As with most of the big names of the New Wave, Claude Chabrol began his cinematic career as a critic for the Cahiers du Cinema. This critical career culminated with the release in 1957 of a book about the films of Alfred Hitchcock. This attraction to Hitchcock’s style and subject matter followed Chabrol when he [...]
Entries from June 2009
June 24, 2009
BG 16 – Mirror’s Edge : The Emptiness of the Short-distance Runner
Futurismic have my 16th Blasphemous Geometries column.
As a piece, it is a lot closer in style to the kind of criticism I have been producing for this blog. Hence the use of YouTube videos and a viewpoint that is a lot closer to the text of the game, rather than standing outside that text and [...]
June 23, 2009
My Work Is Not Yet Done (2002) – The Revenger’s Futility
My Work is Not Yet Done is a novella published alongside two other stories. It is, to this date, the longest work of fiction produced by Thomas Ligotti. It is also a deeply vexing work. While the book is occasionally brilliant and incredibly twisted, it is also a deeply taciturn book that is forever seeking [...]
June 22, 2009
Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) – The Unwanted Guest
There is no greater testament to the evolving nature of genre than the Vampire. Once upon a time, the vampire was the poster boy of the gothic romance. He stood for the dark side of the Victorian heart; The swarthy foreigner whose powers of evil and sensuality lured upstanding Victorian women to their fall not [...]
June 17, 2009
REVIEW – Genesis (2006) by Bernard Beckett
Strange Horizons have my review of Bernard Beckett’s Genesis. Originally published in 2006, the novel won a few awards and is now getting a wider release (including one with a Young Adult-oriented cover).
I really enjoyed writing the review and thinking about the more technical elements of the novel (an aspect of genre writing that is [...]
June 15, 2009
‘From’ in which sense exactly?
One of the running themes of this blog since its inception has been my on-again, off-again relationship with the approach to film criticism. In some cases I have argued that works should be seen as windows into the writer’s mind, in other places I’ve been happy to cast it into the dustbin of history on [...]
June 12, 2009
The Virgin Spring (1960) – Trembling Before God
Horror giant Wes Craven reportedly claimed that the violence of his debut feature The Last House On The Left (1969) is a reaction by his generation to the horrors of the Vietnam war. While this justification seems a trifle pretentious and self-serving, it does raise the issue of why it is that depictions of violence [...]
June 9, 2009
REVIEW – Anything for Her (2008)
Falsely accused of murdering her boss, Lisa (Diane Kruger) is sent off to prison. As the appeals process dries up, Lisa drifts into a dark depression and attempts suicide. Realising that he is losing a wife and his son a mother, Julien (Vincent Lindon) realises that his current existence is untenable and devotes everything he [...]
