Horror in the Woods: The Long Weekend

We screened this flick at the MOA to mixed reviews, but I love this movie. You want to know why? I'll tell ya:

Never in the history of film has there been a more satisfying death on screen: There's a bit in the documentary Not Quite Hollywood where Quentin Tarantino expresses exactly how I feel about the couple in this film: this movie's two goals are to introduce you to this couple, and to make you cheer their inevitable death. And boy do you cheer!

The horror elements actually come from all of nature: Many horror movies that utilize nature in their horror elements do so in the form of a single scene (like Evil Dead), or focus on one element of nature (like Frogs, or the Birds). This movie actually makes all of nature the stalker-killer, eliminating overly complicated exposition or redundant kills. The viewer is never sure what's going to happen, and that gives the film a layer of creepiness that can only come from your imagination.

One flaw [slight SPOILER]: The topic of abortion is somewhat ambiguously introduced, implying that nature has made it's mind up about these two because of their choice. But over all these characters are horrible enough to justify their ends, without adding any elements of "but she also had an abortion". (Honestly the couple terminating a pregnancy is about the only redeeming thing they do because they absolutely should not have brought children into the world together.) There is room to interpret this element as just another layer of how absolutely divided they are on every front, but other devices could have been used to illustrate that without leaving room for viewers to pin their demise on her having an abortion.

We really like this one: Maybe it's because both of us have worked customer service type jobs most of our lives, but something about this one scratches an itch we didn't know we had.

Second Clue: August's Mystery Movie

Clue #2: The director of this month's movie also directed a film that ended up a classic MST3K episode later in the series!

 >>>THIS MONTH'S SHOW WILL BE AT DIFFERENT LOCATION!! Read on to find out more!<<<<

>>>>THE TRYLON IS IN THE MIDST OF A REMODEL SO OUR SHOW IS TEMPORARILY ON THE ROAD!!! Come check us out this month at the community room in the Carleton Artist Lofts! <<<<

Tape Freaks Presents: August's Mystery Movie at the Carleton Artist Lofts community room, Wednesday, August 2nd @ 7:00pm. Suggested donation $5

Horror in the Woods: Friday the 13th

It's a controversial opinion, but the first Friday will always be my favorite. You want to know why? I'll tell ya:

Everyone is playing true to age. There are no 40 year olds playing teenagers in this movie, just a bunch of people in their early 20s playing characters roughly the same age.

It's basically a who-done-it murder mystery with gory kills. A couple times this film utilizes the classic murder mystery setup of POV killer murdering people who know the killer personally, but also someone who the audience is never introduced to, so not only do you get the spear through the fucking neck style never-saw-that-coming kills, you also get the "oh, it's you, what are you doing here" kills! Best of both worlds.

It's a slow burn with a substantial on screen body count. There's lots of atmospheric stalking and misdirect-style character building, interspersed with people getting axed to the head.

[Spoilers, skip the rest of this write-up if you've not seen the movie.]

It's kind of the horror movie version of an old joke. There's an old joke that goes something like this: A father and son are in a car crash. The father is killed instantly but the son is rushed to the hospital for emergency surgery. As the boy is wheeled into the operating room, the surgeon exclaims, “I can’t operate—that boy is my son!” The punch line? The surgeon is the boy's mother. Lots of people break themselves in half trying to figure that simple joke out, and it says a lot about people's gender bias. The revel of the killer's identity at the end of this film doesn't necessarily speak to the audience's bias (see the who-done-it point above) but it does make you think back and wonder if you missed clues because you'd never considered the killer could be female.

There's no supernatural element. In the later installments of this franchise there's consistent supernatural elements bringing Jason back to life, but in this one it's just a lady who wants the camp to stay empty. You don't have to suspend much disbelief to get on board!

First Clue: August's Mystery Movie

Clue #1: The theme for this month's screening is Horror in the Woods!

 >>>THIS MONTH'S SHOW WILL BE AT THE CARLETON AGAIN!! Read on to find out more!<<<<

>>>>THE TRYLON IS IN THE MIDST OF A REMODEL SO OUR SHOW IS TEMPORARILY ON THE ROAD!!! Come check us out this month at the community room in the Carleton Artist Lofts! <<<<

Tape Freaks Presents: August's Mystery Movie at the Carleton Artist Lofts community room, Wednesday August 2nd @ 7:00pm. Suggested donation $5

Third Clue: July's Mystery Movie

Clue #3: The team that composed the music for this month's movie also did the music for one of the mystery movies we screened last summer. (I also inadvertently picked up a soundtrack by the same team while I was visiting NYC last week!)

 >>>>THIS MONTH'S SHOW WILL BE ON A THURSDAY AT A NEW LOCATION!! Read on to find out more!<<<<

>>>>THE TRYLON IS IN THE MIDST OF A REMODEL SO OUR SHOW IS TEMPORARILY ON THE ROAD!!! Come check us out this month at the community room in the Carleton Artist Lofts! The space is nothing special, until we deck it the f-out!! We're going all out this month, you seriously do not want to miss this air-conditioned beach bash!<<<<

Tape Freaks Presents: July's Mystery Movie at the Carleton Artist Lofts community room, Thursday, July 6th @ 7:00pm. Suggested donation $5

July's Mystery Movie Screening

In addition to being on the road and on a Thursday, here are a few other things you should know about this month's screening:

• Parking is kind of a pain: Parking in the lot without a resident permit will get you towed by Rapid Towing (and Rapid is not to be tested) so if you drive you're limited to street parking. Park on Charles Ave, Hamden Ave, Lasalle St ~or~ take the light rail, the 16/87/63K/67 bus, bike, or walk. But whatever you do, do not park in the Carleton lot.
• The Carleton Artist Lofts are right off the Green Line: You can literally walk off the Raymond Station platform into the Carleton building! Take the train (or bus) and save the hassle of finding parking.
• This is a bring your own snack kind of situation: We might have some popcorn, sugary cold snacks, and water on hand, but if you want anything else you're gonna have to bring it. (Feel free to bring stuff to keep to yourself, or to share with the group!) 

Those are the main things to be aware of, the only other thing we can think of is that the chair situation is abundant, but very no-frill. So if you have a favorite traveling chair (like our favorite lounge chairs to bring to the drive-in), feel free to bring those. 

Can't wait to see you Thursday!!!

Just a tiny taste of how extra we're gonna be this month.

Second Clue: July's Mystery Movie

Clue #2: The director of this month's movie also directed a bunch of notable Italian knock off movies, including multiple Mad Max clones.

 >>>>THIS MONTH'S SHOW WILL BE ON A THURSDAY AT A NEW LOCATION!! Read on to find out more!<<<<

>>>>THE TRYLON IS IN THE MIDST OF A REMODEL SO OUR SHOW IS TEMPORARILY ON THE ROAD!!! Come check us out this month at the community room in the Carleton Artist Lofts! The space is nothing special, until we deck it the f-out!! We're going all out this month, you seriously do not want to miss this air-conditioned beach bash!<<<<

Tape Freaks Presents: July's Mystery Movie at the Carleton Artist Lofts community room, Thursday, July 6th @ 7:00pm. Suggested donation $5

Aquatic Horror: Jaws

So much has been said about this horror game changer, but not all of that has been true.

The opening scene: Many times I've heard people tell the story of how the woman in the opening scene was being yanked by grips under water to create this effect. The story goes that she was pulled so hard that they pulled her shoulder out of socket, resulting in the realistic screaming and panic she portrays in this scene.

Not even close: Not only is that story false, it completely erases how a) this was a well thought out stunt put together by an experienced stunt team and b) the stunt woman in the scene designed the stunt expressly to keep her from drowning at the hands of confused crew people. But don't take my word for it, start watching the behind the scenes video below at the 20 min mark and hear it from the woman herself:

Why is that a problem?: Stories like these remove agency from the actors on screen. If we write these performances off as reactions rather than honed skill, we're implying that those people aren't capable of being skilled in these areas. That's pretty messed up. 

Not the only example of this kind of thing: The instance that got me thinking about the possible false narrative of that Jaws scene was the story of Will Smith on an infamous episode of the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Many times I'd seen that this was just an accidental breakdown on Smith's part while recalling his own father leaving him when he was a kid. But that's not true either. According to a well sourced and epic take down of that lie by a tumblr user (that I cannot find now of course) that features this Uproxx article, Smith's father was nothing like his character's father. Smith was actually using unrelated personal experiences to inform his character's emotional response in that scene, just like every other actor on the planet does.

Question everything: The next time you hear a behind-the-scenes story about a particularly real scene in a movie, tv show, or the like that credits the realness/rawness to something other than talent, dig a bit and see what you come up with. And shut those lies down if you turn up that it's false!