Don't Let the Sun Go Down on Me

Because then I might freeze to death.

Batman and I, in a fit of pride, have yet to turn on the heat in our freezing apartment. We have to pay for it, you see, and gas prices tend to skyrocket in the winter here. As we are poor (or at least I am, and all of Batman's funds are clearly going into his crime-fighting apparati and the facade of his playboy existence), we choose to save money by slowly freezing into corpsicles.

Of course, I did just watch a wonderfully fun movie that seemed to offer a lifestyle not entirely incompatible with this level of cold. Granted, it was set in California, but this movie advocated that constant night activity, a casual disdain of the ways of the world, and a willingness to break the "rules" and "social norms" can lead to a fulfilling life amidst the chaos of the world. The name of this movie, if you haven't yet guessed, is The Lost Boys.

Yes, in between my Netflix shipments of "Freaks and Geeks" (which is excellent, by the way), I've been getting horror movies to celebrate Halloween (even a bit belatedly). I had never seen Lost Boys before, and I heard it was quite the celebration of all things '80s. Well folks, this is quite true. Vampires with mullets, and Kiefer Sutherland as a Billy Idol-esque punk biker vampire. And, apparently, vampires aren't that bad. Sure, they may kill the occasional fat boardwalk security guard, and they may generally cause a disturbance, but before they were provoked, whom did they viciously mutilate? Beach thugs! Listening to Run DMC! Clearly drunk, and possibly on drugs! These vampires aren't evil, they're just hardworking, decent, Reaganite Americans.

As I'm sure every child of the '80s but me has already seen this movie, I won't take the time to unpack it further or mention many of its obvious absurdities. Ok, two more. First, why did the vampire dying in the bathtub cause all the pipes, sinks, toilets, etc. to start spraying blood? Physics seems to imply that that degree of force would have exploded outward (i.e. out the top of the tub) rather than generating a massive, water-main disruptive shockwave that not only exploded the pipes but managed to change all the water to blood (I won't even touch the metaphysical implications of that one). Second, the theme song? Children singing the ten commandments? Used at multiple points throughout the film, and linked with a bodacious hair-metal power ballad? Awesome. It was hilarious camp, and it's making me seriously contemplate turning to the undead side of life. If nothing else, I'll no longer feel the cold. (For further justification, see 30 Days of Night.)

(Again, sorry for lack of interesting posts. Since TGD switched CLC spots with me for next week, I've been frantically revising my dissertation chapter to make it suitable for presentation. On the plus side, I now have 31 pages of my dissertation written.)