Knives Out (2019)

I remember hearing about the TV show Alias.  In it, the main character’s father works for the CIA.  Except he doesn’t.  Except he really does.  Knives out is sort of like that.

Harlan Thrombey is a mystery writer who is found dead in a locked room.  It appears to be suicide.  Except his family hated him, so it had to be murder.  Except it’s impossible to prove who.  Plus, he was found dead in a locked room.  So, the police have plenty of suspects, but no real evidence.

Benoit Blanc, a private detective who was hired anonymously, is convinced it’s murder.  He presses the investigation until he figures out what really happened.

I don’t see a lot of mystery movies.  I tend to find them all very similar.  We have a few plot twists.  Some, we see coming.  Some, we don’t.  We have a lot of people who stood to gain from Thrombey’s death and they all look guilty.

Then, there’s Marta Cabrera, who is acting guilty.  She knows something.  Did she murder him?  Does she know who did?  Why isn’t she saying anything?

We come to find out that guilt isn’t so clear-cut a thing.  It’s almost like that riddle where a man falls off a roof only to be shot on the third floor.  Is the shooter guilty?  Well, it’s more complicated than that.  Yes, mistakes were made.

My biggest complaint about this movie could have easily been the bad decisions made.  It’s always easier to come forward (or at least get a lawyer) first thing.  At least it wasn’t overdone.  We understand that Marta is in a difficult position.

The family also could have been overdone.  Most of them are easy to dislike.  We don’t really want to see any of them get their share of the estate.

It’s an interesting movie that’s got an interesting set of circumstances.  It almost appears to be written by someone who dislikes a lot of the clichés I dislike, but didn’t want to necessarily parody the genre.  I wouldn’t call it wish fulfillment, necessarily.  However, it does play out rather interestingly.

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The Sixth Sense (1999)

Some movies have very limited replay value.  The problem with a twist ending is that it will probably put your movie into this category.  At most, you might get a second viewing just to see what you missed.  The more reliant the movie is on the ending, the less likely you are to watch it a third time.  Much of the value of The Sixth Sense is in not knowing how it ends.

It starts with Dr. Malcolm Crowe and his wife, Anna, at home after Malcolm receives an award from the city.  Malcolm is shot by an intruder who turns out to be a former patient named Vincent Grey.  Malcolm is a child psychologist who failed to help Vincent.

Malcolm is meeting with Cole Sear.  Cole’s story is similar to Vincent’s, so if Malcolm can help Cole, it might serve as an act of redemption.  You see, Cole is ostensibly a normal kid.  Sure, he’s a little weird and doesn’t quite fit in.  It’s not unusual for a kid to be picked on.

He has a secret, though.  Yup.  If you were around 20 years ago, you might remember that the kid sees dead people.  It terrifies him, as well it should.  It’s not something that a young child should have to see.  He may see the deceased hanging from a noose or with an obvious wound.

Malcolm is intent on helping Cole, regardless of how strange it sounds.  When Cole is able to help a young girl, Cole is able to come to terms with his ability.  It also prompts him to give Malcolm some helpful advice.  They realize that they won’t see each other again, as the twist ending is coming soon.

I don’t want to give away that ending, as you don’t really see it coming.  This is one of those movies to watch on Netflix or to rent.  I don’t know that I’d recommend buying it unless you’re intent on having every Bruce Willis movie out there.

I don’t see this movie a lot on the cable channels.  I don’t know if it’s that I don’t go looking for it or if it’s that it’s faded into the background.  It’s a shame because it is a well-written movie.  I didn’t see the ending coming the first time around, although I probably should have.  This is what prompted me to watch it again when it became available on Netflix.  I wanted to see all of those moments that foreshadowed the big ending.

The movie was still entertaining.  There is a scary element to the movie.  It’s definitely not something for young children.  As I said, there are some violent elements to it.  It’s also hard to do a full-on review, as it’s also such a well-known movie.  It’s well-known enough that parodies have been done of it.  The line, “I see dead people” was a catchphrase for years after the movie was release.

Still, I don’t think I’ve seen the movie since it came out in 1999.  As good as it was, it wasn’t a movie that I felt an urge to see again.  It will probably be another 17 or 18 years before my next viewing.

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Krampus (2015)

We’re all familiar with Santa Claus.  He brings presents to the good girls and boys.  Americans aren’t that familiar with Santa’s opposite, Krampus.  Legend holds that Krampus comes to kidnap and punish those boys and girls who made the naughty list.  Krampus is better known in Europe, where films like Rare Exports have been made.  Shortly after watching Rare Exports, I had heard of a film to be released in America called, of all things, Krampus.  This week, I have some free movies from on demand courtesy HBO.  Lo and behold, one of those movies was Krampus.

I honestly had such high hopes for this movie.  It focus on a family that’s getting together for Christmas.  It starts a few days before Christmas.   Sarah and Tom are parents to Max and Beth.  Aunt Linda and Uncle Howard will be joining them until the big day along with their kids and dog.  Oh, and Sarah’s outspoken Aunt Dorothy will be coming along, too.  Surprise!  Rounding out the group is the grandmother, who seems to prefer German to English.

Sarah, Tom, Max and Beth are not looking forward to this.  They have varying degrees of hatred for Linda and Howard and their spawn, to say nothing of Dorothy.  Max is picked on by his two female cousins.  Dorothy asks Sarah why she hasn’t served ham, going so far to ask if she’s Jewish now.  Yeah.  This is the kind of petty family stuff we’re talking about.  It gets to the point where Max wishes it would all go away.  He just wants a normal Christmas like they used to have.  Big mistake.

What follows cannot really be described as a horror film.  Sure, it has it’s dark moments.  It also has a few throwaway lines, but can’t really be described as a comedy.  There are a few scenes that would suggest that those who created the film wanted a horror film, but they seem to have failed.  For instance, Beth goes missing quickly, prompting Tom and Howard to take Howard’s Humvee in search of her.  They come to her boyfriend’s house where they find a gingerbread man attached to a refrigerator door with a chef’s knife.  It’s funny, but in a foreshadowing way.

We have already seen a hit of Krampus at that point.  He jumps from rooftop to rooftop.  He’s meant to be scary.  At the very least, he’s ugly.  I may even end up with nightmares tonight.  That’s how bad it is.  It’s his helpers that I’m not sure about.  For some reason, he likes gingerbread men, who come off as comical, but will attack people.  They even take a nail gun to Howard.  (Who leaves a nail gun lying around, anyway?  Especially when they know children of varying ages will be around.)

Krampus also has some large porcelain dolls helping him.  Imagine if a porcelain doll were made in the image of a Predator.  And it wants to eat your kids.  It sounds scary, but it doesn’t always work.  Part of it is that you’re trying to scare the audience with something that’s cute.  You can’t go for flat-out horror with porcelain dolls and gingerbread men.

The other part of it is that the characters don’t elicit sympathy.  Max is the most sympathetic, in that he seems to act only when provoked, even if he is provoked easily.  He also just wants a normal Christmas.  The only other characters I didn’t come to hate were the grandmother, the baby and the dog, mostly because they were background characters.  By nature, the dog and the baby didn’t have any lines.  (The dog did have a few good moments, though.)  The grandmother was there mostly for background information, letting us know what Krampus was.

Howard, Linda and Dorothy are all adults that you want to take into the next room and slap.  You’re rooting for Krampus to get them, even when you earn a little bit of respect for them.  You soon realize that they’re still less than respectable.  Howard and Linda’s kids are the product of their parenting and can be forgiven to an extent, but are still responsible for their own actions.  Also, when I said Dorothy was outspoken, I imagine you get the idea that it’s in an obnoxious way.  I was hoping she’d go first.

That’s another thing.  Building tension requires some hope that the characters might make it out.  Krampus quickly lays waste to their surrounding area.  A utility truck is left idling, presumably as Krampus took the driver.  It’s just a matter of time before the family is eaten.  The only real question is how and when each family member will be taken.  There is a chance Max will be spared.  Even if he is, what then?  Will the town be restored?  Will Max be sent to a foster home?  How do you end a mess like this?

The movie is different, to say the least, but this is one of those cases where different isn’t always good.  It’s like the SyFy channel finally got a theatrical release.  It’s that level of mediocrity.  I was expecting so much more.  I was hoping for some level of depth.  No.  We have some scares and some one-liners.  That’s about it.  Krampus takes everyone in town and for what?  Because some kid wished his family away?  The twist ending doesn’t leave you wondering what just happened so much as why.

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