Scarecrows

“They only want a brain – yours.”

This is my first foray into the Final Girl Film Club, although I have seen several of the films she has selected. I finally remembered to rent the film on time, remembered to watch it in advance, and actually took notes while watching the movie. I prepared for this thing. I studied.

Ah Scarecrows, how I wanted to love you and hold you close and possibly marry you. I had high hopes. After all, the plot sounded right up my alley. A group of thieves steal the Camp Pendleton payroll and kidnap a pilot and his daughter to get away. On the way to Mexico, the always-popular destination for thieves on the run, one of the thieves double-crosses the crew, dumps the loot out of the plane, and parachutes into a graveyard surrounded by creepy looking scarecrows. The chase begins. Will the group survive the night? Why are there scarecrows surrounding a graveyard? Will the girl and her father get away? Will greed ruin the close-knit team of thieves? Only time will tell.

Scarecrows had its good times and bad times for me. I went into it thinking this plot is so silly it’s got to be so-bad-its-good. Right from the start, I thought - Exorcist opening credits steal, that’s okay. Oh and look – a very cute dog. Don’t hurt the dog. But then, well, I got bored. Scarecrows are undoubtedly creepy. It’s a horror film staple – no one likes those scary guardians of the harvest. Wizard of Oz is maybe the only example of a nice scarecrow I can think of, and he didn’t have a brain so he’s pretty much a zombie scarecrow. Jeepers Creepers 2, Children of the Corn, etc. used the idea, plus I am sure there were a Supernatural episode and at least one X-Files episode in there too. But there was so little action in the first part of the movie I had a hard time paying attention. I don’t expect a lot of character development in a film like this but some tension would be nice. And what was with the voice-overs? Everyone was talking in voice-over like the sound guy wasn’t in residence that day. I began to think that the entire movie would be the group of thieves taunting Bert over their headsets. “You’re crow shit.” Awesome. I wanted Henry Rollins to come in a save the day like he does in Wrong Turn 2. My questions morphed from does the team survive to does Bert ever actually talk out loud? Holy shit that scarecrow just knifed Bert! Something finally happened! Ah – scarecrow surprise in the night vision scope!

(I do have to admit, it made perfect sense to me for the lady thief to check out her hair and makeup in her Clinique blush compact in the middle of the film and then let the kidnapped chica check hers out too. After all, how can you successfully navigate murderous scarecrows if your hair is out of place?)

Then finally the movie gets interesting. The girls had to prepare first, then it really kicks off. Our traitor friend Bert shows up all zombified and the gang rips into him, literally. I’m not sure what I expected there but it wasn’t what you see. Wow. That was the second best part of the movie. Especially when the guys think he’s eaten all of that, and then one of them says, “We’ll have to refrigerate this, it stinks.” Ha! Then rusty saws, limb removal, pitchforks, and scythes all come out to play and the thieves are picked off one by one. I’ve always though a pitchfork was a terribly dangerous tool – how do farmers keep from maiming themselves? Of course, somewhere along the say the kidnapped girl actually starts caring for the folks that kidnapped her and left her an orphan and they all “have to work together to get out of here” and away from the murderous scarecrows. It was sudden, but expected.

But Scarecrows saves my favorite part until the end. Scarecrow-Zombie-dog. Freakin’ awesome. Why did they leave that to the end?

I think, all in all I am pretty neutral on Scarecrows. It had good parts, but the slow start up really did me in. Zombie-dog saved it, and some of the creepy farmhouse and scarecrow atmosphere worked, but the acting and casting was atrocious.

Rating: 3 1/2 Purrs for a film that had potential but didn’t live up to my expectations. Zombie-dog should have gotten more screen time.

HEY, INTERNET, STOP BEING SUCH CYNICAL EFFING DOUCHEBAGS BLOG-A-THON!

So one of my favorite blogs in the world to read is Final Girl, and she put the call out -

One day, and one day only: Tuesday, March 18.
You: write about something in the world of film that fills you with complete and total unbridled fucking retarded JOY.

So how can I ignore that? The problem I find is picking out just one thing to write about that fills me with stupid, toe-wiggling joy when it comes to movies. It's like someone asking me to pick just *one* favorite movie or just *one* favorite book. So to take the easy way out, I'll list a few joy inducing items here.

Movies I will watch anytime, anyplace, always, as many times as I can.

I have a few movies I will watch pretty much anytime they show up on my satellite. These movies are the ones I pull out of my DVD boxes most often. My husband groans every time one of these comes on because he's the type that will watch a movie once and be done with it. I'll watch JAWS anytime it's on TV. I'll watch it on DVD. I'll watch it edited and dubbed. When Roy Schneider sees the shark for the first time and says, "We're gonna need a bigger boat," I actually clap my hands with joy. I love the Die Hard trilogy (or quadrology now I suppose). "Now I know what a TV dinner feels like." Awesome. Anytime it's on TV. Halloween. Friday the 13th (I mean, hello - sexy vegetarian chick and creepy ass crazy Momma). Agatha Christie adaptations especially those with Peter Ustinov. (Those lead into my obsession with old people solve crimes media like Murder, She Wrote and Matlock.) The list goes on...

Italian Giallo

When I started college a friend introduced me to Dario Argento. I watched Suspiria and there was no turning back. Ever since NetFlix (another thing I love - access to movies I never would find on shelves at the Evil Empire) was founded and I joined I have watched every single Giallo I can find. I love the so very ultra-mod Seventies fashions, the badly filmed sex scenes, the mystery, the fake red blood, the overall silliness of them all.

Night of the Comet

If I had to pick just one movie. Just one to take with me on a deserted island with a TV and DVD player of course, it would be Night of the Comet. I anticipated the DVD release for this movie like Star Wars geeks foamed at the mouth for the new trilogy. Valley girls are the last people on earth after a comet wipes out the other folks in sunny CA. All that's left are these chicks and some zombies. "Daddy would have gotten us UZIs." Awesome. This is the movie I insist on people watching over and over. Plus - Zombies! Catherine Mary Stewart! UZIs! Shopping Malls!

Roger Corman Movies

Rock-n-Roll High School. Pirahna. Humanoids from the Deep. P.J. Soles. The Ramones. Riff Randall! Angry puppet fish! Lumberjack Man and his little blond daughter. Perky insurance investigators! Barbara Steele! Doug McClure! Slimy fish monsters impregnating women! The Alien-like fish birth! "Terror! Horror! Death! Film at Eleven."

My Current Favorite - Black Sheep

I read about this movie in Entertainment Weekly and saw "were-sheep." I said to myself, I must have this movie. I must see it now. And I finally did. Lamb jokes. Mint sauce, vegan animal rights activists. Special effects by the folks who did Lord of the Rings. Were-sheep.

"You hear that? Sounds like someone is sheering."

Oh man, I am smiling with joy just thinking about it. Black Sheep - It had me at "were-sheep."

I'll stop now cause I could go on. For hours. Just remember - were-sheep, angry puppet fish, feeling like a TV dinner, and those sexxxxy mod 7's fashions. Things that fill me with joy.

The Psychic

I loved the cover art on this DVD, but to be honest, I can’t figure out what in the world it has to do with the film. Nevertheless, The Psychic is a well-crafted Giallo by Lucio Fulci. It’s not in the top ten Giallos I have seen, but there are several twists and turns that make it worth a viewing.

In The Psychic, Jennifer O’Neill plays a newly married young woman who has just dropped off her husband at the airport for a business trip. On the way home, she is plagued by sudden visions of a woman being murdered. When she finally arrives at her husband's Italian villa, she recognizes the room where the visions took place, and when she breaks into a section of the wall, she discovers a skeleton. Her psychiatrist thinks the only thing to do is help her find the truth about who the person was and to clear her husband’s name, so a-investigating she goes with quite a bit of help from her shrink’s assistant. That girl seems to be able to find just about anything – think Wikipedia in human skin.

Overall this Giallo had no nudity and little gore, unlike most of the genre. However, there are some creepy scenes, including the chase through the old house onto the scaffolding. It’s a nice, clean little mystery that is heavily influenced by Edgar Allan Poe’s The Black Cat. It’s not that it isn’t a good film; it’s just that others have been so much better.

Rating: 3 ½ purrs for a nicely crafted mystery and a creepy final 30 minutes

 

Hatchet

I rented Hatchet because it was tagged as “a return to old school American horror.” Well, they lied. Hatchet was nothing like Halloween, nothing like Friday the 13^th, and nothing like Nightmare on Elm Street. Maybe it’s because I saw the unrated version. Maybe if I had seen the cut version I would have liked it better.

In Hatchet, a group of friends are down in New Orleans for Mardi Gras/Spring Break. The main guy has been recently dumped, so the last thing he wants to do is get a face full of breasts at every turn (all though for the life of me I don’t know why), so instead he drags his best pal along on a swamp boat tour run by an obvious out-of-towner. In the tour group, you have your two ladies who are auditioning for a soft porn movie and their stereotypical slimy director. You have your mom and pop tourists, your mysterious girl, and the two hapless college buddies. These folks think they are in for a haunted swamp tour, but instead they find out some local legends are true.  A crazed hatchet baring deformed psycho really does live there, and he wants their blood.

If you are looking for gore, you will find in it abundance in the unrated version. All I know is that in this day and age, it just looked silly. The spurting limbs reminded me way too much of Monty Python and not enough of Chainsaw. The plot was just ridiculous. Why does everyone feel like they have to explain everything? I like the movie where shit just happens, and who knows why? It’s scarier to not know.

I can’t really put a finger on what it was about this movie that disappointed me, but after renting it, I was sure happy I didn’t spend the 9.99 on it that Best Buy was charging. To me, that says a lot.

Rating: 3 Purrs for a snore-fest that while there were boob shots galore it was missing a soul

The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

The Time Traveler’s Wife was talked and talked about as an excellent read, so I had to pick it up and see what all the fuss was about. What a surprise – it was a good as the critics said it was.

In The Time Traveler’s Wife, Audrey Niffenegger tells the story of Henry and Clare. Henry is a librarian (yeah for librarians!) who has an unfortunate affliction – he time travels, spontaneously and without any real control over where he ends up.  The only real guarantee is that it ends up being sometime and somewhere in his lifeline. One of these leaps in time brings him to Clare’s field outside of her family’s large house in the country. She is pretty young at the time, and from there begins a life-long friendship and eventually romance. Time travel can be a problem for a relationship, though, as Henry’s age and his meetings with Clare end up varying from middle-aged Henry to young man Henry while she continues in a normal lifeline and ages normally. 

It sounds like it could be silly, a gimmicky, sappy love story, but Niffenegger never lets the story reduce itself to that. Henry and Clare build a life together as they can, and along that love and relationship all the struggles of a normal relationship are aired. It’s a beautifully detailed story, further enhanced by all of the secondary characters and plots. There is Henry’s musician father, their eccentric best friends, Henry’s other girlfriends, Clare’s family, the doctor brought in to study Henry’s genetic abnormality that allows him to travel in time, and Clare and Henry’s child. It’s a very rich and engrossing fabric that enhances rather than takes away from the story. 

Part fantasy, part romance, part bittersweet story of life lived; The Time Traveler’s Wife was one of the best books I have read last year. It was engrossing, thought provoking, and beautiful. You end up with a picture of life lived is worth the weirdness and struggles.  Instead of focusing on the eccentricity time travel brings into their lives, you really are left with one thing: Henry is Clare’s savior and she, his.

Rating: 5 Purrs for a story that sticks in your head for a long, long time

Wrong Turn 2: Dead End

I really loved Wrong Turn. It was campy, gory fun. Eliza Dushku is always yummy, and Desmond Harrington is a great yummy guy too. The scenes were tense, and I never drive through those many small towns on the way to New Mexico without thinking of Wrong Turn. The sequel wasn’t as good, of course, but it was still a pretty decent follow-up to the original. After all, Henry Rollins was in it.

In Wrong Turn 2, six 20-somethings sign up to participate in a survival reality show. They must survive the ”apocalypse” which unfortunately is taking place in the middle of the West Virginia woods. I say unfortunately because those woods just happen to contain our favorite mutant cannibals who just love to eat fresh meat. The contestants are fresh pickings for the hungry family, and one by one they die in very sudden and gruesome ways.

Henry Rollins has a great time playing the head of the reality show, a tough as nails ex-military man who battles it out with the crazed cannibals. Erica Leerson from Texas Chainsaw Massacre the remake and Blair Witch 2 plays the angry vegan chick that fights her way through the forest.

Overall it was a fun straight-to-video flick with lots of gore. I thought the first had more suspense and scares, but this one was worth a rental.

Rating: 3 ½ Purrs for Henry Rollins and his very aggressive tattoos and playing with dynomite and you have to love that wood chipper thing

Vamp

I remember seeing posters for Vamp when I was younger, but never was able to find a copy of it when I actually got into horror movies. Finally, NetFlix came to my rescue. Vamp was one of those 80’s comedy-horror movies that’s very similar to Fright Night and the like.

In Vamp, some fraternity pledges are out on the town looking for a stripper for their fraternity party. In true 80’s teen comedy fashion, their honest look for a good time turns into a zany adventure, complete with vampire strippers. At the After Dark club, the girls want more than your dollar bills; they want your blood. Will the guys survive the night? Will the guy get the girl? What about the best friend?

Grace Jones plays the main vampire, and she’s just as much of a freak you think she might be. Her costumes are pretty amazing, especially the Keith Herring body paint. Deedee Pfeiffer is very cute as the cocktail waitress/love interest that has a past with our hero, Chris Makepeace. All of the actors were good in an 80’s teen movie kind of way.

Overall, it is a very fun vampire movie, and if you liked Fright Night or those goofy movies like Once Bitten, you’d probably like Vamp. It’s almost like Porky’s, except with vampires. A vampire sex comedy – what more could you ask for?

Rating: 3 ½ Purrs for Deedee Pfeiffer - she's so darn cute! and for Grace Jones being the freak that she is

The Reaping

“How do I know? How do I know what's real?”

The Reaping was a fairly decent thriller. The concept sounded fairly intriguing, so I gave it a viewing. It wasn’t half bad, but it’s not going to make any of my top 10, 20, or even 30 lists.

In The Reaping, Hilary Swank plays Katherine Winter, a former missionary who has lost her faith. She now travels the world, debunking supposed miracles using scientific tests. She is soon called to Haven, Louisiana to investigate a series of so-called biblical plagues. Katherine uses her science to try and debunk these happenings, but as time goes on, she wonders what she should believe. Is this real? Is the creepy young girl the cause? Should she be destroyed? Who can Katherine really trust?

The Reaping does a fairly good job of throwing some realistic looking plagues at the audience, and the atmosphere of Haven is heavy with fear and deception. I don’t think any of the actors really outshined the material, but the script holds up with some creepiness, good atmosphere, and tension. The first little twist at the end wasn’t all that much of a twist, but you know, I don’t really care too much for twist endings anyway. Most of the time it’s not a twist to me; I figure it out way before the end.

I wouldn’t say this is one to buy, but it’s good for a rental, a big tub of popcorn, and a few empty hours to fill.

Rating: 3 1/5 Purrs for a decent biblical thriller, some serious looking plagues, and a creepy kid.

The Murders of Richard III by Elizabeth Peters

I read The Murders of Richard III ages ago, maybe junior high if I remember correctly. I forgot the name, and then stumbled upon this awesome group on Live Journal called “what’s that book.” I posted a summary of what I could remember and BAM – I had the name of this book in maybe a day. I had better memories of the book than the actual book, but overall it was a light, frothy mystery read.

In The Murders of Richard III, Thomas invites fellow academic Jacqueline Kirby to a gathering of friends who believe Richard III was innocent of the murders he is accused of committing. The group is gathering for their historical reenactment and to celebrate the finding of a new letter that supposedly will exonerate Richard. The problem is, someone is pulling pranks, putting the members of the group in the positions and situations like the real murders. Who will be next? Are they safe or will someone really get hurt? Jacqueline and Thomas race to find out who is behind the pranks, all while Elizabeth Peters includes plenty of historical references to keep the history buffs intrigued.

I remember this book being much deeper and involved, but then again, it has been awhile since I read it the first time. The characters are a bit stereotypical, but the historical information and the parlor mystery aspect made this one a fun read. If you go into it not expected a heavily plotted mystery, you won’t be disappointed. Just go into it with proper expectations.

Rating: 3 ½ stars for a trip down memory lane

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

The Lovely Bones is one of those books I put off reading because I knew the story would probably be tough to read. I finally pulled it off my bookshelf recently, and wow, what a book. I love to read, and I read a lot, but it’s not often I get a book in my hands that rips me up and stays with me even now, weeks later. I was sucked into this book, and it ripped me up emotionally, but it was such a beautiful story I just can’t say I regret the experience. As I remember the story and how it was told, I can feel that sorrow work its way back into my heart, but it is bittersweet.

 Susie Salmon, a 14 year old girl, is the narrator of The Lovely Bones. When we first meet her, Susie is in heaven watching over her family. She tells us how she died, and she watches her family deal with that loss. Her parents struggle to keep their marriage together, her sister refuses to feel anything so avoid the sorrow of losing her sister, and her baby brother struggles to understand where Susie went and why she is never coming back. For years, Susie watches the world and struggles with letting it all go. While she works through the grief of losing her life, Susie sees her family grow, mend, and eventually move on.

 I really don’t want to say too much, because I truly believe this is one of those novels that you simply must just discover on your own. I couldn’t do Alice Sebold’s prose justice. Her words are too lyrical and haunting to condense, and I hate to take that experience away from anyone. The Lovely Bones is a memorable and stunning story about love, loss, grief, marriage, memory, heaven, and moving on. I can’t recommend it enough.

Rating: 5 Purrs for one of the best books I have ever read, hands down.

 

I have to point out on  completely personal and braggy note - I am writing this and all future blog posts on my new favorite thing in the world...my new MacBook. I haven't decided a name for it yet, but she is sleek and black and her apple lights up. 

My precious. I loves it.

The Living and the Dead by Todd Livingston and Robert Tinnell

I picked up The Living and The Dead in the bargain bin at my favorite comic shop, Titan Comics.  The cover looked interesting, and you know, it sounded like it was about zombies.  It wasn’t about zombies after all, but it was still a pretty good read. Technically the undead were involved, so it worked out.

In this graphic novel, Livingston and Tinnell revisit the Frankenstein story and see where it could lead if the Baron lived on.  They throw in to the mix all sorts of nasty sins: torture, incest, necrophilia, murder, and resurrection.  This is not a kid’s comic book. Here, the Baron is trying to live a good life with his wife and children and make up for his indiscretions by working as a country doctor and hiding his infamous past history. Unfortunately for him, his relatives won’t let him live free and be the good guy. Instead, they want him to resume working on his evil experiments raising the dead. This naturally leads to all sorts of trouble and the multitude of sins listed previously.

I like the Frankenstein mythos, I always have, and this was a very pleasant surprise. The plot was good, the art was decent, and I got it for a steal. What’s not to like?

Rating: 4 Purrs for a great horror story. I’d rate it higher if I liked the art better.

 

Recent Aquisitions to the Library

I just picked up a few new books and used DVDs. Love to grow that library!

• Sin in the Second City: Madams, Ministers, Playboys, and the Battle for America's Soul by Karen Abbott
• The Thin Place by Kathryn Davis
• Three Bags Full by Leonie Swann
• Duma Key by Stephen King
• Glacial Period (Louvre) by Nicolas De Crecy
• Complete Novels: Red Harvest/The Dain Curse/The Maltese Falcon/The Glass Key/The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett
• Zodiac by Robert Graysmith
• Ex Machina Vols 1-6 by Brian K Vaughn
• Fell Vol 1 by Warren Ellis
• If I Am Missing or Dead: A Sister's Story of Love, Murder, and Liberation by Janine Latus
• Voodoo Heart by Scott Snyder

DVDs

• 5 Dolls for an August Moon
• The Case of the Bloody Iris
• Black X-Mas (2006 remake)
• Dead Silence
• Sunshine
• Flushed Away
  

Thunderstruck by Erik Larson

I loved Erik Larson’s book, The Devil in the White City. I thought it was an extremely well-written, engrossing non-fiction account of building the Chicago World’s Fair and the reign of the serial killer, Dr. H.H. Holmes. When I heard that Larson had another book out, I knew I had to give it a try just to see how it fared.

This time around in Thunderstruck, Larson tells the parallel stories of Guglielmo Marconi, the inventor of wireless telegraphy, and Hawley Crippen, murderer. Marconi’s struggle to succeed in creating wireless telegraphy is intriguing, but also a little hard to warm up to because of the subject himself. Marconi was not a humble man, and kudos to Larson for not glossing over that fact. The parallel story of Crippen is also interesting in its own. It is an excellent picture of an ordinary, mild-mannered man driven to a rather heinous murder to be free and happy with the woman he loves. His story, to me, was the more interesting one, but then again, it could be because murder interests me more than scientific invention.

Larson’s attempt this time didn’t really grab me the way his other book did. I think it could be a number of things: Marconi was not a likable character, and neither were the other men who were competing with him to succeed with inventing successful wireless telegraphy. (I will say the intrigue that comes up with the German government was an interesting tidbit though.) Hawley Crippen was a mild man, beaten down by an irresponsible, slovenly, and careless wife. It was hard to have any respect for him either. In fact, his life sounded down-right horrible. The book really takes off once you get to the part when Crippen’s wife turns up missing and the police investigation begins. Then you can clearly see why Larson decided to integrate these two stories into one book. Marconi’s tenacious quest to create wireless telegraphy enabled the police’s hunt of Crippen and his mistress to cross the ocean, and kept journalists and readers appraised much like we are now while watching O.J. drive around in his white SUV.

Overall it was a decent book, but not quite up to the excellent The Devil in the White City.

Rating: 3 ½ Purrs for what this book could have been

The Girl Who Knew Too Much

Mario Brava’s The Girl Who Knew Too Much is a well shot, spooky mystery with elements of Hitchcock and Agatha Christie. I enjoyed it more than I thought I would (I noticed it was in black & white and thought, oh, a silly horror movie. I was shamefully wrong.)

Nora is a young woman on vacation for the first time alone. She arrives in Rome to stay with her aunt, who is very ill. During her first night in Rome, Nora’s aunt dies, and a horrified Nora rushes out of the house to find help. The poor girl is mugged and while she fights for consciousness, she witnesses a murder on the plaza below. No one believes her, but a strange man seems to be following her everywhere. She moves into a flat on the plaza, the house of a new friend, and while house-sitting she finds information on the murder she witness, a killing by the serial killer of the Alphabet Murders. Will Nora solve the murder and figure out what she saw? Will the killer come after her? Will she be safe, and who can she trust?

Brava’s story here isn’t his masterpiece, but the film is well-shot with some beautiful parts of Rome pictured. There is even some light comedy here, i.e., the sometimes silly behavior of Nora trying to protect herself. I just loved the little traps she set. I wouldn’t say this is a must see for everyone, but if you like a nice, a little bit old-fashioned but beautifully shot mystery, check it out.

Rating: 4 Purrs for string!

The Fourth Bear by Jasper Fforde

Jasper Fforde is a truly creative writer. He takes such simple things, like Nursery Rhymes and invents this whole new world of real characters (or somewhat real – they may be Persons of Dubious Reality) full of mystery and comedy. The Fourth Bear is the second in his Jack Spratt Investigates Nursery Crimes series, and while this series isn’t quite as good as the Thursday Next series, I enjoy anything Fforde writes and will keep devouring them as he writes them.

In The Fourth Bear, Jack Spratt and his partner Mary Mary must find out where Goldilocks has disappeared to, track down the crazed and notorious serial killer the Gingerbread man, and figure out why cucumber-growing enthusiasts are blowing up with their cukes. What does the all-powerful company, Quang Tech, have to do with it? Will Mary Mary finally get rid of Arnold, her ex-boyfriend who won’t stay away? Who was the fourth bear?

Jasper Fforde, you can’t write fast enough for me, but I understand. It takes a lot to be so damn creative, to come up with so many puns, pieces of satire, and oddball characters and situations. Just keep taking the vitamins and eating your apples. I want a long line of stories to enjoy for many years to come.

Rating: 4 Purrs for not being quite as good as Thursday Next but being funny and satirical enough to make me laugh out loud during lunch. Oh, and for making Punch and Judy marriage counselors. That was a hoot.

Teasing Secrets from the Dead: My Investigations at America's Most Infamous Crime Scenes by Emily Craig PhD.

I found Teasing Secrets from the Dead while digging through the stack of true crime books at Half-Price books. When I saw that Kathy Reichs, writer of the Temperance Brennan books and forensic anthropologist herself, wrote an introduction to this book, I decided to pick it up and give it a try. It wasn’t bad, but I wouldn’t have enjoyed paying full price for it.

Emily Craig started out as a medical artist, drawing detailed anatomy pictures for a medical laboratory. She describes how that interest led her to switch her career path to forensic anthropology, and gives you a short section on how her training and study went. She describes the difficulty of marrying fact and intuition, of the long hours of study, and of the differences in forensic anthropology and forensic pathology. Later she describes her work as a full-time employee in Kentucky, and they types of work she does there identifying remains most often found in the back country areas. She is candid about the difficulties of matching remains with missing persons, and definitely rips those CSI blinders off. It’s a lot harder to do this job than TV might make you think. It’s gruesome work, so I don’t recommend eating while you read.

Craig’s tale becomes really interesting when she gets into the chapters on the Branch Davidians in Waco, the Oklahoma City bombing, and the World Trade Center attacks. In Waco, she is the scientist who reconstructed David Koresh’s skull, and before that, the one who reconstructed the skull that showed not all the cult members died because of the fire (she found evidence of a bullet hole). In OKC, she helped rebut claims that the real bomber died in the explosion by identifying that the true owner of an extra severed limb did in fact belong to a victim who was inside the building. Her chapter on the World Trade Center was devastating and emotional, and you can tell the difficulties faced by those workers will never be truly understood by anyone not there to share their burdens. In fact, it is the one chapter where it doesn’t feel like Dr. Craig is bragging.

That is the one thing I had an issue with when reading this book. Dr. Craig’s tone was almost condescending and self-involved, especially when describing the “intuition” side of things. Another thing that was not fun to read– the constant descriptions of maggots. Seriously, yuck. Other than that, it was interesting to get a factual account of how someone becomes a forensic anthropologist and the difficulty of being in that profession.

Rating: 3 1/2 Purrs

Sideways by Rex Pickett

My husband Pandabob picked up a copy of Sideways because of the good reviews about the movie. He read it quickly and hounded me for a while to pick it up and read it too. It was a fun read, and the movie is a good companion to the book. It’s similar enough, but different enough to not be a re-tread.

The best way to describe this book is a buddy movie crossed with a wine instruction manual. Two buddies go off for a bachelor trip through California’s Santa Ynez wine country, only to become entangled in one mess after another. Miles is the wine lover; he’s also divorced, broke, and a failed novelist who somehow friends with Jack. Jack is handsome, about to marry a very rich woman, and is a successful actor. All he wants to do on this trip is drink copious amounts of wine, have a last few days of freedom, and get laid as much as possible. Their adventures are so comical you’ll end up laughing out loud while you read: Jack’s attempts to have sex with any woman he meets, his attempts to set Miles up with his crush, Maya, the boar-hunting episode, and a staged car accident. The scene of Miles sneaking in to get Jack’s forgotten wallet brought tears to my eyes. Don’t forget every event is colored with some sort of wine-snob speech from Miles as they gulp excellent bottles of wine.

I read this book after seeing the movie version, and I admit the casting in the movie fit the characters I read perfectly. Paul Giamatti was cast as Miles, and Thomas Haden Church was cast as Jack. I couldn’t help but see them while I read. Rarely does a book get translated so well onto the screen.

I’ll admit to Sideways inspiring me to learn more about wine. Despite Miles’ very long-winded and snobby speeches about Pinot Noir, there are a few facts to glean. It also gave me a good laugh. I’d definitely recommend checking this book out if you want a fun, buddy trip book to read. There’s even a good moral to this story, if you can get past all the bumbling and drinking.

Rating: 4 Purrs for a good, entertaining read that got me to sign up with our local wine club

Lucky Number Slevin

"What's a Kansas City Shuffle?”

We rented Lucky Number Slevin because a large chunk of our friends told us it was a great movie. I wouldn’t say it was a great movie, but it was a fun hour and a half.

Josh Harnett is Slevin Kelevra. He’s on a trip to NewYork to see a friend, and on the way to his friend’s apartment he’s mugged. That is pretty much just a bad start to a really bad weekend for Slevin. His friend is gone and Slevin is mistaken for him by a couple of very irritated mobsters. It wouldn’t be a problem except that his pal owes a mob boss a whole lot of cash, and of course Slevin can’t pay it. To keep his life, Slevin is coerced into an agreement to kill the rival mob boss’s gay son. Mayhem ensues while the cops get involved and Mr. Goodkat (Bruce Willis) starts playing both sides of the mob.

The dialog is snappy and there are plenty of twists and turns in the plot to keep you guessing on who is screwing over whom. Josh Hartnett and Lucy Liu play with the dialog quite well, bouncing lines off of each other like the old black and whites with Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn. (I’m not saying they are on par with those two, but the feeling is similar.) The characters are larger than life and suit the plot. What I can’t figure out is why the characters keep eating sandwiches. Maybe if I had listened to the commentary, I would know why.

It’s a clever film, but it wasn’t as clever as some like the snappy dialog in Quentin Tarantino films. It’s a fun ride with equal parts gun play, romance, and chemistry. If you like that sort of thing, think a little darker version of The Whole Nine Yards, you’ll like Lucky Number Slevin.

Rating: 4 ½ Purrs

DVD library

I am currently cataloging all of our DVDs into an online database much like I have our books in LibraryThing. This place is called DVDSpot. It's pretty good, but nearly as great as LibraryThing.

http://www.dvdspot.com/member=beakermini

Immortality

Immortality sat in my NetFlix queue for a very, very long time when it finally reached the top. It had been pegged as one of those artsy vampire movies, which I wanted to see because Jude Law is in it, but didn’t want to see because it was an artsy vampire movie. It finally appeared in my mailbox, and to be honest I am glad it finally did. The movie was beautiful, weird, and the actors were excellent.

Steven (Jude Law) is a handsome Londoner with a very weird name. He is good at seducing women, and it is obvious at the beginning of the movie that he has seduced many of them. He is also ill, and needs a woman’s love to survive (enter the vampire mythos). The only way he can feed on that love is by drinking their blood and absorbing it into his bloodstream. He has yet to meet a woman who truly captures his heart until he meets Anna (Elina Lowensohn). She doesn’t know who he really is, and he isn’t quite sure he can kill her when he needs to. Also, he has the added trouble of a pesky policeman who suspects he is somehow involved with the deaths of his previous girlfriends. Will he do it, or will he waste away?

The movie is quite lovely to look at with beautiful locations and a vivid use of colors. The use of color is striking in almost every frame of the film. Jude Law is seductive and creepy, pitiful and ruthless. You genuinely begin to pity him. The only thing I found difficult was some of the vampire mythos and the way it was adapted. The crystals took some thinking to figure out what was going on there.

Overall I wouldn’t go into Immortality looking for a vampire flick. It is really more of a seductive thriller in the vein of The Talented Mr. Ripley, Body Double, and Fatal Attraction.

Rating: 4 Purrs for a beautifully shot thriller with excellent acting, and that very striking painting Jude Law's character has hanging in his flat. It's so freaking haunting, I can't get it out of my head.

Grindhouse: Planet Terror & Death Proof

I love Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino, and I will pretty much see anything they make. The idea of Grindhouse made me wiggle my toes I was so happy, and unlike a lot of other people, I was toe-wiggling happy with how it all turned out.

Grindhouse is a great tribute to the old exploitation movies of the 60’s and 70’s. It starts up with a couple of grainy trailers, which I just loved (and to be honest I can’t remember them all now). Enter then Planet Terror, Robert Rodriguez’s installment. What more could you want- poison gas, flesh-eating zombies, strippers, and machine guns? After a gas is accidentally released near a military base in Texas, people start turning into crazed, brain-eating zombies. An rag-tag group of people, Cherry Darling, a local pole dancer, her boyfriend mechanic, the sheriff (Michael Biehn – woot!), a crazy doctor, his assistant wife (who has Fergie as a lover, thank you), and a group of others have to fight off the zombies, crazy military men, and all the rest to get to safety. I can’t even list how many familiar faces are in this movie: Marley Shelton, Michael Biehn, Rose MacGowan, Freddy Rodriguez, Fergie from the Black-Eyed Peas, Tom Savini, and more. It’s awesome. Of course, I love zombies, so naturally I would love this half of the Grindhouse.

After a few more trailers, we get to see Quentin Tarantino’s half: Death Proof. Here, Kurt Russell plays a crazed stunt man who has a special car, a “death proof” car. He has an affinity for pretty girls, which he likes to dispatch via stunt car driving. He’s a bit kooky and over the top. Soon he meets a group of ladies who won’t take his crazy and dangerous driving lying down. They fight back, and that’s where the great car chases and action begins. It’s fun with some really awesome car chases and stunts. Zoe Bell is not a great actress, but you can tell she’s pretty excited to be doing what she is doing.

Overall, Grindhouse is everything I could have hoped it would be. Unfortunately, I had to buy 2 different DVDs to get the movies, and they are missing all of the very funny trailers that accompanied the movies the first time around. Each film has the touches of their directors, but neither one is at their best. Grindhouse isn’t for everyone, but if you like the nostalgia idea, see it for the fun.

Rating: 4 1/2 Purrs for well, everything. I mean zombies and chicks driving stunt cars. Come on!

Candles Burning by Tabitha King and Michael McDowell

I have never read any of Michael McDowell’s work, and the only book by Tabitha King I read ages ago I thought was so-so. Based on that I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect from Candles Burning, I only knew that my always-awesome book club recommended it, so I grabbed it with some free book points I had earned. I was pleased with what I got; this was book of the true Southern Gothic.

Calley Dakin is a young girl when her family travels to New Orleans where her self-made father, Joe Cane Dakin, is attending a conference. Unfortunately, her father doesn’t come back to the hotel one night, and the next day her crazy Southern momma gets a ransom note for 1 million dollars. In true Southern Gothic fashion, two half-witted women who seem to have no motive dispatch Calley’s father in a very bloody, crazy way. This changes the course of Calley’s life, as her crazy and disapproving grandma takes over her life, ends up “adopting” the “man of the family,” Calley’s brother, and basically runs her mother and her out of the house. Calley and her mother end up in Florida at a strange B&B, where they spend their days entertaining the guests, working, and scheming to get the money back her mother knows her father had before the grandmother and her lawyer ran off with it all. Eventually Calley is able to get revenge for her family, but it takes awhile (she is a grown up by then). The journey there is just dripping with the feeling of swamps, heavy kudzu, magic, mystery, off-beat characters, and oh so twangy Southern dialogue, so it is equal in intriguing reading and annoyance at the silly accents.

I wouldn’t run right out and buy this book for everyone I know, but if you like William Faulkner or Flannery O’Connor and want to read something like Faulkner-lite, pick this up. There is some imagery there that will stick with you, even though you might spend a large portion of the book wondering what the hell is going on.

Rating: 4 purrs for naming her Calliope and for adding just a touch of the supernatural. The story had enough atmosphere on its own without too much “magic” in it.

Beneath

I saw a trailer for Beneath before some other movie and it looked intriguing. Others thought so too, because it took me awhile to get it via NetFlix.

In Beneath, Christy is haunted by visions after she and her sister are in a horrible car accident. Christy was responsible, and her sister was burned terribly and eventually died. But did she really? If so, why does Christy keep having these visions? After many years, she returns to her hometown to attend a funeral of an old family friend. Why do the visions return? Why won’t her sister’s widower husband let her stay in their house? Why does her niece have nightmares of the “dark thing”? Christy is determined to find out the truth once and for all, even if it costs her life.

This is a nicely creepy, atmospheric thriller. The dark old house of her in-laws really conveys a sense of secret doings. Nora Zehetner is delicate and determined in her role as Christy. I really liked her in Brick and Heroes, and she really does a nice job here. She does a great job conveying that determination, but you also wonder if she really is just bonkers. Matthew Settle is less impressive, but the little girl was great.

Beneath was a scary thriller that, while I figured out what was going on with it part way through, I still wasn’t sure if I was right until the end. It was without doubt worth the rental.

Rating: 4 ½ Purrs for a decent straight-to-video thriller

Comics Read in 2007

This year I tried to read more graphic novels and keep my local comic guy happy with spending way too much on comics. Here's what I ended up reading, and I still have more to go.

• The Pride of Baghdad
• The Walking Dead, trades, Vols 1-5
• Pheonix: Endsong, Vols. 1-5
• Powerless, Vols. 1-6
• Black Harvest by Josh Howard
• Fray by Joss Wedon
• Nightmares & Fairy Tales: Once Upon a Time by Serena Valentino
• 300 by Frank Miller
• The Cat with the Really Big Head by Roman Dirge
• Y: The Last Man, trade, Vol 1
• Ronin by Frank Miller
• The Living & The Dead by Tod Livingston, Robert Tinnell
• The Mystery Play by Grant Morrison, Jon J Muth
• Agnes Quill
• Holmes, Vols. 1-4 by Omaha Perez
• Friday the 13th: Pamela's Tale, vols. 1-2
• Friday the 13th: A Summer to Remember
• The Dark Tower: Gunslinger Born, Vols. 1-7
• BookHunter by Shiga
• Tales of the Vampires by Joss Whedon
• Tales of the Slayers by Joss Whedon
• Ultimate Daredevil Elektra, Vols. 1-4
• Eightball by Daniel Clowes
• Friday the 13th: How I Spent my Summer Vacation
• Buffy Season 8, Vols. 1-5 by Joss Whedon
• Blood of Saints by Josh Howard
  

Books Read in 2007

Here's a list of what I read this year. I'm only at 72 this year, but I did read a crap ton of comics, so maybe that makes up for missing my normal 100.

Fiction - Sci Fi, Fantasy, Horror

• Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein
• The Hellfire Club by Peter Straub
• Lisey's Story by Stephen King
• The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
• Eccentirc Circles by Rebecca Lickiss
• Dragonlance Chronicles: Dragons of Autumn Fire by Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman
• Dragonlance Chronicles: Dragons of Winter Night by Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman
• Dragonlance Chronicles: Dragons of Spring Dawning by Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman
• Stardust by Neil Gaiman
• Candles Burning by Tabitha King & Michael McDowell
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J. K. Rowling
• Fear Nothing by Dean Koontz
• Nightwatch by Sergei Lukyanenko
• Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill
• Earth Abides by George R. Stewart

Fiction - Classics

• The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins
• As I Lay Dying William Faulkner
• The Country of Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett
• A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

Fiction - Suspense, Mystery

• Cradle and All by James Patterson
• The No.1 Ladies Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith
• The Vision by Heather Graham
• Kill the Messenger by Tami Hoag
• Arthur & George by Julian Barnes
• Slow Burn by Julie Garwood
• The Poe Shadow by Matthew Pearl
• The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld
• Ghost Walk by Heather Graham
• The Fourth Bear by Jasper Fforde
• Cover Her Face by P.D. James
• Birds of a Feather by Jacqueline Winspear
• Pardonable Lies Jacqueline Winspear
• Messenger of Truth by Jacqueline Winspear
• A Mind to Murder by P.D. James
• Unnatural Causes P.D. James
• An Unsuitable Job for a Woman by P.D. James
• Shroud for a Nightingale by P.D. James
• The Presence by Heather Graham
• 7 Steps to Midnight by Richard Matheson
• Blaze by Richard Bachman
• The Pale Blue Eye by Louis Baynard
• Never Sleep With Strangers by Heather Graham
• The Sunday Philosophy Club by Alexander McCall Smith
• The Island by Heather Graham
• The Black Tower by P.D. James
• Death of an Expert Witness by P.D. James
• The Skull Beneth the Skin by P.D. James
• The Husband by Dean Koontz
• Grave Secrets by Kathy Reichs
• A Taste for Death by P.D. James
• Devices & Desires by P.D. James
• Original Sin by P.D. James
• A Certain Justice by P.D. James
• The Murders of Richard III by Elizabeth Peters

Fiction - General

• The Brief History of the Dead by Kevin Brockmeier
• Spring Collection by Judith Krantz
• Sideways by Rex Pickett
• Northern Lights by Nora Roberts
• The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
• Blue Smoke by Nora Roberts
• The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
• Practical Demonkeeping by Christopher Moore

Nonfiction

• Girl Sleuth: Nancy Drew and the Women Who Created Her by Melanie Rehak
• The Great Mortality:An Intimate History of the Black Death, The Most Devastating Plague of All Time by John Kelly
• Marie Antoinette: The Journey by Antonia Fraser
• Strange Piece of Paradise by Terri Jentz
• It's All Too Much by Peter Walsh
• Thunderstruck by Erik Larson
• A Death in Belmont by Sebastian Junger
• Teasing Secrets from the Dead by Emily Craig, PhD.
• Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer

Severance

“Shit, I've left Gordon's foot on the coach... sorry mate.”

Severance is one of the many horror comedies that have come out in recent years. It’s not as good as some, but it’s got some funny moments. It’s definitely heavy on the sarcasm and black humor.

In Severance, a group of sales people from an international weapons company head off to a team-building retreat in the deep woods of Hungary. Things start off bad, with the bus breaking down and the group finally finds a lodge out in the woods, but it is certainly not what they expected. Soon, people start disappearing and the group comes face to face with a group of cannibalistic, psychotic commandos carrying the same weapons the group sells. These commandos are bent on the group’s destruction, and the sales people must learn to get out of the office and work together to live to see another day.

I was hoping it would be an even funnier movie than it was. It’s certainly no Shaun of the Dead, but it was worth a rental. In fact, I will probably end up watching it again. Laura Harris is great as the girl everybody wants (she looks remarkably like Kirsten Dunst), Danny Dyer is the drug addled guy every body likes, and Toby Stephens is the suave guy.

If you think the premise sounds good, check it out. It’s not a movie for everyone, and it could have been better, but it’s not bad for a newish time director. Christopher Smith directed another movie I rented awhile back, Creep, which was also pretty good. Franka Potente was in that, and if woman trapped in a subway being chased by a bloodthirsty mutant, check Creep out.

Rating: 3 ½ purrs

Recent Aquisitions to the Library

My most recent haul from Half-Price Books 20% off sale, Christmas gifts, and my trip to Barnes & Nobel.

Books:

• 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die by Peter Ackroyd - This should be interesting to see what is listed in this book!
  
• Little Children: A Novel by Tom Perrotta
• The eye of the beholder ; The queen of the night ; The ice maiden (A Black box thriller) by Marc Behm
• Murder & Other Acts of Literature: Twenty-Four Unforgettable and Chilling Stories ed. by Michele B. Slung
• A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail by Bill Bryson
• Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell
• Hollow Man by John Dickson Carr
• The Afghan by Frederick Forsyth
• Thriller: Stories To Keep You Up All Night ed. by Lee Child
• Day of the Jackal by Frederick Forsyth
• Last Bus To Woodstock , Last Seen Wearing , The Silent World of Nicholas Quinn, Dead of Jericho , The Jewel That Was Ours , The Daughters of Cain, and The Way Through the Woods (Inspector Morse Mysteries) by Colin Dexter
• Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq by Thomas E. Ricks
• Sock & Glove: Creating Charming Softy Friends from Cast-off Socks and Gloves by Miyako Kanamori
• The Murders of Richard III by Elizabeth Peters
  

Graphic Novels:

• Flight, Volume One by Kazu Kibuishi
• Sleeper Vol. 1: Out in the Cold by Ed Brubaker
• Ex Machina, Vol. 3: Fact v. Fiction by Brian K. Vaughan
• The Blot by Tom Neely
• Glister Vol 1 by Andi Watson
  

Black Sheep

When I first read a blurb in Entertainment Weekly about a movie where sheep go crazy and attack people, I knew this was a movie I had to see. Finally, Black Sheep came out on DVD, and I lapped it up in all of its ovine glory. Baa, baa, Black Sheep indeed.

A young Kiwi’s older brother plays a cruel joke on him, one he never recovers from. He vows never to return to the sheep ranch where he grew up, harboring a deep fear of sheep from then on. Then one day he returns to sign over his half of the family ranch, only to find out things aren’t what they used to be. Why is his brother genetically engineering sheep? What happens when a vegan-Peta-organic-farming couple raids the genetic laboratory? Why are the sheep licking their chops? Who will survive the “violence of the lambs”?

Weta Workshop did the special effects, and they were fabulous. The relatively unknown cast did a great job. The script had its moments, with some really great sheep jokes sprinkled throughout. I will never forget the scene of the sheep barreling over the hillside into the crowd of people, just like the Ork armies in Lord of the Rings. Brilliant.

If you like a horror movie with some good gore and some great jokes, check out Black Sheep. It’s not quite as good as Shaun of the Dead, but it is definitely a DVD purchase in my future.

Rating: 5 Purrs for the mint sauce and were-sheep! I mean, come on – were-sheep!!!

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

The Lovely Bones is one of those books I put off reading because I knew the story would probably be a tough read. I finally pulled it off my bookshelf recently, and wow, what a book. I love to read, and I read a lot, but it’s not often I get a book in my hands that rips me up and stays with me even now, weeks later. I was sucked into this book, and it ripped me up emotionally, but it was such a beautiful story I just can’t say I regret the experience. As I remember the story and how it was told, I can feel that sorrow work its way back into my heart, but it is bittersweet.

Susie Salmon, a 14 year old girl, is the narrator of The Lovely Bones. When we first meet her, Susie is in heaven watching over her family. She tells us how she died, and she watches her family deal with that loss. He parents struggle to keep their marriage together, her sister refuses to feel anything so avoid the sorrow of losing her sister, and her baby brother struggles to understand where Susie went and why she is never coming back. Susie watches the world and struggles with letting it all go. While she works through the grief of losing her life, Susie sees her family grow, mend, and eventually move on.

I really don’t want to say too much because I truly believe this is one of those novels that you simply must just discover on your own. I couldn’t do Alice Sebold’s prose justice. Her words are too lyrical and haunting to condense, and I hate to take that experience away from anyone. The Lovely Bones is a memorable and stunning story about love, loss, grief, marriage, memory, heaven, and moving on. I can’t recommend it enough.

Rating: 5 Purrs for one of the best books I have ever read, hands down.

Recent Aquisitions to the Library

I have been on a book spree lately. Recently added:

• Wash This Blood Clean from My Hand by Fred Vargas, Sian Reynolds (Translator)
• Sunshine by Alex Garland
• Lace by Shirley Conran
• The Maul and the Pear Tree by P.D. James,T. A. Critchley
• After Dark by Haruki Murakami
• Angelica: A Novel by Arthur Phillips
• I Am America (And So Can You!) by Stephen Colbert

Graphic Novel trades:

• Ex Machina, Vol. 2: Tag by Brian K. Vaughan
• Torso: A True Crime Graphic Novel by >Brian Michael Bendis
• Nightmares and Fairy Tales Vol. 2 Beautiful Beasts by Serena Valentino
• Gloom Cookie Vol 5: The Final Curtain by Serena Valentino
• The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
  

The Proposition

The Proposition is one of the best movies I have seen this year. It’s a western, true life, dirty, gritty Western with and excellent story, acting, and landscape. I haven’t seen a Western I have liked this much since Unforgiven or Silverado. It’s that caliber of a movie.

In The Proposition, Guy Pearce is Charlie Burns. He and his brother Mike are caught by Captain Stanley (Ray Winstone) and given a proposal – hunt down and kill his older brother Arthur in order to gain a pardon and save the life of his younger brother Mikey. Arthur is the leader and mastermind behind the Burns gang, responsible for attacking the Hopkins farm, raping Mrs. Hopkins, and murdering the entire family. Capt. Stanley’s wife, who was a close friend of Mrs. Hopkins, doesn’t accept the proposal. The tensions surmount as the community cries for justice, the relationship between husband and wife become strained, and Charlie hunts for his brother in the Australian outback. Will Charlie kill his brother; will the town have their own justice?

The screenplay was written by Nick Cave, and while I like his music I was very surprised that he could write a screenplay so amazing. The complicated relationships between a husband and wife, a brother and a brother, a town and its leaders are so well written. Everything about this movie feels real, from the flies buzzing people’s faces, the heat rising in the desert, the blood and violence of carving a life out in the rough Outback. There are some scenes that are so iconic that they stick in your brain, like the scene of Stanley and his wife having Christmas dinner, the china set out, the turkey ready for carving, or the roses outside of their home, fighting for life in the arid desert, or the Aborigine leaving the homestead and returning to the land, removing his shoes at the gate.

I can't recommend this movie enough. What a brilliant, bleak, beautiful film.

Rating: 5 Purrs for perfection – Guy Pearce excellent as always , and a gritty, dirty, down to earth Western

The House Where Evil Dwells

What a surprise! The House Where Evil Dwells was an unexpectedly good haunted house movie that I stumbled across on NetFlix. It’s pretty similar to another movie, Ju-On or The Grudge, but it was made in the early 80’s, so it was appealing to see a different version of the same idea.

The House Where Evil Dwells starts out in mid-1800 Japan. A samurai comes home to find his wife in bed with another, and in a rage murders them all in a great bloody slaughter. Zip forward to modern day Japan (well, modern 1980’s Japan), where a young American couple have traveled to Japan so the husband can work. An old family friend, who lives in Japan already, has found them a house. Guess what house it is. The family finds out that sometimes old ghosts stick around. Will they survive, or will they be forced to reenact that horrible night?

Many people say the ghosts were quite silly, and well, yeah, they are a little. But I just chalk that up to it being an early 80’s film, and too many people expecting stringy-haired girls crawling around walls like you see in modern day Japanese horror films. It did at times feel a bit like a movie-of the week, outside of the nudity of course. But overall, I felt the idea and the plot felt fresh, even though I have seen Ju-On, The Grudge, and most of the sequels. It felt new to me anyway. The acting was better than most horror movies you find from that age, including Susan George who shines in the troubled, haunted wife role.

If you like the stream of Asian horror movies being churned out on DVDs, you might take a look at this one. It’s refreshing to see an early version of an idea we have seen over and over in movies today.

Rating: 4 Purrs for a gigantic crab attack and creepy ghosts in the soup

Recent Aquisitions to the Library

I just bought a few books from Amazon:

• World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks
• Black Light, Point of Impact, and Time to Hunt by Stephen Hunter
• Break No Bones by Kathy Reichs

The Stephen Hunter books I ordered for Pandabob. We watched Shooter the other night and now he wants to read about Bob Lee Swagger, master sniper.

Crank

Crank is one of those movies I had to rent because I just love action movies, even if they are bad. Well, Crank was bad. I mean ridiculously silly, Don “The Dragon” Wilson bad. I think I even laughed out loud a few times at just how asinine it was.

Jason Statham if Chev Chelios, just your average, amazingly talented hit man. He kills someone, and in turn, his minions come after Chev and inject him with a potent poison. He and his doctor figure out that he has to keep his adrenalin pumping to stay alive, so he begins this crazed hunt for the guys who set him up. Enter the video game, where Chev runs from location to location fighting folks and trying to protect his girlfriend Eve, who doesn’t know he’s a hit man until just now. After all, he was going to retire to spend more time with her. But first, he needs to find a cure and kick some ass while he looks.

Jason Statham is a great action hero; I just wish someone would give him something more to do than these types of movies. At least give the man a starring role in a bigger action flick, like a Die Hard movie. Amy Smart plays Eve with a great California vibe, and she is nice window dressing, but she’s not more than that. Dwight Yoakam is Chev’s doctor, and at least this time around he didn’t creep me out.

I can’t say I would recommend this movie, unless you really like movies that have no substance whatsoever, ludicrous plot points, and not so great acting. I mean, I like bad movies, I like silly movies, and I like absurd movies. There was just something missing here.

Rating: 1 Hiss for just being plain awful. Not even Jason Statham having sex with Amy Smart in the middle of Chinatown with onlookers could save this movie.

Strange Piece of Paradise by Terri Jentz

True crime is one kind of nonfiction I can tear through. Terri Jentz’s Strange Piece of Paradise was engrossing on a level most true crime doesn’t reach. It’s probably because Terri Jentz lived through this crime, kept it as part of her, and finally, took the case up to find that man who trespassed upon her campsite and tried to kill her. The story is gripping, her search for truth engrossing, and her journey is told with a true voice. It’s the best nonfiction I have read in awhile.

When Terri Jentz was a college kid in 1977, she and a friend began a cross-country bike tour. Their goal was to follow the year-old Centennial bike path across the United States. They made it just over a week. Eight days in they stopped for the night in Cline Falls, Oregon. That night, a cowboy brutally attacked them, driving over their tent with his truck and attacking them with an ax. It was a cruel, unprovoked attack, and both girls barely survived.

Nearly 20 years after the attack, Terri decides to return to the scene of the crime, a community that has taken the attack into itself and its memories. The “two girls from Cline Falls” have been in their minds for 20 years, and the community wants answers as much as it wants to hide the truth. Jentz won’t let them hide anymore. With some new allies, she tries to uncover the truth after such a long time, facing the difficulties of the criminal justice system and the inner workings of the small towns surrounding Cline Falls. Eventually, she finds some sort of truth and healing in the process.

Terri Jentz’s Strange Piece of Paradise is similar to Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood in that it closely resembles a report, a true life, cleanly written report of a truly horrible crime. It is one that makes no sense and truly haunts the people involved, even remotely. The difference is Terri Jentz is that girl from Cline Falls, and it is her story.

Rating: 5 Purrs, for telling a true story even when it uncovered her own warts.

Recent Aquisitions to the Library

Here are some books I just picked up at Half-Price Books:

• Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
• Anatomy of a Murder by Robert Traver
• Oriental Ghost Stories by Lafcadio Hearn
• The Stolen Child by Keith Donohue
• The Mammoth Book of New Historical Whodunits edited by Mike Ashley
• Heartsick by Chelsea Cain
  

The Hitcher (2007)

I really liked the original Hitcher. Rutger Hauer was a truly frightening man, someone who has successfully scared me off of picking up even the most docile looking hitchhiker. The remake wasn’t nearly as scary, but I liked it a lot anyway.

The plot is pretty close to the original, only this time you have a boyfriend and girlfriend who are traveling across New Mexico for spring break rather than a young guy driving a car across country where he meets a waitress who is dragged into the Hitcher’s cross fire. The two kids pick up Sean Bean, a crazed, sadistic killer who torments them as they flee his murderous intent. The New Mexico police, despite how much the two kids try to convince them otherwise, suspect them of actually being the killers.

It’s pretty scary in parts, with lots of blood. I liked the two kids, Sophia Bush and Zachary Knighton, and Sean Bean was good as John Ryder, the crazy hitchhiking serial killer. The blank desert landscape of New Mexico is perfect for the story and it only helps increase the isolation the two kids feel and it only heightens the tension.

This version is nowhere as good as the original, but if you can separate the two and not hold this one up to that classic, you can find this one to be a pretty fun horror flick.

Rating: 4 Purrs for my favorite Sophia Bush and the beautiful New Mexico landscape

The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld

I am a huge murder mystery buff. I love mysteries, highbrow mysteries by Grand Dames like Agatha Christie or Anne Perry, silly serial mysteries like The Jane Austen series by Stephanie Barron, or even, sometimes, begrudgingly the whole time, mystery thrillers like James Patterson or Dean Koontz. The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld belongs in the first category. While I am sure he would rather not be called a “Grand Dame,” Rubenfled’s book is not just a mystery; it is literature.

Rubenfeld bases his book on Sigmund Freud’s first and only visit to America in 1909 and his comment that Americans were “savages." Despite his success while in America, he always talked of his visit as being an unhappy or traumatic one. From this kernel of an idea, Rubenfeld builds the story of a murder and the attempted murder of two socialites. While on their tour of New York, Freud and his apprentice Jung are called in to help diagnose why the young girl who escaped (but heavily beaten while being tied up in a very S&M fashion) is suddenly unable to talk. Our main character, Stratham Younger, is a disciple of Freud and is called in to help diagnose Nora, the fortunate (or unfortunate as her parents believe) girl. The police want to know what happened, and when Nora recovers her voice, Younger must put it all together to help catch the man who attacked Nora. He becomes his own detective, digging deeply into the high society relationships of Nora and her family to discover a twisted tale of sexual perversion, family relationships, and of course, blue-blooded intrigue.

While there are several subplots that do distract a bit from the meat of the story, I found them to be interesting and unexpected commentary on the New York or New England area of the US in the early 1900’s. The young society doctor is earnest enough and troubled when he feels his affection for Nora could get in the way of his treatment of her. Nora is a deeply convoluted and troubled girl who is wrapped up so much in her own lies it gets difficult to understand her motives after awhile, but when you see what is really going on in the story, you can understand why she is so confused and confusing. It is heavily mired in the interpretation of sex and sexual relationships of Freud, all of which seem very masculine to me. Of course, I have never studied that much psychology to really get into Freud, so maybe that is just my interpretation.

Overall, The Interpretation of Murder is a good first outing. It’s much better than some first novels I have read, and the mystery keeps you guessing quite a bit until the end. There are sufficient red herrings and twists and turns to keep you turning pages, and when you are finished with the book, you do feel like you picked up a bit of the flavor of what life might have been like in New York then. I have read better, but not often enough for me to lower this one to the second rung of the mystery ladder.

Rating: 4 Purrs for an engrossing and complex mystery with a bit of unexpected but a little disturbing kink.

Bandidas

Bandidas was a fun little movie about two women, one a spoiled rich girl, Salma Hayek, and a poor farm girl, Penelope Cruz, who end up running for their lives and robbing banks to get back at the men who crossed them and are terrorizing the people who live in their town. It’s not a lot of substance, but it is fun for a rainy afternoon.

Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz are obviously having a great time playing Sara and Maria. They pick off of each other, play up their lines, and complement each other really well. Both characters grow a bit in the film, but of course, there isn’t a whole lot of character development. It is a comedy/action movie, after all. Steve Zahn is quite fun as the agent sent to find the two bank robbers. Each lady tries to win him over, and he is obviously having a lot of fun seeing which one will win. Dwight Yoakam is Jackson, the murderous henchman who is after the bandidas. He was the only downside for me. His character was just way too much. Of course, I must say that I get the willies whenever I see him after seeing him in Sling Blade. He just makes my skin crawl.

If you are looking for a fun, light-hearted movie staring two beautiful women playing female Robin Hoods, corsets included, check out Bandidas. It is worth a rental.

Rating: 3 1/2 Purrs for fun, a surprise part for Sam Shepard, and two very lovely women shooting it up

Ronin by Frank Miller with Lynn Varley

I like Frank Miller, but I have mixed feelings about Ronin. I think maybe I thought I was getting into something else when I picked it up. I thought it was going to be parallel story lines, one with Ronin of 13^th century Japan, and a modern dystopic New York, but instead the two stories were meshed into one. Then, the story just felt too much like The Matrix (which I know was released afterwards, but it did affect how I saw the graphic novel).

Ronin is about Billy, a young paraplegic who works in a 21^st century utopia, a perfect bubble society. One day the demon Agat comes blasting out of the past, with the spirit of the Ronin on his tail. Ronin possesses and transforms Billy and goes after Agat, blazing a trail of destruction through the dystopic New York.

I wouldn’t count Ronin as my favorite Frank Miller. I loved Sin City but Ronin just didn’t wow me the way his other work has. I’m not sure why, but the story just didn’t seem up to par.

Rating: 3 Purrs because it’s Frank Miller.