2017 - May
RANKING ALL FILMS:
01. The Vanishing (1988) 4/4
02. Locke (2013) 4/4
03. Prevenge (2016) 3.5/4
04. Race with the Devil (1975) 3/4
05. Pain & Gain (2013) 3/4
06. Wolf (1994) 3/4
07. The Disappearance (1977) 3/4
08. Buried (2010) 3/4
09. Kill List (2011) 3/4
10. The Leveling (2016) 2.5/4
11. Down Terrace (2009) 2.5/4
12. The Anderson Tapes (1971) 2.5/4
13. Get Out (2017) 2.5/4
14. Shock Waves (1977) 2.5/4
15. The Awakening (2011) 2/4
16. Sightseers (2012) 2/4
17. The Mephisto Waltz (1971) 1.5/4
18. Belphegor – Phantom of the Louvre (2001) 1.5/4
19. Haunted (1995) 1.5/4
20. The Vanishing (1993) 1.5/4
21. Nothing But the Night (1973) 1.5/4
22. Rituals (1977) 1/4
01. The Vanishing (1988) 4/4
02. Locke (2013) 4/4
03. Prevenge (2016) 3.5/4
04. Race with the Devil (1975) 3/4
05. Pain & Gain (2013) 3/4
06. Wolf (1994) 3/4
07. The Disappearance (1977) 3/4
08. Buried (2010) 3/4
09. Kill List (2011) 3/4
10. The Leveling (2016) 2.5/4
11. Down Terrace (2009) 2.5/4
12. The Anderson Tapes (1971) 2.5/4
13. Get Out (2017) 2.5/4
14. Shock Waves (1977) 2.5/4
15. The Awakening (2011) 2/4
16. Sightseers (2012) 2/4
17. The Mephisto Waltz (1971) 1.5/4
18. Belphegor – Phantom of the Louvre (2001) 1.5/4
19. Haunted (1995) 1.5/4
20. The Vanishing (1993) 1.5/4
21. Nothing But the Night (1973) 1.5/4
22. Rituals (1977) 1/4
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- DirectorJean-Paul SaloméStarsSophie MarceauMichel SerraultFrédéric DiefenthalAt the Louvre museum in Paris, the phantom Belphegor awakens and causes electrical havoc. Night guards at the museum start dying, Lisa gets possessed, and Martin tries to help her.01-05-2017
Belphegor is the chief demon of sloth and one of the seven princes of Hell. But his distinctive and catchy name has given him a different sort of fame. There are at least two bands named after him, a truck, a plane and even a manga character. For the purposes of this review, I shall focus on the same named phantom of the Louvre, a tall, mysterious, maleficent figure dressed in black garbs and sporting a distinctively creepy mask created by Arthur Bernede for his 1927 crime novel also titled "Belphegor". In it, though, the titular apparition turned out to be nothing more than a creative and imaginative criminal stealing artifacts from the Louvre. But the idea of a dark and mysterious villain haunting the halls of the world's most famous museum was too memorable and striking to forget and he reemerged, this time on screen in Henri Desfontaines' silent film adaptation of the novel. After several dormant decades, the phantom struck again, this time on the small screens in the 1965 miniseries directed by Claude Barma. While the solution to the series' mystery is definitely Earthly, a more supernatural angle is definitely hinted at, for the first time tying Belphegor, the phantom with Belphegor, the demon. The real crime related to the series, however, is that it isn't better known outside of France. Featuring cracklingly witty dialogues, memorable characters and a marvelous cast (as well as a policeman that is the missing link between Charles Vanel from "Diabolique" and Peter Falk's Columbo) it is absolutely unforgettable for those who are lucky enough to see it. In its native France it was a resounding hit and like all popular things, it warranted a terrible rip-off. "The Curse of Belphegor" was released in 1967 but its nonsensical plot owed more to "The Phantom of the Opera" than the Phantom of the Louvre. There was also a more distinguished sequel to the series in the form of a comic book. Unfortunately, the great phantom seems to have been delivered the deadliest blow so far, not by a brave journalist or a clever policeman but by Jean-Paul Salome, the director of the much-maligned 2001 adaptation, the first "official" film of the novel since 1927. As a fan of the 1965 miniseries, I, naturally, approached the film with much trepidation. I had heard many horror stories about it. What I found is that while most of them are true, "Belphegor" is not as horrendous as everyone makes it out to be. The main problem with the film is, actually, the time it was made in. As everyone knows the French cinema can be divided into many epochs or styles, more than any other nation's film history. We had (among many others) poetic realism, impressionism, cinema du look and, of course, the very divisive but often revered French new wave. To France's great misfortune, a rising star of the 90s cinema world was Luc Besson. Besson, whose films I've often found if not lacking than certainly childish and superficial, shot (and more importantly edited) his films like music videos with quick cuts and a break-neck pace. Of course, many others followed suit and by the 2000s the disease had spread worldwide. In the first half of the decade, almost all commercial films sported this annoying and detrimental style that rather than give its audience a pleasurable and stimulating time at the movies gave them whiplash. Most infamous cases of such films include "The Fifth Element", "Brotherhood of the Wolf" and the two films of Pitof, a music video director turned film hack. His debut "Vidocq", also based on a novel by Arthur Bernede, sported a Gothic atmosphere that clashed heavily with the quick cuts, distracting CGI and lots and lots of things flashing before your eyes. It was released the same year as "Belphegor" but was better received, perhaps justly, but it, unfortunately, brought Pitof to the attention of DC and they put him in charge of the unmitigated disaster that is "Catwoman". He is yet to make his third film, let's hope he never does. "Belphegor", released only a few months before "Vidocq" is noticeably tamer than Pitof's extravaganza but it suffers from the problem of such hectic editing more than most films of the period. I suspect that the break-neck editing is a result of a bad decision in post-production as most scenes play out normally when they are not simply cut off for running longer than one minute. The film is only 84 or so minutes long (not counting the credits) but it was definitely written to be longer. There are huge chunks of plot and character development missing. It feels like someone simply highlighted every shot not featuring huge camera swoops and CGI and pressed delete. What is left is a fairly garbled film in which all exposition (and there is a lot of it) is delivered in fast-spoken monologues that sound like Wikipedia readouts, rarely more than once, with almost no adequate explanations. They are just dumped before us and then quickly disregarded. For instance, there is an instance in which we, at the same time, establish the character of a seemingly psychotic guard, whole swaths of Egyptian history and the backstory of the mummy which is absolutely the most integral McGuffin in the whole story, all of this in a rushed scene that runs no more than two minutes. This is a symptom that reoccurs throughout the film. Characters' backstories, expositions about Belphegor, Egyptological facts, and even important plot elements are hand waved in brief bursts of expositional monologues and then on with the CGI show. This makes the film very hard to follow and despite genuinely trying (read constantly rewinding the aforementioned expositional scenes) I often found myself scratching my head and wondering what's going on. But it's not just the plot that suffers from the imposed and unnatural pace. It's also the film's atmosphere which got defenestrated with comprehension when someone said "Hey, why not put the pace up to eleven hundred" and most importantly the film's epicness. When you're watching a high-budget horror film about Egyptian ghosts, murders and murderous hallucinations that is also the first feature film to be shot inside the actual Louvre museum you expect size. You expect to constantly be wowed and have money thrown at you. And yet every shot of the film seems to be rushed. Case in point is the film's climax. Without revealing what happens I can tell you the whole sequence is two minutes long. I am not embellishing. It genuinely is. It is, without a doubt, one of the most unsatisfying film endings of all time. If you can get past the film's insane pace and actually understand what's going on, you'll be faced by a fairly old-fashioned plot that could have worked in 1965, but just doesn't in 2001. The titular phantom is now a supernatural entity which possesses a young woman (Sophie Marceau) with the intention of helping a recently discovered mummy pass into the other world. The first problem with the plot is that it requires Marceau to constantly enter and re-enter the Louvre. Which she unbelievably does. How? Well, I'm not entirely sure myself, but it seems like a construction crew working in the basement of the Louvre carelessly busts a hole straight into the basement of Marceau's building opposite the museum. She then, every night, walks through the hole straight into one of the best-guarded places in the world, unnoticed by either the construction crew or the museum guard. If it were this easy everyone in Paris would be rich. There is a half-arsed attempt to handwave this problem by saying that the museum's security is down but there is still an entire army of guards there who are apparently all blind. The construction crew obviously is since other than two workmen who attempt to stop Marceau no one so much as bats an eyelid when a half-naked woman walks around their worksite and then beats up one of them. Who knows? Maybe it's a daily occurrence in gay Paris. The next problem is a constant series of inconsistencies which I believe are a result of the careless way the film's been cut together. From characters randomly disappearing and reappearing and uncertain relations between them to the more serious questions like backstories once revealed and then never addressed again, intentions of the phantom and his powers. Out of all of them, the two biggest problems I had were these. First of them is the name of the phantom itself. Unexplainedly, the police inspector constantly refers to him as Belphegor, but the resident Egyptologist never calls him that, in fact, other than the inspector, no one else does. I get the feeling that the name was shoehorned into the script to capitalise on the brand and use the distinctive look of the phantom as there are no other plot connections to the novel. The second question I had is who controls whom? The phantom possesses Marceau and forces her to go into the museum, but she is seemingly able to stop him from hurting her love interest. And yet she seems entirely unaware of her nightly excursions, at least in the first half of the film until she suddenly and unexplainedly knows all about them. I believe all of these problems stem from the post-production and if the film had been cut together in a more atmospheric and deliberate pace "Belphegor" could have been a satisfying if not entirely successful film. You would still have a more or less mystery-less plot to deal with (almost all the secrets are evident from the word go), a cliched bunch of characters and a nonsensical backstory but you'd at least have a lot of opportunity for creepy imagery (the phantom does look scary) and the people involved with the film do an excellent job. First off there is a fantastic score by Bruno Coulais which cleverly mixes the ancient melodies of the east with a modern rhythmic sound. There is also some excellent CGI work, although its design and the way it is shot is questionable. Finally, but most importantly, the cast is wonderful. The assembled actors deal heroically with their cliched characters by adding wit and soul to their performances. It is only due to their excellent work that I found myself caring for these cardboard cutouts. Marceau adds a sense of genuine haunting to the possessed girl, Frederic Diefenthal is very engaging as the love interest, the always dependable Michel Serrault is lovable as the aged inspector and the flirty dialogue between him and Julie Christie is wonderfully played by these two screen legends. However, the performance I found myself enjoying the most is that of Jean-Francois Balmer, a very recognisable and inimitable screen presence. He is absolutely hilarious as Louvre's director. Finally, a small cameo by Juliette Greco, the lead of the 1965 series, tips off the tendency of the film to compete with its television predecessor. The film seems constantly to try to imitate and top the quirky, conversational humour of the series. Memorably, it featured many hilarious scenes such as the one in which the guards debate which one loves Venus-de-Milo more or the memorable monologue of one of our leads' friend about how she picked up and spent a night with a strange man from a bus. It is all very clever, witty and ingenious stuff and the film constantly tries to compete with it. Sadly none of it is very good. There is one scene in which one of the Louvre guides doesn't know where the Mona Lisa is, and one in which a souvenir photographer tries to sell a photo to the director. All pretty feeble stuff really and fairly detrimental to the film. The obnoxious comedic undercurrent only serves to further undercut the atmosphere and provokes only unfavourable comparisons with the much superior 1965 series. As you can see there is a lot wrong with "Belphegor", mostly in the way it was assembled, but the occasional glimpses of the fairly good film it could have been did keep me entertained for most of its runtime. Unlike with most bad films I started to lose my patience with "Belphegor" only in the third act. Up 'till then the good performances and the excellent soundtrack kept my attention. I most certainly would never recommend this mess to anyone but if you are ever forced to watch it know that there are worse fates that could have befallen you.
1.5/4 - DirectorRodrigo CortésStarsRyan ReynoldsJosé Luis García-PérezRobert PatersonPaul is a U.S. truck driver working in Iraq. After an attack by a group of Iraqis he wakes to find he is buried alive inside a coffin. With only a lighter and a cell phone it's a race against time to escape this claustrophobic death trap.02-05-2017
I've always been a fan of thrillers or horrors set in confined spaces. There's something inherently creepy in being unable to leave, escape the horror or not even knowing what's behind the locked door. Hitchcock's "Rope" and "Lifeboat" immediately spring to mind but "Lifeboat" is a drama and the guests in "Rope" aren't really being terrorised and are free (in fact, welcome) to leave whenever they want. The earliest example of the kind of film I'm thinking about is surely Luis Bunuel's "Exterminating Angel", a truly thought-provoking and terrifying film about a group of snobs who find themselves unable to leave a room despite there being no physical restrictions. The subgenre achieved a resurgence in popularity after Vincenzo Natali's 1997 film "Cube" which I found to be a thoroughly brilliant and inventive horror film rose to international acclaim and box-office success. Afterwards, we got such films as David Fincher's "Panic Room", the disappointing "Phone Booth", "Frozen" (not the cartoon), several sequels to "Cube", Wes Craven's boring "Red Eye", the excellent Spanish "Method" and its British cousin "Exam", "Fermat's Room", Shyamalan's "Devil" etc. etc. etc. The most popular and well-known example is without a doubt the "Saw" series whose enormous success is directly disproportionate to its overall quality. One highly notable and clever film in the bunch-of-people-trapped-in-a-room is "Pontypool" whose mix of linguistics and zombies is in short fascinating. But without a doubt, the greatest such film is the classic "12 Angry Men", one of the greatest films of all time. As you can see the concept is hardly new (most certainly not in horror films where one of the most prevalent genres is the haunted house genre which plays by the same rules as do all above-mentioned films). What most of these films play at is tension between the characters. They are stuck together and eventually get sick of each other. This Sartresque vision of Hell can make for brilliant drama but is damn hard to pull off. First off you need to make the characters interesting enough for you to be willing to spend 90 minutes in their company and their company alone. But you also have to make them obnoxious, annoying or nasty enough for them not to want to spend time with each other. Then you have to get excellent actors to play these characters because the success of the film lays square on their ability and the dialouge they are given. Then you need an interesting and suitably terrifying situation to put them in. Many films succeeded ("Alien" is another example), more have failed ("The Killing Room"), fair game, it's a difficult thing to pull off. But, quite honestly, I always and without a fail find these kinds of films fascinating. The confined space and cast list push everyone to be either at their best game or fail and this provides enough tension on its own to sustain my interest. Making such a film work is a tightrope walk while balancing two 20 tonne safes on either hand and it's fun to watch whether the guy makes it or not. As tough as those films make it for themselves, "Buried" makes it even harder. It pushes the envelope right off the table. I was glued to the screen from the moment I read the synopsis. One man (Ryan Reynolds) in a coffin with a cell phone. This can't work, right? Right? Well, I'll be damned, but Reynolds, director Rodrigo Cortes and writer Chris Sparling pulled it off admirably. One man shows in films are rare, in horror films almost unheard of. "1408" comes to mind, but its main actor John Cusack gets more than enough help carrying the film from excellent scares, CGI effects and more than one location. In "Buried", we never leave the coffin. Not even for an establishing shot. We're constantly sharing the claustrophobic darkness with Reynolds as he attempts to navigate his rescue via phone. I was surprised by how much believable tension, drama and action Cortes and Sparling were able to generate without making the coffin haunted. Reynolds has to deal with easily offended friends, short-tempered kidnappers, snakes, sand and most annoyingly bureaucrats only interested in covering their own backsides. All of these people are only heard over the phone and never seen. This premise obviously plays into one of the oldest human fears. Being buried alive. As I'm not particularly bothered by that phobia I wasn't sure if the film was going to work on me, but it did for a different reason. By not showing us the people working on Reynolds' rescue the filmmakers create a different kind of emotion from fear. Frustration. The best way to describe the genre of this film is frustration horror. The best example of this is the scene in which Reynolds finally manages to get through to his employers only to be informed he was fired and they are not accountable. Throughout the film, I was genuinely annoyed at all these idiots sitting in their comfortable chairs and protecting their own jobs. If by the end you don't want to wring their necks you're not human. There's also a palatable sense of paranoia pervading the film as you're never sure if the calm-voiced rescuer (Robert Paterson) really is doing his best or simply lying and babysitting Reynolds until he dies. As the minute tick away and "Buried" works its magic I felt as if I was with Reynolds in that coffin trying to explain over and over and over what's happening to a lot of people who can't help me. It's a frustrating and ultimately terrifying realisation that his biggest enemy isn't the ground above him but the allies (not) trying to help him. Cortes' direction is wonderfully dynamic and he finds many different angles and interesting ways to shoot the confined action. Sparling also did an admirable job, most noticeably in not being too afraid to tackle the general absurdity of the situation. Reynolds is a truck driver for some sort of relief company in Iraq who was taken hostage and buried by terrorists demanding 1 million dollars. But Sparling isn't afraid to condemn both the terrorists and the US military in his well-thought-out and clever screenplay. It is for this reason I am shocked to discover his next film is the through-and-through awful, schlock-fest slasher "ATM". Of course, the film is spearheaded and entirely carried by Ryan Reynolds who does an incredible job. He manages to really make us care for, believe in and like this man, by the end I felt like I truly knew him. It is an incredibly difficult job to relate a character when all the dialogue you have are cries for help and most of the shots are close-ups of your face but Reynolds does it perfectly. His soulful, engaging and charismatic performance is a textbook example of that mythical 'how it's done'. Overall, "Buried" is a whirlwind thriller with tension and drama to spare that provides the viewer with a truly harrowing experience. It's true that one does get a feeling that had it played up the Kafkaesque angle over the more predictable thriller angle it could have been even better, but the mixture we get is satisfying and memorable enough.
3/4 - DirectorSteven KnightStarsTom HardyOlivia ColmanRuth WilsonIvan Locke, a dedicated family man and successful construction manager, receives a phone call on the eve of the biggest challenge of his career that sets in motion a series of events that threaten his carefully cultivated existence.02-05-2017
This is not Ivan Locke's night. On the eve of the biggest concrete pour in Europe, which he's supervising, the woman he had a one-night stand out of pity with is having his baby two months early. Determined not to allow his child to grow up fatherless like he did, Locke sets off on a two-hour drive to the London hospital and en route has to make sure the pour goes alright, has to provide emotional support to the woman he barely knows and break the news to his heartbroken wife and children. Over the phone. The entire film is set inside the car and we only hear the other characters. We are locked in with Locke and by the end (actually, much sooner) we are totally invested in his predicament. We want everything to go alright because we sympathise and like this man on the quest to right his wrong and do what must be done. "I am trying to do the right thing," he says "Whether they like me or not". "Locke", without a doubt, owes a debt to "Buried" in that the success of Rodrigo Cortes' nail-biter certainly helped "Locke" get made, but "Buried" pales in comparison. In fact, it looks like a childish, predictable, formulaic blockbuster. "Locke" blows it out of the water. Director/writer Steven Knight's film is a powerhouse, clear and simple. It is an experience of strange might, an unforgettable, harrowing and tense ride into the depths of Ivan Locke, a man juggling his marriage, his job, basically his life, determined to make all three work. His quest is noble and we are prepared to take this ride with him wherever it goes. This is first and foremost thanks to the incredible performance of Tom Hardy as Locke. He has never been better and he's been consistently incredible. He plays Locke as a man of great calm, a commanding presence whose entire life is being pulled from under him. He is obviously highly organised but also a talented problem solver. In many ways watching Locke sort his problems out is like watching a great footballer on the field dodging opposing players on his way to the goal. Hardy never puts a foot wrong and his Locke is a man of great empathy, but it is not hard to see how he made the mistake that can now cost him his life. Of course, not even Hardy could have made this film work had the script not been so great. "Locke" was released in the US in the year "Birdman" sweeped the award shows, but Knight's script makes Innaritu's sound like childish scribbles. "Locke" is made entirely out of dialogues and the ones led here would make Harold Pinter blush. Natural and yet profound every word made my nails shorter and shorter. Every ring of Ivan's phone made my pulse race. An easy criticism of this film would be that it is essentially a radio play and not a film, but this is wrong. Only someone with no understanding of film could say that. Film makes things real, concrete. It gives every predicament a certain sense of realism even if it the filmmakers doesn't want it to. In "Locke" it heightens the tension to see the road, the car, the traffic. It makes it all the more frustrating, all the more tense to know there's further to go, to constantly look at the cars in front hoping they don't stop suddenly in a gridlock. To see what Ivan sees. On top of that, Hardy gives us a masterful physical performance of a man not only trying to control the problems outside of the car, but also trying to calm the tempest inside him. He is bursting at the seems but must remain calm. The visual experience of "Locke" is not one I'd trade for any radio play or audiobook in the world. But one must praise the voice performances of the rest of cast. Director Knight has assembled an amazing cast list to lend their voices to the unseen characters. Locke's unreliable, alcoholic deputy on the building site is played by Andrew Scott, his wife by Ruth Wilson, and most notably the expectant mother of his child by the newfound stalwart of the British screen Olivia Colman. And yet, despite this formidable cast list, the most important character remains unseen. Locke's father, who abandoned him and thus inspired Ivan not to do the same to his child. He is the catalyst of the entire plot. Despite not appearing physically he is spiritually there in the car and Locke talks to him from time to time. In the most descriptive monologue in the whole film Ivan tells the imagined spirit of his father: "I want you to watch. Do you know, in fact, I would like to take a *beep* shovel and dig you up out of the *beep* ground and make you watch me tonight? I would pull open your eyes and kick the mud and worms and *beep* out of your *beep* ears just for the duration of this journey because it's me driving. Me! Not you. And unlike you, I will drive straight to the place where I should be, and I will be there to take care of my... to take care of my *beep*-up." Now how can a man in a coffin swearing at Stephen Tobolowsky beat that?
4/4 - DirectorHope Dickson LeachStarsEllie KendrickDavid TroughtonJack HoldenSomerset, October 2014. When Clover Catto (Ellie Kendrick) receives a call telling her that her younger brother Harry (Joe Blakemore) is dead, she must return to her family farm and face the man she hasn't spoken to in years: her father Aubrey (David Troughton). She is shocked to discover her home changed forever by the devastating floods that destroyed the area six months earlier, and Aubrey a tormented shadow of his former self. As she learns what has been going on in her long absence she and her father forge a new understanding, but can it withstand the troubles that they face on the ravaged farm as well as the truth of what drove Harry to take his own life?02-05-2017
The unfortunately named Clover Cato (Ellie Kendrick) returns to the home she left after an argument with her headstrong farmer father (David Troughton) to attend the funeral of her younger brother Harry (Joe Blakemore) who apparently committed suicide. Now, strung together by misfortune, Clover and her father have to attempt to clear up the unspoken tension between them, but the question of Harry's motive is a hill to be levelled and a wedge between father and daughter. "The Levelling", the feature film debut of Hope Dickson Leach is a very bog standard film of its type. The story of a son/daughter returning to their childhood home and deep seething resentments is as old as the hills, but it seems to have taken particular root in Britain where it's been rehashed in countless films, TV shows and plays, most notably perhaps in Harold Pinter's "The Homecoming". As fascinating as the subject may be there's little that hasn't already been done with it over the thousands of years and seen in that light "The Levelling" does nothing new. In fact, it plays out exactly as you'd expect it to with big crying fits, explosive arguments and short-lived reconciliations. Dickson Leach offers little of particular interest in the story in the way of style or unique character or resolution. The only unusual element is perhaps the casting of the roles in that the daughter is the older, stronger sibling while the brother is portrayed as foolish and weak. Three years earlier, Carol Morley made her feature film debut in "The Falling" by also taking a series of fairly well-worn subjects and stories but made a film of such distinctive power and style that it was nothing short of brilliant. "The Falling" is such a masterpiece that it successfully made me forget and temporarily overlook all the numerous similarities it had with "Picnic at Hanging Rock". "The Levelling" is not that good or original and in fact, I spent a lot of its runtime thinking about the works of Scottish author Iain Banks who often dealt with the subjects present in this film most explicitly in his novel "Stonemouth". I was also reminded of "The Town", a fairly weak ITV series from a few years ago which was also about a prodigal son's return. As unoriginal as it is, I'd be lying, however, if I said that "The Levelling" is not at least effective. The characters are well-written and believable, the situations also and Dickson Leach does a terrific job of putting together all the pieces of the puzzle and seamlessly assembling them before our eyes. If you've never seen or heard of the prodigal son story before you will be mesmerised. The best cog in the mechanism of the film is definitely the cast. Especially Ellie Kendrick who is absolutely marvellous as the slightly awkward but headstrong (like her father) young woman. She always seems on the verge of a breakdown but you know that she will stand her ground no matter what. Troughton is also excellent, but he's always been. There's little in "The Levelling" beyond the basic story and that's sad because I'm sure that a more inventive director/writer could have done a wonderful job of taking the story and its well-composed characters in different and new directions. As it stands, there was little I didn't know thrown into the mix but the soup was undeniably tasty. I just wish it had more spices in it.
2.5/4 - DirectorBen WheatleyStarsRobin HillRobert HillJulia DeakinA crime family looks to unmask the police informant in their midst who threatens to take down their business.03-05-2017
If you've ever mourned the fact that Mike Leigh's never made a crime drama, well here's the film for you. "Down Terrace" is a kitchen-sink drama with the plot of a Peter Yates film played out like a Mike Leigh adaptation of a Harold Pinter play. That's quite an explanation. Now let's break it down. The plot concerns the events after father and son, Bill (Robert Hill) and Karl (Robin Hill) are released from prison and return to their terraced house in Brighton. Bill is the boss of the local branch of the mob and Karl is his petulant, man-child, right-hand man. However, their troubles are only just beginning and they realise they might have been better off staying in prison. First off, Karl's pen-pal girlfriend (Kerry Peacock) is pregnant and Bill doesn't like her at all. Second, Bill and Karl constantly clash with each other mainly because Bill is a bully and Karl's a whiny brat. To top it all off there appears to be a mole in their organisation ratting them out to the police. Of course, all of this is almost unimportant as "Down Terrace" is essentially a tone piece. The naturalistic shaky-cam photography, non-actors in the leads, and Mike Leighesque ad-libbed sounding dialouge with a touch of Pinteresque threat between the lines give the film its unusual flavour. But, what interested me in "Down Terrace" is not the gritty look and feel but an almost absurdist sense of humour. There's a hitman (Michael Smiley) who takes his toddler with him everywhere he goes even when he's supposed to be taking out a suspected informant, Karl throws a temper tantrum shouting for his mum because he can't find a bunch of letters that are exactly where he left them etc. As you can see "Down Terrace" is a mishmash of different genres assembled under a unifying style. Does it fit together? Not quite. But it's an admirable effort. The drama stuff concerning a distressing lack of trust between family members, allies and friends and the deep underlying issues between father and son is wonderfully played by the cast (most notably between real-life father and son Robert and Robin Hill) and shot with apt intensity but the material is very recognisable and at times languorous. The comedy stuff works much better, as the sheer lunacy and absurdism of the situations the characters find themselves in provides us with a constant source of entertainment but the filmmakers never successfully marry the two and in the end, come across feeling indecisive. I was reminded somewhat of "A Film with Me In It", but unlike in that mess, the separate genre entities in "Down Terrace" work fine on their own but don't come together in the finished product. The film is the debut of Ben Wheatley, one of, if not the most divisive filmmaker of our time. Critics often divide between loving or hating him while the audiences are unified in not quite getting him. I always find myself somewhere in between, while I am certainly fascinated by his films I am never quite sure if I like them or not (except for "A Field in England" which is sheer genius). The same goes for "Down Terrace". I was slightly bored by the recognisable drama stuff, but I found the family dynamic in the cramped house most of the film is set in riveting. I was also consistently entertained by the comedic touches and found myself laughing out loud a few times. I am absolutely sure that the film is very far from perfect but it is a clear herald of an original and potentially fascinating new talent.
2.5/4 - DirectorStuart CooperStarsDonald SutherlandFrancine RacetteDavid HemmingsThriller about a contract killer whose wife has disappeared. When he is hired by an international organization to carry out a "shy" or hit, he suspects they are connected with her disappearance.03-05-2017
At first, we only hear piano music. Slow, soft and lovely. Then we see the player. The beautiful Francine Racette in a glamorous gown is sitting in a light-bathed room next to Donald Sutherland playing the instrument. They kiss lovingly. Then there's a hard cut to the jarringly desolate and cold wintery landscape. Gone is the warmth of the room, Francine Racette and the piano music. A car pulls up and Donald Sutherland exits, now tight, careful, dressed in winter clothes. The jarring difference between the two sequences is symptomatic of the entire film. All the way through we cut between the almost dreamlike, loving perfection of memories of times gone by and the hard, cold, bleak reality. We follow Sutherland down a ladder into a claustrophobic, mechanised hallway, all metal, bleak and dour. He approaches a man from behind and shoots him. The man falls, still alive. Sutherland approaches to finish the job. The man looks up at him and weakly says: "You shouldn't have done that." Sutherland raises his gun and shoots him. There's another jump cut, now to Sutherland in the car driving home, but it's a match cut and if we were to put the previous frame of him shooting the gun together with the one we are seeing now, the gun would be pointing straight to his head. This is the first of several symbolic match cuts in which Sutherland's character, a hitman, the best of them all (aren't they always) seemingly shoots himself. This gives us the hint, before he makes the same realisation, that everything that happens in the film is his fault. From choice of woman to choice of job. It's all his fault. When he finally returns home he finds his wife, the beautiful Francine Racette has disappeared and his bosses want him to carry out a hit in England, a hit he is highly suspicious of. As the film progresses it becomes obvious to us that Sutherland is right, but what exactly is waiting for him in England, we'll have to wait to find out. I have to say I was disappointed. After about 90 minutes of tense, taut and atmospheric drama, punctuated by some of cinematographer John Alcott's best work, the ending is a disappointment. Up to that point, the film was highly stylised, heavy on symbolism and psychology that it was anticlimactic to see the ending be so mundane, predictable and unsatisfying. Instead of ending the film on a similarly symbolic note, the filmmakers have Sutherland confront not himself or the mysterious organisation he's chosen to work for but a regular, thriller villain. Instead of following through on the metaphor of the hitman shooting himself, the filmmakers have your dime-a-dozen slimy bad guy be the architect of Sutherland's doom. I wasn't pleased. This may have something to do with the fact that the Derek Marlowe novel it was based on was just a regular potboiler. It is only through the work of director Stuart Cooper and writer Paul Mayersberg that "The Disappearance" became something more. But I have to say I enjoyed getting there. This is Cooper's third feature film, but it is still very rough around the edges. The combining of the present and the future is not done with as much skill and smoothness as it could have been and there is a decidedly unnecessary tag to the already confusing end that only added to my general exasperation. However, it is definitely an imaginative, stylish and ambitious thinking man's thriller and wonderfully showcases the immense talent of its wonderful cast. Sutherland is superb as the world-weary hitman. He plays the character very low-key as a sort of a logical conclusion to his "Klute" and "Blood Relatives" parts. Francine Racette is also terrific as his unpredictable, at times manic, wife. Also in the film, in small roles (almost cameos), are David Warner as Sutherland's Canadian contact, John Hurt as his English contact, Peter Bowles as his boss, Christopher Plummer as his wife's possible lover and producer and former British star extraordinaire David Hemmings as Racette's former husband from whom Sutherland stole her. The general tone of the film, pensive, slow, but very disorganised, wonderfully emulates the state of mind of our lead. Now, the beginning I described above is only to be found in the 'Director's Cut' which is also the 'Original Cut' Stuart Cooper made in 1977. However, the distributors hated it, as they do, and had it recut by famed film doctor Fima Noveck. Noveck's cut runs 20 minutes shorter and re-organises the film to run in a nearly chronological order. The constant cutting between past and present is almost completely removed. Also changed is the soundtrack from a quiet, almost unnoticeable and romantic Robert Farnon score to a pumping piece by Craig Huntley. This cut is much maligned and badly thought of but other than a distinctly awkward opening (which is actually some of the flashbacks showing how Sutherland met Racine cut together in a jarring and confusing way) I didn't find it to be a massive bastardization of the film. It is not horrible by any stretch. The default cut on the recent BluRay release is the mysterious 'Hybrid Cut'. No one is quite sure where it comes from, but it is a slightly cut down version of the 'Director's Cut'. I can't say I like it much. First off, the visual distinction between past and present is lost. Some idiot applied the warm hue from the past scenes to the present ones as well killing their hard, cold look. Also gone is the excellent match cut of Sutherland shooting himself described above. It is 14 minutes shorter than the 'Director's Cut' and the result of cutting several flashbacks and shortening some scenes is that the film moves at a fairly awkward pace and scenes don't quite cut together. There are several jarring moves from one scene to the next which are not present in the far superior 'Director's Cut' or even in the Fima Noveck cut. The difference between the Noveck cut and the Hybrid cut is this. The Hybrid cut preserves Cooper's original nonlinear storytelling but it is awkwardly edited, while the Fima Noveck cut streamlines the storytelling but moves at a smoother, slicker pace (after the aforementioned opening). The Noveck cut even does the film a slight favour. By removing its ambitious, daring format and all pretensions to symbolicism it makes the film a straightforward thriller thus making the ending work better. Anyway, I really wouldn't watch either but would head straight for the far superior 'Director's Cut' which is ambitious, bold, if not quite succesful in the end. In closing, I have to say I enjoyed "The Disappearance", flaws and all. It's certainly a bumpy ride, but an engrossing and enjoyable one. The spooky, pensive atmosphere is quite unique and the performances are terrific all 'round.
3/4 - DirectorBen WheatleyStarsNeil MaskellMyAnna BuringHarry SimpsonNearly a year after a botched job, a hitman takes a new assignment with the promise of a big payoff for three killings. What starts off as an easy task soon unravels, sending the killer into the heart of darkness.03-05-2017
"Kill List" starts out very much like director/writer Ben Wheatley's previous effort "Down Terrace". It's a story about a shellshocked hitman (Neil Maskell) with martial problems shot in that Mike Leighesque kitchen-sink realism style. But there's something deeply unsettling in the background, a groaning, nauseating sound on the soundtrack, unusual editing choices and an intensity far beyond the expected. As the film unravels and as the hitman goes on another job with his partner and friend Gal (Michael Smiley), the frightening, horrid possibility that there's something very sinister going on starts rearing its ugly head. The best way to describe the tone of "Kill List", because like "Down Terrace" this is also more about tone and atmosphere than plot, is foreboding, ominous and uncomfortable. There's a sense, in every shot of the film, that something is not right, something is off-kilter and it provokes that same unsettling feeling you might have had watching "Irreversible" or listening to a pure 28 Hz sine wave, that guttural, instinctive reaction. I was also reminded of the beginning of "The Wicker Man", the sequences in which you begin to notice that Summerisle is not just another British island. Now lay this profoundly uncomfortable feeling over scenes played at an intensity that John Cassavetes would have envied and you've got yourself "Kill List". Watching a Ben Wheatley film is a special experience. Each of his films demands a second or third viewing when you can put such things as plot and character and sense behind you, sit back and just feel the movie, the atmosphere. I have to say I never fell in love with the plot of "Kill List". There's never enough information or clues for us to get invested in uncovering the central mystery nor was I particularly interested in Maskell's marital problems with MyAnna Buring, but as the film progressed I found it very effective and by the end, it got to me. I was profoundly disturbed and unsettled. On second viewing, I realised this wasn't just a fluke, a one-off thing or me being in the right mood. "Kill List" is very skillfully made and each cut, shot and sound effect is carefully planned and aimed. It's a great testament to Wheatley that his careful construction works and an even greater one that it remains invisible on first viewing. Now that I've praised Wheatley, the director, I must mention my reservations about Wheatley, the writer. The script for "Kill List" is fairly weak. The characters are likeable only on the account of good casting. Michael Smiley is a hugely charismatic actor, fun to watch and Neil Maskell has a certain childlike vulnerability. Their chemistry leaves something to be desired for, but they're good enough actors to make it work. The characters, themselves, however, aren't that compelling. The story, which I've already mentioned isn't that impressive, plays out like a better-written version of "A Serbian Film", but that's not very high praise. In fact, "Kill List" can in many ways be seen as "A Serbian Film" if it wasn't vulgar, pretentious, stiffly-acted and equally badly written twaddle. Wheatley, like in "Down Terrace" chooses to focus more on martial squabbles, oblique discussions about something that happened in Kiev and banter between Smiley and Maskell than the mysterious goings-on and questions posed by the plot. Apparently, he likes to allow his actors to improvise entire scenes and it really shows in a bad way. There is quite a lot of rambling in this film, stuff that could have easily been cut or would have been better if it were carefully rehearsed or actually, oh god strike heathen me down, written. Mike Leigh's legendary improvisatory process is mysterious and magical and no one's ever been able to tap into it so I'm not sure why Wheatley consistently insists on trying. This was also a problem I had with "Down Terrace" but that film, due to a general lack of stylistic flourishes seemed more unfocused than "Kill List" which is firmly grounded by its brilliant atmosphere. A similar thing later happened in Wheatley's marvellous "A Field in England", which also had certain scenes of endless rambling and ad-libbing but the whole film was held together by its unique and distinctive style and absurdism. Finally, at times "Kill List" runs out of steam. There were certain scenes in which I felt like screaming "Get on with it". There are several too many montages and mundane discussions. I get that Wheatley likes this kitchen-sink realism but there is a measure to all things. I was bored once or twice, but when in gear "Kill List" works (to stress it again) not due to its characters, plot or dialogue but due to its intensity, discomfort and performances. With a tight script, less Mike Leigh and more David Lynch, "Kill List" could have been masterpiece, but even as it stands it delivers a potent punch. As the film finished I was sufficiently disturbed to give this film a passing grade.
3/4 - DirectorBen WheatleyStarsAlice LoweKenneth HadleySteve OramChris wants to show girlfriend Tina his world, but events soon conspire against the couple and their dream caravan holiday takes a very wrong turn.04-05-2017
As I've said many times before, dark comedy is almost impossible to pull off. It requires a minute, perfect balance of horror and comedy pitched at just the right level. I have to say I've never seen a good dark comedy which didn't treat the dark elements with a sense of levity, casualness and surrealism. This is why "Sightseers", Ben Wheatley's send-up to Mike Leigh's "Nuts in May", fails. There's an underlying gloomy nastiness to it that makes us genuinely uncomfortable. This is not a good feeling to have throughout a comedy. Now, I'm not saying nastiness can't gel with comedy, take a look at Stephen Frears' masterpiece "Mr Jolly Lives Next Door", a perfect blend of horrid and humorous. I'm saying it doesn't work here. And the fault of that lies squarely on the shoulders of director Ben Wheatley, whose naturalistic, shaky-cam style makes the murdering feel too real. I don't know if this has to do with an ingrained morality of some sort but I don't find murdering inherently funny. I do love dark comedies, but what makes them funny is not the events depicted but the way in which they are depicted. Take a look for example at "The Green Man" in which Alistair Sim describes with jolly glee how he blew up his school when he was a kid, or take a look at Paul Bartel's brilliant "Eating Raoul" in which the bloodless murders are hilarious precisely because they feel so stylised and over-the-top. Reality, emotion and laws of physics are defenestrated very early in "Mr Jolly Lives Next Door" so when the senseless murdering starts, the atmosphere of surrealism and otherworldliness envelopes the events. "Sightseers", comparatively, just feels nasty. I was reminded of another film I found similarly humourless and disgusting, the much revered "Withnail and I" which to me is just an attempt to do what Rik Mayall and the Comic Strip company did so well without understanding how to make it funny. By bringing realism into the equation, Wheatley forces us, the audience, to involve our sense of morality into the question. He never lets us feel like we are watching the film. He makes us feel complicit in the action. For this reason, I found "Sightseers" at times reprehensible and profoundly uncomfortable, which is a shame, because I think it could have been a really terrific movie. Alice Lowe and Steve Oram are great in their roles as a self-involved, entitled and very disturbed couple on a caravaning trip to Yorkshire. They have great chemistry and their characterisations are reminiscent (in a good way) of those by Paul Bartel and Mary Woronov in the aforementioned "Eating Raoul". I really enjoyed watching them. Of course, Wheatley, in his trademark style, allows them to ramble on for too long, eventually drowning their fine comedic timing. Again, less Mike Leigh, please, you can't do it, Wheatley. The idea of them killing everyone they find annoying on the way is also quite a clever one, but beside the previously described problem I had with the tone of the whole thing, I also found the people they encountered and the methods in which they dispatch them, unimaginative and very, very repetitive. Wheatley also spends a little too much time developing and explaining the relationship between the two leads, which I found to be unnecessary and languorous. Overall, "Sightseers" fails at a very basic level, the tone. Ben Wheatley's trademark realism is not a good match for surreal dark comedy. It just can't work. Ever. I do have to say that some of "Sightseers" is quite funny. Mostly the scenes between Lowe and Oram when they're not murdering people. But while watching the film I was haunted by a sense that this is a sadly missed opportunity. Even more so, because Edgar Wright, the most talented comedy director around, who certainly could have made this film unforgettable is credited as an executive producer. His brand of crazy humour would have made "Sightseers" more palatable and thus funnier, smarter and actually good.
2/4 - DirectorAlice LoweStarsAlice LoweDan Renton SkinnerJo HartleyWidow Ruth is seven months pregnant when, believing herself to be guided by her unborn baby, she embarks on a homicidal rampage, dispatching anyone who stands in her way.04-05-2017
Actress and writer Alice Lowe's directorial debut "Prevenge" is one of the strangest films I've seen in a long time. A wild, uncategorisable and consistently entertaining mixture of horror, comedy and drama it is a surprisingly effective film in ways that the Lowe written, Ben Wheatley directed "Sightseers" wasn't. Proving herself to be a hugely talented director, Alice Lowe achieves that insanely difficult goal which has (despite valiant attempts) always evaded Wheatley. In "Prevenge" she seamlessly blends comedy and horror in a film which is alternatingly absolutely hilarious and deeply disturbing. She smartly uses the two genres to complement each other by constantly switching gears without warning or ever slowing down. Thus, the horror scenes are more shocking and disturbing because they are positioned immediately before disarmingly funny moments and in the same way the comedic scenes are made funnier by the sheer lunacy and surrealism of having them follow bloody, gut-wrenching murder scenes. More admirable, however, is the genuine streak of sadness which underlines the entire film. Instead of feeling complicit with our lead, Ruth, like you do with the couple in "Sightseers" or cheering her on like you do with the couple in "Eating Raoul", you feel sorry for her. She seems like a really lovely, caring person deeply disturbed by the sudden death of her husband on a hiking trip. On the same day, she finds out she is pregnant. Driven insane by grief, hormones and possibly guilt, she decides to kill everyone who was with her husband on that hiking trip blaming them for his death. In order to justify her killing spree, her sick mind convinces her that her unborn baby is talking to her and ordering her to kill. "Prevenge" is a movie made with great skill, greater than I'd ever expect from a debutant. She has obviously learned a lot from the debacle of "Sightseers" and unlike Wheatley's rambling, tonally-wrong film, "Prevenge" is focused, smart and emotional. All the dialogue is cleverly and tightly written and delivered with great timing by a hugely talented cast. The plot is original, with unexpected turns and (again, unlike in "Sightseers") the murder scenes are imaginative, inventive and alternately hilarious (like the one in which Gemma Wheelan mistakes the knife-wielding Lowe for a charity worker and boxes her) and heartbreaking (like the one in which she feels sick at having to kill the very nice and sympathetic Mike Wozniak). The Wozniak scene is especially tense and suspenseful. He is such a nice and lovable presence, but you know what's coming. The suspense is almost Hitchcockian as you hope, from the bottom of the heart, that Lowe won't do it. This scene was a huge gamble and if Lowe's character wasn't so likeable and sad the whole film would have come crashing like a house of cards. Much in the same way (I know, I'm repeating myself) "Sightseers" did in which the victims were far more likeable than the killers. "Prevenge" is an intense, hilarious, disturbing, deeply saddening and constantly entertaining masterstroke. I, for one, am eagerly expecting the next Alice Lowe film (as long as it's not directed by Ben Wheatley).
3.5/4 - DirectorSidney LumetStarsSean ConneryDyan CannonMartin BalsamAfter ten years in prison to protect a mafia family, Duke Anderson is released and he cashes in a debt of honor with the mob to bankroll a caper.10-05-2017
"The Anderson Tapes" is a strange mix of a big caper movie, a paranoia thriller and Kafkaesque satire that unbelievable predates the Watergate by a year. I suspect conspiracy theorists will have a field day with this one as it features a lot of people listening in on each other and then erasing the tapes after they incriminate them some time before it became the in thing to do. The dating thing is even stranger considering that all the surveillance sequences feel strangely tacked on, almost like an afterthought. One could reasonably (if not sanely) assume that Sidney Lumet might have had a top tip on the upcoming sea change. "The Anderson Tapes" is firmly, in its structure, pacing, style, and heart a heist film. It follows the well-known formula of the one-last-job plot with a lovable villain being released from prison, him going on to recruit a motley crew of misfits, and then pulling the job with varying degrees of success. Our anti-hero here is the titular Anderson, a stoic, tough, sardonic, smooth, and ruthless man's man with an eye for the ladies and an indelible charm. There aren't many actors who could pull that off and still remain likeable throughout but Sean Connery does it. In the film's prison opening, Anderson remarks: "What's advertising but a legalised con game? And what the hell's marriage? Extortion, prostitution, soliciting with a government stamp on it. And what the hell's your stock market? A fixed horse race. Some business guy steals a bank, he's a big success story. Face in all the magazines. Some other guy steals the magazine and he's busted." And in this world who could argue with him. His plan is to literally burst through the doors of an apartment building and strip it clean. An audacious job for an audacious man. To help him, he calls on an old debt of honour from a quirky, nostalgic mob boss (Alan King) and some old friends including a gay, antique dealer (Martin Balsam), an ancient crook just out from a 40-year stretch (Stan Gottlieb), and a quiet, awkward newbie (Christopher Walken). The thing Anderson doesn't know is that his every step is being recorded. All of his associates seem to be on the government's tail list. The Narcs are tailing the kid, the FBI is tailing the antique dealer, the IRS is tailing the mob, a quasi-HUAC organisation is tailing another of Anderson's comrades etc. etc. etc. Bugs are everywhere, in walls, elevators, pens, and everyone seems to be an undercover agent. In one particularly entertaining scene, an unassuming waiter goes to a back room and removes listening devices from his sleeves, shoes and pockets. The one thing no one seems to be interested in is Anderson's caper. All the agencies are minding their own problems and despite his every move being recorded, he goes about his business undisturbed. The third part of the film constitutes the nice human touches screenwriter Frank Pierson manages to squeeze in between the caper film and the paranoia thriller. There are fine subtle moments in which you get to know the characters, and yet Anderson is the only one with a real personality. All the other ones are simply caricatures (well played, but still broadly drawn). He gets the longest (and often tedious) subplot involving him and his high-class hooker girlfriend (Dyan Cannon). All of these subplots and genre shifts could work in a better-organised picture, but like Anderson's plan, "The Anderson Tapes" is very crudely assembled and executed and gets out of director Sidney Lumet's hands. None of the subplots really connect, even though there is ample opportunity for them to do so. All the taping and surveillance leads to nothing except for a clever commentary on Watergate well before it happened. If you were to cut out all the government scenes you wouldn't even know they were there. The girlfriend plot also fails to connect and kinda stops half-way through. Cannon is good in her role but obsolete. Finally, the caper stuff works well. The motley crew is entertaining, especially King as the mob boss. "Hey, look at me, Vic." he muses during a particularly intense old-timers reminiscing session "I'm a businessman. My gut is swelling. My arse is dropping. I got a wife and three kids. I belong to four clubs. I worry about the crabgrass in the lawn and worms in the poodle. It ain't right. Man's a hunting animal. It ain't natural to be an accountant." There are similar examples of clever dialogue throughout but they are the exception. Typical dialogue in "The Anderson Tapes" is cold and expositional, unless King's on screen. Another terrific character in the film is the no-nonsense policeman 'Iron Balls' Delaney (Ralph Meeker) who proved so popular that he got his own film, "The First Deadly Sin", nine years later with Frank Sinatra in the lead. What "The Anderson Tapes" should have done is tried harder to bind its content into a comprehensible and engaging whole. As it is, it's all over the place. The pieces are good but don't fit. You'll certainly be entertained, and snapping your fingers to Quincy Jones' excellent score, but you will not be satisfied.
2.5/4 - DirectorJordan PeeleStarsDaniel KaluuyaAllison WilliamsBradley WhitfordA young African-American visits his white girlfriend's parents for the weekend, where his simmering uneasiness about their reception of him eventually reaches a boiling point.13-05-2017
Comedian Jordan Peele's directorial debut has been welcomed with open arms and almost universal acclaim. If I were to tell you that the film is nominally a horror film, this fact would be surprising, but your astonishment will vein when I tell you it deals with race relations. In today's snowflakey, white-guilt atmosphere you're almost guaranteed to receive great notices if your film is 1) at least competent and 2) deals with racism. "Get Out" is both of these things and does both of them very well, but I am sure that its uncharacteristically warm reception has a lot to do with the climate it was released in. I also suspect that the recent US elections had a lot to do with it. I am not saying racism is not a potent, important subject for films to deal with, far from it, what I am saying is that "Get Out" wasn't analysed and dissected cooly and rationally because it tugged on certain chords. I am no republican or conservative but I am about as far from a snowflake as you can get without going into the banjo-fiddling "Deliverance" cliche. My hair remained firmly on my head after the elections and I don't shout racism every time I watch a movie that doesn't have a black actor in it. I am also not one to disintegrate into tears every time racism is portrayed on screen. For me, it's a subject matter and not a trigger. When done right such as in "Amistad", "Driving Miss Daisy", "The Defiant Ones", "In the Heat of the Night", "Mississippi Burning" or indeed "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" I react favourably to the film, when done badly I dislike the film. Because of all of this, my reaction to "Get Out" was based on logic, rational thought and years of dedicated movie watching instead of feelings. Looked on in that way I found "Get Out" to be lacking and not quite as brilliant as its hype would have it. Undoubtedly, it's a movie made with great skill. Jordan Peele is far from competent, he's excellent. Through gradual hints, off-beat moments and subtle foreshadowing he builds a stupendously creepy atmosphere of unease and suspicion that could rank up with the best of the best horror films. He also has an excellent feel for eye-catching visuals and "Get Out" looks marvellous. Cinematographer Toby Oliver gives the film a sharp, sheeny look. Also excellent is the work of composer Michael Abels who composes a terrific horror score full of off-key notes, ominous chants and scare chords, it manages to be evocative without becoming cheesy. Lastly, not enough kudos can be given to the cast, all of whom play their characters pitch perfect making them at the same time vaguely humorous and vaguely terrifying so you'll never quite sure whether they're joking or not. Where the film comes apart and breaks down like a house of cards is the script. I am not talking about the dialogue, characters or tone, all of which are adequate, I am talking about the occasionally nonsensical, fairly uninvolving and completely predictable plot. Now, I hear that not everyone had this reaction while watching the film, but I could with psychic precision guess (nay, predict) what will happen next without fail. Every beat of this film was familiar, obvious, and telegraphed. If you've ever read or seen any version of "The Stepford Wives", know anything about how hypnotism works in films and have caught the detail about one of the characters professions' you too, my friend, will be able to play the guess what'll happen next game. The film begins with the premise of "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" with an English-rose type perky, rosy-cheeked white girl (Allison Williams) taking her black boyfriend (Daniel Kaluuya) to meet her parents. At first, all is fine and dandy as the parents seem to be wonderfully accepting, liberal, and nice even if they are trying a bit too hard. However, the film soon swerves into the Ira Levine territory when Kaluuya starts noticing strange things. The house servants, both black, act strangely, smiling all the time in that contractually-nice shopkeeper kind of way, blindly jogging in the night, or always adjusting their haircuts/hats in all reflective surfaces. Soon, the rest of the family and friends arrive and they too are acting strangely, analysing Kaluuya almost as if they want to buy him. Are they all trying to hard, or is something afoot. Well, as I said, the film is almost a remake of "The Stepford Wives" and coupled with the stuff I mentioned before the plot of "Get Out" becomes obvious way before anything of any real substance happens. This leaves us with about an hour to go and little to do. The only mystery in the film left for me was the motive of the villains which when revealed ends up being fairly disappointingly cliche. By evoking two excellent works, "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" and "The Stepford Wives", "Get Out" does itself a further disservice as it undoubtedly compares negatively to both, and in the world where all three films and Levin's book are readily available (just a click away), the existence of this sub-par mishmash is obsolete. Now, there is a lot of "Get Out" I actively enjoyed. Most notably, perhaps, when the comic-relief character Rod (LilRel Howery) was on screen. Even though he is the most thoroughly stock black best friend character imaginable, Howery brings so much energy, charisma, and good humour to the part that he becomes irresistably hilarious. I also loved the scenes between the parents and Kaluuya before the horror elements kick in. There's an underlying tension there that if further explored could have been fascinating. In fact, had Jordan Peele completely axed the needless and bluntly symbolic "Stepford Wives" plot and created a straightforward "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" for the nominally liberal age, the subtle and understated comedy/drama about casual racism that the film seems to be before it swerves into horror, "Get Out" could have been fascinating. As it stands, I found that despite several highly enjoyable and well-executed parts the whole just doesn't work. The plot is so derivative and reminiscent that I was having flashbacks throughout, the plot didn't quite make sense to me and there were too many horror cliches around that despite a subtly comedic tone never really felt like parody. Take, for instance, the mysteriously white trash son (Caleb Landry Jones) of this affluent and well-educated family. His only role in the film is to menacingly play a small guitar on the front porch and provide a fight scene for the climax. I was disappointed, but am looking forward to Jordan Peele's next film as the man has a lot, and I mean a lot, of directorial talent, even if his scriptwriting skills need work.
2.5/4 - DirectorMichael BayStarsMark WahlbergDwayne JohnsonAnthony MackieA trio of bodybuilders in Florida get caught up in an extortion ring and a kidnapping scheme that goes terribly wrong.25-05-2017
To call director/producer Michael Bay polarising is tempting but inaccurate for polarising implies an even or almost even divide. However, in Bay's case, it seems that he is almost universally panned by all those "in the know", as they say. This is the man behind such disasters as "Pearl Harbor", "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles", "Armageddon", "The Island" and most of all all five "Transformer" movies. And yet, I find it hard to entirely dismiss Bay, in hopes that one day he'll give us another film like "Bad Boys" or "The Rock", both of which I liked and continue to enjoy. What I never expected to say is that Bay's redemption will come in the form of a black comedy. A genre so notoriously difficult to pull off that there it has barely a handful of good examples. And yet he's pulled it off. What is even more unbelievable is that it is a perfect piece of self-parody for his dumb, pumped-up, steroid crazed three leads would almost certainly be massive fans of the "Transformers" series. They are the sort of people who cheer for the American dream but believe it to be a "take as much as you can and to hell with the rest" clause. They're a trio of gym workers who decide to kidnap their richest client (Tony Shalhoub) and "convince" him to sign over to them of his money. It wouldn't be a black comedy if things didn't absolutely wrong for them. In their drug-fueled, stupidy-induced state they continuously overlook all the holes in their logic until the plot escalates to shoot-outs and murders. It is their dazed conscience that drives the plot, gives it pace and a winning tone. They never stop to reflect and neither does the movie, they just stumble from one incident to another, each stupider and more violent than the one before and the film is happy to jump along for the ride. Bay is the absolutely perfect director for this material. His trademark no-rest, no-stop, manic pace allows "Pain & Gain" to avoid all the pitfalls many, oh so many, failed black comedies fell into. There is no reflection, no moralising, no drama, there is no moment where we the audience get to feel horrified by the events before us. Now, to clear things up, this is not because the film approves of their actions, or because the filmmakers have made the criminals likeable. The absolute opposite is true. All three are shown to be completely self-absorbed, disturbed, stupid, and thoroughly unpleasant characters and the film never fails to point out just how idiotic their machinations are. The reason why the film treats their crimes with such levity is that they do too. They don't think much of what they are doing, they just stumble head-first. This is what eventually proves to be their downfall. Upon its original release "Pain & Gain" achieved a certain dose of infamy because it is, unbelievably, based on a true story. The typical band of righteous hellraiser raised a storm against the film branding it irresponsible and evil, all based on a major misconception that the film glorifies the trio. I don't know what kind of an idiot could watch "Pain & Gain" and ever think to behave like these nincompoops do. The film gleefully laughs at them and shows them for the asses they are and yet it seems that there is a lot of people out there who are too immature to understand this. I suppose this is the same snowflake gang who would get offended watching Mel Brooks' "The Producers". And for all those who have a problem with the film being historically inaccurate... Remember these three words: "It's a film". If you want accuracy there are several documentaries about the events portrayed here. If you want plenty of quotable lines, madcap entertainment and laughs galore and are not squeamish or easily offended than "Pain & Gain" is for you. The cast is excellent. The trio is played with laser-like comedic precision by Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson and Anthony Mackie. Their victim is played by the always excellent Tony Shalhoub, and the determined, old-fashioned PI who comes after them by Ed Harris. With a cast like that, you can't go wrong. The script is by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, a duet who's recently been busy penning the Marvel movies but have had my attention since the excellent HBO biopic "The Life and Death of Peter Sellers". Their script is witty, pacy and thoroughly enjoyable. Finally, Michael Bay's over-the-top direction brings all the elements together. I enjoyed his inventive camerawork in this film as much as I hated it in the "Transformers" films. Unlike Tom Hooper's singularly annoying ADD overdirecting, Bay's style can really, really work with good material. Before closing statements, I also have to point out a terrific brief performance from Emily Rutherfurd as Harris' steely wife who remains calm and taciturn in the face of all events. When her husband brings home the wheelchair-ridden and bloodied Shalhoub she barely bats an eyelid, when Harris is overtaken by back pains she only quips "It's because of your trip to the gym, isn't it?" She's very funny in this film. In the end, I have to say that I really enjoyed "Pain & Gain". Is it a perfect film? No. At 129 minutes it does feel a little bloated, there are occasional moments where it could have been smarter, a little more fleshed out and not all of it works (Rebel Wilson's character is pushed a bit too far) but when it does (which is more often than it doesn't) it is really, really funny and entertaining and impressively, tonally never drops the ball which is all that counts in a comedy such as this.
3/4 - DirectorKen WiederhornStarsClarence ThomasBrooke AdamsLuke HalpinVisitors to a remote island discover that a reclusive Nazi commandant has been breeding a group of Zombie soldiers.25-05-2017
"Shock Waves" is the debut of director Ken Wiederhorn, a figure not particularly beloved in the film world whose other films have (rightly) been largely forgotten. His filmography contains such flops as horrifically dumb bro-coms "King Frat" (an appalling rip-off of "Animal House") and "Meatballs Part II" (less meat and more... you know), well-made but uninspired and sleazy thrillers "Eyes of a Stranger" and "A House in the Hills", the wholly forgettable first sequel to "Return of the Living Dead" and the criminally awful "Dark Tower", a film so bad even Wiederhorn took his name off of it. However, "Shock Waves" has always had a certain cult status among horror enthusiasts and I have to say it is not entirely undeserved. If I were to see this in 1977 I would have said that I am looking forward to Wiederhorn's next project as "Shock Waves" has several wonderfully inspired and truly chilling sequences. Looking back on them now, though, I know they are just flukes, passing moments of mysterious inspiration, or beginner's luck. The film begins on a totally wrong note by straight-up telling us who's going to survive, but let's not pretend we couldn't have guessed anyway. After being rescued by a fisherman and his son, Rose (Brooke Adams) recounts her story in flashback. She was on a sightseeing boat with a very horror-film-cliche bunch of people. There's the good-looking sailor (Luke Halpin), an annoying snob (Jack Davidson) and his wife (D.J. Sidney), a mysterious, quiet tourist (Fred Buch), a humorous cook (Don Stout), and the grizzled captain (John Carradine). Their boat breaks down and they wander up to an island far off the coast. During the night they are grazed by a passing derelict ship and the captain goes missing because Weiderhorn only had Carradine for four days, so the group decides to go ashore. On the island, they discover a beautiful and abandoned hotel occupied by a mysterious man (Peter Cushing) whom they can't seem to catch. And then one of those moments of inspiration strikes Wiederhorn and genius horror is made. Only for one sequence, mind, but what a sequence! At first, we see an underwater shot of some sand and a turbine. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, a pair of feet wearing army boots walk into shot. The man seems to be walking underwater. Then there's a cut and we see this perfectly blond Arian in a Nazi uniform and black welding glasses walking on the sea floor before his head emerges from the water. He looks around, slowly, left and right, and then dead into the camera. He lunges forward and gets out of the water. There's no sudden noise, no string chords, just atmosphere. and real inspiration and yet I jumped. I hate jump scares as a rule, but this is the first and to date only I've ever truly liked. It's so atmospheric, smart, and (most importantly) earned. Sadly, from there the film never has moments like that. The rest is bog-standard horror stuff as the cast runs around the island and is killed one by one. The kills themselves are not particularly imaginative and curiously tame compared to some other 70s schlock. The basic plot is insane but good. Cushing is an SS Commander who was in charge of a corps of Nazi zombies trained to kill enemy soldiers. After the war, they were hidden away on the island. Sadly, not much is made of this and it's only ever brought up in a lengthy exposition dump by Cushing before he too is killed off. I can't say I didn't enjoy "Shock Waves", it has great atmosphere, a wonderful score composed of electronic whines and twangs by Richard Einhorn and several genuinely suspenseful sequences, but overall the film has a stunningly amateurish quality about it. And in a way, speaking of production, it's a lot closer to a home movie than a film. It was financed entirely by the family of producer/cinematographer Reuben Trane who then hired his film-school buddy Wiederhorn to write and direct the film. Some years earlier the pair had won the Student Academy Award for a similar joint venture but a cinematic release of this ambition requires more professionalism. Trane, for instance, took on the cinematography duties on himself. He had never done it before (or since) and wasn't trained for the job and it clearly shows. The entire film has a dull, flat look to it and there are mistakes galore all the way through evident even to an untrained observer. Often there will be shots out of focus, shots that are over-exposed and in a stunning goof even for a low-budget horror film, one shot meant to show the boat passing through the night manages to capture only the night and a few passing lights. I can understand how Trane, an untrained DP thrown (literally and figuratively) into the deep end could make such a mistake, but I have no idea why Wiederhorn, who presumably has eyes, kept this study in total darkness in the film. Along the way we also encounter constant goofs (corpses moving when they shouldn't, lamps falling over), uneven zombie performances (some stumble around, some stalk with military precision and some walk around like the camera's caught them on their coffee break) and bad acting (even from the obviously bored out of his mind Carradine) as well as a generous array of horror cliches such as characters acting like absolute idiots, the monsters having ridiculous flaws and attacking only when plot convenient. It's a stumbling, bumbling, plodding film with occasional moments of truly effective horror wedged between standard scenes that seem like they are coming from a "How to Make a Horror Film" manual. For some, its cheapness may be charming (it mostly was for me too), for some, it may be tedious, but the good moments are worth a look. If you can stomach the nonsense between them watch the whole film if you have something better to watch (you probably do) just watch the highlights on YouTube.
2.5/4 - DirectorPeter SasdyStarsChristopher LeePeter CushingDiana DorsThree rich trustees are murdered - appearing as suicides. When a bus filled with orphans and three other rich trustees has an "accident," Colonel Bingham investigates.26-05-2017
Frustrated after years of acting in what he perceived to be sub-par horror films without a hint of art or vision, Christopher Lee with Hammer producer Anthony Nelson Keys opened his own production company called Charlamagne. Their goal was to make "real" horror films which relied more on atmosphere, story and character rather than on gore, cheap scares or effects. While this was certainly a noble idea, Lee and Keys failed to deliver the goods and Charlemagne's first and only film was "Nothing But the Night. A curiously rushed production of little merit that fades even more in comparison to the output of Amicus and Hammer. Lee was telling the truth when he said that his films would lack gore, cheap scares or special effects, but "Nothing But the Night" also noticeably lacks atmosphere, an interesting story or well-drawn characters. With a talky script, uninspired directing and actors with nothing to work from it is a sad muddle of good intentions and lack of material. The story at first follows a psychiatrist, Dr Haynes (Keith Barron) who is trying to figure out why a young orphan (Gwyneth Strong) on his ward is having nightmares about fire. Meanwhile, the orphanage is putting pressure on the doctor to have her released as there is nothing wrong with the girl. Haynes turns to his superior, Dr Ashley (Peter Cushing) for help, but before anything can be done, the girl's mother (Diana Dors), a formerly imprisoned prostitute, attempts to kidnap the child and Haynes ends up murdered. Enter semiretired policeman, Colonel Bingham (Christopher Lee) investigating a series of mysterious deaths of Van Traylen fund trustees. The girl's orphanage is also part of the trust and he is an old friend of Dr Ashley. What follows is a pretty trodding and often ludicrous plot that ends in a very rushed, exposition dump that makes little sense or even tries to. I don't know how it works in the John Blackburn novel the film was based on, but here it is a complete washout, an anticlimax. However, the final nail in the coffin is not the uninteresting and often meandering plot, but rather the fact that the film is curiously bland. There is no atmosphere to speak of, no sense of urgency (despite copious amounts of policemen running around and Lee shouting left and right) and definitely no suspense. Most of the runtime consists of people explaining things at each other or Diana Dors crawling around a Scottish island as if she's doing a bad impression of a horny slug. Not all, but a very large part of the blame rests on the shoulders of director Peter Sasdy, a decent-enough director up to this point. I don't know what happened but after "Nothing But the Night" he never made a good film at all. His direction here resembles something you might see in a low-budget mini-series. He takes no chances and remains completely uninspired throughout. Brian Hayles' script takes the rest of the blame. Oddly paced, it is a plodding piece of work, prone to handwaving major issues or simply forgetting important scenes took place until they are of course all explained in a lengthy final monologue by the villain. The characters are all so broadly drawn I think I would have found it hard to distinguish them had they not been played by such distinguished actors. Cushing, Lee and Barron do a fine job in their respective roles but their characters have no real personalities, traits or quirks. They just do what their plot requires them to. Diana Dors is less good, though certainly more memorable. She throws caution to the wind and plays the role of the inadequate mother with the same amount of subtlety Faye Dunaway had starring in "Mommie Dearest". I enjoyed Fulton Mackay as the chief constable. Also present is Georgia Brown in an obsolete role as a journalist. With a little inventive rewriting, she could have been easily removed. The young Gwyneth Strong grew up to play Cassandra in "Only Fools and Horses". She was a better actress in 1973, though that's not saying much. "Nothing But the Night" is a flop through-and-through. It's as uninspired as Lee thought Hammer films were. A completely vapid, meritless and forgettable film best described with the word dull.
1.5/4 - DirectorJack StarrettStarsPeter FondaWarren OatesLoretta SwitTwo couples vacationing together in an R.V. from Texas to Colorado are terrorized after they witness a murder during a Satanic ritual.27-05-2017
If you're sick and tired of horror fans and want to avoid them for a week or so just go out of town to the most beautiful remote place you can find. The reason they're endemic to ugly cityscapes is that all good horror fans know that evil lurks in picturesque clearings, forests and small towns. Had our four leads known that they could have gotten out of a whole lot of trouble. "Race with the Devil" combines several horror genres into a fast-paced, intense and quite often hilarious mix. Two best friends (Peter Fonda & Warren Oates) and their respective wives (Lara Parker & Loretta Swit) go on a caravanning trip to Aspen. On the way, they stop in a secluded forest clearing to spend the night. Fonda & Oates have a few beers, a nice chat and while taking a stroll notice a huge fire on the other side of a small river. Curious, as all horror victims are, they go to investigate. What they see is a group of people, some naked, some in capes and robes engaged in some sort of ritual. Oates describes it as "some kind of dancing, like ring-around-a-rosie". Soon, though, he'll see just how wrong he was when the leader of the group sacrifices a young girl right before their eyes and then notices them just as, in a moment of typical horror stupidity, Swit shouts they should come on back into the RV. A madcap chase ensues as Fonda & Oates do their best to run away from the manic group of Satan worshippers in one of the film's best sequences. Tense, startling and at times downright scary, half-naked Satanists jumping on an RV have never been more effective. They manage to escape and decide to push on to Aspen. What follows is a series of episodes of increasing danger and violence as they realise that the Satanists are following them and are out to kill. There is an array of chase films out there from the serious horror ones like "Duel" and "Mad Max" to the silly comedy ones like "Smokey and the Bandit" and "Cannonball Run". They're not all great, but I find that I tend to enjoy them. While I usually tune out of action scenes, punch-ups and fist fights, I find car chases to be exhilarating. The big problem with "Race with the Devil", however, is that it can't quite decide on its tone. The big set pieces work marvellously. The first chase is, like I said before, wonderfully tense and scary. There is a scene when the four battle snakes in the cramped RV that is absolutely startling from start to finish, and the film has a brilliantly terrifying climax. But what it lacks is atmosphere. You see, strangely, this film is too funny to be scary. The moments between the big chases and scares are filled with interactions between the leads and their chemistry is so good, and the lines so witty, you almost forget you're not watching a road trip comedy. It's great that the filmmakers took so much time to make us really care for these characters, but a starker, tougher tone like the one in "Duel" could have done wonders for this film. The shifts between horror and comedy are quite jarring and it's hard to believe that these four characters can have a laugh and a dance mere hours after being chased down by a crazed cult out for their blood. Along the way "Race with the Devil" bumps into several other typical horror problems such as very thinly drawn characters. Sure, we spend the entire film with them, and we really do care for all four of them, but this is more down to Fonda, Oates, Swit & Parker and their charisma than the script. Neither of them has personality beyond that of their actors and by the end, we know nothing about them other than their names. Then there's the question of believability. The plot could have worked with a more realistic tone to it, but the flippancy with which the characters deal with their predicament almost encourages us to pick holes in the plot. And there are plenty. I won't go into the details so I don't spoil the film but suffice to say that along the way they run into a lot of weird, suspicious people and yet they fall for the same tricks every time. I also have to wonder how do these small towns in the middle of nowhere have such well-stocked libraries. All this said, however, I really enjoyed "Race with the Devil", mostly because of its brilliant cast and some genuinely thrilling scenes. The whole third act, in particular, is brilliant as the comedy gets dropped and things (finally) get serious. This is one just to be enjoyed, a film you have to get on board with and make allowances for. If you do, it's an entertaining, thrilling and in the end potentially scary ride.
3/4 - DirectorPeter CarterStarsHal HolbrookLawrence DaneRobin GammellFive doctors on a wilderness outing are stalked by disfigured, crazed killers.27-05-2017
"Rituals" is the Canuxploitation rip-off of "Deliverance", a much-beloved movie I found to be an unexciting, overlong adventure film that relied too heavily on symbolism instead of introducing elements of psychological disarray between its main characters. "Rituals" takes the opposite approach, but takes it too far. Its lead characters do nothing but bicker on and on for 100 minutes making the film unbearably tedious. These arguments we are forced to listen to are on the level of fifth-graders arguing about who gets the first go at a video game. Take this shining moment under consideration. Harry (Hal Holbrook) and Mitzi (Lawrence Dane) are lost in the wilderness carrying their wounded friend (Robin Gammell) on an improvised stretcher. In fact, most of the film's second act is comprised of wide shots showing precisely this. The only thing in the composition that changes is the background. Sometimes it's rocks, sometimes it's water and sometimes it's the forest. In this particular instance, the background is the sky as they carry him over a rocky hill. As they climb this dialogue ensues.
Mitzi: "I can't see a god-damned thing back there. Now, how about letting me front for a while, his arse weighs a tonne."
Harry: "So does his front."
Mitzi: "Not as much as his arse."
Harry: "What difference does it make?"
Mitzi: "It makes a hell of a difference. You try back there for a while."
Harry: "Alright. You take the front. If you think it's so much easier. Take it!"
Mitzi: "Now you're being petty."
Harry: "Mitzi! If you wanna take the front. Take the front. It doesn't matter to me."
Mitzi: "Well, it matters to me! It's a hell of a lot easier when you can see where you're going!"
Harry: "Then take the god-damned thing!"
Mitzi: "I will!"
Compelling! This kind of dumb, amateurish overwriting occurs over and over throughout the film. Whenever someone speaks this is how they do it. No introspection, no witty jokes, no clever lines. Everything they say boils down to petty bickering. "Your father was a drunk!" "You're a god-damned bastard!" "You'll get us killed!" etc. ad nauseam. In the scenes where no one speaks, however, things get even worse. There's a 10-minute scene which consists of nothing but Mitzi and Harry pushing their friend in a stretcher upstream. I swear it's just endless shots of them slowly walking across the river. Nothing happens. Nothing at all! I've seen some tedious, slow films in my life, but this just got ridiculous. It's almost like someone wrote a silent short and then expanded it on the spot. Now, the film could have been somewhat bearable if I cared about what was happening, but I didn't. First, the plot of five doctors stalked through the woods by a maniacal killer isn't exactly original, and the way it's done in "Rituals" is wholly predictable. Second, the characters are so unlikeable, annoying and badly written I wished they'd all die sooner. Mitzi, in particular, a character we're inhumanely subjected to for almost the entire film, is unbearable. He's hysteric, argumentative and very badly acted by Lawrence Dane. Instead of playing the role with subtlety and slowly portraying a reliable surgeon's decent into madness, he just hams it up for 90 minutes. Holbrook, on the other hand, does as well as its possible to with such awful material and actually creates a believable, if not quite interesting, character. The other cast members either die in the first 30 minutes or spend the other 70 comatose. Perhaps, that's for the best as their main representative Robin Gammell's entire role consisted of nothing but constant whining. I breathed a sigh of relief when he finally passed out. "Rituals" is amateurishly directed by Peter Carter, a man with no idea of how to cut together a coherent action scene. Whenever something is happening, like the group getting attacked by bees, or Gammell stepping into a bear trap, the sequence is edited so manically and clumsily that often I had no idea who's doing what and where. People's hands, feet and backpacks are shown in brief inserts while other people are screaming, or trashing about, or looking very, very, very worried indeed. Meanwhile, I had no idea who's hands I was looking at, or why that person is screaming or flailing their hands about. At least, I knew why they were worried. I'd be too if I were starring in "Rituals". Almost like the proverbial cherry on the metaphoric cake comes a horrendous, cliched score by Hagood Hardy, so badly placed that a peaceful harmonic piece is laid over an intense discussion and scare chords are placed over shots of the group sleeping. All of this mixed together gives you one of the most unremarkable, drawn out, boring and awkward films I've ever seen. From the nails-on-the-chalkboard dialogue to a climax that feels like it came from a different (certainly better) film, "Rituals" is not a film I'd wish upon my worst enemy. A cheap, amateurish, flat production that deserves to stay forgotten.
1/4 - DirectorPaul WendkosStarsAlan AldaJacqueline BissetBarbara ParkinsAn old, dying satanist arranges to transfer his soul into the body of a young concert pianist.28-05-2017
Riding on the whole Satanist-thread popularity wave after "Rosemary's Baby" came "The Mephisto Waltz". Quinn Martin, the legendary TV producer of such thrillers as "The Fugitive", "The Streets of San Francisco" and "Cannon" chose Fred Mustard Stewart's debut novel of the occult and body swapping as his own first film foray. Whether it was a financial, artistic or personal decision or whether the utter failure of "The Mephisto Waltz" convinced him to stick to the small screens I don't know, but the fact remains that this proved to be his only theatrical credit. As such, Martin's impact on the silver screen remains only through the excellent adaptation of his most famous TV show "The Fugitive". "The Mephisto Waltz" is nowadays mostly forgotten. In fact, it seems that the only people who often discuss it are Jerry Goldsmith fans. As it happens "The Mephisto Waltz" is a reunion between Goldsmith and director Paul Wendkos who previously worked together on the impeccable, intense and atmospheric TV movie "The Brotherhood of the Bell" starring the magnificent Glenn Ford. Both Wendkos' vibrant, inventive direction and Goldsmith's unsettling soundtrack are some of the best examples of their respective work. Taking that fruitful collaboration in mind and adding to it the interesting premise, creepy imagery and good cast the promotional material for "The Mephisto Waltz" promised I decided to give it a look. Sadly, it didn't live up to my expectations. The story, at first, focuses on Myles (Alan Alda), a struggling writer who befriends a brilliant but moody pianist Duncan Ely (Curt Jurgens) and his weird daughter Roxanne (Barbara Parkins). However, Ely's sudden generosity and interest in Myles fails to impress Myles' wife Paula (Jacqueline Bisset) who begins to suspect Duncan & Roxanne have malicious intentions. When Duncan dies of a sudden bout of leukaemia (he seemed absolutely fine just a scene before) Paula thinks she can breathe easily, but Myles starts behaving differently. He is suddenly a brilliant pianist and has bad manners, you know, like Duncan. Gee, I wonder what's happening. Well, as it turns out Roxanne is a Satanist and has transferred Duncan's soul into Myles' body. The film then shifts its attention to Paula, but not much happens until the very end. Most of the film are scenes of Myles (or Duncan) and Roxanne flirting before a disapproving Paula. Now, this wouldn't be so bad if the film had atmosphere or interesting characters. Sadly, and surprisingly, this is precisely where "The Mephisto Waltz" fails. Firstly, the characters are paper thin. Duncan and his daughter are your typical 70s horror villains, highly mannered, eccentrically dressed and walk around like they are impersonating Christopher Lee in "Dracula". Our heroes are no better. All we know about Myles and Paula is that they really love each other. They also have a daughter but she is only ever seen when absolutely needed. The thin screenplay gets no help from the cast whose performances are absolutely uninspired. Alda is fine in the first half, doing his usual witty guy schtick, but after being possessed by Duncan he turns into a stiff. Barbara Parkins seems lost, convinced that the only thing she has to do to look scary is stare blankly. It doesn't work. The only person who really tries is Jacqueline Bisset but she tries too hard coming across whiny. Her high-pitched pleas "Myles, Oh Myles, Oh Myles" get annoying really soon. Curt Jurgens is the most fun to watch but only because he's Curt Jurgens and has done this part in almost every film he's ever made and can play it in his sleep, which he almost proves here. Even though he's obviously bored he pulls it off just fine. Consequently, I really didn't care at all what happens to these characters (I really can't bring myself to call thinly drawn cardboard cut-outs people) and as the script is almost completely character driven and focuses all of its attention on their interactions this makes "The Mephisto Waltz" really unbearable. Unlike far superior films like "Rosemary's Baby" and "The Omen", "The Mephisto Waltz" has no grand horror set-pieces. Such a low-key horror film is a great idea but requires excellent writing and a far better and more inventive cast than this. On the more technical side, however, "The Mephisto Waltz" gets better. Wendkos is very good when he has something to do. The transference scenes are very well done and this is why I think he would be much better suited to a more dramatic horror film. I was also most impressed by the film's cinematographer William W. Spencer, a DP who spent most of his life in television (mostly working on Quinn Jones projects). He gives the film a touch of the old-worldly, with carefully placed key-lights highlighting the actresses' beautiful faces. Finally, Goldsmith's score is fine. He does the same strange mix of Baroque and atonal whines that he did in "The Brotherhood of the Bell". I liked the former score better but despite being a little overbearing at times I enjoyed his work here too. Nothing spectacular. In conclusion, I must say that "The Mephisto Waltz" is a most disposable little horror film with nothing particularly notable in it at all. There's not one single thing here that you can't see in so many other films. I definitely understand how it came to be forgotten. Lacking atmosphere, good characters or memorable events it's a chore to watch. Never entertaining or scary it lost me about half-way through. Despite significant promise, I have to write it down as a flop.
1.5/4 - DirectorMike NicholsStarsJack NicholsonMichelle PfeifferJames SpaderPublisher Will Randall becomes a demon wolf and has to fight to keep his job.29-05-2017
"Wolf" is a movie full of obligatories and unusuals. It's all extremes, never, ever settling for mediocre or just OK. It's half werewolf movie, half corporate thriller with touches of romance and barrel loads of comedy. With this kind of film a lot of people are sure to be disappointed. Gore-hound werewolf enthusiasts are going to dislike this film as it lacks the blood, guts and manic intensity they're used to from films such as "The Howling", "Bad Moon" or "Twilight" depending on their age group. People looking for a gothic romance between Jack Nicholson and Michelle Pfeiffer are also going to be disappointed as their love story in the film is largely perfunctory and feels imposed upon the audience as if from a studio note. However, I am sure that people with a good sense of humour, a taste for the clever, witty and unusual will find a soft spot for "Wolf". After all, the film works best (and perhaps only) when it plays it light, breezy and allows Nicholson to do what he does best, be a snarky magnificent bastard. The plot follows a tired, ambitionless, aging editor (Jack Nicholson) who's having a pretty bad week. He's lost his job to his slimy protege (James Spader), his wife (Kate Nelligan) of 20 plus years is cheating on him with said protege and he's been bitten by a wolf. But it was no ordinery wolf. Soon, as is mandated by an unwritten horror movie law, he slowly starts turning into a werewolf, his sight improves, he can hear what people are saying in bathrooms on other floors and he has a sexual appetite of... well, of Jack Nicholson. All of this is played extremely straight with all the cliche necessities of the genre. There's the scene where he discovers his hand is unusually hairy, the scene where he goes outside to test his hearing, the scene where he jumps out of the window and finally, the scene where he howls at the moon. Also there's the conflicted love story acted out with sufficient chemistry but no believabilty by Nicholson and Michelle Pfeiffer. Pfeiffer plays Jack's boss' (Christopher Plummer) daughter. A spoiled heiress who is fairly unlikeable, but undeniably sexy. This is all standard lore and predictable to the t. However, where the film starts going in its own direction is how he uses his powers. Instead of utilising them to kill, ravage and gore, he directs his new found energy in getting his job back, getting vengeance on Spader, and bedding the irresistable Ms Pfeiffer. The whole film feels like someone took a very typical (neither great nor horrible) script for a werewolf film and made it with a great sense of humour. It's no surprise then that the film's director is Mike Nichols. While he might be an unususal prospect at first, as the film goes along his satirical influence becomes quite obvious. The script was originally written by Jim Harrison, a novelist of much repute but whose film work comes down to a few potboilers and "Legends of the Fall". I suspect he wrote the horror stuff. It was later rewritten (muh to Harrison's chagrin) by Wesley Strick, the man who also rewrote "Arachnophobia", a similarly quirky take on the nature-attacks horror films. I think he (with Mike Nichols) added the comedic touches. Nichols' touch is also noticable, not just from the script, but from the film's visuals. He hints on the fact that he's sending up the genre from the get-go by giving the film a truly artificial look and feel. Shot mostly on soundstages, lit like a 1940s Universal monster film and with LA obviously doubling for New York, one only has to look at all those back-projected driving shots to get the idea. He also repeatedly uses quite obvious camera tricks such as zooms and dramatic dolly shots to wink at us. It all works quite well. Also wonderful is Ennio Morricone's score. It's romantic, dramatic and comedic without being saccharine or overbearing like something say Pino Donaggio might have turned out. However, even with all the talent and comedy "Wolf" is still somewhat beaten down by its more conventional elements. No matter how much you knowingly wink at us all those cliches are still there. We still have to sit through a five minute scene of a professor (Om Puri) with a foreign accent explaining the legend of the wolf to Nicholson, we still have to sit through the obligatory scene in which a group of cocky young thugs try to mug the creature and there are still all those scenes with Michelle Pfeiffer. The ending also doesn't work. Instead of something clever to provide closure (and even perheps unity) between its disparate tones, the film elects to just defenestrate comedy and go with a straight forward, wolfman ending that you've probably seen a thousand times before. Even the little twist at the end is very unconvincing. Also notable is the fact that the film could have used with some more strict editing. It's unnecessarily two hours long. However, even though "Wolf" does get bogged down often it's also quite funny, smart and highly entertaining throughout. Not the least due to Jack Nicholson's energetic, charming and hilarious performance. It's really one of his best. I was never bored, even though I was often unconvinced and sometimes annoyed at some of the conventions. It's quite rare to see a film aware of its flaws that instead of hiding them actually plays with them and almost makes them work in its favour.
3/4 - DirectorLewis GilbertStarsAidan QuinnKate BeckinsaleAnthony AndrewsA skeptical professor visits a remote British estate to debunk allegations of psychic phenomena, but soon finds himself haunted by a ghost from his own past.29-05-2017
"Haunted" is what I like to call a "why-do-all" movie. What this means is that this is the kind of movie that is so uninspired that it uses all the cliches in the book and so uninvolving that you notice every last one of them. For instance. Why does every sceptic hunting for ghosts movie begin with a fake seance? Well, this one certainly does. When we first meet Prof. David Ash (Aidan Quinn) he's at one of those movie seances in which a darling old lady falls into a trance and then he stands up and triumphantly reveals it all to be a hoax. From this very scene, "Haunted" made me roll my eyes. That's such old material you can find it in silent movies. Then the fake medium speaks with David's dead twin sister's voice and my eyes turn 180 degrees. The presence of Hilary Mason at the seance evokes memories of "Don't Look Now" making everything look even worse. As the film progresses you'll encounter every ghost film cliche in existence. Flickering lights, slamming windows, doors opening themselves, mysterious girls in white walking eerily through corridors, hallucinations, ghosts who want you to follow them, automatic writing etc. etc. etc. The only one they missed is the ball bouncing down the stairwell, which is a shame considering that the gothic manor house in the film has a lovely one. The plot revolves around a famous sceptic called out to the countryside to investigate a possible haunting. The ghosts can only be seen by the elderly Nanny Tess (Anna Massey), the housekeeper. The residents of the house are a weird, incestuous trio of siblings. There's the commanding Robert (Anthony Andrews), the prankster Simon (Alex Lowe), and of course the sexy Christina (Kate Beckinsale). From here on in you can probably write the plot yourself. Everything you think is going to happen does. First off there's nothing, then there's the scratching on the door... There are the obligatory "rational thinking" scenes, there's the obligatory mystery from the past, and the obligatory lake which David obligingly falls into. The whole film goes through the motions until it finally stops. The whole thing feels like no effort was put into it. Lewis Gilbert's direction is reliable but journeyman-like with no bouts of inspiration or style. The script tells us all we need to know when we need to know it and no more. The plot shows the imagination of a lesser Scooby-Doo cartoon. The acting ranges from the charming but empty (Kate Beckinsale and Alex Lowe) to the stiff and let's get this done with (Aidan Quinn and John Gielgud). Anna Massey tries her best but which such a role you can't do much but look terrified. The best in the cast is Anthony Andrews who is truly entertaining and off-beat as Robert employing some of that Sebastian Flyte touch. I enjoyed him in the film. As for the rest, I spent most of the 100-minute runtime waiting for it all to finish. I have no idea why this movie was made. The material is old, the execution uninspired. Nothing new or remotely interesting happens. At best, I could see this as a very cheap TV production. Then I might understand. But "Haunted" is not. Instead of utilising its premise and talent behind it to do something new it instead chose to annoy me with its uninspiredness, unimaginativeness, and general lack of ambition. It's not as bad as Jan De Bont's "Haunting" but at least that film tried... something, but it tried it. "Haunted" seems to be content with being a great big nothing. A recycling of old themes and cliches to no end what-so-ever. Well, that doesn't fly with me. For the end here's another "why-do-all" moment from "Haunted". Why do all bad countryside ghost films have a palm reader scene in them. You know the one. An elderly gypsy approaches a young couple to read their palms and sees something in their future that either frightens her or provokes a knowing nod. Why? Because no one could be bothered to come up with something new instead! That's why.
1.5/4 - DirectorNick MurphyStarsRebecca HallDominic WestImelda StauntonIn 1921, England is overwhelmed by the loss and grief of World War I. Hoax exposer Florence Cathcart visits a boarding school to explain sightings of a child ghost. Everything she believes unravels as the 'missing' begin to show themselves.30-05-2017
"The Awakening" is a film about a shrewd sceptic whom we see in the opening uncover a fake seance coming face to face with ghosts of the past in a spooky manor house. No, this is not a remake of "Haunted", but it is certainly a by-the-numbers retread of familiar grounds. Again, we are subjected to the following sequences: the fake seance, the scared future client convincing our sceptic to take the case, the sceptic setting up the ghost catching equipment, the sceptic encountering the ghost etc. etc. This one even does the ball going down the stairs scare. It was effective once when it was first seen in "The Changeling". Now it reminds me of "Scary Movie 2". The plot of "The Awakening" is just as contrived, predictable and annoyingly one-sided as "Haunted" was. It never does anything exciting or interesting. However, unlike "Haunted", "The Awakening" isn't bland and it certainly never feels like a failed TV pilot someone accidentally projected on the silver screen. "Haunted" was an unambitious script unambitiously produced. "The Awakening" is different and for that, I have to give it credit. It almost worked. This film is a very ambitious piece of work. Beautifully and lovingly crafted, with top-notch performances, and the most effective and stunning horror score I've heard since Jerry Goldsmith died. If only the script didn't start bad and get worse and worse with every scene. Our lead is now a woman, not that it makes much difference, a distant, at times smarmy, but undeniably brilliant debunker who is secretly hoping to find "the real thing". She's haunted by the death of her fiancee in the war because she has to be haunted by something. Why these horror movie sceptics can't be just reasonable people who are debunking ghost stories out of an honest belief that there is no supernatural I do not know. You don't see James Randi go up to Uri Geller and ask him to contact his long lost lover, do you? As unbelievable as this character is, she actually works in the film. This is mostly down to a marvellous performance by Rebecca Hall, far superseding the quality of the material. The conviction, soul and talent she brings to this film and the sheer fact that she manages to pull it off are Oscar worthy. The case is the most cliche one believable. A ghost of a boy haunting a Gothic school. The matron (Imelda Staunton) tells Hall that the school was once a private house where someone died and I already knew where this was going. Having seen "The Others" and yes, even, "Haunted" I knew immediately there would be no surprises in store for me here. But, while I patiently sat waiting for the film to be over, I became engrossed almost despite my own cynicism for it. I've already mentioned how good Rebecca Hall is, but so are Staunton, and Dominic West as one of the teachers, and Isaac Hempstead Wright as a mysterious boy. Even John Shrapnel is in this and he's always great. Then there's the look of the film. Dark and moody and elegant, it immediately sets the tone for this kind of story. Director Nick Murphy and cinematographer Eduard Grau do a pitch-perfect job at establishing a slow-burning, creepy atmosphere that pays off in good scares (mostly not of the jump scare variety). All of this is encapsulated and enveloped by Daniel Pemberton's staggering, sweeping, orchestral score that is reminiscent of the 60s, a better age for horror films. In the end, however, it's sad to see so much brilliant effort go to waste, shot & buried by a terrible screenplay. The script is by Stephen Volk who continues to bitterly disappoint me. His TV movie "Ghostwatch" is, in my opinion, the best ghost horror movie ever made and a serious contender for the best horror film spot. A small, contained, to-the-point, creepy story that plays with its format in ingenious and witty ways while never undermining its horror core. Everything else of his, however, has not lived up to it. He wrote the awful William Friedkin tree film "The Guardian" and several dumb, straight-to-video-quality films in the 2000s. To be fair, I've not seen his further TV efforts such as "Afterlife" and "Midwinter of the Spirit" (though I certainly plan to) which I've heard are better, but his film excursions don't give me much encouragement. Here, he completely undermines himself several times by rehashing all the old cliches and eventually just cripples his own script by giving it one of the most contrived, unbelievable, and horrifically stupid endings I've ever seen. "The Awakening" could have been brilliant as it is it's a testament to several great artists struggling with an awful, derivative screenplay. Their considerable talent could have been used for better things.
2/4 - DirectorGeorge SluizerStarsBernard-Pierre DonnadieuGene BervoetsJohanna ter SteegeRex and Saskia, a young couple in love, are on vacation. They stop at a busy service station and Saskia is abducted. After three years and no sign of Saskia, Rex begins receiving letters from the abductor.30-05-2017
"The Vanishing" is a film in three distinct parts. Movements, as if those in a symphony. Each of the three could conceivably exist on their own, but only together do they form a movie with such a powerful impact. The first part follows Rex (Gene Bervoets) and Saskia (Johanna ter Steege), a young couple on a road trip. Their relationship is not perfect, but they love each other and that's what's important. They are a regular, unassuming, typical couple. On the way they stop at a gas station, Saskia goes to buy them drinks and never returns. The second part of the film follows Saskia's kidnapper Raymond (Bernard-Pierre Donnadieu), a businessman, family man, a regular, unassuming, typical man. No one you'd notice. Short, stocky, in a suit or a sweater. One of the crowd. We follow him as he meticulously and terrifyingly plans out the kidnapping. He tests whether noise can be heard from his house by getting his family to scream as loud as they can as part of a "game". He tests how long does a person under the influence of chloroform sleep. He drives to see how far he can get in that time. The third part follows Rex again, three years later. Although he has seemingly moved on and has a new girlfriend (Gwen Eckhaus), he's never let go. Saskia's disappearance is eating him up inside. What we're shocked to learn, however, is that it's not his grief that won't let him rest, but curiosity. He can't bear not knowing what had happened so he makes a public appeal for the kidnapper to get in contact with him. He does... "The Vanishing" is, in my opinion, not a thriller even though it may sound as one, and is certainly known and marketed as one. It provides no thrills. The way the story is structured and told also makes it devoid of a mystery or a puzzle. For me "The Vanishing" is one of the finest, truest horror films ever made. The kicks, jumps and surprises in "The Vanishing" do come from tiny details you bearly notice, but when you do notice them they are chilling. Like the fact that the sweater Raymond wears during the kidnapping was the one his daughter gave him for his birthday, like the moment when he figures out how to kidnap Saskia, like the scenes where you find yourself laughing and sympathising with Raymond. Above all, of course, are the central moments which will stick forever with all viewers of "The Vanishing". The big nightmare moment is the finale which is startling for sure, but the two ideas which terrify me more than the finale are the idea that there are such people as Raymond out there and, of course, the basic idea that one day anyone, a person you know, a person you love, you, can go outside and simply never return. Or the possibility that you'll never know what happened. "The Vanishing" filled me with dread as only the best horror films can. It's after all a film describing pure horror, from beginning to end. This film is so powerful and unforgettable it's almost arbitrary and somehow disrespected to discuss it on a technical or critical level. We can wax poetic for hours about all of its perfections and imperfections, but it doesn't matter. What matters is the lasting imprint it leaves on its viewer and in this case it's significant. "The Vanishing" is not just a film it's an experience. Harrowing, gloomy, and absolutely horrifying.
4/4 - DirectorGeorge SluizerStarsJeff BridgesKiefer SutherlandNancy TravisThe boyfriend of an abducted woman never gives up the search as the abductor looks on.30-05-2017
Any remake has to be looked at in two ways. The reviewer has to ask himself how does this film stand up in regards to the original and how does it stand up on its own. The first question may seem unfair after all isn't every film supposed to be its own entity, an individual. But films provoke us, that's the power of cinema and, in a way, their primary role, so if the original was successful and provoked us it's hard to simply disregard it. Especially when that film is George Sluizer's 1988 masterpiece "The Vanishing", a film so powerful, subtle, and unforgettable that when it was over I wanted to watch it again and again, half to enjoy its low-key creepy elegance and half to confirm that I've really seen something so brilliant. A film so powerful leaves an indelible mark and can absolutely not be disregarded. After it was a huge hit, not just in its native Netherlands but also worldwide, Hollywood bought the rights for a remake (of course). They offered Sluizer the director's chair again under one proviso. He is to change the film's memorable, downbeat, and harsh finale. The continual attempts to dumb down the original material and force it into a standard thriller mould is evident throughout this 1993 remake. First off, in regards to the original, "The Vanishing" is an absolute travesty. When people speak of dumbed-down Hollywood remakes this is the film they are talking about. The basic plot is still the same. A young couple (Kiefer Sutherland & Sandra Bullock) stop off at a gas station during a road trip. She goes to buy them drinks and is never seen again. But roads diverge widely here between the two. The original was split into three parts. The first one following the couple immediately before the kidnapping, the second showing the kidnapper prepare and the third showing the boyfriend looking for the kidnapper three years later. Here the first two parts are combined and the film continually cuts between our kidnapper’s comedic attempts to attack women and Sutherland & Bullock's road trip. In the original, the kidnapper's preparations are shown after we see how his plan turns out. All the pain, suffering and evil he’s caused. This lends a dose of eery creepiness to the otherwise disturbingly light proceedings of observing this studied and cold man calmly go through the steps of a horrendous crime. As we watch him make his early clumsy attempts we laugh, we can’t help it, but the weight of the first part hangs heavily on our shoulders and that intense feeling of frustration and helplessness present in it makes us feel awful for laughing. We feel complicit and guilty. The Hollywood studios, of course, know that American audiences are too stupid to understand this, so instead, we get those sequences before the kidnapping takes place. This maneuver makes them lose all meaning and weight they had in the original. Now, instead of feeling guilty for laughing, we just observe. Now, the comedy is not disturbing simply jarring and unnecessary. The tone of these sequences is goofy and at times they move into black comedy territory. The third part of the remake has almost no similarities to the original. This is, of course, the point where the obligatory love story is inserted. Sutherland falls in love with a local diner waitress Rita (Nancy Travis). Granted, the original also had a sequence in which the boyfriend’s new relationship falls apart due to his missing lover, but while in the original it played out thoughtfuly, low-key and in around 15 minutes here we have to endure close to 40 minutes of their bickering, langerous, pace-killing relationship before we can move on. What makes it even worse is that the whole subplot is written by someone who has no idea how human beings work. The grand climax and culmination of their tense relationship no one in the audinece really cares for comes when she discovers he's been writing a book about Bullock. She logs on to his computer but finds the document encrypted. After some (too long) thinking she figures out the password, but the document is a fake book, a plant. Thankfully, underneath this fake text Sutherland left for her to find so she wouldn't know what he's really working on he remembered to leave a little note that says: "Moved the command post to Mt. Si. Hotel. Rita's suspicious". So just to recap, in this document he's left specifically for her to find and stop being suspicious he literally tells her that she has a right to be suspicious and where to find him. Such stupidity is unprecedented even in Hollywood thrillers. I've not seen such dumb logic in exploitation films. Luigi Cozzi's "The Black Cat" made more sense. So what does she do? Does she leave him? Does she forgive him? No. She goes to Mt. Si. Hotel dressed as Sandra Bullock... I am not joking. This happens. Forget the stark reality of the original, folks, this is what we should have been watching from the word go. It doesn’t really help that Nancy Travis’ character is absolutely unlikeable, whiny, and possessive. However, all will be fine when she’s out of the way, right? Wrong. The original 1988 film had one of the most infamous and chilling endings in film history. I won’t reveal it here, but suffice to say is that it was not happy, not upbeat, and left no hope, so it’s a given that it just won’t fly in Hollywood. But perhaps a new ending could work. After all, the tone of the film is all different, the characters are different, the story is different. The thing is it doesn’t. The new ending is one taken directly from a slasher film. Instead of the cruel, introspective logic of the original finale here we get the good guy and the bad guy beating each other senseless in mud with shovels for 15 minutes. It’s your typical slasher ending in which the girl (yes, Travis is sadly back) runs around hiding behind trees only for the crazy killer to pop out right behind her. All of this goes on until she kills him, about three times. Now, I wouldn’t mind changes to the original. It would be pointless and senseless to make the same film twice, but what I do mind about this remake is the blatant and complete misunderstandin of the original material. First off, the core, the point of the original is completly gone. It’s not replaced by anything because this remake feels flat, pointless, empty. Also, despite the fact that he directed the original, Sluzier obviously has no idea what made it work. All of the original's stark and creepy atmosphere is lost. This is mostly becuase replacing the original's subtlety with cliche horror movie melodrama. The horror of the original was in the details. The unassuming, hidden ones like the fact that the kidnapper wears the sweater his daughter bought him as a birthday present when he abducts women. Or the scene when we learn how he figured out his kidnapping plan. No such subtlety here. Everything is telegraphed a mile away and the only thrills are meant to come from standard twists and turns such as the killer shows up at the good guy’s house, the killer tries to get Nancy Travis, etc. etc. Instead of chilling, devastating little tidbits of horror, all we get are predictable starts that would look cheap in an 80s slasher. Now I’ve already touched upon most of what’s wrong with the film, but the unanswered question remains of how does the film work on its own. Well, this question requires a slightly differnet discourse. This “The Vanishing” is obviously a totally unambitious film. It’s meant to look, fell and play out like every other thriller. It has none of the original’s philosophic intentions. So let’s look at it from a clearly thriller point of view. As such, it doesn’t really work. There are too many inconsistencies to deal with, the Nancy Travis character is completely obsolete and annoying and most importantly the film lacks any kind of atmosphere. Todd Graft’s awkward screenplay jilts uncomfortably between comedy, thriller, and action without pace or reason thus eleviating the film of either a sense of urgency or a sense of dread. In other words, the film is too slow to be thrilling and too fast to be scary. Also, I have to confess I really didn’t care for Sutherland’s character. I never for once believed him to be a real person. When we first see him in the second half he is a beaten man. He doesn’t sleep, he’s obsessed with his girlfriend’s disappearance. Then one scene later he meets Travis and completely forgets about the Bullock character. In fact, the only reason he takes up writing the book is becuase he is getting paid for it by some publisher with unclear motives. He seems not to care for her disappearence at all which makes the final scenes of the film (which I won’t reveal) make no sense. In them, he has to make a decision bascially between life and death. Now, in the original his choice made sense because the original character was driven by his obsession with the disappearence. As Sutherland is never really shown to care that much his choice doesn’t make sense. On the other hand, I quite enjoyed Jeff Bridges’ insane performance as the kidnapper. Affecting a nonsensical accent and walking like he’s just had a colonoscopy, his entire performance is fascinating to watch in that is-this-really-happening sort of way. Now, I understand this is a back-handed compliment but it’s really one of the few good things I can say about “The Vanishing”. The only truly good aspect of the film is Jerry Goldsmith’s score. Now, while it is obscenely wrong for the plot it’s not Goldsmith’s fault as his job is to follow the tone of the film. It’s a melodic, entertaining and masterfully composed piece of work, but better enjoyed without the accompaniment of the film. If this film were an original piece of work I wouldn't have given it a second thought. It's so unremarkable, unimaginative, dull, and silly it's almost instantly forgettable. The performances are catastrophically bland (by everyone except for Bridges), the direction without flair or invention and the writing imbecilically by-the-numbers. I was never riveted, interested, or engrossed. However, that is not this film’s biggest flaw. It’s biggest flaw and the biggest turning off point for me is just how condesending it is. The fingerprints of the studio are all over it and you can’t be anything other than pissed off when you realise that they obviously dumbed down the challanging original because they felt the audiences are too stupid to follow it. I don’t know about you, but to me that is an insult, and, by extention, so is this film.
1.5/4