The Winter of my Discontent

Even if the month is short - and on the verge of finishing - I must say that February is the month I hate the most. I can survive the constant rains throughout October, the July heat and the Christmas fever of December, the hopelessness of seeing summer vanish during all of November and the "back to school" suckness of September, but enough is enough.



Let me make this clearer : I wanna move away. Far, far away. You might think I'm somewhat of a schizo. Changing my mind ? No. I may sing the marvels and wonders of Montreal, but it's nothing against the city itself, silly. I just can't stomach winter. It's cold out there - and also inside my appartment. The Hydro-Québec corporation pays its office space with my bills alone.

Calcium permeates everything it comes in contact with. I can't wear any fancy shoes when going out, because they'll quickly be ruined. Buses are delayed. Cars are splashin' slush on yo' ass. I've had it.



I have been thinking about Spain a lot lately. It's hot, beautiful, and part of the almighty European Union. There is always South America, but what the hell would I do there work-wise ? The Middle East, but it's a little volatile right now. Dubai, even if conflict-less, is a bit too pricey for me. Africa ? Could be nice, depending where. The best deal would be to hide somewhere on Ile de la Réunion and work in the touristic field. However, a tropical paradise would be tiring after a while, with nothing to do. It's complicated.

Chances are I'll probably end up staying here and complaining. And thus still write this goddamn blog !

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Speaking about summer, what about Wes Craven's word on it ?



The old man seemingly has something to say. L'ÉTÉ DE LA PEUR anobody ? That would be STRANGER IN THE HOUSE, a 1978 TV movie he shot the year following THE HILLS HAVE EYES, and starring none else than Linda Blair. Can you feel my pain ? The VHS I watched was dubbed in french, adding to the "out there" feel. Whatever this movie was motivated by, you could never tell that Craven worked on it if I didn't tell you. The full frame edition didn't help, of course, but let me start where I'm supposed to begin.

The Bryant family is a happy bunch. They live somewhere in California; the father has big glasses, the mother (Carol Lawrence) is hot as hell, and the daughter (Blair) is proud of her horse. However, one morning, her aunt & uncle are killed in a car accident, and her mother announces that her cousin (Lee Purcell - who starred opposite Orson Welles in Bert I. Gordon's 1972 romp NECROMANCY) is going to come & live with them for a while. She seems charming at first, but after a while even the horse freaks out when he sees her. She ends up stealing Linda's boyfriend and wearing her clothes, and though she is loved by all the little Blair insists there's something fishy going on.



Linda Blair has never had bigger hair. Her face is buried in curls, and the cowgirl costumes she's wearing just add to the ridicule. One can easily understand why any guy would immediately ditch her for Lee Purcell, even if it's not nice to write it. The movie is well paced, of course, but its TV movie status is never quite forgotten. It's tame - there's a sexual sub-text that seems to develop, and is then almost dropped - and silly, and you never really root for anybody. You just watch with a smile as little Linda wakes up with her face swollen & red on the day she's supposed to go to some dance party, and as her boyfriend gets the hots for the sexy cousin and takes her for a ride (implicitly sexual).

There are enough unspoken acts in there to fill a whole porno, but I guess it's also the case with any movie involving more than one character. The supernatural elements & cheap special effects kick in towards the end and it goes downhill from there. Craven should have kept the dodgy scenes suggested, but what can we do other than watch ?

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Korea has a strange cinematic landscape, much like Quebec's. Let's not compare budgets, but rather concentrate on the vast array of styles & treatments that koreans offer when they start shootin'.



Korean cinema "broke out" in the underground mainstream - a term seemingly contradictory, but the kind of term we unfortunately need nowadays - with a few releases that were not very serious - and not very good either. The most remembered of them all has to be Kim Sang-Jin's ATTACK THE GAS STATION (1999), a painful farce with sad late 90's punks... attacking a gas station. The movie featured immaturity, slaps, and a character who dreamed of being in a boy's band. The essence of Korean pop culture ? Let's hope not.

Park Chan-Wook changed the idea that we had about his national cinema with a trio of wonderful, oddly-paced movies, his "revenge" trilogy : SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE (2002), OLDBOY (2003), and LADY VENGEANCE (2005). The fine folks at Fantasia also gave us a chance to view all kinds of oddities from Korea, over the years, and I now personally fully accept the fact that their cinema is as diverse and varied than any country's.



Which brings me to a flick that has been projected at Fantasia a few years ago, but that I missed : THE UNINVITED. Directed by newcomer Lee Su-Yeon in 2003, its original title is 4 INYONG SHIKTAK and it could be the best thing you ever come across to describe in images the old R.E.M. classic "Everybody Hurts".

A young man, on the verge of marrying a nice little bossy chick, lives a strange experience. He falls asleep on the subway, half drunk, and wakes up at the terminal. As he exits the wagon, he sees two little girls, asleep on the benches. But it's too late for him to get them out, already the wagon is leaving the station for the night. The next day, he hears the news : the two girls have been poisoned by their mother and left in the wagon on purpose. He is troubled. He is even more troubled when he goes home and finds their ghosts quietly sitting at his kitchen table.

Turns out that the guy doesn't know anything about his past - well, before he was seven - and he thinks he might have been adopted. Something bothers him. Why would he see the dead ? He ends up meeting a depressed narcoleptic girl - Jun Ji-Hyun, the sassy girl in... MY SASSY GIRL (2001) - who has the same "problem" as him. Together they'll try to "heal" each other, but the viewer will find out that pretty much every character has a dark secret hidden somewhere in his past.

This is a very troubling movie, mainly because most of the deads are children, and that their end is often graphically violent. This aspect, at least, is typically asian. And it can trouble eastern viewers. Some of the content is also confusing, sometimes not too explicit, and only hinted at. Playing the guessing game when the rythm is that slow and the running time more than two hours can be tiring. But the reward is haunting, and almost unhealthy. This well constructed plot will stay with you long after you have switched the TV off.