3. Phantasm (1979)

Late '70s horror seeks 2009 degenerate. Must be tired of sequels to Saw (did you see saw? no, just the swings...) and sick of movies that end by blaming the Lord Himself for the existence of angry, dead little girls with big eyes and black hair who don't like obnoxious white people in their house.

There is something about the late '70s that has always called me; Post-punk music, Joy Division, Alien, the Fall, cocaine availability, and the fact that the late '70s come right before the early '80s, and... what the fuck caused them? Must have been too good to beat... time started eating itself and wearing very bright colors...

In the late '70s, or as I remember them (it's a bit foggy, I'll admit... and could someone that hasn't left yet look around and see if my septum is lying somewhere?), there began to exist a certain darkness to things, an exploration of real people in bizarre, evil and never before presented circumstances. LSD was old news, pot had been around, but cocaine was booming, and people were have horrifying experiences coming down off it it without aid of a Xanax (tm) (but they were possibly on acid, writing scripts for movies.) In '79 the anger of punk started to dance a bit more than mosh. You could have a great time partying to music about death and how gosh darn beautiful it is (the most beautiful things seem to be those no one has ever experienced... how beautiful) (sidenote: Joy Division was originally going to be called "music about death" until Ian Curtis said it was lame to have "music" in the title of the band. No, not really. But yes, maybe.) (you know their drummer was thinking 'jesus, this guy is really fucking emo... all the punks are gunna think we're wankers...)

And I find the movies of the late '70s tend to carry this same dark weight. "Everything fuckin' sucks I wanna die I cant stop laughing but ohhhh wait it's not funny yes it is we might die wouldn't that be happy/sad." It's that same suicidal laughing... the way The Fall's Mark E. Smith screams joyfully "I've got shears pointed straight at my chest!!!" in the first track of their first album "Live at the Witch Trials", entitled very appropriately "Frightened." But this suicidal laughter is at once both relatable and horrifying. We are as scared of ourselves as we are of a poltergeist. "Oh my gawwwd it's gunna kill me! I can't live this scared! I'll do it first!"

The music and film of this era (that I'm talking about too much, with absolutely no knowledge of it because I had to learn about the Pilgrims for 12 years of education, the '70s just never came up. Well, I guess the '70s were fairly recent at the time... maybe no one had written it down yet, and you know how schools feel about learning without a book...)

Let's try again :: The music and film of this era also share those same colors, faded grays and browns. Everything almost appears as if it used to be shiny, even sparkly and metallic, but has turned rusted, faded, old and ruined... like a punk show in an old opera house. The rich were here and now it's our turn. So start pissin'. Don't gotta? Start drinkin'.

In the last season of Seinfeld, there were cell phones. How depressing. I believe this relates. You know what they say... no neither do I, that's why I do not like them.

Phantasm is nothing like the shocker horror movie of today. When the film ends, everything will not be explained (as it is most often done today by blaming our Lord, who surprisingly enough, seems to know about the existence of aliens, oh smite me mighty smiter, and is, in fact, in cahoots with them!) At the end you will not feel complete. You may even feel (get this!) disturbed by this incomplete feeling. The monsters you never see are truly always the scariest (except for that spider in Lord of the Rings, but that shit was originally a book, and Tolkien totally never watched Phantasm.)

You do see the monsters in this movie, but nonetheless, the point stands -- too much is explained in the movies these days. By the end of the flick, it's all got a reason ("ohh i get it, god did it, how inventive.") Phantasm is just bizarre and godless and on that perfect sweetspot between "whatthefuck" and "maybe..." It runs like an old home video in a lot of character-related ways. Time is not spent on introducing Nicholas Cage's character, showing him happily with his family, telling about his friends, his job, his car, just so that you care about him later in the flick. Phantasm throws you in going "Who the shit? What the fuck? Put away that dildo."

There are no famous people in this movie, no one I've ever recognized there or anywhere else, ever. Talk about refreshing. Like a goddamn Junior Mint (tm).

Interesting object alert! :: A flying metal sphere, about the size of a grapefruit, that drills into your brains and sucks them out, spraying them willy-nilly around the room! How efficient! How late '70s post-punk of Phantasm!

If you like this sort of horror flick try Alien, Evil Dead, Eraserhead and the old black and white Night of the Living Dead, one of the first films to star a black man as the hero. Alien was one of the first films to have a woman star in an action-role (Sigourney Weaver.) Horror movies don't give a fuck about the color of your skin or the length of your penis... YOU ARE GETTING YOUR BRAIN SUCKED OUT, REGARDLESS! (unless your penis is big enough to fight evil! Then I'm totally jealous!) Point is, if you can believe in brain-sucking balls from hell, you can believe in the equality of the brains that are being sucked (even if that equality puts us all equally between chocolate ice-cream and Lassie, keeping in mind Lassie isn't even a real dog.)

One of the good guys in Phantasm is a shotgun-wielding ice-cream man. How the fuck do you beat that? Saw XXI doesn't have a flying fuck of a chance. "He helped me" is on the newest billboard for Saw. No he fucking didn't help you! He tortured you and almost killed you! You obviously have pre-existing issues and are in need of... punk rock!!!!

Phantasm has 3 sequels, the 4th entitled Phantasm: Oblivion. Gunna need to strap on your strap-on and get fuckin' that chicken. You got lots to do, and the last one will have going to see the big thing in the sky. I have all four videos on VHS if you'd like to borrow them. Leave your strap-on at home when you come to pick them up. We can use mine.

Happy brain-sucking!

ALEC of LAND

OH MY GAWD OH MY GOD! I forgot! the soundtrack is fucking AWESOME. Just remembered when started watching the preview. YES YES YES.

totally came, brah!

check it ::