Too Many Pazuzuzzzz

I'm sure that you think I sit here atop Mount Horror Blog, all exhausted from having seen every horror-flavored movie and read every horror-flavored book. I get it! Horror blogging is elite business, for 100% experts only. You can't just start a blog because you want to, it takes years of training and education. But here's the truth, dear reader: there's some stuff I haven't seen. There's some stuff I haven't read! For example, can you believe that I, in all of my 83 years on this planet, am only just reading William Peter Blatty's The Exorcist for the very first time? Much like me and a glass of Riunite on ice, the book is a bona fide classic...and yet here we are. Ah well, better late than never, there's a first time for everything, you're only as young as you feel, etc etc.

(aside: now I have "beautiful Mount Horror Blog!" stuck in my head to this tune)

Now then, my telling you all this isn't solely to brag that I do, in fact, know how to read. Nor is it to dazzle you with erudite insights like "Hey, The Exorcist is pretty good," oh no no. I'm telling you all this because the book got my brain all a-buzzin' with The Exorcist (duh) which got me watchin' the movie which got me thinking "Hey, there are way too many Pazuzus in The Exorcist Extended Director's Cut Version You've Never Seen."

The wholly terrifying subliminal demon face is used quite sparingly–and to great effect–in the original cut of the film. It scared me so badly that I really couldn't handle it. I hated it! It was great. Then along came The Version You've Never Seen and the floodgates were opened. Excised footage was unexcised, Friedkin got all George Lucas about it and added a bunch of stuff, like that awful Regan computer face when she grab's the doctor's junk. You know what I mean. It's bad. Heck, I'd just forever opt for the original cut, but I admit: I am a sucker for the spider walk. It's over-the-top and silly but I love it. So sue me.

Perhaps the worst, though, is that the latest editions of the film include a baker's dozen or more new subliminal demon faces. Let's face it (omg "FACE" it lol lol) once this shot happened...

...it was obvious that this was no longer your mama's Pazuzu. It's everywhere! And so it's really no longer scary. Less is more, more is way less.

On my most recent watch, though, I realized just how many Pazuzus are lurking. It is some Where's Waldo shit for real. Look at these screencaps!

Some of those aren't even subliminal! Yes, William Friedkin is a great director and a master of the craft and all that, but to be honest I don't know what he was thinking with all of this.

Day 2: ATM (2012)

The first time I read about ATM I thought "By golly, that sounds dopey." In the ensuing months, no one was talking about how it was surprisingly really great. No one has ever recommended that I watch it. So why, then, after a stellar SHOCKtober Day One would I opt for something that would likely be garbage at best? Because, you guys, I have been dying to see this. DYING TO I SAY. To me, ATM is the equivalent of, like, a 70 pound baby. A 70 pound baby?! No way! Where? I want to get a look at it. Oh. Huh, yeah, that's...that's a 70 pound baby all right. Look at it just lying there.

And so: a movie where people are forced to remain in an ATM kiosk and not let it drop below 50mph or else they will die?! This conceit is kept up through the whole film? No way! Where? I want to get a look at it.

I just...had to see how this would be done. I wanted to know how many times help would be right there, but oh no the killer is right behind you! Behind you! WHAT I CAN'T HEAR YOU! Behind you! Oh no, the help is dead! (SPOILER: that happens 1.5 times.) I wanted to know how many of them would decide FUCK IT and run for help and not make it for some reason, death or otherwise. (SPOILER: that happens 2 times.) I wanted to know how many times the situation would make stress levels rise SO HIGH that the little group would be on the verge of tearing itself apart. (SPOILER: that happens 1 time.) I simply had to see this 70 pound baby.

The action doesn't begin at the ATM, but rather in the high-rise offices of a banking firm. Yes, our protagonists are investment bankers! This really excited me because I can't think of anything I'd rather do than watch a movie about attractive, young, straight, white investment bankers. Okay, there's one thing I'd rather do, and that one thing is pound nails into my eyes. But just my luck, I'm all out of nails. That's a good thing, though, because it turns out that the three investment bankers are actually incredibly interesting:

• one is the douchey one; if you couldn't tell this by his pomaded hair, then you'd be able to tell by the way he talks about women and the way he insults men by comparing them to women because women are the worst
• one is the nice one, who feels bad about the way his job makes him sometimes, like, totally fuck over the working class by wiping out their savings
• one is a girl

So there you go, a truly diverse group. Anyway, the douchey one's insistently douchey behavior leads the three to an ATM kiosk at one in the morning and once inside...a menacing man in a parka shows up in the parking lot and he...menaces them. He kills an innocent bystander walking his dog nearby–honestly, the good doggie acting is probably the highlight of ATM–and so the investment bankers are like, if he killed that guy, he'll kill us, too! And thus they are forced to remain inside the little glass cube as the temperature drops and the man continues to menace them.

Who is the mysterious menace? Is he an investment customer who lost his life savings thanks to these assholes? Is he a random wackadoo? Is he the spirit of Occupy Wall Street manifesting in weather-appropriate gear like a vengeful manitou for the 99%? Late in the movie, The Girl philosophizes that it's just, like, fate, you know? How you make a million little decisions in your life only to end up menaced in an ATM kiosk in the wee hours. 

Yes, ATM really makes you think. All those little decisions you make in your life, only to end up watching ATM in the wee hours. And you may ask yourself...where does that highway go to? And you may ask yourself...am I right? Or am I wrong? And you may tell yourself...my God! What have I done?!

I suppose, however, that I was "entertained." I laughed frequently at the sheer ridiculousness of the entire thing, and I admit that I did want to see how it all turned out. I mean, you can't get mad at the 70 pound baby when you see it and it just lies there–what did you expect? And so I can't get mad at ATM for being as mind-bogglingly stupid as I figured it would be. You do you, ATM. You do you.

"I'm like...way scared right now."

Tomorrow's movie: Baby Blues (2013) - you had me at "sinister-looking doll"!

Juliette Cummins Week Day 2: CLICK: THE CALENDAR GIRL KILLER

There are two kinds of people in this workaday world of ours. Some people see "After Dark Thrillers" and run away as if the case itself is dripping with Ebola- it's eight "erotic thrillers" crammed onto two DVDs! It's under five bucks! They're all gonna be crap! Other people are like me, and perhaps like you, those who see "After Dark Thrillers" in a store and get positively giddy over it just reading the names dripping off of it like Ebola: Elizabeth Kaitan! Karen Black! David Naughton! Sybil Danning! Eight erotic thrillers for under five bucks? This is the greatest deal in the history of ever! Yeah, there's a warning light flashing somewhere in the back of your mind (these movies are going to be terrible you know they're terrible think of all the pizza you could buy with under five bucks, where am I going to get a lot of pizza for under five bucks, get it anywhere pizza is eight dollars, pizza hasn't been eight dollars in like twenty years what's wrong with you, well you could get Little Caesars I think that's still five bucks, eat Little Caesars are you nuts why don't I just eat Ebola) but when you see that Click: The Calendar Killer (1990) listed amongst the garbage, you give that warning light the bird and you go on your way. Didn't a friend tell you one time that Click was the best movie ever? You think maybe that happened, but you can't really remember. Oh well, it's only under five bucks.

Much later: is Click the best movie ever? Was it worth under five bucks? I just don't know, my friends, I just don't know. There's no denying it's an absolute shitshow, but then it  brings out so many feelings in a viewer. Generally these feelings alternate between "I'm going to marry this movie!" and "This movie is torture!" I've already hyped it up for people, letting them know that we must watch Click asap and forever because it's amazing. I know that as we partake, I will wonder why I ever wanted to see this movie again. Then it will end and I'll immediately want to start it over and show more people because wasn't it so great? The cycle will continue forever, and so are the days of our lives.

Although I am tempted to warn you away from this movie, we all know how this scenario plays out. You will see the screencaps herein, you will read about dazzling things like "models", "photo shoots", "explosions", and "Dollar Tree Norman Bates", and you will rush headlong into procuring a copy of Click: The Calendar Killer to clutch to your own bosoms. I won't blame you, for I understand you. I am you. Blessed be.

Look, I know Juliette Cummins is not mentioned on the cast list for this film and it's Juliette Cummins Week around these parts. What kind of bait-and-switch shit is this? I assure you, I am neither baiting nor switching! Cummins has a sizable role in this film (as "Rhonda"), but she's uncredited. As far as I've been able to figure out, it's due to union snafus- I mean, Click boasts two directors and six fucking screenwriters...there's no doubt the entire production was a clusterfuck of epic proportions. In fact, it's the last film she was in, save a cameo in the equally terrible Camp Fear. Click may have been agonizing enough an experience to drive her away from horror movies altogether!

Come on, let's profile the evidence Clarice Starling-style.

Throughout the entire affair she wears the pained, world-weary "I went to Julliard for this?" expression that sneaks right through the fourth wall sometimes, that awareness that completely betrays an actor's true feelings. Why, it's as if you can see her whole life pass right before her eyes! Now let's couple these moments with some of her dialogue, which is all the more delicious if you imagine she ad-libbed everything.

"I'm so frustrated from being here."

"Working for you is worse than getting raped."

"This is totally embarrassing."

"I'm gonna get out of here."

Case closed, Your Honor. This is the urban legend I have made up and I'm sticking to it! So, what kind of film could drive an actor completely out of bargain basement features and right into the lucrative, lovin' arms of commercials? Let's dig our acrylic talons into Click's naugahyde and find out!

Click begins with a photo shoot. There are a lot of photo shoots in Click, and they are all pretty much the same. They feature a plain background (save the light fixtures, of course!), a fog machine, and a model- in a bikini or an industrial strength Playtex bra- posing listlessly with a weapon or power tool. The same "funky" synth music plays every time. Your life becomes a möbius strip that comprises these images. As they flicker endlessly before your eyes, it seems that the cycle will continue forever, that Click might break you, too. And so are the days of our lives.

What I mean is, Click might break you with its awesomeness! Come on, there is nothing not to love here. Oblivious to how horrid these photographs will undoubtedly be, Jack (co-writer/co-director Ross Hagen) snaps away, providing direction to the models, such as "Put some shit in it, man!"

Oh, they do, Jack. They do.

Intermittently we get flashbacks to someone's childhood, wherein a young boy cries as he's berated by a mean nurse for the crimes of 1) existing and 2) sneaking a peek at a nudie mag. It seems his mother is dead and the nurse is his caretaker...? Eh, it's not really explained. All we really need to take away from this is that the mystery boy's torturous past has led to a murderous present as he shaves a leather recliner his chest and dons a wig and nurse's uniform.

Hold on, let me amend that: we assume it's a murderous present because it takes forfuckingever for the Calendar Girl Killer to actually kill a calendar girl. What happens in the meantime? Models and clingy boyfriends hang out at a ranch. There's a moment where one Friday the 13th alum (Part VII's Susan Jennifer Sullivan) clamjams another (Cummins) just for the fun of it, so that's something.

There are more photo shoots, each more extreme to the extreme than the last. Jack is interested in the intersection of sex and violence, you see. I'm pretty sure that's what's going on, but then I don't get art, so.

There are a bunch of red herrings running around, even though as I said no one dies for the longest time. But Click really wants us to ask: who is dressing up as the weirdo nurse? Is it...

Jack's assistant?

A model's hot-headed boyfriend?

This guy, who has a camera?

Or Jack, who is clearly the one behind the mask?

Why surprise, it's Jack! Shit finally gets real an hour in when Rhonda puts on lipstick and then takes a bath. As you do.

Are you feeling the terror yet?

There are a few more killings, and while there are certainly no Tom Savini-level effects going on (shit, there are no Halloween Store-level effects going on!) at least they're varied. I mean, Nursie busts out a blow gun. That's not nothin'! Neither is the epileptic seizure you may have during the murder sequence where a strobe light flashes for five minutes.

Lemme tell you, once Jack is revealed to be the Dollar Tree Norman Bates, Click goes off the rails into Crazytown like nobody's business. He chases the few remaining survivors around the grounds of the ranch, yelling his totally psychotic (he's crazy, you know) nursery rhymes, such as "Jack be nimble, Jack be quick...I'll burn your balls off with my candlestick!"

He shoots a flare gun that somehow fires grenades? And there's a minefield? Look, the details are sketchy and it makes no sense, but know this: there are 27 explosions in the span of seven minutes. It's like a Michael Bay wet dream, I'm telling you!

Eventually Jack grabs the Last Model Alive and ties her to a giant cross for some reason. Her hot-headed boyfriend saves her, and Jack dies in a fire. Like everything else that came before, it makes no sense whatsoever.

See what I mean? Click is the best movie ever, how can you not love it?

Okay, yeah, it's terrible. There are long stretches of nothingness punctuated by fleeting moments of glory. Why, I haven't even mentioned the big-haired all-girl metal band that plays at a party early on!

But as there are two kinds of people in the world, so are there two kinds of slasher movies. In one corner, you've got the likes of  John Carpenter's Halloween. In that film, there's a moment when we think the killer is dead...but he slowly, silently sits up. The iconic, chilling score kicks in as he steps ever closer to his oblivious prey without making a sound. It's one of the most frightening scenes in movie history.

In the other corner, you've got Click: The Calendar Girl Killer. In that film, there's a moment when we think the killer is dead...but then he simply appears in the next shot and says "I'm fine!" to his would-be victims.

Where oh where shall the twain meet? They meet in us, dear reader. They meet in us.

like a big CGI ham and cheese sandwich

"Stay away from it," they said. "It's awful," they said. "You'll regret it!" they said. I ignored every one of 'em. These crazy townspeople held eyeballs all up in my face and warned of impending doom. Just like a horny teenager, I said "Ew, gross, shut up" and went about my beeswax.

Mind you, my beeswax was not a weekend getaway at an abandoned summer camp, no! My beeswax was a viewing of Dario Argento's Dracula, which may not have damaged my person, but it certainly damaged my psyche. Because it's terrible. I should have heeded the warnings! But alas, as the boss of this blog, there are times I have to do some unpleasant things all in the name of science. Just like a horny teenager.

Aw heck, I'm being too hard on it. Sure, it was terrible, but not as terrible as I was expecting. Like, you know, when you go to the doctor and you think the prognosis will be "double amputation" but you walk hop out of there with one leg still intact. Better than you thought it'd be. But still awful.

WAIT. Oh no...already, I feel it happening. Yes...Dracula is becoming Rumplestilskinized! What does that mean? If you don't know, here's something I wrote about that shitshow Rumplestiltskin:

Rumplestiltskin is pretty much the worst movie ever. Somehow, though, if you talk about it enough with your friends, in your mind it becomes the best movie ever and you're struck with a fiery urge to watch it again right this very second. So you watch it and remember how much it sucks...but then, as soon as it's over, you're talking about how great it was and you want to watch it...and so on, ad infinitum.

I'm sitting here thinking about all the ridiculous things that happen in Dracula- and lawd, there are so many- and while it was painful to sit through at the time, now it all seems to add up to the most delightful romper that ever romped a room. Brain, this is a dangerous path you walk. "How could anyone not love Argento's Dracula?" should not become your new battle cry. And yet...

please don't laugh at me, ladies, my brain does whatever it wants

Somewhere in a tiny village in the Carpathians, a busty young lass gets her young bust out for a married fellow. After they do the sex, the busty young lass insists on being walked home- the woods at night are scary, after all- but married fellow refuses. The busty young lass walks home alone and, sadly, she is totally right about the dangers lurking in those scary woods. Before long she's attacked by...a CGI owl! But this is not a SyFy movie about killer CGI owls- this is just one of the many clever disguises of Count Dracula (Thomas Kretschmann). This should not be a surprise, for his name is right there in the movie's title. Anyway, Dracula bites the busty young lass to undeath.

Enter one young Jonathan Harker (Unax Ugalde, which sounds like the name of a villain the Uncanny X-Men would have fought in an issue from 1964), come to Castle Dracula to organize the Count's library, I guess? Which is weird, since the giant alphabet letters over each section implies that the library is already somewhat organized. Regardless, before you can say "Huh. And here I thought that Keanu Reeves would go down in history as the worst Jonathan Harker", the poor young man is set upon by the busty young lass (now a busty young Bride of Dracula) and Dracula himself.

Mina Harker (Marta Gastini) has come to town looking for her husband, and from here you know how the old story goes: Mina's pal Lucy (Asia Argento) takes ill after some bitey-bitey visits from Dracula, Van Helsing shows up to poop on the Count's party, Dracula becomes obsessed with Mina, et cetera, the end. Argento strays from the standard story enough to keep things interesting (SPOILER: poor old Jonathan doesn't make it), but most of all he takes this old recipe and douses it liberally in gallons upon gallons of pure, unadulterated fuckery.

It begins with Claudio Simonetti's score. Now, Simonetti and his Goblin bandmates have teamed with Argento in the past to create some of the most memorable sight + sound assaults in cinema (come on now). In Dracula, he brings some theremin-heavy, Creature Double Feature ooooEEEEEooooo realness, and it's so over-the-top YOU'RE IN DRACULA'S CASTLE corny that one cannot discern whether or not any of this affair should be taken seriously.

The performances only add to the mystery. Everyone either hams it up or barely registers a pulse- and I'm not just talking about the undead. Poor Rutger Hauer coasts through every scene in a mumbly daze, as if the shooting schedule falls right in the middle of naptime. Though she, too, is capable of better, Asia phones in her performance as Lucy, slurring nigh-unintelligibly and dutifully getting (unerotically) naked for her father's camera lens. Then again, she's also supposedly said "I tend to be a lazy actress, unless I'm pushed. Most of the time nothing much is required of directors, which is a pity." Who knows where the blame for her deadpan Lucy lies?

At least she shows some spark after Lucy is transformed into the Bloofer Lady. She seems to have a (great) cheesy old time in her fifteen seconds as a vampire, chewing the scenery, high-kicking crosses out of pious hands, and hissing. So much hissing in Dracula! Here's a little gallery; if you scroll quickly and hiss every time you get to a new picture, it'll be just like watching the film:

My favorite part of the movie? When Jonathan Harker looks out his window and spots a teeny-tiny CGI Dracula scaling the far wall of his castle...teeny-tiny CGI Dracula stops, looks back at Harker, hisses (softly! for he is so far away) and keeps on a-climbin'. Honestly, that was worth the rental price alone.

Yes, CGI owls, CGI teeny-tiny Draculas...this movie is nearly all CGI. That'd be bad enough on principle alone, but folks, we're talking about commercial for DeVry Institute's computer program-level graphics here. The generated effects are so blatant and awful, you'll either get angry or laugh hysterically- but either way you'll wonder how in the hell this happened and how in the hell Dracula is a Dario Argento film.

Let's face it- plot and acting have always been on the backburner in Argento films. Maybe sometimes his movies make sense, but generally it's the look and feel that set his work apart and have made the director Horror Movie Royalty. Is it a case of "Oh no, how far has Argento fallen?", or more "Would Suspiria have looked like this if CGI were rampant in 1977?" Likely, it's a combination of the two. There's no denying that the man can craft an exquisite scene, so maybe his heart simply isn't in it anymore. But there's also no denying that the advent of CGI has made things "easier" for filmmakers, allowing them to save both money and time by making all the magic happen with a keyboard instead of spirit gum, karo syrup, and latex. The problem is, that "magic" is very very rarely up to snuff, particularly in Dracula. It's disheartening as an Argento fan- hell, as a movie fan- to see something as simple as a bleeding cut on a character's arm done with poorly rendered computer graphics. It feels lazy, and dammit, you know he can do better.

If there's one saving grace in Dracula, it's a scene where the Count quickly dispatches a room full of townsfolk who no longer want to do his bidding. It's a crazy whirlwind of blood and violence, and the effects feel...practical. After being bludgeoned with CGI that feels straight outta 1995, it's a welcome relief to see something real. Well, relatively speaking and all.

I truly think there's some fun to be had with this cinematic abomination. I mean, I haven't even mentioned the scene where Dracula turns into a man-sized praying mantis (no one knows why that happens except Dario Argento and whatever god he worships) or the fact that if you took a shot every time you see dangling strings of garlic you'd be drunk five minutes in. Wait, why was I complaining about dodgy, over-used effects, atrocious dialogue, and terrible acting? What am I saying? A man-sized praying mantis...Dracula is the best movie ever!

Dammit...there goes my brain again.