Welcome back once more to another edition of B.L.O.G, and after the intensity and brutality of Martyrs, I looked toward the classics for something a bit more subdued. I found it in the premiere adaptation of the Henry James novel The Turn of the Screw, a classic tale of supernatural horror… or is it merely psychological. That’s the beauty of the performance we get from the lovely….

Scottish born Deborah Kerr was already an established star by 1961. In fact, she had already achieved cinematic immorality after her iconic beachside make out session with Bert Lancaster in From Here to Eternity (1953).  Then in 1956 she appeared in yet another iconic role when she became Anna opposite You Brenner’s king in The King and I. Kerr would rarely step foot into genre film category, her only other entry being the 1967 farce Casino Royale, but with her role in tonight’s film, I think she deserves praise from beyond the mainstream film world. It is her dynamic performance and incredible strength that make this film work so well. So I am very happy to bring you Ms. Kerr in….

A young woman, Miss Giddens (Kerr) accepts a job as a governess to two orphaned children. Upon arriving at the country estate where they live, she finds her bucolic surroundings tinged by a feeling of unease. As the two children, Miles and Flora (Stevens and Franklin), begin to exhibit strange behaviors, Miss Giddens begins to believe that the manor is being haunted by spirits who intend to possess her young charges. 

Henry James novel, The Turn of The Screw, is an amazing piece of literature, and its influence on the modern ghost story should not be understated. The Innocence lays claim to being based on James’ work, and it is by way of William Archibald’s stage play and then some rewriting by In Cold Blood author Truman Capote. This miasma of influences is fully felt in the film, and there are parts where you can clearly pick up the elements of Victorian life, a stage production, and something of a southern gothic feel. Each adds something special and wonderful to the film, and gives it a singular style amongst similar films of the era such as 1959’s House on Haunted Hill or 1963’s The Haunting. 

Filmed in black and white by director Jack Clayton, who would go on to helm Robert Redford’s The Great Gatsby and (the film which scared me so good as a kid that I still won’t check it out) 1983’s Something Wicked This Way Comes, moody and atmospheric hardly covers how this film feels. Joined by cinematographer Freddie Francis, the Amicus alum who would go on to Oscar achievement for his work on Glory (1989), Clayton was dismayed when the studio demanded the feature be shot in CinemaScope, but Francis’ use of open spaces filled with shadows and  a deep focus give the film and eerie look throughout. 

This is most well illustrated in a quick moment spawned from a mistake. As Kerr’s Miss Giddens prowls around the manor with candelabra in hand there is at one point a flurry of motion. It happens quickly and even on repeated viewings nothing can be made of it, but it gives a great impression of something lurking in the darkness. In truth it was merely the clapperboard that had accidentally gotten in the frame. This happy accident coupled with the skill of Clayton and Francis make the perfect example of how subtly unsettling The Innocents can feel. 

Speaking of unsettled, that’s a pretty good way to describe Deborah Kerr’s Miss Giddons. While Clayton and the screenwriters both received nominations for their work, I fail to see why Ms. Kerr was not recognized for her work. James’ novel has been much debated over the years, and one of the main points of contention is whether the novel’s governess is actually experiencing the supernatural or going mad. In The Innocents, Kerr’s performance is equally open to interpretation. She fully embodies all the fear, paranoia, and wild eyed frenzy needed to illustrate either. Coupled with the moody camerawork, Kerr’s performance is impassioned, real, and honest to the character. 

The other great performances come from the two young actors, Martin Stephens and Pamela Franklin. I am always wary of films that showcase young actors in such heady roles, but both manage to impress and give me the heebie jeebies. Stephens’ Miles is a sly, clever boy who is charming beyond his years. Through the course of the film Stephens’ character grows stranger 

and darker, and the illicit kiss he plants on Ms. Kerr will surely leave most viewers feeling as uncomfortable as audiences in 1961 felt. In her screen debut, Pamela Franklin is the very vision of the creepy little girl. There is something magnificently strange that seems to lurk beyond her eyes, and I was not at all surprised to learn she continued working in genre films with work in 1973’s The Legend of Hell House and 1976’s Food of the Gods. 

The Innocents is a film with long reaching influence. Shades of its story can be seen in The Changeling, The Others, and parts of its sound tracking were used for the evil videotape in The Ring. I really loved the look, the acting, and the moody score by former child prodigy Georges Auric. I encourage folks to check this one out, but be forewarned that the opening third of the film is a tad slow, but if you give the film some time to build, the second act will surely grab you and the third leave you wondering why more people don’t rave about this one. 

Martyr - from the Latin martyr < Ancient Greek μάρτυρ (martyr), later form of μάρτυς (martys) "witness".

To state the obvious, the Japanese are responsible for some of the most fucked up shit ever. I tortured myself for a less vulgar way of expressing that sentiment, but there just isn’t one. From Hello Kitty Vibrators (oh, yes they exist) , to toilet paper inscribed with poetry, to virtual bubble wrap you can pop over and over, when it comes to the strange, the Japanese have a corner on the market. So it came as no surprise to me when I heard about a Japanese director who filled his movies with anthropomorphic animals. All I knew is that I had to see one, and how could I resist a title like…..

Mr. Tamura (Ho) is your average executive at Japan’s number one pickled food company. He works long days, he pitches kimchi deals to his boss, and he happens to be a koala. All seems to be going right in Mr. Tamura’s life until one day a couple of detectives show up to talk to him. It seems his girlfriend, Yoko, has been murdered, and after discovering Tamura’s wife had been missing for the last 3 years, they begin to suspect him. At first the furry businessman is sure he is innocent, but as he delves into a world filled with repressed memories, sinister Bunny bosses, and strange unsettling nightmares, he finds out the world is often not black and white, but grey… like a koala. 

I must admit the joke at the end of the synopsis is not my own. It’s a line delivered by a cop who doubt’s the titular koala’s guilt with the actual line being “This case is not black and white. It’s grey like a koala. “. These kind passing references are the closest you are going to get in this film to anyone making a big deal about Mr. Tamura being a koala. While it is an important part of the film, it is not the main focus, and from what I understand that’s director Kawasaki’s thing. 

He’s made films featuring a Calamari Wrestler, a Crab soccer player (Kani Goalkeeper), and a cop who uses his toupee as a lethal weapon (The Rug Cop). Needless to say Kawasaki has something of a strange sense of humor. In reading a bit about Executive Koala, I’ve noticed that some people think this film is totally devoid of humor and a complete waste of time, but the sagest advice came from a reviewer on Netflix which I will paraphrase. If the idea of a koala in a business suit being sucked into a murder mystery seems interesting to you, then you’ll probably enjoy this film. 

One of the problems with reviewing this film is how do you critique the acting of someone in a koala costume. The answer I came up with is that you don’t. You just say that, for a guy with a koala head on, somehow Lee Ho managed to bring emotion though in his performance. It’s easy to get emotionally involved with the character, and I have to admit that much of that possibly comes from Mr. Tamura being so damn cute. The other actors in the film (who were not listed by character on the DVD or IMDB so I’m not sure who was who) all did fine jobs, and you have to give it up to them for being able to keep a straight face in some of the more intense scenes they had to share with Ho’s Tamura. I also really enjoyed the addition of 2 other animal characters in the Bunny boss and a Frog convenience store worker. The latter of the two I would love to see in a sequel. Third Shift Clerk Frog anyone?

The major props have to go to director Kawasaki, who also co-wrote the picture, and Yasutaka Nagano, the cinematographer who also worked on the much lauded Machine Girl. In the old USA if a film with such a low brow concept was made (see Peter Rottentail or any of the Teen Ape movies from Chris Seaver), it would come at the cost of professionalism and technique. That’s just not so here. There are some incredible shots in the film, and the camera is used effectively to create mood as the story moves along. While it starts very standard and flat, like an executive’s world would be, as the mystery thickens, the camera angles become strange, the cuts come faster, and the lighting becomes more intense. Kawasaki might have started with what was a laughable concept, but the film he turned in was adept and interesting throughout.

However, it does have a problem being consistent. While the first two acts are fairly easy to follow, the last third of the film becomes somewhat disjointed as twist after twist is thrown at the audience. I assume this was meant to satirize the “gotcha” ending of so many thrillers, but having the ending being so cluttered and messy really took away from what the movie did so well, have fun. Anyone who goes into this movie taking it seriously is asking for a bad time. Instead, if you take Executive Koala for what it is, bizarre and funny with its tongue firmly fitted in its cheek, then I can assure you that you will have a good time, you will never have seen anything like it, and you wonder what the Japanese will come up with next. 

I don’t recall things being that bad in 1989. Sure George H.W. Bush took office. Sure Muslims were out to kill Salman Rushdie. And, yeah, maybe the Exxon Valdez might have spilled oil all over the place and Pete Rose was banned from baseball, but there was good stuff too. That was the year of Burton’s Batman and the Sega Genesis. The same year that Ted Bundy got the chair, and the Simpsons debuted in their own show. So what in the world made the folks behind this film think that by the far-flung year of 1991 the world would get so violent and crazy. And we’d have laser gun gloves. And a private police force. And David Carradine. Well, I guess the last part did come true, but not much else about….

John Tucker (Carradine), an officer for C.O.P.S. (the “Civilian Operated Police State”), has a reputation for bringing in his criminals dead rather than alive, but it’s not as if he doesn’t warn them. Each time he faces off with a baddie he intones the new Miranda warning, "You've committed a crime. You're presumed guilty until proven innocent. You have the right to die. You choose to relinquish that right you'll be placed under arrest and put in prison.". Sometimes the crooks listen, but more often than not, Tucker doesn’t care either way. Packing a six-shooter and a laser blasting glove, he’s one of the best.

When he goes to make an arrest of the traitorous TV reporter Marian Sims (Rapangna), he soon finds himself on the other side of the law when he finds out that Marian is in possession of a videotape that proves corruption in the ranks of the C.O.P.S. Mob boss Grimes (Culliton) will stop at nothing to get it, but he’ll soon find out that he can’t escape the long arm….or glove of the law.

You know what’s futuristic? A warehouse district somewhere in L.A., people packing revolvers, and a big badass weapon that looks more like Nintendo’s doomed power glove. Oh, wait, that’s the wrong list. That’s my list of things that are NOT futuristic. My mistake and the mistake of Future Force. I have stated many times at the Lair that I love a film set in a dystopian future. So when I picked this flick up on VHS, I thought it looked great. I love David Carradine for all his hammy acting. I thought the idea of him with a robotic arm was full of goofy goodness. I thought the idea of a privatized police force could make for some interesting, ham-fisted, b-movie social commentary. I was wrong on all fronts.

Let’s just take these things one at a time. First off, a dystopian future. I love a film that intones that terrible things will come to pass in the 15 or 20 years it would take us to get to a year like 2002, but really, 2 years! Perhaps David Prior, who is known for his mostly terrible low budget films such as the 1988 Joe Spinelli vehicle Operation Warzone, thought that by reigning in the year he could get by with things not looking so futuristic. It might have worked too, that is if he hadn’t named his film FUTURE Force. C.O.P.S would have been a much better moniker, but at the time, there was a short-lived children’s animated series by the same name, and I’m sure no one wanted those two things to be confused.

Speaking of confused, David Carradine looked like he wondered exactly how he had reached this new low, and this is the man who had already appeared in gems like 1984’s The Warrior and the Sorceress and Safari 3000 (1982). The once svelte actor looked pretty paunchy here, and it wasn’t just his stomach that was bloated. His acting ranges from so flat you wonder if he was awake to so over the top you wonder if he was just powering through the scene so he could take a hit off the craft services table. I don’t know if I can blame him though. If I was saddled with a prop like the laser glove and it’s incredibly bad looking blue lasers, I don’t think I could muster up giving a crap either. Yet there’s something really shocking about his paycheck…er, I mean performance. He returned to the character the year after in the sequel Future Zone, which I read was the better of the two. It wouldn't take much for this to be true. 

So maybe they could save this flick with a dab of that social commentary I was looking for. Give us some overreaching moral lesson, and struggle get your point across or spell it out implicitly in case we‘re too dumb to notice(either way being in great b-movie tradition). So does Future Force pump up the subtext? Not a chance. This movie is at its core one of the most basic stories ever. Bad guys want to kill girl and hero won’t let them. That’s it. I think there was a large opportunity missed here, but the script by Prior and Thomas Baldwin barely achieves passable dialog so I was expecting too much.

I’m not going to waste all our time talking about the other actors in the film, all bad, the direction, clunky at best, and the effects, well; let’s just say they took special to new heights. In the end this film disappointed on all levels. I felt sure that I would encounter a film that could take on the “so bad it’s good" moniker, but instead I wish I had left Future Force in the past where it truly, truly belongs.

Picking this last entry in our journey Between Heaven and Hell proved to be quite a chore, but the last thing I want to be accused of is sloth. After all, tonight’s film proves that old adage is true; Satan does indeed love a sinner. In fact, sometimes he dreams about sinners and how he would shower them with all the love and affection he could muster, but there are occasions when the devil’s dreams turn sour and you just don’t want to be around when it takes a turn into….

A group of tourists, each representing one of the 7 deadly sins, takes refuge from a storm in the Castle of Baron von Rhoneberg (Servais). Little do they know that the Baron’s family had long been cursed to serve the will of the Devil. They have been commanded to turn over their first-born daughter to Lucifer for use as a Succubus. Von Rhoneberg thinks he has escaped the curse by killing his daughter when she was a newborn, but it seems his brother had fathered a daughter (Erica Blanc) with the maid. Soon the tourists begin to meet their end at the hands of the Succubus, and the Devil (Daniel Emilfork) is so confident in his victory, he comes personally to claim the soul of the last living tourist, Father Alvin (Monseau).

The Devil’s Nightmare is the first and only feature film from Belgian director Jean Brismée, and it was a co production between a Belgian production house, Cetelci S.A., and the Italian Delfino Film, which also produced the Mario Bava film Four Times that Night. While his singular feature film is not a work of a great master, it surprises me that Brismée never made another film. The Devil’s Nightmare is a competent and entertaining piece of early seventies European sleaze.  

The film gets high marks right off the bat by casting the luscious redhead Erica Blanc as the Succubus. Perhaps better known for starring as Emmanuelle in Io, Emmanuelle, the film that spawned a jillion imitators and sequels. She also appeared in a couple of favorites here at the Lair, The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave and Mario Bava’s Kill, Baby, Kill. Looking as lovely as always, Blanc slinks though her scenes in a variety of outfits that would look more at home in a disco than a castle, but even more striking is her transformation when she takes a life. This is the only film that Paul de Fru handled the special effects, as he usually worked either as a camera operator or as cinematographer, and keeping the transformation simple and relying on stage makeup techniques and camera tricks was a wise choice. It beings another layer to Blanc’s performance, and allows this low budget feature to have some visually impressive flair. 

While each of the characters is given their moment to shine, and since I watched this with Ms. Directed, we had a fine time trying to peg each person with their sin early on. The two characters I most enjoyed were the gluttonous tour guide Ducha (Christian Maillet) and the slothful and cranky Mr. Mason (Lucian Raimbourg). Each of the sinners is given a death scene, and many of them fit their crime such as when the glutton chokes to death and a greedy lady drowns in gold. There are several that don’t really match up, and I do wish that they had been but more pointed. This would have been a major improvement to the film. One of the biggest blunders the film makes is that our hero, Father Alvin (Monseau) is rather dull and uninteresting. Thankfully, he shares many of his scenes with Ms. Blanc, and that makes his character much more tolerable. I would also have very much enjoyed more scenes with the Baron’s butler. I really enjoyed his calm creepiness as he described all the ghastly goings which had previously befallen the house. 

This is The Devil’s Nightmare after all. Therefore, I do want to take a few moments to talk about Old Scratch here. Daniel Emilfork is one strange looking dude, and his slight form and leering gaze bring his devil to life quite elegantly. This is not the brute devil, but I think more inspired by Ekerot’s Death in Bergman’s The Seventh Seal. It is a brief performance, but one which definitely was an inspired and daring choice. 

While The Devil’s Nightmare will never go down in the annals of history as an incredible film, it is a highly entertaining way to spend 95 minutes. This film is available on many low priced box sets, and for anyone with Netflix, it is currently part of their “Watch It Now” movies on demand. It never reaches beyond the average, but I would have liked to see where Jean Brismée might have taken his next feature. 

In the past few weeks we’ve looked at quite a few films which feature religious themes, and after the Ladies of the Lair took some time out last week to give some love to the pagans out there, I thought it was high time I did the same. So with May Day just around the corner how could I resist a bewitching tale of a pagan cult that includes the equally bewitching….

Rising to fame after a whirlwind romance with Peter Sellers, the Swedish Ekland soon became quite the sex symbol. Over the years she has appeared in many fine cult films such as 1970’s I Cannibali, and the incomparable Michael Caine gangster flick Get Carter. In 1974, she appeared opposite Christopher Lee as Bond girl Mary Goodnight in The Man with the Golden Gun, but the year before she appeared in a more fruitful role alone with Lee when she appeared in….

After receiving an anonymous letter, Sgt. Howie arrives at the remote Scottish island of Summerisle to investigate the disappearance of a young girl, but he soon finds the locals have no use for his inquiries. He begins to delve deeper into life on the island he finds that the locals are practicing pagans, and Howie begins to suspect the young girl is being kept for use in a sacrifice. As layer upon layer of mystery opens up to him, the Christian policeman is blinded by his own resolve, but soon he will get all the answers he wants and learn the secrets of the Wicker Man. 

Cultspoitation? Well, perhaps Celt-spoitation would be more apt. The Wicker Man is, in my humble opinion, one of the best examples of what makes a film a cult classic. Its singular surrealist vision and epic strangeness are practically unparalleled, and the film begs for repeated viewings to truly get and enjoy all its subtle nuances. Thought provoking, hilarious, and baffling are just a few of the words I would choose to describe this film in a Cliff Notes version, but thankfully, this is The Lair and I can go on for as long as I’d like. 

Having no idea where to start with this most excellent film, I suppose one could not go wrong by starting at the beginning. The script by writer Anthony Schaffer, who also wrote the script to Sleuth (1972), was based primarily on a novel by British actor/writer David Pinner, but he received no screen credit as such although the rights to his novel were purchased by the film’s producers. Schaffer’s script strikes chords that are both lighthearted and menacing, and his characters feel like fully realized people. 

This could not have happened without a wonderful cast. Christopher Lee is at the height of his powers as Lord Summerisle, the leader of the island and its pagan people. His imposing presence, always a boon to his roles as Dracula, again serves him well as he towers above his co-star Edward Woodward. For his own part, Woodward is pitch perfect as Sgt. Howie, and he went to great lengths to develop the role. He intentionally wore a police uniform which was too small in order to better portray how constricted his character was. As a viewer, each time I see this film, I still get thrown to fits as Sgt. Howie ineptly investigates the girl’s disappearance. Howie is a man who walks the world with blinders on due to his religious fervor, and it is a credit to Woodward that he could embody his character without just seeming dumber than a box of apples. 

Today we’re here to talk about Britt Ekland though, and while her part in the film is fairly small, she is part of one of the more memorable scenes in the film. As the pious copper tries to bed down for the night, Ekland’s Willow sings a haunting, seductive song as she tries to lure Howie to her room. It comes to nothing, but Howie didn’t have our view as Ekland dances around her bedroom in the buff. Unfortunately, while the scenes showing Ekland nude from the waist up are the real deal, she refused to show her derriere for the camera. So for the cutaway shots of Willow dancing in her room, Lorraine Peters , who also has a small part as a crying naked girl in a graveyard, lent her bum to the proceedings. This footage was shot after Ms. Ekland had left the set, and she was none too pleased that it was in the final film. 

Yet it seems that Ekland was pretty hard to please anyhow. During the filming she called Dumfries and Galloway, the locations in Scotland which doubled for Summerisle, “the bleakest place on Earth”. The producers of the film were quick to provide an apology to the locals. Speaking of providing, I should note that Britt didn’t provide the voice for her Scottish character (although I would love to hear what a Swedish Scot sounded like), and her lines were overdubbed by British singer/actress Annie Ross, who would go on to play the villainous principal Ms. Crestwood in Pump Up The Volume. 

The glue that holds this film together is the direction of Robin Harvey. How the first time director (who to this day only has 3 other credits to his name) managed not only to land in the big chair for this film, but also to direct it so well. Working with veteran lensman Harry Waxman (and I mean veteran his first credit is 1939’s Sam Goes Shopping), the film embraces the beauty and mystery of the Scottish isles. The shots slide elegantly from perfection to being slightly off, and this gives The Wicker Man a great sense of tension. One of my favorite things is the quick cuts we get when Sgt. Howie is on the edge of figuring something out. It’s like a visual cue that Howie is nearly making the connections, but they don’t last long enough for him to really figure anything out. 

The Wicker Man is a movie that has everything I love in a film, good direction, great performances, and enjoyable songs. Did I forget to mention songs? Oh, yes, from the opening strains of Paul Giovanni’s “Corn Rigs” over the opening credits to the bawdy barroom song about the landlord’s daughter, music plays an important role in the film throughout. It becomes another piece of the puzzle as to why people have so long lauded this film with admiration. Unlike its 2006 remake (Why’d it get burned? Why’d it get burned?), The Wicker Man is a very interesting film which will work for cult movie fans of all stripes. So if this is one you haven’t checked out, I thoroughly encourage you to seek this one out, and join the cult already in progress.

Welcome to April 21st, a special day around the Lair. It’s the 11th Anniversary of my marriage to the ravishing Ms. Directed. I love her as much today as when we met, and what better way is there to celebrate our love than with a film about ghost sailors? Plus they know a good date when they hear it. Ladies and Gents, I’m going to turn this one over to John Houseman…..

“11:55, almost midnight. Enough time for one more story. One more story before 12:00, just to keep us warm. In five minutes, it will be the 21st of April. One hundred years ago on the 21st of April, out in the waters around Spivey Point, a small clipper ship drew toward land. Suddenly, out of the night, the fog rolled in. For a moment, they could see nothing, not a foot in front of them. Then, they saw a light. By God, it was a fire burning on the shore, strong enough to penetrate the swirling mist. They steered a course toward the light. But it was a campfire, like this one. The ship crashed against the rocks, the hull sheared in two, mars snapped like a twig. The wreckage sank, with all the men aboard. At the bottom of the sea, lay the Elizabeth Dane, with her crew, their lungs filled with salt water, their eyes open, staring to the darkness. And above, as suddenly as it come, the fog lifted, receded back across the ocean and never came again. But it is told by the fishermen, and their fathers and grandfathers, that when the fog returns to Antonio Bay, the men at the bottom of the sea, out in the water by Spivey Point will rise up and search for the campfire that led them to their dark, icy death.” -Mr. Machen

Choosing to start this film with the scene of Houseman as Mr. Machen telling his story to a group of campers, John Carpenter sets the tone for the entire film. There are two things at work here, a variation on the ghost story set against a local backdrop and the imagination of pre-adolescent boys. Everything that follows plays into one of these two categories. After all, at its core, this is a film that relies on the glowing red eyes of ghost pirates and the menace of eerie weather. 

The greatest strength of the film is the script written by Carpenter and his producing partner Debra Hill. The dynamic of the story and the interlocking storylines are deftly crafted. The most interesting choice has to be the arc of Adrienne Barbeau’s character. As the narrative unfolds, Barbeau as lighthouse based DJ Stevie Wayne, remains isolated as Antonio Bay is attacked by the vengeful sailors, and she only has a singular scene of face to face interaction with another character in the film. To segregate your top billed actress from the main story is daring, and makes the climax of her storyline all the more harrowing. 

There are many other good performances as both Jamie Lee Curtis and her mom Janet Leigh (in their first on screen pairing) each impressed. The young Jamie Lee is paired up with one of my favorite genre film favorites, Tom Atkins, and every scene they were in was highly entertaining. The always enjoyable Hal Holbrook stars here as a priest that knows exactly why the ghost sailors are so mad. 

Carpenter of course makes the most of his film, and shot the whole affair in the same anamorphic widescreen that he used for Assault on Precinct 13. Once again he worked with cinematographer Dean Cundey who would join him for many of his greatest features including Halloween, Big Trouble in Little China, and The Thing. Cundey had a long history in genre films which include Black Shampoo , an Ilsa flick, and Rock ’n’ Roll High School. Cunday still maintains a busy schedule today, but his choice in films has become decidedly more mainstream. 

This review may be a little light on delving into the plot, but The Fog is one of the few films that I feel greatly improves if one goes into it without a ton of prior knowledge. While it still manages to excite and thrill me after many viewings. I still remember the first time I saw the flick. Like the boys in the beginning of the film, I was in my early teens, and The Fog took me on a pretty scary ride. There’s a good reason the films of John Carpenter are generally acknowledged to be some of the greatest in the modern history of genre films, and The Fog is no exception. So if you haven’t seen this one in a while, check it out again, and if you’re getting ready for a first viewing, sit back and enjoy.