Halloween 2024: September 29th

Nightwatch (1994)

Nattevagten

If you are a fan of slickly shot thrillers, possibly featuring serial killers or seductive femme fatales, it's probably because you came of age in the nineties. That was this particular style's brightest point in the mainstream limelight, in the time between the slasher genre's cultural dominance and before its ironic revival later in the decade. Otherwise known as the period directly after "Silence of the Lambs" won all those Oscars. This phenomenon was not limited to the United States either. In 1994, a well photographed, low-budget thriller became the highest grossing movie of the year in Denmark. That means Ole Bornedal's "Nightwatch" outgrossed "Jurassic Park" in its home country. Since then, the film has remained well regarded by the Danes and continues to pop up on comprehensive list of genre classics. 

Law student Martin, in need of funds, takes a job as a night watchman at Copenhagen's Forensic Medical Institute. His nightly duties involve checking all the keys in the building, including in the morgue. In his time off, Martin hangs out with his girlfriend, Kalinka, and his best friend, Jens. The guys like to make juvenile challenges with each other, dares that transgress the lines of politeness. Recently, Jens has become fascinated with a prostitute named Joyce. At the same time, the city's sex workers are being targeted by a killer whose trademark is scalping the bodies... Bodies that end up at Martin's morgue. After some strange incidents at the hospital, the police begin to suspect Martin might be their killer. He wonders if Jens is the murderer. Kalinka has the same suspicions. It won't be long before the butcher's identity is revealed.

Bornedal and his team obviously studied Hitchcock before making "Nightwatch." The film puts a number of the master's lessons to work. The story slowly reveals itself to be a Wrong Man narrative, Martin accused of a crime he knows he didn't commit and rushing to clear his own name before he's locked up. The script frequently puts its characters in situations where danger is lurking right next to them. Kalinka ends up in an apartment with the killer, whose gloved hand appears around the opened door as she looks on. There's a deliberate drip-feed of information to the audience, setting up several scenes in the last third where we, the viewer, know something that the character doesn't. When it dawns on them that a murderous lunatic is in the room with them, this is often accompanied by a slow zoom-in on the actor's shocked faces. If the obvious debt "Nightwatch" shows to Hitchcock wasn't already apparent, the soundtrack features some shrieking strings clearly inspired by Bernard Herrmann's "Psycho" score. "Nightwatch" utilizes these tools well, getting your heartbeat up throughout on the way to a properly exciting finale. 

The effectively tense, and at times foreboding, atmosphere "Nightwatch" captures is largely thanks to Dan Laustsen's cinematography. The film begins with a long tracking shot, through the home as the main characters have a meal in the other room. This creates the idea of being watched, which is revisited through a number of similarly shot sequences. There's a shadowy chilliness to much of the film, the color palette going for cool blues and isolating blacks that doesn't cease when the couples are together. The forensic center is a great setting too. Martin's office resides in a glass case at the end of a long hallway, continuing the paranoid sensation of being observed. Much of the hospital is framed in sickly greens or sterile whites, solidifying the inhuman, uncomfortable sensation we associate with it. This is most true of the morgue, a room always shot in such a way that we never forget there are dead bodies right there the whole time. The clever, intuitive visuals are responsible for a large part of what makes "Nightwatch" work. 

I wish the script was that strong. It's not that "Nightwatch" is badly written. However, the film begins in a much darker place than it ends. Kim Bodnia plays Jens as an always sweaty lout, with a sleaziness about him that suggests he knows plenty about the depraved side of life. Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, meanwhile, portrays Martin as a stout-chinned, blonde babe-in-the-woods, the kind of naive and handsome guy the audience can pin their hopes on. The expectation is that Jens' presence will corrupt Martin's purity in time. That's the sense you get from the scene where the friend sadistically mocks a sex worker in a fancy restaurant or Martin does something inappropriate in the morgue. However, the narrative bends in a totally different direction, blaming the violence and depravity in the story on an outside source. Jens performs a self-sacrificing act, a metaphorical atonement for his earlier bad behavior, on the way to a happy ending that seems incompatible with the film's first act. "Nightwatch" introduces bleak and disturbing themes – necrophilia, a serial killer who mutilates sex workers, men generally treating women badly – but never builds on them in complete ways. An ultimately crowd pleasing story is stuffed with sticky subjects seemingly as flavoring only. 

The result is a film that functions best as a technical exercise, well shot with likable performances and compelling characters. Bornedal nails the mechanics of creating an intense thriller. However, he gets cold feet about the darker elements that he inserted into his own story. Clearly, others don't agree with me on this one. "Nightwatch" has made more than one list of the best Danish films of all time. Bornedal has gone onto a good career, including directing an English language remake of his breakout film and, more recently, a thirty years later sequel. (Though both seem to be regarded as inferior to the original.) Nikolaj Coster-Waldau became a successful Danish export too. While "Nightwatch" can't go toe-to-toe with its influences, I am glad I watched it. Even if a great movie is obviously somewhere in the guts of the pretty good one we got instead. [7/10]

Let's Kill Uncle (1966)

Before the sixties ended, camp horror icon William Castle would make a bid for respectability by re-mortgaging his house – the second time he raised funds that way – to purchase the rights to Ira Levin's "Rosemary's Baby." The ever-savvy Castle knew that an adaptation of the bestseller could be a bridge between the B-budget gimmick horrors that brought him fame and more prestigious fare. Ultimately, Paramount exec Robert Evans insisted Roman Polanski direct the film, Castle being slotted into a producer role instead. If you look at the movies Castle made right before this happened, you can see his growing weariness with in-theater gimmicks. Of the three pictures Castle made with Universal in the middle sixties, only "I Saw What You Did" had an outrageous marketing stunt. The other thrillers to emerge from this period, "The Night Walker" and "Let's Kill Uncle," went out gimmick-less. While the former has garnered some praise over the years, you almost never see folks talking about the other. Let's try and uncover why "Let's Killed Uncle" failed to kill viewers. 

After Russell Harrison dies in a mysterious car crash, his five million dollar fortune is set to be inherited by his twelve year old son, Barnaby. Barnaby's guardian is to be his uncle, Major Kevin Harrison, a former spy and war hero. The major lives on an isolated tropical island. Barnaby travels there with police sergeant Frank Travis and Chrissie, a girl sent to live with her aunt by an apathetic father. The island is drought with danger, including a dilapidated old hotel and shark-infested waters. The biggest danger to the kids, however, proves to be Uncle Kevin himself. He gleefully announces his intentions to murder his nephew, so that he'll inherit his late brother's wealth. The boy and Chrissie decide to go on the offensive, plotting to kill uncle before he kills them. 

Castle's brand of goofy gimmick horror always appealed to kids. You can see the director cashing in on this, by making children the central characters in "13 Ghosts" or "I Saw What You Did." "Homicidal," "Strait Jacket," and "The Night Walker" were Hitchcock knock-offs and naturally skewed older. "Let's Kill Uncle" represents an old attempt to blend these two approaches. With the stars being twelve year olds, scheming against grown-ups, the movie feels a bit like the shenanigans-filled live action Disney movies of that decade. At the same time, the perversity of an adult plotting to kill a child being played as black comedy seems like something Hitch would do. This is paired with a light romantic subplot, of the police sergeant growing closer to Chrissie's aunt, that is reminiscent of "To Catch a Thief" or "Rear Window." This is further blended with some minor Bondian elements – what with the death traps and all the talk of espionage – and more classical horror elements. Such as that spooky abandoned hotel, some hypnotism, a blanket of foggy atmosphere over a few scenes, and a jump scare involving a scarred, legless local. 

The result is a tonal oddity that never quite comes together. The movie seems designed for kids. There are outrageous plot points, such as a shark living in a swimming pool or the evil uncle being a master of mesmerism, that a child would be most convinced by. Uncle Kevin is a cartoonish villain, played with full campy verve by Nigel Green, who gleefully announces his homicidal plans to the boy. Plot points about international spying or Uncle Kevin being part of an ancient criminal conspiracy never comes to fruition, which would probably be more readily accepted by a young audience. The kiddie approach is most evident in two ways. Firstly, the movie has a terrible, deflating ending that removes much of the tension of everything that came before, showing a sort of gee-shucks optimism that is counter to the actions of the plot. Mostly though, it's those kids. Pat Cardi is often grating as the bratty, ever-energetic Barnaby. His habit of weaving big lies – which feels like it's pointing towards a "Boy Who Cried Wolf" moral that never materializes – immediately makes him unlikable. Chrissie, played by "To Kill a Mockingbird's" Mary Badham, has a conceited smarminess to her that makes her difficult to sympathize with. This is paired with a sob story background that does nothing to make her more likable. 

That "Let's Kill Uncle" never successfully blends its different tones and plot points is disappointing. When operating as a more traditional kid-friendly horror movie, it's decently effective. That derelict hotel is the best set in the movie, the location for two of the better scenes. Such as the climax, when uncle stops messing around and starts getting serious about murdering these juveniles, that features a dead body being wheeled out of the shadows. Silly as it is, the image of a shark's fin breaking through the surface of a swimming pool taps into a common childhood fear. You can feel the movie almost leaning into that dream-like vibe, with the artificiality of the island sets or the layer of mists floating over a few scenes. The sequence where the kids plot to feed Uncle Kevin some poisonous mushrooms, playing out around a dinner table, points out what could've been a deeper theme. Namely, that kids and adults live in two different worlds. Those worlds come into conflict often, children and their authority figures frequently at odds with each other. If "Let's Kill Uncle" centered this idea more, blowing up the tension between youngsters and grown-ups into a murderous narrative, it would've been a stronger, eerier movie. Instead, it recedes back into sitcom normality whenever this Grimm's fairy tale angle starts to take focus. 

I cannot over-emphasize how bad that ending is. It's been stated that several conclusions were shot, Universal choosing the lamest one. That it comes on the back of a decently macabre climax leaves the viewer with a sour feeling. If Castle had followed this up with "Rosemary's Baby," it would've been a return to form. Instead, Polanski and Evans got all the credit for the film's success and Castle suffered through a bout of kidney failure. When he returned, he was back to making films like this, that never quite come together into a cohesive whole. There's a few moments in "Let's Kill Uncle" that shows the flair for the macabre and outrageous that the director had in his best work. However, they are fleeting among a series of competing tones and a story that never quite builds on what it sets up. [5/10]

Tales from the Darkside: The Cutty Black Sow

Generally regarded among "Tales from the Darkside's" scariest episodes, "The Cutty Black Sow" is doubly appropriate for this time of year as it's set on Halloween. In the late hours of October 30th, Jamie's great grandmother is near death. In the final minutes of her life, she warns her great-grandson about the Cutty Black Sow, an entity that steals the souls of their family every Halloween. The demon can only be held off with an elaborate ritual, involving writing the initials of each family member on stones and circling them around the All Hallows Eve fire, which must burn through the night. Jamie is tasked with taking his little sister trick-or-treating but is still determined to see the practice through, lest the Cutty Black Sow take his great-grandmother's soul to Hell. Little Gloria doesn't understand what her brother is doing and that leads to trouble... 

"Tales from the Darkside" was ostensibly a program for grown-ups. However, it seems most every fan of the show first saw it as kids, traumatized by a particularly intense episode. The producers must've been aware of the show's popularity among young people, as several of its most highly rated episodes center around children. This is certainly true of "The Cutty Black Sow," which largely plays as a horror story for children. The idea of a kid taking a grandparent's warning – delivered literally on their deathbed naturally – far more seriously than his peers seems like the kind of a thing is a kid would do. Halloween being centered as the night of the horror and the responsibility towards a younger (irritating) sibling are all very child-like contrivances. This is ultimately the tale of a kid hearing an old ghost story and creeping themselves out with it, to the point of imagining monsters in the dark. What is a more child-like experience than that? 

This approach naturally lends "The Cutty Black Sow" a somewhat hokey feeling. Huckleberry Fox's performance as Jamie is utterly ridiculous. The episode largely being confined to one living room set reflects the show's cheapness. At the same time... From its opening shot, centered on a dying old woman's face, "The Cutty Black Sow" captures a certain sinister feeling. The score is heavy on the ominous drone of bagpipes. Predatory yellow eyes, staring in from a window, glowing in the dark, is a memorably creepy image. It all leads towards a surprisingly fucked-up ending that attacks a child's mind in their most vulnerable place. Yeah, I can totally see this scaring the shit out of a kid who stumbled upon it late at night, on some obscure local channel. "Tales from the Darkside" rarely had much in the way of resources or sophistication. It could still deliver an intense shock ending when it wanted, which is very much on display here. [7/10]

The Addams Family: Cousin Itt Visits the Addams Family 

The most well-known, and perhaps most bizarre, of the extended Addams family would make his first appearance in the twentieth episode. "Cousin Itt Visits" begins with Parks Commissioner Fiske arriving at Cemetery Lane, requesting a donation to open an expansion to the city zoo. The same day, the hirsute Cousin Itt comes to stay for a night. Though beloved by the family, Morticia worries about Itt's lack of employment. Gomez soon decides Itt would make a fine authority at the new zoo. However, Fiske mistakes Itt for a wild animal and displays him in a cage. This eventually leads to a wild misunderstanding about a horrible beast escaping the zoo and moving towards the Addams' home. 

Thoroughly into its first season, "The Addams Family" was a well oiled gag delivery machine by this point. "Cousin Itt Visits" begins with the memorable sight of Thing playing castanets, the first of several amusing bits. Such as Morticia naming off whatever French words she can think of, to further Gomez's excitement. (Later, Gomez admits that he also excites himself when speaking French, a line John Astin makes hilariously perverse.) Or an absurd exchange of dialogue that concerns what objects in the house Fester can shoot with his blunderbuss. Really, the cast has settled in with these characters so totally that they can make almost any bit of dialogue amusing. As seen in Ted Cassidy deadpanning a line about how Itt exits the house or Jackie Coogan's spirited reaction to the climatic injustice. 

Naturally, the episode's best absurd joke is Cousin Itt him/itself. The foreign Addamses with bizarre physical features usually only exist as off-screen jokes. That the show manages to make the first to actually visually appear stranger is a compliment to the writers. A four foot tall wig walking around is odd enough but, this show being what it is, Itt is portrayed as nothing but charming. He performs magic tricks, tells jokes, and is implied to be the life of the party wherever he goes. A surprising degree of personality is given to this squawking hairball. (Under all that shag is Felix Silla, a short actor who would have quite a storied career in genre television and film.) It's a strong enough episode that the expected bits of Alan Reed as the Parks Commissioner responding with shock to the Addams' home are quite funny. [7/10]