TCM vs TC-Meh

Horrr night rolled around again this past weekend. Bill, Michael, and I had already decided at our Halloween compare/contrast that our next installment would be a Texas Chainsaw Massacre compare and contrast. I may sound like I am repeating myself but I'm actually not. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is my favorite horror movie. About two blogs ago, John Carpenter's Halloween was my favorite horror flick, but after rewatching Texas Chainsaw it has been bumped up to number 1, leaving Halloween a not-so-distant number 2.

So Saturday found us settling in Bill's Blair Witch Basement in front of the the warm glow of the projector and the great narration (by John Larroquette) and creepy, ambient opening soundtrack to the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

Ahh, the original Chainsaw. How I do love thee. This movie blows my mind. How could someone with essentially nothing, make such a damn good horror movie? Tobe Hooper, you sir, are a genius!

Chainsaw has two of my favorite scenes in horror movies ever. The first is when Dude #1 or whatever the first victim's name is runs into the house. With a pig-like squeal, Leatherface clubs him with the sledgehammer. His body starts spasming - just like the hithchiker had described before. Leatherface drags the body out of the doorway and slams the sliding door shut.

Pure Classic!

The second is at the end when a frustrated Leatherface does the "Chainsaw Dance" in the rising morning sun as Sally escapes in the back of a pickup. To me, this has to me one of the most iconic scenes in horror.

The story is seamless. Kids on a trip. Kids find themselves out of their element. Kids are systematically killed off one by one by homocidal, cannibalistic maniac. Everyone dies except for Sally, the survivor girl (thanks Leslie Vernon) and I think its safe to say that she will never be the same.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre gets in your head. Even the most desenitized horror fans I know are still scared by this movie in some way. I'll admit it. I own this movie. I've seen it dozens of times. After watching it the other night, I felt less than safe when I went outside. The images you see are not brutal or actually violent by today's standards, but they are twisted all the same. This movie was made when people still knew how to make scary movies. There was nothing supernatural. There was no over-the-top gore. There were no hulking, pro-wrestler type playing the villian. There were young people (mostly nameless), there was a problem (van ran out of gas), there were the crazies (just your average ordinary everyday crazy people - well, ok, one did wear the skin of his victims as a mask).

Movies today depend too much on effects and violence and completely disregard psychology.

Speaking of...

The next movie we watched was Michael Bay's remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Now, I will go on the record and say that this film wasn't awful. It had its high points (two of them were under Jessica Biel's tanktop). But as a whole, the movie did nothing for me. It was basically a neutral event.

The remake followed the same basic premise of the original. Instead of going to visit an old family house, the kids were going to a Lynyrd Skynyrd show. They don't pick up a crazy hitchiker that is actually a member of the antagonist's family. They pick up a girl that is in shock and clearly a victim of Leatherface and his ilk. They don't run out of gas, the hitchiker blows her brains out, setting up the most forced camera shot all of moviedom - a zoom out through a self-inflicted head wound and out the shatter back glass of a 1970s Dodge van. Anyway, the girl shooting herself forces them to stop in the vicinity of Leatherface. Oh yeah, and the Franklin character is no longer wheel chair bound, but actually more annoying.

Actually, I don't remember much of the action or the order of deaths in this movie. None of them stood out aside from Jessica Biel's character having to put a friend out of his misery by stabbing him in the gut. I also vividly remember that they ruined my favorite scene with MTV style editing and jumpcuts.

While the original was an outstanding movie and burns itself into you psyche, the remake is just fluff. Like I said, I didn't hate this flick, but I have no intentions of ever watching it again. It was all gore and no horror. Even the jump scares were ineffective.

Ok, I guess I'll wrap it up. The post's babe isn't obscure, but DAMN - Jessica Biel.

Two Wonderful Days of Wilco in New Orleans

My friend Bill G. called me in mid-January and said "Guess who is coming to New Orleans?" Bill is kinda vague like that. I mean honestly, it could be anyone. My first guess was Englebert Humperdink, but I didnt know why I was supposed to be excited by that. I mean, Bill is a fan, but I've always found Englebert Humperdink to be more of a tedious Tom Jones than attention grabbing Wayne Newton.

Anyway, I couldn't guess.

Bill finally told me. "WILCO~!"

To which I responded, "When do we leave?"

Bill said, "That's not the only thing..."

"What more is there? What more could there possibly be?"

"John Doe is opening."

When I woke up I was looking at the underside of my kitchen table.

Ok, so that was maybe a bit exaggerated, but the point of the story is that in January, Bill and I procured tickets to see Wilco and John Doe on back-to-back nights at Tipitina's in New Orleans in early March. Well, those days in March have come and gone and I'm finally getting around to writing about it.

Wilco is a band that is really hard to categorize. So hard to categorize that when they came to my neck of the woods (Meridian, MS), Bill and I went on whim. Neither of us new much about them, but I mean, really, not much goes on around here and, hey, a show's a show, right? That was 2006 and I left that show a changed man.

Bill and I have seen some form of Wilco every year since, but enough backstory - let's blog in the now!

Bill and I had a pretty uneventful trip to New Orleans. He grew up there so there wasn't much chance of getting lost or anything. Well scratch that, he did tell me at one point "I don't really know where we are" but we got to the hotel unscathed.

Tipitina's in small, but really cool. I stuck to my concert M.O. of finding a spot in the middle of the floor in the middle of the building and not moving. I wasn't there to drink. I wasn't there to chase skirts. I was there to see Wilco.

John Doe took the stage at exactly 10:00 pm and put on an awesome show. I wasn't a huge fan of John Doe before this night, but now I am. At one point, he even called Nels Cline on stage to play lap steel. That was kind of amazing.

Wilco took the stage at 11:00. Their setlists never cease to amaze me. Most bands want to blast out of the gates with an upbeat number. Wilco started with "Was I in Your Dreams?" a slow, almost waltz-ish song. Somehow they can pull stuff like that off.

I'm not even going to pretend like I remember every song they played. I will say that I knew every song they played and every song they played was awesome. "At Least That's What You Said" and "Impossible Germany" really stand out in my mind, but I really think the highlight was seeing bassist John Stiratt's father sitting in the balcony not just smiling, but beaming as his son played.

I think that is what is so special about Wilco. They have a "human quality" that other bands don't. Sure there music is amazing. Sure there live shows are beyond comparison. But when you get right down to it, what makes Wilco so special is Wilco. I don't know any of them, but they seem like a personable bunch of guys. After you see them live, you feel kinda like they are your friends.

The show wrapped up 1:00 am that morning with my single favorite Wilco song, "Monday". Oh, and did I mention that they had a horn section? I think this show made me smarter and I'm pretty sure my soul left my body at one point.

Bill and I waited outside in the cold for one of the three cabs that was working the neighborhood, but we finally got back to our room. I had bought a Wilco at Tipitina's poster, a Tshirt, and a Wilco Now. bumper sticker. Maybe I went a little overboard. Who cares?

We went back to Tip's the next night and caught the show again. This time John Doe not only called Nels Cline on stage to play lap steel, he also called him to play lead on a fret melting version of The Stones' 'Gimmie Shelter'. "OH MY GOD! NELS CLINE AND JOHN DOE ARE PLAYING A ROLLING STONES SONG!" Bill said.

Both band put on pretty much the same show so Bill and I decided to be a little more relaxed. We found a nice spot near the door (and near the bar). I think Bill might have been a little too close to the bar though. He kept disappearing and reappearing with a beer in each hand.

A guy standing next to me said with a little disdain, "They are playing the same shit they played last night." I looked at him and said "I don't mind at all".

Wilco ended with "Monday" again and we went back into the cold the wait on a cab. While we stood on the curb, Pat Sansone (Wilco's multi-instrumentalist) stepped out the front door right next to us. Bill and I both yelled "Pat!" He turned and waved. "I yelled Stretch Armstrong!" and he gave me a grin.

So it wasn't much conversation, we still kinda met someone famous!

Oh the way home, it became obvious how much beer Bill had had that night. I looked over at him just in time to see him vomiting on his shirt. I kept watching him from the corner of my eye as he tried to play it off, leaning against the door of the cab, his shirt glistening with puke. It was somehow gross and funny at the same time.

All in all it was a good show and a good trip and I would do it again in a minute. Well, except for the puke part. That part I would not do again.

Obscure babe time - Jacky Reres plays Lynn Blodgett in Kevin Kangas's Fear of Clowns I and II. The movies are alright. Ok, well actually the first one is awful, but the second is pretty entertaining. Jacky has that special something. I can't really describe it, but I think she's pretty gorgeous.

Razzle Frazzle - BaBMN 3 - Night of the Sleepys

The third installment of Beer and Bad Movie Night took place recently and I don't know if there are words to describe it. Adam picked some real gems this time. We started with Hitman (garbage), followed it with The Alien Dead (bizarre and awful), after that came Horror of the Blood Monsters (space vampire cavemen!), and we finished up with Lady Terminator (sexy?).

Before I jump into the synopses, let me tell you about my days prior to this event. I had spent the Saturday before in Petal, MS (about 100 mi from where I live) playing with our local show choir. I know it sounds silly, but it pays well. That next week, I had spent three days New Orleans. (My next blog will be about this). I returned that Thursday for two hell-like days a work. Finally, on the day of Beer and Bad Movie Night, I had to perform with the show choir again. Needless to say, when Adam arrives at Michael's with the movies, I was exhausted. Luckily, Adam had brought supplies in the form of disgusting energy drinks. He had a Steven Seagal drink that I am pretty sure was created when someone squeezed Seagal's sweat rag into an old beer can. That's what it tasted like at least. The other one I tried tasted more like cat pee strained through a pair of dirty boxers.

Adam and I went to the store and secured the snacks and the beer. Then we went to Nick & Al's where Adam bought a pizza that a was possibly the size of the rear propeller on a helicopter. I got a medium Margarita pizza (yum!) and we started the movies.

Again, I find myself not even being able to sum up Hitman, but I'll try. Let's see....Ok, here we go. It was about a hitman. There was shooting and guns. Maybe explosions. There was also some running and jumping. The End.

Next was The Alien Dead. The Alien Dead is a prime example of what Beer and Bad Movie Night is all about. Mindless plot, ridiculous acting, retarded characters. This movie centered around a reporter in a small town that was investigating a rash of killings in the area. The killings are of course the work of zombies. For some reason, the police in the town are covering this up. They want everyone to think that a rogue alligator is killing everyone. Nothing is ever done about anything and I guess the zombies get to run wild on the town forever. Also, the meteor that crashed to earth and made the zombies was actually just a dude with a sparkler.

Horror of the Blood Monsters was next. I actually think I followed this movie...sort of. The story starts with long narration about vampires plaguing the earth and then, without so much as an explanation, cuts to a rocket on a launch pad and the most lovable grumpy old man in the world. He was a doctor of some type, but I forget his name. I dub him Dr. Razzle Frazzle because that is what it looked like he was saying or at least thinking in every shot regardless of the emotion he was exhibiting. Angry - RAZZLE FRAZZLE. Happy - Razzle Frazzle. Sad - razzle frazzle. Arousment - raZZle fraZZle. Anyway, after a couple of scares on lift off, the rockets makes it in to the far reaches of space. Oh and "the far reaches of space" must be really close to Earth because these guys were on another planet in mere moments. There was some kind of trouble with the ship and the crew was forced to bring her down on an uncharted planet with a bizarre, color changing atmosphere. This planet is full of vampire cavemen and hot cave girls and alligators with fins glued to their backs that walk around tiny rocks to make themselves look bigger.

Anyway, like I said, once the crew lands on this planet the film starts changing color. After a little research, we found that Al Adamson (the "director") actually stuck three movies together t make this one. Let me say that one more time.

"THIS MOVIE IS ACTUALLY THREE MOVIES IN ONE".

Adamson made the movie with the astronauts in the rocket himself and combined it with two pre-existing Phillipino movies - one about cavemen and the other about vampires. Unfortunately, the caveman movie was in black and white so he worked in the atmospheric color shifts. So to paraphrase my former college roommate no matter what is going on, if the cavemen or finned alligators or cavebabes are on screen the film is "RED, BLUE, or GREEN"! I was impressed that they at least explained this in the film. I don't remember the explanation but they explained it and even added the fact that the red atomphere made them sick.

I don't actually know how this movie ends. I think they all die. Not sure. All I know is that there was a cave girl in a black skirt kinda dealy and she was hot and she learned English fast. I know at least some people die and Dr. Razzle Frazzle got sad (razzle frazzle). Also, sex was had, but sex involved hoses and pipes and flashing lights and not much...well, not much sex. It was more like they were trying to create a RoboVampire. Like I said, during the scene - "That's sex?! If that's sex, I'll have none of it!"

Lady Terminator tells the story of a girl with an eel in her vagina or as we called it a pussy eel. I will refrain from calling it that because 1) I would like to keep my G rating for this blog and 2) I don't know what it was supposed to be so I really don't need to mention it again.

Ok, I'll have to mention it one more time. Some dude has sex with this woman and steals her pussy eel (now I'm done) and oh, does she get mad. So mad that she curses a descendant of his 100 years later. Thats seemed rather passive/aggressive.

"Oh, you make me so mad. I'm gonna make your cousin's life a living hell!"

So, cut to the agreed upon 100 years later, and an anthropologist/archeologist/poofy haired, hot 80s babe catches the curse and starts killing people. That's honestly all I remember other than the fact that the Lady Terminator looked pretty good in tights.

Alright, so its obvious that I need to get better sleep and pay closer attention to the films for Beer and Bad Movie Night next time. Still we had a good time and I had enough energy drink to elevate my heart rate to that of a super cheetah, which as you know is seldom seen but has the fastest known heartrate in the universe. Anyway, hopefully next time we can watch The Gingerdead Man and Plankton.

For my obscure hot babe this time, I've chosen Robin Sydney (raZZle fraZZle). She played Katherine in the awful movie The Lost based on Jack Ketchum's awesome book. Read the book, skip the movie.