Show!

I thought that I might as well mention this:

Artwork not mine but diggable all the same.

The Haunted House (pt. 2)

I decided to remain in the dark for as long as I could abide it, hoping that something would happen though not really knowing what it might be.  Since my friend had not lasted more than a day I was thinking that the phenomenon would arise in short order, but as I waited my mind began to wonder if perhaps instead of a nightly occurrence this may be weekly, monthly, yearly, or of a much lengthier stretch of interval.  Being as I had reacted quickly to the idea of this adventure I had spent no time researching to find out if there were any history to be plumbed and so then in that darkness began to doubt whether I would encounter anything at all and my patience for my wait eventually evaporated.  I made my way in the dim light from the windows to the nearest fixture and switched it on.

The house was indeed impressive.  The living room was the centerpiece, taking up nearly half of the entirety of the area of the whole.  Various rooms connected from there, the kitchen and dining area, a large bedroom on the ground floor with ample bathroom attached, and a loft above which seemed to be a favorite for children of previous lodgers and was tempting for me, but I decided that the height of it may prove my undoing if anything did happen.  Instead I decided that my first evening would be spent on the massive and comfortable couch in the living room, being as it was so centrally located and perhaps the best vantage for any odd doings.  Again, due to the lack of details about what had taken place previously with my friend, I did not know where I might need to focus attention and so needed to be ready to cast it about as required.

I made myself a cocktail and sat on that couch and waited for whatever may come.  As time dragged on I felt myself drawn more and more to that view, to the dim grey light struggling through the overcast sky above the reflective, metallic sea.  I knew that before I called it a night I would need to make my way down that cliff to the beach and experience a stroll in the darkness.  I began to regret that I had not had time to check and verify that the way was accessible, or even that there was a way at all.

to be continued...

The Haunted House

When a friend of mine returned from the coast two days early to report that the place he had rented had chased him away, and being that I had been doing next to nothing for a span that I could no longer fathom, I asked him if I might take over his time remaining at what had been at first described as an unbelievably economic palace on a cliff with a stunning view of the ocean.  He was barely able to comprehend my question in his frenetic state, but he eventually handed me the keys and the paper describing the details of the rental.

Now, I do not normally go in for any of the supernatural happenings that supposedly dog many in this world and have certainly never experienced anything of that sort myself in my many years of existence, but I do enjoy a good spook yarn and was willing to invest my attentions to the situation free of any severe skepticisms in hopes of perhaps making my first foray into that realm that I had thus far been denied.

The drive to the coast was uneventful and finding my way was not very difficult what with the map and directions.  The sun was nearly setting as I arrived, unlocked the front door, threw my belonging inside and nearly sank to my knees when seeing the amazing vista that awaited in the spacious living room, which had windows facing the sea that encompassed the entirety of what would otherwise have been a wall on that side of the room.  I swear I had tears in my eyes by the time that the sun had dropped and my thoughts returned to the house itself, which had gone unfathomably dark.

to be continued...

Movie Time!

Well, I thought that Strait Jacket was Castle's attempt at his own Psycho, but last night I watched Homicidal and holy crap!  There are so many elements of Psycho directly, uh, referenced (?) in that movie that all of your attention could be taken up with cataloging them.

Apparently shortly after Psycho came out Castle was asking people what they thought of it and then decided to make this film.  The gimmick of this one is a timer that shows up late in the film that allows anyone who feels the need to get up and leave the theater before the ending.  They would get their money back as long as they stood in a booth declaring them a coward as everyone else who stayed for the entirety walked by.

Once again, this movie was another of Castle's that had me yelling at it.  The characters do some really dumb things and the twist is just so damned silly.  I can't say much without blowing it but once you see how odd one of the main characters looks and suss it out, there is really little chance that you wouldn't know what's going on, though I was curious as to which direction they would swing it.

All in all worth a watch, but the idea that this competes at all with Psycho is a bit of a joke.  In fact, most of it seems pretty jokey, including the trailer complete with a fake Hitchcock voiceover:

The Book

So I wrote this fourteen thousand page book about the evils of this world and guess what?  

The evils deleted it.

What more proof do you need that what I wrote and you will never read is true?

Look! Listen!

Wups - Rawr Rawr She-Bear - 2/18/14

The Call

     "Yeah."
     "Hey, how's it going?"  It was Brice.  I let out a soft sigh in preface to my answer.
     "Not so great.  I'm not getting much but the feeling that there's something to be got.  It's like they have something they want to tell me but they're not sure themselves of what it is."
     "Question:  Have you been keeping track of which aliases you've used for individual interviews?"
     "Yup."
     "Write these down:  Burrows, Chandler, Grayson, Keane, Martins.."
     "You going to list them all?" I interrupted.
     "Almost done... Nelson, Peters, Simpson, and Valens."
     "Got it."
     "All dead.  All in the last four months."
     The hotel room walls blew away as a voluminous blackness both expanded and contracted around me, touching me with a cold clamminess and utter isolation.
     "How?" I barely managed to whisper.
     "Various ways.  Accidents."
     I cursed myself a million times as my mind raced.  I had been concerned about the well-being of any interviewees that talked to me but did I once worry about those whose identities I'd used? There was a reason that I had opted for real PIs but I couldn't think of what it was, now that the full onslaught of self-hatred had been unleashed.
     "Best to make sure that it's all worth it, in the end."
     And he was gone.

The Swelling River

First snow like no one can recall ever before, then never-ending rain, and the water is deep and muddy and raging past the new banks, taking what the weight of that snow has given in limbs of trees that have spent decades avoiding such a fate, but the time has come.

At the railroad trestle the water is near the tracks. At the bridge out of town it is high on the support columns.  Under the overpass it is lapping around the foot of the pedestrian's bench that gives you a good view of what it looks like to sit beneath an overpass.

And down at the boat landing there is no landing, or it is all landing now.  There was a steep slope to the bank before, but now that crest where the cars would park is the bank and the slope is buried deep beneath the cold, rushing water.

It could go either way.  It could be a warning of the possibility or it might be the real deal.

Also

Should be fun!

First of a Promising Meme

Coincidence!

So I started watching True Detective and it's pretty awesome.....

Then last night I was reading H.P. Lovecraft's "Supernatural Horror in Literature" and came to the part where he's talking about the author Robert W. Chambers and suddenly there's this stuff about "The King in Yellow" and Carcosa and holyshitthat'sstufffromtheshow!!!  

It seems that he had borrowed the idea of Carcosa from Ambrose Bierce.

So weird when these things come together.


-ooooh!  I was going to try to find a copy but it seems to be public domain so:  The King in Yellow

The Tail

He wuz boarn in thu tahl grases of thu planes on thu north syd of thu Kitchacoochie rivur neer thu yung town uf Dunglenagiddply.  Hiz muthr imeediatlee berst intu flamz fur been u wich and sew he wuz left to be razed by thu wild beests of thu wild.  Hiz bruthr waz a bobkat namd Hoowalli. Sinz thear wuz no won to nam him, he wuz simplee nown as RARRRR!

He spent thu fue yeers uf hiz lif runing arownd thu wild spases and onlee karing abowt wut to eet nekst.  It wuz u good lif.

It wuld al cum to un end soon wen thu trane braut thu man with thu silvur gunz.  Hiz hat wuz blak.

Coincidence

I had recently written here about the movie Strait Jacket and I have also been reading a compendium of H.P. Lovecraft stories for a while now, in fact I'm nearly done.  The last one is dedicated to Robert Bloch who wrote Strait Jacket (as well as Psycho, among others).

It seems Robert started his career writing in the fantastic fiction realm and was a big fan of Lovecraft, becoming one of the handful of writers to set their own tales within the mythic realm that H.P. had created and corresponding with his hero about their craft.  The story that I am currently reading is actually a sequel by Lovecraft to one written by Bloch, who then wrote another sequel to follow it.

When I first saw the dedication I had a hard time believing that this could be the same person seeing as how his later work was so much more "real crime" than the more fantastic, but there you go.

Digging for this info I find that he wrote The Deadly Bees which is a movie that MST3K tackled hilariously and he apparently also wrote a sequel to Psycho that had nothing to do with the subsequent movies that were made.  I'll have to try to track that one down......

The Confession

Sir,
The below was found by our people looking into the latest from this player.  I would highly recommend that it is time to put this one to rest.  There are many others who can and do fill the same role. Whether this effort was successful in reorienting back to the fold is somewhat irrelevant to my mind.  Better safe than sorry.

These words are written for my own benefit, they will never be seen by anyone but me.  I am doing this simply so that I can and be done with it and ideally never need to bother again.  This is something that was recommended to me long ago by one of the few who knew, but only lately have I felt the need to actually make use of that advice. It is a very small number indeed who know anything about this, including my closest friends and family who see my motivations as anything from questionably manic and random to perhaps sometimes even heroic.  I hate to play them like this, but it is not for me to do otherwise.

To many I am seen as the one good apple amongst the bad.  I am the only voice of sanity surrounded by what seem to be those of the worst intentions possessed of a concerning lack of reason, not to mention a dearth of what would be called humanity.

The reality is that the entirety of it is a sham, one with a purpose that I doubt that even I understand.

I was approached long ago when my career was barely beginning with the opportunity to reach the heights that I have, the only catch being that I played along with the script as it was handed to me.  I was assured that I would not be directly involved in anything that would clash with my own morality and this plus the enticement of being someone "in the know" was enough to convince me.  I had after all been a great fan of both theater and intrigue.

There was little to do at first, but over time as I rose in the ranks, mostly due I'm sure to the mechanizations born of my acquiescence, I was shown the first pages of the script as it applied to me.  Oddly enough, I found myself to be in the role of one who went against the grain and seemed a troublemaker regardless of the fact that I could really care less about much of the stances that I was to take.  Over time, as I have said above, I became what some looked to as the voice of reason in a madhouse of lies and evil intents. However, all of it is a lie.  

There is a goal that is beyond me and I'm sure beyond all of the players in this game.  It has been set long ago and carried forward by those whom we shall never even have a hint of knowing. Somehow this giving of false hope to those who would struggle against the attainment of it plays well with the overall plan.  There is a method here but all of our individual maneuvers will end up being seamless when it is over.

I've lived quite well with my bargain throughout this time but I find as I have aged that I have started to have some slight issue with it all.  It is a long time to drag out such a ruse and I think that it is laudable that I have gone this long before having to resort to this exercise.  But here I am.

Now that it is all written out I feel that I can move forward with whatever is left of my part in all of this... after destroying all evidence of this, of course.

It Is Happening Again

Found

At the back of some dilapidated tome of old physics long since left far behind, scribbled in a tenuous fashion under the heading Credo of Time was this:

"Since the repetition of the same looking for varied results when there are none to be had is considered insane, and seeing as how the universe is now known to repeat on the whim of the Observer and whereas there is no variation due to the constraint of the variable elements always repeating their alignment, and as I have now found the key to forcing variance within the field, I will use it to cut my way through both time and space to confront the Observer with the truth of its malady, plead for an end to the madness, and, if failing to get the results desired, will do all that I can to tear it asunder."

The Interview

It was on a low budget television show where he had just attempted to explain how the vivid and complicated dreams that he had been having made him less sure of the validity of what was deemed reality that he asked, "Are you real, John?" while reaching out and putting a hand on the interviewer who smiled and assured him that he was, which prompted the further question, "For God's sake, why?".

The Long Road

His feet hurt.  With everything else flying through his mind this was the thing that stood above it all. The damn boots were waterproof and that's why he bought them, but inside they were sleek and without character and after this long in them his feet were sliding all over the vacant nooks and he knew that he would be paying later, perhaps with some significant blisters to remind him of his folly.

It was all his fault, no question.  He had thought of turning back earlier but he knew that just ahead was a nice view and a possible picture, one that inevitably would fail to show the magnificence of whatever the living reality would bequeath.  So he had pushed ahead, taken the weak picture, seen the sun going down and knew that really he had no clue how long he had been walking and how long it would take to get back, even though it was slightly merciful in being a downhill trek.

It was a long way.

He watched the light slowly fading as he wound his way down the gravel road and felt that even if it went to pitch black the chances of him leaving that road and ending up wandering the woods or falling off the steep sides were slim and that his dangers were small, though occasionally he caught odd sounds that made him think that something might be stalking him in the brush.  Most of these came from himself, and only because he had turned his head to the side did he suddenly notice the noises coming from his own tread that were relegated behind his back.

It was quite dark when he spotted the lights off on a hill, seemingly strung together along some path that could not possibly be there and slowly moving forward along the chain.  Did people really come out here in the dark of night with lights strapped to their heads?  He stopped to listen for human sounds but there were none, and the longer he lingered the creepier he felt and decided that the mystery could go to hell because he needed to continue on and get to where he needed to be.

And his feet really fucking hurt.

Movie Time!

I dig William Castle.  I've always had respect for the huckster approach in movies and he was the king of that realm.  His movies weren't deep and didn't keep you thinking long after, except about how damn silly they could be.  The ones that had a gimmick as a central part of the presentation lose a lot once they leave the theater.  When the screen goes black in The Tingler it's not the same without a theater full of people screaming because a few seats are vibrating.  Instead it's a silly little film that you can feel is missing something vital. (Castle did go on to produce Rosemary's Baby later, I'm just grateful he let someone else direct!)

I stumbled across a pile of these films on demand from Fear.net on my TV recently and really the only one of note other than Mr. Sardonicus (and that only for the crazy makeup effect) is Strait Jacket.  Once again I found myself giggling and yelling at my TV throughout the show and for me that's something special.

It's pretty obvious to me that Castle saw Psycho and thought, "Hey, that's a movie that's right up my alley and it's a huge success.  Why can't I make a movie like that?"  So he got the same author, got Joan Crawford, and set about answering that question, and believe me every bit of this movie answers that question constantly.

First, you've got Crawford at sixty something playing a woman at forty something trying to be twenty something.  I have to imagine that she is a continuing role model for all drag queens.  The wig, the makeup, yow.  And when she suddenly, out of nowhere, turns cougar and comes on to her daughter's boyfriend it was one of the most yell-worthy moments of many in this treat.

And the head chopping.  Someone really thought that the sound of beheading with an axe sounded like a block of wood hitting the floor.  For the most part the heads are pretty unconvincing but I have to admit that when George Kennedy gets it the movie comes pretty close to being shocking.

Throw in the film debut of Lee Majors (uncredited) at the beginning, the fact that the doctor in the movie is actually the Vice President of Pepsi at the time and a full on non-actor, the placement of the six pack of Pepsi in one scene (Joan's husband was a Pepsi magnate), and the ending that really goes for it when it comes to twists and you've got quite a film.  I mean, it's not very subtle when keeping the killer in question, but the resolution is way out there.  Plus you get another nod to Psycho with an end scene of people standing around talking about what just happened.  End it all with the Columbia Pictures logo with her head at her feet and torch extinguished for one last macabre chuckle and you've got one fun film.

There's a great making of doc on YouTube as well and apparently the final scene was to have been Diane Baker (who is very charming and very cute) breaking down, but Joan wouldn't have it so they added a scene of her breaking down listening to it all from outside.  You gotta love those inside tidbits.

But I have to say that Joan does a great job here, from the early scenes of her freaking out in a strait jacket to when she takes off all the stupid makeup and plays a damaged woman who spent twenty years in an asylum, she was not slacking on this one, in fact I'm not sure if she ever failed to bring it in any performance.

So, to answer Castle's hypothetical question about what makes the difference between a classic like Psycho and a "classic" like Strait Jacket, I would encourage you to check it out and run it around in your own head a bit.  It's good for some serious laughs and some rather loud questions to be asked of the film itself, ideally while you are watching it!