cinema history class: zombi 3 (1988

The session: The Dead are Alive!
Keith shows us four Italian ripoffs of Dawn of the Dead 

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 4: Zombi 3 (1988)
Directed by Lucio Fulci & Bruno Mattei

My Level of Prior Knowledge:
Completely unfamiliar.

Plot Synopsis:
In the Philipines, soldiers and tourists struggle to survive a growing outbreak of a disease that turns people into flesh-eating zombies. Meanwhile, the military tries to contain the spreading disaster.

Reaction and Other Folderol:
Zombi 3 (1988), an Italian horror film, combines the zombie genre with the action movie. The result? Kind of crappy, actually. But not entirely without its charms.

The plot involves a deadly experimental virus that gets loose in the Philippines, turning people into flesh-eating zombies. Naturally, the military's efforts to contain the outbreak only make things worse. From there, we get a lot of people running around, shooting things, getting eaten, and occasionally doing things that make absolutely no sense.

I thought the acting was pretty bad, but the others pointed out that much of what I was reacting to might have been the dubbing. Fair enough. Bad dubbing can make a perfectly competent performance look ridiculous. On the other hand, it doesn't explain the numerous things that simply didn't make sense. There were plenty of moments when I found myself wondering why someone was doing something, how something had happened, or whether the filmmakers had simply decided that explanations were an unnecessary luxury.

And then there was the flying zombie head.

WTF?

At one point, a severed zombie head actually flies through the air to attack someone. This happens exactly once, which is once more than it should have. I don't know whether the filmmakers thought this was frightening, exciting, or just a really neat idea they had come up with over lunch. Whatever the reasoning, I would have been happier without it.

Then there was the pregnant woman whose abdomen produces a zombie baby that comes flying out, in an obvious attempt to borrow a little magic from Alien. Except that Alien managed to make its chestburster scene genuinely horrifying. Here, it was mostly gross, ridiculous, and derivative.

Still, I don't want to suggest that the movie was a complete waste of time. There was a lot of creative gore, and some of the effects were quite impressive. Whatever else one might say about the filmmakers, they certainly weren't lacking in imagination when it came to finding new and disgusting things to do to the human body.

And the movie was relentless. There was always something happening. Even when I couldn't quite follow what was going on, I was generally interested in seeing what would happen next. In that sense, the combination of action movie and zombie movie worked reasonably well. These weren't your traditional slow, shambling zombies, either. They were fast, aggressive, and energetic, anticipating the sort of zombies we'd later see in 28 Days Later. There wasn't much opportunity to get bored.

The ending, however, was a major disappointment.

As the movie progressed, I had worked out an elaborate scenario for how everything would end, involving nuclear weapons and a suitably spectacular conclusion to the escalating catastrophe. I was rather pleased with my idea. Unfortunately, the filmmakers apparently hadn't consulted me. Instead, we got an understated non-ending that seemed particularly anticlimactic after all the mayhem that preceded it.

So, ultimately, Zombi 3 was a pretty bad movie that nevertheless managed to be entertaining in spots. It had lousy dialogue (or lousy dubbing), questionable logic, some absurdly stupid moments, and a disappointing ending. But it also had plenty of action, some inventive gore, and enough energy to keep things moving.

And, of course, Joe gave it a ten. If they had used the ending I concocted, he would have given it a twelve -- if Bobbo would have allowed it, which he wouldn't have. But that's another story.

happy tunesday! one crime, two songs and a musical makeover

One of the things that has long fascinated me about music is the subject of cover songs. What happens when one artist takes a song recorded by another artist and makes it their own? Sometimes the result is a fairly faithful reproduction of the original. Sometimes the arrangement changes dramatically. And sometimes the new version changes the entire feel of the song, even though the lyrics remain essentially unchanged.

But what happens when an artist covers himself?

For this Tunesday, I want to look at two Simon & Garfunkel songs: "Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M." and "Somewhere They Can't Find Me."

They're really two versions of the same story. And while they have an awful lot in common, the differences are fascinating.

Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. (1964)

"Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M." was the title track of Simon & Garfunkel's first album, released in October 1964. It's a gentle, acoustic folk song, built around Paul Simon's guitar and the duo's beautiful vocal harmonies.

The story is told from the perspective of a young man lying in bed beside the woman he loves. It's the middle of the night, and she's sleeping peacefully. He's awake, contemplating his actions and his future.

He's robbed a liquor store, and now he's a fugitive. He knows he has to leave before the police catch him, and that means abandoning the woman he loves and the life they've shared.

What makes the song so affecting is its sadness. The protagonist knows he's made a terrible mistake, and he knows that mistake is going to cost him the life he had. He's made up his mind to run, but there's no excitement about the prospect. Instead, he seems overwhelmed by the enormity of what he's losing.

There's no bravado here. No thrill of being an outlaw. Just a man lying awake in the middle of the night, mourning what he's thrown away, even as he prepares to flee.

Somewhere They Can't Find Me (1966)

In January 1966, Simon & Garfunkel released their second album, Sounds of Silence. By then, their musical direction had changed considerably.

Their first album had been firmly rooted in the folk tradition. But after producer Tom Wilson added electric instrumentation to "The Sound of Silence," turning it into a major hit, the duo moved toward a more contemporary folk-rock sound.

And on that second album, tucked between "Kathy's Song" and the instrumental "Anji," is a song called "Somewhere They Can't Find Me."

If you've heard "Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M.," the lyrics will sound awfully familiar.

In fact, the verses are essentially the same. We have the same man, the same sleeping woman, the same liquor store robbery, and the same impending departure.

But Paul Simon has rewritten the music and added a chorus.

And the result is an entirely different song.

Gone is the gentle, mournful acoustic arrangement. In its place is a driving, energetic folk-rock number. The rhythm is more urgent, the vocals more forceful, and the new chorus emphasizes the protagonist's determination to escape.

The man in "Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M." sounds devastated by what he's done and what he's about to lose. The man in "Somewhere They Can't Find Me" sounds determined to get away.

Both men are planning to run. Both are leaving behind someone they love. And both presumably have reason to regret the circumstances that brought them to this point.

But the emphasis has shifted.

In the original, we hear the sorrow of a man who has to leave.

In the remake, we hear the determination of a man who has to escape.

Same Story, Different Man?

What's particularly interesting to me is that the underlying story hasn't really changed.

The facts are identical. The protagonist committed a crime. He's lying beside the woman he loves. He knows he has to flee, and he's going to do it.

But the music changes how we perceive him.

In the first version, I hear a man overwhelmed by regret. He knows he's destroyed something precious, and the music invites us to share his sorrow. His decision to run is already made, but that doesn't make leaving any easier.

In the second, I hear a man whose attention is focused less on what he's leaving behind and more on getting away. The sadness may still be there, but the music pushes it into the background. What comes through most strongly is urgency and resolve.

It's almost as though we're hearing the same man at two different emotional moments in the same night. In one, he's consumed by the sadness of leaving. In the other, he's focused on the practical necessity of escape.

Or perhaps they're two entirely different personalities responding to the same predicament.

Either way, the transformation is accomplished primarily through the music, not the words.

And that, to me, is the fascinating part.

Why Did Simon Revisit the Song?

I don't have a definitive explanation from Paul Simon himself for why he decided to rewrite "Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M." Of course, I'm not searching for one.

But the timing offers a plausible explanation.

The first Simon & Garfunkel album was not initially successful, and the duo temporarily went their separate ways. Then "The Sound of Silence" became a hit after being transformed from an acoustic folk recording into a folk-rock single.

Suddenly, Simon & Garfunkel were back together, recording a second album in a musical environment very different from the one in which they'd made their first.

Reworking an earlier composition in their new style would have made a certain amount of sense. And "Somewhere They Can't Find Me" fits comfortably into the sound of Sounds of Silence.

Still, I wonder what Simon was thinking. Did he believe the original song had untapped potential? Did he simply like the story and want to try telling it differently? Or did he think the new arrangement was a better way of expressing what he'd wanted to say all along?

I don't know.

But I'm glad he did it.

Covering Yourself

I tend to be fascinated by cover versions. In fact, when I first had a radio show in college, it focused on covers. I would play two versions of the same song back to back. Then two versions of another. My listeners, assuming there were any, got an hour and a half of that.

But artists also revisit their own material. They change arrangements, rewrite melodies, alter tempos, and sometimes produce recordings that bear surprisingly little resemblance to their earlier versions.

This particular example has always fascinated me because Simon & Garfunkel didn't simply record a faster or more heavily orchestrated version of "Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M." They effectively created a new song out of the old one.

And the result demonstrates something important about songwriting.

The lyrics tell us what happened. The music tells us how to feel about it.

Here, Paul Simon gave us two different emotional interpretations of the same events.

In one, we hear a man preparing to flee, heartbroken over the life he's destroyed.

In the other, we hear a man preparing to flee, determined to make his escape.

Same crime. Same woman. Same decision.

Two very different songs.

And that's what makes this particular musical makeover so interesting to me.

cinema history class: nightmare city (1980)

The session: The Dead are Alive!
Keith shows us four Italian ripoffs of Dawn of the Dead 

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 3: Nightmare City (1980)
Directed by Umberto Lenzi

My Level of Prior Knowledge:
Completely unfamiliar.

Plot Synopsis:
A bunch of stuff happens -- Presumably a lot of it has to do with zombies or somesuch. The trailer makes it look really good!

Reaction and Other Folderol:
I missed this one, as I was with my family celebrating Asher's 18th birthday. So I really don't have anything useful to say about this. But I'm posting this for the sake of completeness. I assume that Joe would have given it a 10 if he had been there.

Oh, and Keith will be pissed off at me for even posting this.

happy tunesday! heaven was saving you for me

Happy Tunesday!

I'd like to get back in the habit of posting something musical every Tuesday. And what better way to start with "Heaven Was Saving You for Me"? Of course, no promises that I'll keep it up? What's next? The return of Zmedsday?

This is a song I wrote for Sharon and Josh for the first dance at their wedding. I'd been sitting on the title for over thirty years, not sure what to do with it. I really liked it, but every time I tried to use it as a song title, I couldn't get something that I liked. It seemed like a good first dance song title for a wedding. But it also sounded like it could be a great bit of Meat Loaf bombast.

Then Sharon and Josh got engaged. Then they started seriously talking about dates. Then they had a date and venue booked. Then I thought -- "Hey! I have a song idea!" What made it really super is that the title suggested an angle for the song -- something that is perfectly appropriate for Sharon and Josh. She's a Jewish kid from suburban Queens. He's an immigrant who spent his formative years in rural Guyana. So when I wrote the song I leaned into the fact that they managed to meet and work together despite their differences. The challenge was in making it personal and yet general enough. Like, I wanted to reference her research without something as literal as "I was studying what happens as human hands decompose." I think I succeeded. As for the actual performance? A big shoutout to JT Curtis and Emily Seibert. Heck, a shoutout to Eytan Mirsky for putting me in touch with JT. JT produced the track and did the arrangement (in consultation with me) played all the instruments and sang the male vocals. Emily Seibert did the female vocals. I also note that Emily was JT's recommendation. I have to tell you, JT was very professional and easy to work with. He was reliable, and turned in a great finished product. I never actually met Emily, but I was thrilled with her vocal performance. If you find yourself having a song in need of recording, I can't recommend them highly enough. JT's Bandcamp site is here. It's just too bad he's not hawking downloads of my song. And Emily's website is here.

cinema history class: doctor butcher m.d. (1980)

The session: The Dead are Alive!
Keith shows us four Italian ripoffs of Dawn of the Dead 

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 2: Doctor Butcher M.D. (1980)
Directed by Marino Girolami

My Level of Prior Knowledge:
Completely unfamiliar.

Plot Synopsis:

A New York City hospital is rocked by a series of gruesome murders involving cannibalism and stolen body parts. Investigating the killings, a doctor and an anthropologist travel to a remote tropical island, where they discover a mad scientist conducting horrific experiments to bring the dead back to life.

Reaction and Other Folderol:

A New York City hospital is rocked by a series of gruesome murders involving cannibalism and stolen body parts. Investigating the killings, a doctor and an anthropologist travel to a remote tropical island, where they discover a mad scientist conducting horrific experiments to bring the dead back to life.

This is a movie that's mostly boredom punctuated by moments of creatively graphic gore. And when it comes to the gore, it can be a pretty good movie.

Unfortunately, there's all that other stuff in between.

The acting is bad. Really bad. And the movie doesn't do a particularly good job of connecting its New York City prologue to everything that follows. It's almost as if they started making one movie, got bored with it, and decided to make another one instead. Which, come to think of it, is pretty much how I felt watching it.

And then there's the music. I assume the idea was to create an atmosphere of tension and unease. Well, it certainly made me uneasy, but mostly because I wanted someone to turn the damn thing off. Rather than enhancing the action, the score was frequently distracting and annoying.

But let's talk about what the movie gets right: the gore.

The makeup effects are excellent, particularly the zombies, whose decaying flesh is wonderfully disgusting. And the filmmakers certainly aren't shy about showing us the good stuff. An outboard motor to the face? Check. Cannibals enthusiastically munching on freshly harvested internal organs? Check. Yum!

And as the movie approaches its conclusion, things actually get better. The gruesome effects become more frequent, more imaginative, and more effective.

Two scenes in particular stand out. One involves a zombie wearing the hair of a murdered reporter, an image that's genuinely horrifying. The other involves an eye, and let's just say that anyone who's squeamish about eye injuries might want to look away. Or perhaps keep watching, because this is exactly the sort of thing the movie does well.

Which makes the whole experience rather frustrating. Clearly, the people responsible for the makeup and special effects knew what they were doing. If only the people responsible for the acting, pacing, music, and storytelling had been equally competent.

Ultimately, Doctor Butcher, M.D. is a movie that rewards patience with some spectacularly disgusting moments. The problem is how much patience it demands.

It's a pretty good gore movie trapped inside a pretty bad movie.

Joe gave it a 7. I'm not sure whether that says more about the movie or Joe.