P. Viktor

Poltergeist Remake

According to a report from Empire Online, the 1982 horror classic Poltergeist is being remade for 'modern audiences'. Poltergeist is possibly one of my favourite horror films, perhaps due to the fact that it was the first film that I saw when I was young that scared me to death (that and the BBC TV special Ghost Watch, but that is a whole other post). The fact that it is being overhauled by a suspect team of writers who apparently wrote some horror film no one saw, Boogeyman (2005), and are also currently working on the equally pointless remake of Hitchcock's The Birds, makes me very uneasy. These remakes are nothing if not irritating - they are cash-cows using the brand name of a successful film and add nothing to the story. At least with The Birds, the Daphne Du Maurier story on which Hitchcock's film is based differs significantly from the film version, so a remake could be warranted if the writers went back to the original source material, but I doubt very much that will happen. It will be no doubt an 'update' based on Hitchcock's film with none of the suspense and none of the artistry.

The same will be expected for Poltergeist, which is a shame really because after the second film (the third one is so awful that it almost doesn't count) there was still enough story left over to warrant another film. I had always thought that a sequel based in modern day with the same actors (apart from Heather O'Rourke, for obvious reasons) all having grown up and grown apart would have been a good idea, but rather carry on the legacy and try and come up with something original the writers/producers look as though they are just going to lazily rehash the same story. Shame really, because although most horror remakes are a total waste of time (The Wickerman, Amityville, Halloween, The Fog) some franchises do have scope for a new film. Take for instance Stephen King's It, by all accounts a horror classic (and originally a TV movie in two parts). Although there are some brilliant moments, usually involving Tim Curry as Pennywise the Clown, the film has a lot of flaws - especially the very poor ending - and with such a long novel that contains a lot of material not used in the eighties production, an excellent remake could be achieved. Perhaps there just isn't enough writing talent in Hollywood at the moment to make this a reality? For now I suppose we just have to accept that sub-standard remakes are a staple at our cinemas for some time to come.

Plath Profiles - A New Online Journal

A new online journal has just been launched called Plath Profiles, described as an 'interdisciplinary journal for Sylvia Plath studies'. An important new direction and rejuvenation of academic work in the field of Plath's poetry, prose and autobiography, it builds on the recent Plath symposiums held at the University of Oxford and Smith College, as well as recent publications such as Anita Helle's The Unravelling Archive and Kathleen Connors/Sally Bayley's Eye Rhymes: Art of the Visual. It promises to be a facinating addition to Plath scholarship, and is free to download. Copies are available from the website by clicking here (pdf).

Website: Plath Profiles

Madonna | The Ranking Challenge - Albums

In celebration of Madonna’s fiftieth birthday today, I finish the challenge to fellow Madonna fans to rank your top five albums, top ten singles, and top ten videos by her Madgesty. Rules are simple; pick your top 5 favourite ‘studio’ albums, your top 10 singles (whether released internationally or not, so Dear Jessie or Spotlight would be included), and your top 10 videos (released singles or promotional); rank them in reverse order; and be as controversial as you want. Leave your rankings in the comments section. So, I shall finish with the top 5 albums. Have fun, and let me know what you think of my ranking! Oh, and Happy Birthday Madonna (or Madoughnut as we call her in our house).

Madonna | Top Five Albums

5) Madonna (1983) This eponymous record is aptly titled, as it essentially introduced Madonna to the world. At this point Madonna was at the beginning of her career; young, raw, energetic and hungry for fame, and the music on this album possesses the same immediacy that she would try to recreate on recent attempts Confessions and Hard candy to much less effect. Produced almost entirely by Reggie Lucas, with help from then boyfriends John “Jellybean” Benitez and Mark Kamins (who was instrumental in getting her the record deal in the first place), the album is a mix of funk, pop, r’n’b, and dance in the post-disco haze of the early eighties. Despite the small successes of first singles Everybody and Burning Up, chart success came in the form of ebullient Holiday, the nursery-rhyme like Lucky Star and the Motownish Borderline, three of her biggest and most remembered hits. However album cuts like the insistent Think of Me, the sleaze of Physical Attraction, and the full-on-pop of I Know It still stand up well today. Admittedly I couldn’t listen to this album for many years, but with the vogue for all things eighties in the past five years I have had a chance to reassess it, and it certainly stands out as one of her best. Album Track | Think Of Me

4) Music (2000) Building on the groundwork of Ray Of Light which preceded it by two years, the album Music suggested that this new shift that began in the late nineties was a musical revolution rather than just a temporary blip, so the album’s title seems especially significant. It has since become the second album in what is now deemed to be Madonna’s later electronica-phase of her career. Co-produced by Mirwais, with some tracks reigning in the talents of William Orbit and Guys Sigsworth, the whole album is an innovative blend of European electronic music with an American rock/alt-country sound, especially on songs like Gone, I Deserve It, and Don’t Tell Me, a musical formula Mirwais would use again on American Life to less dazzling effect. Taking references from the late nineties French House boom, which is perhaps why she enlisted French man Mirwais Ahmadzaï to helm the project, the majority of the songs have a dark, Daft-Punkish vibe to them (their Discovery album was huge at the time) especially title track Music, almost-fourth single Impressive Instant, and Runaway Lover. Other highlights include the mesmerising Paradise (Not For Me) – a slow techno track full of abstract lyrics (possibly about her mother’s death) and a sweeping orchestra, the gorgeous What It Feels Like For A Girl, which quotes Charlotte Gainsbourg from The Cement Garden of all things, and the jubilant, sixties sounding Amazing which should have been the fourth and final single. Music is an album chock-full of invention and solid song writing, and deserves its place in this top five. Album Track | Amazing

Madonna | The Ranking Challenge - Singles

In celebration of Madonna’s fiftieth birthday on the 16 August, I set down a challenge to fellow Madonna fans to rank your top five albums, top ten singles, and top ten videos by her Madgesty. Rules are simple; pick your top 5 favourite ‘studio’ albums, your top 10 singles (whether released internationally or not, so Dear Jessie or Spotlight would be included), and your top 10 videos (released singles or promotional); rank them in reverse order; and be as controversial as you want. Leave your rankings in the comments section. Next are the singles. Have fun, and let me know what you think of my ranking!

Madonna | Top Ten Singles

10) Bad Girl (1993) Madonna’s ballads are often overlooked in retrospectives of her work. It is usually the more dance-oriented tracks that take centre stage, but I think that is something of a disservice. Bad Girl had it doubly bad because it was unfairly swamped in the Body Of Evidence controversy, which had been released about a month before, exacerbated by the fact that the accompanying video to the song featured a character who looked not unlike the film’s protagonist. Bad Girl is a quintessential ‘lady’s got the blues’ moment – she loves her man, but knows they cannot be together. Instead, she gets drunk, sleeps with strangers, and lives an empty life that brings her no solace. What kind of reflection this is on her private life I could not say for sure, but I think Madonna has intimated that during that era, during the backlash and the intensifying pressures of her fame, she was deeply unhappy. Featuring an excellent and heartfelt vocal performance (who said she couldn’t sing pre-Evita?), crisp production from Shep Pettibone (a bluesy-jazz feel that would mark most of the Erotica album) and a memorable melody, this marks a well-crafted moment in Madonna’s song writing canon.  Bad Girl | Edit| 4:39

9) Get Together (2006) Of the four singles I could have picked from Confessions on a Dance Floor, Get Together may seem like an odd choice considering the huge success of Hung Up and Sorry. But to me, the whole point of that album was the marriage of pop and European dance music, and it is in Get Together that I believe that marriage to be most successful. Perhaps the least melodically memorable than the two aforementioned songs, Get Together relies on its repetitive hooks and employs Madonna’s trademark; a strong musical bridge leading into the chorus. The poppy vocal and song structure is married to a shimmering, pulsating euro-dance treatment from Stuart Price (Les Rythmes Digitales), who slowly builds the song up with layers of synths and throbbing bass/beats until the song’s breakdown, when it suddenly explodes to a climax that leads into the last chorus. Referencing the French House explosion of the late nineties (Daft Punk, Cassius, Bob Sinclair, Modjo) the success of this song is in the pop-dance hybrid that has been a formula Madonna has adopted again and again. Get Together | Radio Edit | 3:56 

8) Angel (1985) Some singles get forgotten because of the company they keep. Let’s face it, being released amongst Like A Virgin, Material Girl, Crazy For You, Into the Groove and Dress You Up, it is not surprising that Angel was almost forgotten, but I definitely think this single deserves a second look. Coming from the album Like A Virgin and one of many Madonna-Steve Bray song writing collaborations, Angel is the perfect pop song. It features one of Madonna/Bray’s simplest but well crafted melody-chord structures, with an almost mournful vocal performance from a young Madonna, with spiky and sparse production from Nile Rogers, full of arpeggio guitars, spectral synths, and bubbling bass-line. Lyrically, the song is just a simple paean to perfect love, but closes with the almost poetic appeal ‘clouds just disappear’. This song perhaps ranks as one of my favourite early Madonna songs. Angel | 7" Version | 3:45 

7) Nothing Really Matters (1999) On first hearing this song when I got my copy of Ray Of Light, I was mesmerised. The most immediate song on what was a subtle, complex (in terms of production) album, Nothing Really Matters stuck out. From the ghostly beeps and echoes of the intro, to the sudden kick-in of the clunky house beat, William Orbit’s sonic palette gave Madonna a post-modern working-over that she never really recovered from. The production is so complex that - like most songs on the album - repeated listens give you a completely new experience. A quintessential Madonna melody (slightly nursery rhyme-ish with a hypnotic and anthemic chorus), one of her best vocal performances, lyrical content about the trappings of fame and the realisation that love is important above all else, make this one of Madonna’s most well-crafted songs. Highlights also include the instrumental break with a xylophone going crazy and then an atonal piano riff, with an outro that turns the chorus melody on its head. Nothing Really Matters | Album Version | 4:26

6) Give It 2 Me (2008) Sadly the second and last song in this top ten from the ‘new millennium’ stage of her career, and by far the most recent (her latest single), Give It 2 Me will prove to be one of her most-loved hits alongside Music, Vogue, Ray Of Light, and Hung Up. Without doubt the best cut from Hard Candy, what is striking about this Pharrell Williams’ produced track is how raw and energetic it is. I described Give It 2 Me in a review of the album back in April, which I stand by; “I love the drum rolls, the jam jar high-hats, the trance strobe-like squelches of the chorus, the old school Madonna vocals/melody lines, the slightly Casio keyboard/clavichord samples and orchestra hits, the relentless stuttering rhythmic pull, the Music--like vocoders… This is Madonna at her glorious best”. An modern anthem to rival Music, this is Madonna in defiant mode doing what she does best; creating contemporary dance music that is unlike anything anyone else is doing. Give It 2 Me | Radio Edit | 4:02

Madonna | The Ranking Challenge - Videos

In celebration of Madonna’s fiftieth birthday on the 16 August, I set down a challenge to fellow Madonna fans to rank your top five albums, top ten singles, and top ten videos by her Madgesty. Rules are simple; pick your top 5 favourite ‘studio’ albums, your top 10 singles (whether released internationally or not, so Dear Jessie or Spotlight would be included), and your top 10 videos (released singles or promotional); rank them in reverse order; and be as controversial as you want. Leave your rankings in the comments section. So, I shall start this post with videos, with subsequent posts for singles and albums. Have fun, and let me know what you think of my ranking!

Madonna | Top Ten Videos

10) Human Nature

Human Nature, which was directed by long-time collaborator Jean-Baptiste Mondino, perhaps accompanies one of Madonna’s least commercial or memorable hits - being more urban/hip hop than anything on Hard Candy – but the video itself is one of her best. Monochromatic in its use of white sets and black leather outfits, it is astonishingly simple and aptly references her first ever video, Lucky Star. The intricate and mesmerising choreography, sleek styling, and sharp editing make for a slick experience. In many ways the song and video is a riposte to the critics that lambasted her during the Erotica/Sex/Body of Evidence fiasco, as Madonna takes on the Dita persona of that era, only this time with a sense of humour lacking in the previous incarnation. The comic art of Eric Stanton is cited as a major influence for this video, whose images of bondage and female dominance are perfect for Madonna’s self-mockery.

9) Bad Girl

One of four videos directed by David Fincher (Se7en, Fight Club), all of which are in this top ten, Bad Girl is typical of music videos from the nineties: a short ‘movie’ with plot and characters, a big budget, location filming (New York) and a Hollywood A-Lister (Christopher Walken) to boot. This was a watershed moment for Madonna, as videos beyond this point became less lavish and artistic, especially as her career moved into the millennium (it has not escaped my notice that this top ten is compiled completely from videos before the year two thousand). Bad Girl is influenced by the book/film Looking for Mr. Goodbar, and tells the story of ‘Louise Oriole’, a high powered Manhattan executive who is living an empty hedonistic life – full of alcohol and one night stands – trying to blot out the pain of a failed relationship with a man she once loved. What it served to illustrate was that Madonna’s acting was best served in music videos, not in movies, and also provided an example of how a pop music video could masquerade as high art.

8) La Isla Bonita

One of many videos directed by Mary Lambert (Borderline, Like A Virgin), La Isla Bonita was one of the first to use overt religious iconography, long before Like A Prayer, which she also directed. In this homage to Hispanic culture, Madonna presents us with the dual persona of herself as a woman: the virgin and the whore. In a room painted sterile blue, dressed in a beige dress that seems deliberately sackcloth-like, with hair slicked back, an almost sexless Madonna is seen at an altar, full of icons and rosaries. A second Madonna appears in a room painted scarlet red, wearing traditional Flamenco dress, crimson flowers in her hair, and fishnet stockings. The video transcends the boy-meets-girl subject matter of the song and becomes a depiction of the internal conflict between the two roles of woman that Madonna’s name represents; the pious Mary the Virgin, and the passionate Mary Magdalene. As one remains locked in her blue-room forever, the other breaks free to dance in the street. Full of gypsy romance and drama, this is amongst the best Madonna videos from the eighties.

Corporate Cannibal

Corporate Cannibal is the first single from Grace Jones' comeback album, Hurricane, which will be released in October. I have always found Grace Jones to be both scary and compelling, but never dull, and always willing to take huge creative risks. This video, directed by Nick Hooker, is both frightening as well as it is beautiful, as the singer is morphed into monochromatic planes; an eye looping along the face, a mouth dissolving into a black mass, being suddenly transformed into Giger's Alien. I love both the song and the video, because they are like nothing else out there at the moment, and originality should always be applauded, whether you like the end product or not. I cannot wait for the album.