Show IN lj i Will Hollywood bleeds red with films i Stephen Hunter The Washingto Post Nobody ignores blood Id I'd just seen gallons of it in inthe inthe inthe the French film mm High Tension surely one of the most blood- blood soaked films of recent release And its it's just the start Blood is ison ison ison on my mind because it seems to tobe tobe tobe be an especially bloody summer summer summer sum sum- mer upcoming Not only is High Tension splattering plasma everywhere but next Friday George Romero who made a fortune and a reputation off arterial spray is bringing outLand out outLand outLand Land of the Dead supposedly the piece de resistance in the zombie oeuvre which he invented and pe perfected I Then theres there's something called Undead a 2003 deal obviously hauled into the marketplace marketplace marketplace mar mar- to take advantage of zombie mania it opens July 1 Then July 22 completes the gore with The Devils Devil's Rejects which isn't about zombies but good old-fashioned old trailer park trash with guns and knives kiln killin folks left and right It was directed by old- old style rocker Rob Zombie no he actually isn't a zombie though he was the lead singer of White Zombie Some of these may be good good- I have high hopes for Romero who is a talented outlaw and whose 1978 Dawn of the Dead is some kind of great American movie Im I'm not sure what kind What they are selling selling selling sell sell- ing however is something unique and specific Its It's not hor- hor horror hor hor- There are other horror movies and the tendency in in horror movies of late has been to show less rather than more Its It's not fear they're selling either though all the films will surely provide a startle or two Still less is it the sophisticated state known as dread which isas isas is isas as much intellectual as anything and beyond the reach of most splatter flicks The movies have always understood the magic power of blood and they play with it in a variety of ways For a while it was vivid in its absence It was wasa a great taboo and could be represented represented represented rep rep- resented only symbolically So when the heros hero's best pal had that telltale trickle of dark moisture and lay back in the heros hero's arms and remembered Mary Sue or The Coach or Grandpa Jones we all knew the trickle stood for something more grotesque Blood its own self raw red wet and demanding that attention attention attention atten atten- tion be paid entered the mainstream mainstream mainstream main main- stream from the bottom The films of a fellow called Herschell Gordon Lewis in the mid after his pioneering work in the nude-camp nude genre with Daughter of the Sun were made for a few bucks inthe in inthe inthe the Florida swamps amateurishly amateurishly amateurishly amateur amateur- acted on plots that could have been diagrammed on the back of a cigarette pack and they were selling only one product which was red liquefied liquefied liquefied lique lique- fied and all allover over the joint Blood had gone fully mainstream mainstream mainstream main main- stream by 1967 when Warren Beattys Beatty's Clyde Barrow shot a banker through the back window window window win win- dow of his 32 Ford by two years later it was here to stay when Sam The Wild Bunch entry and exit wounds in mo so that each bullets bullet's passage through the body was choreographed choreographed choreographed graphed to the blossoming of a multi flower of gore A great movie but for two solid years every single movie had bloody deaths by gunshot in That's the way it works Now it comes and goes It came again in the early on the strength of the the films first Halloween represents the high end the last laston laston laston on the low end which end which again shocked us until we grew bored then they went away Until now They're back Dont Don't go in the water Its It's bloody |