Begotten | Din of Celestial Birds

These two short films by E. Elias Merhige, director of the amazing Shadow of the Vampire(trailer), should be of interest to anyone who is fascinated with the dark and macabre. Begotten begins with God alone in a tumble down shack in the process of eviscerating and killing himself. From his begored body Mother Earth emerges and proceeds to impregnate herself with the dead God's semen.

Where Begotten looks at the emergence of life through the lens of the Judeo-Christian mythology Din of Celestial  Birds looks at evolution and the emergence of consciousness.

Enjoy.

BEGOTTEN(72 mins)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOvnLWv2GUY

DIN OF CELESTIAL BIRDS(14 mins)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jji3EHx86A

True Dick - The King in Yellow

True Detective isn't the first time that Chamber's tattered king appeared in conjunction with hard boiled detectives like Rust and Marty. In 1938 Raymond Chandler wrote a Philip Marlowe short story entitled The King in Yellow. In 1983 this story was turned into an episode of  Philip Marlowe, Private Eye.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ps-yNlv__0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpX7INzF56I

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDVJ7BMzV30

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSU6A13iqT8

Cassilda's Song

I just came across this fantastic version of Cassilda's Song by The Society of the Yellow Sign.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjFKodOgIgs

From Act I Scene 2 of The King in Yellow.

Along the shore the cloud waves break,

The twin suns sink behind the lake,

The shadows lengthen

In Carcosa.

Strange is the night where black stars rise,

And strange moons circle through the skies,

But stranger still is

Lost Carcosa.

Songs that the Hyades shall sing,

Where flap the tatters of the King,

Must die unheard in

Dim Carcosa.

Song of my soul, my voice is dead,

Die thou, unsung, as tears unshed

Shall dry and die in

Lost Carcosa.

True Pessimist - True Detective

I yesterday discovered the new HBO drama True Detective thanks to The Lovecraft Ezine's posting about the show's Ligottian influence. A second person then linked to an article on the Wall Street journal blog that referenced both Lovecraft and Robert W Chambers in relation to the show as well as expanding upon the Ligottian influence.

Whilst I am a bit of a fan of crime dramas I tend to veer towards European, particularly Scandinavian, shows that don't distract from the horror of the murder/crime being investigated with gaudy effects and cack handed appeals to emotion(I'm looking at you CSI). Shows like Wallander(Sweden) and, especially, Forbrydelsen(Denmark). So normally a show like True Detective would just pass me by had it not been for these mentions of Ligotti, Chambers, and Lovecraft. Needless to say, my interest was more than piqued.

The show, now on its third episode, follows two investigations into two seemingly linked murders. One in 1995 and one in 2012. In 1995 we see detectives Rustin "Rust" Cohl(Matthew McConaughey) and Martin Hart(Woody Harrelson) as two mismatched homicide detectives investigating the bizarre, and seemingly occult related, murder of a young woman. the 2012 plot line consists of Cohl and hart being interviewed by a pair of detectives investigating a strikingly similar murder.

The dialogue between Cohl and Hart is fantastic throughout the show but what stands out most, to me being a Ligotti fan anyway, are Cohl's nihilistic diatribes against life, religion, and the bullshit in which we cloak the essential meaninglessness of existence. A prime example of this is seen in the very first episode when Hart, an ostensibly Christian man, asks Cohl what he believes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8x73UW8Hjk

That could have been lifted from any number of Ligotti's stories.

Whilst the murder is most certainly weird and just drips with all manner of occult symbolism it isn't until the second episode that the influence of weird fiction authors becomes overtly clear. References to the Yellow King in the diary of the murdered woman and direct quotes from Chamber's work are laid out before us on the screen.





I don't know if the show is going to feature any supernatural elements, that exist outside of the mind of the killer/s, nor do I know if the show needs anything supernatural to convey the bleak cosmic horror of Ligotti's work that it so closely resembles. The washed out colours, the bleak existential nihilism of Cohl, the occult(but not necessarily supernatural) elements of the murders, the hypocrisy and denial of Hart. All combine to give the show an air of resignation where the true horror lies not in the actions of the, seemingly, deranged killer but in the mundane stripping away of the façade of normality by Cohl's unshakable nihilism.

The series continues on the ninth of this month.