T&K's XMas (2022) Advent Calendar: Day 5 - A Merry Friggin' Christmas

2014, d. Tristram Shapeero - AmazonPrime

Robin Williams. Joel McHale. Lauren Graham. Candice Bergen. Oliver Platt. Clark Duke. Wendy McLendon-Covey. Tim Heidecker. All of them, good to great comedic actors...some are legends. Yet, somehow, these performances feel like community theatre.

There are jokes intended here, and comedic set pieces, and yet every single one of them falls kind of flat. Director Shapeero has directed over a hundred hours of amazing television comedy before (and after) making this film. Community, Parks and Rec, Peep Show, I'm Alan Partridge, Brass Eye... the man knows funny. So why did he try to make, instead of a flat out comedy, something more akin to a scripted mumblecore family drama?

I can't say it's a great script (from Wreck It Ralph creator Phil Johnson, as "Michael Brown"), but it's clear all the beats here were meant to be comedic, with just a few little scattered notes of resonance, all leading to the climactic scene where a father and his two adult sons start discussing the best way of getting rid of a hobo Santa they accidentally ran over...a scene that's supposed to be an absurd comedic high but played so down level as if real lives were about to be ruined. Or a scene where preteen cousins encourage the youngest of them to binge eat a jar of preserved pickles. Should be funny, but it's not, you just feel sorry for the kid. It's just a misfire at every turn.

The predecessor to the climax is an almost completely unearned moment of sentimentality and self-awareness from Robin William's hardass alcoholic racist homophobic dad character. In the typical Hollywood comedy, we're expecting the turn as the guy who hilariously says all the wrong things then finally gets a clue. But here, the tone makes it feel abrupt and out of character, both for Williams to make the pivot, and for McHale to accept it.

If there's something good here, it's the score from Ludwig Goransson, who had plenty of practice at Christmas compositions with the Community holiday episodes. As well, the closing credits song, "More Than I Wished For" by FM Radio just got added to the holiday mix. It's great.

From the abysmal critics and viewer scores and ratings this film has I was expecting it to be offensively bad, a thoroughly unpleasant experience, one pushing its comedic extremes to bad taste levels such that I would have to force myself to stomach my way through... but it wasn't that. It went the other way and almost didn't strive for comedy at all, despite everything and everyone being all set up for it, and so it was curiously puzzling, and maybe a little boring as a result. It's just an unfortunate movie.

3+1 Short Paragraphs: Boy

2010, Taika Waititi (Thor: Ragnarok) -- Amazon

I really do hope that Taika Waititi is exactly as he presents himself in public and through his art -- charmingly disarming and utterly empathetic. During These Times, he's just the sort of inoculation we need against idiocy and callousness. I suspected him of it when we saw Hunt for the Wilderpeople and he generally comes off that way in public. So, it shouldn't surprise me that his earlier endeavours would be of similar ilk.

Boy, the kid not the movie, is Alamein, son of Alamein, a kid living below the poverty line with his grandmother, his little brother and a number of cousins. They mostly fend for themselves, and Grandma has no worry leaving them all on their own while she goes to town for weeks at a time. It's 1984 so the world is not as dangerous. Besides, he has his obsession with Michael Jackson and the fantastical musings of his absent father to keep him company. That is, until his father actually shows up.

Dad is played by Waititi himself in his familiar rambunctious, unhinged self which denotes some very apparent characteristics for Boy's dad -- while Boy idolizes him, seeing the absent man as a rebel and a wild card, we see him as a petulant man-child playing at being a criminal without any understanding of the consequences, nor wishing to deal with them when they eventually happen. Of course, he is charming in his own silly way, but soon even Boy sees through it. This is an incredible coming of age story, as boy learns his fantastical musings may not be so good once reality is interjected, which also applies to Michael Jackson as 2010 would have been deep in the time where people were questioning their devotion to the pop star.

I liked that Boy was through the visual lens of a young boy on the cusp of adolescence. The level of the story telling is from that untainted view point, leaving it entirely up to the viewer to interject their own opinions on what is going on. They are poor -- does it affect them; not at all. Adults are all weird, complicated and all have their own agendas. Sexual hurdles are there, but nobody understands them and everyone fakes that they do. Time is forever as long as you have something familiar to fill it with. Perhaps it is Waititi's own perspective on life, as he does play the manchild in real life, but it does him well, unlike his character in the movie.

Ad Astra

2019, James Gray (The Lost City of Z) -- download

I understood what Gray was trying to give us, a movie of emotion held back and emotion released, one that explored the relationship between a  not-young man and the father he never felt truly connected to, yet not able to truly let go of. It wanted to attach this core to a scifi story that spoke of the near future, of attainable space travel, and of what we as humans want from our next stage in space exploration. It was understanding that, in that I gave the movie a pass even before seeing it, after hearing all the mixed reviews and the words "boring" tossed out.

I am OK with boring, as long as I am given some awe of the production values or the setting or the performances. I am not OK with being bored while in the midst of a sloppy story full of nonsensical, barely scifi elements that are trying to be grounded in real science. The movie opens with Roy McBride (Brad Pitt, Twelve Monkeys) working on a giant space structure in low orbit. McBride's work is interrupted by bright flash in the collective sky which causes overloads to the space station cum giant antenna cum space elevator. Things explode and McBride parachutes back to Earth, from orbit. Thus begins the lead-head-to-side-and-say-really grasp on science the movie maintains.

The flash has come from somewhere deep in space, likely related to McBride's father who was lost on a mission 16 years earlier. He is asked by Space Command (established by Trump?) to head to Mars where a very very strong communications array exists -- it can send a message from Young(ish) McBride to Old McBride, to find out what the fuck he is doing. Apparently these surges, generated by a man-made machine could lead to the end of all life on Earth. Somehow. Getting to Mars involves moon pirates and angry baboons.

As we experience the world Young McBride lives in, we are exposed to him, his mental state, one that is tightly connected to his memories of his father and his extreme desire to keep all emotions in check. He is known for always keeping his heart rate low. We are supposed to see him as completely in control, but I only saw him as always on the delicate edge, always able to fake the computer moderated psyche evals, and always just about to crack. This is supposed to strike us, emotionally, but forgive me for just sighing and not being moved by his daddy issues.

As for the rest, the science fiction was not fantastical enough to be overlooked nor strict enough to be marveled at. And there were just so many moments I shook my head as to why. Sure, the moon buggy chase scene looked good out of context, but the context they provided was so thin it seemed added so there would be some action, i.e. Space Pirates!! As well, the baboons. I can accept the Mars flight being diverted to a random space station sending out a mayday -- there cannot be that many safe flight paths from the Moon to Mars, but once McBride loses a man to a mad monkey, he just runs away, back to the ship and onto Mars, one man down. Again, why even show the scene? Why?!?!

McBride is led to his inevitable confrontation with his father (Tommy Lee Jones, Volcano) on the never-really-lost deep space expedition. Yes, their technology is sending out the flashes that move very fast and are causing lots of damage on Earth. Why does this exist? Why can't it be turned off? Why can't he just tell people "oops" and get assistance? All because he has lost it emotionally, having the crux of his journey into deep space (find evidence of alien life) failed and thus lost his will to accept human reality. Dude, space is big, REALLY big. Just because you cannot find it doesn't mean its not out there. Young McBride finally has to really, truly let go of his father and this emotional catharsis is also supposed to save the human race. But, by this time, I really didn't care.

The whole movie seemed to be about the emotional indulgence of aging men. Maybe that was the point, to show what a creator could get so wrapped up in. That his own reflections and extravagances of the movie could really amount to nothing but .... nothing.

31 Days of Halloween: Crawl

Starting in 2011 we (Marmy and I, as Kent is not much of a horror fan) celebrated the Halloween season (when candies hit the stores) by watching too many horror / Halloween related movies, most of them bad.  2012 had a few flicks but not the full month. Un/Re-employment kill 2013. Apathy killed 2014. But we returned in 2015 with a full run. 2016 had a good start, but stalled in the last few days, likely due to work life. 2017 almost started with a fizzle, but then I remembered, "It's October 1st !"  It still fizzled out. Life abounds. And in 2018, almost the entire year was Halloween *ahem* as in the year of posting was mostly October.

This year I found myself looking forward to it. Oh, there will be interruptions and apathy and a trip to Las Vegas, but we held back from watching a number of lauded horror movies from the year, just so we could do THIS.

2019, Alexandre Aya (The Hills Have Eyes) -- download

Creature Feature. Monster movie. Pit some hapless main characters against something otherworldly or just something natural that acts with preternatural malice. We always attribute predators with malice. Sharks are evil. Wolves are stalkers. Piranha are alien eating machines. Cats sit on your chest at 5am and devour your soul. But they are just animals doing what animals do best -- eat another animal.

Alexandre Aja is mostly known for his remake of the Wes Craven classic The Hills Have Eyes but he also did the less-than-horror adaptation of the Joe Hill's (or Joe King if you prefer) dark fantasy novel Horns. He also did ... *ahem* ... Piranha 3D.  I am tempted to add his original French flick Haute Tension which garnered a lot of praise the year it played in TIFF Midnight Madness. An example of the so-called French Extremity Movement in film, it might just be outside our wheelhouse.

This is an example of how to do a solid horror/tension movie, if not that inventive. While I cannot say it was great, to any degree, it had a decent story, good scares and nicely structured acts. It mostly takes place in the titular crawlspace beneath a family home as a Florida hurricane comes barreling in. A prime example of something greenlit because of our current climate reality.

Haley (Kaya Scodelario; the Maze Runner movies) goes back to  the broken family home to find out where dad (Barry Pepper; Battlefield Earth) is. She is a competitive swimmer and he is the dad who drove her too hard. But... water, gators, SWIMMER ! After playing some cat & mouse with many many gators, and the horrid loss of some people who attempt to help the pair, the two escape to the roof of their house to await rescue. They leave behind most of the gators to eat anyone else who happens along.

3 Short Paragraphs: Prospect

2018, Christopher Caldwell, Zeek Earl (the short Prospect) -- download

I grabbed this movie a few weeks before it showed up on Netflix, primarily because I like gritty space movies. Not just gritty in tone, but dirty, grimy and the opposite of Star Trek's pristine white. Conversely, I also love that look. Anywayz, I loved the low budget look and feel of this movie that I saw in the trailers, from the contained space vehicle the main characters arrive on, to the pollen overloaded planet they go prospecting on, to the cobbled together space suits that made me feel the whole point of this movie was because a bunch of props guys had a competition as to who could create the coolest space suit, and decided they needed a movie to showcase their work.

Gritty. Wow. We are given nothing of detail to this space opera world but what we see. The ship that dad (Jay Duplass, Transparent) and daughter (Sophie Thatcher, The Exorcist) arrive on is cramped and dirty, like an Apollo craft that they have been living in for the weeks, while their ship, tethered to a larger interplanetary vessel, was carried to their destination planet. They are prospectors of a future gold rush type commodity, some sort of alien by-product, and pretty down on their luck. If dad doesn't do this right, or as he really wants to do, find the motherload, the Queen's Lair.

The planet is pollen laden and absolute poison, not just atmosphere but also with seedy characters all looking for this lair. Almost immediately daughter loses dad to seedy Pedro Pascal (Game of Thrones) but the two become tethered to each other, sometimes literally, as they have to find a way off the planet. This is what the movie is really about, how daughter has to dispense with the connections she had with her not-too-fatherly dad and Pedro has to learn how to care for another human being. All this gets wrapped up in a weird and wonderful scifi flick that was perfect for my schtick. The plot is light, but the actors are superb and the practical effects are just perfect.

NOTE: I have to see the original short, to see if the pure aesthetic I detected in this movie is better without the claptrap of a full movie, like with Kin vs Bagman.

The Hiatus Post: Blade Runner 2049

I am taking a break from the web. Not being on the web, but contributing. I have been posting something to something blog related since 1999. I have had unintended extended breaks, but I always felt the pressure to do something. This time, I am under far too many other pressures and I just need one fewer thing that I feel compelled to do. The photoblog is paused, this blog will be paused. On my side, at least; Kent will do as Kent's life allows him to do.

2017, Denis Villeneuve (Sicario) -- cinema

Disclosure. I haven't felt compelled to watch Blade Runner in quite sometime. Disclosure. I actually enjoy the original version, with it's noir over-dub. Disclosure. I never really liked the idea of Deckard possibly being a replicant himself. Disclosure. While I never avoided spoilers, apparently I did because I never caught the first one, till the opening footage.

So, thirty years since the last movie took place, 35 years since the last movie came out. And Villeneuve still wonders why this movie didn't do better. To me its obvious; the original's fanbase was not only late in coming (the original didn't do well either) but they are now old & jaded. Sure, the younger fanbase of all things scifi and retro is there, but again... jaded. As for the rest of the world, the world that makes up the population that determines a movie being a success or not? Despite "hey girl" Ryan Gosling being the lead, its slow paced, atmospheric scifi. And it cost a fortune to make. So, really, not so much of a mystery Denis.

But still dude, I loved it. Fucking loved it. But get it, this is not big grins and rush-right-out-to-see-it-again loving it. This is knowing my expectations and having them met, if not exceeded. It is a lush, colourful (no, really it is) homage to the original while being a powerful, standalone movie. I just wish the plot had been tighter, as in the end, after all the exposition about the powerful central theme I still couldn't really tell you anyone's motivations beyond Joe's. Why exactly did the Bad Guy need Deckard? The replicant underground? Hell, other than the option of tossing the old pigskin back n forth, why did Joe need Deckard? But meh, who cares, I just watched the fuck out of this movie.

The visuals, the aging anachronistic world (remember, now was The Future of the original) where the decay of mother earth is apparent. Is that snow? Ash? Ashen snow? Isn't this LA ? No plants, no real animals no nothing but industrial decay and bodies everywhere. One can assume that the humans left on earth exist for no other reason than to fuel the off-world colonies exodus, through labour and spending. At some point that spending will be done, and ... abandonment.

Speaking of the visuals, I must admit, I am in the camp of being disappointed about the female centric sex machine of the movie. C'mon, I get it, you think the girls get Gosling so we get Joi, the Not Real Girl. But, what about the background? Wouldn't the Joi advertising try and appeal to all ? Unless they didn't want to interfer with the whole Joe-Joi unreal couple thing. The how about the pleasure droid brothel? There wasn't a single sexual exploitative male image, and that just seems ... unrealistic.

In the end, after two-plus hours, I was left satisfied. And more than eager for another part of the story, even moreso than after the dozen plus times I have seen the original. I want to see where the offworld colonies go, what is left with Earth, and now that Replicants know they can procreate, what is next for them?

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2

2017, James Gunn (Super) -- cinema

I have decided that each cinema viewing will never get relegated to the "3 Short Paragraphs" nomenclature, whether I have more or less than three paragraphs to say about the movie.

If you recall, I wasn't a huge fan of the first one. And no, that is not the typical passive aggressive way of saying I didn't like it; its just that, not a huge fan. The best thing about the movie is that it generated a lot of conversation between Kent and I. In his own write up, he says it best, "it was just the condensed, Reader's Digest-light version of what felt like it should be a much longer story." I have seen it half dozen, half paying attention times on Netflix since; I have softened to it, more enjoying bits than the movie as a whole.

But surprise surprise, I really completely fell into this one.

Where the first one introduced the characters, letting them save a planet from a Big Bad, and established themselves as the self-named Guardians of the Galaxy, this one picks up with them hiring out on that name. In a brilliant opening sequence, where Baby (but growing up!) Groot does a dance number to E.L.O. while the team (badly) fights a toothy alien monster in the blurry background, we are reminded to smile when we watch this movie. James Gunn wants us to have a good time.

If they didn't really save the galaxy in the first, they do this  time round. This is a truly grand scale movie, that doesn't just explore Peter Quill's mysterious past (why was he taken from Earth) but also shows how this team will fit well into the cosmic story coming. Even if we accept that the characters are not their mega-powered counterparts from the comics, they show they can hold their own against cosmic powers here.

<spoiler>Do I really have to say this now?</spoiler>

And that cosmic power? Ego, the Living Planet. Yup, Peter's dad was a god (small 'g') who wandered around the galaxy impregnating aliens. Based on his name (apt) and his attitude, I wouldn't be surprised if he stuck with planets where he could be male, and could be portrayed as a handsome example of such. Ego's life-force is tied to the planet of his origin, whereas his humanoid body is just an extension, as he desired to understand these beings that were everywhere.

He reconnects with Peter, dialing into Quill's desire to have familial connections, a past and a family. That is why I connected with the movie; because of the emotional quotient it allowed itself to have. From Peter and his dad, to Peter and Gamora exploring what they have, to Rocket and his anger, to Gamora and Nebula and finally, shifting Yondu and the Ravagers from background characters, to the forefront. In case you don't know, Yondu is actually a member of the original Guardians, in the comics. There was just so much emotion in this movie, and that roped me in.

I also found that Gunn balanced the humour and the action better in this one. I found that the humorous elements were more extensions of the way the characters would really act, instead of funny bits to make us chuckle. The way Rocket deals with the Ravagers was pure Rocket, and of course, Groot is always am Groot.

Its funny, where Kent saw this one as the lesser of the two, I saw this as the better. I think they were able to dispense with the setup the first required, and just dive into the characters and their dynamic. That didn't require them to be together the entire time, but when drawn together for the final battle with Ego, they all worked together like the dysfunctional machine they are.

And and and, Ego had legit, fleshed out motivations for his properly galaxy wide actions. So, this time they really guarded the galaxy from a proper super villain.

P.S. Would someone explain to me why rainbrow brite colours are so prevalent in this one? Why is the galaxy so neon?

P.S.S. What's wrong with a Zune? I love mine. But really, Peter just needs to get over it and visit Earth properly to grab an iPod and someone's external HDD with thousands of songs.

I Saw This!! What I Have Been Watching (PT D.2)

Pt. A, B, C, D.1 can be found there.

I Saw This (double exclamation point) is our feature wherein Graig or David attempt to write about a bunch of stuff they watched some time ago and meant to write about but just never got around to doing so. But we can't not write cuz that would be bad, very bad.  Y'know, red horny demon possession, bad.

Just to round out the pile, I am going to shoe horn in a show I am currently watching. So, this edition, we get a completed season (and series), a dropped show (but likely to be binge watched) and a nearly done season.

Meh; four (series) seasons completed.

Mr Robot S2, 2016, USA Network -- download

Speaking of technology rampant, from the more metaphysical and speculative idea of what could happen, to a more grounded, if darker view on unfettered tech use.

Mr. Robot continues Eliot's descent into madness. Descent? More like riding the wave.

When we last left our young hero and his imaginary dad, Mr Robot, they were enacting their economically catastrophic plan. But of course, wiping out (records of) debt hasn't destroyed Evil Corp nor freed the serfs from debt slavery. In fact its fucking things up royally. Cash has become king and almost everyone, the 98% included, has had their bank accounts frozen.

I would have preferred if the show had expanded its purview beyond NYC so we could see how things are going in the rest of the US, and maybe across the border, but no we wander the streets of the city seeing restaurants that only take cash, people are jobless and pissed off and the TV never stops talking about it. But of course, the suits just keep on suiting. They will always have the money no matter how militaristic Elliot and his sister get.

Elliot spends much of the season desperate to maintain a routine while being forced into a seemingly routine tech support role for a gangster. This gangster, friendly and attentive to Elliots peculiarities is an analog for that guy who ran the Darkweb ebay site, you know, the one that sold weed and hitmen. Meanwhile his sister and her friends are both trying to plan what happens next while absolutely petrified about getting caught. Seriously, with the damage they have done they will end up in a deep dark concrete room, even if you ignore that they have an Arab girl working with them. And Angela, poor lost angry Angela who also wants to be wrapped up in the 2% world, she is being simultaneously courted and manipulated by Evil Corp's CEO. She knows it but she cannot escape, because only within them will she unveil what they did her home town. And her mother, and Elliot's dad.

This was a season better left to binge watching. The individual episodes are enigmatic and frustrating, yes even more so than season one was. And unfortunately, Sam Esmail is now required to have a secret behind what goes on for most of the season. Well, a secret that like in the first season, is pretty telegraphed and not entirely well explained, once the reveal hits.

After the reveal, we return to Elliot trying to find out what happened to his non-F Society cohort, Tyrell. Of course, Tyrell is not dead and he also has further plans for the destruction of Evil Corp and the world's wealth. Or is he? Of course, by now we cannot accept anything on the screen as being quite what it is. Really, this season leaves Elliot more as a side character, while focusing on the fallout and the investigation into F Society. Really, the best bits are about the socially crippled FBI agent Dom DiPierro and her desperate need to work this all out, so she will not have to return home where she only has masturbating and lonely conversations with her Amazon Siri clone, Alexa.

As I said, the season is best watched as a whole, but unfortunately it doesn't pull together at the end. There is no single moment it is moving towards and really feels more like one of those mid-season endings that plague television now. Seriously, its annoying how many shows have two Season Enders these days.

I Saw This!! What I Have Been Watching (PT D.1)

Pt. A, B, C can be found there.

I Saw This (double exclamation point) is our feature wherein Graig or David attempt to write about a bunch of stuff they watched some time ago and meant to write about but just never got around to doing so. But we can't not write cuz that would be bad, very bad.  Y'know, red horny demon possession, bad.

Just to round out the pile, I am going to shoe horn in a show I am currently watching. So, this edition, we get a completed season (and series), a dropped show (but likely to be binge watched) and a nearly done season.

Meh; four (series) seasons completed. This post sat in Draft Purgatory for months.

Person of Interest S5, 2016, CBS -- download

It came to an end; I am still surprised we got it to last this long. Once the show mutated into a speculative scifi thriller about emerging AI, human responsibility and ultimate overseers, I wondered how it stayed on the air. But that doesn't lessen the sadness of seeing it go.

When we started this blog, I was luke warm about Person of Interest. It fit every formula for me, as I am a Heroic Act of the Week kind of guy, but something faded out for me rather quickly. And then Kent got into it, and began to relate the deeper story, as he is the kind of guy who notices arcs and expanded stories long before I do. So we returned, rewatched Season 1, and fell in love. Me and the show; not me and Kent.

And then I rewatched Seasons 1, 2 and 3 again (with intent on continuing, so I could rewatch Season 5 for this post) and began my mourning period. I miss these characters so much.

Season 5 both pulls at all the loose strings and ties things up. It has to end the story, but it also has to open up the horizon for speculation. That is what good science fiction does -- presents ideas for you to ponder and keep on thinking about, long after they are gone.

So, where does it pick up? Where are our characters?

Shaw, the cool sexy emotionally dampened assassin who once worked for Samaritan's former self is still missing, a captive of the Bad Guys. The Machine, the AI built by Finch who meticulously taught her right from wrong, is dying, her code breaking down in the hastily assembled network of PS3s (neat! that IBM cell chip is featured) and other spare hardware. Reese is doing his best to keep up with the numbers and Fusco is being kept at arm's length, as Reese doesn't want him dragged down when they eventually fall.

This season as much focuses on the pain the characters are in, as much as it does on the fight against Samaritan. In some ways this is the Dark Urban Future world I have been reading and writing about for years. The world has changed outside the show, as Samaritan has been manipulating society, killing people and adjusting things appropriate to his agenda. Yes, Samaritan is a he, The Machine is a she.

I was not as enthralled with the Finch vs The Machine plot as I should have been. Finch has been fearful of her emergence, as he knows exactly what an unfettered AI can do in our world. That he has killed her so many times, because she failed his morality tests, is both terrible and required. This is the agenda that Samaritan claims to embrace, one that is terrible but required. But Finch has narrowed his on her, saving the world those ramifications. But I couldn't get on board with him, I just wanted him to embrace her like Root has, to finally understand she will not betray him, to really truly accept her as a living entity, and he, as her father, a father who taught her well.

But really, the plot that broke my heart the most was the exclusion of Fusco. He is my character, the every man, the redeemed man. He should be embraced, brought fully into the fold but Reese's hesitation to do so is actually a kindness uncharacteristic of the man. Reese so values Fusco's place in the world, that he wants to make sure Fusco is around when Reese and the rest of The Machine Gang are eventually killed. Reese has always been fatalistic about all of this but it's still wrong, and it doesn't stop Fusco from getting mixed up in the even seedier underbelly of Samaritan's agenda.

The show also allows us to revist some characters from its past, as it was always a show that had progression in its agenda. If number XXXXXX was saved, and they had this valuable connection, where would they fit into this war? We get to meet some of the past saved characters in a Machine Gang B. Oh, how I fell for that B team crew, who were shown their place in the world and chose to fight for a greater agenda. It was heart warming in the Nth degree and a bit of TV show tease, as in 'is this a possible side launched spin off ?'  No, it wasn't but its fun to speculate.

Of course, Elias, the best and most filled out nemesis of the Machine Gang, returns. He is a fan fav, my favourite and has been around since the very beginning. His denouement is appropriate and touching.

Gah, I feel like a fanboy with memories flitting about his head like moths to the flame. I am yet to rewatch the season, having been stalled in our latest series rewatch by New Stuph, so I don't yet see the end season as a whole. I don't see the threads that bind all these wonderful bits together.

Bittersweet is what I can really say. It ends with some deaths, some regrets, some acceptance and a lot of understanding. And potential.

31 Days of Halloween 2016: The Loved Ones

2009, Sean Byrne (The Devil's Candy) -- download

From the get go, we said, "no torture porn." Yes, we are beating a dead horse (but not torturing him!) but I have come to realize its how the creator takes the torturish path that helps decide whether its is porn or not. At the heart of it, if the movie revels in the pain the victims are feeling, that we are as much rooting for the villain as we are "enjoying" the scenes of torture, then it fits into the sub-genre we enjoy.

But then you see something like The Love Ones where the core of the movie is all about torture, and yet it doesn't quickly fall into that categorization. Unless you are one sick fuck, I don't expect you will be rooting for Lola Stone and her twisted daddy. They are depraved people.

Brent is a high school kid who lost his dad not long ago. He's a tortured kid, who tests the limits of his own strength & endurance, and drags razors across his arm. He believes his mother blames him for his father's death. It's school dance season and he politely turns down Lola. Big mistake. Her dad drugs Brent, kills his dog and drags Brent back to their place so Lola can have her own dance night. With injected bleach and amateur trepanation.

The movie alternates between the scenes of Lola and her "family", the anguish everyone is feeling at Brent's disappearance, Brent's best friends rather messed up date to the dance and the very personal trials of the cop trying to find Brent. The rather lovely and brilliant focus of this movie is not (just) on the torture of Brent, which is horrific and graphic, but all the loved ones affected by what this family is doing, and has done numerous times in the past.

Brent is a kid who questions if he deserves to live, after his driving accident killed his father. This experience answers the question for him, and damn does he ever want to live. His response takes all the energy that has built up inside him over the past six months and explodes it outward against the Stones. Yes, he wants to live. YES !

And he does.