6/7/15 (Part Two): The Heart and the Loneliest Hunter

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A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night, addicts, Alex O'Flinn, Amirpour, Ana Lily Amirpour, Arash Marandi, atmospheric films, Bad City, based on a short, black and white film, black-and-white cinematography, cinema, death, Dominic Rains, dramas, drug addiction, drug dealers, evocative, fantasy, father-son relationships, feature-film debut, film reviews, films, French New Wave, ghost town, horror films, Iranian-American, isolated communities, Jim Jarmusch, John Hughes, loneliness, Lyle Vincent, Marshall Manesh, Milad Eghbali, moody films, Movies, Mozhan Marnò, romances, Rome Shadanloo, Sam Kramer, set in Iran, Sheila Vand, skateboarders, spaghetti Westerns, street urchin, stylish films, vampires, writer-director-producer

Billed as “the first Iranian vampire Western,” writer-director-producer Ana Lily Amirpour’s A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014) is an endlessly fascinating debut, a thoroughly confident horror-art piece that manages to turn its grab-bag of cinematic influences into something effortlessly cool. More Dead Man (1995) than Only Lovers Left Alive (2013), Amirpour’s film throws gorgeous black and white cinematography, nods to the French New Wave, German Expressionism, the holy trinity of Jarmusch, Bergman and Jeunet and the ’80s youth flicks of John Hughes into a blender and hits “puree.” While the results aren’t perfect, AGWHAAN is still a stunning feature-film debut from an amazingly talented new filmmaker and a necessary addition to the existing bloodsucker canon.

Amirpour’s debut (based on an earlier short) concerns the various residents of the Iranian town of Bad City. A virtual ghost town, Bad City appears to be inhabited solely by drug addicts, prostitutes, pimps/pushers, hustlers and the odd street urchin, here and there. Our humble hero, Arash (Arash Marandi), is a hustler who looks like he stepped straight out of East of Eden (1955): with his white t-shirt, blue jeans, omnipresent sunglasses and vintage muscle car, he’s a classic rebel without a cause. His father, Hossein (Marshall Manesh), is a pathetic junkie who owes a wad of cash to the local pimp/dealer, Saeed (Dominic Rains). For his part, Saeed is a philosophical, if thick-headed, thug who isn’t above taking Arash’s car as partial payment for his dad’s debt, while ruling his “girls” with an iron fist. One such “employee” is Atti (Mozhan Marnò), the sad-eyed, thirty-year-old prostitute who plies her trade on the barren, empty streets of Bad City, overshadowed by the towering oil derricks in the background.

As these various sad-sacks go about their repetitive routines, a new force emerges to shake up the status quo: a mysterious, silent young woman (Sheila Vand) has taken to stalking the streets, doling out death to any who cross her path. When the vampiric girl puts a permanent end to Saeed, Arash seizes the opportunity and attempts to fill the void left by the drug dealer. As Atti and the mysterious girl form a bond, however, Arash finds himself similarly drawn to the enigmatic figure. What does the young woman really want? What does the future hold for Bad City and its shadowy residents? One thing’s for certain: if you have to be out after dark, be sure to stay far, far away from the girl walking home alone…your very life may depend on it!

Lush, hazy, hypnotic and vaguely hallucinatory, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is the kind of film that you wrap around yourself like a cozy blanket, consciously giving yourself up to its warm embrace. While the pacing and visuals often bring to mind a perfect synthesis of Jim Jarmusch and Ingmar Bergman’s respective styles (the scene where the Girl skateboards down the center of the deserted street is framed in a way that turns her into the spitting image of Death from the iconic Seventh Seal (1957), while the film’s numerous long takes and relative lack of forward momentum handily recalls the aforementioned Dead Man), Amirpour’s influences are far more wide-reaching than something as simple as “Indie 101.”

Rather, Amirpour has taken a range of different styles and influences and made them all work towards a common goal: in this case, the goal being the film’s all-encompassing sense of foreboding atmosphere. Along with the more traditional indie influences, there are several strong, direct nods to the ’80s youth films of John Hughes (the lovely scene involving Arash, the Girl, a mirror ball and the White Lies’ song “Death” is one of the best examples but certainly not the only one), as well as a strong Spaghetti Western undercurrent (the wonderfully evocative score, locations and sense of big, empty spaces is pure Leone, through and through). On paper, Amirpour’s debut might sound like a rather head-scratching gumbo but the results speak for themselves: thanks to the Iranian-American filmmaker’s deft touch, everything comes together beautifully, giving the film the sort of unifying style befitting something like Jeunet’s exquisitely-crafted fantasias.

While the evocative score and beautiful cinematography (Lyle Vincent, who also shot the upcoming Cooties (2015), is an absolute wizard with a camera) help to give the film a sense of dreamy unreality, the acting keeps everything from dissolving into just another morass of pretty images. Marandi is a suitably cool, aloof “antihero,” while Manesh brings enough genuine regret to his portrayal of the sad-sack, aging junkie to make his character decidedly more complex than he might have been. Rains brings an interesting, almost empathetic quality to his portrayal of the sleazy pimp/dealer, calling to mind a less outwardly insane version of Gary Oldman’s iconic Drexl.

Most impressive, however, are Mozhan Marnò as the melancholy Atti and Sheila Vand as the titular vampire. In both cases, the actresses do a tremendous amount with as little as possible: Marnò is able to express entire worlds of sadness and sensuality with nothing so much as a half-smile and a look from her piercing eyes, while Vand’s portrayal of the Girl is nothing short of ethereal and completely alien. In many ways, Vand’s Girl is similar to Scarlett Johansson’s Female in the similarly eerie Under the Skin (2013): other-worldly, curious, nearly mute and of constant interest to the males around them, the Girl and the Female could certainly share a common bloodline, even if their ultimate goals differ wildly.

Amirpour’s hazy film is many things (seductive, sad, odd, cool and hypnotic being but a few) but it also manages to nail one of the most important aspects of any horror film: when necessary, the film is also genuinely scary. Although the Girl’s attacks have a tendency to rely on some decidedly stereotypical musical stings and old-as-the-hills “scary voices,” the pacing, framing and sense of impeding dread are all masterfully executed, resulting in some great, unique scares. The scene where the Girl stalks a young street urchin is a virtual master-class in how to build and execute: the fact that Amirpour also manages to throw in a clever reference to Fritz Lang’s child-killer classic M (1931) is only frosting on a very tasty cake.

Despite being thoroughly impressed by A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, there were a few elements that let a bit of air out of the proceedings. The aforementioned vampire stereotypes are problematic only because the rest of the film is so clever: at times, relying on the same stock clichés as other vamp films does more to pull Amirpour’s film down than it does to unite it with a common cinematic sensibility. I was also less than on board with the more verite, handheld-shaky-cam style of certain scenes, usually those involving Hossein’s drug use and withdrawal pains. Not only was the handheld style a distinct step-down from the gorgeous cinematography but the “drug scenes” had a different flow and pace that jarred against the rest of the film’s more dreamy atmosphere. In truth, all of these moments could have been cut without damaging the rest of the meticulously crafted narrative.

All in all, Amirpour’s debut feature is a real showstopper, the kind of film that kicks in the door and practically demands your undivided attention. While her debut was set in Iran (although filmed in California), Amirpour’s next film will, apparently, be a “dystopic love story, set in a cannibal compound, in a Texas wasteland,” featuring the combined talents of Keanu Reeves, Jim Carrey, Giovanni Ribisi, Jason Mamoa and the always amazing Yolonda Ross. In other words, it looks like Amirpour is going to continue her fearless genre-splicing. I’m willing to wager that her next feature will grab the world by the scruff of the neck and shake it silly. If it’s half as impressive as her debut, I’ll be the first person in line.

2/14/15 (Part One): Hurting the Ones You Love

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aliens, Ben Huber, body horror, cabins, cinema, co-writers, dark films, directorial debut, feature-film debut, film reviews, films, Hanna Brown, Harry Treadaway, Honeymood, horror, horror films, husband-wife relationship, isolated communities, Leigh Janiak, Lovecraftian, Lovely Molly, low-budget films, Movies, Phil Graziadei, possession, relationship, Rose Leslie, writer-director

Every relationship has its “honeymoon” phase: whether weeks, months or years, there’s always a sweet spot in any new union where cloyingly sweet pet names are common, arguments are unimaginable and every couple seem joined at the hips. These are the times when lovers can while away an entire afternoon just staring into each other’s starry orbs, whispering sweet nothings while hand-feeding one another grapes. While the honeymoon is always great, it’s never where the actual meat of a relationship lies, however: once the initial “puppy-dog” phase is over, couples have to actually get down to the business of dealing with each other, a process which misses as much as it hits. For every couple that grow old together, there are plenty that implode after the rose-tinted glasses (and gloves) come off. Being with someone during the good times is easy: you know that you’ve found a partner for life when the bad times are equally appealing.

Leigh Janiak’s Honeymoon (2014) is, both literally and figuratively, about this happy little time: we pick up with the film’s lead couple right as they arrive at their honeymoon destination, immediately following their wedding. Bea (Rose Leslie) and Paul (Harry Treadaway) are that aforementioned google-eyed pair of lovebirds that make everyone else gag and roll their eyes: he calls her “honeybee” and she “buzzs” while lovingly touching his face, every comment is some sort of “sassy” quip. They’re obviously in love and perfect for each other, the kind of “quirky” renegades who serve Indian food at their wedding as a reference to their first-date food poisoning and have a cake made out of cinnamon rolls. She’s an outdoorsy-type who spent 12 years as a Girl Scout, he’s a city boy who doesn’t know how to fish…it’s the ultimate meet-cute, as if we’re beginning with the triumphant conclusion to any number of generic modern rom-coms.

But then, of course, little cracks begin to appear in the smooth surface veneer. Paul makes an extremely odd comment about Bea’s “womb” which seems to surprise him as much as her…a childhood friend of Bea’s, Will (Ben Huber), lives in the nearby town and there seems to some underlying sexual tension between the two…the swamps and woods that surround Bea’s childhood home seem to be teeming with life, yet we see very little of it. Things come to a head when Paul discovers Bea missing, one night, and frantically searches the woods for her. Upon finding her nude and crouched in the dirt, Paul is (rightfully) worried but Bea passes the incident off as mere sleep-walking. As Bea’s behavior becomes ever stranger, however, Paul is confronted with the disturbing notion that something terrible might have happened to his wife in the woods. Was she attacked by Will or is there something altogether darker involved, something with motives no rational human could comprehend?

After a somewhat shaky first act (Bea and Paul are so nauseatingly cute and broad, at first, that the first 15 minutes or so almost play out like a parody), Honeymoon smooths out into a reasonably tense, atmospheric chiller, albeit one that manages to be both a little too vague and a little to on-the-nose (no mean feat, if you think about it). While none of the events in the film are ever really explained, there’s a point, towards the end, where Bea still manages to give us a recap, of sorts, similar to the point in many films where we finally “see” how all of the events transpired. If it reads a little confusing, it actually plays even more so: rather than wrapping everything up with a bow, she just re-explains what we saw, without the benefit of any new insight whatsoever. It’s similar to asking someone for the score to a sporting match and then having them recap said match without ever mentioning the final score. I’m certainly not a fan of hand-holding but Honeymoon’s many “clues” come across as red herrings simply because we’re never given quite enough to go on.

Even if Honeymoon ends up making imperfect sense (I hope it’s a rather clever, subtle take on Lovecraft’s Shadow Out of Innsmouth but it could also be a much less interesting alien visitation tale…I’m really not sure), there are plenty of creepy scenes here and some genuine pathos to the relationship between Bea and Paul. While Leslie and Treadaway aren’t always convincing as a couple (Treadaway, in particular, has a certain way of delivering lines that renders particular moments rather artificial, especially when he gets more agitated), they have a reasonable amount of chemistry together and the final scene packs a fairly hefty wallop. Leslie, known mostly for roles in hit TV shows like Downton Abbey and Game of Thrones, strikes a nice balance between kooky, sweet and distracted: when it all comes together, she projects a quite winning balance between aloof and vulnerable.  While Treadaway isn’t quite as impressive here as he was in either The Disappeared (2008) or Cockneys vs Zombies (2012), he’s still solid and largely sympathetic.

As a film about a relationship, there’s plenty of authenticity to Honeymoon. More than anything, the film is about the subtle little ways in which couples feint and maneuver around each other, digging into past injuries, hinting around bigger issues and feigning smiles when in-depth conversations might better serve. In some ways, the film can be seen as a microcosm of a fledgling marriage, with the crisis that befalls Bea and Paul serving as their first real “issue.” One of the subtlest, most effective scenes in the film is the one where Paul stares surreptitiously at Bea as they toast marshmallows: even as they’re supposed to be having fun, we can see the pain and suspicion festering in his eyes. Despite the couple’s desire to just enjoy their time together, their internal dialogue speaks volumes. In a genre that’s often criticized for being about “nothing,” Honeymoon actually has something to say, which is a nice change of pace.

As a horror film, Honeymoon is also effective, although it often feels like a modified take on a traditional found-footage film, minus the subjective camera element. We get plenty of staples from that sub-genre (shadowy figures appearing behind Paul, security cam footage, the notion that things are happening just out of frame) along with some (subtle) Lovecraftian elements and a particularly slimy ode to either Andrzej Zulawski’s Possession (1981) or Scott’s Alien (1979)…take your pick. Throughout the whole thing, first-time director Janiak (who also co-wrote the film with Phil Graziadei) displays a fairly deft touch with establishing mood and tension. That being said, I couldn’t help but feel that the film could have benefited from a much darker, grimmier tone, ala Eduardo Sanchez’s knockout Lovely Molly (2011): aside from the ending, Honeymoon never digs the screws into the audience (or its characters) as much as it could, which ends up being a little disappointing.

That being said, there is a lot to like here. While Paul ends up being the focus of the story, in many ways, it’s always refreshing to watch a horror film that gives equal screen-time to the female lead: much of the body horror here is feminine in nature, which provides another parallel to the aforementioned Possession. The film is never out-and-out terrifying, so to speak, but it’s certainly a slow-burner, worming its way under your skin and culminating in a suitably sad, striking finale. For a low-key, low-budget indie horror film, Leigh Janiak’s Honeymoon strikes plenty of right notes: here’s to hoping her follow-up continues to raise the bar.

2/8/15: After the Freeze, the Thaw

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action film, aliens, Atticus Mitchell, Bill Paxton, Canadian films, cannibals, CGI, Charlotte Sullivan, cinema, civilized vs savage, climate change, co-writers, Doomsday, Dru Viergever, dystopian future, extreme violence, film reviews, films, foreign films, frozen wasteland, horror, ice age, isolated communities, Jeff Renfroe, John Healy, John Tench, Julian Richings, Kevin Zegers, Laurence Fishburne, Movies, multiple writers, post-apocalyptic wasteland, quarantine, sci-fi, sci-fi-horror, science-fiction, Screamers, self-sacrifice, siege, Snowpiercer, survival of the fittest, survivors, The Colony, underground colonies, violent films, voice-over narration, writer-director

Sometimes, you don’t expect much more from a film than you can get from a cursory glance at said film’s box art: in this case, I expected Jeff Renfroe’s The Colony (2013) to be a serviceable sci-fi/action flick, set in a frozen, dystopic future, with Laurence Fishburne and Bill Paxton butting heads…nothing more, nothing less. For the most part, this is exactly what I ended up with: while the film throws a few minor twists into the mix, nothing here will be unfamiliar to viewers who’ve seen films like Screamers (1995), Doomsday (2008) or any of a hundred other similar sci-fi/horror/action hybrids. That being said, The Colony is fast-paced, reasonably tense and features a handful of truly impressive fight sequences: if the film ends up being rather silly and over-the-top, in the end, it at least manages to keep the courage of its convictions.

We’re immediately dumped into one of those frozen-over worlds of the near-future that forms such an integral part of recent sci-fi films like Snowpiercer (2014): in this case, we’re not given any real reasons for the catastrophe, although a handy voice-over does let us know that the common cold is now a lethal killer, which positions this somewhere between climate change and bacteriological devastation on the “We’re Fucked” scale. Regardless of the reason, humanity has been split into two separate groups: the ones who made it underground, to protected colonies, and the ones who stayed above-ground. To make it even easier: underground = alive, above-ground = dead. Suffice to say, the future ain’t such a hot place to be, in every sense of the term.

Our entry into the narrative is Colony 7, one of the last, surviving colonies. Run by the even-handed, level-headed Briggs (Laurence Fishburne), the colony is also home to hot-headed, reactionary Mason (Bill Paxton), proving the old film adage that everyone needs an antagonist, especially those who lead post-apocalyptic societies. Our narrator (and defacto hero) is Sam (Kevin Zegers), a nice, upstanding young man who happens to be sweet on Kai (Charlotte Sullivan), the tough-as-nails supply controller who’s more than capable of taking care of herself in an unforgiving world. Life in Colony 7 is harsh and violent death is always around the corner: any residents who develop the sniffles are given one of two options – let Mason put a bullet in their noggins or take a long, cold walk into the oblivion of the snow-blasted wasteland above-ground. It’s not, exactly, how Briggs would prefer to get things done but it’s a balance that works, for the time being.

In a development that vaguely echoes the under-rated sci-fi chiller Screamers, Colony 7 receives a distress signal from the only other known, surviving colony: Colony 5.  In the interest of trying to preserve as many human lives as possible, Briggs, Sam and a young go-getter by the name of Graydon (Atticus Mitchell) set out on a perilous journey to check out the signal. Briggs leaves Kai in charge, which sits about as well with the ludicrously macho Mason as you’d expect. With tension back home at an all-time high, the trio set out for the blinding-white environs top-side, determined to find out what’s going on with their closest “neighbors.”

After a short series of adventures through the CGI-created frozen world that used to be ours, our trio ends up at Colony 5, only to discover what appears to be the remnants of violent conflict. Upon further exploration, the trio finds a single survivor, Leland (Julian Richings), who spins a  tale that begins hopefully, with a potential thawed zone on the surface world, and ends horribly, with news of some kind of attack that wiped everyone out. Since our heroes really can’t leave well enough alone, they continue to explore Colony 5 and run smack-dab into a rampaging horde of bloodthirsty cannibals led by a leader (Dru Viergever) who manages to be a teeth-gnashing, chest-beating amalgam of pretty much every savage/feral/cannibal/evil warlord leader in the history of dystopic cinema. This then begins a protracted chase, as our heroes must return to the safety of their colony while being careful not to lead the cannibal army directly to their next smorgasbord. Who will survive and who will become toothpicks? In this colony, it’s anyone’s guess!

For the most part, The Colony is a pretty run-of-the-mill, bargain-bin type of dystopic action flick. It’s got all of the visual and aural hallmarks of said subgenre (morose score, muted color palette, panoramic wide shots), as well as many of the pitfalls (extremely dodgy CGI, extraneous use of slo-mo and overly flashy editing, over-the-top acting). The cannibal angle isn’t so much a twist as an inevitability and this particular iteration of feral savages is much less interesting and singular than, say, the flesh-eaters of Doomsday, who at least had the foresight to barbecue their victims with an industrial size backyard grill. Here, we just get the typical filthy, snarling, rampaging cannibal Berserkers, albeit with the added lunacy of watching them run around in snow gear. If it sounds silly, it is but no more so than many films of its ilk.

For their part, the non-cannibal actors turn in fairly workmanlike performances, with both Fishburne and Paxton all but fading into the background. Paxton, in particular, seems to be moving on auto-pilot: I expected at least a little gonzo nuttiness but his performance was surprisingly subdued and more than a little grumpy. Zegers and Sullivan make a blandly attractive couple as Sam and Kai but there’s not much spark to their turn, while the rest of the colony passes in a blur of rather similar, generic characterizations.

In truth, there are only two ways that The Colony really distinguishes itself: the computer-designed backgrounds, prior to arriving at Colony 5, are astoundingly fake and the film is surprisingly violent and brutal, even for a post-apocalyptic fable about rampaging cannibals. The violence isn’t really an issue, since I doubt that any shrinking violets in the crowd are going to be drawn to a cannibal film, but it is certainly impressive: there’s one setpiece, involving cutting someone’s head in half, that’s gotta be one of the most bravura effects spectacles I’ve seen in a while. The excellent gore effects are made even more noticeable by contrast to the awful CGI, which seems to exist at a sub-mockbuster level. There’s never a point where the backgrounds look like anything less than a green screen: in one particularly egregious moment, the trio walk into the cheesiest CGI fog that has ever been committed to screen and I’ll go to my grave believing that. I can deal with dodgy SFX: growing up on Corman flicks has a tendency to lower one’s inherent expectations regarding B-movies. The CGI work in The Colony is so rudimentary, however, that it’s all but impossible to suspend disbelief anytime our intrepid group is outside (which is often enough to be a huge problem). Once we get to Colony 5, the film actually doesn’t look bad: close quarters seems to suit the filmmakers better than the wide-open, fake vistas of the surface world. The trip there, however, leaves a bit to be desired.

Ultimately, The Colony isn’t a bad film, although it is a cheesy, largely predictable one. While Fishburne and/or Paxton fans might be a little disappointed at the disposable performances here, fans of dystopic future, cannibal or “frozen world” scenarios might find at least a little something to sink their teeth into. Think of this as a poor man’s version of Snowpiercer (extremely poor, mind you), minus any of that film’s political or sociological significance: if that’s up your alley, pack your long johns and head for The Colony. Otherwise, you’d probably be better off just hibernating until spring.

12/17/14: The Bobcat Bigfoot Project

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Alexie Gilmore, auteur theory, believers vs non-believers, Bigfoot, Blair Witch, Bobcat Goldthwait, Bryce Johnson, Bucky Sinister, cinema, cryptids, cryptozoology, eccentric people, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, found-footage, found-footage films, God Bless America, horror, horror films, isolated communities, isolation, Laura Montagna, legend vs reality, legends, lost in the woods, Movies, Patterson-Gimlin film, Peter Jason, Sasquatch, The Blair Witch Project, Tom Yamarone, Willow Creek, writer-director

While The Blair Witch Project (1999) may not have been the very first found-footage film (we can argue about it later), it was certainly the film that brought the sub-genre to the attention of the general public and helped get it into the pop culture zeitgeist. It was also the film that helped establish the “rules” that would make found-footage such a popular, if restrictive, way to tell a story: hand-held camera, first-person POV, a lack of obvious action with an emphasis on atmosphere and mood, a focus on verisimilitude that includes mundane conversations and long “dry” stretches, small cast, isolated setting, dropping the camera at the conclusion…these were all presents that The Blair Witch Project pretty much brought to the party. Something obviously must have worked, since the film would go on to be one of the highest-grossing independent films of all time and would help to usher in a new era of lower-profile, word-of-mouth film festival hits, such as the similar Paranormal Activity (2007).

Despite its success and influence, however, The Blair Witch Project isn’t without its problems, some of which are more critical than others. For one thing, the acting tends to be rather rough and the characters are extremely unlikable: we basically get stranded with a bunch of amateur actors in the woods as the yell at each other for upwards of an hour. There’s also a decided lack of actual “action” in the film: the majority of the movie consists of the three actors tromping around the woods, arguing about being lost, before we get the decidedly iconic finale featuring the creepy abandoned house. There is plenty of great atmosphere here, don’t get me wrong, but The Blair Witch Project is pretty much the epitome of a film that hasn’t aged well: after screening it again, recently, I actually found it to be fairly tedious and way too obvious. There’s still a great core idea here, an interesting mythos and a nicely isolated setting but I can’t help but feel there was a much better, more interesting film here struggling (and failing) to get out.

Bobcat Goldthwait’s Willow Creek (2014) is that film. While the movie seems to be a conscious attempt to replicate some of the exact same beats from The Blair Witch Project – small cast searching for a local legend in the woods, meeting exceptionally eccentric locals, getting lost in the woods and coming face-to-face with the exact thing that they’re looking for but don’t, in the end, really want to find – Goldthwait does something rather revolutionary: he gives us characters we can actually care about rather than obnoxious “types” who ultimately serve only as cannon fodder. With this one simple step (along with a small host of refinements, tweaks and improvements), Goldthwait fixes many of the inherent issues with The Blair Witch Project and gives us a glimpse into what the film could have been. Willow Creek is not a perfect film, by any stretch of the imagination, but it is rock-solid, one of the “purest” found-footage films I’ve ever seen and, despite the near complete lack of on-screen chaos, a genuinely scary film.

Premise-wise, Willow Creek is simplicity, itself: Jim (Bryce Johnson), a Bigfoot enthusiast, is determined to follow in the footsteps of the famous Patterson-Gimlin Bigfoot film from 1967 (you’ll know it the second you see it, trust me) and he’s dragged his non-believer girlfriend, Kelly (Alexie Gilmore), along for the ride. He’s decided to turn their “adventure” into a lo-fi documentary with him serving as eager “host” and Kelly running the camcorder (in other words, the perfect found-footage set-up).

The pair head to Willow Creek, California, the small, Bigfoot-obsessed town that lies on the outskirts of the heavily wooded area where Patterson and Gimlin first caught sight of the famously hairy woodland creature. Once there, they poke around town, interviewing the locals (believers and non, alike) and gathering information for their inevitable trek to Bluff Creek, the actual location of the famous sighting. Willow Creek happens to be home to more than its fair share of mysterious disappearances, it seems, although the scuttlebutt seems to be divided as to how much ol’ Bigfoot is responsible for and how much is the work of the extremely uncompromising wilderness surrounding them (bears and mountain lions are common occurrences, after all).

While most of the locals are friendly, they also bump into a couple rather sinister ones (gotta have balance!), which has the effect of giving Kelly second thoughts about their trip: she might not believe in Bigfoot but she sure as hell believes in Deliverance (1972). She’s even more wary once they head into the woods and run into former Forest Ranger Troy Andrews (Peter Jason), who tells them a rather disturbing story about “something” that tore his beloved dog to pieces: she’d rather not meet whatever was responsible but Jim has Sasquatch-fever and won’t take no for an answer. From this point on, the progression of events should be pretty familiar: they wander around a bit, find various eerie hints of strange doings and end up spending a rather terrifying night in their tent, all leading to an explosive, highly disturbing ending that’s the very definition of “you should have left well-enough alone.”

And that’s pretty much it: 80 minutes, from beginning to end, no tricks, no frills, nothing but the goods. As I said, nothing here should really be new to anyone who’s seen The Blair Witch Project but the key here is all in the execution and attention to character development. Unlike the antagonistic, obnoxious characters from Blair Witch, Jim and Kelly come across as realistic, interesting, dynamic and highly likable: they may not be completely three-dimensional but they’re a helluva lot more developed than the paper-thin characters in Blair Witch. Little things are the key here: the way in which we subtly learn how obsessive Jim is, via the way he constantly re-records footage to get the absolute best take, even though he’s going for “realism” above all else…the way that Kelly can express extreme disapproval with only a slightly furrowed eyebrow while still smiling and toeing the “party line”…the quietly stunning moment, towards the end, where Jim apologizes for getting them into their current predicament…these are all the kinds of “actorly” moments and beats that were completely missing from Blair Witch. You know…all those things we normally associate with a “good” film?

Willow Creek is also a genuinely funny film, at times: the scenes where Jim and Kelly goof around in town are great and another crucial way in which Goldthwait keeps building our empathy for the characters. The bit where they riff on the ridiculous mural of Bigfoot that covers the entire outside of one building is an absolute classic bit of comedy: paced like a good stand-up routine, the minutes-long segment had me laughing so loud that I found myself needing to rewind in order to miss additional lines…that, my friends, is the very definition of a funny scene. Despite the inherent humor of the town scenes, however, it never feels as if Goldthwait is playing his subjects as idiots: it’s quite obvious that the scenes where they interview the various towns-folk are real, which adds quite a bit to the film’s overall tone (although this was also something that The Blair Witch Project used to fairly good effect). Perhaps it helps that Goldthwait is, apparently, a Bigfoot enthusiast: he has no interest in poking fun of these people since he, himself, is also a believer.

If you only know Bobcat Goldthwait as the Tazmanian Devil-voiced freak-show from the Police Academy films, you’ve managed to handily miss out on one of the best, most daring modern-day filmmakers around: while I’ve always been a bit hot-and-cold on his debut, the transgressive clown comedy Shakes the Clown (1991), World’s Greatest Dad (2009) is an absolutely perfect stunner and easily one of the best films of its year, if not several years in either direction. The follow-up, God Bless America (2011), was a more obvious, if no less well-made film, and showed that former Cadet Zed had somehow developed into a badass writer-director while no one was looking. While Willow Creek is, technically, Bobcat’s first genre film, it’s no less expertly crafted than the rest of his oeuvre, proving that the guy can pretty much do anything he sets his mind to.

Ultimately, however, a big question remains: Is Willow Creek just a style exercise, an attempt to improve on The Blair Witch Project while giving Goldthwait a chance to play around with Bigfoot mythology? While I think that’s definitely one of the factors behind the film, I certainly don’t think it’s the main one…or even the most important one, to be honest. More than anything, Willow Creek seems like an attempt by Goldthwait to weld the type of fully developed characters from his dramas/black-comedies onto a standard-issue found-footage template (short of the rather astonishing 20-odd minute single-take shot that he uses in the tent, there’s not a whole lot of particularly “innovative” filmmaking here, per se). It’s a film where so many of the truly important details happen in the margins: the chilling foreshadowing of the missing poster scene…the marriage proposal…Jim and Kelly’s arguments about moving to Los Angeles…the little asides and quips that crop up in the documentary parts…these are all genuinely human, dramatic moments and they help make the film seem much more fleshed-out and well-rounded than it might have been (and certainly much more than The Blair Witch Project, at any rate).

Is Willow Creek a good film? To be honest, it’s actually a very good film, even if it does manage to get tripped up by many of the same issues that helped fell Blair Witch: the overly shaky camera; bad sight lines; occasional dry stretches; the lack of any conventional “action” on-screen, save for the finale. Crucially, however, none of these issues are critical hits, which can’t necessarily be said for Blair Witch. While Willow Creek doesn’t necessarily reinvent the wheel, it manages to improve on its spiritual forebear in pretty much every way possible. When we actually care about the characters, their ultimate fates become that much more impactful: suffice to say, I found myself thinking about that finale quite a bit after the end credits rolled. As a huge fan of Goldthwait’s work ever since World’s Greatest Dad, there’s nothing about Willow Creek that really surprised me, for one very important reason: I already knew the guy was gonna knock it out of the park as soon as I saw his name attached. While Willow Creek may not be the best horror film of the year (there’s plenty of competition), it certainly deserves a place on the finalists’ list. Here’s to hoping ol’ Bobcat doesn’t lose his jones for the scary stuff anytime soon: with a calling card like Willow Creek, the sky, literally, is the limit.

10/26/14 (Part One): Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

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1st person POV, 31 Days of Halloween, art installations, cinema, eponymous characters, feature-film debut, film reviews, films, found-footage films, guardians, horror, horror films, isolated communities, isolation, Jon Foster, Karl Mueller, Lovecraftian, Mark Steger, Movies, Mr. Jones, mysterious artists, neighbors, Sarah Jones, surreal, totems, voice-over narration, writer-director

Every town has one: a reclusive, secretive outcast who resists all friendly advances from the neighboring townsfolk, preferring his/her own company to that of the outside world. They’re the kinds of people who “polite” folks whisper about behind their hands and children make up stories about. In most cases, these recluses are probably just people who want to be left alone to do their own thing, whatever that may be, and I can’t pretend not to see eye-to-eye with them. In rare cases, however, these societal outcasts aren’t just loners but…well, let’s just call them sequestered, shall we? Sometimes, circumstances make it necessary for certain folks to isolate themselves away from everyone else. These can be for mundane reasons, of course, or they can be for sinister reasons (the provenance of the horror film for too many years to count). Sometimes, however, these outcasts can be sequestered away from society for reasons beyond our grasp…reasons that might just melt our comfortably safe world into candle wax if we were ever to come face to face with them.

Writer-director Karl Mueller’s debut feature, Mr. Jones (2013), takes a close look at just such an individual, the eponymous Mr. Jones of the title. Using the currently ubiquitous indie horror trend of “found footage/first-person POV” films, Mueller has no shortage of fascinating ideas, occasionally even lurching into the all-engulfing cosmic horror of Lovecraft. For all of the positives here, however, Mr. Jones is an ultimately confusing, fractured film, one with an ending that’s so positively out-there that it feels as if there’s a missing reel somewhere. The film is rough going, at times, but there’s a genuine intelligence and desire for coloring outside the lines that makes it worth a watch, even if the end result is a bit disappointing.

Mr. Jones opens with one of those scenes that, for better or worse, will pretty much determine how an audience feels about the film: Scott (Jon Foster) holds a camcorder on Penny (Sarah Jones), his wife, as she drives their car to their new home out in the country. Right off the bat, we get one of the moldiest clichés in the found-footage rule-book (“Thou shalt always film the characters as they drive, for no apparent reason”) and I’ll be frank: my initial impression wasn’t exactly favorable. There’s a redundant voice-over, from the husband, that adds nothing to the narrative and plenty of nearly stock scenes of the couple discussing their, apparently, fractious relationship. So far, absolutely nothing that hasn’t been done to death by this point in the sub-genre.

Just when it seems as if we’re settling into another one of those “odd things happen to an unhappy couple” movies, however, Mueller and company inject a little life into the film. While out exploring their new environs, the couple happen upon another house, an isolated, out-of-the-way little place that seems to be the opposite of “welcoming.” Scott’s a wannabe documentarian which, in this case, means that he’s a busy-body, so he eagerly lets himself into the strange house for a little exploration, even though the place is obviously occupied and the furthest thing from abandoned. Penny, the voice of reason, thinks this is the furthest thing from a good idea until she gets a gander of the bizarre, amazing sculptures in the basement. At that point, she looks like a kid who just got Willie Wonka’s golden ticket. What gives?

Turns out that Penny recognizes some of the sculptures as belonging to the ultra-reclusive artist Mr. Jones, a mysterious figure that she describes as “like Banksy and J.D. Salinger.” Just then, the home-owner returns and the pair narrowly make it out after Penny creates a diversion. Despite their near brush with breaking-and-entering charges, however, Penny is completely hooked: she now wants to make a documentary about the most obvious subject of all: their world-famous, reclusive, mysterious next-door neighbor.

At this point, we get some standard “talking head” interviews with “experts,” who describe Mr. Jones’ decidedly strange M.O.: the artist mails his artwork to random, unsuspecting people around the world, people who then begin to experience drastic changes in personal luck, as it were. There are only nine verified Jones pieces in the whole world: any new work would be worth more than seven figures, or so we’re told. The allure, then, is obvious: we’re always fascinated by what we don’t understand, even more so when it involves giving away priceless possessions to complete strangers.

As Penny and Scott continue to poke around, however, they begin to uncover evidence that Mr. Jones might be more than just an outsider art hero: he may actually be involved in some sort of arcane, supernatural ritual that involves his sculptures, pieces which may or may not function as some sort of totems. The truth of the matter is actually more bizarre than even the couple can imagine, however, and leads to a chaotic, genuinely odd climax that drives home that most basic of truisms: good fences do, indeed, make good neighbors.

From a story/idea standpoint, Mr. Jones is rock-solid: Mueller manages to nail a Lovecraft vibe, particularly in the info dump scenes, that promises huge revelations and soul-shattering terror. The sculptures, themselves, are properly unearthly and, in some cases, flat-out badass: the “scarecrow,” in particular, is a real marvel and the kind of iconic image that most genre filmmakers would kill for.

On the other hand, however, the film is actually kind of a mess. The found-footage aspects are pretty tired and old-hat, especially when played as straight as they are here: there are so many “Blair Witch”-type “selfie” shots that it felt as if the filmmakers had just watched the film and were determined to craft their own version of events. Neither of the leads have much personality or individuality, although neither are obnoxious, for that matter: like much of the film, they’re just kind of there to help advance the storyline. The film’s climax, in particular, is massively confusing and seems to come from out of nowhere: it’s a real head-scratcher that’s definitely thought-provoking, albeit for the wrong reasons. I’m pretty sure I know what’s going on but not completely sure: normally, that feeling would delight me, since it would indicate something outside the box. In this case, however, it’s more of a shrug and accept kind of thing: again, probably not what the filmmakers were shooting for.

Despite the fundamental problems with the movie, there was still a solid underlying idea that was fascinating and certainly worthy of exploration, even if the final result was decidedly hum-drum. While this was Mueller’s first directorial effort, he previously wrote the screenplay to French extreme-horror guru Xavier Gen’s mean-spirited The Divide (2011), which indicates someone who slowly climbing the indie-horror strata. In time, I’m confident that Mueller will have something under his belt that’s at least as explosive as Gens’ unforgettable Frontier(s) (2007). Mr. Jones isn’t that film, not by a long shot, but it’s not a bad way to begin the journey, either.

 

10/21/14 (Part Two): Diggin’ in the Muck

Tags

31 Days of Halloween, Alex Chandon, backwoods folk, black comedies, British films, Chris Waller, cinema, city vs country, co-writers, Damien Lloyd-Davies, Deliverance, Derek Melling, Dominic Brunt, dysfunctional family, film reviews, films, gallows' humor, George Newton, horror, horror films, horror-comedies, Inbred, isolated communities, James Burrows, James Doherty, Jo Hartley, Movies, Nadine Mulkerrin, Neil Leiper, Paul Shrimpton, Peter Jackson, politically-incorrect humor, pubs, Seamus O'Neill, set in England, Terry Haywood, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, UK films, writer-director, youth group, youth in trouble

As a lifelong movie lover, I’ve seen plenty of films over the years that would seem to have universal appeal to just about anyone: I can’t, for example, understand how anyone wouldn’t love The Godfather (1972), 2001 (1968) or The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (1966)…the thought pretty much boggles my mind. As a horror fanatic, I’ve also seen plenty of films that would seem to be perfect for horror fans, even if more “discerning” film-goers might turn their noses (or stomachs) up at the fare: Dawn of the Dead (1978), The Descent (2005), Halloween (1978) and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) should be part of any horror fan’s DNA, as far as I’m concerned, along with a host of others.

Sometimes, as I said, a film just seems to have universal appeal. On the other hand, there are those films that will really only ever appeal to a select group of folks: films that are too “out there,” violent, offensive or transgressive for the masses to ever fully digest. In some cases, these films can appeal to particularly narrow, niche markets: extreme torture films, mumble-core, splatter-core, art films, etc… Sometimes, however, a film just seems to want to push as many buttons as possible, using a scattergun approach to raising eyebrows: Peter Jackson’s ludicrously offensive Meet the Feebles (1989) is one such epic, as is Lucky McKee’s towering ode to the evils of misogyny, The Woman (2011). To this select group of offensive films, feel free to add Alex Chandon’s ugly-as-sin Inbred (2011), a film that promises to do for the backwoods of Great Britain the same thing that Deliverance (1972) did for the Ozarks. In case the name didn’t tip you off, Inbred knows no sacred cows: suffice to say, this is one film that absolutely will not appeal to everyone.

At the start, Inbred is framed as one of those films where well-meaning youth counselors take a group of troubled teens into the woods and try to get them to see the error of their ways. In this case, are troubled youth are motor-mouthed, shithead Dwight (Chris Waller), shy firebug Tim (James Burrows), jovial prankster Zeb (Terry Haywood) and token girl Sam (Nadine Mulkerrin). The well-meaning counselors take the form of stick-in-the-mud Jeff (James Doherty) and laid-back Kate (Jo Hartley), who sees compassion and friendship as the key to reaching the wayward kids.

The group ends up staying at some sort of (seemingly) abandoned structure and set about fixing the place up for their stay. As a reward for their hard work, Kate convinces Jeff to take them all into the nearby town so that they can visit the pub. As soon as the city-folk step into the dark environs of the pub, however, they realize just how out-of-place they are: not only do every one of the (decidedly) scuzzy patrons give them the stink eye, upon their entrance, but many of the drinkers appear to share pretty similar facial features…there are isolated, backwoods towns…and then, there’s this place. The barkeep, Jeff (Seamus O’Neill), seems normal and is very friendly, yet he acts strange when he finds out the group is staying at the dilapidated Ravenwood estate. As Jeff points out, the people in the town are all very friendly and nice…provided that you leave them alone and don’t bother them in the slightest, that is.

The trouble is, of course, that the group are true fish-out-of-water and have no idea about the locals very strange customs: as luck would have it, they end up disturbing a strange ritual that seems to involve burning animals and appear to incur the wrath of the locals. At this point, Jim’s formerly genial personality changes into something approaching terrifying insanity and the film becomes a siege picture, as the kids and their adult guardians do everything they can to stay alive. As the group will find out, however, there are much worse things than a quick death, especially when there’s a town full of inbred yokels to entertain. While the others make a desperate stand, Jim and his vicious son, Gris (Neil Leiper), prepare for one helluva performance, a show that will feature their new “guests” as star attractions.

We’ll just get this out of the way right off the bat: Inbred is an extremely unpleasant, graphic and all-around nasty piece of work. The townspeople, to a tee, are a filthy, strange and nearly animalistic lot and Jim is a truly terrifying figure of awe-inspiring bat-shittery: he spends most of the film parading around in blackface (the entire town is casually racist, as if it were the most natural thing in the world) and looks truly demonic by the finale, as his makeup runs in black streaks down his face. The “performances” are truly disturbing displays of inventive torture and, in at least one instance, are almost impossible to look at: I very rarely look away during horror films (this ain’t snuff, after all) but I was genuinely revolted by one particular scene and had very little interest in seeing it play to its logical conclusion. The violence and gore is sudden, extreme and very well-done: there are no punches pulled, especially during the climax, and there’s a visceral intensity to everything that makes it all seem that much more vivid.

But here’s the thing: Inbred works. It actually works spectacularly well, to be honest, finding a perfect synthesis between the humor and horror elements. The atmosphere in the film is thick and claustrophobic, making good use of some truly gorgeous cinematography, particularly during the film’s many wide shots of the beautiful countryside. The script is a good one, if very strange, with no concessions towards mass consumption whatsoever. Once the film switches from “creepy, sinister locals” to “full-on insane, blood-thirsty mob of locals,” the film ratchets the intensity up and never lets go.

Even better, however, is the fact that the filmmakers never take the obvious approach to anything: time and time again, hoary old genre clichés will pop up only to be bent, folded and manipulated into entirely new forms. One of my favorite moments in the movie comes when one character’s moment of triumph (so cliché but so prevalent in similar films) is completely deflated, turning him from kickass distributor of death to sitting duck in no time flat. Another brilliant, if thoroughly unpleasant, scene comes when Jim and some of the locals wager on one of the outsiders making it safely through a booby-trapped field: when the victim winds up caught in a trap, Jim has one of his guys go free her, so that they can continue their bet. It’s a nasty bit of work but it’s also a genius bit of characterization and makes Jim all that more memorable.

And memorable he is: Jim and his perverted ringmaster outfit has to be one of the most indelible images I’ve seen in some time. O’Neill is masterful as the friendly sociopath: he gets plenty of great speeches and is always a complex character, despite his obvious insanity. The kids are pretty generic, to be honest, but that’s also pretty expected in films like this. I did think there was some really nice work being done by Doherty and Hartley as the supposed authority figures: Hartley turns into a fairly effective hero, while Doherty gets some nicely emotional beats and has the benefit of perishing in one of the most genuinely surprising jump scares I’ve ever seen.

Ultimately, however, individual mileage with Inbred will vary: if you tend to be a sensitive viewer, this is absolutely not the film for you. Whether it’s a rampaging yokel with a hairlip and a chainsaw, torture involving vegetables jammed up noses or a literal shit explosion, Inbred has a real way of upping the ante and keeping it there. I feel fairly safe in stating that there should be something here to offend just about everyone. In a way, however, this becomes one of the film’s greatest strengths: it’s exceptionally well-made and acted but it’s also completely fearless, which is an intoxicating trait for a horror film to possess. In an era where many horror films have begun to seem too similar and too safe, Inbred is that rare beast: a truly transgressive, nasty, mean-spirited film with a coal-black heart and no desire to coddle viewers. I’m not ashamed to say that I had a blast with Inbred, even if I’m not eager to revisit it any time soon. Here’s to hoping that Chandon and company have another nasty little treat like this up their sleeves: sometimes, you just gotta walk on the wild side.

 

10/7/14 (Part Two): No Laughing Matter

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'70s films, 31 Days of Halloween, actor-director, Andrew Prine, based on a true story, Ben Johnson, Captain J.D. Morales, Charles B. Pierce, cinema, Dawn Wells, deadly trombones, Deputy Sheriff Norman Ramsey, film reviews, films, Friday the 13th Part 2, hooded killer, horror, horror films, influential films, isolated communities, Jim Citty, Jimmy Clem, Lovers' Lane, Movies, period-piece, Robert Aquino, serial killer, set in the 1940s, slasher films, small town life, Texarkana, Texas Ranger, the Phantom Killer, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Town That Dreaded Sundown, Town That Dreaded Sundown, true crime

Falling chronologically between The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and Halloween (1978), Charles B. Pierce’s The Town That Dreaded Sundown (1976) is something of a proto-slasher: it uses many of the tropes of slasher films (masked maniac, creative kill scenes, stalking scenarios) but welds them to a more traditional true-crime format. The finished product ends up being a little like a pseudo-documentary, complete with voice-over narrator, but maintains enough horror film qualities to appeal to fans. By comparing the look of the Phantom Killer from The Town That Dreaded Sundown with Jason’s first appearance, Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981), it’s also plain to see how influential the film would be on the genre movies that would follow. Although Pierce’s film would, ultimately, be less influential than either of the landmarks that surrounded it, it’s still a fairly well-made, tense little picture that’s wholly deserving of a resurgence among modern audiences. With a new remake set to open next week, it appears that horror audiences may finally be ready to focus on Texarkana and its mysterious, hooded madman once again.

Based on a true story, The Town That Dreaded Sundown takes place over several months in 1946 and deals with the activities of a serial killer in Texarkana, Arkansas. Beginning with young couples on Lovers’ Lane, the hooded killer would graduate to attacking people in the safety of their own homes before seeming to vanish into thin air. As the attacks increase in sheer viciousness, the citizens of the 40K-strong town begin to hide in their homes, avoiding the nighttime hours like the plague. At first, Deputy Sheriff Norman Ramsey (Andrew Prine) does the best he can to catch the elusive maniac but he’s soon forced to hand the case over to a living legend: Captain J.D. Morales (Ben Johnson), widely renowned as the greatest Texas Ranger to walk the earth. Together, Ramsey and Morales try to run to ground a sinister, vicious killer who seems to appear out of nowhere and vanish just as quickly. As the body count rises, the town of Texarkana is left to wonder if they’ll ever know peace and safety again.

In many ways, The Town That Dreaded Sundown is a tale of two films (three, actually, but we’ll get to that shortly): a true-crime investigation and a serial killer/slasher film. While the true-crime stuff is interesting, if a little old-fashioned, the serial killer/slasher element is particularly well-done. From his very first attack, where the killer disables a couple’s car while they sit there in stunned fear, to the climatic scene where Ramsey and Morales chase him by the railroad tracks, the Phantom Killer (Bud Davis) is one helluva great bad guy. While his initial attacks involve firearms, the killer really gets creative when he ties a knife to the end of a trombone and proceeds to “play” the instrument, repeatedly jabbing the knife into his victim’s back: it’s a nasty, thoroughly gratuitous scene but it’s also pretty genius and well-staged, inexplicably reminding of the similar method of murder in Michael Powell’s legendary Peeping Tom (1960). Like the best horror/slasher villains, the Phantom Killer is a mute, absolutely menacing presence: it’s pretty easy to take one look at the character and see the direct line of inspiration to the appearance of Jason Voorhees in the second Friday the 13th film, although elements of the Phantom Killer’s appearance and behavior can be found in at least a bakers’ dozen other horror films.

On the “good guy” side, Andrew Prine does a great job as the hard-charging Deputy, although I must admit to being slightly underwhelmed by Johnson’s characteristically gruff performance: there isn’t much shade or nuance to Captain Morales, although not being familiar with the actual person probably makes the case a little moot…after all, it’s quite possible that Morales was exactly as Johnson portrayed him. Nonetheless, I found myself gravitating towards Prine much more than I did to Johnson’s throwback “old school lawman.” The rest of the cast is decent, if a bit anonymous, although many of the supporting roles have a decidedly amateurish tinge to them that pretty synonymous with low-budget films of that era.

The single biggest problem with the film, minor quibbles aside, comes from any of the scenes involving director Charles B. Pierce, who plays police office A.C. Benson. While it’s always a bit problematic having the director pop up in his own film (actors directing themselves, ala Eastwood, Gibson or the like, are entirely different scenarios), it’s made even worse when the character is obnoxious and unnecessary. In a nutshell, the character of Benson exists solely to provide the comic relief that the film so desperately does not need: any scene featuring Pierce is pitched at absolutely screwball levels and sits at odds with anything else in the movie. Without the Benson/Pierce scenes, The Town That Dreaded Sundown plays as an effective, straight-faced thriller. With the scenes, however, the film often takes on the quality of a farce, which has the unintended effect of making the rest of the material seem slight and silly. In a way, it’s similar to the big complaint I have from the original version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956): the cheesy wraparound storyline, added later, severely dilutes the impact of the rest of the film. Similarly, the goofy comedy scenes not only don’t add anything to the film, they actually take away much of the film’s sustained mood and impact, at the very least scuttling any of the serious scenes that directly lead-in to or follow the Benson scenes. In the case of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, at least we can blame the studio for unnecessarily interfering: the tampering in Pierce’s film appears to be solely his fault. Regardless of the ultimate reason behind it, Pierce’s performance as Benson ends up being the film’s biggest problem and serves as a pretty substantial black eye.

It’s a shame, too, because the film that surrounds the absurd comic scenes is actually quite good, if somewhat less than relevatory. The setting and mood are strong, for the most part, the action is tense, the killer is frightening and the setpieces are well-staged. While I’m not normally a fan of remakes, finding them to be largely unnecessary, I can’t help but feel that the upcoming remake of Pierce’s film might not be such a bad idea. There’s a really intriguing, frightening idea to be found here: a film that focuses solely on the darker aspects and jettisons the buffoonish comic relief certainly stands a chance of being successful…tonal consistency would, at the very least, be a significant improvement over the original. If you can look past the film’s poorly executed attempts at levity, however, much of it possesses a raw, feral power that should certainly appeal to fans of “classic” slasher” films, as well as true-crime buffs. If only Pierce could have stayed behind the camera, this might have ended up as an unmitigated classic instead of a near miss: nonetheless, this is one film that you definitely shouldn’t dread.

9/21/14: Father Doesn’t Know Best

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AJ Bowen, Amy Seimetz, auteur theory, based on a true story, Charles Anderson Reed, cinema, cults, Donna Biscoe, Eden Parish, estranged siblings, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, found-footage, Gene Jones, House of the Devil, isolated communities, Jim Jones, Joe Swanberg, Jonestown Massacre, Kate Lyn Sheil, Kentucker Audley, mass suicide, mockumentary, Movies, murdered children, Safe Haven, Talia Dobbins, The House of the Devil, The Innkeepers, The Sacrament, Ti West, Timo Tjahjanto, VICE, writer-director

Sometimes, all of the elements can be there for a roaring blaze but all you get is a little spark and some smoke. Although I went into writer/director Ti West’s newest film, The Sacrament (2013), with high hopes and a head full of overwhelmingly positive critical reviews, I’m rather disappointed to admit that this appears to be yet another underwhelming showing from the modern-day horror auteur. Although I really enjoyed West’s sophomore effort, The House of the Devil (2009), I must admit that I’ve been hard-pressed to really like the rest of his output: The Roost (2005) felt half-baked and slight, The Innkeepers (2011) squandered some nicely built atmosphere with a lazy, perfunctory climax and his entry for The ABCs of Death (2012) managed to be equal parts lazy, stupid and sloppy. My main issue with West remains the same: his films tend to look good but are as empty and slight as cereal commercials. While I’d love to say that West’s take on the infamous Jonestown Massacre is a grand slam, the film is actually closer to an entire nine innings composed of walks and bunts.

For a time, The Sacrament manages to hold, build and maintain a reasonable amount of interest and tension. Our trio of protagonists, Sam (AJ Bowen), Patrick (Kentucker Audley) and Jake (indie writer/director Joe Swanberg) are all employed by modern alternative-media outlet VICE, perhaps most familiar to casual fans as the organization that immerses itself in various “outsider” enterprises like street gangs, drug dealers and, apparently, religious cults. This “immersionism,” as the film calls it, results in a neutral, no-judgement take on various societal elements that usually spawn pretty intense reactions one way or the other. Most importantly for the context of the film, VICE is a real organization and their inclusion in the film helps to heighten the realism of the found-footage aspect, as well as blurring the lines between the reality of the situation and the highly fictional nature of filmmaking. This ends up being the film’s biggest hat trick and, for a while, was almost enough to keep this viewer’s attention…almost.

The plot is almost simplicity, itself: Patrick’s drug-addled, estranged sister Caroline (Amy Seimetz) has just sent him a letter explaining that she got clean, moved out of the country and hooked up with a religious cult. Patrick plans to head to the tropical commune and check out the situation: when his boss, Sam, convinces Patrick to take him and cameraman Jake along for the ride, we get yahtzee. Once there, the trio notices that there seem to be quite a few more armed soldiers hanging around than seems necessary for a supposedly peaceful commune: the place looks more like a ramshackle army encampment. The followers all seem nice and friendly, however, especially the former gutter-trawling Caroline. Although our friendly heroes are a little wary, nothing seems particularly out of the ordinary…at least nothing that they can put their fingers on.

In time, Sam gets his wish and is allowed to interview the cult’s charismatic leader, Charles Anderson Reed (Gene Jones), otherwise known as “the Father.” Reed makes his initial appearance dressed in an all-white suit, wearing sunglasses, entering to rapturous applause: he’s like an older, pudgy, nerdier version of Bono. He also seems a bit cuckoo, although his initial paranoia and dislike of American policies doesn’t necessarily set-off warning bells among the counter-culture journalists. When a young girl (Talia Dobbins) slips Sam a note that says, “Please help us,” however, the group begins to realize that there’s something more sinister going on here. As their departure time approaches, unease and turmoil seems to be spreading through the camp: something’s brewing and it’s making Sam, Jake and Patrick more than a little nervous. When “paradise on earth” suddenly becomes “Hell,” however, the journalists find themselves trapped in a living nightmare and realize the terrible truth: when you immerse yourself too completely in darkness, you tend to disappear.

For most of its running time, The Sacrament is a fully competent and well-made film: the cinematography is frequently lovely, the acting is decent and the locations are certainly interesting. The main problem, unfortunately, is the overwhelming sense of “been there, done that.” Perhaps this is due to the fact that Ti West has modeled his film pretty much part and parcel on the real-life Jonestown Massacre: in many ways, Charles Anderson Reed is just a slightly fictionalized version of Jim Jones, right down to the way he dresses. The problem with this becomes a similar problem with any film based on true events: when you know how everything will play out and end, there needs to be other elements to hold viewer interest. Although James Cameron’s Titanic (1997) is a rather dubious example (I’ve never actually sat down to watch the film, so my knowledge of it is strictly anecdotal), there does appear to be one main difference between the two films: Cameron’s film used the sinking of the Titanic as the background for a love story, whereas West seems content to simply rehash the basic beats of the original story.

We get very little in-depth analysis on the cult or its members and none of the main characters are ever fleshed-out beyond a few basic brushstrokes: Sam and his wife are expecting their first baby, Patrick is worried about his ex-junkie sister, yadda yadda yadda. With no particularly interesting characters to focus on, our primary focus becomes the story, itself. The problem with this, of course, is that most of us already know how this particular story ends. I could certainly see how someone who’s unfamiliar with the original Jonestown Massacre might be shocked and horrified by what’s on display here but the reality was much, much worse: West’s depiction ends up being a pale imitation of real events.

This notion of “same old, same old” is compounded by the fact that horror fans have already seen this particular idea done much better previously: Timo Tjahjanto’s entry in V/H/S 2 (2013), Safe Haven, was a similar “journalists go hang out with a doomsday cult” scenario but managed to be endlessly inventive, eye-popping and a ludicrous amount of fun. The Sacrament is too serious and po-faced to be that entertaining, unfortunately, seeming to strain for a relevance that it just doesn’t fully earn.

For all of my disappointment in the film, I still can’t deny that West is a talented filmmaker: the film is filled with highly effective, evocative scenes (the “interview” scene between Sam and The Father is especially atmospheric and well-done) and the mass suicide scenes definitely have a raw power to them. There’s something especially dreadful about watching the helpers mix up the poisoned Kool-aid and serve it to the unsuspecting children as their tearful, resigned parents look on. The violence and gore effects are well-done, helping to ramp up the inherent realism of the piece. On the acting side, AJ Bowen does a typically rock-solid job as the pushy editor, while Gene Jones makes a highly effective cult leader: there’s something about his soft, doughy expressions and wheedling voice that are both strangely soothing and unsettling.

Ultimately, however, The Sacrament is what it is: an extremely faithful retelling of the Jonestown Massacre that features no real surprises and seems to add nothing to discussion of the original incident. While there’s not much technically wrong with the film, there’s also no spark, no real sense of invention or purpose. In a genre that thrives on strong audience reactions to films, whether positive or negative, The Sacrament received the worst possible reaction from me: I shrugged. So middle-of-the-road as to be nearly faceless, Ti West’s newest is another case of “close but no cigar.” I’ll keep watching his films but, at this point, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to muster up much more emotion than faint interest.

7/19/14 (Part One): Memory is a Burden

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auteur theory, based on a play, Best of 2013, Byzantium, Caleb Landry Jones, cinema, Daniel Mays, drama, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, flashbacks, Gemma Arterton, horror films, Interview With the Vampire, isolated communities, Javier Navarrete, Jonny Lee Miller, Let the Right One In, misogyny, Moira Buffini, mother-daughter relationships, Movies, Neil Jordan, patriarchy, rape, romances, Sam Riley, Saoirse Ronan, seaside resorts, the Brotherhood, The Crying Game, vampire code, vampires, vampires vs humans

If you think about it, actually being a vampire would be kind of a drag. You get to live forever but all of your friends and loved ones will be long dead, at some point, leaving you all alone (unless they’re also vampires, in which case, party on, Wayne!). You get to stay the same age forever, which would probably be okay if you were between 20-50 but would, presumably, suck if you were either a pre-teen or in your nineties. You’re pretty much constantly on the run, since normal folks probably don’t dig getting their blood drained as much as vamps dig draining it. There are also all of those codes of conduct to get through: like any secret society, there are leaders and followers…imagine keeping a middle-management job for thousands of years and then come complain about your 9-5 job. You’re also going to wind up old-fashioned and out-of-date, at some point: if you were cutting-edge in the 1700s, you’re gonna be a little passe in the 2010s. And, of course, there’s the whole “daylight turns you into ashes” thing: forget about those sunny afternoon picnics!

While these issues with vampirism have, presumably, existed since the very advent of the idea, too few films actually deal with this on any significant level: for the most part, vampires are either seen as blood-thirsty monsters or as tragic, romantic, Byronic figures. Leave it to acclaimed writer/director Neil Jordan, then, to help rectify the situation a little. Fans of vampire cinema will probably recall that Jordan was responsible for one of the more elegant, esteemed vampire films of the ’90s, Interview With the Vampire (1994), which briefly touched on the huge gap between those who embrace vampirism and those who are afflicted with it. After almost 20 years away from the fanged ones, Jordan has returned with another vampire adaptation, Byzantium (2012), based on Moira Buffini’s stage play “A Vampire Story.” While Interview was a lush, big-budget and star-packed “event picture,” Byzantium ends up being a much more elegiac, low-key and subtle, if no less beautiful, film. It’s a world of difference from Interview but, ultimately, I another masterpiece for the Irish auteur.

Byzantium deals with the life and times of young Eleanor (Saoirse Ronan) and her mother, Clara (Gemma Arterton), who seems to be no more than a decade older than her daughter. As it turns out, both young women are actually centuries-old vampires, on the run from the patriarchal vampire Brotherhood and keeping as low a profile as they can in the modern era. This, of course, means a life spent as refugees, never getting too comfortable in any one spot, lest they blow their cover or run afoul of the omnipresent Brotherhood. Clara exists in the same manner that she did before being “turned,” which means she sells her body and exists on the blood from her unsuspecting “clients.” Eleanor, on the other hand, tries to exist in much the same way as any teenager might: she takes classes, strikes up friendships with young men and tries to stay on the good side of her temperamental mother.

Fortune seems to smile on the pair when they end up back at the small, sea-side village where Eleanor spent her pre-vampire days in an orphanage. While at her “day job,” Clara makes quite an impression on a lonely sad-sack of a guy, Noel (Daniel Mays), who invites Clara and Eleanor to come stay with him at the sprawling, dilapidated resort hotel known as Byzantium. Eleanor, for her part, strikes up a friendship with a pale, wan young wine-bar waiter named Frank (Caleb Landry Jones). As mother and daughter each pursue their relationships, for very different reasons, it seems as if the nomadic pair will finally be able to find some semblance of normalcy in their ageless lives. This, of course, is not to be: when Clara’s violent past comes crashing into their present, she must do everything she can to protect her and her daughter from the predatory, misogynistic Brotherhood. Will mother and daughter find “true love” or is the real onus of vampirism the eternal loneliness and isolation that these creatures must endure?

In many ways, Byzantium is a spiritual cousin to Tomas Alfredson’s exquisite Let the Right One In (2008), a compelling, beautiful and almost crushingly sad rumination on love, duty and the burdens of eternal life. The film looks and sounds absolutely gorgeous: the cinematography, courtesy of esteemed veteran Sean Bobbitt (Hunger (2008), Shame (2011), 12 Years a Slave (2013)), is consistently elegant, vibrant and immaculately composed, while the score, by frequent del Toro composer Javier Navarrete, is instrumental in establishing the mournful, elegiac tone.

Without some serious substance to back it up, however, Byzantium would still only be a beautiful, if empty, confection. Lucky for us, then, that the film ends up being another of Jordan’s jam-packed mini-epics. Truth be told, there’s so much going on in the film that it actually felt way too short at two hours: there are numerous elements, such as the extraordinarily detailed vampire backstory, that get something of short shrift in the film but that’s quite a nice problem to have…after all, how often do you walk out of a film wishing there were more rather than less? Byzantium features some very interesting notions on vampirism, not the least of which is the rather amazing manner in which vampires are “created.” While I’m loathe to spoil any viewer’s first introduction to the “turning,” suffice to say that it involves a supremely creepy shrine on a tiny, isolated island, blood-red waterfalls, bats and doppelgängers: it has to be one of the most unusual vampire origin stories I’ve ever seen and is so visually stunning that I found myself replaying the scenes multiple times. I don’t often have the tendency to “geek out” while watching films but Byzantium makes it patently impossible to not become fully invested in every aspect of the production, be it visually, thematically, or acting-wise.

Thematically, Byzantium deals with some pretty heavy subjects: the power struggle between men and women in a patriarchal society; the burden of revenge vs the higher calling of forgiveness; mother/daughter relationships; euthanasia of the elderly; the notion of women as “creators” vs men as “destroyers;” the impossible myth of true love; the way in which the time constantly informs the present; the intriguing idea of vampirism as cure for earthly illnessess…that’s quite a lot to digest in a mere two hours, especially when Jordan takes the time to develop each angle in as much detail as possible. In particular, I found myself utterly captivated by the power struggle between Clara, Darvell (Sam Riley) and Captain Ruthven (Jonny Lee Miller). Ironically enough, Clara main sin, as far as the Brotherhood is concerned, is the fact that she turned Eleanor into a vampire: women are not allowed to “create,” in the Brotherhood…only males are allowed this particular “honor.” Contrast this with the biological reality of women as the true “creators of life” and you get just a small taste of what the film is cooking up.

None of this would have the same impact, of course, if we didn’t become so invested in the characters. Luckily for Byzantium, the film is graced with a pretty exceptional cast. Ronan and Arterton are exquisite as the mother/daughter pair: Ronan’s ethereal beauty is so otherworldly that it’s pretty easy to buy her as an ageless, tormented creature, while Arterton makes Clara a completely three-dimensional character. Clara is not always the traditional “hero”: truth be told, she can frequently be an impossibly selfish, brutal, emotionless monster but she never stops being Eleanor’s mother, which gives the proceedings a rare poignancy. Jonny Lee Miller portrays the unbelievably slimy Capt. Ruthven as a bigger monster than any bloodsucker and Riley brings a quiet sense of elegance to the role of Darvell that’s as close to Byronic as the film really gets. These are not romantic characters, certainly nowhere close to the vampires in Interview, and the top-notch acting helps to sell this unconditionally.

Truth be told, Byzantium is an amazing film, the kind of beautifully made, deep experience that marks the very best cinematic experiences. There are very few filmmakers that combine languid beauty and gut-churning violence in the same way that Jordan does and Byzantium must certainly stand as a high-water mark in either instance: when the film is beautiful, it’s absolutely stunning (there are probably 300 or more “frameable”shots in the film) and when it’s brutal (beheadings are a pretty common occurrence), it absolutely kicks like a mule. Jordan knows that life is equal parts beauty and filth, however: this wouldn’t be nearly as honest without both.

As far as I’m concerned, Neil Jordan already had the kind of back-catalog that most filmmakers would give their right arm for: from The Company of Wolves (1984), Mona Lisa (1986), The Crying Game (1992), Interview with the Vampire (1996) and The Butcher Boy (1997) to Byzantium, Jordan has made a career out of elegant, difficult films. When his films have managed to break through and wedge themselves into the popular zeitgeist, as The Crying Game and Interview did, Jordan has proven that he can be just as indelible a force as Coppola, Scorsese or Spielberg. With Byzantium, Jordan may just have crafted his most exquisite film yet, which is no faint praise for such an artisan. It may have taken him a while to return to horror filmmaking but let’s hope that we don’t have to wait 20 years for the next one. Byzantium is the real deal and any fan or student of cinema, regardless of their interest in vampires, would do well to see this as soon as possible.

6/1/14 (Part Two): Friends, Zombies, Fellow Men in the Country…

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actor-director, actor-writer, B-movies, backwoods folk, Billy Ray, Buck WIld, chupacabra, cinema, co-writers, Dru Lockwood, dude ranch, dumb films, Edgar Wright, film reviews, films, guys' weekend, horror, horror films, horror movies, horror-comedies, hunting, Isaac Harrison, isolated communities, Jerrod Pistilli, Joe Stevens, Mark Ford, Matthew Albrecht, Meg Cionni, Movies, rednecks, Shaun of the Dead, Tom and Jerry, Tyler Glodt, white trash, writer-director, zombie films, zombie movies, zombies

By this point in world history, plain ol’ “vanilla” zombie films don’t really have much effect anymore. Sure, they may be one of the easiest low-budget productions for fledgling filmmakers to get involved in (Got some friends, a camera and a location? Guess what, Jack: you just got yourself the beginnings of a zombie film!) but that also means that we’ve been drowning in this kind of direct-to-video filler for a good thirty years, at this point. Once the “prosumer” camera revolution occurred, it was even easier for filmmakers to pump out this kind of product and it seems that zombie films have been multiplying like Tribbles within the last decade or so. In order to inject a bit of life into the subgenre, filmmakers have turned to various ways to “spruce” up the ol’ gut-munchers, the most popular of which involves slamming comedy and the zombie film together, chocolate and peanut butter-style, to create an entirely new (well, kind of new) sub-subgenre: the zom-com.

While Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead (2004) definitely wasn’t the first zom-com (I’d give that title to Dan O’Bannon’s outrageous 1985 yuk/yuck-fest The Return of the Living Dead), it’s probably (still) the most popular one, as well as the first to take the “zom-com” tag and run with it. In the decade since Simon Pegg and the lads tried to forestall a zombie invasion of the UK, there have been several fistfuls of zom-coms, ranging in quality from “drop-dead hilarious” to “just drop dead, already.” In a fairly glutted field, I’m managed to see several worthy successors to Shaun of the Dead: Fido (2006) was an ingenious melding of zom-coms with candy-colored 1950’s nostalgia, while Cockneys vs Zombies (2012) managed to overcome a terribly generic title with solidly-paced jokes and thrills. And, of course, who could forget Woody Harrelson and Jesse Eisenberg trading quips in Zombieland (2009)? Mixing zombie chills with chuckles isn’t the easiest task but, when done well, the results can be lots of fun. Unfortunately, Buck Wild (2013), the newest feature from the team of Tyler Glodt and Matthew Albrecht, isn’t so much a “big, dumb blast” as a “really dumb film,” only slightly less stupid than the head-smackingly awful ’80s Troma film Redneck Zombies (1989).

Buck Wild starts promisingly, if crudely, with a fairly funny segment involving beleaguered father Clyde (Joe Stevens), his perpetually horny daughter, Candy (Meg Cionni) and her stupid boyfriend. After decking the boyfriend with a wrench (humping his daughter in the garden is one thing, stepping all over the flowers is a whole other bucket of manure), Clyde ends up getting attacked by a chupacabra. Yes, a chucacabra, ladies and gentlemen. We that, we seem to be off to the races, establishing a crude, fun and extremely tongue-in-cheek attitude.

Unfortunately, the good will begins to fade as the movie proper begins, mostly because we get saddled with a pretty obnoxious group of protagonists. Our “hero” is Craig (co-writer Matthew Albrecht), one of those perpetually put-upon, straight-arrow types that exists solely to become irritated by various indignities. His “best friend,” Lance (Isaac Harrison) is a ridiculously metrosexual “ladies’ man” who happens to be boinking Craig’s girlfriend, Carla (Amerlia Meyers), unbeknownst to our “hero.” The little group is rounded out by Tom (Dru Lockwood) and Jerry (Jarrod Pistilli), who seem to serve as a perpetually at-odds odd couple: you know, cuz they’re named Tom and Jerry? Like the cartoons? The ones with the mouse and cat? Yeah, it just ain’t funny no matter how you slice it, is it? Tom is the typical mealy-mouthed, glasses-wearing dork: we’ve seen at least a million iterations of this character in just the last couple years, nevermind the last couple decades. Jerry, however, is the real prize in this Cracker Jack box: bedecked in a ridiculous fedora, given to smoking cigars in small cars and practicing his nunchuks in the nude, Jerry is supposed to be the epitome of the batshit crazy outsider, that one guy who just…does not…give a FUCK, bro! Except he’s a colossal weenie, sort of a gene-splice between Crispin Glover and Bobcat Goldthwait’s award-winning performance in the Police Academy movies. As such, not only is it impossible to buy the scene where he puts the cigar out on his own hand (cuz this guy totally looks like he would start bawling) but it’s almost offensive to believe that this nitwit occupies the “badass” role in the film. When your bar is that low, no good can come of it, mark my words.

The plot, such as it is, involves one of those “guys-only weekends,” this one ostensibly set-up to allow for not only some male bonding but some animal-shooting, as well. The “gang” heads to the Buck Wild Ranch (Hey! That’s the name of the film! Clever!), which just happens to be run by Clyde. Clyde’s not looking too good and if you’ve seen any zombie films besides this one, you’ll know why. Besides being infected by a chupacabra, Clyde’s also kind of a dick: he calls the guys “punks” and “pissants” (put up your dukes!) and tells them to make sure to stay within the borders of the ranch. Turns out that Clyde’s next-door neighbor is a self-proclaimed “badass” named Billy Ray (Mark Ford) and he doesn’t take kindly to trespassers. The guys end up running afoul of Billy Ray (an absolutely, astoundingly terrible creation that seems to be part frat-boy, part John Waters, part lame-ass rockabilly clothes horse and completely, totally unbelievable) and a completely awful park ranger, Officer Shipley (director/co-writer Tyler Glodt), which don’t really expand the narrative so much as pad it out. Ultimately, they also run afoul of zombies: turns out Clyde has been infecting other locals and, soon, our city slickers are up to their haircuts in the redneck dead. Revelations are had, truths are learned, friends turn into the walking dead, Jerry acts like a badass, yadda yadda yadda. If the ultimate destination of this one-legged mule isn’t readily apparent by the end of the first act…I’m guessing you might actually enjoy this. Hmm…

Look, I’m not gonna sugarcoat this at all: Buck Wild is a stupid film. Aggressively stupid. Worse yet, it’s a hyperactive, self-aware, tone-deaf kind of stupidity that reminds me more of films like Scary Movie (2000) than Shaun of the Dead. Let me give you a good example of the “humor” on display here. After Officer Shipley pulls the guys over because he’s heard “enough gunshots for Baghdad,” he proceeds to stand outside his car and give them a speech about how if you smell shit, you’re probably standing in it. Officer Shipley, it turns out, smells shit: guess what, he asks them. You’re standing in shit, the others point out. And he is…he really is standing in a big pile of shit. Now, if anything about that was humorous (keep in mind that the “delivery” of said “joke” doesn’t help things), Buck Wild just may be right up your alley. Lest we think that the writers only have one kind of joke up their sleeve, they also show us how hilarious and timely their references are: Tom ends up a captive at Billy Ray’s compound and Jerry goes to save him, in a scene that features an ultra-sleazy brass song, Tom bent over a table wearing only his underwear and Jerry wielding a samurai sword. Yeah, that’s right: it’s a fucking Pulp Fiction reference. Not only that, but it’s a “humorous” reference to the rape scene: now that’s comedy!

Lest it sound like Buck Wild is completely worthless, there are actually three elements of the film that really work. The first element is the cinematography, which is consistently well-done and clear: in low-budget films like this, you’re usually lucky if you get something that looks half-way decent, let alone good. The second element that works (spectacularly well, I might add) are the fake TV shows that we occasionally see. One of them, a public access show called “Fucking Hunting” that features Billy Ray and his motley crew, is an absolute scream, miles away the funniest thing in the film. Hot on its heels, however, is another gem of a fake show, this one called “Living Through the Gray,” a self-help show about dealing with color-blindness. The TV shows are not only the funniest moments in the film, hands down, but they’re actually two of the funniest moments I’ve seen in any film recently: it’s a shame that they’re left to die amid the humorless wasteland that is the rest of the film.

The third element that actually works in Buck Wild is an extremely smart and subversive little commentary on the casual female nudity that inundates most low-mid budget horror films. Unlike similar films that might feature a terrified young starlet running around topless, Buck Wild chooses to make Tom the object of the “male gaze.” For the majority of the film, due to one incident or another, Tom rarely wears more than his underwear and socks: at one point, he fashions a toga out of a garbage bag, only to have a zombie rip it to shreds. Later, he gets to take a shower and emerges, clad in a bathrobe, only to have a passing zombie yank it off, exposing him once again. I’ll be honest: this particular running gag never got old and displayed the kind of invention and thought that I wish the rest of the film possessed. I don’t actually recall any female nudity at all, to be honest, although we get plenty of Tom. In some ways, this seems to be a callback to the Pee Wee character in Porkys (1982), who likewise spends the majority of that film in a constant state of embarrassment, harassment and undress. While the film often seems to be exceptionally mean to Tom, it ends up paying off big dividends, especially during a nicely emotional final setpiece.

Ultimately, however, a few worthy elements don’t a worthy film make. If Buck Wild were just a little less inane and stupid, it would be mighty easy to recommend it as the kind of low-budget romp that it thinks it is. Unfortunately, the film mostly ends up being a showcase of missed opportunities and foul balls, with nary a true home run in the batch (unless we count the TV shows, which really only amount to 2-3 minutes of screen-time, max). While I’m more than willing to give Glodt and Albrecht another chance, there’s no way I would put these guys on my radar: Fool me once, fool me twice and all that jazz.