CLOWN – A guy finds a clown costume in a dusty attic. It's his lucky day, because the entertainer hired for his kid's party hasn't turned up. He starts to realise that he might have a problem when he can't actually take the clown suit off. Then he turns into a flesh eating demon. 'Clown' is actually pretty good. Its ludicrous premise is treated seriously, and, aside from a few blackly comic moments, a kind of dour tone prevails. Its heart is set on an enormously bleak theme – child murder. The temptation might be to lessen the impact by goofing around, but 'Clown', whilst rarely all that explicit, doesn't flinch. This is a movie that lets you know that, deep down, it's a pretty mean spirited beast (like most clowns, I imagine). There are some problems. It gets a bit ponderous. It can't quite sustain itself. Once we know where we're going, we're simply taken there. That's OK, 'Clown' still has plenty going for it, although in some ways it doesn't do all that much besides replay its prototype, which is surely Cronenberg's 'The Fly', another film which charts the disintegration of a relationship through the lens of punishing physical transformation. For all its flaws, I recommend that you take a look.
CURSE OF THE CROWS – Opens in a mysterious prison, where some pretty vicious dudes have been locked up. No-one seems to know how they got there, or even where they are. A woman who wears a cloak of raven's feathers appears, and seems to start to play head games with the scummy internees. Where is it all going? I found 'Curse Of The Crows' pretty intriguing at first – the strange set up, the multitude of nasty characters, the low-rent video look (though this might be down to a not so good transfer?)... as time wore on I felt its grip on me ease a bit, and my mind started to wander and I went outside for a cig. When I got back, something happened. 'Curse Of The Crows' went from being baffling and a bit nihilistic to a full blown cod-metaphysical fever dream, bursting with oddness and often teetering on the verge of being not very comprehensible. Characters die, are reanimated, twin up with their externalised demonic souls via yucky umbilical cords. A dense guy digs out eyes with spoons. It all gets a bit mind bending, in a rather good way. Or maybe in a bad way, if you're not keen on this kind of fragmentation. Even if you're not, you won't be able to say you can see what's coming around the corner, which isn't the case with, say, 'Clown'. Some surprisingly good performances – Debbie Rochon is great as a murderess in a scarlet shawl. If you like microbudget weirdness and can tolerate nonsense, 'Curse Of The Crows' might float your boat.
SHACKLED – A lonely guy who works in a bar dreams of a killer in a bunny costume. It's said that a killer is stalking the locale – maybe that's got something to do with the bunny costume. A noirish hooker turns up – also a character from barman's dreams. Strange events occur. Barman gets increasingly paranoid. 'Shackled' is an Indonesian thriller with a tinge of horror and some slightly surreal edges. The blurb goes on about D Lynch comparisons – I can sort of see it, but 'Shackled', although baffling in places, does not exude that kind of ineffable atmosphere. Its weirdness is a bit laboured, a bit strained, and... just not all that weird. It also suffers from a saggy mid-section which shifts the tone and sets up the twisty finale. Some of this works, but there's an element of info-dump about it all. However. 'Shackled' might not be all it wants to be, but there are plenty of positives at work – it looks aesthetically impressive, the first half is diverting and overall the film is pretty entertaining. There were some aspects which subjectively appealed, although I can imagine many others would be indifferent – like, the bunny's mouth, a sinister black crevice. It really creeped me out. I guess bunny costumes do it for me in general, as well. Anyway, far from perfect as it is, 'Shackled' is probably worth checking out if you're into good looking thrillers in need of a reality check.
 |