31 Days of Halloween: The Beach House

 2019, Jeffrey A Brown (location manager for a TON of movies) -- download

"OK" ... it might not be good writing, that I would start many a sentence with this, but as this blog was always supposed to be a reflection of Kent and I sitting at the back of a bus talking about movies, it would be appropriate for me to start a conversation this way... so it stands.

OK, at it's core, this was the body horror alien creature from the depths movie that I hoped Sea Fever would have been. In my head canon, they might have been set in the same world, as they were both about "alien" lifeforms (both bioluminescent jellyfish-life forms) emerging from the depths of the ocean to cause (possibly) catastrophic effects on the surface world.

Where is Aquaman when you need him.

The movie begins with Emily (Liana Liberato, If I Stay) and Randall (Noah le Gros, The Get Down) arriving at his father's beach house on some remote seasonal beachfront sand spit. The place is pretty empty. But the house is not. Mitch (Jake Weber, Dawn of the Dead), a friend of Randall's father is staying there, with his ailing wife Jane (Maryann Nagel). The two couples, one my own age, one much younger, are tense at first, but settle in, despite the two pairs already dealing with their own complications.

During a night where Randall breaks out some pretty strong edibles, the night is lit up with bioluminescent ... something. Its not just in the beach and in the water, but also floating through the air, and clinging to the plant life on the shore. I am sure if Emily wasn't so stone, she would have been more concerned, as she is studying organic chemistry and the origins of life. This is unnatural in the nth degree. Jane, also being rather stone, wanders out into the blue lit grove of trees, panicking her husband, and returning with an immense cough. Hackles are risen.

The next day, the beach shows no signs of the blue glow from the night before. Jane is decidedly not well, and Mitch is nowhere to be found. Randall and Emily go to the beach to relax, but we the viewer know there won't be much time for relaxation. Mitch reappears, but walks into the water, disoriented and seemingly still stoned. He just keeps walking. Randall feels ill and, well, its not just puke that comes from him. Emily steps on a jellyfish tentacle, and it does more than sting her, but finds its way under her flesh. The beach is suddenly saturated with giant gyoza jellies, and Jane has turned into a milky eyed zombie crawling towards the young couple. Randall is getting more ill by the moment.

The body horror of the movie was palpable. We know something alien has come from the water, and is .... changing the people. Alas, the movie never really goes anywhere with it. The escape is trying, but literally goes nowhere. There are eerie alerts on the TV, and on the ham radios, of how this is affecting not just the beach here, but the entire coast. And there are further encounters with other rare occupants of the beach front, all horrific and unsettling, but rather than focusing on the horror, the movie wanted to focus on the narcotic nature, the changing brain chemistry as the remaining people are changed... forever.

I enjoyed most of the movie, but while I understand, it was its intent, I didn't buy into the disconnection all the characters felt, as they changed. And the ending just seemed to dispense with much of the backstory it spent a lot of time building, for naught.