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I’m pretty sure this is the most dick-obsessed misogynist movie I’ve ever seen[1]
if not the most reprehensible,[2]
what with its repeated dick and fag jokes and hysterical thrusting of phallic stakes into the chests of writhing men and women. Or Daniel Baldwin beating up a blonde then stripping her naked and tying her to a bed then beating her up again then stroking her cheek tenderly and calling her “baby” in the most earnest if inherently offensive tone of voice right before asking some other blonde “How do you like your steak, bitch?” as he shoves a stake tied to the end of a pole through her chest. Or James Woods tied to a cross, braving the flames, crying out about his “nuts burnin’ ”. It even ends with a priest telling Woods[3]
his own dick joke back to him.[4]
So I’m going to go ahead here and call this one a pre-9/11 allegory for post-Katrina U.S.. The aforementioned blonde (Sheryl Lee) is named after (if before) the Hurricane that decimated the Time Magazine portrait of Bush as a decisive, strong-willed, and hands-on leader. Katrina asks Daniel Baldwin what time it is and he answers “9:10”, the day before 9/11, back when Bush was just a recovering alcoholic wandering around the White House. As if Katrina wound back the clock or wrenched back the curtain to reveal the hapless Daddy’s Boy liberals have haplessly been berating all along. And just as the U.S. funded the programs that now support the terrorism it targets as some kind of ironic religious fundamentalism (“Islamic Fascism” being the latest neologistic pejorative), so did the Catholic Church (according to Carpenter) create the vampires it hunts through some kind of botched “inverse exorcism”. Any hesitation to align James Woods with George W. Bush is pretty much tossed out the window after Woods disobeys the Vatican (the U.N.) by refusing to recruit a team (a multi-national resolution) before going after head vampire Valek (Bin Laden), who then mocks the unilateral Woods/Bush in Bin Ladenian vernacular: “You are alone, crusader.” Katrina then betrays her psycho-misogynist captor/lover (Daniel Baldwin / Republican Party) by tearing his fucking throat out. Carpenter then offers a prophetic end to the whole mess, by having the still breathing Daniel Baldwin / Republican Party rip down the cross that is both supporting and holding Woods/Bush captive, thus allowing him (now freed of the Religious Right) to plunge the mythical Black Cross (the Congressional Black Caucus?) that created Valek/Bin Laden (okay now I’m confused) into Valek’s/Bin Laden’s heart. But this desperate ditching of the white Right in favor of African American members of Congress isn’t enough to kill Valek/Bin Laden, so Woods/Bush throws himself at the nearest large wooden phallus (a support beam holding up the roof), thus re-embracing the Sun (Son of God, Jesus Christ) as it showers the floor and sets aflame the heathen Valek/Bin Laden until he’s nothing but a pile of burnt rags (scorched towel head). That it’s a “bush” that wields the cock (both cross and beam) that kills its demon spawn could be construed as a linguistic undercutting of the Phallic/Patriarchal triumph at the end, unless one reads Bush as not a real bush but a fake bush made out of a cock tucked between his legs.[5] That behind this Bush a Dick (Cheney) is calling the shots would seem to confirm this reading.[6] That Valek is a phonetic pun on Phallic also supports the contention that all geopolitical conflict can be reduced to a single dick flopping around in an attempt to find its hidden self. In conclusion, I think I feel pretty confident in saying that the image of hundreds of millions of people dying as a result of a collective jerking off that transcends time and space is really the most horrifying thing I can think of.
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[1] The Stephen King adaptation Dreamcatcher may be more dick and grab-ass obsessed than Vampires (w/ the latently homosexual camaraderie and the slimy phallic creatures shooting up butts and a character named Mr. Gray referred to as “Mr. Gay” by Donnie Wahlberg playing a fairly convincing retard), but it’s lacking in the “whore” and “bitch” and beating-women department.
[2] Current Most Reprehensible Movie title holder: Nora Ephron’s ode to Neoliberalism, You’ve Got Mail, which received two “An Abomination!”s from Vogl and Hoy.
[3]
Woods asks the priest if he (the priest) got ‘wood’ when Woods beat him up, thus confirming as directly as possible the suspicion that the casting of Woods was a calculated linguistic maneuver.
[4] Possibly bookended by dick jokes, but we didn’t rewind and check. Addendum: Brian Kalkbrenner confirmed that the movie does in fact open with a visual dick joke in the form of Daniel Baldwin zipping up his pants after taking a piss.
[5] Cf. Silence of the Lambs.
[6] Also, in cinematic terms, Bush is really Wood[s].
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