Me, watching “Kill List” for the fourteenth time. Released in 2012, it’s in my Top Five of all-time favourite scary movies.

It’s late on a soggy Sunday afternoon and I’m delaying my bubble bath so I can write this.  Let’s just finish this off, shall we?  

There have only been a small handful of topics I’ve abandoned on this blog, the most prominent of which (if we must call it that) being the Taylor Swift concert weekend that I couldn’t–I mean, could not–continue writing about.  I posted an entire Taylor-related preamble and downloaded the photos I took around the city during that bright December weekend, but as soon as I sat down with my honest little laptop a few days later to resume the tale of what transpired over those three days, it was next to impossible.

The lineup for this temporary photo-op went on for at least half a kilometre.

There were some observations that, while in the moment, I found noteworthy, but I suppose any writer is in a constant state of processing their immediate environment and sorting out what might be interesting enough to explore, assess, or exaggerate for the purposes of a readable piece.  Since this three-day extravaganza was made out to be an event that only the poor and / or cynical (i.e. pretty much everyone in Vancouver) were missing out on, I assumed that taking some time to immerse myself in the energy of what was Taylor’s final stop on her endless, exhausting world tour would result in an interesting, engaging piece.  But I’m no literary alchemist: I can’t take a bland corporate puppet and turn her into a precious gem.  As I wrote in that long prelude to what was never to be, by December 6-8, 2024–the final stops after Taylor commenced this lip-synced bonanza in spring 2023–you’d figure that, with all the breathtaking events that took place around the planet in that span of time, this gangly blonde was yesterday’s mashed potatoes.  And since her stage presence, overall persona, and creative output reflect that side dish entirely, I was in disbelief that hordes of women descended upon my city to throw thousands of dollars into this Swiftian gravy train–an entirely apropos metaphor–that hasn’t stopped chugging since around 2009.

The only thing that was even remotely interesting was the fact that this event brought forth an impassioned demographic that was, by and large, almost 100% female, and as such, seemed to transform downtown Vancouver into a somewhat safe and positive space.  Sorry, misogynists and woman-loathing cretins (there are far too many of you to keep track of, yet you just can’t quit this blog! ❤️), but if I had a choice between, say, the sort of obnoxious, lager-swilling, fisticuffs-endorsing meatheads who descend upon major cities for the FIFA World Cup or excited young girls wearing sequined outfits accompanied by their supportive mothers, I’m sure it wouldn’t take you long to guess who I would prefer to invade this urban rain forest. 

Not pictured: Hordes of drunken Cro-Magnons destroying public property in the name of spectator sports.

This was a bona fide, memorable adventure for many women both young and old; not only were they paying top dollar to squint at a granule-sized Taylor Swift from afar as she unsexily pantomimed her tunes in a barely-used stadium, but many of them were coming to an unknown city for the first time.  The flight to YVR, seeing the indisputable gorgeousness of Vancouver, setting up camp in a hotel room or short-term rental, doing some shopping, dining out at one of our many lovely restaurants, and finally, being in a massive forum alongside other Swifties and screaming along with a 35-year old who can’t stop bleating about mean boys….that’s what girlie memories are made of, I guess.  Just not for me (my biggest young-woman concert nostalgia is being 14 years old and seeing KISS at Pacific Coliseum, where I was on the general-admission floor getting shoved around by much older fans and making extended eye contact with intergalactic creep Gene Simmons during “Cold Gin”).

Gosh, I guess I DID finish writing about that weekend.  See?  I finish what I start, and I pretty much do everything I say I’m going to do.  This year, these promises to myself will include toiling away on my book to completion (of at least a first or second draft); finally filling out my blasted lens prescription after last November’s optical exam revealed I that I really can’t read anything anymore with my bare-naked eyeballs (my pricey drugstore magnifiers seem to just be making things worse); and, last but not least, booking a consultation to see if I should, in fact, inject some filler into my face.  You’d be shocked at how many people, male and female alike, get these procedures done; and I don’t mean Botox, which is some kind of paralyzing poison that renders portions of your face immovable in that shiny, uncanny-valley, Nicole Kidman-type way.  I just kind of want to smooth out two lines in my face, which I’d be doing for me, not for anyone or anything else. And?  So?  I think I’m quite lovely, and there’s nothing wrong with a bit of upkeep and investment in my appearance.

…the latter being a sentence no Gen Zedder has ever uttered in their life.

Now.  Having brought up my looks as a 49-year old woman, that’s a perfect segueway into…

The Substance – 👍

Well, of course I’m going to include “The Substance.” This film got bucketfuls of attention, and for good reason: Nobody has seen anything like this in a long time, if ever at all.  While it is, to be sure, terrifying in that Lovecraftian, Cronenbergian body-horror way, it is also a heartbreaking study in society’s rejection of and disgust with aging women, from head to toe, side to side, and inside out.   Coralie Fargeat, the magnetic French artist who wrote, directed, produced, and even edited this nutty film, has said straight-up in several interviews that this movie is about women’s bodies and the male gaze, and how she drew a great deal of inspiration for “The Substance” from her own experiences as a woman in her forties.  She deliberately applied a lewd, softcore-porn perspective to a great deal of this work, lingering on the actresses’ bodies, groins, asses, and breasts for prolonged, uncomfortable lengths of screen time.

Plot?  A fitness celebrity named Elisabeth has just turned fifty (Christ, I’ll be there in ten months) and is thus dropped from her long-term television workout show.  Dennis Quaid’s TV exec character, Harvey, simply tells her, “When you turn fifty…it stops.”  Elisabeth timidly asks, “What stops?”  But she, and we, never get a direct answer: we just know.  It stops.  Sex appeal, attractiveness, admiration, and that mythical feminine je ne sais quoi that makes heads turn, loins throb, and all other women extremely envious.  Poof.  Vanish-ed, to quote Martha from “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”  

By fifty, we’re dried-up old peach pits, invisible and aging crones with our failing bodies and our retired reproductive organs, easily forgotten and discarded.  One of my worst ex-boyfriends–no fresh-faced dewdrop on an April daisy petal himself, I can assure you–used to compliment me regularly on absolutely nothing except my looks.  Nothing else.  This sounds nice for a very small while, until you realize with dread that it’s the only thing of value you hold to these sorts of men.  How could I grow old with someone who would not, in fact, accept me growing old?  What if I were to gain weight, develop a myriad network of wrinkles, stop colouring my hair, become afflicted with age-related challenges?  These thoughts troubled me greatly, even though I was supposed to blindly accept and unconditionally adore the fact that he was twelve years older than me and already steadily making his way towards physical decrepitness and alarming mental illness thanks to his genes and lifestyle choices.  Can you imagine being with someone who is supposed to be your life partner, and yet, because he has revealed himself to be superficial on every conceivable level, you are perpetually, paralyzingly concerned with how you’re going to be treated by him as your physical appearance changes with the years? 

I can.  And it’s a horror show all unto itself.

Back to “The Substance”: Elisabeth finds a black-market means of hatching out a sexy, twentysomething, firecracker version of herself she calls Sue, and that’s pretty much that.  There isn’t a lot of dialogue in the movie, but films are primarily a visual medium; the optics here are among some of the most memorable I saw last year.  The entire viewing experience isn’t for the squeamish–we get loving, relentless close-ups of, say, long syringes being inserted into open wounds, complete with wet squelching noises–which is, of course, entirely deliberate.  Things go from bad to worse to the worst, predictably, but it’s a fantastic ride.  And witnessing Demi Moore give it her fearless all in this film, drawing out a performance wrenched from an aching vulnerability and her trust in the female director, will make you forgive her trespasses in the execrable “Striptease” thirty years ago.  

I’m almost certain that most of you have seen this, because it was an immersive 2024 experience, a much-needed pop-culture moment that flared up and still hasn’t really died down.  It isn’t perfect, mind you.  It didn’t scare me so much as repulse me–most people agree that Dennis Quaid’s prawn-eating sequence was the grossest thing in the entire project–and the last fifteen or so minutes of the film, the supposed climax, seemed like they came from a completely different piece altogether.  I can’t figure out why Fargeat decided to not just include a comedic bloodbath scene, but extend it for unbearable lengths, almost stomping on all of the painstaking work she’d done prior to this finale; there’s a reason why writer / directors should not edit their own films, because they seem unable or unwilling to kill their darlings.  

Why do you think many of my blog entries contain tedious, needless ramblings and annoying non sequiturs that should have been deleted altogether?  Because I’m my own editor.  I cannot kill my darlings.  In fact, calling them tedious, needless, and annoying is for your benefit, not mine; I just can’t let go of a single one of my dear, dear creations!

In addition to what I felt was a disappointing ending, I also felt that the scene in which Elisabeth is wreaking havoc in her kitchen–cooking up dishes in a frenzy while watching her young “Sue” self on television and keeping a snide running commentary all the while–should also have been left on the cutting-room floor.  It wasn’t as funny as Fargeat thinks it is, it was wholly unnecessary, it detracted from the overall tone of the film, and let’s face it, Demi Moore simply doesn’t have comedic chops.

Heretic – 👍 and 🤏

I mean, it was a fine watch, sure, but I’m not sure why this was shoved into the horror category.  It wasn’t scary, gory, particularly disturbing, or moving in any real sense.  If I had paid fifteen bucks to see it in the cinema, expecting some frights, I would have walked out very disappointed and immediately gone home to console myself with my seventy-third viewing of “Midsommar.”  This was, at best, a psychological thriller of sorts, although it seemed more like the writer-director duo of Scott Beck and Bryan Woods had this intense, likely years-long idea of writing a very dialogue-laden film that was spawned in equal measures by their own childhood religious trauma and several viewings of the 2007 viral YouTube film “Zeitgeist.”  

The premise of two young Mormon missionaries entrapped by a lonely, crazed, older, know-it-all atheist who smugly believes he has all the answers (dear reader, it is no exaggeration on my part to say that I was almost met with an identical fate two years ago) is original, but it starts to wear thin.  The performances, however, are excellent, particularly on the part of Hugh Grant, who seems to truly relish his role as a villain with an axe to grind against organized religion.  All I know about Hugh is this: He was busted in the mid-90s picking up a Hollywood prostitute; he has played the same version of the floppy-haired, jauntily-grinned, stammering British cutie in one dumb rom-com after another; he has something like thirty kids to support, and is thus adhering to my philosophy of a cheque is a cheque and taking whatever work that’s thrown at him while making no secret of his disdain for most of it.  In “Heretic”, however, he seems to really throw himself into the role with aplomb–entirely contrary to what we’re accustomed to seeing him in, or speaking publicly of–and thus, Hugh comes across as much more unsettling than anything you’ll see in the overrated, over-hyped “Longlegs.” 

It’s an ambitious film, it won’t bore you, but I’m still not sure why it’s classified as a horror.  

Cuckoo – 👎

The trailer made it seem like it would be a disturbing journey through some kind of mysterious, surreal conspiracy set somewhere in the Alps, and after seeing this preview, I was excited: After all, the best movie trailers show it all but tell you nothing, leaving you salivating for more.  After sitting through “Cuckoo”–and I’m shocked I made it to the end, but I was stubbornly determined to get my six dollar’s worth from Amazon rentals no matter how much I wanted to shut this shit off–it was clear that the trailer tells you nothing because there’s nothing to tell.  I don’t remember much of this movie at all, apart from one semi-interesting scene involving the protagonist riding her bicycle at night and an unexpected figure chasing her.  

That’s it.  That’s the only thing that stuck with me.  It was ridiculous, nonsensical, dull, meandering, incoherent, and without purpose or point.  Really, it’s like the writer or writers (I’m not looking them up) were contractually obligated to throw something together by a certain time and date, and therefore threw reason, plot, and sensibility to the wind as they scribbled out whatever they could think of so they wouldn’t get sued into the next century.  Since Kids In The Hall always have a skit that’s perfectly suited to any scenario in life, this one says it all about “Cuckoo.”  What a sky-high mountain of pointless balderdash.  

Smile 2 – 👍

This was really entertaining and well-made, kind of an instant horror classic, with a great deal of its success attributed to the fearless, fabulous performance by its female lead, a lady named Naomi Scott whom I need to see more of.  She carried the entire film–I think she’s actually in every single scene of this two-hour scare-fest–and never phoned it in, not once.  She gave it her everything, flinging her body and voice and face and soul into the project entirely, and it was quite honestly a master class in acting: She was an indisputable powerhouse in this role, rivalling Toni Collette’s sublime work in “Hereditary.”  

You don’t need to see the original “Smile” in order to watch or enjoy this sequel; in fact, I insisted on watching it on Christmas Day with my parents, who hadn’t even seen the first movie.  Mom, no horror fan, patiently put up with it, going back and forth between glancing up from a magazine and tending to things in the kitchen.  Dad, who influenced me with a love of horror dating back to when we got our first VCR in the early 80s, greatly appreciated it, and couldn’t stop marveling over Scott’s acting.  

The first film played with themes of childhood trauma and unexplored psychological scars and mental illness and family dynamics, with Kevin Bacon’s daughter, Sosie (nepo baby!), doing a perfectly serviceable job as the female lead.  This sequel repeats some of the themes, mainly surrounding squashed-down trauma and external pressures and social stigmas–and it also repeats some of the tricks and scares from the original–but takes matters to more intense, emotional heights.  Naomi Scott plays a pop star named Skye Riley who is on a comeback tour after enduring a dastardly accident the year before, one that killed her actor boyfriend and forced her into hitting rehab to deal with her drug and alcohol abuse.  She becomes “infected” with the Smile curse, and it goes on from there.  There are some terrific shots and visuals throughout the film, including one single, frantic, uncut take before the opening credits that I appreciated. It was a terrifically orchestrated way of kicking off the film.

Two things, however, bothered me: There is no way that a pop star of Skye Riley’s caliber would be forced to–much less realistically be able to–endure lengthy detox and rehab, heal her body and mind, then prep and rehearse for a massive tour only one year after a terrible car crash that broke her body down and slaughtered her partner.  It just wouldn’t happen.  Yes, she was on tour when the accident occurred, meaning it had to be cut short and this was her label’s way of recouping their losses, but this simply would not happen.  One year?  Not a chance.  Nobody would agree to this, particularly not her giant fan base, who would want nothing except for their idol to be well and healthy and in the best shape possible for her comeback.  Imagine that was Taylor Swift? Her semi-damaged fanatics would stalk and kill any handlers and managers attempting to cause their lanky goddess even a miniscule degree of further discomfort.

Second, remember what I wrote about stunt casting in my last blog post?  It happened here: The role of Skye Riley’s boyfriend, while not much of a part, was played by Jack Nicholson’s son, Ray.  Why?  Because not only is Ray is the son of Hollywood royalty, but he has the same unnerving grin as his famous pops…and the movie is part of a franchise using the word “smile.”  

This is literally the only skill he brought to the film.

*   *   *   *   *

I’m at the very end of this piece, hungry for spicy agedashi tofu and looking at my checklist to make sure I’ve covered all the 2024 horror films I wanted to write about…and I now see that I forgot one: “Late Night With The Devil.”

I really, really don’t want to write anymore tonight, so I’ll just say that it was One Thumb Up.  It was good, well worth watching, and gave an innovative spin on the idea of demon possession.  Also, it’s set in the 70s, and is a take on the found-footage horror sub-genre; despite my only being a tot during that brown-hued decade, I think I’m allowed to say that it captured the entire essence of what made it what it was.  

…what a sloppy, lazy paragraph.  Oh well.  Maybe if I had an editor I wouldn’t have left it in.

Love

Nadya.