halloweenfest evening four: you're next and dark fields

You're Next: (2011. dir: Adam Wingard) Wow. Worst family reunion EVER.

I don't like home invasion films. But, if you have to watch one, if you're inured to the ultraviolence they inevitably afford, this one has some greatness on offer. The best Final Girl ever, for one thing (Sharni Vinson), and there are perfect touches, like the pop CD stuck on endless repeat, those stoical animal masks, and some utterly shameless humor ("You never want to do anything interesting." "I think that's an unfair assessment." "Then fuck me on the bed next to your dead mother.").

The story was written with some care, although some early decisions the characters make are questionable, but isn't that part of the charm of the genre? (Like in the Geico ad: "Let's hide behind the wall of chainsaws!") And, by the end, the kills are far gone into the realm of absurdity. (It's worth it to hear a character ask where his brother is and get the reply, "I killed him with a blender.")

Adam Wingard, who would go on to give us the Guest (if you haven't seen it, for God's sake, man, go and do so) is already sure-handed and unwavering at the helm.

Dark Fields: (2009. dir: Douglas Schulze) There are these great things: Dee Wallace's eerily-swathed husband bearing her aloft in a green room. An enormous, tiled bathroom, like a chapel where the sacrament is performed. The marvellous faces of Cari's parents (Richard Lynch and Paula Ciccone). The top hat. The brightly-colored, shiny raincoats on the little girls. The strange voyage of Mr. Saul. Three separate and well-managed palettes for the three different time periods (1850s, 1950s, and present day). A Native American curse. A shaman bent on vengeance for the white man's genocide. And then, to render it all nearly useless, a script full of dreadful, clunky dialogue which does not come anywhere near to matching the beauty and grace and strangeness of the images.

If it were a silent film, or more nearly silent, say in the style of Valhalla Rising, it might have been magnificent. As it is, it's an undeniable failure, but with moments that will take your breath away.