkman. Later, while driving with her daughter-in-law through a nighttime Blitzkrieg, she decides that the best plan of action when traveling through an open field being shelled by the Germans is to stop the car right in the middle of the action. Predictably, her problem solving skills don't bode well for the daughter-in-law.

Coal Miner's Daughter: I usually hate biopics, particularly biopics about musicians, so I am very surprised that this might be my new favorite movie. It is less a biopic than a movie about the evolving relationship between two strong-willed people who keep having to figure out their changing place in the world. Sissy Spacek is adorable as Loretta Lynn and makes you see her as a flesh and blood creature. Tommy Lee Jones does exactly what Tommy Lee Jones should do in a movie: scare the shit out of you and do hypermasculine things, like hotrodding a jeep up a ninety degree incline. Plus, Beverly D'Angelo sounds exactly like Patsy Cline and the whole movie looks gorgeous: from the mountain scenery at the beginning to the rainsoaked fairgrounds that Loretta travels through on her way to the top.

Anne of the Thousand Days: This starred an actress who I didn't know very well, Genevieve Bujold. I know I saw her in the creepiest movie ever, Dead Ringers, and that she was in one of Martin's precious Star Trek series, but other than that, I was unfamiliar with her work. This Bujoldnorance (aka, lack of knowledge of or about Genevieve Bujold) is a shame, because she is a great actress and deserves a bigger place in the spotlight. She looks like a prettier version of Hilary Swank, and as Anne Boleyn, she tears through the transformation from naïve courtier to ruthless political policy-maker. She even manages to acquit herself in a heavy-handed monologue that clumsily combines popsicle sticks and the film's title. The story of Henry VIII always makes me uneasy, because you just know he felt terrible when he got to heaven and St. Peter explained how sexual determination worked. But AOTTD has a lot of great elements to carry you through: Richard Burton is a lot of fun as Henry, there's a lot of sumptuous scenery, and a ton of acclaimed Shakespearean actors in supporting roles.

*which I privately refer to as "my precious, precious Netflix account."

We Regret to Informant You

The Informant! was a movie I really wanted to enjoy, but didn't. It looks beautiful: sleek surfaces accompanied by an overly lush score by Marvin Hamlisch, and Matt Damon delivers what they call a bravura performance. But somehow I left the movie unaffected. The movie centers on the fumbling attempts of a real-life whistleblower, Mark Whitacre, to expose a price-fixing scandal within his company. Part of its charm is how terrible both sides of the operation are at their jobs: Whitacre conspicuously dictates his going-ons into his wire while the rest of his company glides along blissfully unaware. And maybe that's the film's larger point: there are no shadow conspiracies manipulating our world, just genial people who remain willfully ignorant of the consequences of their actions. To its credit, the movie doesn't talk down to its audience. It deliberately withholds information and is unconcerned with making sure you understand what's happening at every single minute. But halfway through the movie I got annoyed that a director I really like, Steven Soderbergh, had wasted his talent and a fantastic cast on a film that I didn't really care about. In his defense, there is one scene towards the end of the movie that seamlessly combines Soderbergh's cinematic innovation with Damon's terrific performance to reveal the wounded core of Whitacre. But as Martin said in his review of Inglourious Basterds, one great scene does not a film make. So I will hold onto the hope that Soderbergh just needed to get this out of his system and will deliver a film to rival one of my all-time favorites, "Out of Sight," the next time around.

Post-Script It has been two days since I saw this movie, and I suspect it might be a sneakbomb, aka a movie that you initially are ambivalent about but upon further reflection find yourself liking more and more (there's probably a better term for this, but I am sticking with "sneakbomb" for the time being). I think I would have benefitted from knowing more about the case it was based on. You, young reader, might want to check out the This American Life story about the problems with the ADM case.

The Office Series Finale, or: Goodbye, Old "Friend"

I just got around to watching the tearful Series Finale of long-running, beloved sitcom The Office this past weekend. Hold on, it’s not the Series Finale? The show continues, still alive and (putatively) kicking? Well, guess what, friends and fellow ‘philes, it was the Finale for me! That’s a wrap! Adios! And let me tell you, it’s like a weight has been lifted off my (prime time) shoulders. I am finally giving myself over to the camp of Office-haters after years of tentatively defending a show that I tentatively liked, sort of, sometimes. Well, it’s all over for me now – last one out please turn off the lights. Sorry, Office, I gave you all I could.

Some backstory: I’m one of the legion of people who worship at the comedy altar of the original, British version of The Office. I can’t think of a more perfect TV comedy, ever. You heard me, Cheers and Seinfeld and Arrested Development. The Office, in its original, British form, was transformative not just in its utter realness, but also in its genuinely openhearted emotions, real characters, and wonderfully awful laughs. Seinfeld may have mined the idea that awfulness can be funny, The Cosby Show characters may have felt real and very human, Arrested Development may have innovated away the laughtrack, but The (British) Office tops them all. It’s small and funny and so sad and damn near perfect.

So while I didn’t expect such compressed, diamond-like perfection from the American remake, I do like Steve Carell in spite of the writing of his character, and grew to like the low-key duo of John Krasinski and Jenna Fischer (and have wished for a long time that Mindy Kaling was used more/better, and more recently have started liking the hilarious Ed Helms). So I gave The (American) Office a shot, and the first season was both painful and plodding, but not unexpectedly so. Calling the kind of transition the show was trying to pull off “tricky” would be an understatement the size of GE, so I stuck with it and continued giving it a shot. Season Two, the heart of which was the frustrated romance between Jim and the otherwise-engaged (literally) Pam, was pretty ok. Still not great, but OK. I had the feeling it might be coming together -- certainly going somewhere different from the original, but worthwhile in its own right. Then the downward spiral began. From Season 3 on, the show has utterly fallen apart. Not that it had ever really come together into much of anything. A friend of The Culturephiles (who is not alone in this) takes every opportunity to make fun of the show for getting stuck with the Law of Diminishing Returns with their overplayed “look-directly-into-camera” joke. Yet even that bit of hackery I was/am willing to overlook, episode after episode.

What I was, and am, NOT willing to overlook is how patently totally absurd and unfunny this show has become. Talk about the Law of Diminishing Returns! The creative gas gauge on this show hit E a long time ago. Partly the show hasn’t been able to successfully navigate the classic showkiller: when your two romantic leads finally overcome all the sexual tension and get together. Theoretical kudos to The Office for simply “going there” and refusing to bow to the conventional wisdom that answering the “will they or won’t they” question necessarily kills your show. However, conventional wisdom really hit the nail on the head in this case, because Jim and Pam getting together has, in fact, killed the show. When dowdy-receptionist Pam was stuck at Dunder Mifflin with her zero of a fiancee and Jim was stuck there to pine for her in close proximity, there was a (modest) justification for their continuing employment in the hellhouse of (insane) horrors. Once sad-soulful-Jim grew a spine and got together with emergent-butterfly-Pam, though, the heart of the show stopped beating in any sensible way. However, I can’t and won’t put the Terminal Blame on Jim and Pam, even though their wedding gives me the perfect sense of completion such that I will never have even a momentary twinge of guilt for never watching the show for another second ever again in my whole life. The problems with the show run too deep to put such tedious conventional wisdom on the hook for the whole mess.

The reality is that The (American) Office tries, in some respects, to emulate The (British) Office by playing things real. In most other respects, though, the show is a total joke of a cartoon of a parody of a soap opera. Dwight Schrute is a great example. In a cartoon, Dwight Schrute might be decently funny. In real life – or in a show trying to make fun of real life (I guess?) – Dwight Schrute is a broken cyanide capsule. You can’t have Dwight Schrute and Creed and Meredith (all totally preposterous, nonsensical joke-characters) in the same show with Jim and Pam and Toby and Phyllis (generally “real”-seeming characters). Your show can either be real or a cartoon, not both, or it doesn't cohere. Characters can be weird, and can push the envelope, because there are, in fact, really weird people out there in the real offices of the world. Andy Bernard is a great example of a character that pushes the boundary of how a real person acts, but doesn’t push it so far that he’s no longer recognizable as human being. Same goes for Kelly Kapoor. "Characters welcome," I say, but zany, outsize, commedia dell'arte-style buffoons, not so much. But The (American) Office is terminally stuck between sitcom, sentimental drama, soap opera, satire, and cartoon. Not only is it not funny enough to be a sitcom, but it’s also not real enough to be a drama; its incessant plot machinations are ludicrous enough to be a soap opera but it’s not sexy or pouty enough; it seemed to stop trying to offer a satirical view of the American workplace somewhere around its first 45 seconds on the air, and it is much too real and painful and slow to be a cartoon. Also, it is not animated.

What is The Office then? Over. Done. Kaput. It is nothing anymore. I don't have to think about it or care. It went off the air and out of my Hulu account and away from my life forever this past weekend. Congratulations to Jim and Pam on their wedding. They used to be fun characters that I liked and sort of related to, and sometimes thought were funny. Now that’s over. Further congratulations go out to YOU if you are able to put up with this turd of a show for one more minute.

Thank God the new season of the brilliant, hilarious 30 Rock starts this week. Just in the nick of time.

A Personal Reflection (Not A Review) of Where The Wild Things Are: Sneak Preview Chicago

This past Tuesday, my wife and I were lucky enough to be the guest of erstwhile Culturephiles contributor, Patrick, at a fundraising event at the Music Box Theater for the tutoring/writing center/spy store, 826CHI. (A good cause!) The event itself was a sneak preview of the new Highly Anticipated, Major Motion Picture Release, Where The Wild Things Are, an adaptation of the famed Maurice Sendak book by director Spike Jonze, who co-wrote the screenplay with acclaimed author (and 826 co-founder) Dave Eggers. It’s kind of a 20-something/30-something nerdgasm supernova: famous book that everybody loves from childhood, plus young super-hip director, plus young hip-lit super-author, plus music by cutting-edge indie-rock star (Karen O of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs), wrapped up in a package of amazing special effects, all tied up with a social-justice fundraiser bow. PLUS, Spike Jonze, Dave Eggers, Catherine Keener, and Max Records (the kid who plays Max in the movie) were all on hand and answered some questions both before and after the screening. I know. Pretty awesome.

The book Where the Wild Things Are is something I remember loving but don’t remember all that much about, specifically, at all. I remember the images, I remember the “wild rumpus.” That’s pretty much it. (I am now, of course, desperate to look at my old copy of the book to remind myself, and to compare it with the film.) Without having yet gone back to look again at the original book, though, I can pretty safely say this is a loose adaptation. In the audience Q&A (moderated with aplomb by our own semi-Culturephile Patrick), Jonze mentioned his friendship with Maurice Sendak, who told Jonze to take the book and make his own, personal, movie out of it. One can imagine what a liberating license that must have been! And take that book and make it his own is exactly what Jonze did; it is a real weird movie. Like, REAL weird. You remember how weird Being John Malkovich is; this is along the same lines.

It is also lovely and visually amazing and super-emotional and frightening and sweeping and small and thoughtful and utterly original. It reminded me a little of Lewis Carroll – we are taken into a bizarre world which operates by its own obscure rules, and has operated under these rules long before we dropped in. No explanation is given about the “family” of the Wild Things; everything is presented without judgment or context, and you the watcher can do whatever you wish with all the fragmentary, assumptive information and deep, lived-in emotions. I expect lots of people will be really put off by it. There are both moments of really transcendent beauty and some stretches of dullness, for lack of a better word. It’s neither a thrill-a-minute, nor is it ever boring. It presents a portrait of emotional, troubled creatures both sympathetically and with unapologetic complexity. I rarely have the impulse to watch a movie again (Memento and L.A. Confidential were the last movies I felt compelled to see again to completely understand), but this is one I think I would either really love or really hate upon a second viewing. On the one hand, most of the surprises and the pervasive sense of exploration & wonder might be lost, but on the other hand, there is certainly a raging river of complexity running beneath the film that I feel like I only got a taste of as I watched the first time. (Like trying to take a sip from a firehose.)

I could be 100% wrong, but I bet kids and adults alike will be totally divided on this. It’s a beautiful, sui generis, honest-to-god art film. It stems from a famous book that has become a part of the collective unconscious, and it really mines that nostalgia-vein at the same time as it absolutely cares nothing for convention, never panders in any way, and feels like a total take-it-or-leave-it proposition. A strange tightrope to walk, to be sure: an adaptation of a work EVERYbody knows, in a style that couldn’t be more idiosyncratic. It's weird to apply words like "brave" and "gutsy" to a movie (it's just a movie after all), but I can't help but think there is an element of gutsiness in making this film the way Spike Jonze, Dave Eggers, & Co did. In the end, I enjoyed their work a lot. It certainly takes you on a wild, unexpected, imaginative journey. I wonder what everybody else will think. It’s definitely a movie to be shared and discussed; October 16th can’t come soon enough.