"We Need To Talk About Kevin" and "Retreat"
We Need To Talk About Kevin (2011)
Mark Kermode's top film of last year stars Tilda Swinton as the mother of a child who seem to have a grudge against her from the moment he is born. This is adapted from a novel (by Lionel Shriver), but I have absolutely no idea how this story would work within a book. Unlike most adaptations, there's something especially visual and tonal about the film. While there's clearly a plot line running through the film and we've seen films which use mixed-up timelines and flashbacks before, the whole film is quite disorientating in the way it skips from past to present with occasional glimpses of events in between.
While not actually a horror film per se, "We Need To Talk About Kevin", but the film consistently evokes the same creepy atmosphere as you'd expect to find in classic horror titles like "Ringu" or John Carpenter's "The Thing" (and it's certainly a damn sight creepier than "Wes Craven's New Nightmare"). It's quite interesting to compare how relatively upbeat "Contagion", a film about a deadly viral outbreak threatening society as we know it, was by comparison. We get a clear sense in this film that children are terrifying, that the central figure of 'Kevin' is a monster, and that Tilda Swinton seems to be the only one sensible enough to recognise that her son is psychopathic and, quite possibly, the devil. (Okay maybe we don't go quite that far. If Kevin was the devil, that might indicate the possible existence of a God. As it is, Tilda Swinton's being cursed with the role as Kevin's mother indicates the distinct opposite of a benign power overseeing the universe.)
The film contains so many wonderfully horrible images and ideas that listing them would only serve to spoil surprises. To just pick one image which I felt stood out. Tilda Swinton is pushing a pram around everywhere and we keep hearing the same noise of the baby crying wherever she goes. She simply cannot work out how to stop the baby crying, but eventually we see her with a kind of blissful look on her face because she has stopped right next to a loud building site where the pneumatic drill is in use. Everyone is looking at her incredulous, but what only she (and the audience of course) knows is that this is the first time all day that she's been able to block out the noise of her baby's constant repetitive unwavering whine. Anyone familiar with Peter Jackson's "Braindead" (or "Dead Alive" in the States) may find that movie's scene with the (zombie) baby in the pram an interesting comparison. There's a mixture of horror and humour, but the humour in WNTTAK is all the darker for the realism of the scenario.
While there are humourous elements in this film they are VERY dark. It's not like a Coen Brothers film where you can just get on the right wavelength and you can laugh all the way through. Not on first watch at least and I think you'd have to be pretty heartless to manage it. This is more on the wavelength of Darren Aronofky's misery-fests like "Black Swan" or "Requiem For A Dream". You are basically watching the slow destruction of a woman (mentally) at the hand of her own child. Also there's a sort of Cassandra complex about it all. She knows that Kevin is unstable and dangerous, like a ticking time bomb, but no one believes her and so she's unable to stop the oncoming tragedy. It's made fairly clear early on in the film that something terrible has happened and it was most likely to do with Kevin, but it takes quite a while before we find out what that event was since most scenes take place in the past.
The acting is great. In spite of the weird twisty timeline, the plot is great (and thankfully it all comes together properly by the end), the imagery and visual style is incredible. So why am I not giving this an "A+"? Well, as always my scores are based on my enjoyment. This film was relentlessly miserable (and this is coming from a BIG FAN of Aronofsky's work) and while that might be seen as a good thing, I can't pretend that it helped my enjoyment. I know of another LJ reviewer who marks some movies down somewhat if they are gory in a particularly nasty way, well this is the mental equivalent. They didn't need any gore (or, to go back to the Requiem For A Dream example, arms being surgically removed or people conscious during electric shock treatment) to make this horrible to watch. Still, unlike with "The Loved Ones" (which was a pretty good film from what I saw, but now sets my current standard for what counts as "torture porn" - having seen "Saw" but not seen "Hostel") I was able to reach the end comfortably. And I don't want to oversell the misery, since if it was a completely unbearable experience I wouldn't even be giving it this marginally lower score. This was a near-miss from the top score and the ONLY thing wrong with it is the relentless abject misery aspect.
This is a fantastic film and in regards to its one weakness - you have been warned.
A-
Retreat (2011)
What a cast eh? There's Cillian Murphy, Jamie Bell and um... Thandie Newton. I actually remember quite fancying Thandie Newton in MI:2, but mainly because I thought she had a pretty face. If anything she's lost weight since then so she's looking rather gaunt. Naturally we shouldn't judge actresses by their weight, but that upsets me anyway. In any case, all three of these actors are clearly excellent and so this really ought to be a fantastic film as a result. Sadly, it isn't. The set-up at the beginning feels awkward, the pacing in the middle is slow, the behaviour of the characters (not just Jamie Bell's mysterious figure but the other two as well) is often confusing, the ending ends up looking like a silly cop-out, and I'm not convinced that the director is getting the best out of any of these performers. Yes, they are all brilliant, but I couldn't help but feel that the performances were in spite of rather than encouraged by the director.
The premise comes off as silly, but the filmmakers clearly expect us to take everything very seriously. As a result it's all a little overly miserable and a rather exasperating experience. Strangely this feels like the sort of film that Danny Boyle might have done a good job with, but debut director Carl Tibbets clearly isn't up to the task. It's a bunch of characters who are clearly supposed to be flawed, but the way the film has been done none of them seem terribly interesting. While it's hard to imagine a version of "Trainspotting" where absolutely none of the characters are interesting, I've no doubt someone out there could manage it. And something like that appears to be happening here. I'm clearly supposed to be deeply concerned about the character interactions, but I just don't care, not least because no one's actions ever seem to make much sense.
The story is that a couple are going to an old remote holiday spot in order to rebuild their relationship. Something bad happened between them and things are a bit tense. With the weather looking grim, the boiler messing up and a clear sense that the remoteness is actually a bit annoying, they both come to doubt whether they should really have planned this getaway in the first place. Then suddenly a mysterious figure arrives. The couple find him unconscious and bring him inside and it's then that they realise that he has a gun. And that's only the beginning.
The lack of a connection I felt with the characters became particularly problematic when big revelations are made towards the end. This should be the point where all the gaps are filled, but instead it just made me feel like I was entering a new movie. Since I never felt any connection with the characters they were unable to lead me into the new state of affairs. Rather I just lost all interest. That being said, the final revelations are so ludicrous that I doubt that better development of the characters earlier on would have made much difference.
Jamie Bell is terrifying, Cillian Murphy is cowardly in a fairly understandable and typical way and Thandie Newton is a strong woman who braves everything she faces and becomes slowly unsure which of the men she really should hate more. Unfortunately, the film these excellent actors are starring in is slow and plodding and has a stupid ending which ruins what little character development the actors are able to achieve with their fairly limited script.
E+