Tuesday 6 April 2010

I BELIEVE IT'S MAGIC (MAGIC)



To my mind, one of the greatest moments in 80s cinema. It isn't surprising that Ghostbusters and its soundtrack are touchstones for the purveyors of Hypnagogic Pop. Check the juxtaposition of spectral technicolour with the concrete and steel of Manhattan in this scene, not to mention the eerie shudder of Mick Smiley's 'Magic'. We watch in awe as the supernatural floods into our world, leaving vapour trails which look like synaesthetic representations of a James Ferraro drone.

I'm continually struck by how effectively the populist cinema of the 80s brought dreams - and nightmares - to life. I'm talking Ghostbusters, Blade Runner, Aliens, A Nightmare On Elm Street, The Thing, Gremlins... highly successful films with a sense of otherness today's million dollar event movies for the most part completely fail to capture. And they're the bigger budget efforts - the independent genre film thrived in the 80s, making up for a lack of resources with imagination and visual flair. 1980's Without Warning may have been made for about $200, but its bloodsucking flying discs and cranially-enhanced alien hiding out in a cabin have haunted my imagination for years.

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