A Dangerous Method
Starring: Michael Fassbender, Keira Knightley
Directed by: David Cronenberg
4 out of 5
Myles Herod
Entertainment Editor
For those who appreciate David Cronenberg’s work, there comes an undaunted delight in knowing it will break the rules.
His origin is a gory one. Debuting in the 1970s, the Canadian filmmaker cemented his status with an array of body horror pictures, drawing upon societies discomfort for sex, violence, medicine and technology.
However, unlike like many of his contemporaries (Scorsese and Spielberg), Cronenberg saw film as just another means of art – a philosophy that has undoubtedly allowed him to avoid Hollywood constraints and rise as an original, consistently able to attract A-list talent.
So while the grotesque images of Shivers, Videodrome and The Fly are very much part of his lauded past, the new millennium has afforded revision, one that has seen him transition from mind over body.
His newest in four years, A Dangerous Method follows the relationship between the founder of analytic psychology, Carl Jung (Michael Fassbender), and Sabina Spielrein (Keira Knightley), a Russian psychoanalyst who started as his disturbed patient – seething with spastic contortions and frightening hysterics.
Over the course of six years, spanning Switzerland to Vienna, the film incorporates hypothetical notions and factual context, sourcing its screenplay on Jung’s personal letters. Soon, as their bond intensifies, a breach between doctor and patient explodes into a kinky, masochistic romance – finding the aggressive Spielrein enamored with the married Jung.
In contrast, an air of stately intellect arrives with the film’s second relationship, a man who was Jung’s hero, colleague, and finally, rival – Sigmund Freud. Played by Viggo Mortensen, an actor who usually takes the call of stoic outcasts, the role is superbly cast against grain as Croneberg and Mortensen interpret the man as an adroit and sophisticated luminary.
By all accounts, A Dangerous Method is a period piece through and through – draped in decorative attire of the time, elegant locales brimming with cobblestone and carriages. Inside, however, with its darkened corridors, the picture functions as an absorbing verbal thinker, questioning the repression of our immoral thoughts and actions.
Given the advantage of having their work and ideas readily available, the film’s reward comes from observing these historic figures speak and validate them, splendidly embodied by skilled actors.
Through Freud’s concepts, Jung breaks through with Spielrein, having her divulge memories of sexual fervor and incestual abuse, subsequently igniting their passionate affair and her eventual path of psychoanalysis itself.
Even more fascinating, though, is the contact between Freud and Jung – lavish in insight, zingers, and deceit. A good sign of a film is when you want more, rather than less.
While Freud remains calculated, cerebral, a dismayed with clairvoyance, you sense that Jung is the opposite, toying with mysticism and prophecy – but only hinted at.
Influencing their professional divide further is a salacious cameo from Vincent Cassel as Otto Gross, a rouge student of Freud’s, sent to Jung for observation. While there, explicit tales of sexual promiscuity and cocaine indulgence rattle and seduce Jung’s psyche, rationalizing his affair with Spielrein, which, in turn, forms the catalyst of Freud’s fallout. All three bring terrific nuance to their roles, oddly melding into a ménage a trios of verbal sparring.
Restraint is the key word for A Dangerous Method. Opting for dialogue and debauchery over bloodletting – this is a film that tells, but rarely shows, save for a virginal deflowering. Yes, instead of the typical ‘cronenberg-isms’ of exploding heads, the film deals with imploding relationships and desires, still undeniably sealed by the director’s acumen.
For his first historical effort, David Cronenberg unleashes a stimulating treat for the mind, one that makes you ponder and seek the writings of Jung and Freud immediately afterwards. Tell me, for a film, what’s more admirable than that?
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Directed by: David Fincher
Starring: Daniel Craig, Rooney Mara
4 out of 5 stars
Myles Herod
Entertainment Editor
A little more than a year after gaining critical acclaim for The Social Network, David Fincher is at it again, adapting another well-loved story for the big screen.
In The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, Fincher seems to have extended stylistic leftovers from his previous outing and supplanted them into his newest effort with much aplomb.
Keep in mind, this is a remake – disaster could have prevailed. Luckily, the modern day auteur (seemingly unaffected by Hollywood execs) is incapable of making a bad film.
Even his worst film, Alien³, is actually so well crafted and unique in vision, that for all its problems, it manages to avoid pitfalls of a picture obviously sabotaged by producers.
On the basis of my viewing experience, the Americanized version of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is a stark and grittier product than its Swedish counterpart. That’s right, it’s a superior remake.
Both director, and writer (Steven Zaillian) do an intelligent job of keeping, adapting and removing various parts of the novel to benefit the film’s flow. The dialogue is natural and terse, allowing characters to consciously step on each other’s lines to add a sense of authenticity.
One of Fincher’s most undervalued talents is his attention to character nuance – avoiding clichés of stilted performances, which in essence builds the unique universes he’s so revered for.
The film follows journalist Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig) and his experiences in Sweeden during the investigation of a 40-year-old murder. Hired by the wealthy Vanger family to uncover clues to the murder, Blomkvist ends up using the assistance of an accomplished but socially awkward investigator Salander (a equally sultry and scary performance by Rooney Mara).
The bulk of the two and a half hour film consists of observing Blomkvist and Salander as they unravel the lurid mystery from the isolated Wanger Island.
By building both characters up front, the audience is compelled and completely indebted to the investigation. Fincher uses his great eye for imagery and pacing to really sell the picture – particularly in scenes that could have fallen to contrivance, or dullness.
For instance, one set piece shows the two characters in separate locations compiling research and fitting final clues together. About ten minutes into this sequence it dawned that there had been almost no meaningful dialogue. Instead, the entirety of its structure was just a series of pictures, computer screens, printed words and reaction shots. It was also one of the most intense and suspenseful sequences of any film from 2011. Saying it’s impressive would be an understatement. This is Fincher working on all cylinders.
Mara is a revelation as Lisbeth Salander. Both physically and emotionally, she goes all-in with her portrayal. From the multiple piercings to the detailed tattoos and punk aesthetic, it’s hard to believe that it's the same sweet girl who opened The Social Network as Mark Zuckerberg’s girlfriend.
One cannot discount Craig’s performance either – a fine partner to Mara’s bold interpretation. In addition to the two stellar lead performances, Fincher gets great acting out of Christopher Plummer, Stellan Skarsgard and Joley Richardson.
Fincher does not hold back in portraying adult material here. From two horrific rapes scenes to the depths of torture and mutilation, the film confronts uncomfortable visuals in bleak whites and murky shadows. These scenes are necessary, though, as the audience ends up feeling empathy for the characters, which, in turn, helps ramp up tension.
Overall, this is a masterfully crafted ‘action’ film – one that makes you think as you recoil or guffaw at its sinister subject matter, or streaks of black humour imbued throughout. Fincher, again, has proven himself a master, elevating his clout amongst Hollywood’s most intriguing talents. You can call it a remake, but I prefer to think of it as a superb continuation of his style and mood so effectively refined in 2010’s The Social Network. Heck, he even got Trent Reznor to come back and do the score.
The Descendants
Starring: George Clooney
Directed by: Alexander Payne
2 out of 5 stars
Myles Herod
Entertainment Editor
From beginning to end, everything that happens in The Descendants feels forced.
I’ll let you in on a little secret: the unspoken danger of a film as well-reviewed as Alexander Payne’s newest is that it can rarely live up to its hype.
An Oscar frontrunner, the familial dramedy imposed here is just as manipulative as it is manufactured, pulling at our heartstrings with forceful tugs and false tears.
The story follows Honolulu lawyer Matt King (George Clooney), the prosperous offspring of a Hawaiian family who is dealt a hand of personal blows.
“Paradise can go fuck itself,” he aptly bemoans in voiceover.
Turns out that a waterskiing mishap has landed Matt’s wife, Elizabeth (Patricia Hastie), in a coma. His two daughters, the precious tween Scottie (Amara Miller) and hard-living teen Alexandra (Shailene Woodley), are beyond his authority, with Alexandra in possession of potentially devastating news. “Dad, Mom was cheating on you!” she vents in a heated exchange, conveniently setting the film, and Clooney, on a mission to discover the identity of his wife’s lover.
The awkward script, penned by four co-writers (which may account for the film’s uneven tone), manages to be simultaneously superficial, simple, mawkish and cliché.
It’s a shame, and a shock, for a man like Payne – so talented, so biting in his previous Election and About Schmidt from years past – that he would wait seven to fashion such a banal dud.
Try as it might, the film’s attempt at humour is largely entrusted to dad jokes, or cheap laughs, like Alexandra’s stoner boyfriend Sid (Nick Krause), a character of great irritation and inexplicability.
Truth be told, his presence and stilted delivery nearly ruins every scene he’s in, making portions of the film’s scenic beauty undercut by Payne’s unwillingness to let up on Sid’s idiotic quips. No family in their right mind would allow a doofus like him to tag along when dealing with personal betrayal. It’s simply poor writing.
Aside from that agony, the film finds Matt unfairly belittled by his surly, hard-nosed father-in-law (Robert Forster), a man who blames him for Elizabeth’s accident.
Adding to Matt’s responsibilities is the decision (as head of the King family trust) to sell or bequest a large plane of unspoiled Hawaiian property, inherited from ancestors.
The two narrative strands cross when Matt discovers that his wife’s lover (Matthew Lillard), a yuppie realtor, is miraculously vacationing with his wife (Judy Greer) and kids adjacent to the rendezvous where Matt is meeting with family, most memorably his breezy cousin (Beau Bridges), to finalize their soon-to-be fortunes. Coincidence or contrivance?
Despite the talented cast put together by Payne, The Descendants boils down to mediocrity of the highest order. My suspicion is that the film hit me wrong, but, perhaps, will hit some just right. Look no further than its seemingly universal acclaim.
I have liked other Payne movies about middle-aged men on journeys of self-discovery, but I couldn’t buy the convenient storytelling and erratic tone that litter this one.
Clooney, always the affable star, gives the film’s best performance, establishing a soft-spoken and refreshingly weary look, decked out in high-waisted slacks and floral-printed shirts.
In terms of real acting, however, it’s nothing new for the man, who relies on his expressive eyes and constantly pursed mouth, so common in better films like Up In The Air and The American.
Having seen it at TIFF in September, where it premiered to upbeat enthusiasm, The Descendants has gone on to reap praise for its enlightened sensitivity.
Best Picture predictions abound; this film, not unlike Slumdog Millionaire, encourages audiences and studios to feel good about themselves.
Not me. Save for Clooney’s solos with his comatose wife, the film’s pathos left me cold and certain. In five years, The Descendants will be forgotten.
Martha Marcy May Marlene
Directed by: Sean Durkin
Starring: Elizabeth Olsen, John Hawkes
4 out of 5 stars
Myles Herod
Entertainment Editor
This may be a purely personal bias, but I adore independent cinema. It’s often true that smaller pictures benefit from budgetary constraints, which allow for greater acting, confident writing and smart direction.
Evidently, Martha Marcy May Marlene is such an achievement – clever, creepy and extremely striking in its reflection of the duplicitous ways cults instill their beliefs.
Let it be known that this is a truly uncomfortable, fear-soaked experience. A chilling examination of the human psyche, viewed through the susceptible eyes of a damaged woman who has forgotten how to be human.
The picture opens with Elizabeth Olsen as Martha, an attractive, quiet, troubled 20-something, who — in a moment of quiet observation and rebellious strength — flees the confines of a fundamentalist cult.
Alone, and without resources, she reunites with her estranged sister Lucy (wonderfully played by Sarah Paulson) and brother-in-law Ted (Hugh Dancy), who take her in to their remote summer cottage.
However, the idyllic scenery and support do little to calm Martha’s confused state, and soon she is sent spiraling between tormented memories of her former master Patrick (John Hawkes) and the upscale lifestyle of her new abode.
Viewing the film, it’s impossible not to be shaken by the sense of dread hanging over every scene. Truly, this is a stellar piece of American gothic, calling the arrival of two major talents. Writer/director Sean Durkin — making his feature film debut — is not interested in pointing the finger at any specific ideology, though.
Instead, he stops to examine what might drive such organizations, what might cause one to become a member and, more importantly, the psychological repercussions it causes.
He and cinematographer Jody Lee Lipes have captured arresting visuals of mute beauty, where trees rustle with foreboding sway and murky waters blur the depths of perception.
As commendable as the direction is, though, all might have been lost if Durkin hadn’t found strength in a lead actress.
Newcomer Elizabeth Olsen (younger sister of Mary Kate and Ashley) brings a raw, wounded charisma to the role that’s difficult to watch at the best of times.
Gradually, flashbacks paint a picture of Martha’s enigmatic history. We see her live in what appears to be communal serenity under the watchful eye of Patrick, their hatchet-faced leader, who, in a casual, patriarchal welcome, renames Olsen’s character Marcy May.
Soon, however, charm leads to woodsy manipulation as Patrick teaches his adoptive tribe to channel old hurts into handgun skills, oversees their orgies and enlists them for petty theft.
Fashionably stark, one scene of house burglary, turned murder, immediately draws Manson Family comparisons with disturbing assurance – eventually moving Martha to reconsider her life.
Because Durkin is restrained in his depiction of both of Martha’s families, he can create a powerful juxtaposition as her experiences emerge, one from the other, fragmented yet telling.
At the lake, sisterly relations don’t fare much better. Absent of understanding, Lucy discovers that Martha has retreated within herself to a point of depression and hysterics.
Afflicted by alienation, and too numb to connect, Martha regrettably relapses with a phone call to her former clan, fearfully leaving the film open to whether or not they will come for her.
Strategically, the movie leaves conventional plot structure behind, trekking off into the backwoods, the mind and the paranoia of a bewildered girl. Then comes the ending. Watching the screen, I felt confident that I knew where it would go. I was wrong.
Funny, the more I think about the way Martha Marcy May Marlene ends, the more I realize that any other would have felt forced. Here Durkin devises a film interwoven from the past and present, and leads us into the darkness with one gripping shot.
Simon Marsello
A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas
Directed by: Todd Strauss-Schulson
Starring: Neil Patrick Harris, Kal Penn, John Cho
Harold and Kumar should have quit while they were ahead.
The original Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle, while not quite worthy of the “classic” stamp, was a downright hilarious tale of two stoner-buddies’ epic journey to mini-hamburger heaven, while Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, the second installment, was markedly less inspired but still good for a few cheap laughs.
Unfortunately, our culture continues to demand third helpings of every marginal film franchise in existence, so movie-goers worldwide must endure mind-numbing drivel to the tune of A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas.
The title says it all. Forcing the cultural hot button of the 3D-movie onto a B-comedy insults the innovation of the former and piles a layer of superfluous cheese on the latter. A new Harold & Kumar movie might have been a welcome addition to the fall film lineup, but prematurely jamming it into the Christmas-movie mould adds “unseasonal” to H&K 3’s heap of dubious accolades. Needless to say, my expectations entering the theatre weren’t too high, though the possibility of a pleasant surprise still lingered. No such luck.
The premise is simple: a few years after the events of the previous film, the movie finds Harold Lee a successful, married businessman, desperate for the approval of his father-in-law, and Kumar Patel still a shiftless idler whose marijuana consumption shows no signs of slowing down. A mysterious package reunites the separated duo, and when Kumar unwittingly torches Harold’s father-in-law’s perfect Christmas tree, the old friends are forced to work together to procure a new one, which, for notorious stoner-slackers Harold and Kumar, proves no easy task.
Laughs, which should abound along such plotlines, were few and far between. Lowlights include a small typecast role for Amir Blumenfeld, who is nearly impossible to separate from his character on CollegeHumor’s Jake and Amir, numerous shameless meta-references, an unnecessary claymation segment, and a short-lived tangent in which Santa Claus takes a shotgun bullet to the face.
As expected, the film’s saving grace was the Harold and Kumar universe’s fictionalized version of Neil Patrick Harris, who reprises his role from the first two films and delivers an outrageous Christmas-themed musical number as only NPH can.
If your inner adolescent tells you that the Harold & Kumar 3 box must be ticked off on your to-see list, treat its viewing as a shout-out to the Ghost of Comedy Past and nothing more, and you won’t be disappointed. Expect comedic gold, and you will. As NPH bows out of his refreshingly funny segment, he takes a hammer to the next wall in proclaiming, “See you in the fourth one!”
One can only hope the franchise cuts its losses before then, allowing its fans to remember a glorious time when sophomoric penis-and-boob jokes still made us laugh.
Jack and Jill
Starring: Adam Sandler
Directed by: Dennis Dugan
1 out of 5
Sean Hardy
I went to see Adam Sandler’s Jack and Jill this week. Sadly, I must conclude that it fell somewhat short of my expectations.
Take a moment to make sure you fully understand what I mean when I say this, because I’m being completely serious. If after careful consideration you still don’t follow me, take a gander at Jack and Jill’s current Metacritic rating, as I did for curiosity’s sake. Seriously, take a look. Last I checked, it was a 24/100. That’s what I was expecting, and do you know what? It was worse than that. I didn’t bloody get it, and I want my money back. But it’s not coming back. It belongs to Adam Sandler now.
Given that you’ve read at least one disparaging film review since Your Highness flailed its way into theatres not so long ago, I’ll try to spare you the usual fire-and-brimstone treatment and provide only the essentials. First, the extent of the damage: Jack and Jill is so bad that it actually made me physically anxious.
I wish I were kidding, but I’m not. I’m almost surprised I didn’t break out in hives, so emotionally battered was I in the wake of Hurricane Sandler and his painfully limited repertoire of silly voices and lifeless, uninspired gags.
If nothing else, though, we can at least say that the man is consistent; arm him with a shitty premise (the ol’ twin-brother-and-sister-played-by-the-same-actor shtick, in this case), you know he’ll do everything in his power to ensure that the result is an equally shitty movie experience. Bravo, sir. Bravo.
Given the totality of its awfulness, at times the details as to why Jack and Jill misses the mark so completely seem to bleed together into one sprawling, intricate mosaic of suck. It’s what I imagine a great work of art would be like if any of the great artists had lived in a trailer park and painted with Cheez Whiz and children’s tears.
Still, some of the most problematic elements are so blatant that they can’t help but jump out at you: the plot is razor-thin, the acting is virtually nonexistent, the funniest character by a generous margin is someone’s pet bird and most of the situational gags are uncomfortable and nothing more.
As if this weren’t bad enough, what’s left when these essential components have been stripped away is little more than a hastily thrown-together assemblage of product placements, bizarre cameos (Al Pacino plays the sex-offender version of himself for some weird reason), overtly racist humour and scenes that often begin or end without any real context. “Why is Adam Sandler driving a Jet Ski around a swimming pool?” you might, for instance, find yourself asking.
The answer to this and a multitude of other, similar questions is that we simply don’t know. Indeed, we may never know; in more ways than one, how the Sandler and Co. creation could even have been conceived or put in motion is a complete enigma.
In the end, what we are ultimately left with is a version of comedy gone awry. Too crude to be considered a children’s movie and too painfully unfunny to appeal to adults, Jack and Jill is left to occupy a lonely middle ground indeed. Pass.
The Skin I Live In
Directed by: Pedro Almodovar
Starring: Antonio Banderas, Elena Anaya
3 out of 5 stars
Myles Herod
Entertainment Editor
Spain’s Pedro Almodóvar could not make a boring picture if he tried. Equally lauded and chastised – sometimes for the same film – his distinctive oeuvre illustrates a man seduced by suggestive sexuality and evocative colours. The movie camera, to him, hides nothing.
Truthfully speaking, The Skin I Live In left me speechless. Call it uncomfortable, ashamed, whatever – I sat at the screen startled, and yet, strangely delighted. In many ways, Skin represents Almodóvar at his most demented and transgressive, breaking loose from two pictures of prestige and world recognition, Talk to Her and Volver.
Cinema history is littered with the remains of mad scientists driven by desire, or damned with the consequences of their perverted souls. Breaching the bounds of pathological decency, The Skin I Live In adapts Thierry Jonquet’s lurid novel Tarantula, a tale of revenge, gender identity and unbridled power.
Channeling his best Cary Grant, Antonio Banderas stars as Robert Ledgard, a suave plastic surgeon whose heavy brow seems apt for obsession. Situated in an immaculate clinic in suburban Toledo, the doctor broods over personal tragedy as he deliberately constructs beauty onto a kidnapped body.
The darkly alluring Elena Anaya plays Vera Cruz, Robert’s young prisoner and plaything, a mysterious woman whose skin is experimentally replaced patch by patch. Alone, and encased in a fetishistic body sheath, Vera practices yoga to the knowing surveillance of the doctor and his elderly housemaid, Marilia.
From the beginning, Almodóvar lets us know something odd is afoot. He manufactures a film so vividly rich and baroque in imagery that its style alone leaves one curiously transfixed.
One of the other chief pleasures of The Skin I Live In is its concoction of operatic emotions and a serpentine screenplay. It is a story that slowly teases with its mysteries, flashbacks and violence that climax in horrific fashion and spinning sexual intrigue.
Although the film’s touchstones are more aligned with two specific influences – Georges Franju’s Eyes Without a Face and James Whale’s Frankenstein, Almodóvar also ventures further afield to David Cronenberg territory, constructing a kinky, body-horror thriller.
Banderas, working with Almódovar for the first time since 1990’s Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!, gives a deceptively charismatic performance, imbuing Ledgard with a debonair facade and undertone of menace. Even while Ledgard’s medical colleagues disapprove of his experiments with synthetic skin and forced operations, his secretive work continues as the film compels us to review the context of his God complex.
Elena Ayana’s role is even trickier, since we know little about Vera other than her dislike for feminine garments. The film does not play her as a victim, though. Instead, she comes to participate in Ledgard’s strange experiments and intimate desires, gradually disclosing her history and state of mind.
Few directors have the skill at swerving from confident camp to overwhelming chills like this. Though the film ranks as slightly frivolous in Almodóvar’s cannon, it contains enough carnal nourishment and melodrama to keep one glued until its outrageous third act.
By then, The Skin I Live In has fully embraced its wayward weirdness, declaring itself tragic, devilish and, yes, even a tad silly.
Take Shelter
Directed by: Jeff Nichols
Starring: Michael Shannon, Jessica Chastain
4 out of 5 stars
Myles Herod
Entertainment Editor
There can be something positively terrifying about a performance that makes you tense. What Michael Shannon miraculously achieves in Take Shelter goes beyond that, and into embodiment.
With courage, talent and vulnerability, he takes the viewer into the mind of an early-onset schizophrenic, revealing a man torn between apocalyptic premonitions and his relationships with family and friends.
The movie opens on Curtis (Shannon), a construction worker with growing concerns about the clouds and greasy rain that persistently loom over his land. Inside his household we enter domestic normality, where his loving wife, Samantha (Jessica Chastain), attentively upholds family breakfasts and points of discussion. Together they raise their deaf preschooler in what feels like parental conviction and not plot contrivance.
Early in Take Shelter, we become familiar with Curtis’ work routine, as well as his loyal co-worker, Dewart (Sean Whigham). Similarly, Samantha’s outside life is explored, as she divides her time between entrepreneurial interests and her daughter’s sign language classes.
The film shifts though, and soon Curtis begins suffering from night terrors that consume his consciousness. The dreams retain similar motifs of unruly storms that turn familiar faces into murderous souls. In one instance, a vicious nightmare involving the beloved family dog leaves Curtis with a mysteriously sore arm and distrust towards the canine.
When his visions cease to curtail and begin to extend into real life delusions, the separation between prophecy and lunacy symbolically merge with the construction of a backyard storm shelter.
The film is so delicate, so entrenched in Curtis’ intensity that you hold your breath as his social sphere starts breaking away. Events of grave consequence take effect and soon the heart of the film splits into two unsettling realisms: the whispering gossip of his sanity, and the confidence of his own doom’s day suspicions.
Michael Shannon inhabits his extraordinary performance with a scary charisma that cannot be described, but observed. He knows he has a problem. He knows he needs help. When the story reveals a family history of mental illness, he seeks counseling. Hopelessly, the sessions amount to no more than empty compassion and textbook rhetoric, leaving Curtis, and us, in a state of despondency.
The movie excels through its braveness, which requires our empathy as we interpret the decisions made. Why does Curtis insist on building something so absurd at the risk of losing everything? How the film balances dream logic with the disintegration of relationships, marriage and finances is one of its great strengths.
It is precisely the brand of drama that defines Take Shelter, investing heavily in emotional paranoia, as well as post- 9/11 angst and uncertainty.
For a picture of such power, it is refreshing to see the restraint that director Jeff Nichols brings to the narrative. Wisely, he avoids religious aspects of Curtis’ apocalypse and keeps it very close to life, making forces of nature vengeful and destructive right until the very end.
Many films have addressed the plight of mental health, but few rarely seem to live them out. This one does it with a quiet fearlessness that has you thinking days afterwards.
Paranormal Activity 3
Directed by: Henry Boost, Ariel Schulman
3 out of 5 stars
Marco Filice
The evil shadow-demon offers some recycled tricks and a few new treats in Paranormal Activity 3. Since there are hardly any horror flicks out, this will most likely constitute one’s choice for thrills at the Cineplex. And I have to say, the film it makes up for the lack of Halloween spirit Hollywood has invested this year.
The plot is introduced with a pregnant Kristi, who was a character in the previous film in the series. She is unpacking with her husband, Daniel, who is video recording their getting ready for the baby. Enter her sister, Katie, with a box of VHS tapes. Remember those things? Hopefully you do, because their grainy quality is used throughout the rest of the movie.
A foreboding hint that the tapes are not filled with warm nostalgia is caught in Katie’s face. She gives her sister the box and leaves. The story begins.
It reaches back to 1988 and follows another young couple, Dennis and Julie, who have two daughters. They live in an affluent-looking home, which appeard to be inherited from Julie’s creepy grandmother.
The rich-family-being-scared-to-death plotline is not such a cliché here; their prosperity, which was investigated in Paranormal Activity 2, is important to the story. It turns out that there are roots to the tale that prove far more sinister than you’d imagine. The story’s plot holds disturbing events, leading to a finale that will make you forget your own name.
I caught Paranormal Activity 3 on opening night, and with the theatre filled with obnoxious under-agers, even their goofiness couldn’t spoil how spooked I was. Now, it takes a lot for me to hold onto the arm rests in nervous anticipation. But, believe me, I did just that.
This was especially true during scenes that featured a new technique introduced by the filmmakers.
Dennis, Katie and Kristi’s new parent-figure (we’re left cryptically out of the loop as to what happened to their real father), is an amateur videographer. He cleverly manipulates the mechanics of an oscillating fan and places a camera on it. It slowly scans between the main entrance, the living room, the kitchen and back again.
The audience views only what the camera sees for brief moments, and you’re expecting anything. I won’t go into details, but this gadget utilizes something naturally eerie that I haven’t seen in horror movies before.
This film is a part of the new generation of reality-based recording. In a time of uploading videos from smartphones to the web so that all can participate in our lives, the movie places you in the subjectivity of the characters.
In horror classics, movies allowed us to merely observe the tension. Now we’re involved through the home-video lens – as culprits, even. We not only see, but experience the horror through the characters.
In short, Paranormal Activity 3 causes both characters and audience to react in the same way. This is as real as it gets.
The Thing
Starring: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Joel Edgerton
Directed by: Matthijs van Heijningen Jr.
2.5/5 Stars
Sean Hardy
It’s hard to imagine what films today would be like had flicks like those of the Saw and Hostel franchises never seen the light of day. Given our generation’s clear preference for excess over nuance in almost all aspects of life, this must seem like a far-fetched notion indeed.
Realistically speaking, it’s hard to articulate what the modern horror genre would even be without its familiar buckets of gut-wrenching gore, aside from quick cuts of scared teenagers running around and occasional cameos by washed-up rappers. The real question, though, is what this suggests about us. Are we losing our ability to be “cleverly” entertained?
Shocking though it may be to some of us, there once was a time when “horror” implied more than mass murder portrayed in stunning realism, when aspects of the genre like suspense and atmosphere weren’t just remnants of an earlier time.
On my way to see The Thing this weekend, I prayed that a modern remake of the original classic would do something to bring back the finesse for which horror was once known. I probably shouldn’t have got my hopes up.
By now you surely know the story in some form, whether by way of the earlier Thing movies or one of the innumerable copycats for which they are at least partly responsible. It’s the plot upon which so many modern horror movies have been grafted: research team goes to isolated outpost in remote part of the world to investigate discovery of unusual specimen, specimen goes absolutely apeshit, expendable characters start dying. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Without giving away too much, the specific plot structure of this movie and its predecessors is such that the plot is set up to be suspenseful right from the get-go, with each of the various characters not knowing which of the others to trust.
On paper the premise is perfectly calibrated to allow for maximal suspense, and in a way the movie attempts to play to this very obvious strength. The action is generally well-shot, the Antarctic imagery is striking and the acting is passable, even convincing at times.
Things go off the rails with the over-the-top gratuity, which, given the modern horror landscape, probably should have been anticipated. When it comes to the film’s moments of actual violence, absolutely nothing is left to the imagination, ultimately diminishing the effect that they could have had were things implied rather than spelled out in disturbing detail.
I did not, for instance, need to see someone’s face disintegrating in real time in order to be properly scared. To be honest, the most powerful moments are those in which bone-headed brutality is eschewed for moments of terse, muted tension between the central characters.
Such moments make it all the more devastating when said characters ultimately meet their end. In this respect, the movie succeeds; the problem, sadly, is that moments like these are few and far between.
What, then, are we to learn from The Thing? Well, if most of my sentiments thus far have been any indication, you shouldn’t expect much. As it stands, The Thing represents a discouragingly standard foray into the modern, ultra-graphic horror genre.
Though it is not without its strong points, it ultimately falls short, offering little in the way of thematic innovation or departures from the trusted modern formula of gratuitous violence and gore.
