Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Pontypool


PONTYPOOL

A 2008 film that has many vocal fans and supporters on the message boards of The Internet Movie Database, Pontypool is a zombie film of sorts that takes place almost entirely within a small-town radio station while something anomalous occurs in the community.  The tale follows a morning-shift disc jockey (Grant Mazzy) and his producer (Sydney Briar) and an assistant (Laurel-Ann) as they go about what begins as a routine day getting local news and traffic reports on the air.  Soon eyewitnesses begin contacting the station to report some sort of mob event outside the office of one Dr. Mendez.  A correspondent for the station gives a harrowing account of seeing the mob pulling two people out of a vehicle – and then biting them.  Dr. Mendez himself shows up at the station, realizes that Laurel-Ann is “infected,” and ushers Sydney into the soundproof broadcasting booth with Mazzy.  He explains that Laurel-Ann is now “hunting,” and indeed she slams herself into the booth’s windows repeatedly in an apparent effort to get at those inside.  Mendez says something about how the infection spreads through language, and thus they should probably stop talking.  Zombies swarm into the station.  Mazzy distracts them by looping an audio recording on a speaker over the station’s front door.  When it begins to appear that Sydney may be infected, Mazzy somehow cures her by repeating “kill is kiss” over and over (thus short-circuiting the language-based infection).  The story ends with apparent military intervention and what may or may not be the destruction of the radio station.

Pontypool begins quite well.  The actor playing Mazzy (Stephen McHattie) has a marvelous voice and was totally believable as a disc jockey, and the early scenes establishing the group dynamics between Mazzy and his producer and the assistant had me hooked.  Somewhere around the middle (and more so toward the end), the story lost me.  The narrative grows confusing as Dr. Mendez presents what should be clear exposition about the nature of the zombie infection.  The zombies never seem like an actual threat to Mazzy and his producer (except for one moment when an infected child lunges forward after the two leave the safety of the booth).  I also wanted more sense of narrative resolution: what sparked the outbreak?  Was Dr. Mendez involved in causing the initial infections?  What happens in the world outside the radio station?  None of these questions are answered.  Pontypool is an interesting attempt at a unique zombie story in a confined setting, but it left me more frustrated than scared and awed.

Saturday, September 25, 2010

Dark Remains


DARK REMAINS

Four syllables spring to mind as I reflect on the experience of watching the 2005 film Dark Remains on DVD: bland characters.  If either or both of the leads had been even remotely quirky or distinctive in any way, I might have been able to overlook the semi-coherent plot and the ending that makes no sense.  The story follows a married couple (Julie & Allen Pyke) whose daughter is murdered.  To make a fresh start, the two relocate from a city to a remote cabin on a mountain.  Julie takes photographs while Allen (a technical writer) pounds away at his laptop computer.  Their nearest neighbor is a recluse named Jim.  Julie becomes fixated on an abandoned prison near the cabin and obsessively photographs its interior after she thinks she sees her dead daughter in one print.  Two friends of the Pykes stop by for a visit, and one sees a ghost during the night.  Allen learns that the last couple to inhabit the cabin committed suicide.  He goes to the library to research local history and finds that a lot of mysterious deaths occur in the area on or around May 22 every year.  Neighbor Jim (who it turns out discovered his mother’s corpse when he was a young lad) murders the sheriff for no good reason.  Jim then attempts to kill the Pykes, but Julie shoots him.  Allen spouts some nonsense about how Jim was somehow responsible for causing all the hauntings in the area.  I realize it makes little sense, but that’s the plot in a nutshell.  I did appreciate the musical score.

Steer clear of this half-baked ghost story.  The imagery is periodically creepy, though Brian Avenet-Bradley (the auteur behind the project) overuses the trick of having something spooky (like a quick glimpse of a ghost) appear in the background unnoticed by the characters in the foreground.  I wasted an hour and a half of my life following this tale.  Don’t make the same mistake.  Avoid.    

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

The Skeptic

THE SKEPTIC

A 2009 auteur film (written and directed by Tennyson Bardwell) about a lawyer named Bryan who moves into a house that may or may not be haunted, The Skeptic features fresh and humorous dialogue (mostly banter between Bryan and his friend Sully) that balances out some disturbing and truly creepy scenes.  Bryan inherits (or at least thinks he does) the house from his estranged aunt.  He later learns that her will states that she has left the property to an academic program headed by a Dr. Warren Koven.  Bryan (who is separated from his wife and child) goes to meet the professor and finds that he is a parapsychologist.  Bryan experiences increasingly frightening occurrences in the house (starting with hearing eerie whispering while he’s in bed) but refuses to believe in ghosts.  With the help of a shrink, a psychic named Cassie, and Dr. Koven, Bryan sets out to discover if something’s wrong with his mental health or if he will have to alter his belief system to include the supernatural.  The movie’s ending is slightly ambiguous (on purpose) but emotionally satisfying.

There has not been a truly great haunted house film since 2001’s The Others, but The Skeptic comes close to deserving the same level of critical praise bestowed upon that Nicole Kidman vehicle.  I thoroughly enjoyed the bold choice to make Bryan a strongly-opinionated (to the point of being nearly unsympathetic) fellow who takes no guff from anyone (including his wife).  He is a singular and memorable protagonist.  The project’s tempo is just fast enough to keep the viewer hooked into the mystery of what’s going on in the house.  Add a fine score composed by Brett Rosenberg over an assortment of apparently ghostly happenings in a sprawling old house and you’ve got a recipe for a top-notch horror film.  I suspect that The Skeptic will hold up to repeat viewings, and I intend to test that hypothesis by watching it again before Halloween.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

The Last House on the Left (2009 remake)

THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT (2009 version)

I won’t compare and contrast this project with the original 1972 version, as I don’t remember that one too well (I’ve only seen it once, and that was eight years ago).  On its own terms, the 2009 incarnation of The Last House on the Left is chock full of suspense & tension and follows a sympathetic family through a night of hell. 

In the first half, a 17-year-old swimmer named Mari heads to an isolated vacation home with her parents (John and Emma).  Once there, Mari takes the family’s vehicle into town to meet up with her friend Paige, who works in a general store.  A customer there overhears Paige ask Mari if she still smokes pot.  The customer (Justin) mentions that he has some high-quality marijuana back at his motel room.  The girls end up smoking with him back at the room, where they are caught by Justin’s father (a dangerous criminal named Krug), Justin’s uncle (Francis), and a woman named Sadie whose relation to the others I did not glean.  The three adults (who weren’t supposed to return to the motel so soon) are upset because there’s a story on the front page about how Krug escaped from police custody.  Mari and Paige offer to leave without telling anyone anything, but Krug and his gang want to take no chances, so they kidnap the girls and steal Mari’s car.  Mari and Paige make a concerted effort to escape from the moving vehicle, which results in Krug crashing the car deep in the woods.  Krug and his gang (without the assistance of Justin) stab Paige, and then Krug rapes Mari in what I perceive as the most brutal assault sequence ever put to film.  Mari hits Krug in the head with a rock and sprints to a lake, where she swims for her life.  Krug shoots Mari, and one bullet catches her.

In the second half, Mari’s parents become the proactive characters.  They hear a knocking at their door and find Krug, Justin, Sadie, and Francis outside.  The criminals pose as a family out on a fishing trip that had an auto accident.  John and Emma unknowingly welcome in those who just brutalized their daughter and killed Paige.  I’ll say no more lest I spoil the taut and effective final fifty minutes or so of this well-constructed and convincingly-acted project.     

The unique structure of this tale impressed me: few stories can switch protagonists midstream and work well.  There’s an unsettling realness to the whole affair – when John and Emma realize that Mari has been raped, for example, they react in a psychologically-believable way.  Hats off to the entire creative team behind the 2009 version of The Last House on the Left – they have achieved that rarest of feats, crafting a remake that is more effective than the original.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Memory


MEMORY

A 2006 film in which a fellow named Taylor accidentally gets a hallucinogenic powder in his system and begins having flashes of memories from a serial killer, Memory boasts an interesting core concept but unfortunately has a plot peppered with holes and coincidences.  The basic premise is that the hallucinogen opens access to genetically-stored memories from one of Taylor’s parents – thus, his mother or father must be the killer, who wears a mask and a black trenchcoat.  Taylor uses clues from his visions to piece together where and when the killer was active and ultimately realizes that the villain is still alive and abducting little girls.  With the help of his girlfriend (a painter), Taylor sets out to stop the antagonist.

Memory takes tremendous factual liberties with DMT (an actual hallucinogen) and might have been better had it involved a fictional substance.  The movie contains far too many scenes with talking heads either gushing exposition or wondering what’s going on.  Taylor conveniently stumbles upon information and clues.  He also just happens to walk past a window in which a painting is displayed that features an image remarkably similar to the killer he sees in his visions.

Also, about those visions: the first time Taylor has one, he is “present” as a character in that reality and observes & chases the killer.  Only later is the nature of the visions altered so that Taylor is in fact experiencing memories of the killer (though those scenes are not shot from the villain’s point-of-view).  It’s as if the writer began with one concept and then switched horses midstream without bothering to revise the earlier scenes.  As this project is based on a novel, I wonder how many of these problems occur in the source material.

Memory could have been a unique spin on the old serial killer genre, but its poor construction and unbelievable plot twists make it sadly forgettable. 

Sunday, September 12, 2010

Tamara

TAMARA

A 2005 film in which a meek high school girl wants to have a romantic relationship with one of her teachers, Tamara is a flawed but entertaining story about revenge from beyond the grave.  The titular protagonist (who practices witchcraft) goes to a motel one night thinking her teacher (Bill Natolly) will be meeting her there, when in fact she’s been set up by some of her cruel peers.  The prank gets out of hand, Tamara lashes out and attacks her tormentors, and one of them shoves her in such a way that her head hits the corner of a table, and she dies.  The teens bury Tamara in the woods and vow to never speak of what transpired (I’m not sure what they did about that nasty blood stain on the motel carpet).  The next day, Tamara shows up at school dressed in an out-of-character sexy outfit and exudes a new confidence.  The teens who killed her conclude that they must have accidentally buried her alive.  Tamara (who has in fact magically returned from the dead) compels one of the conspirators to mutilate and ultimately kill himself on camera while the rest of the student body observes on the school’s TV system.  She sets out to exact revenge on the others while simultaneously attempting to seduce Mr. Natolly.  The film is worth looking at to see what occurs next. 

Jeffrey Reddick (who penned the first draft of the original Final Destination) wrote Tamara, and I admire him for creating unique horror fare even if his concepts don’t always work as well as they might.  In the case of Tamara, I was jolted out of the story in the third act (when Tamara chases some of the characters around a hospital) because the location seemed so deserted – not since the original Halloween 2 has a hospital on film been so totally devoid of patients and staff alike.  The tale’s setup felt over-long: Tamara dies around the thirty minute mark, leaving only just over an hour for the “revenge of the hero” section.  Still, Tamara is a fairly singular project with a memorable protagonist and some clever humor woven among the scares.  If you crave original horror in this day and age of constant remakes and sequels, Tamara is worth a look.

Thursday, September 2, 2010

My Bloody Valentine (2009 remake)


MY BLOODY VALENTINE (2009 version)
A slasher film in which the kills are all variations on “death by pickaxe,” the 2009 incarnation of My Bloody Valentine is reasonably stimulating but has an ending that might cause some viewers to cry foul due to the extreme measures the filmmakers take to make it clear that one character is not the murderer only to reveal in the climax that the individual in question is in fact the killer.  The story begins with a prologue (set ten years before the bulk of the narrative) in which a coal miner named Harry goes on a killing spree.  He’s presumed dead, but fresh bodies start to turn up a decade later as the anniversary (Valentine’s Day) of the murders approaches.  One fellow who survived the massacre is Tom, who returns to town in the present to sell off the mine (his father owned it before he did).  His ex-girlfriend Sarah is now married to the Sheriff (Axel).  There’s a lot of nonsense about the politics of selling the mine and the impact it will have on the community, plus some beats about the love triangle and the tensions of Sarah’s old flame being back.  Assorted characters get picked off, and an epilogue sets up a sequel.
My Bloody Valentine is an ensemble piece with no single clear protagonist (Sarah assumes that role for the bulk of the third act).  My main complaint is that the kills are all so similar (there’s only so much you can do with a pickaxe).  The musical score is a bit on-the-nose with stings designed to jolt you just as a scary image appears on screen.  This is one case where I perceive a remake as superior to the original, but that’s faint praise as I really dislike the 1981 original.  My Bloody Valentine is fine if you want to see a fellow in a miner’s outfit run around offing various individuals with a pickaxe for ninety-five minutes.  I’ve seen worse.      

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Jennifer's Body


JENNIFER’S BODY
A non-linear 2009 film, Jennifer’s Body is more a dark comedy than a horror film but boasts a few scares and a plot that revolves around a high school girl turning into a flesh-eating demon.  The tale follows Needy, the best friend of ultra-popular cheerleader Jennifer.  Needy and Jennifer check out a band at a small bar in their home town of Devil’s Kettle.  Turns out the band members worship Satan and want to sacrifice a virgin to ensure quick success in the music business.  The lead singer decides (mistakenly) that Jennifer is a virgin and targets her.  After a fire breaks out at the venue, Jennifer goes off with the band guys in their van.  Jennifer later shows up at Needy’s house covered in blood.  Needy gradually pieces together (thanks in large part to a gush of exposition from Jennifer herself) that Jennifer has become a flesh-eating demon because the band’s attempted human sacrifice did not quite work due to Jennifer not being a virgin.  Jennifer kills a few guys over the course of the tale, and then Needy kills Jennifer.  Needy stalks and murders the members of Low Shoulder (the band that sacrificed Jennifer) in a brief epilogue.
Jennifer’s Body works well on its comedic levels (I laughed out loud several times) but could have used an infusion of more horror.  You’ve got a flesh-eating demon disguised as a human teen girl at the center of your story – exploit that and really go to town with the kill scenes. Unfortunately the deaths are quite tame with a low gore factor.  The plot sounds a touch silly when summarized, but all the Satan-worshipping human-sacrifice stuff actually works in context.  I watched the unrated cut of the film and don’t know how it differs from the theatrical version.  Jennifer’s Body skimps on the scares, but it is damn entertaining.