Bad Obsession

It seems to be one of those days when Plan Nine From Outer Space is playing on every Roku channel I turn to.  Well OK, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but I do seem to keep running into toady.  I have to confess that I've never understood the obsessive fascination with Ed Wood Jr's films seem to hold for some people.  I mean, some of them are mildly amusing on a first viewing, but after that, their ineptitude is merely painful to watch.  I suppose that it is all part of the 'Cult of the Bad Film' which indiscriminately celebrates crap with little or no regard for what makes something 'good bad' as opposed to merely 'shit'.  As I've noted before, the problem I have with many of these 'classic' bad movies is that they actually have no redeeming features at all and subsequently no entertainment value whatsoever.  At least Ed Wood's obvious love of films and film-making, despite having no discernible talent for it, makes his films quite admirable in their attempts to produce actual professional films in spite have having no resources or budget.  There's nothing cynical about them - they aren't those horrible campy self consciously bad low budget pictures turned out by opportunists that seem to proliferate these days.  

But, if nothing else, supposedly 'bad' movies provide fodder for those 'horror hosts' who clog up many Roku channels, constantly interrupting their (usually) black and white subject matter in order to make some supposedly witty comment on the action or point out just how bad it is (and, by extension, how clever they are for noticing this fact).  Again, my dislike of this sort of thing is long established - I don't need to have some smart ass telling me how bad something is, or which bits I should be laughing at: I'm quite capable of judging these things for myself.  The 'horror host' seems to be a uniquely American phenomena, having grown out of late night local TV there.  Unfortunately, thanks to the internet and streaming TV, they are everywhere nowadays.  Quite why anyone wants to dress up like a ghoul and snigger over the same pool of public domain movies week-in, week-out, is beyond me.  The trouble is that they run through so much material and are so indiscriminate that, eventually, they start using movies that aren't bad, but that doesn't stop them from making their inane interruptions.  I once got very annoyed at one of these idiots constantly interrupting Witchcraft (1964), trying desperately to find innuendo and double entendres in the script that simply weren't there.

Yeah, I know, I'm sounding very irritable in this post.  I'm not sure why, but what the Hell, while I'm giving out unpopular opinions, here are a couple more:  Ken Bruce, why are all those knobs crying into their beer about his leaving Radio Two?  I always found him incredibly dull, a boring fart to be precise.  I remember that when he first did the Radio Two Breakfast Show (several decades ago), he was described as being like 'Terry Wogan but without the wit'.  Very accurate, in my opinion.  Then there's Steve Wright, exiled from Radio Two afternoons.  I'm old enough to remember him being on Radio One - I couldn't stand him then and he hasn't improved.  Good riddance.  Ah, that feels better!