CIGARETTE BURNS (Carpenter, 2005)

Maybe you've got to be a film snob to truly appreciate CIGARETTE BURNS. After all, the acting is pretty bad. The story itself gets kind of hokey at times. The gore towards the end is so over the top so as to be almost entirely ridiculous. But despite all these things (because of them?) I loved this hour long MASTERS OF HORROR episode.

The plot is actually pretty interesting. An arthouse owner, Kirby, who specializes in locating rare prints is called in by a rich film collector to track down a lost gem, LE FIN ABSOLUE DU MONDE, a French film screened only once. That one viewing threw the crowd into a murderous riot. The closer that Kirby gets to the film, the weirder things get. Toss in some rather pointless side plots involving lost girlfriends and gun-toting dads, and some near-slapstick gore, and you've got a Carpenter film that doesn't feel like a Carpenter film at all, really. It does contain his trademark spot-on pacing, managing a bit of a character arch in a half-hour episode, but you can definitely feel the confines of the made-for-TV context. LA doesn't look like LA. Europe doesn't look like Europe. Character development is truncated for the sake of time constraints. The film is shot through with a general sense of being rushed.

But the film does raise some interesting questions and will probably be endearing to anyone who's ever spent an evening watching something that sickens them. CIGARETTE BURNS becomes a comment on horror cinema, particularly the horror cinema of MS. 45, Takashi Miike, and CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST. What draws people in to these pictures? What is their appeal? Prurient interest? Maybe. We all love a car wreck. Speaking personally, horror can become somewhat of an addiction. It can lead you to seeking out more and more extreme pictures, images that become increasingly more disturbing, disgusting, and, indelible. Speaking personally, I know my own thresholds and I know that LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT made me hate humanity, but I could not look away. Kirby's quest becomes the viewer's quest, or, at least, the near-snuff horror viewer's quest. CIGARETTE BURNS itself contains one truly cringe-worthy moment that had me wincing. But then again, my threshold isn't all that high.

What is the end result of watching something like I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE (or, to bring it back around, LE FIN ABSOLUE DU MONDE)? Is some greater truth revealed? Is there any justification for stuff like this existing when in real life motherfuckers are shooting up Amish schoolhouses ten minutes from my home? Are you enriched in any way? Am I going to be a better person at the end of 31 days of horror movies? Answers to follow, possibly.