Casual Cogitations

Is it just me, or has there been a drastic and slightly unsettling change in the way filmmakers approach the horror genre in recent years? I'm not talking about the almost monthly release of remakes of classic and not-so-classic titles, more the way that everything has a music video look to it and genuine scares are replaced by excessive gore? I know this is far from an original complaint and horror fans have been making this argument for years, but after sitting through Return to House on Haunted Hill, I'm sorry to say the only genuine scare I had was when a piece of the chocolate I was eating went down the wrong way causing me to momentarily choke. Don't worry I'm fine now, it was my own fault, but the film itself gave me nothing, nada, zip.

Still, a lack of scares needn't be fatal if the film can still manage to entertain on some other level and this, I'm afraid it frequently struggles to do. What we have here is a haunted house movie by the numbers, a few inventive kills, and a three-way lesbian scene where two of the participants in the ménage-a-trois are ghosts. Classy!

The film sets out to explain the reason for the evil forces that control Hill House, this turns out to be the Baphomet Idol. A cursed artifact with corrupting powers, it was this idol that consumed Dr. Richard Benjamin Vannacutt when the house was still a mental hospital, resulting in his ghastly practices, leaving a steady stream of mutilated corpses. These very same victims now haunt the corridors of Hill House, brutally killing anyone who dares enter and using staples of the J-Horror genre (long hair covering all but one eye, odd or jerky movements) in an attempt to scare the viewer and failing miserably. While I can't say the film was completely horrible (it's certainly watchable), it just didn't add anything new to the horror genre or do anything particularly well—apart from the aforementioned ménage-a-trois.

In this sequel, a bunch of people end up back at the house/asylum looking for the Baphomet Idol, which is some kind of valuable (and, we discover, evil) effigy associated with the Knights Templar. No one is actually making a Return to House on Haunted Hill, since the lone survivor of that little foray blows her brains out right at the start of this film, and it's left to her sister to battle the forces of darkness and generally act like an idiot.

Yes, act like an idiot. Now, I'm familiar with that whole horror-movie theory, how if people didn't act like idiots, they'd use logic to survive and there'd be no movie, but the group on display here ratchets up the idiot quotient to uncomfortable levels. Camp Crystal Lake is a Mensa colony by comparison.

These characters do unfathomable things before even setting foot in the Asylum on Haunted Hill, including kidnapping the editor of an apparently high-profile magazine because her sister might (or might not) have told her something (or not). They kidnap her at gunpoint! With two muscle-bound, ex-professional-wrestling goons! And a blank-faced-and-horny lesbian! When we see this lineup of characters, we're not only tipped off as to who our first three victims will be, but we're reassured that our lust for a bit of girl flesh will be quenched by an encounter with the nubile dead.

Once at the house/asylum, we find there are basically two teams: the mercenary baddies, led by Desmond, who are there to find the idol (pronounced "bath mat" by the meatheads) and sell it for $5 million; and the non-baddies, led by Dr. Richard Hammer, who's been searching for the blasted Baphomet for 20 years and thinks it belongs in a museum. Except for the three goons, everyone has some kind of relationship with everyone else, and if this were a movie in which character and plot mattered, these relationships might lead to something.

But this movie is concerned with showing gruesome demises and lots of quick cutting. Much of the action takes place in the basement of the asylum/house, so everything has that bleak and nasty industrial look. The supernatural stuff is ridiculouslous; people are randomly transported back in time to the horrible heyday of the asylum, while others just as randomly escape this fate. Since ghosts are not inhibited by time and space, they can pop up anywhere, but they still insist on chasing people rather than just popping up in front of them.

It's a shame this is all so shoddily done, because there could have been a fun movie here. The idea of a treasure hunt in a haunted house—not the steamy industrial basement of a haunted asylum—holds a lot of possibilities: different surprises in each room, outlandish clues, conniving characters, shifting loyalties, and so on.

Count me disappointed. Not as if I had any right to be, of course. The movie after all is called Return to House on Haunted Hill -- a title which, while evocative, doesn't even begin to sound grammatically correct.

What is there to say about Fahrenheit 451? It has been around for just over 56 years, and it thus merits a detailed review from yours truly. But honestly, without the recommendation of a crony, I would have never heard of this piece of trash.

That was a joke.

Fahrenheit 451 is one of the more remarkable books of our time. Sure, the text has its share of warts. The characters are more like caricatures, over the top and thin in their complexity. Ray Bradbury indulges his inner high-school writer with his strong use of comparisons which, for example, describes the overhead sound of bombers as "if two giant hands had torn ten thousand miles of black linen down the seam." And I am not going to talk about descriptions, such as "The subway fled past him, cream-tile, jet-black, cream-tile, jet-black, numerals and darkness, more darkness and the total adding itself." Moreover, the ending is simplistic and idealistic, where the well read of society emerge from their homeless shelters to save a post-apocalyptic world.

But still.

The caricatures are appropriate. The only fellow with depth and dynamics is Guy Montag, and that is because he is the only human struggling for some truth. By my definition, a full character is one who is making that effort, whatever truth it may be. Montag is -- for those not familiar with the story -- a fireman. His job is to set fire to books so that no one will read and consequently understand the hopelessness of reality.

The book burning is not a government mandated censorship, as in the case of 1984. Instead, it is a society-built degradation of the written word. Society has rejected the black and white messages bound in leather and paper. Burning books is better, according to most of the citizens of his world (including his suicidal wife), than to watch TV. Most the people in this world demand live inside entertainment, ignoring those inner voices that ask, "Is this it?"

Montag must find more. He must find it for himself, and he believes he must find it for society.

The incredible use of comparison does serve a purpose. Bradbury admits his overuse of metaphor and simile in the afterword, but the writing style creates a pulpy, film-noir weirdness to the words. The comparisons are sometimes wonderful, sometimes outrageous. They create a tone of 'hey, this can't be real,' while the content (human apathy, the limitation of the written word) pounds the reader's reality. The disharmony is symphonic. The previous sentence is a metaphor, for those paying attention.

I said I wasn't going to talk about the descriptions, but here's another example: "It was a stroll through another store, and his currency strange and unusable there, and his passion cold, even when he touched the wood and plaster and clay." These over-the-top descriptions do some of the same work as the comparisons.

The ending echoes Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in which Huck and Jim return to the hometown, and all is well in the world. Well, not really, as Twain well knows. Tom is still enslaved. Huck's "rescue" from one slaver delivers Jim to his former slaver. A helplessness moves past dramatic irony. No one in the story notices a permeating stink because each person no longer notices the odor. Huck (and Twain's) solution is to move out of society, to head west into the not-yet-civilized Western America.

The same goes in Fahrenheit 451. Bradbury is acutely aware that books are useless; they are physical objects. They are pieces of paper with words on them. Worse, 85 percent (a rough estimate) of those words are not worth the paper on which they are printed. To see books as the saviors of humanity is not naïve; it is dangerous. Rely on your survival manual in the middle of the desert, and you will probably die of thirst.

The absolute value of books is separate from their personal value that has lifted the souls and opened the minds to countless individuals. But everyone in Bradbury's world, including the exiled book readers themselves, have lost that personal love for the feel of text on paper and the smell of vellum as it ages yellow.

Ray Bradbury's conscious control of these elements, among others, shows his craft. Disagree with his techniques, but do not disagree that he employed those techniques with a purpose. His sentiments are not new. Lots of people have questioned the limits of language (for more on this, Google Jacques Derrida and Deconstruction Theory). The style Bradbury uses, the pulpy sci-fi style that is one reason this book still runs strong in popularity and relevance a half century later.

Fahrenheit 451 has become (and, I think, was designed to be) that thing that caused books to burn. The text or its author offers no answers to the question poised. Instead, if offers a story about a man seeking a truth. Where many forgettable texts use the soapbox, Bradbury used the microscope and telescope.

Observationalists like Bradbury have held the literary court for the past century (if not before). What is the next step? The problem of the human condition has been defined by Bradbury and his peers (of whom there are few), so where's the big leap forward that will not only acknowledge reality at hand, but which will also suggest a solution that will evolve the human of the species? Possibly, there is no answer in this generation or the next. Perhaps humans will go extinct before realizing an answer to even one of its defining questions.

FAMOUS LAST WORDS

Fahrenheit 451 is a brilliant, disturbing novel. It is as meaningful today --- perhaps more so --- as it was when it was written in 1953.

Possibly, there is no Bradbury 2.0.

Until there is, keep your copy of Fahrenheit 451 handy. You never know when some person needs a fire's warmth.

Is it possible to create a perfect society - one where everyone is well-fed and healthy and carefree? How would you do it? Are people only entitled to live in the society if they actively contribute? What do you do with those who are not capable of contributing? Do you have to sacrifice individual freedom for the greater good?

Well, this story is set in a perfect world, but it is only perfect for the inhabitants because they are subdued to the point where they do not question the decisions which are taken for them by their elders. Children live in family units but not with their natural parents. At the age of twelve they are assigned to learn their adult duties. The only object in life is to conform. But in return for this the people never experience hunger or pain. You may think they do not experience real life at all since there is no emotion.

But there are some ugly truths propping up this particular community. Who takes the really difficult decisions which are outside the limited experience of the ordinary inhabitants? Jonas, aged twelve, and teetering on the brink of trainee adulthood is selected to become the new Receiver of Memory.

How on earth do you bear the burden of memory of the whole of human experience? The agonies of war and disease and loss, the heights of human achievement, freedom, music, color, and the overwhelming power of love. Jonas must keep these memories on behalf of his community, but he may not share them with anyone because no-one wants to experience the whole range of human emotion. It is too painful. See how Jonas copes.

Lois Lowry earned the Newbery Medal for this book, so unlike any other for children -- or for adults. There have been utopian novels before--though few for children--but none that give the utopia such a fair shake. It is this fairness that makes The Giver so riveting and thought-provoking, and so perfect for triggering discussions. The author is true to her determination not to stack the deck for readers; the ending is deliberately ambiguous, with allegorical overtones, leaving readers to decide what they want to believe.

FAMOUS LAST WORDS

Jonas's world is very appealing. The community runs by common agreement to its rules; some freedom is sacrificed for security; joy, for avoidance of misery. The choices, which provide the catalyst for discussion, all involve one central decision: to forgo the highs of life in order to get rid of the lows -- to find the middle way. There is a lot to be said for this, though Jonas, speaking presumably for the author, ultimately rejects it. Some children will agree with Jonas, but others will find themselves attracted to a life that is uniformly pleasant, if never exhilarating.

The rules of first-person shooters are changing. Videogames that engage the player in acts of war have always promised one thing; cover. During times of extreme duress the player has always had the option of retreating behind a wall or group of immovable sandbags in order to escape their assailants. Battlefield: Bad Company changes all that.

No longer is the inside of a house a safe haven for fleeing soldiers. Walls, sandbags, fences, and other formerly indestructible objects can now be torn down with a blast from a grenade or rocket launcher. Bad Company, while not perfect by any means, changes the formulaic gameplay of war-based first-person shooters enough to warrant the attention of the many fans of the genre.

The Battlefield series has always been a PC-oriented franchise. Battlefield 2: Modern Combat was the first to make the jump to consoles during the twilight of the Xbox and the infancy of the 360. While it was enjoyed by some, the immense praise that the series was accustomed to was missing. Bad Company not only represents the first story-based game in the series, but it's also the first product to utilize the all-new Frostbite engine which is responsible for all of the luscious destruction that I just mentioned.

Bad Company follows one Private Preston Marlow, a new recruit to a division of the army known simply as Bad Company, or B-Company for short. It's a group of misfit soldiers -- complementing Marlow are Sarge, Haggard and the love struck Sweetwater -- each with his own personality and quippy dialogue. Though the missions in the campaign begin innocently enough with standard seek and destroy objectives, the team's motivations quickly take a turn once the promise of personal wealth enters the equation.

It's interesting to see how DICE dances around the politically charged climate of present day. Especially when you consider that your group of soldiers is essentially abandoned by United States military command fairly early on. DICE could have taken a more politically slanted approach but Bad Company does a good job of keeping things light-hearted and fun throughout the action.

Sadly it's that same light-hearted appeal that hurts the action in BF: BC a bit. War is intense yet the characters in Bad Company are constantly joking around and making fun of one another during battle. The comedy bit just doesn't quite fit in with the incredible level of action on screen.

That having been said, it's clear that Battlefield: Bad Company isn't necessarily trying to be as hard-edged as the drama-charged Call of Duty 4. This is evidenced -- beyond the over-the-top personas -- by both the health and respawn systems. When Marlow begins his adventure he is immediately introduced to his trusty health injector. Players can whip that sucker out, slam it into Preston's chest and his health is instantly restored. While you'll need to wait a handful of seconds before repeating the process, there are moments when you'll feel like all you're doing is running around and sticking yourself with that precious needle. Not exactly something you'd see on CNN war footage.

Next up is the respawn system which will remind many of the cryo chambers found in BioShock. When you die in most single-player games the world resets to the point of your last saved checkpoint. Not so in Bad Company. Instead you'll essentially respawn back onto the field of battle with any damage that you may have caused in your previous life still intact and any downed enemies still deader than a doornail. I can't help but feel like that system detracts from the strategy and overall intensity of the battles. Each life carried very little significance for me as I could charge in, take out a few blokes and trust that they'd still be gone when Preston returned to the living.

Where the gameplay of Bad Company positively separates itself from the throng of other war-based releases is the destructibility. At this point it sounds almost cliché but the Frostbite engine does indeed change the way you play. Hiding behind walls is no longer safe for you or your enemies. I can't tell you how many times my dwindling health sent me retreating into a house, only to have the walls shredded by an onslaught of tank shells.

There's no doubt that the destruction wouldn't have such a profound impact if it didn't look and sound so damn good. Bad Company isn't a graphical masterpiece by any means, but launching a grenade into the side of a wall and watching the debris and smoke spew out of the formerly whole structure is a sight to see. DICE also did a good job of placing plenty of explosive barrels, crates and gasoline tanks around the environment so there's never of shortage of things that go boom.

However, the visuals are not without issues. The lack of vertical sync shows its ugly face fairly often, particularly in the first level. There's also an odd film grain that, while I found it endearing to the overall style, might be lamented by some. There are also moments of wonky physics and other oddities, but nothing that overly hurts the experience.

Throw in some of the best audio effects I've ever heard in a videogame and Bad Company becomes more a treat for the ears than the eyes. The High Dynamic Range Audio creates different audio effects for gunfire, explosions and pretty much every other sound effect you can imagine. Want a real audio treat? Stand inside a house and blow out one of the walls with Preston's grenade launcher then stop and listen to the sound reverberate as the debris comes raining down. Other impressive auditory delights include the sound of a tank shell whizzing by your head and launching a fleet of missiles from an airborne helicopter. While the dialogue from the characters might be a bit too cheeseball for some, the sound effects, classic Battlefield theme music and overall audio design more than pick up the slack.

The story that's told through in-game and in-engine cutscenes is serviceable but nothing award-winning. The dialogue is slightly cheesy and over-the-top and none of the characters are all that inspiring. Marlow is sort of a shell of a hero and is more "along for the ride" than anything else. The main villain, the one who's keeping the quartet of militants from their riches, looks mean but never really comes across as the frightening hard ass as intended.

A big problem that most will have with Bad Company's campaign is that it can't be played cooperatively. With four soldiers built in to the storyline one would think that the developers would have implemented four-player co-op, yet there's none to be found. In this day and age it's pretty much inexcusable to not have cooperative play when it makes so much sense with the core game design.

Thankfully, where the single-player stumbles, the multiplayer shines. The Battlefield franchise is known more for its online matches than its solo play but sadly I cannot vouch that Bad Company is no different. Why? For some uncountable reason, I am unable to connect the multiplayer and therefore, I dont have a say on this....

Battlefield: Bad Company is a great addition to the long-running series, despite the fact that it leaves the comfy confines of the PC world. The added storyline gives newfound depth to the formerly shallow single-player mode, despite the fact that the dramatization pales in comparison to what we’ve seen from Call of Duty 4. Where Bad Company truly shines is in its multiplayer (from what rumors tell) and the technology that drives the game forward. Both raise the bar in their own right and give the competition something to strive for. In this summer relatively devoid of solid first-person shooters, Bad Company does enough to earn your hard-earned dough.

"Everybody, I've got bad news. We've been cancelled."

And so opens the weirdest chapter in TV history.