Halloween Picks: The War of the Worlds

First off it is that time of year again where I give many of you my picks of films that I like to watch at this time of year and I know that many of you are aware that I am an avid defender of the found footage genre and the fact that many of the films present themselves as real and in some cases such as the Blair Witch Project and Cannibal Holocaust have not only presented themselves as real but also succeeded in convincing many of the population that their movies are in fact the genuine article.

In the early years when the most popular medium was radio this feat was also accomplished and half of the nation was sent into a panic.

October 30, 1938 CBS aired its Halloween edition of the Mercury Theatre featuring Orson Wells’ rendition of the War of the Worlds.

 Based on the novel by H.G. Wells The radio play told the story of an alien invasion from the perspective of radio broadcasters witnessing the invasion as the aliens destroy Grover’s Mills as well as New Jersey and New York City.

Many listeners were tuning to a different channel at the beginning of the broadcast and turned over to CBS at the time that the aliens were beginning their invasion and with the tensions from the events in Europe that would become World War 2 many listeners believed that the invasion was real and began to panic believing that the world was coming to an end.

The next day Orson Wells issued a public apology to the nation stating that was not his intention and that was the end of the story and the beginning of Orson Wells’ Career.

The Radio broadcast was inspired by H.G. Wells’ novel also serves as a major influence on the  1953 George Pal Produced film of the same name.

Now this film holds a special place for me as I was introduced to the film when I was 8 years old watching Channel 21 and a TV spot for the show came on and My Mother knew that I would like the show and she recorded it for me.

That year saw the release of the War of the Worlds Television Series and the Movie was aired to promote the show and to launch the new season for the channel. I will get to the series later.

Orson Wells put a bid into Paramount Studios who had just acquired the rights to the novel to produce the film. Wells was hot after the War of the Worlds incident and naturally he wanted to make the film version. However the head of the studio was quite a fan of George Pal and wanted him to produce the film bringing in Byron Haskin to direct.

As is common with the time, the film is different from the novel and had more to do with the Orson Wells Broadcast.

Also hoping to work on the project was Ray Harryhausen who even animated a test of the Martians emerging from their ship. Sadly Harryhausen did not work on the final film.

The novel focused on the narrator of the novel while he witnesses the invasion and his efforts of survival. The film shows the human resistance to the aliens on a grander scale with Scientists working alongside the military and the invasion across the world.

Gene Barry in his first movie role as Dr. Clayton Forrester a  renowned nuclear physicist from Pacific Tech who witnesses the original appearance of the Invaders and meets Sylvia van Buren who remains as his companion and love interest in the film.  Sylvia was played by Anne Robinson. Barry and Robinson were unknowns at the time and were selected to star so that the focus on the film would be the invaders and the special effects.

Told from Forrester’s perspective the viewer is shown the effort from both the military and scientists to try to defeat the aliens. In the process of the film Forrester and Van Buren witness the original invasion and in retreat end up in an abandoned farmhouse where they encounter the aliens close up and fight them while making their escape back to Pacific Tech where the alien’s blood is analyzed as well as the eyes of the invaders. And they witness the final attempt to stop the aliens with nuclear weapons and after all fails the alien’s fall to Bacteria that mankind has been long immune.

The Martian war ships were designed by Al Nozaki seeking to get away from the more traditional saucer design Nozaki based the look of the Martian death ray off a record player.

In the novel the ships were walking tripods however the budget of the film could not have the alien ships as tripods and as a result the ships look like flying machines however the dialog in the film state that the ships have invisible legs that allow them to walk and if you watch the early scenes in the film you notice that you can in fact see the beams and the scorching of the ground.

One aspect of the novel that was dropped is the use of the red weeds and the fact that the Martians are using the humans for fertilizer in the red weeds making it like Mar’s surface. 

The Ships were made of copper and sadly were all melted down in the 1960s for a copper drive and none of them exist today.

The Martians themselves were designed by Charles Gemara who in a haste had to change the size of the alien being and worked with his daughter and as a result the arms are far larger than intended.  

The film was a Academy Award Winner for Special Effects and was nominated for Film Editing and Sound Recording and the Martians are ranked #27 on the AFI 100 Heroes and Villians as well as multiple nominations for the other listings over the years.  

The film was released during the Red Scare where Americans are far more afraid of Nuclear attack and these fears are showcased in the film.

The film also showcases more of the reactions of the populations that want to escape the invaders in one of the best scenes in the film Dr. Forrester is driving through Los Angeles and is attacked by a mob taking anything on wheels who destroys his instruments that was their only hope to stop the aliens. In effect “Cutting their own throats” Making you ask the question who is worse the aliens or the humans who are looking to survive.

There is definitely a religious aspect of the film. The character of Uncle Matthew is the local minister in Grover’s Mill who at one point tries to communicate with the Martians only to be killed by them off camera. There is also the scenes where the survivors are trying to seek shelter from the invaders inside of the many churches as well as the reunion of Clayton and Sylvia and in the final scene where the narrator thanks god and his infinite wisdom placing the microorganisms on the earth.

Another Easter egg for all of you fans is Woody Woodpecker. Walter Lantz and George Pal were close friends and Pal always made it a point to have his creation in his film. Woody Woodpecker can be seen on top of a tree during the crashing of the first meteorite falling into Grover’s’ Mills.

Unlike Many Sci-Fi Films War of the Worlds had a sequel 35 Years after it was released in the form of the War of the Worlds Television series.

Taking place 35 Years after the events of the film it is revealed that the Martians had infact not died but that they were placed in a coma for 35 Years and are awakened by a radical terrorist organization and the Invaders take over their bodies wearing them like suits.

The invaders even have a trio of leaders called the Advocacy who actually reminded me of something out of Dr. Who rather than a George Pal Film.

The Martians are also now referred to as the Mor-Taxans from the planet Mor-Tax instead of Mars.

The Invaders face the resistance from the Blackwood Project which is a group of scientists and a Military Colonel that are both trying to defeat the invaders as well as warn other humans of the invasion. Ann Robinson reprises her role as Sylvia van Buren in this series.

The Television Series was a prime example of many of the Horror/Sci-Fi films that were released at the time which were far more violent and dark Syndicated programs like War of the Worlds, Friday the 13^th: The Series, Freddy’s Nightmares and Forever Knight. These programs were met with much controversy in the time because of the violence and sexual content that they featured.

The Second Season featured many drastic changes to the series such as the deaths of major characters and the replacement of the alien invaders by a new breed and the title of the series was changed to War of the Worlds: The Second Invasion.

A Pre Highlander Adrian Paul joined what was left of the cast for this series which was canceled later in the season.

The Legacy of the 1953 film remains in pop culture as the villain in the early seasons of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 is named Dr. Clayton Forrester as a tribute to the film and the character is featured in the 1996 Film version of the series.

The film was also a major influence in 2005 when Stephen Spielberg directed his own version of the film.

Starring Tom Cruise and Dakota Fanning, This version of the film definitely follows more  the novel as it follows the character of Ray Ferrier as he struggles to  take his children to Boston where their mother is.'

 Along the journey Ray witnesses the invaders attacking a ferry on the Hudson River as well as seeing the aftermath of the attack on the home of his ex-wife finally ending up in a house with a man that may have his own agenda with Ray’s Daughter.

Where the original film was clearly influenced by The Cold War this film is highly influenced by a post 9/11 world. 

like the original The film also places a scary face of the other survivors in their quest for their own lives at the expense of the others around them.

Spielberg admitted that he was highly influenced by the 1953 film and placed his own references and tributes to the film with similarities in some of the scenes such as the Alien Camera in the house 

There is also the scene where the hand is falling out of the ship after the fall of the invaders that is a definitely a tribute to the original film.  

Even the poster makes a refrence to the 1988 promotional poster and logo.

The greatest tribute to the 1953 Film is when the grandparents are revealed to be none other than Gene Barry and Anne Robinson.

Now 60 Years later This film remains on my list of films that I enjoy watching at this time of year.

 Keep Watching the Skies. 

From the Vault: I Spit on Your Grave

I was talking to a friend recently about the times that we live in today. I asked a young lad If he could identify a noise and he didn’t recognize it however the girl and I recognized the noise as the noises that would be made by a dial-up modem connecting to the internet.

That is a definite sign of the times that we live in.

I remember when I graduated high school 15 years ago and the changes in technology that we faced at the time. In 1998 DVD was brand new and had not taken off yet as the main media and VHS was the dominant media in the market and Blockbuster was at the time the only place to rent a movie after they had run all of the independent video stores out of the business and this was a time before torrent and NetFlix.

It was also a time where many stores and theaters would not carry certain films because they were deemed too controversial to be carried. Today is different because many of these films are deemed tame by today’s standards.

Mark Twain said many years ago that censorship was “Like telling a man that he can’t have a Steak because a baby can’t chew it”. That is the way I feel about many films and there was a time after Blockbuster and Wal-Mart took over the industry they refused to carry many films and music because of mature ratings.

I personally worked for a time at Blockbuster and after many of these incidents occurred I left and began working for Virgin Megastore where these titles were carried.

Today Blockbuster is gone and Wal-Mart and the remaining retailers all carry the titles that they at one time refused to carry. Other films are easily accessible through Itunes, NetFlix, and Amazon Instant videos as well as the file sharing sites and viral video sites like YouTube.

In those days if it wasn’t for the internet to keep awareness of these films alive many of them would be forgotten because of censorship.

In the area that I grew up in Blockbuster had taken over all of the video stores in the area and It was increasingly difficult for me to find many of these old films.

One of the films that I had trouble finding was I Spit on Your Grave.

Now I have to ask myself what is the appeal of this film and I have to say it was originally the forbidden aspect of the film and later I became an avid defender of the film.

My relationship with I Spit on Your Grave begins when I was 18 years old. The Video Works store that I misspent many years of my youth at one time carried the film and by the time I was 17 years old and the film was on the list of being 18 years old to rent I patiently waited to turn of age so that I could rent the film and watch it and see what ALL of the hype was about. That hype would lead me to one of my most controversial moments in my life at this point.

I had already heard of the Hype before seeing the movie talked about in Fangoria magazine as well as on houseofhorror.com , thecabnetofdrcasey.com (No Relation), and a slew of other horror websites that I had began frequently checking out. I had managed to obtain a copy of Last House on the Left and upon telling a friend of mine that it was disturbing he promptly replied that I had to see I Spit on Your Grave.

I was in the store checking out a copy of Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things and Phantasm when I saw a disturbance in the front counter. A man had walked into the mature section and was upset because I Spit on Your Grave was within reach of his 8 year old son who I was wondering why he was in the mature section anyway. The man stated that he was a member of a certain Baptist church in the area and they decided that the film was unfit and they had earlier threatened to picket if the video was not removed from the shelves which the store had refused on the grounds that they have the right to show it if they wanted to.

This man then proceeded to open up the amaray and destroyed the tape at the front counter. This action angered me to the point that the very next Sunday I held a one-man protest outside their church angering the community as well as the church and many in my school.

In 1999 I was at the local Bulldog video store in Sulpher, Oklahoma visiting my parent’s Lake House and myself and my friend Slick did see a copy of the film naturally I snatched up and watched it that weekend.

The movie was infact pretty disturbing but was not worth the hype and controversy. This is where I bear in mind that I am a child of a time where many of become desensitized by what we see on the nightly news and on Tabloid Television. We see more violence on these programs than we see in films like these or in Video Games and Comic Books.

If you had told me on the night that I had watched this film that a decade later Camille Keaton would be a friend of mine that I frequently have long conversations with her over the phone I would tell you not to humor me.

Camille and I often speak about about the production of the film as well as some of our own projects and conventions that we plan on attending.

Also Joe Bob Briggs who provided the commentary on the 2003 Millenum Edition release of the film which remains on the 2010 Rerelease and Blu-Ray release to promote the remake of the same name, was one of the main people that introduced me to this film and before the releases that I have just spoke of gave me more information on the film when I asked him about them on his email list during the later days of Monstervision.  

In his commentary Joe Bob proceeded to break down the film and defend it against the controversy piece by piece going as far to point out the camerawork as well as the editing and naming other films that came out before the film.

The Commentary alone is worth the purchase of the DVD.

Needless to say this film has a special place for me for those reasons among others.

The plot of the film goes like this.

Writer Jennifer Hill moves from New York City to a small town in upstate New York for the summer to write her first novel. Upon her arrival she encounters a quartet of locals including Johnny the owner and operator of a gas station and his two friends Stanley and Andy who hang out at the gas station. Jennifer later encounters the mentally disabled Matthew who befriends Jennifer after delivering her groceries to her.

Eventually one day the men kidnap Jennifer and brutally rape her and leave her for dead.  Well Jennifer recovers and begins her quest for vengeance against the men who assaulted her.

Jennifer’s vengeance is carried out in many different ways from seduction to castration to flat out assault.

What I realized the most about I Spit on Your Grave is the point of view of the film.

Many have complained about the length of the rape scene and that is where I point out that there is actually four rape scenes that have a long drawn out scene between them and the assaults themselves are actually pretty short.

The excessive violence is also the main point of the controversy that the film has been subject to over the years. 

Anyone that has seen the process of bringing a rapist to justice knows how hard the process is particularly for the victim.

Meir Zarchi revealed during his commentary on the DVD that he was inspired to direct the film after he witnessed the real life aftermath of an assault while walking past Central Park in New York City with a friend and his daughter, a young woman who was assaulted emerged from the park. After taking his friend’s daughter home they decided to contact the police before they took her to the hospital. Zarchi quickly regretted that decision with the way that the victim was treated by the authorities claiming that the officer was “Not Fit to wear the uniform”.  As a result he produced and directed the film in which the victim of a gang-rape takes the revenge into her own hands.

This is where I point out the 2004 film Irreversible starring Monica Bellucci in particular the scene where her character is assaulted in a tunnel and afterward she is brutally beaten and left in a coma. In the end of the film her attacker is not brought to justice and her ex-boyfriend and fiancé take revenge on the wrong person and are hauled off to jail. I ask you which is worse?

Wes Craven’s First film Last House on the Left followed a similar premise in which a duo of young women head into the city to attend a rock concert are kidnapped raped and brutally murdered by  a quartet of criminals who eventually seek refuge inside the home of the parents of one of their victims. After the parents learn of the fate of their daughter they take revenge against them.

The film is also regarded as one of the most controversial films of the time.

Last House on the Left has been remade twice first in 2005 with Chaos which is far more brutal than it’s predecessor and the far more lighter 2009 Remake of the same name.

The remakes mark a sense of irony taking into consideration that Last House on the Left is in all regards itself a remake of Ingmar Bergman’s film the Virgin Spring.

In slightly similar plot of the family taking revenge against the ones that assaulted them is The Linda Blair film Savage Streets the heroine takes vengeance against the gang that raped her sister and murdered her best friend.

Then there are the other films that aren’t associated with the subgenre with films like Charles Bronson’s Death Wish series as well as the Dirty Harry films especially with Sudden Impact.

 There is also some of the films that have made the mainstream fare such as Jodie Foster’s film The Accused, and Brian De Palma’s Casualties of War. The differences is in these films is that the attackers are brought to Justice in the courts and not facing brutal revenge at the hands of their victims.

These films are just a few examples of the infamous Rape Revenge sub-genre.

The most recent example of the genre is the subplot of the recent film the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,

The character of Lisbeth Salander is assaulted by her lawyer and she takes her revenge by marking him as well as threatening to castrate and kill him. The subplot is highly relevant in the sequels to the novel and the subsequent film adaptations.

The author of the Millennium trilogy Stieg Larsson was inspired to write the character after witnessing the assault of a woman and his reluctance and fear to help her. The event made a massive impact on Larsson and maintained the theme in his novels.

This is where I feel that I am an avid defender because of many people that I have known in my life that have been assaulted and the fact that I can see the aftermath of the attacks and the wrecking ball effect that it has had on their lives. It is a result of these events that I have volunteered for many rape prevention classes over the years.

In reality the film is by far from a feminist’s point of view which I feel that is why the film is so controversial.

In many of the films the victim takes her revenge but the woman is forever destroyed by the events that happened to her as well as her own actions.

Such as the film Ms. 45 the main character Thana (Played by Zoë Tamerlis Lund) begins taking her revenge out on any and all men that she sees she is finally taken down and killed by none other than one of her friends after killing her boyfriend in a brutal shooting spree at a Halloween party.

In I Spit on Your Grave Jennifer Hill is brutalized and destroyed but after a couple of scenes where she is shown healing her body you see her healing her mind and she begins writing her book again and slowly we see the character that we met at the beginning of the film.

 It is at this point that the attackers ride their boat past her house seeing that she is in fact alive and looking at them with revenge in her eyes.

Similar to the production of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre the film was a victim of it’s ultra-low budget and in the fact that the film could not afford stunt doubles.

 Camille Keaton had to do many of the film’s scenes that involved the character’s journey through the woods to civilization had to walk through the woods and streams naked and exposed to the elements, and insects even needing to be rushed to the emergency room one day after being bitten by a massive amount of poisonous insects during the production of the film. Ever the trooper Camille refused to alter the production schedule of the film to recover and continued production as scheduled.

Zarchi revealed in the commentary that Richard Pace who played the mentally disabled  Matthew during the filming of his death scene reacting to a fear of heights began to panic and started to really choke and hang eventually passed out and had to be revived after being lowered. When he came to he simply asked if the shot worked.

Eron Tabor played the woman hating gang’s leader Johnny, Tabor who was also a composer and a pianist was really nervous about the knives in the scenes in particularly the infamous bath tub sequence.

This sequence is the part of the film that is the most talked about. Jennifer seduces her attacker and while manually stimulating him she takes a giant butcher knife that she stole from Matthew and slicing off his penis (which you don’t see but you know that it is happening)  and the macho Johnny is reduced into a screaming crying mess that Jennifer allows to bleed to death.

Anthony Nichols was a cast member highly skilled at driving the motorboat and he even instructed Camille Keaton on how do drive the boat in her scenes.

Various members of the crew ended up leaving the production while the scenes were being filmed because of the excessive violence. These crew members included the Make-up woman as well as the Electrician.

Early on in pre-production Zarchi hired a production manager that many on the cast and crew could not stand because of his arrogance and Zarchi let him go early into the production.

After the scene in the church where Jennifer asks for forgiveness for what she is about to do was filmed the reverend of the church contacted Zarchi asking that he  turn over all footage of the inside of and around the church because he was told that Zarchi and his crew were filming a porno film.

It was later revealed that the reverend was told this by the fired crew member who followed the crew from New York City to Kent, Connecticut where 90% of the movie was filmed to spread the rumor around the town about the crew making a porno film.

He then explained the plot of the film to the reverend and was not only given his permission but was instructed that if anyone else had a problem with the film have them speak to the reverend himself Effectively giving the film the protection of the church.

I Spit on Your Grave has no musical Score to the film. This was not done for budgetary reasons Zarchi stated that he felt that the film needed no score for the film and he did have various music in the movie such Andy playing his Harmonica.

The MPAA constantly refused to grant the film an R-Rating since the NC-17 rating had not been invented yet the film would constantly receive an X-Rating that at the time and is still today looked on as porn films. 

Meir Zarchi self-distributed the film under the title Day of the Woman which did not do well and deeply in debt he had a company redistribute the film under the title I Spit on your Grave which Zarchi hated. As a matter of fact on the release of the Millennium edition release of the film Zarchi had the DVD titled I Spit on Your Grave aka Day of the Woman.

Zarchi also hated the new poster for the film that featured a shot of an actress’s backside (Not Camille) holding a knife with the tagline, “This Woman Has Just Cut, Chopped, Broken and Burned Five Men Beyond Recognition. But No Jury in America would Ever Convict Her!!!”…I Spit on Your Grave.

First off there were only four men and not five. Second off the never broke or burned any of them.

The film definitely takes a female point of view. In reality the only men that you see In the film are the rapists. There is however an organ player in the film and a butcher cutting meat in a store.

No One notices that in the scene where Jennifer is being chased through the woods there is clearly an audio person in the shot.  

Roger Ebert openly campaigned against the film referring to it as "a vile bag of garbage...without a shred of artistic distinction," and said that "Attending it was one of the most depressing experiences of my life."  Ebert himself alongside his partner Gene Siskel would even stand outside of theater to urge people not to see the film. Convincing theater management to cancel screenings and eventually got the distributer the pull the movie.

I Spit on Your Grave is banned in some countries because of the excessive violence in the film in the revenge sequences as well as the flat out violence in the rape sequences.

It is campaigns like these that have both added to the hype of the film and also spawned the outrage that has hurt the film. 

Many of the film’s detractors later admitted that they haven’t even seen the film yet they still spoke out against it.

One of the first reviews that I did here on the Video Creep Blog was the 2010 Remake of the Film.

Click Here for that review.

http://caseycorpier.blogspot.com/2010/09/i-spit-on-your-grave-unrated.html

A sequel for that film will be released later this month.

All in All I am still a fan of the original and I highly recommend it to all of you.

Those of you that are of age that is.

By the Way nowadays you can find I Spit on Your Grave on NetFlix, Wal-Mart, and Hulu.

4 Dead Bodies

2 Breasts

5 Beasts

2 Boat Chases

Axe to the Back

Boat Motor to the Intestines

Hinging

Severed Penis Fu

4 Stars

One of the True Classics and definitely Check it out