sloshed-cinema

[sloshed-cinema]

May December (2023)

Todd Haynes giving Brian De Palma but Brian De Palma if he was actually in on the pulpy jokes he was making. Piano is omnipresent in the non-diegetic sound in May December, adding gravitas to any scene whether or not it deserves it. Perhaps the first indication that there is a vein of pitch-dark humor to this film is Julianne Moore's shock reveal upon gazing into the fridge that there may not be enough hot dogs for the barbecue. This is no They Came Together, but it certainly is a takedown of the 80s/90s Yuppie Nightmare, centering on the dissection of a woman of a certain age's relationship to a much younger man. Cue the Mary Kay Letourneau comparisons, as are doubtlessly intended. But this is suffused with such high camp as to make the whole affair worth it. Haynes seems to favor deliciously extreme asymmetry in framing his characters, particularly in moments of revelation, throwing things out of balance in every sense. The best example of this comes in the graduation dress outfitting where actress Elizabeth follows mother and daughter along on the occasion. When Mary enters in a sleeveless dress, Gracie immediately launches into a speech about body positivity which leaves Elizabeth fragmented, contained in her own separate light as she takes in who this woman is in a different light. The actress isn't merely a vessel for receiving, either. Early in the film she signals that she is distant from her own relationship by hanging up on a call under false pretenses, and her flirtations with Gracie's hubby are intentional from the start. He's drawn along by both women, allowed full personhood. Gracie loves him but will never entertain mature conversation with him, and Elizabeth finds subtle ways to infantilize him even as a contemporary in age with him. No adult refers to another as a 'grown-up'. He is still a 7th grader in her eyes.

THE RULES

SIP

Piano sting in the score.

The film within a film is mentioned.

Insect imagery.

Age is brought up.

BIG DRINK

A breathing apparatus features in a scene.

People be on rooftops.

#drinking games #may december #todd haynes #julianne moore #natalie portman #charles melton #drama #romance

[sloshed-cinema]

To Die For (1995)

Maybe when David Cronenberg stops your car and tells you to follow him, don’t do it. Nothing good can come of it. Then again, bad things happening to her rather than someone else isn’t exactly part of Suzanne Stone-Maretto’s mental calculus. The world revolves around her, and she is a master manipulator. Gus Van Sant’s acerbic satire speed-runs the Pamela Smart story as Suzanne grooms and uses a trio of hapless teens to kill her husband once she realizes their dreams don’t align. She was made for the television screen, after all, and being on TV makes you a worthwhile person because others can see you. You don’t matter if you lead a private life. As late-night weather reports start to scratch this itch, the flood gates are opened for Suzanne. There’s nowhere to go but up, though in all likelihood her trajectory would be a little more of a flat line beyond the small town scene. She shows her hand constantly, revealing through stolen phrases and dinner mains that rather than coming up with her own personality and drive, she is a collage of influences from others. To Die For does anticipate dirty executives like Weinstein or Murdoch, showing that this has been a problem for quite some time, but took people a long while to be able to bring this open secret out of the shadows. Victimized initially at the Florida conference, Suzanne nevertheless turns around and repays in kind the impressionable James. As her scheme unravels, that narcissism persists, causing her to believe she’s shielded from accountability by a layer of uncertainty in proving her connections to the killing. But what the film has to embellish the events which inspired it is some creative panache in the Maretto family’s mob connections. Janice Maretto’s gut might have been right about Suzanne, but she does get the satisfaction of skating on her grave in the end.

To Die For picks up on its principal antagonist’s media obsession, building it into the ethos of the film’s visual language. Suzanne is happiest when there’s a layer of video grain over her wide-eyed face, and she gets to control the narrative in the form of her white-walled confessional clips. Or at least she gets to try to control it. Others have their say in interviews, creating the feeling of a primetime crime special report or a tabloid. Television shapes James’ fantasies about the object of his desires, hearing Suzanne addressing him directly over the airwaves. But, as she notes, in life’s grand irony, Lydia is the one who achieves greater fame: as she concludes her interview, the frame divides exponentially, recreating likeness her over and again as her story reaches so many more TV sets than Suzanne by herself was able to achieve.

Noticing a Latin market title for the film, Todo por un sueño, made me think about the title itself. Film titles, especially in this era of single-word nouns being passed off as clever or unique when it’s just BARBIE or OPPENHEIMER, are currency. How do you refer to the entire experience of a film? Its title. But a title in and of itself also bears significance. What choices were made in this regard? Certainly marketing plays a role, but directors and creatives can still hold sway sometimes. To Die For is a fun pun, doubling Suzanne’s sex appeal to her victims with a common phrase. The Spanish language title pushes it even further into explicitly Joaquin Phoenix’ character’s experience and perspective, at least when doubled with a lurid image of Nicole Kidman. Suzanne is single-handedly responsible for her own fate, but in objectifying herself or rendering herself a reward in steps, she decentralizes the story from herself through the lens of the title. In both cases, the text can be a bit of a double entendre, empowering or sidelining our megalomaniac. But in a way, the title choice is the ultimate insult to her legacy.

THE RULES

PICK ONE

Select either MARETTO or STONE and sip whenever they're named.

SIP

A newspaper headline appears onscreen.

Someone names a public figure.

A new person is interviewed for the first time.

BIG DRINK

Suzanne starts dancing.

"Teens Speak Out"

#drinking games #to die for #gus van sant #nicole kidman #joaquin phoenix #matt dillon #casey affleck #comedy #crime #drama

[sloshed-cinema]

Lake Mungo (2008)

Still images serve as the key driver of tension in this accounting of familial grief in small-town Australia. This is “found footage” horror in a sense, but rather than being something allegedly found in the woods after all its subjects had disappeared it is instead a false documentary. As such, there is a procedural dryness to how the tragedy unfolds, leaning on interviews and recollections just as much as images of the supernatural occurrences. As in documentary, there are beats which feel vaguely exploitative, or might were this a real story: how difficult it must be for the family, even after several years, to return to the site of Alice’s drowning to record B-roll, for instance. While by and large not horror in a “scary” but rather an “unsettling” sense, there is still plenty to draw out in the footage and images collected by various parties. There’s a jarring nature to seeing images of ghosts, and the film knows it is only the latest entry in this fascination. The film opens on historical spirit photographs of the late 19th and early 20th centuries before showing the Palmer family portrait which will bookend the narrative. This is both a clever wink at one of the film’s many twists in Mathew’s passion for photography and an acknowledgement of how the medium has always been used to link present and past. The film invites its viewers to scrutinize each frame before drawing the eye to one pixelated and yet chilling detail within. Even more welcome is its lack of cheap thrills. It single jumpscare is both immaculately executed and well-earned. It’s completely jarring, but so is the strangeness of its implications, making it all the more appropriate. Being suddenly confronted by one’s own death is frightening on a primal level. Grief can be a harrowing process, and this guides us through the gauntlet one particular family ran as they tried to reckon with their loss.

Naming the family the Palmers had to be intentional. This has a certain Twin Peaks quality, specifically in the nature of the relationships surrounding this central figure. Alice is well-loved and yet deeply troubled, seemingly innocent and yet harboring dark secrets. Even though the death here is accidental, it seems at points as if there were dark goings-on: could the pervy neighbor have done something? Is Mathew not being entirely honest? Friends seem supportive or duplicitous at intervals. Tensions are frayed within the surviving family: the stiff-upper lip but fragile father, the mother at the end of her rope, the brother with questionable choices at points. Tell me it’s a coincidence.

THE RULES

SIP

Someone says 'Alice' or 'photo(graph)'.

A specific date is mentioned.

Time lapse footage.

BIG DRINK

Camcorder home video footage begins.

The camera pushes in on an image as spooky music plays.

#drinking games #lake mungo #australian cinema #horror #horror & thriller #found footage movie #joel anderson

[sloshed-cinema]

UFO Abduction / The McPherson Tape (1989)

Oh shit! Oh SHIT! Holy shit, oh shit! Michael Van Heese sure has a broad variety of ways to express his incredulity as he records the events leading up to the abduction by extraterrestrials of him and his family one terrible night. Then again, when we’re not treated to Michael and his brothers’ shock at discovering a UFO and trio of aliens in the woods behind their family home, we’re treated to some truly Altmanesque layered conversations between the family at their birthday gathering. Even if the discussions are mostly unintelligible, it’s safe to bet that they’re bitching about either household chores or familial obligations. Because that’s the key to success in any found footage alien horror movie. Family drama becomes a key motivator in the thrust of the film, characters needling one another and revealing rifts within the family which we will know for such a brief time. I suppose when there’s absolutely no budget and you have a high-concept film involving what would likely cost a decent amount of dough to pull off naturalistically, you’ve gotta fill the runtime with something. The rest of the budget was saved by simply showing nothing for large stretches of time. With the power cut off to their house, the Van Heeses have to rely on flashlights or candles to illuminate the threatening world around them. There can be power in building tension by not revealing your monster, but when nothing is ever shown, it’s just, well, boring as shit. Various family members shoot at unseen (and unheard) foes through the ceiling of their house or react in shock to something that the film hasn’t bothered to convey has happened in any sense. I suppose if it’s going for a truly documentarian effect and this is a home movie made by an amateur, of course there wouldn’t be much intrigue in what he chooses to shoot or how. But at least have the decency to give us a couple of fun scares throughout. As is, the Van Heeses are so annoying that perhaps their abduction was a blessing in disguise.

THE RULES

SIP

Someone says 'shit'.

The scene jumps in continuity.

Someone turns on a flashlight or lantern.

BIG DRINK

Someone makes fun of the camera.

Someone flips off someone else.

#drinking games #the mcpherson tape #horror #horror & thriller #found footage movie #dean alioto

[sloshed-cinema]

The Borderlands / Final Prayer (2013)

Do found footage movies ever end? Like… has anyone ever written a conclusion for any of these turkeys that isn’t just a lot of screaming and all that sort of nonsense. What starts out as a mandated investigation by some Vatican skeptics quickly deteriorates into a nightmare of unthinkable actions and terrible truths, nothing too easily swept under the cover. Great. Good. Exciting. But there’s nothing to go off here. In the final minutes all we have, regardless of everything else, is just screaming priests crawling around in random caves, and then suddenly they’re dissolving or something?!? I paid precious little attention because it deserved none of mine, and yet here we are.

THE RULES

SIP

There is a jump in the chronology.

Surveillance footage of rooms.

Video artifact.

Someone gets fakeout scared.

BIG DRINK

Someone bites it.

POV camera footage begins.

#drinking games #the borderlands #final prayer #pick a title folks #elliot goldner #horror #horror & thriller #found footage movies

[sloshed-cinema]

Werckmeister Harmonies [Werckmeister harmóniák] (2000)

Lars Rudolph as János Valuska is the ultimate vessel of pathos. János wanders the streets of a small, anonymous Hungarian village, performing various odd jobs: he delivers newspapers, aids his elderly uncle in daily tasks, and only ever takes time for himself as an afterthought. He refers to everyone as ‘aunt’ or ‘uncle’ seemingly regardless of their blood relation to him, and most elders in this community view him with affection or at least see him as useful. But there are stirrings of unrest about. A circus arrives in town: János witnesses a tractor pulling a mammoth trailer, a hulking metal beast of corrugated metal far too large for what the vehicle should be able to pull. It passes camera and János alike, arresting for both, ponderous in size, overwhelming and strange. Posters promise a wondrous giant whale and a figure known only as the Prince. Equally jarringly, Tünde Eszter, the estranged wife of Uncle György, the pianist to whom János attends, suddenly returns. She brings fearful news of the zealous hordes that accompany this circus and demands that György use his influence in the village to put together a petition to “clean things up.” Initially these mobs seem the stuff of rumor and nothing more, but soon enough János stumbles on rough outsiders surrounding the whale trailer. It becomes clear that this pair—János and György—are trapped between warring pedagogues. György is opinionated and fiercely independent, railing about the loss of music’s sacred nature in equal temperament of pitch, abandoning the holy uncertainties of natural pitch. Our ears accept it due to years of indoctrination, but it is impure. János is something of an innocent or holy fool. He dreams of the cosmos, a star map on his bedroom wall. He regales drunks at a bar with an accounting of the solar system in the opening scene, using them to make a living model, boozers revolving around one another. But there is darkness to come for these two dissidents as mob mentality overruns the town. The whale whips the mob into a frenzy, decried as demonic by Tünde, but János sees in it only beauty. Though this rage is too powerful, sweeping everyone along. Resistance is a fragile wheel, easily broken under the wheel of a tyrannical majority.

THE RULES

SIP

János calls someone 'aunt' or 'uncle'.

The whale is mentioned.

György rants about something.

BIG DRINK

Mihály Víg's searingly gorgeous score kicks in.

János goes to visit the whale.

#drinking games #werckmeister harmonies #hungarian cinema #béla tarr #ágnes hranitzky #drama

[sloshed-cinema]

The Cassandra Cat [Až Přijde Kocour] (1963)

We should all know less about each other. The social contract involves acknowledging that there are things best left unknown or unsaid, so what happens when unfettered honesty strikes a community? When a mysterious circus comes to town, the magician’s show at first enthralls and then horrifies everyone in attendance. Initially, pantomime with animated clothing is cheekily close to townie drama, but far enough away as to be plausibly deniable. But the titular cat has something to meow about that. This tabby has the power to reveal the literal true colors of anyone under its gaze, purple and yellow revealing envy or unruliness, grey showing thieves for who they are, and red capturing lovers. This radical honesty is enough to throw the entire community into disarray, people unwilling to confront the ugly truths about themselves.

But that damn cat at the center of it all. The cat-actor portraying Mourn is incredibly tolerant, enduring rad sunglasses and undignified head-sock alike, alongside being slung around town by the armpits by some random snot-nosed kid. But this tolerance does not extend to the adult societal structures his unblinking gaze surveys. This in its second half becomes an unflinching, wry satire on social norms, everyone fleeing from being exposed even as the government official tries to make moves without it appearing like he is doing so. He’s shown to be a chameleon in the close, but mostly executes his means from the shadows. It’s a suggestion, not an order.

THE RULES

SIP

Someone says 'cat'.

A color is named.

The magician makes something appear.

We hear someone's inner thoughts.

BIG DRINK

Taxidermied animals appear in a scene.

Cat shades come off.

An absolutely cursed child painting appears in a scene.

#drinking games #the cassandra cat #czech cinema #fantasy #sci fi & fantasy #comedy #vojtěch jasný #až přijde kocour

[sloshed-cinema]

Accattone (1961)

A subset of postwar Italian cinema is defined by listlessness. Yet whereas something like Fellini’s Il bidone still finds rambunctious frivolity in these layabouts and ne’er-do-well youths, Pier Paolo Pasolini’s feature debut (how!?) looks at a blasted Rome with a bitter gaze. Aside from some tongue-in-cheek gallows humor of the opening scene, all laughter in this film is a scream into the void. Accattone’s posse laugh to keep from crying over a man mock-eating flowers as they starve, waiting for a meager plate of pasta to serve eight to finish cooking. Joining up with the local thief Balilla to earn a few lira, Accattone and the boss swap jabs at how bad henchman Cartagine’s feet smell because he hasn’t washed in a long time. Everyone laughs too hard, on the edge of hysterics. This small drama plays out in an outer Rome which resembles a trash heap: crumbling buildings dot neighborhoods, rubble litters the streets, and bottles that girls clean to earn some cash are stacked everywhere. The police exist to harass some people arbitrarily, miscarry justice, and pack away people seeking money illicitly because they feel there is no alternative. Spying on his estranged partner Ascenza, Accattone looks at her family through a hole in the wall of a derelict building: Roman ruins, but of a less storied chapter in Italian history than produced the Coliseum. And when one of Accattone’s associates prays mockingly to whatever patron saint may exist for starvation, the camera tilts reverently upward but only finds a blank and anonymous structure. These people have been abandoned in one sense or other.

But despite these tragedies, make no mistake: Accattone is a rat bastard. He decries all gainful employment, abuses the women in his life, and claims that forcing them to work as prostitutes is his own work. Money is always squandered whenever he has it, and lamented when he doesn’t. As with others, he is disillusioned by the world around him, and he’s chosen to lash out in blind rage at all for it. His cruelty is apparent in twin tracking shots in which he pursues first Ascenza and then Stella, his new victim. They move toward the camera, this choice making him inescapable, and similar dynamics play out, if the aggression is at different temperatures. In portraying both his central character and the situation at large in alternately sympathetic and horrified manners, Pasolini indicts everything about this situation.

THE RULES

SIP

A Bach piece starts to play.

Someone makes a bet.

Someone starts to sing.

BIG DRINK

Someone says they are ruined.

A section of Rome is named.

#drinking games #accattone #pier paolo pasolini #italian cinema #italian neorealism #drama

[sloshed-cinema]

House of Usher (1960)

It takes a lot of sheer gumption to just straight-up put spooky ghost noises in the soundtrack to your haunted house movie. At key moments throughout this take on an evil house and dying bloodline we hear ladies wailing and moaning, adding to the ambiance. This Edgar Allan Poe adaptation, Roger Corman’s first of many to come, simply drips with atmosphere. From the opening foggy moors surrounding the estate to the decrepit matte painted walls of the home itself, this feels ripped straight out of a storybook. While Christian statuettes and paintings define much of the estate décor, its primary inhabitant Roderick Usher has added some flair to the place with a series of portraits. Each one is more unsettling than the last, a nightmarish tribute to the evils of generations past, all glowing eyes and unnerving grins. Whether the family truly are cursed to the end, or if Roderick is helping his sister Madeline along to madness by locking her away in a casket, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy, the house certainly does have a mind of its own. Objects move of their own accord, and at several points it seems to try to kill Madeline’s visiting fiancé Philip by dropping a chandelier on him or causing a banister to break away. And it always helps to have a spooky skeleton around to really twist the knife. With the appropriate audio accompaniment, of course.

Vincent Price truly is a gift. Always a treat in his Corman collaborations, here he plays equal parts aristocratic and deranged. Unable to eat anything other than gruel and bothered by the faintest sound, Roderick still has no problem inflicting his lute “playing” on others. His calculations and resistance in the face of the naive if good-hearted Philip always create the air that perhaps he’s lying about all of it, everything just a ploy to control Madeline. But a late nightmare sequence where Philip wanders a blue-tinged estate before happening upon the generations of the Ushers beckoning and torturing him in their derangement, Price is there along with the rest of them, gleefully playing up the psychosis. When the estate collapses, closing off this evil lineage and being reclaimed by the tarn next to which it is built, this blight on history is erased.

THE RULES

SIP

Someone says 'Usher'.

Mr Usher is averse to sound.

Philip refuses to leave.

Spooky ghost noises in the soundtrack.

BIG DRINK

The house tries to kill Philip.

Philip goes down into the crypt.

#drinking games #house of usher #the fall of the house of usher #roger corman #edgar allan poe #vincent price #horror #horror & thriller

[sloshed-cinema]

A Bay of Blood [Ecologia del delitto] (1971)

In all of horror movie history of characters making incredibly dodgy choices so that they can get killed off or almost killed, Paolo the entomologist needing to look up the phone number for the police in the phonebook takes the cake. Mario Bava’s experiment in violence lays the groundwork for the slasher genre to follow, and even in a sense speedruns the full trajectory of that genre. Initially shocking in its violence (albeit with a quaint approach to gore, all red paint and belabored gasps), early kills are all about creativity. Hell, Simone’s killing of a couple in bed is directly ripped off in Friday the 13th Part 2. But soon enough a cheeky element enters. While match-cuts define the visual language of the film, they get their endcap in the beheading of tarot and Fernet Branca enthusiast Anna transitioning smoothly to a ceramic head being broken. And if humor isn’t enough, by the closing kills, A Bay of Blood even anticipates slashers just making hateable fodder by the end of their main run. This early entry at least does it in a completely crazy way, having our main villains offed nihilistically in the final moments by their own children. This is why you should lock up your guns, people! Never let a dastardly real estate scheme be derailed by an ill-timed shotgun blast.

Serving as his own director of photography on this film, Mario Bava takes a very subjective approach to his giallo. There are multiple killers in this scenario, but the tension is maintained by not knowing who is involved in what way as things go along. Another staple of the slasher, lurid nudity, gets introduced as Brunhild skinny-dips. But while a more lecherous viewer might want to ogle and stare, the camera takes on the perspective, presumably, of Simone, and ducks behind a tree, granting the woman a degree of modesty and cringing away from what might appear in later 80s fare at the height of the exploitative slasher trend. The camera often wanders shakily through spaces, making it clear that someone new is about to meet their maker. Also a common feature are shots with fuzzy focus, a blurred image gradually gaining clarity as the scene settles in. Just what this is supposed to convey remains… unclear.

THE RULES

SIP

Someone says 'kill' or 'bay'.

Closeup of eye(s).

Someone bites it.

The property is mentioned.

BIG DRINK

Anna hiccups.

There is a match cut in the edit.

Blurry camera focus.

#drinking games #a bay of blood #mario bava #slasher #horror #horror & thriller #italian cinema #giallo

[sloshed-cinema]

At Midnight I'll Take Your Soul [À Meia-Noite Levarei Sua Alma] (1964)

While the Internet was mostly a mistake, perhaps if it had been around during Zé do Caixão or Coffin Joe’s day, he would have spent his time sweatily posting on 4Chan and /r/Atheism all day rather than murdering and maiming. Zé is bad to the bone, nasty through and through. Introduced haunting a funeral for which he dug the grave before marching home to eat lamb on Good Friday (true mockery of the Lamb of God), Zé embodies enlightened Atheism and Incel world-views. But one need not wait for a lecture from him on his superiority, how life is just the start of death and that existence is the continuity of blood, the reason to exist, to know he’s a bad egg. He looks it. Swarthy and constantly sporting a top hat and long black cape, the grave-digger has long, pointed nails (which he puts to good use) and often-bloodshot eyes. He is fixated on siring a child to perpetuate his bloodline, but everyone in town fears him. Well, except Lenita, Antonio, and Terezinha, but that proves to be a terrible mistake on their part. Just how Zé is able to get away with an increasingly blatant murder spree, especially when he openly confesses to many of his acts, is completely wild. But death comes for us all, including a man so fixated on how nothing else matters. He may mock Catholicism, but the souls he has claimed find a way to wreak their revenge.

From the opening warning against watching this movie by a cackling witch clutching a papier-mâché skull, it’s clear that At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul is going to be a pulpy good time. This feels like a walk through a haunted house, simple setups for cheesy chills and thrills. Zé’s methods of murder and mangling are creative and bizarre, whether he’s killing his wife with the bite of a tarantula, cutting a man’s fingers off with a broken wine bottle, or gouging the local doctor’s eyes out and burning him to death. Director and star José Mojica Marins gets creative behind the camera as well: when Dr Rodolfo’s eyes are gouged out, Marins uses a POV shot, those sharp nails pushing toward the camera, ready to maim. And as Zé is haunted by omens of his imminent demise, the film uses negative footage and what looks to be glitter painted onto the frame to suggest an otherworldly presence haunting the grave-digger. At points of heightened rage, Zé’s eyes will become bloodshot, veins darkened and painted in on a still frame. It’s goofy and fun, feeling homemade and clever as we ride along on what the witch up top promises to be a “terrible evening.” It is terribly fun, so her wishes came true.

THE RULES

SIP

Someone says 'blood' or 'coffin'.

Crazy scene transition.

Someone does an evil laugh.

Zé puts on gloves.

BIG DRINK

Zé's eyes become bloodshot.

There is a shift in Zé's personality.

#drinking games #at midnight i'll take your soul #brazilian cinema #josé mojica marins #coffin joe #horror #horror & thriller

[sloshed-cinema]

The Gospel According to St Matthew [Il vangelo secondo Matteo] (1964)

Jesus is at his best here: a gaunt, unibrowed Marxist shit-stirrer. Pasolini recognizes the inherent political vein of the Christ story, emphasizing this element of the Gospel through shot selection and execution of plot beats in this neorealist epic. Much of the storytelling is intensely personal, conveyed through close ups of faces conveying emotion. When Joseph finds Mary to be pregnant, his first reaction is dismay and shame, but after being reassured by an angel, his visage is transformed into one of joy. Often exchanges occur almost non-verbally, relying on the gaze of an actor to convey the significance of the moment. Jesus’ early preachings are locked in a closeup of his face as he extols his pearls of wisdom, the audience becoming his target as he speaks directly to the camera. But even as he speaks of the Kingdom of Heaven, Jesus knows exactly what he’s doing on earth. As the film transitions to his final days in Jerusalem, Pasolini’s camera takes on an almost documentarian approach, favoring wider shots and crowd coverage. This captures both the growing influence of this Messiah and the increasing trouble it presents the Pharisees. His destruction of the Temple marketplace is executed like a purposeful provocation of the powers that be, as are his inflammatory speeches in public squares and in the Temple itself. He speaks of his forthcoming doom as if it is prophecy, but also makes damn sure to egg on those who could bring it about. This telling of the Gospel feels like it came from someone who had an intensely Catholic upbringing, but also one who went through a period of social and cultural upheaval like WWII Italy, and understands how such a period of sea change looks in society.

In his final address, Jesus instructs his Apostles to spread this new religious truth to the rest of the world, and, well, we know how that panned out. But while the visual language of the film reads very “the props and costume department didn’t have much to go off,” the score presents an incredibly eclectic palette. Alongside Pasolini’s favorites of Bach and Mozart are extracts from Webern and American spirituals, Congolese Mass settings and a new dance of the seven veils. This speaks to the massive reach that Catholicism or Christianity has had over the eons, a small group of rabble-rousers first spread influence and then became firmly entrenched through one mechanism or other into the power structure of Western and Western-influenced society.

THE RULES

PICK ONE

Select one Apostle and sip when their name is mentioned.

SIP

A prophet is named.

Jesus performs a miracle.

Jesus has tears in his eyes.

BIG DRINK

An angel shows up.

Voiceover narration begins.

Jesus gets Big Mad.

#drinking games #the gospel according to matthew #pier paolo pasolini #drama #biblical epic #italian cinema

[sloshed-cinema]

The Devils (1971)

Catholicism as presented here is a hegemony oppressing a faith that aspires for and sometimes achieves grace. Seventeenth Century France was a blasted wasteland torn by war and plague alike, an apocalyptic landscape both manmade and pathological. And yet the latter in many ways enabled the former. The grand existential drama of the Black Plague allowed for those in power or those aspiring for it to exploit the chaos and fear to their own ends. The sight of bodies being dumped by the score into mass graves is a frightening sight, after all. Early in this accounting of the affaire des possédées de Loudun, lecherous priest Fr Urbain Grandier accuses two snake oil salesmen of giving out useless treatments to the ill which only heightens their suffering. Little does he know that these two will soon have power over him and his own body. But they are not alone, and are indeed lesser figures in the grand conspiracy against him. As a figure in the church and a rebellious one, he is a threat to others with grander designs. Cardinal Richelieu, seeking to gain influence over Louis XIII and resenting Fr Grandier’s vocal defense of the historic agreement to maintain the fortification of Loudun while keeping loyal to the Crown of France, will use any opportunity to remove this blight. Fr Grandier’s doom is twofold: his proclivity for the fairer sex, and a convent of Ursuline nuns. His radical interpretation of the Bible and of Catholic faith leads him to believe that he can marry, and a shoddy at the very best investigation of the convent’s sudden spate of erratic behavior marks him a sorcerer. Commence the show trial, the excessive tortures, the cruel and blatantly political execution. Fr Grandier remains resolute to the end, dying in agony but holding true to his truth. He was an imperfect man, but not a monster.

But this description feels too even-keeled to properly capture the experience of watching Ken Russell’s dark and subversive masterpiece. Russell is a master of tone in his historical films, seeking to capture the absurdity of the events playing out in precisely calibrated degrees. If Lisztomania is a psychedelic fuck-fest and Mahler a darkly ironic paean to nature (that one scene where a Valkyrie or whatever throws knives at a crucified Gustav notwithstanding), The Devils captures Russell at his most excessive and his most sober. He knows his evil-doers. The German composers vilify Wagner as the ur-text of Hitler and all of the horror he wrought, and here the Catholic Church is rendered a potent enemy both spiritual and political. The enemy is Legion. While Card. Richelieu is largely absent, he has executors in the strong-willed and fanatical Jean de Laubardemont as judge, jury, and executioner (abetted by a hooded panel of judges), the impotent stooge Fr Mignon, and the psychotic witch-hunter (redundant) Fr Barre. Barre particularly unifies the two arms of this condemnation of Catholic power-abuse: sexual repression and death. Fr Barre is the original hot priest, his vestments sleeveless and most of his garments easily removed to expose that sweet bod. He cavorts with the mostly nude nuns in a grand exorcism, trying to rid them of the devil’s influence while mostly just getting hot and heavy in some BDSM shit. The scenes in the convent are excessive and baudy, purposefully graphic and insane. This is what the priests desire and yet pretend to loathe. As the acts in the congregation become ever more debauched, our previously horny Fr Grandier becomes ever more Christlike. After his West Side Story marriage to his spouse, he removes himself to the wilderness to become closer to God, embracing a radical Catholicism of love and openness and self-sacrifice. His return to Loudun purposefully mirrors Jesus’ cleansing of the temple in Jerusalem, and his prolonged torture by the political powers that be are a sort of abridged Stations of the Cross. By the end, he is a figure of pure pathos, almost superhuman in his resolve to stay true to his beliefs. The conclusion is almost unfathomable in its cruelty, Fr Barre an insane fanatic on a power trip and Fr Grandier dying in agony. But that’s where the final part of this mess comes together: the populace. Ever present and yet largely faceless (literally, due to carnival masks they all wear), everyone in town bears witness to the fall of this one man. He roused them with a speech about their independence at the start, and yet they waver at either supporting or decrying him as he suffers and dies. This is a spectacle, which is what the powers want. The Church need to remove any voice of dissent, and the Crown, a horny fuck that he is, accepts the orgy at the cathedral as a bit of fun, laughs at their ridiculous faith, and then leaves, indifferent to any consequences that may come. The partial fulfillment of Fr Grandier’s final rites comes only as a result of a group chant, and they are just as willing to egg on the death. Some people die at the hands of others, imperfect and yet righteous in their beliefs, and then others step on their bones to take power while the subjugated masses cheer for more circuses. We are all of us devils.

THE RULES

PICK ONE

Select either CATHOLIC or PROTESTANT and sip whenever that faith is mentioned.

SIP

Someone says 'France' or 'forgive'.

The Plague is mentioned.

Sister Jeanne starts to laugh.

BIG DRINK

Someone makes Confession.

The fortifications of Loudun are mentioned.

That bowl-cut-ass mofo is utterly useless.

#the devils #ken russell #drama #satire #vanessa redgrave #oliver reed

[sloshed-cinema]

Chicken Run 2: Dawn of the Nugget (2023)

Well, now we know what it would look like if Ken Adam designed a chicken farm. If the original Chicken Run was a parody of The Great Escape, this sequel is a loving send-up of classic Connery era James Bond movies, with a dash of Mission: Impossible for good measure. From the second the preposterous façade of Fun-Land Farms is revealed, with its moat of explosive robotic ducks and its craggy exterior, exactly where this will be going becomes abundantly clear. The central break-in and recover mission reads as an excuse to come up with a gag a minute, ribbing those classic spy action tropes. The ethos of the villains is once again: how can someone be so diabolical and yet so dim? A retina scan is in fact just some bloke cross-referencing a magnified image of one of his coworkers’ eyeballs against an Eye Pad manual; even a photo is enough to trick him. The contraption that Ginger is strapped into obviously goes to 11. And formidable guards can be knitted into submission. The crown jewel of it all is the return of the formidable Mrs Tweedie. Her entrance takes so long that it prompts her potential business partner to check his watch as she slowly descends a spiral staircase that exists for no reason, but boy is it worth the wait. Tweedie is in full Dr No mode, hair meticulously coiffed and sporting a Nehru collar on her dress. As with Bond adventures, the sticky situations the chickens land in are always tight, but their escape methods tend towards the home-brewed and simple. Of course popcorn is the solution to all of life’s problems! Aardman Studios shows once again that all it takes is a sparkling, winking wit to make for a cracking fun adventure.

Of course, even with fun gags aplenty, grounding the adventure in characters we want to see succeed makes things stronger. Now that Ginger and Rocky have a child, the sense of priorities for Ginger especially shift: where earlier she had been a freedom fighter, now she views herself as a protector, wanting to shield her little girl from the cruelties that she escaped. But that protection comes with a cost, and the extreme measures Ginger decides to take upon learning about the new farm threaten to quash Molly’s own burgeoning sense of individuality and freedom. Molly’s desire for adventure lands the lot of them in trouble, but also prompts Ginger to realize the importance of that drive in her daughter. None of this is new ground in family animated movies, but it’s executed with sincerity and strong performances from Thandiwe Newton, Bella Ramsey, and Zachary Levi (and fun return performances from the lot of the hens) to make it worthwhile.

The opening strains of the Chicken Run main theme prompted such a strong pang of nostalgia in me. Harry Gregson Williams’ score to that earlier film made a strong impression on me growing up, one of the first to really show me the power of good music in movies. This take drops the kazoos which featured throughout the original score in favor of jazzy little zingers that wink at Lalo Schifrin’s Mission: Impossible theme, but it’s just as equally stirring and melodramatic as before.

If you needs must have a butt joke in your movie, make it about a rat getting fisted.

THE RULES

SIP

Someone says 'chicken' or 'freedom'.

Mission: Impossible or James Bond parody sting in the score.

Someone name-drops Sir Eat-A-Lot.

We cut back to the snail trying to escape a dreadful lecture.

BIG DRINK

A truck goes by on the road past the island.

Popcorn is mentioned.

#drinking games #chicken run 2 dawn of the nugget #chicken run #aardman animations #animation #comedy #crime #action #action & adventure #zachary levi #thandiwe newton

[sloshed-cinema]

Mission: Impossible (1996)

Living in a post Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning, Part 1 world, it is absolutely wild how even with a helicopter chase through the Chunnel just how quaint this film is by comparison to where the franchise catapulted itself. Even by several films later Ethan Hunt was climbing the Burj Khalifa or clinging to the side of an airplane to appease Tom Cruise’s ever stronger death wish. To that end, it’s amusing just how far this has diverged in comparison to a fellow franchise that has managed to put out even more films in a relatively shorter period of time, The Fast and the Furious. Both have exploded in terms of budgets and scope of action. They both trot the globe more, exploring exotic locales because it makes for interesting variety. Both feature a growing cast of lovable repertory players and plenty of Ladies Getting It Done. And the stakes of what is at hand should our heroes fail have become nothing short of apocalyptic: IMF must stop a devastating AI in Dead Reckoning, and in X Dom must… well, I don’t really remember, but it’s about family and Jason Momoa being crazy. But while they’ve been on a similar trajectory in terms of scale, Mission: Impossible has elevated itself to the pinnacle of prestige blockbuster territory whereas The Fast and the Furious is pure action schlock. Both franchises serve to fuel the egos of their respective frontmen, showing that they’re the Coolest Dude Ever. But Tom Cruise simply runs circles around Vin Diesel in terms of the overall impact of the film.

Here at the beginning of it all (aside of course from the TV series which inspired it), Brian De Palma takes an elegant approach to his set pieces. Everything for the plan is laid out immaculately in brief beforehand, informing the viewer of the stakes and planting seeds as to what could go wrong. What are the weak points, the things left to chance? While the opening embassy job is fraught with tense beats and allows for perhaps the most graphic moment in the franchise—Jack Harmon’s elevator death is quite shocking—it’s obviously the Langley NOC list heist which is the film’s pièce de résistance. Conducted in more or less perfect silence, each moment layers on a new moment for everything to fail. Will the rat cause Franz to drop Ethan? What about that sweat droplet clinging to Ethan’s glasses? Will the CIA technician overcome his nausea too quickly? Hell, will the technician even look up when Ethan is dangling just feet over his head, or notice him in the reflective surface of the floor? It’s all a house of cards balancing on the edge of a knife, and all the more satisfying to see it pulled off (even if they leave that knife behind). Sure, the final Chunnel chase is pretty cheesy and shows its age. But it lays track for higher highs to come.

THE RULES

SIP

Someone says 'NOC List' or 'operation'.

Cut to surveillance camera.

Tom Cruise starts RUNNING.

Max is name-dropped.

BIG DRINK

Someone pulls off a disguise mask.

We travel to a new location.

#drinking games #mission: impossible #brian de palma #tom cruise #action #action & adventure #crime #thriller #lalo schifrin

[sloshed-cinema]

Goldfinger (1964)

It’s been said before, but bears repeating: Ken Adam knew what the fuck he was doing on the Bond sets. And indeed any other production in which he was involved. While Goldfinger boasts no volcano lair or exotic aquatic abode, it’s perhaps one of the more refined expressions of this era of Bond iconography. Auric Goldfinger, for all of his machinations and economic designs, is something of a proto-Elon Musk in execution. He’s a bit of a blustering, blithering dipshit. He cannot win at golf or cards, but finds ways to cheat using his lackeys. And he’s clearly paid off a bunch of very Joisey American mobsters to get a thing or two done and hasn’t been able to deliver. But he has a sort of malignant narcissism and penchant for gold which make him… wait, does he also anticipate Trump!? Anyway, his rumpus room is a coup de grâce from Adam, preposterously inconvenient in how it moves furniture elements and reveals ridiculously detailed models which are of use exactly once. Just hearing mobsters gripe about how this feels like a merry-go-round is worth the price of admission. Later, Fort Knox is a strange neo-art-deco gold palace, an ornate prison for gold bullion arrayed behind bars. Metal elevators and marble accents define the space, because why not?

THE RULES

SIP

Bond kills someone.

Bond is a pretentious pedant about some random topic.

A car crashes.

We switch to a new geographic location.

BIG DRINK

The main theme music begins to play.

There is a VERY LARGE table in a room.

A new Bond girl is introduced.

#drinking games #goldfinger #james bond #guy hamilton #sean connery #honor blackman #gert fröbe #action #action & adventure #crime

[sloshed-cinema]

The Pope's Exorcist (2023)

Exorcism movies truly are a dime a dozen these days. Utterly lacking in creativity or originality, it's just an endless rehashing of the same beats. A family move into a spooky new place with a hidden past. Invariably they're dealing with recent drama. Someone finds something that invites a demon in, and we're off to the split pea soup factory. But The Pope's Exorcist goes where none would go before. Not content to settle with sickly people sitting in bed and scratches on the walls, it reveals that THE SPANISH INQUISITION WAS STARTED BY A DEMONICALLY POSSESSED MONK AND THERE IS A FUCKING TREASURE MAP SHOWING ALL THE PLACES ON EARTH WHERE FALLEN ANGELS LANDED SO THEY CAN BE HUNTED DOWN LIKE FUCKING POKÉMON AAAAAHHHHHH!!! When it's Vatican-al Treasure, this movie is glorious schlock. Priests discover spooky skepeton caves with iron grilles and iron maidens. Sigils on the wall catch flame when the demon attacks. Apparitions assault our heroes and explode in a torrent of blood when a cross touches them. The demon appears as a false Virgin Mary and is dragged into a pool of laval after being defeated by our priests screaming prayers at it (Spanish is close enough to Latin to work, it would seem). I don't think I've laughed harder or longer in some time than at the final confrontation. Please take the bait laid at the end and make 199 sequels to this.

THE RULES

SIP

Someone says 'Pope' or 'Asmodeus'.

Someone begins to say a prayer.

A bird appears onscreen.

BIG DRINK

Russell Crowe speaks a language that isn't English in a scene.

Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!

#drinking games #the pope's exorcist #julius avery #russell crowe #daniel zovatto #horror #horror & thriller #exorcism movies #gabriele amorth