Writer/director Trey Edward Shults’ psychological horror flick from this past year, It Comes at Night, is well-written, gorgeously shot, well-acted, and deeply disturbing, but it has a bad title. At first glance, It Comes at Night is a great title for a horror flick. It implies that there is an It that will be coming to terrorize cast members, most probably at night. If this were a monster or a slasher flick, or maybe even something more mysterious, this would be a great title for a film. But in a film that has no It, and which places little meaningful significance on the night, it’s a terrible title. Perhaps Shults had this great title and this great screenplay, and decided to put them together, with little regard to whether or not they were beneficial to each other. Either way, the result is the audience being sold a false bill of goods, which is a shitty thing to do to viewers even if the end result is a good film. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: It Comes at Night, or, Misleading Title: The Movie”
Some of Those Responsible: Joel Edgerton
The Empty Balcony: The Rover
I love a good post-apocalyptic tale. I have a pessimist’s fascination with the myriad ways everything can go wrong. Global catastrophe for the human race holds the same place in my mind as standing at the edge of a precipice and picturing flying off into the void. This isn’t a sign of some psychological damage or misfiring neurons. This isn’t a mental illness or a death wish. It’s just human nature to be drawn in wonder to these things. Some of us feel the pull more than others, but that doesn’t mean we want it to happen. Continue reading “The Empty Balcony: The Rover”
October Horrorshow: The Thing (2011)
Last week, The Thing was released to theaters. Directed by Matthijs van Heijningen Jr., this new Thing is a bit weird. Originally conceived as a remake of the 1982 John Carpenter film, during pre-production the film morphed into being a prequel. This was not a bad idea, as the Carpenter Thing is not only a strong film, it also had a ready-made introductory story that could be made into a full-length feature...possibly. The new Thing, however, while being clearly a prequel to anyone familiar with Carpenter’s work, contains so many visual cues from Carpenter Thing that it also becomes clear the remake idea was not completely scrapped. Or maybe it’s just a case of lazy filmmaking. Maybe there was a script for a remake, the concept changed, but that draft remained, was altered, and became what was finally put to film. Either way, it’s the remake/prequel aspects of new Thing that make it weird. Maybe it’s an homage, but if that’s the case, there was a bit too much homaging going on. Continue reading “October Horrorshow: The Thing (2011)”