Change Your Image
Artamnesia
Reviews
Cat Dancers (2007)
Compelling and tragic
I'm so glad that I stumbled across this documentary without having seen any of the advertising for it.
At first I was a little put off by the strange appearance and the sexually-charged comments of Ron Holiday, but ultimately they contributed to what makes this story so interesting. This isn't a story about Hollywood-perfect people living scripted lives but very real, very unique people.
I won't give away any spoilers but only say that there is an air of foreboding throughout the film that lets you know all did not end well with the trio of performers who were the Cat Dancers.
The filmmaker and editors did a fabulous job with the old footage. A lot of post production houses only wish they could make video look like that, and the soundtrack was perfect.
I didn't cry until the end credits when the song "I want to be a lion tamer" (I think it was) began.
I hope to see more by this newcomer!
The Haunting (1999)
Not just bad....
...to one who loves Shirley Jackson's original novel and who is pretty keen on the original '63 version of the movie, this film is just awful.
I heard that this wasn't the greatest remake but I was curious to see how the spookier aspects would be interpreted by more modern cinema. There are scenes in the novel that I always assumed had been left out of the '63 production due to special effects limitations. In particular, the outdoor scenes where Eleanor watches the process of "something" through the tall grass, or the ghastly midnight picnic that the two women find themselves involved in.
But the '99 version dropped most of the original story opting for an other-worldly search and rescue mission for the souls of murdered children(Aliens meets Ghosbusters?) rather than a subtle and creepy tale of a vulnerable woman's unhinging. Not only the story is dumbed-down the characters are converted to either ludicrous parodies or non-entities. The fascinating interplay between the characters (Eleanor's crush on the doctor, Theo's hinted-at lesbianism) is entirely dropped.
The over-the-top neo-gothic fun house really does star in the film, though it isn't spooky at all, it's just REALLY REALLY big .
The last 20 minutes of the thing are when the special effects kick in to full gear. Strangely, as the special effects intensify, they also become more annoying and funny. I laughed out loud as Eleanor shooed the others off while she began whaling away at the animated griffin sculpture with a 2 x 4. This is also the point when the dialogue plummets to laughable outbursts such as "I'm back home, Grandpa!"
It's just so...bad.