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I'll just mention that one character caused me to invent the term Herpetophile, which I was proud of until I googled the word and realized that it already exists (because of course it does.)
"Herpetology" was a good source of laughs during my high school trivia days.



Gloria and the Three "Princes"



INTRODUCTION
I watched Colossal the other night with a group of friends. At the end, one of them made a remark about the lack of female characters. Now, to be honest, I don't think that she was actually watching for a fair chunk of the film. But on the surface, she is absolutely correct. There is only one female character who has any amount of substantial dialogue/screen-time, while there are four substantial lead or supporting male characters (Tim, Joel, Garth, and Oscar).

Criticism of a film you really love---and I really love Colossal---can go one of two ways. Way #1 of course is "No YOU'RE stupid! *pbbbbbtttt*". Way #2 actually involves taking a cold hard look at the thing you like so much and asking if maybe you've given it a pass or overlooked aspects of it of one reason or another.

As is true with many films I really love, taking a deeper look at this film only made me like it more. And I had two revelations--one very minor and one a bit more fundamental--about why I adore it so much. The latter is the "Three Princes" idea referenced in the title of this post.

Now: I do not like posting huge blocks of spoiler text. So if it's okay with everyone, I'd like to write up this post without spoiler text. But this post will contain MAJOR SPOILERS FOR THE FILM COLOSSAL. PLEASE DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THE FILM. This is not a review, it's an essay-ish thing I'm writing when I should probably be in bed instead of watching cricket and rambling about emotional themes in monster movies.

HERE BEGIN THE MAJOR SPOILERS!!!

First, let's talk about the minor revelation. I had never noticed before that while the middle of the film is basically Gloria and The Dudes, the film is bookended with positive female-female relationships. The film begins with a mother helping her daughter look for a lost doll in the park. While the mother does sound a bit irritated, she doesn't overly criticize the daughter. At the end of the film, we get the friendly conversation between Gloria and the Seoul bartender (Christine Lee).

Okay, onto the whole "Three Princes" thing.

Something that I really like about the film is the way that it shows how achieving clarity in one aspect of your life can suddenly snap into focus other areas. I have experienced this in many ways. I once read a piece of advice that said "Try making your bed every morning for a week and see what happens." Um, okay. Well, a week into making my bed, suddenly I was like, this is so easy. Why am I also not folding my clothes? Why am I not just running the vacuum around for 3-5 minutes once or twice a week?

In Colossal, Gloria's problem is bigger than an unmade bed. She has a serious drinking problem that is impacting multiple aspects of her life. It becomes clear on a repeat viewing of the film that Gloria has developed an array of coping mechanisms for her alcoholism. When confronted with a night that she doesn't remember, she makes a cute little cringey face, makes a general statement about her own behavior ("Was I all dramatic?") and adorably begs forgiveness. Or she nods along, simply agreeing with the other person's recollections. When it becomes clear that what she has forgotten was important, she puts on a serious face. The first time I watched the movie, I thought of this as Hathaway's acting. But increasingly it's clear to me that this is Gloria's acting.

When the events of the film force Gloria to take a long hard look at her behavior, it's clear that the drinking is what needs to go. And once Gloria has freed herself from the destructive, hazy cycle of her drinking problem, the problematic nature of her relationship with the men around her comes into focus.

Enter the "three princes".

In a film where the lead character is surrounded by not one, not two, but three really handsome, charismatic men, your romantic comedy brain immediately starts trying to figure out which one is the "nice one." Which one is the "good one". Which one will be her ally and help her solve her problems. And, again, SPOILERS, the answer is that none of them are. These men are, in their own different ways, not really that nice or good or any kind of an ally. In fact, I would argue that each man in his own turn represents a different kind of destructive, unhealthy relationship/partner.

Passive


Let's start with Joel. Oh, Joel. Ya big dummy. On the surface, Joel is the nicest of Gloria's three suitors. Their first evening of hanging out, he tries to kiss Gloria, awkwardly and apologetically retreating when both Gloria and then Oscar react negatively to his moves. And the thing about Joel is that he never berates Gloria, or puts her down. Aside from that first clumsy move, he never tries to put a hand on her. She is the assertive one in pursuing a sexual relationship with him.

But Joel's passivity takes a darker turn when we see how he responds to Oscar's treatment of Gloria. In many scenes, he is merely an awkward witness to events, occasionally offering a mild "Hey c'mon" when things seem to be getting out of control. But he never dares to take a stand against Oscar. He gets into the passenger seat as an intoxicated Oscar tries to leave, even threatening to run Gloria over. When Oscar is physically violent with Gloria, Joel is the one who comes knocking, ready to play messenger. Joel's behavior becomes something that is clearly enabling. What's the line that Joel refuses to cross with Oscar? We don't know, because we never see it.

Passive-Aggressive


On to Prince number two, Tim. On this most recent viewing, I was like "Whoa, was I being too hard on Tim before?". From the first act, you might think that Tim is actually not all that bad. Yes, he kicks Gloria out of the apartment and breaks up with her. But you know what? Gloria comes stumbling home, repeatedly, from drunken nights spent with people whose names she can barely remember. Tim asserts that he only gets to spend time with her when she's hungover, something she doesn't contest. When Tim leaves for work, Gloria's friends barge into the apartment in the morning, liquor bottles in hand and ready to party. Later on the phone, Tim is disgusted that Gloria is drunk at 8am and says that he won't talk to her when she's drunk. "Yeah," I thought, still thinking I'd misjudged Tim, "That's just healthy boundary setting."

But the change in how I see Tim comes a bit past the halfway point, when Tim comes to visit Gloria on the pretense of a business trip. When Gloria describes the ways that she is trying to get her life together--fixing up the house, getting a part-time job as a waitress--you can see Tim's gears turning as he computes a reason to sneer at her. First he remarks that she's just found a new way to score free drinks. She doesn't refute this, but she doesn't rise to it either. He then tries a different tactic, berating the idea of her being a waitress as a job that is beneath her.

The nature of how Tim needs to see Gloria becomes very clear in this sequence. He needs her to be a screw up. He needs a reason to roll his eyes at her and be exasperated. When she was drinking and partying, he had the moral high ground. But as she begins to actually clean up her life, his response isn't to be happy for her or to be encouraging. Contempt is the high that he is chasing with her, even if that means sabotaging her personal growth.

Aggressive



Hello, Oscar.

There's almost not as much to say about Oscar, as once you get to the halfway point of the film it becomes clear that he is not a nice or good guy.

What I noticed most this third or fourth time through the film was the way that Oscar weaponizes Gloria's alcoholism to serve his own interests. This is a really clever trick that the script slowly unfolds for us.

In an early scene, a hungover Gloria is surprised when Oscar shows up at her door with a giant TV. "Wow, this is a nice surprise!" she exclaims. "Um, we talked about this last night, remember?" Oscar replies. "Oh yeah," Gloria says, sheepishly. Oh, Gloria, we think.

Fast forward a bit, and we watch a scene where Oscar tells a drunk Gloria that she needs a couch on the wall of her room. When he shows up later with a couch, saying "You said you wanted this," we have an aha moment. Gloria's alcoholism, the frequency with which she doesn't remember, and her reliance on others around her to tell the truth makes her vulnerable to Oscar crafting a narrative in which she has needs and he responds to them.

When Gloria gives up drinking, Oscar's aggression only picks up. One of the most intense moments of the film, for me, is when he tries to force her to drink a beer. There are so many horror films out there with a creepy guy trying to control a woman. And in like 90% of those movies, that control eventually expresses itself in some sort of sexual assault attempt. This would have been an incredibly predictable route for the film to take---and honestly a later sequence where he lets himself into her house had me worried that a rape attempt was in the cards--and I find this iteration of creepy control almost more upsetting. He wants to force Gloria to hurt herself. To put herself in a position of vulnerability. He hates himself and he wants to drag her down to his level.

Finally, and obviously, Oscar is the most physically aggressive of the three men. It is not shocking that he eventually hurts Gloria, but the second physical attack is brutal, coupled with his indifferent murder of hundreds of innocent victims, made all the worse by the fact that he kills them to punish Gloria for not bending to his will.

So Are All the Men in This Film, Like, Evil?

I think that it would be easy to watch this film and think that it is anti-men. I don't think that it is at all. I think that the three romantic interests in the film each represent one type or facet of an unhealthy relationship, and Gloria must "level up" past each of them.

This movie could have included a male ally or positive romantic interest, but ultimately I think that the inclusion of such a character would have brought with it the implication that Gloria just needed to find herself a good boyfriend. But Gloria's problem isn't romantic. It's broader. It's her addiction and her ability to be productive and advocate for herself and make something out of her life. I think that the Gloria that we see at the end of the film is a woman who can now go out and find that good guy, knowing that she's too good for the Joels, Tims, and Oscars of the world. And she will also be a person who is ready to bring something to the table in a relationship other than hangovers and rambling stories about how Lydia (sorry, Natasha) really wanted to go to The Loft.



I mainline Windex and horse tranquilizer
Gloria and the Three "Princes"



Jason Sudeikis is scary good in this. It's obviously a departure from his usual comedic characters but he nails it as the stalker *******.



I enjoyed this film. I just wish there was a little more Tim Blake Nelson.
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The trick is not minding
What can you guys tell me about El Vampiro? I found it on Tubi, and since I’m binging a lot of older Films from Mexico, I came across this guy.

Ps: I’m going to watch it whether it’s deemed “bad” or not, but figured I’d get opinions on it first.



What can you guys tell me about El Vampiro? I found it on Tubi, and since I’m binging a lot of older Films from Mexico, I came across this guy.

Ps: I’m going to watch it whether it’s deemed “bad” or not, but figured I’d get opinions on it first.
It's been too long for me to remember any specifics, but it's sufficiently foggy to scratch my itch. The sequel is also streaming. (Vampire's Coffin)



The trick is not minding
It's been too long for me to remember any specifics, but it's sufficiently foggy to scratch my itch. The sequel is also streaming. (Vampire's Coffin)
Excellent! Both appear in the book I bought a few years ago on the history of the horror and sci fi double bills.

Along with a lot of other Salazar films.
It’s funny, even though Coffin is a sequel, it was released in the US first by 3 years.
Going to prioritize them both for watching



The trick is not minding
Well, so much for that idea. Both are in their native Spanish but sans subtitles. Can’t understand what they’re saying. So will pass on those for now, until they become available at some point.
But!
They do have Salazars The Brainiac English release. So perhaps not all is lost?



Well, so much for that idea. Both are in their native Spanish but sans subtitles. Can’t understand what they’re saying. So will pass on those for now, until they become available at some point.
But!
They do have Salazars The Brainiac English release. So perhaps not all is lost?
Weird, I'll have to check that out. I rented the discs via Netflix a hundred years ago, pretty sure those aren't in print anymore.

Another good Mexican horror is The Curse of the Crying Woman (1963). Not sure how easy that one is to find either.

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I vouch for both Curse of the Crying Woman AND Brainiac. And I'm pretty sure there is another one with the word Mirror in the title that's alright...Witch's Mirror maybe?



The trick is not minding
I vouch for both Curse of the Crying Woman AND Brainiac. And I'm pretty sure there is another one with the word Mirror in the title that's alright...Witch's Mirror maybe?
Yep, you’re correct. All the aforementioned Salazar tittles are in my book, and among my watch list.



There was another one that was kind of a horror-Western. Stay tuned....

The Living Coffin?


Think I've seen that one, don't remember anything about it.



The trick is not minding
There was another one that was kind of a horror-Western. Stay tuned....
There 8 of his films list in my book, in total.
The Vampire
The vampires Coffin
The Brainiac
The Curse of The Crying Woman
The Witch’s Mirror
The Man and The Monster
The Living Head
World of the Vampires



The Living Coffin?


Think I've seen that one, don't remember anything about it.
Yes, that was it. Rented that one around 15 years ago. At the time I think I was disappointed that the aesthetic was more Western than Gothic but I bet I'd be more into it now.



There was a company called Casa Negra that released a bunch of these on DVD many years ago, which is how I found them. Rented a few, bought a few. I haven't looked for them in many years, but they seem to be easy to find on Ebay, based on a brief search I just conducted.



There was a company called Casa Negra that released a bunch of these on DVD many years ago, which is how I found them. Rented a few, bought a few. I haven't looked for them in many years, but they seem to be easy to find on Ebay, based on a brief search I just conducted.
Easy maybe, but by god not cheap. Almost everyone has 20+ euros for shipping I'll have to wait my chance to, eh, "steal" them.



I think one of you recommended the short film Possibly in Michigan a while back? Well, I watched that and Beneath the Skin from the same director (Cecilia Condit, who posted these and some of her other short films on her YouTube channel) and would highly recommend both.


Possibly in Michigan is more or less a horror movie, but one which uses trite commercial aesthetics to comment on society's treatment of women (somebody smarter than me can better parse how it navigates the subjects of misogynist violence and the way society pressures women into domesticity and docility). It's eerie enough on its own, but gets a hell of a lot creepier when you realize it's a response to Condit's own experience of having unknowingly lived with a murderer, which she chronicles in Beneath the Skin, which has a visual style somewhat reminiscent of the video from The Ring.