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let the right avatar into your existenz

eXistenZ

Hey, somebody wrote an article about eXistenZ! You can read it here.

Wow. I didn't think anybody remembered that movie other than me. I remember it really well, since I saw it four times in theaters and bought the DVD the day it was released.

My excitement at seeing the article aside, I think the writer is wrong about a couple of things. The biggest one is that I don't think the "game urges" are a commentary on games. As I wrote in my review (click on the spoiler warning at the bottom), Cronenberg is not using games as a metaphor for games, he's using them as a metaphor for movies.

"There are things that have to be said to advance the plot and establish the characters, and those things get said whether you want to say them or not." In other words, characters say the things they have to say in order to get to the next plot point, no matter whether those things are "in character" or not.

I also think the idea behind the "why would anybody want to play this game?" point is in order to beg the question of why we accept the idea of playing games centered around violently murdering other human beings. Why is that considered more entertaining than what Allegra and Ted are going through?

Avatar

I saw Avatar. I enjoyed it, and I will probably see it again. However, taste (and politics) are different from person to person, so I can see why some people might not like it.

The thing which is really hard to understand is how some people (as described here have seen it and apparently their strongest reaction was, "Oh, gracious, there's smoking!!" That's sad.

On the other hand, Cameron's response is hilariously disingenuous. She's Sigourney Weaver, she smokes, she drinks, she curses, she's rude, and she's Sigourney Weaver. In what way is that not an "an aspirational role model"?

Let the Right One In

Score one for brick-and-mortar stores. Some people bought this (excellent) film on DVD from Amazon recently and got copies with the (coveted) theatrical subtitles. Others continue to receive the (pathetic) original DVD subtitles. Appparently Amazon has two cartons, and they pull one from the first box, one from the second box, etc.

There's no way to be sure which you'll get, except to buy it in a store that sells DVDs (where you can check the description on the back).

That's if there are actually still stores that sell DVDs (especially DVDs of non-blockbuster Swedish pre-teen vampire romance movies). I'll have to look around, since I really don't need another copy with the (pathetic) non-theatrical subtitles.

Add comment January 8th, 2010

eXistenZ

Similar to The Matrix in that it deals with virtual reality, but since this is a David Cronenberg movie nothing is sleek, fancy or electronic. The guns are made from gristle and shoot teeth instead of bullets, and the "game pod" looks like sexualized stomach. Many of the people getting off on The Matrix would be unsettled (if not repulsed) by this movie, and that may be the idea.

Allegra Gellar (Jennifer Jason Leigh) is the inventor of a virtual reality game called eXistenZ, which is played by plugging a game pod into a "bioport" (a socket at the base of the spine). Some people (called "the Realists") disapprove of the whole idea and try to kill her. So, she and Ted Pikul (Jude Law), a "PR nerd" from the company she works for, go on the run. His biggest priority is trying to keep her alive, hers is to stop running long enough play eXistenZ with him so they can be sure her one-of-a-kind game pod (which she refers to as her baby) is undamaged.

But first they have to get Ted fitted with a bioport, so they go to an especially greasy rural gas station, run by Willem Dafoe, who does the operation as a sideline.

It goes on from there, with many twists and turns, and the world inside eXistenZ isn't any sleeker or more futuristic than the real world. A lot of it is both disturbing and a little silly, and in the end it's obvious that both reactions are part of the plan. Unlike The Matrix, this movie is in on its own joke, and it has a terrific ending.

Spoiler Alert!
Click Here! for the Secrets of Life, eXistenZ and Everything
(so don't click unless you've already seen the movie!)

3 comments November 14th, 2004

i was writing a blog post…

Actually, I wrote an entire blog post, but something was wrong. I had accumulated a list of URLs of articles (well, three) which I was going to use to illustrate my points (about why the articles were, in terms of their main points, wrong), but something wasn’t right, so I didn’t press the big, blue “Publish” button.

I always go by my gut when writing. As I’ve recounted before, I had a friend, a very long time ago, who was reading a book about the workings of the human brain, and he called me up and asked, “Do you write with the front of your brain?”

“No,” I replied, “I write by the seat of my pants.”

I finally figured out why the blog post should stay, permanently, in Draft mode. I really don’t want this to be the kind of blog that’s devoted to pointing out things that are wrong. Every time I go to YouTube, for example, I see all kinds of videos about what’s wrong with the final season(s) of Game of Thrones, why The Witcher sucks because it’s not like the video games (or the novels), why this or that Fast & Furious movie sucks, why The Walking Dead isn’t as good as it used to be, all the things Licorice Pizza stole from other movies, and why the ending of Killing Eve pissed everybody off and/or broke their hearts.

I’m not agreeing or disagreeing with any of those positions (okay, the ending of GoT did suck, and The Witcher totally rocks) — the point is that I realize (I’m pretty sure I’ve realized this before, maybe more than once) that I’d much rather write about things I like. I really don’t want to be one of those people who can’t shut down the computer at night because, to quote the classic cartoon, somebody is wrong about something on the internet(!).

So, some things I like:

1) There was nice weather yesterday and today. Both days I took some paper and a pen (okay, several pens) to the park and wrote a bunch. Very pleasant. Paper and pen: still the best way to write. (Also, everybody should watch David Lynch’s daily weather reports.)

 
2) Legends of Tomorrow has not yet been renewed for an eighth season. If this is the end, it would be too bad, but back when it started who could ever have predicted it would last this long and end up being so good? Sara and Ava are married, Sara is pregnant (with Ava’s baby — don’t ask) and all is well with the world. (Other than the fact that all the Legends are now in time jail, but they’ll think of something. They always do.)

 
3) Season 2 of The Witcher is over, so I was kind of looking for something else. I tried Peacemaker, since it was based on The Suicide Squad, which I really liked, but the first episode didn’t grab me (although the opening featured an amazing dance number behind the credits).

So, I settled on Moon Knight. I haven’t watched any of the other Marvel shows, and I’ve stopped watching the movies, but it’s supposed to be fairly free-standing — not completely tied into the overall mythology (well, the Marvel mythology — it’s very much tied into Egyptian mythology).

So far, it’s really good. The “heroes” and “villains” are all pretty complex, compromised, and damaged. It’s not as wild as Doom Patrol — although that statement applies to pretty much everything except possibly the new David Cronenberg movie (his first feature based on his own script since eXistenZ).

Also, it deals with DID (dissociative identity disorder), which I’ve been known to write about as well, so that’s interesting (of course, the term, the current replacement for Multiple Personality Disorder, is contentious, since not everybody agrees that it is a disorder in the first place).

 
4)I appreciated this article: “How to recognize gaslighting and respond to it.” When I used the term “gaslighting” twenty years ago, or even ten years ago, I almost always had to footnote it. Now, similar to “triggering,” it is used constantly, to refer to a wide variety of unrelated things.

I always remember watching a TV drama with my father back in — I think — the late 1960s. The episode was about an actress (or maybe she was a singer — I forget her exact profession), who was starting to think she was losing her marbles. Halfway through, my father announced, “It’s Gaslight!” As indeed it was. I’m sure that was the first time I learned what it meant to “gaslight” someone, and where the term came from.

 
5) Good music from Tangerine Dream recently, both composed and improvised.

 
6) Also, Billie Eilish may be winning me over.

Add comment April 17th, 2022

crimes of the future

Okay, this is exciting: “David Cronenberg’s Sci-Fi Movie Crimes of the Future Begins Production in Greece

I’m not completely sure why I’m so excited, but this is intriguing:

“As we begin filming Crimes of the Future, just two days into this new adventure with David Cronenberg, it feels like we’ve entered a story he collaborated on with Samuel Beckett and William Burroughs, if that were possible,” said [Viggo] Mortensen in a statement. “We are being pulled into a world that is not quite like this or any other, and yet is one that feels strangely familiar, immediate and quite credible. I can’t wait to see where we end up.”

Or maybe it’s just this:

“Cronenberg serves up a rare original screenplay with Crimes of the Future (his last one was eXistenZ in 1999), which adds to the anticipation that’s surrounded the project since early details leaked this spring.”

eXistenZ. I was obsessed with that movie when it came out (I saw it four times in theaters — an all-time high for me) and wrote about it quite a bit.

I read the article linked to above just a few days ago, and since then I’ve watched eXistenZ three more times (not in a theater, unfortunately). It’s still as great as ever.

And as for the William Burroughs connection? Well, Cronenberg did direct Naked Lunch.

The Naked Lunch trailer gives you a sense of that movie, but it leaves out perhaps its best feature: a magnificent soundtrack by Howard Shore and Ornette Coleman. Shore also did the music for eXistenZ, and for the Lord of the Rings movies, and he is going to score Crimes of the Future.

Maybe that’s why I’m so excited.

Add comment August 20th, 2021

it’s hard to resist a ghost dog

I’ve bought a few DVDs from the Criterion Collection over the years, so I get their email announcements when new films are available, but I seldom buy any (money, mostly, and for many movies a regular DVD is more than sufficient). But this one was irresistible

It’s been a while since I’ve seen Ghost Dog, which I wrote about here.

But it’s definitely top tier. Probably my favorite of Jim Jarmusch’s movies (well, it’s between that and Dead Man, I guess).

And, since I was buying something anyway, I just had to check for a few other movies at the Criterion site. No Gosford Park, no eXistenZ, oh, but they do have Moonrise Kingdom — I just have to get that (right?). I was so obsessed with Moonrise Kingdom at one point that I watched it every night for a week or so, and I wrote about it a lot.

I forced myself to stop at that point. Early Christmas presents — that’s what they’ll be.

As I say, Criterion editions aren’t for everything (and a lot of my favorite movies are never going to be Criterion fodder anyway). So far, I’ve got Nashville (of course), and several by Orson Welles. Criterion’s very thorough approach is particularly helpful with Welles, since there is often not a definitive final version of Welles’ films — let alone any sort of Director’s Cut.

So, I’ve got Criterion releases of Touch of Evil, Mr. Arkadin/Confidential Report, F for Fake, and Falstaff/Chimes at Midnight.

I’m still hoping for The Trial, too.

(Well, of course, what I’m really hoping for is that someday, somehow, the lost ending of The Magnificent Ambersons will come to light and be released, but that’s not going to happen. Of course, a lot of people said that The Other Side of the Wind would never come out, and then it did…)

Well, this started off being about Ghost Dog but then it quickly veered into Orson Welles, didn’t it?

I thought about Welles recently when I read about the movie Mank, here and here. It was interesting to read about, but I’m not going to (metaphorically speaking) rush out and see it. I may be a Welles enthusiast, but decoding the details of who wrote what in Kane (or any of Welles’ films) doesn’t intrigue me. The movies are there, and they’re all interesting and some are brilliant. Why see a movie about Kane when I can see Kane again?

Add comment November 25th, 2020

these are a two of my favorite things

1) I don’t remember why I read this — but I’m glad I did: “And now, Conan The Librarian: 8 fictional shows, games, and books we wish were real

At first I was pleased that they mentioned eXistenZ — a movie that I was obsessed with for a while — and then I was even more excited that they also praised the book The Diamond Age. Two of my favorite things!

I wrote about eXistenZ here: u-town.com/collins/?p=1238 (there are a whole series of connected pages linked to from there, if you don’t mind spoilers). And I wrote about The Diamond Age, or at least one specific scene, here: u-town.com/collins/?p=5454

 
2) After a process of rewriting that went on for much longer than anticipated (and which was probably longer than it needed to be — but I was having fun), “The Bus Station Mystery” is all spiffed up and improved. It’s not hugely changed (same mystery, same suspects, same solution), but expanded in several areas. More room to breathe, and to get to know the characters.

Add comment May 27th, 2018

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