Author | Lightnews

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 2h

...Also contains a pretty long list of images you'd be hard-pressed to find in any other film, most notably the VR cactus sex of the film's conclusion.

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 2h

As mind-bending as it is revolting, pushing human flesh to its absolute limits then asking the viewer to go a step further. The woman eating herself may be the grossest thing I've ever seen, but the gore is oddly beautiful (one more way to film mixes up pain and pleasure)...

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 2h

SPLATTER: NAKED BLOOD (Hisayasu Satō, 1996)

#HisayasuSatō #AkikoAshizawa #YumikaHayashi #SplatterNakedBlood

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 1d

...Lenzi's direction also may be more workmanlike than some of his better-known contemporaries, but he does have some great little directorial touches, such as the reveal of a lawnmower driving itself around Maria Rosaria Omaggios's front lawn.

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 1d

...given his reputation. That being said, there is an unfakeable sense of anger and desperation coursing through the film, as every institution, from the hospital to the church to the military, is either consumed by the hungry horde or revealed to complicit in its rise....

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 1d

...what separates a great Italian horror film from a serviceable one: Fulci makes films that that feel like nightmares; Lenzi resorts to a very uninspired riff on the "it was all a dream" ending. He also frankly fails to deliver on the level of sleaze I was expecting...

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 1d

A film that is often pitched as the first with fast zombies, which here are radiation mangled and maddened men and women who feed on their fellow citizens. It exists, of course, in the shadow of Lucio Fulci's ZOMBIE and CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD and also helps illustrate...

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 1d

NIGHTMARE CITY (Umberto Lenzi, 1980)

#UmbertoLenzi #HansBurmanSanchez #StefaniaDAmario #NightmareCity

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 1d

...is easy to mock, but I can't deny the power of his imagery (immaculately lit by Sven Nykvist). Woody Allen may be Bergman's no. 1 fan, but David Cronenberg has been the best keeper of his legacy, grounding his existential questions in our physical existence.

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 1d

Bergman's only out-and-out horror film (though TBH, from what I remember of PERSONA, it should qualify too). He's another formative filmmaker for me who I've revisited very little in recent years. TLDR: His solemnity, which occasionally lapses into deadly self-seriousness...

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 1d

HOUR OF THE WOLF (Ingmar Bergman, 1968)

#IngmarBergman #SvenNykvist #LivUllmann #MaxvonSydow #HouroftheWolf

1

Reposted

R. Emmet Sweeney @robert-emmet.bsky.social · 7d

For my Old New substack I wrote about Edward L. Cahn's hypnotically beautiful past-life monster movie The She-Creature (1956) + a brief note on Ken Jacobs: oldnew.substack.com/p/past-lives...

Past Lives: The She-Creature (1956)

A brief note on Ken Jacobs and a longer note on Edward L. Cahn's hypnotic creature feature

oldnew.substack.com

3 4

Reposted

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 29d

THE RED AND THE WHITE (Miklós Jancsó, 1967)

#MiklósJancsó #TamásSomló #AndrásKozák #TheRedandtheWhite

2 2

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · 29d

THE RED AND THE WHITE (Miklós Jancsó, 1967)

#MiklósJancsó #TamásSomló #AndrásKozák #TheRedandtheWhite

2 2

Reposted

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 23

THE CLAY PIGEON (Richard Fleischer, 1949)

#RichardFleischer #RobertDeGrasse #RichardLoo #RichardQuine #TheClayPigeon

1 1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 23

...in particular, where you can also sort of see the creative seeds for his much better film THE NARROW MARGIN start to take root.

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 23

The weakest of Fleischer's early thrillers that I've seen so far, especially compared with something like BODYGUARD, which is similarly compact, but way more visually imaginative. Nevertheless, this has some moments and scenes where Fleischer absolutely locks in, the train finale...

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 23

THE CLAY PIGEON (Richard Fleischer, 1949)

#RichardFleischer #RobertDeGrasse #RichardLoo #RichardQuine #TheClayPigeon

1 1

Reposted

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 22

...that sets the film in motion. The idea of this as a metaphor for Italy's recovery from, but inability to fully come to grips with, the trauma of fascism and WWII is a powerful one and seems consistent with the film's ending, this moment of aching humanity.

1

Reposted

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 22

L'AVVENTURA (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1960)

#MichelangeloAntonioni #AldoScavarda #MonicaVitti #LAvventura

1 2 2

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 22

...that sets the film in motion. The idea of this as a metaphor for Italy's recovery from, but inability to fully come to grips with, the trauma of fascism and WWII is a powerful one and seems consistent with the film's ending, this moment of aching humanity.

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 22

...But there is always this primal force surging beneath the surface--first represented by the rocky waves on the island where Anna goes missing, then by the characters' emotions which keep bubbling up, even when it seems like they have moved on from/lost interest in the disappearance...

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 22

Perhaps the ultimate cinematic embodiment of postwar modernism. The received wisdom of this being a coldly formalist film is not entirely wrong; the scene where seemingly every man in the village stares at Monica Vitti is indeed quite chilling (in the horror movie sense)...

1

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 22

L'AVVENTURA (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1960)

#MichelangeloAntonioni #AldoScavarda #MonicaVitti #LAvventura

1 2 2

Reposted

mjhousiaux12.bsky.social @mjhousiaux12.bsky.social · Sep 21

Addendum: That scene also has a great bit, indicative of Castle's sense of humor, where someone mysteriously slips a note under the door, which Hunter eagerly retrieves, only to discover it's a leaflet for the hotel's valet service.

1 1