Vampires get lonely too...

Now that last year's fantastic "Let the Right One In" is available on DVD, might I suggest a companion piece to make a sweet vampire double header: "The Hunger."



Yup, you remember "The Hunger." 1983 Tony Scott movie. Elegant, atmospheric, barely plotted. Bauhaus' Peter Murphy prancing and droning "Bela Legosi's Dead" over the opening credits. David Bowie in that awesome makeup. And Catherine Deneuve and Susan Sarandon... y'know... doing it.



Alright, you probably only remember the last bit. And frankly, that bit was why I happily decided to drop all of a buck fifty on a VHS copy a week or two ago. But it's a groovy, stylie film -- not terribly horrific, and certainly not action-packed. But it's got a great, dreamy vibe to it.

And it's about a vampire. A female vampire who's latest mortal companion is dying. And we get to watch her hunt down and seduce her choice of replacement. In "Let the Right One In," it's the achingly familiar seduction of puppy love. In "The Hunger," it's girl-on-girl action with opera, rather than "brown chicken brown cow" porno funk as a soundtrack.

Good stuff. A little high-brow, a little low-brow, a little sideways-brow... Get these films in your Netflix queue toot sweet, y'all.

I've Got to Stop Watching Movies

Just for a while. Watched three of the most profoundly affecting films I've ever seen in the past few days. And although only one of them is ostensibly a HORROR film, these films were so thoroughly harrowing and thought-provoking that I'm actually terrified of trying to digest them all.

Saw "Let The Right One In" at my sister's place over the weekend. It's been on everyone's best-of lists, and it deserves to be. Bleak, beautiful urban scenery, haunting, creepy performance by an amazing young actress. Quality gore. Painful, aching memories of puppy love, adolescent ennui and out-of-placedness.

My brother-in-law sent me home with "Oldboy". Those of you who don't know about this film, take a look over at the guy in the corner who does know. Notice that he's not freaking out, yelling "that movie ROCKS!!" No, he's smiling and nodding confidently, knowing that when you get around to seeing it you will be knocked speechless. To say that it is an epic Korean revenge story tells you only a tenth of it. To say that it has an astonishing fight sequence that leaves the viewer as whimpering and exhausted as the fighters gets you a little closer.

And now I've just finished "Synecdoche." Lovely, poignant, at moments quite funny. But overall, I'm just exhausted. Like I've personally had to live through fifty years of neuroses, ill-considered choices, examining, re-examining, attempting to impose direction, yet still failing to understand. Will my life be that puzzling? Will I recognize the grandeur of the puzzle? Will it full of self-inflicted pain, or will a find a way to resign myself with dignity? Was all that really in the movie I just saw, or am I having an aneurism?

Seriously need to cleanse my mental palate. I think I'm too shattered to watch anything with a plot right now. Where's my lava lamp?