My name is Lauren. I dropped out of graduate school to write for a living and co-own an online boutique. I like scary things, pretty things, and geeky things. I'm not really always right. (More)
Posted by Lauren | Under Horror, Movies, Reviews with 1,471 views
Sunday Nov 1, 2009
I love horror movies as much as anyone with a strong appetite for cinematic blood, guts, and gore, but there are horror movie sub-genres I don’t touch unless I absolutely have to. These are supernatural movies and Asian horror flicks with ghosts and shit. To me, these movies take the fun away from horror because I get genuinely scared. My vivid imagination doesn’t make it any easier; I remember the most frightening movie scenes the moment I start nodding off to sleep. To recover from a supernatural horror movie, I have to go to bed with the lights on for a week.
To celebrate Halloween, I invited the Hohobags over for candy, alcohol, and horror movies last night. I thought we’d never get to the movie part of the night, but we eventually stopped talking and got around to watching Paranormal Activity, which was followed shortly by Clueless so we could fall asleep to pretty thoughts of pink fur and plaid. (Am I the only one here who’s weirded out by Clueless‘ incestuous plot twist? How come I didn’t spot this when I was in fifth grade? Whatever happened to Alicia Silverstone anyway? And why does my boyfriend withhold his affection every time young Jeremy Sisto comes on screen?) Without looking at the synopsis, I knew I’d probably have trouble sleeping for the next couple of days.
Posted by Lauren | Under Horror, Movies, Reviews with 958 views
Monday Sep 14, 2009
A couple of weeks ago, I complained about the serious lack of censorship-free horror movie viewing in this country, but little did I know that Phil Dy was awesome enough to show Antichrist all week at Mogwai. Thank God for (free) independent film theaters! I have been waiting to see this movie since I read an article about how its disturbing imagery made people at walk out of it at Cannes. But now that I’ve actually seen the film, I’m not entirely sure what to think.
Let me begin by saying that Antichrist the kind of movie that invites pretentious readings. If you really want to take it apart and talk to your friends about it, you’re going to end up sounding like a douchey, know-it-all critic. Antichrist is very heavy on the imagery, and there’s no other way to talk about the movie without the risk of reading too much into it. The film opens with a couple deep in the throes of lovemaking, completely oblivious to their young son who was slowly crawling his way out their apartment window. (The opening sequence actually had a shot of penis-vagina penetration, woot!) After their son dies, the wife experiences severe depression, which her therapist husband tries to help her recover from. He suggests that they retreat into a cabin deep in the woods so she could overcome the fears and anxieties triggered by their son’s death.
From this point onwards, it’s hard to say what happens next without revealing important (and complicated) details, and without inserting your own interpretation of the events. Let’s just say that after a while, the wife goes batshit insane and some very graphic genital mutilation occurs.
Posted by Lauren | Under Movies, Reviews with 4,924 views
Thursday Nov 27, 2008
When I discovered that Dante Nico Garcia’s Ploningwould be the official Philippine entry for the Best Foreign Film category of the 81st Academy Awards, I felt iffy about the whole idea of sending any Filipino movies to the Oscars in general. I’m no expert on Philippine cinema but the way I see it, movies designed to be commercially successful among foreign audiences have to be one of two things: either it will show nothing but exaggerated “squalor squalor squalor” (to quote Dr. J Neil Garcia) or it will show the Philippines as a tropical island paradise minus the depressing reality of squalor squalor squalor.
On the one hand, it can be argued that, yes, squalor squalor squalor is the way the rest of the world should see us because the reality of poverty is difficult to ignore. While I do believe that those who see the Philippines (either through movies or an actual visit) should also get a glimpse of the indescribable poverty plaguing the country, a movie that lingers too long on the poverty angle would be the socio-political equivalent of a horror movie. Except instead of zombies we have street children, lepers ten families in a shack, all producing the same shock and horror effect on the audience. It’s bad enough that they get to live under inhuman conditions; now we have to fetishize them and turn them into a freak show too.
On the other hand, you can also say, “Why must we be so negative when our country is so beautiful despite the poverty and exploitation? Let’s get away from all this negativity and show the rest of the world how rich we are in natural resources!” So local and foreign audiences get bombarded with postcard-perfect after postcard-perfect image of our beaches, mountain ranges, and rainforests (jungles?). And we get so bedazzled by all that beauty that we forget to ask ourselves crucial questions about audience, perspective, and intention. Who are the people who get to enjoy the beauty of the Philippines? Is it the Filipinos who live in those postcard-perfect areas, the Filipinos who eventually end up being employees of resorts? The Filipinos from the Manila who can afford to enjoy them? The foreigners who come to the Philipipnes to enjoy not just the country’s beauty but the Filipino/as themselves? When showing these images, who are we really making the country look so beautiful for? And for what purpose?
I bring this up because Ploning is one of those impressive, picture-perfect movies that could easily mislead audiences into thinking that life in the Philippines is quaint, easy, and peaceful. The cinematography was so well done that if you paused the movie at any point, the frozen picture would have look gorgeous on your living room wall. Based on the visuals alone, I could easily see why any Filipino would be proud to show Ploning to a foreign audience (hey look, we’re not all about squalor here!).
