There is plenty of "Evil Dead" content on this site if you look around. The original film was one of those movies that terrified me at the prospect of seeing originally. Once I crossed the threshold however, I have not been able to resist the "Deadites" and any time one of these films comes up at a theater, I make the effort to go.
As part of the "Panic at the Paramount" Halloween Programming, we got a chance to see the original film presented with a live performance of the accompanying score. This presentation is apparently touring because my friend Aaron Neuwirth saw it in Los Angeles a week before we got it here in Austin. The score is performed by an ensemble of musicians rather than a full orchestra, but they are all quite good and there were no spots where I thought the sound was empty.
The band members are enthusiastic and the leader of the group encouraged the audience to get into the swing of things with cheers, screams and hooting or hollering as called for. It seems like the audience can fire up the performance with an engaged response to what they are listening to. This was a lot of fun and if it comes to your neck of the woods, (see what I did there?) you should definitely make the trek out to see and hear it.
As hard as it is for me to believe, I do not have a post on the original John Carpenter Halloween from 1978. I have seen this movie almost every year for twenty years at least, and I guess I never had the chance to go back and see it on the big screen until now. It seems like there must have been a Fathom Event Screening, but I looked on the site here and found nothing. So thank you Paramount Theater for giving me this opportunity.
Although not the first "slasher" horror film, that title must belong to "Psycho", John Carpenter's Halloween defined the genre in the late 70s and for the last fifty years has been the template for all the subsequent slasher films around. Obviously, the title "Halloween" helps make this a perennial, something it most certainly not have achieved under the original title "The Babysitter Murders". So much care was taken to set up the characters who are being stalked, it is different that almost all the subsequent films which make the victims into nearly nameless notches on the knife, axe, chainsaw of the killers in later films. The three main girls are introduced and each gets some moments to be a real teenager, before they become the target. Laurie, Annie and Lynda are average girls, with love lives that vary from the raucous to the non-existent. In the end it is Laurie, the virginal Jamie Leigh Curtis who survives and is remembered, but Annie had a well developed suspense scene in the film that is just as effective as the climax moments, at drawing a scared response from the audience.
Donald Pleasance is a little crazed as Dr. Loomis, although from what he knows, it is perfectly understandable. His sense of urgency does carry the pacing of the film in some of the spots where the killer is not on screen or actively pursuing he girls. I was a little nonplussed at the reaction of some of the audience at the screening. They seemed unable to adjust their post modern sensibilities to the late seventies context. They have seen scream too many times to know that the reason that meta narrative exists at all is that the original films took place. I felt a little like Randy at the party, I know the rules and why they existed in 1978, but no one else seemed to care. They did still appreciate the film, but I could not understand why they laughed at some of the moments in the film that are frightening or serious.
Anyway, I found the movie to be continuously compelling, and well shot, utilizing locations in Southern California that I grew up in as Haddonfield, Illinois. Michael Myers becomes an iconic masked killer and there is a long line of slashers that followed in his wake.
Director Robert Rodriguez was presenting the film with a surprise second feature, which was only revealed at the screening. It turned out he was planning a Carpenter double feature, by including Carpenter's next Theatrical Feature "The Fog"
I saw "The Fog" in it's original release and I have always liked the movie. It is a ghost story, told as a ghost tory with malevolent forces returning to wreak vengeance on the descendants of those who wronged them.
I like the fact that not everyone who gets murdered by the ghosts, deserves their fate. After all, furious spirits from beyond the grave are not always reasonable. This film puts Jamie Leigh Curtis in the story, but she is not really the star. If there is a featured performer it is the then wife of the director, Adrienne Barbeau. She plays the evening DJ at the local radio station and her studio is at a high point in the seaside community, so she can see the dangerous fog coming off the ocean, and she directs people to flee when it is clear that the fog contains the ghosts that have returned for their justice.
Jamie Leigh's Mom, Janet Leigh, is also in the picture, a nice bit of stunt casting but not one that was essential. Carpenter made running from the weather much more thrilling than Shyamalan did in "The Happening". It is a lot scarier to have the fog manifest as dead sailors bent on killing, than leaves blowing in the wind.
I can's say it all makes sense, but I like the fact that Tom Atkins gets played as a sex symbol and John Houseman tells a scary story to kids on the beach. All in all it was a ton of fun.
The "Panic! at the Paramount" series this year has featured several special presentations that required an additional admission fee past our membership subscription. That has been perfectly reasonable given the quality of the programming. This presentation of the John Landis classic, featured a Q and A after the movie with the film's star David Naughton, who turned out to be quite the raconteur. He told us a number of funny stories about the production and working with the special effects make-up of Rick Baker
This is another of the great 1980s horror films that initiated the practice of mixing humor in with the frights. Landis was the right guy to do this having a great background in comedy, having made both "Animal House" and "the Blues Brothers". This film came out the summer I was working as a delivery driver for a photo supply company in Los Angeles. One of the places I delivered to, printed movie posters, and I just could not manage to snag one for this movie from the stacks of them I had to walk by when making a delivery to the printing company.
Jack and David are two college students, traveling through Europe on a summer excursion. They end up in a remote part of England, walking through a rural area, that is populated by a community living with a secret that casts fear over them. They are not particularly friendly natives and the boys are sent packing into the dark with a warning to stick to the road and stay off the moors. The humor had already started with the kibbitzing between the two young men, but it get more intensely humorous when they realize they have wandered off the road and they hear a howling animal near them. The tone shifts suddenly, and a horrifying bloody attack ensues. That is the pattern for the rest of the movie. A moment of levity is suddenly dashed by some horror, or a moment of terror becomes a joke in the hands of the actors and director.
Rick Baker famously won the first Academy Award for the new make-up category, for the combination of prosthetics, puppetry and hair and make-up moments. The scene where David's hand extends as it becomes a paw was shot one time. Landis called cut and print and was ready to go to the next shot, but Baker had spent months getting the effect ready and was not prepared to be done so quickly. As Naughton told it, Landis looked at Baker and asked, "Does it do something else" and the flummoxed make up master had to say no, and Landis simply said, "Let's move on then."
The use of pop tunes that evoked the moon was another early innovation. Tons of movies use "needle drops" these days, but in 1981, most films relied on original music for their cues. I can't say that "America Werewolf in London" was the first to use them, but it is the earliest film I can remember that used previous record hits for the distinct purpose of highlighting a scene in the movie. Other films may have used popular songs as background, but this movie was using them as punchlines and energy points.
It might be fair to classify the movie as a romance as well as a horror-comedy. The lovely Jenny Agutter plays the nurse who takes a special interest in David after he is discharged from the hospital. Their love affair is a touching counter-point to the horror story that David is living through. His friend Jack makes frequent appearances in the film, after his character has died, and there are great visual jokes that go along with some gruesome imagery. This is another example of how gallows humor is injected into the story.
I have heard it said that the 1980s were the golden age of horror films. I think that may be a little bit of an exaggeration, but having experienced "Re-Animator", Fright Night", "The Fog" and this movie, all in the last month, I might be convinced.
Having fallen even further behind on my posts, this entry will be a little different. I actually saw "Re-Animator" twice in the week of these screenings, and one of those screening was a special presentation with guests at the Paramount Theater here in Austin. To get the complete discussion of the film which was also the MOTM selection for the LAMBcast, I am including a link to the podcast here.
"Re-Animator" is one of the jewels of 1980s horror gore films. Theater director Stuart Gordon makes a seamless transition to films with a cast of soon to be iconic horror actors, including the great Jeffrey Combs as Dr. Herbert West. His arched brows, deadpan face and monomaniacal voice, are the perfect combination for this science fiction horror story that mixes the Frankenstein mythos with the Zombie aesthetic.
Combs appeared with co-star Barbara Crampton, to talk about the movie with the hostess from Austin's own Hyperreel Fanclub.
The late actor David Gale, steals the movie every time his disembodied head appears on screen. It is both horrifying and hysterical. There is a sequence featuring some nudity and a very explicit sex act being performed by a talking head, so be careful about showing this movie to anyone under age, it is adult fare. The violence and bloodletting should have warned you of that early on.
I fell behind this week, had six films to catch up with. After writing about two of them, I thought it was time for a change of pace. I went to a Friday Double Feature and a Sunday Double feature at the Paramount Theater here in Austin Texas. The programming had some horror themes, I especially liked the idea of "the fun ones". So here is my video commentary on the four films.
Friday Nights they'll be Dressed to Kill, down at the Paramount.
The drinks will flow and the blood will spill.
These two were horror adjacent films but still fit the "fun" description. Looking forward to a NYC trip next year to catch the musical stage version of
"Death Becomes Her". If it doesn't open with "Songbird" I will be befuddled.
This is one of those films that I hope I’ll be able to draft tomorrow on my Lancaster show. We are having a draft of horror films made and released prior to 1973. Rosemary’s Baby from 1968 not only fulfills the requirement okay in the appropriate time, but also being a truly creepy horror film, and one that is extremely well made. It was produced surprisingly, by William Castle, who was Notorious for making the budget gimmick horror films, like The Tingler, 13 Ghosts, and the House on Haunted Hill. He snapped up the rights to make the movie, by buying a book for adaptation before anyone else could get to it. Unfortunately for him, he spent all of his money buying the rights, and had none left to make the movie, which forced him to seek financing, and resulted in a studio-based film, and the studio insisted on hiring their own director. Roman Polanski is notorious nowadays, but at the time he was one of the hot directors in Europe, and this is a movie that put him in the top ranks.
The film is a very literal story about the birth of Satan’s child. You can struggle to look for metaphor or allegory here, but when it comes to the main plot line, Satan rapes a young woman and she is forced to carry out a pregnancy it is going to result in the birth of what is likely to be the Antichrist. This movie came out 5 years before The Exorcist, and 8 years before The Omen. It has very few horror effects, there is one death on screen, and a couple that are implied which take place off screen. The makeup in the film is not full of Prosthetics and goo with blood, there’s only a hint of the devil’s actual appearance with some close-ups on demonic eyes. Most of the makeup involves showing star Mia Farrow as becoming somewhat emaciated in the early stages of her pregnancy. Instead of glowing like a pregnant woman would she seems to be disappearing, pound by pound.
Mia Farrow gives on heroic performance as Rosemary, loving wife of a struggling New York actor, who is befriended by some oddballs in the somewhat sketchy apartment building she and her husband have taken up Residence in. Early acquaintance, when Rosemary has met in the laundry room basement, ends up dead and that is the most gruesome scene in the film. The young woman was staying with the older couple who lives next door to Rosemary and her husband. And it seemed that they were helping her recover from a sordid life of drug use and promiscuity. We never really learn why she died, but it is strongly suggested that the appearance of Rosemary suddenly was a opportunity that was a lot more promising for the coven of witches that occupy the building. Yes that’s right, I said witches.
The older couple next door, take up a particular interest in Rosemary and her husband, and begin to insert themselves into the young couples lives. To some degree Rosemary is happy to have some company, but she does seem to recognize that her husband is taken an unhealthy interest in their neighbors life story. He frequently spends time with the older couple, well Rosemary tries to maintain some distance. Rosemary’s husband is played by the great John Cassavetes, and at times he is a solicitous husband, but at other times he’s an insensitive prick. He and rosemary seem sexually compatible and happy, but he struggles with career uncertainty, and the fear that comes from where your next job is going to be coming from. Things get a little desperate when he loses a part in a play that could have brought him some much-needed attention. Like Cassavetes himself, the actor resents having to work for money, particularly in television commercials. His luck suddenly changes when tragedy strikes the actor who had been cast in the role that he was up for, and the part defaults to him.
This is all my way up set up, because this is really a character based film more than a plot based movie. Rosemary is driven to preserve her marriage in the face of the economic uncertainty that the two of them are confronted by. She also is in the process of nesting, and the desire for a child feels very natural at this point in their relationship. Once it is discovered that Rosemary is pregnant, the old couple next door begins to offer assistance. Ruth Gordon is an eccentric woman who has what appear to be friendly intentions, and some odd cooking skills. Her husband insists that Rosemary see the obstetrician that he is friends with. So the story focuses on this vulnerable young woman, being prayed upon with affection by her husband and Neighbors, and she doesn’t realize how much she is being manipulated. The doctor she sees is played by Ralph Bellamy, and he seems the picture of a wise and comforting older doctor, full of credibility. He needs all of that credibility because he keeps dismissing the problems the Rosemary is facing in her pregnancy. It’s hard for us to imagine the pregnant woman will allow her health to deteriorate the way it did in the early stages of the pregnancy, without seeking some substantial Medical advice. The assurances of her doctor only carry weight because of his reputation. It takes the intervention of some of her younger friends to convince her that she needs to see the original doctor she visited with in order to get a second opinion. Conveniently at that point the negative symptoms she’s experiencing cease, and it seems that the doctor was right all along, which reinforces The credibility he had originally.
The whole movie is about atmosphere, and the old apartment building that’s a couple moves into is full of it before we even meet the characters that fill it up. There’s a long sense of dread in the last third of the film, but they’re also some comical moments with the witches coven struggling to deal with playing nursemaid to hell spawn. Mia farrow’s expression when she finally gets a chance to see her baby is one that is perfectly horrifying, and ultimately maternal which is the real horrific twist in the film. Roman Polanski Maybe a horrible human being but he was a hell of a director, and as noted in another film, this movie made him the biggest director in the world at the time.
The Paramount Theater here in Austin, wrapped up it's annual Halloween selection of movies, Panic! at the Paramount, with this atmospheric contagion movie. Director David Robert Mitchell (he of the three first names) delivers plenty of fright with this film that features a curse, passed on by sexual contact. So there is a provocative concept, layered in guilt which results in a fear induced sense of paranoia for our main character.
The movie "Smile" from last year, basically stole the plot of this film and just changed the nature of the contagion and the way characters react to it. The thing that makes it most clear that the two films come from the same DNA is the manner in which those infected must try to rid themselves of the curse. It comes from forcing it on someone else. Also, the pursuing malicious force can take on the countenance of someone the victim knows. That is the climax of both films, and it is a pretty effective fright tool when deployed.
When I saw this movie originally, I was most interested in the horror dynamics, but there are other elements that make the film work. Jay, the main character, is a college student who has a new boyfriend that she has sex with in his car. Afterward, in an idyllic mood with a very hopeful and sunny disposition, she is suddenly subdued and tied up by the boyfriend. This is the first instance of a negative result from an early in the relationship sexual encounter, but it is not the worst. The boyfriend tries to explain the curse to her and it seems that the entity that pursues, can be diverted by passing on the curse through sex. So now, promiscuity becomes a temporary safety valve, because once the next person dies, the evil will come to the previous possessor of the curse. Will there ever be enough layers between you and the cursed entity for you to sleep well at night?
Outrunning the entity seems to be a good start, but we never quite know the dynamics at play here. The curse is a slow walker, so you would think that a four hour car ride would give you weeks of safety. It doesn't work that way exactly, but the real idea here is that you cannot run away from the consequences of your action. Although only the person with the contagion can see the entity, otherers can interact with it, much like an invisible man, but it can't be simply killed, as Jay's friends discover. Jay has two friends that she ends up relying on in addition to her sister. Greg, a high school boyfriend and former lover, and Paul, a childhood friend who has always longed after Jay. Both are willing to take on the curse to try to free Jay, and that introduces more moral indecision into the film. She is not really interested in a sexual relationship with either of the young men, but she is at her wit's end as to how to escape. The first choice she makes is guided by convenience. That decision ends in disaster, another commentary on the sexual revolution and it's failures.
In what is a very straight horror film sequence, the friends form a plot to go after the entity and try to destroy it. It is a tense sequence and we see something that Jay sees, without quite knowing what is so fear inducing about the image. The plot backfires but there may be some hope that they have diffused the risk. Even so, to be sure, Jay makes another decision, and the plot finishes off with a horrifying implication. There may be a different kind of pandemic ahead.
I looked for a record of the review I saw of "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" on KABC Eyewitness news. This was before Gary Franklin was the resident critic, I can't remember the name of the guy who covered movies there in 1974, but I do remember he had nothing good to say about it. He showed a clip of Sally being chased in the dark by Leatherface and he mocked the repetitive nature of the sequence. It took me years to overcome a prejudice against the film, formed by that childish review on the TV news. When I finally did see the film years later I enjoyed it immensely. However, it was not until relatively recently, that I decided it was in fact a masterpiece of the horror genre, and an incredibly well put together film. Tobe Hooper deserved to be remembered for this above all others of his filmography.
Like many horror films of the 1970s, this is a slow burn that sets up bizarre characters in the background and waits to unleash them fully in the later parts of the story. Listening to Kirk, Pam, Sally, Jerry and especially Franklin, yammer while on their road trip might be a little annoying at first, except, there is a set up about grave robbing that is part of what brought them out on the road trip together in the first place. When the radio is playing in the background of their drive, the news is all bad. Wars, natural disasters and a variety of tragedies are obliquely referred to. The news stories about grave desecration come up regularly and provide great foreshadowing of what is to come.
Horror films of the 70s especially, tended to have disorienting moments or circumstances. When the kids in the van pick up a hitchhiker, things get weird very quickly. The young people are clearly good hearts because it is the oppressive heat and location that motivates them to offer the lone stranger a ride in the first place. Once in the vehicle, they try to play it cool as the new passenger reveals himself to be somewhat deranged and certainly lacking in social skills. After some crazy moments, he is ejected from the vehicle and the trip continues, but we know it is not going to be an everyday excursion into the world. Of course we know that from the opening titles as well, but it is this sequence in the film that establishes the crazy tone for the violence to come.
As our group of kids encounter a variety of problems, like peeing on the side of the road, meeting with the sheriff at the graveyard, or running low on gas, we learn that these kids are just not that lucky. Every contemporary horror fan might yell at the screen for some of the choices being made, but in 1974, you had not had a hundred earlier films with people making the same mistakes, these were among the first to make those mistakes. Pam and Kirk wander off and they enter a house when no one answers the door. Later Jerry makes the same mistake. Also, someone needs to keep track of the car keys. It was innovative to have one of the group be in a wheelchair, and to have him be a bit of a whiner. We simultaneously understand his frustration but also find him frustrating. When he and his sister get into a tug of war over a flashlight, you would think it was the last piece of food in the world, or the most precious jewel ever. Character humor is sometimes subtle in the film, but as often as not, it is also way over the top.
Hooper has designed some pretty terrific shots to establish mood for the film. A dead armadillo on a baking Texas road, the sun bearing down as seen through a turning windmill, and the establishing shots of the house where most of the bad things happen are all examples of a thoughtful film maker, not someone who is just interested in cranking up the gore factor. When you add in the production design, which was done on the cheap but was clearly thought out, you can appreciate Hooper even more. Once the mayhem breaks out, he gets even better in his directing choices. The first "kill" happens so quickly and with such brutal efficiency, it is over before you have time to process that it happened. The second death is not stylized, but rather it is brutal with an establishing shot of a meat hook that increases our anticipated revulsion.
This film may be the harbinger of the "final Girl" trope, and if so, they have a great model to follow. Marilyn Burns character goes through hell. The nightmarish chase that seems to end with sanctuary at the gas station, is only a precursor for the the horrors ahead. If you have ever dreaded sitting down with odd relatives for a meal at the holidays, take a gander at what Sally is up against, you will see your reservations as minor in contrast to her plight. There is nothing artificial about the brutality or craziness that takes place in the last twenty minutes of the movie. Sally's desperation and fear are real, as you will notice from her screams but especially the extreme progressive close ups on her eyes. Those lovely green eyes are so freaking wide and popping out that you might think she was being tortured rather than acting. Her character is so committed to living, that she makes not one but two death defying leaps through glass windows to escape the depravity she is faced with.
Almost every horror movie has jump scares, but Hooper keeps them to a minimum. The two best are in the house of horrors and and the trail in the dark. It's hard to call the first moment a jump scare because we can see it coming, there is auditory prompt to set it up, but it works anyway. A chainsaw is not a silent weapon, but when it comes out of nowhere, you won't be thinking about the question of how Leatherface managed to sneak up on someone, you will be happy that the effects budget did not allow for a close examination of what happens when chainsaw meets flesh.
I would not say it is a happy ending, but it is satisfying. Sure you might wish for something more horrible to happen to two vile characters, but the one gruesome karma moment is pretty damn great. That whole scene is played out so realistically, it surprises me. The truck driver acts like a real person might when suddenly confronted by the insanity we have had half an hour to get used to. To quote a later horror film, "Go. Stay on the road." Sally responds to her actual moment of security with the kind of laughter we sometimes give during a horror film, relief and uncontrolled insanity.
Two more films during the "Panic! at the Paramount" Halloween Screenings, although technically, this should be "Panic! at the State". since they played next door at the State Theater. This was anot a double feature, but two separate shows, although I suspect many in attendance had done what we did, just plan on going to both.
"A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night" is a vampire film, set in Iran but filmed in Southern California. Directed by Ana Lily Amirpour, it tells the story of a dying town that is being drained of life by drugs and a vampire. In this case it is a lonely vampire woman. She seems to be able to be selective about her victims and chooses criminals, drug users and homeless people to feed on. All the while she is intrigued by the others she sees living in the area. She lives in an apartment filled with pop culture refernces on the walls and she listens to music that she has taken from some of her victims as she dwells on her life, alone in the dingy surroundings of the flat and her neighborhood. The idea that we might sympathize with a vampire who kills people is not new, neither is the perceived loneliness of such a life. That perspective was cover pretty well by Tony Scott's "The Hunger".
Before we even meet the vampire however, we encounter Arash, a young man who seems to start the film by stealing a cat, and then proceeds to become more sympathetic in spite of his light fingered tendencies. Some of what motivates him is that he is caring for his father, a heroin addict incapable of doing anything other than remembering the past and shooting up his next dose of medicine. Deeply in debt to his pusher, a pimp who styles himself after the chic Eurotrash he wants to live like, Arash's father allows his son to shoulder the responsibility and the pimp takes his prized possession, his car. The car becomes a keystone in the story, later bringing together an aging prostitute, the vampire and Arash himself.
The film does seem to meander a bit, but most of that is establishing the environment and circumstances of the characters. The horror elements are very limited, with the creepy apparition of the Girl, appearing in the background and sometimes following other characters in the story. The Girl wears a Chador over more Western dress, so that when she is seen in public she simply seems to be a compliant woman, but when we see her in her apartment and at the party later, she is anything but that. Maybe there is some commentary implied about the rules that people live under in Iran, although it appears that there is plenty of privilege for those with means.
Stylishly shot in Black and White, the film creates a foreboding atmosphere without ever provoking fear, just some anxiety. Lighting and shadow effects are used well to draw attention to some emotional points, and the sadness that permeates "Bad City", the town they occupy. My favorite scene in the movie occurs when Arash, dressed as Dracula for a party, drunkenly encounters the girl and the start of their relationship is funny as well as disconcerting. I'd seen this film before, but this was the first theatrical screening for me and I think, as usual, that the theater environment enhances the film in every way.
[•REC]
This is a Spanish horror film that was remade in the U.S. as Quarantine. I never saw the remake and this was a first time watch for me. In essence this is a found footage film, since all of the content is recorded on a video camera by an operator we know as Pablo but who we never really see. The film starts out as an episode of a television program, that looks at everyday experiences. Ángela, is a reporter for this lifestyle news program and she is following a Fire Department crew on their nightly routine. Of course the experience turns out to be anything but routine.
Made up of edits and segments that would normally be culled down to a minimal running time, the realistic nature of the film technique enhances the excitement in the movie and it brings up the terror factor very effectively. We are only seeing what Ángela and her cameraman are able to record, hence the title of the film. She is committed to getting the truth out when dangerous things start happening in an apartment building that the fire crew has been called to. A Mysterious aliment seems to have befallen an elderly woman living on the top floor of the building, but anyone who has seen a zombie movie before, has a good idea of what is coming.
As the stakes get higher, outside authorities have closed off and sealed the building, refusing to let the occupants, the news team or the firefighters and cops inside to exit. Life threating injuries are being neglected and Ángela wants to document that neglect and find out the reasons. So often in movies, the reporters are annoying obstacles that are used for exposition and then treated as humor or fodder for the rest of the story. This film treats the press a little more fairly, although we do see that the two person team is deliberately ignoring the directions of the police during the events.
The action scenes are quick but the after effects are shown in gruesome detail to make the film more horrifying. Towards the end of the film, we switch to a night vision viewpoint on the video camera because the power seems to have gone off in the building and at that point people are sequestering themselves inside the already sequestered building. There is a strange explanation of what might have originated the contagion causing people to become hyper aggressive monsters, but by the time those explanations arrive, they are irrelevant, except to set up a final sequence.
[•REC] is an excellent example of both the found footage style of film making, but also the modern version of a zombies story. Actress Manuela Velasco has to carry much of the weight of the film as the on screen reporter who is essentially directing the movie by pointing her camera operator in the right directions. She does a great job of selling the character as a woman who knows the limits of her job, until push comes to shove and she levels up. This was a real discovery for me and highly [rec]ommended.
