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Starry Eyes (2014)
Ultimately a failure
The film starts out promising, with meditations on self-harm and how intricately it is connected to the creation of art. There's some interesting imagery and intriguing scenes accompanied by a great soundtrack. There's some great comedy too with characters taking themselves overly seriously.
Then about fifty minutes into the film, the screenwriter runs out of ideas because the film turns from a surreal psychological thriller into a generic slasher. All the good will built up through character development is thrown completely away in favor of gratuitous gore and laughable depictions of occultism.
I think what happened here is that the film ran out of budget. So, all the cool things it was doing with extra sets and characters just goes away. I was expecting it to do something more with its message (which is obvious from the first twenty minutes). Instead, it follows exactly the path expected, ultimately wasting the potential to explore its initially interesting main character. It's the kind of movie where the director and the writer think they are being really deep. And while the main actresses' performance was great, the script ultimately fails her and her co-stars with its over-the-top and unoriginal dialogue.
Gothic (1986)
A psychosexual nightmare
If you are fan of gothic horror, this film is perfect for you. It's not for everyone. The surreal elements will get on some people's nerves, as well as the rapid change in tone from scene to scene. The score can be at once triumphant and terrifying, such that it can be difficult to know if you are supposed to be scared or elated by the film's events. And the fast paced and often reference laden dialogue can be confusing.
It can also be difficult to watch, because the character of Mary is the only truly sympathetic character. All the characters have sympathetic moments, but most of their misery is brought on by themselves. Mary, meanwhile, feels like the most intelligent and the most moral character and her being chained to these self-destructive characters, mirrors the historical tragedies of the real Shelley's life.
The film is rife with wretchedness, with Timothy Spall's performance in particular standing out as disturbing. The acting is overwrought, and there's a little 80s shlock in it. But it's all in the service of the atmosphere embodying the genre that the film is celebrating.
It's not for everyone. But it is beautiful and haunting, and it examines sex, addiction, fear, death, creation and God in less than 90 minutes, without ever becoming boring or pretentious. The melodrama feels earned and the tension is never sacrificed for a cheap scares. The use of practical effects makes everything feel real and the breakneck pace of the film means that there is no relief from the mind-numbing madness which has infected the characters' lives.
With all that said, the ending was a bit of a letdown. It felt like the film could have ended with one final scare or with a touch of hope. But instead, it chose to spell out its message. Which is understandable given how bizarre its earlier scenes are. But it's a mistake. A film should never have to tell you how its message. If it wants to be incomprehensible or require additional research, it needs to have the guts to go for that. Had the ending been a less of a letdown, it would have bumped this film to a 10 for me.
Stigmata (1999)
Haphazard at best
The film starts off promisingly with a scene of a possible miracle. But when the obnoxious credits cut in after the stinger, the film takes a real nosedive. I like Billy Corgan as much as the next guy, but the rock music used for the credits, overtop a montage of overlapping images, blended with the sounds of someone praying, combined with the impossible to read font end up as the perfect example of the worst of 90s film making, where all restraint is thrown to the wolves and the result is a muddled mess of uneven visuals and audio.
Once the actual plot starts up, things aren't much better. The screenwriter couldn't decide if he wanted to write a schlocky horror movie or something with gravitas. There are more than one scene of characters talking over each other, including ones where they don't appear to be listening to each other or acknowledging what the other just said. This is followed by blatant statements by annoyingly stereotypical characters, whose motivations feel muddled or outright nonexistent.
So, a few interesting pieces of cinematography, but nothing you can't see to better effect in a quality music video.
Gretel & Hansel (2020)
Interesting but ultimately not worth your time
The film has a ton of interesting ideas. Unfortunately, it is with the implementation where it falls short. Firstly, the narration used starts out well, in terms of creating a fairy tale atmosphere. However, it quickly becomes a crutch. We hear Gretel's monologue about how she and her brother leave home, when seeing it would have been so much more impactful. Which makes it seem like the film ran out of budget, or that the director wasn't confident enough in his abilities to show instead of telling. Now, the budget wouldn't have been a problem, if the film didn't insist on containing so much CGI. A lot could have been communicated without using computers, if it had just been shot a little differently. But instead, we have these obviously deficient special effects. If the film had been more subtle, in its depiction of the supernatural, it could have avoided spending budget on those poor special effects and instead spent more time on character development.
Now, the acting is good for most of the characters. The problem is the script. The screenwriter was going for a kind of outdated, whimsical speech pattern. But the effect is ruined for a couple of reasons. The first one is that despite the period costume, there's no attempt at creating any consistency in the accents of the characters. Now, I understand this isn't a period piece, it's a fantasy story. And that's fine. But it's very distracting, when Gretel has an American accent, and her brother has an English one. That just distracts from the dialogue. Additionally, the attempt to have the characters, particularly Gretel, sound deep also distracts. Lillis is a good actress, but the stilted dialogue debilitates the performance, and saps from what should be emotional scenes.
Finally, the horror elements are utterly ham-fisted. There is so much which is creepy about the story of Hansel and Gretel. A more restrained director could have created a psychological folk horror nightmare. Instead, the film relies on cheap jump scares, which detract from the moody atmosphere the film is attempting to create by replicating cheap, modern scare tactics.
Overall, what starts as interesting series of choices, ultimately builds up into a subpar project. The film deserves its obscurity, as it fails as an artistic endeavor.
Lyle (2014)
Deeply disturbing
The score, the acting and the filming...all incredibly dread inducing. The plot is not unpredictable, especially if you are familiar with classic horror. But that doesn't stop it from evoking profound discomfort, especially for anyone with kids.
The film starts off with the familiar discomfort of being singled out for your sexuality, by someone who you don't know particularly well and who is just a little too prodding. But it quickly ratchets up from there into a never-ending nightmare of grief, paranoia and the disintegrating relationship between two people who once loved each other. Not since watching The Descent and experiencing second-hand claustrophobia from the scenes in the caves, have I been so physically affected by a horror movie. It feels more like a fleshed out short film than a feature picture, but the concept is so simple, the exposition so concise and the tension so unbearable, that the curtailed length serves the film rather than detracts from it. I only wish more horror movies committed to a shorter, more impactful story like this one.
Frosty Returns (1992)
Frosty goes toe to toe with corporate fascism
In this charming and timely tale, a lonely little girl, her scientifically minded friend and the magically animated snowman are all that stands between a decadent society addicted to convenience and TOTAL CLIMATE CATASTROPHE. While her classmates and parents sup from the cup of willful idiocy, Holly, humiliated by her teacher and mocked by her peers, struggles to speak up against anti-Snow sentiment. That is until Frosty the Snowman, brought to life by a hat on the wind, teaches her how to use art (singing and dancing) to overcome her social anxiety and celebrate the magic of winter. A prescient warning to the youth of today, that their childhood is being slowly robbed from them by the madness of consumerism!
On a more serious note, the performances by John Goodman and Jonathan Winters are heartwarming, Bill Mendez-style humor is on point, and the message, about friendship and nonconformity are important. The animation is a little ugly, just like it is in the Peanuts' specials. But people clearly rated it poorly because they don't want to face the reality of our melting civilization. Frosty Returns deserves better.
Pandorum (2009)
A great piece of obscure Lovecraftian cinema
This piece does a wonderful job of adapting some of Lovecraft's lesser known but no less important works, including those focusing on evolution, social degradation, religion, duty, memory and the curious need for humans to do evil. The film quickly moves from standard space-horror fair (wake up from cryo, there's something aboard that shouldn't be), to a series of tense action sequences and engaging dialogue. The more abstract pieces of the story will be distracting to those who care more about plot than feeling, but the character work is vibrant, and the tone is despairing, without being grueling.
If you were disappointed by Promethus as much as I was, you'll enjoy this intellectual but unpretentious meditation on the future of humanity and its exploration of isolation and insanity.