Our Lady of Perpetual Hell

…of my actual mood.

I think it’s true that Jaws couldn’t be made as effectively today as it was back in ’75. The “weaknesses” of Spielberg’s mechanical shark are what helped ratchet up the tension in the viewer. The shark wasn’t flexible, it ran on a trailer, it had little articulation aside from the mouth—all of which meant its appearances in the film had be used sparingly, judiciously. So, instead of being all in your face like it would be if it were one of today’s CGI-laden movies, the shark’s appearances were mostly rare and fleeting and, ultimately, scarier for all that. I just re-watched Jaws (for the umpteenth time in my life) last week and marveled at how well the film still works on me. Favourite fright: the high-angle over-the-shoulder shot of Sheriff Brody chumming off the back of the Orca when the shark’s open maw suddenly rises up out of the water a few feet away and there is a quick cut to a low-angle reverse shot as Brody snaps to his feet and backs into the cabin, where he warns Quint in a low, uneasy voice, “You’re gonna need a bigger boat.” You know the scene. It scared you too. I know it did.

There is a documentary about Jaws that I am dying to see. It’s called The Shark Is Still Working and it has been in the can but looking for a distributor for the past couple of years. Latest news is that it’s been submitted to both Slamdance and Sundance. Narrated by the late Roy Scheider and clocking in at feature length and featuring interviews with all the principals as well as locals and technicians and all manner of folk who worked on the film, it sounds like something that would be a fabulous addition to a re-release of the Jaws dvd—much like Dangerous Days, which was included in the most recent (re-)(re-)(re-)(etc.)release of Blade Runner (”The Final Cut”)(sic). I’ve always been interested in the making of this film: I can remember reading and re-reading co-screenwriter Carl Gottlieb’s fascinating behind-the-scenes account of the Jaws shoot, The Jaws Log, when I was a kid. I wish I still had it, actually (I see it’s been reissued).

Jaws is a film that kept me out of the deep end of my parents’ pool throughout the summer of ’75… I would try to dive in far enough to clear the deep end and then make a beeline for the ladder in the shallow end to scramble up and out—convinced that some kind of monstrous landshark would burrow up from the bowels of the earth, rip through the pool liner and tear me apart. And, no, I’m not kidding. The sensation of being in water over my head still makes me feel uncomfortable—even in fresh water lakes where I am damned certain there are no rogue sharks patrolling the beaches, looking for lunch. When I moved to my new house near the beach this summer, I quit the YMCA and started to do my distance swimming in the lake on those days when I wasn’t running. Because the Grove beaches are popular not just for swimmers but for boaters, I got disposable contacts so that I could wear my swim goggles to see well enough that I wouldn’t be taken by surprise by a seadoo bearing down on me. But, y’know, I don’t really like to be able to see very far underwater… It gives me a serious case of the creeps. I mean, what if I saw something swim towards me out of the distant murk? And I hate having to swim over rocks… Whenever I’d cast my glance down to the bottom and noticed that I wasn’t swimming over sand anymore—I was swimming over rocks—I’d jump out of my skin and beat it back closer to shore where the sandy bottom was. There may or may not have been some underwater yelping involved. I don’t wanna say. And the bigger the rocks down there, the more panicky I feel—I don’t wanna see anything large underwater! I don’t think I’ve been in ocean water deeper than my knees since ’75. In theory, I would love to try scuba diving but, in reality, I think I’d drown in adrenaline—I’d suck those tanks dry in panic, lickety-split. Thank you, Mr. Spielberg. Thank you, Mr. Zanuck. Thank you, Bruce.

All that being said, I love to swim at the beach. Go figger. I know there are no sharks in the water in Lake Huron, but I keep an eye out for them just the same. It’s kinda like what Stephen King said in the forward of his short story collection, Night Shift: ‘The thing under my bed waiting to grab my ankle isn’t real. I know that, and I also know that if I’m careful to keep my foot under the covers, it will never be able to grab my ankle.’

My mom told me that Psycho had a similar effect on her: she took baths instead of showers for years after having seen it.

Are there any films that have had this kind of visceral effect on you?

While I work on something else, here. Lissen to this.

I got the tipoff on “The Fear” from John Sakamoto’s Anti-Hit List on Saturday and it immediately went to the top of my playlist. Lily Allen’s new album is called It’s Not Me, It’s You. As you can see, a few songs have been leaked to the web but the whole album will be out in February. Can’t wait to hear the rest of the tracks on it!

I think the tone of voice that Steven Harper used last night was one he uses when he addresses his fuzzy wittle kitty cats and, umm, we tadded ppl.

Hey, I just read over at PopCandy that The Criterion Collection has redesigned its website into what it calls an online cinematheque so that it can now offer streaming rentals for movie lovers in North America. For me, this will serve as a welcome addition to Zip when it comes to watching films that aren’t to be found on the shelves of the local Blockbuster. (You folks in Tronna have Suspect and Bay Street Video and such, while the SLC’ers have Tower Theater Video, but there is nothing like those non-mainstream video rental stores hereabouts.)

It costs nothing to create an account and then just $5 to rent the ability to stream a Criterion-released film for a week. Watch it online as many times as you want over that period. The online selection is extremely limited at the moment, but it will be gradually expanded. I would like to see them add the various “extras” that you’d get on the disks themselves, but there may be copyright issues with that as it is not mentioned in the orientation video as a planned enhancement.

Amazing to realize how technology has changed things since I was a film student… I can remember going over to the film reference library, booking a little screening room, and watching stuff on 16mm. (Whereas I used to be able to thread a projector with my eyes closed, faced with the prospect of doing that nowadays –even with my eyes open!–I’m sure I’d stand, flummoxed, before the projector, with a reel in one hand and the other hand scratching my head in befuddlement.) Nowadays, film students have such easy access to a vast library of film history! And all they have to do is pop the disk into their laptop or, now, go to the Criterion site and stream the films they are studying.

For me, this will be perfect on those snowy winter evenings when I don’t have anything out from Zip and my satellite reception is down (or my satellite reception is fine but there isn’t anything I wanna watch on those gajillion channels).