Midnight Movie (2008) and A Cat in the Brain (1990)

Today let’s take a look at the perils, both to yourself and others, of making horror movies.

Midnight Movie is an enjoyable chiller that has ambitions beyond its director’s and writer’s current capabilities. Jack Messitt (director, co-writer) and Mark Garbett (co-writer) have attempted something a little unusual, which earns them a lot more credit than just hacking out a remake of some 1970s cow cookie that was overrated then and is practically unwatchable now.

Back in the day, actor/writer/producer/director Ted Radford shot a horror movie that is something of a cult item now called “The Dark Beneath,” and it drove him mad. The movie has been sitting on the shelf collecting dust for 40 years, and Radford has been in an asylum doing pretty much the same thing. It seems that watching his cinematic masterpiece makes him do unpleasant things, especially to people who are made out of meat. One night, a well-meaning psychiatrist runs the film for him and, well, let’s just say that the hospital is suddenly in the market for a new night staff.

Eight years later a neighborhood theater decides to screen “The Dark Beneath” as a midnight movie and every few scenes the movie killer, portrayed by Radford, somehow manages to step out of the picture and into the theater. Think of it as Sherlock, Jr. meets The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.

It’s a clever gimmick that never quit crosses over into a genuinely frightening experience, but it does generate some legitimate suspense and goes all batshit nuts during the last reel. You won’t love it, but you won’t go hunting for whomever recommended it to you, either.

Where Midnight Movie is a mostly serious attempt to be a spookshow about fictional horrors coming to life, A Cat in the Brain toys with the notion that directors who make these films might be a little touched to begin with.

There are actually people who claim to take Lucio Fulci’s A Cat in the Brain (Un gatto nel cervello, 1990) seriously. They see it as a statement about the nature of success in art, but you know what I think? I think it’s just Fulci jabbing an elbow into the ribs of people who have to find serious messages in gore-horror because to do so makes viewing it acceptable. Just look at that title: Fulci, who co-wrote the script with John Fitzsimmons, Giovanni Simonelli and Antonio Tentori, is making a joke at the expense of Dr. Seuss.

Fulci frequently popped up in cameos in his films, but this is the only one in which he starred. He plays Lucio Fulci, a director of gore-horror movies who is beginning to suspect that his preoccupation with sex and violence is causing him to lose his mind, and is turning him into one of the serial killers who inhabit his movies.  He goes to a psychiatrist for help and we quickly learn that the head shrinker has been driven mad by watching his patient’s films, and he is the killer who hypnotizes Fulci into blaming himself.

It’s the ultimate giallo plot and, no, it can’t be taken seriously.  As Fulci tries to finish his latest film, which apparently is the film we are watching, he frequently hallucinates moments not only from his own pictures, but also from those of other directors who work in the same genre. Much of this movie is a mash up of gory death scenes from other gialli.

So why don’t I think this is all commentary on art overtaking nature, or nature overtaking art, or the painfulness of a director becoming so associated with a certain kind of movie he can’t escape it? A couple of reasons. At one point the psychiatrist tells Fulci that the old idea of violent entertainment leading to violence in real life has been discredited.  And he’s grinning like a madman when he says it. Also, the movie ends with an act that would tend to support that interpretation, until a second ending tags along that makes you mumble, “Are you f***ing kidding me?” a question Fulci answers with a gleeful, “Sure am.”

So I suspect a serious reading of the film is naïve, but something we can all agree on is that the production values are strictly from hunger. This is a low, low budget movie, and every negative cent of it is clearly up there on the screen.  Fulci once complained that the only difference between his films and those of Dario Argento was budget. Ah, maybe not, but this is obviously a production that would have to move up to a better neighborhood to be on Poverty Row.

So if your passion for horror movies scratches away like a cat in your brain, fix up a little steak tartar and red wine, and here’s just the picture for you. But if you’ve never sampled Fulci and you’d rather start with one of his better efforts, check out Paura nella citta dei morti viventi (City of the Living Dead, 1980) or E tu vivrai nel terrore – L’aldila (The Beyond, 1981). Stare in guardia, bambini.