My Soul to Take

Directed by Wes Craven.

2010. Rated R, 107 minutes.
Cast:
Max Thierot
John Magero
Denzel Whitaker
Zena Grey
Nick Lashaway
Paulina Olszynski
Emily Meade
Jeremy Chu

Sixteen years ago the local serial killer turned his attention on his own family. He’s rather lazily dubbed “The Ripper” and had been terrorizing the town by cutting up people with a rather large knife that has the word “VENGEANCE” scrawled across the blade. Don’t worry, that’s never actually explained. He seems to suffer from multiple personalities which we’re informed are really multiple souls. One of these kills his wife, while another calls his shrink. A battle with the police ensues which includes The Ripper being shot, presumed dead, waking up a few times to stab some more, get shot again, being rushed to the hospital, causing the ambulance to crash and disappearing.

Fast forward to the present and all the local kids born on that fateful night gather at the lake near the ambulance crash site every year on their birthday to ceremoniously drive The Ripper back into the water for another year. To do this , one of them has to push over a giant puppet representing the killer. This year it’s Bug’s turn. He’s so scared he botches the job. Yup, you guessed it. The kids start getting knocked off…one…by…one.

As slasher flicks go, this premise is okay even though its not terribly original. It reminds me of The Shocker. Not so coincidentally both movies were penned and directed by horror legend Wes Craven. While The Shocker is a gleeful dark comedy and revels in its own ridiculousness, My Soul to Take is an unfocused poser. It desperately wants to be something, it just can’t decide what. It’s attempts at cleverness are anything but. As a result, we get a lot of eye-rollingly bad jokes. It’s efforts at scaring us fail miserably. This is due in part to us trying to figure out if we’re watching comedy or horror and part because there is almost zero tension created. The best of Craven makes us both laugh and cower in fear because humor and horror blend seamlessly to form a potent mixture. Here, the two keep bouncing off one another after awkwardly smashing together. A couple plot twists here and there keep us very mildly interested but aren’t enough to save the film from itself.

What may have helped is better money shots. In slasher fare, money shots are the kill scenes. Even if a movie is awful as a whole, fans of this particular genre will still enjoy it if the grisly murders staged for our morbid pleasure are creative and memorable. In MStT they are neither. They are an incredibly boring succession of stabbings. While they would be undeniably heinous in real life, they’re unbelievably tame for its target audience. We never get what we came for. Imagine watching an action flick in which every fight consistent of just one punch and every shootout a single shot. We get the equivalent of those things.

Wes Craven deserves his lofty spot as a master of horror. He’s earned it through decades of scaring the crap out of us. Occasionally, he’s scared us while simultaneously making fun of how he does it. However, in a career longer than my life has been he’s made some missteps. This is one of them.

Thirst

Directed by Chan-wook Park

2009. Rated R, 133 minutes.
Cast:
Kung-ho Song
Ok-bin Kim
Hae-sook Kim
Ha-kyun Shin
In-hwan Park
Dal-su Oh
Young-chang Song

Sang-hyun (Kang-ho Song) is a priest who volunteers for a medical experiment in hopes of helping to find a cure for the fatal Emmanuel Virus. The experiment fails and infects him with the disease. An emergency blood transfusion saves his life but transforms him into a vampire. Director Chan-Wook’s gifts for telling twisted tales is on full display, here. The film never rushes, letting the story and the characters develop. As it becomes creepier and more incredible it slides in the story of a love forbidden in more ways than one. As the object of our priest’s desire Tae-ju, Ok-bin Kim is simply fantastic and steals every scene starting with the first time we meet her. The script calls for her to go from a stereotypically meek Asian housewife, albeit one not particularly in love with her husband, to domineering and bloodthirsty. She is perfect every step of the way and really adds “umph” to the bittersweet ending. Finally, the movie is beautifully shot. Like the best of Chan-Wook, it’s almost like looking at a series of elegant still shots occasionally splattered with magnificent gushes of blood.

Where did this vampiric blood come from? The priest wonders the same, aloud, once or twice but that’s all we get. The simple fact of his infection implies there are more vampires out there but we never see any. Showing us one, or more, could have set up an intriguing battle of good and evil, further tormenting our reluctant bloodsucker. The movie’s meticulous storytelling draws us into a fantastic world and works hard to ensure our suspension of disbelief. The problem is we’re snapped back to reality by some shoddy cgi whenever our vampires are shown performing great feats from a distance. It’s more than a bit jarring, especially considering there are shots of the priest jumping from a building with the camera really close to him that work much better.

It’s a wonderfully twisted entry into the vampire canon. Park Chan-Wook delivers another masterpiece of the macabre. Though there is plenty of disturbing imagery and somewhat masochistic sex, both help tell the story and don’t feel gratuitous. This makes it a decidedly adult venture into the world of the undead. That means while it is a love story involving vampires, don’t bother if you’re in the Twilight target audience. If you do, bring your reading glasses unless you’re fluent in Korean.

It's Scary Time!!!

Once again, the month of October is upon us. If you stopped by last year you know this is the time of year when I drag out all the creature features, slasher flicks, and haunted house stories I can find right up through Halloween. I even throw in a ghoulish comedy or two. Somehow, we're going to squeeze Batman into this mix. In all, it'll be 31 solid days of horror starting at midnight tonight!!!

Source Code

Directed by Duncan Jones.
2011. Rated PG-13, 93 minutes.
Cast:
Jake Gyllenhaal
Michelle Monaghan
Vera Farmiga
Jeffrey Wright
Michael Arden
Cas Anvar
Max Denoff
Brent Skagford
Gordon Masten

Colter Stevens (Gyllenhaal) finds himself aboard a commuter train in Chicago and he has no idea how he got there. He really freaks out when he makes his way to the restroom and sees a face different from his own in the mirror. He returns to his seat where his behavior disturbs Christina (Monaghan), whom he doesn’t know but who appears to be his traveling companion. Of course, she thinks he’s whoever that was in the mirror and has no clue about what’s happening. In a few minutes, the train explodes, he blacks out and wakes up in a capsule talking to Cpt. Goodwin (Farmiga) through a monitor. By the way, he doesn’t know her, either. Shortly, we’re let in on the plan. Through an invention/discovery called Source Code the last eight minutes of a person’s life can be retrieved to be relived by someone who is a close enough match. Our soldier is a match for the man in the mirror. His mission is to find out who blew up the train. He can go back into the matrix…er…Source Code numerous times, but he always only has eight minutes before he’s kicked out. Back and forth Colter is tossed apparently through time and/or space to conduct his investigation 480 seconds at a time. He also pursues other curiosities on his own since it seems he was volunteered for this mission without his knowledge or consent.

Source Code lost me pretty quickly. Though the movie tries its best to confuse you early on, that wasn’t it at all. I followed just fine. Perhaps I followed too well. I say this because the one thing that ruins a movie built on suspense happened. I knew who the bad guy was within eight minutes of being told what our hero was supposed to do. That’s roughly fifteen minutes of real time. It was pretty simple, actually. I looked at the only person who struck me as a viable candidate, said to myself “That’s who did it,” and waited to be proven right. Unfortunately, I was. There was no mystery for me. Watching him accost person after person in hopes of hitting the jackpot felt like a pointless exercise. It was similar in feel to an episode of CSI. Yes, what’s going on is vaguely interesting but I know the person they bring in at 15 after the hour and 30 after aren’t the killer. It’s always the one they start chasing at 45 after.

Once you’ve figured out the villain it’s easy to sit around looking for other things. Not one to resist this particular temptation, I mapped out how I thought the story would play out in my mind. Sadly, I got almost all of it right including the emotionally manipulative finale. It’s the type of ending I’d normally be okay with because my energy would’ve been spent guessing the identity of the killer. To make matters worse, it spends its last few minutes of screentime breaking every rule of its own movie science without sufficient explanation.

So far I’ve been relentlessly bashing SC but take it with a grain of salt. The truth is if you don’t know who the terrorist is this is probably highly intriguing sci-fi. Even though the protagonist relives the same eight minutes repeatedly, it manages to not be boring like the similarly styled Vantage Point a few years ago. On top of that, some will fall hook, line and sinker for what’s intended to be a tear-jerker climax. It just failed to grab me. Each time it threatened to do so I dodged it by finding something else to nitpick. If it manages to get a hold of you, you’ll probably enjoy it. If it doesn’t, welcome to my world.

MY SCORE: 5/10

Madea's Big Happy Family

Directed by Tyler Perry.
2011. Rated PG-13, 106 minutes.
Cast:
Tyler Perry
Loretta Devine
Cassi Davis
Shannon Kane
David Mann
Tamela Mann
Bow Wow
Lauren London
Teyana Taylor
Rodney Perry

Director Tyler Perry’s most famous creation is back for another adventure. This time, the big family actually belongs to Shirley (Devine) and they are anything but happy. Shirley has come down with an almost immediately terminal form of cancer. Her doctor informs her she only has four to six weeks to live. She’s actually been battling this for seven years and was thought to be in remission. Her family knows none of this. She decides the only way to let them know what’s going on is to have them all over for a grand dinner and break the news after they’ve filled their bellies. However, as soon as her three adult children lay eyes on each other sparks fly, tempers flare and they all flee in different directions. This mix is made even more volatile by the fact that aside from their problems with their siblings they all bring and display their issues with their spouses and children, as well. The two daughters treat their husbands like dirt and the son has baby mama drama and a gold digging girlfriend. As a dear friend of Shirley’s, Madea is asked to help straighten up this dysfunctional bunch.

From the very beginning it is clear that this is classic Tyler Perry. Everything is over the top, both dramatically and comedically, problems mount at an alarming speed, and there’s plenty of sermonizing. This is the director’s tried and true formula. That formula is largely influenced by the movie Soul Food. Much of his work mimics that movie’s tone and style with Madea and/or others adding extra zaniness and homespun wisdom. Here, we practically get a remake. A television set full of money seems to be the only thing missing.

Even without understanding this, most of his core audience doesn’t even get to be surprised by all the plot developments because they’ve likely seen the play of the same name Perry created, toured around the country and sold on DVD the year before. They still flock to his movies, though. It’s become a genius marketing plan. He’s created an entire industry where duplication of product is not only expected but ravenously craved by its consumers.

From my viewpoint, Madea’s Big Happy Family is a colossal disappointment. Part of the problem is its exactly the same as every other movie with the name “Madea” attached to it, as well as a few others. What makes it feel worse than those is it comes on the hells of “For Colored Girls.” Whether you liked that movie or not, it showed Perry as an artist willing to take risks and leave his comfort zone. Even if he didn’t stray very far he still tried to stretch his wings some. Since he has the eyes and ears of so many trained on his every action. I hoped that FCG signaled the start of an artistic growth spurt. I hoped he had either found something more to say or was at least willing to try different ways of delivering his message. Lastly, I hoped he was becoming confident enough to let his audience question what they’ve seen which may in turn make them question themselves and stimulate their own growth. Instead, we get a regression to the norm. It’s a highly profitable norm, but it’s a spiritually unfulfilling one. This is particularly troublesome given the Christian slant to his work. It reaffirms what his core fans already believ in but doesn’t encourage them to do anything more than nod in agreement, laugh and wait impatiently for the next installment in the Tyler Perry canon.

For those that are fans, this is right up your alley. Madea is as outrageous as ever. Mr. Brown (David Mann), Cora (Tamela Mann) and Joe (the director in a dual role) are back for good measure. The movie moves swiftly and maintains a southern gospel tint. Every second of it is precisely who we know Tyler Perry to be. It never once threatens to be anything more. The question is does this float your boat, or not?

MY SCORE: 4/10

The Elephant Man

Directed by David Lynch.
1980. Rated PG, 124 minutes.
Cast:
John Hurt
Anthony Hopkins
Anne Bancroft
John Gielgud
Wendy Hiller
Freddie Jones
Michael Elphick
Hannah Gordon
Dexter Fletcher

John Merrick (Hurt) has been massively deformed all his life. He has been dubbed “The Elephant Man” and is forced to put himself on display as a freak at a carnival sideshow. He is such the draw, the carnival’s owner Mr. Bytes (Jones) calls him “my treasure”. Dr. Treves (Hopkins) is a well respected surgeon who wishes to study “the creature”. After John suffers a beating at the hands of Bytes the doctor takes him in, giving him a room in an isolated part of the hospital where the doc works. As word spreads about the institution’s newest resident, curiosity rises. Once again, people are flocking to see “The Elephant Man. Is Dr. Treves really any better than a sideshow proprietor? The good doctor eventually questions his own motives. The agendas of most others is painfully obvious. They either fear John’s grotesqueness or seek to profit from it by exploiting him. Those who do neither brazenly point and stare. Thus, the movie becomes an exploration of bigotry and the courage some will show in the face of it. We think the lines between good and evil are clearly drawn. However, we’re made to wonder if even the good guys are causing harm. Based on a true story.

Director David Lynch never lets us off the hook by skimming portions of the story. He paces his movie very deliberately, painstakingly so, at some points. This lets us know John intimately. We learn that despite his deformities and the way he’s been treated there is no bitterness in him. There is only his need to be accepted as a man. This makes him a completely sympathetic character.

There are no subplots to speak of. The movie focuses solely on the plight of Mr. Merrick. This tunnel-vision approach gives the film something I find lacking in other work by Lynch: coherence. It is not some cryptic mass of celluloid you have to wade through seventeen times before deciding you finally get it. It’s easily accessible without being easily formulated. Within its rather normal frame many of the director’s nuances and idiosyncracies are contained. However, he never lets them overwhelm the movie. Instead, they flesh it out.

The duty of fleshing out John only falls partly on the man who plays him, John Hurt. To his credit, Hurt plays the role with a perfect naivete and timidness. He wears the latter as a shield. It often fails him, but nonetheless comforts him by its presence. Like Frankenstein’s monster would eventually come to be played for laughs, it would’ve been easy to have Merrick be a bumbling fool, gaining our affections through laughter. Hurt plays him as a man keenly aware that his life is no laughing matter. The rest of the responsibility for making John whole belongs to Dr. Treves. Through an excellent performance by Anthony Hopkins, he draws the man out of the freak.

When its all said and done, we’ve gone on a tumultuous journey with a man that took no easy steps. We root for him not just because we want him to do well, but because we need him to. If he does, it reaffirms our belief that enough of us human beings are decent people. If he doesn’t he will not have failed, we will. In either case, it begs us to reevaluate how we treat those who are different from ourselves.

Boys Don't Cry

Directed by Kimberly Peirce.

1999. Rated R, 116 minutes.
Cast:
Hilary Swank
Chloë Sevigny
Peter Sarsgaard
Brandon Sexton III
Alicia Goranson
Alison Folland
Jeanetta Arnette
Rob Campbell
Matt McGrath

Right away, we find out the one thing in Brandon’s (Swank) life that has caused him the most problems. He is really a she name Teena. Determined to live and pass as a man, this behavior is mostly an issue when whatever girl he’s dating finds out his secret. This is usually followed by Brandon being chased and/or beaten by a group of the girl’s male relatives and friends. It doesn’t look like a fun existence, but Brandon seems bound to keep repeating the cycle. It also appears this way to Brandon’s cousin Lonny (McGrath). Lonny eventually becomes tired of all the drama and decides that Brandon can no longer stay with him in his trailer. With nowhere to go, Brandon falls in with a crowd of ruffians led by John (Sarsgaard). They whisk Brandon away from his hometown of Lincoln, Nebraska to Falls City about an hour away. Shortly, he meets Lana (Sevigny), the girl of his dreams. Based on a true story. To say Brandon is confused or sick is a matter of opinion and belief.

To say Brandon’s deceitful and misguided is fact. His insistence on keeping up a lie at the expense of the emotions of others would normally make him totally unlikeable. Thanks to a masterful performance by Hilary Swank and a very well written script, this isn’t the case. Those of us who haven’t gone through the same struggle probably won’t be in love with Brandon. However, we begin to understand and gain empathy. We admire his courage in some areas while simultaneously lamenting his lack of it in others. To facilitate this, Swank mixes the wild enthusiasm of a child in a candy story with the same child’s fear of being caught stealing. We understand both ends of the spectrum and everything in between.

As well as we come to know Brandon, he’s not the only person we feel for. Our hearts also go out to Lana. She wants us to think she’s tough, that she can handle whatever comes her way. Eventually, we come to realize that not only is she not such a tough nut, but she’s a perpetual victim. She’s a victim of her mother’s carelessness and of the affections of others, including Brandon. Though less heralded, Chloë Sevigny’s performance is no less effective than Swank’s. The surprise is that after this and other critically acclaimed portrayals early in her career, Sevigny hasn’t quite reached the level of stardom she seemed destined to.

Boys Don’t Cry is a movie that asks us to examine the characters on the screen and ourselves, as well. It holds our beliefs up to the light and gives us a look at them we might not have taken. For some, the protagonist will pose a challenge. Brandon is an affront to all they believe. Will they be able to see passed sexuality and into humanity? This is also a fascinating drama that gives us a ride on an emotional roller coaster. After all the climbs, drops and loops we are entertained and drained.