Bugs seem to hold a strange fascination for us. Maybe because they do a lot of good for us - like bees and honey. Maybe because they also do us damage - like bees and stinging. Maybe because, like all living things, we share some DNA.
Bugs have great history in the movies - Vincent Price's 1958 The Fly is one of my all-time favorites. Talk about sharing DNA! After Price's performance about his mad-scientist brother slowly becoming a fly, I could never look at a fly again without seeing Price's moustache....
But as much as I love Vincent Price on the screen, I'd much rather look at Ashley Judd. Her new bug movie opens next week. Take a look at those two posters for Bug. The one on the top blends curly hair and insect tendrils into a flowing, turn-of-the-last century art nouveau form. The one below, with its subtle interplay of light and perspective, is an Impressionist's dream.
Horror movies at their best work like dreams - we can allow ourselves to be scared out of our wits about them, because we know they are fantasy ... though perhaps not completely. As Samuel Taylor Coleridge said about poetic faith, we willingly suspend our disbelief....
I have a feeling this bug movie will make it hard for us to scamper back to reality. Here's a trailer...
4 comments:
Dude, i don't know if you watched the same version of The Fly as the rest of us, but.... ;)
:) which one did you watch - the one I think is a great movie is the 1950s version with Vincent Price ... the later version, with Jeff Goldblum, was just ok...
Vincent Price played François, the brother of ill-fated scientist Andre Delambre (played by David (Al) Hedison.
You're right, of course! Thanks for the catch - I've clarified in the text...
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