FINAL GIRL explores the slasher flicks of the '70s and '80s...and all the other horror movies I feel like talking about, too. This is life on the EDGE, so beware yon spoilers!

Mar 5, 2008

things about which to talk

From the other people write better than I do department:

The inimitable Kim Morgan has written a piece over at MSN detailing why Nosferatu is her favorite vampire. Sayeth La Morgan:
Poetic, horrifying and innovative compositions, atmospheric evil and the transformative powers of an actor appearing as walking death can chill our bones equally, if not more — particularly in the hands of a master. Such is the power of Murnau’s expressionistic silent-screen classic “Nosferatu,” a milestone in vampire cinema and a movie so creepy that its images linger in your mind long after you’ve soaked in its sinister magic.
It's a wonderful piece, and frankly it makes me feel as if I wrote nothing more than "Him are scary doy doy pointy!" back when I wrote about das vampyre back in October. Morgan's piece is part of some MSN Cadillac promotion or something or other where people are supposed to vote for their favorite onscreen bloodsucker; read about fellow nominees Near Dark and Spanish-language Dracula, then go vote and discuss. What, no Christopher Lee? Feh.

Oh, and buy a Cadillac! Nosferatu commands you!


From the you knew it had to happen department:

Man, right after posted my Michael Bay remakes and the subsequent punching of kittens poll comes news that Bay's Platinum Dunes is remaking Rosemary's Baby. JA's got the scoop over at My New Plaid Pants, and he's gone sufficiently apoplectic enough for the both of us. It's obvious that the world of horror movies is becoming one giant mobius strip, where every film is going to be remade and remade until the end of time; I can't really care any more. The remakes may or may not suck, as can be said about the originals. The new will not detract from my love of the old. I do like to note the differences between the version, however- such as with the upcoming April Fool's Day remake, which seems to bear no resemblance to the original- and marvel at the studio reasoning that dictates "Changing the content completely but keeping the title and calling it a 'remake' is way better than creating something entirely new", because that makes absolutely no sense to me. It's also a sort of masochistic fun to see how many corpses Platinum Dunes will desecrate.

From the see you next Tuesday department:

The PS2 version of Silent Hill: Origins hits streets today. I traded in enough old crappy games to get it for free, so SH:O and I are going to spend a little quality time together. Gawd, I hope it likes me back...I made it a mixtape!


From the gratuitous Flo department:

34 comments:

Fox said...

I can't help but be curious... if you WERE to make a mixtape for *Silent Hill:Origins* (and shoot, maybe you actually DID!), what would be on it???

Unknown said...

Silent Hill: Origins?!
I didn't even know this was coming out.

Theron said...

I can't wait for the scene where the Satanists are chasing Rosemary down the freeway in a Mack truck and it crashes in to a gas truck and goes up in a ball of fire...you know, just like in Polanski's version.

Stacie Ponder said...

"Silent Hill: Origins?!
I didn't even know this was coming out."

Aye. It appeared somewhat recently on the PSP and I lamented because I do not have a PSP. Then...voila! In answer to my prayers, it was ported to the PS2. Reviews have been mixed, but I do not care. Silent Hill and I will someday be married, no matter what everyone says!

Fox, let's just say that it includes both "Superstar" by The Carpenters and "Work It" by Missy Elliott.

Stacie Ponder said...

By the way, I may start a band just so I can call it Gratuitous Flo.

spazmo said...

I'm sure an Evil Dead remake is just around the corner.

Only instead of invisible demons, it'll feature long-haired Japanese girls with CGI tentacles. And instead of an isolated cabin, the action will center around a haunted strip mall, and instead of college students, the characters will be rappers wearing shades and trenchcoats.

Oh, and instead of watching the Evild Dead remake, I'll be doing some laundry.

Other than that, the experience will be totally faithful to the original.

Arbogast said...

An Evil Dead remake has been in the works for a couple of years now. I have no objection, actually.

Totally awesome word verification for this post: "otnot."

Arbogast said...

I may start a band just so I can call it Gratuitous Flo.

Then I call dibs on Scary Doy Doy Pointy.

Anonymous said...

Gratuitous Flo & the Melvins?
Gratuitous Flo & the Dingy Chicks?
Gratuitous Flo & the Grits?
Gratuitous Flo & the Sharples?
Gratuitous Flo & the New Girls in Town?

JB said...

Hi Final Girl.

Bay does Baby? Jesus. Of course the real source of fear and trembling in Polanski's masterpiece will likely elude the mindless remakers. Satan was just the comic relief. The scary part of the movie was the neighbors, or more specifically Gorgeous Ruth Gordon.

Yrs,
JB

SikeChick said...

While I'm still smarting over that Halloween debacle Rob Zombie hoisted onto the masses, I'm starting to get over the remake thing. Slooooooowly.

It occurred to me this weekend when watching John Carpenter's The Thing again. I have to wonder how many people were super-pissed back in 1981 when they learned that was being remade. I mean, Carpenter admitted to being a fanboy of the original, much like Zombie talked about the beauty of Carpenter's classic Halloween. Wouldn't people of Carpenter's generation have been appalled to learn that this so-called fan was trying to improve on what they considered a classic? (Granted, I think he did improve on it.)

There are also the classics like Dracula and Frankenstein which have been redone and reimagined to death over the years. Think of life without the Hammer versions of those films. *shudder*

While the seeming lack of originality is verging on unbearable, the movie industry is still pretty young (considering, you know, human existance). It makes some sense that Hollywood would want to reinterpret old stuff for new generations.

Jason Adams said...

I'll watch it if they get Mia Farrow to play Minnie Castavet.

KISS MY GRITS!

spazmo said...

I get what you're saying, sikechick, but Carpenter's Thing had several factors in its favor in terms of viability for remake-material.

Firstly, the restrictive Hays codes had been abandoned, allowing for vast changes in the type of content that could be shown. Another big factor was the dramatic evolution of special effects (particularly in animatronics). Carpenter was also free to cast whomever he liked - the old studio system would have demanded some big-name stars (not to mention at least one woman).

Finally, Carpenter had a vision of the Thing being a major theatrical headliner, given how audiences' tremendous appetites for sci-fi and horror had become so evident, while the original (while cleverly done) was still very much released as B-movie fare.

These are just a few of the reasons why the Thing remake was a good idea. I can't think of any similar justifications that could apply to the ongoing bastardization of modern genre films. It's just creative laziness, pure and simple.

Anonymous said...

OMGOMGOMG!!!

Thank goodness spring break starts soon. I've been trying to get a friend of mine to mail me his PSP so I can play SH:O but now I don't have to! I own a PS2! I'm watching "Wonder Woman" on it right now!

Anonymous said...

Dear Michael Bay,

FUCKING STOP IT!!!!

Sincerely,
The entire world

Snarf said...

I got Silent Hill Origins for my psp, but that a whole ball rolling, and now I'm obsessing about playing ALL the silent hill games cronologicly. So I recently started playing the first Silent Hill game, and so far it's good. I had just forgotten about it 'till you mentioned it... so tonight I'm going in again!

(oh and dammit, I missed The Nanny in the cinema here in Copenhagen, but this month they are showing what I now consider the best movie in the world : Gummo. That movie is in a gigantic staring contest with my entire horror-dvd collection, and after several weeks, none of them has blinked yet...)

Unknown said...

Remakes can be fun if they play about with the originals theme.
For example if Micheal Bay Did "The Birds" something like this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLToN2pjik8

All would be forgiven!

Tim Bird said...

Seems to me the main reason (besides money) to do a remake in the first place is to be able to add something unique to the original. What could possibly be added to Polanski's masterpiece to make it creepier? CGI effects? I just don't understand.

Oh and...

Gratuitous Flo & the Gynecologists

Anonymous said...

Maybe someone here can help me, is there a chronology to the Silent Hill games other than their release order.
Obviously, this new "Origins" (which I didn't hear anything aboot either) would be the first one, but where from there?

Anonymous said...

KISS MAH GRITS!!!!

Yeah, that's what I'd say to Michael Bay about this whole mess.

I'm still wanting Edgar Wright to get hired as the director for that "Phantom of the Paradise" remake Fox has up their sleeve...although they also said they were doing "Race with the Devil"...

Nah, just give me Noel Fielding looking like he came out of a Visual Kei band with his comedy partner Julian Barratt as a sinister Simon Cowell-type producer who are in love with Kristen Bell as an innocent loli-type singer who has affections for Jonathan Rhys Meyers as the only normal male lead in this film.

(Hmm, I think you might have no idea what I'm talking about by now...)

Stacie Ponder said...

Gratuitous Flo & the Grits FTW!

2ndSuitor: Origins is sort of "Silent Hill Zero", so I'd start there. SH3 is the proper sequel to SH1, so you could go SH:O, SH, SH3, SH2, SH4.

I'm really digging Origins...I've been trying my best not to have massive marathon sessions so it'll last. There are a few gameplay issues- I think because it was born on the PSP- but it's nice and creepy. The nurses have gone back to being massively frightening!

I think we all know what the biggest change in the Rosemary's Baby remake will be.

"What have you done to his eyes, you maniacs??"

Now we'll finally get to see the baby's eyes, and they'll be made out of computer! I mean, the original film is just so lacking...why don't they show the damn eyes, you know??

Unknown said...

"Now we'll finally get to see the baby's eyes, and they'll be made out of computer!"

Great sentence.

Anonymous said...

A remake of Rosemary's Baby. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong!

Hey, why not remake a kinda crappy film into something fantastic. Frankenstein '72 certainly comes to mind. Hell, Day of the Triffids would be fantastic these days! Don't like the British, how about a remake of Them. Replace the atomic bomb for genetic manipulating and now it's relevant today.

Remember when they released The Blob back in the 80's? Pretty much the same film...except for that whole it was the humans that were the cause of it. Oh, and lots of gore. Not a great remake but one that at least tried to be relevant. Somebody could do it again and it would work (you know, if at first you don't succeed...)

Those are four ideas off the top of my head that are a hell of a lot better to remake than to take a great movie and decide that some other director can do it better.

Anonymous said...

Your blog rocks.

Tim Bird said...

Why not remake the made for TV mid-70's sequel "What Ever Happened To Rosemary's Baby?" Not having seen it since it originally aired, I don't remember much but a vague sense of lost potential and disappointment.

What I do remember is a twenty-something-hippie-looking-all-grown-up baby living in the desert with satanists, Patty Duke, muscle-cars, prostitutes, haunted buses, Ray Milland, nurses, disco dancing and Donna Mills.

It really could've been something special.

John Barleycorn said...

I've decided I like remakes. I'm going to make a list of movies that should be remade.

Stacie Ponder said...

Repo, why are you being so damn logical? Just because there are countless mediocre-to-shitty movies out there crying for a remake, films that could actually be improved upon...I mean, why bother with those when the classics can be done to much lesser effect?

a guy, big thanks to you and your mac!

Tim Bird, I'm ashamed to say I've never seen that flick, but the way you describe it, I have a hard time believing it's not the best movie ever. Patty Duke AND Donna Mills AND satanists? Sign me the fuck up!

Oh Mr Barleycorn, always the contrarian.

John Barleycorn said...

You just hate me because I'm right all the time.

Stacie Ponder said...

"You just hate me because I'm right all the time."

Well, that and because you're beautiful.

Arbogast said...

Plus, you taste so goddamn good.

Anonymous said...

Stream-of-consciousness meanderings:

(Mis)Reading jb's comment made me wonder:
There's a band name:
Bay Does Baby Jesus.
Although, a movie called MICHAEL BAY DOES BABY JESUS sounds like one of those anthology films that occasionally come out-- you know, they pick a theme and then pick a bunch of noted(ish) directors to make a short film on that theme, like they did some time back about 9/11 and more recently about Paris.
The sentence fragment also reminds me of a beloved anecdote that my wife likes to tell every now and then. She teaches juniors and seniors honors and AP English at a catholic high school and occasionally, she'll get involved in a discussion with them that may or may not be appropriate for a variety of reasons.
Like the time some students were calling each other "gay" and my wife called them on it in an effort to stop them from using the word "gay" as a generic derogatory term, and then one student, a noted wise ass, said to my wife (who has a PhD): " But Dr. _______, anal butt sex makes baby Jesus cry," to which my wife replied, "Well, that's because he's so small."

Cripes!
If only Michael Bay bought the rights to one of those 50 movie pack budget DVD sets that they sell. Hell, they're public domain, already, aren't they? From WEREWOLF IN A GIRLS' DORMITORY to JESSE JAMES MEETS FRANKENSTEIN'S DAUGHTER, there's a whole bonanza of remake fodder awaiting therein!
Okay, I think TRACK OF THE MOONBEAST is part of these collections, too, so there may still be room for some sentimental toes to be stepped on...
But still!

Arbogast said...

Hell, vacuum cleaners make babies cry, but are we going to stop vacuuming? No. Because then the Devil would win.

James Laidler said...

I love the poster with the fingers. Me and my friends used to do that when we were younger pretending to be vampire slayers.

Silent Hill Origins isn't out here yet, I went to go and check because of you and you LET ME DOWN.

Tim Bird said...

Correction: The title of the sequel was actually "Look What's Happened to Rosemary's Baby". After not being able to find anyone I know who've seen it I was begining to think I made it up. I was able to find it here:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074815/

Looks like my memory was pretty much right on the money. Broadcast on ABC in 1976. Now I have to see if I can find it on DVD.