Movie Review: Goodnight Mommy

Director(s): Severin Fiala & Veronika Franz / Starring: Susanne Wuest, Lukas Schwarz & Elias Schwarz / Writer(s): Severin Fiala & Veronika Franz. 

Per IMDb, Goodnight Mommy is a German-Language psychological thriller/drama about two twin boys who move into a new home with their mother after she has face changing cosmetic surgery, but under her bandages is someone the children don't recognize. 

The trailer for this film has been spreading through the internet like wildfire for months now. Usually with the adjectives "terrifying" & "horrifying" attached. I was linked to the trailer on twitter and wasn't exactly hyped as everyone else was about it, but it still looked good to me. Now that I've watched I'm here to report that this is not a horror... at least not in a pure sense of the word anyways. And I kind of expected this.

The film starts out with the young boys, Elias & Lukas, roaming the Austrian countryside. The location wasn't specified, but my god is it beautiful. This cinematography in this film is immediately spectacular. The few, and I mean few, films I've seen out of Austria & Germany have been visually bleak but the visuals for this film are vibrant & indulgent. I was in awe of it from beginning to end. The boys play hide-and-seek, frolic through the forest, go swimming, etc. Do things that kids their age do. when you finally meet their mother(Wuest), it's a cold scene. The twins are unforgiving in their reaction the seeing their mother's bandaged face for what seems to be the first time and she misconstrues their being startled for disgust. Tension in the household begins to simmer.

At first it seems like the film is about the mother's disappointment with her self-image. It even seems to be hinted at with the big portraits of distorted female figures strewn throughout the walls of the house. From that I figured her impatience & resent of her children was due to their youth. Those elements are definitely there, but it's not the entire story. You later learn that the true source of her resentment is and what the second purpose of those portraits when the boys start to suspect their mother isn't their mother.

If you got caught up in the "most terrifying/horrifying" hype when the trailer was buzzing then you will be disappointed sitting through the first two acts of the film waiting to be scared by something. There are some slightly disturbing/hard to look at things that happen, some startling cuts in the editing and it has generally disquiet atmosphere, but this is mostly a slow burn... not a pure horror. Goodnight Mommy is a story of emotional & psychological trauma. To be fair, the way the trailer is cut is purposely manipulative in how it portrays it as a horror, but it still shocked me when I seen so many negative reviews for the film.

 It suffers  the same fate as The Babadook & the underrated Silent House remake. People come in with certain expectations of what they think it's supposed to be and miss the point of what it actually is in the process. It's not a horror with contrived plot about two sociopathic boys whose mother has been replaced by an evil witch or something, it's about two boys who are so perplexed by their mother treating them differently they think she's another person entirely. "Our mother would never do that," Elias & Lukas say in unison  when presenting their mother a video of her hitting one of them. 

The human psyche is fragile... even more so when it comes to children. So it's natural for children to lash out when they suddenly experience resentment & bitter embrace from the person who's supposed to love them the most. On the flip-side, this film is presented from a completely biased point of view of the children for most of the runtime. The Schwarz twins are brilliant, you'd think there's not much to what they had to do, but the precise subtlety to performances should not be taken for granted.

When you examine the mother's behavior closer, and look at it from her angle it becomes a completely different film from what you thought you were watching. Imagine you're a recent divorcée, highly insecure about your self-image and in a sensitive state... reeling from a traumatic experience(Susanne Wuest's face is wrapped in bandages for 2/3 of the film, but she still gives a great turn, emitting emotions the way she did with her face covered is no small feat.) Imagine the two people in the world you'd expect to adore you essentially reject you and choose each other's company over yours. Of course that doesn't excuse the abuse, but just imagine the isolation you'd experience seeing them frolic carelessly through the countryside while you're emotionally wrecked. Is that all of the story? No, but I have to reiterate that these elements are there and shouldn't be whisked away by the "twist" that's barely a twist in the first place. These are real-life themes only retrofitted with "horror" tropes. This isn't anything new either. 

In the beginning, most horrors were rooted in real-life phobias, fears & traumatic events. It's just that over the years horror as a genre has become a thing of its own and it has a lot of people thinking  everything that evokes some element of horror is supposed to scare them when that's not necessarily the case. Not the most terrifying film ever, but is one of the most engaging thrillers you'll see in a while.

Movie Review: The Big Bad F*cking WolfCop

WolfCop(2014)

Writer/Director: Lowell Dean

Starring: Leo Fafard, Jonathan Cherry & Sarah Lind

"...I'm the fuzz."

I liked this movie, but probably more than I should have. There are plenty of flaws that just beg for me to consider this movie as bad, but I just found it to be too awesome. Let's start with how cool of a concept this is. It's about an alcoholic cop who's suddenly turned into a werewolf then decides to go around and use his new abilities to eradicate crime. Well, sort of. But when you sum it up in that respect, it could've easily been a superhero movie. In fact, if this had the budget like one of those big superhero movies, with the story it has, it could've been a great one. Though, it probably wouldn't have all the things that make it cool like ripping people's faces and arms off. That's one of the main things that contribute to me liking this film; the vintage practical effects. Lou's(Fafard) first transformation is the high point of the film for me and rivals that of the eye-popping classic one in 1981's The Howling . And speaking of "eye-popping" there's a scene where a guy literally gets stabbed in the eye by one of the film's villains and it's absolutely glorious in all it's gore and exaggerated sound design.

The movie is pretty short clocking in at 78 minutes so it kicks off fairly fast. It opens up with an alcoholic Lou falling out of bed dragging his hungover body out the door to his job at the sheriff's department which he's regularly late for. As Lou cruises through his schlocky small town, we're made aware of current mayoral election going on and are introduced to front-runners; the longstanding incumbent, Mayor Bradley & an up-and-comer, Terry Wallace. We also quickly get a feel for how much Lou cares for his job or at least a picture of just how non-relevant local law enforcement is to the townspeople. This is made even more clear when Lou pulls up to the station and the front of the building has a busted door and is vandalized with the word "PIGS" (one of the many wolf-related puns in the movie.) Lou walks in trying to duck everyone, but is immediately grilled by his coworker/supercop, Tina(Matysio.) & his Chief who claims that Lou's father would be disappointed in him. Lou doesn't seem to care about that much which points me to an element of the film that I consider quality & a flaw: the overall casualness of the movie.

It's quality because it doesn't take itself too seriously, but it's a flaw because that overall casualness about it dampens some important scenes concerning the story with apathy. The perfect example is the scene after Lou's cursed and has his first transformation where kills a bunch of bad guys at a bar... the next day he comes back and the bartender says to him that he wasn't himself when he did what he did, but he saved her. The exchange is just so drab that the scene feels like a throwaway. It's not that I feel she should've been freaking out or anything, it just that even with a black comedy, scenes like that should at least make an effort to mount some kind of tension or suspense when there's a mystery at play. And there is definitely one at play, but the overall casualness that I mention doesn't allow for you to feel it enough to care that there is. It instead leaves you waiting for the next wolf-up, scene of carnage or whatever campy craziness you expect coming into this. And it does deliver on those expectations, but not enough for you to say "story be damned, this is great." Like  I said, the story is actually pretty good, but due to it being poorly handled I wish the filmmakers would've scaled back on the story and focused more action. Luckily there's a sequel on the way so I know there'll be plenty of fun to be had now that they've gotten this out of the way. 

Hot Fuzz does everything tried here better even the horror stuff, but I still liked this for what it was. Campy genre fare that fails to balance elements of Mystery-Cop & Black-Comedy Horror movies, but entertains anyways. Especially worth watching if you're a die-hard genre fan like me.