Men (2022): The Unwavering Horror of Female Solitude
The A24 film Men (2022) is Alex Garland’s newest and third directorial project. His previous works include Ex Machina and Annihaliation. It is evident that weird, cosmic horror is Garland’s forte and Men is certainly no exception. It is a folk, body horror tale in which the protagonist, Harper Marlowe (Jessie Buckley), is staying at an isolated farmhouse in the remote village Cotson. It is a charming place, with expansive furnished rooms, floor-to-ceiling windows, a elegant garden with an exquisite apple tree. The perfect getaway for a woman who needs time to grieve after witnessing her husband kill himself.
Loneliness is a sin for women in horror
Men is an artistic piece in every sense of the word. After getting her things settled, Harper wonders on her own to explore a nearby forest. She follows a path with flourishing green vegetation and laughs to herself when small rain drops start to fall. The imagery is gentle, even if it is exhaustively comparing womanhood to nature.
When Harper wanders to a tunnel, she plays with the acoustics and sings as loud as she can. She is at peace, hope and comfort beaming in her eyes. But of course, this is ruined when a mysterious, shadowy figure at the end of the tunnel stands up and starts running at her. It is a reminder to Harper that, whether she stays or leaves home, women cannot be left alone.
Harper wants, and has the right, to be alone and she is going to fight for it.
Any time a woman is alone in a horror movie – hell, in any movie – it is evident that she will succumb to danger one way or another. When the strange man from the tunnel appears at Harper’s rental home and threatens to break in, Harper calls the police, who tell her the man must be harmless but arrest him nonetheless. Harper later facetimes her friend Riley (Gayle Rankin), who immediately offers to do the four hour drive and stay with Harper. Harper refuses the company, to which many of us in the theater (myself included) immediately shouted “no!” How can she be alone when she is obviously in danger?
However, I thought about it more and I read Heather O’Neill’s essay on the movie, who pointed out that, “[Harper] has come to be by herself, and she is going to work through the terror of it.” Harper wants, and has the right, to be alone. And she is going to fight for it.
There are other small moments in the movie that I was grateful for. In the beginning, the man who owns the house, Geoffrey (Rory Kinnear), gives her a tour. In one scene there is a room with a baby grand piano and Geoffrey asked if she plays, to which she responds “no.” The host admits he also doesn’t, and they continue with the rest of the tour. But later on, it turns out that Harper knows how to play rather well.
I loved this little detail and the strength it carries. Personally, when I have admitted to a man that I can do something, more often than not he immediately needs visual proof. In this case, it’s evident that Harper did not have the emotional space or energy to prove to the host that she has the ability to do something he cannot. I can see it in my head: if she said “yes,” he would pester her to play the piano until she finally gives in just to shut him up. He would make some comment, it would be a whole thing that didn’t need to happen. Sometimes it’s just easier to not admit to men when you can do something.
A little goes a long way.
Where Men has its strengths also lie its weaknesses. The entire movie is dipped, and eventually drowns, in visual metaphors. While folk horrors rely heavily on visual metaphors, there needs to be substance to the plot and this is where Men lacks. For example, the consistent focal point is a church tabernacle whose clay artwork consists of a leaf-man on one side, and a woman with a spread-open vagina on the other. Garland goes back to this scene often, holding the viewer’s hand in case we didn’t get the reference that historically, specifically in colonial Christian societies, womanhood is defined by biology.
Another example: unless it is in fear, women historically do not scream a lot in movies. Men scream and shout as loud as they want, whether it is in anger or joy or sorrow, because in a patriarchal world men can and need to be heard. There is a moment in Men when Harper visits a church and, after exploring its artifacts, sits in a pew and screams as loud as she can. She is overcome by grief and mental reruns of her husband falling to his death. And sometimes screaming is just what a person needs to do to let it all out.
I want to see women scream more, and not just because she is running for her life. But then a priest walks up to her and points out how he noticed her scream and how she must be tormented, an immediate shutdown of her emotions. Later in the movie, we see that famous visual trope of Harper dunking her head underwater in a bathtub and screaming. This is so no one, not even in a remote house in a meagerly populated town, can hear. And it is certainly no coincidence that her mouth looks an awful lot like Men’s visual depiction of a human vagina.
Blood blood blood
Let’s not forget the bloody climactic birth scene. It is set off by the visual of apples falling from a tree, an old metaphor for fertility. Soon, all the men in the movie who either terrorized or threatened Harper’s safety give birth to each other in a tumultuous depiction of the female human life cycle. Garland’s imagery is trying very hard to prove that gender is fluid and not simply biological, but that gets lost in the bloody sauce. There is also plenty of phallus symbolism, specifically with a bloody knife, Harper’s only weapon. Symbolism meager at best.
When the movie ends after the seemingly endless birth cycle, Riley finally meets Harper at Cotson and the audience learns Riley is pregnant. At this point of the movie, that little detail is thrown in there for no reason. There is fundamentally no purpose for this detail, which maybe is the whole point. Who knows? I wouldn’t be surprised if I’m putting more thought into it than the movie’s creators.
The Verdict
Men, in short, is an all too real story of the danger women face when being alone. It is about female isolation and men’s interference with that personal space. It is not nuanced in it’s message of what happens when women are alone. Horror movies have been telling us that for as long as they’ve existed.
Don’t get me wrong, Men is well made and well written. The acting is incredible and bring this character-driven story to life. The smallest details and simplicity are where it shines best. But the cumbersome plot sadly outweighs that.
At the end of the day, Men is another movie written by a man trying to understand the female experience as simplistically, binarized, and white as possible. Its goal in not reducing our bodies to our parts fails. And, frankly, I am tired.
(2.5 / 5)
*All photos screenshot from the movie’s YouTube trailer*
There are a lot of holiday horrors with the phrase Silent Night in their title. So, to help keep things straight, Silent Night Bloody Night is the one that no one should waste their time watching.
The story
Released in 1972, Silent Night Bloody Night is the story of an abandoned house. When it’s inherited by a man named Jeffrey Butler, the town tries to buy it from him. He sends his lawyer, John Carter, to negotiate. What follows is a Christmas-time revenge killing spree in the house that used to be an insane asylum and is now just a gross eyesore. Much like in Halloween, a prodigal son came home and started killing. Unlike in Halloween, viewers can’t bring themselves to care.
What worked
I would like to give credit where it’s due when I can find it. There were some legitimately creepy scenes in this movie. Two of them, to be precise.
The shots of the escaped inmates are well done. The makeup, dull facial expressions, and zombie-like movements were truly unnerving. In what is maybe the only well done scene in the whole movie, an inmate walks into the dining room and slowly drains a glass of wine. He then breaks the glass and uses the broken piece to rip out a doctor’s eye.
I also enjoyed or was at least unnerved by, the phone calls the killer makes from the house. They were great little eerie moments.
What didn’t work
I first need to point out that the production value of this movie is ass. I’m sure I could have shot a better movie on a Tamagotchi.
The whole thing is grainy, dark and dull. Even scenes with bright colors have all the brightness of a mechanics wash rag. And there are parts where the physical film was corrupted, leaving big black splotches.
Maybe I’m being too hard on it. I mean it was released in 1972. It’s not like they had access to advanced filming equipment. Like, for instance, The Godfather or Deliverance.
Oh, wait. Both those films also came out in 1972. And they sure as hell don’t look like this. Willy Wonka and The Chocolate Factory and Twelve Chairs came out the year before and they look great.
Granted, those films were preserved, digitized, and treated like the works of art they are. Silent Night, Bloody Night was apparently kept near a furnace, in the hopes that it might catch fire and never trouble anyone again.
None of that would matter, though, if the movie was any good. But it’s not. Let’s start with the voiceovers because that’s what the movie starts with.
Voiceovers are great when they add context or interesting commentary. A Christmas Story has voiceovers through the whole thing, and that’s great. This commentary, however, is a cautionary tale against telling not showing. It fails to be interesting or give additional information. It’s just bad.
What bothered me most is that not one shred of joy seems to have gone into this film. Unlike Mercy Christmas, which we talked about last week, nobody is having a good time.
The music is morose rather than eerie. The acting is lazy and half-hearted. Even in the most dramatic scenes, everyone delivers their lines like they’re reading off a list of instructions to build something they don’t care about building. And the effects are just horrific. We don’t see a single blow in any of the fight scenes. We see people wincing in pain, and weapons being raised. And that is it.
I suppose we might say this is to stave off the censors. But my God, that’s not what a Christmas horror movie is for. And it still has an R rating, even though we see neither boobies nor an axe biting into flesh. If you’re going to get stuck with the R rating, earn it.
Overall, Silent Night Bloody Night was devoid of anything joyful. It wasn’t fun to watch, it didn’t leave me with anything to ponder or savor. It was just a bad movie, from start to finish.
(1 / 5)
Christmas time is here! It’s time to listen to the same five songs until your ears bleed, spend time with people you’d fake your own death to avoid the rest of the year and stuff yourself with way too much food. And, it’s time for my favorite holiday tradition, watching horrible Christmas movies to tell you all exactly how god-awful they are. Let’s start with Mercy Christmas, a film about a family with a unique set of holiday traditions. And, a unique holiday menu.
The story
Our main character is named Michael Briskett. He’s a lonely man working a dull job with an abusive boss. But he’s doing his best to have a good Christmas. He even throws a party for everyone at his work.
No one shows up, though, except for the boss’s beautify assistant, Cindy. Together they have some drinks, and eventually, she invites him to her family’s Christmas celebration.
Personally, if a woman that beautiful had asked me out, I’d assume she thought I had money. But poor Michael is so swept up in being included that he jumps on the chance.
When he arrives at the family home of the Robillards, he finds two nasty surprises waiting. The first is that Cindy’s brother is Andy, his horrible boss. The second is that the family intends to eat him and three other people throughout Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day.
After that is, Michael finishes up a work project for Andy. Because it’s not bad enough that he will be eaten, he also has to work over Christmas.
What worked
There are two kinds of bad Christmas movies. The ones that are actually bad, like Gingerdead Man, and the ones that are bad in all the wonderfully right ways that make them a real holiday treat. Mercy Christmas was one of the latter.
First, no one is taking a single second of this seriously. The writers sure didn’t, when they wrote a scene in which Michael and Eddie are tied together by Christmas tree lights to battle the Robillards. The actors didn’t. Half the time you can see them holding back a mighty laugh with all of their might. The stunt coordinators, the costume department, and the effects team were all doing their very best to make this movie as hilarious as possible. Because at every moment, every detail was selected to be funny and festive rather than serious. Cindy wearing a cross to church service. The pineapple on the roast leg. Grandma insisting that they do stockings at her specific time, as though they haven’t got three strangers tied up in the basement. All of this was funny as hell, exactly as it was supposed to be.
Every single person involved with Mercy Christmas was having a fantastic time. As I mentioned, the whole cast felt like they were about to start laughing. There is so much joy in their faces, even when it’s not exactly a joyful scene. But it’s the attention to comical detail that makes it clear that this movie was a labor of love for everybody.
Finally, I adore that the Robillard family acts exactly how we all picture people behaving at a big family Christmas. At least, if the family has money. Everyone’s arguing over food, talking about how they miss their mom, and fussing at each other. But everyone is also doing their little part to make Christmas great for their family after suffering the loss of their beloved mom.
If they weren’t eating people, this could have been a Hallmark Christmas movie.
What didn’t work
All of that being said, there was one thing that bothered me about this movie.
Over and over, we come back to the fact that Mrs. Robillard died. It’s brought up often enough that I thought for sure that it was going to be a bigger plot point. But it isn’t. That just seems to be window dressing for the family.
This felt like failed misdirection. When misdirection is done well, we don’t care about it anymore after the sleight of hand is accomplished. But there is no sleight of hand here. There is no misdirection. We’re just left wondering why the hell the mother was brought up so often if nothing was going to come of it.
All in all, Mercy Christmas was a fun, bloody movie with some incredibly satisfying moments. And while I don’t know if it’ll make it on my list every year, I can see myself coming back for seconds.
(4 / 5)
To a lot of fans, this is the film that killed the franchise. It says a lot that the next installment is yet another retcon. Halloween VI: The Curse of Michael Myers attempts to explain Michael’s unrelenting evil, which lead to mixed opinions from longtime fans. There are two cuts of the film, theatrical vs producer’s. For a lot of people, the latter is the only one worth mentioning. Aiming to be as accurate as possible, I will be talking about the producer’s cut. Let’s begin!
Plot
We start Halloween VI with a six-year time jump from part five. Jamie is now barefoot and recently pregnant, running away from Michael as he wants her baby. While she manages to hide the little one away, Michael finally gets his hunger satiated by killing her. The moment is one of the most brutal ways in the franchise up until that point. Rest in peace, Jamie, you held your ground for as long as you could, the sequels were just too relentless.
The movie then cuts to a whole different scene going on. We have a new family living in the Myers house and their youngest child is hearing voices telling him to kill his loved ones. Tommy Lloyd is watching the family, played by none other than Paul Rudd in his first-ever theatrical role. Tommy still carries trauma from the events all those years ago when Laurie Strode was babysitting him. So when he finds Jamie’s baby, his part in the story becomes even more essential.
Dr Loomis also stars in what was Donald Pleasance’s final role before his passing. He and Tommy try to stop Michael once and for all before the cycle can repeat itself. As it turns out, Michael is a victim of a druid cult which makes him want to kill his family members every Halloween. Thorn, the cult in question, thinks they can control Michael and make him do their bidding. This results in catastrophe and Michael goes berzerk and kills all the cult members. Once again, it’s one of the most gruesome montages for the franchise up until that point.
Tommy and Kara are left to face Michael on their own which they manage to do with some corrosive liquid and good luck. However, nothing stays dead in this franchise as it’s soon revealed Michael somehow escaped and this time Dr Loomis might not be so lucky…
Overall thoughts
I would say for me personally Halloween VI definitely ranks somewhere near the bottom. The whole point of Michael is that there is no rhyme or reason to his killings and this film tries to go against that. I am glad the mistake was rectified by the upcoming installment. There were still some good things about it, such as Paul Rudd’s acting that reveals some raw talent as far as I’m concerned, as well as some direction choices and musical score. However, I also think it absolutely deserves all the criticism that it gets.
(2.5 / 5)
-
Original Creations5 days agoSimple Pleasures, a story about getting away by Jennifer Weigel
-
Breaking News4 days ago
Joe Bob’s Christmas Carnage: A Bloody Good Holiday Special Fri. December 13th – 9pm ET!
-
Book Reviews6 days ago
What Moves the Dead gives depth to Poe’s most famous tale.
-
Movies n TV1 day ago
Silent Night, Bloody Night is A Bloody Waste of A Christmas Horror Movie
