13 Nights of Hallowe'en 2010: Night #11 Poltergeist II: The Other Side

If you are new to my array of blogs or just have forgotten, my favourite movie of all time, any genre, is the originalPoltergeist. I already told you all about it for last year's Hallowe'en movie. I decided not to repeat myself although there were more than a couple haunting movies previously covered that I could have tackled again. Poltergeist II: The Other Side is a great sequel. It didn't have to be as brilliant, or as beautiful as the original, it just had to keep you involved with the family. It helped immensely that Craig T. Nelson, Jobeth Williams, and of course little Heather O'Rourke returned--and the boy too. With them came Zelda Rubinstein as the absolutely iconic Tangina Barrons. This time the Freelings have moved in with the children's grandmother but the ghosts still want Carol Anne, especially their leader the Reverend Kane played by Julian Beck.

Let's start there, with Julian Beck as Kane. That is one seriously creepy old man. Beck is just absolutely amazing whether it is pretending to be a sweet innocent old codger or the seething, wrathful, fire and brimstone, cult leader unsatisfied even in death to let his followers go. That in itself is also the coolest thing about this movie--the back-story that dovetails so well into the goings on of the previous film. That is likely because Poltergeist II has the same writing team that brought us the original movie: Michael Grais and Mark Victor. Kane has another problem beside Tangina this time out in the form of a Native American shaman played by Will Sampson. Both Sampson and Beck were supposed to have died after working on this movie because of the Poltergeist curse--also Dominique Dunne and Heather O'Rourke--one of the creepiest (false) movie legends.

Mood: inspired.

Music: Halloween by Aqua. MP3s

13 Nights of Hallowe'en 2009: Night #13 Poltergeist

Ah! It's Hallowe'en! How are you my pretties? Ready with your candy and drinks to settle in for our movie of the dark night of nights? Good. Sit back and press play on the number one pick for Hallowe'en and my all time favourite horror movie, Poltergeist. This week I read more than one article talking about people's memories of their early horror movie experiences and the sense of great fear, dread, and trepidation of but immense attraction to particular films and shows. For me Poltergeist stands as one of my experiences like that. The commercials and trailers for Poltergeist were terrifying and I loved every jangly-nerve, heart beating hard moment until I could see the movie. I saw it short weeks after Xtro on that same video disc format. I don't know how many times I watched it that weekend, but it was a lot.

One thing I always say about Poltergeist is that it is the most beautiful horror movie I've seen. Some of the scenes are just as awe inspiring as they are creepy or scary. Beyond the visuals there is also the family component that adds so much to the movie. The horror is so much the better for the contrasting scenes and for the real tension created because we feel for this family. The movie touches on a lot horror staples providing a great smorgasbord of terrors. Then there are the imagined horrors behind the scenes. The Poltergeist trilogy has been considered cursed, what with the deaths of Dominique Dunne (murdered), Julian Beck and Will Sampson (cancer), and finally child star Heather O'Rourke (disease). On the other hand Craig T. Nelson has done more than all right.

Mood: festive.

Music: This Is Halloween by Danny Elfman off of The Nightmare Before Christmas (soundtrack).

Anatomy of a Horror Setting #4-2: Arcanis Visicius Domini

Most of the questions, suggestions, and considerations that were a part of devising the setting for a modern magical horror still apply in the horror fantasy setting. The fantasy setting conventions and norms provide extra help as well as disadvantages to crafting the horror of the setting. Even some magic that was discounted is back on the proverbial table. The disconnect that the fantasy genre has with the modern, rational world immediately opens up avenues of horror that would be unwieldy or impractical in the modern magical horror setting. That disconnect also negates the impact of breaking the rational, which is often a major factor in supernatural horrors. In its place is the horror of the inevitable, the persistent threat looming overhead, lurking in every corner.

Magic of any great power or import should be kept out of the hands of the protagonists. This can be achieved by the requirements of magic or by maintaining strict moral lines. Material components and magical knowledge availability is limited not only by the environment but also by the greed for power of the magical caste, the wizards. Magic is nothing more than power in the setting and power is always jealously guarded. Corrupting power and the mad grab for it will direct much of the morality of the spell casters or the magic most commonly used. Beyond that magic can divided into direct black and white moral lines because the fantasy setting is more accepting of such mythos rules. Black magic will have evil requirements as well as evil results.

At the level of specifics fireballs and lightning bolts called down from the sky are fair horror fantasy game. Curses and geasa of terrifying kinds and results can be wonderful plot underliners giving the story a real mythological feel. Geasa is the plural of geas--a kind of magical obligation or prohibition like a taboo. In some cases the person is incapable of breaking the geas because they’re magically compelled. In other cases there are dire consequences to breaking the geas. As a facet of the setting curse bringing and geas infliction lead to other considerations and implications from the level of daily life all the way up to politics. The ever-popular zombie has its fantasy counterpart but requires a different touch. A matter of scale comes into play for this and other magic.

Music: Killed by Love by Alice Cooper and Welcome to the Machine by Motley Crue.

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Anatomy of a Horror Setting #2-20: The Final Conjurations

Let’s continue with our specific spells of horror. The first comes from a self-proclaimed Demon Lord of Pestilence. The spell was always unleashed upon one victim who was initially unaware of the dark magic worked upon them. A lone nomad with no home or tribe was the first victim. The nomad travelled far and wide. All that came in contact with the nomad would fall to the pestilence laid upon him by the spell. Three days after contact, with no warning signs, the disease would strike. It was a deadly wasting. The virulent contagion spread via contact as well as contaminating the water. Animals were not immune to it either. Wherever the nomad went, even taking to a life of hermitage, he killed off all the local game, forcing him to move on and spread it even further.

Spells to raise the dead as a zombie are easy to find. A nasty twist already lighted upon is to tie someone’s consciousness to his or her corpse. A searcher of ancient lore can find something more sinister in dusty forgotten tomes with pages that barely resist crumbling. There is a spell said to come from Mictlantecutli himself. The last to use the spell was a Death cultist. The victim was a traitor to the cult. The traitor was fed to a starving jaguar. The spell brought the traitor to the brink of death and then the traitor was healed within an instant, and given a short reprieve before he began to be eaten again, without the presence of the jaguar. The spell causes its victim’s murder to repeat over and over again in every excruciating detail for seven days and nights.

Blood feuds are as old as people. There is a spell that tries to bring them to an end. This spell curses anyone who kills or murders. The spell attracts non-corporeal entities to the murderer. The entities appear as the slain and are visible only to their killer. Much like a poltergeists these entities throw things, break things, violently--but not deadly--assault the killer, assault those who associate with the murderer, and create a terrible noise and ruckus. The entities cannot affect the physical world constantly and often have to build up to a good tantrum. The true power of this spell is that going forward the killer’s descendents who kill anyone accidentally, on purpose, or even in self-defence will suffer the wrath of a new entity as well as all of his or ancestor’s spectres.

Mood: exhausted.
Music: Day Job by Gin Blossoms and Department Of Youth by Alice Cooper.

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Anatomy of a Horror Setting #2-19: Spelling Horror

Let’s talk about some actual spells now. Rather than retread the usual ones how about something a little more original? First up, what villain hasn’t wanted to flay someone alive? It needs to be little more interesting though. Some ancient, angry, master of the arcane decided that it would be better instead to have a spell that caused his enemy’s skin to pull away from their muscles and stretch but not to tear open anywhere. The result was beyond painful and continuous. It led to a long agonising death due to internal bleeding. It had two added benefits dealing with the increased fear it caused. No ordinary man could achieve such a bizarre thing; it had to be the work of dark magic. It also looked really terrible, especially as the space between skin and flesh filled with blood.

Curses are popular. There’s endless itching, having no reflection, and permanent bad luck. A vengeful Mayombe (evil voodoo priest) decided to make an enemy’s life an actual living nightmare. He set upon this man a powerful curse to make him forever see everything as if it were dead and rotting. This extended to the man’s senses of touch, smell, and taste. Things that don’t exist capered and leered threateningly from nowhere and circled around in the man’s peripheral vision. Voices whispered constantly, saying terrible things and inviting the man to do terrible acts. The last bit was the worst. It constantly ate at the edges of the man’s sanity and tried to drive him to visit evil upon others. It caused the man great guilt long before he gave in to the voices.

Here is a twist on an old stand by. There is a powerful spell used to turn people into slavering, violent, monsters. However, a great and powerful being from another realm of existence, who was capable of great guile and viciousness, had a better idea. This nameless being came up with an alternative. It cast the spell upon some random man, who upon touching his beloved wife changed her. That night the man was awakened to see his wife change into a monster and run off into the night. He went after her, but the local villagers caught her slaughtering the neighbours. The husband found his wife just as the villagers moved to destroy the monster. The man had to chose to die with his beloved or to fight his friends and neighbours, even as true to the spell’s form she attacked them.

Mood: excitable.
Music: Losfer Words (Big 'Orra) by Iron Maiden and Silver Wings by Bruce Dickinson.

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Anatomy of a Horror Setting #2-10: Who Do? You Do.

Any discussion of magic in a horror setting must eventually set upon the one kind of magic that is intrinsically horrific. This particular type of magic isn’t its own school, but more of a subset. It is a small discipline within the framework of invocation magic. This kind of magic is commonly known as Voodoo, which shouldn’t be confused with the religion commonly known as Santeria or other real voodoo beliefs in the real world. Horror voodoo works within a few different veins. Four examples include spirit mounting, curses, voodoo dolls, and zombies. With the exception of spirit mounting voodoo is particularly physical component oriented as far as the casting of spells go. Parts of it also slip into the school of necromancy and others the realm of psychic ability

Spirit mounting is essentially a person allows a spirit to possess them. The spirits range from the possessive’s ancestors, to their gods. This is not very horror oriented, due to the willingness of the possessed, and the goodness of the spirits that are called. Spirit mounting is in line with the Mediumship psychic ability. Alternatively it may be linked to necromancy when they are human spirits. Curses can similarly be more akin to psychic-styled attacks depending on the focus. Symptoms of a plague or disease based curse may be psychosomatic, as can curses of bad luck. They can also be frighteningly real and defy logic and modern medicine. A psychological curse may be beaten by force of will, magic cannot. You don’t need to believe in magic/the supernatural, it believes in you.

Voodoo dolls, referred to as poppets rather than puppets, are common to magic in horror. They require bits and pieces of the person to be affected to be a part of the doll or otherwise attached to it somehow. They were a part of some mystical traditions prior to the creation of voodoo--some tribal, others European. A voodoo doll is always a focus upon which spells are cast, even if such further rituals besides its creation only require concentration and puncturing of the doll with sharp objects or burning it with hot irons. Then there are the zombies of voodoo, which generally are not actually walking corpses, but instead, people held in a state between life and death. Or they may just be the living dominated by magic. Voodoo zombies are always created with the use of mystical powders.

Mood: exhausted.
Music: Wake The Dead by Alice Cooper and Twist My Sister by Murderdolls.

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