Hot Pursuit

DISCLAIMER: EVERYTHING FROM HERE ON BELOW IS AT MINIMUM 6 YEARS OLD AND OUT OF DATE! BUT….POSTERITY?

Horror is created with minimal effects, and suspense trumps all in David Robert Mitchell’s (writer/director) stylish film It Follows.(2014)

Oh sweet, sweet nostalgia

Oh sweet, sweet nostalgia

Right from the film’s opening sequence (a bewildered young girl flees from something invisible), It Follows has a retro vibe. It’s closed in suburb streets evoke Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street and a host of others. The eerie synth pop and heart pounding booms of music lend well to this vintage feel. In fact, the entire film is set in some alternate, unknown era with minimal technology and heavy floral patterns. This inexplicably dated timelessness works. It has the viewer feeling like something is familiar. ….but just a little off.

It Follows is the story of a curse, transmitted by sex, that leaves it’s victims with far worse than a course of antibiotics and an embarrassing itch. This curse unleashes ‘It’. It can take the form of any human. And it’s scary power? Walking purposefully towards you.

Doesn’t sound scary, I know, but within minutes after our heroine Jay (Maika Monroe) is infected, she is being pursued by It. It looks perfectly human, except for that dead eyed stare that penetrates your very soul. Can anyone relate to that feeling of wanting to lean away from the TV when the ghost/killer/demon approaches it?? Yeah, that’s this whole movie.

Jay learns from her (now ex) boyfriend that she must stay away, she must evade this thing, and she must pass it on. And that next victim must live and pay it forward, because it keeps coming back. If the next person dies, it comes for her again. Not so subtle subtext about thinking before you get busy, yes? The consequences could be dire, could be lurking, searching for you, waiting to end it all. Life changing repercussions, indeed.

Jay, with the help of a crew of fairly typical teens, manages to evade It over and over, all the while convincing the others that it is real. Did I mention that you can only see it if you are infected?? Enter the ‘everyone thinks I’m crazy’ subplot.

This film manages to create a very viable sense of doom and dread and, admittedly some pulse pounding scares. What makes it innovative is that it does this on the strength of tone and suspense alone. It doesn’t rely on cgi nor on gore and shock value. Though there is a scene in which It makes invisible (laughable) cgi contact with a victim, the moment serves more to convince Jays friends of its seriousness than the viewer. Somehow, right from its first shadowy stroll towards Jay, staring purposefully into her eyes, we are convinced. We know this isn’t something you want catching up with you, and we don’t need to figure out exactly why to turn and run.

That feeling of being followed, pursued, by something relentless (not to mention shape-shifting into some fairly disconcerting individuals ) is what drives this film. It cuts to the core of fear, it feels like a recurring nightmare and it is shockingly effective.

Monroe, as our lead actress, is adept, and the best of the bunch. Her counterparts tend to feel a little wooden and weak. Character development, for that matter is virtually non existent, and is something that could’ve been improved, but doesn’t detract significantly.

The set design is clever, and lends to that unsettling tone, as each room and home feels somehow frozen in an unidentifiable time. The film seems to be set in Detroit (though it’s not directly expressed) and the city’s abandoned streets and homes feel lonesome and menacing, hopeless and insidious. The setting feels almost like a character in itself, this bleak and unsafe land that surrounds the group. The kids discuss being taught the safe zones of the suburbs, the volatile sense of the city. It looms over them, offering no solace.

It Follows is a film that feels like the sort they just don’t make anymore. It scares, for real, with an unexplored monster, a slow and plodding thing that has you in its sights. And it follows.

The horror hating husband watched this one with me, and later expressed that we have too many windows in our house, thank you very much.

Life lessons (I’ve been slipping, I know)
1. I can’t say this enough, keep it in your pants!! This is the ultimate ‘never have sex’ horror-rule movie.
2. I don’t care how much you disrespect your mother, you wake that bitch up and you get her involved.
3. Never take running shoes for granted.
4. Know your exits.
5. Watch your back. Always watch your back.

No matter what, it follows.

 

Flu Season

The time has come for coughs and colds, sniffles and sneezes, flu shots and vigorous handwashing. For the record, I work in a kindergarten. Flu Season is disgusting, a nightmare of biblical boogery proportions.

I’m by no means a germaphobe, but the contagion aspect, the spreading, the brush fire of disease that ripples through the crowd gets my back up.

Contracted (2013) isn’t exactly a handwashing issue, but boy, it’s got the gross en Pointe.

Hey can I borrow your chapstick?

Hey can I borrow your chapstick?

Written and directed by Eric England, the film opens with the subtlest scene of necrophilia that could ever be possible (don’t get me wrong, it’s disturbing and gross, and immediately sets a tone of heinousness ).

Next thing you know, we meet a girl named Sam. She is a recovered addict. She has a girlfriend who keeps blowing her off. She has a lot of dirt bag friends and one clean cut admirer.

Sam gets shit faced, presumably drugged by a fuzzy blonde stranger and hooks up with him in his car.

Cut to the not so slow decline of Sam’s health, starting from the hemorrhaging nether regions, working up to strange ‘pink eye’, massive hair loss, vomiting blood and the occasional pest control problem.

The acting is decent in this film, with Najarra Townsend at the forefront as Sam. The bad news is that the characters are largely vapid imbeciles who incessantly make idiotic choices. Sam’s mother allows her to profusely vomit blood all over the house without intervening or calling 911 because she might be on drugs again. Seems legit.

Sam’s boss witnesses her disgusting decline and only sends her home from work when she begins to shed fingernails.

Sam’s friends pretend, in turns that they can’t see the disease ravaging her face, and then proclaim how terrible age looks. But never do they call for help.

Sam’s doctor suspects she has a cold and a rash, and upon later inspection that she shouldn’t touch anyone. But go ahead, go home, we trust you. It’s not like we have a facility that’s equipped for a quarantine or anything.

The gruesome deterioration of this pretty young girl into a veritable zombie ghoul is compelling, though disgusting. The effects are through and believable, t he gore factor is solid.

But the shallow twats featured as characters are distractingly terrible. Perhaps the director intended to portray these young people as utter morons. If so, success achieved my friend.

I would have liked just a bit more in the way of science and stoet. Just a tad. Presumably, Sam’s disease bag one night stand defiled a body and passed some mysterious death virus onto the living? Somehow the cops are looking for this weirdo, indication they know about his exploits? Curious. There’s room for more here.

Is it unnerving, yes. Gross? Absolutely. Scary? It has its moments, based largely on the gross, I admit, maybe on the fallible nature of our selves, and our bodies, if you want to dig deeper.

Just know that you may find yourself wanting to punch each and every character. But maybe wear a hazmat suit.

Life lessons
1. Keep it in your pants.
2. Don’t take drinks from strangers dummy.
3. Buddy system, somebody better stay sober.
4 . If it looks like it’s infected, if it smells like it’s infected, don’t make out with it.
5. Go to the hospital, you big spazz.

 

What’s in the BOX?!

The Possession  (2012) is stylish, well acted and oozes with dramatic, booming score. The film seems to have the required components to make a solid and memorable film,  but somehow,  it feels subdued, slow and underwhelming. Have we been saturated with possession tales??

The story centers on a broken family.  Mom (Kyra Sedgwick ) and dad (Jeffrey Dean Morgan ) share custody of their two girls amidst the inevitable bitterness of divorce.  It’s no wonder little Emily is acting strangely.

Or, maybe it’s that bizarre wooden box she picked up at an evil yard sale. The one with the ancient hebrew scrawled on it. You know, the one that contains a pile of knick knacks that combine Pandora’s box with Boo Radley’s tree treasures.

You guessed it, the box contains a demon. In this case, a Dybbuk (an ancient Jewish box demon that looks like a second cousin of the Fiji mermaid.) The snippets of lore, myth and religion that filter into this fairly run of the mill tale are pretty much the only thing that sets this film apart.

Otherwise,  we get rolling eyes, inexplicable gagging, swarms of bugs, pale kids in nightgowns contorting themselves. We’ve seen it before, and while The Possession doesn’t resort to cheap jump scares, it just doesn’t have anything terribly memorable to offer.

Director Ole Bornedal makes a solid effort,  and combined with an uncomfortable score manages to project a fairly chilling image. Young girl being tortured and twisted,  downright infested by demon? Creepy shit. But it’s not new. Perhaps the lore of the Dybbuk was a tempting story to tell, but our director fell flat by pouring it directly into the old familiar mould.

What's in the booox? Oh. Evil.

Think outside the box, next time.

Ha!

Life lessons:
1. One man’s trash isn’t always another man’s treasure.
2. Stay together for the kids!
3. Turn on some lights once in a while, why don’t cha?
4. You’d probably feel better if you just stopped giving a shit.
5. A boat’s just a boat,  but the mystery box can be anything! ! Even a boat!

 

Hashbrown, Gimmick Alert

Alright, #Holdyourbreath (2012) has kind of set itself up for a few easy zings, no? Hold your breath, because something stinks! Looking for a good film? I wouldn’t hold your breath!

Something smells weird….

And for god’s sake, why the hashtag? In a film that sees every character forfeit his or her phone for the weekend (realistic, man,there’s nothing the youth of today like more than eachother’s company) the hashtag is a lame and obvious plea for popularity. And depending on the version you stumble across, it may or may not be included at all.

One can only expect so much of this Asylum produced flick, that essentially was released in a straight to video format. You have to go into a film like this expecting a hearty helping of cheese. In that respect, it does not disappoint.

The film’s top billed actress, Katrina Bowden, looks cute, but I’m baffled by the reviews I’ve read that imply she has any sort of skill beyond high school drama. Perhaps my standards are high? She coos and giggles and writhes her little hips about, and makes winky and pouty faces, and as far as I’m concerned, her role could probably be played by a series of well timed emojis. The film stars a handful of unrecognizable faces as college kids who meet up for a fun camping weekend, you guessed it, in the scenic locale called The Middle of Nowhere. Unfortunately for them, they’ve chosen the closest possible site to an abandoned sanitarium for the criminally insane and it’s spooky cemetery.

The film opens with a scene set in nineteen forty something at this very asylum. Lighting flashes, thunder crashes, and Pastor Maniac is about to be executed in front of a crowd of heavily 40’s-ified viewers. He’s so super evil, so beyond evil that he manages to wield his razor sharp talons and blind a guard before being hastily strapped in and zapped, all the while spouting a clever little rant about an eye for an eye. You know the one.

Back to the future, and college crew has been assembled, has turned their phones into the head jock for the weekend, and sets off on their trip. Our mystery machine is filled with the familiar faces, sexy couple who can’t keep their hands off of eachother, goofy stoner, nerd/physicist/guy with glasses, Bleach blond surfer guy and the smart girl? I think this may be Katrina Bowden, but it’s really hard to say. As they head out to their destination, the group comes upon a cemetery. Jerry (Bowden) begins a shrieking rant about how we must all hold our breath lest the spirits enter our bodies. Some garbage about how spirits that are too evil for heaven and too evil for hell (but seem powerless over cemetery gates?) linger in wait to slip into your nostrils. Blonde guy must be driving awfully slow to allow this entire monologue before they actually pass the graveyard. The kids submit, all except stoner dude, who is too busy getting stoned to hold his breath. Whoops. Bam. Evil spirit.

The film progresses in all the predictable ways. Soon enough, were all exploring the sanitarium, sexy couple is having gross and unsanitary sex inside, kids are being strapped into electric chairs, camera angles tilt, because a hallway tilted always implies evil is about. The stoner throws the phones away, kills a cop, and does little more than smile frequently.

I won’t go into further details, but the evil spirit passes about anytime a character gets a little winded or out of breath, and it’s evil wisp slip into someone else. And then said characters proceed to be weird and smile a lot and, honestly, do very little else.

It’s a slow mover, and it’s really quite dull. I know this movie is on Netflix and you’re thinking, well, hey, it’s here, why not? It’s your time, buddy, but, personally, I’d like mine back. I like a bad horror movie, but this one wasn’t even all that much fun.

Life lessons:

1. Scrap the hashtag, get off the internet and go outside, ya goon!
2. Hold  your breath….all the time? You never know who’s carrying evil.
3. Get better friends, this kids are duds.
4. Let your hair grow out, Paul Walker blonde doesn’t suit everyone.
5. The middle of nowhere is overrated.

 

Never Sleep Again

Hey, remember me??

I know, I know, I am failing at this whole blog thing, but give me a break, it’s summer, after all!

Well, it was. But now I hear the incessant honking of geese flying over our house and waddling about the fields nearby. Our house is overrun with apples, and thus homemade cider and juice and sauce and pies (ok, ok, that’s for the OTHER blog). School is back in session.

It’s fall.

And as per the usual routine, the crisp in the air every evening, and the early settling dark have me yearning for darker realms; for Halloween, for horror, for a good jump scare, for ominous booming music, for corn syrup.

I’ve perused few horror films this summer (we got Netflix, so much of my time was spent on Mad Men….and…ahem, Downton Abbey. Don’t judge me!).

I did watch Jim Mickle’s We Are What We Are (check out my earlier review of this film’s Mexican inspiration). A slow burn of a film, with glorious cinematography, utterly beautiful design and structure, and a surprising amount of emotion, the 2013 film is maybe more for indie film fans with a horror tolerance, as there’s little in the way of scare and gore until the very end. As I rooted about for reviews of the film, I read Salon’s review, and found it summed the film up perfectly. If all that needs to be said has been said on the first page of a Google search, what have I to add?

I had hoped to revisit A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) as an homage to the late, great Wes Craven, newly departed horror icon who will be surely and sorely missed, but my copy has a glitch and won’t play. Tragic, though, Nightmare is a yearly tradition for me, I have watched it every October for years and years. I know it through and through, hardly needing to see it again to recount it’s glorious, whimsical terror.

I watched this film in my teens, and was immediately struck by the foggy, gloomy 80’s horror landscape. That look that only horror’s of the 80’s have, as though the lenses are just a little dirty, and everyone had amazing volume in their hair. I was immediately terrified by Nancy’s dream, early on, as she dozes off in school. You know the one;

‘……were it not that I have bad dreams……’

The shots of Tina slithering down the hall in her blood soaked body bag still grate on me, but trigger that sense of excitement that you horror lovers know. We get that goosflesh, that prickle of the hairs on the backs of our necks, and we know something horrible, but great is about to happen.

The 2010 remake of this film is an atrocity, barely worth mentioning . It could never live up to the standards of the original.

The world will forever be haunted by Freddy Krueger, his slice and dice tactics, his unsettling wardrobe choices (I’m told the brain has trouble recognizing those two particular shades of red and green when they are next to one another) and his inexplicable ability to, you know, wander into your dreams and kill you. The thick, heavy tones of music in this film still ring in my head, months and months since I’ve last seen it, and the dreamy, whimsical jump rope chant is conjured up instantly in my mind. Who could forget dreamy Johnny Depp and the geyser of bed blood? Nightmare stands out beyond it’s time, as more than just just a cult classic on the shelves of your childhood video store (don’t get me wrong, I remember poring over the cases of this and it’s sequels as a kid, while my sister searched for She’s All That, or some such tripe).

Wes Craven gave us some many classic films, and so many scares. Nightmare, to me, is more than just notable, it is THE Wes Craven film. Last House on the Left, certainly chilling and iconic. The Serpent and the Rainbow, under appreciated and highly unsettling. Scream? The film that brought horror back from the dead in the mid nineties. But A Nightmare on Elm Street?

There’s just no touching it.

This is really, half a review. I’ll be back on my A game, soon, hopefully, and delving deeper into the films we know and love, and maybe some we don’t even know just yet. For now, kudos to you, Wes Craven, and thank you for all the nightmares.

 

One Step Further

Who’s ready for another tip toe through the dead and wilting tulips of the other-world?

Eye-spy a meaningless visual gimmick

The Insidious brand is back with another chapter in the form of a prequel, though one could argue that it’s just the story of another family haunted by another ghost/demon/spirit/creeper in the life and times of our resident petite psychic, Elise Rainier (Lin Shaye). There are snippets of inside jokes and references to the other films, but the bulk of this story is set apart from the previous (or, in this timeline, later) tale of Josh and Renai (Patrick Wilson and Rose Byrne).

In this film, Quinn (Stefanie Scott) seeks psychic advice from Elise. She’s recently lost her mother and, desperate to reconnect, she’s tried to contact her herself. Elise points out that speaking to the dead means speaking to ALL of the dead. Come on, Quinn, have you ever SEEN a movie? Stay off the ouija board, girl! Elise says she’s outta the business, hit the road, sugar.

Heard a noise? Why don’t you just look under the bed and see what it is? Bitches.

Quinn hits the road, (pun intended!!) and is clearly being tailed by something far more insidious (!!) than Mommie Dearest, something with black oozy, wall walking footprints and a real mouth breathing problem. Once Quinn finds herself laid up with both legs in casts (talk about your vulnerable main character!), and her resident shadow lurking, ceiling cracking, bedroom crashing boyfriend steps up his game, her widowed pa (Dermot Mulroney) convinces Elise to get involved. Cut to a heavy handed introduction to Elise’s future posse, Specs and Tucker (Leigh Whannell and Angus Sampson), and we’re back in the comfort zone of the Further.

Leigh Whannell makes admirable strides as director, and maintains the tone of gloom and doom that we’ve become accustomed to. Lots of dark, shadowy shots of hallways with an ominous doorway at the end. Lots of curtain creeping and inexplicable indoor fog. The acting is adept, as usual (with the exception of the irritating and unnecessary little brother who feels like an afterthought). Add our familiar cast of Further freaks (the smiler actually got under my skin a bit) and you’ve got a film that gives just enough to satisfy you’re craving.

That being said, in what is becoming the blueprint for this genre of film, the build up of horrors, the unfathomably loud jump scares (no fake outs, thankfully), and the just out of clear view monsters set us on edge and have us gritting our teeth. Then, the good guy steps in and saving the day suddenly seems SO easy. Is that what all the fuss was about? Luckily, this film’s demon is less comical in appearance than the ‘lipstick demon’ of the other two, who, to me, looked a bit like a homicidal pinata. This allows a little bit of discomfort to remain once he’s in full and plain view.

I have no quote, for this one, from the horror free husband, as he, gladly, stayed home with the girl while I went out with my heavily pregnant friend to see it. No labour induced!

Life lessons:

1. Be grateful you are ALIVE. it goes a long way.

2. Buddy system! Share a room and sleep with the lights on, geez!

3.Look both ways, for god’s sake!

4. All you need is love? I’m a Beatles fan, don’t get me wrong, but that’s a moral best left for cartoons, no?

5. Wear flip flops in the shower, who knows what’s in that ooze……

 

Pluralizing Bigfoot

So, here’s the thing about Bigfoot Wars (2014). Maybe just don’t.

This film is an abomination. Set in Boggy Creek (yes, Boggy Creek, folks), Bigfoot Wars follows a plethora of one dimensional characters trying to be two dimensional characters as they are plagued by a wave of bigfoots. Plural. Bigfeet? The typical car full of yappy teenagers drives out to the Boggy woods where there is a patch of sand and a beach volleyball net. Sounds like a northern Alberta beach to me! They are promptly eviscerated by terrible looking sasquatches with a penchant for syrupy blood. Bring on the sheriff, who occasionally and always nonsensically, narrates his portion of the story. Enter his daughter, Trampy Mcgee, Doctor Bullrider (Judd Nelson. When was the last time you heard someone say, ‘Things are really coming up Judd Nelson’?), uneducated nurse, Gale Weathers, camera guy, and Darryl Dixon. Pepper in some random mayoral fellows and a sleazy hooker who might be banking her career on being a far less endearing version of Sarah Rue, and you’ve got yourself a creature feature, my friend.

There’s no story to speak of, yet this film plods away for what feels like an eternity as you strain to hear what is happening. The sound is terrible. Landmines sound like a pin drop, gunshots echo incessantly one minute and are silent the next. The audio work on this film sounds like it was done by a six year old. The timeline doesn’t exactly feel linear, but you find yourself caring less and less about trying to piece together the plot points and make any damn sense of what you’re seeing.

The acting is, by and large, atrocious, and the bigfoot costumes look half Chewbacca and half afro. Bigfoot wars takes itself far too seriously and it is nothing more than silliness. Admittedly, I like a bad movie that starts out bad and features bikini clad victims having their arms torn off by ridiculous monsters, but I”m not dumb, I know there is nothing redeemable about this slop. Bigfoot Wars is terrible, and if you really have a penchant for the genre, and are still on the edge of your seat waiting for a good film about Bigfoot, Werewolves, the Loch Ness monster, the friggen Ogo Pogo, whatever your cup of tea may be, this is not the desperately anticipated film you may have been waiting on. Sorry folks, I’ve seen better, and I mean a lot better, in a 60 minute ep of The X Files. And at least Mulder and Scully had chemistry.

Non horror loving husband’s sound bite: (in reference to the nonsensical woodland volleyball pit) It’s harder to find a reason to get a girl into a bikini than it is to get her out of it. (also in reference to the immediately following nude scene).

Life lessons:
1. Speak up, suckah! Enunciation saves lives.

2. Keep bullriding, medicine is a thankless profession.

3. Bring more than four bullets.

4. If you’ve miraculously got a grenade launcher, and find yourself about to be stampeded by a herd of bigfeet, bring more than one grenade.

5. Spring for the high quality wig for your Bigfoot movie. The two tone afro look isn’t appealing.

Bonus lesson 6. Don’t be Judd Nelson. Just don’t.

 

Youth is a Dream

It was at the impressionable age of 11 that I saw Scream (1996). I’m not proud of it, but Scream changed my horror loving life. And, sadly, in my twisted little mind, I developed a huge crush on rat faced Skeet Ulrich. Oh, the joys of youth.

Credited with revitalizing Wes Craven’s career, Scream brought back the slash and stalk horror films of the 70’s and 80’s and made the idea fashionable again. And boy did it. Suddenly Scream costumes were everywhere, and they still remain on Halloween shelves every year, far beyond the point that children of trick or treating age would possibly know what the costume is in reference to.

Scream has a sense of humor, and pays repeated homage to other horror films, with references ranging from blatantly obvious to deliciously subtle. Scream also offers a few memorable scenes that have somehow managed to stick it out after all this time (yes, nearly 20 years, good god do I feel old). Who among us didn’t cringe a little when Tatum (Rose Mcgowan) was crushed in the garage door? When Casey (Drew Barrymore) is seen hung from a tree with her ‘insides on the outside’. When Randy (Jamie Kennedy….remember Jamie Kennedy?) outlines the rules of survival in a horror film.

Some magical chemistry of actors, music, horror references and general silliness put Scream on the map and managed to spawn a number of terrible sequels (and reportedly, an upcoming TV series…..how indeed). There’s a reference to the sequels of A Nightmare on Elm Street, a dig to all of those terrible films, as Wes Craven sold the rights to the film following the original. Perhaps this indicates that he takes no responsibility for shitty sequels, but anyone who’s seen the following few Screams knows better.

I know more about this film than I should share with you here, and if you ever get the chance to watch it with me, don’t. I know all the lines and I incessantly spout them off at inopportune times, ruing the entire vibe.

The acting is passable, if forgettable. The story is fairly lackluster, but that hardly matters in the grand scope of things.Scream remains a classic, and it hardly seems worth dissecting. Just let it live. Enjoy the cheese and the handful of genuine scares (there’s no longer a fragment that scares me, but 11 year old me was another story) and the general fun. As I’ve said, Scream has a sense of humor, and it truly doesn’t take itself too seriously. If you go into it feeling the same, you walk away satisfied. Scream seems like just the ticket to transition your tween daughter from frightened scattered childhood memories of The Exorcist to full on horror fiend. Not scary enough to scar, but scary enough to leave you asking for more.

Oh, the good old days.

“Youth is a dream, a form of chemical madness.”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald

 

Life Lessons:(I admittedly didn’t have to fish very far for these gems.)

1. Never drink or do drugs. (You’d better not kid.)

2. Never have sex. (till you’re thirty).

3. Never say ‘I’ll be right back.” Because you won’t.

4. Never ask, ‘who’s there?’. Come on, Casey, you should’ve known better.

5. Don’t investigate strange noises.

Bonus: Don’t run up the stairs when you should be running out the front door.

 

 

Nobody Ever Suspects the Butterfly

An indie film made possible by Kickstarter, Chrysalis (2014) is yet another post apocalyptic zombie flick (zombie, undead, infection, they’re all zombie flicks in my book), but it relies heavily on emotion and is far from heavy handed with the gore.

Directed by John Klein, Chrysalis follows Joshua and Penelope as they wander the wreckage of 2038, long after an outbreak of infection that turns its victims into cannibalistic monsters. They scavenge for food and unlikely survivors in the rubble of factories and churches (beautifully shot, I might add) and fend off the monsters as they filter into their safe zone. This apparent wasteland has existed long enough that the couple don’t know their birthdays, Penelope doesn’t know her last name, and she never learned to read. Society has crumbled.

Penelope keeps falling pregnant and miscarrying the children, much to her dismay. Joshua fears for her health and Penelope worries Joshua will leave her. The pair come across another survivor who joins them and urges them further into the city they’ve been living on the outskirts of. As the trio move forward, they are plagued by more and more infected, and questions arise about why the sudden increase. What could be causing the monsters to track them now?

Chrysalis is a slow boil of a film. It doesn’t pound out the action like one might suspect of a ‘zombie’ film, but it leans much of its weight on character development. It’s low budget, and at times, it truly looks it, especially when we are faced with any type of blood and gore, but it isn’t without it’s worthwhile emotional moments. The shots of old, crumbling architecture, warehouses, churches and factories are truly lovely, and there is an aura of stillness and loss that permeates throughout.

The acting is surprisingly decent, with the exception of Sara Gorsky as Penelope. Perhaps it was the way her character was written, but she comes across painfully whiny at times, and so brutally helpless that the Walking Dead fan in me was ready to tell her…..just look at the flowers, Pen. Just look at the flowers. Her delivery is wooden and staccato and feels insincere, despite the pitiful look she carries on her face throughout the film. Cole Simon as Josh and Tanya Thai Mcbride as Abria are capable and sell their characters well.

Chrysalis is a film that banks on characters, mood and story, and in that, it offers us something that is often overlooked in a film of it’s type. That being said, perhaps it is this attention to themes, symbolism and all that lovely literary fluff that allows some details to go a little awry. In a post apocalyptic world plagued by the essential undead, where everyone seems to have his or her own signature killing weapon, how are these girls still so afraid of the ‘walkers’ as it were? The hysteria gets a little unlikely at times. Penelope seems, right from the start, like the type of girl who couldn’t survive the walk to her car in a dark parking lot, let alone someone who could defy the odds and live on the run, as she’s done. And the ability to find canned food and operate flashlights 20 years after normal life has ceased seems a bit far fetched. And lastly, and might I add, SPOILER ALERT, why would infected be ATTRACTED to the scent of another infected? Seems like eau du living might be more appetizing to the ghouls in question.

Chrysalis isn’t unworthy of your time, just go into it knowing it is a low budget film, and it’s far bigger on drama then it is on scare. That certainly doesn’t mean it’s a flop, but it is unlikely to scare the pants off of you when it feels more like a date night film then a Halloween affair.

Life Lessons:

1. LEARN TO READ AND DO IT OFTEN. This is an important lesson, and I don’t need cinema to tell me so.
2. Save your flashlights, apparently they last FOREVER.
3. If dogs are barking somewhere, you may want to run.
4. Don’t waste your freaking matches on cigarettes. That being said, don’t smoke, dumbass.
5. So, maybe you’ve found the love of your life in the apocalypse. Maybe you feel like the only two people left on earth. Maybe you are. MAYBE you can still do better.

 

At Degrassi High…..

Asylum of the Dead (2014) looks like a film made by the high school students at Degrassi Junior High. I keep waiting for Wheels and Joey Jeremiah to show up with a bucket of corn syrup. That being said, no one needs corn syrup in a film that has, so far, zero blood and barely as much makeup as I have at the bottom of my purse. Yes, I said, SO FAR. I didn’t feel compelled to finish the film before beginning my review as it seems pretty clear that there aren’t going to be any redeeming moments.

The story follows a group of youths (we know this because they wear backpacks) wandering about the old abandoned Penhurst Asylum, soon to be Penhurst Asylum Haunted Themepark…….but didn’t you hear about the film crew that was here? They disappeared! After encountering many a poorly made up ghost and ghoul. Hipster youth tells the tale, and we stumble into the story within a story, only occasionally returning to this crew of not quite camera ready kiddos, who make poorly executed references to things like The Walking Dead…….

Story in a story follows cast and crew of Haunted America or Ghost Trackers or Haunted hunters or some such thing as they explore Penhurst asylum, getting the occasional history lesson from Willard, the ‘caretaker’ of the property, who lurks in the shadows, tells the clan to ‘leeeeeeave’, and offers to show them where to find ghosts. Mixed messages, bro. The group consists of Not Hilary Duff, Not Jessica Biel (aka 7th Heaven sister), Tattoos, old guy, other old guy, and sound guy. There might be another one, but they’ve blurred together. IMDB has almost zero information on this movie, so I’m unable to quote you actors names until I make it to the credits. Good ‘ol fashioned IMDB.

Everyone inevitably splits up, wanders the halls as wheelchairs move, gurneys spin and particularly unghostly looking ghosts show up and, quite frankly, do very little. Let it be noted that this is all filmed during daylight, amidst a backdrop of very obviously fake graffiti, that doesn’t exactly lend itself to doom and dread.Gradually, members of the group are accosted by the mysterious masked whitecoat, hauled off to equally well lit rooms and experimented on and slowly eliminated in lackluster ways. Well, old guy number one does get a little extra slice and dice, but sadly, it doesn’t pack the punch it needs to.

We get sent back to the kids and their campfire tales from time to time (how hipster boy knows all these details when none of it was caught on film and everyone seemingly died…..). Two of them split from the group to make out, because urine soaked halls are a turn on.

I’m not giving you any more details, but spoiler alert, the crappy doctor ghost turn out to be Micheal Rooker! Maybe not a plot twist, but I was surprised, and confused. And then saddened. And I thought how badly things must be going for Mr. Rooker following his death on The Walking Dead. Why, you might wonder, is Micheal Rooker in a film that I had originally thought Haylie Duff was too good for. Well, the last and final twist, after the film concludes (stupidly) is that Asylum of the Dead is, in fact, DIRECTED BY MICHEAL ROOKER. God god.

It doesn’t matter what this film is about, all that matters is that it’s unspeakably terrible! Literally no redeeming qualities, as predicted. Now that I’ve ruined the surprise, if it was really an intended surprise, you don’t have to watch it, because I can assure you, you haven’t missed a thing.

Husband’s Sound bite : (in response to my question of ‘how did they even get THESE actors to be in this garbage?) Because everyone needed fifty bucks.

Life Lessons:

1. Don’t quit your day job, direction is NOT for everyone.

2. Quit taunting ghosts, dude. Even terrible looking ones.

3. Never drink or do drugs or have sex. Randy isn’t wrong about his rules in such a run of the mill ‘horror’ movie.

4. Pay for special effects and makeup, it will make a difference.

5. Lay off the meth, because needing fifty bucks for drugs is the only reason anyone would ever agree to be involved in this movie.