After a lengthy period of simmering, the Stone Soup that was concocted in 2005/2006 has finally been shared with those who contributed. At long last,Stone SoupFilm’s first feature length film, “Pray For Daylight” got to see the light of day. Quite a few people made it out to the World Premier last night at the Riverview Theatre.

Background/Disclaimer

Myself and many friends were involved in the making of this film between Fall 2005 and Spring 2006. I think everyone had their turn pulling cables and moving lights. Josh, Sarah, Xtina and I each make an appearance in the film.

Jagged Spiral provided several songs for the film score. Back then we were using the name Jagged Halo, which we later dropped when we discovered it was also the name of Gary Numan’s Record SubLabel under Artful Records.

Outside the handful of Jagged Spiral songs used in the film, Colin Mallon and I wrote original score for the majority of the film. If you search for “Pray For Daylight” on this blog, you can hash through all the chaotic fun and turmoil involved with scoring an indie vampire movie.

It’s hard to believe that more than a year has passed since I handed over the final score tracks, and I was quite excited to see the results of months of work on this project.

The director Tony Bruno compares the budget of Pray For Daylight (PFD for short) to the expense of a used car, but PFD was not a low-budget movie. It was a NO-budget movie. Oh, there may have been some equipment purchased, computers upgraded, parking tickets paid, palms greased, favors pulled,  and other body parts greased and pulled to make this movie, but locations and labor were all gratis, or at most the “dollar to make it legit”.

Link to the videos online:

Pray For Daylight is the third installment of the ‘Cassie Banning’ series. You can watch all three parts on Google Video from the links below:

• The first part is “Steve the Vampire“
• The second installment is called “Pray For Daylight: Vampire Hunter” (Originally called “Hunter”)
• “Pray for Daylight” was renamed “Cassie Banning: Vampire Hunter” but don’t be confused. This is the the movie called “Pray For Daylight” that I’m discussing here.

Detailed Review of Pray For Daylight

Spoiler Warning

If you haven’t seen the film yet, you might want to watch it now, or jump to the bottom of this post for the Executive Summary Version of the review. Jus’ sayin’.

Acting

The acting was pretty good and more importantly, consistent. It never sounded as though people were reading from a script, something which plagues many indie films and really bothers me. Actually, the only lines that sound like they were read off a cue sheet were mine, because they were. Almost forgivable, since they were in some strange language that sounds like I’m trying to talk while tongue-wrestling a Spaniard while eating Pop Rocks.

Kudos to Kate Bruno for maintaining ‘The Wednesday Addams Stare’ while single-handedly kicking my ass.  Also to Kate’s mom, Kristi Bruno as the Uncanny Cassie Banning, and to Sasha Walloch as the “Pretty Hate Machine” Syeria. Outstanding performances by Trey Simmonds as Detective Garrett, and Robin Marie Whitt as the deliciously evil villainness, Lucretia. Special mention to Rick Sullivan as Eric Saveau, and to Josh Kattelman as the nosy bartender, for taking lines that could supply Taco Bell with a month’s worth of cheese and making them sound believable. And finally, props to Sarah for the truly blood-curdling scream, and allowing me to neck with her on camera.

Some of the best lines in the movie are not lines of dialog, but rather, looks. Check out 31:45 and 52:35 to see what I’m talking about.

Locations

The sets are awesome for an indie film. AlleyGators? Valentinos? The Carpathians, fer crissake? Nice work.

Visual Effects

The special effects are reserved and tasteful. Especially the eyes. I loved the eyes. The intro credits were great (If I recall correctly, done in Lightwave by Alex Bruno – Nice work Alex!)  Although I think each actor deserved separate title placement, instead of being lumped together onto a single page.

Using the storyboards during the title credits was a fabulous idea, and they looked great.

There’s a couple gunshots and some sword-point-sharpening via post-production After Effects magic, but they are tasteful, adding to the film, not distracting.

Lighting

The set lighting in PFD was sporadic. Often one character was lit well, and the other was not. This is especially obvious when watching the video in compressed formats.

Check out the shot at 1:05:00 where Cassie Banning is in the foreground putting on her jacket . While scoring the movie, I watched this scene many times before I realized that Syeria and Lucretia were in the background! There’s no light on them at all.

Mythos

The world of Eric Saveau and Cassie Banning is extremely detailed. There is a very rich history (and future) conceived for these characters by Rick Sullivan, and Pray For Daylight covers one small adventure on their timeline. The characters are well thought out, and for those who haven’t seen the previous installments of ‘Cassie Banning’ there’s a quick rundown/flashback near the start of the movie to bring you up to speed on her story.

Eric Saveau is complicated and mysterious. I don’t really know if he’s a good guy or not, and that’s part of what makes him an awesome character.

Plot

Despite the strong background mythology, the story in Pray for Daylight had several weak spots.

The character development and motivation of Cassie Banning is a mystery to me. Why Cassie returned to Minneapolis after a two year leave of absence is never mentioned. Why Cassie returns to Minneapolis and thinks everyone Won’t try to kill her IS brought up, but the answer Cassie gives is “So?…” She seems to intend to live and let live and “do right by herself” and she “doesn’t need guns anymore” but this is inconsistent with the end of the story, and nothing during the story makes me think this would have changed.

When Lucretia orders Syeria to bring Cassie to her, Syeria says, “She won’t come willingly.” But after a short driveway fight scene, we get this battle of wills:

Syeria: “Lucretia wants to see you.”

Cassie: (Sighs) “Well, you gonna lead the way, or do I have to Mapquest it?”

Seems willing enough to me.

I did not like that Syeria, the remorseless killing machine goes to Cassie’s house, beats the tar out of her, and is just about to lop her head off, and THEN? Relents. “You’re pathetic” she says, and walks away. Huh? Did I miss something?

It bothered me that Syeria always snuck up on Cassie from behind. Three times. I’d expect more from someone supposedly so powerful. After the third time it happens, Cassie says, “You need a new shtick!”

Music Score

We could have had ten years to score this film, and I’d still be making excuses here for why it wasn’t better. You can look back through the archives for more about the scoring adventure, but I can say this much: Colin Mallon’s improv guitarwork is amazing, and my improv Casio Keyboard skills are not.

Audio

Heavy noise filtering on the audio tracks created some strange artifacts. Sometimes the dialog would sound like it was cycled through a coffee can, and the hand clapping at near the end of the movie sounded mechanical, but that’s probably better than a constant hissing noise. I suspect the volume level of the score was raised to cover ambient noise caught on tape too. It’s not how I would have mixed it, but no one who’s watched the movie has complained about the audio, so I’ll chalk it up to being an audio guy.

Fight Choreography

The fight scene in Cassie’s backyard was great, you don’t generally see women punch each other in the face like Indiana Jones. Syeria’s spinning kick is top-notch for someone who’s never taken a martial arts class.

Near the end of the movie, there is a short bout between Syeria and Cassie where they kick at the same time and their legs hit. They limp backwards, cursing at each other. It was both funny and brilliant.

Unfortunately, the two worst fight scenes in PFD happen to the same character; (played by Teresa Lhotka, who is the fight coordinator for the movie) she gets taken out by a kick to the knee from Cassie (?) and then a sucker punch from Saveau (??). Disappointing, especially once you learn that Teresa is a real-life black belt in Kung Fu, and could kick all four of your back teeth out at once. Also, I felt kind of cheated that I didn’t get to see a real fight scene with Saveau.

The group fight scene at the end of the movie was dubbed “The Wheel of Death”. It was a great idea, but it did not play out well in the video. I was actually at the shoot for the Wheel of Death, and while I know that there was little prep time for the fight scene, it could have been salvaged by using more tight camera angles and/or moving the camera through the fight scene while filming, and more aggressive editing.

The End Credits

I call “padding” on the end credits. Large fonts. Slow moving. Stacked up instead of side-by-side. The same names coming up over and over again. It screams “indie” and it screams “we can make this movie a couple minutes longgggerrrr…”

Also, the producer, director and stars of the film should never be listed under ‘gaffer’ or other production positions. Give them fake names at least.

The Executive Summary Review

Issues aside, Pray for Daylight is a far better movie than other indie films like Open Water or SuperCroc. I’d put it on par with Dragon, a movie with a real budget.

Actually, it really isn’t fair to compare Pray for Daylight to other movies, because that was not the original scope of the project. The original idea behind Pray For Daylight was the Stone Soup philosophy – to pitch in our respective talents, and making the best movie possible with the available resources, and then share the rewarding feeling of creative accomplishment. The original scope of the project was to make another short follow-up to “Steve the Vampire” and “Hunter”. Within that scope, minor things like plot holes or poor lighting can be forgiven. In that respect, Pray for Daylight is fantastic, far beyond anyone’s expectations, and a movie everyone who contributed to can be proud of.

Converting Pray For Daylight from a fun, 15-minute weekend project into a serious, full-length feature film over a year in the making… well, Bilbo Baggins said it best – “butter scraped over too much bread.”

Anyway, I hope everyone involved with PFD had as much fun and got as much out of working on it as I did.

Blog on,
-CZ

I just finished Michael W Dean’s $30 Film School. The subtitle is “Write, Finance, Direct, Produce, Shoot, Edit, Distribute, Tour With, and Sell Your Own No-Budget DIGITAL Movie.” The target market is absolute newbies, (like myself) who don’t know the difference between a producer and a director.

The Bad:

If you cut out every “I” in this book and taped them together they would circle the Earth. Twice. I wish authors would get their damn credentials, near-death-drug-rehab-and-how-it-changed-their-life-forever experience, and the worthless name-dropping out of the way in Chapter One so I can skip it and get to the ‘how to’ stuff I picked up the book to read about.

I didn’t like the way Michael would beg people to work for him for free, and then piss and moan when they didn’t come thru for him. Publishing the pissed off letter to someone who let you down is Capitol-C-Childish, especially when the person was working for free (or not working for free, which makes as much sense).

Later in the book, he says “Film is built on relationships…” and “…it’s all about people”. Riiight. I have a feeling this man is good at making movies by himself, because no one will work with him.

The Good:

If you can sift thru the self-important bullshit, the rest is surprisingly good and chock-full of useful information. It has lots of useful tips on creating a movie yourself, everything from camera angles to format conversions, to duplication and distribution, clever methods for getting your film ‘out there’ and a good intro to contracts, copyrights and such.

I thought the best part of this book was the motivation. Michael W. Dean is clearly about the art, and wants you to be as well. Not quite Anti-Hollywood, but more Un-Hollywood. He doesn’t mind living meagerly as long as he can make his art and get it out to people. He is one of the few people whose marketing practices I agree with: start by making talented art, and with a little legwork and some fliers, the world will bring an audience to you. Film it, and they will come…

The very very very best advice of all: Don’t do art for the money. While Michael might be an arrogant flake, I must admit he is an arrogant flake with artistic integrity.

The last chapter of his book made me want to make an independent movie. (Wait a minute, I just did. Almost forgot) OK, it made me want to make another.

I give the book an 8 of 10. It could have been a 9 if he had taken out all references to himself (then it could have been shorter and named “$25 Film School”). It could have been a 9.5 if he didn’t live in California, thriving in the center of the very industry and people he makes fun of.

Blog on,
-CZ

It’s tough to objectively review your own movie, but after watching twenty or so entrants in the 48-hour film festival last night, it is not difficult to compare our movie with the others.

Thankfully, the title slate was shown before each movie, so the problem that our film did not have a name/title was minimized. Lesson Learned: Drop in simple crappy titles using the built-in title generator, and replace them with the fancy shit later. If you run out of time, or the files don’t work, or are misspelled, you will be glad to have the simple crappy titles, it’s better than nothing.

Acting:

Robin Marie Whitt (Whom I always think of as Lucretia, and almost called her that on the set) was perfect as the role of Miss Sterling, and she carried 99% of the movie all by herself. Very expressive and the camera loves her.

Jeff Schaffran’s role as the janitor was unfortunately reduced to a blurry distant shot, and while Jeff excels at ‘distant blurriness’ I would have liked to see more of him.

Edward’s momentary appearance was perfectly creepy.

I won’t rate my own performance, since it was straight out of the Chris Carter School Of Stoic Acting, but the event coordinator, Ira Livingstone, did tell me he thought my voice work for the DJ character was good.

Sound Quality:

Our sound was certainly in the top ten percent of the 20 movies I saw last night. The only ones that came close were majorly Pro Studios, or majorly ADR’ed, (meaning the sound was replaced in a studio) We were one of the very few teams that took the time to catch good sound on the set. Unfortunately, we did end up with a line of ADR which makes me cringe to see it, but this was another valuable lesson learned: Make sure to film each actor/location as though they were speaking but with their mouth not visible to the camera. That way, if something changes, or something was missed on the shoot, that footage can be used with any dialog ADR’ed instead.

Josh’s mix was pro, and so were his sound FX. At the theater, I thought the music/dialog ratio was a bit high, but I think it was the house system’s EQ settings being different than our own, because it sounded fine on my home system. I thought the overall volume in the theater could have been turned up.

Score:

“Conspiracy Hour” had the one of the best music scores hands-down, and I can say that because I was not involved with the music. Colin Mallon did it all, and it kicks. Intentionally melodramatic, which really added to the odd/creepy factor. Many entries opted for canned, or preexisting music, which I think is cheating, same to me as if you used preexisting video, but it was allowed if you had rights to the music.

Story:

I think story/plot made the biggest difference for me in my judgement of the 48-hour movies, because it is a place that is on more equal ground for all the teams. The resources for a good plot don’t cost anything at all, and I edged my vote towards those movies with interesting ideas.

While our idea was not particularly new or clever, I think it was interesting, kind of a Twilight Zone comedy episode, SciFi/Horror/Comedy/Drama. We intentionally converted our film to Black and White in post production, to give it a older, Twilight Zoneish feel or like a bad horror movie (with Fresh Step Kitty Litter instead of Blood…) Because I know this is our genre, it makes me laugh. If you thought the movie was serious, you might think it was lame, and I imagine some people did. But the tinfoil joke got a much bigger laugh than I thought it would, and the line “Now take out your mirror, and approach the Beast”, which I thought was a highlight of the movie hardly had any response at all. The two jokes might have been too close together, and the one overshadowed the other. It could also be that after a slew of beers and clove cigarettes at 4AM, saying “approach the Beast” is just damn funny, and had we shown the movie in context (at 4AM after beers and smokes) people would have laughed as hard as I did.

Overall Quality:

There were far better movies than ours, but all the better movies were made by teams of more than 20 people, (some of whom were industry professionals.) One goal of the 48-hour film fest is to encourage independent film making. In that light, there should be more restrictions on the entries regarding team size and budget. Perhaps the team size should be shown on the voting ballots. A movie made by a team of 2 people is more impressive than the same movie made by 20 people. I think all cameras used in the movie should cost less than $1000.

Regardless, “Conspiracy Hour” stood out among the contestants, probably in the ‘Upper Middle Class’ maybe a 6-7 out of 10. With some very small tweaks it could have been in the 7-8 range. Next year, look out.

Blog on,
-CZ

While I have seen Star Wars IV – A New Hope less than a dozen times throughout my life, I thought it would be fun to rewatch/re-review it.

Let me start by saying Star Wars IV should have won an award for the most preposterous cover art of all time. The rippling chest of the Luke Skywalker with the light saber held aloft like an Olympic Torch is some kind of bad joke. The supposedly sexy exposed leg of Princess Leia is more like looking at nude pictures of your sister (and fitting considering how the movie pans out… but NO SPOILERS!) Not a single picture of the Death Star, the Millennium Falcon, Han Solo or Chewbacca. But,I’ll try not to judge a movie too harshly on its cover.

The story is really good, possibly one of the best. The plot traces the beginning of the classic “Hero’s Journey” by Campbell adapted into a well-conceived Sci-Fi universe. The history and mythos of the Star Wars universe was developed before this small story of Luke Skywalker and Friends, and that adds a richness and depth the the story seldom seen nowadays. This is the kind of plot movies used to have before the Hollywood Writer’s Strike, and the advent of ‘reality’ media.

The characters are all strong, and interesting with their own motivations, and distinctive personalities that develop quite well. (For instance: The tension between Skywalker/Leia/Solo.) Don’t get used to this.

Unfortunately, the pacing is something George Lucas will fight with through the remainder of this series and never perfect. Some parts drag on forever, and then some parts blast by so fast that you will look to see if someone isn’t sitting on the remote control, and mashing the FFWD button. Plot jumps in this movie would set Olympic records. The time between Princess Leia’s rescue and the arrival of the Death Star at the Rebel Base is about, oh, thirty seconds or so. And how exactly does the Death Star follow the Millennium Falcon through hyperspace? No time to dwell on that, Scramble the X-Wings!

The CG is top-notch for a movie made in 1977. What was the competition? Dr Who? Lost In Space? They had nothing on this movie. Any glitches in Episode IV are negligible when compared to what it must have taken to make the FX in this movie happen. This is exactly why it is hard to rate this movie now, because it was so ahead of it’s time then, but the technology is so outdated now. I heard an interview with George Lucas where he said one reason he started with the fourth movie in the series was that it was the least technical in terms of FX, and that the technology just wasn’t there to pull the other movies off, but that’s a load of donkey bollocks. I suspect that Episode IV was just a better plot than Episode I (come to think of it, I’m certain of it.) and more likely to pull in producer funding.

If I time-warped back to 1977, I would have given Episode IV a 10 out of 10. The minor issues are heavily outweighed by the originality of the story and the good use of FX. If this movie were released today, probably an 8, mostly because it would lose it’s +2 bonus for being ahead of its time.

Blog on,
-CZ

It was refreshing to see a movie that took longer to write than it did to film. (Don’t worry though, I’m sure that any day now, the writer’s strike in Hollywood will be over…) Anyway, the genre of pseudo-noir-mystery-set-in-modern-day-California-high-school was needing a boost, and this film does it justice.

Like ‘Clerks’ the dialog in Brick was so articulate and fast-paced (In other words: contrived) as to be ridiculous, but original enough to be interesting. For instance, after a short chat with the principal, the main character (a student tracking his missing ex-girlfriend) is telling the principal to ‘keep off his back for a few weeks, no matter what happens…’ to which the principal says, ‘…sounds reasonable.’ Right. I was able to use my Suspend Disbelief skill at +6 (+4 for indie film, +2 for the two Newcastles I had before the show) and I was only merely annoyed.

The dialog was peppered with the dialect of SoCal Coolspeak. My two favorites were ‘Tell so-and-so I want words…’ which means ‘Tell so-and-so I want to speak with him, and ‘where does so-and-so lunch…’ which means, ‘where does so-and-so lunch…’ as though lunch rituals were a defining personal characteristic like hair color or the car you drive. (maybe they are, I just never thought of lunch that way…)

Great acting by the way, I am told the lead character used to be the leader/kid in the TV sitcom, Third Rock From The Sun, but I wouldn’t know. I saw him as a young Agent Moulder from the X-Files, with mad deadpan skillz. As a matter of fact, everyone in the movie had mad deadpan skillz. Plenty of dry humor and witty banter to go round.

Brick never got boring, a perfect pace for revealing all the layers in this well-thought-out mystery. Don’t try to solve the mystery yourself, they don’t give you the info you need. And don’t let the snappy dialog or Coolspeak throw you. Brick is interestingly shot and well edited. According to IMDB, it won the Sundance Film Festival’s Special Jury Prize for Originality of Vision, whatever that means.

I give Brick an 8 out of 10. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to lunch. In the basement of a nearby abandoned factory. Alone. Nude.

Blog on,
-CZ

I was beginning to worry the The Wachowski Brothers had lost it. They had a monster hit with The Matrix, and managed to mangle it with parts 2 and 3. So I tried really hard Not to be impressed by the flashy trailer for “V”

The movie V for Vendetta is quite good. Well paced, and well spoken, although at times it tries a bit too hard to be clever and the dialog comes off as uber-contrived. (The “V” monologue in the alley, for instance, actually made me embarrassed for the writer). How much of the good/bad dialog comes from the original graphic novel I cannot say.

Who knew that Natalie Portman’s hideous acting abilities in Star Wars were only a passing phase! Or is it possible (dare I even suggest!) that giving her a real role with some real lines actually… Um, never mind.

I could have done without Natalie’s character constantly running to different men and asking them for help/protection. The times she spends not under the care of others is…uneventful. She didn’t seem that helpless to me, and it would have been refreshing to see her kick some ass.

The future in “V” does not look very futuristic. Do you really think that in the future everyone will be walking around with RAZR phones? Doubt it. UltraViolet had a much better futuristic look and feel to it.

The plot in “V” is really good. Not surprising, since the movie is based on a comic book. (Don’t worry, I’m sure that any time now the Writers Strike in Hollywood will end, and they can start making original movies again.) The complicated plot is well-done without taking a 15-min break in the middle of the movie to explain it, (the way Underworld:Evolution did.) If this movie doesn’t make you want to overthrow the government, then nothing short of listening to ‘Rage Against The Machine’ will. Let’s just hope the story is not ‘timely’ or ‘visionary’ to any degree.

Speaking of ‘Rage Against the Machine’ I am surprised nothing from them showed up on the soundtrack. The soundtrack for the movie was fairly innocuous, more of a score really, which in itself was a nice change.

Could it be that Hollywood has put out so much utter shite for so long, that releasing a good movie with a good plot and good acting earns a 8 out of 10 from yours truly?

Let’s just hope that the Wachowski Brothers don’t try to make a “V” part 2 or 3. Leave well enough alone.

Blog on,
-CZ

Until recently, I only had two genres of music to abhor: Country and Gangsta Rap. Now I can add a third – Emo. And for the purists who want to divide it down into Emotional Hardcore or Screamo or Post-Punk-Whatever-Core, save your breath. I’ll be more specific:

• Tight, punchy metal or rock music
• Throwaway, sappy, broken-hearted lyrics.
• Whiny singing, possibly punctuated by guttural screaming.

Dashboard Confessional. Fall Out Boy. My Chemical Romance. The kind of music that makes me wish California would break off and slide into the ocean, taking all these bands with it.

Nothing against the music, mind you. Often the music is top-notch. It’s  the singing that wrecks it for me. I can understand the xenophobic, directionless anger of Hardcore music, but its tough to sympathize with a whiny singer whom you would kick in the balls if he had any. And screaming gutteral nonsense doesn’t make you sound tough after you just whined and cried a bunch of sappy lyrics that sound like they were inspired by a Danielle Steele novel.

There are real bands out there that are able to mood swing from angry to melancholic and it sounds authentic. Listen to NIN’s brutal ‘Big Man With A Gun’, then listen to the intimate ‘Hurt’, and then try to call Trent Reznor a pussy. You can’t. Then listen to Linkin Park and try to imagine the lead singer getting into a fist-fight. You can’t. The singer’s lyrics, subject matter, and delivery are so sensitive that anything more brash than flipping him off on the Interstate would make him burst into tears.

Most of these songs are based around two characters, and the relationship gone wrong between them, told from a first-person perspective. They all contain the word ‘trust’ (or more likely ‘trusted’) and they are drowned in first and second person pronouns: I, Me, My, and You. Some Examples:

• ‘I know you felt like I was fading away’
• ‘Youre everything I wanted’
• ‘Ive left nothing for myself’
• ‘You said you wanted me’
• ‘I love you’
• ‘I hate you’

Crap.

My theory is that lyrics like this are easy to write. An afterthought, really. Even easier now,  since bands have moved beyond the need to rhyme. Kiss the vocal hook goodbye. I kinda wish these bands would kiss their lead whiners goodbye and write instrumentals instead.

With any luck, Emo is a fad that we’ll look back on and laugh, “Yeah, people used to listen to that.” You can call me old if you like, but I’d rather be called old than listen to the 2000′s version of Trixter.

-CZ

If Punk had worn a condom when it screwed Death back in the 70′s, the bastard child known as Goth wouldn’t have been born when it was, and future generations of music appreciators would have traced the roots of Gothic Rock Music back to Minneapolis, and the band Revolver Modele, who would have appeared ‘a priori’, without previous influence. This fact is overlooked by many other reviewers who can’t seem to listen to Revolver Modele without imposing influences, and drawing comparisons to other bands because they are too

1. Drunk
2. High
3. Lazy
4. All of the above

to write an original review. (‘INXS? Um, they’re like Cheap Trick, only, um, newer.’ ‘Jethro Tull? Um, they’re like Pink Floyd, only more so.’)

It was a dark and stormy night when local fashion maven, Anna Lee suggested Revolver Modele to me, and I stumbled down to The Kitty Kat Club for a look-see. I was not prepared for the lead singer (Ehsan) to become possessed by demons and begin thrashing around on the stage. The only hint that he still held onto a small piece of his humanity was the fact that he was able to continue singing, and keep the microphone near enough to his mouth so we could all hear it.

When he rolled off the stage and dropped, crashing to the dancefloor in an indeterminate spasming heap, no one rushed forward to help. The band played on; Mikal (guitar) climbed up onto things and jumped off them, all without missing a note, his actions as dangerous as his guitar work. Jesse (drums) belted out clockwork timing, oblivious to the impending threat of being landed upon, and Natasha (bass) simply watched with all the attitude of your cat watching you have sex.

It was then that I realized, even though Ehsan’s body had now become a marionette for other-worldly forces to control, even though a portal to Lovecraft’s ‘Ancient Ones’ had certainly been opened, even though sane audience members should flee in terror, we could not leave. Because through the portal came music.

The music was awesome.

Thankfully, Revolver Modele were able to capture that music on their latest release, ‘Discotheque Crypt’. Amazingly deep sound for such a small group (Guitar, bass, drum, vox) and Ehsan has an amazingly deep voice for such a slim body. Mikal does a fantastic job of switching between rhythm and lead guitar, and from flat-out-distortion to crystalline ethereal echoes to undead silence. Natasha (AKA: The Nun) bottoms-out the songs with clean, prominent and punctual basswork, and a beautiful, catlike stare. (I am fairly certain that she does not ever blink. Or smile.) Jesse holds the songs together with all the tight timing of a Swiss Swatch, and calls attention to his drumming by Not calling attention to his drumming.

The lyrics actually make for good reading and are as meaningful as you make them; a kind of Rorschach Lyrics Test, to see what you read into them. And you will probably have to read the lyrics to distinguish some of them; the vocals on Discotheque Crypt are intentionally thick, and syrupy as if they were drowned in old blood. The feeling roller-coasters between deeply emotional and deeply emotionless, often within the same song.

You might hear the single Les Diaboliques if you listen to ‘cool’ radio stations, and you certainly should request Revolver Modele at request@radiok.org (770 Radio K) and 893dj@mpr.org (89.3 Current) For those of you who decided that anything New is also Bad, Revolver Modele might be just the cure that restores your faith in local music.

It’s hard for me to pick a favorite song off the album, as I tend to listen to it in it’s entirety like a concept album, but I will admit that ‘Les Diaboliques’ and ‘Body Without Organs’ tend to make me drive way too fast, and it is almost impossible to sit still during ‘Deca-Dance’ without tapping some part of your body against something else.

So if you fire up Revolver Modele at home on some dark and stormy night, and Cthulhu suddenly possesses your cat, which falls to the floor, spasming, gargling and pawing at the air uncontrollably, just laugh and tell it ‘thats what you get for staring at me while I’m having sex.’

Blog on,
-CZ

The original Jolt Cola was released in 1985. The grandfather of energy drinks, Jolt’s motto was “All the Flavor and Twice the Caffeine.” The caffeine content of Jolt was equivalent to drinking several cans of Mountain Dew, which had the highest caffeine content of any soda at that time.

Now, 20 years later, Jolt Energy has re-released Jolt Cola with a new logo, and resealable, 695ml, battery-shaped cans, and several new flavors. As a public service, I have sampled each flavor, and here are my findings:

Jolt Cola

The original. Ick. I never liked the original Jolt, but then again, you don’t drink Jolt because it tasts good. You drink it because the mail server is *down* and I don’t care if it is 3AM, By God, if you don’t get that thing fixed by the time the boss gets to the office to check her daily milflist, you might just as well jump in the car, head to Canada, and never look back…

Appearance: Standard color – dark-brown cola crossed with coffee.

Aroma: Earthy Bittersweet Cola mixed with Hydrochloric Acid and Wookie Scrotum.

Taste: Flat, stale Pepsi, only more bitter, and more sweet, and still more bitter.

Effect: The ghastly taste has more effect on your state of awareness than the caffeine and sugar combined.

Overall Evaluation: Ick. With other flavors to choose from, the only use for this I can imagine is stripping paint. Do not take on an empty stomach.

Jolt Cherry Bomb

Now we’re talking. I’ve always loved Jolt Cherry Bomb, and the fact that it is difficult to find only makes it more attractive.

Appearance: Color was standard cherry cola; no surprises.

Aroma: Unmistakable cherry cola and a hint of tangy, wet leather.

Taste: Thankfully, the taste has not changed – Sweet cherry and slightly bitter cola with a surprisingly smooth finish.

Effect: Similar to the effect of eating a kilo of chocolate and a kilo of raw Sumatra coffee beans. Decreases reaction time to a negative number, meaning the body can react slightly before stimulus occurs. Increases eye-hand coordination along with speed; making it possible to thread a sewing machine while it is still running.

Overall Evaluation: OMFG. Without question, the best cherry cola ever made. Do not exceed .733 of one can in a 24-hour period, or Spontaneous Human Combustion can occur.

Jolt Red

Be careful, this can is very similar to the regular Jolt Cola but significantly different in both taste and effects.

Appearance: Unnaturally bright red. Actually glows in the dark. Glow increases when shaken. (Warning: DO NOT SHAKE!)

Aroma: Pungent floral and tropical fruit with a splash of turpentine.

Taste: So impossibly sweet that the taste of smoked salmon, guava and an entire acre of condensed pseudo-fruit is nearly imperceptible.

Effect: Limited superhuman abilities, possibly including the ability to fly (I was not able to test this.)

Overall Evaluation: Dangerous, possibly flammable. Do not smoke while drinking this product. Attracts killer bees. Do NOT sell to third world countries or terrorists. Does not cause stains; instead, it actually disintegrates most common elements.

Jolt Blue

Surprise! I had low expectations from a beverage I thought might actually stain my tongue permanently blue, but was overjoyed when I tasted it. I was not so overjoyed when it foamed all over the place when the can was opened.

Appearance: Liquefied Smurf.

Aroma: Extremely strong odor of Grey Latex Paint and Cilantro massively overpowered by Dark Fruity Citrus and Raspberries.

Taste: Highly-carbonated Blue Raspberry Snow Cone, mixed with Ammonia and Tang.

Effect: Hysteria, Dementia, Visual and Auditory Hallucinations, Blackouts, Memory Loss.

Overall Evaluation: Excellent cohesion, bonds in seconds. Stains everything it comes in contact with bright blue, but cleans up easily with Liquid Nitrogen. May attack some plastics. Mixes well with tequila – best results were achieved when mixed one part Jolt Blue to 6×10^3 parts Cuervo 1600. Seems to negate the effects of Jolt Red, resulting in a warm sparkling water when mixed together.

Jolt Ultra

This sugar/carb free alternative was another unexpected pleasure, and a fine addition to the Jolt family. Contains Splenda sweetener.

Appearance: New, Bright-Green Radiator Fluid mixed with Old, Bright-Green Alien Urine.

Aroma: Weak Citrus Fruit with a hint of overripe bananas and seawater.

Taste: Radiator Fluid and Uranium 238, but mostly watered down Mountain Dew.

Effect: Heightened sensory awareness, body temperature raised enough to melt snow within one meter; making this a poor choice for those attempting winter sports. Causes all bodily fluids to glow in the dark.

Overall Evaluation: I always wondered what they did with the used coolant from nuclear reactors. Slightly less flavor than the rest of the Jolt family, but with no carbs, this is still a great alternative to Crystal Meth. Half life of 4.5 billion years. Contact the EPA for disposal of containers.

Jolt Cola Nutrition Info

From the website (like you care):

Jolt Cola:
Serving Size: 8 fl. oz.
Amount Per Serving

• Calories 100
• % Daily Value*
• Total Fat 0 g 0%
• Sodium 10 mg 1%
• Potassium 0 mg 0%
• Total Carbohydrate 27 g 9%
• Sugars 27 g
• Protein 0 g 0%
• Vitamin C 0%

Not a significant source of other nutrients.
*Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet.

Blog on,
-CZ

From Darren Aronofsky, the twisted bastard who brought you the movie Pi, comes an absolutely depressing and horrific mess called Requiem for a Dream. Pi was visually interesting, entertaining, and kept me wondering what was going on,and I went into Requiem with these same expectations. However, the movie continually raised two questions:

How much worse can it get?

How much longer can it go on?

I am not saying this to be funny. I am saying this because it is true. I wasn’t sure what the movie was trying to tell people, so I made a list of the possible messages the movie could hold:

• following your dreams to excess is bad
• following your dreams is bad
• dreams are bad
• the American pharmaceutical industry is no different than the American street-gang drug industry
• drugs are bad
• drugs are bad because they can wreck your dreams
• drugs are bad because they can make you create a movie like ‘Requiem for a Dream’

The movie might actually not have had any message at all, which would truly suck. The effects, editing and time lapses are good (much like Pi or Spun, or Memento) and the movie gives a good sense of ‘trippiness’ without being ridiculous.

It might be useful to teach High School students that “Drugs are Not Cool.” Or, if you thought your life sucked, you could watch this movie and not feel so bad about it. But it will be a true test of your willpower to see how far down the spiral of depression you are willing to ride.

Blog on,
-CZ