Tuesday 6 September 2011

Kill List (2011)

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHO ENDS UP KILLING WHOM)

[Now, at long last, for a bust of a movie currently on release that will terrify and mystify you in equal measure.]

Kill List (2011) is a British horror movie co-written and directed by Ben Wheatley, starring Neil Maskell, Michael Smiley and MyAnna Buring.

In the end, not only is ex-soldier Neil Maskell forced into the mercy shooting of his best friend and contract killing accomplice, Michael Smiley, but he is also tricked into murdering his own wife, MyAnna Buring, and their young son.


Simmering domestic and marital tension boils over between husband and wife, Maskell and Buring, during a dinner party they throw for family friend, ex-comrade-in-arms and current business partner, Smiley and his latest girlfriend, who mysteriously excuses herself partway through the meal in order to secretly score an occult symbol on the back of a mirror in the couple's upstairs bathroom.

Smiley eventually manages to broker peace between the feuding pair, once he has reassuringly put their worried son back to bed after their antics disturb his sleep.

Before the evening is over, Smiley discusses with Maskell in private the prospect of a well paid hit-man job for the pair of them, a possibility he had apparently already raised with Buring, which would solve the couple's money worries, one of the causes of their rowing.

With Buring's endorsement, Maskell is persuaded into the deal, which is sealed in blood when Maskell's hand is unexpectedly and deliberately lacerated by the mysterious lone client that he and Smiley meet in a suite of an eerily empty hotel in order to receive their instructions. The well dressed man seems aware not only of the pair's reputation as killers but also inexplicably of some traumatic incident in Kiev some eight months previously involving Maskell, which was the last time he had worked, the proceeds of which he and his wife have been living off since.

Much to the chagrin of the god fearing Smiley, the first of their three victims turns out to be a priest, whose body they dispose of in an incinerator after Maskell has dispatched him with a bullet to the back of the head in his vestry after morning service. Smiley is further unnerved by the priest's apparent gratitude for their actions, which Maskell explains away as some sort of release from a guilty burden.

What that burden might have been becomes clearer, when the pair break into a lock-up warehouse from which they see their second target emerging, and discover a collection of homemade dvds depicting what they take to be real scenes of such murderous sexual depravity that Smiley cannot bare to watch them and which tip Maskell into such a blind fury that when the pair catch up with their target at his home, he has no qualms about subjecting the so-called librarian to brutal torture in order to extract details of who else is involved in their production.

During a break in the man's ordeal, while Smiley is absent emptying the contents of their victim's safe, Maskell is perplexed to discover that the man is also aware of his exploits in Kiev and is not only an admirer but, like the priest, strangely grateful for what Maskell is about to do to him. Having heard enough, Maskell sets about him with a claw hammer, making sure that he suffers terribly before eventually stoving his head in.

Having been made to clean up the mess he was responsible for, Maskell is adamant that the pair of them should pay the person named under torture a visit without further delay. Despite Smiley's disgust at his friend's loss of control and misgivings about his desire to widen their remit, he reluctantly agrees to keep lookout while Maskell investigates the address they were given.

Wondering what can be taking his friend so long, Smiley, shotgun in hand, follows Maskell's route into the building site, on his way discovering a dead night-watchman and guard-dog before finding Maskell in the process of stoving yet another victim's head in against a brick wall, oblivious to the time he has so far taken.

Now seriously worried by his friend's unprofessional approach to their task, Smiley begins to doubt whether Maskell is fit to complete the job they have taken on and so delivers him back home to Buring, where Maskell discovers his wife entertaining Smiley's supposed girlfriend, whom Smiley claimed had dumped him and who Maskell thought he had spotted stalking the pair during their killing mission.

While at home, Maskell discovers that his lacerated palm has caused a widespread infection and is persuaded by Buring to seek medical attention from their family doctor. However, Maskell cannot understand why the replacement doctor he is forced to see is less interested in treating his infection and more interested in investigating his marital relationship while offering advice about forgetting the past and embracing the future?

Meanwhile Smiley is alarmed to discover that a file of documents he took together with the cash from the librarian's safe contains surveillance photographs of him and Maskell trailing their first victim. Wanting to have nothing more to do with the job, the pair try to persuade their client to accept replacement killers that they can arrange and personally vouch for. But the client, this time accompanied by heavies and a number of other smartly dressed associates, is adamant that the pair will fulfil their obligation or they and their families will themselves be murdered.

Unnerved by this turn of events, despite her military background, Buring decides to take their son to the safety of their holiday home in the country, while Maskell and Smiley finish the contract.

Gaining access via an underground tunnel to the grounds of the palatial country estate of the third target on their list, a politician, the pair set up a makeshift camp in some woods from which they intend to stalk their victim.

Taking cover for the night, the pair's sleep is disturbed by the sound of chanting, which they discover is coming from a procession of torch bearing individuals passing close by, a few of whom are naked, the rest being mostly in white robes, the majority having their faces hidden behind masks made from straw.

They track the group at a distance through the woods to a temporary gibbet set up on the far side of a lake, where one of their number, a woman wearing a dress made from bank notes, proceeds to hang herself for the entertainment of the applauding onlookers.

Appalled by proceedings, Maskell opens fire on the crowd with a high powered rifle. But instead of fleeing, the crowd advances threateningly on the pair's position despite being mown down by gunfire, forcing Maskell and Smiley to bolt for cover.

Hoping to make their escape through the tunnel that lead them into the grounds in the first place, the pair find that their exit has in the meantime been bricked up. While Smiley uses his shotgun to hold off their pursuers, Maskell breaks through the blocked tunnel, only to have to deal with yet more occultists attempting to outflank them.

Having secured an escape route, Maskell returns for Smiley, only to find his friend has been overwhelmed and mortally wounded. Realising there is no hope for him, Smiley begs his friend to dispatch him, which Maskell reluctantly does.

Fleeing to the sanctuary of his holiday home, Maskell realises too late that he has only lead his pursuers to his wife and child.

With the tyres of their vehicles slashed, the couple find themselves trapped. So while Maskell sets out into the night to bring the fight to their enemy, Buring loads up a pistol and prepares to use all her military skills to protect herself and their son.

Maskell does his best in the dark, but is eventually knocked unconscious.

He comes round to find himself corralled by applauding occulists who reveal themselves to include, amongst others, the client, his associates and the dead Smiley's weird girlfriend.

A blade is thrust into Maskell's hand and he it pitted against a knife-wielding cloaked hunchback, who he dispatches to the delight of the crowd.

Only then does Maskell discover with muted shock that he has in fact killed Buring and their son, who had been strapped to her back under the cloak.



If this plot bust seems to end a bit abruptly, it is only because that is exactly how the film ends. And whereas it is always a good idea not to reveal too much and leave your audience asking questions and wanting more, it is another thing entirely to leave them so completely in the dark that they come out of the cinema (as they did on the night I saw the movie) asking "Is that it? Is that all there is?"

At one point during proceeding the client reveals that the motive for the contract killings is to precipitate regime change, which suggests that some sort of power struggle is occurring within the occultists' group. And the awe in which members of the group seem to hold the Maskell character seems to suggest he is to become their new 'angel of death'. But really, the plot is so loosely tied up, it is not hard to be left wondering what on Earth you have just been watching.

Having said that, the performances are never anything less than totally convincing. The dialogue is razor sharp, and the fact that the script does not rely on some supernatural creature or force to effect its horror, which is at times truly horrific, is to be commended. Rarely has British horror, or, for that matter, that from the States, been so convincingly realistic and terrifying. Just don't expect to understand exactly what any of it is about.

Source(s): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kill_List

Monday 21 March 2011

The Sixth Sense (1999) (Extreme Plot Bust)

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHO DID WHAT)

[And now for balance and fans of the art of Extreme Plot Busting, an undeniably better movie busted down to a single sentence.]

Psychiatrist realises he was murdered by patient after analysing boy who can communicate with ghosts.

The Sixth Sense (1999) is the American psychological thriller written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan, starring Bruce Willis and Haley Joel Osment that put Shyamalan on the map. The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and quite rightly so.

[Pedantic busters should note that although not stated as a rule, it is acceptable, in the fashion of newspaper headlines, to omit both the indefinite and definite articles (i.e. a and the) from a bust as long as the meaning of the sentence is still clear.]


Source(s):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sixth_Sense

The Happening (2008)

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHO LEARNS WHAT)

[Sometimes it's just fun to plot bust a really bad movie.]

The Happening (2008) is an American horror-thriller film written, co-produced and directed by M. Night Shyamalan, starring Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel and John Leguizamo.

In the end Mark Wahlberg confirms his belief that science can't explain all the mysteries of nature.


Spooked by a series of mass suicide events that begin in New York and then rapidly spread to other major population areas of the north-eastern United States, high school science teacher, Wahlberg, decides to join the general evacuation by boarding a train bound for the country together with his wife, Zooey Deschanel, and their best friend, maths teacher colleague, John Leguizamo, who has his young daughter with him, but whose own wife must follow on later, as she is unable to reach their train in time.

However the reassurance of knowing that they are on their way to safety is soon dispelled as the passengers on the over-crowded train receive an ever increasing number of distressing news reports and cell phone calls that suggest the plague of suicides is spreading to ever smaller communities like the ones they are headed for.

Eventually the group find themselves stranded in some one-horse town, when they and the other passengers are forced to disembark the train, whose driver refuses to continue further because he cannot raise anyone on his radio.

Seeking sustenance in the town's apparently lone diner, further speculation on the tv news and then a power blackout sends the crowd into a blind every-man-for-themselves panic which has them scrambling to flee the area in every available vehicle.

Struggling to find a ride, Leguizamo asks Wahlberg and Deschanel to take care of his daughter so that he can travel back to the city they abandoned in order to search for his wife who he can no longer reach on her cell phone. A decision which turns out to be a fatal one on his part.

Although Wahlberg, Deschanel and Leguizamo's daughter are fortunate to be offered a lift from a middle-aged local couple who own a near-by plant nursery, their luck soon runs out, as the group finds themselves trapped at a country crossroads where a large group of vehicles have congregated as all their escape routes appear to be blocked by evidence of the affects of whatever is causing the mass suicides.

Cornered, Wahlberg attempts to find a solution to their predicament by applying scientific method to the evidence he has so far gathered. Inspired by some crack-pot plant-society theories suggested by his nurseryman companion, he determines that the threat is coming from the surrounding vegetation that is somehow reacting to large groups of people. Together with the help of a fleeing army private and a local realtor, he decides that the best course of action is for them all to seek shelter in as sparsely a populated area as they can find.

However, as they head out on foot through the surrounding fields, despite their efforts to split up into ever smaller groups, nothing seems to reduce the chances of them triggering the suicide inducing effect of the surrounding plants. The best that they can hope for is to hide indoors away from the wind that seems to herald an attack. This proves difficult though, as those buildings that they do come across are inhabited by murderous gun-wielding locals determined to keep both strangers as well as the poisonous air out.

Eventually, reduced to just three, Wahlberg, Deschanel and Leguizamo's daughter are reluctantly taken in for the night by a reclusive, grief stricken and paranoid old lady, who has apparently managed to cut herself off entirely from the outside world and is seemingly oblivious to and unwilling to even contemplate the looming threat.

Unfortunately, the house proves not to be the sanctuary that they had hoped for, as, come the morning, the suspicious old lady finds Wahlberg snooping in her room, and demands that he and his companions leave at once.

In a fit of rage the old lady goes out to commune with her vegetable plot and promptly tops herself having succumbed to the plague that is now upon them. In the process, she manages to break many of the building's downstairs windows, which forces Wahlberg to take refuge in a back room, where he discovers he can communicate through a speaking tube with Deschanel who has inexplicably taken Leguizamo's daughter out to explore an out-building.

The couple, who have been experiencing commitment issues highlighted by their failure to start a family, lament the fact that they will now die separated from each other as escape seems impossible. Without a second thought, the pair stride out to meet their inevitable doom together in the swirling wind.

However, for once luck is with them, because as quickly and as mysteriously as the plague arose, it now seems to have abated, as they survive to both make good on their promise to Leguizamo to look after his now orphaned daughter, as well as start a family of their own.

Whether they will live happily ever after is unclear, as, in the dying moments of the story, nature is shown to have resumed its inexplicable vendetta against humans for desecrating the planet?



It is undeniable that M. Night Shyamalan has made a career for himself in the movies by asking interesting questions, like what would it be like to be a ghost and not realise it, or does the existence of super-heroes require the existence of super-villains? However, some of his answers have proved less than satisfying or even entertaining. Equally, it is unfortunate that none of the performances here represent the best work of those involved. Indeed, it was quite hard to keep a straight face at times while producing this bust. Nevertheless, given that some movies are so bad that they can attract a following precisely because of their short-comings, this 9-11, "I see dead people" inspired, thanksgiving roast may have something to recommend it, in the end.

Source(s): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Happening_(2008_film)

Sunday 30 January 2011

Black Swan (2010)

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO TO SUCCEED IN THE BALLET?)

[Now for a bust of a movie widely tipped for Oscar success.]

Black Swan (2010) is an American psychological thriller/horror film directed by Darren Aronofsky, starring Natalie Portman, Vincent Cassel, and Mila Kunis.

In the end Natalie Portman discovers that the only way she can achieve the perfect performance in the lead role of Swan Lake is to go mad and kill herself.


When New York City Ballet director, Vincent Cassel, decides to re-invigorate the classic Swan Lake for his latest production by ditching his aging former protege and established principle dancer (Winona Ryder) in order to obtain a more visceral and real staging, dedicated company member Portman sees it as an opportunity to step into the limelight.

However, she is bitterly disappointed to discover that in Cassel's opinion, despite her brilliantly obsessive perfectionism as a dancer, Portman lacks the dark passion required to portray the black swan portion of the role. He believes that she must abandon reason in order to experience the schizophrenia required to properly play the part. It is especially disappointing for Portman, when the newest member to join the company, wild child and rule breaker Mila Kunis, seems a natural choice for the black swan role.

Desperate for the part, Portman approaches Cassel, only to discover that he has already decided to give it to yet another dancer. In an effort to prove to Portman just how unsuitable she is, Cassel tries to take sexual advantage of her in his office, only for Portman to bite him on the lip in order to free herself. A move which forces Cassel to reverse his decision and offer the role to Portman, much to the displeasure of the other dancers who assume she only obtained the part by offering herself to Cassel.

Having won the role, Portman's troubles are not over, however, as she seemingly has to cope, not only with the stress of rehearsals on her body, but also the increasing competition she feels she has with Kunis for the part, as well as the ever present and suffocating attention of her over protective and doting mother (played by Hollywood maniac stalwart, Barbara Hershey), a former dancer who considers she gave up the possibility of success to raise her daughter.

Neither does misogynist Cassel ease up on his new choice of protege, insisting that Portman constantly push herself to the limit and suggesting that she should indulge in pleasuring herself for homework in an effort to free herself of her inhibitions and frigidity, a task she finds impossible to do at first.

Throughout the whole period leading up to the opening night, Portman suffers an increasing number of ever more bizarre and frightening experiences, from strange lesions appearing on her shoulder-blades, to a leering middle-aged man on the subway, to encounters with Cassel's former leading lady, Ryder, who is supposedly in hospital having sustained terrible injuries after walking out into traffic following her fall from grace, as well as a wild night on the town with Kunis which eventually leads back to Portman's bed where Kunis performs oral sex on her before transforming into a vision of Portman herself.

Not surprisingly these frightening and confused visions involving herself, Cassel, Kunis, Ryder and her mother, culminating in Portman apparently plucking out proto-feathers emerging from the flesh of her back, while both her legs spontaneously break, leave Portman unhinged.

However, when she wakes on the eve of opening night to find that her mother has reported her sick, Portman fights with her, rather than miss her opportunity to dance.

So her unexpected arrival at the theatre confuses everyone. Not least Kunis who by now thinks she will be performing in Portman's place. However, Portman is adamant that she will be dancing and bullies Cassel into agreeing to reverse his decision to replace her.

Clearly still suffering from hallucinations, Portman manages to get on stage, although she injures herself in a fall, breaking down in tears.

Retreating to her dressing room she discovers Kunis preparing to take over from her in the role of the black swan, but will have nothing of it. Tragically, during the ensuing argument Portman apparently mortally wounds Kunis with a shard of broken mirror. Though, she still somehow manages to make it on stage and performs the black swan role like never before, her arms apparently transforming into black wings as she dances.

Between bows, as she receives the adulation of the audience, Portman dashes into the wings to kiss Cassel passionately, much to his tearful delight.

Returning to her dressing-room in order to change for the final act, Portman first tries to soak up the blood emerging from the hiding place of Kunis's dead body, only to be shocked when Kunis herself appears at her dressing-room door to congratulate Portman on her performance, at which point Portman tearfully realises that it was not Kunis who she had stabbed earlier but herself.

Wiping away her tears she rejoins the stage as the white swan for her fatal finale, leaping to a blissful end in front of her sobbing mother who is in the audience, as the blood from her wound consumes her white costume.



Whether or not you enjoy the movie depends largely on whether or not you mind that much of the spectacle occurs in Portman's head. She and director Aronofsky do an excellent job of scaring her out of her wits. And the supporting performances are all great. But there will, no doubt, be audience members who baulk at the use of madness as experienced from the viewpoint of the victim device, as well as those from the ballet community who will take issue with the necessity for a dancer to go mad and kill themself in order to put in the perfect performance. Even so, it's a white-knuckle ride of the highest order, more pop-corn, though, than high art.

Source(s):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Swan_(film)

Thursday 6 January 2011

The Number 23 (2007)

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW EITHER WHO WROTE THE BOOK OR WHO THE KILLER IS?)

[Now for another bust of a woefully underrated-by-critics movie that, like many a cult masterpiece, did scant business in theatres as a result. One can only hope that, like so many other initially poorly received classics, its reputation improves with time.]

The Number 23 (2007) is an American psychological thriller directed by Joel Schumacher, starring Jim Carrey and Virginia Madsen.

In the end Jim Carrey discovers that he is not only a murderer but the author of a manuscript documenting his bizarre obsession with the number 23.


Mild-mannered and devoted father of one, fiercely loyal husband, and animal control officer, Carrey, is one day bitten at work by a stray dog. The incident results in his arriving late for his birthday date with wife, Virginia Madsen. During the time she is waiting, Madsen is drawn into a second-hand book-store where she discovers an intriguing manuscript that shares the name of the movie and which she decides to buy as a present for Carrey.

Carrey discovers that the manuscript is a mind warping odyssey into paranoia which begins by stating that the characters contained within it are fictitious and including a warning, later ignored by Carrey, that any reader who finds any resemblance to persons living or dead should proceed no further.

It recounts the experiences of a policeman who, from an early age, is fascinated by crime fiction and who is inspired to become a detective after becoming the first person to discover the suicide of his childhood widow neighbour.

Although his wife finds the manuscript merely interesting, Carrey becomes convinced that the early detective's life reminds him of his own youth, even though, later chapters recount the ultimately doomed passionate affair that the detective has with a mysteriously dark, sex and violence obsessed woman with possible suicidal tendencies.

Carrey's grip on reality loosens further when he reads of the detective's encounter with a beautiful blond, driven to murder and suicide by an obsession with the number 23.

Indeed, despite his wife's scepticism, not only does Carrey believe that the detective's life mirrors his own, he also becomes convinced that his life is similarly dominated by the same number.

However, Carrey is disturbed by the increasingly violent descriptions of the detective and his lover's affair, especially when they inspire murderous nightmares in him against his own wife.

Now concerned about the state of her husband's mind, Madsen arranges for Carrey to talk to one of her friends, a university lecturer who dismisses the manuscript as typical non-scientific magical thinking. Madsen's friend does, however, offer Carrey one insight, which is that if after finishing the story Carrey still believes that it is about him, then the author of the story must know Carrey very well.

Betrayal and the breakdown of the fictional detective's relationship inspires further paranoid thoughts in Carrey's mind about the faithfulness of his own wife. So much so, that when the detective is driven to jealous murder, Carrey decides to move out of the family home lest he do similar harm to Madsen.

Despite the story's obvious parallels to a real world murder case involving a victim whose grave the stray dog that initially bit Carrey guards, Carrey is eventually convinced that the person convicted of the murder is not only innocent of the crime, but also not the author of the manuscript.

When Carrey and Madsen's son discover a post office box address hidden within the manuscript's pages, the trio hatch a scheme that they hope will flush out the real author. But when they confront the old man who eventually shows up to collect their shipment of 23 large foam-filled boxes, they are appalled when he uses a box opener to cut his own throat, rather than reveal the truth.

Madsen immediately swings into action ordering Carrey and their son home while she takes care of the situation. While there Carrey is assured by Madsen over the phone that she got no information from the old man before he died, despite the old man managing to give her some kind of warning and her recovering an identification badge that relates to a long abandoned and decaying psychiatric institute where the old man once worked.

That night, unknown to Carrey, Madsen investigates the old man's office where she discovers he had a similar obsession with the number 23, while, simultaneously, Carrey's word counting analysis of the manuscript reveals a hidden message that leads him and his son to dig beneath steps in a nearby public park, where they find human remains.

Leaving the scene in order to alert the authorities, Carrey and his son are dumbfounded when they eventually return to the park with the police, only to find no sign of the remains they uncovered earlier.

Carrey's paranoia and his doubts over the fidelity of Madsen are further heightened when she turns up driven in the car of her university lecturer friend.

However, when Carrey notices Madsen's dirt encrusted fingernails, he realises that she moved the remains and jumps to the conclusion that she is the unknown author and he is therefore married to the real murderer. At which point Madsen reveals the truth she discovered from the old man which is that Carrey wrote the manuscript and it is she who is, in fact, married to a murderer.

Returning to the derelict institute in daylight despite the overwhelming evidence Carrey does not initially realise the full horror of the situation, which is that it was he who fell in love with a beautiful but twisted, sexual violence obsessed, college student who, on discovering Carrey's obsession with the number 23, abandons him for the arms of her college lecturer lover, and that it was Carry who, driven insane with jealous rage and her goading, both murdered her and framed her lover.

Only when he returns to the hotel room that he was strangely drawn to after moving out of the family home for Madsen's safety, is the whole truth revealed, as Carrey discovers the missing 23rd and final chapter of the manuscript hidden under the room's peeling wallpaper, thus finally dispelling any doubts about his past.

The explanation of the manuscript is that it was supposed to be an elaborate suicide note that Carrey drafted while staying in the hotel room, the walls of which, as well as himself, he covered with his confession and ravings on the number 23, before throwing himself out of the room's window. The fall however was not enough to kill him, although it did cause him to lose all memory of his murderous loss of control. Unexpectedly, the deranged ramblings of his manuscript fail to raise suspicions that he had anything to do with the recent murder in the minds of those in the psychiatric institute charged with looking after him.

Eventually, sufficiently recovered from his injuries and with no memory of the terrible crime he committed, Carrey is released from care only to literally bump into Madsen as he leaves the institute. Nevertheless one of his carers, who turns out to be the old man, himself becomes obsessed with the number 23 and decides to publish the manuscript under a false name.

Despite the new life he has built and the protestations of a distraught Madsen, Carrey decides he must atone for his sins and hand himself over to the authorities so that the wrongly convicted innocent man can be freed.



Despite the considerable damage Joel Schumacher did to his film making reputation by very nearly single-handedly managing to kill off the Batman franchise (so successfully begun by Tim Burton) with this second collaboration with Carrey, Schumacher did manage to produce a very taught and exciting movie, despite overwhelming negative reviews.

The acting throughout is without exception superb especially from the two principles. Carrey is particularly impressive in his first suspense thriller role. The only criticism that can be fairly levelled at the production is that the script does rely rather heavily on a great many coincidences, and crucially on the authorities willingness to convict an innocent man for a murder while ignoring a raving lunatic in their midst, who should surely have raised more suspicions than he did. And perhaps the Carrey character's willingness to atone for his past sins means that the closing scenes of the movie are a bit soft.

However, that aside the plot contains enough twists and misdirection to keep the cleverest plot buster guessing right up to the ultimate reveal.

Source(s):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Number_23