The Brood and Home Video and The Last Exorcism and Absentia

Well, this is certainly a binge first. Four movies in one post, dang sauce yo. 3(!) from yesterday and one from the day before. I had some time last night and just decided to marathon it; had to play some catch up anyway, so I think with this I'll officially hit 31 movies for month! Go me and my permanently warped psyche from what I subject myself to once a year. Anyway, without further ado, a TL;DR post that I'm sure no one will read. But hey, I enjoyed myself, and that's all that matters:

10/29: It wouldn't be an October horror binge without a Cronenberg film so I went for one I hadn't seen, The Brood. Videodrome is one of my favorite horror movies (and Shivers isn't too shabby either) so of course expectations were high for The Brood; gotta say, it did not disappoint. Full (shameful) disclosure: I was not paying 100% attention while watching this movie. I was distracted by other things around the house and this movie, especially as a Cronenberg movie, did not get the attention from me it deserved. That said, though, The Brood is a great movie that shows Cronenberg at the height of his body horror game.

The Brood is a sort of cross between a slasher-type film and a mutant-y body horror type deal. There's freaky killer mutant children, a mother with a bizarre egg sack growing out of her and death by toy mallet (and paper weight too!). Ah, Cronenberg, you weird bastard, how I love you. As is typical for Cronenberg The Brood asks some big questions that may not be readily apparent on the surface. What is the nature of family, how are we related to each other, etc. It's typically brilliant and beyond all the weird horror elements it's a deep thinking film which makes it all the worse that I wasn't paying enough attention (hey, watching 31 horror flicks is hard, ok?).

9/10

10/30: Here we are, the big horror day. A horror trio in the order they were watched:

Home Movie: After missing out on going to watch Nosferatu with a live score at the local arthouse theater (The Guild) I wanted to have a frightfest at home. First up I watched Home Movie, a found footage film that I'm amazed I haven't heard about from anyone before. I found a list of the 15 best found footage films and this was at #2. The site stated how scary it is how underrated this movie is and I couldn't agree more.

Sticking with an unintentional family theme, Home Movie is staged as the found home movies of a family (parents and their twin daughter/son) that has moved to upstate New York. Their kids turn out to be immensely creepy (and apparently don't speak much) and as the movie continues their behavior only gets worse (running a frog through a vice, crucifying the family cat, etc). The two parents take vastly different approaches to their children; the father, as a preacher, attempts to attack from the spiritual angle while the mother, a psychologist, goes at it from the way of the mind. 

The film eventually descends into every parent's worst nightmare: that their children are monsters, completely separate from any upbringing they've given them, that nature has won out over nurture and that their nature is terrifying and ugly. 

The movie does have some shortcomings of found footage (the need for suspension of disbelief that the camera catches all, for instance) but above it's a stellar, scary as hell film. It's unbelievably unfortunate more people don't know about it. Seriously, go check it out, mmmmmmkay?

9/10

The Last Exorcism: Next up on tonight's big time binge is another found footage film, The Last Exorcism. Exorcism movies have surely become overdone and a bit passé in the post-The Exorcist world and it has become increasingly harder to find a movie that actually breathes something new into the subgenre. 

Luckily The Last Exorcism, while not entirely fresh, does do enough to make itself scary and new. It follows a preacher who has begun to lose his faith in God and decides to do an exorcism to prove that the whole thing is fake. Of course, with this young woman it turns out to be very real and chaos ensues. 

Everything leading up to the twist is super solid and, while the twist isn't terrible, it does feel a little bit out of left field. It's good enough, and is kind of surprising and intriguing in it's own right, but I want more than good enough, ya dig? And while I like dark endings where good doesn't win (spoiler alert) I wanted a bit more to ground the movie at the end. Overall, though, a creative, freaky mashup of The Exorcist and Rosemary's Baby with enough that's new to make it good. Not great, but good. But man... the possessed young woman is freaky.

8/10

Absentia: Last movie of the night (whew!) was Absentia, a movie about a pregnant woman whose husband went missing seven years earlier without a trace. She finally begins to move on and becomes pregnant by the detective who has been searching for her husband in the process; she also files for her husband's death certificate. To her surprise he shows back up one day delirious, beaten, and wearing the same clothes he vanished in seven years earlier. The movie progresses as the woman's sister begins searching for answers and becoming horrified by what she finds.

Honestly... I'm not sure how to feel about this one. I liked it, but I kind of feel like I shouldn't. It's a slow, slow burner. Like, super slow. Oddly though I didn't mind as the mystery kept me locked in, wondering what it was that was taking these people. The letdown though is that the movie never really answers that question and you're left pondering; again, not enough of a resolution for me. Ultimately though I did like the angle Absentia takes on loss and how we process it, how losing a loved one is far reaching and entrenches into our psyche. I just needed more.

Absentia while being a strong idea never quite realizes itself and falls victim to the inexperience of a new filmmaker. In many ways Absentia feels like a student film with rudimentary acting and screenwriting especially (I'm looking at you, dialogue). Final word: many good ideas but not enough to make it great.

Also, that poster is a dumb marketing gimmick. Had to say it :)

7.5/10

Also, excuse any typos... I typed this at like 2 in the morning and hell if I'm gonna proofread. So deal.