Tag Archives: Brandon Thomas

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Nothing to Rave About

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Dreamcatcher

by Brandon Thomas

The music world and the horror world have a simpatico relationship. The Rocky Horror Picture Show and The Phantom of the Paradise are quintessential cool horror rock operas. More recently, Deathgasm – the New Zealand love letter to metal – has gained momentum as a cult classic with its fun mix of gory carnage and shredding guitars.

Where does the world of underground DJing fit into this legacy? Well, if Dreamcatcher is any indication, any legacy might be over before it starts.

Pierce (Niki Koss) and her friend, Jake (Zachary Gordon), tag along to a hot-ticket underground music fest with Pierce’s sister, Ivy (Elizabeth Posey), and her friend, Brecken (Emrhys Cooper). As the show winds down, tragedy strikes and the friends are thrust into a world of deceit and violence.

It’s hard to get excited about slasher flicks these days. Heck, it was hard to get excited about them by the mid-80s. These are movies built on tropes – it’s what the fans expect – and Dreamcatcher is no exception, despite a few clumsy attempts to be something different. The film swings big, trying to be more character-focused. This approach does nothing but put a spotlight on the incredibly weak script, and pad the running time to an excruciating hour and 48 minutes.

The parts of the movie that are your standard stalk-and-slash clash with the other side that wants to be something more akin to a 90s thriller (think Kiss the Girls or other Silence of the Lambs wannabes). Director Jacob Johnston handles the slasher elements well. These scenes are shot in a more grounded and brutal fashion. When the story starts to dip its toe into character motivation or anything resembling drama, the suspense falls apart.

The characters in Dreamcatcher run the gamut from unlikeable to downright loathsome. Scene after scene of Pierce, Jake, and Ivy airing their petty grievances wear out fast. Dreamcatcher lacks even one character for the audience to latch onto as a surrogate. This ends up making the horror shallow and meaningless. 

Dreamcatcher might satisfy die hard fans of the slasher genre, but those looking for something a little more challenging will find themselves checking their watches on more than a few occasions. 

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Best Served Cold

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Rage

by Brandon Thomas

Revenge tales are a messy affair. Forget the buckets of blood you’re liable to wade through (metaphorically – of course). No, vengeance cinema revels in discomfort – the more emotionally taxing, the better. Put all of that together in a two-and-a-half-hour movie, and you’ve got something that’s pretty hard to sit through.

That’s what director John Balazs’s film Rage delivers.

Noah (Matt Theo) and Madeline’s (Hayley Beveridge) marriage is already on shaky ground when we meet them. Petty grievances populate their interactions, and the physical component of their relationship is all but forgotten. Their bond is forever fractured when a violent home invasion leaves Noah comatose, Madeline traumatized, and another family member dead. As the two begin to pick up the pieces, the realization that one of their attackers is still out there spurs them into irrational action. 

There’s no shying away from the brutality of violence here. There’s no celebration of it either. Gratuitous isn’t quite the right a word to describe anything in Rage. The violence is meant to make us wince and squirm, not cheer and pump our fists. 

While the ferocity comes in short bursts, the emotional impact is given far more time to breathe. The trauma suffered by Noah and Madeline takes up the bulk of the film’s running time, and it’s here where the real pain is inflicted. Madeline’s near-catatonic state in the latter half of the film is more disturbing than any physical scar could be. 

Rage occasionally abandons Noah and Madeline’s point of view to follow the detective (Richard Norton from Mad Max: Fury Road) working their case. Focusing on the police procedural side of the story takes away some of the urgency around the couple’s crumbling relationship, and, at times, threatens to stop the film dead. As the tension and drama surrounding Noah and Madeline’s actions increase later in the film, it only goes to highlight how unnecessary the police point of view ultimately is. 

Rage isn’t the first film to comment on the never-ending cycle of violence that vengeance can create. It is, however, one of the few films to spend more than a fleeting moment on the emotional ramifications of random brutality. 

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Through the Wringer

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Test Pattern

by Brandon Thomas

The debut feature from writer/director Shatara Michelle Ford, Test Pattern, is a compelling look at date rape, its confusing aftermath, and the ways in which the medical field and law enforcement can fail victims with their chaotic bureaucracy. 

After an opening that delivers one of the sweetest, most awkward “meet-cutes” in recent memory, Test Pattern digs into the burgeoning relationship between Renesha (Brittany S. Hall of TV’s Ballers) and Evan (Will Brill of The Eyes of My Mother). Their life together is put to the test after Renesha is drugged and sexually assaulted after an evening out with her girlfriend. 

Test Pattern offers a matter-of-fact approach that makes it hard to look away. The audience is with Renesha every step of the way as she traverses the confusing hours after her assault. It’s an honest, but tough, journey we take with her as she runs the gamut of emotions and, at times, humiliating experiences.

Nothing in Test Pattern would work if the strength of the cast wasn’t there. Hall is jaw-droppingly good as Renesha. She easily conveys strength, vulnerability, and poise in her early scenes. At one point on their first official date, Evan comments, “I feel like you always know what you’re talking about.” There’s no greater summation of the Renesha we meet early on.

Brill is equally good as the doting, supportive Evan. Evan’s almost “too nice” persona is in contrast to the man we see later in the film. His focused, almost fanatical need to get Renesha in front of a doctor and the police starts to feel like a salve for his wounded pride, not her well-being.

Together, these two actors have the type of natural chemistry that isn’t often seen. They deliver lines from Ford’s already expertly written script with ease and purpose. You can almost feel the history of this relationship pour off the screen. The genuine love and respect shared between Renesha and Evan make it hurt all the more as things start unraveling. 

Ford’s slow-burn approach to the story, and especially the aftermath of the assault, offers an incredibly riveting, and honest approach to this serious subject matter. The tension that begins to build as Renesha and Evan drive from hospital to hospital sometimes feels akin to some of the more emotionally disturbing horror films from recent years. The result is a direct focus on the painful process this couple is forced to endure. 

Test Pattern presents no easy answers. Renesha and Evan’s story isn’t wrapped up in a nice bow for us to feel good about. We don’t get the happy ending; we get the honest one.

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Fjords of Forgettable

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Sacrifice

by Brandon Thomas

If we’ve learned anything from horror cinema over the decades, it’s that Europe is a scary place and to avoid it at all costs. Werewolves on the moors, rage zombies, predatory hostels – just go to Myrtle Beach again and try your luck with the drunk rednecks. And now, with Sacrifice, co-writers/co-directors Andy Collier and Toor Mian give us a taste of the unsavory side of Norway.

Isaac (Ludovic Hughes) and Emma (Sophie Stevens) return to Isaac’s birthplace on a remote Norwegian island to claim his inheritance. Unknown family truths bubble to the surface as Isaac confronts a dark legacy and Emma fears not only for her husband’s sanity but for the life of her unborn child. 

Sacrifice is a frustrating film from the start. The basic “fish out of water” premise is one we’ve seen time and time again, and Sacrifice offers nothing new to this subgenre. The opening credits promise a story built around the works of H.P. Lovecraft, but the closest we get to Lovecraft is unsubtle nods to Cthulhu.

Subtlety in horror certainly has its place. There are countless horror movies that take a more methodical approach to dole out the scares. These movies eventually pay off, though. Sacrifice is a film that tries to build tension and atmosphere, but whiffs at every opportunity. Semi-odd behavior from backwoods Norwegian folk isn’t exactly edge-of-your-seat material. And I would be ashamed of myself if I didn’t mention how the film uses the tried and true “character wakes up from a nightmare that seemed real” device a grand total of four times. 

At this point, I was hoping the movie was a dream.

So much of the films’s tension is built around the unraveling of Isaac and Emma’s relationship. The problem with this is that the characters toggle between unlikable and uninteresting from the get-go. Isaac’s descent into madness never once borders on tragedy. Instead, this turn feels like the filmmaker’s checking off a box on their genre bingo card. 

Even the illustrious Barbara Crampton (Re-Animator, From Beyond) doesn’t come out unscathed. It’s a role that asks her to do little more than be a suspicious local and deliver an uneven Norwegian accent. 

The film does get a lot out of the location shooting in Norway. The lush green fjords with their raging waterfalls inject a strong sense of place. These scenic establishing shots help set an “otherness” to the island, even if the remainder of the film does a poor job of maintaining the eerie mood. 

Sacrifice tries to set itself alongside Europe-centric horror movies like The Wicker Man and Midsommar, but instead comes off as a watered-down, and quite lazy, copy of better movies. 

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A/S/L

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#Like

by Brandon Thomas

One only needs a fleeting familiarity with social media, message boards and comment sections to know that the internet is a breeding ground for toxicity and abuse. Everyone becomes a target at one point or another. Young women, especially, can become the focal points for violent, disturbed predators who want only one thing: satisfaction through cruelty. 

Rosie (Sarah Rich) and her mother aren’t doing so well. It’s been one year since Rosie’s younger sister, Amelia (Samantha Nicole Dunn), died by suicide. The pain of the loss is made worse as Amelia was goaded into taking her own life by an online abuser. This abuser used his perverse coercion to worm its way into Amelia’s day-to-day life. Rosie’s depression and guilt morph into rage as she believes she’s uncovered the identity of the man responsible for Amelia’s death.

Like many of cinema’s greatest thrillers, #Like leans hard into discomfort. Director Sarah Pirozek pulls no punches when examining how young women are treated not only online, but in their every waking moment. The sexual adoration that men – young and old – direct toward women such as Rosie is shown for what it truly is – villainous and scary. Outside of being a damning portrait of male behavior, this also complicates Rosie’s search for the truth behind her sister’s death. How can she find the man responsible when so many are capable of this reprehensible behavior?

#Like isn’t all hard truths. There’s a throughline of ambiguity in the film that creates an ever-present sense of unease. The audience is sure Rosie has her man…until she doesn’t. Like the aforementioned online cruelty, Pirozek doesn’t shy away from the ugly side of Rosie’s anger. All good revenge movies grapple with the cost of vengeance, and this one is no exception.

Rosie is a great showcase for Sarah Rich. This is a character who is a ball of guilt, depression, rage and sadness – sometimes all within the same scene. Rosie should be your typical teenager, but the grief boiling inside of her won’t allow that. Rich plays Rosie’s loss of innocence as the film’s ultimate tragedy. 

On the other side, Marc Menchaca (Ozark, Alone) impresses as The Man (the only title given to this character), the focus of Rosie’s ire. Menchaca has the hardest role in that he can’t simply play The Man as a mustache-twirling villain without steamrolling the movie’s overall theme. Menchaca’s portrayal of The Man runs the gamut from suspicious to sympathetic. 

#Like could’ve easily gone for pure pulp and still have been a successful film. But by investing in theme, both storywise and through character beats, #Like manages to stand out by challenging the audience.

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The Beat Goes On

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Yung Lean: In My Head

by Brandon Thomas

Thanks to the internet, the world of new music is vast and wide. Anyone can put a song on their website, or upload a poorly produced music video to YouTube. Most of it goes unnoticed. That lack of notice is usually justified.

And then occasionally someone like Yung Lean comes along. 

In the early 2010s, a group of Swedish teens began uploading rap demos to Tumblr and Soundcloud. The same group gained even more notoriety when they began uploading videos to YouTube. This trio, the “Sad Boys,” and their de facto leader, Jonatan Leandoer Hastad (Yung Lean), soon found themselves on a meteoric rise across Europe and then the rest of the world. 

Music documentaries have become a popular subgenre in recent years. The Beatles, Amy Winehouse, and The Beastie Boys have all been the subject of recent, popular docs. Of course, these are artists already known and immortalized through their music and pop culture. The beauty of Yung Lean: In My Head is how the film uses Lean’s underground status to its advantage. The air of mystery is half the point. 

This documentary isn’t one that suffers from a lack of involvement from the principals. Lean’s story is told through his friends and collaborators, video footage shot while on tour, and family photos and video. Thankfully, the film doesn’t get too caught up in talking heads explaining every little detail. The copious amount of footage shot during the American and Canadian tour helps paint a picture of artistic freedom that slowly unraveled into drug-fueled chaos. 

Lean’s story takes a dramatic turn later in the film, one that shifts the focus away from music. This is an area where other films might stumble or even choose to not devote much time at all. Instead, In My Head pivots with ease. The focus was never just the music – it was Lean himself. 

In My Head may not have a subject with the culture cache of the Fab Four or Elvis Presley, but what Yung Lean does have is a compelling story born out of artistic creation and personal perseverance. 

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Is Anyone There?

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Go/Don’t Go

by Brandon Thomas

The opening minutes of Go/Don’t Go hint at a burgeoning relationship drama. Shy boy meets an outgoing girl. Girl draws the boy out of his shell. Hints of electricity crackle as they find themselves engrossed in conversation. The parts are all there, but as the scene comes to a close, Go/Don’t Go crosses into something a little more…sinister. 

Set in a not-so-distant future, Adam (writer/director Alex Knapp) spends his days completing routine tasks. He cleans, prepares meals and works on repairing a car. When not doing his day-to-day, Adam wanders the countryside, checks homes and marks areas on a map as “Go/Don’t Go.” Adam appears to be the only person left.

Isolation and loneliness exist in the periphery of every post-apocalyptic type movie. In Go/Don’t Go, the isolation is front and center. Adam doesn’t spend the entire running time evading cannibalistic marauders or dispatching shuffling zombies. No, Adam’s conflict exists in the haunted memories of a past love, K (Olivia Luccardi, It Follows). 

Looked at as a typical horror/thriller, Go/Don’t Go could be a frustrating watch for many. There’s a purposeful aloofness to the narrative that builds a lot of mystery, but also never shows much interest in resolving said mysteries. Adam’s flashbacks fill in interesting character gaps instead of explaining how Adam found himself in his current situation. 

The film’s most interesting angle is how it plays with metaphor. Is the landscape in which Adam lives even real? Every house he enters has running water and electricity. The market he goes to is always stocked full of fresh products. Maybe Adam’s shyness, hinted at in those opening minutes, has consumed him after the ending of a relationship. Of course, nothing is definitive and most of this is left to the viewer to decide. 

Knapp’s handling of familiar territory is a breath of fresh air. Despite the lack of momentum in the narrative, Knapp taps into a sense of urgency through clever editing. This allows layers of character to be peeled back piece by piece. It’s enough to keep us interested and invested in a story that moves at more of a sporadic pace. 

By focusing on character and theme, Go/Don’t Go manages to stand out in a sea of post-apocalyptic tales. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38k4Mmat_6I

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False Sense of Security

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Bad Impulse

by Brandon Thomas

Now more than ever, home has become the ultimate refuge. Our home is where we are supposed to feel the most comfortable, the safest. Image how horrifying it would be if that sanctuary started driving you insane.

Well, maybe that’s not too hard to imagine right now, either. 

Successful stockbroker Henry Sharpe (Grand Bowler) seemingly has it all: a great career, a supportive and equally successful wife (Sonya Walger, TV’s Lost), and three healthy kids. All of that changes the night Henry is attacked in his home by masked strangers. Paranoid and angry, Henry installs a state-of-the-art security system in their home. This system is so high-tech that the family must provide blood samples so that their DNA can be bonded to the system. As the Sharpes’ comfort with the new system increases, so does their anger and paranoia.

Writer Jason Chase Tyrrell and director Michelle Danner make a few big swings for social commentary, but the ideas and the execution just aren’t there. Dismantling the facade of suburbia as a safe haven has been a genre trope since the 1970s, and Bad Impulse’s inclusion of technology into the mix is neither fresh nor surprising. The broad strokes of this idea feel culled from a half dozen bottom shelf Twilight Zone episodes.

Bad Impulse could’ve been fun on a purely visceral level. Instead, it’s a movie that never fully commits to its genre leanings. Outside of a stylish and well-executed opening, the movie almost seems embarrassed to be in the horror/thriller genre. Going full Savini might not have saved the film, but it certainly would’ve made for a more enjoyable watch. 

Danner is well-regarded as an industry acting coach, and she was able to attract some notable talent to the project. Bowler and Walger, in particular, do their best with the given material. Other industry vets like Dan Lauria (TV’s The Wonder Years) and Paul Sorvino (Goodfellas) pop up in small roles to class the joint up. Unfortunately, the rest of the main cast does little to impress. The actors playing the Sharpe children aren’t up to the challenge of raising up weak material. Their solo scenes are where the movie loses too much steam to recover.

Bad Impulse is a tired, and somewhat lazy, attempt at social horror that manages to bungle both the social and the horror.

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Not So Happy Family

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King of Knives

by Brandon Thomas

I think most modern movie-goers would agree that the last thing they want to see is another movie detailing the mid-life crisis of a rich New Yorker. It’s hard to muster even the most sarcastic crocodile tears while watching a sad advertising executive drive his sports car through Manhattan. Cynicism aside, King of Knives might appear to be the king of cliches at first glance, but this is a film that has a few tricks up its sleeve.  

Aforementioned Frank (Gene Pope) is our through-line into a family that, on the surface, looks to be typical, albeit with a few rough edges. The light banter that permeates through a celebratory anniversary dinner early on is quickly smothered as a hint of tragedy manifests itself. As the fractures in Frank and his wife Kathy’s (Mel Harris) marriage begin to show, their daughters (Roxi Pope and Emily Bennett) struggle with their own wants and relationships.

King Of Knives toys with our expectations from the get-go. There’s a whimsical edge that engulfs the early scenes – a tone that doesn’t feel too far off from a winky Julia Roberts movie of the 90s. The tone begins an interesting transition when family tragedy, infidelity, and mental illness enter the fray. It’s in this transition that King of Knives shows its hand. 

Brutal honesty gives King of Knives its power. This isn’t a movie looking for an easy happy ending. Instead, the characters are going through the painful process of finding what truly makes them happy. For Frank, it’s finally owning up to what a terrible father and husband he’s been. It’s not about Frank searching for pity, or the film doing so on Frank’s behalf. Instead, it’s about seeing a character confront the choices that caused so much pain for the people he loves. 

It’s not all blue Mondays, though. King of Knives is genuinely funny. The cast has a natural chemistry that allows them to bounce off one another. The comedy isn’t about bits being paid off but instead comes through its characters. 

First-time feature director Jon Delgado might not have the sharpest visual eye, but he also knows that this material isn’t looking for a flashy approach. Delgado lets the story and performances shine without letting his more technically-focused experience get in the way.  

King of Knives isn’t going to change your mind about rich New Yorkers, but you might approach the fictional kind with a little more empathy next time.  

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Down the Rabbit Hole

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Collective

by Brando Thomas

On October 30, 2015, a massive fire broke out at the Colectiv Club in Bucharest, Romania. Twenty-seven people died in the initial blaze while another 180 were injured. In the days and weeks following the fire, dozens of survivors died in the hospital of preventable infections. Over the next year, journalist Catalin Tolontan would uncover a trail of corruption that had all but hobbled the country’s health care system.

There’s a restraint to Collective that is much appreciated. Absent are the talking heads and exposition-heavy voiceovers that have become staples of documentaries. In fact, Collective is a film more than happy to let multiple scenes set in boardrooms and offices play out almost in real-time.

And it is riveting. 

The access granted to filmmaker Alexander Nanau is nothing short of astounding. They are there as Tolontan interviews a doctor that has smuggled disturbing footage out of a Romanian hospital. Nanau is also granted unprecedented access to newly appointed Romanian Health Minister Vlad Voiculescu. The juxtaposition between Tolontan’s journalistic work and Voiculescu’s navigation of hostile political waters is fascinating and demoralizing all at once. 

Collective’s foundation is built around that tragic fire and the deaths that occurred. However, the film never once seems exploitative. The victims and their families loom large, but Nanau feels no need to use their grief to propel his film forward. 

The power of Collective is in the film’s desire to avoid one specific point of view. There’s a matter-of-factness to the film that is methodical and precise. Films and filmmaking are all about manipulation, and this clinically observational approach feels more authentic. For a film so steeped in the hunt for the truth, Nanau’s fly-on-the-wall perspective just seems right.

Collective isn’t a flashy film – it doesn’t want to be. What it is, though, is a gripping look at the good that can come from honest, professional investigative journalism.