 |
| August 2nd, 1939 - August 30th 2015 |
There are a number of filmmakers who have become known as pioneers in ushering in the "modern" age of the horror film. George Romero could be considered the first to get his name on the map with Night of the Living Dead, which helped revolutionize gore, bleakness, and tone let alone single-handedly turning the zombie film completely on its ass forevermore. Then before Tobe Hooper made the most disturbing exploitation movie yet conceived of at that point with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Ohio born and raised Wes Craven turned heads with his directorial debut Last House On the Left. Others emerged like Dario Argento in Italy, David Cronenberg in Canada, and John Carpenter back in America that collectively made some of the most genre-defying and best horror films in the history of the medium. All of these men to greater and lesser extents would continue to inspire countless filmmakers who either dabbled or straight-up dwelled in the genre since. In good ways and bad as we all know.
Out of all the aforementioned, Wes Craven is possibly the most successful. From a commercial standpoint, the Nightmare On Elm Street and Scream franchises are two of the genre's most enormous money makers and Craven spawned, continued to direct, write, and be creatively involved in both of them. That alone makes him a person who is impossible to ignore in this field of scaring people at the movie theater.
Of course, Craven offered up quite a few non or minimally sequeled-out horror films over the course of four plus decades as well such as Deadly Blessing, The Serpent and the Rainbow, Shocker, The People Under the Stairs, Vampire In Brooklyn, Red Eye, and of course his very most terrifying Music of the Heart. Now here is where I have to unfortunately play Debbie Downer. After seeing many of these, (including the Screams and the Elm Streets), I am honestly only really a fan of one of them. As in The Serpent and the Rainbow, which made my 100 Favorite Horror Films list. Maybe because Craven did not write it and simply stuck to directing?
 |
| *Spoilers* It certainly does not have anything to do with anyone's testicles getting pounded into dust |
I have always found Wes Craven's film output to be either somewhat or severely flawed. Tone problems run amok in many of them and his earliest offerings suffer from, among other things, some terrible acting and very questionable direction choices. I could write a series of articles about what is wrong with the atrocious Last House on the Left as it is one of the worst movies in the history of filmmaking. Nightmare on Elm Street has a muddled ending and unfortunately it is impossible to take Freddie Kruger seriously after this. I have made no shortage of proclamations that the slasher film is my least favorite horror sub-genre, ergo the Scream franchise which both poked fun at yet completely adhered to EVERY cliche in the slasher book never sat me well either.
So sadly, I have personally never agreed with the label "master of horror" where Wes Craven is concerned. I originally had the intention to watch a handful of the man's films that I had never seen and review them on this blog as a fitting tribute, as of course we all know he just succumbed to brain cancer at the age of seventy-six this past Sunday. I have to be honest with my opinions though and not sugarcoat the results of this experiment. So yes, I regret to inform that none of these films blew my mind as I hoped maybe they might. Though who knows, I have re-watched movies for the second time years later only to find that I very much enjoyed them where I had not before. So maybe there is hope for me to become a Freddie fan after all. Despite my tastes though, Craven's legacy is certainly impressive and now that it is complete, I shall send him off as honestly as I can. May the gods stop future remakes from tarnishing said legacy and may Craven still continue to give future generations the nightmares they, well, CRAVE!
(1977)
Overall: MEH
This was Wes Craven's five-years-later follow-up to Last House On the Left and both explore similar themes. Basically meaning, a bunch of crazies pick off normal folk and then the normal folk eventually fight back. The similarities do not necessarily end there, as several scenes in Hills seem to be there just to make you uncomfortable. This is something Last House certainly attempted and has been recognized for ever since, but the difference of course is that said film is astonishingly awful while this one is an improvement in a few areas. Five years working on miscellaneous projects seemed to have temporarily taught Craven a thing or two about tone, as Hills sticks to its gruesome one from beginning to end. The acting is mostly sub-par, especially Robert Houston who performs like a reluctant teenager in a high school play. Iconic, naturally horrific looking Michael Berryman makes his horror film debut here and though he sadly does not get much to do, he pretty much just needs to stand in front of the camera while motionless to creep you out. The initial trailer-park break-in comes after perhaps a too long build up, but it is generally unnerving. Ultimately, the movie has potential to be a mountain-man horror classic, but Craven was still in amateur terrain where the direction, (particularly with the actors) and pacing is concerned.
(1991)
Overall: WOOF
Yikes. Easily put, The People Under the Stairs is the worst Wes Craven movie ever made that is not called Last House On the Left. The problems that plague most of Craven's work are practically beating you over the cranium with iron clad fists in this one. The tone is outrageously off. Social commentary, racial injustice, poverty, and child abuse are all heavily handled with an equally hefty dose of slapstick comedy, horrid dialogue, cartoonish overacting, and illogical acts taking place every sixteen or so seconds. A little of any of these things and one can shrug it off and continue onwards. Yet all the awful just never lets up, making you shake your head wondering just what in the hell Craven was trying to accomplish here. Was it supposed to be one of those intentionally stupid popcorn horror flicks that a teenager-filled movie theater can laugh at while simultaneously yelling at the screen? If so, then why have so many serious themes? Was it instead meant to actually be a menacing and disturbing bit of celluloid that got under your skin? Whether either or both of these things was attempted or not, the results brutally fail. In addition, the movie is very tedious. Lunatics run around screaming, threatening, shooting guns, and sicking their dog on people. Kids hide in basements, then in walls, then in vents, then in the basement a few more times, then the walls several more times, then various rooms, then the roof, etc. This takes up no joke over an hour of the hour and a half movie. Messy, off the mark horror has rarely been done messier or more off than here.
(2010)
Overall: MEH
What would turn out to be Wes Craven's penultimate feature film, My Soul To Take is unfortunately a lackluster way to almost go out on. With a 9% on Rotten Tomatoes, the general opinion here is that it is basically dullsville in celluloid form. Being yet another slasher movie, having yet another cast made up of teenagers, and throwing in enough other cliches to clutter up the plot, it pretty much guarantee you will be watching it while leaning on one of your hands and occasionally yawning. Because most teenage protagonists in movies are irritating at best anyway, you are practically rooting for the killer to pick them off here. While this is usually played intentionally, in this setting that very killer is unintentionally sillier than both Freddie Kruger and Ghostface at their silliest. Well, maybe not Freddie but still. So basically, there is no one to either care about or get behind. After so many successful horror works under his belt, (arguably more than any other director in the field), Craven just seems to be doing a teenage-slasher-with-a-schizophrenic-twist film by numbers here. Maybe the all too familiar themes were just a safety net for the writer/director as he felt he could do this kind of stuff in his sleep. Sadly, it certainly looks like he did just that.
No comments:
Post a Comment