Alright, gang, here's the circumstance in which we find ourselves. It is currently Canadian Thanksgiving weekend, and I am several hundred miles from my cozy home, in a basement in the capital city, banging out these words on a laptop with a low battery capacity. I obviously have a lot on my plate, so the next couple of posts have to be more snack-like than big substantial meals. Forgive the brevity, but I have to try and take it easy and hit some softball entries this time around. Luckily, my pals were on the ball in that regard, and some of the suggestions I got were for these neat little horror shorts. So, then, here's a paragraph or so on three of those, fired off at rapid speed so I can return to idyllic vacation time. Let's begin with...
TEACHING JAKE ABOUT THE CAMCORDER
Brian David Gilbert is a Youtube fellow I recognize, but haven't watched much of. He called Fire Emblem "chess but horny" one time, and he's not wrong. Anyways he made a 10 minute short involving analog media and a VHS camcorder! Yay wowee we're on brand! Gilbert, as the dad of the titular Jake, is teaching his boy about the camcorder and we are watching it play back on a CRT, and every time we rewind the footage changes in new and disturbing ways. What I really enjoy about this one is the way it uses the aesthetic and power of analog media to tell a story about nostalgia, regret, and how this technology is a snapshot of a long-lost time. In watching the viewer, who I assume is Jake, attempt to rewind the tape over and over in some coping mechanism, I am reminded of the old home movies in my own basement. Memories of times long gone in Grand Bank, of people no longer with me, a memory preserved on a VHS tape. Even as Gilbert pleads for the viewer to move on, to let go of the past and let the image remain, things continue to be rewound. What if our nostalgic snapshots of people long gone could think for themselves? What if the memory of them gained sentience? What would they think of us, fully grown but looking back instead of forward? Even without the shadowy figure and ominous ambiance of this, there's a real horror in that: of being locked in the past, like a fly in amber captured at 240 lines. Shockingly effective short horror, and aesthetically pleasing. I dug this.
THE HORRIBLY SLOW MURDERER WITH THE EXTREMELY INEFFICIENT WEAPON
This one, an oldie by a fella named Richard Gale, is a little sillier. A man is being relentlessly pursued by a white-faced ghoul determined to kill him. Very slowly. By hitting him with an ordinary kitchen spoon. Again and again. It's absolute farce, to be sure, and the fact that it's portrayed as an epic movie trailer for an awesome new thriller is also part of the joke. With that very spoon, however, this short gets to have its cake and eat it too. The premise is completely absurd, and yet the concept is genuinely horrifying. As horrific as getting stabbed in the throat by a Jason or Ghostface would be, at least it's over quick. The spoon guy is just this omnipresent invincible force inflicting a death with ten million bludgeons, and it just goes on and on and on. Part of the joke is that the movie trailer goes on and on and on also, but this poor man is subjected to never-ending relentless assault. My favorite bit is at the end when the spoon finally breaks, only for our killer to reveal he has dozens more and luxuriate in pulling one out and continuing the assault. It's ludicrous and yet sadistic, a perfect mix of moods and a wild ten minutes of this poor guy having the worst life one can muster. I don't have much more to say beyond that, but that's okay, like I said. We're taking it easy for this one, which is tough because the last one is a little more ambiguous.
THIS HOUSE HAS PEOPLE IN IT
Utterly bizarre sort of found footage/home surveillance media in which a family's teenage daughter slowly falls through the floor, and a house descends into utter chaos. It isn't clear what's happening, why it's happening, or what happened at the end. You'd think that'd be a challenge for me, and yet I have a read. This is Lynchian. I don't use that term as a shorthand for strange and inexplicable shit happening in a surrealist piece of media. No, I mean that this touches upon the same bedrock that Lynch was hitting in things like Blue Velvet or Fire Walk With Me. The seedy dark underbelly of the platonic family unit, and how these people can hurt those they claim to love. Even before the parents realize their daughter is falling through the floor, they are being horribly abusive and not just to her. The middle boy's birthday party is neglected as they freak out, and the infant is abandoned and left to its own devices. It's disturbing to watch this mental breakdown, and this poor neglected girl to sink through the floor, literally slipping between the cracks as everything breaks down. That's just one read of it, though, and I can't imagine what others are out there. I'm just here to offer my take on a strange surrealist ten minutes, and I've done that.
Alright kids, it's back to vacay time. Sorry this was a short one, but it is what it is. Next time? I have no idea. There's a heady one I'm just about wrapping up, but we might not be ready to bang out words on that while I'm away. Never fear, for I have things I can do. See you in two days as I do something or other whilst waiting for turkey dinner with the fam. Wishing you the best from da capital!
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