Last year, I read Thomas Harris' “Red Dragon,” after buying it from a closing book store probably ten years prior. Though Hannibal Lecter has been a cultural icon for a long time, I had never actually read any of Harris' original books. The literary “Red Dragon” definitely belongs to the airport read genre but was, nevertheless, pretty damn effective. It's easy to see why Lecter, Will Graham, and Francis Dollarhyde would prove irresistible to filmmakers. Infamously, six years before “The Silence of the Lambs” swept the Oscars, Michael Mann adapted “Red Dragon” as “Manhunter.” You've heard all the tired takes about how this film's approach to Harris' famous characters differs from the better known, later version. At this point, “Manhunter” is established as a film nerd favorite, having grown from the underrated and underseen prototype to a cultishly beloved masterpiece in its own right.
Will Graham is retired. After working as a profiler for the FBI, and barely surviving an encounter with notorious cannibal killer Hannibal Lecktor, the mental strain of the job got to be too much. That's when FBI supervisor Jack Crawford asks him to come back. A serial killer, nicknamed the Tooth Fairy by the press, is murdering families. Graham is reluctantly drawn back into the game. He meets with Lecktor, who is communicating with the Tooth Fairy, and inspects the scenes of the murders. Attempts to capture the killer fail and Graham's own family is endangered. Graham must go inside the mind of the madman if he hopes to stop him before he kills again.
“Manhunter” is also a movie build around that old chestnut about how cop and criminal share many of the same desires, how both seek power and control. Mann's film provides a more than superficial take on this idea. Will Graham sees the world the same way the deranged killers do, allowing him the unique insight that makes him so good at his job. This takes a terrible toll on his mental health, which his family is all to aware of. (And shown brilliantly during the supermarket set scene where he explains his breakdown to his step-son.) Will dominates the first half, Francis Dollarhyde staying off-screen for a long time. In the second half, Dollarhyde takes over the film. Mann then shows the sad, isolated world the killer lives in, the brief hope a romance with a blind woman gives. This makes it clear how similar he is to Will Graham. Both are tortured by their compulsions. Dollarhyde must kill to satisfy his, while Graham's conveniently serve the law.
Three fantastic performances anchor the film. William Petersen plays Will Graham as a deeply tortured man, who carries the mental toll of his work on his face. He is mostly quiet when with his family, not wanting to weigh them down with his problems. Only when he works, when he studies the killer's methods and tries to see through their eyes, does he seem truly energized. Tom Noonan as Dollarhyde is terrifying, when waxing poetically on his transformation or stalking his prey. Yet he's also deeply sympathetic, ruined by shyness and abuse that is only hinted at. Lastly, Brian Cox appears as the first cinematic Hannibal Lecter. (Spelled Lecktor here.) Cox's take on Hannibal the Cannibal is cold, detached, and chilling in his psychosis. As in Harris' book, Lecktor only plays a small role in the film. As in the book, he certainly makes an impression on the viewer.
When the trailers for “Mama” debuted in 2013, I didn't think much of it. The film looked like another disposable, PG-13 horror movie about a vengeful ghost, dumped into theaters in the dead of winter. Really, Jessica Chastain in a short goth wig was the only thing abut the movie that truly caught my attention. The film's critical and fan reaction was slightly more positive than movies of this sort usually receive but I remained skeptical. Not even a gleeful recommendation from Guillermo del Toro was enough to change my mind. However, in the aftermath of director Andy Muschietti actually doing a pretty good job with “It” last year, I decided to give his “Mama” a look after all. Maybe the low expectations helped because I was pleasantly surprised by this one.
A banker name Jeffrey has a breakdown, murdering his coworkers and wife. He grabs his two daughters, three year old Victoria and year old Lily, and drives into the Northern Virginia woods. His plans to kill his daughters and himself are interrupted by a supernatural intruder. Several years later, the girls are found, feral but still alive. Jeffrey's brother, Lucas, chooses to adopt the girls. This is not well received by his girlfriend, punk rocker Annabel. The girls are mentally scarred by their time in the woods... Because they weren't alone. A feminine spectre, which they call Mama, was taking care of them. The ghost adopted the girls. And she has no intention of letting them go. Annabel must uncover the mystery in time if she hopes to rescue Victoria and Lily.
Moreover, some of those jump scares work pretty well. Associating Mama with decay was a good decision, as the ghosts is proceeded by a black mold like substance. She has a habit of phasing down through the ground, only her ratty hair floating up above the surface. That's a decently unnerving, unusual sight. Another clever bit is an attack in a dark room, the ghost ripping a man apart illuminated only by a flashing camera bulb. Though the CGI isn't super convincing, a rotting ghost lady who bends her body at odd angles makes for a thoroughly creepy villain. (Considering Murschetti inserted a creepy, thin woman into “It,” I'm going to say this is a personal phobia of his.) The ghost's origin are explained through nightmare sequences, shot in a first-person perspective, that are surprisingly effective. My favorite moment in the film concerns Annabel assuming one of the girls is in their bedroom before we find out that girl is actually downstairs. That's a quieter brand of spooky and one the film probably should've leaned on more.
Something that really appealed to me, personally, was that the film seems to draw some inspiration from a local legend. The story is set in the fictional Clifton Forge, Virginia, which is a very similar name to Clifton, VA. Considering the role a spooky train-overpass bridge and a mental institution play in Mama's backstory, it seems likely to me that the film was partially inspired by the legend of the Bunnyman Bridge. Some of the flourishes the filmmakers add to the myth – like the role of butterflies – are inspired in their own right. I guess the filmmakers decided a spindly, corpse-like ghost woman was scarier then an axe-wielding lunatic in a rabbit costume. “Mama” doesn't rise above its status as a PG-13 jump scare-fest. However, it's a more sophisticated film then I expected, with a script that has some genuine intelligence and heart to it, as well a director with a strong visual sense. [7/10]
Thanks to the internet, spooky horror shorts can now go viral, convincing producers and studios to fund feature versions. Before “Lights Out” and “They Hear It” followed the exact same path, “Mama” started the trend. Andy Muschietti's original “Mamá” – note the accent mark – is a three minute long short. It's told from the perspective of two girls, one waking the other after being told their mother is home. As the camera follows them through the house, we the viewer soon learn that their Mama is actually a twitchy ghost lady. Muschietti would recreate several shots from the short in the feature., though the premise obviously underwent a lot of changes between here and there.
“Mamá” scared Guillermo del Toro so much, that he agreed to produced the feature adaptation. Which is honestly hard to believe. The short “Mamá” is hokey as shit. Okay, the entire film being one quasi-long take – it's pretty easy to see where cuts could've been hidden – was clever. So is shooting it at the same height and position of its young protagonists. The girl's mother being an angry wraith might've been a nice shock, if the subsequent feature adaptation hadn't completely ruined that surprise. While Muschietti's form is strong, the titular entity simply isn't scary here. It's a hazy CGI image that leaps towards the viewer in a way reminiscent of Youtube screamer videos. And the entire short is building towards that jump scare. That an even half-way decent feature, not to mention Muschietti's promising career, sprung from such an uninspired short is very surprising. Unlike “Lights Out,” which lost a lot by getting longer, “Mamá” is an example of an underwhelming short film being turned into an alright feature. [5/10]
The final episode of “Wolf Creek: Season Two” returns to Mick Taylor's lair for the first time since the original films. Rebecca and Brian arrive at the killer's home, a re-purposed old mining camp, unaware that he's following them. Rebecca heads into the labyrinth underground tunnels, searching for her husband and Kelly. Brian stays above ground, finding fuel for the truck. When Mick catches up with them, all hell breaks loose. Becca finds the others but at the cost of injuring her foot. Brian reveals himself to be an even bigger bastard than previously assumed. Mick continues to play sadistic games with all of them.
“Return” is a fairly tense hour of television. Mick's underground lair is a claustrophobic setting, made more so by the way the camera follows Rebecca's face as she searches through the tunnels. The scene where she steps on a strip of nails is cringe-inducing. Besides the setting, the episode hearkens back to the original film, in that it's mostly a cat-and-mouse chase between Mick and his prey. Long stretches of time and spend arguing and battering.
This certainly fits in with the brutal tone established by the first “Wolf Creek” film. However, film and TV are very different mediums. In most movies, you're only spending two hours or so with the characters. In a TV show, you're spending many hours with them, meaning you get much more attached to them. In this context, the environmental fatalism inherit to the series plays much differently. It feels a bit like the showrunners were just being needlessly cruel and, I suppose, that was intentional. Of course, we all know the real reason why Mick Taylor is left alive: So they can make that third film Greg McLean occasionally talks about or another season of television. Considering John Jarratt is going to trail soon, it's entirely possible those sequels will never materialize. Meaning season two of “Wolf Creek” ends on a downbeat note for all the wrong reasons.
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