Silent Hill 2: the First Room

First cinematic and opening of the game, James is shown looking at himself in a restroom mirror. After staring for a short time, wet his lips and then makes an awkward gesture with his right hand over mouth and face. Then he takes in a deep breath while closing his eyes and stretching his body away from the mirror, as giving the impression he is tired. Cuts to a shot from one of the urinals, in Dutch angle and out of focus you see James entire body in front of the mirror while you hear his voice      

James:  Mary... Could you really be in this town?

Turns slowly into a normal shot while we gain focus of the background, and ends up in another dutch but leaning to the other side.

First of all, Let's appreciate the beauty of the whole opening sequence. Right from the beginning this game shows just how different it is from other games... The final shot is made with the "camera" behind the urinal, in your face, from there you could almost smell the urine! It's dirty, it's mature. The game expects things from the viewer: You got this everyday object in the front and in the background slightly out of focus the point of interest. It makes you work for it.

This first scene is already developing motives and themes that are going to be treated in depth later. Being in front of a mirror suggests looking inside one self. So the game is stating that this is going to be the journey of James Sunderland into himself. It's a discovery journey and as such a perilous one: cause it means traveling into the unknown were possibly danger could be awaiting.

Back to the mirror. This is a Lynchean shot. You can find characters in front of mirrors in many David Lynch's movies. You can see it also in Hitchcock, Cronenberg, Orson Welles, Scorsese and many other directors, but it is a signature shot of David Lynch. He's obsessed with it. You can find it in Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks, Wild at Heart, Mullholland Drive, The Straight Story... you name it  

Lynch use mirrors as a way of giving his imagery a surreal quality. In fact if I had to define David Lynch's work with one word, I'd use: oneiric. All his movies feel like you are watching someone's dream.

But specifically when Lynch uses this particular shot of a character looking at himself in the mirror, is usually a way he has of stating that the character is not exactly the way you see it: it has two faces, or a secret that in time will be revealed. Frequently the mirror acts as a space of encounter for the characters with their true nature. 

Anyway, on a deeper level what James is contemplating here over the mirror is his suicide. He's having suicidal thoughts. 

We know that cause later that's the first thing he thinks of when he sees Angela in front of a mirror.

Granted, in that scene she's pondering while looking at a bloody knife; but for all he knows the place is crawling with monsters, she could be using the knife to defend herself. In fact, I'm not sure she's thinking of suicide at all here. I'm not even sure that she suicides by the end of the game. We know that she used that particular knife to kill her father probably while he was sexually assaulting her... So the knife is not instrumental for suicide in her story, is for "aggressive defense", but suicide is the first thing that comes to Jame's mind! So, in my opinion, he and not Angela is the one that is having suicidal thoughts. 

Sometimes we can use water as mirrors (like in calm ponds or similar); water is used as a mirror in many folktales and Myths; and the same can be said of the opposite: sometimes mirrors are symbolic of water, (particularly in dreamlike circumstances)

Immediately after this restroom scene he goes outside and start looking at the lake. Once you play the game more than once, it kind of gives you the idea that James has come to Silent Hill to commit suicide. As time passes, and he makes conscious the truth, he'll get more and more into wet rooms, some of them are just humid, some drip a little bit of water, till finally in the hotel basement the floor is completely flooded.

We also know that in one of the possible endings James commits suicide by drowning (and in fact he claims that's the reason why he is in Silent Hill)

James: Now I understand the real reason I came to this town

[You hear the starting engine of a car]

I wonder what was I afraid of?

Without you, Mary, I've got nothing...

[You hear the car accelerating]

Now we can be together...

And then you see an image from below water with bubbles and all, while you hear "Mary's Letter".

So, Water means suicide for him. That's what he's thinking at least unconsciously here in front of the mirror and the lake after. And he doesn't shoot himself, he specifically chooses death by drowning because that sort of parallels and accentuates the way he killed Mary.

The weird gesture he's doing in front of the mirror with his hand could just be him freshening up with water.

 

We should notice though that there's no trace of actual water here, and that his fingers are slightly open, so it couldn't hold it.  But sometimes animations in the PS2 era were a bit rough (and we need to always remember that this was intended to be played on a PS2 and on a CTRV TV). Still, the man mainly responsible for this particular animation was Takayoshi Sato; and he repeated the gesture to perfection, showing that he knew it by heart, in The Making of Silent Hill 2

He doesn't seem to be freshening up. The gesture feels more like James checking out What's real on this image that he's seeing, and that's very appropriate for Silent Hill.

Also, I see, a sort of aggression to one self. To his narcissistic image (and in a narcissistic ideal set up: the Mirror). The fingers are slightly curved like in a claw position. And he's blocking destroying his image over the mirror, or symbolically peeling off the face... That's, again, reminiscent of the suicidal ideas he's having.

The gesture could also be aggressive in a different sense. He could be reflecting, unconsciously, on a similar gesture he used to kill his wife, by suffocating her with his own hands: here he's putting the hand over nose and mouth obstructing, symbolically as always - the coming of air. 

Last it could also mean taking of his mask. Stop pretending and come to terms with the truth. The mask is what we show to others. The lies we tell to others and to ourselves. We don't know exactly how James has been showing to others, probably as an abdicated loving and caring husband. But we know the lies he has been telling to himself. Here we have a superficial lie: Mary died of that damn disease three years ago.

And an even deeper lie revealed by the end: That's why I did it, honey. I just couldn't watch you suffer.

But as James concludes:

James: No, that's not the whole truth. You also said that you didn't want to die. The truth is... part of me hated you. For taking away my life...

Mary: You killed me and you're suffering for it. It's enough, James.

That's the final horrifying truth. This wasn't euthanasia. He didn't kill her out pity... He was tired and he wanted his life back! There was a narcissistic reason. That's why he killed her...  At least this final element is a part of the "whole truth". He didn't do it just because he couldn't watch her suffer anymore.

So, the image is telling you he's planning to suicide, and is even telling you how: by drowning, and when: as soon as he stops pretending and discover the truth (taking off the mask)... This could also explain the previous gesture, the wetting of the lips, which I read as simple hesitation move, he's not ready yet (though I confess I still haven't completely grasp this first gesture... I've seen it before in a movie... When Lynch uses female characters in front of mirrors, he usually made them check out their lips or paint them... Maybe it's from there, I don't know...) Look at this whole sequence, that connects two characters, mother and daughter in Wild at Heart (1990, David Lynch)

      

Anyway, let's finally move on with the rest of the things you can find in the room. The restroom was the first room they made for Silent Hill 2. The entire game kind of branched out from this bathroom. So it's not that weird to find these amount of details in it, cause it was the first room. They put a lot of love, effort and care on this one.

Also if you can think one room that could define Team Silent work in horror games, it is weirdly enough: bathrooms! (The high-school bathroom, and the Alchemilla Hospital one are among the most iconic places of the first game. You have this one. The wallet Bathroom. Then the bathroom were Eddie is puking. The scream bathroom in the Prison... you got more and more examples)

And what we can say about this bathroom as a whole is that it's dirty and beautiful at the same time. The man mainly responsible for the look of this bathroom is Masahi Tsuboyama (he was the art director, and so in charge of the backgrounds and the way the game looked in general)

The first thing that calls your attention as soon as you get control of the character is probably the graffiti in the wall over the urinals. Then you move and cut to this image.

It gives me the creeps each time I see it. It's so unsettling, probably because Akira Yamaoka's score has begin to work its magic here. Contrast this eerie theme we hear with the delightful guitar tune we get right away outside the bathroom, when James is explaining how he got the letter and what he's doing in Silent Hill. The Soundtrack is also telling a story.  This eeriness, dreamlike creepiness is talking to us about something evil acting here. Well, let's have a better look.

I call him the Moth-man. Some people think it is an alien, cause it's right next to were you find the Blue Gem in a second playthrough (which allows you to see the UFO ending); but they forget that all this alien crap was added in later editions of the game (The Xbox RD, Director's Cut and GH, and HD... etc) but I believe it wasn't there in the original. It was something they added later (That's why I hate so called "Director's Cut" in movies, and apparently now in games too!) 

For me it is a Moth. In any case it's just a very unsettling drawing. It has this wing-like arms that make him look like a giant moth. But it's also a humanoid figure, with a long neck, head, nose and eyes, perhaps some hair... a rounded body with stripes all over (that makes me think of an insect, like a bee or something like that) And finally there's a pair of legs with what definitely seem to be claws. The claws are telling of its demonic nature. In folktales claws are related to demons or demon like creatures. You can usually tell a devil by claws protruding through one of his shoes (that's a motif in tales).

To the sides and below we see Hebrew inscriptions.  It's a graffiti giving the idea that it was made with a fiber,  so it's a modern piece of art, but at the same time you get this feeling of something very ancient.

There's a long debate over the internet on how can you precisely translate the Hebrew inscriptions. 

Most people agree there are a couple of Hebrew names in this wall given to God, and perhaps some names for demonic entities... It's really hard to tell. I'd like an expert give us a definitive answer on this... But anyway, what probably Team Silent wanted to convey with the Hebrew inscriptions is just this idea of something ancient... maybe also about its religious nature: again, a demon. 

It reminds me of the opening in one of the greatest horror movies of all time (quoted as an influence by the developers); I'm talking about The Exorcist (1976, William Friedkin), were you have the statue of that winged demon, in the words of father Merrin "introducing himself".

But in any case the rest of what we can see in the bathroom might give us a clue of whatta hell this damn thing is. The first graffiti on the right wall, here:

You wouldn't believe it but people have actually identified words in this graffiti, and fragments of a phrase taken from The Bible:  

"While I am decaying like a rotten thing, Like a garment that is moth-eaten"

(Job 13:28)

In the opposite wall, we can find fragments of another phrase also from the book of Job:

"Thy hands fashioned and made me; and now thou dost turn about and destroy me" (Job 10:8)

In the wall near the exit door, directly opposite to the Moth-man we have a Heaven's night poster, with Maria in it

There's also a very obscure inscription over the posters written in the same style and color of the others, and people came to the conclusion that it repeats the second phrase of the book of Job (Thy hands etc...) 

First of all, with the first phrase we get a confirmation that the little drawing, it could be in fact a moth humanoid, could be...

There's a character in the game that is related to moths. I'm talking of course of Maria.  In the end boss battle Maria/Mary appears as an inverted crucified evil entity;

and she attacks by throwing shadowy moths at you. Some people say that they are really Black Butterflies

(I think the HD editions of the game let us see that they are moths)

In room 202 of Wood Side apartments, what I call Maria's apartment, the same shadowy Moths surrounds you following your flashlight (though they are not aggressive here) All over the apartment we see red lights, bug cages and the bodies of dead butterflies. Butterflies and Moths are related, both are lepidopterans. Maria has a little tattoo in her right hip of a Butterfly.

Butterflies are symbols of many things. 

In different cultures it represents the soul (but I don't see that acting here...)They are usually used in literature to represent the ephemeral quality of Women's beauty because of the short life-span butterflies are associated with. Just as their lives, beauty fades away... Some times in poetry women are compared with butterflies.(Maria sort of represents this ephemeral beauty of the female form.

Maybe how Mary Shepard once was: beautiful, sexy, attractive...

but she is in that age... were you can guess that decay is near)

So Butterflies are usually used as symbols of the feminine or Women in general, and particularly Women's genitalia.  Yes! a butterfly is also a symbol of the vagina (by the way in the Butterfly apartment we have a very vaginal hole in the wall and you'll get a key that would let you go through another vaginal hole in the wall: the clock hole); in medieval representations of the female naked body sometimes butterflies, or flowers with butterflies are used to cover the female genitalia (and little birds for males)...

Maria is signaling to this sexual meaning (that's why her Butterfly tattoo is more or less close to her vagina): she's an overly sexualized character, with multiple sexual suggestions and double meanings: the way she moves, the gestures she makes.

In my opinion she's a hooker. She is dressed like one; the first time we see her she's in the park (we can imagine, probably picking clients)... Jacks Inn, the cheap motel, is the next place you can save after encountering her. She also owns a key to the back entrance of Heaven's Night, a stripper dance local... with sexual services insinuated by multiple signboards all over the town and a luminous sign inside the club that reads paradise over a female nude figure with two floating hearts (and let's not forget that her character's name is based upon the iconic last victim of Jack the reaper, the prostitute Mary Jane Kelly) 

Maria is a projection, the embodiment of James sexual desires: What James needs. Similar to What Pyramid Head is (among many other things) the projection of James violent sexual urges: What James demands!

That's why they are introduced basically together: Pyramid Head looking at you from the other side of the bars (Maria will be the one behind bars later in the labyrinth) and almost immediately we need to go to the Butterfly apartment (an Introduction to Maria). That's also why they are both depicted in red colors. 

Well anyway. Finally as good doctor Lecter says:  "The significance of the moth is change. Caterpillar into chrysalis, or pupa, from thence into beauty." The Silence of the Lambs (1991, Jonathan Demme). One of the many movie influences in this game and specially of the butterfly/moth apartment.

Taking Job's phrase in consideration there's someone definitely changing here but not into something beautiful.

As a result of her illness Mary's body is changing, decaying, rotting like a garment that is moth eaten.

What doctor Lecter do not mention is that The moth is a symbol of death, and the changes death brings. In fact in his story the character that nurtures death-moths as pets is the serial killer Buffalo Bill. 

A moth represents the decay, the rottenness of the body (we can see this horrifying changes in the bodies of the multiple monsters) So going back, it's my conclusion that the Moth-Man is really a Moth Woman and it's a representation of Maria/Mary. And it functions here, in the restroom, as a Warning, or perhaps as an introduction to this demon. Similar introduction to the one we see in the opening of The Exorcist. The message is clear: I'm here, and now you are going to face me.  

 

"Thy hands fashioned and made me; and now thou dost turn about and destroy me"

It reminds James the crime he committed with his own hands; and how with this crime he created this "demon". Now has come the time were he would have to face it and destroy it or succumb to it. So, with all this in mind and probably way more, James will turn, finally go through that exit door and abandon the safety of this bathroom for a journey into the scariest of horrors.

In my analysis I tried to basically stick to the first room of the game, the restroom. There is a lot more that you could say about the things that are found here but I thing this will be enough for now,  Just let me point out that this is only the very first room in a ten hour plus game. It's amazing how many things this game is able to convey, how many things this game makes you think of: and that's always the true sign of a work of art.

(by pelida77)

A Personal Journey through 1982 American Movies

Ok, so I've been watching 1982 movies. Any movie: good, bad, regular; just following the alphabetical order, and if I'm able to find the movie I have to watch it: that's the rule... So, I've made a top 10 of the most underrated/forgotten movies of 1982...

But that defeats the whole purpose cause I don't want some asshole telling me what's supposed to be good. So, I decided to write something on the conclusions I've arrived after this long journey (around 60 movies!):  

1) If you got like a group of teenagers or better young adults you gonna have one or more punk kids, dressed in black leather, and weird hair, maybe a chain, sure a knife; they call themselves punks...

But I think they don't fully understand the whole punk philosophy... they usually get the rebellious side well enough, but in these movies they can even be pacifist punks! Like in Alone in the Dark (1982, Jack Sholder. Horror), you got the stupid punk-sister character against the proliferation of Nukes!

I mean, all I've learned about Punks is from Sex Pistols: but if you are a punk, isn't it supposed to be like better if the place goes to hell? But maybe not! Because in this universe, this fucking guy is also a punk...

Granted the quality of my tape is just terrible, but I like to think that this weirdo's glasses read Poonk!  

2) Sometimes kids will say really weird fucked up things. 

Kids in the 80's talk about sex, drugs, shit, body parts. They use them for shock value. Usually little kids but also teens. Like in Amityville Horror part II (1982, Damiano Damiani, Horror) A creepy 27ener guy ends up fucking his own super-hot sister 

"because the demon made me do it" 

She's playing an under-age and pretty much look the part to me... but I guess she was 21 at the time... so that makes it right...

You know, I have a theory that this is the only scene in this whole movie that Damiano Damiani really enjoyed shooting...

I also get the vibe that people didn't understand how bad drugs could be. In The Last American Virgin you got this very, very inappropriate scene with teens snorting cocaine!

And The Police in the background with De Do do do...

Of course the whole thing is funny, tender and cute because it really is just sugar powder; but the whole point is that you can only find this sort of scene back in the 80's. What madman approved this? Good Stuff!

3) They treat objects like Women, man.

There's not a single adult movie that doesn't show at some moment a piece of Tit or Ass, full nudity, bush style or some really cringe-inducing sex innuendo. Frequently there's a rape scene, that makes you feel like a terrible human being for watching it (while furiously masturbating)

Paul Newman gives Charlotte Rampling a good old bloody smuck in the face in The Verdict (1982, Sidney Lumet); not that she didn't deserve it but still: Can you imagine like Ryan Gunslinger punching Jennifer Lawranz whenever she's being a cunt?

In the 80's Women were treated like pieces of shit. In My Favorite Year, there's a pair of legs inside a Cigarette Box costume!

And the gaffer then says: "Hey, Janice, When you gonna let me get into your box?" 

And it comes with another girl dressed as matches... and then the fucking guy uses the matches to light his cigar (Which is a symbolism for... I don't know) Ohhh is so cute and misogynistic at the same time. And I've just picked a random movie... and I know the whole point of the scene is to show a dickhead, a movie mogul or something; But do you remember all the bitching from this ad?

I mean Wtf! He was Doomsday or something and he was mad.

4) By 1982 people started to feel Nostalgia for Classic Hollywood Movies. I found three paying direct homage to oldies: Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid, My Favorite Year and Hammett. There are also multiple movies playing oldies in the background or something, like in Making Love. 30-40 years separate 1982 from classical 40's and 50's which is more or less the same time that separates me from the 80's!

5) Sad forgotten movie genres: 

- Sex comedies: with lame out-of-place jokes, misogyny, racism, homophobic jokes, fat phobia... you name it. You got the purest form in something like the crying inducing Porky's (1982, Bob Clark) or The Beach Girls. Maybe mixed with a coming of Age like Last American Virgin and of course the master piece Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982, Amy Heckerling)  

- Fantasy: We don't see Conan and the likes anymore. Dungeons and Dragon's, Frank Frazetta style: The Dark Crystal, The BeastMaster, The sword and the Sorcerer... 

- Slashers: Like Friday the 13th, part 3, silly movies with some wacko as a serial killer, the plot is there if you want it but all you care really is how many teenagers are gonna get wasted (and how); there was a finding for me in The Slumber Party Massacre (1982, Amy Jones) with my new favorite: Drill-Man!

- Spoofs: like Airplane 2 or Pandemonium; movies that make fun of other movies I miss those days...

- Erotic movies. Is so easy to get porn now, that the genre is just dead: like Aphrodite... Or movies in which the whole point of existence is to show some hot chick in the nude like Pia Zadora in Butterfly (and also... Is really creepy to think that men would go to theaters, pay a ticket, maybe buy some popcorn, with hot sweet butter in it, and a cold delicious beer or a coke just to be able to whack off on Pia Zadora. (Which reminds me there's a scene just like that with Joe Spinell jerking off in a Theater in The Last Horror Film... Joe Spinell touching himself: that's something I'll take to my fucking grave!)

6) They weren't afraid of controversial subjects: Mariel Hemingway fucks with Patrice Donnelly in Personal Best (1982, Robert Towne)... But I'm being unfair here because this wasn't like a lesbian shock value film; it's a beautiful piece of art! Is like Riefenstahl's Olympia (1936); but  a little less Nazi, and there're no underwater fish shots and way more bushy down there and gay... I love the 80's

But you also got like Making Love! Wtf a 1982 Coming of Gay movie! And people think Brokeback with the Sheep on the Mountain or something was like the first gay movie ever; 

You know, a friend told me that in one scene Heath Ledger use his own saliva as a lubricant, so yeah apparently he spits on Jake Gillenhalls ass... And now, now I'm not sure if the scene is real or not... Because I seem to remember it! And I'm just too afraid to go back and watch it again?... 

You don't see that in Making Love I tell you that much!

(by pelida77)

Ok if you are curious about what movies I've watched and which ones I've found to be the best, here's the list 

Dirty Dancing from the point of view of 2018

When you look at Dirty Dancing from the point of view of 2018

Now my intention is not to shit all over a 30 years old movie. Or is it? I feel like this movie always get a pass, because... the 80's right?

It's a teenager movie, meant for tweens. On a deeper level the dirty dancing is symbolic for sex (and in fact for anal sex. That's why is dirty: Takin' the old dirt trail, Spelunking... ) 

The scene of the late night party when all the staff employees are dancing, and she tries I mean, she... but she doesn't look sexy, like the rest of them! No! She dances like a moronic child. Then Patrick Swayze approaches her just out of pity, and teaches her about dance/sex. It's a pity fuck.    

Her time at Kellerman's that summer is a loss of innocence — and I am in fact talking about the loss of her virginity.

When we first meet Baby, she's like reading Plight of the Masses or something, and she's worried about underdeveloped world, southeast Asia starving children and Buddhist monks burning themselves in protest...

But after meeting Patrick Swayze - a.k.a the 80's-  all she cares about is that hot sweat body dancing at the rhythm of the dirty mambo!!!

From the first minute she sees him she's all wet for Johnny Castle - yeah that's his name - Johnny Castle!!!

Well... that's the message I get from the movie, it's an explanation on how Women are molded to be dumb in our society. 

We don't want you to be clever, We want you to dance bitch

You know, some people think this is like a Women empowerment movie or something. There's a bullshit article about that here 

I'm all for the women empowerment thing and I agree with the journalist, I don't know how people get this is an "ugly duckling gets the guy" movie, cause she's fucking hot to me!

Granted, blondie looks better, but hey: that bitch can't act!

So, yeah Baby is not ugly. Totally fuckable!

In fact she's on my mural of the top 80s actresses I want to fuck the most:

Ugly duck gets the guy is the plot of the remake "Dirty Dancing 2017"  ... Well I don't know about ugly, ugly is too strong of a word. Beauty and ugliness, like contact lenses, are in the eyes of the beholder...

Is Little Miss Sunshine girl, Abigail Bressing or something. 

(By the way she's bad. She's fucking bad; long gone are the days of her being a child prodigy, right?...) 

But the thing that really gets you is... Well I don't know how to say this without sounding like an asshole... Well I am an asshole, so:

She's Fat! 
(Oh come on! you though that too: Hungry Eeeeyes hahahaa)

I was surprise to see that in real life she looks kind of Hot! ya'know?

So, my only conclusion is that over the production of the film they made her gain quite a few pawns... they feed her with Nuggets, Doritos, mayonnaise and shit, down it all with pancakes syrup and butter...

Cause is that sort of overweight. Calculated: not disgusting Precious levels... I'd say above average Woman, slightly above chubby, but not that far off you wouldn't like her... They needed their female audience to identify with her. I call that genius.

Appealing to the Bridget Jones, My Greek Wedding audience or the Queen Latifa movie were an NBA super star bangs her?...

(Hey I'm not the one being a fat-phobic here, Hollywood is. Before writing this shit I didn't even know Fat-phobia was a thing.)

So yeah not ugly duck: Fatty Goose!!

So the entire movie becomes like a satire. You are always like: Oh my God they gonna make the lift?!!!

Anyway, back to the original, Baby becomes more and more stupid as the movie goes on. The result of sex I would assume...Yeah sex make us do fucked up things... There's a reason why Peter Abelard, the famous medieval Philosopher and Theologian, remained a chaste. 

At one point, I'm looking at her and just thinking... Why is she carrying a watermelon?!!! Ok she's taking it to the party,

It is something from the 80s? Did people ate watermelons at parties? (Did they spit the seeds on the floor too?) Why aren't they bringing like beer or cocaine, quaaludes or something. I don't get it. I don't get it. 

Ooooh I get it! the whole point is for her to say something really really stupid to Johnny the first time they met.

Her first words to him are the infamous: "I carried a watermelon"

(by the way her delivery here is just terrible)

Who though of that?!! It's so stupid that I'm even tempted to think that somebody actually gave it some though. It would work the same with beer, "I carried beers"

So yeah, she's more and more stupid. And the only reason why you would think she's smart or brave or special, is because Johnny Castle keeps saying it so... but he's human trash: Of course you gonna think being a doctor is the greatest shit ever! You are basically a male prostitute!

But she doesn't do anything special. She doesn't save the day! You just like to think she does cause she's now friends with the cool kids of the neighborhood. But Johnny's first reaction was the right one: Big deal! you got the money from daddy.

Hey Frances you didn't make the world better, the children are still starving out there, and Dhalai Lama is still exiled from LalaLand...

Who cares?! I am LOVED now! 

And there you have it, the best line in the movie, gets me every time:

- So What's wrong? 

- She's knocked up baby

Is just hilarious. 

And then baby asks: What's he gonna do about it?

And Johnny Castle gets offended!!!!! "Oh it's mine. Right away you think its mine"

Why he gets offended?!! I cannot understand that! You are the one dirtydancing Penny all over the place and the other guy is calling YOU, of course she's gonna think that is your baby you silly sonofabitch!

I mean, this is such a chick script! And that's always the problem with chick movies they make the guy assume the perspective of a chick: and then the guy is like saying chick things, like good old Johnny here. 

- For some reason I keep thinking of this guy:

But the movie is filled with these chick scenes... Some days later Penny talks to Baby and tells her, "I just want you to know that I don't sleep around... Whatever Robbie might have told you. And I though that he loved me. I though it was something special" 

(yeah, the Mustafa special)

Why you want Baby to know that? Why would she care? (I mean you know her from like what? Three days?) And isn't that something you say to the guys? 

Hey, you know, I'm not like that, I don't sleep around etc. etc. Is she hitting on her? Like I say, I don't get it...

And also, guys are pigs, they always gonna tell you that they love you, Penny!!!

Many great lines and scenes! When Penny is in pain after the abortion, Baby says to Neill Jones (Nick):

-I though you say he was a real M.D. (yeah like real M.D.s are gonna charge you $250 for an abortion. And she's clever why?

Because she reads books.)

And Nick's answer is just gold:

- The guy had a dirty knife and a folding table. I could hear her screaming in the hallway.

Like damn! This is the stuff nightmares are made of.

This movie prevented more abortions than Opus Dei's crazy people (...quite the redundant expression there)

And there's like a disgusting abortion towel!

I don't know how this got a PG-13. (Not only that, apparently it was edited like three times before it got approved... I wonder how was the assembly?) 

But then they fucked up the scene with Patrick Swayse comforting Penny and dropping his:

"It's all right...

And I'm just laughing hysterically, and feeling guilty cause my Oma, my 103 years old granny is here, watching the movie with me, and she's giving me the look now: "How can you laugh? The poor girl is about to diiie"

So now she thinks I'm some sort of a psychopath...And I could never explain her why I found that to be funny!!!

(Or why I'm masturbating while we are watching it)

And in any case. Why da fuck Lennie is in this movie?

Lennie should be cracking morbid jokes on a rape murder scene not here! Is just so out of place!

And I love Lennie, I do! But who though he'd be a great "good dad"? Nooo! Goddamit, Lenny has seen too much evil in this world of ours.

Why is he giving money to random people? Ok, Baby asked for it, and he didn't know it was for an abortion... but then he writes a check and give it to Robby for him to go to school or something; and he just met him! And he's not rich. Like, come on Lenny, you are just a doctor! You are in the resort on invitation, because you saved the owners life or something (that guy from Casino) 

And his final line. 

"I know it wasn't you the one who got Penny into trouble" 

Why are you calling her Penny? It should be "that girl" you just knew; it should be that bimbo that had an abortion with my money and then I had to save!!!

Well, at least they fixed everything with the final dance. Everyone's dancing, I guess everyone's happy?

I remind you that Johnny is still out of job (for all we know, probably end up in The House of Painters and Plasterers AND without his summer bonus) 

Penny can still have children, Which is great... I guess. But still believes every bum on the street telling her that they love her.

And what about Baby?

Well, she didn't cure cancer, I can tell you that much. 
Wait, Was that from the remake?

(by pelida77)

Top Ten 1947 American Movies (Part 2 of 2)

Ok, so... Here comes the second and final part of the definitive list of the best American Movies of 1947 (look in my previous post for number 10 to 6)... But first, I'd like to point out some things I've learned through the hard, painful - sometimes even perilous - journey (this is like my Golden Boy diary):

- The best job you can get is in a music store (Guys and Girls): selling LP's or something, and the guys usually know how to play piano, and they all sing with pretty voices (in their charm, they are quite annoying!)

- Is not a Noir unless you got a crooked woman. Rule number One. This could be: The Femme Fatale; The double edge lady (a moral character but hiding something or working two sides) or just plainly The Whore

- There's always a happy ending, and when there's not is always that kind of unhappiness that brings some sort of dignity to the characters, like they get a redemption through pain or something.

-  Rule Number 2! Is not a Noir, unless you got the Noir aesthetic. Let's call it Gothic! The shadows have meaning!

- Everybody smokes in the Classical Hollywood. As Nick Naylor well puts it "directors need to give their actors something to do while they're talking" Doctors give their patients cigarettes, parents let the Kids smoke, Old people smoke, pretty girls smoke, ugly chicks chew tobacco; if there's a fucking monkey in the movie they would make him puff.

- All Enterprise Studios movies are excellent

- At least once they say "Swell", or even multiple times, Guys and girls say it. "Was the coffee any good? Swell. How's the Missu? Swell. At that fancy party the girls sure were swell" (and then they light a cigarette, yeah smoking and swelling!)

-There's almost no horror movies in 1947 :(

- All these fuckers (actors/ crew) married and divorced at least 4 times.

- They never gonna make movies like these again, movies with heart, movies that looked and felt like movies.

5. Desert Fury (1947, Lewis Allen) Slightly Erotic Thriller / Film Noir 

Paula (Lizabeth Scott), the young daughter of casino owner Fritzy Haller (Mary Astor) fells for middle age gambler Eddie Bendix (Burt Lancaster)... Soon she finds he had some sort of involvement in the past with her own mother...

Is the most shocking movie I've found in 1947, because like I said is slightly erotic, but I should have said HOMO erotic... is not overtly gay, old people won't notice that's for sure... (I don't know how though? with lines like, Burt Lancasters: "I wanna feel all that Desert Fury in my ass...mmmm Swell")

From this year there's a well-known homo erotic mainstream short called Fireworks (1947, Kenneth Anger), very scandalous at the time (the director was put in jail. Shame on you and your ignorant communist round table witch hunt, senator McArthur!!!) 

But that movie was just a short, and a gigantic piece of experimental shit. This is a AAA produced by Hal Wallis (the man behind Casablanca), distributed by Paramount, shot in technicolor (Every frame of it, screams: Expensive!) and it's good!!!

It's a Noir Melodrama, but the love triangle here seems to be established between the girl and two boys... Wait that's what usually happens in a Noir... yeah well, here the boys are fucking each other!!! 

And if that's not enough there's something between the mother and the daughter too: holy shit!... In any case for many reasons is definitely a unique Film Noir.

Lewis Allen had like a great timing; this movie is so fast paced that feels like a 90's thriller, but with all the elegance of classic Hollywood (the photography by Charles Lang as always flawless, and the music by Miklós Rózsa... I mean what else do you want?)

4. Golden Earrings (1947, Mitchell Leisen) Romantic Spy: Marlene Deitrich, Ray Milland

A British colonel (Ray Milland) escapes from the Gestapo to the Black Forest (south-west Germany); here he'll find the help of a gypsy, Lydia (Marlene Deitrich), and end up posing as her gypsy mate. 

I think more people would mention this one on their lists of best classical movies ever, if it wasn't so politically incorrect... Cause this movie could be understood as sort of racist, sort of... Gypsy's are depicted as filthy, ignorant human beings; devoted to commit thievery and other hideous crimes... But at the same time there is a certain Cervantine quality to it (if you ever read La Gitanilla you know what I mean) Romani people here are a symbol of freedom, liberal kindness and unconditional friendship against oppressive states. And that's what our colonel Ray Milland discovers while posing as one. And Marlene Deitrich's Lydia is really good (I mean, could this woman act or what?) You LOVE her. You'll end up loving her so much: in her filthiness, with all the racist jokes... She's so cute! She'll warm your cold selfish heart.

3. The Ghost and Mrs Muir (1947, Joseph L. Mankiewicz) Romantic "sort of" / Gene Tierney, Rex Harrison, Natalie Wood MUS: Bernard Hermann

Young widow Lucy Muir (Gene Tierney) moves away with her daughter to a secluded seaside cottage. The ghost of the former owner, sea captain Daniel Gregg (Rex Harrison), is haunting the house, but Lucy gathers the courage to stand up to him, and then woman and ghost become friends. 

At first, you don't feel it... This is one of the very best movies I've watched. Because is so silly right? A Lady and a ghost fell in love, not only that: he's a sea captain, and a grumpy one, like: Graaaaaar!

But you end up feeling the wind in this movie, and the sea, and you end up loving both characters... and the one thing that makes all REALLY work: Bernand Hermann's score. Of course, he's a legend, but he's always remembered for the Hitchcock movies or Cape Fear, or The Twilight zone... but I honestly believe this is one of his best ever, you will forever remember the music in this movie, it will haunt you, and you'll long for it like a sailor needs the sea... (puns! puns!) The movie is simple, but the score just elevates it. You can listen to it, here:

Gene Tierney is just fantastic. She plays a single mom that has invested all her money on this seaside cottage, and then she discovers there's a ghost in the house! But you know what? Fuck you! I'm not allowed to be scared: I'm a single mom. So we're gonna stay here and fuck you if you don't like it ghost! 

And Rex Harrison is just... shocked! And amazed by this tiny woman.

  

I said is a romantic movie, but we don't have any romantic scenes, like kisses, or declarations of eternal love... everything is more subtle: like looks and smiles... But it's a tragic love really, cause they can't even let themselves fall in love. Not even that... I love this movie.

2. Nightmare Alley (1947, Edmund Goulding) Film Noir / Tyrone Power, Coleen Gray, Joan Blondell, Helen Walker / FOX

Traveling carnival Stan Carlisle (Tyrone Power) cheats his way to learn an ingenious "act" code that let him pretend to have mental powers. 

Not much to say, other than it's a great movie about the rise and fall of a con-man. A perfect example of a non detective noir, all the characters -except perhaps the accomplice played by Coleen Gray (but even her) are twisted and fucked... There's no morality, no fear of God, no nothing: there's no God in this world...

But the thing that really gives you the creeps in the film is... destiny similarities, the effect is just spell bounding: like a mirror house in a fair... And essentially this is a horror movie: Stan Carlisle is like one of the monsters from Freaks (1932) that escaped from the fair into the world.

  

(I'd love to see the uncensored version... Supposedly - like the things are said in myths - supposedly, originally there was a scene of the Geek actually biting the chicken's head off... like... Daaamn!)

And the Number One goes to...

1. Body and Soul (1947, Robert Rossen) Drama / John Garfield, Lili Palmer, Hazel Brooks, Anne Revere, William Conrad / The Enterprise Studios

Amateur boxer Charley Davis fights in order to save himself from poverty... but discovers that winning has cost him way more than he bargained for.

Old tale: a dream that becomes a nightmare or how success can corrupt a man's spirit. The irony when the attainment of our dreams brings out our perdition... It works, why fix it? 

There're many reasons why this is one the greatest boxing movies of all time and the very best of 1947, but I will only mention two: the Soul of this movie, which is, of course, John Garfield, one of the most talented actors of his generation in his best performance ever. This is the first in the Holy Trinity of Boxing movies, the other two being: On the Waterfront (1954, Elia Kazan) and Raging Bull (1980, Martin Scorsese); but I would argue that both Brando and De Niro took things from John Garfield's performance... Quite a bold statement... 

That's the soul. And the body of the film: the cinematographer James Wong Howe. Any movie made by this guy is worth to be watched, but here... you can feel all the freedom and the savagery of an experimental movie (It was an Enterprise Studios movie so...); the final fight sequence is just mind-blowing, the guy put himself on a fucking pair of skaters and shoot from below the ring... and the effect is just amazing!!!

Talking about the best DPs of all time people mention Greg Toland or John Alton, or whatever, but everyone forgets about Wong...

and this is probably his very best.

Well there you have it. One last thing, if you are curious Here is the list of the best one hundred 1947 movies, maybe you can find your favorite in it... maybe not... Anyway: God Bless Movies

(by pelida77)