The House at the End of the Street (originally published on September 25, 2012)
Jennifer Lawrence is probably the most popular star of the year. This is
thanks in no small part to the enormous success of her biggest film, The Hunger Games, earlier this year. Prior to landing such a blockbuster role, she had appeared in the critically-aclaimed Winter's Bone, which got her an Oscar nod, and she had a fairly small part in the dissapointing X-Men: First Class. Then there was this thing called House at the End of the Street,
an impossibly bland "thriller" that takes the undeniable talent of Miss
Lawrence and does absolutely nothing with it.
The story begins with the
fairly typical mother and daughter moving into a new house right
outside a creepy forest across from which sits a house where a little
girl once killed her parents. Yes, characters go out in the woods for
literally no good reason (And nothing happens anyway.), and, yes, they
open doors when they hear a strange noise and go into dark places they
don't belong. This is that kind of movie.
The first time I saw Jennifer Lawrence was in Winter's Bone and I remember being so surprised by how powerful the performance was (She was seventeen at the time.) and that this was someone to keep an eye out for. After that, she apparently got the knack of landing spots in big-budget movies that get her a lot of attention, but don't allow her to grow at all. She did a very good job in The Hunger Games, but the character was so flat that it took away any chance of making a real impression. Even in this movie, she performs admirably, but what a waste.
Directed by Mark Tonderai, House at the End of the Street fails where even PG-13 rated horror movies have often succeeded: it is not scary in the slightest. I'm usually pretty easy on suspense movies, because all they are really required to do is be frightening to the best of their ability. That's it, yet this movie slumps around in some sort of scare-deprived coma. All the elements that could have made for some frightening moments are there, but instead of using them for even the most silly jumps, the movie would rather prolong its increasingly boring story. At only ninety minutes, it drags and stumbles its feet, not knowing where to go or what to do. Almost anybody could have replaced Tonderai and made a more exciting picture. This is not rocket science.
Despite being a complete bust as any kind of entertainment, the movie will do well at the box office. Originally set to be released in April, it was saved for the fall season to bring in more Halloween-ready horror fans and cash in on the slight connection to The Hunger Games. Nobody will like it, because the trailers before the movie were more alarming than it was, and yet it will play for weeks. Bernie, one of the better movies this year, played for seven days at my theater before closing.
3/10 [Geez. Was I bitter or what?]
Mama (originally published on January 31, 2013)
The Orphanage, Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark and now Mama are all horror movies produced by Guillermo
del Toro which rely on atmosphere and general creepiness for scares, rather
than excessive violence and gore. It’s kind of weird that del Toro has only
directed a couple horror movies himself, because it’s easy to think of these as
his own, rather than that of the fortunate new directors who are given a chance
with his guiding hand. Indeed, his unique creative vision is evident in all of
these films, though this most recent effort suffers the most from his hand not
being directly on the helm.
The movie begins with appropriate dreariness, showing us a
man who kills his wife and takes his two girls to a remote cabin with the
intention of also killing them and himself. A mysterious figure does away with
him before he is able to follow through, and the movie really begins some time
later as the girls are found and taken in by their uncle and his new
girlfriend. They are, of course, emotionally scarred, and still carry on
conversations with an invisible figure they call ‘Mama.’ This figure becomes
increasingly less visible, which allows for some of the film’s most jarring
moments and also, ultimately, its failure.
Mama is a movie
whose premise alone and the idea of harm befalling these innocent children
makes it a creepy experience. I appreciated its willingness to pay attention to
its story instead of simply diving headfirst into extended sequences of creaks
and jolts. It’s got plenty of those, too, though, and there are several moments
that really worked: surreal nightmares right out of Italian horror, random eeriness
like the mountain of cherry pits, the alarming tug-of-war scene. These inspired
moments get lost among more typical ones, like the tiresome use of “ghost
appearing behind character who doesn’t see it, but we do and everyone screams”
shock bits.
The movie makes its most fatal error by completely revealing
the computer-animated apparition in full detail, a mistake from which it never
recovers. The implausibly bittersweet climax doesn’t help either, driving for more
emotion than the film is capable of. Jessica Chastain impresses in the lead,
proving that she is capable of pretty much anything, but other characters are
introduced and forgotten willy-nilly. The writers apparently thought that
innocent bystanders were a requirement of horror, when really the movie would
have been all the better without them.
What good things Mama does have, however, are easily relished. It is a mostly fun
movie despite its flaws and exhibits a lot of good common sense in its direction
from Andres Muschietti, who is extending a short film of his, even though he tries a little too hard to emulate a
style he hasn’t quite gotten down yet. I hope other, better thrillers are on
the way that learn to use this style to its full benefit. In the meantime, this
will do.
6/10
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