Wading Into Trouble
Here We Go Again
The last week has been a strange one with a large part of the county I live in being underwater (I’m thankfully unaffected).
Imgur: The magic of the Internet
Imgur: The magic of the Internet
Up there is Worcester, the nearest city to me and one I work in for most of the week. We’ve had landslides, felled trees appearing where they shouldn’t, and even a death in the county this past week.
But we’ve also had ignorance - reports of people moving warning signs and just driving headlong into floodwaters in their SUVs and becoming stuck, trapped and in dire need of assistance. As well as serving as a shining metaphor of the whole Brexit debacle it speaks to a wider issue.
This flooding will become (if it hasn’t already), the new normal. We’re only in February and there is already a multitude of events across the world that are all working to the drumbeat of real, and consequential, climate change. But still portions of humanity willfully ignore it, don’t understand, don’t appreciate or even respect nature.
At this point I wonder what will it take to change their minds.
Women In Horror Month - Part Deux
Moving on to some film recs following last edition’s literary picks.
The Nightingale
Not strictly horror, but not strictly anything else either. The Nightingale is the second film for Jennifer Kent of The Babadook fame. The film is set in the Tasmanian wilderness in the 1820s with Kent ripping up themes of colonialism, revenge and misogyny from the depths of dark history. It is not an easy watch and content warnings abound - rape, sexual assault, infanticide. It is an exhausting film to watch too, also fully grappling with the costs of violence and the cycles they induce, no matter how much we try to break them. The film also includes a pair of terrific central performances in Aisling Franciosi and Bakyali Ganambarr. A hard watch, but one I’m glad I saw.
Atlantics
Mati Diop’s film, like Kent’s above, is one that defies a simple categorisation but is a movie that definitely includes elements of horror to tell its story. It’s a story of spectres both literal and metaphorical with the phantom of ‘progress’ and capitalism lurking at the edges of every frame, promising the characters a better future, if only they can endure the hardships required to get there.
Revenge
I’ve gone on about this movie ad infinitum in the text of this newsletter. It’s a neon coated, bloody subversion of the ‘rape revenge’ genre directed with confidence by Coralie Fargat. I cannot wait to see what she does next.
Prevenge
Alice Lowe is well known in genre fare for her acting (Kill List, Sightseers, Bandersnatch, The Ghoul to name a few), but this film marks her directorial debut from a script she also wrote. Prevenge details the horrors of pregnancy with its central character (also played by Lowe) being sent on a killing spree, potentially upon the command of her unborn child. Lowe injects the film with a very dark sense of humour, but it doesn’t undermine the more horrific aspects of the film. As well as all of the above Lowe was heavily pregnant with her first child during the film’s production(!).
The Invitation
Never go to a dinner party hosted by an ex. Karyn Kusama’s movie is an exercise in tension and suspense with an absolute doozy of a final shot. Kusama gives the entire film an air of grief and melancholy, allowing it to sit like a barrier in front of its protagonist played by Marshall-Green. His former partner though seems to have moved past the tragic event in their past and has even brought some friends along with her (definitely not a cult). Her follow up to this movie, Destroyer, is also worth your time.
Links
1) It’s not easy being green: a brief history of orcs in video games
A nice piece by Nic Reuben at Eurogamer about the history of Orcs in video games. The article also touches on the literary origin of the lovable green rogues, through to their inclusion in the D&D universe, as well as some of the darker, racial connotations in their creation.
This last point even includes the recent Shadow games set in the Lord of the Rings universe.
“At the start of this piece, I suggested that we might look at orcs as the fantasy genre’s counterculture. Perpetual outsiders, misunderstood by the haughty, self-righteous realms of men. This is where things get uncomfortable, though. If orcs are portrayed as evil, an abomination, or - in Tolkien’s case - a twisted, ugly mockery of a fey, beautiful and noble race, - what does that say about outsiders?”
2) Joe Hill Calls Bullshit On The Crazy Artist Cliché
A solid Buzzfeed interview with Hill that I’d somehow missed the first time around. It includes this little process nugget:
“I would start my day by copying out two pages of The Big Bounce. I’d copy sentence after sentence, trying to get the rhythms back. How does good writing sound? What does good dialogue sound like, how does a story move? I would do about two pages of it and the last couple of sentences would be my own. I was writing The Big Bounce but I was writing my version of The Big Bounce. Then I would change documents and start writing Horns.”
Bonus: Joe Hill is also mentioned in this piece about writing longhand.
3) Blood in the Gears: Chuck Palahniuk on “Consider This” and the Craft of Writing
Chuck Palahniuk has a new book about writing/craft/process out entitled Blood in the Gears. Tyler Jones at LitReactor interviews him about it.
4) THE FABRIC OF SURREALITY – THE HORROR OF PETER STRICKLAND
Great post at GNOH about the filmography of Peter Strickland. I really need to track down his radio adaption of Kneale’s The Stone Tape now.
5) Tinder’s Most Notorious Men
The Atlantic bringing you this week’s story seed. You’re welcome.
6) N. K. Jemisin’s Dream Worlds
The New Yorker brings you a deep dive on N.K Jemisin’s worldbuilding and the ideas that become her stories.
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I’m off to pray for this rain to stop. See you in two!