A Pair of Corpses

Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things (1972)
directed by Bob Clark
rating: 4 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from Netflix

If I'm a little late on the Bob Clark obit, it's because A Christmas Story isn't a movie I even remember all that well. But if every director made his name on low-budget horror as goofy, enthusiastic, and effective as "Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things" (what a title!), I'd be inclined to be kind at their passing, forgetting an unbelievably swishy pair of homosexual stereotypes to remember an even gayer, entertainingly devious ringleader at a nicely localized (an old island off city-lights Miami) theatrical resurrection of ghouls.

Blissfully Yours (2002)
directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul
rating: 2 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from Netflix

Mysterious Object at Noon works because enjoying it doesn't necessarily depend on the director's intentions (and I know I didn't like it until I heard the director's intentions, but another day, another opinion). "Blissfully Yours" doesn't, because as much as I appreciate how Weerasethakul vocalizes his thought processes, the end result in this case simply doesn't stand on its own. I don't think it's an issue of patience with oblique character revelations, because normally I'd approach a movie that makes sunlight and the sense of touch so tactile like a cup of hot coffee meets pie. Maybe a too obstinate strangeness parading as emotional revelation, maybe me just bored.