birth. movies. death. november 2014 issue 17

8/21/2019 BIRTH. MOVIES. DEATH. November 2014 Issue 17

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BIRTH.MOVIES.DEATH. / NOVEMBER 2014

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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

CONTENTS

The Darkest Timelines

INTERSTELLAR And The Ever-Evolving Mind Of Christopher Nolan

Drafthouse Recommends: BIRDMAN

Breaking Baymax: How Disney Animation Found The Story Of BIG HERO 6

Hair Of The Dog And Other Hangover Myths Debunked

drafthouse.com badassdigest.com birthmoviesdeath.com drafthousefilms.com fantasticfest.com mondotees.com

Video Vortex: This Is The DROID You’re Looking For

Why Don’t You Play In Movies? The Absurdity And Sincerity Of Sion Sono

Editor-in-ChiefDevin Faraci

Managing EditorMeredith Borders

Associate PublisherHenri Mazza

Art Director Joseph A. Ziemba

Graphic DesignersZach Short, Stephen Sosa, Kelsey Spencer

Copy EditorGeorge Bragdon

Contributing WritersColin Biggs, Devin Faraci, Tim League, Bill Norris, Annie Choi, Noah Segan

Public Relations InquiriesBrandy Fons | [email protected] All content © 2014 Alamo Drafthouse | drafthouse.com | badassdigest.com

Promotional images and artwork are reproduced in this magazine in the spirit of publi city and as historical illustrations to the text.Grateful acknowledgement is made to the respective filmmakers, actors, and studios.

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BIRTH.MOVIES.DEATH. / NOVEMBER 20141957 - The USSR nukes the US, destroying most of it. King Elvis

sets up his throne in Lost Vegas. (SIX STRING SAMURAI)

Violence in the Middle East. Economic turmoilat home. Environmental catastrophe afterenvironmental catastrophe. It’s easy to look at the

news and think we’re in the end times, but it’s nice toremember that people have felt this way since… well, since always. he early Christians thought thesecond coming was nigh just a few years after Christdied, so people have been counting down to the endof it all for at least two thousand years.

hat feeling that it’s all ending -- or that it’s allgetting worse, day by day -- is mirrored in some ofour greatest movies. his month we take a look atdystopian films in celebration of INERSELLARand HE HUNGER GAMES: MOCKINGJAYPAR 1, which is why you see a timeline of bad

events running along the bottom of this very page.his whole issue contains major dates of bad eventsand apocalypses in cinema history, stretching from1957 to the far, far future.

If all that doom and gloom drives you to drink, thismonth's issue includes a handy dandy hangovercure. And there are also cuddly robots, Birdmenand more of the goodness you expect in every issueof BIRH.MOVIES.DEAH -- and that you'llcontinue to get until one of these apocalyptic futurescomes to pass... 6

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

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The Darkest Timelines

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he greatest dystopian future narratives are abouttoday. hey reflect not a fanciful version of thingsto come but rather modern problems, issues andfears taken one or two steps further, allowing thestorytellers to talk about today’s troubles in a way thatdoesn’t turn off the masses.

After all, what is HE HUNGER GAMES’ Panembut a reflection of our own society, one where haves

and have-nots are farther apart than ever and wherereality television serves to distract us from the risingtide of inequality? A CLOCKWORK ORANGE isalways one step away, a reality where we trade in themost basic freedoms to give us security. And there’sbarely a day that goes by where you won’t see echoesof IDIOCRACY in our pop culture.

We’ve been obsessed with dystopias for a long time;the first modern dystopian work is Jack London’sHE IRON HEEL, which foretells the fall of the

American republic and the rise of an Oligarchy. Likeall the dystopian tales to follow, London used his

book to talk about his present day, including therising international tensions that would lead to

WWI and the growing labor movements. It was setthree hundred years in the future, but it was squarelyabout 1908.

Dystopian stories often have broadly similar qualities-- they’re in the future (often quite near) or in analternate present, and they’re funhouse distortions ofsomething we’re facing today. hey’re not about theevents that changed the world -- they’re not aboutthe nuclear wars or environmental catastrophes

or governmental coups -- but rather how we liveafter the change. hey very often focus on a hero who stands outside the broken system, a hero

whose victory often tends to be deeply personaland incomplete, whether it’s A CLOCKWORKORANGE’s Alex DeLarge being bad again orShuya and Noriko surviving the island in BALEROYALE but remaining fugitives or Jonathan Eovercoming the game in ROLLERBALL while thecorporate dystopia yet stands. Even in dystopian films

where the hero wins and destroys the dystopia -- VFOR VENDEA or LOGAN’S RUN -- the endingis ambiguous, leaving us to wonder what sort ofsociety will now rise from these ashes.

heaters are jammed with dystopian futures rightnow, and they reflect the immense uncertainty in our

world. he climate is visibly changing, the MiddleEast has been embroiled in a decade of violence,the economy remains sluggish, racial tensions aresimmering and our political systems seem completelybroken. It’s hard to see a happy ending on thehorizon, and dystopian movies don’t pull any punches

-- things will likely keep getting worse, they say. But

they offer a pinprick of hope in the darkness -- theygive us Katniss Everdeen and Snake Plissken fightingback, Freder Frederson bringing together the peopleof Metropolis, HX standing for the first timeoutside of his city and seeing the sun, Freeman Lowellsaving the last dome of vegetation and letting therobot Dewey tend it forever.

As the great future leader President Camacho oncesaid: “I know shit's bad right now, with all thatstarving bullshit, and the dust storms, and we arerunning out of french fries and burrito coverings. But

I got a solution.” Dystopian movies let us look at theproblems we have right now, but they also give us thathope that there’s a solution. 6

1975 - The Oil Crisis collapses American government.Mr. President named dictator for life. (DEATH RACE 2000)

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INTERSTELLAR And The Ever-Evolving

Mind OfChristopher Nolan

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INERSELLAR opens shortly and alreadymoviegoers are noticing a shift from the acclaimedauteur that brought a gritty Batman back to thescreen. railers for the upcoming film starringMatthew McConaughey have been less brooding, andmore inspiring. Akin to something Steven Spielbergmight have made in the '80s. A marked change fromthe films that Nolan started out making.

Tere has been a darkness in the hearts of charactersthat populated Christopher Nolan's films in thepast. His first feature-length film, FOLLOWING,involved the tale of a man who breaks into homes.He doesn’t need the money; he does it because hehas no life of his own. A man so desperate for ameaningful moment, he must steal them from others.(A reflection on movie audiences, perhaps?)

Passive audiences have always vied to see morallyambivalent protagonists act on the darker impulses

we all have. Yet most successful directors today cannot

play on those impulses too often without losingfollowers. Nolan is a director who has toyed withsuch themes without losing his audience, drawingcomparisons to another noted and respected auteur,Stanley Kubrick. Kubrick remained at an arm's lengthfrom the characters he depicted, coolly detached

while harboring a sense of dread for the aftermath.Kubrick could afford to be distant with protagoniststo show their faults and those of society, but he didn't

work in the box-office dominated society that Nolan works in, nor was he afforded the big budgets Nolangets to play with.

Despite the bigger budgets and the current moviestudio system, Nolan’s second film MEMENO alsoends with the audience questioning the morality ofits central character. Leonard is free of his puppetmaster, but where does a man constantly seekingrevenge with an anterograde memory disorder go? Ifhe can convince himself of eddy’s guilt, what otherhellish scenarios see themselves played out by theman with no memory? Cross him the wrong way andLeonard Shelby’s name becomes synonymous withmore frightening characters like Anthony Hopkin’sHannibal Lecter or Heath Ledger’s Joker.

Heroes and villains are not as clearly defined inChristopher Nolan’s universe. INSOMNIA took onthe physical toll that a morally ambiguous cop faces

when his past catches up with him. When DetectiveDormer (Al Pacino) kills his partner in a haze-fueledaccident, the pain eats at him constantly, but WalterFinch considers the event in a different light: murderis nothing more than a slight in judgment. Tese menare protagonist and antagonist, respectively, yet theline is drawn thinly between them.

Let us not forget that Nolan’s most popular filmsrely on a man split between his obligation to a citythat took his parents, and an urge to simply letit die. Bruce Wayne is known by all and no one.Bruce Wayne is Batman; the actions he takes as amasked avenger are not separate of the man, ratheran extension of him. He is a mask himself. Tis isfitting given that, as much as Bruce thinks he knowsGotham, the city pulls away from him time after time.

Bruce believes his alter ego to be the savior to a citythat is actively killing him. Batman is drawn a heroand villain in the eyes of Gotham, but he never takesa defined stance. Utilizing tactics like tapping all ofthe cities’ phones to stop a terrorist is not that farfrom becoming a criminal.

As anguished a character as Batman is, the darkestentry into Nolan’s filmography must be HEPRESIGE. HE PRESIGE introduces a conflictof morality to its audience following the reveal ofTe Great Danton’s last magic act. A man who could

brutally murder himself in perpetuity possesses eitherone of the world’s most firm grasps on an afterlife, ora devilish malice that cannot bear comprehension.

With Angier’s belief in God crystallized by this quote:“... the audience knows the truth, that the world issimple. Miserable. Solid all the way through. But ifyou could fool them, even for a second, you couldmake them wonder. Ten you got to see somethingvery special.” Tat Te Great Danton was willing togo to such monstrous lengths for the entertainment ofsome marks him as potentially the darkest characterdepicted in Nolan's works.

Yet 2010 may have marked a transition for the director.INCEPION's lead, Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) isa man trapped inside of his own guilt, destined tolive the same events over and over, but he is at hearta man hoping to reunite his family too. Cobb, likethe aforementioned characters, is not heroic by anymeans, but his motives are far more pure.

INCEPION is not a one-off portrayal of a morehopeful protagonist; the transition continued into2012's HE DARK KNIGH RISES. As theminutes dwindled until the closing of RISES, many

fans held their breath awaiting the moment thatBatman would die. In a move that surprised some,Nolan chose to redeem Batman/Bruce Wayne andallow him to leave the city as the hero "it deserved."Commemorated in city hall, Bruce can walk awayfrom the darkness and finally live the life his parentsalways wanted for him.

Tis growing sense of optimism marks a move awayfrom the antiheroes of MEMENO to the morenoble protagonists of INCEPION and the

1995 - Following a staged terrorist attack that kills the president and most of Congress,theocratic dictatorship Sons of Jacob seizes control of America. (THE HANDMAID'S TALE)

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upcoming INERSELLAR. Could this mood shiftmean that Nolan is switching from his Kubrick modeto something more Spielbergian? Te central missionof INERSELLAR focuses on a team journeyingthrough a worm hole in search of finding a planet

where plant growth can be sustained. In the futureestablished in Nolan's upcoming film, Earth has takena devastating blow over the years, but there still liespromise in the stars above. Te tone indicated in thetrailer suggests a more hopeful mood than previousfilms. McConaughey's Cooper resembles the kind ofspirited lead that hasn't been seen in Nolan's previous

works. Despite the chaos present in a world ravagedby natural disasters, Cooper sees the possibilities of abetter future.

Whether this tonal change is merely temporaryor a conscious shift will have to be seen in futureefforts, but it is an exciting forecast. And Nolanisn't just evolving in tone, but in terms of scopeand ambition as well. Christopher Nolan is set oncreating cinematic wonders that can't be recreatedon a 70-inch television screen in living rooms, andin doing so he may bring about a renaissance in

theatre attendance. In an op-ed regarding the futureof cinema Nolan penned for the WALL SREE

JOURNAL, it appears that optimism isn't justcontained to his latest releases, but the future ofcinema itself.

“Te public will lay down their money to those studios,theaters and filmmakers who value the theatricalexperience and create a new distinction from homeentertainment that will enthrall...” Nolan writes. So

when news broke that Nolan would be attaching acamera to a Lear jet to fly into the stratosphere forINERSELLAR, fans just nodded and said, "Ofcourse."

Evolution is a necessity in filmmaking and if one wants to keep innovating, they need to shift out oftheir comfort zones. Tis kind of experimentationbacked with multi-hundred million dollar budgetingis a rarity in modern Hollywood, but with the box-office track record Christopher Nolan has, that luxurygives him a lot of leeway. Such leeway may lead tosomething truly special, and I can't wait to see itunfold inside of my local theatre. 6

2005 - El Paso and Abilene Texas are nuked, starting WWIIIand throwing the US into chaos. (SOUTHLAND TALES)

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Drafthouse Recommends:BIRDMAN

We devised the “Drafthouse Recommends” banner tohighlight exciting, innovative and downright amazingfilms and share them with all of you. When I first watched the BIRDMAN trailer, goosebumps randown my spine, and I felt sure we would be chasing it

for this series. From the trailer alone you can clearlysense the scale, the craft and the rhythm of a trulyoriginal film. A great trailer, and this most certainly is,can completely captivate you without divulging toomuch about the actual narrative. Even after watchingthe film, I’m still not quite sure whether I witnessed amagical realism fable or was viewing fantasies throughthe eyes of a central character who is losing his mind.

I had the pleasure of catching up with AlejandroGonzalez Iñarritu’s BIRDMAN at this year’s ellurideFilm Festival where it received nearly unanimous

praise. BIRDMAN will almost surely be nominatedfor best picture this year, but it is even more of a lockfor a myriad of technical nominations. A handful ofstaggeringly long takes are cleverly stitched togetherto appear as if almost the entire film is one long take.Legendary cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezkideveloped this technique while shooting CHILDRENOF MEN but elevates it to new levels in BIRDMAN.Lubezki also shot the dizzyingly kinetic GRAVIYand employs many of those same techniques here.Instead of swerving through the vastness of space,however, we careen through the narrow hallways anddressing rooms of New York’s St. James Teater.

Michael Keaton, in a role that quite likely was writtenspecifically for him, plays a washed-up superherofranchise celebrity who is desperately attemptingto rekindle his career and garner respect from theindustry by writing, directing and starring in a vanityBroadway production of Raymond Carver’s WHA

WE ALK ABOU WHEN WE ALK ABOULOVE. Keaton’s performance is stunning throughout.Bobbing and weaving between Hollywood satire, old-fashioned screwball comedy and Russian absurdism,

Keaton still manages to flesh out a wonderfully richcharacter in the vice of mounting stress and deepinsecurities. Layered on top of all that, in the nooks,crannies and fleeting periphery of the frame, Iñarritugives us deconstructed glimpses into the craft of

mounting a Hollywood film.

Tere’s SO MUCH going on, blistering dialogue andso many interwoven stories and visual gags that whenthe credits rolled I felt utterly drained; happy butdrained. One sign of a great film is leaving the theater

wanting to immediately watch it again. I was trying sohard to keep a mental grasp on the dizzying technicalmarvel that was careening in front of me that I don’tfeel I gave the underlying narrative themes enoughtime to fully gestate. I’ll focus there for my secondand possibly third viewing.

BIRDMAN is one of the most visually stunning andtechnically accomplished feats of filmmaking I’veseen in a long, long while. Funny, complex, rivetingand utterly unique, BIRDMAN fits squarely in the

“Drafthouse Recommends” canon and we are honoredto share it with you. 6

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Breaking Baymax:How Disney Animation

Found The Story OfBIG HERO 6

2017 - America has become a police state after the gloabl economy bottoms out.People are kept placated by violent reality shows on TV. (RUNNING MAN)



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“he first screening is always a disaster. Every time.”

Robert Baird, co-writer of Disney Animation’ssuperhero cartoon BIG HERO 6, has worked at

Disney and Pixar long enough to have attendedhis share of disastrous first screenings of animated

movies. “I’ve never worked on a movie where it wasright the f irst time.”

But that’s okay, as it’s part of the system that bringsanimated films to theaters, a system that is so

unlike live action filmmaking some of the greatest

animation filmmakers have a hard time crossing over.

he system perfected by Walt Disney himself in the1930s is one of continuing, massive failure, a system

that can take years to achieve a finished film.

When they say the first screening is a disaster, it’s

truly a horrible mess. Even FROZEN, the latest

classic in the Disney canon, stunk up the screening

room the first time through. It was so bad that Headof Story Paul Briggs (who was also Head of Story on

BIG HERO 6) was absolutely disheartened. “It was

terrible,” he says. “I didn’t want to work on it.”

Every Disney Animation film goes through a process

that everyone involved calls ‘iterative,’ a multi-year

effort that’s filled with false starts and bad choices.

But they all begin with one core idea, and in thecase of BIG HERO 6, that core idea was a boy andhis robot.

echnically BIG HERO 6 adapts a little-knownMarvel comic, but the truth is that director DonHall took only the title and character names from thebook, leaving almost everything else behind. It wasthat boy, Hiro, and his robot, Baymax, that seemedto be the starting place for a movie.

“When Don first pitched this idea there wassomething at its core, this story of a boy whoexperiences a loss and gets through it with the helpof his robot,” says Chris Williams, co-director ofBIG HERO 6. “hat’s where you start, and then you

get this group of people and embark on a journey ofyears to develop the story.”

he standard version of Hollywood screenwriting

is a tortured guy typing away on his own (or in a

Starbucks), but the animated process is very different.

“It’s more like writing a V show. People sitting in

a room talking for months and months,” says Baird.

hose people are the story team -- the studio’s stable

of directors and writers and, every now and again,

John Lasseter, the Chief Creative Officer of Pixar and

Disney Animation, himself.

Set in the fictional futuristic mash-up city of San Fransokyo, BIG HERO 6 sees Disney Animation dipping intothe Marvel Comics catalogue to tell the story of a boy, his robot and the superhero team they assemble to battle ananomachine menace.

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2043 - Crime-riddled hellhole Detroit is saved by the OCP corporation, who takeover the police department and plan building a New Detroit. (ROBOCOP)

hat group sits in a room and begins hashing themovie out, using the core concept as a starting point.he first problem they have to solve, according toBaird, is answering one question: “What is this movieabout? Not plot-wise, but what are we trying to say?”

hose initial meetings go on for a long time. Ideasare put on a white board and everybody sits aroundthe table and argues. And fights. Fists get pounded

on tables. Voices get raised. he story team will breakfor lunch and dinner at the studio commissary andbe friendly and then return to the conference roomand start yelling at each other again. Eventually therest of the building empties out, leaving the storyteam alone in the conference room, yelling at eachother. hey have to take what they call ‘bio-breaks’

just to keep their bodies functioning. All the whilethe group marinates in its own smell. “I describe it asgamey,” says Briggs.

Eventually those ideas on the whiteboard becomestory beats. hose beats become a thirty-page

treatment. And all along the way the team has tomeet with Lasseter. “At regular intervals you have topitch to John,” says Baird. “Nothing motivates likethat fear.”

With Lasseter’s guidance (“Story is king” is theLasseterism most quoted in the halls of Disney

Animation), that treatment becomes a script. Atthis point it isn’t just writers toiling away on anearly, doomed version of the movie; down the hallstoryboard artists are churning out heroic amountsof work while the art department is looking at the

basic story beats and trying to design characters andthe world. he writers will break the film down intothirty sequences and give them to the storyboardartists, who will create thousands of images for eachsequence. “It’s crazy to see all the work,” says Baird.

“And they do it so FAS.”

After about a year there’s a script. In the case of BIGHERO 6 that first script came in around 135 pages; with an industry standard of one script page equalingone minute of screentime that would have been atwo hour long cartoon -- way too long. hat script

was cul led down to about 85 pages, losing tons of

characters, details and small moments.

he storyboards for that script -- tens of thousands ofthem -- are assembled into a rough approximation ofthe movie, and the story team gets to work recordinga temporary vocal track. he writers and artiststhemselves will play the parts for this f irst version ofthe movie -- and sometimes they’ll find themselvessticking in the roles all the way through the end ofthe process. Co-director Chris Williams ended upplaying the role of Oaken in the final version ofFROZEN, for example.

hat’s what is shown to an audience of about ahundred co-workers and trusted friends. Everybodyends up hating it. “You come out of those screeningsand maybe 1 or 2 things will survive,” says Baird.

“housands of drawings in the garbage. Hundredpages of script in the garbage.”

“We work in an environment where we can screento John Lasseter, to the other directors, to the story

trust, and get feedback,” says Williams. “We haveto be very good about knowing what our movieis, what it’s going to be, what the strengths and weaknesses are -- but at the same time you have tobe able to listen to other points of view, people

who are challenging your assumptions. It’s coming with respect and support and from a place of love,but they will challenge everything about the movie.hrough that, through iteration after iterationafter iteration, the movie finds itself. You find thetone and the personality. hat’s our process. You’reforgiven when it’s not great at first.”

Armed with feedback the story team immediatelyevacuates the Disney lot. he next meeting afterthe first screening happens at an off-site retreat, sothat everybody can yell at each other in a fresh newenvironment. hen it’s back to the whiteboard, thistime with the knowledge of what didn’t work. Itisn’t too different from engineers watching a rocketblow up on the launch pad -- failure offers plenty ofvaluable data.

hat first screening happens about one year into thedevelopment process. here are seven or eight morescreenings over the next two or three years, each anew version of the movie launching from the basiccore concept. Each version brings them closer andcloser to the final product.

he changes over the course of the iterations canbe severe. he movie being released in theaters isquite different from that first screening. Some thingsstay the same, though. “he plot is different, butthe idea of San Fransokyo and a boy and his robot,and the transformation of Baymax from a caring,compassionate nurse robot to this badass, mechedout warrior, are all elements that were in that firstscreening,” says Hall.

Some of the things that are lost find their way backin during the process. In the first version of the filmthe protagonist, a young robotics genius named Hiro,spends his time in illegal back alley bot fighting.

“hat went away for a while, the idea of him wasting his talent with bot fighting,” says Hall.“hat was in the first screening, and then ideaschanged and things came and went, but then

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it made its way back in -- it ended up being a strongcore idea. It just didn’t work in the context of thatfirst screening.”

Other characters were completely altered. he finalversion of Wasabi, the precision laser expert on theteam, is almost 180 degrees from the original take.

“He was originally a zen, blissed out character, moreeven-keeled, and we found that while it worked

as a concept it wasn’t helping him fire off othercharacters,” explains Williams. “We made him abit more of a grounded character, who recognizesbeing a superhero is a crazy idea, made him moreconservative, and all of a sudden other charactersfired off him better.”

“Our screening process allows us to hone in on broadpersonalities of characters before we cast actors,” saysHall, and that element comes fairly late in the game.Producer Roy Conli says, “I do hold off on castingif only because many times we’ve hired early and

the character disappears. Before I lock actors I liketo know we’re invested in the character and keepingthem. It’s really nasty to go to somebody and say,‘Sorry, you’re not in the film.’”

But even when the cast is in place the tinkeringcontinues. he actors bring their own personalitiesto the characters, and things continue to get adjustedup until the last minute. I visited Disney Animationin August and Paul Briggs told me somethingshocking: “Writing stopped literally three weeks ago.”

Live action movies usually begin with a singular

vision that is slowly picked apart during the process,but animation comes at story from a totally differentangle. It’s wholly collaborative, and it involves lots oftalented people spending thousands of hours doing

work that will never go anywhere, that will neverbe seen by anyone, that will end up tossed awayforever. A live action movie might be in developmentfor a year and shoot for a few months -- you couldprobably make three live action films in the time ittook to take BIG HERO 6 from an idea to a releasedfilm. And every step of that process looks likeanother failure -- screenings of FROZEN just a few

months before release were reportedly abysmal.

“You know that screening after screening you’re notmaking an actual movie -- you’re making a platformto see what the movie’s going to be,” says Williams.

“You build a higher and higher platform, but the nicething is that everyone knows these are the tools tofind the movie.”

“It’s hard,” Briggs says. “But I love it. I’m passionateabout it.” 6

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When one body exerts a force on a second body, the second

body simultaneously exerts a force equal in magnitude andopposite in direction on the first body.

-- Isaac Newton, 1687

Newton, in his Tird Law of Motion, neatly describesthe genesis for what the French call la gueule de bois , or

“wooden mouth,” a sensation familiar to lovers of drinkeverywhere upon the coming of the morning, the coindemanded by an infernal piper standing next to yourbed, the throbbing display of, in medical lingo, veisalgia.

Veisalgia, from the Norwegian kvei s or "uneasinessfollowing debauchery" and the Greek algia or “pain;” in

the common tongue, we call it a hangover.

Medical texts describing hangovers list as symptoms:poor sense of overall well-being, headache, sensitivityto light and sound, diarrhea, loss of appetite, trembling,nausea, fatigue, increased heart rate and blood pressure,dehydration (dry mouth, extreme thirst, dry eyes),trouble concentrating, anxiety and difficulty sleeping.o some extent, these symptoms are inevitable if youdrink -- the consumption of about four alcoholicbeverages causes increased urination to the tune of upto a quart over your normal, and puts you well on the

way to dehydration. So the question becomes: what can

be done to mitigate a hangover, because if you drink toexcess, the very way your body processes alcohol is goingto make you feel at least a little bit off the next day.

Given the amount of money that could be made bysolving the problem, there is a shockingly small amountof formal research into what causes hangovers. But wedo know that the morning after a bender, the bodydesperately tells the brain, “NEED WAER. NOW.”Te brain responds by drying out your mouth and therest of your body steals water from the brain, causing

the brain to shrink in size and pull on the membranes

that connect the brain to the skull. At the same time,the blood vessels in your head expand, and all thisleads to the familiar morning after headache. Frequenturination while drinking has also depleted the body’sstores of sodium and potassium, exacerbating theheadache and causing fatigue and nausea.

Alcohol also breaks down the body's store of glycogenin the liver, converting it into glucose and passingit from your system through urination, leading to weakness, more fatigue and decreased coordination.Drinking to excess also depletes your stores of

magnesium, another electrolyte responsible for propercell function.

One of the other byproducts of the liver metabolizingalcohol is the creation of acetaldehyde, a substancemore toxic than alcohol. When alcohol is consumedin moderation, acetaldehyde dehydrogenase andglutathione quickly attack the acetaldehyde and turnit into the nontoxic acetate, but the liver’s store ofglutathione is quickly used up when the bottle is hitharder, leading to acetaldehyde build up in the body.Symptoms of acetaldehyde toxicity include severeheadache and vomiting, a symptom familiar to anyone

who has been over served. And, bad news for women-- you naturally produce less glutathione than men, soyou’re at more risk for more severe hangovers. As youcontinue to drink -- or pass out -- your body entersa state called glutamine rebound. Glutamine is acomponent of glutathione, and, in simple terms, is anatural stimulant. After a night of drinking, you sufferfrom sleep deprivation because the body is churningout replacement glutamine and, in the process,stimulating the brain. Te excessive stimulant

Hair Of The Dog And Other Hangover

Myths Debunked

2274 - In order to keep population and resource usage under control, babies can only be bornafter older people die. At age 30 you are sent to Carousel, and to execution. (LOGAN'S RUN)

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BILL NORRISAlamo Drafthouse Beverage Director


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production not only leads to fatigue, but can causestomach irritation and a general sense of illness, similarto what happens when you consume too much caffeine.In severe cases, glutamine rebound can lead to tremors,anxiety, restlessness and increased blood pressure.

Folk remedies abound to treat hangovers, and manyof them actually have some benefit, but some of themost common don’t help at all, and may even hinder

your return to the living. Hair of the Dog, often inthe form of a Bloody Mary, is an oft cited cure, andis -- to a point -- a bad idea. Te consumption of morealcohol won’t fix a hangover; it will only delay its onsetand increase its severity and the acid in tomato juicecan contribute to further stomach irritation. But, thevitamins, electrolytes and, most critically, the salt ina typical Bloody mix can be helpful. A Virgin Mary

would be more helpful.

Tings that are actually helpful the morning after targetthe body’s response to processing alcohol. Eating eggsprovides a protein boost that targets your fatigue, but

eggs also contain cysteine, which helps to breakdownany of the toxic acetaldehyde that’s hanging around.Bananas, kiwi fruit and other potassium rich foodsor sports drinks can boost depleted electrolyte levels.Generally replenishing water and eating salty foods cando the same. Te fructose in fruit juice boosts energyand can help the body speed the process of removingtoxins, while boosting the vitamins depleted the nightbefore. For the same reason, multi-supplements high inC and B vitamins can also be of use. A fruit smoothieis also a good idea.

Coffee is a complicated thing, because caffeine is avasoconstrictor, and that helps with headaches, butit is also a diuretic, which can increase dehydration.Fatty foods, while a very good idea the night beforeas they slow alcohol absorption, can actually furtherirritate the lining of the stomach when you’re dealing

with a hangover.

Painkillers are even more complicated. Excedrin is offcited as a remedy, and because it has caffeine, it willreduce the pounding in your head, but it also containsacetaminophen, which is hugely problematic because itis massively toxic when combined with alcohol, leadingto severe liver and kidney damage. For the same reason,ylenol is to be avoided.

Aspirin, however, is a prostaglandin inhibitor, and high

levels of prostaglandin have been linked to increasedhangover severity. Aspirin is particularly effectiveif taken before bed, but get the stuff with a coating,because aspirin can tear up your stomach. Stomachissues also limit ibuprofen, which has been linked tostomach tears when combined with alcohol.

Te good news is that for light to moderate drinkers(up to three drinks a day for men or one drink a day for women), it’s going to take about 5-7 cocktails downedover the course of an evening to create a major hangover.But beyond not getting wasted, there are other thingsthat can increase a hangover’s power: drinking on an

empty stomach, lack of sleep, lots of physical activity while drinking and being dehydrated before you startimbibing will all lay the whammy down the next day.So eat a solid meal before drinking, drink about 8ounces of water for every alcoholic beverage and easeoff on the booze when you’re shaking your booty at theclub. You’ll thank yourself in the morning. 6

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Video Vortex:This Is The DROID You're Looking For

@annietown

ANNIE CHOIBleeding Skull Contributor and Author of SHUT UP, YOU’RE WELCOME


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DROID begins with a shot of stars zooming in space, which can only mean one thing: an opening text crawlà la SAR WARS:

“In the beginning, the Dominants left Earth, leavingbehind a depraved, violent society, to be policed byleather clad maniacal androids called REFORMERS.

When the theft of a SYSEM decoder occured [sic],an ELIMINAOR was brought in, a cop they called

AYLOR. No more than a hired assassin,”

And that’s it. It cuts off right there and ends with acomma because fuck English and its arcane rules. It’sa shame the prologue is cut short because it’s the onlyclue about what goes on in this movie. We need all thehelp we can get.

It’s Los Angeles, 2020 A.D. Te future looks exactlylike 1988: gold lamé skirts, big hair, obvious eyeshadowand pleather jackets with too many zippers (meaningmore than one). aylor, a grizzled cop with a light-to-moderate mullet, walks into a nightclub called the

Pleasure Dome. Te patrons are a ragtag bunch: there’sa geisha, a white dude dressed up like a samurai anda little man with a Pee Wee Herman dummy on hisshoulder. Everyone wears sunglasses indoors becausethis is 2020 A.D. At some point, a stripper in anEgyptian headdress emerges from a sarcophagus andflashes some beaver. In other words, this is the greatestbar in the galaxy -- better than that bullshit cantina inSAR WARS.

Te R eformers are androids with black helmets andblack masks with flashing lights for eyes. It’s unclear

what Reformers do exactly, but it does involves stagefog. One Reformer steals something. I’m guessing it’sthe “system decoder” as discussed in the prologue? Idon’t know and I don’t care because there’s only onething you need to know about this movie: aylor hasa personal android named Rochester. He’s a flagrantC-3PO knockoff, meaning that he’s uptight and prissy.He wears a red jumpsuit and a beanie.

aylor is on the case to get back the system decoder.Tis is done by hanging out in a bar and watchingtopless women dance. Tis is also done by lookingsadly at a photograph and hassling a guy in a sparkly

turban. Tis is also done by voiceover. aylor narratesthe movie occasionally, in a faux noir style: “Tere Igo getting all emotional, just when I thought I hadforgotten about her.” It’s not nearly as goofy as thenarration in BLOOD HUNGER, but it’s still welcome.(Wouldn’t you know it, Even Steven Productionsdistributed both movies.)

Director Philip O’oole (who is credited as Peter Williams) has written and edited a long string of adultfilms -- DROID is actually a porno called CABARESIN and the sexy times were cut out just so it could be

sold to sci-fi fans. Tis fact simultaneously explains alot and very little. While the plot is incoherent and attimes repetitive, the entire concept is magnetic. LikeCARDS OF DEAH, it’s a vortex of ideas, ambition,disassociating visuals and New Wave costumes.DROID has so much to offer, from boobs to lasers,from trashy lingerie to Asian news footage. Te stripperinterludes are lengthy and plentiful, and there’s even aflash of peen. Also, there’s a spaceship. DROID is what

happens when a porn director gets inspired by SAR WARS and BLADE RUNNER, but only has $5. If youlove SAR WARS, then you’ll love DROID!

Te soundtrack is just as good as the movie. It’simpossibly great -- a cannibalization of Te Normal,Billy Ocean and Annie Lennox. All your favorites.

Whenever there’s an Asian on screen, there’s “oriental”music, or what I call “ching-chong music.” Tere’s alsoan abuse of orchestra hits that does not go unnoticed.Te music is by a band called Cinema Symphony’s [sic].

When you boil it down, DROID is real ly about

four things:

- A mullet nursing a broken heart- A girl smoking a cigarette- A neon sign that says “pleasure”- A disco ball

In other words, it has everything you need.

DROID screens as part of Video Vortex in September atthe Alamo Drafthouse.

o plunge further into the madness of SOV trash-horror,

check out BLEEDING SKULL! A 1980s RASH-HORROR ODYSSEY (Headpress, 2013), co-authoredand designed by Joseph A. Ziemba. Te book isavailable at BLEEDINGSKULL.COM. 6

2300s - America is a liberal police state, run by adictator who has a nefarious plan. (SLEEPER)

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Why Don’t You Play InMovies? The Absurdity And Sincerity OfSion Sono

@kidblue

NOAH SEGAN

Badass Digest Contributor

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Te skinny Japanese guy in the wide-collared shirt andfedora smiled at me. He was sucking down cigarettes ina single pull, his lived-in teeth grinning as he drank mycheap whiskey in my East Hollywood flat. He motionedaround my living room, a shrine to the ‘70s AmericanNew Wave cowboys who influence my every move.

Posters of Warren Oates' films, Peckinpah's, MonteHellman's, line my walls. Te fellow on my couch waved his hands in reverence to the art. He looked atme and squinted, poking me in the chest. "You. WarrenOates." My guest didn't speak English. He thumpedhis own chest. "Me. Sam Peckinpah." Now I knew how

Jane felt. I swooned. Like the royalty he was, the guymotioned with his hand around my living room. "Me,Peckinpah. You, Oates." I liked where this was going.One of the greatest living filmmakers was comparing ourblossoming friendship to one of the most magical lovestories in cinema. "Me. Sam Peckinpah. You. WarrenOates." he repeated, again and again. Finally, he leanedin real close, breathing smoke and liquor at me likea fucking dragon. I waited. A few heavy beats passedbefore Sion Sono grinned wide at me and finished hisdiatribe. He said, "You. You fuck Warren Oates."

Who knows what the man meant with his brokenEnglish? Coming from him, it could feasibly be literal, acommand to put up or shut up with my hipster zeitgeistbullshit. I like movies about existential masculinearchety pes attempting to reconcile themselves in themodern world. I like Sion Sono movies. So fuck ‘em.

From a gonzo professor of cinema, there’s really nothingmore counter-culture than meaning it for real. I’dmet Sono when he was casting his English-languagedebut, which has yet to be made. Tat was a few yearsago. Already a huge fan of his, I knew he'd previouslymade a film with English in it, HAZARD. It had been

lost to the annals of no-budget, limited-distributionfilmmaking that is commonplace these days. Luckily,Sono's prolificness belies the occasionally overlookedpiece. As a cinephile, there are fewer joys than finding afilmmaker whose oeuvre is so extensive, so varied, thatyou'll be stuck to your couch for ages, tracking downPAL and region-free videos. While many of us knowSono's work through his breakout, SUICIDE CLUB,his films range from guerrilla (HAZARD) to sheer epics(LOVE EXPOSURE) to psychological character studies(COLD FISH). He often matches the absurdity andbiting sincerity of other master filmmakers, whether theybe Korine, Von rier or Hitchcock. His commitment tothe surreal state of man, a punk rock responsibility, also

jibes with arantino, Te Coens and a true maestro, LuisBuñuel. When he showed up in Hollywood to meet with a bunch of snotty, snooty, snickering young actors,I put on my best sneer and held on tight to his coattails.Ever the gentleman, Sono let me drive him around todive bars and underground clubs a few times.

I haven't seen Sion in a few years. Tank goodness hekeeps making films, at the breakneck pace of about onea year. In that respect, he's just like Woody. Even though

2600 - Humanity is kept under control through drugs,conformity and constant surveillance. (THX-1138)






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he's made a film about a teenager with a never-endingerection, he's far less of a lech. His latest release, WHYDON' YOU PLAY IN HELL?, is his verse in theongoing eulogy to 35mm filmmaking. As his peers buyrevival movie theaters and staunchly commit to onlyscreen celluloid, write open letters to Kodak and shootblockbusters on film, Sono's flick is genuinely aboutthe protracted death of 35mm. Sono has managed toviscerally illustrate the end of an era, to make the death

of 35mm a real thing, spraying its blood and guts allover us. WHY DON' YOU PLAY IN HELL? never

wavers from its humor, rooted in the Sisyphean taskof making movies. Sono's film sets up that bygone era

where gumption and idealism were the hottest fuel wecould burn to shoot a flick. It fast forwards to thesedays, when his movie team of cinematic cowboys, notso much wannabes as never-beens, finally get their shot,days late and many dollars short. In a Faustian bargainto beat them all, there's a catch. Tey're working for theyakuza, and their dream of a cinematic melee becomes a wake-up call.

From the metaphor of the mob to the actual blood onthe lens, Sono wants us to believe that making filmsis a violent, illogical and largely futile endeavor. Itis. It rarely succeeds. Most flicks that get made verygenuinely suck. For a film to be good is the rarest,trumped only by its finding an audience. It begins ina time when shooting a movie, on film, was the signof success. In the world of independent cinema, justrolling a camera is considered a victory. After all thoseyears of finding a story you want to tell, making friendsyou want to work with, scrounging together a budgetand having to rebuild each of them as they perpetuallyfall apart, just getting on a set is often the top of themountain. Tese days, it's still next to impossible, butinfinitely easier in the Internet and echnology Age.Purposefully or not, Sono has gone meta. Te movie'sgot its watchers, and we get the benefit of viewing boththe process and its bloody conclusion, in which we,gleefully, are complacent. WHY DON’ YOU PLAYIN HELL? is both the chicken and the egg. We don’tknow whether art is imitating life or reality has actuallybecome a cinematic bloodbath. WHY DON’ YOUPLAY IN HELL? may lament these twilight days ofcelluloid, and yet it never wavers in its optimism. Film

production as we know it may be in cardiac arrest, butthe rhythm of the film defibrillates over and over. Ourheroes succeed, an era late and many yen short, theymanage to not just shoot a flick, but do so in spite oftheir circumstances. Sono’s thesis applies to the smallestindie all the way to the studio system, with the caveatthat we still couldn’t expect a mainstream institution toallow for this much viscera.

Te last time I saw Sono was at a screening of his films,a small retrospective here in Hollywood. It was packed,appropriately, and a small group of the programmers,producers and distributors ended up at Canter’s Deli. It

was late at the overhead-lit Jewish diner, and Sono drankHeineken while eating a plate of free pickles. He had atranslator with him, but outside of a random business-person or press inquiry, she didn’t have much to do. He’dlook over at me and smile with his mouth closed, maybe

make a head motion to something I couldn’t place. Likethe rare few of his ilk, it was apparent that even in hisnatural habitat, without cultural or linguistic limitations,he was an observer. He took it in, with the overt duty to

judge it, to spit it back out, because that’s his gig. I wasprobably staring at him, the least qualified person at thetable. Just a fan, puppy-eyed and hang-dogging. owardsthe end of the night, after more than more beers, Sonoended up standing on the booth bench, still wearing hishat and sunglasses. He shook a bottle at me and told thetable, “Noah Segan. Sex cowboy.” It’d be nice to let thatbe an ego trip, a statement of truth, like being knighted.

But it wasn’t. It was a mandate. Like his moviesthemselves, Sono shouted what he wanted, not exclusiveto what he saw. With his most recent film, he does thesame. Am I a “Sex Cowboy”? Of course he is. You knewthat. Te story and characters in WHY DON’ YOUPLAY IN HELL? are movies and filmmakers. But justlike Te Author, the film isn’t about what it is, but whatit will continue to be. As 35mm exits its cell and walksthe green mile, Sion Sono’s latest film stands not as a lastmeal or final statement, but as the executioner itself. Itmay die, but it'll take you with it. 6




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