Stuart Gordon’s Dreams in the Witch House

gordon_witchhouseThe Dreams in the Witch House has never been, for me, one of Lovecraft’s better stories, though more because it reads like a first draft, with no attempt to bring the story alive for the reader. Its main idea, that the dark powers of witchcraft can be linked with the then-cutting-edge mathematics of non-Euclidean geometry, is the bit that lingers in the memory (that and the creepy witch-familiar Brown Jenkin). Stuart Gordon’s adaptation updates the science (non-Euclidean geometry becomes String Theory — to which Brian Greene’s book, The Fabric of the Cosmos, is an excellent introduction), and of course can’t help but make the story more accessible in this, his contribution to the Masters of Horror series.

Gordon’s previous Lovecraft adaptations include ReanimatorFrom Beyond and Dagon (actually The Shadow Over Innsmouth). Although he could be described as the most faithful adaptor of Lovecraft’s work in terms of sticking to the events described in the text, he can’t exactly be said to be the most Lovecraftian in tone. You couldn’t, for instance, imagine him adapting The Colour Out Of Space, which is the real essence of Lovecraft’s bleak cosmic horror. But Gordon obviously has fun. The camp and humorous aspects of horror are never too far away, as he himself points out in the commentary for one scene where the protagonist wakes up to find himself in Arkham University’s Restricted Reading Room with a skin-bound copy of the Necronomicon on the table in front of him… in nothing but his underwear.

It’s interesting, actually, to see how the emphasis in a horror story changes when it’s adapted to film. Some ideas that read as horrific on the page (Brown Jenkin, a rat with a human face), come out as more humorous when actually seen. (Gordon’s Brown Jenkin works for me, but more in a dream-like than scary way.) Others, though, are suddenly more horrific. The aspect of child sacrifice comes across as pretty conventional in Lovecraft’s story, but here, where we actually get to see it, is almost unbearable. Gordon says, jokingly or not, that his wife threatened to divorce him because of this aspect of his 50-minute film, and I can quite believe it.

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Godzilla

godzillaI can’t remember why I put the original Japanese version of Godzilla on my Amazon list — it was a recommendation from either Ramsey Campbell or Mark Kermode — but I’m glad I got to see it. As ever with a cult film like this, you can think you know what it’s about without seeing it, but usually you’re wrong.

For instance, it’s generally accepted that Godzilla’s levelling of Tokyo is all about the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but what actually sparked the film off, and what resonates more with the plot, was an incident in March 1954, when the supposedly safe test of a 15-megaton bomb on Bikini Island resulted in a Japanese tuna-fishing boat being showered in radioactive dust (eventually killing one of the crew), as well as having a serious effect on the fishing industry, with whole shoals of fish being found to be highly radioactive. (There’s a contemporary 10-minute documentary about the incident on this BFI DVD.) The Japanese attitude to the bombs dropped during the war was along the lines of “let it stop with us”, and Godzilla is all about the unlooked-for effects of continued experimentation with A- and H-bombs rather than their initial use.

Compared to the US monster movies of the period, Godzilla presents a far darker and more thoughtful exploration of its themes. Of the two scientists in the film, Doctor Yamane (played by Takashi Shimura, direct from finishing Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai) represents the old world of science-for-science’s sake, and although this blinds him to the danger they’re in (he wants the monster to be studied, not killed), Shimura’s acting keeps you sympathetic with the role, as he goes around shellshocked and depressed by, but unable to face, the horror that has been unleashed. The younger Doctor Serizawa, meanwhile, has in his researches discovered how to create an Oxygen Destroyer — the perfect weapon to use against the amphibious Godzilla — but at first hides it away, afraid that once it is known about, it will be used on people next.

Despite Godzilla’s (apparent) death, the film ends on a gloomy note. As pointed out in the interesting commentary, Doctor Yamane’s final remark, that if atomic testing continues there could well be more Godzillas, would be interpreted nowadays as simply leaving the door ajar for a sequel, but at the time was meant seriously as the film’s warning of very real dangers to come should the world continue to play with such powerful but little-understood forces.

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The Arctic Monkeys — Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not

arcticmonkeys_wpsiatwinI avoided paying any attention to the Arctic Monkeys at first because of all the media hype. No sooner had the Kaiser Chiefs come along than everyone was looking for the next big thing, and they were all saying it was the Arctic Monkeys. But after I’d heard their single When The Sun Goes Down a few times and liked the fact it actually seemed to have lyrics, and some good guitar playing, I thought I’d give their album a go. I’m really glad I did.

Every so often I find myself wondering if there can ever be anything new in music. The history of the sort of music I’m into is the result of a series of nuclear reactions as different cultures and technologies collide, fusing into something new. The Blues had a baby and they named it Rock’n’Roll. But surely there’s a limit to all this? The world’s only got so many oppressed minorities whose authentic forms of musical expression we can absorb into the workings of the Great Western Pop Machine. (Good name for a band, that.)

Now, the Arctic Monkeys aren’t anything new, really. They play rock. (Or Alternative & Punk as iTunes would have it, but I always change that to Rock, which is what it is.) But they’re fresh and vital. They’re doing things their own way. This is particularly noticeable in the lyrics, which are about the world as they see it, not some regurgitation of the standard pop cliches. There’s a real feeling of breaking out against the old order, particularly in Fake Tales of San Francisco and Perhaps Vampires Is A Bit Strong But… (They have great song titles, too). Basically, they come across as a band with a strong belief in what they do, and it’s only when you hear it that you realise how rare something like that is, even among the big successes of the industry

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