That Horrible Pen

  “Forest Whitaker in Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999).” IMDb , https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0165798/mediaviewer/rm4267680513/ . Accessed 3 Sept. 2021. The moment in Jim Jarmusch’s Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999) that best captures the essence of the whole piece is the one where the titular Ghost Dog (Forest Whitaker) is in the process of sizing up a mob hideout from the woods with a scope. His plan seems to be to take out the leader of the operation, Ray Vargo (Henry Silva), from a distance, but his gaze drifts from the building and the men in front of it to locate a noisy woodpecker in the trees nearby. Looking down the scope of his lethal weapon, Ghost Dog watches the woodpecker going about its animal business. Later, when Vargo does arrive, Ghost Dog loses his opportunity to kill the man from a distance when another bird lands on his weapon. This is Ghost Dog —this violent film “distracted” by meditations on nature, nighttime cityscapes, the mundanity of ...

  This piece contains spoilers for both Trick ’r Treat and the movie Snow Day . It also contains some discussion of depictions of fatphobia and ableism. Michael Dougherty’s Trick ’r Treat (2009) is a horror-comedy that I have some mixed feelings about. I’ve watched it a few times now—more times than I’ve watched movies I actually like more —so there is clearly something about it that appeals to me. On the other hand, though, I just don’t feel very positively about it. It’s not that I think it’s a bad film because, rewatching it to do this little seasonally-appropriate write-up, I can’t help but notice shots or lines or performances that I like. The horror visuals have held up extraordinarily well also, thanks to good use of practical effects that have a real presence in the movie’s world. That stuff is balanced against some really awkward dialogue in spots and some other issues I’ll get into below, and yet I don’t think the sum total or average of the elements that make up Tri...