The Innkeepers

The Innkeepers is the typical horror movie people know – horror movies that are set on ghost stories and eerie sounds. The story is set in a once famous hotel named Yankee Pedlar Inn, which is about to close in days. The hotel already has a reputation for spirits.

The story revolved around two characters, Luke and Claire. During the last two days of the hotel, they decided to sleep in and look for the dreaded Madeline O’Malley. During the last two days, they only had two clients: an old man who claims that he wants to revisit the place that is important to his late husband, and Leanne-Rease Jones, a once famous actress.

As any paranormal movie, the spirits only go out when someone is alone. Claire went looking for signs of spirits. Honestly, the scenes were kind of predictable. I would also say that it was not that scary to instill fear to its audience. The internet scare video was kind of a spoiler for me, as it emphasizes how the movie will go.

For me, curiosity made the movie going. Everything happened because Claire was curious, and I think that the only thing that was making the audience continuously watch the movie was because we want to know what is going to happen next.

The movie only started to become interesting when they found out that they were in danger. In real life, satisfying your curiosity when it come to spirits that you feel or hear or even believe is not really something we want to do. In the last scenes, it was funny how they acted like a normal human being who is not in a horror film. They decided to do nothing and leave the hotel. They did not do anything to counter the restless spirit because Leanne-Rease Jones’s vision told them they could not do anything anymore.

The final 30 minutes of the movie was a cliché. Everything was very predictable. I expected Claire to be the one mostly affected or attacked by the spirit but I did not expect he r to die because of it. I felt really bad for Claire then because I knew that she did not intend for everything to end that way. She only wanted to feed her curiosity and interest but she ended up dead. For me this was the lesson of the story. You don’t always have to satisfy your curiosity, and as most people do, look only when you are assured that it is safe to do so.

Overall, I did not really like the movie. It did not experience any jump scares during the duration of the movie. Moreover, it was not the kind of movie you want to talk about after because everything was pretty obvious.

Ginger Snaps 2

Ginger Snaps 2 focuses on Brigitte’s problem of slowly becoming a werewolf. She has been hiding because a male werewolf has been looking for her to mate with her. One night while running away from the werewolf, she lost control of herself and fainted. The next morning, she wakes up in a rehabilitation facility. Authorities thought that she was addicted to some sort of drug, but in reality she was just taking wolfsbane, the drug she had been taking to suppress the process of turning into a werewolf.

The plot of the story was a lot different compared to the first movie. First of all, I think the fact that the werewolf wants to mate with her is sort of insane. Ginger was infected because she was bitten by a werewolf. Biting other human would have been a better way to reproduce rather than mating with Brigitte. Second, there was another prominent character that was introduced in the story. Ghost was this curious girl who was very interested in comic stories. I kind of expected her to be psychotic in her own way because she really liked Brigitte when everybody else did not. It is also possible that she liked Brigitte because she was the only one who was nice to her inside the facility, but all the things she has been doing is not necessarily how kids are supposed to act. First of all, he knew that Tyler was having sex with the patients in exchange of him giving them drugs. A normal kid would not be able to understand it and would immediately tell authorities, or if not at least would be disgusted and scared by it that she will not be friends with Tyler anymore.  Moreover, there were really no scenes where Brigitte told Ghost that the “drug” was helping her to stay human. Hence supposedly, for Ghost the drug would be just a drug that Brigitte is addicted to and she knew that it is not good for her. However, she still insisted on giving her the drug. Also in the scene when she moved her grandmother’s bed and did not care if she was hurt or not, I knew then that she had something to do it even before they went to their house.

Despite the inconsistencies in the plot, I really liked the movie. I think I liked it more than the first movie, mainly because of Ghost’s character. I think she was the one who made the movie an effective horror film. She kind of made the audience anticipate the revelation of her true character rather than wait for what is going to happen to Brigitte, because obviously Brigitte could not stop herself anymore from becoming a werewolf. The ending where she trapped everyone in the basement, and kind of welcomed her grandmother home made me want to watch the third movie. Hopefully, it would be connected to this movie.

May

This movie starts of as a drama about May, a young social outcast that goes great measures to find a perfect friend. May, set apart from her peers as a child due to her lazy eye and social awkwardness. She only has one friend and confidant, a delicate doll encased in glass made by her mother.

May’s deformity is an important aspect of her character. As a character May is off-putting but sympathetic, and her genuine desire to connect meaningfully with people who just don’t understand how she sees the world

May eventually gets friends. However, it soon becomes obvious to May that, though various acquaintances seem to have perfect traits, they never add up to a perfect whole. This leads to her own unique method of creating the perfect friend, by sewing their body parts together.

Although, when May started killing them one by one I did not see it as some kind of justice for her for how society treated her. For me it was her mom who instilled this pity on herself. It is one thing for a child to point out what is wrong with her as it some kind of honest and innocent gesture. But for an adult to comment on it is something else. May’s mom made her think that she is weird ever since the beginning. She kept telling her to keep her patch on all the time so that people will not think she is different. It was not society who made her like that, it was more of her mom who made her like that. It was her mom who kept emphasizing how she can only make friends if she covers her lazy eye. And if not, she always have the doll.

In the movie, the extent of May’s paranoia and self-delusion is not explicitly clear at first, and the tension builds as the viewer waits for all the pieces to come together in a chilling way. For me, the most notable about the film is that although May’s behavior is at times repugnant, you feel deeply sorry for her. The movie is an interesting take on what can become of an adolescent who never has the support system they need, who is deprived of basic human needs of love, touch, and friendship. As a result of the lack of these crucial elements of becoming a functioning human being, May never really had a chance at dealing with reality properly. Though there is no happy ending to this film, the make-believe world that the tortured soul May created finally seems to appease her, and that is really all you can ask for.

Evil Dead

I am very positive that most of us have watched a horror film/s similar to Evil Dead; filled with gore, dealing with evil spirits or demonic possessions, etc. Based on the title alone, we can say that the movie was predictable. For example, just hearing the words “evil” and “dead” make us naturally associate it with ideas of demons, blood, and death. Moreover, at the beginning of the film, when the title was shown, there was a characterization that happened. The surfacing of the title itself elicited a gasping response in the audience. From that, it is as if you already know what to expect from the movie.

This movie focuses on Mia, a drug addict. Her friends tried to help her overcome drug addiction and hence, to fully distract her from the life she had, they decided to stay in cabin that was owned by Mia’s family before. Everything was going smoothly until they discovered a book in their basement. The book was wrapped with barbed wire as if saying no one should ever open it again. But as every horror movie goes, curiosity place a big role in this scene. One of their friends decided to open the book and try to read what was inside.

Beautiful women are always the victims of horror films more than the men. We are more afraid for a character entering a very suspicious scene when the character is a helpless woman/damsel in distress rather than a male who seems manly enough to be able to defend himself. And that exactly is what happened in this movie. Opening the book seemed to have unleashed spirits that have been waiting to escape for the longest time. Mia being the most vulnerable woman in the group gets possessed by the devil.

From there, things just got real. Mia started to infect her friends as if possession is some kind of disease that is contagious. Mia’s possession made them kill each other and thus produced the most gore scenes. I think this place a big part in the movie more than its plot. Images of blood, vomit, etc, are central to our culturally/socially constructed notions of horrific. This horror film plays with its audience, saturating it with scenes of blood and gore. Although, the movie has a pretty repetitive and episodic progression (gore-horror scene 1, gore-horror scene 2, etc), each of the scenes is imaginative, fun, gross, and tense enough to keep your body clenched tight. Moreover, the goriness and the existence of the devil really worked for the film. From start to finish, every scene showed pretty much what you would expect from Evil Dead. You know how things are going to play out yet the shock-gore experience and the agonizing moments occurred in a slow, purposed way, with a sense of sadism rather than jump scares.

In the end, Mia, as the female character who started it all is the one character of stature who does live to tell the tale; The Final Girl is introduced at the beginning and is the only character to be developed in any psychological detail – drugs, mom’s death, feeling of being abandoned by David, etc. Hers is the main story line. She is the hero of this slasher film. However, the devil in this film likes to find ways in which it can appeal to the viewers’ most sensitive spots/areas by suddenly transforming back to the original unpossessed character to deceive those who are not yet possessed and trying to fight the demon. It seems to be all knowing as it targeted each one’s Achilles heel. In the last scene, where Mia was walking towards the light, when she “successfully” defeats the demon killer, was she really able to defeat it? Or did the demon “conceded” for the mean time? Because how can being cut in half by a chainsaw really kill the demon when, all throughout the whole film the demon never died no matter how much it was shot, stabbed, hit, etc. Was Mia, the hero, really able to make everything go back in to normal order?

 

 

 

 

 

Ginger Snaps

Ginger Snaps is a movie that resonates with me because of the sister dynamics of Ginger and Brigette. More than that, there was the layer of how a girl maturing into a woman. The movie parallels the maturity of a woman to Ginger’s transformation into a werewolf. It was intelligent how Ginger’s bodily changes meant something more, because she was already turning into a monster. The movie even gave it a more interesting angle by making it sound comedic, prototypical of an American cult and teen film. The take on adolescence especially in the context of female sexuality was mentioned by Wood in the reading. It was interesting how culture functions in the aspects of the horror genre. Women in Ginger Snaps were empowered by showing how female adolescence and sisterhood meant in this way.

The two characters, Ginger and Brigette has compellingly complementary which makes their sister dynamics enticing. Ginger has a stronger personality with Brigette. Ginger is the one who always saves her from bullies and even covers up for her from their parents. But Ginger, while undergoing the stage of transformation, the situation flips on Brigette being the “saviour.” When they found out the real transformation that was going on with Ginger, Brigette then becomes her saviour because she would do anything just to find a solution to cure Ginger.

Ginger as the werewolf is the monster in this film but it was absurd to me how Brigette stays to see Ginger as a normal human being. Brigette really loves her sister that she will not see her as something else even if physically she is changing into something and mentally becoming temperament and violent. Brigette had a hard time convincing Ginger that there was something wrong with her, but Brigette as smart girl she knew that she could find a way to help her sister.

The concept of werewolves in this Canadian film was also established well. It resonates to the classic American horror where there are monsters in it. At the start of the movie, I like how they establish a grunge, grit, and dark feel with it already. The comedic and humorous aspect of the movie make it ironic with the thriller and suspense parts of the movie. The latter part of the movie when Ginger already transformed into a werewolf turns the comedic and horror characteristic of the story into something tragic. It was tragic that Ginger already killed people and had to drink blood. It was tragic that Brigette was to late to save her sister. And most importantly, it was tragic that Brigette accidentally killed the werewolf Ginger.

The transformation of Ginger also transformed everything else. Ginger as Brigette had know her before became different. Their relationship also changed and Brigette had to endure all of it. Even their family and relationship with other people had changed. In a way, Brigette was also transformed. Her character had developed into someone more independent and stronger. She knew that she is the only one that Ginger could count on so even if she had to pretend to be friends with Sam. Brigette was the most developed character in the movie.

I never though of Ginger Snaps to be able to work out on combing the satire tone with a dark and tragic theme. The exploration of the female sexuality was a perfect hinge to depict a transformation into a werewolf. Ginger and Brigette as the main character empowers women in the horror genre and “male created and male controlled” characters as stated by Wood in the book. For me, it was a fresh take to portray both characters like this.

Grace

Grace was movie on the extent of what a mother could do for her child. Madeline had to up her level since her husband died and after her multiple miscarriages. The movie show how a mother’s love could be horrific. Her child was just an illusion for her and the turnout that led to this event might have cause Madeline some mental illness. She even named her child “Grace” because she saw her as a blessing. The scenes in the movie were ver dreamlike. Visually, it looked fuzzy and still creepy. This might have been done to establish the hallucinations and psychological disorder of Madeline.

Madeline as the mother had a very intimate relationship with Grace. She would do anything to meet the needs of her only daughter. Breastfeeding was a burden for her when she realises that Grace had a special need, something more special the breast milk. It was fine for her even if Grace was already sucking blood out her breasts. She would do anything to keep Grace alive. She bought meat to get blood from it and give it to Grace. She was also desperate that she even got blood from the doctor that Vivian sent.

Madeline was not alone in going through this challenges. She had two women with her, Vivian and Patricia.

Vivian was really concerned about Grace taking care of her baby. Vivian grieving about his son’s death was not easy on how she will deal with Madeline. Of course, she cared about the baby but because Madeline was really possessive about Grace, Madeline did not like Vivian intervening. Vivian was an interesting character that resonates with Madeline. She is absurd because she also had an obsession of being a mother. And because her son died, she was looking for a “substitute” infant and Grace was the perfect baby for her. She was suddenly craving to breastfeed someone and be a mother again. It was really weird how her motherhood would end up like this. It could also be a coping mechanism as she grieves for her son’s death.

On the other hand, Patricia as the midwife miraculously helped Madeline in giving birth of Grace. Madeline was of course very thankful of her. At that point, I knew that they Madeline and Patricia had a past. I was not sure yet if it was romantic or plain platonic but Patricia’s concern for Madeline was overwhelming. She would go out of her way to make sure that Madeline’s needs would be met. However, when Patricia realises that the baby was really dead but Madeline was still clinging on to her as if iGrace was alive, Patricia tried to distant herself. Patricia started ignoring the Madeline’s calls but it was still noticeable how concerned she was for Madeline.

This marks the relationship of Madeline and Patricia. They did had a romantic relationship feeling with one another, which made the ending interesting. The are left with a choice to start a new life. Patricia was who Madeline needed to keep Grace alive. In the end, Patricia accepted Madeline’s hallucinations, because she realised that Grace was not human and had her own special needs. The ending was really horrific on how Madeline endured the burden of providing blood for only daughter.

May

The movie was solely about a girl and only herself. May, as horror movie, it was an interesting angle how intimate was the point of view of the movie. Even the title of the movie was named after her. May’s character would make anyone cringe she is really weird and awkward. Weird and awkward is not really a bad thing at all but May’s character goes overboard with her obsession with Adam. She could have been a result of bad parenting or the some supernatural control of the doll, Suzie. In the beginning of the film, her mother was too protective of her and a control freak on how May should behave as a little girl. It could be that it was not the doing of the doll. It was May all along who had bad motives and intentions and psychologically affected as to who how she grew up.

May is very impressive and establishing the movie as another horrific doll that creeps out a persons while sleeping on her bed. I thought it would be movie playing along the lines of a creepy doll being the monster in the movie. But as the movie goes, May is actually the one who harms and kills people. May had violent tendencies which adds to her weirdness. May working in the veterinary and this fact boosted her violent interest on gory things and her satisfied her morbid tendencies. Initially May had a disability, her lazy eyes. This could be the reason why she grew up not like the other kids. She had other interests and was not able to fit in with other people. She seeks attention but would always come off as someone very awkward and weird. Her weird personality would escalate worse because of her cruelty and thirst for revenge.

At first, Adam found May’s awkwardness cute and took advantage of it to get to know her more. May only wanted a friend ad she had a little crush with Adam so she did everything to seek his attention. But then, Adam found her weirdness threatening and off. He suddenly broke ties with May and realised that He does not really know the girl. Adam might be thinking about what May could do bad for him and that her awkwardness was not cute at all. With their friendship. This same goes with Polly’s concern with May. She had desires for May and found her cute. But because she had Ambrosia, May was hurt and triggered her to be angry with Polly as well.

In the course the movie, I am sympathetic of May. I know that Adam deserved to be punished for doing such thing for May but I was shocked by how she killed each person during Halloween. May is also obsessed an fixated with beautiful things, also probably manifested with with he fascination with dolls. Her violent tendencies and amusement with pretty thing led her to make a new friend and a new doll. The loss of Suzie made he more insane sewing up the body part so of the people she hated. In the end, it was really sympathetic when she realised that the doll she made will not eve notice her. It was not alive and that would actually be a friend for her. May was still alone but happy for a moment knowing that she was able to create such kind of doll.

It Follows

The fear of the unknown becomes more terrifying when paranoia comes in. The movie It Follows revolves in the unknown—unknown about the what the curse was about, unknown about when to be chased after, and unknown about who is the chasing.

The movie It Follows sets a very distinct kind of reality. The setting adds to the mystery of the curse and the “It” that is referred to the title. I noticed how it was a match of the past and the future. The setting looks like it is the past because of the black and white TV and some other elements that are vintage. At the same time, Yara in the movie was holding a kind of gadget something very futuristic. This type of setting gives a feel of of the 80s horror film. The cinematography captures this style with an unfamiliar world.

At the start, Jay had a perfect life. Everything goes in her way. She had a good relationship with her friends and able to get what she wanted. After being passed on with the curse, this changes. She finally experiences the “cruelty” in the world. Like in Triangle, It Follows also shows some kind of resignation and fatalism. Jay accepts the fact that she will be followed by someone and be killed. Her resignation manifested when all she can do is have sex with other men. In this way, the curse will distant her. Still, similar in Triangle, this does not mean she has escaped her fate because sooner or later the curse will go back to her. Her circumstance is as cyclic as the one with Jess.

Hugh was the only person in the movie who could explain how the curse goes. It was his little explanations that made things clearer but it was not enough to fully understand the “It” as the monster. Hugh had his tactic by choosing Jay as the person who he will pass the curse on. Jay was quite a “lucky” girl. She is a girl who can get any men want her. Maybe this was Hugh’s motive why he chose Jay. In some way, Jay could be safe just by passing the curse to any men.

The “It” is the monster of the film. It intrigues me that it could be anyone and it does different things before one would be killed. At the start of the movie, a girl was killed with her legs twisted. This connotes the violence that the “It” could do before she would kill one. It also had some sexual layers with it. This is when Greg got killed by his own mother. I did not quite understand the behaviour of the “It” but this unfamiliarity intensifies the paranoia it bring. There are also inconsistencies with the character of the “It”. I guess this was intentional for the movie to make it more unfamiliar and unknown. This adds to the mystery and inevitability of encountering the “It.

I feel that the movie is a metaphor of people’s lives. Anytime and anywhere people will die. There is the reality of death that “follows” us each day that goes. Death as also like a curse that gives as anxiety. In a way, like Jess and Jay, people must accept this fate. And a way to accept it is by living life well so when the death comes there will be no regrets on what has been done. The ending of it follows shows this kind of acceptance. Jay and Paul have understood their situation. Paul’s love and concern for Jay made him accept her fate. It was fine for him to be under the curse as well.

Deadgirl

Human turned into monsters becomes a total transformations. Humans are treated as someone with its own and dignity while monsters are the opposite. Monsters are like animals that think only for survival and fulfilling only its lower faculties like sexual desies, and even deeply treated as like objects. Deadgirl as Tudor says in the reading is an example of watching horror films and having strange pleasures with it.

Deadgirl is somehow least appreciated by reviews or even by the class because at first impressions would be that it is all about sex, about J.T. satisfying his sexual pleasures. Here in this movie the watching such genre is when pleasure does become peculiar, as Tudor would phrase it.

It was hard to understand how J.T. would have repeated sex with Deadgirl. Deadgirl’s character was plainly depicted as just an object—woman being totally dehumanised and objectified. She was just an object of interest because she was seen as a monster and not as a human being anymore. J.T and Rickie when they found out that she was extraordinary, there was a certain distance that they had with her. Deadgirl is definitely not human but something else. J.T. took advantage of this and treated her as a sex slave. J.T.’s pleasure were satisfied and kept craving for more. On the other hand, Rickie was totally against it that he could not take the abuse that J.T. was doing with her. Rickie here saw Deadgirl as still a human being and a woman; But this changes at the end of the movie.

In the first part of the movie, J.T.’s and Rickie’s character being friends had a lot in common. When they found out about Deadgirl, the had different takes on how they would treat Deadgirl. Their freindship were ruined because they J.T. went overboard and Rickie could not stand on what he was doing. Throughout he film it was established how Rickie liked Joann so much. It somehow already gave me an interpretation that something’s going to happen to Joann and it wll because of Rickie. In the end, Joann turning into the new Deadgirl and Rickie being her sex slave showed how he was repressed. All along he was just like J.T.. They were similar in that sense.

Certainly, the movie was really insulting for women. It was never explained what kind of creature is Deadgirl but there was just something unusual about her. She could be some kind of zombie because she is contagious, just as what happened to Joan. However, even though Deadgirl was a monster, it was obviously offensive, especially for feminists on the way she was treated. Deadgirl was portrayed to have no capacity to act. It was just her body that mattered to give pleasure and to satisfy the desires of J.T.

Personally, Deadgirl is a movie that I did not like. Probably because of how substandard are the motives and character development. But I appreciated how it explored a new form of monster. Something unknown because in fact, in this movie, I was expecting it to be developing the history of Deadgirl and what would happen to her after J.T. and Rickie discovers her. However, the movie progressed on th treatment with Deadgirl—her obejctified as a monster and being just a sex slave. Even at the last part of the movie, Deadgirl just stormed out of the abandoned mental hospital leaving no closure for her character. The ending was already expected. Joann being the new Deadgirl did depicted all of the Rickie’s repressions.

Why is there pleasure or kind of entertainment in watching films like this? Deadgirl in particular is not a very likeable movie. But as Tudor would end his part in the reading. May be it better to contextualise the specific audience, setting, and time to understand the peculiar pleasure and the very reason and answer on why watch horror.

The Innkeepers

There were a lot of stereotypical elements that I noticed in the movie The Innkeepers. Not totally, but it reminded me of some of the Philippine horror movies that I watched. The Innkeepers sets an inn being famous because of the history of a woman Madeline O’Malley. Similar to common horror movies, it gives a background of the motive and why a soul has not been silenced yet. Personally, The Innkeepers being a typical movie like this is not a bad thing at all. I even liked how it reflects with the series of “Philippine Ghost Stories” that I read back in grade school.

Other parts of the movie is when the protagonist, Claire would always be curious of the mystery happening. her curiosity would make her find out things that she would not even want to see. Her partner in the Inn Luke would throw pranks at her because she knows that she is also afraid. At the start, Luke would even support Claire’s observations whenever she hears strange sounds. Later on, the movie reveals Luke’s romantic feelings for Claire that is why he would do anything to please her. Luke and Claire would go together to ghost haunt. It was very typical how they would be engage in debunking the true history of the inn. Claire’s curiosity would bring Luke to be frightened more. All along he was the one scared and would tell Claire to stop “disturbing” the soul of  Madeline O’Malley. In the end, Luke would actually be the one more coward than Claire that she wouldn’t be able to save her. This is apt with one of my favourite lines that Carroll says in the reading “The fascination of the horrific being comes in tandem with disturbance.”

Another stereotypical element was having Lee as the character who is an expert with supernatural. Lee’s character would be to inform what was really happening. She was important in adding tension in the inn, especially when she tried challenging and communicating with spirit of Madeline O’Malley through her crystal necklace. She was a vital part in the movie to warn Claire on what was really going on. At first I though Lee was an antagonist and would be the cause why Madeline O’Malley’s spirit was dreading but she was actually the one who is going to help Claire in solving the mystery.

Additionally, the character of the old man who committed suicide added to how the inn would have a history of tragic deaths. The people dying in the inn would be trapped there and kept on appearing as if they were asking for help. The old man who committed suicide somehow foreshadows Claire’s soul staying in the in after her death. The spirits the die in inn would never be at peace.

The Innkeepers shows how the history of the in is just keeps on repeating. In the ending, it somehow implies that Claire becomes the a spirit who be the next Madeline O’Malley, disturbed and not at peace. This reminded me again of the Philippine horror movies when the needed to make souls at peace so it could return to where it should be and not meddle with the alive human. The death of Madeline O’Malley, old man, and Claire make the movie more eerie. There is a sense that every death in that inn would lead to a hostile spirit being intervened. The movie ends with the inn becoming even more haunted and Claire becoming the new Madeline O’Malley.

On another note, The Innkeepers goes back to the core of the horror genre on why people would still watch horror. Is the feeling of horror even pleasurable? I think as Carroll would say it the reading, it the curiosity and fascination that keeps people watching horror. People should satisfy their unknown and make something known. There is an uneasy feeling when one knows that there is something going on and one is not doing something about—just like Claire on Madeline O’Malley. Claire lived in the inn for a long time as a worker now things would change now that she is a spirit there.