Blu-Ray Review: V/H/S

By Less Lee Moore

V/H/S is possibly the first found-footage horror anthology, two styles of filmmaking that are loved as much as they are hated. Found footage films are, without a doubt, one of the biggest cultural trends of the last decade and as such, can go either very well or horribly awry. Anthologies are another risky venture for horror films as inevitably there will be one or two segments which don’t measure up to the rest, thus rendering the entire project grievously flawed. These issues do plague V/H/S to a certain extent, but as an experimental indie horror film, it’s still a success.

The wraparound story of V/H/S (“Tape 56,” written by Simon Barrett, directed by Adam Wingard) is certainly creepy, but still off putting in the way it posits the main characters as disgusting losers. Our introduction to them is footage of their restraining a woman in a parking garage and filming her naked breasts as they pull off her shirt and later, trashing the hell out of an abandoned house. They do this for money but we get the idea that they’d probably do it for free, too. We next learn they’ve been hired to break into a house and steal one VHS tape, having been told “you’ll know it when you see it.” This makes sense within the context of the wraparound segment, but it doesn’t endear us to them one bit. In fact, I found myself pretty repulsed by the intro and wondered if I could even make it through the rest of the film.

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Ancient Traditions: A Krampus Primer

By Less Lee Moore

Image from Krampus.com,
courtesy of Monte Beauchamp’s
Krampus: The Devil of Christmas

You might have the word “Krampus” around the Internet lately and wondered what it meant. It’s something I only discovered last December and have always meant to investigate further. Luckily, dear readers, you can now benefit from my research into this ancient tradition!

Wikipedia has a brief, but helpful description: “Krampus is a beast-like creature from the folklore of Alpine countries thought to punish bad children during the Christmas season, in contrast with Saint Nicholas, who rewards nice ones with gifts. Krampus is said to capture particularly naughty children in his sack and carry them away to his lair.”

This sounds absolutely amazing to me. The website Krampus.com has an even more detailed and frankly disturbing description which details that the creature is “the dark companion of St. Nicholas” and often depicted as a devil-like beast with “horns, cloven hooves, and a monstrous tongue.” Not only does Krampus punish bad children, he also “swat[s] them with switches and rusty chains before dragging them in baskets to a fiery place below.” This actually reminds me of the demon figure in Insidious, which, Darth Maul jokes aside, scared the crap out of me for months.

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Assemblog: December 7, 2012

Despite The Gods

New this week on Popshifter: Danny is not very fond of the film 360, out now on home video; Chelsea is over the moon about the new Big Dipper album, Big Dipper Crashes on the Platinum Planet (and shares their new video for “Robert Pollard”); Lisa voices unpopular opinions about It’s A Wonderful Life; Cait raves about the new white vinyl 7″ from Concrete Blonde; I express admiration and frustration for Take This Waltz; and Elizabeth talks about Community, Disney, Netflix & Verizon in a new installment of “TV Is Dead, Long Live TV.”

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TV Is Dead, Long Live TV: December 7, 2012

By Elizabeth Keathley

In his keynote speech to the XOXO Festival this past September, Dan Harmon, creator of Community, had this to say about the death of television:

“You don’t want to monetize the Internet. You’re having fun right now because it can’t be monetized. You’re getting away with murder on the Internet. You’re doing wonderful Rodenberry-ish things on the Internet because it has eschewed money and all the crappy people are back on TV wasting everyone’s time while Rome burns to the ground.”

I disagree with Harmon about several things he said in this speech, but I’ll start with the money thing because it’s so easy to disprove.

Dan Harmon created a great television show, but now says TV is dead.
A video of his speech is at the end of this article.

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New Vinyl: Concrete Blonde, “Rosalie” b/w “I Know The Ghost”

By Cait Brennan

From their circa-1980 Dream 6 post-punk bona fides to their genre defining alternative rock gems like “God Is A Bullet,” “Joey,” “Ghost of a Texas Ladies Man,” and “Everybody Knows,” Concrete Blonde has made an enduring career of mixing the sacred and the profane, the earthy and the unearthly, a mosaic assembled in light and blood. Now 30 years into a truly iconoclastic career, singer/songwriter/bassist/artist Johnette Napolitano makes her home deep in the Mojave desert, and the ghosts of Joshua Tree haunt all seven inches of the group’s eminently cool new white vinyl spinner “Rosalie” b/w “I Know The Ghost.”

The limited edition 45 was originally pressed for the band’s 2011 Texas Halloween tour, and now a handful of the records are available at the band’s Official Website.

“She wraps herself in firelight, and dances in the sand like a ghost,” Napolitano sings on “Rosalie,” all low and mournful like a lost coyote. It’s a great country-infused old west tune, the kind you’d spin at midnight on Dia De Los Muertos. The flip side, “I Know The Ghost,” is a rave-up that hearkens to the band’s punk roots, buzzing with the kind of Madame Wong’s energy that only authentic survivors of the era could conjure.

Both tunes feature founding Concrete Blonde guitarist Jim Mankey (ex-Sparks, and himself a Joshua Tree resident) and drummer Gabriel Ramirez-Quezada, one of the brothers in LA rock en español standouts Maria Fatal and a ten year veteran of Concrete Blonde. The disc was recorded at Stagg Street Studios in Van Nuys with the band’s rock-steady engineer Anne Catalino. Videos for each of the songs are in the works.

The band is about to launch an East Coast tour, kicking off at Boston’s Sinclair Music Hall on Dec. 12 and heading to NYC’s Irving Plaza (12/13), Asbury Park’s Stone Pony (12/14), Washington DC’s 9:30 Club (12/17), Carrboro, NC’s Cat’s Cradle (12/18), Atlanta’s Variety Playhouse (12/19), Chicago’s Park West (12/21) and Minneapolis’ Variety Theatre (12/22). The band will also perform on WXPN Philadelphia’s “World Café Live” radio show on December 15.

One of the most unique and enduring bands of the alternative rock era, Concrete Blonde is still getting it done with passion and fire. These “songs of the spirits of the desert” are a welcome reminder of the band’s strength and Napolitano’s singular voice.

New Video: Big Dipper, “Robert Pollard”

By Chelsea Spear

There’s no one way to age gracefully while simultaneously rocking out. Just ask Big Dipper.

The perennially underrated purveyors of jangly pop returned to the limelight with Big Dipper Crashes on the Platinum Planet, an album of richly melodic and wryly funny pop songs. How do they balance their lives as rock stars with maintaining desk jobs, parental duties, and other attendant responsibilities of middle age?

In the video for “Robert Pollard,” Bill, Gary, Jeff, and Tom show you how they find their happy medium.

It’s (less than) a Wonderful Life

By Lisa Anderson

I am about to share what I’m sure will be an unpopular opinion. I don’t care for It’s a Wonderful Life.

In case there’s anyone out there who hasn’t seen it, It’s a Wonderful Life is a 1946 film directed by Frank Capra and starring James Stewart, Donna Reed, and Henry Tavers. Stewart plays George Bailey, a building-and-loan manager who is thrown into crisis on Christmas Eve when his uncle (a co-worker) misplaces $8,000 that was meant to be deposited in the bank. Faced with criminal charges over the money and beset by lot of small emergencies at home, George contemplates suicide and wishes aloud that he’d never been born. A kindly angel named Clarence (Tavers) comes down and shows George what the world would be like if that were the case.

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DVD Review: Take This Waltz

By Less Lee Moore

Take This Waltz, writer/director Sarah Polley’s latest feature, is lovely to look at, with bright, stimulating visuals and convincing dialogue performed beautifully by the cast. It is also terrifically exasperating. Much of this is due to the central character, Margot, portrayed by Michelle Williams.

Granted, I haven’t seen Michelle Williams in anything but Brokeback Mountain, so it’s difficult for me to tell if she’s incredibly gifted at playing an extremely annoying person or if that’s her acting style, but I will give her the benefit of the doubt. However, it also makes it difficult to decide whether to root for her.

28-year-old Margot meets single Daniel (Luke Kirby) on a business trip and there is instant chemistry, or at least we can understand why she’s attracted to him. He’s handsome, sharp, and witty. Then we discover that not only is Margot married, but also that Daniel lives across the street. As she astutely observes right after than discovery: “Oh shit.” Things get more complicated from there, with Margot and Daniel dancing around each other but never consummating anything physically, on ongoing situation skillfully rendered in the pool scene where the two swim around each other like fighting fish.

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Music Review: Big Dipper, Crashes On The Platinum Planet

By Chelsea Spear

Of all the bands from the Boston Rock Class of 1990, Big Dipper weren’t the first candidates for the “Most Likely to Succeed” superlative. They wrote songs with undeniably catchy melodies and witty lyrics, and their shows at mid-sized East Coast clubs never failed to attract an audience.

Unfortunately, they had signed to Homestead Records, whose history of poor distribution and corrupt business practices restricted their reach to all but their most diehard fans. Though they jumped ship to Epic at the close of the decade, a series of shakeups at their label left them with little support. By the middle of the ’90s, “Dippah” (as their local fans called them) had joined fellow Beantown heavy-hitters Tribe and O Positive in the great cutout bin in the sky.

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DVD Review: 360

By Danny R. Phillips

On paper, 360 looks like a good idea; much as I am sure, The Bay of Pigs Invasion looked like an ideal, foolproof military action. Well, neither one of these endeavors worked out very well.

All the pieces are there for a potentially great film. The writer of Frost/Nixon (Peter Morgan), decent director (Fernando Meirelles) and a cast that boasts great actors like Sir Anthony Hopkins, Jude Law, Rachel Weisz, and the too-often-overlooked Ben Foster.

360 is a film that tries to show how seemingly unconnected things are, in fact, related. Everything is related in one way or another despite geography, sex, or belief. It is a gallant effort but falls short. Anthony Hopkins is a driven, possessed father looking for a missing daughter; Jude Law is dying in a marriage-gone-cold with Rachel Weisz playing the part of the distant, closed off wife. There is also a dentist with a romantic side; these are four characters and screenwriter Morgan is just getting started.

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