directed by karthik subbaraj
pen studios/stone bench films
A frankly bizarre eco-horror experiment, this Indian film contains no dialogue; characters communicate with grunts, howls and ululations, with broad gestures and what is apparently some form of sign language that I do not recognize (and which does not seem as though it could be very effective). On occasion, this choice of the filmmaker’s does interfere with one’s enjoyment of his picture, but it’s not as much of a problem as one may surmise. It remains odd and somewhat off-putting, however. WHY there’s no dialogue is implied by some setup shots: the five main characters are graduates of a special school for people with unspecified disabilities, though in this case they’re deaf-mutes. Now, wouldn’t you just know it, some tomfoolery goes horribly wrong and they must face the consequences. Which in this case are supernatural. And then there’s an extremely ironic twist. To be completely honest, this effort’s not exactly coherent, but its hallucinatory elements and creative craftsmanship combine to produce quite an effect. Slight tension arises here and there, not much in the way of fright.
why did i watch this movie?
This one only got a shot because it was a foreign production and described itself as “silent” – NOT meaning that it had no sound. (It has plenty of that.) Having just watched a subtitled film, it seemed reasonable.
should you watch this movie?
It’s definitely different.
highlight and low point
These aspects are likely more aligned in this instance than is usual; it may be difficult to judge without involving one’s opinion of the unique presentation. This goes beyond the lack of dialogue; the picture is highly stylized in many ways. Even for a movie based largely on unearthly events, though, a few things herein don’t really add up.
rating from outer space: B+
blood was raining like water
Now that 
When was the last time you saw a really dumb Hollywood spectacle? I mean D-U-M-B like Armageddon (renegades fly into space to save the Earth by landing on an asteroid and blowing it up), the 1991 Point Break (Keanu plays FBI agent Johnny Utah infiltrating a gang of bank-robbing Zen surfers), Over the Top (long-haul trucker Sly wins his son’s custody by arm wrestling) … and this one, as should be obvious from this introduction. But how does it rank in the Jurassic hierarchy, you want to know. Well, hmm, let’s see:
The first thing I noticed about this movie, the sophomore effort from Bob Clark following Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things, is how vastly improved in every aspect of filmmaking it is in comparison to that initial offering. Script, lighting, camerawork, acting, pacing, makeup effects – everything is better. It’s as though Clark and head writer Alan Ormsby made a serious study of their inaugural production in order to make a more professional showing with their next film. Whatever the explanation – the budget was almost 400% larger, nearly $240,000! – it worked, because altogether this little horror picture is nearly excellent. The emotional impact of the small-town boy returning from a foreign war and the many repercussions of his impaired condition – to describe it as benignly as possible – are powerfully depicted, and the creeping sense that something is very wrong is deftly developed. Inspired by the W. W. Jacobs story “The Monkey’s Paw,” this saga sure seems to have been bastardized within S. King’s 1983 novel Pet Sematary in the tale of Timmy Baterman. (PERHAPS coincidentally, late in this flick, the action veers into a graveyard identified on its iron gates by a sign bearing the misspelling “Cemetary.”)
For almost two-thirds of this (very) independent picture’s running time, I couldn’t stand the damn thing, mainly because the main character is completely insufferable, dampening whatever alleged “humor” I was supposed to be getting from the subpar scriptwriting. Besides which, nothing much happens during this hour, and I was getting pretty tired of looking at the hideous, dated togs sported by some of the clowns in the cast. At long last, however, the dead finally rise from their graves – this cannot possibly count as a “spoiler” – and mostly redeem things … but not for the reasons you may suppose. No, what really turned my opinion of this movie is the sound design, because as the corpses claw their way out of the earth (with suspicious ease) and start to stalk their way around the garishly designed and oddly luminescent cemetery and grounds – the film looks much the way colorized “classics” do, the effect at times almost fauvist – the soundtrack begins BLARING all sorts of unexpected, unrelenting sonic surprises. Was that a cow? I wondered. Is that a foghorn? Is this an Edgard Varèse composition? Man alive (hahaha), is it terrific. The silent final scene is great as well.
So, when you and your pals have tricked your girlfriends into accompanying you to a spooky abandoned house on All Hallow’s Eve – and boy are they MAD, having expected a “jet set party” – naturally, what you next propose is to bring a dead person back to life. Oh, sure, they’re doubtful, until you reasonably explain that the first step is to acquire a dead body from the morgue, at which point you all pile into the car. Does a downpour stop you from performing the ritual, i.e. reading from “the black book”? Of course it doesn’t. But once you’ve successfully revived Devlon – Devlon! – HE sure stops you, i.e. kills you. Up until this point in this generic Mexican flick, it’s reasonably entertaining, but once its focus switches to a group of children stranded in the graveyard, it becomes reminiscent of any random Scooby-Doo episode – then turns into the most blatant ripoff of the “Thriller” video imaginable, albeit with a much smaller budget. So blatant one of the kids sports a jacket with M. Jackson’s famous visage painted on the back. (Also spotted: “Pepsi Free.”)
Some – okay, most – reviewers are going to tell you this movie is terrible, but I must point out that Macabra: La mano del diablo and its similars just may be the raison d’être of this website (not to mention a significant contributing factor to its proprietor’s joie de vivre). Following a prefatory flashback scene, the story proper begins in an old mine complete with self-propelled skulls and tremulous native workers. Then it’s off to Vegas, baby! Before consulting a priest, of course, which naturally involves the police. Yes, the devil’s (left) hand has many functions, which does not prepare us for when it has been lopped off the arm of the cop whose arm it has commandeered, grabs his gun and shoots a nurse in an extremely tight and low-cut uniform. “The Hand will kill again!” intones our female lead. Can THE HAND be stopped? Will THE HAND be destroyed? Could I not stop giggling while enjoying this presentation? A must-see.
While it technically may be true that I’ve never personally been assaulted after hours in a mausoleum by psychokinetically controlled corpses , I think I safely can say that it wouldn’t seem as threatening in person as it does to several of the characters in this ’80s trumpery. The reason I state this with such confidence is that the dead (which appear to be wax dummies) are not reactivated or anything, they’re just being propelled slowly across the floor. That they apparently somehow manage to kill two people – by, uh, falling on them? – is a special bonus. The preposterous tale of a proponent of “psychic vampirism” experimenting in the manipulation of “bio-energy – the electromagnetic force in all living things,” this picture would be a complete failure if it weren’t so utterly absurd. As it is, it’s passable as kitsch … barely. The presence of Adam West helps in that regard, as does the fact that the dramatis personae largely are supposed to be portraying high-school students, which is patently ridiculous.
When the novel upon which this film is based was first published, I was in one of my periodic phases where I was not interested in reading any more goddamn Stephen King novels, besides which I thought it sounded pretty stupid, given that it seemed a little late to be ruminating on mobile phones. (And paradoxically proved to have been early enough to make a more prescient statement than it did!) Then a similarly King-obsessed friend managed to goad me into catching up on his more recent works – Under the Dome and Duma Key, in case you’re wondering – and I was screwed. Cell the novel is not of the more admirable S. King, and neither is this adaptation worthwhile, despite – or because of – the author’s work on the screenplay. John Cusack takes the lead role, Sam Jackson shows up for a paycheck, and the ending is completely different from the book’s, and appalling. It’s also one of the movie’s only effective scenes, and made me wonder yet again why the best-selling author seemingly doesn’t have an editor. Or at least one who can talk him out of his poorer ideas.
For the majority of its 90 minutes or so, this is more of a sex farce than a horror movie. Indeed, at times it reminded me of such bygone classics as Clue, as well as such bygone duds as the Sly Stallone vehicle Oscar. Numerous suspicious or threatening characters abound and … actually, all of the characters are suspicious, as it becomes increasingly more unclear who is trying to kill whom, or why. At long length, it does eventually swing into scary movie mode, but its overweening hucksterism is never superseded. It’s possible this film slipped through the cracks because it has a few moments that are too gory for what is essentially a noirish comedy of manners. As is often the case with such madcap romps, the story doesn’t wind up making a whole lot of sense, either.
SPACE RATS From Outer Space 