KILL YOUR BROTHER. YOU'LL FEEL BETTER

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 My Life In Horror
Every month, I will write about a film, album, book or event that I consider horror, and that had a warping effect on my young mind. You will discover my definition of what constitutes horror is both eclectic and elastic. Don’t write in. Also, of necessity, much of this will be bullshit – as in, my best recollection of things that happened anywhere from 15 – 30 years ago. Sometimes I will revisit the source material contemporaneously, further compounding the potential bullshit factor. Finally, intimate familiarity with the text is assumed – to put it bluntly, here be gigantic and comprehensive spoilers. Though in the vast majority of cases, I’d recommend doing yourself a favour and checking out the original material first anyway.

This is not history. This is not journalism. This is not a review.

This is my life in horror.

Kill Your Brother. You’ll feel better.

Because here's the thing - sometimes you go back, and it’s bad. Not just ‘not as good as I remember’, not just ‘hasn't aged well’, I’m talking ‘actively god-awful, what the hell was I thinking, now I hate myself and the decade of my youth just a little more than I did before’ bad.

Way back when I talked about the WASP record The Headless Children, I noted how the album kind of broke down into three camps in terms of the individual songs, those camps being ‘actually, that’s still a legitimately good song’, ‘that’s obviously not great but I remember why I liked it’ and ‘how did I EVER think that was an acceptable use of my time?’.

But what to do when an entire movie falls into that final camp? How do you approach it when you have a movie that’s a no-brainer shoe-in for My Life In Horror - a movie that honesty dictates you must include, that was formative and hugely influential on 13 year old you - but also a movie that you saw more recently and detested? Despised? Flat out hated? Disliked it so much you felt ashamed of young you, and the holes in his critical thinking and evaluation so large that a garbage truck like this could be driven through it?

Tonight, I will attempt to provide an answer to that question. Tonight, armed only with a netbook, a bottle of Bulleit Bourbon, a tin Deadwood shot glass, a packet of Tunnock’s Caramel wafer biscuits, and a copy of the movie, I will attempt to channel 13 year old me. Talk to him, but also have him talk through me. Reason with him, in the unlikely event that such a thing is possible. Tonight, I aim to put that little goober straight, whilst also giving him the chance to make his tragically misguided case. A transcript of a commentary track recorded across time, if you will.

Wish me luck.

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