6/1/15 (Part One): Invasion of the Vicious Kind

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Alien Abduction, alien abductions, alien experiments, alien invaders, alien invasion, Anja Savcic, Blitz//Berlin, Brittany Allen, cabins, cabins in the woods, cinema, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, co-directors, co-writers, Colin Minihan, Emily Perkins, Extraterrestrial, film reviews, filmmaking duo, films, Freddie Stroma, Gil Bellows, Grave Encounters, Grave Encounters 2, horror films, isolated estates, isolation, Jesse Moss, Melanie Papalia, Michael Ironside, military coverup, Movies, Samy Inayeh, sci-fi, sci-fi-horror, science-fiction, Sean Rogerson, special-effects extravaganza, Stuart Ortiz, the Vicious Brothers, UFOs, Vicious Brothers, writer-director-editor

If you’re the kind of horror fanatic who prefers the road less traveled to the well-worn thoroughfare, you’ve probably also spent your fair share of time backtracking from dead-ends. With the almost mind-boggling array of horror films being released these days, be it studio-supported tent-poles or direct-to-streaming vanity projects, separating the wheat from the chaff has never been a more daunting prospect. While the number of horror films actually released to theaters still seems as small as it’s ever been, direct-to-video/streaming releases are healthier than ever: with companies like Netflix and Amazon looking to scoop up as much content as possible, potential audiences have more choice than we have in some time.

To compound this issue, horror filmmakers have beaten some sub-genres such as found-footage and zombie films into the ground, releasing so much unmitigated crap that it becomes almost impossible to shift out the diamonds. To these over-mined fields that include the possession film, the haunted asylum and the post-apocalyptic wanderer, feel free to add the alien film, whether in its “abduction” or “invasion” variety. As of late, it seems that indie filmmakers are pumping out one alien-themed horror flick after another. Just recently, we’ve had Dark Skies (2013), the “Slumber Party Alien Abduction” segment of V/H/S 2 (2013), Skinwalker Ranch (2013), Alien Abduction (2014), Honeymoon (2014), The Signal (2014), and Oren Peli’s long-delayed Area 51 (2015), along with a host of others that have managed to slither under the radar. As mentioned, sifting out the diamonds in all of the mud is quite the task.

All this, of course, is by way of saying that the Vicious Brothers’ (aka writers/directors Colin Minihan and Stuart Ortiz) Extraterrestrial (2014) is not only a diamond, it’s easily one of the brightest diamonds that I’ve had the pleasure of witnessing in some time. I’ll actually go one step further and, with no hyperbole, state that Extraterrestrial (warts and all) is easily the apex of the modern alien abduction film: the filmmaking duo, along with wunderkind cinematographer Samy Inayeh, have managed to craft a film that is, by turns, gorgeous, terrifying, mind-blowing and endlessly thrilling. Thanks to its impeccable visual effects, amazing costumes and ability to cherry-pick the very best of sci-fi horror gone by, the Vicious Brothers’ ode to little green men looks like it cost roughly 500 times what it probably did. It’s not a perfect film, mind you, but it’s very nearly the perfect alien movie.

Plot-wise, the Brothers’ film stuffs an alien abduction filling into a cabin-in-the-woods casing. Overly serious April (Brittany Allen) and her clingy boyfriend, Kyle (Freddie Stroma), are headed to her family’s backwoods cabin so that she can take pictures in order to facilitate its sale. Without her knowing, Kyle has decided to turn this into the weekend that he proposes and has invited along their friends, Melanie (Melanie Papalia), Lex (Anja Savcic) and uber-asshole Seth (Jesse Moss), to join in the joyous occasion.

The problem, of course, is that no one bothered to ask April what she wanted: turns out, she doesn’t want to marry her high school sweetheart and settle down. She has a job offer in New York and wants to get out there and experience life, neither of which plan really involves Kyle. As expected, this little revelation throws a monkey-wrench into the weekend, causing Kyle to become withdrawn and moody, whereas asshole Seth just gets one more excuse to get blitzed and act like a jerk, in order to “protect his boy.”

Our little close-quarters domestic drama plays out with a larger, more sinister drama unfolding in the background: local sheriff Alan Murphy (Gil Bellows) is investigating a mysterious disappearance that seems to be tied in to a string of local livestock mutilations. He doesn’t necessarily suspect the city slicker kids but he also doesn’t want them stirring up the locals or interfering with his investigation: toss a personal angle into the missing person phenomena (Sheriff Murphy’s wife vanished without a trace) and you have a lawman with an agenda and no time for tomfoolery.

Just when our group of young people seem to have comfortably settled into the kind of restful vacation that might befit Virginia Woolf, however, a fiery meteor explodes out of the sky, screaming right into the nearby woods, where it explodes in an appropriately impressive little display. Upon closer inspection, the group discovers that the object wasn’t a meteor but an honest to gosh flying saucer. To amp the “uh oh” factor to 11, they also notice a set of humanoidish footprints leading away from the crash site…back in the direction of their cabin.

From this point on, the film becomes an unrelenting triumph in building and relieving tension as April and her friends, along with the able assistance of her surrogate uncle/old family friend/pot farmer, Travis (Michael Ironside), attempt to fight back against their other-worldly visitors. From the claustrophobic confines of their cabin “sanctuary” to the surrounding woods and, ultimately, to places that no human has ever gone, the survivors will learn one very important lesson: not only is humanity not alone, we’re not even at the top of the heap.

First off, let’s get the negatives out of the way. As far as the “human” relationships go, Extraterrestrial doesn’t show us anything we haven’t seen a million times in the past, nor does it present us with a group of unique, sympathetic characters: while the young group in the Vicious Brothers’ film doesn’t necessarily fall into the most generic “stoner,” “final girl,” “jock,” et al stereotypes, no one really stands out with the exception of Allen’s April and Moss’ odious Seth. This isn’t the kind of film where one gets wrapped up in the intense interpersonal drama of the characters, let’s put it that way.

The acting is fine, if a little unmemorable, although Ironside and Sean Rogerson both manage to chew a fair amount of scenery: Ironside’s Travis is a great character, however, brought to vivid life by an iconic character actor, whereas Rogerson’s Deputy Mitchell is a blustery, loud-mouthed and very silly caricature. Allen and familiar-face Bellows are constantly sturdy, although I’ll admit that Papalia and Savcic sort of blurred together, in my mind: they just didn’t get much to do, aside from the stock “run and react” options.

There are also a few moments where the editing and/or cinematography gets a little too flashy for its own good: one particular shot featured so much focus-shifting that I would have assumed the operator was having problems if the rest of the film hadn’t been so impressive (more on that later). I’ll also freely admit that the hand-held camera stuff doesn’t work at all, especially when held side-by-side with the actual cinematography: it’s like touching up a Picasso with ketchup rather than paint. The film also has a tendency to over-rely on the soft/loud dynamic of the modern jump scare, leading to numerous moments that are telegraphed by audio stings or ridiculous increases in volume.

And that, folks, is pretty much the downside to Extraterrestrial. The upside? Everything else. The film looks absolutely astounding: from gorgeous, evocative establishing shots to cleverly revealed shocks to immaculately composed frames, cinematographer Samy Inayeh goes way above and beyond the call of duty. It helps, of course, that the film’s visual effects (both CGI and makeup/costuming) are jaw-dropping: when combined when the absolutely state-of-the-art camera-work, Extraterrestrial is as immersive as any mega-budget Hollywood sci-fi film.

In fact, the first full reveal of the massive space craft reminded me of nothing less than Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977): there’s a genuine sense of awe, grandeur and spectacle to Extraterrestrial that is almost completely missing from other indie sci-fi/alien films. Say what you will about the Vicious Brothers’ grasp on the human dynamics of the story: the technical aspect is so astounding that it should, automatically, vault them into the upper echelons of the “event picture” biz.

This sense of perfect visualization continues with the actual aliens, which are pretty much the apex of the traditional “gray-headed, almond-eyed” alien in pop culture. The aliens, here, aren’t so different from other depictions of said types but they inhabit the film in a purely physical way that feels real, refreshing and, ultimately, rather terrifying. I was immediately reminded of the ways in which Spielberg’s original Jurassic Park (1993) felt so organic and “physical”: Extraterrestrial feels the same way, which is pretty much the antithesis of the current “green-screened-to-death” trend.

While the Vicious Brothers’ and their excellent crew absolutely ace the technical aspects of the film, there’s another, even more important aspect that they also nail: the claustrophobic atmosphere. Unlike most alien abduction films that aren’t called Fire in the Sky (1993), Extraterrestrial is genuinely, absolutely frightening. It’s actually frightening on several levels: it perfectly hits the “something in the background” vibe of modern horror films but it also digs in on a deeper, more existential level. There are moments in the film, particularly in its final 20 minutes, where it honestly feels as if the Vicious Brothers are letting us peer into the howling maw of madness: I don’t have to tell you how exhilarating that is, I’m sure.

As I’ve mentioned several times, Extraterrestrial isn’t an especially ground-breaking film, plot-wise: it’s not difficult to see the Alien (1979), Fire in the Sky and Night of the Living Dead (1968) references. The most important thing to remember, however, is that all artistry is theft: it’s what you do with the ill-gotten gains that makes the difference between trash and treasure. In this case, the Vicious Brothers have taken a laundry list of their influences and spun them into something that feels complete and whole on its own, regardless of the foundation its built on.

Lest I seem like an overly supportive stalker, let me conclude by stating that I had seen the Vicious Brothers’ debut, Grave Encounters (2011), some time before I saw Extraterrestrial and wasn’t overly impressed. While the film had its moments, it also didn’t really strike me as anything more than another “found-footage in a creepy place” film, which we already have plenty of. Based on that experience (I’ve yet to see the sequel), there is absolutely no way I could have predicted Extraterrestrial: suffice to say, the level of growth, here, is roughly the same distance between adolescence and adulthood.

Is Extraterrestrial one of the best films of the year? Not at all, although it at least has the finish line in sight (unlike a basketful of films that I won’t mention). Is Extraterrestrial the film to beat for modern, indie alien films, however? I’ll stake my damn reputation on it. There a level of craft and imagination that’s impossible to ignore: if filmmakers can get “discovered” and jumped into the big time based on Youtube videos, here’s to hoping that they can still do it the old-fashioned way…you know, by creating a great, memorable film. If we don’t see the Vicious Brothers directing a tent-pole picture within the next few years, I’ll buy and eat an entire haberdashery.

Catch Minihan and Ortiz on the small stages while you can, gentle readers: something tells me the Vicious Brothers are going to be doing a helluva lot of headlining in the near future.

 

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1/3/15 (Part Five): Reset Your Life

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action films, alien invasion, alternate title, based on a graphic novel, Best of 2014, Bill Paxton, Brendan Gleeson, Christopher McQuarrie, cinema, covert military action, Dion Beebe, Doug Liman, Edge of Tomorrow, Emily Blunt, favorite films, film reviews, films, Go, Groundhog Day, Jez Butterworth, John-Henry Butterworth, Jonas Armstrong, Kick Gurry, Live Die Repeat, Mimics, Movies, multiple writers, Omega Mimic, regeneration, sci-fi, science-fiction, special-effects extravaganza, super soldiers, Swingers, The Bourne Identity, Tom Cruise, Tony Way, unable to die, video game, video games

When I call Doug Liman’s Edge of Tomorrow (2014) the best video game movie I’ve ever seen, understand that’s neither sarcasm nor a pejorative: it really is the one film that perfectly encapsulates everything that’s great about video games and successfully translates it to the big screen. Like the best video games, it’s got a gripping storyline to lead from one action setpiece to the next, a wannabe hero who becomes our avatar into the action and a precise understanding of the importance of multiple lives and the need to reset the whole game from time to time. The fact that Edge of Tomorrow can function as the equivalent of a life-action video game and still maintain enough genuine emotional heft and three-dimensional characters to seem like the furthest thing from a video game is one of the reasons why the film was one of the best of 2014.

Functioning as sort of a first-person-shooter take on Groundhog Day (1993), we get dropped into a reality where the Earth is under attack from an alien menace dubbed the Mimics. The Mimics are horrendously lethal, tentacled monstrosities that prove especially efficient at destroying soft-skinned humans and have proceeded to put the entire species into a serious headlock. After we develop exo-suit technology and creat “super soldiers,” however, we begin to fight back against the extraterrestrial menace and slowly make headway. The forces of humanity are now gathering for a last, desperate push against the Mimic threat on the European front (ala World War 2), a campaign that is being called “Operation Downfall.”

Into this set-up, we get the snide, arrogant, paper-pushing personality of Major William Cage (Tom Cruise). A proud desk jockey and bureaucrat, Cage is the furthest thing from a soldier, despite his rank. He gets the nasty shock of a lifetime, therefore, when he’s called before the imposing person of General Brigham (Brendan Gleeson) and ordered to the frontline. Stripped of his rank, labeled a coward and handed over to the tender mercies of Master Sargeant Farell (Bill Paxton) and the rowdy grunts of J Squad, Cage is pretty much a sitting duck. Once he actually gets to the battlefield, however, he quickly becomes a cooked duck. Game over.

Until, that is, Cage wakes up back at the army base, on the morning of his previous death. Through some sort of exposure to the Mimic’s blood, Cage has now acquired their ability to “reset the day,” as it were: every time he dies, he’s just brought right back to the base, in the morning. As he works through this horrendous case of deja vu, Cage comes into contact with a highly skilled “super-soldier,” Sgt. Rita Pitaki (Emily Blunt), who knows exactly what he’s going through: after all, she used to have the same “condition” until recently. Rita wants to use Cage’s ability to put an end to the Mimic menace once and for all: if he can lead them to the Omega Mimic (and keep dying/resetting in the process), the human forces will be able to strike a decisive victory against the enemy, ending the nightmare.

Cage, however, is such a wimp that he can’t survive in the fury of battle for five minutes, let alone the length of time it will take to lead them to the Omega Mimic. Cue a rigorous training regime that will see poor Cage “die” more times than…well, than your usual video game character, shall we say. Over time, however, Rita is able to bludgeon Cage into the kind of soldier who just might have a chance out there. The odds are never less than dicey, however, and treacherous revelations lie around every corner. Will Cage be able to play this game through to the end or will he lose his last life trying?

First off, Edge of Tomorrow is an absolute blast, a non-stop thrill ride that leaves you breathless from the jump and never flags in energy, invention or wit for the entirety of its runtime time. Director Liman, working with a screenplay from genre virtuoso Christopher McQuarrie and Jez and John-Henry Butterworth, is an absolute wizard at crafting show-stopping action sequences and the entire film is a ridiculous amount of fun to watch. One of my big complaints with modern action films is that the action sequences are always staged in ways that are too needlessly kinetic, robbing the scenes of any sense of fluidity or space. This is definitely not the problem with Edge of Tomorrow, which manages to be non-stop, yet orderly enough to allow for the action sequences to have their own individual quirks and not devolve into blurs of motion.

The film also looks great, with a fully established world that feels lived in and authentic, while maintaining a kind of hyper-reality: again, very reminiscent of modern video games. Cinematographer Dion Beebe, whose resume includes things like Holy Smoke (1999), Chicago (2002) and the recent adaptation of Into the Woods (2014), turns in some suitably stunning images and the effects work is all top-notch.

While Cruise would probably be a huge draw for many viewers, I’ve never been an automatic fan of his: it really depends on the film, as far as I’m concerned. In this case, Cruise is a natural fit for the role of Major Cage and he turns in one of my favorite performances of his in years. Smug, self-serving and vaguely slimy, Cage is positioned as the least likable character you can imagine, yet Cruise is able to develop that into someone who’s a charismatic hero, by the film’s final reel. It’s a really neat hat trick and Cruise is incredibly likable here: I can see why he’s still regarded as a matinée idol. There’s a nuance and sense of irony to his performance that’s quite nice and he manages to pull some genuinely funny moments out of the film, as well (the bit where he bites it rolling under a car is absolutely hilarious, as is the bit where he gets “reset” after breaking his back).

Cruise receives excellent support from Emily Blunt, who turns in a nicely asskicking turn as Rita. She’s always believable as the cold-blooded soldier, yet her subtle emotional turns help posit her as a more three-dimensional character. Blunt and Cruise make a great team, to boot, and the two have genuine chemistry: the scenes where they slowly slog through the battle, inch by inch, are masterpieces of action yet still retain a surprising amount of intimacy.

The supporting cast is equally great, with veterans like Brendan Gleeson and Bill Paxton turning in some fantastic work, along with folks like Jonas Armstrong, Tony Way and Kick Gurry, who bring vivid life to the soldiers of J Squad. In fact, there’s no one performance that comes across as awkward, off or just flat-out awful: everyone in the cast gives consistently strong, believable performances, from the principals to the walk-ons. The film is pulpy, to be sure, but the acting still manages to be broad without sliding over into self-parody or stupidity.

I honestly wasn’t expecting Edge of Tomorrow to be anything special: if anything, I expected it would be nothing more than a glossy, well-made, big-budget studio film that was loud, frenetic and utterly devoid of meaning. Instead, the film ends up being a whip-smart, funny, thrilling and endlessly fun spectacle that slows down just enough for some character development but never enough to let up on the adrenaline. It also looked so good that I instantly regretted not seeing it in a legitimate theater: cest la vie, I suppose. While I enjoyed Liman’s Swingers (1996) back in the day and thought Go (1999) was alright, I never liked his Bourne Identity (2002), mostly because I didn’t care for the staging of the action sequences. Imagine my surprise, then, when the same director manages to helm one of my favorite action films in years. The world really is a funny place, isn’t it?

10/6/14 (Part Two): Middle Age, Pints and Blue Goop

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31 Days of Halloween, alien invasion, auteur theory, Best of 2013, British comedies, British films, cinema, co-writers, David Bradley, Eddie Marsan, Edgar Wright, favorite films, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, friends, Gary King, horror-comedies, Hot Fuzz, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, male friendships, Martin Freeman, Michael Smiley, Movies, Nick Frost, obnoxious friends, Paddy Considine, Pierce Brosnan, pubs, Rosamund Pike, sci-fi, Shaun of the Dead, siege, SImon Pegg, the Cornetto trilogy, the Golden Mile, the Network, The World's End, writer-director, youth vs old age

Like most vacation destinations, nostalgia is a great place to visit but a pretty awful place to live. While all of us may spend at least some part of our lives pining for “the good old days” and hoping to relive past glories, there comes a time when we must plant our eyes firmly ahead and charge straight into the unknown, lest we find that our lives have become the equivalent of a hamster ball: furious motion with no chance of forward movement. In a real reason sense, nostalgia can kill…but it sure is a pretty poison.

Writer-director Edgar Wright’s The World’s End (2013), the third entry in his unofficial “Cornetto Trilogy” that also features Shaun of the Dead (2004) and Hot Fuzz (2007), is a movie that’s not only about the curse of nostalgia but also informed by this very phenomena: it’s a classic case of having your cake and eating it, too, if you will and it’s doubtful that many directors could pull it off as capably as Wright does here. The end result is wildly successful and, as far as I’m concerned, ranks as Wright’s greatest film, thus far, a towering achievement that manages to be equal parts gut-busting and thought-provoking. It’s a film that should be enjoyed by just about anyone but will have particular relevance to that portion of society who find themselves aging into versions of themselves that seem distinctly watered-down from their youthful ideals. For anyone approaching middle-age who’ve ever taken a long look in the mirror and asked, “What the hell happened to me?,” Wright’s got the cheeky answer: “You got fucking old, mate…it happens to the best of us.”

The man-child at the center of Wright’s latest opus is Gary King, expertly portrayed by Wright regular Simon Pegg, who’s managed to turn these type of roles into something of a cottage industry. From his start on the BBC with cult-hit Spaced to more recent films like How To Lose Friends & Alienate People (2008) and A Fantastic Fear of Everything (2012), Pegg has become something of the go-to guy for schlubs trying to relive their youth, characters who would rather get ripped at the pub, play video games all day long and avoid honest work than buckle down and admit that the care-free days are far in the rearview mirror.

In this case, Gary King is firmly stuck in the past: 1991, to be exact, which happens to be the year that he and his pack of friends attempted, but failed, to complete the Golden Mile. The Golden Mile entails drinking a pint at twelve different pubs, culminating in the titular World’s End pub. As far as he’s concerned, Gary’s life never got any better than that one debauched night and he’s spent the two decades since chasing that same dragon. He wears the same clothes as he used to, drives the same junker car, listens to the exact same mixtape and obsessively dwells on every minute detail of that era. When it all gets to be too much, Gary decides to do the only “sensible” thing: get the band back together, as it were, and give the Golden Mile another go.

There’s only one problem: Gary’s crew haven’t seen him in 20-odd years and many of them detest him with a passion normally reserved for baby-stealing dingoes. Never one to let common sense spoil a good plan, Gary goes about insinuating himself back into the lives of his former comrades, all the while trying to wheedle them into giving their old drinking challenge another try. Times, of course, have moved on and so have Gary’s “friends”: Andy (Nick Frost), Peter (Eddie Marsan), Oliver (Martin Freeman) and Steve (Paddy Considine) all have their own lives, jobs and responsibilities to see to and none of them, particularly former best friend Andy, want anything to do with their former “leader.”

Gary’s nothing if not insistent, however, and in no time, he’s got the group back on the Golden Mile. As they pub-hop, however, issues old and new continue to rear their ugly heads: Andy is now a teetotaling “party-pooper” while no one is willing to forgive Gary’s past (and present) churlish behavior. When Oliver’s sister, Sam (Rosamund Pike) enters the picture, new conflicts abound: Gary had sex with Sam in the bathroom on that fateful night so long ago, but it’s poor Steve who’s always pined for her. Just when Gary’s insensitive, assholish behavior threatens to tear the group apart for the second time, they become united in something that seems a bit more important: the group stumbles upon a sinister plot to usurp humanity and invade our planet, a plot which they seem to be in the unique position to foil…even they can quit taking pot-shots at each other, that is. As Gary and his friends fight for the very survival of our species, they’re also fighting for the survival of their long-gone friendships and relationships, seeking to move from the immature past into the responsible present. If they succeed, mankind will live to fight another day. If they don’t, however, we may just see a future that makes Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) seem more like public service announcement than flight of fancy.

The most important thing to note about The World’s End is how absolutely, completely and totally enthralling the film is: from the very first to the very last one, Wright’s film grabs the audience by the lapels and doesn’t let go. From rapid-fire dialogue to an endless array of inventive and (frequently) astounding sight gags to one thrilling setpiece after another, The World’s End is absolutely relentless. The film rarely comes up for breath and hardly ever slows down. This could, of course, be a recipe for one very tiresome film: nonstop chaos is almost impossible to pull off, as evidenced by the fact that even mostly successful films like Airplane (1980) feature as many leaden duds as high-soaring hits. Thanks to the exceptional script, sure-handed direction and fantastic ensemble cast, however, The World’s End is one high-point after the other.

Truth be told, I’d already fallen in love with the film by the time the opening credits rolled: the next 100 minutes simply served to reaffirm this feeling. While I enjoyed both Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, there was something about The World’s End that really struck a chord with me. Perhaps it’s the theme of aging gracefully into a more mature version of yourself…perhaps it was the wildly inventive invasion plot…perhaps it was just the fact that the film manages to hit all of its marks and then some…whatever the reason, The World’s End hooked me hard and refused to let go.

Since part of the film’s endless charm comes from the myriad surprises that it manages to throw at the audience, I’d be remiss to shed too much light on any of them. Suffice to say that the film features fist-raising moments galore: a spot-on reference to the under-rated Dead and Buried (1981); clever riffs on Invasion of the Body Snatchers; a throw-away visual reference to The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) that’s made my jaw drop, a little; the fact that the climax manages to revolve around not just one but two classic clichés of sci-fi cinema; Nick Frost playing a neebish…Martin Freeman taking his prim and proper caracatures to their logical extreme…the film is like an endless replenishing box of goodies, coughing up untold comic treasures at a moment’s notice.

The comedy’s not the only thing that hits the mark, however: The World’s End succeeds just as capably as a sci-fi/horror film, featuring some truly intense and frightening scenes. The moments where the Blanks’ eyes and mouths become the equivalent of high beams is a truly chilling moment, whereas the numerous fight scenes are brilliantly choreographed and staged. One fight in particular, which features Simon Pegg moving in and around a brawl while attempting to avoid spilling his treasured pint of lager, is pure gold, perhaps the single best fight scene I’ve seen in years. Make no bones about it: The World’s End is a very, very funny film. It’s also a very thrilling film, however: the two polar opposites are absolutely not mutually exclusive, in this case.

In truth, there’s very little real criticism I can give the film, aside from the fact that I felt the final coda was a bit silly and unnecessary. Aside from that, however, I found myself in a pretty constant state of awe for nearly two hours. The World’s End is a smashing success, a film that sets a pretty high bar for itself, right out of the gate, and then manages to effortlessly hurdle that bar. It’s a film that can be enjoyed by anyone but should be treasured by those folks with even a passing interest in sci-fi (classic and otherwise).

There’s one point in the film where Gary posits that something must be going on with the people in the town because they’ve “changed”: 20 years later and no one seems to be acting the way he remembered. He never once, of course, allows for the distressing notion that he might be the one who’s changed, not them. We’d like to believe that we’re the truest people out there, the equivalent of a bunch of Holden Caulfields stomping through the masses, pointing out “phonies” left and right. In reality, however, we’re all just as compromised as the next person: time and the need to survive make hypocrites of us all.

Gary thinks that if he can just retrace his steps, he’ll be able to unlock some sort of Fountain of Youth, some way to prevent any more of himself from slipping away. He’s wrong, of course: the most that any of us can do is face the future, keep our backs to the past and keep trudging forward. If we’re lucky, we’ll get to make the journey with some good friends and companions. If not, we’ll keep circling the drain spout of irrelevance, ending up as no more than the dreams that our youthful selves never dared to hope might one day come true. When an ultra-goofy alien invasion comedy can make you think about stuff like this, you have what I like to call a classic on your hands.

10/6/14 (Part One) Et Tu, Spock?

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'70s films, 31 Days of Halloween, alien invasion, alien spores, aliens, Art Hindle, based on, Brooke Adams, cinema, classic films, clones, cult classic, Don Siegel, Donald Sutherland, films, films review, hobo-faced dogs, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Jeff Goldblum, Kevin McCarthy, Leonard Nimoy, Michael Chapman, Movies, outer space, Philip Kaufman, pod people, pop psychology, remakes, San Francisco, sci-fi-horror, set in the 1970s, Veronica Cartwright, W.D. Richter

As a general rule, I don’t care for remakes, finding them to be alternately lazy, creatively bankrupt and, in worst case scenarios, downright offensive to the original property. That being said, there are always exceptions to every rule and I must admit that I do swear loyalty to a handful of remakes. John Carpenter’s remake of The Thing (1982) is the definitive version of that tale, despite not being the first. I’ll always feel that Gore Verbinski’s version of The Ring (2002) is a more frightening film than Ringu (1998) and I’ve always enjoyed Philip Kaufman’s version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) more than Don Siegel’s 1956 original.

For the record, there’s not much wrong with the original version of Invasion, despite my predilection for the remake. Siegel’s always been one of my favorite directors and he brings a taut, razors’ edge sense of tension to many of the film’s scenes. Kevin McCarthy is a more than able hero and the shadow of the McCarthy Red Scare that hovers over everything is just as palpable a menace as those sinister pod people ever were. That being said, the 1956 version is not without its problems. The framing device, added at the insistence of the producers, dilutes the film to a considerable degree and the movie definitely comes off as more dated than many of its contemporaries. In many ways, the original version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers is a product of its time, although its never been anything less than imminently watchable in the nearly 60 years since its release.

Kaufman’s re-do begins with one of the single most inventive intros I’ve ever seen, a superbly imaginative four-minute-epic that tracks the titular alien spores from their home planet, through the vast reaches of space and down onto the Earth’s surface via rain and condensation. Scored like an old-fashioned nature show, the sequence is a real eye-popper and sets a pretty high bar for the rest of the film. The effects in this scene, particularly the one where the leaf becomes “infected” and grows a pod, are superb, allowing for a pretty decent suspension of disbelief. The sequence also allows for a smooth transition into the film, proper, as we witness one of our protagonists, Elizabeth (Brooke Adams) pick the resulting flower off the plant: with that, we officially begin our descent into sci-fi madness.

Elizabeth works for the San Francisco Department of Health (the city’s various sights and locations are utilized to good effect throughout the film), where she works side by side with Matt (Donald Sutherland), our other erstwhile protagonist. Matt’s a stoic, by-the-book health inspector who brooks absolutely no bullshit from anyone: one of the film’s many highlights is the introductory scene where Matt finds a rat turd in a restaurant’s soup cauldron, only for the manager to argue that it’s a caper. After going back and forth for a few moments, Matt holds the offending item out to the manager: “If it’s a caper, go ahead and eat it.” Game, set, match.

The body snatching really begins in earnest after Elizabeth brings the sprouting pod home to her boyfriend, Geoffrey (Art Hindle). Geoffrey is kind of a jerk, right off the bat, but he gets distinctly odder after a little exposure to the unknown flora: he becomes rather strange and emotionless, leading Elizabeth to tell best friend Matt that her boyfriend isn’t himself…as in, really isn’t himself and might actually be someone else. Matt thinks his gal pal is going a little loony until his friendly neighborhood laundry owner makes the same strange comment about his wife. Something, clearly, is afoot.

After Elizabeth tails her husband and witnesses him handing off strange packages to various strangers around town, she’s pretty sure that her initial suspicions are correct: Geoffrey is involved in something very odd and, potentially, very bad. In the interest of “helping” his friend, Matt takes her to see his friend, Dr. David Kibner (Leonard Nimoy), a pop-psychologist who’s seen more than his fair share of these “Person X is not Person X” cases lately. Meanwhile, Matt’s other friends, Jack (Jeff Goldblum) and Nancy Bellicec (Veronica Cartwright), have found something a little strange at their bathhouse: a partially formed humanoid that bears a striking, if rudimentary, resemblance to Jack. In one of the film’s most chilling moments, Nancy watches the humanoid’s eyes spring open at the exact moment that Jack’s close: the clone also has a nose bleed, just like Jack. It would seem that Elizabeth was right, all along: something very strange and terrible is going on.

As the situation around them continues to spiral out of control, Matt, Elizabeth, Jack and Nancy have only themselves to rely on, as any and everyone around them, including the police and government authorities, might very well be “pod people.” The group must also avoid sleeping, if at all possible, since that seems to be when the transformations become complete, resulting in a fully formed clone and a pile of dust where the “real” person used to be. Paranoia, both real and induced by lack of sleep, ensues and the group sees danger wherever they turn. With no one else to turn to, Matt seeks the counsel of Dr. Kibner but is the good doctor really on their side? Or has he become a part of something much bigger, something which could very well spell the end of humanity as we know it?

Above all, Kaufman’s version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers is one sustained chill after another, punctuated by several setpieces that tip the film into full-blown horror territory. There’s one moment, shocking for how untelegraphed it is, where Matt splatters his clone’s head with a hoe: in a film that’s remarkably restrained as far as violence goes, it’s a truly bracing, horrific moment. The film’s piece de resistance, however, has to be the skin-crawling sequence where Matt dozes on the lawn while pod people form on the grass around him. Not only is the scene unbelievably tense, as we, literally, are watching Matt sleep his life away but the effects are astoundingly grotesque and rather nasty, with the forming pod people resembling nothing so much as the soupy mess at the center of the exploitation class The Incredible Melting Man (1977). It’s a great scene, one that has no equal in the original film. Likewise, the discovery of Jack’s clone is handled with considerably more tension and rising horror than the parallel scene in the first film.

Overall, Kaufman’s remake has a slightly different focus than the original: whereas Siegel’s original bemoaned the increasing lack of cohesion within America, as an outside force sought to drive us apart, the remake takes the much more paranoid viewpoint that we, as individuals, are hopelessly surrounded by mobs of sinister, conspiring others. It’s the same notion that makes us believe people are talking about us from behind their hands or planning some terrible event whenever they meet in secret: it’s the modern notion that no individual should have privacy or secrets in order to “protect” the masses that drives such modern institutes as the NSA. Kaufman’s version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers makes the point that sinister groups of people probably are making sinister plans at this very minute: how would we really know?

Despite enjoying McCarthy’s performance in the original quite a bit, I’m much more taken by Sutherland’s performance in the remake. Channeling the same sort of “lovably assholish genius” that Hugh Laurie mined for years in the TV show, House, Sutherland is a thoroughly charismatic presence. Brooke Adams, likewise, is a great relateable character, someone with just steel nerve to get the job done but enough vulnerability to still fill the “damsel in distress” quotient required of film’s from this era. Goldblum and Cartwright are great as the bo-ho best friends, with Cartwright bringing a particularly strong performance: she’s a vastly underrated actor who will probably always be best know for her performance in Alien (1979) but deserves recognition for so much more. And, of course, there’s the colossally fun performance by Leonard Nimoy as the platitude-spouting shrink with an agenda: his character is a great riff on the emotionless performance he perfected as Spock on Star Trek, featuring a truly wonderful bit where he appears to stuff all of the over-the-top emoting normally associated with former cast-mate William Shatner into one little diatribe. It’s a truly great performance, especially since it so ably plays against expectations.

The film looks fantastic, filled with the warm tones and vibrant colors (particularly greens) which always characterized the best of ’70s cinema. The man behind the camera for this one is none other than Michael Chapman, the savant who also shot Taxi Driver (1976), Raging Bull (1980), The Fugitive (1993) and Space Jam (1996): without a doubt, the remake of the film is a much better-looking film than the original and this comes from someone who really digs on the look of ’50s-era sci-fi films. Kaufman’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers is in a whole other category, however.

As a remake, Kaufman’s film sticks fairly closely to the original and its source material, Jack Finney’s novel, “The Body Snatchers.” Many times, scenes will parallel similar scenes in the first film, although writer W.D. Richter makes a few, significant changes from Siegel’s version. One of the niftiest bits of fan service in the remake is the scene where Kevin McCarthy reprises his role from the original: he jumps in front of Matt and Elizabeth’s car, pounding on the hood and screaming that “They’re coming! They’re already here!” just like he did at the conclusion of the original. A new addition that works spectacularly is the ultra-creepy “howl” that the pod people use whenever they discover a human: it’s a great, skin-crawling bit and Kaufman uses it to perfection in several key moments.

Truth be told, there’s really only one complaint that I have about the 1978 version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers and it’s a pretty specific one: the dog-hobo hybrid that makes an appearance during the pivotal “sneaking through the clones” scene is a real howler, so thoroughly goofy as to completely kill the mood of the film. I’m hard-pressed to think of any other cinematic moment that matches this bit of inanity but the stupid “Chaos reigns fox” from Von Trier’s Antichrist (2009) certainly comes to mind. In an interesting bit of coincidence: co-star Goldblum would go on to appear in another remake that featured a human-animal hybrid when he starred in Cronenberg’s remake of The Fly (1986): what the hell are the chances of that?

As I stated earlier, there’s very little wrong with the original film and modern audiences would be well-served by checking it out, if they haven’t already. That being said, Kaufman’s 1978 remake is a much better film on nearly every level, not least of which is an ending that manages to not only beat the original by a country mile but to be one of the single best cinematic endings of all time. In a time and age when we find ourselves increasingly connected to the rest of the world and the notion of “group-think” is becoming more prevalent than ever, much of Invasion of the Body Snatchers has begun to seem rather prophetic. Perhaps the invaders were already here…how would we really know?

 

7/27/14: A Real Case of McCarthyism

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1950s movies, alien invasion, auteur theory, based on a book, black and white film, Body Snatchers, Carolyn Jones, cinema, clones, Communism, Dana Wynter, Don Siegel, dopplegangers, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, invasion, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Jack Finney, Jean Willes, Joseph McCarthy, Kevin McCarthy, King Donovan, Larry Gates, McCarthyism, Miles Bennell, Movies, paranoia, pod people, remakes, sci-fi, sci-fi-horror, small town life, The Body Snatchers, the Red Scare, Tom Fadden, Virginia Christine, voice-over narration

What if the people around you, including your family and loved ones, started acting odd? Not tin-foil hat, playing-fetch-with-an-invisible-dog odd, mind you…nothing that obvious: more like a subtle, slightly out of your line of sight kind of odd. Maybe they seem a little out of it…a little too unemotional and disconnected. Perhaps you’d try to tell someone else, let them know that Uncle Johnny didn’t seem quite like himself or that your next-door-neighbor suddenly seemed a little different. What if nobody believed you because everyone was suddenly acting strange, including all authority figures? Where would you turn, at that point? Would you “give in” and join the masses or would you resist, standing alone against everyone else? More importantly, however…how could you be really sure that the problem wasn’t that YOU had suddenly changed? How can you tell when you’re just paranoid…and when you’re right?

This, of course, is the basic setup for Don Siegel’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), the first of several filmed adaptations of Jack Finney’s sci-fi classic, The Body Snatchers. Coming as it did during the maelstrom that was McCarthyism and the “Red Scare” of Communism, it’s pretty easy to read both Finney’s original novel and Siegel’s original adaptation as commentary on the insidious nature of the communist infiltration of America during the mid-’50s (or, to be more accurate, the perception of certain high-ranking members of the U.S. government as to said subtle “invasion”). While there’s certainly nothing wrong with this reading, I’ve always felt that Invasion of the Body Snatchers was more a cautionary tale about the dangers of assimilation and the problems of “group think,” namely humanity’s inability to turn down any opportunity to “join the mob,” than it was explicitly about communism. Regardless of the particular focus, however, one thing is abundantly clear: Finney’s original tale of clones, pod people and alien invaders has proved remarkably resilient and has become part of the cultural zeitgeist in a pretty substantial way.

IOTBS’s begins with a wrap-around story (added later, against Siegel’s wishes, and easily the worst thing about the film) that introduces us to our hero, Dr. Miles Bennell (Kevin McCarthy), currently under a psych hold at the hospital. No one seems to believe Miles and the story we’ll see is his frantic explanation of events to one of the attending physicians, in order to convince them that he;s not bonkers. It’s an old-fashioned kind of affectation, similar to the whole “it’s only a dream” cliché, and exists purely to give the film a happy ending (the studio demanded the additional scenes after Siegel’s original cut was deemed “too bleak” for the general public).

Miles has been on vacation for a few weeks and returns to his small town of Santa Mira, California, to find that things have been a bit strange in his absence. Plenty of folks have been getting sick, according to his assistant, Sally (Jean Willes), but everyone refused to see the other town doctor or tell Sally about their issues. To compound the mystery, Miles’ old flame, Becky (Dana Wynter), comes to him looking for help: her friend, Wilma (Virginia Christine), has somehow become convinced that her uncle, Ira (Tom Fadden) is actually an impostor. According to Wilma, Uncle Ira looks, sounds and talks just like he always did but there are small, almost imperceptible differences: namely, the “spark” seems to be gone and Ira seems strangely emotionless. Becky has tried to convince her friend that she’s being unnecessarily paranoid, to no avail: she wants Miles to use his authority as a doctor to set Wilma straight.

After running into his psychiatrist friend Danny (Larry Gates), however, Miles comes to realize that there may be more going on in Santa Mira than he originally thought: some sort of “mass psychosis” is causing people to believe that their loved ones are actually impostors. The shit really hits the fan, however, when Miles gets a call from his good buddy, Jack (King Donovan): turns out that Jack has found some sort of “unfinished man” at his house, a seemingly dead (or comatose) creature that looks just like a human, minus things like fingerprints and distinct facial features. At first, Miles and the others seem rather blase about the whole thing (the body is just kept lying on a billiards table and they all sort of poke around it, as if it were roadkill rather than an unformed body) but an overnight development suitably shocks them: the body now looks exactly like Jack, right down to a recent cut on his hand. When Miles finds a similar “double” of Becky, in her basement, one thing is abundantly clear: extreme strangeness is afoot.

Surprisingly, however, the police seem decidedly nonplussed by the whole thing, waving off Miles’ concerns and cueing him in to the fact that there might be a deeper conspiracy going on. Sure enough, Miles, Becky, Jack and his wife, Teddy (Carolyn Jones) are witness to something truly horrific: weird, alien seed pods are spitting out the half-formed proto-humans. Putting two and two together, Miles and the others realize that they’re in the midst of an alien invasion: somehow, the seed pods are cloning the residents of Santa Mira, replacing them with emotionless doubles like Wilma’s Uncle Ira. Who can the friends turn to, however, when everyone seems suspiciously emotionless? When everyone, including law enforcement, seem like alien clones, it’s up to Miles and the others to resist and get the word out to the rest of the world…before it’s too late.

Siegel’s version of IOTBS has always been hailed as a sci-fi masterpiece and there’s quite a lot to like here: the pod scenes are always creepy and suitably icky, there are plenty of well-staged, intense chase sequences (Siegel, after all, was the gritty action-auteur behind such classics as The Killers (1964), Dirty Harry (1971) and Escape From Alcatraz (1979)) and there are several pretty unforgettable images (one of the very best is the bit where Miles kills his own clone with a pitchfork). It’s also quite obvious that Siegel’s film has influenced modern-day filmmakers: the scene where Miles and Becky try to pass themselves off as “pod people,” in order to pass through the clones unnoticed, should be rather familiar to anyone who’s ever seen Shaun of the Dead (2004), while the notion of Miles and Becky taking pills in order to prevent falling asleep couldn’t have passed by Wes Craven unnoticed. The film maintains a fairly tense, claustrophobic atmosphere and Siegel’s original, “downer” ending may be old-hat in these pessimistic times but surely would have been a strong jolt of pure moonshine back in the mid-’50s.

While there’s a lot to like here, however, there’s also quite a bit that doesn’t work. The aforementioned wraparound story is fairly awful and clichéd, while the musical score is always overbearing and too “obvious”: in certain ways, IOTBS is scored like a silent movie, with all of the bombast that the descriptor entails. I also never felt like the romance between Becky and Miles caught heat: it always hovered somewhere between silly and (ironically enough) emotionless, which allows Becky’s latter-half declaration that “I want to love and be loved! I don’t want a world without love!” to come across as both sarcastic and kind of sad.

It’s also kind of difficult to figure out just what the “rules” for the pod people are: sometimes they’re emotionless, sometimes they form mobs of shouting, angry people…sometimes the clones act normal, sometimes they don’t…sometimes the very act of falling asleep is enough to get someone “replaced,” sometimes it isn’t. Without a clear establishment of these basic guidelines, IOTBS comes across much less like a “hard” sci-fi film and more like a drive-in feature (not necessarily a bad thing, to be honest, but still a thing).

Quibbles aside, however, Siegel’s version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers is always entertaining and, frequently, more than a little creepy. The suffocating feeling of paranoia is a palpable thing and when the film is firing on all cylinders, it’s pretty unstoppable: the scene where pods are handed out to the town-members, in preparation of a larger scale invasion, is a real corker and there’s the very real sense that IOTBS features a fun-house warped version of a Norman Rockwell painting. Kevin McCarthy is a suitably fun, if occasionally over-the-top hero and if the rest of the cast ends up a bit generic, they all provide fine, consistent support. The black and white cinematography is also quite nice, if not quite as evocative as something like The Bad Seed (1956): it’s fairly workmanlike but gets the job done. As far as the various film versions of Finney’s story go, I’ve always been more partial to the 1978 version (they always have me at “Donald Sutherland”) but Siegel’s original is a close runner-up. If you’ve never seen the original, give it a shot: the film might feel a tad bit “old-fashioned” today (and that’s coming from someone who tends to place somewhat excessive emphasis on older films) but there’s still a lot of value here.

After all, as our world becomes smaller and more homogenized, it’s increasingly easy to see the notion of “pod people” as being a little too close for comfort: to paraphrase Pogo: we have seen the pod people and they is us.

6/22/14: It Came From Space! (Circa 1983 or Thereabouts)

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alien impregnation, alien invasion, aliens, Almost Human, Anthony Amaral III, B-movies, body horror, cinema, directorial debut, drive-in fare, extreme violence, feature-film debut, film reviews, films, Friday the 13th, friendships, gory films, Graham Skipper, Hobo With a Shotgun, horror, horror films, horror movies, Jami Tennille, Joe Begos, John Ethier, lights in the sky, low-budget films, missing friends, Movies, period-piece, psycho killers, sci-fi, sci-fi-horror, science-fiction, set in the 1980's, slasher films, The House of the Devil, UFOs, Vanessa Leigh, violent, writer-director

It’s not much of a secret that modern horror productions seem to be particularly enamored with the 1980s. Whether filmmakers are crafting straight-up remakes of popular ’80s titles or crafting films that are, basically, homages to ’80s horror, such as Gutterballs (2008), The House of the Devil (2009) or Hobo With a Shotgun (2011), the decade between Friday the 13th (1980) and Puppet Master (1989) certainly seems to be fertile soil, as of late. My theory on the reasoning behind this is pretty simple: as the folks who grew up on ’80s horror get older and move into positions where they can begin to create their own content (directors and writers, for sure, but I’m thinking specifically of producers and studios, here), it’s only natural for them to return to the stuff that first fired them up as kids. Whereas previous generations might have been influenced by weekly serials, ’60s-’70s pop-culture/societal issues and the Cold War, the generation of filmmakers who came of age in the ’80s were influenced by their own particular set of issues and found comfort in their own “new” subgenres, such as slasher films and graphic sci-fi/horror combos like Creature (1985) and The Fly (1986). When it finally came time for the “children of VHS” to make their own films, it shouldn’t be surprising that they returned to their formative era: once the folks who grew up in the ’90s begin to take over, we should be seeing lots of rebooted ’90s properties (there’s already a Scream TV series in the works, so the cycle appears to have begun a little early). Life, as Stephen King so eloquently put it, is such a wheel that it always, in the end, comes round to the same place again.

One-man wrecking crew, Joe Begos, is a little young to comfortably fit within my above theory (he was born in 1987, making him a good decade younger than his “peers”) but he fits the bill so perfectly that he must be an old soul. The writer-director-producer-cinematographer-camera operator behind Almost Human (2013) announced his entry to the world of feature filmmaking with a sci-fi horror movie that could have fit perfectly within the ’80s, sandwiched somewhere between Xtro (1983) and The Hidden (1987). Far from being just a clever approximation of a bygone decade, however, Begos’ film manages to combine all of the necessary ingredients (rudimentary acting, gory practical effects, plenty of action sequences, goopy makeup, intense violence) with a loopy sense of energy and comes up with something that’s suitably rough but just endearing enough to make you want to write Begos’ name on your Trapper Keeper. If ever there were a new genre filmmaker to watch, this guy might just be it.

Set in 1987, Almost Human kicks off in sci-fi high-gear with our terrified protagonist, Seth (Graham Skipper, looking like a slightly doughy Daniel Radcliffe), rushing to the cabin of best friend Mark (Josh Ethier) and his wife, Jen (Vanessa Leigh). Seth has just watched as mutual friend Rob was sucked up into the sky, via a shaft of blue light, and the event has him a little unsettled…actually, he’s in a complete panic but why split hairs? Mark is a burly, Brawny Towel-kind of a dude, so he doesn’t seem too ruffled over Seth’s jibber-jabber. Too bad, since Seth is absolutely right: there’s something otherworldly out there and it sucks Mark straight up into the sky, leaving his terrified wife and buddy standing around as the air is filled with intense screeching and blinding, flashing lights. Smash-cut to the title, white letters on a severe, black background and you might be forgiven for thinking you’d booted up the VCR instead of the Blu-Ray.

Two years later and Seth has been cleared as a suspect but nothing else has really gone right for him: Mark and Rob never turned up, Jen moved on to a new guy, Clyde (Anthony Amaral III) and Seth is prone to headaches, nose bleeds and a generally shitty lifestyle. After two years of relative “peace,” however, things have started to happen again: power outages have become common-place again and folks have been seeing weird lights in the sky. Something appears to be brewing and a pair of unfortunate hunters stumble, literally, right into the middle of everything when they happen upon Mark’s naked body in the middle of the woods. Mark seems to be alive but doesn’t seem quite right (he appears to be covered in amniotic fluid which, for a grown, naked man is usually a dead giveaway that shit is not, in face, okay): his eyes look weird, he seems to be in shock and doesn’t say much more than “Jen,” over and over. He also ends up killing the two hunters with his bare hands, which is probably as good an indicator as any that the Mark we now see ain’t the Mark we once knew.

After taking some clothes and a rifle, Mark proceeds into town, cutting a bloody swath through anyone unlucky enough to confront him. His goal appears to be some kind of reconciliation with his former wife but to what end? As Seth finally reconnects with Jen, the two are forced to team up against a truly otherworldly force: you see, Mark is finally home but he’s both a lot less and a lot more than he used to be. What exactly does he want? Why, he just wants what anybody wants: he wants to start a family with the person he loves, that’s all. Unfortunately, Mark’s notions of fatherhood are more in line with Alien (1979) than Leave It To Beaver, leading to a desperate, all-in fight to save humanity from an evil, insidious force from beyond the stars…a force that, like a shark, knows only a few imperatives: eat…procreate…repeat. Can Seth and Jen survive? Can any of us?

From the above description, one could be forgiven for believing that Almost Human is a pretty traditional Alien/Xtro clone about an alien creature that uses humans for feeding and breeding: in reality, the film is actually much closer to a traditional slasher film dolled-up in sci-fi trappings. This actually allows Begos to do two different things: he can create a more traditional slasher, right down to the emphasis on varied methods of death, and he can throw in enough body-horror/sci-fi ickiness to make sure that this doesn’t just read like a Friday the 13th clone. How’s it work out? Pretty damn nicely, to be honest. The slasher elements are strong and well-done, if not particularly inventive (axes, close-range shotguns, scissors and knives all get workouts) but they’re given an additional shot in the arm by the sci-fi elements. While this definitely helps reign the film’s budget in (Begos, like other low-budget horror filmmakers, has learned that the cheapest villains are always the ones who look the most like us, even if they’re filled with aliens/ghosts/mystery juice/a dose of the crazies), the mixture is good enough that it never feels like a cop-out. Indeed, Bego’s sci-fi elements lead to some of the film’s strongest, strangest scenes such as the ooky “pod people” and Mark’s attempted rape/impregnation of Jen via nasty alien tube thingamabopper. Too many scenes of Mark trooping around with a glare and an ax and we get a pretty generic “dead teenager” film: too much outer space mumbo-jumbo and we get the equivalent of one of Corman’s micro-budget ’80s sci-fi curiosities (many of which were the Asylum/Syfy films of their era, as it was). It’s to Begos’ immense credit that the film always feels perfectly balanced: it always feels like a cheaply made B-movie but never feels awkward or disposable.

From a filmmaking standpoint, Almost Human can be hit-or-miss but most of the issues can be chalked up to “first-time filmmaker jitters” or any of the woes normally associated with micro-budget productions: the acting is pretty iffy, the sound mix is absolutely awful (when will low-budget filmmakers ever learn that sound is too fucking important to be handled by whoever has a free hand?) and some of the plot developments felt completely arbitrary, even for a low-budget horror film. That being said, Almost Human never feels sub-standard and is never difficult to watch: whatever minor flaws the film may have, Begos’ cinematography and the film’s editing style aren’t two of them. I’ve seen plenty of low-budget horror films that are practically painful to sit through: wildly inconsistent acting, poor lighting, crappy camera-work, lame scripts and ridiculous CGI effects. While Begos’ film isn’t a masterpiece, it also doesn’t fall prey to any of these potential deal breakers. The acting may be rough but it’s consistently rough, which makes it a lot harder to notice, ironically enough. The lighting and cinematography are good, as are the practical effects (truth be told, the effects work is actually very good, budget notwithstanding) and the script is solid, if less than spectacular.

Ultimately, as a life-long horror fan, it was impossible for me not to be suitably impressed by Begos’ feature-film debut. While the film was far from perfect, it also revealed a genuine love of the genre and an inherent ability that speaks extremely well for future projects (Begos interned with Stuart Gordon, which may go a long way towards explaining not only the younger filmmaker’s “older” aesthetic but also his affinity for nasty effects work). Begos may have been all of three years old when the ’80s slid into the ’90s but his aesthetic (both visually and thematically) is strictly old-school video store. When a 27-year-old writer/director includes a credit listing for a “Fake Shemp” in his debut film, let’s just say that it’s pretty obvious his head (and heart) is in the right place. Anyone who grew up in the era of direct-to-VHS shockers, low-budget slashers and ultra-gory sci-fi chillers should find something to like about Begos’ Almost Human. If you require the relentless polish and shine of “modern,” CGI-endowed horror films, however, look elsewhere: Begos ain’t for you. For me, however, I’m gonna be sure to keep the kid in my sights: after all, if Almost Human is the first lap, I can’t wait to see how this race progresses.