Phases 1-6 Will Leave you Unprepared for Phase 7

I originally posted about Phase 7 back in July. Now that it's been released to DVD, I felt it was a good time to bring it back to your attention. Take a read through my original post. It's a great watch if you're big into the reactions of the humans in a given horror situation - so fans of George Romero take special note. Check out Phase 7 on DVD, it's an excellent time of year to do so.

Before I even talk to you about the new post apocalyptic plague flick, Phase 7, I want to spend a minute directing your attention to the poster for it. It seems like movie poster art has taken a back seat lately, a travesty for which there is no excuse. As a lover of exploitation, the sort of poster style used here is my absolute favorite. Something featuring large and prominently in the top center, in this case the apartment building with "Phase 7" takes center stage in a stylized font. The central characters, facing out from center and overlapping, with more important players featured larger than the supporting cast. Star Wars is a popular example of this poster style, which in itself was a throw back to 50's promotions. Something about this layout just sings "Saturday Afternoon Matinee" to me and this brings me back to the days of my youth, seeing B-Movies at the Devon in Philadelphia, which was a second run movie theater near the house I grew up in.

Flash forward to the present. So here I am now, totally sucked into the film by the promotional art mixed with my own feelings of poster art nostalgia. I haven't read too much about it before hand. Phase 7 is the story of the occupants of an apartment building in Argentina, who have to survive in the aftermath of a plague that decimates humanity. It's at this point that you are probably thinking the same thing that I was: "oh boy, it's zombie time! Muhahaha!". It's true I cackle like a 40's serial villain when it comes to zombies. It's true also that the setup for this film bears a lot of similarities to Rammbock: German Undead, which we took an early look at HERE. Phase 7, however, is not a zombie film.

We follow the journeys of Coco and Pipi, two 20-something's with a bun in the oven (her oven, not his, luckily). They live in an brand new apartment building that only has a few occupants, since it's just finished construction. This excellent decision gives us the opportunity to examine each of the occupants in much greater detail than we would have been able to if there was a much larger pool of characters, such as in [REC]. As luck would have it, our happy couple just returned from a trip to the grocery store as the outbreak began. They are quickly quarantined in their building and told to stay and wait it out. Which they do, maxin' and relaxin' with their plentiful supply of food stuffs.

"Without zombies, what's the point of watching two people wait out a pandemic?" George Romero would be ashamed of you. For decades he has demonstrated that man is the greatest monster of all. So is it true here, where the folks in the building who are running out of supplies begin scheming. It's at this point we meet Horacio.

Do you often sit around, discussing what you would do in the case of a zombie apocalypse, with your friends? Have you written out a list of supplies you would need, where you would loot first and where you would hold up? No? Stop looking at me like that. You know you have. Horacio is you and your weird B-Movie friends come alive. He is Coco's Neighbor who comes equipped with hazmat suit, trip wire stun bombs and enough food and guns to survive well beyond the government and army. He's an Argentinean BURT GUMMER. Seriously, he's a balding, badass, Batman with guns. And you're gonna love him.

So what does Coco do in the face of humans resorting to anything to survive? He puts on a gnarly t-shirt and grows a rockin' facial configuration. Duh.

This SciFi thriller is a cool look at humans being humans in the wake of the end of the world. It's currently making the rounds as a limited release at AMC theaters around the country and will then be available on DVD in the beginning of October. If you're a classic Romero fan, you can't go wrong with Phase 7. With the spate of great horror coming out around the world, I'm surprised Hollywood isn't more paying attention.

The 31 Days of Halloween: Day 15

Halloween is the best time of the year. It's a wonderfully indulgent time, where your inner ghoul is given societal license to be put on display. To celebrate it to it's wicked fullest, the Midnight Cheese will be posting every day in October with excellent ways to enjoy the season. Whether it's horror films, video games, books or activities, check back every day for some new Halloween fun.

Michael Jackson's Thriller

Now we're in it. We're half way to Halloween and it's time to kick this count down into overdrive. There's only one right way to do it proper and that's with the most influential and important music video of all time. I don't care if you absolutely hate Michael Jackson (no one did in 1984), you're gonna put that distaste aside for the next twenty minutes and listen to me. This massively influential achievement deserves your love and you deserve it's spectacle.

Thriller is a collaborative effort between director John Landis (of An American Werewolf in London fame) and The King of Pop, Michael Jackson. The singer contacted the director after watching American Werewolf and quite frankly it couldn't have worked out any better. Thriller is really a short form horror piece with a dance number. It's a love letter to horror films wrapped in expensive paper and accented with a schlocky bow.

The opening is in a 50's timeframe, with Jackson in his varsity jacket and his date in a poodle skirt. An excellent touch to this whole scene, a movie within a video, is that there are film damage pops to give it a more stressed look. After the two exchange a promise ring, Jackson transforms into a werecat, giving Landis the chance to show off some of the effectiveness of his on screen transformations. Here we pan to the audience watching this film, in the 80's, with Jackson noshing on some popcorn and his date disgusted by the werecat attack. She leaves and we're treated to the outside of the beautiful Palace Theater, with Thriller staring Vincent Price on the marquee. As you're watching this part, check out some of the excellent vintage posters in the background.

The walk home is where the actual singing kicks in and really, everything is going fine until they decide to walk past a cemetery shrouded in fog. Wouldn't you know it, Vincent Price is on hand to recite his now famous "rap", to which the zombies emerge to stalk out happy couple. Before you know it, they're surrounded. What follows is the most repeated part of the video, the amazingly choreographed zombie dance sequence. So famous that it's been performed by daring wedding parties, repentant prison inmates and creative protesters alike. Just check out YouTube, there's so many that I'm surprised there hasn't been a reality contest show centered around it. So You Think You Can Thriller. (I want a cut of the profits)

Why am I spending so much time discussing a fourteen minute music video? Believe it or not, Thriller might have had the most impact on me as a child as perhaps any other single piece of media. It came out when I was very young, it was in rapid rotation on an MTV that was only in the business of showcasing videos (it played once every hour for the whole first year after it's release), it scared my sister and I (we would hide behind the recliner in the living room- it had a brown, yellow and orange afghan) and it was fun. Always the most important factor. The truth is that both my sister and I still have a lingering fear and a tremendous love of zombies- our favorite flavor of horror. This isn't an isolated happenstance, it's a culturally ingrained dynamic. It was important to me, it still is.

I'm gonna leave you with a link so you can watch it yourself. It's a Halloween treat and like I said, it kicks our countdown into overdrive. From here on out, everything we showcase will have a sharper Halloween focus. Enjoy.

The 31 Days of Halloween: Day 6

Halloween is the best time of the year. It's a wonderfully indulgent time, where your inner ghoul is given societal license to be put on display. To celebrate it to it's wicked fullest, the Midnight Cheese will be posting every day in October with excellent ways to enjoy the season. Whether it's horror films, video games, books or activities, check back every day for some new Halloween fun.

An American Werewolf in London

Aooooooooooooo! Werewolves of London. Aooooooooooo!

Where to begin; Oh where should I start?

Have you seen this film? An American Werewolf in London is the quintessential wolf man film of my childhood. Certainly I'd seen the classic Universal wolf man films and other films like The Howling, but none of them made such a mammoth impact, on both the industry and me, as John Landis' 1981 werewolf movie. Rather than recap the plot of the film (which you can just look up at your leisure anyway), let's take a look at some of most influential and interesting things that An American Werewolf in London did.


The Soundtrack
This flick is a black comedy, in addition to being a horror film. It's one of the best blending of the two genres that I've ever seen. Part of what makes it work so well is the subtle use of upbeat songs, not to break the tension in the moment, but to give it a nudge and wink. Landis was limited by what he could license the rights to. Sadly, he couldn't use Warren Zevon's "Werewolves of London". Limitations can unlock creative alternatives though and what is used here is absolutely perfect. Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Badmoon Rising", Van Morrison's "Moondance" and no less than three versions of "Blue Moon" are leveraged to great effect. My particular favorite is the doo-wop version of "Blue Moon" by The Marcels. Bom bom-bom-bom Ba-bom-ba-bom-bom...Blue Moon...


The Transformation
This one sequence changed the face of werewolf films. Before An American Werewolf in London in wolf man films, the transformation from man to beast and back again would be accomplished in one of a few ways:

-Pan away from actor as human, pan back with the werewolf make-up in place.
-Fade in/out. So a close up of the actor as human is filmed. Then, a close up in the same position of the actor as wolfman is filmed on top, to give the illusion of a gradual fade into or out of being a man beast.
-The animated shadow of a man is shown to transform into a beast. When we see them next, they're fulled wolfed out.

An American Werewolf in London never flinches away from a second of the painful, gory, horrendous transformation from man to beast. Special effects master Rick Baker pulled out all the stops and crafted a sequence that is still amazing to the modern viewer. It was hugely influential in a number of ways. The power of this scene convinced Michael Jackson to hire Landis to direct the best music video of all time, Thriller (Disagreement about Thriller is fightin' words where I come from). Werewolf films now, by and large, all show the transformation on camera after the trail had been blazed. It can be argued that this bled through to other horror genre films as well.

Perhaps most amazingly, An American Werewolf in London won an Oscar for Outstanding Achievement in Makeup. What's so amazing about that? There was no Outstanding Achievement in Makeup Oscar the year before...it was created to honor this film specifically. It's been a normal Oscar category ever since.

You really need to see this film on a crisp October night. If you're in the Philadelphia area, it's actually being screened tomorrow (10/7) on 35mm as part of the Colonial Theatre's First Friday Fright Night series. (Information here) I can't urge you to check out this film with an audience forcefully enough. You're missing out on the real experience if you don't. Still, anyway you can, check out An American Werewolf in London.

See you next Wednesday... ;)

I'll Take My Fish Pan-Seared, Please

The reason a bomb explodes with such outward force is due to rapidly expanding gases being confined to a much smaller than required space. In the blink of an eye, what was once an explosive substance the side of a deck of cards now requires the volume to contain outward rushing force the size of a dump truck. It’s this combination of confining space and raging force which creates a devastating blast.

These concepts can be applied in practice to other biological and chemical situations. Take the human being for instance. I’m not suggesting that we fill one fine specimen with C4 and measure the result (something I’m sure will make it into a Saw film at some point). Instead, take the example presented us in the Japanese physiological horror film, Cold Fish. This is the perfect proof of concept to demonstrate what happens when a person’s mind endures more than it can reasonably be expected to contain, much too quickly.

From Midnight Cheese

Have you heard of Cold Fish? It’s the new crazy Japanese thriller from Shion Sono who, among other things, directed the strange and indulgent Suicide Club. It’s billed as based on the real life events, the strange case of dog store owner slash husband and wife serial killers. In the film’s case, we’ve switched out dog store owners and substituted fish store owners. I’m jumping a head into this slow burning sizzler though.

As Cold Fish begins to unfold, we’re brought directly into the plodding and expectations-failing lives of the Syamoto family. Our protagonist, widower Nobuyuki, owns a middling tropical fish store which seems to exist somewhere between totally failing and teeth scrapping by. Taeko is his second (younger, bustier) wife, not adjusting well to her new life as a domestic, cooking dinner in their meager accommodations at the back of the store. Mitsuko is Nobuyuki’s daughter. She resents her stepmom, who is closer in age to her than her father, and completely resents the meager life which her parents are providing for her.

From Midnight Cheese

After setting the table, for our story as well as dinner, Mitsuko is caught robbing a store. Her parents are incredibly shamed when they arrive to pick her up. Seriously, I’ve never seen two people bowing and asking for forgiveness as many times as the Syamotos do. They are depicted as the honor driven, upstanding Japanese couple who would do anything to avoid shame and dishonor. They’re very tightly bound people, keeping everything under control, including how miserable that are. It’s very opposite to western sensibilities. They couldn’t be any more down on their luck and miserable.

Enter Murata, a very boisterous, friendly, talkative and ultimately pushy person. He always gets his way. Observing the shame of the Syamotos, Murata steps in to talk them out of trouble with store security. By a very strange coincidence, he also owns a tropical fish store. Ah but his store is very large, very successful, very extravagant…very western. He insists that Mitsuko should come work and live at his store, giving her purpose, getting her away from a stepmom she hates and a mediocre life at her parent’s store.

From Midnight Cheese

But Murata’s intentions aren’t altruistic; else this would probably be a completely different genre of film. The nature of he and his wife’s mental damage is for you, the viewer, to discover on your own. I will tell you that the gore is spread around in the film, doled out in meal sized assaults to your senses. It never lasts over long and it’s more absurd than disgusting. It does reach Evil Dead 2 levels of comedic gold, but it’s not meant to. It unsettles us, just as it unsettles Syamoto. Reverence for the dead is not a thing to be found here.

Even though this is 144 minutes, it never feels over long. Rather, Cold Fish feels like an arduous journey to the breaking point; to madness but not back. A resolution IS reached, but for whom? Cold Fish hits DVD shelves tomorrow thanks to Bloody Disgusting Selects.

From Midnight Cheese