http://girlbomb.typepad.com/blog/2006/01/feminist_men_ox.html

Though the Erlbaum feminist credentials remain more impeccable than mine, of course.

And though _2001_ (of which _Event Horizon_ is sort of a dark cousin) is no horror movie, it’s hard to beat the apes’ encounter with the Monolith for a sheer sense of existential dread — in some ways (to tie things into the religion/atheism theme on the blog this month), _2001_ is really the ultimate “intelligent design” movie, it must be conceded, since the one unifying idea, if there’s a plot there, is that some progressive force is driving evolution (ape to man, moon-explorer to Jupiter-explorer, submissive computer to self-defending computer, man to godthing) rather than it being a random process.

The Monolith/apes scene, then, is arguably the best filmic depiction of how terrifying it would be to behold the face of God, if there were one, and it’s pretty effective, I’d say.

P.S. I hope Chris doesn’t mind me mentioning, by the way, that my previous entry, also about Lovecraft, inspired him to read “The Call of Cthulhu” aloud to his infant (and thus unharmed) daughter, which amuses me.

P.P.S. And I think Xine needs to rewatch _2001_ as an adult with an interest in theology, now that she has the slower pulse and more sophisticated tastes of a grown-up and won’t just get bored and cranky about it as she did when she saw it as a child.

As for M. Night Shyamalan (not “Knight,” I believe, but he somewhat pathetically made it up in college anyway), I liked “The Sixth Sense” (in spite of knowing the twist going in) and thought “Unbreakable” was underrated. Everything after that has been total shit (though I know you liked “The Village”).