tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34993991.post850461920092547573..comments2023-10-05T07:46:44.392-04:00Comments on And Now the Screaming Starts: Movies: There goes the neighborhood.CRwMhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07896615209770501945noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34993991.post-84615957213490527282008-01-17T09:17:00.000-05:002008-01-17T09:17:00.000-05:00To compare apples and oranges, one of the things t...To compare apples and oranges, one of the things that I really liked about Thomas Harris' book RED DRAGON was the internal struggles and thought processes of criminal profiler Will Graham. In the first film adaptation of that book, MANHUNTER, with William Peterson as Graham, he has a number of thinking out loud monologues as he tries to put himself in the skin of the Tooth Fairy. A little clunky, but you got the idea of what they were trying to achieve.<BR/>However, it still didn't address the other doubts going through his mind about his own moral character, emotional buttons that Hannibal Lector enjoyed pushing every time Graham spoke to him in prison.<BR/><BR/>I wonder, just now, if maybe, theoretically, THE GIRL NEXT DOOR might actually make a more effective theater piece.<BR/>Theater seems to lend itself better to the device of a monologue, and the idea that these crimes are happening in front of you (so to speak, depending on how explicit you got), is an interesting idea, in terms of putting the audience in the same shoes (somewhat literally) as David, making them also an actual witness to these events and being somewhat complicit in the participation.<BR/>I'm not saying it makes for zany entertainment (and I'd nix any musical or dance numbers), but I'm just thinking out loud about a possible method of turning this awful real-life experience into a worthwhile work of art, if possible.<BR/>And, intellectually, I would think it would be possible.<BR/>To a certain extent, it seems like this case is one of those instances where you could argue that it's a situation asking for art to transform it into something to be seen in order to accomplish some good from the event, unless pure journalism is all that is required and trying to convert it into art is really presumptious.<BR/>Does that make any sense?<BR/><BR/>But, the whole case is in a similar category of the Holocaust, I think, about how does a regular person participate in a crime against innocent people, by allowing it to happen?<BR/>Or, perhaps the Holocaust is a bad example because it doesn't "involve" us-- I sometimes think that we as Americans somehow sit in judgment of those civilian Germans, as if such a thing is impossible to occur here in the States, at least not on such a grand, organized scale. But if the degree or scale to which something like the Holocaust were not the issue in terms of comparison, perhaps lynchings in the U.S. is a better example for Americans, considering some of these lynchings were photographed by photo studios and displayed as examples of their work<BR/>and made into postcards, featuring the hanged victim and a gathered mob posing cheerfully around him.<BR/>How much of this crowd response is fear (specifically acting in compliance out of peer pressure) and how much is genuine evil and how much is cultural compartmentalization?<BR/>Okay, the lynching example I find particularly fascinating, so my apologies for arbitrarily dredging that up.<BR/>My reference for that is the book WITHOUT SANCTUARY: LYNCHING PHOTOGRAPHY IN AMERICA.<BR/><BR/>I hope some of what I said made some damn sense!<BR/><BR/>So, is this like the third film incarnation of this case coming out or already out? Sheesh.<BR/>So much for unfilmmable events.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34993991.post-52536640177836549542008-01-16T10:01:00.000-05:002008-01-16T10:01:00.000-05:00Screamin' Sassy,Oh, I'm not arguing that it should...Screamin' Sassy,<BR/><BR/>Oh, I'm not arguing that it should have had a happy ending. There would be two things working against it.<BR/><BR/>First, it would seem kinda creepy given the source material. Even twice removed, it would have seemed like some strange and almost disrespectful cop out to have the girl survive. Or, let me re-frame that statement, given how much emphasis they place on the fact that they aren't exploiting the situation, it would seem like so strange and almost disrespectful cop out to have the girl survive. I mean, imagine if, at the end of the film "United 98" the passengers suddenly overwhelmed the terrorists and set the plane down safely. It would seem like some cheap stunt and it just serve to remind you of what actually happened. If, on the other hand, the film was called "Revolt on American 234" and you didn't make a big deal out of the fact that you were inspired by the events on the doomed flight, then you movie might not be any good, but you wouldn't get that same exploitative feel if you went with a happy ending.<BR/><BR/>The second is that, by the end of the film, survival for the character would be a nominal sort of thing at best. Eventually Meg's suffering is so great that one can't imagine how any character who went through all this would ever get away from it in any significant way. Aside from the physical damage, the mental damage would be profound. Even survival in this case wouldn't make for a real happy ending. Now I'm taking about the character within the narrative, not the real case. And within the story one gets the sense that Meg ultimately welcomes death as a release from what's been done to her.<BR/><BR/>Again, let me stress that I'm talking about the narrative logic of a fictional story here. Pondering what would have happened to Sylvia Likens had she lived through the ordeal is something much more serious and grim to ponder.CRwMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07896615209770501945noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34993991.post-21771191430508324422008-01-15T20:46:00.000-05:002008-01-15T20:46:00.000-05:00But would it have been any better with a happy end...But would it have been any better with a happy ending ?<BR/><BR/>I can't come up with a reasonable answer, but don't most horror movies end with either everyone dead, or a sole (or few) manage to miraculously escape, only to have the killer spring out of the glove compartment in a surprise-you-die-now ending, fade to black ?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34993991.post-29279545252534862282008-01-13T20:41:00.000-05:002008-01-13T20:41:00.000-05:00I bet if they called it "American Girl Next Door" ...I bet if they called it "American Girl Next Door" the film would've been made a lot sooner.spacejackhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14902182763527176185noreply@blogger.com