6/8/15 (Part One): What Would You Do For the Money, Honey?

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13 Sins, Amanda Fuller, Andrew Wheeler, Autopsy, bets, Brody Gusar, Cheap Thrills, cheating husbands, cinema, co-writers, dark comedies, dark films, David Chirchirillo, David Koechner, desperate times, desperation, directorial debut, disturbing films, dramas, drug abuse, E.L. Katz, Ethan Embry, film reviews, films, Funny Games, greed, Home Sick, husband-wife relationship, infidelity, jealousy, Laura Covelli, Mads Heldtberg, money problems, moral dilemmas, Movies, multiple cinematographers, multiple writers, old friends, Pat Healy, Pop Skull, Sara Paxton, Sebastian Wintero Hansen, self-mutilation, The ABCs of Death 2, thrillers, Trent Haaga, violent films, wagers, What Fun We Were Having, Would You Rather

There’s nothing quite like pure, undiluted desperation to help someone solidify their personal beliefs. Sure, you might fancy yourself a pacifist, a vegan, a Creationist, an atheist, a philanthropist, an activist or just a plain, old nice person. When the chips are really down, however, and you have a gun to your head (either literally or figuratively), how many of those deeply held beliefs will actually outlast the most primal emotion of them all: desperate need? If it came down to saving yourself and/or your loved ones, I’d wager to say that the staunchest vegetarian could be made to choke down a steak, the most honest among us could be compelled to lie their asses off and the most pie-in-the-sky do-gooder could, in fact, be persuaded to become an absolute monster.

In an age where income inequity is at an all-time high, the gaping abyss between the “haves” and the “have-nots” has never been wider or deeper. As conspicuous consumption approaches a level not seen since the vaunted ’80s (Gordon Gekko would absolutely rule the 2010s) and the middle-class continues to shrink into oblivion, American society begins, more and more, to resemble the grotesque, self-cannibalistic plutocracy that Brian Yuzna introduced us to in Society (1989). Eat the rich? Not if they eat you first, baby!

E.L. Katz’s directorial debut, Cheap Thrills (2013), takes these twin notions (the desperation of the poor and the mercenary callousness of the ultra-rich) and mashes them expertly together, coming up with a film that’s equal parts pitch-black comedy, endurance match and twisted social commentary. In many ways, Katz’s film makes an interesting companion piece to Michael Haneke’s equally bleak Funny Games (1997), showcasing a world where unrelenting cruelty is the norm and any sense of “humanity” is snuffed out quicker than a candle in a hurricane. While it’s never really a “fun” ride, per se, Cheap Thrills is a masterful film, one of the smartest, most unpleasant movies to stick in our craws in a long, long time.

Our hapless, downtrodden “hero” is Craig Daniels (Pat Healy), a former hot-shot writer who now toils away in a garage, his ability to provide for his wife, Audrey (Amanda Fuller), and new baby slipping away more and more each day. When Craig gets the double-whammy of being laid off and receiving an eviction notice on the same day, he decides to throw the towel in and head to the local bar rather than have an extremely unpleasant conversation with his loving wife. Craig’s not a bad guy, he’s just completely overwhelmed: with his glasses, thinning hair and nerdy demeanor, there’s nothing about him that indicates he can fight his way out of a paper sack, much less a crippling financial crisis.

While drowning his sorrows, Craig happens to bump into an old high school buddy, Vince (Ethan Embry). Like Craig, Vince has also fallen on hard times but he’s an altogether more carnivorous beast than his former friend is: he’s been to prison, has the kind of nervous, suspicious glare that’s meant to keep the world at arm’s length and currently makes ends meet as a strong-arm debt collector. He once broke a guy’s arm for $80, while the guy’s young daughter watched…in other words, Vince does not give one single, flying fuck about the rest of the world. But, yeah: it’s always good to see old friends, right?

As the pair continue to, awkwardly, reconnect, they happen to come into the orbit of another couple of bar patrons, the incredibly conspicuous Colin (David Koechner) and his impossibly bored wife, Violet (Sara Paxton). It’s Violet’s birthday, according to Colin, and the self-proclaimed ultra-rich husband (he brags about a $10K bottle of tequila sitting in his luxurious mansion, for starters) wants to give her an ultra-memorable night.

To that end, Colin begins offering Craig and Vince money for performing a series of “tasks” that range from being the first to drink a shot ($50) to slapping a stripper’s ass ($200) to punching a massive, meat-head bouncer right in the nose ($500). Through it all, Vince is as eager as can be, heartily leaping into whatever Colin commands, regardless of the danger, illegality, etc…as long as he doesn’t have to “suck Craig’s dick,” Vince is down for whatever the night entails, especially once Colin busts out the Peruvian marching powder. Craig, on the other hand, is much less enthusiastic: he may be desperate but he’s also a happily married man and a pretty decent guy…snorting coke, hanging out at strip clubs and getting into brawls really isn’t his thing.

When the party moves to Colin and Violet’s mansion, however, the whole thing begins to tilt on its axis. Vince becomes increasingly excitable and violent, Colin’s “tasks” become increasingly dark (self-mutilation is but one of the party favors) and Violet seems to be throwing herself at Craig with the kind of zeal normally reserved for hawks hunting squirrels. Despite desperately needing the proffered cash in order to support his family, Craig faces one moral quandary after another. Will he be forced to choose between his basic humanity or his family’s needs, making the terrible decision to either be a bad person or a bad husband/father? Or, in the end, will he be turned into the living equivalent of a child’s toy, bent and abused due to the capricious desires of a mysterious, all-powerful “benefactor”? They may be cheap thrills but, in the end, Craig and Vince might just end up paying the highest price of all.

Similar to the recent upswing in doppelgänger films, the current trend definitely seems to favor movies in which normally good, deserving members of the middle-lower class are forced to do terrible things in order to secure financial stability, usually at the urging of the filthy rich. Of these films, three managed to really catch my eye: Daniel Stamm’s 13 Sins (2014), David Guy Levy’s Would You Rather (2014) and E.L. Katz’s Cheap Thrills. While 13 Sins was a blackly-comic geekfest that tended to accentuate the numerous outrageous setpieces, Would You Rather was an altogether more serious affair, albeit one tempered by the inherent bat-shittery that is the incomparable Jeffrey Combs. Unlike the colorful insanity of Stamm’s film, Levy’s tense thriller focused more on physical and psychological torture, making it the much more relentless, if repetitious, of the two.

Katz’s Cheap Thrills splits the difference and ends up the strongest of the three, thanks in no small part to the excellent performances and a truly twisted script (courtesy of Troma’s Trent Haaga and David Chirchirillo, who served as a PA on Haag’s equally twisted Chop (2011)). While the film does become a bit predictable towards the end (if you’ve seen one of these films, you have a pretty good idea of how most of them end), there are still plenty of surprises and left-field revelations. To be honest, I would have expected nothing less from the demented scribe behind The Toxic Avenger IV (2000) and the dreamy, if no less disturbed, Deadgirl (2008).

Acting-wise, the film is grounded by its four leads, each of whom pulls an equal share of the weight. Healy, no stranger to genre fans thanks to performances in everything from Magnolia (1999) to The Innkeepers (2011) to Starry Eyes (2014) is fantastically balanced as the hapless Craig. In order for the film to work, we have to be 100% on Craig’s side, even as the situation gradually degrades from “awkward” to “awful”: if we stop supporting him too early, we lose any moral compass that the film might possess. It’s to Healy’s immense credit that we always buy what Craig is selling: this isn’t just an effortless performance, this is an actor actually “becoming” their character and, as always, it’s a real treat to watch. Suffice to say that once Healy really gets to cut loose, in the film’s final third, it’s the absolute best release to the built-up tension possible.

As Craig’s foil, Vince could have been one of those eternally reprehensible characters who practically demands a comeuppance: think of the hateful jock assholes who are always first on the firing line in any good slasher. Thanks to Embry’s all-in performance, however, Vince comes across as much more complex and fully rounded than he might have seemed on paper. Makes no bones about it: Vince isn’t anyone’s definition of a “nice guy.” Like Craig, however, he is a pathetically desperate individual and, agree with his tactics or not, it’s hard for us to not, at the very least, empathize with (some of) his choices. Vince is a battered, broken person and he holds on to only truism, clutching it as tight as possible: money makes the world run and if you don’t have any, you just don’t exist. Embry, who was so good in the recent Late Phases (2013), has experienced the same kind of genre career resurgence that Elijah Wood has: let’s hope he keeps striking while the iron is sizzling.

Meanwhile, Sara Paxton (who also did time with Healy in Ti West’s The Innkeepers) and David Koechner (who is, perhaps, the living embodiment of “Oh, hey: that guy!) are pitch-perfect as the jaded, sinister rich couple. While Paxton spends much of the film staring at her smart phone with enough ennui to choke Sofia Coppola, she’s also responsible for some of the film’s most unsubtle, uncomfortable scenes. Her timing is perfect: the part where she blandly asks Craig if he wants her to email him photos of the night is superb, as is the one where she nonchalantly suggests that fucking her will, in fact, make him feel better. Although she never gets as much to do as Koechner, Paxton is a vital component to everything and her interplay with her on-screen husband is pretty flawless.

For his part, Koechner balances the smarmy and sinister sides of Colin with uncanny ease: from scene to scene, it’s all but impossible to predict which way his temperament will go, which produces an absolutely essential sense of sustained tension. Colin is a filthy rich vulgarian, unlike Comb’s refined aristocrat from Would You Rather: he’s the living embodiment of the trashy “nouveau riche,” the start-up millionaire who makes up for lost time by throwing money at anything that moves. Alternately goofy, charismatic, slovenly and whip-smart, Colin is a helluva character and Koechner brings him to brilliant, roaring life.

From beginning to end, Cheap Thrills is exceptionally well-made: Andrew Wheeler and Sebastian Wintero Hansen’s cinematography is consistently warm and well-composed, while Mads Heldtberg, who also did the flat-out excellent score for You’re Next (2011), manages to avoid telegraphing anything…no stingers or musical jump scares here, folks. Throughout it all, Katz displays an absolute deft touch, whether it’s through his ability to draw out the tension, the exacting interplay of the performers or the way in which he makes the most of claustrophobic locations like Colin and Violet’s living room. Most importantly, Katz is able to execute all of the film’s major setpieces (none of which I would dream of spoiling) without a hitch: like puppets on a string, Katz hauls us from one shocker to the next.

While there’s a lot to love in Cheap Thrills, the film is, undoubtedly, a pretty nasty piece of work: emotionally similar to the aforementioned Funny Games, Cheap Thrills couches its essential nihilism in some fancy duds but it’s still nihilism, none the less. I’m willing to wager that many folks (the same folks who had similar issues with 13 Sins and Would You Rather, naturally) will find this proximity to utter desperation to be both wearying and the dictionary definition of a “bummer.” For those who either find themselves slipping through the cracks or know someone who has, however, Cheap Thrills might just be one of the more perfect depictions of our modern malaise.

At the end of the day, I’m sure it would comfort us all to know that we could, heartily and without reservation, tell people like Colin and Violet to take their money and shove it where the sun will never shine. The true horror of Cheap Thrills, of course, is that none of us will ever really be sure until we actually have to make that choice. At the end of the day, Katz’s film asks a very simple question: what would you do for the money, honey? In our brave new world, you might not like the answer.

6/6/15 (Part Two): Picking Your Poison

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13 Sins, Bardi Johannsson, Brittany Snow, Charlie Hofheimer, cinema, Daniel Hunt, David Guy Levy, dinner party, director-producer, dramas, dysfunctional family, Eddie Steeples, Enver Gjokaj, father-son relationships, film reviews, films, games, isolated mansion, Jeffrey Combs, John Heard, Jonny Coyne, June Squibb, Lawrence Gilliard Jr., Logan Miller, Movies, psychological torture, rich vs poor, Robb Wells, Robin Lord Taylor, Sasha Grey, self-mutilation, Shepard Lambrick, Steffen Schlachtenhaufen, Steven Capitano Calitri, thriller, torture, Would You Rather

In many ways, Iris (Brittany Snow), the protagonist of David Guy Levy’s Would You Rather (2012), is like a lot of folks in this modern economy: stuck between a rock and a much heavier, sharper rock. She’s the sole caretaker for her cancer-stricken younger brother, Raleigh (Logan Miller), it’s getting harder and harder to make ends meet and the future is looking increasingly grim. When she’s passed over for a hostess job that wouldn’t dig her out of the hole but would, at the very least, allow her and her brother to keep eating, it’s safe to say that Iris has slipped from the rarefied ranks of the “getting by” to the much less desired “left behind.”

All’s not lost, however: Raleigh’s kindly doctor, Barden (Lawrence Gilliard Jr.), arranges a meeting between Iris and mysterious aristocrat/philanthropist, Shepard Lambrick (Jeffrey Combs). It seems that Lambrick and his equally mysterious “foundation” hold regular “games” where groups of needy people are brought together: the winner of these games gets whatever support they need from the foundation for the rest of their lives. In Iris’ case, winning the game would mean getting an instant bone marrow transplant for her brother, along with enough money to set them up for the rest of their lives. When offered the chance to have all of our financial problems simply “vanish,” who among us would turn down a similar offer?

Canny genre fans, of course, will recognize this for the worst kind of sucker’s bet: historically, we know that nothing comes for free and if it’s too good to be true, it probably involves torture. Once Iris gets to the Lambrick mansion and meets the other seven participants, ranging from the obligatory conspiracy theorist (extra points for also making him the token recovering alcoholic) to a kindly, wheelchair-bound old lady and a sullen Iraq war vet, it becomes clear that this probably won’t be a winner-takes-all Pokemon tournament. By the time Lambrick’s obviously nutso son, Julian (Robin Lord Taylor), has made his entrance, we begin to get the idea that this particular royal-blue bloodline is a little compromised. Once Lambrick’s formerly MI-5-employed butler, Bevins (Jonny Coyne), wheels his old torture rig in, however, the full measure of madness becomes much clearer. This won’t end well…for anyone.

If horror and genre films are a good indicator of what particular fears are running rampant in society during any given era, it’s especially telling that the last five years or so have seen such a proliferation in two rather specific subgenres: the doppelgänger film and the “rich people using poor people for sport” film. If you think about it, though, it makes perfect sense: in this era of the social media “identity,” it’s only natural for folks to assume that, somewhere out there, an alternate version of themselves is having a much better time. What is social media, after all, if not a great opportunity to present a carefully cultivated persona to the outside world, regardless of how much it might (or might not) resemble the actual person?

By that token, perhaps no subgenre bears as much current relevancy (at least in the United States) as “rich people using poor people for sport.” One need only look at the current state of income equality to see that this particular pyramid has an extremely small apex and a ridiculously wide base: when so few individuals hold so much wealth and power, it’s understandable that the less fortunate might begin to view these wealthy as virtual deities, capable of doling out both misery and good fortune with equal aplomb. If the game truly is rigged, perhaps the best course of action is to make friends with the dealer and hope for the best.

In many ways, Levy’s film (written by Steffen Schlachtenhaufen) is a much grimmer, more stage-bound version of Daniel Stamm’s 13 Sins (2014) (or vice-versa, since Would You Rather preceded the other by a few years). The action, here, is confined almost exclusively to the mansion and its grounds (mostly the dining room), unlike the more free-roaming 13 Sins. The focus in Levy’s film is also on the psychological torment of the characters rather than Stamm’s focus on the often shocking stunts. To that end, Would You Rather definitely comes off as the more serious and “austere” of the two, despite its eventual descent into the kind of blood-soaked madness that we expect.

As grim and relentless as a freight train, Levy’s film gains much of its impact from another typically excellent performance by Jeffrey Combs (can’t someone just give him the Lifetime MVP award, already, and get it over with?), as well as an exceptionally sturdy turn from Pitch Perfect’s (2012) Brittany Snow. Unlike protagonists like 13 Sins’ Elliot or Cheap Thrills’ (2014) Vince, Iris is a much more likable, relatable character. We’re pulling for her every step of the way, which makes her inevitable bad decisions even more painful to watch. The relationship between Iris and her brother is also nicely depicted in the film, gaining some genuine resonance from Snow and Miller’s intuitive interactions: they actually feel like a brother and sister, which is quite refreshing.

While the cast is consistently solid (it was a real hoot to see Eddie Steeples – better known as Crab Man from My Name is Earl – in a rare serious role and he really kills it), there are a few lead weights: Sasha Grey, who turned in a pretty great performance in the recent Open Windows (2014), is as obnoxious as possible and as abrasive as fingernails on chalkboard with her “performance” as Amy and Trailer Park Boys’ main-man Robb Wells feels decidedly out-of-place with his broader take on the character of Peter. I usually really enjoy Wells (he was outstanding in Hobo With a Shotgun (2011), for example), so it was doubly disappointing to find him so tedious here.

For the most part, though, Would You Rather is stuffed with lots to like: Jonny Coyne’s congenial sociopath is a great character and almost steals the film from Combs, which is no mean feat. Taylor has fun playing the sleazy Julian, although his broad performance almost goes off the rails, at times. While the film can be slightly repetitive in the early stages of the “game” (all participants must do the same trials, which significantly cuts down on the “what’s coming?” factor that can work so well in keeping our hearts in our throats), Levy and Schlachtenhaufen display an admirably dark wit once it gets to the penultimate phase, where contestants must choose between spending two minutes underwater or the unique, unknown test on the cards before them: it’s here where Would You Rather really takes off, featuring some truly inspired, twisted setpieces.

All in all, it’s hard to find much fault in Would You Rather: the script is solid, the performances are generally top-notch, the cinematography (courtesy of Steven Capitano Calitri) is quite evocative and well-staged and the ’80s-inspired score (by Daniel Hunt and Bardi Johannsson) is a real knockout. The film manages to maintain a fairly high degree of tension, throughout, and if the subplot involving the kindly doctor racing to save Iris never amounts to anything, it does give the filmmakers a chance to make a Shining (1980) reference, which is always appreciated. Even the (by now) de rigueur downbeat ending fits the film like a glove, highlighting the extremely arbitrary nature of life: you can do it all right and still get fucked. C’est la vie, eh?

Despite being top-notch entertainment, I’ll freely admit that Would You Rather won’t be for everyone: in specific, if you’re the kind of person who avoids torture films (either psychological or physical) like the plague, you’d probably be best served avoiding Levy’s latest. For those who don’t mind taking a walk on the dark side, however, Would You Rather will probably be right up your alley. Just remember: the next time a filthy-rich plutocrat wants to offer you a hand up, make sure the other hand isn’t holding a knife.

12/14/14 (Part One): 99 Red Balloons Go By

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13 Sins, Alexandra Lydon, Alyvia Alyn Lind, Audrey Marie Anderson, balloons, Barak Hardley, Bryan Bertino, camcorders, children in peril, cinema, clowns, Emily Alyn Lind, film reviews, films, home invasion, horror, horror films, husband-wife team, Lee Garlington, Mockingbird, Movies, mysterious contests, mysterious gifts, The Strangers, Todd Stashwick, twist ending, VHS tape, writer-director

Suppose you received a mysterious, gift-wrapped box containing only a camcorder and a note that said “Keep filming”: would you? If you’ve seen as many horror films as I have, absolutely not. If you’re one of the characters in writer-director Bryan Bertino’s Mockingbird (2014), however, you might: otherwise, of course, you wouldn’t have much job security, now would you? Returning to the big-screen for the first time since his effective home-invasion debut, The Strangers (2008), Bertino turns in a film loaded with foreboding tension, yet slightly too familiar to really set the world alight. There’s plenty of genuine scares to be found, however, along with a truly amazing final setpiece that will stick in your head long after the credits roll.

Utilizing a found-footage aesthetic, Mockingbird weaves together the events of one particularly traumatic evening for three separate groups of people: Emmy (Audrey Marie Anderson) and Tom (Todd Stashwick), a married couple with two young daughters; Beth (Alexandra Lydon), a lonely woman whose just suffered a bad breakup, lives on her own and gets constant phone calls from her over-protective mother; and Leonard (Barak Hardley), an absolutely pathetic loser who still lives with his horrid mother (Lee Garlington) despite being in his mid-twenties. The one thing that seems to unite these disparate folks is the mysterious video cameras that they all receive, along with the various notes that say things like “Keep filming” and “You’re a star.” Emmy and Tom think that the camera must be some sort of prize from one of the endless contests that Emmy keeps entering, Beth has no idea what’s going on but seems happy to be receiving attention from anyone and Leonard’s notes indicate that he’s involved in some sort of competition for $10000: if he successfully completes all of his “tasks,” the cash prize is his, which makes Leonard just about as giddy as a kid on Christmas Eve.

At first, everything seems fairly normal, if slightly strange but sinister elements soon begin to inject themselves into the evening, culminating with the moment where they all realize, separately, that something rather terrible is going on. Once they’re in the middle of everything, however, none of the characters can fully extricate themselves for reasons ranging from saving their family to winning the “game.” As time ticks down towards the “game’s” terrible conclusion, the various groups rush headlong towards a meeting that could involve their salvation…or their complete and total destruction.

Despite being completely unpredictable, Mockingbird is not a terrible original film: rather, Bertino’s sophomore flick functions as a sort of “greatest hits of modern horror,” throwing handfuls of genre tropes at the viewer in an effort to see what sticks. We get home invasion elements (ala Bertino’s previous film), evil video tapes, sinister clowns, children in peril, creepy dummies with automated voices, humiliating tasks for cash rewards, mysterious wrapped packages, found-footage elements, strange videocameras…pretty much the whole nine yards. To his credit, Bertino does manage to mix-and-match these in some pretty interesting ways (despite how familiar the film is, I still wasn’t able to call the ending, which has to count for something) but it’s sort of akin to watching the reels of a familiar film in a random order. I’ll also freely admit that the ultimate resolution made no sense whatsoever and seemed like a rather arbitrary way to tie together the film’s disparate threads: suffice to say that they could have pegged a winged unicorn as the main villain and it wouldn’t have been any more random or out-of-left field than what we get.

For all of the film’s issues, however, it’s still an extremely well-made, exquisitely plotted affair, full of genuine tension and some truly memorable scenes. In particular, the frenzied finale, set in a balloon-filled house to the tune of Grieg’s towering “In the Hall of the Mountain King,” is a complete showstopper: despite how I felt about the rest of the film, the balloon-bit is pretty much as good as modern horror gets and really elevates the film. I also liked how Bertino divided up the film, structurally, via differently colored intertitles (things like “The Family,” “The Woman,” and “Let’s Play a Game”): it was an eye-catching technique but it was also a subtle way to invoke mood and foreshadow via the color scheme. Throughout the film, I never had a doubt that Bertino is a talented filmmaker: despite its obvious budget constraints and found-footage aesthetic, Mockingbird always looks good, although I really wish the dialogue (especially the recorded voices) had been mixed louder…there’s nothing I hate more than riding the volume control on a film, especially when the music and sound effects are set to “stun.”

Ultimately, Mockingbird is well-made, tense and reasonably scary, even if nothing about the film is particularly original or surprising (other than that ridiculous resolution, that is). Come to think of it, I’m pretty sure that I had the exact same reaction regarding Bertino’s previous film, a remake of the French chiller Ils (2006): while it didn’t blow me away, it was well-made and reasonably tense. Same deal with Mockingbird, although this one has the added benefit of that awesome balloon scene: if nothing else, that one segment makes this worth at least a casual watch. At this rate, Bertino has piqued my interest enough to anticipate his next project: here’s to hoping he can wed his talents to something a bit more original, next time.

 

7/19/14 (Part Two): Sucker’s Bet

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13 Sins, bad cops, bad decisions, brothers, cinema, conspiracy theories, corrupt law enforcement, Daniel Stamm, deadly games, desperate times, Devon Graye, dysfunctional family, Elliot Brindle, film reviews, films, horror films, Mark Webber, Movies, Pruitt Taylor Vance, remakes, Ron Perlman, Rutina Wesley, The Game, The Last Exorcism, Tom Bower, writer-director

Just what, exactly, would you be willing to do for complete financial freedom? It’s an interesting question, especially in this day and age where any and everyone seem desperate to secure their “15 minutes of fame” by any means necessary. The formerly notorious but now (presumably) passe game show, Fear Factor, sought to answer this question with a variety of stunts and “dares,” although the rewards usually fell far short of the aforementioned “complete financial freedom” angle. In this case, contestants would eat reindeer testicles, sit in glass boxes filled with tarantulas and perform “hazardous” stunts (hazardous, of course, being a relative term when network television takes as many precautions as humanly possible to avoid on-air death), all for a cash prize that, if memory serves correctly, was nowhere near the amount required to make someone financially independent.

In the case of Fear Factor, people were willing to do some pretty icky things (eating balut, as far as I’m concerned, will always be a deal-breaker) but everything was undertaken with the assurance (again, born of network television, the “safe word” of the entertainment industry) that no harm could really befall the contestants or those around them: the very worst that could happen would be someone puking, which falls pretty low on the “soul-shattering” scale. What if the safety nets of polite society were removed, however? What if the stakes were raised and someone were actually offered complete financial security in exchange for completing a series of ever more heinous tasks? Where would we end up drawing the line? Would we draw a line? These are the questions that writer/director Daniel Stamm asks in 13 Sins (2014), a remake of the earlier Thai film 13: Game of Death (2006). When basic morality stands in the way of a truly life-changing amount of money, is the world really as black and white as we wish it were? Or are the obvious shades of gray that fill the margins more terrifying than any potential monster under the bed?

After a truly dynamic, disturbing opening that introduces us to the closing moves of a previous “game,” 13 Sins begins proper by introducing us to our hero, the put-upon sad-sack known as Elliot Brindle (Mark Webber). As far as problems go, Elliot has a fairly full plate: he’s just about to get married to his pregnant fiancée, Shelby (Rutina Wesley), while also taking care of his mentally disabled brother, Michael (Devon Graye) and his bitter, racist, hateful father (Tom Bower). To make everything better, Elliot has just been fired from his job as an insurance salesman (he isn’t able to “do what it takes,” which is about as obvious as the foreshadowing really gets), his brother is getting kicked out of his care facility and his father is getting kicked out of his retirement home. Holy insurmountable problems, Batman! To whit: Elliot now has no income, an expensive wedding to take care of and needs to move his vile father (Shelby happens to be black, which makes her a constant target for the father’s virulent racism) and loving but “challenging” brother into his small home. For most people, these might be the kind of issues that would completely crush and destroy someone’s spirit. Turns out, Elliot may just be one of those kind of folks, after all.

Our hero’s luck changes, however, when he gets a mysterious phone call while stopped at a deserted intersection in the middle of the night. The unknown, excessively jovial person on the other end of the line tells Elliot that he has the opportunity to be on a game show: when Elliot, rightfully, expresses his disbelief, the caller proceeds to reveal several aspects about Elliot’s personal life that no one should really know. He then tells Elliot to swat the pesky fly that’s currently bopping around his car: if he does, he’ll automatically earn $1000. After swatting the fly, Elliot receives a text message that alerts him to the successful completion of Task 1. A follow-up calls gives Elliot his next task: eat the dead fly and receive $3622, the exact amount that Shelby owes on her credit card. This would make an awfully nice wedding present, according to the voice, and a perfect way to begin Elliot and Shelby’s life as a married couple.

After getting home and checking his bank account, Elliot realizes that the caller isn’t joking: $1000 has recently been deposited to his account. After roughly a second of forethought, Elliot eats the fly, completing Task 2 and receiving his next payment. At this point, the mysterious caller fills him in on the rest of the details: Elliot must complete a total of thirteen excessively more difficult tasks, each task worth an increasingly large sum of money, all the way up to the 13th task, which will reward Elliot with a “life-changing amount of money.” Failure to complete any task will result in “losing it all,” including all money won up to that point, as will trying to interfere with the game in any way. Telling anyone about the game, whether his loving fiancée or law enforcement officials, will also result in a loss: according to the voice, the game is solely Elliot’s to win (or lose). If he wins, Elliot and Shelby will begin their new life on their own terms. If he loses, well…how much worse off could he get? Elliot completes his registration process by facing the bathroom window and intoning “I will dance with the golden toad”: with that, the game is afoot…and Elliot’s fate is sealed.

The kicker, of course, is that Elliot really has no idea how bad things will get until the shit hits the proverbial fan. While the initial tasks seem harmless, if decidedly odd (killing and eating a fly may be nasty but it doesn’t exactly turn someone into Ed Gein), the follow-up tasks find Elliot going down an increasingly grim rabbit hole of public disturbance and reprehensible behavior: making a child cry, burning up a church’s nativity scene (handcrafted by blind children, naturally), getting revenge on a childhood bully. As Elliot completes the increasingly more unpleasant tasks, he must take great pains to keep Shelby, Michael and his father from figuring out what’s going on. Things become even more complicated when a gruff, no-nonsense police detective (Ron Perlman) begins investigating Elliot’s various “crimes.” As the caller continually reminds Elliot, he’s now so far into the game that winning it is the only way out: otherwise, he’ll end up serving some pretty decent jail time for his various “crimes against humanity.”

Elliot is fundamentally a good guy, however, and really just wants to provide for his family under some pretty difficult circumstances. As a nice guy, he begins to balk at some of the tasks but an odd thing begins to happen: as Elliot completes more and more tasks, he begins to get a bit…well, acclimated, to the whole thing. He begins to swagger around and get back some of his old self-confidence. While Elliot may not be doing particularly nice things, he is, at the very least, taking direct steps to dig his way out of the financial hole he’s buried in. He’s doing what all of us would like to do: pulling himself up by his own bootstraps and initiative. Once the tasks take a horrifying turn, however, Elliot is left with a very basic but all-important question: what does it benefit a man to gain it all if he loses his very humanity, in the process? As his life spirals completely out of control and Elliot comes ever closer to that feared 13th Task, he will quickly learn that there are more than one way to play any game. And, sometimes, winning can be worse than losing.

While watching 13 Sins, I was constantly reminded of an old saying: “If this is the kind of thing you like, then you’re gonna love this.” In some ways, Stamm’s film is the very epitome of this ideal: certain people (myself included) will eat up the film’s concentrated nastiness with a spoon, whereas others will find the whole thing to be such a despicable little bit of coal-black misanthropy that they probably won’t make it past the first 10 minutes. To be fair, both viewpoints are completely valid: 13 Sins is absolutely not for everyone and anyone with a decidedly “sensitive” palette should approach this with extreme caution. While the film does go to some pretty intense places, gore-wise, it goes to some even more intense places, concept-wise, which will probably be the dividing line for most folks.

In many ways, the film acts as a sort of moral barometer, asking the audience just how far “too far” really is. I can think of very few people who would have significant moral quandaries over eating, much less killing, a fly. I even know plenty of people who might not balk at making an anonymous child cry (if you know who you are, for gods’ sake, keep your damn hand down!). Suffice to say, however, that I’m eternally grateful for not knowing anyone who could surf through all 13 tasks without feeling at least some sort of pang to the conscience area, especially once we get to the dreaded 13th task. This, then, is the film’s greatest coup and its biggest virtue: it sets up a slippery-slope of dubious actions that traps the viewer half-way down, like a Venus Fly Trap. As we find more and more ways to justify what goes on (I could do that, if I really tried…I could do that if I didn’t think about it…I could do that if I really had to…I could do that if I had absolutely no other choice), it becomes painfully clear that morality and the notion of “good vs evil” are much less concretely defined than many of us might have previously hoped. Even when one adds in the supposed assurances of organized religion, there’s still the unspoken notion that we would violate any and every taboo if only to safeguard our loved ones: hard-and-fast rules are all well and good until it’s your husband/wife/baby/parents/siblings/best friends on the chopping block. At that point, many of us might find ourselves rethinking long-held notions of right and wrong, arriving at a definition that’s a bit more conditional and less rigidly enforced.

But this is all, of course, almost completely academic: a film can worry us with moral quandaries until the cows come home (Are the cows properly treated? Have they been fed growth hormones and kept in tiny pens? Are we raising them simply to be slaughtered or do realize that all living creatures have inherent value as individuals? What if the cows can’t find their way home?) but still have as much impact as one of those old videos from high school health classes. How does 13 Sins hold up as an actual film? Does it work as both a thriller/chiller and a thought-provoking dissertation on our modern malaise? For the most part, despite a few rather sizable plot holes, the answer is a resounding “absolutely.”

While I’ve never seen Stamm’s previous films (I’ve never cared enough for demonic possession films to have really paid The Last Exorcism (2010) much attention and his debut, A Necessary Death (2008) sounds intriguing but was, likewise, off my radar), 13 Sins is a thoroughly well-made, effective little film. Mark Webber channels the working-class relateability of someone like Sam Rockwell in his portrayal of Elliot, which makes it much easier to empathize with his character’s oftentimes terrible decision-making. Devon Graye is excellent as the developmentally-disabled Michael, managing to make the character seem less stereotypical than might previously be possible for a character of this type in a genre film. Perlman, of course, is spectacular but when is the guy ever bad? Even if he were phoning in the performance (which he doesn’t), Perlman would be an utterly magnetic, charismatic presence: there’s one throwaway bit where he sticks his tongue out at a little girl that manages to be hit so many character “buttons” at one time that it’s kind of ridiculous…in a completely badass way, of course. My big complaint with Perlman’s performance in 13 Sins is the same from any film that he doesn’t star in: there’s way too little of him here, although what’s here is suitably excellent. The rest of the cast, from Tom Bower’s obnoxious father to Rutina Wesley’s eternally faithful, if utterly confused, Shelby provide great support for Webber but, ultimately, this is his film and his journey to make.

From a production standpoint, 13 Sins is top-notch: while the film often has a glossy, heavily produced look, the subject matter is pure exploitation, taking a certain perverse glee in presenting a raft of unpleasant situations in as visually appealing a way as possible. When they saw an arm off in the film, it looks great, even if the scene is so protracted as to practically demand nausea: it’s the film’s great blessing (curse?) that everything is delivered in as hyper-realistic a way as possible, even as the scenarios become increasingly fanciful and “unrealistic.”

Since 13 Sins is, technically, a mystery (at least in the same vein as Fincher’s The Game (1997)), the script becomes all-important and Stamm (working with co-writer David Birke) has crafted a particularly smart, strong foundation. While I found the ultimate resolution to be a little problematic (without going into much detail, it bothered me that Elliot didn’t think through the ultimate ramifications of his final bit of revenge: could he have really been that short-sighted?), the plot is exceedingly tight. The tendency to group certain tasks together felt a little arbitrary and more than a little lazy, on occasion (Wait…we really have to think up 13 different tasks? What if we just came up with…I dunno…11 or so and just fudged the rest?) and there were a few elements that seemed unnecessarily vague (I still have no idea what the 5th Task entailed, although I’m pretty sure the filmmakers didn’t, either) but these are, ultimately, pretty small quibbles. When 13 Sins works, it works amazingly well, provided the same sort of gut-punch, visceral reaction that I had to the first Saw (2004). When it doesn’t work, it’s a quick-paced, highly entertaining and suitably sleazy thriller: in my book, that’s kind of a win-win situation.

Ultimately, 13 Sins, like American Mary (2012), is one of those films that is easy for me to like but difficult for me to recommend. While the subject matter is certainly less immediately reprehensible than the body modification/torture scenarios of American Mary, I can’t help but feel that many viewers will feel completely shut out of the pitch-black heart that beats at the center of 13 Sins. In many ways, Stamm’s film is holding a cracked fun house mirror up to society and asking us if we like what we see: in a day and age where, literally, “anything goes,” Stamm asks us to reconsider that notion just a little further. After all, you might be willing to do just about anything to provide yourself with a viable future but how far are you actually willing to go to test that hypothesis? Killing that fly is a small step, sure, but it’s still the first step: at this point, what step are we all on and how far will we go before we say “enough is enough?”