2019 Horror Part Eleven

SYNCHRONIC

Dir - Justin Benson/Aaron Moorhead

Overall: MEH

Continuing in the trajectory and likely the same cinematic universe as two of their previous movies Resolution and The Endless, filmmaking team Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead's Synchronic is unfortunately a bit of a misstep, not quite reaching what it is striving for.  Themes of chance play somewhat heavily where the two best friends lament about how their lives could have went in various paths, if only different choices been made.  On this note, it makes sense to hinge the story on the concept of a recreational drug that can literally send you back to random spots in time depending on where you physically are at the moment that it kicks in/wears off.  While the performances are solid, there are a handful of fun set pieces, and the special effects are expertly used, there is also a bit of an issue that Benson's script seems pretty dodgy along the way.  The characters are underwritten to various extents, which makes the downer ending fail to connect, plus the "ridiculous on paper" premise stands out more as a half-baked bit of flimsy sci-fi nonsense as opposed to something to truly slam home its series of unique, contemplative ideas.

 

THE SIREN

Dir - Perry Blackshear

Overall: MEH

 

An interesting if ultimately just partially successful follow-up to his very solid debut They Look Like People, Perry Blackshear's The Siren, (The Rusalka), utilizes the same understated approach to what is another emotionally-driven character study.  Evan Dumouchel, MacLeod Andrews, and Margaret Ying Drake all return, making up virtually the entire speaking cast who are each dealing with a severe, consuming sense of loss and loneliness.  This particular brand of inner turmoil is at the core of the film and the actors are all exceptional, delivering only sparse dialog, (and in Dumouchel's case who plays a literal mute, no dialog at all), largely relying on subtle mannerisms to exhibit a desperate need for attachment.  Blackshear still makes excellent use out of merely some creepy contact lenses, sound effects, a few filters, and intimate camerawork in place of special effects, but it is in the simplistic plotting that gives everything too stagnant of a feel.  Provided by a voice over, we are given almost the entire premise within the first minute of the running time and while the cinematography is alluring to a point, everything simmers a bit too much with repetitive, interchangeable scenes where the same information is conveyed again and again.  There are also a few predictable, awful jump scares that Blackshear could not resist in utilizing, which is a step down in its own right from the cliche-less They Look Like People by comparison.

IT CHAPTER TWO

Dir - Andy Muschietti

Overall: MEH

Whereas director Andy Muschietti's first It adaptation was simply a neutered, by-the-books, big glossy horror production like any other from a major studio, It Chapter Two finishes off wrapping up the source material with added tonal blunders in tow.  Unmercifully bloated to nearly three-hours in length, it tells a mirror image story where once again the Loser Club, (now grown to adulthood), visit the same sets, go through the same motions, and each individually get scared by incredibly awful CGI cartoons where loud clangy noises punctuate each and every such scene.  Bill Hader is a logical choice for the grown up version of Richie Tozier; a character that basically provided the chuckle relief all on his lonesome in the first film.  While Hader does a solid job as do the rest of the grown-up cast, unfortunately the comedic beats are much more abundant and forced, with ADRed quips and one utterly baffling pop music drop for about three seconds that legitimately seems like it was a last minute mistake that made the final cut.  It is bad enough that Bill Skarsgård's head is attached to a giant, smashy crab monster, (a monster that is one of Stephen King's many cocaine-fueled ideas that made it into both this and the likewise botched 1990 miniseries), but when characters and set pieces are going for idiot-pleasing nyuck nyucks in the middle of what should be harrowing, supernatural, pants-shitting terror, things once again aggressively fall down the stairs into eyeball-rolling schlock.  Though coming from such a bombastic and bloated novel in the first place that probably had no prayer of providing anything remotely creepy on the subtle end of the spectrum, why NOT go for broke and crank it all up to eleven?

2020 Horror Part Twelve

THE CALL

Dir - Lee Chung-hyun

Overall: GOOD

 

A South Korean remake of the Puerto Rican film The Caller from 2011, The Call, (Kol), tweaks the premise enough to be a unique retelling.  By emphasizing its more Twilight Zone aspects in place of overt supernatural ones, the story builds its back-and-forth timeline jumping in darkly dramatic ways even if it hits some predictable beats along its course.  While the structure is for the most part riveting and both Park Shin-hye and Jeon Jong-seo turn in commendable performances as the two stand-ins for good and evil who eventually duke it out with each other, the film may lose momentum for some who find that the twisty-turvy plotting runs itself in circles.  Writer/director Lee Chung-hyun rides a thin line in this regard where once the otherworldly rules are established, (if not at all explained), then the build up can only go in one direction where history is endlessly rewritten with more tension-mounting results.  For Shin-hye's protagonist, the effects of her ordeal are certainly gut-wrenching, yet they never become depressingly overbearing even if the story cannot seem to help itself but to rain on her parade.  Still, the pacing is tight and the somewhat classy, less exploitative, and stylistic attempt at suggesting the horrific elements is appreciated.

 

BLACK BOX

Dir - Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour Jr.

Overall: MEH

 

Another above mediocre Welcome to Blumhouse feature, writer/director Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour Jr.'s debut Black Box has a psychological horror premise that leans more on the side of pseudo-science silliness than anything, but at least the presentation is sincere.  On paper, it is easy to chuckle at things like a medical head contraption that is able to unlock uploaded memories and two different consciousnesses punching each other for control of a physical body, but you would never know how goofy such elements are judging by the excellent performances.  Mamoudou Athie sympathetically portrays his struggling protagonist who is trying to reclaim his life after a traumatic brain injury that by all logical accounts should have left him dead.  Yet when he does succumb to the aggressive duality that is striving to break free, he proves to be terrifying in a domestically abusive sense.  Child actor Amanda Christine is an impressive highlight as well, plus Cosby Show fans will assuredly get a kick out of Phylicia Rashad reemerging with a significant role in a genre film.  The horror elements include blurry faces and a mysterious figure that snaps, creeks, and contortions its body, and sadly none of these elements are either unique or freaky.  It plays things too safe to offer up any compelling surprises, but it is still adequately done.

 

THE OLD WAYS

Dir - Christopher Alender

Overall: MEH

The first full-length in over twenty years from director Christopher Alender, The Old Ways is a loud, dumb folk horror possession movie that weaves some formulaic, heart-string pulling crap about family and overcoming one's personal "demons" and well, you get the idea.  Harsh words perhaps that at least are not wholly deserving for significant chunks of the running time, which allude to something more intelligent and worthwhile than what is ultimately delivered.  Performance wise, it has everyone taking the supernatural material seriously, even when Brigitte Kali Canales in the lead specifically does not take it seriously, yet does seem concerned with her kidnapping at the hands of her cousin and a Nahua bruja who is dressed throughout the movie in a cheap Halloween costume.  Photographed well with some halfway decent effects work considering the meager budget, (and some actual snakes instead of CGI ones, which is refreshing in and of itself), but Alender abuses cliched screechy noises in the cheapest and most obnoxious way possible to convey scariness.  Throw in a couple dabs of schlock and even more screaming monster noises with an "I'm a badass and not afraid of you anymore" finale, and it all degenerates into a pile of tripe that is unfortunate to say the least.

2020 Horror Part Eleven

FRIED BARRY

Dir - Ryan Kruger

Overall: GOOD

After over a decade of cranking out quite a collection of shorts, (including one of the same name that this is an expansion of), South African filmmaker Ryan Kruger delivered his full-length debut Fried Barry which is a flashy, funny, gross, naughty, and highly stylized "fish out of water" alien abduction bit of madness that is surely to please midnight movie aficionados.  Local actor Gary Green is perfectly fitted for the title role; a towering, strikingly ravaged, odd looking man whose character passes through Cape Town's seedy underbelly as a drugged-out zombie when in fact he has either been taken over by or cloned by extraterrestrial forces.  Six of one, half dozen of the other is essentially the joke since Kruger presents a universe so full of lowlifes, drug addicts, prostitutes, and homeless psychopaths that Green's Barry effortlessly glides through all of it, uttering almost no words with his bugged-out eyes and twitchy motions.  Written as a series of set pieces, it is presented in a visually as well as sonically striking manner with eerie synth music setting a sinister mood even as the actual events of the film are often hilariously outrageous and need to be seen to be believed.

 

THE NEW MUTANTS

Dir - Josh Boone

Overall: MEH

 

Unceremoniously released during COVID-19's heyday over two years after it was initially completed due to Disney's corporate takeover of Fox, Marvel's The New Mutants unfortunately hits with a whimper in its attempts to bypass superhero movie burnout by being a straight ahead horror film, at least of sorts.  The intention from co-writer/director Josh Boone is certainly admirable, especially considering that the cinematic X Men franchise has cranked out lackluster duds more often then not, all on top of the detrimentally formulaic framework that both Marvel and DC movies have been safety sticking by.  Tone wise, this is indeed a different beast as its claustrophobic, single location, minimal cast, and lack of a world-ending threat is refreshing in and of itself.  Even with their silly accents in tow, the performances are acceptable as are the cartoony special effects, but the story line still ends up falling victim to the same type of plot-hole heavy blunders that every comic book adaptation seems to possess.  Having an entire establishment run by a single woman who is tasked with "helping" a handful of kids with little to no control over their immense powers, (well, no control when such a thing is convenient for the script), is still impossible to take seriously despite the standard scary movie tropes and less pizazz-heavy approach to the material.  Not nearly as awful as its mangled reputation, but it is still assuredly a swing and a miss.

 

ANYTHING FOR JACKSON

Dir - Justin G. Dyck

Overall: GOOD

Quite hilariously, the effectively wicked Anything for Jackson comes from the writer-director team of Justin G. Dyck and Keith Cooper, both of whom have made an otherwise career almost exclusively out of syrupy, made for television Holiday movies.  In this sense, there work here represents a lighting bolt of bottled up, incredibly evil gruesomeness that even more surprisingly manages to balance a tone that is equally absurd and very creepy.  Somewhat of a dark comedy reworking of Liam Gavin's exceptional, 2016 occult nightmare A Dark Song in which a grieving parent, (or in the case here, grandparents), embark on ancient, insanely risky rituals to find some sort of closure with a traumatic loss, there are various details here that keep it just fresh enough to be persistently interesting.  Stand-out performances from both Sheila McCarthy and Julian Richings in the leads, as well as deadly serious scary music on the soundtrack juxtapose some outrageous moments that nearly disguise their comedic nature.  Even during the finale which does seem to show cracks a bit in the intricate, Satanic specifics of the plot, there is an aura of heaviness that leaves an unsettling, macabre aftertaste.  Here is hoping that Dyck and Cooper find the need to make more 180 degree shifts from their Christmas extravaganzas and have more diabolically fun ideas like this up their sleeves.

2020 Horror Part Ten

THE LAST MATINEE

Dir - Maximiliano Contenti

Overall: GOOD

 

For his second solo directorial effort The Last Matinee, (Al morir la matinée, Red Screening), Uruguayan filmmaker Maximiliano Contenti delivers an unapologetic giallo/80s slasher throwback that is both high on gore and low on originality by design.  As one could logically guess from the title alone, it takes place entirely in an independent movie theater that is of course showing a horror movie, (Ricardo Islas' ultra-cheap, retro Hammer-styled Frankenstein: Day of the Beast, Islas also appearing here as the eyeball collecting maniac).  Contenti utilizes extreme, unsettling close-ups, slow-motion suspense building, vividly eerie color schemes, a synth musical score, campy call-backs, and cliche-heavy plot points that recall many video nasties of the Euro-horror/low-budget American trash variety.  The film looks far better than many of the genre movies it is a homage too though, beautifully photographed even in its most grotesque moments.  There is also a simple charm to the whole thing that while deliberately not trying to reinvent the wheel in any fashion, also does not come off as insulting by means of a lazy execution.  If it took itself too seriously or winked too hard at its nostalgic-hungry audience then it might not get a pass, but it is an innocently unfancy, stylish bloodbath as is.

 

PG: PSYCHO GOREMAN

Dir - Steven Kostanski

Overall: MEH

 

The latest from Astron-6 writer/director/special effects man Steven Kostanski is an aesthetically impressive yet unfunny and obnoxious sci-fi spoof.  Part of the charm with a movie like PG: Psycho Goreman is how it manages to exist at all, cobbled together with a noticeably minimal budget yet featuring inventive practical and makeup effects that look like a cross between tokusatsu action TV and 80s monster movies.  Tonally, it is deliberately chaotic, indulging in splattery violence, filthy jokes, fish out of water plot points, and cringe-worthy musical numbers all within a preposterous comic book parodying framework.  While much of this sounds fun on paper and one or two chuckles land as intended, nearly every character merely behaves in a fashion to simply allow for whoever they are conversing with to respond with groan-worthy quips.  In the process, it is a series of arbitrary behavior from all involved, except of course where Nita-Jose Hanna's brat protagonist/antagonist is concerned who simply will not stop being annoyingly awful.  Her wacky, unnatural parents are a different problem, having a bizarre ark that persistently falls flat in every instance that they are on screen.  An admirable mess, yet one that needs a substantial rewrite from top to bottom in order to be worth one's time.

THE BOY BEHIND THE DOOR
Dir - David Charbonier/Justin Powell
Overall: WOOF

 

An aggravatingly unoriginal and ergo insulting cat and mouse thriller from the newcomer writer/director team of David Charbonier and Justin Powell, The Boy Behind the Door has very little to offer.  Since it has such a bare-bones premise, it is necessary for it to get by on a clever use of its set pieces which in this case are predicated on pure suspense building.  Regrettably though, Charbonier and Powell rely on obvious call-backs, (*cough rip-offs), to much more famous horror movies, particularly The Shining whose entire "Wendy trapped in the bathroom while Jack hacks it down with an axe" scene is recreated almost shot for shot.  Also, public domain classics Night of the Living Dead and The House on Haunted Hill are heard in the background which have been used for characters to be watching on TV in horror movies for decades now.  These are honestly more minor blunders though as the rest of it is littered with obvious psyche-outs and twists to wrack up the tension, one-note villains who are not only evil just for the sake of it but also morons, groan-worthy "friends till the end" nonsense, and eye-wincing nastiness for mere gross-out value.  The more it builds to its conclusion, the easier it is to entirely check out and lose any and all interest in something so thoroughly underwritten and lazy.

2020 Horror Part Nine

AMULET

Dir - Romola Garai

Overall: MEH

 

The debut, directorial effort Amulet from British actor turned filmmaker Romola Garai is an exercise of mood over substance, for better or worse.  It is admirable that for a first time behind the lens, Garai tests the audience's patience tremendously, exhibiting a sense of confidence in her material that while ultimately unfulfilling, certainty emphasizes a heavy atmosphere of something dark and disturbing that will eventually let itself be known.  While this eventually happens, the trek there is tremendously stagnant and the payoff just seems half-cooked instead of efficiently shrouded in a challenging, macabre sense of ambiguity.  On every technical level, it is well put together with strong, somber performances, intimate camerawork, a haunting musical score, and some garish, icky gore which thankfully fails to come off as tasteless for mere shock value's sake.  That said, the overblown finale while memorably stunning in some respects, still does not match the rest of the melancholy tone and leaves a psychologically messy aftertaste.

 

PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN

Dir - Emerald Fennell

Overall: GOOD

 

Emerald Fennell's solid, topical directorial debut Promising Young Woman brings the rape and revenge sub-genre into the #MeToo era with unavoidably dark yet carefully orchestrated humor.  Allegedly sold to Margot Robbie's production company LuckyChamp Entertainment merely based on the synopsis of the opening scene, the balancing themes of complacently, victim blaming, self-serving denial, vengeance, and forgiveness surrounding a med school rape are given substantial weight in a quasi rom-com parody framework.  What is most impressive though is how Fennell's script stays respectful to these issues even when the tone steers heavily towards the comedic.  Whatever jokes are made serve a purpose of highlighting the obvious wrongful acts committed by people who try and regard such atrocities with endless excuses.  Carey Mulligan's protagonist encompasses the complexity of it all as logical points can be made to her finding happiness by "moving on", though such a thing is at the cost of justice failing to be served.  The casting of known male actors with a public likability to them is a deliberate move to show the dangers that women-targeting atrocities can be committed under heavy guise, but it also showcases the flawed thinking of those very same men who see themselves as "good guys" in the grand scheme of things.  An intelligent work that skews several thriller motifs while using others to its well-intended agenda, this is commendable stuff.

THE BANISHING

Dir - Christopher Smith

Overall: MEH

The latest from British filmmaker Christopher Smith, The Banishing is a predominantly unremarkable haunted house movie that fails to justify itself amongst hordes of other near identical ones.  Set in England during the cusp of World War II, things start off pedestrian as a woman, her daughter, and her new Vicar husband all move into an, (of course), creepy, giant house with an, (of course), creepy past.  Supernatural stuff occurs almost straight away, stuff that characters refuse to mention to anyone or just shrug off as soon as they are distracted.  Such hacky familiarity is bad enough, but the story contrived from David Beton, Ray Bogdanovich, and Dean Lines is surprisingly lackluster despite its multitude of spooky-on-paper details.  It certainly takes more this day and age for hooded figures, walking nightmares, scary dolls, cults, and arbitrary, "mirrors do freaky things" gags to come off as anything but painfully derivative without an inventive, engaging narrative behind them.  Sadly, this particular movie has no such narrative and despite one or two somewhat freaky shots and decent performances all around, one is likely to forget that they even watched it as soon as the title credits roll.

2020 Horror Part Eight

THE NIGHT HOUSE

Dir - David Bruckner

Overall: GOOD

Though imperfect in ways, The Night House is a largely gripping, psychological horror movie that subverts enough tropes along the way to forgive its narrative ambitiousness.  A directorial follow-up to the also flawed yet particularly successful The Ritual from director David Bruckner, the film was written by frequent collaborators Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski.  On paper, a number of typical ingredients are present; namely waking "nightmare within a nightmare" sequences and a central protagonist who is going through an enormously traumatic event which allows every other character to be concerned for her mental well-being when she describes the unexplainable occurrences that she has become privy to.  Still, the execution is refreshing as the spooky moments are played for emotional effect while deliberately avoiding insulting jump scares or any other far over-played nonsense.  Most important of all though is Rebecca Hall's outstanding performance as she perfectly manifests the utter frustration and confusion of a grieving widow.  The story bites off a little more supernatural mumbo jumbo than it can chew, but its priorities are in the right place and it has a resonating quality that is admirable.

RUN

Dir - Aneesh Chaganty

Overall: MEH

 

The sophomore effort from director/co-writer Aneesh Chaganty is the Munchausen syndrome by proxy thriller Run, a partially effective if ultimately predicable one.  While there is clearly some mysterious foul-play at hand, the audience will have an easy time putting the pieces together before the movie itself reveals all of its cards.  So, an example of mind-blowing, narrative deception this assuredly is not.  Chaganty plays with many familiar, Misery-style tropes, such as but not limited to the debilitating pills that the wheelchair-bound victim catches on to and secretly stops taking, their thwarted attempts at escape, being locked into rooms, and racing against their "just around the corner" captors in order to obtain information.  The angle here though is that it is all played in a sincere, schlock-less fashion.  While this does not garnish any excusable sympathy for Sarah Paulson's mentally-ill, manipulative caregiver, it does provide some psychological gray area to play around with for the overall extremities of narcissistic selflessness.  Both Paulson and relative newcomer Kiera Allen as the dysfunctional mother/daughter combo are quite excellent, carrying the movie virtually unaided by any other performers.  It does not quite elevate the derivative material and there are one or two conflicting blunders along the way, (including a mysterious clue dropped in a shower scene that has no payoff whatsoever and a campy tag at the end which clashes with the more plausible tone), but it is still impressively made.

THE EMPTY MAN

Dir - David Prior

Overall: MEH

If someone wanted to know what an artsy version of offensively moronic teen horror garbage like The Bye Bye Man or Slender Man would look like, David Prior's big screen adaptation of Cullen Bunn and Vanesa R. Del Rey's graphic novel The Empty Man may partially satisfy such curiosity.  An international co-production that was largely shot in South Africa, a finished cut of the film was rushed for test audiences who presumably hated it almost as much as a later, ninety minute edit that was pre-screened.  The resulting two and a half hour release is a bloated mess as one could imagine, a movie that takes on the impossible task of making its cliche-ridden, on-paper laughable premise come off as profound.  What the movie does do rather effectively is create a series of eerie set pieces that have a low-key approach which offers up a few jarring surprises even if pretty much all of the supernatural occurrences barely variate from the horror movie norm.  In this regard, the derivative nature may have more to do with the source material than with Prior's less-hacky interpretation of it, a source materiel that has its own version of a "chosen one", a protagonist with no free will, a clandestine doomsday cult, Hollywood-moody teenagers that no actual teenagers ever behave like, a shadowy figure who arbitrarily messes with people, and various other "creepy for the sake of being creepy" moments.  Its trippy intentions are in the right place, but it is ultimately rather futile to make whispery chanting, a skeleton stature encased in a cave wall, people blowing into bottles, and a ripped up teddy bear all that frightening.

2021 Horror Part Eleven

SON

Dir - Ivan Kavanagh

Overall: GOOD

 

Another solid genre offering from Irish filmmaker Ivan Kavanagh, Son treks through very psychologically dark terrain while managing to offer up some disturbed surprises.  Tonally, things play out very straight as the story mainly focuses on a woman's emotional downfall as she is trying to care for her ill son while simultaneously venturing back to a diabolical past that she had only until recently been able to leave behind.  The old "woman that everyone thinks is insane" trope usually gets old before it can even get off the ground, yet even as it becomes more abundantly clear which direction things are and have been heading here, Kavanagh successfully plays such a card while balancing between supernatural nastiness and emotionally ravished trauma.  Occasionally, some of the performances fail to land and/or come off as too melodramatic for such a dour presentation, but Andi Matichak carries things through well enough in the lead at least.  Though it is tricky to throw some humorous elements into something with such heady, occult subject matter, said humor dashes are handled appropriately to allow the audience one or two, (probably). necessary chuckles along the way.

 

TWO WITCHES

Dir - Pierre Tsigaridis

Overall: WOOF

Easily one of the worst horror films in many years, Pierre Tsigaridis's debut Two Witches is an incessant bombardment of baffling tonal issues, ridiculous plotting, and only the most hacky tropes that the genre has to offer.  The glaringly broadcasted, loud jump scares are criminal in their abundance and apparently Tsigaridis is six years old in thinking that quick shots of wide-eyed women either smiling, mumbling, or opening their mouths are really creepy.  Narratively, it is structured like two different movies with half of their scenes missing and the script by Tsigaridis, producer Maxime Rancon, and actor Kristina Klebe embarrassingly jumbles head-scratching schlock with ambiguity.  It would be impossible to believe that something so relentlessly stupid was not intended to be a comedy, but the tripe presentation is so insulting and confused in its agenda that all of the intended humor evaporates right into the ether since it is made abundantly impossible to care about anything happening at any time.  This is the type of anger-inducing trainwreck that most sane viewers will turn off within the first nine-minutes while the rest of us gluttons for punishment will finish the whole thing while cursing the fact that the medium of cinema exists in the first place.

 

BINGO HELL

Dir - Gigi Saul Guerrero

Overall: MEH

The debut from Mexican/Canadian filmmaker Gigi Saul Guerrero and the fifth installment in the Welcome to Blumhouse series, Bingo Hell has some heart and chuckles, yet it eventually turns into a barrage of simple-minded schlock.  Predominantly headed by a multi-racial, senior citizen cast, Guerrero and fellow screenwriters Shane McKenzie and Perry Blackshear use a knowingly silly premise for laughs, a premise of a flashy bingo hall run by, (probably), Satan to feast off of the desperation and disappointment of a downtrodden community.  The "we are all a family" themes are pretty pedestrian and rev up to a hokey finale, but until it becomes a borderline embarrassing series of old people delivering cliche one-liners while curb stomping Richard Brake's over the top creepy bad guy, there are some sticky, neon-colored fun to be had.  Visually it is quite fetching in its quirkiness, playing with some demented, eye-popping moments that keep the violent yet heart string-pulling tone very much on the comedic side.  Most of the humor stems from the committed performances who make for a fun group of elderly badasses cracking endless jokes on each other, with the "Batman and Robin" duo of Adriana Barraza and L. Scott Caldwell particularly standing out.  Likeable to an extent, it shows some promise for Guerrero to deliver some flashy full-lengths in the future and judging by her body of work so far as well as her appearance in In Search of Darkness: Part III, it also seems likely that she will stick with horror.