What-if a pumpkin-headed demon eating an ice cream cone came quietly walking down the middle of Southwest Boulevard? What-if a man in a bowler hat walked by with a junkie on a leash?
If I wasn't too tired, sometimes my mind could conjure up some quiet horror better than any F/X house on the planet. I think for me, there's nothing more unsettling than a subtle horror--or a "pedestrian" one. The idea of a mutant hillbilly with chainsaw hands is scary, no doubt. I mean, I don't want to run into him--but the idea of him pushing a flower cart calmly through a deserted street is scarier to me than if he were trying to chop my head off.
This concept is best exemplified in Stanley Kubrick's THE SHINING. There's all sorts of scary stuff in THE SHINING, but the part that freaks me out the most (to this day) is when one of the characters is running around the Overlook hotel and they catch a glimpse of this fucked-out scene:
These two "ghosts" (or whatever) are on screen for less than 5 seconds, but they're way scarier than anything else in the movie. Why? Because they don't run out and try to kill anyone. They act as though they're spending a typical evening alone together...you know, just wearing the dog costume in the abandoned hotel.
What? Like you've never done that.
The hotel is a normal setting, and suddenly in the midst of this normal setting there is this bizarre couple. Who they are and what they're doing are a mystery. They are gone as quickly as they arrive. There is no explanation. There is nothing particularly threatening about them--except that they exist.
I bring ALL of this up because I read a story over at the Daily Mail's website about a guy who was using the street view of Google Maps to find his local optometrist. Instead of his doctor's office, however, this is what he saw:
They're calling this whacked-out fellow "horseboy."
If I was driving along in the UK, and I saw that thing on the side of the road I WOULD PLOW MY CAR RIGHT INTO THE NEAREST TREE. That would be it for me, game over man. What I love about it is the freakish absurdity of the whole situation:
Man either builds or buys a horse head mask. Man waits for Google car to come zooming by. And then what?
Surely he didn't expect to get rich or famous by doing this. I'm talking about it and the British papers are as well, but this person hasn't come forward. He hasn't sought the spotlight.
This was the act of a very strange mind.
So while the identity of the so-called "horseboy" is not known, here's what I do know: if I'd seen that thing during one of my overnight shifts I'd have crapped my pants. 100% guaranteed.
4 comments:
Jason, I completely agree that those acts of "subtle horror" are often more frightening than the more overt things often seen in movies or television. I think it has something to do with the fact that we know zombie rednecks with chainsaw hands are an impossibility, whereas a man in a donkey mask walking up a street with a collection of deflated balloons might actually happen.
And as for that scene in The Shining, every time I watch that part, I have to think, WTF was going through Kubrick's head?
I read online that this strange sight from THE SHINNING is a reference to something in the novel.
I've never read it so I'm not sure.
The "bear scene" in The Shining occurs as Wendy is running through the hotel after assisting Danny to escape from the bathroom window. As she ascends a stairwell, she comes to an open door and she looks in, where she sees two shapes on a bed. As if sensing her, the shapes stop what they are doing and turn to look at her, revealing themselves to be two men. One is wearing a bear suit with the buttocks removed; the other is in a tuxedo, and from the position they were in when Wendy first saw them, it is likely that the man in the bear suit was performing fellatio on the man in the tuxedo.
Like the woman in room 237, this mysterious scene is explained in the novel, but not in the film. At one point in the novel, Jack is dancing with a woman at a masque ball during the 1920s, and he notices a young man wearing a dog mask and behaving like a dog for the amusement of a tall, bald man. This bald man is the man in the tuxedo later seen by Wendy. The woman explains to Jack that his name is Horace Derwent, a former owner of the hotel, and an eccentric Howard Hughes type figure who poured over three million into restoring it after WWII. The young man acting like a dog is Roger, a former lover of the bisexual Derwent, with whom he is still in love. According to the woman, Derwent told Roger that "if he came to the masked ball as a doggy, a cute little doggy, he might reconsider;" that is, he might have sex with Roger. Although no actual sex scene between Roger and Derwent is described in the book, such a scene does seem to take place in Kubrick's film, albeit obliquely.
totally agree w/ the shining part- that part is the freakiest in the movie. thanks for the post! creeeepy.
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