Today, Callie posted on the Bust blog about the TV movie version of Alice in Wonderland which, like her, I remember loving as a child-- but also being a bit freaked out by. In fact, I think the scary aspect helped heighten my intrigue.
This reminded me of another movie in that category: RETURN TO OZ
Oh yeah. That's a little Fairuza Balk as Dorothy!
This came out in 1985 (as did Alice in Wonderland!), and is something of a sequel to the The Wizard of Oz (starring Judy Garland, of course). It's actually based on the novels "The Land of Oz" and "Ozma of Oz" which were the second and third books in the Oz series begun by L.Frank Baum. There were fourteen in all! This one has a much darker spin from the beginning in comparison to its predecessor starting with when Dorothy is taken to a mental hospital by Aunt Em to treat her insomnia and for the crazy stories she tells about the Land of Oz! The doctor in the hospital is said to work miracles with electricity AKA gives SHOCK TREATMENTS! Dorothy escapes with the help of a mysterious girl who helps her back to Oz. Unfortunately Oz has become a terrible place due to the Gnome King's rule and she must rescue all her friends, and save Oz!
By the movies that I liked as I kid, I think I was just destined to do drugs. There was no way around it. Watch the movie in its entirety HERE, you'll see what I mean.
When I was a kid, one of my dad's favorite movies was The Rocky Horror Picture Show. This may sound odd for a Southern middle class business man, but hey-- everybody has their guilty pleasures, I suppose.
The cast included Tim Curry, Barry Bostwick, Susan Sarandon, and Meat Loaf who all went on to very promising performing careers, but I often wondered about the rest of the cast. I knew Richard O'Brien, who played Riff Raff and wrote the musical, went on to write and perform in sequal stinker, Shock Treatment. The only returning cast members happened to be his good friend Patricia Quinn who played Magenta, and "The Lips" in the opening credits (See above), and Little Nell Campbell who played Columbia. Little Nell has proved to be the most interesting to me as I've traced her career.
After Rocky Horror, Nell tried her hand at a singing career where she had a moderately popular single in Britain called "Do the Swim", and then went back to acting. She was a groupie in Pink Floyd's The Wall (although I doubt you'd be able to spot her), and starred in several of Derek Jarman's movies-- most notably Jubilee.
From the mid-80's to 1998, she owned 3 nightclubs in New York City, most famously Nell's (oft mentioned in Bret Easton Ellis' American Psycho), and known for turning away A-list celebrities for fun. You may recognize the lounge in The Notorious B.I.G.'s video "Big Poppa", because not only did he frequent the place, but he shot the video here. After being reincarnated as A through C list celeb hangout NA, Nell's Nightclub became The Plumm in 2006, another club trying on the exclusive vibe, but I'm pretty sure the space has has already had its hay day.
Hopefully there will only be a few more frigid weeks to winter, but no matter the weather I always tend to constantly be wrapped in a blanket when couch-potatoing in front of the tube anyway. Rather than opting for the couch potato's BFF, the SNUGGIE (Gross!), I stick with an old quilt made by my mom's aunt.
I've always loved old quilts and the stories they tell. Women used to make them from rags and ragged clothing to keep their family's warm when they had no other choices. They were also made from the clothes of different family members and gifted to new babies as memory items.
I have one hanging above my bed given to me by my mother, and sewn by an unknown person in my family. This one was just made as a decoration:
Recently, I ran across Julie Floersch's sculptural quilts, and found them to be really intriguing and beautiful. Her work truly makes you appreciate the art of the needle. You may experience her work for yourself and all its tessallated goodness at Jan and Aya in Greenpoint, Brooklyn until March 1st.
Remember the movie, How to Make an American Quilt starring Winona Ryder (pre-klepto days)? They were making a wedding quilt in that one.
OOOOH BONUS TRIVIA: A group of people making a quilt is called a quilter's bee!
BIG LOVE season premiere january 18 9pm I have been waiting for this for what seems like a DECADE! I've even resorted to watching the old episodes On-Demand. In fact, HBO is offering three 2 minute sneak peaks of the new season for those who can't wait till next week! The sporadic seasons of Big Love might be blamed on last year's writer's strike, but I'm not certain. With the wide spacing of the seasons, I get freaked out with all the kids on the show, because suddenly they've all aged so drastically. When the first season ended Ben, the eldest son was a soft-faced little boy, by the time Season 2 began, he returned 2 feet taller, and totally makeoutable! Margene's babies went from newborn to about 10, okay 2, and she herself went from fat to anorexic. By next season, I won't be surprised if Sarah, the eldest daughter is 35, with 5 or 6 of her own kids running around!
Ah! I love this show. The drama, the score, the characters. Can't wait!
GOSSIP GIRL The season premiere was totally disappointing and boring, but I'll still watch it, and hope it gets juicier. Mmm, incest (It's not really though, right? They share a half sibling, but that doesn't make them related. It will just make for um, awkward family reunions. Yeah.)
ROCK OF LOVE BUS Honestly, the premiere of this show made me nauseous. I will still watch it though, as I am sort of desperate.
REAL WORLD BROOKLYN See above-- AND I went to Trash Bar to see a friend of a friend play one night. About 10 people were there, but apparently, they had been taping in there earlier for this show. I'll always find guilty pleasure in TV shows, movies, and books set in NYC so I can pick out the places I recognize. (i.e. The Real Housewives of New York, Gossip Girl, Sex and the City, Woody Allen movies, Rom-Coms, Cactus Flower, The Great Gatsby, American Psycho, and of course, Breakfast at Tiffany's)
MAD MEN Does anyone know when this premieres?! Last I heard there have been no new scripts written!! If this show ends and more trashy reality shows replace it, I might lose faith in the media all together. Last season didn't start till last July, so I'm not too worried yet.
HBO Presents GREY GARDENS april 2009 I am also extremely psyched to see HBO's presentation of Grey Garden's in which Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange take on the roles of Little Edie and Big Edie, respectively. The film will not just be a reenactment of the documentary, but will delve deeper into the pasts of the women, and what brought them to the house that came to be Grey Gardens. I noticed much negative commentary over the choice of Barrymore for the part, but the makeup on her in the scenes shot inside the house is exquisite, and she truly embodies the part. As far as her acting chops go: She has done a lot of fluffy films, but her skills truly do ring out in films such as Woody Allen's, Everyone Says I Love You-- Lest we forget, she IS a Barrymore!
RIP Paul Newman You will forever live on in my bedroom atop this fabulous pillowcase (Scored on Ebay for 6 bucks!), and in my salads.
Here's a screen test from Paul's early years, alongside James Dean:
With that, we shall review a bunch of songs about blue eyes to remember the azure pools that were his.
REM- Pale Blue Eyes (Really Awesome Cover! Live in Passaic 1984)
Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band- Her Eyes Were a Blue Million Miles (Big Lebowski fans?)
Elvis Presley- Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain (Another version by Charley Pride: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmVEMMnAQvo Willie Nelson also does a great job too, but duh. It's Willie Nelson.)
The Black Crowes- Bad Luck Blue Eyes Goodbye (This song comes on my iPOD shuffle about every 3 songs. It's really weird.)
Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young- Suite: Judy Blue Eyes (Live at Woodstock)
Stray Cats- Baby Blue Eyes (Where did Brian Setzer disappear now? Oh, he reunited these dudes for a "Farewell" to Australia--and to his pride-- tour, of course!)
The Blue Comets- Blue Eyes (Although it's all in Japanese, so who knows if that's what they're saying? Cool song anyway. Organ organ organ!)
Timmy Curran- Blue Eyes (This guy was a pro-surfer and just released an album. I actually kind of like this cheesy folky song, although he has a new souped up heavily produced version that's even cheesier with a video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkrAZI92Oxo)
Bullet- White Lies, Blue Eyes (This is the kind of shit you start finding once you dive into a wormhole on Youtube.)
Steve Lawrence- Pretty Blue Eyes (This guy is like a white Sam Cooke-- sort of.)
Lastly, here is an amazing tribute video someone made to figure skater Evgeni Plushenko (Yeah, no clue who he is either.) to The Who's 'Behind Blue Eyes'.
I did it. I went and saw The Strangers last night. As a lover of gore films, I can't say I wasn't disappointed from the lack thereof, but a slasher film can be good without it. I'd actually say this is more of a suspense flick, rather than horror, as it wasn't as utterly terrifying as I was hearing. The spookiest element of the film is the afterthought that no matter how safe you think your home is, if someone wants to come in (to harm, to steal, whatever), they probably can and will. I learned that first hand a long time ago though, when a guy let himself into my apartment while everyone was sleeping and yanked my computer and D-SLR camera. Jerk.
I will add that I had an unsettling dream last night about a girl who was having fluid pumped into her brain by her parents and doctors, so that her brain was turning to mush, while she lay there screaming, "WAIT! I'M STILL ALIVE!!!" I dunno if that was a result of the movie or if I'm just demented. Little o' this, a little o' that most likely.
Anyway, so I decided to create a list of horror movies about people being chased that were wayyyy scarier than this:
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre- The origination of the Leatherface character, and one of the first slasher films. This film and character has been highly influential in the film genre (i.e. Scarecrow in The Strangers, Rob Zombie's flicks, Silence of the Lambs, Michael Myers in Halloween, Jason in Friday the 13th, etc.) Trivia: Leatherface was inspired by serial killer, Ed Gein who also wore the skin of his victims.
Shutter(Original)- I could not get to sleep for two nights after watching this-- mostly because I had a major shoulder/neck ache, which is very much a part of the ending of this movie. WATCH IT! (I can't believe they made an American version of this. Most American remakes of Asian films are total suck in comparison to the originals.)
It- I never read the book, but I was terrified of this when the mini-series came on when I was a kid. I had a fear of clowns like the character in the movie, so a movie about a supernatural evil clown was sure to give me nightmares!
The Hills Have Eyes- Great because it's gory.
House of 1000 Corpses- Another good, dirty gorefest! I love Rob Zombie's movies. The commercials in Grindhouse were awesome too. Pseudo-celeb dish: I met his wife once (Baby Butterfly in the movie.) She's kind of a total ditz, and was staying at Nicholas Cage's apartment. I imagine Mr. Cage to be a weirdo too.
The Decent- One of the best American horror films in the past couple years. Chicks being chased by monsters in the dark in claustrophobia-inducing spaces equals sado-masochistic paradise!
Suspiria- Ballet and witches. I'm in! This was Dario Argento's first installment to what he calls his "Three Mothers Trilogy", and I am insanely excited about the third and final movie coming out THIS FRIDAY, Mother of Tears!
I know there are a ton more, because The Strangers just wasn't that scary. I still liked it though, and it startled me a time or five.
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