The Necessity of Plot (The Possession and The Master)

A good portion of The Possession is a good movie. Natasha Calis has a strong screen presence for someone so young, and this makes up for the weakness of Kyra Sedgwick and Jeffrey Dean Morgan in their performances as her parents. But, in the end, this very plot-driven story comes to an obvious climax--with the requisite "take me instead" detour that comes with just about any movie in the possession subgenre of horror films--with a nice, seemingly tacked on "twist" of an ending that leaves an opening for an unnecessary sequel.

The problem, though is that through all the drama, you know the plot, the story never gels very well. Sure, we can empathize with a divorced dad just trying to do right by his daughters, except the film never gives us too many examples of this--he gives his daughters pizza on his weekend despite his ex-wife telling him not to, which is cute except that his youngest daughter seems to be a vegetarian because of allergies not just moral reasons, so this is actually an example of his bad parenting. His best parenting is in figuring out something is wrong with his daughter, but after she stabs him with a fork he'd have to be blind not to notice that.

There's another man in the wife's life now, and he keeps reappearing but ultimately gets chased out of the story by the possessed girl never to be  seen or really spoken of again. Because Hollywood needs the divorced couple to get back together in the end, you know, and he was in the way. Except, the film never actually gives the husband and wife any reason to get back together. And, his job offer out of state sounds like a good idea... well, it would if the movie bothered to suggest that either of these people were struggling with life monetarily or in any way at all. If he was pining for his ex-wife, if he seemed depressed an lonely without his daughters around in his new house, if there was any depth to any of these characters at all, perhaps we'd have reason to care. Instead, we get a horror film with very few attempts at scares, even fewer successful ones, and a generic, straightforward plot.

That being said, at least The Possession has a plot. Paul Thomas Anderson is a great filmmaker. And, he can tell a good story and get fantastic performances out of his actors. But--and I regret this even as I suggest it, because I understand that PLOT is not actually necessary--I really wish he could discover the idea of having a plot. There's a scene in The Master where the titular Master's son says he sleeps through his father's sermons because he can skip parts here and there and not miss a thing--"He's making this up as he goes," he suggests. And, remarkably, the same seems true of Anderson's film; you could skip a few scenes and still get the whole idea. There are no character arcs, no plot to speak of--well, there is almost a plot, or at least the inkling of a direction, except the film never actually goes that direction and the characters don't change... well, maybe a little, but we don't really see that change happen. We might wonder if there is a real epiphany in Joaquin Phoenix's Freddie Quell walking back and forth and back and forth for at least an entire day, but at best, the epiphany he gets is the same we might get from the sequence: this is going nowhere.

The trailer for The Master includes a few shots that are not in the film, and that happens, sure. But, there is one shot of Phoenix with a gun that hints perhaps at violence or at least the possibility thereof. Maybe he will come to question his Master, maybe even kill him. But, this never happens. In fact, he violently protects his Master and mostly gets away with it.

Chekov would be, well, confused.

Phoenix's Quell has a problem with alcohol, a problem with women, and a problem with his temper. In the end, he's still got at least two of these, and probably all three, albeit perhaps in a more controlled measure. But, this growth, if it is even there, does NOT come from his Master's help, not really. If we believe the Master to be correct in the things he says about aliens and endless battles between good and evil, then this could be one tiny piece of that struggle, but it is so tiny a piece that it doesn't matter. Painted on a cosmic canvas, these two men struggling with their own arrogance and ego is all but meaningless.

One could guess this is the point of the film, but one should expect the point of the film to be, even if only for the briefest of moments, text and not subtext. And, characters should grow (or wither) and change. The order of events should matter. We should not be able to sleep through part of the story and miss nothing.

Then again, at least we get real characters, people with depth in a world where things just happen and demon possessed boxes don't happen into our lives to infuse a plot into the boredom. Arguably, The Master is more realistic--and I do not mean because of the supernatural element in The Possession--in giving us a portrait of life, people who seem real, who have real cares and concerns and struggle with everyday things. But, isn't that why we have life? Shouldn't our fiction have more of a point, or at least a recognizable catharsis? Shouldn't it at least have an obvious endpoint?

The key to a plot is that when it ends, we can recognize that it is over. In The Master, the movie ends, apparently, at the point that Anderson decided for it to end, not at some organic point where the struggles within the story have ended, or at least turned an important corner. There is certainly value to a character study, but even the most aimless and arbitrary character study relies on an arc, something the character wants and in some way seeks. And, failure to obtain can be a reasonable ending to a plot, but a real denouement requires something to come of that failure as well.

The Master is a great film, filled with parts that could probably be rearranged into something far better. But, something is missing.

and i didn't even get to the opening credits... oh, and it's about time i reviewed Cabin in the Woods

In my recent review of Paranormal Incident, I neglected to cover something that should have been right at the beginning--the opening credits... I also should have mentioned the entirely pointless brief flashes of nudity early in the film that served only to titilate and barely to establish some character conflict later which could have been better served by, well, about anything else. But, I digress.

Opening credits. Sometimes, they are awesome and appropriate and set up themes and feelings and tone for the film--I'm thinking North by Northwest, I'm thinking SE7EN, I'm thinking Sleepwalkers, Halloween, any of those Saul Bass style openers... and there are many. I'd like to deal with SE7EN's credits here, because they relate in a way to Paranormal Incidents. There's scratchiness, frames that aren't quite as still as they should be, like the projector is unsteady, there are flashes of creepy imagery that may or may not tie in to the actual content of the film... in SE7EN we get a bit of a behind-the-scenes look at a killer we have not yet been introduced to, and in retrospect we may realize later that we're getting a look at his journals, which show up later. WE also get a good idea of the vibe for the film, that world-os-off-kilter tone that permeates the film...

Paranormal Incident tries this, but doesn't have anything as great as that almost wordless version of Nine Inch Nails' Closer playing. Instead, there's instrumental music that almost contradicts the visuals, which could be on purpose, except that wouldn't fit the tone of the film. It's like the director or whoever put together the titles wanted a creepy vibe, wanted that SE7EN vibe, but didn't quite know how to get it, and just couldn't find his Nine Inch Nails CD (or the money to license one of their songs).

Anyway, sometimes the opening titles work, sometimes they don't. Insidious, which far too many people actually liked, has this discordant and loud stinger-like music to go with its title, like it's going for some classic horror film visual and a jarring audio to, well, get some of that off-kilter vibe also. Except, the film is so lazily put together that the tone never congeals. And, the opening credits seem more like a parody than something as serious as it's supposed to be... Then again, so many people loved that movie and probably totally dug the opening titles. I think that sudden, pseudo-old-fashioned title with accompanying stinger works far better in this year's Cabin in the Woods. Now, this film deserves a review of its own, but the short version is this: while Cabin in the Woods is a horror film, it is not often as scary as its content might seem to require. But, that's kinda on purpose, because Cabin in the Woods IS a parody of a sort, or at least a genre deconstruction. Insidious, on the other hand, is supposed to be taken seriously, is supposed to be a classic in the making, despite Darth Maul's retarded younger brother and all that--go find my Insidious review if you want more on that. The thing is, that stinger title in Cabin in the Woods is so incongruous with what comes before it and what comes after it that it serves as this rather abrupt reminder that what we're watching is NOT real. I mean, we all know the film isn't real, but the fact that it isn't real is part of the point to Cabin in the Woods, arguably...

SPOILERS COMING--Cabin in the Woods is essentially a deconstruction of why we watch horror films, particularly slasher films. Whether or not we the audience are represented merely by the old gods waiting for our sacrifices or perhaps more by the technicians not only leading the victims to their deaths but betting on how it's going to go--well, that's an argument worth having as well. Paranormal Incident gets some of scares in more successfully than Cabin in the Woods, but Cabin in the Woods is not really made for someone new to the genre, needing to be frightened; Cabin in the Woods is made for the veteran audience, the kind of people that populate the edges of the Scream films, knowledgable of the rules of the genre, knowing what's coming and at the same time ecstatic for the moments things twist away from the usual path and completely happy with the moments where eveyrthing happens just as it's happened before and will happen again in the next slasher film (and, yes, it's worth pointing out that the actual plot that gets the characters killed in the film is closer to a supernatural movie like Evil Dead than a straight slasher film, I think it serves the film better in describing it as a slasher because a) it's easier and b) that structure is essentially the same, even if in one you get a methodical killer and in the other you get vengeful spirits or pseudo-zombies... and, that "pseudo" is to separate out the more straight zombies from the likes of Romero's films or even 28 Days Later from the more supernatural ones of the Evil Dead series). Cabin in the Woods is comfort food for people who know what to expect and are comfortable even when cliches are thrown around.

Of course, Cabin in the Woods tears a lot of the cliches apart, makes the stereotypical characters into a part of the story... For those who haven't seen it, the idea is that there are five types of victims for the sacrifice, the jock, the slut, the nerd, the fool and the virgin. These show up (perhaps not exactly) in so many slasher films that they are easily recognizable. But, Cabin in the Woods gives us not screenwriters fitting these characters into a deadly plot but rather other characters turning them into these stereotypes right before our eyes, or at least attempting to. This is already deep into spoiler territory, but I don't want to give everything away.

Cabin in the Woods has the trademark wit of Joss Whedon and a hadnful of good actors for a horror film. This is far more of a "classic" in the making than Insidious (which sucked) or Paranormal Incident (which was pretty good most of the time). The film is intelligent and does serve up a few scares--though, they are comfort scares for we fans of horror films. It's a great deconstruction of the genre/subgenre... now we just need a good reconstructive followup, something new that isn't so-called "torture porn" or mediocre (at best) or bad (at worst) attempts to bring back ghost stories... A recent mediocre example would be The Lady in Black, starring Daniel Radcliffe. Its parts are all pretty good, but the whole just isn't very deep or meaningful, and good ghost stories should have some depth to them, After all, ghost stories are about loss, at least in part, and The Lady in Black is about loss from a couple angles. Insidious would be a bad attempt to bring back ghosts. The Paranormal Activity movies (not to be confused with Paranormal Incident) are good attempts to put something new into ghost stories, with the first one being the most original, the second one probably being the best made, and the third expanding the story into something bigger and weirder... Honestly, when I saw Scream 3 and they said the rule for the third part in a trilogy was that you find some secret from the past that changes the way you look at everything (you know like in the original Star Wars trilogy, learning how Luke and Leia are related to one another and to Darth Vader changes the entire story. And Paranormal Activity 3 does this sort of thing to the series. But, the whold found footage thing is perhaps getting a bit played out, used well now and then... Chronicle made excellent use of the idea, and also made good use of Freudian psychology (which my wife deconstructed far better than I could have, and I should still get her to do a guest review). Insidious, on the other hand, could have used something like a found footage restriction. The conceit would have limited its approach enought that maybe it wouldn't have been so full of itself.

Children who Chase Lost Voices from Deep Below... and the films about them that are not quite as good as they should be

The plot for Children Who Chase Lost Voices from Deep Below is actually fairly simple. A young girl whose father is dead and whose nurse mother is mostly absent ventures into a mythical underworld with a government agent who believes he can get his dead wife back by going there. It's anime, so it's got some great visuals, some interesting design work--the "God" in the underworld is a great visual, for example, like a multi-oared boat flying through the sky the first few times it's seen then transforming into a many-eyed human-shaped thing when it comes time to assist in the government agent's resurrection of his wife...

And, that last bit is not much of a spoiler. That there is resurrection coming is kinda the point of the story, or rather the plot. The story seems to be leaning toward some deeper exploration into grief and coming to terms with loss, except the main girl never really deals with her father's death and never once considers bringing him back. And, the agent is so inexpressive that his grief is all but nonexistent. Still the movie is entertaining. It is entertaining as an adventure story, these two characters and those who help them or that they meet along the way interact in interesting ways, there is tension and drama and though there may be no clear antagonist, there are some villainous inclusions here and there, and there is some good conflict.

The problem, as I see it, is this movie needs more internal conflict. It needs more of the agent's grief, more of the girl's grief. When--SPOILERS AHEAD, not that there haven't already been some--the agent's wife can only return to flesh by possessing the girl, there should be a bigger dilemma for the agent or he should come across as a villain, but there is really neither. It is simple another thing that happens. When the strange shadow creatures come after the characters, it seems more an exericse in worldbuilding than storytelling and... I must admit I'm not sure if there is some source material here that has greater detail, maybe a comic or something--certainly not an actual mythology, since this one incorporates seemingly Japanese ideas about nature with some South American details; the guardian creatures that keep overlanders out are called Quetzal Coatls for example. There are elements here that seem like windowdressing, even though there's a great plot at the center. The story just never quite gets everything together into one cohesive whole. What could have been a fantastic drama about grief and loss disguised as an adventure yarn is instead simply an adventure yarn. And, I don't mean to judge the film simply on what I imagine it to be; there are points in the film where grief is explicitly brought up, hinting at themes that seem to want to be here but aren't.

All in all, still an enjoyable film. It just needed to be more if it was going to hint at much bigger things; I mean, there's a god and giant animalian guardians, shadow creatures, violence, and even a cute little kitten. This movie should be better but is still quite good.

Paranormal Incident... a movie that is not quite what it thinks it is

(school is over for at least a while so it's time to wake up my blogs)

Just finished watching "Paranormal Incident" which has a 2.5 on IMDb. "The infamous Odenbrook Sanitarium closed after a mass suicide occurred within its walls. Sixty years later..." That's the tagline. Basic plot, a handful of college students go to spend the weekend in this supposedly haunted sanitarium ostensibly for some final project in a class. I am not sure what class they are taking, but I wish they'd had it as an elective where I went. I would have loved to do some ghost hunting for credit. Anyway, there's a framing story that is poorly written, badly acted, and ultimately attempts to turn the movie into something bigger than it is. The setup otherwise is simple, a little cliched, but the found footage scenes (more on some problems there later) are occasionally quite good, getting some tension going with what are otherwise very familiar shots to anyone who has seen even one episode of Ghost Hunters. In some (and only some) of these scenes, the acting is even quite good, nothing to win awards but far better than a small budget horror film might sometimes get... and some of the worst that comes from such a low budget as far as acting goes is on display in the framing sequence. In other scenes, especially as the movie goes on, the acting is subpar, and some actors who seem promising early on sound like they are reading brand new script pages in other scenes.

The movie is also inconsistent in its direction. Again, the framing sequence--which involves the one survivor viewing the found footage with a woman who may or may not be law enforcement--is poorly directed... I would wonder if the film was just too short so this sequence was added later except the character involved would have no reason to be absent for so much of the rest of the movie if this wasn't part of the original script. Anyway, a lot of the investigation scenes are put together pretty well. There are attempts to insert flashes of things that aren't there which come across as creepy at first, a little interesting, then the more they happen, especially late in the film, they seem desperate, like the director didn't know he was doing a pretty good job with the scary bits otherwise. Now, once the scares become more explicit, visible ghosts rather than doors slamming for example, the directing seems lazier and a few shots seem to almost have entirely new color schemes and cinematography--yes, I'm talking about cinemtography and color schemes with a low budget horror film.

Regarding the actual content of the plot, there are some problems, but overall it works. It's generic and cliched, but it works. But, there are some holes. Notably, the found footage was supposed to be edited by the guy in charge who was absent from the action. He's in a hospital--SPOILERS AHEAD, not that it matters much--or thinks he is, has NOT seen any of the footage so certainly could not have edited it. And, if any of the supposed law enforcement had edited the tapes they would already have seen the ghosts and whatnot and know that this guy was not guilty of killing his friends, which is why they are questioning him... of course, given the way the framing sequence ends, with them killing him apparently because he saw the devil and knows there's actual paranormal stuff going on at the sanitarium, maybe they already did watch all the footage and edited it to jog his memory... except, why jog his memory if you want him NOT to remember anything? Why pretend to accuse him of murder if you know he didn't commit it? Why have this sequence at all when it fails to make this movie into something that is uniquely clever or that stands out from a crowd of similarly plotted films? I found it while browsing Netflix for a crappy horror film to watch--and it was better than I expect, at least when it bothered to be good--and it currently has only 35 ratings on IMDb. This movie has no real selling point to get attention. I get that it needs some hook to grab an audience. But, it isn't sold on the hook of the framing story. It is sold on the mass suicide history, which though mentioned in context of the story is absolutely unimportant as far as the plot goes.

Still, for a supernatural slasher type film, this movie is not half bad. In fact, it's only about 20% bad. The other 80% is good, at least for this type of movie. Biggest complaint is the lameness of the framing sequence. Also, the inconsistency of the directing, including use of shots that are obviously not from the any of the handheld cameras or hospital cameras but are cut right in with them nonetheless... District 9 got away with mixing documentary style footage with straight movie footage, but this is NOT that. This is lazy editing, lazy directing, with the occasionally good scene. I certainly didn't regret watching it.

274 films in 2011 (six of them twice)

1. 2012
2. 28 Weeks Later
3. 3rd Letter, The
4. 50/50
5. Adjustment Bureau, The
6. Adventures in Babysitting
7. Animal Farm
8. Another Year
9. Army of Darkness
10. Arthur
11. Arthur (original)
12. Artist, The
13. Bag of Bones
14. Bang Bang Club
15. Barney's Version
16. Battle of Los Angeles
17. Battle: Los Angeles
18. Beastly
19. Beaver, The
20. Beginners
21. Better Life, A
22. Biutiful
23. Black Button
24. Black Death
25. Black Swan
26. Blair Witch Project, The
27. Blind Date
28. Bridesmaids
29. Bronson
30. Cabin Fever 2
31. Camden 28, The
32. Cannibal! The Musical
33. Carnage
34. Cars
35. Cars 2
36. Catfish
37. Cave of Forgotten Dreams, The
38. Cedar Rapids
39. Christmas Story, A
40. Citizen Ruth
41. Closet Land
42. Collapse
43. Commerce
44. Company Men, The
45. Conan the Barbarian
46. Confession, The
47. Consent
48. Conspirator, The
49. Contagion
50. Conviction
51. Country Strong
52. Crazies, The
53. Crazies, The (original)
54. Crazy, Stupid, Love.
55. Creepshow
56. Creepshow 2
57. Crush, The
58. Dark Days
59. Day & Night
60. Day of the Dead
61. Day of the Dead 2: Contagium
62. Days of Heaven
63. Dead and Breakfast
64. Debt, The
65. Degenerate Art
66. Descendants, The
67. Dirty Filthy Love
68. Dogtooth
69. Dolphin Tale
70. Downfall
71. Drive
72. Everything Is Illuminated
73. Everything Must Go
74. Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn
75. External World, The
76. Extract
77. Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
78. Film Unfinished, A
79. Final Destination 5
80. Final Destination, The
81. Freakonomics
82. Frozen
83. Game, The
84. Genesis
85. Genius Within, A
86. Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The
87. Gnomeo & Juliet
88. God of Love
89. Good Morning, Mr. Hitler
90. Greatest Movie Ever Sold, The
91. Groundhog Day
92. Grown Ups
93. Gruffalo, The
94. Hangover Part II, The
95. Happythankyoumoreplease
96. Hard Corps, The
97. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2
98. Heathers
99. Hellraiser: Deader
100. Hellraiser: Hellseeker
101. Hellraiser: Hellworld
102. Hellraiser: Inferno
103. Help, The
104. Higher Ground
105. Hobo with a Shotgun
106. Hold for Laughs
107. Howard
108. Hugo
109. Hunger
110. I Am Love
111. I Love You Phillip Morris
112. I Spit on Your Grave
113. Ides of March, The
114. Idiocracy
115. Illusionist, The
116. In Her Skin
117. In the Light of Reverence
118. In the Mouth of Madness
119. In the Pit
120. In Time
121. Incident at Ogala
122. Inside Job
123. Insidious
124. Jack Goes Boating
125. Jane Eyre
126. JCVD
127. Killing in the Name
128. King's Speech, The
129. Knock Off
130. Kung Fu Panda 2
131. Kurt & Courtney
132. Last Airbender, The
133. Law Abiding Citizen
134. Les Miserables
135. Let's Pollute
136. Like Crazy
137. Limitless
138. Lincoln Lawyer, The
139. Lionheart
140. Lo
141. Lost Thing, The
142. Lucky 13
143. Madagascar, A Journey Diary
144. Mao's Last Dancer
145. Martha Marcy May Marlene
146. Marwencol
147. Maximum Risk
148. Medicine for Melancholy
149. Melancholia
150. Midnight in Paris
151. Mildred Pierce
152. Misery
153. Modify
154. Moneyball
155. Mozart & The Whale
156. Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr.
157. My Week with Marilyn
158. Na Wewe
159. Neighbors
160. Neil Gaiman's Short Film about John Bolton
161. Never Let Me Go
162. Next Three Days, The
163. Nice Guys Finish Last
164. Night of the Comet
165. Nowhere to Run
166. One Day
167. One Survivor Remembers
168. One Week
169. Order, The
170. Our Idiot Brother
171. Paranormal Activity
172. Paranormal Activity 2
173. Paranormal Activity 3
174. Paul
175. Philadelphia
176. Pink Floyd: The Wall
177. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
178. Planet of the Apes
179. Planet Terror
180. Poltergeist
181. Poltergeist 2
182. Poltergeist III
183. Pontypool
184. Poster Girl
185. Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
186. Puss in Boots
187. Quarantine 2: Terminal
188. Quest, The
189. Rango
190. Real Steel
191. Red Dawn
192. Red Riding: 1974
193. Red Riding: 1980
194. Red Riding: 1983
195. Red State
196. Replicant
197. Requiem for a Dream
198. Reservoir Dogs
199. Restless
200. Return to Horror High
201. Ring, The
202. Rio
203. Ripple Effect
204. Rise of the Planet of the Apes
205. Robert Kennedy Remembered
206. Rubber
207. Salt
208. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World
209. Scrat's Continental Crack-Up
210. Scrat's Continental Crack-Up Part 2
211. SCRE4M
212. Second in Command
213. Sensology
214. Sentiment of the Flesh, The
215. Sex Drive
216. Shame
217. Sharpe's Eagle
218. Sharpe's Rifles
219. Shining, The
220. Silence behind the Back, The
221. Sling Blade
222. Smash His Camera
223. Smorgasbord
224. Solitary Man, A
225. Source Code
226. Specials, The
227. State of Play
228. Steal this Movie!
229. Strangers No More
230. Sucker Punch
231. Suicide Club
232. Sun Come Up
233. Sunnyview
234. Sunset Limited, The
235. Super
236. Survival of the Dead
237. Sweetgrass
238. Taken
239. Thing, The
240. Thor
241. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
242. Town, The
243. Toy Story Toons: Hawaiian Vacation
244. Tree of Life, The
245. Trick R Treat
246. Triplets of Belleville, The
247. Trollhunter
248. Truman Show, The
249. Trust
250. Tumbling
251. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
252. Universal Soldier
253. Universal Soldier: The Return
254. Unknown
255. Unloved, The
256. Visitor Q
257. Waking Sleeping Beauty
258. Wall Street
259. War Horse
260. War Tapes, The
261. Warriors of Qiugang, The
262. Waste Land
263. Way Back, The
264. We Bought a Zoo
265. We Need to Talk about Kevin
266. Whisper
267. William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe
268. Win Win
269. Wish 143
270. Wolfman, The
271. X-Men: First Class
272. Yellow Handkerchief, The
273. Yellowbrickroad
274. Young Adult