Category: Physiological

 For most of us,
The Blair Witch Project (1999) was the first
horror story we experienced that tried to disguise itself as
real-life events.  (A few novels had actually done this,
hundreds of years earlier.)

It claimed to be an unfinished documentary
shot by three students.  The three had disappeared in the
wilderness, never seen again.     In other words: We’ll
never know where they went, but this seems to be what
happened.  It was an exciting idea, rarely used before.
Lots of imitations followed, not just in the USA, but in
places like Japan and Korea too.

Like some of those movies,
(Rec) presents itself as a live TV program.
A reality series, all its footage shot live on location.
An attractive newscaster, Angela, covering the lives of
people doing exciting jobs after dark.  You don’t get to know
Angela well, apart from her on-the-scene life.

But you know she can do her job.  You watch her
switch on a glowing smile, like clockwork each time she needs to.
She understands that interruptions and delays are part of
the job—you need to turn the smile back on, the second the camera
rolls again.

She has the perfect face, a million-dollar smile,
large expressive eyes.  The camera operator Pablo doesn’t say
much.  He needs to stay in the zone; stay close to Angela,
give her the shots she wants. To know what she wants without her
talking.

Their show is called
While You’re Asleep.  Tonight they are
covering Barcelona’s fire department.  Angela makes a smooth
introduction as she meets the firefighters.  She is a people
person, enjoying the back-and-forth.

Just anotherexciting night; Angela introduces the latest
While You’re Asleep episode

Hanging out with firefighters; Angela knows how to have fun
during down time

The filmmakers know we are familiar with
reality-TV.  We have seen our share of shows with people
doing dangerous jobs: police, animal cops, corrections officers.
And professionals filming the action or shadowing these
people; we are familiar with them too.

But all this familiarity works in the movie’s favor.
We sit there, not expecting anything worse than usual.
Then we get more than we bargained for.

In (Rec), the heroes (like
Manu, the firefighter you get to know best), are put in a
situation foreign to them…alien.  The same with Pablo and
Angela. They are out of their element, cut off from the people and
equipment they need.  Instead of the usual help, they get
orders, warnings, threats.

Not to say they haven’t dealt with emergencies
before.   Far from it.

But they are quickly realizing this situation is
much worse, many levels up, from anything they have
experienced.

They enter an apartment building and get the basic
story: an old lady in danger.  She lives alone, no family,
barely any friends.

They enter the apartment.  A long hallway,
making it hard to see her well.  She stands at its far end.
Her nightgown is covered with blood; her expression is a
crazed one.

The old lady—more than they bargained for

In one second, everyone’s expectations
transform…totally.  She jumps at the closest firefighter and
bites his throat.  The others can’t get her off him for a
long while; she draws a lot of blood.  They rush the
injured man to the lobby.

A second huge change from everyday reality—the
building is sealed off—you can’t leave.  Only a short
announcement:  Health authorities made the decision for
everyone’s safety.

Instead of trying to do a lot of things and
none of them well, the people making
(Rec) decided to stick to a few themes, keep it
simple, and do those well.

Okay… so what did they succeed at?
Most obvious, they show you a devastating downhill slide,
from the everyday, generally routine life of newscasters to…the
opposite.  A small piece of Hell on Earth, full of human dogs
with rabies.  You’re locked in, no help is coming.

Second it shows the reality we usually don’t get to
see— people locked in, for everyone else’s good.

The ones numbered underneath the headlines: 32
Feared Dead.

Not to get melodramatic, but our TV remotes make us
a little like gods on Mt. Olympus.  We sit watching from the
outside with that freedom; if the news is too depressing we can
turn it off, or flip the channel to American Idol.

 (Rec) shows us the reality we
choose to turn off.

A message on the loudspeakers; someone will
come inside in a few minutes to run blood tests.  The man
enters, dressed in a sterile suit.  (You never find out if
he’s an MD, nurse, M.A. or a tech.)  The medic gives the
lobby more bad news.  This unknown disease is spread in
saliva.  Authorities believe it started with a dog in a
veterinary hospital. It awoke in a state of rage.

Jennifer is a quiet little girl that Angela was
drawn to, spent a while talking to.  She mentioned having a
sick dog.  The man tells them the crazed dog had the same
name as Jennifer’s dog, Max.

Since the interview, Jennifer has remained quiet in
her mother’s arms, expressionless.  The whole lobby stares at
them.

Without warning, Jennifer whirls around and bites her
mother in the face.  She leaps to the ground, stands snarling
a second at the crowd, then like a blur, is up the stairs and
gone.   The medic and Manu go upstairs looking for
Jennifer.

The next few scenes are the ones attacked most often
by critics.  Lots of sarcastic comments about “incredibly
stupid, typical horror-movie characters” and things like
that.  It is hard to disagree.

You might argue that these people are not so much
stupid as they are caught in an adrenaline rush. But the nasty
comments have some truth.  The two men wear no protection,
not even gloves.  No reason to think Jennifer will let them
do anything to her.

Jennifer— likely infected; not one to be treated without precautions  

Another long dark hall.  Nobody.
But as Manu steps back into the hall, Jennifer is suddenly
there.  A true jump-out-of-your-seat moment, intense as any
you have seen.  You get a good look at Jennifer.
Blistery lesions on her face, discolored skin.  No one would
bet that you could get near her without getting bitten.

Screeching, she is all over the medic.  Manu
has to try to pull her away.  She makes noises like a crying
baby, only more shrill.

Downstairs, less survivors than when they
left.

(Rec) has been in two chapters so
far.  Chapter One;  everyday TV-reality show.
Chapter Two; on-the-spot emergency news coverage.
The third chapter has just started; pure personal survival
in a building full of crazed people.  In no time, Pablo and
Angela are the only ones not bitten. 

Angela—her world in a rapid slide downwards

What happens afterwards may not be logical, but you
won’t have time to think about it till later.  (Rec)(>’s
story has some minor holes in it, but the rest of the movie is
brilliantly shot, directed, and edited.  Its style feels
radically different from before.

That makes sense.  It is not a familiar
TV show any longer, or even a breaking news story.  What you
have are two people on the run, desperate to stay alive.

They find themselves in the building’s only vacant
apartment.  One room once used as a medical laboratory.
Old newspaper clippings.  A girl in Portugal,
originally thought to be possessed. Gradually—people suspecting
she was ill with an unknown virus.   A higher-up giving an
order; terminate this girl now for everyone’s safety.

Nothing original;  But imagine it a
moment from Angela’s point of view.

REC has that power to pull you in…
out of your neighborhood-mall multiplex theater into…her world.
The acting is that good.  The way it is shot makes you
feel it—a TV newscast gone terribly wrong…straight into Hell.
You are right there with the last two survivors in those
festering rooms.

If you can spare a second, you may remember Angela as
she was, earlier.  The contrast is devastating.

is short for a main feature, less than 80 minutes.
But you can only guess how much is packed into these
moments. A roller coaster.

Blair Witch left most of the terror
in its ending to your imagination.  (Many walked out of the
theater mystified, either not getting it, or convinced the whole
story was a bad con job.  I have to admit; at that point, I
was in the first group.  I remember others saying
simply—Don’t waste your time.)  But like the old cliché, is
up close and personal.  Not much story to remember, but
action that hits you like a freight train.

Keep reading

     Henry was definitely not the first serial
killer movie.  For that, you need to go back to Fritz Lang’s
M (1930), maybe further.  But it came out
early in the most recent cycle of these films; after
Manhunter, (based on the novel
Red Dragon, later re-made as
Red Dragon) but before Silence of the Lambs.  Are you with me so
far?  Recently, the TV show
Criminal Minds has been a big success, with its
serial killer of the week, and  large numbers of reruns
shown.

     It’s a good show.  You can feel the agony
of the good guys, members of the FBI’s BAU team, as they
try to feel inside the minds of the murderers they track down.
 Yet, good as the show is, watching serial killers hunted
over and over on TV does take some of the newness, the shock,
away.  Watching this movie, I wished for a time machine to
take me back to the pre-Criminal Minds days.

     Henry is not the most violent
or scariest of these movies (although it is right up near
the top). But the movie tells its story with great power.
 You watch the killers, feeling constant tension, wondering
when they will snap and start the violence again. 

    Because so much of the time, they are on the
edge…walking time bombs. 

    Yet still you feel empathy for Henry, hearing him
matter-of-factly describe his brutal childhood.  His mother
was a prostitute who forced Henry to watch her have sex, making
him wear a dress while he watched.  And he was likely
sexually abused himself.  Not much else you need to know.

     Even more, you find yourself rooting
for Henry; for him to find love (as we all want to) and to find
some way to stop killing.  Do you feel guilty for this?
 Of course.  Anyone in their right mind would.  Yet
you hear him recount his childhood memories, and watch his
tentative moves at kindness and you stop feeling as guilty as
before. 

     The plot is fairly simple.  Henry and
Otis, who met in prison, are both on parole now, sharing a grimy
apartment in Chicago.  Henry is quiet and respectful most of
the time, but at random moments will suddenly kill, with no
remorse.  Then Becky, Otis’ sister, comes north to stay with
them, find work and save up some money.  She misses her
little girl, but is glad to get away from her
abusive husband.  

     She likes Henry right away, and he is
flattered by her kindness.  Her feelings seem to bring out
the best in him.  Meanwhile, Otis’ fury, repressed up till
then by drinking and crude, mean humor, begins to break the
surface.  Otis dreams of finding the nerve to kill for
pleasure.  

     Henry actually encourages him.  For
awhile, they are ideal partners, killing together with great
satisfaction, including one devastating home invasion.  
 But Becky’s feelings for Henry make the situation more
difficult.  For the first time, you feel serious tension
between Henry and Otis.

     What gives Henry its power,
besides the gore, and the two men’s blindness to the lives they
snuff out so easily?  First, the empathy for Henry the movie
generates. 

     Thomas Harris, novelist, and creator of
Hannibal Lecter, does make you understand Lecter’s
motivations, and those of Francis Dolarhyde
(Red Dragon).  You taste the
horrors that made them who they are.  

    For example, the novel
Red Dragon shows you Dolarhyde’s doomed struggle
to take another road.  A blind woman at his job comes on to
him, and is more than satisfied by his first experience with
making love.

     Dolarhyde is obsessed with a piece of art by
the great engraver/poet William Blake, titled  The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun.
 The dragon becomes a lifeforce for him; it has brought
Dolarhyde his first-ever sense of personal fulfillment, personal
strength.  But it is an insanely jealous, furious totem, one
that inspires him to multiple killings.  Dolarhyde has found
a cautious sense of happiness with Reba, a woman who feels
something comforting in him.  Something he had never guessed
about himself.

     Dolarhyde starts to cover the dragon’s image
in his house.  He tries to steal an original Blake print from
a museum.  When he succeeds, he eats the entire
print.  One agent chasing the serial killer figures this
could be the same man.

     The agent’s comment is devastatingly simple.
  “Maybe he’s trying to stop.”

     Why am I telling this?  The point is,
neither movie version of Red Dragon was able to
translate this part of the killer’s struggle.  Both show the
sex, but how it changes Dolarhyde is never made clear.
 Possibly the directors worried about the time this would
have required. 

     Maybe Henry’s life is less complicated, his
conflicts easier to read.  As a result, the scenes with him
and Becky have great power, even though you have already seen him
kill many times.  Becky, much damaged herself (sexually
abused  by her father and by Otis) gives Henry a different
view of a woman.  A woman harder to distance himself from,
not a blank unknown he looks at behind car windows.
 

Becky—unexpected innocence despite an abusive past

     You may see Becky as hopelessly naïve, even
stupid. I see her in another light.

    Maybe I’m naïve, but Becky seems to me an individual
who has suffered abuse, yet has survived it partially intact.
 People can argue that her taste in men is horrible. That is
hard to argue.  Her husband is in jail, charged with murder.
 She tells Henry she loves him.  Enough.

     Yet Becky somehow has held onto her faith in
people, though the movie never explains how.  Maybe she had
childhood friends who were good to her, and she spent enough time
in their homes to get an idea how healthier families function.
 Possibly a minister or schoolteacher cared about her.  

     Whatever happened, Becky held onto her faith
in people.  For a painfully short time, she can reach Henry.
You get a glimpse at what Henry could have been, had he gotten any
love, years before.  Those few seconds when Becky is ready to
make love…you can read many possibilities in Henry’s eyes.  
 

     One is pure fear—he’s never associated sex
before with anything but pain.  Second: him not
understanding; he’s trying to get the faintest idea what
it’s like to be intimate with a woman….one who’s never been
unkind, never hurt him.  Third, saddest, a glimmer of hope
that he might experience closeness without getting hurt.  

     Seeing Henry’s vulnerability might make you
care about him more than Dolarhyde or Lecter (and no knock on the
great actors who played them).

     Michael Rooker  (Henry), was an unknown
then, except to people who had seen him onstage in Chicago.
 He has done excellent work ever since (Sea of Love, Rosewood,
Music Box, many others) but his performance here
equals any of those.

Michael Rooker as Henry

     A scene much earlier hints too that Henry is
more than just pure killing machine.  You can’t tell what it
proves.  But it may cause you to pray for Henry’s redemption.

     In Silence, FBI agent
Starling describes the killer this way:  “…he’s getting a
real taste for it.”  This could describe Otis as well. All he
needs is a few small pushes from Henry to join him in
killing.

 

 

Otis (Tom Towles)—a mean, sleazy outer shell…masking even
worse

     Henry is happy to explain how he has avoided
being caught.  He takes for granted that Otis shares his
value for human life—just slightly more than zero.

     The two men break into a comfortable suburban
home.  A husband and wife present; they tie the husband up,
leaving him lying on the floor; he can’t look away. 

     Henry has usually done his killings quickly.
 Now he watches as Otis, in no hurry, roughs up the wife,
tearing off her blouse and bra…enjoying it.  Their son comes
home, interrupting them for a second before Henry simply snaps his
neck.  Another quick, cold kill.  The husband manages to
kick Henry; Henry stabs him repeatedly.

     You know for sure, Otis wants to rape the
wife.   Henry makes it clear to Otis, absolutely not. Otis is
not about to confront him. 

     This scene may remind you of a similar one in
A Clockwork Orange.

     The film styles look incredibly different…no
big surprise.  What the scenes have in common are home
invaders with no sense of human life…these families are no more
than fleas to them.  You don’t want to watch what
Otis does to this woman.  You knew it would be ugly.  

     Some therapists who work with hardened
criminals say they look for a point where the criminals draw a
line.   Some say they will not molest a child, for example,
or kill an elderly person.  An attitude like this may
indicate that they can eventually  reach this person, hard as
that may be.

     Maybe this is why you may cling to hope for
Henry, even as you call yourself a fool for feeling that
way.  Rape is probably something he suffered himself.
 Knowing this makes his actions that much more powerful.

     You don’t want to remind yourself it’s already
too late for Henry.  He has taken so many lives already.

     For the record, I would never want a real
Henry out walking the streets.  He is simply existing in
another place from most of us—Killing is a non-issue.

     Still.  Perhaps this is why we find
ourselves praying for him, even while we feel self-contempt for
our prayers. The more we search for signs of good in Henry, the
more we do it for ourselves.

     Audition begins as a
quiet, thoughtful character study.  You may be reminded of
Ordinary People, the under-rated late-60’s drama
Rachel, Rachel, even a serious variation on
Sleepless in Seattle.  Each with its story
of someone trying to make a connection.

     It ends with the worst violence most of us
ever experienced.  At several premieres, much of the audience
walked out on this scene.  It would be a shame if people
experienced Audition only as a schlocky
exploitation movie.  Or if it angered viewers, unable to
accept this much violence—calling it “unjustified,” for
example.  In condemning the movie they would be missing
the many powerful themes that
Audition explores.  Less violent themes but
equally painful.  Only the lonely know.

     The day after I watched
Audition, a suburban man shot and killed three
women in a health club.  His blog was on the Internet by
suppertime; full of loneliness, loneliness fermenting to intense
pain; pain and hatred.   Anyone with any imagination can
free-associate; think of movies, novels, news stories, songs, even
episodes of TV shows sharing these same themes.   

     The excellent recent drama
Little Children; The quiet horror of
child-molester Ronnie’s disastrous blind date.  

    
Taxi Driver.  Play Misty for Me.  Eleanor
Rigby
with its unanswered question; “All the lonely people/Where
do they all come from?”   

    Okay.  What are these major themes overshadowed
by the violence to come?  First of all:  When two needy
people do find each other, how will they cope with the
baggage the other one carries? 

    What has this new person been doing till now to
survive their loneliness?  For many, it’s a scary
question.  We want to ask, but desperately fear the
answer.  To me, this question of baggage is such a
universal one that it continues to fascinate us; intrigue us,
mystify us, frighten us.  

   A basic plot summary is overdue.  Okay. 
The story seems straightforward enough…at least at first. 
You watch Aoyama lose his young wife to illness.  Clearly the
marriage was happy, and the couple had been good parents to their
young son, Shikehiko. 

    Seven years pass.  Shikehiko is now a teenager,
shy, good- hearted, making the adjustment.  Watching his son
grow increasingly independent, Aoyama focuses on his own
loneliness. He tells Yoshikawa, his buddy at work, that he feels
too old to re-enter the dating scene.  

   Yoshikawa’s plan is simple but ingenious.  The
two men can stage an audition for a TV-movie; both are executives
for a major TV network.  Later on they’ll tell the women
about financial problems; that the movie probably will never be
produced.  But Aoyama will get an “accidental” opportunity to
meet an attractive, talented young woman. 

   Aoyama feels guilty about the deception.  But
loneliness can make you do things you don’t feel right
about.  His first job; narrow down several dozen resumes to
30.   

     This scene reveals much more than it
appears.  I may be examining it under a microscope, but I
feel this is warranted.  One resume makes a deep
impression.  The woman’s name is Asami.  Her resume
reveals sadness, a willingness to experience disappointment and
still make a new start, much vulnerability, sensitivity, and a
strong hint of something else which attracts him: neediness.

   But be fair.   He is not searching so much for
someone in need of him as someone able to identify with
the pain he has experienced.   Later on, he will
understand more about the power he holds by simply being a man and
a TV producer.   For the moment, he is swept up in the
possibility of his first romance in years.  

   In Asami, he senses a woman able to see past money,
power and status.  Someone with a life shaped by dreams and
deep disappointment; the way he sees himself.  He respects
Asami’s awareness and courage.

    Is his view of Asami more his own projection than
the person she really is?  Probably.  One way the movie
hooks us; its use of sad, beautiful music as Aoyama finds Asami’s
resume and devours it.  Like Aoyama, we want his projection
to be true. 

    The women who come are poised, attractive,
confident,  but ooze a superficial quality, almost
emptiness.  By the time Asami shows up, Aoyama is seeing what
he wants to see.

   

    Asami waiting her turn

     Two themes.  First, Aoyama is moving
ahead too fast. Second, he is missing some warning signs, some
small, some real creepy.

   Many of us know how he feels.  You avoid making
The Ten Worst First Date Turn-offs; things go according to
plan.  Aoyama phones Asami, identifying himself as “Producer
Aoyama.”  (To avoid being too informal, or to underline his
status?)  Whichever, he makes a date and is delighted.  

   Moments later, Yoshikawa calls, telling him that none
of Asami’s references check out.  We tell ourselves that
Yoshikawa is a cynic, perhaps jealous.  But we get a glimpse
of something that Aoyama doesn’t.

   Asami’s apartment.  A telephone lies on the
floor; it appears to dominate the room.  She looks like she
is camped out next to her phone, sleeping near it, like a lost
hiker in sub-zero weather, whose only lifeline is a tiny campfire
she must protect at all costs.

    A large cloth sack lies close by, on the
floor.  When the phone rings (not a state-of-the-art buzz or
tacky melody, but a loud, old-fashioned ring)…we watch
the bag jump. 

   Secrets Aoyama does not know

     And yet the dates go the way we hoped. 
Asami has a brief, fairly convincing explanation about her
references—she never stammers, or freezes.  The music changes
again; it actually may remind you of the romantic 60’s movie
A Man and a Woman.  When Aoyama tells her
the movie has been put on hold, Asami takes the news in stride; no
signs of irrational anger.  She says she is still glad they
met. 

 
Aoyama’s personal tragedy helps him to sympathize with the
disappointments in Asami’s life

     Although Aoyama’s plan to propose marriage to
Asami seems too scripted, not spontaneous enough, we can’t fault
him much—we may be more like him than we admit.  He takes her
to a seaside resort, cold, formal, yet beautiful too.

   Nothing comes without a price.  Love, one of
life’s treasures, comes with an especially high price. 
Aoyama abruptly finds his scripting won’t change reality.  

   Asami takes off all her clothes, gets into bed, asks
him to look at her.   One of her thighs has deep scars; she
tells him they are from serious burns she got in childhood. 
Quietly, she says to him, “Love me, only.  Only me.”  In
an indirect way, she refers to “others” who failed to keep
promises to her.

   You may remember the old thriller
Play Misty for Me.   How the insane Evelyn
(Jessica Walter) twists a line of poetry from Edgar Allan Poe’s
beautiful Annabelle Lee (“And this maiden/she
lived with no other thought/than to love, and be loved by me.”)
into a death threat.   

     The same themes…what kind of baggage she
carries, what has it done to her. The injury that ended her dreams
of dancing, possible physical abuse, emotional abuse…who knows
what else. All part of her.  Can she  look at the man
who loves her now, and not see all the faces of those
who’ve hurt her? 

   Aoyama is ready to take the whole risk.  He gets
into bed; they make love.  

   It’s here that Audition leaves
Ordinary People territory and heads into
horror-movie land.  Aoyama begins to leave his conventional
world behind, forced into wilderness better left to Bruce Willis
or Tom Cruise.  Dazed, he wakes to a phone call telling him
Asami has checked out.  He realizes he has never even known
her address.    

   Already he knows that most of her resume only yields
dead ends.  But other names she mentioned lead him to strange
places.  A ballet academy, now shut down, lights turned
off.  A man plays the piano, his smile mean,
borderline-sinister.  Suggestions that he was the one who
scarred Asami.  He tells Aoyama, “Go home.” 

   Shaken, Aoyama returns to the safety of his house,
and seeks refuge in whiskey.   His past, secure world has
suddenly vaporized.  He re-lives that first date with Asami.
 

   He had asked about her family…and had gotten bland,
reassuring answers.  This time, her words are danger signs:
her parents divorced, forcing her to live with an uncle and aunt
who abused her physically. Ballet became her only salvation. 

   A weird sex fantasy.  But more terrifying—Aoyama
finds himself on the floor of Asami’s apartment…next to the
sack.  You need to see this for yourself.

     Worse is to come. Aoyama on his apartment
floor, paralyzed.  In the hallway, his dog lies dead.  
Asami comes in, dressed in black leather.  She tells Aoyama
he is paralyzed but fully able to feel pain.  She begins
torturing him.  Never have we seen her face so alive.

   In the midst of all this, we might be asking, “But
why him?  He’s been such a nice guy.”  The
obvious answer (not that there aren’t more)—we want to believe
we are like Aoyama.  

   Of course, there are people who frankly admit, “I’m
just looking for pussy (or cock).”

   But they are the exceptions.  We want to think
we’re good, decent people, and  seeing Aoyama  get
tortured, it hits us that much harder.

     Again, many walked out on this scene. 
Worse, Asami hints that she knows Aoyama’s son will be home
soon—and he’s next.

   Aoyama is already badly injured when he suddenly
wakes—back in the hotel bed with Asami.  She sleeps
peacefully, her face beautiful.  Aoyama first looks to see if
his injuries are real.  He sees none…but still un-nerved,
stumbles into the bathroom to splash his face.

   Suddenly Asami stands behind him, asking if he is all
right. A subtle difference, an Asami you haven’t seen
before.  Not the monster in black leather, not the rather
fragile woman he dated.  But a real adult, with real
feelings.  

   She tells him she will answer his proposal; “I
accept.”  He’s so devastated he literally doesn’t know what
she’s talking about (marriage).  

   “It’s like a dream.  I’m so happy,” she
says.  But possibly, something in him has abruptly
changed.  A wall between them.

   Back to the torture scene.  (The movie never
explains these transitions.) Aoyama’s son walks in; Asami does her
best to cripple him.  He runs.  I won’t ruin the ending.

   One critic’s bizarre, yet strangely convincing take
on Audition:  Except for the scene where
Aoyama wakes up with Asami and looks in panic to see if he’s
injured; everything else following the sex scene was his
dream, including all the torture.  In other words, the scenes
where he wakes up and walks into the bathroom were the exceptions,
the only scenes not part of his dream.

   But in the larger picture, exactly
what(and when) is a dream is not what counts.   What
counts is what we all know…that people get hurt, and may hurt
someone else, in proportion to that hurt.   And we may not
see far enough into someone we think we love.   

    Think of the Elton John song,
Someone Saved My life Tonight; that bleak
snapshot of living with the “princess perched on her electric
chair.”  No one wants to be the heartless one, the one who
abandons someone who loves them.  But how painful will it be
to stay?

   Audition crystallizes that ultimate
nightmare, the absolute worst outcome.  We sit devastated,
asking ourselves who the real Asami was.  The subdued,
mysterious woman during the dates?  The grinning serial
killer in black leather?  Or perhaps the woman with the kind
voice and face who asks Aoyama if he is all right, as he stares in
the mirror trying to forget his nightmare?  We just don’t
know.

   The real Asami…or possibly only a bad dream

     Audition’s incredible power
lies in what we do know; that so many traumatized
children grow up, eventually find someone to love them. 
 

   Only the one who loves them may find they can’t be
fixed.  Some will find a path out of the pain that cut them
so deeply.  Plenty will not.  You say to yourself, my
heart is a good heart…like Aoyama’s.  

     But who have you given your heart to?  

  That is the question that terrifies.  Forget the
question of what is a dream.  The real terror, either way, is
looking deep into someone else’s heart.

   

     You watch, helpless, as a woman transforms
into a mass murderer. You can read her thoughts…it doesn’t take a
mind reader: People are going to grind you into the dirt, she
thinks. They have done it; they will keep _on _doing it…unless you
bite back the way they bit you…over and over and over again. 

      If this sounds like a vision of pure Hell,
you are pretty close to the mark. Isolated communities sometimes
turn more extreme, less stabilized by outside forces. On this
Korean island, the woman feels it…every waking moment. Those
normalizing forces have disappeared, at least gone into the
distance. Not that her family lives in poverty–they have enough of
the basics. But her husband’s rage–and abuse…is steadily growing
worse. And his family all backs him up, unconditionally. 

      This woman Bok-nam, continues to dream of
someone rescuing her..But none of the occasional visitors to the
island offers any help. That leaves one old friend, Hae-won, she
is still confident might help her.When Hae-won comes to visit,
after years of being away, Bok-nam’s hopes go sky-high. 

A WRONG IMPRESSION; BOK-NAM BELIEVES HAE-WON IS BACK TO RESCUE HER
     

But Hae-won was never really a friend,
anyone’s friend–Bok-nam has resisted this truth, painted a
rosey-colored picture over it. When Hae-won turns out to be the
selfish, passive woman she always was, Bok-nam begins to give in
to the darkest, savage parts of herself. Not only are her prayers
unanswered,they were mocked. Life not only remained the same; it
turned far worse. God, or the Universe, or karma, has turned her
life to pure misery–and she will no longer be silent and accept
it. 

HAE-WON WITH YEON-HEE      

People who go to movies for blood-spattered walls and faces will
love this movie…but that doesn’t make it garbage. These characters
are not teenagers, talking about high school bullshit, Internet
gossip and clothes, till some psychopath begins murdering them.
Not even close. Even though you don’t know these actors, you
probably will feel you know these _people, _the dreams they
have given up, the dreams they still hold on to. 

      You even empathize with Hae-won, when you
first meet her–unwilling to take the chance of testifying against
some gangsters from her neighborhood. The low-level gangsters make
it clear–you do this, we will find ways to hurt you. They are
deadly serious, you can see it in their faces. It is simple to
watch the movie, tell yourself, What a coward. But in real life,
it is easy to rationalize when it is you having to pick
them out of a line-up. Of course, the police tell her, We’ll take
good care of you…but they don’t inspire any faith. The huge
capitol city of Seoul has such a feeling of desperation you can
taste it…like New York City in the late 70’s. 

      Burn-out, at a high pressure job, and with
Seoul in general, is why Hae-won visits the island (she spent time
there as a girl, with her grandparents.) Seeing Bok-nam never
figured into her decision. Realizing this is a major factor in
Bok-nam turning to violence. Many of us might re-wind a story line
in our memory–going backwards from where a character kills for the
first time. It can be heartbreaking to realize how different their
life could have been…if they had made other decisions. 

      To give one example, watch Aileen Wuornos
(Charlize Theron–brilliant) in Monster. Aileen is
unmistakably angry and bitter; she would need a lot of time to
describe all the abuse she suffered till now. Yet she still has
not written off everyone as her enemy. You sense the dreams she
held onto–a loving one-to-one relationship, a job that pays the
rent, a home to share with a special someone. 

      The scene where she believes she has taken
her first step towards that, in her friendship with Selby
(Christina Ricci) is both unexpected and devastating. They make
out, blissful, oblivious to the un-romantic ambience outside a
bowling alley, while the Journey song
Don’t Stop Believing blasts out its beacon of escaping two
ugly lives for a new one… fulfillment…of finding our destiny.
Before and after this–realistic scenes showing clearly how
unlikely Aileen’s dreams are. But that love scene is realistic
too…you won’t forget it, even while you watch her life turn to
shit. 

      Bok-nam held on to some dreams too, for
years. The island never had many people; now, less than a dozen
remain. Bok-nam’s husband, Man-Jong, believes he was kind and
self-sacrificing to marry her. She had a daughter from a previous
relationship, yet he took both of them in. In addition, he feels
she has always been cold to him…ungrateful…for her, sex is a chore
at best. All he asked of her was work as hard as was realistic in
this situation–four other women on the island, all of them old.
How could he expect any less? 

      Man-jong is not someone to let people get the
better of him, especially not a worthless wife. That need to stay
top dog is probably the main cause of Bok-nam’s next horror. She
realizes that Man-jong is molesting her daughter. Her husband’s
response–what if I am, bitch? You have nothing to say about what I
do. 

      MAN AND CHILD

     Bok-nam’s response is a testament to her
character. She tells Hae-won; if you can’t get me off this island,
at least let my daughter escape. The movie begins in the brutal
world of the city–plunging you into Hae-won’s life first. One
advantage in this– you meet Bok-nam for the first time when
Hae-won reaches the island, not before. You experience Bok-nam;
her humanity surviving her life’s brutality. She doesn’t have to
tell you, you can see it. Her happiness in being with her old
friend, in showing her around the island, introducing Hae-won to
her daughter, Yeon-hee, in taking her to places they knew as
girls. 

      At one of those places, they lie soaked,
serene a brief moment in a tiny spring hidden in forest. Bok-nam
gently reaches out and touches Hae-won’s breast.  Hae-won,
surprised, but not furious, tells her to stop. 

     Is Bok-nam a lesbian? No reason to think not,
but I saw this scene differently. I think Bok-nam is overcome by
how much she missed their childhood, and in imagining the freedom
in her future—away from this stifling place. Of discovering her
own sexuality—whatever that might be. She knows so little
about the big city she feels that anything there is
possible. 

     Hae-won barely gives one word of encouragement
about Bok-nam leaving with her. But Man-jong is threatened
nevertheless by the change in his wife–ready to show he is still
in charge. A hooker arrives by boat; Man-jong has sex with her in
the house. Another time, you watch him have sex with
Bok-nam…hardly different from rape. He plays a cruel joke on his
wife while she is getting honey from a beehive. She is stung
several times. His response: put some bean paste on those stings;
we need more honey for the guy on the boat tomorrow. 

BOK-NAM TAKES THE IMPACT OF MAN-JONG TRYING TO SHOW HIS DOMINANCE

     And the four old women, always watching,
always ready to back him up in any argument, period. The brutality
in Man-jong trickles directly down to them. The toughest, known as
Auntie, is always around, with something to say to Bok-nam.
Everything is Bok-nam’s fault. She walks up to Bok-nam when the
hooker is inside her house, asks her simply, “How can you sit
here, listening to her sucking your husband’s cock?” In other
words–get out of here; make yourself useful. Another time, Auntie
finds Hae-won talking to Bok-nam’s daughter. She tells her to get
off this island, that Yeon-hee is not Man-jong’s biological
daughter. In other words: so what’s your problem, bitch? 

AUNTIE

     The real tragedy begins when Bok-nam tries to
escape with her daughter on the next boat out. She has made no
plans with Hae-won; she has already lost faith in her. Man-jong is
there–no way he will let them leave…countless reasons. And the
surest way to convince them–to save face with Hae-won and the old
ladies watching–is violence. 

      But nothing goes according to plan. Yeon-hee
watches him beat her mother, and bites him on the leg. He pushes
her away, hard, her head hits a rock. She is dead. No surprises
when the authorities show up–Man-jong has his story ready and the
old ladies all back him up. Hae-won says nothing. Auntie tells the
investigator right off–don’t bother listening to anything Bok-nam
tells you, she’s crazy. The other women nod in agreement. Not long
after, Man-jong and his brother take a boat to the mainland; all
this uproar stressed them out; they need recreation. 

 NOTHING LEFT TO LOSE NOW

     One thing that Man-jong never considered, due
to his heartlessness. With Yeon-hee dead, Bok-nam has nothing left
to lose–life has at last become truly unbearable. Bok-nam working
non-stop under a blinding sun while the old women complain what a
poor laborer she is. Bok-nam finally stops, takes a long look into
the bright sky, then walks deliberately over to them. Starting
with the weakest, the quietest, she cuts their throats with a
sharpened scythe. The third one she kills was beautiful once…and
always there to back Auntie up. She begs for mercy–gets
none. 

      Auntie runs.
Night. Auntie waits deep in the woods with a scythe of her own.
Like me, you may have given Bok-nam only a 50/50 chance–pictured
the old lady waiting in ambush. But next morning, Auntie returns
to the house, shaking uncontrollably. As expected, Hae-won
watches, does nothing. Bok-nam slaps Hae-won’s face, sees Auntie
and calmly starts to follow her. Auntie reaches the edge of a
cliff. In the distance a boat approaching, carrying Man-jong. But
instead of running, Auntie tells Bok-nam, “I”m going with them,”
and jumps off the cliff. “She should have worn her glasses,”
Bok-nam says to herself.      

     Incredibly, the worst violence is still to
come. No major spoilers. But the vicious humor in Bok-nam’s
sarcasm is a sign of things to come. You realize–she has crossed
the whole spectrum…from the ecstatic woman so full of hope when
Hae-won showed up. Now–do _not _get in her way. You are reminded
again of the Holocaust survivor who was asked, “What was the worst
thing they did to you?” The answer is chilling: “They made us like
them.”

 ************************************************************
(SMALL SPOILERS AHEAD) 

     Yet after kicking the shit out of you, the
movie leaves you with grains of hope. Back home in Seoul again,
Hae-won gets one last chance to testify against the same
gangsters. Risking her life, she decides to do the right thing.
    She finally has learned the price you pay for
staying silent.
She will be unable to forget the violence she witnessed…but at
last, witnessing it has made a difference, it changed her. 

     The horror she experienced has broken through
the shell she built around herself.
She realizes now she was never safe–none of us can achieve that,
whatever gated community we take ourselves and our families to. We
may improve our odds of avoiding violence, true, but “staying out
of it, not getting involved” guarantees us nothing.

     Most of the movies I write about, that move
me– tend to be unique. But even among those,
Peeping Tom is a singular experience…one that
will leave you with nagging questions. It also will leave you
feeling slimy… and that is no accident.

Peeping Tom came out at the
wrong time and place—England, 1959. Its screenwriter Leo Marks and
director Michael Powell realized that making it was a gamble. They
paid a heavy price, especially Powell. His directing career in
England (long and distinguished) was all but finished.

Movie critics in England were highly
offended—one actually walked up to Marks after the disastrous
premiere and warned him never to do anything like this again.
Clearly, critics felt that material like this has no place in
film.

Movies about killers will cut deeper if they
make you empathize with the psycho character.
Peeping Tom does this well…maybe too well.
Another major reason critics attacked it so viciously.

Abuse in your family begets more abuse. That’s
clearly a theme in Peeping Tom. The abuse Mark
(the title peeping tom) got from his father has turned him into a
killer. Only a tiny part of Mark can express his need to be loved.

You see again and again that he never learned
how to love. Abuse is another story—Mark could write a book about
it.

.

Mark’s secret life–before Helen

Another theme you see clearly—identifying with
the oppressor. Mark is carrying on his father’s abuse.

Mark’s father was a scientist; his field of
interest the reaction to fear. He wrote several books on the
subject; knew it intimately. Hard as it is to believe, his
research centered on Mark. His father taking notes, making
observations, recording Mark’s terror on film.

Now Mark is grown up, his father dead. But he
is still obsessed with people’s reaction to fear—any sort of fear.
His ultimate compulsion–photograph women experiencing the most
frightening moment of their lives—then dying.

That compulsion led him to build his murder
weapon. A tripod for an older 16 millimeter movie camera
(ironically, a gift from his father) with one leg like a
switchblade. A leg that can snap straight out, with razor-sharp
metal at its far end. Mark lives for the moments he can film
women—as they see the danger first, then understand they are about
to die.

You realize right away that Mark is a killer.
But Peeping Tom would be creepy even if he had
never killed—he has the classic behaviors that get you sent to
prison. Staring into people’s windows, stopping to watch couples
embrace, listening to conversations in rooms wired for sound. Mark
has done all of that. I think many of us have felt similar urges
during periods of depression, periods of low self-esteem.

Today, people hear a lot of psychology on TV,
radio, the internet. The 1950’s were a different story.

That is one reason this movie felt so
offensive when it came out. Most of us then did not have those
insights. We felt Peeping Tom accused us of
perversions, of vile desires at least. That was just what Powell
and Marks wanted.

Early in Peeping Tom, Mark
goes into work. A porno studio behind the front of a
respectable-looking tobacco and newspaper shop. The owner dressed
conservatively, like a banker or stockbroker. An older gentleman
comes in, asking for two traditional daily papers. Then
hesitantly, he asks for “views”—British slang for dirty pictures.
Carefully, the owner shows him what he has. The man is thrilled;
he even forgets his newspapers.

Not only does the owner make a subtle but
sleazy remark: “Well he won’t be doing the crossword tonight,” but
Powell cast a familiar, sympathetic actor as the customer. A man
British audiences felt comfortable with.

You have already seen Mark murder a hooker the
night before. Those scenes may make you feel creepy yourself, as
much disgusted as you feel scared.

The street is quiet at night. An older whore,
her glamorous days behind her. Few dreams left. “It’ll be two
quid,” she tells Mark with no expression. He doesn’t say a word,
but no surprise on her part. The last things she expects are
emotion, sentiment. She starts to undress like she has every other
time. Same shit different day.

But she sees something that frightens her,
something more frightening as Mark gets closer… Cut to a
projector, film rolling.

A story like this can have an added sting if
it includes a truly goodhearted character, able to see something
good in the monster. Helen Stephens (Anna Massey) is that
character. We hope for a miracle; that she can transform Mark.

But you know it is already too late. I don’t
know if they used the term “serial killer” then but Mark is
already through that door. Sadder still, Helen senses something
kind in Mark– not all her imagination. When you first meet her,
she seems shallow, good manners and no more. But Helen is more
perceptive than she appears. You realize that fast. She wants
something better for Mark.

She has lived in the same building as Mark for
years, barely exchanging a word. People have warned her that he
stares into her window. She bumps into him the night of her
birthday and offers him a slice of cake. He is unwilling to join
her party but she comes up to his apartment with the cake. To our
surprise, he invites her in.

He tells Helen his father had owned this
building once; he is dead now.

Helen has a naïve side, but she has surprising
self-confidence; a strong sense of who she is. Without an
invitation she enters his darkroom—never dreaming this is the home
of Mark’s secret life. She is impressed that Mark is in the film
business. Everywhere she looks she sees movie film but Mark says
he doesn’t know what to show her. (Ironic. As the old cliché goes,
‘that’s the understatement of the year.’)

She tells Mark to show her whatever he was
watching before.

Old movie footage. A young boy sleeping, then
woken suddenly by bright lights in his face. Mark tells her the
boy is him. His father shot the film. Helen actually jumps at what
she sees next; a large lizard dropped directly onto the boy’s
blanket, only inches from his face. Not a huge species but
terrifying from the boy’s point of view—so sudden, so close.

Most of us know a few kids–either gifted
athletes or just used to springing into action at a moment’s
notice. Who could flick the blanket like lightning and send the
lizard to the floor. But kids like that are the exceptions; young
Mark lies paralyzed with terror.

Radically different reactions to the same film; Helen feels
disgust and anger; Mark–much more complicated

You see a lot happening at once. Helen
watches with horror and disgust. Meanwhile Mark has his camera out
and begins filming her face. No doubt he is turned on by her
expression. It’s too good not to record. He shines bright
light into her face too, though she barely notices.

Helen is angry but not at Mark, angry about
the film. The child abuse and Mark’s lack of emotion. She speaks
for us; you got abused. (She never realizes how turned-on he is,
as many of us might not, given the impact of the film.)

A strange moment. She may be naïve, but she is
totally on target. What the boy experienced is every bit as bad as she thinks.

Meanwhile Mark caresses his camera—he looks
like he’s about to come; so excited, so out of breath he can
barely speak. “What was he trying to do to you?” Helen asks. The
old film goes on; Mark at his mother’s deathbed, then watching an
attractive woman stepping onto a beach—a woman his father married
soon afterward.

An intense turn-on that only Mark understands

Finally Helen says, let’s get out of here. Mark doesn’t scare her;
it is this film that he shows her so casually.

Mark’s reaction is strange. It’s not that he
shares Helen’s anger but keeps denying it. Anger simply doesn’t
seem part of his make-up. Even when he says he never knew a
moment’s privacy as a child, you don’t hear much emotion. He
doesn’t try to convince her that his father was a great man…or an
abusive man. Just somebody who did what he did.

Mark does say that his father’s research
probably helped a lot of people. But that barely registers with
him; you realize how cut off he is from the world of psychology.
If you don’t know it already, you realize later how absolutely
cold Mark’s father was.

Mark is equally cold; a stranger from normal
relationships; addicted to his obsessions. The rest of his life an
empty shell. Not that what he films is better than sex; it is a
no-contest.

He felt his father had the upper hand while he
was alive. Now, shooting his murders is the only time he has the
upper hand. Now I get to be (the all-powerful) daddy.

If you know the show
Criminal Minds,
you probably remember episodes where the BAU people mention a
killer’s growing confidence. Mark has reached that stage. Besides
his work in porn, Mark has a technical job at a major studio,
working in feature movies. Vivian is an actress with a small part
in the movie he is working on. She is no longer a kid, but still
dreams about getting her big break, especially in musicals.

Mark seems to be someone who could help her
out. Their plan is to use the studio set after everyone else goes
home. Then Mark can shoot some footage of Vivian; perhaps she can
use it to help her career.

You don’t get to know Vivian enough to care
that much about her. Yet these scenes pull you in—in several
different ways.

First, you know Mark is taking a huge chance;
killing where he works. He is breaking the old rule, “Don’t shit
where you eat.” And all his other victims were strangers; if
anything happened to Vivian, Mark is a sure suspect.

Mark is also making a huge jump from the
down-and-out women he has killed before. Vivian may have a small
role in the movie but she projects confidence and self-assurance.
She moves around like she’s saying: here I am, world, just watch
me.

Mark is determined to show her (and himself)
that he is running the show. Before Vivian ever sees him, he snaps
floodlights on, straight into her face, one after the other,
blinding her. Finally he reveals himself—on a platform, looking
down on her.

For a long while, Vivian believes he is
flirting—that this is about, “well let’s see what you’ve got…ifyou’ve got it, leave it all out there.” A playful game of
one-ups-man ship. She has no clue that each time Mark woke in
terror, it started with bright light in his face. Now Mark needs
his own bright lights to give him the feeling of power necessary
to kill.

Powell’s casting of ballerina Moira Shearer
(The Red Shoes) adds to the impact. Shearer plays
the role like someone ready to put everything she has out there.
Someone willing to listen to all Mark’s ideas—to say to him in
effect—tell me your wildest ideas, I’m up for it.

Vivian’s confidence in herself actually makes her more
vulnerable–never suspecting what Mark is feeling

She doesn’t know she is heading straight into
his trap. That it means nothing to him how she dances, what music
she dances to. Mark is miles ahead, adapting his familiar rituals
to this new location. Getting set for the inevitable moment he
longs for. When he says, show me the most intense emotion you can…
and make that emotion fear.

Casting this otherworldly, almost angelic
woman, then having her die this way probably infuriated critics
even more. But perhaps Powell suspected (correctly I think) that
seeing someone with this near-magic aura die this way would jolt
you. To put it simply, it would feel wrong to his audiences. It
definitely struck me that way; like watching Janet Leigh stabbed
to death in Psycho, or hearing that JFK just had his head blown
off.

When Vivian’s body is discovered on the film
set, Mark can no longer fly under the radar. He knows he is on
borrowed time.

More irony; at the same time, Helen’s feelings
for Mark have grown; she is almost in love with him. Helen may
seem hopelessly naïve but a lot of her feelings make sense. She is
a sheltered woman, very close with her blind mother. In addition,
her mother has warned her about Mark—Helen wants to prove her
wrong.

Perhaps Helen believes in fate; it’s not hard
to see how she could have misjudged events. Helen’s day job is
librarian, but she writes children’s books in her spare time. Her
latest is titled The Magic Camera. Helen’s dream
is to publish this book and use photographs instead of drawings in
it. You can understand how she believes that meeting Mark was more
than coincidence—she wants him to contribute the photos she will
use.

It’s an old theme—what could have been. But
everything in Peeping Tom is so powerful: the
acting, direction, dialogue, for example, that you grieve for the
things Mark can never get. A truly goodhearted woman to love him,
as Helen could have. A chance to see his photography create a
joyful, not a lethal, kind of magic. (You ask yourself what
Helen’s book was like, and you imagine true sweetness, not like
Bambi or The Sound of Music, but
more like Maurice Sendak or Eric Carle.) Mark will never get the
chance to experience this sweetness, or find the sweetness buried
under his abuse.

Helen is naïve, but not hopelessly
naïve. Some of the goodness she sees in Mark is real. Watch his
face when he tells Mrs. Stephens he would never photograph
Helen—he’s no liar. Or earlier, when he pulls Helen away from the
camera. Neither woman quite understands him…but you do. Watch his
expression, and the way he steps out the door as he and Helen
leave for their dinner date—the only one they will ever have. He
looks like a happy little boy.

Peeping Tom had the bad luck
to come out about the time of some of Hammer Films’ nastiest
releases,
The Revenge of Frankenstein, The Stranglers of Bombay,
for example. Even worse, it was released by the same company which
had just produced two entertaining but trashy features,
Horrors of the Black Museum and Circus of Horrors.

We all know that movies can be used as escape.
To give just one example, you watch Clint Eastwood tell someone
exactly where to go…then back it up with his fists or his Magnum
.44. Such movies are like a drug.

Perhaps people watching
Peeping Tom then, felt this way. That it told
them, this time, don’t be The Man With no Name or Dirty Harry
Callahan (Eastwood roles). Be Mark instead. Live inside him for an
hour and forty minutes.

Their reaction: What kind of sick invitation
is that? He’s a pervert, for Christ’s sake.    Then
worst of all, you saw and remembered Mark’s kind side, that lets
him spare Helen from harm, as he promised he would. You want to
tell yourself he’s still a sociopath. But you know he is much more
than that.