The DAN ZONE

I never thought I’d see so many female body parts so in-my-face in my life, but thanks to Piranha 3-D, one of my new favorite movies, I’ve now had some extremely intimate moments with the female anatomy. How can I love a movie so filled with babes and boobs, you ask? Well, because all the fish get eaten in this film…and again, I’m not talking about the piranha.

There’s no talking about this film without ignoring the giant—well, not elephant—in the room. It’s the bearded clams!!! Not to mention the boobage. Piranha 3-D has more T, A and P than any other rated-R horror film I’ve ever seen. Which made it all the more uncomfortable having two kids under 10-years-old sitting behind us with their mother. WTF? Seriously, with a movie this explicit, not to mention gory, it should be mandatory for the movie theaters to WARN parents trying to bring their kids in. But back to the, um, ‘TAP’ in the film. Ironically, there’s no sex, it’s just nudity. But it’s almost every single chick in the flick. Now I’ve never been to spring break, and I heard it was raunchy, but I had no idea that there are essentially NO girls with any inhibitions about being naked in front of droves of drunk frat boys.

And despite there being no focus on the bodies of the frat boys, Piranha rules!!! It’s everything the snorefest Jaws isn’t. Okay, that’s taking it a little far, because Jaws is a great film…until, you know, the endless monologues on the boat for the last hour of the movie. As far as fun, entertainment, thrills, and suspense, Piranha is much more up there with the classic Jaws 2, the absolute best film in that franchise, and actually pays much more of an homage to the second Jaws. This film truly does for fresh water lakes what Jaws did for salt water ocean. That’s right. This spring break isn’t taking place at the shore, it’s a party on a lake. And shallow water has never been so frighteningly filmed.

The director happens to be the man behind other favorite horror films of mine like the remake of The Hills Have Eyes and the freaky foreign film High Tension. Alexandre Aja shows an amazing ability to cross subgenres of horror films, because every film is good in its own right, but completely different than the others. This film in particular is witty fun, yet soaked with blood and gruesome gore. After seeing the special effects of this film in 3-D, you pretty much have a full sense of how horrible it would be to have your face gnawed off by the razor-sharp teeth of a pack of piranha. The effects are cringe-inducing.

The film is also amazingly American in its portrayal of loads of stupid, drunken college kids just looking to get laid and totally ignoring the authority of law enforcement. And of course, to satire the whole ‘Girls Gone Wild’ phenomenon, there’s Jerry O’Connell as a sleazy porn director who is a big dick—in more ways than one. Not since South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut has a film gone there to such an extent and gotten so many moviegoers to scream in sheer horror at the sight of all the goodness a man has to offer. And speaking of man goodness, the ever-adorable horror director Eli Roth has a small role here, as does black bear Ving Rhames, surprisingly chubby and older now. There’s even an appearance by “Carlos” from Desperate Housewives, and he’s never looked more delicious (unfortunately…). All the kids in the film are pretty much from a bunch of today’s teen television dramas.

Then there’s the six degrees of Spielberg situation. As if to pay tribute to the man who began the man-eating fish craze thirty-five years ago, this film features Elisabeth Shue as the local sheriff. She still looks stunning after all these years and commands the part seriously despite the campy chaos going on elsewhere. Elisabeth appeared as Marty McFly’s girlfriend in the sequels to the Spielberg creation Back to the Future (replacing the original nobody who played the part in the first film, forever killing the trilogy’s continuity), and is here reunited with none other than Christopher Lloyd, who was clearly directed in this film to act EXACTLY like ‘Doc’ Emmett Brown. Awesome. But the best nod to Spielberg and his original fish film is the cameo in the opening scene. I wish Scream 4 luck in finding a first victim for the prologue to top the one in Piranha 3-D.

More fun than Jaws, smartly not taking itself seriously, and with Ray-Ban inspired glasses that are ten times better than the technologically archaic red/blue glasses used for the 1983 classic Jaws 3-D, Piranha had best be just the beginning of a new generation of summer blockbuster fish franchises!!! Because this film bites—in a good way.

Ever heard of Rolfe Kanefsky? I hadn’t either, until I discovered that I have not one but FOUR of his horror movies in my collection. So I guess that means I’m a fan.

Funny thing about Rolfe, he had a huge window for a lawsuit when Scream premiered in 1996. Four years before Randy gave us lessons on the rules of slasher films, there was David, the lead character in There’s Nothing Out There, who spouted the rules of surviving a horror movie every chance he got. That’s right kiddies. Randy the video store clerk is a total poser.

Speaking of video stores (still hot in the 90s), let’s start with the opening of There’s Nothing Out There. A blonde chick in a hot pink miniskirt and tank top is working in a video store and is suddenly attacked by a crazed killer. As she writhes and crawls with pouted lips and heaving chest across the floor of the video store (make love to the camera, baby!), we are bombarded by the cover art of VHS tapes on the shelves—classic horror titles that feature artistic drawings of curvy, busty, scantily clad women looking somehow horrified and horny at the same time (hornified?). Keep that in mind—because Rolfe likes to make films that are, in part, a discourse about the intercourse between sex and horror.

Turns out video store blondie is only dreaming. She’s actually asleep in her car—and is immediately attacked by some sort of alien with octopus arms! She drives until she crashes…

Dissolve to David…and his teenage friends. They are headed off for a weekend at a summer home. When they see police investigating a crashed car on the side of the road, David immediately pipes up worriedly, claiming this is a clear warning sign telling teenagers on their way to party and have sex that they should really go back. When they arrive at the summer home, Randy…um…I mean…David, warns them not to skinny dip, not to go off into the woods alone, not to go in the basement, to beware the cheap cat scare tactic…you get the picture. David is Randy, four years before. David’s character tries continuously to warn the others that they are in the midst of a horror movie, but they don’t listen until most of them have been slaughtered at the hands of an alien that looks kind of like the lovechild of Basket Case and that big pile of talking poo from Weird Science. David has all the answers. He’s the one who knows how to survive a horror movie. Hell, not even Randy made it past the first sequel.

Even though it was released in 92, I have a feeling There’s Nothing Out There was completed at the tail end of the 80s, because it’s more 80s than 90s. Most of the songs used in the soundtrack are very new wave sounding (nothing famous), there’s a group of punks who come to skinny dip in the water behind the summer home, and all the girls look like members of Poison, only, you know, not as pretty…

There’s Nothing Out There is low budget, extremely funny in all its familiarity, and clearly made by a lover of the genre. Rolfe also serves up the sex—and based on his imdb page, it appears he’s no stranger to ‘non-mainstream’ movies, if you will. In fact, several of the actors in this, his first film, appear in some of them. Here we get a gratuitous shower scene with a blonde chick and sex scenes galore. And Rolfe gives us a nice bit of balance when the cutest guy in the film tears of all his clothes to go skinny dipping at night. And boy is there a full moon out!

There are plenty of nods to other horror films. The slapstick humor, which is laugh out loud at times, is straight up Evil Dead, as is a face melting scene. Random blue and red lighting is thrown in that has Dario Argento written all over it. There are abundant references to stomach bursting scenes from alien horror films. And they even try to burn the alien in the oven in a very Trilogy of Terror moment. Not to mention, there’s a watery basement scene that I would swear is an ode to the film Return of the Alien’s Deadly Spawn that I just reviewed recently.

To add to the fun, there’s one guy who has total gay face. I’m sure this dude has to be gay in real life, because every line he delivers sounds somewhat queeny, not to mention that his only other credit in film on imdb is as a dancer in the original 1988 Hairspray. And not once, but TWICE in this film he lashes out against pussy—first he throws a poor little pussycat to the alien to save himself, and second, he knees one of his ‘girlfriend’ in the va-jay-jay when she is possessed by the alien after it shoots green lasers at her eyes. Yeah, There’s Nothing Out There is definitely my kind of horror film.

12 years after his first horror film (and clearly a fun time making adult entertainment), Rolfe returned to the genre where he got his start with another goody. This time around, the major inspiration seems to be the Night of the Demons series.

A bunch of college kids, including b-movie scream queen Tiffany Shepis, are involved in a hazing (imagine that) on Halloween night that involves them stealing a demonic book for a scavenger hunt from their crazy teacher (scream king Brad Dourif—you know, the guy whose soul jumps into Chucky), then spending a night in a creepy mansion. Well, the demonic book ends up in the basement, Dourif ends up in a coma, and the kids end up getting possessed by his spirit one by one when the hole to hell opens. Hole-y Night of the Demons! The long shots of dark hallways, the glowing fire in the main room where the kids are hanging out and the zooming camera signifying the rampant demonic spirit looking for a new body to inhabit are straight out of my favorite horror film of 1988.

Again, Rolfe loves camp and comedy in his horror, and there are plenty of good one-liners in this film, the kids battling each other as they turn into demons—only one at a time in this film compared to the demon party in Night of the Demons. Tiffany Shepis gets some awesome support from the blonde ‘bimbo’ in the bunny costume, who has a few surprises up her sleeve. And then there’s the absolutely adorable Parry Shen in the male lead. Parry is like the go-to guy if you want an adorable, boyish Asian guy in your film. He has also appeared in the campy horror Hatchet as well as Shrieker. I just hope he keeps making these kinds of horror movies because he totally rules.

On top of all that, there are also creepy mannequins, men in women’s clothing, Tiffany Shepis’s boobs and butt, a chainsaw, a long tongue, a creepy floating red balloon, darts, and a picture perfect Bruce Campbell cameo. And then there’s the basement ending hell hole ending, which is like something out of Amityville-3D.

Too bad Tiffany Shepis was too young to be in movies in 1992, otherwise she would have been in EVERY Rolfe Kanefsky film. Corpses, while campy and low budget, runs a little long in my opinion, but it still has its moments—and plenty of Argento lighting, plenty of gore, and plenty of undead. In fact, it starts immediately with disembowelment—on a baseball field—which leaves you with a lot of high hopes.

An evil undertaker is bringing the dead back to life in the basement of his funeral home using a special embalming fluid. His assistant happens to be Tiffany Shepis’s cute boyfriend (whose nipples she likes to squeeze—hard—after sex in a coffin). Tiffany happens to be the daughter of the Sheriff. The sheriff happens to now be marrying the ex-wife of the evil undertaker, and the ex-wife is trying to get his funeral home shut down so the city can build a mall there (and yes, there’s a reference made to Dawn of the Dead). So the undertaker is going to use the undead to fight the powers that be and get his ex-wife back. But that’s when things get gory and the undead wreak havoc.

This film seems to draw its inspiration from Re-Animator as well as Dead Alive and, of course, Evil Dead. Fun moments include a horny zombie with a constant erection because he died of a Viagra overdose and a bunch of zombies ripping of Tiffany Shepis’s clothes, to which she comment “Is that really necessary?” Jeff Fahey takes a Bruce Campbell stance to battle the undead, but the real comedy show is the MILF playing the stepmother. She totally steals the show.

Just note that this is one of those films that ‘continues’ after the credits. But the content is more like the ‘special features’ because it’s approximately 15 minutes of alternate scenes and endings! WTF?

Moving on up to the big time, Rolfe’s 2006 film Nightmare Man landed in the Afterdark Horrorfest. And people HATE this movie, which shocks me, because I think it has everything going for it. It’s scary, creepy, suspenseful, laugh-out-loud funny, gory, and has Tiffany Shepis in her best scream queen role ever. This time around, Rolfe deeply explores the fine line between hard-ons and horror.

The first half hour of this film is like a mini horror film in itself, with fantastic directing that keeps you on the edge of your seat. A woman having problems getting pregnant with her suave Italian boyfriend orders a fertility mask, but instead gets a seriously hideous looking black mask with gnarly teeth, evil eyes and devil horns. She plans to return it. When she hears someone in the house, the lights go out and she goes to look for her Italian Stallion, who calls to her from the attic. She goes up there…and…EEK!!! Fricking scary scene.

Next thing you know, Italian Stallion is driving her to some sort of nut house. Their car runs out of fuel so he offers to leave her all alone in the middle of nowhere while he walks back to a gas station. It just so happens that, to help with her therapy, one of her doctors has told the Italian Stallion to bring along the mask she thinks is coming to life as the ‘nightmare man’ when she doesn’t take her medication. So now the mask is in the trunk of the car, it turns to night, and we are treated to another fricking SCARY scene. This is what a horror movie is supposed to be. Our infertile femme fatale runs off into the woods, being chased by Nightmare Man.

At the same time, Tiffany Shepis and her friends are partying it up at a summer home in the woods (sound familiar?). It’s only Tiffany, her boyfriend, her female friend (with whom she’s had a secret lesbian relationship), and her now hetero girlfriend’s new boyfriend. Believe me, this hottie could turn anyone from dyke lover to dick lover. Anyway, this group is playing truth or dare, and when the ex-dyke is dared to do demonstrate having an orgasm, Rolfe juxtaposes her gasping and moaning performance over the infertile femme fatale’s screams and gasps for air in the woods, once again exploring the sex and horror theme he first considered way back at the beginning of There’s Nothing Out There.

Naturally, our infertile femme fatale makes it to the house, beginning the reign of terror on this gang of friends. But is Nightmare Man real, or just a figment of this crazy be-otch’s imagination? Is he a symbol of man’s power over women’s bodies? Is he just her husband in a mask? Is he her physical manifestation of everything she fears about men? Well, whatever he is, people start dying, until only Tiffany Shepis and the infertile femme fatale remain. This is where Tiffany shines. Her dialogue exchanges with the crazy bitch are perfect, bringing in the camp and comedy aspects of this film. And just when you think the twist (a lame one) has been revealed, the film delivers a perfectly demonic second twist that’s like something out of…you guessed it. Evil Dead or Night of the Demons.

These aren’t the only films Rolfe celebrates again. He also throws in Argento lighting and…in fact…totally celebrates his own movie There’s Nothing Out There. For starters, one of the characters is wearing a t-shirt that says… “There’s Nothing Out There.” Awesome. There’s another gratuitous shower scene, and also a blatant close-up of a big glass jar of M&Ms being smashed during a fight, something that also happens blatantly in There’s Nothing Out There! On top of that, there’s a bit of dialogue in which Tiffany Shepis references a mysterious sound being the cat, but when another character asks her if she has a cat, she says no. I’m telling you, Nightmare Man is for There’s Nothing Out There fans what the self-referential Was Craven’s New Nightmare was for A Nightmare on Elm Street fans. But even if you haven’t seen Rolfe’s first movie, Nightmare Man is a rollercoaster ride of horror fun that has sadly fallen victim to the negative free-publicity that the online world offers awesome horror films way too often. For me personally, Nightmare Man has me hoping for another Rolfe Kanefsky film to come along.

So, this past weekend, I had one of my favorite co-workers over to the house with her 11 year-old daughter and their dog for a doggy date with my pups. She’d never been to the house before, so we gave her the ‘grand’ tour. Now, if you add up all the furniture in my house that has drawers, there have to be about FORTY drawers in total. And wouldn’t you know that as we take the tour, my friend would be compelled to open only ONE drawer…the drawer that has like 50 of my porns in it! She’s admiring the piece of furniture, and the next thing I know, she’s slowly pulling the knob of the drawer. I scream “NO!” Luckily, she knows all about my side job writing porn reviews on the internet, so she didn’t need to be warned twice and immediately slams the drawer shut and throws her hands up in surrender. Did we have a story to tell our coworkers the next day….

I don’t remember adding the1982 film Midnight to my collection…but there it was as I continue my A to Z rewatch of all my horror DVDs, so I popped it in not recalling anything about it until as soon as it started. I assume I purchased it after seeing it mentioned as a film from 1982 on a message board. Since it is horror and came from the 80s, I’m obligated to own it. Yes, obligated. It’s a rule of living in the Dan Zone. I’m just shocked that I absolutely never saw this movie before I bought it on DVD. It must have been like the one 80s horror movie that we didn’t carry in the video store I worked at in the 80s.

Getting the important horror trivia out of the way, this film is written and directed by John Russo, the man responsible for writing the original Night of the Living Dead. When the film begins, it seems like it’s going to be a real bad low-budget flick but once it gets off the ground (and that takes a while), there are actually some great horror elements.

The film has a ‘prologue’ involving a mother and her children catching a little girl in an animal trap in a field, beating her and then taking her home to sacrifice her. When the little girl is sitting with her leg in the animal trap, she sounds and looks like she was directed to merely scream—without any direction as to the kind of pain and terror she would be in if she was actually caught in an animal trap. Not a good sign.

It only gets worse when we flash forward and meet Nancy, a tomboyish looking chick who somehow ends up being the objective of every man’s ‘affection’ in this movie. First thing, her drunk old stepfather cop comes home and tries to molest her, so she hits him over the head with a tape recorder (totally 80s!) and runs away, leaving him passed out on her bed and…snoring. I kid not.

Once she takes to the streets, she’s immediately offered a ride…in exchange for sex…by some perv in a car. She gets rid of him and is then picked up by a couple of buddies in a truck, a black dude and a white dude (who is hot for her—but she’s not hot! I don’t get it!!!). As they drive off, things go really downhill and make me pretty sure this film was filmed in the 70s but not released until 82. We are treated to a melodramatic, soft rock track by a female singer, with the main lyrics being “you’re on your own.” Wow, this is bad.

Meanwhile, back home, stepdad cop is telling his wife that her daughter ran off and that Nancy has been trying to seduce him! What a disgusting pig!

But back to more of “You’re on your own” as the truck trio makes its way through a small. At a gas station, they meet a black reverend and his daughter who tell them there have been a lot of murders in the town over the past few years that the locals are calling ‘accidental deaths’ because they are a bunch of racists. Wow. Didn’t see the racism angle coming. Anyway, the reverend and daughter hitch a ride in their truck and are dropped off at a cemetery to pay respects to the reverend’s dead wife. The daughter decides to walk home (home seems to be pretty close to the cemetery), and once she’s gone, this bearded fat guy in overalls comes out of the woods with a knife and kills the reverend! Soon, the fat guy is at the reverend’s house, and things don’t turn out so well for the reverend’s daughter.

Meanwhile, our interracial, intergender trio is facing their own harassment by the locals (they’re run out of a bar for having a black dude with them), and the black dude even drops the ‘honky’ bomb after. Awesome! TOTALLY 80s! Right after, the guys inform Nancy that they’ve been stealing food from convenience stores as they travel because they have no money, so she joins in and they steal from another place…to the  mellow 70s sounds of “You’re on your own”! TOO funny.

But this is finally where the real horror begins and we are treated to a backwoods family film that’s half Texas Chainsaw Massacre, half Psycho. After an all-points bulletin is put out for our trio, they are chased by cops and of course make a ‘wrong turn’ into the woods to escape. They soon see the fat killer running around with what looks like a body in the woods. But it wouldn’t be an 80s horror movie if they didn’t decide to camp out in the woods anyway. And if Nancy didn’t decide to take a walk by herself the next morning before the guys awake.

Well, Nancy returns to camp to find that two ‘policemen’ have found her male companions. One creepy guy is a totally androgynous dude (at first I thought it was a woman) and the other is this bulky, bald, goateed leather daddy type! WTF? It’s like something out of a Mapplethorpe photo.

Unfortunately, things don’t go well for Nancy’s friends, and within minutes she’s on her own (the ‘racism’ theme discarded and rendered completely irrelevant for the remainder of the film), running through the woods being chased by the creepy pair and, naturally, right into their sadistic home. This is when it gets really good. Nancy is directed by a nice girl playing solitaire at a table to a phone in another room. Unfortunately, when she goes in that room, she finds the fat killer cutting off some dude’s head with a knife! Within minutes she’s at the mercy of the ‘family’—the two guys in the cop uniforms (which it turns out they got when they killed some real cops), the fat guy, and the solitaire playing be-otch. They make Nancy walk on all fours like a dog into a cage next to some other already caged girl! I was sure this was about to turn into a seriously disturbing exploitation flick, but that never happens.

Instead, it turns out the dirty stepdaddy decides to go find his wife’s daughter and make amends, so he follows clues all the way to the crazy family’s house!!!

While stepdaddy is playing hero and sneaking up for his rescue mission, we get to meet the family’s mommy—a corpse sitting in a rocking chair upstairs. Seems the family needs the blood of three people to perform an Easter ritual at midnight. They hook themselves up with another female victim, who is the first to be sacrificed at an old skool occult ritual including a classic black room with candles, the family in black robes with hoods, inverted pentagrams painted on their foreheads, and dear old dead mom watching the whole ceremony.

Nancy is the star, so she ends up being the lone survivor (stepdad gets killed trying to save her, but we don’t exactly feel sympathy for him, even though he was drunk when he tried to screw her). Nancy takes care of business, knocking off the family one member at a time, and as soon as she sets the last one on fire, the credits begin to roll to the sound of… “You’re on your own”! Didn’t anyone tell John Russo that classics like Night of the Living Dead were classics in part because of their appropriate musical scores???

As cheesy as Midnight is (and actually, the word is actually a lyric in “You’re on your own”), it has some really strong horror moments that make it totally worth a watch. Like I said, it feels more 70s than 80s, so I can’t say it gets points for coming from the 80s. And here’s the real kick. I just discovered that Russo did a sequel in 1993 in which one member of the family didn’t exactly die at the hands of Nancy… I MUST see this movie!!!!

Before I even get into this week’s episode, I have to just comment on everybody being atwitter about a Tweet put out there by ex-American Idol castoff Elliott Yamin. This is pretty much what he said:

“Can someone please xplain what the big deal is with #Glee ?..what’s so entertaining about watchin actors lip sync 4 an hour?..I don’t get it…oh…so…this is what really goes on in HS nowadays?…kids walk around lip syncin 2 auto tuned radio garbage? ..not hatin,just dont get it”

Well, for starters, I have to say, this is why I don’t Tweet—because I much prefer the ability to actually stay as close to English grammar as possible, so blogging allows me to re-read what I’ve written and at least correct the occasional typo. Plus, rather than the knee-jerk reaction to stimulus that Tweeting is (the kind that leaves you looking all jerk, without the knee), blogging offers you time to RATIONALLY think about what you’re saying before you say it.

As for Yamin’s comments, doesn’t Elliott expect people to watch and like his lip synced videos on MTV Hits??? Judging a show simply as the one with ‘the lip syncing high school kids’ (which many haters on message boards do with this show) is incredibly shallow for someone like Yamin, who claims to be an artist. As an artist, he should recognize the aristry that goes into the show–there’s a whole lot more than just lip syncing going on here. The writing is complex, there’s characterization, human emotions and social experiences are explored, and the humor is fantastic even if not everyone’s cup of tea (all humor is subjective—how else would Russell Brand keep getting jobs?). Most importantly, despite lip syncing during filming (something that’s been done in movie musicals since their inception–is  West Side Story a piece of garbage?), just like Elliott, these kids are going into recording studios to actually sing this stuff first, where there may be some fine-tuning of vocals, just as there is with every recording artist. But on top of that, these kids are learning lines, acting and emoting, spending hours learning choreography, getting fit into costumes–yeah, sure. This show is just a bunch of hacks being autotuned for a living…

But on to last night’s episode, a perfect demonstration of why this show is loved and appreciated by so many. The show was all about the struggles of being who we are, saying what we feel, and the masks we wear to hide the painful truths and our own insecurities. Musically, it was all brilliantly captured through the music and personas of Lady GaGa and Kiss (who would ever have imagined this kind of combination?). Sure, the girls’ (and gay’s) performance of “Bad Romance” was fun, and the boys’ performance of Kiss’s “Shout it Out Loud” a hot mess. But a song like “Poker Face” took on a totally different meaning when being sung as a duet between Lea Michele and her TV mom Idina Menzel—revealing that while the two women were claiming they weren’t ready to be mother and daughter, what they were feeling inside, behind their ‘poker faces’ was a totally different story. And how brilliant of the writers to pull back on a story that seemed to be propelling forward way too fast. That’s a not-uncommon practice on the show, which often feels like it’s giving you the money shot way too fast, but then gives the ‘predictable’ storyline a complicated twist that is far being resolved. Sure, Rachel and her mom have called off a hugs and kisses reunion for now, because that would be too easy. Instead, the show is opting for realism. This is going to be a slow burn.

And then we have the harshly realistic tension that has arisen between Kurt and Finn, even if the circumstances are kind of ridiculous with their parents deciding to move the two families in together and force the classmates to share a single bedroom as if they are brothers. For starters, if Kurt’s house is so much bigger than Finn’s house with two and a half bathrooms, why the frick do Kurt and Finn have to SHARE a room—the basement, no less? What exactly is the rest of the house comprised of? A kitchen, living room, dad’s bedroom and two and a half bathrooms? But, whatever. Because the results of this new living arrangement are painfully real—especially on Finn’s part. And my only problem with the whole storyline is that it’s so unbalanced. Two teenage boys have to share a room—one straight, one gay. Why is it that the straight boy is the only one who has to learn to deal with it? When Kurt makes their space look like something out of The King and I, Finn flips out and calls some of the décor ‘faggy.’ Kurt’s dad goes ballistic and makes a heart-wrenching speech about expecting more from Finn and the true homophobia that using that word reveals in a person. Kurt, just like most gays, is so used to hearing the word, often simply as a synonym for ‘not cool,’ so he tries to defend Finn’s usage. But in the end, it is Finn who is pretty much told he just has to deal and accept that he’s a homophobe. But that’s not reality, and that’s not really the full extent of Finn’s side of the story, which is where the writing became one sided.

The fact is, in high school, everyone is uncomfortable—with their bodies, with their sexuality, with the thought of changing in front of their peers in the locker room. All the gay guys I know were the ones who were incredibly uncomfortable with stripping down to their undies in front of other boys. And let’s be honest. What straight teenage boy wouldn’t be uncomfortable in an intimate setting like sharing a bed and bathroom if he knew the boy he is sharing with is gay AND has a crush on him? Finn’s feelings are perfectly natural and he has every right to express them, even if they way he expressed it wasn’t particularly PC. And it doesn’t help that Kurt is so stalkerish in his feelings for Finn. It would be more realistic if Kurt was awkward and uncomfortable around Finn rather than trying to devise a plot to get them to be roomies. The whole plot makes his character seem way too calculated and, you know, like the stereotypical gay predator. Considering the majority of the creators behind the show probably ARE gay, it’s surprising that they would paint him this way and then berate the straight character for being an ‘insensitive,’ homophobic bully. It feels to me like they’ve written themselves into a problematic situation that is only managing to present both characters involved as two-dimensional stereotypes. In the end, it is Finn who sees that it is HE who is completely in the wrong, so he comes to his senses, admits he has a lot to learn, and protects Kurt from other bullies. Well, when is it Kurt’s turn to learn to respect others? Sure, he claims he got over Finn a long time ago, but that’s way too easy an out for him. He also needs to learn that straights have feelings that are just as real. Hopefully the creators are going to work on that.

But one more smart moment stems from the boys’ new living arrangement—which began weeks ago in the ‘Home’ episode, which included the song “A House is Not a Home” being sung by Kurt and Finn. The thinking ahead that must go into this show, because continuing the Kiss theme, Puck sings Kiss’s “Beth” to Quinn in reference to what they are going to name their baby, but Finn takes over for one verse—a verse that includes the line “our house just ain’t a home,” which he sings while looking directly at Kurt. Wow. Yeah, these Glee people are a real bunch of hacks.

A couple of months back I stumbled upon this game that I didn’t know existed for the PS2, so it only cost my 10 bux—with the game pad—instead of the new release price of like 50 bux. Being a huge collector of the Dance Dance Revolution games, I’m always excited to add a game with new songs to my arsenal.

Well, this High School Musical game is very different. Instead of the usual DDR scheme of left/right/up/down arrows scrolling up from the bottom, side by side so your eyes can easily keep them in scope, this game is set up so that there are ‘brackets’ to the North, South, West and East of the television screen. Green balls appear from the center of the screen and move towards the four different brackets—which means, in order to hit the up/down/left/right steps on your dance pad at just the moment when the ball hits the bracket, your eyes seriously have to jump ALL OVER the screen. This isn’t so bad in easier stages (Sophomore and Junior years—don’t know why there’s no Freshman year), but by Senior stage, your eyes are doing some serious Marty Feldman Young Frankenstein Igor shit.

Eventually, you do sort of get used to the alternate screen layout, but you’re definitely at a disadvantage when too many balls are releasing from the center of the screen at once. Your timing gets thrown off as you try to look from one side of the screen to the other quickly to determine exactly which ball is closer to the bracket towards which it is heading. Argh! On top of this, there are no ‘half note’ colors or syncopated color variations, the way the arrows in DDR are distinguished. You simply have to guesstimate when the green balls are going to hit the brackets. Ridiculous. There are, however, purple balls that leave the center at the same time, moving in different directions. These signify that you have to jump on two direction arrows in unison, a concept similar to the DDR series. And finally, there are occasionally these “wildcat” balls that give you more points, and from what I could tell while playing the game, if you don’t hit each one in the series at exactly the right moment, they convert back to plain old green balls, forfeiting you the bonus. For added fun, there’s an outline of a star in the upper left corner of the screen that fills up with color as you get continuous combinations of steps right. When the star fills up completely, an ‘X’ and ‘O’ symbol appear very subtly under the star. This is your chance to simultaneously jump on both of these corresponding keys on the dance pad (sort of like an extra dance step in the middle of your game) to start a timer that runs down as you continue doing your dance moves for added bonus points.

The graphics are great in this game—song are from all three films (29 songs in all, playable in every difficulty level) and are presented along with a rather faithful video game version of the cast singing and dancing to the song just as they did in the movies. It gave me a good chance to get to know the songs better, because I only watched each film once on cable and although I own each soundtrack, I’ve only listened to each one once! For shame. Take away my gay card. But really, doesn’t buying this cheesy game make up for all that??? But back to the game. The big problem with the game is the dance step programming. It’s TERRIBLE, most often lacking any sense of actual flow like real dance moves. This game couldn’t possibly have been programmed by anyone with a sense of rhythm and dance aesthetics. DDR, even when it follows, let’s say, instrumental nuances or vocal syncopations instead of the songs’ beats, does so in places that make sense and are clear accents in the structure of the actual song. In this game, it’s very often completely random very often and lands on illogical, non-rhythmic syllables in the vocals! Plus, the pacing of the dance steps is often just ‘off’ and not fluid. You find yourself WANTING to move to the groove of the song, but suddenly getting tripped up with your foot hovering in the air as you try balancing one leg waiting for that next lagging dance step to hit at one of its bizarre moments. Seriously—what songs were the programmers of this game listening to, because it sure wasn’t the songs in the game.

Even with all these obstacles, the game is still actually quite easy even at its most difficult level, simply because it’s pretty forgiving, essentially because it was made for 14-year-olds, not 41-year-olds…. As a result, even in Senior level, it simply isn’t much of a workout and you don’t break a sweat like you do in DDR games. And once you’ve worked your way through the Senior year (you have to play easier levels to unlock the more difficult levels), all you can really do is continue to play the 29 songs on Senior level for any sort of challenge. So if you want to dance to some High School Musical songs but retain that traditional DDR feel, you’re better off buying the Disney edition of Dance Dance Revolution that was released for the PS2.

Do I even need to say anything about this week’s Glee? It featured one of my all time favorites, Olivia Newton-John, or ONJ as those of us who had the original vinyl Xanadu soundtrack know her, since the side of the album with her songs was called the ONJ side while the Electric Light Orchestra side was called the ELO side. Yes, I’m OCD about ONJ. But before we get to the O-Gleevia situation…

It’s so perfect how Mr. Schuester further pissed off all those who hate his wigger routines by celebrating the most despised king of white hip hop, Vanilla Ice. I can not believe V’s classic Queen/David Bowie rip-off is 20 years old this year. I remember being at some college party in 1990, and all the girls were gathered around the stereo all night changing stations continuously in search of every moment of airplay “Ice, Ice Baby” got. The highlight of that night for me was when they must have moved the dial past the local new wave station, because when the famous bassline kicked in, all the girls squealed with delight…then groaned in despair as David Bowie and Freddie Mercury began singing instead! Heh heh.

But back to the highlights of Glee. Next, we have Rachel tackling the Jim Steinman/Bonnie Tyler 1983 classic “Total Eclipse of the Heart.” Considering Steinman’s compositions are always mega-melodramatic (this is, after all, the man who created every brilliant hyper-theatrical Meatloaf hit), it seemed like the perfect vehicle for Lea Michele’s over-the-top style. I’d say she handled it perfectly, but this is one case where I wasn’t like “she blew away the original artist.” Something about Bonnie Tyler’s harsh rasp is just the key ingredient for this song. Lea’s vocals ended up sounding more like they were lifted from the cheesy hi-nrg cover by Nicki French in the 90s! But the visual performance with all the guys singing “turn around bright eyes” and the ballet dancing was nicely done. It’s just ironic that the storyline didn’t allow for Kurt to sing the “turn around bright eyes” part, considering his almost castrato sound and gender identity.

There were some interesting “cameos” as well. The gym teacher made what I believe is his first appearance since his marriage to Emma was called off, and Rachel enlisted the help of the teacher who was canned at the beginning of the series for possessing drugs, who played the role as the killer father in her “Run Joey, Run” video! And in that same video, there’s a delicious cameo of Puck’s gorgeous hairy armpit. Wow. Meanwhile, Molly Shannon had one important reason to be on the show last night—so that Sue Sylvester could threaten to kick her in the taco! I could not believe my ears (which began immediately bleeding at the thought) when she said that on prime time television!

And then there’s Olivia, her 61-year-old face glowing thanks to her plastic surgery. She was awesome. Her quick lines totally mocking her devotion to her many causes (Koala bears, her daughter Chloe, etc.) were best appreciated by those who know her, as was her satire about her self-proclaimed (and truly) massive successes like Grease and “Physical.” But the crowning moment was of course her duet with Sue Sylvester on the Lady GaGa-inspired, autotuned-to-death modern take on “Physical.” This remake needs radio airplay, seriously. So hot. Better than any of the bootleg dance mixes of the song I uncovered in the 90s, with the addition of some seriously sexy female background singers. And then there’s the video. I love the way you could see that Olivia at times was genuinely laughing at Jane Lynch’s performance of “Physical” as Sue Sylvester. And just like the song, the updated take on Olivia’s original video (complete with the jiggling butt in speedos) was fantastic, with some seriously scrumptious guys doing some phenomenal modern dance moves at floor level. It was even funnier watching Jane Lynch ‘roll’ around with these guys and slapping an ass when you know she’s a lesbian in real life. My ONLY disappointment was the removal of the gay reference from the end of Olivia’s original video, in which she watches all the muscular men walking out the door hand-in-hand! Even so, my immediate reaction was to run and look for their video online to rewatch it, something the producers clearly expected of the audience, therefore having Mercedes, after the kids finish watching it online in the show, frantically slap her knees while chanting, “Again, again, again!” Now excuse me while I go watch the clip online a couple hundred more times…

Wow. What a week. Just heard this morning that service women will finally be allowed on Navy submarines for the first time ever, even though the Navy is acknowledging that there’s going to be resistance by man-loving-men (and by that, I mean the straight guys) on the submarines who want to keep it an all-boys club (which sadly, also probably means a whole lot of sexual harassment and rape is to come, much of which gets covered up by the military just like the gay bashing and gay murders in the armed services).

So there’s the one step forward. Unfortunately, we also have the despicable legalized racial profiling situation in Arizona in which anyone who is of Latin descent is assumed an illegal alien until proven otherwise. Thank God I live in the more closeted-racist state of New York, where racial profiling is done off the books and on the down low.

Meanwhile, a Mississippi lesbian has been cut from her high school yearbook completely because she wore a tuxedo in her photo. Now I seriously, seriously, SERIOUSLY don’t understand the whole girl wanting to wear a tuxedo thing, but I also don’t give a shit if she wears a flies-on-dog-poop mask that makes Lady GaGa look like Mother Teresa. To punish a teen by basically wiping her entire high school existence from the final recap is absolutely disgusting.

In related news, another lesbian teenager from Mississippi who wanted to go to her prom with her girlfriend, initially causing the school to cancel the prom for EVERYONE before playing the nasty trick of directing she and her date and friends to a decoy prom instead of the actual prom, can now expect to be the cause of her class’s graduation being ruined by a Baptist group that plans to picket the ceremony. I honestly can not fathom that it is ADULTS in this country who are punishing an entire class of impressionable teens because they despise ONE student. What happened to protecting the children? Funny thing is, the group’s statement is that they: “…will picket the graduation of Itawamba Agricultural High School to remind the parents, teachers and students of this nation that God said ‘Thou shall not lie with mankind as with womankind, it is abomination.’” So, in reality, this little lesbo is TOTALLY following what God said! WTBeep? Even God thinks lesbians are hot while we gay guys receive all the persecution!

Hm…I guess I have to reconsider my header for this post, because that makes one step forward THREE steps back…

Only two years after the release of the original Friday the 13^th, Madman was one of many that followed the same summer camp stalker format. But this is one really bizarre backwoods slasher. I instantly loved it because the opening credits give a shout out to the composer of the “electronic music.” There’s nothing better than late 70s and early 80s horror film soundtracks that sound like something off a Gary Numan record. Most of the time, the eerie cold minimal synth soundtrack is the scariest part of the film!

That’s not to say there aren’t some eerie visuals in this film. Madman comes complete with a killer who seems to want to be modeled after Jason from Friday the 13^th Part 2, but who ends up looking more like Bigfoot from the Six Million Dollar Man (remember, the pet of alien Stefanie Powers?). Some of the murders are gory and brutal, and there are plenty of killer perspective shots and quick glimpses of him loping through the dark woods around the camp. And, like many of my favorite 80s horror films, this one never tries to give you bright lighting in dark settings. You are forced to imagine what’s waiting in the shadows much of the time. There’s even a commendable, long chase scene, but you’ll be scoffing when the chick decides to hide in a refrigerator…after yanking out all the shelves and getting the food all over the floor. Even KIDS know not to get into a refrigerator—or draw attention to your hiding spot with a floor full of spilt milk.

There are some really odd characters and situations in this film. This ‘summer camp’ is about to close…but it’s the week right before Thanksgiving! HUH? There’s a typical campfire urban legend about the killer–if you say his name out loud, you’ll make Candyman really jealous. So naturally, one of the dweebs around the fire calls out the killer’s name. This same dweeb then spends the entire movie sneaking around the woods and repeatedly going into the killer’s dilapidated house and seeing all the fresh carnage as new bodies are brought back to the house—yet never returns to camp to tell everyone! At the same time, one camp counselor after another grabs a flashlight and goes out into the woods to find him and those who went to look for him before them and never came back…until we’re finally down to just one counselor!

This counselor is played by Gaylen Ross, a blue-eyed blond who also starred in Romero’s Dawn of the Dead and played Ted Danson’s drowning girlfriend in Creepshow. She has the worst eye-rolling moments in this film. There’s simply nothing realistic about the decisions she makes, which sadly tarnishes any hopes of her going down in history as a worthy scream queen/heroine or of  the film being a memorable slasher. In fact, the film is in my collection, and watching it again last night, the ONLY part I remembered was a shot of some dude’s bare ass as he gets in a hot tub (shocking, I know.). However, now that I’ve rewatched the film and written about it, I hope to retain a bit more of it. Actually, the ending is pretty unforgettable, blatantly borrows from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and could be considered a real ‘twist’ ending for its day. Which means you have to remember when this film is coming from to appreciate it. And it’s coming from the 80s, so really, can you go wrong?

I caught this 2007 film Dark Rising on Showtime Beyond, a very cool channel that programs mostly cheesy or direct-to-DVD horror/sci-fi titles like the ones you’d see on SyFy, only without commercials and without any censorship. So I never expect much from the films, but am pleasantly surprised every once in a while.

The cheesy sci-fi flick Dark Rising was one of those pleasant surprises. The reason I was immediately taken with this film was because of this dude Jason Reso, a sexy and charismatic cast member of the film (He’s to the far right on the DVD cover above). He has reddish blond hair, a goatee, and what looks like some nice muscles modestly hidden behind ‘dude’ clothes, which is what makes him so appealing. So I had to Google him to see if he was in anything else. Turns out he’s some sort of wrestler (as Christian Cage), and that body I thought he might have he absolutely has. But I’d still rather see him dressed in his casual clothes than those little speedos—and doing more films than wrestling. He’s just so naturally charming and adorable in this film and was the highlight for me, although the male lead is also very funny, but reminds me of a better looking Jim Carrey (he’s to the far left on the DVD cover). There’s also plenty of female candy for eyes that love women. The buxom female lead runs around scantily clad in ancient warrior attire (guess which one she is on the DVD cover), and there is also some major girl-on-girl face sucking, all a formula for a Xena throwback.

Other than that, this slapstick sci-fi flick is filled with funny and goofy moments, all delivered with just the right comic timing by the cast. The story is pretty simple. A group of friends go camping. The lead guy’s ex-girlfriend is now a woman-loving witch, and she and her new girlfriends pretty much resurrect an ancient demon in the woods. But along with the demon comes a sexy female warrior who can help the campy campers slay the monster. Yep, that’s it. Sounds like a typical SyFy Network plot, but it’s a cut above the rest, including a cute cast and witty dialogue, all of which give it high rewatch value.