It's been some time since I've looked to Hollywood, or American Cinema for my horror movie fix. I don't particularly like horror, I'm more of a thriller kind of guy if I'm in the mood to be scared. Don't get me wrong, there are certainly good horror movies still made here, but few and far between, so when I'm in the mood I look over the oceans to places where they still know how to scare.
This film bothered me in a lot of ways, and the easiest comparison to me, and the way it made me feel would be like that of the movie "Being John Malcovich" The ending of that movie as well as this just makes me feel bad, it makes me feel dirty, and makes me so glad that its not a possibility. The story is about a woman in her early 20's named Marie who is a world class runner, they mention she is the 5th best in the world. She spends most of her time training, and thus has little social life. That is until she gets sick, her immune system is crashing, her blood is weak, and she's going to need to take some time off to recuperate. She begins to fill her time with a new boy friend named Bobby.
Things begin to progress very quickly and she basically starts to crash with him for the time that she is trying to rest. The thing is though is that the building he lives in is making her sick, she isn't getting better but worse, shes throwing up and generally getting more and more depressed. When she starts to have some truly disturbing dreams she looks into the history of the area that he lives in with the help of a man named Dirk whose girl friend lived in the building and disappeared a few months earlier. The lines begin to blur for Marie as she starts to become something else, shes got black coarse hair growing out of a wound on her knee, she cant stop throwing up, and the feeling that Bobby isn't what he seems to be is getting stronger.
Ill leave it at that when it comes to the plot and what happens because I don't want to give anything away. There were things that seemed unfinished though, loose ends and things they never explain. Which at first might seem like lazy writing, or lazy story telling, but honestly I think once you have put a certain amount of effort into explanation most of it after that point should be left alone. If everything is explained away then what am I fearing when the film is done? To truly scare me there has to be some mystery when the film ends because that scares me so much more than a nice neat little package where everything has a reason for happening.
Its very creepy, all the way through, they weren't fearing the dark in the way they shot and lit it, which I love to see, lots of it is dark and very drab. None of what you see really looks like a nice place to live, a lot of soft blues, and sickly greens and yellows (a current popular look) with a certain grimness around every corner. There's some black mud that might as well been a man with a knife that it seemed that threatening to me, and to the characters as well.
The acting was fine, I couldn't really say much about it since for a horror there really isn't much screaming, and only some running. In fact most of the terrifying things in this are ignored for as long as they can which just put the tension on steroids waiting for something to happen. If I had watched it at night I think it would have bothered me more, but just thinking about the ending will remind me how upsetting I really found it.
If you like horror that isn't straight forward or even all that blood soaked then this is a good choice, if you've seen "Let the Right One In" and liked it I think this would be up your alley, it takes so many more risks than most American horror films. One of the better and more atmospheric horrors Ive seen recently, enjoyable to the last minute, I mean as much as one could enjoy it. 8/10 stars.
Director: Pieter Van Hees
Starring: Eline Kuppens, Matthias Schoenaerts, Sien Eggers, Tom De Wispelaere
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