A round-up of week two of unemployment...
...and days 8-14 of horror
Kia ora koutou
During the past week, my scheduled daily horror viewing has been a bit of a footnote to everything else I’ve had going on.
The highlight of the week was my pilgrimage to Avondale for the 25th annual 24HR Movie Marathon. While we’ve been sworn to secrecy on the lineup itself, I am allowed to disclose that it was an endeavour verging on the spiritual. I have always thought of a cinema as a sort of time machine: what you see, hear and feel in the theatre makes your experience of time completely different to life on the outside. Watching heaps of films back-to-back is like reverse light-speed travel, when you come back to earth, you’ve lived years more than the people you’ve left behind. The brain-melting quality of the marathon may be a poor environment for critically engaging with the films but it transcends that, like an Ayahuasca ceremony for indoor kids.
Shoutout to the whole team, led by Ant Timpson, for their curatorial prowess with a special mention to Matt Timpson who edited outstanding video montages for the pre-show and intermissions.
For those who missed my accounts of the screenings I can talk about, I have newly developed fears of the following:
- Day 8 - structural events robbing me of my free will (Coma, 2022)
- Day 9 - emasculation (The Incredible Shrinking Man, 1957)
- Day 10 - overestimating the psychology of psychopaths (Creepy, 2016)
- Day 11 - being cucked by a magician (The Raven, 1963)
- Day 12 - nuclear annihilation (The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, 1953)
- Day 13 - the liberal-to-fascist pipeline (The Cremator, 1969)
- Day 14 - dead wives/black cats/unscrupulous hypnotists (Tales of Terror, 1962)
In addition to my daily viewing, I am helping organise Sunday’s screening of The Last Sky with Justice for Palestine at 6pm on Sunday, 20 October at the Newtown Community Centre. We are privileged to be joined by Director Nicholas Hanna for a kōrero after the film. I would encourage everyone in Te Whanganui-a-Tara to purchase tickets here.
Ngā mihi nui
Johnny
