A man is running in the park one snowy day, and collapses under a bridge dying from a heart attack, years later, still grieving, Anna attempts to move on with her life and is confronted by a little boy who says he’s her dead husband Sean. Is he really her re-incarnated lover, or just a young boy conning this grieving woman. For the whole time I sat, watching this, I kept thinking to myself “The makers are trying to convince us of something”. What? I’m not entirely sure, but through the arduous time I watched “Birth”, it seemed like from the beginning to the climax, that everyone involved in this movie were attempting to convince us of something, but the closest verdict I’ve come to, was that they were trying to dissuade us in to thinking this was a good movie.
Tag Archives: Mystery
House of Wax (2005)
I found myself occasionally chuckling during the film, and the reason was because I could almost practically hear the one-minded logic that would surface when its target audience attempted to explain its endearment for this basically forgettable remake. The typical target audience will ultimately like this better than any of the other versions because: “Oh my god, Chad Michael Murray is like so totally hot”, or “Damn, Elisha Cuthbert is so totally hot and awesome”. Either way, are you at all surprised that I didn’t like this remake very much? I wanted to be surprised by this, but in the end I wasn’t, and I was given exactly what I expected: yet another WB star laden remake that was more concerned with touting stars of hit shows than actually casting real actors. Get with the program people! These are vehicles, not movies, these are promotional tools, not films, these are publicity programs, not a horror movie! These are fillers for resumes, not roles!
Madhouse (2004)
“Madhouse” is less of a bad movie, and more an antecedent, a complete misfire of the potential towards its concept from beginning to end. The plot and its characters are so ripe with possibilities and writers William Butler, and Aaron Strongoni completely sidestep that in exchange for attempted style. Which is a shame because “Madhouse” has all the ingredients for easy bake horror. There’s atmosphere, gruesome imagery, good looking actors, a mental institution, nutty patients, a shady staff, and a killer offing people (two total), but nothing is ever really accomplished here. Director Butler does have a knack for sheer style and atmosphere creating a setting that is both visually appealing and utterly sick. He sometimes pays homage to Barker and Lovecraft–or at least he tries, and sometimes he succeeds and this wasn’t completely difficult to look at.
The nuthouse depicted here looks utopian on the outside, dark on the inside, and the basement is hellish as we’d expect. Who knew they stored supplies beside mental patients? Regardless I liked most of what Butler shows us here, and some of the gags and killings are fun including one death involving electrocution which had me literally cringing in my seat. Butler almost gets it right in the visual department, now if only he could have directed a watchable film. Writers William Butler and Aaron Strongoni are so intent on squeezing all sorts of elements for horror films in that its collapses on to itself becoming an illogical jumbled mess that left us with not only a question mark, but a sheer exclamation point. The climax either means that the production crew ran out of money and just ended it, or had no idea how to end this.
The mental institution, very similar to a modern day Dante’s inferno of a sorts has a slasher, ghosts, mental patients resembling the ghosts from the “Thirteen Ghosts” remake (how sad), dangerous supporting characters, and main characters whom may or may not be dangerous, meanwhile the plot basically runs on fumes. Joshua Leonard (Sounding shockingly similar to Brad Pitt) has zero charisma and plays a bookish and extroverted main character who is interning at a mental hospital and learns the ropes from its staff and a hot nurse named Sara ala Jordan Ladd. Ladd is listless here yet again with no real character traits that make her a likable protagonist whatsoever and serves as a mere love interest, but plays a big role in the climax that would have made a much bigger impact had she been featured more prominently.
There’s something obviously going on at this institution; it’s as subtle as a kick in the head, but with cliché one-liners like “Buildings are like people; sometimes they remember the things that hurt them”, we’re never given what we’re promised. It’s chestnuts like that that make this terribly derivative dreck. With uneven pacing, the film is often very dull and lifeless, with a story that mostly drags on serving its purpose as padding with so much empty character emphases, and there are even appearances from Lance Henriksen and Natasha Lyonne whom are both properly wasted.
We’re pulled in all sorts of directions on this story that lead us to believe one thing, and then another until we’re not sure what the hell is going on around this place.
“Madhouse” is never as smart as it tries to be, delving in to so many Faust-ian themes that are mostly shallow concepts than deep observations that serve as plot devices. The character Clark constantly talks to a mental patient located in the basement of the institution where the most dangerous and colorful of patients lurk, and he seeks counsel about who or whom may be killing the staff members and he’s never given a very clear answer, and neither are we, and we’re left with the “Prom Night” climax that left so many plot holes and lapses in logic out on the table that were never resolved and it just ends up becoming yet another vapid straight to video that will remain on the half price bin. Jordan Ladd is hot, Joshua Leonard does a great impression of Brad Pitt, two people die, and nothing happens. “Madhouse” is a whole lot of elements and plot devices that ultimately amount to nothing and leave many unanswered questions, but the problem is the movie isn’t good enough for me to want to decipher it’s mysteries.
The Clearing (2004)
As much as I didn’t want it to be what with the excellent cast of great actors, “The Clearing” is a surprisingly routine hostage flick with all the usual foibles and aspects you’d expect from a film such as this. Plus, it comes off in the end as utterly incomplete and half-assed. I love Robert Redford, and I think he’s still an immensely talented man, but this is just an overall lame-brained attempt at something more existential. The film goes on and on without even much of a full concept. We have Helen Mirren’s character who is desperate for her husband but begins exploring his shady past and their life together, but that’s never really explored with as much depth as it could have been, we meet the children, one is an eager son, the other is a beautiful daughter, but they’re never truly explored, then we have the bonding of this family whom were disconnected in life but connect during this tragedy, and sadly, that is a concept not truly explored as I wanted it to be.
Dark Chamber (2005)
I tend to underestimate independents sometimes, and with “Under Surveillance” I expected one thing and received the complete opposite. I knew I had this movie pegged about thirty minutes in, and then the surprise climax completely slapped me in the face, and right humbled my suspicions. Writer-director David Campfield manages to create a film that really ends up being a worthy hybrid of Hitchcock and Agatha Christie, with a story that constantly comes up with layers upon layers of plot twists and surprises that really involve the audience with what’s occurring on-screen. He feeds us this notion about what the film is alluding to, and then sneaks on us a completely different concept that fits.
Layer Cake (2004)
Films like this make me happy I can afford to pay for them because “Layer Cake” is worth the money in the end. Taking off with a very Guy Ritchie sensibility, director Matthew Vaughn who has had involvement with one of my favorite films of the past years “Snatch” creates his own stylish monster of a mob movie with “Layer Cake”. What does the title refer to? Well, that’s basically something left for the climax, but this rampage of sex, booze, drugs, and violence make this one of the best mob movies I’ve seen since “Snatch”. Mr. X is a drug dealer/drug maker who wants to grab life by the balls.
Cube Zero (2004)
Just so we know where we stand, I disliked Cube, and hated Cube 2: Hypercube, both films that made the basic horror/science fiction fan cream their pants. Though the concepts were original, the writers and creators did very little with it and thus we were given much repetition in both. One is about a bunch of people in a cube maze with death traps, Cube 2 was just basically a lot more of the same thing, and it seems to me the creators figured out that they needed to change it or else continue repeating the same old stuff, so they created this prequel/semi-sequel called “Cube Zero”.