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Showing posts from October, 2021

Les Diaboliques

Train to Busan vs World War Z

If thou openest not that I may enter I will smash the doorpost and unhinge the gate. I will lead up the dead, that they may eat the living.”    (Enheduanna). Excerpt from “Descent of Ishtar/Inanna to the Underworld.” Written somewhere between 3000 B.C. to 1900 B.C. Train to Busan and World War Z: A Comparative Approach Call them what you want: the undead, revenant (French word meaning come back or one who has returned), Zombi or Zombii in Haitian, or as many Western viewers know them, zombies. There are fast zombies (both of these movies) , slow zombies (George A. Romero’s classic 1968 film Night of the Living Dead), zombies who are under mind control through nefarious black magic or sorcery, and many more. Zombies are a very important concept in pop culture and society. Specifically, lots of movies have been made about them.   Two interesting films about zombies are World War Z (2013) and Train to Busan (2016). Even though World War Z is has more jump scares and fits into the

The Birds (1963)

 Tagline- Suspense and shock beyond anything you have seen or imagined!      Hello friends! I have a question for you: If you had to choose, which animal do you think would be most likely to overthrow or even wipe out the human race? Cats? Domestic cats think they already own the world so they wouldn't want to wipe out all their potential human slaves.  That'd be a waste of labor.         Insects surely?  Locusts can completely strip vast areas of land and crops, leaving humans and livestock to starve. Mosquitoes are easily the most active and bloodthirsty (literally) killers in the world, infecting and killing millions of people with diseases such as malaria, West Nile virus, and dengue.      What if birds went bad? Imagine that there's a magical "button" that if pressed could somehow influence the birds themselves to attack. Even if we don't count the diseases that birds can carry and spread, humanity would be in big trouble.         With millions of pigeons

A Quiet Place (2018)

     Rule #1: Don't make a sound.  Rule #2: Never leave the path.  Rule #3: Red means run.     Happy Halloween Eve to those who celebrate!    Life is full of noise. I often take it for granted and I'm sure many other do as well. When we do stop and pay attention to our surroundings it can surprise us on how powerful and ever-present sound is. My fan is on and is quite loud in the otherwise quiet room. My fingers making deafening impacts on my keyboard as I write. Cars and motorcycles are always background noise. It's almost unnerving and even overwhelming when you really stop to listen to everything. I don't live in a rural setting but at the same time I find it difficult imagining living in a large capital city like London, Paris or Washington, D.C. Life is already chaotic enough without millions of blaring car horns and a constant stream of sensory information.        With that in mind, let's have a (very quiet) chat on today's movie: A Quiet Place . Spoilers