drownsoda90
Joined Jun 2004
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"Link" follows an American zoology student Jane (Elisabeth Shue) abroad in England who takes a job as an assistant to Dr. Steven Phillip, a researcher who studies primates. One of his subjects, Link, is a former circus chimpanzees. Left alone at Phillip's seaside manor, Link and his fellow primates begin engaging in tribal squabbles that result in dire consequences.
This animal horror film has Australian director Richard Franklin ("Psycho II") at the helm, and his Hitchcockian influence can be seen here in a similar manner, despite the story involving mostly non-humans.
"Link" starts off well, and things become interesting once the action moves to Dr. Phillip's rural manor, where the real madness unfolds. The film is nicely shot and the locations and interior sets are exquisitely rendered. Unfortunately, while the film remains entertaining, it suffers from the same issue that many films featuring animal villains have: Link and his fellow chimpanzees simply never feel threatening. We know logically their strength, but there is an enduring playfulness that runs through all of the mayhem which undercuts the dire nature of the situation. I think a large part of this is Jerry Goldsmith's obnoxious score, which is excessively cartoony. Despite this, there are a few bizarre cross-species moments between Shue and Link that are uncomfortable and give the audience pause.
The performances here are mixed: The film suffers from a largely lifeless performance from Shue, who also contributes to the film's lack of threat with a general listlessness that is at times distracting. She has her moments, but again, we never get a true sense that she feels as though she is in legitimate danger. Terence Stamp is great as usual as the professor, though his screen time is unfortunately quite brief in the grand scheme of the story.
All in all, "Link" is a middling animal horror effort. Franklin's direction and cinematography are quite good, and it gets high points for atmosphere. What hurts it is its lack of suspense and a general goofiness that results in what feels like low narrative stakes. It is a marginally entertaining film, but it never actually feels like a horror movie, or even a thriller for that matter. 5/10.
This animal horror film has Australian director Richard Franklin ("Psycho II") at the helm, and his Hitchcockian influence can be seen here in a similar manner, despite the story involving mostly non-humans.
"Link" starts off well, and things become interesting once the action moves to Dr. Phillip's rural manor, where the real madness unfolds. The film is nicely shot and the locations and interior sets are exquisitely rendered. Unfortunately, while the film remains entertaining, it suffers from the same issue that many films featuring animal villains have: Link and his fellow chimpanzees simply never feel threatening. We know logically their strength, but there is an enduring playfulness that runs through all of the mayhem which undercuts the dire nature of the situation. I think a large part of this is Jerry Goldsmith's obnoxious score, which is excessively cartoony. Despite this, there are a few bizarre cross-species moments between Shue and Link that are uncomfortable and give the audience pause.
The performances here are mixed: The film suffers from a largely lifeless performance from Shue, who also contributes to the film's lack of threat with a general listlessness that is at times distracting. She has her moments, but again, we never get a true sense that she feels as though she is in legitimate danger. Terence Stamp is great as usual as the professor, though his screen time is unfortunately quite brief in the grand scheme of the story.
All in all, "Link" is a middling animal horror effort. Franklin's direction and cinematography are quite good, and it gets high points for atmosphere. What hurts it is its lack of suspense and a general goofiness that results in what feels like low narrative stakes. It is a marginally entertaining film, but it never actually feels like a horror movie, or even a thriller for that matter. 5/10.
"Death Valley" follows young Billy (a pre-"A Christmas Story" Peter Billingsley) who accompanies his mother (Catherine Hicks) and her boyfriend (Paul Le Mat) on a trip through Death Valley where he inadvertently gets them tracked by a violent serial killer.
This under-seen effort from Universal Pictures is a strange hybrid of a serial killer road thriller (pre-dating "The Hitcher") and an outright slasher, albeit with a child character who is at the nexus of the danger and bloodshed. The contrasting storytelling modes here set "Death Valley" apart from other films of the era, though I would surmise that much of its more conventional slasher trappings and bloodshed were shoehorned in by the studio to capitalize on the slasher craze, which was at its peak in 1981.
The genre mix here gives "Death Valley" a strange footing in the canon of horror films. My main issue with the film is that its villain character does not come across as particularly threatening, and there are some interactions between the young Billy and the murderer that, though clever, require some suspension of disbelief. Still, there are sequences in the film (particularly one early on in which Billy unknowingly stumbles upon a murder scene) that are extremely suspenseful.
Aside from its brief prologue in New York City, the film is exclusively set in Death Valley, and the cinematography of the landscape is breathtaking and extremely atmospheric, including a rustic resort where the trio of characters end up, leaving them right in the killer's radius. Billingsley is likable here as the lead, and Catherine Hicks also gives a solid performance as his mother.
The film does stretch credulity a bit in the final act as the confrontation devolves into some rinse-and-repeat attacks and (unfortunately) uneventful chase scenes, and the film skids as it crashes into an abrupt conclusion that feels lacking. All that being said, I think "Death Valley" functions as a unique curio of a film. At its heart, it is a road thriller with some slasher trappings that have been cut-and-pasted onto it. The partly-grafted final product produces mixed results that are sometimes dull and sometimes quite thrilling, but its desert locales and committed performances help elevate the material considerably. 6/10.
This under-seen effort from Universal Pictures is a strange hybrid of a serial killer road thriller (pre-dating "The Hitcher") and an outright slasher, albeit with a child character who is at the nexus of the danger and bloodshed. The contrasting storytelling modes here set "Death Valley" apart from other films of the era, though I would surmise that much of its more conventional slasher trappings and bloodshed were shoehorned in by the studio to capitalize on the slasher craze, which was at its peak in 1981.
The genre mix here gives "Death Valley" a strange footing in the canon of horror films. My main issue with the film is that its villain character does not come across as particularly threatening, and there are some interactions between the young Billy and the murderer that, though clever, require some suspension of disbelief. Still, there are sequences in the film (particularly one early on in which Billy unknowingly stumbles upon a murder scene) that are extremely suspenseful.
Aside from its brief prologue in New York City, the film is exclusively set in Death Valley, and the cinematography of the landscape is breathtaking and extremely atmospheric, including a rustic resort where the trio of characters end up, leaving them right in the killer's radius. Billingsley is likable here as the lead, and Catherine Hicks also gives a solid performance as his mother.
The film does stretch credulity a bit in the final act as the confrontation devolves into some rinse-and-repeat attacks and (unfortunately) uneventful chase scenes, and the film skids as it crashes into an abrupt conclusion that feels lacking. All that being said, I think "Death Valley" functions as a unique curio of a film. At its heart, it is a road thriller with some slasher trappings that have been cut-and-pasted onto it. The partly-grafted final product produces mixed results that are sometimes dull and sometimes quite thrilling, but its desert locales and committed performances help elevate the material considerably. 6/10.
Robert Eggers made a significant impression with his 2015 directorial debut "The Witch", and has continued to impress me since. A reimagining of "Nosferatu" at his helm seemed like a dream come true, and after many years, it finally came to fruition with somewhat mixed results.
As with the original 1922 film and Werner Herzog's surreal 1979 remake, Eggers mostly honors the source material here. The original film itself was a blatant derivative of "Dracula," so anyone who knows the bones of that classic story will more or less already have the lay of the land in terms of what happens in "Nosferatu".
Firstly, the attention to detail here is impeccable; the period costumes and sets are dazzling, and the cinematography is top-notch, with repeated uses of muted grey nighttime sequences that border on black-and-white (intentional I'm sure, as an ode to the Murnau original). In the latter act, as rats and plague take over the streets, there is a palpable sense of rot that is highly effective. Given that Eggers has proven his excellence in these departments with his previous films, it is no surprise that the finer details and visuals are uniformly stunning.
As far as performances are concerned, we have a strong cast here. Lily-Rose Depp (whom I'd never seen in anything prior to this) gave a formidable performance as the haunted Ellen Hutter, who is pursued by Count Orlok (Bill Skarsgard), a malevolent vampire whose connection to her is emboldened when her husband Thomas (Nicholas Hoult) is assigned to handle estate matters for the Count. Willem Dafoe is as spunky as ever here as an occult expert who attempts to help the Hutters, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Emma Corrin give effective performances as the Hardings, friends of the Hutters who oversee the troubled Ellen while Thomas travels to Orlok.
All of these aforementioned elements give the film a real leg up, and approximately the first half of it (largely consisting of Thomas's travels into Transylvania and first encounter with Orlok) are engrossing and beautifully contrasted with Ellen's "melancholic" (and eventually possession-like) episodes back in urban Germany. However, once the story returns its focus to the city, the film seems to stall its momentum. One of the notable differences in this reimagining is that the focus revolves more around the Ellen character (aptly named "Lucy Harker" in Herzog's version) and the Hardings, but the unfortunate thing is that it never feels like the audience gets to know them any better for it. This is especially so in the case of Ellen, whose character has a slightly different spin in Eggers's screenplay, specifically in terms of her relationship to Orlok. The result feels like something of a missed opportunity, and the proverbial stake is driven in even further when one considers the film's running time, which is considerably longer than both the 1922 and 1979 versions, and yet those films often feel more involved. There is a strange amorphousness about the 2024 version's latter half that left it feeling enervated, especially against the ominous and suspenseful first hour.
The film's conclusion will hold no surprises for those who already know the previous films, but Eggers's staging of it is nonetheless spectacular and visually effective--and this is a fact that remains true about the film as a whole. Unfortunately, it does stumble a bit in the latter half as it seems to attempt to expand the material without ever fully reaching a satisfactory fever pitch. All that being said, the film is a gothic visual marvel in its own right, upheld by stunning cinematography and uniformly solid performances. It is imperfect, but it is a showstopper in more ways than one. 7/10.
As with the original 1922 film and Werner Herzog's surreal 1979 remake, Eggers mostly honors the source material here. The original film itself was a blatant derivative of "Dracula," so anyone who knows the bones of that classic story will more or less already have the lay of the land in terms of what happens in "Nosferatu".
Firstly, the attention to detail here is impeccable; the period costumes and sets are dazzling, and the cinematography is top-notch, with repeated uses of muted grey nighttime sequences that border on black-and-white (intentional I'm sure, as an ode to the Murnau original). In the latter act, as rats and plague take over the streets, there is a palpable sense of rot that is highly effective. Given that Eggers has proven his excellence in these departments with his previous films, it is no surprise that the finer details and visuals are uniformly stunning.
As far as performances are concerned, we have a strong cast here. Lily-Rose Depp (whom I'd never seen in anything prior to this) gave a formidable performance as the haunted Ellen Hutter, who is pursued by Count Orlok (Bill Skarsgard), a malevolent vampire whose connection to her is emboldened when her husband Thomas (Nicholas Hoult) is assigned to handle estate matters for the Count. Willem Dafoe is as spunky as ever here as an occult expert who attempts to help the Hutters, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Emma Corrin give effective performances as the Hardings, friends of the Hutters who oversee the troubled Ellen while Thomas travels to Orlok.
All of these aforementioned elements give the film a real leg up, and approximately the first half of it (largely consisting of Thomas's travels into Transylvania and first encounter with Orlok) are engrossing and beautifully contrasted with Ellen's "melancholic" (and eventually possession-like) episodes back in urban Germany. However, once the story returns its focus to the city, the film seems to stall its momentum. One of the notable differences in this reimagining is that the focus revolves more around the Ellen character (aptly named "Lucy Harker" in Herzog's version) and the Hardings, but the unfortunate thing is that it never feels like the audience gets to know them any better for it. This is especially so in the case of Ellen, whose character has a slightly different spin in Eggers's screenplay, specifically in terms of her relationship to Orlok. The result feels like something of a missed opportunity, and the proverbial stake is driven in even further when one considers the film's running time, which is considerably longer than both the 1922 and 1979 versions, and yet those films often feel more involved. There is a strange amorphousness about the 2024 version's latter half that left it feeling enervated, especially against the ominous and suspenseful first hour.
The film's conclusion will hold no surprises for those who already know the previous films, but Eggers's staging of it is nonetheless spectacular and visually effective--and this is a fact that remains true about the film as a whole. Unfortunately, it does stumble a bit in the latter half as it seems to attempt to expand the material without ever fully reaching a satisfactory fever pitch. All that being said, the film is a gothic visual marvel in its own right, upheld by stunning cinematography and uniformly solid performances. It is imperfect, but it is a showstopper in more ways than one. 7/10.