More Style, Less Substance

Film: Beyond the Black Rainbow
Format: Streaming video from Tubi TV on Fire!

I am not by nature a contrarian. I do sometime take a contrary position on movies, though. Sometimes, that’s liking a movie that most people don’t like--Soldier, Pootie Tang, and Kung Pow are good examples of this. And, of course, there are films that are highly acclaimed that I don’t like. Under the Skin and The Killing of a Sacred Deer are examples that come to mind. To that list we’re going to add Beyond the Black Rainbow, a film that most people seem to like, and I can’t figure out why.

I’d love to do my normal here and give you a blow-by-blow discussion of what happens in the film, but not a great deal happens in this film. Ultimately, my problem with Beyond the Black Rainbow is that virtually nothing happens in it. This is a movie that has a massive synopsis on Wikipedia but could genuinely be summed up in a couple of sentences. A researcher driven insane by an experiment imprisons a young psychic who he becomes obsessed with while she does her best to escape her imprisonment. There, I did it in one.

Where Exactly is "Beyond Space"?

Film: It! The Terror from Beyond Space
Format: Streaming video from Pluto TV on Fire!

I genuinely love 1950s science fiction in general, and space-based science fiction far more. It believed in us, and had hopes and dreams for humanity. In It! The Terror from Beyond Space, we have successfully landed a team on Mars in 1973. In reality, of course, we haven’t been back to the moon in about half a century and Mars is still a pipe dream. Movies like this, though, just knew that we’d be living in a scientific society and that we would be exploring the cosmos and encountering the weird, strange, and deadly.

When the movie begins, a nuclear-powered spaceship lifts off from Mars, headed back toward Earth. On board is the crew, naturally, as well as Edward Carruthers (Marshall Thompson), the lone survivor of the first manned trip to Mars. Carruthers is suspected of murdering the other nine members of his crew. After all, he had no way of knowing that a rescue was coming. With 10 people, there was only one year’s worth of food. With just one, he’d be able to survive a decade.

Airbnb Has Gone Downhill

Film: The Haunting (1999)
Format: Streaming video from Amazon Prime on Fire!

From a creative perspective, I fully understand the desire for someone to want to remake a story that they like and know well. Over and over, though, great films are frequently remade badly. Consider, for instance how few American remakes of Japanese horror movies are actually worth watching. The Ring, surely, possibly The Grudge, and maybe a few others, but most of them are trash. There’s a reason that every now and then, a meme will surface about remaking terrible movies with good plots to give them another chance. Sadly, with the 1999 remake of The Haunting, we’re instead getting a shabby retelling of a classic story.

Unfortunately for this film, it’s competing against two masterpieces. The original filmed version of Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House is an amazing horror film, terrifying in places and surprising because it is rated G. Today, this is also competing with the made-for-NetFlix miniseries that is arguably the best horror-themed short-form series ever made, and at least in the conversation. I’m not going to bury the lede—in comparison, this is a cheap knock-off.

Change, Changing Places

Film: You Are Not My Mother
Format: Streaming video from Hoopla on Fire!

There is a long tradition of the changeling child in folklore. A young child suddenly “changes,” and it’s attributed to the actual child being spirited away by the fae or by some other supernatural creature and replaced with something that looks like the child but is clearly different. It’s actually pretty good evidence that there were autistic people a thousand years ago. It’s also a particular trope in folklore that has been sadly underused in movies. The closest we have is something like Invasion of the Body Snatchers, which is the alien invasion version of a changeling story. You Are Not My Mother is a film that dives head-first into the idea of a changeling child, and does so with good effect.

The film opens with us watching Rita Delaney (Ingrid Craigie) taking her infant granddaughter to the forest and placing the baby on the ground. She lights a ring of fire around the baby, and the film cuts just as we start to hear the baby crying. I promise, despite what it looks like, the baby is not lit on fire.

In Russia, Victim Murders You

Film: Botched
Format: Streaming video from Tubi TV on Fire!

A lot of horror movies have given us protagonists who are criminals, either intentionally or forced to be so as the premise. Crime movies are a pretty easy sell in general, as are horror movies, so it makes sense to combine them. The entire premise of a crime/horror movie is that the criminals end up trying to commit a crime in a place that is cursed or haunted or against someone who is worse than they are. From The People Under the Stairs to this year’s Abigail, a criminal plot is an easy transition to horror. And so we have Botched.

Richie (Stephen Dorff) is a thief working for Mr. Groznyi (Sean Pertwee), a Russian mob boss. Richie works for him because Groznyi smuggled Richie into the U.S. years before, which means that Richie is in his debt. The film opens with a diamond heist that goes well until a freak car accident followed by another one causes Richie to lose the diamonds. Now, with nothing to show for his work, Richie needs to pull off a new heist to repay his boss.

What I've Caught Up With, September 2024 Part 2

On the television front, I finished White Collar near the end of September, and thoroughly enjoyed it. I'm hopeful that the rumors of a White Collar reboot are true, and that as many of the original cast will return. I also finished Arrested Development, and let me tell you, the last season or two is a slog to get through. I also watched His Dark Materials, which I liked pretty well. Finishing White Collar opened up a spot for new workout show, which I filled temporarily with the Korean zombie series All of Us are Dead, but I finished that on Friday, so once again, I need a new workout show.

What I've Caught Up With, September 2024 Part 1

I spent more than a week sitting on my daughter's couch, grading papers and watching her dog while she and her fiancé were at a destination wedding. That being the case, despite it being finals week for me, I actually watched a few more movies than normal for that part of the month. There was a lot of good in September, and while there were a couple that I ended up not being too fond of, there were several that I enjoyed quite a bit, and may well end up in the regular rotation. More tomorrow.