THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
09/21/01 -- Vol. 20, No. 12
Big Cheese: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
Little Cheese: Evelyn Leeper, evelyn.leeper@excite.com
Back issues at http://www.geocities.com/evelynleeper
All material copyright by author unless otherwise noted.
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Topics:
MT VOID Schedule
Oscilloscopes (Letter to the editor)
Hugo Winners
Lying to Ourselves (Comments)
The Supernatural at the Toronto International Film Festival
(Film reviews of HEARTS IN ATLANTIS,
THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE, and PULSE)
===================================================================
TOPIC: MT VOID Schedule
The MT VOID is dated (internally) every Friday, but since we have
no scheduling software available, you may receive it a few days
early or a few days late, and the date of the email may match
neither the internal date nor the date you receive it. Also
because of this, issues may not include the latest topical news.
(For example, the Hugos and this week's editorial are both a few
days old.) [-ecl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: Oscilloscopes (Letter to the editor by Bill Higgins)
I got a piece of mail from Bill Higgins responding to my article
about HDTV. He says, "Me, I can't get used to color oscilloscopes.
They just look weird." To which my response was "Wait until you
see the new High Definition Oscilloscopes with surroundsound.
It's like being right there on the F(t)=0 line for all the action."
===================================================================
TOPIC: Hugo Winners
For work from 2000:
Best Novel - HARRY POTTER AND THE GOBLET OF FIRE (JK Rowling)
Best Novella - "The Ultimate Earth" (Jack Williamson)
Best Novelette - "Millenium Babies" (Kristine Katherine Rusch)
Best Short Story - "Different Kind of Darkness" (Dave Langford)
Best Related Book - GREETINGS FROM EARTH (Bob Eggleton)
Best Dramatic Presentation - CRUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON
Best Professional Editor - Gardner Dozois
Best Professional Artist - Bob Eggleton
Best Semiprozine - Locus
Best Fanzine - File 770
Best Fan Writer - Dave Langford
Best Fan Artist - Teddy Harvia
John W. Campbell Award - Kristine Smith
For work from 1950 (Retro-Hugos):
Best Novel - FARMER IN THE SKY (Robert A. Heinlein)
Best Novella - "The Man Who Sold the Moon" (Robert A. Heinlein)
Best Novelette - "The Little Black Bag" (C. M. Kornbluth)
Best Short Story - "Coming Attraction" (Fritz Leiber)
Best Related Book - (dropped from ballot)
Best Dramatic Presentation - DESTINATION MOON
Best Professional Editor - John W. Campbell, Jr.
Best Professional Artist - Frank Kelly Freas
Best Semiprozine - (dropped from ballot)
Best Fanzine - Science Fiction Newsletter
Best Fan Writer - Bob Silverberg
Best Fan Artist - Jack Gaughan
===================================================================
TOPIC: Lying to Ourselves (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
I had not originally planned to talk about terrorism this issue.
I figured everybody else is talking about it and you needed an
escape. But then I was listening to the radio and heard somebody
saying something ridiculous and I was off and running in spite of
myself. Be warned some of this article may be hard to read.
Someone said it again on the radio today. The terrorists wanted
to strike at the very heart of our freedom. The radio said we
should fly flags to show our love of our freedom and that way the
attack will be a failure. That is a very moving thought. It is,
I admit, a source of inspiration for many of my fellow citizens.
It also is a lie. What is worse I think most people really know
it is a lie and are taking refuge in it because it feels good to
do so. Flying flags makes us feel we are doing something. The
terrorists who planned this crime do not care one way or another
about our concept of freedom. And they certainly do not care if
we fly flags or not. If we say freedom is what the attack was all
about it is only so we can say that it failed. But by any
measure, it was nothing like a failure.
In fact, by any reasonable standards the September 11 operation
was the most successful terrorist attack in history. Being honest
with ourselves it even was in some senses a very clever idea.
Terrorists had tried before to damage the World Trade Center.
With a powerful fertilizer bomb they did only a modest amount of
damage. This approach was more intelligent. All it required was
the price of some plane tickets, a few knives, and a few people
willing to die for their religion, all readily available materials
in the Middle East. They carefully chose planes fueled for long
flights but taking off near their objective so they would have a
maximum of unused fuel. Knowing the planes were hijacked our
natural inclination would be to get other planes out of their way
to help them reach their objective. That was playing right into
their hands. They did not need much training. The hard tasks of
flying a plane are the take-offs and landings. Piloting a plane
in flight is little harder than driving a car. This was a
relatively simple, inexpensive operation. And as a result they
literally brought the towers down. They killed thousands of
people, cost many billions of dollars, and gave our economy a big
push downward. The whole operation was deadly, elegant, and
somewhat simple. As much as I abhor what they did, there is some
part of me that admires how cleverly the problem was solved.
Anyone who calls the action a failure is lying to himself.
So what was the attack about if not about our concept of freedom?
It was about power and hatred. They used to say that the Golden
Rule was whoever has the gold makes the rules. America has a lot
of financial power in the Middle East and it has its own opinions.
Our opinions do not agree with those of the terrorists. We are
perceived as having a lot of power to enforce our point of view,
the terrorists have a lot less. They want to show the kind of
power they have so we will respect them more. That was what they
wanted to do and that was what they did. Even if hurting us does
not change our policies- -and whether it will or not remains to be
seen--it felt good to them to do it and see us shaken from our
self-confidence and our complacency. That is exactly what they
did see. It probably felt pretty good to them. It certainly did
not feel like a failure.
It also apparently felt good to all the Palestinians who
celebrated seeing Americans hurt. You probably have heard that a
newsman filmed the massive celebration of the success of the
attack, but the film was not broadcast because of death threats
from the Palestinian Authority. [See
http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=95001125] What do the
Palestinians have to do with it? Palestinians are a big part of
the Middle East equation. These are people who enjoy their
hatreds. For many, hatred is the only thing they have in
abundance. It is taught in the schools. The hatred industry is
the only growth employer. And it will take anyone who applies.
We have to admit to ourselves that the enemy is widespread and
international and that they really do hate us. We have to be
prepared for a much bigger struggle than we are expecting. For
years we have ignored the monumental hatreds in the Middle East,
the hatreds intentionally passed from one generation to the next.
We have told ourselves we were dealing with rational, reasonable
people. We thought talking would solve the problems. If that did
not work there were always plans like land for peace. Now the
monster is too strong, he is angry, he has too many heads to be
easily stopped.
I think what we have to recognize is that we have a clever and
dangerous enemy. Their unconventional military power may be the
equal of our stronger but more conventional force. We have to
learn how to fight this enemy. And the first step is to stop
lying to ourselves. [-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: The Supernatural at the Toronto International Film Festival
(Film reviews by Mark R. Leeper of HEARTS IN ATLANTIS, THE DEVIL'S
BACKBONE, and PULSE)
With this issue I will begin coverage of the films I saw at the
Toronto International Film Festival. Over a ten-day period I saw
forty-two films, some of which will play at your local theaters,
some will play only at art houses, some will be available only on
video, and probably some will get no release at all. I intend to
review all forty-two films. Those films that will play in
theaters, I will make every effort to review before their release
to provide the reader my viewpoint.
Just to add a little organization to the presentation I will,
where possible, group the films in categories and review an entire
category at a time. HEARTS IN ATLANTIS is due for release and
falls into my supernatural category. In my review of PULSE, I
also mention CURE by Kiyoshi Kurosawa. CURE is getting an overdue
art house release. This weekend it will be playing at The
Screening Room.
The festival, which has few entries that can really be called
horror films, featured films from two of today's best horror
directors, one Mexican, one Japanese. Not a bad choice for the
few horror films they chose to show.
HEARTS IN ATLANTIS
CAPSULE: In 1960 an eleven-year-old forms a friendship with an
elderly man who boards at his house. Scott Hicks directs with a
great deal of period feel. Anthony Hopkins stars as the
mysterious Ted Brautigan. The story is told sentimentally and
well until the script or perhaps the story falters in the final
reel. Rating: 7 (0 to 10), low +2 (-4 to +4)
Stephen King made his reputation on writing horror and that still
seems to be the major portion of his output. These days, however,
the films made from his horror stories are definitely of secondary
quality to those that do not have strong fantasy content. King
is better when he concentrates on human drama than on the
supernatural. This film based on only one part of his novel
HEARTS IN ATLANTIS basically ignores most, though not all, of the
fantasy elements of the book.
Robert Garfield (played by David Morse) is a photographer
returning to the neighborhood where he grew up. He is visiting
the funeral of a childhood friend. He asks about Carol Gerber,
the girl who was the other close friend, only to discover that she
had recently passed away. Robert thinks back to 1960 when he was
eleven. Bobby (played just a little too maturely by Anton
Yelchin) lived with his widowed mother. Then boarder Ted
Brautigan (Anthony Hopkins) comes to live with the Garfields.
Though his mother takes an immediate dislike to him, for Bobby the
boarder opens up new worlds. Ted turns Bobby onto the world of
literature and forever changes Bobby's outlook on the world.
Bobby and Ted's relationship is made difficult by Bobby's mother
(Hope Davis), a woman who makes all the wrong decisions in her own
life and blames the result on others. She has poisoned Bobby's
mind against his dead father suspects the worst of Ted. Bobby's
mother is right about Ted in at least one regard. There is
something not normal about the recluse. He seems to have psychic
powers that tell him things about the future. And Ted is on the
run from men who know about those powers and want to use them.
The book's fantasy element is much reduced in the William Goldman
(MARATHON MAN, THE PRINCESS BRIDE) adaptation of one section of
the book by Stephen King. Scott Hicks who directed SHINE and SNOW
FALLING ON CEDARS directs here. In general his style is nostalgic
and romanticized, though he somewhat unimaginatively creates a lot
of the mood by playing the popular music of the 1960 period. Also
though the cars we see seem a bit old for the setting. Goldman's
or King's view of the "good kids" is a little too Simon Pure and
cliched as he follows them down railroad tracks and swimming at
the local water hole, slaking their thirsts with the carton of
milk they brought along. Nobody I remember was that good a kid.
Once he has lulled us into this idyllic view of 1960 the
introduction of some nasty violence in the latter part of the film
comes as something of a shock.
HEARTS IN ATLANTIS is a Castle Rock Entertainment production.
They do the best adaptations of Stephen King, including the now
classic THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION. HEARTS IN ATLANTIS is a cut
below that film, but still a good production. I rate it 7 on the
0 to 10 scale and a low +2 on the -4 to +4 scale.
THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE
CAPSULE: During the Spanish Civil War young Carlos is sent to a
dreary orphanage complete with an unexploded bomb in the
courtyard, a murder mystery, and a restless spirit. His life may
depend on his learning the secret of the phantom. This is a
stylish ghost story and murder mystery, though the emphasis is on
the murder mystery. The writer and director is the incomparable
Guillermo del Toro. Rating: 8 (0 to 10), high +2 (-4 to +4)
The Golden Age of the Mexican horror film was during the 1950s and
1960s. During this period the Mexican film industry turned out
horror films with more enthusiasm than budget or quality.
Featured in the films were vampires, werewolves, Aztec mummies,
and professional wrestlers. The latter were usually heroes. They
may not have gotten theatrical release in this country but the
films would occasionally be pressed into service for late night
horror film programs. Beyond that they were not much seen in the
US. The supply died in the late 1960s and for a long time there
were no horror films from Mexico. In 1993 a quality Mexican
horror film, CRONOS, directed by Guillermo del Toro, was released.
It was good enough that it played here mostly in art houses. In
1997 del Toro released another film, MIMIC. Both are atmospheric
and visually remarkable films. THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE is the third
from del Toro, a stylish ghost story set in a boarding school near
end of the Spanish Civil War.
The film opens with a bomb bay opening and a bomb being dropped.
The bomb falls in a schoolyard, but does not explode. To this
same school is brought Carlos (played by Fernando Tielve), a new
student. Almost immediately on arrival Carlos sees a ghostly
presence in a doorway and the sight will shape his life at the
school. Carlos has a hard time adapting to the new school and
winning the friendship of the other students. Bigger children
bully him and the teachers unfairly discipline him. But more
unusual and more disturbing is that he continues to see the
ghostly presence. At night he will see a shadow of the specter by
his bed. He soon finds out the ghost is called by the other
children "the one who sighs." The ghost might be Santi is a
fellow student who disappeared and was thought to be murdered.
The students are all terrified of Santi, but Carlos a bit less
than the others are. For this reason Santi seems more willing to
appear to him. Carlos learns about the school staff through
little clandestine nighttime spying trips. He learns particularly
about Professor Casares (Federico Luppi of CRONOS), his wife
Carmen (Marisa Paredes), and the handyman, the handsome Jacinto
(Eduardo Noriega).
THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE is only partially a ghost story. It part it
is a standard boarding school story with horrors coming as much
from the school bully as from the ghost. Eventually Carlos will
have to find how it was that Santi became a ghost. The script of
this film was del Toro's school thesis. Taking place in wartime
and with a killer in the story, one might think the film could
easily enough horror without a ghost. Even if all the elements
are not necessary for the story, they are fit together in a very
nice way. Del Toro has a beautiful eye for color and landscape.
So in spite of the fact that some of the horror effects not
particularly unique and the ghost is not frightening for long,
the sheer beauty of the film's production make this a pleasure to
watch. Del Toro keeps the digital work to a minimum and when he
uses it, he uses it well. This is not the original film that
CRONOS was, but it does work.
Sadly Mexican horror died in the late 1960s before it could really
get going. Guillermo del Toro has brought about a minor rebirth
and is the only director keeping it alive. But he is just about
the best Mexico has ever had and is one of the best horror
directors making films today. I rate the Mexican/Spanish
production THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE an 8 on the 0 to 10 scale and a
high +2 on the -4 to +4 scale.
PULSE
CAPSULE: The director of CURE brings a weird and very complex
concept to the screen. One viewing will not be enough to
understand fully the premise of PULSE. The idea is something
about ghosts and the Internet. The film has an amazing
apocalyptic style. Rating: 7 (0 to 10), +2 (-4 to +4)
Perhaps the most disturbing (and disturbed?) filmmaker in the
world is Kiyoshi Kurosawa. His films all seem to have one style,
bleak. The worlds he creates are terrifying and cold. Little
known in the US to date, his films deliver the kind of horror that
so many of our filmmakers promise and are unable to deliver. Most
of his ideas are fresh and at the same time morbid. His 1998 film
CURE, with one of his niftiest ideas, is just now getting a sadly
limited release in the US and hopefully enough people will see it
that his name will soon be one to conjure with. CURE is probably
his classic. Last year he released SEANCE, a remake of SEANCE ON
A WET AFTERNOON. That was perhaps a miscalculation inserting
supernatural elements into a non-supernatural story. PULSE is
Kurosawa back on form.
Taguchi, a young computer expert, is late with his delivery of
some important software. Two co-workers go to his apartment and
find it a dismal dark affair in spite of his computer equipment.
Taguchi, acting very strangely, lets his friends look for the
missing software. Meanwhile he slips behind a plastic curtain.
When he fails to respond to calls his friends follow him behind
the curtain and discover he has hanged himself. If that was not
horror enough the body seems to disappear leaving just a strange
dark mildew-like spot on the wall. Taguchi's computer seems to
have been infected with some kind of computer virus. People whose
computer gets the virus seem superficially to die via suicide.
But they are not entirely dead. Their spirits seem to remain
present somehow in the real world and on the Internet. People who
get the computer virus are asked if they want to see a ghost. If
they say yes, they seem to be able to see real time images of the
spirits still nearby somehow. The computer shows them impossible
images of ghosts in their own rooms as seen from cameras that do
not exist. This is all somehow connected to heaven and hell
somehow filling up and overflowing "like a computer disk."
Instead the dead seem to be staying on earth and inhabiting
computer viruses. There is some sort of passage between worlds
having something to do with doors marked with red tape and strange
electronic disturbances on computers. Leave it to Kurosawa to
find a new kind of death.
This is a film that has more weird ideas piled together than
LIFEFORCE and somehow Kurosawa makes the film all work. It may
not totally convey his message of isolation and its parallels to
death, but whatever it does convey is nightmarish. Kurosawa, who
directs his own screenplay, ties his story into the real world
with some familiar and accurate computer discussion. Frequently
the plot is advanced with character hunches being assumed to be
fact. His plotting is frequently hard to follow and always very
strange.
Junichiro Hayashi, the cinematographer who recently has been doing
all of Kurosawa's films, creates a dark, cold, and gloomy tone.
Images are obscured by semi-lighting or are behind plastic
curtain. Scenes are not milked for their horror the way American
exploitation films might. People are shot with guns but there is
little if any blood in evidence. Seeing black silhouettes on
computer screens is not immediately scary. Kurosawa is not going
for and easy visual shock, but a deeper metaphysical dread.
Of any horror filmmaker in the world, Kiyoshi Kurosawa is the one
to watch. I rate this metaphysical look at isolation a 7 on the 0
to 10 scale and a +2 on the -4 to +4 scale. [-mrl]
===================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
There is something about a home aquarium which sets my
teeth on edge the moment I see it. Why anyone would want
to live with a small container of stagnant water
populated by a half-dead guppy is beyond me.
- S. J. Perelman
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