Look out! He's got a knife!

Movie review: Dust Devil

In Namibia, in the early '90s a serial killer is travelling from town to town, killing men and women alike, dismembering their bodies and painting the walls with their blood. A black cop, feeling out of place in a white police force and still racked with guilt over the death of his son and the departure of his wife fifteen years earlier, investigates and is drawn into a web of seemingly supernatural occurances. Meanwhile an American woman flees her unhappy marriage in South Africa, crosses the border and encounters the killer.

I'd wanted to see Dust Devil since first reading about it in Fangoria in the early '90s. I was a fan of writer/director Richard Stanley's first film, Hardware, which was basically a 2000AD strip come to life (quite literally: they sued) made with no money and lots of style. Imagine Dario Argento directing a Terminator rip-off set entirely in one room and with a soundtrack by Ministry & Motorhead.

But for most of the intervening years, it seemed that I would never get to see it. The movie, purportedly a difficult shoot, was finally taken out of Richard Stanley's hands and finished by Mirimax's editors; twenty minutes was removed and the actors were dubbed with inappropriate American accents. Stanley raised money himself to finish it, and showed it in film festivals, but the rights to the movie were tied up in a Gordian knot and it was too small a movie for anyone to bother spending the money to extricate it. To date the only legal way to see the uncut version is on an out-of-print German dvd.

I didn't see it on dvd. I had to resort to less than legal means. My flatmate has yelled at me for using up so much internet traffic but WHAT THE FUCK it was worth it.

Stanley seems to have been desperate to get out of the cramped Hardware room. Dust Devil is filmed on location, and it really makes the most of that beautiful country, with many dizzying crane & helicopter shots showcasing the scenery while demonstrating the characters' isolation.

Technically the movie is superb, but script-wise it's a mess. It attempts to integrate serial murder, police procedural, African spirituality, racial politics, and heavy allegory. Most of these elements don't really work, but the ways in which they don't work are consistently fascinating.

The acting is a mixed bag. Zakes Mokae is great as Ben, the cop. He was terrifying as the villain in The Serpent and the Rainbow and it's nice to see him in a heroic role. Chelsea Field is competent but unmemorable as Wendy. Robert Burke is sometimes great and sometimes terrible as the Dust Devil - this is quite frustrating. Marianne Sägebrecht phones in her small role as the coroner, Rufus Swart is horrible as Wendy's loutish South African husband Joe, and John Matshikiza is excellent as drive-in owner/spiritual advisor Joe, despite being saddled with the awkward narration.

The movie displays more of Argento's influence (The Bird with the Crystal Plumage is name checked), with more than a hint of Sergio Leone thrown in. Despite the slow pace and lack of real scares (or - surprisingly - much gore, though there are a couple of nasty scenes), it's never boring and often beautifully surreal.

I'd say "recommended to open-minded horror fans" but you'll probably never see it so never mind.

Edit: In comments, hix mentions Stanley's production diary for this movie. Guess what? It's online here. I haven't read it yet, but I'm looking forward to it!

National party billboards

Last night I fell asleep watching Hellraiser, and woke up listening to Don Brash. Brrrr.

Billy sent me a link to some parodic user-submitted billboards.

There were exactly two I laughed at, this one and this one.

Edit: I just made a few. I'll share this one and this one.

I didn't make this one, but it also made me laugh. RIP Rick James.

I think I just wet my pants

Just call me Fergie...

Look, just go here

I dunno who made them, but I couldn't stop laughing. Mike introduced me to these many months ago, and they're still funny.

Fappo!

Favourite writer doom?

Current point of obsession: will Poppy Z. Brite survive Hurricane Katarina?

It's going to hit New Orleans soon, and she's not evacuating (despite the "mandatory evacuation" warning) seemingly 'cause she doesn't want to leave her animals behind. Fair enough too.

Meanwhile everyone is being told that if you can't leave, you have to be 3 storeys or higher.

So is Poppy doomed to a watery grave with her husband and 28 other animals? How much consolation is there in knowing her new book will come out regardless?

Some of her older fans, still pissed that she gave up writing angst-horror in favour of humourous chef stories, would see this as some kind of divine retribution from the Gods of Goth. Not me, though. I wanna see what's next.

Carnivàle - first season review

A little while ago, I flippantly claimed that the deadpan, surreal and hilarious fishing show "Fishing With John" was the greatest tv show ever made. I've found something even better - and lots of you have probably already seen it.

Most of these HBO shows haven't appealed to me. To be honest, from where I'm sitting they look like boring old regular tv with tits 'n' ass 'n' gore 'n swearing thrown in. "Oh look, a show about GANGSTERS, what an original idea."

(Tv is so formulaic it makes me want to kill. For example, if there's a tv show about people at work they're almost always doctors, lawyers or cops - or once in a while, firefighters. In a shriek of inspiration, Law & Order is about lawyers AND cops, and has doctors in it too.)

This is something new. It's basically a gothic soap opera with supernatural overtones set in an American travelling carnival in the 1930s. I've always loved stories about travelling carnivals & freakshows & the like (thanks largely to Ray Bradbury's brilliant kids' novel Something Wicked This Way Comes), and this is a really good one.

The first thing that struck me about that show is that it actually has good theme music. This was something that almost turned me off Firefly from the git-go - the theme song is painfull, especially the twee lyrics. Carnivàle's theme is by Wendy Melvoin & Lisa Coleman - two of Prince's most talented associates, for the clueless - and they did a great job.

The second thing that struck me (apart from "Hey, it's Michael J. Anderson!") was the amazing production values. This show looks GREAT.

The third thing was that the acting is superb.

The aforementioned Michael J. Anderson (familiar to many from Twin Peaks and Mulholland Dr) is great as Samson, who runs the day to day of the carnival (though he's not Management material - I'll say no more).

Horror movie fave Adrienne Barbeau is pretty good as the slinky snake handler Ruthie - Barbeau looks her age (almost sixty) but is still presented as a very sexy woman, which is refreshing.

Clea DuVall plays Sofie, one of the most complex roles in the show, and is sensational every step of the way. Amy Madigan stands out as Iris Crowe, Justin's brother (I'll get to him in a minute). Patrick Bauchau and Debra Christofferson are good as pretty unlikeable characters, and hell there isn't a weak spot in the whole cast.

Two actors seem to be the focus of the material, and they deliver the best performances in it (which is really saying something given how goodMadigan, Du Vall & Anderson are). Nick Stahl plays Ben Hawkins, a young fugitive with mysterious healing powers who the carnival takes into the fold at the beginning of episode one. This young actor has a difficult role, having to be simultaneously a mysterious unknown quantity, and also the audience identification figure. He

And then there's Clancy Brown as Brother Justin Crowe, who appears in a parallel storyline whose relevance to the carnival is just hinted at. As a teenager I loved his portrayal of the evil Kurgen in Highlander, and he's always been stereotyped as a bad guy (apart from a small role in Buckaroo Banzai). He's a big man with a big voice and sinister eyes; his casting as the tough drill sergeant Starship Troopers was one of the clues as to who the real bad guys were in that movie.

I never would have thought could be convincing as a naive and idealistic preacher, and I'm amazed at his work here. He is subtle when required and broad when it's needed; he has charisma to spare, whether he's quietly contemplating his faith or delivering a fire & brimstone revivalist sermon. This is a great performance by any standards, and I hope it leads him to more diverse roles.

I have deliberately not given away anything much of the story, which develops over the course of twelve episodes and by no means comes to a resolution at the end of the series. This is like Book One of an epic, and I am very sad that the show has come to an end after a mere two seasons, reportedly without a satisfying conclusion. Hopefully the show's creators can find a way to continue.

This show will probably drive some people nuts. It's extremely uncommercial in almost every way. It's pretty much sui generis and hard to classify (almost everyone compares to to Twin Peaks, but that's not really valid apart from both shows being basically unclassifiable). Every single character seems to have A Tragic Secret In Their Past, and most of them wander around being All Mysterious about it.

And it moves VERY slowly - pretty much the whole season is asking questions, and there are almost no answers. It's also morally ambiguous - there isn't a black or a white anywhere in the show, and it's hard to even tell which shade of grey any given character is. I love this; it's rare enough in books or movies, and pretty much unheard of on tv. Even something like The Shield lets you know which characters to root for (everyone is slime, but some are LIKEABLE slime).

I loved it. You might hate it, or at least go "Meh" (like I do with The Sopranos). You should definitely try it, though. Unless you're squeamish about a little gore and sex, though those are never overdone or gratuitous.

I see dead cellphones; Carnivàle

Either my cellphone or my charger died on Saturday. So if you've txted or called me in the last five days - sorry. (Most people seem to wait until my cellphone runs out of battery before txting it, so odds are I've missed something important.)

I watched season one of Carnivàle on dvd this week. It's totally f'ckin' wicked, man. I wanna write about it at more length, and will do when I have more time.

A point well made

Billy commented on a previous post:

"Everyone should see Desperate Living."

It's very true. Why don't you go watch it now?

Bastard notepad

Searching through a logfile for a keyword using the Find function, Notepad just told me that I "cannot find success".

BASTARD! I kill Microsoft now.

Another pet hate

Look, if smokers want to die slowly and painfully of lung cancer, that's up to them.

But do they HAVE to use the world as their ashtray?

If I were to drop a piece of paper on the ground, it's called littering. If a smoker were to drop their smelly cigarette butt on the ground, it's business as usual... not wait - it's ALSO LITTERING!

Filthy bastards. (This goes double for people who drop their chewed gum on the ground - at least the cigarette butts don't end up embedded in the sole of my shoe.)

You gross motherfuckers ought to be ashamed of yourselves. Why do you think there are all those friggin' ashtrays on rubbish bins?

I can see that I'm needed here...

...and lots of me, really soon.

ObSelfpitying Rant

Only having work dissatisfaction, home dissatisfaction, writing dissatisfaction, blog dissatistaction, and lovelife dissatisfaction, I thought I was doing OK.

I now have walking home from work dissatisfaction, perforated eardrum dissatisfaction and not being able to enjoy eating dissatisfaction.

I couldn't finish eating my lunch today, thanks to my swollen jaw.

It's just gone past the time I left work at yesterday. I don't get paid enough to be the last person here almost every single fucking day.

I don't even get sympathy at work 'cause my black eye is barely noticeable.

Also, I had to attend - and field endless questions at - a meeting that lasted an hour and a half, on the busiest day of the payroll fortnight, where everybody else was a visiting payroll admin - on the day I most need them to be back in their branches working on their end of the fucking payroll.

I'm going home to try and find something funny to watch on tv or dvd or whatever. Hopefully nobody decides to stomp my ass this time. Shit man, a five year old girl could beat me up if she wanted to.

WHY WON'T THIS FUCKING PAY PROCESS?!? Oh. That's why. Add "I am a fucking idiot dissatisfaction" to the list.

*sulks*

Disease/cure

I got a few pet hatreds to toss out. Here's the first.

Disease: People who say that something they don't like is "gay". (Admittedly I've never heard anyone older than 19 say this, but it really bugs me.)

Cure: Instead of "gay", say "a Jew". Say it OFTEN. Soon, either you will be cured of the "gay" meme, or the world will be cured of you being alive.

Random attack!

And I thought my day was going badly BEFORE I left work!

So there I was, two or three minutes' walk from home, thinking to myself "Gee, I didn't do a very good job of pying tribute to David Lange, I'm gonna write something better when I get home," when I walked past four lads going in the other direction. One split off from the others and started following me, making fake-ass sorta boxing moves and going, "Come on!"

Suddely I realised that the other three were right there as well, and the next thing I knew four guys were punching me in the head for no reason at all. All I could think was, "Holy fuck, I hope they don't steal/break my ipod!" which still strikes me as the last thing I should have been concerned about.

Then they stopped, turned, and walked casually away. (I meanwhile was walking in the other direction, a little quicker, thinking "Ow that hurt" and "What the fuck was that for?" and "Holy shit I better get out of here!" One of them yelled, "Get him on the ground!" I spun around, expecting further attacks, but they were already gone.

My lovely headphones ended up smashed to pieces - they still work sound-wise, but they're not going to fit onto my head again. One of my eyes is black, my jaw is FUCKEN sore due to a lump on the side of my face, and I feel slightly ashamed that I didn't even manage to throw a single punch. Otherwise I'm fine.

I think this is the first time anyone's thrown a serious punch at me in over a decade, never mind four guys all at once. It's all very exciting.

All I know for sure is:
1/ I'm never working late again, and
2/ the tribute to David is going to have to wait another day. Sorry big guy.

David Lange, R.I.P.

New Zealand's greatest leader has died. Norman Kirk was a better Prime Minister, but noone made us proud to be New Zealanders like David did.

Others had better policy, but no NZ PM had more oratorial skills, charisma or wit. One on one or addressing the world, he was the best.

Now go read this transcription of his famous Oxford Union debate.

Wanna be a character in a novel?

No, not in mine. Those characters aren't for sale.

A number of writers are auctioning off the chance to have a character named after you. Stephen King will only kill you if you're female; Peter Straub warns your character will be of dubious moral standing; it was apparently all Neil Gaiman's idea, and Michael Chabon organized it. All proceeds go to the Comic Book Legal Defence Fund.

The link.

Thanks to Karon for passing this on.

Hairway to Steven

I think I may have judged Led Zeppelin too harshly.

Not only did Page & Plant allow Dolly Parton to cover their most over-played song, but they gave her permission to write some new lyrics for it. Her Celtic-tinged bluegrass version of Stairway to Heaven is better than the original in every respect - the new lyrics are minor and only at the end of the song, but they subtly change everything.

I still think Zep is the second most over-rated band of all time though.

Quiet in here

I can't think of anything to say.

I've been thrashing Iron Flowers album ever since I bought it. It's my most-thrashed album since Die, Rugged Man, Die!

Fishing With John is the best tv show ever made. It took me 13 years to catch up with it, but it was worth it.

Re-reading The Grifters by Jim Thompson. It's my third time through, and I've seen the very faithful film adaptation twice. What a great book - what a great writer - what a huge downer. Small-time crooks fucking each other over, and dying a little inside all the time. Thompson was the greatest American pulp poet, and this is one of his best books.

God told me to skin you alive.

R.I.P. - Dan Rather.

Or possibly Peter Jennings. I could never tell them apart.

Do Godspeed You Black Emperor suck?

Just about everyone I know seems to be ga-ga over Godspeed You Black Emperor. Why is that?

I liked the track they put over the start of 28 Days Later, because it worked real well in the movie as a background for visuals. Otherwise, they seem to be ok mood music to have going in the background, but pretty boring to listen to.

So what's the appeal? What - specifically - do you like about them? I'd like to get into them 'cause I currently feel like I'm missing out on something, but I can't find anything to latch onto.

Forgot

What's any music review without a few snatches of ze lyrics?

Break my heart
The sweetest, ripest part
Break my heart
Fever stops where trouble starts
If you're looking for a fire darlin' let me be the spark
You look like a good way to break my heart
- The Bloody Bucket, Grey DeLisle

I used to be in a country band, and you know what? This album makes me miss it.

Iron Flowers - Grey DeLisle

Holy shit, this album fucking rocks!

This is a country album (or alt. country, whatever that is) by a young singer/songwriter who I'd never heard of before. Apparently this is about her fourth album. I'm going to have to track down the earlier ones now.

Many people would probably be put off by the fact that the first track on this album is a cover of Bohemian Rhapsody. Grey DeLisle does something unexpected with it: she treats it as a song, rather than as a kitsch icon. She completely leaves out the infamous middle section, and with her beautiful and refreshingly irony-free delivery she almost pulls it off. The song probably has too much cultural baggage to ever fully succeed (see also Dolly Parton's brilliant interpretation of Stairway To Heaven), but DeLisle comes breathtakingly close.

The rest of the album is all originals, and there isn't a weak track on the whole album. DeLisle moves fluently between several different styles without a single misstep. The whole thing is ten tracks running less than 45 minutes, which makes a nice change from the many recent albums which have run over 70 minutes with less than 30 minutes of good music.

Highlights include the gorgeous pop of Right Now, the hedonistic country of The Bloody Bucket, the loose garage rock of Blueheart, and the hard-hearted ballad Who Made You King.

Highly Recommended!

Vote National. Vote Nuclear-Unfree New Zealand

Fuck, I cannot believe that anyone who isn't a frothing at the mouth lunatic would vote for the idiot National Party at the moment. [comments relating to National members fellating US members deleted]

Government does stupid... again

Ecstasy & amphetamines re-classified

OK, I have little problem with re-classifying amphetamines. They're crap.

But if anyone can point me to real & reliable information (eg, not the study where they accidentally used amphetamines instead) which proves that ecstasy is dangerous, they'll win a prize. Something nice, for real.

Because no such proof exists, you see. BECAUSE IT ISN'T!!! Provided you keep yourself reasonably hydrated and don't mix it with other drugs (two things you need to keep in mind with a lot of prescription drugs), ecstacy is safe.

Medical evidence suggests that ecstasy may help reverse Parkinson's disease. OH NO! BAN IT HARDER! BAN ALL RESEARCH!

Here is where I talked about this a wee bit more rationally a while back.

Collect 'em all

Click the above image to learn where this childish urge came from.

Splatstick

FYI: Blockbusta Courtenay currently have a whole buncha cool horror dvds for $15 a pop, including several Dario Argento movies (Tenebre, Phantom of the Opera, Sleepless), Maniac, the interesting Australian vampire flick Thirst, etc.

Maniac is worth $15 just for the great doco The Joe Spinell Story (the movie's pretty good too). The Argento dvds are English only unfortunately, which makes Sleepless next to worthless (the dub is appalling) but Tenebre (aka Unsane) is well worth it, and all the Argento dvds come with a good hour-long doco. (Phantom is next to worthless in any language.)

Everybody SHAKE

This is the voice of the Mysterons.

We would like to do mooovie nights again.

We have got the technology. We have got the cult filmmakers. We have got the capacity to please the girls and the boys, the wimps and the hardcore.

We would like to know if anyone else is keen as beans.

We can be emailed at joeynarcotic at hotmail dot com.

(We've got Faster Pussycat! Kill! KILL! We know you want it. You know you want it. Ted, just admit it.)

This is for the kids!

There's a Clive Barker interview linked in this sentence where he talks about (among other things) his love for the new Dr. Who.

And, more importantly, he's writing horror again. Wahoo!

Oh yeah

I had a party, apparently. It was good. Sadly everyone went home kinda early, which was a shame 'cause it meant I didn't get to feed people like I'd planned to. I didn't mind too much, 'cause that meant we got to pig out on Sunday.

Then, at 3am or so, after everyone had left or gone to bed, James McM showed up! So I gave him some fun and sent his merry band on their way.

Next party is for Hallowe'en, and that means costumes. It also means turning our flat into some kind of beserk post-apocalyptic hideout.

Terra dei morti

I knew before going into Land of the Dead that it wouldn't live up to the original trilogy. I also knew that George Romero hadn't made a really good movie in a long time.

So I am pleased and VERY surprised to be able to say that Land of the Dead can stand proud with Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, & Day of the Dead, and that it's Romero's best movie in 20 years.

From the minimal details I had heard, I was worried that the movie would be "Mad Max vs. the Dead". It wasn't, though there were similar post apocalyptic ideas at times; the club run by the Little Fat Man was a bit Bartertown-ish, for example.

The political satire is as pungent as ever. Plenty of sarcastic laughter rang out when Dennis Hopper delivered a particular line of dialogue borrowed from Dubya. Thw whole movie can be read as an analogy for today's world situation, in much the same way the first three movies were for their own times.

And then there's the gore. Like some, I was worried about the replacement of Tom Savini with Greg Nicotero as gore-meister. It turned out fine, despite a few CGI blunders. Hiring Bernie Wrightson to work on design was a brilliant idea - his distinctive zombie-look is seen several times to excellent effect.

Asia Argento and John Leguizmo give career-best performances - which is lucky 'cause they're not particularly good actors usually. Dennis Hopper is fun, but didn't seem to be giving it his all. Whoever the main two guys were, they were fine. Pedro Miguel Arce as the huge Samoan soldier Pillsbury was the closest to an ethnic stereotype Romero has given us - I mean, the actor is Hispanic! - but makes up for it by being hilarious, despite his unconvincing accent.

The standout actor, however, was Eugene Clark as Big Daddy. Every Dead movie has a big black guy among the heroes; this time he's a wee bit different.

So yeah. Thematically it continues on directly from Day, with the zombies continuing to evolve. Politically it's one of the Movies Of Our Time, to be sure. And I can't discuss it further without mucho spoilage.

Go! Watch! Enjoy! *chomp*