Gothika

I decided to give this one another shot as part of my Robert Downey Jr. appreciation 'month' (this has so far lasted 3 months and looks not to be ending anytime soon. That man is a gift.). My first and last viewing of this film was at a house party in 2005 and I remember being pretty unimpressed at the time. But I was a cocky 17 year old, so lets see how it fares this time:




"Gothika" (2003, Mathieu Kassovitz, Dark Castle Entertainment, Warner Bros. Pictures, Columbia Pictures) is a film about a psychiatrist who wakes up to find herself a patient in the mental hospital she works at.


Dr. Miranda Grey (Halle Berry) works at Woodward Penitentiary as a Criminal Psychiatrist. She is working with several disturbed and violent women including Chloe Sava (Penélope Cruz). She's also the wife of Dr. Douglas Grey (Charles S. Dutton) who runs the facility, and has an apparent friendship-but-nothing-more relationship with her colleague Dr. Pete Graham (Robert Downey Jr.) - much to the latter's disappointment.


On a stormy night, Dr. Grey crashes her car on a bridge while narrowly missing hitting a young girl standing in the road. When the Dr. approaches the girl to check if she's ok she bursts into flames. Miranda doesn't remember anything else until she wakes up as a patient at Woodward herself and Pete breaks the news to her that she apparently went home and brutally murdered Douglas.


Miranda spends the rest of the film slowly piecing together her memory with the help of a vengeful spirit and some pretty inefficient security in the hospital. What she finds out shakes her worldview and it's probably for the best that she'd already dispatched of Douglas.


The film suffers from a lot of things that aren't its fault. The main one being it's just another early 2000s teen-aimed horror with that annoying blue tinged hue over every scene. But there remain some gaping plot holes (really? Pete just pulls some strings and she's kept at her previous place of work? I don't think so) and just too much going on in the plot. It's like they made a few storyboards and decided to mash it all together; crooked cops, crooked doctors, malpractice, ghosts, murder, torture porn, revenge, amnesia, sexual deviants getting access to patients without (supposedly) anyone knowing, misrepresented mental health patients.... you name it, it's in here. It's a bit of a mess plot-wise.


One of my main gripes with the film is its criminal(-ly insane) underuse of its talented cast. Halle Berry as the protagonist gets a fair share of screen time but most of her time is spent screaming and/or being sedated so her character isn't given much depth outside of her initial intro as overworked psychiatrist who likes to swim. As the film moves on she gets to deliver a more proactive role and starts to do her own sleuthing, but ghostly possession, or not, I doubt that she would be set free at the end of the film, having, you know, murdered a guy! RDJ manages to inject some depth into the character of Pete through that amazing ability he possesses to humanise all of his characters, but essentially Pete is just there to be a hindrance to Miranda's escape and doesn't actually get to do much of note from a plot perspective except moon over Miranda and then act as jailor. Cruz' character is probably the most interesting of the film with a pretty sad story arc but she's more of a plot device than a main character.


But it's not all bad. The film remains watchable, and although it doesn't fit into any good-bad-cheese list it's also not so terrible that you can't sit through it. Whether  you'd actually want to is another question entirely. I can imagine the trope-laden, well trodden ideas behind the film still seeming fresh to the young and uninitiated, and it could certainly serve as a gateway to youngish, thirsty horror fans in the making who haven't yet been enticed by the pleasures of 2001's "Thirteen Ghosts" or 1999's "House on Haunted Hill" which, in my view, deliver a much better late 90s/early 2000s horror vibe.


What can I say? I came for the RDJ factor... and I pretty much stayed around for that, too. It seems 17 year old me and 31 year old me aren't so different after all.

[Image: Warner Bros., et al]

Hani

Hereditary

"Hereditary" (2018, Ari Aster, PalmStar Media, Finch Entertainment, Windy Hill Pictures) is a supernatural horror centred around a very unusual family.


When her mother, Ellen, dies, artist Annie (Toni Collette), feels guilty that she is not sad. Her mother had been a very difficult person to love, after all. Her husband, Steve (Gabriel Byrne), is supportive and her teenaged son, Peter (Alex Wolff), is fairly indifferent. But her young daughter, Charlie (Milly Shapiro), who was closest to her grandmother, is inconsolable.


Annie and her family are a strange bunch at the best of times, but little Charlie is an unusual child with a somewhat morose interest in death. Throughout the film we begin to learn or catch glimpses of just how strange the family's lives have been. When tragedy strikes the family again they begin to understand that there is something darker at play here, and it may all stem from Ellen...


A really enthralling film that kept me captivated throughout. Although the plot doesn't deliver constant pulse-pounding terror, the characters are just odd enough and the plot just emotional enough to keep you on the edge of your seat. I left the cinema with a haunted sense of melancholy that didn't shift for a few days. I felt essentially haunted by this film! It's a feeling I don't get often, but it's definitely something I'd consider to be a good sign.


Annie is a study in dysfunctionality, perfectly and movingly performed by Collette who keeps the tension and emotion dialled up to 11 with a believable and oddly sympathetic effect despite some of the character's actions.


Shaprio gives a very memorable and haunting performance as the disturbing young Charlie, and Wolff really brings the events affecting Peter to a level that surpasses typical horror movie levels. Byrne's father character is against all odds, trying to keep the family going. The film is superiorly acted on all counts.


Although the final scenes may seem to go to sudden and extreme lengths in quick succession, as a 70s horror fan, I felt that it really paid an excellent but modernised homage to the genre.


Definitely worth catching in the cinema, it may not terrify you, but it will certainly stay with you for a while...

[Image: PalmStar Media, et al]

Hani

Christine

"Christine" (1983, John Carpenter, Columbia Pictures, Delphi Premier Productions, Polar Film) is the film adaptation of Stephen King's novel, "Christine".

I'm on a bit of a John Carpenter kick.

Christine is a sentient 1978 Plymouth Fury car. She's furious and out for blood. Anyone's blood. She is purchased by Arnie Cunningham (Keith Gordon), an unpopular nerdy teen who plans to bring her back to her former glory. Christine is grateful to him. She just likes to show her gratitude in strange ways.... like attempting to murder Arnie's best friend, or his class bullies... Or, well, anyone really. Arnie becomes obsessed with his new metal lady-love and cannot look away.

Although I enjoyed the book and I am a fan of Carpenter's films, I'll admit to being a little bored with this film after a while. The car is pretty and the music is superb, but in the main there's only so much fear that can be derived from an angry killer car with a sarcastic stereo. The action, naturally, becomes very same-y and the film suffers for that in my opinion.

[Image: Columbia Pictures]

Hani

88

"88" (2014, April Mullen, WANGO Films) is not really a horror movie. It's more an action movie reminiscent of the likes of "Pulp Fiction" and others.

Whilst yes, it isn't a horror, I still want to mention it here because it's good, it's gory and it stars one of my favourite modern day scream queens; Katharine Isabelle. I love her. I can't help it. Not only because she is super hot and in some of my favourite films, but also because she is downright hilarious and, as proven in this particular film, extremely adaptive as an actress.

Gwen (Katharine Isabelle) walks into a highway diner with an injured hand, a gun, a backpack and no idea what the hell is going on... From there we're taken on her journey between two timelines where we get to know more about who she really is and what has brought her to this diner. As it happens, she's a pretty dangerous lady on the lookout for whoever killed her lover. And, wouldn't you know it, it was probably someone pretty dangerous who did it!

A fun and very violent film with more than one similarity to Tarantino (timeline styling, violence, gang banter....). The characters are all very colourful, very memorable and very disposable. It's stylish, witty and not scared to make you think a bit. The story manages to avoid too much confusion, despite the fractured timeline style, and everything links up nicely by the end.

So, if you're a fan of Katharine Isabelle..., or you like Tarantino-esque films..., or you like action movies.... or gore.... or if you are anyone at all... I recommend giving this movie your time. It's worth it.

[Image: Wango Films]

 

Hani