A Child of Rape Responds

Rep. Todd Akin: "First of all, from what I understand from doctors (pregnancy from rape) is really rare... If it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down."

Oh really? I know at least one child of rape who has something to say to Senator Congressman Akin:

"I'm Your Boyfriend Now, Bitch!"

Seriously? You're on the Senate Congressional Science committee and you publicly make an idiotic statement like that and don't expect backlash? Have you never taken a basic high school biology class? Are you so out of touch with reality that you have to insult and denigrate 51% of the country's population? Is Missouri so backwoods that inbreeding has left you with half a brain? And what does your comment say about the constituents who voted you into office?

Is this what we've come to in American politics? It used to be Us Against the World. Now it's The Haves Against The Have Nots. Straights Against Gays. Republicans Against Women. Rich Against Poor. What the hell went wrong? We no longer have the Soviets to hate, so we'll hate everyone who isn't white, rich and Republican? And let's not get into the whole FRC as victims in the shooting at the hate group's headquarters last week. I could write for days about those creeps playing the victim card.

Yes, I certainly know that all of those prejudices have always been in place. But just when I thought we were actually about to turn a corner in tolerant acceptance, some a-hole opens his mouth and reminds us of just how far we still have to go.

Sure, I have some friends who are Republicans. But they are also smart enough to know that the poison being spewed by the "Tea-Party" is nonsense. They are (for the most part) what I like to refer to as 'Lincoln Republicans:' Fiscally conservative but socially liberal. They are smart enough to ignore the religious fundies' views on women and the LGBTQ community; know full-well that so-called Intelligent Design is scientifically invalid and recognize the importance of social programs and the arts. Sadly, my friends are in the minority when it comes to their political party and their voices are consequently drowned out by the vociferous lunatic fringe.

Todd Akin's comments about rape are indicative of everything that's wrong in America, today. How did the "Land of the Free" become the "Land of the Rich and Stupid?" 

I may be gay, but when I was younger, I hoped that one day I would have children of my own. Now I'm glad I never did, because I wouldn't want them to grow up in a country that embraces stupidity and hatred. 

Legitimate rape? Disgusting.

More, anon.
Prospero

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I'm Your Boyfriend Now, Bitch!

There's a new trailer out for the 'reboot" (oh, how I hate that word) of A Nightmare on Elm Street, the 1984 Wes Craven classic that starred Heather Langencamp, John Saxon, Ronee Blakely, Charles "Roger Rabbit" Fleischer and Robert Englund as the pedophile Fred Kreuger (it wasn't until the film's sequel that he was officially called "Freddy"). Oh yeah, it also starred this young unknown by the name of Johnny Depp, in his feature film debut (more on Johnny in my upcoming post about Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland).

In the movie, a small town's teenagers suddenly find themselves plagued by nightmares in which a horribly burn-scarred maniac stalks them with a razor-clawed glove. It turns out their parents had long-ago stalked and killed a local pedo, burning him alive in the high school boiler room, where he had been employed as a janitor. Years later, Freddy manages to invade the dreams of their children, taking advantage of the old urban legend that says if you die in your dream, you die in real life.

The movie was a sensation and spawned almost as many sequels as Friday the 13th, ending with 2003's Freddy vs Jason, a campy mix in which the two unstoppable Horror icons joined forces to take out local teens, but ended up battling each other for supremacy. Beyond silly, Freddy vs Jason was the nadir of both franchises, both of which should have been put to bed long ago (despite the calls for an Ash vs Freddy vs Jason sequel, which, thankfully, never happened).

As a young (23 - yes, I'm old) Horror fan who, at the time, adored 80's slasher flicks, I found the first film to be both original and effective, and Fred Kreuger was probably the most frightening Horror movie villain since Craven's mutant cannibal family in the original The Hills Have Eyes. Of course, as the franchise progressed and Freddy became an increasingly campy spouter of bad one-liners, I began to lose interest. That is, until Craven returned with 1994's A New Nightmare, which pitted Langencamp as herself, battling the fictional Kreuger made real through her son's own nightmares. The movie explored the fine line between fiction and reality, but fell apart in its last few minutes. And Craven's next film, the terrible Eddy Murphy vehicle A Vampire in Brooklyn seemed to seal his fate as a has-been. It wouldn't be until the Kevin Williamson-penned slasher satire Scream that Craven would redeem himself. I'm also a big fan of Craven's non-Horror thriller Red Eye, with Rachel McAdams, Cillian Murphy, Brian Cox and giant-eyed "Glee" star, Jayma Mays.

And Craven's next film, My Soul to Take, seems to explore familiar territory in a tale about a serial killer who returns to his hometown to stalk children whose birthday's fall on the day he was supposedly buried. How much more can Craven mine from this concept? I'm not sure, but you can bet I'll be seeing it.

Anyway, here's the latest trailer for director Wesley Strick's "reboot" of A Nightmare...

Is it me, or does Jackie Earle Haley's version of Freddy sound an awful lot like Watchmen's Rorschach? At least this version of Freddy looks like he's actually been burned, rather than ravaged by some exotic, disfiguring virus. And yes, that's doe-eyed Kyle Gallner from The Haunting in Connecticut and Jennifer's Body as Quentin. I'll withhold judgment until I see the new movie when it comes out in April, but I remain dubious. If nothing else, I'll give it this: At least the damned thing isn't in 3D!

More, anon.
Prospero

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Three, Four... Better Lock Your Door

I hear so many people complaining about remakes these days (myself, often included). But it's hardly a new phenomenon. Cecil B. DeMille re-made both Ben Hur and The Ten Commandments. And I recently read that A Star is Born has been greenlit for a third remake. It just seems that lately, there are so damned many of them. And I suppose it's not so terrible when the movie being remade is older and can be done with the benefit of new technology. With that in mind, I guess I'm slowly warming up to the idea of the new version of A Nightmare on Elm Street. It's been 25 years, afterall.

In 1984, director Wes Craven introduced audiences to Freddy Kreuger, a disfigured pedophile who attacked teens in their dreams. Based on the old wives' tale that if you die in your dream, you die in real life, Elm Street tapped into something we all have in common and twisted it like a knife (or in this case, a razor-fingered glove) in our collective guts.

Heather Langenkamp is Nancy, a young girl who has started to dream about an evil maintenance man. When she questions her parents (John Saxon and Ronee Blakely), they tell her it's nothing. Of course, when Nancy's friends start turning up dead, she knows something is terribly wrong:

It turns out of course, that pedophilic school maintenance man Fred Kreuger (he wasn't called "Freddy" yet) is responsible. When the people in town (including Nancy's cop father) discovered what Kreuger had done, they trapped in the boiler room and burned him alive. To take his revenge, he attacks their children in their dreams, killing them with that vicious glove. Soon, teens start turning up dead all over the place, including a young Johnny Depp in his first feature film:

A Nightmare on Elm Street went on to provide character actor Robert Englund (previously best known for a small role in the TV miniseries "V") with a lucrative career in an increasingly silly series of sequels and other horror films, like the 1989 version of Phantom of the Opera, The Mangler, 2001 Maniacs and Zombie Strippers! Craven eventually returned to the story with A New Nightmare, in which the movie character suddenly finds a life of his own and impinges on the lives of Langenkamp and her "real-life" family, which was the most interesting of the sequels. Of course, Englund took the character to a new low in 2003's Freddy Vs. Jason, in which he teams up and then faces off with Friday the 13th's Jason Vorhees.

So, now it's soon to be 2010 and Michael Bay (ugh) is producing an update (or reboot) of the franchise. The only thing that gives me hope is the casting of Watchmen's Jackie Earle Haley as Freddy:

So, what do you think? Can Bay and Haley successfully resurrect Kreuger from the silly, pun-spouting character he had become by the 90's? Or will the new version simply be masturbatory filmmaking at its worst? The proof, I suppose, will be in the pudding. You know that I always want to know your thoughts. Will you be making a visit to Elm Street next year? I probably will, but I hold no hope for a film better than last year's deplorable Friday the 13th re-boot.

On an interesting side note, before he was the voice of Roger Rabbit, comedian Charles Fleischer appeared as a psychologist in the original Nightmare...

More terrors, anon.
Prospero

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One, Two, Freddy's Light in the Shoes...

This is a picture of the Nike Freddy Kruger sneaker. Why anyone over the age of 14 would want this shoe, is beyond me. Of course, the shoe is only there because of this post's title. JA over at MyNewPlaidPants (welcome home, JA!) has posted this link to an article on StalePopcorn about the absurdist nature of A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge. Mostly, the author talks about the movie's overtly homoerotic tones. I don't know why the author equates "gay' with "absurd," but most of the rest of his arguments are pretty solid. And the movie is pretty freakin' gay:

As I read the piece, I couldn't help but think of openly gay director David Decoteau and his basically soft core gay horror movies. And in particular, The Brotherhood series, which now number 6. Take a look at this trailer for Brotherhood II: Young Warlocks, and see if you can tell what I'm talking about:

Brotherhood V: Alumni

Or this one for Brotherhood V: Alumni

Honestly, does it get more overt than that? TwitMagazine recently had this to say about DeCoteau. Personally, I think his films are dreadful. Stupid, badly acted and cheaply made, DeCoteau's voyeuristic movies put the 'dirty' in "Dirty Old Man." Sadly, horror (almost more than any other genre) is subject to formulaic story-telling and stereotypical characters, which means that LGBT characters in mainstream horror films are simply faceless victims played for laughs, or sexual objects meant for the masturbatory fantasies of middle-aged gay geek virgins (with apologies to those middle-aged gay geek virgins out there).

Personally, I want a horror movie in which the gay characters are strong and effective heroes. A slasher movie where the "last girl" is the "last boy." What's that? Really? There is such a film? Oh yeah, right. Well, almost. While it's far from perfect, we need more gay horror films like Hellbent the 2004 gay slasher film starring Psycho Beach Party's Andrew Levitas. Hellbent writer/director Paul Etheredge tries just a bit too hard, and what could have been a truly effective thriller becomes something more akin to "Gay Sexploitation" than "Gay Horror." Here's the trailer (don't watch this one, Janet):

The problem is getting a still fiercely homophobic Hollywood to embrace the queer writers, directors and actors who provide them with their hand-kneaded, high-fiber, high-protein, whole-grain vegan bread and their non-dairy, low-cholesterol, amino-acid-enhanced 'butter-like' spread. The solution, as always, is through being heard. Squawk loud enough and long enough, and someone will listen.

Personally, I blame the Accountants. They've taken over the studios and turned them into sequel/re-boot/recycling machines, based on business models rather than creative content. Creative, original voices are stifled by whatever is projected to make the most money. That's not to say that Hollywood hasn't always been about the money. Of course it has. And sequels have been around since the invention of the story. Some (though only a handful) Hollywood remakes are even better than their originals. But look at this week's Top 10 money makers. Seriously? OK - I must admit that I HAVE TO see Bruno. But the rest of those films? With the possible exception of The Hangover (starring the insanely hot Bradley Cooper), I'd rather be at the dentist.

Alright. Now I'm ranting about movies. What the hell is wrong with me? I guess I just need to see more stuff like the amazing Moon. Go see it!

More, anon.

Prospero

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