Category: Horror

Nosferatu

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★★☆ (3.8/5)Nosferatu

Rated: TBA

Written for the Screen & Directed by: Robert Eggers

Inspired by the Screenplay: NOSFERATU by Henrick Galeen

and the Novel DRACULA by Bram Stoker

Produced by: Jeff Robinov, John Graham

Produced by: Chris Columbus, p.g.a., Eleanor Columbus, p.g.a., Robert Eggers, p.g.a.

Starring: Lily-Rose Depp, Nicholas Hoult, Bill Skarsgård, Aaron Tayor-Johnson, Willem Dafoe, Emma Corrin, Ralph Ineson, Simon McBurney.

What is the dark trauma that even death cannot erase? A heartbreaking notion. This is at the essence of the palpable belief in the vampire. The folk vampire is not a suave dinner-coat-wearing seducer, nor a sparkling, brooding hero. The folk vampire embodies disease, death, and sex in a base, brutal, and unforgiving way. This is the vampire I wanted to exhume for a modern audience.

-Robert Eggers

‘Blood is the life.’

Come to me, come to me.

You, you.

The wind blows through the sheer curtains.

I swear, she promises.

It’s a dreamy yet stark beginning; the girl, Ellen (Lily-Rose Depp) in a trance as she awakens Nosferatu (Bill Skarsgård) from his slumber to become an awoken corpse, walking upon the earth.

A corpse with appetites.

There’s a nightmarish quality to this gothic tale.  This is not a romantic version of a vampire story.  This vampire is a plague.

Jumping from 1830s Baltic Germany to years later shows Ellen married to Thomas Hutter (Nicholas Hoult).

Newly home from their honeymoon, Thomas’ employer, Herr Knock (Simon McBurney) sends Thomas into the depths of Transylvania to complete a transfer of title to an ancient descendant from a long blood line; the count described as, eccentric.

For extra money, Thomas is willing to go even as Ellen begs him not to.

It’s the travelling to Count Orlok’s (Nosferatu) castle that mesmerises; the silence of Thomas walking down a road through an ancient forest as snow falls.

The beat and chink of horses pulling a carriage through the dark, the tilt as the world shifts, the perspective bending to the will of Nosferatu as the carriage door slowly opens an invitation.

Then the wolves that follow.

It’s an invitation to a new world that’s dark, where fire casts shadows of reaching fingers and pointed nails and nightmares of blood.

The soundtrack feeds the mood of foreboding, the rise and fall of breath.

It’s moody movie.

Composer Robin Carolan states, ‘There’s a lot of dread and claustrophobia in the film.  The score helps with the feeling of escalation, and of this thing that you can’t quite see but that you sense is closing in on you.’

And Nosferatu knows Thomas is married to his bride.  Nosferatu travels across the ocean to reclaim Ellen.  She knows he’s coming.

Inspired by the Screenplay: NOSFERATU by Henrick Galeen and the Novel DRACULA by Bram Stoker, there’s the same lines of story, the travel of the husband to Transylvania to transfer the deed of a new home, the long-lost love.

There’s the best friend, here, Anna Harding (Emma Corrin) who wants to protect Ellen from the call of the monster.

But this is an inspiration not an adaptation so there’s something new here.

Unlike the tease of humour in the Frances Coppola film, like the unforgettable scene where a vampire’s head is cut off, a gruesome scene, that cuts to the professor tucking into a roast dinner – a well-timed shock to evoke a giggle.  There’s no humour here in Nosferatu.

This is cinematic horror.

There’s a spare feeling to the angles of panning, the movement of characters, the endless corridors of a castle that resonates with Bram Stoker’s classic novel, where Nosferatu is nothing more than a monster.

Collaborating with production designer Craig Lathrop, cinematographer Jarin Blaschke, costume designer Linda Muir, and editor Louise Ford, all of whom worked on The Northman, The Lighthouse, and The Witch, Eggers has created something that builds into a vision both magical and horrific.

Heretic

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★★☆ (3.8/5)Heretic

HERETIC

Rated: MA15+

Directed by: Scott Beck, Bryan Woods

Written by: Scott Beck, Bryan Woods

Produced by: Stacey Sher, Scott Beck, Bryan Woods, Julia Glausi, Jeanette Volturno

Starring: Hugh Grant, Sophie Thatcher, Chloe East, Topher Grace, Elle Young.

‘How do you feel about awkward questions?’

Seeing Hugh Grant play a villain in a horror movie is a bit of a treat, especially when he flexes his storytelling skills.

Meet, Mr. Reed.  A man in search of the one true religion.

Mormon missionaries, Sister Barnes (Sophie Thatcher) and Sister Paxton (Chloe East) take a break from door knocking and looking to recruit converts to sit on a bench, facing a huge mountain talking sex and if the magnum condom is actually as advertised, massive.

It’s two innocent girls talking about something unexpected yet gives insight into their character – Sister Paxton showing a naive curiosity, Sister Barnes from the streets of Philadelphia with a tougher backstory where she lost her dad to illness.

After tolerating yet another humiliating show of people’s dislike or misunderstanding of their calling, ‘they think we’re weird,’ the two Sisters’ ride their bikes through the snow and rain to knock on the door of a potential convert.

Sister Paxton can barely hide her determination.

It’s the little things that hint of Mr. Reed’s intention.

‘I’ve never had a Wendy.  I mean, met a Wendy.’

The film’s foundation is word play, dialogue and the dance of theological argument; but the build of suspense is about the close up of the eyes, the sharpness of a look.  Of looking too closely.

The tension builds with the back and forth between the Sisters as they come to understand the game Mr. Reed is playing is a trap.  And it’s the realisation of the game Mr. Reed has trapped them into playing that heightens the suspense – the surprise of each character as they reveal themselves in dialogue that twists through intellectual debate about religion in order to navigate a way through the psychology of a madman who has gotten lost in his search of the one true religion.

He’s not wrong.  And neither are they.

It becomes a matter of argument.  Of faith.

Most of the film is set in the house of Mr. Reed.  A deceptively simple stop to highlight the dialogue and closeups of facial expressions.  To show the fear of: Belief or Disbelief.

Both are terrifying.

Hugh Grant states, ‘I found Heretic to be daring, not just because it questions a lot of things that many people hold sacred, but for the fact that it’s set in one house over the course of one long night and features a lot of talking — hardly normal practice for a horror film.’

The house itself becomes part of the game.

Director and writer, Scott Beck (also screenwriter, along with Bryan Woods of, A Quiet Place (2018)) states, “We had to figure out the psychology of Reed early on in order to understand why his house appears the way it does, serving as a kind of weapon against his young visitors,” says Beck. “Reed is God-playing in a way, pulling these characters through each room so it feels like a gauntlet or a game, consistently evolving to worse and worse places. It became about marrying the character of Reed with the production design and finding a methodology behind it to show how his mind works.”

Heretic is unique in that it’s a storyteller thriller.  Not explosive but a well-rounded creeping poetry based on theological argument from a man driven mad by the search for meaning.

For me the film peters out a little at the end but as Beck states, ‘Hugh has quietly become one the greatest character actors working today,’ making Heretic worth a watch.

 

Hellboy: The Crooked Man

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★1/2Hellboy: The Crooked Man

Rated: MA15+

Directed by: Brian Taylor

Written by: Christopher Golden, Mike Mignola, Brian Taylor

Based on: Hellboy by Mike Mignola

Produced by: Mike Richardson, Jeffery Greenstein, Jonathan Yunger, Les Weldon, Rob Van Norden, Yariv Lerner

Starring: Jack Kesy, Jefferson White, Adeline Rudolph, Joseph Marcell, Leah McNamara, Martin Massindale, Suzanne Bertish.

Screwed, chewed and tattooed.

In this fourth instalment of Hellboy, it’s 1959.  And Hellboy (Jack Kesy), along with Bobbie Jo Song (Adeline Rudolph) from the bureau for Paranormal Research and Defence (BPRD), are on a train transporting an arachnoid that is more than just a spider.

The opening of, Hellboy: The Crooked Man, is fast-paced.  The arachnoid breaking free, the scene out of control as the train dislodges from the track, landing Hellboy and the certainly-has-a-thing-for Bobbie in the Appalachia Forest, lost.

The storyline meanders until landing on the re-negotiation of a soul.  Tom Ferrell (Jefferson White) losing his soul when he happens upon a beautiful witch (Leah McNamara) bathing in the river in his younger days.

The witch encourages Tom to make a deal with the devil, where the bone he holds in his hand when he sees the devil becomes a lucky bone saving him from injury during the war.

In 1959, Tom comes home to the Appalachia mountains to search for his family and girlfriend Cora (Hannah Margetson) whom he left, trying to escape the pact he made all those years ago.

The forest is full of witches, serving, The Crooked Man.

When alive, The Crooked Man was made rich playing both sides of the Civil War.  Hanged, his reward from those who live in the mountains, The Crooked Man was returned by the devil to collect souls, receiving a copper penny for each soul, including Tom’s.

The only sanctuary in the mountains is the old church where blind Reverend Watts (Joseph Marcell) holds the dark forces at bay.

The passage of the film is earmarked with chapters that don’t really signpost the story:

‘The Lucky Bone’,

‘Witch Ball’,

‘The Hurricane’.

But lend a fable to the storyline, like the witch acknowledging the screen as the audience watches through the eyes of a crow as she explains the spell of making a witch’s ball.

There’s trickery with the camera work, the perspectives adding a foreboding feeling:

Guts splatter across the lens of the camera.

Sudden darkened scenes click to switch from one place to another.

There’s that Hellboy flavour to, The Crooked Man but there’s also a distinct feeling of a glossing over, creating a superficial tone.

Hellboy’s mother’s introduced into his origin story, the film clicking into this other dark world where she hangs in suspense, tortured.  A giant crow represents the devil as he incites her pregnancy with Hellboy.

It’s another dimension to the film.

But the threads of the storyline barely hold together in this movie.

Hellboy, the character, is strangely monotone, with a rare wisecrack, ‘Smells like death.  And birdshit,’ so it didn’t seem like Hellboy at all.

But there is a unique strangeness to the film.

It’s dark and creepy but so very disjointed.  Which makes me think of a piece of meat.

It’s that kinda movie.

IN CINEMAS OCTOBER 10

Also screening at MONSTER FEST 2024

Hellboy – The Crooked Man – Monster Fest Australia

Click HERE for dates & venues

 

The Substance

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★★1/2The Substance

Rated: R18+

Directed by: Coralie Fargeat

Written by: Coralie Fargeat

Edited by: Coralie Fargeat

Starring: Demi Moore, Margaret Qualley, Dennis Quaid.

‘Pretty girls should always smile.’

A film of extremes, The Substance is a commentary about Hollywood’s middle-aged, white male’s view of the female form.

There is a male version of, the Other: a beautiful young male doctor introduces an aging fitness guru, Elizabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) to The Substance, himself a demonstration to the Oscar winning actress that she can create a better version of herself.

‘It will change your life.’

Goes to show that men are feeling the push to be beautiful as well.  But here the focus is on the aging actress, Elizabeth.

The action of ‘the substance’ is shown by the injection of green liquid into the joke of a raw egg.  The yoke then pushes out another yoke, like a clone of itself.

And the film continues with this demonstrative view of the procedure, of the process of aging, to the birth of a young body; the splicing of a pupil into two, to another eye growing within another, all shown in macro, close so there’s no-where else to look but at the unfiltered image of the beautiful juxtaposed with the grotesque.

Director and writer, Coralie Fargeat states, ‘Bodies here are going to be tyrannized, ridiculed, destroyed, the same way I truly believe society destroys women with all the rules that we are silently taught to follow.’

‘Women’s bodies. THE SUBSTANCE is a film about women’s bodies.’

After Elizabeth Sparkle is told by Harvey (Denis Quaid) – while feeding his face with prawns, sound included- the producer of her fitness show, that at age 50, It Stops, Elizabeth can’t help but think a better version of herself could be the answer to her lack of self-worth.

Elizabeth is the Matrix, the Other is Sue.

They are one person.

This is a visceral birth, with close-ups of blood, injections, the splitting of the spine to the gush of another pushing outwards from Elizabeth’s lifeless body.

To the high impact beauty of the Other, Sue.

It’s all pink shiny leotards and perfect bodies – Sue becomes the fresh new face of fitness.  She’s new and she’s young and she’s perfect.

It takes 7 days for Sue to rule the world.  And as human nature dictates, Sue wants more.

The concepts of the film are portrayed with clever devices, aging is shown with a static view of Sparkles Hollywood Star cracking in the pavement over time. Of people walking across the star, admiring the star, to then show snow and rain and dirt and feet and food being spilled across her star.  Like time has forgotten her face.  To the giant image of Elizabeth in her apartment with the fractured glass around her eye – a loss of perspective, her self-hatred pinned up on the wall.

It’s an interesting title, The Substance, the focus on the outer beauty and social comment about aging, about what’s supposed to go where, replacing the true substance of a person with a chemical that births a younger, fresher you.  Makes me wonder about Picasso’s cubism and his deconstruction of perspective.

Coralie Fargeat takes apart the idea of beauty and creates a satire with Elizabeth Sparkle using the mantra, ‘Take care of yourself,’ that Sue imitates with a wink because what is taking care of yourself when the expectation is to have medical procedures to try to stay young forever?

Fargeat comments, ‘This movie is going to be bloody gory. And it’s going to be bloody funny at the same time. Because I don’t know any stronger weapon than satire to show the world the absurdity of its own rules. And most importantly: I believe it’s going to be bloody timely. This is what this movie is about in the end. A liberation. An empowerment.’

Throughout the film, there’s an evolution of the grotesque as the weight of society’s expectation is perverted into an embrace of the gross with too much enthusiasm for my taste, to turn a fascinating film with a difference into something so awful it’s laughable.

This is a unique, determined and grotesque film.

This is body horror people.  Prepare yourself.

 

Longlegs

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★★☆ (3.8/5)Longlegs

Rated: MA15+

Written and Directed by: Osgood Perkins

Produced by: Dave Caplan, Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, Oddfellows, Dan Kagan

Director of Photography: Adrés Arochi

Starring: Maika Monroe, Nicolas Cage, Blair Underwood, Alica Witt, Kiernan Shipka.

‘You’re a dirty sweet girl.  You’re my girl.’

T. Rex 1971.

Longlegs is one of the creepier serial killer movies I’ve seen.

The film is created with odd camera angles, the texture of the film, stark.

There’s a quiet tone to the film as FBI Agent Lee Harker (Maika Monroe) makes her way through the case of a satanic serial killer, AKA Longlegs (Nicolas Cage): a killer who doesn’t leave a trace.

The only reason the FBI know about Longlegs is because he leaves a note.  A cipher.

Agent Harker is able to decipher the notes because Longlegs breaks into her house and leaves her the solution to the code.

And then the dance between Longlegs and Harker begins.

The toneless affect of Harker blankets the film in a monotone, making the feeling flat.  It’s a strange device but I get the connection to the life-sized dolls that are introduced later in the film; however, the dampening of Harker made her character borderline dull.

Aside from the flat affect, this is a carefully crafted film with thought put into the build, the montages of crime scene photos, the sometimes up-side-down perspective, the quiet then screech of strings, all to build that unnerving feeling.

Then add Nicolas Cage as Longlegs spouting the bizarre while looking directly into the camera so it’s like Longlegs is speaking directly to you as you watch the movie and you get one unique film that gets under your skin because it takes risks in the storytelling.

On rare occasions when a film has a particular poetic flavour, I’ll re-read my notes and take that as a synopsis:

A corner camera angle, looking through the front windscreen and side window of a car.

A snowy forest.

A little girl watches from her bedroom window.

Just the lower half of the face, a weirdly made-up face, a powdered face.  A male’s high voice.

Strings screech.

Knock, knock.

Have you seen this man?

She’s quiet – he’s in there.

Half psychic.

Ciphers – ten families.

Making the father murder.

Like a tapping on the shoulder.

Highly intuitive.

14th: happy birthday.

911 call.

Flashes of crime scene photos.

Boiling black ink that overflows.

All your things.

Not nice things.

Our prayers protect us from the devil.

Newspaper clippings.

A  life-sized doll.

A nowhere between here and there.

The man down the stairs.

From the perspective of the doll.

Looks right down the camera.

Birthday girls.

The doll maker.

You’ve won.

Happy birthday.

Creepy.

 

Imaginary

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★★Imaginary

Rated: M

Directed by: Jeff Wadlow

Screenplay Written by: Greg Erb, Jason Oremland, Jeff Wadlow

Produced by: Jason Blum, Paul Uddo, Jeff Wadlow

Starring: DeWanda Wise, Taegen Burns, Pyper Braun, Betty Buckley, Tom Payne, Veronica Falcón and Samuel Salary.

‘I’m sorry I couldn’t finish our game.’

I walked into Imaginary with low expectations – a killer teddy bear?

It’s got to be a parody, right?!

Aside for the overacting at times, and mention of a ventriloquist little girl because how is her imaginary friend speaking without the little girl moving her lips?

Again, I use question marks, I know.  But it’s a questionable storyline that is somewhat successful.

From the same producers as M3GAN (2023), I went back and re-read my review and I wasn’t sure how to feel about M3GAN either.  The premise is such a stretch, I wonder how it can’t be absolute trash, but somehow there’s a hook that keeps you watching.

For M3GAN, the humour made the film watchable, here, it was more about the scary, and yes, surprises along the way.

Imaginary opens quietly.  A flickering light down a hallway.  A bloodied woman escapes from a trapdoor in the wall – ‘I’m sorry I couldn’t finish our game,’ she says.

Enter Jessica (DeWanda Wise).  She has nightmares and wakes next to her husband, Max (Tom Payne).

Jessica is the stepmum to Max’s two daughters, Alice (Pyper Braun) and Taylor (Taegen Burns).

Alice is endearing.

Taylor is hard work.

Most of the film focusses on the family dynamic.

After a scary start, Imaginary unpacks the relationships of a step mum struggling with change, getting to know her new daughters while moving back to her childhood home.

It’s here that Alice meets the teddy bear, Chauncey.  Her new best friend.

Her imaginary friend.

‘Meet Chauncey.

He’s not imaginary.

And he’s not your friend.’

Without giving too much away, there’s more then an evil bear here; there’s thought put into childhood imagination and the relationship between children and the imagined entities that become their friends – the theory introduced by creepy neighbour, Gloria (Betty Buckley).

There’s a surreal dimension to the filming that echoed, Insidious (2010), in scratching the door to another world where those unwary get trapped.

And there’s a few surprises that keep up the entertainment, unfortunately some of those twists fell flat.

But in spite of the silly here, there’s some genuine scares, so in comparison, there’s more of a focus on the creepy here than M3GAN (which became funny more than scary).

There’s backstory to Imaginary, making the film a better watch than expected.

 

The Exorcist: Believer

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★★

Rated: MA15+ The Exorcist: Believer

Directed by: David Gordon Green

Screenplay by: Peter Sattler and David Gordon Green

Based on the Characters Created by: William Peter Blatty

Story by: Scott Teems, Danny McBride, David Gordon Green

Produced by: Jason Blum, David Robinson, James G. Robinson

Starring: Leslie Odom, Jr., Ann Dowd, Jennifer Nettles, Norbert Leo Butz, Lidya Jewett, Olivia Marcum and Ellen Burstyn.

‘The power of Christ works through all of us.’

Created as a sequel to the Academy nominated (first horror film to ever be nominated for Best Picture) ‘The Exorcist’ (1973), The Exorcist: Believer finds Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn), the mother of Regan, alone without her daughter who was possessed all those years ago.

After publishing a book about her experience of seeing her daughter undergo an exorcism, releasing her from the demon, Pazuzu, Chris loses Regan again when her daughter can’t forgive her mother for sharing her story with the world.

Walking into the cinema, I wondered if Believer was going to be a legacy movie; like the reboot of the Halloween franchise, Blumhouse is creating, The Exorcist franchise, but I found the legacy aspect here a red herring.

The reminder of Regan was more a touchstone, a cameo, not a continuing thread.

The Exorcist: Believer follows new character, Victor Fielding (Leslie Odom, Jr.), first seen taking photos of fighting dogs in Haiti.

He captures the stills of violence well, his curiosity in the capture of life, while his pregnant wife interacts with it.  She’s a peaceful character, meditative in her wander through the streets, the markets.

A little boy pulls her away for a treat.  A blessing.

A ritual to protect her unborn child: Angela.

Then an earthquake strikes, the chaos of sound rising and falling, images flipping; the peal of a bell sounding through a muffled deafening after the world begins to crumble.

Then back to Victor.  He has to make a choice.

There’s a build to the story, the foundation of the father and daughter relationship a contrast to the inevitable possession of daughter: Angela (Lidya Jewett).

And her friend, Katherine (Olivia Marcum).

Two young girls, two families, a circle back to Haiti and ritual, a circle back to the catholic church to perform the exorcism.

To understand what is happening to his daughter, Victor reaches out to Chris MacNeil, to the catholic church, but the difference here is the exploration of community and combined ritual to fight against evil, so there’s a different take of the view of religion, with the touchstone of the familiar.

‘Are you looking for Regan?’  The question asked from possessed cracked lips and yellow, blood-shot eyes.

Analysing the story, I realise I didn’t find the movie all that scary – because of that familiar aspect to the possessed.

There’s some jumps and twists.  And I appreciated the restraint, building the relationships of the characters rather than over-extending the exorcism (there’s still projectile black spew – classic).

What started to draw a cold shiver was drawn from the montages of cuts back and forth of a young girl reading an old tale of dragons, a ‘snick snack’, as a search continues for lost girls who wander in the woods.

And those new cracks, those hints of old folk lore could have expanded into suspense but were instead filled with a harking back to the beginning of the franchise.  To Regan.  That didn’t really go anywhere.

It will be interesting to see what comes next.

 

Dracula: Voyage of the Demeter

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★★☆ (3.2/5)DRACULA VOYAGE OF THE DEMETER

Rated: MA15+

Directed by: André Øvredal

Screenplay by: Bragi F. Schut, Stefan Ruzowitzky and Zak Olkewicz, based on “The Captain’s Log” from Bram Stoker’s Dracula

Produced by: Brad Fischer, Mike Medavoy, Arnold Messer

Executive Produced by: Matthew Hirsch

Starring: Corey Hawkins, Aisling Franciosi, Liam Cunningham, David Dastmalchian.

‘Evil is aboard.  Powerful evil.’

It’s 1897 when merchant ship, The Demeter is seen off the coast of Whitby, England.

The ship’s sails are torn, the hull blackened and like a ghost ship, there are no surviving passengers.

Based on the chapter, The Captain’s Log from the iconic literary novel, Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897), this is the tale of the vampire’s voyage from his homeland across the seas to England.

The setting of the film is aboard the ship, where the captain (Liam Cunningham) and his crew, including last minute addition, Clemens (Corey Hawkins), a doctor looking for passage home, find themselves trapped as the horror begins; first the animals are found slaughtered, then the crew of the ship.  And there’s no way to escape.

Director, André Øvredal (Scary Stories To Tell in the Dark (2019), Trollhunter (2010), and a recommendation to watch if you haven’t already, The Autopsy of Jane Doe (2016)) focusses on Dracula as the monster – his visage more bat than man, with glowing yellow eyes and needlepoint teeth.

There is no sympathy for the monster, from the outset, Dracula is cast as the ‘Devil’s Serpent,’ a killing machine – and when the animals are found ripped apart, the audience is set firmly against the undead as Dracula preys on the living who have no hope and no understanding of what they’re dealing with.

Until the crew discover Anna (Aisling Franciosi), a girl they first believe is a stowaway, but after blood transfusions from Clemens to save her, she becomes the crew’s only way of understanding the evil that is sailing with them.  She’s not the bad luck that has befallen the ship.  She’s a survivor.

There’re clever devices used to ramp-up the tension, firstly those on board trapped as they wait for the sun to set so the film plays out like a slasher formula as Dracula feeds, picking each member off, one by one.

The crew knock on wood to communicate from the bowels of the ship, so there’s this listening out to hear that knock, to hear if someone’s trapped and about to literally be eaten.

It’s dark, raining, the sea throws the ship back and forth and there’s a monster on board: It’s the perfect set-up for a horror movie.

And I really wanted to love this film.  I’m a fan of the Dracula genre, and horror-thrillers, and there’s a good cast here – Liam Cunningham as the captain (you’ll recognise as Davos Seaworth from Game of Thrones) has just the right amount of gravitas and scores well for humanity putting the audience firmly behind well, the humans.  And the soundtrack adds a foreboding atmosphere, building the tension so there’re some good scares (someone sitting behind me yelped on more than one occasion, which was good fun).

There’s something to be said for watching a scary movie in the cinema where the audience is collectively given a jump.

But because it has that slasher formula, the film starts to feel predictable.

 

Pearl

GoMovieReview Rating: ★★★1/2

Rated: MA15+

Directed by: Ti West

Written by: Ti West & Mia Goth

Produced by: Jacob Jaffke, p.g.a, Ti West, p.g.a, Kevin Turen, Harrison Kreiss

Executive Producers: Mia Goth, Peter Phok, Sam Levinson, Ashley Levinson, Scott Mescudi, Dennis Cummings, Karina Manashill

Starring: Mia Goth, David Corenswet, Tandi Wright, Matthew Sunderland, Emma Jenkins-Purro.

‘I do like a good audience.’

Pearl, the prequel to X (2022) is the origin story of the voyeur who stalks the crew of X, especially porn star, Maxine Minx.

See movie review of X here: X Review

There’s parallels between the two characters, emphasised by the characters, Maxine and Pearl both played by Mia Goth.

Took me a while to figure that here Mia was playing the old woman from X, now young on the same farm.

The opening is an idyllic scene, the barn doors opening to a farmyard with chooks and clothes flapping in the breeze while the sun shines on the green grass.

There’s an emphasis on the brightness of mid-century technicolor with an orchestral score by Tyler Bates; the brightness adding another dimension to the sinister as what is all goodness in the world is splattered with the blood of Pearl’s broken dreams.

There’s a room full of dolls and a girl looking the mirror, Pearl.

She stretches out her arms, like a dancer.

Her mother, Ruth (Tandi Wright) speaks to Pearl in German, chastising her and her silly fantasies.

‘I’m special,‘ Pearl says.

Set in 1918, Pearl’s husband is at war and she is trapped on the farm with her mother and dependent father (Matthew Sunderland).

She acts out.

It gets bloody.

This is a different style of horror to X.  This is a character study, a slow reveal of Pearl’s dark soul.

Ti West returns as director, this time focussing not on the erotic Maxine, but the deranged Pearl, with Mia Goth again, the highlight.

Mia Goth says, “One of the core elements that I came to understand with Ti during preparation is that Maxine and Pearl are not the same women, but they are the same character.  They are polar opposites in terms of their life experiences, and their choices and courage—or lack of it—have shaped them to be who they are. I always saw Pearl as the embodiment of Maxine Minx’s fears.”

West focusses up close to Pearl, as an imagined dancer and star, to her doe-eyed innocent want, to the crazed smile like the flip-side of the mask of comedy and tragedy.

When Pearl meets a cinema projectionist (David Corenswet), he seems to understand her: “…You only get one take at this life. If you don’t make the most of it while you’re young, you may never get the chance again.”

He seems to understand her.  Until he doesn’t.

It’s like a mix of comedy and tragic, so it’s more than her wanting and the tragedy of her life, it’s a technicolor twist of her beauty hiding the darkness underneath.

And the horror delivers, the effects better here in Pearl than the fake monstrous elderly of X – the burnt skin and limbs being cut-off look oh so very real.

Along with the bright aspect of the farm, there’s some play in the presentation, the slow motion of nerves before performance, the stop-frame highlighting Pearl with pitchfolk in hand, a goose impaled about to be devoured by an alligator.

So there’s a circle back, a reflection, a revelation of the character before she becomes the elderly murderous monster: the farmhouse, the gator, Pearl.

We see the character Pearl wanting her dreams to be a dancer more than anything, just like Maxine wanting nothing more than to be famous.

You can understand my confusion about the two characters.

But the prequel is more psychological horror than slasher, so the audience is given a background understanding of the murderous Pearl with more realistic gory bits.

Not recommended to watch in the morning, just after breakfast.

AKA, the horror delivers.

 

Knock At The Cabin

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★★☆ (3.8/5)

Rated: MKnock At The Cabin

Directed by: M. Night Shyamalan

Screenplay by: M. Night Shyamalan and Steve Desmond & Michael Sherman

Based on the book: The Cabin at the End of the World by Paul Tremblay

Produced by: M. Night Shyamalan, Marc Bienstock, Ashwin Rajan

Starring: Dave Bautista, Jonathan Groff, Ben Aldridge, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Kristen Cui, Abby Quinn and Rupert Grint.

‘It’s time.’

There’s always the mystery, the waiting for the twist with M. Night Shyamalan movies – here, it felt like Shyamalan holding his nerve while adding touches, echoes of his previous films: the creaking of trees as the wind shifts through them while the characters wait and watch to see what monster will slowly come into view.

Instead of monsters, four people emerge.  But it’s Leonard (Dave Bautista) who first introduces himself to young Wen (Kristen Cui).  She’s catching crickets.

‘I’m just going to learn about you a little,’ she says.

Leonard helps.  He’s good at catching crickets.

They’re going to be friends.

Until his three colleagues show themselves: Sabrina (Nikki Amuka-Bird), Adriane (Abby Quinn) and Redmond (Rupert Grint).

They’re holding weapons made from axes and sledge hammers.

Wen gets scared and runs back to the cabin, back to her two dads, Daddy Andrew (Ben Aldridge) and Daddy Eric (William Ragsdale).  They’re a loving family.  Andrew and Eric promise each other to always be together, no matter what.

So when Leonard and his colleagues tell them they have to make a terrible choice to stop the apocalypse, they will always choose their family.

Even if the intruders say they have the most important job in the world.

Are they ‘Jehovah witnesses?’ asks Ben.

Knock at the Cabin is a serious film, with brutal and bloody moments.  The opening of sketches of crows and screaming faces.  But the tension is offset with light moments like these doomsayer’s wielding weapons being possibly Jehovah witnesses.

Not laugh at loud funny, but light.

The impending doom and the bloody is also a contrast to flashbacks to family: the love, the honesty; when Andrew and Eric first met Wen.

It’s genuinely sweet and adds weight to the choice they refuse to make.

The pacing of the story shows restraint making this one of Shyamalan’s better quality films.

It’s a deceptively simple structure, most of the film set within the cabin, that builds just the right amount of tension while playing with expectation.

The delivery was there to support the idea of the story: not too funny, nor too violent, or too caught up in the drama of the family, just light touches to suspend the reality of the extreme premise of ordinary people faced with the idea of the world ending.

 

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