Horror films - 2018
| Halloween | Hereditary | A Quiet Place |
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The original Halloween from 1978 gave us something new in horror films - the idea of a silent, unstoppable assailant who strikes without pity or remorse. This idea was copied and expanded upon in many forms, most notably the whole Friday the 13th series with Jason and The Terminator, where the assailant is a literal killing machine. Hollywood loves a good franchise and the attempts to keep the one which started it all going have continued with varying degrees of success over the years. (There have been six sequels to the original film which featured the original killer, Michael Myers. There was also a Rob Zombie directed two-film reboot.)
The other thing that the low-budget original did was show us the John Carpenter way of suspensefully building tension. Characters were introduced and given some development. You had some feeling about whether you liked them or not and why. You could empathize with them as a threat came closer and closer. And Carpenter's relatively simple but absolutely eerie score built as much mood as anything that was happening onscreen.
The story: (First off - this story retcons out every sequel to the original 1978 film.) Michael Myers stabbed his teen-aged sister to death on Halloween when he was six years old. Fifteen years later, he escaped from the sanitarium, returned to his home town of Haddonfield, Illinois, and stalked a group of teen-aged girls, killing all but one - Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis). Forty years after that night, Michael manages to escape again and heads for home, apparently to finish off the job. In those forty years, deeply traumatized by her nearly deadly, terrifying experience, Laurie has lived largely walled off from people. Locked gates surround her house, floodlights are mounted on the roof, and a basement bunker underneath the home houses an arsenal. Her paranoia has severely strained her relationship with her daughter, Karen (Judy Greer), who grew up with it, but she tries to maintain a bond with her grand-daughter, Allyson (Andi Matichak). When Laurie learns of Michael's escape, she prepares herself for a final reckoning.
So how was it?
I'd heard the concept from promotional materials before the film's release and was puzzled. Wasn't this the exact same plot as in Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998)? Obviously, now it's 40 years instead of 20, but otherwise it's the exact same concept: Laurie Strode has tried moving on from the trauma of her experience in 1978, now has a child, and constantly lives with the fear that Michael could return - which, of course, he does. I thought that film was by far the best of the sequels and perhaps the only one worth watching. Why on Earth would they not only do it again but act as if the prior one had never even occurred? Did they think they had a much better way of telling the story and portraying the characters? Perhaps they thought so. But I don't think they were correct.
This film is practically boring to watch. The suspense is poorly built. The stalking scenes just become tedious. Though Carpenter came back to assist with the score, it is rarely put to good use, if any. The characterizations, even including Curtis', are two-dimensional at best. It's hard to care at all about these people. Yes, it has a plot, but it is simply a road map to things happening. A plot twist is put in which goes nowhere. The climactic confrontation at the end is OK, but that is all. As I watched the whole thing unfold, the word that kept going through my mind was "amateurish." The director, David Gordon Green, apparently had no idea how to make a suspenseful film.
Why would one want to hijack a franchise like Halloween and not improve on the product? A bit of reading on wikipedia seems to bring the answer into focus. Blumhouse Productions (the Paranormal series, the Purge series, the Insidious series, the Happy Death Day series) got a hold of it. This reboot has made just enough money for them to greenlight sequels of this version of the story for Halloween Kills (2020) and Halloween Ends (2021). Horror franchises as business. Like this film, they might be suitable for watching some boring day when nothing else is on, but I wouldn't recommend investing more than you're already paying for cable.
- JC
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There is the occasional film that I view, where as I'm watching, I know the director had something in mind that he wished to achieve, and because he did it with some creative flair (either original or imitated), he is going to get a lot of credit for being a genius. Whether or not this is deserved is something I think should be open to debate. Too often, it seems, creativity for its own sake is rewarded. But in film fiction, if it doesn't serve the story it's just a waste. This applies to Hereditary. While I admit that director Ari Aster (in his first feature film) and lead actress Toni Collette definitely both commit to creating a creepy and unsettling experience, I have to also say that in spite of all the heavy melodrama, development of dread, and outright overacting, it left me cold. Perhaps the inclusion of a little more subtlety and the injection of some logic in the script might have served this film a bit better. As it stands, this is a film with an overabundance of style and a lack of quality storytelling. At the end I was wondering what the heck I'd just seen. I honestly laughed out loud when the credits rolled. Surely not what the film-makers had intended.
Toni Collette ugly-faces her way through most of this film, alternately playing angsty child, grief-stricken parent, and deranged psychopath. Unlike most reviewers, I don't give a lot of credit to the performance of Milly Shapiro, as her youngest child, who really does very little except scowl through the film. Alex Wolff, as her oldest, does his part quite well, considering what he has to work with, as did Gabriel Byrne as the long-suffering, reasonably sane father trying to cope.
In spite of what others have said, I was not impressed by the buzzing, humming, groaning score of Colin Stetson. Yes, I was totally aware of the irritating sounds he was using to invoke a sense of dread in place of the jump scares we are all accustomed to. Substituting one cheap trick over another is no great genius and this is a trick I've heard before in better films.
Overall, this film was more annoying than horrifying. If that is all you require, then you will be happy with Hereditary. I caught the horror tropes it used. They were not credible and my disbelief was far from suspended. If Ms. Collette's character had seemed more like an actual human being striving for normalcy instead of someone apparently thriving on the drama, maybe the story would have been more in balance. Maybe if you could explain to me (and the audience) how this family could have lived for over a decade with someone without catching on (AT ALL) that grandma was neck-deep in devil worship, without even having an inkling, that might have made some sense. But, of course . . . THAT WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE. As it is, I found the whole thing impossible to buy into and, by the way, it was unnecessarily lurid. While not being a slasher film, this has plenty of gruesome imagery, which it doesn't build up to or earn. I wouldn't recommend this film to anyone who doesn't have a taste for filmatic brutality.
I could actually go into more detail, but have no desire to. On rottentomatoes.com, this film has received glowing reviews from critics that I feel are misguided. Interestingly, audience responses have not been so good. I feel this mixed response of critics sensing the artistry but not catching the disservice done to the story. I'm not nearly that kind. I've disagreed with audiences ( the mediocre, but successful Jurassic World) and critics (Django Unchained). I thought Django was exploitative trash but it won a best screenplay Oscar. I thought The Shape of Water was ridiculous and it won Best Picture. What do I know?
But, if my opinion matters to anyone, you can skip Hereditary unless creepiness and grossness are all you require. Otherwise, hold out for something better.
- JC
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A Quiet Place was directed by John Krasinski (The Office (2005-2013), 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi (2016)) from a screenplay by Krasinski and story creators Bryan Woods and Scott Beck.
The story: In a not too distant future, the world has been overrun by extraterrestrial predatory creatures that are extremely fast and durable and particularly vicious. Their only weakness is that they are blind and hunt solely by sound. Our point of view focuses on a small family living in rural America: the father, Lee Abbott (Krasinski), the mother, Evelyn (Emily Blunt), their eldest daughter, Regan (Millicent Simmonds), and their son, Marcus (Noah Jupe). Since Regan is deaf, the family had learned to communicate via sign language, which has given them an advantage. The downside of this is that Regan, while accustomed to a silent world, is oblivious to the sounds that draw the creatures that are hunting them. Shortly into the story, the Abbotts lose their youngest son, Beau, due to his playing with an electronic toy that draws the creatures to him. Whether because of this or in spite of it, the Abbotts conceive another child and attempt to take steps to protect it and themselves.
Much of the first half of the film is spent showing us how the family lives. Fishing silently, having meals silently, playing games, all with little to no sound. The basement of their home is equipped with electronics for listening to the outside world and sound-muffling designs anticipating the arrival of their new offspring. The film culminates with a night when several things go wrong at once leading to a terrifying ordeal with a creature which has found their home.
The good points: The actors all give first rate performances, especially Emily Blunt, as she emotes her role as a Mom, as a woman mourning the loss of a child, a loving wife, and most dramatically, a woman dealing with severe pain while faced with a terrifying threat. The creature affects are good, though somewhat similar to the beast from Stranger Things. The level of suspense that hits about midway through the film (it runs only 90 minutes) and doesn't let up through the end is done very well. It was interestingly written as a horror story, but each of the four main characters has an arc with a personal flaw that they must overcome or be taken down by it - Lee trying so hard to be strong he cuts himself off too much, Evelyn trying too hard to go on with life as normal, Regan acting too much as if she is apart from the rest of her family, Marcus struggling to control his fear.
Quibbles: It is a bit hard to get to know the characters, since they speak so rarely, though much is revealed by actions and body language. The first half of the film seems a bit long and dull. But perhaps this was to lull us into a false sense of calm. The revelation of the creatures' weakness was an interesting twist, but a bit convenient. It did shed light on the cost to the family that Lee didn't share his electrical tinkering with his bright daughter, Regan. The ending of the film is a bit abrupt, with the threat still existing. It would have been like Signs if one had cut off the last five minutes.
The obvious question viewers should have just from seeing the trailers is "how can a couple justify having a child - practically a noise-making machine that can't be reasoned with - in an environment where any such sound will lead to the death of your entire family?" It's hard to understand. It could have just been an unintended pregnancy and no safe means of stopping it was available. But the other possibility is that this is actually the message of the movie. It seems in every age young parents question the wisdom of bringing a child into the world. This story stands out only by degree. To this family, I suspect, to them it is just living their lives and expressing their love. Life would be hollow without it. Though threats exist, they do what they can to endure, and if a way presents itself, to overcome. We do much the same in our lives, though the threats be terrestrial. And while it's relatively safe in our western civilization homes, it isn't that way everywhere.
A Quiet Place is exquisitely acted and cunningly paced. It will definitely keep most of the audience white-knuckled and nearly silent in their seats, aghast at what has already happened and in anticipation of what still may. However, with the small knowledge of the characters and the lack of a satisfying ending it's hard to feel as if you have seen a complete story.
- JC