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Another longer than intended/dodgy audio entry in the ‘Powers of Horrorrr’ series, ‘Coup de Grâce’ by Sofia Ajram, this one quite personal to me as it deals with depression + suicide [warning: might be bleak/distressing to some viewers].

Actually, it’s not as bleak as you may think, there’s a lot of irony in there, especially in the music segments, which might, now that I think about it, render it even bleaker cos of the clips used.

I don’t know.

The novella itself, set in an infinite, no exit subway station [Montreal], did take me back to my own darker times, but not overwhelmingly so as it kind of wavered between communication + expression; I favour the latter, write it in my own work; expression as Psyche-Voynich Manuscript, comprehensible [maybe, at certain moments] to me + readers of Voynichese alone. ‘Coup de Grâce’ is at its best when it does this, when it loses itself to the metaphorical/symbolic.

Apologies to Sofia for potentially murdering their surname [I think it’s Azh-ram but not 100% sure] and, for some reason, calling the novella’s MC Vickens instead of Vicken.

Films/music used in the video [as usual, it’s a lot]:

Lilya-4-Ever
Stroszek
Morgiana
In a Year of 13 Moons
Moebius-17
Morvern Callar
Footprints
Rouge
Belladonna of Sadness
Sevmek Zamani [1965]
Meshes of the Afternoon
Lesson Faust [1994, Svankmejer]
Other Side of the Underneath
Anti-Clock
Vibrations [Jane Arden short film]
Separation [1967, Jack Bond]
Daisies
My Own Private Idaho
A Nightmare on Elm Street 3
Red Desert
Demon Pond
Butterfly Kiss
Ganja & Hess
Vagabond
The Devil, Probably
The Fire Within
Subway
Kontroll
The Asphyx
Repulsion
Pieta
Barbarella
The Seventh Victim
Paperhouse
Happy Together
Under the Skin
The Hours
The Simpsons [Hamlet episode]
Galloping Galaxies [tv series, shit]
Séance on a Wet Afternoon
La Chinoise
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

MUSIC/AUDIO

Só Uma Canção // Barbarella [Brazilian]
Oublie-moi // Barbarella [French]
Some Velvet Morning // Lee Hazlewood & Nancy Sinatra
Here With You // Suzy + the Knockouts
Belladonna // Masahiko Satō
Figures in White // Jane Arden
Murder of the Real // lecture from Baudrillard, 1999