No reason to have a breast size complex when you grow up watching this. |
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There's this concept I adhere to that causes most people to shake their heads at me in confusion. I attribute it to the fact that I grew up curled on the couch with my dad on Sunday afternoons when I was a little girl, watching the B-movies of the '50's and '60's airing on Elvira's TV show. I was lucky to have a dad who didn't condescend to me and instead would explain why such obviously bad movies were funny/entertaining/interesting to him. As I would wrinkle my brow over scenes involving rubber limbed monsters attacking screaming blondes, my dad filled in facts on the actors' careers and highlighted what sci-fi literary influences I could check out when the show was over.
I seriously have the coolest dad ever. But back to the point.
What I learned very early on is that there is a point and a purpose to crap. That those rubber limbed monsters weren't suffocating the heat-exhausted guy inside of them for no reason. Crappy movies, as well as crappy music, crappy TV shows, crappy books and anything else meant to entertain the general public, have an important place in the history of things. It isn't until you sit back and embrace the crap that your eyes are really opened.
How could we have gotten to a day where the movie PAN'S LABRYNTH could hold an audience enraptured with its magical set decorations and elaborate make-up if there hadn't been SPACE MUTINY, a 1988 piece of crap where people ran from golf carts driving a whopping 5 miles per hour, screaming about the supposed fear of getting run over. Lampooned on Mystery Science Theater 3000, the episode was considered one of the best of the TV series. Hell, I just couldn't get over the actor screaming, "Go! Go! Go!" like a lunatic.
There never would have been the day that the movie 300 could dominate at the box office largely due to the fact that it contained such powerful special effects if there hadn't first been 1959's TEENAGERS FROM OUTER SPACE. A horror film featuring the frightening lobster creatures from outer space who apparently were best filmed as a shadow projected up on the screen. If you want digitally enhanced Spartans, first you gotta wallow through some Rock Lobster.
I could go on forever if I were to base crapitude simply on horrendous costumes and laughable effects. The point of this is to prove that technology improves only after seeing the alternative on display. Motivation to create better creatures, more realistic make-up effects and 
Just another bit of torture for that special someone. |
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computers to do the graphics that can't logically be obtained by hand comes from first making movies that make the modern day movie goer cringe in agony. You can argue that they were good at the time, but they're bad now. And they're bad now because we learned from them that we can do better. Thus, craptacular movies of yesteryear served their purpose.
There's also a more fundamental point to crap. How else would we be able to appreciate a movie like RESERVOIR DOGS, bloody and foul-mouthed as it is, if we hadn't watched so many movies about heroes saving the day and triumphing? It got to a point in the 1970's when all you get from action movies was some marketable character that the movie studios felt the audiences wanted to see. While I won't deny the power of a hero (or heroine), when they start to devolve into movies like CLEOPATRA JONES, there's a problem.
Tarantino makes light of those old films in the aforementioned movie, having his new characters, the simple-minded criminals that they are, talk about them with reverence. Many people have argued the talent of Quentin with me but I think it takes the eye of someone who has viewed everything from the masterpieces to the lacklusterpieces to know what it takes to turn out a truly entertaining venture. You can claim that you don't like the violence or the negativity in his films, but you can't deny that he created something new and unique simply by observing, recognizing and honoring the history of crap.
I've written some reviews in my time that have been less than warmly received. People always throw up their arms in frustration with me, trying to figure out why I would back movies like 100 GIRLS, a low budget movie from 2000 which caters to all the basic stereotypes of men and women. I've made my friends sit through viewings of THE SPIRIT OF '76, a (again, low budget) flick about time travelers headed back to the birth of the nation to recover lost history and landing in 1976 instead of 1776. They usually sit politely through the movie and then look at me with a dazed expression that clearly reads, "You liked that??"
I usually blame my dad, the original connoisseur of crap. Not only did he fervently watch Elvira and MST3K, he also purchased many of those old films when they were released on DVD as well as three separate books detailing ones he might have missed. He unabashedly enjoys movies that make most other people cringe and proudly 
This is what we do to the naughty little Hobbits! |
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says "Yes!" when confronted with the above question. I have inherited his tenacity even if my library of favorite crap contains different titles. I refuse to apologize for liking crap.
I also refuse to apologize for recommending to people that they should watch crap. It is important to create the gauge by which you judge all other films. If you only watch and comment on the movies that you liked, there is no balance. There are times when a movie will be mediocre at best and yet still contain a performance by someone that hints at future greatness. You need to watch Peter Jackson's MEET THE FEEBLES and DEAD ALIVE to see the where the passion that fueled the LOTR movies came from. Without that education you don't have the proper credentials to refer to yourself as a movie lover.
Because in order to love something you need to understand the converse. To state with sincerity and conviction that you LOVE a movie, you have to be able to provide examples for the opposite. And it can't be based on the asinine comments of, "I don't like that actor/actress/director," "It looked stupid anyhow," or "I could tell that I wouldn't like it." You have to sit through those movies, assess them with as little bias as possible and then determine the level to which it actually sucked and not your preconceived notion of how much you thought it would suck.
That means no walking out in the middle of a screening. No oral gratification of your movie date which would interfere with your proper absorption of the material (manual stimulation is still acceptable). It also includes restarting the movie at the chapter which you fell asleep at. It means you treat watching your crap like eating your vegetables: a necessary part of getting all of your daily vitamins. Consider crappy movies your cinematic Vitamin C. Only it doesn't taste yummy like oranges and it won't help keep you from getting rickets.
Dr. AwesomeZara prescribes one viewing of FOXES (1980) for each movie watcher who thought THIRTEEN (2003) was really good, one viewing of ANGEL (1984) for every guy who drooled over the lovelies in SIN CITY, and a viewing of PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE for everyone because your life just isn't complete without having seen Ed Wood's master-lacklusterpiece.
Go forth and partake of the crap. Feel free to blame any guilty pleasures found on me.
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| Neglected Foster Child of Hollywood |
Every other Wednesday
Not-so-gentle musings from the girl who is saving room in her uterus for Tarantino's spawn.
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| AwesomeZara |
She's awesome, who would have guessed that?
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