Severence (2006)
Jamal's Rating: 3 stars
Netflix Average Rating: 3.1 stars
This flick started with all the promise of a great camp film: an office retreat out in the woods, a guy eating psychedelic mushrooms, possible romance. But the film is a little too eager to get to the spooky stuff, so there isn't much chance to let the characters really breathe. That said, I'm sure it'll please most horror fans, so long as they aren't turned off by all the gore (one extended scene shows a man's leg caught in a bear trap and being ripped apart to free him). There are some funny moments, like a rocket launcher missing its target and blowing up an airplane, and a character trying to stuff a body part into a storage compartment on a bus. But it's filled with just as many inexplicable bits, such as a pointless chronological loop, a girl walking out of a bus spliced with exterior shots of the scene, and a character being punched in the face and then seen a good ten feet from his opponent. This can all be very funny to horror fans, in a campy way, but it's also a bit disappointing when the film obviously aspires to be more, a dark comedy of sorts. Three stars.
I remember the previews made this movie look particularly schizophrenic, as if it weren't quite sure what feel it was going for.
ReplyDeleteThere are some disturbing sleepwalking scenes early on reminiscent of Kubrick's The Shining. But then it goes for awkward The Office style humor in places. And it has a little "taste of what's to come" in the action at the beginning, like Pulp Fiction maybe, but that part's unnecessary because the movie doesn't waste time getting weird.
ReplyDeleteOh and spoiler warning: the bravest, coolest character -- this lady who screams REALLY loud at the man who appears in the window -- dies. Did she really have to die?
Yah, I hate it when I pick a likable protagonist to root for, and the movie goes and kills them in the first act.
ReplyDeleteWell it was a little obvious like most horror movies the few characters who will undoubtedly survive. But, spoiler... EVERY other character dies. What?!
ReplyDelete