31 Days of Halloween: The Occupant

2025, Hugo Keijzer (feature debut) -- download

Kieijzer made a short called The Occupant: Prologue which is tied this movie much more strongly to the scifi vein. But instead of truly building on the base of that short, he decided to go for a more emotional impact, giving us a movie that is about loss and survival. They sometimes call the genre "survival horror" but usually that is when there is more than isolation and elements to be defeated. This movie is entirely about Abby fighting to survive a helicopter crash in the remote Caucasus Mountains of Georgia, the country not the state. The scifi element, which also allows a wee bit of horror to creep in, is there, but it doesn't play a big part of the movie. And if the audience reviews are to say anything, just ended up pissing off the viewers expecting a proper alien incursion movie, which wasn't helped by the absolutely infuriating AI generated images that dominate Google searches for this movie.

Abby (Ella Balinska, Charlie's Angels) and her sister are very close; they bonded strongly after the death of their mother. Now Beth has terminal cancer and Abby is desperate to find any measure to extend her sister's life, including taking a job with a Georgian uranium mining company, which could pay for private medical care. She would rather deal with a long shot than be with her sister during her final days, and the weight of the guiltis heavy.

The speculating hasn't paid off, but she found a strange obsidian like rock she believes could fund her, but then gets "the call" -- she needs to go home. She hops the company helicopter out but it runs into a flock of starlings (murmuration, once again boding ill weather) and the copter crashes, killing the pilots. She's not sure what to do next, but a walkie talkie chirps out some static and she tunes it to hear from John (Rob Delaney, Bad Monkey). He's an American pilot whose plane also crashed; he is pinned beneath some wreckage but otherwise sounds fine, in good spirits even. He knows his long-range radio is working but cannot reach it, so as hers is destroyed, Abby decides to find him instead of walking out.

The walk in the wilderness is the bulk of the movie. As a genre, I generally enjoy the survival in the harsh, cold wilds and this movie gives it in spades. But really the talking between the two is what the movie wants us to focus on, which is weird unto itself. There is notably a lack of mention of food or water, for either of the two. And then there is the rock, the strange black shiny stone that reacts to her touch. The same rocks litter the mountain sides on her journey, exhibiting strange anti-gravity effects, but really the only other-worldly effect she notices is when it rearranges to her will, into a piton assisting her getting up the mountain. Eventually she ends up in an abandoned Georgian mountain village where some Russian soldiers are patrolling. John cautions her exposing herself to them, considering the volatile nature of border patrols. But its when she discovers she's not the only one talking to "John".

Whatever "John" is, he's been manipulating people in the mountains. Can't be many but he does mention Abby was the most "fun" of those he has played with. Its time for the Russian soldier and her to trek out, but they make a fatal error crossing a large lake. The thin ice takes the soldier and Abby partially falls through. Thoroughly soaked, she is about to give up when she sees another helicopter fly over a ridge. Through delirium, she climbs the ridge and... finds a cave. She falls down its incline into a pool of water, wherein lies the body of John, the American pilot, encrusted in the black stones and quite dead.

Then the expositional explainer, the "alien". Whether its John who became one with the strange rocks or something inherent to the alien who crashed, something you would only know after seeing the "prologue" short, it wants her to join with it, with the collective nature the stones provide. Its unclear, unsatisfying (why are the rocks scattered over an entire mountain range) but it serves one purpose -- to give Abby a choice. She can join with it and be given a hallucinatory idyllic family life which isn't real, or she can fight against its offer, get out of the mountains and return for her sister's final days -- reality. She chooses the latter, of course.

I wanted to like this movie, but... it was under-baked. Sometimes the tone and visuals can allow a tense scifi and/or horror thriller to excel, but even with the stunning landscape and great performance by Balinska (is it though; hard to tell as she is the only one present most times) so much was lacking. And frustrating, especially considering the idea that she may have never actually gone for the trek, and the whole thing was an hallucination at the scene of the helicopter crash, influenced by the shiny black rock in her bag. 

3 Short Paragraphs (Or Not): Survive

2024,  Frédéric Jardin (Nuit blanche) -- Amazon

Or Survivre.

This low-budget (more accurately, economical budget; low has connotations) French apocalyptic survival (pun intended) movie strikes me as the pilot episode on a 90s scifi survival series, right down to the make-shit-up "science" of the situation and the "every other person is a Bad Guy" setups. Like those shows, it just rushes along on a wave of adrenalin and the screaming, without really trying to have a plot. Its almost big dumb fun, but not quite, as it takes itself far too seriously, considering how absolutely silly the whole premise is.

It starts with a family on a boat and wee bit of character development, just a wee bit. A French family, he is German, they live in Miami. The family vacation at sea is interrupted by weird storms and satellites falling from the sky and ears bleeding. When they wake up the next morning, the ocean is gone. They are in a desert in the middle of nowhere. Sucked through a rift in time and/or space? Nope, that would make "sense"; instead they are still off the coast of Miami but the oceans have been sucked away. 

By looking at his compass, Dad (Andreas Pietschmann, 1899) determines the poles have reversed after which the oceans went onto the land, leaving what they left behind as dry land. Wait, dry land? So, the water went... uphill? Dry land was not dry because the magnetic poles kept the water there, but because the continents had rose above the water. Furthermore, one night's departure of water would not leave a dry, gritty desert (filmed outside Morocco) but a muddy morass probably massively deep in many places. But no matter, oceans gone, boat stranded, what to do what to do.

They talk to people on the radio. The scientist who was in a deep sea diving rig explains to them what happened, in details only a scientist could and that he is in a vehicle that can hold three people. Also, the oceans will return. How he knows this, who knows or cares -- sense of urgency! Save our kids! And that tense setup is also interrupted by the arrival of a stranger with a dog. Men with dogs are to be trusted, right? Nope, stabby stabby, Dad is dead. Wait what?

The rest of the traumatized family (as if oceans going bye bye wasn't enough) run off into the desert, towards the man in the yellow submarine. Bad Man gives chase, sans dog, cuz Mom (Émilie Dequenne, Brotherhood of the Wolf) killed it. Poor dog, not his fault his owner was a dick. They find a plane that obviously crashed into the ocean years ago, and hide out the night. But not before the bad man catches up to them and Mom stabby stabby kills him. BUT the next morning, his body is picked over; what's been chewing at him?

Delirious with thirst, young teenage Son drinks from a puddle. "Don't do that !" yells Mom! And almost instantly he gets sick, but that's alright, cuz she has a first aid kid with a needle that makes things alright. Further on, they spy a crashed container ship in the distance. Should be LOTS of people on the thing, right? Full of sailors, right? Nope, just a couple of scavengers breaking into a cracked container of bottled water and food. Help a family out? Nope, they wave their guns around cuz in this new no-ocean world, nobody can be trusted. BUT the unknown threat from earlier, that picked over the Bad Man, is now chasing everyone -- CRABS ! Deep Sea Crabs! Not bothered by the lack of pressure, they are hungry and like to pinch pinch everyone to death. The family crawls on top of a container until the sated crabs depart. Now they have food, water and guns.

Eventually they make it to the yellow submarine, but only after leaving Mom behind in a trench. Yellow Submarine Guy says they only have hours until the ocean returns, BUT he's been bitten by crabs so that will make room for Mom. So, back to the trench to get Mom, and everyone gets in, and Submarine Guy dies, and the oceans return. Whoosh.

The next morning they are awash on a ruined beach, inland, oceans where they should be, but proper dry land has been wrecked. Cue the sequel.

If this had been a terrible 90s action survival TV show, I would have probably forgiven it because even That Guy of the 90s liked disaster and survival plots. And back then you forgave a lot but this is now and This Guy, despite having devolved into Terrible Action Movie Guy, has developed an identity of snarky complaining. While being decently shot and acted, where acting was required between the running and screaming, it just diverged from reality so far without giving even the littlest of shit, that it irked me. Pretending that all this lunacy could be caused by natural disaster just strained credulity to the point of breaking.

3 Short Paragraphs (Or Not): Last Breath

2025, Alex Parkinson (a bunch of "documentary" style TV shows like River Monsters) -- download

Well that explains things, in that while watching the movie, it felt more like watching a dramatic version of a documentary, but with no commentary track. There was little to no characterization and the movie was swept along by the tides of the "action", and that action was barely a nod to traditional tense rescue thrillers. And yet I was carried along by what was going on, to the point of going, "Wow, that was 1.5 hours??"

The story is a real life one, where a "saturation diver" (they get stuck inside a compression tank which is saturated with gases, so they can deep dive for long periods of time) is lost due to a rough seas accident, and actually succumbs to lack of oxygen. But even after almost a half hour without air, he.... survived, with no ramifications. Parkinson previously did a documentary on the events, also called Last Breath, which lends some cause as to why it felt so... detailed and realistic. Anywayz, two deep divers, repairing oil pipes in the North Sea are separated during rough weather, and one, Chris Lemons (Finn Cole, Animal Kingdom) is lost when his power & air tether breaks away. The crew of the ship desperately tried to repair their issues, eventually allowing the remaining diver Dave Yuasa (Simu Liu, Kim's Convenience) to recover Chris, and was incredibly surprised when the man started breathing again.

The plot is small, the cast is small, the "action" is limited, and yet somehow, as already mentioned, I felt satisfied with the story telling. There is a great supporting cast all who seemed to be dedicated to giving a good performance without any of those big thriller moments. To me, it says something about Parkinson's directing in that we all, viewer and performers, felt present in the moments. We all have seen movies where it just felt like a camera pointed at someone reading lines. I hope to see him do some more dramatic pieces, though most audiences would not enjoy that this survivor thriller was low on the usual rollercoaster scale of thrills.

3 Short Paragraphs (Or Not): Bird Box: Barcelona

2023, David & Alex Pastor (Carriers) -- Netflix

OK, that's just weird. I listed a 2009 American infection movie above, and it had a very young Kiernan Shipka playing a character named Jodie. I just started watching "The Last Showgirl" and it has a still-young Kiernan Shipka playing a character named Jodie.

I just rewatched Bird Box and wrote about it for the first time as a fill-in for The Dark Year. Its a decent apocalyptic horror movie about creatures (we never see them; we don't know what they are) who inspire people to commit suicide, should you gaze upon them. The movie barely explained what was going, nary a "news stories in the background" as its all "the day off". In the not-long-after the only addition to the world-building was in the form of people who had looked upon the creatures, but didn't die --- they just went mad, and became focused on making sure other survivors did look. Like zombie movies, the greater enemy is other people.

Like its predecessor, this movie dances back and forth between "the day" and current day, some months after the event ended the world. But it does something unexpected -- the viewpoint is from one of the "seers" (get it? see-ers or prophets? how clever) who is convinced this is all a biblical event. He believes the people who die at his hands, never directly, are actually having their souls released to go to Heaven. He even sees a bright spot of light launch itself into the sky. A Bad Guy is the main character. But can we follow him through a movie entirely as one deluded by the insanity imposed by monsters? No, not in a mainstream flick; this ones finds a spot of redemption for him.

I honestly dislike the need for sequels to follow the beats of their predecessor. Sure, there are trope laden ideals in survivalist post-apocalypse stories where there is a road to be followed, a safe haven to be sought, but since this movie already started with a twist on ideals, why not skip the whole road story? Because it provides a frame work for the story to work upon. The journey from the last place that Sebastián (Mario Casas, Los hombres de Paco) dispatches some survivors to a safe haven for his next batch of victims is how we are allowed to see Sebastián's transformation, his redemption. A to B, down the river, up the road, salvation at the end. Death and thrilling action along the way.

As a rework to the existing predecessor story, A Quiet Place: Day One did a better job. Despite my lackluster reaction to that movie, as I was expectedly comparing it to its own predecessor, it was just so much better done than this, connected you more to the story, the circumstance and the characters involved. It did not use up each of the journeyers as fodder, but presented them as people. In the end Sebastián's redemption is interesting but the overall journey was not. 

3 Short Paragraphs (Or Not): A Breath Away

2018, Daniel Roby (Louis Cyr) -- download

Also,  Dans la brume.

This is a movie I recall seeing the trailer of around the time it was coming out, and then... entirely forgot about it. Something about the "standard horror experience" but in another culture appeals to me. This movie is The Mist except there's nothing in the mist but ... mist. The mist itself kills people, leaving us with an almost epidemic/infection movie as people shelter in place, hoping to wait it out, or for the government to come and save them. Also kind of explains why they didn't go with the straight English translation of the French movie -- "In the Mist".

Its funny, but as you get on writing this, you are going to comment that it wasn't actually horror.

Mathieu (Romain Duris, Eiffel) and Anna (Olga Kurylenko, Quantum of Solace) are raising their daughter Sarah in central Paris. Sarah is a "girl in a bubble", as she has an auto-immune syndrome and has to be kept in an atmosphere controlled chamber. Soon after introducing the characters, there is a mild earthquake, something unheard of in Paris. Mathieu is out when it occurs and is witness to clouds of brown smoke billowing forth from the ground. While it is not strictly seen, the idea of running from a massive gaseous substance that appears out of nowhere is not abnormal; nor is reacting as others are -- screaming, fleeing crowds instill the same instinct on Mathieu.

He makes it to his quaint apartment building, grabs his wife and they both flee upstairs to the top floor owned by an elderly couple. The mist only climbs so high, not into the apartment. From a rooftop vantage point Mathieu confirms the mist only reaches to a certain height, and he can even see people collecting at the distant Montmartre. They are safe, for now. But their daughter, who is also safe in her bubble, has only so much time before the batteries fail.

Not a horror movie, just a survival one, which I am sure I would normally label as a sub-genre. Survival Thriller maybe? The only thing against Mathieu and his family is time, and the mist. First, secure replacement batteries. Mathieu can hold his breath long enough to reach the apartment of a neighbour who used an oxygen bottle. That allows him to venture outside long enough to run into a crowd of people being led by the military to Monmartre. He is given a couple of oxygen masks & tanks but not pressured to join. But eventually even extra batteries will run out, and eventually they notice the mist is creeping higher, centimetre by centimetre, very very slowly. They need to collect a "bubble suit" from a research facility they were working with, on Sarah's condition. Unfortunately that does not go as planned, the couple get separated, and Anna returns with barely enough time to switch out Sarah's last battery.... but not to climb back to the top floor. 

There is also a subplot about Sarah wanting her father to check-in on another boy in another bubble in a nearby apartment complex. She has a few friends all with her condition connected only by a now non-existent internet. And then the crux of the movie, the revelation that moves it entirely out of the realm of horror or even survival. Mathieu is desperate to find something to get Sarah out of the bubble and somewhere to safety. His wife is gone, the apartment will soon be flooded by the mist and his daughter is all he cares about. But as he is riding a scooter to claim her last chance, he is distracted and falls. Distracted by a boy walking freely in the mist. It is Noé, the boy his daughter was friends with. And as the batteries were dying on her bubble, she got herself out and joins them, for her father's last breath, but for her first free of any confines.

The movie ends with children running free in fields of flowers. The cynic in me, the guy who usually writes in italics, but whom I share a great affinity with, would usually consider all so very very trite. But I liked it, as it transformed a disaster movie, an End of the World scenario, into something allegorical. With death comes life. Like Melanie lighting up the tower of spore pods at the end of The Girl with all the Gifts, effectively freeing the "hungry virus" to all remaining humans, bitten or not, the world is no longer for us who have ruined it, but for those who come next.

Peripherally related, both that movie, more precisely its originating short story "Iphigenia in Aulis" and the game "The Last of Us" came out around 2012, two stories where the "zombie plague" is caused by cordyceps fungus, and both deal with the idea of sacrificing a child to save the world. I recently rewatched the TV series (maybe the rewatch will warrant a break from my 'not write about TV' hiatus, as I also didn't write about it originally in 2023) and was inspired to watch aforementioned movie.

3 Short Paragraphs (Or Not): Elevation

2024, George Nolfi (The Banker) -- download

This is a monster movie, a post-apocalypse movie, and thus a survival movie (probably the only non-survival post-apocalypse is "The Road", as long as we exempt pure actioners). The pitch, the trailer, the premise is that something came out of the ground and started killing people, and somehow survivors found out the monsters could not go above 8000 feet. So, our main characters have been living for a number of years in a remote community above Boulder. Colorado. Until they are inspired to go back below the elevation line.

These are familiar monsters. The movies have been dealing with them for a number of years: A Quiet Place, Bird Box and The Tomorrow War, etc. Each of their monsters are different in look & feel, though I did say that the last one had "...lizard-y bug-y tentacl-y things..."  (it also reminds me of the Moorwen from Jim Caviezel's 2008 Outlander, with its feline stalking and tentacles) but they are all singularly focused on ending human life, with a little help from vast numbers and nigh invulnerability. I wonder at the psychology behind this particular genre -- not a human monster, not a virus, not a war among ourselves that ends the world, but a very outside force, one that wipes us out and we can barely understand, let alone fight back.

Will (Anthony Mackie, Twisted Metal) lives in the mountain top community with his son Hunter (Danny Boyd Jr, Watchmen). Hunter's mom was lost during an expedition below the safe line with scientist Nina (Morena Baccarin, The Mentalist), and Will has never forgiven her. To be fair, she has never forgiven herself, and spends her days drunk but performing various tests which involve shooting at a scale, a piece of armour, which we assume came from a creature, which they call Reapers. But Hunter's time is running out. He sleeps every night with some sort of CPAP machine that depend on filters, of which they are running out of. Will knows he has to head to Boulder to get more. He convinces Nina to join him cuz she "owes him" and his late wife's best friend Katie (Maddie Hasson, Impulse) demands to come along -- she is secretly-not-so-secretly in love with Will.

In these movies, the point is to get from A to B, with this movie also needing a B back to A, but really its just the first journey that matters. The formula demands we start by taking it slow, keeping the monsters hidden, get to know the characters a bit, some conflict, some exposition about the monsters, how they work, and a bit of recollection about The Time Before. And then we switch to tension and chase scenes, combat in closed quarters, almost always futile, until the corner gets turned.

A Quiet Place excelled at the ... ahem... quiet bits, the "getting to know them" bits, and unfortunately all coming after will be compared. The exposition in this movie is a bit too pedestrian, and sure it scratches an itch, but despite me wanting to say some positive things about it, as I did enjoy the experience, I cannot say it excelled at anything.  Will is Anthony Mackie, Katie is a brave, pretty blonde (code for "red shirt" in these movies) and Nina was the only one an inch above cardboard -- I did enjoy Morena Baccarin's traumatized scientist, I cannot she was great. I want to be an apologist for the movie, I want to feel about the movie as we did Battle: Los Angeles, a solid B man-vs-alien movie, but in the end, even the monster reveal and fight scenes are barely above passable.

I wonder if its my mood of late, that very little is going above meh-driven distraction into the "enjoyable" phase. I did enjoy myself watching the movie, but primarily because this kind of movie is my genre. Nothing about it is as bad as straight-to or mockbuster, as the effects are decent and the monster is creative enough, but... I want more?

Going back to my second paragraph, the meta of these movies, this is where I find my most enjoyment. This is where my own head-canon pondering, the filling in of details, win out over what the movie gives me. And yes, I am spoiling for anyone who might care -- this is another example of the "alien sends monster ahead to clear the planet for them". None of these movies have explicitly said this sort of thing, but this one goes the furthest in acknowledging it -- the monsters are bio-mechanical in nature, just killing machines instead of actual apex predators, and the movie does end with a "3 new stars in the sky" scene, foretelling the coming of the creators. Will this movie get a sequel where we actually fight the master aliens? Doubt it, but it was interesting that the movie led us there.

The Dark Year: Bird Box

2018, Susanne Bier (Things We Lost in the Fire) -- Netflix

This one gets to serve dual duty, slotted into an empty spot in the 31 Days of Halloween calendar and covering a gap from 2018.

This movie slides into the sub-genre of post-apocalypse / survival horror / monster movie that has grown in the last handful of years; I guess, it likely has existed long before, but it garnered attention with the A Quiet Place. This one was based on a 2014 novel from Josh Malerman, wherein an invisible force causes those that look upon it (so, is it invisible or is it just not able to be depicted?) to commit suicide. I can only assume Malerman was inspired by Shyamalan's The Happening which also has an invisible force caused mass apocalyptic level death by their own hands, though he claims he had a rough draft written before. Yeah, uh huh.

Anywayz, the movie does as the book, the bulk of the story told in flashbacks to the time during and just after the event, the arrival of whatever or whoever it was. Malorie (Sandra Bullock, The Lost City) is pregnant, a single expectant mother only connected to the world by her unflappable sister. Said sister (Sarah Paulson, Glass) dies almost immediately and panicking Malorie is ushered into a house where a number of survivors are hiding out. They have quickly ascertained the cause and black out the windows. The rest of the movie, the "current timing" is Malorie escaping with two five year children, Boy and Girl, to a boat on a river to a place of refuge.

There is just enough world building to satisfy my brain. The "creatures" are depicted through shadows, whispers and the swirling of leaves. The movie begins, as all do, with news reports of this phenomena emerging first in Romania or Russia and quickly spreading to the rest of the world. If you do not look at whatever it is, it will eventually leave you alone. It also will not enter a location with closed doors, which led me to wonder if there were hints of vampire mythos in there. This was also supported by the "Renfields", those that had looked upon the "creature" and survived, and were now obsessed with making sure all survivors looked upon the "beauty".

In my rewatch I once again enjoyed myself. The movie goes quickly enough from an ensemble bottle episode format to survival so as to not drag out the expected conflicts between personalities. Bullock really does a good job of embracing the personality of a woman who really wasn't suited to being a mother, but tenacious about protecting her family. I suspected she had not really decided whether she was keeping the child until the day the event happened. The journey, both literally and figuratively is handled well.

3 Short Paragraphs (Or Not): The End We Start From

2023, Mahalia Belo (Requiem) -- download

I may be over my post-apocalypse fascination, especially when the stories are far too tempered in reality. I had the opportunity to watch this movie in one sitting, but I had to turn it off. It may have been my mind at the moment, but.... it was just too sad. I was too overwhelmed by the grief, the loss, the end of it all. I weathered the second and final viewing much better.

Its the climate apocalypse. Super storms are ravaging England. A woman (Jodie Comer, The Last Duel) and a man (Joel Fry, Yesterday) have not left their house, hoping to wait it all out. She is pregnant. But the worst happens and they have to abandon the house and the flooded streets of London, just as she's having the baby. Soon out of the hospital, with failing power and panic, they drive to his parents place, pseudo-survivalists living in an isolated home in the woods, packed with enough food to last forever, more than enough to wait it all out. Except it does last and things do not go immediately back to normal.

The movie opens with tragedy compounded. Normal lives are upended, and ended. For much of the movie it is the woman and the baby Zeb. The baby is the only character ever named, ignoring the letters assigned to each character, a carry over from the adapted novel by Megan Hunter, as listed in IMDB. Despite that leaning, this is not overtly a movie about the beauty and joys of motherhood, for as much as the woman will do anything to save and protect her baby, her memories constantly fall back to her husband. You slowly see how they met, how they connected, a rather mundane meet cute, no grand love affair, no great connection written across the stars, just two people who met each other, and soon ... became three. 

But in revelation, this is not a post-apocalyptic movie. The world has not ended for this couple and their baby, they have just... survived an apocalyptic event. In many ways, it is not all that different than what we see each tornado season in the US, when entire towns are blown away, and the survivors huddle together in shelters until they can return to normal life. Of course, the impact here is greater, vaster in scale, as the loss & dispersal of much of the population of London is not easily weathered, but the movie is about resilience. No matter what happens to you, you can return to normal. But this family will grow in an entirely new normal, something we are familiar with right now, but I fear we are quickly forgetting the impact of.

On a final note, I look back in my paragraphs above, and I did little commentary on the movie and more on the story a I experienced it through the lens of a movie. I often comment I am not writing movie reviews, but who am I kidding, that is the lens through which the blog is written. Kent is embracing that fully, and growing, expanding his horizons on critical thinking, and critical watching. It is undeniable that I watch many movies from the shadow of That Guy, and notice the components of the movie, and write about. And it is undeniable that I am fascinated by the making of movies, the industry behind it, the toxicity and wonder. But sometimes, I am just captured by the story, which I think is the intent behind it all?

Most Dangerous Game

 2021, d. - AmazonPrime

Under most circumstances I would look at a film like Most Dangerous Game, clocking in at 131 minutes, starring the other Hemsworth brother (no, the other one) and popping up on AmazonPrime with zero fanfare, and just balk at the idea of watching it. But, I like the man-hunting-man genre something fierce. Battle Royale, Series 7, Surviving the Game, Hard Target, The Hunt, Avengers Arena, the Hunger Games... it's a genre that hasn't yet been played out despite the rhythms of these things being fairly consistent across the genre. There is only one of these every few years, and I'm there for it each time.

But still...131 minutes. The original film adaptation of The Most Dangerous Game only clocked in at 63 minutes.  But this isn't a remake... there is a remake of that story is coming later this year. Even still where does this Liam Hemsworth starring version get the stones to run at over two hours? And why does it just start cold with a conversation and no opening production credits or anything. Why does it so often feel remarkably like a TV show stitched together into a film? A well-produced TV show, but a TV show nonetheless.

Why do the end credits give writing credits by episode numberss? Waitaminute....is this a Quibi? It is, it is a Quibi. One escaped into the wild. I began to think the elusive Quibi didn't actually exist... but her's proof...proof!

It's a silly movie with a lot of bad dialogue and obvious exposition, and it drops a whole mythology set up to make it feel like it deserves more than just this one "season"(?). But, I was also very much entertained.  It effectively created tension, and, as absurd as it got, I never lost interest. Plus always happy to see Zach Cherry and Sarah Gadon... plus Christoph Waltz is very fun, especially when you're not sure if he's really the bad guy or not throughout the whole thing. 

Waltz is the man offering Hemsworth, apparently dying of a terminal illness, the means to support his family after his passing, by participating in a contests.  For every hour he survives, money in the bank.  If he survives 24 hours, he's a free man.  But if he breaks the rules, if he goes out of bounds of play, he will be hunted for the rest of his short life.  It's pretty basic, and the "film" adds complications and layers that are mostly fun but also not terribly necessary.

If you like this kind of thing, you'll like this thing, kinda.

Yellowjackets Season 1

 2021 - Showtime - 10 episodes
Created by Ashley Lyle and Bart Nickerson

The trailer, I have to admit, was enticing. A high-school girl's soccer team's plane crashes in remote wilderness, location unknown, and they're forced to survive. But also, that was in 1996.  In the modern day, a few of the remaining survivors, including Melanie Lynskey, Christina Ricci, and Juliette Lewis are having their past probed by a reporter, and nobody's talking...yet.

Great casting, an intriguing spin on Lord of the Flies, and the images from the trailer looked impressive (with director like Karyn Kusama, Deepa Mehta and Billie Woodruff on board, it's bound to be shot well), but I didn't sign on right away.  I hesitated.  Why? Because I thought I had it all figured out.  I thought for sure it was just going to be updated Lord of the Flies (as that what we expect when kids are left to survive on their own) but with cannibalism (as that's what we expect when sports teams crash in remote locations).  I didn't expect the modern day with its bigger name stars to be much more than a framing sequence.

Yellowjackets debuted to a little acclaim in its initial release in November, but as the series went on, it picked up more and more viewers and critical attention.  The buzz (pun intended) was good, real good.  I didn't pick up on anything specific from the buzz, except to say that people were surprised, and enthralled.  It became a week-to-week show that generated much noise on the internet.  Somewhere in the early days of January, just as the penultimate episode aired, we started watching (after a recommendation from friend and regular reader Shaun), and binged the first season over a few days.  It's good, real good.

It opens strong, with a young woman (her face never clearly seen, I tried real hard to look) running through wintery woods, completely inappropriately dressed.  Too much exposed flesh, no shoes.  Clearly panicked, she runs, only to fall into a disguised spike pit.  A fur-wearing masked individual looks down upon them.  That's the first 2 minutes.

We're introduced to the soccer team in 1996, regional champions going to the National Finals in DC.  We get a rapid sense of their dynamics, though there are a lot of girls, so it's hard to know which ones exactly will be come important.  We meet the 2021 (non-pandemic reality) version of Shauna (Lynskey) who is a housewife, completely dissatisfied with life.  Her husband appears to be having an affair, her daughter is an entitled asshole, and that rabbit keeps eating her plants in the garden (she later kills, cooks and makes stew of the rabbit). Tawny Cypress plays the adult Taissa, who is running for state senate with the support of her wife, but is distracted by her troubled son, and her opponent keeps insinuating things about her survivalist times.  Adult Natalie (Lewis) is just getting out of rehab, again, and instantly jumps off the wagon.  She's getting harder and harder the older she gets, but also more self destructive. And then there's Misty (Ricci) who was an outcast in high school and is still an outcast in adult life.  She's perpetually perky to an unappealing degree, which hides her psychopathic tendencies. 

As reported in the commercial, a reporter starts digging around, looking for the story that 25 years later still remains untold.  But there's more to the reporter than she seems.  And a mysterious invitation sent to some of the survivors leads to a possible murder of yet another survivor.  And then there's the charming and mysterious artist/mechanic who "accidentally" rear ends Shauna and pulls her out of her suburban funk.  Taissa's revelations start to strain both her campaign and her marriage. Natalie and Misty become a reluctant duo (mostly due to Misty's intervention) and things get warped.

But back in 1996, the first episode ends with the plane crashing.  Before that we learn that Shauna was sleeping with her best friend's boyfriend, and this relationship between Shauna and Jackie is one of the key focal points of the season.  In the woods over the next four or five months of survival (of an 18 month stint) thing fracture and fray between them until it reaches a breaking point.

Taissa in the past also has a best friend/girlfriend, Van, but Taissa's proactive nature winds up putting them, and a few of the other girls in danger.  And then there's the problem of her sleepwalking...

Misty in the past is the only one with any sort of first aid training, and reveals her competence quickly.  As appreciated as her skills are (and as necessary as they are) she just makes everything weird and awkward at every turn... especially with Coach Ben, the only adult survivor whom she's infatuated with (and starts to Phantom Thread him).

Natalie's past was traumatic enough, and it seems like more trauma just piles on top of her.  But when she proves herself to be the best marksman of the group, she's paired with Travis and they form a thin, yet unbreakable bond.  Travis and his brother Javi both survived the crash, but their father was killed.  Their brotherly bond is a rough one, but it's clear Travis knows he needs to look out for his timid younger sibling.  

Other key players include Laura Lee, the deeply Christian one and Lottie whose medication runs out and starts having "visions" which just weird everyone out.

What I thoroughly enjoyed about Yellowjackets was not just it's two-tiered approach to storytelling (which, yeah, acts like Lost in reverse) but also how it didn't choose the expected path.  Though the young women may have individual bones to pick with each other, they never threaten to fracture into two warring tribes.  Tensions may rise within the group, but also many of them are dispelled through sympathy and conversation.  It really does take into account that these are women, and not boys, and that there's a much different tone to how they interact.  Women use words (and silence, and emotions) to hurt each other, rather than physical violence.  The injection as well of two boys and an adult also really change up the dynamic nature of the entire group.  Very, very little of this played out as I would expect.  And if you were thinking, like I was, that there would just be high-school girls getting picked off every episode or two, well, beyond the first episode there's only, I think, two deaths in the woods, and not how you would think.

The present day is absolutely sodden with the traumas of the past that each of the four women we follow are saddled with.  They each cope in their own way - Shauna avoids the world, Taissa just keeps moving forward like a freight train, Natalie is deep into self-medicating, and Misty kind of seems to be having a good time in spite of everyone being totally weirded out by her.

The show hints as a bit of paranormal or mystical, but almost every instance has a pretty grounded truth to it, save for Lottie's visions.  It could have easily went into very specific horror tropes of having found a malevolent, infectious force in the woods that they then brought home with them, but no, it's all really just about survival, the horrors experienced along the way (wolves and bears and oh my), and the trauma that follows.  Even the insinuated cannibalism...still isn't exactly confirmed.  It's all but confirmed.  But the modern day survivors were definitely responsible, even if indirectly, for some deaths.

Season one gives us a lot to chew on, and really just hits home the characters and their dynamics both in the past and present.  What it doesn't give us is any answers to what ultimately happened.  The two deaths this season were accidental, so we're left to ponder what happened to the rest of them?  I can't wait to find out.

I should also note it has the best opening credits of 2021 (2022's best opening credits award is already locked down by Peacemaker).  Even after the full first season, it's a dizzying display of warped and haunting imagery, accompanied by the Hole-esque growl.  The song "No Return" is by Craig Wedren and Anna Waronker,  from the rock bands Shudder to Think and That Dog, respectively. They also composed the score for the season.

Finch

2021, Miguel Sapochnik (Repo Men) -- download

There are some movies that I see the trailer for and I just know that I will enjoy them, in fact come Hell or High Water, I will enjoy them. Yeah, I can be that way. So, when I see a trailer for a PoAp movie where an old guy builds a robot to take care of his dog, mixing in heart-felt hijinx and slap-stick, I know I am there. But y'know, I am not even sure why that does it for me, just something about the whimsy and schmaltzy feel-good with robots is in my wheelhouse.

Finch (Tom Hanks, Castaway) is a robotics expert hiding out in the remains of his corporate offices in St. Louis, underneath a single functioning windmill, generating the power he needs to survive, after the world has ended. While Finch is our last man, we get the idea that he chose to be a last man long before the world ended, as he is a bit of an odd-duck and more than a little antisocial. He is also dying, likely from the ever present solar radiation because of the no longer present ozone layer. But Goodyear the dog will need a caretaker, and therefore Finch builds one. Near sentience in robots must be a thing in Finch's day as he doesn't really pay any heed to creating new life, no great ponderings of the Great Meaning of Life, just a quick load of as much data as he can, and a fast-track into talking & walking. A big storm is coming and it will end St. Louis, even more than the End of the World did, so they have to get out of town.

So, road story. The best PoAp stories are road stories. From St Louis to San Franciso, because Finch was never brave enough to actually visit the city. But there shouldn't be any people there, and that should suit his dog and his robot, who names himself Jeff. Jeff is not a slick example of robotics, more like a teenager with a full set of encyclopedias in his head, which he can barely make sense of. But all the emotion and turmoil of youth. He is still learning what it is to be alive, and what his purpose is, while also being on the run from... everything. Not that there is a lot, for there is very little else in this movie but the trio, as the world has indeed died around them. The story is compact and concise and doesn't stray much from the singular goal. Also, Finch hates people so I doubt if they even came across the Helpful Survivor, they would give them a chance.

Jeff (motion cap'd and voice by Caleb Landry Jones, Get Out) is built to catch on quickly, learning to drive, to follow Finch's orders (and not always literally), and to prepare for the day when it's only him and Dog (Finch rarely calls the dog by his name). But the whole emotions thing and interpersonal interaction are the bigger challenge, especially considering Finch is such a dick to him. CLB handles him sooooo well, giving us a childlike WALL-E meets Stephen Hawking voice, supported by tons of minute and overt physical acting -- the regular wiggling of his Mickey Mouse sized fingers, and the reaction to when he hears a loose screw rattling around inside his own head -- well, it had me giggling constantly. And yet, there was weight there, both physically (he probably weighs a ton) and emotionally -- Jeff's feelings constantly get hurt. But he always recovers, like a kicked Boston Robotics dog.

This is not a tour de force for Hanks, but he plays the role admirably well. He knows he is going to die, and there is no shirking away from that. There is no miraculous ending, though some miracles in small amount do prevail. Apparently Finch was so concerned about hiding from people and surviving in his small bit of the world, he never considered what had happened outside it. The ends opened-ended, a whole wide world of experience for Jeff to capture, as long as he has Dog. 

3+1+1 Short Paragraphs: Underwater

2020, William Eubank (The Signal) -- download

I was rather fond of Eubank's previous movie, The Signal, from six years ago. So, right off the bat, I have to say I am rather disappointed that this one was not better. Alas, I think I have to dredge up my old adage about indie directors making some successes and then being signed on to helm something big and Hollywood Flashy, only to sink to the depths. Pun intended.

Don't get me wrong, Underwater looks fantabulous, so Eubank's vision is still very prevalent. The problem is inherent in the story, in that we have already all seen this overused plot device, where a disaster happens (even so, in water) and the last few survivors have to make it to supposed safety, all while being stalked by a monster. And even though he's got a tired plot, some movies can work wonders with it. Dredd was a re-worked The Raid: Redemption and did it wonderfully. John Wick  was just another "you killed my beloved family member, prepare to die" revenge flick, but... BUT !! So, given how great this movie looked, the budget and effects, I should have enjoyed it much more than I did.

Norah (Kristen Stewart, Twilight) is an engineer on (in?) a deep sea drilling platform, this time one down in the Mariana Trench. We don't get much intro or breathing room before BOOM SPLASH, the rig is collapsing into itself and Norah, and Random Black Dude (Mamoudou Athie, Unicorn Store) are running and hiding in safe(r) parts. Norah thinks she knows a way out, so off they go, picking up some others on the way. It turns out the only solution may be at a not-yet-completed station. But that will require a walk along the ocean floor in their deep-sea-cum-space-suits.

Of course, soon after leaving the relative safety of one interior structure, they realize something is stalking them. Once out in the water, they see the humanoid figures swimming around in the murky water, only lit by whatever the humans have handy. One by one, they lose people until there are three, three at the final destination, where (SPOILER) well, it's Cthulhu. Nobody calls him that, but think of a leviathan sized creature where the murky swimmers were pretty much remoras or parasites swimming around or attached to the great beast. Yep, they dug too deep and release their own massive Balrog. So, in a rather rushed final act, Norah sacrifices herself so the other two can escape, and so she can blow Cthulhu to kingdom come.

I can see what Eubank was trying to do, doing the world building he did with The Signal establishing a monster movie world that is bigger than the encounter we see depicted. The problem is that we don't really get to encounter that world, as we are too focused on watching all these panicky people run clumsily from point A to point B. There is little to no chance to character build, let alone world build, so the movie relegates it to silly opening and closing credits of newspaper reports and redacted documents. I doubt he will get a sequel, so we will never really know what it was all about.

3 Short Paragraphs: Arctic

2018, Joe Penna (some shorts & TV) -- download

Get up, check the fishing lines, scrape the snow out of the SOS ditches (black dirt beneath stands out), eat some raw fish and climb to the top of a nearby ridge to hand-crank the beeping alert box. This is Overgård's (Mads Mikkelsen, Polar) routine, into which we are tossed. There is no background, no plane crash, no flashbacks to a family life or coworkers that miss him. We just get the snow, the cold and the isolation. It is quiet and morose. That he is still mostly sane is astounding. And then a helicopter appears to rescue him, only to crash themselves. Inside he finds the pilot dead, and the copilot clinging to life. From that moment onward, Overgård's routine is blown away like so much snow.

He has been surviving. Barely. He knows of a life station some distance away but he is afraid to go, afraid to make the trek that he cannot fully believe he will survive. But now the copilot is here. Not only does she provide the human contact he has missed for so long. But she will not survive his routine of waiting. So, he packs them up, makes the best of his stores and sleds he can, and off they go.

This movie is quiet and desperate. Overgård occasionally talks to her, but she barely ever wavers into consciousness. His only real companion is the terrain. They have to get to that station or she will die. But both may die on the way. It doesn't surprise me that Mads pulls off this story; he has always seemed like the actor who could well portray hardship. But the rest of the movie has to be given to the director, as he is the one who coaxes the portrayal out of the landscape and the temperature and the isolation. So, kudos, as I was left freezing and shaken at the end of the journey.

31 Days of Halloween 2018: The Night Eats the World

2018, Dominique Rocher (debut) -- download

So, first thing, when I saw Marmy had grabbed this one, I was rather confused. I remembered the blogposts and it had been clearly a French movie set in Paris. But her copy was obviously English and obviously not dubbed. Turns out it was filmed twice; once in French and again in English. I kind of love that, as it opens up the audiences but also retains itself as a movie by its director. The crime series Hinterland did something similar filming the show three ways: in Welsh, in English, in the more likely mix of the two.

Anywayz, onward...

When is a zombie movie not a horror movie? Well, sometimes when they are comedies but more often than not, they are always horror. This one? The debate will rage, but I saw this as a cerebral survival movie. Many reviewers saw this as interminably boring but I was rapt with attention.

But I may be biased.

For years, I have had recurring dreams and I have crafted story snippets and flash fiction set around the Last Man on Earth. Zombie fiction lends itself so well to this idea, but in general, creators don't use it. Almost all zombie apocalypse movies are group events, so they can pick off the survivors one by one, or at the very least make the Walking Dead commentary about how mankind is the real monster. My focus is on the Lone Survivor and how they deal with their solitude as well as the dangers. So, I absolutely love how this story aligned with my thoughts...

Sam goes to a party to argue with his ex, and to retrieve his box of cassettes. The party is annoying and he feels alone and isolated. An elbow to the face and a few drinks sends him to a room with peace & quiet, where he falls asleep. When he awakes the place is in shambles, the walls painted in the blood of conflict but the entire apartment eerily empty. It doesn't take him long to realize the zombie apocalypse has happened and he is trapped inside building by himself. The rest of the party goers have been killed. He is alone. And from the utter silence outside, all of Paris has been affected.

And thus begins a zombie movie that jumps directly into my headspace. Its not concerned with conversations on the existential dread and anguish and fear. Sam is focused on survival, but since he is alone, he never verbalizes what he is going through in those initial days and weeks. Immediately, he gathers food and protection and ... stuff. But as time and the alone-ness of it all settles in, we see how he is affected in his actions, not always his words.

I also was rather taken with some of the tropes they overturned. For example, if you peek into a place where the dead might be wandering. Are you going to creep around quietly hoping to surprise the quiet dead? Or will you do as me and Sam would do, banging & yelling to attract any monsters that might be around the corner. So with precision and only a few missteps, Sam is able to secure the apartment building for himself.

Yes, I said 'quiet dead' which makes so much more sense than the moaning masses. If they are dead, their lungs don't work and they don't need to breathe. Autonomic vs somatic. So, why do so many zombies cry and groan and crackle? Rocher's zombies bang and claw and snap, but they never make a  single wheezy noise. Creepy !!

The movie has little action, and focuses around Sam as he hides and survives and slowly uses up all his resources and sanity. The middle act covers the methods Sam survives, through paint ball guns and gathering water on the roof and keeping himself occupied with percussion experiments (tunage!) and whatever he had on those cassettes he came to collect at the beginning of the movie. But eventually his isolation begins to take a toll on him. Enter Sarah.

I won't go any further, for the sake of spoilers, but an event changes the direction of Sam's living arrangement. He will have to move from being the safe alone guy, to being the On The Move guy. From survival to road story and hopefully we will get that movie.