Would it surprise you to find that the latest from the writer/director behind In the Company of Men and Your Friends and Neighbors (as well as the less impressive Wicker Man reboot and others) is a meditation on sexual dynamics, power and agency? That it’s brimming with psychosexual wordplay? That it’s bitter and a bit misguided?
How many times can we disassemble the mating ritual to judge and shame those involved?
Sometimes LaBute does it well—so well that it’s tough not to look forward to whatever he releases. House of Darkness sees the filmmaker again exploring his favorite topic, this time within a horror context.
Justin Long riffs on his nice guy persona, his character Hap actually referring to himself at one point as “one of the good ones.” (Had Hap seen Promising Young Women, he might have had sense enough not to make such a claim.)
Hap’s been lured into the stately gothic manor of the lovely Mina, played with controlled ferocity by Kate Bosworth. Bosworth seems to relish the directness of her character. Mina’s disinterest in accommodating Hap’s insecurities is glorious—a reminder of how casually brutal LaBute’s work can be.
Perhaps because he started his career as a playwright, each of LaBute’s films rise or fall on dialog. House of Darkness is a chamber piece – it could easily be a stage play (though it’s likely a Covid production). Limited performers pepper scenes with double entendres in an awkward dance of “will we or won’t we” sexual politics.
The difference this time around is the genre trapping, a first for the filmmaker. The look is lush and effective, particularly the more fantastical sequences. Long — a genre veteran — delivers a bit of nuance, his Hap never entirely sympathetic but definitely hard to hate.
The story builds effectively enough. It’s just that nothing is ever in question. The genre tropes are more threadbare from use than LaBute’s banter-driven power game. Worse, the point rings hollow, like a disingenuous, cash-grab reversal of In the Company of Men.
There is no denying the stylistic mastery of Jean Luc Herbulot’s Senegalese horror Saloum. An opening voice-over describes revenge as a river that eventually drowns you, but a wise viewer will follow Herbulot’s current because this film knows where it’s going even when you don’t.
We open during the 2003 coups in Guinea-Bissau. In an incredible shot down an alley of endless bodies, we first meet three hooded men. These men are mercenaries, Bangui’s Hyenas, and they’ve come to extract a drug dealer from the dangerous city. But his escape goes south and soon Chaka (Yann Gael), Minuit (Mentor Ba) and Rafa (Roger Sallah) find themselves hiking across deserts, boating through winding waters, and laying low in an unusual little hideaway near the delta in Senegal.
Already we’ve gone from war movie to crime thriller to Western, and we’ve barely exited Act 1. Act 2 will float between mystery and revenge thriller before Herbulot finally embraces the supernatural horror we realize has been bubbling just beneath the surface all along.
A trio of fascinating performances keeps your eyes fixed on the Hyenas. Gael’s unreadable, unbreakable smile hides true intentions, charms and terrifies depending on the scene. Ba’s mystic/elder statesman helps the film transition from one subgenre to the next and gives the trio a center. Meanwhile, Sallah’s explosive Rafa is a constant surprise.
Gregory Corandi’s cinematography conjures each new genre beautifully without creating abrupt leaps from one to the next. Colors are amazing, vistas are both beautiful and dangerous, and there’s always movement just beyond where you look. Western slides into thriller, which bends toward horror, the popping action the one constant through the entire running time.
Herbulot splashes his cinematic influences across the screen: Leone, Woo, Peckinpah, Tarantino (whose own style amounts to a concoction of the previous three). It’s a heady mix. It’s not style over substance, although the style does draw attention away from the film’s weaker elements. Instead, it’s the calling card of a filmmaker leaving his mark on genre filmmaking.
In 2017, Danny Boyle returned to Scotland with T2 Trainspotting. You know, to see how Mark, Sick Boy, Spud and Begbie were dealing with middle age. The result was poignant, funny and self-aware.
Writer/director Kevin Smith likewise revisits Leonardo, New Jersey to see how Dante and Randall are faring with their own midlife crises. Again, the result is poignant, funny and self-aware.
I swear to God.
For Clerks IIII, Smith delivers a wild mix of amateurish moments, inspired soundtrack choices (that’s the first time I ever enjoyed My Chemical Romance’s Welcome to the Black Parade), sentiment, callbacks, social commentary, and genuine fondness. The end of the filmmaker’s slacker trilogy delivers an ode to independent filmmaking and his own journey as a filmmaker.
Dante (Brian O’Halloran) reenacts the worst days of his youth every day, wasting his life at the convenience store he now co-owns with bestie Randall (Jeff Anderson). The long-shuttered video store next door is now a cannabis shop run by Silent Bob (Smith) and Jay (Jason Mewes), naturally.
After Randall has a heart attack behind the counter, he decides the only way to give his life meaning is to film a movie of his antics at the convenience store.
Essentially, Clerks.
Smith’s style remains a weird mix of sincerity and irreverence. For that reason—and because his leads are the least talented actors onscreen—Clerks III sometimes lands as cloying. But both Anderson and O’Halloran also offer surprising emotional depth here, especially Anderson.
Smith brings back nearly every “actor” who populated his ’94 breakout, and a few of the main players from its 2006 sequel. There’s also a lengthy montage of auditions for Randall’s movie, which allows Smith to fill the screen with other recognizable faces.
The whole movie’s an inside joke, but if you’re on the inside, it’s bound to draw a smile. More than that, if you’re a Kevin Smith fan, Clerks III is a sincere mash note to you.
Gigi & Nate follows the story of an unlikely bond between recent quadriplegic Nate (Charlie Rowe) and his service monkey.
Director Nick Hamm’s film tracks the pair’s difficulties due to Nate’s disability and society’s stigmas around their pairing. Running at a generous 1 hour and 54 minutes, the bond between man and primate is thoroughly, though not particularly well, examined.
Gigi and Nate seems to miss the backbone of what makes this unique story interesting. Threaded by a plot riddled with holes, a strong emotional ethos has no channel through which to flow. Instead, Hamm and writer David Hudgins string together uneven attempts to create a compelling narrative. These attempts hit the beats of any PG, feel-good, family-friendly story, while remaining seemingly uninterested in exploring any nuance.
The story initially paces along logically. It takes a devastating blow, however, when concentration on the human-animal connection is severed and focus turns to a bizarre examination of society’s skepticism toward the human/primate pairing. With this, whatever fuel burning the emotional fire behind the story runs dry.
Performances, including Rowe’s, struggle to rise above surface level. Nate’s lack of metamorphosis is staggering. We see the glimmer of change directly following his accident, but are ultimately disappointed in Nate’s quick return to a sunny-despite-the-circumstances disposition. The filmmakers never allow the audience inside the full depths of Nate’s psyche, so no catharsis can be earned.
This lack of depth creates real problems. Narrative solutions feel unearned. Outlandish antagonists are clumsily formed, their stories undeservingly resolved. A potentially intriguing tale from an underrepresented perspective is lost to a cop-out of a resolution.
Gigi & Nate is especially disappointing because the film —though it takes significant creative freedom— is inspired by the true story of quadriplegic Ned Sullivan. While the filmmakers’ hearts were undoubtedly in the right place, their sincerity doesn’t justify a film that does little work to amplify the voices of the people it’s portraying.
If you’re just looking for your cuteness dosage, Gigi (played by Capuchin, Allie) certainly has her moments, but you’re better off skipping this film and picking up Marley and Me.
Honk. It’s such an inelegant word. Not that beep or toot are much more graceful, but honk?
That’s what makes it such a perfect choice for writer/director Adamma Ebo’s look at commercial spirituality, Honk for Jesus. Save Your Soul.
First Lady Trinitie Childs (Regina Hall, amazing as always) is launching a comeback. Her husband, Pastor Lee-Curtis Childs (the incomparable Sterling K. Brown), had a little run in with morality and scandal five years ago. Since then, their mega church, Wander to Greater Paths—which once boasted more than 10,000 congregants—has been shuttered.
Well, no more! That scandal is almost behind them (there’s the issue of one hold out in the settlement…) and this dynamic duo is ready. And they want people to know, which is why Lee-Curtis agreed to let a documentary crew follow them as they prepare for their upcoming Easter Sunday resurrection.
What follows is a mockumentary of sorts, although Ebo’s point of view is not exclusively that of the documentarian (that elusive Anita). And while the world seems most interested in the pastor and his past transgressions, that sly Anita seems more drawn to the first lady.
To call this a satire, or really even a mockumentary, is to be a bit off the mark. Though it’s often funny, it’s not exactly a comedy, either. Brown’s damaged, shamed pastor is so pathologically single-minded as to be villainous outright. But Brown seems incapable of creating a character whose flaws don’t make him all the more human, and therefore tender, however irredeemable.
Likewise, Hall, whose performance is more decidedly comedic, mines Trinitie for deep conflict between submission to spirituality or to patriarchal bullshit. Her profound unhappiness partnered with her pride make the character a preaching contradiction in a church hat.
Solid support work bolsters the comedy (Nicole Beharie, in particular) and the tragedy (the late introduction of Austin Crute’s Khalil is powerful).
What starts off as a bit of fun at commodified religion’s expense turns into a surprisingly layered and cynical investigation into the damage organized religion of any kind can have, especially on those who believe.
Loosely based on a video game from 2016, writer David Ebeltoft’s Root Letter offers a unique take on the idea of a pen pal seeking out a friend in trouble. Though director Sonja O’Hara does her best to flesh out the surprisingly bare-bones story, there doesn’t seem to be much for her to work with.
Sarah (Keana Marie) is given a school assignment at school to write four letters to a pen pal. She goes above and beyond the requirements, exchanging dozens of letters with Carlos (Danny Ramirez), who was hospitalized after his girlfriend’s dad discovered Carlos in his daughter’s bed.
When Carlos receives a distressing letter one year after the end of his communication with Sarah, he sets out to discover what happened to her.
It takes surprisingly little for Carlos to find Sarah despite only knowing her first name and the name of her high school. Carlos is able to elicit help from an English teacher who offers him a not-so-subtle nudge in the right direction.
There isn’t a lot of meat to Carlos’s character. He doesn’t serve as a guide to the past, since Sarah’s story isn’t told through interviews with her friends, but rather through flashbacks from the previous year. The present story doesn’t raise new questions or offer surprising twists to the story. We’re mostly biding time waiting to get back to the heart of Sarah’s story.
And yet, Sarah’s tale isn’t very compelling either. It’s weightier than Carlos’s forays into Sarah’s past life, but not by much. For a mystery, there are zero surprises as you can predict each measure beat by beat.
There are also too many characters even though the number was greatly reduced compared to the video game. Aside from Sarah, few of the characters come to life in meaningful ways. Sarah’s best friend is the kind of woman who’ll do anything to keep hold of a tenuous relationship. Sarah’s mom is a stereotypical single mom drug addict with a bad back.
Sarah’s friend Caleb (Breon Pugh) is our most interesting character, but his brief moments on screen do little to make him stand out.
There is a certain quaintness to the story, particularly in the beginning – who knew letter writing could be so endearing? – but any originality is dropped in favor of a paint-by-numbers mystery. If only the actors had something more compelling to work with, perhaps their earnestness would have been rewarded with a more watchable story.
Perhaps the most terrifying horror born of neighborly manners is Michael Haneke’s unnerving Funny Games (either his 1997 German-language original or his 2007 English-language remake). Writer/director Duncan Birmingham doesn’t go that far. What he does is walk a tightrope that’s a little goofier, a little less horrifying, but effective nonetheless.
Margo (Melissa Tang) and Adam (Ryan Hansen) throw a housewarming party. Well, Adam throws it. Margo endures it. She doesn’t honestly know what was wrong with their old neighborhood. It doesn’t help that their 5-year-old has had nightmares every night since they arrived.
Adam invites all his colleagues and bosses, hoping to impress without coming off as douchey. He’s upwardly mobile, although the house —which he got at a steal because of that nasty double homicide—might make them look a little higher up than they really are.
Not that Margo and Adam are the only partiers who aren’t what they seem. That really good-looking couple—the two who look like they just came from a really hip funeral—does anyone know who they are?
Maybe Sasha (Perry Mattfeld) and Tom (Timothy Granaderos) are the neighbors, as they say.
But probably not.
What we can say for sure is that they do not want to leave.
What transpires after all the other guests have gone would be a comedy of manners except that it feels pretty clear that something awful lurks underneath the handsome couple’s evasion and gaslighting.
Birmingham’s film is a mystery of sorts, although you’ll have most of that intrigue figured out pretty early. There is also a subplot about Margo’s friends who are babysitting. This goes essentially nowhere. Worse still, Birmingham rushes Act 3 and leaves you feeling short-changed.
However, that 30 minutes or so that Margo and Adam and Sasha and Tom have on their own gets pretty uncomfortable.
Hansen unveils surprising warmth within the needy, insecure Adam. He and Tang take the married couple in surprising and welcome directions. Mattfeld and Granaderos are drolly perfect as the home invaders masquerading as partygoers who just can’t tell it’s time to go.
A tight script wastes little time and manages to surprise even if you figure out the main mysteries early. Who Invited Them isn’t flawless, but it is an anxious bit of fun.
Exciting all MaddWolf Pack episode! Daniel Baldwin, aka The Schlocketeer, and Brandon Thomas join us to talk about a topic we stole from their Twitter conversation: which directors not known for horror made the best horror movies?
Be sure to listen because Daniel and Brandon both bring much knowledge (plus extra movie titles!) to the conversation. But here’s our Top 5:
5. Nosferatu, the Vampire (1979, Werner Herzog)
Sure, it’s another Dracula, but because it’s another Dracula by way of Murnau’s masterpiece Nosferatu, and it’s written and directed by the great Werner Herzog, it’s weird and wonderful.
Herzog uses the imagery Murnau created – in particular, the naked mole rat of a vampire – to turn vampirism into a pestilence to evoke the Black Plague of Europe. Klaus Kinski is that naked mole rat, and he is glorious.
Isabelle Adjani is the pure of heart maiden who is his undoing, but the way Herzog reimagines Jonathan Harker gives the film a cynical twist that feels like a surprise within this dreamlike adaptation. Gorgeous location shooting and an astonishing score help Herzog create a suffocating but captivating atmosphere.
4. The Haunting (1963, Robert Wise)
Coming off the big epics of The Sound of Music and West Side Story, no one would have expected the intimate psychological horror of Robert Wise’s The Haunting.
Shirley Jackson fans have to appreciate the way the film remains true to her vision of horror. Fans of horror have to appreciate Wise’s unbelievable knack for generating terror with sound design and imagination.
Yes, the performances are magnificent – especially Julie Harris, whose bitter Eleanor is picture perfect. But Wise’s mastery of form is what makes this G-rated film a lasting terror.
3. Hour of the Wolf (1968, Ingmar Bergman)
Like all Bergman films, this hypnotic, surreal effort straddles lines of reality and unreality and aches with existential dread. But Bergman and his star, Max von Sydow, cross over into territory of the hallucinatory and grotesque, calling to mind ideas of vampires, insanity and bloodlust as one man confronts repressed desires as he awaits the birth of his child.
As wonderful as von Sydow is as the central figure, a man spiraling toward insanity, it’s the heartbreaking Liv Ullman who owns this movie. Heartbreaking, solid, and the most unusual combination of strength and weakness, her Alma grounds the surreal elements of the movie.
The result is gorgeous, spooky, and so very sad. It’s one of the most underappreciated films of Bergman’s career.
2. The Shining (1980, Stanley Kubrick)
You know who you probably shouldn’t hire to look after your hotel? Jack Nicholson.
A study in atmospheric tension, Kubrick’s vision of the Torrance family collapse at the Overlook Hotel is both visually and aurally meticulous. It opens with that stunning helicopter shot, following Jack Torrance’s little yellow Beetle up the mountainside, the ominous score announcing a foreboding that the film never shakes.
The hypnotic, innocent sound of Danny Torrance’s Big Wheel against the weirdly phallic patterns of the hotel carpet tells so much – about the size of the place, about the monotony of the existence, about hidden perversity. The sound is so lulling that its abrupt ceasing becomes a signal of spookiness afoot.
Nicholson outdoes himself. His early, veiled contempt blossoms into pure homicidal mania, and there’s something so wonderful about watching Nicholson slowly lose his mind. Between writer’s block, isolation, ghosts, alcohol withdrawal, midlife crisis, and “a momentary loss of muscular coordination,” the playfully sadistic creature lurking inside this husband and father emerges.
He’s not the caretaker management expected, but really, was Grady? Like Grady and Lloyd the bartender, Jack Torrance is a fixture here at the Overlook.
1. Silence of the lambs (1991, Jonathan Demme)
It’s to director Jonathan Demme’s credit that Silence made that leap from lurid exploitation to art. His masterful composition of muted colors and tense but understated score, his visual focus on the characters rather than their actions, and his subtle but powerful use of camera elevate this story above its exploitative trappings. Of course, the performances didn’t hurt.
Hannibal Lecter ranks as one of cinema’s scariest villains, and that accomplishment owes everything to Anthony Hopkins’s performance. It’s his eerie calm, his measured speaking, his superior grin that give Lecter power. Everything about his performance reminds the viewer that this man is smarter than you and he’ll use that for dangerous ends.
Demme makes sure it’s Lecter that gets under our skin in the way he creates a parallel between Lecter and FBI investigator Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster). It’s Clarice we’re all meant to identify with, and yet Demme suggests that she and Lecter share some similarities, which means that maybe we share some, too.
After an hour of holding it in, I began to scream at the screen. “You’re stupid. You’re stupid.”
The poor decision-making of the characters in Kate Cox’s thriller Into the Deep, written by David Beton, had finally taken its toll on me.
Into the Deep, starring Ella-Rae Smith, Jessica Alexander, and Matthew Daddario, follows the budding romance of two strangers that become shipwrecked when a mysterious third party joins their affair.
The premise of this slow-burn thriller has so much potential: an isolated location, strangers harboring potentially criminal secrets, and twisted motives. But the film as a whole fails to bring these delicious ingredients together to create a cohesive, entertaining work.
Problems begin with the character development of the lead, Jess (Smith). Her amazingly promising backstory ties perfectly into the setting and action of the film. However, this backstory is never effectively delved into or utilized.
Not every mystery in a narrative needs to be spelled out. Based on the way certain mysteries were presented here, it seems as though the filmmakers did not know how to use them as devices in the film.
While there were no major plot holes, except perhaps in the very last moment, many of the decisions each lead character makes are truly nonsensical. Additionally, the characters will inexplicably overlook or ignore things directly in their faces.
For example, if you pour a gallon of gasoline around someone who has a reasonable sense of smell, you are not going to need to point out to them that they are surrounded by gasoline. That might be fine once or twice, especially in a thriller like this, but not every 15 minutes.
Into the Deep’s runtime hovers roughly around 90 minutes, which I was excited to see at first. However, this film could have been shortened easily by 20 minutes.
Not only was there far too much pointless exposition, the action did not commence until about an hour into the runtime. No real action, mystery, or discovery in a mystery-thriller for almost two-thirds of its runtime.
The saddest part in all of this is that it is more than evident that the cast of this movie is uber talented. I cannot wait to see what each player does next, even Nikkita Chadha, who had a supporting role.
Unfortunately, the wasted talent could not overcome the shallow characters and muddy vision of Into the Deep.
