Silent Night

Title:  Silent Night

Director:  Steven C. Miller
Released:  2012
Starring: Malcolm McDowell, Jaime King, Donal Logue, Ellen Wong, Lisa Marie, Courtney-Jane White, Cortney Palm, John B. Lowe, Rick Skene, Brendan Fehr, Andrew Hughes, Kelly Wolfman

Plot: A serial killer Santa is on the loose in a small Midwest town picking off citizens on Christmas Eve and it’s down to the local police force to track him down before it’s too late.

 

Review:  A remake of sorts of the classic festive slasher “Silent Night Deadly Night” which unlike the original seemingly slipped under the radar for most horror fans, no doubt thanks to its direct to DVD release which inturn mean that it avoided any of the controversy that the original film was greeted with. This of course makes it only the more of a shame as this is one of those great rarities a decent horror remake!
 

It’s worth pointing out that going into this one I had no idea that it was actually a remake, happy to see another Santa Slasher and it only dawned on me after several scenes came off more than a little familiar. At the same time here director Steven C. Miller is clearly keen not to just remake the original shot for shot and here instead gives us an original plot and throws in fun nods to the original when he can. While largely successful it does however mean that the references range from clever such as a sheriff commenting about it being “Garbage Day” to slightly more clumsy as seen with his attempts to work in the catatonic creepy grandpa which comes off misplaced with the scene feeling like it has been forced in especially when unlike the original it has no importance to the plot in the slightest.
 

While the original focused on the psychologically damaged Billy and the events leading up to his psychotic breakdown, here it’s a much more straightforward story and inturn meaning that the film wastes little time before our killer sets to work as we open to him using his home made electric chair on one of his victims after the great opening sequence showing him assembling his Santa suit. From here it essentially a chain of ever more inventive kills while Aubrey (King) tries to track him down which is no easy task when the town is full of Santa’s for the annual Christmas parade. Even with the killer in the towns midst it soon becomes apparent that he’s not the only crazy in town as we also get the drunk and bitter Santa Jim played here by the continually underrated Donal Logue and who here provides a fun red herring.
 

While the original spent its time building up the background of Billy and trying to explain how he ends up going on his murderous rampage, here such things are much more of an afterthought with Miller much keener to rack up the creative kills and keep the film moving at a brisk pace than explain why his killer is doing what they are doing. As such when we do finally get an explanation its feels like much more of an afterthought and thanks to its placement in the film as an epilogue of sorts feels clumsier than if it had it been placed in a more prominent position.  On the flip side the kills here are truly inventive as the killer proves himself more than capable with his axe while getting equally creative with a string of Christmas lights and more memorably a flamethrower while the real standout death comes via the use of a woodchipper

While the kills are all surprisingly good it’s equally surprising to see the film shot like an 80’s slasher as we get a healthy dose of gore and splatter, let alone gratuitous nudity which seems to equally be as much a rarity in modern horror as old school splatter and here its used in such a way that it adds to the film rather than feeling exploitive. Again it’s a credit to Miller that he also shies away from reproducing any of the classic kills from the original outside of a girl being impaled in a pair of antlers, though if only one kill was to be carried across I kind of would have preferred for it to have been the sled decapitation which is sadly absent here
 

Unquestionably it’s a great cast which Miller has assembled here with Malcom McDowell chewing the scenery as the town sheriff while getting the best line of the film when he belittles the killer for bringing “a flamethrower to a gun fight”. Equally on good form is Jaime King who here makes her third appearance in a horror remake, having previously appeared in the remakes of both “My Bloody Valentine” and “Mother’s Day” and here proves herself a great final girl as the deputy determined to learn the identity of the killer with whom they she might share more of a link with than first seems.

While it might be remake here Miller really has crafted a film which stands on its own merits, giving the fans of the festive slasher another film to add to their collection, though by the same quality it’s doubtful that none horror films will find much here to hold their attention, especially as its not trying to be meta or break the mould but this is one which is worth giving a watch even with the horror remake stigma, though it will no doubt leave you wishing that more of horror remakes were like it.

Easy A

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Title: Easy A

Director: Will Cluck

Released: 2010

Starring: Emma Stone, Penn Badgley, Amanda Bynes, Dan Byrd, Thomas Haden Church, Patricia Clarkson, Cam Gigandet, Lisa Kudrow, Malcolm McDowell, Aly Michlka

Plot: Clean cut student Olive (Stone) lies to her best friend Rhiannon (Michalka) about going on a date to get out of a camping trip, which soon escalates to her lying aswell about losing her virginity to a college guy. However when her lie is overheard by the strictly religious Marianne (Bynes), it soon starts to spread around the school while also leading to a surprising new business for Olive

Review: Okay it’s safe to say that when I was working out what to watch this for my review, things weren’t going so great seeing how I been drenched by two jerks driving through puddles beside me on the way home, as well as the stupid blinds falling down again….needless to say it wasn’t the best of times. So hence I decided to finally watching while angry punching the buttons on the Sky+ in hopes of finding something fun and carefree. It is only all the more of a bonus that it also happened to feature Emma Stone

Following in the footsteps of Clueless, 10 Things I Hate About You and Cruel Intentions, this film sees Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlett Letter” also getting the high school remake treatment in what was originally intended to be the first part of an interlinking trilogy of films and one which would have seen both “Cyrano de Bergerac” and “The Mystery of Edwin Drood” also being given a similar treatment. As of the time of writing this is still to happen and sadly currently seems unlikely to either. Still as a standalone film this still stands well on its own as Olive not so much reworks the story of Hester Prynne, but instead draws comparison between Hester’s life and her own as their situation especially as both are thrown into turmoil by the rumour of sexual promiscuity.

One big difference here though is that Olive unlike Hester refuses to let her new found reputation as the school tramp persecute her, as she not only starts playing up her fake reputation by dressing more provocatively and proudly displaying a red A (the old symbol adulaters as well as the symbol Hester was branded with) on her clothes as she works it for the added popularity and increase social status it gives her, especially when she helps her gay friend Brandon (Byrd) convince the rest of the school is straight by pretending to sleep with him, an event which soon has her offering a similar service to boys at her school that are hopeless in love to help improve their own social status’s in exchange for money and gifts though while this starts well with her friend Brandon the quality of gifts soon sharply decline in quality, which only makes it all the more amusing to see Olive working her own pricing structure in regards to what a hardware gift card gets someone.
 

Sadly while the film plays out it’s Scarlett Letter inspired plot well, it sadly throws it away in the last quarter with an unneeded romance between Olive and the school mascot “Woodchuck” Todd played here with grating smugness by Penn Badgley, who I can only guess director Cluck felt came across more hip than he does. It is equally frustrating that the film in places descends into an John Hughes homage, especially with the ending which goes for the grand crescendo of combining elements of The Breakfast Club, Say Anything and Can’t Buy Me Love to nauseating effect and the overwhelming feeling that Cluck couldn’t think of any other way to end it, especially when it doesn’t flow as well as an earlier nod to “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”. Still these references only continue to baffle further when you consider that she is supposed to be a current 17 year old and honestly I don’t know many kids born in the 90’s / 00’s who really care about these movies held in such high regard by the kids of my own generation who mostly grew up with them, while those playing catch up like myself usually struggle to see what the fuss is about. True Olive is played as being mature for her age, especially as she confidently references the key points of the “The Scarlett Letter” something I doubt most students her age could, let alone will have watched both film versions, even if her comparison and dismissal of the Demi Moore version is great.

Of course the real strength of this film lies with the confident lead performance by Emma Stone, who is every bit the feisty redhead with an equally sharp and witty tongue, which only makes Olive more fun to be around. It is also equally an advantage that Stone is more than capable of providing a frequently humorous narration (something deceptively harder than it seems as Keira Knightly proved as she snarled her way through “Domino”) as she regales the tale of her current situation via webcast complete with handwritten title cards. Equally fun is the support from the more established actors like Thomas Haden Church who appears as a cliché spouting teacher, while Lisa Kudrow takes a break from playing her usual dumb blondes and psycho bitches to instead give us a more neurotic and frantic character as the school guidance councillor who also seems to be frequently justifying her role within the school, as she references one after school session for a student who brought a butter knife to school as she proclaims “It’s a gateway knife”. Both are so much fun here it makes me wonder why they are not seen more.
 

Sadly such strong support doesn’t extend to her fellow students who are a mixed bag to say the least with Bynes’s fanatical Christian being so over the top that it regularly becomes farcial, but considering how Bynes’s suffered a breakdown which saw her retire from acting after this film it is hard to tell with this knowledge how much of this was planned. Equally unbelievable is Michalka as Olive’s supposive best friend Rhiannon, but never at one point does their friendship seem believable which is only made the more worrying when they are supposed to be best friends which never seems to come across at any point, as instead we are left with a feeling that Rhiannon is someone who has just claimed friendship with Olive rather than anything closer.

It is purely on the strength of Stone’s abilities as an actress that this film is as strong as it is, especially with its artistic licence regarding students and patching supporting cast, let alone the fact she pretty much carries it on her own performance which ultimately makes this a fun and breezy watch and certainly put me in better mood, but then considering how fun Olive is to be around its hardly surprising and the type of role we will see Stone playing more in the future, especially as who doesn’t love a feisty redhead?

If...

Title: If…

Director: Lindsay Anderson
Released: 1968
Starring: Malcolm McDowell, Richard Warwick, Christine Noonan, David Wood, Robert Swann, Peter Jeffrey, Arthur Lowe

Plot: Following Mick and his friends, as their fond feelings towards their boarding school are slowly pushed out as they suffer a series of indignities and abuse at the hands of the teachers and senior boys known the “Whips”, eventually leading to their violent rebellion.
 

Review: Every now and then I will encounter a film which by the time it ends I am left with the conundrum of how I’m actually going to actually review it. This was certainly the case here, as this is defiantly one of the more original films I have seen of late and one which rewards the patience of the viewer, while equally challenging them as the road to their rebellion slowly reveals itself as it proves itself to be just as memorable now as the year it was released. At the same time it is equally noteworthy for the screen debut of McDowell in a role which would lead to Kubrick casting him as the lead Droog “Alex” in his legendry “A Clockwork Orange” after seeing his surprisingly mature performance here and one which McDowell also considers his favourite.

While the plot might seem a fairly straightforward (well on paper atleast), Anderson instead chooses here to craft something rather different, as surreal imagery meets with the eccentricities of the boarding school system, while he highlights such old traditions as “fagging” were the first year boys branded here as “Scum” are made to act like servants for the prefects or “Whips” who have long since grown corrupt with the power they have been given. The film itself meanwhile is divided up into chapters which seemingly have no link to each other, apart from to highlight further the gradually increasing rebellious behaviour of Mick and his group, though it would seem the seeds have been sown long before we join them, with Stephen drawing comparisons between Mick and Guy Fawkes, while the boys cover their dorm walls with Mao, Che Guevara aswell as the Vietnam war which echo the political changes dominating the headlines at the time.

As the film progresses we are slowly introduced to the inner workings of the school, were the teachers frequently show eccentric behaviour and often suffer from various perversions as memorably seen with the Chaplain who frequently gropes and pinches members of his geometry class, while in an utterly bizarre scene we see Mick’s house master (Lowe) singing hymns while his wife tunelessly accompanies him on her recorder as the matron listening in next door is driven to near orgasm by the sound…well to each their own I guess. Elsewhere the whips are seen growing increasingly corrupt by the power they have been given by the faculty, even handing out corporal punishment, as seen during a brutal and prolonged caning of Mick and his friends which is only made worse when tradition demands that they shake hands and thank the whips when it is over. Anderson meanwhile ensuring that the lines between the establishment and Mick’s crusader’s is kept clear cut as he ensures that he can provide suitable justification for their final resolution.

No doubt Anderson could have shot this film in a more straightforward way than he chooses to here, instead drawing influence from Jean Vigo’s “Zéro de conduite” aka “Zero for Conduct”, which like this film drew extensively from its directors boarding school experiences. As a result the film gives us such surreal moments as the boys seeing how long they can hold a plastic bag over their heads, as the camera remains fixed on Mick’s asphyxiating face. Elsewhere things only getting increasingly bizzare with the headmaster being shown hiding the school Chaplin in a giant drawer in his office, or Mick suddenly engaging in an animalistic sex scene with a local waitress (Noonan) moments after meeting her, a scene which was only included at the suggestion of McDowell, who came up with it as a way to see her nude, even though many highbrow critics would no doubt apply some pretentious alternative meaning to the scene, much like the films infrequent switches between colour and black and white, which is less about artistic statement and more about the film running out of money during production so Anderson decided to save money by processing selected scenes in Monocrome. The effect is undeniably effective and one which helps to keep the viewer disorientated, especially when they frequently appear randomly and without warning.  

Like Brando’s “The Wild One” this film has a legacy of controversy which has followed it since its release with critics at the time eagerly tying it the student protests sweeping through France at the time, which was only fuelled further by Anderson’s association with the counterculture of the time, while later critics have viewed it as a precursor to high school shootings like Columbine. The latter comparison though is an interesting one especially for while on the surface it may seem like an obvious influence, but only falls flat with alitle deeper digging, for while the Columbine killers were obvious psychopaths, Mick and his group are purposely directed at removing an evil blight, while carrying with him the motto that “One man can change the world with a bullet in the right place”. Needless to say it is hard to not side with their perhaps extreme and sudden retribution.

While perhaps not the easiest film to watch, it is hard to deny the frequently startling and memorable imagery contained within, while on first viewing the climatic shoot out a little anti-climactic especially when it is confined within the last ten minutes of the film, yet frequently talked about with such enthusiasm, that you would be mistaken for thinking that it is more than it is. Despite there is something to love about a purple rinse granny packing a machine gun. Certainly not a film to suit all tastes, but a fun curiosity for those who like to challenge themselves occasionally with their movie watching.