Urban Legend

I’ve heard the claim that the character of Denise Hemsfield from Scream Queens was in some way based on Reese Wilson (Loretta Devine) from this movie.  Rewatching Urban Legend, I was surprised to find it had some rather striking similarities in terms of plot and characters to the show.  That said, however, I don’t want to spoil Scream Queens for anyone, so I would just say watch it for yourselves.

This is a movie that does have the rotten luck of being defined primarily in terms of its relationship to other movies.  On its own, it’s not good enough to praise, and not bad enough to mock.  But, its status as the most overtly meta post-Scream movie kind of makes it relevant in discussion of horror history, so it can’t just be forgotten either.

The ending of the movie throws what was or wasn’t real largely into question, revealing the plot of the movie itself to be another Urban Legend based loosely on true events.  That said, however, I find it somewhat hard to believe that a retold urban legend would contain the level of detail in a 90-minute movie, so where “reality” ends and legend begins I’m not sure.

We open with the classic Killer in the Back Seat, setting up the plot with the murder of Michelle (Natasha Gregson Wagner), a murder which deeply shakes our protagonist Natalie (Alicia Witt).  Natalie finds herself in the midst of a series of murders based on urban legends, and is teamed up with school reporter Paul (Jared Leto), who suspects they’re related to a killing spree on campus from 1973, of which Professor Wexler (Robert Englund) was the only survivor.

I’ve heard people say that this movie is no longer relevant, as none of these Urban Legends are widely believed in the day of the internet.  I strongly disagree, however.  Even in the movie, it’s clear most of the characters know that these stories have never happened before, and even the killer acknowledges that she’s likely the first person to ever actually attempt a kidney heist.  If anything, Snopes has created a world where everyone has at least heard these stories, even if they know them only as debunked.  I imagine that there were large chunks of the audience in the 90s who were unfamiliar with at least some of the references stories.

Eventually, we learn that the previous massacre was all a red herring.  Rather, Natalie’s friend Brenda (Rebecca Gayheart) planned the entire thing as a revenge plot, with Wexler as the would-be patsy.  Natalie, as it turns out, had been in a car with Michelle when the latter attempted to scare some random stranger by reenacting the High Beams initiation myth, causing a crash and a death.  If the movie has one detail I suspect we were supposed to take as non-literal, it’s the suggestion that Natalie was the more innocent of the two, as the killer saved her for last, and she was apparently given the same sentence of probation as Michelle.

Rewatching this movie now, I think it’s imperfect, but deserves a watch.  This is a movie that has a sense of humor about itself, and I suspect everyone involved knew they were making a cut-rate Scream, and were okay with that fact.  The degree of character development is certainly less than Scream, but they weren’t really going for a deep character study.  You mostly get what you expect.

…oh, and Danielle Harris is in this…this is a good thing…because Danielle Harris is awesome.

Split

And so, Shyamalan returns to form.  For anyone who hasn’t yet found out yet, Split is the sequel to Unbreakable.  While I was initially a little skeptical of the movie due to the portrayal of mental illness, this aspect really fixed the problem for me.  Kevin (James McAvoy) isn’t a mental patient, he’s a super villain.

The premise of this movie, that a man with multiple personalities has been taken over by three malevolent personalities intent on creating a super-human amalgam, sounds utterly silly on paper.  It works largely because McAvoy is a brilliant performer, who can signal with his body language exactly who he’s supposed to be at any given moment.

We largely see the story of Kevin from the outside looking in, as we follow two subplots.  Dr. Karen Fletcher (Betty Buckley), Kevin’s psychiatrist, who begins to realize that his malevolent personalities have taken over, and Casey Cooke (Anna Taylor-Joy), a victim kidnapped by “Dennis” as a sacrifice for “The Beast.”  While Casey is one of three victims (the other two being played by Haley Lu Richardson and Jessica Sula), the others largely exist as foils to her.  Over the course of the film we realize that this is not her first time in the role of a victim, and she alone realizes that no empowerment mantra can fix the situation easily.

The leader of the three personalities is Patricia.  While she’s both female and terrifying, I feel the movie largely avoids transphobia.  She induces fear mainly from the disconnect between her calm demeanor, and her brutal plans to literally feed the girls to The Beast.

Her recruit, Dennis, really could have been split into two characters.  One who was a sympathetic protector of Kevin, the first alternate personality, and another who was a sexual predator.  These traits make it frequently unclear whether or not we’re supposed to sympathize with Dennis as misguided, or view him as irredeemably evil.

The final “evil” personality is Hedwig, a childlike being who has the power to take “the light” from any of the personalities, and give it to any other.  Hedwig is a very difficult character to nail down.  His nature creates the impression that he was manipulated by Patricia, but there are times in which he takes actions that seem to serve no purpose other than personal malice.

The trailer made it quite clear that, yes, the Beast was real and did come.  If there’s a real shocker to the ending, however, it’s in The Beast’s decision to let Casey go.  Through a series of flashbacks we find out that Casey has been living for years with her sexually abusive uncle, following the death of her family.  The Beast, upon realizing that Casey has been abused, tells her to “rejoice” that she is “pure” because of her brokenness, and by extension is worthy to live.  There’s arguably a strong implication that she will kill her uncle in the near future.

The movie closes with Patricia, Dennis, and Hedwig reflecting on how amazing The Beast is, as we look on and wonder what will happen next.  The ending reminded me of Edward Norton’s The Incredible Hulk, leaving us with some uncertainty whether the “monster” was a purely malevolent entity.  I do kind of wonder what Shyamalan is thinking presenting a character who literally cannibalized multiple people as morally grey.

The movie isn’t shocking or sickening, but it is intense.  It’s a film that I certainly wouldn’t show to a child.  With the sequel, Glass, on the horizon, I’m very eager to see what else M. Night has up his sleeve.

Fright Night

Fright Night is a movie that, structurally speaking, I should hate.  I hated the original Poltergeist because of its disjointed nature.  To a point, Fright Night is the same.  By the end of the movie we technically have four villains.  This in and of itself wouldn’t be a problem, especially as three of them are subordinate to the vampire Jerry (Chris Sarandon).  However, the movie makes the bizarre mistake of never having these three subordinate villains interact as villains, leaving us uncertain of their relationship, and making scenes with them seem almost like random encounters in a video game.

I suspect that at some point there were two versions of this script.  One in which our hero Charley’s (William Ragdale) best friend Evil Ed (Stephen Geoffreys) was turned into a vampire, and one in which his love interest Amy (Amanda Bearse) was turned.  I imagine either of those two versions would have allowed walking corpse Billy (Jonathan Starke) more time to develop.  As it is, he seems to mostly function as an extension of Jerry, getting plenty of screentime, but being used mostly to advance the plot as the vampire’s daylight agent.

Then again, this is my usual schtick, find one flaw and go on and on about it.  But, I did open this review by saying I should hate the film on paper.  Obviously, I don’t.  The special effects, the acting, and the strong characters all make this a wonderful film.

To get into the actual meat of the film, Charley, spying on his neighbor Jerry, sees him attack and kill a young woman, and realizes immediately that Jerry is a vampire.  Furthermore, Jerry realizes almost immediately that Charley knows, and begins planning to silence him.  Charley, meanwhile, finds himself unable to recruit Amy, and that Evil is willing to help him only for money.

After an attack by Jerry in which Charley is threatened, he runs to Peter Vincent (Roddy McDowell), a Horror Host and former movie star who Charley seems to believe is an actual vampire hunter.  The character is supposedly based on Vincent Price, but honestly I found myself thinking of Peter Cushing’s Van Helsing immediately.  Vincent seems to see his films as metaphorically true art, and humors Charley until he realizes that the boy actually believes that there’s a literal vampire across the street from his house.

The movie does a good job of giving us characters who are just different enough from their archetypes to be effective.  While Charley is a fan of old horror movies, there’s no pretense that this is unusual in and of itself.  Evil and Amy are both lovers of Peter Vincent as well, even if they find Charley’s literal interpretation a bit out there.

Jerry, meanwhile, manages to present us with a fundamentally human vampire, without angsting or monologuing.  He’s able to get himself invited into Charley’s house almost immediately, but seems to actually like Charley’s Mom, and initially feels little resentment of Charley himself.  Sarandon has said that he wanted to portray Jerry as more complex than a simple movie monster, and he succeeded.  Jerry has no desire to kill anyone for any reason other than survival, and is even reluctant to kill Charley in any situation that would also require harming his mother.  Ideally, he would scare the boy into silence.

While it would be easy to portray Peter Vincent simply as a money-grubbing glory hound, or a cliché Shakespearian actor “reduced” to horror parts.  But, the movie steers clear of either of these traps, giving us a Vincent who clearly saw the merit in the horror genre, even as he resented the slasher films of the 80s.  When Amy offers him money to “test” Jerry for vampireness in an effort to snap Charley out of what they believe to be a delusion, he takes it, but is facing eviction, so it’s hardly a surprise.

…oh, and Jerry thinks Amy is the reincarnation of his lost love…

It’s kind of hard to believe that the movie is able to deal with all of these dynamics in a 2 hour runtime, but it does so flawlessly.  While Vincent is able to fake a “vampire test” to show Jerry is human, he finds himself persuaded when he notices that the man casts no reflection, and retreats to his home.

Jerry, concerned about if not truly frightened by Charley, turns both Evil, and eventually Amy, as a show of power.  Charley attempts again to recruit Vincent, who finds his courage when Evil attacks him, and he fulfills his title as “the Great Vampire Hunter,” killing Evil (…who gets better…).  The two attack Jerry’s home.

The two find themselves forced to contend with Amy as she’s transforming, and Bill who’s undead status seems to give him the immunities of vampires, without the same weaknesses, before finally battling Jerry.  The confrontation manages to be properly intense, but maintains the focus on the characters, without their drama ever being lost in the special effects.

The movie ends with Jerry dead, but Evil somehow revived, while Amy is again human.  It’s generally considered a tragedy that Geoffreys declined to return for Fright Night Party 2, as he had a great dynamic.  That said, the first film is fantastic.  I’d put it in roughly the same category as Monster Squad, as a 80s films that didn’t attempt to draw a clear line between the comedy and the horror, letting the audience decide for themselves when to scream or laugh.