And I also totally get it if you're not into it. If you're into it (and I am), it's difficult for me to imagine that you can like all of the big choices Zombie makes but then determine that a Sheri Moon performance is simply a bridge too far. It's in the writing, the costuming, the production design, the songs he chooses for the soundtrack, the casting of familiar genre faces - all those things that make a Rob Zombie movie a "Rob Zombie movie." You're either on board for this stuff or you're not. He is a filmmaker with a very specific, very distinct and sometimes overpowering personal aesthetic. But I simply do not believe it's possible for someone to love everything about a Rob Zombie movie but draw the line at a single performance. This does not mean that Sheri Moon - or any actor, for that matter - is entirely inculpable on screen. Back when he was co-hosting the post-Ebert incarnation of At the Movies, the great Chicago Tribune critic (and one half of my wife's #RelationshipGoals) Michael Phillips once remarked - and I'm paraphrasing - that "acting is the last thing to go wrong with a movie." If we are noticing what we think is a bad performance, it is likely the result of some bad writing, or a scene that's been shot or edited poorly, or a director making the wrong choice in actor or any number of issues that might have been addressed before blaming the actor. More than that, though, is that I don't get why anyone who is a fan of Rob Zombie's movies and is watching a Rob Zombie movie somehow thinks that the performance of one actor is really fucking things up. I'm not suggesting that no one should be critical of her work (or any work by any artist for that matter), just that there is a huge difference between "that performance didn't work for me" and "she should never be given a role again!" First of all, I'm a big believer in the idea of filmmakers being given complete freedom to make exactly the movie they want, and asserting casting decisions on anyone flies in the face of that belief. No, Sheri Moon is not a classically trained actress, and yes, sometimes her performances have called attention to themselves when a particular moment doesn't land. Theirs is a love story played out across two decades and dozens of collaborations. Sherri Moon isn't using her husband's films as a platform to a bigger acting career in fact, she's hardly appeared in anything that he hasn't directed. Zombie isn't casting his wife because she's "available." He's writing parts specifically for her. They like to spend time together and work together. Watching "Living Dead Girl" and "Never Gonna Stop (Red Red Kroovy)" and the much more recent "Hideous Exhibitions of a Dedicated Gore Whore," I was reminded of how much I love the relationship between Zombie and Sherri Moon. I want him to continue casting whoever the fuck he wants. The point is that I want horror fans to stop complaining when Zombie casts his wife. Even if she wasn't, that's not the point. Don't confuse the part with the actor.īut it is not my intention to defend each of Sheri Moon's performances, despite the fact that I believe they get better with each movie, culminating in The Lords of Salem in which I think she is genuinely quite good. She's the spider designated to catch flies, so she has to appear the most normal of the Fireflies while still a psychotic who really, truly enjoys being a psychotic. Sure, Baby Firefly's constant shrill cackle and self-consciously "playful" personality can be grating. This complaint dates back to 2003 and Zombie's first movie, House of 1000 Corpses, in which fans mistook an obnoxious character for an obnoxious performance. Seeing Sheri Moon pop up in so many of his videos reminded me of a common criticism of Zombie's work: he needs to stop casting his wife. His wife, Sheri Moon Zombie, appears in many of them - most famously "Living Dead Girl," still one of my favorite music videos of all time. But I have been listening to a lot of Zombie's music in the last few weeks (unusual for me, as I haven't really been in to anything heavy since my Ministry/Body Count/Pigface days in high school), and as a result have been watching a number of his videos on YouTube. I come here not to reassess 31, however, nor to defend what I agree are its many problems. Because it was one of the movies I was most looking forward to in 2016, it also wound up being one of my biggest disappointments. Truth be told, I wasn't a big fan of that movie even as someone who has liked every one of his past films, this one felt like Rob Zombie was autopiloting to the point of self parody. So I know this article is a little out of date, as Rob Zombie's latest directorial effort 31 was released last October and there's no "newsworthy" justification for bringing any of this up. Everyone lay off Rob and Sheri Moon Zombie.
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