WHILE THE MAN WATCHES WAREWOLVES The night before last I watched An American Warewolf in London on one of the bargain 2nd hand VHS tapes from my "VHS inbox" stack. The next morning I noticed that a fox had killed a rabbit and dragged it into the shed to feast on, while disrespectfully leaving a smelly mess of rabbit guts all over the place for me to clean up. The thought struck me that this reality happening just outside my door was the real core of the whole movie. Oh people will point out the entertaining plot, or even to the warewolf concept in general as some expression of the human condition, but that's all bullshit. It's about beasts tearing animals apart, the rest is woven around that to satisfy the willful overthinking that the human mind desires. So all of those creative talents devoted to making the film, all of the technology to show it across the world, then the finely engineered elecromechanics required to show it on VHS tape at home. I mean so many processes, so many people, falling together in their own natural structure, so determines that I'll spend my night watching this impossibly vivid fastasy inspired by the very nature outside, that glances unconcerned at the emanating glow of lit phosphers from a CRT TV seeping through my window. I'll admit that I am a little insecure about my habit of watching movies. I fit a bit too cleanly the stereotype of a "movie guy" who never gets out, or actually sees/knows friends. I also stick to the movies and technology of the "movie guy" stereotype in mind, VHS tapes and lots of old classics mixed with cult films. The main difference is that I buy them 2nd hand for $0.20 at the local op-shop (or did before they shut due to the virus, but I'm still working through my previous backlog anyway) instead of renting, so I've got them all around my TV on shelves and in boxes under furniture, always running out of room for more. Not that I watch them all that frequently. Though there was a period when I was in the habit of two each night (ideally the first would be fun or quirky though a little bitter-sweet, the second sole-destroyingly dark and brutal ("Ghosts... of the Civil Dead"* is a stand-out for that second type, just let it engross you and you'll go to bed completely drained of spirit, just how I like it)). But they probably do substitute somewhat for real human interaction or travel, and as a substitute they naturally form a reality based on the prevailing popular fantasy that society has of itself at the time they were made. Randomly watching films made from the 30s onwards (I've been watching quite a few of 1940s flicks lately, both classics and otherwise), I'm liable to become some amalgamation of western social stereotypes from the last 90 years. Still I don't take that worry seriously enough to actually stop me. At the same time I find it marvelous that for almost no monetary outlay I can legally view works that involved thousands of people in their production, and financial expenditure beyond my comprehension, and view them on-demand on my couch, while foxes stalk their prey outside. I'm not sure that I really understand how or why it happened that technology and society developed to permit this, I'm not sure that anyone really does, but it's facinating that it has, and no doubt it will continue until modern civilisation's dying breath. But I'm thinking that I should do some more travel. Poor timing for that, seeing as I'm in the only state of Australia where it's currently not allowed, though actually before they put country areas into "lockdown" I had a couple of fun trips down to the coast. I normally avoid the coast and going along the Great Ocean Road because all of the tourists make it too crowded. But with no overseas, or even inter-state tourists, and travel even forbidden from Melbourne, it was a perfect chance to visit. I've got the car for it too, for that matter, and it was great fun threading the Jag through the unbelieveably twisty roads down to the coast and back, through the forrest. It's pretty impressive really that in one day trip I can go from open plains, to dense ancient forrest, to long beaches and the open ocean, all while one mis-judged corner away from certain doom. I was a little surprised to see some bikers riding the Great Ocean Road in spite of it all, and even though it was drissling all day and the roads were wet - they've got guts, or something. Then again I got a little lost as usual (no GPS, they take all the fun out of going for a drive) and ended up threading my way back through an unknown, twisty, forrest road in the dark, rain, and fog, probably no more safe. Facinating to see the costal tourist towns empty and largely shut down. There was a big restaurant open, but only one person there eating. Most of the tables had red tape over them, to enforce social distancing, and it looked through the window like a literal sea of red tape - I think it made a good picture, or would if I ever develop the film. I have planned a slightly longer trip, staying overnight at my mother's house, as a rare source of distant free accomodation. It's certainly a limitation with my travel plans that I'm too cheap to stay in motels. But to that end, the opportunity to borrow an old Toyota Land Cruiser for a while has presented itself (although associated with an obligation to do a full service on it and pay the registration). It's about practical to sleep in the back of that, and I can be a bit more brave about destinations than with the (already somewhat abused) Jag. So I'm now planning on doing a tour of some unusual sites in the outback, with a bias towards abandoned townships. In particular, sites of the 1950s atomic bomb tests, and other locations of radioactive notability. But we'll see how I go. - The Free Thinker. * https://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/may/22/ghosts-of-the-civil-dead-rewatched-the-ultimate-australian-prison-drama EDIT: I picked out an old Apollo Bay tourist brochure from the 1940s or 50s for this week's "history snippet", seeing as that was one of the towns that I visited (the one with the "sea of red tape"). See the History Snippets section.