Tag: horror

Review: ‘Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island,’ starring Lucy Hale and Michael Peña

February 14, 2020

by Carla Hay

Lucy Hale, Austin Stowell and Michael Peña in “Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island” (Photo by Christopher Moss/Columbia Pictures)

“Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island” 

Directed by Jeff Wadlow

Culture Representation: Taking place in a fictional South Pacific locale, the horror film “Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island” (inspired by the 1977-1984 TV series) follows a racially diverse cast of middle-class characters who go to a luxurious island to fulfill their biggest fantasies.

Culture Clash: The fantasies turn into nightmares, as the island visitors end up in terrifying life-threatening situations.

Culture Audience: “Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island” will appeal mostly to horror enthusiasts or curious fans of the original TV series who already know that the movie will be filled with over-the-top entertainment.

Lucy Hale, Maggie Q, Austin Stowell, Jimmy O. Yang, Ryan Hansen and Parisa Fitz-Henley in “Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island” (Photo by Christopher Moss/Columbia Pictures)

Here’s one thing that “Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island” movie has in common with the 1977-1984 TV series “Fantasy Island” TV series that inspired the film: There’s plenty of cheesiness to go around. The premise is still the same: A group of strangers fly on a private plane to a beautiful island, where they meet their host: the enigmatic Mr. Roarke, who always wears a white suit. All of the strangers are there to fulfill their biggest fantasies. And one by one, they begin to regret that their wishes came true.

The TV series had so much over-the-top ridiculousness (including Mr. Roarke fighting the devil) that people who’ve seen the show might already sense that the movie isn’t going to have any aspirations of being an arthouse film. However, the movie, which was filmed in Fiji, is a pretty good advertisement for the South Pacific country’s gorgeous landscape. The brand name for Blumhouse (the production company whose specialty is horror, with franchises such as “The Purge” and “Insidious”) might be an added attraction, but the quality of Blumhouse films is hit or miss.

Case in point: Blumhouse was the production company behind writer/director Jordan Peele’s 2017 Oscar-winning horror blockbuster “Get Out.” But Blumhouse also did 2017’s “Truth or Dare,” one of Blumhouse’s worst horror movies, directed by Jeff Wadlow, starring Lucy Hale, and written by Wadlow, Chris Roach and Jillian Jacobs. And guess what? All four of them have reteamed for “Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island,” which is only slightly better than “Truth or Dare,” because at least “Fantasy Island” made some attempt to be a horror film that’s a little more intricate than a cliché slasher flick. Too bad that attempt results in a convoluted mess.

Who are the strangers who’ve gathered on this island and what are their fantasies? They are contest winners who, when they first arrive, cynically speculate about what kinds of elaborate stunts will be pulled to make their fantasies look realistic. Sarcastic beauty Melanie Cole (played by Hale) wants revenge on former schoolmate Sloane Maddison (played by Portia Doubleday), who bullied Melanie in their childhood. Nerdy stepbrothers JD Weaver (played by Ryan Hansen) and Brax Weaver (played by Jimmy O. Yang) want to live out their wildest party fantasies.

Patrick Sullivan (played by Austin Stowell) is a good-guy cop who has a military “Call of Duty” type of fantasy that involves someone from his past. Insecure and sad Gwen Olsen (played by Maggie Q) wants to go back in time to change a decision she made years ago in her personal life. They are greeted by Mr. Roarke (played by Michael Peña), who tells them that once they’ve started living their fantasies, they can’t go back and change their minds.

The “Fantasy Island” TV series famously had an energetic character named Tattoo (played by Hervé Villechaize) as Mr. Roarke’s assistant. In this movie, Mr. Roarke’s assistant is a woman named Julia (played by Parisa Fitz-Henley), who’s as calm as Tattoo was hyper. This movie’s Mr. Roarke is much more serious and aloof than the TV version of Mr. Roarke (played by Ricardo Montalbán), although one thing is still the same: He greets his staff by saying, “Smiles, everyone. Smiles.”

Speaking of the Fantasy Island staffers in the movie, they are some of the biggest clues that all is not so wonderful on Fantasy Island. Julia gets mysterious nose bleeds and has a vacant stare. (And later in the movie, some of the employees bleed black bile from their eyes.) One of the staffers is so creepy-looking that he looks like he walked straight from an audition for playing Riff Raff in “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.”

Because the movie has numerous twists and turns, there’s only so much that can be described without giving away spoiler information. Melanie is taken to a high-tech room where she thinks she’s seeing a hologram of her former nemesis Sloane, who’s tied up and gagged and sitting in a torture-chamber chair. Melanie has fun pushing certain buttons on the control panel that cause Sloane to go through various forms of torture. But then Melanie figures out that the Sloane she’s seeing isn’t a hologram but the real person.

JD and Brax are taken to a massive pool party that looks like a commercial for a Hedonism II Resort, where they’re surrounded by gorgeous people (women for JD; men for Brax, who is openly gay) and whatever they want to get intoxicated. JD and Brax provide most of the comic relief in the film, although some of their poorly written jokes fall flatter than Mr. Roarke’s emotionless voice.

Meanwhile, Patrick isn’t having as much fun as the Weaver brothers. He’s been taken into the jungle by soldiers who start off by treating him like a prisoner, and he has to earn their respect to be part of the squad. As for Gwen, she wakes up to find herself reconnecting with someone she thought she would never see again.

The movie switches back and forth between all four fantasies until some of the fantasies start to overlap with one another. Some characters come and go without much explanation. Some characters might be real or they might be part of a fantasy. And the last 20 minutes of the film are absolutely bonkers with all the plot twists that try to tie in what happened earlier in the story.

“Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island” is like a giant tangled, rotting ball of yarn that keeps gathering dustballs of bad ideas on top of more bad ideas. You can try to untangle it to sort it all out, but it’s not worth it, and it’s best to avoid it altogether.

Columbia Pictures released “Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island” in U.S. cinemas on February 14, 2020.

Review: ‘The Lodge,’ starring Riley Keough, Jaeden Martell, Lia McHugh, Richard Armitage and Alicia Silverstone

February 4, 2020

by Carla Hay

Riley Keough, Jaeden Martell and Lia McHugh In “The Lodge” (Photo courtesy of Neon)

“The Lodge”

Directed by Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala

Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed U.S. suburb, the psychologicial horror film “The Lodge” has a cast of characters that are white and middle-class.

Culture Clash: Two underage children have resentment toward their father’s mysterious girlfriend, whom the children blame for their mother’s death.

Culture Audience: “The Lodge,” which is an arthouse version of a Lifetime movie, will appeal primarily to horror fans who like movies to be simple and very predictable.

Riley Keough In “The Lodge” (Photo courtesy of Neon)

If “The Lodge” were a Lifetime movie, the title would be “The Wrong Babysitter: Trapped in the Snow.” In their first English-language film, Austrian directors Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala (the duo who helmed the chilling 2014 horror film “Goodnight Mommy”) have taken a concept that’s fairly similar to “Goodnight Mommy”—two children and a woman isolated in a house—and made a watered-down, formulaic version of that idea. That’s not to say that “The Lodge” is a terrible movie, because the actors elevate a very sparse screenplay, which was co-written by Franz, Fiala and Sergio Casci. But because “The Lodge” telegraphs the villain’s intentions so early on in the story, it’s resulted in an utterly predictable film that breaks no new ground whatsoever.

The beginning of the movie is the most interesting, but it leaves a lot of questions unanswered. Laura Hall (played by Alicia Silverstone) is seen driving her two kids—17-year-old Aiden (played by Jaeden Martell) and 12-year-old Mia (played by Lia McHugh)—to a visit with the kids’ father, Laura’s estranged husband Richard (played by by Richard Armitage). As soon as they arrive, a tense Richard sends the kids off to get some candy at a nearby store because he says he wants to have a private talk with Laura.

During their conversation, Richard tells Laura that he wants to finalize their divorce because he wants to marry his girlfriend Grace. Laura’s devastated reaction indicates that she had been hoping that she and Richard were going to reconcile. The movie doesn’t come right out and say how long Richard and Laura have been separated and what caused their breakup, but it’s implied that Richard, who’s a newspaper journalist, left Laura for Grace, and it’s caused a lot of turmoil in the family.

That turmoil is evident in the car on the way to the visit, when Aiden makes it very clear that he despises Grace, because he tells his mother that he doesn’t even want to be around his dad’s girlfriend. Aiden dislikes her so much that he won’t even say her name. And when Richard and Laura are alone together at his place for their private talk, he reassures Laura before he begins the conversation: “She isn’t here.”

Within the first 10 minutes of the film, a tragedy occurs that results in Laura’s death. The heartbroken children find little comfort from their guilt-ridden father, because they partially blame him for their mother’s death. The other person the children blame is the mysterious Grace (played by Riley Keough), who doesn’t appear until about 20 minutes in the film, when Richard and the kids are about to take a family trip with her.

How did this fateful trip happen? Six months after Laura’s funeral, Richard nervously asks Aiden and Mia if it would be okay for Grace to come with them to their family lodge for the Christmas holiday season. The kids immediately say no. It’s not the response that Richard had hoped for, so he then puts the kids on a guilt trip by saying that they’re not giving Grace a chance to be a part of their family.

It’s at this time that Richard tells the children that he and Grace are getting married. And, of course, the kids take the news about as well as children being told that they have to live with an evil witch. Eventually, Richard loses patience with the kids’ stubborn refusal to accept Grace. He tells them that Grace will be spending the holidays with them at the lodge, so the kids have little choice but to accept those plans.

Before the trip, Aiden and Mia do some digging around on the Internet and find out that a rumor they heard about Grace is true: She used to be in a religious cult, where all the members except for Grace committed suicide when Grace was 12. There’s some eerie “found footage” of the mass suicide scene with Grace being discovered among the bodies, which have tape over their mouths and the word “sin” written on the tape. The kids also find Internet videos of the cult leader, a menacing-looking bearded priest, who’s portrayed in the movie by Riley Keough’s real-life father, Danny Keough.

Although the movie wants to establish that Aiden and Mia are bright young amateur detectives, this part of the story doesn’t have much credibility. In real life, the kids would’ve found out this information about Grace on the Internet as soon as they knew that their father was seriously dating her, and especially if that relationship broke up their parents’ marriage. It just doesn’t ring true that the kids would be curious about Grace’s background only after their mother’s death.

The kids don’t tell their father what they found out about Grace, which might seem odd, but that’s probably because the kids have a distant and tense relationship with their father since their mother died. It’s already been established that the children don’t like or trust Grace, and their father probably knows about Grace’s past but still wants to be with her, so the kids probably thought telling him this information wouldn’t change his mind. At any rate, neither Richard nor Grace discusses Grace’s past at all in this movie.

When Grace finally appears on screen, she seems to be the prototype of the “pretty younger girlfriend who ends up being a second wife.” But the way she’s written for this movie, she’s an incomplete sketch of a character. She’s generically pleasant on the surface, but there’s no mention of any interests that she has and what she’s doing with her life.

Although “The Lodge” screenwriters must have thought that keeping Grace so mysterious would benefit the story, it actually makes Grace a character that viewers won’t care about at all because she has no real personality. There’s no sense of how she was able to get into Richard’s life, what her previous relationships were like, and how she really feels about becoming a stepmother.

Grace is awkwardly polite to the kids as she tries to establish a rapport with them, but she also doesn’t acknowledge the impact that Laura had on the lives of the children and Richard. It’s almost as if she wants Laura to be erased from their lives—and that lack of empathy is a further indication of what Grace’s role is in this story.

However, there are so many questions that this movie puts forth but never answers: What was Grace’s life after the mass suicide? Why does Richard want to marry her, even knowing how much the marriage will hurt his kids? Is Grace just going to be a trophy wife or does she bring something more substantial to their relationship? Did she have any siblings? What were her parents like and how did they end up in the cult?

Because Grace’s personality is such an empty abyss and because the movie implies that she’s a “homewrecker,” it’s very clear that she’s going to be the story’s villain. And it’s also very obvious that things are not going to go well at the lodge when Richard suddenly has to leave for a few days because of a work-related matter, thereby leaving the kids alone with Grace. And before he leaves, he’s shown Grace the “family heirloom” gun and how to use it. To his surprise (but not to viewers’ surprise), she handles the gun like a pro during target practice.

And because these children are left alone with Grace, there’s only one way for the movie to go. The direction of the story is made even more obvious in the movie’s trailers. In the meantime, there’s a lot of flashbacks to the creepy leader of the cult, as his voice is heard echoing his stern orders: “Repent. Repent your sins.” There are some shadowy figures and strange messages scrawled on mirrors, but is it reality or it is something else?

When a blizzard hits the area, the power generator gets frozen, leaving the lodge without electricity. And that’s when weird things really start to happen. The contents of the refrigerator disappear. So do all the items in Grace’s drawers. And so does her dog that she brought on the trip. She blames the kids, who swear that they didn’t do anything wrong.

Riley Keough as Grace does a very good job with the limited character that she’s been given. Keough comes from a showbiz family—she’s the granddaughter of Elvis Presley and the eldest daughter of Lisa Marie Presley—and as an actress, she’s been doing solid appearances in mostly independent films. Martell (who’s best known for being in the “It” movies) is the movie’s other standout actor. He does a convincing portrayal of the emotionally wounded Aiden, who tries to be strong and protective of his younger sister. While Mia slowly warms up to Grace, Aiden never fully trusts Grace.

The pacing of “The Lodge” is meant to bring a slow burn to its suspense, but the movie seems to forget there’s really no suspense at all to this story and its inevitable ending. In between, there’s a lot of filler that has the intended spookiness, but the scares have been done much better in other “trapped in a snowstorm” horror flicks, most notably in 1980’s “The Shining” and 1982’s “The Thing.” Because of all that filler, “The Lodge” would have been much better-off as a short film with a length of less than 30 minutes.

Neon will release “The Lodge” in select U.S. cinemas on February 7, 2020.

Review: ‘Gretel & Hansel,’ starring Sophia Lillis, Sammy Leakey and Alice Krige

January 30, 2020

by Carla Hay

Sophia Lillis in "Gretel & Hansel"
Sophia Lillis in “Gretel & Hansel” (Photo by Patrick Redmond/Orion Pictures)

“Gretel & Hansel”

Directed by Osgood “Oz” Perkins

Culture Representation: The predominantly white cast of characters live in a fictional fantasy world from the ancient past, mostly depicting the working class and poor members of that society.

Culture Clash: Two underage runaway siblings find themselves staying at the house of an evil witch, who doesn’t want them to leave.

Culture Audience: “Gretel & Hansel” will appeal mostly to horror fans or people who like to see movie adaptations of classic fairly tales, but this movie’s uninspiring and weak story will surely disappoint most viewers.

Alice Krige in “Gretel & Hansel” (Photo by Patrick Redmond/Orion Pictures)

Just like a witch’s spell that makes something rotten appear to be enticing, “Gretel & Hansel” is a horror movie that looks visually thrilling, but it’s really an ugly mess. The movie is a reimagining of the classic Brothers Grimm fairy tale “Hansel and Gretel” (published in 1812 in Germany), but the movie’s ludicrous plot twists have very little resemblance to the original story. (The movie’s log line is “A Grim Fairy Tale,” a cheeky nod to the origin story.)

The core concept of “Hansel and Gretel” is still in the movie—a homeless young brother and sister try to survive by themselves in the woods when they are enticed into a house owned by a cannibalistic witch. But in this botched attempt to make “Gretel & Hansel” a dark feminist tale, director Osgood “Oz” Perkins and screenwriter Rob Hayes have put too much emphasis on style over substance, and they’ve sacrificed story development for gory scares that come too little, too late in the film. The hypnotic cinematography from Galo Olivares is the best thing about this dreadfully dull movie.

There are so many things wrong with “Gretel & Hansel” that the movie should be used as an example of what not to do in adapting a classic fairly tale into a movie. Sophia Lillis, who plays a teenage Gretel, is usually very talented—for now, she’s best known for being the token girl in the “It” movies—but she’s unfortunately miscast in this movie. Lillis definitely comes across as too modern for the role—and having a pixie haircut doesn’t make her a convincing Gretel—because she keeps her American accent and contemporary teenage mannerisms in a film that’s supposed to take place in a time long before the United States ever existed.

Meanwhile, Sammy Leakey who plays Greta’s brother Hansel (who’s about 7 to 9 years old) has a British accent, and the old, evil witch Holda (played by Alice Krige) has an accent that sounds like a mixture of Irish and Krige’s native South African. This hodgepodge of international accents is very distracting and ultimately a detriment to this movie that’s supposed to convey a very insular world.

It’s not as if all the characters should have had a German accent or even the same accent for the entire cast. It’s just lazy filmmaking for the movie’s two siblings, who grew up together, to have accents from two different countries. Lillis seems like a good-enough actress to at least try to have a British accent to match the Hansel character in the movie. As for Leakey’s acting skills, let’s just say that “Gretel & Hansel” was a very lucky break for him indeed.

“Gretel & Hansel” does not have a kindly father, who plays a crucial role in the original fairy tale. Instead, the siblings’ uncaring mother (whose has a British accent) is single and impoverished, and willing to prostitute Gretel out to a sleazy old man, who pretends to want to hire Gretel as a maid. After he makes it clear what his intentions are when he asks Gretel if she’s still “intact” (in other words, if she’s still a virgin), Gretel runs away and tells her mother, who scolds her for not doing what the man wanted for money. (That sexual-harassment subplot is definitely not in the original fairy tale.) Her mother resents Gretel for taking up space and threatens to send her to a convent. Gretel refuses to go because it would mean that she would be separated from Hansel.

Gretel then decides to runs away with Hansel, and they end up sleeping in what they think is an empty castle. But the castle owner (another creepy old man) shocks them out of their sleep and chases after them with murderous intent. He’s killed by a mystical character called The Hunter (played by Charles Babalola), a bow-and-arrow-slinging nomad, who kindly takes in Gretel and Hansel by giving them food and a temporary place to stay.

Gretel has been taught by her mother that people who show generosity will expect something in return, so Gretel is surprised when The Hunter doesn’t expect the siblings to repay his kindness. Instead, he advises Gretel and Hansel to offer their work services to the townspeople. He suggests that Hansel become a forester by developing tree-chopping skills, and Gretel could do traditional women’s work of harvesting and preparing food. The movie wants us to believe that Gretel is a smart and empowered feminist in the making (her interactions with Hansel are basically her telling him what to do and him questioning her), but her later actions in the story make you question her intelligence and leadership skills.

There are also a few quirks in “Gretel & Hansel” that don’t really fit with the foreboding atmosphere that is supposed to be portrayed. One of these quirks is the oddball way that characters in the movie make pig-snorting sounds as a sign of affection. Hansel and Gretel do this with each other, and then later the witch Holda does it too, as a way of trying to bond with the kids. It’s a weird component to the film that seems like a misguided attempt at humor.

Another thing that takes you out of the movie is when Holda drops a glass, which breaks on the floor, and she somewhat chuckles and utters something like, “Oh, well. Another one bites the dust.” Although the rock band Queen might be amused that this ancient witch namechecked a phrase their hit song made famous in pop culture, it’s an example of how awkward the writing is for this movie.

Another out-of-left-field moment happens when, after Gretel and Hansel leave The Hunter and before they see the witch’s house, the two siblings are wandering around while starving in the woods, and they eat mushrooms that turn out to be psychedelic. For about five minutes of the movie, people have to sit through a scene of two children having a drug trip. It’s played for laughs, and it’s an unnecessary scene that throws the apprehensive tone of the film a little off-balance.

Before they get to the witch’s house, Gretel sees some shadowy figures that look like witches in the distance. And a flashback backstory is shown about a girl from the past who was demonized by the townspeople for her magical powers, which include killing a cow just by staring at it. By the time Hansel and Gretel get to the witch’s house, you want some real horror to happen. Just like in the original fairy tale, a starving Hansel and Gretel go into the house when they see a lavish meal prepared on the table.

The witch who lives there startles them and keeps them there by offering them a place to stay and sumptuous meals every day. Gretel is automatically suspicious because she doesn’t see how the food is prepared and where it’s coming from—there’s plenty of meat and milk, but no cows or other animals on the property—but she stays because the food is too tempting and she doesn’t know where else to go. Meanwhile, Gretel keeps having visions of being in a room with a young witch (who looks less like an ancient witch and more like a Goth who just came from a Marilyn Manson concert) in a room where there’s a bloody tablecloth—and you can guess what’s underneath.

But “Gretel & Hansel” commits the worst sin of all for a horror movie: There are long stretches where nothing much happens except the protagonists (in this case, Hansel and Gretel) looking anxious or confused. Gretel has nightmares that are made to look like the events are happening in real time, but then you find out it was only a dream when she’s startled out of her sleep. This gimmick might be acceptable one time in a movie, but when it keeps happening in this type of horror flick, viewers’ patience will start to wear thin.

As the evil witch Holda, actress Krige oozes hellish decay and malevolence, even when Holda tries to appear maternal and protective. And truth be told, Holda is the one who has the most personality in the whole movie. Unfortunately, Gretel in this film is written as a monotonous shell of a person who thinks she’s smart, but she keeps making dumb decisions. (Hansel can’t be blamed for much because he’s too young to know better.)

The cinematography and production design for the movie are interesting, in that the witch’s house isn’t a complete stereotype of being musty and filled with spiderwebs. Most of the house’s interior is dark, but clean and bathed in a dark golden glow. There’s also a room that is entirely in white, to contrast with some very disturbing and bloody things that happen in that room. And Holda’s and other witches’ fingertips look like they were dipped in black paint, which is an aesthetic that isn’t really seen in movies with witch characters.

But all of those eye-catching motifs don’t mean much when the story and characters are nonsensical and tedious. For example, Gretel finds out at some point in the story that she has a specific power, which she doesn’t use until it’s almost too late. There’s no point in trying to make sense of this movie, because it doesn’t have a story or character worth caring about or remembering long after you’ve seen it.

Orion Pictures will release “Gretel & Hansel” in U.S. cinemas on January 31, 2020.

Review: ‘The Turning’ (2020), starring Mackenzie Davis, Finn Wolfhard, Brooklynn Prince and Joely Richardson

January 24, 2020

by Carla Hay

Mackenzie Davis and Brooklynn Prince in “The Turning” (Photo by Patrick Redmond/Universal Pictures and DreamWorks Pictures)

“The Turning” (2020)

Directed by Floria Sigismondi

Culture Representation: Taking place in a fictional Maine suburb, the predominantly white cast of characters represent people from the middle and upper classes.

Culture Clash: A supernatural ghost story, the main plot centers around a young live-in nanny who is being terrorized in a haunted house, and the two spoiled children under her care might or might not have something to do with it.

Culture Audience: “The Turning” will appeal primarily to horror fans who want a movie that doesn’t get too graphic in its violence, but the story leaves a lot to be desired in pacing and structure.

Finn Wolfhard and Brooklynn Prince in “The Turning” (Photo by Patrick Redmond/Universal Pictures and DreamWorks Pictures)

Some people might say that we’re living in a golden age of horror films, because of the horror genre’s resurgence in popularity. But long after movie studios keep churning out more predictable horror flicks, “The Turning” will be a forgotten mishap not even worthy of a footnote in movies about menacing ghosts and haunted houses.

“The Turning” (directed by Floria Sigismondi and written by identical twins Chad Hayes and Carey W. Hayes) takes place in 1994, so smartphones and the Internet aren’t going to be used as resources to get the characters out of danger. “The Turning” is based on the Henry James novella “The Turn of the Screw,” which is a classic work of art that “The Turning” never will be. There is no mysterious uncle in the movie, as there is in the novella, and the movie takes place in Maine (instead of England), but the basic plot remains the same.

Viewers know that “The Turning” takes place in 1994, because in one of the first scenes, there’s a newscast on TV about the upcoming memorial for Kurt Cobain, the Nirvana lead singer who died a few days earlier, according to the newscast. The TV is in the apartment home of 20-something Kate Mandell (played by Mackenzie Davis), who’s moving out because she’s quit her job as a schoolteacher to take a job as a live-in nanny to an elementary-school-aged girl named Flora Fairchild (played by the precocious Brooklynn Prince), who’s a rich orphan living in a remote mansion called the Bly estate. Kate’s roommate Rose (played by Kim Adis) doesn’t want her to go, but Kate has made up her mind, because as she says to Rose, she’d rather be responsible for one possibly unruly kid instead of classroom full of them.

The opening scene of “The Turning” shows a terrified blonde trying to escape from the mansion by car. We find out later who that woman was, but for the time being, Kate is blissfully unaware of the terror waiting for her. As Kate drives to the foreboding mansion for her first day on the job, the first plot hole appears, because based on her awestruck reactions, it’s the first time she’s ever been to the mansion. Even if Kate was hired through an agency, it’s still makes Kate look less-than-smart to not see for herself where she’d be living and working before she took the job. Now that it’s been established that Kate isn’t the brightest bulb in the drawer, since she’s taken a live-in job without ever visiting the place beforehand, the story moves on to her making even more illogical decisions.

When she arrives at the mansion, she’s greeted by the grim and uptight house manager Mrs. Grose (played by Barbara Marten), who tells Kate something that would give pause to any person with common sense: Flora must never leave the family property. Kate is presumably supposed to be Flora’s home-school tutor, but the movie never shows Kate doing any teaching or even asking about Flora’s curriculum.

And then Kate gets a surprise when she finds out that she has to take care of not only Flora but also her troubled 15-year-old bother Miles (played by Finn Wolfhard, who’s best known for his roles on Netflix’s “Stranger Things” series and Warner Bros. Pictures’ “It” movies). Kate unexpectedly meets Miles when he startles her during his visit home from boarding school. Miles is every bit of the rude, insolent creep that he appears to be. He likes to play mean-spirited pranks on Kate and sneak up on her while she’s sleeping. It isn’t long before Miles comes home to stay permanently, because he’s been expelled from school for viciously assaulting a fellow student, by choking the boy and bashing his head into the ground. The kid’s parents have declined to press charges, which is why Miles hasn’t been arrested.

Even after Kate gets this information, she still stays. Mrs. Grose, the ultimate toxic enabler, makes excuses for Miles, and constantly reminds Kate that Miles and Flora are “thoroughbreds” and “privileged” and deserve to catered to by “the help.” She scolds Kate when Kate tries to discipline the kids in a reasonable way. It’s also obvious that Mrs. Grose knows a lot of the estate’s dirty secrets.

Throughout the course of the movie, Kate learns that several other nannies have quit and that three people have died on the property in the past few years: Miles and Flora’s parents (who died in a car accident) and Peter Quint, the horse-riding instructor, who died under mysterious circumstances. (Quint, who is seen in flashbacks and in photos, is played by Niall Greig Fulton.)

Mrs. Grose tells Kate that Quint was a bad influence on Miles (they would disappear together for hours), and Quint had some kind of sexual relationship with Miss Jessell (played by Denna Thomsen), the nanny who had the job before Kate did. The relationship ended badly, and Miss Jessell abruptly disappeared. Quint died shortly after the disappearance. Kate discovers Miss Jessel’s journal that reveals Quint had an unhealthy obsession with Miss Jessel and she was terrified of him. Even after getting all of these warning signs, Kate still stays. And she finds out the hard way what a mistake that is.

“The Turning” is director Sigsmondi’s return to helming feature films after a 10-year absence. (Her previous feature was the little-seen and underrated rock music biopic “The Runaways,” which was such a flop when it was released in March 2010, it was one of the reasons why its independent distributor Apparition went out of business a month after the movie’s release.) Sigismondi, who started her directing career with music videos and has been working mainly in television for the past several years, gets all the visual elements of “The Turning” right, for what could have been an intriguing ghost story. Kudos should also be given to the movie’s cinematography (by David Ungaro), the production design (by Paki Smith) and art direction (by Nigel Pollock), for creating a convincing atmosphere of horror and doom.

But it’s all wasted on a subpar screenplay that ruins the movie. The movie’s pacing also does little to build suspense. Kate has frightening encounters with the ghosts fairly early on in the story, but every time it happens, she has the same reactions: She screams, she blames the kids, and she decides to stay. It becomes too repetitive and ultimately annoying. There are also aspects of the story that could have been interesting but are instead dangled in front of the audience and never fully explained. For example, viewers will get no clear answers for why Flora isn’t supposed to leave the property and why she has a panic attack if she thinks she’s going to be forced to leave.

The actors do a very competent job with the problematic script that they’ve been given. Davis doesn’t have much to work with in portraying Kate’s personality or intelligence, because Kate is a very underdeveloped character who keeps making bad decisions. As Flora Fairchild, talented actress Prince, who had a breakout film debut as a foul-mouthed brat in 2017’s “The Florida Project,” is playing another girl who’s wise beyond her years while still maintaining child-like innocence in some ways. Wolfhard’s Miles Fairchild is obviously the more sinister sibling, and his sociopathic creepiness is actually more disturbing than some of the predictable scares that the ghosts inflict on Kate.

On a side note, it’s always kind of amusing to see these haunted houses suddenly have lights that don’t work, because the protagonists inevitably end up in dark rooms where they don’t/can’t/won’t turn on the lights. And if they’re using a flashlight or a candle to see, the flashlight or candle usually gets dropped when the inevitable ghost scare happens.

The Hayes brothers’ screenplay for “The Turning” really is the movie’s weakest link, which is such a letdown, since they’re capable of writing much better ghost-story horror movies. (Their screenwriting credits include “The Conjuring,” “The Conjuring 2” and “Annabelle.”) Most horror movies about haunted houses have to explain why the people in those houses don’t just move out after it becomes unsafe to live there. The reason is usually because they’ve bought the house and they recently moved into the house, so they’re already invested in staying. Moving out abruptly without another place to live could be an expensive mistake for them.

Back when the “The Turn of the Screw” was published in 1898, women didn’t have very many options on what they could do with their lives and where they could live. But it’s 1994 in “The Turning,” and Kate certainly has plenty of options that she foolishly doesn’t take. (Such as: Leave and get another job.) Another option, which most people in haunted houses do in horror movies, is to go to the authorities or consult with a spiritual expert to get rid of the ghosts. Kate does none of that, and as things get more dangerous for her, she still stays.

However, since Kate doesn’t own the mansion, and they’re clearly not paying her enough for her to justify staying, it doesn’t make sense that Kate stays as long as she does when she starts seeing ghosts, she gets locked into rooms, and she’s assaulted by mysterious forces. The movie gives a weak explanation for Kate staying: In a phone conversation, she tells her former roommate Rose (who practically begs Kate to quit the job and move back in with her) that she doesn’t want to leave because she made a promise to Flora to never abandon her, and Kate doesn’t want to emotionally damage the child. (It doesn’t cross Kate’s mind that the kid could afford to get a good therapist.)

You see, Kate has her own abandonment issues, because her father left Kate and her mother Darla (played by Joely Richardson) when Kate was a child. Darla has been in a psychiatric institution for several years (there’s a scene where Kate visits her there but Kate doesn’t stay long), and Darla might or might not have psychic powers that most people think are delusions. Kate has some hangups about possibly inheriting Darla’s mental illness and being perceived as crazy, which is the movie’s way of explaining why Kate doesn’t get help or report all the bizarre and dangerous things that keep happening to her on the Bly estate.

Darla likes to draw her visions, and she shows her artwork to Kate. The artwork is explained toward the end of the movie, which concludes in such a disappointing way, that it’s bound to confuse and frustrate viewers. (At the screening I attended, a lot of people gasped in disgust at the ridiculous ending.) “The Turning” is one of those movies that has a misleading trailer that makes the film look a lot better than it actually is. Just like a dimwitted person who knowingly stays in a haunted house after being attacked by ghosts, viewers should know what they’re getting into with “The Turning” and experience it at their own risk.

Universal Pictures and DreamWorks Pictures released “The Turning” in U.S. cinemas on January 24, 2020.

Review: ‘Zombi Child,’ starring Louise Labeque, Wislanda Louimat, Katiana Milfort, Mackenson Bijou

January 24, 2020

by Carla Hay

Louise Labeque and Wislanda Louimat in "Zombi Child"
Louise Labeque and Wislanda Louimat in “Zombi Child” (Photo courtesy of Film Movement)

“Zombi Child”

Directed by Bertrand Bonello

French with subtitles

Culture Representation: Set in modern-day France and 1962 Haiti, the horror film “Zombi Child” has a racially diverse cast of white and black actors who portray the upper-class and working-class.

Culture Clash: The movie shows what happens when the worlds of voodoo and zombies collide and span different generations.

Culture Audience: “Zombi Child” will appeal to people who like their horror films to be artsy and somewhat unpredictable.

Clockwise from lower left: Adilé David, Ninon François, Mathilde Riu, Louise Labeque and Wislanda Louimat in “Zombi Child” (Photo courtesy of Film Movement)

Most zombie stories take place in a post-apocalyptic setting where zombies have taken over the world, so it’s refreshing when a zombie story raises the possibility that zombies could be walking among us in the current world, and they don’t have the obvious appearance of rotting, flesh-eating corpses. The French-language horror film “Zombi Child” is a moody, atmospheric and occasionally disturbing zombie story with scares that are more psychological than bloody and gory.

“Zombi Child,” written and directed by Bertrand Bonello, takes place in two different countries in two different eras: contemporary France and 1962 Haiti. The movie starts out in a deceptively “normal” and “controlled” setting: a prestigious boarding school for teenage girls. Almost all of the students are white except for a new arrival named Mélissa (played by Wislanda Louimat), a Haitian orphan whose parents died in the earthquake that devastated Haiti in 2010. Mélissa is currently living in France with her aunt Katy (played by Katiana Milfort). 

As a new student, Mélissa is treated like an outsider. She doesn’t seem to mind too much about being a loner at school, and her mysterious confidence intrigues a fellow classmate named Fanny (played by Louise Labeque), who leads a clique of popular girls at the school.

Inside and outside of classes, Mélissa and Fanny strike up a tentative acquaintance. Although Fanny might look like she’s in control of her life on the outside, on the inside, she’s experiencing a lot of turmoil. In voiceovers, we hear her talking to a boyfriend, whom she says she misses terribly and can’t wait to be in his arms again. Is she reading a letter? Is she thinking about the last time she talked to him? Or is she imagining a conversation that she’s having with him?

We find out later that the boyfriend’s name is Pablo and something has happened in his relationship with Fanny that has caused her a lot of despair, to the point where she’s ready to do something extreme. Meanwhile, Fanny hides her troubles away from the people she knows and acts as if nothing is wrong with her.

Fanny eventually decides to let Mélissa into her clique, which secretly meets at night to drink alcohol and gossip in one of the empty classrooms. One night, Mélissa joins them for one of their candlelit meetings, and Fanny tells her that she can officially join the group if Mélissa tells them a secret and if they like what Mélissa tells them.

Mélissa then reads them a poem-like statement called “Captain Zombi” about African-descended zombies taking back power from white oppressors. While the other girls go in another room to decide if Mélissa can join the group, she stays inside the room and listens to music. The girls come back in the room and tell her that she’s been accepted into the group.

Fanny wants to hear more about Mélissa and her family background, so Mélissa tells them about being an orphan. Mélissa also mentions that she lives with her aunt when she’s not at the boarding school. Mélissa says that her aunt is a mambo. Later, Fanny looks up “female mambo” on the Internet and sees that it means someone who practices voodoo.

Intrigued, Fanny finds Mélissa’s address and shows up unannounced at the house of Mélissa’s aunt. She tells the aunt that she knows Mélissa from school, and so the woman lets her in the house. It’s there that Fanny makes a very unusual request.

Meanwhile, there are mysterious flashbacks to Haiti in 1962, where we see a black man named Clairvius Narcisse (played by Mackenson Bijou), who’s been sent to work at a sugar plantation. He appears to be mute and acting like a zombie. Who this man is and what happened to him are revealed in the movie.

Meanwhile, Mélissa’s roommate tells Fanny that Mélissa has been making strange grunting noises at night, and she doesn’t know if she’s making the noises while awake or in some kind of trancelike state. Mélissa is also heard making the noises while she’s in other places on campus, so it’s established that she’s definitely making the noises while she’s awake.

“Zombi Child” is not going to satisfy zombie fans who are looking for scenes of people being chased by rabid zombies. (The actual horror scenes in the film aren’t until near the end.) The movie takes an approach that being in a zombie-like state is more of a demonic spiritual possession rather than a physical transformation where people turn into monster cannibals. “Zombi Child” is an artsy horror film, but underneath the surface is a nuanced commentary on social classes and what happens when people are complacent about wrongful oppression.

Film Movement released “Zombi Child” in select U.S. cinemas on January 24, 2020. The movie was originally released in France in 2019.

Review: ‘Color Out of Space,’ starring Nicolas Cage

January 23, 2020

by Carla Hay

Nicolas Cage in “Color Out of Space” (Photo courtesy of RLJE Films)

“Color Out of Space”

Directed by Richard Stanley

Culture Representation: The movie’s characters are predominately white (with one African American, one Chinese Canadian and one Native American) who live in the fictional rural town of Arkham, Massachusetts. 

Culture Clash: After a meteorite crashes on a family farm and strange things start to happen, the movie’s characters have conflicting degrees of skepticism and beliefs over what is logical science and what is the unexplainable supernatural. 

Culture Audience: “Color Out of Space” will appeal the most to fans of campy B-movies in the sci-fi and horror genres.

“Color Out of Space” (Photo courtesy of RLJE Films)

Sometime in the 2010s, Oscar winner Nicolas Cage stopped being an A-list actor and started doing a steady stream of low-budget films (many of them released direct-to-video), where he usually plays a character who’s somewhere on the crazy spectrum. Cage has been very open in media interviews that his financial problems (wild spending, lawsuits over non-payment and IRS liens) have forced him to sell off many of his prized possessions. Apparently, this downsizing also extends to the budget and quality of movie jobs he’s been taking.

But somewhere along the way, Cage decided to have fun with these C-list movies by going into high-gear campiness in these roles. (His 2018 revenge flick “Mandy” already has a cult following.) Even though Cage tends to make films in the genres of action, drama and horror, make no mistake: His gleefully unhinged performances are now bringing a lot of comedy to his films.

In “Color Out of Space” (which is based on H.P. Lovecraft’s short story “The Colour Out of Space), Cage plays Nathan Gardner, the patriarch of a five-person clan living on a farm in the fictional rural town of Arkham, Massachusetts. The family, who used to live in a big city, includes Nathan’s wife Theresa (played by Joely Richardson), a recent survivor of breast cancer; teenage daughter Liviana (played by Madeleine Arthur), who fancies herself to be a Wiccan-inspired witch; teenage son Benny (played by Brendan Meyer), a rebellious stoner; and pre-teen son Jack (played by Julian Hillard), a near-perfect child who gets along with everyone.

In the film’s opening scene in a secluded wooden area, Liviana is wearing an outfit that looks like she’s on the way to a Renaissance Faire (cape and all), as she calls out to the spirits of earth, air, water, fire and ether to help heal her mother from cancer. She’s even got a white horse, which might be part of her attempt to look like some kind of fairy mystical princess. This is director Richard Stanley’s not-so-subtle way of telling the audience that Liviana represents someone who believes in the supernatural.

While she’s in this secluded spot, in walks Ward Phillips (played by Elliot Knight), who introduces himself as a hydrologist who’s surveying the water in the area. Ward seems to be kind of amused by Liviana’s outfit and her spiritual ritual, and he makes it clear that he’s a scientist who doesn’t believe in any of that witchy mumbo jumbo. Okay, we get it. Ward and Liviana are opposites.

Back at the farm, Liviana and Benny engage in some verbal sparring and name-calling (something they do several times in the movie) before the family settles in for the night. Their night is massively interrupted when a magenta glow takes over the atmosphere, and there’s a loud boom that feels like an explosion. Running outside, the family sees that a magenta meteorite surrounded by smoke has crashed into the front yard.

Ward and local law enforcement Sheriff Pierce (played by Josh C. Waller), who’s apparently the only cop on duty in this remote area, investigate the meteorite and don’t know what to make of it. Ward, who touches the meteor with his bare hands (not a very safe or scientific thing to do), advises the Gardners not to drink the water from their well until they can figure out what’s going on. Near the meteorite, there’s also a horrible odor that Nathan describes as smelling like a dog has been lit on fire.

Speaking of animals, Nathan is very proud to own several alpacas on the farm. He mentions the alpacas so much in the movie that it’s almost as if the screenwriters (director Stanley and Scarlett Amaris) deliberately made all these references to alpacas so people could make a drinking game out of it. It isn’t long before everyone on the farm (yes, including the alpacas) start to act strangely.

When the meteor first hit, Jack was temporarily in a catatonic state, but then he snapped out of it. Theresa also has a trance-like blackout while she’s cutting carrots in the kitchen. And let’s just say that the carrots aren’t the only things that get sliced. Then just as suddenly as the meteorite appeared, it disappeared from the yard. But the strange occurrences continue, such as weird voices amid static on the phone. And then Jack suddenly acts like he can hear voices that no one else can hear.

And what is famous stoner comedian Tommy Chong doing in this movie? Playing a hippie stoner named Ezra, a recluse who claims that he can find out what’s going on with all of these unexplained and frightening incidents. Ward spends some time at Ezra’s place to hear out his wild theories, but the mystery continues.

There are some glaring plot holes in this movie that are bigger than the crater left by the meteorite. Ward doesn’t do what a real scientist would do—contact his scientist colleagues to get their opinions. He’s the only science-based investigator in the entire movie. And even though the strange sightings make the local TV news (where a reporter openly mocks Nathan in an interview and makes Nathan look like a UFO-sighting nutjob), the publicity doesn’t bring out any curiosity seekers (including scientists) to the farm to take a look for themselves. But hey, this is a low-budget movie with a small cast. Don’t judge too harshly, because this movie doesn’t take itself too seriously.

It becomes apparent that the meteorite brought some non-human, unexpected and unwanted visitors to the area. And things get worse, as some members of the Gardner family develop a gruesome skin condition that leaves them writhing in pain. And one member of the family might or might not descend into madness. (Take a wild guess who it is. )

All of the actors in the film except for Cage are playing it straight in this deliberately bizarre horror flick. Cage’s wild, over-the-top mannerisms invite people to laugh along at the silliness of it all. (There were plenty of laughs at the screening that I attended, and they were all because of how Cage was acting on screen.) The visual effects are standard for this type of low-budget film, except for the last 15 minutes when there is some truly stunning imagery that’s more than a nod to psychedelia.

Crazy Cage, Crazy Chong and crazy, bloody chaos. What more could you want in a horror film? Oh, that’s right. Don’t forget the alpacas.

RLJE Films will release “Color Out of Space” in select U.S. cinemas and on VOD on January 24, 2020.

Review: ‘Get Gone,’ starring Lin Shaye, Weston Cage Coppola, Robert Miano and Bradley Stryker

January 20, 2020

by Carla Hay

Bailey Coppola and Lin Shaye in “Get Gone” (Photo courtesy of Cleopatra Entertainment)

“Get Gone”

Directed by Michael Thomas Daniel

Culture Representation: Taking place in the fictional rural town of Whiskey Flats, Oregon, “Get Gone” has a cast of American characters who are predominantly white, with a few characters who are African American and Asian.

Culture Clash: A low-budget slasher flick, “Get Gone” shows the conflicts that arise between a sinister backwoods family and anyone who dares to go to the remote area where the family lives.

Culture Audience: Even the most avid horror fans will have a hard time sitting through this poorly made film that isn’t very scary.

Robert Miano in “Get Gone” (Photo courtesy of Cleopatra Entertainment)

Ripping off more than a few ideas from the 1980 “Friday the 13th” film (the first film in the “Friday the 13th” series), the horror flick “Get Gone” is a chore and a bore to watch. And it has nothing to do with the movie’s obviously low budget, because there are plenty of low-budget films that have better-than-average direction and writing. (For example, Oren Peli’s first “Paranormal Activity” movie, which is still the best in the “Paranormal Activity” horror series, was reportedly made for only $15,000.) “Get Gone,” written and directed by Michael Thomas Daniel, looks like a student film that would barely get a passing grade at any top-notch film school. As bad as the movie is, it would be somewhat redeemable if the film could be in the “so bad it’s funny” category, but “Get Gone” has almost no sense of humor. Some of the acting is more painful to watch than the movie’s unrealistic murder scenes.

The “Get Gone” plot is pretty simple: An elderly couple—Don Maxwell (played by Robert Miano) and Mama Maxwell (played by Lin Shaye)—live with their two adult sons in a secluded house in the backwoods of the fictional small town of Whiskey Flats, Oregon. And they’re mad as hell. The Maxwell parents have been living on the property for more than 30 years. But now, fracking companies have been drilling in the area, and the owner of the property wants the Maxwells to move.

The state of Oregon has also been battling with the Maxwells for years to leave the property, which is a state game refuge that prohibits hunting. The state claims that the Maxwells have been living on the property illegally, but the Maxwells obviously don’t agree. In the film’s opening scene, a fracking company official named Rico (played by Rico Anderson) has the unpleasant task of telling Don and Mama Maxwell that they’ve run out of time to stay on the property, and that it won’t be long before some men will come over to evict the Maxwells for good.

Meanwhile, there’s a viral video that has started an urban legend that visitors to the property have been disappearing and have probably been killed. (You know where this is headed.) It isn’t long before Hoax Busters, a group whose specialty is debunking urban legends, have traveled from out of town and gathered in the area’s local saloon. The five Hoax Busters people at the saloon are a boss in his 40s named Grant (played by Bradley Stryker) and four of his underlings who are in their 20s: nervous Abbey (played by Emily Shenaut), sassy Connie (played by Caitlin Stryker), wisecracking Kyle (played by Cory Crouser) and arrogant Scott (played by Luke B. Carlson).

They’re all are going to the woods for a “team-building trip” for a few days, but they’re really there to prove that the urban legend about the area is a hoax. They tell one of the saloon patrons that they’re going to the game refuge, and the local guy tells them that the people in the area don’t like tourists. Two of the young people from the Hoax Busters tourist party—Rene (played by Brittany Benita) and Tommy (played by Tristan David Luciotti)—are already hiking in the wooded area, when they’re startled to see a bearded man in his 20s, who gives them a menacing stare and growls at them: “Get gone.”

Back at the saloon, the group has a tour guide named Craig Eubanks (played by Adam Bitterman), who shows up to take them on the tour. Craig is a weird mix of goofy and cocky. His smarmy aura indicates that he’s willing to break the law for the right price. Rico shows up at the saloon and warns Craig and the tour group not to go on the private property where the Maxwells live. (But of course, we all know that warning won’t be heeded.)

Rico then tells them about the Maxwell family history and why the Maxwells are so bitter: The fracking poisoned the water, causing the Maxwell kids to have an unnaturally white pigment to their skin when they were born—and who knows how the poisoned water could’ve affected them mentally. It’s one of many plot holes in the movie’s script, which doesn’t explain why only the Maxwells were affected by the drinking water and not the other people in the area who presumably drank the same water.

Before the tour group heads up to the area, their colleagues Rene and Tommy in the woods have the misfortune of witnessing the Maxwell sons—older brother Patton (played by Weston Cage Coppola), who was the bearded man seen earlier, and his mute, mask-wearing brother Apple (played by Bailey Coppola)—react violently when two of the fracking company workers confront the brothers. Let’s just say that a scythe and a rope are used as murder weapons, and the Maxwell sons are not the ones who end up dead.

In fact, much like “Friday the 13th” villain Jason Voorhees (another mute, mask-wearing serial killer who came from a secluded, wooded area), Apple is able to survive wounds that would kill a person in real life. It should come as no surprise that this death-defying ability will become apparent in the obligatory scene where someone we’re supposed to think has been killed isn’t really dead after all. It’s become such a cliché in slasher flicks, that entire film franchises have been built on these type of fake death scenes.

“Get Gone” is such an amateur film that when the scythe is used to hack someone to death, there isn’t even any blood spatter. And the Maxwell brothers’ skin pallor is described in the movie as being like an albino. But the makeup for the film is appallingly sloppy, because it just looks like white powder haphazardly coated on the skin instead of a convincing-looking skin condition. Furthermore, the acting is incredibly stilted and awkward in scenes that are supposed to be suspenseful. There are tacky homemade videos on YouTube that are scarier than “Get Gone.”

Since movies like this are supposed to have a dead body count, it isn’t long before the rest of the people in the Hoax Busters tour group arrive by van in the wooded area, where they plan to camp out for a few days. Craig, their obnoxious guide, orders them to hand over their phones, which he gives to the van driver, who drives off with the phones. (Of course he does, because why would people in a horror movie who are going to a remote area for the first time with a creepy guy they’ve never met before need their phones in case of an emergency?) As one of the guys in the group says, they want to see if the “mythic albinos” really exist.

Sadly, the amateur filmmaking of “Get Gone” leaves one to wonder: What is scream queen Shaye (who’s best known for the “Insidious” films series) doing in this embarrassing mess? She’s done many horror B-movies before, but nothing that sinks to this level of awful. She didn’t do this movie for the money, because “Get Gone” obviously had an incredibly low budget. Maybe she owed someone a favor. Her agent certainly wasn’t doing her any favors by letting her sign on to this terrible project, which luckily for her won’t be seen by very many people.

How bad are the lines that Shaye has to utter in this movie? Here’s an example of what her Mama Maxwell character says when she rants to a visitor about the persecution she says her family has endured: “There are a lot of mean people. I mean mean! You know what I mean when I say ‘mean’?”

And yes, the Coppola actors in this movie are from that Coppola family: Weston Cage Coppola is the elder son of Oscar-winning actor Nicolas Cage. Bailey Coppola is the son of Christopher Coppola, who is one of Nicolas Cage’s siblings. And they’re all related to Oscar-winning filmmakers Francis Ford Coppola and Sofia Coppola. Maybe “Get Gone” is Weston and Bailey’s way of proving to the world that they’re really not using the family name to get into quality movies.

Horror is not a movie genre that typically gets Oscars and other prestigious awards. People already know that it’s not a genre that appeals to film snobs. But even horror fans expect a certain level of competent acting, directing and storytelling that “Get Gone” doesn’t deliver. In this day and age where independent filmmakers have more access to affordable equipment now than in previous decades, and people have more entertainment choices than ever before, there’s really no good excuse to take the lazy way out and make a garbage movie that’s a waste of people’s time.

Cleopatra Entertainment will release “Get Gone” in select U.S. cinemas on January 24, 2020, and on VOD on January 28, 2020.

Review: ‘The Host’ (2020), starring Maryam Hassouni, Mike Beckingham and Dougie Poynter

January 17, 2020

by Carla Hay

Maryam Hassouni and Mike Beckingham in "The Host"
Maryam Hassouni and Mike Beckingham in “The Host” (Photo by Ashley Paton Photography/Pearl Pictures Productions)

“The Host” (2020)

Directed by Andy Newberry

Culture Representation: Taking place in London and Amsterdam, the cast of white and Asian actors portray a mixture of middle-class professionals, seedy underworld figures and wealthy heirs.

Culture Clash: This film is a classic case of the “haves” versus the “have nots,” the crimes that people will commit to get more money, and how much they might or might nor get away with their crimes.

Culture Audience: “The Host” will appeal most to people who like B-movie thrillers with very familiar tropes that borrow heavily from Alfred Hitchcock’s classic horror film “Psycho.”

Suan-Li Ong in “The Host” (Photo by Ashley Paton Photography/Pearl Pictures Productions)

“The Host” (directed by Andy Newberry) is an uneven, mostly watchable film that wraps itself in the guise of being a crime caper, but the gruesome elements of the story leave no doubt that this is a modern horror flick that will strike some fear into people who venture into a stranger’s home (no matter how lavish it is) for a place to stay. The movie takes quite a bit of time (about half of the film) before viewers get to see the film’s title character.

During the course of the movie, “The Host” screenwriters Finola Geraghty, Brendan Bishop and Laurence Lamers repeat major elements from writer/director Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 classic “Psycho,” including having three of these main characters: a thief on the run who needs a place to stay; a concerned sibling who goes looking for the thief after the thief goes missing; and a reclusive, mysterious host who lives in a foreboding mansion and who has some serious parental issues.

But first, viewers get to know the thief whose actions propel the chain of events that drive the story. In London, gambling addict Robert Atkinson (played by Mike Beckingham) has been stuck in a dead-end job as a bank teller for years. Robert smokes too much, drinks too much, and makes bad choices in his love life, such as sleeping with a married woman (a co-worker), who ends up ending their affair.

Robert and his younger brother Steve (played by Dougie Poynter, a musician/actor who’s best known outside the U.S. as the bass player for the pop/rock band McFly) spent much of their childhood as orphans. Robert looked out for Steve in their younger days. But now, their sibling roles have reversed. Steve, who’s a married father, is the responsible brother who lends Robert money, while bachelor Robert has been stagnating in a self-destructive rut—much to Steve’s worried disapproval.

One day, a customer walks into the bank to deposit £50,000 in cash. The bank manager entrusts Robert to handle the money and place it in a security deposit box. But since Robert is heavily in debt and doesn’t want to quit gambling, he can’t resist the temptation of stealing the money—even though he knows that surveillance cameras in the bank probably caught him in the act. Robert uses the money to gamble at a local gambling parlor, which looks like it’s run by mobster types with menacing-looking thugs as security. It should come as no surprise that Robert loses in a poker game—£2,000, to be exact—and his opponent demands payment from Robert the next day.

But then, a much older, mysterious man (played by Togo Igawa), who’s been quietly observing Robert in the parlor, approaches Robert and offers him a deal that sounds too good to be true: Take a briefcase, fly to Amsterdam, exchange it for a suitcase that will be given to him by a pre-arranged stranger, and bring the suitcase back to London. But don’t open the cases and don’t ask any questions. All the travel arrangements have already been made, the man tells Robert. And if the task is completed, the man will give Robert £150,000 in cash.

Everything about this deal screams “illegal” or “setup,” but Robert agrees to it, since he’s desperate to pay off his debts and have enough money left over to replace the stolen cash before anyone notices it’s gone. The enigmatic stranger who makes the offer has all the signs of being a crafty and powerful criminal, including his willingness throw all that cash around on someone he’s just met. He also surrounds himself with security goons and an attractive woman named Jun Hui (played by Suan Li-Ong).

Even though Robert makes some dumb choices (it wouldn’t be a horror movie if people didn’t), he’s smart enough to know that there’s a sinister plot in the works, and so his nerves are on edge as he boards the plane to Amsterdam. Robert is so nervous that he doesn’t notice that Jun Hui and a male companion named Yong (played by Tom Wu) have followed him to the airport and have boarded the same plane, where they conveniently sit a few rows away so they can be close enough to watch Robert.

Robert is seated in the same row as a talkative and friendly man (played by Nigel Barber), who introduces himself as an airplane security expert. He later tells Robert, as he offers to give him a ride from the airport, that his name is Herbert Summers. Since “The Host” is also a mystery thriller, of course not everyone is who they first seem to be.

That’s certainly true of Vera Tribbe (played by Maryam Houssini), the Amsterdam heiress who hosts traveling strangers in her mansion when her scruffy friend Gerrie (played by Reinout Bussemaker) overbooks the dumpy hostel that he runs in the back of a local café. This type of overbooking happens to a flustered Robert, who’s told by Gerrie that, as an apology, Robert will get an upgrade stay at Vera’s place at no extra charge. Gerrie explains that Vera is a dear friend who makes these accommodations as a favor to Gerrie.

Here are a few things to learn from the bad decisions that people make in horror movies:

(1) Don’t get involved in mysterious deliveries for a stranger, no matter how much money is involved.
(2) Don’t hand over your passport to a stranger who says they’ll need to temporarily keep it.
(3) Don’t accept drinks from a stranger if there’s a possibility that the drinks could be spiked with something harmful.

When Robert goes missing, the police are reluctant to get involved because the Tribbe family is the most powerful family in Amsterdam. During this manhunt, secrets are revealed to sometimes grisly results. The cast members of “The Host” will not be winning any acting awards for this movie, but some of the cast members are better than others. Poynter stands out as being the most credible with his character’s emotions, while Houssani’s acting range is distractingly uneven, veering from awkward to melodramatic.

The movie has so much of “Psycho” in it, that it’s a blatant homage or ripoff, depending on your perspective. Because “The Host” recycles key characteristics of Hitchcock’s most influential film, this lack of originality is ultimately a major flaw of “The Host” that can’t be ignored. The people who will enjoy this movie the most are those who don’t know anything about “Psycho,” since they won’t be able to guess what’s going to happen in the story.

Vertical Entertainment released “The Host” in select U.S. cinemas and on VOD on January 17, 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTCRD6Pquh8

Review: ‘Underwater,’ starring Kristen Stewart

January 10, 2020

by Carla Hay

Kristen Stewart in “Underwater”
Kristen Stewart in “Underwater” (Photo by Alan Markfield)

“Underwater”

Directed by William Eubank

Culture Representation: The movie’s characters are a predominately white, educated crew of underwater explorers (with one African American and one Asian) who are tasked with drilling for resources in the deep ocean when they come under attack and fight for their lives.

Culture Clash: Telling a story with an implied environmental message, “Underwater” shows what happens when deep-ocean creatures fight back against humans who plunder their territory.

Culture Audience: “Underwater” will primarily appeal to those looking for a suspenseful sci-fi/horror movie that won’t be considered a classic but will provide about 90 minutes of escapist entertainment.

Kristen Stewart in “Underwater” (Photo by Alan Markfield)

Kristen Stewart: action hero? Taking massive cues from Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley character in “Alien,” Stewart goes from brainy, introspective crew member to kick-ass warrior, as she takes on deep-sea monsters in the sci-fi/horror film “Underwater.” After starring in the 2019 comedy reboot fiasco of Columbia Pictures’ “Charlie’s Angels,” Stewart (who’s been making mostly arty indie films for the past several years) has taken another step into major-studio action fare—but in 20th Century Fox’s “Underwater,” she’s going for scares instead of laughs.

During the opening credits of “Underwater,” there are flashes of media headlines and news reports about unconfirmed sightings of mysterious creatures in the deep ocean. According to the headlines, a major corporation named Kepler has been mining the deep oceans for resources, and hasn’t been giving full explanations for why employees have apparently disappeared from the underwater drilling sites. These elaborate, high-tech facilities (which are seven miles below the ocean surface) look like a cross between a factory, a spaceship and an underground bunker. They’re so high-tech that the Kepler workers living in these facilities for weeks or months at a time don’t need to wear oxygen masks or submarine suits when they’re in the building.

Within the first five minutes of the film, we’re barely introduced to Stewart’s mechanical/electrical engineer character Norah Price (who looks pensive as she brushes her teeth, muses about her isolation in a voiceover, and thinks about her broken love affair with her former fiancé) when the facility is hit with a massive explosion that kills many people in the crew and destroys the emergency equipment. Six of the surviving crew members, including Norah, find each other and agree to a desperate plan to walk across the ocean floor to an abandoned facility named Roebuck, in the hopes that Roebuck’s emergency equipment still works so they can escape or call for help.

The other five crew members are crew captain Lucien (played by Vincent Cassel), a take-charge Frenchman who has a 14-year-old daughter waiting for him at home; marine biology student Emily (played by Jessica Henwick), an inquisitive type who scares easily; operations expert Smith (played by John Gallagher Jr.), who’s in a romantic relationship with Emily; systems manager Rodrigo (Mamoudou Athie), a solid guy who has a dorky side; and wisecracking Paul (played by T.J. Miller, who can’t seem to break out of his typecast as a supporting character who’s socially awkward and talks too much). They soon find out what caused the explosion (Hint: It wasn’t faulty equipment.)

Because the frantic action begins so early in the film, the “Underwater” screenplay by Brian Duffield and Adam Cozad doesn’t leave much room for character development. The actors do the best that they can with the generic characters and mostly forgettable dialogue that were written for them. The movie’s biggest asset, under the choppy direction of William Eubank, is the way it ramps up suspense, even if there are glaring plot holes the size of the ocean where these crew members are trapped. The visual effects for the sea monsters also achieve their intended impact, but the creatures’ very existence in the ocean (much like Godzilla) requires a huge suspension of disbelief. And cinematographer Bojan Bazelli serves up some compelling shots that might give some people the feelings of dizziness or claustrophobia if the movie is watched on a big screen.

However, the “Underwater” filmmakers don’t want viewers of this movie to think too hard, because then you’ll start to ask questions that unravel the plot, such as: “How could creatures of this size and quantity escape detection for so long?” Even if one company tried to cover up the existence of these monsters, their impact on the environment would be noticed already by too many marine biologists and people who work directly in the ocean. Monsters in outer space make more sense if they’re supposed to be undetected by humans on Earth. And at least in the world of Godzilla, millions of people in that world know that Godzilla is a creature that lives in the ocean. In “Underwater,” these monsters are a total surprise to the unlucky crew members who encounter them.

Just like a lot of movies whose plot is driven by suspense, “Underwater” also has a “race against time” element because (of course) the survivors are running out of oxygen. But this plot device is conveniently ignored when these so-called trained underwater professionals waste a lot of oxygen by talking too much. Paul, the annoying motormouth, is the chief culprit. In order to enjoy this movie, you can’t pay attention to the screenplay’s inconsistencies in how their underwater suits are supposed to work.

And since this is a horror movie, not everyone is going to get out alive. But there will be moments of further disbelief when certain characters go through things that would kill someone in real life, and then they survive, and you’re left wondering, “How are they still alive…and with their hair still neatly in place?” And—this is no joke—you can see freshly applied beauty makeup on one of the actresses’ faces after her character has supposedly gone through underwater hell. There must be some industrial-quality waterproof lipstick they have in that underwater bunker. There’s also a small stuffed animal that gets carried around as a good luck charm that somehow doesn’t get lost or destroyed during all the mayhem. “Underwater” is not a movie made for people who pay attention to these kinds of details.

“Underwater” is certainly not the worst horror film of 2020, and the movie’s ending should be commended for not being a total cliché. However, if you want a horror flick with memorable characters and a solid plot, then you’ll have to look elsewhere.

20th Century Fox released “Underwater” in U.S. cinemas on January 10, 2020.

Review: ‘The Sonata,’ starring Freya Tingley

January 10, 2020

by Carla Hay

Freya Tingley in "The Sonata"
Freya Tingley in “The Sonata” (Photo courtesy of Screen Media Films)

“The Sonata”

Directed by Andrew Desmond

Culture Representation: Taking place in England and France, “The Sonata” is a horror flick that centers mostly on people in the European world of classical music, a culture that is almost exclusively Caucasian.

Culture Clash: A supernatural ghost story, “The Sonata” uses the age-old conflict of good versus evil, with a minor subtext about resentments that working-class people can have for people in the upper class.

Culture Audience: “The Sonata” will primarily appeal to people who have the time to watch a B-movie that covers a lot of the same tropes that many other horror movies have already covered.

Freya Tingley in “The Sonata” (Photo courtesy of Screen Media Films)

When it comes to horror movies about evil spirits, “The Sonata” follows the formula so closely that horror fans can easily predict what’s going to happen. Directed by Andrew Desmond, who co-wrote the screenplay with Arthur Morin, “The Sonata” checks the boxes of many familiar clichés used by movies of this ilk. Attractive young lead actress? Check. Spooky old house? Check. Nightmarish sightings of dead people? Check. The first two acts of the movie are far superior to the third and final act, which devolves into a disappointing dud. But if you must sit through this movie, here’s what to expect, without revealing any spoilers.

Rose Fisher (played by Freya Tingley), a British woman in her late 20s, is a talented and intensely focused professional solo violinist whose life revolves around her work. From the first scene, we find out that she’s an emotionally distant loner with no family ties. When her agent/manager Charles Vernais (played by Simon Abkarian) interrupts her rehearsal to inform her that her father has died, her response is: “I don’t have time for this right now.”

It turns out there’s a reason for Rose’s cold reaction to the news of her father’s death: He abandoned her and her mother (who is now deceased) when she was just 14 months old. The death of her father also exposes the secret that Rose has been keeping for years: Her father was the famous composer Richard Marlowe (played by Rutger Hauer), who disappeared at the height of his fame and became a recluse in France. Because of his abrupt departure from the spotlight, many people had assumed he had died years earlier.

Rose never really knew her father, and he never kept in touch with her and her mother. Therefore, Rose doesn’t really feel sad that he’s died, and she doesn’t even ask how he passed away. (It’s shown in the beginning of the movie that he set himself on fire.) Before his death, she had also kept her father’s identity a secret from everyone (including Charles) in her line of work because she didn’t want to trade in on his name to advance her career. It should be noted that Dutch actor Hauer, who died in July 2019, has screen time in the movie that’s less than 10 minutes, so it would be a mistake for people to think he has a lead role in this movie.

Richard Marlowe did not leave a will, and Rose is his only heir. She finds out that even though he didn’t have much money, he did leave behind his secluded mansion in France and all of his copyrighted work, so Rose inherits it all. Rose decides to bail out on some work commitments, in order to travel to France to check out the mansion. Charles is naturally upset by her decision, and there’s further tension in the relationship when Rose tells him that a big agency has offered to sign her. Ultimately, she sticks with Charles, who is (as he points out to her) the only person in her life who’s like a family member to her.

Early on in the movie, it’s established that Rose is a loner, so it actually makes sense that she has no qualms about staying in an isolated mansion by herself. Soon after arriving, she meets the housekeeper Thérèse (played by Catherine Schaub-Abkarian), who goes to the mansion once a week to clean and do other domestic duties. Thérèse tells Rose that when her father was alive, he kept to himself and was despised by the townspeople, who suspected that he was behind the disappearance of a local boy, who has remained missing. Thérèse also tells Rose how her father died.

While looking through some items in her father’s study, Rose finds a hand-written sonata in a locked desk drawer. Because her father’s initials are signed at the end of the sonata, she rightfully assumes that he was the one who wrote it. There are also four mysterious symbols on the sheets of paper. It’s easy to figure out that these symbols have something to do with the dark and foreboding atmosphere in and around the mansion. When Rose plays the sonata, she sees a shadowy adult figure, which just as quickly disappears. Thus begins her sightings of ghostly figures (some more menacing than others) in her nightmares as well as in her waking hours. It’s clear that playing the sonata has unleashed something evil.

Meanwhile, Rose tells Charles about the secret sonata, which was her father’s last work, and sends it to him to take a look at it. Charles does some research on the Internet and finds a video of an old TV interview that Marlowe gave about a masterpiece that he was working on at the time. Figuring out that the hidden sonata is the masterpiece in question, Charles goes behind Rose’s back and consults with some industry experts to feel out the market value of the sonata and to ask if they know what the mysterious symbols mean. There’s an ulterior motive to these consultations: Charles (a former classical musician and a recovering alcoholic) is in a precarious financial situation, since Rose (his only client) still might end up leaving him for a big agency, so he’s looking for a way to cash in on the sonata for some financial security.

While Charles consults with the enigmatic Sir Victor Ferdinand (played by James Faulkner), a former colleague of Marlowe’s, Sir Victor tells Charles the true meaning behind the four symbols, which represent power, immortality, appearance and duality. He also reveals that a French secret society created these symbols in the 19th century, and the society had certain beliefs on how to conjure up the devil.

The best parts of “The Sonata” are the production design by Audrius Dumikas, the art direction by Janis Karklins and the cinematography by Janis Eglitis, because they all convincingly evoke the Gothic atmosphere of an old haunted mansion in the French countryside. The film’s musical score by Alexis Maingaud is also effective in eliciting moods in all the right places. Less impressive are the movie’s basic visual effects, which look like something you’d see in a mid-budget TV show. The actors do a competent job with this trite and sometimes problematic script. The melodramatic turn of one of the characters toward the end of the movie is just a little too over-the-top and is almost laughable.

If you’re looking for a horror movie with some mild scares and compelling set designs, then “The Sonata” is worth watching. Just don’t expect to see any scares that are original or an ending that is particularly satisfying.

Screen Media Films released “The Sonata” in select U.S. cinemas and on VOD on January 10, 2020.

Copyright 2017-2025 Culture Mix
CULTURE MIX