Book Review: The Rim of the Unknown

    When I was a lad, and first getting into the works of H.P. Lovecraft and other weavers of weird tales, Frank Belknap Long’s name quickly entered my literary world. His story “The Hounds of Tindalos” was one of my favorites from the circle of Mythos writers I tapped into. Years of shopping at my favorite book store (Pro Libris on 3rd Street in Bangor, ME) netted me a lot of Lovecraft related books and collections by authors from that ever growing circle, including several by Long. Like so many of the books I hoarded, I never got around to reading them. Until now.

    With “The Rim of the Unknown” I got a sampling of his work from the late 20s through the mid 50s. A few were clearly of a Lovecraftian bent, especially 1927’s “The Man with a Thousand Legs.” While others felt more like a Ray Bradbury pastiche, like “Fuzzy Head.”  Many of the stores featured the Atomic Age fear (of nuclear annihilation) and hope (of a new, superior breed of humanity) that so marked the mid 20th century Science Fiction. Several of the stories had the Twilight Zone style “twist” endings (“The Cottage,” I’m looking at you!). And there were several stories with that 50s assumption that space flight would just be a thing we did; no big deal.  He also wrote a lot about families and family dynamics.  This seemed a bit odd, considering he was not a family man.  He got married around the age of 60, but never had children.  

    My favorite stories were the ones that tended toward the weirder, more “big idea” Science Fiction side of the spectrum.  “The Trap” was has a very Twilight Zone feel to its plot and resolution.  But the core concept of the alien in it is something kind of special, and I think puts it firmly in the Lovecraft Mythos.  At the end of the volume there are three companion stories that I really, really enjoyed.  “The Great Cold,” “Green Glory,” and “The Last Men” were all written in the mid 30s, and all take place in an extremely distant future of the type envisioned in books like William Hope Hodgson’s “Night Land.”  So far into the future, the Earth is nearly unrecognizable, and what we consider the “natural order” has been disrupted. In this case, Humanity has fallen, to be ruled over by alien (not extraterrestrial) intelligences descended from what we once saw as lowley. Each story looks at Humans living under the yoke of millennia of controlled breeding and institutionalized servitude, and how a thread of what makes us who we are might survive.

    The thing I probably most came away with from this anthology is that Frank Belknap Long was, perhaps, not a great writer.  He was creative.  He was certainly prolific.  But while I sit back and wonder why people aren’t reading Andre Norton, or Robert E. Howard, or some of the other really great talents of Weird, Fantasy, Science Fiction and Horror stories, I understand why Long may have fallen mostly into obscurity.  His prose is acceptable, without being especially artful or impressive.  Many of his tales have a very dated feel, not just in language, but in general concerns.  This might work more as a glimpse at the psychology of the day than as a compelling read.  Go read “The Hounds of Tindalos” (not in this volume), for sure.  It’s great.  Much of this...There’s a reason it’s forgotten.  But for fans of the weird tale, for folks into this kind of fiction, it’s worth a read.  You’ll find things to enjoy throughout. 

-Matthew J. Constantine

Dork Hero: Cary Grant

Growing up on classic films, few actors could stand next to Cary Grant when it came to embodying the Golden Age of Hollywood.  Sure, my favorite actor since I was a boy has been Humphrey Bogart, but I think it's because I feel myself reflected in him, I can relate to him.  Cary Grant, I don't relate to, not really.  I look up to, I want to be, but I don't see myself reflected in him.  I see an idealized version of me, maybe.


"Everyone wants to be Cary Grant.  Even I want to be Cary Grant." -Cary Grant

Obviously, the man is among the most handsome men to ever be put on film, but handsome only goes so far.  Grant has a humor and a charm that elevate him to what we think of when we think 'movie star.'  And he's a fascinating guy, an engineered persona that he sort lived until it became real.

And he followed one of the oldest pieces of advice for any showman.  He left us wanting more.  Still a relatively young man, he retired and lived out the rest of his days doing what he pleased, I suppose.  There are photos of him as an older man, going to events, on the street, with his child.  But he never did another movie after Run, Don't Walk.  Part of me laments the lack of great Old Man Grant performances.  But then, in that day, how many great roles would there have been?  No need to dwell on what might have been, because we have what was, and it is a heck of a body of work.

So, go check out some of the great Cary Grant films; North by Northwest, His Girl Friday, Holiday, Only Angels have Wings, Charade, or any number of others.  I'm not gonna say every film he was in was gold, but the lion's share were darned entertaining.  So, celebrate one of the titans of film, one of the greatest movie stars of all time, by just watching his movies.  The man may be dead, but Cary Grant lives on.

=Matt

A Fistful of Influence! (Matt’s Picks)

    OK, everything Brad said in his post on this same subject.  These aren’t necessarily my favorite films, but these are five of the films that shaped who I am as a movie viewer.  Movies have been a big part of my life for as long as I can remember, becoming all the more so when we got a spankin’ new VCR and color TV in the mid 80s.  These movies represent a few important street signs on the road map of my life in film.

5.  Star Wars:  Growing up in the 80s, Star Wars and the renaissance of genre films that followed in its wake was like a warm blanket I wrapped myself in.  The toys, the bed sheets, the Underoos, sure.  But the movies themselves.  To a lonely kid who spent much of his time inside with a TV, the Star Wars films were trusted friends.  And Star Wars itself was the beginning of it all.  I love all things (almost) science fiction, and I never held with the idea that you were either a Star Wars or a Star Trek person (the 60s Star Trek remains one of my favorite TV shows, and if I did a list like this for TV it would be right near the top).  But Star Wars had a lasting impact, even with all the later tainting of my love that came with the dreaded prequel trilogy and overdose of merchandising.

4.  Fist of Legend:  I’d watched a few Chinese martial arts films before I watched this Jet Li film, mostly Jackie Chan stuff.  But it was while watching this movie that I realized Kung Fu films could be more than just stunts and bad dubbing.  They could also be about stuff.  They could also have compelling characters and solid plots.  They could also tap into genuine emotions.  Fist of Legend has some excellent fights, but it’s a good movie, too.  So, in a way, it was the movie that really introduced me to Kung Fu films.

3.  The Phantom Empire: This Gene Autry serial was a very early viewing for young Matt the Lad.  Not only did it make me fall in love with the idea of the movie serial, but I also became captivated by the mix of genres (here Cowboy Musical and Science Fiction).  Over the years, bits of this film were always floating around in the back of my head, leaking into my fiction and into my choices of movie rentals.

What could I possibly have found to like in this?

2.  Coffy:  When I broke up with my high school girlfriend, I suddenly found myself with more time and more money than sense.  Being me, instead of re-directing those resources into doing something that would improve my life, I descended into a black whole of video rental madness.  For a couple years, I watched more movies than I could possibly count.  I mean, I watched EVERY DANGED THING I could get my hands on.  And while I’d been aware of Shaft, and I knew there were Grindhouse films that had been made in the 70s, I was largely ignorant of them, and knew little of Blaxploitation beyond a few articles in film texts.  But one night, walking through the stacks at the local Front Row Video (yeah, it wasn’t even Movie Gallery, yet), I spotted a very sexy picture of Pam Grier looking out at me from a video box.  I was in love, and my movie lust found yet another new direction to stretch.

1.  Raiders of the Lost Ark:  Almost everything about me, my tastes, and my interests eventually leads back to seeing Raiders of the Lost Ark at the old Bangor Opera House when I was five years old.  I wanted to be Indiana Jones.  I wanted to fight Nazis, travel the globe, find ancient cities, have love affairs with feisty brunettes, and live in Hollywood’s version of the 1930s.  Pulp, history, geography, the desert, the jungle, nature, religion, and so many other life long interests started here, not to mention my eventual love and fascination with the films and the era that inspired it.

-Matthew J. Constantine

Prodigal Son: Roots

                                                                  Part Twenty Three

    Cue long, exaggerated sigh, followed by a nostalgic musing while I stare off into the distance.  Yes.  It is done.  Or, to use a phrase I think should never be used in another film in the history of ever, “It has begun.”  After all the talk, all the wishful thinking, all the day dreaming, and yes, all the many false starts, the first night of actual roleplaying has been accomplished.  The first full session I’ve run in more than six years (other than that one on one thing with Brad a couple years ago when I was first trying to get serious about this).  I think that’s the longest continuous gap in gaming I’ve had since I started with the hobby as a young lad (pretty sure Reagan was still in office).  It feels good to slay that dragon.  Starting a game is always difficult.  Starting a game with people new to the hobby is a challenge (a very worthy one).  But starting a game after six years was very, very hard to do.  I’m using mental muscles that have atrophied, digging into parts of my brain that haven’t seen the light of day for far too long.  But, it all worked out pretty well.  All the stress and apprehension melted away fairly quickly, and I began to feel the old rhythms.

    Call of Cthulhu always has always felt a bit like coming home.  It uses the Basic Roleplaying system, the game mechanic I got started on.  And it didn’t take me long to fall for it’s 1920s/1930s setting.  After all, Indiana Jones was my hero.  Over the years, it’s meant a lot of different things to me.  I’ve played in several very different games, and I’ve run a bunch myself.  It’s always challenging, but usually rewarding.  This time around, I’m trying something a little more ambitious than normal.  In the past, I’ve almost always done one of three things.  Early on, my games were always set in very cinematic versions of exotic countries.  Then I graduated to The Thing style of relatable, but hopelessly remote locations, with characters from different walks of life thrust together through circumstance (survivors of a plane crash, for example).  Later, in an attempt to get things more grounded and relatable, my games were set in and around Bangor, Maine, my home town and a place I had a good deal of practical knowledge of.  Not this time.  This time the game is set in Arkham, the city is wide open, and I’m juggling more than one story.  In the past, I’ve tended to take just one idea, one creature, one item, and build a story around it.  When that story was over, perhaps I’d do a follow-up, likely connected to the first in some way.  This time, I wanted to do something new.  So, I’ve got a whole bunch of storylines, some fully developed, some only briefly sketched out, all waiting to be uncovered by the group.  And I’m going to let them explore those stories in whatever way they see fit.  Sure, I’ll be dropping hints and hooks, but already they’ve gone off in unexpected directions, and it’s great.  Of course, not ever story will pan out.  Not every clue will lead to something important.  And these story threads aren’t all linked.  They’re not all about the same thing, and they’re not all building to something, like I’d normally do.  Though they may be laced together by the characters (that’s already started to happen), I’m letting the chips fall where they may.

    Going way back, I always knew that Call of Cthulhu shouldn’t be Dungeons & Dragons.  I don’t just mean the system and all its nonsense.  I mean, it shouldn’t be about walking around fighting monsters all the time.  It shouldn’t be opening doors and finding random creatures and artifacts.  It shouldn’t be a video game.  I think that might be part of why I always focused stories on only one core idea or creature.  If the story was about Ghouls, then dang it, Ghouls would be what you got.  Maybe, just maybe, they’d have something extra special and nasty working with them, but 99% of what the game would be about Ghouls and Ghouls only.  This time around I wanted to do things differently, so I conceived two major and unrelated stories, and multiple lesser stories.  I still don’t want this to degrade into some 20s themed dungeon crawl, with rooms full of Deep Ones or legions of Nightgaunts flapping around.  But it’s going to be more monster/thing heavy than I’d normally do.  In fact, in the very first session, a monster was spotted (briefly), an artifact was found, and a bunch of other crazy stuff happened.  Normally, I’d take a lot longer to reveal that much.  And of course, like in all Call of Cthulhu games I run, I need to make sure that the possibility of the complete ending of the world is always an option.  I feel like any given session of the game should be able to result in an apocalypse of some form, be it a plague, open war with the Deep Ones, causing Yog-Sothoth to open the Gates, a visit from Ghroth, whatever.

    So, now that I’ve got my head around the game, now that the first session has happened, I feel more focused, and more like I know what I’m doing again.  Now, I need to target each player and his/her character with some particular excitement and horror, as well as provide opportunities for each to be a valued member of a team.

    I don’t imagine this game will go on for more than 3 or 4 sessions, especially as I’m trying to keep things moving quickly, and will probably be throwing a lot more, and more deadly things at the characters than normal.  So, I’m still thinking about what other games might be good for the group.  I would certainly like to do something more long form, something open ended, where character development can get more play, where stories can take their time to build, and where actions have far reaching consequences.  One especially nice thing about games like Call of Cthulhu is that, assuming characters reach a good ending point still sane and alive, there’s always the option of picking things up again later, even if there are new players in the group.  If folks enjoy this roleplaying thing and want to do more, we’ll talk about options again then.  I hope I can keep this ball rolling.  It’s tough, with everyone having kids and jobs and social lives.  But I think we can do it.

I still love Cyberpunk 2020.

-Matt