directed by matthew holness
The FYZZ Facility/british film institute
About as bleak and humorless a film as you’d prefer to imagine, this trudge through the disordered mind of a miserable and tormented middle-aged Britisher will definitely affect you. I’m not much of an abstract thinker and I don’t do too well with symbolism unless it’s really obvious, but even if you’re similarly ill-inclined, that shouldn’t get in the way of your following what this picture is on about. Now, I occasionally bemoan productions in these pages for not being “scary,” which of course does a disservice to a great many movies made in differing horror styles, being far too reductive a criterion. This is a good old-fashioned horror, in that what’s so bothersome about it all comes from within – and I don’t mean viscera. It’s all inside this guy’s head, as it will be in yours. The flicks from the UK I’ve seen all seemingly have that heavily psychological bent, and it works just about every time.
why did i watch this movie?
It, uh, sounded good: “a disgraced children’s puppeteer is forced to confront the secrets,” etc. I like the tendencies in British films of this ilk, where it’s always gloomy.
should you watch this movie?
If you can relate to the journey to the end of the night, surely.
highlight and low point
As this film has minimal personnel, the acting had better be good, and it is. Sean Harris is frankly magnificent as Philip, his mental anguish playing itself out not only on his wretched visage but in his increasingly constrained carriage and the abnormal movements of his limbs. The skillful deployment of the film’s major prop, which is displayed on the poster, is also a major asset. At times I found some of the circular action a bit nettlesome, if cavil I must. Oh, and the sound design is excellent.
rating from outer space: a−
This picture straight from the Brazilian scrapheap is almost completely incoherent. With less than 15 minutes left, the chief of police exclaims – and not for the first time – “but none of this makes any sense!” He is correct. “Satanic Attraction” rivals 
Basically the equivalent of the wave of American teen-idol horror flicks from the ’90s – except that it would have garnered a PG-13 rating – this Indonesian production features a 17-year-old female lead playing opposite an MTV VJ/pop singer. It’s a fairly typical ghost story, this time based on Malay folklore, involving a female entity whose spirit lives in a tree (in the cemetery next to the boarding house, natch) and is summoned into this world by the intonation of durma, a form of traditional Javanese song poem. In this particular case, the Kuntilanak enters our realm via antique mirrors. An occasional barely seen twitch might startle you, and the first couple times the ghastly spirit enters (or exits, I guess) from the mirror are pretty effective, but in the end, this picture is middling at best. It spawned two sequels, because of course it did, and a 2018 reboot – all from the same director, which may be a new world record.
You know, I enjoy listing the multiple titles for some of these pix, mainly because it usually follows that the more different names a film acquires throughout its life of distribution, the more debatable its quality. There are exceptions, of course; every rule has them. This picture could be one of those exceptions. Its sobriquet may have been appended because somebody wisely decided that the original name didn’t make any sense whatsoever. Now, ’tis true that one of the characters in this patently Deliverance-derived flick makes an offhand remark – a barely audible offhand remark, mind you – that the subjects may be the victims of a demonic 
Isn’t it always rewarding to come across a production in which one literally can see the wires attached to objects in special FX shots? And shouldn’t more remakes or reboots or whatever you want to call them be handled like last year’s 
and the nefarious nature of Darminah, the diabolical agent of a housekeeper, is delightfully broadly drawn. 
Oh, and the soundtrack is terrific, blending elements of musique concrète with the principles of free jazz at times; along with the sounds of haunting and weather events and so forth, it’s a treat. Continuity is sometimes an issue: for instance, when the undead boyfriend Herman first reappears, he has fangs,
but in his later return he does not, although at that point he begins to act vampiric. As alluded, the FX can be facile.
No, Marsha, I did NOT expect that I would be watching a morality play when I dialed up this Scottish/Irish co-production set mainly in a single location, that being a police station or whatever the hell they call it in their peculiar dialect over on the Auld Sod, distinctions further muddled by their brogue so that occasional lines of dialogue flew right past these bewildered and dB-damaged American ears. A morality play this is, however, about the souls of the guilty being claimed by You Know, in this case with the able yet hitherto unsuspecting assistance of a human female, played by The Woman
A harrowing exercise in psychological terror, coupled with an in-depth examination of the fight-or-flight response, this British spelunking picture convinced me that I lack a certain sense of adventure, that I am not equipped with derring-do. (I frequently used to be reckless or foolhardy, but those are not equivalent.) Oftentimes claustrophobia-inducing, it at other times reminded me of 2014’s The Pyramid, which is unfortunate, but as it predated that flop by almost a decade, the blame lies with my tardiness. Similarly, I couldn’t help but relate this picture – featuring a group of friends with some relationship issues being picked off one by one – to others with like themes that I’ve watched of late. To be completely straightforward, this flick lacks somewhat for credibility, but it’s executed so well it’s not an issue. Dubious though I was when the cavers first encountered the resident humanoid danger, the troglodytes’ existence and demeanor felt circumstantially logical. (Indeed, I’d be hard-pressed to imagine how ravenous cave-dwelling mutants might not provoke some disbelief.) Seeing it with its original ending also helped, I think, ambiguous though it remained.
Actually directed by 
For those unfamiliar with the Oliver Reed 
SPACE RATS From Outer Space 