JUNKFILM

There comes a time when every friend must prop their friend’s material. I believe this is one (of soon to be many) of my friend’s works that I want to prop.

My friends over at Darth JayDer Comics have been in love with films for years and their love shines through in their comic book that was supposed to originally have been a movie, “Lost.”

While they have been working the Comic Con circuit for a while now, Aint It Cool News just did a review on their trade paper back and I can’t stress just how accurate it is.

LOST TPB
Darth JayDer Comics

An indie staple is the slice-of-life comic, where there’s nary a zombie or a super cape or a vampire or a time stream disruption. Some folks hate these comics and I have to admit they are an acquired taste. Personally, I read comics for the escapism. Reading about another schlub’s money/girl/life problems hit a bit too close to home, if you know what I mean. So when I realized that’s exactly what LOST was, I was half tempted not to give it a look. But I’m damn glad I did. Yes, LOST is a hit TV show that’s about to come to an end this season, but no, that’s not what this book is about. LOST is about a normal guy name Chazz, slacker extraordinaire. He’s got a dead end job, aspirations to be a writer, and no chick in his life. Now in a sci fi or super hero comic, it’s at this point in the “hero’s” life that something extraordinary occurs, usually in the form of a radioactive spider or a meteorite or a lab experiment gone horribly, horribly wrong. But this isn’t one of those stories. In actuality, something extraordinary does in fact happen…Chazz gets a girlfriend. The rest of the book pretty much goes by the old adage, “Be careful what you wish for.” Like I said, most slice of life books turn me off, but writer Derek Glascock does such a great job with the dialog in this book that it made me stick with it. Sure, the guys in this book are basically sitting around talking about absolutely nothing, but the way Glascock turns a phrase works here and it worked enough to hold this reader’s attention for the entire trade paperback. Jaysin Osterkamp does a fine job as well illustrating this book, making every character distinct and unique. His range of facial expressions and poses is vast and he draws a damn fine, curvy alterna-girl if you ask me. LOST is one of those books filled with characters that you will recognize from page one. They may not have been said or happened exactly in the same way, but I’ve lived through stuff like this. And while I often stay clear of slice-of-life books, I’m glad I didn’t do so here because after reading how effed up Chazz’s life is by the end of this book, you can’t help but feel a bit better about your own. Recommended for true indie types who hate spandex and those suffering from super hero overload.

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I loved going to see some splatter house, crap fest of a film in a drive in theater when I was a kid.  If the movie you were watching got boring all you had to do was turn around and watch the movie behind you (and let’s be honest, that one behind you was a lot more filled with nudity and violence than the one your parents took you to).   In the 1960s and 70s the Drive In was the best place to watch these Grindhouse films.  And let’s take a quick definition break, shall we?

Most of you think Grindhouse is a couple of films that came out a couple years ago directed by Tarantino and Rodriguez.  Ok… if this is your sense of what Grindhouse is, that’s ok, you’re about to get schooled, because that pisses me right the fuck off.  This would be like a movie coming out called “Comedy” and suddenly no one has ever heard of the film genre that once was comedy.  Grindhouse was a posthumously-genre title that was given to films that were, wait for it… that’s right… ground out in little to no time.  Yes, most were horror or splatter or even psychotronics, because these are the kinda films that would sell by the hundreds and seen in the theater for a couple weeks and then forgotten about in order to make way for the next blood-spraying title.  Most of these films took about a month to shoot and edit, hence, grinding out the movies.  Now you know, and as we all should know, knowing is half the battle.

Now that you know Grindhouse is a genre of shittily produced films and not some kind of skater dance music, you can see the immense draw drive ins had with these kind of films.  Drawing people by the hundreds to the outdoor mini-festivals every weekend.  But the Drive In was not like it is now.  My girlfriend and I  have been wanting to go see a drive in movie but all the movies are kid-friendly and that has no interest for me whatsoever… but still, I digress.  The drive in was a festive experience.  You didn’t have to sit in your car the whole time unless you’re copping a feel… and then by all means, stay in your vehicle.  It’s cool.

Going to the Drive in is a festive event.  Everyone gets to hang out and scream at the dumb blonde who is creeping down the stairs to the dark basements where the ax murder obviously is going to jump out after she scopes out the area declaring it finally safe.  It’s about sneaking 8 friends in the back of your truck and paying for just you and your girl. It’s about the constant friendly enviroment you get from everyone there because everyone else is there for the same reason: to see the craptastic movie on the outdoor screen and have a good time.

Lately, and by lately I refer to the  time span of the last 20 or so years, the Drive In has turned, well, let’s say, in to shit.  The last few times I have gone, everyone just sits in their car with the windows up.  No one is camped out on top of the trucks.  No one is walking around starting up fun film conversations.  And probably the worst thing of all, aside from the lack of Drive Ins, is the lack of crappy horror films.  Seriously.  WTF?  I want to scream along a few other dozen cars at the poorly executed blood spray of the squib that didn’t go off at the right moment.  But it would seem that these kind of movies aren’t what the public wants to see.  They want to see Beverly Hills Chihuahua, a movie so fucking terrible that I inadvertently erased it from my memory when I did my 2008 worst films of the year and forgot to add it to the top slot.  I don’t wanna see G-force or what ever crapfesticle crappity crap is playing this week.  I wanna see I Eat Your Flesh or I Drink Your Blood or Tomb of the Blind Dead, or to be truthful, almost anything that has Dead in the title, besides movies like Dead Calm.

Ok … tyrannical rant is now over.  Question of the week… and here is a doozy.  How many bullets were fired off in Hard Boiled?  If you can answer this I will have you as a guest author on an upcoming post discussing firearms and bullets in movies.

Until then, I’m off for more Dr Pepper.

So last night, Junk and I went to see Inglourious Basterds (both of which are SUPPOSED to be misspelled, I suppose. And in honour of that, I decided to write my paper in the same sense.) I was excited that another Tarantino movie was coming out. I can’t say that I’m a BIG fan - I do love most of his films, but haven’t seen all of them. Pulp Fiction is one of my favourites, Resevoir Dogs, Kill Bill, Death Race, etc. But this was a war film and I wasn’t sure what to expect, since war films are definitely not my favourite. I don’t typically like movies that take place around a war or are histourically based. I like Titanic, but that’s a different story. I was a silly 13 year old girl when I went to see that and it was sad and romantic and sexy and sad again and then had an old lady at the end. Where did she come from, btw? The whole movie has these two hotties that fall in love and hten this old lady has the gall to throw expensive jewelry off the side of ANOTHER ship? Jeez Louise. (Who IS that by btw?)

Anyway, Junk will tell you (and I insist that it’s part of my charm) that I’m difficult to watch a movie with. I get to whispering (or talking loudly, if we’re at home) about what’s going on and in turn, miss what was said while i was whispering and in turn again, have to whisper. It’s a cycle. I also doze off, even during a good movie like Watchmen… Around the 1.5 hour mark, I start getting tired and no amount of action, boobage, Johnny Depp or nudges from Junk can keep me awake. Or I’m checking my phone to see how much longer I have. I have things to do! Popcourn to throw away! Gum to pick off of my shoe!

But this movie… this was something else. From 4 minutes into the film until the very end, I was… enthralled. Enraptured. Ecstatic. Jaw-dropping dialogue. Brilliant acting. Suspense. Humour at every turn. Bloody graphics that made me cover my eyes and grope for Junk’s hand to squeeze, while he watched, enamoured. The opening 20 minutes are probably my favourite. Followed (closely) by… well, by the rest of the movie. You leave knowing you saw a Tarantino movie. You leave knowing you watched a masterpiece. You leave… wanting to kill some Nazis.

I was driving to work yesterday and heard on NPR that YouTube wants to stream “new releases” for a fee. This is about all the info that was released on the radio broadcast, but I thought, “Hey, that’s fucking awesome. Release a movie in to a theater, a month goes by and you can watch it for a couple bucks on YouTube.” That service, I would pay for.

I went home to check out the news and this is what I found at SlashFilm:
“Youtube has been in discussions with Lions Gate, MGM, Sony and Warner Bros. Movies might be available on Youtube the same day they come out on Blu-Ray/DVD, and could be available to consumers free with advertising, or for a rental fee. Rental fees would probably be around $3.99, comparable to what Apple, Microsoft, and other VOD services charge for a rental. It is unclear whether or not users would be able to download the movies, or whether they would be streaming-only.”

THAT IS FUCKING BULL SHIT!!!! I, by no means whatsoever, would ever pay for a movie when it was just released on DVD to the public. Why the hell would I shell out $4 for a YouTube converted flash video when I could spend astronomically less on a DVD rental and watch it without the conversion, transfer and digital crap I get when I have my TV hooked up to my computer and watch streaming on my TV.

I know, alot of people will be up in arms about this. “Hey, Junk, my video stream is fine on my tv.” Then you aren’t looking close enough. Right now, unless you have a stellaraly beautiful system, which 9 out of 10 people who think they do, DO NOT, you have transfer issues and quality degradation.

But I digress…

$4 for a streaming movie that I can get for…hold on, let me do my math on my netflix here … $0.75 for the entire DVD, including a mildly compressed movie, plus extras, plus director commentary, plus menus, plus the leisure or no bitrate errors and buffering fuck-ups. yeah. Not my bag, baby.

Why is no company releasing a movie into theaters and online simultaneously? Yes, the fear of loss of money is there… but charge $10 for the theater ticket, charge $20-$25 for a digital, one-time streaming, no pausing, no rewinding.

Yes, the fear of screen capturing and recording is there. There is a technology available that can scramble that easily.  In the “I need it now” society we live in, this might be a good idea to cash in on a budding technology that is sure to go that way anyway, why not be among the first?

Do yourself and the movie industry a favor, if YouTube is stupid enough to do this, don’t waste your time, money or bandwidth on this idiotic idea.