DAY 26, or making the best of a bad situation
Katasumi: A little bit of prep work for the incoming viewing of Ju-on! Not terribly much to say here, as this plays more like a workshop for a scene in a larger movie, but I'm surprised at how much of the visual design for Kayako was already present and accounted for, and it doesn't hurt that the actress who would go on to play here for several films was already in the role. An interesting genesis, but a bit too meager to leave a lasting impression.
4444444444: Another workshop for The Grudge! This time, we're introduced to Toshio, that little cat-mimicking scamp, who is also pretty much figured out from a visual perspective. I did find this to be stronger than Katasumi, due to the use of sound and more intriguing camerawork to increase the tension before it's revealed who is calling our protagonist, so it deserves some serious consideration. Not amazing, mind you, but this feels more like a complete work rather than a sketch, which goes a long way towards satisfaction.
Genesis: Nacho Cerda's little trilogy concludes in an unsurprisingly low-key manner, befitting of his previous shorts. Here, a sculptor wracked with grief works on his latest piece, only to discover that it's his life's work in a very literal sense. There's some strong horror imagery in this, but what might surprise someone expecting more along the lines of Aftermath is this winds up being a kind of a tragic romance. There is certainly blood here, but it never attempts to gross you out as the tables turn between creator and object, focusing much more on the anguish of the transformations, both physically and emotionally, and the tenderness applied to the subject matter makes for a far more palatable experience all around. Cerda's technical prowess is on fully display yet again, and he even restrains himself a bit on the music front by keeping the expected famous classical piece for the credit roll, but his handling of the material here shows a side that I don't think I was quite prepared for, with the tragedy here carrying on a bittersweet taste by the end that has quite the punch. If it stumbles anywhere, I did find the makeup for the petrification very underwhelming that makes it hard to believe the process visually (Pep Tosar definitely does his best with his performance, though), but that's not enough to derail the film. I do find myself more impressed by Aftermath, if only because it has such sterner content to have to navigate for something remotely watchable, but there's a quiet grace to this one that makes this just as hard to shake. For the reputation that he had already cultivated, it was quite refreshing to see Cerda produce something that is pleasant.
Outer Space: Not being familiar with The Entity (maybe another marathon...), some of the context was a bit lost on me in the sense of not being familiar with the footage itself. That may not be important, though, as what's being done to the footage is of the keenest interest. It's almost indescribable what happens here from a visual standpoint, but if I had to make my own guess, this is as if a ghost managed to find a way to scare a woman that existed in an infinite number of realities all at once, and somehow created a cascade effect in which the very nature of all realities began to recoil in fear simultaneously and began collapsing. An unhelpful observation to most, I'm sure, but I don't think any observation can sum up the effect that's being done here. This is certainly a feat of editing skills to be able to take footage from a film and do something this extraordinary, if not necessarily the kind of film that you can easily recommend as this is as pure an experiment as experimental film can get. A film I can safely say is unlike any other out there.
27: a bad age to die at and the number of films left
I had the full intention of watching a feature-length film today (The Nameless, for anyone following along), but technical difficulties have ensued and I'm at a bit of a loss as to how to proceed with it. The marathon will go on regardless, but it's not often where a film just doesn't want to cooperate with me.
