Movie Face/Off! Biblical Horror Edition (Results)

The reckoning is here! The scoring is very arbitrary and specific for these films, but the last set of figures represent things I've found I look for in every movie. Production values are something that often mean nothing (the best looking movie can still be shit), but it's where I'll give bonus points for nice photography or an excellent score. Unique selling points account for cool moments that cannot be classified otherwise. Oh, and sorry for using an obnoxious corporate phrase.

As for liveliness, a degree of coherent energy can make up for a lot of other failures, and by that I don't mean crazy pace. Something slow-paced, e.g. Jonathan Glazer's widely hated Birth (off the top of my head), barely moves at all, but there is an intelligence and plan for maximum effectiveness to that film that many films lack despite the frenetic editing or stunt-packed explosiveness or otherwise skillful filmmaking. It's just apparent there's some attention to pacing beyond making individual scenes work in a certain way, something that extends from committed and thoughtful performances on set down to the arc of the movie, and whether it works as a progressive ebb and flow from the first moment to the last, i.e. has the director figured out the movie's parts and whole from a God position instead of just focusing on the money shots, for lack of a better word. It sounds silly and nitpicky, but I'm always surprised at how many talented or untalented directors nowadays can't be bothered to figure that out. ::shakes cane at whippersnappers on their skateboards::

Ugh, it's something I've been thinking about for a while, and hope to explain better in the future, as well as come up with a better word for it. Not right now, though. We've got facing/off to do.

The Omen

Cast:
Liev Schreiber: -10
David Thewlis: -10
Julia Stiles: -3
Pete Postlethwaite: +2
Michael Gambon: +4
Mia Farrow: +7

Total: -10

I will admit, kneejerk dislike of the leads didn't help here, but as much as Schreiber and Thewlis get on my nerves, I'll admit they're talented, intelligent actors (cursed though they are with sinuses that function as reverb chambers). Here, though, they just give up, sleepwalking through the movie with just enough awareness to point their faces in the right direction. Gambon and Farrow bring it back through sheer insane effort, but John Moore really wasn't paying attention to some of the performances, and thus we get a mixture of apathy and shrill annoyance.

Plot elements specific to these films:
Elegant transmission of exposition: -5
Crazy deaths: +4
Ridiculous character names: +3
Grasp of London geography: -5
Fair treatment of women/reproduction: -10
Avoidance of lazy dream sequences: -4
Survival of ethnic sidekick until final frame: N/A (Thewlis doesn't count)

Total: -17

Yes, Thewlis' death was great fun, but once cinema has offered the sight of someone sliced into pieces by a flying wire fence (as in Final Destination 2), or a skull chopped into pieces by a dislodged engine (as in Final Destination 3), you've got to try hard to top it.

Miscellaneous:
Originality: -10
Liveliness: -7
Enthusiasm for project: -8
Avoidance of cliche: -10
Unique Selling Points: -10
Production values: +1

Total: -42

Lowest scores possible for originality, as it's pretty much a Van Santing of the original movie. As for cliche, perhaps it's a bit unfair to judge the script on that, but Moore offers nothing directorially that could sway me. Everything is filmed exactly the way you would expect it. As for offering something you can't get elsewhere, you've got the superior original and the macabre Final Destination trilogy, which not only loses the religious guff (a secular horror movie about fate!) but presents pregnancy as something positive and hope-inspiring. That those movies are horribly bleak is both an unfortunate side effect and a USP. ::sigh:: I really like those movies.

Omen overall total: -69

A truly appalling, cynical cash-in movie, and further casting doubt on the ability of John Moore to create anything memorable in his career, other than the awesome plane crash scenes in Behind Enemy Lines and Flight of the Phoenix.

The Reaping

Cast:
Hilary Swank: +6
David "Elvis" Morrissey: +1
Idris Elba: +1
AnnaSophia Robb: +3
Stephen Rea: -4
Andrea Frankle: 0

Total: 7

For all the film's faults, Hopkins did get a bunch of talented actors and didn't get in their way too much, as opposed to Moore's higgledy-piggledy approach. Swank especially tries hard. I just can't hate on her. Her taste in projects is often way off, but she commits to it, at least. Andrea Frankle, playing Robb's mother, was in the movie enough to register, but was given nothing to do other than be a red herring. She might be good given something to do, but here she was ill-served.

Plot elements specific to this film:
Elegant transmission of exposition: -2
Crazy deaths: -2
Ridiculous character names: 0
Grasp of London geography: N/A (If you could see the London Eye above the bayou, it would win hands down.)
Fair treatment of women/reproduction: -10
Avoidance of lazy dream sequences: -7
Survival of ethnic sidekick until final frame: -7

Total = -28

If only this film had a Bugenhagen, or death by satellite-crashing, it would register more. Instead the earnestness swamps anything, with only the staging of the locust scene making an impression. It's the only proof that the crew were awake during the planning of the movie. However, see below.

Miscellaneous:
Originality: -7
Liveliness: -8
Enthusiasm for project: -7
Avoidance of cliche: -8
Unique Selling Points: -2
Production values: +5

Total = -27

Not as cynical as The Omen, and certainly the dour atmosphere tends to suggest Hopkins thought he was making something more than a silly potboiler, but it doesn't hide the lack of imagination, not to mention the derivative script. It rips off many better movies, and the best scene in it, i.e. the locust attack, is nowhere near as emotionally affecting or dramatic as the locust scenes at the end of Days of Heaven. Completely different film, but infinitely more compelling. Some nice photography and effects, though.

Reaping overall total = -48

Bland to the point of barely existing. It looks a lot better than it should, but it's a film that just didn't need to be made. Not that that's a bad thing; lots of films don't need to be made, but they can still transcend that and become something great. A half-hearted rehashing of better plots without the wit or imagination to rework them, play homage to them, or push them to an insane level of melodramatic hysteria, is not what I have in mind, though.

So, in a fairish fight, The Reaping wins through superior acting and some nice production values. But as you can see from the score, it's a Pyrrhic victory. In fact, here is an accurate representation of the Biblical Horror Movie Fightbot Face/Off, from Stuart Gordon's massively entertaining Robot Jox.



Oh, the humanity! Those final shots show what me and Canyon's brains were like once the movies were over. Damn you biblical horror movies! We should have rewatched Exorcist III. And pooed ourselves with fear.

Movie Face/Off! Biblical Horror Edition (Round One)

In a not-really-very-odd coincidence, over the past couple of weeks we watched both The Omen remake and The Reaping, two low-wattage horror movies tapping into the religious paranoia fad currently sweeping the world. Of course, this being the real world, that semi-coincidence did not signal the imminent birth of the Anti-Christ, or bring about a series of plagues that range in severity from mildly inconvenient to just plain deadly. Which is good, I guess. However, it begs the question, if The All-New-No-Actually-Pretty-Much-The-Same-Omen and The Swankening were downloaded into the bodies of giant robots and then sent to battle it out inside an enormous futuristic arena, which flavour of film-inspired Fightbot would triumph?

The original Omen isn't that great a movie, but it is a lot of fun, and was directed with an entertaining OTT conviction by Richard Donner. The remake, on the other hand, is utterly flavourless and pointless. Other than the rubbernecking attraction of seeing Mia Farrow play a crazy nanny (she's very convincing), there is nothing to recommend. It doesn't help that it features the two most adenoidal actors on the big screen, Liev Schrieber and David Thewlis. Their scenes together sounded less like exposition-heavy blithering about Revelations and more like two adjacent hornet's nests exchanging hostilities.


I'm not a fan of either actor, finding them to be deeply unwatchable, what with their numerous acting tics, relentless nasality, and humourless approach to their craft (though Schreiber did a lot to erase that image with a brilliant appearance on Conan O'Brien taking the piss out of Studio 60. I'd link to it but Satan himself took it off YouTube). The film also erased any good will The Bourne Ultimatum had generated towards Julia Stiles. Perhaps that's a little harsh. After all, it can't be much fun playing that most unpleasantly misogynistic of bibli-horror staples; the mother whose womb and maternal instincts are used as a battleground and weapon in the war between God and the Devil. Still, like Schreiber and Thewlis, she looks like she's counting the money in her head for long periods.


However, it's all well and good seeing actors you don't give a crap about turning up in dreary biblical horror movies, but when it's someone who you think is an acting hero, i.e. Michael Gambon, it gets less funny. Thankfully he's only in one scene, as the memorably named Bugenhagen. The name is whispered dramatically throughout the movie, usually by deformed or insane priests, often during thunderstorms. The dramatic effect this should achieve is undermined by the fact that Bugenhagen sounds like the creator of a popular ice-cream brand. Gambon gives it his all, bellowing various expositionary ravings with a conviction the movie doesn't deserve.

It was also a shame to see Pete Postlethwaite turn up as a priest who tries to encourage Schreiber to kill his kid. Quick pointer; telling someone their adopted child is borne of a jackal is a quick way to alienate them. I mean, I assume so. It's not like I've ever done it. Second thing to remember; if the hounds of Hell and all of Satan's minions are trying to stop you from killing Damien the demon child and will use the weather, twisted probability, and various possessed animals to do it, get to the point. Starting conversations with such information-lite ravings as, "When the Jews return to Zion, and a comet fills the sky, and the holy Roman Empire rises, then you and I must die. From the eternal sea he rises, creating armies on either shore, turning man against his brother, until man exists no more," just obscures the important facts. A simple, "Kill your jackal child with a bunch of daggers owned by Fred Bugenhagen of Megiddo City or we're all screwed," should suffice.


The most frustrating thing about it is that, as has been commented upon by many, the film was rushed out to capitalise on the date 6.06.06. Knowing that, and sadly without the ability to verify this, I was unable to determine any difference between David Seltzer's script for the new movie and the original. Is it the same movie with contemporary references? It certainly seems like it, with only a couple of the death sequences altered, seemingly just to punch them up. Patrick Troughton got impaled by a church spire in the original, but Pete Postlethwaite gets impaled to the power of eleventy by a church spire and multiple shards of stained glass. A damaged sign swings down and clips off Thewlis' head in a shot that is probably less dramatic than David Warner's outrageous death by sheet-of-glass, but is maybe a touch more elegant, if you can call demonically-inspired decapitation powered by mystical contrivance elegant. Whatever. It was the only moment of the film that entertained me, and not just because it meant no more Thewlis, so it gets bonus points.

But I cruelly take those points away for the worst crime in modern cinema; misuse of London landmarks! It's a stupid thing to be pissed about, and I'm sure it happens in movies set in all the major cities, but having the US Embassy downriver from the London Eye is nonsense. Plus, where is the Saatchi Gallery? And the Aquarium? And the Royal Festival Hall? There is nothing. Just a landmark digitally patched into the background. Later, there are several scenes with Stiles and Schreiber driving miles out of London to get to their enormous estate, and yet over the tops of the trees you can still see the Eye. Perhaps it's possessed by Satan, and is following them around. In the final breathlessly boring chase sequence you can see Czech signs on shops in the city centre. I know the movie is a half-hearted, cynical exercise in cashing in on a frigging date, of all things, but surely someone somewhere could have made a bit of effort. I guess if effort's what you want, director John Moore is not your man.

So, in a Face/Off between this and The Reapening, surely the latter will triumph. Have I ruined the suspense by slating this movie so badly? Well, anyone who has seen Swank battle evil plagues with little more than science and not-science will know it's probably going to be a photo finish.

And you thought Ghost Rider was bad

Yes, as I was saying. Brett Leonard. Director of The Lawnmower Man, which was famously Flowers for Algernon with unpleasant cyber-rape, Pierce Brosnan in a tight bodysuit, and a sequel that would get on any bottom 10 movies list. Adapter of Dean Koontz' Hideaway, with Jeff Goldblum dying, coming back to life, chasing a serial killer, and ending up psychically battling with said killer in an outrageous FX blow-out for no other reason than that Leonard was the "Lawnmower Man guy" and it was kind of expected of him. Helmer of Virtuosity, with Denzel Washington as a disgraced cop with a robotic arm, and Russell "Le Roq" Crowe as a living serial-killer-program made flesh by something to do with very silly non-science. I think the word "nanobots" was bandied around at one point. Seems I don't remember much of it, except that I liked it more than I should have. Denzel! Le Roq! Come on! Bear in mind I have very low standards.

But not so low that I could find anything good to say about Man-Thing, his adaptation of the Marvel comic. To clarify, Man-Thing is not a euphemism for penis. He's an ecological, mystical, gooey being living in the Florida Everglades which doubles as the Nexus of All Realities. His full history is available on Wikipedia, and is more interesting than any attempt of mine to recap it. I have so little interest in the character, even though it was often written by Steve Gerber, the writer behind the magnificent Howard the Duck. I've not read Swamp Thing either. Not even Alan Moore's legendary run. I guess I just don't like reading about non-communicative magical swamp dwelling half-men, even when it's well-written.

Man-Thing the movie is not well-written. It doesn't seem to be written at all. I certainly couldn't tell what was going on. There's a town called Bywater with a new sheriff who investigates a bunch of disappearances, and there's an evil oil baron who has built his rig in the middle of the Nexus, and Man-Thing is pissed, and a shaman is pissed too, and Man-Thing kills everyone except for the sheriff and his hott new eco-warrior girlfriend, even though he had the chance and I was wishing for it really a lot, and then Man-Thing disappears in a swamp-tornado thing. Oh, sorry. Spoiler alert!

I could fart a more imaginative and coherent plot. It was written by Hans Rodionoff, who also wrote an excellent horror comic for Vertigo called Mnemovore. It was original, and creepy, and intelligent. If it were adapted as a film, I'd be first in line. So why is Man-Thing such an abomination? Was it the budgetary constraints? Its genesis was amusing. Marvel announced an alliance with Lionsgate Films, supposedly for a series of low-budget adaptations of Marvel properties, and promised they would all get a cinema release. So far, we've had the disappointing but entertaining Punisher, with Tom "Homeless Dad" Jane and John "Hairpiece" Travolta, and Man-Thing, which ended up being a Sci-Fi Channel TV movie. Avi Arad's expensive pants are on fire right now.

Anyway, Marvel are getting flack for the recent drop in quality of their films. I loved the first two X-Men movies and liked the first two Spideys, but other than that their output is disappointing. I admit, with great reluctance, to a fondness for the Fantastic Four movies. They're awful, but they're light and fun. And, contrary to the beliefs of a few unhinged individuals on the internet, they are better than the astonishingly bad Olle Sassone / Roger Corman version, which featured a frantically gesticulating Doom...


...making up for the fact that you couldn't see his face by voguing in the middle of every line, and ended with Reed Richards' bendy arm...


...played by a rubber pole with a glove on it, waving out of the top of a limousine. Daredevil was okayish, Elektra was very bad, Ghost Rider was appalling (yet my love for lean slices of Nicolas Cage ham saved it. Just). However, compared to Man-Thing, they are all masterpieces. Well, not Ghost Rider, but you get my point.

First strike against it, filming it in Australia with a bunch of actors who can't be bothered to master a Louisiana accent (yes, not only is it set in the wrong state, it's filmed in the wrong country). Worst of all is the lead, "hunky" Matthew Le Nevez as the new sheriff who arrives to clean up this one-monster town, dagnabbit.


There's laconic (which is good), and there's lifeless (more of a problem). Le Nevez crushes each cliched line under a mortis-like monotone that would make Zooey Deschanel jealous, if she could be bothered to muster the energy. When he's not doing that he walks around like a Gerry Anderson puppet, arms and legs wobbling away. I really wish I could find his walk on YouTube. Trey Parker and Matt Stone could have saved a fortune if they'd hired him for Team America: World Police.

The rest of the cast are dreadful too, but for the opposite reason, as if attending an all-you-can-eat scenery buffet. The main villain, Frederick Schist, is played by character actor Jack Thompson, who is usually much better than this. I'll blame Brett Leonard for leading him astray. The love interest is played by Transformers "hottie" Rachael Taylor. I'm still pissed at her for taking screentime away from Buffy and Angel vet Tom Lenk in Transformers. He was cast as a nerdy IT tech who is significantly less hott than Taylor (though significantly more talented), and so is deemed surplus to requirements 15 minutes into the movie. Damn you Michael Bay!

The chemistry between Taylor and Le Nevez is blistering! Well, actually it's barely recognisable as such, mostly because both actors seem unaware of each other for most of the movie, until Leonard randomly screams out, "Mack on each other, craven acting dogs!" and they suddenly start kissing on each other's face parts for no apparent reason. It's as if two strangers on a bus started getting busy right in front of you, and equally as discombobulating.

Of course, all of this is mere window dressing. We watched the damn thing for some Man-Thing action, and we sure got a couple of minutes of it. Luckily for our titular non-hero, various characters like to enter the swamp for very little reason other than to get killed. Again, we could see no reason for this. For all we knew, Man-Thing was phoning Bywater for takeout, and the townsfolk were all moonlighting as delivery men because of the high turnover. After many hints as to what he looks like, we finally see that...er...



Oh great, an Ent with tentacles and red contacts. Worth every penny. Still, it's good news for Stephen Hopkins' The Reaping. Watching Man-Thing a couple of days earlier meant that The Reaping wasn't the worst film set in a Louisiana swamp that we've seen this week.