More Eygiene/Eyegasm at SDSU: A New Class on Comics and More --> THE VIRUS EYE/I

The Virus Eye/I: Comics and History, Engl 157 Class || SDSU Student Learning Outcomes!

The Next Evolutionary Step of #eyegiene #eyegasm? The Virus Eye/I -- A Comics and History Class at SDSU

#viruseye is evolving -- my new Fall 2020 Comics and History class, English 157, @SDSU https://t.co/iqtmqVMUOK pic.twitter.com/XfKVQFh3qm

— William Nericcio (@eyegiene) July 25, 2020

Madmen and Madwomen at the Wheel / Prescient Moviemakers Behind the Camera: An Eyegasm/Eyegiene Chapter Focused on Paul Bartel's and Roger Corman's DEATH RACE 2000 (1975)

Madmen and Madwomen at the Wheel, Prescient Moviemakers Behind the Camera: An Eyegasm/Eyegiene Chapter Focused on Paul Bartel's and Roger Corman's DEATH RACE 2000 (1975)*
William "Memo" Nericcio

 “It’s Kung Fu,” we say, with excitement, yearning, and glee. We don’t understand synecdoche, or cultural studies, or any of that crap yet—grad school looms on the horizon like Covid-19 did a year ago for us.

That is, not at all.

We are at the Pla-Mor Entertainment Center in Laredo, Texas, 2 miles or so from the legendary Rio Grande River, north of Mexico. 

As with all pictures in this blog
posting, click to enlarge

Pla-Mor is a wonderland for Laredo: bowling, cinema, pinball, and prehistoric video games: Pong and Death Race. And rollerskating. I kid you not! Rollerskating. Picture Close Encounters but in the South Texas sun and Pla-Mor is a Spielberg location director’s wet dream.

And there playing at the cinema—for Laredo, the movie house at Pla-Mor is a cine-sanctuary, one part Shakey’s Pizza décor, one part cineaste’s memorabilia collection other—is Death Race 2000, featuring the previously mentioned Kung Fu—not Kung Fu, the megahit TV show, where David Carradine became a 70s TV star, but “Kung Fu,” the star, who comes to be called Kung Fu in Laredo owing to his tele-spectacular ubiquity.  In the same way, 8 years later, in 1983, Richard Chamberlain will come to be known as El “Thorn Birds” in Laredo.

El Kung Fu, in Death Race 2000, is a bit of a disappointment. As if the big screen allowed us to garner what was hidden on television, that David Carradine is not so much an actor as an a one-dimensional, mumbling doofus—a dime store Brando, a street-grade James Dean, with the facial expression range of a department store mannequin.

Half the time in Death Race 2000 he’s masked, or then fake-masked in a gorey disguise of facial disfigurement.

But we don’t worry about that too much for long—the riotous violence of the movie (race car drivers running down the elderly and kids; blood spatterings decapitations etc), the R-rated female nudity, are almost just enough to paper over Carradine’s horrible thespian shortcomings. 

We are a year removed from 1976’s Rocky phenomena so Sylvester Stallone’s appearance in the schlock sci-fi film does not tickle our notice.

What we did not register and only came to light as I rescreened the movie for this piece was the brilliant satire that is Death Race 2000—if there is a piece of 70s American cinema that better presages the rise of the religious right, neo-liberal infected news media, and schloch-ster politics (think Trump, but with Hannity-the-enabler there too), I don’t know it. 

Infused with the cinematic equivalent of Kurt Vonnegut’s vision (Slaughterhouse-Five appears in 1969, Breakfast of Champions in 1973), director Paul Bartel’s Death Race 2000 is a lurid and lucid vivisection of America then and America now. Addicted to mindless television, prone to empty distractions on the boob tube, and equally empty violence and titillation, the television audiences parodied in Death Race 2000 hold up a mirror and the monster we see reflected is not the hideous prosthetics Carradine, our “Kung Fu,” uses on the screen, but ourselves, now, pandemic paralyzed, watching in horror as a demented old madman drives our school bus over the edge.

David Carradine's DEATH RACE 2000 Revisited | Bill Nericcio on Hilobrow.com #eyegiene #eyegasm #schlockcinema

My latest piece for HiLobrow just launched on the 70s film "classic" DEATH RACE 2000! ONLY IN LAREDO readers might enjoy--especially gente that grew up there in the 60s, 70s, and 80s! https://t.co/rMMJPYGzFa@HILOBROW pic.twitter.com/gjXpw4xeSu

— William Nericcio (@eyegiene) June 11, 2020

Fall 2020 Class at SDSU Combines #Eyegiene & #Eyegasm with Comics Cultura! Check it out!

Anti Covid-19 Semiotic Brilliance from EraseCovid, Handcarved Graphics, and Michael Buchmiller

A Lecture on Kurt Vonnegut's SLAUGHTERHOUSE-FIVE or The Children's Crusade | Professor William Nericcio | San Diego State University #seductiveamericannightmares

Ever wonder what it is like to be in one of my classes? Or are you a former student, wandering down memory lane, jonesing for a blast from the past? Well wonder no more! Wander no more! Here is a ZOOM version of a class on Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five. My lecture notes, with key quotes appear below the video. This is from a class on American Literature (Film, Photography, Graphic Narrative, etc) after the Civil War and to the present called Seductive American Nightmares-- you can sample the online guide to the class here.

 
First Zoom Lecture, Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five | Seductive American Nightmares Class, English 250B, @ SDSU from Mextasy on Vimeo.

click to enlarge any image below

More Book and Movie Screening Lists Than You Can Shake a Stick At ...

Students are asking me for reading lists during our pandemic! I thought I would share a link to all my past classes--that's close to 30 years of online syllabi to pillage for books that I think are cool!) ... the link is here (prepare to scroll) https://t.co/01cZVfebEG pic.twitter.com/YOJipG09Wn

— William Nericcio (@eyegiene) April 4, 2020

Follow Eyegiene on Twitter!

new temporary #eyegiene #eyegasm wallpaper featuring the wonderful collage art of #xyz_k_ https://t.co/wKVWzA2jcf pic.twitter.com/tJyMdRU99f

— William Nericcio (@eyegiene) March 18, 2020