An explanation that the film is comprised of “real” found footage.
Though the opening seems tame today, back when it was released, this introduction marked The Blair Witch Project as a very real kind of horror. The explanation of the source of the footage informs the viewer that no one in the film is going to make it and the amateur quality of the footage and technique throughout the film seemingly confirms that this film is in fact genuine. The tame introduction gives the footage that follows a credibility that something more stylized or pronounced would ruin.
The film opens on the title card, white letters against a black backdrop, before informing the viewer that the footage presented comes from three student filmmakers who disappeared while shooting it. In other words, this is a “true” story based on true, un-edited, footage.
As if in demonstration and confirmation of this status, a completely unfocused mess of colors permeate the screen. It becomes apparent that the camera technician is trying to get the camera to focus on its subject, Heather (Heather Donahue), who explains that she is going to film a documentary on the eponymous “Blair Witch”. Unlike other horrors that start with the “true story” introduction, like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre by Tobe Hooper, The Blair Witch‘s look confirms its announcement, thereby imbuing it with a grounded feeling. Consequently, Heather’s announcement transforms from quirky and cheerful to swan song; the viewer knows that her documentary will lead her to her disappearance. The cheery footage is confirmation that she, and her two cameramen, Joshua (Joshua Leonard) and Michael (Michael Williams) are no more.
This impending doom permeates the film and tinges each of the introduction to the documentary’s crew with melancholy. Heather’s unending enthusiasm feels like a cruel joke. Likewise, Michael telling his mother goodbye hits harder because it’s the last time he’s ever going to see her. As the crew sets off to Burkittsville, Maryland to get footage for their “film”, the viewer knows they’re marching off to their doom.
Town sign for Burkittsville, Maryland
A statue of an angel.
A shot of tombstones at a cemetery.
The amateur attempt at setting a creepy mood via striking and unnerving establishing shots captured by 16 MM film immediately makes it clear that this is a student film. The voiceover narration by Heather adds to this feeling and consequently makes the entire production feel amateurish. The earnestness by which Heather tries to make her documentary creepy makes what happens to her and her crew cruelly ironic.
Upon getting to the location of where the “Blair Witch” myth started, Heather, the director of the documentary, switches cameras from the camcorder, which records in color, to the 16-MM film camera, which records in black and white. The former camera is her attempt to capture a “behind-the-scenes” and the latter camera is for the for the documentary proper. The juxtaposition of the black and white scenes to the colored scenes which came before, accentuate the realism the film goes for precisely because of the amateur nature of Heather’s filmmaking.
As she uses the 16 MM to film a set of insert shots in foreboding manner – a town sign, an angel figure, headstones in a cemetery, etc – it’s apparent she’s trying to evoke a sense of fear and immensity for the audience she thinks is going to watch her piece. Her narration is overdramatic and makes the attempt at horror on her part feel cheesy. However, it is precisely because her attempts at selling fear in such a forward fashion fail, that the terrors she experiences in the latter half of the film gain their legitimacy. Because the polish associated with a studio project is missing from these “proper” shots, they give the “improper” shots an extra genuine feeling.
An old man talks about the Blair witch on the camcorder.
The old man repeats his story in more professional manner when captured on the 16 MM camera.
A child covers their mother’s mouth when the latter mentions the Blair Witch.
Because the film switches between a camcorder and a 16MM film camera, using the latter for the expressed sake of the “professional” documentary Heather is shooting, it gets to establish multiple layers of “reality”. By revealing a layer of artifice, the film disguises the acting of its actors as a documentary proper – an even more real description of reality. This unseen privileging of the “camcorder” reality over the “16 MM” reality lets the film use exposition and action that seem random as ways to amp up the tension.
Case in point, Heather and her crew interact a decent amount of townspeople for clues about the witch before deciding to go off into the forest to get footage on landmarks associated with the malevolent entity. They approach most of these people with the camcorder first, before then asking their subject questions about the witch. If the answer satisfies them, they switch to the 16MM camera and start to shoot “serious” footage. The viewer gets to see the crew canvas targets, ask them questions, hear vague series of answers which paint a dark mythos that reveals very little, and then switch cameras to film those townspeople who had something “interesting” to say.
In fact, it is precisely the film’s switching between the two cameras that gives it the terrifying texture that’s made it such an integral part of horror canon. The film invites the viewer into the film-making process and shows them a view of “reality” and then “reality via artifice” in comparison. These moments provide a point of minimal difference that cements that the found-footage comes from the real world, the world the viewer actually resides in. When on camcorder, the townsfolk talk naturally and seem like average residents. There’s nothing obviously phony about them or their presentation. However, when the film camera is used, the townsfolk adopt a persona for the camera, as though conscious that they are now “officially” going to be on film, so they have to act their best. By providing a point of contrast and a measured difference, the film convinces the audience of the “truth” of the two realities its presenting.
Obviously, this technique implies that the theatrics are only happening behind the black-and-white screen. As a result, the camcorder scenes achieve a level of “legitimacy” that gives them a staying power. For example, a baby screaming out and rushing to cover their mother’s mouth when the latter mentions the Blair Witch stories on the camcorder immediately feels like an omen, because it’s not “staged”/repeated in 16 MM. Thus, the camera gains the power of being a filter for reality. It’s a measure of control that demarcates what is reality and what is artifice.
This idea of the camera as controlling force is the driving theme behind The Blair Witch Project and explains why it’s one of the most frightening found-footage films ever. Heather is obsessed with getting more footage of the events, constantly shoving a camera in someone’s face or trying to get more coverage of terrifying events as they happen. Her compulsion to record is criticized by both Josh and Michael at various points, as they see the behavior as at odds with the group’s ability to navigate the spectral occurrences they run into. However, as she explains herself, the act of documentation is all “she has left.” The camera is the only tool she has left to frame the horrors around her into a cohesive narrative that she overcome.
This is also why the camera is constantly associated with civilization, with Heather and company constantly mentioning that their detour in the woods as having to end eventually because America is destroying its environment. Far from being a cause of concern, the characters repeat the statement in the hopes that the unconquerable vastness of the wilderness will eventually give way to the calm control provided by civilization. In this way, the camera becomes the normalizing force of the social order – a tool meant to help carve out the wild and mystical unknowns into something more agreeable. It is an extension of an American dream which envisions technology being used to cut through and remove the inexplicable from the day-to-day.
This posture towards technology stands in stark contrast to Japanese horror (J-horror) films coming out at the same time, like Ring by Hideo Nakata and Pulse by Kiyoshi Kurosawa, which focused on the anxiety inherent in technology. In Nakata and Kurosawa’s films, technology provides a conduit through which the supernatural past can make its presence felt once again in the “modern” world. In The Blair Witch Project, far from being a tool of the supernatural, the camera is never allowed to witness supernatural events happening as they happen and instead is only ever allowed to assess their consequences, suggesting that the supernatural can’t be tamed by the powers of modernity. This effect is made all the more suspenseful because of the ambiguous worldbuilding provided by the townspeople. Not a single story any member gives is wholly consistent with another, so the nature of who or what what the Blair Witch and their respective capacities is a mystery. One phenomenon hearkens back to one legend of the myth while another leans another way. With no rhyme or reason to the terror at play, the viewer is stuck, like the crew themselves, to experience the scares without knowing the stakes.
In this way, The Blair Witch Project, is a found-footage horror truly representing the sub-genre’s name. It’s a demonstration of the inability of film to mediate horror and provide enough of a gap to render it palatable and tame. Found footage, far from providing answers, only hints at the uncanny power of the abyss which gives no refuge or answers to anyone willing to seek them. By the time the film gets to the latter sections, the characters no longer find solace in their cameras because their ability to frame the situation is removed. The 16 MM and camcorder become interchangeable as the distinctions between what is reality and what is artifice becomes blurry before vanishing into a void with no answers. The behind-the-scenes footage becomes artifice and vice versa as the places to hide from the terror of the unknown disappear.
When the film approaches its end, the edits between scenes become more jarring and provide less information as to what’s happened in the “down-time”. It’s apparent that the characters are clearly filming less as they find themselves trapped and terrified in a situation they can’t comprehend, let alone control. Like the characters, the viewer gets no reprieves from the terrors, as the camera cutting off doesn’t mean respite as much as it means one awful moment is going to cut to a moment even worse in the future. The audience is strapped into a roller-coaster of nightmares that shows no signs of slowing down as the film races towards its finish.
While the directors, Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez, deserve credit for pushing such a low-budget idea to such great lengths, the reason the film is able to work at all, let alone so effectively, is because of the seeming veracity of every actor. Every member of the cast, whether it be the primary trio or the townspeople, has to put on multiple layers of performance, both presenting a “genuine” representation and an obvious façade on that representation that seemingly also stems from it. In other words, the actors have to present a fantasy off as reality and then pass another related fantasy off as artifice. Despite interviewing a plethora of characters, there’s never a point where this dichotomy fails or feels questionable. Actually, the spontaneous nature of the storytelling and dialogue feels so put together and cohesive that it reaches that magical place where it is both too unkempt to feel constructed but is also pointed enough to not come off as feeling totally left-field.
Even though the film might not be as terrifying as it was when it first came out in 1999, at the height of mainstream acceptance of the internet, its construction and “honesty” make it a compelling watch for anyone willing to invest seriously into its premise. The natural character interactions, commitment to authenticity, lack of polish, and unpredictable roller-coaster of scares of The Blair Witch Project are still rarities in the found-footage genre which it helped to popularize and make commonplace, and all serve as proof of just how special the film is.
REPORT CARD
TLDR
The Blair Witch Project is proof that a solid idea and tight execution can be scarier than any polished Hollywood production. Despite being one of the first “found-footage” horrors, The Blair Witch Project is still one of the best. It effectively combines ambiguous worldbuilding, realistic performances, and quick and efficient pacing to deliver a horror that reveals our natural proximity to the terrors hiding beneath the veneer of civilization. Those viewers willing to suspend their disbelief and give in to the film can still find some of the terror that audiences back in 1999 first got a taste of.
Rating
A+
Grade
9.6/10
Go to Page 2 for the for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis. Go to Page 3 to view this review’s progress report .
India (Mia Wasikowska) walks across the street as the frame freezes. Her actor’s name appears across from her. India (Mia Wasikowska) walks over her name. She sees tall grass. The wind billows India’s (Mia Wasikowska) skirt as another cast member’s name appears in its folds. India’s hair freezes. India (Mia Wasikowska wears her mothers blouse and her father’s belt. The flower has a healthy splattering of red covering its initial white color. India (Mia Wasikowska) smiles at her freedom. India (Mia Wasikowska) dissolves as her younger self “breaks” through the screen, showing us the start of India’s journey towards growth. The film starts on a young woman, India, delivering a whispered monologue about her extraordinary senses and the nature of how identity is always formed by that which it is not. As she walks across a street, her actor’s name shows up on the street. The frame pauses. Then time starts again and India walks over the name, subsuming it. It’s a demonstration of both how meaning is everywhere, waiting to be absorbed into identity, and proof of the way the present is composed of moments which each break into discrete blocks known as the past. As the scene continues, the same visual patterns repeat until finally India’s smiling face dissolves to a view of a past her, running through a green field.
“My ears hear what other cannot. Small, faraway things people cannot normally see are visible to me. These senses are the fruits of a lifetime of longing. Longing to be rescued. To be completed. Just as the skirt needs the wind to billow…I’m not formed by things that are of myself alone. I wear my father’s belt tied around my mother’s blouse. And shoes which are from my uncle. This is me. Just as a flower does not choose its color…we are not responsible for what we have come to be. Only once you realize this do you become free. And to become adult, is to become free.”
These words are whispered by our protagonist, India (Mia Wasikowska) in a part opening montage and part intro credit sequence that opens on her walking away from a sports car and police car across the street to a green pasture. Her actress’s name, Mia Wasikowski appears on the screen right next to her as the frame freezes momentarily – the present fading into the past. Time flows again and she walks over the name, subsuming it. She stands over the pasture and looks over it, as the wind blows her skirt and the long grass around her. Another cast member’s name appears in the enclosing of her skirt as the frame freezes again. Once again, the present “intervenes” and the freeze stops while the name recedes into the invisible abyss it came from. This pattern continues to repeat before settling on a white flower spattered in red.
This image is unsettling because at this point in the monologue, India directly refers to how a flower doesn’t choose its colors, in the same way as people do not choose the contingent events that shape up their lives up to that moment. The camera cuts to an image of her face smiling as her whispered speech ends on her explaining that realizing this truth is to become adult, thereby becoming free. The frame freezes one last time as her smiling face dissolves to another shot of a younger her running through another field of green; the sounds of wind and rustling fabrics and grass give way to composer Clint Manwell’s fairy-tale like score which evokes feelings of wonder and propulsive change.
India (Mia Wasikowska) feels an injury on her foot. India (Mia Wasikowska) examines her foot next to a stone statue in the garden. India (Mia Wasikowska) prods her wound and produces a puss. India (Mia Wasikowska) climbs up a treeIndia finds her birthday present in the tree. People run around the birthday cake as the camera pushes in. The camera dives down on the cake as a glass case is put on top. The smoke of the candles dissipates, filling the covering with a smoke. The dissolve to the title card makes the cake look like an eye. The title card for ‘Stoker’ appears. India recognizes a pain in her foot and sits down next to a stone statue which takes the same position as her. She pops a blister on her foot and the clear pus seeps out. With that out of the way, she begins to search all around her expansive land, from the hillocks to the trees looking for a birthday gift which eludes her. Eventually she comes upon a package which seems to be it wrapped in a yellow box, but before she opens it, the film cuts to her birthday cake and a ruckus around it. As the camera moves towards the cake, which gets covered by a class container, the candles give out and the smoke spreads in wispy manner, covering the frame. The image dissolves as the ‘o’ in stoker appears, leaving an impression of an eye momentarily, before the rest of the title gets written out by an invisible pen scratching away.
Just like her “modern” counterpart, this younger India is also followed by the opening credits which appear in the environment around her. She pays them no mind; instead, she takes her shoes off upon noticing a callous and sits next to a gray statue who serves as a mirror image to her. Her wound bursts with clear pus after she pops it, bursting through the soundscape momentarily, before disappearing again. Without a moment wasted, India continues a search, canvassing multiple locations surrounding her expansive residence for “something.” Finally, she climbs up a tree and finds a Birthday present in a box wrapped with yellow ribbons.
Upon finding her mystery item, the film cuts to India’s birthday cake; the propulsive score fades away as the sounds of sirens and flames take charge – a sharp contrast to the scene in question. The camera pushes in on the cake and then rises above it before descending. Now covered in a glass container, the cake is unable to sustain its flames which dissipate into wisps of smoke as a phone starts to ring. A woman screams, “Richard. No!” as the glass container dissolves into the film’s title card proper, which is etched out by an invisible pen and ink.
The camera lingers on both Evelyn’s and India’s shooes. One wears heels while the other wears saddle shoes, a mark of adulthood and childhood respectively. Evelyn (Nicole Kidman) and India (Mia Wasikowska) sit as the latter notices someone gazing upon them. She looks and sees a stranger (Matthew Goode) looking down on the pair from a hill above. The birthday is interrupted by the death of Richard, India’s father. Both her mother, Evelyn, and her sit at the funeral, grieving the loss of the Stoker patriarch. However, India notices a gaze upon her from somewhere else. She looks up at a hillock above her and notices a man staring down.
A preacher’s voice can be heard and it’s revealed that Richard, India’s father, has died. Thus, her 18th birthday, the threshold marking her “birth” as an adult, is marked by the loss of a parent, a figure meant to guide her on that path. Her mother, Evelyn, and her sit at the funeral, both distraught in their own ways. India is stoic and steely while her mother is visibly puffy and devastated. The camera goes to the pair’s feet momentarily; Evelyn is wearing heels while India is wearing saddle shoes. However, India notices a disturbance – a gaze taking notice of her. She turns her head to the side and notices a figure in the distance, a man staring down at her from above the hillocks she previously ran through.
India plays the piano as a spider crawls towards her. Evelyn (Nicole Kidman) asks India (Mia Wasikowska) to help in the kitchen. The spider crawls up India’s leg. Unable to deal with the absence of her father, India tries to play the piano to distract herself. As she does so a spider, seemingly supernatural, crawls towards her feet slowly. Evelyn comes in to ask India to help in the kitchen. As she derides and pleads with India, the spider makes its way its way closer and closer. India notices it crawl up her leg but says nothing about it.
The funeral service proper ends, but the preacher’s sermon continues playing in the soundscape of India’s mind. She tries to play piano while a spider crawls towards her feet. However, her attempts at distracting herself are interrupted by her mother, whose figure makes its presence known on the mirror above her. As Evelyn implores India to help with the event’s cooking, the latter stares her down with a kind of disdain. Even after turning to face Evelyn, as opposed to facing her mirror image, India refuses to say anything. Evelyn exasperatedly pushes her point while the aforementioned spider skirts up the grieving daughter’s leg.
India (Mia Wasikowska) sits in the kitchen to help make deviled eggs. India starts to crack an egg and focus intently on just the sounds of the cracking in an attempt to drown out the gossip regarding her family. India (Mia Wasikowska) is consoled by Mrs.McGarrick (Phyllis Somerville) who reveals that the former’s birthday present is hidden somewhere. India notices the ribbon on the flowers is the same as on her present and comes to realization that her father was not responsible for her yearly birthday present of shoes. India discovered a key in the birthday box instead of her expected pair of shoes. India (Mia Wasikowska) notices her mother (Nicole Kidman) talking to the stranger (Matthew Goode) from earlier. Evelyn (Nicole Kidman) introduces Charlie (Matthew Goode), Richard’s brother, to India. India (Mia Wasikowska) walks into the kitchen pale after seeing Charlie. Mrs.McGarrick (Phyllis Somerville) inquires into her state of mind. The confrontation between India and Charlie comes to a head right after the former learns that her father was not the one responsible for the yearly birthday gifts of shoes that she held so dear to her. She walks into the living area of the house after the realization and then is hit with another announcement from her mother: the mysterious man gazing down on them from earlier is actually her uncle Charlie, her dead father’s brother who he never once mentioned. The experience proves to be too much for India who rushes back inside and confides in the head caretaker, Mrs. McGarrick, that everything is wrong because her father is dead.
However, India does acquiesce to her mother’s demands and goes to the kitchen to help make deviled eggs. She overhears a pair of maids gossiping about the state of her family’s affairs. These unwanted thoughts her, so she starts to roll an egg, cracking it slowly. Outside noise fades out as the sound of the eggs breaking overwhelms the ears, until finally, Mrs. McGarrick (Phyllis Somerville), the Stoker’s head caretaker, silences the pair and goes to inquire into India’s state of mind. The two remnisce on their shared past with deviled eggs and it becomes clear that unlike, Evelyn, India sees the elderly caretaker as a surrogate-mother of sorts. Mrs. McGarrick takes out flowers which are tied with a yellow ribbon and asks India if she found her birthday present yet. India ties the color of the ribbon on the flower to the color of the ribbon on the box from her initial adventure and reveals she found a key in the box before also expressing surprise at the revelation that Mrs.McGarrick is tied to her yearly birthday presents, shoes, as opposed to her deceased father like she initially thought.
She leaves the kitchen momentarily and sees her mother talking to the stranger who gazed upon the mother-daughter duo earlier at the funeral. Her mother sees India and calls out to her, introducing the stranger as Roger’s brother, Charlie – a stranger turned into long lost uncle. The revelation deeply upsets India who immediately walks back into the kitchen. Her pale expression invites concern from Mrs.McGarrick who inquiries into what’s wrong. India responds honestly: “Yes. My father is dead”.
India (Mia Wasikowska) sleeps in her bed dejected. The camera tracks right, showing one pair of her shoes……which dissolves into another pair…which finally dissolves into the first pair of shoes she ever received on her birthday.The camera tracks right from India’s oldest shoes back to her. India (Mia Wasikowska) is revealed to be surrounded by all her pairs of shoes, the circle they make around her is de-centered. India sleeps in her bed in lethargic fashion. The camera tracks from her head to a box of shoes which dissolves into a series of shoes, each a present which she received on her birthday. Shoes help one walk a path, a path that India thought was being presented to her by father but learns is actually the result of someone else’s efforts. This is why the circle of 16 shoes and 1 pair on the floor is decentered – her notion of unity in relation to this key tenet of her identity has been shaken. A disunity has been revealed in the way her image of things has been formed and the discrete elements must be analyzed again.
As if in response to her dejection, the film cuts to a fully lethargic India. The camera tracks to the right from India’s face to a pair of shoes, like the ones she’s worn previously. This pair of shoes dissolves into another which dissolves into another and so on, each pair smaller than the one that came before it. Eventually, the dissolving shoes come to a small pair, fit for a toddler, before the camera tracks right back to India’s face. The camera steps back and reveals that India is laying in a circle of 16 pairs of shoes; each pair from the montage lies around her, in a displaced oval like shape, ranging from oldest to newest pair. Her “current” 17th pair, lies on the floor next to the bed; one pair for every birthday except for the most current birthday – the threshold to becoming an adult.
It’s not just that the 18th pair, the guide to walking the path to adulthood, is missing. India’s turmoil stems from the double mystery of who was fully responsible for her previous 17 pairs of shoes. Up to the moment of Mrs.McGarricks’ reveal, India has walked in her “father’s” footsteps. With the identity of the gift-giver stripped away, the path which has defined her so long as a subject is now that has to be re-treat, rediscovered. The words from the opening monologue ring more resounding here: “I’m not formed by things that are of myself alone “.
The montage which initially presented itself as a series of discrete images, moments bleeding into one another, turns out to be multiple sections of the same image. Far from being from different times, the shoes exist in the same “present” moment with India. However, the montage of them dissolving demonstrates the logic of how moments are just accumulations of everything that came before. Each “shoe” is an epoch that can now be re-cast; a past that can open the doors to new futures.
Evelyn (Nicole Kidman) comments that India and Richard’s hunting trophies are wastes of life but Charlie seems to appreciate the work the father-daughter duo did. Charlie removes a bird qua trophy and reveals an egg underneath it.The egg fades into India’s (Mia Wasikowska) eye – the place of the gaze. India (Mia Wasikowska) walks around her house as guests whisper about her family from all corners. India (Mia Wasikowska) notices Charlie talking to Mrs. McGarrick. Charlie (Matthew Goode) and Mrs. McGarrick (Phyllis Somerville) speak in hurried tones. Charlie (Matthew Goode) notices India gazing at him and returns the favor. India (Mia Wasikowska) quickly averts her eyes. Charlie (Matthew Goode) tries to relocate India as the camera arcs around the room with him. Charlie(Matthew Goode) locates India (Mia Wasikowska) but can’t stop her before she exits out of one of the side doors in the house. The camera tracks India (Mia Wasikowska) as she escapes the confrontation. She traverses the background of the frame while Evelyn (Nicole Kidman) seemingly has Charlie (Matthew Goode) occupied. India (Mia Wasikowska) gets to the front of the house.India (Mia Wasikowska) discovers that Charlie has somehow got to the top of the stairs. India (Mia Wasikowska) walks up the stairs to confront her uncle and the camera pushes in to show the two entering into one another’s frame. India (Mia Wasikowska) makes her way up to Charlie (Matthew Goode) India (Mia Wasikowska) and Charlie (Matthew Goode) finally stand face-to-face, at the same eye level. Now their battle can begin. If the egg is potential, the dissolution of an egg under a bird qua trophy hunted by Richard and India to India’s eye is indicative of both her role as a bird of prey but also a sign that her uncle, who appreciates her hunting, understands what she’s capable of. India, still finding her own way, walks around her house and comes upon Charlie talking to Mrs. McGarrick, which triggers her curiosity. What could the mysterious stranger want with her and what is his connection here?
Unbeknownst, her gaze is felt and just like she did to him earlier, Charlie manages to locate his gazer and stare back. India averts his eyes and seemingly gets away from him as he chases after her, escaping in the background of the frame as he gets trapped in the foreground by Evelyn. However, Charlie announces his presence at the top of the stairs once she gets back into the house and demonstrates that he’s in charge. With India aware of both the stairs as the battleground and the power dynamic at play, Stoker’s cat-and-mouse game of gazes can begin with bloody aplomb.
Meanwhile, Evelyn and Charlie talk about India and Richard’s close-knit relationship, one formed primarily around hunting birds. Evelyn bemoans the act as senseless violence, but Charlie shows great respect for the duo’s craft. He picks up one of their winged trophies and reveals an an egg underneath. The deviled eggs which start as one of India’s favorite treats become an egg which serves as a remainder of her relationship with her father which then dissolves into her eye itself. Eggs are treats are trophies are eyes. A series of poetic connections between the images are formed.
Eggs are white on the outside and yellow on the inside. Eggs, at least the ones shown in the film, are related to birds. In other circumstances, the eggs would break apart to allow new life to come out – the birth of something new. This is a story of a girl becoming a woman, on the threshold of adulthood, looking for a path to walk on as influences all around her permeate her crumbling shell.
India walks around the house and the whispers about her family’s affairs continue. In hushed tones, adults abound talk about her family; their words enter her mental landscape constantly. She notices Charlie talking to a seemingly distraught Mrs. McGarrick, but just as she sensed her Uncle Charlie earlier during the funeral, her uncle senses her gaze and turns to meet it. However, India immediately averts the battle of gazes and escapes. Before Charlie can catch up to her, she runs out of a side entrance of her expansive manor. The camera track India while she roams the outside of the house in the background of the frame; in the foreground, Charlie is being occupied by Evelyn.
However, this turns out to be far from the case as India, initially confident upon entering her abode from the front, is shocked when Charlie calls to her from at the top of the master staircase. Just like the first time she saw him, he reigns above her. He coyly asks her if she wants to know why she feels she’s at a disadvantage, both announcing his take on the duo’s power relation and also preferring an analysis of her own psyche; this is all done despite the fact, as India rightly retorts, that she was unaware of his existence till the day. He ignores her comment and asserts the real reason is because she’s standing below him. The subtext of the stairs is thus brought to the level of text and the viewer is made aware of both the importance of height and presence of stairs as a motif representing control.
In response to his claim, India slowly climbs up the staircase. The camera pushes in through a doorway, signifying the start of the confrontation between uncle and niece, showing India alone, rising to meet Charlie, who slowly enters the frame. She gets to the top of the stairs and stares her newly found family member down, asserting her right to stand as equal to him. She quite literally rises to the challenge.
Upon giving him a long look, she remarks that he looks remarkably like her father. Suddenly, her confused emotional state at his presence gains additional texture. Her father, the one who guided her and took her hunting, not only turns out to not be the one setting her path via the shoes she walks in but has returned, so to speak, in the form of a part hidden relation, part quasi-doppelgänger. Her confrontation with Charlie, is then, the first step she has to take to find herself.
Charlie responds to her comparison with an expression of sympathy towards her loss. A strange response which she notices and calls out, reminding her uncle that the loss is shared among them. Once again, he ignores her observation and tells her that he’s planning on staying with her and her mother for the foreseeable future. He makes it clear that he’s gotten her mother on board but tells India that he wants her approval as well because it’s “important” to him. Thus, the stage for Stoker is set and the battle for power can truly commence.
Given the title, Stoker, a viewer with context would think of Bram Stoker and his work in gothic horror. On that level, Stoker works. All the ingredients for gothic feeling are present: there’s a death encased in mystery, a hidden relative that shows up, and troubled familial relations that bubble up and sublimate in obscene fashion. However, as the first 13 minutes above demonstrate, the film operates closer to the psychoanalytic thrillers of Alfred Hitchcock: the bodies of birds appear like in Psycho, the game of gazes is played like in Vertigo, and at the most obvious level, the basic story beats of Hitchock’s film noir, Shadow of a Doubt, serve as Stoker’s jumping off point. Both stories feature an uncle named Charlie, who shares a special bond with his niece and who is covered in a veil of mystery. Likewise, both stories follow a niece as she struggles against penetrating the veil her uncle puts up. Stoker even goes so far as to replicate Shadow of a Doubt’s use of the staircase as the scene of battle between uncle and niece along with its presence as a motif.
But, unlike Hitchcock’s film which uses the relationship between the uncle and niece to reveal the duplicitous nature of the social order and the underpinnings of the idyllic American fantasy, Stoker uses the relationship to examine the way personal identity is generated and navigated. In other words, one film is aimed at a macro-level and the other at the micro-level. In this way, Stoker is able to traverse a whole different set of ideas from the vantage point of a coming-of-age horror.
Furthermore, though the story and narrative progression may be Hitchcock inspired, the editing, sensuality, and painterly mise-en-scène are all in line with director Park Chan-Wook’s style as an auteur. His stylistic flourishes here give the film it’s poetic sensibilities because he elects to show most of the story rather than tell it. On top of layering motifs in a more traditional sense, he constantly uses the nature of his edits – both sequencing and the edit itself – to suggest connections between seemingly disparate ideas. Like the egg becoming the eye, “apparent” match-cuts between objects of similar sizes and shapes along with dissolves between images are used to demonstrate the state of India’s psychic journey and how she’s processing the story as it goes along. As she makes connections, the viewer can piece together both the narrative and what it means to her own journey.
That being said, the nature of this journey is constantly up for re-interpretation. Pivotal scenes aren’t cut chronologically but are cut in the order India is making sense of them and rendering them coherent from her own vantage point. This gives seemingly obvious moments, a palpable level of uncertainty, because the nature of what the moment is supposed to demonstrate is indeterminate until the very end of that movement, but because movements fade into one another and are constantly recalled, every sequence gains a newfound freedom in how it’s used in the present to open up future possibilities. Consequently, the film feels dynamic even as moments repeat, because those moments come to mean something new.
Even if all the moving parts don’t make sense, Chan-wook’s construction of the film ensures the journey can be felt even if not fully understood. He achieves this feeling of consistency via in how he utilizes the architecture of the house to reflect the ebb and flow of power and also his attention towards maintaining a consistent color palette. While the latter has been mentioned above, the former hasn’t been given it’s due. At a basic level, the exterior of the house is white like the color of an egg’s shell. The green surrounding the house in the form of vegetation makes its way in the walls of the “public” spaces of the house, like the dining room. India is constantly in the color yellow’s proximity. Likewise, her mother is always in red’s presence. By establishing the colors early on and constantly repeating them in and out of the house, Chan-wook is able to get the audience to think about the meaning of them in the background of their minds. As a result, the colors become affectively charged which is why they can be felt even if their presence isn’t consciously noted. Chan-wook is weaving poetic patterns that operate on a level that appears like it’s just style, but is in style employed in lieu of accentuating the substance.
In light of this, it’s surprising to see that critical consensus is so harsh on the film, with many critics chastising the film for being style over substance. It’d be one thing if the film gallivanted from scene to scene for shock value; with violent masterpieces like Oldboy in Chan-wook’s filmography, it would be easy for him to just sink to spectacle. But Stoker is less focused on the spectacle than the journey itself. It’s filmed in a delicate and sensual way because unlike many of his previous excursions, Stoker is a women-led character study; that too, it’s a women led horror movie where the protagonist, far from being victimized, is allowed to find herself in the most emphatic fashion, something which would certainly not be possible if there was no substance beneath the film’s stylistic maneuverings.
This oddity is even more inexplicable given that, in many ways, Stoker feels like a dress rehearsal for The Handmaiden, Park Chan-wook’s 2016 erotic thriller, considered by many, including myself, to be the director’s best work. Both film’s share a woman lead, explore relationships between women, and focus more on the unseen gazes of characters than any overt physical action. They both also showcase incredibly sensual moments of eroticism in unsuspecting fashion, demonstrating the way desire codes even the otherwise seemingly ordinary. Furthermore, while Stoker is an homage and twist on Shadow of a Doubt, The Handmaiden, feels like something similar in relation to Vertigo, at least from my view.
Perhaps the reason for Stoker’s undeserved treatment lies in its opacity. Though, the feeling of the film is something a viewer can take away from a viewing, the lack of direct explanation regarding some of the more overt symbols, like the spider, might put off those looking for a story that provides all the answers. However, it is precisely because the explanations are withheld, that the film opens up interpretative possibility and can evoke the feeling of poetry as opposed to pretentious philosophizing. It’s for that reason that Stoker is best reserved for those viewers who relish engaging with a film, whether that be mulling over it afterwards or playing it back it back to confirm a hint about a theory. It’s a film that rewards multiple viewings and interpretations of the events depicted. At the brisk rate of 99 minutes, Stoker would already be worth seeing for its visual splendor alone. Few films have this much fun presenting images in such confident fashion. However, given the depth Chan-wook manages to pack behind each and every movement, big or small, the film is something that any cinephile should give a watch.
REPORT CARD
TLDR
Stoker is a film about whispers, glances, stolen gazes, and strategies for getting one’s way. The story uses Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt as a jumping off point to explore the psychological journey of a young woman, India, who is forced to find herself after the death of her father and the mysterious emergence of her uncle. Her journey is one that fluctuates from romance to horror to thriller back again all while remaining couched in psychoanalytic motifs and relationships that give each and every moment a host of meanings.
While fans of director Park Chan-wook’s other works should definitely seek out this underrated part of his filmography, I’d recommend Stoker to any viewer who enjoys the experience of being washed over by a film and trying to piece it together afterwards. For the viewer who enjoys the journey even if the destination is unclear, Stoker offers a key to a box waiting to be unlocked.
Rating
10/10
Grade
S
Go to Page 2 for the for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis. Go to Page 3 to view this review’s progress report .
As is tradition, this year I’ll be watching 31 horror movies- 1 for each day in October. Last year my list was focused on helping me push though and get all the reviews I needed to finally publish my Best Horrors of the 2010-19 Decade List. Unfortunately, that challenge failed and the movie’s on the list are still being reviewed. The biggest takeaway I’ve gotten from both years attempting this challenge is keeping up 1 review a day.
While I’ve never failed at watching my allotted movie on it’s day, I have failed, especially last year, to get the reviews out on time, if at at all. Thankfully, the year since has been invaluable in both helping me develop my more thorough review style, something I was just starting to experiment with last year at this time, and in helping me better learn my limits in regards to quality and output.
That is why this year, my marathon list contains a host of re-watches from previous years. As part of my Site Update Project, I’ve gone through and started the process of taking my older reviews, namely ones without images or any longform analysis, and have been pushing them up to a much higher standard. The marathon gives me a good excuse and opportunity to invest time in some of my eldest reviews and help standardize them.
However, that doesn’t mean that I won’t review any new films. I have a healthy assortment of newer releases and classics I haven’t gotten to review yet. It’s just the focus this year is more on treading old ground again as opposed to trying to expand as fast as possible to new territories. Movies that I’ve reviewed before are marked with an *.
To that end, I will try to post reviews up to 4 days of the “watch” date presented below. For example, if a movie is to be watched on the 4th, the review or updates to review should be up by the 8th. Reviews will be marked with hyperlinks once “finished”. This delay should ensure that I have time to go more granular on the reviews that need the effort without severely compromising the flow of the marathon itself for those viewers following along. While there may be a few delays, I expect to be able to adhere to this schedule for the most part. With that out of the way, here’s the list.
Text card explaining the genealogy of the word ‘sicario’ The modern day usage of ‘Sicario’ means hitman. Establishing shot of a neighborhood in Arizona.Soldiers invade the domestic space. Kate (Emily Blunt) gets ready for the operation. A tank breaks in through the wall. and dust blows everywhere Kate (Emily Blunt) avoids getting shot and kills her assailant. Kate (Emily Blunt) is assisted by Reggie (Daniel Kaluuya) after her encounter. Reggie finds two bodies behind the wall. The film starts with the genealogy of the term “sicario”, a word that initially referred to zealots who killed for their values that now means assassin in Mexico. In other words, the word has transformed from a protector fighting for something to nothing more than a killer. Where does on term end and the other begin? How do they reconcile? These are the questions at the heart of Sicario.
An establishing shot reveals soldiers infiltrating a domestic neighborhood – the homeland has been infiltrated by an enemy hiding in plain sight and the protectors are on their way. Kate, the head of the operation, has her tank bulldoze through the house and then bests an assailant in a gun-fight leading to the individual’s death. However, his bullet ricochet reveals the house in question is nothing more than a mausoleum, filled to the brim with bodies. In other words, the domestic foundation has become the birthplace of the macabre.
The film starts by defining the term ‘sicario’: it was initially used to refer to zealots defending their homeland but means ‘hitman’ in the status quo. Though both interpretations of the word signify a killer, one is oriented around protecting ideals while the other seems to confirm a nihilistic kill-or-be-killed world where no values could persist. This dichotomy between the two meanings of the word represents the battleground Sicario takes place on as it explores what the transition between the terms signifies about the world in a paradigmatic sense.
The establishing shot starts from the vantage point of the idealistic interpretation of the word: a domestic view of a neighborhood in Arizona is interrupted as a group of soldiers, defenders of the homeland, creep into frame while the late Jóhann Jóhannsson’s palpable score reverberates like a droning heartbeat in the background, adding to the feeling of tension. The leader of the group, Kate (Emily Blunt), sits in a tank ready for breach before the vehicle breaks into a house, scattering dust all over the area. She gets down to investigate the residence with her squad but is suddenly caught off guard by a armed resident in the house. She evades his bullet and manages to kill him. The sound calms down. It seems like the dust has settled.
However, his bullet, despite missing her, opens another wound that proves to be even more devastating . The wall, broken in by the impact of the shot, reveals a series of bagged up corpses hiding within – a simple hostage retrieval becomes a mortifying entry into the macabre.
Kate (Emily Blunt) goes outside to vomit. Reggie (Daniel Kaluuya) goes outside to vomit. Officers find a padded cell. A close-up of one of the hidden corpses. The hut blows up. Kate (Emily Blunt) is caught in the debris. A severed arm appears. Kate (Emily Blunt) tries to wash the blood of the day off of her. Kate (Emily Blunt) looks into her clouded image, unable to fully see herself. Just when Kate thinks the situation has settled, an explosion is triggered and the dust which had finally settled is thrown up in bloody aplomb. Kate walks through the hellscape and sees a severed hand for her troubles. At home, she desperately tries to wash the filth of the obscene events out of her body and mind, but as she stares into her self image, it’s clear that her image of the world has already started to change.
Kate immediately goes outside to vomit. Being a soldier doesn’t entail being unaffected by such senseless violence, and the brutality of the situation shakes Kate and her crew. She’s asked by personnel on how to document the situation given its severity. Kate insists that the records reveal everything; transparency is more necessary than ever.
While she tries to get an accurate count on the number of bodies in the house, a group of officers outside find a padlocked door in a shed and try and open it. The cuts and expectations established previously lead the viewer to think it’s more bodies hidden away, but the intense heartbeat track comes back signaling shifting times. Suddenly, the shed explodes.
Debris and dust scatter everywhere, obfuscating the frame, and Kate is once again lost in the fog of the situation, unable to see anything besides the carnage. The domestic area turned mausoleum has now become the site of an explosion – suburbia rendered into a site of gratuitous violence. In her efforts to preserve the rule of law, Kate finds herself soaked with so much blood that she can’t seem to scrub it all off in the shower. As she looks into a clouded reflection of herself in her bathroom mirror, it’s clear her more idealistic worldview has been delivered a tremendous blow.
Kate’s superiors speak to Matt (Josh Brolin) about her qualifications. Kate (Emily Blunt) addresses Matt (Josh Brolin) and her superiors. Kate notices that Matt is wearing flip-flops.Kate is offered an opportunity to deal with the people “really responsible” for the violence she saw by an man, initially framed as imposing and mysterious, named Matt. After questioning Kate and informing of her of his mission, she volunteers for his task force and leaves the area, emboldened to achieve her mission. However, as she leaves she notices Matt’s attire is completely distinct from everyone else. He’s in shorts and flip-flops as opposed to a suit and boots. The disjunct between personality, mission, and appearance all serve to highlight the way image is modulated and not defined. The question becomes why Matt is presenting himself in this way and the answer has to do with the themes the film tries to develop.
The next day comes. Kate and her partner on the force, Reggie (Daniel Kaluuya), wait outside of a glass-paned room as their superiors discuss the previous day’s mission. A man speaks to the group with the camera positioned to his back. His framing suggests importance and a sense of mystery. He asks about Kate and Reggie’s respective backgrounds, approving of Kate’s but rejecting Reggie upon hearing about his legal education. The group calls Kate in and introduces her to the man of the hour, Matt (Josh Brolin).
First, he asks her about her relationship and child status. He’s abrupt and straight to the point. She responds she’s both divorced and childless. He tells her he’s hunting the cartels behind the bodies and bombings. She expresses interest. Her superior, Forsing (Jeffrey Donovan) tells her that joining such a task-force requires volunteering for the position. She asks Matt if they’ll be able to hold the people who committed the acts responsible. He guarantees that they’ll be able to deal with the masterminds behind the operation itself.
She agrees with no hesitation and her journey begins. However, as she leaves the room, she notices that the charming, yet serious Matt, shrouded in mystery, is wearing flip-flops in sharp contrast to everyone else in the room wearing business professional clothing – another indication that appearances are not to be trusted. Images are always imbued with an purpose and can’t be taken at face value.
Establishing shot of Nogales, Mexico. Silvio (Maximiliano Hernández) is woken by his son. Silvio (Maximiliano Hernández) puts on his police uniform and walks his son to the soccer field. The film cuts to Mexico and establishes another domestic hub; this time the subjects are Silvio, a cop, and his wife and son. Though seemingly a respite, the turn to a house in the wake of the destruction of another house along with the invocation of Mexico and cartel violence is anxiety inducing because it serves as the nexus point of multiple points of concern. It may be peaceful for now, but the story has confirmed that this will be a site of turmoil later. The family’s journey here is a counterpoint to Kate’s own journey.
The film cuts to a neighborhood in Nogales, Mexico. A young boy wakes up his father, Silvio(Maximiliano Hernández), to ask him to play soccer. Silvio gets up, eats breakfast while getting a nice helping of side-eye from his wife, puts on his police uniform, and then proceeds to take his son out on a walk. This adjunct narrative is a sense of normalcy that gives the viewer a reprieve from the violence; however, its presence immediately generates a sense of unease. The opening’s mention of Mexico in relation to sicario qua assassin, the eruption of violence in the American residence, the focus on cartel violence, and Silvio’s status as police officer transform a seemingly benign scene and moment into one that threatens to become catastrophic.
Reggie is sent home while Kate (Emily Blunt) is allowed to proceed. Kate (Emily Blunt) sees an unknown man(Benicio del Toro) near the plane along with Matt(Josh Brolin).The plane flies over a mountain whose size engulfs it. The route to Kate’s first mission sets up the twists and turns to come. Despite being legally permitted, Reggie, the lawyer, is turned away at the gates. When Kate gets to the airplane, she meets another mysterious figure who she was unaware of. Then when she’s on the plane, this figure, Alejandro, reveals that the location of the mission is not in the United States but is in Mexico instead. As the plane makes it’s way to its destination, its shadow is swallowed by the wild canvas of the mountains – a premonition of things to come and a confirmation that Kate is going to be engulfed by the task at hand.
Back in the United Sates, Reggie drives Kate to her first day on Matt’s team. She’s told she’s going to El Paso with them on some preliminary task-work. However, upon getting to the gate, Reggie is denied access and the uncertainty about the situation increases. The emissary of the law is not allowed to pry his eyes upon this supposedly legal execution of justice. He’s forced to leave as Kate continues forward.
As she gets closer to the plane, another man, with his head turned around as to disguise his visage, appears at the plane’s tail. Matt comes out to greet Kate letting her know that the wayward man is Alejandro (Benicio del Toro) – another unexpected surprise. The trio get on the plane and Alejandro asks Kate if she’s ever been to Juárez; the shoe fully drops and the pretenses dissipate as Kate realizes that the mission she’s signed up for is far more expansive than she could have imagined.
While the nature of where Sicario mysteries lead is fairly by the books, the way its cinematically rendered gives it a poignancy that elevates the film into something special. Screenwriter Taylor Sheridan’s script is propulsive and juggles multiple storylines, giving director Denis Villenevue the ability to flex his muscles and leave his mark of the genre. Instead of focusing on the mystery, Villenevue repeatedly turns the viewer’s attention to the dichotomy introduced at the film’s start by utilizing parallels in characters and groups to demonstrate the way the terms and the manner by which they’re used to categorize can rapidly shift .
There’s an implied distinction between between killing while oriented towards an ideal that stands for something greater than oneself and killing for the sake of something material, like wealth. The former position is one that’s idealistic and moves towards a vision of a “just” world. The latter is one that’s nihilistic and treats the world of winner-take-all. Or is that really the case? Are the two ideas separate or do they bleed into one another? Could one assassinate as an ideal or choose to assassinate in order to move towards an ideal? Villeneuve allows these questions to fester by taking the parallel’s Sheridan’s script sets up between the cartel and the US government, the Mexican police force and the American police force, and so on, and forces the viewer to play a horrifying game of compare and contrast.
One act of violence by one side is met by a seemingly equal atrocious act on the other. A “good” character postures and makes a comment on a “bad” character but then takes action that seems just as egregious. Villeneuve chooses to showcase the “immoral” bouts of violence in more explicit detail and withhold the brutality within the “ethical” instances of violence. He gives just enough information for the viewer to imagine how a scene would progress given both the context clues and the explicit parallels, forcing the audience to come to their own conclusions regarding the mechanics and ethics underpinning certain bouts of brutality. The subjective process of imagining the violence generates an uncomfortable proximity to the situation and forces us to deal with the contradictions in values.
This move also generates an empathetic connection with Kate who is thrust into the same world of twists, turns, and moments of depravity and forced to find stable footing in spite of it all. The first act sets up Kate as resourceful, honest, and passionate. She dodges a bullet, kills an assailant, takes control of her group, and wants to achieve justice – an ideal protagonist to root for. However, the moment she volunteers to achieve her ethical vision, she’s forced into a world where friend and foe mean very little, and the boundaries between what the “good” and “evil” are doing is suspect. Thus, an action of violence which may be immediately justified as necessary can be questioned because the viewer experiences it with Kate; she’s a moral barometer that lets us traverse the hazy backdrop the film plays against.
Sicario’s genre peers would usually feature a character like Alejandro or Matt as the lead – a burly man of mystery ready to whatever it takes to get the job done. However, the choice to have the lead be a highly capable woman with her morals intact in a sea of men and violence provides a vantage point that gives the otherwise gratuitous moments of sheer visceral terror a counterpoint that has heft. She’s not a damsel in distress, and she’s not some battle-hardened veteran looking for a fight; she’s just a competent soldier looking to do the right thing in circumstances that go against everything she’s been taught to accept. Blunt exemplifies this by constantly modulating between a soldier capable of holding her own and someone way out of their depth being racked by panic. She’s the perfect vehicle for both her character and the moral fiber of the film. By building up her competency and then slowly revealing its limits within a brutal, new environment, the film is able to push forward new ground on a story and make what would otherwise be cliché’s into uncomfortable moments to unpackage.
In fact, it’s because Kate is presented as competent in the context of what she’s signed up to do that otherwise passive scenes on her part are absolutely dread inducing. For example, as opposed to a conventional car chase scene with professionals chasing after one another, a traffic jam scene where assailants can be in any car and the protagonist is a fish out of water is much more dreadful. Because Kate is established as capable, the film is able to emphasize just how unforgiving the reality of the cartel violence and dealing with them can be; the rules of war don’t do anything in guerilla situations. Thus, her position gives impetus not only to the primary questions of the film but allow the visceral moments to have genuine stakes associated with them.
Put together with the parallel storylines and the near-perfect pacing of the narrative, Sicario certainly merits a comparison to the Coen brothers’ masterpiece, No Country For Old Men, a neo-Western following multiple characters who hunt and are being hunted by one another. Like No Country, Sicario presents a dark vision of an age without values, where the values of older days have seemingly faded away to the gusts of apathy and violence. While Sicario may not be as ambitious in terms of its narrative construction and direction, it certainly evokes a similar feeling of wandering through a foreign land where sense and reason have vacated the premises.
However, Sicario does match No Country when it comes to its visuals. Serving as director of photography on both films, Roger Deakins gives Villeneuve’s vision the room it needs to breath and fully take hold. Dust in the air, shadowy environments, and ever-present sources of reflection reveal the complexity inherent in seemingly straight-forward situations by introducing a visual opacity which accentuates the themes. Nothing is what it seems and it’s within the shadows cast by projections that the “truth” can be ascertained; there’s a space between words and the paradigms they operate within.
Consequently, this makes Sicario a must-see experience for any fan of cinema ranging from the casual fan looking for an exciting time to the cinephile looking for something heftier to sink their teeth into. While veterans of cartel thrillers might be less surprised by plot twists, the sheer culmination of skill including, but not limited to, Deakins camera work, the late Jóhann Jóhannsson’s adrenaline-pumping propulsive score, Blunt’s humanistic yet confident performance, and of course, Villeneuve’s brilliant ability to put all these elements together makes this an experience no one should miss. If nothing else, the final few moments of the film exemplify how dedication to craft can elevate even a small movement into a grand gesture.
REPORT CARD
TLDR
Sicario is the rare movie that offers a totally engrossing time from start to finish across different types of moviegoers. With its propulsive narrative, fantastic acting, bloody and well-executed set-pieces, and its dark and foreboding score, the experience stays entertaining the whole time. However, it’s use of Emily Blunt in the role of the main character gives the movie a humanity and a vantage point that transforms it into a meditation on violence and the reality of the rule of law. It’s heady without being alienating and even more engaging as a result.
Rating
10/10
Grade
S
Go to Page 2for the for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis. Go to Page 3to view this review’s progress report .
Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) sits in his car as his mother’s voice drones over.
Helen (Sarah Gadon) sits in the shadows, clearly pregnant.
The words “Chaos is order yet undeciphered,” shows up on the screen.
Anthony (Jake Gyllenhall) opens up the fantasy room/ room of fantasy.
Hordes of men watch women perform sex acts.
Anthony (Jake Gyllenhaal) puts 8 fingers around his face like a spider.
A woman disrobes and becomes nude in the background as Jake gets ready to watch her foreground.
A tarantula crawls out from a platter.
The mirror image of a nude woman walks around the spider.
A woman’s’ silhouette stands against the light.
The woman positions her heel over the spider in menacing fashion.
The opening of the movie sees a yellow, musty looking city haunted by foreboding strings. A young man, Adam, sits in his car dejectedly as a voicemail from his mother drones on and on. A pregnant woman shows up during this monologue – two seemingly different mothers but one is seen and one is shown. The words “Chaos is order yet undeciphered” show up on screen confirming that this pattern isn’t a coincidence. Another man who looks like Adam walks down a hallway and opens up a door to a fantasy room with women engaging in sexual acts. There’s a huge crowd of men eagerly watching. The showstopper event the women build towards is having one woman strip down and then threaten to crush a tarantula from underneath her heel.
The camera tracks left over a muddied yellow cityscape while composers Bensi and Jurrinan’s eerie and foreboding score plays; discordant strings turn into synth-like drones that get under the skin. A beep emerges; the voicemail message accompanying it feels less intrusion and more accompaniment to the score – the soundscape is unified in its discordant elements. A woman’s voice (Isabella Rossellini) can be heard. She talks to her son and thanks him for showing him her new apartment. She mentions concern over his living conditions and asks for him to call back while the camera cuts to Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal), her son, sitting in a musty car. His eyes reflected in the car’s rear-view mirror show an inertia – he looks unenthused and out of it. The mother’s words gain some power as her son’s disposition indicates a lack of vitality.
She tells him she loves him and the film cuts to a pregnant woman, Helen, who sits basked in a yellow haze of light and shadow. Another mother in response to the son. A pattern established, but what does it mean? The screen turns black as if in response and the following words appear on the screen in yellow font: “”Chaos is order yet undeciphered.” This is Enemy’s calling card; the story is a puzzle that entices the viewer to engage in dialogue. Patterns are present and meanings are given but their connections aren’t immediately apparent. Thus, order is only present for those willing to decipher – a great way to prime the viewer to not only pay attention but to stay invested to even the most minor of details.
The words fade into a black background out which a pair of hands appear in close view. We cut to a wider shot and see a man who looks like Adam but exudes a more confident presence along with another man walking down a dimly lit hallway where the yellow lights emit a sickly feeling in the area. This “potential” Adam[1]I use potential in quotes here because the nature of which character this is isn’t made definite and is certainly meant to be presented as up for interpretation at the start. For my full … Continue reading opens the door and enters the room as the unnerving score gets more intrusive and for good reason. It turns out that the characters have entered a dimly lit room filled with smoke and mirrors where hordes of men gather around women performing sexual acts. This mise-en-scène gives the setting a surreal feeling – the perverse room feels apart from a “normal” world. The women’s moans and squeals of enjoyment accentuate the unease generated by the score – the sounds of ecstasy take on the sign of omen as they become infected by the score.
Suddenly, two women adorned in a silky robes and long heels comes out and the crowd’s attention becomes focused. Their initial “holy” appearance, at least comparatively, and the way they command the energy of the room evokes the feeling of sacred ritual – the climax approaches. One of the women carries a covered tray which she places in the center of the room. Meanwhile the other one disrobes in the background as the “potential” Adam places his fingers over his face, almost as if trying to cover it, and leaves room only for his eyes to peer through – four fingers on each side of his face wrapping around from the bottom-up. The tray is picked up and a spider walks out from the center of it. However, as it tries to get away, it’s followed by the now fully disrobed women who follows it around the table. Her pursuit is shown via the reflection of the table – a mirror image.
Eventually she corners and stands menacingly over the creature, revealed only by her silhouette. She places her robe over the spider as if about to crush the creature while the room watches with baited breath. Is this what the men came to see? A nude woman threatening to kill a spider? A leg positioned over a creature possessing 8 legs? We cut back to the “potential” Adam in the same position as before. Now the 8 fingers reaching around his face form part of an inverted image: a spider made of hands reaching around the face in contrast to the feet reaching to the spider proper.
Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) teaches about patterns.
“Webs” are present in the city’s architecture.
Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) puts his hands on his face while grading.
Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) is asked if he watches movies. He is turned away.
Mary (Mélanie Laurent) tries to get Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) to come to bed with her.
Mary(Mélanie Laurent) walks away from Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal).
Mary (Mélanie Laurent) and Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) are separated in the darkness of the apartment.
Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) watches the movie.
Mary (Mélanie Laurent) is fast asleep as Adam watches the movie.
Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) finishes the movie.
Adam tries to have sex with Mary but she rejects him.
Mary (Mélanie Laurent) tells Adam she’ll talk to him later.
Adam teaches his class about patterns of control and how dictatorships control societies. His life is a series of patterns and his city is filled with webs and lines – cable lines, telephone lines, and the like. His day to day life consists of going to work, coming back home, grading papers, and then going to bed with his girlfriend Mary. However, the pattern breaks when a coworker accosts Adam and recommends a movie for him to watch. The conversation with the co-worker and the the movie proper are both deviations from the pattern and mark the start of Enemy’s wild ride. Adam becomes so engrossed in the movie that he neglects Mary, causes her to leave, and pushes his journey in unknown trajectory.
We see a view of the city again before the film cuts to Adam teaching a college classroom. He starts his lecture on control by stating that: “Every dictatorship has one obsession. And that’s it. So, in Ancient Rome, they gave the people bread and circuses. They kept the populace busy with entertainment, but other dictatorships use other strategies to control ideas. How do they do that? Lower education. They limit culture. Censor information. They censor any means of individual expression. And it’s important to remember this, that this is a pattern that repeats itself throughout history. ” He finishes his lecture and the students leave.
He gets on a bus that traverses the city via cable transport that travels along lines that extend from building to building like a web of control. The spider’s influence is everywhere it seems. Adam gets into his disheveled looking apartment where he exists in lethargic state. His dissatisfaction is apparent as he expresses frustration in the movement of his hands while grading his students’ papers. He brings his hands up to his face as if to pray right as his girlfriend, Mary (Mélanie Laurent), shows up. She attempts to converse with him, but he refuses to answer. Instead, he focuses on just engaging in sex with her.
Then, the pattern repeats. He’s back in his classroom, giving the same lecture as above, gets on the web-linked train, grades papers at home, has sex with Mary and back to it again. He’s stuck in a loop that leaves him out of joint. Finally, the pattern breaks. As Adam sits in the teacher’s lounge, one of his co-workers asks him whether or not he goes to the movies and if he’s a “movie guy”. Adam indicates he doesn’t go out a lot and doesn’t like movies. This would also make sense given his lecture content – entertainment is a strategy used to control people so he stays away from it.
His coworker persists and mentions that one can watch a movie at home and that renting can work just as good as going out theatres. In response to this persistence, Adam requests a recommendation for something cheerful to which his coworker recommends Where There’s a Will, There’s a Way” The odd title initially strikes both us and Adam as a philosophical statement until he clarifies the flick is a local film which Adam should check out. Thus, the initial pattern is disrupted. A desire has presented itself within the inert world of Adam’s.
He comes back home after having rented the movie. As he dejectedly rests his head against his right palm, Mary appears and tries to coax him into coming to bed with her even mentioning how “drunk” she is. She plays with his face and tries to awaken something sensual in him but he’s unmoved. In one fluid movement, the camera tracks horizontally Mary as she leaves Adam alone, receding into the darkness and leaving the light on him. He finishes the last paper and opens up his laptop to start and finish the movie. Once again, the camera moves horizontally, demonstrating the passing of time and location. The movie is done and Mary is fast asleep. Adam gets up and looks perturbed, but tries to distract himself by having sex with sleeping Mary. He gets on top of her, but the time is passed and she’s no longer interested. She asks him to stop, gets out of bed, and changes. He asks what’s wrong and she lets him know she’ll call tomorrow. The pattern has now fully broken down and with it comes the first signs of horror.
A bellboy makes his way to help a guest.
The bellboy picks up the guests bag.
Another woman in the lobby who’s courting a man wearing a spider-web decorated tie gets agitated when she sees the guest walking.
The guest turns around to court a man and the bellboy is revealed to be Adam’s double (Jake Gyllenhaal)
Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) wakes up after his disturbing dream.
Adam sees his laptop flickering as though possessed by something else.
Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal) re-winds the movie.
Adam finds the scene of his doppelgänger (Jake Gyllenhaal).
The nightmare sequence interrupts the movie just as jarringly for Adam as it does the viewer, coming into the fray with thunderous aplomb as the score booms. A woman with a black hat checks into a hotel and gets help from a young lobby boy wearing a hat. The boy picks up her bags and walks her through the hotel. Another woman wearing a yellow hat is courting a man with a web-patterned tie. She stares at the woman in the black hat as though scared of losing her suitor. However, the woman in the black hat continues on and eventually attracts another man. It’s at this point the lobby boy is revealed to be none other than Adam’s double. Adam wakes up in shock to go and confirm his fears. His laptop waits on his chair menacingly in the on position, as if telling him that the cat is now out of the bag. Adam re-watches the movie and confirms his worries.
The score becomes intimidating as it starts to pound as pattern of the film fully breaks down – now the screen has transported the viewer to within the Where There’s a Will, There’s a Way. This is Adam’s’ dream and his unconscious, now stirred out of the monotony of his “everyday”, presents the dream to move Adam.
A woman in a red dress and black hat stands at a hotel’s reception and is received by two staff without hats. One of the men calls a bell boy with a red hat to help the woman with her two bags. He retrieves two bags from the floor and follows the woman along. As the two walk, a group of men and women sitting close-by stare at the black-hatted woman. A woman wearing a yellow hat courting a man wearing a red-tie with a spider-web pattern on it is terrified at the presence of this woman in the black hat who continues to walk along. The bell boy and woman then run into another man with a hat, who takes his hat off, and then proceeds to talk with the woman. It’s at this point that bell boy’s face is finally revealed and the visage looks exactly like Adam sans a beard. The dream breaks – the realization has been made.
Adam wakes up in dread and slowly walks out of his bedroom to see his laptop, still on, waiting in his chair as if taunting him to peer closer. He picks up the computer and starts to fast forward, pause, and scan Where There’s a Will, There’s a Way for the disturbance he saw in his dream – the presence of his doppelgänger.
Fittingly, upon finding his “repetition”, he begins his next lecture on something new – Hegel. Adam explains that Hegel claimed that “the greatest world events happen twice” and then Karl Marx added that “the first time it was tragedy, and the second time it was a farce.” Taken together, the statements mean that the repetition of an original event, confirms it not merely as contingency but as necessary. In other words, it’s the instantiation of a pattern – chaos which becomes ordered through a repetition which confirms a “truth” established previously. If this is the case, then what patterns does Adam’s movie actor doppelgänger reveal about his patterns – his “truth”? Adam becomes obsessed with finding out precisely that and thus, Enemy can proceed with gusto.
With its doppelgänger set-up, surrealistic set-pieces, and expressed interest in acting as a puzzle to the viewer, it’s no surprise that Enemy falls in a line of films that includes the likes of: Persona, Fight Club, Lost Highway. Like these films, Enemy employs a dream-like logic in its construction to guide the viewer through a matrix of desire and fantasy in such fashion as to engender a desire in the viewer to delve deeper. For all the answers director Denis Villeneuve withholds, he never leaves the viewer feeling frustrated that only “nonsense” is occurring.
He does this by both employing segments of the film absent of Adam and his duplicate to help establish baselines that the audience can use to decipher what can or cannot be the case and also by priming the audience to pay attention to patterns, some easily discernible and others more hidden. Thus, Enemy becomes whatever the audience makes of it – it’s a game that constantly plays back giving the film and enigmatic pulse that gnaws at the viewers curiosity. There’s always another movement, another scene, another pattern waiting to be found to make sense of what came before. Consequently, the mysteries of the film feel solid enough to grasp, so the viewer can traverse strands of Enemy’s web even if they can’t see the web in its entirety.
Because Villeneuve meticulously stages the film in parallel movements, both within scenes and between them, there’s always a constant series of moving answers and questions. As new patterns are formed, new questions can be raised which opens previous and future scenes up to more nuanced interpretations. This is all purposeful, as evidenced by a scene that occurs midway in the film that quite literally represents a particular breakpoint in the film – it’s proof of the intention driving every one of the film’s decisions. Even if one can’t immediately notice each point and it’s counterpoint, it’s doppelgänger so to speak, they can certainly feel it in the structure of the film which reinforces and builds upon symbols and feelings at a subconscious level, priming the audience one way or another.
In particular, this parallel movement sets the viewer up for moments of genuine psychological fear. Patterns induce a level of comfort and the disruption of those patterns creates a level of anxiety. As evidenced by the intrusion of the film within the film, the seemingly random interruption of a “normal occurrence” jolts ones senses. Because the film clues the viewer to notice the patterns, the moments of deviations, the farces to come, are horrific.
Furthermore, the constant presence of the spider and its web in the mise-en-scène evokes the unease of the opening scene of sexual violence while creating webs of meaning between groupings of ideas. The music that accompanies it stays a constant force throughout the film, punctuating every moment with its anxiety inducing drone. There’s never a moment of respite as the senses are assaulted with an impending sense that something obscene is happening. In particular, Villenevue’s dedication to the sickly yellow lighting and color choice accentuates the feeling of misery the characters seem to be experiencing. The color lets the shadows of the dark “shine” through against the yellow, letting the feeling of the unknown pervade in moments of unease. The result is a psychological horror that uses its surrealistic base not just as a method of presenting unnerving images but as a method of probing the viewer’s unconsciousness to pick up on the undercurrents of terror lying just beneath the veneer of the apparent narrative. It’s precisely because of this that the ending of the film hits as hard and shocks as much as it does. It’s a finale that fully crystallizes the tensions and sense of unease that the film spends most of its run-time building, simultaneously tying the strands of the film together while disorienting the viewer.
At the heart of this disorienting feeling is Jake Gyllenhaal, who plays both Adam and his double within the film. Both characters occupy almost every scene, and their intermingling journey serves as the source of the narrative’s momentum. Having one actor play two characters is hard enough, but Villenevue’s story requires that the duo be similar enough to provoke the feeling of unease at the idea of a duplicate, but at the same time be different enough so that the viewer is easily able to identify which character is present in which scene. Jarring cuts which feature jumps between the characters would be wholly incomprehensible if not for Gyllenhaal’s ability to push the smallest subtleties in the characters’ dispositions to help the audience keep track of what storyline is headed in which direction. The genius of the performance lies not in just the distinctions, but the manner in which those performances give birth to even more performances – acts within acts as the two selves vie for control of the situation. Gyllenhaal has to walk a tight rope to let the nuances of Enemy settle and disturb and because he does so, in what I think is his career best performance, he lets the movie rise to its potential.
Currently, Enemy sports the lowest audience and critic scores on both Rotten Tomatoes [2]Denis Villeneuve. Rotten Tomatoes. (n.d.). Retrieved September 25, 2021, from https://www.rottentomatoes.com/celebrity/denis-villeneuve. and Metacritic [3]Denis Villeneuve. Metacritic. (n.d.). Retrieved September 25, 2021, from https://www.metacritic.com/person/denis-villeneuve.. This makes sense when comparing the film to his most popular outputs, Arrival and Sicario, which both feature energetic narratives where there’s a constant sense of propulsion driving everything towards a certain point. Enemy is very much the opposite, choosing instead to assault the audience with patterns whose boundaries bleed into and out of one another. Instead of presenting a straight-forward journey, Enemy presents a closed loop circling around a mystery it beckons the audience towards solving. Forthose viewers that prefer fully comprehensive narratives that need less discernment on their part, Villenevue’s surreal adventure might prove to be too frustrating an experience to find satisfaction in. However, those viewers looking for a cerebral experience should accept Enemy’s invitation to find order in chaos and take the plunge into the spider’s web of meaning.
REPORT CARD
TLDR
Enemy is one part tense psychological horror and another part a puzzle challenging the viewer to put the pieces together. Fans of Villeneuve’s more straightforward ventures à la Sicario might be put off by the matrix of patterns that is Enemy, but those who enjoy his technical style and dedication to creating immersive worlds will definitely appreciate, if not love, this more opaque demonstration of his craft.
Rating
10/10
Grade
S+
Go to Page 2for the for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis. Go to Page 3to view this review’s progress report .
Chris Hemsworth as Thor Tom Hiddleston as Loki Anthony Hopkins as Odin Idris Elba as Heimdall Colm Feore as Laufey Natalie Portman as Jane Foster Stellan Skarsgård as Erik Selvig
Thor (Chris Hemsworth), God of Thunder and son of Odin (Anthony Perkins), is banished by his father and stripped of his mighty hammer Mjöllnir for having attempted an invasion of the Frost Giant’s home of Jotunheim in retaliation to the giant’s interruption of his own crowning ceremony. Now instead of being the next king, he is cast aside from his home of Asgard; his purpose is now lost and none of his friends are are able to stop Odin’s judgement. Heimdall (Idris Elba), both Thor’s friend and the guardian of the bifröst , a bridge capable of transporting anyone to any location, is forced to send the power God of thunder away. Thus, Thor is transported to the planet of Earth, where he immediately makes contact with Jane Foster (Natalie Portman), a young astrophysicist who had been following weather fluctuations, which unbeknownst to her had been tied to the use of bifröst.
The narrative is ambitious; on one hand it’s an attempt to tell the tale of Thor’s succession with epic familial stakes and on another hand it’s an attempt to meld the fantastical worlds present in the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe) with the scientific excursions demonstrated so far in Iron Manand The Incredible Hulkin order to create a bridge to more complex directions. Unfortunately, that ambition can’t make up for the film’s inability to meld the worlds of Asgard and the Earth off one another in a fluid and mutually beneficial manner. Instead of helping one another, the halves of the movie feel disjointed with another and often times feel like they’re intruding – like they belong in different films.
Establishing shot of Jane and company in Puente Antiguo, New Mexico.
Jane (Natalie Portman) hits Thor (Chris Hemsworth) with her car.
Odin gives a voiceover as the film cuts to Tonsberg,Norway.
The order of the opening sequence is an odd choice that demonstrates the key problem with Thor – it’s inability to meld the human and fantasy storylines in a cohesive and engaging manner.
For example, the start of the movie opens on Jane looking for signs of her phenomena. She gets evidence, gets excited, and then drives towards the event where she ends up hitting Thor with her car. She asks where he came from at which point the film cuts to a voice-over by Odin in 965 A.D. where he goes over and explains the history of mankind. The viewer stays with Odin and Asgard for close to 30 minutes before cutting back to Jane and her crash with Thor, which is treated as a comedic moment. The epic intensity and impact of Thor’s exile immediately becomes the butt of a joke and the rest of the story follows; moments of intensity in the Asgardian moments trade off with comedic, fish out of water human moments which makes it impossible for emotional resonance to take hold at any important moments. This dichotomy is most pronounced in Patrick Doyle’s score which flips from seemingly epic to screw-ball comedy whenever the Asgardian plot threads meet up with the human ones.
Alas, the pitiful characterization of anyone not named Thor and Loki (Tom Hiddleston) hardly helps; the hollow Asgardian and human entourages that are meant to be foils for one another and Thor’s allies only serve to waste screen-time that could have been better spent. That’s the key reason why Iron Man, which also starts with its hero in a low point before cutting back to how he got there, is able to get the audience invested in what’s to come; everyone’s relationship to Tony Stark is established and we get a good sense of who he is, why he is the way he is, and how the people close to him deal with his personality quirks. Thor on the other hand does nothing like this for its titular character. Thor’s closest friends get no development: it’s impossible to tell them apart from one another let alone how they matter to Thor. Likewise, how Thor came to be his pompous and belligerent self and managed to inspire so much faith from those around him is less so explained and more just asserted.
This lack of grounding makes Thor’s subsequent meeting with Jane and her allies less relevant. Instead of being able to serve as ways to humanize Thor and help him grow into a hero worthy of redemption, thereby combining the two halves of the story, they seemingly transport him to a whole other narrative instead. Instead of epic, we get a meet-cute that reduces Thor, the God of Thunder, to a walking set of goofy abs and transforms Jane, an scientist devoted to her research, to a woman smitten by schoolgirl love. It’s precisely because these two worlds don’t line up with each other thematically that the movie then has to waste additional time introducing a whole other villain and sub-plot to help Thor get from point A to point B.
Imagine if the opening of the film started with Odin’s monologue about the history of Asgard and the 9 realms. We could see Thor, the warriors Three (Ray Stevenson, Tadanobu Asano, Josh Dallas), Lady Sif(Jaimie Alexander), and Loki go around and engage in battles through the realms which would give director Kenneth Branagh an opportunity to distinguish the characters from one another. Thor’s headstrong and impulsive nature could be better established along with the nature of his relationships to his entourage. Each battle would require Heimdall to open the bifröst whose energy signature would be tracked by Jane. At these moments, the movie could have cut momentarily towards Jane trying to tie the nature of the events together becoming more and more fanatically attached to it.
This would make Thor and Jane’s collision with one another and their subsequent relationship would be more believable. Jane’s differences from his usual group would be pronounced and her enthusiasm in following him would stem not from his status as a hunk but rather as living proof of her research. Furthermore, many of the latter sequences of characters explaining their motivations could be removed because hopefully those details would be fleshed out in the opening Asgard section. As the film is now, these additional bits of exposition are needed to flesh out the stakes and move the story along. Removing them would make a leaner and more cohesive overall narrative.
Thor (Chris Hemsworth) is captured by Coulson’s men.
Heimdall (Idris Elba) sees Thor’s capture.
Heimdall (Idris Elba) sees all events occurring within the 9 realms.
Branagh uses this movement once and refers to it via the character’s dialogue multiple times. I wish he stuck more to showing and utilized Heimdall’s ability to piece together plot threads to move from the Asgardian to the Earth plotlines in thematic fashion. It would make for a more visually interesting story, establish Heimdall’s power, enable the “twist” in the story better by giving it more room to grow off screen in justifiable fashion, and potentially open up the ending to more wonderous possibilities. Instead, we just get teased with a one-of that barely scratches the surface.
Frustratingly, Branagh demonstrates that he’s more than capable of interweaving between the two storylines in neat movements when he wants, but he chooses not to when it would be opportune. Heimdall, given his role as watcher of the bridge, is shown to be able to pay attention to any event happening in the nine realms. As such, certain scenes reveal that Heimdall is actually seeing them which helps the movie switch from Asgard to human and back with each. However, Branagh rarely uses the Heimdall transition technique. Instead, of utilizing the gatekeeper as a way to swap between parallel plot techniques and introduce a common visual motif, the movie is more than satisfied mentioning and using Heimdall’s skill a few times and then dropping it.
Jane (Natalie Portman) looks at the space phenomena.
Odin (Anthony Hopkins) looks at Laufey.
Selvig ( Stellan Skarsgård ) talks to Coulson.
As a horror fan, I love canted angles, but even within horror they have an established purpose to make them feel more important. Thor lacks that purpose and tosses in canted angles in every type of shot whether it be Odin engaging in war or Professor Selvig talking to Agent Coulson. This is one of the many visual issues with the film that rob its grandiose moments of the impact they would need to feel lasting.
This inconsistency in use extends to all the visual flourishes on display. At one moment Branagh will have the camera swoop from the top of Asgard to the bottom in one fluid moment, while at other moments he’ll just cut without abandon to showcase character reactions. Like previously mentioned, canted angles are on full display from start to finish. However, the choice of which scenes are shot with the tilted angles seems completely at random, rendering their selection confusing. Multiple moments will feature the change in angle and a switch back to normal for no other reason than someone fancied them. Consequently, the discord from the visual and audio swaps makes the incongruity between the Asgardian and human storylines all the more palpable. It’s all one big jumbling mess.
Therefore, while Thor isn’t quite the wreckage The Incredible Hulk is, it’s a far cry from the precise and slicked out Iron Man. It provides a plot that has points that are competently expected on their own, but it never once provides the momentum or composition capable of letting those points build off and complement one another. The end result is a grab-bag of decent points swimming around a pool of mainly bland and unmemorable scenes that teases a great film filled with familiar drama and romance but rarely delivers anywhere close on its potential.
REPORT CARD
TLDR
Thor is a series of interesting ideas that fail to meld into a story that can sustain interest for longer than single scenes. The script gives the actors few moments to sell the gravitas of what’s happening – a feeling which is further undermined by the film’s own inability in determining whether or not it wants to be a serious epic of a cutesy rom-com. The end result is a film that lacks any staying power after the fact.
Rating
5.9/10
Grade
D+
Go to Page 2for the for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis. Go to Page 3to view this review’s progress report .
NOTE: This is a new release and the review is based off a theatre viewing. This means the review won’t feature common elements like visual analysis, extended theme analysis, or long-form discussions of the cinematic techniques being used. Once I am able to get a copy of the movie to watch, pause, analyze, and get stills from the review will be updated to match the current site’s standard.
It’s hard to believe that a storyline involving a psychic monster capable of brutally murdering scientists, inept help from the relevant authorities, a woman who has psychic visions of a black-robed murderer who contorts and viciously slices apart its victims, and meticulously crafted murder set pieces is the basis of a James Wan horror movie when it feels like something plucked out of Dario Argento’s giallo playbook, in particular his fever dream film, Phenomena. In other words, the movie is a showcase of spectacle; the point is not the narrative but the audio-visual journey. Extravagance matters more than plot, which functions more as a vehicle for Wan to canvas off of. He’s always been a stylistic director, but Malignant showcases the height of his visual prowess; it’s an absolute treat to behold.
The movie starts with a small taste of things to come as the walls of a institutional facility are drenched with blood. Dr. Florence Weaver (Jacqueline McKenzie) escorts a group, which includes an officer with a gun, towards a room where people are flung out with bloody aplomb. She instructs them to shoot the patient, Gabriel, who is causing all the issues. The group suffers heavy casualties, but the nature of Gabriel along with his powers is left to the viewer’s imagination as the film cuts to twenty-eight years later.
A woman, Madison (Annabelle Wallis ), argues with her husband, Derek (Jake Abel) over the nature of her pregnancies, which seem to always terminate in miscarriages. He viciously attacks her for inability to conceive and beats her against the wall, causing the back of her head to bleed. Madison locks the door to keep safe from her husband, but then nighttime comes and a shadowy assassin makes its presence known. Its form is just a shadow creeping, and Wan teases the audience slowly with its presence before letting the violence continue; the husband is stabbed with no hesitation before Madison herself is thrown on the floor.
She wakes up at the hospital where she reunites with her sister, Sydney (Maddie Hasson). We learn that the siblings haven’t had contact with one another due to Derek’s controlling nature; he stopped Madison from reaching out. Thus, the black-coated figures first kill marks the end of the estrangement between Madison and her sibling and the start of her journey to move past and overcome her trauma at the hands of abuse.
However, later at night, Madison realizes that after this attack she’s now linked to the black-coated figure and can see the murders committed by the figure as they’re happening. These psychic drop-ins, which feel like the pensieve from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, feature the walls around our protagonist dissolving and reforming around her. Within crisp and fluid shots, Madison is transported from wherever she is to the scene of the next assault. Desperate to figure out the reason for this connection, she tasks Detectives Shaw (George Young) and Moss (Michole Briana White) along with Sydney in an race against time before the killer is allowed to strike again.
Wan said he wanted Malignant to be his take on giallo and the film more than delivers a set-up let lets him have fun. [1]Navarro, M. (2021, September 1). “My version OF GIALLO”: James wan lets us know what to expect from his new horror Movie ‘Malignant’ [Interview]. Bloody Disgusting! Retrieved … Continue readingThere’s a mysterious killer in possession of a distinctive weapon, brutal murders, a race to figure out the identity of the murderer, and law enforcement characters who are meant to help but who actively inhibit the protagonist while bumbling around. However, penchant of any great gialli, like the ones made by Argento and Bava, is to structure the violence with great care around fluid and dramatic camera moves which transform the macabre into the sensational. Malignant nails all of this and more. The plot moves along at a pace that keeps the audience invested until a reveal 30 minutes before the ending which then ratchets the film into an utterly enthralling cinematic experience that any fan of sensual cinema should watch. It’s entirely unpredictable; even if you guess one element of the way events will unfold, the entirety of the combined threads is something that can only be described as Shymalanesque in the best possible way.
Wan, who has always been stylistically talented, is allowed to push the boundaries on his own patterns. While the movie starts slow with some of his trademark sequences, like a tense overhead tracking shot which follows the characters as they navigate a household à la The Conjuringand The Conjuring 2, it really starts to show its hand once Madison is allowed to “dissolve” into the psychic visions that she’s made to see. The transitions are as evocative as the murders which follow and serve a purpose in delineating the contours of Madison’s psyche. As the film continues and Madison is allowed to explore the connection, its visualization changes in ways to reflect the same.
However, what pushes Malignant over the edge is the vitality and fury by which Wan shoots some of the larger set-pieces, moments which blow out scenes from even movies, including even Wan’s own Aquaman. The camera is an assassin and follows the path of blood and carnage with surgical precession. Every blow is brutal. Every slice is sinister. Every moment is an extension of the dance of the fabulous blood-bath. He lets the impact of the ferocity sit with the audience as the frame sticks on the murders unbroken. There may be a lot of the stereotypical horror movie teasing with the slow set-ups and the disappearing shadows, but the pay-off is bloody, excessive, beautiful, and utterly worth every moment in wait – a carnivalesque celebration of blood and splatter.
The supernatural slasher often takes place in rooms lit by rich reds and glowing greens along with rooms dyed in shades of dark blue and pockets of darkness. Often times, the camera glides from one room to another, swinging between colors in a way to accentuate the visual momentum of the spectacle occurring. Even though some of the needle drop moments feel like they could have been timed to synch up with the emotional intensity of the film a bit better, most of Joseph Bishara’s electric score fulfills what it sets out to do – provide a companion to the visuals that can match their energy. Many of the tracks inject a head-bobbing energy that add a fiery intensity to the scenes. The combination of both elements creates dynamite film-making that serves as proof that some things have to be seen on the big screen to be experienced in their full glory.
While there are some plot issues here and there, the muscular film-making put on display by Wan is more than worth witnessing for fans of the genre and for those people looking for a off-the-walls story to have fun with. It’s more than just stylistic homage. Malignant is a celebration of sheer and utter excess in the best of ways. It’s the best of Wan’s artillery amplified to the next level – truly bravura filmmaking.
REPORT CARD
TLDR
Since his horror debut with Saw, Wan has put out some of the most well-loved horror classics. Insidious galvanized a new-age of horror fans and The Conjuring confirmed that his arrival was no fluke. Malignant is a confirmation of the director’s potential and showcases some of the highest highs in his oeuvre as of yet.
Rating
9.0/10
Grade
A
Go to Page 2 for the for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis. Go to Page 3 to view this review’s progress report .
Edward Norton as Bruce Banner/The Hulk (Voice by Lou Ferrigno) Liv Tyler as Betty Ross William Hurt as General Ross Tim Roth as Emil Blonsky / Abomination
Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) tests his Gamma treatment on himself. Bruce transforms into the Hulk. He sees Betty (Liv Tyler) through the windows. The Hulk beats Betty (Liv Tyler) viciously, giving her serious injuries. Bruce (Edward Norton) touches Betty (Liv Tyler) tenderly. Bruce flashes back to fonder times with Betty (Liv Tyler).General Ross (William Hurt) looks at maps to locate Banner. Confidential information from Stark Industries is displayed. A metronome is shown. The camera pushes in on Betty (Liv Tyler) in her hospital bed. This montage qua vision fades as Bruce( Edward Norton) stops the metronome. Bruce (Edward Norton) has a count of the number of days between his incidents next to him. The opening montage is an narrative mess that informs the audience of very little if they don’t have context already on top of being a formal mess in the way it presents the sequence. The start of the sequence with the color tinting and longing shots of Betty would suggest that this is Bruce’s fragmented memory post incident, but shots of maps, General Ross, and confidential documents show up partway through. None of these elements are items that Bruce should be privy, so their inclusion makes it seem as though the montage is just a non-diegetic summation for the audience that has nothing to do with Bruce’s perspective. This confusion is exacerbated as the sequence ends with a push in on Betty which transforms into the ringing of the metronome that Bruce reaches out to push. It seems certain that this was his vision, but the confusion in form makes the rest of the movie harder to evaluate as a result. Case in point, the count next to him loses a lot of potential as a storytelling barometer and a way of getting the inside track of Bruce’s psyche. Instead, it just exists as a way to give the audience random updates.
The movie starts with a montage set to Craig Armstrong’s epic and triumphant score which almost tricks the viewer into thinking that the title sequence is doing something special. In reality, the 3-minute introduction sequence is a formal nightmare and makes the themes and ideas of the story hard to decipher at first. Instead of setting the film’s pace and giving it a unique voice, the introduction feels like a cheap way of getting to the “real” story.
First, the initial images of the montage make it feel like this recollection of memories is from Bruce Banner’s (Edward Norton) fragmented point-of-view. As such, the repetition of certain key scenes – namely Bruce’s partner, Betty (Liv Tyler) being injured after he transformed into the Hulk – should suggest Bruce’s pre-occupation. The scenes are even tinted in green suggesting they might be an effect of the Hulk’s influence on Banner’s brain.
However, at the halfway point of the introduction, scenes that are clearly not from Bruce’s point-of-view enter. For example, General Ross is seen looking for Bruce at one point and maps along with relevant documentation prop up on the screen to reinforce that Bruce is being hunted. Given that he’s on the run, it seems impossible that he’d be privy to this information which begs the question: why are these moments in the montage?
One could chalk it up to just quick storytelling, but the sequence ends in such a way as if to suggest that it is in fact Banner recalling his past. The montage ends as the camera pushes in on Betty’s injury before suddenly cutting to a metronome, an item featured in the montage intermittently at random moments, which Banner grabs and stops. He sits center frame and then a counter appears next to him indicating it’s been 158 days since his last “incident.” Is this counter his mental barometer now perhaps because days to him only exist if he’s not the Hulk or is it a mechanism of the movie to inform the audience of the time between transformations? Because of the sloppy nature of the montage, this determination is impossible make.
The second issue with the introduction is also an issue I expect a few readers to run into: the characters and events depicted in the montage require prior context to have any chance of being relevant to the viewer. Given that Ang Lee’s Hulk came out in 2003, it’s reasonable that Marvel and screen-writer Zak Pen wanted to avoid re-hashing the origin story and chose to truncate it; the issue is the emotional core of the story being told in The Incredible Hulk is contingent on understanding the Hulk’s origin. This issue is even more pronounced because even though The Incredible Hulk could work as a spiritual sequel to Lee’s film, there are enough differences in how Bruce gets and relates to his “Hulk” power that would justify time spent explaining the nuance to the audience.
It’s especially confusing how this movie got approved given how clear Iron Man, the first installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) , ended up being for audiences unfamiliar with the character. Coming right off the heels of one of the best super-hero movies was always going to be rough, but The Incredible Hulk doesn’t make the situation any easier for itself. The issue with the film isn’t even just the botched origin story. Unlike Marvel’s reboot of Spiderman in the form of Homecoming, which truncated the origin story which had been told twice before in the 21st century, The Incredible Hulk doesn’t try and tell a story that can ride its own coattails and get the audience invested with or without previous interest.
Betty (Liv Tyler) and Bruce (Edward Norton) reunite in the rain. Bruce (Edward Norton) laughs about putting on large purple pants that Betty (Liv Tyler) tries to get him to wear. Betty (Liv Tyler) and Bruce (Edward Norton ) argue about todo with a medal that belongs to a “her” that’s never specified. Even though it should be one of the driving forces of the film, Betty and Bruce’s relationship is anything but electric. Their scenes feature nothing but quips, meaningless banter, or references to events alluded to in the flashback montage at the start of the film that are never shown. Even after watching the film, I could not tell you why either character was in love with the other, the nature of what their relationship dynamic used to be, or why they were so willing to get back together after years of separation (especially in Betty’s case) . The movie constantly tells the audience that the couple is in love, but the duo never acts or moves in a way that suggests any real chemistry. This becomes a problem when the movie so obviously wants to rest its emotional heft on this thread and spends the screen-time on the couple that would be capable of achieving the same if done more rigorously.
For example, one of the primary driving forces behind Banner’s desire to control his Hulk state is his desire to eventually get back with Betty. This motivation is his primary purpose for any and all action within the story, outside of some vague ethical concerns about his research which are never explained. The movie tells us as much with the montage which features a moment where Banner flashbacks within the sequence qua memory recall to an even more intimate encounter with her.
Yet, when the couple finally get to talking and meeting with one another there’s absolutely no chemistry between them. Their conversations devolve to quips, useless chitter-chatter, and verbal reminders that they love each other. They’re seeing each for the first time in years and the director and screenwriter can’t think of any possible things they would want to mention to one another again? It feels more like they’re acquaintances running into one another than lovers who have been forcibly separated for years on end. The golden rule is to show and not tell, and The Incredible Hulk never shows; instead, it prefers to reiterate what was shown in the montage and use the shallow scaffolding created off those minute impressions to leverage interest in where the story goes. The couple loves each other because they love each other. The push just doesn’t work and the emotions are missing which makes caring during any of the tense sequences that much harder.
Just to give context, within 15 minutes Iron Man manages to explain its protagonist’s, Tony Stark’s motivations, relationships with key persons in the movie, primary character arc, and foreshadow the eventual final battle. In that same time frame, The Incredibly Hulk explains that Bruce has been trying to figure out to control his anger since his incident, that he thinks about Betty a lot, and then just gets to the first chase sequence in a series of many. Even by the end of the movie’s run-time, the amount of information learned doesn’t actually increase by a meaningful margin. The plot is nothing more than a vehicle to get Banner from point A to point B in the hopes for a Hulk transformation and fight.
The Hulk looks menacingly from the shadows. The Hulk looks agitated as the flames go off behind him and the water pelts. down. The Hulk sits with Betty (Liv Tyler) and is barely noticable from the background rocks. Despite showing visually arresting close-ups of the Hulk that emphasize his dangerous nature and dual personality in relation to Banner, the movie never manages to nail a fantastic long Hulk scene. The psychological divide between the angry, malicious looking Hulk and the calm and timid banner is never explored in the transformation or discussion of the phenomenon. The action and drama set-pieces that feature the Hulk often fail because the color contrast in them de-emphasizes the importance and presence of the Hulk. For example. when the Hulk is watching over Betty on the mountain ranges, he blends in with the rocks surrounding him. Even though the camera spends time on the duo, the image itself leaves very little impact.
Now, this approach would work if they either showcased the Hulk in such a way as to develop Bruce’s character and dynamic or, in a more visceral sense, just let their CGI monster go wild in dynamic action set pieces. Instead, Banner’s transformations are always marred by some other visual distraction and/or a color grading that makes it hard to distinguish his figure. He’s on the screen but doesn’t pop out and get to actually show off. Banner makes fun of the iconic purple pants his character normally wears in a meta-comedy moment, but the reason purple is a great color with the Hulk is because it lets his green shine.
This is made all the more frustrating because it’s clear that Leterrier wanted to go for a green aesthetic. Plenty of shots feature green in the set design; the issue is these greens make the contrast between Hulk and the environment even worse and end up crowding the hulking green mammoth out of the frames he should be a star in. There are a few moments where the camera lingers on a Hulk’s face in a close-up and we get to see beautiful contrasts in his face and a rich texture in the colors. Unfortunately, these moments are few and far in between; the movie usually showcases its showstopper poorly.
Thankfully, the movie spends a decent amount of time on developing Emil Blonsky(Tim Roth). We get to know him as a veteran player who takes the mission seriously and early conversations even set him as the soldier to Banner’s scientist. While the movie does very little with Banner’s scientist storyline, choosing both not to investigate why he would test the “Hulk experiment” on himself or what he wanted, it does go deeper into Blonsky’s motivations and ties his eventual transformations to his character’s’ motivations. It doesn’t matter that the character is shallow; Roth is so amped up about being cruel, militaristic, and bloodthirsty beyond reason that we can get behind his character. Woefully, the movie throws away this saving grace in the third act by replacing Roth with a CGI creature; one less performance capable of galvanizing interest in the fights to come.
Banner clicks on a simple Desktop application. He gets to a remote chat login screen where he puts in in no info. His message is automatically encrypted. The solution implemented to catch Banner is so simple that it reinforces just how lazy the messaging system was treated. One of the largest culprits of lazy storytelling comes from the way Banner communicates with Mr. Blue. It’s shown that he’s sending encrypted messages and is a sleuth who can avoid detection. However, his process of security and encryption is non-existent. He’s using the defaults on a machine that has a miracle software attached to it. The design of the application raises questions on how the government didn’t easily figure out what was happening. They easily demonstrate they can parse through every message and find a location, but we’re somehow expected to believe they couldn’t find a single mention of any issue over years of parsing that would lead back to Banner?
It’s not that the story doesn’t have interesting characters or that it can’t go towards more interesting storylines. It’s just that every story decision feels like the easiest path towards the next plot beat. Case in point, Banner communicates with a secret contact to find a cure to the “Hulk” problem. The way he gets to the contact platform is literally through clicking an application, getting to a chat screen with no place to put in long in information, and then “auto-encrypting” the chat. I don’t expect a complicated encryption process, but I expect the process to be at least be complicated enough for me to believe that the antagonists cannot easily access this information.
However, in this film, the government’s crack-job solution to the messaging platform that Banner has used for apparent YEARS is to put a simple parser out to search for the code names the two are using and then coming upon the duo almost instantly. If the introductory montage didn’t stress that Banner has been sleuthing around the government for years and that the government has been actively pursuing him as per Ross’s command, the laziness wouldn’t be so apparent. Unfortunately, this example of blatantly “rushing” towards the next plot point is one of many. A few can be handled. A litany makes for an unremarkable time. The end result is a skeleton of a espionage movie that never tries to surprise the audience.
Frustratingly, the movie has all the parts necessary to do something intriguing, but it constantly chooses to underutilize them in an attempt to deliver a product that’s “good enough.” It’s a shame because a few tweaks and the movie could have been a psychological navigation of the “Hulk” condition. The opening montage is an attempt at showing how the experiment has fractured Banner’s mind. Imagine if the movie then followed Banner as he tries to figure out a way to control it as opposed to trying to get some mumbo-jumbo cure that acts as nothing more than a MacGuffin. Additionally, the cutaways to distorted green visions, if handled with regards to Banner and the Hulk’s character arcs, could be moments of progression between them. Instead, they’re just quick visuals meant to demonstrate the presence of Banner’s condition – a fact we are well aware of.
Needless to say, the psychological angle was ready and available to dive into, even within the parameters of the script. Some of the movie’s best scenes involve the Hulk showcasing a darker, and more evil disposition. Close-ups of his face showcase an intensity that’s missing from Norton’s face. The movie could have very easily used this juxtaposition to explore even the simplest ideas of good and bad if not something more complex like the Hulk as representative of id and Banner as ego. Furthermore, the movie attempts to use fragmented green-tinted memory recollection sequences as a call-back to the opening montage and as an indication of Banner’s damaged mental state. However, just like the opening, these moments showcase images and details that tells the viewer absolutely nothing of relevance regarding Bruce’s connections or motivations. At the very least, if they presented a warped perspective of scenes, an altered perspective to Bruce’s, these moments could help develop Hulk as a character and juxtapose both sides of the green hero. Instead, the technique is used to just reinforce the same points we already know.
Sadly, there’s a severe lack of effort made at letting the characters and the actors shine through. It’s hard to blame Norton for not getting the audience invested in his character, when all he has to work with are jokes and long chase and walk sequences that are adorned with Armstrong’s rich and emotionally evocative score.
The film tries so hard to use the score to carry the weight of longer A-to-B sections, but Suspiria this movie is not; The Incredible Hulk lacks the grandiose compositions, cinematography, and editing needed to let Armstrong’s music be appreciated. The visuals are safe and milquetoast and drag down the rich and riveting score which is is never given any time to rest because any dead time has to be filled with it. Music is used used to propel all the emotional momentum in the film because the story proper doesn’t give the actors enough material to imbue their characters with passions that would get us to care about their tribulations. The score attempts to generate that momentum, but the lack of any help from any other cinematic element makes the mission impossible.
Alas, this is why The Incredible Hulk marks the low-point of the MCU. It’s a film that feels and actively shows its status as nothing more than a cog in the machine. There’s no flair in it’s presentation or composition which end up making the hollow and threadbare story look all the more lazy and shoddy when on display. The actors are given such little direction on what their characters motivations are or why those desires are they way the are and this lack of guidance carries over to the narrative which often feels like its being forcefully dragged from place to place. There are brief moments of joy, especially when the Hulk is allowed to be the star of the scene, but these moments are so brief that can’t be used to justify watching the entire movie. It’s a shame for fans of the green behemoth, but you’re better off watching later MCU installments ,Thor Ragnarok especially, or even Lee’s older Hulk for nuanced and/or visually interesting story beats.
REPORT CARD
TLDR
The Incredible Hulk is a movie that exists more to push the MCU along than anything else. Outside of Craig Armstrong’s score and a few neat shots, this chronicle of the green behemoth offers very little in terms of engaging content capable. The story is predictable, lazily told, and emotionally empty. Instead of focusing on the interesting psychological angles presented by the narrative, the movie is more than satisfied with giving just enough information to move to the next point until the whole journey is over.
Only MCU completionists or super fans of the Hulk should give this a watch.
Rating
4.3
Grade
F
Go to Page 2for the for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis. Go to Page 3to view this review’s progress report .
Ellen Burstyn as Chris MacNeil Linda Blair as Regan MacNeil Jason Miller as Father/Dr. Damien Karras Max von Sydow as Father Merrin Lee J. Cobb as Lieutenant Kinderman
Release Date
1973
Language(s)
English
Running Time
121 minutes
The title card comes in a deep red font surrounded by black. A black-and-white perspective on the sun rising. The fantasy fades and the hues of the sun overpower the frame.The opening sequence of The Exorcist marks the end of simplistic worldviews; order is broken and the world isn’t a clear cut black-and-white image anymore. The battle begins with a hellish intensity that must be overcome.
The film opens with a bright red title card as the Islamic call to prayer is heard in the background. A grayscale image of a desert is shown before its burning red, orange, and yellow hues dominate the screen. The simplicity of the black-and-white image gives way to a hellish haze that burns the natural environment around it. The world isn’t black-and-white and the battle between good and evil has begun.
Animals walk in the haze of the desert. People dig at a site. Location card indicates we’re in Northern Iraq. Father Merrin (Alex von Sydow) is framed between the legs of a young boy looking up. A series of establishing shots let us know we’re in a desert on a dig site somewhere in Northern Iraq. Despite being shot like a documentary, the establishing shots culminate in a picturesque frame where Father Merrin is trapped in between the legs of a young boy. It’s a sign of strenuous things to come, where he’ll be be starting at a lower vantage point.
We see a series of establishing shots – animals walking through a haze and workers digging up a site – before a location card shows up informing us that we’re in Northern Iraq. The presentation makes us feel like we’re watching a documentary. Eventually the camera comes upon and follows a young boy at the site who runs through the grounds. He stops and we see the subject of his search, an older archaeologist and priest named Father Merrin (Max von Sydow), positioned between his legs looking up. The child informs the priest that that something of interest has been dug up.
Despite the fact that the compositions and camera movements are done in a naturalistic, unassuming manner, director William Friedkin is still able to fill the film with evocative frames like this one to set up the narrative. Merrin is trapped by the child and the announcement. He looks up from a lower position suggesting that what’s to come will be a struggle for him, one in which he will be lowered. The fact that the one giving him the message and demarcating him is a child is not a coincidence; it’s just one small demonstration of one The Exorcist’s major strengths: the ability to portray events in documentary like fashion while retaining full control on what each frame entails in a thematic sense. This is how Friedkin transforms the ordinary into the extraordinary.
Merrin (Max von Sydow) finds the Medal of St.Joseph.Merrin (Max von Sydow) finds a sculpture of Pazuzu’s head. A lone bird flies through the sun covered frame. Merrin’s (Max von Sydow) hands tremble as he takes his medication. Merrin (Max von Sydow) sees a blacksmith tending to burning fire. The blacksmith looks at Merrin. One of his eyes is clouded in shades of gray.Father Merrin finds both a medal of St.Joseph and a sculpt of Pazuzu’s’, a demon-God, head. This double finding of a sign of good luck and a sign of bad luck will be repeated as a motif throughout the film. After finding both items, we see the sun dominate the frame for a split second as a bird flies through the frame – this creature will show up later. The experience disgruntles Merrin so much that even a simple encounter with a blacksmith becomes elevated.
Merrin walks through the desert towards the location of the aforementioned discovery and finds a medal of St.Joseph. The medal is out of place in the environment, both geographically and chronologically, calling to question how and why it’s present in the area. The film even calls attention to the discrepancy by having the characters mention that such an artifact doesn’t belong in the area. After puzzling over the medal, Merrin starts to dig and comes upon a sculpting. The sound of the wind gets stronger as he brushes the dust off the figure revealing it to be a statue of Pazuzu. [1] While Pazuzu is never mentioned explicitly, it’s clear from the material and discussion on the film that the figure is of Pazuzu. As he stares at the ominous looking head, the sound of buzzing flies becomes more intense.
Once again, the hellish haze of the sun takes control of the screen; this time its presence is brief while it burns not just the desert like before but also a large building in the background; the flames have made their way to civilization. A single bird flies through the frame; the conflict has started to move. The scene dissipates and we cut back to Merrin sitting in a crowded area. It’s clear he’s perturbed by his encounter with Pazuzu as his hands tremble fumbling with his medicine. From the way his eyes glaze out, we know he’s not taking in any of his surroundings; his mind is focused entirely on the presence of malevolence. He gets up and walks through the city before coming upon a blacksmith. The intensity of the flames from their work feels off-putting as they remind us of the intensity of the sun. A simple encounter becomes nefarious as our mind puts the visual cues together; a sub-conscious fear is being laid out.
Insert shot of the clock’s chime. Insert shot of the clock.Insert shot of a recovered statue head. Merrin (Max von Sydow) catalogues his finding. Merrin (Max von Sydow) picks up the Medal of St.Joseph. The clock goes on behind him. Merrin (Max von Sydow) looks at the Medal of St. Joseph. Merrin (Max von Sydow) looks at the head of Pazuzu while being informed it’s a ward against evil. Merrin (Max von Sydow) notices the clock behind him has stopped. Friedkin hides subliminal clues in this establishing montage; seemingly benign insert shots become triggers for a scare in the making. By clueing us in to look at the clocks, not from one but two separate angles, Friedkin manages to get our subconscious hyper-focsed on the clock. This is why it stopping hits as hard. The fact that it happens after a repetition of the double finding motif – Merrin touches both the medal and statue again – helps both techniques reinforce one another. This is how the film weaves psychic chains.
We see another set of establishing shots – a clock chime, a clock head, recovered statues – before revealing Merrin documenting his dig findings. He picks up the medal and looks at it for a brief moment before picking up the head. Another worker in the building notes that the head is a figure of “Evil against Evil.” This mention is not without purpose; Pazuzu is both a demon associated with the evils of the air and a God invoked by people to protect against other more malicious forces. [2]Near eastern antiquities : Mesopotamia. Statuette of the demon Pazuzu with an inscription – Near Eastern Antiquities | Louvre Museum. (n.d.). … Continue reading Thus, we have a symbol of God from a different area juxtaposed against the symbol of a God-Demon from a more local culture being discovered by a Father who is deadly terrified of the latter.
Immediately, the clock behind Merrin stops and our anxieties rise along with him. Because Friedkin disguised the clock parts as part of the establishing shot, our minds were primed to pay attention to the clock without being immediately aware of it. This makes its eventual stoppage more effective because it’s something we’re already thinking about. Friedkin shows us the clock multiple times in a non-innocuous manner, so he conditions us even further to recognize its disparity as off-putting. Combining this with the juxtaposition of the findings amplifies our unease, transforming a small clock pause into a moment of utter panic.
Merrin (Max von Sydow) walks past a group of Muslims praying. A woman looks down at Merrin from above. Merrin (Max von Sydow) walks past two women who are veiled. Merrin (Max von Sydow) is almost hit by a carriage. Even though nothing should be going wrong, we’re primed for the worst to happen. Every point of God is met with a counter-point of bad luck, so after Merrin walks past Muslims praying, we’re expecting something go awry. He walks past a woman looking down on him, just like the child did earlier, which starts the trepidation. After he walks past two women, we’re not even surprised that he’s almost run over. The film constantly generates expectations because of how it repeats itself.
Merrin leaves the establishment as a group of Muslims start to pray – a callback to the call for prayer at the start of the film. Despite being a man of faith, he makes no notice of the group and walks past them. It’s a continuation of the juxtaposition between the figures; orientations towards religions constantly mix and swap in this battle for and of faith. While the anxiety ridden priest makes his way around a corner, the camera cuts to a woman who seems him from up above looking down. The shot itself is nothing out of the ordinary, but it’s inclusion in an already tense movement makes us scared for the elderly priest. The last time someone was looking down on him, the child giving the announcement, he was met with a dark presence.
We cut from the women back down to Merrin who stares down at the ground as he walks past two women. Within seconds of passing them, he is almost ran over by a carriage which approaches from a darkened tunnel. Is this Pazuzu or is it just Merrin’s pre-occupation?
Merrin (Max von Sydow) looks up as a shadow comes over him and a gust of wind threatens to blow off his hat. A statue of Pazuzu is revealed to be above, with the burning sun behind it. Pazuzu and Merrin (Max von Sydow) stare off. A man is revealed to be behind Merrin. Dogs fight in the desert. The camera zooms in on Pazuzu. Pazuzu and Merrin (Max von Sydow) are engaged in battle. Pazuzu and Merrin’s (Max von Sydow) battle dissolves into the red heat of the sun. The heat of the sun covers everything. The heat of the sun dissolves into the cool looking cityscape. The city is revealed to be Georgetown. Chris (Ellen Burstyn) hears some animal noises and goes to investigate. A black-and-white image of her daughter is positioned next to her bed. Chris (Ellen Burstyn) puts on an orange robe and goes to investigate the source of the noise. Regan (Linda Blair) wears yellow pajamas. The window to Regan’s room is open and a gust comes in. The confrontation between Merrin and Pazuzu sets the stage for everything to come and marks one of the greatest movie introductions. The wind and sound of animals are established to be antagonistic forces as their presence makes way while Merrin realizes he’s being stared down on by Pazuzu. Merrin has been set lower by the boy, woman above, and now finally, the demon-God before him. We already know the battle will be brutal. A man behind Merrin reminds us that the entity of Pazuzu is not one of pure evil; Merrin is reacting strongly but a local doesn’t move. The film is establishing sources of ambiguity.
At the same time, the battle dissolves into the harsh sun, tying the battle between Merrin and Pazuzu to the universal breaking of black-and-white morals. This further dissolves into Georgetown, which is bathed in a cool blue. The battle has changed locations.
As Chris moves from her black-and-white photograph of Reagan to Reagan herself, we notice that the mother-daughter duo pair are wearing the colors of the sun. Another movement of black-and-white breaking to the intensity of the solar spectrum. At the same time, the gusts of wind break through Reagan’s window. Another repetition.
An answer is given. Merrin walks down to the dig site and a gust of wind blows threatening to take his hat off. His face is cast in shadows as he looks up. The camera cuts to a statue of Pazuzu looking down upon him, the blinding hot sun appearing right behind the figure. Finally, the confrontation has come to a head. The sounds of dogs fighting and the gusts of wind rage over the soundscape as the two combatants take their stances. The two figures stand apart from each other, Merrin positioned lower looking up, as the scene dissolves into the burning bright sun – a confirmation that the days of a black-and-white world are over. This burning environment dissolves to an establishing shot of Georgetown; the arena of the battle has shifted grounds from Iraq to Washington D.C.
The camera moves from the city to the bedroom of a large mansion. We see Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn) writing notes on her bed. On her nightstand is a large black-and-white portrait of her daughter, Regan (Linda Blair). Chris hears loud animal noises coming from her attic and gets up to investigate. She puts on an orange nightgown before checking on Regan, who happens to be asleep in yellow pajamas. The window in Regan’s bedroom is wide open and gusts of wind are blowing through. A black-and-white image that gives way to orange and yellow, gusts of wind, and animal noises are all signs that the conflict we saw in the opening act has made its way here. Once again, Friedkin has managed to tell us what’s going to happen with just the most subtle of elements, using the repetition of visual and auditory cues to highlight the parallels between the evil happenings between both locations.
Extras playing students on the film hold up signs in protests against the Vietnam War, which was hugely unpopular and televised at the time. Father Damien Karras (Jason Miller) laughs in the background as he watches Chris and Burke squabble. The sub-text of the Vietnam war is present but the reasoning for why is never given to the audience. Instead, we’re made aware of its odd placement in the film and then made to laugh at it as to let it float away, to the recesses of our subconscious.
The next day comes and we cut to a film materialized within the film; it turns out Chris is a famous movie actor and is on set filming a movie about the Vietnamese war. Extras on set hold up signs indicative of the counter-culture at the time. The Vietnam war was raging and was immensely unpopular to many college aged students at the time. The war was famous for being the first “televised war” and media reporting at the time made it infamous at large. [3]Spector, R. H. (2016, April 27). The Vietnam War and the Media. Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Vietnam-War-and-the-media-2051426.. In particular, it was a time associated with the hippie movement – a group who was known for its opposition to consumerist bourgeois culture and Christianity. [4]Quinn, D. (2019, August 21). The mixed legacy of the 60s hippie movement. The Irish Catholic. https://www.irishcatholic.com/the-mixed-legacy-of-the-60s-hippie-movement/. It’s place in a film about supernatural evil feels out of place. However, this strangeness is called to attention by a crew member who asks the in-movie director, Burke Dennings, if “this scene [is] really essential” and if “[Dennings could] consider on whether or not [the film] can do without it?” Chris then follows up and asks Dennings to explain the student’s motivations for tearing the building down. In both cases, no real answer is given, but the mention of a purpose entices us to give the scene more attention than we would; immediately, we become aware that what we’re about to see has a purpose which allows the sub-text to become imprinted on our psyches.
Dennings ignores the crew member and responds to Chris’s question by reiterating her role. He tells her that as a “teacher at the college, [she] doesn’t want the building torn down.” In exasperation this non-answer , Chris exclaims, “C’mon I can read for Christ’s sake.” – the first verbal mention of Christ in the film – and continues her search for a purpose to the scene. Dennings is still unable to provide a reason and jokes around with Chris about the situation – diffusing it and providing entertainment for the throng of people who have come around the shoot to watch it in action. In the audience is a priest adorned in black, Damien Karras (Jason Miller), who smiles along in excitement at the proceedings. The joke diffuses us as well as it does the proxy audience within the film, causing us to drop our guard again; the lingering questions disappear, leaving only their spectral vestiges behind to accumulate in the the recesses of the mind.
Chris (Ellen Burstyn) mentions God as she tells the students to calm down. The camera picks up on Damien (Jason Miller) as he leaves the crowd. Damien (Jason Miller) leaves as Chris mentions that change has to occur within the system. Chris (Ellen Burstyn) walks past a yellow door as the wind blows Autumn leaves past her. Chris (Ellen Burstyn) walks past a red door as the wind blows Autumn leaves past her. Chris (Ellen Burstyn) smiles at children in Halloween costumes running past her. Chris walks past two Nuns, one of whom is carrying a rosary. Chris ( Ellen Burstyn) sees Damien (Jason Miller) consoling another priest but can’t make out the conversation due to the loud noise of wind displacement. The filming scene does a great job establishing that Chris and Damien’s paths have and will continue to intertwine almost as if fate is pushing them together. We start with Chris, hop to Damien in a crowd of faces, then cut back to Chris who eventually runs back into Damien. It’s a poetic movement; they can’t meet till the time is right.
Chris’s journey back is also a double of Merrin’s journey in Iraq. She walks past red and yellow (the sun), goes past kids in costumes (a symbol of evil against evil) and nuns holding a crucifix (a symbol of the Lord and two veiled women), while the wind blows and “Tubular Bells” play. We know she, like Merrin ,will have to deal with the forces of evil.
Our attention focuses on the scene itself as it begins. Chris, now in character, walks up to the top of the school and tells the students to stop their protests. Once again, she verbally mentions “God” in her exclamations while telling the crowd of extras around her that if they “wanna effect any change [they”] have to do it within the system.” The irony of a wealthy atheist actress playing a teacher working against the counterculture movement while invoking “God” and “the system” is so astoundingly blatant that the fact that Friedkin was able to disguise each element by only subtly drawing a viewer’s attention to it, while simultaneously not compromising the structure of the film proper is proof enough of how textured The Exorcist is at cultivating multifaceted themes. As Chris’s monologue comes to a close, the camera zooms in on a crowd of faces before finding and following the young priest, Karras, as he makes his way to the Church.
The in-movie scene ends and Chris walks back from the set to her mansion. The red, orange, and yellow Autumn leaves around her blow as the wind blows them around her. The iconic theme music, “Tubular Bells” plays, a confirmation to the audience that the sings they’re seeing are a confirmation of the evil that has come to lay siege to the MacNeils. Chris walks by a series of doors, the first of which is yellow and the last of which is red. Children, symbols of innocence, dressed in Halloween costumes run by her. The tradition of wearing costumes on holiday started namely to protect people from evil spirits. Costumes were meant to disguise oneself from evil. Wearing the monsters protected one from monsters – evil against evil. It’s fitting then that the innocent Regan, soon to be possessed, is being affected by Pazuzu of all entities.
Unlike the innocent depictions of costumes on these children, Chris will be forced to deal with the real thing; just like in Iraq, the conflict has started and Chris, just like Father Merrin, will have to come face to face with her nightmares. On the other side of the street, two nun’s walk by. Their presence does not make the sinister soundscape abate. This scene is done in parallel to Merrin’s own walk in the opening; both parties walk by women in veils as evil pursues. Eventually, Chris come to the Church’s gates and sees Father Karras. He starts to talk but both us and Chris are unable to hear as the soundscape is once again interrupted by the sound of the winds. Chris and Karras have not met yet but the seeds for their encounter have been planted.
With this, all the key players have been introduced and The Exorcist can truly begin as Regan MacNeil finds herself in a series of supernatural events that force her mother and self into action in a race to save their lives. The above description of the first 16 minutes is only scratching the surface of the intricate and deeply enigmatic story lying at the heart of the film. Hypnotic suggestions loom around every corner as the movie cuts between sequences in thematic fashion. Consequently, the story’s rythm always feel constant so we’re none the wiser to how much time has passed in between scenes. It’s from these “gaps” that Friedkin puts the mysteries of the film behind. Just like the medal Merrin finds at the start, The Exorcist is littered with minor oddities like repetitions of certain quips and details in the mise en scène like the cover of a magazine that are brought to attention and then pushed to the periphery only to pop up later in the strangest of ways.
Strange cuts and displacements offer an answer one way, while the nature of the narrative suggests others. Based on how a viewer interprets one event, they color the way other events proceed; each of these decisions, culminates in how one processes the ending and subsequently the themes of the movie. Each little detail is placed there with a purpose, waiting to be deciphered in the matrix of meaning afforded by the rich subtext the film employs. The end result is a movie with an infinite permutations of meanings, each justified by an orientation grounded in the film itself.
For example is the film, like Stephen King suggests, about “the entire youth explosion that took place in the late sixties and early seventies”? [5] King, S. (2010). Danse macabre. Gallery.The film-making scene in-movie would certainly be evidence to suggest as much. Or is the film about the way we demonize the Other? The use of Pazuzu as opposed to directly invoking the Devil from the start is a choice made for a reason. These are only a few of the questions the movie allows us to ponder. Every detail, no matter how small it is, presents with it another layer of themes by which to interpret the primary conflict and a set of questions along with them. It’s not an exaggeration to say that one could watch the movie on repeat and come to a different conclusion each time.
Regan (Linda Blair) is shaken by her blue bed while dressed in yellow pajamas. Chris (Ellen Burstyn) talks to Dr. Klein (Barton Heyman) in a blue hallway. Lt. Kidnerman (Lee J. Cobb) accosts Damien (Jason Miller) in front of blue seats.I have to applaud the efforts in production design to ensure such a consistent color scheme. One only has to pause at a important enough juncture to see the scenes bursting in either blues, oranges, reds, and/or yellows depending on the nature of the scene. Whether it be in the architecture or the clothing, the relevant colors are there when they need to be and frequent enough to not feel like coincidence.
This is due, in no small part, to the way Friedkin repeats motifs, making the connections between seemingly disparate moments seem clear if one is looking. The colors red, yellow, and orange are first introduced at the start of the film and represent the spiritual battle. Whenever the colors prop up in the mise en scène, like in the color of the doorways or the characters clothing, we can already tell something is afoot. This is the color of the fight. In contrast, blues envelop the screen whenever a party is attempting to work against the malicious entities. It makes sense from a color theory perspective; in contrast to the heat feeling generated by the sun’s gradient, the cool and calm feeling of the blues feel like a natural response. Likewise, wind makes its presence apparent preceding scenes of terror, reinforcing Pazuzu’s dominion and area of reach. Animal noises like growls and barks creep into the soundscape reminding us of the buzz of the flies and the fighting of the dogs in Iraq while “Tubular Bells” all but confirms the sinister is going to happen when it turns up.
Damien (Jason Miller) tells Tom (Thomas Bermingham) that he, Damien, has lost his faith. Chris (Ellen Burstyn) hears animal noises from above. Ellen (Chris Burstyn) bathes Regan (Linda Blair) after the latter’s incident. The darkness crowds around them as the light gets further away. The fact that Friedkin could get some of the shots he did with the style of filmmaking he was pursuing is testament to his genius. The use of harsh shadows, smoke, and distant sources of light let him give all his images a distinct texture while enabling thematically rich visual storytelling.
Furthermore, the film’s lighting and use of shadows hearkens back to German Expressionism movement, and to an effect the noir movement which was deeply influenced by the former movement. Smoke fills many frames, emanating from cigarettes constantly being lit and the freezing cold temperatures of the increasingly chilly gusts of wind, giving them a more textured and gritty look. Lighting is harsh and often shows the dark nooks and corners in characters faces. Shadows encroach on characters visually demonstrating the influence of evil on their lives. Likewise, divinity comes in the form of bright lights which often show up near the spiritually inclined characters.
By sticking to a mostly unassuming style, Friedkin is able to employ all the above stylistic flourishes, call attention to them momentarily, and then sweep that attention under the rug in favor of something else. The end result is a hypnotic film that creeps under the skin without notice. Suggestions become patterns which become motifs that inform how one proceeds down the mine. Our mind is conditioned to associate certain triggers with evil and others with good, ultimately giving the viewer full reign in determining what the film really means.
The documentary like severity by which the subject matter is treated is the reason this subsequent engagement is so powerful and potentially cathartic. Because everything leading up to the supernatural phenomena is so grounded, the inclusion of such events is given a real power. Every single actor, from the main to the side cast, deals with the events of the film with a cold sense of realism forcing us to do the same. While I could spend at least a few paragraphs detailing the meticulous performances on display, I mainly want to draw attention at how well the film humanizes our leads and gets us to care about their well-being. In particular, the mother-daughter relationship between Chris and Regan, played by Ellen Burstyn and Linda Blair respectively, is sweet and endearing; their love is palpable. Blair presents her soon-to-be possessed character as innocent, whimsical, and child-like.
This is why her flip to cruel and off-kilter hits so hard; it feels impossible to believe that such a sweet little girl could transform into something so much more sinister. There’s no respite from the macabre cruelty put on display. One isn’t allowed to escape from the violence or allowed to cast it aside; instead, they’re forced to sit and marinate with it, imbuing it with their own personal subjective tendencies. It’s no wonder then that the film elicited such strong reactions when it was released with some more sensitive members fainting in theatres. [6]Vanderbilt, M. (2017, August 23). Audiences had some intense reactions to the exorcist in 1973. The A.V. Club. … Continue reading The movie tapped into the cultural zeitgeist at the time and pricks on a litany of unconscious fears and desires ranging from generational to cultural that are bound to generate strong responses even now and it does all that while remaining a conventionally frightening movie that doesn’t cheap up on the spectacle of the scares.
There’s a reason The Exorcist is often the first name mentioned in discussions regarding the greatest horror films of all time[7]I’m in the camp of critic Mark Kermode who regards The Exorcist as the greatest film of all time. I’m not at that level, but I have the film in my top 30 of all time and it constantly … Continue reading At one level it is as spiritual of an experience as a film by Dreyer or Bergman and then on another level it’s use of spectacle is of the greatest variety providing chills so deep and unsettling that they still serve as a benchmark, along with John Carpenter’s The Thing, on how to utilize practical effects to make horror as real as possible. It is a film that understands true terror lies hidden in the unconscious, so it employs psychological ands subliminal tricks to prime our minds and feelings for the nightmares to follow, but it doesn’t forget that the audience has come to be scared, so it pays off all the tension with the most depraved and upsetting images it can. It’s one of the crown jewels of cinema and is proof the medium’s power at truly probing the corners of one’s mind. Friedkin puts it best in his intro to the film: ” Over the years, I think most people take out of The Exorcist what they bring to it. If you believe the world is a dark and evil place, then The Exorcist will reinforce that. But if you believe that there is a force for good that combats and eventually triumphs over evil, then you will be taking out of the film what we tried to put into it.” [8] William Friedkin’s Introduction to The Exorcist. Warner Brothers. (1973) The Exorcist.
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TLDR
The Exorcist is one of the greatest works of cinema, let alone horror cinema, serving spiritual lessons along with nightmares in equal amount. It is a film that treats every frame as an opportunity to set up subliminal scares, demonstrating that the best results require the most delicate of touches. By lulling the audience to the film’s hypnotic, but elliptical, rhythm, Friedkin forces every viewer to engage in a subjective tango with his mangum opus thereby ensuring that no two viewing experiences are totally alike. Multiple events in the film require the viewer to imagine their own scenes of terror in order to get a “whole” perspective on what transpires. If you give yourself wholly to it, The Exorcist will take you on an unbelievable journey that only the cream of the crop of cinema can dare to venture. The choice is yours.
Rating
10/10
Grade
S+
Go to Page 2 for the for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis. Go to Page 3to view this review’s progress report .
The camera pushes in towards the window qua frame. Louise (Amy Adams) happily looks down at her daughter.Louise (Amy Adams) looks down as Hannah plays in the background.Louise (Amy Adams) looks down at her daughter.Hannah (Abigail Pniowsky) tells her mom she loves her. Hannah (Julia Scarlett Dan) tells her mom she hates her. Louise (Amy Adams) cries for her dying daughter. Louise (Amy Adams) walks down a hallway which arcs and has no defined end or beginning. The opening of the movie demonstrates the fragility and temporary nature of life. We see Louise give birth, raise, and lose her daughter Hannah all within a few minutes of run-time. Match-cuts are used to jump between the past and present, demonstrating the way people change over time; Hannah goes from love to hate over the course of years, but we process it over the span of a few seconds. Thus, the weight of even a single moment is impressed upon us. The montage ends with Louise walking aimlessly, setting us up perfectly for the narrative to come.
The camera slowly tracks down and forward towards a window staring out at an ocean view while “On the Nature of Daylight” by Max Richter plays in the background. The song evokes feelings of melancholy and beauty and sets the mood for what’s to come. The window is a frame; a center point that demarcates an area while presenting. As the camera goes towards this frame we hear a voiceover by our still unseen protagonist, Louise, who explains that “Memory is a strange thing. It doesn’t work like I thought it did. We are so bound by time, by its order.”
We cut from the frame to Louise (Amy Adams) and her daughter, Hannah. We see Hannah as a child, being delivered into Louise arms. We cut again and see Louise playing with a slightly older Hannah (Jadyn Malone). Hannah plays in the background as her mom watches from the foreground. We match cut to Louise looking down on her daughter who says “I love you.” We match cut to an older Hannah who now says “I hate you.” Finally, we cut to a hospital where we see Louise crying over a deceased Hannah. Louise walks down an seemingly never-ending arcing hospital hallway as the music comes to an end. Louise’s narration continues as she notes that, “… I’m not so sure I believe in beginnings and endings. There are days that define your story beyond your life, like they day they arrived.”
Louise (Amy Adams) stands in front of her whiteboard qua frame. Louise (Amy Adams) reveals the television hidden behind the whiteboard.; a new frame opens up. Louise (Amy Adams) reacts to the news. Frames are important for the film, both as a visual motif and key driver of the themes of the film: being able to “take control” of the frame. Louise is always framed in a way that suggests her passivity; she’s behind the frame and doesn’t pay it much mind unless forced to. This opening sequence not only sets up the dominant “frames” in Louise’s life, but also places us firmly in her point-of-view as all our information is filtered through what she sees and hears. Even after she finally watches the news about aliens, we only get to see her reaction as opposed to the content. She’s our “frame” for approaching the film, determining the parameters by which we interpret the information.
Accordingly, the movie shifts to “present” time, to a Louise who seems oblivious to the world around her. She walks along as throngs of people around her crowd around televisions. Her energy levels are muted compared to the frenzy around her. She makes her way to the college classroom she teaches linguistics in and notices a severe lack of students. She gets ready to write on the large white board, a canvas in the center of the screen framing things, much like the window in her house.
The students who are present are distracted by their phones ask Louise to put on the television. She acquiesces and reveals a hidden television behind the whiteboard behind her. This television serves as a new central frame – a plane that provides an interpretative jumping off point. For the first time, Louise is focused on the news, and the camera reinforces this by only showing us her reaction; the content of the news report is not shown. We learn, along with her, that alien objects have landed in multiple locations around the world.
Louise (Amy Adams) goes to the window qua frame. Louise (Amy Adams) turns away from the window after her mom asks her how she’s feeling. Louise (Amy Adams) tries to flip channels away from the news regarding the aliens. The news shows pandemonium and fear happening en masse due to the aliens invasion. Louise (Amy Adams) is unable to “control” her frame, instead being trapped by whatever view it shows her. She can’t get past her funk, refusing to move past it in any meaningful way. She tries to change the channel (both literally and metaphorically) but is unable to. All the while, the world she tries to ignore is bursting at its seams with fear and chaos.
She drives back home and talks to her mom on the phone. She walks towards the center window while her mom mentions some conspiracy fueled news regarding the aliens which Louise says to ignore. She asks how Louise is doing; a fitting question given both Hannah’s death and Louise’s comparatively muted energy levels. Louise responds, “About the same.”
The camera changes positions in response, going from behind Louise to her side. Her unenthused state limits possibilities, something which is driven through as we watch her flipping through television channels in a desperate attempt to find anything not mentioning the aliens. She falls asleep having found no such escape; all the while, the channels, in contrast to Louise’s lack of concern, showcase mass panic and fear happening around the world. It’s only the next day, when she gets to a fully empty classroom, that Louise finally decides to tune in to the alien news the rest of the world has been binging since first contact.
The camera tracks towards Louise. A single window frame is shown. Louise (Amy Adams) slowly comes into view from behind the wall. Multiple window frames are shown. Louise (Amy Adams) comes into view. The window frames surround Louise.Louise (Amy Adams) is caught off guard by Colonel Weber (Forest Whitaker) while she researches the aliens. To demonstrate the way the “alien problem” is creeping up on Louise, Villeneuve has the camera slowly track along a wall into Louise’s room. It’s like the problem is literally creeping up on her from the shadows. The window frames around her are a continuation of the motif ; her frame of reference is about to change completely. Once the problem has caught up to her, as indicated by the full-view of her character, she’s immediately called to action by Colonel Weber who shows up behind her.
The camera tracks in slowly, creeping in on Louise before finally dawning on her, like the news she’s avoided up to now. Her office is adorned with a host of window frames – a continuation of the visual motif. Colonel Weber (Forest Whitaker) walks into her office and interrupts her while she catches up. He mentions that her previous translation work in Farsi helped the military with some insurgents, so he thought it prudent to have her translate recordings of the aliens “communicating”. She responds that her efforts certainly did help the Colonel in eradicating the insurgents – knowledge turned into violence – before claiming that she won’t be able to translate without first seeing the creatures. Weber refuses and threatens to leave before being told by Louise that his potential linguistic replacement for her, Danvers, is unable to do the task. Louise challenges Weber to ask Danvers for the Sanskrit word for “war” to confirm her claims.
Unfortunately for Danvers, Louise is right on the money. While his translation defines the word as “an argument”, Louise correctly defines it as a “desire for more cows.” ; an innocuous desire interpreted as violence. Weber thus acquiesces to her demands to see the aliens; you need the best translator if you have any shot of making sense of an otherworldly language. She is introduced to her soon-to-be partner, Ian (Jeremy Renner), and flies with him and Weber to the flying spaceship; an oblong shaped semi-egg shape whose size absolutely dwarfs the military set-up underneath it.
The researchers go to the bottom of the UFO. The researchers are lifted up into the UFO. Two of the researchers jump off the platform to engage in the ship’s new gravitational pull. The researchers are oriented in different directions due to the pull of gravity. As the researchers approach the aliens, the camera flips upside down. They’re entering a new domain. The researchers approach the “frame” the aliens reside behind. Villenevenue doesn’t use a lot of CGI, but the few special effects set-pieces he does employ are visually fantastic. The journey the researchers take to get on the UFO itself is trippy to say the least. As they jump off the platform, it becomes apparent that the ship has multiple gravitational pulls. This is demonstrated in the fantastic scenes showing the researchers jumping from “one plane” of gravity to another. As they walk towards the aliens, the camera flips upside down to highlight the magnitude of their steps; they’re crossing the threshold to new frontiers.
After being brought up to speed and procedure, her and Ian are sent into the ship to complete their first mission. The two of them get on a rising platform and are pushed up to the very base of the ship which opens to them. They jump off this base to a wall going perpendicular to it, seemingly breaking the rules of gravity. They make their way to the domain of the aliens; the camera flips upside down marking the moment where they officially enter the boundary to a new domain. Ian and Louise come to face with a large cinematic-feeling frame; a large grey canvas which calls to mind Louise’s window, her whiteboard, and the television screen. Face to face with this newest frame, she’s tasked with figuring out the aliens’ purpose on Earth before global war breaks out.
Despite featuring a “save the Earth from extinction” plotline featuring extra-terrestrials, director Denis Villeneuve’s Arrival positions itself closer to science fiction films like Contact and La Jetee as opposed to Independence Day. The focus of the story is about the intimate way human’s experience their day-to-day while grappling with the dice rolls that life doll’s out in seemingly random fashion. This is why we start the movie experiencing Louise’s happiness and her grief. We see a life come into fruition, grow, and then pass all within a few minutes. We’re hit with a range of emotions evidenced most explicitly in Hannah going from “loving” to “hating” her mother. Like Louise mentions in her opening monologue, life is a series of moments, held together in the frames of our memory ready to be processed. These moments with her daughter stick out and demonstrate to us that intensity, not duration, lends moments their meaning.
Even when the movie moves on the “main” storyline, we’re held away from it. We’re put into Louise’s point of view from start to finish, experiencing her grief with her, and then moving forward in dejected fashion. The story happens organically around us, but we’re only given bits and pieces of information. We’re forced to learn with Louise and because of that we adopt her point of view as our own; she is our frame. This is a technique Villeneuve previously employed in his previous film, Sicario, to help set the audience up for the unexpected. We get so wrapped up in our protagonist’s headspace that the world of the movie catches us off guard in the same it does to them. All the pieces of this surprise are shown to us in plain sight, but we’re focused on what Louise sees: a possibility for dialogue.
Arrival is a meditation on syntax and the way that its encapsulation of content changes meaning. In other words, it’s focused on delving into the “how” of language as much as it is the “what” of language. This is why the movie spends so much of its visual capital on frames; what frame do all of us use more than language? The words we use to express ourselves are made up of characters, and each character represents a sound. These sounds only make sense because of the rules we all agree to follow. The process of determining a syntax and providing translation serves as the main narrative focus which follows Louise and her colleagues as they attempt to frame the aliens’ language in such a way as to avoid war.
Louise represents the side of openness and approaches the aliens as partners in a search for truth. Meanwhile the people and organizations around her approach the aliens as, “an enemy who is wrong, who is armful, and whose very existence constitutes a threat.”[1] Foucault, Michel. “Polemics, Politics and Problematizations.” Interview by P. Rabinow, May 1984, In Essential Works of Foucault Vol. 1. The New Press, 1998. Every interaction Louise has with the aliens is met with skepticism from outside parties who seem set in their determinations of what’s going on. Thus, the race to determine the proper syntax becomes a battleground between Louise and everyone around her to establish the dominant meaning; the stereotypical sci-fi battle we’ve been conditioned to expect transforms into a language game between an interlocutor and a polemicist .
Her journey towards discovering the syntax is marked by a similar inner journey to dealing with the death of her daughter. As the movie progresses, it cuts to memories of Hannah and Louise; moments framed in time. These moments take on an initial meaning that changes as Louise is able to frame them in a new way. Moments of despair turn into moments of learning; memories transform into potentials for something new turning from traumatic to joyous. These transformations are given weight by Joe Walker’s’ fantastic editing. The match cuts which are used to demonstrate Louise flashing to memories of her daughter back to the present become varied in rhythm. Sometimes the cut is immediate. Sometimes the cut feels like something Satoshi Kon would do; event A happens, we cut to event B before A finishes that reframes A, and then we cut to the conclusion of A. This change in rhythm is directly tied to Louise’s external journey, discovering the language of the aliens, and her internal journey, finding purpose in her life despite Hannah’s passing, demonstrating true synergy between content and form. These strands all come together in a truly sublime fashion by the film’s end.
The lynchpin holding these strands together is the star of the film, Amy Adams, whose performance gives the movie its emotional heft. The way she gets lost in her thoughts gives the match cut edits from past to present and back again a heft; we can feel her consciousness shifting gears as she’s forced to overcome her turmoil. Despite acting against CGI aliens, her sense of engagement makes them feel real. We become attached to the aliens because her character is so enthusiastic about trying to understand them. This investment is what makes the cerebral nature of the film works; we care and are invested in our main character, so we want her to succeed even the parameters of her battle are in a different domain than what we’re used to. Because she’s invested in understanding the aliens, we are as well, which helps us stay engaged even in the slower portions of the movie.
While the movie isn’t as action-packed as some of its contemporaries, that doesn’t mean that its visually distinct. Villeneuve has just moved the focus from being so action-oriented to something more mystical and “other-worldly.” Instead of space lasers or explosions, we get chambers which shift gravity (and show multiple gravitational pulls at once) and wispy clouds of ink which are transformed into alien orthography. The result is a cerebral film which challenges and invites the audience into examining the power of each and every moment. It’s a movie that delves into the human condition in a way that hearkens back to the best of science-fiction , using an encounter with aliens to deconstruct what it means to live a fully realized life.
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TLDR
Arrival is a movie that uses the event of an alien first-contact as a jumping off point to examine the way people try and give meaning to their lives. Villeneuve’s direction, Heisserer’s script, and Adams’s acting come together in the form of a gripping cerebral narrative that is as engaging as its typical action-fare counterparts while retaining the inquisitive and thought-provoking elements of the very best of the science-fiction genre. By choosing to focus on the task of translating alien language as opposed to just engaging in some “epic” confrontation with them, Arrival forces us to confront the mysteries within ourselves as we tackle the mysteries of the extraterrestrials that come from beyond.
Rating
10/10
Grade
S+
Go to Page 2for the for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis. Go to Page 3to view this review’s progress report .
