![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
It's snowing. Soft, fat flakes that drift lazily to the earth. I'm snug inside, and so it is beautiful. I've been watching it for a few minutes now and find it soothing. I'm still desperate for the warmth of spring, but until it arrives, snow is a worthy recompense for the cold. Perhaps I wouldn't feel that way if I had to brave the elements, but since Roomie and I filled our larder with soup and chili and frozen pot pies and boxes of cereal yesterday, we can afford to marvel at the snow from the cozy sanctuary of the house.
I bought Dayquil yesterday after stubbornly coping with the face-crushing sinus pressure of the lurgy for two days. Oh, blessed Dayquil! I don't know why I resist your sweet, pharmaceutical relief. I felt like rehashed ass yesterday until I popped a pair of capsules, and lo, it was as though I were reborn. I could breathe. I could think. My head didn't throb like an overstuffed cheesecloth, and the bridge of my nose stopped threatening catastrophic explosion. My eyeballs stopped pulsing and watering. I felt human again. My only regret is that it doesn't last as long in its post-nanny state formulation, when they fiddled with it to keep it in front of the counter and make it unpalatable to homebrew drug manufacturers boiling meth in the kitchen, right next to little Dougie's Pop Tarts. I'm sure I could buy a twelve-hour formula from a pharmacist, but I refuse to show my ID and sign my name for Uncle Sam because I have a cold.
Because I felt like ass, I came home and watched a pair of horror flicks on DVD.
Paranormal Activity: This movie illustrates one of the genre's biggest problems: unlikeable protagonists. I suspect this unpleasant phenomenon is an organic offshoot of being marketed to teenagers and twenty-somethings, demographics noted for their self-absorption, arrogance and general air of insufferable assholery. When you are that age, you are convinced that you know everything, and that you possess a keen and unique insight into the world, one that would improve the world if the rest of the world would but recognize your tortured genius. This certainty often makes you a smug shit and inspires in those who have taken their lumps and learned the hard home truths a desire to beat the living shit out of you, or at least to watch the monsters gobble you up.
The producers clearly want us to like and relate to Katie and Micah, and maybe they are American Everypeople. Maybe most early twenty-somethings can afford a ridiculously large house in San Diego with hardwood floors and multiple laptops and desktops and two floors and four bedrooms despite the fact that one of them is a student and the other is a lousy day trader. Maybe most young women cuckold and berate their partner on a regular basis and presume entitlements to which their selfishness should not, well, entitle them. Maybe twenty-something males are grunting buffoons et up with brainless machismo. Actually, that last one I can believe, since PC is in his fifties and still suffers the sad effects of chronic testosterone poisoning. My point is that I've been in two long-term relationships, and in neither did I behave like that.
My biggest issue with the couple's dynamic is the fact that Katie talks like an alpha female and frequently attempts to assert her dominance by screaming at Micah, but she behaves like a whining, helpless milksop. While Micah blunders about trying to solve the mystery of the paranormal activity in the home, filming the house, researching on the Internet, conducting EVP sessions, and stupidly confronting the entity by bringing in a Ouija board, Katie...does a whole lot of not much. After her initial attempt to investigate the issue through a psychic/paranormal expert, she spends most of the movie either avoiding the problem or wailing that it's out to get her and that they should leave. She's the stereotypical blubbering, passive damsel in distress who stands around and waits for the well-intentioned but hopelessly ineffectual Micah to save her. She displays a modicum of sense when she orders Micah to get the Ouija board out of the house, but she doesn't take the initiative and remove it herself when Micah doesn't. Apparently, her hands are incapable of picking it up.
Micah tries, bless him, but he's badly out of his league and hampered by his formidable male ego. Every time Katie suggests that they contact Dr. Avery, the demonologist recommended by the psychic, he bristles and insists that he can protect "his house" and "his fucking girlfriend"(and that is the biggest indictment of Katie, in my opinion. She revels in reminding Micah that the demon is after her, yet she places the decision to summon qualified help squarely into his hands until it's far too late, placing his ego over her safety. And his, too; Micah might be an idiot, but he's a loyal idiot.). He can't, of course. His big ideas for combating the evil are to challenge its demonhood and to sprinkle the floor with baby powder in order to see if anything really is walking into their room at night. This after that truth has been well and truly established by several nights of videographic evidence. That's right; his big demon-fighting weapon is a bottle of Johnson's baby powder. Winchesters, take note.
The haunting itself was well-handled except for a ridiculously hammy scene in which an unattended Ouija board bursts into flames. Until then, the suspense was well-crafted and measured, but that scene was like a rip-roaring fart loosed in a quiet cathedral. It deflated the tension and left me rolling my eyes at the obviously contrived "spooky" conceit. That one scene demolished the "found footage" platform on which the plot depends. From that point on, I knew I was watching a Hollywood movie and that the morons on the screen were recent acting school graduates eager for the exposure and the check.
My favorite part of the movie was that the ostensible expert left the couple high and dry. Once they realize that Dr. Avery is out of the country, they call the psychic in a panic. He sets one foot inside the house, declares that it's gotten worse, mumbles that he can't help them, and flees with the unconvincing promise that Dr. Avery will help them in a few days. It's cowardly, but it's refreshing in its honesty after a glut of shows in which paranormal investigators style themselves warriors and spend hours wandering through houses and challenging entities to cock fights. Yes, Paranormal State and Ghost Lab, I'm looking at you.
Things end badly for EveryCouple, and in the end we're left to wonder if Katie was the demon's latest conquest, or if she was the demon all along. I lean toward the latter explanation since Katie was never found. If they had opted for the alternate ending, in which Katie kills herself after killing Micah, I would have ascribed to the former theory. But I think Katie was the demon all along and was toying with Micah because she knew that his ego wouldn't let him leave before the endgame was played. It would explain her passive behavior on the subject of Doctor Avery, the presence of a childhood photo in the attic(Micah found her outside on the swing, supposedly catatonic, but who knows where she was before he woke and discovered her absence?), and her sudden volte-face when Micah finally decided to leave.
Oh, Micah, the minute Katie said she no longer wanted to leave was the minute you should have beat feet without her, my friend. If you had, you might have lived to fuck another day.
Not a terrible movie, but if you've no patience for obscure thumping, ambiguous shadows, and earnest scene-chewing from the Blair Witch Project School of Thespian Improvement, you can leave this on the shelf. B-
I was going to opine on Quarantine, too, but this review ran far longer than I expected, and so, I will leave it for another entry.
I bought Dayquil yesterday after stubbornly coping with the face-crushing sinus pressure of the lurgy for two days. Oh, blessed Dayquil! I don't know why I resist your sweet, pharmaceutical relief. I felt like rehashed ass yesterday until I popped a pair of capsules, and lo, it was as though I were reborn. I could breathe. I could think. My head didn't throb like an overstuffed cheesecloth, and the bridge of my nose stopped threatening catastrophic explosion. My eyeballs stopped pulsing and watering. I felt human again. My only regret is that it doesn't last as long in its post-nanny state formulation, when they fiddled with it to keep it in front of the counter and make it unpalatable to homebrew drug manufacturers boiling meth in the kitchen, right next to little Dougie's Pop Tarts. I'm sure I could buy a twelve-hour formula from a pharmacist, but I refuse to show my ID and sign my name for Uncle Sam because I have a cold.
Because I felt like ass, I came home and watched a pair of horror flicks on DVD.
Paranormal Activity: This movie illustrates one of the genre's biggest problems: unlikeable protagonists. I suspect this unpleasant phenomenon is an organic offshoot of being marketed to teenagers and twenty-somethings, demographics noted for their self-absorption, arrogance and general air of insufferable assholery. When you are that age, you are convinced that you know everything, and that you possess a keen and unique insight into the world, one that would improve the world if the rest of the world would but recognize your tortured genius. This certainty often makes you a smug shit and inspires in those who have taken their lumps and learned the hard home truths a desire to beat the living shit out of you, or at least to watch the monsters gobble you up.
The producers clearly want us to like and relate to Katie and Micah, and maybe they are American Everypeople. Maybe most early twenty-somethings can afford a ridiculously large house in San Diego with hardwood floors and multiple laptops and desktops and two floors and four bedrooms despite the fact that one of them is a student and the other is a lousy day trader. Maybe most young women cuckold and berate their partner on a regular basis and presume entitlements to which their selfishness should not, well, entitle them. Maybe twenty-something males are grunting buffoons et up with brainless machismo. Actually, that last one I can believe, since PC is in his fifties and still suffers the sad effects of chronic testosterone poisoning. My point is that I've been in two long-term relationships, and in neither did I behave like that.
My biggest issue with the couple's dynamic is the fact that Katie talks like an alpha female and frequently attempts to assert her dominance by screaming at Micah, but she behaves like a whining, helpless milksop. While Micah blunders about trying to solve the mystery of the paranormal activity in the home, filming the house, researching on the Internet, conducting EVP sessions, and stupidly confronting the entity by bringing in a Ouija board, Katie...does a whole lot of not much. After her initial attempt to investigate the issue through a psychic/paranormal expert, she spends most of the movie either avoiding the problem or wailing that it's out to get her and that they should leave. She's the stereotypical blubbering, passive damsel in distress who stands around and waits for the well-intentioned but hopelessly ineffectual Micah to save her. She displays a modicum of sense when she orders Micah to get the Ouija board out of the house, but she doesn't take the initiative and remove it herself when Micah doesn't. Apparently, her hands are incapable of picking it up.
Micah tries, bless him, but he's badly out of his league and hampered by his formidable male ego. Every time Katie suggests that they contact Dr. Avery, the demonologist recommended by the psychic, he bristles and insists that he can protect "his house" and "his fucking girlfriend"(and that is the biggest indictment of Katie, in my opinion. She revels in reminding Micah that the demon is after her, yet she places the decision to summon qualified help squarely into his hands until it's far too late, placing his ego over her safety. And his, too; Micah might be an idiot, but he's a loyal idiot.). He can't, of course. His big ideas for combating the evil are to challenge its demonhood and to sprinkle the floor with baby powder in order to see if anything really is walking into their room at night. This after that truth has been well and truly established by several nights of videographic evidence. That's right; his big demon-fighting weapon is a bottle of Johnson's baby powder. Winchesters, take note.
The haunting itself was well-handled except for a ridiculously hammy scene in which an unattended Ouija board bursts into flames. Until then, the suspense was well-crafted and measured, but that scene was like a rip-roaring fart loosed in a quiet cathedral. It deflated the tension and left me rolling my eyes at the obviously contrived "spooky" conceit. That one scene demolished the "found footage" platform on which the plot depends. From that point on, I knew I was watching a Hollywood movie and that the morons on the screen were recent acting school graduates eager for the exposure and the check.
My favorite part of the movie was that the ostensible expert left the couple high and dry. Once they realize that Dr. Avery is out of the country, they call the psychic in a panic. He sets one foot inside the house, declares that it's gotten worse, mumbles that he can't help them, and flees with the unconvincing promise that Dr. Avery will help them in a few days. It's cowardly, but it's refreshing in its honesty after a glut of shows in which paranormal investigators style themselves warriors and spend hours wandering through houses and challenging entities to cock fights. Yes, Paranormal State and Ghost Lab, I'm looking at you.
Things end badly for EveryCouple, and in the end we're left to wonder if Katie was the demon's latest conquest, or if she was the demon all along. I lean toward the latter explanation since Katie was never found. If they had opted for the alternate ending, in which Katie kills herself after killing Micah, I would have ascribed to the former theory. But I think Katie was the demon all along and was toying with Micah because she knew that his ego wouldn't let him leave before the endgame was played. It would explain her passive behavior on the subject of Doctor Avery, the presence of a childhood photo in the attic(Micah found her outside on the swing, supposedly catatonic, but who knows where she was before he woke and discovered her absence?), and her sudden volte-face when Micah finally decided to leave.
Oh, Micah, the minute Katie said she no longer wanted to leave was the minute you should have beat feet without her, my friend. If you had, you might have lived to fuck another day.
Not a terrible movie, but if you've no patience for obscure thumping, ambiguous shadows, and earnest scene-chewing from the Blair Witch Project School of Thespian Improvement, you can leave this on the shelf. B-
I was going to opine on Quarantine, too, but this review ran far longer than I expected, and so, I will leave it for another entry.