Norman's grab bag

It's depressing to be suffering from this writer's block after only a few entries. The blog form certainly lends itself to a certain mundanity and casualness (what former pop star Jewel refers to as "casualty" in her poetry), but I've never been good at small talk. (Have I told you about all the rain in "sunny" California?) Maybe it's the diary-like intimacy that gives me jitters. (I mean "journal." Journal.) But I don't want my blog to suffer some form of crib death, so I thought I'd check in and share some of my inchoate ideas and failed attempts. Please let me know whether I should move from simple neglect to active infanticide and kill the blog I've sired. (I'm not quitting, but I am given to melodramatic gestures.) Without further ado, here's what's been gestating:

1. Slither review: Last weekend I saw the sci-fi horror comedy Slither, which was written and directed by James Gunn, director of the well-received 2004 remake of George Romero's zombie classic Dawn of the Dead. Of special interest to me, naturally, were Slither's zombies, classical, slow-moving, individually manageable but collectively deadly hordes that represent a welcome development away from the sprinting undead of Mr. Gunn's Dawn. This development alone, however, is not enough. The knowing (practically winking) attempts to mine the outlandishly horrific situations for their comic possibilities keep the audience at arm's length and drain the scenes of much of their power to frighten and disturb. I don't know if this broad, goofy humor reflects any lingering shame surrounding the (formerly?) disreputable horror genre and serves as a hedge of irony against any disapproval an earnest, fully committed approach might face. As a horror fan, I await something truly scary. That being said, Slither had a few good moments and one particularly exciting sequence involving a teenage girl's encounter with a merciless (and darkly funny!) gauntlet of horrors. And I was disheartened to read in today's Hollywood Reporter that, for industry execs, the upshot of Slither's disappointing opening-weekend grosses is that, in the words of one "insider" at Universal, the film's distributor, "there is no audience for horror-comedies." That's too bad, for a well-crafted horror comedy, like any genre hybrid, can be very effective. The overall implications for such blending and for horror in general remain to be seen.
2. Quality-of-life kvetching: I can't stand people who don't wait for you to disembark before barging into the elevator, subway car, etc. But what plagues me even more profoundly is the blindingly high wattage of the headlights of apparently every car or truck manufactured in the last 5 years or so. SUVs, with their eye-level lamps, are the most egregious offender in this regard (not to mention several others). Are these people lighting a path or completely irradiating it? I wonder what I look like from the perspective of these oncoming drivers. Do they see a little skeleton shielding his eye sockets? I don't believe in Hell, but I could design it: A crowded elevator I can't escape, lit on all sides by state-of-the-art beams from Japan/Germany/Detroit.
3. The long shadow of M: I saw M (1931) last Saturday, and as with Metropolis, I am in awe of Fritz Lang's vision and mastery of narrative and technique. In this film credited with giving birth to both the serial-killer movie and the modern procedural, Peter Lorre's child murderer is haunting, particularly when facing a novel form and process of "justice." Lang's even-handed depiction of the killer, his crimes, the hysteria surrounding them and the mob mentality that seizes an entire city is chilling, breathtaking and always timely. It is a testament to Lang's powers that he can, without diminishing the acute suffering such a predator wreaks, critique the society in which he prowls. (I went to see M a few short hours after seeing Slither. One of the reasons I abandoned a comprehensive assessment of Slither was that, before I could record my fresh impressions of it, M had wiped it almost entirely from my mind. Lack of recall and comparisons that would be unfair to almost any movie conspired to poison the review, making it unduly negative.) M had been paired on a double bill with another masterpiece of German Expressionism, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1919). The themes and style of Expressionism, with its then-lurid preoccupations and creeping shadows, were a precursor to and critical influence upon two personal favorites: early Hollywood horror, particularly the Universal classics, and film noir, the subgenre/style closely associated with the studio films Lang directed after fleeing his homeland in the wake of the Nazis' ascension to power. (His wife, staying behind, opted to join the Party.)
4. Lost fan fiction: It has come to light that, in addition to Ana Lucia and the other "tailies," a small band of stewardesses (NOT flight attendants) on Oceanic Flight 815 separately crash-landed on an idyllic yet mysterious area of the island. In keeping with the enormous tease the show has become, this blog will bring you up to date, filling you in on their story up to now, a tale of survival, sexual exploration and madness! (Never let it be said that this blog doesn't pander to the lowest common denominator and its basest instincts.) Now it can be told!
5. Today's fortune: Nothing is impossible to a willing heart. (Not knowing what this means, I won't disagree.) Lucky numbers: 3, 14, 18, 33, 34, 37.