English Dept.
Frankly, it's not hard to see the similarities between the two, between Rosemary's Baby and The Mephisto Waltz, or at least the imprint of one on the other. We've got this educated passing for sophisticated, sufficiently urbane couple, and they're drawn in by a pair of Satanists of indeterminate age, and then they get involved in magic that benefits the Satanists more than the sweet young couple. So it's a little bit Faustian, but it's got jazz hands.
I think Jennifer's Body rides a lot of lines. It's a little nostalgic in terms of its tone and its story. It's a little post-modern though in its execution. I think the characters reflect and refract one another. There's sort of a kind of “reverse menstruation” idea at work. And there's an exploitation of the fear of female or feminine power and empowerment. I think it's got a view of high school that's so saturated with meta-commentary that it seems like it has been made by a team of artists who probably barely survived high school and then really triumphed afterward.
In Extra Ordinary, the characters are all losers in the truest sense. They're mostly unlucky people. They've experienced loss. Everybody is looking for something. But I think it's a rare cinema experience that kind of makes me feel in every scene, if not every frame, compelled to either laugh out loud or get a little misty with truly happy tears.
I chose THE EXORCISM OF EMILY ROSE because it's a film that I return to again and again. It's really well cast. It's a procedural, it's a legal drama, and it's a horror movie. It has a strong female protagonist in Laura Linney's character and an unhinged performance by Jennifer Carpenter in the central role of Emily Rose. And I think it's an interesting story in that it's about transformation and redemption for both of those characters.
