do you really want to hurt me?

In case you dolls haven't noticed, strange things are afoot in movietown.  A painful transition is afoot in which perfectly lovely movies are left rotting on the shelf while soul-crushing dreck winds up with at least three trailers and an international distribution.  Major studios don't seem to understand that we're perfectly content to stay home and watch movies streaming on our monster-Black-Friday-purchased-on-credit-flat-screen TVs rather than shelling out nineteen dollars to see a Jack Black fart his way through a remake we never asked for.  Something's gotta give.

There are too many chefs in the kitchen and no one's buying the soup.  If no one buys the soup, the restaurants close down.  This happened to a company called Overture.  Overture made a charming and uncompromising little adaptation of a critically acclaimed foreign horror film.  By the time the movie was done, they money was gone and Overture no longer had the ability to get the film distributed.  

This movie was not lowest common denominator.  That's scary for a studio whose livelihood depends upon an opening weekend.  So, rather than spend money to make people aware of the film, Relativity dumped it.  Let Me In was released in a handful of theatres opposite The Social Network and Wall Street 2 (both major studio releases costing upwards of 100 million to make/sell to the public), and so it tanked.  It was gone two weeks later.

Luckily, my memory is long. Studio politics aside, our first nomination in this year's FaggotyAssAwards is Matt Reeve's Let Me In.

Whether you fall in love with a boy or a girl or a vampire, first love bites and its sting can stay with you for the rest of your life.  Let Me In captures that moment quite well.  Thoughtful, nuanced, and full of sequences that are sure to stick with you long after everyone's forgotten all about Wall Street 2,   Let Me In is a film worthy of our adoration and respect.  In the same manner that House of the Devil took the world by storm last year, I'm sure that this movie will have a long and happy life on home video.

an early frost

“Timing’s everything.”

Whether serving hot soup in a park or shopping at the local convenience store, it's not really Thanksgiving without the homeless.   My relationship with the local itinerants could be described as tenuous at best. One day I was leaving my CVS where I had just exchanged some change for a coke zero and dry pasta (I was between paydays), when a particularly rambunctious peasant lady asked me for some change.  I replied, "I'm sorry, I don't have any change," to which she yelled out, "You don't have to be GAY about it!" Good for her.  

Every year, despite not having a family myself, I make a gigantic turkey and all the fixing and a lot of it goes untouched because I never learned to negotiate the dark meat.  I tried to take it to the neighborhood food bank once and they explained that they can't take pre-cooked food because the tea-party people try to poison the homeless like sewer rats.  The real world is scarier than any horror film.

There’s a lot to be thankful this year. I got a cute new haircut. Sarah Palin’s wearing tank tops (to question the taste behind this would make me a member of the misogynistic, liberal media). But foremost, there’s the resurgence of long-form horror stories on primetime television. With The Walking Dead, Frank Darabont is back in the game and better than ever. But never forget how he got here.  This year, I am thankful for The Blob (1988).

Darabont is, unquestionably, the definitive cinematic translator of Stephen King’s work (even The Walking Dead often feels like we’re watching appendices of The Stand). Along with Chuck Russell, he also wrote one of the greatest sequels in horror history, The Dream Warriors. That alone would be enough to garner Mr. Darabont a Faggotyass Grapefruit Basket. But Darabont and Chuck Russell teamed up one more time to raise the bar on the re-imagining of horror movie classics. Don’t call it a remake!

"That boy doesn't need condoms, he needs a muzzle."

 

In The Blob, Shawnee Smith plays a woman in love with Donovan Leitch (Who isn't in love with Donovan Leitch?).  She gets herself all gussied up for a date-night in her best, delicate pearl necklace and the latest hairstyle from her local Walmart stylist.  Well, these two don't even have a chance to share a milkshake before they're running into Matt Dillon's brother (inexplicably dressed like a hybrid of Mickey Dolenz from the lost season of The Monkees and Kristy McNichol).  Talk about a third wheel!

They're a regular couple of Hardy Boys, these two, turning what was meant to be a romantic evening into a mission to help the local homeless.  Who says the gays aren't philanthropic? 

Shawnee doesn't seem to mind that Donovan Leitch has a lot more chemistry with Matt Dillon's brother than he does with her.  She's prepared to take what she can get. Unfortunately, before Shawnee even has a chance to freshen up her mullet, Donovan Leitch is devoured by a giant, flesh eating hot pink blob (or is it heliotrope?)!  Some girls just can’t catch a break.

I respect Shawnee Smith because she understands that when your gay boyfriend dies violently of a highly contageous, virulent disease, the only thing a girl can do do is stare in soft focus at a snow globe.

Anyone who knows me will tell you that I can’t get enough of AIDS weepies. Angels in America, Longtime Companion, Philadelphia…I love 'em all!  I can watch them all day every day - they’re like fun-sized Snickers to me.  The Blob is no different. If you pay attention, this movie is full of life-lessons: 

• Never stick your hand down the garbage disposal. 
• When your gay boyfriend dies violently in front of you, go home and change outfits before getting to the bottom of it.

After Donovan gets gobbled up, the rest of The Blob is a pretty amorphous.  Shawnee somehow winds up navigating the town's sewer system with two children in tow.  Matt Dillon's brother gets captured by right-wing extremists hell-bent on using the Blob to defeat the Democrats.  Shawnee loses a shoulder-pad. It's a little hard to follow, but more fun than eating an entire greenbean casserole.

(Horror Nerd Alert: Pay attention.  The usher at the movie theatre is that gay wheeler who threw shade at Dorthy in Return to Oz.)

brown rice and vegetables...

You're welcome.

In honor of our second Halloween together,

I give you...

THE PAUL LYNDE HALLOWEEN SPECIAL.

Have fun this weekend, dolls. Be careful of razorblades in your vodka and never say I didn't give you anything!

xoxo

this is halloween.

In 1987, there was a brief moment when it seemed that my single mother was going to get married to a man with a mustache and impossibly muscular arms. It was great. I suddenly found myself with a step-brother! I was seven years old, he was four. We got all dressed up to go to Salem for the festivities – he as Alf, me as a ninja assassin (Halloween being the only time it’s acceptable to wear all black outside of stage crew; plus, I was starting to get chubby and the black masked my figure).

Everything was magical. We bobbed for apples and we watched the mock-witch trials. There was a chill in the air and leaves on the ground. Then we went to the spook house…

A sound effects cassette blaring, fake cobwebs abounding, from the moment we stepped in line, I was anxious. Never one to step away from the spotlight, I took the lead of our group of strangers, quietly emoting better than any scream queen as I stepped into the black-lit hallway ahead towards certain doom.

Within three feet, there was a diorama set up: a prison cage with colored lights. How lovely. Atmosphere!  Then, without warning, some terrible man in a mask jumped out through the bars, reaching for me. I threw my hands back, preventing anyone from passing. Saving the group, holding tight to the walls, I screamed with all the terror a seven year old gay boy could muster until we had to be escorted out the front door – sobbing hysterically and insisting we go home.
That was a good Halloween.

Twenty years later, that was Michigan.

I never that thought I could recapture the magic of Halloween as it existed in childhood.  In Los Angeles, we have no foliage; the only costume options in any store are "Slutty Cafeteria Lady" or "Slutty Manatee."  But in Michigan, every house proudly displays a jack-o’-lantern and has decorations to spare. There are corn mazes, pumpkin patches, petting zoos! These people care about Halloween.  Michigan State is performing Evil Dead: The Musical. Even the Christians, who hate Halloween, have those Hell Houses every few blocks.   Don’t even get me started on Wiard’s Orchard...

Growing up in Boston, I only thought such wondrous places existed in the movies. Wiard’s not only had a haunted barn, but they have a Haunted Mineshaft and a Haunted Asylum (where walls actually implode and you have to squeeze yourself through to get out)…they even have karaoke! They house a Haunted Hayride that's better than anything Hollywood could muster and (get this) when you're done with the hayride, they have donuts and fresh apple cider waiting for you…for FREE!! There was joy in every presentation.  My faith in humanity is momentarily restored.  There must be a God, because I found Halloween Heaven, kids, and it’s name is Michigan.

Fat Actress

"Tile floors are ass."

-Kirstie Alley

scary stories to tell in the dark...

Everyone get your permission slips out because we're going on a Faggotyass Field Trip!

We're off to North Korea... no, just kidding (sort of), we're going to the Universal Citywalk!  It's that magical time of year when fat people and skinny people, gays and straights, Dominicans and Mexicans all come together to wait in line for hours to have non-union actors invade their personal space.  It's time for Universal's Halloween Horror Nights!!!

Make sure you bring a hooded sweatshirt.  One year I forgot my mine and some actor with zombie makeup and a chainsaw sensed the flash of confused terror in my eyes and proceeded to chase me into a gift shoppe while my boyfriend at the time just looked on, laughing (he's dead now).  Lesson learned.

We never know what to expect at the Universal Horror Nights and that's why we must always pack a flask of Jack Daniels in our Nike Dunks (just put it under your sock so it clears the metal detectors).  Be particularly mindful of proximity... One year, bestie Sean accidentally nudged a local who was standing outside the men's room gnawing on a chicken leg.  This gentleman proceeded to scream something or other about "respect" until Sean and I had to be rescued by a kindly gay employee of Universal who took us on an unexpected VIP tour.

This year, however, it turned out that there would be no such reprieve.

The Good.

The Simpsons ride is joyful and the four tiers of stairwells down to the King Kong ride are a fantastic workout.   There was no line to the "Vampyre: Castle of the Undead" maze because it is not based on a movie so we got a private tour.  Housed in the year-round "House of Horrors" building, this was by far the best experience of the night.  Mirrors, smoke, sparsely populated and completely atmospheric, this maze was a winner.  We also got free parking by flashing Franklin's Universal employee badge from two years ago...that was nice.

The Bad.

Halloween Horror Nights is not enjoyable anymore.  I love a spook house.  I love atmosphere; cobwebs and colored lights make me weak in the knees.  I love a narrative.  None of these things can be found at Universal Studios because their primary concern is throwing actors at you, literally.  Rather than a few well timed scares, the goal of the Horror Nights is to elicit a perpetual fight-or-flight response.  Rooms smell like poop, people throw axes and chain-saws in your face.  Like a jump scare in a movie, this only makes you anxious.

Universal Horror Nights has become indicative of today's horror movies - a lowest common denominator moment tailored for people too busy texting and feeding their kids to actually pay attention to a setup.  It's not fun.  It's over-crowded.  There wasn't one pumpkin.

The Ugly.

Everyone was shoving and yelling unnecessarily.  A man on the terror tram threw up on my shoe.  I saw no Norman Bates.  There was only one short person dressed up as Chucky.  I can say for certain, after four years in a row, this was my last visit to Universal's Halloween Horror Nights. Adios!

This isn't over, dolls.  This isn't over by a long-shot.  Pack up your winter hat, because we're getting out of Los Angeles to prove that there is still joy to be found in Halloween!  Stay tuned...