The AFI Silver theater went on a month-long Aussie exploitation binge, and I was there. Also, here’s a teaser for the forthcoming Drive-In Super Monster-Rama update and something extra-Halloweeny just for the hell of it:
Fear in the Night (1972), in which Hammer Film Production taunts us with suggestions of all the pseudo-giallo movies they never actually made…
Long Weekend (1977), in which taking a wilderness camping trip together is exactly the wrong way to fix your ailing marriage, even if Mother Nature isn’t out to get you…
Patrick (1978), in which a three-year coma is no obstacle to a psychotic psychokinetic…
Road Games (1981), in which there has to be a better way of occupying oneself on a cross-country drive than throwing down with hitchhiker-stalking serial killer…
Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983), in which it isn’t just the kids running away to join the circus…
and…
Turkey Shoot (1981), in which nobody really expects neo-fascist re-education camps to do any re-educating, anyway.
#1 by supersonic man on October 29, 2013 - 3:34 am
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I don’t think it’s all that rare for screenwriters to qualify as auteurs. Schrader, Mamet, Kaufman…
#2 by Jen S on October 29, 2013 - 5:51 pm
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I have a whole bunch of Aussie flicks to add to my Netflix queue…
Also, sorry, sorry, I’m about to be That Girl, but in the Long Weekend review–shouldn’t it be “flammable” underbrush? Inflammable means he could toss all the lit cigarette butts he liked into it without problem.
#3 by El Santo on October 29, 2013 - 8:10 pm
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“Inflammable means he could toss all the lit cigarette butts he liked into it without problem.”
Check your dictionary. It seems like it should mean that given the way that “in-” prefix usually works, but it actually doesn’t.
#4 by Jen S on October 30, 2013 - 9:46 pm
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Gahhh. Stupid English language can kiss my inbutt.
#5 by lyzard on November 1, 2013 - 10:38 pm
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[Nick Riviera] “Inflammable means flammable!? What a language!”[/Nick Riviera]
#6 by Alaric on October 30, 2013 - 2:50 am
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Despite what it seems like, “flammable” and “inflammable” are actually synonyms. The “in-” prefix in “inflammable” is etymologically NOT the same as the “in-” prefix in, say, “insane”.
#7 by The Rev. on October 31, 2013 - 2:53 am
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Yay, now I don’t have to be the pedantic English snob! Hee!
God, I haven’t seen Something Wicked… in ages. I had read the book first and remember being impressed with it; even at that age I knew to be wary of book vs. movie differences. It sounds like it’ll hold up better than The Black Hole did for me.
First, though, I really need to find those Aussie films. Plus Razorback, since I have shamefully still not seen more than a tiny fraction of it. Although I should really try and work through my eternally backlogged DVR…or check those movies I bought dirt cheap and see if they’re worth trying to inflict on people I love, or people at T-Fest…
I need to start playing the lottery so I can win it and finally have time for all these movies.
#8 by El Santo on October 31, 2013 - 2:09 pm
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“I need to start playing the lottery so I can win it and finally have time for all these movies.”
Oh, I know! It’s even worse when you feel compelled to write about damn near everything you watch…
#9 by Blake on November 1, 2013 - 12:21 pm
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Yeah, this year I’ve been purchasing films at a higher rate than I have time to watch them, plus I have films in my collection that I feel the need to re-watch once a while in order to justify their purchase, without mentioning any random movie that happens to catch my attention. Too much to watch.
#10 by lyzard on November 1, 2013 - 10:42 pm
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Worse again is when you stop watching because you can’t find the time to write… 🙁
#11 by The Rev. on November 2, 2013 - 4:57 am
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I can imagine; I have enough trouble with my compulsion to write-up the movie festivals I attend for Ken.
I’d be happy to write movie reviews if I had the time for it. I didn’t even have time to do one for the BMMB after I saw Ghost Shark back whenever it premiered, and I really had a bit to say about it.
And we’re all the poorer for it, my dear.
#12 by lyzard on November 1, 2013 - 10:40 pm
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Hey, remember when *I* started working my way through Australian genre films!?
No? Don’t blame you. Sigh.
(As you know I have an excuse for everything, and my excuse for neglecting that little side-project is that Wake In Fright was next on the agenda and Santo beat me to it.)
#13 by Read MacGuirtose on December 5, 2013 - 3:32 am
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Commenting very late because, as so often happens, I kind of neglected to check the B-Masters site for a while after it’s gone a week or so without an update, and when I do finally check back much later I find that there have been loads of updates while I was away… gah… (This is not intended as a comment on the site’s erratic update frequency; more a comment on my own bad timing, or something.)
Anyway, I just wanted to say you are, of course, completely correct about the screenwriter usually having very little say about the movie, but I just wish people were more generally aware of that. I currently have a single screenwriting credit on the IMDb, for a movie currently listed as “in development” (as far as I know, they’re still looking for funding). I was paid to write the screenplay, based on a concept and summary provided, and have nothing to do with the movie beyond that. Yet I’ve received inquiries by three or four different composers offering their services scoring “my” movie. Of course, since the movie hasn’t even started production yet, it’s way too early for anyone to be worrying about the scoring yet, but even that aside, I have no idea why so many wannabe film-scorers seem to think the writer, of all people, has any say in hiring a composer. The fact that it’s been almost all composers contacting me (I did receive an inquiry by one equally misguided actor) makes me think there must be some film scoring class somewhere where a teacher with no idea what he’s talking about is actually advising his students to find in-development movies on the IMDb and contact the writer… it’s hard for me to believe that so many composers would have come up with such a stunningly stupid idea on their own.
#14 by Read MacGuirtose on December 5, 2013 - 3:35 am
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(As an additional bit of irony, I’m actually also a composer who sort of has some aspirations to get into film scoring, so if I did have any say in hiring a composer to score the movie, I wouldn’t be choosing any of the composers contacting me anyway — I’d want to do it myself!)