Time to catch up on the reviews!
WEEK THREE (Oct 17): WOMEN IN HORROR
As a rule, I tend to not go after rape/revenge films for these marathons. I've got nothing against them personally, odd as that sounds, but with how they tend to get lumped into horror more often than not, you'd expect more of them to be, well, horror movies. While there's a longstanding feeling of rape being a worse fate than murder (and not without good reason), rape itself is rarely explored in a way in many of those films that doesn't begin and end at being rougher with an actress who just didn't have any better options for getting some screen time available for them. In a lot of cases, it feels like the act gets trivialized in the hands of people who want some empty provocation to go along with some skin.
Ms. 45 has a strong reputation of being a standout of the rape/revenge genre, and with enough arguments out there that managed to convince me about it being more of a straight horror film than it initially appears to be, I was swayed into putting it in the marathon. I was also eager to see something else directed by Abel Ferrara, whose work is largely unknown to me, outside of seeing
The Driller Killer eons ago, as his reputation proceeds himself.
Far less a female-starring
Death Wish and much more how I imagine
Repulsion would play if it was more like
Maniac,
Ms. 45 caught me off-guard in all the ways I like. The advertising would lead you to think you're getting a run-of-the-mill exploitation flick, but the film has a very thoughtful progression to it that rarely stoops so low as to appease anyone looking for a cheap thrill, and has far grander ambitions in mind. The beginning's risky gambit of showing two back-to-back rapes would have failed miserably, had Ferrara not taken special care to minimize the exploitation of the victim by focusing more on the attacker, and making sure we understand Thana's unique situation of being mute, which amplifies the horror of her situations without having to depict it in a more straightforward manner. You're screaming for her, which puts you even more on her side than this would normally play out.
A lot of credit goes to Zoe Lund for making everything work so well. As Thana, she has to work with a handicap of being unable to speak by using just about every damn muscle the face has to offer to express her feelings. With great femme fatale features, Lund absolutely owns every scene she's in. Every extreme sensation and feeling is profound and authentic, no matter what the cause of it is. You feel the hurt and rejection she feels as she begins her healing process and pray she gets away with the crime that no one would ever dare convict her for. After about 30 minutes, you might begin to wonder why there's so much film left. Every major plot point is done... right?
From there, the film takes a pretty sharp left turn without even making it obvious that it has taken one. I've alluded to what transpires, but it really does need to be seen to be believed, as
Ms. 45 turns into a very different film, and one that challenges every preconception you've had up to that point with regards to your sympathies and your sense of justice. Ferrara forges a radical spin on the revenge genre, where the very essence of vigilante justice is put forth and tried for its crimes.
The film does have some clunky moments to it, as comic relief seems like a rather odd thing to have in a film about such heavy themes, but what it gets right, it knocks right out of the ballpark. It's an uncompromising film in a genre that often straddles the fence, and in taking a firm stance, it ensures that it gets talked about long after the shock of unpleasant scenes wears off.
Oct 18
Is there a such thing as depicting a character as being too evil?
We Need to Talk About Kevin goes to some obscene lengths to show how evil its title character is from birth. Conceived at midnight and brought into the world by a woman unsure of wanting to be a mother in the first place, Kevin himself is hellbent on making sure his mother knows how much he despises her. As the entire story is filtered through Eva's perspective on how events have transpired, there's a feeling that she might be amplifying the level of malice that's actually present in his actions, especially as its revealed early on that she's now reflecting on it in the aftermath of a terrible incident that was carried out by him. But while that can work for a couple of events that happen along the way, the filmmakers do very little to carry the conversation away from the direction of Kevin being pure evil, like what would happen if Michael Myers had grown up in affluence. There's very little room for any other kind of interpretation, and because the film goes out of its way to show you just how eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeevil Kevin is, the more shocking moments ring hollow and, at times, feel unintentionally humorous with how over-the-top they're depicted while remaining stone-faced serious.
As Eva, Tilda Swinton does a remarkable job of having to carry that character through two different eras of psychological torment, but she's having to do a lot of the heavy lifting for a screenplay that has it in for her every step of the way. With everything prior to the incident, she receives little support for her concerns about Kevin, which wouldn't be so bad if the supporting cast (including a completely wasted John C. Reilly) did more than just fall for Kevin's impish smile and tell her not to worry. In the events that take place after the incident, Eva is loathed by all of the townspeople, who have made it their life goal to make her feel worse than she already does after things have gone down, which feels particularly mean-spirited and nasty in the context of the film's final twist, giving those scenes on retrospect a rather sadistic bent to them that they didn't enjoy prior to knowing just how far-reaching Kevin's crimes were.
For the subject matter it tries to tackle, the film just never seems to know what to say about it. It's carried by a strong lead performance and nice visuals, but it feels very hollow and clumsy once I reflect upon it.
