Mob Blog

rating: highs and lows
directors: Brewer, Tarantino, Fulci, Carpenter
in theaters and at home

I've been watching a fair amount lately - maybe less than usual - but intermittently and from all over. Partly, I think, to make people who are far away seem closer, and some for writing purposes. The site could use a change, but I don't have the wherewithal to implement my vague aesthetic scenarios; bear with me.

Black Snake Moan is terrible, both by parts and in full. I like Pulp Fiction more than ever; the movie is a tactile satisfaction for the part of the brain that registers hunger and a slow release on days that feel otherwise crowded and frazzled. One of my favorites. I'd never realized that Rolling Thunder had a hand in Anchor Bay's The Beyond release; here, the sensation is decay much more than shock: the decrepitude in old homes and bad memories.

And trying to articulate my love for cinematographer Dean Cundey, it might be best to call attention to the way that Big Trouble in Little China feels less like a fun house than a living, haunted maze, where rooms turn back on each other but gather dust, fill with light and then dark water, and still allow rest in corner kitchens beside windows, near bowls of food and half full bottles of beer. An early tracking shot especially - where Jack and Wang flee a street fight only to emerge (seemingly elsewhere) with the clatter and flash of combat still in progress on the far end of the alley - is nothing short of visionary.