THE COMPANY OF WOLVES - Feverish 80s teen imagines her induction into 'dulthood coutesy of a fable spinning Angela Lansbury. I've seen this before, but have disregarded it until now - too drunk, too dismissive of anything that wasn't really vicious etc. Now, I like it. I like the whole storybook scene, the constant dropping of not-so-cryptic cyphers (frogs, snakes, rotted out big toys and overgrown mushrooms populate from shot to shot) and of course the overspilling of men into wolves via eighties special fx. Above all, I think it works cinematically because of the suffocating fairytale atmosphere... mist enshrouded woodland scene is vivid and predominant. The idea sold - ie. that we're all "hairy inside", that the wolf isn't so much a figure of male terror to be feared by young girls as something society positions to make us contain and suppress of the agency and flux of power within us all is true but dealt with heavy-handedly (at the end). 'The Company of Wolves' was co-authored by the brilliant Angela Carter, an exceptional writer whose fictions I recommend way beyond this film.
HENRY - PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER - A re-watch of this classic of eighties dark cinema. It really is as relentless as I remember it, a cool, disengaged rendering of the wanderings of a stone cold killer. Despite the sub-zero atmosphere, it somehow humanises, enough to dash the hopes it raises towards the end. The camcorder rendering of the house invasion is truly disturbing. A triumph of indie-horror.
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