Sunday, January 18, 2009

REAL LIFE/REAL DEATH Chapter Four

I'm a little disappointed in myself, it's been a month since I last worked on Real Life/Real Death, which was meant to be a weekly exercise. But my attention has been pulled back and forth between some other projects, that coupled with my extreme laziness has really crippled my RLRD output. But I was able to jump back into it tonight. It's a short chapter, but it felt good to get back to it.



"THE SHAKEDOWN"

Okay. Okay. Okay.

I repeated that to myself for a few minutes. A cop car was parked outside my building. That doesn't mean anything, not just yet anyway. This is a terrible neighborhood. They're around here all the time. I took a few breathes. I could see them, the cops, they were still in their car. I wasn't sure what they were doing. Probably waiting for somebody. Waiting for me. Damn.

I took a deep breathe. I knew the law, there's nothing to be afraid of. I didn't even do anything wrong. So, what's the matter? Quit being a spineless little shit and walk over there.

I then repeated that to myself a few times before taking that first step across traffic.

Just as I made it to the other side of the street, I heard the click of car doors opening. Could of been anyone, I didn't turn around.

"Mr. Calico. Frank?" I heard from behind. Damnation. I turned around and came face to face with the officers. I recognized the older one, I think his name was Kowalski or something like that, he was on the force when I was still a detective. I didn't recognize his partner, some young kid.

"Koslowski," I finally said after scanning his uniform for his name, "Haven't seen you in a long time. What brings you round these parts?"

"Just wanted to ask you a few questions," He said, forcing a weak amount of charm.

"You finally get promoted to detective then?" I asked rather wickedly.

He narrowed his eyes, "No."

Koslowski was a bad cop. Not just a dishonest cop, which he was, but he was bad at being dishonest. He wasn't the only dirty cop on the force, not by a long shot, but he was the only one stupid enough to get caught by Internal Affairs. Long story short, he took the fall for everyone, which allowed him to pull enough strings to keep his job, but it was clear he wasn't going to be promoted any time soon. Since then he's been a bitter, intolerable man, I feel sorry for his partners.

"No, we're not here on an investigation. You know how it is, the detectives get backed up on dead end cases, so they have us start asking around. Keep our ears to the community, you know?"

"Well, what the hell does that have to do with me? I asked.

"You were out at that budget hotel last night, weren't you? Bargain Hotel? Budget Rooms? What was is, Jerry?

"Budget Hotel," his partner replied.

"Budget Hotel, that's the one. Word has it you were in the area, weren'tcha?

They knew. They knew everything. They had to. They're going to arrest me for some stupid shit like jaywalking(did I use the crosswalk or not, I can't remember) and then pin the murders on me. Kidnapping too. Oh fuck, I'm so fucked. And too sober to be clever.

"Yeah," I said as calmly as possible, "working a case, cheating husbands use cheap hotels. What of it?"

"That all you saw last night? A cheating husband?"

"What the fuck are you implying?" I snapped.

"Easy, bud. Weren't implying nothin. You know there was a murder over there last night? No witnesses either. Thought you mighta seen something out of the ordinary, being that you were in the area."

"People get murdered on the North side all the time. S'why you guys won't set foot in there unless you're called in. A few gunshots really aren't all that out of the ordinary."

"Heh," he chuckled, "Well, this was a particularly peculiar case, I think you'dve noticed something, had you seen it."

"Well, I don't think I did, otherwise I'dve reported it. I used to be a cop, remember."

"Yeah, 'used to be' bein the key words there." You keep your eyes peeled. You see anything, you let us know. Heh, maybe Detective Ross will hire you for a little freelance work. Haw," his single laugh bellowed out like a cannon shot blowing up in my face. His partner chuckled a bit, unsure of what to make of the joke. Poor kid.

"Yeah, maybe," I said completely straight faced, pretending not to get the joke.

"Right, well, good luck with your investigations and all," he said, the sarcasm pouring out of him like so much sewage.

Then they left. Those mother fuckers. Those sons of bitching mother fuckers. I used to be a fucking detective. That asshole wishes he was as good a cop as me. And now he shaking me down for information like a fucking crackhead. Goddamnit!

Thank God I got that bottle of Scotch.

Sunday, January 4, 2009

Daddy Wants a Shine Part Three

Stephen King purportedly hated Kubrick's adaptation of The Shining, which is of note because he is usually pretty apathetic toward other movie adaptations, acknowledging that they are "apples and oranges." But something about The Shining rubbed him the wrong way, and I think I can see why, for all the reasons I stated before, I don't think it was a good remake either. Likewise, King confessed that The Shining was somewhat based off his own struggles with alcohol, so I can see why he'd be a little more protective of this particular story than any of his others.

So, what does he do about it? Well, he waits about twenty years and makes his own adaptation, this one a three episode mini series. I watched this series with great interest because much of it seemed to be filmed in a direct response to Kubrick's version. But sadly, I don't think it's superior to Kubrick's movie, and worst of all, that great of an adaptation to boot.

When talking about movies with friends, I've always held steadfast to the opinion that the writer is more important than anyone else involved in the project, including the director. Of course, I've always maintained that the best directors are also writers, and a good writer can't singlehandedly make up for poor directing and acting, but without a solid writer to craft a good story, we get Michael Bay movies. Since watching Stephen King's The Shining, I've softened on that position a little bit. To do this series, King employed his longtime collaborator, Mick Garris. Now, Garris does a perfectly presentable job with this series, but I wouldn't say it's anything inspired. It's very "made for television" directing. It doesn't even approach what Kubrick was doing in his movie. And filming for television is no excuse, one only has to look at any random episode of Spaced, to see how cinematic a television show can be(it's no wonder Edgar Wright would go on to direct Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz with his writing partner and star actor Simon Pegg). But as I understand it, Garris was under close supervision by King, who I imagine was pretty specific with what he wanted, considering he was so disappointed by Kubrick's film. But King is not a director, he's a writer. What's more, he's a prose writer, not a script writer.

This is best exemplified by Danny Torrance's psychic powers. In the book, when receiving visions of the future, Danny goes into a trance and he is "shown" the visions by his imaginary friend, Tony, who is described as looking like some kind of combination of his mother and father. At the end of the book, it is revealed that Danny's middle name is Anthony. So yeah, Tony is really just Danny's subconscious. In the movie, as I already stated, they ignored this, instead choosing to make Danny look possessed, by rolling his eyes back and having him speak in a creepy voice, rather than bothering with the visual of his subconscious. In the King's series, they go for a straight adaptation of the book. Meaning that Danny's invisible friend Tony shows up to warn him about the future. Now, in order to make him look like Danny's psychic subconscious rather than just a guy, they present him as floating in the air with an aura of light surrounding him. Again I say, this looks silly. It could just be that it's done on a TV budget, but it's silly looking, and either doesn't seem to take the visual concerns of such a spectacle into consideration, or (more likely) genuinely thinks it looks good. Which if that's the case, all I can say is this is why I don't watch lots of horror movies.

But the visual of Tony Torrance is small potatoes compared to the actual vision Danny is shown. In the book, it was actually one of my favorite scenes. King describes a vision of Danny frantically running down a foreign hallway, while a hulking, ambiguous monster chases him, yelling at him in a ghastly voice. All the while a continuously deafening thud is heard as the monster approaches Danny. Danny finds himself trapped in a dead end and sees the ambiguous, unrecognizable monster turn the corner, trapping him in certain doom.

This presents an interesting dilemma on how to present the scene for a visual medium. The monster, of course, is his father, Jack. Except that Jack is possessed by the Hotel, which is why Danny doesn't see his father chasing him, but rather a monster. In a book, it's quite easy to describe something as Danny's six year old self sees it, and it's up to the reader to determine what it could be. But in a movie, even if you present the scene that Danny sees, you are no longer seeing the scene through Danny's eyes, and we as adult viewers can easily see what the monster is. Without some very clever filming or special effects, all you have is Jack Torrance steeping around that corner. This removes all ambiguity of the scene, which isn't entirely bad. The scene works by just having Danny see his father turn the corner, ready to murder him, that certainly is frightening, but it changes the scene, and that's important to the narration. Danny(as well as the viewer) now knows for certain that Jack is going to try to kill him. Again I say, this can work as a type of foreshadowing, but it cancels out much of the tension that builds up to the climactic scene, where Danny is finally living out the vision, but instead of the monster stepping around the corner, it's his father.

Kubrick decides to avoid the whole thing by not bother with the visions, and instead focuses on Danny's repetition of "Redrum." But in King's version, he does his best with the foreshadowing, and what we get is exactly what I described, Jack Torrance stepping around the corner, albeit with some make up on to give him a grayer complexion and no pupils in his eyes. Now, as I said, this isn't expressly bad, if you want to go with the changed scene, especially since, because of Kubrick's movie, the story is already famous for Jack going crazy and trying to kill his son. But as I said before, I think it kills some of the tension, which gets a lot of focus in the series, and makes it seem to drag on unendingly, since we already know the outcome.

For the most part, the rest of the series follows suit and tries to retell the entire book, leaving out only a few of the more superfluous scenes, which is all well and good, until we get to the ending.

Now, I already complained about Kubrick's ending to the movie, which was nothing but a hackneyed attempt to add another level of supernatural suspense to an already sufficiently suspenseful concept. One of the big differences between the movie and the book is Jack's redemption. In the book, just before Jack is about to kill Danny, he regains his composure long enough to apologize and let Danny escape. He beats himself mercilessly in an effort to fight off the possession, but eventually the Hotel takes back control and hurries down the basement in order to prevent the boiler from exploding(which it does, just as he finishes turning down the pressure, proclaiming, "I win! I win!").

In the movie, there is no exploding boiler subplot, Jack never redeems himself, and he dies a murdering psychopath, freezing to death having gotten lost in the hedge maze.

I guess King was disappointed that Jack never got his redemption in the movie because man, does he ever hammer down the point in the mini series. Firstly, what hurts about the ending to the mini series is how all the momentum seems to stop. The one thing that Kubrick did in the movie was, once Jack went crazy, the movie sped along, building momentum and Jack chased his family around. But the series, like the book, meanders about as Jack goes back and forth between beating his wife and chasing his son. This is another thing that works fine in the book, but in a movie, where it's all meant to be watched in one sitting, it's kind of a chore to sit through. But we eventually get to Jack's redemption, which is nicely done, albeit without the self beating(television movie and all), but King isn't satisfied with just letting Jack redeem himself by not killing his son, he tries to make him the actual hero. Danny meets up with his mother and Halloran and informs them that the hotel is going to blow, so instead of getting out of the hotel as quickly as possible, they run up to their rooms to pack...as quickly as possible(another momentum killer). Jack runs down to the boiler and, encouraged by the ghosts, successfully turns down the pressure, preventing it from blowing up. Then, just as the Danny, his mother, and Halloran are leaving, he has a psychic conversation with his father saying that only he can stop the hotel. Jack then turns the pressure back up, much to the dismay of the hotel ghosts, preparing to kill himself in the eventual explosion. Then, for some reason, the ghosts become solid enough to do it themselves, and Jack has an actual physical struggle with one of the ghosts as they fight over the pressure gauge. Danny is able to...take away some of the ghosts power and Jack turns it back up. They have a really corny "I love you" scene and Danny et all escape just as the Hotel explodes. Then we skip forward to Danny's graduation where we see that Tony was really his adult subconscious because adolescent Danny is played by the same actor as Tony. After he receives his diploma, he sees the ghost of his dad and they have another "I love you, I'm proud of you" scene and everyone cries because it's so touching. Overkill. This has nothing to do with being a poor adaptation, it's just bad, and I get the impression that King was so over the top with Jack's redemption specifically because it wasn't in Kubrick's movie.

Ultimately, I disliked the series because it felt like I was watching the book, which just doesn't work. A book is designed to be picked up and put down, but a movie, even one that is split into three episodes, controls exactly how much you experience in the given amount of time(unless you're one of those people who walk out of movies or changes the channel...) As with most things, I think it's all a balancing act, which is a separate skill in and of itself.

Well, it's a new year.

Well the holidays are gone and with them my seasonal depression. I'm not one for making New Years resolutions, I mean, I'm practically perfect in every way. So, no, there's nothing I need to change about myself. But I did make a list of things I need to do this year.

1. Play more gigs. I like playing music, and I always want to do more. There's really not much more to say about this one.

2. Organize my comics. This is a tough one. I buy lots of comics, but I've really gotten away from "collecting" comics, as it were. For me, bags and boards are just an extra expense. So the comics have just been piling up in the spare room, as you can see in the picture. But more than anything, this conflicts with the organizational OCD part of me, so I'm going to have to suck it up and get it all straightened out. Oh, I certainly do take care of my extra great comics, the comics that aren't going to show up in trades anytime soon, like Kyle Baker's Plastic Man, or those extra special comics that just plain deserve preservation, like Rex Libris or Planetary, but on the whole, the average Bendis Marvel comic isn't worth the expense. Also, I've been making the shift toward trade paperback reading. I'll always buy single issues as long as they're being published. Books like Criminal and Cassanova are always going to be on my pull list. But for the most part, if Marvel(and anyone else for that matter) is going to organize their books for trade paperbacks(not just the writing but with the art too) then that's how I'm going to buy them. This also helps me be more selective about what I buy. I'm definitely going to break myself of the "well, I'm 8 issues in, I might as well stick it out for the remaining 4" mentality that had a stranglehold on me.

3. Clean the out the junk closet. No picture for this one, suffice it to say, it's time to get rid of all those old toy backboards, collectible card games, and spare cd cases.

4. Get published. This is a really easy one, since I am secretly including "on the internet" after the "get published" part. Hahahaha. I'm pretty excited for the following year, as I am nearly ready to launch a webcomic. This one also includes the supplemental 4.5. Write more. I actually surprised by the amount that I actually have written in the last year, but it's never enough.

5. Fix the toilet. Yeah, I been meaning to get to that for a while now.....