...Holy-O? ("He rolled around in Oleo"-- variant lyrics to the celebrated Van Vliet ditty).

"The Host" the Most Holy-O? Well, not if you stack it up against the almighty Yog, the Monster from Outer Space (that's Goy backwards)...or against one of Jim Danforth's lovingly articulated creepy-crawly little Zantee Misfits, from the original Outer Limits...or against even the talkative diminutive rubber-shower-capped female head-in-the-Petri dish of "The Brain That Wouldn't Die" ("What a PUNY monster!" was Beefheart's dismissive comment, comparing hooves ...)

Not sure really how I stand on this a-here bouncing blubbery monstrosity as featured in the okay, definitely better than average new Korean cine-shocker "The Host" currently making the rounds of the art-houses and probably soon the multiplexes--it's certainly not as cute and cuddly a monster as some of the reviews make out (Caroline was pretty grossed-out by its tenticular carnivorous antics)...which is not necessarily a bad thing...the film as a whole is one big post-modern cop nudge nudge wink wink from the whole history of fantastic cinema (not just the obvious "Them!" tropisms, a precursor film set in part "down in the sewer" which has been cited in many reviews...but hey hey hey don't forget/what about Inoshiro Honda's "The H-Man"? Great Japanese 1958 color sci-fi flick featuring a similar shape-shifting deliquescent ball 'o slime inhabiting a drainage sytem (in Tokyo, not Seoul, admittedly--but not that far afield, as the ice cream for crow flies)...

..and more obviously, how any reviewer worth his or her laminated press pass missed the obvious lift from Twentieth Century Fox's fabulous "The Horror of Party Beach" camp-fest (a film so audacious in its supernal idiocy that it garnered its own fumetti type one-shot commemorative mag from Warren Publications back in the day), which sported sea-faring rabid gill-men-type monsters created from a similar rum admixture of radioactive chemicals, salt water, and live sea-monkeys (actually human skeletons--but still!), growed up all wrong and and runnin' wild on a bevy of bikini bustin' beauties (was Jeff Beck's former paramour beach bunny/psycho-daisy Mary Hughes in this one? Coulda been...'cept it wasn't shot in Malibu, was actually filmed in Gutzon Borglum Studios in darkest Stamford Connecticut-- yes!)

In point of fact the original Edison "Frankenstein", which some hero finally unearthed last decade or so, which for years existed only in the form of a still photo of its hideous hirsute glowering monster (his deranged indelible mug used to leap right off the pages of Famous Monsters and scare the bejesus out of me--provenance New Jersey), has a great transformation sequence whereby the rag, the bone, the hank of hair that is Dr. Frankenstein's creature template/armature under pressure begins to acquire monster-type fleshapoid characteristics...

Anyway I rather liked "The Host", my friend the great character actor Paul Lazar's in it--no relation to John "Ze-Man Barzell" Lazar, I don't think-- (Paul is the choreographer Annie-B Parson's hubby, they used my arrangement of "Please Allow Me to Look At You Again" in their production of "Antigone" a few years back at Dance Theater Workshop here, he did a swell dance to it--Paul is the next Steve Buscemi, or should be)--plus there's some good cheap shots at jingoistic US militarism/ UN ineptitude in there (and why not?)-- similar to "Babel" in that way, also usage of Asian school girl jail-bait as protagonist (methinks I've spotted a trend here), which seemed almost a non-sequitur/cynical ploy on the part of Alfonso Cuaron in "Babel" calculated to warm the cuckles of many a jaded male film reviewer's heart... but here seems unforced and natural, part of the landscape (you might say)...film's way, way better, and way more entertaining, in any case, than "Pan's Labyrinth" (I wouldn't inflict that particular sadistic gore-fest on kids, for sure...neither would I "Happy Feet"-- go figure!)

CHANGE OF KEY-- Recently performed several solo acoustic songs for my friend Steve Paul on his Puppet Music Hall show, which you can view on his hip new internet channel Downtown TV. com--right now there are 2 clips online-- "In a Forest" (from my album "Improve the Shining Hour"), plus a version of Arthur Russell's great "Let's Go Swimming"--both of them feature Steve's friend Edgar Oliver on puppet backup vocals and general silliness, and you can view them now here at http://www.downtowntv.com/puppet-music-hall/

I had a ball making them, hope you enjoy 'em--and I think Steve's going to put a few more songs up there soon, so stay tuned...

xxLove

Gary

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Posted By Gary Lucas to Gary Lucas at 3/27/2007 07:55:00 PM