See No Evil

In and of itself See No Evil isn't a movie I would have gone out of my way to see. But, I didn't really want to see the Twisted Twins-directed See No Evil 2 until I had seen the original. I debated for some time if I was going to bother reviewing this one, but decided shortly before watching it, “meh, why not?” And, I have to admit, I was surprised. The movie isn't some masterpiece, but it's decent enough, and delivers pretty much what slasher fans want.

I understand that the filmmakers wanted to make the characters intentionally annoying so we'd root for them to die. That didn't really come across to me. The main characters are mostly petty criminals, so I expect them to be rude, ill-mannered, and aggressive. But, most of them show more concern for each others' well-being than many slasher-film “teenagers.”

WWE Studios tends to be in the business of making B-movies for it's performers, with the exception of Oculus, which is one of the greatest horror movies in recent years (...and features no wrestlers...anyone who can explain their involvement in that, shoot). So, I approach this film as a B-movie. It's hokey, the effects are cheesy, and the story is laughable, but the actors put on their game faces and do their jobs.

Four years before the events of the film officer Frank Williams (Steven Vidler) and his partner confronted a psychotic killer (Kane), who keeps the eyes of his victims as trophies. The killer is credited as “Jacob Goodnight,” although I'm not sure if he's ever called that. Jacob murdered Frank's partner, and cut off Frank's arm, but Frank shot him in the back of the head, scaring him off (meh, it's a B-movie). The bullet hole is now rotting and infested with maggots, causing flies to appear as a precursor to Jacob's kills.

In the present Frank works with petty criminals attempting to earn time off their sentence through work. A woman named Margaret (Cecily Polson) purchased an abandoned hotel, and wants to turn it into a homeless shelter. So, some young prisoners are brought in, promised a month of their sentences for three days of work. But Jacob has taken refuge in the hotel, and the bloodbath begins.

Now, the hotel looks like it would take a lot more than three days to clean, let alone repair, and fairly little actual cleaning seems to go on, but it's not as if we really care about the premise. Most of the time is spent talking, planning to escape, planning to rob the hotel, etc. The material is at least more interesting that watching them mop until it's time to die.

The movie makes extensive use of flashbacks, both to things we've already seen, and to past events. I get the impression this was an attempt at establishing a visual style that was memorable. It allows the film to use rapid cuts, and black-and-white imagery in many scenes. It's far from original, but it keeps the momentum of the film going.

As for the victims, there's a lot of them, and most of them aren't worth focusing on as individuals. They work together for the most part , but still die. The most significant is probably Kira (Samantha Noble), a prostitute spared by Jacob only because she has religious tattoos. He's implied to have some mixture of a fetish and a reverence for the crosses, so he keeps her in a cage rather than killing her. You could argue that it's somewhat disappointing that she achieves Final Girl status through no action of her own, but Noble gives a decent performance.

The other Final Girl is Christine (Christina Vidal), whose a badass through-and-through. She takes a gun off the dead body of Frank (yeah, he doesn't make it, the movie kind of cops out on a second confrontation), wields it effectively, spots Jacob's trip-wires, and fights Jacob more effectively than any other victim in the post-flashback portion of the movie.

They're joined in survival by Michael (Luke Pegler), Kira's former pimp. I have no idea why anyone thought he should live, especially as safe-cracker Tye (Michael Pagan) comes closest to surviving with him, and is a far more charismatic character. But, towards the end Michael is treated as heroic, and assists Christine in dispatching Jacob, so I guess he's supposed to be redeemed. He delivers the final line of the film, saying he came back to save Kira and Christine because “I didn't want to walk out of here alone,” as if he's supposed to be some kind of brooding badass.

We get a twist that Margaret is Jacob's mother, who tortured him to be an instrument of God's wrath on sinners, but this is fairly predictable. We get repeated flashbacks of an old woman, with her face obscured, torturing Jacob as a child, and Margaret is the only old woman we've seen. Still, it works. Margaret sees the tattoos as blasphemy rather than veneration, as orders Kira's death, leading Jacob to kill her and flip his mother.

I'm a little curious about how they're going to pull off a sequel. Jacob's death here includes a visual depiction of his heart being pierced by shards of glass, following a long fall, and since he doesn't wear a mask they can't pull a Halloween Resurrection on us. The final shot of the film is literally a dog pissing in his gaping eye socket.

This isn't a movie I'm going to go out of my way to recommend. It's nothing special. But, I can certainly think of worse horror movies, and it's a lot better than most vehicles for pro-wrestlers taking a stab at acting could reasonably be expected to be. It's a fun B-movie, that would be enjoyable with a room full of snarky friends and a pizza.