Nightmare Alley

Year:  2021

Director:  Guillermo del Toro

Screenplay:  Guillermo del Toro and Kim Morgan, based on the novel Nightmare Alley by William Lindsay Gresham

Starring:  Bradley Cooper, Cate Blanchett, Toni Collette, Willem Dafoe, Richard Jenkins, Rooney Mara, Ron Perlman, Mary Steenburgen, David Strathairn

Running Time: 150 minutes

Genre:  Thriller

In 1939, Stanton "Stan" Carlisle (Cooper) is on the run from a shady past when he finds refuge in a travelling carnival, befriending fortune teller Zeena the Seer (Collette), her alcoholic husband (Jenkins), Clem (Dafoe) who runs the carnival's "geek show" and exhibition of "human oddities", and Molly (Mara) whose act consists of her being electrocuted.  Learning the secrets of the inner workings of the carnival, and particularly the tricks behind pretending to be clairvoyant, Stan approaches Molly with a proposition that they work the scam together on wealthier marks.  Two years later, Stan and Molly are successfully working their act for the wealthy elite of New York City, when Stan is approached by Dr. Lilith Ritter (Blanchett), who has her own idea for a scam, but as the stakes are raised to more dangerous levels it becomes increasingly unclear who is playing who.

Guillermo del Toro is probably best known for his work in the horror and fantasy genre, most notably Pan's Labyrinth (2006) and The Shape of Water (2017), this however is not a supernatural or a fantasy film, although it is pretty horrific at times.  This is a modern day film noir, in fact the novel by William Lindsay Gresham has been filmed before in 1947, in the heyday of the film noir.  This film presents a throughly bleak portrait of human nature, almost everyone in the film is working some kind of scheme, or con, although some more innocent than others.  Bradley Cooper is good as the silver tongued charmer who hides very dark secrets and is capable of occasionally lashing out with shocking violence.  Cate Blanchett plays psychologist Lilith Ritter as a classic femme fatale all blood-red lipstick and golden gowns.  Toni Collette plays the smalltime carnival fortune teller who teaches Stan the tricks of the trade.  Rooney Mara plays the innocent, wide-eyed Molly who becomes the conscience of the film and, crucially, the only one perceptive enough to see where they are headed.  Willem Dafoe has a ball as the cruel Clem who keeps a caged man as the sideshow "geek", forcing him to bite the heads off chickens.  The twilight world of the carnival is brilliantly evoked, all mud and dirt and broken-down seedy glamour.  Del Toro is a master of disturbing but beautiful images, and he evokes a cold, bleak world, even New York is wintery streets and palatial but sterile hotel rooms and offices, The film has a complex, twisting plot, punctuated by occasional, brief, shocking bursts of violence.  While it may be too bleak for some viewers, it is a striking latter day film noir, and one of the best new thrillers that I've seen in a long time.         

Bradley Cooper and Rooney Mara in Nightmare Alley

Bone Tomahawk

Year of Release:  2015
Director:  S. Craig Zahler
Screenplay:  S. Craig Zahler
Starring:  Kurt Russell, Patrick Wilson, Matthew Fox, Richard Jenkins, Lili Simmons, David Arquette
Running Time:  132 minutes
Genre:  Western, horror, action, adventure,

In the 1890s, grizzled Sheriff Franklin Hunt (Russell), his loyal, elderly deputy Chicory (Jenkins), ruthless, bigoted gunslinger Brooder (Fox) and cowboy Arthur O'Dwyer (Wilson), who has a broken leg, set off on a dangerous quest to rescue three people, including O'Dwyer's wife, Samantha (Simmons), who have been kidnapped by a hidden clan of cave-dwelling cannibals.

For a variety of reasons, the Western genre has declined greatly in popularity in recent years, but good ones are still made occasionally, and this is a good one.  It is a gripping, if bleak, blend of horror and Western, that plays like a mix of The Searchers (1956) and The Hills Have Eyes (1977).  The film is beautifully shot with stunning landscapes, contrasted with (literally) gut-wrenching violence.  Mostly it moves at a sedate pace, but keeps the tension high and there is a strong vein of dark humour throughout, which helps alleviate the film's often grim tone.  It's very well-performed by a great cast and always visually interesting.  The film really kicks into another gear with the action-packed climax, which feels as if it's been dropped in from another movie entirely.  The film's violence is pretty graphic, and the amount of gore may put off some viewers, while the film's largely slow pace may put off some of the horror fans, but it's worth giving it a go. 

Richard Jenkins, Kurt Russell and Matthew Fox saddle up for Bone Tomahawk
  

The Shape of Water

Year of Release:  2017
Director:  Guillermo del Toro
Screenplay:  Guillermo del Toro and Vanessa Taylor, from a story by Guillermo del Toro
Starring:  Sally Hawkins, Michael Shannon, Richard Jenkins, Doug Jones, Michael Stuhlbarg, Octavia Spencer
Running Time:  123 minutes
Genre:  Fantasy, romance

Baltimore, 1962:  Elisa Esposito (Hawkins) is a mute janitor at a secret government laboratory.  One night a new "asset" is delivered, under the supervision of sinister Colonel Richard Strickland (Shannon).  The asset turns out to be an amphibious humanoid creature.  As Strickland performs a series of cruel tests on the creature, Elsa secretly bonds with him, a bond which develops into a friendship and then something much more intimate.  However, Strickland wants to kill the creature for experimentation, and there is also a group of Soviet spies, who want to kill the creature before the Americans can discover it's secrets.

This is a beautiful, elegant romantic fantasy.  Although rooted in Baltimore in 1962, the film appears to take place in a strange, otherworld.  Sally Hawkins gives a tender delicate performance as Elisa, and Doug Jones manages to make the creature into a genuine emotional character despite the layers of make-up and special effects.  The true monster in the film is Michael Shannon as the sadistic Strickland, who somehow becomes more bestial as the film goes on, while the creature becomes more human.  The film has a tenderness and real emotion, despite being surprisingly graphic and quite violent in places.  It has a warmth to it however, and richness in the supporting characters, such as Elisa's friends, the lonely artist neighbor, Giles (Jenkins), and garrulous, unhappily married Zelda (Spencer).   This is a beautiful and powerful adult fairy tale.

Underwater love:  Elisa (Sally Hawkins) and the Creature (Doug Jones) in The Shape of Water        

Let Me In

Year: 2010
Director: Matt Reeves
Screenplay: Matt Reeves, based on the novel and screenplay Let the Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist
Starring: Kodi Smit-McPhee, Chloe Grace Moretz, Richard Jenkins, Elias Koteas, Cara Buono
Running Time: 116 minutes
Genre: Horror, drama

Summary: In March, 1983, in Los Alamos, New Mexico, twelve year old Owen (Smit-McPhee) lives with his religious, alcoholic mother (Buono), who largely ignores him, on a depressing housing estate. He is also frequenty bullied at school. One night he meets a new neighbour, Abby (Moretz), a seemingly ordinary twelve year old girl, who lives with an elderly man (Jenkins) assumed to be her father. A strong friendship soon blossoms between Owen and Abby until he learns that Abby is, in fact, a vampire, and her "father" is behind a brutal series of ritualistic killings in the local area which he has done to provide her with the blood she needs.

Opinions: The 2004 novel Let the Right One In by Swedish author John Ajvide Lindqvist has previously been adapted as a critically acclaimed and successful Swedish film directed by Tomas Alfredson, and now an English-language version has been made. It's hard not to feel cynical when a successful foreign language film is given an English-language remake, especially when it's only been a couple of years since the release of the Swedish film. In fact, Alfredson was, understandably, very angry at the news that his film was being remade on the grounds that he thought a film should only be remade if there was something wrong with the original and he didn't think that there was anything wrong ith his film, and he is perfectly correct that there is nothing wrong with the earlier film.
However, leaving that aside, Let Me In is a very good film in it's own right. For the most part it sticks very closely to the earlier film and fairly faithful to the original novel (both movie versions excise the novel's gruesome zombie sub-plot). The film has a good sense of time and place with striking visuals of the snow-bathed housing estate. Director Reeves, best known for the 2008 monster movie Cloverfield, delivers some striking scenes, in particular a sequence where the camera is in the back seat of a crashing car. He also has some of the more traditional horror movie scares happening in the background of scenes, and although there are computer generated special effects used, they are mostly fairly subtle. The movie's main strengths are in superb performances from Kodi Smit-McPhee and Chloe Moretz in the lead roles who make their characters if anything even more engaging and sympathetic then their Swedish counterparts.
While sticking a little bit too close to the original to really become it's own thing, this is a fine, well-made movie that deserves a wider audience than traditional horror audiences and should appeal to fans of the original as well as newcomers.


Kodi Smit-McPhee and Chloe Grace Moretz in Let Me In