Director Set: that Carpenter charisma

Perhaps my favourite podcast over the past few years is Blank Check with Griffin and David, which finds actor Griffin Newman and critic David Sims covering the entire filmography of a director (one film per episode) specifically those who were given a blank check at some point in their career to make whatever passion project they want.  It's an entertaining, inviting, insightful, thoughtful and incredibly well researched podcast which goes into deep (and sometimes juvenile) conversations about the director and actors and productions of the films they cover, frequently to the point where the podcast episodes are longer than the films. 

Perhaps their most exciting series to me, to date, was their coverage of John Carpenter's career.  I followed along with *most* of the films, but didn't get around to sitting with all 18 of them.  I covered 10 of them in a recent 10-for-10 (a horrible idea I had that I've never truly made work, and has created some of the sloppiest postings in this here blog, so I guess I'm hereby announcing that I'm retiring that??).  These are what remain...of what I saw.  I I didn't manage to get in Ghosts of Mars or The Ward, the former I'd seen and remember feeling very middling about, and the latter still sounds like a dull time.

Escape From LA (1996) - DVD
Body Bags (!993) - tubi
John Carpenter's Village of the Damned (1995) - rent
John Carpenter's Vampires - dvd

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In 1996 Escape From L.A.  seemed so clunky and old fashioned, out of date, not keeping up with the times.  25 years later, it looks (for the most part) and feels (for the most part) not so much like the sequel to Escape From New York but rather the fifth or sixth entry in the Snake Plisskin Escape series. If only we had 8 more of these.

There is, by 1996, a sense of Carpenter's lack of evolution as an action director, which means he wasn't comfortable with an excessive amount of digital effects, nor the in-vogue fight choreography of the era.  So, it actually lends the film, 25 years later (shit, I'm old), a similar sense of nostalgic filmmaking that EFNY had.  Carptenter's reliance upon old school practical effects and sets lets the film age more like an 80's Carpenter vehicle rather than a forgettable stock 90's actioneer. It's mainly the soundtrack that gives it away.

At the time I originally watched this, a burgeoning cinephile with not a lot of Carpenter experience under his belt, I wanted to like this more than I did.  I was rooting for it.  Though I had little to no investment in Plisskin, I already knew the fanboy chatter around the character.  My disappointment in it meant I'd not really watched it since.  Coming back to it after all this time, it's absolutely wonderful in much the same way its predecessor is. It's definitely just retreading the same ground as New York, but the change of scene and personnel make all the difference.  

Carpenter's cynicism is in full force in the setup (and conclusion), which is what makes it feel so immediately relevant. It's not necessarily prescient, just an astute awareness that the things that always sucked, but perhaps were a bit more under covers or sunshined over, still suck just as much, only now we're a lot more aware of it all.  As with so many of his films, it was undervalued and underappreciated on release, but it's unabashedly really good.

Given the end of this film I could see a 25-years-later post-modern western (ala Logan) with Russell as old-man-Plisskin... oh, that sounds great... someone throw 40 million at Carpenter and Russell and let them do their thing.  And maybe they could do some animated features that fill in the years between them all.  More Plisskin is needed.

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I'll keep this chatter on Body Bags brief.  It was originally intended as a new Tales From The Crypt-like anthology tv series, but only had these three acts made.  As with any anthology, an utter mixed bag.

"The Gas Station" is exactly what you'd want out of a 30-minute Carpenter. Great creeping tension until it finally bursts, it get selectively gory, and impressively fun-scary. I like how Carpenter makes monsters out of men but then reminds you that the monster is still just a man. 

"Hair" is delightfully silly, like a half hour length Kids In The Hall sketch, and I think Stacy Keach might just give his finest performance as a hair-obsessed middle-aged narcissist. The twist is pure 80's creature feature in 90's wrapping.  I like it when Carpenter gets silly. 

Turn it off after the first two, because "The Eye" is a real turd. A hoary play on the old "cursed appendage", with Mark Hamill making some definite choices, and Twiggy trying to keep up. Unless you're really keen to see Luke Skywalker's taint....  I ask the question, but I have no answer, is Tobe Hooper a good director? 

The framing sequences are acceptable camp, but it was probably a mistake to make Carpenter the host of this.  Though quite a character, he's not much of a performer.  I get what they were going for, it's only marginally successful.

If it were a series, I wonder if Carpenter would have remained playing the undead host, and whether he would have directed more episodes.  I would still like to track down his Masters of Horror episodes.

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I recall watching John Carpenter's Village of the Damned in theatres in 1995 and leaving quite aware that what I had seen was a terrible movie despite wanting to champion it (Carpenter? Superman? Luke Skywalker? Nerd worlds collide!). 25-plus years later and little has changed.  The script is still awful, the acting just as stilted as it ever was, and the direction feels lost, unable to escape the story's 60's B-movie trappings or the director's 80's filmmaking tricks.  The ingeniousness Carpenter brought to his remake of The Thing is completely lacking, his lack of interest in challenging himself quite evident. It's very unrewarding, unfulfilling, and largely boring.

There is the possibility of extrapolating themes or analogies out of this (prenatal anxiety, postpartum depression, liberal vs conservative stances on pregnancy, erm...training advanced/artificial intelligence to feel emotion...(?), but none of them seem baked into the script, nor even remotely adequately explored.  Carpenter seems on auto pilot, and while everyone's making choices, none of them seem right for the movie.  

The only glimmer of something more behind all this, a sense of world building, is a couple mentions of similar children in other countries.  I would like to see that...how things go right or, more likely, horribly wrong in the UK or Brazil, or Russia, or Japan...especially Japan.  These damned villagers seem built for J-horror.

This exists now only for Carpenter completists to check off their list, or real dyed-in-the-wool Village of the Damned fans.  There's no other reason to watch it.  

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Is it any wonder my experience with Carpenter was not love-at-first-sight when the first four films of his I saw theatrically (I kept going back) were Village of the Damned, Escape from L.A., Vampires, and Ghost of Mars.  Woof.

I'm sure the allure for Carpenter with Vampires was "blue collar vampire hunters" but it's a little too blue collar for my taste. The hunters are crass and arrogant and vehemently misogynistic (do they hate vampires more than women? Hard to say...), and unbearably stupid ( they are so obsessed with their guns, but the guns seem to be absolutely useless against vampires).  These characters are direly unlikable (hey, they're led by James Woods so, of course they're unlikeable), and they're supposed to be our heroes.  Anyone who likes these characters as protagonists are probably people who act just like them.

Poor Sheryl Lee is forced to suffer every indignity, not the least of which is being alternately abused and then doted over by Steven Baldwin while she's basically incapacitated. It's all...just... ick.

Carpenter had a much bigger idea at play here for the story, but late-stage slashes to the budget meant a hefty re-write and the mass slaughter early on of the team.  It feels like a film that's not true to its intentions, a film that only a shadow of what it could have been.  Yet, I have no desire at all to see what it could have been, so much I detest the characters in this film, I really wouldn't want to spend any more time with them.

In an attempt to distinguish itself from Buffy and Blade, the vampires of Vampires have this strange "fire out of all holes" effect which is really just road flares up the stunt person's sleeves.  I'm not sure if the effect really works or is extra cheesy and doesn't work...or works because it's extra cheesy.

Carpenter seemed to be having fun with the soundtrack, if nothing else, the only redeeming aspect of the picture.

-fin-