Halloween 2022: October 4th

Altered States (1980)

Paddy Chayefsky was one of the most acclaimed playwrights and screenwriters of his time. In 1975, a lunch with Bob Fosse prompted him to write a horror film. That idea, a riff on mad scientist stories, first emerged as a novel called “Altered States.” In the late seventies, Arthur Penn was hired to direct the film version and even began casting the project, but left following arguments with Chayefsky. Enter: Ken Russell, another visionary artist whose deeply uncommercial projects had, somehow, become popular in theaters for a brief period of time. Perhaps unsurprisingly, two voices this distinctive butted heads immediately. The bickering eventually led to Chayefsky staying off the set and taking his name off the screenplay. The movie to emerge from this acrimonious production displays this conflict in an interesting way.

Dr. Eddie Jessup began studying schizophrenia. His experiments brought him to use sensory deprivation tanks to facilitate altered states of consciousness. He's soon having intense hallucinations in the tank. After marrying another university whiz kid, Emily, he continues his experiments further. He travels to Mexico and gains access to an immensely mind-altering potion made from local mushrooms and roots. Combining the drug with the tank, Jessup is soon experiencing powerful trances and visions, seemingly reaching back into a primal form of consciousness. So powerful, in fact, that they begin to effect his physical body. Jessup begins to slide up and down the evolutionary ladder. Not long afterwards, he discovers he can't control the changes either.

My only exposure to Chayefsky, besides this film, is watching “Network” in college. From only these two samples, it's obvious the writer has an immediately identifiable style. His characters deliver bellicose, long-winded monologues at one another about high-minded, philosophical ideas. After Jessup and Emily have sex for the first, they discuss that greatest of pillow talk topics: The existence of God and formative childhood traumas. “Altered States” is full of intricate conversations and monologues like that. Characters have long talks that are peppered with detailed scientific and psychological terms. It's highly stylized and projects a very specific authorial voice. Chayefsky's writing isn't for everyone and, honestly, it bugs me sometimes. Feels show-off-y, especially when the characters are rattling off complex conversations while eating or drinking. 

Chayefsky's particular style collides head-on with Ken Russell's equally distinctive but totally different style. Russell, of course, is known for an aggressive, kinetic visual approach that shoves wild images, usually of a sexual or religious (or both) nature, directly into the audience's faces. The drug trips and visions of “Altered States” certainly gives Russell a chance to create bizarre visuals. Jessup sees a Christ figure on the cross, with a spider-like goat's head. He has visions of Hell and priests. While tripping in Mexico, he envisions himself and Emily eating ice cream in front of a mushroom cloud, while a boa constrictor squeezes his head. Shortly afterwards, Jessup and his wife are petrified and then nullified by a sandstorm. “Altered States'” finale is a swirl of flashing lights, whirlpools of mist, and cosmic nebulas. I love the theatrical way Russell plays with these cultural, Freudian symbols to convey any number of meanings. 

Even when outside “Altered States'” head-trip sequence, Russell still has a fantastic visual eye. A reoccurring motif throughout the film is Jessup standing at the end of a tunnel-like hall, back lit. This even appears during “Altered States'” most typical sci-fi/horror sequence. When Jessup devolves into an ape-like proto-human and rampages through the city, Russell returns to this motif as he climbs into a zoo. There's definitely some tension between “Altered States'” high-minded ideas and its more typical genre movie elements. Jessup hallucinating he has monkey-like feet is creepy. The movie slides more into body horror as it goes on, until his conscience shifts are proceeded by bulging bladders under the skin. Russell's perspective is never anything less than committed. Yet I'm not sure the movie does a good job of converting its esoteric ideas into physical horror. The final scene, where humans are transcending into beings of pure energy but reground themselves by slamming on the wall, feels hopelessly anticlimactic. 

I imagine a Chayefsky script is the kind of projects actors both treasure and fear. Such complex blocks of dialogue are a great display for actorly talent, if your tongue is limber enough to pull it off. If not, you're going to embarrass yourself. Luckily, “Altered States'” cast is up to the task. William Hurt, in his feature film debut, convincingly plays Jessup as a somewhat self-centered asshole who can't let go of his obsessive ideas. Bob Balaban is well utilized as his nerdiest research partner while the ever-acerbic Charles Haid is even better as a constantly outraged partner. Blair Brown as Emily knows her way around Chayefsky's acrobatic dialogue but the romantic subplot is the film's weakest element. Hurt is totally unbelievable when declaring his love and Brown's emotional center is frequently lost among the intricate discussions. 

“Altered States” was not successful at the box office but was well-reviewed. It received two Academy Award nominations: One for Best Sound and one for John Corigliano's evocative score. Dick Smith's make-up effects presumably weren't nominated only because a Best Make-Up category didn't exist yet. Smith turning Hurt into a blue-eyed apeman or a pulsating blob of flesh is pretty impressive stuff. “Altered States” is obviously obtuse in its out-there ideas, not all of which it conveys in an easily understood fashion. Whether the movie handles its lofty ambitions –  nothing less than the existence of God and the limits of mankind's mind – is up for debate. Yet the film is still worth seeing for Russell's wild visuals and the intensity with which it translates some of Chayefsky's cerebral premises. [7/10]

Paranormal Activity: Tokyo Night (2010)

When I talk about the impact “Paranormal Activity” had on the horror landscape, I'm mostly talking about the way it changed the genre here at home. The American indie market was absolutely flooded with found footage movies in the 2010s, each hopeful they'd recreate Oren Peli's success. Yet clearly the film had an international impact as well. Would we have seen found footage movies coming from places as far apart as Norway or Peru if it hadn't? I'm not surprised “Paranormal Activity” was popular in Japan, considering the type of horror popular in that country. (And they had been making home-grown found footage flicks since the eighties.) I was a bit surprised to discover the existence of an officially licensed Japanese sequel to “Paranormal Activity.” “Paranormal Activity: Tokyo Night” would be released the same year as the proper American sequel, showing that this idea had franchise potential right from the beginning.

Koichi has bought a hi-def camera, mostly for his own enjoyment. His sister, Haruko, recently broke her legs in a car accident while in America. Their father travels for work and leaves Haruko with Koichi as she recovers. Shortly after she moves in, the siblings begins to notice strange things happening. Haruko's wheelchair seemingly moves while she sleeps. Koichi puts some salt in her room, to ward off evil, and it's disturbed. He begins to document the supernatural events, the cameras watching as they sleep. As the activity increases, Haruko admits that the car crash that broke her legs involved a San Francisco woman who murdered her husband while supposedly possessed. 

Fittingly, the Japanese film emulates the first “Paranormal Activity” closely. Director Toshikazu Nagae maintains the night vision shots of people sleeping. (He literally doubles it, as Haruko's bedroom is on one half of the screen and Koichi's is on the other.) As in Peli's original, much of the spooky atmosphere is derived from watching the background for anything unusual. Or from a subtle sound design, that is heavy on ominous off-screen noises. This haunting is found of strange pounding noises, to foreshadow any titular activity. A few sequences from the original are remade here. A medium is driven from the house, though here she's a shrieking teen girl who just happens to be sensitive to spirits. An object moves on its own while bursting into flames, though here it's a crucifix and the event happens long after the demon has made itself known.

As beholden as “Tokyo Night” to its American predecessor, Nagae manages to create some clever scares of his own. A fantastic sequence involves Koichi and Haruko getting into an argument around the table, the camera positioned behind a drinking glass. Just as their arguing reaches its peak, the glass bursts apart. More than once, the film manages to mine some squirms from Haruko screaming unexpectedly in the middle of the night. I'd argue that “Tokyo Night” even improves upon the scares it takes blatantly from the original. Haruko being dragged by her hair is freakier than Katie getting pulled ankle first from her bed. The female lead looming over the sleeping man is made spookier because she has two broken legs and is puppeted around like a limp marionette. Nagae effectively doubles-down on “Paranormal Activity 1's” shock ending, by adding a car crash and an additional scare. 

Transporting “Paranormal Activity” from America and Japan does reflect on the cultures in interesting ways. A Shinto priest is brought in to bless the house after the ghostly activities escalate. When Koichi realizes that a distinctly European style demon is haunting them, he clearly has to research it. Yet “Tokyo Night” indicates Japanese sensibilities in subtler ways. The proper two installments of the series were about clueless guys dooming themselves by refusing to respect women. “Tokyo Night,” meanwhile, is about a brother and sister growing closer to each other. Koichi is bookish and socially awkward when compared to the pretty, popular Haruko. He initially resents her presence yet, as they try to unravel this strangeness together, Koichi realizes he really does love Haruko. It's almost sweet at times. In contrast to the American films, it's the guy who instantly believes in spirits while the lady is more skeptical. (Though less so because she doesn't believe and more because she'd rather not think about it.)

I've seen “Tokyo Night” referred to as a spin-off or even a remake of “Paranormal Activity.” The truth is it's very much a sequel. The further American films would contradict it, rendering “Tokyo Night” non-canon, but it's definitely designed to follow the first movie's story. Maybe the incompatibility with the later “Paranormal Activity” movies is why this one was hard to watch for many years. It never had a stateside release until very recently. Even then, it was only available as part of a digital On-Demand bundle with the other seven movies. I'd say “Tokyo Night” is worth seeking out though. The Japanese managed to find their own riff on what Oren Peli did and even improved on it in some ways. [7/10]

Leap in the Dark: The Living Grave

I intend to dig a little deeper into international horror anthology shows this October. And that mostly means British programs. Such as “Leap in the Dark." Running sporadically on BBC 2 from 1973 to 1980, the series started out as short documentaries on the supernatural. By the second season, the episodes were docudramas that freely mixed fact and fiction, the mode the series would continue in for the rest of its existence. Most of the early episodes are lost media but the later ones survive. An installment from the 1980 season, “The Living Game,” was featured in the “Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched” documentary about folk horror last year. That intrigued me enough to give it a look. 

In Dartmoor, Devonshire, there is Kitty Jay's Grave. Residing at a crossroads, the grave is of a suicide victim from the 18th century, believed to be a young woman. Fresh flowers are placed on it regularly by unknown means. "The Living Grave" follows parapsychologist Joe Keeton, who believes he has found a modern descendent of "Kitty Jay" in a woman named Pauline. Using hypnotism, he regresses Pauline back to Kitty's time and has her relate the events of her life. As they draw closer to the date of Kitty's suicide, they discover the tragic story of a young woman with nowhere to run and an unwanted pregnancy. 

Like a lot of British genre television from the seventies and eighties, "The Living Grave" is slow and dry. It has no score, mostly being composed of Keeton and Pauline's voice over footage of historical Dartmoor locations. The mockumentary presentation means there's not much in the way of traditional pacing or structure. The show drops us right into this story with little in the way of set-up or prepping. When combined with the thick accents, this makes "The Living Grave" a little hard to follow in its early scenes. However, the focus on voices does lend an incredible intimacy to this telling, reminding me of an audio-drama or stage play. (Two formats the writer, David Rudkin, previously worked in.) 

Despite its stodginess, "The Living Grave" proves compelling and even chilling. The actual Dartmoor locations, buildings stone and ancient and woods deep and green, are better than any production values could ever hope to be. Lesley Dunlop gives a hell of a performance as Pauline. The sequence where "Kitty" recounts a sexual assault, eventually pushing the documentary crew away from her face, is borderline disturbing. When Pauline is recounting her final minutes, the camera hovers over beams in an aged barn, until a door swings open unexpectedly. The final scene claims the dialogue was taken from actual hypnosis session transcripts, which is almost certainly bullshit but adds to the feeling of verisimilitude here. "Leap in the Dark" were clearly working with limited means but managed to create a suitably unsettling half-hour of television. [8/10]

The Munsters: Family Portrait / Grandpa Leaves Home

“Family Portrait” has Event Magazine statistically selecting the Munsters as America's most average family. A pair of photographers are sent to snap a picture and deliver a 5000 dollar check. Grandpa bristles at the idea of being considered average and flees the house, forcing Herman and Lily to track him down. When the parents of the Munsters household returns, the photographers are in for a surprise. “Grandpa Leaves Home” begins with Herman and Grandpa getting into an argument. The old man decides to leave in as melodramatically a fashion as possible. Herman eventually feels bad about things and goes out to retrieve the elderly count. He's eventually located, performing a magic act in a sleazy club

“Family Portrait” is the last episode of “The Munsters” to feature Beverly Owen as Marilyn. Owens gets at least one funny moment, when she deflects a kiss from the handsy reporter sent to write about the family. Otherwise, it features the typical gags you associate with this show. I don't consider that a bad thing. The alcoholic photographer, played by Harvey Korman smuggling booze inside binoculars, getting glimpses of Herman and Lily unexpectedly got a good laugh out of me. The physical comedy-filled finale, which also features Herman wielding a squirt gun, is especially zany. There's an earlier bit involving Herman poking his head into a restaurant that's even wackier. Al Lewis also gets some stand-out gags, such as when he's hiding in the attic or a dialogue exchanged about turning himself into a bone. The magazine A-plot wraps up in a cute way too.

Pat Priest takes over as Marilyn in “Grandpa Leaves Home,” though she's not given much to do. Instead, Al Lewis' delightful gripes take precedence in most of the first half. (Butch Patrick as Eddie gets a good moment, repeating his grandfather's moaning and groaning to his parents.) Once again, the cartoonish gags are the focus. Such as Herman's walk around the neighborhood frightening a dog and a mechanic in extreme ways. Or an oversized lighter appearing. Of course, Grandpa's magic act goes awry. A nice, subtle joke is all the different names marked out on the illusionist box Grandpa locks himself in. Yvonne De Carlo also does some nice acting, when she gets distraught over Grandpa leaving. However, I definitely feel like this premise could've been exploited for more laughs. The final scene is set at Christmas, which feels horribly out-of-season right now. [Family Portrait: 7/10 / Grandpa Leaves Home: 6/10]