Location Location Location...

A supplement to yesterday's post about Chernobyl, I wanted to mention Jacob Kirkegaard's 2008 album 4 Rooms, which provided the soundtrack (among others) to my reading of Serhii Plokhy's book Chernobyl: The History of a Nuclear Catastrophe. The Lustmord/Robert Rich album Stalker was also pressed into service over the course of the book, but Kirkegaard's album offered a more profound resonance by the fact that it was recorded within the Zone of Exclusion. Taking inspiration from Alvin Lucier's 1970 sound work I Am Sitting In a Room, Kirkegaard traveled to Ukraine in October 2005 and selected four spaces within the Zone - four abandoned rooms that were once busy meeting places for the people of Pripyat before the nuclear disaster. In each of the 4 rooms - a church, an auditorium, a swimming pool, and a gymnasium, Kirkegaard set up his recording equipment to capture 10 minutes of silence. Upon returning to each of the rooms, Kirkegaard played the recordings back within the space, repeating the procedure a further 10 times to produce a set of dense, layered drones. Using some subtle post-production effects Kirkegaard has given each of the four lonely places a remarkable sonic personality, the overtones infused with spectral echoes and reverberations, and in the case of the recording captured at the gymnasium, a shrill metallic timbre which seems entirely keeping with the curious phenomena of visitors to the Zone experiencing a metallic taste when breathing the air of the radioactive environment. The following pictures were taken by Jacob Kirkegaard during the recording sessions.

Church

Auditorium

Swimming Pool

Gymnasium

Catastrophe / катастрофа

I've just finished reading Serhii Plokhy's excellent 2018 book Chernobyl: The History of a Nuclear Catastrophe, and watching some remarkable footage this morning of the liquidators - the brave civil and military personnel tasked with cleaning up the radioactive debris ejected from the stricken reactor 4. Looking at pictures of taken from within Chernobyl’s Zone of Exclusion, the discarded, disintegrating military vehicles; abandoned residential blocks being slowly reclaimed by the wilderness, my thoughts are inevitably drawn to Tarkovsky’s film Stalker and the eerie way the film anticipates life after the aftermath of the Chernobyl disaster. As per the film, the photographers who took these pictures may well have sneaked into the Zone (strict permission is required to pass thru the military checkpoints), and perhaps a guide or a stalker was required to lead them around pockets of radiation - apparently the poisonous radioactive dust that coats the Zone is more prevalent on foliage than asphalt roads. Something else to reflect on was the high number of crew members, including Tarkovsky, who developed cancer in the ensuing years – most probably from working in the poisonous ruins of the Estonian power station where Stalker was filmed. Seeing the film nowadays I can’t help but wince when I see the actors wading thru pools of dirty water (think of the famous shot of Alexander Kaidanovsky dozing in the stream), or negotiating their way thru spaces filthy with toxic dust. Perhaps one can draw a parallel between the Chernobyl liquidators and the Stalker crew - both groups heroically struggling in the face of adversity to complete their missions; the liquidators working to limit the environmental damage, and the Stalker crew battling to get Tarkovsky's film made after the catastrophic loss of the first draft of the film...

The World that summer....

Spotted over at the Internet Archive, Dark Side #20 - May 1992, or more specifically, the Video Nasties issue. I've mentioned this hallowed issue a few times on this blog, and yet I cannot stress enough the importance of this sacred text in this 15-yr old's film-watching life - before it came out, I had scarcely heard of Cannibal Holocaust or Last House on the Left, and then suddenly it was as if a wall had come down to reveal a completely different view. I remember well that glorious summer of '92, spending countless afternoons in darkened video shops hunting down the more tantalizing titles. As primers go, the Nasties feature is strictly entry level stuff - if you've landed on this page with little or no clue about the United Kingdom's Video Nasty phenomena, it's a decent enough whistle stop tour thru the Director of Public Prosecutions' hit list, but there are better studies out there - Davids Kerekes and Slater's 2000 book See No Evil: Banned Films and Video Controversy remains the definitive word on the subject. For more seasoned viewers, the Dark Side's roundup is worth reading as a vintage piece. Perhaps the prickly tone of many of the reviews was down to the reviewers having to contend with aging, fuzzy VHS copies (and fuzzy memories no doubt) - some 25 years later, with the advent of DVD and Blu-Ray, we've come to better appreciate the charms of Don't Go Near the Park and Snuff Worth noting too the idiosyncratic selection process - minor list entries like The Funhouse and Dead & Buried are awarded full-length reviews while more significant titles like Blood Feast and Fight For Your Life and relegated to a few remarks in an addendum section.

But that's not all. Elsewhere in this issue of The Dark Side is a terrific David Cronenberg interview, discussing his latest film Naked Lunch (which was lambasted in a later issue when it premiered on video), and it's followed by a Cronenberg filmography with some typically fascinating commentary by the director - mostly culled from Faber's Cronenberg on Cronenberg book it must be said: (On Scanners: "I was exploding heads like any other young, normal North American boy") Before I close, be sure to check out the excellent selection of books and fanzines the uploader has generously shared

Trailer insanity

Some ballyhoo from the trailer of the seedy 1968 Peter Cushing Horror, Corruption. Single guys are advised to check local listings... I'm currently watching, or rather cherry-picking my way thru Synapse's inaugural 42 Street Forever trailer comp, and the clip from Corruption always stands out for its fish-eye lens shots of a frenzied Cushing. I've often wondered what it must have been like to see a picture like Maniac at the Lyric Theatre on 42nd Street, when Times Square was at its most dangerous ("Maniac ! It will tear the life out of you!" warns the trailer's voicover.)

Meanwhile, the perennial favourite of trailer comps, I Dismember Mama / The Blood Spattered Bride trailer, is surely the most irritating promo in the annals of Exploitation Cinema. Watching the trailer just now I noticed that The Blood Spattered Bride title has undergone a subtle tweaking for the marquee seen in the master shot of the theatre, here playing as the The Blood Splattered Bride. My initial thought was that the film's Stateside distributor Europix Interational put it out as The Blood Splattered Bride, but the title card and poster art all have it as Spattered, so it looks like this snafu was confined to the trailer !

In somewhat related matters, earlier in the week I stumbled across this pic Kim Newman posted on his FB page, a snapshot of the Eros Cinema, Picadilly London during its grindhouse heyday. I'm carbon dating this picture to 1984 when Conquest was first released in the UK on a double bill with Forbidden World. It's always a pleasure to see grindhouse marquees at full swing, being from a younger generation, I sometimes find it hard to believe that something like Conquest (fond as I am of this underrated Lucio Fulci fantasy) actually played in a theatre, but here's the proof. And to get back on topic, notice that the marquee painter got the film taglines mixed up ! More pictures of the Eros can be enjoyed here. Incidentally, look out for the Eros Cinema's cameo in American Werewolf In London doubling as the porno theatre showing the faux-blue movie See You Next Wednesday 

Frank Doubleday (1945-2018)

Frank Doubleday as the sinister emissary Romero in Escape From New York... I chanced upon this scene in John Carpenter's film last night, (broadcast on the Syfy channel and looking horizontally squeezed to the point of being unwatchable), and I had to wonder if Carpenter had based Romero's striking look on Klaus Kinski ? I haven't listened to the film's commentary track in over 10 years but I don't recall it being mentioned. And I see a certain resemblance to Captain Howdy too, not to mention a certain similarity to Brad Dourif's character Piter De Vries (another emissary of sorts) in Dune, made a few years later. Rather than post a traditional still of the scene I found this beautiful piece of fan art, originally posted here

I generally don't do obituaries on this blog, but a few days ago I learned that actor Frank Doubleday had passed away on the 3rd of March, so I'd like to use this post to mark his passing. Doubleday worked primarily in television, with few substantial film credits to his name, but thanks to John Carpenter, he has achieved a certain immortality - if his scene in Escape from New York is one of the more memorable moments in the film, Doubleday landed an equally if not more striking scene in Assault on Precinct 13, playing the Street Thunder gang member who shoots Kim Richards' 12-year old Kathy at point blank range - a wanton killing that still shocks today...

In Case You Didn’t Feel Like Showing Up

The news of Barbara Bush passing away at the grand old age of 92 has me listening to Ministry’s 1990 live album In Case You Didn’t Feel Like Showing Up this morning – the connection being that the former first lady had the dubious honor of being included in Al Jourgensen’s infamous roll call at the conclusion of a particularly savage rendition of Stigmata. I’m listening to the expanded edition of the album released last year as the 2-disc Live Necronomicon, and it sounds fantastic, a more faithful document of the original performance without edits or added overdubs. If the new edition can claim to be definitive, I still think the original album, even with its post-production adjustments remains a powerhouse of incendiary post-Industrial rock, and it’s worth keeping if only for the artwork – a pity Ministry didn’t retain it, opting instead for what seems like a meaningless tip of the hat to The Evil Dead’s Book of the Dead, but then again the band have always indulged in appalling artwork. Regrettable too that the release of Live Necronomicon didn’t prompt a DVD upgrade for the In Case You Didn’t Feel Like Showing Up VHS tape, an extraordinary film of the Indiana show, augmented with a battery of psychedelic effects, different film stocks and speeds, hyper cutting, and layered with all sorts of found footage and surreal imagery, pre-dating Natural Born Killers by some 14 years. Thankfully it’s available on youtube

Boyz n the Hood

Ice Cube spirals in ever decreasing circles in Boyz n the Hood, John Singleton's brilliant 1991 debut, which I revisited last night... I recently finished Jeff Chang's 2005 book Can't Stop Won't Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation, a sweeping chronicle that begins in the dilapidated third world neighborhoods of the South Bronx in the early 70's and concludes some 20 years later in the smoking embers of the Los Angeles riots. Originally I had wanted to follow up Chang's book with a screening of Dennis Hoppers' Colors, but after learning something about life in LA's gang neighborhoods (and the brutal tactics practiced by the LAPD) Boyz n the Hood felt like a more appropriate choice. I seem to revisit Singleton's film at various epochs of my life, and with the advancing years, Boyz n the Hood assumes greater significance - now that I'm a parent, the struggles of Laurence Fishburne's Furious to keep his son beyond the reach of crack and guns resonate more profoundly with me than ever before. All the more remarkable that John Singleton was just 24 when he wrote and directed the picture. I'm reminded of the early 90's when the South Central region of Los Angeles became the quintessential inner city-hell destination for the armchair tourist, with the tide of films and records that emerged in the wake of Boyz n the Hood - films like South Central, Menace II Society, Friday and albums like Straight Outta Compton, AmeriKKKa's Most Wanted, and O.G. Original Gangster all helped shape a mythology, and a stereotype that I myself have bought into - I remember driving along one of the main arteries in Los Angeles a few years ago and seeing a slip-road for Crenshaw District, I felt momentarily anxious, that a wrong turn would end in disaster for myself and my rental car. I don’t think the good people of Crenshaw would appreciate such typecasting…

Face to Face with Derek Jarman

Derek Jarman is never far from my thoughts these days, the forthcoming BFI box will surely be, for me at least, the home cinema event of 2018. The BFI box has been delayed by a week so I’ve been trawling thru youtube for Derek Jarman related videos, and found the excellent BBC Face to Face interview Jarman recorded in 1993 before his death in February the following year. The 40min interview feels very much like a last will and testament, and sees Jarman looking back over his life in his usual erudite, and indeed honest fashion – interviewer Jeremy Issacs is perhaps a tad too preoccupied with Jarman’s sexuality at times, but Jarman discusses it and other related matters (being HIV+) with typical good cheer…

In related matters... I've been revisiting the 1995 Eno/Wobble collaboration Spinner this morning, and while it's one of Eno's better albums from an era which saw him slide increasingly into mediocrity. Despite Jah Wobble's fine contributions to the album I can't help but think of it as the poor cousin of Eno's magnificent soundtrack for Derek Jarman's final film Glitterbug, which Spinner is salvaged from (I use the word salvaged because Eno has expressed a certain indifference for the soundtrack). In fact the best stuff from Spinner is when Jah Wobble leaves the Glitterbug music alone (as in the gorgeous Garden Recalled). I'm hoping Glitterbug will be included in the BFI's second Jarman box (Artificial Eye's 2007 DVD of Blue/Glitterbug has gone OOP  clearing the way for the BFI), and it would be nice to see an optional subtitle where the various Super8 footage is annotated, similar to the original Arena screening back in 1994. I mention this because I shared a few comments recently on Facebook with the team lead on the Jarman-BFI box and requested this. One can hope !

Audiodrome

"Max, I would like you to try this on for size"... Listening this morning to Howard Shore's soundtrack for Videodrome, and quite an extraordinary 30-odd minutes of New Flesh it is too. The soundtrack contains all the music from Videodrome but augmented with additional electronic effects and processing. One might even call it an early example of remixing and reconstruction, which seems very appropriate to Videodrome's theme of mutation and "reprogramming". It's a surprisingly abrasive suite of music too, with torrents of electronic noise sometimes overwhelming Shore's central Videodrome theme music, and anticipates glitch music by a good decade - the opening few minutes of the soundtrack could easily be mistaken for an Autechre track as layers of sound squelch, squiggle and ricochet off one another to dizzying effect. Meshing with the cold, mechanical textures are Shores's beautiful use of strings, which remind me of Goreki's Symphony No. 3, as they soar into the upper register (and put to excellent use in the film's final sequence when Max Renn embraces "total transformation"). Incidentally, the album sleeve credits Alan Howarth for engineering duties, forging a link between Videodrome and the great electronic soundtracks of Escape From New York, Halloween II, Halloween III: Season of the Witch...

Celebrating the Greater Sex

I'm marking International Women's Day today in the company of four extraordinary, inspirational woman from my record collection...