The Last Exorcism

I've always been a big fan of Exorcism films. Even though I count myself among the ranks of non-believers, I am keenly aware of the profound dramatic power of a good Vs. evil yarn done right. To get comparisons to the Friedkin classic out of the way up front, I would say stacked up next to each other, The Exorcist and The Last Exorcism might resemble a side by side look at a Bengalese Tiger and a common house cat. That is to say, they share some of the same primordial traits, but aren't really the same species.

The Last Exorcism is competent enough and boasts a couple of truly nerve wracking sequences that make good use of the camcorder verite format, but ultimately, it's that manner of presentation that proves its undoing. There is a visceral thrill that can be captured by this trendy approach to storytelling, but as it is employed again and again and ad nauseum applied to every single sub genre of horror, it's becoming clear how short sighted and gimmicky it truly is. I see how the facebook/youtube generation is seemingly fascinated by it and I understand that. You're talking about a demographic that values immediacy of content delivery over purity of craft. These are kids who are willing to watch Avatar on a 2-inch cellphone screen, so what do they care if minor things like shot composition, visual metaphor and sound design are sacrificed in favor of ready made stinger images to punctuate television advertisements? Of course I'm not suggesting that ALL of today's youth has such a narrow view of film and that all "first person" films are devoid of subtext or lasting relevance, I'm just saying 90% of the kids going to see this are going to be on their phone though most of the movie. Make of that what you will.

The thing I like about Demon possession films is the battle over faith and The Last Exorcism admittedly has a novel approach to the antagonists struggle. He's lost his faith in some respects, but is still a good man who wants to help people. He's not some alcoholic sitting in the dark nurturing a grudge against his absent creator. He's an imminently likable fellow who wants to do right by his family and perhaps do some good within the confines of a profession he's naturally gifted at. The film also strums some unique chords concerning the schism between tolerating backwards, fundamental belief systems and when action must be taken to protect the powerless trapped in that situation. So there's some strong performances and some genuinely interesting theological gristle to chew on and the film definitely needs to be commended for that.

The problem is that it lacks the courage of its convictions. It sets up a host of well developed characters and when it comes time to bring the hammer down on them with all the histrionic terror and tragedy duelling with the Devil entails, it blinks. It steps back from the brink of being a powerful, thought provoking exploration of faith (which is the heart of why Exorcism films are so compelling) with a hard left turn into silliness courtesy of a telegraphed plot twist that not only strains credulity and rips off a film as shitty and forgettable as The Reaping, it ultimately derails all point or purpose the preceding 90 minutes had.

Which brings me to the ending and the fatal flaw of films of this ilk. The jagged cut is not an ending make. I can no longer abide a movie ending with the narrator/protagonist being quickly killed in an jostling of activity, then a static shot of the ground. It's become such a predictable joke since it was first done in the execrable Blair Witch Project. It's ironic that the only thing that worked in that putrid student film was the chilling ending, and it hasn't meant anything or been nearly as successful in the subsequent 10 years of imitation. When you end a film like that, it invalidates all that happened before it and disregards the emotional investment of the audience. In the case of the Last Exorcism, that tawdry conclusion, coupled with the jarring tonal shift of the tacked-on third act makes for a one-two K.O. punch.

I don't outright hate this film or anything, it tried real hard to tell its little story and had honorable intentions toward its intended audience. It just was too underwhelming, too flaccid and too of its time to be anything other than a missed opportunity. Better luck next time Daniel Stamm. Get yourself a tripod and try not to wimp out when its time to focus on the horrific aspects of your horror film.

The Blood of cowards

In the last couple of weeks, I've revisited what I believe to be the 2 most important American films of the new millennium. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and There Will Be Blood. Both films paint a picture of America at the turn of the 20th century and portray its neurotic adolescence as a nation through central characters making soul destroying decisions that irrevocably alter the course of their lives, and by sub textual extent, the destiny of the country that birthed them.

There Will Be Blood (TWBB henceforth) is a towering achievement in individualistic film making. I've never been much of a Paul Thomas Anderson fan frankly. I found Boogie Nights to be exhausting and unnecessarily slimy. An ugly story not worth telling. Punch Drunk Love was well shot and made amusing use of Sandler's volatile man child-persona, but ultimately felt like a minor, floundering work. Never seen Hard Eight and everything I've ever read about Magnolia has made me run in the opposite direction. Point being, all of that was mere prelude to the startlingly assured becoming PTA underwent crafting TWBB. It's a film of undiluted vision, free from committee tampering and popular concession. In the hands of lesser film makers, that's a recipe for flailing indulgence, but TWBB manages to miraculously be about a million things. It understates its case and overstates its rage. Like the North American man's understanding of God and his terrestrial proxy the father figure, it is distant, vengeful, spiteful, self loathing, greedy and entirely full of itself.

Plainview and Eli are two sides of the same coin. Two men who want power and wealth and are willing to put on an act to attain it. The difference between them is Eli, the preacher, the "spiritual" man, wants his fame and wealth to lead to a prominent place among his fellow man, glad handing and accessible to all. Plainview, the unrepentant capitalist, want to use wealth as a means to forever escape his fellow man, who disgusts him so wholly, he only longs to crush them in competition. Plainview is pragmatic and represents progress. He represents strength and the steroidal heart beating in the chiseled chest of manifest destiny. Eli represents duplicity and weakness. He represents the cowardice of clinging to false prophets and is all the more reprehensible for how quickly he would sell out his publicly cherished "beliefs" when push comes to shove. Politicians and religious leaders are nothing more than pop culture figureheads, true power lies in the hallow boardrooms of behemoth corporations and shadowy conglomerates. And you know what? Just like Plainview, those corporations FUCKING HATE US. They are disgusted by us and treat us like cattle who need their minds made up for them. And for the most part, they're right. We are weak and never get anything accomplished outside of gossipping and paying lip service to popular causes.

The final scene, when Eli pleads with Plainview for a handout and gets his head caved in for the effort, is indicative of organized religion's influence over the future of this nations affairs being brutally murdered by the true world power. Wealth. When Plainview says, "I'm finished!", what he's really saying is that the relevance of superstitious, childish belief systems is finished. Us babbling, idiot masses like to think we have a voice and that our traditions are respected by our corporate overlords, but if you've bothered to read anything or watch any of the 489 documentaries detailing corporate malfeasance released in the last couple of years, you know that is folly. You are well aware how much a human life is worth. Plainview and his rise to power, his intractable determinism, IS the industrial revolution and the 21st century it wrought. Poor old Eli with his collapsed cranium, is the antiquated notion of Billy Graham bending the ear of the President. Not only are those days gone, they were a scam to begin with.

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford is an entirely different animal. Where TWBB tells the story of our masters, TAOJJBTCRF is intimately concerned with us, the average, simple minded shithead that actually populates the space between the coasts. It is about little people with big dreams, warped minds and gigantic holes in their hearts. It's about people who want more than anything to be important, to be noticed, and upon achieving recognition, find it to be as dispiriting and hollow as anonymity was. Casey Affleck turns in what is indisputably the most under rated performance perhaps ever. His Robert Ford is a jittery, lilting media junkie in an age when consumption of media required a great deal more effort and participation than today. He forces himself into the life script he read and endlessly re-read by candle light. You've met people like him, he makes you uncomfortable when he's onscreen and his attempts to ingratiate himself with the cadre of bad men and outlaws he so desperately desires to emulate is wince inducing. You see this needy, despicable behaviour paraded on every reality television show, youtube video and supermarket tabloid cover.

Brad Pitt's Jesse James is the quintessential model of despondent, aloof, paranoid celebrity. His violent mood swings and deteriorating mental state give this constant sense of unravelling. It's the same feeling we get watching flavor of the week pop stars go through the public paces of relationship problems, drug addictions and ultimately hospitalization or death. Pitt couldn't have been a more perfect choice and he plays it beautifully. You sense the natural charisma that sets him apart from his fellow man, but there's something sinister and self destructive constantly threatening to take it all away. His Jesse James is Cobain, Ledger, Hendrix and Lennon.

The film tackles the cult of celebrity and how it mangles common folks ability to manage expectations of their own lives, all the while burning out and callously discarding those we cyclically elevate then consume as a means to sate our unending hunger for self worth.

I find it fascinating that these two films found a way to address the institutionalized sickness of the American existence by going back to the beginning and laying bare the rotten foundations of our collective mental illness. I have little faith that anything can be done at this point to step back from the brink of cultural apocalypse, but I suppose I find solace in seeing the strings in any case.

Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer

I've been watching Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer for 20 years. Not consecutively or anything, but I first saw it in 1989 and have revisited it probably 25 times since then, up to and including the viewing I've just completed that prefaces and occasions this writing. Something about seeing it tonight unsettled me in a manner more profoundly than any since my first go round.

Serial killers and their attendant phenomena have always fascinated me. I've read a great deal on them and the social, psychological and economic factors that produce them. I've seen countless iterations of their ilk in film and television and followed the media details surrounding actual occurrences that have played out in my own lifetime. With all that exposure and study under my belt, I think I can state with definitive authority that John McNaughton's seminal essay on the subject is the most compelling and authentic account yet produced. Sure, Hannibal Lecter is a great character and Dexter gets boffo ratings and fawning critical accolades: but Dr. Lecter is a Hollywood concoction through and through, albeit an exceedingly entertaining one and the ludicrous exploits of blood splatter analyst Dexter Morgan are a fanciful, borderline offensive piece of irresponsible wish fulfillment aimed at housewives and hipsters. Henry is the messy, terrifying actuality whereas Lecter and Dexter are boiler plate fluff, no more complex or close to reality than Darth Vader. They are the much celebrated "bad guy you love to hate". You don't love to hate Henry as portrayed by Michael Rooker. You fear him and recognize him and pity him and lament the all too common abuse that gave rise to his tragically warped worldview and his subsequent acting upon it.

The world of Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer is so cheap, ugly and garbage strewn you can practically see the decay of the surroundings infest the characters souls as the film plays out like some poverty row, inner city Shakespearean tragedy. The scene where Becky and Henry bond while swapping stories concerning the sexual abuse they suffered at the hands of those whose charge it was to nurture them is touching, heartbreaking and despicable all at once. These are characters rich with intricacies and pathos. Even Otis, loathsome, perverted goon that he is, is not entirely without charm or sympathy. Unlike say, Jorg Buttgereit's Schramm, which simply wallows in depravity for depravity's sake, Henry tells an actual story. It's the embellished tale of real life drifter Henry Lee Lucas (whose outrageous claims are in some part believed to be an embellishment in and of themselves) and his partner in crime/lover Ottis Toole. In the film, we see Henry introduce his roommate Otis to murder as recreation and stress relief. Otis, after initial trepidation, takes to it like a parasite to dung. Complicating matters is Otis' sister Becky, come to live with her big brother after escaping an abusive husband and leaving her infant daughter back home with her mother. She instantly takes a shine to Henry, unaware of the nefarious influence he's having on her already unstable and dangerous sibling. Otis becomes more and more insatiable with blood lust, to the point that Henry can't control him, leading inexorably to a shattering conclusion that is surely as morbid, bleak and pitch black as they come.

The first frame contains a succinct summation of exactly how grim the proceedings will be. A slow, Kubrickian pan back from the expressionless face of a woman to reveal her body, naked and lifeless in a field. Jump cut to Henry's hand snuffing out a cigarette in an ashtray, a perfect parable for how he seems to look upon extinguishing a life. For the first half of the film, the focus is on the aftermath of his crimes, which creates an uneasy aura of depravity while allowing the characters to develop unhindered by gross-out set pieces that would certainly detract from the integrity of McNaughton's calculated narrative thrust. There is a refreshing sense of the mundane established in the early stages of the film. There's no masked and bound sociopath's winking at the camera, nor is there any remarkably fit and fashionably attired do-gooder killer hiding blood samples in an air conditioner (so I hate Dexter, so sue me), there is simply impoverished ex-cons living together in relative squalor without a hint of style and less than stellar grooming habits. Even when Becky shows up, she's every bit a woman you see everyday, no more than 5 foot 3 and homely in a very plain way. These are real people you pass on the street and that is what makes this film so effective. They drive shitty cars, drink cheap beer and have dishes piled up in the sink. Matter of fact, when I used to paint houses, I worked with a dude that was the spitting image of Tom Towles Otis, except his jacked grill wasn't an appliance.

If you haven't seen Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, do so, IMMEDIATELY. If you've seen it, WATCH IT AGAIN. I'm not a religious man, but I believe in my heart and soul that people like Henry who walk the earth in real life, are as close to demons as it gets. Born perhaps not of fire, but of abuse and neglect. However brought into existence, demons all the same. I can conjure no more horrific an end to life on this planet than to cross paths with such a monster made living, breathing flesh. Look no further than the videotaped home invasion scene for irrefutable proof that Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer is every bit as terrifying as Friedkin's Exorcist or Kubrick's The Shining.

Speaking of that home invasion sequence, I find it vastly amusing that John McNaughton succeeded in one scene with conveying what Michael Haneke attempted to, 10, then again 20 years later with an entire film, than a shot for shot remake of that entire film. Henry showed us the implicit voyeurism of murder for entertainment and forced us to question our complicity in the whole sordid affair by simply panning back to Henry and Otis sitting on the couch, watching their own murderous exploits with mouths agape, exactly as we in the audience were. So, I guess you could express that monumentally complex and debate sparking concept through one wordlessly visceral and expertly shot minute of film: OR you could make 2 laborious, irritating and let's all admit it, BORING movies to get the same point across. Nice job Mike, have fun being an artiste!