Mr. Minty, in the Bedroom, with the Lead Gripe

I think I did my favorite piece down at SDI today. The movie Ten Little Indians.

It's an Agatha Christie book put to tape, and therefore a gruesome bloodbath of a porno that turns into a mystery. Well, at least I got the last part right.

It's very mysterious, even so far as to say, terribly mysterious. The joy from it comes from the same source which eminated from The Moonstone (read it now?) by Wilkie Collins which I read last year about this time. Pure, pure, mystery. No hodgepodge of action and suspense scenes thrown in. No random nudity to keep bored viewers from realizing the movie has NO legitimate epiphanies (aka, Wild Things), and no actor who plays villains so frequently that as soon as you spot him, you know he's the bad guy even though he's nice now (Thanks, Snake Eyes)

We need more movies like this. Whatever happened to the excitement being from trying to figure it out before they do? Now the twists are either far fetched or subsidiary to T, A, and a whole lot of exploding. Of course we could step out of the 1965 movie fundamentalism that decrees the male and female lead exceed lifewise. Maybe something like that John Cusack movie nobody saw about the killer, or something, and the motel with people all born on the same day or some crap. You know, except interesting.

The Moonstone is an even finer example, stepping the line between being the 1st mystery novel ever, and therefore creating the genre - and simultaneously stepping FROM the genre - as any good mystery must to be, well, a mystery. Anything that follows the mystery genre too precisely and it will no longer be a mystery now will it?

Meanwhile, Ball got me CIV 3 for my computer, so my nights are filled with the arduous task of making my populace happy while my food burns on the stove and my eyes pixcelate.