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psychological thriller

Tailgate – Pride without Grace

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“The time for apologies is behind us.”

Tailgate, from writer/director Lodewijk Crijns, is a psychological thriller built around road rage (and perhaps just rage in general). What begins as a simple road trip turns into a journey into fear and danger.

Hans (Joroen Spitzenberger), along with his wife Diana (Anniek Pheifer) and their two children, are heading off to visit his parents. Even before they leave, Hans is beginning to complain. They’re running late. Every little thing seems to aggravate him. He and Diana bicker as they travel. And then he gets behind a slow moving van. Already anxious about the time, he honks, flashes his lights, and rides the van’s bumper. The van just goes slower. Finally, he gets by and begins to make up time.

When they stop for gas, the van comes in as well, and the driver (Willem de Wolf), lectures the children not to behave like their father and demands an apology. Hans is in no mood for all this. And once they get back on the road, the van is in pursuit. We already know (from a brief prologue) that the van driver is a psychopath who seems to be on a mission to rid the world of people who don’t fit his view of behavior.  His method of dealing with them is to put on a hazmat suit and shoot pest control chemicals into them.

Through most of the film, Hans and family are in a cat and mouse game as the Exterminator tracks them down. It is all magnified by a series of bad choices that Hans makes along the way. (Kind of like in all those slasher movies when people always go into the basement alone.) There are many choices that might have mitigated some of the road rage. Some we may think were fairly obvious, but still the bad choices keep piling up.

A key element that propels the story is pride (the kind of pride that earns it a place among the seven deadly sins.) The Exterminator obviously has way too much belief in his own rightness, but that is is consistent with being a psychopath. Hans, on the other hand, frequently acts out of pride, even when it is self-destructive. Keep in mind that we don’t really see Hans as very sympathetic because of the way he is acting even before he encounters the slow van. He expects the world to adjust to his wishes—not unlike the Exterminator. It’s just that the Exterminator is much more violent and aggressive in acting out that vision of the world.

For me this is a story about the absence of grace in the world. Whether by Hans or the Exterminator, grace is never offered or even seen as a possibility. Perhaps that is an outgrowth of the way pride affects the characters throughout the story. If one always assumes they are in the right and others are wrong, where is the room for grace within any relationship? For Hans, that lack of grace is seen in many little ways, even within his family relationships. As the story plays out, we see that such a lack of grace can be deadly.

Tailgate is in theaters and available on virtual cinema and VOD.

Photos courtesy of Film Movement.

Nina Wu – The Dark Side of Success

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“I really can’t take it anymore. You’re not only destroying my body, but my soul.”

An actress gets the roll of a lifetime in the Taiwanese film Nana Wu, directed by Midi Z. But while it may be a dream come true, it creates nightmares that she must try to figure out. What she discovers will put her career into a completely different light.

The title character (played by Wu Ke-Xi, who co-wrote the script) has spent eight years eking out a career doing bit roles. She is offered a leading role, but is a bit unsure because it involves nudity and a sex scene. Her agent tells her that she’s free to turn it down. But he also notes that this is an excellent role—the kind that can make a career.

We watch as the film is made, seeing occasional abusive behavior by the director. When the film is finished everyone thinks a new star has been found. Meanwhile Nina returns to her small hometown where she is reunited with her former lover who is still acting in a production of The Little Prince done for school children. When she returns for pre-opening publicity, she is pressed about the sex scenes of the film. She responds by stating she is a professional actress.

While on the trip, she begins to have nightmares—usually featuring the color red and frequently involving hallways (which also play a role in the film she was starring in). As we watch these nightmares (and some daytime events that may or may not be real) we sense that there is something from her past that is trying to find its way into Nina’s consciousness. Little by little, Nina begins to piece together the memories that reveal the true nature of her experience.

It is of interest that the quote I open the review with is a line from the film within a film. We hear Nina practicing the line before auditions. We also see her deliver the line in what is obviously a key scene of the film she is making. That line serves to help us understand not just the character Nina is portraying, but the feeling that is within her that is struggling to make its way to the surface.

In press notes, Wu Ke-Xi references stories involving the Asian film industry and the abuse of actresses. These stories were coming to light around the same time that the #MeToo movement began to raise similar issues in Hollywood. These stories highlight emotional, physical, and sexual abuse. This film is a reminder of the scars that such abuse can leave.

Nina Wu is opened in limited virtual cinema locations, expanding to more and to VOD on April 2.

Photos courtesy of Film Movement.

Rose Plays Julie – The Real Me?

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“I can’t help thinking that somehow if you’d managed to hold on to me, I’d be living a different life right now. I’d be a different person—perhaps the person I was really meant to be—the real me.”

The psychological drama Rose Plays Julie, directed by Christine Molloy and Joe Lawler, is the story of a young woman who longs to know about her birth parents, but what she discovers is nowhere near satisfying. The dreams she had about happy reunions turn into a nightmare.

The film opens with Rose (Ann Skelly) on a bleak Irish seawall, thinking about her birth mother and what it would be like to meet—the good memories they would form. We then move to college, where Rose is studying to be a veterinarian. The first lecture we see is about the ethics of euthanizing healthy animals. From time to time, scenes involving animal euthanasia come into the story.

Rose has been searching to connect with her biological mother, but all she has is the name Ellen Wise (Orla Brady) and a London phone number. When she calls, Ellen is silent, but obviously disturbed to hear from Rose. Rose then becomes a bit of a stalker, finding a way into Ellen’s home, where the two finally meet. Here Rose discovers the secret that Ellen has kept buried for over twenty years as she has built a successful life. That secret is that Rose is the product of a rape.

Rose convinces Ellen to tell her who the rapist is. Peter (Aiden Gillen) is an archaeologist. Rose volunteers to help on his latest dig. She seeks to get close to him, but for what purpose? She no longer has any hope of having her dreamed about happy family with her birth parents.

Identity is one of the themes that keeps popping up throughout the film. It starts with Rose pondering what her life would have been like if her mother had kept her. She would be Julie. She would have the different life from the quotation above. She later plays as Julie to stalk her biological parents. Ellen is an actress, who makes her living playing different people. Peter is a respected man in his field, but we see that he has a different persona as well.

The unfortunate thing about this film is that it devolves into a story of revenge. It is important to remember that revenge is not justice. As the film moves inexorably down that road, we lose any real chance for the characters to find a solution to their pain. There seems to be no new identities that these characters are able to assume that will find chances of redemption or wholeness. In the end, they are all more broken than when the film began.

Rose Plays Julie is available on virtual cinema and on VOD.

Photos courtesy of Film Movement.

@Sundance: Knocking

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What if you know something bad is happening, but no one will believe you? Perhaps they think you’re crazy. Perhaps you even begin to think you’re crazy. The Swedish film Knocking is part of the Midnight section of the Sundance Film Festival (happening virtually this year). It is a psychological thriller which saves its revelation to the very, very end.

Molly has had a devastating loss that his sent her into a nervous breakdown. After being released from the hospital (she and her doctor both agree she’s ready), she moves into a new apartment. Soon she begins to hear a knocking from her ceiling. When she visits her upstairs neighbor, he’s at a loss of what she might have heard. The next time she hears it the knocking sounds like a Morse Code SOS. More checking with other neighbors, but no one else hears anything. She calls the police, but they hear and find nothing. Further calls gets her a warning that if she persists they will disconnect her phone. She has been making strange diagrams of connections on her wall. And there is a blood-like spot on her ceiling.

Cecilia Milocco appears in Knocking by Frida Kempff, an official selection of the Midnight section at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Hannes Krantz.

By the midpoint of the film we are certainly wondering if she was in fact ready for release from the hospital. She seems erratic, there is at least one hallucination or dream—seeing a woman jump from the next apartment building, but no body to be found. It seems very likely that she really is imagining it all. And in time, she manages to lose control and end up back in the hospital again.

In press notes, director Frida Kempff ties this story to the Me-Too movement. Here is a woman, trying to tell the world that something is wrong. She is met with disbelief. It is assumed that it is because of some mental issue. She faces threats if she continues to sound her alarm. She is easily dismissed. But what if what she hears is really there? What if she is the only person willing to act to try to save someone?

The film asks us to believe someone who is unbelievable. It asks us to not dismiss those who tell us what we don’t want to acknowledge. It asks us to pay attention to the cries for help that go unheard.

Day 3 at NBFF

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It certainly isn’t news that most films are made by men. Women have been working for the chance to be directors for a very long time. Half the Picture, a documentary by Amy Adrion, speaks with some of the women directors who have found success about the hurdles that they have faced. Among those interviewed are Ava DuVernay, Penelope Spheeris, Miranda July, and Catherine Hardwick. Advancement in many areas of life has been a struggle for women, but it has been even harder in Hollywood. The issue is important not only because of the justice issue involved, but because the world also needs to see the diverse vision that cannot be fully seen in films made almost exclusively by white straight males. Half the Picture will play in theaters beginning in June.

In Touched, by Canadian director Karl R. Hearne, a reclusive landlord believes something has happened to a young tenant. He soon has visions and conversations with the childhood version of the tenant. There are parallels between the girl’s history and the landlord’s childhood. Is this search really about trying to discover his own demons that he has locked away within his psyche all these years? Is there some salvation or comfort that the little girl can provide him? Can he set her free from the chains that hold her in this place? An interesting psychological thriller, although its pace never seems to pick up enough to fully create a sense of suspense.

Thelma – Spooky Self-Discovery

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Strange things happen in Thelma, the horror thriller from director Joachim Trier. Thelma (Eili Harboe), who has been raised by very protective, devoutly Christian parents, goes off to university. Her parents are fearful of what might happen. All seems to be going well until one day when studying in the library, a bird crashes into a window, which somehow triggers a seizure in Thelma. After she recovers she begins a relationship with another woman student. But the seizures continue, seemingly without cause. The seizures occur around times when something strange takes place. As Thelma seeks to understand what is happening, her family’s past hold revelations about her giftedness.

While I’m not a fan of supernatural events in horror films, this film does an excellent job of building tension. This is a spooky story as it plays out. Little by little we see connections between what Thelma is going through, tragic events in her history, and the role Thelma plays in it all. While there is a supernatural foundation, the film is really about Thelma’s journey to self-discovery.

As I noted above, Thelma comes out of a devout Christian background. This is not an oppressive family. (Although it does seem to treat religion as somewhat exotic.) Thelma’s faith adds a bit of depth to the struggles she experiences. In fact, at one point her father suggests that the similar troubles she had in early childhood went away when she accepted Christ. But when the seizures and resulting events begin again, where is Thelma to turn? She prays, but it seems to make no difference.

In time it all comes down to what control Thelma has over her life. Can she take control, or do her seizures control her? How have the things in her past brought her to this point? How will she use the control she discovers for herself or for others?

 

Thelma is Norway’s official Best Foreign Language Film Oscar submission.

Black Butterfly – Deadly Mind Games

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“I have a better ending in mind.”

What makes a film frightening? Is it a monster or sudden noises? Those can get the adrenaline flowing. But to really get people, you have to go for their minds. Black Butterfly seeks to create a story that pulls us in with the mind games being played out on screen.

The film is set in rural Colorado where some women have gone missing over the last few years. Paul Lopez (Antonio Bandaras) is a writer with a severe case of writer’s block. It’s been some time since he’s written anything of import and is trying to salvage his career with a screenplay. But nothing is coming. When he is rescued from a belligerent truck driver at a café by a drifter named Jack (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), Paul offers Jack a ride and then a place to stay the night. Jack offers to make some repairs. Soon Jack insinuates himself into Paul’s life and work. A cat-and-mouse game ensues which could well end in violence.

These two strangers are soon in a battle of the minds. Is one of them the killer who has been victimizing the area? What will that mean for Paul’s realtor Laura (Piper Perabo)? And what of Paul’s absent wife? Was she one of the victims? As the plot plays out there are twists that keep us wondering who these two really are and what violence will it all lead to? (There is one final twist at the very end that I found totally unnecessary, and soured me a bit on the film.)

Psychological thrillers like Black Butterfly sometimes make me think of the Calvinist idea of total depravity, in that it seems everyone operates out of a human nature that is fundamentally evil. Of course, there can be plot twists so that we discover that one of the parties is actually working for the good. But in the process we may wonder if indeed our natures actually do skew toward evil. If not, what can lead people to do such things to other people?

It also raises the question of how we may quickly assume someone is the villain in a story, and then have that assumption called into question. Of course, films like this are designed to lead us in various ways. They twist our early thoughts and even our secondary thoughts until we aren’t sure what we should believe. How does that play out in real life? Often we take those early impressions and are never willing to look beyond that to discover that it may have been mistaken. Perhaps the people we think are doing wrong are in fact victims or are struggling to bring something good into a bad situation. Are we willing to allow our early assumptions about others to be challenged so that we have a chance to have our minds changed?

Photos Courtesy of Lionsgate Premiere

Thursday (the final day) at NBFF

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I’ve reached the final day of the Newport Beach Film Festival. I’ve managed to take in a load of films, but there are a whole lot more I could get to. I finished off the week with a romantic thriller hybrid, a story of a police investigation that goes very wrong and the injustice a young woman and her family endure, and a very interesting program of shorts.

In I Hate the Man in My Basement, Claude is still grieving for his wife, but when he meets Kyra, he may have found someone who will help him move on in his life. The only thing holding him back is that he’s keeping the man who murdered his wife chained up in his basement, torturing him. Although Claude is generally a kind person, his anger towards his prisoner is excessive and violent. But as he begins to return to life and love with Kyra, he begins to soften toward his prisoner. But as long as he has this secret, he will never be able to fully move on with his life with Kyra. It made for an interesting blend of psychological thriller and romance.

You may know that I like to take in some shorts when I go to festivals. More than once I’ve seen Oscar nominated shorts at NBFF (including at least one that I know took home the prize). The festival creates thematic programs for the various shorts it chooses. The program I watched was called “Short Notes on Life.” The nine films from four countries had a bit of a philosophical bent with an eye towards the meaning and challenges of life. The films, which ranged from 5 to 17 minutes, were:

  • Smile, an Italian film that shows us four people, each in bed, as they worry or escape worry during their sleep or sleeplessness.
  • Breath (Respiro), also from Italy. A Syrian refugee seeking to cross the border, is instructed that the key to it all is breathing.
  • Anatomy, from Sweden. A humorous animated look at one man’s body and why he has become the way he is.
  • Dear Kid (Alskade Unge) also from Sweden. A woman is suspicious of a swimming coach’s relationship with one of the kids. Is there reason? Should she do something?
  • Dreamkeeper, from the US. A man who goes around through dreams, making sure everything is working properly, discovers a little girl who was managed to wander out of her dream. Before he can get her back, she gives him new insight into what he should be doing.
  • Glimpse, from the US. A young couple get a glimpse into their future. Would we really want to know what lies ahead?
  • Bathrooms, from Australia. What secrets are there in a family’s bathroom? The whole film is set in the bathroom, as we discover the hidden part of each family member’s life.
  • Ernie, from the US. A man who believes his life unimportant attempts suicide, but in the process discovers how his life can be meaningful. It’s humorous and inventive. The entire set is made out of paper and cardboard.

My favorites of the shorts were Glimpse and Dreamcatcher. To be honest, I would love to have Glimpse find its way to Oscar consideration. It was very special.

The final film for me this year was an Irish film, Out of Innocence¸ based on true events. When a newborn infant washes ashore, it is discovered that the baby was stabbed before being thrown in the ocean. As the police begin their investigation, a woman fifty miles away miscarries the baby she has been secretly carrying. In time, the police come to believe that the child she lost is the one found at the shore. They develop an elaborate scenario that involves the woman’s whole family. The police proceed in a very abusive manner to get confessions from each member. In time the tables turn and the police are being investigated for their actions. But in that investigation, the woman becomes the main focus – the victim as defendant. She becomes a cause célèbre for Irish women. The cry for justice had an important impact on Ireland. But it also had an impact on the young woman’s life. Police errors and abuse are not limited to any one country. I found it interesting that driving home after this film I heard a story from one of the West Memphis Three, who spent 18 years on death row for a murder he had nothing to do with. His story had many similarities to this film.

 

Elle – Obsessions and Revenge

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“It’s twisted.”

That brief line of dialogue defines Paul Verhoeven’s Elle in more ways than one. The plot certainly has very interesting turns along the way, but the convolutions of the personalities are what really make this entertaining and interesting. This is an intense psychological thriller, with the accent on psychological.

Michèle (Isabelle Huppert) is a strong, domineering woman. She runs a video game company in a no-nonsense style. She brings that into her personal life as well. The first hint we have of her past is when she is in a café and another customer walks by and dumps food in her lap muttering about “you and your father.” Michèle’s mother is keeping a much younger man—something Michèle finds somewhat pathetic. We learn her father is in prison with a parole hearing approaching. But things really heat up when Michèle is attacked and raped in her home. She seems to go on like nothing happened, but she fantasizes about killing the attacker. When she learns who did it a tense and very perverse game begins to unfold.

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But this is more than just a revenge film. In fact, we may not even see it as such because we’re never quite sure if that is really what is driving Michèle. Perhaps for all the terror of the attack, she may find it perversely stimulating. Perhaps it provides a balance for the sense of control she manifests in the other aspects of her life. Perhaps, as we learn more about her past, we might wonder if she is emotionally disturbed. Likewise her attacker is also something of an enigma. Between the two of them the tension grows both sexually and emotionally to levels we know can only lead to disaster.

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The film is essentially about obsessions. Certainly sexual and violent fantasies often play out together (compare the video game Michèle’s company is working on). Such obsessions are central to the developments between Michèle and her attacker. For Michèle’s mother it is an obsession with youth. Michèle’s history tells of strange issues her father dealt with that had lasting effects on her and of people’s perception of her. Obsessions such as these take control of lives. So all the emotional protection that Michèle has built around herself comes falling down when the attack brings chaos into her life. That struggle between chaos and control creates a dangerous atmosphere that threatens to undo her and twist her life even more than it has been.

Yes, It is all very twisted (especially all the characters). Delightfully so.

Photos courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics

The Duel – Spiritual Captivity in the Old West

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“The river doesn’t speak. It only divides: the light from the dark, life and death.”

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The Duel, set in the wild Texas of the late nineteenth century, boils down to a battle between darkness and light, between good and evil. David Kingston (Liam Hemsworth), a young Texas Ranger, is sent by the governor to go undercover in a town near the Rio Grande to investigate a series of disappearances and murders of Mexicans that threatens to create an international incident. He takes his wife Marisol (Alice Braga) along. The town is presided over by Abraham, aka The Preacher (Woody Harrelson), a charismatic (and Charismatic) leader who dresses in white and holds the town in thrall. He is also the man who killed David’s father twenty-two years earlier in a hand-to-hand duel.

While The Preacher has a reputation for healing, he is played by Harrelson as creepy, even when he is being friendly to David and Marisol when they arrive in town. He immediately makes David the town sheriff, perhaps as a way of keeping him in town. Soon he has set his sights on Marisol, seeking to bring her into his fold. The two men know from the start that they will eventually have to face off. But the steps they go through before their final showdown make this more of a psychological thriller than a typical Western.

Although David has the law and right on his side, the border between good and evil in this battle wanders and winds much as the river does. David may seem to have come to terms with his father’s death, but how can this possibly not become personal—especially when Abraham had designs on his wife? Yet, through it all, David manages to keep his mission in mind. When the time comes for him to put an end to the great evil being perpetrated by Abraham and the town, David seeks to set free those who are held captive in various ways.

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The idea of captivity is important to the film, although it often seems to be operating in the background. There are physical captives, but there are also emotional spiritual captives. These later forms are perhaps even more dangerous that the physical imprisonment of some. It is in this that the film portrays evil. Evil is not acts of violence (although it may involve that). The true evil is the spiritual captivity The Preacher exercises over people. That evil is often manifested in racism, hatred, fear, and violence, but all of that is undergirded by the spiritual captivity. When we see many of the same troubles in the world around us, it is easy to limit the term “evil” to those ills. It may help us to remember that those manifestations are all built on foundations that threaten to hold us all captive to the evil around us.

Photos courtesy of Lionsgate Premiere