David Moody's Blog, page 57

The Understated Subtlety of Mad Max: Fury Road

Absolutely no irony whatsoever is intended in the title of this post.

MAD MAX and I go a long way back. My interest was piqued when the first film came out in the late 1970s. The UK was a dull and repressed place in many ways back then and, as a nine year old, I remember hearing a respected film critic (Leslie Halliwell, I think) say that Mad Max was so violent it would never be shown on TV, and that, of course, just made me even more desperate to watch it. How times have changed. What would Mr Halliwell think had he still been alive today to see the newest Mad Max movie becoming such an incredible, and largely unexpected, cultural goliath?

Mad Max was a great movie. MAD MAX 2 – THE ROAD WARRIOR – was something else entirely. As a Cold War Kid, I think it had a lot to do with the apocalyptic setting of the second film, and the fact we were watching a character we’d grown to know in the ‘normal’ world, having to deal with the nightmare of a post World War III (we presumed) existence. That’s something that’s always appealed to me. It’s one of the reasons THREADS remains so chilling today – we grow attached to characters in the relative normality of their day-to-day existence, then follow the hell they endure when their lives are, quite literally, blown apart. Road Warrior set new standards and paved the way for a thousand pale imitations.

I even enjoyed MAD MAX: BEYOND THUNDERDOME, though the years have been less kind to the audience-friendly third movie in the series and unlike the timelessness of the other films, it feels rooted in the 1980s (thanks in no small part to Tina Turner and her ubiquitous title song).

Back to the point of today’s post: MAD MAX: FURY ROAD. Sure it’s an incredible spectacle: a non-stop, adrenalin-fuelled, action rush of movie. But it’s also so, so much more than that.

You’ll no doubt have seen the many euphoric reviews the new movie has received. It’s currently standing at an incredible 98% on Rotten Tomatoes. There’s no denying it’s a heck of a spectacle which is worthy of all the hyperbole. It looks beautiful and moves at a breathless pace. Performances across the board are strong, particularly and . I’ll be completely honest – I’m less enamoured with Tom Hardy’s performance as Max, but in the context of this film, that’s not hugely important.

The film might bear his name, but this story isn’t about Max. In this instalment more than any other, he feels to me like a conduit, a means by which we’re able to observe. He’s by no means a bystander, but Max is dragged into events unintentionally and whilst he makes some key decisions and takes some crucial actions, it’s not all about him.

Max isn’t a typical hero. Despite having all the trappings of a blockbuster lead, he doesn’t behave as you’d expect. In this world, life’s about surviving, not living. He does what he has to do, when he has to do it, and you get the very definite impression that this is how he gets through every day. Out in the post-apocalyptic desert, this is what it means to stay alive. There’s a level of desperation to Max’s actions, a feeling of choices having to be made… Max rarely plots or plans, he just reacts.

Much has been made of the fact George Miller didn’t so much as write a script for FURY ROAD, instead he drew it. The action was storyboarded in advance, with almost 500 hours of raw footage eventually being captured out in the Namibian wilds. Again, this speaks volumes about the subtlety of this film. It feels organic. It feels natural. Nothing is crowbarred into place. I mentioned the pace earlier. This movie doesn’t follow the usual action film formula. This movie feels like a chase – run, catch your breath, run, catch your breath, run… and so on. Boiled down, the plot is beautifully simple (mild spoiler ahead) – escape (and fight), run (still fighting), reassess, run (and fight) back. We don’t get bogged down with unnecessary exposition and subplots. There are incredible action pieces and explosions because, at those points, there needs to be incredible set pieces and explosions, not just because they’d look cool on posters/ in the trailer/ in toy shops.

But, for me, the biggest achievement in this movie is the world. It feels so real. It’s a million miles removed from the setting of the first film, and yet there’s no question we’re dealing with the same kind of people in the same kind of place. It’s all so damn plausible. The character’s names (as always with Max movies) make no sense but they just sound right: Immortan Joe, Imperator Furiosa, Rictus Erectus… we don’t know what they mean, but we know they mean something. Soldiers are War Boys. The neighbouring outposts are Gas Town and The Bullet Farm (which, no surprise, produce gasoline – guzzoline – and ammo respectively). And there are numerous nods to the previous films too: the musical box, the War Boys’ black and white appearance…

I guess this is the real point of this post. I enjoyed every second of MAD MAX: FURY ROAD and I recommend it wholeheartedly to everyone, but please, when you watch it, don’t just go for the car chases and big bangs. I’d urge you to look beyond that and enjoy spending a couple of hours in a nightmarish future. More than with any other recent film I can remember, I emerged from the cinema feeling like I’d just spent two hours elsewhere, not just two hours staring at a screen. I genuinely felt like I’d been stuck in the post-apocalyptic Australian outback. FURY ROAD doesn’t pander to any of today’s conventions, filmic or otherwise. We’re not offered endless explanations and expositions, we just have to work things out for ourselves. Max eats a two-headed lizard alive because he needs to eat, not because it looks cool. The War Boys spray paint their teeth because they believe they’re riding into their chrome Valhalla for Immortan Joe. Joe has a onsie-wearing blind guitar/ flame-thrower wielding warrior called Doof because it inspires his troops as they march into battle… I could go on. The detail on show here is incredible. It makes FURY ROAD an immersive experience, and this level of depth in a movie is a rare and beautiful thing which should be celebrated. It’s story-telling at its most basic and most effective.

FURY ROAD is a remarkable film. George Miller, I worship at your feet.

The Understated Subtlety of Mad Max: Fury Road is a post from: David Moody - author of AUTUMN and HATER

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Next Event – Cardiff Independent Comic Expo 27 June 2015

It’s great to be able to confirm that Wayne Simmons and I will be flying the Infected Books flag at the Cardiff Independent Comic Expo next month. Kicking off at 10:00am at the Cardiff Masonic Hall, Guildford Street, the event is designed to showcase the very best in indie comics from South Wales and beyond (with a couple of dodgy-looking horror authors thrown into the mix). Guests include: Jasper Bark, Jason Cardy, Mike Collins, Ian Edginton, Patrick Goddard, Paul Grist, Anthony D Lee, Dylan Teague, Rob Williams, Simon Williams and many, many more. Tickets cost just £5 and are available from the Expo’s website. More information about the event is available on Facebook, and follow the team on Twitter to keep up to date with the latest updates. Hope to see you there!

Next Event – Cardiff Independent Comic Expo 27 June 2015 is a post from: David Moody - author of AUTUMN and HATER

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Did you get to meet the STRANGERS?

My most recent novel, STRANGERS, came out at the end of 2014, and with everything that’s been going on since then, I’ve been guilty of not shouting about it enough. The book got some great press and I’m very proud of it. This is Horror were kind enough to say “Strangers is easily Moody’s best work to date, a dark, disturbing and visceral book that gives him a legitimate claim to the title of Britain’s Best Living Horror Author that was left vacant by James Herbert’s untimely death.” DLS reviews said “I can’t stress enough how utterly captivating Strangers is. It’s addictive reading from start to finish. And it proves once and for all that there’s a hell of a lot more to Moody than the end of the world. 10/10.”

Can I tempt you if you haven’t yet read the book? Do you need more convincing? If so, check out the widget below. A large chunk of the novel has been added to WATTPAD, along with a number of other bits and bobs, including the whole of TRUST available for free.

Did you get to meet the STRANGERS? is a post from: David Moody - author of AUTUMN and HATER

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Invasion of the Body Snatchers

Regular readers will know that I’m usually one of the first to moan about the film industry’s habit of remaking old movies. I stand by most of my previous comments, in that remakes are often a lame excuse to capitalise on the goodwill an older version of a movie has garnered (case in point, pretty much every remake of 1970’s and 1980’s horror – Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th, The Hills Have Eyes, Texas Chainsaw, and so on). Occasionally the original film-makers will be involved, and a remake will make sense (such as the 2013 Evil Dead… you could also argue that Evil Dead II was a remake of sorts of the 1981 original). There remains another category of remakes, and it just so happens that three of these updated versions of classic films rank in my top ten horror movies of all time. This is where new film-makers put a present day spin on horror tales which, quite often, were well made but were limited in some way – perhaps by the technology of the day, or maybe the social landscape has changed to give a story increased relevance. Two of three films I’m referring to here are , and John Carpenter’s ground-breaking The Thing.

Today’s movie recommendation, however, is a 1979 remake of a 1956 original which, although perhaps not quite scaling the heights of the Cronenberg and Carpenter movies I’ve just mentioned, is still an excellent example of a remake done right. I’m talking about Philip Kaufman’s 1978 INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS.

Despite the schlocky B-movie title, IotBS is an intelligent and chilling remake of an equally chilling and intelligent original. Based on Jack Finney’s 1955 novel, The Body Snatchers, this is a bleak and atmospheric film which, although dated in some respects, still retains the ability to unnerve.

The premise is simple: in an otherwise ordinary city, people start to suspect that their friends, family and others are being replaced with emotionless clones. The Body Snatchers has actually been adapted for film four times (in 1956 and 1978, then as Body Snatchers in 1993 and the less well-received The Invasion in 2007). In this version we’re left in no doubt as to the origin of the phenomenon, as spores drift to Earth from outer space before settling and blossoming as unusual flowers which then become pods from which the clones are born. It sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? Thing is, it works, and it works really well. Because although we’re watching an invasion of alien plants, we’re witnessing it from the perspective of a group of well drawn, very well acted, completely paranoid and terrified characters. Donald Sutherland is health inspector Matthew Bennell, Brooke Adams his colleague Elizabeth Driscoll. Leonard Nimoy appears as Bennell’s superstar psychologist friend Dr Kibner, and genre favourites and Veronica Cartwright round out the central cast. Aside from the occasional clunky portion of dialogue (‘We come from space, we come from a dying planet… etc. etc.), the movie is played straight and in a non-sensationalist way which adds to the genuine unease.

I’ve tried to think about why IotBS in its various incarnations has such an appeal. For me, certainly, it’s because the central conceit is similar to the kind of post-apocalyptic tale I love so much. It’s a story about ‘normal’ people forced to fight for their survival against ‘the other’, and in that respect it’s not too far removed from a zombie story. Or from Planet of the Apes. Or from HATER…

Enough rambling. If you’ve not seen IotBS before, please do check it out. I need to revisit the other versions, but to my mind this is the strongest of the four. Certainly it seems to complement the original, not least because the star of the first version, , briefly reprises his role in this one. So that means this remake isn’t a remake after all, it’s a quasi-sequel… I like the ambiguity. In any event, there’s plenty in this film to enjoy… from the gruesome birth of the clones from their pods, to the busker and his dog (if you’ve seen it you’ll know what I’m talking about), to the chase at the docks to the haunting strains of Amazing Grace… this is a horror classic which is highly recommended.

And then there’s that final scene…

Brilliant stuff. INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS (1978) is available on DVD and Blu-ray.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers is a post from: David Moody - author of AUTUMN and HATER

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Up to my neck in Hate

Just checking in with a quick follow up to my recent update post and to explain the ongoing radio silence here right now. I’ve found myself buried neck deep in the HATER world once again, and man, I’m enjoying it. HATER was only ever Danny McCoyne’s story for me, but the more I’ve started to poke around that dark, brutal and relentlessly violent world again, the more the creative juices have started to flow. As soon as I can tell you what I’m dying to tell you, I will. Until then, here’s another piece of stunning artwork which Tomislav Tikulin produced to promote the release of the original novels. This one is a scene from the climax of DOG BLOOD which, incredibly, is five years old next month. Time flies. If you’re new to HATER, visit www.thehatertrilogy.com to find out more.

Up to my neck in Hate is a post from: David Moody - author of AUTUMN and HATER

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Guest blog – GAY, NAZI, CROSS DRESSING ZOMBIES! (or HOW TO SUBVERT THE GENRE AND GET AWAY WITH IT) by Jasper Bark

Jasper Bark once ate my brains (don’t believe me? Here’s irrefutable proof). So it’s with pleasure, and not a little apprehension, that I welcome him to this site with a guest post. Take it away, Jasper…

Over a decade ago, while I was a film journalist, I got to interview producer as part of the the press junket for Shrek 2. At one point I asked him if he thought the Shrek franchise was subverting the fairytale/family entertainment genre, so beloved of Disney? Katzenberg rolled his eyes and shook his head at my question.

“Y’know,” he said. “I get about ten young writers coming into my office every week telling me they’ve got a script that reinvents some genre or other. But you know what – I wish they’d just learn to write the freaking genre, before trying to remake it!” I remember being a bit abashed at the time, not just because he’d brushed off my question, but I probably had some work tucked away in a drawer that aspired to reinvent a genre or two. With hindsight however, I can’t help thinking how spot on his comment was.

Every genre has to reinvent itself over time if it’s to remain relevant and fresh to successive generations. However, so many attempts end up falling flat, or missing the mark. So, what I’d like to look at in this guest post, is the ways in which writers, directors and other genre practitioners have successfully subverted the horror genre throughout its long history, to get an idea of what really works.

One of the most important reinventions came with introduction of psychological horror in the mid 50s. Up until that point the major staples of horror had come from the works of gothic writers like Mary Shelley and Bram Stoker. Genre is often defined by its repeated tropes, and the tropes that were most prominent in pulp magazines like Weird Tales, and the Universal films of the 30s and 40s, were dark looming castles, murderous monsters and the dangers of arcane knowledge, either scientific or occult.

The writer most responsible for this reinvention was Robert Bloch, who was no stranger to the tropes mentioned above, having been a stalwart of Weird Tales and a member of HP Lovecraft’s inner circle. Bloch stated in an interview, published in Douglas E. Winter’s ‘Faces of Fear’, that: “I had pretty well mined the vein of ordinary supernatural themes until it had become varicose. I realized, as a result of what went on during World War Two, and of reading the more widely disseminated work in psychology, that the real horror is not in the shadows, but in that twisted little world inside our own skulls.”

Bloch understood that one of the driving forces behind horror was a fear of dark knowledge, and the threat of death at the hands of the monsters this knowledge unleashes. He subverted the genre by replacing these old tropes with new one to achieve the same effect. So gothic monsters are replaced by dangerous psychopaths and arcane knowledge is replaced by aberrant psychology. This reached its apotheosis in his most famous work ‘Psycho’ and its influence is felt in every slasher movie made right up to the present day.

Psycho also had an impact because it took place in a modern setting, rather than an 18th century castle somewhere in eastern Europe. Bloch owes a debt of gratitude to writers and for this use of setting. Building on the work of Lovecraft, who also used modern settings for his work, Leiber and Matheson were among the first writers to relocate the standard threats of horror to a modern urban setting. In doing so they were hugely influential on a whole host of horror creators from the writers and artists of EC Horror comics through to Stephen King and the horror revival of the 70s and 80s. Setting is an important part of redefining a genre, by taking a well worn icon of horror and placing it in an entirely new environment, you can breath new life into an old idea.

Matheson is also responsible to a great degree, for the invention of a sub-genre. His novel ‘I am Legend’, has not only been filmed countless times in official adaptations, it was also the inspiration for George Romero’s unofficial adaptation ‘Night of the Living Dead’. As Romero didn’t have the actual rights to the novel he turned the vampires into ‘flesh eating ghouls’ who eventually became zombies. This launched the whole canon of zombie apocalypse tales which, in effect, subverted the genre by turning the setting into a trope itself.

While we’re on the subject of the zombie apocalypse it’s worth mentioning that the current popularity of this sub genre is down to its reinvention in the early 00s by Brian Keene, Robert Kirkman and my host on this blog David Moody. These writers didn’t accomplish this reinvention by introducing new tropes, or changing the setting. Their major innovation was focusing the stories on the central characters, placing ordinary people in an extraordinary situation and documenting their desperate fight for survival. So it would seem that the use of character is as important a factor in re-imagining genre as the setting or the tropes.

Mash ups have become very popular of late and this has led to a lot of interesting attempts to breathe new life into more than one genre by marrying them together. One of the ways this works is by cross pollinating tropes, that is, taking a time worn trope from one genre, transplanting it into another and having it operate according to the rules of the new genre. I must confess that’s what I did with the graphic novel ‘Bloodfellas’ drawn by Mick Trimble. ‘Bloodfellas’ is a horror/crime mash up featuring zombie gangsters and set in the prohibition era. For this story, we went right back to the old school voodoo take on zombies and we took the standard tropes of gangster and crime fiction, such as the corrupt land deals that drive the movie ‘Chinatown’ or the unwilling son taking over the family empire as in ‘The Godfather’, and we put a dark supernatural spin on them, hopefully creating something new. We were also able to use authentic voodoo lore to justify having sentient zombies who speak, a metaphor for the dehumanizing nature of the violence integral to a life in organized crime.

I can’t say whether our attempt to subvert the zombie genre was anywhere near as successful as the works of the other writers I’ve mentioned above, but I hope I’ve shown that we’re operating in a time honoured genre tradition. Horror is an amazingly permeable genre because it’s based on the things that scare us and these change over time. Old terrors sometimes need a modern makeover and sometimes they need to be taken back to their roots to remind us why they were so powerful in the first place. Attempts to reinvent or subvert the horror genre can only work if those involved have a good working knowledge, and a healthy respect for everything that has gone before.

There’s nothing wrong with producing work that celebrates the genre as it currently stands, but maybe you’ve got a clear idea of where horror is bound in the future, or a novel, tucked away in a drawer, that’s going to change everything. If so I’d like to hear about it.

To learn more about ‘Bloodfellas’ please check out our Facebook page or look us up on Amazon.

Guest blog – GAY, NAZI, CROSS DRESSING ZOMBIES! (or HOW TO SUBVERT THE GENRE AND GET AWAY WITH IT) by Jasper Bark is a post from: David Moody - author of AUTUMN and HATER

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1984

A week or so ago I attended a school production of 1984. With a small cast, limited props and basic lighting and sound, they did an excellent job of bringing George Orwell’s classic novel to life. As I was watching, it struck me how relevant and frightening the story remains today (in fact, just about the only thing that’s dated about it is the title) and I immediately dug out and re-watched the most recent film version starring and the late Richard Burton. This bleak and powerful film is my movie recommendation for this week.

1984 is a remarkable novel which has, of course, had an enormous cultural impact since its publication in 1949. I could write reams about the continued (increasing?) relevance of Orwell’s nightmare vision, but this is neither the place nor the time. Instead, the purpose of this post is simply to draw your attention to a beautifully made adaptation of an extraordinarily important book. Here’s a trailer. Click the link below for my thoughts.

Mention 1984 to pretty much anyone, and they’ll no doubt start talking about Big Brother, the face of the all-controlling Party which rules its citizens with uncompromising brutality. The totality of that control is truly frightening: even personal thoughts are restricted, with thought crimes punishable by torture and correction or death. But as Orwell’s Big Brother is a visual, almost superficial representation of the Party’s far-reaching powers, so our cultural assimilation of the phrase has somewhat masked the true depth and accuracy of Orwell’s prophetic vision. Look beyond BB’s perennially staring face and oft-recited catchphrases (Big Brother is watching you…) and you’ll find a whole raft of other similarities.

Here’s an example: early on in the book, prior to a controlled outpouring of pro-Party emotion known as the two minute hate, Party members are told that because of the actions of the enemy (with whom Oceania is perennially at war), weekly chocolate rations are being reduced from 30g to 20g per person. Fast forward several days, and it’s announced that there’s great news! Thanks to BB’s leadership and the efforts of the Party and their armed forces, chocolate rations are being increased from 20g to 25g per week! Cue much misguided celebration. From the outside looking in, it’s easy to see the deception. When you’re at the mercy of the authorities, though, its not so clear-cut. I did say I wasn’t going to get political here, but there’s an uncomfortable parallel with what’s happened to petrol prices here in the UK over the last few months. A well-publicised drop due to the price of oil, followed by a less talked about gradual increase in fuel prices again… the cuts are proudly trumpeted, the stealthy increases hidden away.

“Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past.”

Winston Smith (John Hurt) works in the Ministry of Truth. His job is to ‘correct’ the past, dialling up old editions of The Times and amending them so that history is correctly aligned with the current party line. People are made to disappear when they fall out of favour, their achievements and actions simply assigned to someone else. And if that seems a little extreme, think again. You’ve only to look at high-profile UK-perverts like Jimmy Saville to see how people (completely rightly in Saville’s case) can be removed from the public conscience. A retrospective of 1970’s Saturday night TV would inevitably have mentioned Jim’ll Fix It, but since Saville’s appalling habits and behaviours were exposed, clips of his shows have become taboo.

An important point to make before anyone starts shouting: I’m not trying to compare the UK media’s self-censorship of nefarious ex-celebrities with the soul-crushing state control of 1984, I’m just trying to illustrate how plausible and prophetic Orwell’s dystopian vision actually was. In my humble opinion, sick fuckers like Jimmy Saville and Rolf Harris can rot in hell. Bastards.

Back to the point… if you haven’t seen it already, you really should find time to watch ’s superb adaptation of 1984. Filmed during the actual time the novel was set, and in the locations Orwell used, it’s a surprisingly timeless movie. Oceania is portrayed as a crumbling, decrepit place with appalling levels of poverty for all of those who do not achieve the ranks of the Inner Party. Citizens are exposed to continual surveillance and are constantly bombarded with propaganda. Outwardly, Winston Smith acts exactly as he should, but inwardly he’s conflicted. He has doubts… questions… and when he begins an illegal relationship with a woman named Julia, his miserably obedient world is turned upside down.

The film looks gorgeous (as gorgeous as grimy urban decay can be), and the cast are uniformly excellent. Richard Burton – who was in constant pain during filming and who died shortly after finishing the film – gives an uncharacteristically understated performance which ranks as one of his best. But 1984 belongs to John Hurt. It’s a testament to the strength of his portrayal of Winston that he can appear so resigned and beaten in the opening scenes, yet can plunge deeper depths still as his character is caught and tortured by the Thought Police.

As I’ve already said, the extent to which 1984 has invaded the public psyche over the sixty-five years since its original release has reduced some of its most well known aspects to cliché (ask any UK teenager what Room 101 is and they’ll tell you it’s a BBC comedy panel show hosted by Frank Skinner, not the most feared interrogation room in the Ministry of Love), but there’s no undervaluing the importance of Orwell’s book. Michael Radford’s movie (which is available on DVD and VOD) is an accessible and accurate retelling of Winston Smith’s chilling story.

1984 is a post from: David Moody - author of AUTUMN and HATER

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Voodoo Child

Coming later this year from Infected Books, VOODOO CHILD by Wayne Simmons and Andre Duza. Get the scoop here. That retro-VHS cover design is a thing of beauty, don’t you think?

Voodoo Child is a post from: David Moody - author of AUTUMN and HATER

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Time for an update

Hello. I hate not posting here regularly, but there are times when it’s unavoidable. Now is most definitely one of those times. I’ve truly never been busier, though you’d be hard pushed to know given the gap between posts on this site. That’s not likely to change in the next few months, but I think some kind of update is long overdue.

Last weekend I finished writing KAI, a middle-grade novel. I say finished… what I mean by that is I got the book into good enough shape to be able to fire it over to my agent for his feedback, and I’m now waiting nervously for him to get back to me. I’m keeping the story close to my chest. For now I’ll describe it as a weird hybrid of ET and Godzilla, and I’ll leave it at that.

Next week I start a new novel – the first book in the SPACES BETWEEN series (at long last). It was called TOMMY, but it’s now been re-named ELYSIAN FIELDS. I’m in the habit of teasing future projects by referring to their influences, so how does Blade Runner by way of Breaking Bad by way of Nordic Noir with more than a touch of Quatermass sound?

I’ve managed to catch up with Wayne Simmons a couple of times recently, and we’ve been busily plotting and planning the future of Infected Books. We have a few IB releases scheduled between now and the end of this year, but much of our time has been spent working on something massive for 2016. That’s the whole of 2016.

It’s funny – there are some books which never seem to want to go away. That’s a good thing, I think. One of those books is HATER, and it’s been occupying a lot of my time again recently. I have a meeting scheduled for later this week. I can’t say too much just yet, but for those of you who’ve given up hope of ever seeing HATER on the big screen, don’t. More news as and when I’m allowed to share.

And a quick question to whet your appetites/ test the water… going back to HATER again has given me the spark of an idea for a (non-Danny McCoyne) standalone HATER novel. It’s almost four years since THEM OR US hit the shelves, so is that something you’d still be interested in reading?

Original HATER artwork by Tomislav Tikulin 2009

So that about sums up what I’ve been doing in the first four months of 2015. It’s heads down again now, but please do keep checking back. I have plenty of film and book recommendations planned, the return of WHAT WORKS FOR ME, guest posts and much more. And if you want the scoop on any of the projects I’ve just mentioned, this is where you’ll get it!

Time for an update is a post from: David Moody - author of AUTUMN and HATER

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Grave of the Fireflies

Are you happy? In a good mood? Having a good day? If you are, you might want to give this week’s film recommendation a miss. That said, you’ll be missing out on an astonishing movie if you do. Today I’m recommending Studio Ghibli’s 1988 film, GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES. It’s bleak, grim, heartbreakingly sad, and completely superb. As always, a brief synopsis is below, followed by a trailer. Hit the jump for my thoughts.

A devastating meditation on the human cost of war, this animated tale follows Seita (Tsutomu Tatsumi), a teenager charged with the care of his younger sister, Setsuko (Ayano Shiraishi), after an American firebombing during World War II separates the two children from their parents. Their tale of survival is as heartbreaking as it is true to life. The siblings rely completely on each other and struggle against all odds to stay together and stay alive.

In many ways, GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES feels like a spiritual cousin to another animated feature, WHEN THE WIND BLOWS, which I wrote about for this site back in early 2011. GotF was made several years after WtWB, but is set many years earlier. Both films deal with a similar premise: two close family members try to survive through a devastating period of war, and both groups are equally naïve. Whereas WtWB deals with an elderly couple trying to revive the old Dunkirk spirit and survive a nuclear holocaust despite being equipped with little more than a few bits of wood, some mattresses, several paper bags that their potatoes arrived in, and endless cups of tea and optimism (“It was nice in the war, really,” Hilda tells her husband as they reminisce about the World War II), GotF presents us with a different kind of innocence. Based on a semi-autobiographical novel by Akiyuki Nosaka, it’s this innocence which ultimately makes the story of 14 year-old Seita and his 4 year-old sister Setsuko so difficult to watch.

When you consider GotF against the rest of Studio Ghibli’s generally family friendly output (Howl’s Moving Castle, Spirited Away, Ponyo etc.), it seems to stand apart. It shares the studio’s extraordinary design and animation style (realistic, despite the exaggerated features of the characters) and yet this enhances the telling of such a dark and serious story and doesn’t detract. As Roger Ebert’s 2000 review says, Yes, it’s a cartoon, and the kids have eyes like saucers, but it belongs on any list of the greatest war films ever made. It’s a harrowing story which benefits from its presentation. It makes Seita and Setsuko’s tragic tale easier to watch, but doesn’t diminish the impact of their story in the slightest.

I’ve lost count of the number of conversations I’ve had with people about whether or not horror is a genre. My stance is that it isn’t. To me, horror is more a feeling, an emotion found within a story rather than a particular ‘type’ of book or film. To explain further, I think if you’re watching a Western, you’re pretty much certain to see sheriffs, cowboys and gunfights etc. Horror, though, can be about anything at any time. GotF is a case in point. It’s a cartoon which can be watched by any age. It also just happens to be one of the most moving and downright horrific films I’ve seen.

If you haven’t guessed already, I strongly recommend you find time to watch GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES. It’s a hugely important film. If you can take it, watch it in a double-bill with WHEN THE WIND BLOWS, and you’ll be left in absolutely no doubt as to the human tragedy of war.

GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES is available on DVD.

Grave of the Fireflies is a post from: David Moody - author of AUTUMN and HATER

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