Shut up, I love Celine Dion's cover of The Christmas Song.

1. Colbie Caillat - Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
2. Jimmy Eat World - Last Christmas
3. Kristinia DeBarge - Do You Hear What I Hear?
4. John Legend - O Holy Night
5. Keane - White Christmas
6. Kate Havenvik - Winter Wonderland
7. Gavin DeGraw - Silver Bells
8. Celine Dion - The Christmas Song
9. The Hotel Cafe Medley - Auld Lang Syne

Merry Christmas, everyone! :)

If this asked me to make out, it would not be out of desperation... it would be for the obvious, feral, animalistic reasons. Haha! I'm pretty sure that's what Rachel felt. Bakit ganun... I've suddenly become attracted to Noah... ahem... Puck!

The friends at the beach.


photo courtesy of Roget
Wee!

I like horror/suspense flicks. Not the gore-y, slasher ones but the ones that get underneath my skin. I know I've raved about "REC" months ago but up to this day, I find myself rewatching it. There are lots of elements in the film that make it a successful horror and zombie movie... this is how Blair Witch should have ended (instead we get a weird cutaway to the guy staring at the wall).

I like the first person format of the movie. "The Blair Witch Project" was also successful in part because of this. I thought "Cloverfield" also benefited from this format, however jarring. At least this time, we know why the cameraman continually shoots -- because he's paid to, he's part of the news crew. Okay, so maybe he wasn't required to shoot when ALL of the people became zombies but still... nice. And the camera features came in handy, especially the night vision. Shudder.

The U.S. movie "Quarantine" was adapted from "REC." "REC" is actually a Spanish film and tells a story about Angela Vidal and how she got stuck in a building full of zombies. At first, Angela and her cameraman. Pablo, are making the rounds in a fire station, doing a feature on what goes on during night at the station. It's kind of a ho-hum piece until the firemen are called to an emergency because a woman got stuck in her apartment and is acting crazy. And crazy she is because she bites off half the face of a policeman. Yikes.

The tenants in the building are in panic and nobody is telling them anything. Some sort of biohazard team secure the area so they can't get out without being shot. Next thing leads to another, one zombie gets to bite another live person, and then live person reanimates. Next thing you know, almost all of them are zombies.

I have been fascinated with zombies since I was in my teens. Loved "Night of the Living Dead". Watched "28 Days Later", "Dawn of the Dead", and "Shaun of the Dead". This genre appeals to me probably because I'm quite curious about what happens when the whole world is screwed up. And it's probably comforting, to me at least, to know that there are many ways that the world can be screwed up so I thank my lucky stars that it is not.

The way that it's edited gets under my skin. You know how you're scared sometimes because you never know who's (or what's) behind you? That's the feeling that I get. Plus combined with the fact that these are zombies that we're talking about. "Zombie anxiety itself has many levels. Having your own body bitten, eaten, and taken over, as well as losing your own individual identity is horrifying enough, but this is compounded by seeing your loved ones taken over. Zombie stories are preoccupied with losing loved ones. On top of this, the breaking down of society and the ensuing chaos magnifies the nightmare. “Zombies, Mr. Brooks said, are the perfect goblin for such times, in part because they suggest broad social collapse, when anyone – a policeman, a nurse, a friend – can turn into a force of evil. With a werewolf or vampire, all the evil is concentrated on a single creature; with zombies, the evil is everywhere.” (Ref. Chad Helder, "The Literary Renaissance of the Zombie")

At the end of the movie, I was white-knuckling. I literally had to push the stop button a couple of times because I couldn't take it anymore. But eventually, I had to finish. Can't wait for "REC 2"!

1. Madonna - Music Inferno

2. Lady Gaga - I Like It Rough

3. Robyn - With Every Heartbeat

4. Roisin Murphy - Ruby Blue

5. The Presets - Yippiyo-ay

6. Santogold - You'll Find A Way

7. Lady Gaga - Starstruck