The Gothic in Film and Moving Pictures

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology

Autumn plays strange tricks on my mind. For one thing, my inner thoughts tend to have a lot of the following imagery:




So to soothe this latent fixation of mine, I listen to a lot of vintage Nine Inch Nails. Because quite frankly, Trent Reznor? Call me. You're never going to write a thinly-veiled ode to heroin about me if we don't get our act together and give it a go.

I can't even help it. One of these days, I'm going to wake up split into three, surrounded by dust-sewn, velvet curtains on an English moor. The Second Me will suggest we visit the Iciclist Bicyclist (who rides in place on a frozen puddle) and perhaps lay by the Wounded Lake. There'll be a giant foot and I'll find a kitten and name it Absinthe Darkly.

Best day ever!

*

In other news, as previously implied, my mind is sinking to Gothic depths. Mama Gothic, of an 1800s flavour, not this black nails and childish death worship habit. Mama Gothic is sick and twisted, yo, infinitely more perverted than anything Marilyn Manson dreams up. It's all about peeling back the layers of society and exposing it as broken.

HBO's True Blood: The modern Gothic?

Modern Gothic actually follows pretty closely to its original literary counterpart, exploiting a somewhat less Puritanical society to cash in on shock value. But the old guard Gothic wanted to coax you into believing everything is perfectly normal. In other words, our modern Gothic has become a little too self-aware of the genre, telegraphing certain tropes and counting on you, the viewer, to understand the subtext from the first frame. Would Dexter be so satisfying if we weren't cheering for the villain? Would True Blood be so addictive if it wasn't so happy to debase itself to shock us?

Yes, the Gothic wants you to lose sleep, you see, but it knows the true horror comes from waking up from a truly content slumber into a living nightmare.

Alea iacta est: The Films of Christopher Nolan

by Jillian Butler, Ampersandology



Thanks, Inception Cat. You've given me a terrific segueway, in my usual roundabout fashion, to a topic I like to call Christopher Nolan: Genius in the Making or GENIE IN THE BOTTLE? (see what I did there? It's a play on words! hahaha....oh, me.)

Slant Magazine has an outstanding essay by Tom Elrod on the films of Christopher Nolan, exploring the connection, if any, between his artistic merit and populist appeal. It's an idea that's certainly tested in his box offices grosses, at least post-Batman Begins. Read it: it's thoughtful and well-reasoned piece, if not without its flaws. 

Full disclosure: I have written for Slant before, but hey man. As ThreeMafia reminded us in their Oscar-winning song (?), it's hard out there for a pimp, so don't indulge in hating. 

Time will tell, but Inception has left me curious as to what kind if filmmaker Nolan is going to be. By now, I think it's fair to say that his name on a marquee has attained a mystical quality of 'headiness', for lack of a better term: a hushed reverence and a mimed mind-blown gesture from audiences departing the theatres. 

The basic premise of Elrod's article, as I see it, is that Nolan's film-making relies less on an artistic vision than a purely technical one: Nolan is a master of form and plot rather than theme, conceit or character. As he states: 

No matter what anyone may say, [Nolan] is no Stanley Kubrick. Kubrick's films, despite their objectivity and reputation for coldness, were studies of characters. Nolan's films, by contrast, are studies of plot. Indeed, you could say he's an artist of plot.

I enjoyed the article very much, though I couldn't help but think Elrod's argument hinged on the secretive knowledge of some platonic ideal of filmmaking. One point strikes me though, as particularly true: Nolan loves his plot. His films unravel with the postured certainly of being a film; in this way, I think, Nolan finds his real power. 

If there really is a cult of letters, I want to be treasurer.

by Jillian Leigh, Ampersandology


The first time I saw the poster for the Spike Jonze/Dave Eggers collaboration on my childhood, it haunted me. 

Not because I was excited for the film. I mean, I AM (I've already read the weird pseudo short story that Eggers published in The New Yorker AND internalized the trailer). But what really poked at my cerebellum every time I saw this poster was something far more disturbing: what was that FONT? And where had I seen it before? 


A little cursory investigation told me that the font is handdrawn (and also gave me a new hero!) and in any case resembled Mrs. Strange, on the offchance I someday want to recreate without getting a degree in being awesome and good at handdrawn fonts (I hear the application process is ridiculous). The above article is FULL of this delightful insider knowledge, SUCH AS!: 

At Mojo, we recently worked on a custom typeface for the Warner Bros. movie Where The Wild Things Are. It was meant to look like the writing of the lead child actor, and the studio responded very positively to the lettering of Erik Buckham, one of our art directors. So he drew up a bunch of the characters, I digitized them, and built it all in FontLab.

Oh, the effort glows from the result: I am warmed with memories of my own big-print salad days, and must admire the discrete perfection in such hand-lettering. Solution in hand, still, I was not satisfied. DAMN MY INSATIABLE CURIOSITY. You see, I still couldn't remember what it intitally reminded me of, a mystery that warranted mentioning every time I visited the movie theater (without fail, my dear boyfriend would probably add). Then, it dawned on me. 


It was in front of my face the whole time, mocking me from my movie shelf, like the callow, cold-hearted companion it is: 

Kubrick, you've won yet another round in our lifelong battle of wits. MYSTERY = SOLVED. Cred = salvaged. Now, back to not obsessing about random fonts ahem, lunch.