Author Archives: Bob Evans

A Strange Cinematic Love: Planet of the Vampires

 

When I was about 12 or 13 on the local late-night horror show I saw a movie that left a deep and lasting impression Mario Bava’s Planet of the Vampires.

PoV is a science-fiction horror that may have very well influenced Dan O’Bannon when he conceived of his classic scrip Alien. Adapted from a short story “A night of 21 Hours” (in Italy with the more apt title Terror in Space) the movie is an Italian/Spanish co-production with an international cast fronted by American actor Barry Sullivan. Two space craft, the Galliot and the Argos arrive at an unexplored world following a signal that may be of intelligent origin. Attempting to land the Argos nearly crashes and after a brief fugue state where the crew try to murder each other bare-handed they begin a search for the missing Galliot. Strange occurrences and lights plague the Argos’ crew, and they find that the perpetually fog shrouded planet harbors a lethal secret.

Planet of the Vampires lacked a decent budget and quite ironically vampires. The lethal secret of the planet has nothing at all to do with undead corpses feeding upon the blood of the living which is why the Italian title is so much more fitting. However even with a limited budget Bava, who was a master of in-camera special effects, produced a colorful, visually striking, and engaging piece of cinema. Sullivan is reported to have said that while on set everything looked sparse and cheap, and he was later stunned by how it appeared on screen. The film has only a couple of optical effects with everything else, including the ship’s telescreen communications before performed live in set and captured in camera. The cast deals with the multilingual nature of the international production well enough with only a few scenes where it was clear that the various cast did not under the lines being spoken by each other. (This sort of production was common in Italy at the time where English, French, Spanish, and Italian speakers would deliver their lines in their own languages with dubbing for various markets smoothing over the final product.)

Two elements of the story fixed in my mind over the decades. One, the ending which when seen becomes very obvious as to why it sticks and the other a very prosaic scene where Sullivan’s commander comments that their last-minute landing turned from a crash into an Academy perfect one. An observation that isn’t special but lodged deep into my memory.

Planet of the Vampires is not great cinema but it is fun and quite stylish.

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Stop Calling Frankenstein Science Fiction

 

It may be heretical of me, but I do not consider the 1818 novel Frankenstein: or the Modern Prometheus by Mary Shelley to be a work of science fiction.

That is not to take anything away from this groundbreaking, culturally impactful, piece of art. Shelley laid out a horror novel that possesses deep philosophical themes on the nature of humanity and responsibility. However, in my opinion it is not science fiction.

Science Fiction is the genre of art that looks at the current scientific and technological state of the world, extrapolates from that starting position along possible advances and uses that extrapolation to explore themes, stories, and plots of a possible future. Frankenstein for all its inventions does not do that.

Shelley makes no attempt in the novel to elaborate on the scientific process that leads to the creature’s creation. There is absolutely no, ‘because we have this bit of technology or science, we might have this thing in the future’ which is the beating heart of SF. The creation process used by the titular character is described in a manner that is more akin to sorcery than science. Mary Shelley was not interested in the process that might leads a scientist to the creation of life, and that process is science fiction, but rather her interest spring from the deep and troubling moral questions raised by the concept. Questions that are so profound as science and technology reach heights unimagined we find ourselves grappling with the same issues she raised. There is no doubting her brilliance. But she did not extrapolate and that is what separates, genre-wise, her work from that of Wells and Vern. Philosophically Wells tried to keep up with her, but she beat him on that front handily and Vern always seemed more concerned with the engineering than the ethics. All three giants were critical in laying out thematic and conventions that we now accept as science-fiction by Shelley did not invent the genre.

 

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Stolen Infirmity

 

If you follow politics, you are likely familiar with the concept of Stolen Valor where someone claims a military history or deeds that are untrue. They served in combat when in reality they never left the base admin offices and so on.

Hollywood, the most creative place on Earth, has rebooted and reimagined the concept and created what I’m calling Stolen Infirmity.

Over the least several decades there has been a general awakening in American culture to be more supportive, sympathetic, and understanding of people suffering from addictions, disorders, and past trauma. This is a good thing and these people need our attention and our compassion.

However, individuals accused of evil acts are stealing and claiming infirmities as a shield against any and all responsibility for their heinous actions.

People in actual therapy for these serious issues take responsibility for their behavior, for the harm that they have done to others, for their actions but these celebrities do just the opposite. The actions are not their fault but a result of their condition, their drinking, their sex addiction, certainly not themselves.

You can see this on full display in the recent interview where once beloved geek icon Joss Wheadon attempts to rehab his reputation. Despite numerous accusations from numerous people from nearly every production he has led. Somehow none of this true, somehow none of this is hisfault. Somehow, it’s all down to his trauma, and that actors somehow can’t understand his words.

An entire field of bulls would stink as badly.

 

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The Power of Mystery

When an audience or reader has a deficit of information one of two possibilities is likely. They may become frustrated and confused, disengaging with the piece or they may become intrigued and start filling in the missing bits from their own imagination.

In 1975’s Jaws, the mechanical shark worked rarely, and the filmmakers were forced to scrap plans that would have shown the beast on screen much more than the final film. With clever tension building techniques they crafted a taunt masterpiece around not seeing the shark until the final act.

In the television series Babylon 5 the Vorlons and Shadows were powerful mysterious being playing at some struggle that stretched over eons. They captivated the imagination and speculation. Then, once their background was explained, these master races were reduced to disappointed children of a cosmic divorce.

Hannibal Lector, pulled from a supporting role in the novel The Silence of the Lambs to a central thematic element in the film adaptation sparked endless fascination now neutered by endless backstory excavations and explanations.

This brings me to Boba Fett.

Fett, ignoring the animated sequence in the Holiday Special, first appeared in Star Wars: The Empires Strikes Back as the laconic bounty hunter that outwitted Han Solo and captured him for Darth Bader and the Empire. Other than showing a cleverness equal to or greater than Solo’s and successfully backtalking to Darth Vader the character did very little and never revealed his face. A perfect combination to create mystery and fascination with exploded almost immediately. The characters casual end in the next film ignited outrage as already a myth had grown up around him.

Now we are treated to a limited series The Book of Boba Fett centered on the character and as he is seen and heard more and more, he has lost nearly all of his mythic standing.

Having watched 3 of seven episodes I can’t say that anything about the character is worthy of his legendary status. As a guest character in The Mandalorian he was able to maintain that air of mystery that supported him as a mythic character. Front and center of his own series, his own story, he cannot remain an unexplained mystery and like Hannibal Lecter he shrinks in stature.

Mystery is a delicate element in storytelling. Use too much and your story if befuddled and confused, reveal too much as is happening here and there is little to entice.

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Trump Didn’t Create GOP Anti-Vaxxers

 

There is a tendency to lay at the feet of the Former President all the ills of the current GOP ignoring the fact that pre-existing rot is what allowed the charlatan to leap to the front of the GOP field in 2015 and take command of the party.

With the COVID-19 pandemic killing over 800,000 Americans a time-travelers from a mere decade ago would be shocked at how virulent the GOP bases is in resisting this literally lifesaving vaccine, but that time traveler would be ignoring the GOP’s history with an anti-vaccine stance.

Human Papillomavirus is responsible for a number of cancers found primarily in women. HPV is often transmitted via sexual intercourse and can lay dormant in a person for decades. In 2006 the first vaccines against HPV reached the market with the promise to save thousands of lives. For the vaccine to be most effective it is best to administer it before any HPV infection dictating the best course is to vaccinate before sexual activity.

Conservatives rebelled. Ignoring the danger to the lives of thousands of women their only concern, and an utterly unfounded one, was vaccinating against a virus that was principally transmitted sexually would encourage promiscuity. To date legislation merely recommending the vaccination has been defeated by GOP forces.

In 2015 as candidates jostled for the GOP presidential nomination, Senator Paul Rand, a doctor for god’s sake, tied vaccination to autism, a thoroughly discredited position. When confronted with video of his statement Paul insisted his words did not mean what they meant suggesting that people should believe him over their lying eyes.

 

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Grab Bag

Grab Bag

 

Here’s a smattering of topics to kick off the week. Forgive me if my thoughts are scattered and a little light but Monday Migraines are less than fun.

Author and Coordinating Judge Dave Farland has died. I never had the pleasure of working directly with Mr. Farland though a number of my writers pals have and none have had a single bad word about the man. He apparently was devoted to helping new writers and that is admirable. His friends and family have my deepest sympathies.

Vulcanic Eruption in the pacific. An undersea volcano near the island of Tonga erupted massively. So much so that tsunami warnings were issued around the entire pacific rim and the eruptions itself was captured and easily visible from orbiting satellites. The video is online and is both awe inspiring and terrifying.

Shudder now has the 3 hours documentary Woodlands dark and Days Bewitched exploring ‘folk horror’ films from around the world. It is an excellent primer on the sub-genre and has put many new films on my ‘want to watch list.’

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The Artistry of Endings

 

A brief and pleasant interaction with professor and author Tananarive Due on Twitter yesterday has me thinking about endings of stories, both prose and film, and art that is required to land on the right one for the tale.

Our interaction had centered on Jordan Peele’s fantastic directorial debut with his horror film Get Out. Peele’s original vision had a much darker ending in mind for Chris, one that was a more likely outcome given the circumstances but when tested audiences rebelled against. A new ending, the one the film was released with was crafted, and the movie was a hit. A similar sequence happened around Emerald Fennell’s 2020 revenger film Promising Young Woman where a less probable victory of sorts is added to the film’s end over a more downbeat conclusion. Again the film is praised and while Promising Young Woman did not see the sort of box office magic Get Outproduced it is a very well respected and an amazing piece of art.

The wrong lesson to take away from these examples if that your story should avoid bitter or tragic endings.

1968’s Night of the Living Dead is famous for its bleak and uncompromising ending. (Spoilers ahead) Ben, the sole survivor of the characters besieged in the farmhouse, at the film’s end cautiously climbs out of the basement as roving bands of deputized citizens clear the area of the walking dead. Seen only at a glimpse through a window one mistakes him for a ghoul and shoots Ben dead.

One could easily imagine an alternate version where the vigilantes rescues Ben rather than kill him and I believed that if that had been released instead the film would be mostly forgotten. It is that futility that is at the heart of the movie and without that final punch the piece loses much of its power.

Invasion of the Body Snatcher played it both ways. The original 1956 film had the framing story with it implicitly hopeful ending added after audience screenings and the 1978 remake took a darker tone with no hope for humanity’s future.

Knowing the right ending for a story is pure art. There are no formulas, charts, graphs, or calculations that can determine correct tone and it is often the critical alchemy that elevates or dooms a piece.

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The Three Genres of My Life

 

On the first day of this year, 2022, I posted a ranking of the twenty films I watched in theaters during 2021.

What I found interesting looking at the listing is that the top three films, Dune, Nightmare Alley, and Last Night in Soho line up perfectly with my three favorite genres, Science-Fiction, Film Noir, and horror.

Of the three two have been favorite genres of mine since childhood. I cannot remember a time when I did not watch SF or horror movies. Bouncing around my head are fragments of films, most likely Hammer Horrors in full bloody color, from early childhood.

Film Noir I only discovered as an adult with my first introduction coming through Sid Foreman’s Introduction to Cinematography course at San Diego City College with my first viewing of The Maltese Falcon. Though honestly my true love of noir films didn’t really take off until Double Indemnity which remains in my mind a platonic ideal for the genre.

There were examples of the other genres in that listing, with superheroes movies sort of filling in for Science-Fiction but sadly nothing else that really nailed film noir like Nightmare Alley. There were other horrors, the strange and unique Lamb and the more conventional but still quite entertaining Last Night in Soho. I am simply pleased that each of my beloved genres scored in the top three slots for the year.

 

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The Hypocrisy of Ian Malcolm

 

Jeff Goldblum, playing mathematician Ian Malcolm in 1993’s Jurassic Park, delivered one of the films most central and memorable monologs as he lectures Hammond on the hubris and dangers of the dinosaur amusement park.

 

 

The problem with scientific power you’ve used is it didn’t require any discipline to attain it. You read what others had done, and you took the next step. You didn’t earn the knowledge yourselves, so you don’t take the responsibility for it.

 

It is also for my money the height of hypocrisy. What Malcolm is describing the process by which science advances. No one reinvents all of the processes, theories, and techniques that came before them All scientists stand on the shoulders of those that came before and if they are lucky add a bit of new knowledge, new understanding for those that come after. Malcolm as a mathematician did not reinvent calculus but learned what others had invented and discovered before adding his own discoveries in the field of chaos.

 

The questions should have Hammond recreated dinosaurs? Should he have proceeded more cautiously before turning it into a park? Are valid important questions but do not give me this crap that the science didn’t require discipline and it was somehow unearned.

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Back to the Spice Mines

 

Last year after I finished my science-fiction murder mystery and sent it out on submission I turned somewhat lazy.

Oh, I wrote detailed outlines for two novels, one a ‘no contact’ SF story where the aliens come to Earth and have nothing to do with humanity and the other a military SF space adventure but despite to large outlines and detailed plotting I did not turn to the pick and shovel work of prose on paper.

That changed this yesterday.

Finally shaking off these damn doldrums I began writing that outline military SF adventure. And it’s not a bad start, nearly 1000 words written on my lunch, flowing easily from brain to fingers to screen. And despite being a vomit draft not received horribly by my writing group.

One thousand words a day is not an unrealistic goal. In fact, it is one I can often exceed, even with the demands of a day-job. Should I maintain this pace the first draft will be complete in late May.

The time for laziness is past, the time of the writing has begun.

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