MovieMonday: Relic

This is a pretty good horror film with at least two unusual twists:  It is a story about three generations of women and with a theme of senile dementia.

Set in a nice, oldish house outside Melbourne, Relic opens as Kay (Emily Mortimer) and her young adult daughter, Sam (Bella Heathcote), travel from the city to find their mother and grandmother, who has not been seen for a number of days.

When they arrive, the mother-grandmother, Edna (Robyn Nevin), is nowhere to be found.  Her house is a mess, and there are notes that Edna has left in various places to remind herself of basic household matters, a sign of forgetfulness.

Kay goes to the police department.  

"She's in her 80s.  She forgets things," she tells the officer. A police search of the area around the house finds nothing.  

Kay sets to work cleaning the place.  One day Edna appears in the kitchen, barefoot and wearing her bathrobe, which has a spot of blood on it.   A medical person comes to check Edna's vitals and, except for an unexplained bruise, finds the grandmother well enough.

But Edna is not well.  She forgets things she said the day before.  There are a note and a verbal reference to an unidentified "it."  Dark patches appear at various spots in the house.  The gathering question is whether there is something more than memory loss that is afflicting this grandmother.

The final scenes are suitably horrifying but, like other films in the genre, there is not a logical explanation for what has happened.  There cannot be a logical explanation.   It's a horror film.

It is a credible first feature for Australian director Natalie Erika James, who cowrote the script. 

The Economics

While movies now tend to be longer, this one is relatively short at 89 minutes.  Its pace is not fast.  It does not leave the viewer thinking that a lot of film was left behind on the cutting-room floor.   This brevity, taken with the three-actor cast and a story set almost entirely in a single house, suggests a very limited budget.  

This is not unusual for a director's first film and not unusual for horror films.   Roger Corman, Hollywood's "King of the B movies" directed and produced hundreds of films between 1954 and 2018, including many horror pictures.  Made him pretty rich.

When you think about it, horror stories are cheaper.  Fake blood is cheap, ominous music is not expensive, the bad guy is either invisible or only shows up for a few scenes and the stories don't involve many actors.

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Comedian Jordan Peele launched his directing career by making -- what else? -- horror movies:  Investors put up $4.5 million for 2017's Get Out and $20 million for last year's Us.  Both films grossed more than $175 million in US theater ticket sales.  Even if you leave aside the promotion budgets and the credits back to multiplexes, both movies "earned out" handsomely.  Peele is a smart man, and whatever project he proposes (no matter how long the pandemic continues), investors will want to participate.  Not many filmmakers can feel so confident at this moment.  

Note

The Idiosyncratist has observed more than the usual number of new horror films being released this year.  In a way, it seems odd.  Why would the audience for fright be higher during a year marked by a scary disease, massive economic uncertainty and a contentious presidential election? 

My guess is that streaming outlets are looking for more content and are snapping up inexpensive horror films that never found distributors or audiences.  Audiences are looking for something new to watch in their living rooms, and the current price model -- $3.99 to $19.99 per rental -- isn't going to be enough to cause  the Disney or Marvel to commit to making or releasing new films in their traditional styles.  

MovieMonday: A Quiet Place

This is an unusually effective horror movie, especially given the simplicity of its premise. 

As it opens, we meet the Abbott family tiptoeing through an empty small town and picking up items they need at stores.  Nobody says a word, and the parents, Lee (Jim Krasinsky) and Evelyn (Emily Blunt), watch their children to be sure they maintain a careful silence.  

As they walk quietly home, one of the children turns on a battery-powered toy, and we see the consequences:  An alien force appears out of nowhere and snatches the boy, who is lost forever.  

We learn that the aliens cannot see or smell but depend instead on their aural sense to locate their prey.  Making noise means certain death for humans and animals.  


The Abbotts may have outlasted the first attacks that killed their neighbors because they know sign language -- their oldest child is deaf -- but that opening sequence raises the question of whether they can survive over the long term.

As a practical matter, the very limited dialogue requires more of the actors, whose behavior and nonverbal interactions must make the audience care about their characters.  This is done well here, particularly in Blunt's portrayal of the mother's concerns.  

Events proceed, the threat escalates, and parents and children do their best to protect each other as the film reaches its climax.  There are plot holes, as in all such movies, and the film ends with a moment of success but without a final resolution.  

That said, the story is tight and not over-ambitious.  It also is well paced with an efficient 90-minute running time.

Krasinski, best known heretofore as Jim, the amiable paper salesman in "The Office" television series, cowrote and directed the movie. He seems to have the skills for more such work.

The cinematography, by Charlotte Bruus Christensen, deftly counterposes the beauty and intimacy of a farm family's life with the lurking threat that shows itself only late in the film. The contrast enhances the overall effect.



Note

Recent movies, including this one, go to great lengths to portray women as powerful agents who confront evil, protect the helpless and perform acts of great heroism. 
        
This is not inappropriate.  Older films typically portrayed female characters as passive or in minor supporting roles or as victims needing rescue by strong men.  
        
Still, the degree of the corrective pendulum swing is remarkable.