About halfway through On the Line, Mel Gibson stops the film’s traffic with a gem of self-awareness.
“What kind of B grade movie bullshit is this?”
Well, “B” grade might be generous, but more of that wink-wink vibe would have been helpful.
Mel is Elvis Cooney, host of an overnight radio talk show in L.A. On one fateful night, a caller reveals that he has broken into Elvis’s home and taken his wife and child hostage. To save their lives, Elvis will have to own up to a few past misdeeds, then play some survival games while trying to piece together clues to the caller’s identity.
Writer/director Romuald Boulanger has a surprise or two in mind, but everything from the film’s forced dialog to the telegraphed shot selection and generic staging screams unsurprising TV drama. Mel and co-star Kevin Dillon ham it up good, while the rest of the ensemble mostly seems self-conscious.
I’ve been lucky enough to work in radio for over thirty years, but there’s no point in nitpicking over the biz details. The bigger problem is that On the Line is a half-hearted mashup of 2 or 3 better films that I won’t mention for fear of spoilers.
But when Elvis’s call screener (Alia Seror-O’Neill) makes a crack about sex with a man his age, you remember the B-movie line and realize this might have been idiotic fun if it just didn’t take itself so seriously.
The idea that the kindergarten teacher at your child’s school might be a member of an Aryan group is terrifying enough, but writer/director Beth de Araújo takes that idea even further in her first full-length feature, Soft & Quiet.
The kindergarten teacher, Emily (Stefanie Estes), is our focus as we watch her leave school one afternoon to attend a meeting of like-minded women. Right from the beginning, it’s clear Stefanie is unlikeable. She coerces a young boy into confronting a janitor over mopping the floor, painting it to the child’s mom as teaching him to be empowered.
From this uncomfortable moment, the movie takes us further into discomfort as we follow Emily in real time as her evening progresses. Giving away anything more would remove the tension that is slowly built as the movie moves from unsettling to disturbing to terrifying.
Telling a story in real time takes a truly talented editor, and Lindsay Armstrong nails it. Her cut is seamless, and it helps deepen the tension. The editing work keeps you in the moment, showing how quickly mob mentality can take over – especially if the group in question feels threatened (even when the threat actually comes from the group in question).
Most of the time, the cinematography complements the writing and editing. But on occasion, it feels like we’re watching a found footage film, which detracts slightly from the tension. While there are many moments filmed to unsettle, at other times it removes us from the moment. However, these minor faults are easily overlooked.
The acting throughout is perfect. Every woman feels like someone you might know. From the pregnant Stormfront member to the woman living paycheck-to-paycheck, each actor brings a realism that lends to the dread we feel as we follow the group.
Though we follow Emily, it’s impossible to feel any sympathy for her. She is at times coerced into action and other times the leader of the pack. What she chooses to do is horrifying, and her responses to the events don’t evoke understanding.
There are several themes running in the film, but all of them work together to paint a picture that isn’t hard to envision. It’s easy to imagine women like these among us. That’s the scariest part of all.
Suicidal ideation takes a road trip in writer/director Mali Elfman’s feature debut, Next Exit.
Rose (Katie Parker) doesn’t like you. She does not want you to like her. She just wants to get to San Francisco. What’s in San Francisco? Dr. Stevenson’s experiment, which has proven the existence of an afterlife and is recruiting additional participants in the study.
A mix-up over car rental puts Rose in the same vehicle as another of Dr. Stevenson’s voyagers, Teddy (Rahul Kohli). Teddy likes everybody. Even Rose.
They have four days to drive from NYC to San Fran to end their lives. Rose just wants to get there. Teddy can’t see any reason they shouldn’t enjoy the journey.
As a character study, Next Exit soars. Parker and Kohli – both veterans of Mike Flanagan’s various genre pieces – create complicated, believable, fascinating characters. Their chemistry is terrific, and you care what happens to them. Their dynamic makes the road trip aspect of the film come alive. The cross-country antics that in other films can feel like strung-together gags seem more organic because Elfman’s investment is inside the car, not what happens outside of it.
The filmmaker is less successful with other aspects of the movie. What happens to society once it takes no leap of faith to believe in an afterlife? This is touched on but handled perhaps too subtly. The supernatural element hinted at in the opening segment remains vague to the bitter end and casting Karen Gillan in essentially a cameo role as the scientist only draws attention to this limitation. The existential dread isn’t even particularly well-developed.
But the core performances are not to be denied. Both actors fully commit to peculiar characters, each fully drawn turn allowing the other to uncover more backstory and humanity. The farther into the film you get, the more you appreciate what Kohli and Parker accomplish.
What if Taylor Swift lured everyone to a huge music festival, promising to save the world with her new songs, literally through the power of music, Bill & Ted-style? Would you believe her? Would you go?
(Psst…you should say no.)
One Piece Film: Red is the fifteenth film in the One Piece franchise, which has also spanned 20 seasons of television and multiple other forms of media. It posits a world where magic exists, roving bands of superpowered pirates sail the oceans and seas, and a one-world government wields a powerful navy set on destroying them. So you can see why one might want all of the fighting to end. Enter Uta, a talent & supernaturally-gifted singer. She has a plan to save the people of the world and give birth to a new era of carefree fun. The problem is that everyone has to die first! That’s a mighty big ask.
This might be the fifteenth film in this series, but it functions pretty well as a standalone story. Viewers with a greater familiarity with the franchise might gain a deeper appreciation for what unfolds within, but the filmmakers have been careful to make everything (and everyone) make sense for novices. If you are willing to roll with a universe filled with superhero pirates, a music demon, merfolk, a talking skeleton with a sword cane, snails that double as radios, a rock & roll band staffed with manimals, portals, alternate worlds, and magic that can manifest just about anything, then you’re in for a pretty wild time.
The animation is top-notch and is full of striking imagery from start to finish. If you happen to be a fan of musicals, you’re in luck, as there are over a dozen tunes laced throughout its 2 hour running time. If there’s any real negative here, it’s that – at 40 minutes – the final battle goes on a bit too long. This is undoubtedly done to make sure that the huge cast of characters all get standout moments, but it’s a bit too overindulgent and causes the film to drag during its third act.
One Piece Film: Red isn’t the most original anime feature out there, but its delightfully chaotic world and wacky pop-rock opera apocalypse storytelling elements make for a fun ride. If you’re inclined to love this corner of cinema, you’ll have a good time with it.
Rear Window was first, but an awful lot started with Hitchcock. In 1985, Tom Holland’s Fright Night reconsidered the concept – a voyeur certain he spies villainy through a neighbor’s window – with less visual panache, more nostalgic supernatural horror. Then D.J. Caruso essentially remade Fright Night in 2007 with Disturbia, Craig Gillespie did remake it in 2011, and last year, Joe Wright did Hitch’s original pulpy homage with The Woman in the Window.
Can director Mark Hartley do anything new or interesting with his spin, Girl at the Window? Even the title feels borrowed.
Hartley’s take is more specifically horror than the films it apes – not supernatural, just horror. It’s a bit low rent and borrows quite liberally from better films. Still, it does take some fine turns.
Ella Newton stars as Amy, a troubled teen who’s moved with her mom (Radha Mitchell) to a small town after a tragedy. The goal is to start fresh, but immediately Amy becomes suspicious of her next-door neighbor’s late-night trips. When a dormant serial killer seems to return, Amy decides it’s definitely the guy next door. But her own trauma may be clouding her judgment.
Mitchell’s solid as always, and the supporting cast delivers believable, often quite endearing turns. Newton makes for a fun central character, although there are times when Amy’s choices are idiotic and beyond forgiveness. Worse still, her tragic backstory, heavy-handed as it is, goes nowhere.
Hartley is best known for fascinating documentaries on genre filmmaking. His narrative work is less impressive, unfortunately. His 2013 reboot of Richard Franklin’s 1978 horror flick Patrick (an inexplicable favorite of mine, if I’m honest) felt safe, tame, updated without soul.
To a degree, those same flaws plague Girl at the Window. There’s nothing wrong with it and there are moments of fun to be had, but there are also five better riffs on the same tune you should probably watch instead.
Happy Halloween! We’re celebrating the holiday and Nosferatu‘s 100th birthday with a look at the movies most influenced by F.W. Murnau’s masterpiece.
5. Dracula (1992)
Cinematographer Michael Ballhaus called this film Francis Ford Coppola’s last must-watch. It does look amazing. Gary Oldman and Tom Waits are great, too. Everybody else…
Coppola’s inspiration for the film was Murnau’s masterpiece, which is especially obvious in the opening act. Not only is Oldman styled as a goofy older character, but his shadow seems to move on its own. A clear homage to what Murnau did to such startling effect.
At the heart of the film is a glorious Oldman, who is particularly memorable as the almost goofily macabre pre-London Dracula. Butthe film feels more Hammer than Murnau, as the lovely Sadie Frost joins a slew of nubile vampire women to keep the film simmering. It’s a sloppy stew, but it is just so tasty.
4. What We Do in the Shadows (2014)
In the weeks leading up to the Unholy Masquerade – a celebration for Wellington, New Zealand’s surprisingly numerous undead population – a documentary crew begins following four vampire flatmates.
Viago (co-writer/co-director Taika Waititi) – derided by the local werewolf pack as Count Fagula – acts as our guide. He’s joined by Vladislav (co-writer/co-director Jemaine Clement), who describes his look as “dead but delicious.” There’s also Deacon (Jonathan Brugh) – the newbie at only 187 years old – and Petyr. Styled meticulously and delightfully on the old Nosferatu Count Orlock, Petyr is 8000 years old and does whatever he wants.
The filmmakers know how to mine the absurd just as well as they handle the hum drum minutia. The balance generates easily the best mock doc since Christopher Guest.
3. Salem’s Lot (1979)
Tobe Hooper was such an epic choice to direct this made-for-TV event film in 1979. Stephen King’s beloved novel seems an odd fit for network television, especially in Hooper’s delightfully macabre hands.
Though David Soul may have been the draw in ’79, it’s James Mason’s rich and peculiar delivery of every line that kept the film odd and fascinating.
Hooper’s best choice? Going full Orlock with Mr. Barlow!
2. Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979)
Also in 1979, Werner Herzog committed his own take on the Murnau masterpiece to film, and what a glorious endeavor that was! Herzog’s Nosferatu the Vampyre looks hypnotic, and his score feels like a haunting ode to the live accompaniment the original might have boasted.
Klaus Kinski effortlessly revives the ratlike presence of Max Schreck, while Herzog’s script teases out a melancholy the original only hinted at. Isabelle Adjani’s heartbroken central figure is the anchor for the film, but Herzog has a great twist up his sleeve to leave a final scene impression.
1. Shadow of the Vampire (2000)
E. Elias Merhige revisits F. W. Murnau’s masterpiece Nosferatu with smashing results in Shadow of the Vampire. Wickedly funny and just a little catty, ‘Shadow’ entertains with every frame.
This is the fictional tale of the filming of Nosferatu. Egomaniacal artists and vain actors come together to create Murnau’s groundbreaking achievement in nightmarish authenticity. As they make the movie, they discover the obvious: the actor playing Count Orlok, Max Schreck is, in fact, a vampire.
The film is ingenious in the way it’s developed: murder among a pack of paranoid, insecure backstabbers; the mad artistic genius Murnau directing all the while. And it would have been only clever were it not for Willem Dafoe’s perversely brilliant performance as Schreck. There is a goofiness about his Schreck that gives the otherwise deeply horrible character an oddly endearing quality.
Ah, to relive the youthful, sleepless nights of scrolling mindlessly through Reddit, Creepypasta, hell- even Wikipedia, desperate for a fresh scare. And which tale is more infamous among those fabled threads than the Russian Sleep Experiment? A story so desperate to pass as real to susceptible pre-teens- now, it’s one of the most revered spooks by internet-savvy horror lovers.
Director John Farrelly’s The Sleep Experiment takes vast inspiration from the Russian Sleep Experiment, even down to the use of scientifically enhanced gas to keep the participants awake for 30 consecutive days. Unfortunately, The Sleep Experiment ultimately inherits about as much cinematic charm as its internet forum predecessor.
The story awkwardly jilts from point A to B, relying on an uneven present-day police interrogation to clumsily place the narrative into the actual storyline. This left-footed rehashing of the experiment steals time away from what both fans of the Creepypasta original and audiences of the film want: disturbing images inside a sleep-deprived human mind.
However, the moments inside the experiment ultimately fall flatly down predictable paths. Some characters lose their minds, others die – none are interesting. It’s impossible to say if the film would have reaped the benefits from investing its time differently, but ultimately, the audience is left starving for more unnerving content.
The performances are, unfortunately, a particularly sore spot. They are largely stilted and awkward. Actors often have difficulty connecting the characters to the overarching – and loose – themes.
The performers sometimes seem to disagree with their dialog – their connection to it is almost nonsensical. A particularly grating example is one character’s long-winded monologue highlighting the joys of psychopathy. At a point, the hyperdramatic rhythm of the words becomes almost comical before sharply turning into confusing irritation.
Ultimately, if you want a similar scare with more room for imagination, do as we did in the good ol’ days. Log onto your Reddit app after your parents have gone to bed and scroll r/horror until your eyes bleed.
Last year she stole scenes in the super-star-studded Western spectacle The Harder They Fall. In 2019, she seared through the screen in Lane and Ruckus Skye’s woefully underseen (See it! Do it!) Devil to Pay. And now she carries the weight of the world with grace as Mamie Till-Mobley in Chinonye Chukwu’s remarkable Till.
Deadwyler is hypnotic, a formidable presence as a woman who endures the unendurable and then alters history.
And Chukwu wastes no time making this history come alive.
For decades, we’ve mostly been shown the same faded, B&W snapshot of Emmett Till. Chukwu, as director and co-writer, bathes us in color and warmth from the opening minutes.
Mamie and her teenage son Emmett aka “Bo” (Jalyn Hall, charming and heartbreaking) share loving and tender moments as he prepares to leave Chicago and visit family in Mississippi. Deadwyler delivers Mamie’s apprehension with tense stoicism, and her eventual grief with gut-wrenching waves of pain.
Chukwu’s overall approach to the period piece offers hits and misses. The vibrant palette brings urgency to the past while fluid camerawork puts you in the parlors, courtrooms, streets and churches, making you part of the history you’re watching. It’s a beautiful film.
At the same time, much of the plotting, score and script fall back on tropes of the period drama. This comes as a particular disappointment given the filmmaker’s fresh and resonant approach to her 2019 drama, Clemency.
And yet, Chukwu mines these familiar beats for organic moments that create bridges to today. Victim blaming, character assassination, trial acquittals and the intimate helplessness of systemic oppression are all integral parts of this story, and ours. Those are ugly truths, but Till never loses its sense of beauty. There’s a remarkable grace to the film, even as it is reminding us that this American history is far from ancient.
There’s no denying Deadwyler, whose aching, breathtaking turn is certain to be remembered this awards season. In her hands, Mamie’s hesitant move to activism is genuine and inspiring, but it is always grounded in loss.
That loss is the soul of Till, a film that paints history with intelligence and anger as it honors one mother’s grief-stricken journey of commitment.
Shame preys on Catholic girls. It’s guilt that does us in. Just when you think there can be no new or relevant approach to exorcism horror, director Daniel Stamm picks that scab.
Jacqueline Byers is Sister Ann, and she wants to be an exorcist. She attends to patients/inmates/victims as a nurse in a prestigious, centuries-old facility for exorcism in Boston. She also sneaks into classes where no woman is welcome, until Father Quinn (Colin Salmon) notices her unusual connection to some of the afflicted.
Is the church ready for a little feminism?
Wait, the Catholic church?
Prey for the Devil scores points in understated ways. Virginia Madsen’s psychologist dismisses the rite and believes Ann suffers from unresolved trauma. This is treated as something to consider rather than as a narrative device representing good or evil. In the world created by writers Robert Zappia, Todd R. Jones and Earl Richey Jones, science and religion are equally helpful and problematic. It’s often fascinating the way the film respects and undermines simultaneously.
On the whole, exorcism films fall into two categories. One: religion is fake and Catholicism, in particular, is so steeped in misdeeds and debauchery that it may as well kneel to Satan. Two: faith is the only hope. Prey for the Devil suggests a more nuanced approach.
The film’s strengths are its moments of outright feminism because they feel informed rather than flippant. They’re also a bit muted by an acceptance of the “working from within the system” failure.
The other failure is the horror itself, and Stamm should know better. His 2008 gem The Last Exorcism is a standout in the sub-genre (and one of the welcome features where there’s nary a priest on the screen). The horror was inventive, primal and it packed an emotional punch.
A PG13 film, Prey for the Devil suffers from lack of imagination. If you’ve seen one crab walk you’ve seen them all, and Stamm doesn’t deliver a single unique moment of horror in 93 minutes.
But he knows that nothing takes down a Catholic girl faster than a lifetime of guilt and shame. That metaphor fits a tale of an irredeemable soul better than any I’ve seen, and a little slap of feminism is probably the only thing that can help.
