The Redemption of Erâth: History of Erâth – The Second Age (Part V)

(v) The War of Darkness (Part 3)

The Coming of the Dragon Lords

It was in this moment of despair, as the courage of the Men of Thaeìn failed and the marching armies of death were bare moments away, that the salvation of Thaeìn came to be. For years, only the kingdoms of Erârün and Kiriün had made preparations for war against the armies of darkness, and it was against these two kingdoms that the Duithèn had urged Urkûl and Pulväen to first move. But these were not the only kingdoms in Thaeìn, and in the North of the land, the Dragon Lords watched as the armies of Aélûr marched across the great Bridge and against the kingdoms of the South. They remembered well how the Duithèn had attempted to corrupt them and their Dragons, and looked down upon the weaker kingdoms of the South as they slowly turned to despair under the withering influence of the Duithèn.

But as the War of Darkness took shape, they became aware that, should the southern kingdoms fall, the Hochträe and eventually their own lands would come under attack, and they were uncertain that they could resist the combined forces of the entire world against them. Having long chosen to […]

Read the complete section here.

Movie Night: xXx

Year: 2002

Production Company: Revolution Studios

Leads: Vin Diesel, Asia Argento

It’s funny to think that xXx was released ten years ago; it feels like its been a lot longer. Perhaps it’s to do with the fact that I’ve consciously avoided this movie out of a small sense of shame for having liked it all the way back then. It’s not that it isn’t a good movie (it’s pretty average, in my opinion), but it’s such a ridiculously thoughtless, testosterone-fulled feel-good flick that it feels a simple admission of enjoyment would cause giant pecs to explode on my chest. It was also my introduction to Vin Diesel, who seems to have thrown away whatever potential acting career Saving Private Ryan might have spawned and spent the following fifteen years making movies about…Vin Diesel.

Anyway. It was certainly a romp; I recalled exactly why I liked the movie when it came out: the simple pleasure of seeing Rammstein blow shit up as a US spy gets killed by Russians. How very metal. This was novel to me (I hadn’t seen Ace Ventura: Pet Detective at that point, and was still blissfully unaware of the infamous Cannibal Corpse performance), and the idea of introducing metal to the mainstream was wonderful. It didn’t take me long to realize it for a bandwagon, but the simple trip of watching a movie scored my Rammstein, Drowning Pool, Queens of the Stone Age and Hatebreed was satisfying in its own reward.

xXx is a simple enough story; a straight-up James Bond rip-off, dirtied up and without the wit, Xander Cage (really?) is an anarchic criminal picked up by the NSA to become their newest secret agent. He is to infiltrate a crime gang in Prague, because they’re working on world-destroying biological weapons. Or something. There’s also a girl, who’s an ex-Russian agent who was abandoned and decided to hang around the bad guys for a bit, because there wasn’t anything else to do. Or something.

Basically, that’s all you really need to know; everything from there on in is lots and lots (and lots) of explosions. In fact, the stunts themselves are remarkable; the film won an award (it’s only win, it must be said) at the World Stunt Awards. Two scenes in particular: driving a Corvette off a bridge and then parachuting to safety (The Spy Who Loved Me, anyone? (incidentally, one of the best opening sequences of any movie, ever)), and the bit where he harpoons a speedboat and parasails behind it. Yep.

The James Bond shows through in plenty of places: the Russians, the mysterious head honcho, the gadgets and the car full of weapons and an ejecting roof. The most worrying thing about watching this movie was having to explain James Bond to Little Satis. Do you know I can’t find them on iTunes or Netflix? What’s wrong with the world these days?

There were quite a few more ‘sexy bits’ than I remember; particularly a scene where the bad guy wakes up draped in three stark naked women. Little Satis goes, “Boobies – eew!”. Had I recalled, I might have chosen a different film, but in hindsight, I remember being just as thrillingly scandalized at the scantily clad women and the gratuitous scenes in James Bond as a child, so I guess it all works out in the end.

Wait a minute…

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

Tales of Despair: Cup of My Blood

In a dark, cold apartment, two young men stare at the small box in front of them. One, at least, is clearly very afraid. The box must never be opened, one says. We must, the other replies. And so they do.

Moments later, a man and a woman burst in. One man is found in a closet – burned to ash. The other, cowering in the bath. The woman takes the box, and in cold blood kills him.

Jack Fender used to be a renowned photographer, famous for his stark black and white style, and the subtle eroticism of his work. Used to. Three years ago, his wife – his soulmate and his muse – committed suicide. Now he shoots soft porn. Locked off and dead to the world, Jack wanders around in a haze, filled with the dark visions of his wife’s final moments. Then one day, nearly run down in the street, he witnesses the fatal car crash of the woman who took the box. With her dying breath, she bids him to take it, and never to look upon it. And he does.

Jack locks the box away; turns back to his empty life. Continues to pile the cash from his porn shoots on a shelf, never spending a dime. His previous life made sure he doesn’t need to. He puts the box out of his mind – until dark and disturbing visions begin to appear before him. Those around him – the few he interacts with, that pretend to care about him – are certain he’s going insane.

And then – emptying his mind late one night at the pool – he meets Iona. And she listens to him. She speaks to him. And finally, she breaks through to him. They become close, and they begin to love…and after so long, his muse returns. Slowly, his creativity returns, and he begins to feel that he might finally be able to leave the demons behind him.

Janina Gavankar as Iona.

Little does he know that the demons are, in fact, yet to come, lying in wait. As the darkness closes in around him, he begins to realize that Iona may not be all she seems – and the powers of evil are intent on the contents of the box. As everything he knows comes crashing down, he discovers the box holds an ancient and unimaginably powerful relic: the holy grail. And the terrible visions that continue to fill his mind hold an even darker secret from his past.

Cup of My Blood is not a great movie. Mediocrely acted, poorly color-graded and uncomfortably scripted, it is a low-budget B-movie in every possible sense of the word. Yet the editing is strong, and it manages nonetheless to be both visually striking and stylistically unsettling. It is graphic, violent and disturbing, mysterious and frightening, and ultimately charts an artist’s descent into madness in the face of unspeakable horror. Had it had a bigger budget and better actors, it could have been a significant film. As it stands, it’s a visceral depiction of sex and death, haunted by despair.

Some of you may find this film disturbing or upsetting; some of you may simply laugh at it. Either way, approach it with caution: it isn’t as simple as it appears.