Guys, I’m eating junk and watching rubbish!
December 25, 2016 8:28 AM Subscribe
It’s the perfect movie-within-a-movie: a one-minute-and-20-second noir-in-a-nutshell that feels like a fleeting glimpse of a long-lost classic.: Angels With Filthy Souls
Reeking of authenticity, Angels with Filthy Souls is not just a uniquely persuasive parody. It’s the perfect movie-within-a-movie: a one-minute-and-20-second noir-in-a-nutshell that feels like a fleeting glimpse of a long-lost classic. Its dialogue is crisp, the characters and performances credible, the rapid escalation of its drama enthralling. Plus it culminates in not just the most memorable utterance in Home Alone but one of the great movie lines of all time: “Keep the change, ya filthy animal”—the sardonic invitation since emblazoned on many a Christmas sweater.
This is so emblematic of web writing nowadays, a nice little package of trollish bullshit based around some tiny, unremarkable slice of detritus from a familiar pop culture work, trying to infuse it with more meaning than it could possibly hold as a way to reward readers for vaguely remembering its existence by casting that memory as a value. Whether the writer is serious or sarcastic doesn't matter as long as the examined tchotchke garners notice and comment.
posted by gusottertrout at 8:54 AM on December 25, 2016 [34 favorites]
This is so emblematic of web writing nowadays, a nice little package of trollish bullshit based around some tiny, unremarkable slice of detritus from a familiar pop culture work, trying to infuse it with more meaning than it could possibly hold as a way to reward readers for vaguely remembering its existence by casting that memory as a value. Whether the writer is serious or sarcastic doesn't matter as long as the examined tchotchke garners notice and comment.
posted by gusottertrout at 8:54 AM on December 25, 2016 [34 favorites]
gusottertrout: Yeah, but it's Christmas, so I'll let it slide. It's a day for inessential, pointless, fluffy content.
And yeah, I totally thought Angels With Filthy Souls was a real movie as a kid.
posted by SansPoint at 8:59 AM on December 25, 2016 [3 favorites]
And yeah, I totally thought Angels With Filthy Souls was a real movie as a kid.
posted by SansPoint at 8:59 AM on December 25, 2016 [3 favorites]
This makes me realize I would happily watch a compilation of fake film and tv shows from inside films and tv shows. The idea of jamming a bunch of different, varyingly ironic metacontent together removed from whatever original context and consuming that as its own notionally genuine feed of short-form filmmaking work sounds kinda compelling.
Also, at some point someone somewhere is going to decide to reboot Home Alone and I can't even imagine how much more strained the setup will have to be. Today's Kevin would be streaming that shit on Twitch like immediately, for one thing.
posted by cortex at 9:12 AM on December 25, 2016 [8 favorites]
Also, at some point someone somewhere is going to decide to reboot Home Alone and I can't even imagine how much more strained the setup will have to be. Today's Kevin would be streaming that shit on Twitch like immediately, for one thing.
posted by cortex at 9:12 AM on December 25, 2016 [8 favorites]
Also, at some point someone somewhere is going to decide to reboot Home Alone and I can't even imagine how much more strained the setup will have to be.
Unless you just double down and set the reboot in the 1950s/60s to cash in on babyboomer nostalgia.
Either that, or Kevin's family need to be wealthy Idaho preppers who accidentally leave him alone in their compound while traveling to Montana for the holidays.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 9:27 AM on December 25, 2016 [5 favorites]
Unless you just double down and set the reboot in the 1950s/60s to cash in on babyboomer nostalgia.
Either that, or Kevin's family need to be wealthy Idaho preppers who accidentally leave him alone in their compound while traveling to Montana for the holidays.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 9:27 AM on December 25, 2016 [5 favorites]
This reminds me of Brian de Palma's movie Body Double, in which the protagonist watches a porn movie, almost entirely on fast-forward, to get a glimpse of one particular actress. The entire porn movie, of course, had to be made specifically for the purpose of being fast-forwarded past.
posted by adamrice at 9:54 AM on December 25, 2016 [6 favorites]
posted by adamrice at 9:54 AM on December 25, 2016 [6 favorites]
adamrice: Now I'm just thinking of the orgy scene in A Clockwork Orange. (Yes, NSFW.)
posted by SansPoint at 10:26 AM on December 25, 2016
posted by SansPoint at 10:26 AM on December 25, 2016
On a similar note, if you splice together all the McBain clips from The Simpsons you get something at least as coherent as half of Hollywood's output.
posted by ckape at 11:22 AM on December 25, 2016 [5 favorites]
posted by ckape at 11:22 AM on December 25, 2016 [5 favorites]
This makes me realize I would happily watch a compilation of fake film and tv shows from inside films and tv shows.
I'd buy that for a dollar.
posted by mrbill at 1:49 PM on December 25, 2016 [2 favorites]
I'd buy that for a dollar.
posted by mrbill at 1:49 PM on December 25, 2016 [2 favorites]
To all the grinches in this thread, I loved Angels with filthy souls. It scared the hell out of me as a kid, and it really is a perfect piece of condensed pastiche. This hits the nostalgia chords hard for me :)
posted by sp160n at 2:32 PM on December 25, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by sp160n at 2:32 PM on December 25, 2016 [3 favorites]
Wow, I've watched Home Alone twice since Thanksgiving (after not watching it since childhood) because my son is now the perfect age to find the movie hilarious. I had no idea until right now that Angels with Filthy Souls was a fake movie. I covered his eyes for the machine gun part, because it seems a little too much for a kid these days.
posted by banjo_and_the_pork at 2:56 PM on December 25, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by banjo_and_the_pork at 2:56 PM on December 25, 2016 [1 favorite]
The Holiday has an in-story movie trailer starring James Franco and Lindsay Lohan; I would happily see it for the imagined personality clashes alone.
posted by nicebookrack at 4:00 PM on December 25, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by nicebookrack at 4:00 PM on December 25, 2016 [1 favorite]
The lady in Angels With Even Filthier Souls was the performance model for Holli Wood in Cool World
Now that’s a name I’ve not heard in a long time. "Holli Wood if she could."
posted by leotrotsky at 5:01 PM on December 25, 2016
Now that’s a name I’ve not heard in a long time. "Holli Wood if she could."
posted by leotrotsky at 5:01 PM on December 25, 2016
Fun fact, every actor in Angels with Filthy Souls is actually Bruce Campbell wearing a series of prosthetics
posted by beerperson at 9:32 PM on December 25, 2016
posted by beerperson at 9:32 PM on December 25, 2016
Either that, or Kevin's family need to be wealthy Idaho preppers who accidentally leave him alone in their compound while traveling to Montana for the holidays.
Yes! But the invaders are zombies, and Kevin is the only one left in the snowbound preppers compound. I would watch this.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 12:02 AM on December 26, 2016 [1 favorite]
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No I don't know why I know that.
posted by The Whelk at 8:31 AM on December 25, 2016 [2 favorites]