Next Exit
Director: Mali Elfman.
With: Katie Parker, Rahul Kohli, Karen Gillan, Rose McIver.
USA 2022. 103 mins.
(Cool poster.) In a world where the existence of ghosts has some scientific proof, a mismatched couple head across the country with the intention of giving up their lives to further study.
Despite the supernatural backdrop (and a fine creepy opening), this is mostly a road trip of two central brilliant performances of an odd couple going through existential crisis. If it perhaps becomes a romcom for horror fans, the characters and performances convince hard, with a lot of humour and pathos on the way.
The Harbringer
Director: Andy Mitton.
With: Gabby Beans, Emily Davis, Raymond Anthony Thomas, Cody Braverman.
USA 2022. 87 mins.
Horror being the perfect genre for expressing the personal and global anxiety and terror of the pandemic. ‘The Harbinger’ starts with standard ghost/demon spooking, but as it goes on its use of dreams and despondence gets increasingly sophisticated so that it becomes apparent that the film is after deeper existential horror.
Rooted in crucially warm and believable performances, the failing reality and psychological threats are layered on to capture the dread and fear of the early pandemic years, especially the psychological toll. It proves itself something truly haunting and captures that sense of being at a loss and losing all the time which defined the early days of the pandemic.
A Wounded Fawn
Director: Travis Stevens.
With: Sarah Lind, Josh Ruben, Malin Barr,
Katie Kuang.
USA 2022. 91 mins
With some formal play, style, psychedelica, and great performances, this pumps colourful juice in the serial killer genre. It’s a kind of abstract revenge and Final Girl flick where the murderer-in-denial is tormented seemingly by a group of performance artists (embodying his obsession with myths). Trippy and artfully done and topped off with an audacious closing credits sequence.
Night Sky
Director: Jacob Gentry.
With: Brea Grant, AJ Bowen, Scott Poythress, Sandra Benton.
USA 2022. 96 mins.
Another slow-burn road movie with good central performances ('Next Exit' being the other), this one is like 'Starman' crossed with 'No Country for Old Men'; although Alan Jones namechecks road movies from the '70s. With the thriller element in play, the narrative keeps moving until the canyon and bright lights finale, and up until then its proven decent if not quite profound entertainment. Includes a decidedly nasty, pontificating hitman and Brea Grant effortlessly doing "innocent".
Final Cut
Director: Michael Hazanavicius.
With: Romain Duris, Berenice Bejo,
Finnegan Oldfield, Gregory Gadebois.
France 2022. 111 mins.
Unneeded remake of brilliant 'One Cut of the Dead'. It wisely expands on the meta by namechecking that this is indeed the French make of the Japanese original, but with very few new jokes of its own it only illuminates the strength and artfulness of that source material. When you know the gag, the first crucial long-take seems to have missed the point - the opening long-take of the original was amusing if seemingly clunky, but clearly timed its errors so that they never quite clued you in to this being "bad", never quite made you give up before its reveal. I am not sure that the timing and sensibility of this version would not have just signalled "bad" or made me suspicious from the off. When you know the original, it is likely to bore here because you know what's coming. However, so strong is the gag that when the second half kicks in, there is still a lot of hilarity still to be had.
Midnight Peepshow
Directors: Jake West, Airell Anthony Hayles, Andy Edwards, Ludovica Musumeci.
With: Chiara D’Anna, Richard Cotton,
Sarah Diamond, Roisin Browne.
In the sleazy side of London, Soho, men are arseholes and women are femme fatales and sirens, all manipulated by the mysterious entity "Black rabbit", a dark website for transgressive sexual fantasies. The film mostly avoids exploitation (it's mostly the men who get the worst here), but with its sinister Russian sex-abusers organisation (which apparently is only interested in the handful of cast that we see, despite a seemingly global audience), undernourished motivation, a little "A Serbian Film" imagery and nonsensical surrealism, it's not as transgressive as it thinks. Despite Richard Cotton's devoted and haunted performance and a great sleazy Soho atmosphere, it doesn't quite convince. (I am thinking 'The Beta Test' and 'The Special' did this better.)
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