THE CHANGELING – George C Scott is a composer who's struggling with the loss of his wife and kid. When he moves into a new place – OK, 'place' being mansion which looks radically open to haunting – things start to get a bit odd. There's this banging in the pipes, and possibly the the first cinematic manifestation of a “ball bouncing down stairs signposts ghost of child” moment. 'The Changeling' is interesting in that it flips the standard 'haunting' riff over into supernatural murder mystery territory. Before this transition comes a steady build up of atmosphere and fraught conversations with letting agents. Pretty good, but I wanted more. A quite disturbing drowning scene seemed out of place enough to evoke the feeling of a different kind of movie.
THE CONJURING – I suppose this is part of that post-'Insidious' wave of multiplex jump-scare schtick. I saw it at the cinema when it first came out a couple of years ago – I don't know what I was expecting. It's alright. Watching it on Amazon Prime or whatever the other day left me feeling a bit weary, though – although it's nicely put together in a visual sense, its progression lies squarely within the 'boo!' moment. Scene upon scene lays on the same tactic and risks blunting some nice imagery – hands emerging from the dark, clapping. That doll sold it to some, including me – but it's not in it much.
THE BUTTERFLY ROOM – I was a bit nonplussed when I saw this last year, but I really quite liked it on second viewing. It's about an ageing Barbara Steele and the creepy relationship she strikes up with an adrift-seeming youngster. The latter is the daughter of a specialty hooker (amputee), and soon turns out to have an agenda of her own. Enjoyably twisted meditation on the mother-daughter angle let down formally by some tacky abstruseness (film running backwards when we venture into the past etc etc). Interesting to have a genre film tackle a realm where the only important relations are those between women, although it is directed by a guy. Full of old horror stars.
BURIAL OF THE RATS – 'Bram Stoker' (or his nineties American TV equivalent) and his dad are waylaid by a cult of rat worshipping rad feminists in this bedraggled bit of rubbish. I say 'feminists', but they seem quite keen in hanging out in rat skin bikinis and scenes of mild softcore, so I don't think Laura Mulvey will be holding her breath. What IS important is that you get to see a dignity defying Adrienne Barbeau (“I'm the Piper's twisted sister”!) entice a bevy of rats into a frenzy with her frequent displays of flute playing. That, along with the cheap atmosphere of plastic pageantry, really made it for me. Enjoyable toss, made me feel slightly nostalgic for really bad pre-Horror Channel TV shit and therefore quite old and haggard.
HORNS – D Radcliffe finds that he has a new pair of horns and an ability to make others speak of their darkest desires in this horror-fantasy from Alexandre Aja. In the mix is a relationship drama which morphs into a murder mystery. 'Horns' got some lukewarm reviews, most of which levelled criticisms of tonal incoherence and excessive length. It IS a bit of a mess, and stumbles like an amiable drunk from black comedy to moody dramatics to fx-driven horror, along the way scrambling some moving and / or intense bits with cheesiness and loose ends (and a really lame 'bad trip' scene). I did however find it very likeable and absorbing, and was never less than entertained. A step closer to the mainstream for Aja, who seems to be putting those seventies horror remakes behind him.
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