Night Terrors

Posted By:	The Boneman
Posted On:	Fri Jul 25th, 2008

This one is dedicated to the memory of St. George Carlin. His albums were the soundtrack to my adolescence and, next to Richard Pryor, he was the second greatest stand-up comic of all time. His passing brought with it the sobering realization that more and more the heroes of my generation are the ones turning up on the bucket list. Pink Floyd's floundering founder Syd Barrett, The 5th Beatle Billy Preston, the youngest Beatle the other beloved George, and a few months ago Dan Fogelberg. "Dan Fogelberg?" you gasp incredulously, "how gay can you get?" Allow me to explain. True most of his top 40 singles were on the mellow side but, not only could the guy rock, he went 6'5" and a lean 240 - which meant that few people complained about his "excessive mellowness" at least within earshot. For about a decade, say from '75 to '85 Dan was beloved by many a young guitar player. You see, it was all well and good to be able to impress your buddies with a little Zeppelin or Hendrix or Neil Young but, the road to Ladiesville ran right through a sleepy little town called Fogelberg. He got more Mormon boys laid than Elsha. In any case it was a saddening loss for me, and since he only had me by a handful of years it's a little disquieting. I guess cancer felled the gentle giant, but he was far from being an old Fogey.

I've just about decided that the people who die of cancer are the ones who find out they've got it. "Mr. Smith, I'm afraid you've got cancer, but don't worry, we're gonna pump ya full of poison 'til you look like cadaver crap on a cracker and nuke ya 'til your hair falls out. Hey, chin up sport - you've got a couple months, maybe a year if you don't mind agony. The important thing is we caught it when we did, otherwise you might 'never' have found out you were supposed to die." I've also decided that once you pass 50, going to the doctor is a big mistake. Eat a damn apple, because you ain't gonna get any good news from that dude. It just makes me crazy when I start thinking about all the money you have to pay those weasely insurance bloodsuckers. 6,7,8 Hundred dollars a month - just so you don't have to pay out the wazoo if you get wazoo cancer. Why pay for that? Shitely. To be honest, this time around I have to eat my words to some extent. In fact I'm right beholdin' to the medicine men. My Dad just had triple bypass surgery, where they get rid of your old, nasty, clogged-up arteries and replace them with clean ones that they harvest from your leg. There's really no end to the miracles of modern medicine when you have health insurance through your work.

Ah but why dwell on darkness and death when we have such an abundance of life to talk about. I guess everybody's heard something about all these youngsters getting themselves pregnant - on purpose. It seems the once bustling, but now crumbling and faded fishing town of Gloucester Massachusetts (famous as the port where the book and subsequent film "A Perfect Storm" took place) has once again stumbled into the national spotlight -"weather" they like it or not. Oddly, it seems that a pretty good percentage of the female classmates of Gloucester High have offered up their student bodies to some sort of "pregnancy pact." The story broke when it was discovered that 18 girls (some as young as 15) turned up pregnant at about the same time. Or as I call it "The Perfect Stork." That was weak, I know. Sorry George - I can do better than that. Since the whole shebang went down a mere 25 miles from Beantown, how about the "Boston EPT Party." Huh? High five - come on?

Just like everything else, Gloucester High has its own website so I checked it out and laughed to learn that the physical address of the school is 32 L.O. Johnson Rd. (which isn't particularly funny, unless you pronounce it like a British hooker ('ello Johnson!) Even more ironic is the fact that their school mascot is The Trojans. "We are the Trojans, pum pudumpum - Mighty, Mighty Trojans - pum padumpum - If You Run Out, pum pudumpum, We Still Put Out." Evidently the Trojan Hors of the class of 'O8 or '0-vuel-8 decided to go heavy on the mascara and easy on the mascot. They say it's not altogether clear as to the reasons behind what some are calling a shameful tragedy and others, such as Sophomore Richard Handel, are calling the most awesome kegger he's ever heard about.

Actually it's been the media (chiefly Time Magazine who coined the phrase "Pregnancy Pact" - the girls have all denied there was anything spoken that was any more formal than a "piece offering.") In fact local police were skeptical of the "Pact" explanation and thus initially focused their investigation on the School's new Home Ec. instructor Jasper Verdid. "Although some of his new ideas are a little unorthodox, we've found no reason to suspect Jasper of being the 'Leader of the Pact,'" says police detective Jack Hoffman. "In fact we've now shifted our attention toward Homecoming king Rodney Long. Not only is he an all state quarterback with a full ride to BC, but his PlayStation broke and hasn't worked since Mid January. It doesn't look good."

As is always the case whenever something shameful and tragic happens, the media points the finger of blame at Hollywood. In fact several days before news of the strange rash of pregnancies was broadcast nationally, a P.R rep for Matthew McConaughey issued a press release claiming that he'd been filming on location in Mexico for a length of time covering the gestation period of any and all mammals native to the state of Massachusetts and neighboring Connecticut. "I'll be honest with ya," McConaughey drawls lazily, "I make it a point to stay away from states that're s'dang hard to spell. I'm still gettin' the hang of McConaughey - man, that is one tricky handle." Then right on the heals of this move, Disney released a statement making public the fact that the Jonas Brothers are contractually neutered on or before their 13th birthday. After the Jamie Lynn Spears fiasco they had to beef up a few policies. Actually the biggest targets in the media witch hunts were the R rated films Juno and Knocked-Up which they harshly criticized for romanticizing teen pregnancy. Luckily teens have enough savvy to understand that both films were smart and well executed cautionary tales about accepting responsibility for your actions. On a final note, I personally feel that some organization like Planned Parenthood should honor 'Britney' Spears for making teen pregnancy look like a living hell.

Speaking of the mysteries of Hollywood, what on earth has happened to M. Night Shayamalan? The Sixth Sense was such a brilliant film and, though underrated, so was Unbreakable. Most people liked Signs and I pretty much agree, but man - it's gone all to hell since then. I don't know how many of you saw The Village but it was an unmistakable sign that Shamalama ding dong had lost it. The "Village" is surrounded by these woods that are supposed to be haunted to the point that no one has ever ventured within and lived to tell the tale. Basically you're lead to expect some sort of cool Blair Witch kind of thrills. Instead the big money shot is William Hurt bumbling through the trees wearing some kind of cheesy, oversized muskrat costume. Unfortunately for Ron Howard's daughter, Bryce, she is unable to laugh along with the rest of us because she plays a blind person. I didn't see The Lady in the Water (which also starred Bryce Howard) but the scariest thing about 'that' movie was the sadistic beating it received from the critics. So when The Happening came along with its hyped-up "R" rating I was hoping that Night had realized that you have to do more than just put Opey's daughter in some kind of confusing peril to make a good spook film. This one is actually a far funnier film than the Village, and I've seen episodes of Sponge Bob more deserving of an "R" rating. Unless it's suppose to stand for Ridiculous.

The Happening is the first "Green" movie - no doubt the first horror film that will receive high marks for its carbon footprint. I'm not going to worry about spoiling this one, because it's not a horror film, it's a comedy. The premise goes something like this. The bushes, the grass and trees have evidently had it up to their leafy treetops with us reckless, globe-warming humans, so they get together and photosynthesize a plan to stop us humans from ruining the planet . . . and things of that nature. So they simply stop producing the oxygen that we seem to like so much and start producing a gas that makes us want to stab ourselves in the head or jump off a building. Pretty much how I felt after watching the movie. Imagine a small group of terrorized humans running through an open field - just ahead of a pleasant breeze. That's the monster in this movie - a pleasant breeze. I'm not kidding. People flee in horror, screaming and looking over their shoulder to see if the pleasant breeze is gaining on them. Never could it be more accurately stated that a movie blows.

The bottom line is that if you're going to make a movie called The Heist, there should be a bank robbery, or a movie called the Great Escape a daring getaway. Ergo if you make a movie called the Happening, something should. I envision Shamalama late at m. night, pacing in a sweat, tugging his curly locks reading the lyrics to "America the Beautiful" muttering "Purple Mountain Magesties, no no no - that's all wrong. Amber Waves of Grain, hey wait a minute - that's it!"