Dead Silence

Dead Silence
Starring: Ryan Kwanten, Donnie Wahlberg, Amber Valletta, Bob Gunton
Directed by: James Wan

Style: Supernatural Killer
Blood and Guts: 3
Fright Factor: 2
Laugh Factor: 1
Weapons of choice: Ripping out tongues
Overall rating: 1 out of 5

Dolls are creepy. They look like people and have the horrible habit of coming to life and trying to murder us, skittering about like rats and occasionally giggling just to drive us up the wall. In the town of Ravens Fair, there used to be an old woman named Mary Shaw. She was a ventriloquist who was murdered by an angry mob over a boy disappearance. Now, her ghost inhabits her collection of puppets, and if you scream, she tears out your tongue and kills you. Now, Jamie (Kwanten) must find a way to stop her before everyone in the town ends up dead.

This movie should have been better. It had all the makings of a direct-to-DVD movie with a kick to it, with some decent actors, a creepy premise, and decent production values. However, everything goes out the window because the director doesn't know how to work with an art department. The entire film feels like it was run through the Sharpen feature on Photoshop, giving everything a little too much edge and distinction to it. Also, the color palate is way out of whack, with entire scenes drenched in blue filters and then cleared with wipes. The director of photography would go on to be the DP for I Know Who Killed Me, to give you an idea of the look to the film. The best horror films let subtle things creep into the audience's subconscious, allowing them to scare themselves before flipping the switch to make us all jump. This film climbs into a Mack truck, runs everyone down, then points at them while screaming, "Scary, huh?!"

The actors try their hardest to be good, but the director keeps avoiding the performances, instead choosing to focus on atmosphere and effects, leaving the audience with no reason to care about anything that is happening. There is a moment or two of general creepiness when we can see the evil spirit behind the doll, peering out with maniacal glee. Again, these moments are quickly rushed away to allow for chases and manic energy rather than creeping dread.

This film should be used in film classes as an example of how to take something good and instead focus on something crappy. You may get a thrill from this movie if your idea of horror is living dolls. Otherwise, the only thing besides the film that will be blue is you, realizing you actually paid to see this thing.

Fido

Fido
Starring: Carrie-Anne Moss, Billy Connolly, Dylan Baker, K'Sun Ray
Directed by: Andrew Currie

Style: Zombie Comedy
Blood and Guts: 3
Fright Factor: 2
Laugh Factor: 3
Weapons of choice: Biting
Overall rating: 4 out of 5

Zombies are a plague upon the earth. All they long to do is feast upon the living and shamble about, moaning and decomposing. However, what if we could find a way to keep zombies from wanting to eat us and instead make them do our every wish? That would be ideal, right? There is no possible way that could backfire.

In Fido, radiation from space has caused the dead to rise from the grave in the 1950s/ Luckily, a company called Zomcom has found a way to collar the dead, thereby turning them into a harmless batch of slaves for humanity to exploit. Timmy (Ray) comes home to find his mother has bought the family a zombie which he names Fido (Connolly). However, Fido's collar isn't quite right, and soon he is killing those who threaten Timmy. As the bodies pile up, Timmy can't let Fido be found out, as Zomcom will destroy him, and gosh darn it, the killing isn't his fault.

Fido works on several levels. Firstly, you have a great zombie comedy that pokes a bit of fun at the typical zombie scenarios while combining them with old screwball comedies of errors. Second, you have the social satire aspect which is hinted at more than being overt, allowing the comedy to play out as it would rather than being bogged down by "symbolism" and "meaning." Finally, you have a great family movie that happens to involve a zombie and people beaing eaten alive.

Connolly makes this movie. His expressiveness as Fido allows for all of the scenes to have depth to them, and that investment into the characters is what stands out in this film. It's not your typical zombie comedy where it just makes fun of the stereotypes but never really has much substance to it. Following in the tradition of Romero's zombies, the film isn't a zombie movie. It is a social satire that happens to have zombies in it. Even better, the movie is fun, which is more than can be said about a lot of comedies recently.

At the end of the day, this film is not groundbreaking, nor is it the best movie you will see this year. However, it does deliver on its intended promise of entertainment with just a hint of social commentary to stick in the back of your head. If you are in the mood for something different, this could be what you didn't evn know you were looking for.

Session 9

Session 9
Starring: David Caruso, Paul Guilfoyle, Josh Lucas, Peter Mullan.
Directed by: Brad Anderson

Style: Psychological Thriller
Blood and Guts: 2
Fright Factor: 4
Laugh Factor: 0
Weapons of choice: Everyday items
Overall rating: 5 out of 5

When kids talk about what they want to do when they grow up, tearing down old wards for the mentally insane is not usually near the top of the list, much like being a junkie. However, there are always hard working people who are willing to take those jobs. Unfortunately, these people also have to deal with whatever happens to currently be inhabiting these old insane asylums. In this case, Gordon (Mullan) and his team find that a former patient at the asylum, Mary, had multiple personality disorder, and her other personality Simon was both murderous and sinister. Soon after this discovery, members of the team start disappearing. Everyone's a suspect, including the distinct possibility Simon has not vacated the premises.

One of the biggest strengths of this film is the atmosphere it creates. Part of tearing down such a large building involves having the crew operating various machines alone for long periods of time. This feeling of isolation is then tainted by the sheer creepiness of the building. Old chairs with straps, gurneys, and other medical bric-a-brac is everywhere. The entire building is in a state of decay and plays out like a place of nightmares. There is also little music, and the tapes of the little girl talking about the crazed personality Simon is haunting. Finally, the movie never really shows too much of what happens to those people that disappear. Up until the end, when the killer is revealed, they just turn to see someone approaching and then are never heard from again. It adds to the paranoia, and soon the audience is wondering if they are seeing things as shadows scuttle around corners.

All of the actors do an excellent job of not playing up the disappearances too much. Because of the isolated nature of the job, there is never a sense that something happened to the people, only that they went missing. Everything plays out very realistically, and the final moments of the film hits with a force rare for horror movies made in a time of jaded audiences. The entire movie plays out as a horror film that isn't trying to be a horror film, and its success leads to the audience being dragged along for the ride.

In the end, this film shows just how flexible the horror genre can be in finding ways to give the audience shivers while still telling an excellent story. It is differnet than most horror films you will see, and rather than being the same crap that comes out of "independant" horror, this film is a worthy addition to the genre.

Event Horizon

Event Horizon
Starring: Laurence Fishburne, Sam Neill, Kathleen Quinlan, Joely Richardson
Directed by: Paul W. S. Anderson

Style: Haunted Ship
Blood and Guts: 4
Fright Factor: 4
Laugh Factor: 1
Weapons of choice: One's Own Sanity
Overall rating: 4 out of 5

The worst part of space exploration, besides the fact that the smallest of errors can result in horrific deaths for you and your crew in the frigid void, is that it is far larger than we can even comprehend. The most horrific thing ever thought by the most twisted minds ever to exist is mild compared to what mathematically is probably out there waiting for us. Sanity would dictate that the easiest way to avoid that is to not visit these places. Instead, the ship Event Horizon is sent out to see what it can find. With the ability to bend space, it can visit anywhere instantaneously. In 2040 it disappears without a trace. In 2047, it returns, seemingly empty. You know, the type of seeming of a demon that is dreaming. Logically, we send a crew to investigate what happened. What they find will haunt them forever, and their only hope is to escape and live to tell about it.

At its core, Event Horizon is the classic haunted house story placed in an environment where there is no escape. Everyone always wonders why nobody just walk out of a house where the walls bleed. Here, there is nowhere to go. Predictably, the rescue ship is damaged, leaving only the haunted ship as inhabitable while repairs are made. This is a prime example of how Event Horizon operates. It will takes the horror conventions, things any horror fan has come to expect, and still injects enough surprises into that framework that the audience will be white knuckled. There are some distinctly creepy moments, such as the discovery of the old crew's video and the suicide attempt, each designed to ratchet up the tension. With haunted house movies, one's own sanity is in danger, so anything could conceivably happen at any time.

All of the actors, particularly Neill and Fishburne, do an excellent job of portraying people whose concept of reality has just been changed. They feel like people who don't believe in monsters and ghosts and yet now have to face real ones, and that acting draws in the audience. A horror audience doesn't really believe in what it is watching, and so when the characters convincingly don't either, it makes the situations more engaging because they are like us, the audience. Both Fishburne and Neill also capture the slow erosion of sanity excellently, something that is never easy in horror. Without such strong characters, Event Horizon and all of the tension it has would never have worked.

It should be said that if you really do not get into supernatual horror, this movie may not really get under your skin. The twist that comes in the last third of the movie about what has really happened to the ship is borderline ridiculous if you haven't bought in to what came before it. Also, because the film's structure is built like other horror films, some of the occurances are predictable, though the way in which they happen still has an underlying intensity.

In the end, this film is a solid thrill ride best watched in dark places. Before the studio made Anderson cut it down, it was apparently much more dark and violent. One has to wonder what would have happened if they trusted that vision.