Connect with us

Reviews

Malignant Review: Frightening Fantasy Meets Outrageous Creature Feature Fare

Published

on

Malignant Review: Frightening Fantasy Meets Outrageous Creature Feature Fare

Australian filmmaker James Wan needs no introduction. Since directing Saw and its super successful sequels, he’s played a directing or producing role in several of the biggest horror projects of the last 15 years (Insidious, The Conjuring, and Annabelle to name a few.)

His most recent effort Malignant dropped in on us days ago like a storm of chaos, and within hours of its release to HBO Max it had the internet raving with passion and ranting perplexed. There’s a nutty list of reasons as to why this flick has people talking.

James Wan’s Malignant is a film best enjoyed when entering with little understanding as to what it’s about. There’s much I can’t share about the movie, including a shocking twist reminiscent of older outrageous horror that doesn’t shy from “going there” (ridiculously gross places.)

Advertisement

What’s safe to be said is this is one of the wilder movies you’ll see in your lifetime; like a bloody homage to schlocky 80s creature features, meets a modern, stylish haunted house chiller, meets a sort of darkly comic fantasy film. It’s a decidedly chaotic, spectacularly entertaining mess of scary visuals, gruesome violence, and almost comic book-adaptation action. Wan’s style is all over the place and his tongue is in cheek, as we jump between paranormal frights, awkward drama acted hammily, and gross out mania. Frankly, I feel this flick’s for the horror heads, lovers of the absurd, and general drunks, but any viewer can acknowledge there’s a wild world well-constructed here, by an inspired filmmaker with a grip on scary and strange sense of humor.


The film opens in the 90s with a hospital sitting ominously atop a hill. A team of psychiatrists, doctors, and facility workers struggle to tame a boy in a room who we don’t see. A demonic voice sounds from the room. Blood’s splattering as bodies pile. After what feels like a bit of farcical acting, Dr. Florence Weaver (Jacqueline McKenzie) announces gravely they’ll have to remove “the tumor.”

We cut to the present day and meet Madison (Annabelle Wallis,) a pretty young pregnant lady in the Seattle area who lives in a giant old house with her abusive, jerk boyfriend Derek (Jake Abel) who loves watching UFC. After a slight argument he slams her into a wall, which causes her to cut her head. Derek runs to the kitchen and she locks herself in the room. As Madison sits seeing visions, a dark, stringy-haired crawling creature appears in the kitchen and attacks Derek. Madison later enters the kitchen to see him on the ground with his neck broken. While being treated at the hospital, Madison learns she lost her baby.


Advertisement

Following the miscarriage and death of her boyfriend, Madison for some reason chooses to stay alone in her giant house where a contorted, crawling, demonic-looking specimen recently broke in and committed murder. It’s a horror film, after all. She has the support and care of her sister Maddie (Sydney Lake,) who stops by, but Madison’s life is a haunting mess – the creature makes frequent appearances in her place; it contacts her and unrelated folks through phones and radios, and she begins having horrible nightmares of murders being committed – vivid ones, and just before these murders are carried out in real life.

Now Madison’s entangled with the police and their suspicions. Does she know this stringy-haired creature? How does she seem to know exactly when and where these gruesome kills are going down? The main cop sides with Madison and wants to believe that this home-invading demon thing exists. He even has a run-in with the crab-walking ghoul in what amounts to a thrilling chase scene and fight. Still, Madison must know something beyond this surface nuttiness. The rest is up to you to watch.


Malignant kicks off with obtuse gory madness, then simmers into what feels like an ominous paranormal haunt, following a paranoid depressive woman post-tragedy in a scary old house. Wan gives us plenty of foggy outer shots of the home, and frankly I find each one beautiful. The camera lingers overhead with doom, or rises up from the ground with vengeance. Scares featuring the stringy-haired creature invade steadily. One shot looking outside as the creature appears beneath a light post is pure horror.

Wasting no time, Wan wedges in more styles and different feels as more story unfolds, lending to zaniness. Some of the acting in dramatic scenes appears deliberately stale, like it’s parodying a commercial. Lines are generic, characters act almost soapy. It starts becoming more apparent there’s a joke to be in on. Moments of seriousness are concluded with a dry one-liner from a character, before we’re catapulted into another scare or marvelously violent murder sequence.


Advertisement

Horror veers in multiple lanes, between haunting imagery, sleazy slasher antics, and grotesque body horror. Filing the horror of Malignant under one specific subgenre is difficult, but I can say for certain when matters aren’t melodramatic or cinematically over-the-top this is a real frightfest. There’s a lot of suspenseful teasing as we’re pulled into what feels like a jump scare, only to be led astray or given a creepy visual or voice atmospheric as opposed to a jumpy shock. Wan does utilize some jump scares, but favors the lingering, unsettling shots or fantastical sequences. He steers clear of torturous activity, save for a few short scenes in an attic where the creature holds a woman captive. What Wan does evidence is a real love for chiling, raspy voices coming through archaic means of communication. I, for one, appreciate a threatening voice speaking to a little girl through a toy phone in my scary movies. There’s no denying Malignant covers a lot of horror ground.


The effects work on display is impressive, and honestly I’m an old school film fan who prefers visual effects to be practical. Action and visuals here are anything but. Rooms transform around characters. Wounds pulsate. People are thrown by an unseen force. The creature somersaults off balconies, for God’s sake. The action hits nutty levels through some of the chases and fights, and Malignant does become ludicrous visually. At times you feel like you’re watching a comic book adaptation, but it’s cool to witness and exciting to follow regardless.

I described the acting as “hammy” multiple times, and it does come off that way, although the teetering on ironic performance style pairs well with the film’s undecided mood and overall outrageousness. On the other hand, Annabelle Wallis is a standout actress in the lead. She’s believable but never pathetic and pitiful as a victimized leading lady. Wallis is compelling and beautifully expressive, with a telling set of eyes. She runs the range of emotions which I found to be palpable. Honestly I nearly shed a tear during the hospital bed scene when Madison finds out she lost her baby.


Having just praised Malignant‘s leading actress for her dramatic performance, I realize even further how hard this film is to pinpoint, and that may just be the idea. Some of the acting is raw and riveting. Other characters perform like they’re on a sketch show. A clear, stylistic through line isn’t evident. As the tale unwinds it’s as though the moods and visions of multiple filmmakers collided for an intentional tonal mismash. The film’s score is orchestral and heavy. Subject matter ranges from grave and unsettling to pure craziness. Scares are shocking and memorable. Action and chase sequences are showy and spectacular.

Advertisement

Obviously Malignant doesn’t have a set mood or plain intention. It’s a crazed and sporadic shocker with wild visuals. Its’ horror is inspired, gimmicky and modern, while also playing tribute to the brazen creature features of schlocky horror history. The shock of Malignant does come as a shock, though this twist arrives early before the wrap-up and what follows can’t aptly conclude all of the nuttiness we just witnessed.


I didn’t love Malignant‘s conclusion, but I was nothing short of entertained through its runtime, leaning into the effective frights, laughing at twists, and staring appalled at the gross out bits of body horror. It’s a showy, scary, riveting mess – beautifully crafted but tonally incoherent, successfully confusing and funny, and no doubt shocking. James Wans’ Malignant is in theaters and streaming on HBO Max. The horror fans and true freaks out there owe themselves this.


Advertisement

Reviews

Bullet Train Review: A Wickedly Funny, High-Octane Thrill Ride

Published

on

By

Bullet Train Review: A Wickedly Funny, High-Octane Thrill Ride

Brad Pitt leads a wickedly funny ensemble in a high-octane actioner loaded with twists. Adapted from the 2010 Japanese novel by Kōtarō Isaka, Bullet Train has a bevy of disparate assassins manipulated by a mysterious criminal mastermind. Stuntman turned action director, David Leitch (John Wick, Atomic Blonde), stays true to form with unrelenting bloody and flamboyant violence. The codenamed characters get downright verbose before beating, stabbing, and shooting each other to bits. The loquacious banter tends to run long, but the narrative always bounces back with sharp reveals. Strap in for a helluva ride.

Ladybug (Pitt) boards the overnight bullet train to Tokyo with a newfound sense of self. He’s chock-full of philosophy after recovering from a near fatal ambush. Ladybug ignores his unseen handler’s advice to take a gun. Surely any issues can be resolved peacefully. The job seems straightforward enough. Steal a briefcase with a sticker and exit at the next stop.

Advertisement

Also on board are Lemon (Brian Tyree Henry) and Tangerine (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), ruthless “twins” known for their brutal methods. Lemon is obsessed with the British children’s show “Thomas & Friends”. He reads people by comparing them to the anthropomorphized trains. The twins are escorting the previously kidnapped son (Logan Lerman) of a powerful gangster, the White Death (Michael Shannon).

None of the hired guns are aware of the Father, aka Yuichi Kimura’s (Andrew Koji), mission. He’s out for vengeance but foolishly runs into a deceptive figure. The Prince (Joey King) has a score to settle with the White Death. Meanwhile, the Wolf (Bad Bunny) joins the fray after his truly horrific Mexican wedding. He’s also ready for serious comeuppance. Ladybug quickly realizes they’re all unwitting pawns in a dangerous game. Someone has packed the train with killers for an unknown purpose. He desperately wants to get off but can’t seem to escape the carnage.


Related: I Love My Dad Review: Patton Oswalt’s Delightfully Cringeworthy Catfishing Comedy

Cast of Bullet Train

Bullet Train introduces the cast with splashy entrances that flashes back to their dark pasts. The murderous montages are informative but don’t fill in every gap. The script doles out more critical information as the bodies pile up. Alliances bounce back and forth as everyone wonders who’s actually pulling the strings. The whodunit element works well as the audience becomes embroiled in a series of betrayals. You don’t have a sense of the plot’s true trajectory until the third act. The film builds to a showdown that delivers a huge action payoff.

Advertisement

Bullet Train has complex characters that each contribute slices of devilish humor. Brad Pitt preaching self-help and understanding is an effective gag throughout. Brian Tyree Henry’s constant comparisons to Thomas & Friends aren’t as comical but play an important role in the story. There are a lot of moving parts. Leitch, who worked as Pitt’s stunt double for years, is clearly fond of his players. He gives everyone a chance to babble incessantly. I would have trimmed the dialogue to be more incisive.


The action scenes are worth the price of admission. Leitch has a great eye for mixing stylized set pieces with intimate fights. He knows when to go big and small. You never feel let down by his pacing. There’s always the right amount of adrenaline to keep your pulse pumping. Bullet Train is another feather in a skilled filmmaker’s cap. Watch out for A-list cameos and a mid-credits scene.

Bullet Train is a production of Columbia Pictures, Fuqua Films, and 87North Productions. It will be released theatrically on August 5th from Sony Pictures.

Advertisement
Continue Reading

Reviews

Bullet Train Review: Brad Pitt Has A Blast In The Silly And Badass Action Comedy

Published

on

By

Bullet Train Review: Brad Pitt Has A Blast In The Silly And Badass Action Comedy

If orchestrated properly, with adjusted stakes, tone, and atmosphere, there can be a beautiful, symbiotic relationship between intense action and comedy. A hero pulling off a rapid and vicious series of blows against an opponent can be savage and dramatic in one context, but it can also be so deliriously awesome that an audience’s first reaction is to laugh. Fast paced martial arts can be used for wonderful physical humor (see: the legendary career of Jackie Chan), and the best examples provide dual layers of entertainment: you marvel at the skill in all the ass-kicking, and cackle at the creativity in the choreography.

This is a sweet spot that filmmaker David Leitch knows well. After peppering funny moments in John Wick and Atomic Blonde at the start of his directorial career, he brilliantly utilized the action/comedy weapon that is Ryan Reynolds in Deadpool 2, and crafted some excellent physicality with the unique styles of Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham in Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw. His latest, Bullet Train, is another effort that takes aim at that particular tonal target, this time with his most expansive ensemble yet, and it’s another success. With a sensibility that could be described as early Guy Ritchie with more specific action focus, it’s a movie that is both silly and skilled and inspires its primary star in particular to do energetic and engaging work.

Based on the novel Maria Beetle by Kōtarō Isaka, the film weaves multiple narrative threads through the cars of the titular bullet train as it speeds through the country of Japan – all of the protagonists being killers with their own particular reason and motivation for being aboard. Ladybug (Brad Pitt), for example, is a hired gun who has been tasked by his handler (Sandra Bullock) to perform what sounds like a simple job: find a briefcase marked with a train sticker and steal it. What he doesn’t know, though, is that said briefcase belongs to a pair of British hit men named Lemon (Brian Tyree Henry) and Tangerine (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), and that the contents include the recovered ransom for the kidnapped son (Logan Lerman) of a powerful crime lord known as The White Death.

Meanwhile, Kimura a.k.a. The Father (Andrew Koji) is on the bullet train because he is on a mission of vengeance – hunting down the person responsible for nearly killing his son by pushing the boy off of a building. What he doesn’t expect is that the individual he is looking for is a young woman identified as The Prince (Joey King), and that she has purposefully gotten him on the high speed rail with the intention of forcing him to execute an assassination attempt.

And while five killers sharing the space would be enough for most movies, Bullet Train actually has even more that pop in and surprise throughout the film’s runtime – and their roles are worth keeping as a secret pre-release.

Advertisement

Bullet Train has a chaotic storyline, but the pieces properly connect as a fun puzzle.

Narratively speaking, Bullet Train is a messy movie to put together, as focus briskly ping-pongs between the different players, but everything stays in harmony as the film persistently finds ways to build on each protagonist’s arc. This is particularly cool later in the movie as different characters are drawn together from individual angles and instant conflict is generated from their simple interaction.

The film is at its best when it keeps things simple, but it does let things go off the rails at times (if you’ll pardon the pun). This is especially true as it gets into the third act and it tries to pull off stunts like one of the leads leaping from a platform on to the back of the train as it leaves a station; it’s both a problem for the “rules” of the universe and in its strained use of visual effects. The movie also frequently tries to get a bit too cute and Tarantino-esque with what are admittedly familiar-but-not-quite-stock characters – the most prominent example being an ongoing and quickly tiresome gag with Lemon explaining that he understands people through the lens of Thomas The Tank Engine.

Primarily, though, it’s a movie that is able to generate its entertainment with engaging and quippy dynamics between the members of the ensemble, both when they are talking out their issues and trying to kill one another.

David Leitch puts a lot of exciting and weird fights in a confined space, and is at its best when working with a “less is more” philosophy.

Coming from a stunt background, both as a performer and a coordinator, David Leitch’s bread and butter remains deftly and specifically choreographed action sequences, and Bullet Train proves to be a terrific challenge and opportunity for his skills. Regardless of where you are in the titular transport, space is not a luxury, and the best fights in the movie are those that are being fought only between the characters, but against the limitations provided by the location.

There are guns, knives and explosives in the mix, but Bullet Train also has some terrific “found item” moments that add spice and humor to the various showdowns, whether it’s a pocketed cell phone saving a character’s life from a blade, a laptop making for a solid cudgel, a water bottle making for a useful projectile, or a venomous snake showing up at a perfect moment.

Once again we see David Leitch work a special magic turning dramatic and comedic actors into badasses with slick and stylish moves, and while everyone shows off some terrific skills, it’s very much the Brad Pitt show at the end of the day.

Advertisement

Brad Pitt’s joy in the role of Ladybug is palpable.

At the nexus of everything good in Bullet Train is Brad Pitt, who very clearly had a blast reuniting with David Leitch (who performed the actor’s stunts in films including Fight Club, The Mexican, Mr. And Mrs. Smith and Troy). He’s a joy to watch in action not just because of the talented craft he demonstrates in his physicality, but how he channels the psychology of the character. As we meet him, Ladybug is reluctantly getting back into his business following a number of important breakthroughs with his therapist, and Pitt does a fantastic job conveying that he doesn’t ever want to choose violence as a first answer – both via verbal pleas and defense-heavy moves. Action/comedy is a genre he should revisit a lot more often.

Bullet Train doesn’t aim to revolutionize hitman movies, but instead plays with a tongue-in-cheek vibe that lets you recognize the tropes and appreciate how the film plays with them. It’s a slick/goofy action movie that is both contained and wild, and a satisfying late summer release.

Continue Reading

Reviews

Luck Review: A Spectacular Debut Film from Skydance Animation

Published

on

By

Luck Review: A Spectacular Debut Film from Skydance Animation

The world’s unluckiest woman enters a magical land to change the fortunes of a fellow orphan. Luck will make you smile and possibly shed a few tears. The big-budget, CGI animated fantasy shines a spotlight on needy children while telling a truly original story. An assortment of lucky critters and creatures dazzle in a spectacular setting. The highly imaginative narrative gives age-old superstitions a dynamic new spin. Luck is a brilliant first film from Skydance Animation.

Sam Greenfield (Eva Noblezada) reaches her eighteenth birthday with trepidation. She’s finally aged out of the foster care system. Sam never found her “forever family”. She spent her entire life living in orphanages. It doesn’t help that Sam has the worst luck. Everything she does or touches ends in abject disaster. Her only thoughts are for young Hazel (Adelynn Spoon), Sam’s roommate at the girls home. Sam has been set up with a job and tiny apartment. She has to stay in school and employed to remain housed.

Advertisement

Sam’s first day at Marv’s (Lil Rel Howery) floral shop goes exactly as expected. She sadly eats dinner sitting on a sidewalk. Sam learns that Hazel’s weekend trip with a foster family was canceled. She gives half of her sandwich to a curious black cat. It scampers away but leaves a strange penny behind.

The following day is a revelation. Sam’s lucky penny changes everything. Her ecstatic mood sours when she loses the penny in spectacular fashion. Stewing on the sidewalk, Sam’s surprised when the black cat returns. She’s astonished when Bob (Simon Pegg) asks for his penny. The “travel penny” is the only way a creature from the Land of the Luck stays safe in the human world. She follows an unnerved Bob back through the portal to the Land of Luck. Sam has to find another lucky penny to help Hazel. Bob reluctantly agrees, but they have to be careful. Misdeeds end up in banishment to Bad Luck.

Related: Bullet Train Review: A Wickedly Funny, High-Octaine Thrill Ride

Advertisement

The Land of Luck

The Land of Luck is an absolute joy to behold. Leprechauns, cats, pigs, and rabbits, lucky creatures, are the bureaucrats tasked with spreading good fortune. Bringing Sam in such a place is a recipe for absolute chaos. Bob, and his leprechaun assistant Gerry’s (Colin O’Donoghue), efforts to contain Sam’s bad luck will have audiences in stitches. I’m still chuckling at Sam’s “Latvian leprechaun” disguise; their harebrained excuse for why she’s so much bigger than everyone else.

Luck’s serious themes are artfully addressed. Sam’s lonely childhood, and her desperate efforts to change Hazel’s, brings a melancholic touch to the narrative. The film reminds us to not take love and family for granted. Every kid deserves care, nurturing, and a safe place to grow. It shouldn’t take luck or chance for a child to find a “forever home”.

Insert sigh here. Recent headlines concerning John Lasseter (Toy Story, Cars) will undoubtedly cloud this film’s release. The genius storyteller and animator behind Pixar’s success left to head Skydance Animation after awful “Me Too” allegations. He’s brought his incredible talent to Luck, and it shows. This wonderful film deserves to be judged on its own merits. Sometimes we must divorce ourselves from art and the personality of the artist.

Advertisement

Luck is a production of Skydance Animation and Apple Original Films. It will have an exclusive Apple TV+ premiere on August 5th.

Continue Reading

Trending