Goodnight Mommy (2022)

Score: 1 / 5

When Goodnight Mommy, a 2014 Austrian film, hit the international market, it shook the horror world much like Funny Games did in 1997. Insidiously designed, its haunting story creeps under your skin and reminds you that the scariest things are much closer than we expect. It tells the story of two young twin boys whose mother recently had facial reconstruction surgery and his heavily bandaged. Her behavior is different, though: she doesn't sing them their lullaby, she favors one twin over the other, and she is reclusive and quiet as she "recuperates" and self-medicates. The twins become convinced their mother has been replaced with a stranger and that they are in danger from this intruder. It's a stylish and starkly modern haunted house, with no small amount of horrific violence and gore by the end. It also broaches really disturbing taboo subjects, such as children enacting deadly violence and the disintegration of mother-child relationships in the most brutal way.

Naturally, as these things go, someone decided to produce an American remake. This one, dropped unceremoniously by Prime Video, is almost entirely a waste of time. Directed by Matt Sobel and written by Kyle Warren, the film repeats the story point-by-point almost the entire way; there are no new inventions, twists, or surprises. It's a profoundly gloomy affair, looking and feeling more like a standard Gothic mystery than anything, drenched in bluish green hues no doubt exaggerated by post-production manipulations. Its dismal palette seems to inform its energy, with lethargic pacing and muted sound, so much so that it feels more like watching a memory of a film than a film itself.

Without the inherent tension, this movie collapses under its own weight, even despite the considerable talents of its star, Naomi Watts, as "mother" (no name). Of course she's wonderful, but this isn't exactly the meatiest of roles as it is written in this version. Plus, she spends half the film peering out from white gauze bandages wrapped around her head, and Watts isn't exactly known for her physicality being any significant part of her craft. She does similar and better work elsewhere, and frankly this isn't the kind of story one wants to repeat with or without solid performances. The kids are played suitably, though the young actors could have used much stronger direction. But then the trouble with this adaptation comes in again, as the children decide to capture Mother and test her honesty to prove her identity. In the original, they resort to immediately brutal means of torture to elicit the information they want. Here, almost all the violence is absent, removing almost all the stakes and shock value (and even most scares) from the proceedings. And the lack of those elements isn't replaced with anything, making the film feel unbearably dull and void of reason to exist.

There is one small twist, in the film's oddly misshapen climax/denouement sequence, that reveals what's going on between the two boys. It's only scarcely different than the original, albeit slightly more violent, and does nothing to inform any character development for any of the characters. What's more, even this revelation feels lackluster after a nearly complete lack of suspense or tension leading up to it. I never cared about the central ambiguity the story needs in order to function: is Mother really their mother, and if she's not, what game is she playing with them? Actually, now that I think on it, Watts also starred in the American remake of Funny Games, and now I'm starting to rethink my opinion of her choices. 

Black Adam (2022)

Score: 4 / 5

I knew absolutely nothing about the character or premise of this DC superhero film before heading in, and that might have been for the best. For probably half the film, I was surprised that this felt like a major antihero story, something akin to the Suicide Squad or even Deadpool. In essence, Black Adam is a Middle Eastern god of sorts, dating back to the age of the pyramids, who returns to avenge his nation and seek personal revenge; he's willing to slaughter legions to get what he wants -- whatever that is -- or on a whim, because he can. He apparently can't be hurt. He barely speaks. He clearly wants to remove the occupiers from his homeland, though from 2600 BC to 2022, there are indeed a lot of foreigners to remove. And yet his return is hailed as a miracle by many who live there, hoping as they do that he'll deliver them from the organized mercenaries controlling their kingdom.

Without knowing much of the history, it seems Black Adam was the original Shazam hero, bestowed with the power of the gods by the Council of Wizards (and Djimon Hounsou). And he was fittingly angry back a few millennia when he was created; a young slave boy in the kingdom of Kahndaq is gifted with superhuman powers in order to kill the tyrannical king Sabbac and end his evil rule. Sabbac (Marwan Kenzari) has crafted a crown made with the powers of six demons, essentially the arch-nemesis or polar opposite of Shazam. I really liked and didn't expect this connection to Shazam!, which was also a delightful surprise for me when it was released.

Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is here doing a really fun job as the titular hero, leaning heavily into the "is he or isn't he" question about his moral code. He kills somewhat indiscriminately, and sometimes apparently for sport. He finds humor in tossing men a mile into the air and letting them splat. He's also the somewhat stereotypical macho man who occasionally needs to be taught humor and modern ideas and even the Geneva Conventions, which the film effectively doses out to us between major action sequences. By the time Sabbac returns to dominate Kahndaq, Adam has effectively been radicalized (or, perhaps, de-radicalized?) as a full-fledged hero, making their fight one for liberation and decolonization, a pretty fabulous and unique story from major studios and major IPs.

How does he make the switch from selfish revenger to righteous avenger? It helps that Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) calls in for some help, and the Justice Society teams up to monitor, potentially quell, and ultimately assist Black Adam. The team includes leader Hawkeye (Aldis Hodge), Doctor Fate (Pierce Brosnan), Cyclone (Quintessa Swindell), and Atom Smasher (Noah Centineo); that so many new and exciting characters were brought in for this film was a bit overwhelming. Thankfully, they're given just enough individual screen time to make them all interesting and cool, though I couldn't tell you too much about any of them in depth. It's a bit of a shame that so many superhero movies these days have to include teams right off the bat, from Deadpool 2 to Eternals it seems all the heroes in our cultural awareness now are about teamwork. Not a bad lesson these days, but a lot to learn in every new film.

Even apart from all these heroes, we're given several crucial characters to get to know and love, including Adrianna (Sarah Shahi), a university professor who organizes and leads the resistance against Intergang, the organized crime, and her son Amon (Bodhi Sabongui) and brother Amir (Mohammed Amer), who are cute and funny and sweet and heartwarming in every scene. I love the comparative lack of white people in this movie, not unlike Black Panther, and I also love the strong moral ambiguity they all have, again like that movie: nobody has entirely perfect motivations and perfect methods, and so their behaviors are always a bit edgy. Even with all that, it's firmly anti-imperialist and anti-royalist, and Kahndaq itself manages to be an effective stand-in for cultures under the yoke of outside invaders (who are mostly white), even when those invaders are actually there to help. That's complex and wonderful screenwriting, folks, even in one written by committee.

Even beyond the intangible moral gray elements, the film features a surprising amount of violence and blood; it's only PG-13, but then again The Lord of the Rings, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, and even Gremlins fit that bill. It helps that Jaume Collet-Serra directs this enterprise, given his penchant for violent films in which Liam Neeson kicks ass or Blake Lively survives against all odds. He and his writers handle a smorgasbord of characters deftly, especially Brosnan's new hero who is something between Doctor Strange and Vision in the MCU. Brosnan, who hasn't had a really juicy acting role in ages, shocked me with a couple emotional scenes I absolutely did not expect in a movie like this. Same with Johnson, honestly, who eschews the laugh-out-loud comedy of his latest hits like Jungle Cruise and Jumanji (the first and second so far) to hammer home some intense emotional beats. His character's purpose -- to champion autonomy, independence, and liberation -- also hits home a bit more closely these days, adding to a growing list of powerhouse movies for all ages that serve to clearly advance social justice concepts. That's good, even when a film is as chock-full of whirling, shiny, explosive CGI as this one.

Halloween Ends (2022)

Score: 4 / 5

It's all over. Forty years after the original masterpiece, David Gordon Green revealed his revamped vision of what happens to the archetypal Final Girl after a lifetime of dealing with her trauma. And while designing a trilogy isn't groundbreaking these days, his approach to this franchise was certainly different than the onslaught of reboots, remakes, and requels of classic slasher horror that has dominated the genre for the last decade or so. As a planned trilogy, he could plan out exactly his brilliant steps: first, to fashion a Halloween that ensnared fans of the original due to proper character development and a straightforward and highly effective plot, and second, to then push the franchise to the edge of the possible and completely shock everyone with awe (and gore). And then, finally, to end it all. But how? Surely going into this film I wondered if it would be an all-out, balls-out brawl between Laurie Strode and Michael Myers. But certainly that isn't sustainable for a feature film, not least because the characters are much older than most horror protagonists. So what to do?

In what I think is a genius turn, here the writers continue their spin outward from Michael. First, we saw his evil firsthand and its impact on one woman and her family in a tightly wound exploration of generational trauma. Then, in Halloween Kills, we got the consummate slasher film about Michael, in which his evil is at its peak and radiates throughout Haddonfield, infecting others and leading them to mob violence and chaos. No doubt partly due to the pandemic, the final installment feels detached. While it would have been nice to have all three taking place on the same night, or even having this one take place on November 1, I'm okay with the bit of a break because it allows the characters to actually demonstrate growth and development. So this film picks up four years later as Laurie and her granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak) are fully settled into their new life together. But instead of just making yet another slasher in which Michael escapes, arrives, hunts, and disappears, here the filmmakers decide to pull the most unexpected and -- crucially -- realistic ending for these characters they possibly could have.

If Michael is pure evil, as several characters in the franchise have exclaimed over the years, then it stands to reason that he cannot die, try as Tommy and his mob did to prove otherwise in the previous film. You can't just have another installment where they fight and maybe finally Laurie figures out a surefire way to kill him. I mean, in some ways, that does indeed happen in Halloween Ends, and their final fight is pretty brutal to watch. But the bulk of this film, by far, is about the nature of evil and how something like Michael happened in the first place. Thankfully, they didn't go back in time and try to create an origin story for him or try to explain his motivations, his methodology, or even his uncanny ability to bounce back from deadly injuries.

Instead, we're introduced to a new character, Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell), who in the first scene is babysitting on Halloween night in Haddonfield. The year is 2019, a full year after Haddonfield's cozy neighborhood streets ran red with blood, and the town has not recovered. Fears of "the boogeyman" are more gripping than ever, yet the parents Corey is sitting for are unwinding a different way, heading to a party nearby. Corey's charge is a spoiled little brat who wants to watch inappropriately scary movies and play practical jokes; when one goes terribly awry, the kid accidentally falls to his death and Corey is immediately suspected of murder. This simple and chilling opening scene sets up what could be an annoying way to continue the franchise with a new baddie, as many pessimistic viewers will surely roll eyes about, but it works damn well as a reminder that this is kind of how the first one started back in 1978.

I still hate that Laurie's daughter Karen (Judy Greer) got killed off so unceremoniously and violently. I don't really understand how Laurie went from a paranoid survivalist to a thriving suburban house mom (house grandmother, I guess) in only four years during a pandemic and while Michael is clearly still out and about. I don't really understand how Michael survived four years in the sewers without getting caught or leaving or finishing what he started. But these points aside, I found the shifting focus onto Corey to be refreshing and terrifying, not unlike what we've seen in other sympathize-with-the-devil films lately like Joker. A bad thing happened to Corey -- who may or may not be slightly predisposed to some behavioral problems, as early scenes arguably suggest in vague, veiled ways -- and as a result, Haddonfield created a new monster. Michael's slaughter of no fewer than 31 people the previous year made everyone primed to see monsters; now they picked one, and between the hurting, angry parents and the anxious, angry bullies at school, they work in sync to vilify a lone boy who doesn't really fit in and can't quite catch a break.

So when an injured and scared Corey stumbles across the boogeyman in a drainpipe, it's not without some fascination that we see Michael Myers tolerate his presence and even coordinate attacks with him. In a twisted mentorship situation, Michael shows Corey his M.O. and encourages the young man to satisfy his violent urges in cruel and vicious ways. Meanwhile, Corey continues to date Allyson, whose own teenage rebellion lets her finally get to be a bit of a "bad girl" after living in her mother's perfect house and now her grandmother's overwrought attempts at cookie-cutter normalcy. It's not a very believable romance, and the two actors leave quite a bit to be desired, but it's a solid storytelling device.

I found this film, compared with the previous two, to be less focused dramatically but perhaps more focused thematically. I also found its editing and cinematography to be less effective and even occasionally lazy; one wonders if larger portions of this film fell to the cutting room floor during production, or if the writers had too many ideas and didn't prune properly. As a Halloween film, it's not really up to par with the others. But thank goodness for that, because another rote flick in the franchise would have killed it in a bad way. And it does have a badass fight between Jamie Lee Curtis and The Shape, so there's always that lovely inclusion. As a horror thriller about the creation of a new villain, it's really quite wonderful and unexpected. And I think that's the most satisfying way to end the franchise: something fresh and interesting that reinforces the series' concept of evil. It is impossible and unknowable and unpredictable, and most importantly, it is very catching. 

Hellraiser (2022)

Score: 2.5 / 5

Certain circles of horror fans go, indeed, fanatic for Clive Barker's original novella (and subsequent works) as well as Barker's own film adaptation in 1987. The Hellbound Heart, changed to Hellraiser, combines body horror with Lovecraftian horror in surprising and erotic ways. Combined with the knowledge that Barker's queerness made this intellectual property one of the first major studio projects that embraced kinky and queer ideas in such a blatant and mainstream way, it should absolutely have been my thing. It's just not my thing. I tried reading it once and couldn't connect with his prose; I tried watching his film and found it indeed provocative and haunting, but its unbearable pace and complete lack of focus or thematic satisfaction left me nauseated and annoyed. So when I heard the franchise was getting a reboot -- and that Disney was sending this directly to streaming service (Hulu, which is where they seem to be illogically and unceremoniously dumping horror fare they don't know will do well, like the awesome Prey that deserved weeks in cinemas) instead of to cinemas -- I had very little interest in seeing it.

Directed by David Bruckner -- a rising star who has also directed The Ritual and The Night House, which is why I chose to watch this movie -- this Hellraiser is a spooky and violent reminder of why I don't like the source material. Which is to say, I didn't hate the experience of watching it because unlike the original film (and its admittedly kind of wonderful kink iconography), this one doesn't jive with my aesthetic preferences. Very few films from the '80s in general would be ones I'm willing to watch, much less enjoy, but especially in the horror genre. There's something aggressively cheap in appearance and desperate in performance or execution that marries (im-)perfectly in movies like the original Hellraiser. Thankfully, Bruckner modernizes his latest film, and his sleek updates are quite nice for this viewer.

Riley (Odessa A'zion), a former addict living with her brother Matt (Brandon Flynn) and his boyfriend Colin (Adam Faison), has a pretty sketchy boyfriend Trevor (Drew Starkey). We don't know much at first, other than Matt doesn't trust him and is willing to challenge Riley's choice, but it becomes apparent that Trevor is indeed a bit of a delinquent when they break into a supposedly abandoned warehouse and discover a puzzle box. Riley tries it out and learns it contains blades that can poke out and seriously injure the holder if she's not careful. She suddenly meets the Cenobites, a group of supernatural, extra-dimensional religious acolytes in thrall to a mysterious pagan god or demonic lord called Leviathan, apparently living in some kind of Hell in which they experiment with body mutilations and torture to experience hedonistic blending of pain and pleasure.

It's suddenly a whole lot really fast, right? Right. The concept is kind of cool, and in the original film, Barker had the Cenobites dressed, effectively, in BDSM-like leather garb with extraneous and suggestive hooks and straps and buckles. His melding of sex with danger felt incredibly appropriate and meaningful at the time, considering the AIDS crisis and shattering of specifically gay male culture in urban locations like LA and NYC. Consider this revelation in relation to William Friedkin's Cruising, which concerns an undercover cop investigating a serial killer who haunts the West Village and Meatpacking District, released in 1980. It's a taste of the erotic and affirming culture that once was, stirred together with paranoia and fears that our sexuality, so close to liberation, could be so intimately connected with horrific and violent death. The new film is nowhere near as historically or thematically relevant, but its updates are fascinating in other ways. Instead of black leather and fetish gear, the Cenobites here have undergone superhuman body mortifications to craft their appearance and, apparently, clothing. Certain muscles and skin flaps are cut and pulled and strung up around their bodies to create shoulder pads and miters and the illusion of partial coverings, and it just looks painful. Perhaps, like Crimes of the Future, this update asks us to question what we're doing to ourselves culturally in terms of violence upon our bodies, but Hellraiser does not reach for such existential epiphanies.

Riley herself isn't very interesting, but then none of the characters in the new film are. She's preoccupied with a certainty that she's in the thralls of powers beyond her control or understanding (very Lovecraftian, but she's not dealing with potential insanity). Her relationships are fractured and do not develop much with anyone, despite a two-hour runtime, no doubt due to her former addiction, the problematic implication of the screenplay being to use addiction as a shorthand for all that can fail in relationships as well as why those relationships fail. Eventually she traces the box to a wealthy hedonistic bohemian named Mr. Voight (Goran Visnjic, hilariously), hoping to solve the box and rescue her brother and redeem herself before realizing the older man is the reason for their suffering in the first place. The other characters aren't much more developed, which is to say hardly at all, and despite competent performances, precious little about the plot or characters is worth remembering.

What is worth remembering is Bruckner's direction, the cinematography and editing, and the effects. He handles looming horror very well, and here allows the violent shocks to really violate and shock to their full potential. It helps, too, that the appearance of the Cenobites is so unnerving and painful to behold. By the climax, as Leviathan (or whatever that giant, floating, inverted pyramid was) approaches Mr. Voight and the young people fighting for their lives and souls, I admired the visual dynamism of the film, evoking Lovecraft even as it worked to be its own thing. I even admired the screenplay in the ways it compared the pain/pleasure confusion of sexuality and body horror to the pain/pleasure of drug and alcohol addiction and what they do to the body. But the problems with the material -- apart from my own distaste for the central conceit -- are still present: lack of focus on plot and character, over-emphasis on shock value and the appearance of the Cenobites, and tons of unanswered questions about the mythology and apparent plot holes that get bigger upon reflection. I'd rather not sit through the pain of watching this again, though it served its purpose as a mildly entertaining diversion for an evening.

Smile (2022)

Score: 3.5 / 5

In an unexpected twist, Smile is the latest horror film that works best as a metaphor for trauma and mental illness. Marketing billed it as a straightforward horror flick with a nasty streak, most targeted at teenagers and twenty-somethings, not unlike the aesthetic of Ouija or Truth or Dare, with fast edits, jump scares, and an easily recognizable (if shape-shifting) evil entity that allows its cast to be both spooked and spooky. But it doesn't take long into its runtime to see that Smile is up to a very different game indeed, one that lands rather somewhere between The Ring and It Follows, and it has in mind much weightier themes than simple survival against a mysterious and relentless threat.

Dr. Rose Cotter (Sosie Bacon) sits with a new patient, a young woman who was rushed into the psychiatric ward, and they talk for quite a while. A PhD candidate, the patient is shivering and shaking, convinced something has been following and terrorizing her since she witnessed her professor commit a particularly violent suicide earlier that week. She says this entity is toying with her, appearing at random and in different forms -- sometimes as a dead person, sometimes as a living person, maybe even your spouse or parent -- but always with an unhinged, menacing smile. Then the student has a bit of a fit and, when it subsides, bears a creepy, forced smile of her own and proceeds to slit her own throat. It doesn't take long for Dr. Cotter to start seeing those creepy smiles dogging her as well.

Bacon is really very effective at sustaining a high-tension demeanor that is somewhat stoic yet always relatable and realistic, not unlike the now-popular technique of Elisabeth Moss. Her character is primed to be triggered by this sudden rash of suicides she uncovers, of which her most recent patient was in fact the most recent to die, due to her own mother's suicide some years before. In as much as Dr. Cotter's profession is to help and destigmatize mental illness, the film's screenplay intensely amps up the realistic and problematic dialogue that does the opposite: words like "crazies" and "head cases" and "nutjobs" litter the dialogue. Cotter's fiancee Trevor (Jessie T. Usher) discusses "researching" mental illnesses online, though we're left wondering if he did much looking past the initial Google results and splashy headlines. This external tension (for us) thematically challenges the internal tension (for Cotter) of whether or not she is experiencing a severe episode of mental illness, as she wonders aloud multiple times -- along with almost every other character, including her therapist (a stunning Robin Weigert) and her boss (Kal Penn)-- if her hallucinations and lost time are evidence of her own state of mind or if they are being enacted on her by the entity. Her sister (Gillian Zinzer) is perhaps the most dangerous voice in Cotter's head, as she shares the knowledge that all this pain and fear could be traced back to their mother. If it even really exists outside of their imaginations.

Much like The Ring and It Follows, the plot of this movie is twofold: first, the protagonist must convince herself of what's happening to her and try to convince others to help, and second, she must research and experiment on it to determine how to end the relentless threat. Dr. Cotter, thankfully, doesn't have to work too hard to convince one person, her ex-boyfriend Joel (Kyle Gallner), a cop assigned to her case. Tracking down suicide after suicide, each with only one witness who later became a victim, they eventually meet a survivor (Rob Morgan), now incarcerated for murdering another person rather than himself. His testimony is as helpful as it is horrifying, and shortly thereafter the good doctor girds her loins for a direct confrontation with her supernatural stalker.

Despite its title, Smile is a grim affair, shockingly violent and haunting long after the credits roll. From its marketing and subject matter, I was expecting a silly, nonsensical romp chock-full of cheap scares and bad performances that was fun if only for a single viewing. This is not that. While it isn't as polished, focused, or groundbreaking like some of the other films to which I've compared it, Smile manages to sustain its gripping sense of dread -- and, it's true, several highly effective jump scares -- due to excellent performances, cinematography, editing, and writing. Most importantly, its handling of mental illness and suicide I'd categorize along other recent films like Relic and The Night House in sensitivity, creativity, and ambiguity. I love that horror filmmakers are embracing metaphoric conceits to explore mental illness, to combat historical use of mental illness as shorthand or an excuse for horror (think The Silence of the Lambs as one of the best examples of this).

Don't Worry Darling (2022)

Score: 3 / 5

Sumptuous and sensual, dripping with style, Don't Worry Darling has finally arrived after much tabloid coverage. And it's about as much a mixed bag as you might have expected, though not for the reasons splashed across headlines and news bytes. Its marketing was confusing and related press even more so, but generally it looked like a cross between The Stepford Wives and Black Swan, and for the most part I'd still say that's a reasonable set of correlations to make. It's probably how I'll describe it (if I ever need to) in the future. We follow Alice, a young married woman, as she experiences her life in a desert utopia in the American West. We aren't given much information about why she's there, though she seems to be learning the customs and socializing quickly enough, or even who she is, apart from her obvious and troubling attempts to look and act just like the other housewives in town.

And, much as the town in the film functions in relation to her, the film itself asks us the same question: Why does context matter, when everything is so lovely? And lovely it is! Victory, the name of the town and its mysterious workplace that only men are permitted to enter, is indeed victoriously designed with its perfectly manicured lawns leading up to stunning mid-century modern houses in tasteful colors. Every man in tailored suits and slicked hair, every woman in vibrant dresses and aprons, every adult with a delicious cocktail in hand at any hour. Oldies music plays loudly in every scene, and the camera enhances each color to be warm and polished, almost surreal in hue as if we were watching it all in a Technicolor commerical from the '50s. And that's to say nothing of the evenings, when the men of town return from work to ravage their wives with renewed vigor and go to booze-soaked house parties that would make Jay Gatsby blush.

But of course all is not well in paradise, and who better to carry us on that journey of revelation and retribution than Florence Pugh, cinema's recent golden girl who churns out yet another Oscar-worthy performance. Her character Alice is innately above the town of Victory, and we see her struggling to completely fit in; early on, instead of a colored dress and heels, she waves goodbye to her husband in the morning in an oversized white shirt and recently-sexed hair. She challenges the normative ways men treat their wives and constantly wonders what, exactly, they do at "work" every day. Her nagging suspicions threaten to label her as a nagging wife, and so she dutifully -- if somewhat resentfully -- swims at the pool and goes to dance class and does what the other good wives do. After all, she's not really paying for this lavish lifestyle, and her only real concern is what cocktail to drink next or how to fashion her hair today. Who is she to complain, right?

A plane crashes nearby and no one seems to care. A friend of hers (one of the few women of color) has a breakdown and then seemingly kills herself but nobody wants to talk about it. She tries to visit her husband's workplace and passes out for a full day. Things are weird in Victory, no thanks to the charismatic and mysterious founder Frank (Chris Pine, delighting in playing what amounts to a wicked little cult leader). But this Mad Men fanfiction takes a dark turn when Alice -- and we -- realize what exactly is going on. Even though by this point it was fairly obvious what was coming, I found the "aha" moment to be more of an annoyed groan. If you're going to reimagine The Stepford Wives or The Truman Show, the best way to do it isn't to use the tech from The Matrix. 

So while the plot itself is neither original nor inspired, I don't want to completely villainize screenwriter Katie Silberman, whose dialogue and pacing is actually exquisite. She grapples angrily with a lot of weighty ideas, launching a film that ultimately tirades against the American patriarchy, and while it's no fresh idea, it is a bit refreshing to be reminded that this kind of feminist film is still horrifically relevant. It's okay to rage against the machine because most of us in real life are still under its yolk. Pugh, to her inestimable credit, takes her fiery feminist streak in stride and makes it relatable without dumbing it down; her response to being constantly gaslit into compliance is eminently believable and we want to fight back too.

It helps, in odd ways, that her costar is Harry Styles. I've never much liked his artistry, and here he fully fits the character: vapid, vain, and unwilling to be uncomfortable. He can't stand the thought of his Alice gaining the upper hand in any conflict or in general, and so he resorts to aggressive placations, feigning weakness to garner support, and even asking for professional help when he is at the breaking point. Styles, much like his character, is incapable of reaching emotional depths to match Pugh, and his manner of listening and responding to her is embarrassingly forced. Perhaps it was a conscious acting choice (doubtful), but it's telling that the original casting had Shia LaBeouf in this role, who has a much more intense and raw method of performing that would have created a vastly different atmosphere for this film. I'm glad Styles is the choice in that regard, as he fits the bill, but he's just not got the chops across from Pugh or Pine or even Olivia Wilde herself, who plays Alice's neighbor to great effect.

It's a stunning film, from the genius of Matthew Libatique's cinematography to the sumptuous production design and costumes, and even the heavy score worked for me. It's just that the screenplay, which nails so many things, was inspired by a half-baked, derivative notion that wasn't properly fleshed out. Films like this can work if they're either consciously referencing their obvious source material or evolved enough to be only vaguely suggesting connections with it. This does neither, and so despite the rapturous artistry in it, by the closing credits I felt that I'd been had as much as Alice was.

Mr. Harrigan's Phone (2022)

Score: 3 / 5

Adapted from the recent Stephen King novella of the same name, Mr. Harrigan's Phone debuted on Netflix last week. Unfairly (and somewhat inaccurately) labeled as "horror" and put in the same lineups as other spooky October-y fare, the film is almost certain to garner negative reactions from the casual viewer. Streaming categories like that are too broad; sure, the film is technically a horror film, but there's nothing really scary in it. Someone looking for a random scary movie to cuddle up watching will likely be very disappointed with this one, marketed as it is with King's name and reputation. And yet this is very much a King story, albeit a coming-of-age one like Stand By Me. His dramas, though arguably less famous, are pretty incredible themselves; his more recent ones (this story included) tend to take on specific hot topics or social issues head-on. This one, as you might guess, targets our relationship to smart phones even as it fleshes out a remarkably touching intergenerational friendship.

Schoolboy Craig (Jaeden Martell), after reading from the pulpit at church, gets hired by the wealthiest man in the state of Maine. Mr. Harrigan (Donald Sutherland), elderly and lonely, lives an anachronistic life in his local mansion, eschewing technology and preferring to read the newspaper or sit in his conservatory among the plants. As his eyes are failing -- or so he says -- Craig is meant to read to him. Not the tawdry and depressing mess of news blurbs, but rather the literature that Mr. Harrigan keeps in his library. After each reading session, they discuss themes and interpretations of classics like Heart of Darkness and The Brothers Karamazov, building an extraordinary friendship together. Mr. Harrigan's occasionally gruff demeanor belies a sensitive soul striving for sentimental connection. We wonder about his family, if he ever really had loved ones; his business acumen seems to have been his sole passion, one he now resents to some extent.

John Lee Hancock, director of The Rookie, The Founder, and The Blind Side (but, far more importantly, The Little Things, Saving Mr. Banks, and The Alamo), helms this adaptation with a brooding sense of calmness. We can see the ways Mr. Harrigan encourages Craig to stand up for himself with a level of confidence neither of them really feels; at least the elderly man surely did at one point, as he no doubt confidently stepped on others up the capitalist corporate ladders of his career. Craig, while clearly filling a void of companionship, seems to struggle with how to help his friend reciprocally, and so gets him a smart phone on which he can track the stock market and make real-time financial decisions. Mr. Harrigan gets hooked, much to both of their wonder and disappointment. He even mentions, while clasping and swiping his screen, how much he hates being tethered to the device. How many of us feel the same loving loathing toward these little torturous miracles?

I haven't read the story on which this film is based, admittedly, but I found myself wondering how much of the screenplay was King and how much was Hancock (who also adapted it himself). Most of the film is heavy-handed posturing about the dangers of being constantly connected, and it ultimately feels like a lecture on freeing ourselves from slavery to tech. That's not un-King-like, especially in some of his recent work that occasionally bends far from pure horror. But by the point in the film that supernatural elements enter -- and correspondingly darker themes -- it feels forced, rushed, and like woefully squandered opportunities. Because Mr. Harrigan, old as he is, indeed dies of natural causes. After Craig slips the man's cell phone into his casket at the funeral, he begins receiving calls from the dead man's phone. Despairing and missing his friendship, Craig shares stories like a verbal diary, describing his bullies and struggles with school and family. And soon enough, bad things happen to those who have slighted the young man.

Had the film leaned into these elements more intently and spectacularly, it would easily have made for a chilling horror flick. There could have been fascinating artistic representations of the balance (or imbalance) of power when it comes to our age, access to technology, and even virtual power (in instances of cyberbullying, for example). It could have shown how too much information -- rather, misinformation and fake news, as Mr. Harrigan notes his fear of the cell phone "gizmo" -- can in fact lead to radicalization and violence. It could have embraced Craig's coming of age through his learning of how to mete out justice with sudden and profound power. By the end, the film vaguely hints that had Mr. Harrigan had this power earlier in his life, great horrors would have happened, and that Craig has maneuvered through his moralistic mess to choose better. But I'm still not sure that Hancock ever really gets there in any concrete way, and so the film seems content to dwell in the possibilities: haunting in its own way, but not enough to provide any chills or even chilling insights.

Pearl (2022)

Score: 4 / 5

Here it is, the unexpected (well, it was back in March) second installment in A24's surprise horror franchise from Ti West. The initial film, X, was a work of genius, though most audiences probably simply appreciated it as a gory '70s slasher homage; it deftly transgressed subgenre boundaries to make a work of consummate art firmly entrenched in the eccentricities of its thematic and generic roots. Its post-credits video proved to be a trailer for this film, centering on the murderous old woman Pearl and presumably performing as a sort of origin story for her. It was a weird trailer, and one that I was frankly not terribly excited to see. After all, the more we know about the villain or monster, the less scary it usually is, right?

Pearl takes place in 1918 Texas, on a small rural farm that looks a little too familiar. She's back on the farm with her German immigrant parents while her husband Howard is away at war. Her domineering mother, Ruth (Tandi Wright) runs a tight ship and demands a lot from her daughter, who is perhaps a little too young to be a new bride, but the film glances over that. Pearl has too many stars in her eyes and dreams in her head. She dances and sings too much, wishing to someday be a chorus girl or movie star. She runs through her routines, sometimes in her mother's clothes from which she has been repeatedly forbidden, sometimes retreating to the barn where the animals at least won't disapprove. She shows little care or concern about her absent husband, preferring to escape into the local cinema in secret. Her wide eyes absorb every frame on that screen, helping her push through the doldrums of farm life and caring for her invalid father.

But something is very wrong with Pearl. Is Ruth abusive to Pearl because the girl is flighty, or is that only Pearl's perception of her? Or, perhaps, is Ruth scared of her own progeny? Pearl's demeanor is not unlike a young Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz, dreaming of heaven beyond the rainbow, but she barely bats an eye when, to take out her sporadic and unpredictable rage, she skewers a duck with a pitchfork and feeds it to her best friend, an enormous alligator in the nearby pond she has affectionately named after Theda Bara. It's nice that she bathes her father, but she always gets caught actually bathing herself while he sits a little too closely. Her constant quotes, "All I want is to be loved" and "the whole world is going to know my name," sound innocent enough, but we realize fairly quickly that she is deeply unhinged and that these desperate pronouncements are indicative of desperation at any cost. It's as though she's trying too hard to live up to her name, becoming a human gem, something calculatedly innocent and naive to endear the predatory Hollywood executives.

They don't bite, but the local cinema projectionist does. The handsome David Corenswet plays the nameless man, lusting after the wide-eyed Mia Goth with pitch-perfect chemistry. Every actor here is pretty great, to be fair, but the passion these two have is infectious. We're torn between wanting the best for her and stifling our shouts to him to run for his life. Goth is delirious in the role of a young performer's lifetime -- the third massive and award-worthy role she's played this year alone -- and the film primarily works as a result of her dedication to her own insanity. This movie makes you feel as icky as Joker did, where we're forced to sympathize with her even as we are not protected from the horrors she enacts.

There are fewer dead bodies this time around, though I'd argue each is more disturbing and impactful than the ones in X. West and his cinematographer and editor work seamlessly again to craft a waking nightmare with jolting scares and brutal violence, this time all in a color palette a little too rich in hue. Whereas the previous film took its visual inspiration from the independent horror exploitation films of the '70s, here we're treated to a vision meant to mimic the Technicolor vibrancy of the late '30s and '40s. Even the opening sequence feels like an evocation of The Wizard of Oz, and much of the story mirrors that staple film with impossibly dark twists, as when she meets a scarecrow and does unspeakable things to it. Thank goodness this one indeed doesn't have a brain. And then there's the film's constant references to pandemic, as the Spanish flu rages on and the family is meant to be isolating in their farmhouse; there are even visual gags with homemade face masks that feel intentionally funny and alarming at once. They hammer home the points that history repeats itself (a theme helped by Goth's casting, of course) and the needling sensation that the world has become an incurably sick place.

See How They Run (2022)

Score: 3.5 / 5

A uniquely quirky and delightful romp, See How They Run won't be for everyone. It's one of those semi-annoying films that will only really appeal to a particular audience, specifically one that very much enjoys a brand of dry murder mystery. Interestingly, it also requires one that enjoys metafictional commentary on dry murder mysteries (or of any genre, presumably). I was not ready for the latter, though it is a brand of comedy I have loved for many years, since seeing the original Scream. It's all a performative pastiche, camp in delivery if not in form, and earnest in its efforts to delight more than mystify.

Take the opening sequence, which like most classic British murder mysteries assaults you with a sudden onslaught of introductions for all the main characters and their basic issues with each other before revealing that one of them -- of course, the most unlikable one -- has been murdered. It's Adrien Brody, oddly enough, playing American film director Leo Kopernick. He's also supplying the voiceover, an ironic twist that slaps hard once he's been done in. Kopernick, a sleazy and drunken opportunist, joins the celebrations of the success of Agatha Christie's knockout West End play The Mousetrap, having recently reached 100 performances in the year 1953. He's not particularly welcome, as film and theatre artists don't quite see eye-to-eye, and his pushy demeanor offends the producer, female lead, and her husband and co-star, the latter two of whom turn the situation into a brawl. Shortly after, Kopernick is murdered backstage.

After the dramatic and kinetic setup, which really needs a scene or two for us to come down from due to its speed and wit, we're introduced to the heroes of our tale. Inspector Stoppard (Sam Rockwell) and Constable Stalker (Saoirse Ronan) are the oddest pair you might expect in a film like this. Stoppard's heavy drinking makes him unreliable in multiple ways, though his world-weariness suggests he's seen more than his share of crime. Stalker is a hopeful cinephile and earnest note-taker, making meaning through the screen and the page, though she's not adept yet at seeing connections in real life around her. They're investigating the death of a director who was pretty hated -- blacklisted in Hollywood and sent to London to film something he considers the death of theatre and cinema -- and they're not particularly invested either. But it's a job, and between Stoppard (whose job is on the line) and Stalker (who wants to work her way up), they'll slowly and surely get it done. That is to say, to learn whodunnit.

There are lots of theatrical in-jokes, including Stoppard's name and reference to The Real Inspector Hound, and it's a hoot if you get it. Otherwise, I imagine it just feels tacky and weird. Harris Dickinson, who has really been impressing me lately, plays a young Richard Attenborough, star of the play, and his work in channeling the late great actor is really quite impressive and heartwarming. There are references to Julian Fellowes (Gosford Park) and even Agatha Christie herself makes a hilarious appearance, played to iconic and poisonous effect by Shirley Henderson. Some of the jokes are real groaners -- calling the murder "staged" because it happened, in fact, on stage -- but it adds to the offbeat and dry charm of this insanely-paced mystery comedy. While this wasn't always my cuppa (I'm excited for the similarly meta sequel to Knives Out coming soon to Netflix), it's still a fun romp and curious exercise in what amounts to fanfiction. Even if it never really feels as interesting or important as the yarns Christie herself spun.

The Old Ways (2020)

Score: 4.5 / 5

I'm a little late on viewing this one, but it was just so brilliant that I had to write and publicize it a bit. Do yourself a favor and check it out!

Cristina wakes up in an unfamiliar hut. An older man asks her why she was in a region called La Boca and won't let her leave the room. She's chained loosely to a bed. We have no idea why she's here, but we learn over the course of the dialogue that they are in Veracruz, Mexico, not far from Cristina's home. We learn she is a journalist from Los Angeles who had returned home to investigate the La Boca ruins and forbidden caves. We also learn that she is a heroin addict, and a pretty savvy one, but the mysterious man with her is no cartel tough guy. When he opens the door for an older woman with a lot of face paint, we realize this is a shockingly different situation, even while we still have no idea what's happening, much like Cristina herself.

The older woman is a bruja, a witch essentially, named Luz. Her symbolic light will shine on Cristina, whose family has arranged her abduction in order to perform an exorcism. That's right, they're convinced she's possessed by a demon. This revelation hits home when Cristina's cousin Miranda arrives and tells her her behaviors have not been normal nor healthy. We're made to wonder for a long time, at least half the film, whether the belief in Cristina's possession is primitive and violent, and if her ailment isn't just a spiritual name for a physiological problem: namely, addiction. This kind of consideration isn't new in the possession/haunted house subgenre of horror, but it's rare that a film so intently dives into the murky space of the unknown between the two right away (the best I know of is The Exorcism of Emily Rose). 

With the exception of a few flashbacks, the entire film takes place in the room that acts as Cristina's prison and possible sanctuary. The cinematographer and director work hard to bring new and exciting energy to the old "exorcism movie" shtick, bringing novelty in refreshingly frequent doses. Not unlike the ways Possession and The Vigil reframe the subgenre away from Catholicism and Protestantism and toward Judaism or how Under the Shadow leans into Arabic mythology, here we're given strong doses of Latin American folklore in the form of brujeria. Thematically, this works to increase the feeling that Cristina is now enduring exactly the kind of "old ways" she attempted to flee by moving to the States. Now she's trapped in a prison of her past and forced to confront the ways she has denied or ignored the things that really should matter to her in favor of drugs and her career.

But soon enough, weird and scary things start to happen. Snakes are drawn to her, hallucinations and visions take her on wild trips, and her body is pushed to the brink of breaking (to say nothing of her mind). It's a scary, wacky, incredibly violent chamber piece in which no holds are barred and its probably small budget is milked for every damned, gooey cent. An endurance test as much for us as it is for Cristina, The Old Ways is one of the most fresh and exciting entries in the genre in some time.