Halloween 2020: September 29th

At Midnight I'll Take Your Soul (1964)

À Meia-Noite Levarei Sua Alma

Brazilian horror films didn't exist before Coffin Joe. José Mojica Marins  was born in São Paulo, where his parents owned a cinema. Marins was making his own films by the time he was eighteen. After writing, directing, and acting in several features – a drama and a western – Marins had an idea. Foreign horror films had played in Brazil before 1964 but the country did not really have a tradition of native horror pictures. Inspired by a nightmare he had, Marins would conceive “At Midnight I'll Take Your Soul.” After the lead actor dropped out, Marins would step into the role of clawed villain protagonist, Zé do Caixão. (Literally translated as “Joseph of the Casket.”) Marins would appear as Zé many times in the sixties and seventies, across the Brazilian media landscape. These movies were totally unknown in America until Something Weird released them on VHS in the nineties, giving the main character the far catchier moniker of Coffin Joe. Though the Coffin Joe series quickly gathered an international cult following, many of Marins' bizarre, explicit, and fascinating films remain rare in the U.S. 

A small village lives in fear of the local mortician, a cruel man with gnarly fingernails known as Zé do Caixão. An outspoken atheist in a deeply religious community, Zé intimidates and violently attacks anyone who displeases him. He is also obsessed with the “continuity of the blood,” achieving an immortality of sorts by begetting a son with a “perfect” woman. After discovering his current wife is barren, he murders her and begins to pursue/terrorize Terezinha, his only friend’s girlfriend. As the bodies begin to pile up, and Zé’s reign of terror over the town continues, supernatural reprisal against him is promised. Zé dismisses all that... Until the ghosts of his victims arrive at midnight to take his soul.

“At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul” is especially fascinating as a country’s first attempt at a horror movie. Since there were no rules established for what Brazilian horror was, Marins mixed together different styles. The film begins with two ominous intros, one from Coffin Joe himself and one from a gypsy fortuneteller. She holds a papier-mâché skull and warns the weak-hearted people in the audience how scary the film is. The opening credits are filled with Halloween store horrors like bats, skeletons, and cartoon owls. (The latter of which appears in live action near the end.) Hokey terrors like a fuzzy tarantula and ghosts with echoing voices also show up. This kind of kids’ stuff scares stand in stark contrast to the film’s intense violence. Coffin Joe tears off a guy’s fingers with a shattered wine bottle, jabs out someone’s eyes with his pointed fingernails, viciously whips someone, and assaults a woman so badly she graphically commits suicide afterwards. The screams in “At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul” are both cheesy and spine-tingling. Goofy “safe” frights co-exist alongside exploitation movie brutality, creating an engrossing tonal mixture. 

Coffin Joe didn’t become a horror icon in his home country just because he was the first either. He is, of course, a despicable bastard who rapes, murders, and terrorizes wantonly. Yet there is, undeniably, a certain style about him. His wife admonishes him when he heads out to buy meat on a Friday. He quips in response “If I meet the devil while I’m out, I’ll invite him to dinner.” That’s just one example of the cruel but dark wit the character displays. Joe is also a little more complicated than just being an awful son-of-a-bitch. He protects children, seeing them as innocents that haven’t been corrupted by the world’s stupidity yet. He is kind to the clients at the funeral home. (His Nietzschian beliefs, protectiveness of kids, and disdain of religion makes Coffin Joe something of a predecessor to LaVeyian Satanism.) Marins’ acting is hammy and theatrical, especially during the long monologues he gives himself denouncing religion and the supernatural, but it’s certainly captivating too. Coffin Joe shows that amoral sociopaths are charismatic. 

As a director, Marins is interesting too. “At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul” was obviously produced very cheaply, the sets being minimal and special effects being charmingly home-made. The gore is more notable for how furiously deployed it is than how realistic it looks. In order to create a ghostly aura around a spirit, glitter was applied directly to the film cell. Marins often employs hokey visual techniques. Wipes and other cheesy scene transitions are used throughout. Whenever Coffin Joe has been driven into a murderous rage, his eyes become bloodshot via unconvincing dissolves. Yet the film’s approach isn’t ineffective. Marins is excellent at building a spooky atmosphere, especially as the ghosts close in on Coffin Joe. There’s even a really cool dolly shot in a small cemetery. “At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul” was doing things that had never been done before in its country. That innovation is captivating. 

The film is also compelling as a peek into another culture. Reportedly, Coffin Joe horrified Brazilians in the sixties as much for his atheism as for his beastly acts. The Catholic doctrine is so strong in this village, that someone daring to eat lamb on a Friday leads to gasps. “At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul” has that E.C. Comics formula, of a scumbag reaping havoc and then being supernaturally punished for his crimes. (Fittingly, Coffin Joe would become a horror comic host later on.) Yet the ghosts coming to claim Joe’s soul shows how spiritualism was a living force in 1960s Brazil. How ghosts were more facts-of-life than figures of fear. As much as the movie revels in Coffin Joe’s depraved acts, a moralistic structure is reinforced by the ending, where the title’s promise is fulfilled and the bad guy gets his comeuppance. This allowed Marins to have his cake and eat it too, disrupting the moral standards of the day but ultimately functioning within them. 

We know American and European horror films played in Brazil before Marins made his own. Certain shots - a hallucinogenic vision of Joe”s own funeral procession, a close-up in a pair of incoming lips - might’ve been influenced by Corman’s “Premature Burial” or Bava’s “The Whip and the Body.” Yet the film still comes off as a complete original, a true example of outsider filmmaking providing us with something that feels new. “At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul” has its flaws. It drags a little in the last act, despite being fairly short. Some people will probably be put-off by how the movie both cheers on and condemns Coffin Joe’s evil acts. Yet I’m still a fan of this one and Marins’ unique style, which still doesn’t feel like quite anything else. [8/10]

My Amityville Horror (2012)

As of this writing, there's around twenty-five movies attempting to cash-in on the “Amityville Horror” story to some degree. Considering the frequency with which these low-budget, direct-to-video rip-offs sprout up, I'm sure another one is in production as I write this. In all this time, few people have considered how the real people who lived in the notorious house must feel. Four additional families have lived in 112 Ocean Avenue since the Lutz' abandoned it, none reporting any supernatural activity. The real town has done everything it can to distance itself from the infamous pop culture story, including forcing the house to be totally redesigned. And yet the legend persist. A documentary made in 2012 would ask the audience directly to reflect on how the “Amityville” phenomenon affected the real people who lived through it.

Daniel Lutz, the youngest son of the Lutz family, was eight years old when the events supposedly recounted in the “Amityville Horror” book and movie occurred. Now an adult, Daniel is a troubled man who is still haunted by his memories of what happened during his childhood. Director Eric Walter interviews Danny as he recounts the by-now notorious events that continue to linger in his memory. The interview eventually reunites Danny with notorious paranormal investigator Lorraine Warren, shows him seeing his psychologist, and the other ways he has attempted to grapple with the events of his past.

Docs like this live and die based on how interesting their chosen subject is. On one hand, Daniel Lutz seems like an ordinary guy. He talks about his job at the post office and unwinds in his spare time by playing guitar. Yet the cameras bring out another side of him. Lutz is often belligerent with the director – apparently they are friends in real life – expressing disgust at the filmmakers for making him tell these stories. There's a lot of anger in Lutz, much of it poorly hidden and some of it directed at himself. But the guy has good reason to be pissed. He watched his traumatic childhood play out as a series of increasingly trashy horror films. When describing an incident where Harry the dog nearly hung himself while attempting to jump a fence – a vivid episode from the book left out of the films – you can tell these memories are still raw for Danny. “My Amityville Horror” forces us to consider the real person behind all the cheesy horror movies. 

Walter gives time to Daniel's version of events. He reiterates well-known occurrences, like the attic bedroom full of flies or spotting the demonic visage of Jody the pig in the window. He relates less notorious scenes, like a fully visible apparition passing through the kitchen in front of the whole family. Or George Lutz levitating a wrench in his garage. While Daniel seems absolutely certain of his experiences, to the point where he's insulted by the mere suggestion of taking a lie detector test, the film around him is less sure. A reporter who was inside the actual house recalls nothing unusual. Even a trio of paranormal experts are dubious about some of the Lutzes' claims. A visit with the late Lorraine Warren is almost comical. Her pet roosters squawk all through out the interview. She presents a dime store crucifix as a piece of the true cross and is gravely concerned when an agnostic cameraman admits he's never been baptized. Later in the film, a psychologist suggests that Danny was young enough at the time of the events, that the pop culture version has supplanted his actual memories. Especially since the grown-ups around his then-impressionable, eight-year-old mind were insisting on a supernatural interpretation. That strikes me as the most plausible explanation. 

Evil spirits or not, Daniel Lutz was clearly traumatized by something as a boy. He has no kind words for his stepfather. George Luz is described as a petty tyrant who acted less like a dad and more like a drill sergeant. Daniel refers to him as “the man who took my mother away” and expresses relief that he's now dead. When combined with a household that sounds like it was obsessed with the Satanic and demons, it's not surprising Danny went on to a troubled adolescence. The movies were all bullshit but they apparently got one thing right: George Lutz really was an asshole. In light of this, the claims of supernatural terror pale. The only ghosts inside 112 Ocean Avenue were those of abuse and manipulation.  

None of the other Lutz kids were interviewed for this documentary, so don't expect an in-depth recollection of what happened in that house. This is largely Danny's story and that's interesting enough on its own. A few reviews have called “My Amityville Horror” tacky, which I guess is fair. When compared to the narrative “Amityville” films and countless cable ghost shows, it comes off pretty well. Viewed as a companion piece to the outrageous films, it brings things back down to Earth. And childhood trauma is scary too, so it still fits in with any horror movie marathon. [7/10]

The Outer Limits: Nightmare

As I said last year, despite the highly regarded place it occupies among sci-fi nerds, I've seen very few episodes of “The Outer Limits.” When looking for classic episodes to include for Halloween, the series provides me with many choices. After much deliberation, I finally decided “Nightmare” from season one was the right one to choose. In the near future – or, at least, the near future of the late sixties – Earth is at war with an alien race from the planet Ebon. The Ebonites capture a troop of Earthly soldiers. In their prisoner-of-war camp, each man is subjected to tortures both physical and emotional due to the Ebonites' advance technology. The goal is to get the men to reveal military secrets. However, not everything is how it seems in this place.

Though not quite as surreal as the title suggest, “Nightmare” does benefit from its minimalist set design. Most of the episode takes place on a simple slate floor, set against white walls, with strange structures spread about. What was probably a budget saving measure gets turned into a effective choice by director John Erman. The Ebonites themselves are classical, pulp magazine-style aliens, with their green skin, elongated faces, and caped uniforms. Their monotone voices, as if they are shouting every line, is certainly creepy too. The horror content largely emerges from the bizarre test the aliens subject the men too. Such as melting the bones within their body, casting various illusions on them, or stealing away one of their senses. 

Yet “Nightmare” has more on its mind than just little green men and intergalactic war. The endless questions the aliens ask the men, many of which they do not understand, have a hint of Kafka-esque existential dread to them. As if the men could say whatever they want in response and still be punished for it. Eventually, the guys turn on each other, rendered paranoid but the constant demands to sacrifice one of their own. Eventually, a twist comes: The Ebonites are actually peaceful and the entire ordeal has been orchestrated by the American government. “Nightmare” was produced right before the start of the Vietnam War and not long after the end of the Korean War, which is referenced through dialogue several times. This distrust of an authority that is willing to sacrifice lives in order to gather intel was probably a commentary on Cold War ruthlessness. In retrospect, it becomes a critique of the U.S. war machine that sees young men as only resources, to be used and replaced. In other words, it's a still chilling and effective hour of television. [7/10]

Forever Knight: Night in Question

With seemingly no other ideas left, the “Forever Knight: Season Three” writers decided to use that old chestnut of easy amnesia. After chasing a criminal into a storage warehouse for parade floats, Nick is shot in the head. Though his vampire powers quickly heal the wounds, he awakens with no memory of who he is. He doesn't even remember that he's a vampire. Natalie uses this opportunity to get closer to him and try and cure his vampirism. LeCroix also arrives, in order to remind Nick of what he really is. Meanwhile, Tracy Vetter is also having a memory block about what happened the night before but remains determined to track down the killer. 

As hacky a plot point as a character getting a head injury and amnesia is, as it's not like there's any chance the main protagonist of the show will suffer permanent memory loss, “Night in Question” is still probably season three's best episode. Nick having to rediscover that he's a vampire makes for some decent conflict. The scenes of him interacting with his apartment, Natalie removing the signs that he's undead, are pretty funny. Seeing these two finally passionately kiss is satisfying too. The flashbacks, and his later actions, show us that Nick and LeCroix do care about each other, though in an odd way. Perhaps the reason this episode works so well is because Tracy Vetters is barely in it. When she becomes the focus in the final third, it becomes far less interesting. It leads to an underwhelming pay-off to what was a decent episode up to that point. [7/10]