Director Report Card: Alexandre Aja (2024)

10. Never Let Go

Somehow, it has been more than twenty years since the term “The Splat Pack” was coined. It referred to a loosely connected group of filmmakers making gory horror movies around the turn of the millennium. The likes of James Wan and James Gunn have become immensely successful, both within the genre and outside. Others, like Eli Roth and Rob Zombie, still put out a new movie every once in a while. Most of them never quite broke through with the mainstream and have largely stuck to the indie scene, like Neil Marshall and Greg McLean. Alexandre Aja, being European, has always been slightly apart from the others. He has obviously done very well for himself, with "Crawl" being his last big hit, even if his later work has perhaps not lived up to the promise of "Haute Tension" and "The Hills Have Eyes." A lot of his work continues to slip through the cracks though Aja came back this year with “Never Let Go,” which was mostly lost in the constant shuffle of new movies coming and going from theaters. I'm the thorough type so it's time to see if this one is a hidden gem or rightfully overlooked. 

Deep in the forest, young brothers Samuel and Nolan live with their mother. Their entire lives, Momma has told them that the world was destroyed by a great Evil. That this force worms its way into your body and possesses you with a single touch. The family, and their dog, live in a cabin made of blessed wood. The only way they can protect themselves when outside the cabin is by holding onto a rope that connects them to the house. As their food supplies run out and their mother announced they'll have to eat the family dog to survive, Nolan becomes increasingly skeptical about the existence of the Evil. Sam remains a true believer, however. The brothers' disagreement over the beliefs they grew up with will only grow more intense as their situation gets increasingly desperate. 

The world of fiction has presented us with a thousand different takes on the premise of people forced to survive in a post-apocalyptic world. Too often, the genre is worn down to survivalist fantasies about being free to run amok in a world without society's rules or getting to rebuild a "better" world than the one that exists now. "Never Let Go," at the very least, defies either of these trite set-ups. Instead, this is a film very clearly about how surviving in the world after the fall of polite society would definitely suck. The family survives on a meager garden. When a rough winter renders that useless, they turn to eating bugs and tree bark. When mom threatens to kill and cook their dog, she is planning to cannibalize only the fourth other living thing these boys have other known. The actors look emaciated and sunken eyed, a good depiction of individuals on the brink of starvation. "Never Let Go" is not a doomsday prepper's wish fulfilment fantasy. This is a harsh existence for these characters and not one to envy. 

As we've seen a thousand stories about surviving after the end of the world, that means we've seen a thousand different ways to end the world. "Never Let Go" does manage to find a somewhat novel approach to this idea as well. Zombies, disease, environmental or economic collapse, nuclear war or alien invasions are all avoided. Instead, the outside threat that has seemingly ended society as we know it is supernatural. The nature of this Evil is kept vague throughout. It can manifest hallucinations of dead loved ones and strangers in order to belittle or tempt the survivors. (It reminds me a lot of the First Evil from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," though slightly more offensive.) This brings a clear religious connotation to mind, of demonic forces luring the righteous off the blessed path, though this idea also isn't expanded on too much. It's something different, I'll say. "Contagion-like demonic force" is a new one I can add to my list of possible ways the world can end.

The real reason why "Never Let Go" doesn't expand more on the origins of its demonic force is simple: That movie isn't truly about that. Instead, the film represents Alexandre Aja trying his hand at another well-worn, if less popular these days, style: The Southern Gothic story. It is never specified where this story takes place. Judging from the accent Halle Berry adapts at Momma, we can assume it's somewhere in the American South. The thick trees of the surrounding forest, with its willowy branches and entangling vines, suggests rural Alabama or the less swampy parts of Louisiana. (The movie, of course, like so many low budget genre films, was shot in Canada.) Wherever the story takes place, the isolation the characters live with clearly connect it to the Southern Gothic tradition. The sins of the past, regrets, familial anxiety, religious fanaticism, all out in a dilapidated country home besieged by outside forces and colored by distinct accents: Yes, we are for sure in Tennessee Williams country here. 

Whether "Never Let Go" is a good example of a Southern Gothic story is much more debatable. It makes good use of its desolate, isolated setting. However, the more blatant attempts to capture a particularly "Southern" feel comes off as a bit campy. The modern horror cliché of an old song, played on a rickety viola, eventually being subverted for creepy ambiance is used. The song this time is "Big Rock Candy Mountain," another choice that feels more goofy than scary to me while also overemphasizing the deep south setting. The film is structured like a novel, with on-screen chapter breaks, which gives the impression that this is an adaptation of regional novel. It's not. Kevin Coughlin and Ryan Grassby wrote the script on-spec, under the title "Mother Land." Mostly, the accents the actor adopt – Halle Berry especially – feel very put-on and cartoonish to me. In other words, this does not feel like a story influenced by actually living in the American South but more movies and books set in that region. 

Despite some flaws, "Never Let Go" does do some things well. Like the best science fiction or horror stories, it roots its fantastical premise in an emotion all of us can understand. Nolan and Samuel are growing up. Nolan is at the age where he's beginning to question whether his mother truly does know everything about the world. He's testing boundaries, developing an independent mind, and setting out on his own. Which is made especially dangerous thanks to the very specific circumstances he lives in. Forced to hold onto a rope that always connects you back to your mother, and the womb-like home you share, is some not so subtle umbilical cord symbolism. When Nolan cuts the rope, he frees himself but also terrified a mother that believes she must cling to her babies to protect them. It's not a bad metaphor for trying to break free of a smothering parent, and make your own life. 

The boys' mother is, from any perspective, abusive. She makes her sons prayer to the house and its holy wood every night. She often tossed them into an underground cellar and forces them to stay there, until they've pushed any influence the Evil might have on their minds out. Despite these extreme methods, the simple fact remains that the boys still love their mother. Samuel, on the other hand, begins to hear the Evil whispering in his ear too. Divorced of its fantastical content, this is the story of a mentally ill parent that has passed her condition onto one child, while the other struggles to correlate how someone he loves, who genuinely loves him, has treated him so badly. Its climax is one of acceptance and love, in spite of these flaws. In a genre landscape where "elevated" horror films foreground their metaphors to the point of practically excluding the scary stuff, "Never Let Go" must be commended for being the slightest bit subtle about this. 

Unlike a lot of the would-be Jordan Peeles or Robert Eggers out there, Alexandre Aja is definitely not afraid of making a horror movie. In some ways, "Never Let Go" harkens back to the kind of films the director got his start with: Gory throwbacks to seventies and eighties horror. The film's cabin setting, story of demonic possession, and central role for a trap door brings a clear influence to mind. This is Aja paying homage to "The Evil Dead." When the rotting, bile spewing spectre of the boy's grandmother appears and begins to bleat like a goat, you definitely feel the Raimi influence. Sometimes, this works well too. The finale features some stylized camera angles and brutally edited attack scenes, recalling Aja's best work. A scene where a little girl becomes a contorting, multi-limbed human centipede is, ya know, a clever visual. There's some good spurting blood too. Unfortunately, "Never Let Go" does not maintain those frantic thrills throughout. In fact, quite a lot of scenes involving screeching, twitching undead visions strike me as more silly than scary. Sometimes a horror director makes a swing and it ends up on the wrong end of the absurd/unsettling chasm. 

The moment Nolan begins to doubt his mother's version of events, "Never Let Go" presents a clear question to the audience: Was the Earth genuinely brought to its knees by a malevolent, supernatural force or is Momma simply insane, imagining it all and wrapping her sons up in her delusions? That nearly the entire movie is set within the cabin and the surrounding wood certainly leaves things open to interpretation, as we never see the rest of the world. Narrative structures like this can be tricky. On one hand, if you can weave ambiguity like this into the themes of your story, it can make for a very rich experience. Alternatively, if you fumble it, the result is a script that tries way too hard to deceive and mislead the viewer to almost always underwhelming results. There's one moment in "Never Let Go" that keeps the audience guessing in the best way. The boys are alone at the house and a hiker approaches them, asking if they need help. Nolan wants to accept the man's offer and get out of there. Sam is convinced he's a manifestation of the Evil, pointing a crossbow at him. This is a genuinely tense moment, the viewer uncertain which of the brothers is right, either decision having dire consequences.

A better film could have kept that question lingering in the air longer, leaving us increasingly unsure of what is actually happening in such ways as to up the suspense. Instead, the script spoils its own ambiguity by showing us what is actually happening here. In the ever-more frustrating last third, the script then repeatedly backtracks on what exactly the truth is. "Never Let Go" wants its cake and to eat it too. Or, rather, wants to add some psychological complexity to its setting while still providing the monster movie thrills the audience wants. The film continues this flip-flopping right up to the final second, making me roll my eyes hard right before the credits roll. Put some convictions behind your premise and respect the audience's intelligence rather than tying your own story in knots to prove how clever you are. 

Tempting as it is to dismiss "Never Let Go" as another disappointing half-assed measure from a once promising director, I do think Alexandre Aja and his team were working very hard to make a good movie here. Aja's regular cinematographer, Maxime Alexandre, does handsome work. He makes the forest look properly foreboding. Fog and the extremely green foliage adds a lot of depth to each frame, presenting the idea that anything could be out there nicely. French electric artist rob also collaborates with Aja again, creating a decent score that knows when to ramp up the ominous strings and doesn't lean too hard on the increasingly worn-out synthwave sound. The cast does decent work. Despite that wavering, unsure accent, I do think Halle Berry adds some complexity to the role of the mother, showing her fear and uncertainty but also a warmth and love. Percy Daggs IV and Anthony B. Jenkins, as Nolan and Samuel, give sturdy performance. Daggs does especially well, more-or-less carrying the movie on his own in the second half, allowing the boy to come off as both brave and frightened. Jenkins doesn't get to express quite as much depth but he, at least, avoids the obnoxious clichés of the creepy kid subgenre. There's also a neat looking monster in the finale, which appears to have been made entirely through practical make-up. 

This makes a certain conclusion unavoidable: "Never Let Go" is most let down by its script and its willingness to find one version of the truth and stick with it. Aja probably could've made the movie scarier and a number of other aesthetic choices might have been improved but, with a stronger script, other flaws would have been more easily overlooked. Still, this is a better movie than the similarly divided "Horns" and "The 9th Life of Louis Drax," while also probably proving more memorable than "Oxygen" was. I don't know if Aja will ever make pulp as gloriously messed-up and beautifully engineered as his best movies but he's clearly still has some fight in him. If only he could select better screenplays to work on... "Never Let Go" is well done in many respects and has intriguing ideas but its unwillingness to be genuinely ambiguous, instead of keeping back and forth between different conclusions, keeps it from being a lot stronger. [Grade: B-]

Director Report Card: Alexandre Aja (2021)

9. Oxygen

There's this term – I don't know if it's a phrase that has catch on yet – for a type of horror/thriller that is largely set within one, usually very small location. I call these “confined space thrillers.” I know, it's not the catchiest name. A while ago, there was a minor wave of these movies. Thrillers were set in all sort of unlikely locations, like a phone booth, an ATM area, a shuttle bus, a sauna, a swimming pool, a bathroom stall, a car, a ski lift, an elevator and, of course, a coffin. I guess Hitchcock's “Lifeboat” is the granddaddy of this mini-genre. Alexandre Aja's previous film, “Crawl,” already sort of fit in with this premise, being mostly set in a flooded basement. For his next movie, Aja decided to set a story in an even more confined space. “Oxygen,” which largely takes place within a cryogenic chamber, would premiere on Netflix earlier this year.

She awakens, alone and terrified. She is trapped inside a space that is just big enough to hold her, with no memory of her name or even how she got there. Soon, the woman discovers that she is trapped inside a cryogenic chamber. Worst yet, she only has about ninety minutes before she runs out of oxygen and suffocates to death. An on-board A.I., known as MILO, is her only means of contacting the outside world. Memories drift back and the woman soon realizes her name is Elizabeth Hanson, a well-known scientist with a husband and a mother. She rushes to uncover more of her past, figure out how she got into this space, and whether or not she can survive it.

“Oxygen” – which is known as simply “O2” in its native France – certainly has a hell of a premise. The idea of waking up inside a box, with only enough room to wiggle back and forth a little, is a terrifying thought. Since the film's character purposely begins as a blank, it's very easy for the viewer to imagine themselves in this same frightening scenario. This claustrophobic set-up is paired with an aggressively ticking clock. Every time Elizabeth talks, she uses up a little bit more air. She has a set amount of time before she completely runs out, the movie playing out more-or-less in real time. The combination of ideas creates a premise potentially rich with suspense.

Of course, there's a reason people don't attempt to make more movies with such limited settings. It's really hard to keep a story going when one person stuck inside a seven foot long box is the entire movie. “Oxygen” has to think up a number of solutions to the challenges its premise presents. The first of which is that Elizabeth is not really alone in her chamber. She may be the only character on-screen, for most of the movie, but she's far from the only one in the movie. MILO, visualized as a pulsating electric circle and voiced by a fittingly robotic Mathieu Amalric, is her constant companion. The computer also provides a way for Liz to contact the police and other authorities, though this is frequently made difficult by poor signal connections. 

If giving our protagonist a robot to talk to already feels like “Oxygen” is cheating a little with its own premise, it's not the last time it does this. As Elizabeth works hard to jog her own memory, the film often segues into flashbacks. Yes, the movie all about someone being trapped inside a box frequently goes outside that box via the power of the mind. She gets flashes of the laboratory she worked in or the home life with her husband. This naturally fleshes out both the character and the story. Yet it does feel a little bit like “Oxygen” is going out of its way to violate the very gimmick the entire movie is built around. 

Another challenge that confined space thrillers often have to deal with is justifying why someone is stuck in such a tiny area. It's usually because they're pursued by some outside force or trapped due to a disaster scenario. “Oxygen” goes the latter route. If the presence of an advanced A.I. with all sorts of communicative abilities didn't clue you in, this is also a science fiction film. As the film goes on, and we learn more about the exact circumstance Elizabeth is in, increasingly outlandish plot twists are revealed. All the marketing made “Oxygen” seem like a fairly grounded story, so I was caught off-guard by these turns. In fact, I couldn't help but feel like the movie starts to get a little silly the more far-out it becomes. 

Like the similarly preposterous “Crawl,” that silliness sometimes works in “Oxygen's” favor. The movie's growing absurdity can be surprising, or even fun at times. In its best moments, the film is genuinely suspenseful. A sequence where Elizabeth's air is all-but out and she is nearly euthanized has her scrambling to pull her various I.V. tubes out. That scene keeps building effectively, being the closest of close calls. Yet, sometimes, “Oxygen's” attempts at suspense simply fall into the goofy side of things. A scene where she has to roll around to avoid a tiny robotic arm with a needle is too awkward to be suspenseful or amusing. 

Ultimately, I didn't mind “Oxygen” getting goofier as it went on too much. There's some fun to be had with a script that starts out within the realm of the plausible and becomes increasingly more unlikely as it goes on. However, packing at least two huge plot twists into the second half of your movie does have a down-side: It means you're never going to think up an ending that can top that. “Oxygen's” final moments go for sentimentality and quiet catharsis over more shocks. With a little more time, this probably would've made for a fine ending. Yet it couldn't help but feel a bit abrupt, or even anticlimactic, to me on this initial viewing. 

When you have a movie devoted almost entirely to just one person, you better have a really strong actor in your corner. Originally meant to star Noomi Rapace, who still has a producer's credit, Melanie Laurent would end up inside the cryo-pod instead. (Presumably because Rapace had already done enough of that in “Prometheus.”) Laurent is, of course, more than capable. Her performance goes a long way towards humanizing “Oxygen's” often ridiculous writing. Her ability to panic with utmost sincerity immediately sucks the audience in. She creates an utterly human character, someone completely terrified and lost but still fighting on to survive. We are more than willing to follow Laurent on this journey. When “Oxygen” works at its best, it's because of her.

As an Alexandre Aja movie, “Oxygen” carries with it certain expectations. Though it's not true of everything he's directed, his best movies usually feature gory horror delivered in shocking ways. “Oxygen” does indeed feature a bit of that. Elizabeth occasionally hallucinates images of herself on an operating table, gasping for breath while her body is all twisted up. Rats with enormous cancerous tumors have a cameo appearance, before another hallucination fills the chamber with the same rats. Probably the best shock in the movie occurs when Elizabeth finally gets the lights just outside her chamber turned on and is greeted with a very grisly sight. That was a good one.

Yet Aja's memorable visuals aren't strictly limited to the gruesome stuff. The director shows a sharp eye all throughout “Oxygen.” Obviously, shooting an entire movie in such a tight, limited location forced the director to get creative. Sometimes, the camera swirls around the inside of the pod. Other times, Elizabeth is shown floating in complete darkness and isolation, depicted from the side. Easily the most impressive scene in the entire movie occurs when the camera pulls back – all the way back – showing us exactly what kind of situation our protagonist is in. As we spiral through an enormous structure, it begins to resemble the iris of an eye. Which the film then makes more literal, by dissolving to Elizabeth's eye. When combined with rob's ethereal score, “Oxygen” manages to create a real sense of awe. 

The tricks “Oxygen” pulls off are mostly of the narrative and technical type. Yet there is another layer to this movie that I couldn't help but notice. The opening minutes of the film has Elizabeth ripping herself out of a membrane-like bag. When combined with “Oxygen's” premise of a single individual inside an enclosed area, with tubes running in and out of her body, the film's single location can't help but strike me as rather womb-like. Yet Elizabeth also spends the entire movie on the verge of death, which makes the cramped cryo-pod also indicative of a casket. I don't know how intentional this was, and the film's story never quite connects, but themes of birth and death definitely seem to be floating around inside “Oxygen.”

It's also notable that “Oxygen” is Alexandre Aja's first movie in his native language of French since “High Tension.” I can only assume this is because Melanie Laurent is also French. If the movie starred Anne Hathaway, who was attached very early in development, one assumes it would've been in English. Considering this is a very dialogue heavy movie, what language it's in does make a difference. The reviews were pretty mixed on this one, which is not surprising. There are times when “Oxygen” works extremely well. Yet it's also got a goofy streak and an underwhelming ending. How much you're able to enjoy this one will likely depend entirely on how willing you are to swallow its more outlandish moments. [Grade: C+]

Director Report Card: Alexandre Aja (2019)

8. Crawl

For horror fans that don't really keep track of this stuff, it probably seemed like Alexandre Aja just disappeared for a while. After his hyper-violent breakthrough “High Tension,” he found mainstream success with gory remakes of “The Hills Have Eyes” and “Piranha.” After that, he tried to branch out with more distinguished material. “Horns” was still basically a horror movie but it skewed more on the psychological side of things and had a major star, in the form of Daniel Radcliffe. But not many people saw it. “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” got buried and that was probably for the best.

Now, sixteen years after first catching horror fans' attention, Aja has finally got a movie in megaplexes all over the country again. It would seem he's gotten back to his populist roots, directing a trashy genre picture. Set in Florida but shot on Serbian sound stages, the film was produced by Sam Raimi, a combination that seems irresistible. (And one I'm surprised didn't happen during Sam's Ghost House Pictures days.)  “Crawl” is another down-and-dirty, waterlogged killer animal flick from the French auteur. The undeniably catchy premise of “woman trapped in a flooding house, full of pissed-off gators” caused the movie to crack my list of most anticipated features of 2019. Because I, for one, can appreciate some glossy gator-sploitation.

Haley is a competitive swimmer who lives in Florida. She has a somewhat complex relationship with her recently divorced father, who is having trouble letting go of the family home he shared with his daughters' mother. Hurricane Wendy, a category five storm, is blowing into the state. When her sister can't get a hold of her dad, Haley drives right into the storm's path to figure out what's going on. She finds her father in the house's crawlspace, where he's been attacked by a pack of seriously angry alligators. Soon, the two are trapped inside the building as Wendy rolls in and entirely floods the area. They'll have to battle the weather and fight the gators if they hope to survive.

“Crawl's” script comes from the mind of the Rasmussen brothers, a screenwriting team that previously wrote John Carpenter's “The Ward” and a bunch of other low budget horror stuff I never noticed before. I can't speak much for the quality of their other films but the script for “Crawl” delightfully takes advantage of its ridiculous premise. For Haley and her dad, things just go from bad to worst. What starts as two gators grows to an entire pack. The water level just keep rising and rising, dad pressing his face to the floorboards for one last gulp of oxygen. Just when it seems our characters get a break, that's when the levees break and a tidal wave rolls in... “Crawl” amusingly exploits every possible outcome of its delightfully pulpy premise.

More than pluming just about every situation you might think of after reading that long line, “Crawl” actually functions decently as a thriller. As unlikely as a Floridian home right in the flood zone with a basement might seem, it proves a tense location to set a creature feature. For most of the film's first half, Haley and her dad are hiding in different corners of the tight location, sneaking between pipes that the giant reptiles can't quite squeeze through. There's not even enough room for either of them to stand up. It's definitely the last place you want to be trapped with some angry gators and “Crawl” takes full advantage of that. You feel the danger the characters are in, more room becoming unavailable as the water rises and the beasts close in.

There have been many crocodilian thrillers over the years, ranging wildly in quality. “Crawl” distinguish itself from the scaly lot by making its gators especially aggressively. In real life, American alligators are usually not going to attack people. In this movie, they tear humans apart without a moment's notice. They are also shockingly sneaky for reptiles that can weight upwards of 500 pounds. More than once, “Crawl” engineers surprisingly effective jump scares around its reptilian antagonists. The gators fall suddenly onto stairs, are revealed by lightning brightening the room, or leap from a doorway to attack. Though largely brought to life via CGI, the creatures still have a surprising amount of weight and heft to them. They hiss and roar, slinking across the ground but swiftly navigating the water.

Alexandre Aja largely founded his career on his ability to deliver intense sequences of gory mayhem. After backing away from the gore a bit with his last two films, Aja brings the grisliness back in a big way with “Crawl.” These incredibly pissed off gators sure like to tear people apart. The water is flooded with red many times throughout the film's run time. The gators grab limbs in their powerful jaws, crushing them, stabbing them, and graphically tearing them apart. Interlopers are introduced into the story largely to beef up the body count, looters or cops being pulled apart by a whole pack of gators. Aja, like before, makes every attack as painful as possible. Even the non-gator gore, like a scene of the dad setting a bone all by himself, are fittingly upsetting in their own way. The sound design is full of cringe-inducing crunching and popping.

In fact, all of the sound design in “Crawl” is surprisingly good. In the early scenes, before the flood water really starts to rise, an uneasy tension is built by the dripping water from the leaky pipes and the static of a radio Hailey's dad brought down with him. Once the flood waters truly start to roll in, Max Aruj and Steffen Thum's fittingly noisy musical score ramps way the fuck up. “Crawl” is a well produced motion picture, is my point. You also see this in Aja's stylish direction, which utilizes several underwater effective P.O.V. shots and other tactics to keep the tension on the upswing. My favorite of which is when Aja sends the audience on a death roll with one of the victims.

“Crawl” is a star vehicle for Kaya Scodelario, an actress I keep hearing people talking about even though I've never actually seen her in anything else before. I can now say I definitely get the hype. Scodelario gives an impressive physical performance. She spends pretty much the entire movie submerged in water. That's in addition to being torn up and battered around by gators and waves. Through it all, Scodelario brings an unerringly tough – I'm tempted to even say plucky – protagonist to life. She even manages to inject some humor into a role that mostly has her facing down death, drowning, and gory dismemberment.

“Crawl” is practically a two-hander, between Kaya Scodelario and Barry Pepper. (Three hander, if you count dog Cso-Cso. And you should, because she's a very good girl.) Pepper is not as convincing as Scodelario. Sometimes, he does not seem as paternal as the script calls for him to be. Pepper isn't always willing to totally buy into the emotions of the material. However, Pepper is similarly up to the physical demands of his character. In fact, that's the part of the film he really seems to enjoy. Struggling with a broken leg and numerous other injuries throughout the film, he similarly grasps a certain toughness.

The team behind “Crawl” was clearly working hard to make this more than just a movie about gator carnage. There are obvious themes of family and survival here. Though Haley and her dad have had many disagreements over the years, they clearly still love each other. That clear affection for each other is part of what keeps them fighting through this crazy situation. The film attempts to link this idea with the movie's scaly villains.  Midway through the film, we learn why the alligators are acting so extraordinarily aggressive. It turns out they've built a nest of eggs in the house's drainage pipe. So the gators are also motivated by a love of family, a need to keep their off-spring safe, through this story.

Disappointingly, this plot point is dropped more-or-less the minute after its introduced, “Crawl” getting on to the more pressing matter of in-coming flood waters. It's not the only way the writing, though admirable, is a little underdeveloped. I know survival is a big theme of the film because the characters lay it out. More than once, Dad tells Haley exactly what her special skills are, precisely how and why she should can keep fighting. The script lays that on a little thick, connecting it back to Haley's life as a pro-swimmer and the challenges she faces. I'm all for adding more depth to our trashy horror flicks but that needs to be paired with some subtly too.

Ultimately though, I really enjoyed “Crawl.” As grim as the material can be, a tongue-in-cheek end credits song choice makes it clear we aren't suppose to take these events too seriously. The whole film is in-and-out in less than 90 minutes, the kind of speedy runtime I didn't think showed up in theaters much anymore. But that's exactly the kind of run time needed for a low-demand, gory, and intense creature feature like this. I'm pretty pleased to see the film has done well at the box office, so hopefully Aja won't spend quite so long in exile after this. [Grade: B]

Director Report Card: Alexandre Aja (2016)

7. The 9th Life of Louis Drax

As someone who has been following Alexandra Aja's career for a while, I've seen one or two odd projects come across his IMDb page. There was that “Pet Sematary” remake, which is finally being made by an entirely different group. For a while, Aja was attached to a live action adaptation of classic anime “Space Pirate Cobra.” So when I saw something called “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” crop up as in development, I assumed it would be another one of those weird, unrealized project. In fact, the project would actually end up going before cameras, becoming the director's first non-horror film in quite some time. Despite being based on a reasonably well regarded novel by Liz Jensen, “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” would attract almost no attention when it came out last year.

Louis Drax is an especially accident prone child. He has suffered nearly fatal accidents almost every year of his life, from being electrocuted when he was a toddler to having his ribs crushed as a baby. On his ninth birthday, he falls from a cliff into freezing waters. The shock seemingly kills him, before he receives and falls into a coma. Inside his own head, Louis constructs a fantasy world. It's made of his memories, primarily of his parents' troubled marriage, and clearly fantastical elements. In the waking world, his mother Natalie bounds with Dr. Pascal, the physician watching over the boy. When his father's dead body surfaces in a cave, a mystery starts to emerge.

From its opening minutes, “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” hits you over the head with its quirky tone of magical realism. The first shot does an old-fashion iris out on the protagonist as he falls before an intentionally artificial green screen. The opening credits are done in a hand-written style, with various animals and critters illustrated around them. The score, which is trying so hard to sound like something from a Jean Pierre Jeunet movie, plays overhead. The entire first half of “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” feels this way. The montage devoted to Louis' history of injuries has that same energy, attempting to come off as eccentric and charming. Drax's dreams are full of whimsical elements, like a seaweed monster that sounds like Tobin Bell in “Saw” that he tells his life story too. It's all straining to capture a very specific tone that a hundred other movies have done better.

The first half of “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” is characterized by this quirky-for-quirkiness' sake atmosphere. The second half, however, makes a largely unexpected lurch towards mystery. Suddenly, the film is preoccupied with who is sending a series of threatening letters. Once the death of Louis' father, Peter, is introduced, the film becomes a full blown murder mystery. It's such an odd tonal shift, to go from whimsical to serious. It's almost like two completely different movies were awkwardly bolted together. Moreover, “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” is not especially compelling as a mystery. The conclusion is easy to figure out. The clues do not add up in an interesting way.

It must be said, “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” attempts to reconcile these two vastly different approaches. This solution is equally awkward as the divide itself though. There is no interior logic to the movie's magic-realism. The fantastical touches are not limited to Louis' dream sequences. Instead, Dr. Pascal starts to experience strange dreams too. He begins to practice automatic writing and sleepwalking. This thoroughly unexplained plot development reaches its ridiculous conclusion when Dr. Pascal is hypnotized, Louis speaking through him somehow.  Why or how does this happen? The movie does not explain it. It's just suppose to be magic, I guess, which is a good example of how sloppy the writing is.

In his horror pictures, Alexandra Aja often showed a fantastic and flashy visual sense. This is certainly on display throughout “The 9th Life of Louis Drax.” During those fantasy sequences, he gets to indulge in some of his most unusual images yet. Such as Louis floating through the water, approaches by the seaweed monster. Or a later sequence where glowing jellyfish circle him. However, the director's approach to the scenes in the waking world are less impressive. The hospital scenes are often washed-out and overly glossy. It's not flat, just unappealing.

I have no idea what attracted Alexandre Aja to this material. We can assume the filmmaker was hoping to try something else, to flex his directorial muscles a bit. However, there are times when you can definitely tell that “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” was directed by a horror filmmaker. That seaweed monster is certainly a bizarre touch and even stars in a jump-scare nightmare. There's another moment, a possible homage to DePalma's “Raising Cain,” were Louis leaps up in his bed suddenly. Louis' shrink seems to be a horror fan too. He decorates his office with giallo posters and Universal Monsters action figures. Even when handling a project outside horror, it would seem Aja can't help but from including a few callbacks to his usual genre

From one angle, “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” would seem to be a movie about parenting. Bad parenting, that is. Louis' mom and dad fight constantly. His father, a former MMA fighter, has a temper. His mom, meanwhile, seems especially traumatized by the constant injuries her son has suffered. More than once, the boy retreats into his room. During a key scene, he types loudly on a typewriter in order to blot out the sound of mom and dad at screaming at each other. Louis resents all men, for the way the gender at large has mistreated his mom. Despite these scenes, the movie doesn't seem to be making any sort of solvent point about parenting or gender.

That is until the deeply dumb last minute twist. To top off its weird shift into murder-mystery territory, Jensen and actor-turned-screenwriter Max Minghella throw in a twist that is, honestly, offensive. Spoiler alert: Louis' mom has Munchhausen-by-proxy. She's been responsible for all of his injuries and even murdered her dad, events shown in the kind of revealing montage common to hacky thrillers like this. At that point, the movie takes a 180. The loving mom is abusive, the abusive dad is loving. Not only is this twist borderline misogynistic, boiling down to “bitches be crazy,” it is not a fair or realistic depiction of a troubled marriage. A complicated issue like this deserves a more nuanced take than this half-assed, black-or-white bullshit.

Yet even this is not the film's biggest problem. The truth is Louis Drax is simply not an appealing character. He likes to murder his pet hamsters, the filmmakers mistaking animal cruelty for a likable quirk. (Louis' parents don't seem to find this behavior distributing.) He has a smug side, frequently mocking or belittling the grown-ups around him. This becomes especially apparent in the overbearing narration Louis gives, which plays over most of the movie and explains every last thing about its themes. Aiden Longworth, a child actor with a number of credits, is not a strong enough actor to overcome these writing flaws. In fact, Longworth's delivery is often irritating and overly broad.

Aside from its unappealing lead character, “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” has a supporting cast of equally mixed quality. Jamie Dornan gets top-billing as Dr. Pascal, the coma expert brought in to work on Louis. Dornan's performance seems uncertain at, confused by by the material as much as the audience is. Aaron Paul, as Louis' father, has a few good moments. His interaction with Aiden Longworth is the only time the boy's performance seems genuine. However, Paul also plays the character as a soulless, raging monster at times. Sarah Gadon's performance as Natalie at least succeeds in making the audience feel sorry for her, even if it too rings false. Barbara Hershey has a small and somewhat cartoonish appearance as Louis' bitchy grandmother. Oliver Platt plays Dr. Perez, Louis' psychologist and the most likable person in the movie. This is mostly thanks to Platt's easy-going charms as a performer.

I didn't totally hate “The 9th Life of Louis Drax.” There are some clever touches. The sequence where the seaweed monster leads the boy into a cave is nicely spooky moment, once again suggesting Aja's experience in the horror genre. As mockable as the decision seems, a seaweed monster as the inner mentor that Louis explains his story to is certainly an interesting idea. (How it plays out, in a moment involving a thuddingly obvious bedtime story, I am less fond of.) There's also a scene in a Chinese restaurant featuring some really tasty looking food. I liked that.

I seem to recall “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” sitting on a shelf for a while. It's easy to see why. Not just because the movie isn't very good but also because it was pretty hard to sell. When released last September, I can't recall a single soul talking or writing about it. Having seen it now, it's definitely a misfire for Aja. The exceedingly muddled script lets down a filmmaker with some strong visual ideas or one or two clever conceptions. Aja's next movie, an awesome sounding crocodile thriller called “Crawl,” sounds like it'll return him to more comfortable territory. I don't think “The 9th Life of Louis Drax” will damage his career much, since so few people seemed to have actually seen it. [Grade: C-]

Director Report Card: Alexandre Aja (2014)

6. Horns

Alexandre Aja’s careers has had its ups and downs. He burst onto the scene with “High Tension,” one of the films that helped defined the new wave of French horror in the two-thousands and won over horror fans from all around the world. After coming to America, he became known as a remake specialist, directing three horror remakes in a row. Though only one of those was a dud, Aja perhaps bristled against that reputation. He turned down remakes of “Pet Sematary” and “Silent Night, Deadly Night” before trying to kick-start an as-yet unrealized live-action version of “Cobra the Space-Pirate.” After three years, the director finally returned with “Horns,” the first film based on a novel by Joe Hill. Despite being from a book by the son of Stephen King, “Horns” is something of a departure for Aja. It’s more dark fantasy then pure horror. It also stars a major actor, Daniel Radcliffe, someone else looking to break pop culture preconceptions.

Ig Perrish, a DJ and local celebrity of minor renown in his small town of Gideon, is going through a personal hell. His angelic girlfriend, beloved by everyone around him, has been murdered and Ig is widely assumed of being the killer. He isn’t. The grief of loosing his beloved is hard enough. The constant badgering and suspicion is driving him crazy. After a particularly rough night, Ig awakens with a pair of satyr-like horns growing from his forehead. When staring directly at the horns, people confess their deepest secrets to Ig or act on their darkest desires before forgetting the events all together. Though he’s disturbed by this development at first, Ig quickly begins to use his newfound abilities to uncover his girlfriend’s true killer. As he searches for the devil in others, his own devilish nature grows.

After being Harry Potter for the first decade of his career, Daniel Radcliffe probably could have retired from acting altogether or pursued easy roles in similar big budget summer flicks. Instead, Radcliffe has used his star power to get dark, off-beat projects made. After an infamous stage revival of “Equus,” “The Woman in Black,” “Kill Your Darlings,” “A Young Doctor’s Notebook,” (but before a new version of “Frankenstein” where he’ll play Igor) ”Horns” fits right in with Radcliffe’s new career direction. Radcliffe’s performance winds up being one of the most solid elements of the sometimes-rickety film. Performing with a convincing American accent, Radcliffe wrings every ounce of emotion he can out of the occasionally stiff dialogue. There’s a raw, honest quality to his work here. A few times, he delivers his lines, on the verge of tears, earning the audience’s investment. Radcliffe’s soul-barring performance is the best thing about the film and, just when it threatens to fall apart, he holds it together.

The first half of “Horns” revolves around the revealing of secrets and the fulfillment of base desires. These themes and concepts could have been used to explore deeper ideas about society and people. Instead, the film uses Ig’s powers to create moments of broad comedy. This, actually, works out fine. The movie is frequently hilarious in these early scenes. Ig becomes the straight man to everyone around him acting like loonies. A doctor and his comely assistant say grossly inappropriately things before mating like bunnies in the operating room. The secretary and the mother of a screaming daughter in the waiting room swear at each other. Patrons of the local bar commit arson and expose themselves. A pair of overly macho cops nonchalantly confess their homoerotic desires for one another. Realizing he has the ability to influence people, Ig gets a group of bottom-feeding reporters, constantly following him, to beat the shit out of each other. It’s funny in a dark way and honest too. “Horns” obviously couldn’t have continued down this path forever but I sort of wish it did.

In time, the film has to address the girlfriend’s death and the identity of her killer. In its middle chapter, “Horns” becomes an atypical murder mystery. Ig uses his abilities to gather clues. He discovers that a waitress lied about his behavior on the night of the murder. He learns that his drug addict brother was the last person to see Merrin alive. Knowing these things, Ig decides to use his new abilities to punish those that have wronged him. When Ig gives into his devilish urges the movie, none too subtly, has him picking up a pitchfork and giving him a sway over snakes. During these trashier moments, “Horns” begins to feel more like the horror movies Alexandre Aja has made in the past. It’s less interesting then the dark comedy but isn’t without its positive attributes. The waitress being bitten by a horde of snakes in her car is certainly a memorable moment. You could see the roots of a solid revenge thriller in “Horns” if it had committed to one tone.

The script takes a number of liberties with Joe Hill’s novel, most of them for the best. However, like the book, the movie makes extensive use of flashbacks. The first extended flashback goes back to Ig’s childhood, exploring when he first met Merrin, the love of his life, and a few other friends for life. This first sequence works fairly well. The cast of kids are talented and all resemble their adult counterparts. The way Merrin and Ig meet, involving a cross necklace and Morse code in church, is cute without being too gimmicky. An anecdote involving a cheery bomb pays off fairly way. The centerpiece of this sequence has Ig, in his underwear, riding a shopping cart off a ramp, into the logging lake, and nearly dying.

However, “Horns” relies too much on flashbacks. Each one is long enough that you honestly forget what is happening in the story’s present. The character of Merrin, whose death motivates the entire plot, is seen only in flashback. She is presented as so angelic that everyone around her loves her immediately. Ig’s parents literally loved their potential daughter-in-law more then their own son. She is essentially more of a plot device then in a real character. Her goodness has to be so overwhelming as to completely remove any other character trait. A few of the other flashbacks few extraneous, presenting more detail then is necessary to the story. It begins to affect the pacing after a while.

For its flaws, “Horns” functions fairly well as both a dark comedy and a demonic-tinged thriller… Up until the last half-hour. Ig discovers who kills his girlfriend and confronts her, the story coming to a logical ending point. Instead of finishing up there, the movie continues for another thirty minutes. The murderer stops acting like a reasonable human being and begins acting like a psychotic, cartoon supervillain. Ig puts on Merrin’s cross necklace, his wounds healing instantly, another example of the film’s heavy-handed symbolism. It gets worst. Hero and villains meet again. All the good will “Horns” builds up so far is squandered at this point. Ig trades in his devil horns for angel wings that then burst into flames, causing him to transform into a full blown demon. The effects are heavy-handed. The story concluding with a big fight scene is disappointing. The resolution is hopelessly cheesy too, even throwing in the “horny” pun the movie was probably resisting the entire time. If you cut “Horns” off at the 90 minute mark, you’d be left with a more satisfying film.

In addition to Radcliffe’s strong central performance, “Horns” features a cast full of great character actors. James Remar and Kathleen Quinlan, who hasn’t had a role this good since “Twilight Zone: The Movie,” both have plum roles as Ig’s parents. Each one gets a solid monologue to themselves. Joe Anderson and Kelli Garner both play desperate characters and their desperate qualities are increased by Ig’s powers. Juno Temple only has to be angelic and flawless as Merrin and, luckily, Temple is more then capable of that. David Morse is another juicy supporting player as her angry, grieving father. My favorite performance in the film belongs to Heather Graham. As a frequently underutilized and unappreciated actress, Graham is given an oppretunity to dig into some prime dialogue here. As the lying, sleazy waitress, she indulges in some nasty, over-the-top behavior. It’s the most alive I’ve seen Graham in years. It’s unlikely to lead to better parts but I am glad to see her reinventing herself as a character actress in tighter parts.

Alexandre Aja’s style usually shows in his approach to violence. Visceral, intense attack scenes, played for maximum horror, is his primary director’s trademark.”Horns” has him in a expressive mode. An early scene has the perspective flipping upside, throwing the audience off-guard. Once Ig is on the path of revenge, he tracks down his no-good brother and forces him to OD on his extensive drug collection. An acid trip ensues which, possibly, pushes the film’s style too far. The twitchy, exaggerated close-ups on Daniel Radcliffe’s face was definitely not a thing we needed. Aja can’t resist throwing in some crazy gore. “Horns” features a stunningly gory exploding head, which comes out of nowhere but definitely makes an impression.

The crappy last act and simplistic characters decisions are symptoms of “Horns’” biggest problem. The whole film is hassled by an overly didactic tone. This is evident from the beginning, literally. As soon as the film begins, we are greeted with an unnecessary voiceover that lazily explains the themes of the story. Joe Hill’s dialogue works fine on the page but, coming out of actors’ mouth, often come off as overdone and too literal. The musical choices are often a little too-on-the-nose as well. Did “Personal Jesus” have to start up right as Ig manipulate a group of people into a fist fight? “Horns,” as a movie, probably needed a smoother screenplay and more naturalistic dialogue.

“Horns” is uneven but does contain plenty of things I like, Radcliffe’s performance and a intriguing and funny first half chief among them. It’s an interesting step forward for Aja, showing his interest evolving in different direction. His next film, “The 9th Life of Louis Drax,” is outside the horror genre too and sounds similarly themed to this one. Hopefully that film avoids the narrative bumps and choppy writing of this one. “Horns” comes very close to being satisfying but just misses the mark. [Grade: B-]

Review: Piranha 3D (2010)

5. Piranha 3-D
I had low expectations for “Piranha 3D.” The trend was ongoing when it was greenlit, but the horror remake fad is now winding down. I’m already sick of the new 3D. I figured the awful trailer was final evidence that Aja had left behind his European style and was strictly functioning as a director for hire.

Sometimes, low expectations are good. “Piranha 3D” is a blast, a campy, over-the-top throwback to exploitation cheese of the eighties. Right from the beginning, it’s obvious this was made by fans. The movie opens with Richard Dreyfus playing a character named Matt who sings “Show Me the Way to Go Home.” This is the first of many good signs.

The movie has two selling points: Blood and breasts. It doesn’t skimp on either. This might be the goriest horror film I’ve ever seen in the theater. The vicious piranhas tear their victims to literal pieces. Flesh is chewed down to the bone, limbs are eaten off, and the water quickly becomes red with blood. The highlight of the film is when the piranha menace hits the Spring Break partiers. Literally hundreds of victims step out of the water, their skin gnawed away, while others are left below to become fish food. Boat related carnage actually provides the gore highlights. A girl has her face torn off by a propeller. Another is literally bisected by a whipping wire. Eli Roth, the Paris Hilton of horror directors, has his head crushed in what might be the most satisfying horror movie death in years.

And what about the T&A? The first shot of gorgeous, top heavy model Kelly Brook is of her wiggling backside. I’m not made of stone, people. Puerile as it might be, the movie has no shame in showing off its actresses assets and, I’ll admit, it added to my enjoyment. Miss Brook and porn star Riley Steele have a fully nude, underwater ballet. The movie stops for about five minutes just to ogle these women. It somehow doesn’t come off as exploitative, but rather goofy, fun, and genuinely erotic. (That the characters hold their breath for ten minutes might be a good indicator of the cheese factor at work here.) In the scene most indicative of the movie’s mentality, a topless parasailor, played by 34DD-cupped porn starlet Gianna Michaels, first thrust her jugs into the camera and then has her legs eaten off by killer fish. 3D tits, covered in blood. You can’t argue with that.

Most amazingly though, despite being a gore and boobs delivery system, this is the first time in a while were I actually cared wither the characters in a horror movie made it out alive or not. Steven R. McQueen plays Jake. He is clearly crushed on Kelli, played the capable and cute Jessica Szohr, but never comes off as too whiny. The romantic tension between the two proves to legitimately sweet. Moreover, at the end, Jake proves himself to be a capable and resourceful hero, and pulls off the kind of “Smart teen saves the day” style scheme that was a hallmark of 1950 creature features. Adam Scott is similarly smart and badass, especially when he jumps on a water ski and goes after the piranha with a shotgun. Elisabeth Shue provides us with a strong female authority figure, a rare sight in a horror movie, and it’s a great performance. She plays both a mother and a cop with equal strength. Christopher Lloyd has a great cameo as the resident fish expert. Ving Rhames kicks a lot of ass, especially when he picks up a boat propeller and faces the aquatic threat one-on-one. Jerry O’Connell gets maybe the meatiest role as the Joe Francis stand-in. O’Connell has made a career of playing obnoxious douchebag, so much that I’m not convinced it’s an act. His eventual, 3D prolonged, incredibly painful death gives the movie its most over-the-top, gruesomely funny moment.

Aja direction is not as fierce as in his previous film but this suits the movie’s wacky tone. He does, however, get one great moment when he copies the reserve dolly shot of “Jaws,” a moment that caused me to cheer it was so cool. The piranhas themselves are vicious little fuckers, and brilliantly brought to life. The movie mixes CGI and practical effects extremely well. And did I notice a reprise of Pino Donaggio’s beautiful score from the original film at one point? “Piranha 3D” sets out to be the guilty pleasure of the summer and, goddamn, does it ever succeed. There will probably be competitors later on, but for the moment, this is the best, most entertaining horror film of the year. [Grade: A-]

Director's Report Card: Alexandre Aja (2006-2008)

3. The Hills Have Eyes
Casual horror fans might not have even seen Wes Craven’s original “The Hill Have Eyes” and therefore probably don’t understand the level of anxiety that accompanied serious fright fanatics at the news of this remake. Serious fans can get touchy when a favorite of their’s is being redone, especially after the many subpar adaptations a lot of classic have received recently. Even a talented filmmaker would have trouble meeting the skill of Craven’s best film. Though Aja had one impressive horror behind him at this point, his mettle was still fully unproven.

Luckily, all in all, the new take on “The Hills Have Eyes” is pretty good. The story is faithful to the original and really only makes two serious changes to the tale. My biggest bone of contention would be with the changes made to the family of cannibalistic madman. Originally, the murderous clan was equal in numbers to the Carter folks and many deliberate comparisons were made between the two, suggesting that environment has more to do with the vast difference then anything else. In this rendition, the hill dwellers are a small colony and have become grotesquely deformed nuclear mutants. The main villain of the original piece, Papa Jupiter, is barely in this telling at all.

The social subtext of Wes Craven’s vision, the critique of the American family and proper society, has instead been transformed into a metaphor for America’s involvement in Iraq. Hear me out: A strictly conservative father leads his family into a desert area where the technologically advanced group is picked off easily by the primitive native inhabitants. Its only when the liberally minded man takes charge does things turn around for our victims. Reading too much into it? Perhaps. But the presence of an American flag in a key scene surely isn’t by accident.

As just a scare flick, the new “Hills” is successful, too. Aja continues to show a knack for creating intense attack sequences. His mobile home invasion is, dare I say, more suspenseful then Craven’s original. The final confrontation between Doug and Pluto is also a great moment.

The cast is solid and filled with several familiar faces, such as Ted Levine, Robert Joy, and Billy Drago. I might have preferred a more subtle take, the atomic mutants do push believability, but the monsters are created by cool old school make-up and I can’t complain about that. Aja’s visual style adapts well to the flatness of the Nevadan desert and though some say the remake lacks the grindhouse grittiness of the first, the director has create a new sort of grit, empathizing the heat and dirt. There’s plenty of blood too, even in today’s climate of ultra-gory torture horror, this is still one of the bloodiest films I’ve ever seen in a theater, but it’s never used needlessly and always has a point. Perhaps it’s his European roots, but Aja never befalls to the obnoxious trend of rock video shots prevalent in so much horror today. (Except briefly during the opening credits. Yeah, I noticed.) Unlike a lot of remakes, this one is respectful of its originator and was obviously made by fans. As another fan, I approve of the effort. [Grade: B+]


4. Mirrors
I had really hoped that “Mirrors” would be able to overcome its silly concept. I mean, the movie wants to do for reflective surfaces what “Psycho” did for showers. But I trusted the talent involved. So I’m sad to report that “Mirrors” is, to sum it up, dumb. My biggest disappointment is that almost all of Aja’s trademark style seems to be absent. Only twice does anything resembling his typical style rear its head at all.

The red-band trailer gave me hope that, even if the movie sucked, we’d at least get some crazy gore. Not really. There are only two moments and, while both are quite impressive, it amounts to about six minutes of a 110 minute movie. (And we saw most of the action in the R-rated trailer anyway.) The first act is composed mostly of what I call “stock-and-shock” segments. Basically the scare is pitched so far in advance that when it comes, we don’t even get a little jump. Besides, the scare is usually nothing more then something jumping at us or something “spooky” passing by the camera. The overzealous musical score helps none at all and often I was more irritated by the blast of loud cords then anything else.

Kiefer’s character starts out as morose but mildly compelling, but his ex-wife and kids that figure into the subplot are as boring as can be, in particular the kids, who are terrible actors. And what was with Paula Patton’s gratuitous cleavage? Her boobs are always falling out of her shirt and are framed prominently in every scene she’s in. I mean, its distracting.

After Amy Smart, who does nothing by the way, exits the film and the second act starts, things pick up. We basically have Kiefer Jack Bauer-ing every mirror he encounters. Sure, it’s goofy, but at least it’s entertaining. It should be a rule somewhere that the crazier Kiefer becomes, the better the movie gets. If the whole thing was just him punching glass, I would have liked it better. The mystery here is swiped pretty heavily from “The Ring” but didn’t completely bore me.

It wasn’t until the third act, when Busty Mom and Annoying Kids are locked in the house with the evil-mirror bound spirits, that things become uninteresting again. After another neat moment of gore, the movie takes a bizarre hard turn in its last minutes. We get a climatic fight scene that feels like something out of a video game and is tonally unlike anything else before. And then there’s a dumb twist.

Aja does get some atmosphere out of the creepy abandoned mall but any mood is soon crushed by a goofy plot point or a loud blast of music. I think it would be best if Aja stayed away from supernatural horror in the future as its obvious he doesn’t have any wings for it. Oh well. [Grade: C]

Director's Report Card: Alexandre Aja (1999-2003)

When Alexandre Aja first busted onto the horror scene in 2003, it seemed a blessing. "Haute Tension" was a fanboy friendly homage to slasherdom of yore and opened the floodgates for similarly visceral French horror. His mastery of color, mood, and artful, intense gore set pieces set him up as the heir to Dario Argento. Similarly, his remake of "The Hills Have Eyes" launched him into the mainstream, was easily the best of the still on-going wave of remakes of '70s classics, and positioned him as the most skilled of the so-called "Splat Pack" directors. And then he got stuck doing a bunch of shitty remakes. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's go back to the beginning.

1. Furia
Let’s face it, Orwellian, dystopian sci-fi has become a bad cliché. Like the religious zealot or corrupt politician, it’s a concept that seems really daring when you’re thirteen but, after you’ve seen it used to cheap effect over and over again through the years, becomes considerably less so. “Furia” doesn’t rise above these central problems. Its plot of two lovers torn apart by the state is right out of “1984.”

But let’s give credit where it’s due. It would certainly develop over the next film but the roots of Aja’s style are evident here. The color palette here is intentionally drab which makes the occasional burst of color even stronger. And you’ll notice Aja has always included acrobatic blood spill in his stories. I’m not sure where “Furia” was filmed but it’s dilapidated, desert location adds a great deal to the film’s effect. It’s definitely a convincing dystopian future, if nothing else. The actors are capable with Marion Cotillard being appropriately enchanting.

The story is hardly anything new. The oppressive state is drawn in broad terms and never made particularly threatening, even in the middle of torture scenes that stink of been-there, done-that. The love story is pulled off convincing, mostly thanks to the strong acting, but falls away to the background after the first half-hour. All the interesting ideas are pretty much used up by then making the remaining 69 minutes increasingly tiresome. Characters fade away (literally) far too often and the finale is a little overdone.

The music is a big problem. The score is from Brian May (Yes, the guitarist from Queen, not the veteran Australian composers with the same name.) and, with its electronic chirping and raging guitar solos, more then a little melodramatic. Ultimately, the music needs up robbing many scenes of any potential power. A chase comes off especially badly. This could have been easily improved with a more subtle score.

The biggest problem with the movie is that, despite the talent of everyone involved, nobody can bring much of anything new to this often told tale. It was a determined feature debut but maybe the filmmaker should have waited for his skill to catch up with his ambitions. Ultimately, “Furia” is a stylish but unimpressive production. [Grade: C+]


2. High Tension
“High Tension” is ultimately an exercise in style. The film’s plotting, especially the final revelation, gets criticized a lot. That’s not what’s important. Aja and his team were creating a homage to splatter flicks of old but with a decidedly European slant.

Visually, the film is gorgeous. Blues, greens, and especially reds fill out the rich color palate. Despite the intense violence of what happens onscreen, the French countryside is still beautiful and incredibly inviting. The music further enhances the moody atmosphere create by the visual style.

Alexandre Aja’s direction is very impressive. He reminds me a great deal of a young Argento in several ways. First off, both directors treat every act of violence like a grand operatic set-piece. It’s not just the amount of blood sprayed, it’s how it's sprayed. Viscera is their canvas. They understand the anticipation of violence and spread things out accordingly. Another similarity is the incredible way the audience is drawn into each attack, how they are made to feel at the center of things, which leads to a hugely intense effect.

The cast is small and the acting is really limited to just two roles. Cecile DeFrance manages to bring a great deal of emotion to a primarily physical role. She carries the whole movie and does it with ease. It’s a star-making role. Philipee Nonan plays the Killer and is an expert in sleazy bastard roles like these by now. His role is largely physical too and Nonan’s looming frame is well suited to the part.

The tension spoken off in the title is maintained throughout almost the whole run time. The early home invasion scene is a terrifying set piece and the game of running and hiding between the protagonist and antagonist that follows builds upon those feelings.

Things go quite well up until the infamous twist late into the third act. In retrospect, things make sense, once the viewer realizes the whole thing isn’t meant to be a literal telling of this tale but from the prospective of lead character, Marie. On first viewing, the twist is asinine and breaks up the elegant simplicity that made everything before work so well. Still, if you can ignore this one oversight, “High Tension” is a grand horror picture and well on its way to becoming a modern fright classic. [Grade: A-]