In Theaters: THE GRUDGE (2020)

THE GRUDGE 
(US - 2020)

Written and directed by Nicolas Pesce. Cast: Andrea Riseborough, Demian Bichir, John Cho, Jacki Weaver, Lin Shaye, Betty Gilpin, Frankie Faison, William Sadler, Tara Westwood, Dave Brown, John Hansen, Zoe Fish, Junko Bailey. (R, 94 mins)

Going back over the last decade and change in the grand tradition of the US remake of ONE MISSED CALL, THE DEVIL INSIDE, DEVIL'S DUE, PARANORMAL ACTIVITY: THE MARKED ONES, THE FOREST, and THE BYE BYE MAN, THE GRUDGE continues Hollywood's seemingly annual ritual of kicking off the new year by bilking genre fans out of some multiplex gift cards with a horror movie that's forgettable at best and a contemptible piece of shit at worst. A reboot of the US franchise that was itself based on a Japanese franchise (got that?), THE GRUDGE 2020's biggest problem is its utter pointlessness. It's a step up to the major studio big leagues for writer/director Nicolas Pesce, who established some indie horror cred with 2016's THE EYES OF MY MOTHER and 2019's PIERCING. I'm not saying Pesce is an auteur, and I haven't seen PIERCING, but THE EYES OF MY MOTHER, while flawed, had some genuinely unsettling elements that showed Pesce was a promising new talent in the horror genre. But the kind of style and potential that got him the GRUDGE job in the first place is rendered moot when it's all just loud and predictable jolts and a tired story that could've been directed by anyone. GRUDGE 2020 is the kind of bland, by-the-numbers, one-note jump-scare machine that doesn't really even require a talented filmmaker as much as it needs a competent manager, someone handed a checklist and able to work through it without rocking the boat and making sure that all the same shit you've seen in dozens of other horror movies over the last several years is dutifully repeated--and instantly forgotten--yet again.

Counting Sam Raimi among its dozen or so producers, GRUDGE 2020 employs the non-linear structure used by director Takashi Shimizu in the 2004 GRUDGE and its Japanese antecedents in the original JU-ON series which, along with the likes of Hideo Nakata's RINGU films and Takashi Miike's original ONE MISSED CALL, helped establish the iconic "J-Horror" movement of the early 2000s. Set from 2004 to 2006, GRUDGE 2020 is both a reboot and an offshoot, opening in 2004 with American nurse Fiona Landers (Tara Westwood) leaving the Japanese house seen in the previous GRUDGEs, where someone was once killed in a fit of uncontrolled rage and their spirit cannot rest, forever haunting those who move into the cursed residence. But the Grudge (Junko Bailey in a brief appearance as the franchise's crawling, croaking spectre, thus sparing Japanese actress and JU-ON and GRUDGE vet Takako Fuji the indignity of embarking on the "Will Play Kayako for Food" phase of her career) also attaches itself to Fiona, following her to her home in the fictional Pennsylvania suburb of Cross River, where she's ultimately driven to murder her husband Sam (Dave Brown) and young daughter Melinda (Zoe Fish). Cut to 2006, as recently-widowed Detective Muldoon (MANDY's Andrea Riseborough, looking ready to crush her audition for the lead in THE CARRIE SNODGRESS STORY) has just transferred to quiet Cross River with her young son Burke (John Hanson), hoping for a change of scenery after losing her husband to cancer three months earlier. She's paired with weary, chain-smoking Detective Goodman (Demian Bichir) and they immediately catch a case where the charred remains of a woman are found in a car in an isolated stretch of woods on the outskirts of town. The dead woman is Lorna Moody (Jacki Weaver), an assisted suicide counselor who had been staying at 44 Rayburn Dr., the home of the Mathesons--William (Frankie Faison) and Faith (Lin Shaye, whose presence in these post-Blumhouse-era horror movies appears to be required by law)--to evaluate the terminally ill Faith's decision to end her life. Goodman wants nothing more to do with the case after hearing the address, so Muldoon goes there alone and finds a delirious Faith with her fingers hacked off and the rotting corpse of William sitting in the living room chair.

Then it cuts back to 2005, when married realtors Peter (John Cho) and Nina Spencer (Betty Gilpin) have the Landers house--at 44 Rayburn Dr--on the market, soon to be purchased by the Mathesons. In all the instances--Peter spending time at the house, Muldoon looking into the death of Lorna Moody, and Goodman's old partner Wilson (William Sadler) investigating the Landers killings in 2004 and ending up in a mental institution after blowing his face off in a failed suicide attempt (and allowing Sadler to wear what appears to be leftover remnants of Gary Oldman's Mason Verger prosthetics from HANNIBAL)--the "grudge" attaches itself to anyone who walks in the house, resulting in recurring instances of flickering lights, garbled phone calls, and out-of-nowhere appearances by little Melinda, who essentially serves as the new creepy, croaking, grudge ghost. Pesce rewrote an earlier draft penned by Jeff Buhler, who scripted last year's underrated THE PRODIGY but is also responsible for writing the recent dismal remakes of PET SEMATARY and JACOB'S LADDER. I'm willing to bet that Buhler is a big fan of Mario Bava's SHOCK, aka BEYOND THE DOOR 2, whose famous hallway jump scare was recreated in THE PRODIGY by director Nicholas McCarthy and is trotted out again here, to much lesser effect thanks to Pesce's bungled staging of it.

It's not that THE GRUDGE 2020 is an overtly terrible movie, though it does start to get pretty dumb near the end when Muldoon inexplicably takes her son--who Pesce leaves offscreen for so long at one point that you might start wondering if he's a Shyamalanian figment of her imagination--with her to 44 Rayburn Dr in the middle of the night and tells him "I want you to be safe!" and to...wait in the car, as if he's really going to listen to her (also, why is everyone driving beater cars from the late '70s and early '80s in a film that's explicitly set from 2004-2006? I don't know what small-town detectives make, but they should be able to get something newer than a primer-colored 1981 Caprice Classic). It's not an offensively bad movie, it's just an unbelievably routine one that does nothing to justify its existence or, at the very least, explain why it's opening on 2400 screens instead of premiering at your nearest Redbox. It not only squanders an overqualified cast (Bichir and Weaver have three Oscar nominations between them), but it takes the time to set up new metaphorical implications for the Grudge and doesn't even bother to explore them. With Muldoon's late husband and the cancer-stricken Faith, along with mention that Goodman's mother recently succumbed to cancer and pregnant Nina learning that her unborn child has the brain disorder ALD, THE GRUDGE 2020 seems poised to make some statement about the effect that terminal illnesses and grief have on caregivers and survivors, but it never does anything to work those ideas into the Grudge mythos, instead falling back on more ominous burps and croaks and jump scares you'll see coming a mile away. So why even bring them up and use them to develop the characters if nothing's going to be done with them? Maybe there was something more here and the studio whittled it down. Who knows? There is one telling moment that could almost be interpreted as a cry for help from Pesce. Faison's William gives a long speech about how all we really have is hope and love and we gotta hold on and be there for each other every day as the sentimental music cue swells and Pesce just abruptly cuts it off and goes to a shot of Riseborough in another location, and it's accompanied by the faint sound of a needle dragging across vinyl. It's a jarring cut that doesn't really have any artistic purpose unless you consider it an in-film auto-critique from Pesce, possibly incredulous that things have gotten so far off course that veteran character actor Frankie Faison is being forced to embody the archaic "Magical Negro" trope in the first goddamn movie of 2020.

In Theaters: CRAWL (2019)

CRAWL 
(US - 2019)

Directed by Alexandre Aja. Written by Michael Rasmussen and Shawn Rasmussen. Cast: Kaya Scodelario, Barry Pepper, Morfydd Clark, Ross Anderson, Anson Boon, Ami Metcalf, Jose Palma, George Somner. (R, 87 mins)

Or, GATORS IN A CRAWLSPACE, but that might be a little too SNAKES ON A PLANE-y. Mostly stupidly enjoyable if you shut your brain off completely, CRAWL is a disaster movie/nature run amok mash-up from director Alexandre Aja, one of the key figures in France's "extreme horror" movement from a decade and a half ago. After HIGH TENSION hit the US in 2005, Aja was courted by Hollywood and made the better-than-expected remake of THE HILLS HAVE EYES, but beyond that, his output has ranged from "Meh" with MIRRORS and HORNS to "Are you for real with this shit?" with his inexplicably fanboy-approved remake of PIRANHA, the horror equivalent of a Friedberg/Seltzer spoof movie. After somewhat of a departure with 2016's little-seen THE 9TH LIFE OF LOUIS DRAX, Aja returns to horror with the Sam Raimi-produced CRAWL, working from a script by Michael and Shawn Rasmussen, the sibling team that penned 2011's THE WARD, John Carpenter's last film to date and among his least essential.

College student Haley Keller (Kaya Scodelario of the MAZE RUNNER franchise) is on the University of Florida swim team (yes, the Florida Gators). She gets a frantic phone call from her Boston-based older sister Beth (Morfydd Clark), who can't get a hold of their father Dave (Barry Pepper), who's a couple hours south of Gainesville with a Category 5 hurricane bearing down on the state. Estranged from Dave after her parents' recent divorce, Haley makes the drive through treacherous storm and ignores a road block in an area where people are being forced to evacuate. She ends up at the family home but Dave is nowhere to be found until his barking mutt Sugar alerts Haley to his whereabouts: a quickly-flooding crawlspace under the house where he's bloodied and unconscious with a snapped leg. He comes to, tells her he was down there trying to cover the vents before the storm hit but had a run-in with an unexpected guest: a large alligator that's decided to call the crawlspace home and soon makes its presence known to Haley. She and Dave are able to hide behind a de facto fort of pipes that have been arranged in a way to maximize plot convenience, but before long, a second gator appears. And there's some hatched eggs, as it seems the Keller home, escrowed in the recent divorce, has an unexpected family of squatters brought in by the hurricane. Then some of their relatives start showing up.

CRAWL is a situation begging for Robert Forster but, like Cecile de France in HIGH TENSION, Scodelario displays a good amount of grit and toughness. This is the kind of film where a father and daughter decide to work out their issues as they're under siege by ferocious alligators. It's the kind of movie where Dave says "Be quiet!" only they both continue their loud conversation as Haley wades through the water to retrieve her phone. It's the kind of movie where Haley again tries to silently wade through the rising flood water but her foot hits a submerged cage, prompting an alligator reaction shot. It's the kind of post-QUIET PLACE horror movie that thinks alligators are blind and if you stand perfectly still, they won't know you're there. It's the kind of movie where Dave's leg is snapped and Haley's leg and arm have been chomped on, but they somehow manage to continue wading and swimming, walking it off like Werner Herzog being grazed by an insignificant bullet. CRAWL also amuses in that it's one of these movies shot in Eastern Europe--Belgrade, in this case--and Dave's house is in a cul-de-sac with a strangely-placed gas station right in the center of it, clearly the kind of "average Florida neighborhood" that could only exist in the imagination of an outsourced Serbian production design team. But there's really no use being snarky and nit-picky--CRAWL is what it is. The CGI gators look better then expected, there's a couple of good jump scares, and Scodelario (also terrific in the recent EXTREMELY WICKED, SHOCKINGLY EVIL AND VILE) is a solid heroine you can get behind. Still...this really feels like a Netflix Original that's accidentally been released in theaters.

In Theaters: DON'T BREATHE (2016)

DON'T BREATHE
(US/Hungary - 2016)

Directed by Fede Alvarez. Written by Fede Alvarez and Rodo Sayagues. Cast: Stephen Lang, Jane Levy, Dylan Minnette, Daniel Zovatto, Emma Bercovici, Franciska Torocsik, Christian Zagia, Katia Bokor, Sergej Onopko. (R, 88 mins)

Director Fede Alvarez made his mark on the horror scene with his surprisingly well-received and better-than-expected 2013 remake of EVIL DEAD. Once again teaming with co-writer Rodo Sayagues and producer/original EVIL DEAD mastermind Sam Raimi, Alvarez is back with the home invasion-thriller-with-a-twist DON'T BREATHE. In an almost apocalyptic Detroit (some exteriors were done in the Motor City, but the bulk of the film was shot in Hungary), Rocky (Jane Levy, outstanding in EVIL DEAD '13) is fed up with her abusive, white trash mom (Katia Bokor) and wants nothing more than to take her little sister (Emma Bercovici) and run off to California. Rocky's been stashing money away by breaking into houses with her dirtbag boyfriend Money (Daniel Zovatto, from IT FOLLOWS) and their nice-guy friend Alex (Dylan Minnette). Alex's dad manages a home security company, so that gives them easy (a little too easy--why wouldn't his dad have all the keys and alarm codes to his clients' homes at the office instead of at his own home?). Money gets word of an inner-city neighborhood completely abandoned except for one house. In that house is a recluse who's supposedly sitting on six figures he got in a settlement from a rich family whose teenage daughter accidentally ran over his own daughter. Casing the house and observing the owner (Stephen Lang) outside, the trio of nitwits are surprised to see that he's blind, the result of a bomb blast during his military days in Iraq. They manage to get in the house in the dead of night but they're no match for the fighting and weaponry skills of The Blind Man, who can take easily take them on despite his lack of sight. He starts by killing Money and isn't aware of Rocky and Alex until his enhanced sense of smell leads him to their shoes, which they took off and left in the kitchen. Fleeing the Blind Man and his vicious watchdog, Rocky and Alex end up in the basement, where they stumble on an entirely unexpected house of horrors.

The premise of a home invasion where the invaders become the hunted isn't exactly new, as Wes Craven's THE PEOPLE UNDER THE STAIRS did it 25 years ago. But Alvarez does a great job in the early going--despite beating you over the head with some bush-league foreshadowing--establishing some serious tension in every whisper, sign, and creaking floorboard potentially giving the trio away. Alvarez and Sayagues also take a big risk in not making the trio particularly likable, even if Rocky's doing what she's doing for herself and her sister, and friend-zoned Alex is doing it because he's carrying a torch for Rocky. Killing Money off first is gratifying to the audience since he's by far the most loathsome of the three and at that point, you're sort-of expected to be on the side of The Blind Man. Other than the business involving Alex's access to the keys and alarm codes, the first half of DON'T BREATHE will have you wound pretty tight and holding your breath in suspenseful anticipation of what happens next. But what happens next is the story moves to the basement, where there's a moderately clever scene shot with a low-lit camera after the Blind Man shuts off the power and Rocky and Alex are forced to wander around in total darkness, as blind as their pursuer but without his homefield advantage.

DON'T BREATHE's utter collapse begins with the reveal of what's in the basement and why it's there. And also, how it's there, because that doesn't seem too plausible, either. There's a really demented element that's brought to the forefront involving this discovery in the basement, and it all seems to be a long, drawn-out buildup to a gross-out gag that seems more in line with something that the Farrelly Brothers would've concocted in the late '90s. From then on, DON'T BREATHE becomes an endless series of plot holes and contrivances, with one major thread left dangling at the end that, upon any scrutiny whatsoever, makes the Detroit police look completely incompetent. Yes, it may seem silly and nit-picky to gripe about implausible story mechanics in some movies (I haven't even mentioned the dog chasing Rocky through the heating ducts), but it smacks of Alvarez and Sayagues recognizing that they've backed themselves into a corner, and instead of even bothering with a ridiculous deus ex machina, they choose to simply not address it at all. And sure, maybe some moviegoers won't even think about it, but it seems so glaring that it seems impossible to not think of it. Lang and Levy do some very good work here, with Levy in particular staking her claim as one of the great Final Girls of today's horror, but other than an extremely impressive sequence involving Rocky barricading herself in Money's car to avoid The Blind Man's dog that's a small masterpiece of blocking and editing, DON'T BREATHE's second half just completely flies off the rails into total stupidity when it had a really good thing going.

In Theaters: EVIL DEAD (2013)

EVIL DEAD
(US - 2013)

Directed by Fede Alvarez.  Written by Fede Alvarez and Rodo Sayagues.  Cast: Jane Levy, Shiloh Fernandez, Lou Taylor Pucci, Jessica Lucas, Elizabeth Blackmore.  (R, 92 mins)

Producers Sam Raimi, Rob Tapert, and Bruce Campbell gave their seal of approval to this remake celebrating the 30th anniversary of their beloved cult horror classic THE EVIL DEAD (shown in its native Detroit and at film fests in 1981-82, but not released nationally until 1983).  Uruguayan director/co-writer Fede Alvarez, making his feature debut, omits most of the humor from Raimi's original film, instead going for a relentless, full-throttle assault of blood, guts, gore, vomit, dismemberment, demonic possession, and all-out madness.  It has a nice eerie vibe, and though it's rarely overtly scary (other than those of the quick, cheap, jump-scare variety), it's an undeniably enthusiastic '80s throwback horror outing with minimal CGI and countless gallons of wet, chunky, sloppy splatter, so if you're sick of cartoonish, digital gore and want to kick it old school, EVIL DEAD will satisfy on that point alone.

While the set-up remains the same--five people in a cabin in the woods--Alvarez and co-writer Rodo Sayagues (with uncredited contributions by JUNO's Diablo Cody, of all people) change the circumstances.  Mia (SUBURGATORY's Jane Levy, in a performance that should make her a fixture at horror cons for the next few decades) is a heroin addict brought to the cabin by friends Eric (Lou Taylor Pucci) and Olivia (Jessica Lucas), along with Mia's estranged brother David (Shiloh Fernandez) and his girlfriend Natalie (Elizabeth Blackmore), for a cold-turkey intervention to get her to kick her addiction for good.  The cabin is a wreck, thanks to a prologue that showed some local hilljacks burning a possessed young woman in the cellar, but they make do and settle in for a long weekend of Mia's inevitably unpleasant withdrawal and ironing out some deep-rooted family issues with David, who went MIA and left Mia to deal with their dying mother on her own.  Eric finds a bunch of dead, hanging cats and some blood in the basement, along with a flesh-bound book of incantations that summons the spectre of the executed girl, who promptly possesses Mia in an ambitious but ultimately facile metaphor for her heroin addiction.  With Mia possessed and transformed into a haggard, vulgar, taunting, vomiting demon, and the only road back to civilization flooded by high water, everyone is trapped in the cabin for the duration as they fall victim to demonic possession one by one.

Alvarez isn't the least bit subtle with the foreshadowing--the moment you see a roast being sliced with an electric carving knife, you know that'll be slicing through human flesh at some point--and no, there wasn't really a need for an EVIL DEAD remake, but as far as remakes go, it's quite good.  It's just nice to see something that bucks the trend and, for the most part, appears to be aimed toward adults and longtime fans who cut their teeth on some classic shit when they were young.  If you grew up on '80s horror or have a significant degree of affection for it, you'll like what Alvarez does here.  These characters are all in the mid-to-late 20s, well into adulthood, there's no snarky or ironic humor (which makes one wonder exactly what Cody's script contributions were; they tried to keep her involvement on the QT, but it's pretty much an open secret by now; rest assured, there's no JUNO or JENNIFER'S BODY quipping going on here), and Alvarez is keenly aware that the old ways are the best, throwing buckets upon buckets of blood and other bodily fluids all over the screen.

Knowing his limitations and that he can't top a classic and shouldn't embarrass himself and torpedo his career trying, Alvarez makes his EVIL DEAD its own film, but pays respectful tribute and a certain degree of allegiance to Raimi's film in the process. Some plot elements remain intact, and he replicates the famed fast-tracking shots through the woods.  The major difference, other than the heroin addiction angle, is the significant toning down and near complete-removal of the comedic elements, which were there in Raimi's film but weren't really prevalent until 1987's EVIL DEAD II and 1993's ARMY OF DARKNESS.  Adding to the effectiveness is the committed work of the cast, particularly Levy and Pucci, who gets some of the more crowd-pleasing moments and is the closest thing the film has to comic relief, but even his Eric is a little too shell-shocked to commit to being a smartass.  Is EVIL DEAD 2013 a new genre classic?  No, but it accomplishes what it sets out to do with its grisly excess and stretching the R-rating to its breaking point, and, provided it's in your wheelhouse, it's the probably the most enjoyably fun horror film to see with a big crowd since last year's Raimi-inspired deconstructionist gem THE CABIN IN THE WOODS.

 

 

 

 



In Theaters: THE POSSESSION (2012)

THE POSSESSION
(US - 2012)

Directed by Ole Bornedal.  Written by Juliet Snowden & Stiles White.  Cast: Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Kyra Sedgwick, Matisyahu, Grant Show, Natasha Calis, Madison Davenport, Jay Brazeau. (PG-13, 92 mins)

It's been nearly 40 years since the release of THE EXORCIST, and the knockoffs show no signs of slowing down.  Produced by Sam Raimi, THE POSSESSION is better than most, with an experienced figure behind the camera in veteran Danish horror/suspense director Ole Bornedal (1994's NIGHTWATCH and its 1998 US remake), but except for one nicely-done scare and some impressive production design, there's little here we haven't seen before.  Written by Juliet Snowden & Stiles White (KNOWING), THE POSSESSION utilizes most of the standard-issue possession motifs (or as much as its PG-13 rating will allow) fused with more J-Horror imagery (are we done with this yet?), and relies too much on loud crashes and piercing music cues in place of actual tension and scares.  However, Bornedal does a nice job establishing an unexpected, almost European look to the film in the early going (featuring the most Kubrickian-looking basketball practice gym you'll ever see), with some impressive camera movements and lighting and lots of interesting technical aspects that, for a while, set THE POSSESSION apart from the usual DTV-level time-killer that it eventually becomes.

Jeffrey Dean Morgan dares to open the Dybbuk box.

In this "true story" (inspired by a 2003 eBay listing) set in upstate New York, college basketball coach Clyde Brenek (a strong performance by the underrated Jeffrey Dean Morgan) is recently divorced from ex-wife Stephanie (Kyra Sedgwick) and gets his daughters--Hannah (Madison Davenport) and Emily (Natasha Calis)--on the weekends.  The girls, particularly Emily, are having some difficulty with the disruption in their lives, and things get really complicated when Clyde and the girls stop at a yard sale and Emily is drawn to a mysterious, sealed wooden box with strange lettering carved into it.  Emily soon becomes slavishly devoted to and fiercely protective of the box, and often erupts in violence if anyone comes near it.  After Emily has a shrieking fit where she repeatedly smacks herself in the face, Clyde is accused of abusing her and Stephanie gets a restraining order.  When Stephanie and her new boyfriend Brett (Grant Show) start observing Emily's continued strange behavior, Clyde does some research and finds out the lettering on the box is Hebrew, and seeks the guidance of Tzadok (Hasidic reggae beatboxer Matisyahu), who turns out to be the demonic possession genre's hippest exorcist.  Tzadok says the box is a Dybbuk Box, used to house an ancient Jewish demon called the "dybbuk."  Tzadok defies the wishes of his elderly rabbi father and agrees to perform an exorcism on Emily.

Natasha Calis as the possessed Emily

The "dybbuk" is an interesting concept, and it's handled better here than in the 2009 film THE UNBORN, which featured Gary Oldman as a rabbi who battles a dybbuk by blowing into a shofar  The casting of Matisyahu as the exorcist is a distraction that's hard to get over, but he has a loose and engaging presence that makes one wish he had more screen time.  THE POSSESSION's problems start when the script begins requiring otherwise intelligent characters to start behaving stupidly.  Clyde should be a little more alarmed when Emily stabs him with a fork at breakfast for no reason.   Why is it that parents of possessed children in movies are always way too slow on the uptake when it comes to these matters?  Haven't any of these people seen THE EXORCIST? 

Madison Davenport and Kyra Sedgwick

There's also stupid contrivances that are there only to advance the plot in the easiest way possible.  In one scene, Emily is on the phone with Clyde and asking him if the box is OK and telling him to not to go near it (it's at his house).  In the next scene, Emily has the box with her at school and attacks a classmate who tries to steal it from her. Emily is sent home and the box is left at school. That night, the dybbuk attacks and kills Emily's teacher (this film's obligatory Burke Dennings stand-in), who's there, alone, late at night, grading papers next to a tiny lamp at her desk.  Are the screenwriters even trying?  Does this woman not have a home?  With better lighting?  Also, what happens to Brett?  He's last seen being attacked by a possessed Emily as all of his teeth start falling out, then getting into his car and driving it in reverse as Emily has a seizure on the front lawn and Hannah calls 9-1-1, and they're off to the hospital. Where does Brett go?  Is he dead?  Alive and still driving around in reverse, all bloody and toothless?  I'm glad Grant Show is getting paid post-MELROSE PLACE, but his character is so irrelevant that even the filmmakers forget about him.

Exorcist Tzadok (Matisyahu) tries to save Emily

When the script isn't dumbing things down, Bornedal and his regular cinematographer Dan Laustsen have a great-looking film on their hands.  And I liked the little shout-outs to past demonic possession films, like Emily's right eye moving on its own while the other stares straight ahead (from the 1975 Italian EXORCIST ripoff BEYOND THE DOOR) and a nicely-CGI'd swarm of moths surrounding a still Emily that looked a lot like the climactic bird attack in the 1979 OMEN/CLOSE ENCOUNTERS-inspired cult classic THE VISITOR).  There is one very good, almost great jolt when Emily is getting an MRI and something pops up unexpectedly in the resulting scan.  Those bits, Bornedal's direction, and the fine performances by both Morgan and Calis nudge THE POSSESSION a bit beyond the typical genre offering, but after a while, it's done in by a script that just feels illogical and half-baked.

INTRUDER (1989): Director's Cut

INTRUDER
(US - 1989)  Written and directed by Scott Spiegel.  Cast: Elizabeth Cox, Renee Estevez, Danny Hicks, David Byrnes, Sam Raimi, Eugene Glazer, Billy Marti, Burr Steers, Craig Stark, Ted Raimi, Alvy Moore, Tom Lester, Emil Sitka, Bruce Campbell.  88 mins.  Unrated.

Just released on Blu-ray by Synapse Films, Scott Spiegel's maniac-loose-in-a-grocery store cult film INTRUDER is presented in its uncut, 88-minute version.  The Paramount VHS, issued back in 1989 (also the version currently streaming on Netflix), ran 83 minutes and had almost all of the gore footage cut, in addition to artwork that totally gave away the killer's identity.  Spiegel, his cult movie bona fides having been established two years earlier when he co-wrote EVIL DEAD II with pal Sam Raimi, was given a shot at writing and directing his own feature with INTRUDER, and while it's not a front-to-back success, there's a lot to appreciate in it, especially now that all the excised footage has been reinstated.  Spiegel accomplishes quite a bit with a budget of $130,000, and the Blu-ray looks fantastic.


The plot is rather simple:  Walnut Lake Market cashier Jennifer (Elizabeth Cox) is hassled near closing time by her psycho ex Craig (David Byrnes), who just got out of prison.  Some co-workers come to her aid and Craig is thrown out of the store, and as they continue working their overnight shift of markdowns and restocking, they're locked inside and slaughtered one by one, and the natural assumption is that it's Craig.


The grocery store setting is pretty effective overall, and Spiegel does a great job with darkness, shadows, reflections, and so on.  I really liked the effect of blood dripping on the light bulb of an overturned lamp giving the room a blood red glow.  Or the way the killer finds out where Jennifer is hiding.  Spiegel is at his best in these stylish and relatively subtle scenes, but really stumbles when he relies far too much on Raimi-esque visual trickery.  He uses it less as the film progresses, which helps a lot, but early on until maybe 2/3 of the way through, there's just too many wacky POV shots from inside shopping carts, inside telephones, from the floor aiming up as a broom passes over, or through wine bottles.  It's amusing once or twice, but by the 25th time, it wears out its welcome.  Spiegel shows a lot of promise here when he's not trying to be Sam Raimi, and who knows?  Maybe Raimi used a lot of Spiegel's ideas.  At any rate, Spiegel has remained a known and loved figure in cult horror circles, primarily for his EVIL DEAD II work, but his directing career never took off.  He's only directed sporadically since INTRUDER, most recently the dismal HOSTEL PART III.


Raimi, as well as his brother Ted, co-star in the film, and Bruce Campbell turns up at the very end as a cop. There's also GREEN ACRES co-stars Alvy Moore and Tom Lester as a pair of dumb cops, and legendary Three Stooges foil Emil Sitka as a grumpy customer who's in the film long enough to tell a couple "Hold hands, you lovebirds!"  None of the main actors are very good, and heroine Cox is downright terrible.  Perhaps early victim Renee Estevez (Martin Sheen's daughter) should've been given the lead.


As mentioned, Synapse's presentation of INTRUDER is superb.  There's a commentary with Spiegel and producer Lawrence Bender, who went on to produce all of Quentin Tarantino's films (and an early INTRUDER close-up of a box of Fruit Brute makes me wonder how much Bender brought to the table on PULP FICTION, not to mention INTRUDER cast member Burr Steers went on to play Flock of Seagulls in PULP FICTION before abandoning acting to direct bad Zac Efron movies like 17 AGAIN and CHARLIE ST. CLOUD).  There's several featurettes, interviews, workprint footage, cast audition footage, and a brief interview with filmmaker and INTRUDER superfan Vincent Pereira, who tells a great story about writing an angry letter to Fangoria about the cut VHS release only to get a package sometime later with Spiegel's return address, containing a VHS tape of the uncensored INTRUDER.


Is INTRUDER a lost classic?  No, not really.  But it's an enjoyable, blood-soaked slasher flick with moments of truly inspired, creative filmmaking.  I just wish Spiegel had spent more time crafting a unique style that we see fleeting glimpses of here instead of mimicking Raimi's EVIL DEAD/EVIL DEAD II moves.