Dir - Jalmari Helander
Overall: GOOD
A full-length debut and expansion on two of his previous shorts Rare Exports Inc. and Rare Exports: The Official Safety Instructions, Finnish writer/director Jalmari Helander's Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale is a sly parody of several different movies at once, all while never laying the tongue too firmly in cheek. In other words, this is played straight for something with the ridiculous premise of a gigantic, horned-Krampus who is accidentally unearthed from a long, frozen slumber, only for an army of naked old mall Santas to try and defrost him with stolen radiators and children in sacks to punish. A more overtly silly approach would have been expected and arguably still sufficient, but Helander's handling of his material has genuine suspense, a touching father/son dynamic, a fully-realized arctic setting played for ominous effect, and it avoids winking at the audience more than is agreeable. Some of the CGI in the final set piece is less than convincing, plus the characters could use more backstory to engage with, but the brisk running time is appreciated and the emphasis remains in the right place. Fusing European folklore with John Carpenter's The Thing and then presenting it as a feel-good holiday movie except with full-frontal male nudity and some gore, Helander has crafted a wacky, R-rated hodgepodge that is endlessly inventive.
Dir - Daniel Stamm
Overall: MEH
Another faulty found footage movie with a laughably insulting twist ending, The Last Exorcism botches a fetching enough premise as well as undermining some wonderful performances. As the huckster preach who is hellbent on setting the record straight, Patrick Fabian has a hard time disguising his smirk, which is something that works wonderfully in the first two acts when he lays out the tools of the trade in convincing poor saps that a couple of demon noises and smoking crucifixes can rid their loved ones of unwanted forces. Once things become more disturbingly dire though, director Daniel Stramm's mockumentary approach comes off as ridiculous. Presented as a finished, fully edited account of "real events", the use of location titles, scary music on the soundtrack, and the cameraman making sure to keep his cool enough to shakily capture things, (things that any rational-thinking human on earth would run to the authorities in order to report), all makes for an absurd botch of the found footage framework. Pentagrams and 666s painted on the walls, child-like foreshadowing drawings, and a robed/Antichrist-esque birth scene amongst a bellowing fire are all unintentionally comedic touches that further impair the previously established exploration of how exorcism can either prey upon or cure, (depending on one's point of view), devout believers who suffer from mental illness.
Dir - Adam Wingard
Overall: WOOF
For his first of many collaborations with director Adam Wingard in A Horrible Way to Die, screenwriter Simon Barrett further establishes his modus operandi of utilizing glacier-sized plot holes in order to move things forward. Perhaps because of this, Wingard chooses to emphasis a dread-fueled mood which disguises none of the script issues, yet does create a dour viewing experience if one can stomach the obnoxious, claustrophobic, hand-held cinematography that never, ever, ever stays stationary. To be fair, Amy Seimetz and A.J. Bowen deliver brooding performances, each on the verge of either uncontrollable tears or an outpouring of rage. Also, Wingard spares us most of the graphic depictions of violence, making sure that the audience knows exactly what unwholesome acts have transpired without gleefully exploiting them. Barrett's work here though is appallingly insulting. An escaped serial killer manages to evade capture through a massive manhunt, a police-monitored roadblock, and with his face plastered all over the news, (which a quick shave in a truck stop is supposed to excuse). On top of that, said killer's ex-girlfriend who turned him in is never once contacted by the authorities, apparently pays zero attention to current events, and once she does suspect that her murder-happy former partner is free, she does the "logical" thing which is to run away into the middle of the woods with her brand new boyfriend while still making sure that the police are none the wiser. Throw in an icky, unbelievably far-fetched twist ending and the whole thing collapses upon itself.
Overall: WOOF
For his first of many collaborations with director Adam Wingard in A Horrible Way to Die, screenwriter Simon Barrett further establishes his modus operandi of utilizing glacier-sized plot holes in order to move things forward. Perhaps because of this, Wingard chooses to emphasis a dread-fueled mood which disguises none of the script issues, yet does create a dour viewing experience if one can stomach the obnoxious, claustrophobic, hand-held cinematography that never, ever, ever stays stationary. To be fair, Amy Seimetz and A.J. Bowen deliver brooding performances, each on the verge of either uncontrollable tears or an outpouring of rage. Also, Wingard spares us most of the graphic depictions of violence, making sure that the audience knows exactly what unwholesome acts have transpired without gleefully exploiting them. Barrett's work here though is appallingly insulting. An escaped serial killer manages to evade capture through a massive manhunt, a police-monitored roadblock, and with his face plastered all over the news, (which a quick shave in a truck stop is supposed to excuse). On top of that, said killer's ex-girlfriend who turned him in is never once contacted by the authorities, apparently pays zero attention to current events, and once she does suspect that her murder-happy former partner is free, she does the "logical" thing which is to run away into the middle of the woods with her brand new boyfriend while still making sure that the police are none the wiser. Throw in an icky, unbelievably far-fetched twist ending and the whole thing collapses upon itself.
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