Friedkin

“I’ve always felt that A Film should first of all 

be an EMOTIONAL Experience : 

It should make you laugh, 

or cry, or be scared — 

but it should also inspire

and PROVOKE You…. 

and make you REFLECT.

Over the years, I’ve found that 

people take from The Exorcist 

what they bring TO it — 

if You Believe that The World is a Dark 

and EVIL Place, then The Exorcist 

WILL reinforce that belief…..

…..but if You Believe that 

There is a Force for Good, 

that COMBATS, and eventually 

TRIUMPHS over Evil 

— then You will be taking out of The Film, 

what WE tried to put IN to it.”

— Friedkin.

Oblivion

David Foster Wallace Interview and 

Reading from "Oblivion" on WPR (2004)

In fact, The 'Oblivion Machine' is the name 

in this story for The Entertainment INDUSTRY 

- comics, books, mags, film, TV, social media - 

that consumes our mortal hours, 

wasting The Days of Our Lives in

'picture shows' of all kinds.

Days of Our Lives is an American Television soap opera 

which originally aired on the American Television 

Network NBC from 1965 to 2022, 

and is one of the longest-running scripted 

Television programs in The World, 

airing nearly every weekday 

since November 8, 1965.

Stopping Power

Stopping Power

Dirty Harry, 

Magnum Force,

The Enforcer, 

Sudden Impact, 

The Dead Pool

Seamless Branching

Seamless Branching of 

The Theatrical Version, 

Special Edition Version and 

Extended Special Edition Version

“That’s the movie’s main plot, but let’s observe here that one of T2’s subplots actually echoes Cameron’s Schwarzenegger dilemma and creates a kind of weird metacinematic irony. 

Whereas T1 had argued for a certain kind of metaphysical passivity (i.e., Fate is unavoidable, and Skynet’s attempts to alter History serve only to bring it about), Terminator 2’s metaphysics are more active. 

In T2, The Connors take a page from Skynet’s book and try to head off the foreordained nuclear holocaust, first by trying to Kill Skynet’s inventor and then by destroying Cyberdyne’s labs and the first Terminator’s CPU (though why John Connor spends half the movie carrying the deadly CPU chip around in his pocket instead of just throwing it under the first available steamroller remains unclear and irksome). 

The Point here is that the protagonists’ attempts to revise The “Script” of History in T2 parallel The Director’s having to muck around with T2’s own script in order to get Schwarzenegger to be in the movie. 

Multivalent ironies like this — which require that film audiences know all kinds of behind-the-scenes stuff from watching Entertainment Tonight and reading (umm) certain magazines — are not commercial PostModernism at its finest.” 

— David Foster Wallace

The Intentional Fallacy

“The New Critics, rather level-headedly at first, 

sought to dethrone The Author 

by attacking what they called “The Intentional Fallacy.” 

Writers are sometimes wrong about what their texts mean, or sometimes have no idea what they really mean. Sometimes The Text’s meaning even changes for The Writer. 

It doesn’t matter what The Writer means, basically, for The New Critics; 

it matters only what The Text says. 

This critical overthrow of creative intent set the stage for the poststructural show that opened a couple decades later. The deconstructionists (“deconstructionist” and “poststructuralist” mean the same thing, by the way : “poststructuralist” is what you call a deconstructionist who doesn’t want to be called a deconstructionist), explicitly following Husserl and Brentano and Heidegger the same way The New Critics had co-opted Hegel, see the debate over the ownership of meaning as a skirmish in a larger war in Western philosophy over the idea that presence and unity are ontologically prior to expression. There’s been this longstanding deluded presumption, they think, that if there is an utterance then there must exist a unified, efficacious presence that causes and owns that utterance. The poststructuralists attack what they see as a post-Platonic prejudice in favour of Presence over Absence and Speech over Writing. 

We tend to trust Speech over Writing because of the immediacy of The Speaker : he’s right there, and we can grab him by the lapels and look into his face and figure out just exactly what one single thing he means. But the reason why the poststructuralists are in the Literary Theory business at all is that they see Writing, not Speech, as more faithful to the metaphysics of True Expression. 

For Barthes, Derrida, and Foucault, Writing is a better animal than Speech because it is iterable; it is iterable because it is abstract; and it is abstract because it is a function not of presence but of absence : The Reader’s absent when The Writer’s writing, and The Writer’s absent when The Reader’s reading. For The Deconstructionist, then, a writer’s circumstances and intentions are indeed a part of the “context” of a text, but context imposes no real cinctures on The Text’s meaning, because Meaning in Language requires a cultivation of Absence rather than Presence, involves not the imposition but the erasure of consciousness. This is so because these guys — Derrida following Heidegger and Barthes Mallarmé and Foucault God knows who — see Literary Language as not a tool but an environment. 

A Writer does not wield Language; he is subsumed in it. 

Language Speaks Us; Writing Writes; etc. 

Hix makes little mention of Heidegger’s Poetry, Language, Thought or Derrida’s Margins of Philosophy, where all this stuff is set out most clearly, but he does quote enough Barthes — “To Write is… to reach that point where only Language acts, performs,’ and not Me’”— so you get the idea that author-as-owner is not just superfluous but contradictory, and enough Foucault — “The Writing of Our Day has freed itself from the necessity of ‘expression’; [it is] an Interplay of Signs, regulated less by The Content it signifies than by the very nature of The Signifier”— so you can see that even The New Critics’ Holy Text disappears as the unitary lodestone of Meaning and Value. 

For Hix’s Teachers, trying to attribute Writing’s meaning to a static Text 

or a Human author is like trying to knit Your Own Body, Your Own Needles. 

Hix has an even better sartorial image: “Previously, The Text was a cloth to be unraveled by The Reader; if the cloth were unwound all the way, The Reader would find The Author holding the other end. 

But Barthes makes The Text a shroud, and no one, not even a corpse, is holding the other end.”

Herberts

“No Fair! 

You changed 

The Outcome 

by measuring it!”

“When I was 16 

I left Home in search 

of My Misfortune and 

quickly found it. 

It was in Bermondsey. 

There’s enough misery in 

South London for everyone, 

it wasn’t as cool then as it’s 

meant to be now. 

There I holed up with 

some Lost Boys, 

two years older and 

a great deal wiser, 

and in My Mind

I made them Legends.

When I look back now at 

these 18-year-old lads 

I see that They were Herberts

but I needed them to 

Be Cool, so Cool

is What I Saw.”

— Brand.

“Perhaps Young Men like Me go awry 

because nobody can hold them. 

I don’t mean embrace, I mean 

in a parental sense, 

like parentheses ‘bracket’ them, 

To Stand as A Dam either side 

of the wayward lash and

unmovingly emit Care. 

The only Authority I ever 

knew was negative. 

Either inefficient or corrupt --

This is the consequence of 

Living with false ideals 

in a materialistic society. 

The Authority that I Give to Jimmy is Sacred, 

I know he is flawed but I am not consulting 

with the flawed part of him —

I am consulting with the part of him that is willing 

in spite of his own numerous obligations, Work,

 and Family to provide Loving Counsel for free. 

I Believe this relationship becomes 

a conduit for Truth, Divine Truth. 

That needn’t mean it’s all 

chocolates and roses. 

There’s a fair amount 

of ‘Suck it Up’ and 

‘Face Your Fear’, 

but it IS Truth. 

Perhaps we can take Truth 

to mean The Timeless, 

The Universal. 

Things that will not 

erode and fade, qualities 

I need to Live the Life 

I have moved into —

How Does someone who has never 

been A Father become one? 

How Do any of Us 

progress beyond 

our Temporary Limits? 

The Potential-Person 

We can Become •hums• 

in an invisible grid 

Within and Without Us. 

A Genius may actuate

by Intuition but 

All of Us need Heroes, 

Role-Models and Mentors, that 

We may See What is Possible, 

Living Mandalas 

to lock onto as We Inhale 

and Expand into new states.

A Fortified Tower

Moving forward, We wish to downplay 

What You Represent.

We find problematic your 

reckless self-determination.

Progress necessitates new strategies, 

you understand, collective behaviour.

In this endeavour, there are 

other potential candidates, 

better suited to The Task...

Dr. Temple :

(reading from prepared notes)

That man in the isolation-tank... 

You know, the one you looked in on? 

(Rehearsing, without reference to his notes)

The one you looked in on. 

(Back to His Notes — )

The Police brought him in here 15 years ago. 

They picked him up wandering 

the C&O Canal. 

Down around Key Bridge. 

Yes, total amnesia. 

The Man in The Isolation Tank... 

You know, the one you looked in on. 

The Police brought him 

in here 15 years ago. 

They picked him up wandering 

the C&O Canal. 

Down around Key... 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

You had something to tell me? 

Dr. Temple :

Please, sit down. 

(Kinderman notes the huge stacks of magazines and scientific journals around Temple’s office)

Det. William F. Kinderman :

There's a paper drive? 

Dr. Temple :

Haven't had a chance 

yet to read them. 

I just keep them till I do. 

I hate to miss the science articles. 

They're good. 

That man in the isolation tank... 

You know, the one 

you looked in on. 

Dr. Temple :

Yes. 

Dr. Temple :

(checks his notes, hidden 

in an open desk drawer)

The Police brought him 

here 15 years ago. 

They picked him up wandering 

the C&O Canal around Key Bridge. 

Total amnesia. No I.D. 

They brought him to us here. 

And his condition grew worse. 

He ended up catatonic. 

Completely withdrawn. 

But recently... 

Well... about six weeks ago, 

he slowly started to come out of it. 

Every day he got better. 

Just a little, but better. 

And then all of a sudden, 

he got violent. 

Really bad news. 

We give him electroshock therapy. 

And as of two weeks ago 

he's been in isolation... 

...but the thing is... 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Yes? 

Dr. Temple :

He says He’s The Gemini Killer. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

I want the file on that man. 

Get it. Now! 

You want to know about 

The Man in Cell-11. 

Stretch your memory. 

What was he wearing 

when he was brought in? 

That was quite some time ago. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Was he dressed like A Priest? 

Like a Priest? 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Were there any signs of injuries? 

That would be in the file. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

It is not in the file! 

It is not! 

Two men on every ward. 

Rotate them 24 hours a day. 

In the disturbed ward, one man 

inside near the entry door, 

one man outside. 

Ask the Jesuits for the dental records 

of Father Damien Karras. 

Find out if he had a saliva test. 

Might help us get a positive I.D. 

Ryan :

What for, sir? Sir, are you all right? 

IV team to NICU. IV team to NICU. 

Ryan :

You all right? 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Yeah.  Father Karras... 

was a Jesuit psychiatrist 

at Georgetown University. 

The man was A Saint. 

He was My Best Friend, 

I loved him. 

Fifteen years ago he jumped, 

or was pushed to his death... 

down that long flight of steps 

next to the Car Barn. 

Atkins...  I saw it. 

I watched him... die. 

I Think... The man in cell 11... 

is Damien Karras. 

The Gemini Killer :

It's a wonderfull life. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Who are You? 

The Gemini Killer :

I am No One. Many. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Are You Damien Karras? 

The Gemini Killer :

You haven't any medical 

records for him, have you? 

No tedious fingerprints. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Are You Karras? 

The Gemini Killer :

I am The Gemini Killer, 

James Venamun. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

The Gemini is Dead. 

The Gemini Killer :

No, not quite. 

Remember Karen? 

Little ribbons in her hair? 

Yellow ribbons. I killed her. 

After all, it was inevitable, wasn't it? 

“A Divinity shapes Our Ends,” and all that. 

I picked her up in Richmond. 

And then I dropped her off at the city dump. 

Some of her. Some of her I kept. I'm a Saver. 

Pretty dress she was wearing. 

Little peasant blouse, pink... 

and white ruffles. 

I still hear from her occasionally, screaming. 

I think The Dead should shut up 

unless there's Something to Say —

The Gemini Killer :

I also killed the black boy, by the river. 

And the priests. Oh, yes, their names 

began with a K. 

That modicum at least I was able to insist upon. 

You see, they were off my beaten track. 

I kill at random. That's the thrill of it. 

No motive. That's the fun. 

The black boy and the priests were different. 

I was obliged to settle a score on behalf of... 

well... a friend. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

What ‘friend’? 

The Gemini Killer :

A friend Over There. 

On The Other Side, 

one needs friends. 

There is suffering There. 

They can be cruel. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Who is "They"? 

The Gemini Killer :

Never mind. I cannot tell you. 

It's... forbidden. 

The Gemini Killer :

He lows like a Steer.

I Do That rather well. 

Don't you think? 

Well, why not? After all... 

I've been taught by The Master. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Who is that? 

The Gemini Killer :

The One. There is only One. 

Who's this ‘Damien’ you mentioned? 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Don't you know? 

The Gemini Killer :

I know nothing, except I must 

go on killing Daddy. I must shame him. 

Do The Papers call these Gemini killings? 

You must get them to do that, 

Lieutenant, it’s important. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

The Gemini is Dead. 

The Gemini Killer :

No, I am not! I'm alive! 

I go on! I breathe! 

Look at me! 

Look at me 

and tell me 

what you see! 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

I see a man who looks 

like Damien Karras. 

The Gemini Killer :

If you looked with 

The Eyes of Faith... 

You'd See Me. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

What the hell are you talking about? 

The Gemini Killer :

Your blindness. 

Tell The Press that 

I am The Gemini, Lieutenant, 

or I will punish you. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Punish me? 

The Gemini Killer :

Yes. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

What are you talking about? 

The Gemini Killer :

Do You Dance? 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

What do you mean? 

The Gemini Killer :

I like plays…. 

The good ones. Shakespeare. 

I like Titus Andronicus 

the best, it's sweet. 

Incidentally... Did you know 

that you are talking to 

An Artist…? 

I sometimes do special things 

to my victim. 

Things that are creative. 

Of course, it takes knowledge, 

pride in Your Work. 

For example: A decapitated head 

can continue to see, for 

approximately 20 seconds…. 

So when I have one that's cocking... 

I always hold it up so that 

it can see its body. 

It's a little extra I throw in 

for no added charge. 

I must admit, it makes me 

chuckle every time. 

Life is fun. It's a wonderfull Life, 

in fact... for some. 

It's too bad about poor Father Dyer. 

I killed him, you know. 

An interesting problem, 

but finally it worked —

First, a bit of the old succinylcholine... 

to permit one to work 

without annoying distractions. 

Then a 3-foot catheter... 

threaded directly into 

the inferior vena cava... 

or the superior vena cava. 

It's a matter of Taste. 

Then the tube moves 

through the vein... 

under the crease of the arm, 

into the vein that leads 

into the heart. 

And then you just hold up the legs 

and you squeeze the blood manually... 

into the tube from the arms 

and the legs —

There's shaking and pounding 

at the end for the dregs —

It isn't perfect. 

There's a little blood left, I'm afraid. 

But, regardless... 

the overall effect is astonishing. 

Isn't that really what counts 

in the end? Yes, of course. 

Good showbiz, Lieutenant. 

The effect! And then... 

off comes the head 

without spilling one 

single drop of blood —

Now, I call that showmanship, Lieutenant…!

Then of course, no one notices. 

Pearls before... 

(Kinderman PUNCHES him, 

a right cross across the face —)

Oh, a few boos from 

The Gallery, I see. 

That's all right. I understand. 

I've been dull. 

Well, I shall liven things up for you 

a bit, Lieutenant.

 The Master is throwing me 

a scrap from his table. 

A little reward for faithful Service. Something fun. Something random, something My Way. 

Good night, Moon. 

Good night, air. 

Good night, Amy. 

Telling her beads. 

Her beads….

He passed out. 

Again? 

He's hemorrhaging. 

The man in that cell knows the details of a girl's murder that happened years ago. 

A Gemini killing that 

wasn't in the papers. 

His goddamn nose is broken! 

When I said The Man in Cell-11 fell 

unconscious, you said something. 

Really? 

Yes, I think you said, "Again?" 

Might've done. 

It's happened before? 

Yes, it has. 

Many times? 

No, not really. 

It's just been this week. 

I think the first time was Sunday. 

And again? 

The next day. 

If you want exact times, it's... 

On your chart. 

That's right. 

Any other times? 

Yesterday morning, 

before we found... 

Yes. 

That's all right. 

I'm very sorry. 

When this happens, 

does it seem like normal sleep? 

Nothing's normal about that man. 

You seem a bit pleased about that. It's quite unusual. 

His autonomic system 

slows to a crawl. 

His pulse, his temperature... 

his breathing. 

But his brain wave 

activity accelerates. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Accelerates? 

(Finishes bandaging Kinderman’s swollen Right Hand)

Okay, keep that on 

until the weekend. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

You're most kind. 

(scoffs) I'm a bitch. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Have you told the man in cell 11 what happened to Father Dyer? No, of course not. Might anyone else have told him? Why would they? I don't know. I don't, either. Thanks again, miss. Why did you hit him? Take it easy on that hand. I will. "Save your servant." That's something our friend in cell 11 said once. "Save Your Servant"? 

Keeps running through my mind. Odd expression. What was odd was how he said it. How was that? It was just his voice. It was different. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

Different how? 

He sounded decent. Nice. Completely different. 

There was so much 

emotion in his voice. 

He sounded... 

I don't know. Desperate. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

And what else has he said 

in This Voice? 

Only one other thing. 

Det. William F. Kinderman :

What was that, miss? 

He said, "Kill it." 

"Save Your Servant, 

who Trusts in You, My God. 

Let him find in you 

A Fortified Tower 

in The Face of The Enemy." 

The Lord is my light and my salvation. The Lord is the defender of my life. My life. "

And Jesus said to the man who was possessed: 'What is Your Name?' And he answered: 

'LEGION, for We are Many."' 

Many. 

Julie Kinderman 

(sleepwalking) :

Good night, Daddy. 

(smiles, warmly) 

Good night, Julie. 

It's so late. 

Yes, it is. 

Very late. God! Can't I get any sleep? What do you want? I'm sorry. Bad enough you wake me at 5:30 to eat. I'm sorry. Sorry? You do this on purpose. What's your name? I'm reporting you. Amy Keating. Angels of mercy. Horseshit. 

You all right? Yes, I'm fine. I'm just a little jumpy. That's all. She was slit down the middle. 

Cut open... and all her vital organs were removed. 

Then The Killer stuffed her body 

with other materials 

and sewed her back up. 

'Other Materials'? 

Rosaries. Catholic rosaries. Lieutenant! Did you get my message? I left it with Keating. Nice girl. Good heart. Yes! About this body of mine... Friend of yours. Well, there I was... so awfully dead in that electric chair. I didn't like it. Would you? It's upsetting! There was still so much k*ll to do, and there I was... in the void without a body. But then along came... well, you know, my friend. One of them. Those others, there. The cruel ones. The master. And he thought that my work should continue. But, in this body. In this body in particular, in fact. Let's call it revenge. A certain matter of an exorcism... in which Karras expelled certain parties from the body of a child. Certain parties were not pleased, to say the least. To say the very least. And so my friend, the master... devised this pretty little scheme as a way of getting back... of creating a stumbling block, a scandal... a horror to all men who seek faith. Using the body of this saintly priest... as an instrument of... Well, you know my work. But, the main thing... is the torment of your friend, Father Karras... as he watches while I rip, and cut, and mutilate the innocent! His friends! And again! And again! And on and on! He is inside with us! He will never get away! His pain won't end! Gracious me. Was I raving? Please forgive me. I'm mad. Let's see... where was I? Oh, yes! The master. He was kind, you see. He brought me to our mutual acquaintance, Father Karras. Not too well at the time. I'm afraid he... was passing on in the dying mode, as we say. So... as Karras was about to slip out of his body... Is this true? The master was slipping me in. There was some confusion when the medics said that Karras was dead. He was dead, technically speaking. His time was up. He wanted out. But I was in. A little traumatized, true. After all, his brain was jelly. Lack of oxygen and that sort of thing. You understand? It took a MAXIMUM effort... that at last got me out of that cheap little coffin! Vow of poverty, disgusting. Never mind. Toward the end, a little slapstick... and comic relief when old Brother Fain... who was tending the body, saw me climbing from the coffin. It's the smiles that keep us going. The giggles and bits of good cheer. But then, after that, it was all blue Mondays for a while, I'm afraid. So much damage to Karras' brain cells. So many lost. It's not enough, you see, to be a spirit. There's no magic. In this artificial box you call a world... we can't touch, except through bodies. We must operate through neurologic systems, brains that function... and your friend's was nearly past resurrection. It was quite an effort to regenerate his puny little brain cells. It took me 15 years! So many years. Now I'm just a traveling man. One who moves. I have dreams of a rose. And falling down a long flight of stairs. 

I Don't Believe You're The Gemini Killer. 

Oh, YOU are Issuing a CLEAR Invitation to The Dance.... 

What does that mean? 

Nevermind. Incidentally, don't blame me for that idiot Temple. That was a su1c1de. The man was a lunatic weakling. 

Still, he Helped Me. Are there services? I would like to attend. 

Temple Helped You? Of course! He brought you to me. I told him if he failed to convince you to come to me... that he would suffer in unspeakable ways. "Pain that cannot be imagined," I said. Poor superstitious fool, he believed me. But he couldn't take the pressure. 

What pressure? 

The Pressure of Inimitable ME. 

Some other tasks I said I had in mind for him. 

Things. Little Things. 

Did Temple get you 

out of This Cell? 

Who Gets You Out? 

Just Friends. 

Old Friends. 

Tell The Press that 

I am The Gemini, 

Lieutenant -- Final Warning. 

Incidentally, I can Help. 

Help what? 

Your unbelief. 

I'm Tired. I am so Tired. 

Bill, Help Me. 

Damien? 

No! 

Little Jack Horner. 

Child's Play, Lieutenant. 

Father Morning, please. 

Jim, I can't read this. Korner. 

K-O-R-N-E-R. 

I'll call again. See you later, alligator. Sweetheart, let's go back to your room. Take your time. That's it. Take it easy. - How do you get out of here? Old friends. Old friends. I'm a traveling man. One who moves. Old friends. One who moves. One who moves... I didn't hear it. Say it again, will you? Hit the light! Mommy! God almighty! What are you doing? Are you crazy? What is the matter with you?! I want my mommy. Just toys. Is that a crime?! He's after someone. Who? You treat your own family like this?! Aren't you leaving?! Please leave! I cannot wait for you to leave! You are issuing a clear invitation to the dance. - To the dance. To the dance... Julie. Bill. Hi, honey. Where..? Okay, sweetheart. That was Bill. A nurse is coming over with a package. Danny, get in the car! Roll it! Move it! Go! Go around! Ram it if you have to! Back up, you son of a..! Get out! That must be the nurse. Go around the back! Hi, Dad. Mother, Daddy's home. What's this? Billy, what's going on? I'm crazy. That's the explanation. You're honest. From the beginning. It's fine. No, it isn't. What's this nurse thing? What nurse? I'm so tired. Julie! Dad, I'm talking. Sorry, I missed that. Bill... what kind of nurse is this? I open the door for the woman, she faints. And then when she wakes up, she says, "When is it bedtime?" Please help me. Is it bedtime? So is she staying for dinner? It's okay. Catatonics are so easy to possess. I've been waiting for you, lieutenant. I wanted you to see this.