Monthly Archives: October 2019

New Achievement Unlocked

The road to publication of my first novel has been long, twisty, and full of detours that sent back to square one but the destination has finally come into sight.

It has been an interesting experience as I proceed into new and unknown territory with phase of the publication. Submitted books and stories is something I have become quite familiar with but when the contract arrive for the novel that was new, particularly since I was navigating those waters sans agent. Then there was working with my editor. I must say that Don has been great, between his comments and the insights from Imogene the copyeditor I not only improved Vulcan’s Forge  I also learned things about my own writing style and hopefully have improved.

For the last two weeks I have been carefully reviewing the galleys for Vulcan’s Forge, scouring the PDFs for mistakes, typos, and the like. (And I must report that there have been very few. I adore the layout and look of the text. This is one of the principal reasons I sought traditional publishing there are far too many critical skills that are best performed by others.)

This morning I popped over the Flame tree Press’ website and saw that their Spring 2020 catalog was posted and there on page 28 was my book.

I was not ready for the emotional experience. There is a vast gulf between thinking about a thing and seeing that actual thing come into reality. It’s an excitement I have looked forward to and now it makes my fingers tremble and my heart flutter.

There can only be one ‘first time’ and I am so happy to share mine with Flame Tree.

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Midsommar: The Director Cut

While I saw the theatrical cut of this year’s Midsommar  twice during its release I unfortunately missed the brief run of the film’s director’s cut. At nearly three hours and combined with it quite limited time in theaters I simply never managed to clear my schedule enough to make room for the feature. Now it has been released on home video, the longer cut available exclusively from Apple, and I can give my opinion on it versus the original version.

Director’s cuts of things are not always a blessing. The example that best comes to mind at this moment is the musical Little Shop of Horrors. The director’s cut has an extended sequence at the end where the plants have grown to monstrous size and are kaiju  stomping about the world’s cities eliminating humanity. However by this point ALL of the major characters are dead and there is no emotional tie for the audience making for a dull, plodding, and ultimately boring end to the movie/ The theatrical version is far superior.

Gladly this is not the case with Midsommar. Writer/Director Ari Aster has mostly expanded scenes in this version, carrying various sequences a bit further and greatly expanding the depth of his characters and illuminating more of their natures. There is one wholly new sequence, another ritual by the Swedish cult that follows in the evening of the day after the visitors have witnessed the horrifying attestupa. This evening sequence along with a further dissolution of Dani and Christian’s relationship further isolates the non-cult members and gives Dani’s character a moment to shine as the brightest among the visitors.

Midsommar’s  director’s cut is a deep careful exploration of the themes and wholly satisfying. I can say without reservation that it is my deeply preferred version of Aster’s vision.

 

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Streaming Review: Twins of Evil (1971)

One of the things that my sweetie-wife and I enjoy is British horror films, particularly of the Hammer variety and Shudder has a few offerings in that vein including the later period Hammer movie Twins of Evil.

Hammer horror films, iconic color movie that made stars out of Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee started in 1958, though the studio had been well established before that, and pretty much ended production with To The Devil A Daughter  in 1976 so Twins of Evil  represents the dying gasps of the once great horror house.

The movie stars Mary and Madeleine Collinson as twin sister Frieda and Maria, recently orphaned and now sent from their home in Vienna to live with their stern Uncle Gustav (Peter Cushing), a devote man who  leads The Brotherhood a collection of men that hunts and burns suspected witches attempting to purge the area of a festering evil. The two sisters chafe under their unyielding uncle and each becomes enamored with local men, Maria with the rationally minded and atheistic Teacher Anton and Frieda with the decadent Count Karnstein, who, under the protection of the Emperor, publicly flaunts his wickedness.

Cushing is his usual professional and talent self, convincingly playing a man so devoted to his singular vision of virtue that he is untroubled by the frequent execution of young women without even the flimsiest evidence of witchcraft. The rest of the cast vary from competent working actors to Damien Thomas chewing the scenery as Karnstein and ended on the Collinson twins who were most likely cast by Hammer to take advantage of the status of Playboy  centerfolds.

The pacing of the movie is off, starting, despite the repeated instance of women being burned at the stake, out quite slow but once the film reaches the second half and vampirism appears in the plot the film moves quite deftly towards its somewhat uneven conclusion.

Production is overall well done with interesting set and well designed costuming but the movie does suffer from some of the worst day for night shots every committed to film. Lengthy forest sequences set in the dead of night are clearly shot in bright sunlight with the characters appearing quite ridiculous as they hold up their torches for illumination.

With some violence, an explicit beheading, and brief nudity this movie will not be to everyone’s taste but I appreciate that Shudder  presented the feature unedited. Twins of Evil  is far from Hammer’s best horror film but it also far from their worst and there are worst ways to spend 90 minutes.

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Time Off

My day job involves helping complete enrollments for Medicare Advantage member for a large non-profit HMO and that means our busy period is just about to being as the Annual open enrollment period starts today. In anticipation of the hours to come I took Friday and Monday off from last week and this week giving myself a 4-day weekend. I didn’t go out and do anything special. No trips out of town, no shows, just a longer than usual weekend with one role-playing game sandwiched in the middle on Saturday.

That game is a Space Opera  game with the original rules published by FGU back in the distant past of 1980. One of the players and a dear friend for decades hosting the group of us at his office allowing the players and myself as game master, to be as loud as we wish since at that time of the day and week there is no one to disturb. It’s been a real blast revisiting this game system I haven’t run in ages and everyone appears to be having a great time. Even if every mission the players are dispatched on doesn’t quite turn out the way that they hoped.

I had also planned this weekend to finally see It: Chapter Two  at nearly three hours its running time makes it a very difficult film to schedule during my usual week. Sadly Sunday afternoon I started with a minor migraine and canceled my seat reservation. By the evening I was not disabled from the pain but distracted enough that I would have not enjoyed the film.

At least I was feeling fine Sunday morning so my sweetie-wife and I could enjoy our customary Sunday trip to the Zoo and lunch out together. Pictures to follow soon.

All in all it was a pleasant long weekend and now I am reading and refreshed to get back to work at my day job and complete reviewing the galley’s for Vulcan’s Forge  coming out in March of 2020.

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Movie Review: Joker

There has been a lot of buzz surrounding the film Joker, there has been talk of awards and Oscars, there has been praise and adoration as well as criticism and sharp commented dislikes. With an open and mind and trying to set aside all expectations and since I had today off from the day-job I attended a late screening.

Joker  is a possible origin story for the iconic nemesis of that caped crusader Batman. I say possible because the cannon for the comic book character stretches back many decades and as with all comic book histories that ancient it is filled with revisions, reboots, and flat out contradictions in the character’s backstory.

Joaquin Phoenix plays Arthur Fleck a troubled young man living with his mother in the decaying crime infested city of Gotham during the turbulent 1980s. Arthur makes his living as a clown, working promoting dying businesses as they hoist one final sale and providing mediocre entertainment to children in hospitals. Suffering from an unnamed neurological disorder that causes uncontrollable fits of laughter whenever Arthur is emotionally stressed Arthur dreams of success as a comic, living out detailed delusions of what he life might be as his mother sends endless letters to Thomas Wayne lost in her own delusions. As economic, physical, and mental stress takes their toll of Arthur his losses the frail support network he barely possesses and soon confronts terrible truths about himself and truth of his life. Caught between fantasy and reality and unable to tell the two apart he loses his identity and discovers a new one.

My opinion on this film is somewhere between the two extremes that are common on the Internet; the film is interesting and had a decidedly pointed theme it is trying to express. This film is a commentary on the result of a society that ignores the under-privileged, the unreal world of the wealthy and the pressures that explode from that dangerous combination. Yet this film is also flawed. Nearly all of the film is from Arthur’s point of view and that is on point, it is his story we are experiencing, and yet there are sequences where the story steps away from Arthur solely for the purpose and nudging the audience in the side with reminders that this take place in DC’s continuity. These excursion weaken the story, undercut the theme and serve no purpose but fan service. This film also felt like it didn’t quite know how it wanted to end. Twice before it actually ended the director services up visions that would have made for a powerful final image, only to continue the film with unrequired wrap-up.

Some of the criticism I have read and heard about this film I think say more about the critics than the film. Much like Star Wars: The Last Jedi  it seems a number of people came into their screenings with preconceived notions of the film and its subject matter and those pre-judgments formed the core of their critique, however unlike The Last Jedi  these critics hail from the liberal side of the political spectrum and betray their biases just as much of the right’s criticism betrayed theirs.

Over all this film was well made and interesting, a little editing would improve it punch, but it achieves neither the heights or the lows so many are ascribing to it.

 

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Does Gemini Man Herald the End of Acting?

In a recent article over at VOX an author expressed the fear that the near perfect digital recreation of an actor’s younger version is merely the camel’s nose in the tent that will lead to the replacement of actors with entirely digital creations. This is not a new concern and formed the one central question in Connie Willis’ novel Remake and then as now I do not foresee that as a concern for the near future.

Acting is not just walking from mark to mark and parroting the words from the script. If it were there would be a far large number of great actors entertaining us and it would not b so plainly evident when a talented actor was simply ‘phoning in’ their performance. Acting is an art and like all art is requires a conscious creative act. There are numerous choices an actor makes in their performance that go far beyond simply repeating the words.  There will not fully digital actors entire there are self-aware computers capable of making those emotional choices.

A second often expressed fear is that there will be endless films using recreations of stars that have passed and while there will the occasional use of a dead actor to recreate a famous role, for example Peter Cushing’s double in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story  it will never become a vehicle for a star powered film. Firstly there is still the creative aspect that will fail to double the original actor’s unique vision but more importantly is that younger generations will never simply adopt their parent’s stars. Even an eternally young John Wayne would not have continued to be the massive star of his earlier days as the country and culture changed around him.

Change is coming but actors are not about be wholly replaced by bits and bytes.

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Choice versus Ability: What RPGs Can Teach Us About Writing

The other day I listened to the episode of the podcast Scriptnotes  where the two hosts, Craig and John played the role-playing game Fiasco  with a fellow writer and it sparked some thoughts about story telling and how characters become compelling. John and Craig in addition to being successful screenwriters, show runner, novelists, and playwrights, are role-play gamers notably playing Dungeons and Dragons  the wellspring of all role-play gaming today so listening to them play Fiasco  a game that is entirely focused on storytelling with only extremely limited mechanics intrigued me, especially since I had thoroughly enjoyed the episode of the web series Tabletop  where I first learned of Fiasco.

In Dungeons and Dragons  characters have a well defined set of abilities, usually derived from a ‘class’ that defines the character profession, thief, wizard, warrior, and so one but in Fiasco  the only thing that defines a character is their relationships to the other characters of the game. There are not statistics for physical or mental abilities, no rule set for determining if a gunshot hits a target or misses, in short characters have no defined abilities whatsoever. A Fiasco character is defined by their choices and in fiction writing it is the same.

In fiction a character’s attempt at any action is not random determine by lucky or unlucky dice rolls but success is predetermined by the author compelled by the needs of the text. The character’s abilities are there to allow the possibility of success at any particular action but not to drive that action. What makes a character compelling is the choices that they make. If you can remove the character from the action and replace them with another person with a similar skill set and nothing changes then it is likely that your character is not very compelling. It is the choice that defines the character, it is in agonizing dilemmas where there are no good choices that forces a character to grow and confront their own true nature.  From quiet dramas such as The Remains of the Day  and Mr. Stevens choice to not speak up and tell Miss Kensington how he really feels to special effects spectaculars such as Captain America: Civil War  where Steve has to decide to confess to Tony Star the truth that he had kept secret the truth of Stark’s parents’ murder it is the choice that a character that makes them empathetic.

Abilities can be switched out, anyone can be an expert of some skill ort knowledge but only this particular person with this particular background and experience can be tortured with a specific choice and there you will find the compelling character.

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Streaming Review: The Corpse of Anna Fritz

Premiering in 2015 at the South X Southwest  festival The Corpse of Anna Fritz  is a Spanish Language thriller/horror film about  morgue attendant Pau (Albert Carbo) who finds himself alone with the body of a young and extremely popular actor Anna Fritz (Alba Ribas.) Pau texts photos of Anna’s corpse to his friends Ivan (Cristian Valencia) and Javi (Bernat Saumell) who join Pau in the morgue to ogle the actor’s corpse. Being men of low character and with their inhibitions eradicated by cocaine the word of the day becomes necrophilia. A bad and immoral idea turns disastrous when Anna awakens from her unexplained comatose state and the three young men are faced with the serious criminal charges but lack the moral fortitude to do anything approaching what is right.

Anna Fritz is a horror film that presents no supernatural elements existing in the continuum of thriller and thrillers turns on their characters and their acting. This film does an admirable job at both of these factors. The young men with their limited intellect and obsession with partying are sadly not outside of the bounds of reality and their divergent reactions to Anna’s living state drive the dramatic conflict at the heart of their relationship. Alba Ribas as Anna is phenomenal, her character at times is paralyzed leaving the actor with only her eyes to express her terror and shock and she is terrific at it. The most empathetic character in the small film Alba’s Anna is the emotional heart that beats the movie’s lifeblood of tension.

With a brief running time of just 74 minutes Anna Fritz  does not overstay it welcome, moving directly into the tense plot and telling its story with economy.  Currently streaming on Shudder  Anna Fritz  is not a film to everyone’s tastes but it successfully captures the terror, tension and idiocy of its character without devolving, despite prominent nudity, into titillation with the real horror always centered in Anna’s experiences.

 

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Movie Review: Ad Astra

In Ad Astra  Brad Pitt plays Roy McBride an astronaut whose father, Clifford McBride also a revered astronaut, vanished on a mission beyond Neptune in the outer solar system to survey extra-solar planets for signs of intelligent life. Sudden intense burst of gamma radiation from outer solar system now threaten human on Earth, the Moon, and Mars, burst of radiation that appear to be coming from Clifford’s list mission. Roy is dispatched to send a message to his father and hopefully end the threat the humanity.

Sharing some thematic elements with Conrad’s Heart of Darkness  this film is a slow mediation on the shadows they live within the human spirit and the dangerous of isolation and disconnection that can happen even when we are surrounded by people. However while those are the themes of the screenplay, and the film is filled with talented veteran actors Ad Astra  fails to fully engage on a character level leaving the audience to experience repeated long sequences of Brad Pitt stealing Ryan Gosling’s thunder of staring expressionless in the middle distance.

Now, I love good slow cinema. The Remains of the Day  a film about one man’s repressed emotions set in the sedate world of less English nobility is one of my favorites but Ad Astra  fails to find the character at the center of the story and never forces the character to engage in a meaningful choice. A much better science-fiction film on these same themes and also with a careful slow pacing is the US version of Solaris. These films are possible but ad Astra  simply isn’t it.

The science in Ad Astra  is bad, but I have come to expect that from Hollywood science-fiction but without a good character story to catch the viewer that allows the bad science to become that much more noticeable.

The film is tonally inconsistent. It tries to balance quiet character contemplation with scenes of intense action and fails at both. There are two major set pieces of action that simply have no story reason for existing: a sequence with lunar pirates and an unmotivated attack on Roy McBride as he transits between lunar locales and a rescue mission to space station that apparently orbits between Earth and Mars solely for animal research.

All in all Ad Astra  was a dull plodding affair that thought is had much more profound things to say than it really did.

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Streaming Review: Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History of Friday The 13th

I love a good documentary and that is only amplified if it is a documentary about films or filmmaking. After all two Christmases ago my sweetie-wife got for me the 13 hours documentary The Story of Film  and I was thrilled. So discovering that the streaming services Shudder  is offering the massive 6 hour and 40 minute Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History of Friday the 13th  was exciting news.

Crystal Lake Memories  covers every installment in the successful franchise from the first film in 1980 through the most recent re-boot and including the 90s television series and the monster match-up movie Freddy vs. Jason.

Each installment gets it’s own chapter in the documentary, part of the reason why it is so massive in its extended running time, with cast and crew interviews and a history of the writing and production decisions surrounding the films. This makes it very easy to watch the documentary over several viewing. Full disclosure I am not the most engaged fan of this franchise. I have not seen every entry; I did enjoy the series though it had nothing to do with the main storyline of Jason and killed campers. I still enjoyed this documentary quite a bit and for people who are fans this is a rare glimpse into the decisions that shaped the franchise and why some of the most controversial calls were made in the manner they were.

Shudder  has become one of my favorite streaming services and gives in my opinion fantastic value for the low monthly cost.

 

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