November 2024 Watch Part 1

Monday, 18 November 2024

On Halloween I did a Lenormand reading that predicted illness for me in November. Sure enough, this came swiftly and left slowly. In that time, I watched a lot of things, and so I came up with a few rules for the first half of this month’s responses: 1. No rewatches and 2. The length does not need to be uniform. I tried to get in at least 500 words for each movie and show, though sometimes I got a bit carried away. I watched a lot of horror in my feverishness, which I hope makes up for the lack of it in October; I never watch very many horror movies before Halloween, to be entirely honest, so this does make sense.

The Substance (2024, dir. Coralie Fargeat)

I have spent several days really trying to figure out what it was exactly that made me not like this movie. It has an overwhelming number of aspects I am usually drawn to—body horror, overt themes, stylistic distinction, over-the-top performances, an unclear time period, and an all-out finale full of blood. And yet, I couldn’t bring myself to enjoy it. The problem is not the horror elements or the themes (these are actually really strong); I think my issues come down to the characters and the way it went about proving its thesis. Without these elements to anchor it, it ended up feeling lofty in ideals but hollow in execution. I completely see why people like this movie, and I’m saddened I didn’t get the chance to.

The Substance is a body horror flick about the dangers of beauty culture as it relates to entertainment in particular. It follows Elisabeth, an aging celebrity who uses a mysterious product to create a “better” (read: younger) version of herself; the catch is that they must switch between bodies every seven days. This new self, Sue, is enamored with her life, and begins to abuse Elisabeth’s body in pursuit of her own happiness and fame. This frames their relationship for the film, as Sue grows increasingly abusive and Elisabeth increasingly frustrated, though choosing to never act on her feelings. In the end, Sue takes too much from Elisabeth to sustain her form, the two have a violent interaction, and finally Sue tries the substance on herself, resulting in a third form of them known as Monstro Elisasue.

The reason I introduce the movie’s themes before its actual plot is entirely intentional; I’m a lover of themes all the way, but I think these are better left to support and orient a story, not comprise it. It is a movie that is all statement and no substance (no pun intended). I really struggle with this criticism, as I love a movie entrenched in its own ideas and themes, but because there was nothing to anchor the audience, it made it difficult to watch. Not only that, but it ended up undercutting the themes in a few different ways, and while the choices in those moments seem intentional, they are also so wildly counterintuitive I can’t be sure what anyone working on it was thinking.

The most glaring issue this movie faced was the lack of character development. We knew little about Elisabeth/Sue—aside from their ambition and anxieties and a brief knowledge of their backstory—which made it hard to connect with them. This was a problem with our main characters, but also with the side characters; it clearly came from an intentional choice to keep them archetypical, yet I cannot overstate how poorly this decision worked. It seems difficult to critique very real issues with our society placing appearances (in the form of beauty and youth) on such a high pedestal, while not giving any characters the personality to make that critique meaningful. This plus the exaggeration nearly make it work as a satire, but it felt so heavy-handed and spoonfed to the audience, that it ended up sacrificing all the wit and humor that satire as a genre begets.

Following this issue was the separate characters of Elisabeth and Sue. The duplicity aspect really undercut the themes of the movie; it can say as many times as it wants that they are one, but the narrative use of two different actors playing two different characters gives me pause. Nothing about Elisabeth and Sue seemed even remotely intertwined, so it never felt like a woman doing this to herself, but an entirely unrelated character doing it to her. This created a sense of victim and abuser that didn’t really work for this film. Even when Elisabeth refused to give up the substance, we never felt the urgency because as far as we could tell, she wasn’t actually experiencing any of the benefits herself. She and Sue were so disjointed that she was doing this to herself on behalf of someone else, and maybe there’s a metaphor there, but it just seemed like a decision that came from big ideas but was executed poorly. I think the duplicity does speak more to the theme of abusing ones body as they age, but I thought this theme was underdeveloped and I only mention it because I've seen people talking about it after watching.

I keep wanting to compare this movie to Black Swan, another movie with similar themes of physical perfection and great production value, but that really left a lot to be desired with its screenplay. Themes felt over-the-top and overstated, but performances and production were stellar. It’s a struggle to watch these movies for me, because I want to like them so much, but the insistence of the script to tell you these things overtly is already annoying, which doesn’t even raise the issue when that is being restated through visual storytelling. The visual language of this film was so strong, and to devalue that by constantly telling us the plot was disheartening. In general, this took the form of a sort of genericism placed over everything in the movie, which made the sense of time and landscape unclear aside that it was vaguely modern and probably set in LA. It’s not a choice I personally vibed with, but it made sense thematically. As well, it made heavy use of contrasts in the clean versus the "gross,” a distinction I felt also really hurt the movie’s themes.

The horror of this movie is in this grossness: there is a disgust involved with bodies, particularly aging bodies, and with food. Perhaps the best example of this is a scene in which Sue dreams she finds a lump in her thigh, which she moves up to pull from her navel and reveal a drumstick. It’s a wildly gross scene, and I will admit that several other moments had my stomach churning, but it’s strange to apply these so brazenly next to scenes of older bodies. Broey Deschanel’s video talks a lot about how this film works with genre, and mentions how its treatment of older character’s bodies is tantamount to horror with their framing, both narratively and visually. If the entire movie is about how we treat older women (including when we ourselves are those women), especially those in the entertainment industry, then what does it say when we are treating their bodies as horror? The changes to Elisabeth’s body are treated as jumpscares, as frightening imagery to underscore the point of the movie, and yet she never looks like anything besides an old woman (up until the finale). The movie is so wildly out of touch with itself that I struggle to see how these choices were made.

In the end, while I liked the visuals and production, I could not get on board with this movie. I found it unsubstantial, which is so strange for a movie with such strong themes. I can totally see why people are drawn to it, but it was not a hit for me. I will say, if you do end up giving it a chance, do not watch it with a fever. The sense of distortion that comes in the end of the film and the ick factor is exciting, but would be really disorienting if you were, for example, really sick.

Time Cut (2024, dir. Hannah Macpherson)

This movie is almost identical to the 2023 flick Totally Killer but if it were about sisters instead of a mother and daughter. I knew that going in and I couldn’t help myself—I absolutely eat up these distinct plots and tropes that are turned into slashers (It’s a Wonderful Knife, Happy Death Day, Freaky). They’re never super great (one of these is a notable exception) and still I just can’t get enough of them! I feel like they’re so fun and I never talk to anyone else who has watched them, so they feel so special to me. I’m hoping that this response convinces at least one person to watch one of these movies (of this list, I would recommend It’s a Wonderful Knife, but not because it’s good).

Time Cut follows Lucy, a teenage girl who lives in the shadow of her older sister, Summer’s, death in 2003. Lucy discovers a time machine to the days before her sister’s murder and befriends her and another friend, Quinn. The trio eventually manage to best the serial killer, who they learn is a later timeline version of Quinn, motivated by an unrequited crush on Summer.

The plot is very barebones as this is not a particularly complex movie. It’s generic at times, and boring at others, but it was ultimately a little heartwarming. You can call the killer in the first five minutes, and neither the suspense nor action are particularly riveting. Most of the time, we meet characters in the scene they are being murdered or nearly-murdered, a trend that exemplifies how most of the cast is treated. Aside from the main trio, we only see characters as they are explicitly called for, which makes their deaths and arcs entirely unimpactful. The red herrings are pointless, as we never spend enough time with anyone but the main characters to really care all that much.

One of the big issues is demonstrated well in Summer’s character arc. We learn early on that she is a lesbian, and this is a fact that she never told her family and also inadvertently caused her death as she could not reciprocate other timeline-Quinn’s feelings. Summer keeps this from her sister the whole movie because she keeps it from everyone, just as her sister keeps from her that she is the final victim of the murder spree. When Lucy finally reveals who she is, she slips up that she doesn’t know that Summer is gay, and this is reduced to a couple lines of dialogue a few scenes later and the implications of it never hit her beyond general confusion. As Lucy tells Summer that she is the final murder victim, the pieces fall into place, but the camera literally cuts away from her reaction, removing it from our understanding of the movie. Thus, her story must be contained elsewhere, but where we find it instead is strange. Summer’s queer narrative culminates in her kissing her girlfriend at a party, a symbolic act that means little as her not coming out to her family seems much more important thematically than to her school. It’s a kiss that’s captured in slow motion and bright, colorful lights, but one that seems entirely out of place in the narrative. Summer’s story is about her relationship to others and what it means for her to be a lesbian within those relationships, not about her girlfriend. The girlfriend herself barely makes an appearance, except for a major scene in which they save her from the killer, which makes this culmination feel ill-placed and less monumental than it wants to be. It’s a small detail, but one that demonstrates everything wrong with this movie’s writing: the arcs don’t really make sense, the world isn’t fleshed out enough that actions have any kind of meaningful consequences, and it walks away from drama at every opportunity.

And despite all these issues with the writing, I didn’t mind it at all. It was fun, I love the subgenre, there isn’t much else I can say about it. The ending is sweet and satisfactory—I’m obsessed with this girl who goes home, finds out that her parents don’t know her anymore, and just goes back to live in 2003 with no resources. It absolutely makes sense for what the movie set up, and in doing so almost explains away the complete lack of development around her life prior to the time travel. This movie is poorly written and not the best visually, either; it’s not particularly fun or innovative. I probably wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. But I had a great time.

Big Fish (2003, dir. Tim Burton)

First of all, everything I said about Tim Burton’s movies I stand by. I don’t remember how much I got into it, but the sense of “goodness” they insist on is really unappealing to me, even if visually and based on their premise they usually seem interesting. But this movie presents a different kind of story, and does so in a very profound and heartfelt way. It is an exception to the rule.

Big Fish is a movie about Will Bloom’s relationship with his father Ed Bloom, a weaver of tall tales to Will’s pragmatic realism. The story comes as Ed is dying, and he still has a few (oft-repeated) stories left to tell to his loved ones. With a baby on the way and his father dying, Will has the urge to reconcile with his father. The movie weaves storytelling into it through voice over and a briefly overwhelming duality of stories, scenes switching between these tales Will knows so well and the final days of his father’s life. It doesn’t do the ending justice to describe it this way, but it ends with Will telling the final story of the movie, the story of how his father dies surrounded by everyone he’s loved and helped.

I cannot stress enough how much I love this screenplay. Towards the start of the movie, I was briefly unsure about the quick switches between the tall tales and the current events, but I quickly got used to it. There was a line that referenced this in the movie, in which Ed explained how he tells stories in a way that the film itself mimics. While I might typically find this frustrating in its instruction, it was framed in such a way that made it more of a statement of thesis than anything. It gave a guide on how to watch the film, but not because it didn’t trust you to understand it for yourself. Instead, it insisted upon its own premise, making the film feel invested and interested in itself. This created the effect that despite the fantastical elements and exaggeration built into Ed’s stories, the movie felt earnest and heartfelt.

Those fantastical elements did a wonderful job creating a distinct sense for the movie. The story is based on realism and emotion, but surrounded by fantasy at the same time. This creates a tension between the two timelines, Ed’s fabulous one and Will’s practical one. It mimics the tension between the two, mirrors the moments when Will must give into hearing the story once more. This culminates with the ending, in which Will must also become a teller of stories—he has been one this entire time, we learn early on, but now he must fully step into that role and all that it means. It’s a beautiful example of symbolism for the understanding between them, and throughout the whole movie it really allows you to come to love the world and its characters at the same time you understand Will’s frustration over his life.

This is a movie that deals with story and reality, how they intertwine and if they can, and it does so in a brilliant way. This is a movie dedicated to telling a small story in a grand way; it knows exactly what it is doing and why. It is sincere, imaginative, and beautiful. The movie made such excellent use of storytelling as a motif and a device, and I really appreciate it for those reasons.

Jeepers Creepers (2001, dir. Victor Salva)

There is something so utterly compelling about this movie that I cannot describe. It is the sort of movie you are consistently screaming at the characters about the choices they are making, and yet I was so enraptured by it.

Jeepers Creepers is a horror film that follows siblings Trish and Darry as they are driving down the highway on their way home from college. While driving, Darry’s brief recklessness on the road quickly comes to an end as the pair are tailgated by a dangerous driver. They later see the same truck outside a church, its driver putting bundles that appear to be bodies down a large pipe. Further down the road, the driver begins to chase them again, and to get away they drive the car off the road. The siblings elect to go back to the church to see if someone needs help, which sets off the driver’s true pursuit of them down this highway. Eventually, the driver is revealed to be the Creeper, a flesh-eating creature that will pursue them at all costs. Aided by various people who live and hang out along the highway, Trish and Darry try to avoid their deadly fate and the climax of the film occurs in a police station.

Going into this movie, I had no idea what horror subgenre this fit into and I was shocked to learn it is a monster movie. The opening and premise do not imply this at all to me, but it was such a blast to get to meet the Creeper and his strange idiosyncrasies. He is less lasting in my mind than the other strange aspects of this movie, but he made for a fun and engaging foe for the siblings.

The structure of this movie is probably the most notable thing about it. There were way too many details to list in the summary paragraph, as there are quite a few characters and plotlines despite the isolated environment. The first fifteen minutes provide a solid indicator of what the rest of the movie will be in their strangeness, though not in their format. They take place in the siblings’ car, demonstrating their relationship and journey, introducing the element of danger in dialogue and chases, and rooting the movie in the setting along this seemingly endless highway. It is utterly captivating how this film garnered my interest despite the straightforward path of entry into the action. You really feel like you are in the car with them for these opening scenes. At the same time, so much happens in these fifteen minutes that I was shocked when I looked at how much time is left in the movie. Overall, it is incredibly fast-paced and packed with new things to encounter all the way down this highway.

The urban legend element felt so random and unnecessary, yet I still appreciated how it was done. When Darry is in the Creeper’s lair, he sees two corpses that resemble the couple their local legend is about that he and Trish discussed in the opening scene. The audience is clued into this fact by Darry’s reaction and the class ring on one of their fingers. It’s a small detail that made me feel immensely happy, as I felt like the movie was going out of its way to not talk down to the audience. It trusted their ability to listen to the details in those first fifteen minutes and remember them later on with minimal visual cues into what was going on. This was such a strange sense, as it was complemented by the siblings’ wild decisions, but was something I really appreciated.

On that note, the characters throughout the movie made absolutely ridiculous decisions and were often frozen in fear, which was frustrating and not usually something I critique but is so frequent I must point it out. A few of these decisions are explained, perhaps too much, like with their choice to go back to the church where they saw the Creeper disposing of the bodies. This is explained away by nerves about possibly rescuing someone, but is underlain with an acknowledgement of wanting to see something possibly grotesque. But so much of the movie is just watching the characters fully frozen and watching the horror unfold. Paired with the dialogue about Darry wanting to see something that will scare him and his eventual ending, this feels like a line of external commentary that is never fully explored, even while the internal symbolism is clear. In many ways, the characters mimic the audience in their watching, but this seems like a misplaced and undeveloped thread in the movie overall. This is a strange sense because the interest in vision, watching, and seeing feels so strong, but it drops the ball if we are to expand that idea beyond internal logic.

This movie embodies the classic horror critique of the audience watching the whole time wondering why the characters are choosing to do what they are. As well, it’s such a busy, cluttered movie. Despite these criticisms, there is something so compelling about the way it is structured, written, and performed. I was consistently enraptured during this film and I think it’s great if you’re looking for a fun horror flick to yell at with your friends.

Living for the Dead (2023, dir. Raja Gosnell)

I saw this show pitched as “Queer Eye but with ghosts” and despite this it for some reason did not occur to me until I was actively watching it that it is a reality ghost show. I debate over whether I want to include shows like this in my responses, but I was too enamored by it to not write about it this month. We’ll have to see what I decide to do in the future with similar shows, if they even come up.

Living for the Dead has five queer mediums, witches, and paranormal investigators travel the US and help both the living and the dead find healing. It takes place over eight episodes in which the group goes to a new location each time, investigating occurrences in a specific building and presenting options for its living residents or employees to hopefully avoid such intense hauntings.

Stylistically this show is so charming. The editing itself leans a bit into the standard ghost show format, but other than that it feels so unique. The visual style in the color grading and distinct wardrobe choices for the cast make it feel much more put together than other shows like it. The music is especially helpful in this aspect, with a beautifully cultivated soundtrack to take us through the episodes. I became so focused on this soundtrack and so disappointed by how difficult it was to find so many of the songs, that I dedicated myself to attempting to find the full thing. While I was a handful of songs short, I managed to find most of the show’s amazing music, which you can find a post about here.

As for the rest of the review, I struggle on how to go about it, as it doesn’t have the story structure of a typical fictional television show. With that said, each episode had a fairly coherent internal narrative, with a conflict and proposal for resolution in an otherwise straightforward chronological organization pattern. In general, I’d say the way the episodes were structured was very engaging. The group stayed at each location for multiple nights, usually doing a preliminary investigation the first night and a more focused one on the second. In between (and often before the first night), they did interviews with employees and visited a local bar to ask for stories about the locations. This worked well to ground the haunted locations in specific environments, rather than feel so similar even across states. As well, their investigation style leaned into mediums and psychics more than the traditional “scientific” paranormal investigation methods (though these were still present), which was personally more captivating.

One of the most noticeable stylistic elements was the way they did the confessional-style moments, in which one member of the group is talking to a camera away from the others. It is usually accompanied and often replaced by a wider shot of them recording their own confessional. We see them holding the video cameras throughout the season, but it creates such a distinct effect. It does a lot of work to remind you of the production of the show and make the investigators themselves apart of it, which was an interesting choice that I appreciated. There are themes of acceptance, community, and healing in the show, but I struggle to tie this decision to them. In a similar vein, there was opening and closing narration that was not my favorite, but only impacted the show for either end of the episodes.

Overall, this show was a very fun watch around Halloween time. It thought about ghosts in a really interesting way that I have not seen in other paranormal investigation shows that I’ve watched. It was stylistically interesting and just something easy to watch and enjoy.

The Thing (1982, dir. John Carpenter)

I truly cannot believe how long I put off watching this movie. In my sickness in the first half of this month, I was briefly obsessed with doomed remote expeditions, and I chose the absolute perfect film to satiate that hunger. This movie has everything I love: incredible practical effects, a compelling screenplay, isolated and remote setting, Keith David—the list goes on. I truly cannot express how much I adored this movie; it is definitely going to become an annual rewatch for me.

The Thing follows the crew of an American research station in Antarctica when a shape-changing alien infiltrates their base. It has previously caused the deaths of a neighboring Norwegian station’s crew and, once it sneaks into the base in the form of a dog, this large cast of characters must reckon with a hidden someone among them. Of course, this means they cannot trust the people they once relied on and devolve into paranoia and fighting.

First and foremost: the effects on this movie are absolutely beautiful. There is such a range of them, from this charming, moving mass of the Thing, tubes writhing around it, to the gorgeous, grotesque sculptures of the Thing mid-transformation. They are such 80s effects and the use of puppetry and sculpture is so expert and artistic. They are simultaneous disgusting and utterly bewitching. My personal favorite was the Norwegian Thing or Split-Face Thing, this incredible sculpture of one of the aliens between two faces stretched together; the folds of it give it such movement at the same time it feels crafted. The doubled faces invoke the sense of the comedy and tragedy masks, made here grotesque in what is a theatrical and stunning but also utterly horrifying work of art. This page discusses a bit more about the marvel of the practical effects in this film.

Even without the practical effects, this is a stellar movie. The atmosphere is so palpable, from the isolation and the boredom to the fear and paranoia. Most of the movie takes place in the base itself, but there are occasional visits to nearby buildings and bases that allow us to see this expansive span of space covered in snow. The pacing of the movie makes excellent work of its isolated setting and trapped characters, so the danger feels real and desperate while never veering into boredom or exaggeration. Somehow it feels both slow and action-packed, the tension throughout so extreme, even when you think you’ve figured it out this time.

This movie is often called a masterpiece, and I kinda totally get it. It has an excellent cast, superb writing, and incredible visuals. I think there is something to be said about what this film does with the premise of infiltration, especially in a remote environment, and how it reflects a paranoia that leads to death of all the people involved once they no longer trust each other. It takes this very classic idea and just executes it so well. Also, the movie poster art is some of the best I’ve ever seen in terms of communicating the mood of the movie.