Home Invasion

For my partner and I, the procedure is routine. We case a one-storey house for several days to ensure that there's only one homeowner and few-to-no visitors. Somewhere rural, where the houses are a few minutes' drive from each other. This time, it's a middle-aged man. He leaves his house alone, and returns alone, for hours each night. He carries large containers which appear to be very heavy from his door to an old, poorly-maintained truck, and back again. It's during one of these trips that we start our work.

I sneak up behind him while he's on his way to the vehicle, and knock him out with a crowbar. The large cooler he's carrying spills onto the ground; in the country darkness, I can't see its contents, but they sound wet. My partner breaks a window and we climb inside. We turn on some lights and begin loading our bags with anything of value. Lots of women's jewelry. We split up to cover more ground; I find the stairs to the basement, and upon descending them, discover a large, locked metal door. Jackpot. I call for my partner to help me open it, but he doesn't answer. Whatever, we're running out of time. The guy outside will wake up soon. I'll do it myself.

I jimmy the crowbar into the crack, near the doorknob. It's taking a while to pry. We're running out of time. I pull harder, with my foot on the door. We're running out of time. I'm straining against the lock. Suddenly, the door gives, bursting inward, unleashing light from inside, illuminating the stairwell, revealing its horrifying interior.

Human arms and legs, heads, midsections. Hanging from the ceiling, suspended by meat hooks. I'm immediately aware of the footsteps behind me.

It doesn't sound like my partner.

Django Unchained + The Possession

I mentioned in the past how wondrous it is for a film to summarize all of my aspirations as a viewer; the culmination of events that, in complimenting each other, create a wholly phenomenal experience.

The Possession is one of such films. Django is another.

Lately I've become picky in my deeming a film even "great," hence when I call one more than that, you can bank on my endorsement. Any fans of demon, ghost or possession-themed horror should write this down on their list of To-Watch, preferably somewhere around the top, in order to ensure that you'll be able to view it as many times as humanly possible before rolling over and promptly allowing yourself to die happy.

Denny from Grey's Anatomy is a thoughtful father/basketball coach whose daughter makes the obvious mistake of going to a garage sale without properly researching her ancient Hebrew demon curses (first of all, who the hell doesn't visit an everything-must-go without doing that first...plot holes) and happens across a box that wastes no time in teaching everyone a lesson about how pertinent it is to pay attention in your high school World Religions class. Denny spends the rest of the film trying to undo his bad-dad mistake(s).
Don't interpret this paragraph to be an accurate plot synopsis, I assure you it's anything but.

I'm not even going to bother detailing the plot of Django, because it cannot be explained in less than three full-length novels, and I wouldn't bother trying to do so even if I wanted to.

There's no way to adequately describe The Possession's experience until one sees it for oneself, so I'll instead declare that it combines all of its acts into an ending that couldn't possibly make more sense. There are no loose ends, and if one goes into the film with a mind open to its subject matter, they will not be disappointed.
Demonology is something that remains elusive of my desire to research, so I'll admit my ignorance to the subject. However, one does not need to be versed in these things to enjoy the movie fully since it is one of few that properly explains everything that needs to be explained. The atmosphere created within it is perfect for its style, and you may find yourself enthralled.

Django is a classic Western hero tale told with a very unique slant that adds a refreshing element to a historically stale genre, spun by one of my favourite directors, ever. It would be a lie to say Quentin Tarantino can do no wrong, however it seems to be very difficult for him. The story is well-paced and its ups and downs are great in their intensity. The film provides you with hopelessness and pride on a scale that could race earthquakes.

I had, in the weeks before, been privy to many accidents turned into "films" via avenues that included poorly-fathomed Netflix decisions and suggestions from those who had heard that I sometimes watch stupid bullshit. Perhaps, then, these two movies were made better by comparison, but I doubt it, because either one of them    could stand on its own, even if it had no legs and one eye. As a matter of fact, watching these two movies back to back is encouraged, because they pretty much run the gamut of genres that don't involve giants, robots, or giant robots, or giant robot penises that rotate and pulsate like a shower head from the bowels of the Earth.

To reiterate, as a famous filmmaker (me, in my dreams) once said: God be damned, these two movies are beautiful.

If you enjoy Leonardo DiCaprio (as I'm sure you've heard by now) completely annihilating his hand on a glass, then rolling with that punch as if it were dealt by an Asian midget; Jamie Foxx playing "a black man" as no one has before, with enough pride, gusto, and anguish for eighteen of us; That happy Nazi from Inglorious Basterds with an equally pleasant demeanour and an impregnable beard of excellence; Quentin Tarantino being classic as ever in the chair of director, as well as on screen in actor form, you had better make time out of your busy schedule and catch Django Unchained. Pff, as if you haven't,

Before you get up, and while you're at it, check out The Possession because, may lightning strike my dick and cause it to explode upward into my own mouth if I'm wrong, it's just as good for about three handfuls of different reasons.

"Sinister" is an All-Around Enjoyable Experience

This post may contain what some would consider to be "spoilers." If you don't like it, suck it. Suck it hard. But don't spoil it. 'Cause then sucking it would have spoilers which defeats the original purpose of sucking it.
You know what I mean.

It has been a while since I've watched a standalone horror film (as in, not part of a greater series) that I've been adequately satisfied with. Often a good premise will be squandered with poor pacing or a terrible ending, cliffhangers with no guarantee of salvation. Typically if a person can see a movie and immediately fathom a couple of better ways to wrap it up, or even a more effective method of overall execution, there has been some mistake made in the process of its creation.
Sometimes you get the feeling that a filmmaker has held back a possible outcome for fear of squandering their creation in the process; perhaps if some directors were bolder, or more willing to take risks that would jeopardize their operation, in the interest of a greater result, more films could be touted as pushing the boundaries of a genre. This is especially true of horror; many times I have encountered movies that could have been better if the creators hadn't erred on the side of caution quite so much.

Sinister, Ethan Hawke's latest good decision, took a chance, and pleased me thoroughly in the process. The loose synopsis is as follows: a defunct true crime writer moves himself and his loved ones into a house that was once the home of a family who was (all but one missing child) killed by an unknown person. He finds a series of films depicting the murders, discovering connections between them and planning a book around the results. Mystery and horror ensues within his family, as well as on the property itself.
Of course one can see the immediate danger associated with moving your wife and children into an abode where a family-targeting killer once chose victims, and there are many ways for the head of the household to react to that.
Many times, in classic "Paranormal Activity" fashion, the family decides to stick it out through the trauma and turmoil in the interest of preserving the unit, only to find out that their decision was a poor and ultimately irreparable one. People start dying, children are put in danger, maybe father goes insane. The nice thing about Sinister is that there is a hint of most of these elements, a satiating amount, but the characters don't plummet so far into a delusional perseverance that they don't notice their own lives crumbling in the face of the madness and exercise their ability to eject from a terrible situation.
There are many things in this vein that Sinister does right that other movies tend to overdo. When it comes to the horror genre, less tends to be more; you can imply a gruesome act without depicting it in its entirety. Many of the people murdered in the film are obviously dead, and yet one isn't forced to sit through the entire ordeal in stereo sound as some sort of cheap reach for a shock factor. This, to me, is more effective than a more direct method of conveyance. The mind is left to fill in the blanks of the footage which, depending on the creativity of your imagination, can be very colourful.
I've also noticed an increase in the ever-present "jump-scare" type of attempt to induce a fearful response from viewers. Sinister does employ this tactic, however it's achieved in a way that's much more tasteful than most movies. Whereas sometimes it's as if a caveman put a scene together, everything here is still very surprising, even if you're expecting the events to transpire.

The ending, without giving it away, is very unexpected, although it does fit the mood of the film. It is, to me, the most viable way to end a story of this kind; everything is nicely wrapped up and you're not left guessing many outcomes, if any at all. The creators of Sinister tried many new things and executed them successfully, while still managing to maintain a familiar mystery horror feel. Overall, I'm very satisfied., annd it gives me hope for titles to come.

Also, Ethan Hawke is an acting giant, not to mention a sex GOD.

Not that I'd know.

Horror Genre's Ups and Downs

Last month (if I'm correct, far too lazy to check), I posted an article detailing my interests in the horror movies being produced this year. Emerging not only partially disappointed by the titles mentioned (if you want motivation to remove your own eyeballs, go ahead and throw on Wrong Turn 5 one afternoon) but disenfranchised and unenthusiastic about what I've yet to see, I couldn't help but turn my gaze toward the plethora of films riding the coattails, or better put, playing the market created by such popular genre flicks appearing lately.

Oren Peli, director of just about everything I've liked wholly in the past half-decade (that's a blatant exaggeration, so don't call me on it) continues to do things that bring a mild elevation to the sides of my talk-hole. Unfortunately, in a great display of universal balance, the world must continue to preserve my apathetic frown by showing me things that, to a certain extent, drain the faith I had in the film industry.

I haven't been pleased with any alien-related films since The Fourth Kind and, on a lower level, Super 8. Being a proprietor of cranial fantasy and great hopes/dreams in favour of hostile galactic exploration (in other words, visitations from monsters from beyond my long-armed reaches), imagine my excitement when hearing about Dark Skies, an alien abduction story slated for February. Upon viewing the trailer, however, I was alerted to the definite and probably discouraging idea that we'll all bear witness to the return of what I call the "neighbourhood misunderstanding" concept. Often in films, in order to add another layer of story to an already fairly-yet-not-quite-complex-enough arc, many directors will introduce the difficulty of explaining a supernatural situation to a close-knit or friendly group of neighbours. There are only a few destinations on this avenue, the most common sometimes involving a police report filed by a nosy carpool mom, or in this case, a hospital visit that rapidly turns into evidence of domestic violence. I have little patience for characters who refuse to take the time to study the circumstances more closely in order to make a more informed and fair decision, and I believe this is what we'll be seeing here.

In other news, V/H/S was half-good and half-bad upon retrospect (though I think I mentioned that already), and I'm beginning to give independent and low-budget films less and less benefit of the doubt as time wears steadily forward to my demise. I'm growing tired of attempting to convince my cohorts to ignore the poorly post-produced blood splatters and stock screaming, in favour of immersion and suspension of disbelief. In the back of my brain, that nagging feeling of accidental farce continues to haunt me. That's scarier than the ghosts.