Tag: sort of horror

REVIEW: Get Out (2017)

Donald Joseph Molosky Leave a comment

For me, the name Jordan Peele will always be synonymous with clever sketch comedy. In the early stages of my adolescence, Key & Peele (2012-2015), a Comedy Central series created by Jordan and his frequent collaborator, Keegan-Michael Key, was held, amongst the likes
of South Park and Family Guy, in the highest echelon of my pantheon of teenage television. However, in 2017, Peele left behind his comfortable niche in the realm of buddy-comedy shorts and made his directorial debut with Get Out, a psychological thriller neatly wrapped in astute social commentary. The film has been met with a significant amount of positive attention from a diverse pool of critics (98% on Rotten Tomatoes), and for the past two years, I have waited eagerly to see Get Out for myself. Unfortunately, I left the State Theater a bit
disappointed.

 

From a purely cinematic perspective, Get Out falls flat on a number of fronts, but most glaringly, I found that the film was far too stylistically ambivalent. Over the course of 104 minutes, Get Out oscillates between moments of dramatic tension, over the top slasher violence, sci-fi absurdism, and yes, nostalgic, Peele-esque humor. Independent from one another, the scenes of Get Out are strong, but the way in which the greater project incorporates the footage is detrimental to the emotional gravity of the film. Additionally, the thematic elements of the film are focused mostly on the serious and relevant issue of camouflaged racial tensions between Black and White Americans, and with such a dynamic narrative structure, some of the film’s more nuanced messages are greatly obscured by the spectacle of it all. Again, Get Out was Jordan Peele’s directorial debut, and at times, the film feels like a somewhat disjointed string of shorts – eerily reflective of Key & Peele.

 

My concerns about the stylistic coherence of Get Out aside, I found that the dramatic climax of the film was set far too early in the story. The first hour of the film is fantastic, but after the second act, the previously riveting tension of the film felt, well, cheapened and manufactured, and as such, the third act of Get Out features far more moments of the stylistic inconsistency that I took issue with in the previous paragraph. From the perspective of the viewer, it almost seems as if Peele directed two entirely separate films: acts one and two of Get Out were bold, chilling, and intellectual, whereas act three felt slightly unbelievable, goofy, and rushed.

 

All things considered, Get Out is slightly above average, but the film’s narrative structure was somewhat flawed. On a positive note, I thought that the cinematographers and set designers of Get Out made exceptional use of both dark and light landscapes, props, and clothing to highlight and reinforce some of Peele’s more abstract messages. Similarly, I also thought that the audio mixing of Get Out was remarkable, as the occasional interjection of shrill, dissonant violin strokes sent my fellow moviegoers out of their seats in fear.

 

6.2/10                                     

 

 

 

 

REVIEW: International Studies Horror Film Fest

Emma Pinchak 2 Comments

Another year of the annual International Studies Horror Film Fest has come and gone, and with it went my hope that they would show actual horror movies.

Don’t get me wrong; the selections were wonderfully artistic and variable in tone and theme and texture. All three featured original plots and unsettling undertones. They each force a bit of creepiness into one’s idea of the world, while remaining quite beautiful. However, I would have appreciated at least one fully, overtly gruesome movie in the program. The gore was almost nonexistent in all of the films, limited to a few scenes of graphicness apiece. I found myself groaning over the romantic subplots and long periods of calm while trying to focus on the main stories and character dynamics. On Halloween, I need fear to rule. This can be done in complex, story-rich, writerly ways; the artistry of a film need not be sacrificed. Thus, even if the fest’s planners intended to get together a group of intellectually stimulating movies, they could have done so while giving the audience a little more of a scare.

Face was basically CSI or Criminal Minds in all it accomplished horror-wise. The whole movie seems cast in shadows, plagued by an uninspired soundtrack and TV-drama style acting. But the pace of the film was perfect, a slow reveal of a shocking truth whose slime does something venomous to the psyche of the audience.

The Lure was an entire musical, and certainly the only movie of its kind, however impossible to define that may be. The heavy glamour of the strip club pairs so well with the mythology surrounding mermaids, and the girls’ dead stares were a perfect balance for all the life in their musical numbers. The unwholesomeness of the young girls participating in this business combines with the sexual power of mermaids in lore to create an uneasy feeling for the audience, similar to the trickery sailors face in all the stories. But even with the violence and the complex uneasiness, this movie is far closer to a comedy than a horror film.

Dogtooth seemed like something I should have enjoyed, given that its creator is the same man behind The Lobster (a movie which, after watching, made me feel so unmoored that I literally held onto street signs as I walked to the bus stop, certain I’d blow away with the wind). It bears obvious similarities in how the cast is directed to act (basically emotionless, flat) and the minimalism of the indoor environments. But it falls short of creating the same level of effect for me that Lanthimos had in his later film. I think he realizes later in his career that there is a limit to the lack of expression he can write into his actors and the barrenness of the landscape before it becomes too offputting for the audience to focus on the story. In short, I got bored, and the beauty of the expertly done lighting and the carefully constructed garden space did little to change that. Some emotional music would have gone a long way.

Truly, these movies have tons of artistic value to consider and appreciate. In another sort of film festival, they would be great additions (and indeed, they have been inputs of such festivals as Cannes and Sundance), but I still hold that they are unwise selections for a true horror fest. I hope that next year, they have more time in the gallery to show an extra movie that a Halloween lover would appreciate.