is now officially reserved for long text posts, i.e. the kind of thing people used to read before the internet.

I started another one that’s more conventional:

http://turdparty.tumblr.com

In space, no one the Department of Defense can hear you scream.

On Rotten Tomatoes, APOLLO 18 currently holds a rating of 25%. But the film is far from the cinematic misfire that such a score might suggest; instead its low marks prove, yet again, that when it comes to horror movies, mainstream film critics are often as trustworthy as Rutger Hauer’s murderous drifter in THE HITCHER.

Like any cultural gatekeeper, the film critic class has its own codes, culture, and mores, and like most of those who comment on culture they are obsessed with novelty. Thus the original SAW was able to effectively divide critics (often the best a horror can hope for), winning high marks from, say, Rex Reed and Owen Gleiberman, and even a little grudging acknowledgement from Roger Ebert, while still alienating middlebrow milquetoasts like Richard Roeper, Bill Muller, and NYT critic Stephen Holden, a man capable of hating MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO. This is more impressive when considering that, outside of Scorcese movies, excess violence is another critical no-no—unless cloaked in nervy stylistic trappings (DRIVE), cloying, postmodern self-consciousness (Tarantino), or a foreign language (OLDBOY, countless others).

But the second that “torture porn” became a recognizable style rather than a grisly innovation, it became the reigning whipping boy for movie critics—a position now taken up by the “found footage” genre. And, admittedly, it’s hard not to shake your head at the sheer cynicism evinced by Dimension Films head Bob Weinstein in an interview about the film with Entertainment Weekly: “We didn’t shoot anything. We found it. Found, baby!”

The executive producer of APOLLO 18 speaks to the press.

But found footage has also yielded great artistic triumphs like MAN BITES DOG, and in horror’s recent past it has been the premise of some of the genre’s finest films, like REC and TROLLHUNTER. (Honorable mention to THE LAST EXORCISM, marred by a shitty cop-out ending.) But the prejudice against found chillers also suggests a mean-ass double standard. In the more “serious” category of drama, critics will make allowances for familiar territory revisited well: isn’t last year’s RABBIT HOLE just a modified update of ORDINARY PEOPLE? And doesn’t odds-on Oscar favorite THE DESCENDANTS mine the same softcore suburban malaise as a thousand other Updikean dramas? With occasional exceptions like THE DESCENT, this lassitude is rarely extended to horror films, which are pre-emptively dismissed by most critics as not “serious.”

So I guess the question this whole issue turns on is, does APOLLO 18 do its thing well? Unequivocally, enuthusiastically: yes.

This is a better film than THE LAST EXORCISM, the second PARANORMAL ACTIVITY (though not the first, and running neck-and-neck with the third), and even CLOVERFIELD. It’s clever, stylish, and effective, with a couple of the best jump scares I’ve seen since the nerve-blasting American take on THE RING. It culls influence from a variety of sources in addition to the PA series, recalling ur-chillers like THE THING, THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE, and THE EXORCIST. Despite the prejudices outlined above, I’m still a little bit at a loss to explain why this movie was so intensely despised by critics.

Not pictured: Moonbeast.

One of the best features of APOLLO 18 is its look, which is built with grainy, occasionally stuttering footage appropriate to the circa 1974 cameras it was purportedly filmed on. The whole conceit of A18 actually hangs together much better than most of its contemporaries: this is, after all, an Apollo mission, being painstakingly recorded by the DOD for “posterity” (or more nefarious reasons alluded to later). The film is filled with painstaking details that give it the ring of verisimilitude—I especially loved the film’s title card, which is simply an insignia for the fictional mission. The familiarity of the EVA suits and the always-eerie moonscape, coupled with the degraded, fuzzy look of the film, lends a unique affect akin to a Tim Hecker record: something beautiful, strange, and maybe a little horrifying, seen through a lens of snowy distortion.

And there is a subtlety at work here, likely learned by respectful study of PARANORMAL ACTIVITY: the creeping evil hidden by the moon’s craters is never really glimped clearly and directly, and (as always) it’s all the creepier for it. Your mileage may vary of course, but think back to the silly, chirping mini-critters from CLOVERFIELD and appreciate what an improvement A18 hath wrought.

There are, of course, familiar items in APOLLO 18’s bag of tricks—most notably a pit of inky blackness lit only by the flash from a camera, a technique that’s still as viscerally pleasing as ever. But everything is artfully assembled into a film smarter and scarier than anyone gave it credit for. Conspiracy isn’t just a bullet point on Dimension’s marketing strategy, but woven through the film: the opening card notes that the footage wasn’t actually found but “uploaded onto www.lunartruth.com”; late in the game one of the astronauts brings up Watergate, then a fresh and stinging wound in an American psyche; and the entire movie playfully inverts the Apollo hoax theory.

“You won’t have Moonbeast to kick around anymore, because gentlemen, this is my last found footage.”

And it works toward an effective ending. Horror movies, even the good ones, really struggle with the finish, leading to fine fare cut short by a stupid conclusion (I’ve beat on LAST EXORCISM enough already, so let’s point the finger at HIGH TENSION). I thought it was headed for a PA style finish, but it goes another direction, with no dumb twists and an effectively bleak close.

I’ll admit that this film had all the ingredients needed to appeal to me: I love horror, I love space, and I love histories both real and faked. But APOLLO 18 is a lot like one of the real, later lunar missions: it deserves more respect than it gets.

Being ahead of your time sucks. If you’re lucky, posterity will remember you fondly, but chances are that while you’re around, you’re just going to be ignored by posers going crazy over bullshit that will seem terrible in retrospect. Case study: 97a.

Formed in New Jersey in 1993, 97a played the kind of fast, no-bullshit hardcore that would come into serious vogue right around the time they were breaking up, in 2001. The music they left behind sounds like a kind of alternate history, where instead of straying into Krishna consciousness Youth of Today had instead just gotten faster, punker, and skateboarding-er. (Their name is one of the best ever in a subtle kind of way—in case you didn’t grow up ollieing, it’s a measurement of skateboard wheel hardness.)

Most 97a songs adhere to an extremely rigid formula: blasting thrash, chugging YOT-style breakdown, finish line. Making each song sound fresh in this context is a rare gift, but 97a had it: like Capitalist Casualties or Charles Bronson, they approach every song like it’s the first one, which makes their records lively and exciting rather than a tedious slog through blastbeat after blastbeat. (97a, being upstanding metal-free punx, don’t actually use blastbeats.)

You may not find yourself humming the songs afterwards, but a particularly choice breakdown (e.g. “It’s In Our Power”, “Society’s Running On Empty”, “Actions Speak Volumes”—shit, basically every single song on the LP) will get you bedroom moshing in seconds.

Anyways, there’s not really that much to say about a band like this: they came, they thrashed, they broke up. But their music holds up, their record sleeves look great (they had the essentials of a memorable logo and crisp, uniform typefaces, long before Fucked Up brought both back into style), and along the way they avoided a lot of the worst trends of the era: their youth crew sensibilities came through in positive lyrics rather than college sports aesthetics, they avoided long, goofy song titles, and they never succumbed to the allure of metal.

Put simply, they ripped/skated, never hesitated.

You can still get a copy of the LP, Society’s Running On Empty (the most essential 97a release in my book), from Interpunk. Or you can just hit up this blog and download everything.

10. Shoppers - Goodbye to All That (honorable mention: Silver Year)

I hate to be that guy, but the demo totally destroys the LP. The album is pretty good, but the recording on the demo suits the songs much better than the more blown out sound of the full-length. Plus, the demo has a way more definitive version of the best song on the LP—you know, the one with the line “hold me down / fuck my mouth.” And the history nerd part of me gives bonus points for the title/cover art. Anyway. Creepy, beautiful music for people who wish Vivian Girls were more fucked up, or that The Wipers smoked hard(er) drugs. This band is definitely balanced on the precipice of blowing up. 

9. Hoax - 7” 

This band makes me think that the “mysterious guy” trend might finally, officially be at a low ebb. Hoax are as nasty and ugly as all those crummy hardcore bands that were crummy harsh noise bands five years ago, but the difference is that they actually write SONGS. Remember those? ”Fagget” might be my pick for song of the year: it sounds like someone spraypainted the word “PISSED” on an old, grimy skateboard, ground it into paste, and forcefed it to you with PVC pipe. The rest of the 7” can’t measure up, but it’s worth paying eBay prices (or clicking mediafire links) just to play that jam over and over until your brains leaks out of your ears.

8. Citizens Arrest - Soaked in Others Blood

This isn’t all that mind-blowing, but it is very undeniably good, and it’s just exciting to hear. Daryl’s vocals are still first class too, although it kind of bums me out that he doesn’t really do the feral birdman screams anymore. Also lame that it’s an “e-release”, but what are you gonna do? 2011 is fucking bullshit.

7. The Copyrights - North Sentinel Island

Honestly, this is their weakest album yet, but due to The Copyrights’ curve-wrecking prior output that means it’s still better than 90% of other records released in any given year. I’m afraid that they’ll never top Make Sound, though. Who could?

6. Burning Love - Songs for Burning Lovers

This was released in 2010, but I don’t give a shit because I still listened to it way more than anything all year—again.  (Low Threat Profile also falls into this category.) Probably the best band in existence, and a devastating riposte to the undying plague of the shitty-sounding, songless hardcore bands.

5. Fucked Up - David Comes to Life

I actually don’t love this album quite as much as some folks, but it’s definitely way better than ChemCom, and solid all the way through. I could kind of take or leave the “storyline”, which feels like it’s constraining Haliechuk and Abraham from writing the kind of beautifully weird and weirdly beautiful lyrics that made the last two albums so indelible. But this is a corker, no question. Hidden World is still the gold standard though.

4. Marvelous Darlings - Single Life

A singles comp, but singles rule the world. No new MD stuff this year, probably because Cook was preoccupied with Fucked Up - but that’s okay, because these are still the most amazing pop songs I’ve ever heard. A more essential collection of music may not currently exist on planet Earth.

3. J Church - The Lost Demos

Not a “proper” album (although it should be—what do you say, No Idea?), but for me it was still more exciting and more listened to than most of what came out this year—and it was “released” in November! R.I.P. Lance, we miss you.

2. Leatherface - Viva La Arthouse

When can you justify a live album as one of the best of the year? When it’s Leatherface, when it sounds this good, and when the setlist is this fucking STACKED.

1. Smart Cops - Per Proteggere e Servire

First hearing this album was one of those instances where you sit straight up and lean forward in rapt attention, because you didn’t realize music this good was still being made (at least, outside of Marvelous Darlings singles). Ludicrously catchy songs that boil over with nervy energy, all beautifully recorded and totally unafraid of being classically, Platonically punk. Great logo? Check. Sexy uniforms? Present and accounted for. A jaw-dropping 12” collection of weapons-grade pop narcotics? That’s a big 10-4, buddy. As they used to say in MRR, buy now or pose forever.