"The Conjuring" Engrosses You In a Palpable Sense of Dread

Horror movies, perhaps more than any other genre of film, are an experience. The characters might be paper thin and the events that take place may be (okay probably are) implausible, but that's not why we go to see horror movies. We go to be frightened, to be on the edge of our seat wondering how the film is going to play on our fears and our emotions. It's all atmosphere, mood, timing, and expectations. And The Conjuring is very good at all of this.

The Conjuring is very much a throwback. This is most obvious in its period piece setting which has the film occurring back in the 1970's. This almost feels like a sly acknowledgement of the film's more old school storytelling methods. The film doesn't have too many over-the-top moments or buckets of blood moments. It's more about building a slow sense of dread that makes us worry that something could happen at any moment. In many instances nothing does or the film undercuts our expectations and provides a moment of levity (It's a surprisingly funny movie at times).

This isn't to say that nothing happens. There are a number of expertly shot horror setpieces. A musical box with a mirror that shows demonic spirits when it's done playing. A clairvoyant who witnesses terrible things. A creepy doll that has a mind of its own. The brief glimpses of demons (wonderful designs of make up and special effects) after tense, nerve-wracking sequences.

The type of storytelling appears to be partly due to the film's smaller budget, but it uses this budget to its advantage. The film, especially early on, makes so much of what takes place all about the suggestion of something evil and disturbing. This is combined with the look and feel established by cinematographer John R. Leonetti to make something really evocative and engrossing. 

It's also worth noting the great irony of the film being directed by James Wan. Wan broke into the industry with Saw. Wan had little to do with the bloody and awful followups to that film but the Saw movies have helped create a trend of movies devoid of good storytelling and that are more dishearteningly schlocky than good. Wan's ability has matured since Saw (which I still find to be a good (though not great) film with a great twist ending). His next big film Insidious hinted at the direction Wan was going with his career. That film was more about a simple story, atmosphere and the fright value of that atmosphere and things popping up unexpectedly. The Conjuring is more Insidious than Saw, and better than both.

At times the film is archetypical. An old, creepy house is bought by an unsuspecting family. Demonologists trying to get out of the business come to investigate and it turns out to be their toughest case yet. This is all a good thing though. The film gets explanations out of the way in a brief prologue and then lets the horror really go to work.

I will say little of what takes place because as with the best horror movies, it's best to be anticipating nervously what may come. You will anticipate, you will jump from your seat a little, and you'll dread, with eager delight, what is coming next. What more can we ask of a horror movie?           

Grade: B+

The Weird, Campy Cult Classic "The Rocky Horror Picture Show"

The Rocky Horror Picture Show has long been staple of off-the-beaten-path cinema for cinephiles. It was a cult movie before anyone was defining what a cult movie was. Overlooked in its own time but picking up attention through midnight movie screenings, the film began to take on a life of its own. You really don't watch the film so much as you experience it, and the experience today for the film has become infamous; featuring people performing the film in front of a screen that's simultaneously projecting the movie. The crowds at these screenings have seen the films dozens of time; there are ritualistic reactions assigned to viewing the film, and many prepare jokes to yell out at exactingly planned moments.

Now I didn't see the film in this manner as I've been told that its best to watch Rocky Horror on your own to get a sense of its casual ridiculousness before roping yourself into a screening. This isn't just due to the nature of these screenings but also because the film is fucking weird, and honestly pretty bad. It's one of those films that's so bad that it almost becomes kind of good. There's no point in grading it really (I think I'd give it a B-). It should be a D but there's so much endearing weirdness and headcase-like antics that it almost transcends its badness to become something that you have to see at least once.

To put this into a better context, Brad and Janet (Barry Bostwick and Susan Sarandon), a recently engaged couple that's squarely straight laced, stumbles upon a castle filled with transvestite aliens from Transexual, Transylvania. They're lead by their charismatic leader Dr. Fran-N-Furter (Tim Curry balls-to-the walls committing to the role with delightful results) who is doing experiments to create the perfect lover ... or something. It's kind of hard to follow, unfolding with the logic of a bad drug experience.

Oh, and there's music. All original music written for the film. Most well-remembered is the gloriously goofy "Time Warp Jump", which explains a dance to do to it! The music isn't bad but is so silly that it's hard to take seriously. Though it really is best to not take the film seriously as it never seems to take itself serious (Much of this is intended as parody of B-movies and sci-fi).

It's campy and fun but drags in lots of places. It's more interesting as the phenomena and experience its become than an actual movie. But there's still no denying that it's a certified cult classic no matter its shortcomings, and there's certainly never been anything quite like it before or since.

This Week in Film (7/30/13 - 8/3/13)

There's no theme for this week but I like the idea of a master post that collects all the posts for a given week and therefore I've decided to make up one for this week as well. Below are the various reviews and writings for this week. Perhaps a pattern will divulge itself! (Though I doubt it)

So sit back, grab yourself a tub of pop corn (and perhaps a cold one) and lets dish out on some movies.
 
Tally of Films:

Drinking Buddies (2013) - Pour yourself a beer and consider watching this drama-comedy indie recently released simultaneously on demand and in theater at the same time. It's charming and easygoing and therefore probably nicely goes well with a drink.

Mama (2013) - The title is deceiving in that I would only watch it with your mother if she's into creepy and mildly scary movies. The devout horror fan will likely appreciate its old school horror storytelling even if it is overall a bit of a mess.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) - Time warp back to 1975 where rich, stick-in-the-mud white kids stumble upon some of cinema's most beloved weirdos (by certain niches at least anyway). This is leftover from when I intended to make this a week of cult movies. The enduring cult classic still has its moment even if it's incredibly uneven and insanely weird.

The Conjuring (2013) - The film gets bonus points for engrossing us so thoroughly in its creepy world. The Conjuring is a little film with small ambitions but, boy, does it ever deliver to us the scares we're looking for with maximum assurance.

"Mama" Provides Chilling Enviroments But Not Enough Story to Back It Up

Mama is a film that's more interesting than entertaining. For a horror movie, it's got the creepy, evocative, atmospheric visuals down cold but its storytelling is a bit more loose and uneven. There are some wonderfully textured and moody sequences that are equal parts unsettling and imaginative. The story though is less well put together and things feel disconnected from one scene to the next.

Two girls are taken to an abandoned cabin where their father (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) is quickly picked off by some unknown entity. Five years later, the father's twin brother Chris (also Coster-Waldau) continues to spearhead a search to find his nieces, but when discovered they are found to be feral, as well as obsessed with a person they call "Mama". Chris adopts them but he and his girlfriend Annabel (Jessica Chastain) find it difficult to get through to the girls.

Twists and turns occur as they must in the horror genre. Things that go bump in the night do some bumping. Things pop up just at the corner of the frame to startle and frighten us. There are visuals that drip with eerie terror and darkness. Its very by the books, even as the mid stretch features an atypical exploration of mother-daughter relationships that is the most interesting, engaging, and emotionally rich part of the film.

Annabel is not on board with taking in the girls. This is put at odds when Chris is injured and incapacitated in the hospital. Soon Annabel is forced to bond with the two girls that she wanted nothing to do with before. Here the film takes advantage of Chastain's always great acting to really make the give and take between the girls and Annabel feel the emotional weight intended.

The film falls apart a bit at the end. It collapses under a muddled inability to determine how the film should go out (In overextended and baffling fashion apparently it decides). But before that there's enough well-executed horror setpieces and ambiance to carry Mama. It's good to see a horror movie attempt to scare us less through blood and carnage and more with straightforward storytelling; however Mama still could have been better executed.

Grade: C+

"Drinking Buddies" is More Ale Than Lager But It'll Still Give You A Mild Buzz

There's a shaggy dog quality to Drinking Buddies. The film feels like a couple people picked up a camera and just started filming stuff. This works to the films favor as it suits the subject matter; intimate, low stakes dramedy. Most of the film is about people talking and drinking (and drinking a considerable amount at that). The story isn't the strongest thing you're going to see out in theaters right now (and on demand as well). It largely plays out with rom com predictableness. Two couples find troubles in their relationships and yearn after partners in the other couple. Some consider it, some act on it, and relationships are tested and reevaluated. It really shouldn't work but the charm and likability of its performers (a sort of dream team featuring Olivia Wilde, Jake Johnson, Anna Kendrick and Ron Livingston) makes the material have an affability and a low-key pleasure to it. The four work off eachother really well and there's a sense of ease and familiarity that elevates scenes that could have been disastrous in the wrong hands.

It's indulgent and scatterbrained but there's enough chemistry and charisma from its four stars to salvage it from totally falling apart at the seams. 

Grade: B-

Post-Mortem on the Week of Films From the 2000's

The goal for this week was to watch films made between 2000 and 2013. This featured a good deal of rule bending. That began right with the very stated goal, which if I was being more honest should have been limited to 2000 through 2010. I changed that a little bit so I could cheat and fit in more recently released films and films that I'd seen in theaters. Then I broke it even more by including A Bug's Life which I had been dying to make an argument in favor of for a long time. On top of this, I chose to make the "week" end on Sunday in order for it to be a seven day running thing (not that it mattered as I missed two days altogether due to a lack of time).

Then there's the whole matter of how this set of films is not representative of the time period I set out to look into. There are several years that have absolutely no film whatsoever. And though I did my sincere best to include a wide range of films (for instance, Spirited Away is there so that animation got its fair due, Jiro Dreams of Sushi is there so at least one documentary was part of the conversation, and Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter ... And Spring is there both because its a foreign film and a film from what was then a rising film market), I haven't even scratched the surface of what made the 2000's such a great time period for movies.

This was all due to a combination of factors and there's not really any excuse other than that I chose movies I wanted to watch and then time caught up to me before I could level out the playing field. However, I'm very pleased by the movies I chose which turned out to all be great and I had been wanting to give them a chance for far too long.

This exercise was frustrating at times. The constraints on my options for films required me to not watch films that I really wanted to watch but didn't fit the billing (I hope to get to some this week). But it also made me remember that exceptional films are still getting made and that I've been neglecting them in favor of older movies. I hope that from now on I can have more of a balance between old and new.

"Life of Pi" Has Gorgeous Visuals to Match Its Deep Spirituality

It's crazy that Life of Pi ever got made. The second biggest character is an adult Bengali tiger. The main character was an unknown actor. The story is based on a book deemed unadapatable. Almost the entirety of the film is spent out in the middle of an ocean on a shipwrecked raft. There's very little dialogue actually spoken in the film. And yet 20th Century Fox put millions of dollars into the production of director Ang Lee's visionary film, and I'm so glad they did because it was worth every penny. There's simply no way the film could have been made before recently; film technology never would have been able to properly capture the sweeping, exquisite vision that is the film's highlight. 

Life of Pi's fantastic centerpiece is about a young man named Pi (Suraj Sharma), the sole survivor of a shipwreck that takes the lives of his family, being stranded in the middle of the ocean on a raft. The time spent out on the ocean is technical wizardry at its finest. Watching Pi as he faces near death, the vicious tiger, boredom, exhaustion, and a spiritual crisis could very easily be plodding, boring and excruciating, but Lee turns this into an extended series of visually stunning scenes. Through green screens, a giant wave pool, and CGI the film creates grand, spectacular visuals that cue us into the vastness and beauty of the environment. The beauty of the film's look and feel fits with the underlying spirituality to it. Pi's only companions is a tiger named Richard Parker, a tiger his father once told him had no soul but who becomes both an obstacle and a saving grace. The central conflict of the film is less about Pi facing his impossible circumstances and more about Pi struggling to believe the tiger is worth saving and has a soul. And damn if the film doesn't make you identify with Richard every bit as much as Pi.

There's story that takes place before and after the the long sequence on the raft. We see an older Pi (Irrfan Khan) telling the story to an interested writer (Rafe Spall). He describes some of his life before the incident -- how he got his name, how he became the great swimmer that would aid in his survival, how he became deeply inquisitive about faith and religion, and shows us the zoo that Pi's father runs and where the animals come from -- and also poses an intriguing alternative to the story he's provided (one we're led to understand though less fantastical and more plausible is a far cry from the "truth"). These are great bookends to the story. The beginning is like an brief Amelie-esque set of bullet points that establish much of the tone (whimsical even at its darkest and most brutal), the visual style, and, of course, our reasons for caring about Pi, and also the tiger. And the ending is a wonderful restatement of the film' themes, its spirituality, its hopefulness, its sense of wonder.  

Life of Pi tells a fantastic, gorgeous fable. It's uplifting even at its most tragic. Most importantly though, Life of Pi has sense of awe about its subject matter and a desire to use the medium to properly convey it.

Grade: A